Oxfam America

Groups Forge Emergency Coalition to Pressure US on Gaza Cease-Fire

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

Demonstrators march for a Gaza cease-fire in San Francisco on November 18, 2023.  (Photo: Brett Wilkins/Common Dreams)

“It is long past time for the United States to use its leverage and uphold U.S. law to end Israel’s indiscriminate bombardment of Gaza and have this war come to an end.”

A broad coalition of advocacy groups on Tuesday launched an emergency online campaign to pressure U.S. lawmakers to support an immediate and permanent cease-fire in Gaza.

Demand Progress, Oxfam America, the Friends Committee on National Legislation, Win Without War, Common Defense, the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, and 23 partner groups started CeasefireAction.com, which includes a searchable database of each member of Congress and where they stand on the cease-fire issue, as well as a tool for contacting lawmakers to urge them to publicly support a cease-fire.

“It is long past time for the United States to use its leverage and uphold U.S. law to end Israel’s indiscriminate bombardment of Gaza and have this war come to an end,” said Seth Binder, director of advocacy at the Middle East Democracy Center, a coalition member. “The humanitarian catastrophe that millions of Palestinians are suffering through and its seismic moral and strategic consequences should compel members of Congress to do everything in its power to secure a cessation of hostilities.”

According to the database, 164 of the 536 members of Congress “support some form” of cessation of hostilities in Gaza. All of them are Democrats, plus independent Sens. Angus King (Maine) and Bernie Sanders (Vt.). Seventy-six lawmakers “fully support” a cease-fire.

The launch of CeasefireAction.com comes as Israeli forces continue their relentless bombardment, invasion, and starvation of Gaza’s 2.3 million people, around 90% of whom have been forcibly displaced. According to Palestinian and international humanitarian officials, more than 102,000 Palestinians have been killed or wounded by Israeli bombs and bullets, with at least 7,000 others missing and believed dead and buried beneath the rubble of some of the hundreds of thousands of homes and other buildings destroyed or damaged by Israeli bombardment.

Israel’s conduct in war, along with statements by members of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right government and Knesset lawmakers, are cited in a South Africa-led genocide case filed in the International Court of Justice in The Hague. On January 26, the ICJ issued a preliminary ruling that found Israel is “plausibly” committing genocide and ordered the country’s government to “take all measures within its power” to prevent genocidal acts.

As Israeli forces are poised for a major ground invasion of Rafah, where an estimated 1.5 million Palestinians—the vast majority of them forcibly displaced from other parts of Gaza—are sheltering, “it is more urgent than ever that Congress and the [Biden] administration support an immediate, permanent cease-fire,” said Demand Progress policy adviser Hajar Hammado.

“We need an end to the violence, a release of [Israeli] hostages, and the free flow of humanitarian aid to alleviate the immense scale of suffering,” Hammado added. “This new tool, CeasefireAction.com, empowers constituents to hold their members of Congress accountable for their stances in this critical moment. A temporary, six-week cease-fire is not enough—we need an immediate, permanent cease-fire now.”

The Biden administration—which is seeking an additional $14.3 billion in U.S. military aid for Israel atop the nearly $4 billion it already gets from Washington each year—has pushed for a temporary cease-fire deal ahead of Ramadan in recent days under intensifying pressure from the U.S. public.

Vice President Kamala Harris on Sunday said that “given the immense scale of suffering in Gaza, there must be an immediate cease-fire for at least the next six weeks.”

“People in Gaza are starving,” Harris said. “What we are seeing every day in Gaza is devastating. We have seen reports of families eating leaves and animal feed, children dying from malnutrition and dehydration. Too many innocent Palestinians have been killed.”

Meanwhile, the Biden administration—which twice sidestepped congressional review to expedite weapons transfers to Israel since October 7—is preparing to send thousands more bombs to the country’s military.

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

Continue ReadingGroups Forge Emergency Coalition to Pressure US on Gaza Cease-Fire

Pressure rises for Biden to drop military aid to Israel

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Original article republished from Peoples Dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.

After over two months of genocide, support for the US’s usual policy of unconditional aid to the Zionist state is dwindling

Image from demonstration outside of Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin’s house on Christmas morning, protesting US policy in Israel

Since October 7, Biden has added to Israel’s massive US-made military arsenal and sent more weapons to Israel as it carries out its genocide in the Gaza Strip, even bypassing Congressional review to do so. After nearly three months of war, however, support for the US’s usual policy of unconditional aid to the Zionist state is dwindling.

Some of the most bloody attacks against Palestinian civilians have been made possible with US-made bombs, such as the attack that leveled an apartment block in the Jabalya refugee camp, killing over 100 people.

Many of the atrocities perpetrated by Israel with US-made weaponry and funded by US money have been broadcast internationally across communications channels for even the people of the US to see. As a result, mass protests have erupted in the streets for months, often disrupting major commercial centers and events throughout the busy holiday season. 

A recent poll shows that popular support for US aid to Israel has dropped since November. According to a poll from Quinnipiac University released on December 20, less than half (45%) of registered voters support sending “military aid to Israel for their efforts in the war.” This is a significant drop from the results of Quinnipiac’s previous poll from a month ago, in which 54% of voters expressed their support for military aid to Israel. A comparison of the two polls reveals that support for aid to Israel has dropped among voters in both the Republican and Democratic parties. In the November poll, 71% of Republicans and 45% Democratic voters said they were in favor of further military aid to Israel. Those numbers dropped in December, with 65% of Republicans and only 36% of Democrats supporting more US aid to Israel.

The dwindling support for US support to the Zionist state follows the trends of other polls in the growing popularity of the Palestinian cause, such as an early December Date for Progress poll which found that 61% of voters support calls for a permanent ceasefire—including nearly half, 49%, of Republicans. 

Pressure for the Biden administration to shift its policies on Israel has also been coming from within Congress itself—not even necessarily from the most progressive elements of the legislature. Six members of security-oriented committees of the House of Representatives, including the Intelligence, Armed Services or Foreign Affairs committees, none of whom are known progressives, penned a letter to Biden on December 18, calling on the President to “use all of our nation’s leverage to shift the Israeli military’s strategy.” 

“The mounting civilian death toll and humanitarian crisis are unacceptable and not in line with American interests,” the letter reads. The representatives also reference the history of “America’s war on terror” as a warning for the future, stating, “We know from personal and often painful experience that you can’t destroy a terror ideology with military force alone. And it can, in fact, make it worse.”

Several prominent humanitarian organizations, including Human Rights Watch, Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders USA, Oxfam America, and Amnesty International, have also penned a letter to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, urging him to halt military aid to Israel. The organizations urge the Pentagon to “withhold U.S. assistance, in accordance with U.S. law and policy, that would facilitate violations of international humanitarian law.” 

Biden himself has not responded to any of the outside pressures against his Israel policy, and has only dug his heels in. As his administration told CNN earlier this month, the US has no plans to place conditions on Israel aid as it carries out genocide in Gaza.

Original article republished from Peoples Dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.

Continue ReadingPressure rises for Biden to drop military aid to Israel