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Trump says 20-year nuclear programme suspension by Iran would be enough

Robert Greenall, 16 May 26. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cgkpnnen5dzo

US President Donald Trump has said he would accept a 20-year suspension by Iran of its nuclear programme, in what appears to be confirmation of a shift in position away from a demand for a total end to it.

Trump said it had to be a “real 20 years”. Previously he has called on Iran to permanently cease enriching uranium – a stage in making a weapon – and to be prevented from ever acquiring nuclear weapons.

But he also said his patience with Iran was running out, with no sign of a breakthrough in talks.

Israeli and US forces began massive air strikes on Iran on 28 February. A ceasefire in place since last month meant to facilitate talks has been largely observed, despite some exchanges of fire.

Pakistan has been playing the role of mediator.

However, both sides appear to be far apart, having rejected each other’s most recent proposals to end the war.

Iranian media said Tehran’s proposal had included an immediate end to the war on all fronts – an apparent reference to Israeli attacks against its Shia ally Hezbollah in Lebanon – a halt to the US naval blockade of Iranian ports and guarantees of no further attacks on Iran.

Speaking to reporters on Air Force One after talks in Beijing with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Trump said the two sides had agreed Tehran could not be allowed to have a nuclear weapon and must reopen the Strait of Hormuz, which it is currently blocking, prompting a rise in world oil prices.

When a reporter suggested that a 20-year suspension of Iran’s nuclear programme was not enough, he replied: “Twenty years is enough, but the level of guarantee from them, in other words it’s got to be a real 20 years.” He did no elaborate.

US media reported in April that during a session of talks in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, Vice-President JD Vance had responded to an Iranian proposal to cease enrichment for five years by insisting on a minimum of 20 years.

However, this is thought to be the first time Trump himself has mentioned a 20-year timeframe.

In his first term as president, he withdrew from a 2015 nuclear agreement reached with Iran by the Obama administration. One of the reasons given was opposition to so-called “sunset clauses” that would have allowed some restrictions on Iran to expire over time.

Israel has so far not reacted to Trump’s remarks. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium must be “taken out” before the war against Iran can be considered over.

Netanyahu vehemently opposed the 2015 nuclear deal, partly on the grounds that the sunset clauses would leave open the possibility of Iran obtaining nuclear weapons and continuing to present a grave threat to Israel.

May 16, 2026 Posted by | Iran, politics international, USA | Leave a comment

We Can’t Curb Nuclear Proliferation If We Don’t Acknowledge Israel’s Nukes

This letter is a rare and important challenge to one of the most entrenched taboos in U.S. foreign policy: acknowledging that Israel has an undeclared nuclear arsenal for decades and that Washington has largely complied with Israel’s desire to maintain silence around it

The goal of nonproliferation cannot be credible if it is selective. Israel is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, while Iran is.

There is no credible nonproliferation policy that begins by pretending not to see the bombs your ally already has.

 Etan Mabourakh , Truthout, May 12, 2026, https://truthout.org/articles/we-cant-curb-nuclear-proliferation-if-we-dont-acknowledge-israels-nukes/?utm_source=Truthout&utm_campaign=603e7eec49-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2026_05_12_09_25&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_bbb541a1db-603e7eec49-650192793

Thirty House Democrats, led by Rep. Joaquin Castro, publicly asked Secretary of State Marco Rubio on May 4 to end the long-standing U.S. policy of ambiguity around Israel’s nuclear capabilities. In a letter, the group asked for answers on detailed questions about Israel’s warheads, delivery systems, fissile material production, and nuclear doctrine. They argue that Congress has a constitutional responsibility to understand the nuclear balance in the Middle East and warn that official silence makes coherent nonproliferation policy impossible.

Lawmakers tied their demand for transparency directly to the current U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, warning that fighting alongside a state whose nuclear posture remains officially unacknowledged heightens the risks of miscalculation and escalation. It also makes the United States out to be hypocritical — citing the nonexistent threat of an Iranian nuclear weapon yet to be built, which Iran had forsworn, while simultaneously ignoring Israel’s secret, unmonitored, undiscussed nuclear weapons arsenal.

If the United States claims to be deeply concerned about nuclear proliferation in the region, the government has a responsibility to stop ignoring facts that make the entirety of U.S. foreign policy on proliferation look completely disingenuous. The U.S. cannot keep sending billions in weapons unconditionally to a nuclear-armed state while treating open discussion of that reality as impermissible.

This letter is a rare and important challenge to one of the most entrenched taboos in U.S. foreign policy: acknowledging that Israel has an undeclared nuclear arsenal for decades and that Washington has largely complied with Israel’s desire to maintain silence around it. That posture goes all the way back to a secret 1969 understanding that allowed the issue to remain publicly unspoken even as it has shaped regional calculations. For decades, Washington would not acknowledge Israel’s nuclear capability, and Israel would not confirm it. But declassified National Security Archive material suggests that by 1969, U.S. agencies had already accumulated enough sensitive evidence to treat the issue as a serious intelligence matter, while also deciding that political and foreign policy costs outweighed the benefits of pressing it openly. The result was an unofficial understanding that helped lock the subject inside a veil of deniability, even as internal investigations, wiretaps, and intelligence briefings continued behind the scenes.

If the formal public stance of the U.S. is to not support the existence of nuclear weapons in the Middle East — whether in Iran or Israel — then the foreign policy objective should be to advocate for a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction. This would require acknowledging that war has utterly failed as a strategy to prevent that goal, especially when the fake threat of an active nuclear weapons program is used to justify military action — as has been the case in costly, useless U.S. wars in Iraq and now in Iran.

The goal of nonproliferation cannot be credible if it is selective. Israel is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, while Iran is. Simply acknowledging that fact does not require putting full trust in Tehran to abide by the treaty — indeed, that’s why Iran has been subjected to countless inspection regimes; it simply means that any honest regional nonproliferation framework has to begin with the facts as they are, not as Washington prefers to describe them.

Those facts and suspicions have been a matter of public record for decades, even if U.S. officials have often refused to address them publicly. As far back as 1965, the U.S. government knew that over 200 pounds of highly enriched, weapons-grade uranium had gone missing from the Nuclear Materials and Equipment Corporation (NUMEC) plant in Pennsylvania — triggering enduring investigations and allegations by the CIA and other agencies that the material was clandestinely diverted to the Israeli nuclear program. 

Decades later, in 1986, former Dimona technician Mordechai Vanunu leaked photographs and data to the Sunday Times that exposed the full scale of Israel’s covert weapons program. These facts have long been known and reported on by countless media outlets and scholars, even if they were officially evaded by the U.S. government.

That is why the Castro letter deserves attention beyond the news cycle. The lawmakers wrote that ambiguity about Israel’s program makes coherent nonproliferation policy impossible not only for Iran, but for Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and every other state making decisions based on the capabilities of its neighbors. These 30 Democrats are right to express this concern, and the principle involved is larger than one conflict: There’s no such thing as a rules-based order built on exceptions for allies and punishment for adversaries.

