US Politicians’ Theatrics Fool None

Over the years some 57 American actors switched to politics and occupied various positions in the United States’ governance. For the outside world, the most famous US actors-turned-politicians include Ronald Reagan (POTUS in 1981 after serving as the Governor of California), Clint Eastwood (Mayor of Carmel-by-the-Sea in 1986) and Arnold Schwarzenegger (Governor of California 2003-2011).

Interestingly, the number of Indians who at some point in their lives were actors, and also at some point politicians (elected at state or national level) is 147. This is hardly surprising, given that it is the shortest cut to a power in India with lifetime monetary benefits and perks. Moreover, political parties want actors joining them; for using their glamour as vote-bank pullers.

The Gaza Genocide and Ukraine War, however, is witnessing a reversed trend in the US, with politicians indulging in theatrics and histrionics, hoping in vain that their acting skills would pull wool over the eyes of the world.

No doubt a zebra can’t change its stripes, but a snake always sheds its skin. The snake remains a snake, as venomous and perhaps more agile after shedding its skin.

Witness the POTUS Joe Biden’s mammoth contribution to the Gaza Genocide, funding and arming Israel, even at times without approval of the US Congress, vetoing any and every move at the United Nations (UN) condemning Israel, calling for Israel’s accountability and ceasefire in Gaza.

The UN and the International Court of Justice (ICJ) have been castrated. The US has quietly approved and delivered more than 100 separate foreign military sales to Israel since October 7, 2023, using the loophole that Congress need not be notified when certain amounts of dollars are involved.

The gimmickry of food aid, airdropping included, is to lure hungry Palestinians as easy prey to be fired upon by Israeli forces. Biden then presents a sombre face and asks Israel to let the aid go through.

The US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is periodically sent across to Tel Aviv to pat Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the back while Biden portrays the opposite. All this, while US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin, replying to a question by Congressman R. O. Khanna on how many Palestinian women and children had been killed by Israel, admitted during a congressional hearing that more than 25,000 Palestinian women and children have been killed in Israel’s war on Gaza since October 7, 2023.

Biden’s next act was to portray that Netanyahu is out of control who doesn’t listen to Washington any more, including Biden’s most sincere wish for a two-state solution (sic), adding that the Gaza ceasefire is in the hands of Hamas. Vice President Kamala Harris has been roped in to wash off the blood-soaked hands of Biden.

So Benny Gantz, Netanyahu’s rival, was summoned to Washington and met by Harris. According to the Jerusalem Post, Kamala Harris evidently wanted to make a splash bigger than the ones she got while working her way up the ladder at the DA’s office.

She worked on her inimitable ‘acting skills’, and played the compassion card for all it was worth; lapping up applause with trembling voice and feigned concern, but adding that the ceasefire would just be for six weeks.

So far 30,800 Palestinians have been killed and 1.9 million displaced (85 percent of the total population of Gaza) since October 7 2023, by US-supported Israel.

But these numbers are just a fraction of what the US-NATO has laboriously managed to notch up over the decades by invading, bombing, ravaging, plundering multiple countries and regions (including over 250 military interventions since the Cold War ended), which continue to date.

Hence, ceasefire or no ceasefire, the Gaza genocide should be expected to continue, with Gazans exterminated to the maximum possible extent or flushed out as refugees. The plan is to starve those to death who have not been shot or killed in bombings.

Now Biden wants the US military to establish a port in Gaza under the guise of bringing in humanitarian aid while simultaneously funding the Israeli regime's very same policies that led to the man-made disaster.

Earlier in December 2023, Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission and hardcore Nazi women, approved the participation of the Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) in a new science project, named AlrighT, during the current genocidal war against Gaza.

Biden-supported Netanyahu has announced he is going ahead with the ground invasion of Rafah even though a leaked US cable has warned this would have catastrophic humanitarian consequences; with 1.5 million Palestinians trapped in Rafah, an Israeli offensive would cut off all aid and seize an already collapsed health system.

According to Germany’s Kiel Institute, the US has directed about $75 billion in assistance to Ukraine, while dozens of other countries, including most NATO-EU members are also providing large aid packages to Ukraine.

To expedite funds to Ukraine, British Foreign Secretary David Cameron has said, “the UK is ready to provide Ukraine with a loan in the amount of Russia's frozen assets, on the grounds that the Russian Federation will be forced to pay reparations after the end of the conflict.”

Witness the obduracy of first forcing Russia to launch special operations and arbitrarily freezing funds in its Central Bank and now the audacity of suggesting using those funds to continue waging war – typical British way of looting occupied countries ($47 trillion looted from India alone) and then creating an organisation called “Commonwealth”, which should actually be called “Common-Looted-Wealth”.

But the above is only half the story. Listen to actor-turned POTUS Joe Biden explaining that $113 billion or any more amount is not going to Ukraine, it actually is going to American Defence Manufactures, the big contractors - it is a money laundering scheme.

So, do you think the US would worry how many Ukrainians are killed, how much of Ukraine is destroyed, what happens to the environment with tons of explosives used daily and how the degraded soil will sport future crops.

Biden’s next big act would be his State of The Union Address, where he will condemn Russia like hell and shed buckets of crocodile tears over the Gaza Genocide. But the butcher games will continue because he has the arms and oil lobbies backing him full hilt.

Interestingly, Donald Trump has said if he was the POTUS, Hamas would have never attacked Israel on October 7, 2023.

Lt General PRAKASH KATOCH is a veteran of the Indian Army. Views expressed are the writer’s own.