It is Sunday, so we might as well check out what sort of inane and offensive political activism the church is up to, and it appears Israel bashing remains the topic du jour:
One by one, mainline Protestant denominations with close ties to the Holy Land are taking controversial steps aimed at influencing the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
While the churches have engaged in Middle East issues for decades, the decision of some to begin using economic leverage to press for an end to the Israeli occupation has roiled the US Jewish community and some within their own church ranks. The initiative to consider divestment began with a vote by Presbyterians last year, but has been gathering momentum as various churches debate the issue in national conventions.
On Friday, the Presbyterian Church USA reignited concerns when its investment committee named five US corporations it intends to push to reform their practices. The effort could eventually lead to divesting from the church’s $8 million portfolio.
The committee said the firms contribute to the ongoing conflict through support for the Israeli occupation and settlements, construction of the separation barrier on the West Bank, or facilitating violent acts against civilians.
“This is not an immediate divestment, nor a blanket divestment against Israel as a whole – I hope that gets heard,” says the Rev. Marthame Sanders, a Presbyterian spokesman.
No doubt the leadership of the Disciples of Christ will quickly fall in line. And it is important to remember it is mostly just the leadership:
Rabbi Cooper said the Protestant churches were ignoring the current “reality on the ground” – that Israel is preparing to withdraw this month from Gaza and remove settlements there. “Instead of divesting, these churches should be investing,” he said. “There is so much humanitarian need on the ground in the Holy Land. We’re not telling them: ‘Stay out of it. It’s not your business.’ There’s a ton of work to be done.”
He called the churches’ actions “functionally anti-Semitic.” But he said that after attending the conventions of the United Church of Christ and the Disciples of Christ this year, he concluded that the resolutions were being “rammed through” by denominational leaders and were not reflective of the churches’ grassroots membership.
Here is the latest press release from the DoC:
The 2005 General Assembly called upon Israel to tear down the barrier fence it is building across Palestinian territory to shield itself against terrorist attacks. Assembly representatives approved the resolution first by majority voice vote and then by standing. The amended resolution 0522, was entitled, “Breaking Down the Dividing Wall.”
The resolution calls upon the Israeli government to cease the project to construct the barrier, tear down the segments that have already been constructed, and make reparations to those who have lost property and homes among other things. The resolution also calls upon the U.S. government to engage actively, fully, and fairly in a peace process that will lead to the peaceful coexistence of both Israel and a Palestinian state.
The amended resolution can be found here. I love it that the DoC leadership now is releasing statements that read like International A.N.S.W.E.R. or Indymedia wet dreams. Really, it makes me proud.
To give them a piece of your mind, go here for the congregation locater or here to send the nationals a message.
KC
Hey, it’s what they want to do. There’s also the otherside too, the fundamentalist Robertson side, that seems to want to do everything it can to encourage a war. When I was in my fundy years, there were plenty of people I knew that seemed to want Isreal to build a new temple on the temple mount. Despite the fact that the mount is now a holy shrine for muslims, they wanted a new temple rebuilt to fulfill one of the first signs of the second coming. After all, the sooner Jesus returns, the better off the world will be.
rilkefan
It’s happy-to-be-an-atheist day for me. Course given the way people abuse religion, most every day is happy-to-be-an-atheist day.
Andrew Reeves
The thing about the “mainline” churches is that no one but unbelievers take them seriously since pews are empty and their clergy do not believe.OTOH, the Evangelical approach of “Jews go to Hell upon dying but in the mean time have carte blanche to kill Arabs since they’re the Chosen People” is a bit more disturbing.
The Disenfranchised Voter
Hey John, care to explain how Presbyterian Church USA’s actions are equivalent to Israel bashing? I am specifically talking about Presbyterian Church USA’s comments, not the others.
Everything they claim here:
…is true. I find it hard to believe that speaking the truth about this matter is equivalent to Israel-bashing.
Then again, there have been times that you have labelled legitimate criticism of Bush, “Bush-bashing”; so I guess this shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise.
Israel is on the same level of the Palestineans. They both have committed horrible acts; they both are guilty. The fact that we blindly support Israel is ridiculous. We need to take a more neutral stance in this matter, as Clinton started to do, but then Bush fucked that one up too when he came into office.
See? Legitimate criticism, not “bashing”. The truth hurts sometimes.
JPS
The Disenfranchised Voter:
“Israel is on the same level of the Palestineans. They both have committed horrible acts; they both are guilty.”
Can’t remember who said it, but here’s the difference: If the Palestinians lay down their arms, they’ll get peace, their own state, and lots of foreign aid to make that state work. If the Israelis lay down their arms, they’ll all be killed.
