The Gazafication of Lebanon: Israel Blows up Nabatieh City Hall, kills Mayor and Aid Workers
Juan Cole, 10/17/2024
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Israeli military has begun giving southern Lebanon the Gaza treatment. Some 25% of Lebanese are under “evacuation orders,” which is to say that Israel is expelling them from their homes in preparation for further military operations against the Hezbollah Party-Militia.
The U.N. Humanitarian Coordinator for Lebanon, Imran Riza, said Wednesday, “Health care facilities, mosques, historical markets, residential complexes, and now government buildings are being reduced to rubble. Displaced families continue to feel at risk, even after fleeing to safe areas.”
Lebanon is a small country of perhaps 4 million citizens and nearly 2 million refugees. The UN says that some 1.2 million people have been displaced, with 275,000 people leaving for Syria. This latter number includes both Lebanese leaving their own country and Syrian refugees in Lebanon returning to the Baathist dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad. The equivalent of such a vast displacement of residents in the United States would be 51 million internal refugees. It is unimaginable.
We saw this movie in Gaza. It is total war.
Even the humanitarian aid workers attempting to help people get through the violence and displacement are being targeted by the Israeli military. Humanitarian Coordinator Riza added, “This morning a devastating attack claimed the lives of yet more civilians and local authorities working to provide relief, with the strike occurring just as a crisis meeting was convening at the municipality of Nabatieh in South Lebanon. I deplore and mourn the deaths of Ahmad, Sadeq, Mohammed, Qassem – members of a relief team with whom the UN and humanitarian partners have been working for more than a year – and all other victims of this conflict that must stop, urgently.”
The attack referenced by the UN official was an Israeli airstrike on the City Hall of the Lebanese city of Nabatieh, which is a civilian object, not a military one. The Israelis killed the mayor, Ahmed Kaheel, council member Sadeq Ismail, photographer Mohammad Baytar, and employees Qasem Hijazi and Mohammad Zohri. Sadeq Ismail and Qasem Hijazi, along with Mayor Kaheel, were the humanitarian relief team to which the UN official referred to above. The Lebanese Ministry of Health (and no, it isn’t “Hezbollah controlled”) said that the strike killed 16 persons in total and wounded 52.
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Miqati condemned the bombing, noting that the city council had been meeting about humanitarian aid issues before they were blasted to smithereens……………………………….
Nabatieh is majority Shiite Muslim, and Israel’s targeting of its municipal building may be a manifestation of the increasing hatred of Shiites visible in Israeli social media, which sometimes sound like Sunni extremists such as ISIL. The city, however, also has substantial Maronite Christian and Eastern Orthodox Christian communities and many churches and mosques………………….https://www.juancole.com/2024/10/gazafication-lebanon-nabatieh.html
Leaked US Intelligence Documents Outline Israeli Preparations to Strike Iran
Reportedly, the leak comes courtesy of a US intelligence source
by Connor Freeman October 19, 2024 https://news.antiwar.com/2024/10/19/leaked-us-intelligence-documents-outline-israeli-preparations-to-strike-iran/#gsc.tab=0
Leaked top secret documents from the Pentagon and the National Security Agency (NSA) outline Israeli preparations for a major attack against Iran, CNN reported on Saturday. The documents were published Friday on a Telegram channel, said to be affiliated with Iran, named “Middle East Spectator” that claims it received the information from a source within a US intelligence agency.
Besides the US, these documents, dated October 15 and 16, were only meant to be viewed by officials in Canada, the UK, Australia, and New Zealand, Washington’s “Five Eyes” allies. CNN cites “three people familiar with the matter,” including one that confirmed the documents’ authenticity. The documents can be viewed here and here.
The documents, including a visual intelligence report from the Pentagon’s National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, details ongoing activities being carried out in anticipation of the attack in Iran at Israeli Air Force (IAF) bases.
The US has observed, “IAF exercises using air-launched ballistic missiles (ALBMs), air-to-surface ballistic missiles, fighter jets, UAVs, and refueling tankers previously used during Israeli strikes on Houthi sites in Yemen… The IAF has handled at least 16 Golden Horizon ALBMs and 40 IS02 (Rocks) ALBMs since October 8,” reports Times of Israel.
