Caitlin Johnstone: A Former Israeli Leader’s Admission

Consortium News, July 3, 2024 Israel’s complete dependence on U.S. support means the Biden administration has all the leverage it needs to force an end to Israel’s aggressions at any time. By Caitlin Johnstone CaitlinJohnstone.com.au Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has been launching a forceful attack on Benjamin Netanyahu in both U.S. and Israeli media for sabotaging peace in Gaza and pushing Israel to the brink with Hezbollah in Lebanon. During this he inadvertently made an interesting acknowledgement that flies in the face of the Biden administration’s feigned powerlessness to rein in Israel’s assault on Palestinians. “I accuse the prime minister of Israel of a deliberate attempt to destroy the political-security-military alliance between Israel and the United States,” Olmert writes in an op-ed for Haaretz titled “I Accuse Netanyahu of Betrayal.” “For many years, Israel’s political stability in the international arena rested on the absolute support of the United States,” writes Olmert, adding, “The entire Israel Air Force relies completely on American aircraft: fighter planes, transport planes, refueler planes and helicopters. All of Israel’s air power is based on the American commitment to defend Israel. We have no other reliable source for essential supplies of equipment, munitions and advanced weapons that Israel cannot manufacture on its own.” Olmert’s comments echo those made in November of last year by retired Israeli Major General Yitzhak Brick, who said of the Israeli assault on Gaza, “All of our missiles, the ammunition, the precision-guided bombs, all the airplanes and bombs, it’s all from the U.S. The minute they turn off the tap, you can’t keep fighting. You have no capability. … Everyone understands that we can’t fight this war without the United States. Period.” Contrast these frank admissions by longtime Israeli government insiders with the way the Biden administration has been pretending since the early days of this onslaught that there is nothing it can do to force Israel to be less monstrous and murderous in Gaza, constantly posturing as a passive witness to genocidal atrocity after genocidal atrocity while the Western press churn out nonstop anonymously-sourced articles about how secretly upset the president is with the Netanyahu regime. It’s just a simple fact that Israel’s complete dependence on U.S. support means the Biden administration has all the leverage it needs to force an end to Israel’s aggressions at any time, but instead you’ll get White House officials like John Kirby, national security communications adviser, spouting nonsense about how Israel is a completely independent nation to whom the U.S. is incapable of dictating any terms whatsoever. Kirby at a press briefing in October 2023. (White House, Oliver Contreras) When asked by the press back in February if the U.S. was doing anything to deter Israel from its planned assault on Rafah, for example, Kirby replied as follows: “[Israel] is a sovereign nation. They plan their military operations, and they conduct their military operations, and they make the choices. It’s not like we give them a homework assignment, and they have to then turn in their plan to us for grading. We have said that from our perspective, as a friend of Israel and as a supporter of their efforts to defend themselves, we would expect that any plan for going into Rafah would properly account for the now more than a million civilians that are seeking refuge down there.” Israel has since launched a brutal assault on Rafah which features regular massacres of civilians, with the Israeli military forces now reportedly working toward the complete capture of the entire city. This despite the White House previously having said that a “major ground operation” in Rafah would be a “red line” for this administration. The U.S. is just as responsible for what’s happening in Gaza as Israel itself, and will be responsible for everything that happens in Lebanon as well. They could end this at any time, and they choose to keep it going instead. As Noam Chomsky once said during the Second Intifada, “They’re not Israeli helicopters, they’re U.S. helicopters with Israeli pilots.” Caitlin Johnstone’s work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, following her on Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud, YouTube, or throwing some money into her tip jar on Ko-fi, Patreon or Paypal. If you want to read more you can buy her books. The best way to make sure you see the stuff she publishes is to subscribe to the mailing list at her website or on Substack, which will get you an email notification for everything she publishes. For more info on who she is, where she stands and what she’s trying to do with her platform, click here. All works are co-authored with her American husband Tim Foley. This article is from CaitlinJohnstone.com.au and re-published with permission.

