US lawmakers complain to Abbas over Thomas award

Two members of the US Congress have sent President Mahmoud Abbas a letter complaining about his awarding a press award to former White House columnist Helen Thomas, an Israeli newspaper reported Wednesday. Israel's Haaretz daily reported that Steve Chabot, chairman of the Middle East and South Asia Subcommittee, and Eliot Engel, senior member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, expressed concern over the award. Last year, the letter said, "the Committee on Foreign Affairs adopted an amendment entitled the Preparing the Palestinian People for Peace Act. This legislation conditioned U.S. assistance on whether the PA was actively preparing its people for peace through compromise with messages of tolerance, understanding, and reconciliation." But they argued that "Thomas' words and beliefs have been anything but supportive of a settlement where two peoples, Israelis and Palestinians, would live side-by-side, in peace and security."