A group of Church of England interfaith advisers has called on Christians in the Green Party to challenge its new policy on Zionism or reconsider their membership, warning that the vote has heightened Jewish communities’ sense of vulnerability.
The statement, endorsed by three bishops and 11 diocesan interfaith advisers, accuses the party of becoming institutionally antisemitic and calls on churches to resist growing hostility towards Jewish people.
It follows the Green Party’s conference vote equating Zionism with racism. Delegates approved the motion by 1,022 votes to 813.
The advisers said: “We call on Christians in the Green Party to stand in solidarity with Jewish Greens and work to change their party’s policy or reconsider their membership of a party that is now institutionally antisemitic.”
Those endorsing the statement include the Bishop of Manchester, David Walker, the Bishop of Birmingham, Michael Volland, and the Bishop of Aston, Esther Tamisa Prior.
The advisers, whose work includes building relationships between religious communities, warned that the consequences of the vote extended beyond party politics.
“For many Jewish communities in England, this vote has deepened an already acute sense of vulnerability,” they said.
“It risks further eroding the trust that has been carefully built between Jewish communities the Church of England and wider society over many years.”
They backed the Movement for Progressive Judaism’s condemnation of the motion as antisemitic, alongside concerns expressed by Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis, Masorti Judaism’s senior rabbi Jonathan Wittenberg, the Board of Deputies of British Jews and the Jewish Leadership Council.
The statement argues that the policy ignores an understanding of Zionism rooted in Jewish religious and communal life, while failing to recognise the different meanings it holds within Jewish communities.
“It dismisses as inherently racist the idea of Zionism, that for most Jewish people, expresses the centuries-old longing for safety, home, belonging and self-determination woven through Jewish history, prayer, ritual and communal life and therefore immediately ostracises religious Jews in the Green Party who worship at synagogues all of whose liturgies affirm this longing for Zion and pray for the well-being of Israel,” the statement reads.
In its response to the conference vote, the Green Party leadership rejected discrimination and harassment. In a joint statement following the vote, its MPs and senior leaders said: “We know there is no conflict between supporting the rights of Palestinians and the rights of Jewish people.”
Party leader Zack Polanski subsequently said members would remain welcome regardless of their faith or place of worship, and that he would not accept their exclusion because of the religious or communal organisations to which they belonged.
The interfaith advisers said that the vote “does not stand alone” but instead “forms part of a wider and troubling pattern in public life”, citing attacks on Jewish communities, rhetoric surrounding pro-Palestinian demonstrations, and the dismissal or minimisation of the Hamas-led attacks on 7 October 2023.
They also criticised their own Church’s General Synod over its decision to hear the Kairos II document, saying its language had caused pain to Jewish communities and overlooked years of work on Jewish-Christian relations.
They called for further study of God’s Unfailing Word, the Church of England Faith and Order Commission’s 2019 document, particularly its discussion of Zionism and Jewish relationships with the land of Israel.
“We reject language that erases Jewish peoplehood, denies Jewish trauma, or repeats patterns historically associated with antisemitism and anti-Judaism,” the advisers said.
At the same time, they affirmed Palestinian dignity and self-determination, adding that opposition to antisemitism must be accompanied by deep concern for Palestinian suffering.
They called for an approach that holds Israeli security together with Palestinian freedom, dignity and self-determination, and encouraged practical support for reconciliation projects, including those promoted by the Alliance for Middle East Peace.
The statement concluded with a challenge to churches to examine their own rhetoric.
It said: “The Green Party vote is part of a wider deeply concerning drift towards an increasingly antisemitic culture in our country.
“As Diocesan Inter Faith Advisers, we believe the Church of England and other churches and religious communities must become a bulwark against that drift, repenting where we have played our part and ensuring any debates on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are conducted with theological integrity, historical awareness, and pastoral responsibility.”
It concluded: “We call upon political leaders, Church institutions, and citizens across England to join us in resisting the current drift in our national life towards increasing antisemitism”.
