Vegans for Palestine Podcast - Episode 07 - Vegan Easter & the Christians of Palestine

As Easter is on the horizon, Dalal and Rayan discuss vegan traditions within Palestine's Christian communities. In this episode, Dalal and Rayan challenge the Western portrayals of Christianity as inherently Western and Islam as Eastern, highlighting the deep cultural and spiritual ties between Palestinian Christians and Muslims, and the shared history of coexistence in Palestine.

This podcast has edited captions here.

Amal Murkus sings 'Memory of a Palestinian Wound' by Mahmoud Darwish. 

Follow Amal here.

Erhasat (Sameh) chants lyrics from Fairuz, and you can follow his work here. 

Read about: 

Palestinian Veganism by Neda Ketana and Michel Khoury here.

'We Palestinian Christians say Allahu Akbar' - Read here. 

Joseph Massad's article on Palestinian Christians here.

An article on Palestinian Christians & Christmas here.

The Christian roots of Palestinian Nationalism.

A Palestinian Christian Podcast called 'Christ at the Checkpoint' here. 

Palestinian Priest, Antonious Hanania, said that if the mosques of Gaza are bombed and there is no muezzin to call to prayer, he “will raise the call to prayer on behalf of [his] Muslim brothers.”

Article on the bombing of the Church of Saint Porphyrius in Gaza. 

Transcript

[Music] [Oud/Lute played by Amal Murkus]

MOTHER: Ok, let’s pray and ask God to keep the children of Gaza safe. 

GIRL: In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen. Peace be upon you, Mary, full of Grace….. 

[Music]

DALAL: So we are almost there to celebrate Easter so happy early Easter! 

RAYAN: Yes, thank you so much! and I think it's been almost a week since Ramadan, so Eid Mubarak! 

DALAL: Thank you! Eid Mubarak to you too as well! So I'm sure people don't really know a lot of things about Easter, but I would like you to tell us about you being a Palestinian, vegan, Christian. Tell me a little bit more about that and the vegan traditions or the Easter traditions for Palestinians. 

RAYAN: I'm proud to say that Palestinian Christian communities - most of us have a vegan tradition when it comes to Easter. The vegan tradition is four times a year, but for this episode, I'll talk about one tradition which is called the Great Lent otherwise known as الصوم الكبير. We do the Great Lent for عيد الفصح otherwise known as Easter, and the Great Lent is actually something that is specific to Arab Christian communities and it's similar to Ramadan in the sense that we abstain from consuming any foods or liquids at all, but instead of doing it from sunrise to sunset we actually fast from midnight to midday, من 12 إلى 12, from 12:00 a.m to 12:00 pm. Strictly, we are required not to drink any liquids, or consume any foods, and the listeners might be wondering ‘where's the vegan part?’, well, it means also for 40 days right before Easter, even through شعنينة  which is otherwise known as Palm Sunday. We are required to consume a strictly vegan diet and so I'm proud to say there is a strong tradition of vegan diets within Palestinian Christian communities. Now across other parts of the year there, are other fasts so it's not just عيد الفصح Easter, it's also Christmas time as well, but most Palestinian Christians actually do the Great Lent and that is why it is called “the Great Lent”, and so we basically embrace a vegan diet, we abstain from animal products and the rule is - if it bleeds, do not consume it. If it moves, do not consume it and unlike say Christian communities in Lebanon that are overwhelmingly Catholic or Maronite, Christian communities across Palestine are overwhelmingly Orthodox, and the Orthodox church is in fact the first church, and what is coming up is that we are of course commemorating the crucifixion of the world's most famous Palestinian يسوع المسيح Jesus Christ and as he suffered and bled on the crucifix. In commemoration for him, that is why we fast, and we also fast because we live in a time whereby not everyone in the world has access to the foods and water and hydration and drinks and so forth - that we do. Specifically, since the beginning of the genocide, Palestinian Christians have not been able to commemorate عيد الفصح or Christmas or Easter or any of our traditions, any of our personal birthdays; we haven't been able to, because we are Palestinian and we are going through a period of mourning. At the same time, as we are fasting from midnight to midday, we are thinking about the people of Gaza and we are commemorating that, right now, they are suffering in ways that are outrageous, that are devastating, and so out of respect for them, and other peoples in this world that are suffering, we are taking this time similar to what happens during Ramadan. Well before 1948 before the Zionist state came about inflicted horror, rape and terror upon the people of Palestine, Palestinian Christian communities we celebrated the Great Lent and I want to mention that according to some statistics, there are about 14 million Palestinians including the diaspora of course so all around the world, and 20% of those Palestinians are in fact المسيحيين Palestinian Christians and within the Christian population overwhelmingly Orthodox a minority of Catholic a smaller minority of Maronite, Protestant, Lutheran and as we are 20% of the population, whilst the world likes to classify us as a minority, I don't see it that way because of how mainstreamed we are in Palestinian society. So when it comes to Christian minorities within Palestine, I tend to think of Armenian Christians who have a strong historical presence in Jerusalem, in Nazareth, Bethlehem and other places and also Assyrian Christians and also Ethiopian Christians as well. So whilst we are technically a minority according to world standards, unlike minorities in other societies I consider us as being mainstreamed because of our status within Palestinian society and even though we are often used as a political football by racists, by neo-colonialists, by orientalists and even though Christian Zionism, which I'll talk about later on, exists, there are I've heard approximately 70 million Christian Zionists in the world, and about something like 3 million Christian Palestinians so we are outnumbered significantly by the people that apparently we share a religion, with but I contest that wholeheartedly. Within Palestinian Christian communities, we are blessed because the Palestinian diet which we share with our Muslim siblings and other and people of other religions within Palestine, it is overwhelmingly vegan, and there are particular terms for dishes and the term that we use is صيامي and صيامي is Arabic for fasting or to fast, is that right? 

