> An Ohio-based humanitarian group, HEAL Palestine, is the main American organization helping evacuate people — primarily injured children and family members — and bringing them to several cities in the U.S. for medical treatment. According to the organization's website, it has evacuated 148 people from Gaza, including 63 children.
https://www.npr.org/2025/08/16/nx-s1-5504634/state-departmen...
Are there similar organizations operating in other countries?
The WHO is organizing some evacuations internationally
> the World Health Organization supported the transfer of 32 children and six adults to Italy, Belgium and Turkey, but more than 14,800 patients are still waiting.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/aug/16/malnourished-p...
Are there legitimate organizations to donate to that are effectively evacuating people?
Thanks, that’s a good link! Shared.
I didn't expect the article to conclude with a pg quote from twitter. Why did they think pg was a notable authority on the matter of human rights? I am not asking in snark, just curious.
To prevent the story from getting flagged on HN.
It's an example of notable criticism. The campaign was on twitter, so the PG quote is context and as an example of what detractors are saying.
Writing a summary of twitter hot takes is easier than doing actual research.
The quote is there to distract from the fact that Laura Loomer herself is Jewish, and that is probably what motivates her in this case - not adherence to some abstract political ideals, but simple in-group/out-group distinction.
This is confusing to say the least, the US are providing Israel with heavy hardware and ammunition to kill the Palestinian civilians, and then they want to take the children victims for medical care?!
Why the US plays on both sides?
because
- it's about civilians and at least the official stance is that the US helps Israel to fight terrorist, not civilians.
- a government isn't a single person
- this doesn't just involves the US government but also humanitarian help groups
It's not weird for an organization to choose to help children, any children. Even the military conducting some action in an area will do so. Plenty of photos of solders sharing rations with local kids.
That seems like a reasonable goal all by itself.
Because the US is an entity made up of millions of people
The “US” doesn’t do anything- it’s people in the country that ultimately act
“The US” is not providing medical care for the victims. A private charity is. The role of the US government is in allowing, or now denying, the recipients to enter the country to receive care.
remember jews want all Palestinians deported from the area, it makes perfect sense for zionists to support humanitarian efforts OUTSIDE of israel
>> This is confusing to say the least, the US are providing Israel with heavy hardware and ammunition to kill the Palestinian civilians, and then they want to take the children victims for medical care?! Why the US plays on both sides?
The US taxpayer has always paid for Israel’s citizens healthcare, while US citizens go without healthcare and ration their necessary medicine. Makes you wonder how such leverage can exist.
> The US taxpayer has always paid for Israel’s citizens healthcare
What is your source for this claim?
Most US military aid to Israel goes to US defense contractors. The US hasn't provided any significant economic aid to Israel in decades.
Because the $1 saved on a missile can be spent elsewhere?
Dollars are fungible
By this logic, the US is funding X at 173 countries, where X is anything governments spend money on (healthcare, soup kitchens, cocktail parties?)
Since the US has shuttered USAID which distrubutes food for humanitarian reasons, and made massive cuts to domestic healthcare program, this is indeed the logic of the current administration
Your rhetorical question is more true than you may realize: The high levels of US military spending is indeed a major reason why so many countries in (for example) Europe have been able to afford their robust social welfare systems instead of having to spend more of their budget on defense than they traditionally have.
A lot of articles discussing the consequences of the Trump administration’s pressure on other NATO countries to spend more of their GDP on defense and its public hesitation to protect Europe militarily have discussed how some of European governments’ nonmilitary expenses may have to be reduced as a result.
No, robust healthcare is cheaper than the US system.
Here in Sweden we had this even back in the day when we spent 5% of GDP on defence, mostly materiel, and upon that had mandatory military service.
The US healthcare system is more expensive than a Swedish-style healthcare system. Another fun fact: our university education is cheaper per head than our high school education.
I think the education of physicians is maybe 1.5x as expensive as high school education, but that's an unusually expensive program.
They aren't really dollars, so much as in-kind aid. The US pays Raytheon to manufacture interceptors in the US and then send them to Israel. So it's fungible in the sense that without US military aid, Israel would have to figure out how to pay for missile defense and other military needs. And maybe that involves less domestic spending on healthcare and maybe it involves making deals with other countries or making foreign or military policy changes. Maybe it leads to positive changes like peace deals, but maybe it leads to negative changes, like Israel switching its allegiance to countries that aren't as friendly to US interests.
