Jacob Magid is The Times of Israel s US correspondent based in New York
Israeli security forces clash with protesters outside a home of a Jewish family in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah on May 8, 2021. (Olivier Fitoussi/Flash90)
Twenty-five House Democrats have signed onto a letter calling on US Secretary of State Antony Blinken to condemn the looming evictions of Palestinian families in Sheikh Jarrah.
The letter was co-sponsored by Illinois Rep. Marie Newman and Michigan Rep. Mark Pocan. It gained the signatures of Reps. Pramila Jayapal, Betty McCollum, Rashida Tlaib, Raul Grijalva, Ilhan Omar, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Andre Carson, Jesus “Chuy” Garcia, Cori Bush, Judy Chu, Ayanna Pressley, Bobby Rush, Eddie Bernice Johnson, Gerald Connolly, Jared Huffman, Peter Welch, Judy Chu, Alan Lowenthal, Veronica Escobar, Jackie Speier, Anna Eshoo, Chellie Pingree, Debbie Dingell and Hank Johnson.
We must defend human rights everywhere. pic.twitter.com/ZIHtv5Sto6
“Palestinian families have every right to live safely in their homes. That’s why I’ve led my colleagues in a letter calling on the State Department to immediately condemn these heinous actions by the Israeli government against Palestinian families in East Jerusalem. America must defend human rights everywhere,” Newman said in a statement.
In their letter, the House Democrats call on the Biden administration to “immediately send the strongest diplomatic message to Israel to desist from its plans.”
Ultranationalist Jewish groups are seeking to oust dozens of Palestinian families from their homes in the East Jerusalem neighborhood over a real estate dispute. The most imminent notice against four families sparked mass protests in East Jerusalem late last month. Israel’s Supreme Court was slated to hold a hearing on the matter on Monday, which the state decided to delay due to concerns of violence and inte
Democrats condemned Israel for the "infringement of human civil rights" of Palestinians and touted a two-state system as a solution to end the violence.
As a barrage of Israeli air strikes on the besieged Gaza Strip continued late on Wednesday, US President Joe Biden said “Israel has a right to defend itself” against rockets fired from the coastal Palestinian territory.
In brief comments to reporters, Biden said his “hope is that we’ll see this coming to a conclusion sooner than later”, however.
At least 65 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli strikes on Gaza since Monday, after Hamas fired rockets towards Israel in response to a continuing Israeli crackdown on Palestinians in occupied East Jerusalem.
The United States, a major supporter of Israel that provides the country with $3.8bn in military aid annually, has faced calls to “put the brakes on the Israelis” as violence escalates in the occupied Palestinian territories and inside Israel itself.
With violence against Palestinians escalating in East Jerusalem, the US expressed concerns over the situation and the planned evictions in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood. According to multiple media reports, the
Israelis didn’t want to hear these concerns and told the US not to meddle in the crisis.
The concerns were expressed in a Sunday phone call between National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and his Israeli counterpart, Meir Ben-Shabbat. According to Hebrew media reports, Ben-Shabbat told Sullivan that the US and other countries
should stay out of the conflict. He said international pressure on Israel to halt the evictions or stop the violence would be a prize for the rioters and those sending them who hoped to put pressure on Israel.