The Israeli-Palestinian conflict continues to divide political opinion in the United States, as evidenced by the most recent resolution to come before the House. In an attempt to resolve the conflict through a negotiated two-state solution, the US House of Representatives on Friday passed the resolution in a 226 to 188 vote.
The four Democrats who opposed the resolution were Reps. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) – freshmen Congresswomen euphemistically known as "The Squad."
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Omar co-sponsored the original bill, but felt unable to support it in the House after significant changes were made in the committee stage. She was also said to be unhappy about the inclusion of language committing the United States to $38 billion of military assistance.
Today, I believe we are squandering a real opportunity to support peace in Israel/Palestine.
Here is why I can't support the final version of H.Res 326, a resolution about U.S. support for a two-state solution that I fear will make it impossible to ever bring about that peace.
— Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) December 6, 2019
Tlaib also criticized the bill, speaking out against it from the floor of the House adorned with a black and white keffiyeh wrapped around her shoulders. Invoking the language of the Civil Rights Movement in the US, opining that "separate but equal didn't work in our country," in an egregious attempt to equate the two situations. She also argued that the resolution did not account for steps that Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has allegedly taken to ensure the demise of the two-state solution.
Ultimately, the bill was introduced as a rebuke to the Trump administration's overtures to Israel's right-wing, the House resolution supported a two-state solution, "recording opposition to any peace plan put forward by the Trump administration that doesn't expressly call for an independent Palestinian state living side-by-side with a Jewish state of Israel," according to The Hill.
The sands are shifting with regard to the opinion in the legislature regarding the Israel-Palestine conundrum. Solid bipartisan support is becoming a thing of the past – especially when a figure as unpopular and divisive as 45 – is president. The bill was brought after a raft of Trump administration measures that the Democrats have criticized for endangering the so-called two-state solution; including moving the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, Israel's capital since 1949; recognizing Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights and punitive cuts of US aid to the Palestinians.
In addition, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced that there would be a shift in US policy vis-à-vis Israeli settlements in the Biblical heartland of Judea and Samaria. They would no longer be considered illegal under international law, a rebuttal of one of the Obama administration's last pieces of business – to not veto UN Security Council Resolution 2334, which claimed their illegality.
For some commentators, the Squad's decision to vote against the resolution was yet more evidence of their animus toward the world's only Jewish state. This sentiment was echoed by House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Eliot Engel (D-NY) opening remarks from the floor. He decried the idea of a one-state solution, arguing that "Israel's right to exist as a state that is both Jewish and democratic is incompatible with a one-state solution, period," The Hill reported.
Similarly, international lawyer and political analyst Arsen Ostrovksy tweeted that none of them is interested in a two-state solution at all, rather the destruction of the state of Israel.
#TheSquad unveiling their mask!
They never cared for 2 State Solution or peace in first place! They've wanted One State and the destruction of #Israel all along! Will @TheDemocrats leadership & 2020 candidates condemn @RashidaTlaib @IlhanMN? pic.twitter.com/AEWxuU3Yju
— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) December 6, 2019
