FaithZone is the blog of the Institute for Applied Faith, an economic justice advocacy think tank devoted to enhancing the human potential of members of vulnerable communities through the Science of Applied FaithTM.
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Monday, January 19, 2009

A Once Unthinkable Reality

Faith and Society

Throughout the Martin Luther King celebration I attended today, I couldn't help but to reflect tearfully about the progress that African Americans have made since Dr. King's martyrdom in 1968. Much progress so far, but a dream yet to be fully realized for so many.

This entire weekend was a weeping season for me, as I know it has been for many others. While the strains of war and the current economic crisis are cause for our present concerns, my tears were tears of joy at the thought of the historical significance of the imminent inauguration of Barack Hussein Obama, America's first African American president.

As we anticipate tomorrow, we recognize that it will be the beginning of a new pledge for unity and service to make America true to the essence of its divine inception. It will be a new and hopeful chapter in American history, and a moment that undeniably fulfills a once unthinkable reality . . . Read Full Story

Friday, January 16, 2009

Faith Vindicated: The Sparing of Flight 1549

Faith and Society


Yesterday, on the 80th anniversary of the birthday of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, tears came to my eyes as I witnessed the news about the heart-wrenching emergency landing of US Airways Flight 1549 in the Hudson River near midtown Manhattan.


US Airways pilot Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger demonstrated a level of faith in his skill, aircraft, and crew that resulted in one of the most sensational miracles of the 21st century. Clearly, his leadership and years of devotion to his purpose of safely flying passengers enabled him to save 155 precious lives.


Though we recognize him now, Mr. Sullenberger has always been a true hero. Read Full Story

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Thursday, January 8, 2009

Acting Boldly, Acting Now

Faith and the Economy


President-elect Obama’s sobering but bold economic speech this morning clearly appreciates the fears of a great many of us regarding our collective financial destinies in these troubling economic times.


Not since the Great Depression has America faced such an ominous economic future.


As he unveiled his new American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan, Obama put out a clarion call to Americans and the world for renewed faith and personal responsibility in defeating the causes of the current domestic and worldwide economic crisis.


Even the staunchest conservative politicians and economists concede that he must use the power of the national government's resources to at least offer a temporary safety net for the American people. Even if we have to suffer a goodly amount of hyperinflation during the next few years.


President-elect Obama's bold and timely appeal is reminiscent of the calls to action of two great American presidents who have preceded him . . . Read full Article here

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Saturday, January 3, 2009

The Israel-Gaza Conflict: Divining the Ghost of Ralph Bunche

Faith and International Affairs

In a "world-gone-wild", I believe that any country so threatened should take the strongest measures possible to defend its homeland and sovereignty, as well as its various domestic and international economic and political interests.

But the recent Israeli military incursion into Gaza has disturbed me so greatly in the first days of the new year because it seems to violate so many of the precepts of human decency. Israel's timing of its military action during a political power vacuum in US politics (between Bush's exit from office and Obama's imminent inauguration) adds another dynamic to America's already tense domestic drama. In the long run, I believe that Israel has made an unfortunate tactical error, exposing itself to the international community as a fascist regime against Palestine. Observe the anti-Israel protests throughout the world.

After a healthy dose of late night cable news, followed by a restless night of tossing and turning, I contemplated the causes and effects of this conflict and woke up to an overwhelming sense of Ralph Bunche's presence upon me. His soft but powerful voice seemed to reveal a deep sense of disappointment in Israel's behavior towards the Palestinian people.

Despite the media overkill, Americans remain particularly uninformed about world history, and even more so about the events leading up to the current Middle East crisis. This lack of knowledge and understanding is the cause of so many irrational views about Middle Eastern affairs. Such aberrant views constantly creep into public opinion and the foreign policy mechanisms and explanations concerning Israel and its security interests. Israel's tendency towards paranoia always seems to overshadow the interests of others, which is both an arrogant and dangerous posture. But it may be understandable given its espoused superiority complex and subsequent difficulty in being a good neighbor.

Roll Over Ralph Bunche

Enter Ralph Bunche, arguably America's foremost African American diplomat and one of the world's leading international mediators in the 20th century. Here's a biographical snippet of how Bunche left his mark of distinction on the ever-present conflict between Israel and Palestine.

