I didn’t intend to write this much. I never do. I’ve just been reading the news and the news is dismal. The kidnapping of soldiers is wrong, no doubt. But the Israeli army has ravaged the Palestinian people for years, years, and more years. By “ravaged” i refer to the rape of women, the killing of children, the shooting of unarmed civilians, the bulldozing of the homes of the poor. Most importantly, there are numerous Palestinians in jail–at least nine thousand–many of them completely and provably innocent. Fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, sons and daughters, equally taken. They, too, have been kidnapped. It is not for me to give you answers but to ask the right questions. One Israeli soldier kidnapped versus thousands of Palestinian civilians illegitimately held in torture-documented jails? Granted, some have committed crimes–even *gasp* terrorism–but what of the equally heinous terrorism committed by Israeli soldiers on a nationwide scale? One reaps what one sows. Why is the killing of Israeli civilians by militants called “terrorism,” whereas the killing of Palestinian ones called “self-defence”? Is Israel “justified” just because they are God’s chosen? Is Israel “right” because they are God’s chosen? My opinion–and it does not have to be yours–is a clear No (and it seems Paul would agree–see Romans).

What is most disappointing to me is Israel’s completely disproportionate response toward Lebanon. In the last few days over 70 civilians were killed in Beirut–in Lebanon’s capital. Beirut’s civilian airport was bombed. Bridges were bombed. CROWDED RESIDENTIAL AREAS were bombed!! RESIDENTIAL AREAS. I can’t believe that. Why bomb civilian crowds as a response to two kidnapped soldiers? And this in the regions not even governed by the group who actually kidnapped the soldiers?

People are getting maimed–not soldiers even! Can you imagine planes from the U.S. flying into Hong Kong airspace, bombing Tsing Ma bridge and a crowded Tai Koo Shing in response to China kidnapping two soldiers? What a preposterous response! What an illogical maneuver! Of course action is necessary. But not the deliberate bombing of civilian targets and civilian residential areas! This does not help one’s case. Stupidity has been given new meaning; Mars, rather than YHWH, is being called upon to “save.”

In light of what is practically an open war maneuver, it looks like the other powers–even if only for face reasons, given their civilians are being attacked–will be forced to launch a military response. >From there, the reasons for going to war will become an irrelevant matter–only the war will matter, each side claiming divine sanction, each side fighting for their honour and sense of self-righteousness, each side playing on the terms laid down by Death–that is, each side trusting in the power of Death to save, and each side trusting in the ways of Death–to live.

Irony indeed.

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the sons of God.” I deliberately keep the word “sons” here because in the Hebrew tradition, to be called a son meant more than biological kinship: it meant inheriting the honour, mission, and legacy of one’s father. It meant receiving and taking up his character, and most importantly, continuing the work of his hands. Thus, in calling peacemakers sons of God, Jesus confers on them the title of those who participate in and continue the very work of God in the world (peacemaking which Jesus himself would later epitomize).

Peacemakers–workers for justice and love–follow Christ by offering their own bodies for the sake of reconciliation, and in their willingness to lay down their life for an enemy, they retell the gospel to the world. Peacemakers bear the very character of God for the world to see–and scorn. Peacemakers shout with Ghandi and King that “an eye for an eye makes the whole world go blind!” Their logic seems too simple to be true. “Normality” coerces people to label them as insane–utopian idealists of touch with reality. Yet perhaps it is they who have kept their sanity in a world that has forgotten every language but that of the gun.

“Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind. Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. Repay no one evil for evil. Do not overcome evil with evil, but overcome evil with good.”