United Methodists are responding to Kairos Palestine: A Moment of Truth ,a statement of faith and urgent call to action from Christians in Palestine. UMKR seeks, through nonviolent means and in partnership with Palestinian Christians, freedom, justice and equality for all Palestinians and Israelis.
UMKR needs your support
General Conference 2020 has been
scheduled for Aug-Sept 2021. Our justice legislation is still vital & needs
YOUR support! LEARN MORE:
🔴 New on our site 🔶 See Updates
THE PETITION
On December 21, 2019, the International Criminal Court (ICC) concluded a lengthy and extensive preliminary examination of war-crime related allegations in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including the ongoing forcible displacement of tens of thousands of Palestinians in the West Bank.
The Prosecutor leading the preliminary examination concluded that the Court has “reasonable basis to proceed” but asked it to decide whether it has jurisdiction on the matter. While the ICC weighs this issue, the Jahalin Bedouin and many other Palestinian communities are locked into an untenable position. Their status in limbo, they have no legal recourse to protect their homes and livelihoods.
We, residents of member state signatories of the Rome Statute of the ICC, and other concerned citizens, demand that the Court settle the matter of jurisdiction quickly and positively. If the Court cannot protect their rights, the international community must find an alternative such as recognition of Palestine. This issue cannot wait. The machine driving forcible displacement grinds on. The lives of tens of thousands lie in the balance.
Sign this petition to the International Criminal Court calling for a quick and positive ruling for Palestinian rights!
Click here to take action
In this 2014 photo, Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Chairman Cedric Cromwell speaks at the opening of the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Community and Government Center in Mashpee, Massachusetts. On March 27, the U.S. Department of the Interior ordered the removal of 321 acres of the tribe’s land out of federal trust. Photo courtesy of the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe. [via United Methodist News Service]
Land is Sacred: Stand With the
Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe
The Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe, the very tribe that welcomed the Pilgrims in the 1600s, is at risk of losing what is left of their homelands due to a determination made by the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
Why is this important?
The Mashpee Wampanoag,
the People of the First Light,
have occupied the same
region for over 12,000 years
and have faced deminishment
of their homelands since
colonization.
After an arduous process
lasting more than three decades,
the Mashpee Wampanoag were re-acknowledged as a federally recognized tribe in 2007. In 2015, the federal government declared 320 acres in Massachusetts as the Tribe’s initial reservation, where they can exercise full tribal sovereignty.
Now the Trump Administration has decertified the protected land of the indigenous Mashpee people. This is colonialism and must be stopped.The Mashpee Tribe has legislation in Congress Senate that will protect their land: the "Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe Reservation Reaffirmation Act (HR.312)."
LEARN MORE ABOUT THIS
See this informative article from the United Methodist News Service:
“Native caucus sounds alarm over tribal land dispute”
See this piece in The Guardian: Trump administration revokes tribe’s reservation status in ‘power grab’
The Native American International Caucus (NAIC) is one of our church's ethnic caucuses and one of UMKR's fellow members in the Love Your Neighbor Coalition (LYNC). Download the NAIC open letter to legislators
MoveOn.org has a petition to the U.S. Congress calling for support of the tribe’s legislation. It has over 280,000 signatures. Help them get to 300,000! Sign the petition to Congress
For those in the US: Send a message directly to your legislators. Color of Change has one prepared to make that easy. Take action here
COVID-19 RESPONSE PLAN
FOR THE OCCUPIED
PALESTINIAN TERRITORY
UN Office for the Coordination
of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)
The humanitarian community
in theoccupied Palestinian
territory hasreleased a detailed
plan aimed atpreventing further transmission of
COVID-19 and mitigating the worst effects of the pandemic, laying the foundations for the Government of Palestine’s response plan. To implement the plan, we are urgently requesting that donors contribute US$34 million.
See the summary
Download the full plan
RESOURCES
See stories on Covid-19 here:
https://mondoweiss.net/tag/coronavirus/
Sign up for their COVID-19 updates on this page:
https://mondoweiss.net/newsletters/
In the list of newsletter choices, see:
Special Coverage: Covid-19
Find their COVID-19 stories at this page:
https://electronicintifada.net/tags/covid-19
See their Coronavirus stories:
https://www.972mag.com/topic/coronavirus/
Statistics on the Coronavirus in the Occupied Palestinian Territories See the reports
Updates from Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) Includes Palestinian refugees in Lebanon
ACTIVISM
FROM HOME
during COVID-19
DON'T FORGET the campaigns in
Dismantling Racism, our new website
section: Go there
Dismantling Racism, a new section of
our website, has additional campaigns
and actions you can join: See them
PCAP's Open Letter to Church Leaders Calls for Action
PCAP asks church leaders to press the Israeli government to lift the blockade of the Gaza Strip in light of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Endorsed by UMKR and many faith partners.
WE ALL CAN DO THIS!
UMKR has the link and a prepared message that you can
send directly to the Israeli Prime Minister:
See PCAP's letter and TAKE ACTION
The #CPTJusticeJourney
For intersectional
justice action
at its best,
check out this
2020 Justice Journey
from Christian
Peacemaker Teams.
These are great solidarity actions, for people in Palestine, in Iraqi Kurdistan, for the indigenous people of Turtle Island (aka North America), at the US/Mexico border: the places where CPT
teams are serving.
