To keep abreast of the cascade of breaking stories about Palestine and Israel right now is a challenge. Almost every day there are reports of outbreaks of yet more violence. The current violence is only new, however, in its brazen and bare-knuckled intensity. So much so that B’Tselem, the Israeli human rights NGO, described the recent Israeli settler attack on the West Bank Palestinian village of Huwara as a pogrom. “This is exactly what Israeli control looks like,” B’Tselem said. “The settlers carry out the attack, the military secures it, the politicians back it.”

The surge in attacks is rooted in the on-going structural violence of Israel’s illegal and crushing occupation or, more accurately, acquisition of Palestine. And there is nothing new about that. Such attacks on Palestinian communities are fully consistent with the “intended end of the long game of Israel’s Zionist project,” observed Richard Falk, a former UN Special Rapporteur on the Palestinian Territories, in a recent webinar (see link in Breaking the Stories). 

Israel’s far-right Zionist supremacist government, driven by those whom Thomas Friedman in a recent New York Times op-ed described as “messianic, religious zealots,” is pushing things to the brink. In a recent update, Sabeel Director Omar Haramy confirmed that “things are very bad . . . it’s clear we are in a third intifada.” 

What is new is that this brink seems to be precipitating the beginning of a seismic shift. Globally, many Jewish leaders, including in the U.S., are now speaking out against Netanyahu’s government. Nearly 100 Democrats in Congress last week spoke up in a letter to President Biden deploring Netanyahu’s proposed judicial ‘reforms.' 

Justice for Palestinians and their human and democratic rights are, however, still barely a footnote in these critiques of Israel. Nor have Palestinian rights been a focus of the massive demonstrations of Israeli citizens. This omission, while predictable, is shameful. Palestinian rights to equality and sovereignty are at the heart of the matter and need to be recognized, respected, and protected. 

Now feels like a new Kairos moment, a time of unprecedented urgency but also of unprecedented opportunity. We are being called to see clearly and act decisively, as a matter of faith and of justice. We are being called to raise our voices as human rights advocates, to intensify pressure on Israel’s apartheid regime, and to insist on accountability from Israel as well as from our own government which aids and abets Israel’s human rights crimes with 3.8 billion dollars a year in military aid.

The United Church of Christ has seized this Kairos moment. On March 10th, along with nine other Christian denominations and organizations, the UCC sent a powerful and prophetic letter to President Biden and members of Congress criticizing the U.S. for “its uncritical support . . . for the Government of Israel and its failure to demand accountability,” and demanding urgent action. (Find link to the letter’s text in article below.)

This month’s Global Ministries 3^rd Thursday Alert (see article below) urges us to amplify the call for accountability. “[T]here is virtually no accountability for Israeli violations of Palestinian rights,” the Alert states. No accountability still for the murder of Rachel Corrie, 20 years ago, on March 16, 2003. No accountability for the murder of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, slain by IDF soldiers last May.  No accountability for the deaths of 83 Palestinians killed so far this year. No accountability for the Nakba in 1948 and on-going ever since. Israel has been allowed to act with impunity.

The 3rd Thursday Alert suggests language for a letter we can each write to our members of Congress. Through our letters and our voices, let us be vigorous in calling for accountability and justice. Let us be persistent in defending the human rights of Palestinians. Let us advocate for the dignity, humanity, and equality of all God's beloved. Let us seize this Kairos moment and magnify the seismic shift.