News Releases

ARUN KUNDNANI, arunkundnani@gmail.com, @ArunKundnani
   Kundnani is the author of What is Antiracism? (2023) and The Muslims are Coming! (2014).

He wrote the piece “Islamophobia in the U.S. is rooted in its unconditional support for Israel” and more recently “Some questions for the 234 representatives who voted to censure Rashida Tlaib.”

He said today: “A cultural shift is taking place among young Americans in their attitudes to Israel and Palestine. Most under 35s in the U.S. now oppose Israel’s war on Gaza. And large numbers of students across U.S. colleges have become active in groups like Students for Justice for Palestine and Jewish Voices for Peace to demand a ceasefire. Recently, Redveil, a popular U.S. rapper, led thousands of his fans in a chant of ‘Free Palestine’ at a concert. This is unprecedented. For the first time Israel has lost legitimacy among young people in the U.S.

“Rather than engage young people in open debate and discussion, supporters of Israel are responding with efforts to censor and penalize them for expressing support for Palestinian freedom. Examples include:

• Columbia University has suspended two pro-Palestinian student groups, Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace. They will no longer be able to hold events on campus.
• Harvard University President Claudine Gay has sent a letter to all students and faculty declaring that the slogan “from the river to the sea,” a widely used call for  freedom for Palestinians, whether they live in the Occupied Territories or in Israel, is antisemitic and its censorship is not a violation of free expression. Prior to this, Harvard lost at least $30m in donations from pro-Israeli funders who believed that the administration was failing to rein in its students. It also faced a demand from Bill Ackman, billionaire hedge-fund manager, and Harvard donor, to release the names of students who had signed a pro-Palestinian statement, so that companies could avoid hiring them.
• At New York University, law student Ryna Workman was removed as president of the school’s Student Bar Association and subsequently lost a job offer from the law firm Winston & Strawn after she wrote a newsletter expressing solidarity with Palestinians.
• At Cornell University, Russell Rickford, an associate professor of history, was suspended from teaching after he described the 7 October attack as “exhilarating.”
• The Intercept recently reported: “The U.S. Senate passed a unanimous resolution condemning what it called ‘anti-Israel, pro-Hamas student groups’ across the country following a day of walkouts.”
• A letter from the Anti-Defamation League and the Brandeis Center to presidents of colleges and universities, called for the group Students for Justice for Palestine (SJP) to be considered a material supporter of terrorism. SJP is a non-violent student group. The ADL and Brandeis Center are essentially calling for young people engaged in lawful protest activity to be criminalized under a federal anti-terrorism statute.
• The State University System of Florida chancellor, in consultation with Governor Ron DeSantis, has ordered chapters of SJP be “deactivated.”
• Senator Josh Hawley, R-Mo., has demanded the Justice Department investigate “far-left student groups” which have been critical of Israel.

Axios reports that an internal State Department dissent memo, signed by 100 current employees, states that Biden’s support of Israel has made him “complicit in genocide” in Gaza. The dissent memo says that Israel is committing “war crimes” against the Palestinians in Gaza and that the Biden administration is “spreading misinformation.”

The Intercept reports in “Palestinians Sue Biden for Failing to Prevent Genocide in Gaza“: “A group of Palestinian human rights organizations, residents of Gaza, and U.S. citizens with family members impacted by Israel’s ongoing assault jointly sued President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin on Monday for failing to ‘prevent an unfolding genocide.’

“The 89-page lawsuit, filed by the Center for Constitutional Rights in a California federal district court, traces 75 years of history and analyzes acts committed and rhetoric espoused by the Israeli government that exhibit a disregard for international law. It is accompanied by a declaration from a genocide expert who describes Israel’s actions as signs of genocide and argues that the Biden administration has breached its duty under international law to prevent it.

“’Under international law, the United States has a duty to take all measures available to it to prevent a genocide. Yet, Defendants have repeatedly refused to use their obvious and considerable influence to set conditions or place limits on Israel’s massive bombing and total siege of Gaza,’ the lawsuit reads.

“’Despite escalating evidence of Israeli policies directed at inflicting mass harm to the Palestinian population in Gaza,’ the Biden administration has opposed ‘a life-saving cease-fire and lifting of the siege, even vetoing United Nations measures calling for a ceasefire,’ the lawsuit continues. ‘Instead, their actions to fund, arm, and endorse Israel’s mass and devastating bombing campaign and total siege of the Palestinians in Gaza constitutes a failure to prevent an unfolding genocide and complicity in its development.'”

