Citing the Barmen Declaration, written by German theologians fighting the Nazi takeover of Christian churches in the 1930's, Dexter Van Zile, the author of the report, says proponents of divestment should have subjected the Palestinian Christian narrative to more scrutiny.

"By broadcasting this narrative, the PC(USA) did not speak in a prophetic voice, but allowed itself to be used as a megaphone for the Palestinian nationalist cause," says Van Zile. "We've seen Christian churches used this way before and the results were catastrophic. The Barmen Declaration is included in the PC(USA)'s Book of Confessions," he says. "The warnings are there in black and white, but for some reason, they were ignored by people who knew better."

The report also documents efforts by some of the denomination's leaders to misrepresent the meaning of the resolution after it was passed, says Van Zile. "After the resolution was passed, the denomination's leaders tried to portray the policy as if it punished both Israelis and Palestinians for acts of violence. The resolution did no such thing," Van Zile says.

He follows up with some pointed questions for church leaders which highlight their hypocrisy.

He thinks that the liberal Protestant denominations are (scroll down to comments)

. . . gripped by jihad denial. In the context of the Arab/Israeli conflict, this means that the church has ignored the following characteristics of the war against Israel.

The war against Israel is a Regional war.

The war against Israel is a Religious war.

The war against Israel is a Racist war.

These are the "Three Rs" mainline Protestants have ignored in their condemnations of Israel. If the denominations are truly serious about defending Israel's right to exist, as they say they are, they have to take these issues into account. Their is a mountain of evidence to demonstrate mainliners have ignored these issues.

Explaining the Three Rs to people who have never heard the word dhimmi and the history behind it will be exceedingly difficult.

The mainliners have a role to play in modulating the response to militant Islam. They will not be able to play this role and lend their voices to the creation of more tolerant societies in the Arab world and the emergence of a moderate Islam until they acknowledge the reality of militant Islam.

By dealing with people like Hezbollah, the PC(USA) has made things worse by giving the extremists within the Arab world credibility they do not deserve, therefore making life more dangerous for the moderates the mainliners keep telling us about. They are indeed out there, but mainliners have undermined their efforts to reform Islam by apologizing for its fundamentalists.

He advises nervous Jews that 1) most rank and file church-goers don't know how extreme their leaders beliefs are, and 2) when they do, they look askance at those beliefs.

US Christians stopped listening to the WCC [World Council of Churches] long ago. Many still have not forgiven it for giving $85,000 to the Patriotic Front of Zimbabwe in 1978, months after the group shot down an airliner, killing 38 of the 56 passengers on board. Terrorists killed 10 survivors.

American Christians know the WCC has a history of supporting violent "liberation" movements in Central America, Africa and East Asia.

They know the WCC ignored the plight of dissidents behind the Iron Curtain and "built bridges" with killers and tyrants, just as leaders from the Presbyterian Church (USA) recently extended offers of friendship to Hizbullah, a group that killed 241 US Marines in 1983.

Much more here on the Presbyterian record of anti-Israel activity.

An internal discussion of the Presbyterian initiative.