Yesterday, I headed to a Y to sign up for a month of swimming to help me ease some knee pain that my regular walking exacerbated. I grabbed one of my ball caps as I headed out the door, this one from a trip to Israel. I had no idea that the sign-up guy would be a self-proclaimed Palestinian who’d want my opinion on the goings on in Gaza. 

I’ve been the Holy Land six times, the first in 1966, when the Mount of Olives was still in Jordan, the Gaza Strip was Egyptian, and the Golan Heights were under Syrian control, a vantage point from which they shelled kibbutzim farmers in the Jezreel Valley. The next summer, Israel seized these areas in the Six-Day War, and the back-and-forth conflict has smoldered and sometimes raged for nearly six decades. In 1973, the Syrians and Egyptians made a run at Israel with mixed success; Egypt took back the Sinai Peninsula while Syrian armored forces faltered on the Golan. And then there were Palestinian intifadas (uprisings) in the late 1980s and early 2000s, but the event that fills our consciousness at this moment came on October 7, 2023, when Hamas forces attacked from Gaza, killing 1,200 people, over 700 of them Israeli civilians, including 38 children. About 250 hostages were taken. Israel’s fierce counterattack ensued, and we’ve seen a tenuous peace deal brokered this year.

(Actually, for perspective, you need to go back to 1948, when Israel was birthed on May 14, and, the next day, troops from Egypt, (Trans)Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq invaded.)

As my Y-registration continued, I ventured some words on behalf of Israel, including the observation that only a hundred years after the death of Mohammed (whom Hamas reveres), Muslim forces has pushed east to India, west into Spain, north to Jerusalem, and south to the Upper Nile.  He brushed all this aside, saying that “Palestinians” had been in place there for thousands of years. (BTW, the name was originally a Roman insult, naming the territory for the Philistines.) He pulled a screen up on his phone casting David Ben-Gurion and Menachem Begin as “terrorists.” I granted that Irgun was responsible for the King David Hotel bombing in 1946 (part of the push to expel British rule from nascent Israel, an attack that killed 91). But I noted that Israeli Arabs were in the nation’s parliament (the Knesset) and had served as members of the supreme court, diplomatic corps, and the army (FIDF). He brought up the fact that Palestinians shared DNA with the Jews, and I granted that both Isaac and Ishmael were sons of Abraham. It was that sort of exchange, but I excused myself from it, especially since he was talking as if he considered me a child. I told him I knew a thing or two about the situation, but that we should call it a day. I needed to move on to the pool, and we ended the encounter pleasantly enough.  

Maybe, one day, I’ll pass along to him one or a few of the things I’ve written on the topic, either solo or in collaboration, e.g., here, here, and here. But I’ll let it rest for now. 

Coincidentally, my maternal grandfather once ran the YMCA in the town where I pastored (2000-2011), Evanston, Illinois. All along, I’ve been fascinated by the organization, coming across its history repeatedly—from seeing James Naismith’s Bible at the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Massachusetts (where he invented the game to help keep Y missionaries in shape during the bitter winters of their training days); to reading about China’s efforts to raise some tall people to compete in basketball, the sport having been introduced to the nation by Y missionaries, the story laid out in Operation Yao Ming; to my study of the spiritual history of Marshall University, where I discovered that, in 1900, 42 students belonged to the YMCA, 54 to the YWCA. They were involved in support for and service in Christian work regionally and abroad. In my book on Marshall, chapter 4, I note that 326,311 WWI soldiers signed the Y’s War Roll Card, which read, “I hereby pledge my allegiance to the Lord Jesus as my Saviour and King, and by God’s help will fight His battles for the victory of His Kingdom.” The soldiers kept a tab as a reminder, and the card was forwarded to the Y’s Religious Work Bureau, which notified relatives and home churches. 

I’ve been fascinated by the Y’s work abroad during the First World War, and, when I came across the two-volume, 1922, publication, Service With Fighting Men, I snatched it up. It’s a great read, with a 2018 reprint now available in paperback. Therein, I read that these guys weren’t just running gyms back in London, but that many served at or near the front. For instance, a major with the 101st Infantry recommended one of these Y men for the Distinguished Service Cross, saying, 

During the fierce fighting at Molleville Farm, Houppy Bois and Belieu Bois, October 23d to 31st inclusive, Mr. ____, a Y M C A man, although wounded by a shell fragment, refused to leave his boys, as he called them, and stayed with them during the intense artillery and machine gun fire. He brought them cigarets and hot chocolate, each trip being made under continual hail of shells and bullets. He ministered to the men of the battalion in every way possible, giving great assistance in rendering first aid. His courage and devotion to this entirely voluntary duty, his utter disregard of his person safety, that he might be of help to others, merits the highest praise. 

Well, as you can see, we’ve come a long way, and I don’t just mean withdrawing the supply of cigarettes. Of course, on the walls, there are inspirational and even scriptural reminders of the early spiritual commitments, but the Y is essentially a health club, where a proud Palestinian exudes contempt for Israel. Maybe he’s a Christian, but I wasn’t picking that up. Perhaps we’ll talk a bit more, and I can get a fix on that.