MARC VAN DER HOUT, [currently in DC] MV@vblaw.com,
Van Der Hout, one of the lawyers on the case, of the law firm of Van Der Hout, LLP, said, “The United States must fulfill its obligations under the Genocide Convention and international law to prevent escalating atrocities in Gaza. The killings and kidnappings perpetrated by Hamas on Oct 7, horrendous as they were, in no conceivable way justify the massacres now being perpetrated by the State of Israel with the unconditional support and acquiescence of the United States. The courts must now force the U.S. to comply with its obligations under the law.” See piece quoting Van Der Hout in the San Francisco Chronicle.

See statements by Center for Constitutional Rights and Al-Haq: “Palestinians Sue Biden for Failure to Prevent Genocide, Seek Emergency Order to Stop Military and Diplomatic Support for Israeli Government’s Assault on Gaza.”

Also, at the Center for Constitutional Rights, contact: press@ccrjustice.org.

See past related IPA news releases.

In the latest of a series of protests around the world, hundreds of thousands in London marched this weekend to demand “Cease-Fire Now” in Gaza.

MICHAEL BEER, michael@nonviolenceinternational.net, @NVIntl
STARHAWK, info@starhawk.org
    Executive director of Nonviolence International and author of Civil Resistance Tactics of the 21st Century, Beer just co-wrote a letter to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial council chair, Stuart E. Eizenstat. The letter was co-written with Starhawk, author, activist, permaculture designer and teacher, and a prominent voice in modern earth-based spirituality and ecofeminism.

The letter states: “We organized an alternative opening ceremony of the Holocaust Museum in 1993 because the official ceremony explicitly excluded Gay/Bi/Lesbian people (homosexuals). Within the year, the Museum embraced the pink triangle Holocaust story and doubled down on its inclusion of other victim groups such as the Roma, people with disabilities, Slavs and others. To ensure that the Museum maintains its contemporary relevance, it created the Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide whose purpose is genocide prevention, crisis response, justice and accountability. Recently, the Museum’s exhibition on the genocide of the Rohingya was a strong political statement and superbly presented.

    “Last month, the museum (on the Press Room webpage) condemned the horrific attacks on Israel and Jews by Hamas on October 7th and then released a statement in defense of the State of Israel. Yet, when it comes to genocidal threats and the attack on 2.2 million Palestinian people, (not to mention scores of Jewish pogroms on many communities in the West Bank), the Holocaust Museum website appears to be silent. Setting the bombing (and 10,000 deaths) aside, halting water, food, medicine and fuel to an entire population is barbaric and genocidal. The fact that this is being done by a Jewish state is doubly tragic and ironic.

    “Attacks on Palestinian civilians and the death of thousands of children will not make Israel safe; it will only foster more anger and resentment. Only a just resolution of the conflict can assure true peace for Israel and Palestine alike.

    “At the alternative opening ceremony in 1993, we laid a pink triangle flower arrangement on the Museum Plaza with a black and white sign that read ‘Silence = Death.’ This referenced the silence of the Museum toward Gay & Bisexual men as well as the silence of policy makers and society towards a generation of Gay & Bisexual men who died unnecessarily from AIDS.

    “Will the Museum speak up for a Israeli-Palestinian ceasefire and humanitarian assistance for all? Will it help decision-makers, the military, and the public work to prevent genocide and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians now and in the longer term?

    “The mission of the Holocaust Museum should be universal, not one primarily based in the exceptionalism of Jews. There is an urgent and dramatic opportunity for the Holocaust Museum to elevate its mission of Never Again. Silence in this case means death for countless Palestinian people.”

RAED JARRAR, rjarrar@dawnmena.org, @raedjarrar
In response to President Biden’s tweet about the opening of so-called humanitarian corridors in Gaza, Jarrar, advocacy director at Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), issued the following statement: “There is nothing humanitarian in President Biden’s corridors in Gaza. These are ethnic cleansing corridors — a vital part of Israel’s ongoing forced displacement plan for Gaza. The U.S. government’s endorsement of these corridors only serves to sanitize and enable Israel’s campaign to depopulate Palestinian lands.

“Biden’s corridors are nothing but an effort to provide a soft-sounding cover for the ongoing massacre of Palestinians. Israel announced the establishment of these corridors on October 21, 2023. The Israeli army dropped leaflets on northern Gaza ordering residents’ immediate ‘evacuation’ and warning residents that ‘anyone who chooses not to leave from the north of the [Gaza] Strip to south of Wadi Gaza may be determined an accomplice in a terrorist organization.’ In addition, Israel has repeatedly bombarded convoys of fleeing Palestinians, as well as those sheltering in makeshift refugee centers in the south of Gaza.”

