Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, April 2000, pages 90-94

Arab-American Activism

Michigan Arab Americans Hear Presidential Surrogates

Hundreds of Arabs and Arab Americans gathered in Dearborn, Michigan to listen to surrogates of presidential candidates discuss domestic and foreign policy. The unprecedented event demonstrated to many conference attendees that the Arab-American community has “arrived.”

“The event was important because it represented a town hall meeting where we brought major representatives from the presidential campaigns,” said Arab American Institute (AAI) director James Zogby, whose organization sponsored the event.

Surrogates for the presidential candidates at the Feb. 17, 2000 event included:

• McCain 2000: Senator Chuck Hagel
  
• Gore 2000: Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater
  
• Bush for President: Michigan House Speaker Chuck Periccone
  
• Bradley for President: Gloria Beach, State Director.

Other speakers included Congressman John Dingell (D-MI); Randa Fahmy Hudome, legislative assistant to Sen. Spence Abraham (R-MI); communications director Dennis Denno of the Michigan Democratic Party; and Michigan State Senator Dianne Byrum, who is running for incumbent Democratic Congresswoman Debbie Stabenow’s seat.

“The community is being paid serious attention to. People are looking at the Arab vote in Michigan as a very serious component in this year’s presidential election,” added Zogby.

“Meetings like these are needed and they are a positive step,” said Imad Hamad, director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) Detroit chapter.

The event turned sour during one portion, however, when Senator Chuck Hagel referred to the Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. The positive spirit changed and, while all attendees were clearly put off by the senator’s comments, a few took the opportunity to inform Senator Hagel in less than tactful terms.

“Emotions were very high that night about what was happening in Lebanon and about the insensitivity to this of both parties,” Zogby commented afterward. “What we all saw was a disconnect between the policy debate over Lebanon and the circumstances in Lebanon and the real feelings in our community.

“We have to let politicians know the reality of the situation that is Lebanon today. Israel is the occupier and there is a resistance movement in the south of Lebanon that is legitimate and is abiding by the rules of the game.”

While not excusing Senator Hagel’s comments, Zogby pointed out that “our community has to learn a lesson. There were members of the audience who made compelling arguments, but they got drowned out by a few individuals. Senator Hagel would have learned an important lesson had he not been confronted by a few people who should have known better and, in fact, did know better. Individuals screamed, shook fists, and shouted in Senator Hagel’s face. As a result, he did not learn the things he would have learned.

“We will not win our case by shaking fists and screaming,” said Zogby. “We will win our case because we are right and because the community is right. We have learned in America, through our business dealings, that we succeed because people like us and people learn from us. That people trust us.

“We have Arab Americans today who are working in every presidential campaign and are trusted across the board in politics. We have Arab Americans who are being consulted by the presidential campaigns. But there are some people in our community who still want to play by the old rules, which is unfortunate,” sighed Zogby.

“Overall, the event was a victory,” he said. “We brought 600 people together. We made powerful, compelling cases. We showed politicians our numbers. We’re going to vote in the primaries and we’re going to vote again in big numbers to elect delegates.”

The AAI event was co-sponsored by ACCESS, ADC, St. George of Troy Church, St. Mary Antiochian Orthodox Church, the American Arab Chamber of Commerce, Arab American Journal, Arab American Political Action Committee, Arab Student Union (U of M-Dearborn), Bint Jebail Cultural Center, Chaldean Federation of America, Islamic Center of America, Islamic House of Wisdom, Iraqi Democratic Union, Islamic Institute of Knowledge, Karbala Islamic Education Center, Lebanese American Heritage Club, and the Yemeni American Benevolent Association.

For profiles on the presidential candidates, please go to <http://www.aaiusa.org>. Click on Campaign 2000 and then go to Presidential Campaigns.

—Sheri Muzhar

Council for Palestinian Reparation holds Inaugural Press Conference

Some Palestinians say it’s 52 years late, while others say better late than never. In any case, the March 3 National Press Club inaugural press conference of the Council for Palestinian Repatriation and Restitution (CPRR) made clear that establishment of the organization is an idea whose time has come.

Principal speakers at the event were former Palestinian Authority Education Minister Hanan Ashrawi, University of Chicago Professor of International Law Francis Boyle, Georgetown University Professor Maysam Faruqi, who is the principal organizer of the group which incorporated in December 1999, and 74-year-old Jawdat Hindi, a Palestinian refugee who was forced to flee his home in Palestine in 1948.

