As long as the foreign interference is bipartisan... AIPAC Talking Points Revealed Documents show that the powerful lobby is spreading its influence on Capitol Hill by calling for unconditional military aid to Israel and hyping up threats from Iran.The potty-trained messenger delivers boilerplate US talking points.
At least some of the evidence Israeli used to allege ties between the UN Palestinian Aid Agency (UNRWA) and Hamas was obtained through the torture of the organizationâs staff members, according to a report by the United Nations. After the Israelis made the allegations, the US cut funding to UNRWA. Secretary of State Antony Blinken initially labeled the Israeli assertions as âhighly, highly credible.â
On Friday, Reuters reported that it reviewed an 11-page UN investigation into claims that UNRWA had substantial ties with Hamas. âAgency staff members have been subject to threats and coercion by the Israeli authorities while in detention, and pressured to make false statements against the Agency, including that the Agency has affiliations with Hamas and that UNRWA staff members took part in the 7 October 2023 atrocities,â the report says.
The investigation concluded the coercion âincluded severe physical beatings, waterboarding, and threats of harm to family members,â according to the outlet. UNRWA did not provide transcripts to Reuters, and the Israeli military declined to comment.
Additionally, the UNRWA report found significant abuse of all Palestinians detained in facilities. Reuters said the abuse listed in the report included, âbeatings, humiliation, threats, dog attacks, sexual violence, and deaths of detainees denied medical treatment.â (...)
From accounts of people on the ground, videos and photographs of deadly episode after episode, plus the resultant mortalities from blocking or smashing the crucial necessities of life, a more likely estimate, in my appraisal, is that at least 200,000 Palestinians must have perished by now and the toll is accelerating by the hour.
The number of civilian casualties in Gaza has been at the center of international attention since the start of the war. The main source for the data has been the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry, which now claims more than 30,000 dead, the majority of which it says are children and women. Recently, the Biden administration lent legitimacy to Hamasâ figure. When asked at a House Armed Services Committee hearing last week how many Palestinian women and children have been killed since Oct. 7, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said the number was âover 25,000.â The Pentagon quickly clarified that the secretary âwas citing an estimate from the Hamas-controlled Health Ministry.â President Biden himself had earlier cited this figure, asserting that âtoo many, too many of the over 27,000 Palestinians killed in this conflict have been innocent civilians and children, including thousands of children.â The White House also explained that the president âwas referring to publicly available data about the total number of casualties.â
Hereâs the problem with this data: The numbers are not real. That much is obvious to anyone who understands how naturally occurring numbers work. The casualties are not overwhelmingly women and children, and the majority may be Hamas fighters.