State Department Memo Accuses Biden of ‘Spreading Misinformation’ on Gaza War

Palestinians in shock at Khan Yunis Hospital in southern Gaza after Israeli strikes on Monday. (Reuters)
Palestinians in shock at Khan Yunis Hospital in southern Gaza after Israeli strikes on Monday. (Reuters)
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State Department Memo Accuses Biden of ‘Spreading Misinformation’ on Gaza War

Palestinians in shock at Khan Yunis Hospital in southern Gaza after Israeli strikes on Monday. (Reuters)
Palestinians in shock at Khan Yunis Hospital in southern Gaza after Israeli strikes on Monday. (Reuters)

A memo signed by 100 State Department and USAID employees accused US President Joe Biden of "spreading misinformation" on the Israel-Hamas war and said that Israel is committing "war crimes" in Gaza, according to a copy obtained by Axios.

According to Arab World Press, the memo said that "we strongly recommend that the US government advocate for the release of hostages by both Hamas and Israel" — citing the "thousands" of Palestinians being held in Israel, including those "without charge."

The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs had prepared a report through which it confirmed the commitment to international law.

The army command said that it has a legal department in the military prosecution, whose task is to approve every Israeli operation in the Gaza Strip and to ensure that it complies with international law.

The government’s legal advisor, Attorney-General Gali Baharav-Miara, sets broad lines for the government to guarantee that it doesn’t violate international law.

One of the prominent stances of the judicial departments is that the war was imposed on Israel, and it is a defense war. The narrative adds that the targeting of civilians is happening because Hamas is using them as human shields.

But the Israeli judicial advisors call on the government not to be reassured by this narrative.

Avichai Mandelblit, the former attorney general of Israel, said that Israel should be more cautious and the fact that Hamas committed war crimes doesn’t necessarily mean that Israel responds the same way.



Pro-Palestinian Protest Leader Details 104 Days Spent in US Custody

Former Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil (L) spent 104 days in federal detention after being targeted by the Trump administration for deportation. kena betancur / AFP
Former Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil (L) spent 104 days in federal detention after being targeted by the Trump administration for deportation. kena betancur / AFP
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Pro-Palestinian Protest Leader Details 104 Days Spent in US Custody

Former Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil (L) spent 104 days in federal detention after being targeted by the Trump administration for deportation. kena betancur / AFP
Former Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil (L) spent 104 days in federal detention after being targeted by the Trump administration for deportation. kena betancur / AFP

Mahmoud Khalil, one of the most prominent leaders of pro-Palestinian protests on US campuses, recounted his experience surviving 104 days in Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention after being targeted for deportation by the Trump administration.

"I shared a dorm with over 70 men, absolutely no privacy, lights on all the time," the 30-year-old said Sunday on the steps of Columbia University, where he was a graduate student, AFP reported.

Khalil, a legal permanent resident in the United States who is married to an American citizen and has a US-born son, had been in custody since March facing potential removal proceedings.

He was freed from a federal immigration detention center in Jena, Louisiana on Friday, hours after a judge ordered his release on bail.

The activist was a figurehead of student protests at Columbia University against US ally Israel's war in Gaza, and the administration of Donald Trump labeled him a national security threat.

"It's so normal in detention to see men cry," Khalil recalled, deeming the situation "horrendous" and "a stain on the US Constitution."

"I spent my days listening to one tragic story after another: listening to a father of four whose wife is battling cancer, and he's in detention," Khalil detailed in his first protest appearance since regaining his freedom.

"I listened to a story of an individual who has been in the United States for over 20 years, all his children are American, yet he's deported."

The circumstances of the detention were tough, Khalil described, and he took solace where he could find it to gain the strength to carry on.

'We will win'

"It is often hard to find patience in ICE detention," Khalil said.

"The center is crowded with hundreds of people who are told that their existence is illegal, and not one of us knows when we can go free.

"At those moments, it was remembering a specific chant that gave me strength : 'I believe that we will win,'" he continued, to cheers from the audience.

Khalil said he even scratched the phrase into his detention center bunk bed as a reminder, being the last thing he saw when he went to sleep and the first thing he read waking up in the morning.

He repeats it even now, "knowing that I have won in a small way by being free today."

Khalil took specific aim at the site of his speech, Columbia University, chastising the institution for saying "that they want to protect their international students, while over 100 (days) later, I haven't received a single call from this university."

Khalil's wife Noor Abdalla, who gave birth to their son while her husband was held by ICE, said his "voice is stronger now than it has ever been."

"One day our son will know that his father did not bow to fear. He will know that his father stood up when it was hardest, and that the world stood with him," Abdalla said.