What Does Jerusalem Worth?

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم
Bismi Allahi al-Rahmani al-Rahiym
In the name of God the most Gracious the most Merciful

JERUSALEM. It is the largest city in present-day Israel, and it is also the capital city. Look at it closely, and you may find interesting places to see. Like Cairo, Beirut and Damascus, Jerusalem has wonderful places to see. Just like Damascus, it is known for its minute area known as the "Old City". Less than a square mile, it is officially being titled as a U.N. Heritage Site. It is divided into four quarters: Christian, Jewish, Muslim, and Armenian Israelis. However, as the tourists and pilgrims look around Jerusalem, what is so holy about this ancient city today? Trouble roams around it since Zionism and the so-called Palestinian cause came to action.

Judaism in Jerusalem

Judaism was not really founded in Israel or Palestine, for some of you who did not know about this before. Prophet Abraham, one of notable prophets of Judaism -- and Christianity and Islam as well, began his prophecy between the present-day West Bank and the western part of Jordan, a neighboring Arab country today.

For some reason, the Jews who were inspired by Abraham's prophecy migrated to Egypt for 400 years. However, during their stay, they were being thrown into Egyptian custody as slaves. Fortunately, they were being taking into Israel by Prophet Moses through the Red Sea. However, according to Christianity and Islam, they were sinners, and Moses needed to raise sin-free generations by making them roam the deserts for forty years. At the end of it all, they were very close into creating a small influential empire within the area.

However with the empire ended the existence of a well-known temple to Jews and Christianity. It was believed that the Romans destroyed the temple (rebuilt a number of times before), as Emperor Titus went on to diminish a Jewish revolt over a broken truce. Presently, Jews believe that the Western Wall, also known as the Wailing Wall, is all that is left of the temple. However, this has been giving Muslims and Islam's well-being problems, since Muslims have been repeatedly saying that the wall shows no sign of being part of a temple. They believe that Al-Aqsa Mosque, an important mosque in the Temple Mount's courtyard, was a replacement of a perished site Muslims used to pray towards [before finally facing the Kaaba in Mecca, of course], though the mosque was constructed by a loyalist to Prophet Muhammad, not by a prophet.

Christianity in Jerusalem

Jerusalem is important to Christianity as it is to Judaism. Although Jews do not believe in him, and consider the other and his rank -- as a Messiah -- a heresy to Jewish prophecy, John the Baptist and Jesus Christ are important figures to Christianity. Jesus is known to Christianity as the Messiah to both Christianity and Islam, but Christians believe that he was crucified on a Roman cross in Jerusalem. Chrisitians believe that his death was honored as a symbol to wipe away all sins of faithful Christians. In fact, they believe that the Jews and their Roman colonial masters were jointly responsible for the crucifixion. Because Christ was believed to be born in Bethlehem (in the Palestinian West Bank), and had been to Nazareth and Jerusalem (of Israel), as much as Judaism depends on the geographical area, so does Christianity.

But despite such credibility to Christianity, native Arab Christians, unlike foreign Christians who travel to Israel for any purpose, seem to be under the weather. Israel and the Palestinian areas (the Gaze Strip and the West Bank) make up what Jews and Christians either call the "Holy Land" or the "Promised Land". However, since the Israeli Defense Forces (I.D.F.) and Palestinian militant groups had been trading fire till this day, Israel had been destablizing the West Bank with concrete fences to keep unwanted extremists from entering Israel westwards. The fences had done more harm to Palestinians than good, despite being mentioned as "Temporary solution". Since the Palestinians would not step down its struggle against Israel, the fences stay, cutting off Palestinian cities from interacting with each other freely, and farm lands had been reduced in size.

In Bethlehem, as shown late last year on CNN International, Christmas was marred by Israeli routine actions and the fence built around the city. Native Christians are said to be leaving the geographical area for better life in the Western World.

This might be unofficial, however I found a website that made specific charges against the current Israeli regime against native Palestinian Christians:

* http://www.aqsa.org.uk/leafletsdetails.aspx?id=34

Islam in Jerusalem

al-Islam (literally means "the Submission"). This the ultimate trouble in Jerusalem and the rest of Israel. Because it was God's religion being reassembled in Arabia not up to 1, 500 years ago, it has always been inviting heavy criticism from Christians and Jews all over. Even the holy shrines and mosque in the Old City is currently endangered.
Islam has been occasionally seterotyped as if it were a religion that has no relationship with the God of Abraham, Jewish and Christian-like history, or is somewhat similar to non-Abrahamic faiths that recognize different god or gods: Hinduism, Buddhism, and others. Or, it were as if it were just an Arab religion, despite Arabs making up only 20% of the billion Muslim worshipers worldwide, or an heresy. In fact, a few years ago, a plot to slam a jumbo plane into the Dome of the Rock was busted by the Israeli authority. This was immediately echoed into the Arab world by AlArabiya news channel, a division of the MBC Group based in the Arab Gulf.

Currently, however, things seem to be looking up for Israeli Muslims. Jerusalem granted the community a Muslim council, which has a responsibility to watch over Muslim sites at the Temple Mount region. An Israeli Muslim had also found himself a member of the Israeli parilament, or what they call the "Kenesset". But, a lot needs to be done, not to mention assuring that no harm is being done to Muslim sites of the Temple Mount by the ongoing repairs.

Conclusion

I believe that Jerusalem should not be turned into a competiting ground just because three Abrahamic religions share the land. This is a great symbol of the love of the prophecies that took place within the land. The holy book of Islam does not mention Jerusalem by name (let it be "al-Quds", "Urshaliym", "Yerow Shalaym", etc), but the Holy Land, both Israeli and Palestinian areas, were indirectly mentioned by referring to its dwellers instead. They are referred to as "Children of Israel". And Muslims should not see themselves as the only ones who need to have their reputation straightened up. Native Christians in the Holy Land are not as benefiting as Christian tourists or pilgrims are, because the natives have a Palestinian background.

Personally, Jerusalem is not as important as the faiths it raised. As we saw in the movie, "Kingdom of Heaven", the conversation between Balian, a French blacksmite, and Salah al-Din, Arab king of great influence in Syria and Egypt, after the collapse of European rule and its Crusade:

. Balian: What does Jerusalem worth?

. Salah al-Din: Nothing

Salah al-Din walked away a few meters, leaving Balian slightly puzzled. Then he turned around and gave himself two thumbs up.

. Salah al-Din: ... Everything.

If current well being, increased life span, and renowned technologies and medicines do take hold in the next few hundred years, natives of the Holy Land would need to spread out to Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon because the land would be too small for them. It is ideal to be there for spiritual means, but as for Zionism, it is not necessary to be in Israel before you could be a true Jew, Christian or Muslim. My father told me the same thing when I told him I had a thought of going to Saudi Arabia to work there, though I resemble Gulf Arabs due to my background. I do wish you readers take the time to realize what you have read today, and as they say: Shalown ("Peace" - Hebrew) ma'a Sala'am ("With peace" - Arabic), and al-sala'am alaykum wa rahmatu Allahi wa baraka'atuh ("Peace is with you, and with God's mercy and His blessing" - Islamic greeting).

Next month: I interviewed the founder of the Jews of Lebanon blog, Aaron-Micael Beydoun. But, what did we say? Find out more on my next article coming April 1st.