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Mannheim – US Congresswoman Ilhan Omar, one of the most vocal pro-Palestine voices in American politics, voted last week in favor of a bill that calls for a $3.3 billion US aid package to Israel.
The 2022 State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs funding bill, which was adopted on Wednesday last week, does not include any conditions to protect Palestinian human rights. But it was approved by all but three democratic represenatives who recently co-sponsored the Palestinian human rights bill with Represantitve Omar: represenatitves Rashida Tlaib, Cori Bush, and Alexandria Ocassio Cortez.
The state department’s budget for the 2022 fiscal year gives the $3.3 billion in US security assistance to Israel as agreed in the 2016 Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) under President Obama. The MoU underscores the United State’s commitment to providing both financial and military support to Israel.
During the latest Israeli bombardment campaign on Gaza only a few months ago, Omar released a statement against the Biden administration’s proposed arms sale to the Israeli government. “The United States should not stand idly by while crimes against humanity are being committed with our backing,” she said. “We should be standing unequivocally and consistently on the side of human rights.”
Omar continued by stating that it would be “appalling for the Biden Administration to go through with the $735 million in precision guided weapons to Netanyahu without any string attached in the wake of scaling violence and attacks on civilians.”
Only last week, while the US Congress voted to reiterate America’s financial and military support for Israel, Israeli soldiers murdered three Palestinians, including two children.
On Thursday, Israeli soldiers fired tear gas, rubber coated bullets and stun grenades at Palestinians attending the funeral procession of Mohammed al-Alami, a 12-year-old boy killed the day before in the occupied West Bank. 20-year-old Shawkat Khalid Awad was killed during the funeral by Israeli fire.
Mohammad Alami died on Wednesday after being shot by Israeli soldiers while traveling in a car with his father in the town of Beit Ummar. Five bullets entered Mohammad’s body. “They took my heart from me, they snatched it from me,” the boy’s father told Haaretz.
Only days before Alami’s murder, Israeli soldiers killed 17-year-old Mohammed Munir al-Tamimi from the Palestinian village of Nabi Saleh, northwest of Ramallah.
Many organizations and activist groups are disappointed with Omar’s vote. The Islamic Leadership Council of New York, which represents Muslims across the state, said that they are “incredibly disheartened.” The group told Morocco World News, “This bill would empower Israel’s aggression and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians through 3.3 billion dollars of direct military aid. Most recently, aggressions against Gaza and illegal settlement neighborhoods shows us what Israel intends to do with this aid.”
Israel’s continued mistreatment of Palestinians is exemplified with the sustained efforts to forcibly evict Palestinian residents of Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan in occupied East Jerusalem to make way for Jewish settlers. Residents of Sheikh Jarrah are still anxiously awaiting their fate as Israeli courts have still not made their final decision on whether Palestinian families will be forcibly displaced and made homeless. These forcible expulsions are categorized by the United Nations as a war crime.
In Gaza, meanwhile, Palestinians are now dealing with the catastrophic aftermath of a devastating 11- day Israeli assault that killed 250 people. On-the-ground reports speak of hundreds of thousands of children in desperate need of mental health support, hundreds of apartments completely destroyed, and an unemployment rate that increased to 50%.
American military aid to Israel only makes another assault on Gaza even more likely.
Despite the commotion surrounding Omar’s rather surprising vote in favor of Israel, some organizations have maintained that the US congresswoman’s vote was not all that unprecedented. When asked about her assessment of Omar’s vote, the advocacy director of American Muslims for Palestine (AMP) told MWN: “Congress members have historically included massive bills that include and tuck away unconditional support for Israel.
“Ilhan Omar was not the only member to recently criticize the state of Israel yet vote in favor of the bill. These are patterns representatives have shown no matter how left they are. We just have to work and advocate harder.”
Representative Omar garnered the support of many because of her strong stance and commitment to Palestinian human rights. Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network said that Omar’s vote is a “betrayel of her supporters.”
The group added, “This is a red line, and any congress member who claims to support Palestine should- at the very least- fight this aid on the floor.”
For its part, the organization Jews for Palestinian Right of Return, said that “it is reprehensible that anyone, let alone someone who presents herself as progressive would vote yes on a bill that sends money to apartheid Israel” they continued by urging representatives to boycott Israel “as we boycotted the apartheid Afrikaner regime in South Africa.”
The group believes that voting for continued and unrestricted aid to Israel only enables the ongoing dispossession and oppression of Palestinians.
