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US vetoes UN Security Council action on Israel, Gaza

By Michelle Nichols, October 19, 2023

UNITED NATIONS, Oct 18 (Reuters) – The United States vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution on Wednesday that would have called for humanitarian pauses in the conflict between Israel and Palestinian Hamas militants to allow humanitarian aid access to the Gaza Strip.

The vote on the Brazilian-drafted text was twice delayed in the last couple of days as the United States tries to broker aid access to Gaza. Twelve members voted in favor of the draft text on Wednesday, while Russia and Britain abstained……………………………………………………………………

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Wednesday called for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire to allow for the release of hostages and humanitarian aid access to Gaza. https://www.reuters.com/world/us-vetoes-un-security-council-action-israel-gaza-2023-10-18/–*Israel #Palestine #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

October 24, 2023 Posted by | politics international, USA | Leave a comment

White House Seeks $105 Billion To Arm Israel, Ukraine, and Taiwan

The Biden administration released details about its massive proposal to provide arms to Israel and Ukraine, as well as funds to build up military assets in the region surrounding China.

SCHEERPOST By Kyle Anzalone / Antiwar.com, October 21, 2023

On Friday, the White House rolled out its proposed $105 billion bill to arm Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. The legislation also includes funding for the border and humanitarian assistance. US officials say over $50 billion will go to American weapons manufacturers.

The Biden administration is proposing a massive aid package as it has struggled to get Congress to appropriate more funds for the proxy war in Ukraine. The largest portion of money is for Ukraine at $61.4 billion. The White House wants enough money for Ukraine to fund Kiev through the 2024 election.

National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan described the aid as critical to American national security and demanded Congress pass the bill. “This budget request is critical to advancing America’s national security and ensuring the safety of the American people,” Sullivan said. “The world is closely watching what Congress does next.”

Israel will receive $14.3 billion in assistance, with $10.6 billion for air and missile defense support.The aid would be in addition to the $3.8 billion Tel Aviv from Washington in security assistance annually……………………………………………

The bill includes $7.4 billion for several initiatives to increase Washington’s military posture in the Indo-Pacific. That includes $2 billion in grants for foreign governments to buy American weapons. Taiwan will receive a portion of that money, although US officials did not provide a detailed breakdown.

Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Shalanda Young, explained that nearly half of the money will go to American arms makers. “This supplemental request invests over $50 billion in the American defense industrial base, ensuring our military continues to be the most ready, capable, and best-equipped fighting force the world has ever seen,” she said.

Young claimed that the spending would bolster the American economy and create jobs. However, a study indicated that military spending costs more jobsthan it creates……………..

A small number of Republican represenatives have hindered Congress from passing additional funds for Ukraine. The Biden administration hopes to push several GOP members of Congress to vote for the bill by combining funding for Taiwan, Israel, and the border with Ukraine.  https://scheerpost.com/2023/10/21/white-house-seeks-105-billion-to-arm-israel-ukraine-and-taiwan/ #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

October 24, 2023 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Ralph Nader: Biden Returns Empty-handed, Except for a Huge Bill for the American Taxpayers

Biden wants Congress to approve $14 billion for Israel to address the colossal failure of Netanyahu’s extremist coalition to protect its own citizens on the border.

By Ralph Nader / Nader.org  https://scheerpost.com/2023/10/22/ralph-nader-biden-returns-empty-handed-except-for-a-huge-bill-for-the-american-taxpayers/

If President Joe Biden were a pony, instead of a perennial warhorse (e.g., gung-ho for Bush/Cheney’s criminal destruction of Iraq), he would have his tail between his legs on his return from a one-day trip to Israel. He failed to achieve any immediate, critical objectives while the ongoing destruction of Gaza and the defenseless Palestinians continues.

Did Biden get Israel and Egypt to allow the exit of hundreds of American citizens fleeing the Gazan firestorm? No!

Did Biden open up corridors for humanitarian aid to the babies, children, women, elderly and other civilians in Gaza who had nothing to do with the October 7th Hamas homicide/suicide attack on Israelis? No!

To the contrary, earlier in the week he cruelly ordered his UN Ambassador to veto a widely supported resolution calling for a humanitarian ceasefire.

Did he forcefully double down on his earlier counsel to the Israeli government to obey the laws of war, then and now, being openly violated? No! He continued his silence after the Israeli Defense Minister ordered his soldiers with the genocidal command, “No electricity, no food, no fuel, no water…” That death sentence includes patients in hospitals who must endure the carpet bombing of this long-time blockaded tiny strip of desert land holding 2.3 million people. (See, Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide).

Did Biden press for the exchange of Hamas’ hostages for the release of Palestinian prisoners, including young Palestinians, who have been in Israeli jails for years without due process or charges? No! Worse, Biden failed to object to the Israeli military stating that the release of over 200 Israeli hostages is a “secondary priority” to smashing Hamas and Gaza “into the Stone Age.” This policy flouts the moral codes of many venerable Judaic sages described in an October 19, 2023, New York Timescolumn by Mikahel Manekin titled “The Safety of the Hostages Must Come First.” Israel conducted two prisoners for hostages’ exchanges, one in 2004 and one in 2011.

Did Biden, in strong terms, tell the Israeli politicians that they have already exacted revenge many times over on the stateless people of Gaza – in civilian lives lost, injuries, related spread of disease, destitution and destruction? Did he say it is inhumane and counterproductive to bomb hospitals, clinics, schools, mosques, churches, apartment buildings, water mains, electric networks and ambulances, all of which is in violation of civilized norms and rules of war? Of course not. He greenlighted Israel’s genocidal warfare from the beginning of the Israeli assault and sent U.S. weaponry. He is enabling other actions of “co-belligerency” against the defenseless Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

Did he even get the 20 trucks of humanitarian aid waiting at the Rafah crossing – also bombed by the Israelis – from Egypt into Gaza before he left? No!

Biden did come back with a bill for the American taxpayers – who for decades have been forced to pay for these Israeli wars. Now Biden wants Congress to approve $14 billion for Israel to address the colossal failure of Netanyahu’s extremist coalition to protect its own citizens on the border. (Adding only $100 million for Palestinian relief).

That sum of money, to be authorized without any Congressional hearings or Congressional oversight, is greater than the combined annual budgets of the FDA, OSHA, NHTSA and the section of HHS, whose missions are to reduce the loss of hundreds of thousands of preventable American fatalities in the workplace, on the highways, and in the marketplace and the hospitals. (See, the 2016 peer-reviewed study from the John Hopkins University of Medicine).

Lastly, still not calling a ceasefire, Biden is disregarding his own military’s private advice against an Israeli ground invasion of Gaza as raising the risk of a larger war in the Middle East that would clearly be against the national interests of the American people and U.S. security.

He could have done what President Eisenhower did in 1956, when he demanded that the Israeli, British and French attack on Egypt stop immediately.

And stop, they did!

After all, the U.S. has some influence over Israel, to put it mildly. The U.S. endorses all Israeli aggressions (including Israel’s admission to bombing hundreds of sites in Syria, mired in its civil war and no threat, in addition to striking Damascus International Airport). All with U.S. advanced weapons, and billions of dollars in annual aid to Israel, a prosperous military, technological and economic superpower. In fact, Israel’s social safety net is better than that of the U.S.!

Biden provides total diplomatic cover in the U.S. with Washington’s automatic UN vetoes, and pressures allies to follow the party line.

Moreover, Biden seems unwilling to recognize the historical origins of this conflict that now has mighty Israel occupying, colonizing, brutalizing and stealing land and water from the twenty-two percent of the original Palestine left for millions of Palestinians under Israeli daily control.

