Thank you, Hamilton. Thank you for recognizing the protesters deserve respect for trying to force the Democratic Party to account. I’ve been involved in multiple actions & protests every single month since October now, trying everything from phone calls to actually switching my party registration from Independent to Democratic so I could participate in the Uncommitted Vote movement in my state, to being arrested at the Senate. The level of disrespect & maybe worse, contemptible silence, I’ve received back, including from friends & family, has been extremely depressing. I’ll keep going, because my respect & concern for the Palestinian people is much more powerful than that disrespect (& frankly my “sacrifice” is embarrassingly small), but it’s encouraging to get a supportive message from journalists like you.
It’s been maddening watching a party I’ve always supported prop up and fund a genocide and bat away any and all criticisms of it. It feels like the Democratic Party at large has long been just putting out fires rather than having a long vision, and now they aren’t even visionary enough to see a world where we don’t send weapons and billions of dollars so that Israel can slaughter children and entire families. It’s so disheartening and rings so hollow, especially when we basically just switched from a geriatric president’s genocidal policy to a girl boss one.
How have we become inured to atrocities? Especially those that are done with the blessings of our leaders? I am appalled at the actions of Israel's military. Air strikes that kill hundreds to "eliminate" two Hamas soldiers? Bombing hospitals and schools, then lying about it. If there are 20 Hamas soldiers encamped with the civilians why doesn't IDF send in ground troops to capture or kill them. Why mass destruction to accomplish this goal. Probably because Israel doesn't pay for those bombs. They're a gift from the United States.
I can imagine Israel officials saying the destruction of Gaza through air strikes is "urban renewal." And that is an atrocity as well.
What other choice is there? We cannot accept mass killing, starvation, torture, rampant disease, mass murder. No decent human being can or should accept their government giving the means for the slaughtering civilians en masse. It violates every precept of basic human decency to allow it.
It's still a real political conundrum though. The politics of our country is right now hostage to very powerful people who want no recognition of the truth of Palestinian humanity, or the recognition of international law. So it's not entirely about discomfort alone. Trump winning is legitimately scary. These people will do whatever they can to help him win if Harris shows any inclination toward altering the status quo. We've seen they can do a lot. They already want to. This will incentivize them further.
Ultimately though, there's no other option but to protest, and do whatever brings the most pressure on whomever has the most power to stop this, which is the current administration. It's an immediate emergency for millions of lives. Even assuming she would do something after winnning the election, they can't wait until January, 2025 as many won't make it. Those people cannot be sacrificed for our benefit.
It's a question of risk v. certainty. It's a risk to our future to protest but it's a certainty more will be killed if the assault on Gaza doesn't stop.
We wouldn't let someone crush a baby to death to increase our chances of winning an election against a fascist, right? Or maybe some would--but it's not defensible to do so. This means we can't let the US arm Israel to crush babies to death just because there's a risk the media and a bunch of billionaires will put more weight on the scale against us. We are simply forced to take this risk.
Thank you Hamilton for this. Much appreciated piece. Everyday more and more children are killed and families wiped out. Schools hit. We call our Congress members. Everyday. We protest. We write letters. How come President Reagan could tell Israel to stop killing children in Lebanon?
"In a recent book on Biden, The Last Politician, writer Franklin Foer details how Biden put an end to Israel’s bombing of Gaza in 2021 with one phone call.
After Netanyahu 'struggled to justify his request [for more bombing] because he couldn’t point to fresh targets that needed striking,' Biden said, according to Foer, 'Hey, man, we’re out of runway here. It’s over.' And then, Foer continued, 'like that, it was. By the time the call ended, Netanyahu reluctantly agreed to a cease-fire that the Egyptians would broker.'"
"In December, Khaled was feeding pigeons when he was killed by an Israeli sniper."
*ahem* "Most moral army."
Incidentally, thank you for this. I periodically have the same/a similar question go through my brain. Everytime that nonsense phrase ("Israel has a right to defend itself") is raised, I want one person - JUST ONE - to ask how many more kids have to die? How many more hospitals/schools/refugee camps have to be destroyed? When is the toll of death and carnage enough to satisfy whatever "self-defense" actually means to these people? And what's it gonna take before we stop talking about this shit in terms of self-defense? That's even before we get to issues of Israeli apartheid and Palestinian self-determination/self-defense.
