By Dexter Van Zile, Algemeiner

January 25, 2012

It’s time for journalists, human rights activists and church leaders in the U.S. to confront the prospect of Christianity’s destruction in the region of its birth.

That’s the message that came out of a one-day conference that took place in Framingham, Massachusetts on Jan. 21, 2012. The conference, titled The Persecuted church: Christian Believers in Peril in the Middle East was sponsored by the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA), which is celebrating its 30th anniversary in 2012.
Andrea Levin, CAMERA’s executive director said the goal of the conference was to draw attention to the plight of Christians in the Middle East.

“If the media shines a light consistently and clearly on the persecution of Middle Eastern Christians, that can make a crucial difference in restraining potential violence,” she sa“Silence on the other hand may do the opposite.”

Walid Phares, a Maronite Christian from Lebanon and author of The Coming Revolution: The Fight for Freedom in the Middle East said Christians and other minorities have been the victims of violence for decades. “I lived through it in the 20th century. Now we’re all living it, trying to witness for it,” he said. “We have crossed the threshold of a new century and yet it’s still happening.”

Attendees of the conference heard testimony from Juliana Taimoorazy, founder of the Iraqi Christian relief council and Egyptian human rights activists Cynthia Farahat. Taimoorazy, who reported on the plight of Assyrians in Israq stated that since June 2004, churches in Iraq have been bombed more than 80 times. Sometimes, multiple churches would be bombed at the same time as part of a coordinated attack.

“Most of these attacks happened on Fridays, marking the day of Islamic prayer,” she said. Clergy have been routinely kidnapped and killed on a regular basis. Even children have been killed by Islamists, Taimoorazy reported.

“In October of 2006 – in the 21st century – a 14-year-old boy was crucified in Basra, in the center of the city,” she said.

Farahat reported that Copts are second-class citizens in their homeland

“But for me, as a woman and a Copt, I am a fourth-class citizen,” she said. “The first class citizen is the Egyptian Sunni Muslim male, the second class is the Sunni female. The third is the Christian male. The fourth is the Christian female. I’m a fourth-class Egyptian citizen with absolutely no legal rights.”

The plight of religious and ethnic minorities in Muslim and Arab majority countries in the Middle East has largely been ignored because of an obsession with the Arab-Israeli conflict, Phares said during his keynote address. Phares first witnessed this after immigrating to the U.S. from Lebanon in the 1990s.

“In the 1990s, if there as an incident in the West Bank, the son-in-law, the mom, the uncle of both sides would be interviewed and the psychologists would come in and talk about the deep roots of the conflict,” Phares said. “At the same time, two villages were burned in Egypt or the Kurds would be gassed. Zero [coverage] in the New York Times.”

Franck Salameh, assistant professor of Near Eastern Studies at Boston College, echoed Phares’ complaint.

“There’s clearly a prevailing hierarchy in the media’s treatment of Middle Eastern violence,” he said. “Some victims get airtime on prime time, all the time. Others simply don’t. Middle Eastern Christians are not a top priority. Those uncouth, cross-wearing primitives are not cause for curiosity. They are too Christian in a world plagued by political correctness, cultural relativism and a false conception fo the Middle East as an Arab Muslim preserve.”

Documenting attacks on Near Eastern minorities is not fashionable, Salameh said, because it is viewed as being anti-Arab and anti-Muslim and part of a Western attempt to divide a cultural and linguistic monolith. If this thinking were applied to North America, no one would talk about the plight or fate of Native Americans because it would be regarded as subversive to the Anglo-European paradigm.

“Middle Eastern minorities, Christians and Jews, are the native Americans of the Middle East,” Salameh said. “The dominant Arab-Muslim culture is indeed the colonizing intruder culture here.”

Richard Landes, associate professor of history at Boston University and author of Heaven on Earth: The Varieties of Millenial Experience reported that Islamists have worked assiduously to disarm Westerners by engaging in cognitive warfare against democracies. This cognitive warfare is pursued, Landes explained, by using self-criticism and concern for the other to undermine the ability of democracies to defend themselves. “The purpose of cognitive warfare is to turn your own people into patriots and your enemies into pacifists,” Landes said.

This strategy has had “staggering success” over the past few years, he said. The success is due to “an unholy marriage between pre-modern sadism and post modern masochism,” Landes said.

“The pre-moderns accuse us of the most vicious things in the world and we say, ‘You’re right, I’m sorry,” Landes joked.

Posted by Ted Belman, January 25, 2012

by Raymond Ibrahim
Stonegate Institute
January 5, 2012

The Nigerian church bombings, wherein the Islamic group Boko Haram killed over 40 people celebrating Christmas mass, is just the most obvious example of anti-Christian sentiment in December. Elsewhere around the Muslim world, Christmas time for Christians is a time of increased threats, harassment, and fear, which is not surprising, considering Muslim clerics maintain that “saying Merry Christmas is worse than fornication or killing someone.” A few examples:

• Egypt: The Coptic Church is being threatened with a repeat of “Nag Hammadi,” the area where drive-by Muslims shot to death six Christians as they exited church after celebrating Christmas mass in 2010. Due to fears of a repeat, the diocese has “cancel[ed] all festivities for New Year’s Eve and Christmas Eve.”
• Indonesia: In a “brutal act” that has “strongly affected the Catholic community,” days before Christmas, “vandals decapitated the statue of the Virgin Mary in a small grotto … a cross was stolen and the aspersorium was badly damaged.”
• Iran: There were reports of a sharp increase of activities against Christians prior to Christmas by the State Security centers of the Islamic Republic. Local churches were “ordered to cancel Christmas and New Year’s celebrations as a show of their compliance and support” for “the two month-long mourning activities of the Shia’ Moslems.”
• Malaysia: Parish priests and church youth leaders had to get “caroling” permits—requiring them to submit their full names and identity card numbers at police stations—simply to “visit their fellow church members and belt out ‘Joy to the World,’ [or] ‘Silent Night, Holy Night.’”
• Pakistan: “Intelligence reports warned of threats of terrorist attacks on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day,” adding that most church security is “inadequate.” Christians also lamented that “extreme power outages have become routine during Christmas and Easter seasons.”

Meanwhile, if Christians under Islam are forced to live like dhimmis—non-Muslims under Muslim authority, treated as second-class citizens—in the West, voluntarily playing the dhimmi to appease Muslims during Christmas time is commonplace: the University of London held Christmas service featuring readings from the Quran (which condemns the incarnation, that is, Christmas); and “a posh Montreal suburb has decided to remove a nativity scene and menorah from town hall rather than acquiesce to demands from a Muslim group to erect Islamic religious symbols.”

Categorized by theme, the rest of December’s batch of Muslim persecution of Christians around the world includes (but is not limited to) the following accounts, listed according to theme and in country alphabetical order, not necessarily severity.

CHURCH ATTACKS

Ethiopia: A video of some 500 Muslims burning down a church on November 29 while crying “Allahu Akbar!” appeared. The pretext for burning this church was that it had no “permit”—even though it was built on land owned by Christians for 60 years.

Indonesia: An “Islamic extremist” group is pushing hard to have five churches demolished, again, to claims that the churches have no permit. The congregation of another “embattled church” that Muslims are trying to shut down “was forced to move its Christmas prayers to a member’s house after Islamic groups assembled at the disputed site making threats.

Iran: While celebrating Christmas, a church was raided by State Security. All those present, including Sunday school children, were arrested and interrogated. Hundreds of Christian books were seized. The detained Christians suffered “considerable verbal abuses”; the whereabouts of others arrested, including the reverend and his wife, remain unknown. “Raids and detentions during the Christmas season are not uncommon in Iran, a Shi’a-majority country that is seen as one of the worst persecutors of religious minorities.”

Nigeria: Weeks before the Christmas Day church bombings, another jihadi attack, enabled by “local Muslims,” left five churches destroyed and several Christians killed: “The Muslims in this town were going round town pointing out church buildings and shops owned by Christians to members of Boko Haram, and they in turn bombed these churches and shops.”

