WASHINGTON: Democratic presidential contenders vowed Monday to switch gears sharply from Donald Trump’s hawkish embrace of Israel, pledging they would press for a peace settlement that leads to a Palestinian state.
Half a year after Democratic candidates all shunned the annual conference of AIPAC, the historic pro-Israel lobby, five candidates came in person to deliver a peace message in the same Washington convention center before J Street, a left-leaning group which argues that it is more in tune with American Jews.
Senator Bernie Sanders, who rarely talks about his Jewish faith, explained how the murder of much of his father’s family in the Holocaust shaped his progressive views.
“If there is any people on earth who understands the danger of racism and white nationalism, it is certainly the Jewish people,” Sanders said to thunderous applause.
Rising from his seat on stage to give a campaign-style address, Sanders, who would be the first Jewish president, accused both Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of fomenting division.
“Let me underline this because it will be misunderstood — it is not anti-Semitism to say that the Netanyahu government has been racist. It is a fact,” he said.
“We demand that the Israeli government sit down with the Palestinian people and negotiate an agreement that works for all parties,” he said.
Sanders said his message to Israel would be, “if you want military aid, you are going to have to fundamentally change your relationship” with the Palestinians.
He called for some of the $3.8 billion in annual military assistance to be turned into humanitarian aid for the Gaza Strip in a “radical intercession” for the packed, impoverished territory that has been under a blockade since it elected the Islamist movement Hamas in 2007.
“Who is going to deny that when youth unemployment is 60 percent, when people have no hope, when people cannot literally leave the region — who can think for a moment that you’re not laying the groundwork for continued violence?” he said.
Trump, whose evangelical Christian base is staunchly pro-Israel, has taken a series of historic steps including recognizing bitterly divided Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
The Trump administration has signaled support as Netanyahu — whose political future is unclear after two inconclusive elections — flirts with annexing parts of the West Bank.
Democratic frontrunners Joe Biden and Elizabeth Warren, both appearing before J Street in video messages rather than in person, said they would oppose any action that closes the door on a Palestinian state.
“If Israel’s government continues with steps to formally annex the West Bank, the US should make clear that none of our aid should be used to support annexation,” Warren said.
Warren said that she would reverse two key measures of Trump — by resuming aid to the UN refugee agency for Palestinians and allowing the Palestine Liberation Organization to unshutter its Washington office.
While not reversing course on the US embassy, she said she would reopen the US mission in east Jerusalem which would become an embassy if a peace deal creates a Palestinian state.
Biden, who had uneasy relations with Netanyahu while vice president, said: “We can’t be afraid to tell the truth to our closest friends.”
“The two-state solution is the best, if not the only, way to secure a peaceful future for a Jewish, democratic state of Israel,” Biden said.
In a scene unimaginable at AIPAC, the mostly Jewish crowd gave a standing ovation to chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat as he stood on stage to the sounds of U2’s “Beautiful Day” and said of creating a Palestinian state, “Let’s not give up.”
With some 4,000 people in attendance, J Street still had less than a quarter of the turnout of AIPAC, which is itself non-partisan but this year drew a who’s who of Republicans.
J Street president Jeremy Ben-Ami said he believed his organization was more in line with the US Jewish community, which votes overwhelmingly Democratic.
“If you go to the AIPAC conference and you’re standing and cheering for Trump and Netanyahu, that is one approach.
“This is a conference where you stand up and you fight against what Trump and Netanyahu are seeking to do,” he said.
Led by Sanders, Democrats vow to press Israel on Palestinian state
Led by Sanders, Democrats vow to press Israel on Palestinian state
- Senator Bernie Sanders, who rarely talks about his Jewish faith, explained how the murder of much of his father’s family in the Holocaust shaped his progressive views
- Bernie Sanders: Let me underline this because it will be misunderstood — it is not anti-Semitism to say that the Netanyahu government has been racist. It is a fact
Displaced by war, cancer patients in Lebanon struggle for survival
When he saw the tangled mess around him, he knew he had to grab his family and flee.
