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June 29th, 2021 
Awake Goy The signs are clear that the United States and Israeli governments are trying to reestablish the “special relationship” between the countries as an intimate partnership with no public differences and squabbles, everything ironed out in private. Israeli President Reuven Rivlin comes to Washington today. Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid met with Secretary of State Tony Blinken in Rome and vowed to restore bipartisan support for Israel in Washington. Israeli media are reporting that Prime Minister Naftali Bennett may come to Washington in July for a group hug at the White House.
And whatever could come between them? The good news here is that progressive groups are pushing Palestinian human rights in Washington at a time when the Biden administration clearly wants the Palestinian issue to disappear.
More than a dozen leftwing groups showed up today to lobby for the Palestinians of East Jerusalem, specifically the Silwan neighborhood, being ethnically cleansed so as to further the Judaization of the city. You can see the list below. The US Campaign for Palestinian Rights writes:
As you read this message right now, about 1,500 Palestinian people in the al-Bustan neighborhood of Silwan, Jerusalem are fighting to stay in their native homeland, resisting Israeli bulldozers coming to destroy their homes and push them out. For some families, those bulldozers could arrive as soon as today.
Their resistance is part of a global uprising for justice for the Palestinian people. Today we’re showing up on the phones and in the streets in solidarity, alongside thousands, for a Day of Action to stop Israel’s ethnic cleansing. We demand that Democratic leadership quit giving Israel the green light to continue ethnic cleansing in Silwan, Jerusalem, and all of Palestine.
Here is the petition from Jewish Voice for Peace aimed at the Democratic leadership: “Nancy and Chuck are complicit in ethnic cleansing.”
I have seen no positive response from House Democrats.
Though 73 House Democrats have signed a letter supported by J Street, calling on the Biden administration to reverse the moves of the Trump administration– including the green light for evictions.
Strongly oppose the forced expulsion via eviction of Palestinian families from their homes in East Jerusalem and throughout Palestinian territory.
Meantime, today, the Israeli government was able to defuse another political crisis. The government reached a deal with religious settlers to evacuate the illegal outpost of Evyatar although they can maintain a yeshiva on the occupied lands of Beita village.
The deal removes a source of division inside the government. Defense Minister Benny Gantz has been pushing to evacuate the outpost, despite resistance from the rightwing members of the coalition, notably Bennett and Gideon Saar. Yossi Alpher at Americans for Peace Now:
Evyatar’s overnight construction [in May] was unauthorized even by the Netanyahu government back in May. Gantz and the IDF insist on dismantling it lest its survival provoke new West Bank tensions (four Palestinians have already died in the violent protests engendered by Evyatar) and complicate Israel’s relations with the Arab world, the US and the EU. The outpost’s removal is almost certain to provoke settler violence aimed at IDF soldiers, with political ramifications for a coalition that comprises a number of rightist sympathizers with the settlers.
Americans for Peace Now had called on the Biden administration to demand the removal of the Evyatar outpost settlement. Americans for Peace Now posted a statement by Avner Gvaryahu of Breaking the Silence saying that the outpost is a clear sign of “apartheid.”
The deal cannot be satisfying to Palestinian neighbors — the houses in the settlement are to be reoccupied by yeshiva students in coming weeks. I imagine protests in Palestine will continue.
Bear in mind that at least four Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli military as they protested this outpost on their land.
h/t Michael Arria and Yumna Patel.
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