• On August 8, Gaza's health ministry said the death toll from Israeli bombardment on the strip neared 39,700
• By January, reports claimed that Israel had already dropped 65,000 tons of explosives and missiles on Gaza since October 7

Arab News Japan

TOKYO: The US ambassador to Japan skipped a ceremony on Friday marking the 79th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki in protest at Israel not being invited.

Rahm Emanuel instead attended a prayer meeting at a Tokyo temple with Israeli ambassador Gilad Cohen and Britain’s Julia Longbottom, who also boycotted the Nagasaki event.

On August 9, 1945, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki, killing 74,000 people including many who survived the explosion but died later from radiation exposure.

The bomb fell three days after the first nuclear bomb hit Hiroshima and killed 140,000 people. Japan announced its surrender in World War II on August 15, 1945.

On August 8, Gaza’s health ministry said the death toll from Israeli bombardment on the strip neared 39,700, with 91,722 others injured.

By January, reports claimed that Israel had already dropped 65,000 tons of explosives and missiles on Gaza since October 7, which was the equivalent of three nuclear bombs, similar to the ones dropped on Hiroshima.

Nagasaki’s mayor, Shiro Suzuki, has insisted that Cohen’s exclusion from the annual event in the southern Japanese city was “not political”. Instead, it was to avoid possible protests over the Gaza conflict and ensure a “smooth ceremony in a peaceful and solemn environment.”

But Emanuel, former chief of staff for ex-president Barack Obama, on Friday rejected this.

“I think it was a political decision, not one based on security, given the prime minister (of Japan) is in attendance,” he told reporters after the ceremony at the Buddhist temple.

The snub drew “a moral equivalence between Russia and Israel — one country that invaded versus one country that was a victim of invasion,” he added.

Russia and ally Belarus have not been invited to either Nagasaki or Hiroshima since Moscow’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

“My attendance would respect that political judgment and political act. I cannot do that in good conscience,” Emanuel said.

Cohen said: “On behalf of the state and the people of Israel, we extend our sympathy and stand by the victims of the Nagasaki A-bomb, their families and the people of Japan today.”

*With AFP