Israel

Reliigons for Peace organised a fascinating lecture by Professor Rabbi Dan Cohn-Sherbok who was Professor of Judaism at the University of Wales  and is now a research Fellow at Heythrop. There was a large audience in the Westminster Cathedral hall and Bishop John Arnold chaired the meeting.

The Professor argued for a two state solution for Israel on Jewish biblical grounds. He began by outlining the history of Zionism as a political movement. Zionists wanted a “country from which we cannot be expelled”. He pointed to Jewish anti-Zionism in the 19^th and 20^th centuries. Both Orthodox and Reformed Jews rejected Zionism.

The Orthodox saw Zionists as usurping God’s will that there would eventually be Messianic redemption in Zion. The Reformed Jews wanted emancipation and liberation in the societies in which they already lived.

Gradually the Zionist idea which had originally been supported by a few became the mainstream orthodox view. The Biblical concept of “The land is ours” led to the view that all the land belonged to the Jews.

Professor Dan went on to give his own view based on Jewish scripture.  He based this on Exodus and the Kingdom of God. The message of liberation is that now we Jews are free, we must engage with all the oppressed. Who are the oppressed in Israel? The Palestinians.

The Kingdom of God concept points to divine justice for all. Crucial to this is the concept of the right to return. Jews have it but Palestinians do not and they want it. The question of settlements must be addressed.

The Professor answered the many searching questions with humour and wisdom. He remains hopeful that a solution to a seemingly intractable problem can and must be found.

John Woodhouse

Raphael Wein Stand with us

The topic of the talk was, "What we can do to help the Palestine-Israel conflict"
My points of discussion were as follows:

1. Regardless of our personal point of view we must not point the finger of blame at either the Palestinians or Israelis. This is to ensure a fruitful conversation and productive discussion aimed at moving forward and not delving on the past. This is not to say we should not discuss certain topics to avoid blaming a specific party not to sweep issues under the rug. There is no topic that is taboo and should not be discussed. However, I firmly believe we should focus on coexistence, working together for a better future rather than casting blame on the past.

2. We must educate ourselves and others when talking about Israel and Palestine. Educate is the operative word here. Education should always be balanced. Yes we are all entitled to our personal views and opinions. But we should never let them cloud our judgement or the facts of a matter. When reading about Israel/Palestine in the media we should always keep a wide berth of websites at our disposal and educate ourselves on the whole picture and all the context. We should educate with balance and not advocate without.

3. We must not diminish the importance of charity and how every small amount can make a difference. We should be thorough when researching and deciding what charity to give to.

These were my main points I think that can be done to help the situation. We further discussed some possible solutions and touched on the trump plan. Here is a link to our website that sums up the key points of the Trump Peace Plan 2020 https://www.standwithus.com/factsheets-2020-peace-plan