FCNL in the News

On Sunday September 8, FCNL’s Middle East Policy lobbyist Hassan El-Tayyab sat down for an in-depth interview about the war in Yemen on KPFK 90.7FM in Los Angeles.

In the wake of news that the Trump Administration is preparing to engage in direct talks with the Houthi forces in Yemen, Al Jezeera spoke with Hassan El-Tayyab, FCNL’s Legislative Representative for Middle East Policy.

Following the House’s recent historic passage of legislation to repeal the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF), both the House and Senate may be considering legislation to repeal another AUMF: the 2002 version that authorized war in Iraq.

Officials are suggesting the 9/11 law used by three presidents to justify every intervention of the last 18 years is applicable to Tehran, too.

When it comes to the war in Yemen, Congress has made its feelings known: It wants to end any U.S. participation, as well as block the sales of weapons to the countries carrying it out.

A new amendment to the Defense Appropriations Act will give Congress the opportunity to wrest greater control over its authorization of war under this and future presidents.

“Today is a historic day for peace,” Diane Randall, the executive director of the Friends Committee on National Legislation, which has been in the forefront of the struggle to end US support for the Saudi-led war and the de-facto blockade of Yemen, declared shortly after Thursday’s vote.

Recent Kennett High grad Fiona Davis-Walsh spent part of her spring break in the nation’s capital lobbying lawmakers about immigration. The teen was in Washington, D.C., with about 500 other young people from around the country who are part of the Friends Committee on National Legislation, a lobbying organization in the public interest founded in 1943 by members of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers)

Enacting the Elie Wiesel legislation represented a major victory for activists and advocates. But our work is not over.

Like many West Virginians, I am thinking of our troops serving overseas during this Christmas season. It is hard for families to be separated during the holidays. That is why many of us are sending thoughts, prayers, even gifts to adopted soldiers.

Here is a gift idea. Let’s be very careful with how and where we ask our soldiers to serve.