Another reason Israel banned the Congresswomen

From a Lee Fang (Intercept) email:

After every congressional election, Democratic leaders pressure newly elected lawmakers to visit Israel on a trip paid for and organized by the nonprofit arm of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the lobby group known as AIPAC.

So after last year’s Democratic victory, I reached out to freshmen lawmakers like Rep. Rashida Tlaib and asked if they would go on AIPAC’s trip.

Many of the incoming freshmen hadn’t yet heard about it, so I shared documents and records of past trips and the one-sided perspective they provided for lawmakers.

Tlaib, the first Palestinian-American woman elected to Congress, responded to my inquiry by publicly rejecting the AIPAC trip and announcing her own delegation — to give lawmakers an opportunity to see firsthand the conditions in Gaza and hear from a broad range of voices.

  

She didn't want the Potemkin tour.

Most media outlets see congressional support for the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and its blockade of Gaza as business as usual and don’t report on it. But reporting on AIPAC’s influence is a vital part of The Intercept’s commitment to expose the powerful forces shaping U.S. foreign policy.

The Intercept broke the story of Tlaib’s delegation last December, making waves within the Democratic caucus. In the same story, which I wrote with Alex Kane, she came out in support of the movement to boycott, sanction and divest from Israel as a response to its ongoing occupation.

This week, the Israeli government made the unprecedented decision to bar Tlaib’s delegation from entering the country, making headlines across the globe — and citing her support for BDS in its decision.

For years, AIPAC’s delegations have gone on with relatively little scrutiny. Human rights experts have long argued that the little-known junkets are a major factor in tilting the scales toward policies that reflect the interests of the Israeli government over Palestinians.

We dug into the numbers, exposing how AIPAC quietly wields power with party leaders and how much the group spends per year to fly lawmakers and staff on luxury junkets to hear from Israeli military and political elites.

This summer, we exposed the political underbelly of the trip, reporting on the strong-arm tactics used by Majority Leader Steny Hoyer to pressure new Democrats into accepting AIPAC’s invitation. Had Tlaib’s trip gone forward, we would have been one of the only U.S. outlets accompanying the lawmakers to document the journey.

Well, we can't have that.