complicity

US Doctors Tell Biden, Harris They ‘Witnessed Crimes Beyond Comprehension’ in Gaza

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Original article by Jessica Corbett republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Razan Arafat Barbah, a 14-year-old Palestinian girl who lost both of her legs in an Israeli attack on her home in Rafah in southern Gaza, is treated at Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis on October 1, 2024.  (Photo: Hani Alshaer/Anadolu via Getty Images)

“A cease-fire must be imposed on the warring parties by withholding military support for Israel and supporting an international arms embargo on Israel and all Palestinian armed groups.”

Nearly 100 U.S. healthcare providers who have volunteered in the Gaza Strip over the past year sent President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris a Wednesday letter detailing “the massive human toll from Israel’s attack” and urging the administration to “end this madness now!”

Israel has been waging war on Gaza since the Hamas-led attack that killed over 1,100 people last year. During that time, the physicians, surgeons, nurse practitioners, nurses, and midwives who signed the letter have collectively spent 254 weeks volunteering in hospitals and clinics throughout the besieged enclave.

As of Wednesday, Israeli forces have killed at least 41,689 Palestinians in Gaza and injured another 96,625, according to local officials. Thousands more remain missing in the rubble of civilian infrastructure. Israel—which also launched a ground invasion of Lebanon this week—faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice.

“This letter and the appendix show probative evidence that the human toll in Gaza since October is far higher than is understood in the United States. It is likely that the death toll from this conflict is already greater than 118,908, an astonishing 5.4% of Gaza’s population,” the health workers wrote to Biden and Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee for the November election.

“Our government must act immediately to prevent an even worse catastrophe than what has already befallen the people of Gaza and Israel,” they argued. “A cease-fire must be imposed on the warring parties by withholding military support for Israel and supporting an international arms embargo on Israel and all Palestinian armed groups. We believe our government is obligated to do this, both under American law and international humanitarian law. We also believe it is the right thing to do.”

“Gaza was the first time I held a baby’s brains in my hand. The first of many.”

Even before the October 7, 2023 attack, the United States had given Israel billions of dollars in annual military aid. Throughout Israel’s assault on Gaza—and now Lebanon—the Biden administration has continued to provide weapons and diplomatic support.

The American medical volunteers’ new letter—published on a website that also features a July missive along with similar ones that Canadian and U.K. health workers sent to their governments—shares accounts from individual signatories. Dr. Thalia Pachiyannakis, an OB-GYN, said that “I saw so many stillbirths and maternal deaths that could have been easily prevented if the hospitals had been functioning normally.”

Those who survived birth faced a warzone where thousands of children have died. Last month, Gaza’s Ministry of Health released a 649-page document with names and ages of Palestinians killed in the past year—and the first 14 pages are babies.

“Every day I saw babies die,” said Asma Taha, pediatric nurse practitioner. “They had been born healthy. Their mothers were so malnourished that they could not breastfeed, and we lacked formula or clean water to feed them, so they starved.”

Israeli bombings in the past year have claimed thousands of lives. Dr. Mark Perlmutter, an orthopedic and hand surgeon, said that “Gaza was the first time I held a baby’s brains in my hand. The first of many.”

The letter to Biden and Harris states:

Children are universally considered innocents in armed conflict. However, every single signatory to this letter saw children in Gaza who suffered violence that must have been deliberately directed at them. Specifically, every one of us who worked in an emergency, intensive care, or surgical setting treated pre-teen children who were shot in the head or chest on a regular or even a daily basis. It is impossible that such widespread shooting of young children throughout Gaza, sustained over the course of an entire year is accidental or unknown to the highest Israeli civilian and military authorities.

President Biden and Vice President Harris, we wish you could see the nightmares that plague so many of us since we have returned: dreams of children maimed and mutilated by our weapons, and their inconsolable mothers begging us to save them. We wish you could hear the cries and screams our consciences will not let us forget. We cannot fathom why you continue arming the country that is deliberately killing these children en masse.

“I’ve never seen such horrific injuries, on such a massive scale, with so few resources,” said Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, a trauma and critical care surgeon and the letter’s organizer. “Our bombs are cutting down women and children by the thousands. Their mutilated bodies are a monument to cruelty.”

The letter notes that “Israel has destroyed more than half of Gaza’s healthcare resources and has killed nearly 1,000 Palestinian healthcare workers, more than 1 out of every 20 healthcare workers in Gaza. At the same time, healthcare needs have increased massively from the lethal combination of military violence, malnutrition, disease, and displacement.”

It also challenges Israeli forces’ attempts to justify attacking the enclave’s medical infrastructure, stressing that “not once did any of us see any type of Palestinian militant activity in any of Gaza’s hospitals or other healthcare facilities.”

