Forgiveness; DIY

BBC Watch has blogged ‘walls’. We blogged them the other day as well. 

The matter of fact way the BBC describes walls constructed by various countries to separate their citizens from undesirables or illegal migrants differs in tone from the suspicious manner they adopt when referring to the security barrier, often called the apartheid wall. They imply that Israel’s ‘excuse’ is disingenuous; not really for protecting Israelis from intruders with malicious intent, they imply, but for land-grabbing. 

I’m only mentioning this again because yesterday the rev. Lucy Winkett delivered a ‘forgiveness‘ themed sermon on Thought for the Day.  She has a thing about walls.

I was wondering if I could truly forgive her for teaming up with the smarmy Stephen Sizer whose six month ban on anti-Israel internet activity must have expired by now.  

Could I forgive Stephen Sizer for being a manipulating sanctimonious antisemite? I suppose that would be the Christian thing to do, taking the lead from Vincent Uzomah who forgave his assailant because he’d very likely been brought up with violence and that was all he knew. Lucy was full of admiration for Uzomah’s Christian attitude.

I could say, Stephen Sizer, you’ve been brought up with antisemitism, and that’s all you know, so I forgive you. But how do I know how he was brought up? Perhaps he was educated by the BBC, in which case one might be minded to forgive all the antisemitism that has arisen from the BBC’s legacy of one-half-of-the-story reporting. Forgive them for they know not what they do.

I hadn’t realised Sizer was the inspiration behind Bethlehem Unwrapped. I thought it was Lucy’s project, devised in conjunction with that other chap whose name escapes me.  I was wondering if a nice girl like Lucy would have been so hopelessly open to persuasion, since she was described in, dare I say ‘excessively’ glowing terms in this radio 4 profile, which was, admittedly, constructed before the offending ‘Wall” stunt.

At the end of her sermon she said something like “in order to forgive, one must be able to forgive oneself” So Lucy, have you forgiven yourself for your politically inept, misguided collaboration with the antisemitic Palestinian lobby?  

Who cares?

When I say that BBC insiders seem to be the only sentient beings who are unaware that the BBC’s influence is wielded irresponsibly, in the willy-nilly manner of those who don’t know their own strength, I immediately think of the way that your man in the street regards Israel. (sigh)

The recent news concerning Scarlett Johansson and the SodaStream factory, together with the Bethlehem Unwrapped debacle highlighted the magnitude of wrong assumptions that are generally held about Israel. Both these newsworthy occurrences showed how widespread is the reach of the BBC, with the inextricable Guardianista, left-wing affiliation that they steadfastly deny. Between them, no doubt boosted by the Islam factor, the BBC/Guardian umbrella has succeeded in vilifying Israel over decades, so that the word ‘Zion’ is now more or less analogous to ‘Nazi’, not just because of those spikey Zs and Ns, but because of the inverted ‘holocaust survivors turned oppressors’ meme that one casually encounters when least expecting it.

Incidentally, I have noticed a slight shift in BTL comments on Telegraph and Guardian blogs, especially since Daniel Birnbaum came on the scene, i.e. Newsnight. People are beginning to think.

“The settlements impoverish the Palestinians” Said Mr. Oxfam determinedly. Paxo tried to force Mr. Oxfam to admit it wants to shut SodaStream down and put 500 Palestinians out of work. He did it in a manner reminiscent of that infamous and hugely childish Paxo/Michael Howard stunt. But Oxfam wouldn’t. It merely repeated, in an almost equally repetitious fashion that the objection was “to settlements”. Despite the fact that Birnbaum trounced Mr. Oxfam, Paxo of the BBC still failed to grapple with the fundamentals such as why there is “an occupation” what are “settlements” and what is the biggest cause of Palestinians’ hardship. 

Elder of Ziyon wished Paxo had asked: "In the case of a peace agreement where the Sodastream factory ends up in Israel, would you want it to employ Palestinians?" 

(The factory is in an area that has been virtually allocated to Israel under the terms of land swaps already agreed by both sides.)

