Activity

• Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) is “a worldwide ministry of Anabaptist churches” that “strives to share God’s love and compassion for all through relief, development and peace.”

Funding

• In FY 2020-2021, total income was $95.9 million; total expenses were $64.9 million, of which $578,000 was spent on “Palestine and Israel.”
• The Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) is “registered as a nonprofit charitable organization in both Canada and the United States.”
• In 2020-2021, MCC Canada received CAD 7.2 million from Canada.

Political Advocacy

• MCC’s activities and publications reveal a biased and anti-Israel agenda, including campaigning against the blockade of Gaza while altogether omitting that the blockade was implemented in an effort to stop Palestinian terrorists from smuggling weapons and rockets into Gaza that would later be used to target Israeli civilians.
• MCC has provided grants to a number of highly biased and politicized NGOs active in the Arab-Israeli conflict, including Zochrot, Sabeel, the Culture and Free Thought Association, Baladna, and New Profile. (See table below for further funding information.)
• MCC leads “Learning Tours” to Israel to “gain a better understanding of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, while experiencing “on the ground” realities.” The trip meets with members of highly politicized NGOs including American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), Applied Research Institute of Jerusalem (ARIJ), Kairos Palestine, Military Court Watch, Stop the Wall, Sabeel, Health Work Committees, Zochrot, Tent of Nations, and the Human Rights Defenders Fund.
  • Both Stop the Wall and the Health Work Committees have alleged ties to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a terrorist organization designated as such by the US, EU, Canada, and Israel.
    • Salah Khawaja, a “leader” with Stop the Wall was “an active member of the blacklisted Popular Front Liberation Party.” He was arrested by Israeli security forces seven times between 1983 and 1992 and served five years in prison between 1992 and 1997.
    • Former HWC Executive Director Dr. Majed Nassar has alleged ties to the PFLP. According to a 2007 document, Israel has prevented Dr. Majed Nassar from traveling “since 2001,” a decision upheld by the Israeli High Court. Daoud Ghoul, director of development projects and programs in Jerusalem, was convicted by an Israeli court of being a PFLP member.
• In November 2021, MCC condemned the decision by the Israeli Ministry to designate six Palestinian NGOs, including MCC’s partner Defense for Children International – Palestine, as terrorist organizations. According to MCC, “The labeling of these organizations as ‘terrorist’ undermines the credibility of these groups within the international community and impedes their ability to carry out important humanitarian, human rights and peacebuilding work. Such organizations are essential in documenting human rights violations and holding accountable all governments who perpetrate these violations.”
• In April 2018, during the violence on the Gaza border, MCC US was a signatory on a statement stating that “The United States stood by and allowed Israel to carry out these attacks without any public criticism or challenge. Such US complicity is a continuation of the historical policy of active support for Israel’s occupation and US disregard for Palestinian rights.” The statement ignored the violent nature of the protests, which have consisted of an organized armed attack on the Israeli border and IDF positions, attempts to destroy and breach the border fence, and sustained arson, rocket, and mortar attacks on Israeli civilian communities.
• In February 2018, as a member of Association of International Development Agencies (AIDA), MCC published a report titled “50 Years of Occupation: Dispossession, Deprivation and De-development” that accused Israel of “systemic, decades-long squeeze of Palestinian economic prospects and human rights.”
• In January 2018, MCC released a “Prayer for Palestine and Israel” accusing Israel of placing Palestinians in an “open air prison.”
• In January 2017, MCC posted a statement calling on outgoing US President Obama to support “a strong UN Security Council resolution on settlements.”
• In October 2016, promoted and hosted a webinar about Kairos Palestine. Dr. Munther Isaac, director of the Christ at the Checkpoint conference, led the discussion.
  • The Kairos Palestine document characterizes terrorist acts of “armed resistance” as “Palestinian legal resistance,” denies the Jewish historical connection to Israel in theological terms, calls to mobilize churches worldwide in the call for BDS, and compares Israel with the South African apartheid regime.
  • The Christ at the Checkpoint conference seeks to advance the Palestinian nationalist agenda within Evangelical Christian churches, while simultaneously revives theological antisemitic themes such as replacement theology.
• In March 2016, MCC asked for people to tell their members of Congress “not to add their names to legislation that encourages ignoring these [settlement building] indignities by blurring the line between Israel and the occupied territories. Urge them to support peace and justice for all peoples in the region, not the illegal settlements.”
• Published an April 13, 2015 joint agency briefing paper titled “Charting a New Course: Overcoming the Stalemate in Gaza,” misrepresenting international law and distorting legal terminology to place primary blame for the 2014 Gaza war on Israel. The paper omits Hamas rocket attacks against Israeli civilians, as well as terror tunnels running beneath the border into Israel. The paper further encourages contact with Hamas, stating: “Restricted contact can undermine humanitarian access and implementation of humanitarian programmes…”

No Way to Treat a Child

• MCC US and Canada are listed as a “National campaign partners” on American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) and Defense for Children International-Palestine (DCI-P)’s campaign, “No Way to Treat a Child.”
  • The campaign exploits children for political warfare against Israel, falsely alleging “widespread and systematic ill-treatment of Palestinian children in the Israeli military detention system.” It further calls upon the United States and Canadian government to pressure Israel and encourages supporters to write Members of Congress and Parliament. The campaign claims that a letter addressed to then President Obama calling for the establishment of a Special Envoy for Palestinian Children, initiated by Rep. Betty McCollum (D-MN) and signed by 20 US congressmen, was a “direct response” to demands made by its supporters.
• In 2017, 2019, and 2021, MCC endorsed US Congresswoman McCollum’s proposed legislation meant to advance BDS and demonization of Israeli companies and defense forces. The entirety of the proposed bill is premised on factually inaccurate claims from anti-Israel advocacy NGOs, including direct quotes from DCIP’s “No Way to Treat a Child” 2016 report and website.

BDS Activities

• In July 2021, MCC was a signatory on a letter to President Biden to “Halt Weapons Sales to Israel.”
• In June 2015, a MCC delegation met with Hanan Ashrawi to discuss the “importance of the BDS movement and the need to invest in Palestine.”
  • In a January 2017 interview for Deutsche Welle, Hanan Ashrawi, founder and Chair of the MIFTAH Board of Directors, claimed that Palestinian “attacks and their perpetrators” (as described by the interviewer, Tim Sebastian), “are seen by the people as resistance. And you cannot somehow adopt the language of either the international community or the occupier by describing anybody who resists as terrorist (sic)” (3:20).
• In 2013, the board of directors of MCC “unanimously decided that MCC U.S. will not knowingly invest in companies that benefit from products or services used to perpetrate acts of violence against Palestinians, Israelis and other people groups.”
• In March 2013, the Mennonite Central Committee adopted AFSC’s investment screening tool, which targets companies operating in the West Bank for divestment.
• In October 2012, MCC was a signatory on a letter to members of Congress to make military aid to Israel conditional, stating that “we urge Congress to undertake careful scrutiny to ensure that our aid is not supporting actions by the government of Israel that undermine prospects for peace. We urge Congress to hold hearings to examine Israel’s compliance, and we request regular reporting on compliance and the withholding of military aid for non-compliance.”