The Murdered West Bank Man From Bethleham

His Empathy for Both American Slaves and Palestinian Virtual Slaves

There are many American Christians who believe that there is never a circumstance when the explicit word murder should be used to describe what priests and rulers did to Jesus/Isa in Jerusalem two thousand years ago. Yet, that was the precise word that the first Christian martyr Stephen chose to use minutes before he himself was murdered by an enraged Jewish mob. But for many American Christians, it is far more important to be politically correct than honest when speaking or writing about the political execution of ALLAH’s now risen West Bank man from Bethlehem. Also, they avoid the use of the word “murder” so that they will not be accused of being anti-Semitic. They have no similar reluctance to use the word “crucified” as though a totally illegal crucification of a totally innocent messenger of GOD is somehow not a purposeful murder. Similarly, the current Israeli leadership has amazingly worked it out in their minds that targeted illegal assasinations of Palestinian resisters to their illegal occupation of Palestinian land is not murder.

When American Christians are so careful to say what is politically correct and acceptable and adopt this no risk attitude, they miss important realities. For instance, they miss the fact that when the courageous Stephen openly used the term murder to describe what the Jews had done to their Messiah, he virtually guaranteed his own bloody death by stoning about an hour after using the word murdered. But by speaking the truth, his resulting death accomplished two things well beyond his own imagination. His brutal death by stoning sparked into full flame a sudden turning to the Risen Messiah of thousands of former disbelieving Jews. Additionally, the very close view of his horrible, bloody stoning would be a direct assault on the calloused conscience of the brazen murderous Jewish Rabbi, Saul, who later became the Christian Apostle Paul. His very nourishment had been derived from imprisoning and torturing and sometimes even casting his vote to murder sincere followers of ALLAH’s West Bank man from Bethlehem . Yet, the Scriptures imply that by this self-righteous rampaging Rabbi closely observing the courageous commitment of one man who was willing to proclaim to temporarily deranged Jews the truth about their deliberate murder of their own Messiah, was an experience that forever changed the rampaging Rabbi’s life, totally altering the future of Christianity.

A mob of Jews held the defenceless Stephen’s life in their hands. Nevertheless, he bravely confronted them with their wicked betrayal and more wicked murder of the “Righteous one.” This bold declaration to them by their defenceless prisoner standing totally alone against their mob, enraged them to such an extreme that they ground their teeth, yelled at the top of their voices, covered their ears, rushed at him, drug him out of the city and viciously stoned him until he died; but he did not die until he lovingly asked GOD to not hold their sin against them in a quite similar way that the Bethleham man had asked GOD to forgive his murderers.

Near the time that I was reading about this account in the Scriptures (Acts 7) which so vividly portrays the contrast between men of hatred who live in virtually total darkness and one man of love who lived his life in brilliant light, I had also been reading Jordan Times’ accounts of the hopelessness of Palesinians as they are the defenceless victims of the murderous, cruel and viscious policies of Israeli leaders. These self-righteous, hypocritical leaders somehow expect these humiliated, mostly unemployed, often destitute, without hope Palestinians, to always comply with the oppressive, illegal, U.S. supported occupation. They are expected to peacefully and cooperatively accept the building of hundreds of Israeli homes on their land which is being illegally occupied; to peacefully watch the calloused bulldozing of their own sometimes newly built homes; to helplessly and peacefully watch hundreds of their own precious olive trees being destroyed on their own land, all the while being forced to cooperate with humiliating, economically paralyzing, multiple, illegal Israeli check points. But to add poisonous insult to already unbearable injury, the U.S. Afro-American, popular Secretary of State virtually gives the green light to Israelis to swiftly punish and even kill resisters to all of the humiliation which is required on a daily basis of the occupied Palestinians. She appears to fully support these illegal oppressive actions of Israelis against Palestinian even though this now well educated and successful woman must have had ancestors who were humiliated, dehumanized, disenfranchised slaves. So it is incomprehensible that she would not demonstrate both empathy and sympathy for the suffering of Palestinians who are virtual slaves of Israei slave masters who are living in total violation of U.N. resolutions and in violation of International Law. Yet, she appears to go on record as approving of Palestinians being swiftly punished, imprisoned and sometimes killed when they do not obediently and swiftly comply with Israel’s unjust and illegal but U.S. supported requirements. However, in her own conditioned if not brainwashed mind, Israel is virtually always just, fair and reasonable, so the requirements that Israel has for the Palestinian, to her are not unjust and illegal.

