Letters - 25 March 2011
From Palestine and Israel to Japan
Supporting both sides?
I fully agree with Simon Gray (18 February). He is right to be appalled that the question of boycotting Israeli goods ever reached Meeting for Sufferings. It assumes that Israel is entirely at fault for violence in Israel/Palestine. Consider: if both sides laid down their arms there would be peace. If the Palestinians laid down their arms there would be peace. If the Israelis laid down their arms there would be no Israel.
The arguments advanced by letter-writers in the Friend in favour of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions are based on widespread but false assumptions. Israel is said to be an ‘apartheid state’, but Israel, uniquely in the Middle East, has citizens of minority religions and cultures who have no legal impediments. All over the Middle East Christians are being driven out of their homes, except in Israel, where they are welcome and safe. Israel has welcomed Ethiopians and even Vietnamese boat people! In contrast, Jews are not allowed in Arab-controlled Palestine (nor, according to the anti-settler line, even in the disputed territory of the West Bank) and they have been largely expelled from the Muslim countries of the Middle East and North Africa. There is no definition of ‘apartheid’ that applies to Israel, but still we are asked to boycott Israel because of it.
The Kairos document is one-sided and deceptive. Ostensibly about Christian concern, it is rather about a one-state solution (such as the destruction of the state of Israel). The implications are anything but peaceful. The Society of Friends should have nothing to do with it.
Sarah Lawson
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