Yossi Alpher is an independent security analyst. He is the former director of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, a former senior official with the Mossad, and a former IDF intelligence officer. Views and positions expressed here are those of the writer, and do not necessarily represent APN's views and policy positions.

By Madeleine Cereghino, Director of Government Relations

Yesterday, House Republicans forced a vote on a resolution intended to specifically target Democratic members of Congress who have been vocal in their opposition to the Israeli government’s ongoing occupation and anti-democratic practices.

 While we may not agree with every comment made about Israel, it is crucial to emphasize that criticizing Israeli policies and actions is not inherently antisemitic. Still, it is disappointingly obvious that Speaker McCarthy is only concerned with antisemitism when it is politically expedient. This was the clear impetus for yesterday’s messaging resolution, which says that Israel is not a racist or apartheid state, rejects antisemitism, and reaffirms United States support of Israel. For Congress, it was about as groundbreaking as the renaming of a post office.

Voting for or against yesterday’s non-binding resolution is inconsequential. It requires little effort to claim to "stand with Israel." But what does it mean to “stand with Israel?” Do House Republicans stand with Israel as its Prime Minister seeks to dismantle the judicial check on the Knesset's power, jeopardizing the country’s democracy? Do they stand with Israel as sitting members of its government incite violence and then allow the military to stand by and watch as settlers rampage through Palestinian towns? The answer, unfortunately, is a resounding yes.

After nearly six decades of occupation and seventy-five years of conflict, we cannot settle for mere platitudes. As Israel's closest ally, the United States must stand not just with Israel but FOR Israel and FOR the individual and national rights of the Palestinian people. We must stand FOR a democratic and secure Israel that coexists harmoniously with its neighbors, and FOR a Palestine that is free, independent, and sovereign.

The United States should stand for practices and policies that bring us closer to a viable long-term solution. Even when it means confronting difficult truths, we must be willing to speak out. The United States, as Israel's closest ally, has a responsibility to champion policies that pave the way for a brighter future—a future of justice, self-determination, and equality for both Israelis and Palestinians.

There could hardly be a greater disconnect between tomorrow’s US Congressional salute to Israel and its democracy, and the anti-democratic campaign that Israel’s government is ramming through the Knesset. While the US government in Washington is embracing Israel’s ceremonial head of state, President Isaac Herzog, Israel’s political head of state, Benjamin Netanyahu, is systematically working to wreck the very values of democracy, equality, justice and peace that Washington wishes to see and respect in Israel.

President Herzog, aware of this discordance, told President Biden in the White House today that “Israeli democracy is sound and resilient” and that the heated internal Israeli debate over the so-called legal reform is testament to that resilience. But Herzog knows how endangered Israeli democracy is as the government of Israel works to gut it by denying it basic judicial checks on the already vast powers of the executive branch.

Furthermore, both Presidents Herzog and Biden know that Israel cannot and will not be a true democracy as long as it continues occupying the West Bank and ruling over millions of Palestinians who lack national sovereign rights and human rights.

Americans for Peace Now’s President and CEO Hadar Susskind said: “President Biden and other leading Democrats have spoken about their concerns regarding Israel’s character as a democracy. Israel’s democracy is indeed important and worth fighting for. But the administration and Congress need to  see past Herzog’s ‘shared values’ platitudes and address the issues of settlement expansion, settler violence, and creeping annexation.

“What Israel needs from its friends in Washington is not more enabling, but rather a reality check, an intervention, which would clearly define what the US is and is not willing to accept from a state that wishes to continue enjoying a values-based ‘special relationship’ with America. The red lines should be clear and so should the consequences if they are crossed.”

Yossi Alpher is an independent security analyst. He is the former director of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, a former senior official with the Mossad, and a former IDF intelligence officer. Views and positions expressed here are those of the writer, and do not necessarily represent APN's views and policy positions.