According to CNN, one of the documents reveals that Israel maintains a nuclear weapons arsenal which, for decades, has been an open secret. This is highly controversial, as amendments made to US foreign assistance laws by US Senators Stuart Symington and John Glenn in 1976 make Washington’s huge military aid to Israel illegal because Tel Aviv is not a signatory of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. But successive US presidents since Richard Nixon, including Joe Biden most recently, have agreed with their Israeli counterparts to never acknowledge Israel’s approximately 90–300 nukes.
US officials are telling the media that the leak is “extremely serious.” At the same time, officials emphasize that it will probably not affect Israel’s plans. Without commenting further, the Pentagon as well as the Office of the Director of National Intelligence have not disputed the documents’ authenticity. The US has apologized to Tel Aviv for the leak, an Israeli source told Haaretz.
Washington is expected to be involved with the Iran assault either by providing intelligence support to Israel, or less likely by pursuing direct military action. Earlier this week, the US bombed Houthi targets in Yemen using B-2 long-range stealth bombers, which haven’t seen combat since 2017, in a message to the Islamic Republic.
Israel’s attack is being framed as retaliation against Tehran for Iran’s October 1 barrage of roughly 200 ballistic missiles which targeted Israeli military sites. That missile attack came in response to a litany of Israeli provocations, amidst its genocidal war against the Palestinians, including the assassination of Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh while he was visiting the Iranian capital this summer.
Earlier on Saturday, reports surfaced of a drone attack on a home belonging to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. According to Israel’s Channel 12, an official said this will imply “greater legitimacy for a wider range of targets” concerning the upcoming Iran strike. Netanyahu has fingered Hezbollah for the drone attack, although the group has not claimed responsibility.
Gabor Mate: ‘It’s like we’re watching Auschwitz on TikTok’
October 20, 2024 https://scheerpost.com/2024/10/20/gabor-mate-its-like-were-watching-auschwitz-on-tiktok/
Had there been YouTube and Instagram and TikTok around Auschwitz, this is what we would have seen, people burning alive. And it’s beyond horrendous, it’s beyond comprehension.”
In an online meeting with French activist and film producer Frank Barat on Monday, Canadian physician Gabor Mate explored the psychological complexities of witnessing atrocities in Gaza and Palestine, saying: “It’s like we’re watching Auschwitz on TikTok.”
They delve into the emotional and historical roots of violence and oppression, highlighting the trauma, guilt, and helplessness experienced by observers. Mate stresses the need to acknowledge these emotions and examines the normalisation of violence, while contemplating the future implications for Gaza and global society.
Widening the War: The US Sends Troops to Israel
October 20, 2024, Dr Binoy Kampmark, https://theaimn.com/widening-the-war-the-us-sends-troops-to-israel/
The dangers should be plastered on every wall in every office occupied by a military and political advisor. Israel’s attempt to reshape the Middle East, far from giving it enduring security, will merely serve to make it more vulnerable and unstable than ever. In that mix and mess will be its greatest sponsor and guardian, the United States, a giant of almost blind antiquity in all matters concerning the Jewish state.
In a measure that should have garnered bold headlines, the Biden administration has announced the deployment of some 100 US soldiers to Israel who will be responsible for operating the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system. They are being sent to a conflict that resembles a train travelling at high speed, with no risk of stopping. As Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant promised in the aftermath of Iran’s October 1 missile assault on his country, “Our strike will be powerful, precise, and above all – surprising.” It would be of such a nature that “They will not understand what happened and how it happened.”
In an October 16 meeting between the Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III and Gallant, the deployment of a mobile THAAD battery was seen “as an operational example of the United States’ ironclad support to the defense of Israel.” Largely meaningless bits of advice were offered to Gallant: that Israel “continue taking steps to address the dire humanitarian situation” and take “all necessary measures to ensure the safety and security” of UN peacekeepers operating in Lebanon’s south.
The charade continued the next day in a conversation between Austin and Gallant discussing the killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar. THAAD was again mentioned as essential for Israel’s “right to defence itself” while representing the “United States’ unwavering, enduring, and ironclad commitment to Israel’s security.” (“Ironclad” would seem to be the word of the moment, neatly accompanying Israel’s own Iron Dome defence system.)
A statement from the Pentagon press secretary, Maj. Gen. Patrick Ryder, was a fatuous effort in minimising the dangers of the deployment. The battery would merely “augment Israel’s integrated air defense system,” affirm the ongoing commitment to Israel’s defence and “defend Americans in Israel, from any further ballistic missile attacks from Iran.”
