Faith and Justice in the Holy Land: Feat. Bishop Jamal Khader

In this episode of Jerusalem Talks, Avraham (Avrum) Burg explores the personal journey of Bishop Jamal Khader, who previously served as patriarchal vicar for the diocese in Jordan and is currently the head of the dioceses of Djibouti and Somalia. During their conversation, they detail Bishop Khader’s identity as a Palestinian Christian, the physical and spiritual connection to the Holy Land, and the challenges of navigating interfaith dynamics between Christians, Jews, and Muslims. They also discuss the misuse of religion for political purposes and the merits of social justice in Christianity’s mission. Finally, they talk about Bishop Khader’s efforts to serve the marginalized in Djibouti and Somalia, emphasizing education and poverty alleviation while addressing the remnants of colonialism.

With gratitude to the production team - Daniel Schwake, Gabriel Mitchell, and Avrum Burg - as well as Eli Krogmann and David Turjman for making this season of Jerusalem Talks possible.

Transcript

Jerusalem Talks ND

Season 2 Episode 2

Host: Avraham Burg

Featured Guest: Bishop Jamal Khader

Avraham Burg: Peace on you, Father Jamal.

Bishop Khader: Thank you. Peace on you.

Avraham Burg: I try to follow you and I tell you, I mean, I've no idea how you do this journey. Born in this beautiful pastoral village of Zababdeh South of Jenin, which is a Christian bastion with churches and next to the American university. So un West Bank, I put it like that. And then you went there and there and Amman and now Djibouti. Tell me a little bit about the journey. 

Bishop Khader:  So I began at the seminary and then after a few years of pastoral work, I went to Italy to continue my studies. When I came back in 1998, I went, I came back to the seminary in Betjala and the Catholic University of Bethlehem where I was chair of the Department of Religious Studies for 10 years. In 19, in 2013, I went to Ramallah as a parish priest for four years. You know, I became first the rector of the seminary and then in 2017 parish priest in Ramallah for four years. And then I was appointed as a patriarchal vicar in Jordan Representing the Patriarch of Jerusalem. And then I was ordained a Bishop. And after two years, from 2021 to 2023, after two years, the Pope asked me to go to Djibouti to be the Bishop of Djibouti and the apostolic administrator of Somalia.

Avraham Burg: Stop here for a second.

Bishop Khader:  Yes

Avraham Burg: I know that in the church you hardly can argue. I mean, if you are nominated, if you're appointed, you say yes and you move on. But tell me, tell me what happens to you. I mean, what happens to you? They tell you Djibouti.

Bishop Khader: Oh, that was kind of surprise for me. And I wondered why and why me, you know to go to Djibouti. This is an African country, a different country. Even if Djibouti is part of the Conference of Bishops of the Arab region. So when I asked, the only reason they gave me is that Djibouti is in the border between Africa and the Arab world. Djibouti is an Arab country. So they wanted to give a new face to the church because all the bishops were, you know, Europeans. So they didn't want to show that the church is European church, but you know, it's kind of a local church, so. I went there, even if, you know, to be an Arab country, it's a member of the Arab League, but no one speaks Arabic there.

Avraham Burg: So what's the language of the sermon?

Bishop Khader:  It's in French. It's a.. French is the official language with Arabic, but everyone speaks French, not Arabic. On the street they speak Somali, they speak, you know, different languages, local languages…

Avraham Burg:  But between the walls of the patriarchy is French.

Bishop Khader: Yeah, the official language is French, yea. Exactly

Avraham Burg: Maybe we'll have later time to go a little bit to the African Christianity, which is, I want to assume, a bit different than the cradle of the Christian civilization here or maybe Western Europe, but you already put your hand on the horn, not the horn of Africa, but the horn of the dilemma and this is Arab Christianity. And I want to begin and to begin in a place which is a little bit more detailed, but not the political side of it. I will say that the whole set of relationship between the Church and between the Church and the Jews is actually built on 2 pillars, which is the Holy Scriptures and whatever happened between the Jews and Christianity in the last 2000 years since Christianity moved from the Holy Land to to the West and eventually is centered around Rome. And here all of the sudden, which is with the years diluted the political dimension of it and we'll talk about it later. But here all of the sudden there is another perspective that you talk a lot about it and this is in a way very political,  that is the Palestinian dimension of it. So we have here at the Holy Land, the Terra Santa. We have a three pillars structure. Can you elaborate a little bit about the pillars and the relationship or tensions between them?