Jarrar appeared on the recent IPA news releases “In ‘Grotesque Hoax’ Biden Admin Not Just ‘Green Lighting’ Israeli Ethnic Cleansing — ‘It’s Bankrolling It’.” When questioned about this by Sam Husseini, the State Department refused to comment. Jarrar also appeared on the recent IPA news release “Is Israel Killing U.S. Citizens by Refusing a Ceasefire?“

Israel told people inside Gaza’s al-Rantisi Children’s Hospital to evacuate. On November 10, patients and staff at the hospital evacuated, waving white flags in the streets. 

STEVE SOSEBEE; steve@pcrf.net, @Stevesosebee 
    Sosebee is the president and founder of the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund (PCRF). 

PCRF opened Gaza’s first and only pediatric cancer hospital, al-Rantisi, in 2019. Before that, children with cancer had to leave the Gaza Strip for treatment. Sosebee told the Institute for Public Accuracy that since October 7, the hospital has been “providing food, water, and ongoing medical support [to patients]. The hospital has been overrun with thousands of internally displaced people while continuing cancer treatments for patients. PCRF has also been working on obtaining accurate information about how to get humanitarian aid and supplies into Gaza. We are also getting kids out for medical care. We have transferred 13 children out. They are mostly in Egypt now.

“As of [November 10], the hospital has been evacuated. It was hit in an Israeli airstrike three days ago. Now children in wheelchairs are waving white flags under the nose of Israeli tanks. We’re not sure where those patients and staff are at the moment. There have been threats over the past 4-5 days [that they would need to be evaucuated], but we were hoping that common sense would prevail. It’s a hospital full of kids: cancer patients and kids in the ICU and kids with cystic fibrosis and kids on dialysis. But at a press conference last night, the [hospital] director was saying we needed to leave. 

“Before that, communication was difficult. We lost complete contact a few times. [When signal returned], we would hear the horror stories and the fear that everyone had. Now it’s not a question of communication being cut. These are kids with cancer. They’re starting to relapse and fall out of remission. These are diseases with 95 percent cure rates with proper treatment, but they’re a death sentence without proper treatment. These patients need to go to a facility where specialized care is available to them––and that facility has been destroyed. We don’t know if the physical structure is still standing. 

“According to the Israeli army, hospitals are legitimate military targets. The [Gazan] health sector has completely collapsed. Thousands of innocent children––on ventilators, on dialysis, with cancer, with heart conditions, amputees with trauma injuries, and hundreds [of kids] in the burn department––are not getting care anymore. That should be on the conscience of the entire world. It’s not only relentless bombing taking place; it’s that hospitals are being targeted and patients are being denied treatment. Doctors are being killed or sent into streets, and the institutions they’ve worked in in the last years and month are being damaged, destroyed, or depopulated. The lives of these Palestinian children seem to mean nothing to the world.” 

Some cultural institutions have unleashed a wave of retaliation against speakers and thinkers since October 7. The medical community is now seeing similar backlash at healthcare institutions. At Montefiore Medical Center in New York City, an OB-GYN Grand Rounds seminar presentation was recently canceled after the speaker, Dr. Ghazaleh Moayedi, voiced solidarity with Palestinian people on social media. Moayedi was scheduled to give a talk entitled “Healthcare through a Human Rights Crisis.” 

ANDREW GOLDSTEIN; andrew.d.goldstein@gmail.com 
    Goldstein is an assistant professor in the Department of Medicine at NYU and a primary care physician at a public hospital.

According to members of the group Healthcare Workers for Palestine and Moayedi’s own statements, Montefiore canceled OB-GYN Grand Rounds because its upcoming speaker had expressed solidarity with Palestine, called for a ceasefire, and stated that solidarity with the Palestinian people is a reproductive justice issue. The speaker’s posts did not support violence of any kind. The talk was canceled by the interim chair of the OB-GYN department at Montefiore approximately two hours before the grand rounds were scheduled to take place. The department made no mention of the process for that decision or who decided it.

Goldstein told the Institute for Public Accuracy: “People in the department and outside of it, at various levels of training, have responded [to the cancellation] in private. They were disturbed by the action. Some even contacted leadership at Montefiore. Other workers have been called in [to management] because of their social media posts on the issue.” Those workers feel that they were intimidated to discourage future posts. Though some institutions are more or less stringent in their policies, in general, any “language around Palestinian resistance––and [in particular] the phrase ‘from the river to the sea’––is fireable.”

