US to Israel: you have 30 days to starve Palestinians before we consider enforcing US law
The Oct. 17th chance killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar by a unit of reserve combat soldiers presented Israel with an opportunity to declare ‘victory’ and at least ‘pause’ its genocidal aggression in Gaza and reach a ceasefire agreement with Hezbollah. But despite the unstinting support given Israel by the Biden administration – including its diplomatic protection, the active involvement of US troops from Joint Special Operations Command and some $18 billion given Israel this year in military aid (with over a half a billion dollars contributed by Massachusetts taxpayers) – Prime Minister Netanyahu has shown little inclination to hand Democrats anything that might conceivably mollify some voters outraged by Biden’s collusion in a genocidal war.
While the Israeli public celebrated the death of Sinwar, Israeli forces continued with their ‘extermination campaign’, raising the known death toll in Gaza to 43,000. UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini reported on Oct. 22 that in the northern Gaza Strip “the smell of death is everywhere,” as Israeli troops bombed hospitals and shelters and refused to allow bodies to be removed from the streets. Some 50,000 people (out of a total population in the north of 400,000) have been driven from their homes, a move that the Israeli human rights group B’tselem has denounced as ethnic cleansing and a war crime. The army has made mass arrests (including of doctors and their patients), with men often stripped to their underwear and separated from women. It has attacked crowds of displaced residents with drones and artillery fire, burning their homes so they have no place to return to. The forced displacement and non-stop military onslaught led the World Health Organization to postpone the effort to give children a second polio vaccine that is essential to bolster their immune systems.
Having killed at least 138 journalists in Gaza, imprisoned 69, labeled the remaining six Al Jazeera journalists as Hamas members thereby targeting them for death, and barred entry to all foreign journalists, Israel clearly hopes to keep what it is doing in Gaza hidden from the world. While it insists to western diplomats that it is not forcibly displacing residents and intentionally depriving Palestinians of food, water and fuel, Gaza’s Government Media Office has reported that more than 250,000 trucks have been blocked from entering the Gaza Strip to make aid deliveries during the course of the war. According to OCHA, only four out of 70 aid convoys planned for the north were allowed to proceed in October and starvation was spreading.
On Oct. 13, Secretary of State Blinken and Secretary of Defense Austin sent a letter to the Israeli Minister of Defense and Minister of Strategic Affairs giving Israel 30 days to “surge all forms of humanitarian assistance throughout Gaza” and stating that a failure to do so “may have implications for US policy under NSM-20 and relevant US law (weapons supply).” The enforcement of the US statute cutting military aid to countries that bar humanitarian assistance is once again being put on the back burner.
With Israel in the process of dismantling UNRWA, how would that aid be distributed? Israel and the US State Department are reportedly considering a proposal made by the Global Delivery Company (GDC), a US private security company owned by two Israeli-American businessmen. Composed of former Navy Seals and other highly trained mercenaries from the US and UK, GDC plans to partner with Constellis, formerly the notorious Blackwater run by Erik Prince. In the words of Haaretz, “Essentially, this would privatize military rule over Gaza by handing it over to private companies with private financial interests and nothing beyond that.” Private militias could eventually end up protecting Israeli settlers who on Oct. 20-21 held a ‘Preparing to Resettle Gaza’ conference starring National Security Minister Ben-Gvir.
Meanwhile, Israel is heavily bombing areas of Lebanon, including Baalbek, the home of spectacular Roman ruins, and Tyre, a UNESCO World Heritage site and one of the oldest cities in the world, and appears bent on yet again establishing a large ‘security zone’ in the south. A confidential report reveals that it has launched at least a dozen strikes on UNIFIL forces and injured some 15 peacekeepers with white phosphorous. Following its Gaza playbook, it has also bombed apartment buildings, hospitals and a media guesthouse, killing three journalists.
Two leaked US intelligence documents, posted online on Oct. 18, show that the US has had Israel’s preparations for attacking Iran under close surveillance. “We have not observed indications that Israel intends to use a nuclear weapon,” one document states. Biden achieved a temporary victory of sorts on October 25, when Israel appeared to limit its ‘retaliatory strikes’ on Iran to military targets as the President requested, avoiding its nuclear and oil infrastructure. But The Times of Israel reports that “the IDF does not regard the incident as over, that Iran was still assessing the damage and its options, and that the IDF has ‘a bank of targets’ ready to hit in a next round if necessary.”