| Last week, U.S. Representative Betty McCollum (D-MN) introduced H.R. 4391, to restrict U.S. aid to Israel if “Israeli military forces or police” engagein “physical violence” or use “military detention” against Palestinians under the age of 18. A day later, according to the Times of Israel, a 17-year-oldPalestinian deliberately ran over two Israeli civilians (one of them an elderly man), then attempted to stab other Israelis, near the town of Efrat [pictured below] The terrorist was then shot by Israeli soldiers, an act which apparently would trigger a cut-off of some U.S. aid if the McCollum billbecomes law. “In the wake of continued terrorist attacks by young Palestinians targeting Israeli citizens, the Simon Wiesenthal Center calls on Rep. McCollum andher co-sponsors* to withdraw the bill that parallels a global effort to cast Israel’s efforts to protect its citizens from terrorists’ attacks as child abuse. In fact, the proposedlegislation would actually serve as enabler of the ongoing systematic child abuse of Palestinian children by Hamas and the Palestinian Authority,” charged Rabbi Abraham Cooper, Associate Dean and Director of Global Social Action for the Simon Wiesenthal Center, a leading Jewish Human Rights NGO. “Palestinian youth do need a “Protection Act”—but not from Israelis,” Cooper continued. “They need protection from Hamas that uses them as human shields forterrorism and who send them to dig terror tunnels. They need protection from the brainwashing of the Palestinian Authority that teaches them to deny the rights and humanityof their Jewish neighbors,” Rabbi Cooper concluded *[Representatives Mark Pocan(D-WI), Earl Blumenauer(D-OR), André Carson(D-IN), John Conyers, Jr.(D-MI), Danny K. Davis(D-IL), Peter A. DeFazio(D-OR), Raul Grijalva(D-AZ), Luis V.Gutiérrez(D-IL, and Chellie Pingree(D-ME)]. See Rep. Mc Collum’s bill at: https://mccollum.house.gov/sites/mccollum.house.gov/files/documents/17.1107MCCOLL_005_xml.pdf For more information, please contact the Center's Communications Department, 310-553-9036. Join the Center on Facebook, www.facebook.com/simonwiesenthalcenter, or follow @simonwiesenthal for news updates sent direct to your Twitter feed. The Simon Wiesenthal Center is one of the largest international Jewish human rights organizations with over 400,000 memberfamilies in the United States. It is an NGO at international agencies including the United Nations, UNESCO, the OSCE, the OAS, the Council of Europe and the Latin American Parliament(Parlatino). |
