Fascist Israeli minister Smotrich calls Gaza genocide a “real estate bonanza”
Oops, your real motives are showing
by Skwawkbox, 19 September 2025, https://www.thecanary.co/skwawkbox/2025/09/19/smotrich-gaza/
“We paid a lot of money for the war, so we need to decide how to divide the percentages of the land” – these are the words of self-described ‘fascist and homophobe’ Israeli finance minister Bezalel Smotrich as he discussed how Israel and the US plan to divide up Gaza between themselves this week.
“We paid a lot of money for the war, so we need to decide how to divide the percentages of the land” – these are the words of self-described ‘fascist and homophobe’ Israeli finance minister Bezalel Smotrich as he discussed how Israel and the US plan to divide up Gaza between themselves this week.
Smotrich: Gaza is a ‘real estate bonanza’
Speaking in Hebrew at a property conference, Smotrich added:
The Gaza Strip is becoming a real estate bonanza.
The Israeli and Trump regimes – to be more accurate the Israeli-Trump regime – have long been discussing the US ‘Trump-Gaza plan’ to turn Gaza, after the extermination or expulsion of its rightful Palestinian owners, into a beach-front resort money-making project, a plan even accompanied by a deranged AI video posted by Trump to his social media.
We paid a lot of money for the war, so we need to decide how to divide the percentages of the land in Gaza. The demolition phase is always the first phase of urban renewal. We did that, now we need to start building.
Trump’s plan was first developed for him by the same people who came up with the so-called ‘Gaza Humanitarian Foundation’ whose ‘aid’ stations have killed more than 2,000 desperate refugees seeking food and wounded more than 15,000 – a group of Israeli business people.
BCG, the consulting firm who financialised the plan, calculated that it would return to its backers four times the initial investment of $100 billion, according to the plan. The firm has since tried to distance itself from the plan, claiming to have sacked all the partners who approved it.
Smotrich should be in the Hague. No ifs, no buts.
They Said The Massacres Would Stop When The Hostages Were Released. They Haven’t Stopped.
Caitlin Johnstone, Oct 18, 2025,https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/they-said-the-massacres-would-stop?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=176485051&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
Last year I banged out an angry rant about the way Israel supporters would yell “release the hostages!” at anyone who talked about the latest massacre of Palestinian civilians, saying Hamas was to blame for the killing because of their refusal to release the Israeli captives, and that it would all stop once the hostages are free. I’m remembering that essay today because the hostages are free, but the massacres are continuing.
On Friday Israel reportedly blew up a vehicle carrying a Palestinian family of eleven people, including seven children. The IDF gave its usual excuse for the massacre: the civilians were deemed to have crossed an invisible line into a forbidden zone which made the Israeli soldiers feel unsafe. They did this exact same thing constantly during the last “ceasefire” as well.
In my polemic last year I argued that the slaughter we were seeing in Gaza plainly had nothing to do with pushing for the release of Israeli hostages, and that even if it did it would still be barbaric to massacre children until your enemies caved in to your demands.
But two years of genocide have made it clear that the Israeli military was never killing Palestinian civilians in order to push for the release of hostages or force Hamas to cave in to their demands. The Israeli military kills Palestinian civilians in order to kill Palestinian civilians. The killing is the goal, and it always has been.
We see this illustrated over and over again, in all sorts of ways. Israel apologists always argued that the only reason the IDF had destroyed Gaza’s healthcare system with nonstop hospital attacks was because Hamas was using those hospitals as secret military bases. But then multiple independent reports from western doctors in Gaza confirmed that Israeli forces had been entering the hospitals after attacking them and systematically destroying individual pieces of medical equipment one by one in order to make them unusable. Hamas wasn’t the target in those hospital attacks, the hospitals themselves were the target.
And now we are seeing the “Israel is killing people because Hamas has Israeli hostages” narrative debunked in exactly the same way the “Israel keeps bombing hospitals because there are Hamas bases in all of them” narrative was. The hostages are free, but the massacres continue.
None of which will surprise anyone who was paying attention these last two years. Israel’s genocidal intent has been on full display every minute of every day, and it continues to be even during this joke of a “ceasefire” where the genocide was theoretically supposed to be on pause for a little while.
Trump downplays hopes he will supply Ukraine with US missiles after meeting with Zelenskyy
US president seemed more intent on brokering a peace deal after surprise phone call with Putin earlier in day
Pjotr Sauer Russian affairs reporter and Andrew Roth in Washington,Sat 18 Oct 2025
Donald Trump seemed more intent on brokering a peace deal than he was to supply Ukraine with Tomahawk cruise missiles during a White House meeting with Volodymyr Zelenskyy, saying that the US may need them for a future conflict.
While Trump did not rule out providing the long-range missiles Zelenskyy seeks, Trump appeared cool to the prospect as he looked ahead to a meeting with Vladimir Putin in Hungary in the coming weeks.
After speaking with Zelenskyy for more than two hours, Trump implored both Ukraine and Russia to “stop the war immediately”, even if it means Ukraine conceding territory.
“You stop at the battle line, and both sides should go home, go to their families,” Trump told reporters on his way to his home in West Palm Beach, Florida. “Stop the killing. And that should be it. Stop right now at the battle line. I told that to President Zelenskyy. I told it to President Putin.”
The Ukrainian leader was frank, telling Trump that Ukraine has thousands of drones ready for an offensive against Russian targets, but needs American missiles.
“We don’t have Tomahawks, that’s why we need Tomahawks,” he said.
Trump responded: “We’d much rather have them not need Tomahawks.”
Later, Trump reiterated that he wants the United States to hold on to its weaponry. “We want Tomahawks, also. We don’t want to be giving away things that we need to protect our country,” he said.
Trump’s doubtful tone on the cruise missiles follows a surprise phone call with Vladimir Putin on Friday during which the Russian leader told Trump that supplying the Tomahawks would damage US-Russian relations.
His position on supplying Ukraine with weapons has changed a number of times since he returned to office in January, often after negotiations with Putin or European backers of Ukraine.
During the White House meeting with Zelenskyy, Trump also discussed plans to hold a bilateral meeting with Putin in Hungary, saying it was “to be determined” whether Zelenskyy would join but that he would inform him of the discussions.
“There is a lot of bad blood,” Trump said.
After the talks on Friday, the US president issued a stern call to both sides on social media to “stop the killing, and make a DEAL!”.
“They should stop where they are. Let both claim Victory, let History decide!” Trump posted on Truth Social.
Zelenskyy told reporters he did not want to talk about long-range missiles, saying the US did not want escalation, and he was “realistic” about his chance of getting them.
