What with the recent catastrophe in Iran and Gaddafi’s defiant suppression of his rebel opposition, little notice has been taken of a significant change resulting from the pro-democracy movement in the Middle East: the Egypt-Gaza border has been opened.

The Mubarak dictatorship, to ensure that its $2 billion US subsidy kept rolling in each year, negotiated with Israel to keep it closed as part of their ongoing dispute against the Palestinians.

Supplies for basic human needs –food, medicine, and building material- were denied entry since the three-week Gaza War of winter 2008-2009. The Israeli army allegedly used white phosphorous against the civilian population -then, a weapon (like poison gas and land mines) that was banned under international law. Among the 1,400 Palestinians killed during the conflict were 350 children (UN figures). Today, most of Gaza’s housing, schools and hospitals continue to lie in ruins, and malnutrition is widespread among the population.

Armed with U.S weapons, the Israeli invasion was a response, in large part, to the ongoing rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel, alleged weapons smuggling into the region and the 2006 election that had brought Hamas to power (though the election had been certified as open and honest by a delegation of international observers including former president and Nobel Peace Laureate, Jimmy Carter). The UN’s ‘Goldstone Report’ in 2009 documented several atrocities committed by Israeli and Palestinian soldiers during the invasion against each other.

What hasn’t changed in the Middle East –this recent, charged pro-democracy movement notwithstanding- is the obfuscating rhetoric emanating from Washington.

There’s hard evidence to this as well: the United States were the only nation at the UN (in part, an American creation) to vote in support of Israel’s seizures of Palestinian land. One hundred and fifty others voted –no abstainers- to stop the decades-long uprooting, decimation, and relentless persecution of the Palestinian people.

Most recently, it seems the world has stood by and watched as Libya's rebel forces are overrun by Gaddafi's forces and all talk of implementing a 'no fly zone' is talked on and considered and debated with no sum result or action. And now our other 'close allies' Saudi Arabia are diving in and sending troops to Bahrain to suppress pro-democracy demonstrators.

When we so clearly saw that tear gas canisters being fired upon Egyptian pro-democracy demonstrators bore the label ‘Made in USA’ we surely must, at last ask: how do we reconcile the freedoms we enjoy at home on American soil with the support, power and protection we have given to regimes abroad who would supress other individual's rights to democracy?

Send your Letters To The Editor to feedback@thecud.com.au