Biden should take a moment in the Oval Office to read page 121 of the book “The Jewish Paradox” by Nahum Goldman (January 1, 1978), the head of the World Zionist Organization. He quotes the leading Founder of the Israeli state, David Ben-Gurion as candidly saying to him: “If I were an Arab leader, I would never sign an agreement with Israel. It is normal; we have taken their country. It is true God promised it to us, but how could that interest them? Our God is not theirs. There has been Anti-Semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They see but one thing: we have come and stolen their country. Why would they accept that?”

Today’s Israeli leaders refuse to demonstrate this degree of empathy. Instead, they provoke and deny the creation of a Palestinian state, envisioned by the Oslo Accords they signed in 1993, hurl the most racist epithets (“animals,” “vermin,” “snakes,”), and make sure the politicians in the U.S. Congress never utter the words “Palestinians also have a right to defend themselves” as violently subjugated victims of Israel the superpower.

Many members of Congress who demand giving Israel whatever money and weaponry it wants for whatever it does, violating human rights under international law in its illegal occupations and blockade, turn around and vote against the child tax credit, worker health and safety, universal healthcare, paid family leave and daycare for Americans. Their viciousness – as with the homicidal outburst of Gen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) against all Palestinians, and Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) a Harvard Law graduate, saying “As far as I’m concerned, Israel can bounce the rubble in Gaza…” set new levels of depravity.

A few Senators see it differently, especially Senator Bernie Sanders (D-VT) who noted “…it is no secret that Gaza has been an open-air prison” with “horrendous living conditions,” and that “children and innocent people do not deserve to be punished for the acts of Hamas.”

Little known is that Israel and the U.S. fostered and funded the rise of Hamas as a religious counterpoint to the secular Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO). It was established in 1987 following the first intifada uprising. A 2009 The Wall Street Journal article titled: “How Israel Helped to Spawn Hamas” noted:

“Instead of trying to curb Gaza’s Islamists from the outset, says Mr. Cohen, Israel for years tolerated and, in some cases, encouraged them as a counterweight to the secular nationalists of the Palestine Liberation Organization and its dominant faction…”

To Biden and the Congressional “howlers” for the death of civilian innocents, historical facts matter little. Hamas’ lethal attack on October 7th was preceded by far greater numbers of Israeli violent attacks over the past decades taking four hundred times the number of innocent Palestinian lives, injuries and other casualties than inflicted on innocent Israelis.

Israel’s carpet bombing of Gaza will take twenty times or more lives of innocent Palestinians than those killed by Hamas on October 7th with the casualty toll of direct fatalities and the loss of life from the devastation of life-sustaining water, food, medicine, shelter and other hospital/clinic emergency infrastructure.

Also conveniently forgotten is the detailed peace offer to Israel in 2002, by 22 member states of the Arab League to establish diplomatic and trade relations with a recognized Israel in return for its retreating to the 1967 borders and creation of a Palestinian two-state solution. The Israel extremists in Congress and President G.W. Bush declined even to respond to this proposal. (See, the March 29, 2002 New York Times article: Mideast Turmoil; Text of the Peace Proposals Backed by the Arab League).

It is incumbent on the supreme military superpower in the region to take the initiative for peace over the powerless victims under its thralldom. That country is, of course, high-tech Israel, bristling with the latest weapons and nuclear atomic bombs.

Both the brave Israeli human rights groups and those courageous human rights Israelis standing shoulder to shoulder over the years striving to conduct non-violent civil disobedience at the besieged Palestinian village level, only to be dispersed by Israeli soldiers, know the real obstacle to peace. It is the plan by the right-wing Israeli parties to annex the entire Palestinian West Bank (nearly attempted under Donald Trump) and forcefully drive Palestinians into Jordan and Egypt.

Joe Biden is skilled at shedding tears at memorials of grief in this country. But he runs dry when the recurring catastrophes befalling Palestinians beg for his presidential compassion and actual deeds.

He will not escape history’s judgment. #Israel #Palestine

October 24, 2023 Posted by | politics international, USA | Leave a comment

Decontaminating Fukushima: have the billions spent been worth it?

The Conversation, Jim Smith, Professor of Environmental Science, University of Portsmouth, October 24, 2023

The Chernobyl and (to a lesser extent) Fukushima nuclear accidents contaminated large areas of land with low-level radioactivity. After both accidents, huge efforts were taken to decontaminate the affected areas.

But a recent study at Fukushima raises doubts about whether these decontamination efforts were worthwhile. Less than one-third of the population has returned to the evacuated zones and extensive areas of forest in the region remain contaminated.

Following the accident at Fukushima Daiichi in 2011, approximately 1,100 square kilometres were evacuated, resulting in the relocation of more than 100,000 people from their homes. A contaminated area about eight times larger remained inhabited, albeit subject to continuous radiation monitoring.

The dominant source of radiation exposure for people stemmed from gamma rays emitted by contaminated soils, pavements, roads and buildings. The objective of the decontamination operation was to ensure that the general public received an annual dose from Fukushima’s radioactivity of less than 1,000 microsieverts (µSv) above the natural background level. The average natural radiation dose in Japan stands at 2,200 µSv per year.

Radiocaesium, which is the most important long-lived radioactive element emitted by the accident in terms of radiation dose, adheres to soil particles very strongly. Consequently, the decontamination of agricultural land primarily involved removing the top 5cm of soil. In urban areas, decontamination efforts entailed the removal of topsoil from sports fields, as well as sandblasting or pressure washing hard surfaces, and pressure washing drains and gutters.

These efforts reduced doses by about 60% in residential areas and farmland, allowing people to return to their homes in a large part of the evacuated area. This is a far cry from Chernobyl, where extensive decontamination initiatives were ultimately abandoned, leaving huge evacuated areas that remain empty to this day. But was undertaking decontamination in Fukushima worthwhile?

Costs and benefits

Decontaminating the land in Fukushima has cost tens of billions of dollars. The process has, unfortunately, also caused substantial radiation exposure for the workers involved, and has generated huge amounts of radioactive soil waste. But the question of whether to decontaminate land is complex and only partially related to scientific evidence.

On the one hand, decontamination provides reassurance that radiation is being “cleaned up” and that doses are being reduced. But it can also give the impression that low-level radiation is more dangerous than it actually is.

Dose rates were not dangerously high in many areas of Fukushima that were subject to decontamination. In fact, doses were relatively low in the first year following the accident (less than 12,000 µSv), and these levels decreased significantly in subsequent years.

These levels fall within the natural range people are exposed to from radioactivity in rocks, soils, building materials and cosmic radiation worldwide (typically between 1,000 µSv and 10,000 µSv per year, but sometimes higher).

On balance, I think the reassurance that contamination was being cleaned up was valuable in many areas where people remained living. Decontamination also allowed agricultural land to be returned to productive use more quickly. However, the process of removing topsoil had the side effect of damaging soil fertility.

Accidental rewilding

In the evacuated zone where dose rates were around ten times higher, it’s less clear that decontamination was beneficial. Only 30% of people have returned to their homes in the decontaminated part of this area and much of the land in the most contaminated so-called “difficult to return zone” remains abandoned.

A better option may have been to declare most of this zone a nature reserve and allow managed rewilding of the area. Rewilding is happening to a large extent anyway, as it has at Chernobyl. It would also have avoided decontamination workers being exposed to radiation and allowed more financial support to help people relocate.

But this is a complex decision that needs to consider the views of many stakeholders, not least the evacuated people themselves.

Fukushima’s contaminated forests

The land in and around the region’s towns and villages has generally been decontaminated effectively. However, much of the Fukushima Prefecture (71%) is covered by forest. Most of this forest remains contaminated.

The persistence of radiocaesium in ecosystems, particularly in forests, has been known for many decades. Globally, radiocaesium levels in wild foodstuffs such as mushrooms, edible plants, game animals and freshwater fish tend to be higher than those found in agricultural systems.

