World
Biden’s legacy is Gaza genocide, Palestinian rights advocates say
Democratic politicians and commentators in the United States have heaped praise on President Joe Biden since he dropped out of the 2024 presidential race on Sunday.
Representative Maxine Waters, for instance, called Biden a “kind and decent man”. Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, meanwhile, extolled his “vision, values and leadership”.
But while political leaders showered Biden with compliments, bombs continued to rain down on Gaza, killing dozens and sparking another wave of mass displacement in Khan Younis.
For many Palestinian rights advocates, the carnage and abuses in Gaza will define Biden’s place in the history books, as the US remains steadfast in its support of Israel’s war in the Palestinian territory.
“He’ll be remembered for the hundreds of thousands killed, injured and displaced in Gaza,” said Abed Ayoub, the executive director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC).
“There is no way around it. ‘Genocide Joe’ is what he’s going to be remembered as.”
Thank you, President Biden! I am one of your greatest supporters and I was willing to stay with you through the Democratic Party nomination. However, you have decided to step down and you have endorsed your Vice President Kamala Harris. You are a kind and decent man who is…
— Maxine Waters (@RepMaxineWaters) July 21, 2024
Since Israel’s war on Gaza started on October 7, Biden has offered the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu unconditional military and diplomatic support.
Only once did Biden withhold a shipment of bombs to Israel over humanitarian concerns — and even then, he released part of that cargo a couple months later, amid pressure from Netanyahu.
Israel’s war, meanwhile, has killed nearly 39,000 Palestinians, displaced hundreds of thousands, fuelled a man-made hunger crisis and destroyed large parts of the territory. United Nations experts and other observers have warned of a “risk of genocide” in Gaza.
Ayoub told Al Jazeera that, despite Biden’s domestic achievements, the president will rank among the worst in US history due to his unconditional support for Israel.
The US Campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR) echoed that comment. “Nothing will erase the fact that Biden’s legacy is — and always will be — genocide,” the group said in a statement.
Netanyahu ‘bear hug’
The US president has been a stalwart supporter of Israel throughout his decades-long political career.
He frequently calls himself a Zionist and argues that Jews across the world would not be safe without Israel.
He put that worldview into policy during his presidency, as he pushed on with Former President Donald Trump’s pro-Israel doctrine. Biden kept the US embassy in Jerusalem and refused to reverse the Trump-era decision to recognise Israel’s claims to the occupied Golan Heights in Syria.
He also aggressively pursued formal ties between Israel and Arab states, a goal Trump advanced with the 2020 Abraham Accords.
That push for normalisation, however, came without progress towards the recognition of an independent Palestinian state or the dismantling of systemic anti-Palestinian discrimination.
The outbreak of the war in Gaza further underscored Biden’s pro-Israel policies.
Weeks after the conflict started, Biden travelled to Israel and publicly embraced Netanyahu in what many critics have described as a “bear hug”.
That sign of friendliness was widely understood to be an endorsement of Netanyahu’s response in Gaza, after the Palestinian group Hamas attacked southern Israel on October 7.
Even early in the conflict, human rights groups accused Israel of horrific violations rising to the level of genocide — a push to destroy the Palestinian people.
Within the first week alone, the Israeli military said it had unleashed 2,000 strikes across Gaza — a strip of land roughly the size of Las Vegas.
Biden has since authorised continuous arms transfers and more than $14bn in additional aid to sustain Israel’s Gaza offensive. Moreover, his administration has vetoed three United Nations Security Council proposals that would have called for a ceasefire.
Hatem Abudayyeh, the chair of the US Palestinian Community Network (USPCN), said Biden will be remembered above all for enabling Israel’s “crimes against humanity”.
“He could’ve turned the tap of money and weapons off in October, but he allowed this genocide to happen. He is complicit, and that’s what will be written on his tombstone,” Abudayyeh told Al Jazeera.
Biden and Palestinians
Following his entry into politics in 1970, Biden quickly rose from local to national prominence, mounting a successful dark-horse campaign to represent Delaware in the US Senate in 1972.
