THE CO-EXISTENCE OF JEWISH, CHRISTIAN AND MUSLIM COMMUNITIES IN JERUSALEM: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES- Fr David Mark Neuhaus SJ

Islamic Studies Association, Delhi and Secretariat for Service of Faith, Delhi jointly organised a webinar on The Co-existence of Jewish, Christian and Muslim Communities in Jerusalem: Challenges and opportunities by Father David Mark Neuhaus SJ. Fr. Neuhaus is an Israeli Jesuit priest. He serves as superior of the Jesuits in the Holy Land. He teaches Scripture in various institutions.

Fr. Neuhaus, drawing from his 45 years of experience of living in Jerusalem, presented the picture of Jerusalem that is standing at the cross roads of political conflicts often camouflaged in religious and cultural apparel. Any meaningful dialogue must be rooted in reality, and the context is: ‘occupation’ of Palestinian lands by Jewish settlers and discrimination practiced by Israeli authorities against Arab Muslims and Christians, he said. Though three faith communities, Jewish, Christian and Muslim, live side-by-side we cannot call it a true co-existence since no real life-giving and life-promoting contacts exist among them.

Conflict and Discrimination

The state of Israel was established in 1948.The west part of Jerusalem is in Israel since 1948. Since 1967 the Eastern part of Jerusalem was forcefully occupied by Israel. Having East Jerusalem as the capital for Palestinians remain an elusive dream at this moment.  Further, more and more of Palestinian land is forcefully and illegally occupied in order to settle Jewish communities. Israeli authorities privilege Jewish Israelis and discriminate against Palestinians. Israelis exercise control over demographics, political power, and land relentlessly by dispossessing, confining, forcefully separating and subjugating Palestinians. These deprivations are so severe in Palestinian areas that they amount to the crime against humanity of apartheid.

Dialogue born in the manger of Resistance and Resistance to Dialogue

Muslims, Christians and many Jewish people together are committed to collaborate with one another to fight this occupation and discrimination. In this collective resistance, dialogue takes birth. Many Muslims and many Christians reject any dialogue with Jews. The pressure of living under Israeli occupation and discrimination has generated tendencies in some Muslims and they oppose dialogue and take to extremism and some other Muslims project Islam as the only solution and propagate Islamic idealism and imagine a monochromatic society. The Christians who oppose dialogue with Jews and Muslims either withdrew into ghettos, since for them either the world is too scary or no light on the horizon and  settle into ‘Christian-only’ neighbourhood.  One might notice here that resistance to occupation and discrimination provides a platform for dialogue between all who promote human dignity and freedom against occupation and discrimination while another form of resistance born of the fatigue of living under occupation that leads either to different forms of terrorism or unrealistic hope of Islam providing the final solution. Does belief in dialogue and engaged coexistence  not indicate hope in God and hope in the good will of all who strive for equality and justice in a real need in places like the Holy Land?

Pseudo Dialogues: Leading nowhere

The State of Israel likes to present a narrative about itself as a democracy rooted in tolerance and secularism.  The Israeli State sponsors ‘interfaith dialogue’, where the participants are ‘guided’ to discuss commonalities in religions. Similarly some Palestinians seek out  anti-Israel voices like the ultra-orthodox groups that oppose Zionism as dialogue partners. Both these forms of dialogue lead nowhere.These dialogues are fruitless since they do not touch the vital issues but tip-toe around issues. They resist recognising the political underpinnings of the problems, by  treating this as merely a religious debate. It is like losing a key elsewhere, but search for it where there is light, instead of taking the light into the dark quarters where the key is lost.

Real Dialogue: Embers of Hope

There are efforts from committed social, political and cultural activists, who are historians, writers, film makers, lawyers and students to engage with one another for Justice and Peace. Today they are  few, but the hope is that many more may join and push towards a Critical Mass to bring about a new possibility of justice, equality, coexistence and peace.

A culture based co-existence and partnership that take seriously the fact that each group have their roots in Arab/Islamic Civilization. Christians and Jews who originate in the Arab world have contributed much to Muslim Arab civilization . Therefore, reclaiming that cultural identity is the key to see beyond the present predicament.

There is also dialogue sponsored by foreign bodies. Jerusalem needs neutral places where all parties can speak to each other in truth (which may not be possible in a local setting or space).

Fr. Neuhaus ended his lecture with a thought on the life and mission of the citizens of Jerusalem. He said: Jerusalemites need to realize the privilege of living in Jerusalem. It is a dream for those who don’t live there. They need to take the responsibility as custodians of Jerusalem city seriously. So, put aside the sectarian division and seriously take the responsibility of stewardship of Jerusalem- that all can live together in peace rather than in contempt. And thus, promote peaceful co-existence. This must be based on the recognition that each group – Jews, Christians and Muslims –are an essential part of the city and the city would not be Jerusalem without any one of them.

Reported by David Mao SJ, Vidyajyoti, Delhi