{"id":2036,"date":"2014-03-20T17:12:52","date_gmt":"2014-03-20T23:12:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/peacenotwalls\/?p=2036"},"modified":"2015-09-20T17:20:25","modified_gmt":"2015-09-20T23:20:25","slug":"wcc-general-secretary-calls-for-reversal-of-israeli-knesset-law-categorizing-palestinian-christians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/elcasumud\/wcc-general-secretary-calls-for-reversal-of-israeli-knesset-law-categorizing-palestinian-christians\/","title":{"rendered":"WCC General Secretary Calls for Reversal of Israeli Knesset law Categorizing Palestinian Christians"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"author\">Julie Rowe<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div class=\"ExternalClassDAF401AE66E840919A3762D73E44BBC9\">\n<p>\u200b<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone\" title=\"World Council of Churches\" src=\"http:\/\/www.oikoumene.org\/logo.png\" alt=\"World Council of Churches\" width=\"435\" height=\"47\" \/><br \/>\n19 March 2014 &#8211; Joining voices of the churches in Palestine and Israel, the World Council of Churches (WCC) General Secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit has expressed \u201cgrave concern\u201d about a law recently passed by the Israeli Knesset or parliament.<\/p>\n<p>The law passed by the Knesset on 24 February would define the status of Palestinian Arab Christians in the state of Israel.<\/p>\n<p>Top officials of the Catholic Church in the Holy Land have said that this new law \u201cintroduces a distinction between Christian and Muslim Palestinians and states that Christian Palestinians are Christians and not Palestinians\u201d.\u00a0 The church added: \u201cThis campaign clearly has as its aim to divide Christians from their Muslim compatriots. However, it is equally dangerous because it will divide Christians among themselves even further,\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In a statement issued on 18 March, Tveit called on \u201cIsraeli authorities to reverse this law to stop an injustice against the Christian citizens of Israel\u201d.\u00a0 He encouraged the WCC member churches to \u201craise this issue with representatives of Israel and with their own governments\u201d, urging reversal of this law.<\/p>\n<p>Tveit said that this law establishes a \u201clegislative distinction between the indigenous Palestinian Arab Christians and Palestinian Arab Muslims, both of whom are citizens of the State of Israel\u201d. This distinction, he stressed, is an \u201cunacceptable severing of entire communities from their cultural identity\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Tveit added that the \u201cKnesset has transgressed all proper distinctions between state and religious authority by attempting to define the nature and character of Christian communities within Israel against their own will and self-understanding\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Warning of the adverse implications of this law, Tveit said that \u201crather than creating divisions among communities, the Knesset should pave the way for breaking down barriers that divide people according to ethnicity and religion.\u201d Tveit echoed heads of the Catholic Church in Israel, who stressed that \u201cit is not the right or the duty of the Israeli civil authorities to tell us who we are\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>The WCC has long affirmed the right of religious communities to define themselves, condemning the manipulation of religious identity for political gains.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/webmail2.elca.org\/owa\/redir.aspx?C=LlORKrGna02KK-JPvMmKR5BLYevkF9EIe_2a9fAtMI9mizEiBmcepxYTX899y88wY1EkfQmlCP0.&amp;URL=http:\/\/lists.wcc-coe.org\/c.html?ufl%3d4%26rtr%3don%26s%3djazjt%2ctfo0%2cusx%2cbknj%2c2f50%2c70e1%2chkrh\">Read full text of the WCC general secretary\u2019s statement<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/en.lpj.org\/2014\/03\/19\/christian-palestinians-in-israel-a-threatened-identity\/\">Statement on Knesset law by he Assembly of the Catholic Ordinaries<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/webmail2.elca.org\/owa\/redir.aspx?C=LlORKrGna02KK-JPvMmKR5BLYevkF9EIe_2a9fAtMI9mizEiBmcepxYTX899y88wY1EkfQmlCP0.&amp;URL=http:\/\/lists.wcc-coe.org\/c.html?ufl%3d4%26rtr%3don%26s%3djazjt%2ctfo0%2cusx%2cr69%2cc3wc%2c70e1%2chkrh\">WCC\u2019s Palestine Israel Ecumenical Forum<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.oikoumene.org\/en\/what-we-do\/churches-in-the-middle-east\">WCC programme &#8220;Churches in the Middle East\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Julie Rowe \u200b 19 March 2014 &#8211; Joining voices of the churches in Palestine and Israel, the World Council of Churches (WCC) General Secretary Rev. Dr Olav Fykse Tveit has expressed \u201cgrave concern\u201d about a law recently passed by the Israeli Knesset or parliament. The law passed by the Knesset on 24 February would define [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":201,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1400],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2036","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-post"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>WCC General Secretary Calls for Reversal of Israeli Knesset law Categorizing Palestinian Christians - SUMUD<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"WCC General Secretary Calls for Reversal of Israeli Knesset law Categorizing Palestinian Christians - SUMUD\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Julie Rowe \u200b 19 March 2014 &#8211; Joining voices of the churches in Palestine and Israel, the World Council of Churches (WCC) General Secretary Rev. 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