The very public presence of US troops, working alongside their Israeli counterparts in anticipation of broadening conflict, does not merely suggest Washington’s failure to contain their ally. It entails a promise of ceaseless supply, bolstering and emboldening. Furthermore, it will involve placing US troops in harm’s way, a quixotic invitation if ever there was one.
As things stand, the US is already imperilling its troops by deploying them in a series of bases in Jordan, Syria and Iraq. Iran’s armed affiliates have been making their presence felt, harrying the stationed troops with increasing regularity since the Israel-Hamas war broke out on October 7 last year. A gradual, attritive toll is registering, featuring such attacks as those on the Tower 22 base in northern Jordan in January that left three US soldiers dead.
Writing in August for The Guardian, former US army major Harrison Mann eventually realised an awful truth about the mounting assaults on these sandy outposts of the US imperium: “there was no real plan to protect US troops beyond leaving them in their small, isolated bases while local militants, emboldened and agitated by US support for Israel’s brutal war in Gaza, used them for target practice.” To send more aircraft and warships to the Middle East also served to encourage “reckless escalation towards a wider war,” providing insurance to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he could be protected “from the consequences of his actions.”
Daniel Davis, a military expert at Defense Priorities, is firmly logical on the point of enlisting US personnel in the Israeli cause. “Naturally, if Americans are killed in the execution of their duties, there will be howls from the pro-war hawks in the West ‘demanding’ the president ‘protect our troops’ by firing back on Iran.” It was “exactly the sort of thing that gets nations sucked into war they have no interest in fighting.”
Polling, insofar as that measure counts, suggests that enthusiasm for enrolling US troops in Israel’s defence is far from warm. In results from a survey published by the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations in August, some four in ten polled would favour sending US troops to defend Israel if it was attacked by Iran. Of the sample, 53% of Republicans would favour defending Israel in that context, along with four in 10 independents (42%), and a third of Democrats (34%).
There have also been some mutterings from the Pentagon itself about Israel’s burgeoning military effort, in particular against the Lebanese Iran-backed militia, Hezbollah. In a report from The New York Times, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr., is said to be worried about the widening US presence in the region, a fact that would hamper overall “readiness” of the US in other conflicts. Being worried is just the start of it.
Israel Is Routinely Shooting Children in the Head in Gaza: US Surgeon & Palestinian Nurse
SCHEERPOST, October 17, 2024
As the official death toll in Gaza passes more than 42,400, the true number may be impossible to know until Israel’s war is over. But medical workers who witnessed the carnage in Gaza’s hospitals are speaking out. We speak with Dr. Feroze Sidhwa about his op-ed in The New York Times that features harrowing stories from dozens of healthcare workers and CT scans of children shot in the head or the left side of the chest. The Times called the corresponding images of the patients too graphic to publish. “I personally wish that Americans could see more of what it looks like when a child is shot in the head, when a child is flayed open by bombs,” says Sidhwa. “I think it would make us think a little bit more about what we do in the world.” We also speak with Palestinian nurse Rajaa Musleh, who worked at Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. “I will never forget the dogs were eating the dead body inside Shifa Hospital at the front of the emergency department. This will be stuck on my mind for my whole life,” says Musleh. “My message for the whole world: We are human beings. We are not numbers. We have the right to receive healthcare inside Gaza.”
Transcript
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: As the official death toll in Gaza passes more than 42,400, the true number may be impossible to know until Israel’s war is over. But medical workers who witnessed the carnage in Gaza’s hospitals are speaking out.
We begin today’s show with a surgeon who volunteered at the European Hospital in Khan Younis and wrote a devastating opinion piece in The New York Times headlined “65 Doctors, Nurses and Paramedics: What We Saw in Gaza.”
In a minute, we’ll be joined by Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, who begins the piece writing, quote, “I worked as a trauma surgeon in Gaza from March 25 to April 8. I’ve volunteered in Ukraine and Haiti, and I grew up in Flint, Mich. I’ve seen violence and worked in conflict zones. But of the many things that stood out about working in a hospital in Gaza, one got to me: Nearly every day I was there, I saw a new young child who had been shot in the head or the chest, virtually all of whom went on to die. Thirteen in total.