DALAL: Yeah that's correct and for non-Christian vegans it's easy to go around asking for صيامي food instead of saying that you're نباتي or vegan, and trying to explain what that entails so I mean but the difference would be if you're nonpracticing Christian then صيامي for you would be the food without the religious practices around it. 

RAYAN: Yeah absolutely so that word صيامي to describe a particular food, even though it has specific connotations within Palestinian Christian communities, so as an example stuffed zucchini صيامي, Yalanji, instead of stuffing obviously zucchinis, tomato, vine leaves with meat and rice, instead there are vegan substitutes, so really when I hear Palestinians who aren't vegan tell me that “oh it's hard to find substitutes”, I like to remind them that our ancestors have been eating صيامي food for a very long time, and also within the Palestinian traditions., there are some members of the church who are encouraged to abstain from olive oil, because olive oil is deemed to be a luxury and so a lot of the vegan foods that we consume that are naturally vegan like foule, hummus and other greats, we usually can't have them without olive oil, we can't have our morning زيت وزعتر ]za’ater and olive oil] without the olive oil component, but again it's to value that olive oil is considered a luxury not everyone has access to it, it's associated with richness within Palestinian culture. Before when I spoke about how Palestinian Christians, we are indeed mainstreamed within Palestinian society, if you approach any facet of Palestinian life, whether it be the arts, whether it be culture, sports, religious institutions political institutions education every component whether it be Fellahin, Bedouin, every component has members who are Christian, who form Palestine's Christian community and so not only are we successful members of the Palestinian community, we thrive and the only time we haven't been able to thrive is because of the colonization of our lands, which impacts both Palestinian Muslims, Christians and Palestinians of other faiths. When Dr Leila, before on her awesome episode about Veganuary, I remember thinking to myself that ‘the white vegans really think they've invented the wheel on everything’, like well before we sort of had within our traditions, a month whereby we went vegan, without engaging in commercialized sort of initiatives, capitalist initiatives, without collaborating with genocidaires and Zionists and so forth, so when Dr Leila was talking about the initiatives of Veganuary, I thought well wow my ancestors were doing it well before their ancestors in the West supposedly converted to Christianity ,so I suppose that's Palestinian Orthodox traditions in a nutshell. 

