To the editor,

Early last year, a local pastor and I maintained a vigil in River Falls in opposition to the Biden Administration's illegal and immoral participation in the genocide in Gaza. Aside from an occasional straggler, we were alone for the several weeks we demonstrated. Now I see virtually hundreds of people are gathering to protest the current Republican Administration's actions.

At this point. over 50,000 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, have been slaughtered with full American support. Experts on war casualties tell us that when the rubble is finally cleared, if ever, the count will certainly be well over 100,000 dead.

Where were you, I ask today's demonstrators, when the Democrats were murdering these people? The strong smell of partisan hypocrisy can be detected all the way to the ruined hospitals, schools, churches, mosques and dwellings in Palestine, home to the largest number of child amputees in modern history.

Paul Schaefer, PhD

Veterans for Peace

Hager City