Trump’s Phantom Enemies
The Trump administration is laying the groundwork for blacklisting and criminalizing all left-wing, progressive, anti-war and anti-imperialist dissent.
Chris Hedges ScheerPost, July 23, 2026, https://scheerpost.com/2026/07/23/trumps-phantom-enemies/
The State Department’s 100-page report on Cuba’s “campaign of subversion against the United States,” along with Donald Trump’s assertion that “Americans were blatantly lied to about the security of our election infrastructure,” lays the groundwork for dictatorship.
Elections will be sabotaged in the name of “national security.” Left-wing dissent will be criminalized in the name of “combating terrorism.” Democracy will be snuffed out in the name of protecting “freedom.”
Trump, who has lately taken to issuing warnings about a communist plot to take over America, posits that an island of 9.6 million people — nearly 90 percent of whom live in extreme poverty amid extended blackouts due to decades of U.S. economic warfare — is an existential threat.
These accusations are not meant to be rational. They, like the charge that our elections are manipulated, are transparent excuses to go after institutions and individuals that are seen as threatening Trump and the Republican Party’s absolute grip on power. While Cuba has supposedly “carried out one of the most durable and damaging foreign intelligence penetrations in American history” Russia, China, Iran and North Korea, as well as non-state groups, “have the capability to compromise U.S. election infrastructure.”
Under the heading “Front Groups and Fellow Travelers,” the report assembles a disparate collection of organizations belonging to Cuba’s“ideological network.”
For example, the Interreligious Foundation for Community Organization (IFCO), founded as an ecumenical social justice organization by the Presbyterian Church, is described as part of a Cuba “solidarity network” which “facilitates radical agitation within the United States.”
I am an ordained Presbyterian minister. I can assure you the Presbyterian Church is not facilitating “radical agitation.”
The report lists a wide variety of organizations on whose behalf IFCO has acted as an intermediary — perfectly legally — facilitating tax-exempt donations and handling grant management, compliance and reporting. These include The Jericho Movement, Equality for Flatbush, Claudia Jones School, Haitian Women for Haitian Refugees, changingFrequencies, Viva Palestina US, and The People’s Forum, which the report describes as “a major activist group in Cuba’s U.S. ideological network.”
The National Lawyers Guild (NLG) and Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) are castigated in the same chapter. The NLG “is one of the most persistently relevant — and insidious — organizations in Cuba’s U.S. network.”
The report continues:
“The association of extreme-left lawyers and radical street activists has played a key role in a disproportionate share of the far-left terror and violence that has plagued the United States from the 1960s up to today. Throughout its history, it has maintained intimate ties to Cuba and other communist regimes and has explicitly sought to advance the causes of the international far left, including by working to defend and facilitate terrorism and extremist violence — from the Weather Underground of the 1970s to the violent BLM militants and Antifa terror cells of today.”
The NLG is labeled a foreign influence operation because it provides assistance to activists, whose right to legal representation is constitutionally enshrined.
In 2025, the Trump administration conditioned federal funding to Harvard University on defunding and dissolving the law school’s chapter of the National Lawyers Guild (HLS NLG), which provided legal assistance to individuals and student groups that opposed the genocide.
A subsection in the report is dedicated to the anti-war activists at CODEPINK and their co-founders Medea Benjamin and Jodie Evans. It notes Evans’ marriage to the wealthy software entrepreneur Neville Roy Singham was attended by a “Who’s Who’ of progressivism” including co-host of Democracy Now! Amy Goodman; Ben & Jerry’s co-founder Ben Cohen and the playwright V (formerly known as Eve Ensler) who wrote “The Vagina Monologues.”
Naming guests at a wedding is one of the more bizarre passages.
The report grossly exaggerates the influence of Singham’s support for left-wing organizations — described as “far-left” — while ignoring the massive sums supplied by U.S. corporations, millionaires and billionaires, as well as the Israel lobby, to both major political parties, super PACs, think tanks and advocacy networks.
Israel has a far more insidious influence on U.S. politics and foreign policy than Cuba, Russia and China combined.
The State Department attacks the co-founders of The People’s Forum, Manolo De Los Santos and Claudia De la Cruz.
It draws on documents that are often decades old and infused with Cold War paranoia. These include a 1966 Senate report claiming there is “overwhelming evidence that the machinery of the Cuban Government has been progressively organized over the years, to carry out its number one task — the export of Communist subversion.”
It ignores more thoughtful assessments, including a 1981 CIA estimate that acknowledged “[m]uch of the turmoil around the world is rooted in regional and local disputes of a political, social, or religious nature and has nothing to do with Communism.”
In a chapter titled “Revolutionary Tourism,” the Venceremos (“We Shall Overcome”) Brigade is characterized as one of the most “extensive and dangerous infiltration operations ever undertaken by a foreign power against the United States.” This assertion libels thousands of individuals and organizations as Cuban assets, offering nothing more than innuendo.
It lists “the founder of Mother Jones,” — although there were four founders —– along with “several other [unnamed] notable magazine editors, leaders of powerful labor unions and advocacy groups, think tank executives, and a suite of professors at top U.S. universities” as Brigade “alumni.”
Transporting humanitarian goods to Cuba is not a crime. Although the Justice Department’s extradition request from Spain of philanthropist Fergie Chambers, who provided funds to humanitarian organizations in Gaza, may see the criminalization of any person or any group that assists those suffering under sanctions and a blockade.
The report attacks members of the March 2026 “Nuestra América Convoy” which transported goods to Cuba “in defiance of U.S. sanctions.” It notes that 120 organizations “from across 33 countries joined the caravan” with “a suite of influential progressives,” including Isra Hirsi — daughter of U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, video game live streamer and commentator Hasan Piker — with whom I discussed my book “A Genocide Foretold” last year — former U.K. Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn and “several other current and former members of European Parliament.” Even the Gaza flotilla activist Thiago Avila — who I interviewed last month after he was tortured by Israeli soldiers — gets a mention.
Those listed in the report did not become “radicals” because of Cuban indoctrination. Their politics are homegrown, formed in opposition to racism, genocide, police violence, the terrorizing and killing of immigrants and U.S. citizens by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) thugs and neoliberalism, along with the crimes of U.S. imperialism and militarism.
The report makes passing reference to a wide range of people on grounds so tenuous that it has to be read to be believed.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani is mentioned for refusing “to denounce” a “tribute to [Assata] Shakur,” who was almost certainly framed for murder and who fled to Cuba after escaping from a U.S. prison in 1979.
It dedicates two paragraphs to Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass for her “friendliness towards the communist regime.” The evidence provided is her participation in a congressional delegation that joined then President Barack Obama on a visit to the island.
Cuban agents, it charges, “maintain a foothold in hundreds of front groups, activist organizations, solidarity centers, and ideological NGO and nonprofit networks. These groups collectively represent one of the single largest, most sophisticated and dangerous vectors for hostile foreign influence in modern American history.” Cuba has allegedly “infiltrated the highest reaches of the U.S. government, recruited and cultivated generations of American activists [and] backed an unprecedented wave of leftwing terrorism [my emphasis] on American soil.”
Note the word terrorism. Note that it makes these individuals and organizations terrorists. Note that it makes them subject to draconian terrorism laws. And note that the Trump administration has committed itself to hunting down and rooting out the “radical left.”
The report charges that Cuba and its allies are mounting “a revolution against western civilization itself — waged, in part, via the novel and insidious method of persuading the children of the West to turn against their own inheritance.” It accuses Havana of “gleeful support of the George Floyd uprisings.” It asserts that “the rise of antifa” and “the explosion of pro-terrorist activism on American college campuses,” can be “linked, in some way, shape, or form, to Cuban influence.”