Wild boar in certain regions of Germany, for instance, still exhibit radicaesium levels exceeding consumption limits as a consequence of both Chernobyl and historical nuclear weapons testing. Restrictions on the consumption of forest products have lasted for decades following the Chernobyl incident. And they are expected to persist in many forested areas of Fukushima too.

Radiocaesium lingers in forests due to the prevalence of organic soils and the absence of fertiliser application. Low nutrient levels facilitate the absorption of radiocaesium by plants. This is mainly attributed to radiocaesium’s chemical similarity to potassium, a crucial plant nutrient.

Forests do pose a wildfire risk. There have been many forest fires in the vicinity of Chernobyl since the accident. But radiation doses from smoke inhalation are extremely low, even for firefighters, and the fires have not significantly redistributed radioactivity.

There are no easy answers regarding clean up after a nuclear accident. Japan has made huge and often successful efforts to reduce radiation doses and reassure people living in or returning to the affected areas. But low-level radiation remains everywhere, particularly in forests……….. https://theconversation.com/decontaminating-fukushima-have-the-billions-spent-been-worth-it-215836 #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes.

October 24, 2023 Posted by | environment, Fukushima continuing, Reference | Leave a comment

China-Russia in a nuclear sub counter to AUKUS

China’s Type 096 nuclear submarine draws on Russian tech and expertise and once operational will bring US mainland into closer missile range

Asia Times, By GABRIEL HONRADA, OCTOBER 23, 2023

China is making new quiet nuclear submarines with Russia’s expert assistance, an answer to the AUKUS alliance and the latest sign of the two powers’ converging strategic  interests against the United States and its Pacific allies

The project could make it harder for the US and its allies to track China’s submarines in crucial theaters including the South China Sea and represents a direct challenge to US undersea dominance in the Pacific.

This month, Reuters reported that China is producing a new generation of nuclear-armed submarines, citing evidence that its Type 096 nuclear ballistic missile (SSBN) submarine will be operational before the end of the decade. The report said that breakthroughs in the submarine’s quietness have been aided partly by Russian technology……………………………………..more https://asiatimes.com/2023/10/china-russia-in-a-nuclear-sub-counter-to-aukus/ #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

October 24, 2023 Posted by | China, global warming | Leave a comment

Congress calls for third US nuclear submarine yard to meet American and AUKUS obligations


Defense Connecg, 20 OCTOBER 2023, By: Stephen Kuper

“………………………………….. the US Navy and its supporting industrial architecture, once the unassailable leader and security guarantor for much of the world and the global economy, is now a shadow of its former might.

This has left the US Navy and its global partners, including the Royal Australian Navy, to face an increasingly uphill battle to field a range of next-generation capabilities ranging from hypersonic weapons, through to advanced surface and submarine capabilities.

…………………..In response to these mounting concerns, the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States released an updated final report, titled, America’s Strategic Posture: The Final Report of the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States, detailing the make-up of America’s critical strategic capabilities, namely the nuclear submarine fleet.

A third yard is critical to meet American and AUKUS obligations

Of particular importance for Australia is what is by now the well-documented lack of capacity in the existing US submarine construction yards to meet the stated minimum requirements identified by the US Navy.

The dual demands of replacing the remaining Los Angeles Class attack submarines and the Ohio Class ballistic missile submarines has already stretched the US defence industrial base to capacity, prior to the added layer of complexity required to support the trilateral AUKUS agreement.

……..The commission report suggests that the Pentagon, “increase shipbuilding capacity, by working with industry to establish or renovate a third shipyard dedicated to production of nuclear-powered vessels, with particular emphasis on nuclear-powered submarines”.

However, given the immense cost required to bring a third yard from either a green field or brown field site, government spending would be required the Pentagon has been told, this is particularly important when you account for the maintenance and sustainment requirements of nuclear-powered submarines on top of the construction phase.

Highlighting just how monumental this task is, the report states, “In the sea leg, the Navy is scheduled to construct one Columbia Class submarine per year and sustain the Ohio Class in parallel relying on the same infrastructure for both (manufacturing facilities, dry docks, etc). Additionally, this same workforce and industrial base also support Virginia Class submarine production.”

Such a balance isn’t without trade offs, with the Pentagon warning that, “As a result, the Navy must consider schedule trade offs between the two classes of submarines. The [Office of Management and Budget] as well as the Commission are skeptical that the current infrastructure can simultaneously support conventional and nuclear sustainment, modernisation, and construction as scheduled. The AUKUS agreement may place further stress on this capacity.”

………………………………………………………  the US Navy and its allies, including Australia, are facing stagnating or declining defence budgets (in real terms) as a result of increasingly costly technology-heavy platforms, coupled with continuing societal atomisation and disconnection from the principles of liberal democracy,…………………………………………………………..

Final thoughts

Importantly, in this era of renewed competition between autarchy and democracy, this is an uncomfortable conversation that needs to be had in the open with the Australian people, as ultimately, they will be called upon to help implement it, to consent to the direction, and to defend it should diplomacy fail……….  https://www.defenceconnect.com.au/industry/12977-congress-calls-for-third-us-nuclear-submarine-yard

October 24, 2023 Posted by | AUSTRALIA, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

St. Louis businessman charged with kickback scheme involving nuclear weapons parts

St Louis Post Dispatch, Katie Kull, Oct 19, 2023

ST. LOUIS — A local businessman is facing federal charges in Kansas after authorities say he sent kickbacks and bribes to an engineer at a nuclear weapons parts manufacturer in exchange for subcontracts.

Richard W. Mueller, 63, was indicted Wednesday on six federal charges, including wire fraud and lying to federal agents, after authorities said he paid Kansas engineer Michael Clinesmith more than $1 million in exchange for steering contracts to Mueller’s businesses over the course of a decade………………………………………………………………….. more https://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-courts/st-louis-businessman-charged-with-kickback-scheme-involving-nuclear-weapons-parts/article_7a7fff2c-6eb7-11ee-a26a-3f5922548456.html #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

October 24, 2023 Posted by | Legal, USA | Leave a comment

Nuclear regulator raps EDF over cyber compliance

The Office for Nuclear Regulation says EDF has come up short on needed measures to improve cyber security standards at several critical UK nuclear facilities

France-headquartered energy giant EDF has been singled out by the UK’s
Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) and placed under significantly enhanced
regulatory attention for cyber security – the highest possible level of
scrutiny – after the critical national infrastructure (CNI) operator failed
to comply with previously made commitments to enhance its cyber security
posture.

Computer Weekly 19th Oct 2023

https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366556335/Nuclear-regulator-raps-EDF-over-cyber-compliance #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

October 24, 2023 Posted by | safety, UK | Leave a comment

Rolls-Royce facing £350m class action lawsuit from investors

 Rolls-Royce, the FTSE 100 engineering giant, is facing a potential legal
claim from investors worth at least £350m after a bribery and corruption
scandal wiped millions of pounds from the company’s value. City lawyers
are working with a group of investors seeking compensation from Rolls-Royce
after the bribery allegations rocked the aircraft engine maker in 2017.


Shareholders are to claim that the company made misrepresentations to the
market about the bribery scandal. Rolls-Royce previously agreed to a £497m
settlement with the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) in a bid to draw a line
under the wrongdoing. The SFO’s agreement with Rolls-Royce in 2017
covered “12 counts of conspiracy to corrupt, false accounting and failure
to prevent bribery” across its aerospace and energy divisions.

Telegraph 22nd Oct 2023

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/10/22/rolls-royce-face-350m-lawsuit-investors/

#nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

October 24, 2023 Posted by | secrets,lies and civil liberties, UK | Leave a comment

Bulgaria abandons Belene NPP project

SeeNews, Antonia Kokalova-Gray, Oct 12, 2023

– The Bulgarian government said it decided to repeal a previous cabinet decision to seek investors and equipment manufacturers for the construction of a nuclear power plant at Belene, on the Danube.