[Music] Orthodox Christian Prayer [Music]

DALAL: The part about the زيت ]Olive Oil] is very, I mean زيت وزعتر za’ater and olive oil are very precious in every Palestinian household, and I'm sure even across the Arab households as well, it's one of our traditions and abstaining from consuming or using olive oil in itself can be challenging, but it's a it's a good reminder that this richness and this it could be a sign of luxury to some people may not be to others as well, so it's a good reminder that sometimes when we give up on certain items or within our diet, it's our way to connect deeper with our community and celebrate the shared values and traditions that we have together, so tell me more about the Palestinian Christians and particularly living in Australia and how you keep that connection and keep that tradition going amidst everything happening, and especially the fact that you are away from Palestine or outside of Palestine and how do you keep that connection going with your community?

RAYAN: so with a lot of Palestinian Orthodox Christians what we've been forced to do is we've been forced to set up our own churches in the diaspora it's very hard for us to attend Western churches because there is a huge difference between Western Christianity and Eastern Christianity and unfortunately the West likes to portray Christianity as coming from the west and Islam as coming from the east when in fact our experiences as Palestinian Christians are that we have more in common with Muslims from Arab countries specifically Palestine, the Levantine specifically  in my case than we ever would with say Christians in the West and so  I've even got family members that have set up  a church in Qatar, like  I'm talking about like being forced to leave after 1948, most Palestinians were forced to go to Kuwait, because apparently at the time that's where a lot of work opportunities were. I had uncles and aunties within my own family, who unfortunately did not have money for schooling, but went straight to Kuwait to either work as hairdressers, to work as cleaners ,or to work as mechanics, or as welders, or as plumbers, in a lot of  blue-collar jobs within Kuwait, and even then were forced to sort of set up or attend diaspora churches and it also means that a lot of priests within our communities, a lot of Palestinian Orthodox priests have had to do a lot of traveling to connect with the diaspora. The vast majority of Palestinian Christians are unfortunately outside of Palestine and we went from being 20% in 1948 to now only about 2% because of the Zionist colonial project, and well before that I will outline we have never had in Palestine, in Gaza specifically, no one has bombed our Orthodox churches until the Zionists came along. In terms of diaspora life, all Palestinian Christians should have the right to attend two holy places within Palestine. So as a Palestinian Christian when I open up the Bible and I read about holy places that  there's Jesus of الناصرة aka Nazareth born in بيت لحم aka Bethlehem was crucified in Jerusalem aka القدس was tempted on Mount Temptation جبل لقرنطل في أريحا in Jericho, walked on water on the Sea of طبريا, the Galilee Sea or the Sea of Tiberius I think it's called in English, all these things, for a lot of Western Christians, these are basically places that they learn about, but for me, I have a connection that you similarly have and other Palestinians in that these aren't just places mentioned in the Bible, these are places where we come from.

DALAL: Jesus Christ (peace be upon him) is mentioned in the Quran as well and is celebrated as well in Islam, and the Virgin Mary as well and one of the things that we should really also highlight ism how there's apparently an idea that ‘Christians don't exist in in the Arab world’ and it would be quite baffling when someone is confronted with that fact, that there are Palestinian Christians and Arab Christians, and it's not that it that they only exist in in Australia or in the US or in Canada and other non-Arabic speaking countries, and I'm sure that you probably came across that but I myself was asked that before and it was quite a surprise for people. 