It characterizes the DSA as serving “as a particularly potent illustration of the ideological victory of Cuba’s effort to position itself as the spiritual capital of Third Worldist radicalism.” It claims the organization maintains a “fierce, almost religious commitment to the cause of the Cuban regime.” It alleges Cuba has built a “sprawling revolutionary network” that has “shaped America’s most famous and influential extremist movements” including the Black Panthers, the Weather Underground and antifa. These networks include “powerful leftist nonprofits, anti-ICE collectives, socialist groups, and Marxist militant organizations” in the U.S.
Cuba, the report concludes, “has sought to undermine, degrade and destabilize America with spies and soldiers, but also with students and intellectuals; with terrorist cells, but also with solidarity committees and nonprofit networks with intelligence officers operating under diplomatic cover.”
The broadside is chilling. It is worse than McCarthyism. It presages a savage purging of American society.
Those named in the report are condemned without evidence. They are denied due process. That the assertions in the report are distorted at best, and often fictitious, is irrelevant. Fascist propaganda is not rooted in truth. It is rooted in a hatred for liberal values, democracy and the left. It is rooted in the belief that once those condemned as human contaminants are removed, there will be a moral, spiritual and economic renaissance.
We have seen this fascist dance before. We know what comes next. It is not good.
Trump threat to hit Pickaxe renews calls in Iran for nuclear bomb, NPT exit
Official position remains unchanged
Before Ali Khamenei’s death, Iranian officials and nuclear negotiators consistently maintained that his fatwa was a permanent religious ruling rather than a temporary political decision.
According to their interpretation, not only the production and use of nuclear weapons but even their possession solely for deterrence is forbidden under Islamic law. They argued that Iran’s deterrence should instead rest on missile capabilities, technological advances and human capital.
Maryam Sinaiee, Iran International, Jul 23, 2026, https://www.iranintl.com/en/202607237263
President Donald Trump’s threat to strike Iran’s Pickaxe Mountain nuclear-linked facility has intensified hardline calls for Tehran to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and develop a nuclear weapon.
The debate gained fresh momentum after Trump warned Tuesday that the United States would target the deeply buried facility, known in Persian as Mount Kolang Gaz La, if Iran sought to restore its nuclear program there.
Advocates of this view argue that the recent wars demonstrated that conventional military capabilities alone no longer provide sufficient deterrence, making a nuclear option increasingly necessary. Others stop short of openly advocating nuclear weapons but argue that Iran should at least leave the NPT in response to growing US threats.
The arguments echo comments made by Fereydoun Abbasi, the former head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran and a politician closely associated with Saeed Jalili’s hardline camp, months before he was killed in Israeli strikes during the 12-day war in June 2025.
In January 2025, Abbasi argued that under the new security environment, “the dangers of not building a bomb and lacking strong deterrence are far greater than the costs of acquiring it,” warning that weak deterrence would only encourage direct aggression.
Abbasi also maintained that Iran had long ago crossed the scientific and technical threshold required to build a nuclear weapon, arguing that the remaining obstacle was no longer technical but rather “a strategic decision.”
In his view, when threats from Israel and its allies become existential, missile deterrence and reliance on regional allies are no longer sufficient, leaving the country increasingly vulnerable without a nuclear deterrent.
Social media campaign targets negotiating officials
Many hardline social media users now argue that Iran should build a nuclear bomb as quickly as possible. They have also criticized officials they describe as “eager for negotiations”—including President Masoud Pezeshkian, Parliament Speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi—for failing to put withdrawal from the NPT on the government’s agenda.
One X user writing under the name Ayyar reacted to Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei’s statement that Iran remained committed to the NPT.
“Just hours after Baghaei declared that Iran is still a member of the NPT, Trump threatened to bomb the Pickaxe Mountain nuclear facility,” the user wrote. “They killed the country’s leader along with thousands of Iranians and repeatedly struck our nuclear facilities. What exactly must the enemy do before we leave the NPT? Are you asleep?”
Another user, writing under the name Sam, argued: “Why are we afraid of leaving the NPT? Afraid of a global consensus against Iran? Staying in the treaty hasn’t prevented that. We have no choice but to build nuclear weapons for comprehensive deterrence. Nuclear weapons could be the final answer.”
Another account, Seyed Mehrdad, wrote: “The answer to a nuclear threat is not threatening regional infrastructure. Deterrence lies in leaving the NPT and conducting a live nuclear test.”
Other users argued that Iran should not remain without nuclear weapons if countries such as Turkey or Saudi Arabia eventually acquire them, insisting that “missile power alone cannot guarantee deterrence.”
Another post claimed that nuclear-capable bombers would not threaten Iran if the country already possessed nuclear weapons, reflecting a broader argument among hardliners that only an atomic arsenal could prevent further US or Israeli attacks.
Debate spreads beyond social media
The discussion has also spread into conservative media. On June 28, the IRGC-affiliated Fars News Agency published an opinion piece titled “There Is No Alternative but to Build an Atomic Bomb,” arguing that Iran required nuclear deterrence to secure the “peace of mind” necessary to resolve other disputes through negotiations.
Fars later clarified that the article had appeared in its interactive opinion section and did not represent the agency’s official editorial position.
Other conservative outlets, including Kayhan, and hardline members of parliament have generally avoided explicitly endorsing nuclear weapons. They have, however, increasingly referred to concepts such as “redefining deterrence,” “reviewing nuclear commitments” and “revising the country’s defense doctrine.”
Calls for NPT withdrawal intensify
Trump’s latest warning against Pickaxe Mountain has also prompted some conservative figures to publicly raise the possibility of leaving the NPT.
Political analyst Mohammad Hossein Khoshvaght, who has close ties to the late supreme leader’s family, questioned whether conventional responses to US attacks would simply encourage further aggression, asking whether such a cycle could continue “until Iran is brought down.”
Former senior Revolutionary Guards commander Ghorbanali Salavatian urged Iranian authorities to formally notify international organizations that Iran would withdraw from the NPT if the United States attacked Pickaxe Mountain.
He added that such a withdrawal should occur “without delay” if an attack took place.
Khamenei’s fatwa returns to focus
The debate has also reopened questions surrounding the religious prohibition on nuclear weapons issued by the late Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
Following Khamenei’s death, some social media users argued that Mojtaba Khamenei, as the new supreme leader, should revoke or revise his father’s fatwa declaring nuclear weapons religiously forbidden in light of the changed security environment.
One user wrote in March that because Ali Khamenei was no longer a living source of emulation, his fatwa was no longer binding. The user described the pursuit of nuclear deterrence as “a national demand and the right of the Iranian people.”
The issue had already surfaced in September 2025, when 70 members of parliament argued that Khamenei’s previous ruling should be changed or reinterpreted and demanded authorization for the development and possession of an atomic bomb to establish “nuclear deterrence.”
The lawmakers argued that while the use of nuclear weapons could remain religiously forbidden, producing and possessing them solely for deterrence should be treated differently.
Official position remains unchanged
Before Ali Khamenei’s death, Iranian officials and nuclear negotiators consistently maintained that his fatwa was a permanent religious ruling rather than a temporary political decision.
According to their interpretation, not only the production and use of nuclear weapons but even their possession solely for deterrence is forbidden under Islamic law. They argued that Iran’s deterrence should instead rest on missile capabilities, technological advances and human capital.
Under Shiite jurisprudence, however, a new marja, or source of emulation, may issue rulings that differ from those of his predecessors.
Araghchi acknowledged this possibility in an interview with Al Jazeera in April, saying any change to the nuclear fatwa would depend on the position adopted by Iran’s new supreme leader.
For now, the government’s formal position remains unchanged. Baghaei said Monday that Iran remained a member of the NPT and recognized its obligations under the treaty, although he added that Tehran continually reviewed its foreign policy and national security options.
Baghaei also said Wednesday that no nuclear activity was taking place at Pickaxe Mountain, accusing Washington of using the site as a “fabricated pretext” for further attacks and sabotage.