The energy ministry must now cancel the procedure under which the National Electricity Company (NEK) was to select a strategic investor to build the Belene NPP, the government said in a press release on Wednesday.

In addition, NEK must notify the decision to the applicants that have been shortlisted to submit binding offers and with which confidentiality agreements have been signed………………………………………………………….  https://seenews.com/news/bulgaria-abandons-belene-npp-project-836570

October 24, 2023 Posted by | Bulgaria, politics | Leave a comment

Nuclear news – week to 23rd October

A bit of good newsUNICEF: First deliveries of life-saving supplies for children enter Gaza. Prepositioned emergency supplies.  UNICEF has prepositioned additional emergency supplies for up to 250,000 people at the Rafah crossing that can be brought into Gaza in a matter of hours, with more enroute. Humanitarian supplies must be allowed to safely reach children and families in need wherever they are, in accordance with the rules of war.

TOP STORIES

 How Media Outlets Work With Israel To Control Gaza Narrative. 

Ralph Nader: Biden Returns Empty-handed, Except for a Huge Bill for the American Taxpayers.

Nuclear power is a dead end as a climate solution. 

NUSCALE POWER ($SMR): A FAKE CUSTOMER AND A MAJOR CONTRACT IN PERIL CAST DOUBT ON NUSCALE’S VIABILITY.

Christina notes. Voices for decency.          Atoms4NetZero – the International Atomic Energy Agency is deceiving the world on climate change

**************************************************

ECONOMICS. Why NuScale Power Stock Got Thrashed on Thursday.     Germany caves in to French demands for government subsidies to the nuclear industry in the EU electricity market.       Fukushima plant water release: Russia follows China, suspends all Japanese seafood .imports.

EDUCATION. The nuclear industry continues to encroach on education.

ENERGY. World may have crossed solar power ‘tipping point’. Dunkelflaute (or… can we keep the lights on when the wind doesn’t blow and the sun doesn’t shine?)

ENVIRONMENT. Oceans. China highlights marine radiation monitoring in draft law revision.  Multiple radionuclides detected in Fukushima nuke wastewater planned for 3rd round of ocean discharge.

ETHICS and RELIGION. Israel’s Violence Will Never Bring “Safety” to Anyone, Including Jews. Holy See urges renewed efforts to advance nuclear disarmament.

HISTORY. Declassified Soviet files reveal horror crimes of Ukrainian Nazi collaborators.

HUMAN RIGHTS. Amnesty Probe Finds ‘Damning Evidence of War Crimes’ by Israel in Gaza.

LEGAL. Two Men Plead Guilty to Falsifying Documents Related to Testing of Equipment at Nuclear Power Plants. St. Louis businessman charged with kickback scheme involving nuclear weapons parts.

MEDIA. Atrocity Propaganda. Mass Media Reporters Aren’t Buying Israel’s Hospital Bombing Story. The Mainstream Press Keep Slamming Israel’s Hospital Bombing Story. How Big Media Facilitate Israeli War Crimes in Gaza.

NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY. UK small nuclear competition: Rolls Royce in, Bill Gates snubbed.       Small modular nuclear reactors: Unlikely, unaffordable, dirty and dangerous.         Why are Small Modular Nuclear Reactors a Dog’s Breakfast of Designs?              Many years before floating nuclear power plants could become viable.

PERSONAL STORIES. Nuclear Weapons and New Mexico’s Downwinders: Tina Cordova on “the legacy for us that no one ever talks about”.

POLITICS. Poland’s $40 billion plan for 2 nuclear reactors, built by 2043. Ukraine, Taiwan, Israel:  Biden’s treasure squandering trifecta. Bulgaria abandons Belene NPP project.

POLITICS INTERNATIONAL and DIPLOMACY. 

SPACE. EXPLORATION, WEAPONS. Burned-up space junk pollutes Earth’s upper atmosphere, NASA

planes find. Nuclear companies sign up for space technology missions.

WAR and CONFLICT. 

WEAPONS and WEAPONS SALES. 

October 23, 2023 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

NUSCALE POWER ($SMR): A FAKE CUSTOMER AND A MAJOR CONTRACT IN PERIL CAST DOUBT ON NUSCALE’S VIABILITY

As of now, there are only two operational SMR plants in the world — located in Russia and China — and both have experienced cost blowouts and delays. NuScale claims approximately 680 issued and pending global patents. But the company does not have an operational SMR and the only revenue it generates comes from the reimbursement of specific R&D activities.

Considering Fluor’s plan to divest its NuScale stake and the apparent lack of substantial activity at Entra1, one could speculate that Standard Power and Entra1 were brought in primarily to pump NuScale’s stock, just like many other SPACs. 

October 19, 2023 · by Iceberg Research

Main Findings

  • NuScale, a developer of small modular nuclear reactors (SMR), recently disclosed a huge contract with blockchain datacenter service provider Standard Power. The deal aims for a projected capacity of 1,848 MWe that we estimate is worth ~$37bn. This contract has zero chance of being executed as Standard Power clearly does not have the means to support contracts of this size. Its managing director Adam Swickle was found guilty of securities fraud in the past. Entra1 — NuScale’s commercial partner — is expected to help with the funding. The company was created in 2021 and it is very unlikely to be able to finance even a portion of this contract.
  • NuScale has a more credible contract with the Carbon Free Power Project (“CFPP”) for the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (“UAMPS”). CFPP participants have been supportive of the project despite contracted energy prices that never seem to stop rising, from $55/MWh in 2016, to $89/MWh at the start of this year. What many have missed is that NuScale has been given till around January 2024 to raise project commitments to 80% or 370 MWe, from the existing 26% or 120 MWe, or risk termination. Crucially, when the participants agreed to this timeline, they were assured refunds for project costs if it were terminated, which creates an incentive for them to drop out. We are three months to the deadline and subscriptions have not moved an inch.   
  • NuScale has around 15 months before its cash runs out. We fully expect further shareholder dilution, as completion of the CFPP remains an iffy prospect with its constant cost overruns. On 13 October 2023, former CFO Chris Colbert sold the last of his NuScale stake.  
  • We believe these commercial and financial struggles present hurdles NuScale won’t cross without continued support from the Department of Energy (“DOE”). This presents a double-edged sword. Even if that support continues, the DOE’s usual policy is that costs have to be shared with the private sector, meaning that existing shareholders will be diluted. 

Presentation of NuScale

NuScale Power Corporation, based in Portland, Oregon, has been developing small modular nuclear reactors (“SMRs”) since 2007. In May 2022, the company went public through a merger with SPAC Spring Valley Acquisition Corp. NuScale’s market cap stands at ~$1.2bn. This valuation combines both Class A and Class B shares, which can’t be traded unless converted to Class A. Fluor Enterprises Inc, NuScale’s parent company, holds 126 million Class B shares that represent 55.8% of NuScale’s voting power.

SMRs have power capacities of up to 300 MWe per unit while conventional nuclear reactors generate around 1,000 MWe. For example, NuScale’s design is 77 MWe. These SMRs come with lower upfront costs because of their smaller size. But this benefit is offset by lower economies of scale compared to conventional reactors. 

Over the last 16 years, NuScale has spent ~$1.6bn to develop its SMR tech, funded by a mix of SPAC money, government grants, and private investments. The Department of Energy (“DOE”) has contributed over $650m of grants to NuScale’s endeavors.

