Above All Nations Is Humanity

A play which helps to bridge a gulf

2011-01-29T12:44:00.000Z

The Palestinian writer, Ghassan Kanafani, assassinated in a car bombing in Beirut nearly 40 years ago, was despite his political beliefs, still able to portray, understand and recognise the suffering of a Jewish Holocaust survivor in his novella, Returning to Haifa.

When the Israeli playwright, Boaz Gaon, came across Kanafani's Returning to Haifa, the story inspired a project Return to Haifa..

Please read Peter Marks's article in The Washington Post describing the evolution and reception of Gaon's play.

Even if there is only one decent X..

2010-11-08T07:35:00.000Z

"Even if there is only one decent German, [that person] would deserve to be protected from the barbarian rabble, and for that one German's sake, one should not pour out one's hatred for the entire people."

Etty Hillesum, born Middelburg 1914, died Auschwitz 1943.

For X, choose your 'category'. It's whatever makes you feel uncomfortable, whatever nationality, belief, human need inspires you with apprehension, alarm, unease, fear, annoyance, scorn.

Trust me. You already know that exception.

And there's more help from Etty. Think on this:

"Ultimately we have just one moral duty: to reclaim large areas of peace in ourselves, more and more peace and to reflect it towards others. And the more peace there is in us, the more peace there will be in our troubled world."

One of my ongoing projects is finding ways to boost positive emotion in learners. What I have learned from this practice is how easy it is to spread goodwill. It helps, I think, that my formative years were spent in Africa, so I don't have the wariness towards strangers of my fellow Islanders, in the corner that lies south of Watford. I am given to striking up conversations at bus stops, for example.

But even at bus stops, I know the cloud in my thought...against those who fail to acknowledge that a queue, even a queue of one, requires respect. Trivial, innit? Observe how far I have to go in reclaiming peace within myself..... .

Enough of fame; a pox upon these actions

2009-01-07T10:39:00.004Z

The fame of good men’s actions seldom goes beyond their own doors, but evil deeds are carried a thousand miles’ distance. [Chinese proverb]

In this time of conflict and turmoil, insecurity and despair, if there’s one question one cannot ask, with the expectation that there will be universal agreement, it seems to be the one that starts, “Who could fail to be moved by...?”

Adding to our grief is the loss of trust in the innate goodness of our neighbours on this planet. For now we all know that there is clearly a substantial body of people, not just ‘out there’ but even ‘right here’, on every ‘side’, across every political and religious divide, who indeed fail to be moved by the horrors that they and their teams unleash.

The Independent never fails to bring to my attention the anguish of victims. This must have an effect on its sales: from those like me, who look at the headlines and photos, who reflect, wince, then opt for another paper, as opposed to those bold souls who buy because of those very headlines, those very photos.

On Monday, the blow was the death of Fares Akram‘s father. Now it’s someone we ‘know’. Fares’s Dad. Journalists force us up close and personal. We now chalk up for our Ongoing Concerns lists, Fares’s wife, their baby and the nameless, invisible, overlooked women and children in that region, whom they represent.

Yesterday, the photo of the three Samouni children being carried to their graves. The day before, the anxiety of Ibrahim Dawwas. Next week, no doubt, a flurry of images. From Zim, the DRC, Afghanistan...

Enough. Enough of fame. A pox upon these actions.

Yay, Yay! Yum, Yum!

2009-01-05T09:26:00.002Z

The cheer of a favourite four year old expresses some of my glee on coming across the teaser Kindness — the great taboo on the front page of Saturday’s Review Section of The Guardian. What a start to the year...

Turned out this section’s lead story was an extract from the book On Kindness, a joint effort from psychoanalyst, Adam Phillips, and historian, Barbara Taylor.

This against the background of ongoing conflict across the globe, and the increasingly vicious conflicts that dismay and depress.

While a soppy Fifties scene accompanies the story in the print edition, a Fra Angelico fresco of St Lawrence distributing alms accompanies the online edition.

What this, and the story’s headline, the Christianity-associated admonition to Love thy neighbour, could suggest is that kindness is predominantly a Christian value, and I wonder how many atheists, agnostics, and those of other faiths, scanned the headline, dismissed the story, and paged on.

But then, who am I to talk? After all, I eventually felt I had to two words to this blog’s title, hoping this would somehow clarify that it’s not based on some Old Testament rant.

The book itself looks both at the evolution of the concept of kindness over the centuries, going on, from a more psychoanalytical perspective, to examine our ambivalence about kindness . The Guardian's piece gives an overview of attitudes to kindness over the centuries, its appeal to, and dismissal by, the human psyche, concluding with the claim that “it is kindness, fundamentally, that makes life seem worth living; and ... everything that is against kindness is an assault on our hope.” (My italics. My sentiments.)

I recommend this read.

Note: On Kindness is published by Hamish Hamilton. I see that it’s currently going for half the published price on Amazon UK but, re the US, please note that your Amazon indicates the book won’t be released there until late May.

"If not me, then who?"

2008-12-29T21:51:00.012Z

This story doesn't strictly speaking 'qualify' as an 'act of kindness done to enemies' but as the current conflict is providing scant opportunity to record such acts of kindness, I am extending the scope of this blog to acknowledge an extraordinary, experienced trauma surgeon, John P. Pryor, of Philadelphia, who was killed in Iraq this Christmas.

I came across his story on the Tanker Brothers blog, and subsequently read more on sources linked to it. This surgeon was motivated by compassion to apply his medical skills in the service of those victims of war whom the public, and particularly those who oppose war, often overlook: the combatants.

According to a report which Tanker Brothers quote, these words of Albert Schweitzer reflect what John Pryor stood for. "Seek always to do some good, somewhere. Even if it's a little thing, do something for those who need help, something for which you get no pay but the privilege of doing it. For remember, you don't live in a world all your own. Your brothers are here, too."

This conviction led John Pryor to Iraq, a decision which, according to the report, "was not always supported by those closest to him".

Spare a thought for a man who laid down his life for his brothers. And for those closest to him in their great loss.