In contrast to the unreal context in which this U.S. Secretary of State comes to her oppressive and calloused conclusions, I find both Rima Merriyman and Abu Hasan Nimah’s Jordan Times’ commentaries to offer especially persuasive reasoning revealing the extreme injustice of the policies of the unjust Israeli occupation and the reasonableness of resisting many of the policies and resisting the illegal occupation. They consistently expose how current Israeli policy offers virtually no potential for negotiation for a just or reasonable settlement for the unjustly besieged Palestinians. So it appears that mass, peaceful protests and peaceful demonstrations by the Palestinians on a daily basis at each of the many humiliating, economically crippling, illegal check points must occur. Such extreme measures may be the only viable option remaining. These mass demonstrations would be with the hope of rallying deserved international indignation at the absurdity of the degree of illegal compliance that the U.S. Administration led by its apparently calloused Secretary of State, is supporting the Israelis in demanding of the physically and psychologically battered but not beaten Palestinians.

As I was considering the virtual hopelessness of the choices facing these battered, oppressed and suppressed people, I noticed an amazingly relevant verse in Doctor Luke’s description of the now Risen Bethlehem man when  he was forced to carry his own cross to the place of his crucifiction.

One concise statement in one important verse especially captures the extreme irony and absurdity of it being an American Secretary of State who is of African descent whose ancestors were slaves who would be the person who is now leading the supposed freedom and justice trumpeting Americans in supporting the heavy handed Israelis in oppressing the virtually enslaved Palestinians. (In reference to virtual slavery, it is quite relevant that the converted rampaging Jewish Rabbi who became the caring Christian, Apostle Paul, gave an often over looked by Christians, severe denunciation of slavery. In chapter one, verses 9 and 10 of his first letter to Timothy, he lists slave traders along with murderers as those who deserve the classification of people who are especially displeasing to God.)

Dr Luke is careful to mention where the man came from who was seized to carry the cross of the Messiah so that we have no difficulty in knowing that he was a Black man. It was Simon the Cyrenian who was forced by the Romans, while the Messiah was on his way to his crucifiction, who was made to carry the Messiah’s heavy cross. So Simon struggled behind his Messiah through the narrow streets of what was supposed to be a holy city, Jerusalem . The Bethlehem man was completely exhausted from his full night of absorbing torturous beatings and humiliating interrogations at the brutal hands of both his Israeli captors and their calloused Roman occupying force and no longer did he have sufficient strength to carry his heavy cross.

Stated from a modern day perspective regarding slavery, his previous night of torture, beatings and interrogations had so totally drained him of the required strength to carry his cross fast enough to keep up with the required pace, the following plan B was put into effect. A resourceful member of the White European Roman occupying force spotted a strong Black African man to carry the Messiah’s cross for him. Of course, one of the strong, White Roman soldiers could have carried the cross instead of requiring a Black African to do this task. But why should a White man bother himself when there was a strong, supposedly inferior Black man available?

So it was in this context when the detail oriented Dr Luke writes his verse which has an exceptionally relevant phrase regarding racism contained in it. This concise phrase captures in an amazing way the horrible cross that Black Africans have been forced to bear for generations for the decendants of the White Europeans who settled in the American South where inhumane slavery become so prevelant.

