Prayer as Provocation

By the waters of Babylon, there we sat down and wept when we remembered Zion. On the willows, there we hung up our lyres" …"If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand wither, let my tongue cleave to my palate if I do not remember you, if I do not set Jerusalem above my highest joy."

Yesterday in Israel celebrations were held in memory of the 40th anniversary of the unification of Jerusalem. It seems silly to point this out, but I have found over and over that most North Americans don’t fully appreciate the meaning of the unification of Jerusalem. It seems beyond ridiculous since the celebrations for the last 40 years center around “unification” of Jerusalem, but be that as it may, most North Americans don’t fully comprehend that a portion of the city of Jerusalem always remained in Israeli hands.

For example, take this Canadian government decision not to recognize Jerusalem, Israel as a birthplace for naturalized Canadians born in Jerusalem. I mean really, how does the government know that a naturalized Canadian citizen was not born in the Jerusalem which has been recognized as part of the Israeli state since the armistice lines were drawn in 1949? It does not. Therefore, it refuses to make any distinctions and invokes the fabrication that no such city has ever existed within the modern Israeli state.

I read this editorial in Ha’aretz today criticizing a group of Rabbis who ascended the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, to pray at the holiest site in Judaism, and I think perhaps it is somewhat pre-mature to celebrate the unification.

If a Jew cannot pray openly and freely in the Jewish state at the holiest site in Judaism without a condemnation from an Israeli paper - there is something seriously wrong within the so-called Jewish state and with the whole "unification" process. Imagine Muslims being refused access to pray in Mecca and you have the equivalent.