The Collapse of the Bipartisan Consensus over US-Israel Ties
22 July 2026 AIMN Editorial, By Dr Dan Steinbock
After the Gaza genocide, bipartisan consensus over US-Israel ties is crumbling. As legal debate is expanding, the political foundation of unconditional U.S. military support for Israel has entered its most serious crisis in decades.
For decades, U.S. support for Israel rested on one of Washington’s strongest bipartisan assumptions: that military assistance was strategically necessary and politically untouchable. But Gaza has weakened that consensus.
Critics now see Israeli military aid as a misguided strategy and political target. The most visible shift has occurred inside the Democratic Party.
A collapsing bipartisan consensus on Israel
Driven by voter and demographic shifts, humanitarian concerns in Gaza, and the unwarranted conflict with Iran, more than 100 House Democrats recently supported an amendment seeking to block billions of dollars in Israel-related assistance, an extraordinary departure from previous voting patterns.
House Democratic leadership (including Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries) has officially called for a “major reset” in U.S.-Israel relations.
Senate efforts to restrict weapons transfers have also attracted substantial Democratic support, reflecting growing concern about civilian casualties, international law, and U.S. responsibility.
The Republican coalition is also less unified than before. While most Republican lawmakers remain strongly supportive of Israel, MAGA-aligned figures influenced by anti-interventionism, “America First” priorities, and skepticism toward foreign aid have increasingly questioned open-ended commitments.
Growing opposition within the MAGA movement to U.S. arms transfers centers on a deep ideological rift over foreign interventionism. Former Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene left office in January 2026 after a bitter falling out with President Trump.
While much of the base supports President Trump’s foreign policy, a growing, vocal faction—backed by prominent voices like Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens, and Representative Thomas Massie—challenges continued, unconditional weapons shipments.
The result is a new political landscape: traditional pro-Israel Democrats, evangelical conservatives, progressive Democrats, libertarian Republicans, and anti-interventionist conservatives now approach the issue from fundamentally different premises.
The debate is therefore no longer simply “pro-Israel versus anti-Israel.” It concerns whether U.S. strategic interests, domestic law, international obligations, and humanitarian concerns can continue to be reconciled under existing policy.
From political controversy to legal challenges
At the same time, legal initiatives accusing U.S. officials of complicity or failure to prevent alleged Israeli violations have moved the debate from politics into courts, international institutions, and questions of historical accountability.
The legal debate has developed along several tracks. The most significant U.S. case was Defense for Children International–Palestine v. Biden, brought by Palestinian organizations, Gaza residents, and Palestinian-Americans against President Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, for their alleged “failure to prevent and complicity in the unfolding genocide against Gaza.”
Along with the human rights organizations, the lawsuit was promoted by Josh Paul who had resigned from the U.S. State Department over arms shipments to Israel; Jewish Voice for Peace; and genocide and Holocaust scholars spearheaded by international lawyer William Schabas.
The plaintiffs proposed that a genocide, or serious risk of genocide, of Palestinians in Gaza was occurring. They also argued the U.S. is violating its duties under international law to prevent and not be complicit in the genocide. Those U.S. failures were seen to contribute to the erosion of “long and widely held norms of international law,” including the Genocide Convention and Universal Declaration of Human Rights…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….https://theaimn.net/the-collapse-of-the-bipartisan-consensus-over-us-israel-ties/
Democrats prepare to resist Saudi nuclear deal
Eleanor Mueller, Nicholas Wu, and Burgess Everett, Jul 23, 2026, https://www.semafor.com/article/07/22/2026/democrats-prepare-to-resist-saudi-nuclear-deal
The Trump administration has yet to formally notify Congress of its nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia, but Democrats are already laying the groundwork for an attempt to block it.
The civil nuclear pact, announced Wednesday, is designed to strengthen US-Saudi relations as President Donald Trump seeks an end to the Iran war plus funnel billions of dollars to the US nuclear industry.
But lawmakers in both parties will have questions about the details, especially the deal’s anticipated lack of additional nuclear oversight by the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Once the Energy Department transmits the deal to Congress as promised, the Atomic Energy Act gives lawmakers 90 legislative days to adopt a joint resolution disapproving of the agreement or let it automatically take effect. Democrats on relevant House and Senate committees told Semafor they’re already approaching the Saudi deal with a high degree of skepticism — citing, among other issues, the Trump administration’s escalating Iran war.
“I’m very concerned” over the deal, Rep. Greg Meeks, D-N.Y., his party’s top House Foreign Affairs Committee member, told Semafor. He added that “the timing seems funny,” and that the nuclear pact “seems as though it might be something that the Trump administration is doing to pay the Saudis to do something in the region.”
Democrats, still in the congressional minority, have dim prospects at winning passage of any disapproval resolution. Their level of pushback against the nuclear deal, however, could create a new and unwelcome political headache for Republicans who are fighting to preserve their majorities this fall amid the spiking unpopularity of Trump’s Iran war.
Any Senate vote to overturn the deal would be at a simple majority, meaning that Trump would only have to keep most of his party in line and, at worst case, survive a veto override. That’s likely: Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., said he initially had questions about the deal but after reviewing it is not “uncomfortable” with it.
Meeks’ Senate counterpart, Foreign Relations Committee ranking member Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, told Semafor she believes the deal is “going to have to come before the Senate.”
Another Foreign Relations Democrat, Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia, said he’s “pretty nervous” that the Saudi pact doesn’t meet the so-called gold standard set by the US’ nuclear deal with the United Arab Emirates.
That agreement allowed for IAEA oversight of the UAE’s civil nuclear activity, a provision not expected to be part of the new US-Saudi deal.
Ukraine has a new butcher-in-chief – all the better to feed Ukrainians to the grinder
the comedian-on-the-way-to-the-presidency made one and only one specific promise: that he understood the absolute priority of peace and would do everything to find a negotiated solution with Russia.
Syrsky is gone, but his replacement is a sign that Zelensky as committed as ever to prolonging a losing war at terrible human cost
23 Jul, 2026 , By Tarik Cyril Amar, a historian from Germany working at Koç University, Istanbul, on Russia, Ukraine, and Eastern Europe, the history of World War II, the cultural Cold War, and the politics of memory https://www.rt.com/news/643351-ukraine-drapaty-new-butcher/
The rule of Vladimir Zelensky has been a catastrophe for Ukraine, and that is how it will be remembered once the dust of relentless info war campaigns in his favor – and against his critics – settles.
While the corruption of the Zelensky regime is stupendous, that fact – sad as it is – is not what makes him special, however. Because exorbitant, shameless embezzlement, kickbacks, and fraud have been the Ukrainian establishment’s perverse normal since independence. Zelensky and his cronies are certain to have cashed in like no one before because the West has pumped in money as never before while turning two blind eyes to what happens to it. But in principle, Zelensky has merely done what they all do. Not that that makes it any better.
Zelensky’s truly distinct contribution to Ukraine’s misery has consisted in two other things. His unprecedented ramping-up of authoritarianism – begun long before the escalation of the war in 2022 – and his merciless choice to relentlessly sacrifice his country and its people to serve as cannon fodder in a Western proxy war against Russia.
Zelensky’s responsibility before his country is all the greater because he once either knew better or he lied. During his 2019 election campaign, when he generally “avoided serious interviews and discussions about policy – preferring instead to post light-hearted videos to social media,” as the BBC back then was still ready to report, the comedian-on-the-way-to-the-presidency made one and only one specific promise: that he understood the absolute priority of peace and would do everything to find a negotiated solution with Russia.
And then in the spring of 2022, Zelensky, of course, deliberately missed a golden opportunity to end the large-scale war when it had barely begun. Heeding not Ukraine’s obvious national interest but duplicitous advice from the West’s emissary, then British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Zelensky personally ditched an almost finished peace agreement, locking in years of devastation for his country. In the end, once the war will be fully lost, Kiev is virtually certain to get a deal much worse than what was on offer then.
