Peter Welch: “the Israeli-inflicted starvation of Palestinians in Gaza must end. It must end. I have come to the floor time and again…”

“the Israeli-inflicted starvation of Palestinians in Gaza must end. It must end. I have come to the floor time and again to urge the Senate to take action, to demand a cease-fire, to stop the bombing, to demand a surge of humanitarian aid in Gaza, and to bring home the hostages. Two months ago, I spoke about a young girl who starved to death in Gaza--Jinan Iskafi, seen here--who died in the arms of her father. All those speeches have been to no avail. Tragically, Jinan--and by the way, that name means ``paradise,'' the hope of that family for what they hoped would be a future for this beautiful, young girl--died of starvation, government-inflicted starvation, in Gaza. Tragically, many more young children have followed. Jinan's death and the deaths of so many--tens of thousands of innocent people--in Gaza will become part of our history because the U.S.A. shares responsibility for this catastrophe, and we and future generations of Americans will have to live with that forever. The children who survive this war will be remembered as victims of a unique class of warfare. This is a manmade famine caused by weapons provided by the United States--and paid for, by the way, by U.S. taxpayers. The starvation we are seeing today is not the unforeseen or unintended consequence of war. Let me be direct. The starvation we are witnessing today is the result of a military policy to concentrate the Palestinian population into an ever-smaller slice of land.”