Category: Israel

National Times – The right to violent resistance and a false… | Facebook

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The right to violent resistance and a false Western morality

As for non-state actors, who in the West today would express inhibitions about the use of violence by those who resisted the Nazi occupation of Europe? How many people in 2023 remain squeamish about the extremely violent slave revolts in antebellum America?
In Greece, Cuba, Nicaragua, Afghanistan, Venezuela and Syria, to name only a small number of recent examples, Western governments have encouraged and backed non-state actors to violently overthrow governments with enormous sums of money and gargantuan arms supplies courtesy of their taxpayers.
Most anti-colonial struggles are drenched in violence and suffering. And for subjugated peoples who won their freedom from colonial occupation – in countries such as Algeria, Vietnam, Timor Leste, the Congo, South Africa and Kenya – those who led the armed struggles are venerated as national heroes and martyrs. In some cases they became the political leaders of their newly independent states.

Source: National Times – The right to violent resistance and a false… | Facebook

The evidence Israel killed its own citizens on 7 October | The Electronic Intifada

Collage: Israeli army officer and a destroyed building

Army major admits Israel killed Israeli civilians.

Speaking almost two weeks before the start of Israel’s wider ground incursion into northern Gaza, Major Graeme explained that after the airstrikes “there was some bodies there that the special forces went and collected.”

If accurate, this account suggests that Israel is trying to cover up evidence that – whether intentionally or otherwise – it killed its own civilians on 7 October.

 

At the least the account underlines the urgent need for an international investigation into what really happened on 7 October.

An anonymous group of Israelis has written an open letter calling for an independent investigation. But Israel seems unlikely to allow this, and appears to be covering up the evidence, burying some bodies before they have been identified.

Israel also made no effort to collect forensic evidence from bodies supporting its allegations of rape and sexual assault by Palestinians.

After more than three weeks of claiming that “at least 1,400” Israelis had been killed, Israel on 10 November officially revised its death toll down to “around 1,200.”

Source: The evidence Israel killed its own citizens on 7 October | The Electronic Intifada

White House fears pause in fighting will let journalists see what’s been happening in Gaza – Pearls and Irritations

The White House in Washington DC under dark stormy clouds.

The Biggest Fear is the Narrative will be lost by 4 days of Transparency. Does the cease-fire mean Israel won’t control all movement in and out of Gaza? Will they let UN inspectors in? Will we see an increase in the propaganda war?

This is what Biden feared, according to Politico: That a ceasefire would enable the world to see the extent of the carnage in Gaza, paid for by US taxpayers. “And there was some concern in the administration about an unintended consequence of the pause: that it would allow journalists broader access to Gaza and the opportunity to further illuminate the devastation there and turn public opinion on Israel.”

Tucked away many paragraphs into this report is a sentence that is getting a lot of attention on social media today saying that according to Politico’s sources, there has been some resistance to the pause in fighting within the administration due to fears that it will allow journalists into Gaza to report on the devastation Israel has inflicted upon the enclave.

Source: White House fears pause in fighting will let journalists see what’s been happening in Gaza – Pearls and Irritations

Why are so many Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails? – Pearls and Irritations

Palestinian child with handcuffs on hands Image:iStock

One in every five Palestinians has been arrested and charged under the 1,600 military orders that control every aspect of the lives of Palestinians living under the Israeli military occupation. That incarceration rate doubles for Palestinian men — two in every five have been arrested.

By comparison, in the United States, the country notorious for the world’s largest prison population, one in 200 people is imprisoned. The imprisonment rate among Black Americans is more than three times the overall rate — but even then is a tiny fraction of an average Palestinian’s likelihood of spending time in jail.

Palestinian Prisoner rights group Addameer has described the Israeli prison system as a “complex of monstrous machinery in form, laws, procedures, and policies…designed to liquidate and kill”.

Today, the number of Palestinians currently behind Israeli bars is 5,200, including 33 women and 170 children. If tried, Palestinian prisoners are prosecuted in military courts.

 

Source: Why are so many Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails? – Pearls and Irritations

IDF Knew Real Hamas HQ While Lying About al-Shifa

How can they sell the most sophisticated surveillance equipment in the world and not know where Hamas headquarters are?

Although corporate news media have made it clear they don’t buy the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) claim that al-Shifa Hospital has been a cover for a Hamas command and control center and weapons armory, Western media have failed to report a much bigger story.

The IDF and the Israeli government already knew when they launched their propaganda campaign about al-Shifa that Hamas had no military command and control facility hidden there because it had already found the complex kilometers away.

Source: IDF Knew Real Hamas HQ While Lying About al-Shifa

Opinion | Israel’s Genocidal Antisemitism Against the Arab Civilians of Gaza | Common Dreams

Israel’s Genocidal Antisemitism Against the Arab Civilians of Gaza

Netanyahu’s right-wing government has unleashed a “unifying” genocidal war against every child, woman and man that comprise the 2.3 million population of Gaza.

