Reader Rob Browne sent along this interesting update on the Congressional letter to Hillary Clinton on rebuilding Gaza. First Browne points out that there are 62 signatories, not 60, as Reps continue to sign on. The latest are Marcy Kaptur (OH-09) and Bill Pascrell, Jr. (NJ-08). Browne writes about Pascrell:
county is Paterson, where my entire family lived when they came to
America. Paterson was a large labor city, and had a large Jewish
population. As the Jewish community moved away from Paterson and into
the nearby suburbs (think Barry Levinson's Avalon), other minority
groups moved in (initially African-American, then Latino-Americans).
Now, Paterson has a sizable Muslim community.
What I find interesting is that this is the first time I can
remember Rep. Pascrell signing onto something like this letter. I
don't know if that is important in the big picture, but I thought you
might like to know this bit of anecdotal information.
Very interesting. Pascrell, 72, is a representative who went from defending Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard in 1997 to saying this on the house of the floor earlier this month:
Military action will not result in an enduring resolution of these long simmering tensions. It is only through diplomacy and a strengthening of the Israeli Palestinian reconciliation process that a sustainable two state solution will be achieved. The violence must stop and the healing process begin, before more civilians are hurt and more lives are destroyed.
That's the story of one of the 62, demographic and constituency change, what are the others? Although we would hope that Congress would be moved by the incredible bloodshed and damage Israel wrought with US weapons and tax dollars, we know this isn't the case.
There are many theories to explain why Congress acts the way it does towards Israel. Yet we know there is always one definite way to influence our representatives: through their pocketbooks . Towards this end Browne has set up a page on the website ActBlue where you can show your support for the Congresspeople who have signed this letter. The page is called "A Dream of Peace: Justice and Equality for the People of Israel and Palestine" and in five days it has raised $3,380.
(Adam Horowitz)
[Weiss comments: My loving mother was born in Paterson. Also: Pascrell's wisdom about military action is absolutely and specifically the Lesson of Iraq. It demonstrates that all that bloodshed and waste and horror was not completely in vain: that it has imparted some wisdom to American leaders about the political character of terrorism.]
