Congressional Democrats on a junket to Israel last month “bristled” at the American ambassador because the Biden administration refuses to “pick some fights” with Israel’s government, one congressman reports.
Rep. Jared Huffman (Northern California) also said that he saw “parallels” to apartheid in Israel’s “untenable occupation [that] just goes on and on and on.” But Huffman said many Democrats find the term “offensive,” and he had an argument with a fellow Democrat, Brad Schneider of Illinois, because Huffman and others did not push back when the Palestinian prime minister used the term “apartheid.”
The trip was a week-long junket in February for ten Democratic Congresspeople, paid for by J Street, the liberal Israel lobby group. J Street staged a panel about the trip last week with Huffman and Rep. Jennifer Wexton (Virginia), along with the J Street president, Jeremy Ben-Ami.
The two Congresspeople said that in a meeting with Ambassador Tom Nides, some of the J Street group pressed Nides over Joe Biden’s promise last year to reopen the Jerusalem consulate that serves Palestinians. Trump had shut the consulate down in 2019 in deference to the Israeli government. But Nides backed away from Biden’s promise, saying reopening the consulate could undermine the new rightwing Israeli government, which does not want any recognition of the Palestinian place in Jerusalem.
Rep. Huffman said he was disappointed that Nides is giving priority to the Israeli government and not to “our values” when it comes to Palestinians living under occupation.
I don’t want to get you [Ben-Ami] or J Street in any trouble… But I was disappointed quite honestly in his unwillingness to have a more pro-active agenda on some of these things. You know, We were told that if there is too much pushing on any of these things it could endanger this fragile coalition government in Israel and that has to be the top consideration. And I think some of us bristled at that. Why would Israeli politics be the top consideration for our administration and for our ambassador on the ground? Why not our values and our agenda? And as I told him, I understand you got to pick your fights, but– Pick some fights– and I didn’t hear any.”
Wexton added that it was important to hold Biden to his promise in the name of preserving hope for “the two-state solution.” But she said Nides “was very hesitant to come out on either side.” He expressed fears of “escalating the situation in the region… causing people to be very backlash about it.”
Jeremy Ben-Ami of J Street leaped in to “assure” viewers that the delegation did not single the U.S. ambassador out. Ben-Ami is surely concerned about J Street appearing to be critical of the Biden administration.
“I just want to go on record and say that our delegation in all of the meetings, whether it was with Israeli officials or Palestinian officials or American officials, that you all pushed very hard– appropriately and politely but hard, on all the different parties to this, about the things that they do and the policies…J Street leadership [has] deep admiration and respect for all of you and the way that you carry out your roles, and push as possible, and push as necessary.
Wexton then said that Nides is trying to improve Palestinians’ lives by trying to get 4G internet to Palestinians in the occupied territories. So as to provide “tangible deliverables that he can do without rocking the boat too much.”
Huffman said a lot about apartheid, at times hinting that he believes there is apartheid in the West Bank.
He noted that the J Street delegation stayed in the King David Hotel along with 41 Congress-people on an AIPAC trip (both Republicans and Democrats), who were there to do pro-Israel combat,” Huffman said. The J Street trip was also from a “pro-Israel perspective,” but its visits to the West Bank were an “eye-opener”.
The two delegations met separately with Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh who used the word “apartheid” to describe Palestinian conditions — as countless human rights organizations also do. Huffman:
“He brought up apartheid in our meeting. Almost all the Palestinians we brought up used that term and talked about the current state of affairs as being apartheid. So that’s clearly how they’ve decided they’re going to talk about it. They think that’s a winning description. But when they met with AIPAC he went further and in response to Hakeem Jeffries, an African American colleague of ours, he said it was worse than apartheid in a way that was fairly provocative and even offended several members that were in attendance.
Huffman later disagreed with a member of the AIPAC trip, Rep. Brad Schneider of Illinois.
We did kind of compare notes on our meeting with the Palestinian president [sic]. There was an interesting moment on that, where the fight that the Palestinian president had with Hakeem Jeffries on apartheid, when I mentioned to Brad that he had used the same term in our meeting, and he asked if I took him to task for that and I said, ‘No I just listened on that, and he’s entitled to his characterization.’ And he [Schneider] told me how disappointed he was that we had not fought with the Palestinian president over the use of that term.