Source: Opinion | Israel’s Genocidal Antisemitism Against the Arab Civilians of Gaza | Common Dreams

Is Israel Destroying Gaza to Control World’s Most Important Shipping Lane? – Gibraltar Messenger

Source: Is Israel Destroying Gaza to Control World’s Most Important Shipping Lane? – Gibraltar Messenger

50 Israeli Hostages to be exchanged for 150 Palestinian “Prisoners” — Why the Prisoners are also Hostages

Palestinians in the West Bank are killed and disappear by Israel’s IDF and colonizers daily

Israel arrests as many as 500 minors each year, including children as young as nine and ten, keeping the bulk of them in military brigs, and about 150 in civilian prisons. They stand accused of mistreating these children while they are in custody. Most are guilty of sassing Israeli soldiers or police, though some are stone-throwers.

These people have been effectively kidnapped by the Israeli state and are hostages, not prisoners.

Source: 50 Israeli Hostages to be exchanged for 150 Palestinian “Prisoners” — Why the Prisoners are also Hostages

There has been much talk of war crimes in the Israel-Gaza conflict. But will anyone actually be prosecuted?

If the battle of the narratives travels at the speed of light truth and justice travel at snails pace. The Dutch archives of accused Nazi collaborators will only be opened in 2025. That’s 75 years after the war and some 38 years after Israeli investigators presented the truth hidden by the Dutch. They destroyed the myth that the Dutch protected their Jews. But, the identities of the accused have still remained protected for another 40 years .

There is a growing inevitability that war crimes arising from the Gaza conflict will be prosecuted either nationally or internationally. The wheels of international justice do, however, turn slowly.

Source: There has been much talk of war crimes in the Israel-Gaza conflict. But will anyone actually be prosecuted?

Israeli strike kills three journalists near Lebanon border | Israel-Palestine conflict News | Al Jazeera

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Al Mayadeen TV said an Israeli attack ‘deliberately’ targeted its correspondent Farah Omar and cameraman Rabih Me’mari.

Source: Israeli strike kills three journalists near Lebanon border | Israel-Palestine conflict News | Al Jazeera

No water, no food, no privacy | The Electronic Intifada

Fact Not Fiction

Forcibly displaced by Israel, almost 900,000 Palestinians are sheltering in UNRWA facilities in Gaza.

Source: No water, no food, no privacy | The Electronic Intifada

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu says war against Hamas will not stop after cease-fire – Victoria Times Colonist

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JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel and Hamas on Tuesday appeared close to a deal to temporarily halt their devastating six-week war for dozens of hostages being held in the Gaza Strip to be freed in exchange for Palestinians in Israeli prisons.

Source: Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu says war against Hamas will not stop after cease-fire – Victoria Times Colonist

Americans are Bankrolling Israel’s Unfolding Genocide in Gaza | The Smirking Chimp

It is the job of journalists to warn against abuse, exploitation, and corruption, and to shine a light on power so that an informed citizenry can decide on the course of its government. Many journalists are indeed speaking out against sidestepping the responsibility to report on genocide. More than a thousand have signed on to a letter saying they “hold Western newsrooms accountable for dehumanizing rhetoric that has served to justify ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.”

That ethnic cleansing is in full force. CCR’s lawsuit is seeking an injunction to immediately block U.S. tax dollars from supporting Israel’s war in a concrete effort to block the genocide, or at least wash the stain of Palestinian blood off American hands. Meanwhile, public support for U.S. aid to Israel has dropped, with more Americans now opposed to the military assistance than supporting it according to a Reuters-Ipsos poll. Nearly 70 percent support a ceasefire.

Source: Americans are Bankrolling Israel’s Unfolding Genocide in Gaza | The Smirking Chimp

The Israeli Right Wing’s Genocidal Dream of the “River to the Sea”

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu has been openly championing an Israel “from the river to the sea.”

And while ceasefire rallies composed of Palestinians and other supporters, including Jews, have aspirationally chanted “from the river to the sea,” Netanyahu, his cabinet, and religious zealots have been actualizing just such a reality through actions taken and statements made on behalf of the Jewish state. It is an insidious, catastrophic irony, generally ignored by the US press.

Source: The Israeli Right Wing’s Genocidal Dream of the “River to the Sea”

Antisemitism and criticism of Israel: open letter to Julian Leeser MP – Pearls and Irritations

An open letter, sent to the Hon Julian Leeser MP, in response to his comments reported in the Sydney Morning Herald on November 17, 2023.

