WHEREAS 13 Iranian Jews were arrested and jailed on suspicion of spying for Israel and for the United States; and
WHEREAS both Israel and the United States deny these charges vehemently; and
WHEREAS this situation has caused great concern among the Jewish citizens and all fair minded citizens in Iran and throughout the world; and
WHEREAS the release of three of the prisoners on bail has signified a positive step in the handling of this spurious case.
WHEREAS the Government of Ontario is constitutionally mandated to provide
for the education of every child in Ontario; and
WHEREAS the Government of Ontario currently funds the Roman Catholic
Separate School system in keeping with the historic Confederation Agreement
of 1867 in that province; and
WHEREAS independent denominational schools completely comply with Ontario
Secondary School Diploma requirements; and
WHEREAS no comparable governmental funding is provided to Jewish, Islamic,
Sikh or Protestant private schools; and
WHEREAS almost six years have passed since the AMIA Bombing in Buenos Aires, an aggression against the Jewish community which resulted in the deaths of 86 people; and
WHEREAS the Argentine Government has been lax in investigation, trial and conviction of the perpetrators, ignoring numerous pieces of relevant information brought to them by family and community organizations; and
WHEREAS the Rabbinical Assembly passed a resolution "On Educating Conservative Jews Regarding Organ Donations" at its May 1996 convention; and
WHEREAS every day as many as 200 people in the United States join the list of those awaiting organ transplants, with a death occurring every three hours as a result of a severe organ shortage; and
WHEREAS Jews do not constitute a proportional share of organ donors, possibly due to the misapprehension that Judaism prohibits organ transplants; and
WHEREAS the world’s poorest nations bear a crushing debt of more than $2 trillion borrowed from the world’s richest nations, from multilateral organizations and from private banks in the richest countries; and
WHEREAS Jews have served faithfully in the military, participating in the support and defense of the United States; and
WHEREAS Jewish members of the armed forces of the United States serve their country in distant locations, helping to bring peace to such places as Korea, Somalia, Kosovo, the Arabian Peninsula, and Central America.
WHEREAS the Rabbinical Assembly has consistently sought to uphold the separation of religion and state in the United States; and
WHEREAS prayers recited over public address systems at public school sporting events such as football games have been prohibited by law, most recently by the US Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in the case of Doe vs. Santa Fe Independent School District: and
WHEREAS nothing prevents students and athletes form engaging in private, voluntary prayers for their respective groups either before, during or after their games; and
WHEREAS the prophetic call for all nations to "beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks" (Isaiah 2:4) demands an ongoing effort on behalf of every nation today to stop nuclear proliferation; and
WHEREAS in the second half of the 20th Century, over 2,000 nuclear weapon tests have affected human health and the environment in devastating ways; and
WHEREAS the "Unborn Victims of Violence Act" (HR 2436/SR 1382) under consideration in the United States Congress treats the mother as a separate person from the fetus, in essence raising the status of the fetus to that of a person for law enforcement purposes, the first piece of Federal legislation to make this distinction; and
WHEREAS Jewish law does not recognize the fetus as an independent person as is made clear in Exodus 21:22-23; and