Rep. Jim McGovern deserves credit for expressing, on Dec. 17 to Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, his disapproval of their continued support for what Amnesty International concludes is genocide. In a letter, co-signed with 19 other House Democrats, he observes that “the Netanyahu government has not complied with the United States’ repeated requests to allow humanitarian aid to be delivered safely to innocent people. Under U.S. law, the United States government must suspend offensive weapons to any nation that fails to meet these basic standards.”

Furthermore, he continues, “human rights groups and the U.N. have documented Israeli military attacks that violate international law, including attacks on Gaza’s hospitals, tent communities, schools, and places of worship. These violations should also trigger reviews, and the withholding of offensive weapons transfers.”

Given that Blinken and Austin aid and abet Israelis as they exterminate civilian populations with the intention of colonizing more Palestinian lands, I support our congressman’s effort to enforce the law. These public servants must be governed. When he urges them “to adhere to and uphold U.S. law by suspending offensive military transfers to Netanyahu and his government,” we must — if we are to be a nation of laws, and not of “might is right”— we must urge them, too.

Kurt Heidinger

Westhampton