You say anti-Zionism is a cover for antisemitism. Let me tell you why your view is wrong. The constant desire for Israel to expand beyond its accepted 1967 borders appears to be driven by a political, nationalistic ideology which the perpetrators describe as Zionism. Yasser Arafat agreed to the State of Israel based on the 1967 borders. The current Netanyahu government makes no secret of the fact that their version of Zionism forbids them to cede Palestinians the right to one inch of land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean. If the nationalistic, colonialist ideology of Zionism cannot be singled out, the alternative is quite damning. The only other conclusion is that the state of Israel cannot exist without the continued suppression and ultimate annihilation of the Palestinian people. That is not a conclusion I personally wish to draw. I want to believe the state of Israel is at heart a genuine democracy with liberal values and commitment to live under international law. It is my contention that the State of Israel is corrupted by Zionism and is in the process of making itself a pariah state.

Israel has every right to defend its internationally recognised 1967 borders, but it has no right to defend the annexation of other lands or the perpetual siege of 2.3 million people.

This brings us to the current situation in Gaza.

Source: Antisemitism and criticism of Israel: open letter to Julian Leeser MP – Pearls and Irritations

ADL Data on Rise of Anti-Semitic Incidents Doesn’t Add Up – scheerpost.com

ADL Data on Rise of Anti-Semitic Incidents Doesn’t Add Up A new report from the ADL claims that anti-Semitic incidents across the US have skyrocketed by more than 400%. But as Alan Macleod reveals, the numbers do not add up unless one equates opposition to Israel’s bombardment of Gaza with hatred of Jews.

Source: ADL Data on Rise of Anti-Semitic Incidents Doesn’t Add Up – scheerpost.com

Australian peak bodies condemn allegations against UN Rapporteur Francesca Albanese – Pearls and Irritations

UN Special Rapporteur for Palestinian Human Rights Francesca Albanese addresses the National Press Club in Canberra, Tuesday, November 14, 2023. Image: AAP /Lukas Coch

The Australian Friends of Palestine Association (AFOPA) and the Australia Palestine Advocacy Network (APAN) condemn the statement circulated by the Australia Israel and Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC) in response to the National Press Club address by the visiting UN Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, Francesca Albanese. The UN Human Rights Council appointed Ms Albanese to this function in April 2022 for a six-year term.

Ms Albanese is an anti-Semite, or spouts anti-Semitic tropes is slanderous and completely rejected. Criticism of Israel is not anti-Semitic. Her lifelong efforts for human rights and justice have been endorsed by numerous members of the global Jewish community, both overseas and in Israel. As Professor Avi Shlaim remarked, “The three main pillars of Judaism are truth, justice, and peace. Ms. Albanese personifies these values to a remarkably high degree. And there will be many Jews worldwide, disturbed by Israel’s departure from these core Jewish values, who may have reason to thank her for upholding them.”

Many other prominent Jewish scholars have vehemently defended the Special Rapporteur against these unfounded accusations.

AFOPA understands that the overall thrust of AIJAC’s statement is to discredit Ms Albanese and her integrity and to cast doubt on her ability to fulfil her UN role as a Special Rapporteur.

AFOPA and APAN will recommend Ms Albanese seek legal advice to protect herself from this manifest and grave incidence of defamation as soon as possible.

Source: Australian peak bodies condemn allegations against UN Rapporteur Francesca Albanese – Pearls and Irritations

The “Human Shields” Defense of Bombing Gaza’s Civilians Is Morally Bankrupt

A more revealing justification was offered a few days ago by a former Israeli intelligence chief being interviewed by Anderson Cooper. “The noncombatant population in the Gaza strip is really a nonexistent term,” he told Cooper, “because all of the Gazans voted for Hamas, and as we have seen on seventh of October, most of the population in the Gaza strip are Hamas.” He followed this up with a supremely unconvincing reassurance that the IDF was treating Gazan civilians as if they were real civilians anyway, but the transparent purpose of his statement was to justify killing them.

Source: The “Human Shields” Defense of Bombing Gaza’s Civilians Is Morally Bankrupt

Slaughter in Gaza Continues on World Children’s Day

Father Jamil Al-Agha cradles his 5-year-old son killed in airstrikes

As of Monday, World Children’s Day, Israel’s six-week war on the Gaza Strip has killed at least 5,500 Palestinian children and threatens the lives of about a million more who are enduring the Israeli bombardment and raids of homes, schools, and hospitals.

“An additional 1,800 children are missing under the rubble, most of them presumed dead,” the outlet noted. “A further 9,000 children have been injured, many with life-changing consequences. Many of these children have lived through the trauma of multiple wars.”

Ramez al-Sury’s family was sheltering at the Saint Porphyrius Greek Orthodox Church compound in Gaza when it was hit in an Israeli airstrike on October 19. He told Amnesty International that “my heart died with my children that evening. All my children were killed: Majid, 11, Julie, 12, and Suhail, 14. I have nothing left. I should have died with my children.”

“The church was full of peaceful people, only peaceful people,” he added. “There is nowhere safe in Gaza during this war. Bombardments everywhere, day and night. Every day, more and more civilians are killed. We pray for peace, but our hearts are broken.”

