Biden Admin Secretly Ended Trump Policy of Cooperation With Israeli Science and Tech Institutions in Judea and Samaria
Former Ambassador David M. Friedman on U.S. boycott of Israeli institutions in the so-called West Bank: “Make no mistake. The United States, by this action, is embracing the BDS Movement.”
Two weeks ago, the State Department informed Israel that the United States would no longer fund research projects in the West Bank, the Golan Heights, and East Jerusalem with Israeli science and tech institutions, the Times of Israel reports. The move restores the policy that was in place from 1967 until late 2020, when President Trump reversed it, removing existing bans on taxpayer-funded cooperation with entities in those restricted areas.
In fact, as reported in Axios, the decision to reinstate the prior policy banning cooperation with projects in the settlements was made early on in Biden’s presidency. But it came to light only recently when one of the institutions in those areas submitted an application for research funding. Its hand now forced, the State Department re-implemented the prior policy restrictions.
From the State Department spokesperson’s statement to Axios:
“The Department of State recently circulated foreign policy guidance to relevant agencies advising that engaging in bilateral scientific and technological cooperation with Israel” in the occupied West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights “is inconsistent with U.S. foreign policy.”
…
The spokesperson said that the U.S. “strongly values scientific and technological cooperation” with Israel and such cooperation continues.
“This guidance is simply reflective of the longstanding U.S. position … that the ultimate disposition of the geographic areas which came under the administration of Israel after June 5, 1967 is a final status matter and that we are working towards a negotiated two-state solution in which Israel lives in peace and security alongside a viable Palestinian state,” the spokesperson added.
But critics say this “longstanding U.S. position” is nothing less than a U.S. government boycott of Israeli Jews based on where they live. That was Senator Ted Cruz’s take this past Sunday when he blasted the Biden administration for its quiet re-implementation of the pre-Trump era prohibitions:
Joe Biden and Biden administration officials are pathologically obsessed with undermining Israel. Since day one of their administration they have launched campaigns against our Israeli allies that are granular, whole of government, and done in secret.
“This new boycott of Israeli Jews is yet another example. The State Department is telling the entire U.S. government not to cooperate with Jews in Judea and Samaria. And of course it was sent to Congress in secret, and only revealed because reporters found out.
“The Biden administration defends funding scientific research in Wuhan with the Chinese Communist Party, but they’re discriminating against and banning cooperation with Jews based on where they live.
“I will do everything possible to reverse this decision and prohibit such antisemitic discrimination by the U.S. government in the future.”
Former U.S. Ambassador to Israel David Friedman agrees. Friedman and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signed the Trump Administration agreement removing the barriers to cooperation with research entities in the settlements. “But apparently that’s now over as the Biden Administration has restored the boycott,” Friedman tweeted on Sunday:
Make no mistake. The United States, by this action, is embracing the BDS Movement, violating a binding bilateral agreement with Israel, and creating a lose/lose dynamic whereby the people of the region — Israelis and Palestinians — will lose the most.
We knew something like this was going to happen. We just didn’t know it would happen this fast. The Biden administration’s “whole of government” ban on funding research entities in the settlements, regardless of what they call it, creates a government-sponsored boycott of those entities. And it comes just weeks after another newly minted “whole of government” policy: the National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism covered here.
The problem with the new White House strategy, we said then, is that it equivocates on its mission. The plan leaves “antisemitism” so vaguely defined that we wondered if it would become a pretext for permitting it instead of a plan for stopping it. Perversely, it could actually enable the antisemitism it promised to oppose.
Because today’s antisemitism doesn’t fit the old definitions. It finds expression in anti-Zionism—campaigns to boycott, divest, and sanction Israel (BDS); accusations of apartheid against Israel; and calls for the destruction of the Jewish state.
You won’t find the term “boycott” anywhere in the President’s new plan. Now we know why.
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Comments
Orange man Bad! Jews Bad!
QED Jews are orange!
Orange man bad! Jew Orange!
I set up an easy Orange Jews/Juice wordplay response and that’s the best you could come up with?
The world’s most unsurprising antisemitism.
Most antisemitism seems to come from the left.
Nothing new. Hitler was after all a man of the left.
Are you really surprised
Only President whose ancestors never had slaves, includes Obama, like I said.. all
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/06/every-living-former-u-s-president-except-trump/
Muslims sold slaves out of Kenya so I would guess that BOs fathers side is not clean either.
There is nothing clean about BO.
In other words the “researches” didn’t (or couldn’t) trace Trump’s family back far enough into history. There is also the selection bias of only “researching” living ex-Presidents.
Except as a curiosity, unworthy of being posted in response to Biden’s Israel policy, this is irrelevant to everyone who isn’t part of the Trump cult.
Only after Israel is a Arab-dominant.Islamic state will this administration ease off.
Arabs advocate extermination of Jews, driving them into the ocean turnabout seems reasonable for unreasonable people.
but, remember, Jews: Harry Truman, a Democrat, was the first to recognize the state of Israel, so, all these years later you still owe your vote to them.
Besides, those mean old Republicans kept you out of their country clubs.
I personally refrain from characterizing American Jews as a monolithic bloc, in terms of their political loyalties. Yes, too many American Jews still reflexively vote Dumb-o-crat, but, frankly, the same can be said about American Christian voters, especially in urban areas. And, there are many American Jews who are staunch conservatives, as the good Professor J. here at LI demonstrates.
I have a Jewish friend, male is is conservative, his Jewish wife is a Dem. No one has supported black American as much as Jews, yet blacks are increasingly anti-Semite. Jews need to wise up.
Also it could be punishment for Israel not sending arms and support to Ukraine.
A secret-to-the-target-nation punishment isn’t useful. If pressuring Israel to help out against the nation supplying and supporting their enemies was the goal then it would be done openly.
No. His Imperial Executiveness, Barak the Nonpareil has simply restored his antisemitic, anti-Israel policy through his sock puppet Quid Pro Joe. And he’s still having Quid Pro Joe’s administration working on restoring the Iranian sweetheart deal.
I hope all the Jews who voted for this feeble, frail, demented doofus are just tickled by this news. There’s a synagogue near me which has tilted Left. I haven’t set foot in it since the 2020 presidential election.
So you can see why it was so important for Democrats to isolate Saudi Arabia after it was made clear they were talking to the Juices via back channels through Trumps Presidency.
It seems in Democrats best interests to keep the conflict in the Middle East going for as long as possibly regardless of the cost in lives or money.
This is more proof of the abandonment of Israel by this admnistration .Yet the portions of the Jewish establishment that encourage aliyah and settlement in such areas remains silent as this administration continues to throw Israel under the bus
Whatever happened to Milstein?