The company is going toe-to-toe with industry goliaths like Westinghouse, Rolls-Royce, EDF, etc. But it managed to snag the first-ever Standard Design Approval from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 2020 – a 12-module plant at 50 MWe each. However, in August 2023, the company decided to switch the blueprint – a six-plant design featuring an uprated 77 MWe. NuScale is now waiting for the new design’s approval, which would take ~24 months according to the company.

As of now, there are only two operational SMR plants in the world — located in Russia and China — and both have experienced cost blowouts and delays. NuScale claims approximately 680 issued and pending global patents. But the company does not have an operational SMR and the only revenue it generates comes from the reimbursement of specific R&D activities.

As for customers, NuScale has two significant contracts. The first is a 462 MWe agreement with the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (“UAMPS”), a consortium that supplies wholesale electricity to around 50 municipalities, priced at $9.3bn. The second is a 1,848 MWe deal that was recently signed with blockchain datacenter service provider Standard Power, with an estimated value of ~$37bn.

New client Standard Power: Crypto mixed with nuclear energy – What could possibly go wrong?

On 6 October 2023, NuScale’s stock popped over 20%, after the company announced its largest-ever contract, to deliver 24 units of 77 MWe modules in 2029. As part of this agreement, NuScale’s commercial partner Entra1 would develop, manage, own, and operate these SMRs, while blockchain datacenter service provider Standard Power would be the end-user.

The deal’s total projected output is 1,848 MWe, four times the size of NuScale’s existing agreement with its other major client UAMPS, and translates to a staggering $37bn financial commitment. Considering there are only two operational SMR plants globally, one in China and the other in Russia, this agreement not only marks a significant achievement for NuScale but also holds the distinction of being the largest SMR contract ever.

Unsurprisingly, the sell-side cheerleaders have applauded this deal…………………………….

Both Standard Power and Entra1 present obvious credit and performance risks.

1) Standard Power

Standard Power was formed in 2018 to provide data centre services for blockchain mining and high performance computing applications. 

According to its LinkedIn page, the company operates with just 30 employees.

Searching the internet suggests that Standard Power’s most significant partnership to date was with Cipher Mining. In 2021, the company signed a hosting agreement with Cipher ‘to provide a total mining capacity of at least 200 MW’. This deal ultimately fell apart as the contract was terminated in February this year (see below on original).

In addition, Standard Power’s management team raises some serious red flags, especially when it comes to their managing director, Adam Swickle. 

Swickle has a track record that screams “investor beware”. He cut his teeth at notorious Wall Street firms like Stratton Oakmont and Meyers Pollock & Robbins — both infamous for pump-and-dump schemes and ultimately shuttered due to regulatory crackdowns.

In 2003, the SEC went after Swickle for setting up a fake foreign exchange trading house and making off with investors’ cash. As the CEO of United Currency Group, from May 2001 to December 2002, he conducted a fraudulent offering of securities based on misleading info. This included the company’s plans for an IPO, Swickle’s own background, and how corporate funds would be used. …………………………………………………………………………..

Taking these factors into consideration, it appears that Standard Power does not have the balance sheet to support this contract, both in the present and in the future.

2) ENTRA1

NuScale portrays Entra1 as having a “strong global pipeline of energy production projects” and a ““one-stop-shop” for the financing, investment, development, execution, and management of NuScale-powered projects and opportunities”, suggesting that Entra1 will finance the Standard Power contract. 

Entra1 was incorporated in Delaware in December 2021. But the firm has only one employee referenced on LinkedIn, its online presence is almost non-existent, its Twitter account is essentially a NuScale bulletin board, and its only announced deal is unsurprisingly, with NuScale.

At a recent Analyst/Investor Day event, it was disclosed that Wadie Habboush, the founder of Entra1, has a longstanding personal relationship with NuScale’s CEO, John Hopkins. Around 10 years ago, Habboush formed a joint venture with Fluor — NuScale’s controlling shareholder — for projects in the Middle East e.g., Iraq. We can’t see how experience working on Middle Eastern projects would be directly transferable to managing a $37bn mega-SMR project in the US.

Fluor, NuScale’s controlling shareholder, has been open about its intention to reduce its stake (55.8%) in the company. Its long-term plan is to own only 20%-25% of NuScale as per EVP Joseph Brennan on Fluor’s 3Q22 call. He further elaborated in 4Q22 that Fluor had “kicked off the strategic exercise” and the company would be in a better position to discuss that at the end of 1Q23. There were no updates on Fluor’s 2Q23 call.

Considering Fluor’s plan to divest its NuScale stake and the apparent lack of substantial activity at Entra1, one could speculate that Standard Power and Entra1 were brought in primarily to pump NuScale’s stock, just like many other SPACs. 

We believe that the contract with Standard Power has zero chance of being executed. Announcing a deal with such counterparties damages the credibility of a company in an industry where public trust is paramount. We doubt established players like Westinghouse would deal with a questionable client like Standard Power. 

The situation at the Carbon Free Power Project is much worse than what NuScale lets on

Unlike Standard Power, the Carbon Free Power Project (“CFPP”) started off as a sound counterparty.  The project was launched in 2015 by the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS), as part of its long-term strategy to reduce carbon emissions and replace outdated coal-fired plants. If completed, the Idaho Falls plant will begin generating power in 2029, and will deploy six, 77-MWe modules to generate 462 MW of electricity by 2030. Its development and construction is funded under a cost-share agreement between the DOE and UAMPS.

Originally, between 2016 and 2020, NuScale priced the power at $55/MWh. Then, the price was raised to $58/MWh when the project was downsized from 12 reactor modules to just six (924 MWe to 462 MWe). By December 2019, 35 UAMPS members had signed on for 200 MW of power. But escalating costs have caused these numbers to shrink. As of March this year, there were 26 participants, and subscriptions dropped to ~120 MW (see appendix for table), representing 26% of the project’s total capacity.

The shocker came in January this year when new cost estimates pushed that figure up by 53%, setting it at $89/MWh. NuScale attributed the significant increase to a 75% rise in estimated construction costs, from $5.3bn to $9.3bn, caused by factors such as commodity price inflation and higher interest rates. The actual cost would be much higher, if not for more than $4bn in subsidies the project expects to get from US taxpayers, according to the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis.


The good news for NuScale is that the participants extended their commitment and accepted the revised cost. On NuScale’s 1Q23 earnings call, CEO Hopkins stated, “Right now, we feel very comfortable with that $89 megawatt hour.” 

What was generally overlooked in the press is that the agreement includes conditions that essentially kick the can down the road, and endanger the project. The extension (Pg 4) states that NuScale must raise subscription levels from its current 120 MWe (26% of total capacity) to 370 MWe (80% of total capacity), on the earlier of the combined license application (“COLA”) submission, or 1 February 2024. ……………………………………………..

UAMPS member Idaho Falls laid out the stakes at its council meeting (Pg 4) in February. If NuScale fails to meet the subscription target, and costs continue to go up, so does the risk of project termination………………………………….

Key to the extension is this condition: participants will be refunded their costs if the 80% threshold is not reached. Now, with this new clause, they have a strong financial incentive to withdraw if NuScale fails to meet the subscription target. 

NuScale has around three months to the deadline but is nowhere near the 80%. In August 2023, the company told news outlet Power that “no changes have occurred since March”. At a September meeting of the Washington City power board, when asked about subscription progress, director Rick Hansen said (1:01:10-1:04:00) that “Not anybody that’s able to or willing to sign at this point.” He added. “We have lots of cheerleaders but not a lot of people that want to jump in the game at this point.” Interested parties want additional mechanisms to de-risk it, according to him. This suggests no one has signed on since March. 

The contract that has lent NuScale credibility is hitting a wall. The company seems to echo this sentiment, based on recent language in its 10-Q, which now adds: “While it is reasonably possible we will be required to pay these amounts, no accrual has been recorded in our financial statements.”…………………

Specifically, NuScale had a capped financial obligation’ of $83.5m to UAMPS. As of the end of June, this looming liability was around $37m.

