The legislative effort is led by Representatives Cori Bush, Rashida Tlaib, André Carson, Summer Lee, and Delia Ramirez calls on the Biden administration to push for an immediate ceasefire and send humanitarian aid to Gaza.
More than 60 national organizations are demanding Congress back a bill to require the FBI to publicly report details of Shireen Abu Akleh’s killing.
“There has been no independent, credible investigation,” VT Senator Patrick Leahy said yesterday of Israel’s killing of Shireen Abu Akleh May 11. “To say that fatally shooting an unarmed person, and in this case one with PRESS written in bold letters on her clothing, was not intentional, without providing any evidence to support that conclusion, calls into question the State Department’s commitment to an independent, credible investigation and to ‘follow the facts.'”
In response to an Israeli raid on Palestinian organizations, the Biden administration has finally said it doesn’t share the Israeli position that the organizations are “terrorist” groups, but it also won’t question or criticize Israeli actions.
Two new legislative efforts to force the Biden administration to investigate the killing of Shireen Abu Akleh were announced this week.
Pressure is building on the Biden administration from Congress and the media to investigate the killing of Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu Akleh. One fourth of the House Democratic caucus signed a letter calling on the U.S. to investigate the killing, and recent investigations by CNN and the Associated Press have debunked Israeli talking points. The U.S. has a history of accepting Israel’s explanations for the deaths of Americans, but pushing for an investigation makes sense as it would be a small step toward eroding Israeli impunity.
Nearly 60 House Democrats have signed onto a letter, sent to the State Department and FBI, calling for an independent investigation into the killing of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh. The letter is led by Reps. Andre Carson (D-IN) and Lou Correa (D-CA).
Mainstream Democrats were shocked by the killing of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, but their calls for an investigation were vague, even suggesting that Israel could investigate itself– a recipe for “whitewashing,” says a human rights group. No mainstream leader approached the position of progressive Congresspeople, that the U.S. must investigate Israel, or the view of the Foundation for Middle East Peace, that Israeli “apartheid” is the context of the killing.
Israel’s declaration of six leading Palestinian human rights and civil society groups as “terrorist” organizations continues to have reverberations in Washington. Rep. Betty McCollum has introduced a resolution calling on the U.S. House of Representatives to condemn Israel’s announcement, and specifically called for the Biden administration to “publicly condemn this authoritarian and antidemocratic act of repression by the Government of Israel against prominent Palestinian civil society organizations.”
Protests are being held in solidarity with Palestine around the world this week, with large…