“As they led him away, they seized Simon from Cyrene , who was on his way in from the country, and put the cross on him and made him carry it behind Jesus.” Luke 23:26

In order to understand how I conclude that this one brief phrase ties in so closely with the American civil rights for Blacks movement that Queen Noor had great sympathy for when she was still an American college student named Lisa Halaby, we will make a brief diversion. In western speech, the term “carry ones cross” has come to refer to some type of unpleasant experience a person is forced by circumstances to endure. Significantly, it has been my experience in the U.S. that persons of African-American Legacy (Black) are much less likely to not explain away as insignificant the deep sufferings and cruel injustice experienced by Palestinians as a result of cruel, oppressive, Israeli policies. (Secretary of State Rice, regretfully, is an exception to this observation.) In other words, most American Blacks are quite likely to have empathy for the terrible cross that Israeli leadership has been forcing Palestinians to bear for almost sixty (60) years. I believe that their extra understanding and sympathy for Palestinians directly relates to the intense psychological pain, anger at discrimination, enforced splitting up of their slave families, hardship, segregation and even lynchings (hangings) that has been a major part of the African American’s heritage in the U.S. Despite the horrible suffering of their forefathers in the South under the cruel bondage of slavery and despite painful discrimination that many Afro Americans even today experience throughout the U.S., many have now become exceptionally successful. But many, many more are still caught in a race based poverty cycle that was exposed on T.V. by the hurricane in New Orleans and Biloxi .

Yet, this hard fought success of many has only been a result of the rights that were won through the difficult struggle of the Americal Civil Rights movement. This movement to liberate Blacks often inspired illegal and even diabolical violence against Blacks and against some of their White supporters during the long and resented Civil Rights confrontation which finally achieved more reasonable rights for Blacks. These hard won rights finally allowed most Afro-Americans to be treated as human beings rather than as an oppressed, disrespected, virtually occupied people. Thus, it was only after this prolonged struggle that American society finally allowed significant numbers of Blacks to succeed. Before the time of the gains achieved through the civil rights struggle, the White European majority population, especially in the South, forced the easily identifiable Black-African American population to carry their crosses for them, the sort of universal symbol of suffering. This was virtually prophesied or foreshadowed or symbolized by the way the Black man, Simon of Cyrenne, was literally forced by the White European Roman soldiers to carry this symbol of suffering behind the suffering Messiah.

But evenwhile the exhausted Messiah stumbled through the narrow cobblestoned streets of Jerusalem , Israel, he also undoubtedly deeply appreciated the also struggling Black Simon of Cyrenne for carrying his heavy cross for it was still no easy task to carry the heavy cross even if you had not been tortured and beaten all night. Therefore, we can now be certain that our now Risen Messiah, with his scars still visible, notices and appreciates every ounce of suffering the Blacks have experienced in the U.S. at the hands of their cruel oppressors. While the tens of thousands of Blacks were continuously suffering in the south, a large percentage constantly remained aware that their own suffering Messiah was continuously remaining aware of their suffering. It was this contstant awareness of their Risen Messiah’s awareness and empathy that was a major contributing factor helping many besieged, exploited slaves to endure. In the midst of the slaves persistent suffering, they created and sang songs which reminded them of their Savior’s constant awareness of their suffering. While the sun relentlessly blazed down on their aching bodies as they labored long hours in their master’s exhausting cotton fields, their Risen Messiah could hear them singing about his understanding of their suffering.

“Nobody knows the troubles I’ve seen,

Nobody knows but Jesus.

Nobody know the troubles I’ve seen,

Oh glory, hallelujah”

For the suffering slaves to constantly remind themselves of their Savior’s understanding of their suffering, did not solve the problem of their enslavement. But knowing that their Risen Messiah himself had endured cruel suffering helped them to endure. So they were able to cry out together in unison the equivalent of

“Oh Majd, Ilhamdillillah”

“Oh glory, Hallelujah”

Out of that great suffering under the unbearable sun of the oven like cotton fields, finally came triumph. Out of the humiliating rape by many members of the white plantation families of many, many of the most attractive Black women who would become pregnant with their white oppressors child who they would then raise as Blacks, finally came Triumph. Out of the humiliation of Black slaves not being able to maintain coherent family units due to the White slave owners constantly breaking up Black families by selling the fathers, the brothers, or the sisters whenever it was to their economic advantage to sell a supposedly meaningless piece of their property, finally came Triumph. Out of the horrible disgusting lynchings of totally innocent young Black males that frequently occurred, finally came Triumph. Out of the totally unjust laws which consistently treated Blacks as disposable property rather than as valuable human beings, came a people who usually have a deep empathy for the unjust suffering of others including the unjust suffering of the Palestinians.