Ultimately, the person I'm replying to is giving a false impression of what the US is doing.
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Because there are people in the US who are willing to give them medical aid for free. They would travel here, receive medical care, and then leave.
"Well, there are other charities elsewhere in the world" is a horrible reason to prevent a charitable organization from doing good for people.
That would make more sense if if there weren't locals who needed intensive care. We have many, many people who fall through the cracks. Why do they take second place to people 5,000+ miles away? It's cool that they want to be charitable and nice; are their own people not worthwhile helping, if not why not?
In addition, if they have all the money and want to help both locals and foreigners, they could do it cheaper by financing this care at places closer to where these people live.
I give a huge amount of money to charity. Most of it is local, but I also give a lot to international causes. Should the government interfere in my ability to do that?
It will be difficult to finance care in Gaza given that a lot of the medical infrastructure has been destroyed by bombs.
Yes, charitable organizations could coordinate with hospitals in surrounding countries. But is "your charity is inefficient" justification for this sort of government interference? Should some charity who is trying to help people via the infrastructure they know and understand be required to coordinate with third parties?
Overall, you should be able to donate to whatever cause is legal for you to donate to. If say, you wanted to send support to Ukraine or alternatively Russia, a sovereign person would be able to. But we all know it's a fool's errand to claim sovereign personhood.
Given that we live in nation states and we defer international affairs to the government, whether we like it or not, they call the shots there. US businesses would have loved to have been able to sell into the Iron curtain, but that decision was not one for businesses or individuals.
I think if those organizations are fluent enough to arrange to have people fly in, they should also be fluent enough to coordinate with institutions that are more local and also share aspects of culture and language with the patients. If I were in need of help, would I prefer to get treated in a Chinese hospital with Chinese personnel or a a hospital in the Anglosphere with English speaking physicians? I know where I would prefer to go. I would want familiarity.
I do agree that the fascists appear to call the shots. I am saying that I don't like this and I am stunned by the number of people who seem to think that a self described "proud Islamophobe" is advocating for the policy for any reason other than to immiserate muslim people.
You can start your own organization to get suffering Gazans treated in Egypt. I'd praise you if you did. But I truly don't see how that option is relevant to the evil being done here.
The hospitals in area were targetted by bombings. So were journalists and NGO.
I somehow doubt Cairo, Damascus or Baghdad would get targeted. Or, we could go to 1,000NM and include Athens and Istanbul and Kuwait.
When our own Armed forces folks need hospital care, we take them to DE or IT. we don't fly them all the way to the US when there are facilities that can treat them closer to where they were injured.
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yeah and the invasion of ukraine definitely had denazification as the goal
It is quite literally genocide and yes Israelis are targetting civilians. They were doing it for years, but now they do it very openly.
The only consolation I have after the reading the above is the knowledge that 95% of Planet Earth which has seen for themselves what has (& is) happening, and 100% of those who then took it upon themselves to look into the history of this, all have come to the same conclusion. That Israel is a racist, apartheid, genocidal entity (hard to call it an actual "state") which is hellbent on its trajectory until its removed.
In short, the old hasbara garbage might still play here in certain sheltered tech circles, but in the real world, it's over. Done. Finished.
You're confused because you favor a simplistic view of the world where you have evil people and good people.
The US is not an enemy of Palestinians in general. Policies historically reflect conflicting goals and problematic facts on the ground. And problematic facts on the ground are often not the US's fault.
The biggest problematic thing is outsiders that support Palestinians armed conflict with Israel. And then get butthurt and double down due to the predictable results.
The US are not providing Israel with heavy hardware and ammunition "to kill the Palestinian civilians". Israel seeks to MINIMIZE collateral damage to Palestinian victims while achieving the military objective of destroying the terrorist group Hamas and its military capabilities. The rate of civilians and combatants dead is lower than the average of urban wars (lower than when the US fought in urban wars). Israel performs precise attacks on Hamas combatants and military facilities. It sends communication before performing attacks though radio, leaflets, "sound bombs", etc, to allow civilians to escape even though this obviously hinders the effectiveness of its operations because this allows Hamas to change the location of its combatants and weapons. Israel even flat out cancels some operations on valid military targets (such as Hamas weapon deposits and launchers) in order to save civilian lives. In short, Israel seeks to MINIMIZE collateral damage to Palestinian victims while achieving valid military objectives.
