Three Families Displaced on Ash Wednesday
By, Rev. Ronee Christy
I left the US last week on Ash Wednesday for a trip to Israel/Palestine. While I was in the air, headed for our IPMN trip, 30 armed police (with teargas and guns) came to the home of Fakhri Abu Diab and ordered him to leave his house. They ordered him to take everyone who lived there and get out. This demolition was a situation that the family had feared for years. He had been in court for years. The system in Israel states that Palestinian citizens must have a deed and prove ownership of their homes/ land, which sounds logical unless your family has owned that land since 1340. In 1340 people often showed ownership by personal voice agreement with boundaries marked by trees and other buildings.
Clearly Fakhri did not have the required paper document. For years he had tried to get documents that would show ownership of his house, but each time he tried, he was rejected because he did not have the paper document. In 2010 half of the house was demolished. He had gone back to court to save the remaining part of the house. This case has been in the court system for the last 14 years.
Four days after his house had been demolished, our IPMN group came to the site. We stood beside him and watched the grief. Everything he owned was in front of him in a huge pile of rubble. He told us about the threats that he had received. He told us that he had been warned that his house would be demolished because he was a Palestinian anti-demolition activist. Mr. Daib stood looking at a life time of work. He had moved into the house 60 years ago to help his mother. He said he could still feel her presence.
Three families were displaced on that Ash Wednesday: Fakhri and his wife, his children and their children, a total of 35 people. Our group gathered around him as he told his story. He stood with utmost dignity and grace. He spoke of his goal to stand strong and hopefully (someday possibly) rebuild. We sang a song together and prayed. As we were leaving, one of our group asked to take a stone from the rumble to remember and pray for him. He told us ‘yes’ because we are now ‘family’. As I was leaving Fakhri looked into the side yard and he tilted his head, as if he had just noticed that they were still there and he said, ‘Those are my birds! Do you hear the birds? Those are my song birds and they did not leave.’
As we remember Fakhri we continue to thank God for his life and his family!
Amen.
Rev. Ronee Christy
Rev. Christy was pastor of 1st Presbyterian Church in Oil City, PA for 11 years. She retired during the pandemic and moved to Pittsburgh where she began a part time position at Bellevue United Presbyterian Church, where she is currently serving. She has worked in a Presbyterian Church in one way or another since she was in college. She traveled to the Middle East (1966, and mid-1970) with her family. Their travels were not as much about touring as they were about understanding situations of conflict and struggle in that region. I grew up hearing missionaries (example: Dr. Ken Bailey) who lived in the Middle East (and around the world), who had eyes to see a different perspective than what is offered here in the USA. Rev. Christy is honored to be a part of this community.