1.Bills, Resolutions & Letters

2. Members of Congress’ Most Excellent Recess Adventures in the Middle East
3. Israel & AIPAC in the 2024 Election Cycle (things are heating up)
4. Media & Reports
5. Members on the Record

See also FMEP Legislative Round-Up: August 25, 2023 (recess edition)

“One Israeli soldier has been killed and two others injured in a ramming attack by a Palestinian truck driver at a checkpoint between Israel and the occupied West Bank, Israeli police and medical officials said. The ramming happened at the Maccabim checkpoint, known to Palestinians as Beit Sira, on Thursday, and the driver left the scene immediately, only to be stopped at another checkpoint about six kilometres (four miles) away where he was shot and died, Israeli daily Haaretz reported…An Israeli police commander described the driver as a 41-year-old Palestinian who had a permit to work in Israel.” See also Israeli-Palestinian tensions rise with fresh attacks in Jerusalem, West Bank (Al Monitor)

“A 22-year-old Israel was moderately wounded in a stabbing attack at a light rail station in central Jerusalem on Wednesday. According to police, the 14-year-old assailant was shot and killed by an off-duty border police officer who was on the light rail when he witnessed the incident and immediately got off the train to respond. However, it was unclear if the boy was still armed when he was killed in what was described  as a fast-moving incident.”

“There are almost no Palestinians remaining in a vast area stretching east from Ramallah to the outskirts of Jericho. Most of the communities who lived in the area — which covers around 150,000 dunams, or 150 square kilometers, of the occupied West Bank — have fled for their lives in recent months as a result of intensifying Israeli settler violence and land seizures, backed by the Israeli army and state institutions. The near-total emptying of the region’s Palestinian population shows how Israel’s slow but gradual process of ethnic cleansing is continuing apace, effectively annexing large swathes of the occupied territory for exclusive Jewish settlement…Technically, the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from this area was not an official act of “transfer.” Neither the Israeli army nor the Civil Administration — the occupation’s bureaucratic arm — arrived with trucks, loaded the residents onboard, and destroyed their houses. But they didn’t have to: in the face of unremitting settler violence and crippling restrictions by the Israeli authorities, the Palestinian residents felt that they had no choice but to flee.” See also Palestinian village fears imminent expulsion as settler attacks escalate (Tash Lever//+972: “Residents of Ein al-Rashash are calling on activists to help deter Israeli settler violence that has already forced neighboring communities to flee.”)

“When Israeli settlers kill Palestinians and don’t get indicted: Eight cases of lethal stabbings and shootings that ended without a trial, investigation closed…The incidents are similar: Settlers come to the outskirts of a Palestinian village or an open area between a settlement and a neighboring village. A confrontation erupts and a Palestinian is killed. In some cases, the settlers’ claims of self-defense sound credible, in others less so. In none of the cases has an Israeli been brought to trial.”

See also Palestinian fears grow amid rising Israeli settler attacks  (BBC: “There’s been a dramatic rise in violence carried out by extremist Israeli settlers against Palestinian civilians in the occupied West Bank this year, with more than 100 incidents reported a month according to the UN. It warns that some 400 people have been driven from their land since the start of 2022. Already 2023 has set an all-time record for settlement construction in the West Bank and for the legitimisation of outposts, according to settlement watchdog Peace Now.”); See also Jewish extremists taunt ‘Ali’s on the grill’ at slain toddler’s relatives (Times of Israel); and Even bees can’t escape Israeli settler violence (Imad Abu Hawash/+972: “Settlers began encroaching on Palestinian land where a beekeeper had placed a colony of bees. They burned 20 hives — and forced the residents to flee.”)

“The Israeli military and border police forces are killing Palestinian children with virtually no recourse for accountability. Last year, 2022, was the deadliest year for Palestinian children in the West Bank in 15 years, and 2023 is on track to meet or exceed 2022 levels. Israeli forces had killed at least 34 Palestinian children in the West Bank as of August 22…The authorities have routinely failed to hold their forces accountable when security forces kill Palestinians, including children, in circumstances in which the use of lethal force was not justified under international norms. From 2017 to 2021, fewer than one percent of complaints of violations by Israeli military forces against Palestinians, including killings and other abuses, resulted in indictments, the Israeli rights group Yesh Din reported…The Israeli rights group B’Tselem, which for decades filed documented complaints about killings to the Israeli military, has deemed the Israeli law enforcement system a “whitewash mechanism.” See also Palestinian dies one month after being shot during an Israeli raid in West Bank (New Arab)

