Israel was warned this week by one of its staunchest supporters in the U.S. Senate that its request for U.S. guarantees covering $10 billion in loans to help absorb new immigrants is in danger.
According to Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), many officials of the Bush administration want to link the loan guarantees to Israel’s suspension of settlement-building in the administered territories.
Inouye, who arrived in Israel on Sunday for a three-day visit, made that point in a conversation with Shimon Peres, leader of the opposition Labor Party.
Peres said that if the guarantees were not forthcoming, enabling Israel to secure commercial loans at reasonable rates, life would become much harder in Israel, especially for new olim.
Inouye, who chairs the defense appropriations subcommittee, said he and other U.S. lawmakers are pledged to make every effort to obtain the guarantees.
Only last week, the senator blasted President Bush for delaying action on the guarantees.
Addressing an American Israel Public Affairs Committee dinner in Los Angeles on Dec. 10, Inouye charged that the United States is “a major cause of Israel’s economic ills.”
He said Israel is an excellent credit risk and that all it is asking from the United from the United States is to “extend the hand of friendship.”
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