“We want to go back to our homes, to our work,” he said, breaking into tears as he received cancer treatment at the American University of Beirut’s Medical Center (AUBMC), his sister sitting next to his bed.
Israel launched a broad attack on southern Lebanon in September, almost a year after Iran-backed Hezbollah militants there stepped up their rocket fire on northern Israel as Israeli forces fought Hamas gunmen who had attacked Israel from Gaza.
Washington is trying to broker a ceasefire but Israel says it must be able to continue defending itself. It says Hezbollah uses civilians as human shields, something the militants deny.
A father of two teenagers who owned four welding shops in Nabatieh, Fahess is now not only unsure when he will be able to go home, but also how long he will be able to access treatment for the rare cancer, sarcoma, which affects the connective tissue in his left arm.
“I used to come three days to Beirut for treatment and go back home,” he said. “Now with the war, we were displaced, and the treatment struggle started.”
Thousands of cancer patients are among more than a million people who have fled their homes.
“It all happened very quickly. We were at work when the shelling started; we were surprised by it,” he said. He fled with his family to Antelias in Mount Lebanon with only $4,500 that quickly dwindled.
Fahess now depends on the hospital’s Cancer Support Fund, a charity initiative launched in 2018 to assist cancer patients and now also giving extra support to displaced individuals.
“The treatment is costly; if the hospital didn’t help me, I couldn’t have afforded it,” he said.
But he is worried about funding drying up. “If we have to pay and we’re back at our homes, it would be fine, but if we are still displaced, it’ll be impossible,” he said.
Lebanon’s health ministry said more than 2,500 displaced cancer patients have been forced to find new treatment centers, as at least eight hospitals in southern Lebanon and Beirut’s southern suburbs were out of action due to Israeli shelling.
Cancer was already expensive to treat under Lebanon’s health care system, which in recent years has been battered further by economic crisis.
It is now under severe strain, said Ali Taher, the director of the Naef K. Basile Cancer Institute at AUBMC, adding that treating displaced patients has brought new complications, including finding their missing medical records and doctors.
“It’s also difficult to get cancer screening ahead of time because it’s no longer a priority for people,” Taher said.
Ghazaleh Naddaf, 67, was displaced from the southern village of Debel. Now living with her brother in Beirut, the former pharmacist assistant lost her job and has been unable to afford her therapy for multiple myeloma for two months.
“I am skipping treatment and medication,” she said. “I used to come twice a week for treatment, paying over $1,000. I can’t afford it anymore,” adding that she also needs a bone marrow transplant costing $50,000, an expense far beyond her reach.
“It’s war, and there is no safety, and I still need to go through the treatment to get on with my life,” she said.
Hala Dahdah Abou Jaber, co-founder of the Cancer Support Fund, said displaced cancer patients have to choose between basic necessities and life-threatening therapies and many can no longer co-pay for their treatment.
“Cancer doesn’t wait. Cancer is not a disease that gives you time; it’s harsh,” she said.
Iran president visits Sistan-Baluchistan after deadly attack
TEHRAN: Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian arrived in the restive southeast of Iran on Thursday for a visit to Sistan-Baluchistan province, state media reported, nearly a month after one of the deadliest ever attacks in the region.
Sistan-Baluchistan, located some 1,200 kilometers (745 miles) from the capital Tehran, shares a long border with Pakistan and Afghanistan and has experienced recurring clashes between Iranian security forces and rebels from the Baluch minority, radical Sunni groups and drug traffickers.
On October 26, ten police officers were killed in what the authorities described as a “terrorist” attack.
Pezeshkian arrived at the airport in the regional capital Zahedan for a one-day visit during which he was set to meet the families of the dead police officers, state television reported.
