Brit Tzedek v'Shalom

Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

February 15, 2007

Contact: Jessica Rosenblum, Rabinowitz/Dorf Communications, (202)265-3000

NEW CAMPAIGN CALLS ON AMERICAN JEWS TO TALK MORE

Chicago—American Jews now have a new opportunity to talk to each other about resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and to call on the Bush Administration to actively engage in diplomacy to get the peace talks back on track.  Today Brit Tzedek v’Shalom, the country’s largest Jewish grassroots peace movement, launched the “Let’s Talk” campaign [letstalk.btvshalom.org/home], a multi-part, community-driven effort to change the way American Jews talk and think about Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

This campaign will stimulate substantive debate in order to get people thinking about how best to act on behalf of Israel. Creative programming throughout this far-reaching campaign will bring a range of perspectives to Jewish communities across America.   A personal pledge to become more involved in community discussion will be used to promote discourse locally via house parties, discussion groups, and Brit Tzedek chapter activities.

While Let’s Talk uses a petition to urge President George Bush to facilitate the negotiation of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it is more than just a petition campaign. Over 1000 people have already signed the petition [letstalk.btvshalom.org], however, the campaign will reach deeper into communities to mobilize many people to do more than just sign their names.

 “The campaign will build a model for the dialogue we want to see take hold not just on the community level, but on a national and international level as well,” said Marcia Freedman, Brit Tzedek’s president.

One example of the kind of programming that Brit Tzedek plans to do more of as part of this campaign is the group’s recent nationwide tour of the Combatants for Peace that it sponsored in the lead up to the campaign.

While representatives of the group of former Israeli soldiers and Palestinian militants, who are now committed to promoting peace, spoke to hundreds of people daily in a 22- city tour across the country last month, the Israeli Consulate in LA issued a report to the Israeli Foreign Ministry and to all of Israel’s representatives in North America condemning the tour and calling for actions to be taken against conscientious objectors to stop “their negative effect on Israel’s image.”

Although Brit Tzedek disagreed sharply with the consulate’s assessment, in a letter in response, the group welcomed the opportunity it presented to engage in the “open exchange of ideas,” because doing so “offers the best opportunity to strengthen Israel and the American Jewish community’s relationship to it.”

“This controversy underscored the range of opinions of what it means to be pro-Israel that exists within the American Jewish community,” said Freedman. “If we are to be successful in doing our part to secure a tenable peace for Israel, we must do more than preach to the choir; we must reach out across our community in order to broaden and invigorate this critical debate.”

 “Having witnessed both the disastrous effects of America’s profound diplomatic neglect in recent years and of military action in the Middle East last summer, Brit Tzedek is absolute in our conviction that only through dialogue and negotiation will  long term peace, security and stability for Israel and the region as a whole be achieved, “ Freedman added. “History has demonstrated that only when the United States plays an active role in promoting these negotiations is true progress made. Therefore, we as a community must be certain that out voices are heard calling on our government to actively engage in facilitating a return to the negotiating table. That is what ‘Let’s Talk’ is about.”

Brit Tzedek v'Shalom, the Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace, is a national grassroots organization more than 35,000 strong, that educates and mobilizes American Jews in support of a negotiated two-state resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict