Jerusalem, 25, June 2018, The board, staff and supporters of Kairos Palestine and the members of Global Kairos for Justice coalition celebrate the historic pro-justice actions taken by the Presbyterian Church(USA) at its 223rd General Assembly meeting just days ago. We offer our profound thanks to staff, commissioners and advisory delegates of the PC(USA), and to its mission network, the Israel/Palestine Mission Network of the Presbyterian Church (USA) (www.theipmn.org) which worked tirelessly to bring a slate of resolutions to the church’s assembly gathered in St. Louis.
A long-time partner of Kairos Palestine, the PC(USA) was among the first denominations to commend for study the Kairos Palestine document and to endorse the document’s emphases on hope for justice, nonviolence resistance, liberation and reconciliation.
The many resolutions that were overwhelmingly passed include:
- Condemnation of the recent violence directed against Palestinians during the Great March of Return in Gaza;
- A renewal of the church’s call for an end to the decade-old Israeli blockade of Gaza;
- Opposition to U.S. federal and state laws designed to suppress Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) in support of Palestinian human rights;
- A call to RE/MAX, LLC to do “everything within its legal and moral power” to stop facilitating the sale and rental of properties in Israeli settlements built on occupied Palestinian land;
- A call for the use of diplomatic tools by the government of the United States to bring Israel into full compliance with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by granting full equality to its citizens who are Palestinian, by “changing its laws, policies, and practices that favor its Jewish citizens and discriminate against its Christian and Muslim citizens and other ethnic minorities”;
- Opposition to Israel’s illegal annexation of Jerusalem.
The resolutions passed following powerful support from local and visiting Palestinians, Black Lives Matter leaders, Friends of Sabeel North America, U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Equal Rights, American Muslims for Palestine, St. Louis Palestine Solidarity Committee, Palestinian Christian Alliance for Peace, St. Louis Jewish Voice for Peace, National Christian Coalition Organizations in Palestine (NCCOP), Kairos Palestine and others.
Because of partners like you, we may be “hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.” (2 Cor. 4:8-9)