NEWS: Amid Humanitarian Disaster in Gaza, Sanders Urges World to Act
Floor Speech
"M. President,
The situation in Gaza today is a disaster. Congress must take action. The administration must take action. The world must take action.
Today, three weeks after Hamas' barbaric attack against civilians in Israel -- which began this war -- many hundreds of thousands of innocent men, women, and children in Gaza are on the brink.
Over the past three weeks, it is estimated that some 8,000 people in Gaza have been killed in bombings -- including more than 3,000 children -- and far more have been wounded. More than one million people in Gaza have been displaced from their homes and some 670,000 people are sheltering in UN installations, where they are down to one liter of water per person, per day. They lack sufficient food, water, medical supplies, and fuel. The hospitals and medical facilities there are in nightmarish condition, with hundreds of babies in incubators and patients on life-support at risk of death, should the generators that sustain them run out of fuel. Corridors are lined with injured and displaced people, and overwhelmed doctors must turn patients away or operate without anesthesia or antibiotics.
The humanitarian crisis is dire, and getting worse by the minute. There must be a humanitarian pause, NOW, so that sufficient supplies -- food, water, medicine, fuel -- can reach the people of Gaza. If not, thousands more will die needlessly. We cannot allow that to happen. A stop to the bombing is critical to save innocent lives and secure the safe return of hostages.
M. President, let us never forget: the lives of all children--all people--are sacred, whether they are Palestinian children, Israeli children, or American children, and we must do everything we can to protect them.
But M. President, if we are going to make any real progress in addressing this never-ending conflict between Israel and Hamas -- there have been five wars in the last fifteen years -- we need to understand how we got to where we are today. If peace is to come to that troubled region, and if the Palestinian people are ever going to be able to enjoy lives of security and dignity, there must be a vision of where we go in the future.
Let's be clear: the living conditions in Gaza before October 7th were horrific and inhumane -- that was before Hamas ignited the latest war. Before this conflict, in Gaza, nearly 80 percent of people lived in poverty, and two-thirds were reliant on humanitarian assistance. Almost half the population, and over 70 percent of young people, were unemployed in Gaza. What kind of life could they look forward to? Electricity was intermittent, with 11- to 12-hour blackouts every day. Water and sanitation systems were inadequate, and there were constant shortages of all basic necessities. Gaza was mostly cut off from the world, with Israel and Egypt severely limiting the number of people and the types of goods that could go in or out. In fact, many observers described Gaza as "an open-air prison." All of that is before October 7th.
M. President, if we are serious about bringing freedom and dignity to the Palestinian people, that is a situation that can never be allowed to be returned to. Palestinian people are entitled to much more than that.
In Gaza, Hamas, an authoritarian terrorist organization, ruled by force, stockpiling arms and war material, taxing the desperately poor population, and stealing resources to build tunnels and rockets. Make no mistake: Hamas is a terrorist organization bent on the destruction of Israel, and long before this horrific attack they had killed countless innocent people, including Americans. They advance a fundamentalist ideology which treats women as inferior, second-class citizens, and which threatens to kill people who are gay. Hamas is an authoritarian nightmare, repressing dissent and stealing from Gazans not just many materials of life but the dream of a better future.
That was the situation before October 7th.
And what was going on in Israel before Hamas' terrorist attack? What was going on there? That country had the most right-wing government in its history, a cabinet that included outright racist ministers who consistently dehumanized the Palestinian population. Benjamin Netanyahu, the Prime Minister, was under indictment for a litany of corruption charges, and many believe that Israel's intelligence failure on October 7th had everything to do with his government's preoccupation with his political problems.
Before the war, this right-wing Israeli government had systematically undermined the prospects of peace. Netanyahu and his extreme partners in the cabinet had worked to marginalize Palestinian voices committed to peace, pursued settlement policies designed to foreclose the possibility of a two-state solution, stymied economic development in Palestinian areas, and passed laws that entrench systemic inequality between Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel.
This last year saw record Israeli settlement growth in the West Bank, where more than 700,000 Israelis now live in areas the United Nations and the United States agree are occupied territories. Despite that, the Israeli government authorized thousands of new homes for settlers and opened up new areas to construction, while bulldozing thousands of Palestinian homes and schools and further restricting Palestinian movement. Legal experts agree these policies constituted nothing less than illegal annexation.
