Assad Assad says he and his family feel betrayed.
But more than that, the Palestinian American said his first reaction to the United States government’s decision to continue funding an Israeli army unit that bound his elderly uncle and left him for dead could be summed up in a single word: “devastation”.
“We see this [as] hypocrisy — a US government that allows a foreign entity to have this opportunity to kill,” Assad, 36, told Al Jazeera in a phone interview from his home in the state of Wisconsin.
“They murdered my uncle in cold blood. My uncle was not armed, was not…,” he continued, his voice trailing off. “He was just going home from a night with his friends, his cousins, playing a card game.”
Omar Assad, a 78-year-old Palestinian American, died in January 2022 after he was detained by Israeli soldiers at a checkpoint in his home village of Jiljilya, near Ramallah in the occupied West Bank.
He was forced out of his car and then gagged, blindfolded and dragged on the ground, according to witness accounts and his family. He was unresponsive and the soldiers left him out in the cold at a construction site without any assistance or medical care.
An autopsy later found that he had died of a heart attack “due to the external violence he was exposed to”.
His death prompted widespread condemnation, and the Assad family and Palestinian rights advocates in the US have called on President Joe Biden’s administration to conduct an independent investigation and ensure Israel is held accountable.
Those calls grew louder after the Israeli army said in 2023 that soldiers involved in the incident had been disciplined but none would face criminal charges.
In April of this year, the US State Department said it was looking into whether to sanction the Israeli military battalion that had detained Omar Assad — the Netzah Yehuda Battalion — which is notorious for abuses in the West Bank.
But last week, the department said Secretary of State Antony Blinken had determined that issues with Netzah Yehuda had been “remediated” — and the unit could continue receiving US government funding.
“My cousins and my uncle’s wife don’t want to speak to the media. They are just distraught, and they don’t want to be around any of this because it’s unbelievable,” said Assad, Omar’s nephew. “It’s unjust. It’s just hypocrisy.”
Pattern of impunity
The Biden administration’s decision to continue funding Netzah Yehuda comes amid a surge in Israeli military and settler violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank under the shadow of the country’s war in the nearby Gaza Strip.
Nearly 600 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces and settlers in the West Bank between the start of the Gaza war on October 7 and August 12, according to the latest figures from the United Nations humanitarian affairs office (OCHA).
But Palestinians in the occupied territories have faced decades of Israeli state violence.
They also have come up against what rights groups describe as a system of “endemic impunity” for soldiers and settlers involved in attacks against Palestinians.
Omar Assad was not the first — or the only — American citizen killed by Israeli soldiers who later evaded criminal charges.
Just months after the 78-year-old’s killing, in May 2022, the Israeli army fatally shot renowned Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh in the northern West Bank city of Jenin.
In another recent case, in January of this year, 17-year-old Tawfiq Ajaq, who was born and raised in the US, was killed in the West Bank village of al-Mazra’a ash-Sharqiya when an off-duty Israeli police officer and an Israeli settler opened fire.
Both families are still seeking justice and accountability for the killings of their loved ones.
Ahmad Abuznaid, executive director of the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, said, “It’s frustrating to see the United States not only have a lack of care for Palestinians, a lack of care for international law, but an unwillingness to enforce US law.”
The US Leahy Law, for example, prohibits assistance to foreign military units that commit abuses.
Abuznaid told Al Jazeera there is a double standard at play in American foreign policy: The US government only reserves full-throated outrage for anti-Israeli actions, but not anti-Palestinian ones.
“When the Israelis commit a whole genocide [in Gaza], when they kill Shireen Abu Akleh or Omar Assad, the United States is concerned. When the Israelis can point to something that the Palestinians have done, it’s immediately condemned,” he said.
That difference signals that “the US government views Palestinian people as disposable”, Abuznaid added.
“Their foreign policy has been shaped around an all-out support for Israel, no matter what. And this clearly puts US foreign policy at odds with Palestinians who bear the brunt of Zionism and are currently bearing the brunt of the US-Israel war machine’s genocide.”
‘Palestinian lives do not matter’
That’s a feeling shared by many who knew Omar Assad personally.
Othman Atta is the executive director of the Islamic Society of Milwaukee, the US city where the 78-year-old had lived with his family for many years before retiring in Jiljilya.
A lawyer by profession, Atta said he helped Omar with his family businesses. Atta also would see him at social events in the Milwaukee area, which is home to many families whose roots go back to Jiljilya.
Atta said the US government’s decision to continue funding Netzah Yehuda sends a clear message “that in the eyes of the US government and US officials, that Palestinian lives do not matter, even if they happen to be carrying US citizenship”.
That, coupled with Washington’s unwavering military and diplomatic backing of Israel after 10 months of a devastating war in Gaza, has shaken him.
“We actually see a genocide taking place. We see people are being starved. They are being denied water. They are being bombed into oblivion [with] no regard for any human life,” Atta told Al Jazeera.
“And yet we cheer [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu in Congress. We send billions of dollars in aid,” he said. “It’s very difficult to fathom the depths of hypocrisy, of hatred against Palestinians and innocent people in Gaza. It really shakes you to the core.”
‘We need to find justice’
The US State Department did not respond by publication time to Al Jazeera’s request for comment on the decision to continue funding Netzah Yehuda, or to criticism that the move fails to ensure accountability in Omar Assad’s death.
In a statement shared by media outlets last Friday, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Washington had reviewed information provided by Israel and determined that violations by the unit had “been effectively remediated”.
As a result, under US law, Netzah Yehuda could continue receiving assistance, Miller said.
But for Assad Assad, Omar’s nephew, the decision is not the end of his family’s push for justice.
He described his uncle as a serious man who at the same time would never pass up a chance to joke around and make everyone laugh. “He was serious, but he was always funny with everything he did,” Assad told Al Jazeera.
“He was a good man that raised a large family. He has grandchildren and sisters and brothers that loved him dearly. His nephews all missed him,” he added.
“We need to find justice for my uncle.”