Saying Israel seeks to kill Palestinian civilians is as absurd as saying that the US Federal Highway Administration seeks to kill American civilians in car accidents.
Does Egypt have a border with Gaza?
Yes. That is how these patients were being evacuated in the first place before traveling to the US for treatment.
Why not treat them in Egypt?
Because there is a charitable organization offering to treat them for free in the US. Is there something wrong with doing good?
Isn't medical care less expensive in other countrues than the U.S.?
Wouldn't they be able to treat more children if they didn't have to spend money on transportation, and paid cheaper healthcare costs in Egypt?
1. If a US based charity finds a hospital and doctors that are willing to treat these children for free, why would you look for alternatives?
2. Some of these are likely complex cases in children that cannot easily be handled elsewhere. The US has some of the best hospitals and doctors in the world.
> free
Free to whom? These arrangements invariably turn into immigration vectors. Data show that refugees and low skill/education emigres are multi-generational net takers from government social programs. They also tend to not assimilate.
> These arrangements invariably turn into immigration vectors.
Quite the leap. Do you have data to back this claim, or are you just making it up as you go?
I take as evidence that the involved charities make no claims about when, how, and where their beneficiaries will go upon completion of medical treatment. I would be glad to see evidence to the contrary.
How specifically do medical visas invariably turn into immigration vectors?
Once a person sets foot in the US, they get the benefit of US law, thereby allowing the nonprofit-legal complex to activate on their behalf. You think the lawyers and activists won’t instantly start to advocate for granting these people refugee status or jump to some other lane on the basis that these patients cannot safely return to Gaza? Better to not let them in, full stop. Plenty of stable third countries much closer where relief can be provided.
Why do you think that lawyers are not able to provide support for refugee applicants prior to setting foot in the US?
Do you have data demonstrating that a significant number of people end up with successful refugee status applications that would have failed had they not come here for medical purposes and where their case is abusive? Or do you consider all refugees coming to the country for any reason to be bad?
Should all medical visas be stopped? Just those for Gazans? Just those for countries that you don't like?
Maybe. That'd require significant additional international coordination.
Is running an inefficient charity so bad that the government needs to step in and stop it?
There could be an entirely different conversation about whether this particular group is effective. I really don't care about that. What I care about is that an organization is trying to do something nice to suffering people and then decision makers within the Trump administration decided that this was unacceptable and used an extreme legal hammer to put a stop to it where their only possible motivation is simply rage at Gazans.
There's something wrong with that if you wanted to do the most good per unit of pretty much any kind of resource, yes.
I give at lot of money annually to a local food bank. This is less efficient in terms of fighting hunger than giving to an international organization by virtue of the higher cost of food here.
Should the government stop me? Am I a bad person for doing this?
Frankly, it is absolutely fucking insane to me that people somehow think that this decision is somehow based in the Trump administration's desire for maximally efficient charitable giving.
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Are Jordan, Saudi Arabia, all of Europe, etc closer to Gaza than the U.S.?
They have a point in that Israel should be forced to take care of those children, also to stop the genocide. Taking in displaced only serves Israels interests
Since Israel is not going to do either, and the US is not going to try and make them, I think we should at least save the lives we can. Imagine asking Germany in the 40s to take better care of Jewish children to turn away refugees, right?
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https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/07/israel-weapo...
Yeah! No USA involvement there... take a second and imagine it was you and your family getting bombed and starved. stop being such a horrible person.
What’s horrible is that some want to bring the horrible here.
My family came here decades ago to escape oppression and chaos, not bring it here. And we don’t.
Every action I’ve seen from activists—both by Zionists and Palestinian hardliners—have been to sow discord for their own ends.
The children here don’t deserve it. If you want to be decent? Then convince neighbors like SA or the UAE to provide medical aid.
Are there other ways in which I should be disallowed from aiding suffering children?
You’re allowed to aid; but you refuse to believe a nation is allowed to say “not here”.
