Tucker Carlson's Plea

About a thousand years ago, the Crusaders were surprised to find Christians in our lands as well, but illusions and ambitions were greater than sympathy or religious ties. Therefore, these invaders put the sword to the necks of the Christians of the land, just like their Muslim brethren. The invaders did not believe that there were Christians who had their churches, fields, schools, businesses, and contributions to public life. That reality did not fit at all with the colonial Crusader project, and therefore history does not record that the Christians of our lands dealt with or cooperated with the invaders except to a minimal and narrow extent, and that was due to helplessness, destitution, or the desire for salvation, exactly as happens to every people under occupation. And in our days, too, the American right-wing journalist Tucker Carlson carries the task of clarifying the ordinary truth for us, which is astonishing for the extremist Christian right in his country: that there are Christians in Palestine and Jordan who have lived for thousands of years as the salt of the earth, in deed not just in word, and that they and their Muslim brethren present a living example of harmony, cooperation, and cultural integration, as well as in patriotism and citizenship, and that all they are subjected to—displacement, hardship, persecution, and humiliation—their Muslim brethren had no role in it. Both Hosam Naoum, the Anglican Archbishop of Jerusalem, and As'ad Al-Ma'asher from Jordan, presented a very clear picture of fruitful pluralism and the dazzling mosaic of shared life in both Palestine and Jordan. Astonishment leaped from the eyes of the courageous American journalist as he heard and saw how all the lies and delusions spread by most American media fall on the hills and mountains of these lands. This man heard and saw with his own eyes that there is an Arab Muslim king who cares for Islamic and Christian endowments, and that Christians enjoy all rights and entitlements, and that Islam is part of Christian culture, and that coexistence, tolerance, and understanding are not imaginary concepts, but rather facts lived daily and ordinarily. What Tucker Carlson presented on his platform was a slap and a shock to the extremist right that claims Christianity—I mean Scofield's Christianity and his reference Bible, that American lawyer who presented messianic interpretations of the Bible that turned into another gospel. What Carlson did with living and tangible evidence is that the support provided by these extremist groups actually works to displace, impoverish, and humiliate Christians, and that their beliefs in interpretations and explanations of the Gospel harm Christians and their existence and lives in their land, which they have not left for thousands of years. What Carlson did was expose, strip bare, and dismantle all claims and lies as well, and presented a completely different picture from the malicious propaganda and flowing political money that serves the occupation, and that the set of facts and evidence Carlson presented in his program is a humanitarian plea against that broad current controlling American decision-making and public mood, which will intensify the ongoing discussions in the United States of America.