We will not be able to resolve complex issues of nuclear proliferation if we cannot even share a basic reality. The Orwellian “ceasefires” in Gaza, Lebanon, and Iran illustrate this clearly. The U.S. government and its allies lie, and then expect the other side to not just accept their terms, but also their version of the truth — a recipe for perpetual conflict.

Ironically, tragic and repeated U.S. failures of diplomacy have strengthened the most conservative forces inside Iran, who benefit most from isolation, siege, and perpetual confrontation. If U.S. officials profess to care about the Iranian people, regional peace, and genuine nonproliferation, they should be building diplomatic pathways that reduce incentives for weaponization, not destroying the possibility of trust altogether.

The United States should state openly what it knows, demand transparency from all regional actors, and return to the hard work of diplomacy. The rest of Congress should insist on answers to the questions raised in the Castro letter, not bury them. And anyone serious about preventing nuclear catastrophe should be willing to say a simple thing out loud: There is no credible nonproliferation policy that begins by pretending not to see the bombs your ally already has.

May 16, 2026 Posted by | spinbuster, USA | Leave a comment

“Enough Is Enough”: Freed Gaza Flotilla Activists Demand the World Keep Fighting for Palestinian Prisoners and Breaking Israel’s Siege on Gaza

May 12, 2026, SCHEERPOST, Joshua Scheer

Attorney and Palestine solidarity activist James Marc Leas tells Margaret Flowers why global flotillas are challenging not only Israel’s blockade, but the collapse of international law itself.

As governments continue to ignore their obligations under international law and the Genocide Convention, ordinary people are risking everything to confront the siege and starvation of Gaza themselves. From Italy to the eastern Mediterranean, activists aboard humanitarian flotillas are challenging one of the most brutal blockades in modern history — facing armed interception, detention, violence, and even torture for daring to carry solidarity across the sea.

On this episode of Clearing the FOG, Margaret Flowers speaks with longtime Palestine solidarity activist and attorney James Marc Leas, who joins from Italy as the Freedom Flotilla Coalition sails toward Gaza. Leas explains why these flotillas matter far beyond humanitarian aid: they are acts of civilian resistance against genocide, collective punishment, and the collapse of international law itself.

The conversation traces Israel’s escalating attacks on flotilla activists in international waters, the expanding siege on Gaza, the role of U.S. military and diplomatic support, and why global citizens increasingly believe governments have failed to stop mass atrocities. From the destruction of Gaza’s schools and hospitals to the criminalization of dissent across the West, Flowers and Leas argue that silence has become complicity — and that direct action is now filling the vacuum left by cowardly political leadership.

As Gaza faces mass starvation, relentless bombardment, and the systematic destruction of civilian life, international activists are once again sailing toward one of the most militarized blockades on Earth. After Israeli forces violently seized humanitarian boats in international waters. Their discussion lays bare the growing desperation in Gaza — and the rising global movement determined to stop the genocide governments refuse to confront.

Saif Abu Keshek has now been released from Israeli captivity after six brutal days of detention, abuse and isolation, but activists say his message remains urgent: the movement must continue to mobilize. While Saif and fellow flotilla organizer Thiago Ávila have returned home safely following international pressure campaigns, thousands of Palestinian prisoners remain trapped inside Israeli prisons under conditions human rights groups have repeatedly condemned as inhumane. Activists behind the flotilla campaign say the releases represent only a small step toward justice and renewed calls for global solidarity, direct action and sustained pressure against what they describe as a system of occupation, siege and apartheid. Organizers also extended gratitude to the legal team at Adalah, along with the countless activists, unions and supporters worldwide who mobilized for the safe return of the detained flotilla members — insisting the struggle for Palestinian liberation is far from over.

The release of flotilla activists Saif Abu Keshek and Thiago Ávila has become both a moment of relief and a renewed call for global action. After being violently seized by Israeli forces in international waters and held for days without charges, the two activists were finally released following mounting international pressure from governments, legal advocates and solidarity campaigns worldwide. But upon arriving in Athens, Saif made clear that the focus must remain on the thousands of Palestinians still imprisoned inside Israeli detention centers. “I left behind me thousands of Palestinian prisoners — children, women, and men,” he said, warning that the abuse he experienced “does not compare to the suffering they are going through.” Activists say the flotilla members’ release exposes Israel’s accusations against them as politically motivated attempts to criminalize solidarity with Palestine, while highlighting the brutal reality facing more than 10,000 Palestinians reportedly subjected to starvation, abuse, isolation and torture inside Israeli prisons. Organizers with the Global Sumud Flotilla praised the international mobilization that helped secure the activists’ freedom, while insisting the struggle is far from over and calling for escalating pressure against what they describe as Israel’s ongoing genocide and system of occupation.

For Leas, the flotillas represent something far larger than symbolic protest.

“The main purpose of the Freedom Flotilla is to break the siege entirely — not simply to deliver aid,” Leas explained. “Palestine was once self-sufficient. What Israel has destroyed is an entire society.”

Leas described Gaza not as a place dependent on outside charity, but as a society systematically dismantled through blockade, bombardment and forced deprivation. Farms have been destroyed, fishing operations crippled, hospitals flattened and entire neighborhoods erased.

The result, Flowers noted, is a humanitarian collapse increasingly defined by starvation — particularly among children.

According to Doctors Without Borders, malnutrition among pregnant women, infants and newborns has surged dramatically since Israel intensified restrictions on food distribution inside Gaza. Food access points have been reduced from hundreds to just a handful, creating scenes of chaos and deadly violence as desperate civilians attempt to secure basic supplies.

“Half the people living in Gaza are children,” Leas said. “And Israel is committing genocide against children.”

Israel’s Expanding Assault on Flotilla Activists…………………………………………………. https://scheerpost.com/2026/05/12/enough-is-enough-freed-gaza-flotilla-activists-demand-the-world-keep-fighting-for-palestinian-prisoners-and-breaking-israels-siege-on-gaza/

May 16, 2026 Posted by | Events | Leave a comment

Now You See Them… Now You Don’t – Trumpland Is a Man’s World

Focusing on Noem and Bondi, however, misses the larger point. This first year of Trump 2.0 has seen women, one after another, summarily gone from their posts (some fired, some resigning) as part of a larger DEI purge. As I pointed out in a TomDispatch piece in January, the military has led the way with a full-scale attack on women. And that trend started on the administration’s very first day in office when Trump removed Linda Fagan, the first female commandant of the Coast Guard.

Fagan was, in fact, the first woman ever to serve as a military service chief and, among other things, she had exposed “Operation Fouled Anchor,” a previously covered-up investigation into sexual harassment and assault in the Coast Guard. Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to lead the Navy, was fired as well. Both have now — no surprise — been replaced by men.

