US-Palestinian congresswoman Rashida Tlaib launched a petition calling on US president Joe Biden to reject efforts to allow Israelis to enter the United States without a visa, the official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported on Friday.
The petition also calls on Biden to reject Israeli discriminatory measures that restrict Palestinian-Americans’ ability to travel to the West Bank, live, work, teach, study, and reunite with family members there.
To all #US citizens ⬇️ Please #ActNow #FreePalestine
Urge Your Member of Congress to sign on to Rep. Rashida Tlaib's Dear Colleague Letter on Israel's Entry to the Visa Waiver Programhttps://t.co/uKgB2e5SK8
— Princess Warrior #FreePalestine 🇵🇸 (@aneesafalasteen) June 3, 2022
The petition asks the Biden administration to uphold US law, which prohibits Israel from joining the Visa Waiver Program while continuing to discriminate against US citizens on the basis of their ethnicity, national origin, religion, and political opinion, as has been documented extensively by the State Department.
This letter closes for signatures on Monday, June 6.
“Next month Israel will greatly restrict Palestinians’ ability to travel to the West Bank, live, work, teach, study, and reunite with family members there,” Americans for Justice in Palestine Actions (AJP Action) said in a statement.
“These new procedures will even force US citizens to provide Israel with incredibly intrusive information about the personal details of anyone they plan to visit in the West Bank, and any property Palestinians stand to inherit,” AJP Actions added.
This is as close as Ruba can get to seeing her family. She’s in Palestine & they are 10 meters away in Jordan. She’s hasn’t been reunited with them for 11 years because Israel has been rejecting family reunification requests for 10Ks families for a decade. pic.twitter.com/d7HS9Zpuom
— Arwa Ibrahim (@arwaib) June 16, 2021
The Visa Waiver Program requires that participating countries provide reciprocal, non-discriminatory treatment to US citizens.
Instead of ending Israel’s discriminatory policies, the new procedures would increase the discrimination based on ethnicity, national origin, religion, and political opinions.
Rashida Tlaib and other progressive lawmakers are pushing back against the new Israeli procedures and demanding information from the Biden administration to ensure that Israel reverses its discriminatory policies toward US citizens.
(WAFA, PC, Social Media)