Turkey: A large-scale al-Qaeda plot to bomb “all the churches in Ankara,” was exposed. An official indictment against al-Qaeda members earlier arrested revealed the homegrown terrorist cell’s plans to attack Ankara’s churches and their Christian clergy.

APOSTASY, BLASPHEMY, and PROSELYTISM

Algeria: In May, a Muslim convert to Christianity was sentenced to a five-year prison term on charges of “insulting Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, and with ‘proselytism’ for giving a Muslim a CD about Christianity.” Now the judge has decided “to indefinitely postpone” the man’s appeal, thus “show[ing how] the judicial system keeps Christians in limbo without officially punishing or acquitting them.”

Kashmir: The top Islamic clergyman launched a website against apostasy and the conversion of Muslims to Christianity. The website works to “check the conversion of young [Muslim] boys and girls [to Christianity]“; its “fundamental goal” is to “thwart catastrophic [Christian] missionary activities.”

Iran: Pastor Yousef Nadarkhani, who caught the attention of the world after being imprisoned and awaiting execution for leaving Islam, may have to wait another year for a ruling on whether the sentence will be upheld, as authorities continue to delay, in the hopes that the world will forget. Meanwhile, authorities continue “to pressure Nadarkhani to recant his faith,” giving him and ordering him to read “Islamic literature aimed at discrediting the Bible. The court reportedly has been told to use whatever means necessary to compel Nadarkhani to recant his faith.” Another convert to Christianity recently told of his experiences: “When my family and friends learned of my decision, they didn’t accept it and rejected me as a result. They made me leave our family home. In addition, my friends treated me like my family had and began calling me an apostate and an infidel. In Iran, anyone who converts to Christianity faces various problems. In spite of the love I had for my family, I had to leave my home. Everyone rejected me.”

Malaysia: Lamenting that “It could be hundreds, maybe even thousands” of Muslims converting to Christianity, a former state-commissioner has been “collecting data” to “persuade” the apostates to return to Islam: “We are helping them, hoping they will come back to Islam.” Likewise, the Sultan of Selangor, a Malaysian state, has ordered top-level Islamic organizations to take strategic steps against proselytism, “so that Muslims who have began distancing themselves from Islam will return to the fold and repent.”

Pakistan: After a Muslim family discovered their son had converted to Christianity, not only did “his father put up a notice in local newspapers disowning him,” but his family “file[d] a police complaint against him because—as a murtad or apostate deserving death—he was said to have committed “blasphemy.” Likewise, after a rent-related quarrel, a Muslim landlord accused his Christian tenant of desecrating the Quran, which led to crowds of Muslims surrounding the Christian’s house, making threats and hurling anti-Christian slogans; “Muslim leaders made announcements from several mosques calling for severe punishment.” He was arrested and charged under Pakistan’s “blasphemy” laws, which make willful desecration of the Quran punishable with life imprisonment.

VIOLENCE and KILLINGS

Kashmir: Christians imprisoned under “blasphemy” charges continue to be tortured. One was “seriously injured in a knife attack and was believed to be in a Lahore hospital on Christmas Day.”

Kenya: Seven Muslims of Somali descent beat a young Somali Christian unconscious, seriously injuring his eye, less than six weeks after a similar attack on his older brother, saying “we did not succeed in killing your brother, but today we are going to kill you.” His family was presumably Muslim when he was born, so the gang beat him as an “apostate” even though he was raised as a Christian.

Iraq: A rash of attacks on Christians erupted following a Friday mosque sermon, and included Muslim “mobs burning and wrecking [Christian] businesses. Later, Muslim gunmen shot and killed a Christian couple as they were walking towards their car; their two children were hurt but are still alive. New information has been received “on a plot against the Christian minority in Mosul during the upcoming Christmas and New Year holidays.”

Pakistan: A Muslim man murdered a Christian girl during an attempted rape: he had “grabbed the girl and, under the threat of a gun, tried to drag her away. The young Christian woman resisted, trying to escape the clutches of her attacker, when the man opened fire and killed her instantly, and later tried to conceal the corpse.” Though the man is described as a “young drifter and drug addict,” the ongoing sexual abuse of Christian women by Muslim men exposes how Christians are seen as second-class, to be abused with impunity.

Philippines: A 71-year old pastor was shot dead by two unidentified gunmen on board a motorcycle. “The [Mindanao] province is known for Christian pastors becoming victims of persecution. Just earlier this year, a lady pastor of a local Pentecostal church was hacked to death by suspected Moslem rebels in front of her daughter.”

Syria: “Around 50 Christians have been killed in the anti-government unrest in Homs, Syria, by both rebels and government forces, while many more are struggling to feed their families as the violence brings normal life in the city to a halt…. In one tragic incident, a young Christian boy was killed by the rebels, who filmed the murder and then claimed that government forces had committed the act. Another Christian was seized by the rebels, taken to a house and asked, ‘How do you want to die?’ The man completely broke down and was released but has been left in severe psychological distress.”

Uganda: Muslims threw acid on a church leader on Christmas Eve shortly after a revival at his church, leaving him with severe burns that have blinded one eye and threaten sight in the other. The pastor “was on his way back to the site for a party with the entire congregation and hundreds of new converts to Christianity when a man who claimed to be a Christian approached him. ‘I heard him say in a loud voice, Pastor, pastor, and as I made a turn and looked at him, he poured the liquid onto my face as others poured more liquid on my back and then fled away shouting, ‘Allahu Akbar.’”

DHIMMITUDE

[General Abuse, Debasement, and Suppression of non-Muslim "Second-Class Citizens"]

Egypt: Accusations that a 17-year-old Christian student posted a drawing of Islam’s prophet on Facebook triggered Muslim violence and havoc for two days (the student insists his friends posted the picture on his Facebook page). At least three Christian homes including the youth’s were burned to cries of “Allahu Akbar” and he was severely beat by Muslim classmates prior to being taken away by police. Demands that Christians pay jizya—tribute collected from non-Muslim infidels—are increasing. Also, Rif’at al-Said, head of Egypt’s Al Tagammu Party, proclaimed that Christians are right to be scared, some are packing and leaving, and that the “history of Egypt includes religious riots and oppression, and subsequent Christian emigration.”

Iraq: A Christian man was kidnapped and held for three days, during which his captors demanded a $500,000 ransom. He “was blindfolded and tied down during his ordeal” until “rescued by a SWAT team … to the great relief of his 21-year-old wife Amal and the local Christian community.”

Malaysia: An evangelical Christian leader may face charges of sedition following a statement he made concerning Article 153 of Malaysia’s Constitution, which he likened to “bullying” for only protecting the rights of Muslims.

Philippines: In Mindanao, where Muslims make 1/3 of the population, a 20-year-old Christian preschool learning center is being threatened with closure, under technicalities. Mindanao “has the highest incidence of persecuted Christians doing missionary work in the Philippines and it was also in this region where a suspected man lobbed a bomb grenade at visiting Christian missionaries … priests and missionaries have also been kidnapped.”

Saudi Arabia: Dozens of Ethiopian Christians were arrested for holding a prayer meeting, though under charges of “mixing with the opposite sex”: “the Saudi officials are accusing the Christians of committing the crime of mixing of sexes because if they charge them with meeting for practicing Christianity, they will come under pressure from the international human rights organizations as well as Western countries.”

About this Series

Because the persecution of Christians in the Islamic world is on its way to reaching epidemic proportions, “Muslim Persecution of Christians” was developed to collate some—by no means all—of the instances of Muslim persecution of Christians that surface each month. It serves two purposes:

1. Intrinsically, to document that which the mainstream media does not: the habitual, if not chronic, Muslim persecution of Christians.
2. Instrumentally, to show that such persecution is not “random,” but systematic and interrelated—that it is rooted in a worldview inspired by Sharia.

Accordingly, whatever the anecdote of persecution, it typically fits under a specific theme, including hatred for churches and other Christian symbols; sexual abuse of Christian women; forced conversions to Islam; apostasy and blasphemy laws; theft and plunder in lieu of jizya (tribute); overall expectations for Christians to behave like cowed “dhimmis” (second-class citizens); and simple violence and murder. Oftentimes it is a combination thereof.

