peacefare.net

Happy anniversary!

Today marks the first anniversary of www.peacefare.net, more or less.  Listen carefully to NPR, where a day sponsorship will mark the occasion!  Here are the stats, as of this morning:

• Posts:  this is number 562, not counting those I put up as “pages”
• Visits:  Googleanalytics says 31,304
• Page views:  59,931
• Unique visitors:  16,790
• Countries of origin:  149
• Visitors from the U.S.:  56%, hence 44% non-U.S. (most from Serbia, Kosovo, Italy, Bosnia, UK, Canada, Germany, France, Sweden, Poland)
• New visits:  53%
• Pages per visit:  about 2
• Minutes on site:  about 2

I put all this in the so far, so good category.  I might wish for more, but even if the numbers were double I’d likely still wish for more.  And that high percentage of new visitors means peacefare is still growing, as do the 1200 or so Twitter followers, with 2-5 added most days.

The one clear area needing improvement is getting other people to write for the peacefare.net  I’ve had a few fabulous friends, students and colleagues contribute wonderful pieces, but not as many as I would like.  Peacefare is too much a solo act, something I regret.  Please help me fix that!

I would also hope for more comments.  My Balkans readers have engaged in rough and tumble debate, rarely moderated by my intervention.  The Middle East hasn’t yet elicited the same feistiness.  I wish it would.

Please accept my sincere thanks for your readership, which is really the only reason I do this almost every day.  I could just as well tuck these thoughts away, as I did during more than four decades of diplomatic career at the UN, State Department and U.S. Institute of Peace.  It is much more fun to get them out to you, so I sincerely hope you’ll keep reading, commenting and contributing when the spirit moves you.

On to year 2!

Boren graduate fellowships

Eid Mubarak!

Tomorrow evening begins Eid al-Adha, the Muslim feast of the sacrifice, commemorating Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice his son, as commanded by God. So I’ve spent a bit of time refreshing my familiarity with this tale in the Bible and the Qur’an.

Abraham is where Judaism, Christianity and Islam intersect. The “Abrahamic” religions all share a commitment to monotheism and this (to me horrifying) story of supreme faith.

But the story is not identical in all three religions.  The five books of Moses (Torah, Old Testament to Christians) say Abraham was prepared to sacrifice his son Isaac, son of Sarah.  The Qur’an says it was Ishmael, son of Hagar, whom Abraham was prepared to sacrifice.  The Christians follow the Old Testament version, which has an obvious parallel in the story of Christ–son of God–and his death on the cross.

There is a seldom remembered coda as well, according to the Torah:  Abraham’s “sons Isaac and Ishmael buried him in the cave of Machpelah,” which today is in Hebron (Tomb of the Patriarchs to Jews and the Sanctuary of Abraham to Muslims).  In the Qur’an, too, Ishmael and Isaac are mentioned repeatedly in the same breath.

I like to think there is nothing that would get me to sacrifice one of my two sons, and certainly not some voice inside my head. Apologies to the devout among us, but Abraham would be a nut case in the modern world.

This coda is worth remembering though:  it implies reconciliation of Isaac and Ishmael, with obvious parallels in modern times between Jews and Arabs, who regard themselves as descendants of the two sons of Abraham by different mothers.  Unlikely as it seems, that is something worth having faith in.

Eid Mubarak!

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Winner of the 3-minute, six-line film competition, Tell It Your Way, and worth every second:

Healthier and wealthier, maybe not wiser

This may seem off the topic of war and peace to some, but it really isn’t.  It demonstrates phenomenal progress, and the Swedish optimist who presents it does a fine job.

The question is whether we are wise enough to keep it up. Or will we suffer another one of those big dips associated with war?