theologies and cultures Vol. XI, No. 1, June 2014 A Moment of Truth Struggles of the Occupied People for the Right to Life Editor M. P. Joseph Editor [Chinese] Yatang CHUANG Associate Editors Chhong-fat CHEN Po Ho HUANG Jui Hsiang LIANG Augustine MUSOPOLE Chong-yiau Wong Fuya WU Consulting Editors Mark BURROWS, USA/Germany Wentuan CHEN, Taiwan Enrique DUSSEL, Mexico Virginia FABELLA, Philippines Dwight N. HOPKINS, USA Chi Li HUNG, Taiwan Abraham, K.C, India Yong-Bock KIM, Korea Jessi MUGAMBI, Kenya Michael NORTHCOTT, Britain Teresa OKURE, Nigeria Choan-Seng SONG, Taiwan/USA Elsa TAMEZ, Costa Rica Lieve TROCH, Netherlands Yen Ren TSAI, Taiwan WONG Wai Ching Angela, Hong Kong theologies and cultures Vol. XI, No. 1, June 2014 A Moment of Truth Struggles of the Occupied People for the Right to Life THEOLOGIES AND CULTURES is an academic journal dedicated to inter-disciplinary research and scholarly exploration in the field of theology and its interplay with the social, economic, political and cultural dimensions of people. The journal is committed to promoting engaged dialogue of different faith traditions and theological formulations in view of creating communities of justice and mutual understanding. Views expressed in this journal are those of the authors, and do not necessarily reflect, those held by the editorial board of THEOLOGIES AND CULTURES or of FCCRC or its sponsors. Copy right @ Chang Jung Christian University & Tainan Theological College and Seminary All rights reserved. Reproduction of articles is allowed with an acknowledgement of the source. ISSN no. 1813-7024 Editorial correspondence, submission of articles, book reviews, and books for review should be send to THEOLOGIES AND CULTURES, FCCRC, Chang Jung Christian University, Kway Jen, Tainan, Taiwan, e-mail: [email protected] Business correspondence should be addressed to THEOLOGIES AND CULTURES, FCCRC, Chang Jung Christian University, Kway Jen, Tainan, Taiwan; e-mail: [email protected] This periodical is indexed in the ATLA Religion Database® , a product of the American Theological Library Association, 300 S. Wacker Dr., Suite 2100, Chicago, IL 60606, USA. email: [email protected], www:http://www.atla.com. Contents Preface 5 Guest Editorial The Myth of the Promised Land Ranjan Solomon 7 The Struggle for Truth Kairos Palestine: A Faith-Based Instrument of Political Transformation and Justice Rifat Odeh Kassis 14 Kairos: Exploring the Idea of Justice in Palestine From a Woman’s Perspective Nora Carmi 32 Responses towards the Struggle for Truth The Moment of Grace and Opportunity: The Global Kairos Movement For Justice in the Holy Land Mark Braverman 42 Liberative Justice – A Brazilian Response to Kairos Palestine Felipe Gustavo Koch Buttelli 84 Kairos Palestine: Some Reflections from Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme for Palestine and Israel Manuel Quintero Perez 97 The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement against Israel: A Call for Justice Bisan Mitri 111 Towards viable alternatives International Law and Standard: Setting the Scene for Durable Solutions In Palestine Amjad Alqasis 125 Appendix. A moment of truth: A word of faith, hope and love from the heart of Palestinian suffering 138 Preface The struggle of the people in the occupied land of West Bank and Gaza for their right to life is the focus of this issue of THEOLOGIES AND CULTURES. The war to legitimize occupation threatens the very existence of the construction of a peaceful world. As Michael Ben-Yair, who served as the Attorney General of Israel from 1993 to 96 has observed “We (Israelis) enthusiastically chose to become a colonial society, ignoring international treaties, expropriating lands, transferring settlers from Israel to the occupied territories, engaging in theft and finding justification for all these activities. That oppressive regime exists to this day.” The ongoing war in the region is to legitimize the colonialism and its never ending greed for expansion. Shulamit Aloni, the former Israeli minister of education under Yitzhak Rabin acknowledges that the practice of the state of Israel reminds atrocious form of Apartheid practiced by the racist South Africa. She says, “Through its army, the government of Israel practices a brutal form of Apartheid in the territory it occupies. Its army has turned every Palestinian village into a fenced in or blocked in, detention camp.” This injustice, rationalized by an erroneous and deceptive reading of the Biblical history continues for decades. But what is new is the determination of the Palestinian people to resist and to speak against the grave injustice and humiliation that they were made to suffer for long. Essays in this volume attempts to articulate the crisis of the occupied people from their perspective and the responses from Christian and Jewish groups from around the world. As Sabeel has reiterated, this attempt