A Sacred Awakening

I have just been listening to a podcast interview with   Sami Awad, author of “A sacred awakening”.  He is a Palestinian living in Bethlehem with an 800-year heritage in the Territory, who says he can no longer accept Christianity and yet holds the teaching of Jesus as central to the hope of his people, indeed of the world. 

He is a liberation activist who believes we are called to take the words of Jesus: “love your enemy’, seriously: he believes nonviolence is the route to harmony, justice and peace. While he grew up in a devout Christian home, he claims he discovered Jesus when he stepped out of Christianity.
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That should pique some interest!

The Christianity he says he cannot accept is one primarily focussed on personal salvation. He fails to see how such teaching speaks to the context in which he lives. Yet the teaching of Jesus, teaching on justice, liberation, forgiveness, and nonviolence he finds profoundly life giving. It is in this teaching, teaching he would describe as teaching on the Kingdom of God, that his hope lies. He argues that Jesus never called people to focus on him, to accept him as Lord, (as he says he did when he was 12), but to become awakened to and live the kingdom of God, both present, and longed for. 

I found the interview challenging, not least as I seek to say a word that makes any real sense of the Advent season in the world context of 2025.

I was prepared for confirmation, aged 12, by my local vicar Mr Baines, brother of Harry Baines then Bishop of Wellington NZ. I was his only candidate! I rode my bicycle from our farm to his home in the next village, St Bartholemew’s Chalvington. The focus of the lessons was the beatitudes, the opening to the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5.  To be honest, I do not remember much about the lessons, but I do recall him saying that the beatitudes described the nature we are called to be, and that in my confirmation I was committing myself to be like this, because it is what Jesus is like. (Am I who I am because of my confirmation!?) These pithy sayings have long been understood to be the core of Jesus’ teaching.  They are not, as often taught, blessings poured on people exhibiting certain traits, but an invitation to a life which is more Christ like.

Herein is the Kingdom of God.  It is not about reign, or rule, or power, or authority, it is about abundant grace accessed when life is lived as life is intended to be. At heart, everyone of us are children of God.  Christ is the image of the invisible God, all things came to be through him, we carry that divine DNA, confirmed through Jesus taking human nature to himself. Becoming awake to that nature is the essence of the Christian journey.

This Sunday we read Isaiah 65:17-25, a repeat of the more famous Isaiah 11: 6 – 9 Both use metaphors to describe the world as God envisages: “the wolf and the lamb shall feed together”, Is this possible?  Can Russians and Ukrainians sit together?  Can Netanyahu and Hamas leadership live together?   Sami Awad recounts the story of sitting down at a café with one of the leaders of Settler violence in the West Bank.  The Settler apparently began the meeting by drawing a square frame with his finger around his face saying: “this is the face of the instigator of violence against Palestinians”.  His aim was clearly confrontational. Sami declined to respond in kind but asked, “tell me about yourself, who you are, your pains, sufferings and difficulties”. Apparently, the man then proceeded to tell of a lifetime of pain, dislocation and bullying and went on to say this was the first time he had ever told his story.

Jesus was born at a time of great turbulence; it seems to be forever thus. Does it have to be? So, where does hope lie? Christ likeness is always transformative. Transformative both for the one offering it and for the situation graced by it.  The Isaiah passage and the teaching of Jesus speak of a new creation. Incarnation is the heart of Christian life.  We are not ‘saved’ out of an evil and dying world’, we are called in partnership with Christ to be agents of transformation within this world.  This is where our blessing lies, this is the work of salvation.

This work is never done, that is why it is right to speak of the Kingdom of God as both now and yet to come.

In the meantime, don’t expect a Christian life to be universally lauded, especially when its standard is judged to threaten agendas of power and wealth. This has been the experience of Bishop Marrian Budde of Washington, it will probably be the experience of Archbishop Sarah Mullally of Canterbury.
Power and authority are too often grasped and cemented through notions of who is in and who is out, notions exaggerated by belief about the saved and the lost, the worthy and the unworthy, about truth that can be known here but cannot be known there.   Cruelty and fear have too often pushed light, understanding, and harmony aside.

 As painful as it is, we must never forget that when faith or religion use Christ’s name to declare some to be right and others wrong, some to be clean and others unclean, some to be worthy and others unworthy, the Kingdom of God is denied.

Examples:  The crusades; genocides on all continents in which Christians have been complicit including Palestine; Northern Ireland; hatred towards the Islamic world; conspiracy theories circulating amongst Christians; Ukrainian atrocities given legitimacy by Patriarch Kirill of the Russian Orthodox Church; South African apartheid promoted by the Dutch Reformed Church; subjugation of First nations people by missionaries who insisted cultural rites were haram, and faith needed to be dressed through western thought. 

We will read a lot of Isaiah in the lead up to Christmas. Let’s give him the last word here. Isaiah 12: 2 – 6 is used liturgically as the Song of Isaiah.  It begins:  Surely God is my salvation I will trust and will not be afraid, for the Lord God is my strength and my might: he has become my salvation.   The “I” is not the individual, but the community.  Scripture knows little of an individual out of the context of the community to which he or she belongs. Our community begins with the immediate family but spreads to include the whole created order.  It is always in the wider whole that we bless and are blessed.
 
 
 
 
 
 

Move out, this is my house
 
This is what GAFCON, a network of conservative evangelical Churches who are wont to loosely describe themselves as “bible-believing” Christians, is telling me and Anglicans like me, who adhere to the truths and life-giving grace we have found in the Anglican  Church.

I am a Christ-believing Christian, not a Bible-believing Christian. This is where 80+ years of life on earth and a lifetime reading the bible has taken me.  Why make this statement? Because knowing the rock upon which you stand is important. Why make the statement now? Because following the announcement that Dame Sarah Mullally, the Bishop of London, is to be the new Archbishop of Canterbury, GAFCON, has announced itself not just in opposition to the legitimate Anglican Communion historically linked to Canterbury, but to have replaced it and now claim to b the true Anglican Communion not liked to Canterbury. This claim is deeply troubling not only because a judgment is made that I and others like me are no longer orthodox Anglicans, let alone Christian, but even more troubling, because I believe the boot is on the other foot, these folk have diminished the gospel of Christ and are guilty of biblical idolatry.

This needs a lot of unpacking, so please stay with me.

