Millions of Americans find it hard to accept the fact that the United States has been complicit in Israel’s destruction of Gaza by providing the money and bombs needed to destroy Gaza’s entire infrastructure and to destroy 100,000 innocent Palestinian men, women, and children.
Israel kills Palestinians with bombs, drones, and by cutting off the delivery of essential food and medical supplies. The Israeli Defense Forces do it by destroying hospitals, universities, or tented camps.
Meanwhile, 170 non-governmental organizations have called for the U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation to be dismantled, after the killing of more than 500 Palestinians seeking food since it launched operations. The previous program, run by U.N. NGOs, distributed food and medicine that saved lives. The United States should support the U.N. in distributing needed food and medicine to the Palestinian people.
Instead, Israel’s defense minister, Israel Katz has laid out plans to force all Palestinians in Gaza into a concentration camp on the ruins of Rafah. He has ordered Israel’s military to prepare the camp, which he ironically calls a “humanitarian city.”
“Palestinians would go through ‘security screening’ before entering, and once inside would not be allowed to leave,” Katz said at a briefing for Israeli journalists.
“Israeli forces would control the perimeter of the site and initially ‘move’ 600,000 Palestinians into the area — mostly people currently displaced in the al-Mawasi area,” Haaretz newspaper reported.
We must not let this caging of Palestinians happen. The Israeli military must not be put in charge of hundreds of thousands of people in need of all life’s necessities. History shows that at the hands of the IDF, they would not receive all they need.
America has paid 70 percent of Israel’s military costs since October 7th. It is time to stop the killing by stopping the flow of bombs, planes and armaments to Israel, and to change our focus to rebuilding Gaza for the Palestinians. America can stop the creation of this concentration camp and help create livable homes for Palestinians instead.
Israel’s plan is to rid Gaza and the West Bank of Palestinians, and to create for themselves a greater Israel that includes parts of Syria (like the recently seeded Golan Heights) and parts of Lebanon.
More and more Americans see that Israel is a destabilizing force in the Middle East. It is time for us to reach out to our senators and representatives with a clear message: “Stop Arming Israel.” If they refuse to hear us, we need to take to the streets.
Create a sign and join us at a weekly protest at the corner of Main and Broadway in Santa Maria, every Monday between 4 and 5:30 p.m. to raise the consciousness of Santa Marians. Help stop the Genocide and Israel’s Apartheid State. If we don’t try, who will?
