In a press briefing yesterday National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby was asked about Israel’s brutal siege on Gaza.
“I’m wondering if the administration is having concerns that the Israeli response has been disproportionate in response to the obviously horrific attack that we’ve seen from Hamas,” inquired a reporter.
Kirby said the administration would avoid reacting to “every single event on the battlefield” or trying to analyze developments in real time. He then admitted that more death and destruction was imminent.
“I said this the other day, and — and I think your question prompts me to say it again, because I think it’s an important notion: This is war. It is combat. It is bloody. It is ugly, and it’s going to be messy. And innocent civilians are going to be hurt going forward,” responded Kirby.
“I wish I could tell you something different. I wish that that wasn’t going to happen. But it is — it is going to happen,” he continued. “And that doesn’t make it right. It doesn’t make it dismissible. It doesn’t mean that we aren’t going to still express concerns about that and — and do everything we can to help the Israelis do everything they can to minimize it. But — but that’s — that’s, unfortunately, the nature of conflict.”
Earlier in the week State Department spokesman Matthew Miller dismissed calls for a ceasefire in the region during his briefing with reporters.
“Any ceasefire would give Hamas the ability to rest, to refit, and to get ready to continue launching terrorist attacks against Israel,” he explained. “You can understand perfectly clearly why that’s an intolerable situation for Israel, as it would be an intolerable situation for any country that has suffered such a brutal terrorist attack and continues to see the terrorist threat right on its border.”
DeSantis tries to shut down SJP in Florida
On Tuesday Florida Governor and presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis’ directed state universities to “deactivate” National Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) chapters in the state.
DeSantis made the move in coordination with Ray Rodrigues, chancellor of the State University System of Florida.
“Based on the National SJP’s support of terrorism, in consultation with Governor DeSantis, the student chapters must be deactivated,” reads the letter to the school’s state universities. “These two student chapters may form another organization that complies with Florida state statutes and university policies. The two institutions should grant these two chapters a waiver for the fall deadlines, should reapplication take place.”
Rodrigues implies that a resistance toolkit distributed by SJP constitutes a felony because it knowingly provided support to designated terrorist groups.
On Twitter Jewish Currents reporter Alex Kane called the directive, “an unprecedented attack on Palestine activism and free speech.”
In 2019 DeSantis signed an antisemitism bill designed to stifle Israel criticism throughout the state. He touted the legislation during a ceremonial cabinet meeting in Israel.
“Israel stands tall as a beacon of freedom in a troubled region, an engine of economic growth and opportunity and center of innovation and technology, that is the envy of the world,” the Governor told a campaign crowd earlier this year. “Israel is also one of America’s most valued and trusted allies. Maintaining a strong Israel relationship has been a priority for me during my time in elected office, and I know it’s been a priority for the overwhelming majority of the American people.”
DeSantis is trailing former president Donald Trump substantially across every Republican primary poll.
Odds & Ends
???? ‘CUNY stands with Palestine liberation, despite what the chancellor says‘
✏️ Israeli antisemitism envoy Michal Cotler-Wunsh told Jewish Insider’s Marc Rod that she is urging the White House more clearly endorse the controversial IHRA working definition of antisemitism and declare that anti-Zionism is antisemitic.
???? Sixteen former staffers of Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) wrote a letter urging him to back a ceasefire.
???? Scoop from Barak Ravid at Axios: “U.S. Secretary of State Tony Blinken told a group of American Jewish community leaders on Monday that he asked the Qatari prime minister less than two weeks ago to tone down Al Jazeera’s rhetoric about the war in Gaza, according to three people who attended the meeting.”
I realize the analogy is “incomplete “, but imagine that Mexico rejected the US annexation of Texas and California, et al and was thus at war with the USA until the US would agree to withdraw from those states, and then to emphasize the state of war it crossed the border and slaughtered 1000 American civilians in similar fashion to what Hamas did on October 7th, wouldn’t you think war against Mexico was justified and imperative? Wouldn’t the US in that war try to minimize American casualties by an air campaign of bombing. Wouldn’t you recognize that as politically necessary. That is how Israelis view this war. Only that Mexico in my analogy only demands withdrawal from a handful of states and not “go back to where you came from” to all Americans.