In this week’s Update, we focus on a core issue with the Biden administration’s approach to foreign policy: their failure to back up words with actions. This failure stretches into a number of arenas with which Israel’s supporters are concerned, but this week we’ll focus on Team Biden’s interactions with the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the Palestinian Authority (PA).
Dear ICC, Please Do as We Ask?
On Friday, the Biden administration announced they were ending Trump administration era sanctions against members of the ICC who had unilaterally extended jurisdiction to American military actions in Afghanistan and Israeli actions subsequent to the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teenagers in 2014.
Neither the US nor Israel are members of the ICC. And no American or Israeli administration has ever acquiesced to the ICC’s jurisdiction. Interestingly, the Biden administration’s statements remain consistent with this policy. In fact, in the very announcement ending the sanctions against relevant ICC personnel, the State Department noted, “We maintain our longstanding objection to the Court’s efforts to assert jurisdiction over personnel of non-States Parties such as the United States and Israel.”
So why has the Biden administration ended the sanctions against those people responsible for targeting American and Israeli soldiers? Because they feel “engagement with all stakeholders in the ICC process” is the answer to the ICC’s brazen actions. Unfortunately, if this approach worked, we wouldn’t be in the present situation to begin with.
Dear PA: Pretty Please….?
You’ll not be surprised to learn that the PA has continued its pay-to-slay program. You know the one: where they pay terrorists and their families a stipend for killing innocent people. Several years ago, Congress advanced and President Trump signed legislation, the Taylor Force Act, into law that prevented American taxpayer dollars from ending up in the hands of the PA so long as that entity paid terrorists to kill people.
In January, the Biden administration assured the American people that “the Biden-Harris administration will fully comply with US law, including the Taylor Force Act.” Yet last week we learned that the US plans on sending $100 million to the Palestinians. The vast majority of these funds were not made public, and we only learned about them after the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) quietly notified Congress of the intention to provide the aid.
Moreover, and not to put too fine a point on it, but according to news coverage, news of the Biden administration’s plans came just a few hours after the release of a Government Accountability Office report which noted that USAID “had not properly vetted all of its Palestinian funding recipients for U.S. antiterrorism criteria as required by law.”
Put simply, the Biden administration has sent the ICC, the PA, and America’s adversaries a bad message: do as we ask, or
we’ll issue some strongly worded statements, and then engage with you.
President Theodore Roosevelt’s approach to foreign policy was to “speak softly and carry a big stick.” President Biden’s appears to be the opposite.
Yom HaShoah
Holocaust Remembrance Day begins this evening and will be commemorated tomorrow. In Israel, sirens will sound throughout the land and the entire nation will stop what they are doing, stand still, and contemplate the enormous loss and lessons of the genocide by which all others are measured.
CUFI’s founder and Chairman Pastor John Hagee has often said that if we love the Jews of the Bible but refuse to stand up for the Jews in our communities, our country and our world, we are failing to fulfil God’s biblical mandate to stand with His people.
From advancing Holocaust education initiatives at the state level to standing up to misguided federal foreign policies that imperil Israel, at the CUFI Action Fund our mission is to serve as the voice of those Christians—like you—who know the importance of this solemn day and choose, not just today but every day, to act upon God’s mandate to stand alongside our Jewish brothers and sisters and fulfill the promise of Never Again.
To borrow the words of CUFI's dear friend and Holocaust survivor, the late Irving Roth,
spoken to those who participated in CUFI's Living Witness Tour to Poland, your participation in CUFI “has taken the words Never Again and is making reality from it. And for that, I'm thankful for you. The Jewish people are thankful for you. And I believe that humanity should be thankful for you. You are the righteous of the world - a heavy burden. But I know, deep in my heart, you're up to the test. And that gives me hope for the future.”
As always, we are grateful to you for your commitment to ensuring the evils of the past are never repeated and America stands with Israel, our friend and
ally.
Sincerely,
|
|
|
