For a country that practices apartheid, defies international law, and engages in ethnic cleansing, Israel is popular in the US Congress. During just about 125 days in session, the houses of Congress managed to entertain more than 70 new pieces of legislation pandering to Israel.
It is no coincidence that the pro-Israel lobby is arguably the most pervasive and influential lobby in the U.S. – and that Israel partisans, many of them billionaires, make massive campaign donations to both parties.
This year’s legislative items include plenty of military aid and non-financial perks for Israel, and scoldings for those who speak ill (if truthfully) of the Jewish state.
Americans need to know how generous our legislators are with our tax dollars – toward a country that is universally known to be a human rights abuser. Below is a list of legislation currently under consideration in Congress (and there will be more in the coming days). Also find links to plenty of facts about Israel – illustrating that Israel may not be the sort of state that Americans should bankroll.
(Note that the three bills in support of Palestinian rights – one quite robust, and two marginally beneficial – at the bottom of the article.)
A fire rages at sunrise in Khan Yunis following an Israeli airstrike on targets in the southern Gaza strip, May 12, 2021. During the recent violence, Israeli military forces killed 260 Gazans, while Palestinian resistance forces killed 13 Israelis – sources & more information here. (YOUSSEF MASSOUD | Credit: AFP via Getty Images)
LEGISLATION TO PROVIDE MONEY FOR ISRAEL
This first batch of legislation seeks to provide the standard annual $3.8 billion in military aid to Israel ($10.8 million a day), and then some.
Since 1946, two years before Israel’s founding on 78% of mandatory Palestine, the US has given Israel $154.7 billion in total military aid (adjusted for inflation: $243.9 billion) – more US assistance than any other country since World War II – this in spite of US laws that forbid military aid to countries committing gross human rights violations (like Israel).
Some of the legislation listed here ensures the flow of the usual sum of $3.8 billion a year; others seek to fund Israel through less direct ways. If these pass, taken together they may bring our daily contribution on behalf of Israel closer to $20 million.
H.R.4373 Department of State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 2022
This bill provides the largest chunk – $3.3 billion – in military aid to Israel, and encourages Arab states to end their boycott of Israel and normalize relations.
This bill also earmarks $3 billion more in expenditures not to Israel itself, but for Israel’s benefit.
Read about the billions of taxpayer dollars earmarked for Israel in this bill here.
H.R.4432 – Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2022
This bill provides FY2022 appropriations to the Department of Defense (DOD) for military activities, including $500 million for Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system (despite the fact that Israel, a human rights abuser, sells military technology to other states that are human rights abusers, and refuses to share some technology with the US, even though we subsidized its development).
Read the details of funding to Israel in this bill here; read about the massive US investment in Israel’s Iron Dome anti-rocket system here (and US expenditures overall in Israel here); read about the minor effects of Gazan rockets on Israel here; read about Israel’s refusal to share technology with the US here.
These bills call for an additional $1 billion in emergency funding for Israel’s Iron Dome (on top of the standard $500 million/year), with various fiscal strategies, including taking money earmarked for Gaza or the Palestinian authority.
Several of the bills were introduced following the removal of the “emergency” $1 billion in Iron Dome funding from the budget bill. The removal of the funding demonstrated America’s waning support for Israel; the flurry of separate bills demonstrates Congress’ ongoing infatuation with Israel.
Israel “needed” the funding because its military had depleted its Iron Dome materiel during an attack on Gaza – in which Israel killed 260 Gazan Palestinians (vs. 13 Israelis killed).
H.R.5305 may be in a league of its own because of the deviousness with which its Iron Dome funding appeared as a line item. Read about it here.
Read about the massive US investment in Israel’s Iron Dome anti-rocket system here (and US expenditures overall in Israel here); read about the minor effects of Gazan rockets on Israel here; read about Israel’s recent attack on Gaza that resulted in depletion of Iron Dome supplies here and here.
S.Con.Res.14 Setting forth the congressional budget for the US Government for fiscal year 2022 and budgetary levels for fiscal years 2023 through 2031 and S.Con.Res.5 – A concurrent resolution setting forth the congressional budget for the United States Government for fiscal year 2021 and budgetary levels for 2022 through 2030
An amendment in S.Con.Res.14 establishes a reserve fund for preventing terrorist attacks and ensuring that no US tax dollars benefit terrorist organizations “such as Hamas or the Palestinian Islamic Jihad”; part of S.Con.Res.5 relates to funding for the US Embassy in “Jerusalem, Israel.”
Read about Israel’s (and America’s) controversial use of the word “terrorist” here, here, and here.
Read about the controversial move of the American Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem here, and about the Palestinian struggle to hold onto East Jerusalem here.
S.1193 &H.R.2659 US-Israel Cybersecurity Cooperation Enhancement Act of 2021 and S.2120 &H.R.5148 United States–Israel Artificial Intelligence Center Act
These four bills propose that the US partner with Israel to facilitate (and pay for) cybersecurity research and development. The Dept. of Homeland Security would provide “not less that $6 million” a year; the State Dept., Commerce Dept., and National Science Foundation would provide another $10 million a year.
The legislation is framed as part of the fight against Russian, Iranian, and Chinese technological advances and/or cyberattacks – but ignores the fact that Israeli cyber technology has gone rogue again and again, is suspected in a high-profile murder, and has been caught multiple times spying on the US. Israel’s most notorious US spy exhorted young Jews to spy on America for Israel (“if we’re Jews, we will always have dual loyalty”).
S.221 & H.R.852 United States-Israel PTSD Collaborative Research Act (also mentioned in H.R.4350–NDAA, National Defense Authorization Act)
These bills establish a grant program (no dollar amount indicated) for collaboration between the US and Israel to advance research on post-traumatic stress disorders. “Our ally Israel, under constant attack from terrorist groups, experiences similar issues with Israeli veterans facing PTSD symptoms.” (The bill overlooks the fact that Palestinians have suffered from Israel’s devastating attacks at a much higher rate than Israelis have suffered from Palestinians’ meager attempts at resistance.)
Read about Gazan trauma here (especially for children) here and here; read a comparison of Israeli airstrikes and Gazan rockets here and here (video here).
S.1518 To authorize appropriations for the US-Israel Binational Agricultural Research and Development (BARD) Fund
This bill would create a blank check (“such sums as are necessary”) to support agricultural R&D activities mutually beneficial to the US and Israel – embracing Israel’s “legitimacy” in the international community, in spite of its rampant human rights abuses that have drawn censure from most of the world.
Read about Israel’s destruction of the natural environment of Palestine here.
Non-monetary legislation for Israel includes recognition of Israel as the “only democracy in the Middle East.” Pictured: view of segregated road (Route 4370), northeast of Jerusalem, which separates vehicles of Israeli citizens and non-citizens. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90/JNS)
LEGISLATION TO PROVIDE NON-MONETARY PERKS FOR ISRAEL
As always, Congress members lined up to introduce legislation in support of what they claim is America’s “greatest ally.” The facts don’t support this claim – see this, and this, and this and this.
S.Res.226 Expressing the sense of the Senate that the US supports Israel, our greatest ally in the region, and its right to defend itself against terrorist attacks
This resolution denounces Hamas rockets (but not Israeli airstrikes), mourns the loss of 13 Israeli lives caused by the rockets (but not the 260 Palestinian lives lost due to airstrikes), and urges “steadfast support for Israel” (but not for justice and self-determination for Palestinians).
Read about Israel’s alleged “right to self defense” here, about Hamas rockets here and here, and about Israel as America’s supposed “greatest ally” here.
This bill authorizes the President to introduce U.S. Armed Forces into hostilities or to direct immediate transfer of defense articles or services to ensure the survival of Israel and its people from an existing or imminent threat. The President thus would act without oversight or limitation, and could tell Congress about such actions after the fact.
Israel’s “existential threat” ideology rests on its “vulnerability”; it claims to be threatened by the Palestinian-led boycott movement (BDS), by the rising Palestinian population, by Iran and Gaza, and by the “delegitimization” caused by factual reporting on its human rights abuses.
Read about a high-ranking Israeli who insists that Israel no longer faces any existential threat here; read the deconstruction of the nonviolent BDS movement as an existential threat here; read about Israel’s response to the growing Palestinian population (“demographic threat”) here; read about Israel’s disproportionately powerful military here; Israel’s “secret” nukes here; and Israel’s decades of human rights abuses here, here, and here.
