Identity, occupation and Fractured Peace

Bishop Justin Duckworth with Fr David Neuhaus SJ

In a region too often reduced to headlines and heat maps, Fr. David Neuhaus offers something far rarer: a life lived in the tension.

Born in 1962 to Jewish German refugee heritage and raised in apartheid‑era South Africa, Fr. David arrived in Jerusalem as a teenager and fell in love with a city pulsing with diversity. He learned Arabic to speak without intermediaries, read the Qur’an with his closest friend, and became an adopted son in a Palestinian Muslim family. Years later, as a Jesuit priest, he taught in Egypt and returned to Jerusalem with a conviction that faith, language, and friendship can open doors that politics keeps slamming shut.

In this conversation with Bishop Justin Duckworth, Fr. David lays out a timeline of the conflict. He points to 1917, the post‑Holocaust reconfiguration of the land in 1947–48, and the 1967 occupation of the remaining territories as milestones that shaped today’s reality. He challenges the very phrase “peace process,” suggesting what many witness on the ground feels less like peace and more like a piece‑by‑piece dismantling of Palestinian life. The aftermath of October 7, he says, brought relentless devastation to Gaza and a sharp deterioration in the West Bank, where land confiscations and settler violence compound daily insecurity.

Fr. David speaks as someone who loves the Hebrew language and Israeli culture, who prays and teaches within the Christian community, and who breaks bread with a Palestinian family that welcomed him as their own. He invites viewers to consider how identity can hold complexity without collapsing into cynicism — how one can tell the truth about suffering while refusing to dehumanize.

In part two, Fr. David unpacks Christian Zionism and its impact — exploring how theology shapes policy and people, and what that means for Christians seeking a faithful response today.