Last Wednesday night, dozens of President Biden’s employees held a vigil outside the White House. They called for a lasting cease-fire in Gaza to protest their Chief’s near total support, in weapons and words, of Israel’s genocidal ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza.
Protesters wore sunglasses and masks to hide their identities in fear of losing their administration jobs; indeed destroying their government careers.
Their protest was the most visible pushback from government workers to Biden’s grotesque involvement enabling the destruction of Gaza and its 2.3 million beleaguered Palestinians.
In November, over 700 political appointees sent Biden a letter demanding he support an immediate, permanent cease-fire to stop the killing, and resume humanitarian aid. Earlier this month over 40 White House interns sent Biden a letter condemning Israel’s genocidal response to the October 7 attack and imploring Biden to support a permanent cease-fire.
Did you read those letters from political appointees and lowly interns, Mr. President? Did you peer through the White House windows to view people, with more courage and decency than you could imagine, beseeching you to end the madness of your war policies?
Along with those hundreds of courageous government workers, the whole world, save for the leaders of America and Israel, are pondering when President Biden will reclaim his humanity.
Walt Zlotow became involved in antiwar activities upon entering University of Chicago in 1963. He is current president of the West Suburban Peace Coalition based in the Chicago western suburbs. He blogs daily on antiwar and other issues at www.heartlandprogressive.blogspot.com.
You good people rock! Rocking it for Peace!
This is unprecedented. It didn’t even happen during the Bush II savagery of the Iraq invasion. Not with a White House staff, anyway. Just goes to show the utter depravity of the Biden Administration.
It’s about time the American People and people around the world protest a Democratic President’s support for a war he funds. People did not protest Obama’s wars although some people protested his drone strikes.
The people protesting Israel’s slaughter of Gaza and Biden’s funding of it should also protest the proxy war in Ukraine.
Obama’s drone strikes were the most prominent component of Obama’s wars, and Code Pink protested extensively against them and against him.
They’ve also protesed against Blinken over Palestine, confronted Biden at a restaurant over Ukraine, occupied Bernie Sanders’s office over Ukraine, etc.
This is the dumbest article. Ethnic cleansing in Gaza? Seriously? I used to respect you guys, but this is idiotic.
When did you respect Antiwar.com? They have always been critical of Israel’s mistreatment of its Arab population.
I’ve been a libertarian for decades and a huge fan of Scott for a long time, hearing of his work through Tom Woods. It’s nonsense like this article that keeps turning people away from libertarianism. Seriously, anyone that thinks Israel is guilty of ethnic cleansing for defending themselves is a moron and I will not give them a second of consideration.
Are the illegal squats (“settlements”) on occupied land outside Israel an example of “defending themselves?”
How about the abduction and indefinite detention without trial of kids as young as 14? Is that Israel “defending themselves?”
When and if Israel withdraws to within its own borders (set in UNR 181), or at least actually negotiates revised borders with its neighbors (e.g. the 1967 line), then it gets to cite “self-defense” without everyone else doing a spit-take.
You clearly have no idea what you’re talking about. Here’s some pictures so you possibly might be able to comprehend:
1. Palestinian flag in 1939. In case you don’t know, Israel was founded in 1948. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f89456b05fad905d234a8fcf8ae68d1eb7cb56ce4cf4e44dcbe031f5715d0379.png
2. 1947, Palestinians refuse what they now claim they want. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e5be4a30eb5c6c2a42a771b2b617f7f6570902c7e0693435fbac3c7d4604d86a.png
3. How many times has Israel accepted peace, only to have “Palestine” break the treaty? This many +1. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b66a454a87bee450dbe3fe61fc5c242cef9afa9f40c7ee497150d44f86d8a255.png
OK, so a bunch of stuff orthogonal to, and not in any way contradicting, what I wrote.
Better than nothing, I guess.
But not much.
You’re just too blinded by hate to understand my point. The point is that the land belongs to Israel, and the so-called Palestinians are a made up group in the 1960s with no other aim than the eradication of Israel. Support them if you want, but know that you’re willingly ignoring facts and supporting genocide. Ignorant boob. And because I know you won’t “get it,” the map was included to show that the partition was between Israel and “Arabs.” There wasn’t a Palestinian people. It was made up by Arafat. Israel is constantly attacked by their neighbors, they’re forced to retaliate, and then they get attacked by lunatics like yourself. You can’t point to ONE!!!! time that Israel was the aggressor, you lunatic.
Who is it that you fantasize I “hate?”
Until well into the 20th century, the word “Palestinian” referred to a Jew born in Palestine.
A “Palestinian” Arab identity did begin to take form before Arafat (who was himself an Egyptian, not a Palestinian), though.
Any time an IDF unit is in, for example, the occupied West Bank, it is an invader/aggressor force operating outside of Israel. That’s how borders work. I’m personally not a fan of states or borders, but I do understand the system and the rules underlying them.
I’m no more a supporter of the state of Palestine than I am of the state of Israel. I’m no more a supporter of Hamas than I am of the IDF. I’m an anarchist, so if I “hate” anything, it’s the Westphalian Model.
???
Where is your sense of morality?
You excuse Israel, very casually, while people are dying?
Says the person who, very casually, dismisses Hamas cooking babies alive in ovens, burning them alive in piles, raping women to death then continuing after they were dead, and kidnapping 240+ people. Let me guess, you think it was okay for Hamas to take a woman that was alive, cut open her pregnant belly, pull out her baby, stab it, then her, and leave her there with the umbilical cord still attached, right?
Israel and the US made those things up except the part of people being taken hostage. They say what it takes to portray Israel as the victim and the Palestinians as terrorists.
So that’s the answer. Jews lie. Okay, pinko antisemite. You are a terrible person.
“Israel” /= “Jews.”
As of 2019, about half again as many Jews lived in the United States as in Israel.
Nor are all Israelis Jews, or all Jews Zionists, or all Zionists Jews.
genocide is closer?
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a1f8f519f303d5d38b0e9aa206e607465fdfff630bca50709a9fd1d6cc749606.jpg