Thousands of pro-Palestinian protesters gathered outside the White House in Washington on Saturday, calling on President Biden to end all military aid to Israel and calling for an immediate ceasefire in Israel’s war in Gaza.
Carrying signs calling Mr. Biden a liar, the mostly red-clad protesters marched with Palestinian flags around the park block where the White House is located. They spilled down two six-lane boulevards, pushing out tourists whose faces showed confusion, anger or intrigue. The police presence was heavy and US Park Police used pepper spray on a protester at least once.
Mr. Biden was not at the White House but in France, where he joined President Emmanuel Macron for a state dinner in Paris on Saturday evening. But the dissenting voices in the American capital highlighted the challenges he faces at home as he tries to carve out a narrow-minded position that both supports Israel’s right to defend itself against Hamas and calls for a quick cessation of hostilities .
The pro-Palestinian activists outside the White House, highly critical of the Biden administration’s response to the war, encouraged a key portion of Mr. Biden’s base — young and nonwhite voters — to reconsider their support for the president before the election falls .
“There is no world that I can confidently vote for,” said Nas Issa, a spokeswoman for the Palestinian Youth Movement, one of the left-leaning groups that organized Saturday’s protest. If Mr. Biden “does not change course and hold Netanyahu and the Israeli government as a whole accountable, under what circumstances would it be acceptable for a person of conscience to vote for him?” she added, referring to the Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
On Saturday afternoon, some demonstrators formed a ring along the mile-long perimeter of the White House fence and unrolled strips of red paper bearing the names of the more than 36,000 Palestinians killed during the war. The others marched along the edge. The format was intended to create a red line that, if crossed by the Israeli military in Gaza, would result in Mr. Biden withholding arms shipments to Israel.
But Mr Biden and his administration have said recent attacks that killed dozens of Palestinians in the Gaza town of Rafah did not represent his red line for Israel. John F. Kirby, a White House spokesman, said the United States needed to see “a major ground operation” – not airstrikes – to increase its pressure on Israel.
“Biden’s red line was a lie!” Read one of the pickets frequently used by protesters.
Protesters who gathered on Saturday to put political pressure on Mr. Biden said their biggest demand was a freeze on all arms shipments to Israel until the end of the war. The United States has pledged $38 billion in military aid to Israel over 10 years.
“We are funding it,” said Alexia Samano, a protester who traveled to Washington from Orlando, Florida. “Stop funding this.”
Law enforcement officials said there were no arrests until late Saturday afternoon, when tens of thousands of protesters ended their march around the barrier. But statues in Lafayette Square, on the north side of the White House, were vandalized with handwritten scribbles reading “Free Palestine.” Two cherub statues were also covered in a red, sticky substance that appeared to represent blood.
And many protesters chanted slogans that some Jewish groups said fueled violence against Jews, such as “There is only one solution: intifada, revolution” and “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”
However, according to one protester, such slogans were not a call for violence against the Jewish people, but rather a broader resistance to the status quo.
“We have nothing against Jews,” said Adam Kattom, a founding member of Peoria for Palestine, who traveled 12 hours from Peoria, Illinois, to join the demonstration.
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2024-06-10 19:16:48
www.nytimes.com
