President Joe Biden on Tuesday blasted Israel yet again, declaring, “I am outraged and heartbroken by the deaths of seven humanitarian workers from World Central Kitchen, including one American, in Gaza yesterday.”
He added, “Israel has pledged to conduct a thorough investigation into why the aid workers’ vehicles were hit by airstrikes. That investigation must be swift, it must bring accountability, and its findings must be made public.”
Was there more than a hint in the president’s statement of outrage to suggest Israel’s investigation would be slow, shirk responsibility for the attack, and be kept secret?
Biden then said, “Even more tragically, this is not a stand-alone incident. This conflict has been one of the worst in recent memory in terms of how many aid workers have been killed.”
The president lied. On February 2, OCHA spokesperson Victoria Andrievska reported, “Last year, 50 aid workers were killed or injured in Ukraine, including 11 killed in the line of duty. Since the beginning of the year, this repeated pattern of attacks appears to have intensified. In January alone, five aid workers were injured.”
Now, go search for President Biden’s show of outrage about the carnage of aid workers in Ukraine. I suspect that if they were not killed by Jews, Biden didn’t hear about it.
The Republican Jewish Coalition on Tuesday released a statement titled, “Joe Biden Must Stop Undermining Israel,” saying:
“President Biden, lecturing the Government of Israel, stated, ‘Israel has not done enough to protect aid workers… Israel has also not done enough to protect civilians.’
“Mister President, let’s be clear: 1. Hamas is the party that intentionally and indiscriminately targets civilians in Israel and in Gaza, and 2. Based on everything we know, Israel has done more in this war to prevent civilian casualties than any military in modern history, including our own.
“When the US military botched an airstrike in Kabul killing ten civilians, on Joe Biden’s watch in 2021, he dismissed criticism, offered no apology, and went to the beach for the weekend. Needless to say, Israel issued no statements of condemnation. That’s not how you treat an ally – unless you’re Joe Biden and the Democrats.”
According to a 2023 Aid Worker Security Report, “A total of 444 aid workers fell victim to violence in 235 separate attacks, with 116 killed, 143 injured, and 185 kidnapped in 2022.”
That, too, happened on Joe Biden’s watch. But it wasn’t Israelis doing the killing, so, you know, crickets.
IDF spokesperson, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, spoke with WCK founder, Chef Jose Andres, and expressed the IDF’s deepest condolences to the entire World Central Kitchen family. He stated that the IDF would enlist an independent investigating body to look into the tragic incident.
Andres’ response came in a New York Times op-ed: “Israel is better than the way this war is being waged. It is better than blocking food and medicine to civilians. It is better than killing aid workers who had coordinated their movements with the Israel Defense Forces.”
At that juncture, I, for one, would have appreciated if Andres noted that while all the medicine Israel allowed into the Gaza Strip was delivered, the medicine to the Israeli hostages never reached its destinations. Nor have Red Cross workers been allowed by Hamas to visit the hostages. I mean, Israel’s goal in this war is not to starve civilians, it’s to release its own civilians and remove the existential threat posed by Hamas. And 7 aid workers died by mistake. 1,200 Israeli civilians were burned, raped, beheaded, and murdered intentionally.
If Chef Jose Andres is a friend, as he is claiming, he should acknowledge that.
