PCUSA leaders urge Hamas toward peace, but don’t condemn terrorist group
By John H. Adams, The Layman Online, February 21, 2006
Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it.
The Covenant of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas)
Adopted August 18, 1988
We have consistently condemned the illegal occupation of Palestinian territories by Israel, the expropriation of Palestinian land and natural resources, and the destruction of homes, farms, olive groves, and other means of livelihood. We have condemned the daily humiliation of the checkpoints, the closures, and the isolation and division of Palestinian communities by the separation barrier.
Clifton Kirkpatrick, stated clerk
Rick Ufford-Chase, moderator
Feb. 9, 2006, letter to Hamas
In their joint letter, written “as long-standing friends and supporters of the Palestinian people,” Kirkpatrick and Ufford-Chase appeal to the new power brokers for Palestine.
Hamas is one of the most radical terrorist groups in the Middle East. It is listed as a terrorist organization by Israel, the European Union and the United States. Jordan has banned the group. Declaring in their 1988 covenant that it is the “best nation that hath been raised up unto mankind,” Hamas describes others, including Christians and secular Muslims, to be “smitten with vileness.”
Hamas has perpetrated 425 terrorist attacks of various kinds, in which 377 Israelis were murdered and 2,076 civilians and soldiers were wounded. Since the beginning of the current wave of Palestinian violence, in September 2000, Hamas has perpetrated 52 suicide attacks, in which 288 Israelis were murdered and 1,646 were wounded.
Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs
While Hamas has begun a global fundraising campaign through the Brotherhood of Muslims, the Presbyterian Church (USA) has initiated steps toward a “phased selective divestment” of PCUSA holdings in corporations that do business with Israel. Several Presbyterian groups have met with terrorist leaders in the Middle East and complimented them.
Kirkpatrick and Ufford-Chase do not overlook the problems Hamas creates in the ongoing work for peace in the region. “Calls by Hamas for Israel’s destruction are clearly a barrier to finding peaceful solutions,” they say.
Without implicating Hamas, they add, “We have also condemned all forms of terror and violence that have led to such unspeakable human tragedy in the region. This condemnation applies to all acts of terror perpetrated against Israelis in rocket attacks, suicide bombings, and other acts carried out by Palestinians.”
They urge Hamas “to find a way forward that will change the current stalemate of hatred and violence, so that all who live in this land holy to our three faiths may dwell with their children in peace, security, and prosperity. We pledge ourselves to continue to support such efforts as fully as we are able.”
Representing a denomination that sponsors “Interfaith Dialogue” with Muslims – financed partly through Presbyterian Disaster Assistance – the two Presbyterian leaders do not appeal to the Christian faith as a reason to oppose Hamas’ calls to destroy Israel. Rather, they argue from a secular perspective that those calls “contradict widely supported international agreements and ignore realities that will inevitably shape the future for all parties.”
This week, exiled Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal said in Sudan his group had no plans to recognize Israel; Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called on Muslim nations to fund the new radical Islamic Palestinian government; and the Muslim Brotherhood said it is launching a global fundraiser for Hamas.
The pledge by the Brotherhood, which has branches and affiliated groups in 86 countries, comes as U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice started a Middle East shuttle to caution regional powers against giving money to a Hamas-led government.
The U.S. and Europe, the world’s two largest donors to the Palestinians, said they will not provide funding directly to the Palestinian Authority if Hamas heads the government.
“This is injustice and an attempt to impose a blockade on the Palestinians,” said the Brotherhood’s supreme leader, Mohammed Mahdi Akef.