Official emblem of the World Council of Churches – Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons The World Council of Churches (WCC) is currently training their volunteers to promote the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel and uses blatantly anti-Semitic rhetoric. Interestingly, the WCC receives funding, either directly or indirectly, from nations that have accepted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of anti-Semitism. While the WCC recently denied charges of anti-Semitism against them, evidence suggests that they have been spreading anti-Semitic and anti-Israel sentiment for years. Since 2002, the WCC has sent 1,800 “ecumenical accompaniers” to Jerusalem and the West Bank, as part of their Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI). They aim to have 25-30 ecumenical accompaniers on the ground at all times, hoping that their “presence makes the costs of human rights abuses more apparent to the perpetrators, persuades them to act differently, and deters attacks on civilians.” They also monitor human rights violations and “stand with local peace and human rights groups.” EAPPI’s key principles also say that “We are not pro-Israeli or pro-Palestinian and we do not take sides in the conflict. We are pro-human rights and international humanitarian law.” The IHRA Working Definition of Antisemitism lists “drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis” as an example of anti-Semitism. WCC and EAPPI activists have clearly made such comparisons. WCC’s general secretary Rev. Dr. Olav Fyske Tveit has said, “I heard about the occupation of my country during the five years of World War II as the story of my parents. Now I see and hear the stories of 50 years of occupation.” In 2017, Rev. Gordon Timbers of the Presbyterian Church of Canada said he saw similarities between gas chambers in Europe and the West Bank. During a South African Apartheid Week event, EAPPI activist Itani Rasalanavho said, “the time has come to say that the victims of the Holocaust have now become the perpetrators.” Rev. Joan Fisher, also an EAPPI activist, has quoted a Palestinian cleric as saying, “We are sympathetic to the suffering of our Jewish brothers and sisters in the Holocaust, but you don’t deal with one injustice by creating another injustice.” The WCC supports boycotts of Israeli settlements, while EAPPI activists have called for a boycott of all of Israel. In 2012, one of EAPPI’s publications called for “sanctions and suspension of US aid to Israel,” to “challenge Israel in local and international courts,” and for “economic boycotts.” That same year, EAPPI’s National Coordinator in South Africa signed a letter that called “on our government and civil society to instigate broad-based boycott, divestment and sanctions on Israel.” WCC and EAPPI members have also discouraged and attacked Christian Zionism. During a WCC event in 2015, Zionism was called “heresy” under Christian theology. Additionally, the leadership compared Israel to apartheid South Africa, modern Israelis were said to have no connection to the ancient Israelites, and Israeli society was said to be “full with racism and light skin privilege.” In 2016, EAPPI activist Hannah Griffiths blamed the “Jewish lobby” for American Christian Evangelicals’ support of Israel. She also went on to claim that Israel plants knives on the bodies of Palestinian terrorists who were shot after attempting to stab Israelis. EAPPI activists frequently spread misinformation and falsehoods about Israel. In the UK, one activist said that Israel has a policy to reduce the Arab population by sending them to the West Bank or Gaza. A volunteer in Canada said that Israelis are not allowed in Area A (controlled by the Palestinian Authority) “to prevent Israelis from seeing what was going on.” EAPPI also partners with groups like B’Tselem and Breaking the Silence. B’Tselem – The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, has repeatedly spread inaccurate information and statistics. Breaking the Silence is an organization made up of IDF veterans who have “taken it upon themselves to expose to the Israeli public to the reality of everyday life in the Occupied Territories.” While comprising less than .005% of the IDF’s combat forces, the organization demonizes Israel by spreading inaccurate narratives of the IDF. Not surprisingly, Jewish communities have found that EAPPI volunteers have inflamed antisemitism. In 2012, the UK Jewish Board of Deputies president Vivian Wineman said, “members of Jewish communities across the country have suffered harassment and abuse at EAPPI meetings.” She also said that the EAPPI “helped to create a climate of hostility towards Israel within the Church of England.” In response to The Jerusalem Post, WCC Commission of the Churches on International Affairs Director Peter Prove said that the WCC “does not countenance equating Israel to Nazi Germany, neither in the training of participants in the EAPPI nor otherwise.” He also said, “Since its founding Assembly in 1948 the WCC has denounced antisemitism as a sin against God and humanity, and we strongly maintain that position.” The WCC also stated that the organization “does not promote boycotts based on nationality in this or any other context. Nor does WCC promote economic measures against Israel. It does however have a longstanding policy in favor of boycotting goods and services from the settlements.” EAPPI receives funding from many foreign governments, including those that have signed onto the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism. For example, the British Church NGO CAFOD, which has received funding from the EU, UK and Ireland, gave EAPPI GBP 25,000 last year alone. DanChurchAid of Denmark, which receives funding from Denmark and the EU, has pledged $328,995 to EAPPI in 2017-2019. Countries like Norway, Sweden, Germany, and Finland also support church organizations that fund EAPPI. UNICEF has also been involved in funding EAPPI. The NGO Monitor has stated that “EAPPI misuse tourist visas to enter Israel, where the group has no legal status. They are hosted in Jerusalem by a WCC affiliate, the Jerusalem Interchurch Center (JIC). Notably, the head of JIC, Yusuf Dahar, is one of the authors of the Kairos Palestine Document, which legitimizes terror, embraces anti-Jewish theology and rejects Jewish history. Similar views have been expressed by a number of WCC officials.” NGO Monitor’s president Gerald Steinberg also said that their research “highlights EAPPI’s radical agenda, which, rather than advancing or defending human rights, is a platform for conflict and anti-Semitism.” He also believes that the WCC should adopt the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism, which would force them to hold themselves accountable. On January 30th, the WCC announced that it would pull its “ecumenical accompaniers” from the city of Hebron for “security concerns.” Within recent months, members of Im Tirtzu, a Zionist non-governmental organization in Israel, have been filming EAPPI activities in Hebron. WCC general secretary Rev. Dr. Tveit said that this “intensified harassment of WCC’s programme” caused it to pull the accompaniers, since “the WCC accompaniers are currently prevented from fulfilling their role as peaceful protective presence for residents in Hebron.” CEO of Im Tirtzu Matan Pelege said that “we are pleased to see that foreign government-funded delegitimating organizations are beginning to leave Hebron.” WCC’s announcement followed Israel’s decision to end the Temporary International Presence in Hebron (TIPH), a 22-year-old observer mission in the city that had previously operated under an agreement between the Palestinian Authority and Israel.