“Coworkers are also monitoring social media. People have been warned or otherwise been intimidated when coworkers have expressed that they were uncomfortable with Palestinian solidarity posts.

“Many workers outside of Montefiore are feeling this. Institutions across the board issued statements soon after October 7 about their support with Israel and supporting staff who might be feeling emotional distress. But most institutions have done nothing about what Muslims, Palestinians, or Arabs in Palestine or in the U.S. are enduring right now.”

Healthcare Workers for Palestine have organized events across the U.S. calling for a ceasefire, including: press conferences, safe space dinners, teach-ins and education sessions, a die-in in Boston, a walkout of UCSF students, a walkout at San Francisco General Hospital, and healthcare worker vigils in New York, Chicago, New Haven, Seattle, Philadelphia and elsewhere.

The group also put out a statement calling on the international healthcare community to condemn Israeli violence and destruction against the Palestinian healthcare system and to materially support colleagues using direct aid. The statement received nearly 5,000 signatories. 

The United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs is reporting: “On 4 and 5 November, seven water facilities across the Gaza Strip were directly hit and sustained major damage, including three sewage pipelines in Gaza city, two water reservoirs (in Gaza City, Rafah and Jabalia refugee camp) and two water wells in Rafah. The Gaza municipality warned about the imminent risk of sewage flooding.” See the most recent report from the office, including information about the dire water situation.

There are reports of Israel bombing relief trucks from the Red Cross.

Yoav Gallant, the head of Israel’s military said in October: “We are putting a complete siege on Gaza. No electricity, no food, no water, no gas. It’s all closed. We’re fighting animals and are acting accordingly.”

ZEIAD ABBAS SHAMROUCH, ziad@mecaforpeace.org, @MECAForPeace
Zeiad Abbas Shamrouch is executive director of the Middle East Children’s Alliance. He said today: “Children in Gaza are not only living through a terrifying attack on their homes, schools, and communities. Now they are thirsty and getting sick from the small amounts of polluted water available to drink. Israel’s deliberate attacks on access to water in Gaza will lead to more deaths and disease, especially among young children. So they are not just killing thousands of children through their bombings, but they are working to ensure that those who survive are psychologically harmed and physically traumatized as the result of drinking polluted water. …

“Due to Israel cutting off some of the supply of water and destroying key water infrastructure and storage tanks, people are being forced to drink water from unsafe sources. Dehydration and waterborne diseases are spreading and medicine is running out. There are outbreaks of chickenpox, scabies and diarrhea due to the shortage of water.”

The group also notes that Al-Jazeera TV is reporting tens of thousands in Gaza, most of them children, are suffering from severe diarrhea as a result of drinking contaminated water.

Politico reports: “U.S. diplomats slam Israel policy in leaked memo.”

Quds News Network reports that Israeli police “raided the anti-Zionist Jewish neighborhood in occupied #Jerusalem to take down Palestinian flags and brutally attacked anti-Zionist Jews, knocking them down on the road, hitting, and punching them in the face.” [See video.]

ABBA SOLOMON, abbasolomon@gmail.com, www.threads.net/@abba.a.solomon
Solomon is author of two books on Zionism, The Miasma of Unity: Jews and Israel and The Speech, and Its Context: Jacob Blaustein’s Speech “The Meaning of Palestine Partition to American Jews.”

He recently wrote the piece “Endangered and Dangerous Israel, Endangering Jews,” which states: “In U.S. defense policy, partnership with the Israeli state has become axiomatic, providing fulsome American support, turning a blind eye to the parallel dispossession of Palestinians with the Israeli achievement of ‘Jewish’ sovereignty, allying with the manifest injustice.

“The Huffington Post on Oct. 19 reported U.S. State Department staff are preparing a ‘dissent cable’ on American absolute support for Israel’s attacks on Gaza, following the resignation of one official, publicly announcing he ‘could not morally support the U.S.’s moves to supply Israel’s war effort.’

“Israel’s conduct seems to be stimulating open hostility to Jews around the world, as local targets for anger at Gaza’s agony.

“The call from Israel when Jews abroad are in danger is, Come home to Israel, where you belong and will be safe from violence inflicted because you are Jewish.

“It is now less credible to think of Israel as a safe place for Jews as Jews, in an ironic twist. And the more extreme measures Israel wreaks on Gaza for Israel’s safety, the more imperiled by association Jews outside Israel will be.

