Church leaders protest Israeli housing policy
More than two-dozen American church leaders have protested what they say is Israel’s policy of unduly confiscating the Jerusalem residency cards of Palestinians, which legally ends their right to live in the city. The protest came in the form of a letter to Israel’s ambassador to the U.S., Zalman Shoval. The letter, released February 8, was written in support of an earlier one sent by Jerusalem’s Greek Orthodox, Roman Catholic and Armenian Apostolic prelates to Israel’s minister of the interior. The three churches account for the majority of Jerusalem’s Christians.
Both letters charged Israel with increasingly confiscating the Jerusalem residency cards of Palestinians after they move out of the city to neighboring towns and villages in search of affordable housing, a job or schooling. Palestinians have long maintained that Israel nullifies the residency cards to increase Jerusalem’s percentage of Jewish residents in advance of any Middle East peace talks about the city’s final status, although neither letter referred directly to that charge. Israel maintains that it is merely following its residency laws.
The American letter was signed by Archbishop Spyridon of the Greek Orthodox Church of America; Bishop Joseph A. Fiorenza, president of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops; and Archbishop Khajag Dikidjian, western region prelate of the Armenian Apostolic Church in America. Twenty-four other church officials added their support in an addendum to the American letter. They included leaders of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the National Council of Churches, the Orthodox Church in America, the Episcopal Church, the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), the American Baptist Churches in the U.S.A., the Church of the Brethren, the Reformed Church in America and the United Church of Christ.
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