uides are required to take at least one make-up course a year in order to renew their guides' license. I am still operating on an old license because it turns out that, with one thing or another, I never did my required courses last year and the year before. (Help! I'm missing 3!!). No complaints here; these make-up days are marvelous and I welcome the chance (even if under compulsion) to do them. The best people in the business, academics and archaeologists, takes us around and teach us what's really going on. And we guides get to meet each other while doing the day's course.

So I signed on for a number of make-up courses as soon as I realized the situation, and spent  one of the most remarkable days of my professional life on the first of them: a walk through the Greek Orthodox churches, monasteries, and properties of the Old City of Jerusalem. Our guide was a remarkable woman, daughter of a famous academic in the field, who is working on her doctorate on the subject of the Greek Orthodox, knows the language, seems to know all the priests, monks, and nuns too, clearly loves them and they her, and is a splendid teacher to boot. 30 of us followed her around the Old City that day.  

THIS MAY BE HARD TO BELIEVE, BUT I FOUND MYSELF IN A DOZEN  PLACES—THE FIRST AT JAFFA GATE AND MOST OF THE OTHERS BURIED DEEP IN THE CHRISTIAN QUARTER—I HAD NEVER BEEN TO IN ALL THE 40 YEARS I HAVE BEEN WALKING THE OLD CITY. OR IN PLACES I HAD BEEN (TO 2 OF THEM) BUT NEVER UNDERSTOOD MUCH ABOUT, HARDLY ANY OF WHICH I COULD EVER AGAIN FIND ON MY OWN AND CERTAINLY NOT EVER GET INSIDE THE GATE EVEN IF I DID FIND THEM.  

 The churches are notable mostly for their icons; there's a whole language to be learned there. But the monasteries are truly remarkable because they are, in fact, little neighborhoods in and of themselves, hidden from the streets of the city behind big iron gates. We sometimes saw a priest inside, always met a few (mostly old) nuns living there, and were aware of anywhere from 5 to 15 families who are paying rent and living there inside the monastery. Nothing religious about them; they may not even be Christians. Just living there. I never knew that was possible.

The day was exhilarating, but muted somewhat (a lot!) by a dark cloud hanging over the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate these days. This is a long and very sad story, but it is important enough (for Jerusalem) to tell although I fear it will be impossible to tell briefly.

The Embattled Patriarch 

iodoros I,  Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, died in Jerusalem in December 2000 at the age of 77. No reason for anyone not involved to remember him, except for that horrendously ugly iconostasis (screen in front of the altar) he was putting up in the Holy Sepulchre, which they stopped working on (with a sigh of relief) the day he died and which hasn't been finished, or even touched, ever since.

The selection of a new Patriarch was something like the election of a Pope. The Fraternity of the Holy Sepulchre, which is the  Greek Orthodox Council, chose 3 of the 15 candidates proposed, and then the Holy Synod itself, 17 in number, chose Irineos I as the new Patriarch in August 2001. So far, more or less the same as what happens in the Roman Catholic church and choosing the Pope.

The difference is in what happens next. Because the eastern Orthodox church, tracing its rules and usages back to the Byzantine Era—maybe even to Justinian himself!, when the Emperor was also head of the church—requires that the appointment be approved by the government of the country to which the Patriarch is elected. That meant that  the Israeli government, the Jordanian government (which used to be in control of Jerusalem and the West Bank) and the Palestinian Authority were all called upon to affirm the choice. In case you haven't guessed already, the situation now gets complicated.

Irineos was known as a supporter of Arafat and the Palestinian Authority and his appointment was therefore quickly approved by the Jordanians and by Arafat and the PA. But some really pro-Palestinian letters written by him, and some sermons preached, were circulated in the Israeli press. He always said they were forgeries, signed by an assistant with ambitions of his own, etc., but reliable witnesses testified that they saw him write them. So it took Israel a long time, until March of 2004, to finally approve him following a long period of secret negotiations.

The Arabs smelled a rat. What could have happened to reconcile Irineos and the Israelis at last? The answer was BUSINESS. 

Business, but too close to home 

he "business" we were talking about, and presumably the subject of the 4 years of negotiation that preceded Irineos' approval by the Israeli government, was about selling property. Hard to prove that statement, but nobody denies it. It seems that the Israelis agreed to satisfy Irineos' ambitions to be Patriarch in return for his willingness to keep on selling church land to Israel.

Selling land was an old tradition, but when Ma'ariv, an Israeli newspaper, reported last Easter that the Patriarchate had sold the Imperial and the Petra, the two big old hotels right inside Jaffa Gate , then the you-know-what really hit the you-know-what. Selling land out in the suburbs, or wherever, was somehow ok, but selling land INSIDE THE OLD CITY crossed a red line.

The Patriarch denies that he ever did it, but says one of his assistants, who has meanwhile left town for parts unknown (surprise!), did it without authorization.

The Arabs are furious, because they know the Israelis are trying to "Judaize" Jerusalem, which they are, and they object to that. And doubly so because they see the hated Greek as helping the Israelis politically. They also say that it's their land, not just his private property.

