CNN’s star anchorman, Wolf Blitzer, recently asked Mark Regev, spokesman for Israeli PM Netanyahu, whether Israel planned to occupy Gaza for a long time. The question is shocking but not a surprise. Neither the U.S. mainstream media nor the U.S. political machine dares to question Israeli policies. And Mr. Blizter’s question betrays an incredible ignorance of the decades of occupation already violently and illegally imposed on the Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem. In Gaza, as the death toll approaches 300, at least 56 being children, 700 homes destroyed, as well as schools, hospitals, clinics, pharmacies, destroyed or heavily damaged, human rights organizations like Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the United Nations, have named Israel’s actions as war crimes. These names: Fulla, Jihad, Waseem, are ones you will not read in U.S. media reports. They are the three children killed on the streetnear Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. They were feeding pigeons when an Israeli tank shelled them. This is genocide, ethnic cleansing, not defense of a homeland. Ninety percent of Gaza has no electricity or potable water because of Israeli military actions. End the occupation, tear down the illegal settlements and the illegal separation wall, open the Gaza borders, stop the violent enforcement of apartheid and end U.S. complicity in these war crimes. As always, the military option will not work.
GENOCIDE