“At the time, I assumed this had to be the work of a particularly sadistic soldier located nearby. But after returning home, I met an emergency medicine physician who had worked in a different hospital in Gaza two months before me. ‘I couldn’t believe the number of kids I saw shot in the head,’ I told him. To my surprise, he responded: ‘Yeah, me, too. Every single day,’” he said.
The piece quotes dozens of healthcare workers and includes three X-rays or CT scans of pediatric patients who were shot in the head or the left side of the chest. The person who provided the scans was Dr. Mimi Syed, who worked in Khan Younis from August 8th to September 5th and said the children usually arrived at the hospital either dead or in critical condition after suffering a single shot.
On Tuesday, The New York Times opinion section editor issued a statement refuting claims circulating online that the images were altered, saying the editors had, quote, “photographs to corroborate the CT scan images,” but, quote, “because of their graphic nature, we decided these photos — of children with gunshot wounds to the head or neck — were too horrific for publication.”
For more, we’re joined by Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, the trauma and general surgeon who wrote this piece. He also spearheaded an open letter to President Biden and Vice President Harris signed by 99 U.S. medical professionals who served in Gaza, testifying to the unprecedented scale of the healthcare catastrophe and calling for an immediate ceasefire and the end to all U.S. support for Israel.
We are also joined in Chicago by Rajaa Musleh, the country representative in Gaza of MedGlobal, a medical humanitarian aid group. She previously worked as a nurse at Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… more https://scheerpost.com/2024/10/17/israel-is-routinely-shooting-children-in-the-head-in-gaza-us-surgeon-palestinian-nurse/
Israel attacks the United Nations
Contrary to popular belief, the United Nations General Assembly has only accepted Israel’s membership conditionally (resolution 273). However, Tel Aviv has never respected its commitments. It refuses to implement 229 resolutions of the Security Council and the General Assembly. It has just declared a UN agency a “terrorist organization,” called for its headquarters in New York to be razed, designated its Secretary General António Guterres persona non grata, and has just attacked four times UN peacekeepers in Lebanon (UNIFIL), wounding two blue helmets.
Voltaire Network | Paris (France) | 15 October 2024 by Thierry Meyssan, https://www.voltairenet.org/article221376.html
Israel has just attacked a position of the UN peacekeepers in Lebanon. When the British withdrew from Mandatory Palestine (i.e. Palestine placed by the League of Nations under the provisional administration of the United Kingdom) on May 14, 1948, the Zionist General Council, an offshoot of the Haganah (i.e. the main militia of the immigrant Jewish community), unilaterally proclaimed the independence of the State of Israel. It was announced by the chairman of the Jewish Agency (i.e. the executive of the World Zionist Organization).
It is important to note here that the British occupier withdrew from only about a quarter of Mandatory Palestine. It had already officially left the other three quarters, constituting Mandatory Transjordan, the future Jordan.
After a few days of reflection, the United Nations General Assembly decided to recognize the new state, not without having emphasized that in principle, it was not up to a militia, the Haganah, to proclaim a state, even if this proclamation came to fill the void left by the departure of the mandatory authority, that is to say the British. The General Assembly had noted that the proclamation of independence said nothing about the regime of this state (theocracy or republic), nor about its borders. It intended to pursue its plan for the creation of a binational state, both Arab and Jewish, without territorial continuity between the two entities (Jerusalem and Bethlehem having an international status). It had been reassured by the new state’s reference to “complete equality of social and political rights for all citizens without distinction of belief, race and sex.”
The day after independence, Egypt, Iraq, Transjordan, Lebanon, Syria and Yemen sent their armies to Palestine. Official history today assures that these six countries (the “Arabs”, understand the “Muslims”) did not accept a Jewish state, while five of them opposed Jewish colonization after British colonization and the sixth supported Israel. Religion was a problem only for Izz al-Din al-Qassam, the Muslim Brotherhood and the Nazi mufti Mohammed Amin al-Husseini.
Identicaly, propaganda assures that these armies were defeated by the valiant Israeli army, implying “from the first day, the Jews are morally superior to the Arabs”. The reality was quite different. The world war had just ended and none of these countries, except Transjordan, had an army worthy of the name.