Israel orders mass displacement of Palestinians from Khan Younis

Andre Damon, WSWS.ORG, July 3, 2024 @Andre__Damon Israel ordered the mass displacement of another 250,000 people from the city of Khan Younis in Gaza on Monday, in the latest stage of its genocide against the population of the narrow Palestinian enclave. Palestinians flee Khan Younis, Gaza Strip’s second largest city, on Monday, July 1, 2024. [AP Photo/Saher Alghorra] The ongoing bloodbath has the full approval of the Biden administration in the United States which is funding, arming and politically supporting Israel’s policy of genocide ethnic cleansing. Last week, Reuters reported that the US government has provided Israel with 14,000 massive 2,000-pound bombs—more than any other type—making clear that the destruction of Gaza and the massacre of its population is the intended US policy. The United Nations condemned the latest mass displacement. “Yesterday’s order for evacuation of 117 square kilometers in Khan Younis and Rafah governorates applies to about a third of the Gaza Strip—making it the largest such order since October, when residents were ordered to evacuate northern Gaza,” said a spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. Those fleeing the city were forced to set up temporary shelters “at the water’s edge because displacement camps are already packed at the coast,” the UN said. Khan Younis had been largely abandoned weeks ago following earlier evacuation orders, with most of the population pushed into Gaza’s southernmost city of Rafah. But with Israeli forces launching an attack on Rafah, those seeking shelter there were once again forced into Khan Younis. On Monday, they were forced to flee again. “It’s another devastating blow to the humanitarian response here, it’s another devastating blow to the people, the families on the ground. It seems that they’ve been forcibly displaced again and again,” UNRWA Senior Communications Officer Louise Wateridge said. She continued, “How do parents decide where to go? Where is there to go? Already by this morning, just to the middle Gaza area, along the coastal road, you can see the makeshift shelters right up to the shoreline, right up to the water coming in. It is absolutely packed with families who have already had to move.” She added, “In the north, middle and south areas of the Gaza Strip, no place is safe. Already on the ground, we are seeing families move away from this area. There is more chaos and panic spreading on the ground.” Al Jazeera reported that 12 members of a single family were killed by an Israeli airstrike Tuesday after evacuating from Khan Younis to a supposed “safe zone.” One displaced man, Bakri Bakri, told AFP News agency, “There is no room for us or any of the displaced.” He added, “We have left again, and we do not know where to go. We went back to our place in al-Mawasi, but we could not find it because there are so many displaced. We slept in the street without shelter, without food, without water.” Israel’s assault on Rafah has largely shut the border crossing with Egypt, cutting the flow of food and energy into Gaza to a trickle. Hospitals are forced to ration power and cannot provide normal levels of care, much less enough to deal with the hundreds of people being wounded by Israeli bullets and bombs each day. “Hospitals are once again short on fuel, risking disruption to critical services as injured people are dying because ambulance services are facing delays due to a shortage of fuel,” World Health Organization Regional Director Dr. Hanan Balkhy told UN News. The lack of clean and potable water is leading to a surge of disease, which hospitals are simply not equipped to deal with. The daily Israeli bombardment continues throughout the Gaza Strip. Between June 27 and July 1, 135 Gazans were killed and 631 were injured. The official death toll stands at 37,900, but there has been widespread speculation that the real death toll could be in the hundreds of thousands. A report by UN Women last month noted that 557,000 women in Gaza are facing food insecurity, “leading many to skip meals or reduce their intake to ensure their children are fed.” A recent UN survey found that 76 percent of pregnant women were suffering from anemia, while “99 percent reported facing challenges in accessing necessary nutritional supplies and supplements.” The UN noted, “Faced with no alternatives, women are also largely relying on burning wood, plastic, and other waste materials to cook, being particularly exposed to hazardous smoke and pollutants that cause respiratory and other health issues, the survey found.” Gaza’s Health Ministry noted that hospitals are facing “rampant” skin infections and lice outbreaks, as well as 880,000 cases of respiratory diseases. In a statement to the United Nations Security Council, UN Coordinator for Gaza Sigrid Kaag declared, “Over one million people have been displaced once again, desperately seeking shelter and safety. 1.9 million people are now displaced across Gaza.” She said, “The war has not merely created the most profound of humanitarian crises. It has unleashed a maelstrom of human misery.” Meanwhile, Israeli officials have announced that they are implementing a plan for creating what they call “humanitarian bubbles” throughout Gaza, a euphemistic term for what will effectively be concentration camps. In an article titled “The Postwar Vision That Sees Gaza Sliced Into Security Zones,” the Wall Street Journal reported over the weekend a US-Israeli plan to create “temporary shelters” in the form of “fenced-off geographic islands located next to their neighborhoods and guarded by the Israeli military.” This plan is being put into effect, the Financial Times reported, in a series of camps throughout Northern Gaza. The camps “will soon be launched in the northern Gaza neighborhoods of Atatra, Beit Hanoun, and Beit Lahia, according to six people with knowledge of the plan,” the FT reported. Israeli officials, meanwhile, are pledging even more barbaric treatment of the Palestinian people. In a post on Twitter, Israeli National Security Minister Ben Gvir declared, “Since I assumed the position of Minister of National Security, one of the highest goals I have set for myself is to worsen the conditions of the terrorists in the prisons, and to reduce their rights to the minimum required by law.” He declared, “It is very possible that even after the addition of the new prisons is completed, the many terrorists will still be overcrowded in prison. I have already proposed a much simpler solution, of enacting the death penalty for terrorists, which would solve the overcrowding issue.”

Oppose genocide and imperialist war!

Demonstrate in Washington D.C. · July 24 On July 24th, Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu will address a joint session of the U.S. Congress, invited by Democratic and Republican leaders. Netanyahu is prosecuting genocidal war resulting in over 40,000 Palestinian deaths, mostly women and children. He is being welcomed not in spite of, but because of these crimes. As a political agent of U.S. imperialism, his speech will serve as a progress report on how this war advances American capitalist interests globally. On the same day, thousands will demonstrate in Washington against this war. The Socialist Equality Party, International Youth and Students for Social Equality, and International Workers Alliance of Rank-and-File Committees call for widespread participation in this protest. This demonstration aims to ignite a mass movement against the Gaza genocide and U.S. imperialism, rejecting any illusion that Congress might change its policies. Instead, it seeks a new political orientation and strategy. Following the demonstration, there will be a meeting to assess the events of the day and discuss and elaborate the socialist strategy to advance the fight against genocide and war. The Gaza genocide is part of a broader global conflict instigated by U.S. imperialism, threatening nuclear escalation. The same governments supplying Israel are also intensifying proxy wars, including the US-NATO war against Russia in Ukraine, and escalating tensions with China. Recognizing this interconnected imperialist aggression is crucial for developing a powerful mass movement against war, genocide, and fascism. The demonstration and meeting are based on three strategic principles: The struggle against war requires an unconditional break from the Democratic and Republican parties, establishing the political independence of the working class. The movement against genocide and war must be international, uniting workers globally based on their common class interests. The fight against war must be anti-capitalist and socialist, targeting the economic system that fundamentally causes war. Join the demonstration and meeting in Washington, D.C. on July 24th! Mobilize your co-workers, friends, and communities. Distribute this message widely. Stop the genocide and declare war on war.