Oppose S.384 – Reject Censorship, Settlements, and Religious Nationalism

I am writing to urge you to publicly oppose S.384, a dangerous bill that seeks to prohibit federal materials from using the term “West Bank.” This legislation is not about linguistic preference—it is an attempt to erase the internationally recognized term for occupied Palestinian territory and enforce extremist settler narratives that advance illegal Israeli annexation. For decades, the term “West Bank” has been the accepted designation in international law, diplomatic agreements, and U.S. policy. S.384 aligns the U.S. government with Israel’s most extreme factions, who push for full annexation of the occupied West Bank under the biblical term “Judea and Samaria.” Israel has already begun stamping foreign passports with “Judea and Samaria” to impose its illegal territorial claims on visitors. S.384 represents a larger effort to censor language that acknowledges Israel’s violations of international law. Beyond being a blatant attempt at historical and political revisionism, S.384 is also a dangerous effort to inject religious ideology into U.S. policy. The term “Judea and Samaria” is not just inaccurate—it is rooted in religious nationalism and used to justify Israeli expansionism at the expense of Palestinian lives and rights. The U.S. cannot allow foreign religious extremism to dictate our policies. Doing so undermines our commitment to secular governance and emboldens those who wish to reshape American foreign policy according to religious fundamentalism. This is unacceptable. The U.S. should not participate in this blatant whitewashing of Israel’s occupation, nor should we set the precedent of shaping American policy around religious-nationalist ideologies. I urge you to oppose S.384 and speak out against efforts to align U.S. policy with extremist settler agendas. The U.S. should stand for truth, not censorship in service of apartheid.