by James Abourezk

This piece first appeared in CounterPunch on March 27, 2015. James Abourezk is a former US senator from South Dakota. He is the author of: Advise and Dissent: Memoirs of an ex-Senator.

The Minnesota State Board of Investment is honor bound when it invests monies from Minnesota’s public employee pension funds. Each of the Board members, which includes Governor Mark Dayton (Chair), State Auditor Rebecca Otto, Secretary of State Steve Simon and Attorney General Lori Swanson know, or should know, that the Board has violated its fiduciary responsibility to only invest public pension funds prudently by investing in Israel Bonds. Israel Bonds are government bonds issued by the State of Israel.

Earlier this month, I appeared before the Board members to urge them not to invest in Israel Bonds. Immediately after I ended my presentation, the Governor handed the other Board members a previously prepared written motion to continue investing the state’s pension funds in Israel Bonds. All of us in the packed hearing room understood that my testimony had been wasted. Facing members of the pro-Israel Lobby who had been seated in the front row, three of the four board members voted to invest. Only the State Auditor, Rebecca Otto, voted against the motion.

I’ve seen this pressure before. It usually consists of a subliminal threat by the pro-Israel Lobby to cut off any campaign money to those who defy what the Lobby wants. That is the same kind of threat that allowed Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu to travel to the United States to dictate to our Congress how American foreign policy should be conducted. I believe that the 36 standing ovations for Bibi and the 47 Republican Senatorial signatures on the letter to Iran were eager messages to the Israeli Lobby telling them how much Congress appreciated the campaign money given each election cycle to its obedient members. When I served in the US Senate I well remember the threats directed against me for not being obedient enough to the Lobby.

The Board of Investment’s vote to use Minnesota pensioners’ money to buy the low-yield bonds issued by Israel is, without question, highly imprudent and illegal, especially because the Board knows how the money will be used. American money plunged into Israel Bond sales is fungible, meaning that the money is lumped into Israel’s General Fund, and then used for anything Israel wants, without
restriction. That also means that the money sent to Israel is used for settlements. Israel’s settlements are illegal under Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits an occupier from transferring any part of its civilian population into the territory it occupies. Article 49 was adopted by the international community after WWII as a direct response to Nazi Germany’s illegal and brutal occupation of lands belonging to its neighbors. Both the United States and Israel have signed the Fourth Geneva Convention.     Even the United States Government has acknowledged that Israel’s settlements are illegal.

Beyond just exploiting American elected officials in their political zeal to become complicit in financing illegal Israeli settlements by using money from taxpayer funded public employee pension plans to do so, Israel has a long history of inflicting damage on American interests. During the 1967 Middle East War, Israel’s military attacked and attempted to sink a fully flagged American Navy vessel—the USS Liberty—which had been ordered to monitor the War by assuming a listening post off the coast of Egypt and Israel. Using fighter jets, as well as torpedo boats, Israel killed 34 American sailors and wounded another 171 sailors in the process.

What was painful for the survivors and the families of those Americans killed and wounded by Israel were the duplicitous actions of our own public officials, starting with President Lyndon Johnson, by refusing to allow fighter jets of the Sixth Fleet to come to the aid of the Liberty when it was under attack and working to cover up evidence of Israel’s deliberate attack on our ship and the killing and wounding of our sailors.

That wasn’t the last injury against American interests by our so called “ally.” In the 1970s, Israel recruited and paid a Pentagon employee, Jonathan Pollard, to sell to Israel a “truckload of secret documents,” as described by our then Secretary of Defense, Caspar Weinberger.

More recently, a Pentagon official, Larry Franklin, was indicted by the Justice Department in 2004 for handing over classified information on Iran to two employees of AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee), the leading lobby for Israel. Franklin, a former United States Department of Defense employee, pleaded guilty to several espionage-related charges and was initially sentenced in January 2006 to nearly 13 years in prison. Amazingly, Franklin’s sentence was later reduced to ten months house arrest and 100 hours of community service. In reducing his sentence, the Judge told Franklin that his community service should consist of “speaking to young people about the importance of public officials obeying the law.”

