Two headlines screamed from the September 20 and September 27 issues of Roll Call, a Washington Capitol Hill daily paper read by Senators and Representatives:
"Israel Divestment Blasted" &
"Church Fires Back at Congress"

A lead article in last month's MennoLetter carried the headline, Israel Labeled an Apartheid State Presbyterians Under Attack by Zionists. Little did we expect that their next round of attacks would come in a letter from members of the US Congress, with a forceful Presbyterian rebuttal! Their lengthy letters have been sharply excerpted below for space reasons, and the paragraphs are not always consecutive, as indicated by"... " Our intent is to provide the reader with the essence of the debate. To read the full letters, go to www.cmep.org/Alerts/2004Sep28.htm

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September 13, 2004 letter from Congress representatives to the Presbyterian Church leadership:

The Reverend Dr. Clifton Kirkpatrick
Stated Clerk of the General Assembly
Presbyterian Church (USA)

Dear Reverend Kirkpatrick,

As Members of Congress from various faiths, we are terribly distressed about the resolution adopted at the 216th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA), which calls on the Church to divest from
certain companies doing business in Israel. In our view, this resolution and other associated resolutions and statements reflect a fundamental misunderstanding of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, contradict the
Church's stated commitment to "the secure existence of Israel and the Israeli people," and undermine the prospect of peace by emboldening those who seek to de-legitimize the State of Israel.

... Israel's decision to erect a security fence between Israel and the West Bank must be viewed against the backdrop of this horrific terrorist assault. It is truly "the fence that terrorism built." In its 'rationale' for the resolution on the security fence, the Church asserts that the barrier "decreases the security of Israel." In fact, the exact opposite is true. Since the fence was completed in the Northern West Bank section, no Palestinian terrorists have infiltrated Israel from Jenin and Tulkarm, the sources of many previous suicide bombers. A similar fence around Gaza has been nearly 10

... We disagree with your characterization of the conflict as "rooted in Israel's continued occupation of Palestinian territories." We believe the conflict is primarily rooted in the Palestinian leadership's refusal to accept Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state. Sadly, nothing else can adequately explain their unwillingness to provide a substantive counteroffer to the Israeli peace proposal at Camp David, not to mention the subsequent campaign of terrorism.

... We believe strongly that the efforts of the Church to divest from companies doing business in Israel thus penalizing Israel for acting in self-defense are irresponsible, counterproductive, and morally bankrupt. Rather than contributing to peace, this approach will only provide encouragement for those that seek to de-legitimize the very existence of the Jewish State.

... The resolution's blatant disregard for recent history, and its blatant disregard for the safety and security of the only democracy in the Middle East, leads us to only one conclusion: the Presbyterian Church has knowingly gone on record calling for jeopardizing the existence of the State of Israel.

We urge you in the strongest possible terms to rescind your resolution.

[Signed by 14 Democratic and Republican members of the Congress]

Reply of September 24, 2004 to the fourteen Members of the House
from PC-USA Stated Clerk, Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick:

I am in receipt of your letter indicating that you are "terribly distressed" by the action of the 216th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) seeking a just and peaceful resolution to the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. I very much regret your disappointment, but in all candor, must also communicate with you that I am terribly distressed in the failure of the US Congress to seek a peaceful resolution to this conflict that would both protect the right of Israel to live in peace with secure borders and the rights of the Palestinians to statehood and an end of the occupation of their territory. Perhaps if the US Congress had been more forthright in seeking such a just solution for Israel and Palestine, it would
not have been necessary for our General Assembly to take this further action to achieve our long term commitment for peace and well being for Israelis and Palestinians. Let me give you a bit of background on our church's stand.

... The decision made by the 216th General Assembly to initiate a process of phased, selective divestment from certain companies operating in Israel, which are profiting off the harming of innocent lives was not taken lightly. It was born out of the frustration that many of our members, as well as members of other denominations, feel with the current policies of Israel and those of our own government in regards to the Israel/Palestinian conflict.

... It has been very disappointing to us that the US Congress has not proven to be an ally or a balanced arbiter in the negotiations for peace in the region. While Congress has passed repeated statements against the Palestinian Authority, it has never passed a resolution condemning the continuous illegal construction of settlements in the West Bank. There has been nothing done by Congress to pressure Israel to adhere to international law. Rather, Israel has been encouraged by Congress to violate international law. The recent passage of House Resolution 713, which condemns the International Court of Justice and supports a wall
that is in blatant violation of international law, is one case in point.

... While the Israeli government claims it is building the "separation barrier" between Israel and the West Bank, only a small percent will be on the Green Line, Israel's 1967 border. The rest stretches into the West Bank, isolates huge amounts of land and affects the lives of many thousands of Palestinians. This year some 210,000 people will be economically and socially cut off from their neighborhoods. The route of the wall has been determined not by security, but by the political goals of maintaining the settlements and impacting future peace talks. (A wall built along the Green Line would be half the length of the current wall and much easier to patrol.)

