In her recent book, Walking Where Jesus Walked: American Christians and Holy Land Pilgrimage, Hillary Kaell explores how American Christians think of the land of Israel, what motivates them to go there, and what they find when they get there. Listen to her discuss her book. (Interview by Kristian Petersen; audio, about 20 minutes.)

https://soundcloud.com/marginalia/first-impressions-43-hillary-kaell/s-MaZDU

Commenting on the wave of anti-Hamas demonstrations in the Gaza Strip, Seth Mandel writes:

Gazans have not have been fully honest in public. There’s a reason for that. To take just one example, Amin Abed was nearly beaten to death with hammers for criticizing Hamas. Abed was saved by bystanders, so presumably the intention was to finish him off. During the cease-fire, Hamas members bragged about executing “collaborators” and filmed themselves shooting civilians.

Which is what makes yesterday’s protests all the more significant. To protest Hamas in public is to take one’s life in one’s hands. That is especially true because the protests were bound to be filmed, in order to get the message out to the world. The reason the world needs to hear that message is that Westerners have been Hamas’s willing propaganda tools. The protests on campus are not “pro-Palestinian,” they are pro-Hamas—and the people of Gaza are Hamas’s victims.