Helping Without Taking a Side

The hospital's Cancer Diagnostic
Center before it was damaged.

Every year the now-retired rector of our church requested that we make a donation, always approved, to the Episcopal Diocese of Jerusalem. It was his way of acknowledging our debt to the fount of Christianity.

The Episcopal Diocese of Jerusalem runs the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital that was damaged in an explosion last week. Hamas and Israel are each claiming that the other was responsible.

Militant group Hamas immediately blamed Israeli airstrikes for the blast at the Al-Ahli Arab hospital and said 500 people had been killed. Israel, the U.S. and independent security experts on Wednesday cast doubt on Hamas’s claims, saying the preliminary evidence pointed to a Palestinian militant group. The amount of damage also appears inconsistent with the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry’s assertion on Wednesday that 471 people were killed, experts said. U.S. officials said that the death toll so far is likely between 100 and 300.

Images of the site suggest that a rocket, or fragment of a rocket, landed in the hospital’s parking lot, according to the Israeli assessment of the damage left by the explosion. Those killed by the explosion were likely many Gazans who had been camped out in the parking lot, Israeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari said.

Many people have been wrestling with how to help the suffering people of Israel and Gaza without "taking a side," or worse, having their donations go to combat forces and advocacy groups. 501(c)3 organizations that assure us that 100% of the donations will be directed to humanitarian aid in the region are Episcopal Relief and Development and American Friends of the Episcopal Diocese of Jerusalem.

As individuals and as churches we will be making such donations in November.