“We urge you to see that Israel has systematically and deliberately devastated Gaza’s entire healthcare system, and that Israel has targeted our colleagues in Gaza for torture, disappearance, and murder,” the American volunteers wrote, describing Palestinian healthcare workers as “among the most traumatized people in Gaza, and perhaps in the entire world.”

While welcoming the administration’s efforts to negotiate an end to the fighting, they emphasized that “the United States can impose a cease-fire on the warring parties by simply stopping arms shipments to Israel, and announcing that we will participate in an international arms embargo on both Israel and all Palestinian armed groups.”

“President Biden and Vice President Harris, we are 99 American physicians and nurses who have witnessed crimes beyond comprehension,” they added. “Crimes that we cannot believe you wish to continue supporting. Please meet with us to discuss what we saw, and why we feel American policy in the Middle East must change immediately.”

Original article by Jessica Corbett republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Continue ReadingUS Doctors Tell Biden, Harris They ‘Witnessed Crimes Beyond Comprehension’ in Gaza

UK forces involved in response to Iran attacks on Israel

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Zionist Keir Starmer is quoted "I support Zionism without qualification." He's asked whether that means that he supports Zionism under all circumstances, whatever Zionists do.
Zionist Keir Starmer is quoted “I support Zionism without qualification.” He’s asked whether that means that he supports Zionism under all circumstances, whatever Zionists do.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx2krlgekpxo

UK forces were involved in supporting Israel in the conflict in the Middle East after Iran launched a missile attack on the country.

Defence Secretary John Healey said British forces had “this evening played their part in attempts to prevent further escalation”, without giving more details.

The BBC understands UK fighter jets were involved, as they were in April when Iran last attacked Israel with missiles.

Responding on Tuesday to Iran’s attack, which the Israeli military said involved 180 missiles being fired with most intercepted, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said the UK “stands with Israel” and recognises its right to self-defence.

…

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx2krlgekpxo

Continue ReadingUK forces involved in response to Iran attacks on Israel

With Green Light From Biden White House, Israel Invades Lebanon

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Original article by Jake Johnson republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Israeli tanks are pictured near the Israel-Lebanon border on September 30, 2024. 
(Photo: Erik Marmor/Getty Images

“The Biden administration has acted recklessly in giving Israel a blank check to light the entire region on fire.”

Israeli forces invaded southern Lebanon early Tuesday with the open support of the United States, which endorsed what it called “limited operations to destroy Hezbollah infrastructure” despite warnings that a ground assault could spark a wider conflict and intensify the humanitarian disaster facing Lebanese civilians.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) described its ground invasion with the same terms it has used to characterize its bombing campaigns in Lebanon and Gaza, which—despite being called “targeted” at Hezbollah and Hamas—have frequently killed scores of civilians and obliterated schools, hospitals, shops, and residential buildings. Since mid-September, Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon have killed more than a thousand people and displaced roughly a million.

The IDF launched its ground invasion with the backing of the Biden administration. In a statement, the White House said that the invasion of Lebanon is “in line with Israel’s right to defend its citizens and safely return civilians to their homes.”

A spokesperson for the White House National Security Council acknowledged the risk of “mission creep” only to effectively wave it away, saying that “we will keep discussing that with the Israelis.”

Analysts likened Israel’s movement of troops into Lebanon to its invasion of the southern Gaza city of Rafah earlier this year—an operation that was initially described as limited but ultimately left the area in ruins.

“Gaza was a testing ground for Israel to see what they could get away with and, it turns out, the answer is absolutely anything it wants,” said historian and analyst Assal Rad. “It did not stop at Gaza or the West Bank and it may not stop at Lebanon, because war was [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu’s objective all along and his prize is Iran.”

“Make no mistake: The Biden administration is providing cover for Israel as it invades a neighboring, sovereign nation.”

The invasion comes after the Netanyahu government rejected a three-week cease-fire proposal put forth by the U.S., France, and other nations and intensified its bombing of Lebanon, hammering Beirut with airstrikes that killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and many civilians. The attack that killed Nasrallah was reportedly carried out with 2,000-pound bombs supplied by the U.S.

Coverage of the invasion in the Western corporate media painted the U.S. as “increasingly powerless,” with “limited” influence to forestall a massive ground assault on Lebanon. But the Biden administration has yet to seriously leverage American military aid to prevent a war that could envelop the entire region.

On the contrary, billions of dollars of aid and American weapons have continued to flow to Israel, enabling its war on Gaza and Lebanon. The Washington Post observed that “the events of recent weeks appear to fit a pattern in which the administration urges against specific Israeli actions only to later backtrack so it can avoid imposing conditions on military aid.”

The U.S. has also engaged in what’s been described as “unprecedented” intelligence-sharing with Israel, further deepening its complicity in the devastating wars.