Regretably however, possibly the most strategic Afro-American person in the U.S. today who is in position to contribute to the healing of this injustice which is currently occurring to Palestinians, is unmovable. She has effectively managed to close off almost any signs of having either compassion or empathy for these suffering people. Yet this normal emotion for especially a person with an Afro-American legacy to have, has a very probable explanation. If the current Secretary of State of the very pro Israel Bush Administration had even an inclination to provide a more just persepective concerning the Palestinians, that would create an enormous problem for U.S. Republicans and more specifically for the powerful Neoconservatives. Any sympathy for Palestinians would very much offend two extremely powerful Republican voting blocs. Both the Jewish Republican voting bloc regulated by AIPAC and the Evangelical Christian Republican voting bloc would be heard around the world screaming out the dreadful A. S. term – anti-semitism. To even hint at the Palestinians having any legitimacy to their charges of injustice, would at this point in the Administration’s love affair with Israel’s right to ignore international law and U.N. resolutions, would severely hurt the future election chances of Republican candidates.

Despite the intransigence of the Afro-American Secretary of State, how does this suffering of the Afro-Americans, a tiny fraction of which I have reviewed, relate to todays sufferings of the Palestinians at the wicked hands of certain calloused Israeli unjust policy makers?

I am not certain of the answers to this question. But of this relevant fact I am certain. The now Risen Messiah who once lived and breathed among the people of Israel, was cruelly crucifed because of the illegal, unjust decision of the chief priests and rulers of that nation. Consequently, just as he always had tremendous compassion for the American Blacks, he now has great empathy for what the Palestinians are now experiencing at the hands of this day’s Israeli leadership. Though the majority of Palestinians are Muslim, and though Muslims have an unfortunate understanding of one verse in the Quran so that have become wrongly convinced that ALLAH’s Messiah did not suffer and die, the relevant reality is this. He did suffer and die. Yes, he was cruelly murdered by an illegal, ugly Israeli execution whether one billion two hundred million Muslims deny that the death occurred or whether ten hundred billion Muslims deny that his death occurred. His death and resurrection did occur no matter how many hundreds of billion people say that it did not. The more there are that deny something occurred though it did actually happen, does not in any way cancel out the historicity, or actuality, or awfulness of the event. Also, no matter how many holy books have a verse in them such as the Quran has, and have the true intent of that verse misunderstood to mean that the Messiah was not murdered and did not die, does not mean that he was not murdered when the true reality is that he was murdered. Consequently, because he did suffer and die at the wicked hands of enraged chief priests and calloused Israeli rulers and at the compliant hands of their Roman occupiers, this forever guarantees one important reality. It means that the now Risen Messiah who himself suffered at the hands of the unjust Israeli leadership, continues to have a special empathy for the suffering of the Palestinians because of what some of his own Jewish people are still doing to those who they are now having opportunity to victimize like they once victimized him. It is quite relvant that the Messiah himself once reminded Jerusalem ’s leaders that their own forefathers consistently victimized their own righteous Prophets by killing them in Jerusalem . He explained that these Israeli leaders further demonstrated their own hypocracy by building tombs in Jerusalem honoring murdered prophets whom their own ancestors had maliciously killed inside this city. Yet these leaders also revealed their own callousness and gross hypocrisy by not condemning the wickedness of their own ancestors for murdering ALLAH’s own righteous Prophets.

