Bob’s Sabbatical
November 18, 2009 – Nablus Visit and Sabeel
One of
the Diocese of Jerusalem’s outreach ministries is St. Luke’s Hospital in the
West Bank town of Nablus. Episcopal
Relief and Development is funding the Administrators’ position, and Susan
especially wanted to visit, if possible.
Canon Bob Edmonds at the Diocesan office arranged for us to go.
We were supposed to leave at 10:00 am. The time got moved to 10:30. We are on “Palestinian Time,” Canon Edwards told us. We finally left at 11:15 am for the one hour drive. Amin, the Diocesan Property Manager is our driver, and Haleem Bashlawi, the Diocesan Financial Officer comes too. They have a meeting with Dr. Walid Kirreh, the hospital administrator. We were stopped at one checkpoint for a passport check.
St.
Luke’s started in 1895 (cornerstone, set on May 24th – my birthday,
1900 –NOT my birth year!). Today it is a
60-bed hospital with 71 employees. It
runs a clinic in a nearby town as well. Like
other ministries, it serves mainly Muslim Palestinians (i.e. St. George’s
School in Jerusalem has 940 students, 40 of who are Christian, and only two of
those are Anglican.)
When we
arrive, we meet Dr. Walid, chat for a few minutes, and are served Turkish
coffee. Then we are introduced to Mrs.
Salwa Khoury, who is in charge of Public Relations. She shares this year’s dramatic increase of
patients and services over last year. We
are served a special pastry Nablus is famous for, Knafah, which is cheese
wrapped in honey-soaked “shredded” pastry with chopped pistachios on top –
served warm. It is wonderful! Mrs.
Khoury, who has been with the hospital for 18 years, goes on to say how proud
they are of their ministry. We notice on
the tour she gives us that there are more than a few pictures of the Bishop.
This
little hospital is the referral hospital for all neurosurgery and renal surgery
in the West Bank. Much of their
equipment is old (autoclaves – 18-20 years old, washers and dryers that don’t
work, only 4 old incubators in the neo-natal unit – we saw a baby in one that
had just been born at 25 weeks, weighing 2 lbs.- in a place where there were over
1100 deliveries through October of this year).
We asked about getting used equipment, and she said that the Palestinian
Authority and the Israeli Government usually will not allow this. The hospital recently got a CT scanner from a
hospital in the USA, supposedly working.
They paid to have it shipped and set up, and then it did not work.
Fr. Ibrahim Nairoz, the local Anglican Priest arrived to talk with us. Of the nearly 200,000 residents in the Neblus region, only 700 are Christians – mostly Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic. He serves two congregations. (Haleem tells us later that the offering on any given Sunday is about 50 Shekels, or $15). Fr. Ibrahim refers to himself as a “bridge-builder.” Since it is against the law here to proselytize, “the only way to teach people about Jesus is to show them,” through things like hospitals and schools, good deeds, etc. His teenagers are currently working with Muslim and Samaritan youth on website project.
We ask, “what can we do? He said that visits like ours are important, he will tell his people about us on Sunday. Our prayers for him and them are important. Telling their story is important. Of course, money helps too, especially for things like Christmas food baskets that can be shared with his people and with non-Christian Palestinians.
“What major difficulties do you face?” we ask. His reply is that it is not the Muslims. He said that they get along o.k. with each other. The #1 problem is the Occupation. The poor cannot leave to find work, checkpoints are invasive (people have died in ambulances waiting to pass, women have given birth while waiting to pass through). “It is as if we are living in prison,” he says. Examples: he requested permission to take 50 women to Bethlehem. Because of the distance, he wanted to go one day, spend the night, and return the next. They were given permission, but told they had to be back by 7:00 pm. He has to ask permission to come to Jerusalem for clergy meetings – sometimes they say yes, sometimes no. No reason is ever given. Palestinians cannot leave the West Bank to go to the airport in Tel Aviv. Instead, they have to go to Amman, Jordan. Fr. Ibrahim said, “it is Apartheid all over again. You can just feel the oppression all the time.”
As we returned, the difference between the West Bank and Israeli sections was clear. Roads are well paved, well lined, well marked in Israel. In the West Bank they are rough, unlined, etc. The wall, or “separation barrier” where it is a fence continues to be built. Where there are Jewish settlements, the wall snakes around to include them, often encroaching on property of Palestinians. New roads, which cannot be used by the Palestinians are built to the settlements, and sometimes between settlements, cutting between homes and fields, and even dividing parts of towns, making it impossible for people to harvest their crops or visit family and friends.
What a
difficult day. What huge issues these
people face.
That was yesterday, Wednesday.
Today, Thursday, Sister Ellen and Sister E.S. from the Order of St. Helena, Susan and I went to Eucharist and lunch at Sabeel headquarters. This is an ecumenical Christian ministry seeking justice for Palestinians. The major concern today seemed to be “Christian Zionism.” There were about 30 people there. Some were volunteers who have come to work here for a week, a month, or even a year. Some were young, just out of college, others were older. There were people there from Holland, Great Britain, Germany, Sweden, the USA and from Jerusalem.
I repeat: What a difficult day. What huge issues these people face.
Peace,
Bob
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