{"id":251156,"date":"2023-12-25T12:00:30","date_gmt":"2023-12-25T12:00:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=251156"},"modified":"2023-12-23T09:52:46","modified_gmt":"2023-12-23T09:52:46","slug":"in-unprecedented-slaughter-of-gaza-civilians-us-claims-israel-is-the-victim","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2023\/12\/in-unprecedented-slaughter-of-gaza-civilians-us-claims-israel-is-the-victim\/","title":{"rendered":"In Unprecedented Slaughter of Gaza Civilians, US Claims Israel Is the \u201cVictim\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Gaza’s Al Shifa hospital a ‘bloodbath’ says WHO.\u00a0\u00a0 The Jerusalem Post<\/p><\/div>\n

As the death toll in Gaza tops 20,000, Israeli-US lies about Al-Shifa hospital are newly exposed.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

22 Dec 2022<\/em> – In a news conference this week, Secretary of State Antony Blinken lashed out at global criticism of US support for Israel\u2019s mass murder campaign in Gaza.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hear virtually no one saying, demanding of Hamas that it stop hiding behind civilians, that it lay down its arms, that it surrender. This is over tomorrow if Hamas does that,\u201d Blinken complained.\u00a0 \u201cHow can it be that there are no demands made of the aggressor, and only demands made of the victim?\u201d<\/p>\n

Blinken\u2019s statement is an outright endorsement of state terrorism. Its underlying logic affirms that Israel is free to massacre Palestinian civilians until the armed resistance in their midst offers up a \u201csurrender.\u201d<\/p>\n

The chief US diplomat\u2019s indigitation at the supposed absence of any \u201cdemands\u201d on Hamas is also based on a false premise. As Blinken is well aware, the multiple UN Security Council (UNSC) resolutions that his government has vetoed demanded that Hamas grant the unconditional release of all hostages. But because these resolutions also demanded that Israel end its attack on Gaza and allow the unfettered delivery of humanitarian aid, the US has blocked them.<\/p>\n

Committed to defending Israeli violence at all costs, Blinken is accordingly willing to cast Hamas as the \u201caggressor\u201d and Israel \u2013 an occupying power that has now reportedly murdered a well over 20,000 people in Gaza \u2013 as the \u201cvictim.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even if we were to pretend that history began on Oct. 7th<\/sup>, and forget that the Hamas militants who attacked Israel on that day were caged inside the world\u2019s largest concentration camp under the world\u2019s longest-running military occupation, Blinken\u2019s statement would be just as mendacious. Hamas\u2019 atrocities came in a one-day guerilla operation against Israel. That does not give Israel the right to wage a nearly-three month military campaign that is causing historic levels of carnage and destruction.<\/p>\n

With Israel routinely blocking life-saving aid, a new United Nations report finds that more than 500,000 people in Gaza \u2013 one-quarter of the entire population \u2013 are starving. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t get any worse,\u201d says Arif Husain, chief economist for the World Food Program. \u201cI have never seen something at the scale that is happening in Gaza. And at this speed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Israel has drastically reduced aid by insisting that it inspect every shipment going into Gaza, even goods that arrive through Egypt. This means that before entering Gaza at Egypt\u2019s Rafah crossing, aid trucks must first drive for an inspection in the Israeli border town of Kerem Shalom before returning to Rafah. While claiming to be working strenuously on the aid deliveries, the Biden administration has played its traditional role of enforcing Israel\u2019s dictate. As one US official told the New York Times<\/a> of the Biden administration\u2019s latest stonewalling of a UNSC resolution, \u201cWashington would not approve a measure that removed Israel from the inspection process.\u201d<\/p>\n

When it comes to military tactics, Israel\u2019s wanton recklessness was newly underscored when its forces killed three unarmed Israeli hostages after mistaking them for being Palestinian civilians. Had they been the latter, as Israeli troops believed when they shot them, the murders would have been routine and likely unnoticed.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, even President Biden has been forced to admit that Israel is carrying out an \u201cindiscriminate bombing\u201d<\/a> of the besieged enclave. \u201cBy some measures, destruction in Gaza has outpaced Allied bombings of Germany during World War II,\u201d the Associated Press reports<\/a>. Whereas the Allies destroyed about 10% of buildings across Nazi Germany between 1942 and 1945, in Gaza that figure stands at 33%.<\/p>\n