The Ukrainian president, who spoke by phone with European leaders after the meeting, said he was counting on Trump to pressure Putin “to stop this war”.
The Kremlin’s top aide, Yuri Ushakov, earlier said Putin had initiated Thursday’s conversation with Trump, during which the Russian leader urged his US counterpart not to supply Ukraine with the Tomahawks.
“I did actually say: ‘Would you mind if I gave a couple of thousand Tomahawks to your opposition?’ I did say that to him. I said it just that way,” Trump said, recounting the conversation.
“He didn’t like the idea. You have to be a little bit lighthearted sometimes.”
Ushakov told reporters in Moscow that Putin warned Trump during the call that supplying Kyiv with Tomahawks “won’t change the situation on the battlefield, but would cause substantial damage to the relationship between our countries”.
It was the eighth known call between the two men since Trump began his second term in January, and followed a familiar pattern in the complex and often confusing contest between Putin and Zelenskyy for Trump’s ear.
On previous occasions, when Trump had seemed ready to tilt towards Kyiv and its European allies, a call from Putin was often followed by a sudden softening in the US leader’s tone towards Moscow.
A flurry of activity was also set off with Trump’s announcement after the call that he was planning to meet the Russian president in the Hungarian capital on a date still to be determined, in an effort to end the war.
Putin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, on Friday morning said that the summit could take place “within two weeks or later”.
Peskov said Putin had already discussed the planned meeting with Viktor Orbán, the Hungarian prime minister. Orbán – an outlier among European leaders with warm ties to Trump and Putin – said he had also spoken to Trump about the summit, writing on X: “Preparations for the USA-Russia peace summit are under way.”
It remains unclear how Putin would travel to Hungary, given EU sanctions and airspace restrictions imposed after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, as well as the fact that he is wanted by the international criminal court (ICC). As a signatory to the ICC, Hungary would be obliged to arrest him, though Orbán has previously said this would not happen.
When asked about the logistical challenges, Peskov said the route was “so far, of course, unclear”.
Hungary’s foreign minister, Péter Szijjártó, said on Friday that Putin would be able to enter and leave the country. “There is no need for any kind of consultation with anyone, we are a sovereign country here. We will receive [Putin] with respect, host him and provide the conditions for him to negotiate with the American president,” he told a press briefing.
Trump and Putin last met in Alaska in August, which did not produce a diplomatic breakthrough. Trump added that fresh high-level talks between Washington and Moscow would be held next week, led on the US side by the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, before a presidential summit in Budapest.
The latest conversation, which lasted more than two and a half hours, appears to have sapped the momentum Zelenskyy had built with Trump, with the US leader now unlikely to show significant support for Ukraine before meeting Putin.
“Zelenskyy must be pulling his hair out. Today’s meeting with Trump is now completely overshadowed and overtaken by the Budapest meeting,” said John Foreman, a former British defence attache to Moscow and Kyiv.
Trump also has hinted that talks between Putin and Zelenskyy may need to take place indirectly, contradicting Zelenskyy’s longstanding aim of meeting Putin face to face to end the war.
“They don’t get along too well, those two,” Trump said. “So we may do something where we’re separate. Separate but equal.”
Zelenskyy, who touched down in Washington on Thursday and met US defence contractors before his White House visit, has not commented on the Putin-Trump call, though few in Kyiv are likely to view it positively.
Some Ukrainian officials tried to put a positive spin on the call, saying that Putin’s outreach underscored the Russian leader’s fear of new Ukrainian weapon supplies………….https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/oct/17/trump-putin-phone-call-sinks-kyiv-ukraine-hopes-for-us-tomahawk-missiles
Trump to Zelensky…’I haven’t got a weapon to spare’
Walt Zlotow, West Suburban Peace Coalition, Glen Ellyn IL, 17 Oct 25
Ukraine President Zelensky arrives at the White House Friday to once again beg President Trump for US weapons which will do nothing to prevent his impending defeat to Russia’s overwhelming military forces.
Because Trump knows the war is lost, he will give Zelensky what he’s given him all year…nothing. While President Biden gave Zelensky over $170 billion in military aid during Biden’s last 3 years in office, Trump will only sell US weapons to European NATO countries to gift Zelensky’s lost cause. But while the US has the wherewithal to fund Ukraine till their inevitable collapse, Europe does not.
NATO country leaders tried to fill the US void in the first 6 months of 2025 with an average of $3.8 billion in military aid. But that self-destructive policy has degraded their economies, tanked their polling, making right wing nationalist parties more popular than the interventionist incumbents. Beginning in July even diehards like UK’s Starmer, France’s Macron and Germany’ Merz have cut back on Ukraine’s lost cause. Total European military aid dropped to just $1.7 billion monthly for July and August with no possibility of heading north.
Trump must tell Zelensky Friday that with no cards to play he should capitulate to Russia’s very reasonable and non-negotiable peace demands. No NATO for Ukraine, neutrality between Western Europe and Russia going forward, and no return of lost territory.
Ukraine’s military will collapse on Trump’s watch. He’s correctly blaming America’s failed proxy war against Russia on predecessor Biden who made the Russian invasion of February 2022 inevitable. He’s also blaming Europe for not buying enough US weapons to keep Ukraine fighting.
Trump has plenty of weapons in his trillion dollar war warehouse. But he blew over $20 billion on weapons to enable Israel’s genocide in Gaza, and another $10 billion for related Israeli wars against Yemen and Iran. Now he’s ramping up weaponry to take out his Venezuelan bête noir Nicholas Maduro.
So many wars to gobble up Trump’s war weaponry is why he’ll tell Zelensky Friday…‘I haven’t got a weapon to spare.’
Trump Says He’s Mulling Land Strikes On Venezuela, Confirms CIA Covert Ops
Zero Hedge, by Tyler Durden, Friday, Oct 17, 2025 –
President Trump later in the day Wednesday verbalized that he’s mulling a land operation or strikes in Venezuela following a New York Times report that same day which said he had authorized CIA covert operations targeting the Maduro government.
“We are certainly looking at land now because we’ve got the sea under control. We’ve had a couple of days now where there isn’t a boat to be found,” Trump told reporters inside the Oval Office when asked about the issue. Below is direct confirmation from the Commander-in-Chief:
“I authorized for two reasons, really. No. 1, they have emptied their prisons into the United States of America, they came in through the border,” Trump said. “A lot of drugs coming in from Venezuela, and a lot of drugs come in through the sea.”
“But we’re going to stop them by land also,” he added. The NYT report had made clear that the end goal would be overthrowing socialist strongman Nicolas Maduro.
We should note that by this logic, the United States would be justified in invading Mexico and waging war against other regional countries as well.