“The strangulation of the two-million-plus population of Gaza is the ultimate expression of the militant Jewish nationalist assertion of control, watched in real-time by the world.”

DON WAGNER, dwag42@gmail.com
Rev. Dr. Don Wagner is a retired member of the Presbyterian clergy, professor and a human rights activist. He is the author of the memoir Glory to God in the Lowest: Journeys to an Unholy Land and other books including Anxious for Armageddon.

He just wrote the piece “Netanyahu abuses Bible to impress U.S. evangelicals” which states: “In his press briefing on 27 October, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu cited a biblical reference to ‘Amalek’ in the context of the destruction of Hamas and to ‘eradicate this evil from the world.’

“This pseudo-religious spin may have confused all but his ultra-right religious followers, both Jewish and Christian Zionists. Netanyahu continued: ‘We remember, and we are fighting…..our soldiers are part of a legacy of Jewish warriors that goes back 3,000 years.’

“What appeared bizarre to many was a highly intentional religious justification for Israel’s ethnic cleansing of Gaza’s Palestinian men, women, and children.

“The ‘annihilate Amalek’ theme invokes support from the divine in this modern crusade to exterminate the Amalekites, interpreted today as every Palestinian. Netanyahu´s base of political support among militant settlers finds inspiration from these violent biblical texts.

“Another base of Netanyahu’s support is the international Christian Zionist movement, rising in the Global South, southeast Asia, and North America. Netanyahu can count on these ‘friends’ to provide political, economic and media support despite a dramatic decline in his popularity at home and abroad.

“Shortly after the 7 October attacks, a letter of support for Israel’s war on Gaza was issued by 60 conservative evangelical leaders in the United States, including two former presidents of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission — Russell Moore, now editor of Christianity Today, and Richard Land.

“Several pastors from the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest evangelical Christian denomination in the United States, signed the letter. Many of the supporters, but not all, embrace the ‘annihilate Amalek’ war mentality, while others draw on just war theory.

“The letter was delivered to the White House and every Congressional office on Capitol Hill, lending support for the Israeli aggression on Gaza.”

[On Monday, IPA senior analyst Sam Husseini asked a series of questions about the Genocide Convention at the State Department briefing. For video, transcript and analysis, see here.]

MAIREAD MAGUIRE, mairead@peacepeople.com
Available for a limited number of interviews, Nobel Peace Laureate Maguire is founder of Peace People and has done peace work based in Northern Ireland for decades.

The Belfast Telegraph reports: “A Nobel Peace Prize winner has called for the Genocide Convention to be invoked against Israel for its actions against Palestine at a rally outside the U.S. Consulate General Belfast on Saturday.

“Mairead Corrigan Maguire told the crowd of more than 4,000 people that international law and human rights need to be upheld in relation to Israel’s conduct of its invasion of the territory.”

She said today: “The governments of the U.S., U.K., Germany and much of Europe are wholly complicit in the horrific assault on the people of Gaza.

“Not only are these governments refusing to meet their treaty obligations to ensure respect for the Genocide Convention but they are in fact actively arming the assault by providing economic and intelligence support and giving political and diplomatic cover for Israel’s war crimes.

“Palestinians in Gaza are being demonised and suffering ethnic cleansing and collective punishment.

“This is a classic genocide and Israeli government has to be held accountable.

“As the U.S. uses its veto to block action at UN Security Council, another legal way must be found and this means  state can invoke Genocide Convention at the World Court. States such as Ireland, Brazil, South Africa, Colombia, Venezuela, Iran, Spain could help save the lives of Palestinians being cruelly slaughtered in an immoral and illegal war by Israel.”

FRANCIS BOYLE, fboyle@illinois.edu
Boyle is professor of international law at the University of Illinois College of Law. His books include The Bosnian People Charge Genocide (1996) Palestine, Palestinians and International Law (2009) and World Politics, Human Rights and International Law (2021).

See Boyle’s lecture: “Stopping Zionist Genocide Against The Palestinians” and IPA news releases: “UN Official Resigns, Calling Israel’s Attack ‘Genocide’ — Will a Nation Invoke the Genocide Convention?” and “On Israel: Lawyer Who Applied Genocide Convention for Bosnia Recommends it Now for Palestinians.”

Also see from Jewish Currents magazine: “A Textbook Case of Genocide” by Raz Segal, an associate professor of Holocaust and genocide studies at Stockton University and the endowed professor in the study of modern genocide.