A war on Israelis is being conducted in Israel
In the weeks since Hamas’ October 7 massacres in southern Israel and the start of Israel’s bombardment of the Gaza Strip, there has been a dramatic increase in surveillance and political persecution of Palestinians with Israeli citizenship and Jerusalem residency. Emergency wartime regulations, introduced by the Attorney General’s office and the National Security Committee, have given Israeli police and other security bodies expansive and unchecked powers.
Source: Israel’s ‘thought police’ law ramps up dangers for Palestinians
One of the most recent attempts at denying the growing consensus in support of Palestine in the U.S. is to call it a result of people on social media (particularly young people) being tricked by foreign propaganda. A bipartisan group of politicians, media pundits, and think tanks have begun arguing that support for Palestine is built on fake news and disinformation; that millions are being manipulated by China, Russia, Iran, or Hamas.
Source: Opinion | Pro-Palestinian Voices Are Not Disinformation | Common Dreams
The West Bank is simply forgotten but extremely active.
Dr Shamekh Abu Rub was executed today while standing with his brother at the entrance of their home in Jenin. An armored Israeli military vehicle fired directly at them with the intent of executing them. His brother remains in a very critical condition. Their father, Kamal, is Jenin’s deputy governor. He is a friend.
Another heartless crime that brings the number of murdered Palestinians in the West Bank since October to over 230.
IT IS POSSIBLE to find out what is happening and why, in Gaza, to a certain extent, despite the din of arguments and raving bilge on social media.
Source: Quality over quantity: Reliable media sources on the Israel-Gaza war
Israel proves to be no Hollywood despite the years of experience of Jews in the film fiction industry. Incompetence seems more their skill set in everything but killing. Even that, it seems, has its blunders when done wholesale.
In this bleak mess, it is worth stressing that even if the hospital proved to be a military facility, humanitarian protections would not mysteriously cease for those patients and staff within it. “Anything that the attacking force can do to allow the humanitarian functions of that hospital to continue,” reasons Adil Haq of Rutgers Law School, “they’re obligated to do, even if there’s some office somewhere in the building where there is a fighter holed up.” But the strategy against Al-Shifa was never humanitarian to begin with, starting with depriving Gaza access to fuel, food and water. The rest is Pallywood.
The Indian government’s intelligence agency, the Research and Analysis Wing, or RAW, has been planning assassinations targeting Sikh and Kashmiri activists living in foreign countries, according to secret Pakistani intelligence assessments leaked to The Intercept.
Leaked Pakistani intelligence backs up Canada’s claim of an Indian assassination program.
Source: Secret Intelligence Documents Show Global Reach of India’s Death Squads
the censorship actions taken by both TikTok and the Guardian align with the requirements of the US government. This should come as no surprise to anyone who is familiar with the long history of the Guardian acting as a liberal gatekeeper for establishment power. Moreover, the paper’s ever-closer relationship with UK state security services, themselves subservient to US state power, is abundantly clear.
And yet, after 9/11, the US government instructed the television networks – ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, Fox – do not show any speeches or interviews with Osama bin Laden, because they didn’t want the American population hearing from him what their actual grievances were. They didn’t want Americans to think that maybe we had done things in that part of the world that caused it to happen, that causes “blowback”, to use the CIA’s term.’
As with any statement from an influential or powerful figure, bin Laden’s letter needs to be read critically. There is much to revile in the letter, not least its antisemitism and homophobia. But consider some of the grievances he detailed against the US government, summarised below:
Yes, and the biggest investor in the Quit Campaign is claimed to be the tobacco industry. Ask Peter Dutton and he will tell you the fossil fuel industry isn’t a threat to whales as much as wind farms are. He’ll quote you a fake study un peer-reviewed study. That’s Free Speech. It’s protected by law and worthy of front-page Murdoch-supported press and opinion.
The fossil fuel lobby has had a busy year on the eco-camouflage front. Earlier this year, interest started to rumble and rage against the stranding of humpback whales on the east coast of the United States. Suddenly, opponents of wind turbine technology – and renewable technology more broadly – had identified an invaluable, if tenuous nexus: a link between whale mortality and offshore wind farms.
The greatest threat to various whale populations lies in fishing, ship strikes, and oceanic disruptions arising from climate change. As, it would seem, those figures in eco-camouflage such as Dutton and Canavan, who continue to coddle fossil fuel companies intent on seismic blasting and offshore drilling.
The drawn-out saga of Dixon Advisory – the superannuation managers who enticed their clients into investment assets they managed – has come to an end. Four cents to the dollar for the superannuants; millions for lawyers, accountants and ASIC. What’s the scam?
The scam is how Dixon Advisory enticed their superannuation clients into investing in assets that they managed, in many cases without properly considering their client’s circumstances when making those investments.
An Industry: Advisers employed to break the backs of ordinary Australians via Tax Fraud
All this follows the raid of Scale Facilitation by the AFP in June over the biggest alleged tax fraud in Australian history.
Scale had established a subsidiary in Malta, with the help of PwC, to reduce its tax exposure in Australia.