RAYAN: Absolutely! For westerners to portray Christianity as coming from,  similar Islam Christianity, all Abrahamic faiths come from the Middle East specifically Palestine. A Christian Palestinian sister, by the name of Sawson Muaddi-Darraj, and I wrote an article for Christmas back in I think it was 2020 or 2021, it was something like a list of things that Palestinian Christians wanted the world to know about Palestine, and often we get asked questions “Oh, you're Christian when did you convert?” and often we have to explain: ‘we didn't convert, it was actually your ancestors that did’, because we're the first Christians but it is this illiteracy whereby Zionists and other racists, they love to portray Palestine as being a supposed conflict between Christians and Muslims, and I'm like: no! Number one, do not facilitate the erasure of Palestinian Christians because even though we're outside of Palestine, we're coming home, it's only a matter of time, we are coming home. Every Palestinian Orthodox priest that I spoke to in preparation for this episode, that's exactly what we agreed upon - what we disagreed upon was that  I'm in my 40s and not married, but that's another story, but what we agreed upon is that we are all going home, and interestingly, some of them were like,  well one interestingly, one in particular was like “my wife is more stricter than me fasting from olive oil” so it goes to show that the fasting from olive oil is really an independent thing but just a quick shout out to Father Dahdal and Father Aziz, thank you both for sharing your expertise for me in preparation for this for this podcast! But I also want to affirm that in Palestine, it's not just one group that celebrates their own religion because coexistence is at the core of who we are. We all celebrate each other's each other's celebrations we mourn with each other whilst I don't know specifics about Islam again because it was not taught to me I do know a lot about Qatayef and Ramadan, and what's eaten and so forth because those elements for me are part of Palestinian culture, and so unfortunately, we do get asked some of the most annoying questions, as an example within our within our churches women cover their heads, my own grandmother wore a headscarf and immediately non-Palestinians assume “oh she must be Muslim wearing a hijab” and I'm like, ‘no  it's a cultural thing’ and there is a lot of ignorance. I will say is that doing the Great Lent for me as a Palestinian Christian was actually my pathway to veganism, so a few years ago I did the Great Lent, I thought to myself I am not ready to return to meat because I was told I must have meat in order to sustain myself, in order to keep myself from getting sick, blah blah blah, it was very undesirable and so I thought no I'll wait one more week, and then a week passed, and then I waited two weeks, and then 3 weeks and I tried to sort of go back to eating meat, because I was told that I needed to, my body needed to, and I'm like so I went into vegetarianism and then ultimately came to a full vegan diet, reconnected with my ancestry in the sense that I was able to eat the way my ancestors did, in terms of a plant-based diet, and I just want to read something because I want to acknowledge that well before I was vegan, because I've always been Palestinian, and I've always been Christian, but I haven't always been vegan, so I want to acknowledge the amazing work of the Palestinian vegans that have written things that helped me when I was doing some research on Palestinian veganism, because well before Vegans for Palestine, I avoided vegan spaces because of how white and racist and annoying they were, and the lack of intersectionality annoyed me, but I want to pay tribute to Nada Ketani and also Michel Khoury, and I'm just going to read something that they wrote which is about Palestinian veganism they write: “vegan diets have roots also in the religious vegan fasting practiced in segments of local Palestinian society, including both the Islamic and Christian faiths every year Palestinian Christians like Christians from other parts of the Middle East fast for 40 days during Lent in preparation for the great feast, during this fast followers are encouraged to adopt spiritual practices that include self-examination and leading to a spiritual connection with one's body the implication that eating vegan helps avoid sin and grow closer to God (which we also call Allah) as practiced in both Christian and Islamic traditions raises questions regarding the ethics of eating animals and animal byproducts”. I want to also mention that because of the colony the apartheid colony we do not have access to our holy places so Christians across Kazer have had to ask the people colonizing us whether they are allowed permission to go to Jerusalem at Easter time and whether they're allowed to go to Bethlehem during Christmas time, so we never had Muslim Palestinians telling us that we weren't allowed to go to our holy places in fact what we've had is the opposite that not only have they been taken care of by Muslim authorities but within as an example because of the significance of Mariam (Mary) peace be upon her, that she that a lot of that within Palestinian churches especially like the Church of Nativity, it's quite common to find Muslim women praying in that church so I know that the west doesn't have the narrative of coexistence so often when western societies talk about adopting multiculturalism and talking about how wonderful they are again we did that in Palestine well before you lot even knew what it was all about, so I want to clearly state that I'm proud that there are vegan traditions within Palestine's Christian communities they might vary in Armenian Christian communities who are also facing threat from the colonial project that is Israel so, yeah.

[Erhasat chanting lyrics from Fairouz]: They walk through the porticos of the temples, and embrace all the ancient churches, and take the sadness away from the mosques, our eyes take away the sadness every day. Every day.  They walk through the porticos of the temples, and embrace all the ancient churches, and take the sadness away from the mosques.

