April 4, 2024 (EIRNS)—U.S. President Joe Biden heard first-hand reports at an April 2 White House meeting from American Muslims of the starvation in Gaza. However, despite an hour of gripping reports, it appears that Biden could not process what he was hearing.
First, Palestinian-American Dr. Thaer Ahmad, an emergency room physician from Chicago, handed Biden a letter from an 8-year-old girl in Gaza, who had lost both parents. Her message was: “I beg you, President Biden, stop them from entering Rafah.” Dr. Ahmad told CNN that he had volunteered to work at Nasser Hospital in Gaza’s Khan Younis, and had witnessed massive numbers of displaced, injured, and dying people. He said that he told Biden that “it was disappointing I’m the only Palestinian here, and out of respect for my community, I’m going to leave,” as he got up to go. He explained that he did not feel it was appropriate to talk about death and famine over a dinner: “I wanted a chance to stand up and walk away from the people making decisions the way they are walking from my people.”
He told CNN’s news anchor Kaitlan Collins: “It cannot just be rhetoric. It can’t just be the President saying he’s very sorry…. Gaza is becoming unlivable. I mean, there is nothing left there. There’s no schools, and people are living in tents in a very cramped area. … It just seems that the White House has not decided to take that leap and really put their foot down.”
Dr. Nahreen Ahmed, an ICU physician in Philadelphia, spoke at the meeting. She described to CNN the “heartfelt plea” of her colleague Dr. Ahmad: “This was not him as a doctor, this was him as a Palestinian American, having witnessed the atrocities that he saw firsthand.
“Thaer and I were both in Gaza together. We watched far too many people killed, coming in dead on arrival in the emergency room.”