Scroll down their web page where they have gathered all these actions together and you can raise your voice for marginalized and endangered people around the world. Go there and take action
TOOLKIT:Organizing for
Palestinian Rights in the time of COVID-19 Download it
Ongoing News & Updates
With this Alert, you can CONTACT CONGRESS about the urgent need to help Palestinians under occupation during the Covid-19 pandemic. And there are several other important actions you can take: See the alert
Release Palestinian Child Prisoners
Palestinians living under occupation
and siege are among the most
vulnerable populations in the world
during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Even while many of us are staying
home, we have the powerto help:
TAKE ACTION with the campaigns and programs below.
Have a campaign to suggest? Let us know: info@kairosresponse.org
On the right side of this page: see RESOURCES for activists and all who are concerned about the COVID-19 situation in Palestine.
Children should never be imprisoned — this is especially true during a global pandemic.
Palestinian children imprisoned by Israeli authorities live in close proximity to each other, often in poor sanitary conditions, with limited ability to maintain minimum hygiene standards.
Four Palestinian prisoners detained at Israel’s Megiddo prison were placed in isolation after they were in contact with a COVID-19 positive Israeli officer. Megiddo prison is one of several prisons located inside Israel where Palestinian child “security prisoners” are held.
There is simply no way Israeli prison authorities can ensure the health and well-being of Palestinian child detainees during this pandemic.
Israeli authorities must take immediate action to release all Palestinian child detainees in Israeli prisons and detention centers due to the increasing vulnerability created due to the rapid global spread of the COVID-19 virus.
Join thousands of justice advocates who are demanding that Israeli authorities release Palestinian child detainees.
Learn more and take action here
A call to action from Christian Peacemaker Teams,
the Good Shepherd Collective, Human Rights Defenders,
the International Solidarity Committee, the Hebron Defense Committee, and the Protection and Sumud Committee.
This campaign is not about the coronavirus. It is about continuing to work and prepare for a world beyond COVID-19. Right now, there are hundreds of institutions working tirelessly to create that world in the ways they see fit.
For indigenous communities everywhere, that means programs of displacement and commodification of their resources continue to be executed.
In Palestine, Israel continues their colonization of the West Bank, with demolitions continuing all over - even the destruction of mobile coronavirus clinics. Since Feb 21, when the first reported case of coronavirus was reported, the Israeli military hasdemolished some 54 structures, displacing 63 people. Of these 54 structures, 20 were donated by the international community.
Clearly, the plans to forcibly displace the indigenous population from the West Bank as a precursor for annexation are underway.
A large coalition of Palestinian organizations are directly challenging the way the Israeli settler movement exploits US tax laws and funnels US charitable donations for the displacement of Palestinians from their homes.
We are calling on New York Attorney General Letitia James to investigate the Hebron Fund – a radical settler organization that maintains a 501 ( c ) 3 registration in the State of New York – and revoke their license.
If you haven’t signed this petition yet, you can do so here:https://bit.ly/FreeHebron.
Many observers have described the situation in Hebron, a Palestinian city in the occupied West Bank, as the most extreme and vivid example of Israeli apartheid. Learn more here about the settlers, Hebron, and this campaign
In the Time of COVID-19
Christian Organizations write to President Trump and Secretaries Mnuchin and Pompeo
Urge Trump administration to lift sanctions hurting the people of Iran and Syria, end US support for Israel's blockade of Gaza and press Israel to ensure all needed supplies can reach Gaza Download the letter
Christian Organizations write to
the U.S. Congress
Urge Congress to restore humanitarian aid to Palestinians including UNRWA, aid that had been cut by the Trump administaions, and thank them for their efforts to provide aid in the previous year
Download the letter
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An Appeal from UMKR
UMKR has important church legislation for our denomination's global General Conference, to be held in 2021. These resolutions address:
• protecting Palestinian children,
• defending the right to boycott,
•divesting from the bonds of occupation governments, and other timely justice issues.
We also have BIG PLANS for educating
A LOT of people throughout our church about Palestinian rights, with literature, displays, speakers, meals, and witness actions!
With very limited resources, UMKR has made a BIG impact in the global United Methodist Church! Groundbreaking divestment and boycott actions by the UMC would never have happened without UMKR's advocacy AND all the extraordinary partners and allies who helped us.
General Conference is always our BEST OPPORTUNITY to make a worldwide impactfor Palestinian rights throughout our denomination.
But, if we are to succeed in advocating for justice with thousands of United Methodists who come to General Conference from four continents,WE NEED YOUR HELP!
Click the green button and take action now:
Please give as generously as you can, and
know that whatever you are able to give
will be greatly appreciated.
Political Analysts of Al-Shabaka:
Publications on COVID-19
• What the coronavirus outbreak means for
Palestinian refugees
by Yara Hawari, The New Arab
• Coronavirus outbreak in the time of apartheid
by Osama Tanous, Al Jazeera English
• Israel’s caging of Gaza is a recipe for
by Jehad Abusalim, +972 Magazine
• ‘A hotbed for fake news’: How Palestinians are
fighting coronavirus misinformation
Yara Asi and Marwa Fatafta, +972 Magazine
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for our work to continue.
General Conference