Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday gave one of his most direct condemnations of the civilian death toll in Gaza and said more needs to be done to “minimize harm to Palestinian civilians.”
Although Blinken commended Israel for its announcement of daily military pauses in areas of Northern Gaza and two evacuation corridors, he said that “there is more that can and should be done to minimize harm to Palestinian civilians.”
The top US diplomat has subtly shifted his messaging in the days since he departed the Middle East earlier this week to more directly voice condemnation of the civilian toll in Gaza and the US’ expectations for the Israeli government. However, he still has not condemned the Israeli government offensive and has continually voiced support for its right to defend itself.
War is brutal. There is an acceptable amount of civilian casualties, and according to him, Israel has exceeded that number.
Let’s tell a story… Imagine for a moment, if you will, the United States in the present day.
Imagine a bill reaches the US House of Representatives called “America the nation state of white people”.
In its basic principles it states “the right to exercise National self-determination in the United States is unique to white people”.
Further down a clause for White Settlement “the state views the development of White Settlement as a national value and will act to encourage and promote its establishment and consolidation”.
Outraged a coalition led by the Congressional Black Caucus initiates a challenge to the bill and proposes a bill of their own where it calls the United States “a country for all its citizens” but the speaker of the house unilaterally disqualifies the bill before it’s allowed to even be debated.
The House General Counsel explains in a statement the bill includes several articles that are meant to “alter the character of the United States from the nation state of white people to a state in which there is equal status from the point of view of nationality for whites and people of color” the bill is dead.
“America the nation state of white people” passes through both chambers of Congress unchallenged it’s then signed into law.
US President Joe Biden would invoke the law in a tweet a year later saying “America is not a state of all its citizens according to the nation state law we passed America is the nation state of white people and not anyone else”
As one Rights group put it “there is no Democratic constitution in the world that designates the Constitutional identity of the state on racial grounds as serving one ethnic group”.
There is now, this disconcerting scenario is anything imaginary. It’s completely real and happened just a few years ago to little coverage and little condemnation in Israel.