Bishop Khader: First of all, when we talk about this land and we say the Holy Land, for me as a local Palestinian Christian, this is my land, you know, simply. And the Bible, This is my Bible and this is the word of God. And as word of God, it's good news for everyone. So as even as a child, I used to read the scriptures. I love the scriptures, all the scriptures, you know, the whole Bible.

Avraham Burg:  You mean Old Testament and New Testament 

Bishop Khader: …and New Testament. Yes. Yeah, because all of it is word of God. And I see it as a journey of God with his people until now. So I didn't have any problems reading the scriptures After recently, you know, when I began to hear about political interpretation of the Bible. But for me it's good news and it should be good news for everyone. So I consider this story as my own story as a Palestinian Christian. And you know, living in the Holy Land makes this, you know, being Christian, following Jesus more concrete as you know we visit the holy places, we see where Jesus lived, where he was born, etcetera. So this there is another dimension s which is this attachment to the land as a Christian because it's the Holy Land. For the relations with Jews, You know, I never thought that the Bible would divide us. The Bible unites us in that sense. And I for many years, I was a member of the Diocesan Committee of Dialogue with Jews with Monsignor Patriarch Sabbah. And we met a lot of theology, Jewish theologians, and we had the sessions of dialogue with them. And we would explore our different readings. And this is an enrichment of this reading. So that's the way I see it. Now, of course, the center of Christianity moved to Europe and we know the history of the Christian-Jewish relations in Europe.

Avraham Burg: But hang on, hang on, hang on, hang on. You don't have to cover the entire history on the first question.

Bishop Khader: No, no, no I'm talking about this is not my history. That's what I wanted to say.

Bishop Khader: OK.

Avraham Burg: Sorry to interrupt you.

Bishop Khader: That's OK.

Avraham Burg: Let's see a little bit.

Bishop Khader: OK.

Avraham Burg: You live in the West, be it Rome, be it Paris, be it South Bend, United States of America. In a way, for you, the Holy Land is like it was for my grand-grandfather, a kind of a spiritual abstract.

Bishop Khader: Yeah,

Avraham Burg:  it's a place of inspiration, of orientation, of memories, of thoughts, contemplations. But it's not a concrete place. Comes the Palestinian…the Palestinian Christian and say it's a physical essence for me. Comes the Israeli one who says I'm not like my great grandfather, it's a practical Holy  Land for me. So all of a sudden what was possible in the past, which is Jewish and Christian dialogue, as difficult as it was, but both accepted at least the first part of the Bible.

Bishop Khader: Yeah, 

Avraham Burg: All of the sudden even this first part is very controversial. So how the dialogue is possible now that the physical dimension entered faith and theology?

Bishop Khader:  So just to give an example how physical it is, our religious life is around the holy places. We celebrate Christmas in Bethlehem. We celebrate the Holy Week in Jerusalem. Annunciation in Nazareth, yeah. So it is physical. And even during the liturgy we add a word we say hick in Latin, which is here, here, Jesus was born here, etcetera, etcetera. So this is very physical  in that way that you know, I like it. Now of course we have different readings of the first part of the Bible or the Old Testament. And we need to agree that we have different readings. Some Christians even try to separate the Old Testament from the New, and they read the Old Testament as if the New is not there, etc.. For me, they are linked together. And what I call a Christological reading of the Old Testament is a valid reading. I read it through my faith in Jesus Christ. That Jesus who interprets the scriptures for me, what do they mean? There are difficult passages, of course, in the Old Testament. And that's why through my faith in Jesus that I try to understand better the difficult passages in the Old Testament, especially everything related to the land, the promises, the chosenness, etcetera. All those topics, difficult topics, of course I know, but it's through my faith. What does Jesus tell me about those passages. That's how I try to understand this. And at the same time, hearing the Jewish reading of the Bible, it's very enriching. You know, it was a great experience for me. Enriching experience when we read the same passage and I, you know, we hear a Jewish reading and then a Christian reading of this passage. That's mutually enriching, I think. But I think the difficulty comes when there are political interpretations and that's a different topic.

