This is a special edition of the Wire from JVP Action
Last Thursday, Trump announced that a “breakthrough” had been reached in his so-called “peace” plan for Gaza. But in the days immediately following that announcement, the Israeli military escalated its attacks on Gaza, killing more than 30 Palestinians over the weekend.
That included 18 people killed on Sunday alone, including 33 year-old Abdullah Adnan Abu Al-Tayf, his 29-year-old wife, Abeer Kamal Kazem Anan, their five-year-old son, and their unborn baby, who was reportedly ripped from Abeer’s body by the sheer force of the explosion, after an Israeli bomb struck their apartment building in Gaza City.
The Israeli military has violated Trump’s “ceasefire” agreement thousands of times since it was announced in October — bombing makeshift tents, shooting dead men, women, and children who approached their ever-shifting “yellow line”, and killing entire families in their sleep.
July was the deadliest month for Palestinians in Gaza this year, with over 150 killed in near-daily Israeli strikes across Gaza. But August could surpass this death toll if Israel continues to escalate its attacks — and right now, Israeli leaders have said they have no intention of pulling back.
Trump’s deal was never going to stop the slaughter. The only way to end the genocide is for the U.S. government to stop arming Israel.
No end in sight.
According to Trump’s announcement last Thursday, his “Board of Peace” had reached a deal for a phased disarmament of Hamas and withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza.
But Netanyahu’s government has made it abundantly clear that they have no intention of withdrawing. As they enter election season, far-right Israeli leaders are pushing to continue the genocide at all costs. On Monday, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and Settlements Minister Orit Strouk formally demanded that Netanyahu block an international force from entering Gaza — a move the Israeli Cabinet just agreed to last week in line with Trump’s “peace plan.”
With no end in sight to Israel’s occupation and bombardment, every day in Gaza remains a struggle to survive. Over two-thirds of Palestinians in Gaza are facing “crisis” or worse levels of acute food insecurity, with 10% of the population, over 200,000 people, on the brink of famine.
And still, Palestinians continue to recover their loved ones from under the rubble, sometimes months or even years after they were killed. On Tuesday, Palestinians held a mass funeral for 112 members of two families, including dozens of children, who were killed by the Israeli military in a 2023 strike on Gaza City’s Sabra neighborhood. The strike was one of the single worst attacks of the genocide, killing over 300 people — most of whom still remain buried under layers of broken concrete.
The only way to end the genocide.
Trump’s “peace” plan was never the breakthrough his administration claimed it to be — not just because the U.S. government has no intention of actually forcing the Israeli government to halt its genocidal onslaught, but also because Trump never intended to allow Palestinians control over their own lives or hold the Israeli government accountable for its crimes.
The only way to end the genocide — and to begin to rebuild what has been lost during three years of abject horror in Gaza — is for the U.S. government to stop arming Israel. That’s why for the last three years, our movements have been organizing day in and day out for an end to U.S. weapons and funding to the Israeli military, without which it would not be able to continue its relentless onslaught.
We are not there yet. But we are farther along than our opposition would have us believe. Tens of thousands of JVP members are mobilizing in cities and towns across the country in solidarity with Palestine, including winning tens of millions of public dollars divested or not reinvested in Israeli genocide. This organizing is so thoroughly debunking the lie that to be Jewish is to blindly support Israel that now 39% percent of U.S. Jews say Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.
At the same time, JVP Action is helping elect pro-Palestine candidates to Congress, from Michigan to Colorado to Texas and beyond. We just notched our 8th Congressional primary victory of the cycle, propelling an unapologetically pro-Palestine candidate for Senate to victory in Michigan in one of the most consequential races of the year, and defeating over $60 million in AIPAC spending.
By cracking open the traditional political wisdoms of what Jews believe and who they will vote for, we have helped bring about a sea change in public opinion. And a seismic, undeniable shift in U.S. politics towards support for Palestinian rights is now underway as a result. Next year will usher in the most pro-Palestine elected officials in Congress’s history — and we will be in an even stronger position to escalate our fight for an end to U.S. support for Israeli genocide and apartheid.
Take action: Stop censoring pro-Palestine students.
Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is investigating 10 campus community members for painting pro-Palestine messages on a fence that has been a space for free expression on campus for over 100 years.
Demand that the university protect and continue the legacy of its free speech fence and end its disciplinary actions against the fence painters for supporting Palestinian freedom
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