Brit Tzedek v'Shalom

Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 9, 2003
Contact: Aliza Becker, Tel: 773.583.5747
aliza@btvshalom.org

JEWISH ALLIANCE FOR JUSTICE AND PEACE HAILS MIDEAST TALKS AT AQABA
Statement by President Marcia Freedman

The Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace, Brit Tzedek v'Shalom, applauds President George W. Bush's recent efforts on behalf of Mideast peace.

The Jewish Alliance recognizes the events in Aqaba of June 4 as no less historic than the Rabin-Arafat handshake on the White House lawn in 1993.

We call upon other Jewish organizations to join us in supporting the President, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas for the initial steps they took in Aqaba on June 4.

We urge the President to continue "riding herd" on the process. American resolve is critical to ensure that deeds match the words uttered in Aqaba.

Brit Tzedek has long called upon the Administration, in concert with the international community, to play a more active role in reviving hopes for a Mideast settlement. We have criticized the Administration's past timidity and suggested a new initiative for the United States to further the peace process by bringing the settlers home from the Occupied Territories.

Although we applaud the Administration's initial efforts on behalf of the Road Map, we fear that the President's resolve has not yet been tested.

Suicide bombings and targeted assassinations have repeatedly torpedoed past peace initiatives. We call on the President to insist that the parties remain resolute in their refusal to be held hostage to extremists on both sides of the conflict.

The President also faces a re-election campaign in which his advisors may urge him to drop his Mideast peace efforts to attract Jewish voters. This is a misperception of the views of the American Jewish community. Although the leading Jewish organizations have at best grudgingly supported the Road Map, these organizations are increasingly out of step with the views of the large majority of American Jews as well as the large majority of Israelis who support the Road Map to peace and want an active American role.

The extremist settlers who now call Sharon a "traitor" should not distract us from the fact that the large majority of settlers are not ideological extremists. Most of them moved to the West Bank in response to generous government incentives and would be willing to move back into Israel if they could afford it.

Removing this major obstacle to peace has been the focus of Brit Tzedek's recent petition campaign, which calls for the United States to take the lead in creating an international fund to buy the settlers out. Such a step, made in concert with other industrialized countries, could hand the Bush administration a potent instrument for furthering the peace process by reducing greatly the number of settlers in the Territories and the degree of resistance to evacuation.

In a very short period, more than 4,500 American Jews have signed the Call to Bring the Settlers Home to Israel. These include Theodore Bikel, Vivian Gornick, Morton Halperin, Rabbi Arthur Hertzberg, Adam Hochschild, Stanley Hoffmann, Alice Kessler-Harris, Robert Jay Lifton, former Congressman Abner J. Mikva, Rabbi Paul J. Menitoff, Newton Minow, Grace Paley, Eli Pariser, Letty Cottin Pogrebin, Art Spiegelman, Gloria Steinem, and Studs Terkel. Other endorsers are listed here

For more information, or to arrange an interview with Board President Marcia Freedman, please contact Aliza Becker, Tel: 773.583.5747; Email: aliza@btvshalom.org.

For press kit materials, go to www.btvshalom.org/pressrelease/

The Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace, Brit Tzedek v'Shalom, is a grassroots organization of American Jews deeply committed to Israel's well-being through the achievement of a negotiated settlement to the long-standing Israeli-Palestinian conflict.