Christians in the Middle East

Since 2013, the wars in Iraq and Syria have revived the persecution of Christians of the Middle East as an issue in Europe, in the context of Islamist targeting of religious minorities. The French case is especially revealing of the NGO, ideological and political movements that have emerged to advocate for the “Christians of the Middle East”, or “Oriental Christians” (in French, “Chrétiens d’Orient”, “Christians of the Orient”). The use of this term is far from reflecting the diversity of Christian standpoints with respect to these wars. Rather, both in France and in Syria, it contributes to processes in which identities become redefined.

...a book providing an informed and intelligent analysis of the predicament of Christian Palestinians would play an important part in mobilizing external support for Palestinians under occupation. Unfortunately Said Aburish's TheForgotten Faithful is not this book.
Aburish has interviewed many Palestinians - both Christian and Muslim - in the Territories, and what strength the book has lies in his transcriptions of these interviews. A reader who attends carefully to what Aburish's interviewees have to say will learn a lot about the role played by Christians in supporting the struggle for national liberation. Aburish, however, does not give credence to his interlocutors and dismisses statements made by them as examples of "the traditional Arab way of pretending things aren't
what they are" (p. 151).

"We Choose Abundant Life" is a document issued by Christian intellectuals and theologians who met together in Beirut at the end of September 2021, to launch their vision for Christians in the Middle East. A stark choice is presented in this document, to choose the abundant life that is promised to God's people in Deuteronomy (30:19b) ("Choose life, so that you and your descendants may live"), which is both the choice and the challenge taken up by this group of Christian intellectuals, or the alternative which is a resignation to the gradual death of Christian communities in the Arab world. The document of intent, "We Choose Abundant Life", promotes a progressive vision of the cultural diversity of Middle Eastern society over a narrow focus on Christians as a beleaguered minority in an Islamic world.

Most reports about the state of Christians in Syria and Iraq centre on their persecution and dwindling numbers. In the rare cases that Christians are granted political agency, they are –simplistically– placed in the pro-Assad camp. Even then, they are relegated to a passive role, abstaining from violence. However, in reality, the Christian communities in Syria and Iraq have assumed a military role, for the first time in the region after decades. In this context, militias fighting on opposite camps, geographical pressures and concerns, competing identities and alliances and even foreign fighters form a complex mosaic of Christian forces that have moved beyond the neutrality threshold.

I 1950 hadde VG et oppslag om kommunismen i den arabiske verden. I en bisetning ble det advart om at mange av de kristne minoritetene i Midtøsten var «lydhøre overfor kommunistenes kampanje» . Noen tiår senere, under den blodige borgerkrigen i Libanon, var budskapet nærmest det motsatte. Da sukket generalsekretaeren i Det norske bibelselskapet, Gunnar Stålsett, over at kristne i Midtøsten først og fremst ble forbundet med høyreorienterte geriljakrigere i det norske nyhetsbildet. De siste 30-40 årene har man i Norge sett en økende interesse for kristne i Midtøsten. Denne sammensatte gruppen har gått fra å ha vært nesten fraværende i offentligheten til å bli portrettert på mange og forskjellige måter - som alt fra fremmede, fiender eller fascister, til følgesvenner eller forfulgte. Men hvilke kristne i Midtøsten har man egentlig snakket om, og hvilke norske narrativer har disse framstillingene inngått i? I dette kapittelet undersøkes ulike norske fortolkninger av kristne i Midtøsten de siste 30-40 årene. Utgangspunktet er primaert en norsk kristen kontekst, men utvides tidvis til en bredere norsk offentlighet. Kapittelet forsøker ikke å gi en uttømmende historisk oversikt, men viser talende eksempler på ytringer og retorikk som preger ulike narrativer og fortolkninger. Hensikten er også å vise hvordan disse narrativene om kristne i Midtøsten er preget av andre og bakenforliggende narrativer og interesser som kjemper om hegemoni seg imellom.

