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A delegation from the WCC attended the 12th World Social Forum in Montreal, Canada, which concluded on 14 August. More than 30,000 participants from around the world gathered to discuss global issues based on their local experiences, network with others working on similar problems, and create new joint initiatives advancing a progressive path forward.

Every morning a cheerful and articulate man arrives at his office in East Jerusalem with at least a grain of hope. Dr Bernard Sabella has devoted his entire life to the rights of the Palestinian people. In his job as the executive director of Department of Services to Palestinian Refugees, he encounters issues concerning the Palestinian-Israeli relationship daily.

For Ramzi Zananiri, executive director of Jerusalem and the West bank at the Department of Service to Palestinian Refugees, which is part of the Middle East Council of Churches, the current situation in the Holy Land is "heart-breaking", and he says the Palestinians are "hostages" under troublesome realities.

War, ethnic conflict, millions of refugees and a deteriorating humanitarian situation provide a bleak background for discussion of the Middle East.

For Hind Khoury the issue of water justice is quite simple. She believes there is no water justice in Palestine because access to clean water for drinking and sanitation exists in Israel but not in the Palestinian territories it occupies.

When Palestinian Bishop Munib Younan talks about the thirst, he links it with a quest for justice in both Palestine and Israel.

The WCC’s Seven Weeks for Water Lenten campaign through its ecumenical initiative — Ecumenical Water Network — has gained much attention recently, but the campaign is not new.

A water crisis for Palestinian people was highlighted by the general secretary of the WCC, Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit, at the launch of the Seven Weeks for Water campaign in Jerusalem.

Addressing a Council for World Mission Theological Colloquium in the Palestinian city of Bethlehem, the head of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land and president of the Lutheran World Federation affirmed the “need of a spirituality that helps us remain steadfast, that gives us the courage to act not with hatred and revenge, but in the pursuit of peace based on justice”.

Tackling the tragedy of hunger in a world of abundance, the Churches’ Week of Action on Food (11-18 October) is an opportunity for Christians, communities and all people around the world to act together for food justice.

Affordability of water and sanitation as a human right were deliberated at a side-event during the 30th Session of the Human Rights Council at the United Nations Office in Geneva, Switzerland.

Ecumenical efforts led by the WCC continue to encourage peace in Ukraine, where a fragile cease-fire is daily tested by violence in the eastern part of the country.