Avraham Burg: No, I want to, I want to push back a little bit.

Bishop Khader:  OK.

Avraham Burg: You gave me the good, beautiful Sunday sermon and I have Monday, Monday suffering, OK? In the sense that I understand I grew up through God as an abstract. This is so beautiful because it can be so comprehensive. I can even say it be Catholic, which encompasses it all. But when you have to translate it into practical little things, which is very, very physical, all of the sudden the whole monotheistic idea is very here and now. I cannot defer it for eschatological end of the days, because every day is the days. Which is an end of of the day. So and there is a collision here between the two readings. Forget about the beautiful articulated theologians. I speak about people in the street. The Jews all of the sudden,  Well, it's only ours. And the little kid, Jamal Khader, sits on the church at the age of I don't know what 3, 4, 5. Father is abroad. Only momy is around. and the occupier walks in. It's as much as it is about faith, it's about pragmatical reality that collides. How do you, how do you work there?

Bishop Khader: Yeah, I think at the beginning it was kind of a crisis or shock for me to deal with the with those readings. Now, reading more and trying to understand, I believe that those readings, those exclusive readings, OK, this is only ours, the land, is a selective reading. Of course there are passages in the Old Testament and we can select those passages, but we cannot stop there. Whenever we read the scriptures, we need to read the whole scriptures in order to have the bigger picture. I'll give an example, a concrete example.

Before Genesis 12, where God chose Abraham, there was the Genesis 1 where God created all men and women at His image and resemblance. So beginning with this calling of the whole humanity and the dignity of all humanity, because we are created at the image of God then We understand how God chose someone, chose a people. 

Avraham Burg: which means I'm a human first. And only then my identity is Christian, Jew, whatever.

Bishop Khader: Yes.

Avraham Burg: And by the later identity, I do not write off the original one.

Bishop Khader: Exactly 

Avraham Burg: I simply get on.

Bishop Khader: Yeah… So who is God? That's the main question for us. Is he my God and only my God? So whenever, for example, whenever we read God of Israel. What does it mean? In the context of the Bible, I understand it. OK? but if we take the same word, God of Israel, meaning that he's only our God fighting with us against everyone else, that's not the God that I know. That's a tribal God.

Avraham Burg: Yeah,  because what the church did from second generation Christianity and on opened the particular tribal one into the Gentile universe.

Bishop Khader: Gentiles, go and preach to all nations. So at the beginning, God created everyone, the whole humanity, and the message is addressed to everyone. So this universality of the message. Because God is God of everyone and all of us, we are, you know, we are created and we are children of God, you know, so he cares. God cares about everyone. So I don't want to turn God into a tribal God, the God, you know, as the idea in the past that every people has its own God and the fight is among the gods, et cetera, like. Moses and Pharaoh, for example, 

Avraham Burg: the Pantheon, the Pantheon of Egypt versus the Jehovah.

Bishop Khader: Yeah, exactly. No, the God that I believe in, he's a God of everyone. So if someone tells me that God gave your lands to another people, my question is, who is God? Is he the God of one people or the God of all peoples? He's also my God, you know. So in this universality, I understand the promises of God and I cannot translate or translate the promises of God into something exclusive to one part and excluding everyone else.

Avraham Burg: Father Jamal, I must tell you it's a beautiful reading of Humanism and universality and universalism. It's a beautiful one. And when I see something beautiful, I ask myself questions. Isn't it too beautiful at the sense? 

Bishop Khader: How to translate it into concrete actions?

Avraham Burg: No, no, no, no. That's …There we failed. So far we're not there. But I put…. I want to walk into your shoes for a second.

Bishop Khader: Ok

Avraham Burg: Not to impose mine, because, I, within Judaism, I'm almost 99% with you because I see the universal the universalism within Judaism the way the particularists do not see it nowadays. So I'm closer to you theologically. yet If we introduce the physical geographical presence, which is Christianity through the eyes of the person or people who were born, the Palestinians as well. In order to succeed in the Palestinian struggle for redemption, for freedom, for liberty. leave aside the tools for that. Just a concept. You have to cooperate with the overwhelming majority of Palestinians who are not Christians, mainly Muslims. And here is a dilemma for you. The common denominator you have with me is the Old Testament. This is the one you do not have with them, because there is no common denominator between the Christian both Testaments and the Koran. So on one hand you're closer to me textual wise, and on one hand you're closer to them politically wise. So this is one side of the dilemma. And here I go to another side of the dilemma. You live within the church. You know what? You live within churches. How many churches are there in the West, especially North America, who read the same text you read and say no, no, no, Jews only. So it's a dilemma within Christianity and dilemma between Christianity, Judaism and Islam, politically speaking. 