Source: Slaughter in Gaza Continues on World Children’s Day

Rape, ISIS, Mein Kampf and other Lies: How Israel Lost All Credibility  – CounterPunch.org

Never has Israeli propaganda failed so astoundingly and never has the mainstream media failed to shield Israel from the global anger – in fact, seething hatred – for Israel’s ugly apartheid regime. The repercussions of all of this will most certainly impact the way that history will remember the Israeli war on Gaza, which has, so far, killed, and wounded tens of thousands of innocent civilians.

A whole generation, if not more, has already built a perception of Israel as a genocidal regime and no number of future lies, Hollywood movies or Maxim Magazine spreads will ever lessen that in any way.

More importantly, this new perception is likely to compel people, not only to re-examine their views of Israel’s present and future, but of the past as well – the very foundation of the Zionist regime, itself predicated on nothing but lies.

On Saturday, November 11, Israeli military spokesman Daniel Hagari claimed in a press conference that Israel had killed a “terrorist” who had prevented 1,000 civilians from escaping the Shifa Hospital.

The allegations made little sense. Even by the standards of Israeli propaganda, falsifying such a piece of information while providing no context and no evidence, further contributes to the deteriorating credibility of Israel in international media and image worldwide.

Just one day earlier, an unnamed US official was cited by CNN as saying, in a diplomatic cable, “we are losing badly on the messaging battlespace”.

The diplomat was referring to American reputation in the Middle East – in fact, worldwide – which now lies in tatters due to blind American support for Israel.

Source: Rape, ISIS, Mein Kampf and other Lies: How Israel Lost All Credibility  – CounterPunch.org

‘Nowhere Safe in Gaza’ as Evidence of Israeli War Crimes Mounts

Injured Palestinians, including children, are taken to Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital

Amnesty investigators visited the sites of the bombings, Saint Porphyrius Greek Orthodox Church in Gaza City and a home in al-Nuseirat refugee camp near Deir al-Balah, and interviewed 14 people, including nine survivors of the attacks and two other witnesses. The group’s Crisis Evidence Lab also analayzed satellite imagery and and audiovisual material.

The two bombings, which killed a total of 46 civilians, including 20 children, “were indiscriminate attacks or direct attacks on civilians or civilian objects, which must be investigated as war crimes,” said Amnesty.

Source: ‘Nowhere Safe in Gaza’ as Evidence of Israeli War Crimes Mounts

Antony Loewenstein: Israel Is Testing New Weapons on Gaza as Arms Dealers Profit from Gaza War | Democracy Now!

How Israel Exports the Technology of Occupation Around the World. Loewenstein explains that Israel’s military-industrial complex has used the Occupied Palestinian Territories for decades as a testing ground for weaponry and surveillance technology that it then exports around the world for profit. “You find in over 130 countries across the globe in the last decades, Israel has sold … a range of tools of occupation and repression that have initially been tested in Palestine on Palestinians,” Loewenstein says.

https://www.democracynow.org/2023/11/14/israel_weapons?jwsource=cl

Worldwide protests calling for a ceasefire are drawing attention to the role of weapons manufacturers and distributors supplying machinery to Israel’s assault on Gaza, with demonstrators blocking shipping tankers and entrances to weapons factories, and unionized workers refusing to handle military materiel over the war in Gaza. There is “a growing public awareness and anger” about the global connection between Western powers and the Israeli military industry, says Antony Loewenstein, who has investigated how Israeli weaponry and surveillance technology are used on Palestinians and exported around the world. “Israel is already, as we speak … live-testing new weapons in Gaza,” says Loewenstein. He also discusses what he characterizes as the “intelligence” and “political” failures of the October 7 Hamas incursion.

Source: Antony Loewenstein: Israel Is Testing New Weapons on Gaza as Arms Dealers Profit from Gaza War | Democracy Now!

Israeli helicopter shot civilians at 7 October rave, police find | The Electronic Intifada

Burned out, overturned bus lies amid debris and trees

The Israeli information seems to be proven false at every turn. Israeli helicopter pilots are trained to shoot Civilians not identify them. It’s the Hannibal Directive Israel said was canceled. They are bombing the sites they claim are where the hostages are held as well. They prefer the hostages aren’t returned because they believe it supports the annihilation of Gaza and the West Bank

An Israeli military helicopter shot civilians at the Supernova rave where Israel says 364 people were killed on 7 October.

Source: Israeli helicopter shot civilians at 7 October rave, police find | The Electronic Intifada

The most successful military raid of this century: the October 7 Hamas assault on Israel – Pearls and Irritations

Gaza envelope after coordinated surprise offensive on Israel.

