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America’s support for Israel has damaged US interests: Analyst

Friday, 23 August 2019 10:12 AM [ Last Update: Friday, 23 August 2019 10:33 AM ]

Mark Dankof

America’s diplomatic, financial and military support for Israel has been detrimental to the US economy and its international reputation and Washington must immediately discontinue all forms of assistance to the regime, a former US Senate candidate says.

“The United States is going to have a $40 trillion debt by the end of the decade,” partly due to US economic aid to Israel, said Mark Dankof, who is also a broadcaster and pastor in San Antonio, Texas.

“But this is just the tip of the iceberg on this thing,” Dankof told Press TV on Thursday.

“The United States ought to pull the plug on Israel right now, pull every cent and foreign aid, pull our diplomatic support and military support for Israel and move in a direction that enables us to regain our standing in the world, a more solid economy and the good-will of many, many people in the Middle East that we have totally alienated by supporting a criminal regime,” he added.

US Congresswomen Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar have been calling for an end to American aid to Israel.

Tlaib and Omar, the first two Muslim women elected to Congress, are outspoken critics of Israel’s policies toward the Palestinians and vocal supporters of the Boycott, Divest and Sanction movement (BDS).

PressTV-Ilhan Omar questions billions in US aid to Israel

Democratic Representative Ilhan Omar has said that billions of dollars of US aid to Israel should be tied to its treatment of Palestinians.

The United States and Israel signed an agreement in September 2016 to give Israel $38 billion in military assistance over the next decade, the largest such aid package in US history.

US military aid to Israel has skyrocketed over the past several years while the regime’s forces are engaged in blatant human rights violations against Palestinians in Gaza and elsewhere.

Omar on Monday said that Congress should reconsider the annual US aid allocated to Israel, after the regime banned her and Tlaib from traveling to Jerusalem al-Quds and the occupied West Bank.

Tlaib, with Palestinian roots and Omar, with a Somali origin, were scheduled to arrive in the occupied territories last week on a trip that was initially approved by Israel. But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, under pressure from Trump, announced that Israel had reversed its position.

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