D004 Express Solidarity with Palestinians as an Indigenous People
Resolved, the House of ________________ concurring,
That the 81st General Convention reaffirm its solidarity with and concern for the well-being of “the Indigenous Peoples of the world,” in accordance with Resolution 2012-A131: Express Solidarity with Indigenous Peoples; and be it further
Resolved, That the 81st General Convention, in affirming this solidarity recognize that Palestinian Arabs, including our Palestinian Christian sisters and brothers, are among the indigenous people of the lands of Palestine and Israel lying between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River; and be it further
Resolved, That the 81st General Convention and The Episcopal Church direct the Office of Government Relations to apply the demands of Resolution 2012-A131 to Palestinian Arabs who experience displacement, discrimination, dispossession, and daily harassment at the hands of the state of Israel. Applying the demands entails supporting their right to “retain their traditional lands and territories,” giving “high priority” to protection of the rights of Palestinian Arabs, and urging the U.S. government, in its dealings with the government of Israel, to “identify” and correct Israeli laws and policies that treat Palestinians unfairly or with “invidious discrimination.”
Explanation
It is widely, but incorrectly, believed that the Palestinian Arabs of today are non-native late-comers to Palestine, having moved there only in recent centuries, particularly following the emergence of Islam in the seventh century. In fact, however, Palestinian Arabs are collectively the descendants of all the ancient and modern peoples who have lived in, immigrated to, and conquered Palestine through the ages. This includes ancient Jews, Canaanites, Egyptians, Assyrians, Greeks, Romans, European Crusaders, and Arabs.
Christian Palestinians have been a presence in Palestine since the time of Jesus; today’s Christian Palestinians are descended from the Jewish contemporaries of Jesus who adopted the new faith and became Christianity’s earliest practitioners in the first century CE. These earliest Christians spoke Aramaic, as did Jesus and other Jews of the period. In later centuries, with the advent of the Byzantine Roman empire, the language of the land was Greek, but the people’s ethnicity did not change; Palestinians of all faiths remained indigenous to Palestine. Following the Muslim Arab conquest in the seventh century, a great many Greek-speaking Christians converted to Islam, and Arabic became the common language. Neither the multiplicity of faiths, the changes of language, nor the admixture of other populations through immigration and conquest over the centuries alters the indigeneity of today’s Palestinian Arab population. They are no less indigenous than the Jewish people.
Although the exact numbers or proportions of indigenous peoples are not a measure of their inherent rights in any nation, it is important to note that in Palestine-Israel, the indigenous Palestinian Arab population today roughly equals the Jewish population, each population numbering approximately seven million.
Despite this equality in numbers, there is no equality of political rights: the Palestinian Arabs who live inside Israel’s borders and are Israeli citizens, as well as those living in Jerusalem, enjoy some limited rights—limitations not imposed on Jewish citizens—but the almost five million Palestinian Arabs living under Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza enjoy no political rights or freedom whatsoever. Palestinians forcibly expelled in 1948 and their descendants have no right to return to their original homes and land and can receive no compensation for their loss of property and livelihood.
In 2018 Israel enacted a Basic Law entitled “The Nation State of the Jewish People.” (Because Israel has no constitution, a Basic Law has the status of a constitutional provision.) This law states that in Israel, as the “nation state of the Jewish People,” the right to national self-determination “is exclusive to the Jewish People.” The law declares the state to be open to Jewish immigration and encourages the “development of Jewish settlement as a national value.” There is no mention of immigration other than of Jews and, in fact, Palestinian Arab immigration is prohibited.