The impending US elections cast shadows over the ongoing conflict between the Palestinian Hamas movement and Israel in Gaza, as Palestinians hope that the US elections will end the bloody war that has left more than 39,445 Palestinians dead, according to official numbers from the health ministry in Gaza.
A study published in July by the prestigious, peer-reviewed medical journal, Lancet, estimates that Israeli actions since October 2023 could result in over 186,000 deaths in Gaza, with many caused by diseases and other indirect factors rather than direct violence.
The war came after Hamas launched an attack on Israeli towns adjacent to the Gaza Strip on Oct. 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people, according to official Israeli statistics.
Over the last 300 days, attitudes on the Israel-Hamas war have shifted, leading to a surge in activism and protests across the United States, including a large-scale college encampment movement. This growing movement has the potential to influence the upcoming presidential election, as both presidential candidates address the heightened public concern and polarized opinions on the conflict.
For Palestinians, the behavior of Kamala Harris, the current US Vice President and expected Democratic Party candidate, in boycotting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech in the US Congress last week offered hope that someone would advocate for justice and help them end the war in the Gaza Strip soon.
After meeting Netanyahu in Washington, Harris said that she would not remain silent in the face of the tragedies and suffering, describing the past nine months in Gaza as “devastating,” especially regarding the killing of children, and called on Netanyahu to immediately stop the war in Gaza.
Nearly 11 months in, famine, starvation, shortages of clean water and medicine, and unsanitary conditions in Gaza are causing hunger, disease, and dehydration that are already killing many Palestinians and could surpass the death toll from Israel’s military campaign. A ceasefire is an “absolute requirement” to turn the hunger crisis around, says WFP Palestine Country Director ad interim Matthew Hollingworth.
Ibrahim Salah, a displaced man based in Khan Younis suffering from the dire reality in Gaza, expressed hope for real change in the US position under Harris’s leadership towards what he called the Israeli “genocide” in the besieged coastal enclave.
“We felt sadness over the Arab silence during the current war, but the US people and other European populations, let us feel that we are not alone in this war,” Salah said. “Campaigns that tell the US leaders that [the people] will not remain silent, give us more power and more hope that the war will end soon.”
Mariam Kamal, a Egypt-based Gazan woman who escaped from death in Gaza four months ago, shared a similar sentiment.
“When arrived in Egypt, I thought I will never come back to my Gaza City as I believed that Israel will do its best to evacuate all the Palestinians in Gaza, but when I heard Harris’s speech that said she will not remain silent I returned my hope to see Gaza once again once the war ends,” the 26-year-old accountant said.
She added, “I know that the current American generation is aware of our suffering, so they will do their best to achieve justice. Harris also knows that very well, so she will never risk her political future in exchange for protecting Israel.”
Nidal Hassouna, a Gaza-based Palestinian political expert, believes that Harris’s statements represent a “slight change” in the US policy toward the ongoing war on Gaza.
He noted that this may be one of the few times since the beginning of the war that a high-level voice in the US has spoken about “justice” for Palestinian civilians.
Hassouna believes that Harris, who still supports Israel, has no problem criticizing Netanyahu publicly. He also believes that there may be indication that she supports stopping the war, avoiding the occupation of the Gaza Strip, and addressing the dire humanitarian situation in the besieged strip since 2007.
Many Palestinians in Gaza tend to hope that Harris will win over Republican candidate Donald Trump, whom Palestinians consider one of the US presidents who they believe greatly harmed the Palestinian cause.
Hanan Alian, an engineer who was displaced to the city of Deir al-Balah, said she would prefer anyone over Trump.
“We do not have the luxury of following any news due to the circumstances and the power outages since months, but if you ask me who I hope will win, I will say Harris is my favorite candidate,” said Alian, who currently works as a vendor making candies and sweets for families.
Although Palestinians do not know much about Harris, they were impressed by her ability to publicly criticize Netanyahu, the ongoing war, and the catastrophic humanitarian situation in Gaza.
“We do not prefer Trump to come,” said displaced Ahmed Awad, sitting at the door of his tent in the Al-Mawasi area west of Khan Yunis, south of the Gaza Strip.
Palestinians’ preference for Harris over Trump stems from the former US president’s policy towards Palestinian issues, such as recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel in 2017 and moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem the following year. These actions were seen by Palestinians as undermining their aspirations for East Jerusalem as the capital of a future Palestinian state and as a firm endorsement of Israeli sovereignty over the contested city.
