Resist The Injustice

The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon has been defending that country’s southern frontier since 1978. Some interim. And defending it from whom? What nameless terror lies to Lebanon’s south?

As the Israelis order Hezbollah to move north of the Litani, thereby dictating to Lebanese citizens, and indeed to members of a governing party, where in that Republic they may presume to set foot, remember that by no means only Revisionist Zionism has always regarded the Litani as Israel’s natural northern border. At least. Theodor Herzl blithely expected not only Tyre, but Sidon as well. He must have been thinking of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem.

That brings us to this, in yesterday’s Observer:

As the international community presses for a ceasefire hostage agreement in Gaza, there has been a drastic acceleration and intensification of settlement construction, land confiscation and home demolition in the West Bank, exacerbating longstanding patterns of oppression, violence and discrimination against Palestinians. There has always been a close relationship between successive Israeli governments and the settler movement, but there now seems to be little distinction between settler violence and state violence.

Sadly, we are now at an inflection point, as numerous Palestinian communities in the occupied West Bank, including Christians, are in grave danger of losing everything precious to them. The forceful dispossession of the Kisiya family from their ancestral land in the al-Makhrour valley outside Bethlehem is a case in point.

The Israeli authorities have demolished their home and restaurant many times over the last 12 years and allowed an illegal settlement to be established on their land, but until now the family have continued to find ways to farm there.

This is a very human tragedy but, as the international court of justice’s advisory opinion (22 July 2024) recognised, Israel’s ongoing occupation and its associated policies of settlement construction and the forcible transfer of Palestinians from their lands and their homes are, despite Israel’s protestations, in violation of international law and must end immediately.

The Israeli government must stop acting as if it is above the law. The UN General Assembly’s vote last week that Israel must bring to an end, without delay, its unlawful presence in the occupied Palestinian territories is important, but it can’t be another false dawn.

Now is the time to move beyond strongly worded resolutions and agree a robust set of measures to ensure Israel’s compliance with this advisory opinion, and other international court of justice orders issued this year. The UK government should not abstain from such efforts. In the meantime, we will continue to stand in prayer and solidarity with the Kisiya family, and thousands like them, as they resist the injustice of occupation.

The Rt Revd Rachel Treweek, lord bishop of Gloucester; The Rt Revd Dr Guli Francis-Dehqani, lord bishop of Chelmsford; The Rt Revd Graham Usher, lord bishop of Norwich; The Rt Revd Christopher Chessun, lord bishop of Southwark

As in Lebanon or anywhere else in the region, vanishingly few of the Christians’ ancestors in Palestine were Muslims. With a small dose of invader blood, no more than the Norman blood in Britain but as long ago as the Saxon Conquest, it was the Muslims’ distant ancestors who were Christians.

Between the post-Constantinian Romans, their Byzantine successors, the Crusaders, and the British, Christian sovereignty is the historical norm in the Holy Land, having prevailed, all told, for longer than any other kind. The French Republic is a constitutionally secular entity, so the technical situation in Lebanon is slightly more complicated. But the point could still be made.

There is no dispute that, on that basis, the Christians founded both modern Palestinian and modern Lebanese identity, and that they have always been the mainstay of both. All of that is on the brink of being destroyed. Just never ask by whom.