“As a result of the seizures, residents have been left with virtually no means of transportation. “They cannot travel at all,” Nidal Younis, the head of the Masafer Yatta Village Council, said…”The abuse and torment of the over 1,000 residents of Masafer Yatta has reached new heights in recent days,” [Attorney Roni Pelli] said. “This is a significant change in the policy prevailing until now in which the military has refrained from expelling the residents and allowed them to move around within Masafer Yatta.” See also this Twitter thread from +972 journalist Basel Adraa on implications for families in Masafer Yatta on the loss of their cars: “This 5 year old, my neighbor Kawrtha, was stung by a lethal scorpion in Masafer Yatta. Her family rushed her to a hospital on a donkey 4km away because the Israeli occupation army took their car. The pretext was that her village is an “army training zone” & no cars are allowed. This is now a wide-spread policy in Masafer Yatta: The army raids family homes, and steals their cars, claiming we are not allowed to drive on our lands. Soldiers threatened the residents that any movement by means of tractors and cars would be confiscated immediately. Israel does this in order to achieve one goal, which is to make us living in Masafer Yatta suffer horribly until we leave the land and the settlers can steal it.” See also this AJ+ video on settler incursions to the Masafer Yatta village of Tuba: “This Palestinian family is fighting to protect their home in Masafer Yatta from settler violence while the Israeli government is working to expel them.”

“Thousands of Palestinians enter Israel every day from Gaza on permits that don’t cover medical care. When accidents occur, they have nowhere to turn…According to Kav LaOved, a labor rights NGO in Israel, such workers from the occupied territories have little to no protections in Israel and their working conditions are unsupervised. Palestinian workers, who are often employed in sectors where there is a high risk of accidents, such as construction, have no authority they can turn to unless their employer has an employment permit and pays a regular wage…When Israel resumed issuing work permits to Palestinians in Gaza at the end of 2021, following a 15-year ban, the legal rights group Gisha, which advocates for the freedom of movement of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, published a report addressing the permit system’s failures, and pointing out how it leaves Palestinian workers exposed to abuse and the violation of their human and labor rights. The paper further noted that over 100,000 Gaza residents initially submitted applications when Israel resumed granting workers’ permits. A year ago, Gisha and Kav LaOved jointly requested that the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), the military body that oversees civilian affairs in the occupied territories, clarify the terms of employment for Palestinians from the strip. They have yet to receive a response.”

“The Israel Police abruptly expelled to Gaza a woman who was born in the Strip, the mother of 12 children with Israeli citizenship, including four minors. Fifty-one-year-old Agzayeh Karan was deported without a hearing and less than a day after she was arrested during a routine check on her way to her workplace because she did not have a valid residency permit. She was transferred to a police station and from there to the Erez crossing within a few hours, without being allowed to speak with her children or consult with a lawyer. Karan’s ex-husband left the family years ago, and her underage children are now in Israel without any parents…Her youngest child is seven.” See also Palestinian Mother Deported to Gaza After 30 Years in Israel Allowed to Return to Settle Legal Status (Haaretz: “After Haaretz contacted the Israeli army and reported on Agzayeh Karan’s sudden deportation, she was given a residency permit a day later allowing her to stay with her family in Israel during the bureaucratic process”)

“Ben Gvir’s flippant evoking of Israel’s apartheid reality understandably inspired outrage (and satire) on social media, including from stalwart supporters of Israel. That an Israeli minister — in charge of the police, no less — thinks Palestinians’ “quality of life” is subordinate to the rights of his family (and by extension, of all Jews) should strike any decent person as racist and wrong. But for those who have been following the words and deeds of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s sixth government, the most extreme in Israeli history, Ben Gvir’s remarks are only the tip of the iceberg…But Ben Gvir is no outlier, and his contemptuous “apology” to Magadli betrays as much. He is the natural conclusion of the many decades throughout which the Zionist project has subjugated and dispossessed, ghettoized and divided — and after which Palestinians have still refused to bow their heads or leave. From the Nakba to military rule over Palestinian citizens, land confiscations in the Galilee, the military dictatorship over the occupied territories, the siege on Gaza, the Jewish Nation-State Law and the ban on family unification, Ben Gvir is the most pristine manifestation of the supremacist impulses emanating from the very core of Zionism, and which have always necessarily come at the expense of the Palestinians. In many ways, “Sorry Mohammad” is a much more fitting name for the Israeli national anthem than Hatikvah — “The Hope” — ever was.” See also Israel’s Ben Gvir hails ‘sacred’ demolition of Palestinian homes in Negev (Middle East Eye); US condemns Israel’s Ben-Gvir over ‘racist rhetoric’ (Al Monitor); Ben-Gvir lashes out at supermodel Bella Hadid over Palestinian rights (Al Jazeera)

