A GLOBAL CAMPAIGN FOR ETHICAL INVESTMENT

ON BEHALF OF PALESTINIAN HUMAN RIGHTS

AND A JUST AND VIABLE PEACE IN ISRAEL-PALESTINE

May 2008

An Ongoing Review of Diverse Approaches by Groups and Individuals Worldwide

By the Palestine-Israel Action Group (piag_@mac.com), 

a subcommittee of the Peace and Social Concerns Committee of Ann Arbor Friends Meeting (Quakers).

The campaign is not formally endorsed by the Ann Arbor Meeting.

 

n   Church- & Faith-based Organizations p.  1

  n  Jewish & Palestinian Groups               p.   8

 n  Secular Groups & NGOs                     p. 11

n  Individuals                                            p. 19

n  Governmental-Political                        p. 20

n  Universities                                           p. 21

                                                                                                                                      

CHURCH & FAITH-BASED ORGANIZATIONS

 

World Council of Churches Central Committee

WCC advocates selective divestment from US companies like Caterpillar that profit from the Occupation, and from Israeli companies that depend on settlements for materials and labor, or that produce military equipment used to violate Palestinian human rights.

Churches with investment funds have an opportunity to use those funds responsibly in support of peaceful solutions to conflict.  “Economic pressure, appropriately and openly applied, is one such means of action. “  (Adopted 2/05; reaffirmed 8/06)                                                (media@wcc-coe.org)

 

Sabeel (a Jerusalem-based international organization representing Palestinian Christians)

“There is a spiritual dimension to all investment.”

1.  Earning money through investment in companies whose products and services are used to violate International Law and human rights is equivalent to profiting from unlawful acts and the oppression of others.

2.  Continuing such investments, once the facts are brought to our attention, constitutes enabling harm to innocent civilians under Occupation and condoning illegal settlement policies that lead to human rights violations.

Sabeel cites Israeli human rights lawyer Shamai Leibovitz: “If the Jewish people are ever to become ‘a light of all nations’ and return to their core values of justice and human dignity, Israelis and Jews of conscience must call for effective measures to end the occupation of millions of Palestinians. I believe that selective economic pressure is the most effective way to end the brutal occupation.”

“The churches have exhausted all other options,” says Sabeel founder Naim Ateek, a Palestinian-Israeli Anglican priest. (See “Morally Responsible Investment: A Nonviolent Response to the Occupation,” 8/05.)                                                                                                  (www.fosna.org)

 

Anglican Church of England: General Synod, 2/06

Supported by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, the Synod overwhelmingly

votes to support “morally responsible investment in the Palestinian occupied territories and, in particular to disinvest from companies profiting from the illegal occupation, such as Caterpillar Inc, until they change their policies.”  The Synod asks its Ethical Investment Advisory Group (EIAG) to engage Caterpillar in “intensive discussions . . . with a view to its withdrawing from supplying or maintaining either equipment or parts for use by the State of Israel in demolishing Palestinian homes.”

The Synod urges EIAG to visit Palestinian lands to see recent house demolitions and “to give weight to

the illegality under international law of the activities in which Caterpillar Inc.’s equipment is

involved. ”The Episcopal Bishop of Jerusalem urges action, asking the Synod if the church must “wait until there are no homes and no trees for our people to wake up  . . . ”         (www.anglicancommunion.org/)

 

Anglican Church of England: Virginia Water Parish, Guildford Diocese. 10/06

The parish decides to implement the decision of the General Synod on its own.  It withdraws its funds from its Church of England investment account in order to disinvest from companies such as Caterpillar that are profiting from Israel's occupation of Palestine.  The Central Board of Finance (CBF), which manages investment funds, has so far declined to implement the General Synod's decision.  "We are simply doing what the local Church in Palestine and the General Synod has asked us to do," says Vicar Stephen Sizer. "If the CBF will not withdraw our money from Caterpillar, then we will do it for them. We are looking for an investment fund with a more ethically sound policy."      (info@imri.org.uk)

 

Anglican Consultative Council. 5/05

Calls for “active engagement” by Anglican communions worldwide to wrestle with companies that support the occupation of Palestinian lands or violence against innocent Israelis.  It encourages investment that supports the infrastructure of a future Palestinian State.   (www.anglicancommunion.org/)

 