My Paper presented at Diyar's Seventh International Conference on " Palestinian Identity in Relation to Time and Space" held in Bethlehem in August 2013. It looks at Mahmoud Darwish's Writings in chronological order and how Bibilcal texts and themes were used in what context and why.
http://www.amazon.com/Palestinian-Identity-Relation-Time-Space/dp/1502713462/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1424009505&sr=8-1&keywords=palestinian+identity+in+relation+to+time+and+space

This study explores the identity dynamics of the Arabic-speaking Greek Orthodox community of the Hatay province of Turkey. Citizens of Turkey, members of the Greek Orthodox church and Arabic speakers, members of this small but historic community stood among three nationalisms, Greek, Syrian and Turkish. Following the urbanization waves that have swept through the Turkish countryside since the 1950s, thousands of Arabic-speaking Orthodox moved to Istanbul and were given the chance to integrate with the Greek minority there. The Hatay Greek Orthodox point at the resilience of millet-based identities, more than a century after the demise of the Ottoman Empire.

Les XIIIe et XIVe siècles mamlūks sont une des périodes les plus difficiles de l'histoire des minorités chrétiennes en terre d'Islam. Ce mémoire se propose d'offrir un tour d'horizon de l'historiographie et des sources disponibles sur les chrétiens du Bilād al-Šam (Syrie-Liban-Palestine-Jordanie) sous la domination des mamlūks turcs Baḥriyya (1260-1382), dans le contexte des Croisades et des tentatives d'invasion mongole du Proche-Orient, et tente d'appréhender les causes des nombreuses crises antichrétiennes qui jalonnent la période.

This paper considers the diverse situations in which Palestinian Christians experience and narrate themselves, attending to commonalities and differences in both. This entails attention to environments broadly understood: the “clusterings” of lives in different places across historic Palestine, each inscribed by stories and meanings that have implications for everyday experience. We will therefore consider in turn Palestinian Christians’ situations in different landscapes, jurisdictions, group relationships (both to one’s own and others), and in relation to powerful circulating narratives, not least those that are distinctively Christian and Palestinian. This is an attempt to sketch a physical and symbolic ecology of Palestinian Christian diversity, their interrelationship with places, materials, others (human and non-human), and countless meanings.

The Arab Christians  العرب المسيحيون or  العرب المسيحيون  have always been part of the Arab world since the dawn  of history. They have actively respected the predominance of Islam in the Middle East, and were instrumental in the protection and promotion of the Arab language and Islamic culture worldwide.  Indeed, many people in the Middle East refer to them in an endearing  fashion , strangely enough as it might seem,  as: Christian Muslims.

The Arab Christians were always part and parcel of the Arab world: renown politicians, writers, business people, actors, singers and Islam experts and when they migrated to Latin America in the 19th and 20th century, they took with them the Arab civilization and promoted it there by publishing newspapers, magazines, books,  speaking the language and else.

In Lebanon the Arab Christians are known for their zeal in defending Arab culture and were the first to publish Arab language dictionaries  sold worldwide and for a long period of time Beirut was the capital of Arab culture because of its publications of books and related cultural activities financed and led by these dedicated people.

While working among the Jews in the nineteenth century, Protestant missionaries from Europe and the United States encountered with the Sabbateans/ Dönmes, the followers of Sabbatai Sevi, and the missionaries wanted to extend their activities to this community as well. In this article, the American missionary activities among the Ottoman Sabbateans are traced by focusing on letters, memoirs and reports of the missionaries who worked in the AB-CFM (American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions) station in Salonica. The ABCFM mission to the Jews discontinued in 1856. According to the available reports, none of the Sabbatians in the Ottoman Empire converted to Christianity.