All of these policies and more greatly increased tension in the West Bank: before October 7th, 179 Palestinians had been killed in 2023, which made it the deadliest year in two decades. Since October 7th, 121 more Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank, including some by settlers. These tensions were part of why so much of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) was deployed in the West Bank, rather than the border with Gaza.
Then came the October 7th and Hamas' atrocities that began this latest and horrific war.
The Hamas attack was unspeakable. Over 1,300 innocent men, women, and children in Israel were killed. Over 200 Israelis and Americans taken hostage, including young children and grandparents. Young people were gunned down in cold blood at a music festival, babies and older people brutally murdered in their homes. And let's remember that Hamas did not primarily target the military -- no, they intentionally targeted civilians. Their goal was to kill civilians. Their attack was designed to provoke a response. And in that they succeeded.
M. President, many Israelis are now understandably furious and they want to strike back forcefully. I think we can all understand that. But rage and revenge do not make useful policy. Here in the United States after the attack on 9/11 in this country, we acted with rage and revenge, and I think many people now understand that was a horrific mistake.
M. President, killing innocent Palestinian women and children in Gaza will not bring back to life the innocent Israeli women and children who have been killed by Hamas.
Like any other country, Israel has the right to defend itself and destroy Hamas terrorism. But it does not have the right to kill thousands of innocent men, women, and children in Gaza. Israel does not have the right to endanger the lives of millions of Palestinians -- half of whom are children -- by shutting off water, food, fuel, and electricity. That type of action against a helpless and impoverished population is morally unacceptable and in violation of international law. Israel does not have the right to bomb an entire neighborhood to target one Hamas leader or installation. But that is what the Israeli government is doing. One need only look at the satellite imagery and photography of Gaza to see that this is not a carefully calibrated campaign. These are not surgical strikes.
Yesterday, Israel struck the densely populated Jabalia refugee camp and killed a Hamas commander. But they also killed some 50 other people and injured hundreds more, though the exact toll is not yet known. That was actually the fourth airstrike on Jabalia: an October 9th airstrike killed 60, an October 19th airstrike killed 18, and an October 22nd airstrike killed 30, according to respected outside researchers. UNRWA--the United Nations relief agency--reported yesterday that their Head of Security was killed along with his wife and eight children. In total, 67 UNRWA workers have been killed and 44 facilities damaged since October 7th.
M. President, the current Israeli strategy must end. Israel must begin the process of restoring water and electrical services in areas where they are still operable. The international community must also rush generators and solar capacity to Gazan medical facilities, to address acute needs and reduce Israeli fears of diversion to Hamas. Israel will not stop going after Hamas, but it must do it in a very, very different way, and additional pauses will be needed.
M. President, let me conclude by saying that Israel must also begin the process of laying out a political strategy -- it cannot bomb its way to a solution. Such a strategy must include, as minimum first steps: a clear promise that Palestinians displaced in the fighting will have the absolute right to safely return to their homes; a commitment to broader peace talks to advance a two-state solution in the wake of this war; an abandonment of Israeli efforts to carve up and annex the West Bank; and a commitment to work with the Palestinian Authority to build genuine governing capacity.
The United States must make it clear that these are the conditions of our solidarity. Just as we want justice for the Israelis murdered by Hamas, we also want justice for the Palestinian people. That is not going to happen with Hamas. Palestinians need a state of their own, contiguous, with the freedom of movement and access that can sustain a vibrant economy.
M. President, this will be a long and difficult road. It will take concerted U.S. and international support, and a doubling down of our political commitment to a two-state solution.
But the first step -- right now -- must be to stop the bombing and bring in as much humanitarian aid as possible. I think Secretary Blinken said it well and he said, "Providing immediate aid and protection for Palestinian civilians in the conflict is a necessary foundation for finding partners in Gaza who have a different vision for the future than Hamas -- and who are willing to help make it real."
M. President, this is a dreadful situation. It is part of a very, very long-term conflict between Israel and its neighbors. But the immediate need is to save lives and stop the bombing, to bring forth a humanitarian pause, and then go forward to bring peace and stability to the region."
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