Now, in the summer of 2026, it may seem as if Zelensky’s grip on Ukraine is finally slipping. A combination of street protests and – inevitable if quiet – Western pressure has forced him into a humiliating climb-down. After the president’s sudden dismissal of the popular – and much-hyped – defense minister Mikhail Fedorov, the protesters had demanded his re-instatement and the sacking of Fedorov’s rival, the military’s commander-in-chief Aleksandr ‘the Butcher’ Syrsky. Zelensky has now fired Syrsky to be replaced by General Mikhail Drapaty, while some new influential position for Fedorov is being discussed.
Boris Johnson, currently a more-than-usual washed-out has-been of British politics, busy trying to catch the public eye, has made meager headlines with blaming the Ukraine War on the Britain’s new foreign secretary, Ed Miliband. How is that supposed to work? Somehow via Syria. Yes, really.
The single most important cause of this perfectly avoidable war was of course the West’s reckless policy of NATO expansion. And the man who helped most directly to make the war go on when it could have ended quickly was Boris Johnson. But sure: “Syria.”
Boris, though, does stand for something, namely just how bizarre much of this developing story is. Here is a regime that, together with its Western supporters and users, has just been running an absurd but pervasive propaganda campaign claiming its drone and missile strikes are winning the war. And yet both the minister of defense and the head of the military have to go. An odd way to celebrate impending victory.
In reality, one thing the Fedorov-Syrsky saga shows is that even Zelensky doesn’t believe in his own boasts of moving the war from “the earth into the sky” and securing victory in that manner. Fedorov did not have to go despite finding a winning “asymmetrical” strategy, as many of the protesters and Western mainstream media claim. He never did. Fedorov did not fall over his alleged struggle against corruption either. He may have antagonized one set of war profiteers, but in Ukraine that only means another network will take a larger cut.
The most likely real reason for Fedorov’s sacking – whether it will be reversed or sort-of-reversed – is that Zelensky fears him as a rising political competitor, as Ukrainska Pravda reports. And while firing the defense minister, Zelensky himself created the cover story that there was no other way to deal with conflicts between Fedorov and Syrsky. In that way, it is Zelensky who made Syrsky, already widely disliked for wasting the lives of Ukrainian soldiers with futile and stubborn tactics, a target for the protesters.
The diehard Zelensky fans at Britain’s Telegraph may try to sell this outcome as “nimble” Zelensky successfully buying time by making Syrsky his fall guy in the same manner that he had already sacrificed his very intimate friend and top fixer Andrey Yermak to dodge the fallout from his own corruption. In reality, Zelensky has lost face again. His authority, brittle in any case, has taken another hit.
For Ukraine, though, none of this is good news. Yes, the de facto dictator Zelensky has suffered a defeat, and the abhorred ‘butcher’ Syrsky has been removed. But he has been replaced by a man who, while almost two decades younger, is very unlikely to be any better. Drapaty, who is treated with the usual kid gloves by Ukrainian and Western mainstream media, may or may not be an efficient commander. What is certain is that he first came to public attention in 2014, when his units brutally cracked down on resistance in the eastern Ukrainian city of Mariupol (before, as often forgotten, losing control of the city). Nothing in his career since then indicates a change of attitude. This is the man in charge of the whole Ukrainian military now.
Zelensky may well know that his own hype about the current air campaign turning the war around is propaganda. Yet clearly that does not mean that the Ukrainian leadership is willing to be serious about a negotiated solution. Emboldened by exceedingly rash Western support, Kiev has not yet given up on continuing a losing war, propped up by brutal forced mobilization, until an end that will be even more bitter than Ukraine’s current wretchedness.
Labour mayor candidate vows to push new nuclear with Burnham
News & Star, The Cumberland News, 21st July, By Gareth Cavanagh, Data Reporter
LABOUR’S mayoral candidate has pledged to work with new Prime Minister, Andy Burnham on delivering new nuclear in West Cumbria.
Speaking today, David Allen welcomed the appointment of Mr Burnham, as his party’s leader and Prime Minister.
Mr Allen, Police Fire and Crime Commissioner and a candidate in the Mayor of Cumbria election race, said that he was “delighted” to see Mr Burnham in 10 Downing Street.
Mr Allen said: “Andy has already signalled strong support for nuclear, so I’ll be working with him to help deliver new nuclear at Pioneer Park alongside Josh MacAlister MP.”………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… https://www.newsandstar.co.uk/news/26298408.labour-mayor-candidate-vows-push-new-nuclear-burnham/
Israel spent £50,000 lobbying Reform
Before deputy leader Richard Tice told MPs not to talk about Israeli influence
DANIA AKKAD, 30 June 2026, https://www.declassifieduk.org/israel-spent-50000-lobbying-reform/
Reform UK’s deputy leader said last week that a parliamentary debate into Israeli influence on British politics was “antisemitic in its very motivation and at its core”.
“As such, we should utterly reject it,” argued Richard Tice to a room full of MPs.
What he did not tell them, however, was that he had been on a trip to “the Gaza front line” last September funded by the newly-created Reform Friends of Israel, where he concluded that the Gaza famine was a “blatant lie”.
And that trip is not the only example of pro-Israel pressure groups working with Reform. Just a few short weeks after Tice’s visit, his chief of staff and a motley crew of Reform figures visited Israel in a trip which has received scant media attention.
Their six-day jaunt in November 2025 included a visit to the illegally occupied Golan Heights, which the UK recognises as part of Syria.
They also visited Israel’s police headquarters, which is overseen by far-right national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who is sanctioned by the UK for “repeated incitement of violence against Palestinian civilians”.
This trip was funded by the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, according to newly released Israeli government data seen by Declassified and found by Berlin-based journalist Yossi Bartel.
The records show that the ministry paid Conexión Israel – a company based in Jerusalem that organises high-level country visits – more than £50,000 to facilitate the delegation.
The delegates returned singing Israel’s praises and denouncing British protesters marching against the war in Gaza as antisemitic and “naively propping up a terrorist ideology”.
Dr David Bull, then Reform UK party chairman, said the trip had been “life changing”.
“I now understand the situation that Israel finds itself in and Reform UK will always stand with the Israeli people,” he said.
Andy Kalil, the member of the public who organised the petition that sparked last week’s debate in parliament, said the trip “goes to the heart of why we petitioned for an independent inquiry into pro-Israel influence in UK politics.”
“A trip funded by the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs that exposed participants to the Israeli government’s perspective is clearly a matter of public interest,” he told Declassified.
‘Their fight, our fight’
In addition to Bull, delegates included Lancashire county council leader Stephen Atkinson, London assembly member Alex Wilson, and Reform UK board member Gawain Towler.
Both Atkinson and Wilson declared that their place on the trip cost Israel’s foreign ministry £4,861 each.
Ryan Powell, Tice’s parliamentary chief of staff who recently ran unsuccessfully as a Reform UK candidate in south London, was also on the trip.
As was Rafaella Stefani, another member of Tice’s parliamentary staff. She helped host an event at Reform’s party conference where Israel’s deputy ambassador spoke.
The reason for the visit, according to the parliamentary staff register, was to study Israel’s policing, border security, health service and immigration control.
The group visited several locations targeted during the Hamas-led attacks on 7 October 2023, including the Nir Oz kibbutz in southern Israel and the site of the Nova music festival massacre.
“It sickens me that something like this could ever happen,” said Wilson, who posted a video from where the mass killing took place.
“It also sickens me that back in the UK, week after week, we’ve seen thousands of people marching to give succour to the monsters who did this.”