H.Res.394 Expresses support for Israel’s efforts of self-determination and collective security against external forces, recognizes Jerusalem as the legitimate capital city of Israel, and condemns actions by Hamas against the people of Israel
This resolution, introduced during Israel’s attack on Gaza, purports to support both Israelis’ and Palestinians’ right to live in peace and security, then condemns Hamas rockets only (not Israel’s aggression that prompted the rockets), recognizes Israel’s (but not Palestine’s) claim to Jerusalem and right to self-determination.
Read about Israel’s attack on Gaza here and here; about Hamas rockets here and here, and Israel’s actions in Jerusalem here and here.
This resolution declares that Israel is a crucial ally of the US, and that antisemitism and hostility against Israel should be rejected. The language claims that Israel “is the only democracy in the Middle East”; that Gazan resistance rockets are “unprovoked”; and that boycott, divest, and sanction (BDS) is used by “radical, racist, and extremist organizations.” All of these claims are inaccurate.
Read about the myth that Israel is a democracy here; read a few examples of why the people of Gaza resist Israel here and here; read about Gaza rockets here and here; read about the nonviolent Boycott, Divest, and Sanction (BDS) movement here and here, and why BDS is not antisemitic here.
One piece of pro-Israel legislation seeks to halt the resumption of aid to the UN agency providing food for Gaza’s poorest. (Pictured: UNRWA food distribution for Palestine refugees in Gaza during the COVID-19 pandemic is being conducted through home deliveries.) (Khalil Adwan UNRWA)
LEGISLATION CENSURING PALESTINIANS (HAMAS AND OTHER “TERRORISTS”), THEIR ALLIES, AND OTHER NE’ER-DO-WELLS
A supply of new legislation in 2021, as always, takes the form of threats and punishment of Israel’s adversaries.
H.R.1543 No Social Media Accounts for Terrorists or State Sponsors of Terrorism Act of 2021
The purpose of this bill is to provide authorities to prohibit the provision of services by social media platforms to certain individuals and entities on the Specially Designated Nationals List and senior officials of governments of a state sponsor of terrorism. The bill provides 4 examples of foreign leaders who have used their social media accounts to promote hate – 3 of them involved alleged “antisemitic” rhetoric; the 4th names a regime “responsible for multiple gross violations of human rights.”
Read about Israeli officials’ use of social media to spread hate and racism here and here, and their manipulation of social media here and here; read about Israel’s appropriation of “antisemitism” to cover its atrocities here; read about Israel’s gross violations of human rights here and here.
S.2479 & H.R.4721 UNRWA Accountability and Transparency Act
The purpose of these bills is to withhold US contributions to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). As the Biden administration makes plans to restore funding to UNRWA cut by Trump, the bill alludes to the Israel-centric IHRA definition of antisemitism, seeks to limit refugee status, and recommends withhold funding from UNRWA unless every employee passes an extreme vetting process (e.g. conveying information that calls Israelis “occupiers” or “settlers,” supports BDS or the Palestinian right of return, or shows a map that does not include Israel).
Read about UNRWA cuts here and here, the IHRA definition of antisemitism here, and the Right of Return here.
S.1904 & H.R.261 Palestinian International Terrorism Support Prevention Act of 2021; H.R.3685 Hamas International Financing Prevention Act; S.1899 Stop Taxpayer Funding of Hamas Act
These bills impose sanctions on individuals and groups (including governments and the UN) that support Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and any affiliate or successor groups, or that encourage “anti-Israel or antisemitic ideas or propaganda.”
Read the little-known facts about Hamas’ and Israel’s weapons here and here (video here); read about the severity of Israel’s impact on Gazan life here and here; read about the United Nations and Israel here.
H.Res.396 Condemning the rocket attacks perpetrated against Israel by Hamas in May, 2021, and expressing that the US must continue to invest in and support Israel’s security and sovereignty
This resolution declares Israel’s right to self-defense and denounces Hamas rockets, while ignoring Gazans’ right to self-defense and overlooking Israel’s 14-year blockade, its many brutal attacks, and the preventable humanitarian disaster Israel has caused for the people of Gaza.
Read about Israel’s attack on Gaza here and here; about Hamas rockets here and here, and about Israel as America’s supposed “greatest ally” here.
H.R.2374 Peace and Tolerance in Palestinian Education Act
This is a repeat of a bill that was introduced in the last session of Congress (H.R.2343), about the alleged failure of the Palestinian Authority and UNRWA to “eliminate all content and passages encouraging violence or intolerance” from textbooks, perpetuating the falsehood that Palestinians teach their children to hate Jews. Studies have found that Palestinian textbooks are largely neutral (as they have been monitored closely for years) – unlike Israel textbooks which, according to Israeli scholar and academic Nurit Peled-Elhanan, regularly “marginalize Palestinians, legitimize Israeli military action and reinforce Jewish-Israeli territorial identity.”
Read about studies of Palestinian textbook content here (also book, video) and here; read about the ADL, which itself prepares educational materials for US schools on equality – but silence calls for equality when it comes to Palestinians, here.
This bill would hold corporate officers personally liable when actions they take on behalf of the corporation are considered political, “un-American,” or in some other way not in the best interests of the shareholders. It specifically mentioned the act of “boycotting a state.”
As Foundation for Middle East Peace explains, “the bill would on the one hand open up companies to shareholder lawsuits if they take business decisions that reflect their progressive political views/ideologies/conscience, while on the other hand, it would explicitly exempt from this same shareholder accountability companies that act to punish other companies for boycotting Israel/settlements.”
This proposed restriction on free speech ignores the fact that Americans in general are very supportive of boycotts: only about 1 in 5 agree with such anti-BDS legislation.
Read more about S.2829 here; read about the nonviolent Boycott, Divest, and Sanction (BDS) movement here and here, and why BDS is not antisemitic here.
LEGISLATION SEEKING TO LIMIT OR CENSURE FREE SPEECH WHEN USED TO CRITICIZE ISRAEL (SOMETIMES ERRONEOUSLY CALLED “THE NEW ANTISEMITISM”)
A number of bills and resolutions were introduced during and after Israel’s attack on Gaza in May – some were related to alleged and actual antisemitic incidents triggered by the attack; others targeted Congress members who criticized Israel’s actions.
S.Res.250, S.Res.252, H.Res.428, S.1939, H.R.3515, H.Res.557 (all of these resolutions are built on an inaccurate, Israel-centric reading of current events, in which pro-Palestine or pro-Hamas Americans attacked or harassed Jews (allegedly antisemitic acts), triggered by “violence against Israel” at that time)
S.Res.250 is Israel-centric, mentioning Israel 16 times. S.Res.250 affirms Israel’s “right to self-defense” and labels the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement as antisemitism. The title of S.Res.250 places blame for Israel’s attack on “terrorists” from the Gaza Strip. S.Res. 252 focuses more on actual antisemitism, and mentions Israel twice, although the “antisemitic violence and harassment” it refers to have been disputed.
Three of the bills refer to alleged antisemitic incidents tracked by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) – an organization with a strong pro-Israel bias.
Read about Israel’s dangerous misappropriation of the term “antisemitism” here; read about Israel’s alleged “right to self defense” here; read about why BDS is not antisemitic here and here; read a comparison of the weapons of Gazan “terrorists” vs. Israel here; read a rebuttal of the alleged antisemitic nature of incidents in May here; read about the ADL, which claims to fight for human rights everywhere but ignores Palestinian rights, here and here; Read about the run-up to Israel’s attack on Gaza here (note the warnings Israel was given in the timeline), Israel’s attack here and here.
S.Res.232, H.Res.474, and H.Res.431 accuse Reps. Cori Bush (D-MO), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), and Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) of various “antisemitic” statements (see below) in relation to Israel’s attack on Gaza in May.
The resolutions describe the reps’ comments – all of which were factual and not antisemitic – as “poisonous rhetoric,” and accuse them of “defending foreign terrorist organizations and inciting antisemitic attacks across the United States,” and declare that “blaming Israel for Hamas rocket attacks…is a form of antisemitic speech.”
Some of the statements the legislation denounces:
Cori Bushtweeted, “The Israeli military’s occupation continues. The blockade continues. The ethnic cleansing continues.” These statements are accurate: see this, this, and this.