Because these accounts of persecution span different ethnicities, languages, and locales—from Morocco in the west, to India in the east, and throughout the West wherever there are Muslims—it should be clear that one thing alone binds them: Islam—whether the strict application of Islamic Sharia law, or the supremacist culture born of it.

Raymond Ibrahim is a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and an Associate Fellow at the Middle East Forum.

http://www.meforum.org/3146/muslim-persecution-of-christians-december-2011

What the Media Does Not Want You To Know

by Raymond Ibrahim
Hudson New York
October 31, 2011

Western media coverage of the recent massacre of Coptic Christians in Cairo, Egypt—in which the military killed dozens of Christians and injured some 300—was, as discussed earlier, deplorable. It merely repeated the false propaganda of the complicit state-run media, without checking facts. Since then, further proofs of the lies and brutality surrounding the massacre have emerged; they are compiled in the following report which consists of facts and videos from Arabic sources—many of which have not appeared in the Western media.

This report documents: 1) the activities of the Supreme Military Council of Egypt and de facto ruler; 2) the lies and duplicitous tactics of both the Military Council and its media mouthpiece, Egyptian TV; and 3) the anti-Christian sentiment pervading all aspects of this incident.

The Egyptian Military

Along with a new report by Magdi Khalil asserting that the day before the planned march, a "death squad" of snipers hid atop buildings and shot at protesters, armored vehicles intentionally chased after and ran over protesters, killing and mutilating many:

• Here is perhaps the clearest video; it shows a high-speed armored vehicle willfully plowing over unsuspecting Christian demonstrators.
• This video shows another armored vehicle chasing protesters, and a soldier opening fire into the fleeing crowds.
• This video shows high-speed armored cars running amok in the middle of the crowds, including chasing protesters on the curb, as well as soldiers beating protesters.
• As for eyewitness testimonies attesting to the brutality of the massacre, they are many, and include Muslims.

The Tactics of the Military Council ( or "War is Deceit")

After the incident and notwithstanding crushing evidence, Egypt’s Military Council held a news conference wherein senior official, Mahmoud Hegazy, spun lie after lie: he stated that the military would "never, never" run over civilians; that the very idea was "impossible, impossible!" and "Shame on those who accuse the Egyptian military of such things!… Never has our military run over a single person, not even when combating the Enemy [Israel]."

Hegazy portrayed the Christian protesters as the aggressors, attacking and killing "honorable" soldiers. To prove his point, he showed an image of a protester on top of a stalled armored vehicle, throwing a rock at the soldier inside, and a video of a military vehicle—that he claimed was hijacked by a protester—driving wildly into the crowd.

Hegazy’s deceit lies in the fact that the "hijacked" vehicle running amok, and the one stalled and attacked by a protester, were one and the same vehicle: Al Dalil revealed that both vehicles had the same identification number. In other words, when the vehicle in which a soldier was chasing and running over protesters finally stalled, the protesters then attacked it. Egypt’s leaders willfully manipulated the footage to exonerate themselves and portray the Copts as violent aggressors.

Several eye-witnesses, including Muslims, further stated that, to hide the "evidence," they saw soldiers hurling the mutilated bodies of those run over into the nearby Nile River. Likewise, among the slain, a dead Muslim soldier, whom the military said was killed by protesters, was actually killed by friendly-fire—although there are indications that he may have died elsewhere, and his corpse thrown among the dead for show.

As Copts have long suspected, the "thugs" (al-baltagiyya) who always appear in protests attacking Christians seem to be men whom the military uses to create an excuse to open fire and exercise brutality. Muslim eyewitnesses say they saw the thugs coming with State Security: Al Dalil showed a video clip of a soldier exposed dressed as a civilian, interspersed among Coptic protesters, and other videos showing the thugs cooperating with the military.

This video might offer the greatest proof: Days before the massacre, when Copts were protesting the destruction of their latest church, around 20 Egyptian soldiers and security personnel captured a protester and mercilessly beat him (while calling him an "infidel," to put the beating in context). Mixed among the military (camouflage uniforms) and security (black uniforms) is what appears to be a plainclothes civilian, who proceeds to stab the Christian protestor in the head with a knife several times; the victim later received 20 stitches. The plainclothesman is most likely a member of the military or security, dressed as a civilian for stealth purposes, otherwise he would not have been able to move among them so casually.

The Role of the Egyptian State Media (or "War is Deceit")

"Egyptian TV"—demonstrating, unsurprisingly, that state-run media always serve dictatorial regimes—merely propagated the lies of the Military Council.

Even as armored vehicles were mowing down Christian protesters, Egyptian TV broadcast footage of reporters saying, "Help, the Copts are killing our heroic, patriotic soldiers and burning Qurans!" One segment on Egyptian TV had an outraged reporter condemning Christians—"as if they were the Israeli enemy"—for killing "our noble protectors [soldiers], who never once fired a single shot." As a result, many Muslims took to the streets brutally attacking Christians and their property.

Egyptian TV also lied by saying three soldiers died at the hands of Copts: officials at the TV station later confessed to making it up. That, however, did not stop a barrage of op-eds in Egypt blaming the Christians for their own massacre.

Due to Egyptian TV’s misinformation, several Egyptian reporters unequivocally condemned it. Anchorwoman Dina Rasmi said: "I am ashamed that I work at this despicable TV channel… Egyptian TV was effectively calling for civil war between Muslims and Christians… Egyptian TV has proven that it is a slave to those who rule." Another news anchor, Mahmoud Yousif, announced that he "washes his hands of what Egyptian TV is broadcasting."

Anti-Christian Hate

Although it should be clear that anti-Christian sentiment fueled this latest Muslim slaughter of Christian minorities, a few specifics follow:

• Soldiers screamed "Allahu Akbar!" (Islam’s primordial war-cry), and cursed "Infidels!" as they approached and attacked the protesters—which of course is not so unexpected when one considers that, even in olden times and in movies, the Egyptian military was called the Jihadiyya (the organization that wages holy war).
• A video of a soldier boasting that he shot a Christian in the chest is greeted by the crowd around him with "Allahu Akbar!"
• After the incident, Dr. Hind Hanafi, president of the University of Cairo, recommended separating wounded Christians from wounded Muslims admitted into the hospital, thereby institutionalizing religious discrimination, even in hospitals.

Conclusion

A massacre at this level never occurred during the thirty-year reign of ousted president Hosni Mubarak, and yet Mubarak is being charged with "crimes against Egyptians." What about the Military Council? It has committed greater crimes—even though it has been in charge for less than a year. Saddam Hussein was condemned by the international community for using chemicals on his own people; where are the international community, the media, and the so-called human rights groups when it comes to a government running over its own civilians with armored vehicles and having "death squads" of snipers shooting at them?

Finally, if this report testifies to crimes against humanity, consider what it says about diplomacy: If Egyptian leadership lies and deceives to suppress its internal "infidel" citizens—whose "crime" was to object to the continual destruction of their churches—how credible can it be to external "infidels," Israel and the U.S.?

Raymond Ibrahim is a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and an Associate Fellow at the Middle East Forum.

http://www.meforum.org/3086/egypt-massacre-christians-media

On the surface, Israel is everything outsiders expect it to be: Nationalistic, obsessed with the past and segregated. But venture beyond those first impressions and you’ll discover an Israel that is the exact opposite of all those things.

"I haven’t come here as a pilgrim seeking salvation, but as an observer struggling to make sense of a country and a region where it feels as if anything — war, the fall of despots, visions of angels, even peace between Israelis and Palestinians — might happen."

By Tyrone Beason, Seattle Times, October 23, 2011

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Photo: MICHAEL TEMCHINE / THE WASHINGTON POST

 Tel Aviv, "the city that never sleeps," is the bustling cultural capital of a nation where the interplay between the religious and the secular, the ancient and the modern, never ceases to surprise. In this snapshot, taken with a camera phone using the Hipstamatic application, a man appears to be meditating in the city’s Magen David Square.

