Please Help New English Review
For our donors from the UK:
New English Review
New English Review Facebook Group
Follow New English Review On Twitter
Recent Publications by New English Review Authors
The Literary Culture of France
by J. E. G. Dixon
Hamlet Made Simple and Other Essays
by David P. Gontar
Farewell Fear
by Theodore Dalrymple
The Eagle and The Bible: Lessons in Liberty from Holy Writ
by Kenneth Hanson
The West Speaks
interviews by Jerry Gordon
Mohammed and Charlemagne Revisited: The History of a Controversy
Emmet Scott
Why the West is Best: A Muslim Apostate's Defense of Liberal Democracy
Ibn Warraq
Anything Goes
by Theodore Dalrymple
Karimi Hotel
De Nidra Poller
The Left is Seldom Right
by Norman Berdichevsky
Allah is Dead: Why Islam is Not a Religion
by Rebecca Bynum
Virgins? What Virgins?: And Other Essays
by Ibn Warraq
An Introduction to Danish Culture
by Norman Berdichevsky
The New Vichy Syndrome:
by Theodore Dalrymple
Jihad and Genocide
by Richard L. Rubenstein
Second Opinion
by Theodore Dalrymple
Not With a Bang But a Whimper: The Politics and Culture of Decline
by Theodore Dalrymple
In Praise of Prejudice: The Necessity of Preconceived Ideas
by Theodore Dalrymple
Defending The West:
by Ibn Warraq
Nations, Language and Citizenship:
by Norman Berdichevsky
Romancing Opiates
by Theodore Dalrymple
Which Koran?
by Ibn Warraq
Our Culture, What's Left of It
by Theodore Dalrymple
What The Koran Really Says
by Ibn Warraq
Life at the Bottom
by Theodore Dalrymple
The Origins of the Koran
by Ibn Warraq
Why I Am Not Muslim
by Ibn Warraq
Spanish Vignettes: An Offbeat Look Into Spain's Culture, Society & History
by Norman Berdichevsky
Leaving Islam
Edited by Ibn Warraq
The Danish-German Border Dispute, 1815-2001: Aspects of Cultural and Demographic Politics
by Norman Berdichevsky
What's Love Got to Do with It?: Emotions and Relationships in Pop Songs
by Thomas J. Scheff





Thursday, 17 May 2012

Church Bureaucrazy About Israel

One of the charges CAMERA levels at mainline Protestant churches in the U.S. is that they exhibit a monomaniacal focus on Israel while ignoring the misdeeds and human rights abuses of its adversaries in the Middle East. This assessment is typically based on the resolutions submitted to the national assemblies of these churches. The problem is not limited to resolutions approved or debated at national church gatherings, however. Another place where this monomaniacal focus can be seen is on the newsfeeds of the churches.

Probably the worst offender is the Common Global Minstries of the United Church and the Disciples of Christ. This organization, which is the overseas arm of the two denominations mentioned above, sends missionaries and activists to countries throughout the world.

Theoretically, Global Ministries is, well, a global concern, but you would not know that from its newsfeed which links to articles produced by denominational leaders and staffers, and so-called peacemaking groups such as Sabeel and Churches for Middle East Peace and para-church organizations such as the National Council of Churches and the World Council of Churches. Serving as a news aggregator, the Global Ministries newsfeed focuses a huge amount of attention on the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians while ignoring other conflicts where many more people are killed.

During all of 2011 and the first four and a half months of 2012, the Global Ministries newsfeed linked to a total of 593 articles, 208 which deal with the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. (One article, posted today, talks about about the creation of a "national UCC Palestine/Israel Network.")

In other words, approximately 35 percent of all the articles listed on the Global Ministries newsfeed since Jan. 1, 2011 and today were related to Israel.

During this same period of time, the newsfeed linked to approximately 10 articles, (less than two percent of the total) related to Syria, where approximately 12,000 people have been killed in fighting the Assad regime and anti-government rebels during the past 15 months. Nigeria, where Christians have been routinely attacked, is hardly even mentioned in the newsfeed during 2011 or 2012.

And Egypt, where dozens of Coptic Christians have been killed by Muslim extremists and government soldiers since the beginning of 2011, merited only 28 links -- less than five percent of the total -- on the Global Ministries news feed during this same time frame.

This is kind of odd given that the Global Ministries Executive for the Europe and Middle East is Rev. Dr. Peter Makari, an Egyptian American who wrote a book Christian-Muslim relations in Egypt! Couldn’t he throw some links to his fellow Christians in Egypt?

Apparently not! Talk about Eyes Wide Shut!

Don’t believe us? Go look for yourself, here.

Just start scrolling down. And keep scrolling down. You can go all the way back to 2005!

And just tick off how many times you see the “[Israel-Palestine]” tag next to an article!

You’ll see for yourself. These folks are obsessed.

Start counting.

Originally published at CAMERA.

Posted on 05/17/2012 5:08 PM by Dexter Van Zile
Comments
No comments yet.



Most Recent Posts at The Iconoclast
Search The Iconoclast
Enter text, Go to search:
The Iconoclast Posts by Author
The Iconoclast Archives
sun mon tue wed thu fri sat
    1 2 3 4
5 6 7 8 9 10 11
12 13 14 15 16 17 18
19 20 21 22 23 24 25
26 27 28 29 30 31  

Subscribe