Blessed are the confused and curious
They speak to me with a lying tongue (Ps 109:2)
In this piece, I am using the reporting on the current situation in Gaza to make my case that Christians do well to be humble, confused, and curious. Which I believe fits nicely into Pope Leo's stance: (The church) “does not claim to possess a monopoly on truth, either in its analysis of problems or its proposal of concrete solutions.” and “Every ideology, no matter how perfect it may seem, ends up turning against the human person.”
What is happening in Gaza?
I gather that the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) has around 6 million meals in its first week and has plans to open more centers. It seems clear that Hamas and the UN are unhappy with this new approach to deliver humanitarian relief. And it appears to be true that the GHF centers are under the direct control of American contractors with the IDF anywhere from 1 km two 500 m around the centers. Some people have died by gunfire in the area around the centers.
There are all sorts of things that are not at all clear.
How many people have been killed and who killed them? Some Palestinian sources claim a large number and accuse the Israel forces. That has been reported in the New York Times and the Washington Post. The Israel Defense Forces, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, and the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem have said that much of the reporting is inaccurate and some entirely false. That seems to get covered by media such as The Free Press (FP), the Jerusalem post, and the New York Post. There are some reports of gunmen in civilian clothing shooting people. The lack of clarity can be seen in yesterday's Washington Post’s acknowledgment that its report that Israeli soldiers killed dozens of civilians in Gaza could not be verified. In a FP article today they state an obvious truth, “Now it goes without saying that these stories are nearly impossible to verify in real time. The truth is the first casualty in war, as the old saying goes. And that is especially true when it comes to Gaza.”
What is Hamas doing? What we do know is that Hamas has warned people against using the centers. There are accusations from The Center for Peace Communications that Hamas is responsible for the violence (video). When the IDF claimed that large numbers of young Palestinians were rushing toward their troops, what came to my mind was “the Great March of Return,” an effort in 2018-19 to challenge Israel's control of the border by methods that included large numbers attempting to breach the fence. Hundreds of Palestinians were killed.
Health Ministry
Most of the reports about casualties come from medical authorities inside Gaza. We can see issues of ideology in the way media sources name those medical authorities.
The New York Times refers to them as "the Gaza health ministry" or sometimes “the Palestinian health ministry”. The Dispatch reports them as “the Hamas-run Palestinian Ministry of Health.” A significant difference in language.
Then there is the matter of how to understand and report civilian and military deaths.
Parts of the media use a phrase something like this, “there have been 53,000 Palestinians killed according to the Palestinian health authority which does not distinguish between combatant and civilian deaths.” A whole series of questions have been raised around that phrasing of the matter. For example, why would we accept numbers coming from Hamas, a terrorist organization, according to the US and most European nations? Why are the numbers offered by Israel not reported alongside this (Israel estimates that about 22,000 +/- of the killed were Hamas combatants)?
We also see little reporting about what military experts understand to be normative, if tragic, military to civilian ratios of death in this kind of war. John Spencer, Chair of West Point’s Urban Warfare Studies says that Israel has taken significant measures to minimize civilian casualties and there is a civilian-to-combatant death ratio in Gaza ranging from 1 to 1.0-1.5. Others estimate it at 1 to 2. The Gaza Ministry of Health says that the civilian-to-combatant ratio is higher than Israel's claims. At one point they suggested that least 74% of the dead are civilians. The United Nations estimates the global average civilian-to-militant casualty rate at 9:1. So depending on which one ends up being true, either Israel is fighting one of the most moral wars in history (which Spencer believes) or one of the most unethical wars in history.
At one point the Gaza (Hamas) Health Ministry claimed a very high percentage of civilian deaths saying that 75% of the dead were women and children. Later they quietly dropped the assertion. The Associated Press then showed a decline in the overall proportion of women and children killed, falling to below 40% at one point, which coincided with Israel having changed military tactics and an AP review of the Gaza Ministry's methodologies.
The Al-Ma’amadani Hospital
This is an addition to the original article. It was added one day later. We can see the same kind of issues about what is actually happening and who is? responsible. It may be of special interest because the hospital is related to the Anglican Diocese of Jerusalem and there were reports from Episcopal news sources
4 Journalists Killed in Attack on al-Ahli Hospital (The Living Church)
The article highlights the Jerusalem diocese’s condemnation of the attack and the death of four journalists. The article also acknowledged that “The IDF has shown a pattern of Hamas placing military operations within civilian structures, including hospitals.”
Diocese of Jerusalem condemns deadly Israeli attack on its hospital in Gaza (Episcopal News Service)
The ENS report covered some of the same territory as we saw in The Living Church article. It noted a response from The Episcopal Church - “We in The Episcopal Church stand with Archbishop Hosam Naoum and the Episcopal Diocese of Jerusalem in condemning this attack. We urge the Israeli government to respect international human rights law.” The piece goes on to say that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said the strike “occurred in the hospital’s courtyard and that its intended target was an Islamic Jihad terrorist who Israel says had been using the space as a command center.” The Archbishop of York Challenge to the claim, “Despite our repeated requests, the Israeli Government has been unable to prove its claims that Al Ahli Hospital has been used by Hamas. Instead this is part of a relentless and outrageous pattern of attacks on hospitals and health care facilities in Gaza. There is no justification for this under international humanitarian law.”
An Israel Times report picked up on the hospital story.
