St Barbara of Aboud
By
Israel Shamir
“Aboud is one of the prettiest Palestinian villages, strongly
reminiscent of Tuscany. Its time-mellowed stone houses grow on
the gentle hills. Vine climbs up their balconies, leafy fig
trees provide shadow to its streets. The prosperity of this
well-established village is seen in the spaciousness of the
mansions, in the meticulously clean roads. The old men sit in a
small and shady, walled enclosure, on the stone benches, like
the aldermen of Ithaca gathered by young Telemachus. That is the
biblical ‘gate of the city’, or a diwan. Kids bring them coffee
and fresh fruits. Local people are not the refugees of Gaza and
Deheishe; here, as in a time warp, one can see the Holy Land as
it should and could be.
Three millennia old Aboud received the faith of Christ from
Christ himself, says the local tradition, and there is the
church ready to prove it, one of the oldest on earth, built in
the days of Constantine in the 4th century, or maybe even older,
as some archaeologists claim. The church is a dainty thing,
carefully restored and well taken care of. The Byzantine
capitals of its columns bear the image of cross and palm
branches. They recently discovered a plaque in old Aramaic
script immured in the southern wall of the church.
Aboud has more than one church: there is a Catholic, a Greek
Orthodox and an American-built Church of God. There is also a
new mosque, as Christians and Muslims of the Holy Land live
together in great harmony. On December 17th all of them, the
Muslims and the Christians, go to venerate the village patron
saint, St Barbara. She was a local girl who fell in love with a
young Christian and was baptized. It happened in the rough days
of Roman emperor Diocletian, and she was martyred in the
persecutions. The ruins of the oldest Byzantine church of St
Barbara are still seen on a hill a mile away from the village.
At the foothill, there is her burial cave, and there the
peasants lit their candles and ask their wishes to be
fulfilled”.
I wrote these lines above almost a year ago, when the Israeli
army began its campaign of devastation in the hills of Western
Samaria. Now, on 31 of May, they dynamited St Barbara, a rare
relic of Christian past of the Holy Land. It was one of these
bittersweet ruins of churches that still attract worshippers,
together with St Anne of Safurie and Emmaus of Latrun. I do not
know whether the sappers were the same soldiers who for
proverbial forty days and forty nights, from Catholic to
Orthodox Easter besieged the Nativity and whether they said the
prescribed by Shulkhan Aruch blessing, Blessed you are, God of
Israel, the Prince of the World, Who destroys the temples of
Goyyim. I have no doubt this destruction is connected with
Bethlehem siege: it passed so quietly, with so little attention,
that it would be strange not to continue.
My friend Miriam Reik from New York, a wonderful person and a
friend of Palestine, wrote to me, “I intuit that you are writing
a piece about this example of replacing the Judaic paradigm of
revenge for the Christian one of sacrifice and redemption… but
don't. That's not what it's about - it's about destroying
everything meaningful”.
For a change, I am going to agree with Miriam. It is true, the
Jews can’t stop trying to undo Christianity. Our worst enemy is
the Church, wrote Freud, and Gretz the historian seconded,
Christianity must be destroyed. It is better to serve Hitler
than Christ, concluded the most prominent modern Jewish Israeli
theologian. One can quote hundreds of such one-liners, but
Miriam is still right: they indeed destroy everything
meaningful.
Not only churches. In nearby Nablus, they destroyed the Green
Mosque, the oldest extant building, build above the cave where
Jacob lamented his lost son Joseph. One of the great shrines of
Palestine, contemporary with St Barbara, it was a Byzantine
church, and later served as a Samaritan synagogue, the centre of
worship for local Israelites-not-Jews. Samaritan priests pointed
it out to me. A holy place is always attended in the Holy Land,
and it again was converted to a church and beautified by Queen
Melisende, the pious flirt and the builder of the Holy Sepulchre.
