http://www.forward.com/issues/2002/02.10.18/news3.html
WASHINGTON - Thousands of Evangelical Christians waving Israeli flags
cheered last week as Knesset member Benny Elon called for the "relocation"
of Palestinians from the West Bank into Jordan.
The enthusiastic crowd at the annual convention of the Christian Coalition
in Washington also cheered House Majority Whip Tom DeLay, who urged
activists to back pro-Israel candidates who "stand unashamedly for Jesus
Christ."
Elon, whose Moledet Party advocates the "transfer" of Palestinians to Arab
countries,said that a "resettlement" of the Palestinians is prescribed by
the Bible.
None of the other high-profile speakers echoed the call for transfer by
Elon, a former minister of tourism in Prime Minister Sharon's government and
head of the Moledet Party. But they joined him in opposing American and
Israeli plans for a Palestinian state - a position well to the right of most
American Jews and Jewish organizations on Middle East issues.
The cheers for Elon and DeLay highlight potential pitfalls in the burgeoning
political alliance between Jewish pro-Israel activists and evangelicals.
While large gaps still divide them on the domestic front, both camps have
been working together with increasing comfort on Israel-related issues.
Still, while American Jewish groups have staked out hawkish views on Israeli
security issues since the start of the intifada, most organizations fall far
short of endorsing the concept of a mass expulsion of Palestinians. Yet Elon
received an enthusiastic response when he quoted from the Bible in an
attempt to justify the idea.
"If that's what he said, then it is something that should be unacceptable,"
said Kenneth Jacobson, associate national director of the Anti-Defamation
League. "We have criticized that position before and will continue to do so.
That's not what the State of Israel is all about."
Jacobson stressed that ADL welcomed and encouraged the evangelical
community's show of support for Israel. But, he added, "This kind of thing
should have been rejected as soon as it was said."
Several prominent figures who spoke at the event, including DeLay, Jerusalem
Mayor Ehud Olmert and Christian Coalition founder Pat Robertson, did so
before Elon took his turn at the podium. Since the rally, however, none have
criticized Elon's call for transfer.
Olmert has rejected the idea of transfer in the past. But, when contacted
this week by the Forward, a spokeswoman for Olmert said the mayor would not
be commenting on Elon's speech. "The mayor participates in numerous events
with numerous speakers, and therefore does not see himself obligated to
react to each of their statements," the spokeswoman said.
The mayor, she said, works diligently and equally for the well-being of
Jerusalem's Arab and Jewish populations. Therefore, she added, any question
regarding his position on transfer "is obviously irrelevant."
The Israeli embassy in Washington also declined to react to Elon's comments.
But an Israeli official in Washington said that the government does not
endorse Elon's positions. Also, the official pointed out, Elon does not
represent the government of Israel.
The Texan was slammed by the National Jewish Democratic Council, which
warned that statements like his push for Christian candidates "threaten the
atmosphere of religious freedom that our nation is founded upon."
"There should be no religious litmus test before choosing which lever to
pull in the voting booth," said Ira Forman, executive director of the Jewish
Democratic group. He added, "When it comes to the inclusive, heterogeneous
nature of American society and the inherent dangers of religious
exclusivism, Tom DeLay still does not get it."
A spokesman in DeLay's office rejected the claim of religious exclusivism,
citing many occasions when the Majority Whip spoke out in favor of religious
tolerance. The spokesman declined to comment on Elon's remarks.
During his speech last week, Elon quoted from Chapter 33 of Numbers, in
which God tells Moses that the children of Israel are mean to inherit the
land of Canaan. God then instructs the children of Israel: "Ye shall drive
out all the inhabitants of the land from before you... But if ye will not
drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then shall those that
ye let remain of them be as pricks in your eyes, and as thorns in your
sides, and they shall vex you in the land wherein ye dwell."
Drawing loud cheers from the audience, Elon said, "I know, we always have to
be politically correct, but it is very, very complicated to be politically
correct when you have to correct so many political mistakes."
To correct such mistakes, said Elon, an Orthodox rabbi, "Let's turn to the
Bible, which says very clearly... we have to resettle them, to relocate
them, and to have a Jewish state between the Jordan River and the
Mediterranean."
Another Texas Republican, House Majority Leader ***** Armey, made a similar
argument in May, during a television interview with Chris Matthews on CNBC.
Israel's government declined to send an official representative to the
rally. Instead, it was decided that Olmert, a senior member of the reigning
Likud party but not a member of the cabinet, would represent Israel. Olmert
fired up the crowd by saying he had come "from the city of God, the place
which God made the capital of the Jewish people more than 3,000 years ago,"
and vowing that the undivided Jerusalem will remain the eternal capital of
the Jewish state.
Elon, who was not participating as an official representative of Israel,
thanked the crowd "in the name of the people in Israel."
A spokesman for the Christian Coalition, Ross Torossian, said that Elon had
been invited as a representative of the Moledet party, "which maintains very
close contact with the coalition." He said that many other Knesset members
were invited as well, but declined to participate. Torossian refused to
comment on Elon's message of "transfer." He declined to indicate if the
coalition endorses it or rejects it.
However, a senior official of the Christian Coalition said that the
organization was well aware of Elon's ideology when it sent him an
invitation. The invitation, he added, was sent not despite of Elon's
ideology, but because of it.
Although the Israeli government did not authorize a senior government
official to address the coalition's gathering, the Foreign Ministry, Tourism
Ministry and Israeli embassy in Washington all had booths at the convention.
Robertson was the main speaker during the pro-Israel rally, which ended the
three-day annual convention. He lashed out at Yasser Arafat, accusing him of
having "killed or deported the vast percentage of the Christian population
in Bethlehem." Robertson said that "the Palestinian Authority, right now, in
my opinion, are a group of mafia-like thugs, who have been imported from
Tunisia, and really, Palestine has been occupied by Yasser Arafat and his
thugs. We cannot turn that nation over to them."
Dismissing the legitimacy of the Palestinians' claim to the land, and
particularly to Jerusalem, Robertson said that "the Palestinians are really
Arabs who moved there a few decades ago. Their claim to that land really
does not go back very far such as it is," while the claim of the Jews goes
back thousands of years. The Temple Mount, he concluded, "belongs to Israel,
not to the Palestinians."
The most significant characteristic of this year's Christian Coalition
convention was the attempt to graft foreign-policy issues onto the
organization's traditional domestic conservative agenda. That fusion of a
conservative domestic platform and a hawkish foreign policy agenda was well
expressed in the introductory statement of Roberta Combs, national president
of the Christian Coalition.
"Our Road to Victory conference will be the largest pro-family event in
America, as Christians will don armor for the war on terrorism," Combs said.
"We will call on America to safeguard our institutions by returning to the
true teachings of the Bible. We will pray for reform of our nation's soul by
casting aside abortion, pornography, drugs and other manifestations of moral
decline... we set out an agenda to affect social change in America, and want
to let the terrorists know that they will not win."
--
Sometimes God takes those closest to us, because it makes him feel better
about himself. He is a very vengeful God. He's all ***** about
something we did thousands of years ago. He just can't get over it, so he
doesn't care who he takes. Children, puppies, it don't matter to him, so
long as it makes us sad...God gives us life and love and help just so that
he can tear it all away and make us cry, so he can drink the sweet milk of
our tears. You see, it's our tears that give God his great power.
aa #2133
apatriot #19
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