American for Peace Now is urging the Bush administration to require an Israeli settlement freeze as a condition for receiving U.S. guarantees for $10 billion in immigrant resettlement loans.
“Unless there is a reversal of Israeli government policy on the settlement issues, there is no serious chance for approval of unconditional loan guarantees,” the organization said in position paper issued here this week.
“The best way to get the guarantees for the absorption of new immigrants is to support directly conditioning the loan guarantees on a freeze on Israeli settlements,” the paper said.
The group’s stance was rejected by the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. Shoshana Cardin, the umbrella group’s chairman, said there should be “absolutely no linkage between issues that are on the table in the peace process.”
She also said that it is neither appropriate nor helpful at this point “to establish preconditions for what is a very important and critical humanitarian need.”
While Peace Now charges that the settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip harm the peace process, the position paper also urges the Arab states and the Palestinians to end violence against Israel and lift their economic boycott.
“To fail to do so signals to the Israelis that it is only Israel that must make concessions, a proposition that is only likely to lead to decades more violence and conflict,” the statement said.
The position paper was issued during the organization’s national leadership meeting here. After the meeting ended Tuesday, about 125 participants fanned out across Capitol Hill to explain the group’s position to members of the Senate and House of Representatives.
The 10,000-member American Friends of Peace Now supports Israel’s request for the loan guarantees, and its position was taken only after months of discussion, Mark Rosenblum, the group’s political director, stressed in an interview.
Shalom Achshav (Peace Now in Israel) has been urging such as step, because it believes that Israel’s scarce funds, including the loan money, should be used to house and provide jobs for immigrants, as well as improve economic conditions in Israel, rather than to build settlements in the territories, Rosenblum said.
REJECTS LEAHY PROPOSAL
The statement urges that any agreement on the loans between the United States and Israel be made public. This is partly aimed at reports that the Bush administration has proposed a partial freeze on settlements that would allow Israel to go ahead with those already being built or approved for construction.
In addition, the administration is said to want to consider the loan guarantees on an annual basis, rather than give approval now to a five-year package of guarantees that would be released in annual installments covering $2 billion.
Rosenblum said this could result in disputes every year between Israel and the United States over the conditions.
American Friends of Peace Now also rejects a proposal by Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) that would reduce the amount covered by the loan guarantees by every dollar Israel spends on the settlements.
“Deducting from the guarantees amounts spent on the settlements will not put an end to settlement activity,” the position paper said.
Meanwhile, Agudath Israel of America has written to President Bush urging that there be no link between the settlements issue and the loan guarantees.
The settlement issue “should have no bearing on an issue that clearly does unite the United States and Israel: the need to provide humanitarian assistance for the hundreds of thousands of Russian Jews who have flocked to the State of Israel in search of a better life,” said the letter.
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