Just War: Why Christians Should Not Falter in Support of Israel

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Honorable friends:

The Holy See permanent observer to the United Nations has quoted Pope Benedict XVI as saying of the conflict in Gaza “that the military options are no solution and that violence, wherever it comes from and whatever form it takes, must be firmly condemned.” Naturally, I would expect the pontiff to be praying for peace. However, I am surprised that the former head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith would make such a careless comment so wildly out of line with the Church’s teachings. Such slips only encourage the type of behavior I saw this weekend from a few guests at a wedding who, though totally uneducated on the subject, pronounced their condemnation of both Israel and Palestine while piously declaring that war is always wrong. Such statements are as contemptible as they are intellectually lazy, and I grow weary of listening to them.

While Christianity has perhaps lamented that war is always tragic and unfortunate, it has never declared that war is always wrong. To the best of my knowledge there is not a single mainstream Christian Church so foolish as to make such a declaration. Certainly, Israel’s actions in Gaza cannot be called wrong by any rational observer. To fully understand how incredibly imbalanced the ethics of this conflict are in favor of Israel, there is no better teacher than Charles Krauthammer in his last two columns, “Excruciating Moral Clarity,” and, “Ending Hamas Rule.”

However, for those of you who, like me, have an assortment of Christian friends who refuse to sanction any war no matter how powerful the justification or how clear the moral reasoning, I suggest you refer them to the Christian Just War Doctrine. Going all the way back to Saint Augustine of Hippo, it predates all the schisms and is a part of every mainstream form of Christianity.

The Just War Doctrine, codified in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, states in §2308 that, “as long as the danger of war persists and there is no international authority with the necessary competence and power, governments cannot be denied the right of lawful self-defense, once all peace efforts have failed.” Section 2309 goes on to list the conditions under which a just war may be prosecuted:
· the damage inflicted by the aggressor on the nation or community of nations must be lasting, grave, and certain;
· all other means of putting an end to it must have been shown to be impractical or ineffective;
· there must be serious prospects of success;
· the use of arms must not produce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated. The power of modem means of destruction weighs very heavily in evaluating this condition.

Considering what we know of Gaza, despite all international effort over the past several decades, no authority has been successful at persuading the Palestinian militants to desist from launching rockets into Israel. As Mr. Krauthammer points out, rocket fire on the Israeli population has continued unabated even after Israel withdrew all settlers and military, and ceded governmental control to the Palestinian Authority in 2005—effectively doing everything the Palestinians had demanded for an end to hostilities. Negotiations have gone on for decades, yet only Israel attempts to abide by any of the agreements reached. There is nothing more Israel can offer save its own annihilation. Thus, I would say negotiation has proved most ineffective.

Israel does have a good chance of permanently ending this conflict, though, if its assault can topple Hamas’ control and demonstrate that Islamic militants will succeed only in bringing greater hardship down on Palestinian people. The hardship endured by the Palestinian people is indeed unfortunate, but Hamas has deliberately orchestrated that hardship by using its own civilian population and humanitarian centers as shields against Israeli counterstrikes. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) acknowledges that the problem of proportionality is “aggravated if one side deliberately positions military targets in the midst of a civilian population.” Though Israel is doing all it can to minimize civilian casualties, they are inevitable. Nonetheless, after so many decades of failed negotiations, if Israel can succeed in destroying Hamas utterly, the permanent peace to follow will be worth the terrible price.

As the Catechism states in §2304, the peace Israel fights for is “not merely the absence of war, and it is not limited to maintaining a balance of powers between adversaries. Peace cannot be attained on earth without safeguarding the goods of persons, free communication among men, respect for the dignity of persons and peoples, and the assiduous practice of fraternity. Peace is ‘the tranquility of order.’ Peace is the work of justice and the effect of charity.” According to Pope John Paul II in his World Day of Peace Message of 1982, “Unconditional and effective respect for each one's unprescriptable and inalienable rights is the necessary condition in order that peace may reign in a society.” Currently, only Israel offers such respect—going so far as to offer warnings and aid to enemy noncombatants in its quest for peace. Hamas, on the other hand, is dedicated to the complete destruction of Israel. Unless it is clearly defeated, that ideology of hate will remain as an impenetrable barrier to peace for yet more decades to come.