JUST STEPS inside Jerusalem’s Church of the Holy Sepulchre, built on what’s thought to be the site of Jesus Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection, Orthodox Christian pilgrims from Eastern Europe drop to their knees around a red marble slab known as the Stone of the Anointing.

Most of the genuflecting pilgrims are elderly women, dressed in simple frocks and headscarves, whose tired expressions make it seem as if they have trekked to Christendom’s holiest place on foot. And given the heightened level of religious devotion on display among the Christians, Jews and Muslims who pray in parallel piety here in Jerusalem’s Old City, some of them may have done just that.

But as I approach the stone, which commemorates the spot where Jesus was anointed with oils and wrapped in linen in preparation for burial, I realize the look on their faces is more like ecstasy than exhaustion. It is an intense, almost disturbing sort of joy, not like happiness but more like triumphal relief at having arrived at the birthplace of their religion.

The women pull vials of oil from their bags, dab a little in their palms, spread their arms over the stone and lay hands on it, massaging its creased surface to a high sheen in a ritual that recalls the original anointing. They bend down and kiss the stone and chant lamentations over it, surrendering to this moment of communion with the divine.

At first it feels inappropriate to play voyeur at this scene, a little like peering into someone’s living room through a crack in the door. But this is Israel, the Holy Land, where religion is a very public matter.

You have to get used to bumping into people who are so intent on siphoning the magic running through sacred stones and worship halls they don’t even know you’re there.

The women slap down trinkets and heirlooms belonging to loved ones and rub them against the anointing stone, coating them with holiness.

I step back and take it all in.  

Then I spot a clearing on the floor among the praying women. I swoop in to fill the space, kneel, slide an index finger across the stone and wait for a reaction.

But while my hand smells of resinous oils, no holy current runs through me.

That’s OK. I haven’t come here as a pilgrim seeking salvation, but as an observer struggling to make sense of a country and a region where it feels as if anything — war, the fall of despots, visions of angels, even peace between Israelis and Palestinians — might happen.

On my most recent visit, the Middle East and North Africa are still in the throes of the "Arab Spring," a democracy movement that would have been unthinkable a decade ago.

Meanwhile, uneasiness hangs over Israel, whose security is tied to the fate of peace agreements and cease-fires with its Arab neighbors. Israelis understand the volatile fusion of grievance and protest very well.

This sliver of a nation is crammed with 7.4 million people, mostly Jews. But Muslims, Christians, Druze and nomadic Bedouins make up about a quarter of the population. The land is riven by political fissures that go back generations and actual barriers that divide Israel proper and Palestinian-controlled lands in the form of security walls, checkpoints and restricted highways.

The tense political situation, as well as opposition among many Westerners to Israel’s dealings with the Palestinians, keeps some tourists away, which is a shame.

A visitor will be struck by how easy it is, in moments of public prayer in Jerusalem’s charming Old City, on visits to cities that hardly ever make the news, at family gatherings marking a bewildering array of holidays or on strolls along sparkling beaches, to fall under the country’s peculiar spell.

Even more remarkable is the ability of Israelis, funny and cantankerous in equal measure, to achieve something resembling calm on a landscape that is, as the "Danger . . . Mines!" signs dotting the bucolic pastures of the Golan Heights near Syria remind you, literally a battlefield.

It’s only when you start to understand the unique vibe of Israelis, who work, pray, party, bicker and battle like there’s no tomorrow, that you can fully appreciate this country’s extremes.

On the surface, Israel is everything outsiders expect it to be: Nationalistic, obsessed with the past and segregated. But venture beyond those first impressions and you’ll discover an Israel that is the exact opposite of all those things.

There’s a telling passage in a memoir published last year by the NBC Middle East correspondent Martin Fletcher, "Walking Israel: A Personal Search for the Soul of a Nation." Writing about covering conflicts here and meeting Israelis on his coastal sojourn in preparation for the book, he argues that "the tangled and complex stories" of the country’s people "defy the accepted simple narrative of Jews against Arabs."

"One man’s triumph is another man’s sorrow," Fletcher writes. But "no Jew or Arab should celebrate too loudly, because sure as hell, his turn could be next."

This is a land divided, but the realities of its people are tightly bound.

On three visits to Israel, what has struck me is the bittersweet sense of possibility just within reach but untapped. That its people live like there’s no tomorrow, as Fletcher puts it, may not reflect nihilism but shrewdly calculated hope.

TRANQUILLITY AND peace of mind come in cherished rations for the people of Israel.

Boisterous reverie, on the other hand, comes easily.

It is the end of the Jewish Passover holiday, and I’ve been invited to a garden party at the home of a Moroccan-Jewish family in Hadera, a town north of Tel Aviv.

In Morocco, the occasion is called Mimouna, and it’s customary for Jewish families there to throw open their doors to friends and neighbors, and celebrate the end of a period of reflection and restrictions against leavened bread with a festival of doughy delights. The tradition lives on among the Moroccan-Jewish households of Israel.

In the backyard of the family’s home, platters of colorful sweets and pastries line a long, candlelit table set with bowls of butter, dates, jams and honey.

Holiday lights stream overhead, and percussive North African dance music fills the air. The hosts have even placed elaborate Easter baskets, a decidedly Christian and Western symbol, throughout the yard to further lighten the atmosphere.

The main attractions of the Mimouna party are a deep-fried, doughy pastry called sfinge, and moufleta, a fried flatbread that comes out of the kitchen steaming hot and stacked like pancakes. The women cooking up these treats indoors shake their hips to the loud music and tell jokes in Hebrew as they serve up the food.

The idea is to tear off a piece of the moufleta, dip it in the condiments and enjoy. In practice, eating a moufleta creates a finger-licking mess. But nobody’s feeling particularly self-conscious.

As relatives and friends file in, shot glasses are filled and refilled (and refilled) with vodka as community gossip shimmies around the table.

Is this a sign of everyday existence or just a snapshot in time, destined to fade with the next reports of rockets fired into Israel from militant strongholds or controversy over Israeli settlements?

Is it magical thinking, as the late Palestinian intellectual Edward Said might have put it, to regard the party as anything but a respite in a not-so-cold war?

I’m too woozy from shots and sugar to ponder these questions tonight.

The next morning, I’m off again to Jerusalem.

IT DOESN’T take long to understand why Israel’s seat of government, perched high in the evergreen-clad Judean hills, is such a flash point. It is a largely Jewish city that happens to be located at the heart of the overwhelmingly Muslim Middle East.

From Jerusalem’s walled Old City, it is only 44 miles to Jordan’s capital Amman, 48 miles to Gaza City by the Mediterranean coast, 135 miles to Syria’s capital Damascus, 145 miles to the Lebanese capital Beirut and 246 miles to the Egyptian capital Cairo. Ramallah, the West Bank’s bustling chief city, and Palestinian refugee camps may be worlds away politically but lie just a few miles down the road as the crow flies.

There’s probably no better place to witness Jerusalem’s importance to Muslims than the majestic, golden Dome of the Rock, a shrine covering the believed location of the Prophet Muhammad’s ascension to heaven, where he met with Moses, Jesus and Abraham and received instructions from God. The building sits on the Temple Mount, which happens to be the holiest spot in Judaism. Non-Muslims can enter the complex, but not the shrine itself, for only an hour after lunch on weekdays.

A welcome serenity sweeps across the expansive plaza that surrounds the octagonal shrine’s dizzyingly ornate blue, white, yellow and green porcelain base. Arab children play soccer on the pavements. Clusters of vacationing Muslim women, covered head to toe, pose for pictures. A man with freshly washed bare feet orients his internal compass toward Mecca, kneels with his forehead touching the ground and completes his afternoon prayers.

But Israel can feel as if it’s spinning on two alternating axes, one religious and the other decidedly secular.

