U.S. states, municipalities, and public pension funds own at least $1.6 billion worth of Israel bonds combined.
As Israel continues its relentless bombing of Palestinians, raising the death toll in Gaza to over 27,000 people, state and local treasuries across the United States are investing hundreds of millions in the state of Israel by purchasing Israeli bonds. Israel Bonds, also known as the Development Corporation for Israel, raised a record-setting $2 billion in bond sales in 2023, with $1 billion raised since October 7th, as Israel bombed hospitals, destroyed essential infrastructure for water, medicine, fuel, and electricity, and used starvation of civilians as a weapon of war.
Activists and some elected officials in the U.S. have been calling for an end to monetary aid to the Israeli government and purchases from the weapons manufacturers enabling Israel’s assault on Gaza, but few have directed their attention to the U.S. investments being made in Israel through the purchase of Israel bonds.
This post explains how Israel Bonds work, highlights the institutional investors who have recently bought Israel bonds, and shares some history of the human rights activists who have been calling on institutions to divest from Israel bonds.
Universal healthcare: How will we pay for it?
Genocide: Money printer go brrr.
Considering that its not the Federal Government its literally taxpayer funds.
That’s what we’re always told, but that’s not how sovereign fiat money works. We’re always told that because the capitalist class doesn’t want the working class to know how it really works. Why The Government Has Infinite Money
yes the Federal Government does have ‘infinite’ money but not the states/municipalities.
in a roundabout way ig the Federal Government is paying the states on Israeli bonds considering all the military aid.
Israel Bonds had $5.4 billion dollars in outstanding bonds and notes amounting to 12% of Israel’s external debt.
Dollar recycling
Correct. The federal government can print money for states & municipalities, though. Actually it does do that, but we’re to believe the money comes from federal taxes rather than the money printer.
That video is misleading at best, and is itself propaganda (i.e. the thing they’re claiming to object to). It follows the normal narrative of a propaganda piece:
- identify something the reader/viewer wants
- reveal just enough about “how things really work” to help the reader/viewer feel educated
- simplify #2 by pointing at a person/group/institution that prevents it
- identify a new group that will fix the problem
In this case, we have:
- Free healthcare, and other government programs
- Money isn’t the limitation, resources are, and we have plenty of resources
- Capitalists are the problem
- Socialism is the answer
But this glosses over a few things, such as whether socialism is actually viable, what transitioning looks like, and the very real hit to productivity that often accompanies a switch from capitalism (as in, a reduction of resources). A lot of leftists just take current resources for granted, and that’s just not fair.
So this piece tells half the story, but doesn’t explain why we might want the current system over alternatives, or what a competing system might look like, it just riles people up. I’m not going to rail on socialism here, just pointing out that this video is incredibly slanted for appearing as a PSA-type video.
Universal health care isn’t socialism, but of course you’re just here to spread half truth too.
I never said it was, I said the point of the video is to pitch socialism, it just uses universal healthcare as a hook.
He straight up said this is a very brief introduction, and provides links to further videos & articles.