If your aim is to help, then the elected government has said find a different way so what’s your next move?
As a lifelong Democrat, I’m forced to conclude this appeal from a certain segment of hardline liberals isn’t in good faith.
You may not like it and it’s shitty, but Hamas’ attack last year changed things for me; and I’m guessing I’m not the only silent centrist who thinks this.
Every lie of omission by extremist liberals deepens my suspicions.
You're repeating the same lies as laura loomer. Quoting the article: "Loomer wrote, before falsely stating that “95% of GAZANS voted for HAMAS.”
"In fact, Hamas got 44% of party list votes in the 2006 Palestinian legislative elections across Gaza and the West Bank, and lost three of the five districts in Gaza to the secular Fatah party. There has been no election since then."
Plurality, not majority. The conservatives lie by saying majority.
Liberals lie by saying that it wasn’t a majority; yet omitting a key detail: Yes Hamas won, with 44%.
And if you’re gonna quote wikipedia: “ Tensions between Fatah and Hamas began to rise in 2005 after the death of Yasser Arafat in November 2004. After the legislative election on 25 January 2006, which resulted in a Hamas victory, relations were marked by sporadic factional fighting. This became more intense after the two parties repeatedly failed to reach a deal to share government power, escalating in June 2007 and resulting in Hamas' takeover of Gaza.[35]”
> Liberals lie by saying that it wasn’t a majority; yet omitting a key detail: Yes Hamas won, with 44%.
44% of the party list votes and 41% of the constituency votes; the PLC had 132 seats half elected by party-list proportional method and the other half by vote-n/top-n win elections in electoral districts (while mechanically slightly different, this tends to basically approximate the partisan effect of plurality election of multicandidate slates, where party is the main driver of preferences, though in the PLC in some districts there was an additional twist of reserved seats for Christians which went to the highest voted Christian candidate regardless of where they placed overall.)
The reason Hamas was able to secure an outright legislative majority despite having a plurality of votes in both halves of the election is largely the wildly non-proportional results of the latter: with 41% of the district vote, they secured 68% of the district seats.
Also, those results are Palestine-wide, and Hamas IIRC (I can't easily locate data by district or split Gaza/WB) way overperformed in the WB largely as a protest vote against incumbent Fatah members.
I quoted the article. The median age in gaza is estimated to be 18. Half of the population was not even born the last time there was an election. Consider hamas lost 3 of 5, it was neither a plurality. It's not about how liberals or conservatives lie, what was written is a lie.
A plurality of gazans did not vote for Hamas because half of them were not even yet born. They had no vote.
No. You shifted the goalpost.
What’s terrifying is that what would be elected is far worse.
Unless I made a terrible copy/paste error, I 100% quoted the guardian article that we are discussing. In other words, "did you read the article?"
To your other point: The goal post is the statement (I'm paraphrasing here): "It was not a majority of Gazans that voted for Hamas, but instead a plurality". My rebuttal is that for sure half of the country did not vote for Hamas because the last election is before the median age of the country (half the country was not even born yet).
Could you explain how I shifted goal posts?
I think you might be assuming that we "know" without elections that the majority of the current population is "radicalized". The evidence of pluralities and majorities is given through elections, we don't have evidence for the current population. Maybe that is what you perceive as shifting the goal posts?
If you're going off of something other than elections as evidence for support of hamas at a plurality level of current Gazans - please share the data you are using to be "terrifi[ed] of .. what would be elected" (quoting you @nobodyandpround with slight paraphrase to make the grammar work). The population is roughly 2M people, it's difficult to get to any answer other than "we don't know" without a full blown and free election.
You’re appealing to the lack of elections as lack of evidence.
Which I’ve pointed out is quite wrong.
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Steelman—you know, as the forum rules insist—and ask yourself if there are other reasons.
My rationale: First we bring the children; then we appeal to humanitarian grounds and allow then to stay; then we lobby to allow in their parents or relatives.
Hamas+Israel are 100% at fault here; and Palestians are not innocent of this. The last time (twenty years ago) when they last had elections, they allowed and enabled this.
I’m sorry it’s a shitty situation, but that’s a slippery slope few countries have allowed or want.
>Palestians are not innocent of this. The last time (twenty years ago) when they last had elections, they allowed and enabled this.
