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Thursday, May 3, 2012

BDS Movement Not Impressing Methodists

Nadene Goldfoot
The Methodist delegates at a general conference in Tampa, Florida have voted to reject divestment from Caterpillar, Motorola Solutions and Hewlett-Packard companies that trade with Israel.  I am most happy to hear this.

Desmond Tutu has been instrumental in getting people to divest from Israel..  He is South Africa's Archbishop who has endorsed this initiative which is like  adding one more pebble to the raft to sink Israel.  Here we had many Jews fighting against apartheid in his country but he doesn't want to  understand that apartheid simply doesn't exist in Israel.

The people behind this divestment are a certain group of Palestinian Christians, the United Methodist Kairos.  They are connected with Hamas and Fatah, who want to bring down Israel.  They keep drumming up antagonism with claiming that Israel violates Palestinian human rights and denial of their freedom.

The truth is that Israel has done everything possible to keep Palestinian  human rights and gives them freedom.  Palestinians of Israel number 1.4 million and are in the Knesset.  It is the Arabs living in Gaza under Hamas's rule that are attacking Israel constantly that don't regard Israel's human rights and freedoms.  It is also the Arabs in Judea and Samaria who are intolerable to Jews who also live there as well.  They want the whole land to become "Palestine" and be Judenrein, without Jews.  They attack Jews as well under Fatah's ruling.  The Druze who live in Israel are wonderful citizens and participate in Israel's Army.

I don't think there is another country on the face of this earth who are under such stress and attack as Israel, and to think that they are keeping their heads up above water and work to be fair to everyone is only a reflection of their inner beliefs.  They are a people surrounded by enemies in a world that seems to reject Jews at every possible chance they have.  This is one time that a group has resisted.

However, there are some holdouts.  There are several regional churches who will divest and they're hoping that they will be copied.  It's too bad they couldn't open up their ears, hearts and minds to find out what's really happening in Israel.  I would suggest they stay in Sderot or Ashkelon for a few days and visit with people there.

As someone whose mother had many Methodist ministers on the family tree, I am grateful that there are people who are rational.

Resource: http://www.haaretz.com/news/international/methodist-church-says-no-to-israel-divestment-initiative-1.427922
http://jewishfactsfromportland.blogspot.com/2012/02/kairos-palestine-against-israels.html

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