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<\/p>\nThis article by Otto Fors of Left Voice (USA) \u00a0argues that the Israeli state\u2019s aggression and impunity would not be possible without long-standing, bipartisan U.S. support, including that of President Biden.<\/p>\n
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Israeli aggression against occupied Palestine has once again boiled over into open conflict this past week. What started as Israeli police repressing demonstrators who were protesting the forced expulsion of several families in East Jerusalem has escalated to full-scale bombings in Gaza and the violent storming of Al-Aqsa Mosque, the third holiest site in Islam. This is in addition to both the deadly vaccine imperialism that Israel has been practicing against Palestine and the constant occupation and subjugation of the Palestinian people and their land. In the current crisis,\u00a0at least 53<\/a>\u00a0Palestinians have died, including 14 children, and over 300 have been injured. Amid this uncertainty, one thing is for sure: the bipartisan U.S. policy of ironclad support for Israeli aggression will continue unabated, led by Israel\u2019s ally, President Joe Biden.<\/p>\n This latest aggression was triggered by protests in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah where six Palestinian families are facing\u00a0imminent eviction<\/a>\u00a0to make room for Israeli settlers after years of legal proceedings. With Israeli police protection, these settlers have been\u00a0brazenly terrorizing<\/a>\u00a0the Palestinian residents, who have lived in their homes since 1957. Protesters in East Jerusalem organized demonstrations and sit-ins in support of the families only to be met by brutal repression from Israeli forces who fired tear gas and rubber-coated bullets.<\/p>\n The repression escalated substantially last week, on the last Friday of Ramadan, when Israeli police violently repressed Palestinian worshippers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque. The worshippers and protesters valiantly faced off against the police to defend themselves against the repression. In the end, over 200 Palestinians were injured, sparking more protests in East Jerusalem and beyond. Residential buildings have been destroyed by bombs which were purchased directly with U.S. funds.<\/p>\n The current violence is far from an aberration: Israel is\u00a0built on<\/a>\u00a0a policy of violent occupation, displacement, and dispossession of Palestinians. And it is no exaggeration to say that the Israeli state\u2019s aggression and impunity would not be possible without long-standing, bipartisan U.S. support, including from President Biden.<\/p>\n Cumulatively, Israel has received\u00a0over $100 billion<\/a>\u00a0from U.S. administrations since 1962, more military aid than any other country in the world has received from the United States. Israel currently receives $3.8 billion in military funding annually as part of a\u00a0ten-year deal<\/a>\u00a0brokered by the Obama administration, with Biden playing a leading role in negotiations. The Israeli government can also count on the United States\u2019 backing in the international arena: the U.S. has used its veto power at the UN Security Council at least\u00a043 times<\/a>\u00a0on Israel-related resolutions since 1970. U.S. support and funding thus touches nearly all aspects of Israeli aggression, and the blood of dead Palestinians is on the United States\u2019 hands.<\/p>\n Biden has been a pillar of U.S. support of the Zionist Israeli state. He has\u00a0called<\/a>\u00a0U.S. backing for Israel \u201cunshakable,\u201dclaims<\/a>\u00a0that \u201cthe United States will constantly and forever have Israel\u2019s back,\u201d and touts an\u00a0extensive record<\/a>\u00a0of support for the Zionist State since the 1970s. In 2006, Biden acted as an\u00a0international observer of the Gaza elections<\/a>\u00a0and denounced the results after Hamas won a resounding victory, saying that Palestine could not be trusted to hold fair elections; he subsequently signed onto a bill that called on the Bush administration to prohibit all international aid \u2014 not just from the United States \u2014 to the Palestinian Authority.<\/p>\n When Israel began its all-out bombing onslaught against Palestine and Lebanon later that year, Biden was an ardent champion of the military offensive,\u00a0likening it to the U.S. invasion and occupation of Afghanistan<\/a>. This support persisted when he was vice president during the major bloody Israeli attacks on Gaza in 2009, 2012, and 2014. In the infamous 2014Operation Protective Edge<\/a>,\u00a0which caused the deaths of over 2,000 Palestinians, including more than 500 children, Biden and the Obama administration\u00a0defended<\/a>\u00a0Israel\u2019s actions.