Esther EllisIt is important for Christians to keep the sad history of Christian antisemitism in mind when responding to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict because it is the biggest contributor to the existence of the conflict. If Christians hadn’t persecuted the Jews and stood up against the Jews, Jews would have stayed in Europe. Jews were not accepted, so they had to leave. One of the videos we watched in this class said that there are always going to be two types of countries: one where Jews are not allowed to live and one where Jews are persecuted for living in (or something along those lines). This was especially true in the times of the Catholic Church during the diaspora. Jews were seen as the people that killed Christ, and thus were viewed as sinners not worthy of respect or equality. Because of the fact that Jews had to leave Europe due to antisemitism is the reason why the Palestinian conflict occurred. If the Jews hadn’t had returned to their homeland, there would be no rivalry between them and the Palestinians over the land. If Christians deny this fact, then they are showing themselves out to be liars. As believers, we need to be honest and open when it comes to the truth. We must own the past mistakes of our religion (even if we don’t believe many of those who claimed to know Christ actually did) if we are to be seen as genuine and humble when approaching the Israeli-Palestinian problem.