GAFCON is a network of conservative evangelical Churches, inspired initially by the Diocese of Sydney Australia, which claims Churches or Dioceses such as the ones over which I have had oversight, have abandoned the faith by embracing women in all positions of leadership, and by supporting or at the very least not opposing the union of homosexual people. Many outside the Church on hearing this, might respond “are you serious, surely, they would pick on a serious matter like the Church’s attitude to disadvantage and poverty”. I will come back to that, but in passing let me point out the current lead bishop of GAFCON is the Archbishop of Rwanda.  I visited Rwanda and the then Archbishop in the years immediately following the genocide, a genocide in which the Church had been implicated and bishops removed from office. At that time, the then Archbishop had already linked the province to the initiative of the Diocese of Sydney. I said to the then Archbishop, surely you have a generation of work ahead of you to address the shocking reality that Anglican Christians had been involved with genocide, a reality which should then and now take every fiber of attention. Focusing on homosexuality in that context is an indulgent distraction.

Let me deal first with homosexuality.  There is no evidence the bible addresses homosexuality, as an orientation, at all.  In many places, Old and New Testament, it deals with practices, which are seen to be both disgusting and abusive, almost exclusively by men.  There is an underlying assumption that all males have the same sexual orientation, and therefore these practices degrade that orientation, degrade themselves, and abuse others. Understanding that a certain percentage of both genders find intimacy with the other gender impossible, has more recently been properly understood while the same understanding  is refused by those who hold the GAFCON position.  (Not dissimilar to the Church’s initial response to Galileo’s proposition that the earth rotates around the sun, not the other way around).

Here is the rub.  Biblical teaching is clear: “it is not good for man (human) to live alone”.  It is unchristian to deny intimacy and the fulfilment that life-long commitment brings to any human being.  Indeed, there is ample evidence to show that security flowing from such intimacy has enabled many to live outstanding lives that would not otherwise have been possible.  (I was present at an annual national bishops’ conference in Perth when Justice Michael Kirby was disgracefully defamed under parliamentary privilege by a senior member of the then coalition government.  I sought to gain a public statement of support from the conference for the judge. This was disallowed by the conservative evangelical bishops present at the meeting).

There is no excusing any sexual abuse, heterosexual or homosexual, however there is plenty of evidence that refusal to allow or enable such relationships has itself been a cause of abusive behaviour.  Over the years I have dealt with clergy who entered a heterosexual marriage because it seemed the only way the ordained could be accepted. Dealing with the consequential breakdown, disfunction, and pain was very tragic.  

Leadership by women. 
The fundamental biblical position is that all are equal “in Christ there is no Jew or Gentile, bond or free, male or female” (Gal. 3: 28). In a heterosexual relationship both male and female are fulfilled in and though one another. Neither are the possession of the other.

The implications of this injunction have taken the Church a great deal of time to understand and correct.  The New Testament appears to tacitly accept slavery.  But the principle of equality in Christ for those in slavery was not finally dealt with until 1833 after decades of struggle by William Wilberforce, and shortly before his death.  Males must face the truth that patriarchy has not yet submitted itself to the demands of Christ.

In a poll taken a few years ago it was found that abuse of women in marriage (emotional, financial, sexual, physical) was not less in families founded on conservative evangelical beliefs, but higher.  I grew up in a conservative evangelical family. I am aware of the impact that patriarchal views of headship have, not least because differences of view are not tolerated. Headship, as in sovereignty and control, is eschewed by the human face of God revealed in Jesus and should be similarly repudiated by his followers.

Female leadership in the Church has been crucial from the very beginning, starting with Mary, the first witness to the resurrection upon which our faith is built and whose testimony is never doubted.

I have long believed that the loss experienced by the Celtic Church led by Abbess Hilda at the synod of Whitby in 664 AD has led to a Millenia of patriarchal leadership in the UK Church, and in Churches worldwide that have grown from British colonization. This still waits to be fully addressed. (When I began my ministry 60 years ago all members of Parish Council and all members of synod were men!)
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The appointment of Bishop Sarah Mullally as Archbishop of Canterbury is prophetic.  Prophecy is the capacity to point to that which has been hidden or unseen, but lays in plain sight. She has a proven track record through her career in nursing, ministry and public service as a person of compassion for the marginalised and courage to speak the truth. What a blessing for the Anglican Communion. Gafcon are on the wrong side of not only history but the Gospel of Jesus Christ. She has the same capacity that we saw in Bishop Mariann Budde of Washington who spoke at Donald Trump’s inauguration of mercy as a Gospel imperative. For speaking this Gospel imperative, she was castigated by leadership of the US Conservative Christian Right.  Sarah Mullally will experience no less and both needs and deserves our prayers.

Now let me return to where I began: “I am a Christ believing Christian, not a bible believing Christian”.
Taking my lead from the traditional Christmas Gospel reading John 1: 1 – 14, I believe the eternal word, or perhaps wisdom, of God from whom all things owe their existence became incarnate in Jesus.  Thus, the whole created order speaks of and to the God present in Jesus, as does the bible.  The one must speak to the other.  This is abundantly clear in any reading of the psalms which are at the very foundation of Anglican liturgy.

GAFCON adherents focus on the cross as a flagpole for personal salvation, rather than focusing on the brokenness of the whole created order - of which personal brokenness is part. Let me illustrate from the Gafcon statement that followed the service marking the tragic murder of Charlie Kirk. “We give thanks to God for the clear proclamation of salvation and forgiveness in Jesus Christ at the Charlie Kirk Memorial Service held this week in Arizona, USA and broadcast globally. The gospel was preached with boldness, and many were stirred to think deeply, ask questions, and respond to the good news.”

I commend to you an excellent article printed in Pearls and Iritations by Keith Mascord, a former Sydney based priest now ministering in another diocese

The reality is that the glorious expanse of the gospel was not preached at this service.   It was a service that celebrated personal salvation and blessing with little or any reference to the biblical injunction that blessing is in constant movement of being received that it might be given away.  The service and everything surrounding it was an affirmation of an agenda which has seen aid for those in need being reduced, the judicial system hijacked to defend power, and the environment trashed to enable wealth for a few.
In 1967 Lynn White wrote an article in the periodical Science entitled “the historical roots of our ecological crisis” in which he lays blame squarely at the feet of Christianity. He does this by arguing that the plethora of denominations that flourished post the reformation competed for membership by arguing that devotion to their brand would bring blessing in terms of wealth – hence prosperity gospel.  Whilst I think White’s argument is grossly overstated, there is nevertheless more than an element of truth as demonstrated in the Trump administration’s obsession with wealth linked with Christian adherence.
The biblical Abraham was blessed in that he and his descendants were to be a blessing to all humankind. A point totally ignored by Zionist Israel. In Christ we are similarly blessed that we might be a blessing.
Richard Hooker, a founding father of Anglicanism at the Reformation, was clear that the Church in and of itself is unimportant, its importance lies in its capacity to be an agent of transformation in the communities of which it is part.
Don’t ask me if I am saved, ask me in what way, through Christ, I am an agent of grace and redemption in the lives of others, including the whole created order.
 
