He who is without sin in war let him cast the first stone at the enemy
The double standards of Israel and the United States
Law Offices of Bruce Fein
300 New Jersey Avenue, N.W., Suite 900
Washington, D.C. 20001
Phone: 202-465-8728; 703-963-4968
Email: bruce@feinpoints.com
October 13, 2023
President Joe Biden
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20500
Re: Israel and the United States are not without sin in the Hamas-Israeli war
Dear President Biden:
Jesus sermonized, “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.”
Hamas has perpetrated unspeakable war crimes in targeting civilians and taking hostages in unleashing violence against Israel on October 7, 2023, in a grisly war which continues with no end in sight.
But where do Israel and the United States stand in complying with laws of war and the United States Constitution?
The Genocide Convention, born of the Holocaust, defines in the crime of genocide in Article 2 (c) to include, “Deliberately inflicting on [a national, ethnical, racial, or religious] group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.”
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Energy Minister Israel Katz collectively proclaimed, “No power, no electricity, no food, no water, no gas. We are fighting human animals, and we act accordingly.” In other words, Palestinian civilians in Gaza will suffer deadly privations which earmarked the Warsaw Ghetto in World War II. No food or water is the antechamber of death.
Israel states its war objective as the “destruction” of Hamas. But it is clueless as to how that goal will be achieved without physically exterminating Palestinians in Gaza in whole or in part, i.e., genocide. Palestinians are not all Hamas members or adherents. Israel is not proposing case-by-case individual evaluations before lethal military strikes but indiscriminate killings, i.e., collective punishment, by presuming guilt by association.
Israel is also violating the law of proportionality. It prohibits military action reasonably likely to inflict substantial civilian casualties disproportionate to a legitimate military objective. Israel has not articulated any military objective in the Gaza war against Hamas other than killing Palestinians. There is no other endgame: no cease fire, no truce, no two-state solution, no curing or alleviating the oppressive conditions that ignited the war. It is killing for the sake of revenge.
Along with Israel, the United States is legally responsible for Israel’s genocide and war crimes because we have become a co-belligerent by systematically supplying Israel with weapons and other assistance to fortify its war against Hamas. Co-belligerency includes the systematic or substantial supply of war materials, military troops, intelligence, or financial support in common cause with another belligerent. You and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin have both reassured Israel, “we have your back.”
The Declare War Clause of the Constitution, Article I, section 8, clause 11, entrusts exclusively to Congress responsibility for making the United States a co-belligerent. But Congress has never declared co-belligerency against Hamas. You are acting extra-constitutionally in making the United States a co-belligerent against Hamas without a congressional declaration.
Neither Israel nor the United States have clean hands in the Hamas-Israeli War. They are imposing double standards to justify serial violations of international or constitutional law.
Sincerely,
/s/Bruce Fein
Bruce Fein
While I respect Bruce's position, I also think that the Hammas has a criminal long history of attacking the state of Israel severally from Palestine soil, therefore, trying to completely extricate them (Palestine) from historic barbarisms would mean attempting to have a bath without getting wet.
The attack on innocent citizens on 7th Oct was needless and evil, it is one too many, there is high need for decisive actions.
I salute Bruce Fein for his truthful remarks at a time truth is held hostage by social media propaganda. He is truly a NATIONAL TREASURE and the very persona of the man I would like to see as the President of the United States.