Pelosi Enables Israel’s War on the People of Gaza
While the majority of San Franciscans are calling for a cease-fire, our Representative supports funding Netanyahu’s Assault
• • • • • • • • • • February 2024 • • • • • • • • • •
Nancy Pelosi seems to be working more for the State of Israel than for the people of San Francisco. Nancy is our congressional representative, but she is out of step with the majority of San Franciscans who are calling for an immediate cease-fire and a halt to military aid to Israel. She supports giving away our tax dollars to Israel, and at the same time, she is taking contributions from AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. Did you see where she accuses people who are calling for a cease-fire of working for Putin? And the whole time, she is working for Israel. Don’t know what anyone’s going to get from Putin, but Nancy is making out.
The US Senate just passed a $95 billion bill to fund the wars in Ukraine and Israel. This war supplemental — a supplement to the $886 billion military budget - is scheduled to go to the House of Representatives in March. Nancy should recuse herself from that vote unless she gives back the money she’s received from the pro-Israel lobby.
Nancy, if you are truly representing the people of San Francisco, do all you can to prevent that bill from being passed.”
The Senate bill includes another $14 billion for weapons for Israel to use in Gaza, $60 billion to continue the war in Ukraine and almost $8 billion for military projects in Asia. The bill includes $9 billion in humanitarian aid to be split between Ukraine, Israel, and Gaza, a pittance compared to the money going to the arms industry. The Senate bill also includes a prohibition against US funding for UNRWA, the lifeline for water and food to Gaza, where over a million people are threatened with mass starvation. Finally, there’s a provision that allows President Biden to send unlimited weapons to Israel without the legally required notification to Congress! I have to put that in bold because it is a complete abdication of Congress’s legal responsibility. This must not be allowed to happen. Nancy, if you are truly representing the people of San Francisco, do all you can to prevent that bill from being passed.
“What’s happening in Gaza isn’t a war, it’s a genocide. It’s not a war of soldiers against soldiers. It’s a war between a highly trained army and women and children. What’s happening in Gaza and with the Palestinian people [...] already happened in the past: when Hitler decided to kill the Jews.” — Lula da Silva, President of Brazil.
“Mounting questions over Israel’s massive intelligence failure to anticipate and prepare for a surprise Hamas assault were compounded Monday when an Egyptian intelligence official said that Jerusalem had ignored repeated warnings that the Gaza-based terror group was planning “something big” — which included an apparent direct notice from Cairo’s intelligence minister to the prime minister” — The Times of Israel, October 9, 2023.
Are you kidding me? Israel, with the world’s most sophisticated intelligence service and around-the-clock monitoring of Hamas, didn’t know of the attack? The border fence with Gaza, where the Palestinians are kept in the world’s largest open-air prison, is only 25 miles long. Are you telling me that the Israeli Defense Forces didn’t have cameras trained on that fence 24/7? The Netanyahu government let the attack happen so it would have justification for implementing the “final solution” to its Palestinian problem.
The following is from an article from the online news magazine Common Dreams:
“While the Senate passed the $95 billion foreign aid package, including $14 billion for Israel, lawmakers have not agreed on funding for WIC (the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children), which is estimated to cost $6.3 billion in 2024 and faces a $1 billion shortfall. So, our Senators have no problem approving $14 billion to bomb Palestinian women and children, but they can’t see their way to feeding hungry mothers and children in the US.
Israel’s bombardment of Gaza has killed more than 28,000 people since October, including more than 12,000 children.
The Senate’s 70-29 bipartisan vote in favor of the package, wrote defense analyst William Hartung of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, “lays bare the skewed priorities of the federal government. Despite deep divisions, it is possible to get bipartisan support for a package that mostly involves funding weapons exports,” Hartung wrote. “Don’t expect any such emergency measure to address record levels of homelessness, or aid the 1 in 6 American children living in poverty, or accelerate investments in curbing the climate crisis. In the view of the administration and a majority of members of Congress, some emergencies count more than others.
At the Institute for Policy Studies, National Priorities Project director Lindsay Koshgarian pointed to WIC as a prime example of the kind of program the federal government should be prioritizing over military aid for Israel, which has garnered growing condemnation from US allies for its indiscriminate attacks on civilians.” - $95 Billion More for War, But No to $1 Billion to Feed 2 Million Families? by Julia Conway, Feb. 15, 2024.
We need that $95 billion aid package here at home, here in California. The California State budget projection for 2024-2025 has risen to $68 billion in the red. For fiscal years 2025-2026 San Francisco is projecting a budget shortfall of approximately $799 million with a $245 million deficit in the first year and $554 million in the second year. “As of October 2023, over 3 million households in California – including over 1 million households with children – face food insecurity.” - California Association of Food Banks. “In California, 4,104,060 people are facing hunger - and of them 1,182,720 are children.” - from the Feeding America website (https://www.feedingamerica.org/hunger-in-america/california.)
Nancy, please don’t allow our tax dollars to fund wars overseas that will only make America less safe and kill innocent civilians. Join the Jewish groups calling for a cease-fire now. “More than 500 employees of dozens of synagogues and Jewish groups signed a letter calling for a cease-fire. Most signed anonymously for fear of their jobs.” — Hundreds of Jewish organization staffers call for White House to back Gaza cease-fire, NBC News, Dec. 7, 2023. Even the San Francisco Board of Supervisors is calling for a cease-fire.
And call for a halt to all military aid to Israel until the already well-documented war crimes of the Netanyahu government are investigated and those responsible are held to account.
David Romano is an environmental activist living near Ocean Beach
February 2024