CMEP Action Alert: “Don’t punish the Palestinians for attaining UN observer status”

Members of Congress are still seeking to punish the Palestinians for elevating its status at the UN last month. A bi-partisan group is asking other House Members to sign a letter to President Obama asking him to close the PLO mission in DC, recall the U.S. Consul General in Jerusalem who works with the Palestinian Authority, and cut off funding to any other UN body that admits the Palestinians as a member. The letter is being circulated by Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), Howard Berman (D-CA), Edward Royce (R-CA), and Eliot Engel (D-NY).

The measures recommended in the letter are ill-conceived and self-defeating. The Members state that direct talks are the only way to resolve the outstanding issues between Israelis and Palestinians, but the measures they propose would undercut U.S. diplomacy and make it harder for direct talks to take place. Cutting off funding to UN agencies would deprive the U.S. of the benefits those bodies bring to U.S. national interests around the world.

Act now and tell your Member of Congress not to sign on to theRos-Lehtinen/Berman/Royce/Engel letter