{"id":1308530,"date":"2023-11-01T20:18:58","date_gmt":"2023-11-01T20:18:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/?p=449713"},"modified":"2023-11-01T20:18:58","modified_gmt":"2023-11-01T20:18:58","slug":"gop-representative-denies-existence-of-innocent-palestinian-civilians-and-tries-to-hobble-aid-to-gaza","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2023\/11\/01\/gop-representative-denies-existence-of-innocent-palestinian-civilians-and-tries-to-hobble-aid-to-gaza\/","title":{"rendered":"GOP Representative Denies Existence of \u201cInnocent Palestinian Civilians\u201d and Tries to Hobble Aid to Gaza"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Congress is considering<\/u> a bill<\/a> that would significantly slow down humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip amid ongoing airstrikes and a ground invasion by Israel that have left at least 8,000 dead<\/a> and strained critical resources in the already besieged Palestinian territory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The debate over the bill comes two weeks after its sponsor said U.S. officials should make all efforts to slow down any humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza and suggested that there is no distinction between civilians \u2014 including children \u2014 and the militant group Hamas that massacred some 1,300 Israelis in an October 7 surprise attack.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

The original text in the bill \u2014 the Hamas International Financing Prevention Act, or H.R. 340 \u2014 allowed a humanitarian exemption to provide food, medicine, and medical devices to civilians in Gaza. During committee markup, Rep. Brian Mast, R-Fla., the sponsor, offered an amendment<\/a> to remove the language and replace it with a provision that would require President Joe Biden to issue a case-by-case waiver to approve humanitarian aid transfers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAny assistance should be slowed down \u2014 any assistance,\u201d Mast had said in a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on the bill last month. \u201cBecause I would challenge anybody in here to point to me, which Palestinian is Hamas, and which one is an innocent civilian? Which is the child that was poking other Israeli children?\u201d \u2014 a reference to a viral video allegedly showing Palestinian boys prodding an Israeli Jewish hostage in Gaza \u2014 \u201cAnd which ones exactly are the innocent ones? … It should absolutely be every effort made to slow down any perceived assistance that\u2019s going there.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAny assistance should be slowed down \u2014 any assistance.\u201d<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Rep. Sara Jacobs, D-Calif., offered another amendment<\/a> to reinstate the exception allowing for ease of humanitarian aid transfers. The Jacobs amendment was voted down on party lines after the American Israel Public Affairs Committee<\/a> sent out a recommendation urging members to vote against it. (AIPAC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During floor debate on the resolution on Wednesday, Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, said he was appalled by Mast\u2019s comments during the committee hearing last month and that the decision to remove the provision \u201camounts to intentional collective punishment.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While he unequivocally condemned the October 7 attack and fully supported past sanctions on Hamas, Castro said, there is a distinction between Hamas and innocent Palestinian civilians. \u201cOur efforts to hold Hamas accountable must not come at the expense of those innocent civilians,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

The State Department and the Treasury Department supported the original bill language to exempt humanitarian aid deliveries for food, medicine, and life-saving supplies from broader restrictions, he added. \u201cAt times here, we need to speculate about the motivations behind specific legislation and legislative decisions. In this case, however, it\u2019s part of the committee record,\u201d Castro said, going on to quote Mast\u2019s committee hearing remarks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe decision to intentionally remove this provision was a choice to hurt people in Gaza who are not responsible for this conflict,\u201d Castro said, adding that he would support the bill if its original humanitarian exemption were restored. \u201cBut I cannot in good faith support a bill that amounts to intentional collective punishment against the people of Gaza, nearly half of whom are children.\u201d
<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Mast replied by doubling down and claiming that no Palestinian is innocent. \u201cI would encourage the other side to not so lightly throw around the idea of innocent Palestinian civilians, as is frequently said,\u201d Mast said. \u201cI don\u2019t think we would so lightly throw around the term \u2018innocent Nazi civilians\u2019 during World War II. It is not a far stretch to say there are very few innocent Palestinian civilians.\u201d Members who vote for the resolution might not understand that the bill slows down rather than eases the transfer of humanitarian aid, according to two senior Democratic staffers familiar with the bill, given that the language replaced the original humanitarian aid exemption with a waiver provision. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A vote on the bill is scheduled for this evening.<\/p>\n

The post GOP Representative Denies Existence of \u201cInnocent Palestinian Civilians\u201d and Tries to Hobble Aid to Gaza<\/a> appeared first on The Intercept<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n

This post was originally published on The Intercept<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With AIPAC urging members to reject eased humanitarian aid transfers, Republican Rep. Brian Mast compared all Palestinians to Nazis.<\/p>\n

The post GOP Representative Denies Existence of \u201cInnocent Palestinian Civilians\u201d and Tries to Hobble Aid to Gaza<\/a> appeared first on The Intercept<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":98,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1308530"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/98"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1308530"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1308530\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1308531,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1308530\/revisions\/1308531"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1308530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1308530"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1308530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}