Repatriation is “the most important human right of the Palestinian people who were dispossessed, forcibly expelled from their homes in 1948,” CPRR chairwoman Faruqi told journalists. “Therefore a just peace will not take place unless that right is achieved.”

Ashrawi, who served as Palestinian spokesperson during the initial Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations and who now is an adviser to the Washington-based CPRR, called for acknowledgment by the Israelis of the suffering they caused the Palestinians. “What we need is first of all a genuine recognition and admission of guilt and culpability by Israel and the real authentic narrative of the Palestinians to come out,” Ashrawi said. “There was a systematic dispersion of a whole nation and a denial…of their rights to their own identity…to their own history, a right to their own homes and land.

“There are many people who don’t want the story to come out,” Ashrawi charged. “They don’t want to have reality intrude on the myth and the image and the legend of the heroic creation of the state of Israel. [But] if the victims cannot speak out and if we cannot deal with these issues and we cannot resolve them, there can be no peace.”

Jawdat Hindi, a retired schoolteacher now living in Raleigh, NC, said that as a teenager he witnessed the Israeli massacre in his village of Tantura, in which between 100 and 200 Palestinians were killed. After fleeing Palestine he lived in Jordan and Kuwait before coming to the U.S. and becoming an American citizen. Now, he said, as a U.S. citizen he can visit the town in which he was born, but not as a Palestinian.

Professor Boyle discussed the legal bases for claims by Palestinians dispossessed in 1948 and 1967 to repatriation, restitution and compensation, on the basis of which CPRR gathered the support of 150 organizations and 15,000 individual signatures around the world in its first three weeks of existence. The organization affirms “that every Palestinian has a legitimate, individual right to return to his or her original home and to absolute restitution of his or her property.”

In its mission statement the organization pledged “to provide Palestinian victims and refugees with legal advice and assistance in achieving their rights to repatriation, restitution and reparation for lost income attributable to displacement, expulsion and confiscation, and all associated rights.”

It also noted that Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that “Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.” Similarly, Article 12 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights states that “No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of the right to enter his own country.”

In her report on the press conference, Pauline Jelinek of the Associated Press noted that “just as Jewish groups worked to win compensation from Germany for Holocaust victims” the newly formed group of Palestinians is “taking a page from their long-time enemies.”

Dr. Faruqi told the Washington Report that readers can learn more about the organization and how to add their names to the CPRR petition by writing P.O. Box 21520, Washington, DC 20009 or by e-mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

—Richard H. Curtiss

Nazareth: A Case of Israeli Political Propaganda

Father Emil Salayta, priest of the Diocese of Jerusalem and general director of the Latin Patriarchate Schools (covering the entire West Bank and Gaza), spoke on Feb. 14 at the Center for Policy Analysis on Palestine in Washington, DC about recent disturbances in Nazareth, inside Israel’s “Green Line” borders, and general issues facing both Palestinian Muslims and Christians. Father Salayta, of Greek Orthodox Arab Christian Bedouin origins, spoke of his family lineage to Jordan and southern Saudi Arabia, and noted that his own Christian faith “has never been in contradiction with being an Arab.”

The problem in Nazareth, said Father Salayta, “has never been a Christian-Muslim dispute.” He described Nazareth as an example of coexistence and cooperation between Arab Muslims and Christians for centuries. For Christians, he said, Nazareth is a very holy place as the site of the Basilica of Annunciation built over the remains of the house of Mary.

The controversy, Fr. Salayta explained, initially developed as a territorial issue at the site of the Holy Basilica in Nazareth. Members of a small group, known as the Harakat al-Islamiyya (“the Islamic Movement”), said they wanted to build a mosque near the Basilica over the tomb of Shihabuddin, cousin of the Muslim (and Kurdish) hero Salahuddin al-Ayoubi (known in the West as Saladin), who reclaimed Jerusalem and the Holy Land from the Crusaders.

Around Easter of 1998, tensions over the proposed mosque, which would reduce a planned parking lot for visitors to the Basilica, led to direct clashes between Muslims and Christians. While conceding that “the Islamic movement” was elected by a popular majority within Nazareth, Salayta stressed that the group “does not represent, at all, the Muslims of the Galilee.”