"How about in case of a peace agreement and it ends up in Palestine, would you allow an Israeli company like Sodastream to invest in the Pal areas?" 

"Then how does it make sense to insist they close today if it would remain in operation and employing Arabs no matter which side of the border it ends up on?"

Birnbaum allowed several defamatory and spurious accusations about settlements and illegality to pass, a necessary sacrifice in view of time constrains and the need to focus on the SodaStream issue. Nevertheless by concentrating on the benefits SodaStream brings to the Palestinian workers and the detrimental effect on them should Oxfam have their wish and the factory be removed, Birnbaum won the argument. I think and hope that any ‘undecideds‘ out there would have seen through Oxfam’s anti-Israel  bluster.

As for as the Bethlehem Unwrapped fiasco, I saw a video of the cringemaking closing ceremony. I spotted our old friend Zeinab Badawi amongst the attendees. Nigel Kennedy bounced up and down with his Kaffiyeh-clad mates and some Palestinian “dancers” cavorted around amateurishly. Justin Butcher thanked Lucy Winkett, and gave her  a “certificate”, and Lucy Winkett hugged Justin Butcher and thanked him for organising such a successful event. They both beamed with pleasure at their accomplishment (stirring up Jew-bashing.) The finale consisted of dancers streaming symbolically through the section of symbolic torn-down wall, accompanied by chants of “Free, Free, Palestine”. 

If that wasn’t agenda-driven outright Jew-bashing I don’t know what is.

I’d also like to mention something in a piece by Ed West, in which he is broadly sympathetic to Israel over some of these issues.   It’s just this bit:

“Still, many of the internet supporters of Israel are not exactly nuanced either, refusing to see fault in anything it does;.”

When people stop querying Israel’s right to exist its supporters can be free to criticise her without her enemies seizing on anything and everything negative and amplifying it to suit their hatred. “Refusing to see fault” is as unfair as it’s untrue. It’s only from a position of security that one can afford to self-critcise.  Ed West is being insensitive. He’s taking out each-way insurance. Covering himself against every eventuality by defending Israel whilst keeping in with the Jew-bashers and not aligning himself with Zionists.

Sunday Unwrapped/Interrupted

As predicted, when the Bethlehem Unwrapped item was featured on Ed Stourton’s Sunday, Radio 4, time ran out just as things were (might have been) hotting up. Having been trailed throughout, the discussion was nipped in the bud before anything significant or new had a chance to get its boots on. 

This sort of thing happens so frequently it’s beginning to look like a conspiracy by some mischievous BBC producers ‘aving a larf.

Lucy Winkett reiterated the same claims she has stated many times in the BU publicity and subsequently in the Guardian, with knobs on.  Alan Johnson, putting the case for Israel, hardly got beyond reciting the figures relating to suicide bombings. He did manage to  mention the recently foiled bus-bombing including the pertinent fact that the plot was hatched by terrorists from Bethlehem.You know, the ordinary people of Bethleham who find themselves in the grievous situation which must be acknowledged. Or should I say ‘unwrapped’.

Alan Johnson

It almost seems that by pitching those two contributors against one another (one defending Israel, and the other allegedly ‘not taking sides’,) the BBC at least, was putting the Rev in the very partisan position (taking sides) which she so unconvincingly denies she’s in. 

If she and her project genuinely weren’t taking an anti-Israel stance, why did the BBC not bother to seek a spokesperson who was taking an anti-Israel stance, in order to flesh out their feeble proposition that ‘This wall ENsLaves lives’ and perhaps have a go at substantiating their cynical claim that it’s merely a land-grab?

Otherwise what was the point of even trying to set out Israel’s justification for the separation wall ?  In other words if Alan Johnson or anyone else actually believed the Bethlehem Unwrapped project was merely intended to be an even-handed anti-wall protest and not a straightforward anti-Israel one, they would have argued differently. For example, to explain why it was misguided rather than even-handed he could have cited the nature of the graffiti, the nature of the speakers and the nature of the project’s collaborators and beneficiaries; factors which amount to an overwhelming body of evidence that the project was indeed another Israel-bashing pantomime in a paper-thin disguise. 

