Letter to the Editor: Lowell Fine

I read the recent full-page ad by Rev. Raphael Warnock in the AJT and was excited that he now says he supports Israel’s (the Jewish people’s) “right to exist.” Israel’s and her Jewish citizens’ right to exist are not subject to discussion, debate or negotiation any more than discussing America’s right to exist. Warnock now boasting of his support for Israel’s right to exist is insulting, pandering and just plain baloney.

There are actually two Warnocks: the one before he ran for office and the one now wanting to be senator.

In 2018, he repeatedly bashed Israel from his pulpit telling lies about her, and he signed a National Council of Churches of Christ statement in 2019 calling for an end to arms sales to Israel. In particular, that statement called for the U.S. to reconsider its $38 billion military aid package to Israel.

Warnock was also a 2019 delegate for the Progressive National Baptist Convention and endorsed a 2019 resolution calling on the U.S. government to end military aid to Israel, which means it would no longer be able to properly defend itself.

Warnock now denies that he wants America to stop giving military aid to Israel, but he cannot deny approving the false, one-sided NCC statement and the PNBC resolution.

He signed the 2019 statement that likened Israel and “saw parallels” to apartheid South Africa, which totally abused the majority black population for so many years. Unlike South Africa used to be, Israel is a democratic state, and the Arab minority have the rights of the Jewish majority.

Warnock now says in his “I stand with Israel” ad that he never accused Israel of being an apartheid state.

He did not say Israeli police had the “gangsters and thugs mentality” like he called police in America, but he accused them of shooting so-called nonviolent protestors like “birds of prey.” Did he actually check to see if these “peaceful protestors” had planted bombs or were carrying knives and guns?

Nothing in Warnock’s “Israel sermon,” the statement, the resolution and his numerous ads, addresses the cruelty of the Palestinians whom he calls “his brother and sisters,” but he never refers to Israeli Jews as “his brothers and sisters.”

Warnock is no friend of Israel. I will never vote for any Republican or Democrat whom I feel is anti-Israel. Therefore, I will not vote for him.

Lowell Fine, Atlanta