Tellingly, the entire Israeli police force present in Nazareth witnessed the clashes, but did nothing to intervene. Instead, the Israeli authorities allowed the violence to continue for three consecutive days. It was a time when Israeli national elections were about to be held, and Israeli authorities began to give public support and direct promises to permit the Palestinian Muslims to build the mosque in Nazareth, despite a ruling of the Nazareth courts against the building of the mosque on that site. Ultimately, said Fr. Salayta, the blame rests on the Israeli government (then headed by Binyamin Netanyahu’s Likud Party), which, in a bid for Muslim votes in Israeli’s elections, encouraged divisions between Muslims and Christians.

Fr. Salayta charged that Israeli authorities played the religion card “to try to destroy harmony in Palestinian society.” The issue was not a question of losing or winning for Palestinians, he said, because both the Muslims and the Christians lost, by creating a false and negative public image of Palestinian Muslim-Christian relations.

The Christian community of Nazareth has asked the Muslims of Nazareth to respect the Christian holy place and to build the mosque elsewhere, Fr. Salayta said. The request was supported by the Mufti of Egypt, Sheikh Nasr Farid, who ruled that it is forbidden for Muslims to pray in the mosque next to the Basilica of the Annunciation. Furthermore, Crown Prince Abdallah Bin Abdul Aziz of Saudi Arabia offered to fund the entire development of the mosque in Nazareth, but not at the site of the Basilica. The consensus of the Arab countries has been against the building of the mosque, Fr. Salayta said, because “everyone in the community feels that [building the mosque] will foster future conflict.”

Because of the sensitivity of the situation, the Patriarch of Jerusalem has proposed to build an Interfaith Center at the site in order to return harmony to Nazareth and rebuild trust between the Arabs. Fr. Salayta explained that the Interfaith Center will stand as, “a place of dialogue between three peoples [Christians, Muslims and Jews].”

Fr. Salayta stressed that the agendas of Christian and Muslim Palestinians are the same—an Arab agenda. “Our aspirations are to enjoy our own state with Jerusalem as the capital,” he explained.

—Adila Masood

Palestinian American Congress Holds Reception for Members of the Palestinian Legislative Council

The Palestinian American Congress (PAC), an organization that speaks on behalf of Palestinians in the United States, held a Feb. 10 reception for members of the Educational and Social Affairs Committee of the Palestinian Legislative Council at the Sumnerfield Hotel in Washington, DC.

The members—committee chairman Sharif Mash’al Abass Zaki; councilmen Musa Za’bout, Ahmad Abdul Fattah Naser, Jawad Khalil Al-Tibi, Outhman Husien Al Ghashash; and committee staff member Ahmad Husnie Khalil Al-Batsh—whose visit was sponsored by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), were introduced to invited PAC guests.

Chairman Zaki described the committee’s work in the West Bank and Gaza to create laws to protect educational and social services, particularly for women, the disadvantaged, and the handicapped. Many of the committee members spent years in Israeli prisons, hoping that some day they could work for democracy in their country, Zaki said. “Yes, we have corruption,” he continued. “Some small cats became big cats by taking advantage of others. But we are working very, very hard to fight corruption.”

Regarding the peace process, Zaki said Palestinians are working to make peace with Israel on the basis of U.N. resolutions, which are not negotiable. Refugees can’t accept an agreement omitting Jerusalem or missing one inch of land occupied in 1967 by Israel. He noted that the Palestinian opposition groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad hesitate to support President Yasser Arafat for fear that Arafat will accept the unacceptable. Zaki warned that Palestinians are sick and tired of giving up more and more as the economy gets worse and worse because Israel has prevented Palestinian access to the world. Palestinian leaders now have zero credibility, and many fear that they won’t be able to control the people if the tide does not change.

Even if the peace process falters, Zaki said “We will announce a Palestinian state on Sept. 13, whether Israel likes it or not. We are determined to have a democratic state, not a few cities isolated by Israel.”

Before Americans looked at Palestinians as the enemy and supported Israeli vetoes, Zaki said. Now Palestinians have established relationships with Americans in the White House, Congress, universities and in many walks of life who “agree with our democratic goals for a country of our own.”

—Delinda C. Hanley

Saeb Erekat Discusses Israeli-Palestinian Track

“We, as Palestinians, believe that we cannot achieve a comprehensive peace without Israeli withdrawal to the June 4th, 1967 borders with Syria.…Israeli withdrawal from south Lebanon…[and] withdrawal from the Palestinian territories occupied in 1967,” said Palestinian Authority (PA) Minister of Local Government Saeb Erekat at a Jan. 19 presentation at the Center for Policy Analysis on Palestine in Washington, DC.