David Rice: his brother's salute to his memory

2008-09-08T21:48:00.006+01:00

After his brother David died in the second tower, Andrew Rice was appalled by yet more civilian casualties—this time in Afghanistan.

But Rice chose not to fall in line with those who were determined to show the "other side" that they couldn't mess them about. With grieving relatives of other victims, he comforted the weeping mother of Zacharias Moussaoui.

He explains his approach to the loss of his brother: "I'm refusing to fall in line with what “they” want, which is visceral hatred between two sides; this gives me permission to reconcile."

[You can read more about Andrew Rice's story here and also check out The Forgiveness Project and check out Peaceful Tomorrows amongst the links under BREAKING THE MOULD in my side bar.]

A sketch in the sand, a loosened bond

2008-09-08T20:57:00.002+01:00

I've recently come across reports of the Presidential Faith Forum in California in mid-August.

John McCain referred to a guard who had come in and loosened the ropes that bound him so tightly, before returning to tighten them four hours later. This puzzled me when I first read about it, and I didn't initially interpret it as showing kindness to the enemy. Actually it occurred to me that this act might simply have been a variation of the good cop/bad cop scenario, with the same guard playing both roles. But I've since found the transcripts of this forum online and the additional details make it clear that this 'qualifies' as kindness to an enemy in a relatively recent war. (As ever, I hope to come across more recent kindness towards enemies. Today, last week, last month, last year...)

Following the transcripts of the Forum Responses, it seems it was the same guard who approached McCain, while he was praying on Christmas Day, and who drew a cross in the sand with his sandal, leaving it visible for a minute before rubbing it away.

Come to think of it, did McCain ever return to Vietnam?

Did he ever try to track down that guard?

Courage and compassion during Black July

2008-09-02T11:41:00.004+01:00

A report based on an address by Dr Palitha Kahona in Toronto last week, has appeared online in the Sri Lankan Sunday Observer. It included a reference to a comment by Dr Nallai Nallainayagam on his family's experiences during the Black July of 1983. (I have been unable to locate the original.)

“The riots brought out the worst and the best of human traits. Some neighbours who have lived in harmony and peace for a long time turned informants, guiding the mobs towards Tamil homes. At the same time, many Sinhalese and Muslims, both neighbours and strangers, risked their lives to protect the lives of Tamils by hiding them in their homes and feeding them till they could be taken to safety. My family sought refuge in the house of a very close Sinhalese friend and was well looked after for more than two weeks due to the kindness and the generosity of this family and friends in the Muslim community. We have no words to thank them for their bravery and kind heartedness”.

A captor's gift

2008-07-27T16:18:00.007+01:00

Just when I was despairing of ever coming across the report of any kindness shown to hostages in Iraq, I came across Norman Kember's account on the web site of The Forgiveness Project.

Norman Kember said:

"We also experienced small acts of kindness from our captors. After a month we were given toothbrushes, and then a notebook and pen. Just after, at Christmas, we were shown a DVD of the Life of Jesus in Arabic, and one of them brought us a fragrant rose from the garden."

I hope, when the four surviving hostages, from the group kidnapped from the Iraqi Ministry in 2007, are released, that they will also be able to draw on a memory of even one fleeting act of kindness too, from their hardened captors. Given reports of the suicide of Jason, and what we know of man's brutality to man out there, this seems a wish so childish that I can feel my reader's scorn, and hear an exasperated "Get real!"

I hoped, when Jill Carroll was released, that her account of her kidnapping would mention some act of kindness. At one point, I seem to recall, word came out that she was "preparing food with the women of the house", yet her subsequent accounts showed that the women were particularly unfriendly towards her.

Whenever I consider the appalling atrocities carried out in zones of conflict across the globe, I realise how, increasingly, I expect less and less of humanity.

Yet, amongst it all, we can acknowledge a Quaker's crumb of comfort, for Norman Kember experienced kindness during his ordeal - and that kindness registered.

A land called Paradise?

2008-01-21T10:04:00.001Z

"In December 2007, over 2000 Muslims in the USA were asked what they would wish to say to the rest of the world. This is what they said."

This film is just one of many entries in the One Nation Many Voices contest. Go browse.

Create a Peace Room

2008-01-09T19:32:00.000Z

Today, at the University of Hull's stand, at the BETT Exhibition at Olympia, I got chatting to Andrée Jordan, and heard for the first time about the Peace Room. Check this site out, if you're a teacher, learning with any age group—8 to 80! I'm going to spin it at my students next week.

It was in South Africa that I first came across the book Above All Nations, in a shop selling secondhand books in Fish Hoek. That book inspired this blog.

The Peace Room Project set me thinking about the many peacemakers South Africa has produced, in spite of its turbulent past, but a country which now looks set to a turbulent future, with the prospect of a President whose theme tune, still invariably aired on public occasions, is Umshini Wami (Bring me my machine gun).

And now you can get the ringtone.

Cry, the Beloved Country.

2007-05-19T21:45:00.001+01:00

I don't know anything about the site, Iraq has a voice, other than it promises to give Iraqis a voice. So if I am being naive in taking it at face value, I hope someone will tell me.

This post records compassion shown to an Iraqi man by American soldiers. Mind you, rescue from a mob — well, that's a job we hope they do. That sounds a tad niggardly. Given the constant danger everyone is in, for some Iraqis, they do make a difference, and in the political ranting over the whole Iraq Thing, we often overlook that.

Yesterday I came across Chikitika's blog where I read about the funeral banners that go up in neighbourhoods whenever there are deaths. Of course googling the banners, sidetracked me even further. But we can't overlook that there are far more black banners than there are white banners — the white banners signifying those who have been killed by American actions.

I think it's like this: we have to get past the point of feeling so squeamish about what's happening in Iraq and past seeing it purely as a bloody big blunder.

If you look closely, it's not all noise and nonsense out there. When they're off duty, many soldiers are involved in projects to help and rebuild local communities. It's not all blogging and bloke stuff out there. Maybe, less grudgingly, we should recognise the peacekeeping part when we spot it.