After nearly four decades in Congress, he became vice president under Barack Obama, and in 2021, he won the presidency himself.
The president does not hail from a political dynasty, and he is not an exceptional orator. His success in politics is often credited to his interpersonal skills and ability to project empathy.
That sense of compassion, however, never extended to Palestinians, activists say.
“For nine and a half months, President Biden has funded and armed the brutal Israeli genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, making the US government directly complicit in the killing of at least 39,000 people, including over 15,000 children,” Jewish Voice for Peace Action said in a statement on Sunday.
“Americans have watched in horror and outrage as Biden sent the Israeli government the weapons it used to wipe out entire generations of Palestinian families, to destroy hospitals, bakeries, schools, mosques, churches, universities, refugee camps, homes and Gaza’s entire health care system and electricity and water grids.”
Beyond policy, Biden’s rhetoric at times seemed dismissive of Israeli atrocities and Palestinian suffering.
“I have no notion that the Palestinians are telling the truth about how many people are killed. I’m sure innocents have been killed, and it’s the price of waging a war,” the US president said in October.
But that stance caused Biden troubles both domestically and abroad.
Even before Biden delivered a disastrous debate performance on June 27, the 81-year-old had started to trail his Republican rival Trump in public opinion polls.
Parts of the Democratic base — including young people, progressives, Arabs and Muslims — voiced frustration and anger with his support for Israel.
Groups like the USCPR argued that Biden’s age and debate performance were only one factor in the pressure that forced him from the presidential race.
“It was not Biden’s failed debate that showed he is unfit to lead,” USCPR said. “It was the tens of thousands of bombs he sent to kill Palestinian families. It was his callous, dystopian disregard for Palestinian lives.”
Other commentators likewise argued that Biden failed to show enough concern for the humanitarian crisis unfolding in Gaza.
Aaron David Miller, a veteran former US official, described the situation bluntly in an interview with the New Yorker in April.
“Do I think that Joe Biden has the same depth of feeling and empathy for the Palestinians of Gaza as he does for the Israelis? No, he doesn’t, nor does he convey it. I don’t think there’s any doubt about that,” he said.
World
Argentina reveals secret WWII files on Hitler’s henchmen who fled before, after the war
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Multiple documents featuring some of the worst Nazi war criminals were released and declassified earlier this year by Argentine President Javier Milei. The more than 1,850 documents comprise thousands of pages detailing the South American country’s efforts to track and verify the whereabouts of thousands of Nazis who fled Europe after World War II.
The catalyst for the effort came from the Senate Judiciary Committee and its Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, who was credited by the Simon Wiesenthal Center for his efforts in getting Milei to release the documents.
Most of the materials relate to investigations carried out between the late 1950s and the 1980s and were digitized and made available on the nation’s General Archive website, along with secret, declassified presidential decrees from 1957 to 2005.
The original batch of documents released online is divided into seven large files roughly centered around the main Nazi criminals covered in them. There are multiple documents related to Adolf Eichmann, the engineer of the “Final Solution,” the plan for the extermination of European Jewry. He lived under the name Ricardo Klement around Buenos Aires until being captured by Mossad agents on Argentine soil and taken in a secret operation to stand trial in Jerusalem in 1960.
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Adolf Eichmann, in a bulletproof cabin, puts on earphones to hear the reading of the act of accusation against him, Dec. 17, 1961. He was in charge of the extermination of Jews in Poland and then organized the deportation and extermination of Jews in 13 European countries. (Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images)
Eichmann’s case features prominently in the files and there is contradicting evidence that the leftist, populist government of Juan Perón not only knew Eichmann was in the country but also made efforts to protect him.
Multiple documents also exist detailing the lives of Josef Mengele, the “angel of death” doctor from Auschwitz-Birkenau camps who lived in Argentina and escaped to Paraguay and Brazil, where he died in 1979.