Jerusalem’s intensely religious character presents a stark contrast to other parts of the country. Certainly its atmosphere differs from the nudist hideaways of Ga’ash Beach on the coast, the rolling vineyards around the Sea of Galilee with its tourists wading hip-deep in the lake where Jesus is said to have walked on water, the minaret-studded Muslim towns up by the border with Lebanon and Eilat’s sweltering Red Sea resorts. The contrast is especially vivid in Tel Aviv.

"ONLY TWO kinds of creature get fun in the desert — Bedouins and gods," Mr. Dryden warns British Lieut. Col. T.E. Lawrence in the classic film "Lawrence of Arabia."

If only Mr. Dryden could see Israel’s simmering, cosmopolitan cultural capital today.

If Jerusalem, overcrowded with religious devotees in traditional dress, is wrapped up in the past, Tel Aviv, full of pretty young things, designers and entrepreneurs, is preoccupied with the here-and-now.

From the 20-somethings who throng patio lounges set in Rothschild Boulevard’s futuristic Bauhaus buildings to children riding bikes along the undulating wooden boardwalk of the city’s northern seafront to the Arab servers animatedly barking out orders at the famous Abu Hassan hummus emporium in the adjacent city of Jaffa, Tel Aviv’s easygoing spirit comes as a breath of fresh air.

Still, even in this aggressively modern city, the country’s complexity is on full display.

The golden sands of Tel Aviv’s coastline, a gift brought in by sea currents from Egypt’s Nile Delta, offer the perfect backdrop for contemplating the crazy interplay between enchanted nostalgia and refuge-seeking aspiration that characterizes Israel.

The country today is shaped just as forcefully by human currents — Jews fleeing repression in Europe and North Africa, Palestinians uprooted from homes and towns in countless land disputes, and smaller streams of yearning immigrants such as the Black Hebrews, who emigrated from cities like Cleveland and Detroit and settled among the ancient spice-trading routes and stunning natural craters of the vast Negev Desert.

But to get a wide-angle view of Israel’s evolution, which is marked by the ebb and flow not just of exiles but of emperors, legends and libertines, find a hilltop perch in Jaffa overlooking its 4,000-year-old port.

Tumbling down toward the water is a picturesque village full of cobblestone streets and taxing stairways that some believe were built by one of Noah’s sons. St. Peter took shelter in Jaffa, and the Egyptians, King David, the Romans, the Crusaders, the Ottomans, Napoleon and the British all fought over it.

Pan across the choppy waters to where the prophet Jonah fled from God (only to be swallowed and spat up by a whale) and where Poseidon chained Andromeda to sea rocks. Stretching northward is Tel Aviv’s procession of high-rise hotels, condos and sunbathers more interested in catching a tan.

Or spend the afternoon roaming the narrow side streets of the bourgeois-bohemian district of Neve Tzedek, Tel Aviv’s original settlement after Jews drifted out of Jaffa’s Arab-dominated neighborhoods a century ago, and retreat into a world of tiny, pastel-colored houses, art galleries, cafes, workshops and million-dollar apartments.

The hairpin turns of a journey around this perpetually on-edge nation will induce the lightheadedness that comes not from fervent prayer but from having your expectations turned upside down.

Like Tel Aviv, the coastal city of Acre, a 90-minute drive to the north, offers something surprising. On a previous visit to Israel, I arrived in the city at the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

The town is notable as one of the few places in Israel where Muslims and Jews live more or less in harmony.

On this summer evening, though, its walled old city was chaotic with celebration as Muslims marked the end of a month of fasting. Whole families rolled down the narrow streets on horse-drawn wagons blaring Arabic-language pop songs while vendors served up spicy kebabs, luscious baklava and fresh-squeezed pomegranate juice, and well-dressed couples sipped tea on covered terraces overlooking the pounding surf. Groups of young men chilled on the streets in plastic chairs, sucking on flavored-water pipes and spying cute young women out of the corners of their eyes.

Like the Mimouna party, the mood was unabashedly cheerful.

Maybe this is what normality in a conflicted land looks like, after all.

ON THE WAY from Eilat to the ancient, "rose-red city" of Petra in southern Jordan this spring, the scenes roll by like a Technicolor dream.

We emerge from a gorge lined with craggy pink mountains streaked with vertical black-granite stripes into a sea of orange sand. A wind storm kicks up swirling clouds of dust that make the jutting rock formations of the distant Wadi Rum look like rampaging giants, a spectacle that surely must have impressed the real-life T.E. Lawrence, who crossed that desert during another great Arab revolt.

Walking with my head upturned in amazement through a dramatic, mile-long gash in the towering sandstone cliffs, where the Nabateans carved iconic temples 2,000 years ago and Indiana Jones found the Holy Grail in a 1989 summer blockbuster, I’m again reminded of the sheer romance of travel in the Middle East.

Returning to the border crossing with Israel, though, I’m snapped back into reality when I am told to step into a private side room for "secondary screening."

An Israeli border agent orders me to spread my arms. He methodically rubs and squeezes his way up one side of my body and down the other, then slides his hands down the inside of the front and back of my jeans, before waving his handheld metal detector against those same private areas for good measure.

He gives me the all-clear, with no explanation.

But I don’t let the experience ruin my travel high.

A verse in the biblical book of Hebrews says, "Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."

The Jews and Muslims of Israel don’t place much faith in the stumbling diplomacy playing out at the highest levels of government, but at street level — in the markets, in hummus joints, in mixed towns and at recent multiethnic demonstrations against the rising cost of living — little breakthroughs offer glimmers of what’s hoped for on a grander scale.

So I decide it’s more fitting to freeze-frame on the last thing I saw as I walked out of Jordan into Israel, a giant sign with a single word written in Arabic, Hebrew and English and depicted by flying doves:

Peace.

Tyrone Beason is a Pacific Northwest magazine staff writer.

The Feast of Tabernacles is simply loaded with rich spiritual and symbolic significance. Those who truly submit themselves to God’s command to assemble for eight days with other worshipers “in the place which he shall choose to place his name” for worship and instruction find it incredibly rewarding. Their understanding and appreciation of it grows year by year.

Joel Hilliker Columnist

October 12, 2011 | From theTrumpet.com

It’s about joy and thanksgiving—but that’s really only the start!

Scrolling through the am radio dial a few days ago, I stopped short at a mention of the words “Feast of Tabernacles.”

Aha! I keep this festival—have my whole life. It is the highlight of every year. Very rare to hear it mentioned on the radio though.

“The 2011 Feast of Tabernacles features must-hear speakers at Cornerstone Church, October 28th through the 30th,” the radio ad began.

This really intrigued me, for a couple of reasons.

This church’s website gives some important history of this biblically mandated observance: “Leviticus 23:33-43, Numbers 29:12-39 and Deuteronomy 16:13-16 all describe the details of this unique feast,” it says. “‘Sukkot’ [the feast’s Hebrew name] commences the 15th day of ‘Tishri’ [the seventh month on the Hebrew calendar], five days after Yom Kippur or the day of Atonement. It lasts seven days, with an eighth day, Sh’mini Atzeret, spent as an added day of rest. This feast occurs during late September or October.”

All true. This year, Tishri 15 is tomorrow; thus, the opening night of the feast is tonight at sunset (which is when Scripture reckons the beginning of a day—e.g. Leviticus 23:32). After this weeklong festival, at sunset of next Wednesday begins the Last Great Day.

This is why it struck me as odd that that church decided it will celebrate “Tabernacles” more than two weeks late, and for only three days. Scripture commands seven days starting on Tishri 15, followed by another festival on Tishri 22. These folks go three days from Tishri 30 through Cheshvan 2 and say close enough.

An extremely important biblical principle I have come to appreciate over the years is encapsulated in Psalm 111:10: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do his commandments.” Take another look at that. Proper reverence and respect for God leads to wisdom. Obedience to God’s commandments precedes understanding. The corollary is this: People who refuse to obey biblical instructions they don’t understand to their satisfaction are guaranteeing they’ll never understand them. As Jesus said, God hides His truth from those who are wise in their own sight, and reveals it to “babes” (Matthew 11:25).