The problem with the Israeli claims is that they are demonstrably false or misleading. Nearly a third of the Israeli casualties consisted of military, security, and police officers. Moreover, it turns out that the number one killer of Israelis on October 7 wasn’t Hamas or other Palestinian factions, but the Israeli military itself. Recently released video shows Israeli Apache helicopters indiscriminately firing on Israeli civilians trying to flee the Supernova Sukkot Gathering held in the open desert near Kibbutz Re’im, the pilots unable to distinguish between the civilians and the Hamas fighters. Many of the vehicles that the Israeli government has shown as an example of Hamas perfidy were destroyed by the Israeli Apache helicopters.

Source: The most successful military raid of this century: the October 7 Hamas assault on Israel – Pearls and Irritations

Heavy fighting in north Gaza after hostage deal denied

People mourn as they collect the bodies of Palestinians killed in airstrikes on Sunday at Khan Yunis, Gaza.

Fighting is raging between Hamas militants and Israeli forces in parts of north Gaza and Israeli air strikes have killed dozens of Palestinians in the enclave’s centre, witnesses say, as a report of a tentative hostage release deal has been denied.

Source: Heavy fighting in north Gaza after hostage deal denied

This Evangelical Company Believes That Finding Oil in Israel Is Part of God’s Plan | The Smirking Chimp

But there is sure as hell Gas in Gaza

Far-right white evangelical Christian fundamentalists have a complex relationship with Israel.

On one hand, they consider themselves very pro-Israel. On the other hand, their severe, dogmatic, ultra-strict interpretation of the New Testament teaches that Jews and other non-Christians will be condemned to eternal damnation unless they convert to fundamentalist Christianity before they die.

Many Catholics and Mainline Protestants, in contrast, have interfaith activities with synagogues and have agreed to disagree with Jewish allies over whether or not Jesus is the Messiah. The modern-day Vatican, in fact, even has a policy against proselytizing to Jews, although atheists and agnostics are considered fair game for conversion.

Source: This Evangelical Company Believes That Finding Oil in Israel Is Part of God’s Plan | The Smirking Chimp

Netanyahu is prolonging the war to save his life’s mission

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant visit at an army base near the occupied West Bank city of Jenin, July 4, 2023. (Shir Torem/Flash90)

Netanyahu may have expected that a massive assault on Gaza would improve his political standing with the Israeli public, but the exact opposite has happened.

It’s hardly the first time this has happened in Israeli history: Menachem Begin was forced to resign a year after the 1982 Lebanon War, and Ehud Olmert was deposed in great part due to the 2006 Lebanon War.

in Netanyahu’s eyes, the bigger threat to Israel, and the bigger threat to Zionism’s historical purpose, is a political process with the Palestinians, at the end of which a different political entity — besides the Jewish State of Israel — can be established between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. And if Israel has to keep fighting to prevent this threat, and if it has to forever live by the sword to block this possibility, so be it. A century ago, this was Ze’ev Jabotinsky’s Iron Wall. Now, this is Benjamin Netanyahu’s Iron Wall.

Source: Netanyahu is prolonging the war to save his life’s mission

Young people in the West stand in solidarity for a Gaza ceasefire

Israel’s latest bombing campaign shows absolutely no signs of letting up anytime soon, they’ve firmly rebuked diplomatic efforts to impose a ceasefire and with every passing day it only looks more and more likely that the Israeli military will soon begin a full-scale ground invasion of the Gaza Strip.

Source: Young people in the West stand in solidarity for a Gaza ceasefire

Craig Murray: Activating the Genocide Convention

There are 149 states party to the Genocide Convention. Every one of them has the right to call out the genocide in progress in Gaza and report it to the United Nations.

In the event that another state party disputes the claim of genocide — and Israel, the United States and the United Kingdom are all states party — then the International Court of Justice is required to adjudicate on “the responsibility of a State for genocide.”

These are the relevant articles of the genocide convention:

There is no room to doubt that Israel’s bombing of Palestinian civilians and depriving them of food, water and other necessities of life are grounds to invoke the 1948 Genocide Convention.

Source: Craig Murray: Activating the Genocide Convention

Things the Zionist media doesn’t say about Hamas

Things mainstream media does not say about Hamas

Hamas is the officially democratically elected government in the Gaza Strip. Jimmy Carter was present during the elections and stated that they were free and fair

Source: Things the Zionist media doesn’t say about Hamas

When is genocide ever balanced? – Pearls and Irritations

Palestine vs Israel flag on cracked wall. Israel and Palestine war concept

This war didn’t begin on 7th of October and it isn’t Religious

Now, Israel justifies its indiscriminate attacks on Gaza by demanding return of the 230 hostages, military and civilian, captured by Hamas on 7 October (the 50th anniversary of Yom Kippur war). But between 6000 and 7000 (Scott Ritter says 10000) Palestinians are in jail in Israel, and Hamas won’t give the hostages up without their release. Political and military leaders in Israel have repeatedly stated their intention to rid Gaza of all 2.23 million Palestinians, either by forced emigration to Sinai, or by death.

