Rep. Pramila Jayapal, the head of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, on Saturday condemned Israel as a racist state, warning activists that there is an organized opposition against progressive critics of Israel’s policy towards the Palestinians.
The sharp criticism from the lawmaker from Washington state marks among the highest-level condemnations of Israel, as several members of her caucus plan to boycott Israel President Isaac Herzog’s address to a joint session of Congress later this week.
Speaking on a panel at Netroots Nation, an annual progressive activist conference in Chicago, Jayapal was addressing pro-Palestinian attendees interrupting the session.
She’s not wrong about Israel. I would support cutting off aid from Israel and not support Palestine either. That’s probably the best solution.
But at least America wouldn’t be HELPING Israel burn Palestine to the ground.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/7/10/us-and-israel-start-joint-military-exercise
Ok, what are other solutions that would work? I could think of sanctions toward Israel on top of cutting off aid toward Israel would help a bit. I do not know much about Israel-Palestine history, but to me I get the impression no one there wants it to end or seem to be so.
The U.S. actively helped Israel starve Gazans and the U.S. ensured that UN aid to Palestinians was blocked. We have a collective responsibility to Palestinians to help undo our damage.
I’m not versed in Palestine-Israel history. I only know that Palestine currently doesn’t seem like it has a leader while Hamas is still a issue, and Israel is participating in trying to destroy Palestine. Basically, it looks like no one wants to solve problems there or get involved.
My initial reaction is that this is a “both sides” stance that punishes the victim, but I’m interested to become more nuanced. Would you mind expanding on why this would be best?
Read my other response. I do have a impression that Palestine doesn’t seem like it has a leader, and there’s some issues with Hamas. And it appears no one wants to come to a end. So, I can only think of cutting off aid to Israel and possibly with sanctions as a response to continuation of war.
If you want to get real nuanced, realize that a lot of people are missing the point. Our aid to Israel has nothing to do with their human rights record. They’re a foothold for Western hegemony in a geopolitically significant region. Stop aiding Israel, or Saudi Arabia for that matter, and that is a retreat from the global conflict between West (USA/Europe) and East (China/Russia).
Withdrawing from the Middle East cedes control of the region to the Eastern proxy, Iran. Is a Middle East controlled by Eastern interests preferable to one controlled by Western interests? Does that result in Palestinian liberation? Does it result in peace? Or do we end up with a genocide in the opposite direction?
Of course, there are smaller adjustments that can be made that may pressure one side or the other into pursuing a brokered peace. That’s what we’ve tried and failed at for decades, up until Trump anyway. We were quite close until Netanyahu riled up the crazies and caused the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin.
It is almost unheard of for US representatives to publicly criticise Israel. Is she quitting next election or something?
Trump upset the balance. Support for Israel used to be bipartisan, but Trump was so extreme in his pro Israel support that Democrats took the opposite position.
Edit: not sure why people are downvoting for this. Support for Israel used to be nearly unanimous in Congress before Trump. The Squad and others came into office as a result of Trump, and they weren’t afraid to criticize Israel. Trump told Israel to ban them and they did, blocking Rashida Tlaib from visiting her family and causing a wave of criticism in Congress, creating a visible rift between the parties. Democrats weren’t punished for criticizing Israel and the Israel lobby wasn’t able to pressure them as much anymore for fear of angering Biden.
Maybe it’s less about Trump and more about Netanyahu and his very conservative buddies dismantling the only checks to his power while stepping up settlements. There are lots of reasons to criticise Isreal that have nothing to do with American political divisions. The Israeli’s themselves were protesting in large numbers just last week.
Far right trolls everywhere damn. We need a feature that hides severely downvoted comments.
She’s correct. Fuck Israel. (inb4 someone calls me an antisemite bc they conflate hating the nation of Israel to hating Jews which is the dumbest fucking thing ever, bc I am American and I hate the American government so I guess I hate myself and everyone who lives here?)
Kicking people off their land so your own people can move in has a term, it’s called ethnic cleansing. It is considered a crime against humanity under the genocide convention.
Damn, try to relax. I think they were agreeing with you and just adding too the conversation.
a significant amount of jews moved to mandatory palestine before israel was even established, due to the loose immigration laws. the other portion of the israeli population arrived as refugees in the 50s after several states in the middle east expelled their jewish populations post independance. the people kicked out of their homes are not being kicked out for forigners to move in usually, but rather for native israelis to move into, though there are some small american groups in the west bank settler movement. (i am not pro israel or pro palestine, just trying to educate people)
Look up Theodor Herzl. He is the father of Zionism and is buried in Israel’s national cemetery.
Right. Let me kick you out of your house that you’ve had for generations because I can “claim” the land as mine as my ancestors resided there a thousand years ago. This is the dumbest argument to justify ethnic cleansing. Stop trying to pass this revisionist idiocy off as “education”.
People use antisemitism accusations to defend the evil the Israeli government does. It’s not antisemitic to recognize that kicking people out of their homes and having an open air prison city based on religion is evil.
Huh. I guess right now, this is the one sole Democrat representative I have respect for. At least someone’s willing to speak the truth of Israel’s manifesting their destiny all over Palestine.
Right now, “the Squad” is quite outside my graces ever since the ratfucking of the rail unions.
We don’t get to see behind closed doors. I get it, and I feel the same way, but rail workers have been getting some things they asked for, but their right to protest was also undermined. What should have happened is the government forces the rail companies to give into the union demands, not the other way around, but that was likely never an option with the current government. If they got the best deal possible for the rail workers by publicly cooperating, whatever. They are a hugely important part of the economy (hence, they should get their way if they’re that important), so the government wasn’t going to let it shut down.
