• The Green Party of California stands in solidarity with the Palestinian people and with their fight against the brutal apartheid regime of Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territories

SAN FRANCISCO – June 8th, 2021 - The 11-day carpet bombing of the Gaza Strip by the Israeli military from May 10 to May 21, 2021, killed 248 Palestinians, including 66 children, and injured over 1,700 people . More than 1,000 buildings, schools, hospitals, businesses and roads have been destroyed by devastating airstrikes leaving at least 6,000 residents homeless, displacing tens of thousands, and depriving almost half of the population of Gaza of access to water and electricity in the midst of a raging pandemic and without the protection of a vaccine.

Despite a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas brokered by Egyptian mediators on May 21, Israeli forces and settlers have since attacked the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem multiple times and continued to evict Israeli Arabs from their homes after building a blockade in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood. Operation "Law and Order" is currently targeting over 500 Palestinian citizens of Israel in retaliation for their participation in demonstrations against the occupation and the settlers' violence. "The occupation is the root cause of the violence," Palestinian Authority Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki explained.

These war crimes follow the hallmarks of genocide that Israel is perpetuating against Palestinians living under its rule in East Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The ongoing destruction of Palestinian homes, villages and whole communities is not new: it started 73 years ago and continues to this day. The mass exodus of at least 750,000 Arabs from Palestine, the "Nakba" (the catastrophe), was followed by the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip in 1967. Then came the Israeli wars on Gaza of 2008, 2012, and 2014 - during which over 2,000 Palestinian civilians were killed by Israeli forces , among them 1,220 children.

The ongoing Nakba is made possible by U.S.'s financial, technological and military assistance, using U.S. taxpayer money, which makes our country a consistent and willing accomplice of Israel in crimes against humanity. The U.S. government gives $3.8 billion in military aid to Israel every year as part of a 10-year agreement made under the Obama administration in 2016. The U.S. has repeatedly vetoed the United Nations Security Council resolutions to condemn Israel's military response and to call for a ceasefire. Even today, President Biden refuses to hold the Israeli government led by the current Prime Minister Netanyahu accountable for the continuous violation of Palestinian rights and security, and falsely claims Israel is exercising its "right to defend itself" instead. In the midst of Israeli aggressions against Palestinians, the Biden administration approved the sale of precision-guided weapons to Israel
while Israel was bombing Gaza and killing civilians, in direct violation of human rights and international law. And on June 3, 2021, less than two weeks after the ceasefire, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz arrived in Washington, D.C., to ask for $1 billion more to replenish Israel’s “Iron Dome” and to purchase additional precision-guided missiles. Meanwhile, President Biden is merely allocating $110 million to rebuild Palestinian homes that he contributed to annihilate.

Even though a few Democrats have recently called out Biden for his unconditional support of Israel, their opposition remains slow and weak. On May 20, 2021, almost two weeks after the start of the recent conflict, Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib and Senator Bernie Sanders introduced sister resolutions to block the Biden administration’s $735 million arms sale to Israel while Congress was informed about the arms sale on May 5. They then quickly dropped their joint effort after hearing that the sale had been approved.

Democrats and Republicans alike usually do not question our nation’s backing of Israel’s institutionalized discrimination and disproportionate use of violence against Palestinians. "My Congressperson is Barbara Lee," said Laura Wells, Green Party of California spokesperson and 2018 Green Party candidate for Congress in California’s District 13 opposing Barbara Lee. "She has played it extremely safe. She has indicated that she is supportive in theory, but at best she has signed onto a few noncontroversial positions such as ending military detention of Palestinian children. Meanwhile, she has taken campaign contributions from Lockheed Martin, the largest arms-producing company in the world."

Ajamu Baraka, the national organizer of the Black Alliance for Peace and 2016 Green Party candidate for vice president wrote “In the alternative world of Western liberalism, some lives are more equal and more valuable than others,” noting "the colonial/capitalist West is prepared to sacrifice everything and everyone in order to maintain its global dominance, even if it means destroying the planet and everyone on it."

The Green Party of California calls for:

• An immediate end to economic and political colonialism worldwide.
• An immediate end to U.S. weapons sales and all military aid to Israel.
• An end to the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories, and the restoration of the right of Palestinian people to self-determination as stipulated in multiple U.N. resolutions and included in our platform .
• Full support for the right of return of over seven million displaced Palestinian refugees, and for the Boycott,
• Divestment, and Sanctions movement led by Palestinians and inspired by the South-African anti-apartheid movement.