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Journalism of Courage
Jerusalem and Al Quds. Both shorthand for the same heady experience are effectively within an area of under a km. One may have read and fantasised about it, but to stand on the Mount of Olives and see the Dome of the Rock, Al Aqsa Mosque, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and parts of the Wailing Wall is magical. It turns the most agnostic of us into believers. Even if only for a minute.
The passage through the serpentine lanes, running through the Christian, Muslim, Jewish and Armenian quarters, puts you on a different plane. The Omar Caliph mosque is just a few feet away from the church, built on the spot where the Crucifixion is believed to have taken place; and the place from where Christ is believed to have ascended to the heavens is now the Ascension Mosque. The Dome of the Rock 8212; the tribute to Abraham, the father of three faiths, Judaism, Christianity and Islam 8212; is holy for all. Pass through the bleeps and suspicious guards and general sense hits you with a bang: you are at the epicentre of it all. At the ground where despite symbols of Yahweh, Jesus and Allah, all existing cheek by jowl, charmingly so, there is an environment making daily life very difficult for the followers of every conceivable God.
But the irony is how all sides refuse to really see the view from the Mount of Olives. They miss the bigger picture 8212; the point that intertwined quarters and the Temple Mount, Al Aqsa and The Church of the Holy Sepulchre make. That magnificent view, for even agnostics like us, points towards the solution, not the problem. Then why don8217;t the Believers get the point?
