June 21, 2014
The Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD) applauds the decision of the Presbyterian Church USA to divest from Caterpillar, Hewlett-Packard, and Motorola, three US companies that profit from Israel's military occupation. The General Assembly’s decision of June 20th comes 30 years after it divested from corporations complicit in South Africa’s apartheid regime. It follows a decision by the United Methodist Church to divest its pension fund from G4S, an international security firm involved in manning privatized Israeli checkpoints in the Occupied Territory, guarding settlements and working with the Israel Prison Service, and a similar decision by the Central Atlantic Conference of the United Church of Christ to divest from companies profiting from the Occupation.
Emphasizing its support for a just and lasting peace between Israelis and Palestinians, the Presbyterian Church expressed hope combining economic sanctions to its long-standing political and moral opposition to Israeli occupation policies will play a role in realizing this goal.
ICAHD, which has long supported the BDS movement in its various forms as virtually the sole means by which people can effectively intervene to address an unjust and oppressive situation which the world’s governments have failed to resolve, awaits the moment when the organized American Jewish community, so engaged in the past with movement for social justice and human rights, will speak in as firm a voice against an injustice being perpetrated in its name by the Israeli government.
In the meantime, as Israelis and as Jews, we applaud this courageous decision which gives heart to all of us in Israel/Palestinian working for a just peace.
http://www.icahd.org/node/552#sthash.KSXI9RB1.dpuf
