by Mike Whitney, The Unz Review:

If you’ve ever taken a lifesaving course, you know there’s a real possibility that a drowning person will drag you under and you’ll both die. It’s a lesson that should be kept in mind when discussing America’s relationship with Israel. (adapted from)@LarryBoorstein

On Monday, Israel intensified its airstrikes on Rafah, bombing more than 50 sites in the heart of the city. Video footage on Twitter showed plumes of smoke rising from the makeshift encampments and residential buildings where more than 1.4 million refugees are presently huddled in the most densely populated place on earth. Israel’s air campaign was accompanied by a sizable ground-offensive that deployed tanks and armored vehicles to the southern border where Israeli troops quickly seized the Rafah Crossing without resistance.

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The sudden uptick in violence has triggered widespread panic among the Palestinians many of who have already gathered their families and belongings onto carts and buses and fled northward to safety. The opening assault on the civilian enclave is reminiscent of earlier attacks on Gaza City and Khan Younis both of which followed a similar pattern. The launching of random bombings is designed to amplify feelings of terror within the population while the humanitarian blockade tightens the stranglehold on critical food and medical supplies. The objective here is not to kill as many Palestinians as possible, but to force them into sprawling tent cities where they will languish amid the rubble until the international community finds a way to spirit them out of the country. For Israel, the endgame has always been ethnic cleansing, a comprehensive erasure of the native population. The ground invasion of Rafah represents the final phase of that maniacal strategy. This is from an article at the World Socialist Web Site:

The assault on Rafah comes despite the acceptance by Hamas Monday of a proposal for a temporary cessation of hostilities in exchange for the release of hostages. But after spending weeks attempting to blame the Palestinians for the ongoing war, Israeli officials flatly rejected the proposal….

In response to the murderous Israeli onslaught, multiple US officials reiterated their unlimited support for Israel. “We have always made clear that we are committed to Israel’s defense,” said State Department spokesman Vedant Patel on Monday. “That commitment to Israel’s security remains ironclad.” US reiterates “ironclad” support to Israel as Netanyahu launches assault on Rafah, World Socialist Web Site

The cynical and misleading phrase “Israel’s right to defend itself” has become synonymous with the premeditated mass-murder of civilians. Most people have never seen anything as horrific as Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza which explains why college campuses across the United States have become hotbeds of political activism almost overnight. America’s students now serve as the nation’s conscience by opposing a flagrantly-immoral onslaught that deliberately targets defenseless women and children.

Not surprisingly, Israel has yet to produce any hard evidence that their 7 month-long bloodbath has killed even one Hamas militant. Instead, we are expected to believe the unverified claims of IDF spokesmen who have proven themselves to be thoroughly unreliable time and time again. For all we know, the Hamas death figures are completely fabricated like the “40 beheaded babies” or the numerous fictitious rape allegations. All of these elaborate hoaxes have turned out to be part of a twisted, public relations campaign aimed at building support for Israel’s relentless butchery.

In fact, there is no reason to believe that Israel’s operation has anything to do with Hamas at all. Hamas is merely a pretext for corralling the Palestinians and driving them out of Gaza. That’s the real goal.

But while surveys show that a large majority of the global population opposes Israel’s demented crusade, that is not the case in Israel. A recent article by Philip Giraldi stated that “92% of Israelis fully support the slaughter of the Palestinians by Netanyahu and his psychopaths.” Author Norman Finkelstein has largely corroborated Giraldi’s findings but provided more detail in a recent interview on You Tube. Here’s what he said:

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