Peace Statements from December 2023

Note: minutes are statements that have been collectively agreed upon by the people gathered at a Quaker meeting for worship with a concern for business.

Minute from Brooklyn Meeting's Peace and Social Action Committee

“We utterly deny all outward wars and strife and fightings with outward weapons, for any end, or under any pretense whatsoever; and this is our testimony to the whole world.”  ~ Declaration of Friends to Charles II, 1660 (Quaker peace testimony) as reconfirmed by Brooklyn Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends December 3, 2023

As members of Brooklyn, NY Friends Meeting, and in keeping with our peace testimony, we are horrified by the killing on all sides in Israel, Gaza, the West Bank, and the larger Middle East. We support a lasting cease fire, instead of violence and revenge, as well as peaceful action by the United States and other world powers to bring about lasting peace, with justice and freedom, between Israelis and Palestinians.

Our hearts are with all who are mourning the loss of loved ones. We stand in silent vigil to remember them and honor the lives of all innocent victims for we cannot accept the dehumanization wrought by war and conflict at home and abroad. Whatever our differences, love is the only way to save our bodies as well as our souls.

Quakers have a history of mediating conflict, often between warring parties, and we recommit ourselves to do so during this strife through such organizations as Friends Committee on National Legislation, American Friends Service Committee, and the Quaker United Nations Office. We see that of God in all people and in all conflicts throughout the world.

Peace-making is the work of a lifetime. Quakers have been at it for more than 350 years. This is no time to be discouraged by this and other worldly conflicts. Rather, we must continue to speak truth to power on behalf of all earth’s people and living creatures.  

“A good end cannot sanctify evil means; nor must we ever do evil, that good may come of it… It is as great a presumption to send our passions upon God’s errands, as it is to palliate them with God’s name…We are too ready to retaliate, rather than forgive, or gain by love and information. And yet we could hurt no man that we believe loves us.  Let us then try what Love will do: for if men did once see we love them, we should soon find they would not harm us. Force may subdue, but Love gains: and he that forgives first, wins the laurel.”  ~ William Penn, 1693

A Minute of Concern for the People of Palestine and Israel from 15th Street Meeting

Moved by the great suffering sustained by the people of Palestine and Israel, and guided by the words of our national organizations that help our search for peace and justice, we, the members of the Fifteenth Street Friends Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, urge our lawmakers, President Biden, Senators Gillibrand and Schumer, and Representative Nadler to:

• endorse a ceasefire, de-escalation, and respect for international law against war,
• protect lives, including hostages held by Hamas, and civilians, both Palestinians and Israelis, suffering because of the conflict,
• provide humanitarian aid wherever needed,
• address and resolve the root causes of the longstanding regional dispute, and
• speak out against both antisemitic and anti-Islamic words and actions that inflame discussions of these issues within the United States.

Adhering to our three-hundred-year-old peace testimony, we resist the use of our tax dollars for killing, destruction, and violence. “We seek a world free of war and the threat of war.”

Minute on the Conflict between Israel and Gaza from Morningside Meeting

Morningside Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) calls for a ceasefire now in Gaza and a free flow of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip.

We grieve the deaths, beginning on October 7, 2023, of approximately 1,200 Israelis and (as of this writing) an estimated 18,400 Palestinians in Gaza, an estimated 226 Palestinians in the West Bank and 104 deaths of Israeli soldiers so far. Each death pierces the hearts of family and friends and the loss of each person is a tear in the fabric of community. This grief makes it harder to see the other as a Child of God.

As Friends, we are committed to our Peace Testimony, not only because, given that we are asked to honor the Inner Light within each person, we feel it is wrong to humiliate, hurt or kill, but also because acts of violence create a cycle of continuing and escalating violence. It is important, therefore to examine the causes of violence and work to eliminate them. In this spirit, we ask that the United States and other countries work for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in this conflict. Without a ceasefire, not only will casualties from the fighting and bombing continue to escalate, endangering those who have been captured by Hamas, but civilian deaths from lack of shelter, food, clean water and medical care will escalate as well.

We also ask that President Biden and the U.S. Congress withhold further military aid to Israel, aid that is in violation of the Leahy laws, which states that the United States is prohibited from providing security assistance to any unit that is credibly accused of having committed a gross violation of human rights. Of the many casualties that have been inflicted by Israel’s bombing of the Gaza strip, more than 50% have been women and children. Supplies of food, water and fuel have been extremely limited or blocked entirely. Many civilian institutions, such as schools, hospitals, mosques, and a church, have been bombed. These actions constitute violations of human rights.

Finally, we ask that there be a focus by the international community not only on providing immediate humanitarian aid to Gaza, but also, over the long term, on ensuring the civil and political rights of the Palestinian community, so that the cycle of violence can be stopped.
— Approved on December 17, 2023 by Morningside Monthly Meeting