The late Antique mosaic of Orpheus decorated a small room, approximately 18 m2 in area, connected with two even smaller ones, in 4 m2 and the other 2 m2 in area, belonging most likely to a small funerary chapel (or tomb) discovered in the ancient necropolis by the Damascene Gate in Jerusalem; it was discovered in 1901 by H. Vincent.
The author proposes a new interpretation of the iconographic program of the Orpheus myth used by wealthy Christians in a sepulchral context (see Olszewski M.T. «Orphée endeuillé de la mosaïque funéraire de Jérusalem», in Rey Mimoso-Ruiz, B. ed., Actes du colloque «Orphée entre Soleil et ombre», à l’Institut Catholique de Toulouse du 16 au 17 novembre 2007, Inter Lignes, numéros spécial – mars 2008, pp. 205-214, 226). He also proposes a new interpretation of the role Orpheus played in Roman funerary art, concentrating on the importance of the play on words and the visual and textual punning that was popular in ancient art and especially in funerary art. He rejects the popular interpretation of Orpheus as Christ in the Roman catacombs and proposes to interpret the image as that of Orpheus, bard of the departed souls, without any ahistorical connection with Christ. The program of the mosaic from Jerusalem is thus explained as a play on the words Orpheus-orphanos and Chiron (Chi-Rho) and Pan [Παν(τοκράτωρ)].The frequently used Christian funerary formula of resting in peace, Christ or the Lord corresponds
perfectly with the mood created around the mythical bard.
Orpheus’ universal role as singer and musician moving even the most stony of hearts, extolling the beloved departed, is absolutely justified in the context of a 6th-century Christian tomb. Orpheus is a popular and neutral figure, meaning that in effect it does not constitute a threat to Christian theology and can be tolerated by the educated Christians of Jerusalem.

In social terms Arab American Christians lie both inside and outside the category of ‘white’ by race. Seemingly ‘white’ via their religious affiliation with the majority and non-white through their Arab and Middle Eastern backgrounds, at times they have access to privilege and power, and at other times face discrimination as non-white and foreign. In this study, there was a connection between those who identified as white, age, and residence in the wealthy suburbs of Virginia and Maryland. The younger generation of professionals who live in the city of Washington DC, as well as activists and academics, tended to be more ambiguous about their own perceived whiteness. Women and men faced differing challenges from prevailing stereotypes of Arabs and gendered expectations of race. The term ‘Ancient Christian’ was used to denote a non-Muslim identity and claim an original Christianity located in the Middle East.

This periodical began publication in 1935. Two fascicles are issued each year, which contain articles, shorter notes and book reviews about the Christian East, that is, whatever concerns the theology, history, patrology, liturgy, archaeology and canon law of the Christian East, or whatever is closely connected therewith. The annual contribution is € 46,00 in Italy, and € 58,00 or USD 76,00 outside Italy. The entire series is still in print and can be supplied on demand. Subscription should be paid by a check made to Pontificio Istituto Orientale or a deposit to ccp. 34269001.

The article has got two important parts and dimensions. The first is rather methodological and concentrates on giving ideas that could refresh and enrich the interdisciplinary research on ethnic issues in the Arab world. The author's point of view is the one of an Arabist who combines philology with the methods of contemporary social sciences. In the second part of the text the methodological context is practically utilized in the analysis of chosen examples. This would be the case of the Maronites of Lebanon - their collective identity and politics of history conducted by their elites. Lebanon itself is a unique example of Muslim-Christian "confessional democracy" in a region dominated by the Arab-Muslim civilization. However uniquely diversified, it can also serve as an example of a more universal social phenomena concerning the entire Arab world. The Maronite question is very interesting in this context, because it illustrates a rare situation in which minority, ethnic and religious community, becomes the dominant group only to return finally to the role of a minority fighting for its place in the society.

Christianity and Christians have been present in the Middle East since the time of Jesus Christ. Their indigenous status, though, does not prevent them from being widely perceived as a victimised minority. Colonialism drove a wedge between Christians and Muslims, who had shared a heritage in culture and language which stretches back to pre-Christian times. Under pressure from diverse geo-political stakeholders, Middle Eastern Christians developed ambivalence for both, getting embroiled in an identity crisis between becoming ‘Arab Christians’ or ‘Eastern Christians’. Their predicament has risen since the Global War on Terror with Western intervention for politico-economic purposes and the rise of conservative and militant brands of Islamism. A return to spirituality may serve as a panacea to the deteriorating state of inter-faith relations in the Middle East.

