The region braces for growing confrontation after a string of Israeli assassinations.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should be considered the “chief arsonist in the Middle East”, American journalist Jeremy Scahill says.
Scahill tells host Steve Clemons that Netanyahu “smells blood right now because [United States President] Joe Biden is a lame duck president”. This allows Israel to make bigger moves against the Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip and also to drag the US into confrontation with Iran, Scahill argues.
He spoke after Israel claimed responsibility this past week for the killings of Fuad Shukr, Hezbollah’s military chief, in Beirut and Mohammed Deif, the commander of Hamas’s military wing, in Gaza. Hamas’s political leader, Ismail Haniyeh, the chief negotiator in the talks to achieve a ceasefire in Gaza, was also assassinated in Tehran. Israel is suspected in his killing but hasn’t claimed responsibility for it.
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Iranian spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, Nasser Kanani, condemned Israel on Saturday on “X” Saturday for practicing “medieval forms […]
The U.N. report found evidence of sexual violence, waterboarding, and the use of dogs against detainees, many of whom were deprived of food, water, sleep, and toilet access.
A standoff at Israel’s Sde Teiman military base this week has thrown longstandingabuses against Palestinian detainees and the Israeli military’s history of impunity for torture into stark relief.
Israel’s allies should increase pressure to end grave abuses against Palestinians in custody, stop detaining them without charge or trial, and allow independent monitors access to detention facilities.
Last month, the International Court of Justice issued a damning assessment of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian land and the apartheid system it has built. All states now have a clear obligation to impose sanctions on Israel until the occupation ends.
The Israeli army is using Amazon’s cloud service to store surveillance information on Gaza’s population, while procuring further AI tools from Google and Microsoft for military purposes, an investigation reveals.
The London School of Economics has admitted it discriminated against a professor based on his opposition to Israel’s state ideology Zionism.
In November last year, the LSE’s British Politics and Policy blog rejected an article by James Hughes, who has taught at the university since 1994.
The piece referred to the strong connections between the Conservatives, then Britain’s ruling party, and the pro-Israel lobby. The pressure group Conservative Friends of Israel was supported by most lawmakers in the party, it noted.
“The expansion of that lobby has been nurtured by Israel over recent years,” Hughes stated. “This explains the almost unanimous pro-Israel positioning of the current Conservative government and its mirroring of the policy of the Israeli state itself by fusing criticism of the Israeli state with anti-Semitism, and attempts to ban anti-Israeli political expression.”
After the article was censored by the LSE, it was published by The Electronic Intifada.
As the editor handling its publication, I contacted the LSE seeking an explanation for why the piece had been rejected.
A spokesperson replied at that time by alleging that Hughes’ piece “did not meet the blog’s editorial guidelines.”
The LSE has now sent The Electronic Intifada a fresh statement retracting that accusation. The LSE accepted that the comments provided in November last “could have been viewed as misleading.”
The retraction follows a grievance procedure initiated by Hughes.
As assiduously as Israel seeks war with Iran is precisely the extent to which it will seek to draw the U.S. into it. That is what made Congress’ insanely intemperate recent reception of Netanyahu so dangerous.
Juan Cole In a 2011 exposé , Mike Stobbe of NBC news revealed a long history of federal physicians from the US deliberately infecting challenged persons or prisoners with diseases so as to experiment on them.
For many, the spectacle of those in power rioting on behalf of sadistic thugs evinced the “deep moral deterioration” of a nation already deemed barbaric by much of the world – ghastly proof, writes Nesrine Malik, that despite rulings and protests, the war “has found its place, nestled within the status quo” of an apartheid Israel where there are no innocents in Gaza and “the most abject Palestinian suffering (is) normalized as just a part of life.” This “dissolution (of) a fundamental human law…seems to say: Yes, this is the world we live in now. Get used to it,” says Malik. “What does getting used to it look like? It looks like accepting that there are certain groups of people who can be killed…That it is, in fact, reasonable and necessary that they should die in order to maintain a political system (built) on the inequality of human life, (where) we exist and deserve freedom from hunger, fear and persecution (and) others have demonstrated some quality that shows they are not owed the same.””Justice, justice shall you pursue,” Judaism teaches. In Genesis 18:19, “We are called to be just and righteous.”God, if She’s implausibly watching, weeps.
