US trade law seeks to defend the unacceptable

If Congress passes the TPA legislation, the US will be defending Israeli settlements against European pressure, writes James Zogby

For the first 14 years of the occupation, the US called Israeli settlement construction “illegal”. Menahem Kahana / AFP

On March 2, the US Senate finance committee voted unanimously to insert an amendment into the Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) legislation. According to its principal sponsor, Ben Cardin, the amendment would discourage activity that “penalises, or otherwise limits commercial relations with Israel”.

The intended targets of this effort are the countries of the EU that have called on Israel to clearly mark whether products originate in settlements in occupied Palestinian lands.

For the first 14 years of the occupation, the US called Israeli settlement construction “illegal”. Beginning in the Reagan years, however, the US dumbed down its language referring to settlements as “unhelpful” or “an obstacle to peace”. Europe, on the other hand, has been consistent in affirming the position that such settlements are in violation of international law.

Having wearied of Israel’s refusal to abide by conventions that ban the expropriation of or transfer of population into occupied lands, Europe’s actions are intended to send a clear message of displeasure with Israel’s continued flagrant violation of these laws, as well as making a statement that Europe will not be party to Israel’s efforts to derive economic benefits from the settlements.

Fearing that European pressure will only grow as Israel’s government rejects efforts to end its occupation activities, AIPAC (Washington’s pro-Israel lobby) made it a legislative priority to coerce the US government into making it a defender of Israel’s settlement policies. Enter Sen Cardin.

At the behest of AIPAC, Sen Cardin introduced his amendment. It defines the actions that US trade officials must include in negotiating trade arrangements with EU partners, to discourage agreements with countries that have instituted measures “that are intended to limit commercial relations specifically with Israel or persons doing business in Israel or in Israeli-controlled territories”.

It is especially troubling that the words “in Israeli-controlled territories” have been inserted in these amendments. This language, which equates Israel with the territories Israel occupied in 1967, replicates the language recently used by Israel’s Supreme Court in a controversial ruling against any advocacy of boycott, divestment, or sanctions activity in Israel. The TPA, as amended, will, for the first time, make the US complicit in shielding Israel’s settlement activity from any international scrutiny or penalty.

As disturbing as is this effort to defend Israel’s behaviour and to pit the US against its European trading partners is the disingenuous way members of Congress have sought to explain their actions.

Mr Cardin said: “Israel is one of America’s closest allies and the only stable democracy in the Middle East. We may not agree with every Israeli policy, but we cannot allow our potential trading partners in the EU to fall prey to efforts that threaten Israel’s existence.” Separately, Sen Rob Portman said the amendment sent “a clear message that if you want to be an economic partner with the US, you cannot support politically motivated boycotts [that] attempt to weaken Israel”.

Congressman Peter Roskam said the measure “will make combating these boycotts a principal objective of the US in our negotiations with the EU ... countries seeking free trade with the United States cannot participate in ... economic warfare against Israel”. Sen Ron Wyden added that “we shouldn’t let American trade policy be used in any kind of fashion that would in some ways show a tolerance for that kind of anti-Semitism”.

Contrary to these outrageous claims, EU measures are not “economic warfare”, nor are they intended to “weaken” or “threaten the existence of Israel”, and they are most certainly not displays of “anti-Semitism”.

Rather they are Europe’s modest attempt to ensure that they do not unwittingly economically underwrite illegal settlement activity. In this context, it is worth noting that the administrations of both George HW Bush and Bill Clinton also applied economic pressures to dissociate the US from Israeli settlement construction by annually deducting the amount Israel spent on such activity from the US loan guarantees that would be available to Israel to resettle Russian Jews. Were these two presidents also guilty of “economic warfare” and “anti-Semitism”?

The bottom line is that if Congress passes the TPA legislation, the US will be defending Israeli settlements against European pressure. It will also be making its commerce agreements conditional on conducting trade with Israeli settlements, in contravention of their own long-standing policy.

For the first time, it will also establish the conflation of Israel with the territory it has occupied, expropriated, and settled since 1967.

James Zogby is the president of the Arab American Institute

On Twitter: @aaiusa