As for protestors interrupting Democrats now (I mean can you even imagine???) - I just listened to an episode of the Some More News podcast where they talked about protestors being asked why they're not protesting trump/the GOP. Besides having real "why aren't you protesting ISIS" energy, do these people not realize it's because protestors don't see the Dems as being totally lost in the way that the GOP/MAGA is? Like...nobody is protesting trump/the GOP because it's very clear they won't change their minds. They want the blood of brown people to flow to usher in their Armageddon fairy tale. As such, they show no sign of beginning to think about maybe considering giving even a third of shit about Palestinian lives. The dems, on the other hand, are at least willing to pay lip service to the civilian death toll in Gaza. Which of these seems like the better target for protest? The answer seems pretty obvious to me.
Thanks Hamiltonn. Let me quote Catlin Johnstone about the topic:
" Every few years the US empire has this weird little festival where it pretends the government is changing hands and will now begin operating in a way that is meaningfully different from the way it was operating before. But then exploitation continues, the injustice continues, the ecocide continues, the wars continue, the militarism continues, the imperialism continues, the propaganda indoctrination continues, the authoritarianism and oppression continues.The behavior of the empire is no more changed by getting a new president than a corporation is changed by getting a new secretary at the front desk of its main office."
FWIW, I think that last sentence could as well end "...than a corporation is changed by getting a new CEO".
I mean, it's maybe less provocative in one sense, but in another, it calls attention to the facts that a) corporations are built to be exploitative and b) no-one with serious intentions of changing that would get anywhere near the executive suite.
“I’m guilty of murder/of innocent men/innocent women, innocent children/thousands of ‘em/my planes, my guns/my money, my soldiers/there’s blood all over my hands/it’s all my fault”
— X, I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts (from More Fun In The New World)
This song has been on a loop in my head since this war started. It shouldn’t be this relevant 40 years after it came out.
“Kamala Harris and her campaign want to minimize this issue. They want to talk about it as little as possible. The activists who are protesting and making noise and disrupting her campaign appearances are the only significant force that are making the Democratic Party at large face this issue publicly. Those activists are deserving of your respect.”
I would respect activists who refused to pay any federal taxes in protest of US support for Israel or who block factories and shipments of weapons. I have no respect for the action of disrupting Democratic campaigning and increasing the likelihood that an electoral system already significantly biased against the D candidate will produce a third majority vote loser but Electoral College winner.
“There is a very clear way to get people to stop protesting: Stop sending Israel the money and weapons that allow them to carry out this atrocity.”
Please support this assertion with even a scintilla of actual evidence rather than handwaving. An alternative prediction is that doing so would provide a much much greater incentive for people to disrupt Democratic campaigning with further demands for changes to US Middle East policy, bolstered by the proof that such disruption pays off.
If you acknowledge democratic protest, you show respect for an open, free society. These are peaceful protests, correct? At least by and large? Protest is an often forgotten lever to pull in an open democracy, and capitulation to protest doesn't cause chaos, it shows acknowledgement of major issues.
You can feel that Hamas committed a horrible atrocity AND fhink Isreal should stop bombing innocent men, women, and children. There's no contradiction there--it's the murder part that's wrong. Pretty basic.
The Middle East is terrifically difficult overall but that complexity it used to support horrible crimes all the time. 'We bomb them because they attacked us' doesn't hold up.
Since you have not "even a scintilla" of evidence of what would happen if we stopped arming Israel how about we stop doing it and see what happens? Worst case scenario is we stop murdering kids for at least a little while and then maybe get some other positive changes in foreign policy (according to your guess at what will happen)
I’m a new follower and enjoy your thoughts. This one doesn’t seem to have been as thought through and researched as much as the others.
Hamas started this war with a horrific attack with the hope that Israel would react in exactly the way that they did. Hamas purposely puts civilians in harm’s way by launching attacks from peoples homes, schools and hospitals. Hamas doesn’t care about Palestinian lives. Each dead child is one more death to blame on Israel. Hamas takes no blame. 40,000 may or may be correct (numbers come from Hamas) and there isn’t any mention of how many of those are terrorists shooting from behind terrified children.
