Scoop: “Anti-Israel” group inviting House and Senate staff to Jerusalem with no mention of “Israel”

Why is an "anti-Israel" group trying to get Republican Hill staff to "the West Bank"?

House and Senate staffers have received invitations from an anti-Israel organization to participate in a Leadership Learning Mission (LLM 9.0) that will visit “Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Amman.” 

Middle Eastern experts describe the organization, Rebuilding Alliance, as “anti-Israel” to the Washington Reporter. It endorses the anti-Semitic movement to boycott Israel, and its blog falsely accuses Israel of both “state terrorism” and “ethnic cleansing.” Its invite also downplayed a recent terror attack in which a Jordanian man opened fire at a border crossing, murdering three Israelis as a “security incident.” 

“[Update] In light of the security incident at the Allenby bridge on Sunday, we may be adjusting our itinerary,” it reads.

While the invitation materials, reviewed by the Reporter, make frequent reference to the country of Jordan, there is only one mention of Israel, when applicants are asked if they have visited “Israel or West Bank [sic] before.”

While the group regularly brings staff from progressive members of Congress, like Rep. Gwen Moore (D., Wis.), to Israel, multiple GOP staffers were considering the free trip to Israel, sources say. 

“This is a biased anti-Israel group that seeks to undermine Israel through propaganda and lies,” a foreign policy expert told the Reporter. “Rebuilding Alliance is trying to use Congressional staffers to give itself legitimacy, especially by having Republican staffers they can claim they’re ‘bipartisan.’ It would reflect badly on any Republican staffer to go on one of these trips and would show a lack of common sense. Staffers should remember that the record of them going on one of these trips is easily accessible to any future employer through congressional ethics disclosures.”

Rebuilding Alliance has in the past hosted events with then-Sen. Kamala Harris’s senior national security staff. A 2017 call invite, for example, went to “all who sent letters to ask Senator Kamala Harris’ help to keep Palestinian villages standing.” According to the invitation, the organization spoke with Halie Soifer, Harris’s National Security Advisor. Soifer is now the CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America (JDCA).

While groups like American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) regularly take policy staffers from relevant offices to Israel, a senior communications staffer on the Hill, who received the invitation from Rebuilding Alliance, told the Reporter that the lack of a focus on comms staffers by pro-Israel groups like AIPAC is a strategic mistake. “We’re the ones writing the op-eds and talking points defending Israel.”