It reverted to a mosque eight hundred years ago, when the
cathedrals of Chartres and Köln were erected. The mosque
celebrated its fifteen hundred years anniversary, when an
Israeli tank ravaged it. Just to show their impartiality, they
also bombed St Philip Episcopal church in Nablus and put under
curfew St Luke Hospital.
Some traditional old-fashioned anti-Semite would see it as a
sign of hatred to Gentiles in toto. But Miriam is right. They
destroy everything. In Jerusalem there was a great spring, the
biggest spring of Highlands. It gave birth to Jerusalem, and it
is the reason for the city’s existence. It has a plethora of
names: Gihon (in the Bible), Ein Sittna Miriam, after the
Virgin, Ein Silwan, as the nearby village.
Many events are connected with this living spring. King David’s
soldiers climbed up its pier, Jesus healed blind men at its
pool, King Hezekiah bored a half-kilometre long tunnel to keep
its waters within the walls, away from the reach of Assyrian
army. It is forever venerated, and an old mosque stands at its
lower exit. Many times in the hot days of July I waded
breast-deep the tunnel’s cool length, drinking its sweet water
and biding time to emerge at the fig tree above broken Roman
columns of the pool.
Then, over a year ago, Ehud Olmert, self-styled ‘Mayor’ of
Jerusalem, the great destroyer of Palestinian homes, seized the
spring. He locked the entrance, put a Russian guard, a few
soldiers, and transferred it lock, stock and barrel to settlers.
The Palestinians were not allowed to approach it anymore.
Nowadays, the Gihon spring is dead. Instead of pure water,
sewage of the city flows by its tall tunnel. It joined many
other springs of Palestine. Some were fenced, others covered
with concrete, some eliminated by pumping stations, and others
poisoned by sewage, all killed by the Jews.
I hear voice, Oh no, say: Zionists! I would, but it seems unfair
to the Jewish people abroad. They work so hard, they demonstrate
in support of Israel everywhere from Brussels to San Francisco,
they collect funds for Israeli soldiers, they sue everybody who
supports Palestine, they keep news about blown up Byzantine
churches out of your newspapers – don’t you think they deserve
to be considered as full-blown partners in the Zionist
enterprise?
- “They make life so miserable that the Palestinians will
leave”, wrote ever-so rational Miriam. Here I tend to disagree.
A year ago, I saw just outside the village of Aboud two giant
American-built Caterpillar bulldozers slowly devouring the olive
trees. “They were huge, covered from every side by armour
plates. They appeared impregnable, like moving fortresses. They
towered above the landscape as the mechanical monsters of Evil
Empire attacking Ewocks”. That is their purpose: to destroy. Not
just churches, not only mosques, but everything alive, from
olive to spring, as their service to the Faceless Destroyer.
Expulsion of Palestinians is a part of the task, as Palestine
can not survive without Palestinians. It will wither, as sure as
the spring of Gihon did. Forget the line, ‘Palestine next to the
Jewish state’; it is ‘the Jewish state or Palestine, for native
and adopted Palestinians’.
A few days ago, the lady wife and guiding light of Conrad Black,
Barbara Amiel, whined, “the Jews and Israel are increasingly
presented as Evil Empire”. Well, dear Ms Amiel, Israel and the
Jews are not the Evil Empire, but they will do, until real Evil
Empire will show up.
P.S. As an anticlimax, I propose to my readers to calculate the
ratio of Jewish influence in their newspaper, as follows: divide
the coverage of a synagogue wall being dirtied with graffiti (in
square inches) by the coverage of the venerable Byzantine church
of St Barbara destruction (in square inches). Just to remind
you: a ratio with denominator zero equals infinity.
Israel Shamir is an Israeli journalist based in Jaffa. His
articles can be found on the site www.israelshamir.net In order
to subscribe to this list or to be removed from it, please write
to info@israelshamir.net No copyright for electronic
transmission, but please ask for permission in order to publish
as hard copy.