Even if the project continues, NuScale’s $89/MWh commitment adds further financial risk. The nuclear reactor industry has a notorious history of cost overruns and delays during the construction stage. NuScale has not built a SMR yet so there’s no reason to believe the company will defy industry norms. For equity holders, this is uncomfortable, as they will bear the brunt of these performance shortfalls and costs.

NuScale’s heavy cash burn will lead to shareholder dilution

NuScale’s financial position appears increasingly shaky under the uncertainty hanging over the CFPP. The company has around 15 months of cash, based on its end-June cash balance of ~$215m, and LTM operating cash flow of negative $167m. That runway could stretch to ~26 months if the company maxes out its $150m at-the-market equity line, announced on 9 August 2023. But this does not account for potential CFPP cost repayments………………

We fully expect further shareholder dilution. Completion of the CFPP remains an iffy prospect, and given NuScale’s track record with cost overruns, that seems almost inevitable.

Against this backdrop, we noted that former CFO Chris Colbert has been selling his shares since May 2023, fully unloading his stake on 13 October 2023 – reaping total gross proceeds of ~$1.7m over this period. This could be a leading indicator of NuScale’s unspoken issues. …………

Conclusion

NuScale’s delusional contract with Standard Power seems more like an act of desperation to shore up investor confidence, rather than a strategic move. The company is struggling and we believe its equity has little to no value without government support. Even if that support continues, the DOE’s usual policy is that costs have to be shared with the private sector, meaning that existing shareholders will be diluted. 

Importantly, the DOE holds a non-exclusive worldwide license to NuScale’s intellectual property, according to financing agreements. This creates the possibility that the DOE could simply transfer this intellectual property to a more established player, if NuScale is unable to meet performance obligations. ……………………..

We are short NuScale……………………………

Appendix………….. https://iceberg-research.com/2023/10/19/nuscale-power-smr-a-fake-customer-and-a-major-contract-in-peril-cast-doubt-on-nuscales-viability/ #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

October 23, 2023 Posted by | Small Modular Nuclear Reactors, USA | Leave a comment

Amnesty Probe Finds ‘Damning Evidence of War Crimes’ by Israel in Gaza

“Our entire family has been destroyed,” said one survivor of an Israeli bombing in the besieged Palestinian territory.

SCHEERPOST, By Brett Wilkins / Common Dreams 21 Oct 23

As Israel’s assault on Gaza continued Friday with 4,100 Palestinians—including over 1,600 children—killed and at least 13,000 others wounded by relentless bombardment that’s destroyed or damaged nearly a third of the besieged strip’s homes, Amnesty International shared “damning evidence of war crimes as Israeli attacks wipe out entire families.”

Amnesty interviewed survivors and eyewitnesses, analyzed satellite imagery, and verified photos and videos to investigate the Israeli aerial bombardments of Gaza, documenting “unlawful Israeli attacks, including indiscriminate attacks, which caused mass civilian casualties and must be investigated as war crimes.”

Agnès Callamard, Amnesty’s secretary-general, said in a statement: “In their stated intent to use all means to destroy Hamas, Israeli forces have shown a shocking disregard for civilian lives. They have pulverized street after street of residential buildings killing civilians on a mass scale and destroying essential infrastructure, while new restrictions mean Gaza is fast running out of water, medicine, fuel, and electricity.”

“Testimonies from eyewitnesses and survivors highlighted, again and again, how Israeli attacks decimated Palestinian families, causing such destruction that surviving relatives have little but rubble to remember their loved ones by,” she added.

Amnesty’s report focused on five specific incidents the group said amount to war crimes, including the October 7 bombing of a three-story residential building in the al-Zeitoun neighborhood of Gaza City that killed 15 members of the al-Dos family, including seven children.

“Two bombs fell suddenly on top of the building and destroyed it,” said Mohammad al-Dos, whose 5-year-old son Rakan was killed in the attack. “My wife and I were lucky to survive because we were staying on the top floor. She was nine months pregnant and gave birth at al-Shifa Hospital a day after the attack. Our entire family has been destroyed.”

The report also details an airstrike on the Gaza City home of the Hijazi family that killed 12 relatives, including three children, as well as four neighbors. Amnesty found no evidence of any military targets in the area at the time of the attack.

Amnesty’s report focused on five specific incidents the group said amount to war crimes, including the October 7 bombing of a three-story residential building in the al-Zeitoun neighborhood of Gaza City that killed 15 members of the al-Dos family, including seven children.

“Two bombs fell suddenly on top of the building and destroyed it,” said Mohammad al-Dos, whose 5-year-old son Rakan was killed in the attack. “My wife and I were lucky to survive because we were staying on the top floor. She was nine months pregnant and gave birth at al-Shifa Hospital a day after the attack. Our entire family has been destroyed.”

The report also details an airstrike on the Gaza City home of the Hijazi family that killed 12 relatives, including three children, as well as four neighbors. Amnesty found no evidence of any military targets in the area at the time of the attack.

According to the Palestinian Health Ministry, more than 50 entire families have been removed from the civil registry after most or all of their members were killed in Israeli attacks.

“The five cases presented barely scratch the surface of the horror that Amnesty has documented and illustrate the devastating impact that Israel’s aerial bombardments are having on people in Gaza,” Callamard said. “For 16 years, Israel’s illegal blockade has made Gaza the world’s biggest open-air prison—the international community must act now to prevent it becoming a giant graveyard.”………..

Other possible war crimes perpetrated by Israeli forces not specifically covered in the Amnesty report include but are not limited to collective punishment; an order to evacuate more than 1.1 million people from northern Gaza ahead of an expected ground invasion; Israel’s stated focus on “damage and not accuracy” in its war on Hamas; bombing a civilian convoy heeding the evacuation order that killed around 70 people on a route Israeli authorities said was “safe”; use of white phosphorus munitions in a densely populated area; bombing schools and civilian shelters; and deadly attacks by Israeli settlers and soldiers on West Bank Palestinians.

Amnesty also said that Hamas and other Palestinian militants have committed war crimes including the deliberate killing of 1,400 Israelis—most of them civilians—during last week’s surprise attack on Israel, the taking of around 200 Israeli and international hostages during the incursion, and the indiscriminate firing of rockets at civilian targets.

“Amnesty International is calling on Hamas and other armed groups to urgently release all civilian hostages, and to immediately stop firing indiscriminate rockets,” said Callamard. “There can be no justification for the deliberate killing of civilians under any circumstances.”

The Amnesty analysis came amid reports of possible fresh Israeli war crimes, including an airstrike on the Church of Saint Porphyrius, an 873-year-old Christian Orthodox house of worship crowded with people seeking shelter from the bombing. Officials said at least 18 people were killed in the attack, including numerous children………………………………………………………………………………..

Earlier this week, lawyers with the U.S.-based Center for Constitutional Rights warned that the Biden administration is rendering itself complicitin possible genocide against Palestinians by providing weapons, political support, and diplomatic cover for Israel’s war.

On Wednesday, the U.S. vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning violence against civilians in Israel and Gaza and calling for “humanitarian pauses” to allow aid to enter the enclave.  https://scheerpost.com/2023/10/21/amnesty-probe-finds-damning-evidence-of-war-crimes-by-israel-in-gaza/ #Israel #Palestine

October 23, 2023 Posted by | civil liberties, Israel | Leave a comment

Multiple radionuclides detected in Fukushima nuke wastewater planned for 3rd round of ocean discharge

Xinhua 21 Oct 23  https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202310/21/WS65339e99a31090682a5e9ef2.html

TOKYO — The third batch of Fukushima nuclear-contaminated water to be released during Japan’s next round of ocean discharge contains carbon-14, cobalt 60, strontium-90 and other radionuclides, according to pre-discharge test results released by the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO).