Sarah Leah Whitson, executive director of Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), said in a statement late Monday that “Israel’s invasion of Lebanon, following its devastating attacks on Lebanon over the past two weeks, is the entirely predictable consequence of the Biden administration’s ceaseless coddling and resupply of weapons to Israel, whatever public bleats for cease-fires the administration has otherwise made.”

“The Biden administration has acted recklessly in giving Israel a blank check to light the entire region on fire, all while disregarding our own legal obligations under both U.S. and international law to halt the weapons flow to them,” Whitson added.

The U.S.-based anti-war group CodePink said that “Israel claims its operation in Lebanon is ‘targeted,’ but like in Gaza, civilians are the real victims.”

“Make no mistake: The Biden administration is providing cover for Israel as it invades a neighboring, sovereign nation,” the group said. “U.S. taxpayers fund Israel’s military, providing billions annually and supplying weapons used to kill innocent people.”

“The Biden administration and Congress could halt this escalation by cutting military aid, demanding a cease-fire, and holding Israel accountable,” CodePink continued, “but instead, they allow continued aggression across the Middle East.”

Original article by Jake Johnson republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Continue ReadingWith Green Light From Biden White House, Israel Invades Lebanon

Biden’s UNGA address espousing democracy and cooperation contrasts with reality

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Original article by Natalia Marques republished from peoples dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.

Biden addresses the general debate of the General Assembly’s 79th session (Photo: UN Photo/Loey Felipe)

Biden’s final address to the United Nations as president was riddled with falsehoods and hypocrisies typical of US foreign policy

When US President Biden ended his final address to the UN General Assembly with “my fellow leaders, there is nothing that’s beyond our capacity if we work together,” it can be easy to forget that the United States is the number one obstacle to mutual cooperation around the world.

Biden’s mention of the various conflicts and aggressions around the world—from Ukraine to Sudan to Gaza—of course made no mention of the US’s complicity in each of these conflicts.

Biden calls for “a ceasefire and hostage deal” for Gaza in order to “bring the hostages home, secure security for Israel, and Gaza free of Hamas’ grip, ease the suffering in Gaza, and end this war.”

But while Biden calls for an end to the war, the US continues to send weapons and other forms of aid to Israel as it carries out genocide in Gaza, aggression in the West Bank, and extends the war to Lebanon. Biden’s administration has ignored the popular demand for an arms embargo against Israel, supported by major labor unions which represent almost half of all unionized workers in the US as well as 61% of the US population. Instead, the US has only expanded its military support for Israel, approving a USD 20 billion dollar arms package to the Zionist state in August. 

The US has maintained its unconditional support of Israel, even as Israel floats a possible ground invasion of Lebanon. Yet ironically Biden said of the war in Sudan, “the world needs to stop arming the generals.” According to the Palestinian Youth Movement, an international Palestinian diaspora organization, “the Biden-Harris administration is responsible for the current massacres in Lebanon.”

The US’s support for Israeli genocide has received additional scrutiny after it was revealed that USAID and the State Department knew that Israel had deliberately blocked humanitarian aid to Gaza. US law requires the government to cut off weapons shipments to countries which block deliveries of US-backed aid, and so US Secretary of State Antony Blinken seems to have deliberately told Congress that Israel did not block aid so that weapons shipments to Israel would remain unaffected. 

Yet in his speech to the UNGA, Biden entreated Sudanese generals to “stop blocking aid to the Sudanese people.”

“We do not currently assess that the Israeli government is prohibiting or otherwise restricting the transport or delivery of US humanitarian assistance,” Blinken told Congress on May 10, despite being told the opposite by USAID and the State Department in April.

In Ukraine, not only were the US and NATO’s violations of Russian security red lines the chief cause of that war, but the West continues to be an obstacle to a peaceful settlement of the conflict. There has been no negotiation between Ukraine and Russia ever since the West allegedly forced Ukraine to withdraw from talks in April 2022, and the US in its usual fashion continues to supply billions of dollars in weapons to Ukraine to continue the war. 

And while Biden urged other UNGA member nations to “stand up” for the Ukrainian people, US military officials openly thirst for Ukrainian blood—complaining in a New York Times article from last year that the Ukrainian military has become too “casualty averse,” causing it to “race through precious [US-provided] ammunition supplies” as opposed to human lives.

Biden spent time lamenting the humanitarian situation in Sudan, and claiming that “the United States has led the world in providing humanitarian aid” to the war-torn country. But like many global conflicts, the war in Sudan has its roots in the savagery of US imperialism. According to Stephanie Weatherbee Brito of the International Peoples Assembly, “Through both military interventions and economic sanctions, the United States has shown its willingness to coerce any nation deviating from its interests. This has fostered a global environment where nations vie for power and influence. The US’s propensity to invade and punish perceived adversaries has spurred countries to bolster their military and geopolitical capabilities to safeguard their sovereignty in a world marked by violence and conflict, saturated with weaponry and lacking effective mechanisms to ensure peace.”