There's more to this name

2007-05-19T21:15:00.000+01:00

I chose the title Above All Nations for this blog, because I was moved by, and wanted to replicate, the spirit behind the original compilation Above All Nations. I hoped that it would be possible, in these turbulent times, to record acts of kindness in current conflicts across the globe.

I have previously agonised over the title and changed nothing. However, I am increasingly of the opinion, especially when I see what googling "above all nations" trawls, that it is too sectarian a title. Just the sight of it, could alienate a lot of readers. Ordinarily, when I see titles with any jingoistic undercurrent, I click straight on Next Blog. There's no denying that, without the "is Humanity" tag, this blog falls into that category. So, for starters, there is a change which I'm going to run with for a couple of weeks: I've added "is Humanity" to the original string.

I've been exercising my mind over the past few days, torn between letting go of this blog, and trying to come up with a title that reflects my conviction that we need to give nationalism and other divisive forces the push. By night, I welcome 'brilliant' ideas that come to me half asleep, a brilliance which eludes me when I'm fully awake and have struggled to retrieve them. ("Noisy Households" was the last straw.)

What we have in common, has to be stronger yet softer, more enduring yet less rigid, than what drives us apart. It's the spirit of Us, rather than You and Them that needs to drive our actions towards others.

I'm passing the baton on this to you. Please comment, or email to aboveallnations at gmail (etc.)

"But who shall return us our children?"

2007-05-09T14:13:00.001+01:00

This question forms the refrain in the first and final verses of Rudyard Kipling's poem, The Children [1914–1918] .

Sorting out my desk muddle this morning, I came across the poem in the form of a cutting of it when it was the Saturday Poem in The Guardian some time back.

I thought of the children who aren't returned to their parents. Anwar, and so many other sons and daughters, lost in a violent encounter. And young children, spirited away by those with malicious intent.

There is nothing of ubuntu in the recruiting, often forcible, of children as child soldiers. How do we undo some of that damage when the children are rescued, or escape?

According to Ishmael Beah, a former child soldier, "It is easy to become a child soldier, but it is much more difficult to recover one's humanity. But it is possible." (My italics.)

There are at least a quarter of a million child soldiers. You can find out about the work of Save the Children here, and of Unicef, here.

In the UK, War Child publishes resource packs for teachers.

I will be adding a new side bar area for organisations which work with former child soldiers, or which actively seek to support children affected by war. Please look out for it.

For Anwar, for his family, for all whose lives are shattered by conflict

2007-05-07T09:33:00.000+01:00

Today I have been thinking of Anwar's mother, who, despite her grief at the murder of her son, said to her nephew, repeatedly:

“Thank God for everything. We still have you and the rest of your cousins. Thank God for everything.”

I can see how faith can be an insurance against despair, even as what is done in the name of faith, only serves to diminish the residues of mine.

Today is a good time to reflect on the grace, despite great suffering, of Anwar's family, including Omar, his cousin.

In searching for a tribute to this lost life, I will return, today, to my neglected PTSD project.

This time I will not let frustration or despair distract me from it.

"I am what I am because of who we all are"

2007-05-05T22:56:00.000+01:00

This post title is another line on Ubuntu, the African concept of "humanity towards others" which regulars might remember was one of the U words in this post. And in these murky, messy times, not always reflected across the continent, sadly.

But, but, but...it's also the name of Open Source software that's currently so alive on Klei Lat's Moddereiland potgooi blog that even I registered the kick to check it out.

Technically literate or not, you can get the gist of the Ubuntu Technology Community on the Ubuntu web site. Expect the glimmer of a smile to broaden into a grin.

As one of my gripes is that information is no longer freely accessible on the Internet (as was originally envisioned) I feel heartened by the generosity of the Ubuntu community. When they need Ubuntu for Dummies, as they will, I'm volunteering.

Ubuntu's website defines ubuntu as "the belief in a universal bond of sharing which connects all humanity" so there's another variant of what you've read earlier.

Now for the ground rules as given in Ubuntu's code of conduct as this is what's relevant to this blog's Impossible Quest. Wouldn't they be a universal blueprint just for plain decent treatment of others? As within families, between colleagues, in takeovers (political and financial), in handovers of power, against vanity in bosses especially...

Here they are (with the nitty gritty thereof elaborated on the site):

Be considerate.
Be respectful.
Be collaborative.
When you disagree, consult others.
When you are unsure, ask for help.
Step down considerately.

Mooi bly, Ubuntu. (Lank sal julle lewe!)

Speaking of good causes, here is something any blogger can do

2007-04-24T19:33:00.000+01:00

There's now a banner in support of Alan Johnston on this blog.

That's Alan's picture to the right of the first post.

Today he has been missing for 43 days. 43 days in which a good bloke has been held captive, unjustly. Any rational Muslim would agree it is thuloum, an injustice - I learnt that word from Jill Carroll's description of her time in captivity.

Many, many Palestinians have called for his release because they recognise that his is a voice that speaks up for those whose voice is faint or unheard, regardless of their religious or political beliefs. That voice still needs to be heard. In Palestine and in too many places across the globe.

If you would like to show your support for those who are trying to secure Alan's release, you can easily add this banner to your blog too.

Follow this link to the BBC site. You'll find the HTML code you need to insert in your blog or on your web page. Select and copy it, and then paste it into your blog template. Do a quick preview, just to make sure it appears where you want it to, before you save it!

Some come home...

2007-04-06T11:06:00.000+01:00

I've got mixed feelings about this. Relieved that the released marines and sailors were able to board a flight to return home from Iran: disturbed by the 'scripts' and other pressure which seem to have been imposed on the prisoners and the distortion of facts by at least one side. This means that I can't consider their release as an act of generosity on the part of the Iranian President.

Dismayed as, at almost that exact moment, four more soldiers died in Iraq.

Who gets the credit for this release? It seems, Iran's President, though it also seems as though he didn't really want to release them.

My favourite Iraqi bloggers help me to have a sense of the lives of the Iraqi people in this ongoing struggle. But I am also conscious of many other civil war zones and the suffering that goes on, right now, as I type this.

