Walking to Jerusalem: Endurance and Hope on a Pilgrimage from London to the Holy Land

by Justin Butcher

Overview

A moving and informative narrative of a six-month walk from London to Jerusalem on the centenary of the Balfour Declarations.

On the centenary of the Balfour Declaration, which was also the fiftieth anniversary of the since the Six-day War and the tenth anniversary of the Blockade of Gaza, Justin Butcher—along with ten other companions (and another hundred joining him at points along the way)—walked from London to Jerusalem as an act of solidarity, penance, and hope.

Weaving in history of the Holy Land as he moves across Europe, from Balfour and Christian Zionism, to colonialism and Jerusalem Syndrome, from desert spirituality to the lives of his fellow travelers, Walking to Jerusalem is a chronicle of serendipity, the hilarious, the infuriating, and, occasionally, an encounter with the divine.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781643132112
Publisher:	Pegasus Books
Publication date:	09/03/2019
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	1,053,940
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

Justin Butcher attended Oxford University and then trained at the Drama Studio London. He has worked all over the world as actor, writer, director and musician and has worked extensively as creative consultant in the business, government and voluntary sectors, across the U.K. and Europe, Russia, the Middle East and Africa.

Table of Contents

Foreword xiii

1 First Steps 1

2 Preamble 17

3 Esprit de Corps 37

4 Au Chemin de la Guerre 55

5 Champagne Trail 73

6 À Piedmont à Pied 91

7 Aut viam inveniam aut faciam 105

8 Balkanisation 127

9 Refugee Road 151

10 Walking Turkey 175

11 Crossing Jordan 199

12 Jerusalem Syndrome 225

Epilogue 283

Acknowledgements 286

Notes 289

Index 293

Editorial Reviews

09/02/2019

As this rambling memoir recounts, after witnessing the aftermath of Israeli demolition of a Palestinian home near Bethlehem, writer, director, producer, actor, and musician Butcher led a group pilgrimage from Britain to Jerusalem “in penance and solidarity” with the Palestinian people. In June 2017, he gathered a “crowd of forty-odd adventurers, all ages from 18 to 80, from every walk of life and every nation” in Trafalgar Square to begin their march. Only 10 ended up making the entire journey, but even the diehards don’t emerge as distinct or memorable personalities. Butcher’s description of the pilgrimage is both incongruously self-focused—graphic descriptions of the toll the walking took on his feet are mingled with offhand references to the death of a relative—and at odds with his stated goals: given the sympathy he hopes to engender for Palestinians living in squalid conditions, details of the fancy food consumed en route may rub readers the wrong way. Butcher also assumes a level of knowledge about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that not every reader will have, and glosses over salient information about Iranian-Israeli relations, the First Intifada, and the opposition within American and Israeli Jewry to the continued occupation of the West Bank. The end result is more travelogue than a serious attempt to focus world attention on a neglected human rights issue. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

"As an Israeli who campaigns for equal rights, I found in Justin's compelling account a clear sense that peace based on justice and equality is no pipe dream but a real possibility in my tortured land. With Justin as a guide, all of us can begin to walk the walk."

Jeff Halper

"A must-read for everyone who yearns for peace in Palestine."

David Suchet

"Butcher relights the flames of hope in our age of hopelessness."

Yasmin Alibhai-Brown

★ 2019-06-23
A pilgrimage to Palestine brings a message of compassion and understanding.

Actor, director, and musician Butcher makes an impressive literary debut with a vibrant, moving chronicle of a five-month, 3,300-kilometer journey from London to Jerusalem to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, the 50th anniversary of Israel's military occupation of Palestine, and the 10th anniversary of Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip. Sponsored by Amos Trust, a London-based human rights organization, "A Just Walk to Jerusalem" began in June 2017 with the goal of expressing solidarity with the Palestinian people and to counter Theresa May's public endorsement of the Balfour Declaration, which, Amos Trust asserts, "precipitated a century of dispossession, conflict and suffering." The walk attracted some 40 participants of all ages, religious backgrounds, and nationalities, all eager to make the historic pilgrimage to protest injustice and stand for equal rights. For much of the book, Butcher recounts, in lyrical, radiant prose, sights and sounds, triumphs and discomforts as the group slogged on, blistered and sweaty, across France, Switzerland, Italy, Albania, Macedonia, Greece, Turkey, Jordan, Egypt, and finally into Palestine. Here, for example, he conveys the thrill of witnessing a lightning storm from the deck of a ferry in Ancona: "Brilliant glimmers fleeting across the sky, now and then concentrated with intense radiance in soiling forks, now diffused in yellow splashes spilling behind, along and through the clouds." On the moors in Greece, he records "a magical potpourri of sounds—tinkling goat bells and dogs woofing, bees buzzing, cicadas trilling and the silvery sliver of wrens and thrushes singing." The author's purpose, though, is far more consequential than to create a travel narrative: "A Just Walk" bore witness to a century of oppression. Welcomed warmly in Palestine, Butcher talked with residents whose lives had been cruelly circumscribed by Israeli settlements, who lost their homes, who were cut off from water and medicine, whose children were shot by Israeli soldiers—and who still harbored hope for peace and goodwill.

An urgent and impassioned plea for justice in the Middle East.

Kirkus Reviews