US should support cease-fire

All the good that President Joe Biden’s administration has done in the last three years will be erased and forgotten by voters if he doesn’t distance the U.S. from the cruelty of Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s blind bombing of innocent civilians in Gaza and elsewhere.

All are cowardly acts of war. Civilians in Gaza and now Lebanon are exhausted by war, and so are we. This is not a question of Democratic or Republican support for the Middle East conflict. It is a question of understanding right from wrong.

Biden and his staff understand very well, as do many in both parties, that the abuse of Palestinians began decades before Hamas ever existed. Voters of many persuasions understand this as well. While aid for Ukraine languishes in the House, Biden approved two sales in December of emergency weapons to Israel totaling more than $200 million.

Netanyahu is very clear. He and his far-right coalition have never been interested in a two-state solution. For all the above reasons, the U.S. needs to stand clearly and publicly in the United Nations Security Council and vote “yes” to a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. This is not a political solution but a humane solution to the deepening need in the Middle East for security and peace. If the conflict is left unchecked, the United States will find itself pulled like quicksand into a war that no voter of any persuasion wants.

Our trail of tears in Vietnam and Iraq should have taught us that lies and war propaganda never work. We cannot afford to repeat those mistakes.