WASHINGTON, 7 October — The bitter dispute between Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and President George Bush over tactics in the anti-terrorism war is reflected closer to home, just a few blocks from the White House — on Capitol Hill.
The Middle East subcommittee of the House International Affairs Committee met this week for the first time since the terrorists launched their devastating Sept. 11 attack.
The group focused on US policy toward the Palestinians, and pro-Israeli congressmen wasted no time in speaking up for Israel.
Rep. Tom Lantos, D-California, and a Hungarian-born Holocaust survivor, is one of the many outspoken lawmakers who oppose the administration’s alleged plans to bring Syria, Iran and the Palestinian Authority into its anti-terrorism coalition.
The pro-Israelis lawmakers attacked efforts by the administration and its defenders who present Israeli-Arab negotiations as imperative in the looming war against Osama Bin Laden.
“I’m tired of hearing the idiots in the State Department continue to talk about Israel using so-called disproportionate force, or asking Israel to use restraint in the fight against terrorism,” Rep. Eliot Engel, D-New York, said during the hearing.
Every Jewish lawmaker present was outspoken in rejecting efforts by administration defenders to make distinctions between Palestinian terrorism and that of Bin Laden. “The issue is not whether the objection of the terrorist is or is not thought to be reasonable,” said Rep. Brad Sherman, D-California. “The issue is whether terrorism is going to be allowed as a way of influencing policy.”
Similar statements were made by Democratic Reps. Shelley Berkley of Nevada and Gary Ackerman of New York and by New York Republican Ben Gilman.
“The Palestinian account at the American bank of trust is in deep default,” Ackerman said. “If they want to fix this, they have to start making big deposits.”
After the hearing, Engel told Jewish newspapers that he and other subcommittee members were privately concerned with the administration’s tacit support for Palestinian statehood.
Engel promised to become increasingly vocal in opposing the administration’s outreach to states
“I can’t see why the American Jewish community can’t show support for Bush’s efforts to root out terrorism,” said Morton Klein, president of the Zionist Organization of America.
Klein said his organization has sent out an action alert to its members telling them to write to President Bush and Secretary of State Colin Powell to urge them to keep “terrorist regimes such as Syria and the Palestinian Authority out of America’s coalition.”
Meanwhile, these pro-Israeli congressmen are continuing their efforts to cut off aid to the Palestinian Authority.
Congressional critics of President Bush’s coalition-building plans are focusing efforts on a House-Senate committee that is expected to meet next month cut off foreign appropriations for the Palestinians.
The House version of the bill includes an amendment, adopted in May, which would cut off US aid to the Palestinians if they are found not to be complying with their commitments under signed accords with Israel.
The amendment, known as the Middle East Peace Commitments Act, was originally introduced as a bill by Democratic Reps. Tom Lantos and Gary Ackerman and Republican Ben Gilman.
A similar amendment was to have been attached to the Senate spending bill this month by Sens. Dianne Feinstein, D- Ca., and Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky.
This week, however, the senators agreed not to introduce the amendment at the request of Secretary of State Colin Powell.
In a letter addressed to Feinstein, Powell called the amendment “counterproductive to our coalition-building and peace-process efforts” and urged them “not to tie the president’s hands.”
An aide to Rep. Ackerman said the congressmen plan to push for the amendment and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) plans to continue lobbying for the measure, citing alleged Palestinian failure to comply with commitments.
