B’nai B’rith International has issued the following statement:
B’nai B’rith International deplores the Presbyterian Church (USA) for publishing and selling an “educational” document and DVD entitled, “Zionism Unsettled: A Congregational Study Guide,” which promotes virulent hatred of Israel, as well as animosity toward the historic rights and fundamental sensibilities of Jews across the religious and political spectrum.
According to the church’s website, the guide—created by the denomination’s Israel/Palestine Mission Network (IPMN)—draws on “compelling and diverse viewpoints from Jews, Muslims, and Christians in Israel, Palestine, the US, and around the globe.”
Despite the rosy terms in which the church describes the guide, its description is profoundly deceptive. The church conceals the actual nature of the publication—engagement in vile revisionism of not merely Israeli, but Jewish history too—while exploiting fringe perspectives to legitimize polemics contrary to any understanding of genuine interreligious dialogue and peacemaking.
The Presbyterian Church (USA) has supported and marketed a hateful and defamatory anti-Jewish publication, perversely obscuring Israel’s very right to exist alongside its neighbors. We hope that the members of the Presbyterian Church (USA) will see through the distortion of facts and the politicization of “education,” and renounce this assault on truth, decency and intercommunal relations.
B’nai B’rith International deplores the Presbyterian Church (USA) for publishing and selling an “educational” document and DVD entitled, “Zionism Unsettled: A Congregational Study Guide,” which promotes virulent hatred of Israel, as well as animosity toward the historic rights and fundamental sensibilities of Jews across the religious and political spectrum.
According to the church’s website, the guide—created by the denomination’s Israel/Palestine Mission Network (IPMN)—draws on “compelling and diverse viewpoints from Jews, Muslims, and Christians in Israel, Palestine, the US, and around the globe.”
Despite the rosy terms in which the church describes the guide, its description is profoundly deceptive. The church conceals the actual nature of the publication—engagement in vile revisionism of not merely Israeli, but Jewish history too—while exploiting fringe perspectives to legitimize polemics contrary to any understanding of genuine interreligious dialogue and peacemaking.
The Presbyterian Church (USA) has supported and marketed a hateful and defamatory anti-Jewish publication, perversely obscuring Israel’s very right to exist alongside its neighbors. We hope that the members of the Presbyterian Church (USA) will see through the distortion of facts and the politicization of “education,” and renounce this assault on truth, decency and intercommunal relations.