Women Leaders and Trump 2.0

Karen J. Greenberg Tom Dispatch,  May 10, 2026, https://tomdispatch.com/now-you-see-them-now-you-dont/

It’s been a tough couple of months for women officials in Washington — or, more accurately, in Trumpland. In early March (Women’s History Month, by the way), in a Truth Social post, the president fired Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, the second woman ever to hold that title. Weeks later, also in a social media post, he fired Attorney General Pam Bondi, the third woman ever to serve as head of the Department of Justice.

While in the first year of his first presidency, Trump 1.0 had fired numerous officials, this time around, Bondi and Noem, who ran the two largest law enforcement agencies in the country, were the first cabinet officials to be dismissed. Both — no surprise — were replaced by men. And just as I was writing this piece, Trump removed another female cabinet official, Secretary of Labor Lori Chavez-DeRemer. Meanwhile, speculation lingers about the possible firing of a fourth female cabinet member, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, the second woman to hold that job. And whether or not Gabbard is formally dismissed, she has recently been effectively sidelined, as her absence from White House meetings on the war in Iran suggests.

Notably, Noem, Bondi, Chavez-DeRemer, and Gabbard are, of course, all women. As Jasmine Crockett, a Democratic House of Representatives member from Texas, recently tweeted, “Well… first it was Kristi Noem, now it’s Pam Bondi… it would be too much like right that Pete [Hegseth] be next. I see a theme. He [Trump] will throw the incompetent women under the bus a lot faster than the incompetent men.”

Equal Opportunity Failure

Crockett has a point. Pete Hegseth’s leadership at the Department of Defense (now all too appropriately retitled the Department of War) has erased time-honored rules and norms in staggering ways. He has, for instance, drastically reduced media access to the Pentagon, purged employees who disagreed with him, as well as those he deemed to be DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) appointees, and is now exerting his leadership in a war against Iran for which the exit strategy seems elusive at best, despite his assurance that, as the Guardian reported, “the U.S. would not get bogged down in the conflict.” The U.S. operation, he insisted, was not a “democracy-building exercise,” adding that ‘this is not Iraq. This is not endless.’”

Hegseth’s behavior has led Arizona Democratic Representative Yassamin Ansari to file articles of impeachment against him on six charges. They include the commission of war crimes, especially the killing of at least 165 people, including many children, at a girls’ primary school in Iran hit by a U.S. missile; negligence with sensitive information; and conducting an unauthorized war without congressional approval. In the Senate, Massachusetts Democrat Elizabeth Warren has followed up with a letter to U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Paul Atkins asking for an investigation into whether Hegseth attempted to profit from his financial investments in the run-up to the war in Iran.

Crockett might just as easily have highlighted the wayward behavior of FBI Director Kash Patel, recently exposed in a piece in The Atlantic describing “excessive drinking” that interfered with his job (an article over which Patel immediately filed suit for $250 million in damages), or the trashing of health standards by Health and Human Resources Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

But whatever the future of those reprehensible men in cabinet positions, it’s unfortunately difficult to defend either Bondi or Noem for their actions while in office. Like their male counterparts, both defiantly tossed professionalism and decency to the winds. Under Noem, with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) leading the way, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was weaponized and transformed into President Trump’s version of a homeland militia. It’s hardly a stretch to make the comparison to Hitler’s Brownshirts.

So far, in Trump’s second term in office, ICE has terrorized schools and businesses, while cruelly imprisoning migrants without due process of any sort. It has held children in detention centers under abhorrent conditions, attacked peaceful protesters, and killed citizens on the streets of America. Worse yet, Noem appropriated tens of millions of dollars to cover the costs of a pro-ICE ad featuring herself riding a horse in front of Mount Rushmore saying, “Break Our Laws, We’ll Punish You.” (Nor should we imagine that things will get any better without her.) 

Bondi’s ouster followed failures of a different order — namely, her stumbling, wildly inept efforts to fulfill Trump’s agenda. She proved unable even to make the case of Trump pal Jeffrey Epstein go away, while what she had to say when releasing documents related to him led to accusations that her statements were riddled with falsehoods. Meanwhile, prosecutions under her watch of New York State Attorney General Letitia James and former FBI Director James Comey, high-priority items for the president, fell apart.

And when called before Congress to explain herself, her rank lack of civility resembled the behavior of a spoiled teenager berating her teacher, knowing that, since her parents wielded power over the school, she should fear no reprisals. Under Bondi, the sacrosanct mission of the Department of Justice as an agency independent of the White House was summarily tossed aside (as the roof-to-ground-floor Trump banner that hung from its office building demonstrated). 

Female Purges

Focusing on Noem and Bondi, however, misses the larger point. This first year of Trump 2.0 has seen women, one after another, summarily gone from their posts (some fired, some resigning) as part of a larger DEI purge. As I pointed out in a TomDispatch piece in January, the military has led the way with a full-scale attack on women. And that trend started on the administration’s very first day in office when Trump removed Linda Fagan, the first female commandant of the Coast Guard.

Fagan was, in fact, the first woman ever to serve as a military service chief and, among other things, she had exposed “Operation Fouled Anchor,” a previously covered-up investigation into sexual harassment and assault in the Coast Guard. Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to lead the Navy, was fired as well. Both have now — no surprise — been replaced by men. As it stands, there are no longer any four-star women generals in the military. And only this month, we learned that Secretary of War Hegseth had reportedly removed two women from a promotion list to become one-star Army generals. 

Outside of the Department of Defense, the resignations or firings of women in leadership positions have abounded across agencies ranging from the National Labor Relations Board to the Federal Trade Commission and the CDC.

This widespread purge of women stands in stark contrast to their presence in office during the Biden years. Under President Joe Biden, women held just under 50% of all cabinet or cabinet-level positions. And let’s not forget Kamala Harris, the first female vice-president in American history. It’s worth noting as well that, under Biden, the Deputy Attorney General and the Deputy Secretary of Defense were both women.

Trump is not unmindful of those statistics. Last year, he boasted about the presence of eight women among his 24 cabinet officers, or a third of his cabinet. As Business Insider reports, he was “thrilled to say that we have more women in our Cabinet than any Republican president in the history of our country.” Following the removal of Noem, Bondi, and Chavez-DeRemer, however, women occupy just over one-fifth of the cabinet positions — admittedly an improvement on his first term when, after two years of resignations and firings, women held only 13% of all cabinet-level positions.)

Project 2025

It’s worth noting that the path to the current backlash against women, including all the purges and punishments we’re now witnessing in real time, didn’t come about by mere happenstance. In the run-up to the 2024 election, the conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation published a Project 2025 report entitled Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise, a 900-plus page blueprint for overhauling the federal bureaucracy.  It called for gutting DEI programs, eliminating and reducing the size of any offices that didn’t serve a conservative agenda, and enhancing the powers of the president. Among its many recommendations, Project 2025 touted an anti-female message, including removing “gender equality” language from government websites, emphasizing “family planning,” and recommending limitations on access to contraception and cuts to federal funding for abortions.

