Presbyterian Church-USA General Assembly Resolution Slanders Israel as ‘Apartheid’ State

U.S. Christian support for the State of Israel and Jewish people is under attack by malicious activists seeking to drive a wedge between adherents of these two Abrahamic faiths. At a time when the likes of Iran, Hamas, and Amnesty International are pushing libelous claims that Israel is an “apartheid” state, it is particularly disturbing to see the Presbyterian Church-USA (PC-USA) join this axis of hatred and bigotry.

This week, at its biennial General Assembly in Louisville, Kentucky, attended by hundreds of clergy and parishioners, PC-USA adopted a divisive resolution, rooted in antisemitic ideology, titled “On Recognition that Israel’s Laws, Policies, and Practices Constitute Apartheid Against the Palestinian People.”

The location of the PC-USA conference is not lost on the local Jewish community, nor on the Christian allies of Israel and the Jewish people. Only eight months ago, an antisemitic gunman attempted to murder a Jewish member of the Louisville City Council member in his campaign office.

This attack, coupled with a string of recent arson and vandalism incidents at Chabad of Kentucky, begs the question — “Why is the Presbyterian Church obsessed with defaming the Jewish state and putting Louisville Jews at risk of further peril?”

The Philos Action League — working alongside Presbyterians for Middle East Peace, Chabad of Kentucky, Louisville’s Congregation Adath Jeshurun, and the Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM) — organized an awareness campaign to fight the antisemitic lies behind the PC-USA resolution. Letters to the editor were sent to Louisville and Christian media, workshops were led by mobilization experts, and Jews and Christians from across the U.S. — including CAM Director of Partnerships and Development Nelson France — gathered in Louisville to demonstrate their opposition to PC-USA’s “apartheid” slander of Israel.

The PC-USA resolution will fuel antisemitism in the United States, which is already at all-time high levels, and inspire individuals who wish to harm Jews and Israel. It will also undermine, rather than enhance, chances for an Israeli-Palestinian peace settlement, and it will turn the PC-USA into a pulpit for extremists and a safe space for antisemites to promote ahistorical falsehoods.

The proponents of the resolution who assert “there is widespread Jewish support for the overture” are deceitfully lying.

“What the PC-USA is planning to adopt is essentially Christian antisemitism, as a Christian it is important to denounce and rejects all forms of Christian antisemitism,” Luke Moon — Deputy Director of the Philos Project — said. “2,000 years of Jewish hatred cannot be ignored.”

Pastor Todd Stavrakos — Director of Pathways for Middle East Peace — commented, “We as Presbyterians have a laundry list of wrongs that we want to right, but can we really do that if we don’t fix our wrongs against the Jewish people. We’ve never apologized for the hundreds of years of antisemitism from Calvin or Luther. Our recent actions show we haven’t confessed nor have we learned from our past mistakes.”

A joint letter sent to PCUSA members urging them to reject the resolution can be read here.