Even before the present Hamas war against Israel began, during all the sound and fury over Kevin McCarthy’s travails, and whether Steve Scalise or Jim Jordan would succeed him, that dominated Washington news, the House passed a foreign appropriations bill. Two of its measures were particularly welcome in Israel. More on those provisions can be found here: “US House Targets UNRWA Incitement, Moves to Prevent US Embassy From Leaving Jerusalem,” by Andrew Bernard, Algemeiner, October 5, 2023:
Overshadowed by the passage last weekend of a continuing resolution to keep the US government running for 45 days and the subsequent forced ouster of Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) as House speaker, the House of Representatives last week passed a foreign appropriations bill with significant provisions for the US-Israel relationship.
While the House failed to pass the full slate of 12 appropriations bills that would keep the government open through the 2024 fiscal year, one of the four they did pass was the Department of State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, which includes heightened scrutiny of the UN agency assisting Palestinian refugees and would deny funding to move the US embassy in Israel out of Jerusalem.
A report from the House Appropriations Committee accompanying the bill notes the US Congress’s “longstanding concerns” that the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) supports educational programs that promote incitement to violence against Israelis and Jews….
The House appropriations bill includes provisions that put UNRWA on notice that its textbooks and other educational material will be examined for antisemitic and incitement-to-hate content, as will all material produced for use in the classroom by individual teachers. Two NGOs, Impact-SE and UN Watch, have in their own studies found that UNRWA employees had created classroom material celebrating the firebombing of a Jewish bus as a “barbecue party,” encouraging students to pursue jihad and martyrdom, erasing Israel from maps, and encouraging students to “liberate the homeland” with “their blood,” among other examples of incitement to radicalism. The study of what individual teachers do in the classroom will likely require videotaping of classes, as well as unannounced visits by inspectors to make sure that teachers do not stray from the guidelines that UNRWA, under great pressure from outside donors, is now willing to accept. The House has now put UNRWA on notice that, however indulgent the Bidenites have been in renewing aid to the agency, the House takes a much less tolerant view, and won’t hesitate to vote down money that the Department of State wants to give to UNRWA, if the latter does not comply with these new requirements. This part of the foreign appropriations bill has received very little media coverage.
Meanwhile, Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-NY) introduced an amendment to the appropriations bill that also prevents funds from being used to move the US embassy in Israel from Jerusalem.
That amendment passed overwhelmingly with 360 votes in favor, and just 67 opposed. Among the “Nay” votes were staunch critics of the US-Israel relationship from the progressive caucus like Reps. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) and Ilhan Omar (D-MN), as well as more mainstream Democrats like Reps. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Gregory Meeks (D-NY), the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. All Republicans in the House voted for the measure.
Morton Klein, the president of the Zionist Organization of America, said in a statement this week that the vote was evidence that support for the US Embassy being located in Jerusalem was moving beyond partisan politics.
“This overwhelming support for Jerusalem as Israel’s eternal capital is a significant milestone,” Klein said. “Except for those with extremist, even Israel-hating opinions, large majorities of both parties support the continued presence in Jerusalem of the US Embassy. There is a true consensus that Jerusalem is important to both the United States and to Israel.”
The House vote refusing to allow any money to be spent to move the Embassy out of Jerusalem is tantamount to saying our Embassy will remain where it is. The vote was overwhelmingly in favor, with 360 yeas and 67 nays; that’s a sure guarantee that the Embassy will never be moved from where it needs to be, in the capital of the Jews.
Now let us hope the House will, if necessary, adopt other appropriations bills that can limit the Bidenites’ anti-Israeli actions. Should the Bidenites apply such pressure, for example, on Israel so that the Jewish state agrees, most reluctantly, to allow a “consulate to the Palestinians” to be reopened in Jerusalem, even amid this present conflict, Congress can step forth and deny, in any appropriations bill, funds intended to pay for that reopened building. The legislative branch’s power of the purse may be the best way to hold the Bidenites’ anti-Israel malevolence in check.