Investing in Palestinians

How can the churches acknowledge the complexity of the political challenges in the Middle East? How can Christians support Palestinian brothers and sisters in faith who are caught in that complexity and have endured four decades of Israeli occupation and restricted human rights? And how do we respond in a way that actually helps Israelis and Palestinians move toward peace and mutual security?

One response is the so-called BDS movement, which has proposed boycotts, divestment and sanctions from corporations that do business with Israel and are deemed harmful to the prospects for peace and harmful to Palestinians and which has publicly condemned Israel as an “apartheid” state.

In this issue ("Investment, not divestment"), Thomas A. Prinz and Karl-John N. Stone argue for an alternate response—positive investment in the Palestinian economy. In 2010, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman argued that a viable Palestinian state (which a majority of Israelis support) must have strong Palestinian institutions and businesses and that the best way to further that goal is to invest in those institutions and businesses. He commended Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayyad, a former World Bank economist who has “unleashed the real Palestinian revolution” with his efforts to build a viable economy and market.