Bishop Khader:  OK, so first you're right about having the scriptures common among us. That's true. With Muslims,  I had a lot of not only dialogue, but I was teaching, you know, Muslims for years and years.

Avraham Burg: Wow

Bishop Khader:  And believe me, we have a lot in common, especially the faith in God, in the one God. That's very important. And then the sanctity of human life also and many other values that we can build on. Now when we talk about particularism, I think that we need to accept not, you know, as Rose Luther said, the multi-particularisms, etc. But I think, you know, this openness, this universality is important in how we think. And what does it mean? It means that if those settlers who come to take the Palestinian land say that this is only our land, I cannot respond saying no, this is only my land, you know, So this is the Holy Land. This is, you know, as it was in the past and should be in the future, open for everyone. And I think that our belief in one God and those values, Religious values, are important. Now, with the Christians. I think that there is a theology in those churches, especially the evangelical churches  in the United States who are preparing the second coming of Christ and the end of the world. And it comes within their own theology, but when they are confronted with the presence of Palestinian Christians, Arabs, you know, at one hand we are considered as part of the other side, the enemy for for them, you know, but  on the other side, you know, we are Christians and we believe in in the Bible as as they do. So first they should know what does it mean. Their theology means injustice, means oppression, means, you know, a lot of harm not only to Muslim Palestinians, but also to Christian Palestinians. So to introduce the concept of social justice, this is something new and few churches accept now to talk about justice, not only about this eschatological theology that in order to prepare the second coming of Christ, you know we have to fight the Antichrist and all the infidels, et cetera, et cetera, preparing for the armageddon, the final battle. No, we need to build what we call the Kingdom of God here on this earth by working for justice, for peace, for reconciliation, for everything that the Bible tells us and Jesus taught us.

Avraham Burg: So actually what do you do with your philosophy or your approach Is you do a transformation of the classic Christian notion of salvation from history of salvation to geography of salvation.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah, 

Avraham Burg: OK, 

Bishop Khader:  Yes And this notion of geography of salvation was mentioned by Pope Paul the 6th, by the way, in 1974. And for me, this combination of history and geography. History of salvation, geography of salvation makes it very concrete. Meaning that what does it mean for me, this salvation here and now, you know, in this moment of history and in this piece of land called the Holy Land. So, you know, salvation for us means to work towards all those values, to build the Kingdom of God especially through being brothers and sisters, accepting that every human being is equal, and that we need to be on the side of the poor and oppressed, not the mighty and the powerful.

Avraham Burg: And that's anyway the entry point of the church to enter through the most needy rather than the most powerful.

Bishop Khader:  Exactly.

Avraham Burg: That's  the heart of social conscience.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah, yeah But when I see some Christian churches, you know, siding with the powerful and you know, with this mentality of using power, et cetera, et cetera, that's, you know, I see it as a danger to the message of of the gospel and of of the Bible. You cannot impose your own theology by force. We need to work humbly in, you know, in front of the Lord to, you know, to to build a better world. And here I'm talking about the Holy Land, which is not only a land like any other land, which is in a way, you know, but at the at the other hand, it's a test for humanity if we can build peace here in this land, it will reflect to reflect on the entire region, on the relationship between East and West.

Avraham Burg: So what do you say is actually father, what do you say is as follows. As for now, we had for I don't know what 100 years conflict between superpowers: the West, a billion people, the East, Russia and China, whatever, billion people. Now we say, hey, we're also a power. We are also a billion people and we are different billion people because we are billion people of softness, of peace building rather than arms and ammunition exporters. It's a different superpower. 

Bishop Khader:  You know, if we talk about the power of normal people, people who want to live their normal life, to live in peace. Yes, people are powerful.

Avraham Burg: Vaclav Havel called it the power of powerlessness.

