Three weeks ago, Israeli forces shot an American teacher from New Jersey. In the aftermath, Amado Sison told me that while Palestinians showed him “so much warmth and love,” he has heard little from his own government. This despite President Joe Biden declaring in February that “If you harm an American, we will respond.”
Sison, a pseudonym he uses for his safety, was in the occupied West Bank to demonstrate against illegal Israeli settlement activity when he was shot. A State Department spokesperson told me they are aware of “reports involving a US citizen in the West Bank and are in contact with local authorities to gather more information,” adding: “we are greatly concerned when any US citizen is harmed overseas and work to provide consular assistance.” Neither the White House nor any of his home-state lawmakers have reached out.
The US never did anything about Rachel Corrie or the USS Liberty or Hersh Goldberg-Polin. And we can probably add hundreds of Palestinian Americans to the list, but even their names aren’t known in the mainstream media.
It seems the USA capacity to care depends on how much AIPAC will allow it to care.