Congress has been missing in action and US Presidents have long pursued regime change in countries the US deems ‘enemies’ with or without the consent of the American people or its representatives…………………………………… https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/trump-says-hes-mulling-land-strikes-venezuela-confirms-cia-covert-ops
Israel Tortured And Sexually Humiliated Greta Thunberg.
Caitlin Johnstone, Oct 16, 2025, https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/israel-tortured-and-sexually-humiliated?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=176291910&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
In an interview with Swedish paper Aftonbladet, Greta Thunberg has corroborated earlier eyewitness reports that she and her fellow Global Sumud Flotilla activists were subjected to monstrous abuses by Israeli officials after being abducted from their boats carrying aid for Palestinians in Gaza.
Here are some excerpts (quotes from Thunberg are italicized, quotes from Aftonbladet are in bold):
“They grab me, pull me to the ground, and throw an Israeli flag over me.”
“They dragged me to the opposite side from where the others were sitting, and I had the flag around me the whole time. They hit and kicked me.”
“They moved me very brutally to a corner that I was turned towards. ‘A special place for a special lady’, they said. And then they had learned ‘Lilla hora’ (Little whore) and ‘Hora Greta’ (Whore Greta) in Swedish, which they repeated all the time.”
In the corner where Greta was sitting, the police placed a flag. “The flag was placed so that it would touch me. When it fluttered and touched me, they shouted ‘Don’t touch the flag’ and kicked me in the side. After a while, my hands were tied with cable ties, very tightly. A bunch of guards lined up to take selfies with me while I was sitting like that.”
“They were thrown to the ground and beaten. But I could only see it out of the corner of my eye, because every time I lifted my head from the ground, I was kicked by the guard standing next to me.”
Greta was then taken into a building to be searched and undressed. “The guards have no empathy or humanity, and they keep taking selfies with me. There’s a lot I don’t remember. So much is happening at once. You’re in shock. You’re in pain, but you go into a state of trying to stay calm.”
Outside, she was forced to take off her clothes again, she says. “It was mockery, rough handling, and everything was filmed. Everything they do is extremely violent.”
“It was so hot, like 40 degrees. We begged the whole time: Can we have water? Can we have water? In the end, we screamed. The guards walked in front of the bars the whole time, laughing and holding up their water bottles. They threw the bottles with water in them into the trash cans in front of us.”
“When people fainted, we banged on the cages and asked for a doctor. Then the guards came and said, ‘We’re going to gas you.’ It was standard for them to say that.”
“This shows that if Israel, with the whole world watching, can treat a well-known, white person with a Swedish passport this way, just imagine what they do to Palestinians behind closed doors.”
Thunberg told Aftonbladet that the Swedish government greatly downplayed the abuse she and her fellow Sumud Flotilla activists suffered, and wouldn’t even bring them water:
“We were together and told them about the treatment we received. About the lack of food, water, about the abuse. The torture. We showed them the physical injuries we had — bruises and scratches. We gave them all our contact details — I gave them my father’s number and the number of our contact in the organization. We were clear: everything we say now must be released to the media.”
“They didn’t do anything, they just said: ’Our job is to listen to you. We are here and you are entitled to consular support.’”
“We said over and over again: we need water. And they saw that the guards had water bottles. The embassy staff said: ’We’ll make a note of that.’ One of us, Vincent, said: ’Next time we meet you, you must bring water.’”
Then it took two days before the embassy staff showed up again.
“They didn’t bring any water, except for a small bottle of their own that was half empty. Vincent, who was in the worst shape, got to drink it. We kept asking the guards, ‘Can we have some water?’ but they just walked around with their water bottles and didn’t answer.”
“I said, ‘Are you going to leave us like this? If you leave now, they will beat us up.’ But they just kept walking.”
When Aftonbladet compares emails sent by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to relatives, with what the captives describe telling embassy staff, it becomes clear that the seriousness of the situation has been downplayed.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs describes the scene at the port, where Greta Thunberg was beaten for hours, as follows: “She told us about harsh treatment and that she had been sitting on a hard surface for a long time.”
On Saturday, several media outlets published testimonies that Greta had been subjected to torture.
Aftonbladet has spoken to three other members of the flotilla who largely confirm what Greta Thunberg says and who have all experienced various types of abuse and humiliation. We have also spoken to relatives. Everyone is highly critical of how the Swedish embassy staff acted.
Thunberg’s statements are not just in alignment with eyewitnesses who said these things were done to her, but with statements from the Israeli government itself.
Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said last month that Sumud activists must be treated as terrorists in order to “create a clear deterrent” from future flotilla activism, declaring that “Anyone who chooses to collaborate with Hamas and support terrorism will meet a firm and unyielding response from Israel.”
“We will not allow individuals who support terrorism to live in comfort. They will face the full consequences of their actions,” Ben-Gvir said at the time.
After the flotilla activists were abducted by the IDF, Ben-Gvir filmed himself taunting them and calling them “terrorists” and said he “was proud that we treat ‘flotilla activists’ as terror supporters.”
Israel, needless to say, has an extensively documented record of torturing and raping individuals who’ve been given the “terrorist” label by the regime.
So what Thunberg is describing would be Israel doing what it said it was going to do in order to send a message and deter future efforts to feed starving Palestinians — perhaps singling out the most high-profile activist on the flotilla for special abuse in order to really drive the point home.
Israel is so evil it’s actually hard to wrap your mind around it.
Trump’s military escalation against Venezuela repeats the Iraq War blueprint
With the suspension of dialogue between the US and Venezuela, the sighting of US B-52 bombers in Venezuelan airspace, and the further lethal US strikes in the Caribbean, the US seems to be accelerating its drive towards war with Venezuela
Peoples Dispatch October 15, 2025 by Manolo De Los Santos
The mood in the Caribbean grows increasingly tense, as the United States intensifies its military threats. Beneath the deceptive shroud of the “war on drugs,” the United States is actively executing a blueprint for military intervention in Venezuela, employing lethal force and projecting power in a manner that legal institutions and regional leaders have condemned as a profound threat to international order. This aggression is not a law enforcement operation; it is the negation of law, a neocolonial revival of the Monroe Doctrine, designed to shatter the sovereignty of Venezuela, seize control of the world’s largest oil reserves, and install a compliant regime.
A license to kill: the precedent of state murder
A chilling adoption of extrajudicial violence has marked the current escalation. The Trump administration has ordered unilateral military strikes against private vessels near the Venezuelan coast, allegedly to stop drug trafficking. To launch these alarming attacks, the US military has deployed a massive naval force of warships, drones, and special operations forces.