In 2019, Trump recognized Israeli settlements in the West Bank as legal, in blatant defiance of international law, and halted US support for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). This action was seen as tacit approval of Israel’s expansion into occupied Palestinian territories.
“We hope that if Harris wins the election, she will put pressure on Israel and put an end to the fighting that has been going on for 10 months,” said Awad, a father of three who lost his home and several family members in an Israeli bombardment of Gaza City last November.
Palestinians in Gaza have expressed satisfaction with the American popular movement and campaigns that were launched to support the Palestinians, such as the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights and the actions organized by Jewish Voices for Peace, and some celebrities like Cardi B and Kehlani who have explicitly called for a ceasefire and an arms embargo on Israel. This, from their point of view, is what caused Biden’s popularity to decline, especially since they hold him responsible for Israel’s persistence in its war on civilians up to this point.
However, Palestinians fear that Harris will not be able to achieve a ceasefire or pressure Israel, especially since Netanyahu persistent resistance to ending the conflict in Gaza.
Nevertheless, some Palestinians believe that if the new US president aims to impose justice in the world, he or she will impose sanctions on Israel or at least force it to stop its war in Gaza and its violations in the Palestinian Territories.
“I cannot imagine Donald Trump would get a place in the White House once again. Absolutely, he will support Israel forever even if Israel commits more and more massacres against us,” Samia al-Alami, a Gaza-based woman, told Reckon. The 39-year-old mother of four lost her entire family during an Israeli airstrike that attacked her house in al-Yarmouk neighborhood in Gaza City in February.
“No one can imagine how we live under such war, but Harris, [as a woman], can put herself in our shoes. For a moment if she thinks about us as humans who need only to live in peace, she will never let Israel continue its crimes in Gaza and even in all the Palestinian Territories.”
In contrast, political analyst Saleh Lotfi believes that a Trump presidency could alter the grim reality in Gaza and potentially end the war.
Lotfi argues that Trump may have more influence over Netanyahu than current President Joe Biden, who has provided absolute support with weapons and money to Israel and visited the country during the war and has recently announced his withdrawal from the presidential race.
Trump has criticized what he described as the weakness of the current US administration that the October 7 attack would not have happened on his watch..
Despite Trump’s public stance against military interventions, his administration aimed to expand Israeli power in the Middle East, exemplified by the controversial Deal of the Century.
Lutfi suggests that Trump “will work to stop the war on Gaza within the framework of a more comprehensive deal represented by normalization with an Arab Muslim country, most likely the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which may make Netanyahu salivate.”
Trump is seen as a favorite of Netanyahu, given their achievements in normalizing relations with Arab nations—the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan—during Trump’s first term.
However, both Lotfi and Hassouna agree that both major U.S. parties, the Republicans and Democrats, are likely to continue their strong support for Israel.
Radi Kamal, a displaced resident based in Deir al-Balah, is still dreaming of coming back to his home in Tel al-Hawa neighborhood in the west of Gaza City.
The 41-year-old father of six was forced to evacuate his area with hundreds of his neighbors to avoid the death. But, he recalls, he had not imagined that his real suffering would start after displacing his house and his city.
“I thought that I would be far away from my house for a few days, but as you see, I have enrolled for the tenth month while I do know if I would survive or even if I would return back to my house,” he lamented.
He hopes for an end to the war and the possibility of returning home to rebuild his life, urging the world to help end the conflict as soon as possible. He said “it will never be easy, but we can [end it] and we can manage our life once again (...) just I am asking the world to help us stop the mad war as soon as possible.”
However, the Palestinian Authority called on the US administration and Congress to pressure Israel and Netanyahu’s government to cease hostilities on Gaza.
Nabil Abu Rudeineh, the official spokesman for the Palestinian presidency, accused Israel of violating all the prohibitions established by international law during its war on Gaza.
Abu Rudeineh called on the US administration to force Israel, its strategic ally, to stop its “aggression” and comply with international legitimacy decisions and international court decisions, and not to give it support to continue its “brutal crimes” while it bears responsibility for everything that is happening in Gaza, the West Bank and Jerusalem.
Ahmed Masood is a journalist based in Gaza.
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