IPMN and Presbyterians to Obama: Don't block statehood!

The Honorable Barack Obama
President of the United States

Dear Mr. President:

We write this open letter to confirm support within the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) for statehood for Palestine and hence for the admission of the state of Palestine into membership of the United Nations. We believe the admission of Palestine—currently a permanent observer—into full membership will hasten progress toward the two-state solution affirmed by international law and will contribute to a just peace for both Palestinians and Israelis. 

The General Assemblies of our church have long supported the two-state solution and an end to the Israeli military occupation; this letter allows a broad spectrum of our members to affirm this position, which we base in Jesus Christ’s prophetic call for us to be peacemakers and the call of Palestinian Christian partners. Thus we encourage all nations to support Palestinian self-determination on questions related to UN membership. If a nation cannot vote Yes for its own considerations, we ask that its representatives abstain and not deny the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people, nor withhold financial support for the Palestinian people to overcome decades of restrictions on their freedom and development.

We understand the view expressed by United States and Israeli representatives that international recognition by the UN is no substitute for two-party, two-state negotiations.  But the reverse is also true, given the prolonged and undeniable failure of the negotiations between parties of vastly different power since the Oslo accords of 1993. In fact, affirmation of Palestinian membership in the United Nations would seem to increase the likelihood of fair and transparent two party negotiations before a watching world.

As General David Petraeus indicated to the US Congress in 2009, the lack of a just peace in Palestine engenders insecurity and hostility to the United States, Israel and the West generally, particularly in Arab and Muslim nations. We oppose all violence in Israel and Palestine, by both the occupier and the occupied, and see ending the occupation itself as the right path to ending both structural and reactive violence, terror and discrimination. 

The principle of democratic self-determination by peoples is fundamental to a just international order. In particular, the Geneva Convention dating from the Nuremberg trials in 1949, that land acquired in war should not be annexed and subjected to population settlement or removal, is a bulwark against nations seeking to expand their territory by force of arms. UN membership will not solve all statehood issues, but it offers a firmer platform for future resolution than unequal and infinite negotiation. Our rationale accompanies this letter, but the core principle is that the Palestinians have a right to freedom in their own viable and democratic state.

In closing, we reaffirm our support for Palestine and Israel, living in a peace that goes beyond the absence of hostilities to include an embrace of full human rights and economic equity for all citizens of both countries. Thus will they both be fully welcome within the family of nations.

Sincerely,
The Israel Palestine Mission Network 
of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) 
and the undersigned Presbyterians from around the United States

[Sign Open Letter here.]