“This is essentially what is happening in Sudan today, where the conflict has resulted in more than ten million displaced persons. The conflict between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces serves to thwart the democratic process the people have been struggling for since 2018, as rival military groups struggle to control the country and its resources,” Brito articulated. 

US hybrid wars remains chief obstacle to global cooperation

“Our task, our test, is to make sure that the forces holding us together are stronger than those that are pulling us apart,” Biden claimed in his address to the UN, despite his administration’s wielding of sanctions that cause economic devastation throughout the world.

For decades, the international community has been calling on the United States to lift deadly sanctions on Cuba that are part of an over 60-year-long blockade against the socialist nation. Most recently, a group of nearly 600 parliamentarians from 73 different countries penned a joint letter condemning the continued inclusion of Cuba on the list. And 35 former heads of state from across the globe penned a separate letter to Biden, urging him to remove Cuba from the US’s “State Sponsors of Terrorism” list. 

But when it comes to US sanctions and other violations of the sovereignty of other countries, Cuba is but one facet. Comprehensive US sanctions target and put a stranglehold on the economies of countries such as Iran, North Korea, Russia, Venezuela, and Syria. Other nations, such as China, are under constant attack on many fronts, whether through media fear mongering or military exercises near their territories. 

And yet in his speech to the UNGA, Biden seems to deny that his administration has deliberately stoked conflict with China. “We also need to uphold our principles as we seek to responsibly manage the competition with China so it does not veer into conflict,” Biden pontificated. “We stand ready to cooperate on urgent challenges for the good of our people and the people everywhere.”

According to Amanda Yee, journalist, anti-imperialist activist, and host of The China Report on BreakThrough News, Biden’s China strategy has nothing to do with managed competition. “In reality, it’s a belligerent policy which will only escalate toward war,” Yee told Peoples Dispatch. 

“What he calls ‘strengthening our network of alliances and partnerships across the Indo-Pacific’ really means the continuation of arming Taiwan, building more military bases on allies’ soil and in the South China Sea, sending cruise missiles to Japan, conducting war games exercises in South Korea—all to further build up the military encirclement of China.”

The future of US democracy

“I’ve made the preservation of democracy the central cause of my presidency,” Biden claimed during his address. And yet those in the US who have protested against their governments’ domestic and foreign policies have faced police violence, mass arrests, and even deportation. 

As US presidential elections fast approach, whether the winner is Biden’s successor Kamala Harris or the ultra-conservative former president Donald Trump, anti-imperialist activists can expect more of the same repression.

Original article by Natalia Marques republished from peoples dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license

Continue ReadingBiden’s UNGA address espousing democracy and cooperation contrasts with reality

Youth Demand spray ‘GENOCIDE CONFERENCE’ at the Labour Party conference

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Youth Demand group spray paints 'GENOCIDE COFENCE' at the UK Labour Party Conference, Liverpool, 24 September 2024.
Youth Demand group spray paints ‘GENOCIDE COFENCE’ at the UK Labour Party Conference, Liverpool, 24 September 2024.

Two Youth Demand supporters have taken action at the Labour Party conference by painting ‘GENOCIDE CONFERENCE’ on the front entrance. Youth Demand are calling for a two-way arms embargo on Israel and for the new UK government to halt all new oil and gas licences granted since 2021.

At around 10:50am two Youth Demand supporters walked up to the security check-in building, where all guests must pass through, of the Labour Party conference being held in Liverpool and spray pained ‘GENOCIDE’ and were part way through writing ‘CONFERENCE’ before they were tackled by plain clothes police officers and arrested.

A Youth Demand spokesperson said:

“Labour is still arming Israel despite a majority of the public backing a complete arms embargo. Despite admitting there is a ‘clear risk’ of ‘serious violation of international humanitarian law’, they have spinelessly suspended less than 10% of arms licenses.

“They claim their national conference is ‘democracy in action’. This is a joke when in reality Labour sold our democracy to arms and fossil fuel companies. Just last week it was revealed Starmer accepted a £4,000,000 donation from a hedge fund with hundreds of millions of pounds worth of shares in fossil fuels and weapons.“

One of those taking action today was Danny Lusardi, 23, a graduate from Lancaster. He said:

“The Labour government has admitted the arms it’s selling to Israel are being used for war crimes. But still they’re happy to keeping licensing 90% of those sales. We’re here to show them the British public can’t accept that.”

“It’s our duty as citizens to hold our government to account. When they won’t listen to the democratic will of the people, that means breaking windows and spraying paint.”

“As we approach a year of watching Israel’s genocide on the news and social media, it’s time to ask ourselves: are we serious about ending it now?”

Continue ReadingYouth Demand spray ‘GENOCIDE CONFERENCE’ at the Labour Party conference