Since the October 26 attack, Iranian forces have launched a vast counterterrorism operation in Sistan-Baluchistan that is ongoing, during which at least 26 militants have been killed and around fifty people arrested, according to the authorities.
The Sunni jihadist group Jaish Al-Adl — Army of Justice in Arabic — based in Pakistan and active in southeastern Iran, claimed responsibility for the attack in a message on Telegram.
The Iranian president is also scheduled to visit the Chabahar Free Trade-Industrial Zone, a major project aimed at developing southern Iran.
Chabahar Port, which bypasses the heavy traffic of the Strait of Hormuz, is aimed at attracting businesses from nearby Pakistan, India, the Gulf and China among others.
Chabahar, located on the edge of the Indian Ocean, was exempted by Washington from the economic sanctions it unilaterally reimposed after withdrawing from a landmark nuclear agreement.
Sistan-Baluchistan, one of the most impoverished provinces in the country, is home to a large number of the Baluch minority, an ethnic group spread between Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan which practices Sunni Islam in contrast to the country’s predominantly Shiite population.
International Criminal Court issues arrest warrants for Netanyahu, Gallant
- The decision turns Netanyahu and the others into internationally wanted suspects and is likely to further isolate them and complicate efforts to negotiate a ceasefire to end the 13-month conflict
THE HAGUE: The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants on Thursday for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his former defense minister and Hamas officials, accusing them of war crimes and crimes against humanity over the war in Gaza and the October 2023 attacks that triggered Israel’s offensive in the Palestinian territory.
The decision turns Netanyahu and the others into internationally wanted suspects and is likely to further isolate them and complicate efforts to negotiate a ceasefire to end the 13-month conflict. But its practical implications could be limited since Israel and its major ally, the United States, are not members of the court and several of the Hamas officials have been subsequently killed in the conflict.
Netanyahu and other Israeli leaders have condemned ICC Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan’s request for warrants as disgraceful and antisemitic. US President Joe Biden also blasted the prosecutor and expressed support for Israel’s right to defend itself against Hamas. Hamas also slammed the request.
“The Chamber considered that there are reasonable grounds to believe that both individuals intentionally and knowingly deprived the civilian population in Gaza of objects indispensable to their survival, including food, water, and medicine and medical supplies, as well as fuel and electricity,” the three-judge panel wrote in its unanimous decision to issue warrants for Netanyahu and his former defense minister, Yoav Gallant.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry said in September that it had submitted two legal briefs challenging the ICC’s jurisdiction and arguing that the court did not provide Israel the opportunity to investigate the allegations itself before requesting the warrants.
“No other democracy with an independent and respected legal system like that which exists in Israel has been treated in this prejudicial manner by the Prosecutor,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Oren Marmorstein wrote on X. He said Israel remained “steadfast in its commitment to the rule of law and justice” and would continue to protect its citizens against militancy.
The ICC is a court of last resort that only prosecutes cases when domestic law enforcement authorities cannot or will not investigate. Israel is not a member state of the court. The country has struggled to investigate itself in the past, rights groups say.
Despite the warrants, none of the suspects is likely to face judges in The Hague any time soon. The court itself has no police to enforce warrants, instead relying on cooperation from its member states.
Israel, Hezbollah trade deadly blows despite ceasefire talks
- In Israel, a 30-year-old man was killed when shrapnel from a rocket struck a playground in the northern town of Nahariya
- In southern Lebanon, an Israeli airstrike killed three people in the village of Chaaitiyeh
JERUSALEM/BEIRUT: Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah traded deadly blows on Thursday as their war raged on despite signs of progress in US ceasefire efforts, with airstrikes pounding Beirut’s southern suburbs and rockets flying into northern Israel.
US mediator Amos Hochstein was in Israel for talks with Israeli officials to try to secure a ceasefire which he said was “within our grasp” during a visit to Beirut earlier this week.