The US has funded Hamas. We tell ourselves it goes to the Palestinian people, but it’s pretty clear that money has gone to enrich the Hamas leadership and buy weapons.
It’s a horrible situation, but to drop it all on Israel isn’t up to the quality of your writing.
Yes, arming Israel to eradicate Hamas. The Palestinians will never be free with Hamas in charge, using them as human shields to foment the global intifada against the Jews and America. They openly talk about their willingness to sacrifice their own people in the name of Allah and increasing the rest of the world’s hatred of the Jews. It’s awful what is happening, but it’s not going to stop until Hamas is defeated.
No, this is not how things work. Vice presidents don’t set foreign policy. Will Kamala Harris be as complicit in this genocide as Joe Biden? We don’t really know. I personally doubt it. However, what we do know is that Donald Trump has promised to deliver even more suffering to the Palestinians than Joe Biden has. There is a reason Bibi loves Trump. The question we all need to confront at this critical moment is, will we allow Donald Trump to be the next president? The only way to stop that horror is if enough of us vote for Kamala Harris. You don’t have to love her to understand that the alternative, the only alternative, would be much much worse for the Palestinians and everyone else.
I... don't agree with you. I mean, you're right that VPs don't set foreign policy and that we don't know how bad (good?) Kamala Harris will be re: Gaza. What we do know is, at best, she's been somewhat better rhetorically. Tim Walz as well.
As such, the best time to let Kamala and Tim know what we think of the horrors in Gaza is now, with the hope that maybe we can have some influence on their thinking should they win in November. To their credit, they met with Uncommitted voters in Michigan and Kamala took a softer stance against protestors in AZ. I think it's fair to say, then, that the protestors are having a relatively positive effect.
By all means, we should be protesting the horrors in Gaza and demanding an arms embargo on Israel. But let’s also say loud and clear that if the GOP wins, the suffering of the Palestinians will be drastically worse. And act accordingly
Absolutely valid. I think the question is what happens domestically. What I mean by that is if we'll see a militarized response to protestors and deportation of Palestinians (especially students.) I don't think that's particularly likely under Harris/Walz but significantly more likely under Trump/Vance.
I hate to think of it in those terms, but I don't see much chance of things improving in Gaza regardless of who wins in November.
Fair question. Bibi is doing his damndest to drag us into a full-on war with Iran. This would make an already catastrophic situation much, much worse for the Palestinians and millions of others. To say Harris and Trump would respond the same way to Bibi’s machinations is, I believe, seriously mistaken. Dems are having to deal with massive discontent on this from their constituents. The Reeps feel none of that pressure. So it is up to us to keep up the pressure but with the understanding that, as bad as it is, yes, it could get much worse and, if Trump and his crew were in command, it would.
A good piece. Unfortunately, it is a loose loose situation for VP Harris or any politician to address the plight of the Palestinians. Should have been addressed years ago, aka 2 State solution. Meanwhile, it seems that when we mention the plight of women and children who are innocent, have nothing to do with Hamas, and are victims, it becomes an antil Israel message. Our worthless large media ( I am looking at your NYT and WAPO) do not offer anything addressing this issue. Meanwhile the War Criminal Netanyahu continues to get a free pass. He caused the war, he wants it to continue, and he cares nothing about the hostages. Please dont take this to mean I am in favor of Hamas, they care nothing about their people, only staying in power. FREE PALESTINE..From HAMAS
Hey Hamilton, I understand and agree with the moral force of the argument to have an arms embargo with Israel. But are there measures short of an arms embargo that you would find compelling? Would calling for/achieving a ceasefire be enough? What about calling for a ceasefire and immediate stop to the annexation of the West Bank? I ask because 1) an arms embargo feels politically untenable given the longstanding US Israeli relationship and 2) Cori Bush & Jamal Bowman just got forced out of congress by AIPAC and so doing too much right now to antagonize AIPAC seems like a losing proposition for Democratic candidates. Curious to hear your thoughts.
