East Jerusalem YMCA, 1963: The origins of my Discontent
By: Ms. Constance Charles
In the summer of 1963, between my junior and senior years at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, I was one of 39 students chosen to work at Hilton Hotels in Europe and the Middle East. I and three others were assigned to the Nile Hilton, in Cairo, Egypt. We were there for six weeks; working, being paid, and taking in the sights and sounds of this foreign land.
At the end of our time in Cairo, another woman, Claire Sindt, and I traveled to Alexandria and boarded a ship, traveling fourth class (sans lit, sans nourriture) bound for Beirut where a long-time friend of her family, Elsa Farr, was the head of the American School for Girls. This was a priceless addition to our summer experience, as she provided us numerous excursions that introduced us to historic Lebanon.
It was my hope to be able to go to Jerusalem, being a dyed-in-the-wool Presbyterian and having the intention to follow my college degree with a seminary education. When the moment came to go, Claire was suffering with dysentery and unable to make the trip. With the benefit of Elsa’s years of living in Beirut, I was put into a service (an American Chrysler) with five seats for hire and sent on my way alone.
Needless to say, I was out of my element, seated in the middle of the front seat with Arab men on either side of me and three more in the back. The route took us through Damascus, where we stopped to visit the Great Souk for shopping, and through Amman, Jordan before going “up to Jerusalem” on the road through Jericho.
I have no clear memory of how it happened, but I was the last to be dropped off at my destination, the YMCA—which Elsa must have arranged—along with the youngest of the men in the car, who had been sitting on the left in the back seat. He got out there, too, and somehow it happened that after dinner he asked me to go with him to the roof of the hotel.
I do remember standing beside him looking over a wall in the middle distance to a hillside dotted with houses in the far distance. He pointed to one and told me that it was his family home. He said that one afternoon, while his sister was practicing the piano, a phone call had come and his family had been told they had to get out. He said that it was terrible for them, but they were given no alternative.
I learned that his name was Victor Shiber, that he was 27 years old, that he had gone to Poland to get a degree in engineering, and that his family had settled in Beirut, but longed to be at home in Jerusalem.
The next day I was on my own to visit the sites of interest to Christians—Golgotha, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, and the supposed tomb in a garden from which Jesus arose from the dead—that were outside the walls that the Israelis had erected along with the gate that connected with the famous Allenby Bridge. There was no way I was going to be able to get into Israel given that I had a passport stamped in Egypt and that Egypt and Israel were at war with each other.
That is about all I remember. The full meaning of what I had been told was long in gathering its due weight and I began to understand that this family, along with thousands of others had been made refugees because of the claim that European Jews had made to their lands—and homes. Somehow, decades later and disasters of Israel’s making dawning on my consciousness, I came to see that I wanted to have a role in balancing the scales of justice for Palestinians, and I have been working at it ever since.
Over the years I have slowly gotten involved in the effort to bring peace and justice to that little area of land at the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea. Along the way, I discovered that whenever I brought up the subject of Palestinians, people would either turn away or counter with words about Israel’s need to exist or antisemitism. I joined Churches for Middle East Peace in the 1990s and began speaking more boldly.
In 2018 I discovered Jewish Voice for Peace—Jews fighting for Palestinians!—and then the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, and became a committed activist. Happily, there are now thousands of Christians and Jews who are dedicated and unwavering in their efforts to bring peace and justice to the Holy Land, and freedom to Palestinians. The movement is growing and gathering strength, and it will not be stopped.
Prayer for peace: God, you call us to be peacemakers. Help us to heed your call, to be willing to be counted for the good of the future of Palestinians and Israelis. Give us a vision of a means to end the ongoing hatred between Palestinians and Israelis, and a finish to the theft of land. Lead us to a true end of hostilities and to the peace of two peoples living side by side in safety and mutual respect. I pray this in the name of Jesus, the Prince of Peace. Amen.
About the Author: Constance graduated from Macalester and went on to Union Theological Seminary/Columbia University in NYC to get a master’s degree in comparative religions. She served as Christian education director at La Jolla Presbyterian Church for five years, and then changed careers, going into public relations. All these years later, Constance is a member of Santee United Methodist Church. As a member of Jewish Voice for Peace, she is also a mentor to young Palestinian writers through the program called We Are Not Numbers. She has worked with eight writers to date, and cherishes each opportunity to help them tell their story and have it published on the web at wearenotnumbers.org. Constance is very much committed to elevating Palestinians and their rights for all to see and recognize, and to working towards peace.
Please note any views or opinions contained in this devotional series are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of Churches for Middle East Peace (CMEP).