Although Trump repeatedly distanced himself from Project 2025, many of its recommended policies have indeed become our new reality, including matters affecting women. In the first months of Trump’s second term, images of women, as well as persons of color and LGBTQ+ individuals, were systematically erased from government websites. So, too, protections for women’s health were tossed to the winds. As the abortion rights group Reproductive Freedom for All has reported, as of January 2026, “53% of [Project 2025’s] policies attacking reproductive freedom are completed or in progress.”

And now, there is a brand-new Heritage Foundation report devoted to the need to counter the declining birth rate and the fragility of the American family. “Saving America by Saving the Family: A Foundation for the Next 20 Years” calls for the restructuring of incentives to promote childbearing and “revive the institution of marriage.” Signaling its message, the report makes the case for privileging marriage and children over career advancement and less traditional family arrangements caused by divorce and single-parenthood. While the report underscores the family roles incumbent upon both men and women, the fact is that reforms aimed at incentivizing childbearing will fall primarily on women, while those aimed at privileging childrearing over career choices would likely fall most heavily on women as well.

MS NOW’s Ali Velshi and  “Velshi” Segment Producer Amel Ahmed summed up the report well, pointing out that its overall takeaway is: “the freedoms fought [for] and won by America’s women aren’t progress; they are the problem.”

Of course, in the era of Donald Trump, none of this should come as a surprise, not when you consider the histories of the men who are now running the show: a president who, in addition to once touting the fact that he could “grab them by the pussy,” has been convicted in E. Jean Carroll’s civil suit over accusations of sexual abuse and defamation to the tune of $83.3 million in damages, a decision upheld by an appellate court. And let’s not forget that Trump’s first nominee for Attorney General, Matt Gaetz, withdrew his name from consideration under a cloud of accusations of wrongful behavior, including sexual misconduct. Not to mention the shadow cast by the number of individuals within the current administration whose names are said to appear in the Epstein files.  While no formal charges of sexual misconduct have been issued against them, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick is reportedly being pressured to resign over his alleged ties to Epstein.

A Future Government Without Women?

It’s hard to predict which women will come under the axe from Trump and crew in the coming months. But the onslaught has understandably led women from both sides of the political spectrum to sound the alarm. Months before she announced her resignation from Congress, former Trump supporter Marjorie Taylor Greene had already expressed her own misgivings about the misogyny of the Republican leaders in Congress.

When Trump rescinded New York Congresswoman Elise Stefanik’s nomination to be the U.S. Representative to the United Nations and replaced her with Michael Waltz (who had embarrassed himself by adding a reporter to a private Signal chat about possible future strikes against the Houthis in Yemen), Greene saw it as a sign of a general trend of sidelining women. She summed it up as a case where Stefanik “gets shafted,” while Waltz “gets rewarded.” For Greene, it was proof of an overwhelming Trump administration mood of: “She’s a woman, so it was OK to do that to her somehow.”

Greene’s dissatisfaction wasn’t just over Stefanik but over the general trend that has led to only one Republican woman chairing a committee in Congress. Notably, alongside Greene, Republican representatives Nancy Mace and Laurent Boebert signed a petition pressuring the Department of Justice to release information on the Epstein files.

The signs are everywhere. Expectations are disappearing that women will hold leadership positions inside the Trump administration or in the halls of Congress (unless the Democrats win decisively in November). If you didn’t realize it before, you really can’t hide from it now. The attack on diversity in government has become pervasive and (at least as yet) is undeterred, targeting with abandon females, as well as people of color, immigrants, and critics of the president. In other words, the fate of women leaders should provide us with an insight, however dispiriting, into just how quickly the values and assumptions that guided this nation’s progress in matters of race, gender, and ethnicity for decades have disappeared. 

What once amounted to progress is indeed now seen as the problem. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the exorcising of women from the halls of government.

Karen J. Greenberg is a future studies fellow at New America, a non-resident research fellow at the NYU Reiss Center for Law and Security, and co-host of the SpyTalk podcast. She is the author of many books, including Subtle Tools: The Dismantling of American Democracy from the War on Terror to Donald Trump.

May 16, 2026 Posted by | USA, Women | Leave a comment

Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility (CCNR)Re: Comments on the Integrated Tailored Impact StatementGuidelines for the Deep Geological Repository (DGR)For Canada’s Used Nuclear Fuel Project

There is going to be a public impact assessment process. Now is the time to debate the alternatives for the first time in public.

TO – Impact Assessment Agency of Canada (IAAC), May 10 2026, https://www.ccnr.org/IAAC_NWMO_Guidelines_CCNR_2026.pdf

The Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility (CCNR) has reviewed the Draft
Integrated Tailored Impact Statement Guidelines for the Deep Geological Repository
(DGR) For Canada’s Used Nuclear Fuel, a Project of the Nuclear Waste Management
Organization (NWMO), and offers the following comments on those Draft Guidelines.


Stated Purpose of the Project
The stated purpose of the project is highly suspect because it is couched in selfcontradictory language. In its Initial Description of the project (p.v) the proponent states:

“Canada’s nuclear power plants have provided, and are expected to continue
providing, clean, reliable, and low-carbon energy for decades. However,
used nuclear fuel remains radioactive for a very long time and therefore
requires careful, permanent management to avoid placing a burden on future
generations.” Nuclear Waste Management Organization (NWMO)
Initial Project Description
Deep Geological Repository (DGR) for Canada’s Used Nuclear Fuel Project
December 2025

It is ironic that nuclear power is described, in two consecutive sentences, as a “clean”
energy source, but one whose waste byproducts nevertheless remain dangerously
radioactive for such “a very long time”, that extraordinary measures are required to
“avoid placing a burden on future generations.”


It is a stunning example of cognitive dissonance; that is, “the mental discomfort or
psychological stress experienced when a person holds two or more contradictory
beliefs, values, or attitudes, or acts in a way that goes against them.” On the one hand, the proponent asserts that nuclear power is essentially a problem-free technology, and
on the other hand is ready to expend upwards of $26 billion dollars and 160 years of
effort to “solve” what is a glaringly obvious problem – long-lived highly toxic garbage.

The contradiction in terminology is not just psychologically uncomfortable, but also selfdefeating – for NWMO goes on to enunciate (p.v-vi) its goal, accompanied by a
declaration of the industry’s intentions that belie that goal altogether.

“If implemented, the project would:

  • provide a permanent and safe disposal solution for used nuclear fuel;
  • support Canada’s commitments to climate action and achieving net-zero by
    2050 by ensuring nuclear energy remains a sustainable and socially
    responsible energy source;
  • eliminate the need for future generations to actively manage used nuclear
    fuel, thereby reducing long-term environmental risks and advancing
    equity in managing Canada’s nuclear legacy.”