Early in his married life, Herbert W. Armstrong began studying the Scriptures and found the commands to observe the Feast of Tabernacles and six other annual festivals. “I did not know why!” he wrote. “I knew only that God said ‘Do it!’ My wife and I did—alone! For seven years!” (Good News, May 1981). At that point, congregations of what would later become the Worldwide Church of God began to form, and the Armstrongs kept those biblical festivals with the congregants for seven more years—still not understanding their spiritual meaning. “For 14 years we kept these annual days holy because we saw that God commanded it. We wanted to obey! In due time God revealed to me, and I to the Church, why! … God’s days have meaning, and this meaning God wants us to understand. That’s why they are repeated yearly.”

The Feast of Tabernacles is simply loaded with rich spiritual and symbolic significance. Those who truly submit themselves to God’s command to assemble for eight days with other worshipers “in the place which he shall choose to place his name” for worship and instruction find it incredibly rewarding. Their understanding and appreciation of it grows year by year.

This church that keeps a three-day “Tabernacles” conference of their choosing says the feast’s major theme is “joy and thanksgiving.” In a shallow sense that is true. But in truth, the major theme of the feast is something far more awesome.

Another name for this event is the “feast of ingathering.” Yes, it was meant celebrate the ingathering of the harvest of late summer or early autumn (e.g. Leviticus 23:39). However, as Mr. Armstrong came to see after years of festival-keeping, many other scriptures show that it pictures a prophesied ingathering of the great harvest of human beings, begotten by the Holy Spirit, into the Family of God during the thousand-year period known as the Millennium. (You can read scriptural proof of this in Mr. Armstrong’s booklet Pagan Holidays, or God’s Holy Days—Which?)

Anciently the Israelites celebrated the feast by traveling to Jerusalem and living in booths, or temporary dwellings. It was a massive, literal ingathering of peoples from all over the land. This merry scene anticipated the time in the World Tomorrow when people of all nations will gather in Jerusalem to keep the feast (Zechariah 14:16).

Today, feast-goers from many countries assemble at a handful of pre-selected and organized feast sites around the world. Uprooted from our normal lives, we meet, worship and fellowship together with people of all different ages, different races, different backgrounds and personalities—yet as one spiritual family, all joined by one spirit.

The festival theme of rejoicing is established in Deuteronomy 16:13-15. “This will be a happy time of rejoicing together with your family,” says verse 14 in the Living Bible. The feast is meant to unite parents with their children: “thou shalt rejoice in thy feast, thou, and thy son, and thy daughter,” it says. Bring the servants, too! Clearly few people have servants today, but consider how much this instruction separated Israel from surrounding nations. At the feast, God wants no one excluded—which makes sense when you understand that this festival pictures the time when God opens His Family up to everybody!

This passage tells people not to forget the Levites, or those in the ministry. At a proper feast celebration, God’s ministers are full participants in all activities, rubbing shoulders with everyone in the spiritual family. Foreigners, people from other countries, are also included. The widows and fatherless, those without physical family, are deeply involved. No one is neglected. Everyone does his or her part not only to rejoice, but also to see that everyone rejoices!

We thus picture the time, vividly prophesied in the Bible, when the whole world will live together in peace and harmony under God! It is a spectacular means by which God demonstrates the grandeur of life in His eternal Family.

As I said, I have been keeping the Feast of Tabernacles my whole life, and it truly does get better every year. Obeying the commandment as God gave it brings unanticipated blessings and rewards, not the least of which is an enhanced understanding of the tremendous prophetic vision wrapped up in this magnificent holy day. •

Joel Hilliker’s column appears every Wednesday.
To e-mail Joel Hilliker, click here.
To read more articles by this author, click here.

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Copyright © 2011 Philadelphia Church of God, All Rights Reserved.

Posted By AFP On October 10, 2011  Reprinted from DAWN.com

More then 200 people were injured in fighting that erupted during a protest by Copts on Sunday, prompting a curfew in central Cairo, said official statements broadcast on public television. – AFP Photo

CAIRO: A curfew was imposed overnight in Egypt’s capital after 24 people, mostly Coptic Christians, died in clashes with security forces in the deadliest violence since President Hosni Mubarak’s fall.

More then 200 people were injured in fighting that erupted during a protest by Copts on Sunday, prompting a curfew in central Cairo, said official statements broadcast on public television.

At least five of the dead were mown down by a speeding army vehicle, a priest from the minority Coptic community said, while an AFP correspondent saw other bodies with gunshot wounds.

Some activists blamed government-backed provocation for the bloodshed which has triggered fears of worsening sectarian strife.

Prime Minister Essam Sharaf appealed for Egypt’s Muslims and Christians “not to give in to sedition because it is a fire which burns up everybody”.

As the military police gave assurances that calm had returned to the capital, Sharaf warned on public television that Egypt was “in danger” following the most serious clashes since Mubarak was ousted in February.

Sharaf, appointed by the military council that took power after mass protests led to Mubarak’s downfall, heads a caretaker government ahead of elections the council has pledged will be democratic.

A 2:00 am (0000 GMT) to 7:00 am curfew was declared in the area from Maspero to Abbassiya square, while security was stepped up around parliament and other official buildings in central Cairo.

“These events have brought us backwards… instead of moving forward to construct a modern state on a healthy democratic basis,” Sharaf said.

The clashes broke out during a demonstration in the Maspero district on the Nile, an AFP correspondent said after counting bodies at a Coptic hospital.

Amid scenes of mayhem at the hospital which was filled with grieving relatives, a priest named Daud told AFP at least five of those killed were mowed down by an army vehicle.

“Here is the brain” of one of them, he said, pointing to white matter in a plastic bag next to the body and disfigured face of a dead man. “Wael, wake up my dear Wael. Speak to me,” sobbed his sister in despair.

Other bodies bore gunshot wounds.

State television reported that three soldiers were shot dead and dozens of their comrades wounded as angry Copts wielding batons protested over the burning last month of a church in Aswan, southern Egypt.

“They fired at my colleague. He was standing next to me  Christians, sons of dogs,” one wounded soldier said on the television.

Later Sunday night, hundreds of Muslims and Coptic Christians exchanged blows and threw stones at the hospital treating the wounded from the earlier clashes, an AFP journalist witnessed.

The hospital morgue housed the bodies of those killed.

Some 200 to 300 protesters marched on the hospital to meet up with several hundred Christians already gathered there, including family members of the dead and wounded.

Several cars were set on fire in a wide street next to the hospital, and protesters were tapping the cars to make petrol bombs.

Users of social networking sites such as Twitter said the earlier clashes were provoked by thugs at the scene, while state television was accused of fanning anti-Coptic sentiment.

The prime minister said on his Facebook page, “What is taking place are not clashes between Muslims and Christians but attempts to provoke chaos and dissent.”

The protesters clashed with anti-riot police and soldiers guarding the state television building, after thousands took part in a protest march from the Shobra district.

A standoff degenerated as the demonstrators started hurling stones and set fire to two cars, an AFP correspondent said. The television channel said that an army vehicle was burnt.

Security forces fired into the air to disperse the crowd, and dozens of people fled.

“Down with the marshal,” the demonstrators chanted on the march to Maspero, referring to Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, who heads the military council.

Copts complain of systematic discrimination, but since Mubarak’s fall, tensions have also mounted between the military — initially hailed for not siding with Mubarak – and groups that spearheaded the revolt, which say the army is reluctant to carry out genuine reforms.

Sectarian clashes are frequent in Egypt, where the Coptic minority, which makes up about 10 percent of the Muslim-majority country’s 80 million people, has often been the target of attacks.

Hundreds of Copts took part in a protest last Tuesday outside the state television building over the September 30 burning of a church in the southern province of Aswan, demanding that its governor be sacked.

The church in Merinab village was attacked after governor Mustafa al-Seyyed was reported as saying Copts had built it without the required planning permission, according to state television.

The caretaker cabinet has pledged to reopen closed churches and ease church building restrictions.

