“I am Yahweh. I do not change. I am why Jacob’s descendants are not destroyed.” (Malachi 3: 6)
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NPR—Israelis Have A Love-Hate Relationship With Jerusalem:
A short walk from the new U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem is a stone apartment building on a leafy street that might as well be a metaphor for Israelis’ love-hate relationship with the city and its religious character.
On the ground floor, a religious Jewish Israeli man has moved in with his family. One floor up, a secular Jewish Israeli woman has moved out.
When President Trump moved the American Embassy from Tel Aviv, he said Jerusalem was “the capital of the Jewish people established in ancient times.” The city is central in Jewish tradition. It is also revered by Christian and Muslim traditions. Palestinians rejected the embassy move, demanding their own capital in parts of the city Israel captured in 1967. Most countries do not base their embassies to Israel in the city, so as not to take sides in the dispute.
Some Israelis celebrated the U.S. Embassy move as recognition of Israel’s right to sovereignty in the Jews’ spiritual homeland. Some shrugged their shoulders, accepting what most Israelis believe to be a long-established fact that Jerusalem is Israel’s capital.
But every Israeli has a strong opinion about Jerusalem as a city. It has experienced much change in the past few decades, including the trauma of violence around the Palestinian uprising of the 2000s and the growing influence of its religious Jewish community.
There’s a concept in Jewish tradition about the existence of two Jerusalems: Yerushalayim shel maala — the heavenly Jerusalem — and Yerushalayim shel mata— the earthly Jerusalem. It’s a city of opposites, with both spiritual and physical dimensions.
Like a magnet with two poles, Jerusalem both attracts and repels.
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SnyderTalk Comment:
Katie and I have been exploring Israel for 2 decades. We’ve traveled all over the country and visited many important sites. We lived in the Arava for 2 months, but we have spent most of our time in Jerusalem.
Jerusalem is my favorite city in the world. I love being there. There is so much to see and do. If you know what you are looking for, you can find and explore places that you have read about in the Bible. Those places are still there. Many of them are waiting to be discovered.
The City of David is a great example. It’s the Jerusalem that you read about in the Old Testament. It’s being excavated now, and you can explore it. There is a lot to see.
In 2006, Katie and I visited the City of David for a tour, but it was closed to the public that day. Only archaeologists were there, and they were working in an area that they later realized was David’s palace.
While we were there, one of the archaeologists asked us if we wanted a memento to take with us. We said, “Sure,” and he gave us the handle to a pitcher. You can see it in the video below.
Many people who know that Katie and I travel to Israel a lot ask us if it’s safe. The answer is yes. It is safe, but you need to know where you can go and where you can’t go.
In Jerusalem, it can be safe on one side of the street and unsafe on the other side. For example, in the City of David, the Pool of Siloam has been excavated. You can see it and walk the ancient street from the Pool of Siloam all the way up to the Temple Mount. It’s the same street that you read about in the Bible.
Silwan is across the street from the Pool of Siloam. It’s in a Palestinian area that is best known for terrorist activity. You cross that street at your own risk.
Below is a picture of Noam Markman and me in the City of David at the Pool of Siloam. We are with our tour guide. Katie took the picture. The year was 2014. Silwan is across the street on the other side of the fence. You can see some of the houses in Silwan in the picture.
Over the 20 years that Katie and I have been exploring Israel, we’ve seen Jerusalem become progressively less safe. For instance, we used to feel comfortable in the area around the Damascus Gate to the Old City of Jerusalem, but not anymore. It has become a hotbed for terrorist activity, so we try to avoid it. We still go there occasionally, but only at times when Palestinians are there in large numbers with their families.
You can trace the increase in violence in Jerusalem to the Oslo Peace Accord. It was signed in 1993, and things have been going downhill ever since. The Oslo Accord was supposed to bring about peace, but it has had the opposite effect because Palestinian leaders saw it as a sign of weakness on Israel’s part. For them, it was an invitation to step up their attacks.
Any sign of weakness on Israel’s part no matter how small is interpreted as an invitation for more and more violent attacks. Palestinians continually explore their border with Israel to find soft spots. When they find one, they pour through it until they encounter opposition.
Israel is forced to use violence when attacks occur, because the attackers use violence. Making matters worse, Palestinian terrorists bring their children with them when they attack and position the kids between themselves and Israeli soldiers.
It’s hard to believe, but Palestinian terrorists who are in the process of carrying out terrorist attacks use their own children as human shields. That’s been happening every Friday for months on the Gaza border. You’ve probably seen pictures of the violence on television.
There are no fences in Jerusalem, but there are borders. If you go to Jerusalem, you need to know where the borders are. If you don’t, you can find trouble in a split second.
Don’t let anything that I’ve said prevent you from visiting Jerusalem. It’s a wonderful city, and I will continue to go there. In fact, I plan to live there at some point, but I keep my eyes open all the time. So do the Israeli people who live in Jerusalem.
Despite the problems I’ve mentioned, Jerusalem is safer than Los Angeles, Las Vegas, San Francisco, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Oakland, New Orleans, Baltimore, Memphis, Dallas, Orlando, Chicago, Detroit, Atlanta, Houston, Miami, or Washington, D.C. See “World’s Most Dangerous Cities” for a list of cities rank ordered from least safe to safest.
The Israeli people have figured out how to live safely in a hostile environment. They are doing things right. We should spend less time telling them what they need to do and more time listening to them as they explain what they are doing.
In a nutshell, Israel confronts violence with violence, and it works. We should do the same thing.
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SnyderTalk Comment:
Notice the guy on the left in the picture above. He’s a guard in the City of David.
Notice that he has a pistol in his right hand and that his right index finger is in the proper position. To protect visitors to the City of David, he’s ready to confront violence if it occurs.
Because of people like him, the City of David is safe. There are people like him all over Jerusalem. They have weapons, and they know how to use them. They will use their weapons if the need arises.
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“The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one; I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me. Father, I desire that they also, whom You have given Me, be with Me where I am, so that they may see My glory which You have given Me, for You loved Me before the foundation of the world.” (John 17: 22-24)
