U.S. Condemns, Enables Israel's 'Appalling' Gaza Slaughter
stressed that Israel must "do more to meet its own
standards and avoid civilian casualties."
But at the
same time, the US is providing Israel with the
diplomatic cover, the money and, critically, the
very weapons it is using to slaughter innocent
Palestinian men, women and children — always
children — by the hundreds.
Last week, as
Israeli forces
bombed a playground full of children celebrating
a lull in the fighting and the festive Eid al-Fitr
holiday (8 children killed) and a
UN school in Jabalia (20 killed, including more
children), the United States was busy
resupplying the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) with
the mortar rounds and grenades it needed to keep on
killing.
Laying
waste to a nation requires not only an enormous
arsenal, but also a source for all that weaponry.
The United States is more than willing to be that
source. In addition to the well-publicized
$3 billion in average annual US military aid to
Israel, there's another little-known program that
made headlines amidst last week's carnage.
Under a
Pentagon program called War Reserves Stock
Allies-Israel (WRSA-I), Israel stores American
munitions that it can also use in emergency
situations. The US allowed Israel to tap these
reserves, even though IDF did not cite any
emergency.
"They
didn't ask for it from there but we gave it to them
so we could rotate our stocks," a Pentagon explained
to Reuters.
As Israeli
leaders issued
bloodthirsty calls for ethnic cleansing —
and even genocide — in Gaza, and as Israeli
forces obliged them by
wiping out entire Palestinian families, the US
Senate
unanimously approved an additional $225 million
in emergency aid for the murderous IDF.
As world
leaders blasted the Gaza slaughter, with a host of
Latin American nations recalling their ambassadors
from Tel Aviv and Bolivian President Evo Morales
declaring Israel a
"terrorist state," American lawmakers from both
sides of the aisle have been falling over themselves
to proclaim their unwavering loyalty to the tiny
Jewish state.
Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL)
, who made her political
career championing the cause of murderous Cuban
exile terrorists, introduced a
resolution praising Israel for its restraint
in Gaza. The resolution was overwhelmingly approved
by a voice vote.
This
disconnect between reality —
more than 1,800 Palestinians, most of them
innocent civilians (including at least 400 children)
have been killed so far in this war — and US
perception shocks, but does not surprise, the world.
Indeed, when the UN Human Rights Council
recently voted 29-1 to investigate possible
Israeli war crimes in Gaza, the lone dissenting vote
was cast by the United States. It was the latest of
many instances in which the US either
vetoed or otherwise torpedoed UN resolutions
condemning Israeli policies and actions.
If anyone
thinks this weekend's strong words from Washington
offer hope for change in the US-Israeli
relationship, think again. This isn't the first time
the Obama administration has denounced Israeli
crimes. Early in his first term, the president
repeatedly demanded an immediate freeze on the
construction of illegal Israeli settlements in the
occupied West Bank. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu responded by announcing a major settlement
expansion while visiting the White House in 2009.
Remember
Obama's response? He angrily cancelled a planned
dinner date with Netanyahu, then
dropped his settlement freeze demand, allowing
what some observers, like Jewish-American UN human
rights official
Richard Falk, have called Israeli ethnic
cleansing to continue.
The last time
the United States actually sanctioned Israel for its
barbarism was in the 1950s, when the Eisenhower
administration suspended economic aid after an IDF
commando unit led by future prime minister and "man
of peace"
Ariel Sharon massacred scores of innocent
civilians, including many children, in villages in
Jordan and Gaza.
Since then,
even when Israeli warplanes
attacked the USS Liberty, killing 34
sailors in an attack that the secretary of state,
NSA director and many victims believed was
intentional, the United States has stood by Israel,
right or wrong.
Ultimately,
the American people are complicit in Israel's crimes
against humanity. America counts a racist,
fortified, paranoid and aggressive state as one of
its best friends in the world. American taxpayer
dollars are funding the slaughter of Palestinian
children. American bombs, bombers, bullets,
bulldozers, guns, missiles, jets, helicopters,
tanks, artillery and chemical weapons are used to
kill, maim, terrorize, repress and humiliate the
Palestinian people.
Meanwhile,
we keep electing the same leaders who perpetuate
this madness, forever pledging our undying
friendship to a nation whose leader has said that
9/11 was good for Israel and who has
boasted about how easily he can manipulate
America.
Until we, the
American people, condemn Israeli aggression — and
disgraceful US hypocrisy — in the loudest and
strongest possible language and demand an end to
military aid to the murderous Israeli regime, we all
bear some responsibility for the slaughter of
innocents in Gaza.
copyright ©
2014
digitaljournal.com
U.S.
Condemns, Enables Israel's 'Appalling' Gaza
Slaughter
By Brett Wilkins
August 04, 2014 "ICH"
- "Digital
Journal" -
The
United States raised eyebrows around the world
over the weekend by excoriating Israel after its
forces bombed yet another United Nations school
sheltering refugees from its ferocious Gaza
offensive.
In an
extraordinary rebuke, the State Department
condemned Israel's "disgraceful" attack,
which
killed 10 people including, as usual,
children:
"The
United States is appalled by today's disgraceful
shelling outside an UNRWA school in Rafah
sheltering some 3,000 displaced persons, in
which 10 more Palestinian civilians were
tragically killed," said spokeswoman Jen Psaki.
"UN
facilities, especially those sheltering
civilians, must be protected," Psaki continued.