Thus, whether Muslim Palestinians will accept it or not, in the midst of their horrible suffering, they have a Risen Messhiah who is now in the presence of the Just ALLAH, and he fully knows and understands what it is to cruelly suffer at the hands of an unjust Israeli leadership. With great compassion he is patiently waiting for the besieged Palestinians to cry out to him for help. It is quite possible that when the cries to the Risen Messiah of hundreds of thousands of suffering Palestinians spill into the streets it will be covered by a sensitive and sympathetic media. Then, as a result of tens of thousands of Afro-Americans becoming more fully aware of the similarity of the Palestinians’ suffering with their own suffering, they will join them in public pleas to ALLAH and to government authorities in various nations for justice for Palestinians. Furthermore, these now mostly liberated Afro-American people may be motivated to become more politically involved in helping to bring justice to the Palestinans by pleading with U.S. Senators, U.S. Congress persons, U.S. Governors, U.S. Mayors, U.S African American Churches and organizations as well as to U.S. Mosques and to U.S. Muslim Organizations, and to the majority of U.S. Christian churches that have not been brainwashed by the U.S. Christian Zionist movement. When this occurs, the power and influence in the U.S. of the combination of Jewish Zionists and Christian Zionists will be overwhelmed by a mighty national and finally international outcry for justice that will give Israel much less opportunity to hide behind their anti-semetic smokescreen and will be more amicable to reaching some kind of more equitable settelement with the severly exploited, oppressed and robbed Palestinians. But as important as all of these groups crying out for justice to the calloused Bush Administration who live in the hip pockets of Zionist forces and who have eleven of their fingers in their ears so they will not hear cries for justice, is the urgent, relentless cry from people in all nations crying to ALLAH, pleading with him for justice for Palestinians.

When this occurs, the powerful Zionist/Christian coalition who wants Palestinians to forever be second class citizens, will no longer have their way to the extreme extent that they now have. The Jewish Zionists among them wait for a Messiah to come who already did come and they crucified him. The Christian Zionists among them wait for the second coming of their own invention of a racist Messiah who favors the Jews who have not yet admitted that their ancestors murdered him by crucifiction, over the Palestinians who even today are being figuratively crucified by an Israeli leadership who sees themselves as virtual slave masters who can do anything they want with their slaves.

One of the first followers of the amazing man from Bethlehem wrote in his gospel of John these wonderful words of hope.

“The Light shines in the darkness and the Darkness shall not over come it.”

So the Light of the Risen West Bank man from Bethleham will finally defeat the disciples of darkness in Israel who persistently deny justice to Palestinians. For if no one else has seen the trouble that Palestinians have experienced except for the Risen Bethlehem man, that is enough. This is true because he is no longer the “Murdered man from Bethlehem .” Rather, he is now ALLAH’s own Risen man from West Bank Bethlehem whose own heart aches with the suffering of each Palestinian who is persecuted by Israelis or by unjust Israeli policy

When the rampaging Rabbi Saul was on his way to Damascus to persecute and imprison followers of the Bethlehem Man, a brilliant light temporarily blinded him.

He then heard a voice from heaven speaking to him these significant words.

“Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?”

Saul could not understand how he was persecuting anyone who had the power to blind him with a blinding light and who could speak to him from heaven, so he quickly replied, “Who are you Lord?”

He was stunned when he heard the totally unexpected answer,

“I am Jesus/Isa who you are persecuting.”

As far as this rampaging, self-righteous Jewish Rabbi knew, he had never persecuted Jesus. But he actually had persecuted him ever so severly – every time he persecuted a believer in whom the Risen Messiah lived. So the Risen Jesus used shock therapy to let the rampaging Rabbi know how grevious his crime was. So the lesson to be learned from Saul’s life changing experience in this. Every time a self-righteous Israeli persecutes a Palestinan, whether the U.S. Secretary of State or the President of the U.S. approves or not, there is a mystical experience that occurs. The Risen Messiah closely identifies with each Palestinain in his or her suffering at the hands of the Israelis. In fact, he indentifies so closely with the suffering that it is also the Risen Jesus/Isa who intesenly experiences that suffering whether calloused Israelis realize that or not. But one day soon they will come to realize that they not only crucified their Messiah over two thousand years ago, but they have also been crucifying Palestinians every day of their illegal occupation of Palestinan land and with every other atrocity, persecution and injustice that has accompanied their illegal occupation.

Racism In Biloxi

In Football--

In the Occupied West Bank--

When I was four years old my Father was the director of the Y.M.C.A. in Boone , Iowa. Since we lived right in the Y.M.C.A. building it was nice for my mother to get rest from all the activity so that summer she took me with her to visit her mother “Tute” in Biloxi , Mississippi. (We seldom saw my grandfather Harry because he was a traveling salesman and away from home most of the time.)