 
 

Cyrus Scofield
 
The news of ceasefire and release of hostages in Gaza is cause for great rejoicing and for giving credit where it is due.  But the big questions remain: where to from here, and how did the world allow this to happen in the first place?  Where to from here will not have a happy outcome unless the question “how we got to this place” is honestly addressed, acknowledged and corrected.  Jonathan Sachs is right to identify unadulterated western style colonialism as one of the causes, I wish to draw attention to a shameful Christian distortion that lies at the heart of US conservative politics in as much that their foreign policy has dominated outcomes in the Middle East.

To understand this distortion and to understand how it has impacted the lives of 21st century Palestinians we have to delve into the legacy of one Cyrus Ingerson Scofield (1843 – 1921).

At a personal level, Scofield’s life does not measure up.  He was allegedly guilty of several acts of dishonesty and fraud.  He was allegedly an army deserter. He claimed titles, including Doctor of Divinity, he did not have.  He abandoned his wife and children, leaving them without means of support.
He was however capable of considerable charm and influence. In 1883 he was ordained a congregationalist minister with connections to the Plymouth Brethren and had considerable success building congregations. He was influenced for good by the missionary to China, Hudson Taylor, and by the publisher Dwight Moody, but he was influenced with ulterior motive by a Jewish Lawyer, Samuel Untermeyer. In “Unjust War Theory: Christian Zionism and the Road to Jerusalem,” Prof. David W. Lutz writes, “Untermeyer used Scofield, a Kansas City lawyer with no formal training in theology, to inject Zionist ideas into American Protestantism”.  (It is said there are more Christian Zionists than there are Jews in the world – probably by a significant margin).

Influenced by Untermeyer and assisted by publication through the Moody Bible Institute Scofield produced the Scofield Bible.   This Bible went on to become the fundamental text of biblical literalism and the foundation stone of American conservative evangelicalism and consequently, the American political right.  Multiple millions have been published, even finding a place in the theological library when I was a student!

So, what is the Scofield bible about?  It divides human history into seven dispensations of which we are supposedly living in the sixth. The first dispensation is titled ‘innocence’ and is of course the period of Adam and Eve, before sin became a human experience!!   You can see how Scofield followers have come to believe creation stories as literal history – as is apparently the case with a staggering percentage of US citizens.

The dispensation we are supposedly now in, the sixth, is titled ‘grace’ and is defined as the period between Christ’s resurrection and Christ’s return.  The pre-emptive feature of this period is to be the restoration of Israel to what he claims to have been the unrestricted area from the ‘rivers to the sea’, the land promised to Abraham.  According to Scofield when this occurs Christ will return and rule from Jerusalem for one thousand years, during which time the world’s dross will be expunged. The one-thousand-year reign connects ‘millennialism’ with ‘dispensationalism’ as the corner stones of Scofield’s ‘theology’.  

Rather than diminishing in the 100+ years since Scofield’s death, his legacy has not only retained its influence, but since the 1967, 6-day war, and Israel’s control of all Palestinian land, it has in fact deepened.  How else can we explain why the accelerating occupation of Palestinian land, against international law has been totally unchallenged and why the US has vetoed all motions at the UN Security Council that in any way criticised Israel, let alone refused to sanction it.  Christian Zionists who have influence at the highest levels of American political life include Mike Pence, Vice President under the previous Trump administration, Sarah Palin and of course Mike Huckabee.

An oft used biblical mis-quote is a distortion of Genesis 12: 3.  In reference to Abraham it reads “Those who bless you, I will bless, and those who curse you I will curse”.  The mis-quote is “those who bless Israel I will bless and those who curse Israel I will curse.

In the biblical text Abraham and his descendants are called chosen for one clear reason; through them all peoples of the world are to be blessed. Chosenness in the biblical text has nothing whatsoever to do with benefit for self, least of all land at the expense of others. It is that through righteousness and mercy, harmony and justice, blessing, might flow to all.  This is of course the very opposite of how chosenness is interpreted in defence of Israel’s outrageous actions.

Returning then to where we began, given America and American politics have and will have enormous power over the future of both Israel and Palestine, the future for Palestinians will remain bleak if this grotesque distortion of Christian, let alone biblical truth remains at the heart of US policy and decision making.

All three ‘Abrahamic religions have reason to cherish extraordinary contributions to the wellbeing and harmony of life on this planet.  But equally, all three have reason to seriously repent of having pursued agendas that are not core matters of belief, but flow from partisan rivalry and desire for sovereignty and power.
 
 
 
 
 
 

Never Again – So the world pledged

For 80 years the world has sympathised with and supported Israel through the prism of the indescribably brutal holocaust. For generations to come the world will now view Israel through the prism of its atrocities in Gaza.  This will be a huge burden for members of the Jewish community to bear, especially as it was not carried out with their imprimatur, but through its vengefully and ideologically driven self-interested and self-aggrandising inner political circle.  Waging war has always served the self-interest of those doing the waging.

Appropriately there are multiple holocaust memorial sites throughout the world including many in Australia:  the Adelaide Holocaust Museum and Andrew Steiner Education Centre; The Jewish Holocaust Centre Melbourne; Centre for Progressive Judaism Kew, Victoria, Holocaust Memorial; Melbourne General Cemetery Holocaust Memorial; Magen, Shoah, The Central Synagogue, Sydney.

On 1 November 2005, the United Nations General Assembly created the International Holocaust Remembrance Day, to be celebrated on 27 January every year.  The first purpose of the day is to remember the lives of an estimated one third of European Jews, together with thousands of others unwanted by the Nazis, who were slaughtered on the pretext they were an inferior race, whose very existence sullied the lives of a supposedly superior Aryan race.

Its other prime purpose was to remind the world that this horror happened, it must not happen again, and there must be fierce human resolve to uphold human rights.

Netanyahu and those who support him do all in their power to diminish, criticize, or stymie those who wish to uphold this, the second purpose of Holocaust remembrance. Cynically the name ‘holocaust’ has been weaponized through the IHRA definition, to accuse as antisemitic those who dare to highlight the human rights violations of the State of Israel.

