Ted Cruz aims at Trump, Obama in AIPAC speech
Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, running second to Donald Trump in the race for the Republican presidential nomination, targeted the front-runner in remarks to AIPAC’s annual conference.
In his remarks in Washington, D.C., on March 21, Cruz said he would not remain neutral on Israel and would recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
“Let me be very clear,” Cruz said. “As president I will not be neutral.”
Cruz reviewed his history of support for Israel in the Senate and criticized the Obama administration for its treatment of Israel in recent years, blasting the president for refusing to meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a year ago when the Israeli leader spoke to Congress against the emerging Iran nuclear deal.
“We need a president who will be a champion for America, and we need a president who will be a champion for Israel,” Cruz said.
Cruz again said he would “rip to shreds” the Iran deal and pledged to go to New York himself, as president, to veto any United Nations Security Council resolution that recognized Palestine as a state outside the context of talks with Israel.
“Indeed, I tell you today I will fly to New York to personally veto it myself,” Cruz said. — jta
Sanders: ‘All options back on table’ if Iran cheats on nuclear agreement
In the text of the speech Bernie Sanders would have delivered to the AIPAC conference, the Vermont senator laid out his vision for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
In a rare foray into foreign policy, Sanders said peace would require recognition of Israel’s right to exist and the end of threats to its security. But it would also require the end of the Israeli occupation and “pulling back settlements in the West Bank.”
“It is absurd for elements within the [Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu government to suggest that building more settlements in the West Bank is the appropriate response to the most recent violence,” Sanders said. “But, by the same token, it is unacceptable for President [Mahmoud] Abbas to call for the abrogation of the Oslo Agreement when the goal should be ending the violence.”
Sanders was the only major party presidential candidate not to appear in person at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s policy conference this week in Washington, D.C. Citing the demands of his campaign schedule, Sanders sought to address the conference remotely, but was turned down by AIPAC, though the organization had made the accommodation to other presidential candidates in years past.
The speech Sanders released March 21 in lieu of a personal appearance dealt at length with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Sanders noted his personal ties to Israel, including the time he had lived on a kibbutz, and committed to ensuring Israel’s survival and security. Sanders also condemned Hamas’ attacks on Israeli civilians.
But he reiterated his criticism of Israel’s 2014 military campaign in the Gaza Strip and said peace would require ending the blockade of the coastal strip and ensuring Palestinian self-determination and control of their natural resources, especially water.
Turning to other regional challenges, Sanders repeated his past support for the Iran nuclear deal, insisting that for all its flaws it represents the best hope of denying Iran a nuclear weapon.
Sanders said if Iran doesn’t abide by the agreement, sanctions should be reimposed “and all options are back on the table.” — jta
Illinois becomes 1st state to list banned companies
An Illinois state agency named 11 companies barred from doing business with the state for boycotting Israel or its settlements, the first such designation by an official U.S. body.
A number of the entities on the list approved March 18 by the Illinois Investment Policy board have pulled money from Israeli businesses that operate in the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem, but have not boycotted Israel within its 1967 lines. At least two of the entities have said their disinvestment from Israel in recent years was based on commercial, not political, calculations.
The Illinois law passed last year explicitly bars dealing with companies that boycott Israeli operations in territories controlled by Israel.
“Today’s actions were truly historic and will lead the way for the dozens of other states following Illinois’ lead,” said a senior official in the administration of Gov. Bruce Rauner, a Republican who championed the bipartisan legislation. More than 20 states are considering bills or have passed laws targeting companies that comply with the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel. — jta
ADL uses $56K Trump gifts for anti-bias efforts
The Anti-Defamation League has redirected $56,000 in donations from Donald Trump — his total contributions over the past decade — to fund new anti-bias and anti-bullying education programs.
“These undoubtedly were sincere gifts,” Jonathan Greenblatt, ADL’s CEO, said in a statement released March 20. “But in light of the recent campaign, we have decided to redirect the total amount of funds that he contributed to ADL over the years specifically into anti-bias education programs that address exactly the kind of stereotyping and scapegoating that have been injected into this political season.”
ADL also called on other groups, philanthropies and nonprofits to consider redirecting charitable funds given to them by Trump into similar initiatives “to combat hate, promote tolerance, and build a stronger American community,” the statement said.
The Trump money will go to expand ADL’s national No Place for Hate initiative by enabling schools in 10 regions — New York, Philadelphia, Cleveland, Atlanta, Houston, Denver, San Diego, San Francisco, Arizona and Las Vegas — to increase their anti-bias and anti-bullying work.
“We are taking this step to demonstrate that, even as the campaign has surfaced ugly rhetoric, we can reach higher,” Greenblatt said. “Even as his campaign has mainstreamed intolerance, we can push back on the hate.” — jta
Columbia faculty sign letter backing Israel ties
More than 200 Columbia University faculty members have signed a petition supporting the university’s ties with Israel and opposing divestment from companies that do business with the Jewish state.
The letter, posted online on March 20, is signed by some 235 professors and other faculty members. It comes in the wake of the establishment of Columbia University Apartheid Divest, which is calling on the university to “divest from corporations that supply, perpetuate and profit from a system that has subjugated the Palestinian people,” according to the student newspaper, the Spectator.
“It would not be just or principled to respond to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by disengaging from Israel or from companies that do business with Israel,” the letter reads. “It would be unjust to blame only one side for this conflict, and unprincipled to single out Israel for this sanction, while maintaining ties with other nations that — unlike Israel — are undemocratic, repressive and much less restrained in their use of force.”
The petition comes less than a month after 40 faculty members signed a petition urging the New York Ivy League school to divest from such companies. — jta
Anti-Semitic graffiti at Brown University dorm
Anti-Semitic and homophobic messages were written on the walls of a student dormitory at Brown University.
The vandalism discovered March 18 at the Providence, Rhode Island, school came days after the cancellation of an appearance by prominent African-American transgender activist Janet Mock at the Brown University Hillel. Mock had been criticized for allegedly supporting Hillel’s “pinkwashing” of Israeli treatment of the Palestinians.
The graffiti discovered in the Marcy House student housing, written in black marker, read “Gay will die” and “Holocaust 2.0,” the Brown Daily Herald, a campus student newspaper, reported. A Jewish fraternity, Beta Rho Pi, is housed in the building, and many LGBTQ students also live there, according to the newspaper. Members of the Jewish fraternity and Zeta Delta Xi, a coed fraternity also in the building, washed the graffiti off. — jta