Two American families of Palestinian origin filed a lawsuit against the administration of President Joe Biden, saying that the government is making little effort to evacuate their American relatives stranded in Gaza, as it did with dual Israeli citizens.
The lawsuit – which was filed on Wednesday before the US District Court in Indianapolis – accuses the federal government of failing to protect citizens in a war zone, and depriving Americans of Palestinian origin of the right to protection stipulated in the US Constitution.
This lawsuit seeks to force the US government to begin evacuation efforts and ensure the safety of citizens “on an equal basis with other civilians in the same war zone.”
Following the “Al-Aqsa Flood” operation – launched by the Palestinian resistance on the seventh of last October and the subsequent Israeli war on the Gaza Strip – the US government organized charter flights to help its citizens leave Israel for Europe after many airlines stopped their flights to Israel. .
The US State Department says that it helped about 1,300 citizens of Palestinian origin to leave Gaza and escape the Israeli retaliatory bombing in several ways, including coordination with the Israeli and Egyptian authorities to transport them to Egypt.
Violation of rights
The two American families suing the Biden administration say that the United States has not taken steps to allocate flights or to help secure the exit of an estimated 900 American citizens, residents and family members who are still trapped in Gaza, stressing that this represents a violation of their constitutional rights.
Reuters news agency quotes Yasmine Agha, who has family stuck in Gaza and helped file the lawsuit, as saying, “There is a lot the American government can do and it has chosen not to do so for the sake of the Palestinians.”
The State Department declined to comment on the lawsuit, but a spokesman said that the department was working to remove more Americans and their family members from Gaza.
The White House referred questions related to this lawsuit to the Department of Justice, which has not yet commented.
According to health sector officials in Gaza, the Israeli bombing led to the death of about 19,000 Palestinians and the injury of more than 50,000 others, and international estimates indicate the displacement of up to 85% of the population of this densely populated and besieged strip, which amounts to 2.3 million people.