‘Balance’ between supporters of Israel and of the Palestinians is what most police and State governments in Australia say they seek. So does the ABC. But what’s happening in Gaza isn’t balanced: it is asymmetric warfare.

Source: When is genocide ever balanced? – Pearls and Irritations

Chris Hedges: Israel is Shutting Down its Human Laboratory in Gaza – scheerpost.com

The Palestinians are human laboratory rats to the Israeli military, intelligence services and arms and technology industries. Israel’s drones, surveillance technology — including spyware, facial recognition software and biometric gathering infrastructure — along with smart fences, experimental bombs and AI-controlled machine guns, are tried out on the captive population in Gaza, often with lethal results. These weapons and technologies are then certified as “battle tested” and sold around the world.

Source: Chris Hedges: Israel is Shutting Down its Human Laboratory in Gaza – scheerpost.com

‘We Are Too Humane. Burn Gaza Now,’ Says Senior Israeli Lawmaker

Israeli Deputy Knesset Speaker Nissim Vaturi delivers a speech beside an Israeli flag

The Israeli leadership has made thousands of genocidal statements. Netanyahu, his Ministers, and Rabbis have all stood in line to publicly declare Palestinians should be wiped off the face of the earth, and their children killed like rats. We have heard it all before and fought a world war against exactly that mindset that’s become Israel’s State policy. We didn’t advocate the killing of all Germans in an act of revenge neither did the Jews. Even the one-time survivors of the holocaust didn’t advocate genocide. But now some Israeli judeo-zionists have adopted the same mindset their parents and grandparents along with the rest of the world once fought against.

https://normanfinkelstein.substack.com/p/fighting-amalek-in-gaza-what-israelis

Deputy Knesset Speaker Nissim Vaturi is one of many Israeli leaders who have made genocidal statements against Palestinians

Source: ‘We Are Too Humane. Burn Gaza Now,’ Says Senior Israeli Lawmaker

Is Israel deliberately Starving the Palestinians of Gaza? WFP Warns of Immediate Possibility of Man-made Famine

The deprivation of food, water, fuel, electricity, and medical equipment to civilians is Genocide, a Crime against Humanity, and a War Crime being waged by a judeo-Fascist regime.

WFP says, “The collapse of food supply chains is a catastrophic turning point in an already dire situation, where people have been stripped of basic necessities”, said Samer Abdeljaber, Representative and Country Director in Palestine. “Without access to fuel, our ability to provide bread or transport food to those in need has been severely compromised, essentially bringing life in Gaza to a standstill. People are going hungry.”

Source: Is Israel deliberately Starving the Palestinians of Gaza? WFP Warns of Immediate Possibility of Man-made Famine

Opinion | Hamas Didn’t Attack Israelis Because They Are Jewish | Common Dreams

Peace protesters flood Grand Central Station in New York to call for a Gaza cease-fire.

We need a basic analysis of power and history to understand that Hamas’ attacks on Israeli civilians, while egregious, had nothing to do with those Israelis’ religion and everything to do with occupation and settler colonialism.

Source: Opinion | Hamas Didn’t Attack Israelis Because They Are Jewish | Common Dreams

Is criticism of Israeli settlement policy anti-Semitic? Israeli nationalists insist it is – Pearls and Irritations

Israel and Palestine flags on cracked wall

Calling out China for its persecution of Uighurs is not to be a Sinophobic racist. Calling out Myanmar for its crimes against Rohingya people is not to be anti-Buddhist. Calling out Saudi Arabia and Egypt for their murder and suppression of dissidents is not to be Islamophobic or anti-Arab. And calling out Israel for its sabotage of the two-state solution and creation of a de facto apartheid state is not to be anti-Semitic.

Source: Is criticism of Israeli settlement policy anti-Semitic? Israeli nationalists insist it is – Pearls and Irritations

Probe Demanded Over ‘Absurd’ Israeli Narrative About Gaza’s Al-Shifa Hospital

Pro-Palestinian protesters holding Palestinian flags

“Israel needs to offer the outside world more than a few rifles and other armaments to justify its attacks on Gaza’s hospitals and ill and injured civilians,” said Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor.

Source: Probe Demanded Over ‘Absurd’ Israeli Narrative About Gaza’s Al-Shifa Hospital

Israeli Communist Leader: The Netanyahu Government Has No Answers

The Israeli Communist Party, one of the oldest left-wing parties in Israel, is calling for an immediate cease-fire in the country’s war on Gaza. We spoke with a party leader about the war, the domestic political situation in Israel, and what comes next.

There are serious dangers, such as a regional war resulting in a world war and an increase in attacks on innocent people and ethnic cleansing in Gaza and the West Bank. There is also the danger of increasing racism and fascism and the transformation of Israel into a completely fascist state.

