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April 8, 2005/Adar II 28 5765, Volume 57, No. 32
YWCA USA disowns anti-Israel report
DEBORAH SUSSMAN SUSSER
Associate Editor
The National Coordinating Board (NCB) of the YWCA USA has distanced itself from a controversial report.
At a meeting in Washington, D.C., on April 2, the board passed a statement that the American YWCA does not endorse the "2004 Witness Report to Palestine."
The Witness Report, authored by Doris Pagelkopf, vice president of the World YWCA and the American representative on the World YWCA board, following a Middle East tour last spring, states that during World War II, "Hitler tried to exterminate the Jews and now a group of Israelis ... is trying to choke off and rid the land of Palestinians."
On a local level, a perceived lack of attention from the Maricopa County YWCA's board to the matter led former YWCA of Maricopa County executive director Barbara Lewkowitz and other board members to resign beginning in the fall of last year.
Former board member Abbie Beller, who resigned after 40 years of involvement with the organization, told Jewish News at the time that she felt especially disappointed that the YWCA of Maricopa County didn't "take the situation more seriously."
Janet Marcotte, executive director of the Tucson YWCA, expressed satisfaction with the results of the April 2 meeting.
"The YWCA of Tucson is pleased that our national board took formal action at the YWCA annual meeting to make it clear that the offensive statements in the 2004 'Palestine Witness Visit Report' were those of the author and not the views of the YWCA USA," Marcotte said in a written statement to Jewish News. "The YWCA USA has set a higher standard for dialogue on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict," she continued, "and views such as those expressed in the 'Palestine Witness Visit Report' will no longer go unchallenged."
The new statement, which is posted on the YWCA of the USA's Web site (www.ywca.org), is similar to that proposed by the YWCA's Pacific Region, of which Tucson is a part, at a Feb. 13 meeting of the YWCA's NCB in Phoenix. That earlier statement was voted down and referred to the World Relations Committee, of which Pagelkopf is a member.
The new statement clarifies the overall difference in position between the World YWCA and the YWCA of the USA on issues such as the Palestinian/Israeli conflict, and concludes: "Both the Israeli and Palestinian people are suffering as a result of this conflict. The YWCA USA has an historical record of supporting a balanced study of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. The views expressed in the 'June 2004 Witness Report to Palestine' are the views of the author and are not endorsed by the YWCA USA."
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