  Representative Ritchie Torres, a Democrat from New York, speaks at a House Financial Services Committee hearing (Photo by Al Drago-Pool/Getty Images) Torres: ‘To unilaterally suspend air travel indefinitely until mid-2025, as American Airlines has done, has the practical effect of a boycott’By Emily Jacobs Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) is urging U.S. airlines to reconsider their prolonged suspensions of flights to Israel “in order to prevent the appearance and the substance of discrimination against the Jewish State.” Torres, who serves on the House Financial Services Committee, sent a letter on Wednesday to the CEOs of American Airlines, Delta Airlines and United Airlines expressing his concerns over their decisions to suspend flights to Israel without FAA guidance that such flights are unsafe. Torres’ letter comes just over a week after American Airlines announced that it would extend its suspension of flights to Israel through April 2025. “The suspension has been so prolonged and so pervasive that El Al, an Israeli airline, has become the sole carrier offering direct flights from America to Israel. The lack of competition has made air travel to Israel less available and less affordable, putting customers at the mercy of a de facto monopoly that can easily gouge prices with impunity,” Torres wrote to American Airlines CEO Robert Isom, Delta CEO Ed Bastian and United CEO Scott Kirby. You May Have MissedUNION LABELWhy several leading labor unions abandoned their long-standing support for IsraelLast month, the UAW led a contingent of seven unions to throw their support behind a U.S. arms embargo on Israel. Read more...ON THE GROUNDErnst, GOP House members visit site of Hezbollah rocket attack that killed 12 childrenThe Republican senator said Israeli leaders are more more optimistic now about a cease-fire deal to free the hostages and ultimately end the war than they have been in months.        |
8.28.2024
🚨Rep. Torres accuses U.S. airlines of ‘effectively boycotting’ Israel