Bull wrote that the group also met with Tel Aviv’s deputy mayor to discuss “visa overstayers and asylum seekers” and the Israeli National Police operation headquarters “where the very advanced use of technology enables them to act on ALL CRIME”.
Towler questioned how the UK “once a steadfast ally, let relations with Israel collapse into this sorry mess”.
“After all, their fight is, in many ways, our fight. A fight for enlightenment ideals, international norms, democracy and the rest,” he wrote.
Rising power
The cost of the trip represents only a small fraction of an enormous influx of money flowing into Reform UK, particularly from a small group of overseas expats.
The party raised more than £9 million in donations in the first three months of 2026, far more than any other political party and nearly half of total donations raised by all the parties put together.
Most of the funding came from two crypto billionaires: Christopher Harborne, a British-Thai dual national, and Ben Delo, who is relocating to the UK from Hong Kong so he can keep donating to the party after new legislation capped overseas donations from British citizens to £100,000.
The party has also held international fundraisers in wealthy British expatriate communities including in the United Arab Emirates, and has said it will hold ones in Monaco and the US.
Chris Doyle, director of the Council for Arab-British Understanding (Caabu), said the trip was “very typical” of the Israeli government’s approach over decades.
With Reform leading in opinion polls, Israel has clearly assessed that the party “will have a high chance of either forming the next government, being part of that government in a coalition perhaps or being the lead opposition,” Doyle said.
It’s also very much in keeping with the Israeli strategy of reaching out to far-right groups across Europe, in the US and India which “have adopted highly anti-Muslim, Islamophobic positions”, he said.
“This is perfectly standard operating practice to reach out to such groups, build long-term links to try to get them to see the world as one between Israel as a representative of Western civilisation against barbaric Muslim extremists,” he said.
‘Greater scrutiny is needed’
Kalil said he found the strongly pro-Israel public statements from the delegation “very concerning”.
“Delegates were shown sites highlighting Israel’s security concerns, but not the devastation in Gaza. That’s not a balanced fact-finding visit,” he said.
On Monday, Kalil submitted a formal complaint about last week’s debate.
Among his primary concerns, he said in his complaint, was “the repeated characterisation of the petition, its signatories and several MPs who spoke in support of it as antisemitic.”
“The debate did little to address fundamental questions relating to lobbying, political donations, parliamentary visits, transparency or influence,” his complaint said.
“Instead, it demonstrated why many people believe greater scrutiny is necessary.”
He has asked that the government review whether it met the standards expected of such debates and for it to be rerun.
In addition to trips paid for directly by the Israeli government, British politicians including Tice have been taken to Israel by Reform Friends of Israel.
The group is led by Jason Pearlman, who until December was a media adviser to Israel’s president, Isaac Herzog.
Herzog has been found by a UN commission to have incited genocide in Gaza.
Speaking from Israel, he told Declassified that he started a conversation with Reform about turning the party’s ‘Friends of Israel’ group into a “full-time” organisation while he was still working for Herzog.
In addition to trips paid for directly by the Israeli government, British politicians including Tice have been taken to Israel by Reform Friends of Israel.
The group is led by Jason Pearlman, who until December was a media adviser to Israel’s president, Isaac Herzog.
Herzog has been found by a UN commission to have incited genocide in Gaza.
Speaking from Israel, he told Declassified that he started a conversation with Reform about turning the party’s ‘Friends of Israel’ group into a “full-time” organisation while he was still working for Herzog.
“We did have a dinner with Nigel [Farage] and some key backers,” he said. “We were able to put seed funding together.” Pearlman refused to say who Reform Friends of Israel’s (RFOI) donors were.
The Israeli embassy in London and Richard Tice have been approached.
The Fall of Israel’s Longest-Serving Leader: Is This the End for Netanyahu?
Aleena Im , July 20, 2026, https://journal-neo.su/2026/07/20/the-fall-of-israels-longest-serving-leader-is-this-the-end-for-netanyahu/
Israel may be witnessing the twilight of Netanyahu’s era as security failures, war fatigue, and the rise of the Yashar party erode his aura of indispensability. In geopolitics, leaders who build their legacy on security often fall when that very promise collapses.
In the world of geopolitics, even the strongest of leaders can be dethroned by just one crisis. For almost two decades, PM Netanyahu has held on as the leader of the Israelis. Considered to be the longest-serving prime minister of Israel, Netanyahu’s foreign policy revolves around security and regional monopoly. However, now in 2026, he is facing serious political backlash. It seems like his policies are now backfiring, and the situation is getting out of hand.
From domestic political circles to the international ones, hatred against Netanyahu has been increasing at an alarming rate. Whether it’s the October 7 attack or the recent war with Iran, Israel has been caught in a protracted conflict where it has become too costly to win the war. Is Israel witnessing the end of Netanyahu’s era, or is he preparing for a bigger comeback? The unfolding of Israel’s domestic circumstances would direct the ultimate result.
Israel’s Multi-Party System
There are various political factions in Israel, divided into right-wing, left-wing, and centre-wing parties. However, due to intense political fragmentation, no single party has ever been able to secure a majority in the Knesset. Therefore, coalition-based politics have become central to Israel’s domestic political structure. Bibi Netanyahu belongs to the right-wing political party named Likud, while the centrists include the alliance of opposition leaders Yair Lapid and Naftali Bennett. The leftist parties include Arab-Israeli factions, which never secured a majority.
The major reason why Netanyahu has remained in power for almost two decades is that he has mastered coalition politics and has made alliances with nationalist and religious parties. However, the same coalition-based politics that allowed Netanyahu to remain in power are now creating vulnerabilities for him. A new political party, ‘Yashar,’ has been established by the former IDF Chief Gadi Eisenkot. Although he belongs to the centrist faction, his popularity has seen a boom in recent months, even more than that of his predecessors, Lapid and Bennett. This ever-increasing political fragmentation would now decide the future trajectory of Israel’s foreign policy…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Conclusion
“The old order changeth, yielding place to new.” (Alfred, Lord Tennyson)
The upcoming elections in Israel would decide the fate of Netanyahu’s political career. However, one thing would be permanent: any future administration would continue to pursue the aims of dismantling Iran and its regional partners in one way or another. Their strategies and policies might be different, but their ultimate objective would be the same. The newly emerged Yashar party is gaining momentum at an alarming rate. Although Netanyahu remains the most influential political personality in Israel, the combination of security failures and political fragmentation has caused a serious dent to his indispensability. Whether he will survive this challenge or not remains uncertain. The fact is that, for the first time in years, Israel is seriously contemplating a future beyond Benjamin Netanyahu. https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2026/07/21/fatal-fallout/
Are Trump and AI driving a nuclear power boom?
July 20, 202 By Berly McCoy, Geoff Brumfiel, Regina G. Barber, Rebecca Ramirez, https://www.npr.org/2026/07/20/nx-s1-5884889/are-trump-and-ai-driving-a-nuclear-power-boom
A race started by President Trump is leading to the rapid construction of new, experimental nuclear reactors. If they work, they could power data centers for artificial intelligence. But critics worry that the breakneck pace is compromising safety and public trust. NPR correspondent Geoff Brumfiel talks about the potential risks and benefits, and whether this may lead to a new nuclear age.
Red, white and glowing blue: Trump’s push for new reactors reaches the finish line
June 29, 2026, Geoff Brumfiel, https://www.npr.org/2026/06/29/nx-s1-5847944/new-nuclear-reactors-america-250-safety-concerns
A little over a year ago, President Trump set an ambitious goal: He wanted to see American companies build at least three new experimental nuclear reactors by July 4, 2026, the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
Shortly after Trump signed an executive order enshrining his goal, the Department of Energy launched its Reactor Pilot Program. The program is designed to help companies build and run test reactors quickly, in part by radically cutting back on the regulations required for such reactors.
That program has sparked a nuclear race, and with less than a week to go, two companies have already reached the goal of switching on their reactor (“going critical” in nuclear-speak).
