Letters From the November 2024 Issue
No mention of genocide… Developer talk…
No Mention of Genocide
I was disappointed to see The Nation’s endorsement of Kamala Harris for president [“For Kamala Harris,” October 2024]. Arming a genocide should constitute more than an incidental detail in a presidential candidate’s track record, especially for a publication with a principled, progressive history.
Harris robotically repeats that she “unwaveringly” supports Israel’s “right to self-defense,” without ever spelling out that this right must stop where Palestinians’ and US citizens’ right not to be murdered with impunity by Israel begins, and that it must not be construed to encompass genocide. On her watch, Israel has slaughtered 17,000 children with our bombs and munitions, not counting the thousands more children who are buried beneath the rubble or starving to death. She has signed on to Joe Biden and Antony Blinken’s policy of defunding UNRWA and allowing Israel to systematically starve children in Gaza, and has refused to hold Blinken accountable for repeatedly lying to the American public about our role in fostering this man-made famine. Perhaps most damning of all, Harris wouldn’t even allow Georgia state Representative Ruwa Romman four minutes out of a four-day Democratic National Convention to describe Palestinians’ suffering in their own words—one of the most fundamental human rights of all.
I can’t bring myself to vote for someone who has the blood of so many children on her hands. Even though the Democratic National Committee has managed to get Cornel West disqualified on my state’s ballot, I am going to vote for him on principle. Harris can get right with God, Palestinian Americans, and the Democratic base by using our clout as Israel’s chief weapons supplier and fiscal subsidizer to pressure Benjamin Netanyahu to slam the brakes on the Gaza genocide and to stop trying to export that genocide to the West Bank, Lebanon, Iran, Yemen, and Syria.
Steve Babb
lawrenceville, ga
Developer Talk
Re “The View From Whole Foods” [August 2024]: Karrie Jacobs’s article on the transformation of Gowanus in Brooklyn does not define what developers mean by “affordable housing.” A recent “affordable housing” lottery in Long Island City, Queens, for example, has set aside eight studio units, with a monthly rent of $3,088 each, for households with annual incomes of $105,875 to $161,590. There is now very little movement into low-income projects in the city. In Gowanus, the low-income projects will be increasingly isolated from the rest of the community. “Affordable housing” does not mean housing that is affordable for low- or moderate-income New Yorkers. It is frequently a euphemism for total gentrification.
Sharon Long
newark, nj
We cannot back down
We now confront a second Trump presidency.
There’s not a moment to lose. We must harness our fears, our grief, and yes, our anger, to resist the dangerous policies Donald Trump will unleash on our country. We rededicate ourselves to our role as journalists and writers of principle and conscience.
Today, we also steel ourselves for the fight ahead. It will demand a fearless spirit, an informed mind, wise analysis, and humane resistance. We face the enactment of Project 2025, a far-right supreme court, political authoritarianism, increasing inequality and record homelessness, a looming climate crisis, and conflicts abroad. The Nation will expose and propose, nurture investigative reporting, and stand together as a community to keep hope and possibility alive. The Nation’s work will continue—as it has in good and not-so-good times—to develop alternative ideas and visions, to deepen our mission of truth-telling and deep reporting, and to further solidarity in a nation divided.
Armed with a remarkable 160 years of bold, independent journalism, our mandate today remains the same as when abolitionists first founded The Nation—to uphold the principles of democracy and freedom, serve as a beacon through the darkest days of resistance, and to envision and struggle for a brighter future.
The day is dark, the forces arrayed are tenacious, but as the late Nation editorial board member Toni Morrison wrote “No! This is precisely the time when artists go to work. There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.”
I urge you to stand with The Nation and donate today.
Onwards,
Katrina vanden Heuvel
Editorial Director and Publisher, The Nation
