Dining with Terrorists

{or a contemporary rendering of The Parable of the Wedding Banquet, Matthew 22.1-14}

January 30th, 2010

It had been four years since Hamas won the democratic Palestinian elections in 2006, and Ehud Olmert couldn’t believe what was going to happen that evening. Over the past few years, the Palestinian parties of Hamas and Fatah had been cooperating more and more with each other and had actually come together to form an alliance which was becoming less polarized and militant. While there were still the violent resistance movements within each party, Hamas and Fatah had been slowly moving themselves further away from those groups and becoming more interested in and involved with the Middle East peace process.

And it was going to happen that evening. Ehud Olmert, along with Palestinian Mahmoud Abbas and other leaders of Hamas and Fatah, had begun to plan an International Peace Conference. The conference was set to begin that evening, and it was going to begin in true Middle Eastern style: with an enormous banquet. Everyone knows that hospitality is one of the primary virtues of Palestinian and other Middle Eastern cultures, and that was going to be evident this evening. They had more falafel, schwarma, pita, hummus and lamb than anyone had ever seen.

Olmert was a bit worried about it all working out, but he was very hopeful because of those who were invited to the conference. It was an international conference, so there were many international peaceworkers from different religious and social organizations. Olmert pushed hard for many Israeli and Jewish peace groups to be represented at the conference, and many had already signed up and promised to be there: Rabbis for Human Rights, Gush Shalom, Jeff Halper with the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, Yesh Gvul, Bat Shalom and the Alternative Information Center. There were Palestinian groups invited such as Holy Land Trust, Palestinian Centre for Rapproachment, Al-Awda, Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center and many others. They had also invited some very high-profile names such as Naim Ateek of Sabeel, Mubarak Awad, Founder of Nonviolence International in Washington, DC, Martin Luther King III, and many others involved with peacemaking and nonviolence around the world.

However, during that afternoon, a few hours before people were supposed to begin arriving for the conference, Olmert’s staff began to receive email-replies from the conference attendees stating that many could not come. In fact, one after another, each attendee who had pre-registered and paid sent an email saying they wouldn’t be able to attend. Everyone was apparently too busy with their own projects, their own plans. And they just refused to come.

Olmert couldn’t believe it. He gathered his staff together: “No! This is not possible. We have put so much work into this conference – and into this banquet tonight! There is so much food – and we’ve already paid for it all. I won’t be embarrassed like this. Get out your cell phones and start calling all of them – one by one and explain the situation. Reason with them. Get them here, dammit!” And so the next few hours felt like a telethon to the staff, as they were in a mad frenzy to find phone numbers, make calls and try to persuade the conference attendees to actually attend the event, and most importantly, make it to the huge banquet that evening! Yet, they kept receiving excuses. “I have some things I need to take care of this weekend, I’m sorry” or “My organization ran into some really important business today and I’m really needed here” or “I don’t want to miss this protest I’m involved in tomorrow.” They continued to say “No.” Some even became upset and verbally assaulted the staff, demanding that they be left alone.

When Olmert heard this, he was outraged. All of the work and time and energy that he had put into the conference, and now all of these ‘peacemakers’ had decided to not attend what was supposed to be one of the most important peace conferences in the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Even the leaders of Hamas and Fatah were now backing out. Olmert told his staff to cut all ties with the previous conference attendees. “This is disgraceful! From now on, let it be as if they were dead to me. I will not tolerate this anymore. We have a beautiful conference and an even more beautiful banquet that must not go to waste. Here is what I want you to do. Go out into the Old City and into the Palestinian Territories and find anyone you can. Bring them all here for the banquet.”

So Olmert’s staff went out and found many people. Some Palestinians from Bethlehem, Ramallah and Nablus, some Orthodox Jews, and even some Settlers from Ma’ale Adummim. However, the most noticeable guests were those who were part of the militant resistance efforts (those labeled by the world as terrorists), particularly the Al-Aqsa Martyr’s Brigade and Zakaria Zubeidi. Zubeidi is one of Israel’s most wanted men and is the head of the Jenin branch of the Al-Aqsa Martyr’s Brigade. There was some obvious tension in the room when Zubeidi walked in, but it was clear to everyone that none of them were supposed to be there, so they couldn’t really say anything.

As the evening progressed, the banquet hall was filled with a very colorful crowd and people were beginning to talk, eat and drink more. However, there was one man who kept hoarding food for himself, was sitting by himself in a corner and was not participating in the community at all. Olmert approached him and asked, “Why are you here if you don’t care for anyone but yourself? You were let into this banquet and yet you are still a stingy, selfish person? I don’t think so.” And with that, security came and threw the man out.

When some of the guests asked why Olmert threw the man out, Olmert replied, “You were all invited to be a part of this celebration tonight – but it’s clear that not everyone knew what that entailed.”