Documents detailing the hunt for Martin Bormann, Hitler’s lieutenant and right-hand man, as well as Croatian murderer, Ante Pavelic, deputy führer and defector Rudolf Hess and the so-called “butcher of Lyon,” Klaus Barbie, received special attention in the files.
NAZI OFFICER’S DAUGHTER CHARGED AFTER STOLEN WWII PAINTING SPOTTED IN REAL ESTATE LISTING
Three SS officers socialize on the grounds of the SS retreat outside of Auschwitz, 1944. From left to right they are: Richard Baer (Commandant of Auschwitz), Dr. Josef Mengele, and Rudolf Hoess (the former Auschwitz Commandant.) Mengele escaped to Argentina, later escaping to Paraguay and Brazil. (Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
According to Harley Lippman, a member of the United States Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad and a board member of the European Jewish Association, the relevance of the release of the Argentinian documents cannot be understated.
“There are numerous questions that these documents can bring light to why a sophisticated society, far from the plagues of European antisemitism such as Argentina’s, agreed to hide Nazi criminals and their secrets for so long. What happened to the U-boats loaded with Nazi gold brought to the country and given to the authorities?” he asked.
“On the one hand, it is shameful that Argentina kept these documents a secret for so long, but on the other hand, we also need to acknowledge the enormous efforts being made by this government to make these documents public. While the historical significance is important, this is more important for Argentinians to be able to confront their demons as a society than for Jews,” Lippman said.
This 1950 Argentine federal police memo, marked strictly secret and confidential, seeks intelligence on Josef Mengele, the notorious Nazi doctor from Auschwitz, suggesting that Argentine authorities were aware of his possible presence or activity in the region at that time. (General Archives of the Government of Argentina)
Adding to the large reveal, in May, while the Supreme Court of Argentina was undergoing renovations and transferring document collections to museums, a forgotten trove of 83 boxes of Nazi documents was discovered almost untouched in the basement of the institution. Upon inspection, the crates revealed documents intercepted by Argentine customs in 1941, sent from the German Third Reich Embassy in Tokyo, Japan, to Argentina’s capital, Buenos Aires, aboard the Japanese steamer Nan-a-Maru.
The documents had been sent as personal effects of embassy personnel but were intercepted under orders of the country’s minister for foreign affairs in order not to undermine Argentina’s neutral position in the war. The shipment became the subject of a probe by a commission investigating “anti-Argentine activities”, which led to the seizure and possession of the crates by the country’s supreme court, where they remained for nearly 84 years.
The finding of the boxes revealed multiple materials intended to propagate and consolidate the Third Reich’s and Hitler’s ideologies in Argentina and South America, possibly in an effort to bring neutral countries under the auspices of Germany.
MILEI SCORES HISTORIC WIN IN ARGENTINA MIDTERMS, TIGHTENS GRIP ON CONGRESS
The document recounts an Argentine police report describing a German fugitive, Walter Flegel, believed by some to be Martin Bormann, Hitler’s former deputy, living under a false identity in Argentina. It was later proven that the lead was incorrect and that Flegal was not Borman. Earlier this year Argentina President Javier Milei declassified and released over 1,850 documents detailing Argentina’s efforts to track and verify the whereabouts of thousands of Nazi war criminals. (General Archives of the Government of Argentina)
After opening the boxes along with prominent members of the country’s Jewish community, the court issued a statement saying that “given the historical relevance of the find and the potential crucial information it could contain to clarify events related to the Holocaust,” an exhaustive survey of all the material was ordered.
The contents of the crates have not yet been made public, but Milei’s office has said that once all the documents have been digitized, they will also be declassified and made available.
Argentina’s Chief of the Cabinet of Ministers, Guillermo Francos, has previously said Milei gave [such] order “because there is no reason to continue withholding that information, and it is no longer in the interest of the Republic of Argentina to keep such secrets”.
“Jews after World War II lived a golden age of about 80 years where antisemitism had subsided, at least apparently, and they could be productive and contributing members of society. This has now ended — partially because of the genocide committed against Israelis by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, with world opinion projecting on Israelis and Jews the false role of perpetrators of genocide in the war in Gaza, but also by bringing back the same old antisemitic views that had been alive in Germany and before then,” Lippman says.