While the scale of what happened in Europe in the 1930s and 40s dwarves other atrocities, such as Armenia, Rwanda, and now Gaza, similarities are appalling.

• Populations must first be inculcated with a false narrative, convincing them they and especially their leaders, are in the right. But ……. Palestine was not an empty land.  …… Palestinians are not inferior human beings. …… The land does not belong exclusively to Jews. ….. The land now occupied was not ceded, or bought, it was taken violently.  ……. Palestinians are not violent people, they are peace loving people who have for generations been glad to live harmoniously alongside others.  ……. The violence, as deplorable as it was, did not commence on October 7, it began with Palestinians being made aliens to their own land in 1948, again in 1967 and has continued, even escalated, ever since.  Gaza is largely populated by refugees. Hamas is the product of this alienation. And yes, Palestinians are also Semites.

All human beings are responsible for their own actions, but we are also responsible for actions of others that emanate from what we have done to them.

• Those committing atrocities do all in their power to conceal or deny what they are doing.  The Nazis, believing they would win the war, did all within their power to conceal what they were doing.  Had they won the war the world may never have known.  Netanyahu refuses foreign media access to Gaza. The killing of journalists at the Nasser hospital was not a ‘regrettable accident’. They were targeted. The UN says 242 journalists have died in Gaza since October 7. Netanyahu continues to deny what is in clear sight. After every appalling incident Israel tells us there will be an investigation. The ‘investigation’ is not transparent and there are never any consequences.

Truth always flourishes in the light; evil can only flourish in the dark.

• The image of emaciated Jewish figures, victims of Nazi starvation and humiliation are forever burned into my mind.  It was not enough to exterminate, it was necessary to starve, torture and humiliate.  That the same is happening in Gaza is fiercely denied but is beyond dispute. How so?  International humanitarian organisations have been stopped from operating. UNWRA, the most effect vehicle of food distribution has been banned on the pretext it has Hamas fingerprints on it.  Zomi Frankcom the Australian aid worker with World Central Kitchens was targeted and killed with other aid workers despite her vehicle clearly displaying its identity and posting its travel details. The agency no longer works in Gaza.  Israel wants complete control of food distribution that it might limit it.  Countless Gazans have been shot trying to access food.  

It is not simply morally wrong, it is unlawful to deny essential sustenance to any human being, in any circumstance.  This is a war crime

• The European Jewish community, through hard work, ability, and research accessed considerable wealth assets and influence. The Nazis pillaged these assets to their advantage. The facts of the matter are that Netanyahu and those who support him are doing the same. It is clear the Israeli government wishes to push Palestinians out of West Bank land, generationally theirs, into small enclaves. The speed at which this is being done is escalating, not least through planned new illegal settlements that will cut the West Bank in half. It is also brazenly clear that they wish to take the Gaza strip, making it Israel’s riviera. (How much of this Trump wants, for himself is less clear). Make no mistake, this is an open and unapologetic grab for Palestinian assets that the international community should be protecting.

What should never happen again is happening in clear sight. The US has the power to stop it and chooses not. It is complicit.

Tony Blair, Jared Kushner, as you meet to plan the future of what will be left of Gaza, with no input from Palestinians, you might first consider how to stop the killing and starvation. Then the first item on your agenda should be a memorial which names every single, child, parent, elderly citizen, aid worker, medical practitioner, journalist who have lost their lives.  As you contemplate this task you might also contemplate the lifelong trauma that the living will have to endure.

You may then like to contemplate the shame and ignominy of dreaming to build your ‘riviera’ over the rubble you have caused, actively, or complicitly.
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I write for the people of Gaza, including the October 7 Kibbutz hostages (apparently expendable to the Netanyahu agenda of blitzkrieg) with words from this weekend’s lectionary ringing in my ears: Remember those who are in prison as if you were in prison with them; those who are being tortured as though yourselves are being tortured. (Hebrews 13: 3)

A Coalition of the willing in support of Palestinians

The situation faced by Ukrainians and Palestinians is vastly different, but at the same time similar.  Neither Russia nor Israel will abide by international law unless pressure is brought to bear from outside.  In particular, there must be agreement in relation to sanctions.  Without such pressure, Israel under Netanyahu will continue his campaign to gain control of all the land of ancient Palestine denying forever the common law rights of Palestinians, let alone their dignity, freedom and autonomy.  

Benjamin Netanyahu continues to reveal himself as the self-important, arrogant, impervious to human suffering, figure that he is. It is apparently not enough to deny the starvation he is overtly causing. Not enough to sanction the killing of journalists who report atrocities. Not enough to sanction bombs that fall on children’s playgrounds.  Not enough to treat his own Israeli hostages as collateral damage as he feeds his insatiable appetite for war, despite the advice of his own IDF. Not enough to consider sending Palestinians to war-torn and poverty-stricken South Sudan. Not enough to deny there will ever be a Palestinian State. Not enough to approve settler violence on the West Bank. Not enough to show the tortured face of Marwon Barghouti. He now has the arrogance to tell leaders of democratic countries they have no right to speak against such atrocities and no right to unequivocally voice support for equality, justice and the rule of law.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, you have been personally criticised by this arrogant, violent man. This is a compliment to your strength of character and your commitment to the values of decency and common good held by mainstream Australia and Australians.   

It is also a compliment to the standing Australia holds in the international community, otherwise why would he have bothered.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     You have received much criticism for ‘virtue signalling’. The blasts you received from Netanyahu and Mike Huckabee, the US envoy, indicate you have done far more than that. I realise you are not wanting to go beyond positions adopted by Britian, Canada, France etc.  but if there is any valid criticism, it is that you have not gone far enough. It is time for you to work hard with Australia’s allies including Arab countries, to establish a coalition of the willing, which will place severe sanctions on Israel.

Bridget Mackenzie, Michaelia Cash, et al, be very careful. You have the politician’s desire to score political points. Be conscious of the fact that in so doing you are voicing support for action that seemingly does not even have the support of the majority of Israelis, let alone justice loving members of the Jewish diaspora here in Australia. Please try to be honest.  You cannot uncritically support Netanyahu and the Israeli government while at the same time mouthing support for an outcome in which Palestinians have a future.  In supporting Netanyahu, you are supporting the denial of any right, let alone autonomy for Palestinian people, now and into the future.  You are in fact supporting Netanyahu, Smotrich and Ben Gvir in their view that Palestinians do not exist.

