Leaders from the Lutheran, Methodist, and UCC (United Church of Christ) churches signed a letter to Congress requesting that U.S. military aid to Israel be contingent on “compliance with applicable U.S. laws and policies.” The letter’s 15 signatories noted that they have “witnessed widespread Israeli human rights violations committed against Palestinians, including killing of civilians, home demolitions and forced displacement, and restrictions on Palestinian movement, among others.” They expressed their “grave concern about the deteriorating conditions in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories which threaten to lead the region further away from the realization of a just peace.”
Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA) Chair Larry Gold noted that while the letter does acknowledge that Palestinians share responsibility for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it includes “no call for investigation of Palestinian intransigence.”
Rabbi Stuart Weinblatt, director of Israel Advocacy at the Conservative Movement’s Rabbinical Assembly, said in a statement that Israel’s “readiness to pursue peace is not matched by the Palestinians, yet the document seeks to assign blame only to the Jewish state for the inability to progress in the quest for peace.”