Source: Israeli Communist Leader: The Netanyahu Government Has No Answers

Gaza – What is the end game? – Pearls and Irritations

Blue UN helmets waiting for their deployment.

In recent weeks some frightening possibilities have come to the world’s attention. The Israeli newspaper Haaretz has noted plans, by some, for high density Jewish cities in the Gaza Strip. Such plans call for total destruction and mass expulsion in Gaza.

Source: Gaza – What is the end game? – Pearls and Irritations

Sandy Tolan: Humanity Has Failed Gaza – scheerpost.com

Tolan also draws from his reporting experience, describing an assignment to cover the water crisis in Gaza where, “97% of the water… was not fit for human consumption,” to exemplify the harsh reality on the ground. The 2006 blockade that saw food, water and electricity become tightly controlled is also discussed as one of the elements that paints Gaza as an “open air prison.”

“If it continues the way it is, it’s hard to imagine there not being another person arising from this terrible rubble and growing up with a lifelong resentment and hatred towards Israel and perpetrating something that we can’t even envision right now. Unless there’s a way for people to feel represented and for them to feel like they have the right to freedom of movement, to be safe, to enjoy an evening in the Gaza Harbor without fear of bombs made in America raining down on them, it’s really going to be hard to imagine how anybody long term is going to feel safe.”

Source: Sandy Tolan: Humanity Has Failed Gaza – scheerpost.com

The War Machine Wants You to Condemn Hamas

Hamas’s actions were what every Western Government demanded of POWs during WW2, fight back and escape. Resistance was regarded as a duty and heralded as heroic when it occurred. Hamas was an Act of resistance and difficult to condemn of people trapped in the world’s biggest concentration camp for 17 years. It’s even more understandable when conducted by a youth who had never experienced the hope of freedom.

Israel’s actions on the other hand in all 75 years have never been anything other than oppressive colonizers. Even before 2006 70% of Gazans were refugees living in what eventually became what a senior Israeli politician labeled a “concentration camp” A camp with 51% kids 70% unemployed and without a future that Israel stole with force. Any nation that currently supports the genocidal intent witnessed today has brought shame not only on themselves but their children. Those who simply stand by and abstain from demanding a cease-fire, like Australia, will also never be forgotten for their participation in this crime against humanity. Where were they when Israel killed 5000 children 7000 people and maimed 35,000 and never stopped? Where were they when Israel was seen killing their own people held hostage and claiming they were doing their best to save them?

More importantly, where were you when Israel sent in 15 trucks and not 15,000 a day to help save 2.3 million people from starvation clean water, and disease forcing them to go to promised safe areas and then bombing them. Then telling them to move again only to claim they were showing compassion. Where were you when Israel left babies and the sick and injured to die?

But there is an important distinction to be made between recognising that crimes were committed and colluding in an act of condemnation that has been openly politicised, and continues to be politicised, to justify harming Palestinian civilians.

Source: The War Machine Wants You to Condemn Hamas

For all its military might, Israel succumbed to its most fatal weakness

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gives a press conference with Minister of Finance Bezalel Smotrich at the Prime Minister's office in Jerusalem, January 11, 2023. (Olivier Fitoussi/Flash90)

After the heated atmosphere of revenge subsides, Netanyahu must be removed from power, and his extremist coalition dismantled. If Netanyahu is replaced right now, while the public is still demanding retribution and harboring illusions of victory, the opposition that takes power will fail, and that would be a disaster. There is also no need to rush into direct negotiations between two collapsing political systems — Israeli and Palestinian — as this will not lead anywhere.

Source: For all its military might, Israel succumbed to its most fatal weakness

Does Israel have a right to exist? – Pearls and Irritations

Israeli security fence near Jerusalem separating territory.

America and Israel are last on the list of nations that abide by UN rules and we ask if Israel has a “right to exist”? Israel has only been a member since 1949. It has constantly broken and disregarded the rules that other nations have agreed to. Israel was a mistake. The Belfour agreement was an anti-Semitic mistake, It was Britain’s mistake.

33% of Israelis wanted to emigrate from Israel before this war and even more do today given Netanyahu’s Fascist Apartheid regime. The true test should be given to the Israelis but allow them to not only emigrate but change their citizenship status. Then the world might just have a more realistic picture to the question of the indigeneity of Palestine. In the current circumstance, It’s extremely hard to say yes to when fascists run the 4th most weaponized nation on the planet. BDS

Israel’s membership of the United Nations was approved in 1949. Unlike other states, it was approved conditionally upon Israel complying with Partition Resolution 181 as to the limits of the Israeli State, and UN Resolution 194, allowing the return of refugees. Israel has complied with neither condition. It refuses to define its borders and is today governed by an Apartheid regime that has murdered over 4,500 children in Gaza in the space of one month. Israel’s membership of the UN must be illegal. It should be expelled from the community of nations.

