23 November, 2020

Dear Mr. Blinken,

Congratulations!

Like many US advocacy organizations that focus on foreign policy, we are delighted at the promise of change that your new administration brings. 

While we are well aware of the challenges and priorities that your administration faces, both domestically and overseas, we urge you to keep Israeli-Palestinian relations high up on your agenda. Should you conclude that the time is not ripe now for a full-fledged Israeli-Palestinian peace initiative, we urge you to consider that time is running out on the two-state solution that President-elect Biden strongly supports. Developments on the ground – sanctioned and even encouraged by the outgoing administration – are severely jeopardizing a future two-state solution to the conflict. They must be reversed.

We at Americans for Peace now, the sister-organization of Israel’s peace movement Shalom Achshav (Peace Now), are writing to share with you our alarm at the current state of US policy on the Israeli-Palestinian issue, to offer some initial actions to address the wreckage left behind by the Trump administration, and to affirm our commitment to work closely with the Biden-Harris transition team, and subsequently with the new administration, to advance the cause of Palestinian-Israeli peace. 

APN's daily news review from Israel - Tuesday November 24, 2020

Quote of the day:

"With all due respect to the Emirates, Saudi Arabia, the guardian of the holy places to Islam, is the real thing, and it is a historic move that will probably take some more time."
--Middle East analyst Shimrit Meir writes in today's Yedioth that Israel should not hold its breath for normalization with Saudi Arabia.

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.

REMINDER: APN Webinar with Yossi Alpher on Tuesday, November 24, 12 noon (Eastern): Israel and the Biden Administration - Register to attend 

APN's daily news review from Israel - Monday November 23, 2020  

Quote of the day:

"We don't owe him anything, sorry. He was an American spy who worked for a lot of money. This was not some Zionist volunteer who sacrificed his life."
--Former prime minister Ehud Olmert said that Jewish-American spy Jonathan Pollard should not immigrate to Israel because it will harm US-Israel relations further.*

APN's daily news review from Israel - Sunday November 22, 2020 

Quote of the day:

“I don’t know. We’re still counting votes in the US, so there’s not much game in talking about that, other than to say we’re very convinced that we have made the Middle East safer, and the policies we put in place are the right ones.”
—In an interview with the Jerusalem Post, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo answers the question: How easy or difficult will it be for the next administration to scale back its policies (vis-a-vis Israel and the Middle East)?*

1. Bills, Resolutions & Letters
2. Hearings & Markups
3. On the Record

Produced by the Foundation for Middle East Peace in cooperation with Americans for Peace Now, where the Legislative Round-Up was conceived. Views and positions expressed here are those of the writer, and do not necessarily represent APN's views and policy positions.

APN's daily news review from Israel - Thursday November 19, 2020

You Must Be Kidding: 
Inspectors from Israel’s Civil Administration in the West Bank impounded cows belonging to a Palestinian resident of the northern Jordan Valley on the grounds that he had been grazing them in a nature reserve. However, the same Umm Zuka nature reserve has been used for grazing hundreds of cows by settlers of an unauthorized outpost in the same area.***

This webinar on November 24 featured strategic affairs analyst Yossi Alpher providing a view from Israel, as part of our series examining the Middle East policy impact of transitioning from the Trump to the Biden administration.

LISTEN

• How is the transition from Trump to Biden viewed in Israel, both by its leaders and the public?
• How might dealing with a Biden administration alter Israeli government policies and priorities?
• How would Israel’s conservative government and the Israeli public at large adapt to a liberal administration with a worldview diametrically opposed to Trump’s and very different from Netanyahu’s?

These and other questions were addressed by Yossi Alper, one of Israel’s leading strategic affairs analyst, and the author of APN’s Hard Questions Tough Answers, our weekly analysis of Middle East policy, politics, and strategic affairs. Alpher 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.