In 1946, the first UN Secretary-General Trygve Lie sequestered Bunche from the US State Department, and from June 1947 to August 1949, Bunche worked on the confrontation between Arabs and Jews in Palestine. Bunche served first as assistant to the UN Special Committee on Palestine, and then as principal secretary of the UN Palestine Commission, which was charged with carrying out the partition approved on November 29, 1947 by the UN General Assembly. UN Resolution 181 (United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine) was supposed to end the British Mandate of Palestine by August 1, 1948, and facilitate the creation of two states, one Jewish and one Arab.

In early 1948 when this plan was scuttled and fighting between Arabs and Israelis became especially severe, the UN appointed Count Folke Bernadotte as mediator. Ralph Bunche was named Bernadotte's chief aide. Regrettably, while Count Bernadotte was in Jerusalem in the fall of 1948, he was assassinated by members of the underground Zionist terrorist group dubbed the Stern Gang or Lehi (Hebrew acronym for Lohamei Herut Israel, "Fighters for the Freedom of Israel"). Subsequently, Bunche was named acting UN mediator on Palestine.

After nearly a year of seemingly ceaseless negotiations, Bunche succeed in persuading Israel and the Arab States to ratify the 1949 Armistice Agreements. Because of his heroic efforts, Bunche was welcomed home to a New York ticker-tape parade up Broadway. The next year in 1950, Bunche was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, the first-ever such honor conferred upon an African American. He was awarded the Medal of Freedom by President John F. Kennedy.

Despite his exemplary role in these efforts, Bunche, even to this day, is barely mentioned in history books, media commentary, or discussions about Israeli-Palestinian affairs!

Needless to say, Bunche's dream of a peaceful Middle East has not yet been realized. Instead, Israel has planned for some time and launched a complex Public Relations-Military campaign against the Arab World that vilifies Palestine while characterizing itself as a victim compelled to fight "terrorism". Israel seems to have forgotten it's own sullied revolutionary history of terrorist activity in the name of statehood, and consistently chooses guns over diplomacy.

What really happened

The convoluted history of Israel has confused many with respect to the question of Israel-Palestinian relations. Because of my own faith tradition, I became quite knowledgeable about both the ancient and modern histories of Israel, as well as many of the geo-political dynamics of Israel's nationalism. I acquired this knowledge from several sources.

As a child, I was raised as a devout Christian with a substantial religious education in Judaism. For more than a few decades since then, I have regularly read, studied, and recited the 24 Books of the Tanakh (Old Testament scriptures that include the Torah, Nevi'im, and Ketuvim) in the Christian Bible. As a seminarian, I excelled in the study of Judaic and Christian history. As an independent researcher of the Jewish tradition, I have studied the works of Raphael Patai, noted Hungarian-Jewish Rabbi, ethnographer, and anthropologist who earned the first doctorate awarded by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 1936. I am an admirer of certain aspects of the Ashkenazim tradition that I believe can help achieve economic justice for African Americans. As a university student studying political science and international relations, I was an ardent dilettante of Ralph Bunche, then Deputy Secretary-General (second highest ranking UN official), and world-renowned expert in Israeli-Palestinian affairs.

Therefore, I understand that the 2008 "60th Anniversary of Israel" is a misnomer. Most observers are not aware that the new state of Israel came into existence only after the Land of Israel and its Jewish inhabitants had been disaffected during over two thousand years of invasions and conquests! Some theologians even argue that Yahweh or Jehovah ("God" in Abrahmic religions) destroyed the Land of Israel ages ago, never to exist again, because of Jewish disobedience and violation of the covenants between God and the Children of Israel.

But the Holocaust horrors of Nazi Germany left millions of European Jewish refugees seeking a place to resettle. The US Jewish Lobby recognized that Great Britain was not a proponent of Jewish resettlement in Palestine after World War II. So it sought a powerful partner who would support its Zionist campaign to target Palestine under the guise of reclaiming it as the Jewish homeland. The US enjoyed new superpower status after crushing Germany and the Axis Powers. Using its substantial influence as the preeminent player in the newly formed United Nations, the US won UN approval to designate Arab Palestine as the "modern" State of Israel. The Jewish re-gentrification of Palestine was then enabled by US and UN military power that displaced the Palestinian people who have since struggled to reclaim their centuries-old homeland.

The Zionist movement then incorporated "anti-Semitism" in their ideological sheath as a two-edged sword to attack and defend against any lesser Gentile mortals who dared question Israel's motives and actions in Palestine.

