{"id":12280,"date":"2016-05-02T16:43:14","date_gmt":"2016-05-02T23:43:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/?p=12280"},"modified":"2016-05-05T08:11:48","modified_gmt":"2016-05-05T15:11:48","slug":"gc2016-divestment-debate-continues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/gc2016-divestment-debate-continues\/","title":{"rendered":"GC2016: Divestment debate continues"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Linda Bloom<\/strong>
\nMay 2, 2016 | NEW YORK (UMNS)<\/h4>\n

Through petitions and advocacy, some United Methodists are again asking delegates to the denomination\u2019s top legislative body to use divestment as a way to address the Israel-Palestine conflict.<\/p>\n

Legislative proposals for General Conference, which meets May 10-20 in Portland, Oregon, name three companies \u2014 Caterpillar, Motorola Solutions and Hewlett Packard \u2014 as divestment targets and call for an end to investments that relate to illegal settlements, including those on Palestinian land. Similar legislation failed during the\u00a02008<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a02012<\/a>\u00a0General Conference sessions.<\/p>\n

The divestment petitions for 2016<\/a>\u00a0were submitted by various annual conferences, the United Methodist Board of Church and Society and United Methodist Kairos Response, an advocacy group. A few other petitions oppose the use of divestment for church funds.<\/p>\n

The Rev. Michael Yoshi, who co-chairs Kairos Response with Susanne Hoder, believes the situation in Palestine \u201chas gotten increasingly worse\u201d since the last General Conference, as the confiscation, annexation and demolition of Palestinian land and property has escalated.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve seen more and more United Methodists join us in this movement as we respond to the call of the Palestinians, whom we\u2019ve developed close relationships with,\u201d said Yoshi, who calls the movement a faithful response to \u201ca moral and justice issue.\u201d<\/p>\n

The United Methodist Church\u00a0officially opposes Israel\u2019s military occupation<\/a>\u00a0of the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, as well as the continued building of illegal Jewish settlements.<\/p>\n

The church\u2019s position \u201cdoes not support a boycott of products made in Israel\u201d but does call upon on \u201call nations\u201d to prohibit the import of products made by companies in Israeli settlements on Palestinian land and asks that companies profiting from the settlements \u201cstop any business\u201d that supports the ongoing military occupation.<\/p>\n

Pension agency opposes divestment<\/h4>\n

The calls for divestment mainly focus on the United Methodist Board of Pension and Health Benefits and Wespath, its investment arm. The agency\u2019s website has a resource,\u00a0\u201cAddressing Human Rights \u2013 Israel and the Palestinian Territories,\u201d<\/a>\u00a0that addresses the divestment question.<\/p>\n

That resource points to the board\u2019s conviction that \u201congoing dialogue with diverse stakeholders from both the Palestinian and Israeli communities\u201d is the key to engagement.<\/p>\n

The pension agency has consistently opposed legislative attempts at General Conference to require divestment from specific companies. \u201cWe don\u2019t believe that divestment is an effective strategy for increasing positive change,\u201d said Barbara Boigegrain, top executive. \u201cWalking away from the table silences your voice.\u201d<\/p>\n

Using investment screens can impose the same limitations, she added, because dialogue can no longer be initiated. The pension agency has been in ongoing conversation \u201cwith all of the companies\u201d mentioned in General Conference petitions on divestment, she said.<\/p>\n

Dave Zellner, chief investment officer, said the pension agency has been \u201cvery active in advising Caterpillar on its human rights policy. They have come to us with ideas, we have given them feedback on what they\u2019ve provided and they have taken it carefully into consideration. We feel pretty confident that we have been making progress with them.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a recent press release<\/a>, the Board of Pension and Health Benefits pointed to Caterpillar in relation to Wespath\u2019s engagement with companies through the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.<\/p>\n

\u201cCaterpillar recently announced that, in alignment with the Guiding Principles, it has expanded its human rights policy; provided more detailed reporting on the policy implementation to its board; and conducted a human rights impact assessment across its entire value chain, including its suppliers and dealers,\u201d the release stated.<\/p>\n