These strikes have resulted in the summary execution of at least 27 people as of recent reports. The most recent lethal strike in the Caribbean resulted in the “elimination” of 6 more people. This is not law enforcement; it is extrajudicial murder and a campaign that now stands as part of a war plan against Venezuela. The administration has characterized the victims, without credible proof, as drug traffickers and “terrorists,” a claim that, even if true, provides no legal authority for the US president to execute whomever it decides.
Legal and human rights organizations have been unequivocal in their condemnation of this profound and dangerous policy, which replaces established law enforcement procedures with premeditated lethal force. The New York City Bar Association (NYCBA), a key voice on international legal ethics, has strongly denounced these actions. The NYCBA stated explicitly that “Because the recent attacks on Venezuelan vessels and their crews were unauthorized by US law and in violation of binding international law, they were illegal summary executions – murders.” They further argued that these actions violate the fundamental international principle that “No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his life” under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
The US government possesses ample legal authority for the Coast Guard to interdict and search vessels suspected of carrying narcotics, followed by prosecution in US courts according to due process requirements. However, in the case of the Venezuelan vessels, the Coast Guard’s Congressionally authorized police function was bypassed; instead, the crews were simply targeted and executed by overwhelming military force. Regional leaders, including Colombian President Gustavo Petro, have condemned the extrajudicial killings, highlighting the profound anxiety across Latin America over a return to unilateral US military action under the cover of anti-narcotics policy.
Escalation: B-52s and the threat of war
Beyond the lethal strikes, the US government has engaged in significant military posturing that amounts to a direct challenge to Venezuelan sovereignty. The sighting of US B-52 bombers in Venezuelan airspace, flying in close range, is a significant escalation. This warmongering has nothing to do with the “war on drugs” and everything to do with regime change to plunder Venezuela’s oil. This reckless push for war is a criminal act of international aggression.
The Trump Administration’s unilateral drone strikes in the Caribbean, combined with the White House’s termination of all negotiations with Venezuela, appear as a precursor for a full-scale regime change operation. This is a critical moment. We must sound the alarm: there is a risk of a new, catastrophic conflict in the region.
The US government’s own officials continue to escalate the crisis with bellicose rhetoric and actions. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a key architect of the regime-change policy, has consistently refused to rule out a military option, asserting that the Maduro regime has become a “threat to the region and even to the United States.”
Venezuela’s response has been one of principled defense of its sovereignty. Ambassador to the UN, Samuel Moncada has repeatedly sounded the alarm on the global stage, arguing that the US military deployment in the Caribbean is a massive propaganda operation that seeks “excuses to fabricate a conflict” to seize the country’s oil wealth. Moncada affirmed that, “The United States believes that the Caribbean belongs to it because it has been using the expansionist Monroe Doctrine for over 100 years, which is nothing more than a remnant of colonialism.”
President Nicolás Maduro has called on Washington to resume dialogue, stating, “Our diplomacy isn’t the diplomacy of cannons, of threats, because the world cannot be the world of 100 years ago,” while simultaneously mobilizing national defense exercises to ensure the country is prepared for any direct assault. The NYCBA warned that attacks against Venezuelan vessels and reported threats against the Venezuelan government violate the nation’s obligations under the United Nations Charter, with the risk of escalating to open hostilities.
Parallels with the Iraq War: oil, ideology, and deception
The current situation is chillingly reminiscent of the lead-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. In that case, the Bush administration justified unilateral action on the basis of “weapons of mass destruction,” but this was a pretext. The true objectives were not limited to oil, but also included achieving profound ideological and political goals – overthrowing a government to reshape Middle Eastern politics and assert dominance………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..https://peoplesdispatch.org/2025/10/15/trumps-military-escalation-against-venezuela-repeats-the-iraq-war-blueprint/
The Trumpanyahu Administration Is Already Sabotaging The Ceasefire
Caitlin Johnstone Oct 15, 2025, https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/the-trumpanyahu-administration-is?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=176195807&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
I don’t know who first coined the saying that an Israeli ceasefire means “you cease and we fire,” but it proves reliably accurate time after time.
The IDF reportedly killed nine Palestinians trying to return to their homes today under the usual justification that they were traveling in some kind of unauthorized area in ways that made the troops feel threatened, blah blah. They did this all the time during the previous “ceasefire” at the beginning of the year, using the exact same excuses.
Just as we speculated the other day might happen, Israel has announced that it is going to cut the aid it allows into Gaza in half and cut off fuel and gas shipments because Hamas hasn’t returned the bodies of all the dead Israeli hostages. Israel was fully aware when it signed the agreement that Hamas would not be able to deliver the bodies of all the hostages right away due to the rubble and chaos caused by the Israeli bombing campaign in Gaza.
On October 9, CNN published an article titled “Israel assesses Hamas may not be able to return all remaining dead hostages” which reported that “the Israeli government is aware that Hamas may not know the location of, or is unable to retrieve, the remains of some of the 28 remaining deceased hostages.”
The Red Cross says that finding all the bodies of the hostages will be a “massive challenge” in all the rubble created by Israeli airstrikes in the areas where hostages were being kept.
Drop Site News’ Jeremy Scahill explains that “During Gaza negotiations, Israel understood it would take time to recover all bodies of deceased captives. A specific mechanism for recovering the bodies was agreed. Now Israel is pretending that didn’t happen so it can violate the deal and cut the agreed aid shipments in half.”
Mondoweiss reported last week that Hebrew-language Israeli media had been saying that a “secret clause” in the ceasefire agreement would allow Israel to resume its onslaught if the bodies of the dead hostages were not returned within a 72-hour window.
So it looks like this was planned from the beginning. Create obligations that Israel knew Hamas would be unable to fulfill, then use it as an excuse to resume the slaughter.
And President Trump appears to be going right along with it, posting on Truth Social that “A big burden has been lifted, but the job IS NOT DONE. THE DEAD HAVE NOT BEEN RETURNED, AS PROMISED!”
“We were told they had 26, 24 dead hostages… and it seems as though they don’t have that, because we’re talking about a much lesser number,” Trump told the press on Tuesday, saying, “I want them back.”
Trump also told the press that Hamas is going to have to be forcibly disarmed, which amounts to an open admission that this entire “ceasefire” show is a sham.
“If they don’t disarm, we will disarm them, and it will happen quickly and perhaps violently,” Trump said on Tuesday.
This statement matches recent comments from Benjamin Netanyahu saying that Hamas will be disarmed “the easy way” or “the hard way”.
The president and prime minister are making it clear that in order for the ceasefire negotiations to proceed to a lasting peace, Hamas is going to have to completely surrender and Israel is going to have to be handed total victory. They’re branding it as a ceasefire deal when it’s actually a total surrender deal, and Hamas has made it explicitly clear that it is not surrendering.
