Prejudice in some Protestant churches...

A nice op-ed piece in the National Post today by Rabbi Abraham Cooper of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, about anti-semitism in some Protestant churches.

A recent study by the Institute for Religion and Democracy examined the human-rights-related pronouncements by these four mainline Protestant denominations [Presbyterian, Lutheran, Methodist, and Episcopal]. It showed that during the period 2000-2003, 37% of their criticism was directed against tiny Israel, and an additional 32% against the US conduct of its war on terror. That leaves just 31% for the combined barbarity of all the world's authoritarian regimes.

It is difficult to fathom why this perverse anti-Israel mindset persists. Next time, instead of taking choreographed tours of refugee camps, mainline Protestant leaders should spend a week in Israel, a modern nation that in fewer than 60 years has absorbed millions of multicultural Jews -- from Morocco and Ethipia to Iran and Russia -- as well as 1.5 million gentiles. The Jewish state has forged an inclusive, democratic society despite recurrent wars and incessant terrorist attacks -- and has kept Jerusalem and other Christian holy cities open as sites for gathering and prayer by people of all faiths. Why on earth would THIS nation -- not Sudan, not North Korea, not Cuba -- should be a special target of Protestant wrath?