UPDATE: Tuesday, Dec 5, 2023 · 9:33:51 PM +00:00
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CReade
Someone claimed they saw an Ukraine hashtag here. My apologies if they did but I didn’t put it there. If you read Sanders statement though, maybe I should have. Thanks to everyone that agreed that using statistics to justify the creation of a public health crisis, and to justify sloppy and immoral combat may be a historical precedent of the US — think Native Americans or Black Americans, etc.- but as Harris said, how Israel protects itself matters. And they are creating a mighty force of enemies through their actions that I don’t believe the US should underwrite until far more efforts are made to stop the slaughter of civilians.
Vice President Harris outlined the objectives of the United States with regards to what should and should not take place once the Hamas and Israel strategic goals have been met.
But Harris, like President Biden and Austin have all been more and more vocal about how, exactly, Israel accomplishes the objective of eliminating Hamas. Even Israel military say it could take months. I think we all know that it could take years.
And Israel will do everything it can to force the Palestinians to move out oil the way, their preference being to Egypt or Jordan. In the meantime, however, what Israel is doing to the Palestinian people is inexcusable.
As Kirby stated the way that Israel informs civilians they are going to start dropping bombs 24 hours or more ahead of time is very civilized. But dropping thousands of leaflets from planes does not meet the standard of protecting civilian lives when the civilians are extremely hard pressed to move. While bombs rein down on them.
A catastrophic health emergency that will take out hundreds of thousands of Palestinian civilians is developing. I’d give it 48 more hours before the point of no return is reached, and people will start dying by the thousands from health conditions.
Enough.
Senator Sanders, who I only occasionally agree with, issued a statement yesterday, some of which is below. I couldn’t agree more.
Israel is fighting a war that will lead to a Pyrrhic victory. I expect the President, Vice President, Austin, Kirby and others to loudly voice their objections to the unspeakable carnage that is taking place.
And, I expect them to make it clear to Israel that no more money is coming their way until they stop the purportedly accidental deaths of tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians.
Every former Israeli President I’ve seen talk about the difficulty of eliminating Hamas has clearly stated that there is no easy way to tweezer out the Hamas terrorists among the civilian population.
It may not be easy, but it does not justify the way that Israel is torturing innocent people under Netanyahu’s rule. He will be gone soon. Giving him billions of dollars is not the way to get him to value human lives.
No, I do not think we should be appropriating $10.1 billion for the right-wing, extremist Netanyahu government to continue its current military approach. What the Netanyahu government is doing is immoral, it is in violation of international law, and the United States should not be complicit in those actions.
We are all clear that Hamas, a corrupt terrorist organization, began this war with their barbaric attack against Israel on October 7. Given that reality, Israel has a right to defend itself. It does not, however, have the right to wage all-out war against innocent men, women, and children who had nothing to do with the Hamas attack.
Therefore, I believe it is appropriate to support defensive systems that will protect Israeli civilians against incoming missile and rockets attacks, but I believe that it would be absolutely irresponsible to provide an additional $10.1 billion in unconditional military aid that will allow the Netanyahu government to continue its current offensive military approach.
That approach has included indiscriminate bombing that has killed nearly 16,000 people, most of whom are civilians.