Recently I was in conference with a colleague of mine, Kellen the Editor of David Star Magazine while we discussed Israel and the Politics that without doubt was to shape Israel’s future more so Prophetically than politically he shared with me a new contributor to his magazine. Christy Anastas was her name, a vibrant woman with a passion to tell the World what really goes on in the West Bank and Gaza, a look behind the politics and media influence of the World. The article she wrote in David Star magazine was inspiring and eye opening, an article of many that have endangered her life for having the courage to speak out.
I have learnt many things growing up in the West Bank: I experienced two intifadas, my home was occupied by Israeli soldiers, I saw militants fighting Israeli soldiers, children being used as combatants and have seen human rights violations committed by both Palestinians and Israelis against each other and themselves. It was against this background I decided to study law which turned out to present new challenges for me as I soon discovered we didn’t have any solid ground within our legal system either, and we still don’t.
Palestinian law is based on old Jordanian, Egyptian, Ottoman and “al awrf – what is known,” which essentially is a combination of Sharia and tribal law. The Palestinian constitution regards the state of Palestine as an Islamic state, because the demographic population is 95 percent Moslem. This is a very important point because, as we see in most of the surrounding Islamic states, where radicalised Islamic groups are dominating the land, non–Muslims especially Christians are regarded as dhimmis, which means being second class citizens. The West Bank thankfully has not fully embraced this yet, most likely because of the significance of the land as the “Holy Land” in Christianity, and with Bethlehem being the birthplace of Jesus. Continue…Click Here
Leave a Reply