Source: Does Israel have a right to exist? – Pearls and Irritations

US Critics of Israel’s War Are Being Slandered for Making the Same Criticisms as Israelis

Family members of those who were killed or kidnapped have called for de-escalation or for making peace and demanded that their deaths not be used as an excuse for killing more innocents.

Source: US Critics of Israel’s War Are Being Slandered for Making the Same Criticisms as Israelis

Yannis Varoufakis points the finger at British Colonialism for the Israel-Gaza War and raises Australian history in the process

Israel releases ‘proof’ of ‘terror’ HQ at Al Shifa hospital

Israel’s propaganda team proves themselves to be not just fraudsters but real failures at what they do. Their military snipers are free to kill people leaving the hospital yet they order people to evacuate assuming terrorists won’t? On one particular video tour lights, camera, and action, a military spokesperson points to the evidence that the hospital was a terrorist hive, a list of terrorist names on a wall, that happens not to be names at all but an everyday Arabic Calendar. All this performance to justify their destruction and mitigate their killing of babies and critically ill patients by cutting the power to the hospital. Then demanding the evacuation of everybody under the threat of death expecting the terrorists will stay. All theater of the absurd

Israel’s history has been one of lying to its citizens, its allies, and the world and it continues lying by spending as much on media control of the narrative as they do on weaponry.

The Israeli Defence Force has released “proof” that Hamas was using Gaza’s main hospital as a command centre after raiding the compound.

Source: Israel releases ‘proof’ of ‘terror’ HQ at Al Shifa hospital

Israeli Deceit & the Battle of Shifa Hospital

Every time Israel tries to prove their point they have failed miserably.

In fact, when the history of supposedly damning revelations about Shifa hospital providing cover for Hamas military activities are examined more carefully it becomes clear that it has been no more than a thinly veiled excuse for the IDF to attack and close down Gaza’s most important provider of medical care for the population of Gaza.

The time has come for a reckoning on the long-running IDF propaganda ploy of claiming that Shifa has been used to hide Hamas’s command center.

Unless the IDF can show journalists convincing evidence of that long-claimed Hamas command presence under the hospital, the should stand for the truth and denounce that massive Israeli deception about Gaza. 

Source: Israeli Deceit & the Battle of Shifa Hospital

Serial Abuse of ‘Antisemitism’ Destroys Meaning, Harms Jews – CounterPunch.org

It’s time to stop abuse of the word antisemitism.

Source: Serial Abuse of ‘Antisemitism’ Destroys Meaning, Harms Jews – CounterPunch.org

The Long View of Palestine, Israel and War – CounterPunch.org

If a Jew raises these issues in the contemporary setting of the war, then the libel and slander of antisemite and self-hating Jew will closely follow. The dogs and masters of war have even turned against the Jewish ideas of repairing the world and not doing to others what a person does not want done to them. It’s not antiwar Jews who need a huge mirror held above our collective selves, but the Zionists and warmongers who need that mirror handed over to them. Their ugliness and hate in that reflection and on the ground are apparent and blinding.

Source: The Long View of Palestine, Israel and War – CounterPunch.org

Shocking Restrictions on Israeli Immigration to West should be Lifted, Since 1/3 wish to Emigrate

The Final Solution Let Israelis’s leave Israel

Moreover, open immigration of Israelis to these countries should be instituted, such that any of them who desires to can emigrate from Israel and make a new home. Special programs should be set up to offer them job training and integration into local communities.

One poll this summer found that nearly a third of Israelis wish to emigrate, in part over pessimism about the country given the extremist governments attempts to gut the Supreme Court. The number could be higher today.

Of Israel’s 7 million Jews, at any one time about a million of them are living abroad. Whether because their visas run out or because their jobs were downsized, or out of homesickness, most of them ultimately used to return to Israel. But now a recent poll finds that half of the current generation living abroad, some 500,000 people, have no plans to return.

Britain, it caused the whole problem of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute with its double-dealing during World War I and its asinine Balfour Declaration that promised Jews a homeland in Palestine while promising that the Palestinians would not be disadvantaged by it. Now that the horrid Suella Braverman is gone, maybe the UK can adopt a saner immigration policy. And part of it should be free immigration of Israelis.

Since there are really only 6 million Israeli Jews left in Israel, if each of the major North Atlantic countries just took in half a million, they could all flee the unpleasantness of drones, rockets, and terror attacks, and the even greater trauma of being ruled by far right extremists Binyamin Netanyahu, Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir. In this way, the Europeans wouldn’t even have to admit the traumatized, ethnically cleansed Palestinians of Gaza, who could finally go back to their homes in southern Israel, from which their families were expelled in 1948.

Source: Shocking Restrictions on Israeli Immigration to West should be Lifted, Since 1/3 wish to Emigrate