As Drop Site News explains, “In reality, senior Hamas, Islamic Jihad and figures from other resistance factions have repeatedly rejected disarmament throughout negotiations, including in multiple interviews with Drop Site over the past year.”
A big part of the confusion around the ceasefire in public discourse today is that there are two contradictory ideas going around about what the ceasefire is and what it means. Israel supporters think “ceasefire” means “total victory and complete surrender by Hamas,” while everyone else thinks “ceasefire” means ceasefire.
That’s why you see Israel supporters celebrating the deal while Palestine supporters are much more apprehensive. Palestine supporters understand that a ceasefire and a surrender are two different things, and see Trump and Netanyahu stating that Hamas is going to have to completely disarm if “ceasefire” negotiations are going to move toward a lasting peace. They understand that the unyielding mutually exclusive positions of the Trumpanyahu administration and of Hamas are likely to come to a head in ways that result in the reignition of the Gaza holocaust.
So for all the applause and fuss that has been made about the ceasefire, as things stand right now it doesn’t look like much has changed. From the very beginning of this genocide it has been the officially stated position of the US and Israel that the killing will not end until Hamas lays down its arms and surrenders, and that is still their position today. There’s a much-needed pause in the slaughter, sure, but the Trumpanyahu team is making it explicitly clear that it is going to ramp up again under the justification of Hamas refusing to disarm.
And that’s assuming negotiations even make it that far; Israel is already doing everything it can to sabotage the ceasefire by murdering Palestinians and greatly reducing the amount of aid it promised.
Unless something significant changes about all this fairly soon, even this feeble reduction in Israel’s Gaza atrocities cannot be expected to hold.
Palestinians freed from Israeli prison denied reunion with families as Trump claims a ‘forever’ peace
At the end of the prisoner exchange, between 9,000 and 10,000 Palestinians will remain behind bars, including around 5,000 Palestinians who are being held without charge or trial, and without clear release dates, under Israel’s system of “administrative detention.”
Palestinians gathered in the West Bank to reunite with loved ones set to be released as part of the prisoner exchange between Israel and Hamas. But many were devastated to learn that Israel had deported them instead.
Mondoweisss, By Qassam Muaddi October 13, 2025
Palestinians in Gaza lived another day without bombs dropping over their heads as the first phase of the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas continued into Monday, which saw the release of Israeli captives from Gaza and the release of 1,718 out of 10,000 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.
At around 8:00 a.m. local time, Hamas’s armed wing, the al-Qassam Brigades, handed the first group of seven Israeli captives to the International Committee of the Red Cross in Gaza, without any ceremonies or media exposure. The second group of 13 Israeli captives came an hour later. Meanwhile, the Israeli prison services moved hundreds of Palestinians out of its detention centers.
Palestinians in Gaza lived another day without bombs dropping over their heads as the first phase of the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas continued into Monday, which saw the release of Israeli captives from Gaza and the release of 1,718 out of 10,000 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.
At around 8:00 a.m. local time, Hamas’s armed wing, the al-Qassam Brigades, handed the first group of seven Israeli captives to the International Committee of the Red Cross in Gaza, without any ceremonies or media exposure. The second group of 13 Israeli captives came an hour later. Meanwhile, the Israeli prison services moved hundreds of Palestinians out of its detention centers.
A total of 1,718 Palestinians were released into the Gaza Strip, all of whom were abducted by Israeli forces from within Gaza during the past two years. In addition, Israel released 250 Palestinians who had been serving high or life sentences in Israeli prisons, 88 of whom were released in the West Bank, while the rest were deported to Gaza and Egypt.
In the town of Beitunia, adjacent to Ramallah, dozens of Palestinians gathered in expectation of the released prisoners, who were announced to be released from Israel’s Ofer detention center just outside of the town. Israeli drones flew over the gathering, dropping leaflets that read “we are watching you everywhere. If you show any support for a terrorist group, you will expose yourself to arrest and punishment.”
At around 11:00 a.m., two Red Cross-marked buses drove through Beitunia as Palestinians waved at the released prisoners along the way, in decidedly smaller numbers than the crowds that had received released prisoners during the previous January-March ceasefire.
At the Ramallah Cultural Palace, prisoners’ families and crowds of Palestinians gathered to receive the released prisoners. In the crowds, the family of a prisoner, Murad Abu al-Rub, 45, including two of his sisters, his cousin, and his paralyzed mother, stood on a sidewalk trying with difficulty to get a glimpse of the Red Cross buses as they arrived.
“He has been in jail for 19 years with a life sentence, and the last time we visited him was before October 2023,” the cousin told Mondoweiss. “For more than two years, we haven’t seen him, and the news we have had about him through lawyers is very limited.”
“His father and one of his brothers died during his time in jail,” the cousin explained. “And his mother suffered a stroke last year that left her unable to move or speak. But we brought her because she has been very anxious to see him.”
The family left Jenin in the northern West Bank at 6 a.m. to avoid the Israeli army’s expected road closures, as it did during the previous ceasefire. “The Israeli Shabak came to our house yesterday and warned us not to show any signs of celebration, and they told us that Murad will be released here.”
After all the prisoners left the bus, the family discovered that Murad wasn’t among them. Minutes later, they received confirmation from the Red Cross that he had been deported to Egypt.
As the cousin shared the news, the elderly mother broke into tears and random screams in her wheelchair. As her daughters helped her into the car, one of them tried to console her. “He went to Egypt to study! He’ll be back later,” she said. The mother moved her hand in an apparent refusal to hear, continuing to weep.
Meters away, the older brother of Abdallah Barham, 40, one of the prisoners set to be released, had just learned that he, too, had been deported. The brother was in Ramallah by 7 a.m. to wait for Abdallah, who had served 18 years of his life sentence in Israeli prison.
“The family and the entire village are waiting in Kufr Qadoum to celebrate his release,” he explained. “And the Shabak came yesterday and warned us not to celebrate.”
“Our younger brother and our mother died during his period of imprisonment,” he continued. “And our father has been waiting for this day for the past 18 years. The feeling is tragic.” ………………………………………………………………………………..
At the end of the prisoner exchange, between 9,000 and 10,000 Palestinians will remain behind bars, including around 5,000 Palestinians who are being held without charge or trial, and without clear release dates, under Israel’s system of “administrative detention.”……………………………….
Donald Trump speaks before the Knesset, Sharm al-Sheikh summit
……………………………………. In his speech, Trump said it was a “historic dawn of a new Middle East” and the beginning of a “grand concord and lasting harmony for Israel.” Trump praised Netanyahu, whom he called “hard to deal with.” The U.S. President also lauded special envoy Steve Witkoff and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, whom he said was “called in” to draft the plan for the end of the war, all with a wave of applause by the Knesset members. Trump also thanked the Arab and Muslim countries that participated in his plan for the end of the war, which did not receive any applause from the Knesset.