“A talented midfielder, Nabil Hayek, 19, was one of four people injured in the assault in late July, victims of a surge of gun violence within Israel’s Arab communities, much of it linked to loan-sharking and protection rackets run by Arab crime organizations. These gangs have proliferated over the years, preying on a population that has long faced discrimination and has limited access to bank loans. But Arab officials say the situation has deteriorated — and many put the blame at least in part on the right-wing government led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, which they say has done little to fight crimes against Arab citizens since taking power late last year. Many people have no option but to take loans from the gangs and are at their mercy when they come to collect. Unemployed young men are also lured by easy money into becoming gang foot soldiers and enforcers…Making the situation even more volatile, a proliferation of weapons, many of them stolen by criminals from army bases, means that personal disputes among ordinary Palestinians often turn deadly and lead to lengthy clan vendettas. And the gangs are now targeting local politicians and candidates in the run-up to municipal council elections in the fall. At least 155 Arab citizens of Israel have been killed by members of their own community so far in 2023, double or even triple the number of such homicides for similar periods in recent years, according to official data and the Abraham Initiatives, a Jewish-Arab advocacy and monitoring group.”

“The Libyan foreign minister has fled to Turkey out of fear for her safety, Libyan officials said Monday, amid a growing uproar in their country over news that the minister met with her Israeli counterpart in Rome last week. Israel’s triumphal announcement of the meeting on Sunday set off protests in several Libyan cities and prompted the prime minister to suspend the foreign minister, Najla el-Mangoush. Israel does not have diplomatic relations with Libya, one of a host of Arab countries with a long history of hostility toward Israel. The Libyan foreign ministry said the meeting in Rome last week was “informal and unplanned,” and that Ms. el-Mangoush had reaffirmed Libyan support for the Palestinians. But that did little to quell protests in the capital, Tripoli, and other parts of the country. The rage that greeted Ms. el-Mangoush’s contact with her Israeli counterpart, Eli Cohen, was a reminder that, for all the fanfare around U.S.-brokered normalization deals between Israel and three Arab countries over the past few years, much of the Arab world remains deeply hostile to Israel and devoted to the Palestinian cause.” See also Scoop: U.S. protests Israel’s exposure of secret meeting between Israeli-Libyan FMs (Axios); Uproar over Libya-Israel meeting shows challenges for normalization (WaPo)

“The Biden administration told the Israeli government last week that it would have to make significant concessions to the Palestinians as part of any possible mega-deal with Saudi Arabia that includes normalization between the kingdom and Israel, four U.S. officials and a source briefed on the issue told Axios…Reaching a deal that includes a Saudi-Israel peace agreement will be a historic foreign policy achievement for President Biden. The administration is pushing to get an agreement before the end of the first quarter of next year, when the presidential campaign is expected to consume Biden’s agenda.” See also Israeli PM Netanyahu thanks Saudi Arabia after emergency plane landing (Al Jazeera; Smotrich: Israel Won’t Agree to Any ‘Gestures’ Toward Palestinians for Saudi Deal (Haaretz)

“The Palestinian Authority is seeking “irreversible” steps that will advance its bid for statehood in the context of negotiations for a normalization agreement between Israel and Saudi Arabia, a US official, a Palestinian official and a senior Arab diplomat told The Times of Israel. The steps proposed have included US backing for recognition of Palestinian statehood at the United Nations, the US reopening its consulate in Jerusalem that historically served Palestinians, the scrapping of congressional legislation characterizing the PA as a terror organization, the transfer of West Bank territory from Israeli to Palestinian control and the demolition of illegal outposts in the West Bank. The three officials differentiated those kinds of measures from others proposed in the past that Ramallah views as reversible, such as a temporary Israeli settlement freeze, an Israeli return to peace negotiations with the PA, or Israel expanding the number of work permits it grants to Palestinians. The irreversible steps were part of a list that the PA has passed along to both the US and Saudi Arabia, the officials said, adding that the measures will be discussed further during a visit by PA Civil Affairs Minister Hussein al-Sheikh to Riyadh next week.” See also Palestinian delegation to visit Saudi Arabia to raise its demands in any Israel deal (Times of Israel); Scoop: Palestinians gave Saudis list of what they want in Israel-Saudi peace deal (Axios)

