Rep. Jayapal: U.S. Losing Credibility if We Don’t Call Out Israel’s ‘Siege’ of Gaza

Representative Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that the United States was losing moral credibility for not calling out Israel’s military moves in response to the Hamas terror attack.

Kristen Welker said, “As The New York Times points out today, Hamas is actually sitting on a lot of that fuel, food and aid that you reference. Their headquarters is underneath that hospital there. So, ultimately, they are the ones who are depriving the civilians of Gaza of all of those necessary aid items that you referenced. If there were to be a cease-fire, what’s the guarantee that Hamas would abide by it?”

Jayapal said, “Well, look, Kristen. First of all, nobody has any love for Hamas. Hamas is a terrorist organization that has deprived the Palestinian people absolutely of many, many things in the time of their rule. Let’s not forget that the last election where Hamas was elected was 16 years ago. Half of Palestinians are children. They were not part of that.”:

She continued, “Hamas is not Palestinians, and Palestinians are not Hamas. We have to be very clear about that, but humanitarian agencies have been sending aid through approved partners and before October 7, it was about 500 trucks per day. Now, Kristen, since the beginning of this war, we have seen less than a hundred trucks delivered. Israel has stopped the fuel from coming in and being delivered by trusted partners.”

Jayapal added, “I think we have to recognize that this is a double standard. The United States rightly called out Russia for its siege of Ukraine, rightly called out the attacks on the power infrastructure, the refusal to provide food and, water and fuel to the Ukrainians, and we have to recognize that our credibility and our authority on the moral stage is greatly diminish if we do not also call out these, this siege that Israel is launching on Gaza as violations of international law. We are losing credibility, and frankly, we are being isolated in the rest of the world.”

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