I still hope to come across those seemingly rare acts of kindness and generosity which I longed, when I started this blog, to be able to celebrate here. No change either on feeling naive in having started this blog. A wild goose chase might have been a better option.

At last

2007-01-14T19:31:00.000Z

Came across this when I returned some books to the library, and saw Baghdad Burning Volume 2 on display. Now, although I visit this blog fairly regularly, it's a lot easier to read a book, than online, so I went to the catalogue to track down Volume 1. It was on loan, but I went to the shelves to see what else was parked at that Dewey number.

Picked up Andy McNab's Bravo Zero Two for the first time and flicked through it. Scanning page 280, I spotted the following:

The door opened and I saw daylight. I stretched out my arms, palms upwards, in a gesture of helplessness.

'I can't move,' I said. ''Stiff.'

He called to another guard. I clenched my sore muscles in readiness for the kicking I was about to receive.

They came into the toilet and bent over me.

'Up, up, aah,' one said, all nice and gentle. They put my arms around their necks and lifted me upright, almost with compassion. they were actually
concerned. I couldn't believe it.

The crash of a door bell and the friendly shout of 'Good morning! Good morning!' echoed round the block as they helped me towards the door to the courtyard.

Andy McNab's move to another location that same day turned out to be the prelude to worse torture and suffering.

But amongst all of that, one more flicker for the count.

Looking for psychologists who are PTSD experts

2006-12-01T20:08:00.000Z

The long gap between posts is because I've lost heart re this project, overwhelmed by the unrelenting, not to say mounting, "upheaval" in the Middle East. Senseless slaughter. How can the survivors ever feel peace?

With The Lebanon under siege once again, my heart is heavy. Even as I type, I wonder how many people will die violent deaths in Iraq before I have formulated what I am trying to say. Increasingly I worry about the long term effects of living under such constant stress.

I have been reflecting a great deal on the enormous emotional damage suffered by those living in Iraq today. Amongst my former pupils are two Iraqi brothers. A year or so ago, they had a cousin from Iraq over here to give him some respite from the civil war. They told me of the effect on him of a car backfiring. I met him once, and could see a young man whose eyes betrayed how much he had suffered.

I googled PTSD and found, amongst others a US site for veterans of conflict, with suggestions as to how they could manage traumatic stress.

But what can one do for Iraqis for whom Post-traumatic Stress Disorder is hardly "post"? What help and advice can one offer people to whom that traumatic stress is far from 'post'? And what about the children....?!

I have obtained a Google page. I want to use it to list simple points which will help people living in an environment of ongoing traumatic stress. That's damage limitation for those in it, now - not after the storm has abated.

If you know an expert, please ask for their advice. You can leave a comment or email me at aboveallnations at gmail dot com.

What colour week is this?

2006-11-24T10:47:00.000Z

What colour will be assigned to this eventful week?

Black for grief, despair and death?

Red for anger, heartache and impatience?

Green for discord?

UNIFIL troops

2006-11-23T20:26:00.000Z

I have been reflecting on previous peacekeeping efforts in The Lebanon e.g. by UNIFIL soldiers.

Sometimes I worry about the UN forces, given their impotence, for example in Rwanda and Bosnia.

At the time of the recent hostilities, I came across the Irish Lebanon War Veterans Organisation — I hadn’t realised quite how many Irish peacekeepers (47) died in “The Leb”, in the service of peace during what they refer to as “the endless war of Lebanon”.

Visiting their web site gives you an idea of how much they loved the Lebanon and its peoples, particularly the citizens of Tibnin with whom they built .

Earlier this month about 150 Irish troops were deployed to the Lebanon — let's hope with their role clearly defined, properly equipped for it. And that their intervention is not endlessly required.

"They didn't give peace a chance..."

2006-11-23T20:05:00.000Z

Sectarianism has everything to answer for.

How do these tit for tat cycles benefit anyone, except the bullies?

However — I have come across what I feel is a strong case for Buddhism.

“Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense.” BUDDHA 4th Century BC

Peace Potion 2

2006-11-17T21:01:00.001Z

Don't ask questions. Question the answers.
[Colman McCarthy, Career Pacifist and volunteer teacher]

Read the story here.

Mohammed Odeh al-Rehaief & Others

2006-11-14T06:46:00.000Z

I’m aware that the details of the Jessica Lynch rescue are contentious but it came to mind again yesterday and, aware that those who rescued her had had some inside help, I googled to see what the current take on that story is. Some of the language of current commentary contains phrases like “official account” and words like claims and allegedly, so it is difficult for a non-American to sift out and suss.

The young Iraqi lawyer, Mohammed Odeh al-Rehaief, who provided details of her location, was given asylum in the United States, together with his family in April 2003. At some point prior to the event, while taking information to her rescuers, he received a shrapnel injury which permanently damaged his vision. Although physically safe, in an undisclosed location in the US, and with his immediate family, he has suffered because of his role in her rescue in that he now has a physical handicap, and is living with the accompanying stress of a life in exile.

I’ve read neither al-Rehaief’s autobiography, Because Each Life Is Precious, not Lynch’s I’m a Soldier too.

Copious use of Google’s link command, over the past hour, has left me little wiser.

It does seem clear also (from the ‘kindness to enemies’ angle) that Private Lynch’s medical treatment and the nursing care from staff at the no doubt under-resourced hospital from which she was rescued, was as good as they could provide.

A soldier's view

2006-11-13T18:23:00.000Z

Fortunate son wrote (5 October)

I was told on several occasions by Afghan leaders that their personal relationships with me positively influenced their perceptions of Americans and I know that my team and I influenced hundreds if not thousands of young Afghans, leaving lasting, positive impressions of Americans as a kind, caring and giving, yet determined people who want nothing more than for them to inherit a free and open society where they will have opportunities not available to their fathers; where ignorance does not dominate their lives.

and more recently (10 October)

We have plenty "anti-War" types who are willing to demonstrate once war becomes a fait accompli, but we don't have near enough "pro-Peace" types willing to work for a more just and equitable world and actually prevent the conditions of war before they begin. As long as the average American's preoccupations are the price of gas; as long as we remain willfully ignorant of the world around us; as long as we're content to be the "Shining Gated Community on the Hill", it would seem to me that our fate will be to settle for the ensuing partisan blame game for the last crisis while waiting for the next Pearl Harbor or 9/11 in order to get people to pay attention to the miserable conditions of their fellow man and stop tolerating the existence of those regimes that benefit from their misery and ignorance.