DALAL: The very fact that people don't even recognize that Jesus Christ is Palestinian, and then when you go around the world and you'll see all these white, like blonde portraits of Jesus and then at the same time there is the terminology as well and in the media there is a lot of framing of what Christian Palestinians are. The propaganda promotes the idea that what's happening in Palestine is merely a ‘religious conflict’ between the Jews the Christians and the Muslims, when it's not really the case because what we're witnessing in Palestine is merely an ethnic cleansing that does not differentiate between Palestinian Muslims or Palestinian Christians or even Palestinian Jews, the Samaritans who live in their community on Gerizim Mountain in Nablus, in the West bank. So tell me more about what other maybe from your personal experience what other misconceptions or preconceived notions that you've encountered as a Christian Palestinian vegan?

RAYAN: So off the top of my head, I'm just going to add to what you said earlier and this needs to be stated very clearly Jesus was not white, Jesus will never be white, unlike our Muslim siblings, the vast majority of people that have our religion are Westerners and as a result what it means is that they like to fashion the religion in a way that makes them feel comfortable, in accordance with whiteness, and so often in their movies they will portray Jesus & Mary as being white, and it's a way to make them feel comfortable. Obviously, the whiteness of Jesus is something that definitely needs to be challenged what we're absolutely sick of is Westerners appropriating our traditions and completely changing them for the worse commercializing them so within Palestinian society, there is no Easter Bunny, there are no chocolate Easter eggs, there is no focus on capitalism and consumption, but rather there is a focus on religious traditions and that's one example, so often in the west you often see at Easter time, movies that come out with a white Jesus, who is now in recent say in recent films, now portrayed by Israelis, go figure, by the people colonizing us rather than ourselves, and whilst we know that unfortunately the focus is on commercialization, on capitalism, on looking at something and seeing its value in terms of how it can be exploited - that is not how we do things in Palestine, and the second thing is that, I'm really annoyed with the white saviorism of the west, and their approach to Palestinian Christians is extremely condescending, and patronizing, so whilst the vast majority of Palestinian Christians are Orthodox, there are of course Melkite, Maronites, Lutheran, Protestants, Edward Siad his family was Orthodox, and I think his father converted to Protestantism but nonetheless very pro-Palestinian dedicated to Palestine. There is an attempt in terms of the white saviorism, which is done also by Zionists, as well Zionists love to claim that they are saving Palestinian Christians from Muslims whilst they're annihilating us, whilst they're surprised that we even exist, and it's this enraging paradox that haunts us that challenges us and it's often a tradition that we have to not only educate non-Palestinians about the realities of Palestine, but also it's almost like we have to explain that yes, Palestinians are in fact an extremely diverse society, culturally, linguistically, ancestrally, religiously, and we're very proud of that. We know how to do coexistence without Zionism, as a matter of fact in a free Palestine we're going back to coexistence and the not only does the white saviorism offend us, but it's almost like living Palestinian Christian in the modern day, the vast majority of people that supposedly share your religion want you dead, deny you exist, if they find out you exist, they'll ask you if you're converted. The vast majority of Zionists in the world are in fact people that claim to be Christian. Now when I see what happens in everyday churches in the west,  in terms of how people what people wear, when they walk into the churches, what they say, how they live their lives - that would not go down in the Palestinian church, that would not go down at all, because the way they practice Christianity is unrecognizable, their white saviorism offends us, and I would even argue that it's almost like we have a separate religion, but because the label Christian is used upon us all, because we happen to use the same book that's why we have the same category but that's the only part where our similarity exists we're different on every other front.

DALAL: This is also a “shared quote unquote experience” here within the Muslim community because even here in Palestine people the religious traditions and practices have fallen to consumerism there is no occasion where you won't find decorations and specific items around the house and people rushing to the markets to buy certain items because that is how they will start the celebrations around for instance Ramadan or around عيد الفطرor عيد الأضحى. Those consumer behaviours have been really impacting the way also people celebrate these traditions, as if you will never celebrate Ramadan if you wouldn't have specific items of decorations, from furniture to where you have the painting or the print of the crescent, and certain religious items printed on these decorations, and as you're saying, the some somehow the world has changed to follow a consumer mindset in the way they look at religions and religious practices, instead of really connecting with their deeper values because fasting in our cultures is not only about the food, but also it's how you try to connect with yourself with your soul, with your creator, with your ancestors with your land. 

