By Ruth A. Sheets
The genocide being conducted by Israel in Gaza is beyond appalling, but it seems our leadership is doing little to nothing to stop it. Israel is our ally perpetrating these murderous actions. Though we are much larger and the major provider of war material for Israel, somehow, we can’t/won’t stop their barbarism.
I recently read a comment that mentioned similarities between what is being done to Gaza by Israel and the Warsaw Ghetto during the Holocaust. It is important to me that others have come to see this connection too. I noticed it nearly from the beginning when the people were shuffled around Gaza for no logical reason other than so Israel could bomb the areas the people were being forced to leave, being enclosed in smaller and smaller areas. The Israeli "guards" became like the Ghetto and concentration camp guards, killing at will, laughing at the horrors. There seems little difference between what Israel is doing to the people of Gaza and what the Nazis did to Jewish and other people during the Holocaust. It is on a smaller scale as there are fewer Gazans, but the basic excuses for the horrific behavior are the same: those people are just animals; they are a threat to us; they are vermin and need to be destroyed. Essentially, Gaza is a large ghetto and the prisons where Palestinians are being held are concentration camps where violence, torture, starvation, and more are the sadistic tools of guards who have lost any semblance of decency they might once have had. Sound familiar?
Netanyahu has made pathetic excuses for what Israel is doing in Gaza, and Trump wants to build a resort there when the Palestinians are gone. It is clear Netanyahu ordered the genocide, supposedly to destroy Hamas. The Israeli soldiers have gone along with it, Now, readying for a gigantic invasion using military reserves and weapons supplied by the US.
As an American, I am ashamed that again we are participating in genocide. It seems when a nation commits genocide once (against indigenous Americans), it is easier the next time.
It also seems "never again" means only Jewish people not facing another holocaust, not that Israel couldn’t perpetrate one on its neighbors. Netanyahu is also OK permitting illegal settlers in the West Bank to steal land, homes, and possessions from the Palestinian people. Murder of Palestinians is a pretty regular event there too.
Palestinians as everyone should know have been in the land that is now Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank as long as the Jewish people have been there, so, it should be time Israel and Palestine find ways to work together instead of committing atrocities.
Out of a feeling of guilt or just to make money, over the years, The US has given Israel free rein to do as much harm to Palestinians and others as it chooses. I just read of an incident I had forgotten about. Israel attacked an American ship during Israel’s “6-Day-War” in June 1967, killing at least 34 sailors and injuring many more. The US declared itself neutral in Israel’s “war,” and the ship was well-marked as American, flying our flag clearly and moving slowly through the international waters of the Mediterranean. The American survivors were informed they would be imprisoned if they told the truth of Israel’s unprovoked assault, so it took more than 20 years for information about the attack to get out.
The USS Liberty should not have been attacked from the air and on the sea and it is not clear why Israel chose to do it and why the US under President Johnson didn’t respond. We were supposedly their ally and we gave them a pass, just as we are doing right now.
For the sake of the whole Middle East, the killing and famine in Gaza must stop, blaming Hamas for acts of Israeli violence must also end. Getting food and medicines to the people of Gaza is critical, and in sufficient quantities to actually make a difference, not the tiny trickle Netanyahu and his cronies have permitted so far, while Israeli soldiers shot down people who came to collect food for their starving families.
What Israel is doing and has been doing for years is EVIL! There is no other word that comes close to describing it, except Holocaust. The insanity must stop and the Israeli people be fully informed as to what their own government is doing in Gaza and the West Bank. It must be called genocide done in the name of the Israeli people.
I am still wondering when people will publicly ask how it was that Israel/Netanyahu was so completely caught off-guard on October 7th when they had been warned that Hamas was planning a major attack, a year ahead. How fortunate for Hamas that Israel’s intelligence was “off-line” that particular day. One might think that Netanyahu had known the time of the attack and wanted something big to happen so he could go all-out against Gaza and the Palestinians in general, now, 64,000 dead and counting. Like many, I have noted what has happened in the past couple of years. It is pretty obvious something was up when Israel got no warning while there is surveillance everywhere in Gaza. I am thinking the reason “no one knows what really happened” is that Israeli citizens might not be OK with the idea of sacrificing their loved ones for the Gaza takeover plans of Netanyahu.
The United States needs to withdraw from support of Israel, knowing Israel will do whatever they wish to whomever they wish if they think it will send their message.” We do not need that in our lives, so there must be a lot more pressure from the American people to stop the genocide and our donations of weapons to Israel. If more of us realized we are being used by a would-be dictator of a little country, to boost the influence of our own would-be dictator, more people might step up to demand Congress stop the insanity. It could happen.