The snippet on Sunday wasn’t worth bothering with at all, since anyone who was interested will have gone far beyond the superficial ‘Lucy Winkett denying the bias versus a Zionist justifying the wall”.  

If they were going to have a debate, why not have a real one? Why not allow time to discuss the whole issue and its ramifications, lock, stock and barrel? 

Why not bring up the issue of the persecution of Christians in the Middle East, which was the topic of an item aired earlier in this very episode of Sunday, or better still amalgamate the two items. Alan Johnson has written articles about this matter, yet he didn’t have time to bring it up at all.  

What about the project’s dodgy association with Interpal and War on Want, which have also been extensively written about online.

Why didn’t we get to hear the testimony of the pro-Israel demonstrators who were tuned away or harassed by monitors when they wished to write their messages? 

Useless stuff. Not worthy.

Not Taking Sides (says Lucy Winkett)

At times like this I almost regret leaving Biased-BBC because our “Is” readership is comparatively limited, and our contributions come and go more or less unremarked. We don’t promote ourselves or spam other blogs with links and ads. Maybe we should, but we don’t.

We don’t orchestrate festivals or raise money for massive publicity stunts either. 

Speaking for myself, the obscurity of “Is” doesn’t bother me, until something like Bethlehem Unwrapped comes along. 

As many people as possible should be made aware of what was wrong with it. 

I detect that Lucy Winkett herself is even beginning to have doubts. She has written a defensive op ed in the Guardian, which seems to be one of those damage limitation efforts, without openly admitting that there has been any damage.

  

She claims that they were supporting “beautiful resistance”, which reinforces the concept that the ‘resistance’ is a noble thing. But is it?

Palestinian spokespersons tell the western world that they are resisting Israel’s illegal occupation of ‘Palestinian land’. The western world seems to accept this uncritically, but leaving aside all the legalities that relate to both the Israeli occupation and the term ‘Palestinian land’, (especially as leaving these matters aside is precisely what anti-Israeli people have chosen to do) there’s the crucial issue of what exactly is it that Palestinians themselves believe they’re resisting. The very concept ‘Palestinian land’ might be a clue, but It’s not much of a secret that what they’re actually resisting is Israel itself.

“and in the church courtyard our stewards have listened to all viewpoints without exception.”

Lucy’s primary case for the defence is that this project is even-handed and not about taking sides. She gives examples of some of  the messages, singling out a poem entitled “Every Wall Has two Sides” and continues: “Several have written “this wall saves lives” Anything offensive on the wall has been removed immediately” 

Several? I’d be interested to know exactly how many people, other that the original author, have managed to write that, and whether the invigilators intervened while that particular slogan was altered, twice, by anti-Israel scribblers in the way I mentioned in an earlier post. Perhaps she was exaggerating to bolster her argument.

“We are supporting the ordinary people of Bethlehem at Christmas because we believe it would be wrong to sing about the town and meditate on its importance to our faith without acknowledging the grievous situation its citizens find themselves in today.”

Statistics say that the ordinary people of Bethlehem are predominantly Muslims, and that they are intimidating the dwindling Christian population. Why would the church particularly support that? 

“Of course we have attracted some criticism for doing this, and so, on behalf of the church, I would like briefly to address this head on. Some have said that by hosting this event, we are somehow refuting Israel's status as a state; some have even claimed that we are aligning ourselves with those who support the Holocaust, suicide bombings or that we are antisemitic. These accusations and the ease with which they are employed are totally irresponsible and inflammatory. We are acutely aware that antisemitism is real and pernicious and we stand strongly against all forms of racism including antisemitism.”

Lucy, you have said precisely nothing. You have aligned yourself with holocaust supporting organisations, no doubt inadvertently. But you haven’t engaged with that specific accusation head on, merely denied it. Okay, you’re not an antisemite. Not deliberately, just ‘accidentally on purpose’, which is what we used to say when we were kids but you don’t seem to hear it so much these days. Quite a useful phrase it is too.  