Bishop Khader:  Yes. Oh, OK, that's a good way of putting it. And you know, when Jesus said, blessed are the meek as they will inherit the land.

Avraham Burg:  Will Inherit the land, right.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah. So maybe you can impose use your, you know, yourself by force, etcetera. But at the end the meek will inherit the lands.

Avraham Burg: So if assuming that Father Jamal builds now his superpower, OK, or at least a strategy and now be more, less smiling, a strategy for the Christian world, or at least the part of the Christian world who believes in this bridge building and will go, will get there soon. And now we are 100 years down the road or 200 years down the road. As Cardinal Pizzaballa once told me, the church has a lot of patience. I mean, I'm an Israeli, I'm edgy, I'm thorny, I'm have no patience. Hang on, the church has a lot of patience. So let's take the marathon running of the church and we're 200 years down the road. Will we see actually two different Christian communities? Like, by the way, we see nowadays two different Jewish communities. And this is those who live here, OK, the witnesses who give testimony to the concrete reality of where it happened and how it should happen. And all of those sympathizers, fans, supporters outside there who have beautiful spiritual life, but it is not it.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah, I think that in our dialogue as Christian Palestinians with Western churches, we need to listen to each other. I. in those dialogue, I learned a lot, for example, about the history of Christianity in the West and especially its relations with the Jews there and how important it is for Western, especially European churches. But at the same time, I think they need to listen to us. We have something to say we have, we can contribute. 

Avraham Burg: We have something to offer. Not just to say, beg, listen to us. Hey, we we….

Bishop Khader:  We can offer something this concreteness of, you know. And at the same time a different way of looking at the conflict, especially if they want to see it through religious eyes. So many of them, for example, have the idea of a conflict between Judeo-christian civilization against Muslim barbarism. That's, you know, a simple way of putting it.

Avraham Burg: Welcome to conservativism, to Christian conservatism.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah. But when they see Christians who are Arabs and culturally, of course we are our identity, we are Arabs. That's our culture. That's who we are. So we have something to offer and they need to listen. And sometimes it's a new discovery for them. /  There is another point in the West. It's a point I thought that this mentality of colonialism, of white supremacy is over.  It seems it's not. It's not. You know, the way that some of those powers support war with, you know, weapons, etcetera. The way they, you know, they don't care about human lives when it comes to Palestinian lives. I see it as a continuation of the continuity of this mentality of supremacy. If you know, I'll give another example, not from the Holy Land this time. When there were many refugees from Ukraine, all the churches in Europe made an appeal and there was a lot of response to answer this emergency, which is the refugees from Ukraine. The same Christian organizations made another appeal for millions of refugees from Sudan, and no one answered, no one cared. And so, when it comes to the differentiation between Jewish lives and Palestinian lives, that's the way of, you know, this Western Orientalism, if we can call it, where they see the Palestinians or Palestinian lives as less worthy than others.

Avraham Burg: Father, I hear the pain and believe me, I share the pain because there is here what we call in Judaism distinction between blood and blood.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah.

Avraham Burg: And it shouldn't happen.

Bishop Khader:  Yes.

Avraham Burg: Yet, and this is a reluctant yet.  Yes, the colonialism and the colonial mentality is here. But on the other hand, there is another mentality which is also very, very difficult. If you say Deen Mohammad Bil seif, which is the law of Mohammad is in the sword.  Or you say Dar al Islam, which means the House of Islam. Every place that once was part of the Khalifa should come back to Muslim hands. So it's a kind of a no less violent push back. So you cannot just put the blame on the side of ancient Western patronizing arrogant colonialism. There is another partner to this unpleasant tango.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah, I believe that whenever we use religion in an ideology, and especially when we have a religious ideology, there is a lot of harm done to religion itself. For Muslims…We lived for Muslims for centuries. With regular Muslims, we have no problem, We can live.  And you mentioned my village, Zababdeh. That's the only Christian village in the north of the West Bank until you reach Ramallah.

Avraham Burg: And it is such a beautiful, it is such a beautiful place.

Bishop Khader:  It is, it is. So all the other villages and towns, etcetera, there are Muslims and we live with them. Now when it comes to political Islam, when we transform Islam or any other religion into an ideology, yes, you have those movements, the Muslim Brotherhood or any other, you know, faction who talk about having an Islamic country and I had discussions with even with my students at Bethlehem University. “What about me?” He want a Muslim country. “What about me?” He Said you're not a Muslim. Said I will.

