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Legislative Roundup - 4/15/05

I. Senate Action on Supplemental II. Sen. Alexander (R-TN) on the Record III. APN on Supplemental IV. New Bills

APN Legislative Round-Up for the week ending April 15, 2005

I. Senate Action on Supplemental
II. Sen. Alexander (R-TN) on the Record
III. APN on Supplemental IV. New Bills


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I. SENATE ACTION ON SUPPLEMENTAL
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On April 11th the full Senate began debating HR 1268, the FY05 Supplemental that includes assistance for the Palestinians and Israel (see last week's Round-Up for details of the Senate version, and previous Round-Ups for details of House actions).

Since the bill includes funds and language related to a wide range of programs, debate is focusing on larger issues, like immigration reform, and except for one notable floor statement (see below), the aid to the Palestinians has not been discussed (other than in passing) during the floor debate. It is not known when exactly the Senate will pass HR 1268 (it will certainly pass). Once it does pass, the House and Senate will appoint conferees to work together to resolve the differences between the two bills (something that will happen behind closed doors).


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II. SEN. ALEXANDER (R-TN) ON THE RECORD =====================================

On April 14th, during discussion of HR 1268, Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) spoke on the Senate floor in strong defense of aid to the Palestinians and specifically aid to the Palestinian Authority:

"Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Colorado. In fact, I rise to discuss an individual who the Senator from Colorado and I met when we were part of a bipartisan delegation led by the Democratic leader, Harry Reid, a couple of weeks ago. On that trip, we visited a number of countries-- Kuwait, Iraq, Israel, France, Georgia, Ukraine, and the Palestinian territory. We saw a number of emerging democracies. It made me think of what our own country might have been like more than 200 years ago. We visited with two men who were named Prime Minister and Speaker of the Iraqi Parliament a week later. In Georgia, we saw the young government. Many of them were educated here in the United States as students. When we went to Ukraine, we met Mr. Yuschenko and some of the students who had been part of this revolution. What we saw was very impressive, as were those people we were introduced to.

"But from my way of thinking, there was no one more impressive than the Finance Minister of the Palestinian Authority, Salam Fayyad, who instituted a number of reforms to fight corruption and bring transparency to the finances of that Authority.

"This remarkable individual was born Palestinian, and his family fled the West Bank for Jordan in 1968. He studied at the American University in Beirut. He later received a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Texas at Austin. He worked for the Federal Reserve in St. Louis and the International Monetary Fund in Washington, DC. He became the IMF representative to the Palestinian Authority and moved to Jerusalem in 1995. Then, in 2002, he was named Finance Minister of the Palestinian Authority.

"What is remarkable is that all of us either know or suspect that when Arafat was in power, there was gross corruption with the moneys that came into Palestine. Mr. Fayyad has done the following things: He centralized control of the Palestinian Authority's finances. Previously, agencies had collected the money and kept it. That meant, for example, that education was poorly funded since it collected little money. Mr. Fayyad forced all the incoming funds to be put into the general treasury and disbursed by the Finance Minister.

"The next thing he did was direct deposits for Palestinian security forces. Previously, money was given in plastic bags to commanders for them to distribute. Obviously, this led to what might generously be called a lot of mismanagement of those funds. Now soldiers are much happier because they get their pay on time, and the government is sure the money is going where it should. The soldiers and the government both know the money is not going to somebody who didn't earn it.

"Public budgeting: He issued the first publicly detailed budget for the Authority, which totaled about $1.28 billion. The Ministry now issues public monthly reports of the government's financial status.

"Eliminating graft: Due to his efforts, revenue of the Palestinian Authority is up from $45 million to $75 million, largely because money that was skimmed off the top in the past is going into the treasury where it belongs. I am not just saying this today because I want to give a pat on the back to Mr. Fayyad, who, in taking these steps, has shown a great deal of courage. I am sure there are a good number of people in the Palestinian territory who were skimming money off the top before who are not going to be happy with him now. I am bringing this up today because it has to do with a vote we are about to take here in the Senate.

"The bill before us, the supplemental appropriations bill, provides $200 million of the President's request for aid to the Palestinian territories. There is another $150 million in the normal budgeting process. Unlike the House version of this supplemental appropriations bill, our version--the Senate version as it is coming to us--preserves the President's waiver authority that would allow him to designate a portion of those funds as he sees fit by the use of the Palestinian Authority. I believe that policy--the Senate policy--is the right policy. In other words, our policy would permit our President, President Bush, to decide that Mr. Fayyad and the government of the Palestinian Authority could properly spend this money. Some people are saying they stole money over there before. Yes they did.

"Yasser Arafat is dead and buried. It is time to make a new start.

"The Finance Minister has made great strides to ensure that funds are publicly accountable. We will be able to keep track of where our taxpayer money goes. The Palestinian Authority needs some money. There is no poorer part of the world than the Gaza Strip. Someone has to provide security in the Gaza Strip. We look to the Palestinian Authority to do that if the Israelis pull out. Someone has to provide a social services safety net for these poor people so they are not tempted to join with the terrorists. We look to the Palestinian Authority to do that.

"Why in the world would we keep our President from making the decision that would give the money to the Palestinian Authority, which is the group we are counting on to provide security and to provide the social safety net?

