As the death toll from the escalating crisis in the Gaza Strip continues to rise, calls for a ceasefire have been growing in Congress, particularly among progressives of color. One of the loudest voices urging a ceasefire is Missouri Congresswoman Cori Bush.
For those who haven’t been following the crisis, earlier this month, tensions boiled over after Hamas launched a terrorist attack on Israel — killing 1,400 civilians and kidnapping an additional 212 people. Israel retaliated by bombing the Gaza Strip and cutting off food, water, fuel, and electricity to the two million people who live there, nearly half of whom are children. Over 5,700 Palestinians were killed during bombing raids in the Israeli-occupied territory over the last several weeks, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. And the humanitarian crisis is likely to get worse as the remaining hospitals in Gaza rapidly run out of fuel and capacity.
The Root sat down Congresswoman Cori Bush, who introduced a resolution urging the Biden administration to call for a ceasefire and properly allow humanitarian aid to flow into the region.
“We need to save lives urgently,” says Representative Bush. “Calls for de-escalation alone and compliance with international law, it’s just not enough given the atrocious and escalating violence that we’re seeing...[This] is one of the areas where we could step in and do something about the bloodshed. Do something about the horrific killing of children, women, seniors, and people across Palestine, Gaza, but also Israel.”
Tensions Grow Between Progressives of Color And The White House
So far, the White House has rejected calls for a ceasefire. A National Security Council Spokesperson told The Root, that while they’re concerned about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, Israel, “has a right to defend itself.” President Joe Biden has urged Congress to provide additional military support for Israel. However, he has also brokered a deal to provide aid to Palestinians trapped in Gaza.
White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre went a step further saying calls for a ceasefire, spearheaded by progressives including Bush, Rashida Tlaib, Ayanna Pressley, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, were “repugnant,” “disgraceful,” and “wrong.”
Bush says she’s still waiting for clarification on whether the White House was directly speaking about her and the others in her coalition, but she has a rebuttal all the same.
“What is repugnant and disgraceful is feeling as if there are certain people who are collateral damage, that collective punishment is ok, that if there is an ethnic cleansing to bring about a desired effect, that is ok,” she says. “So if we are what is repugnant and we’re disgraceful, I’d rather be on that side, that actually saves people regardless of where they live and what their skin color looks like.”
Bush says that when she and others worked to elect President Biden in 2020 she had high hopes. “We came out, we hit the streets and made sure that our voices were heard at the ballot box,” she says. “We hoped that we had someone who is going to see Muslims and Palestinians the same way as they see our Jewish neighbors and anyone else in this country.”
Bush and the White House’s dueling comments speak to a growing divide between the Biden administration and progressives of color. As of the time of our interview on Friday, Bush noted that the only people to sign on to her and Rep. Tlaib’s resolution were people of color, hinting at a growing racial and political divide within the Democratic party that could spell trouble for President Biden as he seeks re-election.
Bush Connects Black Lives Matter To Free Palestine
For Bush, a former Black Lives Matter activist, this issue is deeply personal. “I came to Congress [to end] the oppression, the violence, the dehumanization of an entire group of people by the state and state-sanctioned media,” she says. “That’s the basic premise of the movement to save Black lives. How I got started in the first place. And that’s the premise behind the movement to free Palestine.”
Bush doesn’t shy away from acknowledging that the Free Palestine movement, which calls for an end to the occupation of Palestinian territories, and full citizenship for Palestinians, is considered controversial by many. But, she notes that when Black Americans fought against police brutality, Palestinians and Muslims stood beside them. “When I think about these movements, whether it was from Michael Brown all way to George Floyd, our Palestinian and...our Muslim community members came out and hit the streets with us,” says Bush. “They stood with us for no more bloodshed. They stood with us because they understood that violence. And so that same solidarity, we should be able to feel back for them.”
Although the war is thousands of miles away, this is an issue Bush says Black Americans should pay attention to. “We have both in two different parts of the world, been living under oppression and this state-sanctioned violence,” she says. “This struggle for freedom, for our full dignity and humanity, we’re both fighting this fight.”