Naddaf to French envoy: Stop protecting BDS activists

The spiritual leader said it was inappropriate that official French representatives would help people who are breaking the law.

By BENJAMIN GLATT
Father Gabriel Naddaf (photo credit: FACEBOOK)
Father Gabriel Naddaf
(photo credit: FACEBOOK)
The head of the Christian Empowerment Council wrote to the French ambassador to Israel asking him to remove BDS activists who are operating illegally in a building in their jurisdiction in Jerusalem.
Father Gabriel Naddaf, the spiritual leader of the Armean-Christian community in Israel and an ardent Zionist, told French Ambassador Patrick Maisonnave on Sunday that the group Ecumenical Accompaniment Program in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI) is spearheading a boycott Israel campaign, and they’re leading it from the Church of St. Anne in Jerusalem’s Old City.
By acquiring tourist visas and not volunteer visas they are violating the law, the CEC said. EAPPI was founded by the World Council of Churches in 2001. The Christian Empowerment Council began following the EAPPI’s actions since the beginning of 2015.
“Acting on the part of a Christian organization that represents different churches is damaging coexistence, relations between Jews and Christians in Israel and worldwide,” he wrote. “More than a few Christians who serve as police officers and soldiers in Jerusalem and the West Bank are also a target of those lawbreakers who take advantage of Christianity, distorting the Christian values ​​and distorting the holy books in an attempt to gain legitimacy in the Christian world.”
The spiritual leader said it was inappropriate that official French representatives would help people who are breaking the law.
"I think that the fact their office is in the area under the auspices of the French government is serious and represents inappropriate relations between friendly nations,” he said. “The French government should take them out of the compound under its territory immediately and without delay and to stop assisting the organization, which is operating illegally.”
Naddaf also said that the group’s “dangerous activity whose sole purpose is to weaken Israel,” is trying to undermine Israeli sovereignty and make it easy prey to terrorism.
The CEC isn’t the only organization to see through the masquerading techniques of the EAPPI. NGO Monitor, which promotes accountability and supports discussion on the reports and activities of NGOs claiming to advance human rights and humanitarian agendas, has found that the EAPPI utilizes demonizing rhetoric accusing Israel of “apartheid,” “collective punishment,” and “war crimes,” and that it “places sole blame on Israel for the difficulties faced by Christians in the Holy Land.”