Press Releases

Today, Representative Gerry Connolly (D-VA) joined Representative Rosa DeLauro (CT-03) and Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), along with Representative Sean Casten (IL-06), and Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL), in announcing their efforts to press the Biden Administration to hold members of the Netanyahu Government – specifically Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir – and others accountable for the rise in settler violence, settlement expansion, and destabilizing activity in the West Bank. The group was joined in this bicameral push by 15 members of the Senate and 68 members of the House of Representatives.

“With radical officials in the Netanyahu government continuing to enable settler violence and enact annexationist policies, it is clear that further sanctions are urgently needed,” the lawmakers wrote. “The key individuals and entities that are destabilizing the West Bank – thereby also threatening the security of Israel and the broader region, and U.S. national security as well – should be directly held accountable. The message that such actions are unacceptable from leaders, including within the Israeli government, must be heard.”

“Given their critical roles in driving policies that promote settler violence, weaken the Palestinian Authority, facilitate de facto and de jure annexation, and destabilize the West Bank, we urge you to sanction Finance Minister Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir pursuant to Executive Order 14115. Government leaders instigating violence must be subject to U.S. sanctions; those in leadership responsible for the lawlessness must be held to account,” they continued, also noting that the Administration should consider applying sanctions to other entities – such as Amana and Regavim – and officials that are destabilizing the West Bank by promoting settler violence and dispossession of Palestinian communities.

“Israel is the United States’ closest and most enduring democratic ally in the Middle East, and we remain completely committed to ensuring its long-term security, including by supporting a negotiated two-state solution,” the lawmakers continued. “Settler violence in the West Bank, incentivized by external organizations and even by extremist officials in the Netanyahu government, threatens the long- term strategic security of Israel and the region.”

In addition to Representative DeLauro, Senator Van Hollen, Representative Casten, and Senator Durbin, the letter was signed by Senators Sanders, Murray, Heinrich, Shaheen, Schatz, Reed, Warren, Coons, Welch, Warnock, Merkley, Smith, Hirono, Lujan, and Markey; as well as Representatives Amo, Balint, Beyer, Blumenauer, Carbajal, Carson, Casar, Castro, Chu, Cohen, Dean, DelBene, Deluzio, DeSaulnier, Dingell, Doggett, Escobar, Eshoo, Foster, Frost, Garamendi, Sylvia Garcia, Green, Grijalva, Hoyle, Huffman, Jeff Jackson, Jacobs, Jayapal, Hank Johnson, Kamlager-Dove, Kaptur, Khanna, Kildee, Kuster, Larson, Barbra Lee, Leger Fernandez, Lynch, Magaziner, McCollum, McGovern, Mfume, Nadler, Norton, Ocasio-Cortez, Omar, Pingree, Pocan, Porter, Pressley, Ramirez, Raskin, Salinas, Sanchez, Scanlon, Schakowsky, Sorensen, Swalwell, Takano, Tokuda, Tonko, Trahan, Underwood, Velazquez, and Watson Coleman.

You can read the full letter here.