Avraham Burg: What does that mean? “You're not a Muslim, so you're not welcome.”?

Bishop Khader:  You are not welcome in the sense that it's up to us to decide. We are the majority and that was representative of Hamas at that time.

Avraham Burg: OK, but it's a philosophy which is there.

Bishop Khader:  It is dangerous. I said I will never accept to be a second class citizen. You know, I'm a citizen, I have full rights and my struggle, nonviolent struggle of course, will be, you know, to be an equal citizen of everyone. So,  I would like to differentiate between normal Muslims with whom we have no problem living and political Islam, especially those ideologies who exclude everyone else. So I'm fighting the Jewish exclusion of the land, you know, at the same time with the same force  I fight against the Islamic exclusion because when it comes especially to Israel, Palestine with the Holy Land, you cannot, you know, eliminate this diversity that we are, we enjoy. We cannot say that it's only for Muslims. So the presence of Muslims, Christians, Druze, Samaritans, et cetera, it's a richness and we have to conserve it. So you are right in what you said and this is a danger. In many ways, I see it as a reaction, not only, but as a reaction of, you know, how the West sees the, you know, Islamic countries and how they treat the Islamic world, et cetera. Locally in Palestine, that's a reaction to the lack of any political solution also. So it was very easy to convince young people that Islam is the answer. That was the slogan in 2006 during the elections. Islam is the answer. Answer to what? You know,

Avraham Burg:  what is the question No, what is the question?

Bishop Khader:  Exactly. For all the problems, we need to go back to Islam. So that's the danger. And I see it partially, of course, as a reaction to the failure even of the national movement and the Palestinian national movement. So here is the religious movement that that's, you know, tries to replace it and to give answers for me, false answers to the problem.

Avraham Burg: I understand. I appreciate, I admire the courage to say it. Because usually conversation like this you do inside, you do not share it outside. You know, we know how it works. OK, don't wash. As my mother used to say, don't wash the dirty laundry in the street. OK, so appreciate it. And I want to.

Bishop Khader:   It's about integrity. If I say this on one side, I need to be honest with myself and fight against any exclusiveness. You know,

Avraham Burg:  This is why I say I admire it and I want to work with it a little bit further with your permission.

Bishop Khader:  OK,

Avraham Burg: We have 2000 years of ups and downs, mainly downs and downs of relationship between Christian Augustinian theology and the humbled Jews or contempt, whatever as a testimony, testimony to the new blessing, to the new church. Fine, no problem. Then in the middle of the 20th century, which is almost almost 100 years ago, something else was born because of the Holocaust. And this is theology of guilt.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah.

Avraham Burg: And if I hear you correctly, you actually call the church to extend the to extend the theology of guilt beyond the Jewish Holocaust. Maybe to begin with, to the Nakba, and maybe later to every atrocities done by as if the burden of the white Christian man, but created a very splitted, bleeding universe of us today. So talk to me a little bit about this extension or expansion of theology of guilt of the West.

Bishop Khader:  You remember in the year 2000 there was a document published by the church called ‘We Remember’ and that's also to go back to this history, especially with the relations with the jewish people

Avraham Burg: And this was in the wake of the visit of the Pope to the country.|

Bishop Khader:  Exactly 

Avraham Burg: And I will go later to another church council. So go to the 2000 paper.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah. And when I read the document, I see it as a Western document. It's a Catholic document from the Catholic Church, but it reflects the Western Catholicism, if I may say now. What happened during the World War 2, the Holocaust, is of course horrible, horrible. No one can argue about it. And whenever we say never again, it should be never again to anyone, to anyone, not only the Jews. It's true. Never again for the Jews, of course, but never again for everyone.