Will Israel call them HAMAS and summarily imprison and assassinate them?
Israeli soldiers, like soldiers in other countries, bask in the self-serving effusive praise showered upon them by politicians, but privately they know BS when they hear it.
Right from the start on October 7th, the soldiers knew that the sudden collapse of Netanyahu’s state-of-the-art multi-tiered border defense system left the door open for the Hamas attack. Still denied an official investigation by Netanyahu, people know that had the border defense been in place, all the terrible consequences never would have occurred. (See, the open letter by six very prominent Israelis in the New York Times on June 26, 2024: “We Are Israelis calling on Congress to Disinvite Netanyahu.”)
The soldiers also know that the small Hamas militia of some 25,000 fighters hidden in tunnels, having only small arms with dwindling ammunition, is up against the 465,000–person military armed with 1,500 F-16 fighter pilots and nuclear weapons. The Israeli military is also equipped daily by Biden with the most modern weapons. All this makes Netanyahu’s absurd description of Hamas as an existential threat sheer propaganda designed to protect his job.
“Everything’s quiet until it’s not,” Arab al-Aramshe resident Kareem Suidan told me while we walked through the village in late July. Three months earlier, the apparent calm had been broken when Hezbollah targeted an Israeli command center inside the village, killing one soldier and injuring 16 other people, including four civilians. In the wake of the April 17 drone strike, the targeted building was described in news reports as a “community center,” but according to Suidan and the aftermath of the bombing that I observed, the building was in fact a school.
“It’s an academy for the children, but the soldiers were inside,” the 33-year-old Suidan said. The kids “go there to learn, for activities, and the soldiers during the war go to sleep there.” For the village’s Arab community, the school is incredibly important, as it allows a degree of autonomy relative to sending their children to schools in nearby kibbutzim.
The United States is largely acting like it’s business as usual in the Middle East and Iran right now. But Israel’s assassinations of top leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah have brought us to the precipice of an absolutely disastrous war throughout the region.
It is no longer possible to categorise the nihilistic violence of the Israeli state. It appears to have no objective other than violence and an urge for desolation.
In 24 hours Israel has murdered the man with whom it would need to negotiate hostage release in the short term and political settlement in the long term, and a key figure in its most dangerous potential military enemy which has refrained from full-on war.
In doing so it has violated the territory, indeed the capitals, of two crucial regional states.
A detail of a mailer paid for by AIPAC’s super PAC, left, and a detail of the original photo, right, reversed to match the mailer’s orientation. Mailer image obtained by The Intercept. Photo: Annelise Hanshaw/Missouri Independent
The photo of Bush used in the AIPAC mailers was taken from a Missouri Independent article. In the mailers, part of Bush’s forehead has been photoshopped and appears sloped. The photos are also color altered.
The Missouri Independent said AIPAC’s use of the photo violated its site rules.
“As a nonprofit news organization we do not allow campaigns or political groups to use our photography,” said Jason Hancock, the editor-in-chief of the Missouri Independent. “We would never give a PAC permission to use our photos, and doing so without our knowledge or permission violates our terms of use.”
AIPAC, the leading pro-Israel lobbying group, has been one of the single largest outside spenders in an election cycle that’s broken records for the most expensive House primaries in history. According to Sludge, AIPAC helped raise two-thirds of the campaign funding for Bush’s Democratic opponent, St. Louis County prosecutor Wesley Bell. (Neither United Democracy Project nor Bell’s campaign responded to requests for comment.)
The United States government regularly decries authoritarian press crackdowns around the world. Yet that same government gives billions to Israel as it makes no attempt to hide its policy of killing journalists.
During its war on Gaza, Israel has claimed its bombings of journalists and civilian targets were strikes against Hamas.
“Journalists are civilians and should never be targeted. Israel must explain why two more Al Jazeera journalists have been killed in what appears to be a direct strike,” CPJ CEO Jodie Ginsberg said in a statement on Wednesday.
From Ismail Haniyeh to Imad Mughniyeh, Israel’s policy of assassinations is a great example of winning the battle but losing the war, writes Emad Moussa.
Israel may have rationalised and justified extrajudicial murder as a way to provide security. But doing so augmented the very antagonism that makes it insecure. Instead of tackling the root of the problem, the occupation and colonialism, Israelis can only see and deal with the symptoms of their deeds.