Three fourths of the current population couldn't have voted at all. The elections had a participation about about three fourths and Hamas got less than half of the popular vote.
Napkin math says for each 100 people in Palestine today, only 25 could have voted at all, of which 19 did, of which 9 voted for Hamas. This whole line of thinking is completely ridiculous.
Which doesn’t prove that Hamas wouldn’t be elected in again.
In fact, Hamas surged in popularity after its October 17th attack: https://themedialine.org/top-stories/the-rise-of-hamas-popul...
https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-palestinians-opinion...
“57% of respondents in Gaza and 82% in the West Bank believe Hamas was correct in launching the October attack, the poll indicated. A large majority believed Hamas’ claims that it acted to defend a major Islamic shrine in Jerusalem against Jewish extremists and win the release of Palestinian prisoners. Only 10% said they believed Hamas has committed war crimes, with a large majority saying they did not see videos showing the militants committing atrocities.”
Even articles like https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/polls-sh... which try to downplay the support—“In fact, Gazan frustration with Hamas governance is clear; most Gazans expressed a preference for PA administration and security officials over Hamas ”—have to caveat as follows: ‘But it is organizations like Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and Lion’s Den that receive the most widespread popular support in Gaza. About three quarters of Gazans express support for both groups, including 40% who see the Lion’s Den in a “very positive” light, an attitude shared by a similar percentage of West Bank residents.’
These are more militant than Hamas.
So you’re right: What would get elected in isn’t Hamas, but something far worse.
Thanks, but no.
Sorry to be crude but that's just a very long winded concession to my initial point.
Crude and wrong.
It’s not a concession, when it contradicts your position.
You believe Palestinians aren’t accountable because most of them didn’t vote.
I just showed you that not only is Hamas still popular, more militant orgs with zero tolerance for two-state are far more popular.
Until you forced me to research, I wouldn’t have known that the younger Palestinians were even more violent than the public is lead to believe.
Hard agree. I am highly sympathetic to the numerous tragedies that have afflicted the modern Palestinians. They have only knowing suffering at the hands of overwhelming adversaries from the British colonial rule to the rule of western armed Eastern European terrorist gangs.
That being said if we take in Palestinians we are effectively advancing the self proclaimed objective of the Israeli government: ethnic cleansing. The west should not take them in and the west should instead sanction Israel to the point of crippling their economy. Only then will the Israelis stop the abuse.
In this case, we're talking about a small number of people who need specialized medical treatment. Denying medical care for people who need it based on some principle is inhumane.
I don’t think you realize how this works in practice.
In theory it will be for highest need. In practice various parties will find ways to make sure every applicant meets the bar.
In theory it’s temporary. In practice majority will find ways to stay.
It will a sudden exodus of 100.000 Gazans to the US. Israel wins as they will probably in the end kill 10-20% of the population (we know that they’ve killed 5% but many organizations estimate that at least as many are under the ruins and there are excess deaths to count too eg those starved because of Israel’s blockade), they will maim 10-20-%, and finally find ways to expel most of the remaining to various countries.
These are visitor visas. We’re not “taking in” the recipients.
Do you have any doubt that they will strive to go from visitor to permanent? It’s not as hard as you think.
Bottom line: why can’t we compel Israel to meet their medical needs? Or for example to stop bombing hospitals in Gaza so they don’t have to come here for need?
Do you have any evidence they’re staying?
Israel’s responsibility isn’t really relevant to visas being issued for medical care being paid for by private charity.
> western armed Eastern European terrorist gangs
The majority of Israelis (45%) are Mizrahi or Eastern Sephardi [0] - primarily Moroccan, Iraqi, Yemeni, Syrian, Algerian, Iranian, Kurdish, Azeri, Tajik, and Egyptian in origin. The rest are Arab (20%) or Ashkenazi (33%) but these are overwhelmingly Soviet-era Jews who faced antisemitism during the Soviet era. You also have 1% who are Ethiopian in origin and 1% who are Indian (primarily Marathi) in origin.
The most rightwing Israelis are themselves 1.5 generation Mizrahi, such as Ben Gvir (Kurdish) and Karhi (Tunisian).