Biden himself (and Harris) has been "calling for a ceasefire" for months while continuing to supply weapons to Israel and the result has not been a ceasefire. There need to be concrete steps to force Israel's hand, which is why the ask has evolved to cutting off military aid. Another way to phrase this is: the US President calls Netanyahu and says "stop now or we cut off aid." This sort of leverage has been used many times in the past.
Biden apparently made such a call in 2021, halting an Israeli bombing at the time. Also I would argue that continuing to supply arms to Israel violates the Arms Control Act, so I think we are, in fact, legally obligated to immediately halt weapons sales to Israel.
Oh, I think that makes total sense and I agree. In my mind “an embargo” is an extremely long lasting situation, probably because of the Cuban Trade embargo. I would have described the scenario you’re talking about as conditioning military support.
Although this is what is really needed, if Harris didn't want to speak out about that right now, a minimum would be to denounce some of the things Israel is doing like bombing hospitals and schools and like denouncing the grotesque torture at Sde Teiman, where there is even CCTV video as of this week. (Many Israelis are FURIOUS at the person who leaked the CCTV footage and determined to find and punish them - it reminds me that even in those situations some people have a conscience and are willing to take huge personal risks to try to stop/mitigate this.)
She has said it matters HOW Israel defends itself but if she actually spoke out about some of this that would show some actual good faith. Her calling for a ceasefire I believe is meaningless and unfortunately I just don't trust her one inch on Israel given her record. I would be stunned - but happy - if she spoke out about the prisoner torture and abuse and killings.
Thank you, Hamilton. Thank you for recognizing the protesters deserve respect for trying to force the Democratic Party to account. I’ve been involved in multiple actions & protests every single month since October now, trying everything from phone calls to actually switching my party registration from Independent to Democratic so I could participate in the Uncommitted Vote movement in my state, to being arrested at the Senate. The level of disrespect & maybe worse, contemptible silence, I’ve received back, including from friends & family, has been extremely depressing. I’ll keep going, because my respect & concern for the Palestinian people is much more powerful than that disrespect (& frankly my “sacrifice” is embarrassingly small), but it’s encouraging to get a supportive message from journalists like you.
It’s been maddening watching a party I’ve always supported prop up and fund a genocide and bat away any and all criticisms of it. It feels like the Democratic Party at large has long been just putting out fires rather than having a long vision, and now they aren’t even visionary enough to see a world where we don’t send weapons and billions of dollars so that Israel can slaughter children and entire families. It’s so disheartening and rings so hollow, especially when we basically just switched from a geriatric president’s genocidal policy to a girl boss one.
There are reports from non western media stating the death toll is closer to 200,000 at this point. They aren't counting that missing as dead.
How have we become inured to atrocities? Especially those that are done with the blessings of our leaders? I am appalled at the actions of Israel's military. Air strikes that kill hundreds to "eliminate" two Hamas soldiers? Bombing hospitals and schools, then lying about it. If there are 20 Hamas soldiers encamped with the civilians why doesn't IDF send in ground troops to capture or kill them. Why mass destruction to accomplish this goal. Probably because Israel doesn't pay for those bombs. They're a gift from the United States.
I can imagine Israel officials saying the destruction of Gaza through air strikes is "urban renewal." And that is an atrocity as well.
What other choice is there? We cannot accept mass killing, starvation, torture, rampant disease, mass murder. No decent human being can or should accept their government giving the means for the slaughtering civilians en masse. It violates every precept of basic human decency to allow it.
It's still a real political conundrum though. The politics of our country is right now hostage to very powerful people who want no recognition of the truth of Palestinian humanity, or the recognition of international law. So it's not entirely about discomfort alone. Trump winning is legitimately scary. These people will do whatever they can to help him win if Harris shows any inclination toward altering the status quo. We've seen they can do a lot. They already want to. This will incentivize them further.
Ultimately though, there's no other option but to protest, and do whatever brings the most pressure on whomever has the most power to stop this, which is the current administration. It's an immediate emergency for millions of lives. Even assuming she would do something after winnning the election, they can't wait until January, 2025 as many won't make it. Those people cannot be sacrificed for our benefit.
It's a question of risk v. certainty. It's a risk to our future to protest but it's a certainty more will be killed if the assault on Gaza doesn't stop.
