The lawmakers are among eight Democrats linked to U.S.-based groups that funded the Hamas terror organization.
By Debbie Reiss, World Israel News
At least eight progressive Democratic members of Congress, including anti-Israel Reps. Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib, share close ties to a nonprofit implicated in the murder of an American teenager by the Hamas terror group in 1996, the Washington Examiner reported on Wednesday.
David Boim was 17 when Hamas members shot and killed him at a bus stop in Judea and Samaria.
Boim’s parents sued a network of American-based Palestinian groups in federal court “for financing the terrorists that killed their son,” the investigative report by Andrew Kerr said. They were awarded $156 million in damages after the case went to trial in 2004.
But the NGOs never paid out the money, claiming they were bankrupt and ostensibly shuttering their operations. One group, the Holy Land Foundation, had its financial assets seized by the U.S. government, and in 2008, five of its leaders were handed decades-long prison sentences for providing material support to Hamas.
“That’s where American Muslims for Palestine, an Illinois-based nonprofit group that has since developed close ties with influential Democratic lawmakers such as Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Minn., came into play, the Boim family alleged in a follow-up lawsuit filed in federal court in 2017,” the report said.
AMP and its fiscal sponsor, Americans for Justice in Palestine Educational Foundation, are “alter egos,” with the same core leadership and operations as the groups that were found liable for Boim’s death, the report said, citing the 2017 lawsuit.
“In every meaningful respect, AMP/AJP is nothing more than a disguised continuance of IAP/AMS — stripped of the burden of the Boim judgement and the ignominy of having been found liable for aiding and abetting the murder of an American teenager,” according to the claim. “AMP/AJP are the alter egos and successors of IAP/AMS, and are therefore liable for the unpaid portion of the Boim judgement.”
That case is waiting to face a jury trial that could take place next year.
In the meantime, however, AMP has “massively expanded its pro-Palestine lobbying activities in the halls of Congress, developed close ties with influential Democratic lawmakers, and earned a reputation as one of the most influential groups in the anti-Israel boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement,” the report said.
Tlaib has been featured at multiple events held by the group. Other attendees include Reps. Donald Payne Jr., D-N.J., Debbie Dingell, D-Mich., Judy Chu, D-Calif., Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass., and Omar.
AMP itself claims to have held meetings with the offices of 191 members of Congress.
Reps. Andre Carson, D-Ind., and Betty McCollum, D-Minn., have been given awards by the group.
“Your support for my work in Congress gives me the strength to push forward, and I want to thank you,” McCollum said at an AMP event.
The Anti-Defamation League has warned the members of Congress that AMP “seeks to delegitimize and demonize the Jewish state” and provide a “platform for anti-Semitism.”
Marc Greendorfer, founder of the pro-Israel Zachor Legal Institute think tank, was cited by the Washington Examiner as saying that it was “outrageous” to have so many members of Congress simply ignore AMP’s alleged ties to a designated foreign terrorist organization.
“The fact that affiliates of American Muslims for Palestine, the equivalent of an Islamic Ku Klux Klan, are involved in fundraising, voter outreach, and policy development for a prominent group of Democrats is outrageous, yet not a surprise,” Greendorfer said, according to the report.