We support the state of Israel's right not only to exist but to flourish as a member of the international community within secure, internationally recognised borders.

In what way? So how does your support manifest itself? By opposing the security barrier?

Secondly, says Lucy, we have been challenged that we haven’t acknowledged: “The government position” that the wall was built for security reasons.”

The government’s position? That’s exactly like saying “Israel says”, just like the BBC always does, i.e., paying lip service to Israel’s case, while impliedly casting doubt on both the sincerity and the validity of it.

She states that this has been well articulated by the church, and:

“It is also projected on to the wall installation along with an acknowledgment that the barrier has been declared illegal under international law.”

So, another argument for the not taking sides defence obliterated with a neatly timed own goal.  She’s boasting that they made sure anything that might look pro-Israel was counteracted before the anti-Israel brigade had the time to be offended.

She also refers to events with speakers, omitting to mention that the list is predominated by known anti-Israel activists. Where’s the ‘disproportionate’ argument when you really need it?

Douglas Murray has written about this.  

I’m in good company. He makes many of the points I’ve tried to make, with added value, personal testimony and eloquent prose. "Moral squalor."

I was surprised that the Guardian article drew a mixed bag of comments, rather than the usual Israel-bashing ones. There seemed to be an unusual number (for the Guardian) of comments critical of Lucy Winkett and critical of Bethlehem Unwrapped. So yippee. One thing that came up in several comments was the lack of ‘below the line’ engagement by the author. Given Douglas Murray’s eminence as a speaker and writer, even more telling is the ending of his article “I have been trying to get hold of Lucy Winkett, the Rector of St James’. But she does not appear to be available.”

Well, she usually makes herself available to the BBC, as do Jeremy Hardy and the other one.

Oddly enough, the BBC hasn’t reported this event at all. At least the BBC website search engine brings up ‘sorry there are no results for your search”.

Maybe it’ll be the subject of “the Big Questions” I think there’s one tomorrow.

O little town of Bethlehem How still we see thee lie....

Bethlehem Unwrapped has, undeniably, drawn a disturbing number of enthusiastic and positive responses. Such a shame. It’s inflammatory in a wholly negative way, and I’m astounded at the wrongheadedness of the instigators. They may have begun the project with good intentions, but they leapt onto the wrong bandwagon ‘and they don’t even know it!’

  

The pretence that it was an even-handed symbol of protest at ‘walls’ in general was belied by much of the participants’ graffiti. The ‘This Wall saves Lives’ slogan was defaced, firstly with “Doesn’t” scrawled in black between  ‘wall and ‘saves’, then the word ‘saves’ was altered in red pen to read ‘Enslaves’ despite supposed close supervision by the monitors. It appears that prospective message-scribblers were being asked for ‘paperwork’, perhaps   in an un/intentionally ironic replica of ‘the checkpoints’.

Saint James's Piccadilly.

 “In 2009, Patriarchs and Heads of Churches in Jerusalem issued a joint appeal to Christians throughout the world to understand and help to alleviate the desperate hardship the wall has caused. It is a daily disaster for ordinary Palestinian families.” 

says a statement on the official St James’s  website. Daily disaster it may well be, but one that pales into insignificance beside the daily suffering of all bereaved families of victims of Palestinian ‘martyrdom’ on both sides.

“In hosting this festival, St James’s Church joins the movement in Bethlehem known as “beautiful resistance”, celebrating the culture, music, food and humour of those who live behind the Wall.  St James’s stands in solidarity with the universal call for a just and sustainable solution for both Palestinians and Israelis. “

Hmm.

Four Islamic Jihad operatives from Bethlehem were arrested in connection with the December bombing of a Bat Yam public bus.
The terrorists placed a large amount of nails and screws inside the pressure cooker, which Harimi detonated remotely by cellphone.The terrorists were planning a further, larger bombing in Tel Aviv, but were arrested before they could carry out another attack, a senior IDF official told Ynet News. A further 25 kg. of explosive material was confiscated during the arrests, he said.

