The New Mexico House resolution that would have put the state on record as supporting a God-given Greater Israel was killed last night. The House Consumer and Public Affairs Committee voted 3-1 to table the legislation.
The bill says Jews have a biblical mandate to rule Israel and that a 1922 League of Nations resolution legitimized Jewish control over the West Bank and Jerusalem.
“The house of representatives supports Israel in its legal, historical, moral and God-given right of self-governance and self-defense upon the entirety of its own lands, recognizing that Israel is neither an attacking force nor an occupier of the lands of others, and that peace can be afforded the region only through a whole and united Israel,” the resolution reads.
Similar versions of the legislation, backed by the right-wing Zionist Organization of America, have passed in five other states. But activists in New Mexico were successful in opposing it. Dozens of people called and emailed their representatives to urge them to vote no on the resolution.
Last night, members of Jewish Voice for Peace’s Albuquerque chapter and Another Jewish Voice of Santa Fe testified against the resolution. The sponsor of the legislation, Republican state Representative Yvette Herrell, did not show up to defend her bill.
“People have their agendas and then all we do is kill it, if it’s ridiculous–which this is,” Democratic Representative Gail Chasey, who opposed the bill, told me last week in an interview.
Sense!
Also, I think its important to note that the other states where this passed only passed it in one house or the other. I could be wrong, but I don’t think any became law.
There are limits to this influence and/or behavior and it’s good to see them more crisply defined, if only to have a better sense of where to insert and/or how to leverage pushback efforts.
Thanks Alex.
So God gave it to them. Any documentation ? Or do you just need faith ?
>> The bill says Jews have a biblical mandate …
Does the bill support all other biblical mandates Jews have? Or just this particular bit of Zio-supremacism?
What impresses me most about the last couple of years is how suddenly those whose number one concern is the protection of Israel no matter what it does, are popping out all over the place in these frantic legislative moves to give semi-legal authority to the object of their devotion.
This is a good thing, whipping away the curtain to expose the Wizard of Oz, as it were.
It is also encouraging because it shows desperation, an attempt to go over the head of the public that is warming to BDS. It’s far easier to work on politicians in their offices than it is to present a case to the public that will stand up to debate.