This headhunting never worked and will not work in the future, unless repeating the same thing over and again and expecting a different result is no longer the definition of insanity.
Ismail al-Ghoul had become a household name for anyone following the war on Gaza. When he went to Ismail Haniyeh’s hometown to cover a commemoration of his killing, Israel assassinated him too.
Far-right protesters, soldiers, and MKs rallied for guards suspected of raping a Palestinian detainee. Once fringe, they’re now the public face of the state.
Some 9,700 Palestinian security detainees were being held captive in Israeli prisons in May, according to Addameer, a Palestinian prisoner rights organization. Some 3,380 were administrative detainees, meaning Israel holds them without charge or trial.
The numbers do not include prisoners from Gaza. The Post reports that Israeli authorities will not reveal exactly how many have been detained or where they are held.
“Join Us in Supporting Israel’s Defense,” read the text on the Xtend-Support-Israel.com website, directly above a large “DONATE” button. All donations would be “used for the immediate production & deployment of life saving systems for our IDF troops on the frontlines.” The site included a dazzling marketing montage of XTEND robots zooming across buildings, smashing through windows, and dropping what appears to be an explosive device from the air, “enabling soldiers to perform accurate maneuvers in complex combat scenarios.”
Israel lobby groups have increased efforts to silence those accusing the nation of genocide in Gaza.
The United States makes much of the role of the Iranian Council of Guardians selecting acceptable candidates for political office but ignores the role of its own Council of Guardians, AIPAC, which decides on suitable candidates for office.
U.S. Congressman Jamaal Bowman, once a recipient of lobby largesse, after seeing reality in Palestine on a J Street-funded excursion, called Gaza a genocide and said boycotts were legitimate.
Israeli lobby groups spent $9.9 million in a Democrat primary to get rid of him in favour of a supporter of Israel.
The scare campaign around rising anti-Semitism, which conflates criticism of Israel’s mass atrocities with prejudice against Jews, is a feature of most of the old colonial countries.
Mary Kostakidis, one of Australia’s most respected journalists, who speaks truth to power, has written regarding the Israeli genocide in Gaza:
‘In an effort to silence me, the Zionist Federation have filed a complaint with the [Australian Human Rights Commission] for racial vilification, aided by a reporter who can’t do his own research.’
The lobby levelled another case of harassment and suspicious accusations against a Palestinian Australian engaged in anti-genocide activity
Hash Tayeh, who had to present himself to the police over alleged anti-Semitic comments, was not charged and his matter has been referred to the Office of Public Prosecutions.
His Caulfield Burgertory outlet was set on fire, allegedly by two men, on 10 November, an attack he claimed was linked to his involvement in a pro-Palestine rally and thus a hate crime.
Then we witnessed the arrest of a Palestinian activist in the Prime Minister’s electoral office.
Sarah Shaweesh, who was asking about the delay in visas for her family in Gaza, was arrested.
The office refused to help her.
She is a key organiser of the 24/7 Gaza sit-in protest in front of the PM’s office.
The large number of Palestinians – men, women, children, doctors, journalists, human rights defenders – detained since 7 October, most of them without charges or trial and in conditions that raise concerns of the abuse of administrative detention, along with reports of torture and other ill-treatment and violation of due process, raises serious concerns regarding the arbitrariness and punitive nature of such arrests and detention. Many of those detained and subsequently released have reported being subject to forms of torture or other ill-treatment, including severe beatings, electrocution, being forced to remain in stress positions for prolonged periods, or waterboarding. At least 53 detainees from Gaza and the West Bank have died in Israeli detention since 7 October.
In an open letter, Veterans For Peaces asks the vice president to call for a permanent ceasefire and emergency food and medical aid now, while she is campaigning for president.
Israel has refined the practice of targeted assassinations, often coupled with the arrest of key leaders, to eliminate influential political and military figures. This strategy is not merely about neutralizing immediate threats; it is also about shaping the composition and character of the resistance it faces in the region.
These assassinations reinforce the bond between political-military organizations and the broader society within which they are enmeshed. . . Instead of weakening their opponents, such tactics can unintentionally solidify unity and resolve.
