My letter to USA Today 1-5-2024 RE 50-year friendship offers a close look at caring dialogue on Israeli-Palestinian conflict

 RE 50-year friendship offers a close look at caring dialogue on Israeli-Palestinian conflict

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/01/05/cross-cultural-friendship-survives-israeli-palestinian-conflict/72087017007/

Dear Editor,

I very much enjoyed reading about Anan Ameri and Dick Soble's 50 year long respectful relationship in Violet Ikonomova's  1-5-2024 article "50-year friendship offers a close look at caring dialogue on Israeli-Palestinian conflict"

This long lasting friendship and dialogue between a Jewish American and a Palestinian American has been facilitated by a common language and America's current legal framework of full and equal rights for all people, regardless of supposed race or religion.

76 years ago, following the horrors of the Nazi Holocaust, The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was born "Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world..."

60 years ago America's Civil Rights Act of 1964 ended segregation in public places and banned employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin. This is considered one of the crowning legislative achievements of our collective civil rights movement.

Forging peace, specifically a just and lasting peace for as many people as possible, regardless of supposed race or religion, is both a noble and a necessary goal, for everyone's sake:  Religion should be a personal, private choice, not a state funded project.

Sincerely,

Anne Selden Annab

American Homemaker & Poet

 

 NOTES

50-year friendship offers a close look at caring dialogue on Israeli-Palestinian conflict USA Today 1-5-2023

My letter to the New Yorker RE Mosab Abu Toha's A Palestinian Poet’s Perilous Journey Out of Gaza

Ibtisam Barakat: A Palestinian Whose Childhood Was Destroyed by War Pleads for Peace- Never letting children endure war again is the “never again” that might actually heal our wounded humanity.

But where should people go... 

Shereen Audi "I really wanted to spread some hope and positivity and give that feeling to the world and to everyone who needs it... all I wish for Palestine and for our world is peace and light.."

Ottoman Era Palestine circa 1890's... Palestinian fishermen in Tiberias (Tabriya) 

May the new year bring a free Palestine. Jordanian artist: اسامه حجاج-Osama Hajjaj Instagram: osamahajjaj

Israel eases up on bombing parts of Gaza, but only as famine and disease take their hold. 

I hear reports and see TV commercials showing that Anti-Semitism and other forms of racist hate is increasing. We need to stop that trend

Together, we have the power to shift the narrative on Palestine and build a future of collective liberation- Visualizing Palestine NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTIONS

Homeless in my homeland by Hanin A. Elholy

Almost all the universities in Gaza destroyed or damaged. A huge amount of students and academic staff killed.

Mosab Abu Toha · Heartbreaking to learn that Ammar Ghraiba, a young motion graphic designer and an aspiring filmmaker, got killed today. Our journalists, poets, and filmmakers are killed. But the story, the poem, and the film continue.

Like Palestinians in the rest of east Jerusalem, most Armenians do not hold Israeli citizenship but only residency...

The Jewish settlers 'living the American dream' in the West Bank

Powerful Bansky

Powerful Bansky

Howard Thurman: I Will Light Candles this Christmas & The Work of Christmas

From “The Mood of Christmas…”
—by Howard Thurman

I will light Candles this Christmas,
Candles of joy despite all the sadness,
Candles of hope where despair keeps watch,
Candles of courage for fears ever present,
Candles of peace for tempest-tossed days,
Candles of grace to ease heavy burdens,
Candles of love to inspire all my living,
Candles that will burn all year long.

The Work of Christmas

—by Howard Thurman

When the song of the angels is stilled,
When the star in the sky is gone,
When the kings and princes are home,
When the shepherds are back with their flock,
The work of Christmas begins:

To find the lost,
To heal the broken,
To feed the hungry,
To release the prisoner,
To rebuild the nations,
To bring peace among others,
To make music in the heart.

 

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Howard Washington Thurman (1899-1981) was an American author, philosopher, theologian, mystic, educator, and civil rights leader. As a prominent religious figure, he played a leading role in many social justice movements and organizations of the twentieth century. Thurman's theology of radical nonviolence influenced and shaped a generation of civil rights activists, and he was a key mentor to leaders within the civil rights movement, including Martin Luther King Jr.

Thurman served as dean of Rankin Chapel at Howard University from 1932 to 1944 and as dean of Marsh Chapel at Boston University from 1953 to 1965. In 1944, he co-founded, along with Alfred Fisk, the first major interracial, interdenominational church in the United States

Thurman was a prolific author, writing twenty books on theology, religion, and philosophy. The most famous of his works, Jesus and the Disinherited (1949), deeply influenced Martin Luther King Jr. and other leaders, both black and white, of the modern Civil Rights Movement. 

He was the first black dean of a chapel at a majority-white university or college in the United States.  

When Thurman asked Gandhi what message he should take back to the United States, Gandhi said he regretted not having made nonviolence more visible as a practice worldwide and remarked "It may be through the Negroes that the unadulterated message of nonviolence will be delivered to the world". Visions of a Better World: Howard Thurman's Pilgrimage to India and the Origins of African American Nonviolence 

Detail from a stained glass window featuring Howard Thurman at Howard University's Andrew Rankin Memorial Chapel

Bradley Burston: As Lincoln abolished slavery, Israel must abolish occupation... I realize now that I am an abolitionist and that occupation is slavery. I also realize that I need to pay more attention to Abraham Lincoln, in his ability to remind us all of the wisdom hidden in the obvious.

"I realize now why "apartheid" is too easy, too slick, too Madison Avenue a term, for what occupation truly is and does.

Occupation is slavery.

In the name of occupation, generation after generation of Palestinians have been treated as property. They can be moved at will, shackled at will, tortured at will, have their families separated at will. They can be denied the right to vote, to own property, to meet or speak to family and friends. They can be hounded or even shot dead by their masters, who claim their position by biblical right, and also use them to build and work on the plantations the toilers cannot themselves ever hope to own." Bradley Burston

http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/a-special-place-in-hell/as-lincoln-abolished-slavery-israel-must-abolish-occupation.premium-1.505908

Sally Field and Daniel Day-Lewis appear in a scene from "Lincoln." Photo by AP

[AS ALWAYS PLEASE GO TO THE LINK TO READ GOOD ARTICLES IN FULL: HELP SHAPE ALGORITHMS (and conversations) THAT EMPOWER DECENCY, DIGNITY, JUSTICE & PEACE... and hopefully Palestine]

Palestinian Freedom Riders

Palestinian Freedom Riders
Inspired by
the Freedom Rides of the US Civil Rights Movement
Palestinian activists will attempt to board segregated Israeli settler buses to occupied East Jerusalem

We Shall Overcome....White House Celebrations of Music From the Civil Rights Movement

Watch the full episode. See more In Performance at The White House.

In Performance at The White House | A Celebration of Music From the Civil Rights Movement

"In Performance at the White House: A Celebration of Music from the Civil Rights Movement" features songs from the Civil Rights Movement performed by top entertainers, as well as readings from famous Civil Rights speeches and writings.

In Performance at The White House | Celebrating the Music of Paul McCartney
[Paul McCartney, (born 18 June 1942) is an English musician, singer-songwriter and composer. Formerly of The Beatles (1960–1970) and Wings (1971–1981), McCartney is the most successful songwriter in the history of popular music]

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