On the same day that Palestinians and many of their leaders were shown on televisions celebrating the kidnapping of three Israeli teenagers, the pension board of the United Methodist Church USA voted to divest its holdings in a security company doing business in Israel, with one official citing “concerns about involvement in human rights violations in the Israeli prison system and the occupation of Palestinian lands.”
Later this week, another large, mainstream US Protestant denomination, the Presbyterian Church USA, will gather to vote yet again on a proposal to single out Israel for more extensive divestment sanctions to protest its “occupation” of “Palestinian territories.”
The company cited by the Methodist Church pension board is GS4, a high-tech security company that does business with Israel as well as many other countries around the world.
David Zeller, the chief investment officer of the Methodist Church’s pension board, disputed the claim that the divestment action had anything to do with Israel by saying that the stock was purchased only in error, since Methodist Church guidelines prohibit investments in any companies that profit from prisons. This may have been an attempt to ease criticism from church members opposed to singling out Israel for its ongoing conflict with the Palestinians while still holding a position palatable to those who support punishing the Jewish state through boycotts and sanctions.
The last time Methodist church leaders presented a motion to divest all church holdings in companies that do business in Israel to the broader Methodist community in 2012, it was defeated overwhelmingly.