By CAIR
Photos: CAIR\YouTube Screenshots
The Council on American-Islamic Relations, the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today welcomed the “principled” resignation of a Muslim Biden administration appointee, Maryam Hassanein, over U.S. complicity in the Israeli genocide in Gaza.
Hassanein is the first American Muslim appointee to publicly resign over the Gaza genocide.
In a letter of resignation posted online, Hassanein, a political appointee at the U.S. Department of the Interior, stated in part:
“I am resigning today from my position as a Biden administration appointee in the Department of the Interior. As a Muslim American, I cannot continue working for an administration that ignores the voices of its diverse staff by continuing to fund and enable Israel’s genocide of Palestinians.
“Marginalized communities in our country have long been denied the justice they deserve. I joined the Biden-Harris administration with the belief that my voice and diverse perspective would lend a hand in the pursuit of that justice. However, over the past nine months of Israel’s genocide in Gaza, this administration has chosen to uphold the status quo instead of listening to the diverse voices of staff urgently demanding freedom and justice for Palestinians…”
In a statement, CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad said:
“We welcome this principled resignation by another Biden administration official who took up their post believing they could help the nation, but instead realized they were becoming complicit in the administration’s enabling of the far-right Israeli government’s genocide in Gaza.
“President Biden, whose administration has lost all credibility on the issue of human rights, must reverse course and end our nation’s complicity in genocide, forced starvation and ethnic cleansing. He must demand an immediate and permanent ceasefire, an end to the occupation and justice for the Palestinian people.”
Earlier this year, CAIR demanded answers from the Agency for International Development (USAID) after a contractor with that agency resigned, saying USAID gave him a choice between resigning or dismissal over a presentation he wanted to give on maternal and child mortality among Palestinians.
CAIR also applauded another in a “growing list” of Biden administration officials who have resigned over the president’s continuing complicity in the Gaza genocide.
Stacy Gilbert, a senior official in the State Department’s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM) announced that she is resigning from her post over the Biden administration’s policies on Gaza. According to the Washington Post, Gilbert sent an email to State Department employees saying a report that Israel did not obstruct aid to Gaza was incorrect.
CAIR applauded Lily Greenberg Call, an Interior Department official, who resigned from her position over continued US support for the genocide in Gaza. Greenberg Call says that she is the first Jewish-American administration official to resign due to the genocide.
CAIR also commended Defense Department intelligence agency official Major Harrison Mann for resigning in protest of the Biden administration’s military and financial support for the Israeli government’s war crimes in Gaza.
In March, CAIR thanked a U.S. State Department official working on human rights issues in the Middle East who resigned in protest of U.S. support for the far-right Israeli government’s genocide in Gaza.
In January, CAIR commended former Biden administration official Tariq Habash for his “courageous and principled” decision to resign in protest of President Biden’s support for ongoing war crimes against civilians in Gaza.
Habash, formerly a Department of Education policy adviser appointed by the Biden administration, quit to protest the administration’s support of Israel’s genocidal assault on Gaza.
Other Biden Administration Resignations:
In April Hala Rharrit, a former Arabic language spokesperson for the State Department, resigned over the administration’s position on the war.
Josh Paul, a former director at the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, resigned after Israel launched its war on Gaza.
