BILL TO END US COMPLICITY FOR ISRAELI ABUSES IS FULLY SUPPORTED

We fully support Rep. Betty McCollum who initiated a bill seeking to end US complicity for Israeli human rights abuses.

With the new administration the Congress needs to make a drastic shift to ensure that the US is no longer complicit in Israel’s denial of freedom to five million Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

We admire her courage to table a comprehensive legislative initiative to promote Palestinian rights, the Defending the Human Rights of Palestinian Children and Families Living Under Israeli Military Occupation Act.

It is an undeniable fact that U.S. assistance has for long used by Israel’s security to violate the human rights of Palestinian children, demolish the homes of Palestinian families, or to permanently annex Palestinian lands.

Israel is terrorist state , no doubt. It behaves the way it is now behaving to subject Palestinians to the worst treatment of injustice and occupation. This is possible only because of full backing by the US.

US has been funding from the public tax money to allow israel to brutally abuse Palestinian human rights, especially the rights of children.

The US must take responsibility for how taxpayer-funded aid is used by recipient countries, Israel included.

We support the position that Congress must stop ignoring the unjust and blatantly cruel mistreatment of Palestinian children and families living under Israeli military occupation.

We call the 13 original sponsors of the bill , supported by over 75 organizations, including Palestinian human rights groups, US-based organizations led by Palestinian-Americans and Muslim-Americans, and US-based Palestine solidarity groups , to push hard for the bill to be approved by the Congress.

We are surprised by the support from J Street, a liberal Zionist organization which has publicly backed this legislative initiative that seeks to condition weapons to Israel.

We congratulate McCollum’s path-breaking legislation centering Palestinian rights.

Her bills on Israel’s detention and ill-treatment of Palestinian children in Israel’s separate-and-unequal military judicial system , is a well thought bill. US funding for this practice must stop.

We support for US funding to report Israel’s abuses and providing rehabilitative services to Palestinian children subjected to abuse.

We admire McCollum’s a bill to ensure that US funds do not support Israel’s de jure annexation of additional Palestinian land.

Biden’s administration needs to take a daring shift of policies on israel.

It is a courageous move by McCollum to reiterate her opposition to Israel’s ill-treatment of Palestinian children and the possibility of its formal annexation of additional West Bank land, and expands her critique of Israeli occupation policies.

The Congress should make a conscious decision to end US complicity in the human rights violations endemic to Israeli military occupation.

Israeli barbarism in human rights violation is US driven and US funded. The perpetual occupation over the occupied West Bank results in other serious violations of international law, including the unlawful demolition of Palestinian homes and the forcible transfer of Palestinian civilians.
 
We condemn the oppressive conditions that leave Palestinians in a condition of homelessness.

We take cognizant that the Members of Congress have protested Israeli home demolitions before–most notably in Rep. Ro Khanna’s (D-CA) March 2020 letter to former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, signed by more than 60 Democrats, opposing Israeli home demolitions in the Wadi Hummus neighborhood of Jerusalem and calling for an investigation into Israel’s potential violation of the Arms Export Control Act in demolishing homes with US weapons.

We call them to re-iterate their stand and stay consistent as a matter of principle.

We condemn israeli plan to forcibly displace nearly 2,000 Palestinians in Jerusalem through the demolition of homes in Silwan and forced evictions in Sheikh Jarrah.   

If passed, McCollum’s bill will prohibit US funding for “the seizure, appropriation, or destruction of Palestinian property and forcible transfer of civilians in the Israeli-controlled and occupied West Bank in violation of international humanitarian law.”

Years of US support to israel have never been transparent and accountable. This bill will address this issue.

We see this bill would also impose strict and detailed certification and reporting requirements on the Secretary of State.

The requirement to verify whether the US funding prohibitions were being met, and provide details on the nature and extent of Israeli colonization, forced displacement of Palestinians, and ill-treatment of Palestinian children , is appropriate.

Up untill now the transparency and accountability US weapons flows to Israel is lacking and israeli abuses is rampant.

Israel has not been accountable for violations of the Arms Export Control Act and the Leahy Laws.

Israel currently enjoys a unique exemption in US law that enables it to spend approximately one-quarter of US weapons funding on its own domestic weapons manufacturers.

All other countries receiving funds from US taxpayers for weapons are required to spend this allocation exclusively on US weapons makers.   

The US weapons funding for Israel , called Offshore Procurement , is blocked from any scrutiny. Even reports are not available for the public. Taxpayers money to support israel weapons of war are completely obscured from public knowledge.

We support for the full disclosure of the end-use monitoring of US weapons by Israel.

The US administration has so far not track which Israeli units receive which weapons from the United States.

As such , Israeli accountability for violations of the Leahy Laws is not possible to impose micro-targerted sanctions against specific military units and individuals committing grave violations of human rights with US weapons.

Israel must be held accountable for its actions under these laws.

We call the Congress not to cave in to the Zionist lobby to reject the bill .

This bill is uniqe. It is initiated to stop the oppression by the israel.

It will oppose and prohibit funding to many of the Israeli policies of military occupation that violate the human rights of the Palestinian people.

By increasing the transparency around US weapons flows to Israel, US taxpayers will know how their money is used by israel .

We demand United States no longer be complicit in Israel’s impunity against the rights of the Palestinians.

The time has come for US to free the five million Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip from the occupation of israel.

Mohd Azmi Abdul Hamid
•President Malaysian Consultative Council of Islamic Organization ( MAPIM )
• Cordinator Asean’s Peoples Coalition for Palestine ( ACP )

Endorsed by :

Alliance of World Mosque in Defence of Al Aqsa.

Secretariate for the Ulama Assembly of Asia

Sejagat , Malaysia

Palestinian Cultural Organization of Malaysia

Al Quds Foundation , Malaysia.

Palestinian Scholars

Ulama Association of Malaysia

Council of Humaniatrian Network Syekhul Islam Office, Thailand.

Justice and Development Association of Cambodia.

Al Aqsa Working Group , Indonesia.

Advocacy for Justice and Peace Malaysia

Malaysia Kashmir Youth Movement

Ummah Care

Malaysia Women Action Group for Kashmir.

Muslim Afdair Commision , Zamboanga The Philippines

Thailand Muslim Students Association.