The same way Palestinians made homeless due to the 1948 war continue to resent Israel, similarly Mizrahi families continue to resent and distrust the Muslim countries their parents and grandparents were forced to leave from their mohallas.
Assuming Israel is overwhelmingly Ashkenazi is itself white normative and neocolonialist in nature.
> colonial rule
Same for plenty of Jews in Eastern countries.
For example, the Farhud [1] in Iraq as Iraqi Sunnis viewed Iraqi Jews as collaborationists with the British (this was also caused by Nazi propaganda during WW2) and the 1945 Libyan Riots [2] instigated by British occupation forces to coopt Libyan Sunnis.
[0] - https://people.socsci.tau.ac.il/mu/noah/files/2018/07/Ethnic...
[1] - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farhud
[2] - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1945_anti-Jewish_riots_in_Tr...
Now do Christians in the Middle East--they have been practically exterminated out of existence everywhere.
The population has decreased significantly due to religious fanatics, but you should also give credit where credit is due.
Sisi has protected the Coptic community and Lebanon continues to have an active and prominent Christian community (which is split 50-50 between supporting Saudi and supporting Iran)
Morocco has also continued to protect the Jewish community there due to clan, tribal, and Berber ties trumping Arab or religious ties.
I wonder how upset those Mizrahi Jews should be with the Ashkenazi Jews that worked to promote their exodus by conspiring to create the conditions to push them out of Iraq and Egypt.
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20230619-undeniable-proof-...
Plenty are annoyed with shenanigans like those in Egypt in the early 1950s, but denying the Farhud or the Shagabh Tarabulus is just as bad as denying the Nakbha.
Yemeni Jews didn't ask to be genocided out by Imam Yahya's Ghazis, just like an Arab families in Galilee didn't ask to get forcibly removed from the Levant during the same year.
Plenty of people did bad things - evil knows no border.
The kisas has been paid. Let them deal with it. This is a problem that can only be resolved by regional players acting in good faith.
Alternatively, the Enlightenment never happened in Baghdad, Aleppo, Oujda, etc. If Hamas and factions of the PA can argue for Shariat, then factions in Israel can argue for Halakha.
Of course, this is unrealistic, so the only answer is to nut up and negotiate. Reality is, the politicians and governments are in constant contact based on personal experience.
The moment Israel makes a sweetheart deal with Qatar instead of the current one with the UAE and the previously planned one with KSA, all of the Hamasniks would be in Ramla in hours.
The Thanis (whose country funds and owns the MEM like AJ) still haven't forgiven the Nahyans and al-Sauds for considering invading them if Tillerson didn't intervene.
No disagreements there!
I guess in the end: people are predictability and the predictability of masses makes them vulnerable to manipulation. What we get out is endless cycles of rule by the zero-sum cynical.
I guess even the faithless will end up resigning to pray for peace.
This is a huge aspect of the conflict that the left doesn't want to understand, because it doesn't fit the narrative of colonialism.
And it doesn't fit with the conservative Christian view of the nation consisting purely of those that fled Germany. The truth is simply more complicated than either extreme is comfortable with.
That being said, the ancestry and the history doesn't change the actions being committed today.
I don't think it changes the facts about what is happening, but I do think it changes how we think about the roots of the conflict, and about how (if) it gets resolved in the long term.
> That being said, the ancestry and the history doesn't change the actions being committed today
Yep. But it adds nuance, which has been lost in discourse.
This is fundamentally an Eastern conflict that can only be resolved by Mizrahis and Arabs.
Westerners converting Israel-Palestine into a culture war are doing more harm than good, because it breeds resentment from both sides, as both view the West as the lackey of the other.
This framing is an American culture war topic that has morphed into a global culture war.
In most Western countries (except France), the Jewish community is overwhelmingly Ashkenazi in origin, and that is what sets the tone for how these countries view the conflict.
Mizrahi Jews have significantly different practices, and Israel is fundamentally their state, as Mizrahi culture has become the default culture in Israel. Even pop Hebrew music is overwhelmingly Arab in musical style now (eg. Daniel Saadon) and Arabic, Farsi, and other Mizrahi languages terms have become a major part of colloquial Hebrew now (יאללה anyone).
