Lame-duck Biden ramps up sanctions on Israelis — and eases up on terrorists
As he heads for the exit, President Biden is easing sanctions on Hamas and Hezbollah — while sanctioning Jews in Israel.
Under pressure from Israel-bashing critics, including scores of congressional Democrats, a president who stood firmly behind Israel after the Oct. 7 massacre seems to have lost his moral compass.
And just as President Barack Obama in his last months in office allowed the UN Security Council to pass a resolution slamming Israel, Biden may use sanctions to further turn the screws on the Jewish state in his lame-duck stretch.
In 2022, the Treasury Department determined that the Foundation for Global Political Exchange, a US-based non-profit, would violate sanctions laws by inviting Hamas and Hezbollah to a conference it was planning in Beirut.
Last week, the Biden administration did an about-face and gave the group a green light for the meeting.
Yet at the same time, the Biden administration has created the first sanctions program designed to target citizens of a major US ally.
The directive that created the program, Executive Order 14115, theoretically applies to anyone whose actions “threaten the peace, security, and stability of the West Bank” — but there are already plenty of tools for imposing sanctions on Palestinian terrorists.
The real purpose of Biden’s order was to punish Israeli Jews.
Usually, sanctions target those responsible for severe wrongdoing, such as terrorist financing, nuclear proliferation and large-scale human rights abuses.
The new sanctions break this mold by targeting Israeli Jews in the West Bank accused of property crimes and vandalism, or of simply associating with the wrong people.
Despite an ongoing campaign of terror by Palestinians in the West Bank, Biden has used his order to target Jews almost exclusively.
A single fig-leaf exception was made for a Palestinian terror organization known as the Lions’ Den — which should have been a target of existing US terrorism laws.
Worse, the administration has been creating its sanctions list with information from biased and unreliable sources, including the Muslim Brotherhood-tied DAWN MENA, a radical anti-Israel nonprofit.
This means the US is punishing Israelis based on allegations from those who believe the Jewish state has no right to exist.
If an American ally had no independent system of prosecutors and courts, it might make sense for the United States to consider sanctions on that ally’s citizens.
But Israel has a fiercely independent judicial system. It isn’t perfect, but Biden should leave it to Israeli courts to determine if accusations of “settler violence” have merit.
Israelis hit by sanctions often pay a severe price.
Russian oligarchs and Iranian terrorist leaders can rely on offshore accounts and other devices to protect their assets, but the Israeli targets are run-of-the-mill citizens.
For them, sanctions often lead to frozen bank accounts, canceled credit cards and an inability to conduct basic life activities.
The sanctions have gotten broader and more aggressive by the month.
They started with obscure hilltop farmers in the West Bank and moved on to protest organizers in Israel proper.
One target was a prominent Israeli nonprofit that provides volunteers to help protect isolated West Bank farms, which are constantly subject to theft and terror attacks.
Last week, 88 congressional Democrats wrote a letter demanding that the Biden administration go out swinging, sanctioning Israeli government members as well as a mainstream Israeli NGO that reports on illegal Palestinian activities.
These members of Congress want Israelis sanctioned for their political views and activism; their suggested targets are not alleged to have committed any violent or illegal acts.
Once he takes office, President-elect Trump can quickly rescind these sanctions or let them expire — but in the meantime, a new precedent has been set: The US government is mainstreaming the goals of the anti-Israel left’s Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign.
Meanwhile, US allies including Canada and Britain have already imitated the Biden administration, imposing even more far-reaching sanctions on Jews in the West Bank.
State Department progressives may hope these countries will keep the fire burning — including through another UN Security Council Resolution in the coming months punishing Israel — while Democrats are out of power.
US citizens have filed a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Biden’s sanctions. Trump’s Justice Department should quickly move to settle the suit, and to direct the government to stop basing sanctions on unreliable information from highly politicized NGOs.
For its part, Congress should investigate the process behind the sanctions.
Finally, Trump should warn the lame-duck administration that expanding the sanctions program could spur him to keep Biden’s executive order in place — and use it instead against progressive groups with connections to the Palestinian terrorists who are destabilizing the West Bank.
After all, turnabout is fair play.
Mark Dubowitz is chief executive of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Eugene Kontorovich, a professor at George Mason University Law School, is a member of the legal team challenging the sanctions in federal court.
