In Israel, war rages. Dozens of IDF troops have died in fierce fighting with Hamas as Jerusalem’s warriors continue vanquishing Gaza’s terrorists and working to free the kidnapped. In
Washington, our elected officials are finding new ways to disappoint us, so we’re going to grab a few thousand of our closest friends, travel to our nation’s capital and have a little chat with our leaders.
Situation Update
It has been one month since the October 7th Hamas Massacre of more than 1,400 innocent Israelis. More than 240 men, women and children remain in Hamas captivity. After an extensive aerial campaign, Israeli ground troops and armor have entered Gaza and are holding key territories inside the coastal enclave.
The Israeli military has destroyed thousands of terrorist targets, encircled Gaza City, and divided Gaza’s North from its South. Simultaneously, Israel has opened up a humanitarian corridor allowing residents of northern Gaza to flee the fighting while enabling numerous trucks with humanitarian goods to enter southern Gaza from Egypt.
To Israel’s north, exchanges of fire continue with Hezbollah, and residents of Kiryat Shmoneh – a small town of 22,000 in northern Israel – have been asked to evacuate after more than a dozen missiles were fired at their community over the weekend. In Judea and Samaria, Israel continues to engage in counterterror operations, arresting dozens of terrorists in recent raids.
Finally, the American presence in the region has increased both strategically and diplomatically. First and foremost, the US is deploying a nuclear-capable, Ohio-class submarine to the Middle East – with a public announcement the Navy rarely makes. On the diplomatic front, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken travelled to Ramallah and Baghdad in recent days to meet with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani.
It has also been reported in both American and Arabic news outlets that the U.S. has sent a direct message to Tehran: if Hezbollah or Iran get involved in this war, the U.S. will as well. This seems to have worked as Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah’s delivered a speech on Friday in which he took great pains to separate Hezbollah and Iran from the Hamas Massacre. Between Nasrallah’s words, and the fact that he was delivering them from a hidden bunker, the speech was a masterclass in straight-faced cowardice.
Washington Update
Last week, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed the Stop Harboring Iranian Petroleum (SHIP) Act – one of just three policy items included in CUFI’s 2023 Washington Summit legislative agenda. If signed into law, the bill would target entities that aid in Iran’s multi-billion-dollar illicit international oil trade which funds Iran’s support for terror, including the 10/7 Massacre. The Senate needs to advance the House-passed SHIP act in short order.
The House of Representatives also advanced a $14.5 billion military supplemental package for Israel, but unfortunately, the legislation conditioned aid to Israel on U.S. budget cuts elsewhere. As Israel-haters in Congress have spent years seeking to open the Pandora’s Box of conditioning aid to Israel, the legislation, which will never even be considered in the Senate, constitutes an unforced error with consequences at home and abroad.
In the near term, this dithering is seen in Tehran, Damascus, Ramallah, and Moscow as further evidence of Washington’s partisan-induced paralysis creating opportunities to further the ambitions of those who would like to see both the United States and Israel defeated. The Senate meanwhile is crafting its own aid package which it will need to pass in the coming days as the congressional schedule begins to bump up into the fall and winter holidays.
Action Update
The IDF will handle the terrorists in Gaza; we have to handle their allies and enablers in Washington. On November 14th, the pro-Israel community is gathering at 1:00 pm on the National Mall. And we’ll be there.
We’ll be there to tell our leaders that Israel needs them to cease their bickering and get the job done. We’ll be there to let Congress know that every day the House of Representatives tolerates Rep. Rashida Tlaib’s incessant antisemitism is a day that brings shame and dishonor upon that institution. And we’ll be there to tell the 16 Members of the People’s House who refused to support a resolution condemning Hamas’s atrocities that we see them, and we know they are nothing more than accessories to Hamas’s war crimes.
As always, thank you for taking the time to stay on top of these issues and ensure you’re able to do the most you can for Zion’s sake. More information about the November 14th event will be coming out soon, and if you can make it, we hope to see you there.
Sincerely,
The CUFI Action Fund Team
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