delivered June 27, 2014
The national leadership of the Presbyterian Church has done a grave disservice to themselves and their church by endorsing a resolution to divest from three companies on the “hit list” of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanction movement, known as “BDS.” The BDS movement claims that these companies aid in the destruction of Palestinian lives and property by virtue of Israel’s use of them.
The church’s Israel Palestine Mission Network is further propagating an anti-Jewish, anti-Zionist, and anti-Israel manifesto“Zionism Unsettled” that was only removed two hours ago from the the church’s national publishing website. It has been available since January of this year.
From its description and marketing “Zionism Unsettled” appears to have all the subtlety of a modern-day Henry Ford. In other words, none at all. It is a document that inflames an incredibly delicate situation in the region and in the diaspora.
With issues remaining overwhelmingly complex, complicated, and challenging, the Presbyterian General Assembly, in its recent meeting in Detroit, passed a binding resolution 50.5% to 49.5% calling for divestment in these three companies they believe aid the Israeli government’s efforts to maintain Israel’s security: Caterpillar, HP, and Motorola. BDS has said that Caterpillar is a target for boycott because of the involvement in the Rachel Corrie incident some years back, even though the Caterpillar equipment was provided to Israel by the US government. Hewlett-Packard was also targeted with the claim that it sells software that the Israeli navy uses to enforce the Gaza blockade. In fact, HP’s software is used for back office computing needs.
This is the third time in recent years that this resolution has come to a vote, and the first time it has passed the Presbyterian’s lay-led General Assembly. Each time it arises it has consumed infinite amounts of time, only to rear its ugly head again and again. Given that the Presbyterians are lay-led, there are no bishops to mediate denominational disputes. This BDS resolution went to the floor unfiltered by ecclesiastical consideration.
The Presbyterian General Assembly has now given the BDS movement a “successful result”--but at great, great cost.
The Presbyterians’ action is actively hurting relationships between Jewish communities and Presbyterians. The divestment resolution does little to foster demonstrative change in the conundrum of the Middle East, nor does it foster positive relationships with the Jewish world.
It is also a slap in the face to those in the Jewish community who have and will continue to work assiduously with colleagues of other faith traditions to alleviate suffering, Palestinian and Jewish.
Three of the main individuals who worked at the Presbyterian General Assembly to ensure a “no” vote were on a call this past Wednesday. Since they were in Detroit, I would like to share their insights with you.
Ethan Felson, Vice President and General Counsel of the Jewish Center for Public Affairs said, “You could spin what PCUSA did because the words are not in the resolution; you can also kick someone in the shins and call it a love-tap, but it is still a kick in the shins.”
Felson said that from the Durban Conference in 2004 BDS has continued to pursue its insidious course. Within PCUSA the Israel Palestine Mission Network is a member of the BDS movement.
“What happened afterward,” Felson said, “was a victory lap by the BDS movement; this was born of and processed as of the BDS movement. I wish there was nuanced BDS; if there is, this certainly wasn’t it. This was BDS, pouring syrup on it, to get to 50 and one-half point percent to pass it.
“If PCUSA had been involved in responsible peacemaking they could have availed themselves of an offer to meet with the Prime Minister of Israel. But the Presbyterian church is so far away from being that kind of partner for peacemaking that this option had to be concretized for them. It was a situation where they were out on their own. The fact that it was concretized for them; unfortunately a majority of them went down the wrong path.”
The Rev. Dr. Katharine Henderson, president of the progressive Auburn Theological Seminary, an organization that enjoys a superb relationship with the Jewish community, and is herself a Presbyterian minister, expressed her “deep pain that my denomination is causing to the Jewish community right now. We at Auburn have been working to fight divestment in the last two GA’s and now the third one last week we did not prevail. A number of factors happened last week including a growing and deep concern for Palestinians, particularly Christian Palestinians. Many Presbyterians have taken trips to Israel and the West Bank and depending on who you talk to and which narratives you hear it influences their perceptions and analysis of the situation. Presbyterians are very connected for Palestinian Christians and their narrative. There is an imbalance created through these trips.
“In this particular situation we are at the table with parts of our church that were very upset. . .the alliance of the Israel Palestine Mission Network, the pro-Palestinian lobby in the church and the Jewish Voice for Peace has become very strong; it is represented in the “Zionism Unsettled” document; coupled with the pro-divestment leadership at the national level of the church that has been supportive of divestment for a long time. The GA delegates also empowered a small Jewish organization known as “Jewish Voice for Peace” that supports BDS, giving them a primary seat at the table to the exclusion of other Jewish voices.
“The church is now divided over this issue; what we are going to see is what is even more division as this news filters down to local communities and people in the pews will produce a backlash,” she said.
Rabbi Rick Jacobs, the president of the Union for Reform Judaism, said his experience in Detroit was “an uphill climb all the way. All we were doing was to ask the church to say no to their BDS resolution--not to refrain from weighing in in a potentially productive manner.
“That was not enough. The idea of inviting Gradye Parsons (the elected stated clerk of PCUSA) to join Rabbi Jacobs in Jerusalem to meet with the Prime Minister was something the church never considered. The playing field was never ever level. The time in committee arguing for BDS outweighed the words of opposition. Jewish Voice for Peace represent a minuscule part of the Jewish community, yet, were given complete access at the GA and to the leadership of the church. Jewish Voice for Peace presented themselves as a mainstream voice, which is a misrepresentation of the truth."
JCPA’s Felson noted: “There is a national versus local issue and the disconnect is wide. There is a lot of anger out there. None of us (in the Jewish community) are now in dialogue with PCUSA. In many ways the Presbyterian Church has walked away from the Jewish community and come together with Jewish Voice for Peace. It has not come to its reconciliation place, its Nostra Aetate moment said that we should understand others as we understand ourselves (this was the innovation of Pope John 23rd who abandoned theological belief that Jews were responsible for Jesus’s demise and other theological issues that had ruptured Catholic/Jewish relationships for two millennia)."
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So another difficult issue for Jews to wrestle with, one in a long line of problems that affect the Jewish national home.
We can only hope that the Presbyterians one day come to their senses, to work toward constructive relationships with their Jewish brothers and sisters.
Until that time comes, they have put a wrench into that relationship. And given BDS a perceived victory that will ricochet through the world of propaganda while Israel continues to secure herself from all sides.
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