Thinking About Palestine

I just got a forward from a friend saying HB1388 has passed. The text said the President signed an executive order concerning Palestinian refugees. This was another fishy smelling forward. If the House passed a bill, there would be no need for a Presidential executive order. I discovered that the hyperlink in this email is not to the official site of the Federal Register. Anytime you see a .com address, you can bet it is not a government site; they almost all end in .gov. In this case, the web site linked in the email apparently copies some of what goes into the real Federal Register which is found at www.federalregister.gov.

Turns out H.R. 1388 (notice the correct designation is H.R., not HB) is a bill to fund citizen service opportunities like Americorps, as far as I can tell. Nothing on the House website leads to any Palestinian refugees, unless they want to volunteer to clean up America or something. Google HB 1388 and you get dozens of hits about an email spoof about the aid for Palestinians. Funny thing is, I checked the real Federal Register and there is an executive order from February that does give $20million for refugees from Palestine.

Let's look briefly at the thorny issue of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Those who know me know that, generally speaking, if Obama's for it, I'm agin' it. In this case, I find myself torn because of the massive misinformation that has been floated our way by Christian Zionists (mainly) who wink at some plainly awful actions based on policies that would be detestable if they were from anywhere but Israel. Did you know, for example, that when Israel claimed its land in 1948 that they tossed out Arab Christians as well as Muslims? They stole their property and refused to let them take anything but the clothes they were wearing. Are you aware that even today, the official government policies in Israel treat Palestinians, Muslim or Christian, pretty much the same way the US treated blacks in the post-Civil War era -- that is until civil rights reform in the 1960's?

Jesus called Pharisees who ignored God's commands sons of the Devil. They claimed Abraham as their father, yet Jesus pointed to their hypocrisy and named their true generation. I remain unconvinced that the Israel of today is in line for God's blessing in the last days. If all of the promises of God are fulfilled in Christ, and if His kingdom is "not of this world, why are some Christians looking for a physical kingdom ruled from Jerusalem? Are supporters of Israel's right to Jerusalem on supposedly Biblical grounds making the same mistake as first century Jews? They looked for a physical king to set up a material kingdom in Jerusalem.

I know there is a religious component to the battle in the middle east. But I don't think Christians should be backing Israel without considering whether their actions are righteous. They certainly don't follow the principles in the Torah regarding the treatment of neighbors. How can anyone read the history of Israel in the Old Testament and think that God wants Christians to support Israel unconditionally? God's judgment always fell on His people eventually when they disregarded His commands. Should we "pray for the peace of Jerusalem?" Of course. But let's not walk with the priest and the Levite who passed by the injured man on the roadside. Jesus calls us to imitate the Samaritan.