Boston Avenue United Methodist Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Photo: www.cityprofiles.com.

As delegates at The United Methodist Church’s upcoming April 24-May 4 General Conference in Tampa, Fla., are expected to debate a resolution calling for divestment from three companies for their sales to Israel, more than 1,200 American rabbis signed a letter opposing that resolution.

Two months later, the Presbyterian Church’s General Assembly will vote on a similar resolution recommending that Caterpillar, Hewlett-Packard (HP), and Motorola Solutions “be placed on the General Assembly Divestment List until such time as they have ceased profiting from non-peaceful pursuits in Israel-Palestine.”

“For Jews, the use of economic leverages against the Jewish state is fraught with inescapable associations,” the letter states. “They resonate in the Jewish consciousness with historic boycotts against Jewish companies and the State of Israel…policies that knowingly tap into the deepest fears and pain of another is, in our tradition, a serious failure of [the Christian-Jewish] relationship.”