The claim that Prime Minster Albanese is supporting Hamas and that the choice is between supporting Hamas or supporting Israel, is rank nonsense. Israel has needed Hamas as an excuse for carrying out its long-held desire of possessing this land.   Hamas exists because all Palestinian rights are denied. Israel will always face resistance while it makes Palestinians aliens in their own land.  Insisting on the right of Palestinians to exist, far from supporting Hamas, is a step towards creating peace for Israelis and Palestinians alike.
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Benjamin Netanyahu is doing irreparable harm to the reputation and standing of worldwide Jewry. Often, when people attribute to others derogatory motive or consequence, they are describing themselves. When Netanyahu accuses the current Australian government of whipping up antisemitism, he is in fact describing the outcome of his own actions.  It is regrettably the case that the Zionist enterprise in Israel, and the support it has received in Australia has caused a rise in antisemitic behaviour.  However, here in Australia we are also profoundly blessed by many thousands within the Jewish community to whom we owe a great debt of gratitude who have made it abundantly clear this is not being done in their name.
 
 
 

Urgency of Palestinian Recognition

Of course, Netanyahu is angry about talk of Palestinian recognition.  He runs a narrative that Palestine and Palestinians do not exist. This is exactly why recognition is so urgently needed and why the conservative side of Australian politics as expressed in views by Julian Lesser and James Patterson are so wrong.  Recognition of Palestine cannot come at the end of a ‘peace process’, because Netanyahu and the extreme right who keep him in power (and out of gaol) have said not one inch of land between the river to the sea will ever be ceded to Palestinian autonomy. There is no peace process, just a continual erosion of Palestinian rights and land and the gradual extermination of its people.

It is desperately urgent that, with a single voice, the international community declares Palestine and Palestinians to be an entity that cannot and will not be wiped out. Such recognition should have immediate consequences. A state has rights, rights that the international community is obligated to defend.  Unless Israel immediately ceases its assault not only on Gaza, but its attacks and intimidation of Palestinians on the West Bank, Australia with its partners in the international community must act.  
 

• Trade that assists Israel with its hostilities must immediately cease,
• Sanctions should apply not simply against Israel but against any country that supplies arms to Israel.
• The international community must assume responsibility for humanitarian relief in all its forms in Gaza.
• Starvation as a weapon of war must be immediately referred to the international criminal court.
• Denial of starvation in Gaza by Israel must be equated, in its seriousness, with denial of the holocaust.

Recognition in and of itself does not prescribe how a ‘two-state’ solution will unfold.  It may be that geographical areas are designated Israeli, and other geographical areas are designated Palestinian.  Netanyahu is obviously totally opposed to this outcome.   In this circumstance Netanyahu needs to understand that the only way forward then is a form of dual self-determination: equal rights, respect for language, religion, and culture across all the land from the river to the sea.  This would be a very exciting outcome, enabling Palestinians and Israelis to flourish together, their mutual strengths skills and diversity invested in the flourishing and enrichment of one another.

What Netanyahu and his cabal of extreme Zionists need to understand is that no resolution is totally unacceptable and will leave Israel in a weak and almost friendless situation within the international community. No outcome should also be unacceptable to the international community which created Israel in 1947/48 while intending there also be a Palestinian state.  This is unfinished business especially for Australia which was a co- signature to the initial partition.

The need for Australia to be partner to an international statement of recognition is great. Australians must recognise we have a partisan history of support for Israel to the detriment of Palestine and Palestinian rights and in that sense have contributed to the present situation. Under Australian conservative governments we have equivocated in naming Palestinian land ‘occupied’, as it is under international law, or to name the settlements unlawful as again they are under international law. Under Morrison we were quick to agree that Israel could assume the whole of Jerusalem as its capital when East Jerusalem is an integral part of a Palestinian state. The facts of the matter are that the terrible situation which now prevails would not have occurred if the international community had done its duty and placed sanctions on Israel when it first started its annexation of land beyond the 1967 borders.

There is much talk about Hamas and its need of disbandment prior to recognition. Achieving this outcome in relation to the remnants of what has been the military/civil control of Palestine would be the easy part.  The permanent eradication of the idea that lies behind Hamas will be far harder and entirely in the hands of Israel, not its military might, but its mindset.

The idea that created Hamas arises from perception that Israel will never peacefully negotiate a just solution, leaving many to feel violent resistance is the only option. This is not to condone violence, on the contrary, violence always begets more violence.  But it is a tragic truth that what Israel and the US call terrorism is violence from those who believe this to be the only form of resistance that Israel will take note of. Post October 7, every painful day has shown the futility of violent resistance, but it is the outcome of those who have come to believe it is better to die than live a life of want and humiliation.

Palestinians are sick of words.  Australia’s stated bi-partisan support for a two-state solution has frankly been insulting and humiliating for Palestinians because no action has ever accompanied these words – not from either side.  It is insulting to say it is up to the two sides to negotiate peace when the side that holds all the power does not recognise there is another side. The Coalition has been slightly more honest, they have made it clear they will always support whatever Netanyahu wants with no regard whatsoever for Palestinian rights or for justice.    Labour has mouthed the right words, but its pro-Israel faction has always prevented any action other than empty words.

Now is the time.  The international tide has turned. Anthony Albanese you can no longer equivocate; you are either on the side of common humanity and justice, or you are not.
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What is currently happening in Gaza is a most egregious stain on collective humanity. 
 
 
 
 
 

Let’s talk about the weather

I have recently ‘enjoyed’ a south coast low.  Nothing particularly unusual about that.  However, the accumulative effect of exaggerated weather events, exactly as climate scientists predicted, is not historically usual, but is now normative.

Hotter than ever, wetter than ever, drier than ever, worst ever fires, worst ever floods, I doubt there is a place on the planet that is not experiencing the accumulative effects of weather events of increasing severity.  All of this with a mere 1.5 global temperature rise. It is now inevitable that this mark will soon be exceeded; in some parts of the world, notably Europe, it has already. More than a global 2 degrees is now more probable than not in the foreseeable future.   These events are but the visible manifestation of a much more extensive problem.

Yesterday, 16 July, Ken Henry gave a very important address at the National Press Club.

