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Saturday, February 3, 2007

As ignorant as Shannon O’Donnell, who's missive the Presbyterian Church (USA) News has made the unfortunate decision to print: A letter from Shannon O'Donnell in Jerusalem. Forgive my stridency, but this stuff can make your eyes cross.

The trouble with these lame-brains is that they have no idea about history, no knowledge of how the world works, no capacity for critical thinking...yet they go overseas, wring their hands a bit and then are put on pedestals as experts. This is really disgraceful stuff:

...I am learning more about the history behind the conflict here and now I am familiar with words like “Nakba” and “Occupied Territories.” Everyone knows about the Holocaust, but few in the West seem to have heard about Nabka. I find that there is a whole lot more to history than I was ever taught. There is a whole other side of the story that is never talked about...

That's right, the Holocaust is just like the "Nakba"...an ignorant and offensive comparison. Yes, "Everyone knows about the Holocaust," except, apparently, Shannon O'Donnell.

Nakba means “catastrophe,” and it is used by the people here to describe the events of 1948 in this land. It refers to a type of ethnic cleansing, crimes committed against the Palestinian people, crimes that were never admitted to. In seven months, 531 villages were destroyed, and 11 urban neighborhoods were emptied. Where did all of these people (the ones who survived) go? To refugee camps, to prisons for a while, to the Old City in Jerusalem, to wait until they could return to their homes. That was in 1948. They are still waiting.

Yes, darlin', some of them went to Jerusalem in 1948, after their friends had kicked out all the Jews that year. "It refers to a type of ethnic cleansing, crimes committed against the Palestinian people"? It refers to a war of genocide they started and lost, and represents the rallying cry of a political movement dedicated to having another go at that war. "They are still waiting"? Get used to disappointment. They are going to be waiting a long, long, time.

As I understand it, Israel doesn’t officially own the West Bank land, but they act like they do, using force, guns, intimidation, walls, and checkpoints to control it. It’s not hard to see who’s in charge here when you’re living here. I had no idea that Jordan used to own where I now reside. I wonder if they are even interested in owning this land again.

I don't know where you live, honey, but I doubt Jordan "owned" it. More likely they simply took it by force and since they were the right tribe or the right religion, no one complained much. Certainly no one imported useful dupes from the West to complain about it. Have no doubt, they are probably not much interested in owning that land again...bit of a bad history between the Jordanians and the people who live near you that now call themselves "Palestinians," but then that's a bit of that history you're not familiar with.

...Every day I watch them construct the separation wall, one of the biggest obstacles to a possible future state of Palestine. It’s getting difficult to see hope for a two-state solution, because there’s a big grey wall blocking my view...

The "separation wall" is one of the biggest obstacles...how about those suicide murderers that made it necessary? Think they're a problem? How about the groups that indoctrinate the kids to blow themselves up in the name of Allah? How about those gangs running around killing each other and preventing the emergence of any sort of civil society? Think they might be part of the difficulty?

Bishop Dr. Munib Younan is the head of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land (ELCJHL) and also the vice president of Lutheran World Federation. He says...blahdeblahblahblah...

Ah, Evangelical Lutherans again...and oh yes, we've met Bishop Younan before.

Greetings to this year's crop of Sabeel interns. No need to send a postcard.

Update 2/4: [Minor edits made to post]

Will Spotts is a far better man than I for showing the patience he does in addressing this article and describing the problem to his fellow Presbyterians: Letters Home from PC(USA) Mission Workers

4 Comments

these people would go to germany or japan at the end of 1945 and say isn't this terrible, what the allies did?

This woman sounds like a 12 year-old writing an essay about how she spent her summer vacation. The ignorance is simply mind-boggling.

You know, they all have this same tone. There was a blog (last I checked it was gone) kept by a Sabeel volunteer that took exactly the same tone...This sort of Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm delivering speeches written by Hamas feel...

For the record, Jordon illegally occupied the West Bank in 1948 and illegally annexed it in 1950. There's no doubt about that. "Jordan" was previously called "Transjordan," meaning, across (on the East Bank of) the Jordan River. In 1949, they dropped the "Trans," at least partly in the service of their unsuccessful effort to legitimize their occupation of the West Bank. But their annexation of that territory was never recognized by any Arab nation or by anyone else (other than Britain and Pakistan, apparently).

As for their interest in "owning" that land "again," Jordan formally renounced it in 1988, declaring the PLO to be its rightful "owner."

See, here and here (where they get the names reversed but otherwise a pretty good account).

And, yes, reading that definitely did make my eyes cross.

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