Sign-On Letter Concerning Potential Annexation of the West Bank

To: Prime Minister Netanyahu, Alternate Prime Minister and Defense Minister Gantz, Foreign Minister Ashkenazi

We write as American lawmakers who are long-time supporters, based on our shared democratic values and strategic interests, of Israel and the U.S.-Israel relationship.  We firmly believe in, and advocate for, a strong and secure Jewish and democratic State of Israel, a state able to build upon current peace treaties and expand cooperation with regional players and the international community.  We have consistently endorsed the pursuit of a negotiated peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians resulting in two states for two peoples and a brighter future for the Israeli people and the Palestinian people. In that vein, we write today to express our deep concern that the push for unilateral annexation of territory in the West Bank after July 1st will make these goals harder to achieve.

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.

APN's daily news review from Israel - Monday June 15, 2020

Quote of the day:

“I can’t breathe.”
--Arab-Israeli diplomat Ismail Khalidi said to Israeli security guards who pinned him to the ground and put a knee on his neck at the entrance to the Jerusalem Central Bus Station.*

You Must Be Kidding: 
"The riots prove that there is no chance for coexistence in Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and all the minorities must leave the city.”
--Yair Netanyahu, son of the prime minister, called to ethnically cleanse Jaffa from Arabs following Arab-Israeli protests in Jaffa.**

APN's daily news review from Israel - Sunday June 14, 2020

You Must Be Kidding: 
"They double themselves every 12 years, and so it’s something that needs handling.”
--Right-wing pro-settler MK Bezalel Smotrich called for urbanization and “Westernization” of the traditionally nomadic Bedouin community so that there will be fewer of them.*

Quote of the day:
 “The birthrate of the settlers is a kind of bomb that has to be defused. If we don’t neutralize it, it will blow up on us with even greater force. They double themselves every 12 years and this is something that has to be dealt with. The more Western we make them, the more the birthrate will come down. A lawless area has been established here, with no enforcement. Everybody builds wherever they want, they use violence."
--By changing the word 'Bedouin' to 'settlers,' Haaretz+ columnist Gideon Levy illustrated the racism of MK, Bezalel Smotrich.*

CLICK to jump down to the Hadar Susskind letter

APN was one of the first organizations to publicly condemn the President of the Zionist Organization of America Mort Klein's racist tweets about Black Lives Matter. APN now joins with fellow member organizations of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations in sending this letter to Mr. Klein, which concludes with:

"At this delicate and critical juncture in American history, Jews of all colors must stand up for black lives and against senseless hatred and divisive bigotry. It is time to find our common humanity, not to search for ways to keep us apart. There is no room for hate in organized Jewish life."

APN's daily news review from Israel - Thursday June 11, 2020

You Must Be Kidding: 
“At 6 A.M., they knocked and told me to get out of the house. I said, ‘What? With all our things inside?’ They told me they’d remove everything. They didn’t show me an order or anything. They took me to the checkpoint for four hours; when I returned, there was no house.”
--Fayez, a farmer who owns land and a home, which was one of four buildings belonging to Al-Walaja village farmers that was destroyed without a permit in order to clear the area for an Israeli tourist nature site.**

The Israeli government’s decision to annex large parts of the West Bank is now on the forefront of the political agenda in the public and in the Israeli Knesset. 

Listen to Knesset Member Merav Michaeli of Israel’s Labor Party, who is currently a member of the opposition, discuss annexation on this APN briefing call from Thursday, June 11. 

In her eight years in Israeli politics, following a successful career in television and print journalism, MK Michaeli has established herself as a clear, courageous progressive voice, focusing on peace, social justice, and women’s rights. One of Israel’s leading feminists, Michaeli has been socially active since the late 1990s, when she established a lobbying organization to assist and promote sexual violence victim centers across Israel. As a Knesset member, she has consistently speaks out against the occupation and against the Israeli government’s inaction in pursuit of an end to the occupation.

APN's daily news review from Israel - Wednesday June 10, 2020

NOTE: APN invites you to join a briefing call on West Bank Annexation: A View from the Knesset - with MK Merav Michaeli of Israel’s Labor Party, a member of the opposition in the Knesset, and a longtime advocate for Israeli-Palestinian peace.
Date: Thursday, June 11th
Time: 11:00 am (Eastern Time)
Dial-in Number: 951-797-1058
Participant Access Code: 147414

Number of the day: 15

--Percentage of Israelis who fully support the application of Israeli sovereignty in parts of the West Bank and in the Beqaa Jordan Valley, as per the Trump plan, according to a poll.

You Must Be Kidding: 

“Interference.”
—The term the Likud party used to describe the High Court ruling that struck down the law that would allow Israeli settlers to confiscate privately-owned Palestinian land for the benefit of settlements. The Likud party promised to pass the law again.**

Update: this action, now closed, ran from June 9- June 30, 2020.

Go HERE to sign the letter

Americans for Peace Now and our Israeli sister organization Peace Now (Shalom Achshav) are raising our voices in solidarity and asking Israelis and Americans who care about peace to sign on to this letter.

The government of Israel, with the encouragement of the Trump administration, intends to begin annexation of the West Bank as soon as July 1st. Annexation would have disastrous repercussions for Israelis and Palestinians and would threaten US national security interests.

Israeli and American citizens are urging the government of Israel to abandon its unilateral annexation plan and to instead pursue negotiations with the Palestinian leadership to reach a conflict-ending peace accord.

Please add your name to these and the growing list!

Peter Beinart   *   Nicole Berner   *   Martin I Bresler   *   Rachel Faulkner   *   Tom Feldman   *   Dan Fleshler   *   Dr. Robert O. Freedman   *   Aviva Futorian   *   Judith Gelman   *   Gili Getz   *   Joe Goldman   *   Ginna Green   *   Rabbi Steve Gutow   *   Jonathan Jacoby   *   Steven Kaplan   *   Nancy Kaufman   *   Jim Klutznick   *   Shawn Landres   *   Luis Lanier   *   Rabbi Michael Latz   *   Rabbi Amichai Lau-Lavie   *   Libby Lenkinski   *   Rachel Lerner   *   Ruth Messinger   *   Aviva Meyer   *   Mik Moore   *   Jo-Ann Mort   *   David Myers   *   Kathleen Peratis   *   Marcie Setlow   *   Mark Silverberg   *   Daniel Sokatch   *   Mary Ann Stein   *   Judith Tuller   *   Michael Walzer   *   Peter Weiss