A senior official from the US Education Department resigned on Wednesday, mentioning President Joe Biden’s support for the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. Tariq Habash was a special assistant in the Education Department’s Office of Planning. He is the second person to resign amid the protest over the US way of responding to the war and the first person of Palestinian origin. He wrote in his resignation letter that he could not stay silent as the Biden-Harris administration has been ignoring the cruelty against the innocent people of Palestine. Habash is an American of Palestinian origin and has expertise in student debt. He was appointed as part of the expansion of student loan expertise under the Education Department of the US.
Previously, 17 members of Biden’s re-election campaign wrote in a letter anonymously that he could lose voters due to this conflict. The letter requested that Joe Biden help with a ceasefire in Gaza. The staffers also mentioned how they have seen a large number of volunteers quit, and the people who have been voting in their support have become doubtful because of this war.
Also Read – Harvard President Claudine Gay Resigns After Allegations of Plagiarism and Anti-Semitism
Josh Paul, a former member of the State Department, resigned in October 2023 because of the way the administration was handling this conflict and supporting Israel despite the atrocities committed by them. In November 2023, more than 1,000 members of the US Agency for International Development signed a letter requesting President Joe Biden to call for a ceasefire in Gaza. However, it was surprising that Biden commented in December that he had warned the Israeli government that they needed to change their policy as they were losing international support due to the conflict.
Matthew Miller, the spokesman for the State Department, said on Wednesday that the US does not think of activities in Gaza as genocide. Israel also refuses to accept the claims of genocide in Gaza.