Rashida Tlaib tweeted that the Israeli military was killing “babies, children and their parents,” and asserted that Palestinians are “being massacred” in a form of “ethnic cleansing.” These are also accurate statements. See this and this.
Ayanna Pressley said in a House speech, “We cannot remain silent when our government sends $3.8 billion of military aid to Israel that is used to demolish Palestinian homes, imprison Palestinian children, and displace Palestinian families,” and “the pain, trauma and terror that Palestinians are facing is not just the result of this week’s escalation, but the consequence of years of military occupation.” See this.
Pramila Jayapal stated in a CNN interview, “we condemn Hamas’ firing of those rockets, but I think you have to look at what prompted even that behavior…this has been a pattern of action from Israel that…has led to increased hopelessness from the Palestinian people…we have to look at the power balance here, or imbalance as it were, and we have to put more responsibility on Israel in maintaining peace in the region.”
Read about Israel’s appropriation of “antisemitism” to cover its atrocities here; read about Israel’s May attack on Gaza here and here.
LEGISLATION THAT PROMOTES ISRAEL INTERNATIONALLY
This session of Congress has seen a slew of bills that, rather than giving Israel “special” treatment, seek to position Israel as just another state like all the rest. This tacit acceptance of Israel as a “normal” state ignores the fact that it was established in 1948 by a war of ethnic cleansing, has been violating international laws for decades, has been censured by the United Nations hundreds of times, and is therefore considered a rogue state by much of the world.
The purpose of this bill is to support security and law enforcement training and cooperation between the US and Israel, specifically by supporting the inclusion of Israel in the International Law Enforcement Academies in Europe (ILEAs are training facilities run by the US Department of State, to instruct local police on counterterrorism and other practices).
Read about how Israeli police teach American forces militaristic, often violent techniques, and Israeli officers’ use of torture and other cruel methods against Palestinians here. (video here).
S.1061 & H.R.2748 Israel Relations Normalization Act of 2021
This bill requires the Department of State to take certain actions promoting the normalization of relations between Israel, Arab states, and other relevant countries and regions, building on the so-called Abraham Accords of 2020.
Read about the Abraham Accords here; read about the “normalization” of Israel here and here.
S.Res.344 Expressing support for the State of Israel joining the African Union under observer status
This resolution encourages heightened cooperation between the State of Israel and African nations, particularly in areas such as economic growth, sustainable agriculture, and humanitarian development – in spite of the fact that many African nations object strongly to Israel’s presence.
This resolution declares that Israel, “in the span of a few decades, has emerged as a developed nation and therefore offers an example of a path to economic progress for developing countries” – a statement that belies the fact that the US has ensured Israel’s “development” with subsidies to the tune of $243.9 billion (adjusted for inflation); the statement also ignores the fact that Israel joined the AU without approval from the 55 member states, and the move has been described as a breach of the AU’s own protocols.
Read more about Israel and the African Union here and here.
S.1260 United States Innovation and Competition Act of 2021, or Endless Frontiers Act
This bill seeks to establish programs to strengthen US leadership (over China) in critical technologies. One amendment solicits “cooperation with our close friends and allies,” specifically including Israel, and excluding “nations that engage in discriminatory boycott, divestment, and sanctioning (BDS) efforts” against Israel – including “Jews living anywhere in Israel.”
The Foundation for Middle East Peace (FMEP) explains this last phrase as targeting “the mere act of differentiation between sovereign Israel and the occupied territories…to coerce the entire world into treating the West Bank and Israeli settlements in it as part of Israel.
Read about illegal Israeli settlements here; read about the nonviolent Boycott, Divest, and Sanction (BDS) movement here and here, and why BDS is not antisemitic here; read about Israel’s de facto annexation of parts of the West Bank here and here.
This bill is a repeat of legislation that died in the last session of Congress (H.R.7900). Its purpose is to clarify parts of the 1984 National Organ Transplant Act. In addition to citing statistics showing how economical organ transplants are, the bill singles out Israel for the “sweeping changes” it made to its national organ donation program in 2010, and as a result saw organ donation approximately triple over a 10-year period. The bill neglects to mention Israel’s history on the subject of organ trafficking.
Read a review of the 2020 version of this bill (including Israel’s history of organ trafficking) here.
S.2000 U.S.-Greece Defense and Interparliamentary Partnership Act of 2021
The bill encourages ongoing partnership between Cyprus, Greece, Israel, and the US.
Read about global condemnation of Israel’s human rights abuses here and here, read about US failure to join in that condemnation here.
S.Res.271 Affirming that the United States supports the Eastern Mediterranean Gas Forum and the Eastern Mediterranean gas pipeline.
The Forum includes Israel, Greece, and Cyprus.
Read about the background of the pipeline here and here.
Among the legislation being proposed in Congress so far this year is the “Combating BDS Act of 2021,” which would limit Americans’ free speech regarding Israel. (Pictured: a woman yells while holding a sign “#BDS,” referring to “Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions,” in front of the Israeli Consulate in Los Angeles on May 14, 2018.) (Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)
This bill seeks to block the Biden administration from reversing the Trump-era policy requiring goods produced in illegal Israeli settlements in the Palestinian West Bank to be labeled as “Made in Israel.”
The bill fails to take into account the fact that, under international law, Israeli settlements on Palestinian land are not part of Israel.
Read more about the bill here; read about illegal Israeli settlements here.
S.Res.237 Approving of the sales of defense items to Israel notified to Congress on May 5, 2021; S.J.Res.19 & H.J.Res.49 Disapproving of the same sale
These resolutions are responses to an almost-unnoticed approval by the Biden administration for the sale of $735 million in precision-guided weapons to Israel. In days when Israel enjoyed bipartisan support, such an arms sale would sail through Congress; today, however, no-strings support is under scrutiny. All three pieces of legislation were introduced within a few days after Israel attacked Gaza, killing 260 Palestinian men, women, and children.
Read more about the arms sale here, and about the changing climate in Congress vis-a-vis Israel here and here.
“To provide for non-preemption of measures by State and local governments to divest from entities that engage in certain boycott, divestment, or sanctions activities targeting Israel or persons doing business in Israel or Israeli-controlled territories…Nothing in this Act shall be construed to infringe upon any right protected under the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.”
Read about the nonviolent Boycott, Divest, and Sanction (BDS) movement here and here, how anti-BDS laws do in fact infringe on First Amendment rights here and here, and why BDS is not antisemitic here.
S.1641 & H.R.3190 Israel Sovereignty Reassurance Act of 2021 (ISRA)
This legislation seeks to prohibit rescinding the recognition of Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights – a region that Israel captured from Syria in 1967, and has illegally occupied ever since. During the 50+ years of occupation, most of the world has never recognized the region as Israeli.
Read about former president Trump’s ill-informed decision to recognize Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights here; read about mainstream media’s inaccurate coverage of the Golan Heights here.
S.1182 SECURE F–35 Exports Act of 2021; H.R.5302 U.S.-Israel Military Technology Cooperation Act
S.1182 requires specified assessments and certifications related to the sale of F-35 aircraft to countries in the Middle East to ensure that the sale, export, or transfer of these aircraft does not present a significant danger of compromising the critical military and technological military advantage of Israel or the U.S. Armed Forces (this in the context of the fact that Israel, a human rights abuser, sells military technology to other states that are human rights abusers, and refuses to share some technology with the US, even though we subsidized its development).
H.R.5302 directs the US Secretaries of Defense and State to provide a forum in which the US and Israel can work together in developing weapons technology.
Read about the costs (in lives and tax dollars) of American support for Israel’s military here and here; read about Israeli sales to human rights abusers here and here; read about Israel’s refusal to share technology with the US here; read about Israeli weaponry compared to Palestinian weaponry here.
H.R.4712 Desalination Development Act; H.R.3404 Furthering Underutilized Technologies and Unleashing Responsible Expenditures (FUTURE) for Western Water Infrastructure and Drought Resiliency Act
These bills seek to subsidize desalination project development and drought resilience in US states, with several requirements – one of which is that the state “demonstrably leverage the experience of international partners with considerable expertise in desalination, such as the State of Israel.”
It is entirely possible that Israeli consultants or companies will be paid American taxpayer dollars through this program.