The diplomacy marks the most serious attempt yet to end the conflict between Israel and the heavily armed, Iran-backed Hezbollah, part of the regional spillover of the Gaza war that erupted more than a year ago.
In southern Lebanon, an Israeli airstrike killed three people in the village of Chaaitiyeh, some 10 km (6 miles), from the border, the Lebanese health ministry said.
In Israel, a 30-year-old man was killed when shrapnel from a rocket struck a playground in the northern town of Nahariya, Israel’s MDA medical service said.
“The Israeli government is not safeguarding my security, my residents or the residents of the north (of Israel). It is not possible to live in such a situation like this,” Nahariya Mayor Ronen Marelly told public broadcaster Kansas
The Israeli military said about 10 rockets were launched from Lebanon toward Nahariya. “Most of the projectiles were intercepted and fallen projectiles were identified,” the military said in a statement.
Channel 12 said three rockets hit the coastal town.
Hezbollah’s Al-Manar television station, citing its correspondent, confirmed rocket fire toward Nahariya and the surrounding area.
Airstrikes on Beirut’s Hezbollah-controlled southern-suburbs shook the capital, sending up thick clouds of debris.
The Israeli military issued a statement on X ahead of strikes warning residents they were near Hezbollah targets against which it would soon take action. Residents have largely fled the area since Israel went on the offensive in September.
White House envoy Hochstein left for Israel after declaring progress during two days of talks in Lebanon with officials including Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, endorsed to negotiate by the Iran-backed Hezbollah. Speaking before he left Beirut, Hochstein said he was going to Israel to try to close an agreement if possible.
The diplomacy aims to end a conflict that has inflicted massive devastation in Lebanon since Israel began its offensive, mounting airstrikes across wide parts of the country and sending in troops.
Footage broadcast by Al Jazeera showed thick smoke rising from the town of Khiyam in southern Lebanon, some 6 km (4 miles) from the border, a focal point of ground battles between Hezbollah fighters and Israeli troops.
Israel says its aim is to secure the return home of tens of thousands of people evacuated from its north due to rocket attacks by Hezbollah, which opened fire in support of Hamas at the start of the Gaza war in October 2023.
Hezbollah, which has suffered major blows since Israel began its offensive in September, has kept up rocket fire into Israel, attacking Tel Aviv this week. Its fighters are battling Israeli troops on the ground in the south.
The casualty toll since Oct., 2023 stands at 3,558 people killed in Lebanon, the Lebanese health ministry says, most of them killed during the Israeli offensive since September. The figures do not distinguish between combatants and civilians. The ministry said 14 fatalities were reported on Tuesday.
Hezbollah strikes have killed more than 100 people in northern Israel and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. They include more than 70 soldiers killed in strikes in northern Israel and the Golan Heights and in combat in southern Lebanon, according to Israel.
US envoy to meet Israel’s Netanyahu on Thursday: spokesman
- Israeli media outlets reported that Amos Hochstein had arrived in Israel on Wednesday evening
JERUSALEM: US envoy Amos Hochstein, seeking to broker a ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah war, will meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday, the premier’s office said.
The announcement by spokesman Omer Dostri came after Israeli media outlets reported that Hochstein had arrived in Israel on Wednesday evening and held talks with Israeli Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer.
The meeting between Hochstein and Netanyahu was scheduled to take place at 12:30 p.m. (1030 GMT), according to a statement from the Israeli leader’s Likud party.
In Beirut on Wednesday, the US envoy met twice with Lebanese parliament speaker Nabih Berri, who has led mediation efforts on behalf of the Iran-backed Hezbollah armed group.
Wednesday’s meeting “made additional progress, so I will travel from here in a couple hours to Israel to try to bring this to a close if we can,” Hochstein told reporters in the Lebanese capital.
Hochstein had said on Tuesday that an end to the war was “within our grasp.”
Ahead of his arrival, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said: “In any agreement we will reach, we will need to keep the freedom to act if there will be violations.”
