Week 28: Morally Responsible Investing Online Gathering

On Tuesday, July 13 Jerusalem time we learned how morally responsible investing can be used around the world to support Palestine. Our guest was Charlotte Marshall of Sabeel-Kairos UK.

More about our guest:

Charlotte Marshall has worked in support of Palestinian human rights for over 15 years. She has been the advocacy officer at Sabeel-Kairos UK since 2014, creating and leading the organisation’s campaign ‘Investing for Peace’ in the UK Churches. Prior to joining Sabeel-Kairos she worked for 10 years at Christian Aid, in several roles pertaining to the Middle East including as Gaza programme officer and Middle East Communications officer. Charlotte has a masters degree in Conflict, Security and Development from the University of Birmingham, and wrote her dissertation on the Rights of Palestinian refugees in international law. She visits Palestine whenever she can, and tries to keep up with her (very) rusty Arabic. Charlotte lives in Surrey with her husband and two young children.

You can read Charlotte’s “Reflections from Palestine” at https://www.sabeel-kairos.org.uk/reflections-from-palestine-charlotte-marshall/ 

You can find Sabeel-Kairos UK on their website at https://www.sabeel-kairos.org.uk/ and followe them on Facebook at https‭://‬www.facebook.com/SabeelKairos and Twitter at Twitter: https://twitter.com/SabeelKairos 

You can find information on their Investing for Peace campaign at https://www.sabeel-kairos.org.uk/category/taking-action/investing-for-peace/, their publication Investing for Peace: A Guide for Local Church Activists at https://www.sabeel-kairos.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Investing-for-Peace-free-download-June-19.pdf, and the article “Methodists Divest from Caterpillar citing Palestinian Evictions” at https://www.sabeel-kairos.org.uk/methodists-divest-from-caterpillar-citing-palestinian-evictions/#more-8687. 

Activism Time

Activism Time slides available as PDF here.

Kumi Action:

Write to your church, company, school, place of worship, or any community you belong to and find out where/how they invest their money. Write them with a message such as, “I stand for moral and ethical investment. Yet, many companies are profiting from the Israeli occupation of Palestine. Is our community investing in these companies?” Find out whether they have an ethical investment screen, and if so, ask if it includes Israel/Palestine. If not, apply pressure for them to introduce one, using Sabeel-Kairos UK’s “Investing for Peace” to help you form a campaign group and take this forward in your community.

Include the links and share your messages on social media. Include a link to this page of the Kumi Now website and the hashtags #MorallyResponsible, #KumiNow, and #Kumi28.

Full Kumi Action at:
https://kuminow.com/morallyresponsible/#kumiaction

Additional Action: Send a Thank You!

Send a thank you to the United Reformed Church for committing last week at their national conference to ensuring that companies they invest in do not profit from the occupation of Palestine.

• Email: ecumenical@urc.org.uk
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/unitedreformed @unitedreformed
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheUnitedReformedChurch @theunitedreformedchurch

From the Presentation/Chat

• If you missed it, our song today was “Yomma Mwel El Hawa (Mother, This Is My Story)”. It is a “song of Palestinian heritage that talks about the importance of freedom and love of the homeland. It calls for steadfastness in the face of occupation, with death being preferable to living under oppression, while expressing the hope and belief that morning will come and winter will fall at the end.” It was arranged by Wajdi Abou Diab and played on piano by Ramzi Hakim. The score is from the book “Arabic Folk Tunes” for solo piano and the recording is from the album “Samme’na Shi Mna’erfou” for solo piano. You can find this piece on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LbpV6PqPUZM. You can purchase the sheet music at https://www.sheetmusicmarketplace.com/arabic-folk-tunes-for-piano and find information on the album at https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/ramzihakim/sammena-shi-mnaerfou.
• About Khalid’s and Suha Jarrar: https://www.palestinechronicle.com/khalida-jarrar-to-remain-prisoner-despite-daughters-death/
• In the US, The Episcopal Church adopted resolution B016 “Develop Investment Criteria for Israel and Palestine Based on a Human Rights Screen” which can be found here. https://episcopalarchives.org/cgi-bin/acts/acts_generate_pdf.pl?resolution=2018-B016 Since that time TEC has stopped investing in 5 companies, including two Israeli banks, where they had investments. You can read more about it here https://www.episcopalnewsservice.org/pressreleases/epf-pin-commends-the-ccsr-and-executive-councils-latest-actions-on-investments/
• Sabeel-Kairos UK Wave of Prayer: https://www.sabeel-kairos.org.uk/sign-up-to-receive-the-wave-of-prayer
• Charlotte’s email: advocacy@sabeel-kairos.org.uk