This morning I arrived at JFK around 6am from Israel.  I bought a breakfast sandwich at Burger King (it’s nice to be home!), turned on the computer, and connected to my e-mail, which downloaded the following message from Brother Jack Curran, vice-president of Bethlehem University.

Brother Jack has served me lunch at the university so many times now, he remembers that I hate fish! 

Bethlehem University, founded by the Christian Brothers in the mid-70s, is the oasis of peace and sanity in Bethlehem, apart from the Church of the Holy Nativity itself, of course.  But at BU, Christian and Muslim students and staff have worked together as friends for over forty years. They still do. 

The e-mail from Brother Jack begins with a description of Christian homes presently being bulldozed in East Jerusalem -- an area according to international agreements (including with the U.S.) that does not belong to Israel. 

The following story from Brother Jack gives the flavor of what daily life is like for our Christian brothers and sisters who live in places like East Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and the city just to the west, Beit Jala.

From Brother Jack Curran, Bethlehem University:

May I share with you a description of what happened just a few days ago on Sunday, Palm Sunday, 5 April 2009.  This is a description of what happened to one of our Bethlehem University faculty members -- Dr. Muna Matar -- a graduate of Bethlehem University who earned her doctorate in Computer Information Systems at the University of Ghent (Belgium) and then returned to Bethlehem to join the faculty.

Here is what she writes:

            "I am not your friend" - the Israeli solder said.

After a very long and busy weekend of celebrating Palm Sunday with my family and then attending meetings with some of my academic colleagues reviewing and planning our computer course curriculum, I finally went to bed around 12 midnight - it was Palm Sunday, Sunday April 5, 2009.

Then, in the middle of the night, at about 2:00 am, my brother came into my room and woke me up.  He and I were frightened.  He was whispering, "Muna get up. The soldiers are surrounding the house and banging on the garage door."

What, I thought to myself as I awoke 'Israeli soldiers here in the middle of the night at my house in Beit Jala?'

Waking up very frightened I ran to the front door of the house and heard the soldiers banging on the main entrance of the house shouting in their very broken Arabic "Open the door. Open the door. Put the lights off."

My brother went into his room to put some clothes on and ran to the main entrance. Four Israel soldiers with their guns stood at the front door pointing their guns at us.

I asked, "What is happening? What do you want from us?"

One of them shouted, "Go inside and do not say anything."

"This my house.  You are coming to my house.  You cannot tell me to go inside."

The soldier answered, "I am not your friend.  I do not come to your house.  This is Israel.  Do you understand?"

And he pointed his machine gun to my chest.

My sister in-law, who was standing behind me, said to him, "I have two small children in the house. Do not shout.  You will frighten them."

The soldier replied, "I do not care" and continued shouting at my brother to give him his ID.

Then they took my brother out of the house.  I followed them.  The soldier pointed his machine gum at me again and forced me inside the house.

They kept my brother in the street -- in the middle of the night -- in the cold for about two and a half hours.

Those were probably the longest two hours of my life.

When my brother finally came back home he told us that they took him out in the fields.  Apparently they were looking for somebody and they wanted some "protection," so they took my brother with them.

After searching the fields and found nothing or no one (they didn’t tell my brother who or what they were looking for), they brought my brother back to the jeep and showed him a map of the area. They had a laptop in their jeep with maps on it. They wanted my brother to then take them to a house. They forced him to walk with them "to protect" them and to show them the house. Again, they found nothing and returned to the house at about 4:30am -- just before sunrise.

In the morning, after the sun rose, we went out to check around our house and neighborhood to see what happened.  We found that the soldiers broke the glass of the garage window and the shutters of one of the bedrooms of our house.  That was the physical damage - there was other harm that they imposed upon us. 

I am still haunted by the words of the soldier when I told him, "This is my house," and he shouted back, "I am not your friend. This is Israel. Do you understand?"

Indeed.

But, I don't have the luxury to dwell upon this now.  I need to get to the University -- my students await me and I have classes to teach.