One Picture … Possibilities of Hope ...

Yesterday, I listened the most beautiful but tragic story from a neighbor from Palestine...

He was an older man and was sharing with me a memory from his childhood. Decades before, his mother and father had taken him back to Palestine for the first time since his grandparents were forced to flea during the Nakba ‘48.
The purpose of their visit was for his father to see the home he grew up in, which had been taken from their family and given to a Jewish family. Something that continues to happen today.

He vividly recalled how the Jewish family shared they had come from North Africa and they missed their ‘real home’ as well. And he remembered seeing his father cry at the joyful memories of his youth and likely the sad realization that the land and home they once owned would never be returned.

Like so many other Palestinian neighbors around the world, these stories are all too common. When I hear them, I mourn the stolen land, stolen homes and even stolen lives.

And I mourn the role my country’s politicians and religious leaders play in keeping so many of us mislead and misinformed about this human tragedy continuing to unfold today.