Avraham Burg: Hannah Arendt said that the Holocaust was a crime against humanity formed in on the body of the Jews, but it's against humanity, 

Bishop Khader:  against humanity, of course. It doesn't matter if it's, you know, the numbers. Even killing one Jew because he's a Jew is a crime, is a crime. So never again for everyone. And when I see the church in Germany, for example, or Germany in general. They have this guilt and they want to support Israel, but this may lead them to remain silent on the suffering of the Palestinians. So if they were silent, you know, during the persecution of Jews, now they are silent, or complicit even, in the suffering of the Palestinians. So with, you know, our presence within the Catholic Church, our dialogue with the European churches and whenever we  meet them, etcetera, knowing about reality makes them realize that the European history is part of the history of the church, of course, but it's we have much larger history. For example, anti-Semitism was well known in Europe, but much less in the Arab countries where Jews were there. So when Jews suffered from anti-Semitism, they came to Palestine in the early 20th century, for example. So anti-Semitism is not part of our history. After 1948, that's a difference, you know, approach, political, et cetera. But we don't have this, you know, guilt of centuries of teaching of contempt, for example.

Avraham Burg:  But you say here something very, very interesting, if I may, if I hear you correctly, and it's not about hearing, it's about comprehending. OK? you say the Second Church Council of 63, 65, which is known as the Nostra Aetate, our situation at that time, I mean at our whatever it is. And I say it's second because the previous one was called 100 years earlier. So the church convenes every 100 years. I mean, the term of a president is 4-5 years, It's a different one. And what happened from 65 and 65 was actually post two world wars, atrocities, crimes, victims. The 50s and everything that was open, the new women status, etcetera. So it was in a way addressing Western issues. And if we call today the Third Church council, it will be much larger. And the Nostra Aetate, especially Chapter 4 or Annex 4, which was about the relationship with the non-catholic and especially the Jews, will extend much wider. So, I understand the process. If I look at it from your point of view, and you spoke about the German Church. So we had Benedictus the 16, Yosef Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, and we had a Polish Pope. All of them addressed European wounds. Will there be one day an Arab Pope?

Bishop Khader:  I hope one day. That's the Catholic Church. You know, all the Catholics in the world are part of the Catholic Church. We see the number of cardinals, for example, from the third world And this is part of the universality of the church. They began with a Polish Pope, a German, now an Argentinian Pope. So anyone from the Catholic Church, even from the Third World.

Avraham Burg: The global south,

Bishop Khader:   The global South. Yeah, for example, that can be. for the Nostra Aetate. There were a lot of discussions at the Vatican at that time, and the whole document should have been about the relations with Jews and with the intervention of Oriental bishops and patriarchs, that there were changes made to the documents. First of all, to talk about other religions, about Islam also. And then to you know the wording of the paragraph 4, talking about biggest paragraph talking about the relations with Jews that was very important. and I agree with it, of course. we cannot blame all Jews, we can't blame Jews today, we cannot persecute Jews because of what happened 2000 years ago, etcetera, etcetera. You know that's a Christian thing to do. Even though that this paragraph opens the way to further theology interpretation, especially the quote from the letter of Saint Paul to the Romans 1129, the promises of God are irrevocable. What does it mean, etcetera. So I think we, you know, we needed that document, we needed to to address it and it was a beginning of, you know, listening to the Oriental Christianity and not only European Christianity. Of course, until now, you know, Christianity, Catholicism in Europe is more European, you know, but little by little it's opening to include all peoples and I see it as a positive, very positive sign in the Catholic Church.

Avraham Burg: When you walk the streets of Rome, it was the just last year, the Sunday of the Palms. I mean when you see the processions, it's everything. But you, I mean Europeans are, I don't know what 40% maybe in Rome, OK. In Jerusalem, when you see the procession, it's a completely different social fabric and as beautiful by the way.

Bishop Khader:  It is beautiful when you see this diversity of Christians, local foreigners, pilgrims coming and participating, participating in it with this, you know, popular folklore, et cetera. That's beautiful. That's beautiful.

Avraham Burg: So let's take this celebration of light, the holy, I mean the light you just put on. We spoke a lot about not so much about politics, but about the under the hood of politics, which is the theology, the ideas, the philosophy, the alternative approach, which maybe the Christian, the way you read Christianity and offer it can heal some of the damages done by Judeo-muslim conflict. Now, take me to the journey to Africa. Yes, you said it's the last, the last frontier of the Arab world, but it's very African.

Bishop Khader:  It is 

Avraham Burg: In character, in the tribes, in the interaction with the rest of the region, as much as Ethiopia is that close.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah.