is informed by the desire of the people of the region--Palestinians and Israelis—to establish lasting peace, and security. “With peace and security in place, bonds of acceptance and friendship can grow. It is no service to either community to promote a peace which flouts international law, ignores justice, and ultimately cannot endure since this will lead to continued bitterness and violence.” Editorial team of THEOLOGIES AND CULTURES wishes to express its gratitude to Mr. Ranjan Solomon, consultant for the Palestine-Israel Ecumenical Forum/WCC for his contribution to bring out this volume. If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality. Archbishop Desmond Tutu theologies and cultures, Vol. XI, No 1 June 2014, pp. 7-13 Editorial The Myth of the Promised Land At the time of writing this preface, over 640 Palestinians have been arrested in less than ten days. These include released prisoners from the exchange deal of 2011, pre-Oslo prisoners - bringing up the number of pre-Oslo prisoners in Israeli jails to 41, and 11 Members of Parliament, bringing up the number of imprisoned parliamentarians to 22. Around 170 of the Palestinians arrested over these 10 days are now held under administrative detention, the worst form of arbitrary detention, bringing up the number of administrative detainees to over 350. This wide arrest campaign has brought the number of Palestinian prisoners to over 5800. This is not all. Gaza is being pounded by Israeli rockets and airstrikes. It seems as if Israel gets easily restless when they are unable to attack Gaza or strangulate its economy when the military attack is done with. It does not end there either. Israeli police have deployed in large numbers around Jerusalem to restrict Palestinian worshipers from entering the Aqsa compound on the first Friday of Ramadan when tens of thousands of Palestinians come to pray. Israel has unilaterally blocked off Palestinians who hold permits from crossing some 300 check points around Hebron. In other places, there are clashes between Israeli soldiers and Palestinians. Israeli soldiers are shooting rubber-coated bullets, tear-gas canisters and stun grenades at youths, while the 8 theologies and cultures youths threw rocks and empty bottles and shut nearby streets with garbage containers. In short, Palestine is under assault. Palestinians face the ignominy of severe collective punishment. And all because three illegal settlers were abducted and found dead. There is not an inch of evidence that it was Palestinians who were responsible. The UN has demanded that Israel provide evidence for their claim. Israel has provided none. It probably knows there is no evidence on offer and that the real facts behind the deaths lie in completely different realities- a huge distance away from what is being alleged. In fact, there are several theories about who might have done the killings and many of these points to extraneous factors- not Palestinian militancy. For some weeks, Israel has been uneasy about the unity government involving the PLO and Hamas. Israel has stubbornly refused to accept this government as legitimate. It rejects any form of government which involves Hamas thus denying Palestinian democratic processes to define how Palestine is governed. The situation I am now writing about it is not an uncommon one. It is an almost ipso facto Israeli prerogative to keep the Palestinians in some form of unending political volatility. Israel’s occupation of Palestinian lands began in 1967 and that adds up to 47 years of occupation. The history of occupation had its roots in the formation of Israel. It began in the late 1800s when Europe was growing increasingly anti-Semitic. Jewish thinkers planned an escape from the region seeing this as the only way to escape persecution. The ideology of Zionism has its roots in this persecution. Only after the British mandate (brokered by the League of Nations), when Britain took control over Palestine, did the notion of a Jewish state gain currency. Until then, Palestine had no more than 4% Jews in its population. It was predominantly Muslim with a 10% Christian population. Between 1882 and 1928, a huge wave of Jewish migration into Palestine took place Editorial 9 and more than 250,000 more Jews followed from 1929-1939 - (the time of the Nazi holocaust. By the end of the Second World war, over a half million Jews escaped into Palestine and that created an uprising of the indigenous Arab population. The conflict that ensued and the British abandonment of the area brought about UN intervention. The partition plan that followed assigned 56% of the territories to the Jews (then a mere 30% of the population) and just 44 % to the Arabs. Still unsatisfied with this generous, though unjust partition plan, the Zionist elements gathered the Jewish population into a military confrontation and, with their superior military strength, won that war.