“The military said that the strike at the Al-Ma’amadani Hospital targeted a Palestinian Islamic Jihad command center in the medical center’s courtyard. The Hamas-run health ministry claimed, however, that the strike had hit a press compound and killed three people. Reports named one victim as Ismail Badr, a cameraman for the Islamic Jihad-affiliated Palestine Today channel. A second journalist, Suleiman Hajaj, was also killed, according to reports. The IDF said the compound was being used by Islamic Jihad operatives to plan and carry out attacks on troops and Israeli civilians.” Note: The Al-Ma’amadani Hospital is also known as Al-Ahli Arab Hospital, The Jerusalem Post reported, “The IDF killed a Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist who was operating in a command center in the yard of the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in the area of Gaza City, the military announced Thursday. The terrorists used the command center to plan and execute terrorist attacks.”
Comment - When I did a search, “Is there evidence that Hamas has used Ahli Arab Hospital during the war? The AI response was, “It is difficult to definitively say whether Hamas used Ahli Arab Hospital during the war, as the situation is complex and subject to conflicting claims and reporting.”
The underline dispute is whether Hamas or other terrorist groups have used the tunnels under the hospitals or hospital spaces for military purposes. It’s been an issue since the beginning of the war, here’s a 2023 article - “Setting the Record Straight About Hamas’ Use of Gaza’s Hospitals and Israel’s Efforts to Help Patients” - from the American Jewish Committee, “Hamas has long sought to exploit the specially protected status of hospitals under international humanitarian law and to use them to shield their activities from counterattack by Israel. As the IDF has reported and U.S. intelligence has confirmed, Hamas has integrated its operations in and around hospitals throughout Gaza. Hamas does this knowing that it could paint any Israeli action against them as yet more evidence of Israel’s desire to harm Palestinian civilians.”
So what are we to make of this? Hospitals have been attacked. If they were being used for military purposes, that is legitimate under the rules of war. If those claims are false as asserted by the Archbishop of York., Israel is violating the rules of war. I wonder if this is an other situation around which we can’t know much for certain. There's much that we're not going to have evidence about until after the war is over. And maybe not even then.
Blessed are the humble, confused and curious
Let the creditor seize everything he has; *
let strangers plunder his gains.
Let there be no one to show him kindness, *
and none to pity his fatherless children.
Let his descendants be destroyed, *
and his name be blotted out in the next generation.
(Ps 109 10-12)
Well, no! I’m not into destroying descendants because of what their parents did. But maybe the rest should fall upon reporters, podcasts, and influencers who offer us reporting through their ideological lens. Okay, not even that. We Christians are just not into the business of destroying all the wicked in the land.
As an alternative, I suggest there's value in humility, the acceptance of our confusion, and the activation of our curiosity. Some people will address the uncertainty of this kind of situation by doubling down. They will find themselves making a case based on their ideology. This of course is exactly what the new pope cautioned against. Others will expand the sources of information they consult in the hope that they will find the truth. One level of that might be trying to get the facts correct. But that is almost impossible in any war situation. The other level of truth is more about morality and ethics. We seek who to blame. And we want to blame them now.
Still, most of us will find ourselves with more sympathy toward one side or the other in most conflicts. It may help to recall that sin and human limitation are not only in the conflict we are looking at, but in ourselves. But even at that, decisions have to be made. Christians in the government must decide what energies and resources to put into helping one side or the other or in the promotion of peace agreements. And those of us not in such responsible positions are still citizens who may vote and attempt to influence the situation in one way or another. I tend to have a bias toward Israel. Some of that runs deep in my own history because I grew up among a vibrant Jewish community and knew people who had numbers tattooed on their arms. But most of it is driven by my own conviction that liberal democracy is the best form of government if we are to value human dignity. So I tilt toward Israel, not because I'm certain that the way they are conducting the war is entirely correct - I don't think that will be known until many years after the war is over, maybe not even then - but because they are a liberal democracy, imperfect, as are all liberal democracies. But still a place in which Arab citizens have all the rights of Jewish citizens and gay people and women live with a measure of dignity. And also, because on the world stage, there is a struggle going on between the liberal democracies and the forces of totalitarianism and terrorism.
Finally, my approach is to affirm humility, confusion, and curiosity. Then maybe to pray for the success of humanitarian relief for Palestinians and send some money. And for Israel, well, this is from today's Morning Prayer, “I will gather you from the peoples, and assemble you out of the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel. When they come there, they will remove from it all its detestable things and all its abominations. I will give them one heart, and put a new spirit within them; I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, so that they may follow my statutes and keep my ordinances and obey them. Then they shall be my people, and I will be their God” (Ezekiel 11:17-20). I might pray then, that even in a time of war the people of Israel will not turn toward a heart of stone, but one flesh and compassion. Yes, I know how difficult that is.
And then I return to the essential Christian truth. That in every situation, we are called to these things (mentioned in an earlier posting.)
In all times of adversity, when we are most anxious, there is always the same response to be made.
Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control … “An inquiring and discerning heart, the courage to will and to persevere, a spirit to know and to love you, and the gift of joy and wonder in all your works.” … humility, gentleness, patience, forbearance born of love, eagerness to maintain unity in the bond of peace, truthfulness mediated in love, mutual kindness, tenderheartedness and forgiveness … · Prudence (good sense and practical judgment grounded in reality and directed toward what is good), Justice (rooted in the assumption that we live with one another), Fortitude (removing barriers to justice, perseverance) and Temperance (Self-awareness and self-control)
This abides,
Brother Robert, OA
The Feast of John XXIII (Angelo Guiseppe Roncalli), Bishop, 1963