To the editor:

As Quakers, we recognize the divine imprint in every human being and affirm the equality of all to live safely and without fear. We are also compelled as Quakers to speak truth with integrity, including when it is uncomfortable, yet always to do so in love. This requires us to speak against the catastrophic violence in Gaza.

On Monday, July 28, eight Quaker organizations from around the world released a joint statement expressing their belief that Israel’s actions in Gaza constitute genocide.

The statement reads in part: “After deep communal and prayerful discernment, informed by our direct witness in Palestine/Israel and readings of the positions of international human rights organizations, international and Israeli genocide scholars, and experts on the UN Genocide Convention (1948), we are exercising our religious conviction to speak the truth as we see it. We believe with moral clarity, and in line with the definition of the crime of genocide, that the current actions in Gaza perpetrated by the Israeli government, constitute genocide.”

Signatories include American Friends Service Committee, Canadian Friends Service Committee, Friends Committee on National Legislation, Friends World Committee for Consultation, Quakers in Britain/Quaker Peace and Social Witness, Quaker Council on European Affairs, Quaker Service Norway, and the Quaker United Nations Office.

The members of the Saranac Lake Friends Meeting (Quakers) concur with this statement.

We have reflected deeply upon the United Nations’ definition of genocide and how countries or individuals can be responsible for complicity. As Quakers, we must be faithful to the principle of seeking truth even when it is uncomfortable. With heavy hearts, we feel compelled to ask ourselves whether, in providing offensive weapons to Israel, we as a nation also bear some responsibility for the genocidal actions of the Israeli leadership.

In our discussion, we have also asked were the horrific actions undertaken by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023 a war crime? In our hearts, we believe that they were.

In addition to endorsing the joint statement of the various Quaker organizations, we feel a responsibility to seek avenues of direct action that our Saranac Lake community could take to foster peace. As such a small group, we feel helpless and humbly ask for your help in discerning which actions could open hearts to the suffering of the people of both Israel and Palestine. We note with special sadness that thousands of those harmed in this conflict are innocent children. It is also our hope that our leaders seek peace based on the equality of all people and the recognition that the imprint of the divine is within us all.

A PDF of the full Quaker statement is available here: tinyurl.com/z6xzcj76. The link to the UN’s Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights’ web page regarding the genocide convention (See Article II) is tinyurl.com/yc42ctek.

Leo Pickens, Clerk,

Saranac Lake Friends Meeting (Quakers)

Saranac Lake