Huffman went on to say that the Israeli occupation has “parallels” to apartheid:
And as you know, Jeremy, I continue to struggle, I do still– where does that term fit in to our characterizations and our conversation about our occupation. I understand there are distinctions, but there seems to be a concerted use by the Palestinian side to use that term more and more and a similar effort on the other side to say you can’t ever use that term, that’s like a third rail, and you’re not even allowed to say it or even compare it. So somewhere in between these two things there’s a real interesting conversation about how we characterize the occupation–and to some extent the parallels we can draw to apartheid.”
Huffman mused that the United States should simply recognize Palestinian statehood, so as to offer a real hope of ending the occupation.
And both Congresspeople supported restrictions on U.S. aid to prevent it from funding human rights abuses– but not cutting our $4 billion a year in aid.
“Ever since we began providing this aid it’s basically been a blank check,” Wexton said. Though she said that even restrictions on aid to Israel would “encounter some resistance for sure” in Congress.
Huffman was harsher. He said an “honest debate” over restrictions on aid was important. He spoke of the “incredible imbalance of power” he’d witnessed in the West Bank: the demolition of Palestinian homes and the harassment of Palestinian villagers by Israeli settlers “assisted and armed by the IDF [Israel Defense Forces].”
It’s time, he said, for the U.S. to use “our influence to… maybe level the scales of justice a little for these folks.” Because all that can stop these “outrageous” actions is the U.S. Congress and the Israeli Supreme Court.
Huffman said young Palestinians feel duped by the two-state solution and just want equal rights.
I don’t want to end on a downer, I always like to leave hope, but quite honestly one of the big takeaways for me is that the two state solution is in deep trouble. And it’s not just the settlers or settler violence or other problems that I kind of knew were undermining it. It is the loss of credibility on the Palestinian side, and the fact that the younger generation is kind of just moving on and fairly locked in to this rights based approach to realizing their aspirations. And they’re not buying it, they think the two-state solution has been a giant bait and switch. That they’ve got nothing since Oslo, that their leaders have sold them out, that Israel never intended to make good on this. So I’m not hugely hopeful that we can put this thing together, but at the same time no one has been able to articulate a better way to solve this conflict. So we have to keep at it and… get back to at least some notion of statehood, so we can move on and try to resolve other issues.
Though Huffman said he had fallen in love with Israel on earlier propaganda tours of the country, and Wexton echoed him. “I also fell in love with [Israel]. I really did. And I want it to be the best country it can be.”
While Ben-Ami said that showing Congresspeople the bad side gives him misgivings.
One of the things that I think is difficult. as somebody who is very deeply tied to Israel and feels so strongly about the good things about the country– it is always hard to run a trip basically spending a lot of time focused on what is wrong and you don’t get enough time to focus on the good side of things. It’s not our intent to imply that there aren’t good things, but we’re focused on this conflict.
The trip was led by Rep. David Price of North Carolina and also included Rep. Suzanne Bonamici (Oregon), Joaquin Castro (Texas), Seth Moulton (Massachusetts), Madeleine Dean (Pennsylvania), Sean Casten (Illinois), Jason Crow (Colorado), and Lauren Underwood (Illinois).
It’s encouraging to hear these words and sentiment for some of the members on this tour. I’m still disgusted by the current administration tiptoeing around Israel THEY they are global superpower and the US is just some yokel sucking on their generous teet.
Huffman is right, why is our ambassador to Israel treating the current Israel coalition with kid gloves at the expense AMERICA’S interests? Is Israel seriously such a fragile political entity? Or are they just terrified that the collapse of the current coalition including the Arab List and ruin their perfect strawman excuse to maintain the status quo of eternal occupation, dispossession, and annexation but Israel?
The basic fact is that it’s been so long since we’ve had an Ambassador to Israel that actually acted in America’s interests and not like an Israeli Representative and mouthpiece for Israeli propaganda, that we’ve all but forgotten what that role is even for anymore.
