A senior Israeli official told Axios that Joe Biden assured Naftali Bennett that the U.S. will continue providing cover for Israel’s not-so-secret nuclear arsenal.
Israel has a long-standing policy of refusing to release the bodies of Palestinians who have been killed by its military for burial. This is yet another form of collective punishment, where Israel uses the dead as an example to anyone who dare challenges the apartheid state.
Israel withholds Palestinian tax funds from the PA so as to enforce its collective punishment of the families of militants. Now Defense Minister Benny Gantz is seeking to “loan” the P.A. that money in line with Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s promise to Joe Biden to improve Palestinian conditions.
The U.S. embarked on the “war on terror” with Israel as a model. Occupy Muslim lands, bomb civilians to defeat political opposition. It didn’t work in Afghanistan; and the U.S. withdrawal will force the Israel lobby to come up with new messaging to maintain the false belief that Israel and the U.S. face the same “bad neighborhood.”
Progressive groups condemned Joe Biden’s embrace of Israeli PM Naftali Bennett yesterday and the president’s vow to continue military aid to Israel, with no reference to its apartheid policies against Palestinians. Israel’s advocates say that Bennett got everything that he wanted from the meeting, including a suggestion the U.S. would use force against Iran.
Activists showed up outside The White House today to protest the arrival of Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett. “Biden is actively endorsing a right-wing leader of an apartheid state,” said Palestinian Youth Movement’s Laura Albast.
The script of the Naftali Bennett visit to the White House was set yesterday when Secretary of State Antony Blinken told the prime minister, “Maybe you have something to teach us,” with reference to Bennett’s diverse governing coalition. The idea that Israel is a model democracy (and not an apartheid state) is sure to be a theme for President Biden in his meeting with Bennett today.
As Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett launches a charm offensive in Washington to show he is not Netanyahu– but will do nothing about Palestinian human rights–Joe Biden should go along with the charade so as to overcome his loss of international standing from Afghanistan and to keep Israel a bipartisan issue, leading Israel lobbyists urge the White House.
Palestinians plan to continue protests at the fence separating Gaza and Israel this week, following clashes over the weekend where 24 protesters were wounded. “We can’t stand doing nothing while our people are suffering death due to Israeli siege,” Talal Abu Zarifa explained.
The Israeli government has approved initial plans for thousands of new housing units in illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, along with hundreds of Palestinian units in Area C, the part of the West Bank under full control of the Israeli government. “It seems that the approval of a handful of plans for the Palestinians is only intended to try to reduce criticism of the government and to please the US administration ahead of Prime Minister Bennett’s expected visit to Washington in the coming weeks,” settlement watchdog Peace Now said in a statement.