IMO, I think Israel becoming culturally Mizrahi is what is causing Israel to lose it's clout. Israeli and (non-religious) American Jews are increasingly separated from each other as they consume different media, speak different languages, and don't even go to the same Synagogues (or Temples as Ashkenazim call them). Israel has become much more insular as it has also become a richer country (it's not like 30 years ago when Israelis had to immigrate to the US to get paid a real salary).
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How many German children did the allies take to provide medical care to in WWII?
Israel used to provide advanced medical care to gazans.
One day women that was treated for cancer (and iirc was healed) arrived to follow up checkup in suicide vest.
Gaza borders many kibutzim (kind of socialistic communal settlement) which are very left leaning, pro peace, 2 state solution, etc, etc. People from those kibutzim used to pick up sick gazans from border crossing and drive them to hospitals in Israel for treatment and back. On Oct7 those kibutzim were hardest hit with some of them I think loosing 50% of members.
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You think little Palestinian children are Israels enemies? The most moral army indeed...
Two territories are each other's enemies: Israel VS Gaza (Gaza citizens supported Hamas for 20+ years- cheering on 7th of October-and probably still are). Again, Israel doesn't kill children for fun neither does it try to kill.
Gaza is an occupied territory. It's not equal.
> Gaza citizens supported Hamas for 20+ years- cheering on 7th of October-and probably still are
This is a lie. The stats do not bare this out. Sure you can find examples, but a picture or three does not represent 2 million people. Even if it did, we're talking about badly maimed children that are clearly innocent. Last I checked humanity considers children as innocents.
Israel doesn't target children. It has no reason to, and it's a civilized country with a full (far left if it helps) judging system.
I didn't write anything about targetting children.
But, while on the topic. Targetting vs accepting children as collateral damage are different. Both can be true.
The judiciary is also notably notoriously lenient in prosecuting crimes against Gazans.
> They don't block food or other humanitarian aids
There is tons of evidence of Israel blocking food from entering gaza. Please be honest.
There is no concrete evidence. All of the evidence is from Hamas news reporters, and evidently it was all fake.
When you lie through your teeth you make everyone hate you. Israel actually has a decent argument for why they are in the right here but you throw that all away when no one trusts you.
Can you give me sources (actual concrete trustworthy sources) Israel doesn't give enough humanitarian aid? Meanwhile I watched a video of Hamas soldiers feasting and saying "Thank you Israel".
It is completely absurd to accuse Israel of a "genocide". A genocide is the intentional killing of an ethnicity by trying to kill as many people as possible of that ethnicity. E.g. the Holocaust, in which Nazi Germany engaged in an industrial process of killing as many Jewish people as possible, at a total of 6 million Jewish people murdered.
Israel seeks to MINIMIZE collateral damage to Palestinian victims while achieving the military objective of destroying the terrorist group Hamas and its military capabilities. The rate of civilians and combatants dead is lower than the average of urban wars (lower than when the US fought in urban wars). Israel performs precise attacks on Hamas combatants and military facilities. It sends communication before performing attacks though radio, leaflets, "sound bombs", etc, to allow civilians to escape even though this obviously hinders the effectiveness of its operations because this allows Hamas to change the location of its combatants and weapons. Israel even flat out cancels some operations on valid military targets (such as Hamas weapon deposits and launchers) in order to save civilian lives.
In short, you are taking a country that goes out of its way to MINIMIZE civilian casualties in achieving valid military objectives, and accusing it of wanting to MAXIMIZE the number of civilians dead. This is completely inverted. It devalues the weight of actual genocides. And it is particularly despicable you falsely accusing Israel, which was created to protect victims of an actual genocide.
Full title: US state department stops issuing visas for Gaza’s children to get medical care after far-right campaign
The most important thing is why they stopped:
> The US state department announced on Saturday that it would stop issuing visas to children from Gaza in desperate need of medical care after an online pressure campaign from Laura Loomer, a far-right influencer close to Donald Trump who has described herself as “a proud Islamophobe”.
> In a pair of posts on the social network on Friday, Loomer had shared video of badly injured Palestinian children and their family members arriving in Houston and San Francisco this month, along with false claims that their shouts of joy were “jihadi chants” and that they were “doing the HAMAS terror whistle”.