We wouldn't let someone crush a baby to death to increase our chances of winning an election against a fascist, right? Or maybe some would--but it's not defensible to do so. This means we can't let the US arm Israel to crush babies to death just because there's a risk the media and a bunch of billionaires will put more weight on the scale against us. We are simply forced to take this risk.
Thank you Hamilton for this. Much appreciated piece. Everyday more and more children are killed and families wiped out. Schools hit. We call our Congress members. Everyday. We protest. We write letters. How come President Reagan could tell Israel to stop killing children in Lebanon?
Not just Reagan; Biden himself -
"In a recent book on Biden, The Last Politician, writer Franklin Foer details how Biden put an end to Israel’s bombing of Gaza in 2021 with one phone call.
After Netanyahu 'struggled to justify his request [for more bombing] because he couldn’t point to fresh targets that needed striking,' Biden said, according to Foer, 'Hey, man, we’re out of runway here. It’s over.' And then, Foer continued, 'like that, it was. By the time the call ended, Netanyahu reluctantly agreed to a cease-fire that the Egyptians would broker.'"
https://www.levernews.com/biden-again-pretends-to-be-powerless-this-time-about-gaza/
"In December, Khaled was feeding pigeons when he was killed by an Israeli sniper."
*ahem* "Most moral army."
Incidentally, thank you for this. I periodically have the same/a similar question go through my brain. Everytime that nonsense phrase ("Israel has a right to defend itself") is raised, I want one person - JUST ONE - to ask how many more kids have to die? How many more hospitals/schools/refugee camps have to be destroyed? When is the toll of death and carnage enough to satisfy whatever "self-defense" actually means to these people? And what's it gonna take before we stop talking about this shit in terms of self-defense? That's even before we get to issues of Israeli apartheid and Palestinian self-determination/self-defense.
As for protestors interrupting Democrats now (I mean can you even imagine???) - I just listened to an episode of the Some More News podcast where they talked about protestors being asked why they're not protesting trump/the GOP. Besides having real "why aren't you protesting ISIS" energy, do these people not realize it's because protestors don't see the Dems as being totally lost in the way that the GOP/MAGA is? Like...nobody is protesting trump/the GOP because it's very clear they won't change their minds. They want the blood of brown people to flow to usher in their Armageddon fairy tale. As such, they show no sign of beginning to think about maybe considering giving even a third of shit about Palestinian lives. The dems, on the other hand, are at least willing to pay lip service to the civilian death toll in Gaza. Which of these seems like the better target for protest? The answer seems pretty obvious to me.
Thanks Hamiltonn. Let me quote Catlin Johnstone about the topic:
" Every few years the US empire has this weird little festival where it pretends the government is changing hands and will now begin operating in a way that is meaningfully different from the way it was operating before. But then exploitation continues, the injustice continues, the ecocide continues, the wars continue, the militarism continues, the imperialism continues, the propaganda indoctrination continues, the authoritarianism and oppression continues.The behavior of the empire is no more changed by getting a new president than a corporation is changed by getting a new secretary at the front desk of its main office."
Yes. People who want to cut Harris slack with no evidence she'll be different are being bamboozled.
FWIW, I think that last sentence could as well end "...than a corporation is changed by getting a new CEO".
I mean, it's maybe less provocative in one sense, but in another, it calls attention to the facts that a) corporations are built to be exploitative and b) no-one with serious intentions of changing that would get anywhere near the executive suite.
“I’m guilty of murder/of innocent men/innocent women, innocent children/thousands of ‘em/my planes, my guns/my money, my soldiers/there’s blood all over my hands/it’s all my fault”
— X, I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts (from More Fun In The New World)
This song has been on a loop in my head since this war started. It shouldn’t be this relevant 40 years after it came out.
“Kamala Harris and her campaign want to minimize this issue. They want to talk about it as little as possible. The activists who are protesting and making noise and disrupting her campaign appearances are the only significant force that are making the Democratic Party at large face this issue publicly. Those activists are deserving of your respect.”