... The current wall ghettoizes the Palestinians and forces them onto what can only be called reservations. A just and lasting peace will only be achieved when BOTH people are able to live within secure boarders.
A wall imposed by Israel on the Palestinians while maintaining the right to invade at anytime does not advance that goal.

... The fourth Geneva Convention details the responsibility that an occupying power has for the civilians under its control. However, Israel has refused to apply this to its occupied territories. Just recently, Prime Minister Sharon repudiated the Road Map and announced that the illegal settlements in the West Bank are there for the long term. Americans for Peace Now, a Jewish peace organization has documented the most recent moves to expand these settlements. Israeli Agriculture Minister Yisrael Katz has issued instructions to have 72,000 olive trees planted in huge areas of the West Bank near settlements for the settlers' exclusive use. He stated "This is seizing lands and preventing them from being turned over to Palestinians. That is how we will strengthen our hold on Judea and Samaria."

... I would welcome an opportunity for constructive dialogue between you and your colleagues. Once I receive word of your interest in pursuing this dialogue, I will ask my colleagues in the Presbyterian Washington Office to be in touch with your staff to make the necessary arrangements for our
conversation together on this most important concern for the well being of all the peoples in the Middle East.

Clifton Kirkpatrick
Stated Clerk of the General Assembly
—Excerpted from reports by Churches for Middle East Peace

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"We refused out of love for this place and for the people who live here and asked to do alternative service to contribute to the community."
Israeli Army Dismisses Five Conscientious Objectors from Service

The Israel Defense Forces has dismissed from service the five conscientious objectors who were released last week from the civilian prisons where they were serving their sentences. The five have served some two years in military and civilian prisons, including 10 months "open detention" in an army camp. The permanent dismissal from army service did not come as a complete surprise, as the committee that commuted their sentence also discussed bringing them before the IDF "unsuitability committee" to have them released from service, a position taken by two of the three military judges who sentenced them.

Although the objectors were described in a negative light by the military prosecutor during their trial, the committee particularly noted their potential to contribute to society, which they had done before they were taken into custody for refusing to be inducted, and continued to do during their incarceration, serving as tutors and helping other prisoners in various ways.

"We were in prison for almost two years because our moral belief prohibits us from being part of an army occupying another people and destroying Israeli society, and we come to Yom Kippur with a clean heart," Shimri Tzameret said on the eve of his release.

Said Matan Kaminer, "We refused out of love for this place and for the people who live here. All along the way, we asked to do alternative service to contribute in our own way to the community. With our release, we will work according to these principles."

Movement established in by Israeli officers and soldiers who
out of conscience refused to serve in the occupied territories.
'Courage to Refuse' Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize

The Courage to Refuse movement and one of its founders, Israel Defense Forces reserve Captain David Zonshein, have been nominated for the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize. Both were nominated as candidates for this year's prize by two former winners: 1996 prize winner Carlos Filipe Ximenes Belo, a bishop from East Timor who led the struggle against Indonesian rule, and 1992 winner Rigoberto Menchu, who struggled for native rights against an oppressive Guatemalan regime.

"Our candidacy is a victory for those who love Israel, and a victory for Zionist values and the Israeli spirit, which have championed an uncompromising battle defending the State of Israel alongside protecting human life, human rights and honor," Zonshein said.

"We see this as a victory for real Zionism, based on the principles of freedom, justice, and peace," said Courage to Refuse director, Arik Diamant.

"Particularly in these times, when the right-wing settlers announce their refusal to evacuate settlements, our candidacy marks a line between refusal to take part in actions that oppose Jewish and international law and ethics, and refusal of the settlers, whose sole purpose is the perpetuation of control over another nation," Diamant said.

Courage to Refuse was established in 2002 with the publication of a letter signed by 50 officers and soldiers who refused to serve in the territories and said they will defend Israel only from within its borders. The movement now numbers more than 600 reservists.

By Rabbi Arthur Waskow
"We helped to bring about a growing consensus both in Israel and abroad
that the home demolition policy was wrong."
Human Rights Rabbi Goes to Court

Months ago Rabbi Arik Ascherman, well known executive director of Rabbis for Human Rights in Israel [and frequent speaker for our Jerusalem Bat Kol programs and for incoming church and study groups] was arrested for twice nonviolently standing in the path of bulldozers that were about to demolish Palestinian homes homes of families who had not been accused or suspected of any involvement in terrorism, but had no permits for building. This is a news report excerpt

Permits are very rarely given Palestinian families, and in some cases are impossible to get because the Israeli government has refused to make any zoning regulations in Palestinian villages annexed by the Knesset into Jerusalem. Since there are no zones assigned to housing, the Israeli authorities then act as if no new homes can be built anywhere. Some homes are demolished despite Israeli court orders prohibiting their demolition. Now his court case has begun.

