The Presbyterian Church

According to the New York Jewish Week: 

Misguided Presbyterian Vote

"By a 310-303 vote last week, a prominent American Protestant denomination made history. The Presbyterian Church, with about 1.8 million members, became the first major Christian group in this country to approve a resolution in favor of economic divestment from American businesses that make equipment that helps foster Israel’s occupation in the West Bank. 

The amount of money that the Presbyterians will withdraw from Caterpillar, Hewlett-Packard and Motorola Solutions, $21 million, is relatively small in the world of international finance. But the message that the Presbyterian’s General Assembly sent last week in Detroit was huge: keep away from Israel."

 I am wondering if the youth of the Presbyterian Church will now be donning brown shirts, swastikas and standing in front of Jewish shops stopping people from buying there.  For there is no difference between what this church has done and Nazis.

Future Presbyterian Youth At Work!

Ten Reasons Why The BDS Movement Is Immoral And Hinders Peace ~~ By Alan M. Dershowitz

By Findalis of Monkey in the Middle


From The Gatestone Institute

As a strong supporter of the two state solution and a critic of Israel's settlement policies, I am particularly appalled at efforts to impose divestment, boycotts and sanctions against Israel, and Israel alone, because BDS makes it more difficult to achieve a peaceful resolution of the Mid-East conflict that requires compromise on all sides.

The BDS movement is highly immoral, threatens the peace process and discourages the Palestinians from agreeing to any reasonable peace offer. Here are ten compelling reasons why the BDS movement is immoral and incompatible with current efforts to arrive at a compromise peace.

1. The BDS movement immorally imposes the entire blame for the continuing Israeli occupation and settlement policy on the Israelis. It refuses to acknowledge the historical reality that on at least three occasions, Israel offered to end the occupation and on all three occasions, the Palestinian leadership, supported by its people, refused to accept these offers. In 1967, I played a small role in drafting UN Security Council Resolution 242 that set out the formula for ending the occupation in exchange for recognition of Israel's right to exist in peace. Israel accepted that Resolution, while the Palestinians, along with all the Arab nations, gathered in Khartoum and issued their three famous "nos:" No peace, no negotiation, no recognition. There were no efforts to boycott, sanction or divest from these Arab naysayers. In 2000-2001, Israel's liberal Prime Minister Ehud Barak, along with American President Bill Clinton, offered the Palestinians statehood, and the end of the occupation. Yasser Arafat rejected this offer—a rejection that many Arab leaders considered a crime against the Palestinian people. In 2007, Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert offered the Palestinians an even better deal, an offer to which they failed to respond. There were no BDS threats against those who rejected Israel's peace offers. Now there are ongoing peace negotiations in which both parties are making offers and imposing conditions. Under these circumstances, it is immoral to impose blame only on Israel and to direct a BDS movement only against the nation state of the Jewish people, that has thrice offered to end the occupation in exchange for peace.

2. The current BDS movement, especially in Europe and on some American university campuses, emboldens the Palestinians to reject compromise solutions to the conflict. Some within the Palestinian leadership have told me that the longer they hold out against making peace, the more powerful will be the BDS movement against Israel. Why not wait until the BDS strengthens their bargaining position so that they won't have to compromise by giving up the right of return, by agreeing to a demilitarized state and by making other concessions that are necessary to peace but difficult for some Palestinians to accept? The BDS movement is making a peaceful resolution harder.

3. The BDS movement is immoral because its leaders will never be satisfied with the kind of two state solution that is acceptable to Israel. Many of its leaders do not believe in the concept of Israel as the nation state of the Jewish people. (The major leader of the BDS movement, Marwan Barghouti, has repeatedly expressed his opposition to Israel's right to exist as the nation state of the Jewish people even within the 1967 borders.) At bottom, therefore, the leadership of the BDS movement is opposed not only to Israel's occupation and settlement policy but to its very existence.

4. The BDS movement is immoral because it violates the core principle of human rights: namely, "the worst first." Israel is among the freest and most democratic nations in the world. It is certainly the freest and most democratic nation in the Middle East. Its Arab citizens enjoy more rights than Arabs anywhere else in the world. They serve in the Knesset, in the Judiciary, in the Foreign Service, in the academy and in business. They are free to criticize Israel and to support its enemies. Israeli universities are hot beds of anti-Israel rhetoric, advocacy and even teaching. Israel has a superb record on women's rights, gay rights, environmental rights and other rights that barely exist in most parts of the world. Moreover, Israel's record of avoiding civilian casualties, while fighting enemies who hide their soldiers among civilians, is unparalleled in the world today. The situation on the West Bank is obviously different because of the occupation, but even the Arabs of Ramallah, Bethlehem and Tulkarim have more human and political rights than the vast majority of Arabs in the world today. Moreover, anyone—Jew, Muslim or Christian—dissatisfied with Israeli actions can express that dissatisfaction in the courts, and in the media, both at home and abroad. That freedom does not exist in any Arab country, nor in many non-Arab countries. Yet Israel is the only country in the world today being threatened with BDS. When a sanction is directed against only a state with one of the best records of human rights, and that nation happens to be the state of the Jewish people, the suspicion of bigotry must be considered.