Let’s leave aside culture, music, food and humour, none of which seem particularly characteristic  of the Palestinian, particularly the humour,  and merely address the ‘just and sustainable solution’ and  “the right of the State of Israel to exist with secure internationally recognised borders.”

So how, given the Palestinian Authority’s openly declared refusal to ever, never not on your nellie, recognise Israel as a Jewish state, and their penchant for sneaking into Israel’s cafes and coffee bars whenever they get the chance, and blowing themselves and everyone nearby to smithereens, would one achieve justice and security without enforced separation?

“This wall is symbolic of walls all over the world that divide and confine peoples, restricting free movement and dominating the imagination of those who live behind them. “

No it isn’t really. It’s a replica of one wall in particular, and to prove it,  the slogans. 

Are these the slogans of ‘walls all over the world?’ No they’re not. What about Broadmoor, for example. That might be whataboutery gawn mad, but I bet the criminally insane find their walls inconvenient. Are they protesting about all dividing walls that separate something or someone from something or someone?  Not this time. No, they’ve built a replica of a specific wall for a specific purpose, and not a very Christian one.  

St. James’s is supposed to be a Christian church, is it not? Yet Bethlehem Unwrapped doesn’t seem concerned about the threat they ought to be concerned about. Christians being harassed and intimidated by Muslims. 

The information is freely available, but they’re only concerned with*innocent face* style Israel-bashing.

  

It is estimated that, for the past seven years, more than one thousand Christians have been emigrating from the Bethlehem area annually and that only 10,000 to 13,000Christians remain in the city. International human rights lawyer Justus Reid Weiner, who teaches at Hebrew University, told the Jerusalem Institute for Global Jewish Affairs that, under the PA-Fatah regime, Christian Arabs have been victims of frequent human rights abuses by Muslims.

"There are many examples of intimidation, beatings, land theft, firebombing of churches and other Christian institutions, denial of employment, economic boycotts, torture, kidnapping, forced marriage, sexual harassment, and extortion," he said. PA officials are directly responsible for many of the attacks, and some Muslims who have converted to Christianity have been murdered.

 I wouldn’t like to be on the receiving end of a hostile mob like that Arab guy (haven’t we seen him before,  heckling the anti-Sodastream demo ?) who was outnumbered by ill-informed passers by, pro-Palestinian activists and an angry person who accused him of being a frigging Jew.

“Persecution of Christians in the Islamic Middle East has intensified in recent years, and the fear now is that Christianity may be becoming extinct in the area where it has existed for two millennia. They are criticized, absurdly, as Crusaders, or as colonialists associated with the West, or as infidels.The exception, and the only country in the area where Christians possess full religious rights and can exercise them, and have increased both in absolute number and proportion of the population, is Israel.”

Denis MacEoin’s letter.

“Throughout the Middle East, Christians are dwindling rapidly in numbers, mainly because extremist Islamic groups drive them out. Israel is the only country in the region where Christian numbers have been growing steadily since 1948. It goes without saying that Israel is the only country across the Islamic world where Jews can live safely, after almost a million were killed or driven out of Arab lands in the late 1940s and early 1950s. Those few Jews who live in Iran live on a knife-edge.”

There Lucy Winkett, put on your robes and sermonise that.

Playing racist chicken

I haven’t anything original to add to the debate about the so-called art installation ‘Bethlehem Unwrapped” that has been erected outside St James’s Church Piccadilly, but the whole thing seems so ignominious and unhelpful that I want to say something, original or not. 

The BBC seems to have avoided the subject, despite the fact that the Rev Lucy Winkett is involved, and Jeremy Hardy and Mark Steel are performing for the cause. They’re all all BBC regulars, and the BBC’s favourite popular philosopher of the spiritual kind, Giles Fraser, has ‘weighed in’ over at the Guardian.