Their troops were exclusively formed of volunteers. In addition, the Transjordanian army, which ended the conflict, fought on the side of Israel against the other Arabs. Indeed, Transjordan, still under British influence, hoped to prevent the creation of a Palestinian state and annex its territory. Its army was none other than that of the British (the “Arab Legion”) and was still placed under the command of General John Bagot Glubb (alias “Glubb Pasha”). It was the Transjordanians (in fact the British) and not the Israelis who defeated the other Arab armies.
During the conflict, its sovereign, King Abdullah I was also proclaimed “King of Palestine.” During this conflict, the Israeli forces let the British of Transjordan fight against the Arabs and applied Plan D (in Hebrew: Plan “Dalet”). The Haganh intended to share as little territory as possible with Transjordan. Israeli forces illegally imported weapons from Czechoslovakia (already ruled by the communists), probably with the agreement of the USSR, supposedly to fight against British colonization, in reality to expel the Palestinians. This is the Nakhba (catastrophe). 750,000 Palestinians (between 50 and 80% of the population) were forcibly displaced.
Israel requested and obtained, the following year, its membership in the United Nations. At that time, no decolonized state was part of it. The countries under Anglo-Saxon influence were in the majority. However, they only accepted Israel under conditions. In its resolution 273, the UN General Assembly referred to a written commitment by the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the provisional government of Israel, Moshe Shertok, by which he “accepts without any reservation the obligations arising from the Charter of the United Nations and undertakes to observe them from the day it becomes a Member of the United Nations” [1].
To date, Israel has failed to uphold this commitment and has failed to comply with 229 Security Council and General Assembly resolutions. Its membership could therefore be suspended at any time.
In recent months,
• Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said on March 23 that the UN had become “an anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli organization that harbors and encourages terrorism.”
• Israel has campaigned against a UN agency, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), accusing it of serving Hamas. Last July, the Knesset passed three laws (1) banning UNRWA from operating on Israeli territory (2) stripping its staff of diplomatic immunities (3) declaring it a terrorist organization.
• Israel’s permanent representative to the United Nations, Gilad Erdan, declared at the end of his term last August, speaking from the UN headquarters in New York, that “this edifice must be razed from the face of the Earth.”
• Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz declared UN Secretary-General António Guterres persona non grata.
• The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) deliberately targeted French, Italian and Irish soldiers of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL).
The bottom line:
• Israel was not created by its people, but by its army.
• The first Arab-Israeli war was not won by the Israelis, but by the Arabs of Transjordan under British command.
• By joining the United Nations, Israel committed itself to respecting all its resolutions, which it has violated 229 times.
• After Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Iran, the Netanyahu government has opened an eighth front against the United Nations.
An Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities could backfire
And recent Iraqi history can tell us how.
Ibrahim Al-Marashi, Associate Professor of Middle East History at California State University San Marcos, Aljazeera, 16 Oct 24,
Since Iran’s October 1 missile attack on Israel in response to the killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut and Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, there has been much speculation about how Tel Aviv will retaliate. Some observers have suggested that it could hit Iranian oil installations, and others, its nuclear facilities.
US President Joe Biden’s administration seems to oppose both options, but it has approved the deployment of a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile defence system and United States troops to Israel, possibly in anticipation of an Iranian response to an Israeli strike.
Biden says he would not back Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear sites
Iran’s President Pezeshkian says Tehran ready to improve ties with West
Iranian president says ‘ready to engage’ on nuclear deal
Iran ready to resume nuclear negotiations immediately: Foreign minister
Meanwhile, Biden’s political adversary, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, has egged on Israel to “hit the nuclear first”. Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner has also suggested the same.
While Trump, Kushner and other staunch Israel supporters are happy to cheer on an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, they likely know very little about the consequences of another such Israeli attack that targeted an Iraqi nuclear site.
Israel’s destruction of Iraq’s French-built Osiraq nuclear reactor in 1981 actually pushed what was largely a peaceful nuclear programme underground and motivated Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein to invest in the pursuit of a nuclear weapon. An aggressive act against Iran’s nuclear programme will likely have a similar effect.
A ‘pre-emptive’ strike
Iraq’s nuclear programme started in the 1960s with the USSR building a small nuclear research reactor and providing it with some know-how. In the 1970s, Iraq purchased a bigger reactor from France – called Osiraq – and expanded its civilian nuclear programme with significant French and Italian assistance.
