Black Pastors Join Forces to Persuade Biden to Call for a Ceasefire in Gaza

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The ongoing war in Gaza has sparked national attention and concern for nations all over the world, especially in the United States The coalition of Black clergy pushing Mr. Biden for a cease-fire in Gaza.

Many Black voters — serving as the backbone of democrats voting base — whose churches have become involved in the cease-fire movement have voiced increasing disappointment with Democrats, who they feel have done little to stop the war.

“Black clergy have seen war, militarism, poverty and racism all connected,” said Barbara Williams-Skinner, co-convener of the National African American Clergy Network. “But the Israel-Gaza war, unlike Iran and Afghanistan, has evoked the kind of deep-seated angst among Black people that I have not seen since the civil rights movement.”

When Hamas raided Israel on Oct. 7, murdering over 1,200 Israelis and kidnapping about 240 people, leagues of Black pastors joined their counterparts in interfaith prayer for Israel, whose land they revere as holy.

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As the president readies for extremely close election race against former President Donald J. Trump, The Black pastors’ effort has forced the Biden administration to pay attention to the bigger picture, tragedies at hand,

“What they are witnessing from the administration in Gaza is a glaring contradiction to what we thought the president and the administration was about,” said the Rev. Frederick D. Haynes, the senior pastor of Friendship-West Baptist Church in Dallas. “So when you hear a president say the term, ‘redeem the soul of America,’ well, this is a stain, a scar on the soul of America. There’s something about this that becomes hypocritical.”

Rev. Cynthia Hale, the founder and senior pastor of Ray of Hope Christian Church in Decatur, Ga, believes this situation is so dire to black people because we relate to them more than ever in this circumstance.

“We see them as a part of us,” said Rev. Hale,  “They are oppressed people. We are oppressed people.”

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