As it stands, the score is still 0-0, the newspapers have already printed the headlines declaring our humiliating loss, our broadcasters are sending the opposing side our playbook, sixty percent of our spectators (most were "fans" only before kickoff) have headed for the parking lot, our coaches are down to fielding only seven players and we're still in the first minute of the game.

It's not going to be easy to nurse the ills of this wounded planet. It's going to require billions rather than millions to consider the possibility that a massive re-think may be required.

'Final' impressions (April 2003!)

2006-11-12T21:14:00.000Z

In April 2003, as opposition to the 'occupying forces' grew, the BBC reporters who had covered the invasion, recorded ‘final impressions’ (sic) of the war.

Ryan Dilley wrote:

“I saw callous and calculated acts of destruction perpetrated by both sides, but balanced by acts of great generosity and kindness.”

I have seen a boy enraged to the point of throwing stones because he was denied a chocolate bar, while another youth — shot through the middle and dying — behaved with utter composure, politeness and dignity.

I have seen a palace the splendour of which was made all the more sickening by the poverty, filth and want in the city beyond its gates. I have seen people with great intelligence and potential, trapped in a situation surely created by fools.

What I am really not sure about is whether I have seen a liberation or an invasion.”

Nickel Mines and Forgiveness

2006-10-06T21:32:00.000+01:00

Over the past decade I have become increasingly pessimistic about the prospects for peace on this planet.

Lately, I've been letting politicians off a little more lightly, since what leaves me aghast is the spiritual leaders preaching the propaganda of hate.

This week, grieving Amish families in Nickel Mines walked the forgiveness of their talk.

"They buried their anger, even before burying their children."

And what do they want from the world outside?

"Tell the world we are grateful for its prayers but also remember to pray for the gunman's family."

In search of Peace Potions

2006-08-16T21:32:00.000+01:00

Here's the first:

Choose one of the things that you strongly believe and think about how you might be wrong.

(Repeat seven times.)

A question for Muslims

2006-08-03T17:52:00.000+01:00

(This question is directed at those Muslims who follow Islam as a religion of peace.)

How best can those of other faiths, including those of no faith, express their goodwill towards you?

The Prophet Mohammed on the reward for kindness

2006-07-30T18:05:00.000+01:00

Particularly since 7/7, I have been anxious not to behave in such way as to suggest to Muslims that I regarded them as potential suicide bombers. Hassan's plea, recently, for a minute of freedom resonated with me as that was something I have consciously, in spite of a certain "British" reserve, been trying to accord to my fellow passengers on London's public transport. Even though I sometimes wryly reflect that the very ones who are most obviously Muslim, are probably rejecting me, my nod, my greeting, my sitting next to them - because of my short sleeves and uncovered head!

One Sunday, a couple of months ago, I passed, and then turned back to stop at, a table in our town centre's pedestrian mall which is manned by Muslims from the local mosque. After a cautious sort of conversation, I took away with me a book they proffered A brief illustrated guide to understanding Islam. I was looking at it again today, and I have found the Prophet Mohammed's response to the question: "Messenger of God, are we rewarded for kindness towards animals?"

He said, "There is a reward for kindness to every living animal or human".

(The references cited for this were: Saheeh Muslim #2244 and also Saheeh Al-Bukhari #2466)

On the Jill Carroll front, I had the disappointing response from the Monitor that my question (During her capitivity, did she experience any kindness from her captors?) was not one of the questions selected for her to answer.

Don't know that I'm giving up completely on that one yet. Suggestions welcomed.

Revisiting The F Word

2006-07-26T18:13:00.000+01:00

I came across The Forgiveness Project recently.

Stories for our times.

U Words for Peace

2006-07-25T10:40:00.000+01:00

South Africa, 1994. The Boer War (1899–1902) still rankling. Inkatha versus ANC, AWB versus Everyone Else. Necklacing.

Who would have given Peace a chance?

I can remember Julius Lewin’s valedictory tutorial when, in 1966, about to upsticks and leave our sinking ship, he looked into the future for a small class that included Bram Fischer’s son, Paul. “A revolution is not around the corner.” He gave the Nationalist government 30 years. He was pretty much spot on, in that and in much else. I also remember him commenting at some point that, when the handover happened, South Africa had several advantages over other African countries, namely that, in spite of everything, there was still “a reservoir of goodwill” (i.e. between the factions).

Now Tutu’s Rainbow Nation has become a key player in the conflict resolution industry. (Sorry about the creepy jargon.) Yes, it’s still one of the destinations that carries what amounts to an FCO “health warning” with high levels of crime, abysmal driving standards and the now almost universal risk of indiscriminate terrorist attack. But when it comes to forgiveness, Ubuntu rules and this brings me to my first U word.

U IS FOR UBUNTU.

“Ubuntu” in the Nguni languages (“botho” in the Sotho languages) is a concept that emphasises humanity.

Ubuntu ungamntu ngabanye abantu. Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu.

A person is a person through other people.

Desmond Tutu has explained ubuntu in No Future Without Forgiveness (1999, Doubleday) and in God Has A Dream (2004, Doubleday) as “the essence of being human” as a concept in which “my humanity is inextricably bound up in yours”.

“A person with ubuntu is open and available to others, affirming of others, does not feel threatened that others are able and good; for he or she belongs in a greater whole and is diminished when others are humiliated or diminished, when others are tortured or oppressed, or treated as if they were less than who they are…”

Read Further Links:
Dr Timothy Muriti in Practical Peacemaking Wisdom from Africa: Reflections on Ubuntu
and Professor George Devenish’s Understanding the True Meaning of Ubuntu in Politics

U IS ALSO FOR UMMAH

I would have thought The Ummah would also be a powerful force for unity. How does it fit in here?