During Trump’s speech, Palestinian Knesset member Ayman Odeh and left-wing anti-Zionist Knesset member Ofer Kasif raised signs calling for the recognition of Palestine as a state, and were forcibly removed from the hall
…………………………………………………………… Israel and Hamas still have to negotiate terms for the definitive end to the war based on Trump’s plan. This includes the body meant to rule over the Strip, which Hamas and Palestinian factions insist must be an independent Palestinian body of technocrats. In contrast, Trump’s plan would include a “board of peace” headed by Trump himself that would be in charge of running Gaza.
Another point to be negotiated is the disarmament of Hamas and other Palestinian resistance factions. Palestinian factions, including Hamas, insist that they would lay down their arms upon the establishment of a Palestinian state, while Trump’s plan would see the resistance movement’s disarmament and makes no mention of Palestinian statehood. https://mondoweiss.net/2025/10/palestinians-freed-from-israeli-prison-denied-reunion-with-families-as-trump-claims-a-forever-peace/
Putin and Trump, between the war of deadly Tomahawks and the peace of disarmament “START 3”.
by Alfredo Jalife-Rahme, Translation, Maria Poumier
Source La Jornada (Mexico) The world’s largest Spanish-language daily newspaper. Voltaire Network | Mexico City (Mexico)
| October 11, 2025, https://www.voltairenet.org/article222961.html
Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin are trying, against the instincts of their administrations, to end the confrontation between their two countries since the Cold War. The American president is balancing threats and peace proposals, while his Russian counterpart is showing patience. Will the two men succeed in freeing their countries from the trap they have built for eighty years and which is closing in on them?
The relationship between Putin and Trump has reached a turning point that will decide between war and peace, between the two greatest nuclear superpowers in the Milky Way [ 1 ] . Catholic Vice President JD Vance told FoxNews Sunday that “the United States is reviewing Ukraine’s request for long-range Tomahawk missiles” that would strike deep into Russian territory. The young millennial vice president added that President Trump would make the “final decision
On the other hand, retired General Keith Kellogg, 81, Trump’s special envoy to Ukraine, has byzantinely declared that Russia—against all tangible evidence on the battlefield where Ukraine is currently being thrashed—”lost the war” because “it failed to destroy Ukraine [ 3 ] .” It should be noted that General Kellogg’s daughter is addicted to the illegitimate regime of Khazarian comedian Zelensky, who is also delusional, trying to make people believe that he is “winning the war.”
If Ukraine, a vassal of NATO and the European Union, was indeed “winning the war,” why would it need the help of the fearsome Tomahawks, which can carry US-NATO nuclear weapons? At the same time, the genocidal Netanyahu is planning to deliver Patriot defense systems to his Khazarian coreligionist in kyiv….
Russian philosopher and geopolitician Alexander Dugin claims that “delivering the Tomahawks to Kiev would be a pure disaster” that “would irreversibly damage Russian-American relations”: the “neoconservatives’ dream would be to drag the United States into a third world war
[ 4 ] “, which would tragically be nuclear in nature.
Contrary to the drums of war that are sounding more forcefully within the European NATO countries, President Putin, during his participation in the plenary meeting of the Valdai Club in Sochi, invited Trump to “peaceful coexistence [ 5 ] “.
Regarding the hypothetical delivery to Ukraine of deadly Tomahawk missiles—with a range of 2,500 kilometers and a cost of $1.3 million each, capable of reaching Moscow and beyond—Putin said that this would not change the irreversible course of the war, which is now favorable to Moscow, but that it would constitute “a new step in the escalation,” because Ukraine cannot use these sophisticated missiles without the control of the US military.
India ‘s Economic Times speculates that “the US is unlikely to send Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine” because “it faces obstacles related to stockpiles committed to its navy operations.” This appears to be a Trump-like bargaining chip.
Since last year, the neoliberal think tank American Enterprise Institute (AEI) has denounced the sharp decline in the number of these deadly US missiles, already widely used in Yemen against the Ansar Allah guerrillas
[ 6 ] .
China ‘s Global Times highlights Putin’s warning about delivering Tomahawks to Ukraine, as the Russian president “praised U.S. President Donald Trump’s efforts to help broker peace in Ukraine,” calling his August summit in Alaska “productive,” while “reiterating Russia’s confidence in its nuclear shield. ” [ 7 ]
Putin told members of the Russian Security Council that “Moscow will respect the limits set on nuclear weapons for one more year, after the expiration on February 5, 2026, of the “START 3” nuclear treaty (Treaty on the Reduction of Strategic Nuclear Arms) with the United States [ 8 ] . Trump responded that Putin’s nuclear proposal was “a good idea” [ 9 ] .
The world is anxiously awaiting Trump’s final decision on the Tomahawks, a decision he appears to have already made, but which he will keep secret until he deems the time opportune [ 10 ] , while waging a veritable “civil war” from Oregon to Illinois against what he calls the terrorist group Antifa, financed by George Soros and his son Alex.
References ……………………………………………………………………………..
Israeli Soldiers Torched Food, Homes, and a Critical Sewage Treatment Plant in the Wake of Ceasefire Announcement
Soldiers called the mass arson of Gaza City their “final touches.”
Drop Site, Younis Tirawi and Yaniv Cogan, Oct 13, 2025
In the immediate aftermath of Donald Trump’s announcement on Thursday that both Hamas and Israel had signed off on an agreement to stop the fighting, the Israeli military launched an arson spree, setting fire to civilian infrastructure, including the destruction of an essential sanitation plant in Gaza City. After publication, the Israel Defense Forces told Drop Site it “is aware of the incident and it is being reviewed.”
The destruction of Palestinian structures following the departure of soldiers who had used them as temporary bases has been a hallmark of Israel’s approach to Gaza for two years. In July, Israeli reporter Yuval Abraham collected testimonies from soldiers describing a myriad of arson methods. “Every Arab house we entered had olive oil […] We poured the oil on the sofas, on anything flammable in the apartment, and then we ignited [it] or threw in a smoke grenade. This was a common practice,” one of them described.
The agreement came after months of a concerted effort to render Gaza uninhabitable by destroying residences and civilian infrastructure, culminating in the ground invasion of Gaza City and the leveling of several high rises in Gaza City. In September, Israeli government minister Gila Gamliel told Channel 7 News, “We have already completely annihilated 75% of the entire [Gaza] Strip. There remains 25%, which, as you know, it too…we are now taking over [the city of] Gaza—there will be nothing left there that would really [have] the potential to be habitable.”
