IPS’s New Internationalism Project director Phyllis Bennis joins the Tavis Smiley Show to speak about Israel’s airstrike bombardment of Palestinians following recent escalations and violence waged by Hamas. She warns of the dangerous conflation of Hamas and other armed resistance movements with Palestinians civilians, which is being used to justify the collective punishment of civilians in the Gaza strip. She calls for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, and outlines the critical need for the United States to exercise its leadership and influence with the Israel government to support a ceasefire.

She warns, “We’re seeing in response to [the horrific attacks on Israelis by Hamas] a massive Israeli war, using U.S.- supplied weapons, paid for — 20 percent of it is paid by our tax money — against the entire population of Gaza, which is 2.2 million people, half of whom are under the age of 18. Children who in their short years of life have known at least five wars already. And now, with this order to evacuate all of the northern half of the Gaza strip, that’s over a million people, Tavis, who live in this overcrowded little scrap of land. They’re being forced south, where there are no possible ways where they can get any kind of support.”

Listen to Tavis Smiley’s full interview with Phyllis Bennis here.