Read about the failure of Israel’s own desalination efforts here; about Israel’s withholding of water from Palestinians here and here; about the “normalization” of Israel here and here; and about global condemnation of Israel’s human rights abuses here and here.
H.Res.558 & S.Res.377 Urging the European Union to designate Hezbollah in its entirety as a terrorist organization
These resolutions ask the EU, which already considers Hezbollah’s military wing a terrorist organization, to also include its political wing in the designation. The legislation calls attention to Hezbollah’s violence against Israelis in the past and its destabilizing effect on the region – ignoring the immense damage that Israel has done to Lebanon, Hezbollah’s home base.
Not everyone agrees that Hezbollah is a terror group – read about it here; read about Israel’s devastating 2006 attack on Lebanon here, Israel’s 1982 invasion here, and its 1978 invasion here – also here.
This bill outlines alleged ties between Iran and China, and imposes certain requirements on Iran (vis-a-vis its relationships with China and Hamas) before the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action relating to Iran’s nuclear program may be renegotiated.
The bill includes the curious statement, “The United States Government unequivocally condemns the Hamas-incited terrorist attacks originating from Israeli land currently occupied by Hamas.” This may be a reference to the most radical Zionist belief that all of Mandatory Palestine is actually part of Israel.
Read about the alleged threat Iran poses to Israel, and Israel’s meddling in US-Iran relations here; read about Israel’s transfer of U.S. weaponry and technology to China here and here.
“The purpose of this Act is to preserve conditions for, and improve the likelihood of a two-state solution that secures Israel’s future as a democratic state and a national home for the Jewish people, a viable, democratic Palestinian state, an end to Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories, and peaceful relations between the two states, and to direct the Department of State and other relevant agencies to take steps to accomplish these ends.”
While this description seems promising, leaders in Palestinian rights organizations remain unconvinced: the bill offers no mechanism for ensuring Palestinian rights, and fails to hold Israel responsible for its decades of human rights abuses; it also locks the US into two states as the only solution – in spite of the growing popularity in some circles of the one-democratic-state solution.
Read about the problems with the two-state solution, and the benefits of the one-democratic-state solution here.
LEGISLATION ACKNOWLEDGING THAT BOTH PALESTINIAN AND ISRAELI LIVES MATTER
S.Res.225 & H.Res.429 Expressing the sense of the Senate regarding the value of Palestinian and Israeli lives and urging an immediate ceasefire and diplomatic efforts to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
These resolutions are the only pieces of legislation that make an attempt to assign equal value to Palestinian and Israeli lives.
The resolutions, introduced during the May attack by Israel on Gaza, urge an immediate cease-fire and support diplomatic efforts to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, uphold international law, and protect human rights.
Read about the United States’ complicity in Israel’s atrocities here, and President Biden’s pandering to Israel here.
LEGISLATION SEEKING JUSTICE FOR PALESTINIANS
H.R.2590 Defending the Human Rights of Palestinian Children and Families Living Under Israeli Military Occupation Act
This is the only bill so far in the 2021-2022 Congress that specifically advocates for justice for the people of Palestine. The purpose of this bill is to promote and protect the human rights of Palestinians living under Israeli military occupation and ensure that United States taxpayer funds are not used by the Government of Israel to support the military detention of Palestinian children, the unlawful seizure, appropriation, and destruction of Palestinian property and forcible transfer of civilians in the West Bank, or further annexation of Palestinian land in violation of international law.
Read about the significance of this bill here; read about previous versions of the bill, and why such legislation is needed, here and here.
If it seems to you like our Congress is spending too much of its time – and too many of our tax dollars – on Israel, please contact them and tell them so.
Kathryn Shihadah is an editor and staff writer for If Americans Knew.
15-year-old Sama A. and 11-year-old Rahaf N. share what was it was like to live through the Israeli military’s latest aggression in the Gaza Strip during May 2021. Each of them have lived through several Israeli military assaults and agree that the May aggression was the most intense.
Israeli forces stopped ambulance carrying injured Palestinian boy for nearly an hour
Israeli forces shot 13-year-old Nashat in the stomach with live ammunition then held up the ambulance, carrying Nashat to the hospital, at a military checkpoint for 45 minutes.
The intimidating power of Australia’s pro-Israel lobby limits what mainstream media outlets dare publish about Israel and forces self-censorship on editors and journalists alike, writes John Lyons in his latest book Dateline Jerusalem: Journalism’s toughest assignment. Kim Wingerei reports.
In 2019, Fairfax Media’s Sydney and Melbourne mastheads made an error. In the daily crossword section, the answer to the clue “Holy land” turned out not to be six letters starting with an I, as some would expect, but nine letters: Palestine. So affronted was the Australia/Israel and Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC) that they demanded an investigation.
Fairfax acceded, blamed the error on an external contractor and apologised to Colin Rubenstein, executive director of the AIJAC.
This is just one of many examples which John Lyons uses to illustrate the power of a lobby group so influential it can force changes to Government policy, hound journalists out of their jobs and pressure the ABC board to justify the appointment of foreign correspondents.
… there are only three people who can tell the editors of The Australian what they can or can’t use: Rupert Murdoch, Lachlan Murdoch and Colin Rubenstein. – John Lyons
John Lyons is an experienced journalist. Currently the head of investigative journalism at the ABC, his 40 years in the media include being editor of the Sydney Morning Herald, Middle East correspondent for The Australian and winning one of his three Walkley Awards for “Stone Cold Justice”, a Four Corner’s episode which exposed the human rights abuses in Israel military courts.
His earlier book Balcony over Jerusalem covered his six years of witnessing the tragedies and contradictions of a region which has suffered more armed conflict than any other since World War II.
In his latest book released this weekend (at 85 pages, it’s closer to essay size), Lyons focuses entirely on the Israel-Palestine conflict and specifically how pro-Israel lobbyists seek to control the narrative for the Australian audience.
He makes the point several times that the press in Israel is far more overtly critical of the policies of Israel’s Government than is the media in Australia, including how the regular flare-ups in the West Bank are covered.
To the AIJAC it’s a war of words. It is a battle to control how and what is said.
For example, Colin Rubenstein and his fellow lobbyists are particularly sensitive about using the word “occupation” in reference to Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories. But as the lieutenant colonel responsible for Israel’s army operations in the occupied territories quips:
If this is not occupied then the media has missed one of the biggest stories of our time, (Israel’s) withdrawal from the West Bank! – LC Eliezer Toledano, Israel Army
The pro-Israel lobby has even developed a special dictionary. The Global Language Dictionary was funded by The Israel Project to “guide politicians and journalists on the language to use to win support for settlement expansion.”
Merely using the word Palestine can land a journalist in trouble. Jennine Khalik, a Palestinian Australian and former journalist at The Australian recounts in the book how she was yelled at by a sub-editor for referring to a refugee and singer as coming from Palestine:
PALESTINE DOES NOT EXIST … Palestine is NOT a place … What kind of journalist are you, using the word Palestine?
For Jennine Khalik this was the last straw, she left the paper shortly after, following what had been a concerted campaign by the pro-Israel lobby, including diplomats from the Israel embassy questioning her editors about the appointment of “a Palestinian activist”.
In another example of the tactics used to control the narrative, Lyons refers to a story told by former The Age editor, Andrew Holden, where Colin Rubenstein and Mark Leibler – lawyer and well known leader of the Jewish business community – marched into his office and complained loudly about the paper’s coverage of the 2014 Gaza war.
Anyone who thinks that such a display by an esteemed member of the Australian community doesn’t have a chilling effect is kidding themselves. I have seen its effect in the years since in hesitancy on the part of editors and trepidation about any story which may show Israel in a negative light. – John Lyons
Lyons himself has also been subjected to threats and intimidation over the years for his reporting on Israel and Palestine. Like many who have dared to criticise the Israeli Government, he has been called an anti-semite, but also a “Goebbels” and “a Hamas smelly used tampon”.
It is a tactic he says is used persistently by those in Australia agitating for positive coverage of Israeli government actions.
I think the aim is to make journalists and editors decide that, even if they have a legitimate story that may criticise Israel it is simply not worth running, as it will cause more trouble than it’s worth. – John Lyons
As a result, most Australians don’t know much about the plight of the Palestinian people. They don’t know about the 101 permits that Palestinians need to obtain from Israel to be able to work and live in what they believe is their own land. They don’t know that Palestinians don’t enjoy free speech, freedom of movement or equality before the law.