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RESPONSES to THE FIRST EDITION
Dear Israel Shamir;
I read with sorrow and longing your beautiful piece below on
Aboud. I know the village quite well from the period after the
Gulf War when I was working on residence rights and family
reunification there and other places for the Palestinian
Federation of Women's Action Committees (Zahira Kamal), and from
1989, when our then press office (Sanabel, at which Rayna Moss
was assistant editor) spearheaded a campaign to counter the
middle-of-the-night deportations of people whose right to live
there had been denied.
I currently work with destitute AIDS patients in Cambodia, so it
is impossible for me to be in Palestine now. It is good to know
that someone with your loving heart is working on behalf of
people I still love and miss.
In solidarity,
Beth Goldring
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Dear Mr. Shamir,
Thank you for going to Aboud. I knew this had happened, but
didn't see anything in print about it. Recently I "gained" a
critic who told the EWTN network that I am too "one-sided".
Reading your reports always makes me feel that I'm not anti-semite,
just trying to get the other side of the news out there. This
article really helped me even though it is about such violence
to people and to the environment.
Gratefully,
Sr. Mary
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One is so outraged to read your articles. One feel impotent. But
at least you are one voice in the wilderness. And the most
important thing. Arabs are also Christian. Thank you for your
article. NAILA.
------------------------------------
Dear Israel,
I loved this piece; it tackles the often overlooked issue that
people, good, solid people, have been living on the land for
millennia. Best.
Nabeel
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Israel: It is very difficult not to feel a profound pain upon
hearing your testimony. The most pitiful victims of the Shoa are
not the men and women of who were railroaded to their death, but
the men and women who survived only to become Nazis.
Miguel Bedolla (we were Jews five hundred years ago, but now we
are Catholics).
--------------------------
Mr. Shamir:
For some time I doubted your intentions. This goes back to an
exchange that took place earlier on between the two of us.
Perhaps I misunderstood your intentions. It is not that I do not
think that Israelis are capable of caring about what is
happening to the Palestinians....for I know there are some very
good Israeli people who are working hard for peace. Also, some
of your recurring themes deeply disturbed me and made me feel
that somehow you were not genuine. I am still confused about
what and who you really are but what would impress me the most
is when you go physically out to stop the aggression against the
Palestinians....which I believe you have started doing.
It is not that you are not eloquent, for you are. But what I
mistrusted for some time was your sincerity. I asked many people
about you. Some did not know, some told me good things, some
felt you to be a fake. If I have misjudged you, forgive me. If
we are both on the same side, I would be delighted more than you
could ever know.
Edna
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Dear Lena, The Abboud Article is so beautiful. I was touched!
and to be written by someone called Israel Shamir, Wow.... Mary
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Habibna Shamir, it is good to hear from you as always. Many
thanks for your concern about my favorite place on this planet
Aboud. As my cousin Hiam said to me this past Sunday when I
talked to her "we are lonely here, send friends to visit us".
Her Mom, my Aunt Um Munier asked her to tell me that they are
living a life of "a mouse in the trap". This really summed up
the situation pretty good. As for Aboud, what I understand is
that about two weeks ago a settler was killed or injured about a
kilometer outside Aboud in the direction of Bir Zeit which was
used by settlers as an excuse to grab the surrounding land for
the start of a new settlement. They moved in and the Army is
protecting them and no one in the village is allowed to even
check their property. The Land of at least three of the village
families are affected but no one is sure how much damage to the
olive trees has occurred. Two of these families are my
relatives. No one in the Village is allowed to use this main
road to Bir Zeit and Ramallah and are forced to take a 2.5 hours
route (one way) through Shoukba and round about. Real nice life.
