76 Members of Congress write to Netanyahu over Israel demolitions

Seventy-six Members of Congress have co-signed a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urging him to end the demolitions and evictions of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.

According to J Street, a Washington DC-based liberal Zionist pressure group, “the letter notes that the destruction and displacement of these communities pose a serious threat to the human rights of Palestinians, to the prospects for a two-state solution and to Israel’s future as a Jewish and democratic state.”

“This is the latest sign that US lawmakers are increasingly concerned by the alarming consequences of the Israeli government’s policies in the West Bank,” said Dylan Williams, J Street’s Vice President of Government Affairs.

Demolitions, evictions and settlement expansion clearly imperil the prospects for a peaceful two-state solution.

In the letter, the members write: “The forcible eviction of Palestinian communities and the expansion of settlements in areas of the West Bank, which would become part of a future Palestinian state, abandon our two countries’ shared values of justice and respect for human rights.”

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The letter also “cites over 300 rabbis, organised by J Street and other American Jewish groups, who wrote to Netanyahu in January opposing demolitions”.