Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib refused to apologize Wednesday for saying on Tuesday that Israel is to blame for the hospital explosion that day in Gaza, an accusation that sparked political backlash against her from Republicans as Israel denies fault.
Tlaib joined thousands of protesters calling for a ceasefire in Gaza during a solidarity rally hosted by the left-leaning group Jewish Voice for Peace at the National Mall. She was visibly emotional, at times pausing her speech to openly weep and criticizing lawmakers who have not backed a ceasefire resolution.
I think it’s fair criticism . At the very least walk back and reserve judgement until there’s more conclusive evidence. But I think until there’s better evidence, there should be more respect given to the US intelligence community. It was not long ago trump was criticized for accepting foreign intelligence over the US intelligence community. I think it’s fair to criticize tlaib for this as well.
And the thing is, the blame of who bombed the hospital isn’t critical to advocating for peace, criticizing unproportial Israeli response, or other pro Palestine messaging.
Here is the available evidence: https://www.npr.org/2023/10/18/1206795861/heres-the-available-evidence-of-what-happened-at-al-ahli-arab-hospital-in-gaza
This is the best I’ve read on the subject
The US intelligence community isn’t an objective organization with a mission to inform US citizens of what’s really going on in the world. Anything they release is at the direction of political actors and intended to cause some effect. They can be good at their jobs and their released information is still inherently untrustworthy.
So what is the unbiased source that investigated this faster than the US Intelligence community that was not directly involved in the current conflict?
Yes, there are blemishes on the US Intelligence’s history. But a US Politician should have a little more deference you the US Intelligence Community.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/10/18/gaza-hospital-explosion-missile-palestine/
OSINT analysis. Independent analysts using public data very quickly determined that Israel was not to blame.
It doesn’t matter if the US Intelligence community is faster, they’re still not trustworthy. Within the government, hopefully intelligence is just a confidential useful tool to inform government officials, but press releases are political actions.
And frankly, US politicians (outside of the president) shouldn’t be overly trusting of the intelligence community. They’re heavily influenced by the executive’s wants and were (under pressure) a key player in justifying the war in Iraq. That’s not a small blemish, and I’m not aware of any changes that would make that impossible in the aftermath.
So you choose to trust Hamas instead.
How about this? https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/10/18/gaza-hospital-explosion-missile-palestine
No, that’s stupid and you haven’t been reading the conversation thread.
It feels like she is too close to this, and is expressing her passion instead of allowing evidence to be presented. It’s gonna look real bad if things don’t pan out her way, and she’s the one supporting terrorism.
How would she be supporting terrorism?, she’s one of the few in Congress calling for a ceasefire and an end to the violence. Even if she’s wrong and islamic jihad were responsible that doesn’t mean she accidentally supported them. She said the bombing of the hospital was horrific and unless she changes her tone once she realizes Palestinians did it then this isn’t supporting terrorism.
She’s calling for a ceasefire while Hamas has its hostages. Hamas isn’t going to give back the hostages in honor of a ceasefire. A ceasefire, even a temporary one, is a win for Hamas in that it prolongs the terror, and resolves nothing. The best-case scenario of a ceasefire is they wait two months, Hamas jerks everybody around, and then it all starts over again, except now with the babies indoctrinated two months further into Islam.
She’s blaming Israel with only one piece of evidence: Hamas’s accusation. Meanwhile, OSINT + Israeli intelligence made public + US Intelligence all make it clear that Israel was not at fault. She chooses to repeat Hamas’s story instead of looking at the evidence. She is supporting Hamas.
She didn’t just say the bombing of the hospital was horrific. She explicitly said that Israel bombed the hospital:
There’s enough evidence - from third parties, not from either Hamas or the IDF or another invested party - out there that runs counter to the claim that it was an Israeli airstrike that Tlaib should have at least modified here initial statement.
But she hasn’t.
I agree that she hasn’t openly supported terrorism, but blaming one side for something that was very likely caused by the other side, and then completely refusing to acknowledge that once evidence to the contrary comes out is, at the very least, doing nothing to calm tensions.
War doesn’t exist in a vacuum. If you add weight to one side of the scale, the other side is raised. If I have a can of Coke and a can of Pepsi, and I point to the Coke and say, “This one gave me diabetes,” it doesn’t matter that the Pepsi is just as bad, all that matters is that I pushed the blame on Coke.
No one is accusing Palestinians of intentionally targeting the hospital, though, so even if she’s wrong it’s not as bad as you’re saying.