Josh Paul, the former State Department official who resigned in protest of the Administration’s policy on arms transfers to Israel explained to radio personality Laura Flanders in an interview for The Nation yesterday that there was no debate on the complexities of supporting Israel in Gaza. “There is simply an urgency to rush arms into a conflict where civilians are dying en masse and that is what I don’t understand,” he said. “That is what I could not do anything to stop. The lack of space in the administration and in Congress to have this discussion is why I thought that the only place to have it would be in the public eye.”
Paul told Flanders that the Biden policy towards Israel even violates its own policy on arms transfers when there is a “likelihood” of human rights violations. “I think it is more than apparent how arms that we are providing to Israel, particularly precision-guided munitions for the conflict in Gaza will be used,” he said. “In fact, it is a certainty that they will be used for human rights violations and result in massive civilian casualties.”
Among other things, Paul particularly criticized the policy of arming Israel to the teeth (which has been U.S. policy since at least Richard Nixon). “I think the policy approach from the U.S. has been security for peace, that if Israel feels secure, it will feel comfortable making the concessions necessary to allow peace,” he said. “But what we have seen instead is the more secure Israel feels, the more it has pushed the envelope, the more settlements have expanded, the more civil rights have been taken away from Palestinians in the West Bank, the more the siege of Gaza has continued. And so I think we need to step away from that way of thinking and ask if maybe instead of security for peace there’s some way of peace for security.”
