Washington, DC – State lawmakers and Palestinian rights supporters, joined by actor and progressive advocate Cynthia Nixon, have launched a five-day starvation strike exterior the White Home to demand a ceasefire in Gaza.
At a information convention on Monday, the activists decried United States President Joe Biden’s position in supporting the Israeli offensive in Gaza and referred to as for a direct finish to the preventing.
The starvation strike provides to the growing demand for a ceasefire from activists, artists and politicians, in addition to employees members working within the US government. However Biden has to this point resisted such calls, voicing unwavering help for Israel.
Biden has additionally pledged greater than $14bn in further US assist to Israel — funds that advocates say are contributing to the Israeli violence.
The protesters at Monday’s occasion confused that public opinion polls present that the majority Individuals again a ceasefire. Additionally they underscored the dimensions of the destruction in Gaza, the place greater than 14,800 Palestinians have died. United Nations specialists have warned that the battle places Palestinians “at grave risk of genocide“.
“How many more Palestinians must be killed before you call for a ceasefire, President Biden? We cannot wait any longer,” mentioned Iman Abid, an organiser with the US Marketing campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR).
Israel and Hamas declared a four-day truce within the battle final week, and on Monday, officers introduced the pause in preventing would proceed for 2 further days, to permit for the discharge of extra Israeli captives and Palestinian prisoners.
The hunger-strikers mentioned that the continued pause demonstrates that diplomacy — not bombs — can clear up the disaster in Gaza.
Israeli leaders, nonetheless, have recommended that they will resume the bombing with extra depth as soon as the truce expires. They’ve additionally warned residents from northern Gaza in opposition to returning to their houses.
“The area north of the Gaza Strip is a combat zone, and it is forbidden to stay there,” Israeli army spokesperson Avichay Adraee mentioned final week.
This week’s starvation strike in Washington, DC, is organised by Palestine solidarity advocates, progressive Jewish teams in addition to Arab and Palestinian-American organisations.
Right here’s what a few of the hunger-strikers on the White Home needed to say:
At this time we start a starvation strike in entrance of the White Home demanding a everlasting ceasefire. pic.twitter.com/BChpnSJX7z
— Sumaya Awad (@sumayaawad) November 27, 2023
Nixon: ‘Never again’ means by no means once more – for anybody
Finest identified for her work within the TV collection Intercourse and the Metropolis and her run within the 2018 New York governor’s race, Nixon used her speech at Monday’s occasion to spotlight the carnage in Gaza, together with the killings of dozens of journalists and UN employees in addition to the destruction of entire neighbourhoods.
“Our president’s seeming disregard for the incredible human toll Israel’s far-right government is exacting on innocent civilians does not remotely reflect the desire of the overwhelming majority of Americans,” she mentioned.
“And I want to make a private plea to a president — who has himself skilled such devastating personal loss — to attach with that empathy for which he’s so well-known and to take a look at the kids of Gaza and picture that they had been his kids.
“We implore him that this current ceasefire must continue, and we must build off it to begin to negotiate a more permanent peace. We cannot keep letting American tax dollars aid and abet the killing and starvation of millions of Palestinians. ‘Never again’ means never again — for anyone.”
Delaware lawmaker Madinah Wilson-Anton: Majority of Individuals need ceasefire
Wilson-Anton, a Muslim American legislator from Biden’s residence state of Delaware, mentioned that whereas she is anxious about abstaining from meals for a number of days, her ideas are with the folks of Gaza who’re experiencing a bloodbath with no alternative or finish in sight.
“The majority of Americans are for a permanent ceasefire. And it’s unfortunate that our president and our congressional members are not being responsive to what’s important to Delawareans and Americans from all states,” Wilson-Anton, a Democrat, mentioned.
“And so I’m hoping that, this week, we’ll be successful in gaining the ear of our president and of our congressional members, so they can actually start to use their privilege and position to negotiate a ceasefire that is lasting.”
New York State Consultant Zohran Mamdani: Negotiations, not struggle, freed captives
Mamdani hailed the discharge of Israelis held by Hamas and Palestinians imprisoned by Israel through the truce.
“We are hunger striking for a world where everyone is with their family. And it is a world that can only be made possible through a ceasefire. It is not war that brought us these reunifications. It is negotiations; it is a cessation [of hostilities],” he mentioned.
“We hunger-strike not because we want to. We hunger-strike because we have been forced by this president and by our government’s foreign policy. We hunger-strike because Palestinians have been doubted in life and death, and their experience has been erased.”
Activist Rana Abdelhamid: Dehumanising rhetoric normalises Palestinian deaths
Abdelhamid, a New York organiser, linked the killing of Palestinians in Gaza to an increase in prejudice in opposition to Arabs and Muslims within the US. She pointed to Saturday’s capturing of three Palestinian students in a suspected hate crime for example.
“As someone who has been organising against hate-based violence across this country, I’m fully aware that the violence and the anti-Palestinian rhetoric that we’re seeing abroad is also impacting us here in the United States. Those two things are inextricably linked,” Abdelhamid mentioned.
“When our elected [officials] and our politicians and our representatives are continuously dehumanising Palestinian people, are normalising Palestinian deaths, we get what we got two days ago. We get three Palestinian students in Vermont being shot for simply wearing a keffiyeh, for simply speaking Arabic.”
Palestinian-American author and advocate Sumaya Awad: The US is complicit
Awad confused that the US is “complicit” within the ongoing violence in opposition to Palestinians. She added that the battle additionally has domestic ramifications within the US.
“I’m Palestinian and I’m a New Yorker. I’m an American and I’m a mother of a 16-month-old, and I’m on hunger strike to illustrate to our government just a sliver, a fragment of what Palestinians are enduring in Gaza every single day,” Awad mentioned.
“I’m on starvation strike to demand a everlasting ceasefire and to say that we’ll proceed to strain our authorities in each approach doable to get that everlasting ceasefire as a result of we’re not simply silent observers. We’re complicit in what is going on in Palestine.
“We are on hunger strike because what’s happening in Gaza is not something far away that we have nothing to do with. It has real impacts on our lives here in the US.”