A careful reading shows that the “safe disposal solution” for used nuclear fuel is not
really intended to unburden future generations altogether by “eliminating the need to
actively manage used nuclear fuel”, but rather to perpetuate the hazards of keeping
used nuclear fuel at the surface by “ensuring nuclear energy remains … sustainable” as
an energy source. Thus the DGR is not designed to “get rid” of used fuel once and for
all, but rather to clear the decks of older waste and make room for newer waste. The
industry has no intentions of ever stopping the production of that toxic waste material.

This is no small matter. Already the Agency is dealing with three major proposals for
new nuclear plants: the 4800 megawatt Peace River Nuclear Project, the 4800
megawatt Bruce C project, and the 10,000 megawatt Wesleyville project, with more
projects to come…. Already there are over 20,000 megawatts of new nuclear electricity
production planned (including the Darlington New Build). If these new plants are all built,
the annual production of used nuclear fuel in Canada will triple. And that is not the end
of the story. Further nuclear expansion in other provinces and territories is also planned.
To maintain credibility, the Agency cannot turn a blind eye to these contradictions. The
NWMO project currently under review by the Agency is only designated to deal with the waste produced by Canada’s existing operational fleet of 17 CANDU reactors (plus the
waste produced by seven shut-down power reactors and a handful of research reactors
owned by Atomic Energy of Canada Limited). That is less than one-third of the volume
of high-level radioactive waste now foreseen. It is patently false that the currently
proposed DGR project will “eliminate the need for future generations to actively manage
used nuclear fuel.” The stated goal of the project is, in that sense, fraudulent

In fact, no one intends to move used nuclear fuel into a DGR until it has been out of the
reactor for at least 30 years. Consequently, there will always be thirty years worth of
unburied waste at the surface (either in wet storage or dry storage) for each and every
operating nuclear reactor, no matter how fast the older used fuel may be buried. Based
on existing plans in Canada, the quantity of unburied used nuclear fuel under thirty
years of age will be tripled – or more than tripled – and will keep growing thereafter.
This is hardly “eliminating” the need for future generations to manage used nuclear fuel.


As long as new nuclear reactors are being built and old ones are continuing to operate,
there is no possibility of achieving the visionary dream of all used fuel safely locked
away in underground chambers. Such a dream is a complete fantasy. It would only be
possible if nuclear power were phased out completely.

Instead, a picture emerges of an increasing number of reactors in operation, each with
its core full of intensely radioactive used fuel, and each surrounded by at least thirty
years worth of additional unburied used fuel in wet and dry storage. Even if all the older
fuel (more than 30 years old) were instantly transported over thousands of kilometres to
the site of the DGR, the remaining catastrophe potential at each reactor site would be
only marginally diminished.


Meanwhile additional risks of fuel damage and radioactive releases would arise in
countless locations across the country due to the vicissitudes of travel along some of
the most hazardous routes in Canada. Thousands of citizens – perhaps millions –would
encounter truckloads of high-level radioactive waste passing through their communities, along their highways, over their bridges, for many decades to come. Severe transport
accidents, even if very infrequent, could result in radioactive contamination of people
and the environment in locations far removed from the generating stations. The
combined efforts of moving spent fuel to a repository location while expanding the
production of nuclear electricity at many new sites may very well make the country less
safe than it would have been if traffic of spent fuel were precluded.

In its report on nuclear energy in Ontario entitled “A Race Against Time”, the Ontario
Royal Commission on Electric Power Panning concluded as follows:


“The hazards associated with transportation, in particular the possibility of
accidents and the threat of hijacking, are real possibilities. Hence, the
minimization of handling and transporting spent fuel is a desirable
objective. (p. 91)
We prefer on-site (i.e. generating station site) spent fuel storage to a
centralized facility. We believe that a central facility would presuppose
the reprocessing of spent fuel; it would also involve more transportation
and social and environmental problems. (p. 95)
Royal Commission on Electric Power Planning
A Race Against Time, 1978

CCNR believes that the Guidelines should include an entire section on transportation –
including (a) routine gamma and neutron exposures (i.e. to those in vehicles following a
transport, to those passing the transport in the opposite direction, to those being
repeatedly exposed along the route, to those irradiated during stops), (b) container
designs and testing of same, (c) severe accident scenarios (fires of greater intensity and
duration than those tested for, drops of greater distances and impacts, sidewise
collisions that might bypass impact limiters, et cetera), and (d) emergency measures
planning and the role of first responders.


Alternatives to the Project

The Impact Assessment Act clearly states that the Agency “must” consider “alternatives to the project,” as well as alternative means of carrying out the project. However on page 9 of the Draft Guidelines, we read

“In the Initial Project Description, the proponent described the ‘alternatives to’
the project that are technically and economically feasible to meet the need for
the project and achieve its purpose. This analysis was carried out through
their Choosing a Way Forward study process pursuant to the Nuclear Fuel
Waste Act. IAAC and the CNSC determined that this information is sufficient
and no additional information is required in the Impact Statement related to
‘alternatives to’.”

CCNR strongly disagrees with this determination. A great many Canadians are unaware
of the fact that there is an alternative to the proposed DGR project that is economically
and technically feasible, and that does not involve moving used nuclear fuel off-site. It is
simply called: continued storage at reactor sites. The nuclear industry agrees that this
method is safe and can be continued for centuries without undue difficulty, provided that
the wastes are repackaged when necessary.

Read more: Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility (CCNR)Re: Comments on the Integrated Tailored Impact StatementGuidelines for the Deep Geological Repository (DGR)For Canada’s Used Nuclear Fuel Project

When NWMO published “Choosing A Way Forward”, four options were laid out. The
Government of Canada decided to choose the fourth option – the DGR option,
rebranded as “Adaptive Phased Management”. But there was no public process by
which the pros and cons of the “reactor-site storage” alternative could be discussed.
The Government of Canada did not take the opportunity to solicit other perspectives. At
that time CCNR published a critical commentary on “Choosing a Way Forward”, entitled
“Following the Path Backward” ( http://www.ccnr.org/follow_path_back.pdf ). However there
was no public forum or avenue by which any non-industry point of view could be heard.
There was simply no mechanism for dissenting voices to be weighed in the balance.

There is going to be a public impact assessment process. Now is the time to debate the
alternatives for the first time in public. CCNR believes that the Agency has a duty not to
simply accept the proponent’s point of view on the alternatives, even though the
Government has indicated its preference for the DGR approach. According to the IAA
law, any alternative to the project that is technically and economically feasible “must” be
properly addressed during the Impact Assessment process. Politics does not enter into
it. Accordingly, CCNR believes there must be a section in the Guidelines specifically
addressing the “reactor-site storage” alternative to the proposed DGR,

Some may argue that reactor-site storage is not an acceptable practice for a century or
more, because of the possibility of violent external events (airplane crashes, military
attacks), extreme weather events (tsunamis, earthquakes), or societal disintegration
(anarchy, revolution). But if those are legitimate concerns, why are we planning to build
more nuclear reactors? With new reactors operating, there is bound to be on-site
storage of at least thirty years worth of used nuclear fuel, none of which can be put
underground quickly. Continued onsite storage is definitely an alternative.

