ISM says Biden ‘hypocritical’ in response to killing of US-Turkish activist by Israeli soldier

US President Biden claimed to be “outraged” and “deeply saddened” by Israel’s murder of International Solidarity Movement (ISM) volunteer Aysenur Eygi last Friday, but his actions, said the ISM, tell a very different story. He is being “hypocritical”, the movement insisted, for trying to change the focus to Israeli settlers, given that it was an Israeli soldier who killed Aysenur with weapons likely provided by his own administration.

Moreover, while Biden described the shooting as “unacceptable”, he is refusing the family’s demand for an independent, transparent investigation and continuing to trust those responsible for the murder to investigate themselves.

“Aysenur’s family and the ISM are clear that we have no confidence in any Israeli investigation, given the Israeli army’s longstanding practice of using investigations as exculpatory coverups,” said the movement yesterday. “We continue to demand a transparent and independent investigation.”

The ISM accused the United States government of the “complete dereliction” of its responsibility to its own citizens by accepting the results of Israel’s internal military investigations. “This is nothing new, however. In 2003, the US did nothing to hold the Israeli killers of US citizen Rachel Corrie to account for her murder. In recent years, the US has done nothing when Palestinian Americans, like Shireen Abu Akleh, have been murdered by Israel. President Biden is pursuing business as usual and allowing Israel to continue to kill both US Citizens and Palestinians with total impunity.”

Biden’s disrespect for Aysenur’s family and community extends even further, claimed the ISM. “Although Aysenur’s family is mourning the death of a US citizen, his administration has yet to pick up the phone and call to offer condolences. He asserts that he will remain in contact with Israeli and Palestinian authorities but is unwilling to communicate with the ordinary people who were closest to Aysenur.”

In his statement, Biden asserted that he treats “violent extremist Israeli settlers” and “Palestinian terrorists” equally and implies that the violence in the West Bank is equally the fault of both groups. “Both assertions are false. Biden’s own administration arms the violent Israeli extremists, as ISM volunteers can testify, based on our extensive experience doing protective presence work in the West Bank face to face with Israeli settlers armed with US weapons.” These are the same weapons that make the US complicit in Israel’s genocide in Gaza, the ISM pointed out.

“As long as the US continues to send weapons to Israel to kill Palestinians, in Gaza as well as in the West Bank, the US is sustaining the violent extremism of the Israeli settlers and the Israeli government.”

Meanwhile, Biden’s “false equivalence” between Israelis and Palestinians in the West Bank ignores the fact that the current violence has its roots in over a hundred years of settler-colonial terrorism, ethnic cleansing and now genocide perpetrated by Zionists and the Zionist state of Israel. “Contrary to what President Biden asserts, it is Zionist colonisation that is the obstacle to peace.”

According to one American ISM volunteer who wishes to remain anonymous, “When I was detained by the Israeli army for my nonviolent work with ISM, everything I saw in the army van was stamped with ‘Made in the USA’ or ‘Property of the USA’.”

Amado Sison, another US citizen shot in August by Israel during one of the weekly demonstrations in Beita, noted that, “The money I pay in my taxes as a teacher, probably funded the bullet they have run through me.”

The ISM is adamant that President Joe Biden and his administration are complicit in Aysenur’s death and his statement attempts to cover up what the whole world knows: “Israel’s violence is funded, sustained, supported and endorsed by the US. Honouring Aysenur’s memory requires a complete change of policy, starting with an independent, transparent investigation and extending to an arms embargo.”

The International Solidarity Movement is a Palestinian-led movement committed to resisting the long-entrenched and systematic oppression and dispossession of the Palestinian population, using non-violent, direct-action methods and principles. Founded in August 2001, ISM aims to support and strengthen the Palestinian popular resistance by being immediately alongside Palestinians in olive groves, on school runs, at demonstrations, within villages being attacked, by houses being demolished or where Palestinians are subject to consistent harassment or attacks from soldiers and settlers as well as numerous other situations.

OPINION: The life and legacy of Turkish-American activist Aysenur Ezgi Eygi: A beacon of hope for Palestine