Israel kidnapped three US citizens. Their relatives know nothing about their locations. While the White House and State Department have daily briefing about the Israeli hostages, suddenly Biden and Blinken are dead silent. Why???

All happened during the last two weeks. First, Samaher Esmail, 46, was kidnapped at her home in village of Silwad in the occupied West Bank very early in the morning. She was handcuffed and blindfolded, denied the right to put her hijab on, and was taken to a military jeep to an undisclosed location but not before the soldiers ransacked her house.

According to her family, Esmail returned to her native land last November because she has a hearing scheduled with Israeli intelligence officials stemming from an incident where she was assaulted by soldiers at an Israeli checkpoint back in December 2022.

Esmail runs her successful grocery business in Louisiana and she is being detained on a Mickey Mouse charge of “incitement on social media.” The family said the IOF saw a picture of Samaher on her Facebook account holding a gun at her son's wedding in Louisiana, which is perfectly legal but not in the occupied West Bank if you are non-Jewish.

During the same week of Esmail's kidnapping, another two brothers Borak Alagha Borak Alagha, 18, and his brother Hashem Alagha, 20, were kidnapped in Khan Younis, south of Gaza, along with their Canadian father as well as their disabled uncle. After that, the most moral army beat the crap out of their mom and younger brother. Then the soldiers wanted to have more fun in humiliating the family.

They blindfolded all the women and children in the house, ransacked their home, and to inflict more pain on the family, they slashed all the tires of their car before they left. The Alagha brothers are both Chicago natives. Israel neither made any accusations nor provided any evidence against them.

I should note her that the Elagha family was among several Palestinian-Americans families who filed a lawsuit against the federal government last December, accusing President Biden and Sec. of Defense Austin of failing to protect American citizens in Gaza alleging that the government has failed to protect its citizens. In contrast, nearly 20,000 Americans were evacuated to the US during the first week of the war.

I still remember when On October 16, Gov. Ron DeSantis welcomed the first flight at Miami Interantional airport coming from Tel Aviv that was carrying nearly 280 Americans to be reunited with their families, free of charge. He arrogantly said, Palestinian refugees are not welcome to America.

After 127 days of war, Palestinian-American families feel they were discriminated against and were left stranded in Gaza for several months. After all this time, there are still a few dozen US citizens stranded in Gaza who are unable to get an exit visa to leave, according to the Huffington Post.

Who can forget when VP Harris tweeted when the Russian court sentenced WNBA star Brittney Griner? The VP then said Griner should be released immediately, and tweeted then, "@POTUS and I, and our entire Administration, are working every day to reunite Brittney with loved ones who miss each of them dearly."

What about Borak, Hashem, and Samaher, Madam Vice President? These three have families who loved them, care about them, and want them back home ASAP.

Shamefully, the Biden administration has not expressed the same sentiment or spoke in the same language and tune for Samaher, Borak, and Hesham, who are being held by the IOF on Mickey Mouse charges.

Had those three kidnapped Americans been gay, trans, or black, the Biden Administration would be screaming for their release faster than you can say sticks and bricks.

Mahmoud El-Yousseph is a Palestinian freelance writer and retired USA veteran who lives in Westerville, Ohio. He could be reached at: [email protected]