Jacob Magid is The Times of Israel s US correspondent based in New York
Israeli security forces clash with protesters outside a home of a Jewish family in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah on May 8, 2021. (Olivier Fitoussi/Flash90)
Twenty-five House Democrats have signed onto a letter calling on US Secretary of State Antony Blinken to condemn the looming evictions of Palestinian families in Sheikh Jarrah.
The letter was co-sponsored by Illinois Rep. Marie Newman and Michigan Rep. Mark Pocan. It gained the signatures of Reps. Pramila Jayapal, Betty McCollum, Rashida Tlaib, Raul Grijalva, Ilhan Omar, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Andre Carson, Jesus “Chuy” Garcia, Cori Bush, Judy Chu, Ayanna Pressley, Bobby Rush, Eddie Bernice Johnson, Gerald Connolly, Jared Huffman, Peter Welch, Judy Chu, Alan Lowenthal, Veronica Escobar, Jackie Speier, Anna Eshoo, Chellie Pingree, Debbie Dingell and Hank Johnson.
Get email notification for articles from Ben Samuels
Follow
May. 13, 2021 5:03 AM
WASHINGTON – Twenty-five House Democrats signed a letter urging U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken to publicly condemn the planned eviction of Palestinians from homes in Jerusalem’s Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood on land claimed by Jewish settlers and exert diplomatic pressure on Israel to prevent the acts from taking place.
The number of signatories on the letter, which has been circulated for nearly a week by Reps. Marie Newman and Mark Pocan, is significantly higher than what sources had been expecting, reflecting the steadily growing disapproval of the displacement plans within the Democratic Party.
We must defend human rights everywhere. pic.twitter.com/ZIHtv5Sto6
“Palestinian families have every right to live safely in their homes. That’s why I’ve led my colleagues in a letter calling on the State Department to immediately condemn these heinous actions by the Israeli government against Palestinian families in East Jerusalem. America must defend human rights everywhere,” Newman said in a statement.
In their letter, the House Democrats call on the Biden administration to “immediately send the strongest diplomatic message to Israel to desist from its plans.”
Ultranationalist Jewish groups are seeking to oust dozens of Palestinian families from their homes in the East Jerusalem neighborhood over a real estate dispute. The most imminent notice against four families sparked mass protests in East Jerusalem late last month. Israel’s Supreme Court was slated to hold a hearing on the matter on Monday, which the state decided to delay due to concerns of violence and inte
After hundreds of rockets from the Gaza Strip targeted central Israel on Tuesday night, killing three more Israeli civilians, IDF.
Similarly, the column frames the aid issue as a rhetorical question: “as American taxpayers, we don’t have much influence over Hamas, while we do have influence over Israel and we provide several billion dollars a year in military assistance to a rich country and thus subsidize bombings of Palestinians. Is that really a better use of our taxes than, say, paying for COVID-19 vaccinations abroad or national pre-K at home? Shouldn’t our vast sums of aid to Israel be conditioned on reducing conflict rather than aggravating it, on building conditions for peace rather than creating obstacles to it?”