Engel Lobbies American States To Oppose Palestinian Statehood
Rep. Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.), the senior Democrat on the U.S. House of Representatives Western Hemisphere subcommittee, is lobbying countries to vote against Palestinian statehood recognition in the United Nations.
“I am contacting as many countries as I can speak with to tell them the U.N. resolution is destructive and awful and will not make peace, it will make peace talks more difficult,” Engel told JTA this week.
Engel had just returned from a trip to Israel with top officials from the Caribbean island nations of Grenada and Saint Kitts and Nevis. The officials met there with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad.
Engel, who chaired the Western Hemisphere subcommittee from 2007-2011, has cultivated a number of the region’s leaders.
Israel has said that the Palestinian Authority effort to secure statehood recognition would set back the prospect for renewed peace talks.
The Obama administration has pledged to veto a statehood recognition resolution should it come to the Security Council. The Palestinians may also seek enhanced status short of statehood through the U.N. General Assembly, which began meeting in its 66th session on Tuesday.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30