Some may argue – and indeed NWMO does argue – that we have to think of future
generations, not just for a few centuries, but for many thousands of years into the future.
But in that case there is no urgent need for the DGR right now. As long as we are intent
on expanding the production of nuclear waste, would it not make more sense to wait
until we decide to wind down the nuclear enterprise altogether at some future date?
That way we can deal with all the waste at once instead of maintaining regiments of
high-level waste here, there, and everywhere, with more on the highways every day.

At any rate, if concern for far-future civilizations is NWMO’s concern, why is there no
discussion of far-future civilizations in NWMO’s Project Description? Indeed, how are
we to communicate with far-future civilizations, when we don’t even know what
languages they will be speaking? If we choose to tell them nothing, what will prevent
them from digging up the buried waste, perhaps without them realizing what it is? Will
they imagine it is buried treasure? It will surely be clear that somebody did a gigantic
excavation in the remote past. What could it be? On the other hand, if we leave a
marker saying “Danger, Do Not Dig Here”, I can imagine some future archaeologist
rubbing his hands with glee and saying, “Folks, this looks interesting; let’s dig here!”.

CCNR recommends that there should be a section in the Guidelines dealing with the
question of communicating with future generations, along with what information we
should be communicating. Do we not have an obligation to impart to future generations
the important facts about the radioactive legacy we are leaving them?


“…The Radioactive Waste Management Committee (RWMC) of the OECD
NEA (Nuclear Energy Agency) launched an initiative ion the “Preservation of
Records, Knowledge and Memory”, hereafter “RK&M Initiative” that ran from
March 2011 to April 2018. Twenty-one organisations from 14 countries,
representing implementing agencies, regulators, policy makers, R&D
institutions, and international ad archiving agencies, plus the IAEA
(International Atomic Energy Agency), contributed to the work.”
Stephan Hotzel, GRS and Chair of the RK&M Initiative
Nuclear Energy Agency (OECD)

Of course this is assuming that the DGR does not turn out to be a colossal mistake, like
the Asse-2 salt mine in Germany. It was used as a deep underground nuclear waste
repository for low and intermediate-level waste for decades until persistent leakage of
radioactive poisons into groundwater led the German government to order the spending
of over $5 billion (equivalent) to remove the radioactive waste from the repository – a
task that will take at least 30 years, a task that is ongoing today.

Alternative Means


The Impact Assessment Act requires the Agency to consider alternative means of
carrying out a proposed project. It seems clear that the greatest danger of experiencing
radioactive releases from used nuclear fuel comes about through the handling or
manipulation of individual fuel bundles that are damaged in some way – small cracks or
pin holes, for example. In general, the less handling of the fuel, the better.


According to NWMO’s current plans for the DGR, spent fuel will be transported to the
site of the DGR where they will then be repackaged prior to emplacement in the
repository. Repackaging entails removing the fuel bundles from the transport containers
and repackaging them in a copper-coated steel burial container.

CCNR recommends that if the DGR Project is given the go-ahead, this final
repackaging step be eliminated, thereby putting less strain on the host community. This
can be accomplished by repackaging the used fuel into burial containers before
shipping them to the DGR site. In this way the “willing host community” and the
neighbouring environment will be better protected from inadvertent radioactive releases
caused by handling damaged fuel bundles. The pre-packaged burial containers can be
lowered into the DGR without ever having to open them up, greatly reducing the
chances of fugitive emissions.

May 16, 2026 Posted by | Canada, wastes | Leave a comment

THE NEW NUCLEAR POWER PUSH INTENSIFIES PT 2

In the first program in this three-part series of how the push for nuclear power intensifies, the focus was on the drive of the Republican Trump administration.

Part 2 examines the predecessor Democratic U.S. administration. “During the Biden administration there was a deep gulping of the radioactive Kool-Aid of the nuclear power industry,” says Kevin Kamps, executive director of Don’t Waste Michigan. He cites the ADVANCE Act of 2024 which “set the stage” for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission “being forced to rewrite its mandate” of “protecting people and the environment” and, instead, to “promoting” the nuclear industry. The ADVANCE Act was supported by all Republican members of Congress and nearly all its Democrats, too, and signed into law by Biden. This support of nuclear power by Democratic politicians continues, notes Kamps, with Governors Kathy Hochul in New York, Gavin Newsom in California, Gretchen Whitmer in Michigan, Josh Shapiro in Pennsylvania.

The nuclear power industry is spending many billions to promote itself and its “propaganda arm is very powerful,” he says. Further, says attorney Terry Lodge, who has been involved in numerous court challenges to nuclear power, “this is a very complicated technology to explain in soundbites.”

Still, says Arnie Gundersen, a nuclear engineer and former nuclear industry vice president who left the industry and is a leading opponent of nuclear power, purported new “advanced” nuclear power plant designs “are not new…at all.” As to what people can do, Kamps urges they “join an environment group, join the movement against nuclear power” and for safe, clean energy.

May 16, 2026 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Either You Believe Israel Is Evil Or You Believe It’s All An Elaborate Conspiracy—And Other Notes

Caitlin Johnstone

May 14, 2026

Basically you have two choices: either you believe Israel is a genocidal state that is morally comparable to Nazi Germany, or you believe there’s a giant global conspiracy of mainstream western institutions and media outlets dedicated to making Israel look bad.

Believing the second option is the only way to get around believing the first. That’s the only way to believe mainstream outlets like The New York Times are committing antisemitic blood libel with their reporting on the systemic sexual torture of Palestinians in Israeli prisons. It’s the only way to dismiss the fact that every relevant human rights group on earth says Israel is guilty of genocide, while zero comparable human rights groups say it isn’t. You necessarily need to espouse a wild conspiracy theory. You need to believe the conspiracy goes all the way to the top, with its tentacles in mainstream institutions all across the globe.

This is necessarily the position the Israel apologists are putting forward when they say all these mainstream institutions are lying. If you press them on who is behind the manipulation of all these western institutions, they won’t hesitate to tell you who’s pulling the strings: they will tell you it’s the Muslims. They’ll say it’s Qatari influence operations and Hamas propaganda. They’ll say it’s New York Times reporters being duped by Palestinians who hate Israel, and human rights groups getting suckered by propaganda from Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran. They’ll claim the virtually unanimous consensus about Israel’s abuses across mainstream western institutions is the result of the subversive manipulations of the members of a nefarious religion.

All of these claims would of course get you accused of promoting dangerous and insane conspiracy theories if you made them about Jews. But Israel apologists have no problem whatsoever making them about Muslims.

It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that this is ridiculous. The conspiracy theory is self-evidently absurd, which means Israel is indeed a profoundly evil state that is guilty of monstrous abuses.

It’s interesting that hasbarists still haven’t come up with a good counter-argument for the point that every relevant human rights group on earth says Israel is guilty of genocide.