The synod of the church feared damage to church interests and repercussions all over the Middle East if they stayed quiet about what the Patriarch was doing, and were fed-up with this man who so far had been nothing but trouble, especially after he came back to occupy his quarters in the Patriarchate (he had been away) accompanied by a band of local (Muslim) hooligans whom he paid to protect him, and whose presence caused a serious riot in the confines of the Patriarchate. Thus the Israel Police—my old unit from the Kishle in the Old City who were never allowed inside because we were carrying arms—found itself called in, in full gear, to the Patriarchate to protect the Patriarch from his own people!

Deposition (sez who?)

 The synod met on May 7, 2005 and deposed the Patriarch.  (Note the  difference between the Greeks and the Latins. In the Roman Catholic Church, the synod elects the Pope but may not depose him. In the Orthodox Church, the synod may do both.)

Wishing to confirm this step, the church convened an extraordinary meeting in Istanbul (which Irineos attended) of all 14 of the autonomous Orthodox Churches (Syria, Greece, Cyprus, Bulgaria, Russia, Serbia, etc.) at the end of May which approved the decision of the Jerusalem synod. And that should have been the end of it. But it wasn't.

Irineos refused to accept the decision and came back from Istanbul to Jerusalem (with his 20-man mob) knowing that unless the governments involved approved the move there was nothing anybody could do to fire him. Whoever had the crazy idea that Church and State are not supposed to mix?

The Jordanians backed off quickly; they don't need this fight. King Abdullah confirmed the dismissal in mid-May. And the Palestinian Authority did the same in mid-July. So the fate of the Greek Orthodox Patriarch in Jerusalem  is now in the hands of the Israelis, in fact of Tzahi Hanegbi, who was a government minister until he was suspended pending criminal investigation(!),  and is still head of the LIKUD central committee, which is really pretty strange, come to think of it. 

What's with the P.A.?

he PA had been so supportive of the Patriarch at the beginning. Not only was he in good close relations with the Greek government, traditionally pro-Arab and anti-Israel, but he was himself really sympathetic to the Palestinian cause.  That's why they voted for him so quickly in the first place. But now they have done a 180° about face! What happened?

What happened was continuation of a long-range policy. The PA has been working since the days of Arafat to create a local Arab clergy for the Christians which they, the PA,  can control.  (Remember that "control" means getting your hands on a lot of property and whole lot of money! And political clout and influence in Europe which comes to the ones who control the holy places. The PA has been successful in this in Bethlehem, where they control the Church of the Nativity. And want the Holy Sepulchre next.)

They have to walk a fine line here; take over the churches and holy places without aggravating their allies in the government of Greece.

The program has been successful indeed; a whole bunch of Jerusalem churches have turned Palestinian; that is, pro-PA and anti-Israel. The Latin Patriarch, the Anglican Bishop, the Lutheran Bishop and the Greek Catholic Bishop are now Arabs who are not Lovers of Zion. The  Greeks of Jerusalem, the Armenians, the Greeks of the Galilee and the Franciscans are next on the firing line.

No coincidence that a claimant to the Patriarchate once Irineos has been got rid of is one Atallah Hanna, once the spokesman for the Patriarchate, an Arab priest with the clout and ambitions to become the first Arab Patriarch since the year 1563.

 And that's the cloud under which we walked that day
in the Old City 

ome of the monasteries & churches were actually closed to us, even though they knew our guide. We had, after all, been required to coordinate the tour with the Patriarchate and had done so, which made us as a group persona non grata with them. Others let us in because they knew our guide; they were otherwise closed to the world.

And that's how the situation stands today. The Israeli Police are there protecting the Patriarch in his compound, a deeply offensive situation by all accounts, while the government decides what on earth to do about a pickle which we have no business being involved in at all.

With a strange (and Byzantine) p.s. 

 final twist in this Byzantine scenario: on July 4^th the Palestinian Cabinet issued a report determining that the Patriarch was not, repeat NOT, involved in illegal land sales to the Jews. Now what on earth was the point of that, when the sale of the hotels inside Jaffa Gate was the chief reason for deposing the Patriarch in the first place!?

Come, my children, for a lesson in politics. If the Patriarch DID sell the land, then the sale is legal and final. BUT if he was not involved in the sale, then the sale, done presumably by one of his assistants without his knowledge and permission, is illegal and can therefore be revoked by his successor. Especially if his successor is Father Hanna.

Get it? It's all about business. About land. About money. The ideological/religious/political stuff may be important to some, but that's  not the bottom line.

It's the money, stupid!  Welcome to the Murky Middle East.

 p.p.s. On August 22^nd the synod elected a new Patriarch (not Father Hanna). Inside word is that he's a good guy and the best choice and everybody is happy. Except now there are two (count 'em, TWO) Greek Orthodox Patriarchs of Jerusalem. That must be a first in history! Now the government of Israel really has to get its act together. My guess is that it will; the situation of two Patriarchs is too absurd even for a hooligan like Tzahi Hanegbi. But that will depend on what kind of deal the Israelis have made  with him about a certain unmentionable subject (psst! it's land!)