Anglican Church of Kenya, 7/05

Joins in urging movement toward divestment from companies whose activities contribute to the occupation of Palestinian land or to violence against innocent Israelis.  “You only have to go there and [you will] sympathize with the Palestinians, especially when it comes to the separation wall. . . and the mistreatment of the women and men at the roadblocks,” said Bishop Gideon Ireri, speaking after the Kenyan synod backed the 5/05 call of the Anglican Consultative Council.      (www.episcopalchurch.org)

 

Anglican Church of Canada, 11/05 

The Council of General Synod unanimously passed a resolution asking the eco-justice committee, with the help of Kairos, a Canadian ecumenical justice group, to research the activities of companies believed to be contributing to violence in Israel and Palestine, as well as those contributing to peace and economic stability in that region.  The committee, along with the Financial Management Development Investment Subcommittee, should “explore a range of socially responsible investment strategies, including corporate engagement and positive investment or divestment.” (anglicanjournal.com/132/01/canada15.html)

 

Ecumenical Campaign to End the Illegal Occupation of Palestine: Support a Just Peace in the Middle East.  The campaign, begun in 2002,  aims to mobilize member churches and ecumenical partners of the World Council of Churches through advocacy, prayer, building awareness of the issues and of churches' and secular groups' work in addressing the conflict, and accompaniment of Israelis and Palestinians engaged in nonviolent actions.  The Campaign calls for a boycott of all products from Jewish settlements and an arms embargo until Israel withdraws from the Occupied Territories and complies with UN resolutions.           (www.wcc-coe.org/wcc/what/international/palestine/campaign-home.html)

 

Episcopalian Executive Council (US),  10/05

EEC directs its Committee for Social Responsibility in Investments to undertake the following:

1. Corporate engagement via dialogue and shareholder resolutions, as appropriate, to encourage companies to adopt socially responsible practices that advance positive changes in Israeli government policy and end the Occupation.

2. Urge the Palestinian Authority to oppose violence as a means of resistance.

3. “Positive investment” – encourage companies to invest in the economic infrastructure of the West Bank and Gaza: “A stable Palestinian state will make for a more secure Israel.”  Seek opportunities, with others, to make loans to “support economic justice and development in support of a future Palestinian State.”  Palestine, like Israel, has a right to an economy that flourishes.

4. Urge members of the Church to visit church partners and others in Israel and the Palestinian Territories in order to understand the complexities of the conflict.         (www.episcopalchurch.org/)

 

Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA),  8/07

Evangelical Lutherans, with nearly 5 million US members, back "exploration of the feasibility of refusing to buy products produced in Israeli settlements," and of supporting the purchase of Palestinian products, in measures adopted by The Churchwide Assembly, the denomination's key legislative body. The Assembly calls for examination of the denomination's "entire investment activity," excluding divestiture.  These economic initiatives are part of a decision to "recommit to the Churchwide Strategy for Engagement in Israel and Palestine through awareness-building, accompaniment [visits with Holy Land hosts], and advocacy." The initiative builds on the Peace Not Walls campaign the Assembly adopted in 2005, and will be undertaken in consultation with Evangelical Lutheran churches in Jordan and the Holy Land.                                                                       (www.elca.org/news/Releases.asp?a=3718)

 

Interfaith Council for Peace and Justice

The Ann Arbor, Michigan interfaith group, in 5/03 adopted a resolution that recognizes the US government’s complicity in violations of human rights, and calls for suspending military aid and arms sales to Israel. It asks the University of Michigan, the city of Ann Arbor and members’ religious organizations to exert their influence, and, along with individuals, to divest from companies that sell arms or other military hardware to Israel.  The goal is to bring about Israel’s compliance with UN resolutions and the Geneva Convention.                                                                                                                          (info@icpj.net)

 

Pax Christi: Catholic International Peace Movement. 7/06 

Pax Christi announces support for a UK campaign aimed at multi-national companies that profit from the Occupation, including Volvo, Caterpillar, Daewoo and Sainsbury's. Australian Pax Christi convenor Fr. Claude Mostowik calls for the campaign to expand as a worldwide boycott. (cathnews.com/news/607/60.php)

 

