Meredith Tax: Biden is supporting Turkey’s Bounties on Kurdish Leaders / American silence over Israeli land encroachments and attacks on Palestinians

By Dilip -

In April 20, the State Department renewed multimillion-dollar bounties on three senior leaders of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK): Cemil Bayık, Duran Kalkan, and Murat Karayılan. Bayık and Karayılan are founding members of the PKK and Kalkan is a senior commander. The Kurdish freedom movement sees these men as instrumental in the defeat of ISIS, but to some this is no recommendation. Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan would rather hit the Kurds than the Islamic State. 

In renewing the bounties, the State Department has given him tacit permission to attack Kurdish democratic movements in Iraq, Syria, and Turkey, since according to Erdogan they are all really PKK. The bounty renewals are part of a long history of the United States bribing or rewarding Turkey by facilitating its attacks on Kurds. The bounties were originally part of an apparent deal in 2018 to get Pastor Andrew Brunson, a Christian evangelical preacher, released from a Turkish jail in time to be televised at the White House before midterm elections. In other words, Trump was willing to trade the lives of Kurdish leaders for evangelical votes….

https://www.thenation.com/article/world/kurdish-turkey-bounties-erdogan/

More posts on Turkey

American silence over Israeli land encroachments and attacks on Palestinians

Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), along with several other progressive Democrats, spoke out Thursday to condemn Palestinians “being killed as the world watches” and the lack of recognition by U.S. leaders of the Palestinians’ suffering at the hands of Israel. In a speech on the House floor, Tlaib, who is Palestinian American, said she was “a reminder to Congress that Palestinians do indeed exist, that we are human.”

“And colleagues, Palestinians aren’t going anywhere no matter how much money you send to Israel’s apartheid government,” Tlaib added, referring to the $3.8 billion in annual military aid that Congress sends to Israel. “It is our duty to end the apartheid system that for decades has subjected Palestinians to inhumane treatment and racism,” Tlaib added, referencing Human Rights Watch’s recent report accusing Israel of committing crimes of apartheid and persecution against Palestinians. Palestinians are “still suffering, still being dispossessed, still being killed as the world watches and does nothing,” Tlaib said. …

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/rashida-tlaib-democratic-congress-members-house-floor-palestinians-israelis_n_609dc605e4b0daf2b59f404a

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