5. The BDS movement is immoral because it would hurt the wrong people: it would hurt Palestinian workers who will lose their jobs if economic sanctions are directed against firms that employ them. It would hurt artists and academics, many of whom are the strongest voices for peace and an end to the occupation. It would hurt those suffering from illnesses all around the world who would be helped by Israeli medicine and the collaboration between Israeli scientists and other scientists. It would hurt the high tech industry around the world because Israel contributes disproportionally to the development of such life enhancing technology.

6. The BDS movement is immoral because it would encourage Iran—the world's leading facilitator of international terrorism—to unleash its surrogates, such as Hezbollah and Hamas, against Israel, in the expectation that if Israel were to respond to rocket attacks, the pressure for BDS against Israel would increase, as it did when Israel responded to thousands of rockets from Gaza in 2008-2009.

7. The BDS movement is immoral because it focuses the world's attention away from far greater injustices, including genocide. By focusing disproportionately on Israel, the human rights community pays disproportionately less attention to the other occupations, such as those by China, Russia and Turkey, and to other humanitarian disasters such as that occurring in Syria.

8. The BDS movement is immoral because it promotes false views regarding the nation state of the Jewish people, exaggerates its flaws and thereby promotes a new variation on the world's oldest prejudice, namely anti-Semitism. It is not surprising therefore that the BDS movement is featured on neo-Nazi, Holocaust denial and other overtly anti-Semitic websites and is promoted by some of the world's most notorious haters such as David Duke.

9. The BDS movement is immoral because it reflects and encourages a double standard of judgment and response regarding human rights violations. By demanding more of Israel, the nation state of the Jewish people, it expects less of other states, people, cultures and religions, thereby reifying a form of colonial racism and reverse bigotry that hurts the victims of human rights violations inflicted by others.

10. The BDS movement will never achieve its goals. Neither the Israeli government nor the Israeli people will ever capitulate to the extortionate means implicit in BDS. They will not and should not make important decisions regarding national security and the safety of their citizens on the basis of immoral threats. Moreover, were Israel to compromise its security in the face of such threats, the result would be more wars, more death and more suffering.

All decent people who seek peace in the Middle East should join together in opposing the immoral BDS movement. Use your moral voices to demand that both the Israeli government and the Palestinian Authority accept a compromise peace that assures the security of Israel and the viability of a peaceful and democratic Palestinian state. The way forward is not by immoral extortionate threats that do more harm than good, but rather by negotiations, compromise and good will.

A Most Sorrowful Boycott

By Findalis

I love Sabra hummus. Especially the roasted pine nut variety.  So a call to boycott Sabra, an Israeli company, is very disheartening and sorrowful to me.

An Israeli company that co-owns Sabra, the number-one selling hummus brand in the United States, has removed support for the IDF from its English-language website after a video circulating the internet criticized the company's support of Israel's "human rights abuses," according to a press release issued Thursday by the Philadelphia branch of the Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS) movement.

Strauss Group, which recently highlighted its "adoption" of the Golani Reconnaissance platoon and other Israeli soldiers on its website, has taken down its support for the IDF, according to the press release.

Kate Zaidan, a spokesperson for BDS group said, "We notice that while Stauss's English-language website no longer makes these claims, the Hebrew-language part of the site still includes them."

She added, "Philly BDS is asking that Strauss Group clarify whether the removal of the references means that Strauss no longer supports the Golani brigade, or whether it is simply an acknowledgment that support for the Israeli military is no longer seen as beneficial to Strauss's international image. We hope Strauss will confirm that the company now supports the 2005 Palestinian call for boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel."

Last month, Philadephia activists staged a dance around a local supermarket as part of a campaign to pressure grocery chains to stop carrying Sabra Hummus products. The activists urged the supermarket and its customers not to "buy into Israeli apartheid," and shouted "No Justice, No Chickpeas!"

Full Story

Giving into the demands of anti-Semites who would see the death and destruction of 7 million Jews (Dancing and singing  while they kill them.) is and should be unacceptable to everyone with a working conscience.

I have sent them an explanation of why I am boycotting their products and why I hope they will reverse their decision so I can then change the boycott into an buycott.

I understand that you removed your "adoption" of the Golani Reconnaissance platoon and support of other Israeli soldiers on its website, has taken down its support for the IDF. I find this not acceptable. The rational that was given to me was the so-called human rights violations of Israel. Violations that occur only in the minds of the anti-Semites of the Philadelphia branch of the Boycott Divestment Sanctions (BDS) movement.

I support the State of Israel and the men and women of the IDF. I also find the BDS movement to be against everything I hold dear.

Since you have caved into their pressure I have no choice but to divest myself from your product. I have enjoyed Sabra hummus for many years, preferring it to other brands. But as of today I will join the growing boycott of your product.

I do hope that one day you will reverse your decision and support the IDF openly.

If you wish to contact them you can by the following methods:

Snail Mail: Sabra Consumer Relations, PO Box 660634, Dallas, TX 75266-0634
Phone: 1-888-957-2272, Monday – Friday 9:00AM to 4:30PM Central Time
E-Mail:  Click here

A boycott isn't effective if the company involved doesn't know you are boycotting them or why.

Join this boycott and let us see if we can change Sabra's minds to join the BDS and instead reject this idea.