Few addresses at the Press Club in recent years have been more important.  This one should be read and heeded by all who are interested in the direction humankind is heading. Unless we address the fundamental imbalance in the relationship between ourselves and the natural order, we face economic as well as environmental problems that technology alone will not have the capacity to solve. He makes the point that recent falls in economic productivity (an observation made by both sides of politics) alongside declining environmental sustainability is not coincidence. If the health and capacity of the natural order is in decline it is inevitable that human productivity will also decline.

Every individual has a responsibility to act given the information available to us, but Ken Henry argues the responsibility of the legislature to enact credible policy is the key. For example, no new dwelling should now be built without a capacity to produce and store solar energy.  No housing complex should be built without investment, and proportional ownership, in a solar farm. In the last two decades there have been several reviews resulting in recommendations that have been ignored by those in power.  Because Albanese and his government now have so much political capital, their responsibility to finally formulate policy that will cement necessary reform, is vital.  If not now then perhaps never, a very depressing outcome for every succeeding generation. If Jim Chalmers is serious about policy that will increase productivity, he must support policy that ensures human activity works with the natural environment, not against it.

It is beyond my capacity to understand that those with the responsibility for energy policy still argue that the cost of transition away from fossil fuels is too high, that at best we need to slow the transition down, at worst abandon it altogether.  The reality is that, had we seriously decided to make the transition 25 years ago, when climate science was already blatantly obvious, and transition easier, we would now be past the most painful parts of transition, enjoying increased productivity.  But no, we endured a quarter of a century wasted in the mire of climate wars. Please don’t tell me we are still there.

Why are we so stupid, so slow to change, so wedded to a path that is going to cause very considerable grief? The answer lies in the way the privileged (I and I suspect you are numbered in this company) have chosen to live our lives as if the natural order must submit to human desire; where possessing is winning, consuming a duty, and moderation is either weakness or losing.  Why is the Church so mute, so reluctant to lead? The answer is that Christianity, since the enlightenment, has become so transfixed with the individual and their salvation that a vision for the individual’s place within the whole created order has been lost. Good has become individualised, not common.

Yes, we are a technologically advanced society, but being economically dependent upon a ceaselessly expanding GDP is dumb.  The Venice wedding of Jeff Bezos was an extreme, crude, even obscene example of outcomes emanating from this madness. It is clear the main players wanted to be admired, even envied, but there was nothing here to be admired, least of all envied.

We need less technology and more wisdom. Science and religion, at least the religion that forms the foundation of my life, sing from the same song sheet.  Both are committed to understanding warp and weft – the manner in which all existence is intertwined. Night and day balance one another, as do the seasons of the year. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. “When a butterfly stretches its wings in South America, the weather patterns of Europe change”.   We share some DNA with all living, breathing life. A forest is a living ecosystem where each element contributes to, and gains from, the rest. The same is true of the ocean.  The patterns and cycles of the universe are replicated in miniature on earth.   Nothing exists independently, every action has consequences.

‘Commodity’ is a word we use for a disconnected entity. Before a resource became dislocated into a commodity, it belonged somewhere, it was related to something.

A commodity can be moved around, traded, bought or sold, seemingly without consequence.  But it is not without consequence. Donald Trump is the commodity king. His ‘deals’ are trades of one commodity for another. Tariffs are ways of exploiting the price of a commodity. But commodities are not just items such as beef, iron or aluminium, they have come to include land like Panama, Canada and Greenland. Water, air, space human health, - everything has become a commodity to be bartered.

Our economic way of life is based upon commoditising everything.  However, nothing exists by human hand that has not been drawn from the natural order.  It is no wonder that in the western world we humans are the most prosperous and at the same time the most disconnected: as a result, the most prone to the effects of dislocation – loneliness depression, disillusionment and mental health crisis.
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The good news, as Ken Henry points out, is that there is still time for us to do this. The old normal which began with the industrial revolution is over. Those invested in its continuity will do all in their power to pervert and prevent a new order. So far, they have mustered sufficient political influence to achieve their ends. However, the cost of their success is being borne in the present by increasing loss of productivity, extinctions, climate refugees, conflict over resources, insurance denial etc; and in the future by generations who will never enjoy the freedom my generation has taken for granted.
 
 
 
 
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“No other land”

I write this blog in quite a distressed state.

Yesterday I watched the award-winning documentary film – “No Other Land”.  It was shot through the partnership of a courageous Israeli journalist and a young Palestinian on the West Bank.  It documents the relentless push of Israeli bulldozers and the violence of illegal settlers to force Palestinians off their land. The filming concluded less than two years ago. This is the story most Israelis are not permitted to hear.

There was nothing in the film that I did not know.  The brutality I knew.  The gracious resilience of Palestinians I knew. Children and women standing outside their homes and schools having to watch the bulldozers demolish everything they had known and then pick through to find a pot here, or a toy there, I knew.

The shooting of Palestinians who object to the bulldozers I also knew. The film showed the shooting of a man at short range.  He did not die immediately but became a quadriplegic.  Because his house had been bulldozed his mother had to look after him on the earthen floor of a cave. That this happened I also knew. That the IDF soldiers, members of the most ‘moral army in the world’ did not care, even found it funny, I also knew.

Now multiply this one thousandfold and we begin to comprehend today’s Gaza where citizens are shot seeking food and children with amputated legs scream through the night from gangrene, the result of no available medication.

What I was not ready for was the encounter between these wonderful Palestinian women and Israeli soldiers. “Are you not ashamed”? “How will you explain your actions to your mothers”?   Their response was: “it is the law, why should we be ashamed”?

It is not the law.   It is not Jewish moral law. It is not torah. It is not humanitarian law. It is not international law. No country has the right to enact such a law.  This land upon which crazed settlers are running wild and Netanyahu is committing genocide is occupied land. Under international law the occupier is legally and morally bound to care for its occupied citizens.  Israel, through its IDF, and the illegal settlers it protects, are doing the opposite.

Now, here is the rub.  Why does the international community let them get away with it?

After the film was over, (btw there was a huge spill-over crowd in the little town of Moruya), I was billed to lead the Q and A. The first question: “why is the Zionist lobby so strong”? I answered very poorly.  So, I want to answer it now.

