The Coalition for Jewish Values slammed the presidential candidate for saying if elected he would restore American aid payments to the Palestinians, which they use to pay terror salaries.
By Yakir Benzion, United With Israel
The American group Coalition for Jewish Values (CJV), which represents over 1,500 traditional rabbis, called on Sunday for Senator Joe Biden to back down from his statement that if elected president he would resume giving American foreign aid to the Palestinian Authority, which continues to pay salaries to convicted terrorists and their families.
The rabbis also demanded Biden take back his claim that Israeli annexation of Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria would “jeopardize a two-state solution.”
“Every American should be outraged,” said Rabbi Dov Fischer, Western Regional Vice President of the CJV. “Joe Biden has just said he would break US law to do something which is also, of course, morally repugnant — to re-involve the American taxpayer in incentivizing terrorism against innocent Americans like Taylor Force and others.”
Force was the American veteran who was murdered by a Palestinian terrorist in 2016 while in Israel as part of his MBA program. The Taylor Force Act was passed by Congress with bipartisan support in 2018 and requires the Palestinians to stop their “pay to slay” program in order to continue receiving foreign aid from the United States.
The Palestinian Authority has spent over $1 billion to date in cash payments to Palestinians in Israeli jails convicted of attacks against Israelis, and to the families of Palestinian terrorists killed during attacks against Israelis and other foreign nationals including Americans like Force.
PA President Mahmoud Abbas has refused to do so, saying that killed and imprisoned murderers are “the most sanctified” and that “If we are left with one penny, we will spend it on the families of the prisoners and martyrs.”
The CJV criticized Biden for saying the settlements threatened peace, noting that even President Barack Obama had acknowledged there would be land swaps with the Palestinians for settlement blocks that would stay under Israeli control. In an interview last week U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman said the Trump administration would recognize an Israeli declaration of sovereignty over settlements if Israel met certain conditions.
“As a Senator, Joe Biden both declared and demonstrated his strong support for Israel,” said CJV vice president Rabbi Yoel Schonfeld. “Yet in recent years he has been pulled away by radical anti-Israel leftists.”
Schonfeld said Biden blames the Trump administration “for following US law.”
“He must realize that fairness and civil rights demand a balanced approach, without double standards that blame Israel for desiring to live in peace,” Schonfeld said.
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