The scope of the arson perpetrated in Gaza City on the night of October 9th and early morning of October 10—Thursday night into Friday, just after the ceasefire was agreed to but before Israel’s cabinet approved it—was broader than at any other time Drop Site has tracked during the assault on the strip. …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
The Torching of Gaza City’s Sewage Treatment Plant: “[One] last memory”……………………………………………………………………………………………
Mass Arson Campaign Around Sheikh Radwan Market, Gaza City……………………………………………………………………………………………..
Burning Homes Across Gaza City Israeli troops also shared photos of torched houses in other locations accompanied by captions musing about the arson. One soldier dubbed the burning of several buildings the “finishing touches.”……………………………………………………………………………………..
As the ceasefire takes hold, Gaza has already been rendered largely uninhabitable. One Israeli colonel recently bragged to the Israeli media, “We are leaving behind us only dust. There’s nothing here.” For officials like Gamliel, who have expressed satisfaction with the level of destruction in Gaza, the upshot is clear:
“Look at the hypocrisy of all European countries. They constantly go ‘starvation, starvation’ Well…? Open [your] doors! Why, when it was about Ukraine, it was fine, when it was about Syria, it was fine. When it comes to the Palestinians, they want to perpetuate this conflict structurally.
Now, just for your information: one million and seven hundred thousand inside the Gaza Strip are defined as UNRWA refugees. Meaning, once they get out of there, they are not coming back! Because as refugees, this is not the place where they actually have the right of basic belonging.” https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/israel-idf-soldiers-set-fire-food-homes-sewage-treatment-plan-after-ceasefire-announced
Israeli Defense Minister Says IDF Will Destroy Gaza Tunnels Once Hamas Releases Israeli Captives
by Dave DeCamp | October 12, 2025 , https://news.antiwar.com/2025/10/12/israeli-defense-minister-says-idf-will-destroy-gaza-tunnels-once-hamas-releases-israeli-captives/
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Sunday that the Israeli military would destroy tunnels in Gaza after the remaining Israeli captives are released by Hamas, which is expected to happen on Monday.
“Israel’s great challenge after the phase of returning the hostages will be the destruction of all of Hamas’s terror tunnels in Gaza, directly by the IDF and through the international mechanism to be established under the leadership and supervision of the United States,” Katz wrote on X.
“This is the primary significance of implementing the agreed-upon principle of demilitarizing Gaza and neutralizing Hamas of its weapons. I have instructed the IDF to prepare for carrying out the mission,” he added.
According to the outline of the Gaza ceasefire proposal released by the White House, all “military, terror, and offensive infrastructure, including tunnels and weapon production facilities, will be destroyed and not rebuilt,” and there will be a “process of demilitarization of Gaza under the supervision of independent monitors.” But the details of how those steps will be taken, including who will be doing it, are unclear. A senior Hamas official has also said that Hamas won’t disarm unless it can hand its weapons to a Palestinian state.
So far, Israel and Hamas have just entered the first phase of the ceasefire deal, which involves the release of the Israeli hostages in exchange for thousands of Palestinians held in Israeli jails, the IDF pulling back to an agreed-upon line, and Israel allowing more aid to enter Gaza. Details on implementing the rest of the agreement still need to be worked out in negotiations between Israel and Hamas.
Katz’s comments come as many are concerned Israel will restart its genocidal war once Hamas releases the Israeli captives. Also on Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the military “campaign is not over,” though he could be referring to other areas where Israel is at war or potential escalations elsewhere in the region.
“And I want to say: Everywhere we fought – we won. But in the same breath, I must tell you: The campaign is not over. There are still very great security challenges ahead of us,” Netanyahu said, according to a statement from his office. “Some of our enemies are trying to rebuild themselves to attack us again. And as we say – ‘We’re on it.’”
According to a report from Israel Hayom, the US has given Israel a guarantee that it would back Israeli military action if it determined Hamas violated the deal in a way that “poses a security threat.” The report said the understanding “constitutes a side agreement” between the US and Israel.
The US gave Israel a similar side deal for the November 2024 Lebanon ceasefire agreement, which Israel continues to violate on a near-daily basis.
Japan Weighs Nuclear-Powered Submarines Amid Regional Tensions
Rojoef Manuel. The Defense Post, October 10, 2025
Japan is considering developing nuclear-powered submarines after a state-backed panel formally recommended research into “next-generation propulsion” systems for the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF).
Submitted to the Ministry of Defense last September, the proposal marks the first time an official advisory group has opened the door to studying nuclear propulsion, signaling a potential departure from Japan’s long-standing policy limiting military use of nuclear energy, Army Recognition reported……………………………………………………………………………………
Legal, Political Barriers Remain
Despite the new strategy, Japan’s postwar laws still make such development difficult. The Atomic Energy Basic Act restricts nuclear technology to peaceful uses, while Japan’s “Three Non-Nuclear Principles” forbid manufacturing, acquiring, or receiving nuclear weapons.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi also reiterated last year that the East Asian government has “no plans to possess nuclear submarines” under its current law……………………………………………………………. https://thedefensepost.com/2025/10/10/japan-nuclear-submarines/
5 Days in Israel’s Desert Prison: Jewish Flotilla Activist David Adler on Harrowing Detention Ordeal
10 Oct 2025, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_pM-ZDaPAA
Israeli forces have abducted over 500 peace activists over the past week who were sailing to Gaza in an effort to deliver humanitarian aid to the besieged territory.
Organizers of the Global Sumud Flotilla say most of the participants were sent to Ktzi’ot Prison, notorious for harsh and abusive conditions. Some have reported physical abuse, humiliation and inhumane treatment by Israeli soldiers. Jewish American activist David Adler, co-general coordinator of the Progressive International, says he faced additional abuse because of his background. Democracy Now! is an independent global news hour that airs on over 1,500 TV and radio stations Monday through Friday. Watch our livestream at democracynow.org Mondays to Fridays 8-9 a.m. ET.
A Philadelphia company’s obscured support for killing Palestinians with autonomous flying bombs
Ghost and RoboTiCan were quick to capitalize on the Israeli invasion of Gaza, with Ghost’s Vision 60 robot dogs being deployed into Gazan tunnels
Philadelphia’s Ghost Robotics elevated its exclusive partnership with the Israeli military drone manufacturer RoboTiCan as the company began advertising its usage for bombing indoor Palestinians.
Jack Poulson, Oct 09, 2025, https://jackpoulson.substack.com/p/ghost-robotics-robotican-gaza-lethal-reyburn?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1269175&post_id=175669807&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=8cf96&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
It was a simple idea. Enclose the left and right sides of a quadcopter drone with 12-inch wireframe wheels to form a nearly 16-inch-long cylinder. In addition to providing the ability to switch between flying and rolling across the floors of houses and tunnels, the surrounding cage would further act as a sort of bumper to prevent the drone’s rotors from hitting walls in cramped spaces.