He said:

"Rabbis for Human Rights is a rabbinic Non-Government Organization working to promote the human rights of Israeli Jews, Israeli Arabs, Palestinians, and foreign workers alike. In 1993 RHR was awarded the Speaker of the Knesset's prize for our contributions to Israeli society. Since 1997, RHR has been active on the issue of homes demolished because their owners were not able to get permits.

"More than anything else, I am conscious of our Jewish tradition's teaching that we have no right to ask the Holy One of Blessing to judge us mercifully in the [heavenly]Yeshiva Shel Mala until our earthly courts and institutions establish justice here among us. In the Bible, law and justice are synonymous but not so in our world.

"Standing here on trial before your earthly court in the name of all the victims of home demolitions, I believe that it is in your power to unite justice and law. I didn't suddenly show up [in front of the bulldozers] on April 7th and May 26th 2003 with no knowledge about demolitions. Since 1997 I have experienced countless events connected to the demolishing of homes of families whose only crime was to want a roof over their head.

"I came to those places after having seen so clearly the enormity of the
injustice, and after working to change the demolition policy in court, in the Knesset and with the international community. I came to the places in question after we had helped to bring about a growing consensus both in Israel and abroad that the home demolition policy was wrong."

" authorities knew that there was a court order on the way to stay
the demolition and they hurried to destroy the home
before the order was delivered "

"[Since an earlier easing of demolitions for a time] I have experienced the policy reversal of recent years leading to an all time high in the number of demolitions in Jerusalem. I arrived at the two homes in question with the knowledge that there had been an increasing number of homes demolished in which authorities knew that there was a court order on the way to stay the demolition, and they hurried to destroy the home before the order was delivered or in which security forces prevented the home owners from delivering the order.

"For example, in Sur Baher, attorney Solan informed the Municipality and the police that he had obtained a last minute order. "Yaron," the supervisor of the demolition, refused to receive the order orally from the lawyer, from his own office, or even from the police officer on site in charge of the forces protecting the demolition. The home was partially demolished when the written order was delivered. Yaron then brought the Municipal Engineer to declare the home unsafe, and on that basis continued with the demolition."

" the policy was to use zoning regulations to prevent Palestinian building until such time as land could be expropriated to build Jewish neighborhoods."

"Clearly I did not arrive at the events which are the subject of this trial with much faith that those interested in carrying out demolitions were even respecting Israeli law. They certainly were not respecting international law, nor the Torah that I as a Rabbi swore to uphold. I must add that, if I thought I knew everything that there was to know about demolitions beforehand, even I have been surprised by what I have discovered in preparation for this trial. For example, I found minutes of city council meetings in which it was clearly stated that the policy was to use zoning regulations to prevent Palestinian building until such time as land could be expropriated to build Jewish neighborhoods."

[At this point Rabbi Ascherman enumerated a number of examples of personal and family abuse and suffering as a result of the demolitions] "I must state that I was surprised that your March decision rejecting our pre-trial motion was based, among other things, on the argument that we are not personally affected by these demolitions. Nobody with a heart beating in their chest can not be affected. Furthermore, the trial opened last January the week in which we celebrate the birthday of one of the great proponents of non-violent civil disobedience, Martin Luther King, Jr., who taught that 'Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.'

"That week we also marked the yartzeit (anniversary of death) in the Hebrew calendar and the birth date of one of the great Rabbis of our time, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel. He often said that "In a democracy a few are guilty, all are responsible.

"I am very deeply affected when the Torah which I am sworn as a Rabbi to uphold is being trampled on."
—in The Shalom Report

By Rabbi Michael Lerner
"We must understand that Palestinian violence, which causes so much bloodshed, is the predictable result of our cutting off every other road in front of them."
Arun Gandhi Promotes Grandfather’s Pacifism
“It’s not true that a demonstration is non-violent when its participants don’t use guns but ‘only’ throw rocks… It may be ‘less violent’ but it’s not non-violent.”

The recent formation of a non-violence campaign in Palestine, spurred by the visit of Arun Gandhi, the grandson of Mahatma Gandhi, has generated a fervent debate in both the Israeli and Palestinian peace movement about the relative efficacy of non-violence. I am afraid that Gandhi will not succeed either, because they lack the decisive argument. Half a year without suicide attacks inside Israel have not brought the Palestinians any achievements on the ground. So the suicide attack in Be’er Sheva, just a week after the Gandhi rally, was to be expected.

As long as the Sharon government, with the active encouragement of President Bush, goes on enlarging the settlements, building the Wall, and all the other actions of annexation, there is no way to convince Palestinian public opinion to turn its back on violence. And only a decisive change in Palestinian public opinion can put an end to suicide attacks. No wall will stop people who are ready to die in order to carry out attacks, and the Palestinians have already proved that they have any number of such people.

