Call for an end to the bombings
Israel has killed more than 37,000 Palestinians in Gaza and wounded at least 86,000, a majority women and children. Thousands more are missing. After telling Gazans to flee to the south, Israel bombed the one crossing into Egypt that was open to them. It bombed refugees as they made their way toward supposed "safe areas," and it bombed them after they arrived. There is no escape, as Israel has begun attacking the 1.5 million civilians sheltering in Rafah at the southern border. Thousands of children are among the dead. Hospitals and schools, churches and mosques, roads, electricity grids and water pipes have been destroyed. Food and water are scarce, with starvation and disease rampant. Doctors, reporters and aid agencies describe an overwhelming humanitarian crisis.
The United Nations reports that "A staggering 85 per cent of the total population of Gaza — 1.9 million civilians — have been forcibly displaced." After Israel's carpet bombing of their villages and towns, there are no homes for them to return to. This comports with the plan voiced by leading Israeli politicians, which is to rid the Gaza Strip and West Bank of Palestinians and replace them with Israel settlers, completing the ethnic cleansing that began in 1948. Our country will be held accountable for this brutal and disproportionate assault on the civilian population of Gaza.
Please contact the White House, the State Department and your Members of Congress to demand an end to the bombing and a permanent cease fire from all parties. Your action now can save lives!!
One of the most frightening aspects of Israel's assault on Gaza has been the severe curtailment of humanitarian aid on which two million people in the imprisoned enclave depend. Before the war, an average of 500 commercial and aid trucks per day entered the Gaza Strip. At present, only about 95 per day make it through. The United Nations has estimated that over half a million people face starvation.
In the midst of this humanitarian crisis, Israel has sought to discredit and ban UNRWA, the international agency responsible for feeding, educating and sheltering Palestinian refugees since 1949. Israel has claimed, without providing any proof, that twelve UNRWA employees out of 13,000 working in the Gaza Strip, took part in the October 7th attacks led by Hamas. UNRWA immediately fired the employees and requested an independent investigation. However, the United States and eight western nations temporarily halted funding for the agency, leaving it unable to plan and operate. This interruption affects refugees in Lebanon, Jordan and other countries, as well as those facing starvation in Gaza.
Citing Israel's failure to prove the allegations, most nations have resumed their support of UNRWA. Yet in March, the US Congress passed a measure preventing further funding of UNRWA through March 2025. A bill in the US House of Representatives, HR 8771, would ban US support for UNRWA through September 2025. It must be opposed. No other agency has the network and infrastructure throughout the Middle East to fill the gap this would leave. Millions of refugees would be affected. This would destabilize US allies like Jordan as well as other countries that already face social and economic upheaval since the war in Gaza began. Seldom has there been such a short-sighted and vindictive policy proposal.