The facts of the matter are that the one who controls the narrative holds the power. All the strong and powerful people in our contemporary world know that and are where they are because they control the narrative.  The most obvious example is the US and the machine known as MAGA.  In relation to Israel and Palestine, Zionists control, have controlled, and seek to continue to hold, the public narrative in western media.  The narrative is that Israel is the victim, and all its actions are in defence of itself. This narrative is ruthlessly run in all News Corp outlets, even the ABC the BBC and other ‘respectable’ outlets are cowered into shutting down any voice that might challenge this narrative.  The latest example has been the treatment of Antoinette Lattouf by the ABC who, the court has revealed, acted for her termination out of pressure from the Zionist lobby. The mindless action of pouring petrol on the door of a synagogue and setting it alight feeds this narrative, as we have heard in recent days from the excessive noise of politicians and even the grotesque intervention of Netanyahu.  No Palestinian will have lauded this action, only the Zionists will have done so behind the sham of their antisemitic protest.

There is no truth in this narrative.  In the first half of the 20th century Jews in Europe were victims of cruelty and genocide in the most horrendous fashion.  Since 1948, Israel, through its Zionist dream and aspiration, has made victims of others.  Some of their own rabbis who opposed the creation of Israel forecast unremitting violence. There is no vacant land on planet earth (terra nullius in Australia was a lie too). Creating an ethnically pure land necessitates violence in its creation, and violence in its maintenance and defence. The rabbis who opposed Israel’s creation also predicted the Jewish diaspora would suffer approbation as a consequence.

The 1947 UN partition envisaged two states, originally roughly a 50/50 split. After the 1948/49 war it became Israel 78%, Palestine 22%.  In the 1990’s Palestinians agreed to settle on the 22% at the Camp David accord.  However, 78% has not been enough for Netanyahu and his zealots – hence annexation by stealth, the settlement programme.  

The international community, including Australia, is culpable.  When the first illegal settlement was built on the West Bank, against international law, Israel should have been punished with sanctions and boycotts.  This did not happen, has not happened, as a consequence Israel has become emboldened.  The suffering inflicted upon Palestinian people is horrendous, the international community could have stopped it, but it has not.

Just before Anthony Albanese became Prime Minister, I went to see him to plead that Palestinians be given the same access to his office that is granted to Zionist delegations.  It did not happen.  I also asked that he use the language of genocide and apartheid.  He refused and was adamant I was wrong in wanting to use this language. Recounting this anecdote against Albanese, we need to be reminded that compared with the Coalition, Labour is Palestine’s best friend.

The Zionist narrative prevails - Israel is the victim. NO IT IS NOT.

Australians need to know that every parliamentarian in Australia, State and Federal, is invited to Israel to become imbued with this false narrative.  Most accept.  More Australian politicians have visited Israel than any other country on the planet.
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Thank you, producers of No other land. Although deeply distressed by it, I needed to see it and to be shamefully reminded that I live in a country where those in power continue to protect a narrative, a false narrative, which excuses and permits the tortuous suffering of a very resilient, resourceful, highly educated, culturally rich, people - the Palestinians. Netanyahu, please ask Ahed Tamimi or her father Basem Tamimi, whom you have imprisoned and tortured, if, even now, they would live in harmony with neighbouring Jews.   They will answer Yes.   It is you and your acolytes who refuse to be neighbours to and with them.
 
 
 
 

Australian Honours: Review

Twice a year Government House issues a list of those awarded an honour within the Australian Honour system.  The vast majority of those awarded are clearly worthy of recognition, but each time the list appears there is a level of contention.

Almost 30 years ago Prime Minister Paul Keating appointed me, along with others including the late Ian Keirnan AO, to a panel tasked with the responsibility of reviewing the honours system. The report never saw the light of day.   Soon after we completed the report, Paul Keating lost the 1996 election.  Vested interests, including those of a political nature, clearly did not want the report publicly addressed.

The review resulted from consultations across the continent and from every walk of life.
Some findings reflected sectional interest while others were common to every region and to most people. As I remember, the broadly based findings included:

• Being honoured rests entirely with the nomination process.  Many worthy people are never nominated: this particularly applies to more isolated areas. It is assumed those with knowledge and contacts are more likely to be nominated some may even seek nomination.
• Certain postcodes predominate.  Some in the ACT have the highest per capita representation.
• Too many appear to be recognised because of the position they have held. It was felt an award should only be made for significant service beyond that which could reasonably be expected from the position held.  Reaching a certain rank, or years of service, should not on its own be sufficient criteria for an award.
• Many did not support this recognition for achievement in sport unless, in addition, other criteria of service were considered.
• Power and authority is more likely to be recognised than attributes of extraordinary generosity, mercy, justice etc. Those who challenge inappropriate and sometimes criminal power or authority in their profession, or more widely in the community, are unlikely to be recognised despite courageously serving the common good. Some experience the opposite – retribution - despite serving the greater common good. It is also unlikely a human rights advocate will receive an award. 
• A person of extraordinary compassion, e.g. a lifetime of fostering children, is worthy of the highest award.
• There are too many categories.

There are currently four levels of recognition.   AC recognises a contribution considered to be of national or international significance.  AO recognises a lesser contribution but still of merit beyond their profession or region. AM recognises a contribution of significance emanating from the person’s sphere of interest or community.  OAM is recognition of contribution to a sector of the local community.

There are also two divisions, civil and military.

Some of the recommendations that I remember:

• The military division should be terminated, with recognition being awarded on merit equally for all sections of society, including the military, within a common division.  It was believed the armed services, along with the public service, the police force, ambulance service, fire service etc should be strongly encouraged to review and if necessary, extend and enhance appropriate ways in which they honour their personnel, not least, long service.  Using the Australian Honours system in a separate division creates a different purpose and distorts the intention of equity and equality.
• Criteria for the awards should be more reflective of moral qualities judged to be the values of Australian citizenship.
• Four categories should be reduced to three, probably by removal of the OAM which will lift the honour bestowed on countless volunteers, the backbone of every community, to a seemingly higher level.
• Government House must invest more in making the nomination process and criteria better known.

On countless occasions I have been asked to add my name to a nomination.  In most cases I have been honoured to do so, but not always.  On rare occasions I have made a nomination.

I do understand the contention created each time a list is published.  It is perhaps unavoidable given the diversity of views held in the community.  But in considering some of the findings and recommendations of the small group I was privileged to serve, some of these concerns may have been obviated.

There have been a few occasions when, having seen the list, I have thought to myself I would not want to have been listed in that company.
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The honours system is important. It is generally treated, as it should, with great respect. It is however not respectful to seek public opinion on this or any other matter and then ignore it.  Nor is it respectful not to seek public opinion in the first place.
 
