Friends,
I’ve been visiting the West Bank for over a decade. You’d think little could still shock me.
You’d be wrong.
It’s never been this bad. The rate of home demolitions, settlement construction and rampant, brazen settler violence is off the charts.
We visited one community where a prominent Palestinian peace advocate had been killed – shot point blank – by a violent settlement outpost ringleader just two weeks earlier. While the community was still in mourning, the perpetrator was released after brief detention.
By the time we arrived, settlers had built a new illegal outpost on the community’s farmland, just yards from the crime scene.
Far-right extremists are trying to wipe entire communities off the map and extinguish the Palestinian people’s dream of freedom and statehood – and the Netanyahu government is backing them all the way.
As Jews, as Americans and as supporters of Israel’s founding ideals of peace, justice and equality, we cannot be complicit in this.
This week, J Street advocates were on Capitol Hill lobbying senators to support sanctions against violent settlers by signing on to the West Bank Violence Prevention Act. Can you support us by signing our petition and making a call in support of the legislation?
The US Must Sanction Violent Settlers
Add your name to support our advocacy ✍️
Friends, we’re deeply thankful to the Senators who have shown leadership in putting this legislation forward, including Cory Booker who took the lead in introducing the bill, Jeanne Shaheen, Mark Warner, Jack Reed, Chris Coons, Michael Bennet, as well as Peter Welch. Their support sends an urgent message to those on the ground.
On our most recent trip, we were shown around by an Israeli human rights and peace advocate whose grim determination was matched only by his visible distress at how fast things were deteriorating.
We saw remnant after remnant of Palestinian Bedouin communities that had been harassed and intimidated out of existence. Communities of hundreds of people abandoned, leaving just the frames of homes and farm infrastructure. Ghost towns. It felt apocalyptic.
I was raised to respect and revere the IDF. To love Israel – my Jewish homeland – and its people. It was with that love that I made aliyah and raised a family there.
So when I see fellow Israelis doing this, backed by the government and protected by the IDF – who they seem to order around like personal bodyguards – I find it gut-wrenching and infuriating.
There is no justice here. The people paying the price are peaceful families and communities with zero control over the conflict and no recourse for injustice.
I have to believe that if my fellow Israelis knew about this, they would be outraged. Communities torched. Young and elderly people beaten. Families attacked just for existing.
“If only they saw what I saw,” I kept thinking.
But the settler movement has taken over the political system as well as the West Bank, managing to hide its criminality from the mainstream press. When incidents break through, it’s blamed on a “few bad apples.” The political and media ecosystem is all too willing to turn a blind eye as well. These vandals are unaccountable in courts of law and free of public judgment.
So what gives me hope? The determination of the young Israelis I met in the West Bank camping out in local communities, waiting to be called if there’s a violent incident so they can rush to the scene, intercede and bear witness.
Just like young Jewish advocates back in the States, they are filled with purpose by fighting for a better future – by fighting for something greater than themselves.
We have to stand with them. That’s what we told senators on Capitol Hill. We have to pursue a measure of justice and accountability – for the families in harm’s way. For the future of Israel. For our own moral standing.
Friend: Please sign our petition and call your Senators today. The US must cut off funding for violent settlers and the groups that back them.
Add your name to support our advocacy ✍️
Thank you, sincerely, for your support.
Adina Vogel Ayalon
Vice President and Chief of Staff, J Street