Now I’m on more uncertain ground and I would appreciate helpful comment.

The OED definition includes this reference: “The flexibility of government in Islam goes back—doesn’t it?—to the concept of ‘Umma’ in Islam, the idea that Islam came actually to build up an Umma, a community, rather than to impose a doctrine” (Jnrl.R.Soc.Arts CXXIV 613/1)

Isn’t The Ummah a concept in which there is also a supportive community? Yet the news, and blogs, make gloomy reading. Yasmin Alibhai-Brown refers, in The Independent to Darfur, where “an appalling number of African Muslims are being hounded, raped, killed and dispossessed by Arab militias - brothers-in-arms, fellow Muslims of the Ummah”.

Divisions between sects seem to mean that The Ummah applies only to that community which shares the same approach to the teachings of Islam.

Is this so? If so, why?

Lucky along the line

2006-07-24T19:24:00.000+01:00

The heat today took me away from my computer and out into the shade. It could have been a welcome break from news and thoughts of war and slaughter, flight and its aftermath.

But because I am glued to the Middle East blogs, it’s not a case of taking a break, sipping a drink. I am, after all, looking for grace towards enemies. I take outside with me Pity the Nation and Country of My Skull. Two wounded nations.

I flick idly through Country of My Skull, skimming for the names of people I knew until I spot a reference to Joyce Seroke, and several paragraphs further on, to Ellen Kuzwayo too. So it is, hooked by two giants Joyce and Ellen, that I come across the testimony of Deborah Matshoba and read about the man Taljaard.

During Deborah Matshoba's first detention in the Old Fort, she was returned to her cell after harsh, harrowing interrogation over several days, during which she became delirious and collapsed.

She recalled in her testimony to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, “The cell was swarming with lice. The blankets were caked and smelt of urine. I didn’t know where I was, I was screaming and shouting and had severe asthma attacks.”

“But,” she added, “I was lucky along the line. Because an Afrikaner came, Taljaard, I’ll never forget his name. He said he thought I was mad. I told him I was a political prisoner. He listened carefully and smuggled an asthma spray and some tablets in and helped me to hide it behind the toilet.”

Incredulity and humility compete as I return to these words:

But I was lucky along the line.

Pity the Lebanon - Again, again

2006-07-15T07:44:00.000+01:00

As a friend and wellwisher of the Lebanon, I would like to draw attention to the Open Lebanon Forum as a source of up to date news and comment, particularly during the current crisis.

How does "above all nations" resonate for you?

2006-07-10T07:50:00.000+01:00

I have been working up a minor fret about possibly jingoistic connotations of “above all nations”, particularly to someone who googles the phrase.

Let me make it clear.

The title of the Catlin/Brittain/Hodges compilation was inspired by the inscription “Above all nations is humanity”.

I interpret this inscription as something of a counter-balance to any notions of national or religious superiority.

So I googled the entire phrase (i.e. “above all nations is humanity”) earlier this week. US links topped the list, which is hardly surprising, given that the inscription is carved on the Cornell campus.

Here are some interpretations of "above all nations is humanity":

George Ball reflecting, in 1999, on his first sighting of the inscription said: "it took me many decades before I realized what it really meant. It was identifying the greatest threat to the human race, national sovereignty, the idea that the nations of the world are autonomous, that they can do what they like within their own borders, that they are accountable to no one. During World War II, I recall a big sign I saw on the wall in a German school house which read "National Socialism is our people's greatest belief." It does not fit well with "Above all nations is humanity."

Nearly all the great atrocities of the 20th century are the result of the decisions made unilaterally by sovereign nations.

Here is the idea in the fine words of Max Frankel in a recent issue of the New York Times magazine: "Someday in the next century we will acknowledge that there can be no global rights without global laws and no way to write and enforce those laws without a global congress, courts and cops. As the lion in the jungle of nations, the United States is not ready to yield to higher authority. But in time we will realize, like the nations of Western Europe, that sovereignty has become the enemy of safety."

It appears also to be the motto of The Cosmopolitan Club at the University of Illinois which devotes a page to its philosophy, along with translations of the phrase into several languages. (You need to scroll down. And they need to seek out more translations, the obvious ones coming to mind being Arabic, as well as the languages of Africa and South East Asia.)

Then elsewhere there's David Scott along with other residents of the Cosmopolitan Club commenting on their interpretation of its (selfsame) motto: "It's a worthy motto. I wish more people in the world took it to heart. Is the corollary of this, 'Beneath all nationalism lies inhumanity'?"

Flying the flag for Iraq

2006-07-10T07:05:00.000+01:00

How about this, then? Now that the flags (of St George), have come down - we could put our flag waving and flag positioning skills to another cause.

How about we replace them with flags of Iraq? Even just for one day?

It does slightly go against the one humanity line, but just imagine the effect, even if there were only a tenth of the number of flags that were flying a week ago.

And we'd all know what the flag of Iraq looked like too.

Postcript: Read what's happening to Iraqi football supporters. (I don't know how to link to this particular post, so you'll need to scroll down to Wednesday May 31.)

Scoring for humanity

2006-07-09T20:27:00.000+01:00

I read today yet another powerful post by Rachel of North London. Many times over the past year she has moved me to tears and many times to share her outrage.

Do they read her in Downing Street, I wonder? How can they not be moved by her penetrating coherent arguments, her tenacity, her compassion? She is the child in the crowd who is crying out that the Emperor is naked.

One of the points she made today really resonated with me, because it is the very thought that spurred me to start this blog.

Rachel wrote: “I think is the duty of every man and woman alive to seek justice and healing, to work for peace and reconciliation, to root out and report abuse and extremism, and to challenge and speak out what they find to be cruel and unfair. I do not think it matters what I call God, or whether I call on no God at all but instead look to a common humanity…”

Another thing that struck me quite forcibly was the reminder that "every day in Iraq is 7th July". This thought strikes me every single time I hear of another bombing with reports of scores dead.