Presbyterian Church, USA. 6/06

The 2006 General Assembly votes to continue its policy of economic engagement in the denomination’s work for peace in Israel-Palestine.  The new resolution makes the geographic scope and the substantial reach of the project more explicit, urging that the church’s investments “as they pertain to Israel, Gaza, East Jerusalem, and the West Bank, be invested in only peaceful pursuits.”  The resolution, overwhelmingly adopted, states that “the proper vehicle for achieving this goal” is the “customary corporate engagement process of the Committee on Mission Responsibility Through Investment (MRTI).”  MRTI aims to persuade corporations to change their practices through correspondence, direct talks, proxy voting, shareholder resolutions, and if need-be through a recommendation for divestment.  Rev. Gretchen Graf, Moderator of the GA Peacemaking Committee, affirms that MRTI “as a last resort” could recommend divestment to the next General Assembly in 2008 despite the absence of the words “phased selective divestment,” in this year’s resolution.  That phrase in the 2004 GA document aroused the ire of organizations that considered it punitive toward Israel, although the phrase had drawn praise from organizations that believe it may persuade Israel to end its occupation more effectively than have decades of urgent requests.

The 2006 resolution asks MRTI to  ”identify affirmative investment opportunities as they pertain to Israel, Gaza, East Jerusalem, and the West Bank.” The Presbyterians also explicitly ask the entire church “to work through peaceful means” to end the occupation, to end violence against civilians, and for the “creation of a socially, economically, geographically, and politically viable and secure Palestinian state, alongside an equally viable and secure Israeli state, both of which have a right to exist.” Finally, the GA supports “fair criticism” of the wall: “To the extent that the security barrier violates Palestinian land . . . the barrier should be dismantled and relocated."                                                           .                                                        (http://www.pcusa.org/worldwide/israelpalestine/resources/divestmentfaqpart2.pdf)             

 

Presbyterian Church, USA, Detroit Presbytery.  2/08. 

Temporary Suspension of Military Aid to Israel:  The Presbytery votes to ask the 2008 General Assembly to 1)reaffirm the right of Israel to exist; 2)deplore suicide bombings and terror attacks; and

3) call for temporary suspension of US military aid to Israel until it complies with the Arms Export Control Act and the Foreign Assistance Act.  These laws prohibit the use of US weapons against civilians or civilian infrastructure and bar aid to countries that engage in a consistent pattern of gross violations of internationally recognized human rights.

General Assemblies have repeatedly addressed denial of aid to Israel and have called for an end to further settlements and land appropriation. Yet, since 1948, Israel has driven Palestinians from their homes, lands and towns, confined them to refugee camps, destroyed their commerce with blockades, and built a wall that divides families, separates children from school and sick persons from hospitals.  It has arrested and imprisoned people without trial and created fear and loss of life through random military attacks on civilians.  Christian communities are being eliminated. US military aid, now over 10 million dollars a day, is crucial to the continuance of these human rights violations.  The Presbytery deplores all violence, including suicide bombings and other terrorist acts, as well as violence perpetrated by an occupying army. Heeding the call of the prophets, of Jesus, and of the denomination's own Book of Order, the Presbytery affirms that all human life is precious. The cycle of violence must stop.     

                                    (Middle East Work Group (MEWG) of the Presbytery of Detroit <http://mewg.org/overture218/>)

 

Presbyterian Church of Scotland. 5/06

The General Assembly, meeting in Edinburgh, calls on European authorities and the World Council of Churches to clearly identify products from Israeli settlements in the West Bank “to enable consumers to make informed choices.”  The General Assembly has no investments directly relevant to its concerns about Israel and the Palestinians. (ekklesia.co.uk/content/news_syndication/article_060524cofs.s)

 

Religious Society of Friends (Quakers): American Friends Service Committee (AFSC).  3/08.

AFSC is affiliated with the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers).  The AFSC Board adopts an "investment screen" barring investments in companies that provide products or services (including financial services) used by Israeli governmental or military bodies or Israeli or Palestinian organizations or groups "to facilitate or undertake violent acts against civilians or violations of international law."  The screen would bar investment in companies that help maintain Israel's military occupation of Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, or that help maintain and expand Israeli settlements or the Separation Wall. The Board states, "We take this action as a matter of conscience and an expression of our unwillingness to remain complicit with violence and oppression occurring daily in Palestine and Israel, which is contrary to all that we know to be true and right."   <www.afsc.org/israel-palestine/default.htm>                                                                                                                       

Religious Society of Friends (Quakers): Atlanta Meeting (Georgia), 7/06, and Olympia Meeting (Washington State).  8/06

“By using US-supplied weapons to attack Gaza and Lebanon, </