Des Harakat à la guerre du Liban (1975-90) La notion de massacre et ses représentations chez les chrétiens et les druzes du sud du Mont-Liban Dima de Clerck » Par l'étude du massacre, l'historien poursuit l'ambition d'établir des césures dans un passé unifié : il assume ainsi la vocation critique de sa discipline . « David El Kenz (2005, p. 23) Dans le but de sonder les mémoires collectives communautaires relatives à la guerre de la Montagne 1 (1982-84), un épisode particulièrement sanglant et douloureux de la guerre du Liban (1975-90), plus d'une centaine d'entretiens individuels et de groupe ont été menés entre 2004 et 2010, avec des druzes et des chrétiens, civils ou anciens combattants originaires du sud du Mont-Liban, une région de cohabitation druzo-chrétienne communément appelée al-Jabal (la Montagne). Ces hommes et femmes sont âgés de plus de trente ans en 2004, et ils ont donc le souvenir de la guerre de la Montagne. En parlant de celle-ci, la plupart ont évoqué spontanément les événements de 1860. Pour eux, la guerre de la Montagne en est une réédition. Il fut intéressant de constater que pour nommer la période 1840-60, que les historiens ont coutume d'appeler Harakat (agitations, mouvements), les chrétiens et les druzes utilisent des registres différents : les chrétiens emploient quasi systématiquement des termes se rapportant au massacre, tandis que les druzes qui évoquent spontanément 1860 (en général des intellectuels, des dignitaires religieux et des notabilités aristocratiques et bourgeoises) ont recours au vocabulaire ayant trait à la guerre. Partant du constat de cette dichotomie, je me suis interrogée sur la place qu'accordent aujourd'hui chrétiens et druzes à cette période (notamment le moment 1860), sur les sens que revêt pour eux le massacre (ou tuerie de masse), et par conséquent sur les modalités d'écrire l'histoire de telles violences. Ma réflexion s'alimente des travaux d'historiens et de sociologues des violences de masse qui me paraissent entrer en résonance avec les récits et informations que j'ai pu récolter sur 1840-60. Dans un contexte de bouleversements géopolitiques et sociaux au sein de l'Empire ottoman, des affrontements intercommunautaires ont lieu entre 1840 et 1860 dans la moitié sud de l'espace libanais actuel. Au XVII e siècle, pour cultiver leurs vastes terres, les druzes, grands propriétaires terriens et guerriers de métier, ouvrent le Jabal druze à une main d'oeuvre chrétienne venue du nord du Mont-Liban et de Syrie (actuelle). Après la proclamation des Tanzimat, les rapports entre druzes, jusqu'ici dominants, et chrétiens, en plein essor 1 La guerre de la Montagne débuta avec l'occupation israélienne (juin 1982) et atteint son apogée en septembre 1983, dans la foulée du retrait israélien de cette région du Liban. Elle opposa les miliciens chrétiens des Forces libanaises aux druzes partisans de Walid Joumblatt, soutenus par leurs alliés palestiniens et la Syrie. Le bilan humain en est encore mal connu. Selon le travail effectué dans le cadre de mes recherches doctorales et basé sur des documents du Front libanais et des archives du Parti socialiste progressiste (PSP), les tueries qui eurent lieu se soldèrent par plus de 1 500 victimes civiles chrétiennes, et plus de 200 victimes civiles druzes. Plus de 163 000 chrétiens furent contraints d'abandonner la région. 70 000 autres quittèrent le Chouf côtier en 1985. 1 démographique, socioéconomique et culturel depuis le début du XIX e siècle, se redéfinissent dans la violence 2 . Le sentiment de perte de terrain sociopolitique devant les chrétiens, surtout les maronites, qui s'insurgent contre les abus des grands propriétaires terriens (eux-mêmes chrétiens) dans le Kesrouane en 1858 et aspirent à une égalité sociale, pousse les druzes qui craignent la contagion dans leur région à l'action militaire pour préserver l'ordre social hiérarchique. La guerre qui éclate entre druzes et maronites en mai 1860 tourne aussitôt à l'avantage des druzes. Durant les trois Harakat de 1841, 1845 et 1860, des tueries de chrétiens sont rendues possibles par la passivité complaisante des autorités ottomanes locales. Celles de 1860 coûtent la vie à plus de 12 000 chrétiens (grecs-catholiques, orthodoxes et maronites) dans le sud du Mont-Liban et de la Bekaa, soit un peu moins de 20 % des chrétiens de cette région 3 . L'effet de contagion atteint Damas où 5 000 à 11 000 chrétiens sont tués en moins de cinq jours. Ce n'est qu'après l'envoi d'une expédition française que le ministre ottoman des Affaires étrangères intervient pour restaurer l'ordre, punir les coupables et limiter ainsi l'ingérence des Européens qui se disent indignés et réclament un règlement politique. En 1861 est officialisé le système de la Moutasarrifiyya. La province du Mont-Liban, réunissant les deux précédents districts, est dès lors administrée par un fonctionnaire ottoman chrétien non libanais, nommé par la Sublime Porte. L'éloignement dans le temps de ces violences de masse qui constituent un moment fondateur de l'histoire contemporaine du Liban n'en a vraisemblablement pas effacé le souvenir. La guerre du Liban en a ravivé les plaies. Mal digérées à la fois par les chrétiens, dont les ancêtres furent les principales victimes, et par les druzes, dont elles précipitèrent le déclin sociopolitique, elles participèrent du zèle des uns et des autres à prendre les armes en 1975 ( DE CLERCK 2004 et 2010).