I would respect activists who refused to pay any federal taxes in protest of US support for Israel or who block factories and shipments of weapons. I have no respect for the action of disrupting Democratic campaigning and increasing the likelihood that an electoral system already significantly biased against the D candidate will produce a third majority vote loser but Electoral College winner.
“There is a very clear way to get people to stop protesting: Stop sending Israel the money and weapons that allow them to carry out this atrocity.”
Please support this assertion with even a scintilla of actual evidence rather than handwaving. An alternative prediction is that doing so would provide a much much greater incentive for people to disrupt Democratic campaigning with further demands for changes to US Middle East policy, bolstered by the proof that such disruption pays off.
If you acknowledge democratic protest, you show respect for an open, free society. These are peaceful protests, correct? At least by and large? Protest is an often forgotten lever to pull in an open democracy, and capitulation to protest doesn't cause chaos, it shows acknowledgement of major issues.
You can feel that Hamas committed a horrible atrocity AND fhink Isreal should stop bombing innocent men, women, and children. There's no contradiction there--it's the murder part that's wrong. Pretty basic.
The Middle East is terrifically difficult overall but that complexity it used to support horrible crimes all the time. 'We bomb them because they attacked us' doesn't hold up.
Since you have not "even a scintilla" of evidence of what would happen if we stopped arming Israel how about we stop doing it and see what happens? Worst case scenario is we stop murdering kids for at least a little while and then maybe get some other positive changes in foreign policy (according to your guess at what will happen)
I’m a new follower and enjoy your thoughts. This one doesn’t seem to have been as thought through and researched as much as the others.
Hamas started this war with a horrific attack with the hope that Israel would react in exactly the way that they did. Hamas purposely puts civilians in harm’s way by launching attacks from peoples homes, schools and hospitals. Hamas doesn’t care about Palestinian lives. Each dead child is one more death to blame on Israel. Hamas takes no blame. 40,000 may or may be correct (numbers come from Hamas) and there isn’t any mention of how many of those are terrorists shooting from behind terrified children.
The US has funded Hamas. We tell ourselves it goes to the Palestinian people, but it’s pretty clear that money has gone to enrich the Hamas leadership and buy weapons.
It’s a horrible situation, but to drop it all on Israel isn’t up to the quality of your writing.
🤡
Didn't you leave out the part about the deliberate slaughter of Israeeli babies, the rape of Jewish women,kidnapping and torture --used asking
The US government is not arming Hamas. It is arming Israel. Now that you understand that you never have to make that comment again.
Yes, arming Israel to eradicate Hamas. The Palestinians will never be free with Hamas in charge, using them as human shields to foment the global intifada against the Jews and America. They openly talk about their willingness to sacrifice their own people in the name of Allah and increasing the rest of the world’s hatred of the Jews. It’s awful what is happening, but it’s not going to stop until Hamas is defeated.
You're giving Hamas too much credit. They don't have the reach or resources to accomplish what you state.
Zionism will do that--rob you of your rational thought and replace it with emotional responses.
As for the world's hatred of Israel--they don't need Hamas to do that--they're doing just fine on their own.
If that's why the US is arming the IDF, then both the IDF and the US have failed.
It is impossible to eradicate a guerrilla movement like Hamas militarily. Viet Nam? Afghanistan? Any of this ring a bell?
“Never wrestle with pigs. You both get dirty and the pig likes it.”
Are you talking about Hamas or Hamilton with that snippy response?
No, this is not how things work. Vice presidents don’t set foreign policy. Will Kamala Harris be as complicit in this genocide as Joe Biden? We don’t really know. I personally doubt it. However, what we do know is that Donald Trump has promised to deliver even more suffering to the Palestinians than Joe Biden has. There is a reason Bibi loves Trump. The question we all need to confront at this critical moment is, will we allow Donald Trump to be the next president? The only way to stop that horror is if enough of us vote for Kamala Harris. You don’t have to love her to understand that the alternative, the only alternative, would be much much worse for the Palestinians and everyone else.
I... don't agree with you. I mean, you're right that VPs don't set foreign policy and that we don't know how bad (good?) Kamala Harris will be re: Gaza. What we do know is, at best, she's been somewhat better rhetorically. Tim Walz as well.