Guest edited by Madeleine Cereghino, Director of Government Relations here at Americans for Peace Now, where the Round-Up was born!

by Madeleine Cereghino, Director of Government Relations- APN

Every year as Congress reviews and approves the United States' annual spending bills, we have a valuable opportunity to advocate for change. Each year, Congress passes spending bills funding the United States government for the upcoming fiscal year, specifying the budgets of each department, and outlining the allocation of funds within those departments. The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) specifically focuses on authorizing defense-related expenditures, including funding for the military, defense programs, and national security initiatives. However, it is important to note that the NDAA often includes provisions that go beyond defense matters and is used by both parties as a vehicle to raise other policy issues.

We at Americans for Peace Now have long called for increased oversight to ensure that our funds aren’t used in ways that run counter to our values and to US policy. This commonsense concept is reflected in some of this year’s NDAA submissions.

This year, several of the over 1500 amendments proposed in the NDAA address the issue of US assistance contributing to human rights violations and offer language that would add additional scrutiny to the use of US funds as it relates to the Israeli occupation. These amendments encompass a range of provisions aimed at promoting accountability and safeguarding human rights. They include mandating an annual report to Congress on Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank, reaffirming Congressional support for a two-state solution, requiring vetting for gross human rights violations by program recipients, and directing reporting on journalist killings including Shireen Abu Akleh’s.

Ori Nir  00:15

Hello, everyone. Welcome to this Americans for Peace Now webinar. With us today is peace now Executive Director, Lior Amihai. As you know, we before we start, we have our usual comments. So I will remind you that like all our webinars, this one is recorded and you will find the video recording probably tomorrow that will happen on our YouTube channel. The audio will be uploaded sometime later today to our podcast Peace Cast. I will also remind you that you are invited to ask questions and you can do that anytime during the webinar beginning now using our q&a tool that is at the bottom of your screen. I ask you that you keep your questions short, because we go through them as we go along with the webinar. I'm assuming that you by now you most of you, if not all of you are familiar with Lior Amihai, The executive director of Israeli sister organization Shalom Achshav, peace now, Lior has been with Peace Now for quite a few years as the co director of its settlements watch project. Then he joined Yesh Din and was its director, the director of Yesh Din, and recently he came back home to us to head Shalom Achshav, we're very happy about that. And really, you know, very few people know the situation in the West Bank on the ground, particularly as it relates to settlements, but better than Lior. So, Lior, thanks for joining us.

Lior Amihai  02:04

Thank you Ori, thanks for inviting me, and thank you for being here.

Last Night, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government of ultra-nationalist zealots drove Israel further away from its roots as a liberal democracy and toward unabashed fascism. 

As Netanyahu and his government allies recklessly curtail the power of the judiciary to serve as a check on the executive and legislative branches of government, Americans for Peace Now (APN) is deeply concerned about Israel’s future. APN calls on the Biden administration to make clear to Netanyahu that these actions have consequences and that the United States will reassess its relationship with Israel if its government turns the state into a hollow democracy.

The Knesset Last night passed by first vote (out of three) a bill that would remove the power of Israeli courts to use the standard of reasonableness as a criterion to strike legislation and government executive orders. The bill (an amendment to Basic Law: Judiciary) reads: “Notwithstanding what is stated in this Basic Law, those who have jurisdiction to adjudicate according to law, including the Supreme Court in its function as a High Court of Justice, shall not discuss the reasonableness of the decision of the government, of the prime minister or of another minister, as well as of another elected official which shall be determined by law, and shall not issue an order against any of them in such matter."

Israel has almost no separation of powers between its executive and the legislative branches. The government, which enjoys a coalition majority in the Knesset, can legislate as it deems fit. The only check on the government is therefore the judicial branch and specifically the Supreme Court. Once the executive/legislative branch removes that check, Israel will become a hollow democracy.

The government of Israel can still halt its march toward the destruction of Israeli democracy by not bringing the bill to a second and third vote.

Yossi Alpher is an independent security analyst. He is the former director of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, a former senior official with the Mossad, and a former IDF intelligence officer. Views and positions expressed here are those of the writer, and do not necessarily represent APN's views and policy positions.