Former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak, a very violent person, once said that if he had been a young Palestinian, he would have joined a terrorist organization. Obviously, he doesn’t believe that non-violence will succeed against the Israeli army. And he should know. I was impressed by the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi. He was the greatest liberator of the 20th century, achieving freedom for the whole Indian subcontinent, including present-day Pakistan and Bangladesh. But Gandhi also said that Hitler should be opposed only by non-violent means, and even his most ardent admirers found it hard to accept that.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Journalist Uri Avneri comments, “In my youth I joined two very violent organizations—the Irgun [Israeli underground movement against the British pre-1948] and the Israeli army—but after I was wounded near the end of the 1948 war there were several months when the very thought of combat caused me physical nausea. I detest violence in all its forms, but how can it be stopped? There are people amongst us who are ready for a compromise peace but have been led to believe that ‘there is no one we can talk with’ because ‘they’ don’t want peace but seek to annihilate us.

“But we must understand that Palestinian violence, which causes so much bloodshed, is the predictable result of our cutting off every other road in front of them. I am convinced that it is possible to put an end to violence in our country—if we offer the Palestinian people an alternate, non-violent way of achieving freedom and justice. Anyone who believes that a wall will succeed in stopping suicide attacks might as well rely on the amulets of kabbalist Rabbis.”

A Response to the Violence/Non-Violence Debate

We have no sympathy with the side of the argument presented in favor of violent struggle against Israeli civilians. The pragmatic argument that is made, “We’ve tried non-violence and it has failed,” is completely false. It’s not true that a demonstration is non-violent when its participants don’t use guns but ‘only’ throw rocks at the IDF. It’s not non-violent when you do your best to land rocks on the heads of your opponent. It may be ‘less violent’ but it’s not non-violent. That Palestinians make this argument is a reflection of their failure to even understand what a non-violent movement would look like.

The strategic argument for non-violence goes like this: Every oppressor gets locked into their position as oppressor in part out of fear that should they remove their boot from the neck of the oppressed, the oppressed will jump up and do to the oppressor the same horrific things that they oppressor has done to the oppressed. If you want to get the oppressor to lift the boot, you must convince the oppressor that he/it/they will NOT face this reversal in which the oppressor becomes the oppressed. And that is no easy sales job, because understandably the oppressed have lots of anger, and that anger is felt by the oppressor who feels the need to strengthen their hold on the neck of the oppressed—for self-protection.

“But if conveying that message is the goal of the non-violence,
then the non-violence must be total and must be held in ways
that become credible to the oppressor.”

The major strategic goal of the oppressed, in this case, must be to convince the oppressor that the oppressed have been able to retain a sense of the humanity of the oppressor, and have decided not to return ‘eye-for-eye’ vengeance should they be in a position to do so. The commitment to non-violence is one of the most powerful ways to convey that message.

But if conveying that message is the goal of the non-violence, then the non-violence must be total and must be held in ways that become credible to the oppressor. It can’t be that 95% of your actions are non-violent, and only 5% violent, because those 5% who are violent may be the very ones who will use their violence to dominate the oppressed once they have been liberated, and to use the position of power that they achieve through violence to inflict terrible violence on the current oppressor.

So, if you want to convince the oppressor that you see their humanity and do not intend to do back to them the horrible crimes they did to you, you cannot be partially non- violent or tactically non-violent. The non-violence has to be persistent, determined, and principled. That is the kind of non-violence employed by Martin Luther King that thawed through the consciousness of racists in the South and the kind of non-violence used by Nelson Mandela in South Africa.
—Tikkun magazine

Modern Parables—
More Lost Sheep, but Coins Found!

Disaster recently struck at the popular Nazareth Village when, during the night, a few locals blow-torched off a heavy gate lock to their sheepfold, and stole its flock of 22 sheep and goats, a terrible loss for this internationally-sponsored site that teaches the life of Jesus in a natural setting. Whenever our tour groups visit this first-century reconstruction project—just a few blocks from the actual village area where Jesus grew up—the animals on the working farm are a big attraction. Sometimes a donkey is hard at work pulling an ancient plow through the hard earth—a great photo-op with a ‘first-century’ farmer dressed in authentic Roman-period clothes. Over 30,000 Muslim and Jewish youth have already visited this creative teaching location in recent years.

But goodness knows no limitations! On hearing of the theft, friends from Iowa to Israel have already sent funds for four sheep and goats—at $275 each. If you, your Bible Study group, or a Sunday School project could help them further, tell the Village Director, Michael Hostetler, at

Why not donate a lamb in the name of someone you love? And the Village gift shop is a must visit for truly unique Christmas gifts. Go to www.nazarethvillage.com.

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