Oh, and one further difference, one that matters a great deal to me: On September 11, the Israelis lowered their flags to half-mast. Palestinians danced in the streets and handed out candy to their kids. And no, I don’t “have to understand”, as some have tried to tell me, why our support of Israel justifies their celebrations.
smijer
Curiosity… are you (John) DoC? Don’t answer if you don’t like sharing that kind of info… it just seemed like your beef with their leadership sounded like it was coming from a p.o.’d parishioner…
SoCalJustice
We don’t blindly support Israel.
We do support them as our allies, though.
USAID has given billions of dollars to the Palestinians, and we frequently look the other way as incitement in the Palestinian Authority’s controlled media, schools and mosques continues unabated.
The US State Department frequently speaks out against Israeli policies.
Not sure how that is “blind” support for the Israelis. Obviously we support one side more than the other, that’s not the same as “blind” support.
BoDiddly
Ok, guys . . . time to draw the line. Anyone that does just a miniscule amount of googling on PCUSA knows that it is wildly liberal on everything from universalism to denying a historical Christ. It is horribly misleading and inaccurate to portray them as representing “mainstream Christians.”
For pete’s sake, these idiots actually opened a singles bar downstairs in an Atlanta church several years back!
I know this isn’t a “Christian-friendly” blog, by any stretch, but don’t stoop to the same brand of generalizations as the morons over at DU. Most Christians, for one reason or another, support Israel’s desire to not be decimated, and believe that the US is doing the right thing by keeping them as an ally.
stickler
The Palestinians are citizens of which sovereign state? Which state’s military forces occupy their land? Do they have a choice about this?
Who chose to build settlements in the West Bank? On whose land? Did the farmers and herders and city-dwellers whose land was chosen for these settlements get paid for that land? Did they get to refuse, or the chance to appeal to a higher court? (You think the Kelo decision is outrageous? Look at the farmers of Bethlehem and what’s been done to them.)
Where is the wall being built — on Israel’s territory pre-1967? No? Why not?
How does a Christian or Muslim Arab travel from Nazareth to visit his/her cousin in Jerusalem? Look at a map, with military checkpoints, and do a time-distance calculation.
Is this just?
stickler
And on this mishmash:
I know this isn’t a “Christian-friendly” blog, by any stretch, but don’t stoop to the same brand of generalizations as the morons over at DU. Most Christians, for one reason or another, support Israel’s desire to not be decimated, and believe that the US is doing the right thing by keeping them as an ally.
Well, of course almost all Christians worthy of the name support Israel’s desire not to be decimated. It’s Israel’s desire to dominate the West Bank, Gaza, and the 20% of its own population who are Christian or Muslim that all add up to serious problems for Christians.
Christian Arabs — who became Christian, in many cases, at Pentecost! — have suffered considerable wrongs at the hands of the state of Israel. They have essentially no property rights. They have no real civil rights. They are occupied by a foreign military power.
Should people who call themselves Christian just ignore this? Should they just shut up because Israel is such a great ally? Is that silence in the face of injustice Biblically supported?
Andrew J. Lazarus
Stickler, FYI, a until 2000, Christian Arab visiting a relative in Jerusalem would have driven down Route 60 via Afula, Nablus, and Ramallah. There were all of two checkpoints on that road, one south of Afula at the entrance to the Occupied Territories, and one just north of Jerusalem at the exit. An Israeli Arab citizen would have been unlikely to have encountered anything more significant than an ID check at either one.
That wouldn’t be true any more, but I’d say that has more to do with the intifada than Israel’s settlement program, loathsome as it is. (Indeed, the highways that traverse major Palestinian cities are now ironically usually off limits to all Israelis, including Jews, except to the extent that the residents of the open-air insane asyla called settlements need them for their own access.)
I think you’re confusing the status of Palestinians in the Occupied Territories with Israeli Arab citizens. The citizens’ civil rights situation isn’t great, but “no property rights” and “no civil rights” is wildly exaggerated. And you’ve inadvertantly hit rather near the mark that behind the Christian churches’ —and this goes double for many Orthodox Churches and the Roman Catholics prior to JPII—sympathy for Palestinians seemed tinged with a theological resentment that Nazareth and Jerusalem had fallen back into the hands of the Jews. I don’t think that’s what motivates the US Protestant Churches; they’re more into White Man’s Guilt Trip Burden, but it’s not an unknown phenomenon.
stickler
Andrew:
I think you’re confusing the status of Palestinians in the Occupied Territories with Israeli Arab citizens.
No, I was perhaps too sloppy in my writing. Mostly I am, like many mainline Protestants, upset at how my co-religionists are being treated by the state of Israel in the Occupied Territories. I did not mean to conflate the issues faced by Israeli Arab citizens with those Arabs living under occupation.
But this seems strange:
And you’ve inadvertantly hit rather near the mark that behind the Christian churches’ —and this goes double for many Orthodox Churches and the Roman Catholics prior to JPII—sympathy for Palestinians seemed tinged with a theological resentment that Nazareth and Jerusalem had fallen back into the hands of the Jews. I don’t think that’s what motivates the US Protestant Churches; they’re more into White Man’s Guilt Trip Burden, but it’s not an unknown phenomenon.
