As a Palestinian-American, I can’t vote for Joe Biden any more. And I am not alone | Ahmed Moor
www.theguardian.com
The president’s moral failure in Gaza has taken on historic proportions, like Lyndon Johnson’s in Vietnam before him

I am a Palestinian American in Pennsylvania, a contested state. I plan to write in “uncommitted” in the Democratic primary on 23 April and in November, I will vote for a third-party candidate.

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For many, myself included, a vote for Biden is simply impermissible – the extent of the moral calamity is so great as to render a vote for Biden a vote for complicity.

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As the president of the Center City mosque in Philadelphia, Mohammed Shariff, said to me: “My vote is the purest form of expression and speech.” President Biden ignores our voices at his own peril, and ours.

  • jhymesba@lemmy.worldEnglish
    192·
    8 months ago

    Here’s some pragmatism for you.

    • Leaving Israel to hang out to dry will open up America to accusations that it gives in too easily to ‘antisemitic’ rhetoric and doesn’t really care for Jews. Don’t think that can happen? It already has.
    • Putin and Netanyahu, despite not being as close today, have historically been close, and Israel is a pretty friendly nation to Russia, with the third most common language spoken in Israel being Russian, and the third ranked non-Soviet state in terms of Russian speakers being Israel.
    • Jews represent roughly 5.8 million Americans, compared to roughly 3.5 million. And Jews, as a whole, lean heavily towards Democrats, with roughly half of those polled in 2018 identifying with Team Blue. And while almost 60%, we’re still talking 2.9 million Jews versus 2.1 million Muslims. Doing what you say you want him to do will lose him many of those 2.9 million votes, and if he listens to the most vocal of the people saying they won’t vote for him, he has to wonder how much of the 2.1 million other votes he’ll get back.
    • And of course, the rest of the Middle East is just WAITING for us to stop protecting Israel. They’ve wanted Israel gone since 1949, and we are the only reason that hasn’t happened. I’m sure that’s entered Biden’s pragmatic evaluation, too!

    How’s that for pragmatism for ya?

    • TheBananaKing@lemmy.world
      75·
      8 months ago

      1: Jews aren’t Israel, and they’re perfefctly capable of making that distiction. The US doesn’t need to equate them.

      2: Great, let’s get all the murderous shitheads in one bloc and fuck them all off together. Not seeing the downside here.

      3: It’s not just Muslims that he needs to win back, it’s everyone on the left with any kind of principles. Including a goodly number of Jews.

      4: 76 years of brutal oppression, but now Uncle Vernon isn’t around to shield them from consequences? Behold my garden of fucks, may’st see that it lieth barren.

    • juicy@lemmy.todayOP
      13·
      8 months ago

      My friend, you just argued that fueling genocide is the pragmatic choice.

      • shalafi@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        8 months ago

        Trump said he wanted Israel to hurry up and get it done. Rather have that man in office? Jesus fuck me you kids are dumb as fucking rocks. Dehydrated, rock hard stupid.