Salamat, Mousa
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Amazing and sad. Thanks for sending me Olives of Aboud. When
will it end? Warm regards, Builder
---------------------------------
Dearest Issi, This is really such a beautiful piece.... Wallah
mabrouk wa alf shookur! I've fallen in love with the village
through your words and I hope that I visit it one day and help
to plant new olive trees with the villagers. Genie
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Your account of another example of shameless Israeli brutality
has to reflect the dichotomy of Israel's way of life which
allows you to write such things without fear of persecution, yet
lacking respect for their Palestinian neighbors' rights, is
baffling proving once more that Israel's democratic system must
only be for Jews. My question then is, are the Israeli
authorities allowing you to express your views just to show the
world how fair minded they can be to their Jewish population or
is that their way of attempting to ferret like-minded people
like yourself for some nefarious reasons? Regardless of Israel's
intentions, your courage to express your opinions to the world
is very much appreciated and we hope will awaken the conscience
of those Israelis who are blindly following the policies of
their previous rulers, the British during their ignominious
mandate of Palestine which saw my father incarcerated twice for
defending Palestinian freedom fighters during the 1936-39
riots!! Salams and keep hope alive !! Cecil
----------------------------------------
In passing Shamir's article alludes to an aspect of Zionist
destruction that often escapes notice or mention. In the early
20th century anthropologists discovered Appalachia as a
storehouse of 17th century British folk culture, linguistics and
music.
Likewise, the Palestinian villages that Zionist destroyed in
1948 and the population that the Zionists ethnically cleansed
were a treasure of at least 2000 years of anthropological,
cultural and linguistic information. It will probably require at
least another century to comprehend exactly what Zionism
destroyed beyond all recovery in Palestine.
To be fair, I should note that the Zionists had equally
murderous intention toward Eastern European Jewish folkculture
and probably would have happily worked with Nazis for its demise
if a reasonable understanding could have been achieved (as it
might have been if Arlosoroff had not been assassinated --
Arlosoroff and the Nazis had a good working relationship and
basically spoke the same language).
Joachim Carlo Santos Martillo Ajami
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Dear Shamir, - A great account, very powerful.
If it is not a final version, may I suggest that you replace the
word "Jewish" either with "Zionist" or if you don't like that
word something else such as "Israeli"?
Walter
------------------------------------
From Ezra Ounce to Israel Shamir:
As a result of posting your article to Free Republic, I have
been banned from that site.... I can no longer post, there. It
would appear that "Free" Republic is available only for the
discussion of non-sacred cows.... Here is the discussion on the
site.
newwahoo
------------------------------------------
Give me one example of different people living in harmony and
I'll give you 100 examples of different people trying to destroy
each other.
How about the Roman Catholics, Greek Orthodox, Church of God
Christians, and Arab/Palestinian Moslems living in Aboud ?
Israel's report reads to me as though they were living in
perfect harmony for more than nineteen hundred years..... until
the 'holy' Israelis, aided and abetted by the American
'Government' interposed
Ezra Ounce
----------------------------------------------
And doubtless those "olive trees" were only PLO stunt men
dressed up in paper mache and wearing fake branches on their
helmets. Those darned A-rabs.
rdww
---------------------------------------------------
I'd like to see a second source on this. The Israelis have their
hands full right now without having to busy them with destroying
a peace loving Christian village. Something is missing from this
story.
-------------------------------------
Ezra Ounce: Arafat is a criminal of global proportions.... no
doubt about that...... But that doesn't justify the destruction
of ages-old olive trees!!! Or the pauperization of
non-adversarial, peaceful and harmonious people!
Calm down, newwahoo, don't blow your keppa! Take a valium, and
regain your composure and coherence!
--------------------------------------
To: newwahoo
Don't whine about 'anti-Semitism', you don't even follow the
meaning of the word and for someone who gets so much mileage out
of a term, you sure do ask for it with your mouthy, arrogant
attitude. Is it really that Israeli murder of Palestinian kids
and destruction and trespass of Arab property is such a small
problem, globally speaking, or is it that Jews just can't deal
with ANY criticism at all?
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