Source: Failure at Scale as high-flying Collard company ordered to wind up – Michael West
Is James Patterson, Eric Abetz’s party replacement? He surely comes across like him.
Liberals have been playing the “fear card” since Christ played ruck for Jerusalem. If Christ applied for a visa the LNP wouldn’t have let that mother effen rebel against the Jewish establishment in.
Morrison used the fear card to get preselected. Dutton used it against anyone of Colour, against Muslims, he even used it against Christians. Maoris, Pacific Islanders, and the Sudanese weren’t real Christians. By the way, does Dutton even have a church?
“The opposition has spent the morning fearmongering over the Palestinian visas, with the implicit assumption that Palestinians are dangerous. Shadow home affairs minister James Paterson jumped on RN Breakfast to announce, among other outrageous sentiments, that he was “seeking assurances” from Labor that “no corners have been cut” with these temporary visas. (Again, why would they have been?) “A very large number of visas have been granted in a very short period of time,” he added conspiratorially, making no mention of the 1793 visas issued to Israeli citizens in the same period. Wong, meanwhile, was on breakfast TV, assuring Australians once more that all the normal checks and processes had been followed.
Source: “The… – The Fiberal Party of Australia – Lies & Misdemeanours | Facebook
The Gateway to guaranteed success isn’t the schools per se but the networks and peer groups enabled by the exposure in these schools which have lasting effects in later life. It doesn’t necessarily mean it applies to all attendees. However the same can’t be said of public schools. The fees guarantee a level of status and suitability of applicants.
Exclusive: education department figures reveal the private schools received about $770m in government money amid a public schools funding shortfall
The right to violent resistance and a false Western morality
Source: National Times – The right to violent resistance and a false… | Facebook
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
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.
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
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.
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
The Trump filing relies heavily on a 2012 Supreme Court ruling in United States v. Alvarez that says Xavier Alvarez, an elected official, could not be prosecuted for his false claims that he was awarded a congressional medal for bravery. The Supreme Court said that he had a right to lie, including claiming to be a U.S. Marine who had fought for his country.
Source: Donald Trump’s Lawyers Say That False Statements Are Free Speech
What is particularly disappointing is the way the Albanese Government has so abjectly accepted Dutton’s scaremongering and confected moral panic. Rapists and murderers exist within Australia’s population. If they have served their sentences, they are free to re-join society. But not if they are on a visa, or stateless.
Source: Let us punish immigration detainees twice – » The Australian Independent Media Network
Mark Dreyfus AG is related to Alfred Dreyfus the French artillery officer of Jewish ancestry from Alsace whose trial and conviction in 1894 on charges of treason became one of the most polarizing political dramas in modern French history.
Australian replay of the U.S.-UK persecution of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange; the war criminals are running the persecution while the whistleblower is facing five indictments for the leaks, which carry maximum sentences of ten years each.
A roll call of Australian whistleblowers and politicians was on hand to lend support. They addressed the assembled media and the McBride supporters, decrying what some described as a “war on whistleblowers” and others called the “war on truth”.
ASIC is back with new ways to ‘fix things’ following damaging testimony in yet another Senate Estimates hearing this week. Whatever the fix might be, holding Big 4 accountants or big corporates to account is still not in the corporate regulator’s plans. Michael West and Kim Wingerei report.
You could drive a truck through it, no make that a road train – ASIC’s view of itself that is, versus that of its critics.
In this week’s Senate hearing, the Australian Accounting Standards Board (AASB) told Senator Deborah O’Neill that ASIC had refused the AASB access to the financial accounts of the Big 4 (EY, PwC, Deloitte and KPMG) because “it might offend”. Instead, the AASB had to purchase the data from a third-party (private) company.
Source: ASIC. Big fat cash-cow or world-class regulator? – Michael West
Open one social media platform and you’re hit with a fake video; open another and you’re hit with bigotry. Open a news article, and you’ll find some victims “killed” but others “dying.” Each account of events in Israel and Palestine seems to rely on different facts. What’s clear is that misinformation, hate speech, and factual distortions are running rampant.
There are no consequences.
Source: “Read With Extreme Caution”: A Journalist’s Guide to Israel-Palestine Media Literacy – Mother Jones
Being part of the global supply network that supplies parts for the Israeli F-35 jet fighters used over Gaza implicates Australia in their alleged war crimes.
With Australia previously spruiking the benefits of our global defence cooperation in supply and construction, it is now notable that the government is not being forthright with the Australian people about the extent of our involvement.
Australia needs to honestly acknowledge that atrocities like Gaza are exactly the kind of risk it has signed us up for.
Source: Australia’s role in the bombing of Gaza – Pearls and Irritations
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.
Look, at what they have done Mum!!
While the operation to exterminate and ethnically cleanse the Palestinians in Gaza has – quite rightly – monopolized the world’s attention for weeks, little or no attention is being paid to one of its crucial objectives, which is passing rather unnoticed: the habituation of our societies and of each and every one of us, i.e. of all humanity, to a new international reality devoid of the humanitarian law that has governed international or internal armed conflicts since 1949. In short, we are becoming accustomed to a world that increasingly resembles a jungle, where only the law of the strongest reigns, and where the worst atrocities against the weakest are “permitted”!