In April 2021, Human Rights Watch (HRW) released its landmark report “A Threshold Crossed: Israel Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution”. It was largely ignored by mainstream media in Australia. “Including by my own organisation, the ABC,” says Lyons.
The pro-Israel lobby is so effective it has achieved the ultimate aim of information suppression – self-censorship.
John Lyons: Dateline Jerusalem: Journalism’s Toughest Assignment – now available from Monash University Publishing
Kim Wingerei is a businessman turned writer and commentator. He is passionate about free speech, human rights, democracy and the politics of change. Originally from Norway, Kim has lived in Australia for 30 years. Author of ‘Why Democracy is Broken – A Blueprint for Change’.
Five Palestinian factions called on Wednesday for the cancellation of the Oslo Accords and the adoption of a national agenda agreed upon by their secretaries general in September last year, Sama has reported.
According to the news agency, the five factions are the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, Islamic Jihad in Palestine, the Vanguard for the Popular Liberation War, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command.
They warned against what they called the blackmailing of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) and undermining of its status at the expense of the rights of the Palestinian refugees. The EU’s “extortion” against UNRWA to make school textbooks and curriculums “Israel friendly” is intended to make Palestinian students grow up without knowing their national identity, they said.
The factions also reiterated the importance of fast-tracking the adoption of a national resistance strategy instead of Oslo and its related Paris Economic Protocol. The formation of a united leadership for a comprehensive popular resistance effort to push the Israeli occupation out of Palestine is also a priority, they insisted.
“Betting on the delusional international proposals” and dependence on the International Quartet led by the United States “is an extension of a three-decade of failure,” they added. “Political escalation is not achieved through illusory and empty statements, but through the accumulation of material power on the ground.”
US Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) has introduced a bill, the Mind Your Own Business Act (S.2829), that would hold corporate officers personally liable when actions they take on behalf of the corporation are considered political, “un-American,” or in some other way not in the best interests of the shareholders.
Among other things, Mind Your Own Business would hold corporate officers personally liable for the act of “boycotting a state” – undermining their freedom to boycott Israel over its endemic human rights abuses. This is in spite of the fact that Americans in general are very supportive of boycotts: only about 1 in 5 agree with the anti-BDS legislation of the type that Rubio and others (including many Democrats) have been trying to pass. The BDS movement (boycott, divest, and sanctions) is based on “the simple principle that Palestinians are entitled to the same rights as the rest of humanity.”
The practice of boycott in the 1990s was instrumental in the toppling of apartheid in South Africa, and is a growing movement today. Numerous experts have documented Israel’s profoundly discriminatory system, which amounts to apartheid.
The BDS Movement has declared that “states have a legal responsibility to end complicity and dismantle apartheid” in Israel; all over the US, universities, local governments, and unions are considering BDS actions.
Israeli impunity
Interestingly, while laws in 32 states forbid the boycotting of Israeli companies, these same states are in favor of boycotting under different circumstances.
That is, businesses (and in some cases, individuals) that participate in boycotts of Israel are often themselves boycotted. The difference is simply that in the first case, the action is taken on moral grounds (for example, in protest of Israel’s human rights abuses against Palestinians); the second is merely punishment for the entity’s exercise of free speech.
Last month, several states boycotted Unilever, parent company of Ben & Jerry’s, when the ice cream company decided to stop selling its products inside illegal Israeli settlements.
Human rights organizations argue that penalizing those that oppose Israel’s policies has enabled Israel to continue violating international law. Human Rights Watch maintains that “States should encourage, not sanction, companies that avoid contributing to rights abuses.”
Supporting Israel is damaging to Americans on many levels.
In addition to providing arms to a country that abuses human rights (and that in turns provides arms to other human rights abusers), the US has lost respect globally for its complicity; foreign agents are controlling much of our country’s foreign policy; pro-Israel donors hold many politicians hostage; and American freedoms are being eroded in the name of protecting Israel from criticism. Israel also often spies on Americans and steals our technology.
Congressional impunity
Sen. Rubio himself, like many other senators, refuses to take responsibility for his actions in Congress that are not in the best interest of his constituents: his support for Israel (and Israel partisans’ support for him) is well-known; Rubio has prioritized Israel over his own country, and worked against American free speech.
Only a quarter of Americans consider themselves Zionists, yet the vast majority of our Congress members vote pro-Israel.
In addition, Americans are increasingly in favor of limiting and/or conditioning aid to Israel, while the majority of our legislators are willing to send Israel $10 million a day (and much more besides) with no strings attached – even though we have laws that prohibit such aid to countries that commit large-scale human rights abuses.
This would suggest that perhaps these Congress members – not corporations wanting to boycott Israel – may be acting in an un-American way, not according our best interests.
One of the great tragedies of Palestine is that almost every day there is a commemoration of one massacre or another, the death of a child or destruction of a home or village, leading one to think that the Palestinian narrative is one of death and destruction, which is what Israel wants people to think. But the truth is that this is not the case. The Palestinian narrative is one of a glorious history with periods of great sadness and tragedy. It is the Zionist story that is full of killing, stealing and destruction and not, as they try to sell it, one of creation and growth.
September 16, 2021, marked 39 years since the massacres at Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in Lebanon. As people remember and mourn the thousands of unarmed civilians who were butchered and the countless who survived suffering terrible injuries and emotional scars, we must also remember the man that stood behind this bloodbath.
This was a man whose complicity even the Israeli authorities could not ignore, the former general and renowned war criminal Ariel Sharon. And although he was momentarily penalized and banished from politics, he very quickly returned, and for a quarter of a century, he was the most powerful and influential man in Israeli politics.
Narratives
At the end of the day, it is all about the narrative, and we know all too well that Israel has done an outstanding job of erasing the Palestinian narrative and injecting its own mythical, false narrative in its place. In the media, in movies, in literature, in public education, and in politics the false Zionist narrative rules supreme and we who oppose racism and violence are faced with an enormous task as we engage in the work of reversing the narrative – a task without which it is hard to imagine Palestine ever becoming free.
Over the last 100 years, the Zionist movement managed to take the truly incredible history of Palestine and turn it into a historical footnote, replacing it with a mythical story that relies heavily on a Protestant-Zionist, literal reading of the Old Testament, which allowed them to create what is known as “return history.” In other words, the Zionist version of the history of Palestine creates the impression that the Jews returned to their ancient homeland after 2,000 years, making it an unprecedented historical event that overshadows anything else that occurred in Palestine over that bimillennial span.
The Zionist narrative is designed to turn the ancient history of Palestine into a small, unimportant story that cannot be compared with the grandeur of the narrative that is presented by the Old Testament. This is highlighted when Israeli politicians like the current prime minister, Naftali Bennett, refer to the Bible as the source of legitimacy for Israel.
A four thousand-year history
Thanks to the historian Nur Masalha, we now know that the name Palestine goes back close to 4,000 years. We know that the name Palestine was used in Egyptian sources going back to the Bronze Age, more than 1,000 BCE. Later, the name was used by the Assyrians in inscriptions from that era. The Greek historian Herodotus, who lived in the 5th century BCE and who is considered to be the father of history as we know it, visited the country and referred to it as Palestine. The Greek scientist and philosopher Aristotle also refers to Palestine by name in his writings.
The cities of Lyd, Ramle, and Yaffa all had remarkable histories, as did the cities of Akka, Haifa, and, of course, Nablus, Gaza, and Al-Quds-Jerusalem. Throughout the Muslim rule of Palestine, cities grew, cultures flourished, economic conditions and trade with Europe allowed people to prosper. Dhaher Al-Umar, who ruled over large parts of Palestine during the 18th century, is seen as the founding father of Palestinian modernity and, according to Nur Maslaha, he was the most influential figure in the modern orientation of Palestine towards the Mediterranean. During his reign in Palestine, there were agricultural and technical innovations introduced that “benefited the majority of Palestinian peasantry.” Thanks to Dhaher Al-Umar, there was considerable growth in the export of cotton, olive oil, wheat and soap.
