Thursday, May 03, 2012
MAY 2 2012 - By Robert Wright - In the wake of the controversy over last week's 60 Minutes episode on Palestinian Christians, the Israeli website 972 today runs an illuminating post by a Palestinian Christian, Philip Farah. On the question of whether Christians are being driven out of the occupied territory by Islamic radicals or by Israeli policies, Farah writes:
Palestinian Christians are, indeed, worried about the militancy of extremists who cloak themselves in distorted Islamic rhetoric. Yet, the majority of Palestinian Muslims and Christians have chosen peaceful resistance. To say that Hamas is the cause of the declining Christian population in the occupied Palestinian territories is standing the truth on its head.
Our people are fleeing their homeland because the Israelis are confiscating the land of Palestinians -- Muslims and Christians alike -- to build Jewish-only settlements and the Apartheid Wall which is ghettoizing many Palestinian communities. Palestinian Christians are leaving because of Israeli checkpoints and barriers that severely restrict the freedom of movement of Palestinians, destroying their economy and preventing their access to their holy places in Jerusalem. They are leaving because Israel diverts Palestinian water resources in a way that gives illegal Jewish settlements the right to enjoy swimming pools while the fields of Palestinian farmers next door go fallow for lack of water.
This testimony meshes with the one piece of evidence on this issue that I got first-hand. During a trip to Israel and the West Bank last summer, the group I was with visited a Palestinian brewery in the village of Taybeh. After touring the brewery, before getting back on the bus, a few of us were chatting with a Palestinian woman who was one of the brewery's proprietors. Small talk about how her business was doing led her into a pretty intense discussion of the occupation. She didn't deliver a political rant--she didn't talk about Palestinians lacking the right to vote or due process of law. She just talked about how her brewery couldn't count on the things an American-based company would take for granted--consistent access to water, electrical power, etc.--because these were under the control of Israelis who didn't seem very attentive to the needs of Palestinians.
But however mundane her critique, it was no less animated for that. And after watching this articulate, forceful testimony from a Palestinian woman with a cross around her neck, I said to a traveling companion something to the effect that, if you could get this woman on American TV, that could change some American opinions about the Palestinian predicament. I think that's one reason the Israeli government was so concerned about the 60 Minutes broadcast: It provided first-hand testimony about the grim reality of the Israeli occupation from people large numbers of Americans might actually believe.
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60 Minutes on the Plight of Palestinian Christians
APR 23 2012
Last night's 60 Minutes segment about the plight of Christians in the West Bank has gotten a lot of attention, in part because of the attempt by Israeli ambassador Michael Oren to intervene with CBS brass while the segment was being put together. (See the 11-minute point in the video below, where CBS correspondent Bob Simon confronts Oren with this fact.)
You can see why Oren might rather the piece hadn't aired. Things that Palestinian Muslims routinely say about the Israeli occupation may get more traction in America when Palestinian Christians say them. Such as this, from a Christian clergyman: "The West Bank is becoming more and more like a piece of Swiss cheese, where Israel gets the cheese--that is, the land the water resources, the archaeological sites, and the Palestinians are pushed in the holes."
Also, Oren clearly doesn't want this document, mentioned by Simon, to get attention. In it an interdominational group of Middle Eastern Christian clergy--Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant--refer to the occupation as "clear apartheid." (Oren hints that they're anti-Semitic.)
Finally, the 60 Minutes piece complicates the post-9/11 Israeli narrative according to which Israel and Judeo-Christian America are involved in a common struggle against Islamic radicals, and the occupation should be viewed in that context. Hence the importance of the moment when Oren insists Christians are leaving the West Bank under duress from Islamic radicals, not because of the occupation, and Simon presents testimony to the contrary.
Notwithstanding Oren's understandable qualms, the piece struck me as legitimate and balanced. Its subject--the ongoing exodus of Christians from the Holy Land--is of undeniable interest to American viewers. And Simon emphasizes that Israel isn't singling out Christians for persecution; their plight is simply the plight of Palestinians in general--a plight that, Simon notes, is due partly to actions taken by Israel to secure itself against terrorism. Now that Oren has had a chance to see the 60 Minutes piece, I'd be interested in hearing what, if any, parts of the story he thinks CBS should have included but didn't.
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