On June 4, Antares Nuclear announced it had gone critical, and Valar Atomics said it went critical on June 18 and is now producing tens of kilowatts of heat from its new reactor core, which is operating out of a tentlike structure in the Utah desert.
Other companies are getting close to making the deadline, and all this happened in less than the span of a year.
“We haven’t done anything this fast, basically ever,” said Nick Touran, chief nuclear officer at Ocean Atomics, which seeks to put nuclear power onto civilian ships. His company isn’t part of this program, but he has been tracking it closely.
He says this pilot program could jump-start America’s nuclear industry.
“I’m just excited that we’re now actually building these little reactors and trying it out and we’re going to look at what the economic story is and find out if there’s a market,” he said. “It’s going to be so much better than sitting there talking about it like we did for the last 40 years.”
But for others, the speed sparks alarm. The race is “essentially an exercise in public relations,” said Edwin Lyman, director of nuclear power safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists. And, he added, the slashing of regulations undoes decades of safety lessons learned in the nuclear industry.
“This is taking us back to the 1950s, and that is not progress,” he said.
Building the core
A lot of the action is happening at the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory, where several of the companies have set up shop. One of them is Radiant, which hopes to build small reactors for everything from disaster relief to data centers. Rita Baranwal, the firm’s chief nuclear officer, said they are assembling their reactor inside a special secure building called the DOME.
“By July 4, we’re tracking to get the reactor into DOME and to initiate the testing,” she told NPR this month.
Initiating testing isn’t quite the same as going critical, and Baranwal said Radiant probably won’t be critical by the July 4 deadline. But she does expect that Radiant’s reactor will be running soon. “The only thing we will not be doing at [Idaho National Laboratory] this summer is generating electricity,” she said.
Radiant’s reactor looks radically different from the massive reactors that exist today. It’s far smaller, and its nuclear fuel takes a different form. In a modern power reactor, nuclear fuel is loaded into long tubes, but Radiant’s reactor uses little nuclear fuel balls filled with grains of uranium. “Do you remember gobstoppers?” Baranwal said
These nuclear gobstoppers can operate at higher temperatures and are more resistant to melting down. Radiant and several other companies plan on using this type of fuel along with other tech to build a bunch of smaller, more mobile reactors.
“We have broken ground on our factory to mass-produce reactors. We’re targeting around 50 per year,” she said. (Currently, 96 reactors are operating in the United States.).
Safety worries
To get the reactors built this quickly comes at a cost. This year, NPR reported that the Energy Department completely rewrote its safety and security standards to make it easier for companies to win regulatory approval. The department has said that the cut regulations were “unnecessary” and that safety hasn’t been compromised.
The department consulted with the companies but not with the public. It also exempted the new reactors from environmental reviews.
And that has some skeptics of the program worried.
“Yes, of course, if you bend all the rules, you can do things quickly,” said Lyman, referring to the Energy Department’s decision to rewrite its rules for the program.
The test reactors might be working, he said, “but that should not be confused with anything related to a nuclear power reactor that’s capable of producing electricity in a stable and safe way.”
Lyman said he worries that deregulation will erode standards for things like how much security is required or how much environmental monitoring should be done, at a time when these mass-produced little reactors could start popping up at locations all over the country.
New energy policy for Burnham?
The soon to be UK Prime Minister, Andy Burnham, is being portrayed as a ‘new broom’ that could, or might, adopt better polices in all areas. Well, what about the energy sector? It’s in a mess, economically, driven by high fossil gas prices, with retail electricity prices at an all-time high, despite renewable energy doing well (65 GW so far) with its wholesale price mostly being low. It’s in a mess technologically, at risk of undermining the crucial next stage of its important renewables programme by diverting cash to support major high-cost nuclear and fossil carbon capture and storage projects.
Both of these programme involve multi-billion funding. The much delayed Hinkley Point nuclear plant may end up costing £40-50bn, inflation adjusted, when it finally gets completed, probably in 2030. Its follow-on project, Sizewell C, may not do much better, despite promises about learning from Hinkley, and despite the investment risks being met by a consumer levy. There are already construction issues. A late 2030s start up at best? By then we might also be seeing some outcomes from the very speculative funding for small modular reactors and even maybe some results from the even more speculative fusion funding, with £2.5bn set aside for it.
Is any of that good value for money? Will it deliver anything useful on time? On past performance, it’s very uncertain. Same for the £21.7 bn Carbon Capture and Storage programme, the full cost of which has been put at possibly up to £264bn by 2050. CCS is basically an attempt to allow us to keep burning fossil fuel. Is that sensible? Or for that matter the controversial Drax wood pellet combustion plant– it got £1bn in subsidies last year. Burning imported wood from forests does not seem to be a very sustainable option…
There are arguably so many more worthy projects, for example in green hydrogen production and storage, a vital new area for expansion. Heat storage linked to local heat networks too. To be fair, some of these ideas are now getting a bit of funding. For example, pioneering green hydrogen producer ITM Power has received £86.5 m from Great British Energy and DESNZ. It will be used to expand ITM’s electrolyser production at its Sheffield plant to 1GW p.a. But we need more like that for the rapid expansion of short and long duration storage. Freed from drain of endless nuclear and carbon capture diversions, we could also accelerate the newer renewables, like tidal stream turbines, via expansion of the Contacts for Difference (CfD) system. ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
What next? Hinkley Point C is about half-built, so a lot of capital has already been sunk in it, but there are yet more billions scheduled to be spent on it. Burnham is unlikely to be willing to halt it (he is, it seems, pro-nuclear) but he might be persuaded to ditch Sizewell C, work on which has hardly started.
And the big proposed CCS programme too, so as to release further billions. To soften the change of policy, he could keep some small projects going (an SMR perhaps, or a CCSU project) as ‘insurance’ options, much as some renewables were treated in the past (including, at one stage, offshore wind) when nuclear was seen as the main new UK energy option.
More or less everyone, except some deadhead Reform supporters, now see renewables as that. The only debate seems to be on what backup might be needed. Large inflexible nuclear plants are not much use at that, nor are costly CCS fossil gas plants, while SMRs are as yet uncertain in terms of cost and viability.
But we don’t need any of this to deal with variable renewables. Storage, large and small scale, is part of the answer, along with improved transmission and flexible demand management plus smart grid systems, so as to balance local variable demand and variable supply efficiently.
We have to build a new system and that will inevitably be costly, although, arguably, not as much as trying to keep the old system going with dubious supply choices and carbon fixes. For example, on the basis of its latest LCOE data, Lazard says ‘Despite rising and inflationary cost pressures across all generation technologies, renewables remain the most cost-competitive form of new-build generation on an unsubsidised basis’.
And economic cost is not the only issue. For example, if built, Sizewell C will produce around 40,000 kg of plutonium in its spent fuel over its 60-year lifespan. Plutonium has a half-life of around 25,000 years, with SMRs, if they ever work, also adding to the pile. Is that what we want to bequeath our far-off descendants? Along with other long-lived nuclear wastes?
That’s a big challenge. Andy Burnham has made some commitments on energy and climate, but only so far mostly in a limited and cautious way. Will he now come up with something more radical? We will have to wait to see. Meanwhile, the latest data show that over 70% of DESNEZ expenditure is now nuclear related…
https://renewextraweekly.blogspot.com/2026/07/new-energy-policy-for-burnham.html?m=1
JD Vance Says Israeli Officials Are Pressuring U.S. to Prolong Iran War
SCHEERPOST, July 16, 2026
Vice President JD Vance has made one of the most striking public acknowledgments yet of tensions between Washington and Israel over the future of the Iran conflict, claiming that members of the Israeli government are actively working to keep the United States engaged in an open-ended military campaign.