Avraham Burg: So you came to a place which is for you, even for you, was a surprise. What do you meet there? What is it? What is African Christianity?

Bishop Khader:  So first of all, Djibouti is a Muslim country and there are very few Christians. And the Christians present there are foreigners. And my community comes from 25 different nationalities. 25, mainly Africans.

Avraham Burg: They are living there, they are residents or they're passing by?

Bishop Khader:  No, they work there. Some of them are residents for years, some come for work.

Avraham Burg: Oh, but no real natives. The majority are not natives.

Bishop Khader:  Very few, very few. Yeah, from the French era. So this diversity and with the presence of Europeans, especially French there in Djibouti. Then it's a poor country. No human, you know, natural resources, etc. So what I always say it when I say poverty in Djibouti and I say poverty here in, you know, it's totally different. It's totally different. So for example, Caritas Djibouti works with the children of the street. There are hundreds who live in the streets. This phenomenon, we don't have it. Those are unaccompanied refugees. Coming from Somalia and especially from Ethiopia. So the poverty.  Then you know the combination of tribes. We have the issa tribe, which is a Somali tribe. We have the Afar in the north and we have Yemenis who live here and we have all the foreigners etcetera. So it's a, you know, a successful harmony now among them.  At the same time, We see the neighboring countries. We have, you know, Somalia, Yemen, Eritrea and Ethiopia with a lot of political instability in those countries. So what is unique in Djibouti here is the stability. Really, it's quiet, it's peaceful, it's, you know, safe here and that's that's important. One other thing is Djibouti took its independence in 1977 and now we have, what, 7-8 military bases for the French, Italian, American, Chinese, Japanese, etcetera. Everyone is here. And I see that this mentality of colonialism is not over. It's not over, unfortunately. The way they look at Africans Or local people

Avraham Burg:  looking down at.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah, I'll give an example. We suffer from malaria and many other African countries. Not anymore in Europe and in America. Until early 60s they fought against malaria And until now there is no vaccine for malaria. No one cares about having a vaccine for a disease where all those who suffer and die from it are Africans, not Europeans, you know. And the way they look down, yeah, on Africans and you know, that's striking really for me. So being an Arab myself, it's, you know, a positive thing for me really in Djibouti. Whenever I present myself to people there, I present myself as Palestinian. So they see I'm close to them. I'm one of them, if you want. So it gives another face of the church, which we should do really. It's not a European church. It's not continuation of the colonization, etcetera. No, no, no It's an an Arab church with an Arab, you know, Bishop there serving the population. And what we do is very important I think that we have schools. We have 10 schools and centers of alphabetization for children. And we have Caritas. Everyone we serve is a non-Christian.

Avraham Burg: OK.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah. And that's our mission. That's what we should do. And that's what we are doing, especially the a lot of our children at school cannot pay the school fees, which is minimal thing, of course.  Some of them are streets from …are children from the streets. They come to our schools. They don't have documents. We welcome them because we work with the poorest of the poor here in Djibouti and I think that is the mission of the church. I'm happy here really because of this diversity within the Christian community and the mission of the church. And at the same time, I see a lot of suffering, a lot of suffering, especially from poverty here in Djibouti.

Avraham Burg: If I want to take your teaching in order to wrap it all, you will say I'm a Palestinian, I'm a Christian in Palestine, I'm very low in this situation. You have the European Western mentality, you have the Jews as occupiers, you have the Muslims who maybe will grant me presents or not. I'm very low. But still, as a Christian, I have something to give to somebody over there who has more needs even than I do. So in a way, it's a beautiful sense of never be a victim or never, never be a victim only, be a giver.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah.

Avraham Burg: It's beautiful.

Bishop Khader:  The mentality of victimhood is very damaging. You know, if we see ourselves always as victims…

Avraham Burg:  I have an entire society like this.

Bishop Khader:  Yeah, yeah, we cannot contribute. We can do nothing. And we continue to complain about it. And I think, yeah, we can do. There are a lot of things that we can do around us. Yes, 

Avraham Burg: You do a lot. And Father, I'm so happy for this. It was not a conversation, it was a teaching. And I can call you my father and teacher. 

Bishop Khader:  Thank you.

Avraham Burg: Thank you very much my dear. See you soon.