Christians Who Demonize Israel

In this mailing: Denis MacEoin: Christians Who Demonize Israel: Kairos Burak Bekdil: Turkey: Death to Free Speech Shoshana Bryen: The Value of Tolerance Christians Who Demonize Israel: Kairos by Denis MacEoin  •  January 27, 2016 at 5:00 am "Christian children are massacred, and everything is done in plain sight. Islamists proclaim on a daily basis that they will not stop until Christianity is wiped off the face of the earth. So are the world Christian bodies denouncing the Islamic forces for the ethnic cleansing, genocide and historic demographic-religious revolution their brethren are suffering? No. Christians these days are busy targeting the Israeli Jews." — Giulio Meotti, Italian journalist. The Kairos document seems to be so egregiously discriminatory that in 2010, the Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR) declared it "supersessionist" and "anti-Semitic." We must ask why a presentation of the work of Kairos in an Anglican church made no reference whatever to the many associations with extremism and denial of a more rational Christian approach to the problems faced by Palestinian Christians. Rifat Odeh Kassis, co-author and general coordinator of the Kairos Palestine initiative, is pictured above giving an interview to Al-Manar TV, the official TV channel of Lebanon's Hezbollah terrorist organization. (Photo source: Kairos Palestine) Last September, during the World Week for Peace in Palestine Israel -- an initiative of the Palestine Israel Ecumenical Forum (PIEF) of the World Council of Churches, St. Thomas' Church in Newcastle upon Tyne, UK, hosted an event titled "Wall Will Fall". For anyone unfamiliar with the history, legal issues, and distortions of the Israeli-Arab and Jewish-Muslim conflicts, the deeply one-sided presentations and literature of the event may seem reasonable in the lack of such a context, and this report will, therefore, attempt to rebalance the narrative.   Christians Who Demonize Israel - Part II by Denis MacEoin  •  February 9, 2016 at 5:00 am It is commonly repeated by Palestinians that there were never any Jews in the Holy Land before the 19th century and that the first and second Jewish Temples never stood in Jerusalem. Not only do these claims fly in the face of over a century of archaeological work and the records of Greek, Roman and other historians in antiquity, they flatly contradict and annul the texts of both the Old and New Testaments. By their own rejection of Jewish rights in Israel, Christians unwittingly repudiate their own rights and history. Christians in St Thomas Church did not once criticize or deplore the Palestinian glorification of violence, this delight at the murders of children, this dancing in the streets when innocent throats are cut. Is it the Christian thing to demand that hospitals and doctors across the globe should refuse to use Israeli medicines or surgical devices or advanced medical equipment? Would Christians who work with bodies like Christian Aid call on countries damaged by natural and man-made calamities to ban Israeli aid teams? Abandoning Israel will not soothe the hearts of the Palestinian people or make the Christians less vulnerable -- as we are now seeing from the throat-slittings and mass displacements throughout the Middle East, done not by Jews but by Muslim fanatics. St Thomas The Martyr Church in Newcastle upon Tyne, UK (left) recently hosted an event in which a Kairos leader advocated a boycott of Israel. (Image source: Wikimedia Commons) Christians make up only some 1.5% of the Palestinian population. They live in an overwhelmingly Muslim atmosphere and are, given the threats they face from Muslim extremists, naturally loath to express a Christian narrative that differs from the dominant Palestinian narrative, which openly rejects many fundamental Christian beliefs. It is commonplace for Palestinians to express denials of history. Thus, it is repeated that there were never any Jews in the Holy Land before the 19th century and that the first and second Jewish Temples never stood in Jerusalem. Not only do these claims fly in the face of over a century of archaeological work and the records of Greek, Roman and other historians in antiquity, they flatly contradict and annul the texts of both the Old and New Testaments. As Christians, we cannot attack nor condemn God's people the Jews, we can distance ourselves from any wrongdoings, or malpractices, they do, but NEVER condemn them. The Jews are God's chosen people, as we Christians also are  only through Christ Jesus (a Jew). So we are connected - the Jews and Christians - for God has brought them back to Israel in 1948, which was not by chance or coincidence. . And God have protected them through the wars, conflicts, since the Nation ISRAEL began, and still the LORD GOD is protecting as can be seen through the last conflict, where 2,000s rockets and missiles rain down upon Israel, but only inflicted minor damage and causalities  So if we Christians keep on attacking and condemning God's people the Jews, we will bring a curse on ourselves, as God blesses those who bless Abraham descendants through Isaac and Jacob - the Israelites or Jews. .