Andre Damon
The Biden administration, the leading imperialist sponsor of Israel’s Gaza genocide, which has killed 32,000 Palestinians, displaced nearly 2 million, and imposed starvation on the entire population, is introducing a UN resolution supporting an “immediate ceasefire” in Gaza.
The cynicism of Biden’s call for a “ceasefire,” while continuing to fund and arm the government that is massacring over a hundred Palestinians every day and starving the entire Gazan population, is beyond description. The Biden administration hopes that by proclaiming its support for a “ceasefire” loudly enough it will make the world’s population forget that it fully supports and enables the US-Israeli “final solution” of the Palestinian question.
In reality, every major action taken by the Netanyahu government, from the ethnic cleansing of northern Gaza in October to the assault on al-Shifa Hospital over the past weekend, has been coordinated with and approved by the Biden administration, which continues to funnel to Israel the weapons used to massacre the population of Gaza.
In a call with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Sunday, Biden called for discussions with a “team” of “military, intelligence and humanitarian experts” on Israel’s impending onslaught on Rafah, underscoring once again American imperialism’s direct participation in the genocide against the Palestinians. The southernmost city in Gaza is currently packed with over 1.5 million Palestinians with nowhere else to go.
Unlike multiple UN ceasefire resolutions previously vetoed by the United States, the latest resolution explicitly links a ceasefire to the achievement of Israel’s military goals.
The resolution ties the call for a ceasefire to the demand for the release of hostages by Hamas, stating:
This is a restatement of language used by Biden in his warmongering State of the Union address earlier this month, in which he declared, “Hamas could end this conflict today by releasing the hostages, laying down arms, and surrendering those responsible for October 7th.” In that speech, Biden said that the US has “been working non-stop to establish an immediate ceasefire that would last for at least six weeks.”
The claim by the Biden administration to support a “ceasefire” in Gaza is belied by one fact: It continues to be the policy of the United States government that Israel has carte blanche to commit any war crime in Gaza without leading to a reduction of US weapons shipments.
Earlier this month, Biden declared, “The defense of Israel is still critical. So there’s no red line where I’m going to cut off all weapons.”
Last week, when asked if there was anything Israel could do that would curtail US funding, Principal Deputy Press Secretary Olivia Dalton replied, “I don’t think it’s productive to assign ‘red line’ terminology to what is a very complex set of policies.”
The unmatched hypocrisy of the Biden administration on the Gaza genocide flows from the contradiction between the interests of American imperialism and the sentiments of the vast majority of the American and world population. While Washington is determined to resort to the most barbaric methods, including genocide, to secure its hegemonic position in the latest redivision of the world among the great powers, millions of workers and young people around the world oppose the war crimes being perpetrated by the US and Israel against the population of Gaza.
It is for this reason that the White House has deliberately sought to hide its leading role as the enabler of the Gaza genocide. Earlier this month, press reports revealed that the Biden administration sought to hide weapons transfers for use in Gaza by splitting them up into over 100 separate transactions, each falling below a minimum threshold for reporting to Congress.
The secret weapons shipments include, in the words of the Wall Street Journal, “at least 23,000 precision-guided weapons, including Hellfire air-to-ground missiles, drones, and Joint Direct Attack Munition kits, which turn unguided bombs into ‘smart’ bombs,” as well as bunker-buster bombs.
The Biden administration has spread falsehoods about every aspect of Israel’s genocide. On March 18, the Washington Post published an article based on extensive interviews with Biden administration officials revealing the extent to which the White House consciously lied to the public to justify the genocide.
Three weeks after the October 7 attacks, “top Biden officials” delivered a private briefing in which they admitted that Israel was carrying out deliberate airstrikes against civilians.
And yet, to this day, every time a White House official is asked this question, the White House asserts that the bombings of civilians amount to a series of unfortunate accidents. For example, when asked in December whether Israel was carrying out indiscriminate bombing, White House spokesman Matthew Miller said, “We have not made a formal determination to that question.”
In a subsequent statement, White House national security spokesman John Kirby said, “There is a clear intent by the Israelis … that they are doing everything they can to reduce civilian casualties.”
The Washington Post account proves that both of these statements were flat-out lies.
In yet another example, the Biden administration gave Israel a green light in November to attack al-Shifa Hospital by declaring, in the words of Kirby, “We have information that confirms that Hamas is using that particular hospital for a command-and-control node.”
In reality, no such information existed, because the Biden administration knew the claims by Netanyahu were false. The Post cited Senator Chris Van Hollen, who declared there was a “disconnect” between the “administration’s public statements and the classified findings” presented to Congress.
The Biden administration, together with the other major imperialist powers, bears responsibility for the Gaza genocide. American imperialism sees it as an essential component of its efforts to subjugate and dominate the Middle East, which are focused on preparations for a region-wide war targeting Iran.
The struggle against the Gaza genocide is the struggle against the imperialist governments that are enabling it, as part of a global eruption of imperialist barbarism throughout the Middle East and around the world.
Workers and young people all over the world must take up the struggle against the Gaza genocide as a critical component of the building of a mass antiwar movement armed with a socialist perspective.