As the official death toll in Gaza passes more than 42,400, the true number may be impossible to know until Israel’s war is over. But medical workers who witnessed the carnage in Gaza’s hospitals are speaking out. We speak with Dr. Feroze Sidhwa about his op-ed in The New York Times that features harrowing stories from dozens of healthcare workers and CT scans of children shot in the head or the left side of the chest.
The Times called the corresponding images of the patients too graphic to publish. “I personally wish that Americans could see more of what it looks like when a child is shot in the head, when a child is flayed open by bombs,” says Sidhwa. “I think it would make us think a little bit more about what we do in the world.”
We also speak with Palestinian nurse Rajaa Musleh, who worked at Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. “I will never forget the dogs were eating the dead body inside Shifa Hospital at the front of the emergency department.
This will be stuck on my mind for my whole life,” says Musleh. “My message for the whole world: We are human beings. We are not numbers. We have the right to receive healthcare inside Gaza.”
It’s hard for the whole world to do anything when the largest economy on Earth will undo any small step, political statement or protest with large amounts of cash, weapons and strong arming allied countries to agree with them via trade and sanctions, such as via the Anti Israel Boycott act H.R. 6940 which even affects the European Union. The whole world isn’t just standing aside. It’s just hard to stand on the path of the freight train that is the USA.
Nevertheless the ICC is proceeding, protest are occurring in many cities worldwide to embargo Israel and the UN is trying to prevent the US from sweeping this under the rug with constant world affirmations of rights of a Palestinian state and condemnations of Israeli actions, despite the US voting against.
Nobel prize winners are using their time in the spotlight to speak about it, presidents and prime ministers are urging more countries to stop trading with Israel, universities are refusing collaboration with Israel universities and exchange programs, investment capital is refusing to invest in Israeli companies and even Israeli tourists are being shunned abroad in several countries, including mine where they were booed on the streets. All this in the face of potential retaliatory action from the US.
Of course, it’s not what we hoped it would be or as effective as we need it to be for our dying Palestinian and Lebanese brothers and sisters, but it is a far cry from standing aside doing nothing. People are doing things and it would be a hell of a lot easier if the US either stopped helping the enemy or at the very least did nothing. I don’t wanna be writing “America bad” posts, I’ve been trying to make an effort to avoid making sweeping hot take statements about the US in general, but hot damn, in this case, i can’t help it. America very bad on Israel support and this will tarnish US international image for ages to come, even worse than the war on terror did.
The international community sees the US right now as the americans see Harris. It’s better than the alternative, sure, but we’d sure enjoy a whole lot less of genocide right about now.
The problem in the European Union is called Germany, whose politicians seem to have never leaved the whole “We support any Holocaust as long as it’s a ´good´ race ´solving the problem’ of a ´bad´ race” mindset.
If the US tries to hit any EU country with any commercial sanction the EU as whole is Treaty bound to impose counter-sanctions on the US and America doesn’t really want to see its access to a market of 470 million people cut and its tacit support from the biggest trade block around to it’s Guerrilla Trade War with China to dissapear completelly.
One of the main reason why the EU exists (the other being to incentivise Peace in Europe through tight trade ties) is exactly because whilst large nations like the US can indeed bully small and even medium sized nations via trade and sanctions, they can’t bully a tightly integrated association of nations adding up to a larger Economy with a larger Market than the US.
The US trying that shit on EU nations would just result in a Trade War and a significant acceleration of the current post-Imperial decay stage the US is in.
But there are bills currently in congress going for approval that will target the EU specifically, such as the one mentioned on my previous comment, where US companies would face fines for joining boycott movements promoted at a EU level. Whether they will succeed or not is still not determined, but there are actors inside the US trying to push this agenda towards the rest of Europe. I do hope the EU does as you say and not fold on the US pressure, because i really don’t want to see our union bundled together with US foreign policy as it has been since the 2000s.
What the US politicians think, decide and legislate is irrelevant: the US actually targetting EU nations would directly yield counter-sanctions from the whole of the EU because that’s a core part of the EU Membership Treaties (so, not the kind of thing that can just be blocked by a veto from a US-friendly EU member nation), and those would seriously impact the US Economy, not to mention the indirect impact on the US’ broader geostrategical influence from treating the EU as an adversary.
For the EU it would be something like Brexit - even if the EU loses from a hard posture, it cannot afford to let the other side get away with it without very painful consequences because that would result in them doing even worst things later and would incentivise others to do the same - only in this case the EU would suffer way less from playing hardball with the US than it did from doing it with Brexiting Britain.
For the US it would basically be comitting Trade Suicide at the feet of China.
If the US Congress and Senate are too stupid and actually pass those laws and POTOS too is too stupid and actually uses it, all without the companies that are going to get screwed the most by counter-sanctions (mainly Tech) lobbying that proposal away into nothing, thats a lot more a US problem than an EU problem and there is no way at all that the upsides are close to even just begin to justify the downsides.
(Sure it would hurt the EU, just a lot less than doing nothing about it would).
Personally I would love for the US policians to try it and find out.
I… Doubt it. The alternative is China, who despite their general nonsense don’t really do violent imperialism AFAIK.
I was thinking of Russia (as I’m European they’re the most immediate threat), but being honest, while China keeps mostly to themselves, i would not like to be subjected to their level of censorship and dissent suppression. Plus there’s allegations that they’re committing a genocide of their own.
I mean yes but the EU is fully capable of dealing with Russia even without US support. Russia isn’t really a superpower anymore.
That’s true and it sucks, but it mostly sucks for Chinese people. I don’t think they can or want to do any of that abroad.