The perpetrators of this, and other recent crude gestures, vehemently insist that they have nothing to do with antisemitism, but their actions creep closer and closer to the real thing. It’s as if they’re trying to see how close they can get to the precipice, like a game of racist chicken. 

I’ll never be able to watch Masterchef again without feeling a little uncomfortable each time a chef plates up a spoon-shaped dollop of desert. 

There’s a radio 4 ‘profile’ of Lucy Winkett, the rector of St. James’s Piccadilly.  Apparently she has a marvelous singing voice, and is an all round good egg. Everyone questioned was unable to think of a single flaw the Rev Lucy might have. I can think of one. 

“I’m Lucy Winkett rector of St. James’s Piccadilly. This Christmas we’ve built huge wall right  across the front of our church. We’d really like you to come and see it because it’s what the people of Bethlehem are experiencing today.”

Mindlessly disseminating propaganda with antisemitic overtones is a flaw, surely. If Lucy Winkett has deluded herself into genuinely believing that the people of Bethlehem are entirely peace-loving, and not part of a movement calling for a third intifada, let’s hope the real wall stays in place so that her theory hasn’t a chance of being put to the test.  

The Bethlehem Unwrapped director, Justin Butcher has something of the Will Self about him. I  bet they’re mates. “We’ve spent eight months planning this replica of the separation wall” he boasts. “This is a festival of hope, reaching out to the people of Bethlehem behind the wall’ he continues. “an eight meter high separation wall surrounding it” proclaims he, inaccurately. He is delighted with himself for organising a childish stunt based on prejudice and ignorance and aligning the church with haters who indoctrinate their children and each other with the crudest most virulent antisemitism imaginable.

Don’t people look angelic when they gaze wistfully heavenwards?  They are thinking pious thoughts about the poor peace-loving Palestinians who have been brutally separated from their prey. 

“Stand up against the wall with Jeremy Hardy” announces Butcher. “Jeremy Hardy versus the Israeli army!  Mark Steel!!”  “Come down, make your mark on the wall. Send a message to the people of Bethlehem this Christmas”  

“The River to the Sea” for example. “Free Palestine”, or how about a nice swastika fashioned out of the letter ‘S”.  Peace! Stuff like that. Oh yes, and ‘This wall saves lives’

Melanie Phillips has written:

St. James’s has put out a pious statement that it

‘… opposes all forms of racism including antisemitism and supports the right of the State of Israel to exist with secure internationally recognised borders’.

But Melanie Phillips tends to be dismissed as a ‘she would say that” Zionist apologist, although she is a terrific writer, which must be irritating for those who don’t like her politics.

Melanie Phillips explains:

·      The ‘wall’ does not surround Bethlehem.·      For most of its length it is not a wall at all but a simple chain link fence.·      It has been constructed not to oppress Palestinians but solely to prevent Israelis from being    murdered by Arabs.·      This security barrier has had to be built as a wall alongside one area of Bethlehem because a fence here – cheek by jowl with Jerusalem ­– would be insufficient to prevent the very real threat of some of its inhabitants murdering large numbers of Israelis.·      The undoubted hardships caused by this barrier are solely the result of the ever-continuing attempts by some of those living behind it to murder yet more Israelis.·      Since this security barrier was constructed, the number of Israelis murdered in terrorist attacks has decreased by some 70 per cent – while the number of attempted attacks remains high." 

“Bethlehem is a real place cut off by a concrete wall and that it has very little in common with the fantasy, Narnia-like version that is the stuff of Christmas cards.”  says Giles Fraser. Yes, and the Palestinians have very little in common with the three wise men, away in the manger and while shepherds wash their socks by night all seated round the tub. Or Santa Claus.

“The online reaction to this installation has also been predictably binary. For some it is a powerful testament to Israeli government brutality; for others it's another example of Christian antisemitism seeping into the liberal church. And some of the graffiti on the Piccadilly wall reflects this same for-us-or-against-us division. Some have written about its illegality under international law; others have written that this wall saves lives.”

