ON the 4th of January, this year I stumbled upon some news. Tanzania had received a new Palestine’s ambassador. I was coming from a religious centre of Dar-based Asian charity organisation centre in Upanga when one of the embassy’s official spotted me.
“Happy New Year!” hailed the official of
the embassy. “We have a new ambassador. Please do come and know each
other.” I entered the compound of the embassy I had been to couple of
times previously and met His Excellency, Mr Hazem Shabat, the new envoy
in his small and simple office.
The embassy’s Charge d’affaires Derar
Gennam ushered me into the room and introduced me to the ambassador, who
rose to his full height of something close to six-two, embarrassingly
dwarfing me. We took our seats and Mr Shabat said little he so far had
about our country. ‘I like Tanzania,’ he said. ‘It is a peaceful
country.’
With the temperature hovering about 30
Celsius, I asked him if that was uncomfortable for him. “No, it is
hotter than that in Palestine, about 33 Celsius.” Mr Shabat hopped it
would be cooler in Dar and more peaceful in the country as a whole .
Although the local temperature was not unfriendly to His Excellency,
peace he would love to have still eludes him and his people.
On January 16, he sent out press release
denouncing a provocative act by the Israeli regime of what he called:
“The latest vandalism act of spraying racist graffiti on the walls of
Dormition Monastery in occupied East Jerusalem carried out by Israeli
settler leaders, in which they blatantly called for attack against
places of worship and slaughtering of Christians.”
For decades the people of Palestine have
engaged in a liberation war against Israel which has for decades
occupied the West Bank and the Gaza Strip both in Palestine against any
of the UN world order statutes.
Christians and other peace lovers of the
world must be threatened by such a comment in latest Middle East
political development the Jews are alleged to have made.
It is risky and is pushing the region’s
politics to the brink of explosion. “The new attacks targeting Christian
Churches represent an additional chapter in the long record of Israeli
crimes and violations against the entire Palestinian people
indiscriminately,” Mr Shabat added.
“The attack comes only three weeks after
a similar attack that was conducted by settlers against the Salesian
Monastery in Beit Jamal.” Such religious twist of the Middle East
conflict is scary and indeed alarming. It signifies that the Israeli
regime is antagonising nearly every religion outside their Hebrew faith.
That is not acceptable and is widely against global peace.
It is alleged that the attack which came
only three weeks after a similar attack that was conducted by settlers
against the Salesian Monastery in Beit Jamal, was another heinous job of
Israeli extremists.
Tanzania loves to tread a middle line in
the conflict, but obviously it won’t support forceful occupation of
Palestine and any provocative acts which threatened political stability
of the region. Religious conflict is no doubt a most outrageous act and
could disrupt calm far and wide beyond the region.
This latest act of provocation,
according to His Excellency Shabat, took place against Christians in
Jerusalem, and must have been committed by Israeli extremists as the
racist graffiti was sprayed in the Hebrew language on the walls and
doors of the monastery.
The latest graffiti contained not only
shameful insults against Jesus, but also called for slaughtering
Christians and sending them to hell, he said in the press release dated
16 January 2016. The Benedictine abbey is a popular site for pilgrims
and tourists. It has been damaged several times in recent years.
This latest act of vandalism took place
against Christians in Jerusalem, as the racist graffiti was sprayed in
Hebrew language on the walls and doors of the monastery.
The latest graffiti contained not only
shameful insults against Jesus, but also called for slaughtering
Christians and sending them to hell. This position was echoed by Wadie
Abu Nassar, a senior advisor to the Catholic Church who said the doors
of the Dormition Abbey church were vandalized with threats scrawled in
Hebrew that read: “Kill the Christians, the enemy of Israel” and “The
revenge is coming very soon,” as well as “Send Christians to hell.”
Dormition Abbey dates back to the 5th century, and is thought to be the
place where the Virgin Mary died.
The abbey is owned by the German
Benedictine Order and is considered to be one of the three earliest
churches built in Jerusalem. Ambassador Shabat noted that this was one
of the numerous attacks against the church in the occupied Palestine.
In February 2015, for example, Jewish
Settlers set fire to a religious school affiliated with Jerusalem’s
Greek Orthodox Church, which they sprayed with anti-Christian graffiti.
This was denounced by the Patriarch of
the Holy City of Jerusalem and all Palestine, Theophilos III, condemning
what he called ‘repeated’ attacks on Christian and Muslim places of
worship in the Palestinian territories by extremist Jewish settlers.
“The targeting of churches and mosques is caused by pervasive racism and
hatred,” he said.
The latest incident is thus not the
first Israeli attack against Dormition Abbey. Other many similar
incidents have previously taken place against Christian sites, including
churches, monasteries, and cemeteries. These incidents coincided with
calls made by Jewish settler organizations to expel Christians from
Jerusalem and to burn churches.
The criminal acts by settlers take place
under the slogan ‘price tag,’ a term used by Israeli extremists to mark
nationalist-motivated hate crimes. “Israeli settlers have carried out
at least 221 attacks on Palestinians and their properties in occupied
East Jerusalem and the West Bank in 2015, according to the UN Office for
the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs” Shabat said in the release
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