A REVIEW: BLOOD BROTHERS by Elias Chacour (03.02)

In view that this book has deeply penetrated Christian circles and generated not only deceptive impressions, but a basic challenge to the accuracy of Scripture with regard to the prophetic return of the Jews to their ancient homeland, I find it a must to enumerate the following inconsistencies:

1. Chacour's subtlety of presenting the Israeli army's seizure of the two villages of Biram and Ikrit as normative throughout Israel is an unfortunate bit of journalistic sleight of hand. Indeed, the two villages were cleared for strategic military security to safeguard the fledgling State of Israel in 1947-8. In a High Court challenge as recently as 1995, deliberation has continued on the just and permanent resolution of the problem (Jerusalem Post, 11April 2000) that hinges on security rather than confiscation. Bureaucratic bungling, yes! Systematic seizure of Palestinian lands? Definitely not! Chacour latches on to the opportunity to inflate a political football with a not-so-veiled hatred and revenge syndrome throughout. His personal vendetta casts grave doubts on whatever credibility may remain in the rest of his book. (Some invaluable research on undeniable land ownership within Israel can be found in "From Time Immemorial" by Joan Peters, Harper & Row, 1984.)

2. In other features, Chacour calls the Jews "brother" out of one side of his mouth, but bitterness seems to seep out in every reported encounter.

3. His father and his classmate Faraj more characteristically represent the true Arab Christians that I have met, who recognize that without the groundwork of a Biblical Israel, the Palestinians are left with little hope and even less future. I personally know at least two Arab believers who, on coming into faith, had unique encounters with the Lord sensing an indelible truth: "You can't love Me without loving My people".

4. He concedes that as a Palestinian, he was miserably rejected by other Arabs, yet in spite of this acknowledgment, he appears to shift all of his bitterness and blame on the "Zionists".

5. History records that the Irgun gang had a record that was less than commendable, but it also records that these were but a small minority of terrorists whose deeds were reprehensible to the Haganah military authority and the majority of Israelis. (For authentic historical records, see "O Jerusalem" by Collins and LaPierre, Simon and Schuster, 1972.)

6. Moreover, Chacour lays on Herzl and the "Zionists" what biblical Christians have always recognized as a prophetic response of Almighty God to keep His promises. He does not seem to be aware that the Scriptural writings of Isaiah, Joel, Ezekiel, Micah and Zechariah must, indeed, be the most Zionist of all! Can these ancient prophets, therefore, be Zionists but the God who inspired them to write, from another camp?

7. Chapter 8, Seeds of Hope, is replete with half-truths, anti-Semitic distortion and less than accurate accusations. It would appear that in Europe Chacour was unfortunately influenced with manifest anti-Jewish sentiments, a distortion of reality and a history reinvented for political expediency.

8. Historical records would also verify that after World War 2, Britain capitulated to a strongly pro-Arab bias that effected an extremely frustrating handicap to a peaceful restoration of the Jews to their homeland. It is likewise not an uncommon acknowledgement by sincere British Christians today, that their country is now paying the price of her injudicious treatment of Israel with an epidemic of mosques in a land where Christianity once thrived and revival reigned.

SUMMARY AND EVALUATION

An embittered Chacour seems to shunt all the blame for the untimely traumas in his life onto the "Zionists", quite ignoring the major roles in his misfortunes played by the British, the Arab Muslims who loathed his people, the Arab Christians who confronted his ministry, the terrorists who murdered the Arab moderates and incited suspicion of Palestinians across the board, and above all the duplicity of the PLO. The depth of his Christianity is not mine to judge, but his message of "peace" is a narrow one built on the Beatitudes quite in isolation of other Scripture, and is hardly representative of the wider message of Jesus Christ. He quite misunderstands what Zionism is, in that the Christians who trust in the prophetic promises of the return of the Jewish Diaspora to "the place the Lord your God will choose as a dwelling for His Name" (Deut. 14:23) are every bit as Zionist as the refugees from Hitler's Holocaust.

A paramount quotation from the President of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry is: "To allegedly accept Israel and yet bracket Zionism with racism, or to reject Zionism, is a play on words which amounts to a rejection of the Jewish state's right to existence." And we must quickly add a rejection of Zionism is a deeper rejection of the fundamental underpinning of our Old Testament, without which the message of Jesus as Messiah can never be fully appreciated.

It is my observation that Chacour is grinding his own personal anti-Semitic axe, his book is riddled with half-truths and a subtle but blatant denial of our Judeo-Christian heritage.

Victor K. Schlatter, Director
South Pacific Island Ministries, Inc.
PO Box 990, Smithfield, Qld. Australia
Email: office@spim.org.au