Scottish church boycott scuppered by Israeli intimidation http://www.irna.ir/ENNewsShow.aspx?NID=30405125&SRCH=1

The Church of Scotland has called for the labelling of illegal Israeli settlement goods after being intimidated to withdraw a resolution calling for a boycott following threats of reprisals against its staff and assets in the occupied territories.At its annual general assembly, the church's national decision-making body instructed the Church and Society Council to work with ecumenical and civil society partners to continue to lobby for the introduction of labelling of products to identify unlawful products sold in the UK.Church and Society Council convenor Ian Galloway said that in the light of the withdrawal it was 'additionally important that church members buy fair trade products marketed by organisations 

like the Hadeel Palestinian Fair Trade Shop.'  Galloway described threats by Israel to legislate judicial and financial punishment against anyone calling for a boycott of illegal settlement goods that were reported to the assembly meeting in Edinburgh on Wednesday as 'ntimidatory'. He made it clear that this was not the end of the matter and said continued lobbying of Israel to end its occupation, dispossession and oppression of Palestinians was necessary.The Church of Scotland has assets and staff in the occupied territories and Galloway expressed regret at the withdrawal of the proposed boycott, divestment and sanctions strategy (BDS), 

saying it was 'impossible to assess the risk' posed to them by the Israeli threats.Speaking during the debate Rev Paraic Reamonn said Christians had for far too long been complicit in the Israeli state's oppression of Palestinians and condemned Israeli threats. 'Israel is holding the work of this Church hostage,' Reamonn said. It constituted an apartheid state which 'privileges Jewish ethnicity in the way that Afrikaaners used to privilege white people in South Africa,' he said. 'This situation of institutional injustice, and all that flows from it, damages the soul and security of Jewish people as well as destroys the lives of Palestinians,' he said.