A bipartisan group of lawmakers are circulating a letter on Capitol Hill asking the White House to punish Palestinians for their successful statehood bid at the United Nations last month. Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), Ed Royce (R-CA), Eliot Engel (D-CA), and Howard Berman (D-CA) have signed on to the letter imploring President Obama to shut down the Palestinian Liberation Organization’s (PLO) office in Washington, D.C. and “call our Consul-General in Jerusalem home for consultations.” The letter, which is supported by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, says to use “every means at our disposal to ensure that this General Assembly vote does not serve as a precedent for elevating the status of the PLO in other UN bodies or international forums.”

Ros-Lehtinen last month called for cutting aid to the Palestinian Authority in response to the statehood bid (a move that isn’t a very good idea). And a Senate amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act last week would have done just that and also called on the U.S. to shut down the PLO’s diplomatic mission in the U.S.

CAP’s Matt Duss wrote that responses like these are mistaken and could potentially help groups like Hamas:

“U.S. policymakers and legislators should consider the words of several former Israeli officials who have come out in support of the Palestinian bid, including former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who said in a recent interview that “the Palestinian request from the United Nations is congruent with the basic concept of the two-state solution. Therefore, I see no reason to oppose it.” Writing in Foreign Policy this week, former deputy Israeli defense minister Ephraim Sneh warned that efforts to punish [Palestinian President Mahmoud] Abbas and the Palestinian Authority over the U.N. bid — which would likely redound to the benefit of Abbas’ more hardline rivals in Hamas — “would be a shot not in the foot but in the liver — Israel’s.”

In the end, the Senate amendment did not make its way into the final Senate NDAA. Groups like J Street, who heavily opposed the amendment, celebrated the move, saying that closing the mission would be too extreme and is “usually reserved for instances in which the United States is responding to deadly acts committed against our country or citizens, or gross violations of human rights by the government in question.”

CAP’s Duss adds that “rather than punishing Mahmoud Abbas’s government for the U.N. effort, Congress should recognize the considerable work it has done in building institutions and creating security in the West Bank. Congress should also support the Obama administration in bringing Israelis and Palestinians back into a credible negotiating process, with clear terms of reference in which both sides are held accountable to their commitments.”

After Palestine was upgraded to a non-member observer state at the United Nations, members of both houses of Congress proposed legislation responding to the Palestinians’ U.N. statehood bid by cutting off American aid. However, cutting off aid would harm the prospects for peace and immiserate thousands of Palestinians.

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) (who has done this before) was the first to call for defunding, followed shortly by two measures in the Senate. The proposals are essentially non-starters as they would also take away massive amounts of money from the U.N., a move Senate Democrats would most likely not allow to move forward.

A fourth proposal, amendment 3203 to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), would only remove United States aid to the Palestinians in case any Palestinian authority brings a case at the International Criminal Court (a potential consequence of the U.N. upgrade). Regardless of whether or not one thinks the United States should seek to deter the Palestinians from going to the ICC, the blanket, automatic aid cutoff proposed in SA 3203 could have potentially devastating consequences. As CAP’s Matt Duss explains, diplomatic and financial support for the Palestinian Authority is a critical tool for bolstering the moderate Palestinian leadership vis-a-vis their hardline Hamas rivals:

U.S. policymakers and legislators should consider the words of several former Israeli officials who have come out in support of the Palestinian bid, including former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who said in a recent interview that “the Palestinian request from the United Nations is congruent with the basic concept of the two-state solution. Therefore, I see no reason to oppose it.” Writing in Foreign Policy this week, former deputy Israeli defense minister Ephraim Sneh warned that efforts to punish Abbas and the Palestinian Authority over the U.N. bid — which would likely redound to the benefit of Abbas’ more hardline rivals in Hamas— “would be a shot not in the foot but in the liver — Israel’s.”