Franklin had passed highly classified information to AIPAC policy director Steven Rosen and AIPAC senior Iran analyst Keith Weissman, whom AIPAC later fired. Initially indicted for illegally conspiring to gather and disclose classified national security information to Israel, all charges against Rosen and Weissman were eventually dismissed.

These are just a few examples that we know about where Israel’s activities have seriously damaged United States interests. What we do not know, including the extent of the duplicity of our public servants, would most likely fill the pages of a book.

Not only is the Investment Board’s action imprudent and illegal with respect to giving Minnesota retirees’ money to a country that has never hesitated in harming America’s interests and will use the money to violate international law, it also tells Israel that it can do what it wishes, without paying any penalty, and that it can even get the United States to pay the price for it.

The Minnesota Investment Board should obey the law whether or not Israel’s Lobby dislikes that decision.

On May 8,2012 the Israeli Occupation Forces raided the Stop the Wall office in Ramallah. This is not the first attack this office has seen. In 2009 two of the organizers at Stop the Wall were arrested. Neither had any charges brought against them. Yet it still took an intense international pressure campaign during their time in prison to bring about their release a few months later. Following the organizers’ release, the STW office was raided  during February of 2010.

These ongoing attacks tell us one thing with certainty: Israel is scared that the movement is effective. Today, with the imminent threat of death in the air as Palestinian hunger strikers Bilal Diab and Thaer Halahleh reach day 74 of their hunger strike, mass outrage is inevitable. Following behind Diab and Halahleh are over 2,000 other Palestinian prisoners on one of the largest hunger strike movements of all time.

They are protesting Israel’s long-standing policy of detaining Palestinians without charge or trial, as well as inhumane prison conditions such as egregious solitary confinement, denial of family visits, and the refusal to medically treat critical health conditions, all punitive measures which violate international law.

Stop the Wall has been supporting civil, non-violent resistance as well as avid advocacy campaigns for almost ten years. Their work is central to much of the resilient resistance on the ground against the apartheid regime.

Repression from Zionist forces is an inevitable result of the growing resistance movement and solidarity with Palestinians. Therefore it is vital that we support each other through such backlash with determination to let “the powers that be” know that we will increase our solidarity and non-violent resistance in response to increasing repression.

Photo: http://www.stopthewall.org

The United Methodist General Assembly convened in Tampa during the week of April 30, 2012. Among the many resolutions on which they voted were two to divest pension funds from three companies which profit from Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, namely Caterpillar, Motorola, and Hewlett-Packard. The body rejected the two divestment resolutions and instead passed one calling for “positive investment to encourage economic development in Palestine.” Minnesota Break the Bonds Campaign (MN BBC) applauds the courageous individuals who brought forth and voted for the resolutions. They worked against overwhelming odds to bring awareness to the Christian community and to the world at large, and we believe their efforts have not been in vain.

The United Methodist Church has had a long history of supporting human rights causes, including speaking out clearly against slavery in the United States. They have a clear and ethical investment strategy, which spells out the importance of “investing in a socially responsible manner.”

MN BBC, which has signed on to the 2005 Palestinian civil society call for Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) of Israel until it complies with international law, is disappointed in the outcome of the vote. Many of the people who spoke in favor of the divestment resolutions gave passionate speeches fully conveying the depth of the oppression which the Palestinians daily face. Those in favor of the divestment resolutions had read and understood the Kairos Palestinian Document of 2009 calling on people of faith all over the world to stand in solidarity with Christian and Muslim Palestinians and support the BDS movement.

MN BBC believes that the resolution that passed the assembly – that of positive investment in Palestine – is a misguided move that is actually destructive to the cause of liberty and equality. This is true for three main reasons. First, according to Khalil Nakhleh, a Palestinian economist, the majority of investments in “Palestine” go towards foreign-owned companies whose owners become wealthy while adding nothing to the Palestinian economyⁱ. The Palestinians who live in the West Bank and Gaza would not benefit significantly, if at all, from investments in those foreign-owned companies. Notably, Palestinian refugees in foreign countries would receive absolutely no benefit.