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Reprinted from Africa Review

By DALLIA M. ABDEL MONIEM Posted Thursday, October 6  2011 at  10:11

History teaches us that with change, with revolution, comes improvement. But it seems that is not always the case, especially if the improvement is expected but fails to materialise.

For many of Egypt’s Coptic population, things have become worse rather than better. The latest statistics from the Egyptian Union of Human Rights Organizations (EUOHR) show that since March, nearly 100,000 Egyptian Copts have left the country with the number possibly rising to 250,000 by the end of this year. Though some skeptics have questioned the number, saying it is “exaggerated”, there is nonetheless a genuine concern and fear that the increasing levels of sectarian violence will lead to a mass exodus of Egypt’s Christian community, who form 10 per cent of the country’s population.

According to Naguib Gobrail, a lawyer and the head of EUOHR, the latest bout of destruction of Christian places of worship is part of a “systematic policy of ethnic cleansing” by Salafi (hard-line Islamist) groups targeting Copts. Speaking at a press conference plaintively named ‘The Cry of the Copt’ and held only two days after a church attack, Gobrial lamented that “Copts feel like strangers in their own country; many are being forced to leave Egypt as a result.”

The attack on the Mari Girgis (St. George) church in Upper Egypt was the latest that has seen Christian establishments targeted. According to eyewitness accounts, a number of Muslim men surrounded the church in the village of El-Marinab near the city of Edfu, set fire to parts of it and then proceeded to move onto Coptic homes in the area as well as Christian-owned businesses.

The attack was the most recent in a continuing spate of similar violent acts against the Coptic Christian community. On New Year’s Eve, a church in Alexandria was bombed leaving 23 people dead. In May, clashes in the Cairo suburb of Imbaba saw 12 people killed and 52 wounded over rumours that Christians had kidnapped a woman who had converted to Islam. The spiralling violence led to the burning of a church on May 7, for which 48 Muslims and Christians are being tried in a criminal court.

Other incidents have included Coptic girls being forced to wear the veil to public schools and one man’s ear getting chopped off by hardliners.

The Salafis

The governor of Aswan, Mostafa El-Said, stated on state television the clashes erupted when the Christian community “unlawfully tried to add more floors” to a Christian guest house, adjacent to the church, with “the intention of turning it into a church which provoked the Muslims,” as the permission was only for an added 9 metres but had been exceeded to 13. He added that the Christian community should apologise and denied the clashes were violent, a statement that angered many Copts.

The governor’s assertion that the attack was not on the church but a service centre was disproved by Gobrial at the press conference where he displayed documents confirming the partly burnt down building was the Mare Girgis Church.

These building regulations have been at the heart of various clashes between Muslim and Coptic Christian, especially in regard to the issue of building new churches or expanding established ones. It’s a commonly held belief by most Egyptian Christians that the law governing the construction and repair of churches imposes more conditions, and is more restrictive and complicated, involving as it does a long and difficult process of bureaucratic red tape – whereas Muslims can build a mosque anywhere.

For years many activists and observers have called for a more unified law for houses of worship and in June a new unified house of worship law was passed. The new law says the Ministry of Local Development will issue the permit, then the Ministry of Religious Endowment or the representative of the religious group will provide written consent. Finally, the governor approves or rejects the permit within three months (otherwise approving the permit by default).

The religious community cannot appeal the governor’s rejection of a permit through the administrative courts. Furthermore, no house of worship can be built closer than 1,000 metres to another church or mosque and that all places of worship will be under the Central Auditing Agency’s supervision. Needless to say, both Christian and Muslim community representatives have cried foul at the law, with each side believing there are points to the law that are unfair to them.

But as of yet, attacks against churches continue with Gobrial pointing the finger of blame squarely at the Salafis, those who adhere to a very strict and hard-line interpretation of Islam, saying: "Their teachings are extreme. They call us infidels and burn our churches. They don’t consider us as citizens; to them we are strangers to this land.”

It should be noted, however, that Egypt’s largest Islamic group, the Muslim Brotherhood, has stressed the Christians’ right to the presidency and accepted them as members in its political arm, the Freedom and Justice Party.

| Full Story

From Dovid Efune, Dir. Algemeiner Journal

From the author: After seeing a list of the world’s richest Jews (in JPost, gave rise to much controversy on why the list was made at all, ed.), I was inspired to create a list of my own — not of Jews, but of non-Jews, specifically those that are having the most positive influence in shaping the Jewish future.

A year later, much has changed, new figures have emerged, others have faded and some have remained. But the importance of bringing attention to this group is constant. For this reason I have sought to make this a regular endeavor, as such I present the second-annual list.

Similar to the criteria used by other list makers, I chose my candidates from around the world and from all walks of life. The list includes, politicians, activists, business giants and more, all of whom have made a significant constructive impact on Israel and the Jewish world. Last year I only listed the top six, but wanted to make the list slightly more comprehensive, so it is now expanded to include the top 10. They are in ascending order.

Although by no means an exact science, my aim in this compilation, is to provide some insight into the playing field of this unique yet modest group. Additionally I aim to provide a glimpse at their often courageous, sometimes unacknowledged activities on behalf of Israel and the Jewish people.  

10. Julie Burchill
Columnist and novelist
Currently a columnist for The Independent, she has written for newspapers such as The Sunday Times and The Guardian. The Jewish Chronicle described her in 2008 as "Israel’s staunchest supporter in the UK media."

9. Jon Voight
Actor
Supporter of Jewish causes, most notably Chabad, Voight is also a prolific spokesman for Israel. A rarity in Hollywood circles, he has advocated for Jewish values, consistently reaching an often indifferent audience.

8. Patrick Debois
Founder, Yahad-In Unum
A Roman Catholic priest, Debois is head of the Commission for Relations with Judaism of the French Bishops’ Conference and Consultant to the Vatican. He is the co-founder and president of Yahad-In Unum, an organization whose mission is to document the murder of the 1.5 million Jews of Ukraine, shot dead by the Nazis and buried throughout the country. This work is vital in ensuring that the memory of these victims will not fade with the death of the last witnesses.

7. John Hagee
Founder, Christians United for Israel
Hagee’s Christians United for Israel continues to experience rapid growth, now boasting upwards of 600,000 members. The group makes significant contributions to Jewish causes, and has become a potent political force in support of Israel. Author of "Jerusalem Countdown" and "In Defense of Israel," the pastor from San Antonio has met with every Israeli prime minister since Menachem Begin and his ministries have given more than $8.5 million to bring Jews from the former Soviet Union to Israel.

6. Warren Buffet
Investor
The famed investor has been a strong supporter of Israeli innovation, and has bought into it significantly. Last year, while visiting the country, he famously said that "Israel has shown that it has a disproportionate amount of brains and energy." Buffet’s strong statement of confidence has gone a long way in encouraging significant foreign investment in the Jewish State.

5. Jose Maria Aznar
Former Prime Minister of Spain
In 2010, Aznar founded the Friends of Israel Initiative, with the stated goal to "counter the attempts to delegitimize the State of Israel and its right to live in peace within safe and defensible borders." Referring to the ill-fated takeover of the Mavi Marmara by Israeli commandos, Aznar said in 2010 that the world must support Israel because "if it goes down, we all go down." His unique organization provides a strong voice of reason in circles where it might otherwise not be heard.

4. Manmohan Singh
Prime Minister of India
The largest customer of Israeli military equipment and Israel’s second-largest economic partner, Indian ties with Israel are now stronger than ever and advanced negotiations for an extensive bilateral trade pact are well under way. Singh is largely responsible for cultivating and developing this crucial alliance that is vital to Israel’s economic stability and continued growth.

3. John Boehner
Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives
Among the many friends of the Jewish community in the U.S. Congress, Boehner’s recent actions have made him stand out. Centrally involved in the recent invitation of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress, Boehner provided the platform for the Jewish narrative to be conveyed to a pivotal audience at an important time.