Les chrétiens ont historiquement été des vecteurs de modernité au Moyen-Orient et des dynamiques qui en découlent en termes de liens avec « l’Occident », d’apports culturels novateurs, de circulation des idées et de mobilité transnationale. Partant, on aurait pu s’attendre à ce que la mondialisation et ses corollaires leur soient favorables. C’est pourtant un sentiment de malaise, voire d’abandon, qui prévaut au sein de leurs communautés, qui se réduisent comme peau de chagrin dans leurs terres ancestrales, de plus en plus de leurs membres se résolvant à l’exil pour fuir conflits, autoritarismes, montée des islamismes, occupations, persécutions ou marasme économique. Dès lors, il s’agira d’appréhender les incidences de certains liens affinitaires noués entre chrétiens orientaux, puissances étrangères et réseaux religieux transnationaux, mais aussi les implications des systèmes d’alliances qui se font à leur détriment dans l’espace mondial et de la déterritorialisation des idées et des sentiments, sur lesquels ils n’ont pas toujours de prise immédiate.

The group of Christian intellectuals and leaders met in Lebanon in autumn 2021 to launch their vision for Christians in the Middle East. Source: Twitter/@nakhtaralhayat

We Choose Abundant Life names both a statement of intent and the group of Christian intellectuals and leaders who met together in Beirut last autumn to launch their vision for Christians in the region. The group who convened included Assaad Elias Kattan, Professor of Orthodox Theology at the University of Münster, Gabriel Hachem, Professor of Systematic Theology at USJ Beirut, and Souraya Bechealany, Secretary General of the World Council of Churches.

A critical reading of the situation in Lebanon at the end of 2020 from a contextual theological perspective. Some Biblical texts are interpreted with some insights for the future. Ecumenical and inter-faith dialog and its role in building Lebanon for tomorrow.

“Living in Palestine between Tablets, Walls, The Bible and The Koran” is an e book kindle that reports the daily life in West Bank through population’s direct experiences and the reconstruction of historical facts almost unknown or forgotten.
Not only the check points, the Barrier of separation, the huge burocratic difficulties are under the lens. In fact the book focuses also on another Palestine, the one that more and more uses the most sophisticated technologies, especially in computer field, the Palestine of the entrepreneurship of the youngest people as well, especially women, who are the majority of the universities students by now.
Commonly West Bank means strong rules imposed on Palestinian people, continuous clashes and violences, Jews settlements where settlers live shut in, like prisonners, the oldest refugee camps all around the world where 2/3 of Palestinian people still  live. 
But there is much more than this, even if international media never mention it, because they are focused on the neverending conflict. The book reveals these unespected faces of the Palestinian life. 
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REVIEWS
“I met Giovanni Verga sitting in a coffee shop, in an Arabic garden near Damascus Gate. He was leaving for his journey towards Palestine’s lands and lives. He had already read the poets and the books, memorized the analyses, kept the chronicles. He laked the daily voices, which he found later and tells us in this book: voices essential to those who write about an invisible State with uncertain boundaries, full of colonies, deprived of olive trees. He speaks about a place that has only memory of tragedies (the Nakba) and that invents its own life into a grey, boycotted daily life, ruled by a corrupted political class, where resigned people suffer”. (Francesco Battistini, former Jerusalem correspondent for the Italian daily newspaper “Il Corriere della Sera” )

“A Palestinian diary where the stories of the people living beyond the Wall of separation are told directly” (Fulvio Capurso, former private sector development expert of Jerusalem Italian Agency for Development Cooperation)

What kind of strategies did Christians adopt to increase their survival chances in the Middle East? What can we learn from the Crypto Christians of the past in order to strengthen the Church today? Throughout the Islamic era, Christians utilised several different strategies depending on the particular context and particular time. This article will, briefly, discuss three survival methods that Hidden Christians in the Middle East, during the Islamic period, used to survive persecution and difficult circumstances: namely martyrdom, dissimulation and secrecy.

La leggenda dei «Sette Dormienti di Efeso», insieme con le amplissime tematiche che a essa afferiscono, è notoriamente diffusa sia nel mondo cristiano sia in quello musulmano. La presente opera non costituisce una ripresa della problematica inerente la leggenda, neanche nel suo motivo antropologico di fondo. Aspetti, questi, affrontati a dovere negli studi, fondamentali, di Louis Massignon, prezioso complemento a quanto fornito dalla ricca letteratura esistente in proposito. Si tenta qui semplicemente di individuare alcuni elementi per lo più trascurati, o non adeguatamente segnalati, concernenti aspetti e momenti della vicenda. Formatosi dalla raccolta di appunti occorsi nel tempo, soprattutto nell’occasione di quelli che vengono definiti «Sopralluoghi» dell'Autore in alcuni fra i numerosi siti di ambo i mondi – che ogni tradizione e devozione religiosa vuole, e quasi rivendica, sede per eccellenza dei Dormienti – il presente lavoro diviene, pur ben lungi dall'esaurire le molteplici fattispecie della leggenda, testimonianza della complessa trama intessuta da culture ed esperienze, forse solo in apparenza, distanti tra loro.

The violently-contested 1926 elections in Aleppo reflected the violence and trauma of the wider Syrian revolt, and constituted a moment in which the city’s long-ambiguous politics were clarified, with various actors declaring for and against the nationalist movement, which demonstrated its ability to command the interclass support of the city’s urban Muslims – and crucially, not of its Christians or of the inhabitants of its rural districts.

This paper focuses on ethno-sectarian interpellation, class economic interests and the availability of imperial alternatives to Syrian Arab nationalism as overlapping factors whose effects in Aleppo were disclosed in contrasting reactions to the 1926 elections. Throughout the eight years between the arrival of the British-backed Arab Revolt in Aleppo and these elections, the nationalist vision faced competition for the loyalties of Aleppines from both the French colonial empire and a rising independence movement in what would become Turkey. Political actors in Aleppo shifted their stance towards these three political alternatives based on the varying strength of the movements behind them, but these shifts were conditioned by their economic interests, and by the differing ways these movements laid claim to the sectarian and ethnic identities of Aleppines. There is little ideological consistency to be found in the words and deeds of these actors over the period under survey. Instead, their path – along with Aleppo’s as a political community – is best understood in terms of actors seeking to find their way after the end of empire.

The following article reviews the conversion of space, that is the appearance of Christian holy sites, in fourth century Palestine. Later, it explores the conversion of the population of Palestine by examining the writings of different Christian authors. Juxtaposition of the archaeological and literary evidence alludes to a historical discrepancy, one which can be resolved by considering the political and religious aspirations of key figures, such as: emperors, bishops and monks.
Keywords: Conversion; Palestine; Fourth Century; Christians; Jews; Pagans; Holy Sites; Constantine.