Palestinian Christians celebrating Mass in the Cremisan Valley between the West Bank and Jerusalem, available in the public domain.
Palestinian Christians Release Kairos II
Kairos Palestine launches its second document, condemning apartheid, settler colonialism, and ethnic cleansing.
In November 2025, Palestinian Christians released Kairos Palestine II (“A Moment of Truth: Faith in a Time of Genocide”), a 14-page update to the 2009 Kairos Palestine document, this time describing the situation in Gaza and Palestine as genocide and calling for a global Christian response of solidarity, resistance, and justice.
The statement was issued by Kairos Palestine, officially known as the Palestinian Christian Ecumenical Initiative. These Christian residents of Palestine assert that the current moment is not a “conflict” but rather a “genocide, ethnic cleansing and forced displacement” of a people suffering under “tyranny and an oppressive regime of settler colonialism and apartheid.”
The statement focuses heavily on the assault on Gaza, describing a war with massive casualties, the destruction of all components of life, and actions that “constitute genocide.” They see the war on Gaza as a continuation of the “Zionist project to seize all of Palestine, emptied of its Palestinian people.”
The statement condemns the unfolding actions as a “structural sin against God, against humanity, and against creation.” It challenges the global Church, particularly Western churches, expressing deep shock at those who “adopted the colonizer’s narrative or remain silent” in the face of what they call genocide.
Kairos Palestine explicitly rejects Christian Zionism, naming it a “theological distortion and a moral corruption” that promotes a “tribal, racist god of war and ethnic cleansing.” They call on the churches of the world to repudiate this theology.
The authors outline a future not based on military power, but on the foundations of justice and equality. They reject the concept of a religious state that favors one citizen over another, instead hoping for a “civil, democratic state grounded in a culture of pluralism.”
The document offers a strategy for international solidarity: pressure, isolation, sanctions, and boycotts. It reaffirms the value of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement, calling it an effective form of “creative resistance rooted in the logic of love and nonviolence.” It urges people of conscience to:
- Pressure their governments to ban arms exports to Israel.
- Call for the prosecution of war criminals at the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court.
- Support prophetic Jewish voices that oppose Zionism, while boycotting dialogue with Zionist voices that support occupation and genocide.
- Visit Palestine to see the “living stones” (the local Christians) and “strengthen the steadfastness of the Palestinians and the Christian Palestinians” who face the profound threat to the birthplace of Christianity itself.
FAITH IN ACTION: Follow Churches for Middle East Peace for education and advocacy on peace in the Holy Land.
Photo: Palestinian Christians celebrating Mass, available in the public domain via Wiki Commons.