\u201cGaza is one of the most intense civilian punishment campaigns in history,\u201d US military historian Robert Pape observes. \u201cIt now sits comfortably in the top quartile of the most devastating bombing campaigns ever.\u201d The campaign has relied on the steady provision of US weapons. According to a recent US intelligence assessment<\/a>, almost half of the munitions that Israel has dropped on Gaza have been unguided or \u201cdumb\u201d bombs, which are known for their inaccuracy and wholesale destruction.<\/p>\n

In the war\u2019s first weeks, \u201cIsrael routinely used one of its biggest and most destructive bombs in areas it designated safe for civilians,\u201d a New York Times analysis concludes<\/a>. Although Washington has given free rein to use its 2,000-pound bombs, they \u201care almost never dropped by U.S. forces in densely populated areas anymore.\u201d Their lethality extends to 1,000 feet from impact, a large-scale death sentence for what CNN notes<\/a> is a Gaza population \u201cpacked together much more tightly than almost anywhere else on earth.\u201d<\/p>\n

Under Israel\u2019s US-backed indiscriminate bombardment, Gaza\u2019s official death toll has passed 20,000, an unusual if not unprecedented figure for a 21st<\/sup> century war that is less than three-months old. Given that only one side has a military and air power, it was also entirely predictable. The 20,000 figure is also assuredly an undercount. \u201cWe don\u2019t know how many are buried under the rubble of their homes,\u201d notes the World Health Organization\u2019s Director General. Health data expert Benjamin Q. Huynh adds that there is \u201cno evidence\u201d that Gaza\u2019s health ministry has inflated the Palestinian death toll. Beyond those buried under the rubble, an additional reason why the \u201ctrue death toll is probably higher than what\u2019s being reported,\u201d he observes, is a \u201cdiminished capacity from the hospital system.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Israeli attacks on Gaza\u2019s hospital system have targeted more than two dozen health facilities in Gaza, another milestone in the conduct of modern warfare.<\/p>\n

When it comes to last month\u2019s Israeli assault on Gaza\u2019s largest hospital, al-Shifa, a new report in the Washington Post<\/a> concludes what was obvious from the start<\/a>: Israeli-US claims of a Hamas \u201ccommand and control\u201d center there were yet another pro-war fabrication<\/a>.<\/p>\n

After seizing the hospital, Israel claimed that five buildings were used by Hamas, and sat above tunnels that were used to direct the group\u2019s militant activity. But according to the Post, rooms that were connected to the tunnel network underneath the hospital \u201cshowed no immediate evidence of military use by Hamas.\u201d Additionally, neither al-Shifa\u2019s hospital wards or the five hospital buildings were accessible to the tunnels. Accordingly, the Post concludes, \u201cthe evidence presented by the Israeli government falls short of showing that Hamas had been using the hospital as a command and control center.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Biden administration was equally complicit in Israel\u2019s al-Shifa deception, aided as usual by reliable media stenographers. Before Israel attacked al-Shifa on Nov. 15th<\/sup>, White House spokesperson John Kirby assured reporters<\/a> that he could \u201cconfirm\u201d that Hamas and Islamic Jihad were using al-Shifa\u2019s tunnels \u201cto conceal and to support their military operations and to hold hostages.\u201d One day after Israel launched the assault, President Biden doubled down. \u201cHere\u2019s the situation: You have a circumstance where the first war crime is being committed by Hamas by having their headquarters, their military hidden under a hospital,\u201d Biden said<\/a> on Nov. 16th,\u00a0\u201cAnd that\u2019s a fact.\u00a0That\u2019s what\u2019s happened.\u201d<\/p>\n

Biden\u2019s grasp of this \u201cfact\u201d is as reliable as his false claim to have seen photographs of beheaded babies, which he nonetheless continues to repeat<\/a> despite Israeli and US admissions<\/a> that no such photographs exist.<\/p>\n

Anonymous US officials also informed the New York Times<\/a> that \u201cthey are confident that Hamas has used tunnel networks under hospitals, in particular Al Shifa, for command and control areas as well as for weapons storage.\u201d The Times additionally cited \u201csenior Israeli intelligence officials,\u201d who \u201callowed the Times to review photographs that purported to show secret entrances to the compound from inside the hospital.\u201d In other words, these Israeli officials \u201callowed\u201d the Times to launder their lies.<\/p>\n