A police officer stands in front of a cache of Nazi artifacts discovered in 2017, during a press conference in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2019. Argentine authorities found the cache in a secret room behind a bookcase and had uncovered the collection in the course of a wider investigation into artwork of suspicious origin found at a gallery in Buenos Aires. (Natacha Pisarenko/AP Photo)
“The fact that many people under 30 do not know or understand [the meaning of] the Holocaust is part of the reason why antisemitism is on the rise again. “The Holocaust was the largest systematic industrial killing of humans in history. This happened only 80 years ago. Young people seem not to be able to grasp the scale of this, but these documents can bring back the memory of what the Holocaust really was,” he said, comparing the propaganda war currently faced by Israel and Jews under a progressive and projectionist guise.
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Beyond the lives of senior Nazis who escaped to South America on the so-called “ratlines”—possibly under the auspices of certain local governments—Lippman said the documents could also provide important information regarding the role played by Swiss and Argentine banks.
“The Holocaust was the greatest theft in history. Many Swiss banks [which were the depositaries of Jewish money] would not release funds to sometimes a sole survivor from a family who perished in the Holocaust without a death certificate for their loved ones. But Auschwitz did not issue death certificates — they only issued ashes.”
World
Pakistan says Islamabad, South Waziristan bombers were Afghan nationals
Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi says both fighters who carried out suicide attacks on Islamabad and South Waziristan were Afghan nationals.
Pakistan’s Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi has said both suicide bombers involved in the two attacks in the country this week were Afghan nationals, as authorities announced having made several arrests.
Naqvi made the remarks in parliament on Thursday during a session carried live on television.
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On Wednesday, at least 12 people were killed and more than 30 were injured, several of them critically, when a suicide bomber blew himself up at the entrance of the Islamabad District Judicial Complex.
The Counter-Terrorism Department in Punjab province’s Rawalpindi said seven suspects were detained in connection with the Islamabad blast. The alleged perpetrators were apprehended from Rawalpindi’s Fauji Colony and Dhoke Kashmirian, the Dawn daily reported, while a raid was also conducted in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province.
The other suicide attack took place on Monday at a college in South Waziristan, KP.
Cadet College, which is near the Afghan border, came under attack when an explosive-laden vehicle rammed its main gate. Two attackers were killed at the main gate, while three others managed to enter, according to police.
Relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan have been severely strained in recent years, with Islamabad accusing fighters sheltering across the border of staging attacks inside Pakistan. Kabul denies giving haven to armed groups to attack Pakistan.
Dozens of soldiers were killed in border clashes between the two countries last month, as well as several civilians.
On Tuesday, Pakistani Defence Minister Khawaja Asif said Pakistan may launch strikes inside Afghanistan following the attacks this week, saying the country was “in a state of war”.
“Anyone who thinks that the Pakistan Army is fighting this war in the Afghan-Pakistan border region and the remote areas of Balochistan should take today’s suicide attack at the Islamabad district courts as a wake-up call,” he said.
Pakistan passes bill giving army chief immunity for life
In a separate development on Thursday, Pakistan’s parliament approved a sweeping constitutional amendment, granting lifetime immunity to the current army chief, boosting the military’s power, which was previously reserved only for the head of state, despite widespread criticism from opposition parties and critics.
The 27th amendment, passed by a two-thirds majority, also consolidates military power under a new chief of defence forces role and establishes a Federal Constitutional Court.
The changes grant army chief Asim Munir, recently promoted to field marshal after Pakistan’s clash with India in May, command over the army, air force and the navy.
Munir, like other top military brass, would enjoy lifelong protection.
Any officer promoted to field marshal, marshal of the air force, or admiral of the fleet will now retain rank and privileges for life, remain in uniform, and enjoy immunity from criminal proceedings.
The amendment also bars courts from questioning any constitutional change “on any ground whatsoever”.
World
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