Religion: Swords and P.L.O.-shares

Jewish-Christian tensions

Some of America's most powerful Protestant leaders sat in a nondescript room in Washington last week, listening to witnesses testify on the Israeli-Palestine dispute. The atmosphere was calm, but the charges swirling around the work of this extraordinary Middle East Panel of the National Council of Churches (N.C.C.) are not. Sixteen national Jewish organizations that were invited to testify boycotted the Washington session and previous hearings, publicly accusing the N.C.C. panel of an anti-Israel bias.

The dispute is as convoluted as the Middle East situation. The major issue, however, is possible American recognition of the Palestine Liberation Organization (P.L.O.) as the sole, legitimate representative of the Palestinians. The N.C.C. will infuriate American Jews, and exacerbate Jewish-Christian relations, if it recommends that the U.S. adopt that policy, or does so without demanding that the P.L.O. renounce terrorism and accept Israel's right to a secure existence.

The N.C.C., which includes 32 Protestant and Eastern Orthodox denominations, is controlled by liberal-minded churchmen who, once upon a time, were lockstep allies with the Jewish organizations in domestic social-justice crusades. But there has been increasing criticism of Israel from Protestants sympathetic to the Third World, where most regimes support the "Zionism equals racism" formula. The N.C.C. is influenced as well by U.S. churches with links to Protestant and Orthodox Arabs in the Middle East.

The split became more obvious last August when Andrew Young, a clergyman and onetime N.C.C. staff member, resigned as Ambassador to the United Nations. The N.C.C. executive committee declared its "fundamental agreement" with Young's opposition to the "no-talk policy" (the refusal of Israel and the U.S. to deal directly with the P.L.O.). The N.C.C. also set up the Middle East Panel, which includes the heads of six denominations. Then a nationwide rally of black pastors in Detroit urged U.S. recognition of the P.L.O. after a speech by Young advocating more foreign affairs involvement by the clergy. The Syrian Orthodox Church raised temperatures further by filing several human rights charges against Israel with the N.C.C.

The Middle East Panel is headed by the Rev. Tracey K. Jones Jr., general secretary of the Board of Global Ministries of the United Methodist Church, the most important agency in the N.C.C.'s largest member body. Last October Jones' agency went on record favoring P.L.O. participation in peace talks as "the representative" of the Palestinians. But Jones conveyed an air of fair-mindedness as he steered the Washington hearings, which broke no new ground.