THIS WEEK'S TRIBUNE  THIS WEEK'S TRIBUNE Building bridges based on ‘unconditional love of the Jewish people’
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Building bridges based on ‘unconditional love of the Jewish people’ |
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Written by Rick Kardonne
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Tuesday, 13 January 2009 |
JERUSALEM – Although the fundamentals of the Israeli economy have been holding up remarkably well so far in the current global economic downturn, 30 per cent of Israeli children are living below the poverty line. There are 150,000 Israelis on welfare and this number is expected to grow in the months ahead.
These grim statistics are being nobly confronted by Bridges for Peace, a Jerusalem-based non-proselytizing worldwide Christian organization whose underlying principle, as stated back in 1976 by its founder Dr. Douglas Young, is to “bolster relationships between the Christian world and the Jewish world.”
Emphasizing the “importance of the Jewish world to Christianity,” Bridges for Peace seeks to build Jewish-Christian relationships based on, in the words of its media director Ron Ross, “unconditional love to the Jewish people.”
Ron Ross and his assistant, South African-born Marnus Schoeman, took this reporter to its food bank in the south Jerusalem district of Talpiot, which, together with its branch in the lower Galilee town of Karmiel, helps 23,000 people, including Jews and Christian Arabs, on a monthly basis.
Under Bridges for Peace’s Adopt-a-Town program, 15 towns across Israel, including Sderot, Kiryat Shmona (which was a major target during both Lebanon wars), the western Jerusalem suburb of Beit Shemesh, and other new traditional immigrant towns such as Ofakim in the south to Shlomi in the north, are being targeted not only as recipients of food but also as education centres for job training, leadership training, and psychological counselling for victims of Arab-Muslim terror.
As many traditional Diaspora aid programs to Israel have been adversely affected by Bernie Madoff’s alleged scandals, of which Ross and Schoeman expressed shock and shame, Bridges for Peace programs, more than ever, are filling the gaps of aid to Israel.
One of the unique programs is “Haifa for the Blind.” Many of the victims of the Second Lebanon War and previous wars were blinded. They and their families are being aided by special Bridges for Peace medical and social counselling squads. The reaction of the blind victims in Haifa and surrounding areas was so enthusiastic that, according to Ross, “they formed a line” to avail themselves of these services. Ethiopian Jewish immigrants have also been recipients of Bridges for Peace aid.
Outside of Israel, Bridges for Peace has sponsored Project Tikvah (Hope) for those Jews stuck in the rural Ukraine, which has been severely impoverished since the Chernobyl atomic reactor explosion of 1986 irradiated the vast wheat farms, rendering them useless. “Bridges for Peace has supplied soup kitchens in Ukraine as an intermediary step towards helping Jews return to Israel. More than 1,500 Ukrainian Jews, thanks to Bridges for Peace, have returned to Israel,” said Ross.
Bridges for Peace is also involved in an international program to combat worldwide hostile anti-Israel propaganda not only in the mainstream media, but especially in youth-oriented culture and entertainment magazines, which influence vulnerable students. Effie ben Mattiyahu, now the Israel ambassador to Thailand, with Bridges for Peace assistance, began a radio station in the popular Queensland Gold Coast resort town of Noosa, where Ross’s son lives, which combines pro-Israel advocacy with pop culture. Similar media outlets, both on standard broadcast channels and the internet, are being launched elsewhere in Australia, New Zealand (whose new prime minister John Key is Jewish), South Africa (where Bridges for Peace’s Gary Blair in Durban is writing to worldwide youth magazines from his Zealous for Zion internet service, accessible on www.zealous82.com), Canada (where Rev. John Howson of Winnipeg heads Bridges for Peace), the US, UK (centred in Wales) and Japan.
“There is an amazing [positive] situation in Japan,” stated Ross. While Bridges for Peace is being funded by most Christian denominations worldwide – from Anglican and Roman Catholic to fundamentalist Protestant, to North American black churches who have been to Israel and, according to Ross, wish to establishment positive contact with Israel – Japan, most of whose population is not Jewish, has been the source of large financial private contributions to Bridges for Peace.
Bridges for Peace has enjoyed complete partnership and cooperation not only with Israeli politicians such as Bibi Netanyahu, former UN Ambassador Dore Gold and a key spokesperson for the IDF, but also prominent journalists such as Michael Freund and Caroline Glick.
The monthly Bridges for Peace magazine, Dispatch from Jerusalem, promotes Israel and alerts the world to hostile Muslim threats not only to Israel, but to the world, by quoting Muslim clerics from, for example, Iran and Hamas. Just one example: Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamanei “was aglow,” describing the [current world economic] crisis as “a victory of the Islamic revolution” (of course not mentioning that today’s low oil prices are particularly crippling Iran).
Bridges for Peace worldwide sponsors speakers on topics such as Iran. And within Israel, according to Ross, “we visit Jewish families to let them know that Christians are behind you.”
From its handsome headquarters in Jerusalem, Bridges for Peace conducts a worldwide media network, which includes hundreds of radio stations, all accessible on its web site: www.bridgesforpeace.com |
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Last Updated ( Wednesday, 21 January 2009 )
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