<\/p>\n The first months of his administration have predictably highlighted that Biden represents\u00a0more of the same<\/a>\u00a0brutal policies of murder and dispossession for Palestinians. While he has departed from his Republican predecessor on a few issues related to Palestine, these departures are largely symbolic. Whereas Trump, a staunch ally of Prime Minister Netanyahu, cut hundreds of millions of dollars in funding from the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees and closed the office of the Palestine Liberation Organization in Washington, D.C., Biden has\u00a0pledged<\/a>\u00a0to restore the aid and reopen the office. The Biden administration also\u00a0reversed<\/a>\u00a0Trump\u2019s 2018 withdrawal from the UN Human Rights Council, at the time a response to \u201cchronic bias against Israel,\u201d according to UN Ambassador Nikki Haley.<\/p>\n While they may come in response to changing public opinion from a growing sector of the Democratic Party\u2019s base which is critical of the United States\u2019 relationship to Israel and its violent occupation of Palestine, none of these actions mark a shift in U.S. support for the murderous state of Israel. They are an attempt to speak to sectors of the Democratic Party who are increasingly questioning Zionism and the United States\u2019 support of Israel without making any real change. In fact, the U.S. is reportedly\u00a0blocking the release<\/a>\u00a0of a UN Security Council statement calling for a ceasefire, and in a conversation with Prime Minister Netanyahu yesterday, Biden\u00a0reaffirmed<\/a>\u00a0Israel\u2019s \u201cright to defend itself.\u201d<\/p>\n Biden has\u00a0continued<\/a>\u00a0several of Trump\u2019s policies on Israel, and remains committed to maintaining the oppressive status quo. His administration has\u00a0pledged<\/a>\u00a0to keep the U.S. embassy to Israel in Jerusalem, and\u00a0expressed<\/a>\u00a0\u201cconcerns\u201d over the International Criminal Court\u2019s attempts to investigate Israeli war crimes in occupied Palestine. And despite\u00a0increasing calls<\/a>\u00a0for conditions to be imposed on U.S. aid to Israel, Biden maintains $3.8 billion in annual military funding \u2014 the military funding currently being used to murder Palestinian children and destroy Palestinian neighborhoods.\u00a0In fact, Biden may even help shore up bipartisan support for Israel by, in the words of former Anti-Defamation League president\u00a0Abe Foxman<\/a>, \u201cmak[ing] sure Israel will not be politicized.\u201d In other words, by distancing the issue from Trump and giving the appearance of sympathy for the humanitarian crisis in Palestine, Biden may be creating bipartisan stability to maintain the United States\u2019 Zionist policies despite increasing resistance among Americans.<\/p>\n Biden\u2019s own comments as vice president are instructive as to why the United States continues to actively aid and abet Israeli aggression and the oppression of Palestinians. At an event in 2013, Biden\u00a0went as far as to\u00a0say<\/a>\u00a0that,\u00a0\u201cIf there were not an Israel, [the United States] would have to invent one to make sure our interests were preserved.\u201d<\/p>\n Democrats and Republicans alike have championed the violent alliance between the United States and Israel because they have an interest in maintaining the latter as an imperialist enclave. U.S. administrations, including the current Biden administration, need a heavily armed, imperialist client state in order to maintain U.S. interests and hegemony in the region. Whether the current administration is red or blue, this fact will not change. There is no \u201clesser evil\u201d for Palestine.<\/p>\n The lukewarm opposition of progressive Democrats like Bernie Sanders and the \u201cSquad\u201d to Israel\u2019s crimes while essentially voting for the policies of the Democratic and Republican establishment is a slap in the face to the anti-Zionist folks who campaigned for Sanders. Both\u00a0Sanders<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez\u00a0<\/a>have voted in favor of funding for the Israeli state.<\/p>\n Joe Biden, and the Democratic Party he represents are imperialists.\u00a0It\u2019s clear in its interventions on behalf of Israel in Palestine and in its aid to the military of Colombia which is murdering protesters in the streets.\u00a0They represent and govern the most powerful imperialist state in the world which cannot be \u201cpushed to the left\u201d in any substantive way on foreign policy matters. And that means continued U.S. aid to the murderous state of Israel, all the while the U.S. claims there is just no funding for healthcare or to produce vaccines for the world.<\/p>\n But all over the world, people are standing up in support of Palestine and organizing Free Palestine protests in solidarity with their struggle. In the U.S. dozens of cities held protests, signaling a shift: a new generation of anti-Zionists are standing up and taking the streets. And in Palestine, the heroic resistance of the Palestinian people continues, with their hands empty or at most armed with rocks, Palestinians are resisting the Zionist invasion and Israeli repression.<\/p>\n Imperialism is a bipartisan affair, and for Palestinians who are suffering under the boot of Israeli oppression, there is no lesser evil in the Biden administration. This is why we cannot support the imperialist Democratic party. We must be anti-imperialists, and demand the immediate end of all military aid to Israel and a free Palestine.<\/p>\n 13th May 2021<\/p>\n