Erekat’s lecture preceded meetings between PA Chairman Yasser Arafat and U.S. President Bill Clinton who, Erekat emphasized, plays a key role in continuing the peace process. Erekat spoke of the final status issues the Israeli and Palestinian leadership still needs to resolve, including Jerusalem, settlements and refugees.

Erekat stressed the importance of discussions between Israel and Syria, yet said that “the finality of the conflict…cannot and will not be obtained without a solution to the Palestinian question in all its aspects.” He emphasized the intimacy of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians: “Today…on the same street, on the same corner, on the same bus, there are Palestinians and Israelis living and interacting with each other.”

Erekat said also that the Israeli-Syrian and Israeli-Palestinian negotiating tracks should not be manipulated against each other. “We will do everything in our power,” he said, “to see to it that the negotiation tracks are parallel tracks and not competitive tracks.” If the different negotiations are played off each other, it “will constitute a major setback to the interests of those attempting to achieve a genuine peace in the region.”

Highlighting his disagreement with Israeli officials who refer to the need to make “painful and difficult decisions,” Erekat said that they should “understand very well that as Palestinians…we will not evaporate, we will not melt, we will not assimilate.” The Palestinians already have compromised, he pointed out, by their willingness to take only 23 percent of Mandatory Palestine for a state, including East Jerusalem.

A genuine peace agreement would need to incorporate the economic, security and social needs of both Israelis and Palestinians, said Erekat. “Security can no longer be guaranteed through geographic and territorial” expansion. “What is required [are] major political decisions, and I hope that the Israeli government will be up to its historical responsibilities that stand ahead of both of us.” Erekat concluded by arguing that “it is doable to achieve a Palestinian-Israeli peace treaty no later than September 2000.”

—Wendy Lehman

Marchers Protest the Israeli Bombing of Lebanon

The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) sponsored a candlelight vigil in front of the Israeli Embassy in Washington, DC on a cold Feb. 15 evening to protest the brutal Israeli bombing of Lebanon. On Feb. 7, 2000, Israel launched a devastating series of air raids against civilian areas in Lebanon, which injured at least 18 civiliansand destroyed three major electrical power plants. The Israeli bombings followed military actions by Lebanese resistance forces that were directed against Israeli occupation troops on Lebanese soil and staged away from civilian areas.

Since 1978 Israel has occupied at least a tenth of Lebanon, which it describes as a “security zone.” In 1978, the U.N. Security Council, including the United States, unanimously demanded in U.N. Resolution 425 that Israel withdraw its troops “forthwith” and without conditions. Since then, Israel has repeatedly attacked Lebanon’s infrastructure and power systems, most recently in June 1999, when eight civilians were killed. Each time the country rebuilds its infrastructure, Israel bombs again.

ADC’s organizing director, Nabil Mohamad, distributed literature including an ADC fact sheet listing Lebanese casualty figures resulting from Israel’s repeated invasions. More than 1,000 Lebanese were killed in 1978; another 19,085 civilians were killed in 1982, culminating in the Israeli-coordinated massacre at the Sabra and Shatila Palestinian refugee camps in Beirut in which at least 1,500 unarmed civilians were murdered; in July 1993 Israel killed more than 125 civilians; and in 1996 civilians were explicitly targeted in attacks on an ambulance, homes, and even the deliberate shelling of civilians who had taken refuge in the U.N. compound at Qana that killed 102 civilians.

Angry that U.S. television news reports focused on Israeli civilians huddling in bomb shelters in case there were any Lebanese attacks (there were not), rather than reports of actual bombing by Israel, American demonstrators of every age and ethnic background gathered in front of the Israeli Embassy. They chanted “Israel out of Lebanon Now,” “Stop the bombing,” and “Obey Resolution 425,” and waved placards reading “International Law: Occupation is Illegal. Resistance is Legal,” and “Peace Begins When Occupation Ends.”

—Delinda C. Hanley

Arab-American Reception Held in Chicago

The fifth annual Arab-American Networking Reception was held at the posh Chicago Athletic Club in downtown Chicago on Thursday, Feb. 3. The annual event brings together hundreds of businessmen, professionals, and politicians of mostly Arab descent to interact with one another and give guests the opportunity to build networks and strengthen existing ties.