RAYAN: Absolutely! 

DALAL: And how you abstain from these consumerism behaviours and practices, because I see that as there is no alignment, and there is no way that people can be fasting, and wanting to be closer to their to themselves and to their creator and sisters, but at the same time they're being heavily consumers and fallen in the trap of thinking of the material aspects of these celebrations and practices, when they should be abstaining and living humbly and with humility and realizing the importance of and appreciate what they have actually in their lives instead of putting more burden on themselves.

 [FAIRUZ SINGING]: 

 هذا هو اليوم الذي صنعه الرب فلنفرح و لنتهلل به

المسيح قام من بين الأموات و وطئ الموت بالموت و وهب الحياة للذين في القبور

المسيح قام من بين الأموات و وطئ الموت بالموت و وهب الحياة للذين في القبور

RAYAN: I just want to acknowledge also the work of Joseph Massad who has written about how Palestinian Christians face two oppressions within historical Palestine, one we can all guess is the Zionist colonial project, and the second one, I can foresee that there's a whole bunch of orientalist, racists, that are going to assume that I'm going to talk about Muslim Palestinians, no it's actually the Greek Orthodox Church. So the Greek Orthodox Church has actually had control over the church the Orthodox Church in Palestine to the point where only recently have Palestinian archbishops been allowed to lead the Orthodox Church, when in fact before that there was systemic discrimination against us within our homeland, from fellow Christians and so again it is really enraging to not only have my story as a Christian Palestinian not told, but for people to condescendingly tell me that my enemy are the people that are also surviving the colonial project, that I've got traditions more in common with, as opposed to the people that are annihilating me, denying my existence, not allowing people from my community to lead my church? I'm proud to also say that throughout the course of the genocide, there has not only been an affirmation of Palestinian Christian coexistence and unity, and you can even argue that Palestinian veganism is one of the ultimate expressions of religious unity, of coexistence. because it transcends religious boundaries, like that's what you could argue is that because I know we're often told that, yes, there are differences in terms of when to eat and so forth or what time to eat, obviously, but Palestinian veganism again is a firm expression of coexistence. 

DALAL: I can also say that it's also it's important to highlight that this year the fasting for Christians and Muslims have been coinciding, I agree with you. 

RAYAN: Like, look at it this way Dalal, so if Zionism was not a thing, and we were able to exist in Palestine without the oppression, and the apartheid walls ;this year we've got Ramadan, Easter, and Passover in the same month, and in Palestine without Zionism, we'd be able to celebrate, commemorate all three occasions, together. 

DALAL: Yes, sadly even here in Palestine I can tell you that with the current situation with checkpoints, even commute between from your house to your workplace can take you longer than it should, and even if there is traffic, it would even still take you longer because it's the mood of that soldier at that checkpoint that day that would determine the entirety of your day, let alone how it really impacts you, but definitely when if there are no checkpoints and no borders and no settler colonialism in Palestine, and I'm sure that those traditions of celebrations have long existed in Palestine way before the settler colonial state of Israel came into creation, and people had these traditions long before. That's why we again going back to the point of صيامي food, that's why it's when you look at صيامي food what it's about it's really part of the Palestinian cuisine, and you can't really separate it. I heard it from different other vegans as well that when they want to have access to vegan food, they will just say I want صيامي food and they would go to restaurants and places where it's available,  because it's on the menu. even if it wouldn't be necessarily made for the Fast but it would still be on the menu and people wouldn't have issues accessing that. 