Why do we not stop what we are doing, just once, as we have done with our minutes of silence for the victims of the London bombings - why do we not just once all stop what we are doing and step out of our offices and houses and schools on to our pavements in all our cities and stand, just once, for the people of Iraq?

What holds us back? Is it that we think a particular message will go out because of this? Perhaps that by commemorating somewhere else's dead we will be in some way be betraying our own?

I think we do need to make this kind of stand but how could one organise this, without it being taken over by groups with a different agenda? Think what it could mean if we showed the grace to make a grassroots gesture like this here, where we live in relative safety? No one would be marching anywhere, after all so we shouldn't need insurance or Health & Safety approval, or the cancellation of police leave.

Maybe we need a rock singer or a rapper to put a rhythm to this thought...

Above all nations, and above all the cliques of government, and above all extremists...is humanity.

We'll prove it yet.

I'm alright Jack. (Someone else can do it.)

2006-07-09T13:39:00.000+01:00

“For evil to triumph it is sufficient for good men to do nothing.”

These words, and innumerable variants of them, are attributed to Edmund Burke. The closest Burke actually comes to these words is thought to be: "When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle." This with the usual Wikipedia caveats...

No matter. I go with the first version, partly for sentimental reasons. Over 20 years ago in Cape Town, a fellow Black Sasher supplied me with dozens of orange stickers on which she had had these words printed. I worked out that lifts were good places to ‘place’ this message, provided I was the sole passenger (I am a coward). The stickers did not peel easily, and occasionally the lift doors opened just as I was placing one. Pretty soon I learnt to unobtrusively start the peel, before I got into the lift. I'm not even sure that the stickers delivered a clear message, as more than one person remarked that the message they sent depended on the reader's interpretation of who was good and what was evil!

I felt rage and despair often, in South Africa, because of the "I'm alright Jack" attitude of people who disapproved of racism yet who, I believed, were doing nothing.

So who are our good men, doing something today?

Here's one. Hassan is a Northerner, who has been writing eloquently about the impact of the London bombings. His latest is a Letter from Leeds, which has been posted by Rachel of North London.

Thank you, Hassan, for speaking out and for not passing the buck.

Six Degrees of Separation

2006-06-19T22:29:00.000+01:00

I thought of asking Jill Carroll if any of her captors, or their cronies, had shown her any kindness during her 82 days of captivity. On 8 May, The Christian Science Monitor invited its readers to put questions to Jill. Unfortunately, this invitation seems to have been online for a mere 24 hours — I only came across it a day or so after the deadline.

Yet the link seemed to work still, so I filed my question under “What do you want to ask Jill Carroll?” I’ve had no response and it doesn’t seem as though anything’s been added to the update blog since. In fact, the Monitor has gone very quiet on Ms Carroll.

So who else do we know of who was vulnerable in the presence of enemies? Norman Kember? Surely there aren’t that many links between me and someone who knows him? Norman Kember’s gone very quiet too, though it’s not hard to see why both Jill Carroll and Norman Kember have every reason to seek refuge from further inquisition.

And how do I find an Iraqi who can testify to a humane gesture from an American soldier?

Will the people who constitute the six degrees of separation between me and any of these, please step forward?

An Audience in Beirut

2006-06-09T19:12:00.000+01:00

I've remembered an article, written by Robert Fisk, that I read some time ago. It appeared in The Independent, but unfortunately you have to pay to read most, if not all, of Fisk's articles in their archive. This charging to view really does bother me, not least because it goes against the original idea of the Internet as being freely accessible to all. I've managed to find a different link to the article, which I've added to the links under Breaking the Mould - it's to the right of this page.

Fisk was encouraged by the response of "a Muslim audience in Beirut ... most of them in their 20s" to the moment in Kingdom of Heaven when Saladin sent his own doctors to a Christian king.

He wrote, "At this, there came from the Muslim audience a round of spontaneous applause. They admired this act of mercy from their warrior hero; they wanted to see his kindness to a Christian".

Yes, the event they applauded happened centuries ago, but the Lebanon is a nation recently ravaged by war and a country where still today brave men and women are being targeted by assassins.

I salute that audience. This generation inspires hope.

Blog addiction

2006-06-02T20:49:00.001+01:00

Last Thursday to Goldsmith's Hall to hear Helena Kennedy deliver a Gresham Lecture, Walking the Line: preserving liberty in times of insecurity. As always, it all seemed eminently logical, sensible and moral - while I was listening. Does a wary hesitation indicate, I wonder, that recent events, rather than piling on of decades, have shifted me from the ideals I once soaked up thirstily from liberal philosphers like Leo Marquard? I couldn't find a transcript of the lecture on the Gresham website but I did get diverted by Vernon Bognador's latest lecture on the Judges and the Constitution, with its references to his Human Rights lecture last year.

Another loop, another detour. And so day by day I get diverted from my search for signs of humanity. Sometimes it's a detour to wrestle with, or clutch to, a liberal argument, but mostly it's the sheer weight of atrocities and dismal news that depresses.

What has made me hit the Create button today is that I've had a couple of really useful prompts/prods/pointers in comments on two posts. As a relatively new blogger, who's not yet ready to share this URL with her friends and colleagues, I am surprised that I get any comments at all. None of my 'frivolous' blogs draws in any comments at all, so I rather imagined this would at first really be just a case of my thinking aloud, communicating with the ether, and maybe using the blog to keep me on track, scanning for sparks of hope.

Of course I want to make ripples, but I thought naively I would have to spread the word about the blog to get any sort of response, and that I imagined would be once I'd written a few posts, gathered some anecdotes and could feel a momentum building.

Yet some posts have raised a comment, and my curiosity about the posters, has taken me to blogs which draw me right in and right away from what should be my spark-seeking priorities. So these detours are a learning experience and that's humbling too.

