Bombs, Betrayal, and Brotherhood: How Christ Heals Our Divided Past

I was born in 1964—long after the bombs fell on Baghdad’s Jewish quarter, but still close enough to feel the tremors of those events. I grew up hearing conflicting stories: Jewish neighbors fleeing en masse, whispers of synagogues bombed from within, and the old friendships between Arabs and Jews fractured beyond repair.

One line stopped me cold:

“The bombs weren’t thrown by Arabs—they were thrown by Jews dressed as Arabs.”

A survivor’s memory, later echoed by historian Avi Shlaim—himself from Baghdad—after reviewing trial evidence and archival documents showing that three of the five bombings between April 1950 and June 1951 were carried out by Zionist underground operatives, not Muslim extremists Simon & Schuster+2Wikipedia+2Amazon+2Jewish Voice for Labour+13Wiley Online Library+13Wikipedia+13.

Shlaim describes this painful discovery in Three Worlds, where he writes that Zionist activists sought to “fan the flames” of fear to encourage Jewish emigration. He calls this “undeniable proof of Zionist involvement,” though he notes historians debate whether it was official state policy or local agitators Wikipedia.

So the story isn't just Israel rescuing Iraqi Jews—it’s also about Jews turning on their own community in desperation and ideology.

The Iraqi Jewish Experience: From Integration to Exile

For nearly two millennia, Jews lived in Mesopotamia—teachers, doctors, merchants, musicians, sharing neighborhoods and lives with Muslims. By the early 20th century, Baghdad’s Jewish community was fully woven into Iraqi society Wikipedia+6Jewish Currents+6Financial Times+6.

Yet, post-1948, everything unraveled. The Farhud pogrom of 1941 had already exposed rising anti-Jewish violence, but the bombings of 1950–51 shattered trust completely. Iraqi courts convicted three Zionist underground members—Shalom Salah Shalom, Yosef Ibrahim Basri (executed), and Yehuda Tajar (imprisoned)—for attacks that terrorized their own co-religionists and enabled mass airlifts to Israel The ORB+2Wikipedia+2Wikipedia+2.

Shlaim, a member of Israel’s New Historians movement, reminds us that these were not figments of conspiracy. They were real decisions made by desperate people caught between their homeland and the Zionist dream CAMERA+6Wikipedia+6Jewish Currents+6.

Palestinian Displacement: A Different Wound, But Equally Real

Meanwhile, on the same land, another story was unfolding.

In 1948, war and fear drove between 700,000 and 750,000 Palestinians from their homes—a trauma remembered in Arabic as the Nakba, the Catastrophe Amazon+2Simon & Schuster+2The New Yorker+2kias.asafas.kyoto-u.ac.jp+3Wikipedia+3AP News+3. Villages like Deir Yassin became symbols of what was lost. Survivor Dawud Assad, recounting the massacre of April 9, 1948—when over 100 villagers were killed—shared at a Nakba commemoration:

"I don’t know how I escaped… They called me the living martyr." Wikipedia+2AP News+2AP News+2

In Lydda and Ramle, tens of thousands of Palestinians were expelled in a swift, violent operation—some estimates suggest up to 70,000 people in a few days The New Yorker+2Wikipedia+2kias.asafas.kyoto-u.ac.jp+2.

These are the stories Muslims grew up with—loss, erasure, heartbreak. Unlike Iraq’s Jewish story, Palestinian displacement was exiled by war and supported by some official Zionist strategy AP News+13Reddit+13Jewish Currents+13.

Both Wounded, Both Wronged

Neither people’s suffering can be dismissed or simplified.

Iraqi Jews fled violence that wasn’t always external. Palestinians were uprooted in ways intended to reinforce a new national identity. Both narratives bear responsibility and victimhood.

Yet much of our public discourse reduces these to caricatures: Jews only victims or oppressors, Palestinians only innocent or terrorized. History isn’t binary—it’s braided with human flaw, faith, fear, and failure.

What Christ Enters Into

This is where the Gospel changes everything.

Jesus came not to cleanse history, but to redeem it. He refused Roman empire, Jewish nationalism, and religious pride. His kingdom is invisible, yet deeply real.

He says:

“My kingdom is not of this world.” (John 18:36)Paul adds:“He Himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility.” (Ephesians 2:14)

Rather than siding with conquered or conqueror, Christ stands with the broken. He weeps over Jerusalem—not for damage to its stones, but for its people's lost opportunity (Luke 19:41–44).

He breaks cycles of violence, not by denial, but by love.

Living the Reconciliation He Calls Us To

We can't undo the Baghdad bombings or bring back the Palestinians of Deir Yassin. We can't resurrect Iraqi synagogues or Palestinian olive groves. But we can tell the whole story—with honesty, sorrow, and generosity.

Christ doesn’t ask us to choose sides in history. He asks us to choose Him.

We remember Iraqi Jews who were frightened by bombs thrust from their own. We remember Palestinians driven from home by force. And then—we stand under the Cross.

Not as victims or victors, but as survivors seeking healing.

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