As Israeli forces attacked al-Shifa, anonymous US intelligence officials informed the Wall Street Journal<\/a> that they had \u201cindependently\u201d obtained \u201cintercepted communications of fighters inside the compound.\u201d Predictably, the Journal\u2019s sources \u201cdeclined to provide more details about the U.S. intelligence on Al-Shifa,\u201d citing the familiar excuse of protecting \u201csources and methods.\u201d The claim of sourcing \u201cintercepted communications\u201d happens to be a tried and tested method of US war propaganda, deployed to sell the fabrications about Iraq WMDs or claims of chemical weapons attacks by the Syrian government.<\/p>\n

Although the Journal acknowledged that the US \u201chasn\u2019t been able to determine details of Hamas\u2019s alleged operations at Al-Shifa,\u201d it left room for even more Israeli attacks by claiming that the US \u201chas also picked up intelligence about other hospitals.\u201d When reporters pressed Kirby to provide even a shred of evidence, the White House spokesperson refused. But not to worry: yet another anonymous \u201cknowledgeable source\u201d emerged to inform Reuters<\/a> that the intelligence \u201cis definitive.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Israeli siege of al-Shifa caused the deaths of several dozen patients in intensive care, as well at least four premature babies. In heralding the operation, an Israeli official even dispensed with the pretext about a Hamas command post or rescuing hostages. \u201cThe entrance to Shifa is first of all a symbol that there is no place we will not reach,\u201d the official said<\/a>. \u201cWe did not think we would find hostages, but we will definitely locate and dismantle Hamas capabilities.\u201d<\/p>\n

For its part, the Biden administration still defends the al-Shifa assault. \u201cThis was a very precise and targeted military operation that Israel carried out with a range of efforts to reduce any civilian casualties,\u201d a senior U.S. administration official told the Post.<\/p>\n

The operation was indeed targeted. In attacking Gaza\u2019s largest hospital with US assistance, Israel laid the foundation to destroy and disable even more health facilities across the besieged enclave. This unprecedented barbarism can only have one goal: to maximize civilian casualties, and destroy the basic institutions of a functioning society.<\/p>\n

The assault on al-Shifa is also perfectly in line with Israeli officials\u2019 open calls for genocide and ethnic cleansing<\/a>, and the high-level effort undertaken for those goals.<\/p>\n

According to the newspaper Israel Hayom<\/a>, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu\u2019s top aide, cabinet member Ron Dermer, has been tasked to \u201cthin\u201d the Palestinian population in the Gaza Strip \u201cto a minimum.\u201d A new account in the Washington Post<\/a> claims that in the days after Oct. 7th<\/sup>, Netanyahu even personally asked President Biden to pressure Egypt into accepting a massive influx of Palestinian refugees. Aides claims that Biden rebuffed Netanyahu, but evidence suggests otherwise. On Oct. 20th<\/sup>, the White House submitted a Congressional budget request<\/a> that included funding for the \u201cpotential needs of Gazans fleeing to neighboring countries,\u201d given that the \u201ccrisis could well result in displacement across border and higher regional humanitarian needs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Resistance from Egypt and Jordan has thwarted, for now, Israel\u2019s effort to enlist their help in trying to \u201cthin\u201d out Gaza. Accordingly, the Israeli army is settling for exterminating as many Palestinians as possible, and making the death camp uninhabitable for those who survive.<\/p>\n

White House support for Israel\u2019s war on Palestinian civilians goes beyond any act of US barbarism in recent memory. Complicit in mass murder, Biden and his principals are also engaging in unprecedented levels of deceit, from lying about civilian hospitals to pretending that the perpetrator of a genocide is in fact the victim.<\/p>\n

___________________________________________<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Aaron Mat\u00e9 is a journalist with<\/em> The Grayzone, where he hosts<\/em> \u201cPushback.\u201d He is also a contributor to<\/em> Real Clear Investigations and the temporary co-host of<\/em> \u201cUseful Idiots.\u201d In 2019, Mat\u00e9 won the\u00a0Izzy Award for outstanding achievement in independent media for Russiagate coverage in<\/em> The Nation.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 aaronmate.net<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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