In an interview with podcaster Joe Rogan, Vance said he was “beyond a shadow of a doubt” certain that Israeli officials had attempted to shift U.S. policy away from negotiations and toward indefinite military action.
“There have been people within the Israeli government who are trying to shift us away from that policy because they want to continue the military campaign.”
Vance framed the dispute as one between competing national interests, saying that while Israeli officials naturally prioritize Israel, his responsibility is to pursue what he believes serves Americans.
“I care about America first.”
Claims of an Israeli Influence Campaign
Vance also alleged that individuals connected to Israel were attempting to manipulate American public opinion in favor of continuing the war.
According to Vance, some actors were:
Leaking information to reporters.- Coordinating attacks against him on social media.
- Opposing negotiations with Iran in favor of continued military operations.
He further claimed he had been falsely accused of acting on behalf of Qatar or taking direction from conservative commentator Tucker Carlson because of his position.
JD Vance on Israel, U.S. Policy, and the Iran War
Vance argued that he sees himself as occupying a moderate position in the debate over Israel within American politics………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
A Growing Divide Inside the Republican Coalition
The interview also highlighted a widening divide within the Republican movement over U.S. foreign policy.
While some Republicans continue advocating close military coordination with Israel, others—including Vance and several prominent “America First” figures—have increasingly argued against deeper U.S. involvement in another prolonged Middle East conflict.
The debate reflects broader disagreements over whether Washington should prioritize diplomacy, military escalation, or a more restrained foreign policy………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… https://scheerpost.com/2026/07/16/jd-vance-says-israeli-officials-are-pressuring-u-s-to-prolong-iran-war/
Hamas’s Governance Exit Exposes Israel’s Real Objectives
Abbas Hashemite, July 15, 2026, https://journal-neo.su/2026/07/15/hamass-governance-exit-exposes-israels-real-objectives/
Hamas’s decision to relinquish governance of the Gaza Strip appears to be derived from domestic and international strategic needs, and to further weaken the Israeli propaganda.
Hamas’s Administrative Withdrawal Amid Gaza’s Humanitarian Catastrophe
After ruling Gaza for around two decades, Hamas recently announced that it was prepared and willing to hand over the Strip’s governance to the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza, the technocratic administration set up under US President Donald Trump’s so-called Board of Peace. According to the spokesperson of Hamas, the decision was made to “remove any pretexts for the [Israeli] occupation.” Indeed, the Israeli genocide, war crimes, occupation, and war of extermination against the Palestinian people persist despite the ceasefire, which took effect in October 2025.
According to a UNOCHA report, “nearly all of Gaza’s current population of 2.1 million people has been displaced, lacking access to sufficient shelter, food, life-saving medical services, clean water, education, and livelihoods.” According to some reports, the IDF has butchered more than 80000 Palestinians from October 7, 2023, to January, 2025; the actual figure is estimated to be much higher, as many bodies are still buried under rubble. The Israeli Defense Forces have also committed many other war crimes, such as raping Palestinian women and intentionally bombing hospitals, mosques, churches, and educational institutions, along with targeting journalists and welfare workers.
There are several indications that the Zionist regime may resume its full-scale genocidal operations in Gaza, using the resistance group’s refusal to surrender its arms and weapons as a pretext. Nonetheless, it appears that the Western nations have put the onus of honoring the deal only on Hamas, and Tel Aviv enjoys the freedom to violate the ceasefire at its will. This is evident from the fact that the IDF continues to kill Palestinian civilians, including women and children, despite the ceasefire. Moreover, it continues to control around 70 percent of the Gaza Enclave.
Why Relinquishing Governance Is a Strategic Calculation, Not a Defeat
Considering these developments, Hamas, in a strategic move, has decided to dissolve the Government Emergency Committee in Gaza. However, considering it as a surrender or defeat would be erroneous. In the current regional and domestic scenario, this was the most accurate move that Hamas could make. Through this move, the resistance group has reaffirmed its commitment to implementing the ceasefire deal and fulfilling Hamas’s objectives.
Even after one of history’s most horrific wars, the Zionist occupational regime has failed to achieve its primary objective: eliminating Hamas. The resistance’s decision to relinquish Gaza’s administration allows Hamas to reorganize its operational and institutional structures, minimize its institutional exposure, and focus on its fundamental objective, the struggle of Palestinian national liberation from the Zionist occupation. The Israeli government has long leveraged on the political, geographical, and ideological division between the West Bank and Gaza. This move would end this leverage and allow the two sides to unite.
A New Test for Israel and International Mediators
Despite this decision, the new administration would not mean complete foreign control over the Strip or exclusion of native Palestinians from politics, as Gaza belongs to its native population, not to any foreign-backed administration. Therefore, the most crucial challenge for the Western mediators will be to rebuild a representative and deeply rooted Palestinian leadership capable of raising the genuine concerns of the native people in the West Bank and Gaza. Otherwise, this new administrative structure will lose its credibility and domestic acceptance.
Another significant point to understand is that resisting and governing are two distinct functions. Therefore, this move must not be mistaken for a withdrawal from resistance. Hamas took this decision to advance its broader strategic objectives. For years, the Zionist regime of Israel has justified its war crimes, genocidal operations, and blockade of the Strip under the pretext of Hamas’s so-called threatening presence for the state.
After the resistance group’s complete compliance with the terms of the ceasefire and its announcement to transfer the administration of the Strip, the Zionist regime now seeks to hinder the implementation of the deal and hamper the National Committee from assuming the administrative responsibilities, to amplify the sufferings of the Palestinian people. This further exposes the propaganda of the Israeli government. It demonstrates that the actual ambition of the occupational regime was never to eliminate Hamas from the government; it was to deprive the Palestinians of their fundamental rights and resistance.
According to the Israeli government, the objective of this recent war was to end Hamas’s government in Gaza. After the recent decision by Hamas, the Israeli government has no reason left to blockade or bomb the Strip. Through this strategic move, Hamas is now confronting all the mediators and actors with their responsibilities. Moreover, this decision has further increased complications for the Zionist regime to legitimize its military aggression and genocidal operations in Gaza. It has been revealed once again that Hamas’s government was never the actual problem, but the refusal of the Palestinians to submit to the Israeli occupation. Through this decision, Hamas has not only gained strategic leverage but also achieved an opportunity to reorganize and restructure itself.
Аbbas Hashemite is a political observer and research analyst for regional and global geopolitical issues. He is currently working as an independent researcher and journalist
‘Seismic Shift’ as Over 100 House Democrats Vote to Cut Off US Military Aid to Israel
“This should be a blaring wake-up call for Democratic leaders,” said one campaigner. “The political tide is clearly turning against unconditional US military support for Israel.”
SCHEERPOST, Brett Wilkins Common Dreams, July 16, 2026
Nearly half of all Democrats in the House of Representatives voted Wednesday to cut off US military aid to Israel, a move that underscored a dramatic shift away from the US support the Mideast ally has enjoyed for nearly 60 years.
While House lawmakers ultimately rejected Rep. Thomas Massie’s (R-Ky.) amendment to a national security spending bill that would have eliminated the $3.3 billion in annual foreign military financing provided to Israel’s military, the details of the vote were viewed as an encouraging sign by defenders of Palestine and the rule of law.
Massie and 103 Democrats voted for the measure, while 215 Republicans and 98 Democrats rejected it. The overall tally was 104 for, 314 against, and 10 “present” votes, with 9 absences.
“I cannot vote for aid to a country that committed genocide and has used tax dollars to detain Americans like me,” Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) said ahead of the vote, referring to an incident in which heavily armed residents of an Israeli settler colony stopped and surrounded him last week in the illegally occupied West Bank of Palestine.
Speaking to reporters after the vote, Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Greg Casar (D-Texas)—who had urged colleagues to support Massie’s amendment—noted, “It used to be that just a small number of House Democrats would vote against sending taxpayer dollars to weapons for the Israeli military.”