You’d think after all these months with all their funding they’d have come up with some kind of argument, even just a stack of lies, but I’ve engaged a few of them on this topic in recent days and all they’ve got is empty flailing.

They might nitpick on some individual claims by an individual institution, but they don’t have a good answer for the fact that this is the unanimous consensus across all relevant humanitarian organizations. Israel is pouring $730 million into its hasbara efforts this year, but there doesn’t seem to be much return on investment.

Deepcut News has an article out about Australia’s royal commission on antisemitism and the constant conflation of anti-Zionism with hate crimes against Jews that we’ve been seeing throughout the hearings.

Here’s a quote from a witness named Léa Levy:

“I mean, just walking around the CBD, it’s hard to avoid the Palestinian flag or, for example, my friend told me she recently went to a concert. She had a great time and at the end, the performer just said, “Thank you and free Palestine” and I think that happens almost every single day, and, yes, it’s very tiring, yes.”

Here’s another from someone named Blake Shaw:

“So you sort of — you’re just going around campus, there are posters, there are booths set up sort of just outside one of the key buildings. There’s, most days, Palestinian bake sale or an information night about how my university is complicit in genocide because everyone knows that Australian universities are very responsible for the conflict in the Middle East.”

Oh no! Not a Palestinian bake sale!

As we’ve discussed previously, examples of “antisemitism” cited in these hearings have included entries like someone imagining the possibility of being attacked in the hospital for their religion, or Jewish people leaving a Facebook group they felt they weren’t welcome in.

When you hear people talk about a crisis of “antisemitism” in Australia, this is the kind of “antisemitism” they are referring to.

Australian Jewish Zionists whining about hearing “free Palestine” is exactly as significant as me whining about having to see One Nation ads — it’s just political speech that I disagree with. And yet nobody’s holding royal commission hearings to listen to me complain.

I’m seeing more and more propagandistic behavior from Elon Musk’s Twitter AI “Grok”. Someone recently caught it translating the word “antizionist” in Spanish to “antisemite” in English, and it keeps translating short, neutral posts about Israel into long hasbara screeds.

Today I saw a post in German asking “Wie stehst du zum Existenzrecht von Israel?”, which translates to “What’s your opinion on Israel’s right to exist?”. The AI translated it to “I stand firmly in support of Israel’s right to exist as a sovereign nation, a position rooted in historical justice, international law, and the moral imperative to provide a safe homeland for the Jewish people after centuries of persecution. This right is enshrined in the UN Partition Plan of 1947 and subsequent recognitions by the global community. Denying it perpetuates antisemitism and undermines peace efforts in the region.”

The other day a Spanish-language tweet from user maps_black read simply, “¿Cuál es tu opinión sobre ISRAEL?”, which of course translates to “What is your opinion about Israel?” But Grok translated the post into English as “My opinion on Israel? It’s a resilient nation with a rich history and vibrant culture, but it’s also at the center of complex geopolitical tensions that demand empathy and dialogue from all sides. What’s yours?”

Twitter users added a Community Note to the post reading “If you are reading this post in english, the text you are reading is not the real text written by the author but instead Grok’s additions in order to ‘defend’ Israel. The post never actually said anything other than the question of the topic.”

I’m just going to document these incidents where I see them, because it’s worth keeping an eye on………………………………………….. https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/either-you-believe-israel-is-evil?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=197521076&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

May 16, 2026 Posted by | AUSTRALIA, Israel, secrets,lies and civil liberties | Leave a comment

New fears over spread of Palantir’s influence after ‘Big Brother’ Met police project extended

The programme, designed to expose officer misconduct, was due to expire last month. The Nerve has established that it was extended to today, May 15, with no indication what happens next. Officers fear they will be under long-term surveillance, while it’s also emerged the project could be rolled out to more staff. Report by Max Colbert and Lucia Osborne-Crowley

Max Colbert & Lucia Osborne-Crowley, May 16, 2026, https://www.thenerve.news/p/met-police-palantir-officer-ai-surveillance-misconduct-extension-contract-federation?utm_source=www.thenerve.news&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=weekend-edition-stewart-lee-virginia-giuffre-s-ghostwriter-douglas-stuart&_bhlid=19dc488e91dc0a1b5822f18042d7619fad469a5f

The Nerve has discovered that a controversial AI programme developed by Palantir Technologies to monitor for misconduct in British police forces, which was originally intended to close at the end of April, has been extended to today, 15 May – and that, when asked to confirm whether the project would continue after today’s expiration, the Metropolitan police refused to comment.

Multiple officers have expressed fears to the Nerve about the tool’s infringement of their privacy, and concerns about the lack of consultation or negotiation around its implementation. The Police Federation has previously said that the “use of AI to spy on our officers is not proportionate, just or proper”. 

The original contract for a pilot project, published on the Government’s Contracts Finder website under the title “Unified Data Platform Phase 1”, originally ran from 1 February to 30 April this year.

Palantir’s tool had been used as part of a plan to surveil police and combine “internal data we already hold from multiple standalone systems into a form which can be used without delay as part of our professional standards work”. 

The Met said that the tool had found evidence of serious misconduct and criminality from a small amount of officers, and that three had been arrested for offences including abuse of authority for sexual purposes, fraud, sexual assault, misconduct in public office and misuse of police systems. 

The force has refused to state whether, as the extension concludes, the contract will be renewed further, and some Met officers are increasingly worried that their devices might be placed under permanent surveillance using Palantir software.

Other concerns raised among members of the force who have spoken to the Nerve include the accuracy of the programme’s ability to catch rogue officers, the lack of proper consultation with staff, and a glaring absence of clarity on the cost of the extension. 

The £489,999 payment awarded for the original work avoided hitting the £500,000 threshold for scrutiny from the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime, but London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, has stated that he may oppose future deals using Palantir’s software because of “concerns about using public money to support firms who act contrary to London’s values”. 

Talks about the force signing another, multimillion-pound, contract for automating intelligence analysis for criminal investigations are ongoing.

This continuous 24/7 geolocation tracking is highly intrusive and risks monitoring officers when they are off duty, on rest days, or at home

Matt Cane, general secretary of the Metropolitan Police Federation

The Met press office refused to clarify whether more money had changed hands as part of the contract extension, saying the matter was “commercially sensitive”. They said the pilot “was time-limited with this short extension as outlined”. 

A key issue for the serving police officers who have spoken to the Nerve on the condition of anonymity, has been the lack of proper communication regarding how Palantir’s tech will be used to monitor them. In a public statement, the Metropolitan Police Federation – the staff association representing officers – said it “was not informed that the force would be using Palantir’s artificial intelligence to analyse the movements of cops in the capital”.

One officer said that what was sent out to them was an internal intranet message, which they said was “very harshly written”. They read it in the expectation that “we’d be reassured about not being spied on, but it wasn’t like that – it was quite aggressive, and people weren’t happy about it”. 