Other, lesser-known parts of Palestine also flourished throughout history, such as the Palestinian town of Khalasa, which was founded by the Nabatean Arabs in the fourth century and then depopulated by the Zionist militia in 1948. It was known to be on what is called the “Arab incense route” and, according to Nur Masalha, under Arab-Islamic rule, the town, which sits just southwest of the city of Bi’r Al-Saba, was a major urban center.
According to Mansur Nasasra, the Palestinian Bedouin in the Naqab had a very profitable export of barley to England for the production of beer. Aerial photos from the early British occupation of Palestine also show large tracts of cultivated land in the Naqab. These lands are now mostly depopulated and the Palestinian Bedouin in the Naqab are prohibited from cultivating their ancestral lands. All of this stands in the face of Zionist claims that they came to a barren land and made it bloom.
The Zionist narrative is arguably responsible for the welcoming and forgiving attitude the entire world has towards the horrendous, unforgivable crimes committed by Israel since its founding in 1948. In order to prevent the next massacre by Israel, a state that seems to have an insatiable thirst for Palestinian blood, we have to reverse the narrative and delegitimize Zionism.
Well, here we go again. The Israelis, in collusion with no less than 420 criminals in the US Congress, have again ripped off the US taxpayer. I stop short of calling the congresscritters “traitors” because the US Constitution, which defines the word, requires that one actually be cooperating with a declared enemy of the United States to be so described. Israel is not yet an enemy as defined by a declaration of war from that same Congress, which is instead intent on showering our goods and even our freedoms on the Jewish state. Indeed, Israel has so corrupted our political system that it receives far more in benefits from the federal treasury than does any American state. And it is all done with a wink and a nod from the Jewish dominated media and through the agency of a grossly disproportionate number of Zionist Jews in high office and government aided and abetted by a host of pigshit ignorant Christian Zionists who are incapable of seeing or understanding what is best for their own country.
To be sure, many of those in Congress who pander to Israel as a top priority are not Jewish. But they know that that the Jewish state can be a harsh master if they deviate in any way from providing their enthusiastic support for the Greater Zionist project outlined in the Yinon Plan of 1982. This has led to America’s own interests being sacrificed and a continuous cash flow of many billions of dollars from Washington to Jerusalem, even though Israel is one of the ten wealthiest countries in the world per capita and its citizens enjoy free top level medical and educational benefits that many Americans cannot afford.
This is what happened last week, revealing yet again the US government’s total subjugation by Israel: Congress was preparing to vote on a multi-billion stopgap bill to pay for continuing government functions through December since a comprehensive budget has not yet been agreed to. Democratic Party friends of Israel had inserted an amendment into the bill only days before, consisting of a $1 billion gift to Israel so it could rearm its Iron Dome defense system, which ran low on missiles during the recent “Operation Guardian of the Walls” slaughter of Gazans, as well as for the purchase of other munitions. Senator Richard Shelby of Alabama defended the arrangement, saying “Importantly, our legislation includes funding for the Iron Dome, making good on our commitment to a historic and significant ally.” He explained that the money would “bolster Israel’s defense capacity and protect against Hamas attacks.”
Hamas attacks? Inserting freebies for Israel in such a fashion is routine in Congress as it allows money to flow without any debate or context, but this time there was a problem. A number of Democratic Party progressives in Congress objected and made an issue of it, in part because procedurally the move was an obvious attempt to hide what was being done, so the amendment was withdrawn. The Israel friendly media, tv talking heads from both parties, and leading congressmen all immediately went to bat for poor little defenseless Israel and a new bill was quickly drafted up to give the Jewish state the money without delay. Representative Josh Gottheimer complained in a tweet how “The Iron Dome protects innocent civilians in Israel from terrorist attacks and some of my colleagues have now blocked funding it. We must stand by our historic ally – the only democracy in the Middle East.”
One might suggest that Gottheimer go to live in Israel as he appears to like it so much and he might well fact-check his comment. It is not possible to be an apartheid state and occupying power as well as a nation where only one religion constitutes full citizenship if one aspires to be a democracy.
In spite of continued objections by “the squad” progressives, including this by Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, daughter of Palestinian immigrant parents, who said “I will not support an effort to enable and support war crimes, human rights abuses and violence. The Israeli government is an apartheid regime,” the new bill passed by 420 votes to 9. It did not mention that Israel had previously used its US-provided weapons to kill more than 250 Palestinian civilians, including 60 children. The nine brave Congressmen, who will now be targeted for non-re-election by Israel and all its friends, consisted of Thomas Massie (R-KY), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), Ilhan Omar (D-MN.), Raúl Grijalva (D-AZ), André Carson (D-IN), Marie Newman (D-IL), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), Cori Bush (D-MO) and Chuy Garcia (D-IL). Massie was the only Republican, who tweeted that “Foreign aid is the result of foreign influence exerted on US politicians at home.”
It is interesting to note some of the media comments that surfaced supportive of giving the Israelis another billion dollars on top of the $11 billion or so it already gets annually in direct military assistance, trade agreements and support for its illegal settlements coming from fake charities. The conservative Washington Timesdescribed Iron Dome, somewhat bizarrely, as “relied on against Islamist efforts to kill its [Israel’s] civilians.” A New York Daily Newseditorial last Thursday reads in part “A small claque of far-left House Democrats thought on Tuesday that they had torpedoed a $1 billion replenishment for Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system by threatening to vote down a larger package, forcing the Israeli assistance to be stripped out of it. On Thursday it all backfired, when 210 Democrats joined with 210 Republicans to approve the money in a brand new, standalone bill, the Iron Dome Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2022. Exposed and alone, no shield to protect them, just eight Dems voted no, along with an always cantankerous Republican… So that’s the vote, on the record: almost unanimous support in the House for the Jewish state’s right to defend itself from Hamas and Hezbollah rockets.”
Bret Stephens, over at the New York Times, has this to say about anyone who would dare oppose funding Israel’s war machine: “It would behoove Democrats in the honorable majority to start treating their Israel-hating members not as parliamentary nuisances or social media embarrassments but as the ill-intended bigots they well and truly are.” Sure Bret, it all comes down to anti-Semitism, like always, doesn’t it? Bret is of course Jewish and reliably Zionist. He lived in Israel where he was editor of the Jerusalem Post.
The Republicans inevitably had accused the Democrats of having gone wobbly on Israel, with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy tweeting “While Dems capitulate to the antisemitic influence of their radical members, Republicans will always stand with Israel.” House Republican Conference Chairwoman Elise Stefanik also tweeted that Democrats “do NOT support Israel. Instead they choose to side with the Hamas Caucus wing of their Party.”
Representative Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut, the Democratic chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, provided pushback as she enthused after the vote: “This bill demonstrates Congress’s commitment to our friend and ally Israel is bipartisan and ironclad.” What she should have said was the Israel’s grip on the US Congress and theft of taxpayer money is shameful, but somehow she must have misspoke. And the Daily News piece is, of course, bullshit unless one actually believes that snipers shooting children and warplanes blowing up apartment buildings is defense against home-made rockets and balloons.
And there was also plenty going on behind the scenes between Capitol Hill and Jerusalem. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland, possibly the most rabidly pro-Israel partisan in Congress, said “There are some few that won’t support [the new bill], but the overwhelming majority of this Congress — not in a partisan way but in an American way — will support defending the Democratic state of Israel.”
Hoyer seems to be saying that all good Americans must support Israel. He should know as he was negotiating with the Israelis on the deal to bring about a quick vote to approve the Iron Dome funding. His maneuvering was in response to Israeli officials, including Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, who had watched developments in Washington with alarm and telephoned Hoyer who, in turn, assured Lapid that what had occurred was no more than a “technical delay.” He quickly moved to bring the new bill to a vote. Of course, one might also note that Lapid had not hesitated to contact Hoyer and state clearly Israel’s demand that something be done. He felt himself empowered to put pressure on a foreign legislative body to take action that would result in considerable benefit to his own country precisely because he knew that Hoyer would be on his side. One wonders if bottom dwellers like Hoyer might be indicted under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) since he is clearly no longer working for the United States, nor defending its Constitution as he is required by oath to do.