Nature of the Conflict

Hamas, the ruling party in Gaza and the West Bank, continues to express its frustration about prior agreements with Israel in which they [Hamas] believe that Israel persists in arrogantly and unilaterally exercising oppressive control of Palestinian land and sovereignty, and the quality of life of its citizens.

Historically, Israel occupied the Gaza Strip in June 1967 during the Six-Day War and governed it until 2005. In between this period, Hamas launched its First Intifada in 1987 and the Second Intifada in 2000 to assuage what it perceived as fascist Israeli policies towards Arabs generally and Palestinians particularly.

Here it's important to note that under its Closure Policy, Israel still controls Gaza's airspace, territorial waters and offshore maritime access, the population registry, entry of foreigners, imports and exports, the tax system, and intimidates the Palestinian people on the Israeli side of the Gaza-Israel border. This situation enables Israel to control the inflow and outflow of Gaza's essential resources, including food. Whenever there has been a food shortage in Gaza, they've had to rely on food supplied by the World Food Programme. Although Hamas has been dubbed by America, Israel, and others as a terrorist group, we have to acknowledge that Israeli embargoes and border incursions have contributed greatly to the significant disaffection of the Palestinian people. Israel seems to be employing lex talionis ("eye for an eye" principle of equitable retaliation for an offended party as expressed in Exodus) to justify it's Gaza incursion.

On December 27-28, 2008, Israel commenced air strikes allegedly against Hamas infrastructure and security forces in Gaza. Despite this allegation, Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) under Operation Cast Lead, have killed over 500 and wounded over 2,000 Palestinians, many of them innocent women and children. They call it collateral damage for which Hamas is to blame.

On Saturday, January 3, 2009 (Palestinians call it the "Black Saturday Massacre"), Israeli tanks and infantry invaded Gaza with air support from gunships. Israel vowed to eliminate Hamas control of the region. Specifically, Ehud Barak, current Israeli Minister of Defense, deputy Prime Minister, and leader of Israel's Labor Party stated that the operation will be "a war to the bitter end". The Israelis have cast their invasion as a war on terror.

Hamas claims that its rocket and mortar attacks were in response to Israel's Siege of Gaza and unilateral actions with respect to Palestinian sovereignty.

History Forgotten or History Remembered?

On page 284 of his book Reason in Common Sense, George Santayana wrote that "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it".

It's ironic that Israeli Jews now abuse Palestinians, relegating Gaza as a peculiar form of concentration camp . . . almost analogous to the "Native American reservations" in America. One wonders: "Have the Jews forgotten the "Endlösung der Judenfrage" (Nazi Germany's Final Solution of the Jewish Question). As the Israeli Defense Forces spray "Willy Pete" on the Gaza Palestinians (chemical phosphorous bombs that can burn to the bone), have they forgotten what happened to their forebears in the Nazi "gas chambers"? Aren't the Israelis exacting the same Holocaust-type measures on the Palestinians that their forebears suffered at the hand of Hitler? What does one call this "abused-to-abuser" behavior of the Israeli Jews? Again, one wonders if the Jews have perverted Zabludow.

Maybe we can all rest in peace

As I've stated before, I am neither an advocate nor opponent of war. However, as long as human beings exist, war will continue. Our most primitive animistic instincts cannot preclude it. An end to all human conflict would require a perfect "state of faith" among all peoples of the world that is not likely to soon arise. Most critically, the duality of good and evil in the face of diverse cultures could hardly lead to a lasting peace.

Now I'm not condoning terrorism -- I abhor it in any form. . . but Israel needs to be careful that those who've been afraid to speak out against "any" Israeli action will be labeled as anti-Semitic. This form of political extortion is no longer unacceptable in the modern world.

A right to exist does not confer a right to abuse, oppress, or exact genocide. It's time for Israel to stop its charade of victimhood, and acknowledge that other peoples, particularly those whom they've displaced, deserve respect and consideration. It's time for Israel to respect the right of Palestine to exist, as much as it insists that the Palestinian peoples respect Israel's right to exist.

Maybe then, Ralph Bunche can rest in peace.

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About the Author and Moderator

Gregory Dean
CEO and founder of the Institute for Applied Faith, the FaithZone Blog, and FaithNetTV. Religious Studies and Political Science, Howard University; Public Administration graduate studies and Municipal Management, George Washington University; Sr. Executive in State & Local Government, Harvard-Kennedy School.
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