The presiding bishop of the ECLA Rev. Elizabeth A. Eaton. Photo: ECLA.

JNS.org – Special Envoy to the United Nations Laurie Cardoza-Moore this week harshly criticized a resolution by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s (ECLA) that calls on the US to stop giving military aid to Israel.

Backers of the resolution want the aid halted until building in Judea and Samaria stops, and they want to see the establishment of a Palestinian state.

“The Lutheran Church’s decision to single out the Jewish State for rebuke is nothing short of anti-Semitic heresy based on its anti-Semitic roots,” said Cardoza-Moore who represents the World Council of Independent Christian Churches (WCICC) at the UN. “It would seem that the Lutheran Church has chosen to follow in the path of their founder Martin Luther, who, later in his life, became a vehement anti-Semite.”

The ELCA, which has four million members in 10,000 congregations throughout America, also called on President Obama to recognize the state of Palestine and to agree to not block its application for full membership in the UN.

Cardoza-Moore, a Christian Zionist, called the Lutheran’s Church’s decision “absurd” and “anti-Christian,” based on the fact that there was never a Palestinian state in the Bible and that God’s land covenant with Jews is eternal and irrevocable.

ELCA also voted to divest from all Israeli investments aligning with the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement. They are now the ninth Christian denomination to divest from Israel.