would have the blessing of the Palestinian leadership and would not be used by the Saudis’ rival in the Arab and Muslim world to accuse the Kingdom of abandoning the Palestinian cause…On Tuesday, the Wall Street Journal reported that Saudi Arabia has offered to resume financial aid – which was significantly scaled back in 2021 – to the Palestinian Authority in order to overcome opposition in Ramallah to the normalization of the kingdom’s relations with Israel. In the past, the Saudis have sent billions of dollars to Ramallah. Senior Saudi officials told the newspaper that the offer was designed to show the Palestinians that normalization with Israel would not come at the expense of their aspirations for an independent state. The Saudi proposal is being seen as another step toward normalization with Israel, but the Biden Administration believes that this alone is not enough. “The Palestinians do not want to come across as having been bought by money,” a senior U.S. official told Haaretz.”

“The Biden administration is increasing its efforts to try to de-escalate the growing tensions between Israel and Hezbollah and prevent a breakout of hostilities on the Israel-Lebanon border, according to Israeli and U.S. sources briefed on the issue. Why it matters: Any small border incident between Israel and Hezbollah could quickly turn into a much bigger conflict in Lebanon that would likely have wider regional implications. Catch up quick: Tensions between Israel and Hezbollah have been escalating for months over an outpost established by the Lebanese militant group 100 feet south of the border in an area recognized by the UN as Israeli territory. The Lebanese government claims the area belongs to Lebanon.”

“Israeli airstrikes on Aleppo airport in northern Syria have caused the grounding of flights, the Syrian state news agency Sana has reported, citing a military source. During more than 12 years of civil war in Syria, Israel has launched hundreds of airstrikes on its territory, primarily targeting Iran-backed forces and Lebanese Hezbollah fighters, as well as Syrian army positions…Israel rarely comments on strikes it carries out in Syria, but has said repeatedly it would not allow its enemy Iran to expand its presence in the country.” See also Iran claims to foil Israeli plot against its missile operations (Al Monitor)

“Amos Goldberg, a leading professor of the Holocaust at Hebrew University in Jerusalem, has published a scathing retort saying that describing Israel’s treatment of Palestinians as “apartheid” is not anti-Semitic, in a guest post in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ). Felix Klein, Germany’s commissioner for Jewish Life and the Fight Against Anti-Semitism, said using “apartheid” in such scenarios is “an anti-Semitic narrative” in an interview with Die Welt, one of Germany’s most-read newspapers. The Israeli government, Goldberg stated, fights against human rights, democracy and equality and propagates the opposite: “authoritarianism, discrimination, racism and apartheid”. “Accusing Israel of apartheid is not anti-Semitic. It describes reality,” he said. Goldberg’s standpoint was not an outlier, he urged Klein to understand. Rather, it represented a growing chorus of voices, including leading Israeli academics propagating the term apartheid to describe the treatment of Palestinians by the current regime. In fact, if Klein were right, Goldberg wrote, then some of the best-known Holocaust and anti-Semitism researchers from Israel, the United States, Europe and worldwide would be anti-Semites.”

“A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit against the multinational food company Unilever tied to Ben and Jerry’s 2021 announcement that it would stop selling ice cream in what it called “Occupied Palestinian Territory.” Unilever is the ice cream maker’s parent company. The lawsuit, which was thrown out on Tuesday, claimed Unilever misled American investors by not immediately sharing the news of the boycott with them.”

