United Church's Israeli boycott plans draw ire from Canadian Jews

05 August 2009

The United Church of Canada has been accused of anti-Semitism by the Canadian Jewish Congress. Later this month, the National Council of Canada’s largest Protestant denomination is due to debate proposals calling for the boycott of Israeli institutions. The four resolutions on the table call for a "comprehensive boycott of Israeli academic and cultural institutions at the national and international levels" and refer to the recent assault on Gaza as a "visible reminder of the ongoing Israeli regime of exclusion, violence and dehumanization directed against Palestinians." They also said that Israel was "built mainly on land ethnically cleansed of its Palestinian owners," and make reference to the effectiveness of boycotts when dealing with state-sponsored racial discrimination and violence as was the case in South Africa.

In an open letter, Canadian Jewish Congress chief executive Bernie Farber said the United Church resolutions allied the church with the enemies of Israel. "The whole purpose of this material is to vilify Israel and to present it in a crude caricature as the 'new apartheid' state, allegedly based on a state-sanctioned policy of racial superiority," Farber wrote, adding: "The purpose of this hateful invective is to deny the legitimacy of Israel because it is a Jewish state."

Eric Vernon, director of government affairs at the CJC, said: "The use of boycott, divestment and sanction has been a weapon used by Israel's enemies to destroy it. Those are elements of anti-Semitic behavior in the contemporary world."