The central organization of American Presbyterians has officially partnered with a group called Sabeel, dedicated to defaming Israel and promoting BDS. Sabeel’s ideology is rooted in a 20th-century school of Catholic thought that finds messages in the Bible purportedly aiding the cause of the poor and oppressed. Shiri Moshe explains:

Sabeel was founded in the early 1990s by Rev. Dr. Naim Ateek, a Palestinian priest of the Anglican Church who introduced a Palestinian variation of radical “liberation theology.” The organization was the culmination of Ateek’s efforts to advance an alternative interpretation of the Christian Bible that is “nourished by the hopes, dreams, and struggles of the Palestinian people.”

Ateek’s theology, which supposedly challenges a literal understanding of the Old Testament as a “Zionist text,” features violent imagery that depicts Jewish acts of deicide as well as forceful repudiations of Jewish national self-determination. During Christmas celebrations in 2000, Ateek spoke of destructive “modern-day Herods . . . in the Israeli government,” and in his 2001 Easter address declared that “Palestine has become one huge Golgotha. The Israeli government crucifixion system is operating daily.” . . .

Today, Sabeel is an official partner of the Presbyterian Church USA, the principal Presbyterian body in North America. In 2012, the church voted to boycott goods manufactured in Israeli settlements. Two years later, it narrowly voted to divest an estimated $21 million of the Church’s holdings from Caterpillar, Hewlett-Packard, and Motorola Solutions, all of which manufacture products used by Israel in the West Bank.

How did Qatar, an American ally, become the nerve center of the leading Palestinian jihadist organization? Natalie Ecanow explains.

When Jordan expelled Hamas in 1999, Qatar offered sanctuary to the group, which had already become notorious for using suicide-bombing attacks over the previous decade. . . . Hamas chose to relocate to Syria. However, that arrangement lasted for only a decade. With the outbreak of the Syrian civil war, the terror group found its way back to Qatar.

In 2003, Hamas leaders reportedly convened in Qatar after the IDF attempted to eliminate Hamas’s founder, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, following a Hamas suicide bombing in Jerusalem that killed seven people, including two American citizens. This episode led to one of the first efforts by Qatar to advocate for its terror proxy.

Thirteen years and five wars between Hamas and Israel later, Qatar’s support for Hamas has not waned. . . . To this day, Qatari officials maintain that the office came at the “request from Washington to establish indirect lines of communication with Hamas.” However, an Obama White House official asserted that there was never any request from Washington. . . . Inexplicably, the United States government continues to rely on Qatar to negotiate for the release of the hostages held by Hamas, even as the regime hosts the terror group’s political elite.

A reckoning is needed between our two countries. Congressional hearings, legislation, executive orders, and other measures to regulate relations between our countries are long overdue.