 
 

Christianity: the Antithesis of Zionism

This week I attended a symposium –‘ Who owns the Holy Land’ - sponsored by PIEN (Palestine Israel Ecumenical Network).  It was extremely well attended and was an excellent night.  If the symposium is still on its way to your city – please attend. However, in answer to questions one of the speakers shocked me by saying, “Zionism is rooted in Christianity”.   I completely understand why this was said, given the influence of the American Christian Right, together with its offshoots in most Western countries including Australia. However, to consequently assume Israel must be defended from a Christian perspective has become one reason why criticism of Israel is weaponised as antisemitism. and censorship of Palestinian voices has become so prevalent in Australian public discourse.    I wish to explain.

Zionism has both secular nationalist roots, as well as religious messianic roots. But neither have any basis in Christianity.

Let’s deal with the secular (even atheistic), nationalistic roots first.  After the catastrophe of the fall of Jerusalem and destruction of the second temple in AD 70 Judaism survived for millennia as a diaspora.   We are familiar with the terrible persecutions suffered by Jews over centuries, especially in Europe, culminating in the holocaust.

Towards the end of the18th century and into the 19th century tension arose between those members of the Jewish community who believed their future lay with appropriate integration into Bavarian, French, or whatever culture prevailed in the lands in which they were domiciled and those who strongly opposed such a move.  Integration does not mean loss of identity or religion, but it does mean accepting the governing rules and requirements of the State in which you live.  Jews, along with most cultures across the globe. are thoroughly integrated into most Western countries, including Australia, without loss of identity, culture or religion. Not accepting the norms and rules of the country where you live inevitably means living in ghettos.

Strong voices resisted integration. The Zionist movement was born. A homeland was sought to be ruled, owned and governed for Jews to the exclusion of others.  Nationalistic Zionism, by definition, cannot be anything other than racist, clearly attested through statements of its early and present leadership including Ben Gurion, Golda Meier and Benjamin Netanyahu.  Failure to understand that harmonious living together in the Holy Land by Christians, Jews and Muslims, in the time of the Ottomans could not prevail with the introduction of Zionism was and remains a massive failure of the West. (The 1917 Balfour Declaration was written assuming such harmonious cooperation and the honouring of the rights of all residents). Since 1967 Israel has controlled the lives of every man woman and child, whether they live in the lands designated Israel, or East Jerusalem, West Bank or Gaza. Half the people with unencumbered Israeli citizenship live with the rights and privileges of nationhood.  The other half, depending where they live, either have greatly restricted rights, or they live with constant expectation of their lands being confiscated or, as in Gaza, they have lived with a seemingly endless blockade and of course now with starvation. One state solution, two state solution: peace and prosperity for all is not possible with an Israel that maintains a nationalistic Zionist mindset.

Nationalistic Zionism is of course buttressed by historical religious belief that the land was promised to Israel by God.  Bizarre that historical religion should buttress modern day national secularism! Bizarre too that politicians, often with no known spiritual background, appear to give weight to this argument. Wide sections of the Christian community gloss over sufferings inflicted, legality ignored, human rights abused, holding a priori that Palestinians must be the bad guys and Israelis the good guys because of priority given to this claim.

. There are so many problems with this claim.

• According to biblical story, the promise of the land was made to Abraham along with the expectation that through his descendants all nations on earth would be blessed.  Since 1948 the creation of Israel has not been a blessing, especially not to its neighbours; in contrast members of the Jewish diaspora have been and continue to be a blessing beyond measure.
• The last time an entity called Israel held even fleeting sovereignty over a portion of this land was 721 BC 
• Most Jewish settlers in the 20th and 21st centuries have no historic connection to the land whatsoever, they are Europeans, Russians and Americans who have brought with them agendas from afar and a total lack of tolerance for anyone who is not Jewish. Jews with historic connection with the land lived in harmony with their neighbours.
• It is utterly inconceivable that God would countenance large scale suffering if not annihilation of another people to achieve the ‘promise’.

Now, let me come to the hopes and aspirations of religious Zionism. 

Christian Zionism’s origins in the US post-date the Nationalistic fervour of the late 18th and 19th century Zionism in Europe, and conveniently piggy-back on them. Christian Zionism has no connection with Orthodox Judaism’s hopes for the coming of a messiah.
 
We know little about the first Jewish diaspora which occurred following the annihilation of the northern kingdom of Israel in 721 BC.  This diaspora is often referred to as ‘the lost 10 tribes’.  The remaining tribe, Judah, with its capital Jerusalem survived until 586 BC.  The exile to Babylon was both utterly devastating and totally transformative. What had been in effect the religion of a relatively inconsequential tribal kingdom who believed their God dwelt in Jerusalem’s temple, had to admit they were wrong, or that if God was God, then God could also be worshipped in Babylon – monotheism was born.  They dared to believe that they had a role in hosting the presence of God for all humankind and dreamed of a return to Jerusalem and the establishment of a ‘Holy Hill’ – Zion - to which all the nations of the world could be drawn. (Please forgive me for reflecting the UN hopes for Jerusalem are not new)!

Unfortunately, when the return occurred under the Persian, Cyrus, the particularity of being Jewish prevailed and any vision for hosting divine presence in harmony and peace for the world vanished.

Now, fast forward to Christ and the birth of Christianity.  Antagonism existed between those who claimed to be survivors of the long-lost Northern Kingdom of Israel, known as Samaritans, and the Jewish community focussed on the 2nd temple in Jerusalem.  Christ was asked in which place should God be worshipped. He answered – neither.

It is Christian belief that “in Christ God had been pleased to dwell”. If ‘Zion’ is the dwelling place of God, then Christ is that Zion.  Place has become person.  The presence of the living one, the risen one, the light of the world, the prince of peace is present for all humankind; at our best we Christians facilitate that presence, at our worst we get in the way.

There has never been a century in the last 2000 years when end times have not been immediately predicted. One of the ways in which some Christians seriously get in the way is by relinking, with zero justification, the living person who personifies ‘Zion’, with place.  These people, drawing on their interpretation of apocalyptic writings, foresee an end to this world as we understand it through the ‘coming of Christ’ in a final history of the Middle East. They have come to believe his coming will occur when Israel is all in all from the river to the sea. It is bizarre that these Christians, strong supporters of Zionist Israel, really have no interest in the long-term future of Israel, but in what they perceive to be the long awaited ‘end times’. 
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No, Zionism is totally and completely antithetical to Christian belief and it should be the obligation of all Christians everywhere to speak loudly and clearly in its condemnation, of course for Palestinians, but also for Israelis for what future is there for people who have become a pariah to everyone else.