Seems? Tinged? I’m not quite sure what you mean, since I’m neither Orthodox nor Catholic, but your comment seems unduly mean-spirited. Who objects to Jews living in the land of the Old Testament? I’m not sure.
But the White Man’s Guilt crap is just uncalled-for. My church, the ELCA (Evangelical Lutheran Church in America) has mission churches, hospitals, and a few thousand Arab members, mostly in east Jerusalem and the West Bank, and they are subjected to very objectionable treatment by the state of Israel. Here is one example, from 2003:
http://www.holyland-lutherans.org/newsletters/march2003.htm
Wingnut jihadi imams are, obviously, making things much worse, as are suicide bombers of every stripe. Blowing up Israeli buses is horrific and helps nobody. But the Israeli occupation is the elephant in the room.
As a US taxpayer, I’m supporting ONE of the parties in this mess.
rilkefan
Anybody interested in this topic should read the cover article in the current Atlantic Monthly, “How Yasir Arafat destroyed Palestine”. It’s amazing how many Palestinian leaders are willing to admit on record that they could have had a successful state at peace with Israel if they hadn’t been led by a vainglorious terror-supporting crook.
I’m looking forward to the day Israel gets out of Gaza because I’m eager to hear people like the DoC leadership praise Sharon.
stickler
Rilkefan:
I’m looking forward to the day Israel gets out of Gaza because I’m eager to hear people like the DoC leadership praise Sharon.
What if Sharon so mismanages the Gaza pullout (through unforseen circumstances, I’m sure!) that any kind of pullout from the West Bank seems impossible?
Hm?
Stay tuned for the next couple weeks. Real cynics may want to tote up the number of Palestinian dead vs. the number of Israelis arrested. Should be fun!
SoCalJustice
Not that anyone ever changes their position on this issue but…
Stickler,
It’s not like the border between Israel and the West Bank can be likened to the border between Ohio and Kentucky.
There is a war going on, and there has been one for decades.
After that argument, pro-Palestinian types will often counter that they’re fine with Israel buidling a security fence, as long as it’s on the Green Line.
Well, this is a battle on several fronts, and Israel is still looking for Palestinians to give up many of their intransigent positions. They’re already giving up Gaza for nothing in return, they don’t want to give up everything without even a paper promise that there will be a legitimate and actual cessation of hostilities from the Palestinian side. They don’t want to pull up stakes only to still be constantly attacked with no accountability regime on the other side whatsoever.
It’s very easy to pretend that the Israelis might as well be living in Delaware, with the Palestinians in New Jersey – but that’s not the case.
The Palestinians have shown no desire OR ability to stop their terrorists from killing Israeli civilians. They are still actively encouraging “martyrdom” operations.
Of course more Palestinians have died in the Intifada than Israelis, that’s what happens when you keep attacking the stronger military country – but it surely hasn’t lessened the Palestinian desire to kill the “Zionists.”
AS for your “prediction,” it seems remarkably similar to the pro-Palestinian professors who signed a letter on the eve of the Iraq war pre-complaining about all the ethnic cleansing of Arabs that was going to take place under the cover of the Iraq war. Didn’t happen, but that didn’t stop the shameless demonizing that goes on from “well-meaning,” “leftists.”
No mention in your “prediction,” that Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Al-Aqsa Martyr’s brigade will be shooting at the settler and IDF who are leaving Gaza.
And yes, Palestinians – Christian and otherwise – have suffered during the Intifada. You know, it’s called the Intifada (as opposed to “the crackdown”) because the Palestinians started it.
The problem is that this is another case of “well-meaning, leftists Christians” only blaming one side.
Whatever.
Richard Aubrey
I’m an elder in the PCUSA.
They have been on the wrong side of just about anything you can name, from the Cold War onwards.
The leadership is morally bankrupt, dishonest, and corrupt.
The pewdwellers pay no attention to the head shed, which is good and bad.
The PCUSA’s view of Israel, that it is the villain in this piece is crazy.
Conservatives, like me, have tried to put real atrocities in front of the leadership–see Zimbabwe for the latest attempt–to no avail.
The latest theory is that bashing Israel is a proxy for bashing America, something the PCUSA liked to do for decades.
To think the occupation is the cause of the trouble is dishonest.
Everybody knows, including the people who make the claim, that Israel was under mortal threat, including attacks and wars, before the occupation. The occupation is only an excuse, and when it’s gone, the anti-Semites in the mainline denominations will call up their buddies in the terrorist movements and ask for the name of the next excuse.
Bastards.
The PA has said that nothing will be solved until they own all of Jerusalem.
Forget trying to make this Israel’s fault. Nobody is so stupid as to honestly believe it.
goonie bird
We did,nt come from a ape and darwin was wrong despite the BS you get from NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC and DISCOVER theres no proof to support evolution but there is intelligent design becuase god is intellegent