This year’s event was hosted by the Arab-American Bar Association, the Arab-American Business and Professional Association, the Arab-American Medical Association, and the Arab-American Association of Engineers and Architects.

Bill Haddad was the emcee for the evening’s program, which included speeches by the presidents of each of the host organizations.

Senior Illinois Circuit Court Judge Thomas R. Fitzgerald, a candidate for the Illinois Supreme Court, was given the Distinguished Service Award for his support of the Arab-American community, in particular Arab-American lawyers.

The reception was attended by nearly 300 people, who are the changing face of a traditionally commerce-oriented immigrant community. Arab Americans now number nearly four million in the United States, and their presence is increasingly being felt in all aspects of American society, from business to government, and from the classroom to the courtroom.

—Raeed N. Tayeh

Peace Now and American Committee on Jerusalem Sponsor Conference

A Jewish-American group, Americans for Peace Now (APN), and an Arab-American group, the American Committee on Jerusalem (ACJ), co-sponsored a Feb. 11 Capitol Hill conference to explore the sensitive and intricate issues surrounding Israeli-Palestinian final status negotiations over the future of Jerusalem. Decision-makers on Capitol Hill and activists listened to leading authorities on Jerusalem from both communities present their perspectives on the issue and explore possibilities for resolving disagreements.

The first keynote speaker, ACJ president and director for international studies at the University of Chicago Dr. Rashid Khalidi, said he believed “an equitable agreement on sharing Jerusalem between the two peoples for which it is the capital, the Palestinians and the Israelis, is the key to a just and lasting peace in the Middle East. Given the absolute centrality of Jerusalem to both peoples, it seems to me an illusion to assume any kind of real settlement worth the name is attainable without addressing both sides’ basic aspirations as far as Jerusalem is concerned.”

There are three aspirations that must be taken into account, Khalidi said: “Jerusalem is, as far as the Palestinians are concerned, their capital, and it must be recognized as such. Such recognition is necessary if the Palestinians are expected to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. One of the little-recognized benefits when this does happen is that other Arabs and Muslims, and, incidentally, the rest of the world, will rapidly follow suit with such recognition.

“The second of these aspirations has to do with the fact that, as we all know, Jerusalem is as sacred to Palestinian Christians and Palestinian Muslims as it is to Jews. That goes without saying. Beyond that, however, Jerusalem is the largest Arab city in Palestine. It is the communications hub of the West Bank, and for both of these reasons, there must be absolutely free and unimpeded access to and through Jerusalem for all Palestinians which, as you may know, is not currently the case and has not been for many years. This is an absolute desideratum of a settlement.

“A third relates to the fact that as far as Palestinians are concerned, it is completely unacceptable that the Arab population of Jerusalem continue to be subject to the rule of others as they currently are. What this means is that they have to be fully recognized as citizens of a Palestinian state, which they already have been in part by the Oslo accords. It means, moreover, that they must enjoy some form of municipal self-governance with all that follows in terms of zoning and land use.”

Khalidi discussed the need for genuine assistance from powerful friends like the United States. “I have to say, and it pains me to say it on Capitol Hill, that unfortunately the contribution from this country thus far has often been less than helpful. I think it has encouraged intransigence sometimes rather than a search for a compromise. I would stress that for our country to assist in a resolution of this issue means treating Jerusalem not as a domestic political football. It means treating it as an extremely sensitive matter where every single word said in this building, on the Hill, in this country has the potential to either help or hinder the search for a compromise, and what we need is a compromise.”

He concluded by saying, “It means finally that Americans have to play a serious part not in imposing a solution which, of course, is unfeasible, but rather in facilitating a solution in which both sides can live in dignity with Jerusalem as the capital of two states at peace with one another.”

Dr. Ron Pundik, a key architect of both the Oslo accords and the “Beilin-Abu Mazen Understanding” on Israeli-Palestinian final status issues, said that the Zionist dream belongs in the past. “In an era of peace a border is only a line on a map. It doesn’t divide a city. The solution must be based on reality, not dreams,” Pundik said, “Not on religious or messianic dreams. If there is no peace with Palestinians, there is no peace with Arabs.”

It seems ludicrous that Jerusalem’s man-made borders have become holy, Pundik said. How can we claim a city with 200,000 Palestinians and two refugee camps “is our holy eternal capital forever and ever?” he questioned.

