God v. Allah

Up to 1948 the British controlled the Palestine territories when economic problems caused them to relinquish control of the area. In order to preserve peace the U.N. partitioned the region creating the Jewish state and leaving the rest of the land to the Palestinians, though the region including Bethlehem was put under international control. The Jews accepted the U.N. resolution, the Palestinians did not. Kind of understandable in that it was their territory, along with the parts they’d lost to Syria and Jordan earlier. This overview is probably pretty simplistic, but had the effect of exacerbating an already combative situation.

So now we go into a New Year with yet another bloody squabble in the region and another prime example of the dark side of organized religion. Christianity has had its dark side as well, the most recent the fighting between Catholics and Protestants in Ireland, the crusades, the Spanish Inquisition, and the less violent Reformation. While I have always maintained faith is a great thing, and an important formative tool, creating a conscience as well as providing a moral compass, some branches of organized religion have twisted it to provide their followers a license for violence against anyone not maintaining the that sect’s doctrine - the Middle Eastern brouhaha being a prime example. The Iranian leadership has vowed to wipe Israel from the map, other Arab countries are attempting to deal with Israel in a peaceful fashion, if under the table, but the zealots aren’t; about to let that happen. Unfortunately there are zealots on both sides creating friction, whether it is Hamas or Israeli settlers grabbing land in contested areas. I’m not going to point fingers, primarily because it is tough to pick out the aggressors and victims at any given time. I am sure some people have already accepted one side or the other as being the antagonist, but I believe the fault lies squarely on the shoulders of extremist religious leaders. Instead of preaching love of all they spout hatred from their pulpits and educate the children of their followers in that hatred in order to propagate the violence to their own ends.

Until a way is found to change that culture of hatred the world will be in turmoil, innocent humans will die for no reason other than the other side doesn’t agree with their religious practices or beliefs. There seems to be no peaceful solution and violence just begets more violence and therefore presents no solution. It is going to take the rational leadership of each religion to rein in their more exuberant brethren before any kind of peace can happen and I don’t see any of that happening in the Israel/Palestine conflict. In fact it appears as there are outsiders doing their best to inflame the situation. All in all making it look as though it will be more of the same for 09.