Film: Walking to Jerusalem

Scene from Walking to Jerusalem

In 2017, Justin Butcher conceived and co-organised an epic walk to Jerusalem with the Amos Trust, a Christian Human Rights organisation, to apologise to the Palestinians for the Balfour Declaration, on the occasion of its centenary.

The Declaration was a public statement of support by the British Government for the establishment of 'a national home for the Jewish people' in Palestine. It greatly increased popular support for Zionism within Jewish communities worldwide and became a core component of the British Mandate for Palestine.

While the Declaration resulted in the birth of the State of Israel, it also led to the expulsion of many thousands of Palestinians and the depopulation and destruction of hundreds of towns and villages. It is considered a principal cause of the ongoing conflict between Palestinians and Israelis.

The Amos Trust has a mantra: Equal rights for all who call the Holy Land Home.

Justin, a playwright, actor and musician, wrote of this pilgrimage of solidarity in a superb book Walking to Jerusalem which was characterised by cogent historical scholarship, lyrical travelogue and a deep empathy for human suffering.

And now, in time for Palestine Land Day, and for the next week, a companion-piece film Walking Back to Jerusalem can be viewed for free.

In the film, Justin walks around London with his Palestinian friend Ahmed Masoud. Most of Ahmed's family are languishing in Gaza and Justin speaks of his profound pain at the denial of rights (of movement, to land) to Palestinians.

The two friends share anecdotes and aspirations and these are linked to sections from Justin's book. All the while, their peregrination winds around Jerusalem and Palestine, the imaginative hold of these over the British, and Britain's troubled role in the history of Palestine and Israel.

They pass through Jerusalem Passage in Finsbury, pause a while by an olive tree in the garden of Clerkenwell Priory (once home to the Knights Hospitaller of Jerusalem), and visit Bunhill Fields where they see John Bunyan's pilgrim labouring under his burden of sin. Here too, they find a memorial to William Blake the poet and writer of the beloved hymn 'Jerusalem'. Justin speaks of a radical message of spiritual fight but Ahmed counters with his experience of studying the poem back in Gaza while drones sounded outside his classroom. This left a bitter taste and encouraged an all-too-felt reading of colonisation and dispossession.

It should come as no surprise then that the two friends, taking their cue from Black Lives Matter, visit several statues, a memorial to the Imperial Camel Corps, to Major General Orde Wingate, to Richard Coeur de Lion etc, and post up symbolical messages of decommission. According to Justin, Wingate, a passionate supporter of Zionism who founded the Special Night Squads and oversaw collective punishments in British mandated Palestine, was effectively the founder of the Israeli Defence Force.

Under the shadow of Big Ben, Justin says that all the pomp and circumstance in London makes him think of Banksy's 'Walled Off Hotel' (there really is one abutting the separation wall in Bethlehem), and an accompanying punning art installation in which skinny Palestinian kids are at a tea-party with British festive bunting and the Queen performs a ceremonial opening with the unveiled words 'Er sorry'.

The two friends' distress, even when ironic and satirically expressed, is all too apparent but the film, like the book, ends with hope and magnanimity. There is footage and photography of a service of reconciliation in St George's Cathedral, Jerusalem, which Justin attended at the culmination of the 2017 walk. Here, the preacher was Naim Ateek, founder of the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Centre. His text came from the prophet Micah, when many nations would come to Zion and swords would be beaten into ploughshares.

To watch the show on Facebook click HERE

Watch on Vimeo here: https://player.vimeo.com/video/526337907

For more information and to make a donation see: www.thenewtheatre.com