The United States government for two weeks has been offering Israel “sensitive intelligence to help the Israeli military pinpoint the location of Hamas leaders and find the group’s hidden tunnels, according to four people familiar…” reported the Washington Post May 11. The Biden Administration has also offered thousands of shelters for building tent cities, and help in constructing delivery systems for food, water, and medicine; trying to “persuade Israel to conduct a more limited and targeted operation in [Rafah].” Unwritten, but implied, is that Israel’s government has shown no interest in any of this, but has proceeded to what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu calls “an extreme force operation.”
“Biden aides are stressing to their Israeli counterparts that Palestinians cannot simply be moved to barren or bombarded parts of Gaza, but that Israel must provide basic infrastructure— including shelter, food, water, medicine and other necessities—so that those who are evacuated will have livable conditions and not simply be exposed to additional famine or disease,” the Post reported. “Experts from across the U.S. government are advising their Israeli counterparts in great detail on how to develop and implement such a humanitarian plan, down to the level of how many tents and how much water would be needed for specific areas, according to several people familiar with the discussions.”
As part of the GOP move to generate “bipartisan” Congressional attacks on Biden over withholding weapons, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AK) claimed on “Face the Nation” May 12 that the Post report meant the United States had been “withholding intelligence about the location of senior Hamas leaders and therefore, hostages,” for weeks, part of Biden’s “pro-Hamas” policy.
The failure of Biden’s small and tentative carrot-and-stick act over Rafah raises a question: Without the United States joining other nations in a development plan like LaRouche’s Oasis Plan, is there anything the United States, ICJ, United Nations, or any other institution—aside from the Israeli population and many other nations’ citizens in the streets—can do, which, by coercion alone, could stop Israel from slaughter of Palestinians in Rafah and extermination in Gaza?
Israel invaded Egypt’s Gaza and Sinai in 1955 and for seven months—from August 1955 until March 1956—defied U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower’s public statements that it should withdraw, until he started to sell off Israel’s bonds. Today, Israel has sold more than $3 billion in government bonds to American county, city, state and federal governments just since Oct. 7, 2023, according to Israel Bonds/Development Corporation for Israel; the total was $3 billion when reported by Bond Buyer on April 9. Israel’s largest exports by value are polished and rough-cut diamonds, $10-11 billion/year, exported for the most part to Europe and secondarily to the United States. Those are followed by electronics exports, largely to the United States, of $5-6 billion/year.