Second, several projects which have been financed by other countries or by the U.N. and which are meant to develop the Palestinian economy are undermined by Israeli policies. For example, the Spanish NGO Seba built a solar power plant for the Palestinian village of Imneizil. Israel is in the process of destroying it. The German development bank KfW and United States Aid for International Development (USAID) raised money to build 15 wastewater treatment plants in the West Bank. None of them were constructed because Israel denied permits for their construction.

Third, in order for the Palestinian Authority to have any credibility with the Israelis, they must act against the interests of their own people and only act in the interests of the occupying force (Israel). The projects which do get funded, like the training of the PA security forces, help Israel in continuing to oppress Palestinians. Needless to say, these projects do not benefit Palestinians.

MN BBC believes that the only way to directly confront oppression is by non-violent resistance, and that those of us who believe in human rights and justice have a duty to stand in solidarity with Palestinians. We must heed the call for boycott, divestment, and sanctions of Israel, until we achieve our goal. The struggle continues!

Endnote: i. Globalized Palestine: The National Sell-Out of a Homeland, by Khalil Nakhleh, The Red Sea Press, Trenton New Jersey, 2012

Photo: mondoweiss.net

You know your legal case has a strong backbone when…”the oldest and most extensive network of public interest and human rights activists working within the legal system” expresses support for it!

That network makes up the National Lawyers Guild, a non-profit federation of several thousand lawyers, legal workers, and law students that has been working to “advance social justice and support progressive social movements” since 1937. For more information about the NLG, visit their website at www.nlg.org/.  The following letter was sent by their National Executive Committee to the Minnesota Attorney General:

Thank you NLG!

December 13, 2011

To: Attorney General Lori Swanson
CC: Governor Mark Dayton, State Auditor Rebecca Otto, Secretary of State Mark Ritchie

On behalf of the National Lawyers Guild, we write in support of the lawsuit filed on November 29, 2011, against the Minnesota State Board of Investment (SBI) which seeks a judgment directing the SBI to divest from Israel Bonds.

The complaint against the SBI makes pointed reference to Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, to which both the United States and Israel are parties. Article 49 specifically prohibits an occupying power from transferring (settling) parts of its own civilian population into territory it occupies. Article 49’s anti-colonization provisions are jus cogens, which means that they are mandatory norms of international law. Jus cogens violations are not political questions.

As the complaint abundantly shows, there is no credible dispute that Israel has been in continuous violation of Article 49 since shortly after the 1967 war by engaging in ever-accelerating settlement building activities in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, including East Jerusalem. In the last ten years, the United States has reduced its loan guarantees to Israel by nearly one billion dollars in response to Israel’s illegal settlement activities. The International Court of Justice has issued an advisory opinion confirming the illegality of Israel’s settlement activities and the UN Security Council has issued a number of resolutions condemning Israel for these activities.

It is well known that money obtained from the sale of sovereign Israel Bonds is used by Israel to fund its continued violations of Article 49 in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. On its Israel Bond website, the Government of Israel goes so far as to even promote its settlement infrastructure projects along with its official slogan that Israel Bonds are a “Bond with Israel”.

Despite having been repeatedly informed that money generated from the sale of Israel Bonds is used by Israel to violate the Fourth Geneva Convention, the stridency by which the SBI clings to its Israel Bond investments demonstrates that they are at least “purposive”. This means that the Board is aiding and abetting Israel’s violations of international law. Such aiding and abetting is itself a violation of international law.

The SBI’s violation of international law also violates Minnesota law. The Fourth Geneva Convention is part of the supreme law of the land and must be regarded as part of the law of each individual state to the same degree as the state’s own statutes. Additionally, the Minnesota statutes impose an express fiduciary duty on each Board member to invest “in a manner consistent with law.” By aiding and abetting Israel’s violations, the Board members are investing state pension funds in a manner not consistent with law and violating their fiduciary obligations to the citizens of Minnesota.

By investing in Israel Bonds to “Bond with Israel”, the SBI has made an international law issue a Minnesota law issue. Under Minnesota law, the SBI’s investments in Israel Bonds are illegal and Minnesota should immediately divest.

National Lawyers Guild

Letter originally posted with photo: http://nlginternational.org/news/article.php?nid=452