The wisdom of Giles Fraser. A powerful testament to Israeli brutality? The brutality of separating innocent civilians from fanatics who have been whipped up into murderous frenzies with the same perverted zeal we saw only the other day in Woolwich. 

“Thirteen times the shepherds thrust their knives into the women, breaking bones, tearing flesh, even impaling one to the ground. As the Jew played dead, she watched the ßChristian friend hacked to death before her very eyes.The shepherds returned home glorifying and praising Allah for all that they had seen and spread the word concerning what had they had done. ‘Today near the town of David two Jews have been slaughtered,’ they declared. They plotted and schemed, boasting to their neighbours, ‘this will be a sign, they will find two of their own, all meanly wrapped in bloody clothes and in the bushes laid.’ And everyone who heard of it, was amazed.”

From a letter to St. James’s Church from Kay Wilson.

A below-the-line commenter has countered her affecting testimony with tales of atrocities carried out by Israeli settlers who been given unforgivably lenient punishments by the Israeli courts for murdering innocent Palestinians. This appalls me, but there is one fundamental difference. Neither the Israeli public nor the Israeli press condone these aberrations. They do not erect statues to them, name streets after them glorify their actions or pay their families lifelong salaries. Using this argument to justify the St. James’s stunt is like bringing up Baruch Goldstein or Anders Breivik every time a Zionist or a right-wing commentator expresses an opinion one disagrees with.      

Counter Tourism: Responding to Pro-Palestinian Protest and Solidarity Tours

by Ardie Geldman

My view of this barrier is quite different than that of these (pro Palestinian solidarity tourists) visitors. The heightened security for which it is responsible has changed all lives for the better. For local Israelis, its physical presence is felt only where, for a short distance, the barrier actually assumes the form of a wall. This is where Route 60 skirts the Arab town of Beit Ja’ala, south of Jerusalem and runs adjacent to Bethlehem. It is here, at the height of the Second Intifada, that automatic weapons were fired from rooftops in Beit Ja'ala onto the road. Today this extended wall strategically blocks the line-of-fire from the town onto this section of the highway. Apart from a single grey lookout tower positioned to oversee the southern end of Beit Ja’ala and the valley beneath it, there is nothing that suggests the wall's security purpose. There is no unsightly barbed wire; rather, its brick facade is stylized and decorated with shrubbery and young trees. At this point along its route the wall might be confused for a standard highway acoustical barrier. A different section of this wall situated closer to the eight-lane (four in each direction), permanent checkpoint is admittedly more ominous. It is much higher, rising some 25 feet, and its grey exterior is makes it appear much more foreboding. It would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, for potential suicide bombers to physically negotiate any section of this barrier, or for snipers to again menace the thousands of daily local commuters, Jews, Arabs, or even overseas tourists, that travel this highway.
Along Route 60 near Beit Ja’ala the security barrier does not divide private Arab property. No one is physically separated from their workplace or field. In fact, a large vehicular and pedestrian tunnel, a complicated and costly engineering undertaking, was created beneath Route 60 to allow residents of Beit Ja’ala direct access to the neighboring village of Hussan. Foreign visitors are not impressed by this costly accommodation to the needs of local residents. In their eyes, this wall is an expression of human separation and repression. Even though it is a proven deterrent to terrorism, this barrier remains a sore in the eyes of every group I meet. As with the checkpoints,  this barrier seems a greater evil in the eyes of many visitors than the murder of innocents at the hands of terrorists that is prevents. 

Giles Fraser thinks the separation barrier is a monstrosity. So it may well be. But where the church is very wrong is in its implied conclusion, which is that tearing down the barrier would have a peaceful outcome. They might think abolishing restrictions on Palestinians’ everyday lives would amount to stage one on the rocky road to reconciliation, as though the Palestinians were a homogenous body of ManelaGhandis. They must surely know that is wishful thinking. 

I understand that some of the organisers had not heard of the Fogel family, largely thanks to the BBC’s selective reporting. If the indeed the organisers have relied solely on the BBC to accurately and impartially report the Israel/Palestine situation, that would account for their dogged anti-Israel activism.