As such, the best time to let Kamala and Tim know what we think of the horrors in Gaza is now, with the hope that maybe we can have some influence on their thinking should they win in November. To their credit, they met with Uncommitted voters in Michigan and Kamala took a softer stance against protestors in AZ. I think it's fair to say, then, that the protestors are having a relatively positive effect.
By all means, we should be protesting the horrors in Gaza and demanding an arms embargo on Israel. But let’s also say loud and clear that if the GOP wins, the suffering of the Palestinians will be drastically worse. And act accordingly
Honest question: How exactly will the suffering of Palestinians be worse than their suffering is now as Hamilton describes above?
Absolutely valid. I think the question is what happens domestically. What I mean by that is if we'll see a militarized response to protestors and deportation of Palestinians (especially students.) I don't think that's particularly likely under Harris/Walz but significantly more likely under Trump/Vance.
I hate to think of it in those terms, but I don't see much chance of things improving in Gaza regardless of who wins in November.
Fair question. Bibi is doing his damndest to drag us into a full-on war with Iran. This would make an already catastrophic situation much, much worse for the Palestinians and millions of others. To say Harris and Trump would respond the same way to Bibi’s machinations is, I believe, seriously mistaken. Dems are having to deal with massive discontent on this from their constituents. The Reeps feel none of that pressure. So it is up to us to keep up the pressure but with the understanding that, as bad as it is, yes, it could get much worse and, if Trump and his crew were in command, it would.
I think we're saying the same thing.
A good piece. Unfortunately, it is a loose loose situation for VP Harris or any politician to address the plight of the Palestinians. Should have been addressed years ago, aka 2 State solution. Meanwhile, it seems that when we mention the plight of women and children who are innocent, have nothing to do with Hamas, and are victims, it becomes an antil Israel message. Our worthless large media ( I am looking at your NYT and WAPO) do not offer anything addressing this issue. Meanwhile the War Criminal Netanyahu continues to get a free pass. He caused the war, he wants it to continue, and he cares nothing about the hostages. Please dont take this to mean I am in favor of Hamas, they care nothing about their people, only staying in power. FREE PALESTINE..From HAMAS
Hey Hamilton, I understand and agree with the moral force of the argument to have an arms embargo with Israel. But are there measures short of an arms embargo that you would find compelling? Would calling for/achieving a ceasefire be enough? What about calling for a ceasefire and immediate stop to the annexation of the West Bank? I ask because 1) an arms embargo feels politically untenable given the longstanding US Israeli relationship and 2) Cori Bush & Jamal Bowman just got forced out of congress by AIPAC and so doing too much right now to antagonize AIPAC seems like a losing proposition for Democratic candidates. Curious to hear your thoughts.
Biden himself (and Harris) has been "calling for a ceasefire" for months while continuing to supply weapons to Israel and the result has not been a ceasefire. There need to be concrete steps to force Israel's hand, which is why the ask has evolved to cutting off military aid. Another way to phrase this is: the US President calls Netanyahu and says "stop now or we cut off aid." This sort of leverage has been used many times in the past.
Biden apparently made such a call in 2021, halting an Israeli bombing at the time. Also I would argue that continuing to supply arms to Israel violates the Arms Control Act, so I think we are, in fact, legally obligated to immediately halt weapons sales to Israel.
Oh, I think that makes total sense and I agree. In my mind “an embargo” is an extremely long lasting situation, probably because of the Cuban Trade embargo. I would have described the scenario you’re talking about as conditioning military support.
Although this is what is really needed, if Harris didn't want to speak out about that right now, a minimum would be to denounce some of the things Israel is doing like bombing hospitals and schools and like denouncing the grotesque torture at Sde Teiman, where there is even CCTV video as of this week. (Many Israelis are FURIOUS at the person who leaked the CCTV footage and determined to find and punish them - it reminds me that even in those situations some people have a conscience and are willing to take huge personal risks to try to stop/mitigate this.)
She has said it matters HOW Israel defends itself but if she actually spoke out about some of this that would show some actual good faith. Her calling for a ceasefire I believe is meaningless and unfortunately I just don't trust her one inch on Israel given her record. I would be stunned - but happy - if she spoke out about the prisoner torture and abuse and killings.
Excellent piece.