THE DONATION FORM FOLLOWS A LETTER FROM ATFP PRESIDENT ZIAD ASALI

The American Task Force on Palestine joins with millions of our fellow Americans and others around the world in welcoming a new Administration in Washington as we all try to work together to seize important opportunities and face significant challenges, particularly in supporting the causes of peace and Palestine. Obviously, these challenges were vividly illustrated during the war in Gaza in late December and January. As always, your support is the bedrock of all our activities.  I want to update you on the vital work your generosity is underwriting, and encourage you to renew your support for ATFP.

The Task Force has always emphasized building strong links with our government, and we are delighted to report that during the transition we have not only been able to maintain but also expand our strong working relationship with the executive branch in the new Administration. We are also making significant progress building a sound institutional relationship with the leadership in Congress, on both sides of the aisle.

This progress was perhaps best illustrated by our Feb. 12 testimony at a hearing of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Subcommittee on Middle East and South Asia, on the aftermath of the Gaza war. Representing ATFP, I was asked to join a panel of experts providing advice on the political and humanitarian aftermath of the war, and also submitted our 51-page comprehensive written testimony for the record. Perhaps the most significant aspect of the hearing were the serious and constructive comments from the Subcommittee members, in particular Chairman Gary Ackerman (D-NY), Robert Wexler (D-FL), Keith Ellison (D-MN) and Gerald Connolly (D-VA), and the fact that the full Committee Chairman, Howard Berman (D-CA), took the unusual step of attending part of the Subcommittee hearing and listening to my testimony.

It would be an understatement to say that when we first established ATFP in 2003 discourse in Congress regarding Palestinian issues and peace in the Middle East were very different. In many important ways, the attitudes expressed – particularly those strongly in favor of Palestinian statehood – were almost unrecognizable from the prevailing mood in Congress in the past. Almost everyone I know who attended or observed the hearing commented on the predominance of serious and constructive questions and comments from the members of Congress at the hearing and how isolated and anachronistic the few remaining voices of unqualified hostility towards peace in Palestine sounded amid the overwhelming consensus in favor of more robust US engagement towards a two-state solution that would end the occupation. This welcome development is only a milestone in the long path towards realizing peace and independence for Palestine, but it is hard to imagine a more significant one.

Obviously, the war in Gaza necessitated not only a redoubled effort to engage our government but also to expand ATFP’s profile with the media. During the war my colleagues and I were fixtures on both American news outlets such as CNN and the Arab media. Many of our appearances and commentaries can be accessed at ATFP’s website.

In spite of the intense challenges posed by the war, ATFP and its sister charity, American Charities for Palestine, have not neglected our commitments to humanitarian developments in Palestine, especially in the fields of health and education. Since my last letter to you in November, 2008, in which I mentioned that ACP had secured $200,000 worth of laptop computers for Palestinian students, we have initiated a $300,000 development project in the West Bank village of Beit Ur al-Tahta. In cooperation with CHF International, and with funding from the Sheikh Mohammed Shami Foundation and USAID, the program will complete installation of street lights and other infrastructure development in the village. In addition ACP has just presented a $5,000 donation to the Spafford Children Center in Jerusalem. This means that in the past six months, ACP has helped secure about $505,000 in development aid for Palestine.

As I noted above, while ATFP has been making significant progress on the political, public advocacy and development fronts, there can be no downplaying the difficulties facing those of us who are determined to help build peace in the Middle East and secure an end to the occupation. While the war in Gaza brought death and devastation to countless innocent civilians, it also served as an early reminder to the incoming Obama Administration that the issue of Palestine cannot be placed on the back burner, and that this is one of the most important foreign policy challenges facing our country in a new era of hope and optimism.

In the coming months as the new Administration begins to craft its own approach to securing our national interests, ATFP will be second to no one in seizing every opportunity to remind our fellow Americans, at every level, how important it is to our country to achieve an end-of-conflict agreement and an end to the occupation. There are important early signs of a new seriousness in American engagement, but we must ensure that this engagement is translated into significant economic and institutional development in Palestine and, even more importantly, meaningful political progress towards peace and Palestinian independence. In particular, ATFP intends to spare no effort in the coming months to push for a freeze in all Israeli settlement activity in order to preserve the viability and credibility of a peace agreement between Israel and Palestine.
To do this, we rely, as we always have, on your generous support.

Please do whatever you can to support the Task Force, and help us continue to make this kind of serious and effective progress on advocacy in Washington for peace and Palestine.

As always, your support is completely tax-deductible due to ATFP’s designation by the IRS as a 501(c)(3) charitable organization. I urge you to be generous, and again please keep in mind that, thanks to a matching grant from the Schooner Foundation, every dollar you give to support the invaluable work of the Task Force will be doubled.


Sincerely,

Ziad Asali, MD, President

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