Tantur Institute promoting dialogue amid West Bank violence

Tantur Institute promoting dialogue amid West Bank violence

A view from Tantur Ecummenical Institute in Jerusalem across the Israeli separation wall into Bethlehem.- RV

(Vatican Radio) Clashes between Palestinians a nd Israeli security forces continued in the cities across the West Bank on Friday, marking a second day of protests against U.S. President Donald Trump's decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital city. One Palestinian was reportedly killed and dozens of others injured in Gaza on Thursday, after police opened fire on stone throwing protesters.

For an eye-witness account of the latest flare-up of tensions, Philippa Hitchen spoke to Holy Cross Father Russ McDougall, rector of the Tantur Ecumenical Institute, located on a hill between Bethlehem and Jerusalem. The institute was founded following Pope Paul VI's historic visit to Jerusalem in 1964...

Fr Russ notes that Bethlehem lies just down the hill from the institute, saying that over the past two days he’s seen and heard “round after round of tear gas” being fired by the Israeli military from towers along the separation wall.

He says there is “a sense of hopelessness” among local Palestinians at “the lack of progress in the so-called peace process”, but despite that, he adds, people do not want a return to a third intifada, as some Palestinian leaders have called for.

People don't want intifada

Fr Russ recalls the peaceful protests that took place last summer following the killing of three Israeli policeman and the subsequent installation of metal detectors around the Al-Aqsa mosque.

He adds that “if people see that President Trump’s action doesn't lead to any kind of rush on the part of world leaders to move their embassies to Jerusalem, they will see [….] it’s America that has isolated itself internationally”, encouraging them to support peaceful protests to bring about change.

Mission to build bridges

Fr Russ says the mission that Tantur was given at its foundation by the Holy See is to be a catalyst working for communion among Christians, but also to build bridges with other faiths. He says that is increasingly difficult “when, at least from the Palestinian perspective, things seem to favour Israelis in a unilateral way”.

President Trump, he says, could have made “a significant gesture” recognizing Jerusalem as the Israeli capital, but also as the capital of the State of Palestine. Instead of just making a gesture to Israel, he says, he could have announced the move “as a way of showing that we want Jerusalem to be a place where all segments of the society who live here, whether Muslims or Christians, or Jews, can feel that this is their city, their home, their capital”.

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