“To date, 2023 is the deadliest year on record for Palestinians in the West Bank since 2005, largely due to the Israeli regime’s violent operations in Jenin and Nablus to suppress Palestinian mobilization and armed resistance. While the Palestinian Authority (PA) was largely absent during the Israeli army’s raids, it quickly sought to re-establish the guise of control following their conclusion. Shortly after Israeli withdrawal from Jenin in July, PA President Mahmoud Abbas visited the city for the first time since 2012, accompanied by a slew of Palestinian security forces. Days later, the PA began a crackdown campaign of its own, arresting members of Islamic Jihad and other factions across Jenin and throughout the West Bank. Such a cycle encompasses a critical component of PA-Israeli security coordination: the revolving door/al-bab al-dawaar. This policy memo examines the protocol, situating it within the wider “collaboration paradigm.” It details what the revolving door looks like in practice, and offers recommendations to both Palestinian leadership and civil society for ways forward that may help to establish accountability, redress, and reconciliation.”

“A Palestinian man was killed in a gunfight with Palestinian Authority (PA) security forces in the West Bank on Wednesday, a rare instance of violence between the PA and local Palestinians. PA security personnel arrived at Tulkarm near the Israeli border to clear roads leading to the refugee camp in the town. The roads had been blocked by unidentified gunmen to prevent Israeli incursions, but the PA said locals complained that the obstacles posed a threat to passersby. A gunfight ensued and a Palestinian man was killed. Locals said the deceased was not a member of any armed groups, Reuters reported…The Gaza-based Hamas movement condemned the PA for the death, referring to it as a “dangerous crime against security and civil peace in the West Bank,” according to a statement…The incident occurred at a time of growing tensions in the West Bank involving Israel, the PA, Hamas and other armed groups.”

“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will meet with US President Joe Biden on September 21 when both leaders are in New York for the annual UN General Assembly, according to a diplomatic source…It remains unclear whether there will be an additional meeting at the White House in Washington, as Netanyahu has been seeking.”

“For the past several months, $75 million in badly needed food assistance for Palestinians has been held up in Congress, not because of any bureaucratic or logistical impediments but for purely political reasons…In its foreign aid appropriation FY2023, Congress directed the State Department to provide an additional $75 million to UNRWA, the UN agency that provides basic services to millions of Palestinian refugees, specifically for additional food assistance to the West Bank and Gaza…More than three months later, however, those funds are still being held up in Congress—not by any committee or political party but by a single, solitary lawmaker: Idaho Sen. James Risch…Risch’s beef with UNRWA has deep political, if not ideological, roots. Indeed, Risch’s record suggests he is less interested in reforming UNRWA than in dismantling it while doing away with the issue of Palestinian refugees altogether…Failure to release the funds by Sept. 1 would set off a chain reaction of negative consequences, including a break in the Gaza food pipeline and the potential inability to pay salaries to UNRWA’s 28,000 education, health care and social services staff. In the event the funds are released after Sept. 1, UNRWA officials estimate it would take two to three months to restart its food program.” See also Democrats Urge GOP to Lift Block on $75m in Palestinian Food Aid as Deadline Looms (Haaretz)

“Before this year, many of these teens and twentysomethings had never been to a protest. Now they’re taking to the streets not just to fight the Israeli government, but to change the old order…This salient presence of youth raises important questions about how so many Israelis who were born and raised almost exclusively under Benjamin Netanyahu’s rule ended up taking such mass direct action — exposing themselves to the risk of arrest and police violence in the process. Indeed, how is it that a generation that largely refrained from protesting, and that grew up in an era characterized by the post-Oslo doctrine of “managing the conflict,” the near-total collapse of the left, and with many turning away from politics altogether, suddenly finds itself setting fires on highways? +972 spoke with several of these young demonstrators, ranging from their late teens to their early thirties, to understand these questions and more.”

“Israel’s autocratic drift is inextricably tied to the occupation. The ongoing judicial coup reflects not just the determination of a power-hungry leader to evade legal scrutiny but also a settler-driven effort to establish an apartheid regime between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean. And it is the occupation that has also facilitated the meteoric rise of previously peripheral figures such as Ben-Gvir and Smotrich…As pro-occupation leaders become increasingly candid about its objectives, their opponents must articulate a clear strategy for the West Bank’s illegal settlements and outposts – the epicenters of Jewish fascism – and the thousands of soldiers on the ground sent to uphold military law on a civilian population. Our strategy must, first and foremost, strive to end the occupation. As long as Israel insists on maintaining a military dictatorship in the West Bank, genuine democracy will be impossible.” See also Analysis | Can the Protest Movement Take on Israel’s Toxic Issues Before It’s Too Late? (Dr. Dahlia Scheindlin//Haaretz)