The real reason for Israel’s current policy of assassinations serves more as a mechanism to galvanize its own society rather than genuinely altering the political or military stance of its adversaries.
Israel needs to start a war to end the war by dragging America in. With friends like Israel who needs enemies?
Since Iran has not shown any inclination towards starting a direct war with Israel, the next best scenario for Israel is to trap it in an untenable position. Assassinating the leader of an ally, particularly in Tehran in the evening of the day in which a new administration took the oath of office, is that trap. It has put President Pezeshkian and his allies in an extremely difficult situation
Nagham Abu Samrah was 24 years old Palestinian karate champion from Gaza. She had the potential to participate in the 2024 Paris Olympic games. Unfortunately, an Israeli attack on her home killed her sister and left her seriously wounded . Unconscionably, Israeli authorities delayed her permission to leave Gaza for treatment, and when she finally reached an Egyptian hospital, she died soon thereafter.
After ten months of relentless genocidal war, it is impossible to avoid the conclusion that both the Israeli state and society are partners in the genocide. The picture that emerges is a genocide from above and below.
Israeli forces killed at least 30 people and injured over 100 in an attack on a girls’ school in central Gaza on Saturday, potentially using what one expert said is a U.S. bomb.
The strike on the Khadija School, near Deir al-Balah, killed at least fifteen children, officials reported. Their bodies were sent to al-Aqsa Hospital nearby, along with people who were injured in the attack. The Associated Press reported seeing a dead toddler loaded into an ambulance after the attack.
The accusations of abuses by the Israel Defense Forces against Palestinian detainees in Sde Teiman are growing more gruesome. Last month: dozens of deaths. This week: gang rape.
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Israeli newspaper Arab 48 reports that on Monday, military police raided the Sde Teiman detention center where Palestinian prisoners […
They added: “Instead of absolute condemnation, some Israeli far-right leaders have rallied to support the suspects of abuse, which is emblematic of the root causes that enable such abuse to happen in the first place.”
Zionism has become for some people a sort of ethnic superiority which denies equal claims to recognition by Palestinians. If we are unable to talk about this within the Jewish community we are doing a great disservice to both Palestinians and Israelis, writes Dennis Altman.
Forget the genocide of Palestinians, writes Jonathan Cook. Only when Israel exploits the deaths of Syrians living under its military occupation are there “consequences”to worry about.
Hamas also had ulterior motives of winning a propaganda war by treating their hostages verifiably well while Israeli forces are well known to brutalize Palestinian prisoners. If Hamas is able to survive the war, which they will (Israel claims to have killed around 12k Hamas militants, experts estimate the real number at 6-7k, and Hamas had 40k+ soldiers prior to this war and there are now many more angry young men radicalized by Israeli war planes and terrorism to join their cause) as eradicating a group like them is next to impossible, then they will claim victory regardless of the outcome.
Wesley Bell, who’s challenging Cori Bush in Missouri, dropped out of a race against Republican Josh Hawley to take on the Democratic congresswoman. Apparently, punching left with AIPAC’s support is a more appealing career booster than challenging the Right
A long-standing member of the European Parliament has been recruited by a secretive pro-Israel group.
Antonio López-Istúriz, the lawmaker in question, agreed to join what has been described as an “exclusive advisory body” for the Israel Economic Forum (IEF).
The IEF describes itself as “an invitation-only group” bringing together “deeply committed pro-Israel CEOs, business executives, and world leaders who leverage their success and influence to ensure the future of the Jewish people and the state of Israel.”
Such framing is problematic as it implies that Israel is synonymous with Jews around the world, large numbers of whom object to that state’s crimes and its racist ideology Zionism.
The United Nations says 86 percent of the besieged Gaza Strip is now under Israeli evacuation orders as 33 more Palestinians are killed in yet another day of attacks and displacement.
Dr Perlmutter also provided a chilling account of children being targeted by snipers. “I have children that were shot twice,” he said. When asked if children in Gaza were being shot by snipers, he responded definitively: “Definitively. I have two children that I have photographs of that were shot so perfectly in the chest I couldn’t put my stethoscope over their heart more accurately and directly on the side of the head in the same child. No toddler gets shot twice by mistake by the world’s best sniper and they’re dead centre shots.”
olddogthoughts 
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