The Omer, Israel-based manufacturer RoboTiCan labeled the resulting product a ‘Rooster’ and pronounced it “the ultimate indoor drone system.” A February 2023 promotional video made explicit the driving use case for the product, showing a first-person view of the Rooster alternating between rolling and flying through a set of war-torn buildings, including by passing a brick wall graffitied with the slogan “FREE PALESTINE.”
Despite an initial pretense of nonlethality, the Rooster drones are now advertised as supporting 300 gram explosive payloads, and the flagship customers — beyond the Israeli military — include the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The result is an industrialized nation’s analogue of urban suicide bombers, though the weapons industry prefers the sanitized label of ‘loitering munition’.
The University of Pennsylvania spin-out Ghost Robotics — widely known as the weaponized competitor to Boston Dynamics — recently began advertising itself as the exclusive reseller of the Rooster in the United States. The move follows Ghost pitching its robots to U.S. commandos, including through a polished portrayal of its flagship four-legged ‘Vision 60’ robot executing two humans with attached SigSauer rifles. The U.S. Army’s 10th Mountain Division similarly experimented with attaching M16 rifles to the Vision 60 robots as part of Operation Hard Kill on August 1, 2024.
Adding further international complexity to the partnership between RoboTiCan and Ghost, the South Korean weapons manufacturer LIG Nex1 bought a 60% stake in Ghost for $240 million last year, establishing a beachhead in the United States for exporting its products. The majority control followed a separate contract between the Philadelphia-based Ghost and the South Korean company Ghost Robotics Technology (GRT), with GRT both serving as a reseller of the Vision 60 within Korea and as an intermediary for Vision 60 parts manufactured by its close affiliate and investee, Korea Robot Manufacturing Co. (KRM).
Following the Hamas raid of Israel on October 7, 2023, the Israeli military responded with unprecedented death and destruction, killing at least 67,074 and injuring at least 168,716 of the roughly two million Palestinians in Gaza prior to Wednesday’s nominal ceasefire deal. Alongside the mass murder — including of at least 20,000 children — Israeli soldiers became infamous for posting photos of themselves modeling the clothing of Palestinian women whose homes had been assaulted. Israeli commandos also openly raided humanitarian flotillas bound for Gaza, brazenly portraying their kidnappings of peaceful human rights activists as counter-terrorism.
Ghost and RoboTiCan were quick to capitalize on the Israeli invasion of Gaza, with Ghost’s Vision 60 robot dogs being deployed into Gazan tunnels as a sort of aircraft carrier for the RoboTiCan Roosters. Promotional photos of the Rooster docked on top of the Ghost Vision 60 robot were widely published in the international press by early 2024, but RoboTiCan had begun promoting the usage of Vision 60 robots in Gaza by the end of 2023, including with footage of the robots firing assault rifles.
The Gazan use cases for the robotic duo were reported almost universally as surveillance and reconnaissance, despite RoboTiCan in December 2023 promoting its Channel 13 coverage with the headline “A robot in the Hamas tunnels: the electric dog that can neutralize charges and shoot.” RoboTiCan last month publicly repositioned the Rooster as a tool for lethal urban warfare, with CEO Hagai Balshai stating that the Rooster was “bringing precision and autonomy to environments that were previously off-limits to loitering munitions,” adding that, “Forces can now conduct surgical strikes inside structures.”
Ghost’s explicit promotion of its company as the exclusive U.S. reseller of the Rooster has come since the product’s lethal reorientation. Ghost’s nominally nonviolent support for the Israeli invasion of Gaza through RoboTiCan had already led to sustained protests against the company, including Ghost CEO and UPenn PhD Gavin Kenneally having the front door of his Fairmount townhome spraypainted with the word ‘MURDERER’ in the early morning of July 9, 2024, according to an apparent confession on the Philly Anti-Capitalist website.
A subsequent post to the same website the following October detailed both another defacement of Dr. Kenneally’s home — allegedly writing “Funded By Genocide” across his garage and smashing his windows— as well as the spraypainting of “NO KILLER TECH” across Ghost’s then-headquarters within UPenn’s innovation center. “Ghost Robotics AI-enabled machine-gun-armed robot dogs have been used against Palestinians in Gaza,” stated the explanation.
Ghost Robotics appears to have attempted to prevent further protests of its facilities by hiding its headquarters. A January 22 press release stated that the firm had “signed a lease and relocated from Pennovation Works to a new, larger location in Philadelphia, PA.” But Ghost remained tight-lipped about where this “larger location” would be, with the firm’s LinkedIn profile and corporate records continuing to list the Pennovation Works address.
But a recently public, $120,000 agreement for Ghost to sell the U.S. Army Research Laboratory two of its Vision 60 robots lists a new address for the company. As recently as February, Ghost sold the U.S. Army’s Armaments Center a $3.2 million “Wolfpack” of Vision 60 robots through its old Pennovation Works address. Ghost’s newest contract instead lists its headquarters as Apartment 170 within the refurbished former central factory of the Pep Boys auto services company in the northwest Philadelphia region of Bala Cynwyd.
Acquired by Icahn Enterprises in 2016, Pep Boys ceased operations at the factory by early 2021, with investors turning what is now known as the Reyburn Manufacturing Company Building into a beautiful five-story condominium, complete with a rooftop pool and a podcasting studio.
With its loft-style apartments only located on the second through fifth floors, the Reyburn’s first-floor addresses are assigned to a detached, single-story partitioned warehouse on the north side of the building, with addresses counting down as you move north. The nonprofit Share Food Program occupies a section just north of a pink sign reading ‘106’, while the section assigned to Ghost remains unadorned.
Despite months of Ghost Robotics and its parent company refusing to respond to questions about the location of the company’s new headquarters, apparent confirmation came three weeks after the firm’s latest contract to sell the U.S. Army two Vision 60 robots. According to U.S. Customs records, a 740 kilogram “40 Foot General Purpose Container” with three motors from Korea Robot Manufacturing arrived at Ghost’s Suite 107 at the Reyburn Building on July 30, 2025.Subscribe
1 This Month
of the week – Shut Down Drone Warfare!
Tell the Ukrainian Government to Drop Prosecution of Peace Activist Yurii Sheliazhenko
Petition to revoke the licensing of the Near Surface Nuclear Disposal Facility (NSDF) at Chalk River. https://www.ourcommons.ca/petitions/en/Petition/Details?Petition=e-7247
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