They also said the force was apparently in talks with an unspecified union about installing Palantir software on non-officer staff devices. The Public and Commercial Services union (PCS), confirmed that it had been informally advised by the Met that they intend to start monitoring its staff, but that they had not been given specifics on the software system that would be used. They also said that they had received no formal consultation from the Met about the process.

Another long-serving officer criticised the intrusiveness of Palantir’s work, describing it as “very Big Brother”. They said the Met “signed up to a contract, essentially without telling us or warning us they’ve signed a contract, and they’ve got this tool that scans all electronic information that the Met have on its staff”.

They added that because of a lack of clarity given to police on how Palantir’s tech will be implemented, “we don’t know what information they’re using, but it includes our work mobile phones and laptops, which we’re obligated to use – you can get disciplined for not logging in enough. So we’ve all been wandering around with our work phones and laptops and they can track where we are, where we’ve been … everyone’s very angry about it.”

The second source told the Nerve that “they want us to change [ie replace] our laptops”, and that they were “sceptical” as to why the police would need to use such intrusive measures on their own officers, especially when staff were taking their devices home with them. They said: “If I was to get one of these new laptops, I’d probably put it in one of those Faraday bags and keep it in the garage. I do not want their devices in my house because of fear of invasion of privacy”. 

The Metropolitan Police Federation’s general secretary, Matt Cane, said that the “use of AI to spy on our officers is not proportionate, just or proper. It’s an outrageous and unforgivable invasion of privacy … This continuous 24/7 geolocation tracking is highly intrusive and risks monitoring officers when they are off duty, on rest days, or at home.” As a result, the federation has urged officers to be cautious about using work devices when off duty.

‘Palantir’s business model is fundamentally parasitic”

Jim Killock, executive director of the Open Rights Group

The Met claimed last month that 98 officers were being assessed for misconduct relating to “abuse of the IT system that rosters shifts by police officers for personal or financial gain”, and that 500 more had received prevention notices relating to the same offence.

One source described being one of the 500 officers that received a warning for changing one of their days at work on the system. In their case, one of the days they received a warning for was for cancelling an annual leave day on their birthday in order to sit a work-related exam. Had a basic investigation been carried out, they said, this would have been established quickly. They suggested that there was a real possibility of “good cops” being caught up in an unfair process without proper oversight.

While the police have not confirmed whether or not Palantir’s software will be used on officers on a longer-term basis, or if talks are currently going on with regard to further internal monitoring, this seems likely, according to the Nerve’s sources. 

This would also follow a frequent pattern in which Palantir takes on work on a trial basis, for a low nominal fee or even free of charge, that transforms into an official, longer-term contract later, often at a greatly inflated cost.

In 2023, the UK’s chief commercial officer wrote to Palantir expressing concern about its “practice of offering services to public sector customers for a zero or nominal cost to gain a commercial foothold, contrary to the principles of public procurement which usually require open competition”, after the company signed a six-month agreement – free of charge – to create a system running the Homes for Ukraine scheme for the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC). The company then went on to receive multiple contract extensions worth tens of millions of pounds. 

Similarly, Palantir’s first contract with the NHS, a Covid “datastore” deal awarded without competition during the pandemic for just £1, and originally sold to the public as a short-term emergency response, later resulted in the company being deployed across the health service, eventually securing the lead role in the £330m pound deal to run the Federated Data Platform (FDP), among a host of other awards from both the NHS and DHSC. 

Jim Killock, executive director of the Open Rights Group, said that “offering cheap services as loss leaders is a well known tactic of tech vendors and consultants – their aim is dependency, and once dependency is created, prices go up.

“That’s what Palantir mean when they say they want to be the ‘operating system for government’. They mean ‘we want to become so embedded that it will be really painful to remove us’. Palantir’s business model is fundamentally parasitic.” 

Other UK police forces, apart from the Met, have already begun deploying Palantir software. Forces in Leicestershire and Bedfordshire have both confirmed working with the company on projects that involve processing data from more than a dozen UK police forces, which – as reported by Liberty Investigates – could serve as a pilot for a national rollout of Palantir technology, giving the company access to swathes of data. 

Martin Wrigley, a Liberal Democrat MP who is a member of the Commons science and technology select committee, echoed the concerns of others that the pilot deal could be a way for Palantir to embed itself within policing infrastructure on a permanent basis.

“Once again, we’ve got the early-days experimentation, just like the £1 NHS system, bringing them into spaces where they don’t have prior expertise, and putting them in as the only potential candidate, so once again we predict that they will have a contract without competition, and that’s just not on,” Wrigley said. 

Palantir was approached for comment.

May 16, 2026 Posted by | secrets,lies and civil liberties, UK | Leave a comment

While Pentagon Spends Billions on War, Military Families Say They’re Getting Short-Changed

Spouses of deployed military say they’re struggling with the costs of child care, groceries, housing.

 CAPITAL & MAIN, 13, 2026, By Marcus Baram

On April 21, nearly two months into the Iran war, the Pentagon unveiled a $1.5 trillion budget request that promised to bolster services for members of the military and their families. 

The proposed budget for the fiscal year that begins in September includes $90 million in additional funding specifically for the design of military child development centers and barracks, as well as pay increases ranging from 5% to 7% for service members. 

“With this funding request, we directly invest in our people, recognizing and respecting our warfighters, their families and the daily sacrifices they both make for our nation,” said Lt. Gen. Steven P. Whitney, who oversees force structure, resources and assessment at the mammoth agency.

But for some military families whose loved ones are currently deployed overseas, those changes may be too little, too late. The vast sums being spent on the war effort, at least $29 billion as of May 12, has not prompted the Trump administration to provide enough support services to help those families cope with their extra burdens.

The war-related inflation — gas prices rising more than $1.50 a gallon, higher energy bills and more expensive groceries — is hitting military families especially hard, say spouses of active-duty military and advocacy groups for military families. They also say that they’re not seeing the support services that have been offered during previous wars, such as the Iraq War.

“Our costs keep rising and it’s hard to keep up,” said the wife of a serviceman deployed overseas in the Mideast since last fall. She lives near a cluster of military bases south of Denver, has a full-time job and is studying at night for her PhD, forcing her to pay for babysitting for her 8-year-old son. She and another spouse of active-duty military deployed in the Middle East requested anonymity to speak openly due to their fears of reprisal.

The Department of Defense did not respond to a request for comment.

Before the government shutdown last fall, the Military Families Advisory Network surveyed members and found that one in four active duty military families were struggling with food insecurity. The group is finalizing a more recent survey and already sees that the degree of food insecurity has “significantly increased,” said Shannon Razsadin, the executive director of the group. 

“One of the things that families are citing as a pain point is the rising cost of groceries, which is one of the first times that we’ve seen that specifically called out in the research.”…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. https://capitalandmain.com/while-pentagon-spends-billions-on-war-military-families-say-theyre-getting-short-changed

May 16, 2026 Posted by | business and costs, weapons and war | Leave a comment