"The suspicion that militants are operating
nearby does not justify strikes that put at risk
the lives of so many innocent civilians."
Paski also Condemns, Enables Israel's 'Appalling' Gaza
Slaughter
By Brett Wilkins
August 04, 2014 "ICH"
- "Digital
Journal" -
The
United States raised eyebrows around the world
over the weekend by excoriating Israel after its
forces bombed yet another United Nations school
sheltering refugees from its ferocious Gaza
offensive.
In an
extraordinary rebuke, the State Department
condemned Israel's "disgraceful" attack,
which
killed 10 people including, as usual,
children:
"The
United States is appalled by today's disgraceful
shelling outside an UNRWA school in Rafah
sheltering some 3,000 displaced persons, in
which 10 more Palestinian civilians were
tragically killed," said spokeswoman Jen Psaki.
facilities, especially those sheltering
civilians, must be protected," Psaki continued.
"The suspicion that militants are operating
nearby does not justify strikes that put at risk
the lives of so many innocent civilians."
stressed that Israel must "do more to meet its own
standards and avoid civilian casualties."
But at the
same time, the US is providing Israel with the
diplomatic cover, the money and, critically, the
very weapons it is using to slaughter innocent
Palestinian men, women and children — always
children — by the hundreds.
Israeli forces
bombed a playground full of children celebrating
a lull in the fighting and the festive Eid al-Fitr
holiday (8 children killed) and a
UN school in Jabalia (20 killed, including more
children), the United States was busy
resupplying the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) with
the mortar rounds and grenades it needed to keep on
killing.
Laying
waste to a nation requires not only an enormous
arsenal, but also a source for all that weaponry.
The United States is more than willing to be that
source. In addition to the well-publicized
$3 billion in average annual US military aid to
Israel, there's another little-known program that
made headlines amidst last week's carnage.
Under a
Pentagon program called War Reserves Stock
Allies-Israel (WRSA-I), Israel stores American
munitions that it can also use in emergency
situations. The US allowed Israel to tap these
reserves, even though IDF did not cite any
emergency.
"They
didn't ask for it from there but we gave it to them
so we could rotate our stocks," a Pentagon explained
to Reuters.
leaders issued
bloodthirsty calls for ethnic cleansing —
and even genocide — in Gaza, and as Israeli
forces obliged them by
wiping out entire Palestinian families, the US
Senate
unanimously approved an additional $225 million
in emergency aid for the murderous IDF.
As world
leaders blasted the Gaza slaughter, with a host of
Latin American nations recalling their ambassadors
from Tel Aviv and Bolivian President Evo Morales
declaring Israel a
"terrorist state," American lawmakers from both
sides of the aisle have been falling over themselves
to proclaim their unwavering loyalty to the tiny
Jewish state.
Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL)
, who made her political
career championing the cause of murderous Cuban
exile terrorists, introduced a
resolution praising Israel for its restraint
in Gaza. The resolution was overwhelmingly approved
by a voice vote.
This
disconnect between reality —
more than 1,800 Palestinians, most of them
innocent civilians (including at least 400 children)
have been killed so far in this war — and US
perception shocks, but does not surprise, the world.
Indeed, when the UN Human Rights Council
recently voted 29-1 to investigate possible
Israeli war crimes in Gaza, the lone dissenting vote
was cast by the United States. It was the latest of
many instances in which the US either
vetoed or otherwise torpedoed UN resolutions
condemning Israeli policies and actions.
If anyone
thinks this weekend's strong words from Washington
offer hope for change in the US-Israeli
relationship, think again. This isn't the first time
the Obama administration has denounced Israeli
crimes. Early in his first term, the president
repeatedly demanded an immediate freeze on the
construction of illegal Israeli settlements in the
occupied West Bank. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu responded by announcing a major settlement
expansion while visiting the White House in 2009.
Remember
Obama's response? He angrily cancelled a planned
dinner date with Netanyahu, then
dropped his settlement freeze demand, allowing
what some observers, like Jewish-American UN human
rights official
Richard Falk, have called Israeli ethnic
cleansing to continue.
The last time
the United States actually sanctioned Israel for its
barbarism was in the 1950s, when the Eisenhower
administration suspended economic aid after an IDF
commando unit led by future prime minister and "man
of peace"
Ariel Sharon massacred scores of innocent
civilians, including many children, in villages in
Jordan and Gaza.
Since then,
even when Israeli warplanes
attacked the USS Liberty, killing 34
sailors in an attack that the secretary of state,
NSA director and many victims believed was
intentional, the United States has stood by Israel,
right or wrong.
Ultimately,
the American people are complicit in Israel's crimes
against humanity. America counts a racist,
fortified, paranoid and aggressive state as one of
its best friends in the world. American taxpayer
dollars are funding the slaughter of Palestinian
children. American bombs, bombers, bullets,
bulldozers, guns, missiles, jets, helicopters,
tanks, artillery and chemical weapons are used to
kill, maim, terrorize, repress and humiliate the
Palestinian people.
Meanwhile,
we keep electing the same leaders who perpetuate
this madness, forever pledging our undying
friendship to a nation whose leader has said that
9/11 was good for Israel and who has
boasted about how easily he can manipulate
America.
Until we, the
American people, condemn Israeli aggression — and
disgraceful US hypocrisy — in the loudest and
strongest possible language and demand an end to
military aid to the murderous Israeli regime, we all
bear some responsibility for the slaughter of
innocents in Gaza.
copyright ©
2014
digitaljournal.com
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