It has been one year since fighters from Hamas and other militant groups fired rockets and crossed the border from Gaza into Israel, brutally killing nearly 1,200 people and kidnapping 251 more, ripping apart families and traumatizing the country. It has been one year since Israel retaliated with airstrikes against the crowded cities of Gaza, soon to be followed by a ground invasion and blockade that cut Gaza’s access to food and fuel. Why do we care? Why don’t we just look away and trust these far-off countries to sort it out themselves? 

The war in Gaza has been going on for almost a full year. At Peace Catalyst, we believe that God’s mission is to build a holistic and just peace and that our calling as Christians is to follow Jesus in the work of peacebuilding. Watch this video to hear our peacebuilders talk about what the Church should be learning and doing, and how everyday people can be engaged.

To honor Rick’s legacy, to further his vision, and to raise up more peacebuilders like him, Peace Catalyst presented the 3rd annual Rick Love Peace Awards atAlliance for Peacebuilding’s annual gathering, PeaceCon, on September 11, 2024. Meet this year’s Rick Love Peace Award recipient, Munther Isaac…

How do we understand the shared need for justice in both Minneapolis and Palestine? And how should the church be showing up and speaking out? Watch this conversation with Palestinian pastor Rev. Dr. Munther Isaac and local Twin Cities clergy and racial justice activists about liberation and solidarity across borders.

In a time of unimaginable violence in the Middle East, how can the Church imagine a future reconciliation? What wisdom can Christians gain from Jewish, Muslim, and Middle Eastern Christian concepts of justice? In this conversation, we talked with Palestinian Christian Salim Munayer about his latest book, Reconciling Justice: Concepts of Justice in the Multireligious Context of Palestine/Israel.

After everything that has already happened, Gaza’s Christians may now be facing their biggest challenge since the war began.

Daoud Nassar and his brother Daher own the Tent of Nations farm that sits on a hilltop outside Bethlehem and is surrounded by five Israeli settlements. The settlement bloc seeks to expel the family from the land so that another settlement can be built there. The Nassars have been fighting a legal battle within the Israeli legal system for 34 years to re-register the land in their name, and they have an upcoming hearing on July 2 in the Israeli Supreme Court.

Christ at the Checkpoint was by far the most impactful conference I’ve ever attended. Nothing can compare to hearing from Palestinian Christians themselves at this particular moment of crisis. Even while these Palestinian Christian leaders affirmed their love for Jewish people and the depth of solidarity they feel from Jewish allies around the world, they spoke with authority and clarity to call western Christians to confront our own anti-Palestinian racism and the underlying Christian Zionism that results in harmful theological and political positions. So what can we do? Here are some resources.

Why am I going to Christ at the Checkpoint (CATC) 2024? On the one hand, this is a simple question to answer. I’m going to CATC because I have accepted the invitation to journey to the other side of the wall to stand in solidarity with Palestinians. On the other hand, the answer requires a bit of personal history…