Last July, the Presbyterian Church (USA) passed an overture at its General Assembly calling for "selective phased divestment" from multinational companies doing business in Israel whose products or operations contribute to the occupation of Palestinians. The stated rationale for this action is that the occupation is the sole cause of the conflict. If the Israelis would return to the pre-June 1967 (1949 armistice) lines, there would be no Palestinian grievance and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would end along with the Muslim resentment of the West that it engenders. However, Israel stubbornly refuses to accept this view and therefore, out of love for both the Palestinians and the Israelis, the church sees no option but to bring economic sanctions against Israel.

		David Shtulman is executive director of the Pittsburgh chapter of the American Jewish Committee (shtulmand@ajc.org).

This overture, I am told by local Presbyterian leaders who were present at the vote, was pushed through with little if any meaningful debate. Neither has there been much meaningful debate within the church since that time.

A survey conducted last November by Presbyterian Church Research Services showed that 60 percent of Presbyterians were unaware of the plan adopted four months earlier while, of those who did know, only 28 percent of church members and 30 percent of church elders backed divestment. Those numbers approximate pretty well my own experiences discussing the issue with Pittsburgh-area Presbyterian parishioners and church leaders.

What I find so perplexing is that given such a low level of interest in and support for divestment, the national church seems ever more determined to forge ahead with this process.

Just recently, the Presbyterian Church (USA) persuaded the Geneva-based World Council of Churches (for whom PCUSA is a very important funding source) to encourage its member churches to endorse divestment as well.

But if the proposed purpose of divestment is to hasten peace, how exactly is that supposed to work? Consider the following: Since the death of Yasser Arafat and the subsequent election of Mahmoud Abbas, Palestinian-Israeli negotiations have reached their highest levels of activity and hopefulness in four years. Abbas, Sharon, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Jordanian King Abdullah of Jordan joined together in a summit declaring a cease fire. Abbas publicly declared that the war with Israel is over. Mubarak and Abdullah have agreed to return their ambassadors to Israel and are discussing personal visits there. Qatar has invited an Israeli cabinet minister to participate in a conference there for the first time. Syria is desperately concerned that Lebanon, if rescued from Syrian occupation, would try to make its own separate peace with Israel. The relationship between Israel and other Arab nations has never showed such signs of hope.

Israel will unilaterally abandon all settlements in Gaza and four in the northern West Bank. The major Palestinian towns are being restored to Palestinian control. The Israeli security barrier has been rerouted to include less than 5 percent of West Bank territory and to be considerably less intrusive on Palestinian life. Israel has ended the policy of demolishing homes of Palestinians tied to terrorism, is announcing a timetable to dismantle all unauthorized Israeli settlements and has already implemented an initial release of 500 Palestinian prisoners. These steps go on despite the recent suicide bombing in Tel Aviv.

At the same time, Syria, Iran and their Hezbollah terror proxies in Lebanon have emerged as the parties most opposed to the success of the Palestinian-Israeli peace process.

If the Presbyterian Church (USA) and the World Council of Churches are truly committed to peace, they could make significant contributions in three ways. They could put their resources to assisting the development of democracy, the economy and an active peace camp in the new Palestinian government; they could encourage the hopeful but still tentative overtures between the Arab world and Israel; or they could use their economic power to pressure Syria and Iran to support rather than sabotage the peace process.

Instead, in a policy that seems more divorced from reality by the day, they continue to drive a divestment policy that Israeli and Palestinian peace activists agree can only serve to harden the extremist positions in both societies.

The one bright spot in all this is the open way in which area churches, the Pittsburgh Presbytery and many other Presbyteries across the country have been willing to engage their respective Jewish communities on these issues. Many have either openly questioned the wisdom of the divestment policy or plainly expressed their opposition.

Considering the lack of support for divestment by church members, and the seeming disconnect between the stated methods and goals, I cannot help but wonder if divestment is moving ahead because national church leaders truly believe it promotes peace -- or if divestment is moving ahead just because.