Is this senator nuts or has he in fact been void of news or foreign policy updates provided to Congress? Both perhaps? And some fellow senators appear to have the same problem.
What is worse, the letter is addressed to SecState, John Kerry who is quite anti-Israel and for sure anti-Egypt but perhaps the White House has a few in the senate taking on this written challenge…..
Check this out…..
First comes Prime Minister Netanyahu’s response:
PM Netanyahu’s Response to US Senator Patrick Leahy’s Letter (Communicated by the Prime Minister’s Media Adviser)
Following is Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s response to US Senator Patrick Leahy’s letter:
“The IDF and the Israel Police do not engage in executions. Israel’s soldiers and police officers defend themselves and innocent civilians with the highest moral standards against bloodthirsty terrorists who come to murder them.
Where is the concern for the human rights of the many Israelis who’ve been murdered and maimed by these savage terrorists?
This letter should have been addressed instead to those who incite youngsters to commit cruel acts of terrorism.”
Then we need to ask some deeper questions regarding the influence some communist lobby groups have in Congress like American Friends of Service Committee. Perhaps this organization is also tied or maybe funded by Iran?
Leahy asked State Dept. to investigate Israeli human rights ‘violations’
Politico: Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and 10 House members have asked the Obama administration to investigate claims that the Israeli and Egyptian security forces have committed “gross violations of human rights” — allegations that if proven truei could affect U.S. military aid to the countries.
In a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry dated Feb. 17, the lawmakers list several examples of suspected human rights abuses, including reports of extrajudicial killings by Israeli and Egyptian military forces, as well as forced disappearances in Egypt. The letter also points to the 2013 massacre in Egypt’s Rab’aa Square, which left nearly 1,000 people dead as the military cracked down on protesters, as worthy of examination.
Leahy’s signature is particularly noteworthy because his name is on a law that conditions U.S. military aid to countries on whether their security forces are committing abuses.
“In light of these reports we request that you act promptly to determine their credibility and whether they trigger the Leahy Law and, if so, take appropriate action called for under the law,” the signatories state in the letter, which was obtained by POLITICO on Tuesday evening from an organization that provided input for it.
The Leahy Law’s application and impact have been difficult to measure, and while U.S. funding to a particular foreign military unit may be cut off as a result of the law, overall U.S. military aid to the country need not be stopped.
The letter’s real impact may be political: Israel’s unusual, if not unprecedented inclusion with Egypt on such an inquiry is likely to rile Israel’s allies in Washington, who bristle at the notion that the Middle East’s only established democracy could be lumped in with a notorious human rights abuser like Egypt.
Though it was sent to Kerry well beforehand, the timing of the letter’s release comes just days after an Israeli soldier was filmed executing a Palestinian prisoner at close range – setting off fury in the Arab world and launching a military disciplinary process that has many on the Israeli right fuming.
Leahy spokesman David Carle downplayed Israel’s inclusion in the request, noting that the Vermont Democrat “has always said” that the law that bears his name “should be uniformly applied.”
Egypt’s inclusion may be no easier to navigate, as the military-backed Egyptian regime has proved a vexing problem for President Barack Obama as he has sought to balance the U.S.’s traditional concern for human rights with its need to maintain Cairo as an ally in an increasingly chaotic Middle East.
The U.S. is so wary of losing Egypt’s friendship it declined to call the military’s 2013 takeover over of the elected Muslim Brotherhood government a coup — a label that would have triggered a legal obligation to suspend military aid. Israel, meanwhile, remains America’s closest ally in the region despite tense relations between Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and it has received billions in U.S. military assistance over the years.
The letter questions the current mechanisms that the U.S. has to monitor its military assistance to both countries and asks for clarity on how the various divisions of the State Department “document and determine the credibility of information related to allegations of gross violations of human rights by foreign security forces.”
“According to information we have received, the manner in which U.S. military assistance has been provided to Israel and Egypt, since the Camp David Accords, including the delivery of assistance at the military service level, has created a unique situation that has hindered implementation of normal mechanisms for monitoring the use of such assistance,” the letter states.
A State Department spokesman said it would provide a comment later Wednesday.
Meanwhile, the letter was hailed by left-leaning organizations such as Jewish Voice for Peace, the National Lawyers Guild International Committee and others. These groups also provided input for the letter.
“Both Israel and Egypt receive billions of dollars in U.S. military aid, and both countries’ security forces have opened fire on protesters with impunity. This letter from key members of Congress is an important first step in the right direction,” said Sunjeev Bery of Amnesty International USA.
Added Raed Jarrar of the American Friends Service Committee: “We call on the Department of State to investigate all the cases mentioned in the letter, and to provide Congress with a comprehensive answer.”
**** About American Friends of Service Committee as noted in part from Wikipedia:
For its anti-war, pro-immigration, and anti-capital punishment stances, the AFSC receives criticism from many socially conservative groups. Often the criticisms allege that the AFSC has supported Communist activities.[citation needed]
Throughout much of the group’s history the US Federal Bureau of Investigation and other government agencies have monitored the work of this and many other similar organizations.[17][18][19]
Since the 1970s, criticism has also come from liberals within the Society of Friends, who charge that AFSC has drifted from its Quaker roots and has become indistinguishable from other political pressure groups. Quakers expressed concern with AFSC’s abolition of their youth work camps during the 1960s and what some saw as a decline of Quaker participation in the organization. The criticisms became prominent after a gathering of Friends General Conference in Richmond, Indiana, in the summer of 1979 when many Friends joined with prominent leaders, such as Kenneth Boulding, to call for a firmer Quaker orientation toward public issues.[20] Some Jews have accused AFSC of having an anti-Jewish bias.[21] Jacob Neusner calls the Committee “the most militant and aggressive of Christian anti-Israel groups.”[