The Biden Administration simply doesn’t want to “look bad” on Israel, and are hanging their hat on this useless coalition, when the truth is this coalition is unlikely to survive the next flair-up in East Jerusalem and Gaza. Summer is coming and so are the home invasions, the expulsions, the mass protests, and cross border fighting. The coalition honeymoon is over, and the power plays will begin the second Israel starts killing Palestinians en masse again. I certainly wouldn’t bet on the coalition lasting long enough for Gantz to get his turn on the iron throne. Then what excuse is Nides going to use to justify his Zero Pushback policy? Or is he just hoping to bide his time and get a nice revolving door gig with Israel or land on the board of some pro-Israel group when he’s done serving Israel’s interests?
Rep. Jared Huffman (Northern California) also said that he saw “parallels” to apartheid in Israel’s “untenable occupation [that] just goes on and on and on.”
Small victory – “the Massachusetts-based Harvard Law School has recognized Israel as an apartheid regime, joining an array of organizations labeling Israel as such for its practices in occupied Palestine, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported.In a recent report to the United Nations, the International Human Rights Clinic at Harvard Law School joined the international community by recognizing the apartheid character of the Israeli regime.
https://www.palestinechronicle.com/harvard-law-school-recognizes-israel-as-apartheid-regime/
An old question, but still appropriate:
“Israel Or the United States: ‘Who’s the F*cking Superpower Here?’In 1996, President Clinton met a newly-elected Benjamin Netanyahu for the first time and came away from the meeting cursing at his gall, “Who’s the fucking superpower here?” The answer, then as now, is the United States”.
Congress has to quit acting like WE are beholden to Israel, when we are not. WE do what is best for our country, and WE do not have to bow and scrape to the zionists. WE send them aid, and WE send them the weapons, that they use to kill unarmed civilians, so WE should be calling the shots.
The members of Congress who lose their spines when dealing with this parasitic nation, are constantly putting our interests after Israel. Are they so desperate to get zionist campaign contributions and AIPAC support, that they are willing to sell their souls to the devil? The answer is YES.
Biden must honor his campaign promise and open an embassy in East Jerusalem for the Palestinians, and if the zionists do not like that, too bad.
“Why would Israeli politics be the top consideration for our administration and for our ambassador on the ground?” Why, indeed. And if we didn’t know before, we now know where J Street stands: Israel right or wrong, Israel as a Jewish state where non-Jews get bubkes.
South Africans have said Israel is worse than South Africa. They are right. South African whites wanted to rule, exploit, and dispossess Blacks. They didn’t want to get rid of them.
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https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2022/3/18/indifference-to-ukrainian-suffering-could-prove-costly-for-israel
“Bennett government’s fumbled response to Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine betrays Jewish history & draws attention to Israel’s similarly odious actions.” by Richard Silverstein, Al Jazeera, March 18/22
EXCERPT: “Since the start of Russia’s all-out invasion of Ukraine, many Israelis have been passionately protesting against the aggression, & demanding their leaders do more to help Ukrainians.
“Indeed, according to a poll conducted by Direct Polls LTD in early March, 76 percent of Israelis support the Ukrainians, while only 10 percent favour the Russians in this ongoing conflict. While the same poll showed that half of the Israeli population supports the government’s decision to remain neutral, there is still widespread disappointment over how this policy of neutrality has been implemented.
“In order to avoid angering Russia, Israel rejected a US request that it co-sponsor a February 25 United Nations Security Council resolution condemning Russia’s invasion, which spurred a Biden administration protest. A week later, however, when it became clear that an overwhelming majority of the world’s nations are willing to condemn Russia’s aggression, it turned around and voted for a similar resolution at the UN General Assembly.
“Israel eagerly welcomed Ukrainian Jewish refugees to its shores, & said it was planning to airlift tens of thousands more to safety. But it pulled back the welcome mat when it came to Ukrainian non-Jews. After this discriminatory approach to asylum provoked outrage, Israel said it would cap refugees at 25,000, but only 5,000 non-Jews would be accepted. Further, it announced that Ukrainian non-Jews would be granted a three-month visa on payment of a $3,000 fee refundable on their departure from the country. Imagine how many refugees fleeing with little more than the clothes on their backs have such a sum stashed away. Following widespread criticism of the proposal, Israel eventually withdrew the fee requirement.” (cont’d)