So it is a done deal once again. Israel has its money, as always, and has bent American politicians to its will. Unfortunately, the denizens of Congress were all too willing to be bent. The stooges on Capitol Hill and in the media are largely to blame for this shameful behavior, to be sure, but Alison Weir of If Americans Knewhas proposed that those who object to the use of US taxes to support a rogue state might well begin to put pressure on their congresscritters to encourage the wealthy Israelis to pay for their own missiles. Beyond that, as it is the Gazans, West Bank Palestinians and Lebanese who have borne the brunt of Israel aggression, the US can finally seize the high ground on a major human rights issue by ponying up another billion to improve their defensive capabilities for the next time the Jewish state comes calling. It is a wonderful idea and it just might convince Israel that there are consequences for bad behavior. And, by the way, it would be an antidote to some very bad behavior by the United States of America, which has been funding and encouraging Israel and emboldening its apologists ever since the Suez Crisis in 1956, which was the last time a US President actually successfully defied Israel.
Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is https://councilforthenationalinterest.orgaddress is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org
An urgent task is awaiting us: given the progression of events, we must liberate ourselves quickly from the limits and confines placed on the Afghanistan discourse, which have been imposed by US-centred Western propaganda for over 20 years and counting. For a start, we must not allow the future political discourse on this subject to remain hostage to American priorities: successes, failures and geostrategic interests.
For this to happen, the language itself must be challenged. This is critical if we are to glean valuable lessons from Afghanistan and avoid a repeat of the failure to comprehend the US defeat in Vietnam (1955-1975) in the way it should have been understood, not the way that Washington wanted Americans — in fact, the whole world — to understand. Vietnam was not merely an American “debacle”, and did not only culminate in an American “defeat”. It was also a Vietnamese victory and the triumph of the will of the people over the US imperialist war machine.
In US mainstream media and, to a large extent, academia, the history of the Vietnam War was written almost entirely from an American perspective. Even the anti-war version of that history remained US-centric.
Alas, in the case of Afghanistan, many of us, whether in journalism or academia, wittingly or otherwise, remain committed to the US-based discourse, partly because the primary sources from which our information is gleaned are either American or pro-American. Al-Akhdar Al-Ibrahimi, former UN Peace Envoy to Afghanistan from 1997 to 1999, and again from 2001 to 2004, reminded us recently, in an interview with French newspaper Le Monde, of the importance of using proper language to describe the unfolding events in Afghanistan: “Why [do we] always speak of an American defeat? First of all, this is a victory for the Taliban, which must be attributed to their tactical genius.” (Translated from French)
The answer to his question can be deduced easily from his own words because, to speak of a Taliban victory, is to admit to their “tactical genius”. The admission of such a truth can have far-reaching consequences.
The use of the terms defeat vs. victory is critical because it situates the conversation within two entirely different intellectual frameworks. For example, by insisting on the centrality of the question of the American defeat, whether in Afghanistan or Vietnam, then the focus of the follow-up questions will remain centred on American priorities: Where did the US go wrong? What urgent changes must Washington implement in its foreign policy and military agendas to stave off its Afghanistan shortcomings? And where should the US go from here?
However, if the focus remains centred on the victory of the Afghan resistance — and yes, it was Afghan resistance, not merely that of the Taliban or Pashtun — then the questions that follow would relocate the conversation somewhere else entirely. How did poorly armed fighters manage to defeat the world’s combined great powers? Where should Afghanistan go from here? And what lessons can national liberation movements around the world learn from the Afghan victory?
For the purpose of this article, I am concerned with the Afghan victory, not the American defeat.
The rise and fall of the “terrorist” discourse
The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 had a massive impact, not only on the geopolitical map of the world, but also on relevant global political discourses. Like the USSR, the Warsaw Pact and its global alliances began to disintegrate, the US moved quickly into action, asserting its dominance from Panama (1989) to Iraq (1991) and beyond. The American objective was not merely a violent declaration of its triumph in the Cold War, but a message to the rest of the world that the “American century” had begun and that no form of resistance to the US stratagem could be tolerated.
In the Middle East, in particular, the new narrative was on full display, with clear and repeated distinctions between “moderates” and “extremists”, friends and enemies, allies and those marked for “regime change”. According to this new logic, anti-colonial forces that were celebrated as liberation movements for decades fell suddenly into the category of “terrorists”. This definition included Palestinian, Lebanese and other resistance groups, even though they sought liberation from illegal foreign occupation.
Years later, the discourse on terrorism — summed up by George W. Bush’s statement in September 2001, “Either you are with us or you are with the terrorists” — became the yardstick by which the world, according to Washington, was to be judged and divided into freedom-loving nations and terrorist, extremist regimes. The latter category was eventually expanded to include Iraq, Iran and Syria. On 29 January 2002, North Korea was also added to Washington’s so-called “axes of evil”.
Afghanistan, of course, topped the American list of terrorist states, under various pretences: initially it was for harbouring Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda and, later, the mistreatment of women, and so on. Eventually, the Taliban was labelled a “terrorist” group, leading an “insurgency” against the “democratically-elected” Afghan government in Kabul. The past 20 years have been spent in the construction of this false paradigm.
In the absence of any strong voices in the media demanding a US withdrawal and defending the Afghan people’s right to resist foreign occupation, there was a near-complete absence of an alternative political discourse that even attempted to raise the possibility that the Taliban, despite all of their questionable strategies and practices, may, in fact, be a national liberation movement.
The reason we were discouraged from considering such a possibility is the same reason why US-Western-Israeli propaganda insisted on removing any distinction between Daesh (ISIS), Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, Hamas, Hezbollah, Al-Houthis and many other such groups. On the one hand, discussing the particularities of each movement requires real knowledge of the history and formation of each one separately, and the political circumstances through which they continue to operate. This kind of knowledge is simply non-existent in the cliché-ridden, soundbite-driven mainstream media. On the other hand, such understanding is inconvenient, as it complicates the deception and half-truths necessary for the US, Israel and others to depict their military occupations, unlawful military interventions and repeated wars as fundamental to some imagined global “war on terror” and, as some European intellectual circles prefer to dub it, a war on “radical Islam”.
However, unlike Al-Qaeda and Daesh, Hamas, Hezbollah and the Taliban are not trans-border militant groups fighting a global agenda, but national liberation movements which, despite their emphasis on religious discourses, are political actors with specific political objectives confined largely within the borders of their own countries; Palestine, Lebanon and Afghanistan, respectively.
Regarding Hamas, London-based author Daud Abdullah wrote in his book Engaging the World: The Making of Hamas Foreign Policy that: “Hamas sees foreign relations as an integral and important part of its political ideology and liberation strategy. Soon after the Movement emerged, foreign policies were developed to help its leaders and members navigate this tension between idealism and realism. This pragmatism is evident in the fact that Hamas was able to establish relations with the regimes of Muammar Gaddhafi in Libya and Bashar Al-Assad in Syria, both of whom were fiercely opposed to the Muslim Brotherhood.”
It was also Abdullah who became one of the first to draw the parallels between Palestine and Afghanistan as soon as the Taliban declared victory in Kabul. In a recent article in the Middle East Monitor, he wrote, “Palestine and Afghanistan are salient examples. Throughout history, their peoples have witnessed numerous invasions and occupations. After two decades the US has finally run out of stamina. Similarly, they will eventually realise the futility of supporting the Zionist occupation of Palestine.”
Indeed, the lesson of Afghanistan must be studied carefully, especially by resistance movements that are undergoing their own wars of national liberation.
Now that the US has officially ended its military operations in Afghanistan, albeit not by choice, the emphasis on the so-called “war on terror” discourse will certainly begin to fade. What, though, will come next? While another interventionist discourse will certainly fight for prominence in the new American thinking, the discourse of national liberation, based on legitimate resistance, must return to the centre of the conversation.
This is not an argument for or against armed struggle, as this choice falls largely, if not entirely, on nations that are struggling for their own freedom, and should not be subject to the selective, frequently self-serving, ethics of Western moralists and activists. It is worth mentioning that international law does not prohibit people from using whatever means necessary to liberate themselves from the jackboot of foreign occupation. Indeed, myriad UN resolutions recognise the “legitimacy of (oppressed people’s) struggle by all means at their disposal, including armed struggle”. (UN Commission of Human Rights Resolution 1982/16)
Nevertheless, armed struggle without popular, grassroots support often amounts to nothing, for a sustainable armed campaign, like those of Hamas, Hezbollah or the Taliban, requires deep-rooted social and socio-economic support. This proved as true in Vietnam as it did earlier in Algeria (1954-1962), Cuba (1953-1959) and even South Africa, where the history of armed struggle has been largely written out in favour of what is meant to appear as a “peaceful” anti-apartheid struggle and transition of power.