As the USCCB states, “This is why Christians, even as they strive to resist and prevent every form of warfare, have no hesitation in recalling that, in the name of an elementary requirement of justice, peoples have a right and even a duty to protect their existence and freedom by proportionate means against an unjust aggressor.”

Rather than making foolish statements about how all war is evil, if Christendom truly wants to see an end to conflict in the Middle East, they would do well to bring real pressure to bear on Hamas, Palestine, and their Arab allies to prevent the continual flow of weapons and armaments into Gaza, and to enforce real consequences for mortar attacks beyond occasional dispatching another diplomat for talks while the militants rearm. The USCCB reminds us that a true “Christian has no choice but to defend peace, properly understood, against aggression. This is an inalienable obligation.”

Fort Collins Chooses Hybrid Holiday Policy

Audio of the "holiday display task force presentation", Mayor Doug Hutchinson's ground rules and clarifications, and citizen comments:



An immigrant from the UK describes the nefarious encroachment of socialism/multiculturalism and explains that the "celebration of diversity" really means more restrictions and less inclusiveness:



Rabbi Yerachmiel Gorelik explains his original request to display a Menorah that touched off the controversy, first when his request was denied twice, and then with the formation of the "holiday task force":




Still legal in Fort Collins--at least this year


Citizens of Fort Collins prepare to weigh in on the "holiday task force" recommendations

Avoiding another battle in the "war on Christmas", the Fort Collins City Council ultimately decided on adopting the third, hybrid option recommended by the "holiday display task force"--keep traditions by retaining current policy, while adding a new multiholiday exhibit at the Fort Collins museum:

All holidays are welcomed and celebrated in Fort Collins. City Council voted, 6-1, to adopt a Holiday Display Policy that honors current Christmas traditions and adds a new multicultural display at the Fort Collins Museum.

Council chose to adopt a hybrid plan which incorporates elements of both the existing Holiday Display Policy and a portion of the Holiday Display Task Force recommendations.

Consistent with existing policy, interior and exterior of City buildings may include traditional displays of trees, adorned greenery, wreaths, and other secular symbols or messages. Both white and colored lights are acceptable.

Based on recommendations from the Holiday Display Task Force, a multi-cultural educational exhibit will be placed on the grounds of the Fort Collins Museum. Both secular and religious celebrations and traditions will be included.

This decision, however, does not remove the responsibility the City Council bears for having put itself in such an awkward, attention gathering situation. It failed for two years to approve a request to add a Menorah, at no cost, to its existing display. It also punted the political football created by the controversy by overreacting and appointing a bureaucratic nightmare of a task force whose composition--widely derided by the citizens of Fort Collins--seemed to be predisposed to providing a multicultural mess of a recommendation that became media fodder overnight and drew even more negative publicity for the city.

The hybrid option did not please some task force members including, unsurprisingly, the lone ACLU member:

Some members of the citizen Holiday Display Task Force committee said Monday they are unhappy with changes city staff made to a holiday display policy coming before the City Council for a vote Tuesday night.

The task force, which met weekly for more than two months, made recommendations to ban colored lights and wreaths from the exterior of city buildings but to allow building managers' discretion in determining what adorns building interiors - including flexibility for religious displays.

The "hybrid policy," mashed together with parts of the task force recommendation and input from individual council members and the public, would allow for colored lights and Christmas tree displays on city building exteriors, including Oak Street Plaza, but limits what can be placed inside city buildings to items secular in nature unless part of an educational piece of artwork.

"My primary concern is that the (hybrid) recommendation includes aspects that were neither in the original policy nor the task force recommendation," task force spokesman Seth Anthony said. "I am concerned that some of the things were not thought all the way through and carefully (vetted) like the task force recommendations were."

City manager Darin Atteberry disagreed, saying the city has a long-standing policy and tradition of using citizen group input along with other factors when preparing policy for council debate and vote.

"That is why they are called advisory groups," Atteberry said, adding these types of decisions are always left to the city's elected officials.