Also, those comments have been a boost especially as they appear whenever I think this isn't going to work or when I've read something like, yesterday, a review of Left to Tell I tie myself in niggly knots wondering if this "counts" as a spark of humanity shown towards an enemy. This is how ridiculous my side-tracking is: because the man who sheltered the woman was a Hutu priest, "technically" he was their enemy, but as a priest he had his thoughts focused on an altogether different, "spiritual" tribe - ergo, does it count?

How do they find me? Is it a complete chance, i.e. via the random Next Blog button? One early comment was from someone who had apparently read about my site on another website but when I google my own blog, I don't even come across it. So it's puzzling.

I'm starting to think about whether I should try to count "my" hits. Is this natural curiosity? Or just plain vanity?

At what cost to humanity...

2006-05-22T07:01:00.000+01:00

Six teachers were assassinated in Iraq in the course of the past week.

The toll, according to Saturday's issue of The Guardian:

Balad Ruz: Gunmen kill 4 primary school teachers. (Monday)

Kerbala: Gunmen on a motorcycle shoot a school teacher dead. (Thursday)

Kirkuk: Gunmen shoot dead a school teacher and a student. (Thursday)

(And in another attack on teachers and learners, a bomb at al-Mustansiriya University killed one and injured eleven...) (last Sunday)

How can the children ever feel safe again?

Where is humanity?

Forgiveness

2006-05-20T22:13:00.000+01:00

My mother has shown me an article by Amelia Thomas, Enemy Soldiers gather - to strive for Peace which appeared in The Christian Science Monitor in April. It's about Combatants for Peace, an alliance of former Palestinian 'freedom fighters' and Israeli ex-soldiers. One of them commented, "It doesn't cease to be hard. But you must listen, and you must forgive, even for the most difficult things."

The issue of forgiveness has been explored recently by bloggers like Rachel from North London in The F Word. This post has links to the efforts of other survivors to respond to a request to write about whether they could forgive the bombers.

People often hold up South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission as an example of what can be achieved in reconciling former enemies. It certainly provided the opportunity to reveal more of the 'Truth', i.e. in the form of the 'facts' - but real 'Reconciliation'? I suppose it's easier to come to terms with a 'wrong' if you feel that justice has been served, and that there is hope for the future.

In South Africa in the Eighties, when I fretted over police actions, someone, to reassure me, told me that a woman we both knew, prominent in the Anglican Church, was quietly recording who had done what to whom, so that one day, when the struggle was over and we had that justice and a moral government for which we were working, the guilty could be brought to trial.

Instead we got a new government and we got the TRC. So did the victims feel cheated when the truth was out and the culprits walked free? Percy, I think they might have.

Interesting too, that amongst the King's Cross survivors, some of the rage has simply been re-directed from the now unavailable home-grown bombers to home-grown institutions. It's even easier to do this when a government is clearly morally wrong. In South Africa there was a tiny, tiny chance that 'agitators' from other parts of the country, might come across me, a 'Whitey' in the course of their anger and, not knowing me, might necklace me. Pretty melodramatic I know, but I still come across, amongst my box of 'important' papers, a note I left there for my husband, instructing him to make it clear at any trial, that I blamed the government, not the accused. (Even though the risk of 'accidental' necklacing is now rather remote on several accounts, I continue to leave this scribble amongst the papers - Why? As some kind of a souvenir? Perhaps it's time to move on, Percy...)

Antjie Krog calls reconciliation a cycle, rather than a process. However it happens, or whatever brings it in to settle over victims of horrors, it's not the full forgiveness Monty.

I digress. This blog isn't about forgiveness. It's about finding a flickering candle in the pitch-dark stadium of war.

Day after day after day

2006-05-19T22:50:00.000+01:00

Day 1 having involved the somewhat impulsive setting up of this weblog, Day 2 started with some serious stalling tactics like trying to make sense of the sidebar's HTML code, followed by searching for a good example of a magnanimous enemy from the 1945 compilation.

Suddenly somehow, the language of the anthology seemed so foreign and stilted that I began to feel myself at such a distance from it, that I began to ask myself: Have I, in my naivete, simply failed to recognise that, like the changes in the way we speak and write, we are all utterly changed since 1945. Am I not in pursuit of something that no longer exists?

I woke to "Nineteen dead in Baghdad" and, heavy-hearted. typed www.baghdad.com instead of www.blogger.com I use Google Earth to look at Baghdad even though I realise that this is just making me even more moved by the plight of those who will walk along those roads today. Right now they may be brushing their teeth, reaching for labneh - only to be slaughtered before noon, while queueing for work.

I also remembered reading, I think in one of the colour supplements, the mention by a Palestinian of a single occasion on which his family had been 'shielded' by an Israeli soldier amongst a search party . I spent part of this morning trying to find some reference to the report online, but without success. I need to enlist help here - collaborators!

"Atrocity-mongering is the rule in every war..."

2006-05-18T12:18:00.000+01:00

The rule, yes? Or not?

This post's title comes from the Foreword to Above All Nations. The original book, a slim volume, not even available today on Find in a Library, was published by Victor Gollancz in 1945, as the war drew "to its close in a welter of terror and agony for millions".

I came across a second-hand copy of the book in Fish Hoek, South Africa, last October, at a time when I was transcribing letters that my mother had received from a close friend during the Second World War, and was consequently particularly curious about contemporary feelings and attitudes.

The intention of the compilers, George Catlin, Vera Brittain and Sheila Hodges was to show "that even amidst the illimitable degradation of modern warfare men of all nations [could] be decent and merciful to those who, at the very moment [were] their mortal enemies".

"Hope must come, if it is to come at all" he continued, "from...the faith that in every human being some goodness is latent". Can we feel that hope today? Can we find magnimosity in a bleak landscape?

Today, with this blog, I have taken the first steps towards creating something like a sequel to Above All Nations. I'm planning to use a Google Page to create a web site that will record humane acts towards enemies, whether hostages, civilians or soldiers - even though this record may well be a mere mole-hill beside a noisy mountain of atrocities - anything, anything to counter my heavy sense that, as Auden wrote, suffering is taking place "while someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along" - or blogging...