CMEP Action Alert: Tell Your Member of Congress: Support Development for Peace
Write your member of Congress today to let them know that you support continued U.S. aid to the Palestinians. Tell your representatives in Washington that U.S. financial assistance is helping provide the building blocks for peace.
The security, education, healthcare programs for ordinary Palestinians that U.S. aid supports should not become pawns in the politics of a UN confrontation. Don’t stand by and let these punitive measures become a part of U.S. policy.
With so much attention focused on what happens at the United Nations, it is easy to forget about the role that U.S. aid plays in improving the daily lives and security of everyone in the region. That aid is vital to laying the groundwork for a future Palestinian state that can exist as a peaceful and constructive neighbor to Israel and all countries in the region. But that aid is now under threat.
Two key bills in the House of Representatives call for dramatic cuts in funding to the Palestinian Authority and UN agencies that provide humanitarian support and development programs for the Palestinian people. The draft text of the State Department and Foreign Operations Appropriations bill and the recently released United Nations reform bill, H.R. 2829, both take specific aim at U.S. funding for the Palestinian Authority and programs that support the Palestinian people, and seek to punish the Palestinian people for the Palestinian leadership’s pursuit of a resolution at the UN.
No matter what the outcome at the United Nations, dramatic cuts in U.S. aid, the largest single-state donor to the Palestinians, would be dangerous. The suggested cuts would decimate the dramatic security and quality-of-life improvements that have been achieved in the West Bank and would be detrimental to the security of Israelis and Palestinians alike, not to mention U.S. interests in the region.
Write your member of Congress today and let them know that you believe that the called-for funding cuts are detrimental to U.S., Israeli, and Palestinian interests alike. Let them know that you support continued U.S. aid to the Palestinians and the UN agencies that assist them because this aid helping to lay the groundwork for a future peace.