Friday, August 23, 2024

Democratic Party platform lacks call for US arms embargo on Israel

Pro-Palestine protesters pick up signs at a rally near the United Center where the Democratic National Convention is being held on August 19, 2024 in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by AFP)
The US Democratic Party has unveiled its party platform ahead of the 2024 presidential race, laying out 92 pages of policy priorities with no mention of halting weapons sales to Israel amid the regime’s genocidal war in the besieged Gaza Strip.

The platform which was approved by delegates at the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago a day earlier lacks a call for curbing arms sales to Israel despite a demand by pro-Palestinian demonstrators for an arms embargo on the occupying regime in the US city.  

The platform, rather, announces that the 2016 Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) reached with Israel under former President Barack Obama “is ironclad”.  The memorandum which runs until 2028 gives Israel $3.8bn in US military aid each year.

The platform also lists examples of US President Joe Biden's unwavering support for Israel's war on Gaza, including the sending of arms shipments and providing a diplomatic shield for Israel at the United Nations during votes for a ceasefire.

The latest development comes a week after Biden’s administration approved more than $20 billion in weapons sales to Israel.

The new US military aid comes despite claims by Washington that it is supporting a ceasefire in Gaza where Israel has been waging a genocidal war since early October last year.

Israel launched the war on Gaza on October 7 after the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas waged the surprise Operation Al-Aqsa Storm against the occupying entity in retaliation for its intensified atrocities against the Palestinian people.

Since then, the United States has supplied the Tel Aviv regime with more than 10,000 tons of military equipment and used its veto power against all United Nations Security Council resolutions that called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

The occupying regime has killed more than 40,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, since the start of the barbaric campaign of death, destruction and genocide. And more than 1.7 million people have been internally displaced.

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