The Jerusalem Post is reporting today: “Amid a lengthy round of applause, including a standing ovation from U.S. lawmakers, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert addressed the U.S. Congress…”
EDWARD L. PECK
EUGENE BIRD
Peck, a former chief of mission to Iraq, was deputy director of the White House Task Force on Terrorism in the Reagan administration. He recently wrote the article “Of Course There Is an Israel Lobby.”
Bird is president of the Council for the National Interest. They both were on a delegation observing the latest Palestinian election and met with the Hamas leadership.
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SANDY TOLAN
Tolan wrote the recent Los Angeles Times oped piece “The incredible shrinking Palestine: Israel is whittling away at Palestinians’ land again, but it needs the U.S. to sharpen the knife.” Tolan is author of the new book The Lemon Tree: An Arab, a Jew, and the Heart of the Middle East.
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Related maps of the West Bank
MITCHELL PLITNICK
Plitnick is director of education and policy for Jewish Voice for Peace. He said today: “HR 4681, also known as the ‘Palestinian Anti-Terrorism Bill,’ which just passed the House, imposes unprecedented sanctions on the Palestinians … it is not meant to inhibit terrorism, but to punish the Palestinians for exercising their right to a democratic election. The simple fact is, this bill will increase desperation, and desperation is the fertile ground for violence; if it does become law, it will lead to more deaths, both Israeli and Palestinian. Neither the Bush administration nor the Israeli government supported this bill. What does that say about the House?”
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NADIA HIJAB
Hijab is senior fellow at the Institute for Palestine Studies in Washington. She said today: “While Olmert is talking about his plans for the Occupied Territories, his government is forging ahead on moves to reduce areas of Arab concentration in Israel’s Galilee and Negev regions. … The administration may also be embarrassed by the uproar among Palestinians over the Israeli High Court 14 May decision to uphold the law barring family reunification for thousands of Israelis married to Palestinians from the Occupied Territories. Amnesty International condemned ‘institutionalized racial discrimination,’ adding: ‘Statements by Israeli officials and legislators who support the new law indicate that it is primarily motivated by demographic, rather than security, considerations — that is, a determination to reduce the percentage of Israeli Arabs among the country’s population.'”
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For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020, (202) 421-6858; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167
