“The lawsuit is a longshot, but Abrams does not need to succeed in court to declare victory. As Lara Friedman has detailed at length here, Abrams has used the ambiguous language of ‘material support’ regulations to ‘intimidate and coerce NGOs into abandoning moral, humanitarian, political and financial support for Palestinians.’”

“Lara Friedman, president of the Foundation for Middle East Peace, put Biden’s position in perspective at a recent panel hosted by Jewish Currents magazine. ‘I’d love to see more constructive, more courageous, more visionary thoughts, particularly at a time when Israel is getting set to do something like annexation,’ Friedman said. ‘But essentially what [the Biden camp has] articulated is as close to a status quo [as you get].'”

“Lara Friedman, president of the Foundation for Middle East Peace, put Biden’s position in perspective at a recent panel hosted by Jewish Currents magazine. ‘I’d love to see more constructive, more courageous, more visionary thoughts, particularly at a time when Israel is getting set to do something like annexation,’ Friedman said. ‘But essentially what [the Biden camp has] articulated is as close to a status quo [as you can get]'”

“‘I’d love to see more constructive, more courageous, more visionary thoughts, particularly at a time when Israel is getting set to do something like annexation,’ [FMEP’s Lara] Friedman explained. ‘But essentially what they’ve articulated is as close to a status quo — ‘don’t upset the apple cart, we’ll deal with things as they happen, we’re solid, we’re going to give the rhetoric of progressives just like every other previous administration has, and we’re not going to shake things up,’’ she posited. ‘Anyone who is hoping for a Biden administration to come in and save the Palestinians, I think, one, should take a [deep] breath,’ Friedman continued, ‘because no progressive candidate, no president from either party has ever come in and said, ‘I am going to be the one who will come in with great vision and change everything.’ [Barack] Obama didn’t say he would do that, and he came in and really didn’t even meet the expectations of people who thought he might surprise them. So I think it is useful to look at what the Biden campaign has said and the people around the Biden campaign and say, ‘This is a reminder there is no savior here.’”

Welcome to FMEP’s Weekly Settlement Report, covering everything you need to know about Israeli settlement activity this week. To subscribe to this report, please click here.…

1. Bills, Resolutions, & Letters 2. Hearings 3. On the Record *Brought to you in cooperation with Americans for Peace Now, where the Round-Up was…

“…as the U.N. Secretary General warns that Israel’s plan to annex 30% of the West Bank will constitute a “most serious violation of international law”, we speak with Lara Friedman, the President of the Foundation for Middle East Peace who was a U.S. Foreign Service Officer serving in Jerusalem and Washington and is a leading authority on the Israeli-Arab conflict and the settlements. She joins us to discuss how Trump’s ambassador to Israel is a leading proponent of the settlements and has been working with Netanyahu to implement his July 1 plan that could spell the end of a Palestinian state and a renewed flareup of violence.”