Despite mounting concerns and opposition among local fishermen as well as from other countries, TEPCO said that preparations for the third round of ocean discharge will begin after the second round of discharge is completed and relevant maintenance and confirmation operations are carried out.

The nuclear-contaminated wastewater from the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, after advanced liquid processing system (ALPS) treatment, must enter the measurement and confirmation facility and wait for pre-discharge test results before being discharged into the ocean.

The measurement and confirmation facility is split into three groups of 10 tanks with each of the groups used on a rotating basis as receiving tanks, measurement and confirmation tanks, and discharge tanks.

At present, the 10 tanks in Group B were emptied in the first round of discharge starting on Aug 24. Meanwhile, the 10 tanks in Group C were confirmed to meet the discharge standards on Sept 21, and the discharge started on Oct 5.

The sampling of the nuclear wastewater stored in Group A tanks for the third round of discharge was completed on July 10. The analysis results showed that they contained trace amounts of carbon-14, cobalt 60, strontium-90, iodine-129 and cesium-137, of which strontium-90 was not detected in the second round of discharge from Oct 5, according to reports released on Thursday by TEPCO.

TEPCO claims that its ALPS facility, a multi-nuclide removal system, can remove 62 radioactive substances except tritium, but it was found that about 70 percent of the water in the storage tanks contained non-tritium radionuclides at a concentration exceeding the regulatory standards applicable for discharge into the environment. #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

October 23, 2023 Posted by | Fukushima continuing, OCEANIA, radiation | Leave a comment

How Big Media Facilitate Israeli War Crimes in Gaza

Corporate media’s dehumanization of Palestinians, lack of historical context, and repeating hearsay as fact make the current tragedy unintelligible to Americans.

By Robin Andersen / Project Censored, October 22, 2023  https://scheerpost.com/2023/10/22/how-big-media-facilitate-israeli-war-crimes-in-gaza/

On October 6, 2023, Hamas broke out of Gaza, lobbed rockets, and sent fighters into Israeli territory. The attacks killed hundreds of Israeli soldiers and civilians. Images of violence and brutality were recorded and distributed widely over broadcast news over and over again, repeatedly showing abused, bloodied, and crying women and children. The violence was presented with voices of US and Israeli officials asserting that the attack was “unprecedented.” Israel retaliated immediately and bombed the Gaza Strip, one of the most densely populated places on the globe. Photographs of death and destruction ran side by side, each with only brief captions about location. Many news outlets reported that the violence came out of nowhere, offering no historical context. The attacks therefore were without motivation, attributed only to the pure evil of Hamas and Palestinian terrorists.

German media scholar Hektor Haarkötter, who partners with Project Censored for his work with the News Enlightenment Initiative, was recently in the US speaking on an international roundtable at a critical communication conference and said he was stunned by the coverage: “When I saw the images of such violence repeated many times, on rotation, I was shocked. This would not be considered news in Germany. It would have been seen as little more than sensationalism.”

On October 7, the AP reported that US President Joe Biden told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the United States “stands with the people of Israel in the face of these terrorist assaults. Israel has the right to defend itself and its people, full stop.” On October 9, The Times of Israel quoted Defense Minister Yoav Gallant saying, “We are fighting human animals, and we are acting accordingly.” Maj. Gen. Ghassan Alian directed his threat at all Gazans on October 10, declaring, “Kidnapping, abusing and murdering children, women and elderly people is not human.” He then announced, “There will be no electricity and no water. There will only be destruction. You wanted hell; you will get hell.”

In a piece published on October 8 titled “Media Calls The Attack On Israel Unprovoked: Experts Say That’s Historically Inaccurate,” the Huffington Post pointed to the Israeli government’s “apartheid against Palestinians” as a provocation. It quoted IfNotNow, an American Jewish group that opposes Israeli apartheid, expressing their dread for the loss of life and loved ones, Israelis and Palestinians alike. It continued, “Every day under Israel’s system of apartheid is a provocation. The strangling siege on Gaza is a provocation. Settlers terrorizing entire Palestinian villages, soldiers raiding and demolishing Palestinian homes, murdering Palestinians in the streets, Israeli ministers calling for genocide and expulsion” are all provocations.

Indeed, multiple international human rights groups have defined the long-term Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands as a system of apartheid. The death toll on each side exposes the false assertion that Israeli violence is always retaliatory and that of Palestinians is “unprecedented.” The UNOCHA documents 6,407 Palestinian deaths since 2008, compared to 308 Israeli fatalities. Gregory Shupak reported that since 2001, more than ten thousand Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces, with “nearly 9 out of 10 deaths this century have been on the Palestinian side.” In addition, the Israelis have made daily life in Gaza miserable. As UK journalist Jonathan Cook wrote, “[Gaza’s] inhabitants—one million of them children—are denied the most basic freedoms, such as the right to movement; access to proper health care, drinkable water, and the use of electricity because Israel keeps bombing Gaza’s power station.” But voices such as Shupak and Cook are virtually absent from US establishment news coverage of the violence.

The Hamas attacks were taken out of the context of ongoing violence, presented without cause, and in narratives that see only Hamas violence but have rarely featured or condemned equivalent Israeli violence against Palestinians. Establishment media’s one-sided pro-Israel coverage, established over many years, fed into the growing consensus that a major retaliation by Israelis would be forthcoming. Early corporate news reporting seemed to confirm its inevitability, with almost no voices of reason or caution allowed to enter the militarized revenge frame coalescing around a major attack.

The verbiage used by the New York Times on the Tribe of Nova music festival also illustrates Big Journalism’s sensationalized, inaccurate reporting. The Times wrote that the “massacre of its youth” and Israel’s “75-year-old quest for some carefree normalcy” met the “murderous fury of those long-oppressed Palestinians who deny the state’s right to exist.” The language of the Times’ report—using “murderous” and denial of Israel’s “right to exist,” with “long-oppressed Palestinians”—makes a mockery of what Gazans have experienced. Additionally, it is not true that Palestinians deny Israel’s right to exist. A quick look at the US State Department’s summation of the 1993 Oslo Accords states that the Palestinian Authority “renounced terrorism and recognized Israel’s right to exist in peace” and “Israel accepted the PLO as the representative of the Palestinians,” concessions that undergirded the two-state solution between Israel and Palestine. But Rashid Khalidi has called out the “empty words about a two-state solution while providing money, weapons and diplomatic support for systematic, calculated Israeli actions that have made that solution inconceivable.”

Most important among the systemic violence against Palestinians is the growing weaponization of Israeli settlers. As Israel was dropping bombs on Gaza, Common Dreams reported that the California-based Institute for Middle East Understanding (IMEU) accused Israel’s far-right National Security Minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, of enabling settler attacks by handing out thousands of military assault rifles to settlement residents. “The extremist settlers Israel is arming have spent years attacking Palestinian cities in lynch mobs, with full backing from the Israeli government.” IMEU continued, “This year alone, they have killed Palestinian civilians and set fire to cars and homes with families inside.” Such stories are virtually absent from establishment media.

Gregory Shupak examined the editorial pages of major US newspapers from October 7 to 9, concluding that none of them provided readers with “information necessary to comprehend what is happening and why, and they consistently mislead readers about key facts.” Some papers were openly ravenous in their demonization of Palestinians. For example, the Wall Street Journal ran an op-ed titled “The Moral Duty to Destroy Hamas,” telling its readers that “Israel is entitled to do whatever it takes to uproot this evil, depraved culture that resides next to it.” Calling for the destruction of Hamas and extending the call to exterminate the “culture” is a call for genocide. It mirrored and promoted Israeli announcements that they would turn Gaza into “hell,” “rubble,” and a “city of tents.”