“Today, over 100 House Democrats voted for a measure to block billions of dollars in weapons to [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu,” he continued. “That is enormous progress. That is a victory for our movement, for security, peace, and justice for all people.”
The vote, Casar said, “sasends a strong message to Netanyahu that the days are over of an unaccountable blank check to his wars and his war crimes, at least from the Democratic Party.”……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. https://scheerpost.com/2026/07/16/seismic-shift-as-over-100-house-democrats-vote-to-cut-off-us-military-aid-to-israel/
Liberals Have Relaxed About Trump Because They Trust Him To Keep The Wars Going
Caitlin Johnstone, Jul 16, 2026, https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/liberals-have-relaxed-about-trump?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=207158487&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
Have you noticed how the liberal establishment hasn’t been nearly as emotional and outraged about Trump’s second term as they were about his first? Now that he’s the president who bombed Iran, the entire western political/media class is cool with him.
The term “Trump Derangement Syndrome” has always been used by the MAGA crowd as a blanket pejorative to protect the president from criticism, but during Trump’s first term it wasn’t entirely unfair. You’d see Democrats shrieking their lungs out over Trump doing things that other US presidents did all the time like cozying up with dictators and tyrants. They’d lose their minds over relatively sane things like Trump talking about moving troops out of Syria. The whole Russiagate thing was liberals going bat shit over a crazy conspiracy theory that caused them to push for the escalations against Russia which ultimately gave rise to the war in Ukraine.
We’re not seeing any of that in Trump’s second term. That extra layer of screeching emotionality simply isn’t there. There are no Russiagates or emotional support Maddows this time around. Democrats hate Trump, but they hate him about as much as they’d hate any Republican president. The emotional response to his second presidency is wildly, wildly different from the first.
Which is nuts, because he’s quantifiably far worse this time around. His domestic policies are much more tyrannical. He’s as evil a warmonger as the White House has ever seen. He’s so corrupt that he’s just openly admitting to being bought and owned by Zionist oligarchs while making his family a fortune using the power of his office. Now that he doesn’t have to worry about re-election, he’s being completely nakedly monstrous.
And what’s creepy is that’s why the liberal establishment is so much more mellow about him. They’re no longer worried that he’s going to promote “isolationist” foreign policy and roll back the US war machine. He went to war with Iran, so they like him now. Because they know he’s fully compliant.
I’ve had many a Trump supporter tell me that all the anti-Trump vitriol we saw from the imperial political/media class was evidence that he really was fighting the Deep State and draining the swamp, but that was never what was actually happening. As I have been arguing since Trump’s first term, the oligarchs and empire managers never opposed Trump because they believed he was opposed to them. Rather, they simply viewed him as a poor steward of the empire. They didn’t trust him to keep the imperial gears turning in the way they must turn to maintain the status quo.
Clearly that has changed. They trust him now. They know he will keep the bombs dropping, keep the capitalism chugging along, and keep the power centers where they are.
They view him as one of their own now. When he finally dies, he will be lovingly eulogized by all the same liberal institutions which called him a second Hitler during his first term. He did enough to reassure them that the presidency of the United States had not been accidentally awarded to a decent human being.
‘Extreme risk’: AUKUS warnings as Garrett’s inquiry docks in Adelaide
“Extreme” economic risk and nuclear waste disposal concerns for the $368 billion AUKUS submarine project are being heard at an independent inquiry in Adelaide today.
The risk associated with the Federal Government’s $368 billion AUKUS nuclear submarine project are being criticised by former federal senator and self-described ‘transparency warrior’ Rex Patrick this morning at an independent inquiry held in Adelaide today.
And transparency warnings were raised over the government’s plans for nuclear waste from submarines built at Osborne in South Australia, Patrick saying he was fighting in the Federal Court for information to be made public.
Meanwhile, former South Australian Liberal MP Christopher Pyne, who was Minister for Defence from 2018 until his retirement in 2019, said he “thought twice about appearing” at the inquiry led by famed Australian musician and former federal Environment Minister Peter Garrett.
Pyne said he bit the bullet because he believed in the “battle of ideas”.
The independent inquiry into the defence agreement between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States was established earlier this year to scrutinise the deal.
It is being led by former Labor MP and Midnight Oil front man Peter Garrett, with public hearings taking place across the country, including in Adelaide today and tomorrow.
Other commissioners included First Nations leader Karina Lester, former West Australian Premier Carmen Lawrence, former Chief of the Australian Defence Force Chris Barrie and co-CEO of the Australia Institute Leanne Minshull. A final report was expected on October 30.
“Adelaide is at the epicentre of the AUKUS project,” Garrett told reporters at a press conference before the inquiry started.
“Whether it’s questions on the safe, long-term storage of radioactive waste, whether it’s the impact on communities in Adelaide and around Osborne, whether it’s the question of opportunity cost for the Adelaide economy.
“It is a matter of some regret that the AUKUS decision – the biggest-ever decision by any Australian government to spend public money on submarines, some not even built – was made with minimal public debate.”
The inquiry has been supported by trade unions and non-profit organisations to address questions over whether risks – economic and political – were being managed appropriately, Patrick telling the inquiry the country was taking on a “hugely risky program”.
“From an absolute cost perspective, it is unaffordable and it is bankrupting,” he said.
“There’s also an opportunity cost. You know – $360 billion – if you think about what you can spend with that amount of money… we wouldn’t be worrying about fuel security, we wouldn’t be worrying about industrial resilience.”
He added that nuclear waste storage was “a problem that needs to be solved”, noting he was fighting in the Federal Court for the release of documents around where the government was planning to store waste from the nuclear submarines.
“I’m not asking for the release of documents that relate to how fast a submarine might go, how many weapons it might have… I’m asking for information that is incidental to this project but really important to it: Where are you going to put the waste associated with this?” Patrick said.
Pyne gave evidence ahead of Patrick, and emphasised the importance of the AUKUS project in terms of national defence against China, saying the uplift in defence capability would be imperative “if we find ourselves on our own in the worst case scenario”.
He described AUKUS as “unstoppable” and said it would deliver a permanent boost for defence spending, an upgrade to Australia’s bases and facilities, an investment in STEM and trade skills, and would be a permanent change to Australia’s national security.
The inquiry was set to continue until this evening, with other speakers including anti-nuclear campaigner David Noonan and SA Greens MLC Melanie Selwood.
The Greens today released new findings from a survey of 343 South Australians, showing 83.7 per cent of respondents were “mostly concerned” about AUKUS.
Seventy-one per cent said AUKUS would make Australia less secure, and 74.5 per cent said they did not see “clear benefits” from the defence pact.
AUKUS was set to be a boon for the South Australian economy and jobs creation, with the nuclear submarine shipbuilding yard set to be constructed at Osborne at a cost of at least $30 billion.
Both the state and federal governments said they hoped the project would create 10,000 jobs in design and construction as well as up to 1000 apprentices per year at an on-site training facility, with the first newly built submarines expected to be delivered to the Australian Navy in the 2040s.
Enough steel to make 17 Eiffel Towers as well as 710,000 cubic metres of structural concrete will be used in the construction of the 420-metre-long fabrication hall.
However it has already weathered several hiccups.
In June, Federal Defence Minister Richard Marles announced Australia would only buy three second-hand nuclear-powered submarines instead of the promised mix of new and used US vessels.
This plan was expected to happen before Australia eventually built its own submarines using US nuclear-propulsion technology and parts made in Britain.
The second-hand subs announcement comes after the US has struggled to make enough Virginia-class submarines for its own use, leading some American lawmakers to question how it could also build enough of the boats to meet Australia’s needs.
Australia faces a critical window to receive the submarines before its existing, 1980s-designed Collins-class vessels are retired from service.
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