Muslims in the United States have increased pressure on President Joe Biden, threatening to cut off their support for him if there is no ceasefire in Gaza, where Israel has been bombing the civilian population for more than three weeks.
Muslim leaders and a number of Democratic Party activists warned Biden that they will begin campaigning to mobilize millions of Muslim voters to withhold donations and votes towards the Democratic president’s 2024 reelection unless he takes immediate action for a ceasefire in Gaza.
The US National Muslim Democratic Council — which includes Democratic Party leaders from hotly contested states whose voters’ ballots will likely decide the outcome of the 2024 presidential election in the United States, such as the states of Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania — mounted pressure on Biden to push Israelis to put a ceasefire in place in Gaza by 5 pm (2100 GMT) on Tuesday.
In an open letter titled “2023 Ceasefire Ultimatum,” the Muslim leaders threatened to mobilize Muslim voters to “withhold endorsement, support, or votes for any candidate who endorses the Israeli offensive against the Palestinian people.”
“Your administration’s unconditional support, encompassing funding and armaments, has played a significant role in perpetuating the violence that is causing civilian casualties and has eroded trust in voters who previously put their faith in you,” the council wrote.
In the meantime, the Zionist regime continues its atrocious attacks against Gazans, which started early this month after the Hamas resistance movement launched Operation Al-Aqsa Storm against the occupant Israeli forces.
At 8,525 Palestinians, including more than 3,400 children, have been killed since then, while another 21,048 Gazans have been wounded in the besieged territory.
Israelis cut fuel, electricity, food and water to the more than two million Palestinians living there while firing artillery shells from sea and land and bombing the trapped population with its warplanes.
The international community has called for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire to allow aid to reach the trapped people in Gaza, where the Israeli forces’ genocidal bloodbath has forced more than 1.4 million people to flee their homes.
The head of the United Nations Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) announced on Monday that the ceasefire in Gaza had turned into “a matter of life and death for millions” of Palestinians. Philippe Lazzarini warned that basic services are crumbling in Gaza and that medicine, food, water and fuel are running out.
However, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who received Biden and the Pentagon‘s go-ahead for the genocide of Palestinians, rejected the calls for the ceasefire.
“Calls for a ceasefire are calls for Israel to surrender to Hamas… That will not happen,” Netanyahu declared on television.
Netanyahu said regardless of who stands with the Tel Aviv regime, “Israel will fight until this battle is won,” insisting that the airstrikes on the Gazan women and children will continue until the resistance of all the Palestinians in the occupied lands is completely crushed by the Zionist occupant group.
Some of the weapons and munitions supplied by the US military to Israeli regime forces for its attacks on Gaza include its advanced fighter jets armed with precision missiles and GBU and BLU bunker-buster bombs.
In addition to Washington providing funds, guns and all-out support for the Zionists, US commanders from the Central Command (CENTCOM), as well as the US Army and Navy have gone to Israel to aid Israeli officials in the ongoing slaughter of Palestinians in the blockaded Gaza Strip.
“The Iranian Armed Forces have received information that commanders of the CENTCOM, as well as the US Army and Navy, have teamed up with Israeli commandants at an underground base in Tel Aviv to supervise and direct the Zionist regime’s brutal offensives against Palestinian people,” Major General Gholam-Ali Rashid, commander of the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, said at a gathering of Iranian police commanders and officials in Tehran on Tuesday.
He added, “This shows that the United States’ measures run counter to its claim of restraining the war in the region as thousands of destructive bombs and missiles have already been sent to occupied Palestine, and directions plus support for ground battles are being provided [to Israel].”
