Peace, Love and Palestinian Beer

This post was going to be titled "Is Everyone Insane?" However, I came across a story of hope in the Middle East which makes me believe that all is not lost.

First the insanity. I have written about why the people who want to block the Manhattan mosque are not good Americans. I did not write about the idiot in Florida who wanted to burn the Quran, mostly because I thought he was getting way too much attention as it was.

However, just when you want to get on your high horse and accuse Americans of being hypocrites who hate the First Amendment and anyone who does not look exactly like them, you come across a story (or in this case, a whole bunch of them), which makes you appreciate that a group of peacefully demonstrating hypocrites is much better than really angry fanatics.

For me, the proposed Quran burning was a non-story. An insignificant pastor got a lot of press by threatening to burn the Quran, but backed down after God, President Obama and a bunch of generals told him not to.

However, the reaction in the Muslim world was much less begnign. Despite the fact that the Quran burning never occurred, we have the following stories from Afghanistan, Pakistan and India:

--In Afghanistan, crowds shouted "Death to America" and injured eleven
--In India, two Christian schools and a Christian church were burned and two other Christian schools were attacked
--In Pakistan, a grenade exploded in a Lutheran church.

If this is how radical Islamists react to a proposed desecration of their holy book, image what the reaction would be to a real provocation?

However, the news is not all bad. In a Christian town within the Palestinian West Bank under Israeli occupation, Christians, Jews and Muslims came together to celebrate Oktoberfest and drink Palestinian beer. You can read about it here. The following quote really sums it up for me:

"Normally I go to demonstrations. It's nice to drink beer instead," said Ms. Natasha Dudinski, a 43-year-old Israeli from Jerusalem who, as a pro-Palestinian peace activist has attended weekly protests for years.

The basic tenor of the story is that enough security has returned to the area to where the different groups can gather in peace. The local Palestinian authorities were sensitive enough to their own constituencies to highlight the event as a celebration of Palestinian crafts and honey with a few thousand gallons of beer thrown in for good measure.

It is nice to see that somewhere in the world, actually in one of the most unstable areas in the world, people came together and acted sensibly. If it would help world peace, I would give up my own abstention from beer (based entirely on its carb content) and down a Palestinian Taybeh.