The webinar, moderated by WCC advocacy officer George Sahhar in Jerusalem, marked the beginning of a new campaign, “From Condemnation to Consequences,” that portrays the escalating crisis in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and the clear, yet unfulfilled, legal obligations of the international community to demand concrete, legally-grounded consequences for Israel's persistent violations of international law. Rev. Dr Kenneth Mtata, WCC programme director for Life, Justice, and Peace, opened the webinar by noting that the WCC conceived the campaign in an environment completely different from what has happened in the last 72 hours, and now people are gathered at a very grave moment of escalation in the Middle East. “But our campaign needs to remain focused on the commitments that the churches have made together, with all their partners, to see how we move from the statements and condemnation of the occupation and annexation of Palestine, and to try to translate this into concrete changes and transformation,” said Mtata. Dr Yudith Oppenheimer, executive director of Ir Amim, noted that, over the course of the past two years, there have been rapidly unfolding developments in Jerusalem and its vicinity that have been largely overshadowed by the war in Gaza and the war going on right now. She named settlement expansion in East Jerusalem, an unprecedented rise in home demolitions and forced evictions, and moves leading to the complete collapse of the Status Quo, among other grave violations of human rights and international law. “Together, these actions threaten not only the future of Jerusalem but the broader prospects of peace, justice, and security for both peoples,” she said, citing that plans for nine new settlements with over 20,000 housing units have advanced in East Jerusalem since the start of the Israel-Hamas war. Many of these plans are designated for lands in the hearts of Palestinian neighborhoods. Hana Kirreh, a member of the WCC Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel International Reference Group, presented the remarks of Mayada Tarazi, director of operations, human resources, and international relations for the YMCA. “Families are getting displaced again and again,” noted Terazi, highlighting that women and children are bearing a painful brunt of the upheaval. “Many are still without homes, without access to water, food, medical care, and safety,” she said. “Women say, ‘we aremanaging or surviving,’ but what is happening is not normal, and it is not acceptable—and too often it feels that no one is doing enough to stop this.” A former ecumenical accompanier, John Wardlaw, a human rights lawyer from Australia, shared his eyewitness accounts of families being forcibly evicted under inhumane conditions and time constraints, as well as other acts of violence and grave violations of human rights and dignity. Showing photos of Silwan, where the community has initiated a public art project in which eyes are painted on the fronts of homes, he noted that God’s eyes do not close on the suffering of Palestinian communities. “All of these people in the houses that have the eyes on them, are subject to eviction notices,” he explained. Iskandar Majlaton, programme coordinator for the WCC Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme Palestine and Israel, urged people to endorse the campaign, which runs through 31 March, and urged churches and partners all over the world to use the advocacy materials already produced. “Everything is already online and published—and you can use it,” he said. “From Condemnation to Consequences” campaign will call for accountability to end occupation of Palestine Campaign page and resources WCC-EAPPI | 
On the 80th anniversary of the atomic bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, churches and communities across the world deepened their calls for...
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