Few speak out for Palestinians in U.S. Congress

[Violet_Crumble]

WASHINGTON, Jan 9 (Reuters) - Many voices around the world speak up for the Palestinians, but few in the U.S. Congress.

Lawmakers in Washington routinely pass nonbinding resolutions supporting Israel during Middle East crises. The Senate on Thursday backed Israel's battle against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip and the House of Representatives followed on Friday.

Even U.S. lawmakers who express sympathy for the Palestinians hesitate to call themselves pro-Palestinian and they voice strong support for the security of Israel as well, hewing to decades of close U.S.-Israeli ties.

"When these events occur, there's almost a knee-jerk reaction of Congress that endorses 1,000 percent what Israel is doing," said Nick Rahall, a West Virginia Democrat and Lebanese-American who has voted against some of the measures and did so again on Friday.

"Israel is our ally. ... It always has been, with which I perfectly agree. But I don't believe in allowing that to blind us to what is in our best interests, or giving knee-jerk approval to anything Israel does. We don't do that with any other ally," he told Reuters.

http://www.reuters.com/article/vcCandidateFeed2/idUSN09303848

[Barack_America]

1. Unfortunately only 5 congresscritters felt that way.

390 gave Israel knee-jerk approval.

[sixmile]

2. How peculiar.

One would think such an enlightened, progressive body as the U.S. Congress would take more of a thoughtful, balanced view. I suppose the Gazans haven't been filling election coffers or may do so anonymously.

[shira]

6. maybe they don't rely

on propaganda rags for their news on all that is I/P related.

[Name removed]

3. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[ShadesOfGrey]

4. Who were the five?

Dennis Kucinich, Ron Paul, and ???

[IndianaGreen]

5. Maxine Waters

and two others.