Special to the World Jewish News Agency by David Bedein, Bureau Chief of the Jerusalem-based Israel Resource News Agency and a fellow of the Center for Near East Policy Research.
www.IsraelBehindTheNews.com

Mounting a Citizens Challenge

American citizens often ask what they can do for Israel when they are in touch with their Congressional representatives. Perhaps the most important thing they can do is to challenge the Ten Principles of The U.S. State Department’s 2005 Middle East agenda, which includes:1-The cutting of Israel in half by advocating that the proposed PLO entity be “contiguous” ­ in the words of Secretary Condoleeza Rice ­ from Gaza to Bethlehem. 2 -Ignoring the PLO’s decision not to annul the PLO covenant, which mandates that the PLO continue its state of war against Israel. This covenant continues despite a firm American commitment not to deal with the PLO until it cancels the covenant. 3-Financing a Palestinian school system that operates the first curriculum since the Third Reich that teaches children to make war against Jews. (Review the Palestinian curriculum at www.edume.org) 4 -Allowing PLO leadership to order the murder of Palestinian dissidents. A total of 51 Arabs are currently facing death for the “crime” of cooperating with Israel. The State Department has said it will not intervene to stop this practice. 5-Vetoing Israel’s right to build homes or synagogues in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem. The State Department’s answer as to whether the repair of the Hurva Synagogue in the Jewish Quarter would represent an act of “illegal settlement activity” was “yes.” 6 -Rejecting the idea that Jerusalem is even part of Israel. Most recently, President Bush, on the advice of the State Department, vetoed a bill that would require U.S. documents issued in Jerusalem to list “Jerusalem, Israel,” as their point of origin.  Currently all such documents are listed as “Jerusalem,” with no country mentioned. They include U.S. passports and birth certificates issued for American citizens who dwell or were born in the western sector Jerusalem. 7-Nurturing Muhammad Dahlan, as coordinator of PLO security forces, despite the fact that Dahlan has taken credit for planning the murders of hundreds of Jews (See Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s article in the Wall Street Journal of June 3, 2002, documenting Dahlan’s murder record and calling for his elimination). 8-Ordering renewal of CIA training for the PLO security forces, despite the fact that these same PLO forces have used the CIA training they received in the 1990’s to murder Jews since the September 2000 inception of organized terror warfare against Israel. 9-Continuing to fund the “right of return” campaign of the UNRWA
Palestinian Arab refugee camps, despite the President’s clear statement on April 14, 2004 that he opposed such policies. 10-Recognizing Palestinian Authority Chairman Abu Mazen  (a.k.a. Mahmoud Abbas) as a “moderate” force, even though he has armed and incorporated every terrorist group instead of disarming them and defining the election of Mazen as “democratic,” despite the resignation of 46 members of the PLO’s own election council on the night of the elections.



The role of the Congress to “Advise and Consent” on matters of foreign policy is defined by the U.S.  Constitution.  It is up to American citizen supporters of Israel to work with the Congress to “advise” the State Department so that they do not “consent” to its Middle East policy agenda.
 

ONE PLACE LEFT IN THE WORLD WHERE THERE ARE  NO HUMAN RIGHTS FOR JEWS

US Consul Wilcox responded quickly and straightforwardly, and with no emotion: "If you live where you live, you have no human rights and no civil liberties." The US consul invoked the 1949 Fourth Geneva Convention, which forbids nations that conquer other lands in war to settle their citizens in those lands. Wilcox, consistent with this position, now heads the Washington-based Foundation for Middle East Peace, which has as its purpose the eradication of Jewish communities in Judea, Samaria, Gaza, the Golan and even in the new neighborhoods in Jerusalem that were established by Israel since 1967. Wilcox's statement ignored the fact that the San Remo Treaty had been adopted by both the League of Nations and by the United Nations. That treaty protected the right of Jews to purchase land and to settle in the Jewish National Homeland, defined as anywhere west of the Jordan River.

Yet, 15 years later, Israeli Attorney General Menachem Mazuz adopted the precise formula that Wilcox had articulated in 1990: that Israelis have no human rights or civil liberties if they live in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, even if they are law-abiding and tax-paying Israeli citizens. Even the mainstream Israeli left-wing had never held such a dogmatic approach. That had been the position of the Israeli Communist Party and an anti-Zionist organization in Israel known as Matzpen, which had always favored unilateral retreat from all areas acquired by Israel in the defensive war of 1967.