Coalition Questions Jerusalem Evictions

U.S. Catholic leaders have joined leaders of other faiths in protesting the evictions in August of Palestinians from East Jerusalem. In a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton dated Aug. 7, an interfaith coalition of U.S. religious leaders called for the immediate reversal of the evictions. Israeli riot police evicted two Palestinian families—more than 50 people in all—from their homes in the Arab neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah on Aug. 2. Police later allowed Jewish settlers to move into the homes where the Palestinian families had lived for more than 50 years. The U.S. religious leaders objected to the evictions in part because they occurred close to the 1949 armistice line or Green Line, which separates Israel and the Palestinian territories. Among the Catholic signers of the letter were representatives of the Conference of Major Superiors of Men and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.