But, interestingly, they didn’t totally disavow themselves of the anti-Israeli measures — just enough to dampen the overly heated debate.

The resolutions, and some of the strong language included in background papers that accompanied them, overshadowed all other activities at the triennial congress.

Earlier in the week, the delegates voted to reject the worst of the supporting language, then, on Friday, the worst of the resolutions also went down to defeat.

Sort of.

It was left to individual congregations to decide what boycotts and protests to take over Israeli actions they disagree with.

It was a classic compromise. Observers from the Canadian Jewish Congress were satisfied just enough that the church had responded to their concerns.

Yet church delegates who want to continue to pursue a stand against Israel can still do so.

The message that can be taken from this is the United Church is politically savvy, but still has concerns about the way Israel conducts its affairs.

The language on both sides of the debate went a little far on the odd occasion. The supporting documents for the congress resolutions accused MPs of having dual Canadian-Israeli citizenship and compared Israel-sponsored MP junkets to bribes, without any proof.

Junkets may be distasteful, but the word bribe should never be thrown around loosely.

The Jewish Congress lobbied hard against the resolutions, but instead of supporting a vigorous debate, the CJC at times appeared to be calling for the debate to be shut down.

The United Church leadership took a more democratic position by letting the delegates take care of that.

The CJC’s message came perilously close in parts to saying that criticism of Israel is the same as criticism of Judaism.

But none of these resolutions were critical of Judaism, just Israel. The CJC should accept the difference.