Dr. Salim Tamari, director of the Institute of Jerusalem Studies in Jerusalem, said: “In the case of Jerusalem, we have a unique situation where all of the outstanding issues unresolved by the Oslo agreement are combined in one package: the status of the city itself, the existence of a large number of Jewish settlements on the Arab side of the city, and the question of refugees from the western part of the city, from the ’48 war and displaced persons from the ’67 war. As a result, many of these people lost their right to stay in the city, a right which, of course, has never been denied to any Israeli Jew who moves in and out of the city at will.”

Daniel Seidermann, lead counsel and one of the founding members of Ir Shalem (Whole City), an Israeli non-profit organization working to make Jerusalem a viable city for all of its residents, said, “Jerusalem will be shared by two peoples or it will be a living hell for both. There will be no end to the conflict without addressing the fundamental issues of Jerusalem. My goodness, if we cannot have Jerusalem accepted as the capital of Israel in Disney World, in the home state of Dr. Irving Moskowitz, how are we going to fare in a rather more hostile arena, the international arena?

“I grew up the son of a refugee family, Holocaust survivors in upstate New York,” Seidermann continued. “Rashid is also from a refugee family. We grew up in New York City in about the same time. Jerusalem is not Jerusalem—and I say this as a Zionist and as an Israeli—Jerusalem is not Jerusalem without the Khalidi family heritage. It is a different city, and it is simply unconscionable that Rashid be able to come to Jerusalem by right only as an American citizen and not as a Palestinian. That has to be addressed, regardless of the issue of sovereignty.”

Peter Edelman, vice chair for Peace Now and a professor at Georgetown University, moderated the event. Roundtable discussants included: Ellen Laipson, vice chairman of the National Intelligence Council; Mark Rosenblum, founder and policy director of Peace Now; and Seymour Reich, past president of B’nai B’rith International and of the American Zionist Movement.

—Delinda C. Hanley

U.S. Embassy Site in Jerusalem Challenged

The American Committee on Jerusalem (ACJ) hosted a Feb. 17 briefing on Capitol Hill to reveal the true ownership of land on which a new U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem is slated to be built. In a three-year investigation Dr. Walid Khalidi, an internationally recognized historian of the Middle East, and author of All That Remains, discovered that the future embassy site consists of land mostly owned by Palestinians.

Armed with plot maps, he illustrated the ownership of each square of land to the audience which included diplomats, congressional aides, State Department officials, journalists, and representatives from human rights and religious groups. Painstaking investigation of land records and other documents has determined that a total of 19 Jerusalem families, 4 Christian and 15 Muslim, are the principal owners of this land. Of particular concern to U.S. officials is Dr. Khalidi’s conclusion that at least 88 of the original owners of the prospective American Embassy site or their heirs are U.S. citizens. Another 43 owners are Canadians and Europeans, and hundreds have other nationalities.

The rest of the land is made up of Waqf (Muslim religious endowment) property, for which the British government was paying rent until the moment it left Palestine in May 1948.

ACJ’s legal counsel on this matter, George Salem, said “the State Department is mistaken in its assertions that there are no private claims to the property.” He told the Capitol Hill audience that there is an “outstanding request for a substantive meeting with the Secretary of State, Madeline Albright, or her designee to discuss these U.S. citizens’ claims to the Jerusalem property.” He stressed that “ACJ is committed to pursuing this issue in all of its aspects. Under the specific terms of a 1989 agreement between Israel and the United States concerning the embassy site, the fact that the Jerusalem property is not “free from any encumbrances or third-party claims,” Salem said, “renders any lease for this property null and void as a matter of law.”

The relocation of the U.S. Embassy in Israel was mandated by Congress in 1995. No U.S. administration has recognized Israeli sovereignty over any part of Jerusalem, and the United States has maintained its embassy in Tel Aviv. ACJ president Dr. Rashid Khalidi observed that “The Jerusalem Embassy Act passed by Congress in 1995 is ignorant, misguided, insensitive, and immoral. It is a disservice to American prestige and credibility. It is a threat to American national security interests.”

According to Khalidi, the Embassy Act “retrospectively endorses Israeli wholesale confiscations of refugee properties since 1948 because the majority of the site is owned by Palestinian refugees....It also ignores the interests of tens of U.S. citizens who have private property rights on this site.”

—Delinda C. Hanley

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