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> After misrepresenting the children, including amputees arriving to get prosthetic legs, as “Islamic invaders from an Islamic terror hot zone”, Loomer demanded to know “who at the US State Department under @marcorubio signed off on the visas for Palestinians from a HAMAS hot zone”.
> “Is Rubio even aware of this?” Loomer wrote, in reference to the secretary of state who was at the time in Alaska meeting Vladimir Putin.
> “Why would anyone at the State Department give visas to individuals who live in Gaza, which is run by HAMAS?” Loomer wrote, before falsely stating that “95% of GAZANS voted for HAMAS.”
(The articles notes that in fact Hamas got 44% of the votes, not 95%, and only won 2 of the 5 districts, and that the last election in Gaza was in 2006).
Just for context, because sometimes we need to remind basic facts.
The Geneva Conventions are international laws that establish international legal standards for humanitarian treatment in war since 1864. They extensively define the basic rights of wartime prisoners, civilians and military personnel.
A war crime is a violation of the laws of war. War crimes include shooting on disarmed civilians, denying medical treatment, food or water to captive wounded soldiers from the enemy, or deliberately starving people to death.
Israel MUST provide reasonable medical care to civilians wounded by its army, because this is required by the international laws and treaties signed previously by Israel.
FYI, taking hostages is prohibited by Geneva Conventions. Firing of thousands of rockets basically only at the civilian targets too.
And actually, Geneva Conventions don't really apply to a military action against a Gazan terrorist organisation that is committed to genocide.
Two wrongs don't make a right
The second claim is interesting because avoiding to declare formally a war has been a common trick for decades to bypass the Geneva Conventions. The legal category of Crimes against humanity still apply in those cases.
Most probably not - but there is also absolutely no need for chivalry if your opponent doesn't stick to any rules.
The point was not the war declaration or the lack of it - the point is - if someone announces he's going to kill you and then does basically everything to prove that it's not a bluff and no one else is stopping him, then you're allowed to do whatever it takes to save your life.
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Of course, someone can be jewish and be far right. Someone can be black and own black slaves. Someone can be a woman and be against women's suffrage. Someone can be rich or poor and a class traitor, etc etc.
Someone's identity can and often does influence their politics, but they are not always in alignment, and their identity certainly doesn't negate their positions that are harmful towards others who share parts of their identity (all of this is often done in exchange for personal gain with these famous people who make a living off all this).
The "far right" can and does have polar-opposite attitudes towards Israel, so all of what you wrote applies equally to that. Yet the Guardian leads with "far right", but actively misleads on her semitism.
Sure, the far right does have polar opposite attitudes towards Israel. I don't understand what any of this has to do with the comment I was replying to that seemed to imply that there was some sort of contradiction between being far right and jewish.
I wasn't implying any contradiction. I was drawing attention to the fact that framing her as "far right" falsely ascribes her position as coming from some abstract political ideals [1], when it is nothing more than in-group/out-group distinction.
[1] By most measures, Palestine is more "right-wing" than Israel.
Those two attributes are not contradictory.
Since a Jewish ethno-state is currently ethnically cleansing Gaza, one is more relevant than the other. The Guardian not only omits it, it tries to give its readers the impression that is the direct opposite of the truth.
I guess the Guardian journalists believe that ethnically cleansing is an inherently right-wing endeavor, even though left-wing regimes have practiced this a lot and often with the blessings of communist intellectuals.
I don't see how Jewish ancestry has any actual relevance, especially given the "proud islamophobe" quote.
No matter how much overlap there is between Jews and Zionists, it is one thing to criticize someone for their position on something and a whole different thing to criticize them for their ethnicity. That "whole different thing" is prejudice, which helps nobody here.
I'm not "criticizing her for her ethnicity", I'm noting that her ethnicity is more likely to be what's driving her in this case. What the Guardian is doing is blaming a Jewish ethno-centric position instead on the vaguely-defined "far-right".
Surely Jews can have differing beliefs?
Every fact about Laura loomer could be wrong, doesn't change the cruelty of the policy change.
The VERY FIRST SENTENCE of your wikipedia link says: "Laura Elizabeth Loomer (born May 21, 1993) is an American FAR-RIGHT political activist, conspiracy theorist,[b] and internet personality." (caps added for emphasis)