For nearly 30 years, partly as a consequence of the dismantling of the Soviet Union and the seemingly uncontested rise of the American empire, almost any form of armed struggle in national liberation contexts has been depicted as “terrorism”. Moreover, in the post-9/11 US-dominated world, any attempt at arguing otherwise earned any daring intellectual the title of “terrorist sympathiser”.
Twenty years have elapsed since the American invasion of Afghanistan culminated in the defeat, not just of the US but also of the US political discourse on terrorism, resistance and national liberation. The resulting victory of the Taliban will extend well beyond the borders of Afghanistan, breaking the limits imposed on the discussion by western-centric officials, media and academia, namely the urgently needed clear distinction between “terrorism” and national liberation.
The American experiment, using firepower to control the world, and intellectual hegemony to control our understanding of it, has clearly failed. This failure can and must be exploited as an opportunity to revisit urgent questions and to resurrect a long-dormant narrative in favour of anti-colonial, national liberation struggles with the legitimate right — in fact, responsibility — to use all means necessary, including armed struggle, to free nations from the yoke of foreign occupation.
The Iraqi government highlighted its rejection of the conference held by some tribal figures in Erbil city in Kurdistan for advocating the normalization of ties with the Israeli enemy.
The Iraqi government also stressed that the tribal figures who attended the conference did not represent the cities they came from, adding that the assembly was aimed at stirring sectarian sedition amid the national preparations for the upcoming public elections.
The government further indicated that normalization is constitutionally, legally and politically rejected in Iraq, reiterating support to the Palestinian cause and rights in face of the Israeli aggression.
The House of Representatives just voted 420-9 in favor of a fast-tracked bill (H.R. 5323) to give Israel an additional $1 billion dollars. The bill is now in the Senate (S.2839), where it is expected to be passed with little or no dissent.
In other words, once again, the vast majority of U.S. politicians from both parties obeyed Israel’s demand that American taxpayers give Israel their hard-earned tax dollars. Keep in mind that this $1 billion is over and above the $3.8 billion – $10.5 million per day – in military aid Israel currently receives from the U.S. Plus, our reps plan to expend an additional $3 billion on behalf of Israel.
This is on top of decades of receiving more U.S. tax money than any other country on earth. On average, Israelis have received 7,000 times more aid from the U.S. per capita than others around the world.
In voting for this latest billion dollars to Israel, members of the Israel lobby were elated at this demonstration of their power. Other Congress people explained that they were supporting the bill because it would ‘save civilian lives’ in Israel. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, for example, said that Iron Dome has “saved thousands of lives.”
Pelosi and the other 408 politicians who voted for the bill didn’t explain why Israel’s numerous billionaires and millionaires shouldn’t pay for this system themselves.
More important, our politicians failed to note that the population whose civilians have been killed in vastly larger numbers are actually Palestinians, including multitudes of children.
The bill that our politicians voted for states that the billion dollars “shall be provided to address emergent requirements in support of Operation Guardian of the Walls.”
The bill leaves out the fact that during this operation Israeli forces killed 260 Gazans, 66 of them children (Palestinian resistance groups killed a total of 13 people in Israel).
The bill also fails to mention that the Israeli operation damaged 52,000 Palestinian homes, totally destroying 2,400 of them, and displaced 120,000 Palestinian men, women, and children. Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International both reported that Israel committed war crimes.
Amnesty stated: “There is a horrific pattern emerging of Israel launching airstrikes in Gaza targeting residential buildings and family homes – in some cases entire families were buried beneath the rubble when the building they lived in collapsed.”
Gazan children walk among the rubble of a building destroyed by an airstrike, May 24, 2021, in the Gaza Strip. (John Minchillo, AP)
And this is typical. Previous “wars” between Israel and Gazans (the large majority of whom are from families that were ethnically cleansed by Israel) have been just as one-sided. Over the years, Israeli airstrikes have killed approximately 4,000 Gazans, while Palestinian rockets have killed a total of 49 people in Israel.
In other words, Iron Dome actually costs lives – It allows Israel to attack and oppress Palestinians time after time, without being constrained by concern that such attacks could lead to retaliation that would endanger Israeli citizens.
It is clear that civilians in Gaza are in desperate need of protection.
Therefore, I suggest that our Congressional representatives who say they are so deeply concerned about civilian deaths now support an Iron Dome-like system for Palestinians.
If any of our Congress members truly care about all human beings, regardless of race, religion, ethnicity, or nationality, they will immediately introduce such a bill.
Anyone who agrees with this can use the form below to contact their Congress members and ask them to introduce such life-saving legislation.
Recent statistics corroborate the growing resentment in the occupied Palestinian territories against the Palestinian Authority and its leader Mahmoud Abbas. The Palestinian Centre for Policy and Survey Research (PSR) carried out a poll at a time when the PA persisted in proving how unsynchronised it is with the Palestinian people’s needs, and to what lengths it would go to ensure its political survival over Palestinian liberation.
Against the backdrop of the latest Israeli aggression on Gaza, the extrajudicial killing of Palestinian activist Nizar Banat by the PA’s security services, as well as the PA’s repression of protests calling for justice for Banat, the PA fared badly, to the point that an unprecedented 80 per cent of Palestinians are now demanding Abbas’ resignation. Indeed, the PA would do well to heed the survey’s findings, because its reliance on Israel and security coordination to keep Palestinians under control might not be so effective, when considering Palestinian unification from the people’s perspective.
While Abbas is clearly failing to inspire Palestinians, as seen in the increasing calls for his resignation, 87 per cent of Palestinians stated that the escape of the six Palestinian prisoners from Gilboa served “as an inspiration to Palestinians outside the prison to take the initiative and actively work toward the ending of occupation.” Abbas has also fared badly in terms of the Israeli bombardment of Gaza when compared to Hamas – 45 per cent of Palestinians believe that Hamas would better represent the Palestinians people, while only 19 per cent advocated for Fatah under the leadership of Abbas.
For decades, security coordination has provided safety for Abbas with regard to his political leadership and the purported state-building funded by the international community. Diplomatically, security coordination was considered an integral component of state-building, so much so that it overrode the Palestinian people’s legitimate concerns and fears of repression.
If the PA wished for its violent tactics to cement silence among Palestinians, Banat’s murder heralded the opposite. The survey shows that 63 per cent of the Palestinian public believe that the PA or security leaders ordered his extrajudicial killing deliberately. Likewise, 63 per cent supported the demonstrations demanding Abbas’ resignation, while 69 per cent are not satisfied with the steps taken by the PA in terms of seeking justice for Banat’s murder. And if the PA expected that violence would suppress dissent, 74 per cent of Palestinians “believe the steps taken by the PA security services in arresting the demonstrators who demanded justice for Banat is a violation of liberties and human rights.”
A dire picture has been painted for the PA. Not only have the Palestinian people expressed their beliefs in the survey – their demands are being publicly articulated. There is no turning back for the Palestinian people – Abbas and the PA proved themselves unworthy of leadership not only by clinging to illegitimate rule, but also through the “sacred” security coordination. The only option remaining is to turn to the people, and Abbas will soon realise that even turning to the people will not suffice, because Palestinians are no longer waiting for the leadership to spell out their political demands.
On February 13, 1960, France carried out its first nuclear test in Algeria’s southern Reggane region. According to official statistics, 17 nuclear tests were carried out in total over the next 6 years. The area remains affected, and local scientists say that radioactive contamination has caused genetic mutations and irreversibly changed the region.
There are no official statistics on the number of victims. The only figures can be found in the records kept by the French representative of the local church, which lists 42,000 victims of nuclear tests. Three years ago, the French Ministry of Defense issued a statement, putting the number at 27,000 people. The victims include French soldiers as well as local Algerians who lived in the surrounding areas. … continue
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John Lyons is an experienced journalist. Currently the head of investigative journalism at the ABC, his 40 years in the media include being editor of the Sydney Morning Herald, Middle East correspondent for The Australian and winning one of his three Walkley Awards for “Stone Cold Justice”, a Four Corner’s episode which exposed the human rights abuses in Israel military courts.
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