Ironically, on October 8, the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz offered more explanation and context than most US papers when it criticized Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s attempts to “annex the West Bank” and “to carry out ethnic cleansing in…the Hebron Hills and the Jordan Valley.” It pointed to the massive expansion of settlements and increasing Jewish presence on Temple Mount, near Al Aqsa Mosque. In April 2022, Mondoweiss reported that the Israeli military attacked Palestinians on their way to pray at the Al Aqsa Mosque seven times in eight days, injuring dozens of worshipers and arresting hundreds of Palestinians. Israeli forces used remote-controlled drones to drop teargas inside the mosque. Meanwhile, Israel facilitated the entrance of thousands of Jewish settlers for the Passover holiday.

War Propaganda: Babies were Decapitated and Women were Raped

Sensationalized repetition and media saturation of decontextualized Hamas violence quickly evolved into full-blown atrocity propaganda with horror stories claiming that Hamas had slit the throats of forty Israeli babies, decapitating many of them. Visceral baby slaughter is classic war propaganda, first used in World War I with false claims that German soldiers joyfully bayonetted babies. Similar stories convincedskeptical Americans to support the First Persian Gulf War, with the fake news story about Iraqi soldiers tossing over three hundred Kuwaiti babies out of their incubators. Roundly debunked after the war, journalists published the story uncritically, just as they eagerly circulated the unverified decapitation story.

Alan MacLeod investigated the story that Hamas had slaughtered Israeli babies, finding that it came from an anonymous Israeli military source and was originally reported by Israeli i24 News. 

Without verification, Fox News, CNN, MSN, Insider, and the New York Post picked up and repeated the incendiary propaganda in the US. The UK’s largest newspapers screamed outrage as the salacious story was flung across the front pages of the Times of London, the Independent, the Financial Times, and the Scotsman (as documented by Mint Press News).

The key source for the false claim was an Israeli soldier, David Ben Zion, a fanatical settler who has incited riots against Palestinians, describing them as “animals” who need to be “wiped out.”

Another propaganda trope circulated to justify war is the rape of women, made more devious by its actual use as a military strategy. The Intercept noted that unverified claims that Hamas was raping women had gone viral online, and President Biden claimed that women were “raped, assaulted, paraded as trophies.” Caitlin Johnstone noted, “We’re seeing claims about mass rapes being uncritically pushed by the mass media, only to see them retracted as unverified after the narrative has taken hold.”Any legitimate journalist should recognize such war tropes, and if not, should at least track the stories’ origins and refrain from publication until those sources are verified. President Biden was forced to walk back his lie about seeing “confirmed pictures of terrorist beheading children,” while talking to leaders of US Jewish organizations at the White House.

What was the purpose of perpetrating such lurid fake news, the stuff of visceral propaganda? The Hamas attacks that killed civilians were met with outrage and widely condemned, even by those who advocate for Palestinian rights, express criticism of the “unprovoked” news frame, or have criticized Israel’s growing violence and worked to create humanitarian spaces amidst the cruelty. Certainly, the attacks alone could be considered justifications for Israeli retaliation. But as Caitlin Johnstone argued, that was not enough. Israel’s response was about to dwarf the initial Hamas offensive. Israel and its allies needed to frame the attack in “the most shocking and rage-inducing discourse in order to make Israel’s ongoing murder of civilians in Gaza look appropriate.”

War Crimes and Wiping Out Gaza

Writing for Declassified UK, Jonathan Cook detailed how Israel’s retaliatory attacks on Gaza violated numerous international laws and the Geneva Convention, pointing out that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) were committing war crimes. “One of the fundamentals of international law—at the heart of the Geneva Conventions—is a prohibition on collective punishment: that is, retaliating against the enemy’s civilian population, making them pay the price for the acts of their leaders and armies.” He continued, “What Israel is doing to Gaza is the very definition of collective punishment.”

Two days earlier on October 11, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken spread what can only be called “fake news” on Sky News when he claimed, “What separates Israel, the US and other democracies…is our respect for international law and the laws of war.” By October 14, Al Jazeera reported that in the first seven days of the conflict, an estimated one million Gazans had been displaced, according to the UN, and aid groups said the situation in the besieged enclave was “catastrophic,” as fourteen Palestinians were being killed every hour. Israel had dropped the equivalent of “a quarter of a nuclear bomb on Gaza,” accordingto the Geneva-based Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor. And by October 16, Euro-Med posted, “The Stench of Death Looms Everywhere in #Gaza, Immediate Halt to the Killing of Civilians Required.”

The saturation bombing of Gaza, where entire apartment buildings filled with residents are destroyed, taking out entire families, amounts to horrific collective killings. Israelis are committing numerous violations of international law, as hospitals are on the verge of collapse, and food, water, and electricity are blocked along with humanitarian aid to Gaza. An Israeli air strike targeted a convoy, killing seventy-three Palestinians and injuring 130 others as they attempted to move south. Euro-Med Monitor condemned the deliberate targeting of civilians being forcibly displaced after Israel’s orders to leave. It was an open practice of forced transfer (transference) outside international law and a “blatant violation of Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention.” NBC News reported the airstrike on the convoy but failed to report it as a war crime. A PBS news brief softened the blow with a baseless speculation that it was not clear “whether militants were among the passengers.”

Just as President Biden left for Israel, a bomb hit the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza, killing five hundred people, including patients and doctors: a war crime. Israel claimed that Hamas or Islamic Jihad was responsible for the precision strike and huge explosion. From the AP to the New York Times, establishment media framed the story as a dispute between Hamas and the IDF or as an exchange of air strikesbetween them. Jonathan Cook called it Western propaganda, saying, “If Hamas or Islamic Jihad could cause the kind of damage that happened last night, you would hear about it happening in Tel Aviv or Ashkelon too. You don’t, because they can’t.” Caitlin Johnstone included the text of a phone conversation presented by Israel and also argued the unlikely veracity of the evidence. Using altered or invented audio and video, Israel has succeeded in the past in delaying and planting doubt about their role in such violence, at least long enough to allow the story to do its damage. For example, an altered video was used to “prove” that an Israeli sniper did not assassinate Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh or the unprovoked Israeli violence perpetrated at her funeral.

It took time for the dozens of investigations to counter the gaslighting, and the delay facilitated President Biden’s failure to hold the Israeli military accountable. For the time being, once again, the denial allowed Biden to re-confirm US support for Israel, this time allowing Israel to carry on with the massacre of Palestinians in Gaza.

Choosing Humanity Over Killing and Destruction

While condemning the Hamas attacks as a crime against humanity, the Center for Constitutional Rights also stated, “It is our commitment to human dignity and the preciousness of life that has long led our organization to stand with Palestinians as they resist Israeli colonization, occupation, and apartheid.” The Center’s statement expressed grief for “the many Israeli civilians killed in the assault on their communities on October 7,” while also decrying “Israel’s slaughter in Gaza, which is in danger of becoming a genocide.”

Common Dreams reported on protests calling for a ceasefire and an end to the genocide in Gaza, organized by IfNotNow and Jewish Voices for Peace. IfNotNow has stated, “We absolutely condemn the killing of innocent civilians and mourn the loss of Palestinian and Israeli life, with numbers rising by the minute. Their blood is on the hands of the Israeli government, the US government which funds and excuses their recklessness, and every international leader who continues to turn a blind eye to decades of Palestinian oppression, endangering both Palestinians and Israelis.”

US establishment media should consider these humanitarian narratives, in contrast to their standard militarized revenge frames, which only fan the flames of genocide that imperil the Palestinian people. #Israel #Palestine

October 23, 2023 Posted by | Israel, media, weapons and war | Leave a comment

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