"Nongovernment agriculture organizations can provide valuable help in support of what the Palestinian Authority is doing. If we are going to do business with the Palestinian Authority, and are going to expect them to be accountable for keeping things safe and providing a basic level of social services so people are able to eat, we should deal directly with them. At the very least we should give the President of the United States the authority, as the Senate bill does, to deal directly with the Palestinian Authority.

"I am happy with what our Committee on Appropriations has done. I disagree with what the House of Representatives has done, and I suppose the matter will go to conference. I hope in the conference the Senators will insist on the Senate provision, and I hope our House Members will see the wisdom of giving our President the discretion to give the money to the Government that we are going to hold accountable."


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III. APN ON THE SUPPLEMENTAL
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On April 8-10th, APN sent the following talking points to all Senators:

Next week the Senate will take up President Bush's FY05 War Supplemental. Americans for Peace Now (APN) urges Senators who care about Israel to support the $200 million included in the Supplemental to bolster the prospects for Israeli-Palestinian peace, and to oppose new conditions and restrictions on this assistance - conditions and restrictions unrelated to accountability or transparency. The PA is headed in the right direction, and continued action on all fronts - especially fighting violence and terror - is urgently needed. And just as urgently, Congress needs to recognize and support the historic changes that are taking place, and recognize that strengthening the new Palestinian leadership is a vital U.S. interest. APN is the premier voice of American Jews who are committed to preserving Israel's security and ensuring Israel's future as a Jewish, democratic state.

This aid package has a dual purpose: to provide badly-needed assistance to the Palestinian people, and to send a message of U.S. support for Palestinian democracy and for Palestinian leaders who embrace non- violence - a message that will set a precedent for U.S.-Palestinian relations in the post-Arafat era. Opponents of improved U.S.-Palestinian relations have convinced some in Congress to place conditions and limitations on the new aid package that are more far-reaching and intrusive than any conditions Congress placed on such aid when Arafat was in charge. New restrictions and conditions that far outstrip anything required during the Arafat era send exactly the opposite message: that Congress does not support Palestinian democracy and trusts democratically-elected Palestinian leaders who embrace non-violence and reform even less than they trusted Arafat.

For the sake of Israel, the U.S., and all those in the region who yearn for peace, we urge Senators to take advantage of the floor debate to speak out against the negative message these new conditions and restrictions send.

Conditions placed on the aid by the Senate Appropriations Committee are:

- NEW AUDITS: While Congress should demand accountability when providing funds to any foreign entity, government, or NGO, accountability must not be a pretext for undermining U.S. support for Palestinian democracy. Unfortunately, this is exactly what is happening. The bill designates up to $5 million (out of the $150 million designated for the Palestinians in this $200 million package) for an outside audit of PA finances. This audit is in addition to the existing audits, vetting, reports, and reviews of Palestinian aid programs and grant recipients established by Congress (some for the entire world, most just for the Palestinians) and deemed sufficient to ensure transparency and accountability during the Arafat era. No arguments have been made to explain why Congress should consider the new PA and President Abbas less trustworthy than Arafat.

-NEW REPORT: The bill links the aid package to a requirement for the President to submit an exhaustive report covering Palestinian actions and progress on a laundry list of reform and policy areas. None of the items covered in the report are related, directly or indirectly, to the use or oversight of U.S. assistance provided in the post-Arafat era.

-NO DIRECT AID TO THE PA: Senate appropriators wisely left out language, present in the House version, removing the President's ability to use a national security waiver in order to grant aid directly to the PA, if he deems it to be in the national security interests of the United States to do so. Unfortunately, they undermined this positive message by including report language emphasizing their intent that no aid be granted directly to the PA _ language that was never deemed necessary even during the darkest days of the Arafat era.

-EARMARKING: The President requested $200 million for assistance for the Palestinians, and reports from the Administration indicate that $50 million of that assistance is planned to be used for crossing points between Israel and the West Bank and Gaza. However, Senate appropriators chose to change the structure of the President's request, making the $50 million a hard earmark for Israel. In doing so, they opened the door for opponents of peace to attack the $150 million for the Palestinians in conference (while leaving the $50 million for Israel intact).


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IV. NEW BILLS
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On April 14th, Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) introduced HR 1670, "To prohibit United States military assistance for Egypt and to express the sense of Congress that the amount of military assistance that would have been provided for Egypt for a fiscal year should be provided in the form of economic support fund assistance." Reps. Crowley (D-NY) and Blumenauer (D-OR) are cosponsors on the measure, which was referred to the House International Relations Committee. The measure echoes HR 3725, introduced by Weiner in the 108th Congress (with the same title, and with the short title "Egyptian Counterterrorism and Political Reform Act"). That bill garnered no cosponsors and did not move out of committee.

HR 1670 is the latest in a series of Middle East-related measures introduced by Rep. Weiner, who since February 2005 has introduced 3 measures related to Saudi Arabia (HR 505, HR 604, and H. Amdt 56 to HR 1268), 2 measures related to the Palestinians (HR 1143 and H. Amdt. 61 to HR 1268), and has recently circulated a Dear Colleague seeking co-sponsors on a bill (not yet introduced) to force the closure of the PLO's office in the United States.

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For more information contact APN Government Relations Director Lara Friedman at 202/728-1893, or at LFapn@earthlink.net.