People in Gaza are starving, common humanity compels action - VP Harris

Palestinian suffering in Gaza must end through the increase of food shipments and a six-week ceasefire coupled with a hostage deal, Vice President Kamala Harris told the audience at a special memorial event in Selma, Alabama, on Sunday.

“People in Gaza are starving,” Harris said. “The conditions are inhuman, and our common humanity compels us to act. As [US] President Joe Biden said the US is committed to urgently get more life-saving assistance to innocent Palestinians in need.”

Harris spoke at an event in front of the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, to commemorate the 59th anniversary of “Bloody Sunday” during which state troopers beat peaceful civil rights marchers.

By that bridge, which is symbolic of the civil rights movement led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., she issued some of the harshest remarks a Biden administration official has publicly made against Israel’s military campaign in Gaza to destroy Hamas.

It’s a campaign that the US has supported but has also sharply criticized Israel for the manner in which it is being carried out. The Biden administration has argued that it has not done enough to protect civilians and ensure the delivery of humanitarian aid in a war zone.

US humanitarian airdrop in Gaza

Over the weekend the US began a campaign to airlift food to the enclave which is home to 2.3 million Palestinians, many of whom fled their homes, particularly in northern Gaza to seek safety in the south of the enclave by the Egyptian border.

Later on Monday, Harris is set to meet with Minister Benny Gantz at the White House, where they are expected to discuss Gaza, humanitarian aid, and the hostage deal.

The war has complicated distribution efforts in Gaza, so it has not been possible to deliver food to all of the enclave and the United Nations has warned about hunger and starvation.

At Selma, Harris said, “We have seen reports of [Palestinian] families [in Gaza] eating leaves or animal feed, women giving birth to malnourished babies with little or no medical care and children dying from malnutrition and dehydration.”

She also referred to the aid delivery disaster in which over 100 Palestinians were killed, in an event that involved both a stampede and gun fire.

“Just a few days ago, we saw hungry, desperate people approach aid trucks, simply trying to secure food for their families after weeks of nearly no aid reaching northern Gaza,” Harris said.“And they were met with gunfire and chaos,” she added.

“Our hearts break for the victims of that horrific tragedy and for all the innocent people in Gaza who are suffering from what is clearly a humanitarian catastrophe,” the vice president said.

The Biden administration, Harris said, is committed to ensuring humanitarian aid reaches Palestinian civilians in Gaza, She pointed to the US airdrop of food over Gaza on Saturday and that more aid would be delivered that way, as well as by sea.

HARRIS CALLED on Israel to “do more” to ensure the delivery of aid including in the opening of additional land crossings into Gaza, adding that there can be “no excuses” in this regard.

Israel must also do more to protect convoys and aid sites and well as refrain from imposing any “unnecessary restrictions on the delivery of aid.”

Harris addresses the 7th of October Massacre

Harris also took a few moments to condemn the Hamas-led October 7 invasion of Israel, in which 1,200 people were killed and another 253 were seized as hostages. Some 112 of those captives have already been freed.

“As I have said repeatedly since October 7th, Israel has a right to defend itself. And President Joe Biden and I are unwavering in our commitment to Israel’s security,” Harris said.

Hamas cannot continue to control Gaza and pose a threat to the Palestinian people, Harris said as she underscored that “Hamas is a brutal terrorist organization” dedicated to Israel’s destruction that has vowed to repeat October 7th again and again until Israel is annihilated.

“The threat of – Hamas poses to the people of Israel must be eliminated. And given the immense scale of suffering in Gaza, there must be an immediate ceasefire – for at least the next six weeks, which is what is currently on the table.”

Supporting the hostage deal discussions in Cairo

Harris threw her support behind the hostage deal now under discussions in Cairo.

“Hamas claims it wants a ceasefire. Well, there is a deal on the table. And as we have said, Hamas needs to agree to that deal,” she stated.

“Let’s get a ceasefire. Let’s reunite the hostages with their families. And let’s provide immediate relief to the people of Gaza,” Harris stated.

Such a deal, she said, would also provide a window of time to push for a different arrangement that would “allow us to build something more enduring to ensure Israel is more secure and to respect the right of the Palestinian people to dignity, freedom, and self-determination.”

Her words alluded to a Saudi-Israeli normalization deal that was initially derailed by the war and which the Biden administration is hoping to complete by the summer, which would include a path to Palestinian statehood.

The rest of her speech was devoted to the struggle by those in America for equal rights, including African Americans and women, as well as the modern-day struggle to preserve democracy and voting rights.

Drawing parallels between the struggle of African Americans and Hamas' war with Israel

Those who peacefully faced down police violence on the bridge in 1965, knew they were fighting for a future that was “more equal, more just, and more free,” Harris said.

She recalled how those Black Americans brought together a cross-section of the country to stand with them, including “ministers and rabbis.”

Those who stood there knew that “Freedom is fundamental to the promise of America. Freedom is not to be given. It is not to be bestowed. It is ours by right,” Harris said.

On Monday at the United Nations, Permanent Observer for the Palestinian Authority Riyad Mansour spoke of her speech at a General Assembly debate, as he explained that her words linked the struggle of African Americans for civil liberties with that of the Palestinians fighting against Israel in Gaza and for self-determination in general.

“Speaking to the meaning of Selma, Vice President Harris said, freedom is not to be given, it is not to be bestowed it is ours by right,” Mansour said.

“We say… freedom for the Palestinian people is not to be given and it is not be bestowed it is ours by right,” Mansour said.