The desperation shows when the cry of Anti-Semitism is used as a smokescreen to deflect Truth
Actual hatred of Jews absolutely does exist in western society, but it’s much more peripheral than racism toward immigrants and people of colour. You don’t typically see the average westerner espousing a hatred of Jewish people unless they dive down some pretty obscure and fringey rabbit holes that leave them babbling about the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and denying the Holocaust and such nonsense. Jewish people simply are not othered that much in western society compared to other minorities, so if an Israel apologist needs to shout down western criticism of Israeli atrocities as arising from a hatred of Jews, they must necessarily resort to fallacious reasoning.
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.
And this time it’s happening in the world’s most weaponized country
There are few Americans alive today who remember Hitler, and for most of us the details of his rise to power are lost to the mists of time. But Donald Trump is bringing it all back to us with a fresh, stark splash of reality.
Source: Opinion | Trump’s Similarities to Hitler Prove It Certainly Could ‘Happen Here’ | Common Dreams
Despite its many achievements, the Albanese Government is denied credit in the mainstream media, which turns every success into a failure. Paul Begley reports.
At the same time, News Corp outlets work relentlessly to promote Opposition Leader Peter Dutton as a heroic speaker of truths that “woke” mouths are not game to utter. And as the dominant media voice in Australia, sharing 86 per cent of outlets with one other like-minded owner, News Corp manages to set the default that other legacy media players increasingly follow, including the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s once robust news service.
The most recent example of the strategy has been to surrender to Dutton’s Liberal Party hysteria on refugee detention policy following the High Court decision that indefinite detention of refugees is illegal. Dutton falsely characterised the release of refugees as a Labor Party initiative, knowing full well that the Government does not control decisions made by the High Court.
Source: News Corp denies Albanese Government any credit for success
The Government has just released its ‘Review into Secrecy Provisions’ which contains the greatest assault on democracy and accountability that there’s been in many years.
Source: Michael West Media – investigative journalists – always independent
Al Mayadeen TV said an Israeli attack ‘deliberately’ targeted its correspondent Farah Omar and cameraman Rabih Me’mari.
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
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.
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
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”
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 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
WAS I SCAMMED?
The problem for Western governments is that he said a lot of accurate things about their ugly behavior in the Middle East and for that bin Laden must now be silenced, not because he is a terrorist, but because he names Western crimes.
Americans are finally finding out why. We are republishing here the 2016 piece that originally contained The Guardian link to bin Laden’s letter, which is now gone.
Why Americans Are Never Told Why
Crucially, the biggest, most dangerous source of disinformation is not randos on TikTok. It’s the same people we’ve been dealing with for years now: Trump and his right-wing acolytes like Johnson. They’re the ones who are pumping out a steady stream of lies meant to destabilize American democracy so they can seize power. Worse, they use official government powers, like the ability to hold House hearings or release security video footage, in order to do it. A few dumb kids experimentally saying ignorant stuff they soon regret is not a story. What does matter is that an entire political party, the GOP, is attempting to finish the job bin Laden started by decimating our democracy.
The world is facing drastic rises in temperature, the head of the United Nations Environment Programme predicts.
The annual Emissions Gap report, which assesses countries’ promises to tackle climate change compared with what is needed, says the world faces between 2.5C and 2.9C of warming above pre-industrial levels if governments do not boost climate action.
At 3C of warming, scientists predict the world could pass several catastrophic points of no return, from the runaway melting of ice sheets to the Amazon rainforest drying out.
“Present trends are racing our planet down a dead-end 3C temperature rise,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said.
“The emissions gap is more like an emissions canyon.”
Talking RESPONSIBILITY
“In 2022, Oxfam undertook an analysis of 125 billionaires and found that, on average, they emitted 3m tonnes of CO2e a year through their investments – over a million times more than the average for someone in the bottom 90% of humanity.”
banks are also ‘testing the limits’ of their social licences by shortchanging savers and failing to be upfront with existing customers about the lowest rates they could possibly offer.
Many savers at big banks are still languishing on rates that have risen far less than the quantum of RBA rate hikes, while new loan customers continue to get better deals than existing ones.
“They need to be careful they aren’t seen to be profiteering,” Humphery-Jenner said.
“When the government puts you in a position where you’re insulated from competition … then it is incumbent upon those companies to act in an appropriate manner.”
Source: How banks profit from high interest rates as they test ‘social licence’
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.
The ABC was never there to breathe life into Ingmar Bergman’s 1960’s Film “Shame”. The ABC charter wasn’t to be balanced. It was there to question, test, and make the bastards accountable while working for us. It was essential to Australia’s once robust Democracy a standout example from America’s failing one. We are however being culturally colonized and allowing it to happen.
ABC boss David Anderson announced last week that it was not the broadcaster’s job to use terms such as “genocide” and “apartheid” in its coverage of the ongoing attacks by Israel on Gaza and the West Bank.
Source: ABC watches its language concerning alleged Israeli genocide
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
olddogthoughts 
You must be logged in to post a comment.