Threatening aid in retaliation for the widely popular U.N. bid would undermine the moderate leadership’s argument that diplomacy with Israel, and not force, is the best way to advance the Palestinian national cause. Passing SA 3203 would undermine America’s main goal in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — furthering a peace process towards a two-state solution.

It could also shatter the fragile Palestinian economy. Though Palestinian growth has averaged a massive 7.7 percent in recent years, that growth has been fueled by foreign economic assistance. Without foreign aid, the Palestinian Authority would be unable to pay for services and development projects, which is why the World Bank believes “it is imperative” that “donors maintain their support to the PA’s budget.” This situation is unfortunately likely to continue for the forseeable future, as the continued occupation makes sustainable, non-aid fueled growth difficult. Since the U.S. provides an enormous amount of non-military aid to the PA, and aid is already slowing down, further cuts could do serious harm to Palestinian economy, endangering both vulnerable Palestinians and the legitimacy of the moderate, economically-focused Fatah leadership.

Perhaps for these reasons, the White House is not supporting any sort of “punishment” for the Palestinian bid at the United Nations.

Two of the Israeli government’s most reliable critics of an Iran strike were swept out of power during Monday’s Likud party primary, replaced by hard-right members of the Knesset (MKs) on both Iran and Israeli West Bank settlements. According to a Reuters report, the defeated members, Dan Meridor and Benny Begin, were staunch opponents of a strike on Iran, and “their likely ouster could point to a strategic shift closer to confrontation.” Israeli journalist Noam Sheizaf notes that hardliners now make up almost all of the MK candidates in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s party:

All the so-called Likud “moderates,” except for Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin, were pushed out of the top seed and will probably be out of the Knesset; that includes ministers Benny Begin, Michael Eitan and Dan Meridor. The most vocal backbenchers – those behind attacks on the left, Arabs and human rights NGOs – won the day. The Likud looks right now like the Tea Party’s dream team.

Another analyst of Israeli politics, Michael Koplow, argues that the Likud primary “makes an Israeli strike on Iran a lot more likely” because the “security cabinet [may flip] from being divided down the middle to being nearly unanimous in favor of a strike.” Likud, which for the first time this year is forming a joint party with the conservative nationalist Yisrael Beiteinu party, is widely expected to be the big winners in Israel’s general election in January.

High-ranking Israeli officials have recently indicated that the pressure-and-negotiations approach currently employed by the Obama administration could lead to a successful diplomatic resolution of the nuclear crisis. There is some tentative evidence Iran might be open to a negotiated solution. Given the terrible consequences of war, the U.S. government believes diplomacy is “the best and most permanent” way to resolve the nuclear issue.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Egyptian Prime Minister Mohamed Kamel Amr today announced a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel, ending eight days of violence that resulted in nearly 150 dead and more wounded. President Obama dispatched Clinton to the region yesterday and the nation’s top diplomat traveled to Jerusalem and Cairo today to help facilitate the deal.

But in a statement on the Gaza ceasefire today, Sens. John McCain (R-AZ), Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) — one day after intelligence officials debunked their attacks on the Obama administration over Benghazi — didn’t have any kind words for the president and his team. In fact, the new “Three Amigos” attacked Obama, saying there needs to be “smarter American leadership” in the Middle East.

Yet the three Republicans did have praise for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Egyptian President Muhammad Morsi:

We commend Prime Minister Netanyahu and other Israeli leaders for the role they played in reaching today’s ceasefire. We also are encouraged by the responsible leadership role played by the President of Egypt and his government. President Morsi deserves credit for successfully bringing an end to the violence and preventing further loss of life on both sides. These actions are befitting the commitment to peace and security that Egypt has traditionally upheld as a leader of the Arab world.

Indeed, Netanyahu, Morsi and others involved ending the hostilities deserve credit — but so does the Obama administration. And given their embarrassing campaign to bring down the Obama administration on Libya, it’s not entirely shocking that McCain and his allies don’t see it that way.