2. Rupert Murdoch
CEO of News Corporation
At an American Jewish Committee dinner honoring Murdoch he opened his acceptance speech by saying, "over the years, some of my wildest critics seem to have assumed I am Jewish. At the same time, some of my closest friends wish I were. So tonight, let me set the record straight: I live in New York. I have a wife who craves Chinese food. And people I trust tell me I practically invented the word chutzpah."

As CEO of News Corporation, Murdoch has continued to ensure that the outlets under his direction, including The London Times, Fox News and The Wall Street Journal, are fair and honest in their coverage of matters relating to Jews and Israel.

1. Stephen Harper
Prime Minister of Canada
Recently winning a majority government for his conservative party, Harper has been a great friend to Canada’s Jewish community as well as an outspoken supporter of Israeli positions in the international political arena, saying last year, "When Israel, the only country in the world whose very existence is under attack, is consistently and conspicuously singled out for condemnation, I believe we are morally obligated to take a stand."

His recent blocking of a G8 resolution in support of President Obama’s Middle East policy speech that would mention the call for a Palestinian State based on the 1967 lines, while not incorporating other elements of the speech, earns him the top spot this year.

OSSUARY YIELDS NEW DETAIL OF GOSPEL STORY

Background comes to light on the family of the high priest who pursued Jesus

The bone box itself was plundered from a Second Temple-era grave by looters. But when archaeologists finally got their hands on it some 2,000 years later, they guessed its inscription could possibly shed light on one of the major figures surrounding the death of Jesus.

They were right.

“It is remarkable and exciting,” Boaz Zissu, a senior lecturer in the Department of Land of Israel and Archaeology Studies at Bar Ilan University near Tel Aviv, told The Media Line.

Zissu and his colleague Yuval Goren, of Tel Aviv University, discovered that the ossuary, or small stone chest that Jews used at the time to store bones, belonged to a woman belonging to the family of Caiaphas, the high priest who the Gospels say sent Jesus to the Romans to be crucified.

While Christians may find an archeological remnant of the Gospel story to be intriguing, Zissu and Goren are more focused on the rest of the inscription, which for the first time revealed that Caiaphas was a member of the priestly division called Ma’aziahu and was probably born in the hills south of Bethlehem.

The Israel Antiquities Authority won’t say who had possession of the bone box before its agents confiscated it three years ago. Such bone boxes are common, but with its ornate decorations and carefully engraved inscription, officials realized when they rescued it that they had something special and handed over to experts to decipher its secrets.

“We lack the original context of the ossuary, but we found it to be an original ossuary from the first century CE,” Zissu said, adding that forensic examination of the ossuary determined that it likely came from the Elah Valley area in the Judean foothills.

The inscription in Aramaic, the language spoken by Jews at the time, reads, “Miriam Daughter of Yeshua Son of Caiaphas, Priest of Ma’aziah from Beth ‘Imri.” Yeshua was not the Caiaphas of the Gospel, whose name was Yosef (Joseph), but a less famous relative. Nevertheless, the ossuary sheds important light on the famous family.

“Until yesterday, Miriam the daughter of Yeshua was unknown. Now we know that there was such a person. And Caiaphas is a well-known character and we remember his role in the judgment of Jesus and here we have a Yeshua mentioned as the son of Caiaphas,” the archaeologist said. 

Zissu said the names Miriam (Mary) and Yeshua (Jesus) were two of the most popular names of the time.

According to the New Testament (Mark 26:62), a high priest named Yosef Bar Caiaphas interrogated Jesus and then handed him over to the Romans. While a pivotal character in the New Testament, little is known of his origins. 

An ossuary with Yosef Bar Caiaphas’ name was found in 1990 in Jerusalem, not far from where the Gospel story would have taken place. But not all archeologists are convinced it’s authentic, nor does its offer much additional information about the man or his family. The newer discovery of Yeshua  Bar Caiaphas’ ossuary, however, holds a key to the lineage and ancestral lands of the Caiaphas family, said Zissu.

“We learn that Caiaphas was a priest. We knew if from the New Testament and [the Jewish historian] Josephus, but now we read it here, from a contemporary inscription. Then we learn that Caiaphas’ origins are from the priestly course of Ma’aziah,” Zissu said.  

The Bible and from other sources indentify Ma’aziah as the 24th priestly course, but this is the first time that a contemporary inscription where the name of the course is mentioned had been found.

“So Caiaphas is related to this 24th priestly course, which is something new. We never knew what were the origins of this family,” he added. 

According to the Bible, the priestly courses were established 3,000 years ago by King David, who divided the priesthood into 24 divisions, each serving two weeks a year conducting services in the Temple in Jerusalem. When the Romans destroyed the Second Temple in 70 AD, the priestly courses ceased to exist.

“The facts link this woman’s father Yeshua with the high priest at the time of Christ’s death Yosef Bar Caiaphas,” Zissu said. “Maybe they were brothers? Or maybe not? Maybe there is another link. At this stage we don’t know exactly. But Caiaphas is a rather rare name.”

The rest of the inscription noted that this Miriam was from Beit Imri, which archaeologists speculate means she came from a village that is now known as Beit Ummar, located south of Bethlehem in the Palestinian Authority and today a hotbed of Palestinian nationalism.

“The village of Beit Ummar is built atop the ruins of an older village called Khirbet Kufin, a Jewish settlement identified from the Second Temple period,” he said. “We have a linguistic connection between the names Caiaphas and Imri and the names of Beit Ummar and Kufin. So maybe we have here a clue, a hint of the origins of this family and their connection to this certain place.”

Assahel Lavi, a former member of the government’s unit for the prevention of the theft of antiquities, said the Judean hills are riddled with thousands of ancient graves, many containing ossuaries and other items spanning the millennium.

“But what attracts the grave robbers the most are the artifacts from the Second Temple period,” Lavi told The Media Line. “Grave robbers want anything with a Jewish symbol on it, like a menorah, from that period because it fetches a lot more money than from other periods.”

Lavi said items with crosses and other symbols from latter times, such as the Byzantine period, were much more common.

“This is one of the leading drivers for grave robbers seeking out ancient Jewish sites from the time of Second Temple,” he said.

Zissu, who was once the commander of the anti-grave robbing unit, said he was very disappointed that the ossuary had not been found in situ, which prevented him from examining it in its archaeological context.

“Sadly, the robbers’ desire of monetary gain has erased entire pages of the country’s cultural history,” Zissu said. “But I’m sure there is more to discover. This land is still full of surprises.”

By Arieh O’Sullivan on Sunday, July 03, 2011

Published June 29, 2011 | FoxNews.com

Israeli scholars say they have confirmed the authenticity of a 2,000-year-old burial box bearing the name of a relative of the high priest Caiaphas of the New Testament.

The ossuary bears an inscription with the name "Miriam daughter of Yeshua son of Caiaphas, priest of Maaziah from Beth Imri."

To confirm the authenticity of the ossuary, the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), who discovered the ancient burial box turned to Dr. Boaz Zissu of the Department of the Land of Israel Studies and Archaeology of Bar Ilan University and Professor Yuval Goren of the Department of Archaeology and Ancient Near Eastern Civilizations of the Tel Aviv University.

"The prime importance of the inscription lies in the reference to the ancestry of the deceased – Miriam daughter of Yeshua – to the Caiaphas family, indicating the connection to the family of the Ma’aziahcourse of priests of Beth ’Imri," wrote Zissu and Goren in the conclusion of their study. 

An ossuary is a stone chest used to store bones.

From the wording of the inscription it was discovered that ossuary belonged to a famous family of priests that was active in the first century CE. One family member, the high priest Yehosef Bar Caiaphas, is especially famous for his involvement in the trial and crucifixion of Jesus.

The Israel Antiquities Authority says the ossuary was seized from antiquities robbers who plundered an ancient Jewish tomb of the Second Temple period three years ago and has since been undergoing analysis. Forgery is common in the world of biblical artifacts.

The IAA says in Wednesday’s statement that microscopic tests have confirmed the inscription is "genuine and ancient."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/06/29/israeli-scholars-confirm-authenticity-2000-year-old-burial-box-belonging-to/#ixzz1QrGUy4bV