RAYAN: Absolutely and so yeah, again it affirms not only coexistence but it shows that it is embedded in Palestinian culture

[Applause] [CHANTING CHRISTIAN MULSIMS IN UNISON]

DALAL: There is an important thing that we have been touching on in in the importance why we're even having this conversation today is we want to shed light on the layered misconceptions about not just veganism and Christianity, but also the intersectionality of that within the advocacy for Palestine, and in our fight for liberation and freedom, and decolonizing the occupation and decolonizing the misconceptions and decolonizing and debunking the myths about Christianity, Christian Palestinians, and let alone vegan Christian Palestinians, tell me more about that from your experience as well because I really want people to take lots of things from this conversation but most importantly that when we're addressing these topics, we are decolonizing the white saviorism, the white ideas and Orientalost ideas about Palestine and Christians and vegans in Palestine and Christian Palestinians as well, so tell me about that how do you decolonize these misconceptions about being a Palestinian Christian vegan? 

RAYAN: In terms of decolonizing white saviorism is probably one of the central tenets, it's definitely at the heart of it, because not only is white saviorism offensive we also get it as Palestinian vegans as well from Western vegans, they don't need to save us, we know how to do veganism. And with regards to Christianity not only do we know how to do Christianity the West actually got it from us. Now if say in a western country a group of Jews were prohibited from going to a synagogue by authorities or police, it would be mainstream news. But both Palestinian Christians and Muslims all over Palestine are prohibited or restricted from attending our holy sites, and practicing our traditions which I want to add is practiced by everybody as an example on Palm Sunday or right before Christmas or Easter, there are across Palestine scouts that march through the streets, wearing strictly Palestinian thobes and clothes that are of cultural significance. Many of my family members currently in Palestine, currently participate in them, and both Muslims and Christians participate in them as well so whilst Christians might lead them, they do so through the support of Muslims, and the same thing in terms of in the early days of Ramadan as Muslims are getting their bodies used to the idea of fasting, often in sunset there are Christians on the street that are passing out bottles of water and foods and so forth, or dates for our Muslim siblings so this idea of coexistence it's not performative, it's what we do. Hospitality is a huge part of Arab culture whereby when you enter our homes or visit us, we like the idea of hospitality it is so important to us, and challenging the white saviorism and the commercialization is part of it. Chocolate eggs and the bunny and so forth, these are all western things that's not from us so really I'm happy for the Westerners to sort of have that  their commercialization and their capitalism same as the sort of conservative vegans that's just not what I'm going to participate, i'm not going to participate in that. The West is sort of commemorating again during Christmas the birth of a Palestinian man and then the crucifixion of a Palestinian man in Easter, and a recent example is the bombing of the world's third oldest church which happens to be in Kazer was bombed by the Israelis, so if you think about it, well before the Zionist project the church in an overwhelmingly Muslim community, was never bombed until the Israelis did at the start of the genocide, and again it's similar to what Reverend Isaac actually says when he looks at Western Christianity he says, the Christianity is not only offensive but it is unrecognizable, and thankfully that it is not our Christianity because for me that is not what my Christianity is about the vegan traditions I also want to mention are practiced by one group and western Christians what they might do in terms of their Lent is on Friday instead of consuming dead animals they'll consume dead fish, sorry, instead of consuming dead lamb or beef or whatever chicken they'll consume dead fish, and we look at that and think well that's not you're not what are you giving up like okay sure as a vegan I don't agree with consuming animal products but  you're not giving up much? it's all about convenience and again emphasizes that whilst the West likes to portray themselves as embodying Christianity - no they don't. Their ancestors converted when mine were practicing. When Christians narrate the story of the Bible there is no acknowledgement of what's happening within these places mentioned in the Bible, so if Western Christians were to look at okay what's happening in Tiberius. what's happening in Jericho, what's happening in Nazareth where there's an apartheid system whereby the Palestinian population have to live in secret in in terms of their Palestinian identity and what I'm proud to say is that not only is there coexistence and respect and solidarity between Muslims and Christians across Palestine, that there is a strong solidarity between Orthodox Christians, some with Israeli citizenship some without Israeli citizenship, some in the diaspora, some