Frustrated by negotiations<\/h4>\n

Jim Nibbelink, a General Conference delegate and lay leader of the Desert Southwest Conference, believes the church should not have investments in companies involved in situations where there are clear violations of international law and overt human rights abuses.<\/p>\n

A member of the Kairos Response steering committee, Nibbelink said he sees the value in shareholder advocacy, but pointed out that 12 years of the denomination\u2019s negotiations with Caterpillar have yielded no fruit. \u201cThey (Caterpillar) have, as far as we can tell, made some minor revisions in their policies on human rights,\u201d Nibbelink added. \u201cHowever, their behavior has not changed a bit.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Hoder, the idea that positive investment in Palestinian is a solution to real change for Palestinians \u2014 an idea promoted at the 2012 General Conference \u2014 is not feasible ahead of necessary political changes. \u201cIt\u2019s our opinion that first the occupation needs to end and then the investment can come,\u201d she explained.<\/p>\n

The leadership at Kairos Response believes that most church members are not really informed about what is happening in the Palestinian territories. Those who go and visit the Palestinian people \u201ccome away with a stark sense of the injustice of what\u2019s taking place,\u201d Yoshi said.<\/p>\n

Kairos Response leaders said they would bring Palestinian and Jewish representatives to General Conference and hope United Methodists will take the time \u201cto listen to their stories, to their truths and to their hopes about the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Seeking divestment alternatives<\/h4>\n

The Rev. Alexander Joyner is part of a group called \u201cUnited Methodists for Constructive Peacemaking in Israel and Palestine\u201d\u00a0that also took part in the conversation at the 2012 General Conference in Tampa, Florida.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI do think the landscape is pretty much the same,\u201d he said. \u201cThere\u2019s a similar focus on particular companies on the divestment side.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Joyner\u2019s opinion, using divestment as a tool to end the occupation does not foster reconciliation or allow for restorative justice. \u201cIn effect, it singles out Israel as the part that needs to change, but Israel is not capable of unilaterally solving the situation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

But he also sees the need to move beyond an emphasis of positive investment in the Palestinian economy, which the group promoted in 2012. That is still a valuable pursuit, Joyner said, but the group\u2019s new focus is on \u201cnon-exclusionary screens\u201d to proactively seek companies \u201cthat are contributing to the development of cooperative ventures between Israelis and Palestinians.\u201d<\/p>\n

A petition that Joyner submitted on behalf of United Methodists for Constructive Peacemaking in Israel and Palestine asks General Conference to call upon the Board of Church and Society, in cooperation with JustPeace, to affirm strategies to engage both Israelis and Palestinians, and support U.S and international efforts at diplomacy with restorative justice. Restorative justice \u201cworks to recognize damages, rebuild trust, honor dignity and integrate all people who have been harmed through conflict.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another proposed resolution \u201cwould encourage United Methodists to ask the U.S. government to give more a concrete framework of a two-state solution,\u201d Joyner said. \u201cThat alone can\u2019t be the answer but it\u2019s got to be part of the answer to have some sort of negotiated settlement.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bloom is a United Methodist News Service multimedia reporter based in New York. Follow her at\u00a0<\/em><\/em>https:\/\/twitter.com\/umcscribe<\/a>\u00a0or contact her at (615)742-5470 or\u00a0<\/em>newsdesk@umcom.org<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Linda Bloom May 2, 2016 | NEW YORK (UMNS) Through petitions and advocacy, some United Methodists are again asking delegates to the denomination\u2019s top legislative body to use divestment as a way to address the Israel-Palestine conflict. Legislative proposals for General Conference, which meets May 10-20 in Portland, Oregon, name three companies \u2014 Caterpillar, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":12284,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[449,3],"tags":[483],"class_list":{"0":"post-12280","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-general-conference","8":"category-umns","9":"tag-umcgc"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/7132100095_d9b1cf9c6c_b.jpg?fit=1024%2C683&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2l75j-3c4","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12280","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12280"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12280\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12283,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12280\/revisions\/12283"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12280"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12280"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12280"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}