in West Bank and Gaza. Over the past few years, it feels like forever since the beginning of the genocide we have not been able to celebrate Christmas or Easter all of us not just those of us in the West Bank not just those of us in Gaza, not just those of us in the diaspora but even bishops and leaders within the Orthodox churches in 48 Palestine have agreed with us and said "We are not celebrating." Mind you even though they are under huge scrutiny directly from the Israeli authorities for doing so, they have still refuse to celebrate in solidarity with us so whilst the West likes to differentiate between Palestinian Christian and Muslim, the Zionist Project likes to do that and also differentiate between Palestinians with Israeli citizenship, and Palestinians without and the only Arab-Israelis that I know of are the ones from Arab countries who are Jewish, so the Moroccan Jews the Iraqi Jews  Palestinians - we are not  we reject that term wholeheartedly, even if a Zionist tells me they've got one friend who happens to you can keep that one friend to yourself. Also in terms of decolonizing we need to realize that terms like Allah, alhamdulillah are significant to Christian prayer to Christian sayings i should be allowed to say alhamdulillah and refer to my God as Allah without being asked are you Muslim or are you Christian I thought you were Christian? It's almost as though whatever the West considers Islamic has to be Islamic, and there's no regard that number one, Arabic is the language of Islam number two Palestinians are culturally Muslim because the majority of us are Muslim, and it also and because we speak Arabic we speak the language of Islam, that is why we are allowed to say these terms so it is not appropriation, several the Palestinian theologians are really sick to death to quite to be quite honest of writing articles and explaining we Palestinian Christians say Allah Akbar , it's so common. I also want to emphasize how Palestinian saints, Christian saints have been removed of their Palestinian identity so within England, the site of where that began so much horror and colonization in the world. one of their saints is in fact Saint George- a Palestinian, every Palestinian Orthodox household I reckon. or most of us, if you walk into their homes you will find usually a Palestinian flag a giant cross or a صليب and a picture of Saint George. When I was growing up you knew who the other Palestinian Christians were because you always had a chain with three things the map of Palestine, a cross a crucifix and an evil eye. So again you can't look at our Christianity without looking at our Palestinian identity and vice versa and I'm going to echo again what my Palestinian sister Sawso said, and I when we wrote an article a few years ago which I've referenced I’m sorry to plug it but we sort of we sort of raised this because it's so significant we're not there to be used for the West's orientalism for the West's Zionism and for the West's racism, or for the West's white saviorism. The West does us a lot more harm than good so you imagine the very people that are supposed to have your solidarity are not only watching you your people annihilated they are funding it and they are passing laws and collaborating with those that are murdering you, and the deception is real, the feeling of devastation is real, it is almost like we regret that we pray from the same Bible it is not the same Bible if that is exactly what you do after reading it because from my point of view the Palestinian Christian that I'm proud to say that structures my Great Lent, that structures when I was baptized, family traditions that is from my country, Palestine, would not at all sit back and watch a western power that purports to be Christian fund and murder so many Palestinian babies, whilst as Christians we are taught to forgive and forget, again as several Palestinian Orthodox priests have mentioned, we will not forget, we cannot forget and I will say this very quickly I might finish on this point, you speak to every single Palestinian Christian you will find not only that we are proud to be Palestinian Christian but we will not accept the sort of Islamophobic rhetoric that we get from the West, and so as I was saying before what I will finish on is the words by Father Antonius who actually said that if the Zionists bombed every single mosque in Gaza, we will actually begin the call to prayer from every church that remains, because our existence is not just about us, it is about our solidarity so whilst the west tries to erase us, tries to erase our traditions, appropriated our religion supports the people that annihilate us …. We will always exist we will continue to exist we are from Palestine we'll always be from Palestine. and we are going home. 

DALAL: And Palestine will be free from the river to the sea!

RAYAN: Exactly! 

DALAL: Thank you, Rayan thank you so much and happy bless peaceful celebrations to you to your family to our brothers and sisters celebrating in Palestine under occupation and across the world in diaspora everywhere. 

RAYAN: Thank you كل عام وأنتم بسلام، شكرا

DALAL: Thank you. 

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AMAL MURKAS sings Memories of a Palestinian Wound by Mahmoud Darwish:

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