The French government had made sure that technical measures were in place to prevent any possible dual use of the reactor and it shared this information with the US, Israel’s closest ally. Iraq, which was a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and had its nuclear sites inspected regularly by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), was not “on the brink of” developing a nuclear weapon, as Israel falsely asserted.
Nevertheless, the Israeli government, which was facing growing discontent domestically and a potential loss at the approaching legislative elections, decided to proceed with the “pre-emptive” strike…………………………………………………
A trove of declassified US documents released in 2021 demonstrates that Israel’s strike did not eliminate Iraq’s programme, but rather made Saddam more determined to acquire a nuclear weapon………………………………..
The consequences of a strike on Iran
…………………….assassinations may have killed key cadres, they have inspired a new generation of Iranians to pursue nuclear science, part of an Iranian “nuclear nationalism” emerging as a result of the constant attacks on Iran’s nuclear programme.
…………………………….. Israel’s actions so far are only increasing Iranian determination to continue its nuclear programme. A strike on any of its nuclear facilities would make that determination even stronger. And if we are to go by the Iraqi example, it may drive the Iranian nuclear programme underground and accelerate it towards the development of a nuclear weapon.
………. what Netanyahu is doing in Gaza and Lebanon now and will do in Iran will not bring victory to Israel. His strategy produces resentment in these countries and across the Middle East, which will help Iran and its allies rebuild swiftly whatever capabilities they lose to reckless Israeli strikes. https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2024/10/14/an-israeli-attack-on-irans-nuclear-facilities-could-backfire
We’re Basically Being Asked To Believe That The Palestinians Are Genociding Themselves
Caitlin Johnstone, 16 Oct 24
One of the dumbest things we are asked to believe about Israel’s genocide in Gaza is that all these civilians are being butchered because the Palestinians are evil and not the Israelis. That it’s the victims doing evil things and not the perpetrators.
That’s all this gibberish about “human shields” and “self-defense” is meant to do, you know. To make it look like the victims of siege warfare and carpet bombing are the ones responsible for all the death and destruction we are seeing and not the people who are actually doing it.
Can you think of anything more insulting to your intelligence? So self-evidently counter to common sense? They’re seriously asking you to believe that the people who are being starved, shot and bombed to death are the perpetrators of their own genocide, and that the side which has attacked every hospital in Gaza are just the innocent bystanders responding to unprovoked acts of aggression in the most ethical and responsible way they can manage.
Off the top of my head I really can’t think of anything more absurd.
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Everyone who reacted with more sympathy or outrage over October 7 than they have over the last year of Israeli atrocities has just spent a year confessing that they don’t see Palestinians as human beings.
I am not a dog person or a cat person, but if I saw dogs or cats being treated the way Palestinian human beings are being treated I would care more than the average western liberal cares about Palestinians.
A liberal is someone who thinks the moderate position between being pro-Israel and being pro-Palestine is giving Israel everything it needs to genocide the Palestinians and then watching the genocide and saying “Oh how heartbreaking and tragic, this is all very complicated.”
Israel to continue blocking humanitarian aid from Gaza on the grounds that the aid could fall into the hands of Palestinian civilians.
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Imagine getting into journalism school thinking you’ll change the world for the better, finally graduating and making your family proud, getting into a prominent news outlet, spending years working your way up to editor, only to wind up spending your days writing headlines like “Gaza children perish after chance encounter with missile.”……………………………………………………… more https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/were-basically-being-asked-to-believe?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=150287267&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
200+ Jewish-Led Protesters Arrested at NY Stock Exchange Say ‘Stop Arming Israel’
“The U.S. war economy is profiting from genocide,” said Jewish Voice for Peace. “The 50+ members of Congress who invest in arms companies get richer every day.”
Jessica Corbett, 14 Oct 24, https://www.commondreams.org/news/israel-wall-street
As the Israeli assault of the Gaza Strip and Lebanon continued on Monday, over 200 Jewish-led protesters, including descendants of Holocaust survivors, were arrested at the New York Stock Exchange while demanding that the United States “stop arming Israel and profiting from genocide.”
Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP)—which has led several anti-genocide protests across the country over the past year of war—said that hundreds of people joined the action in New York City. The advocacy group shared photos and videos on social media of participants in red T-shirts with messages including “Not in Our Name” and “Stop Arming Israel.”
They sat in rows outside the iconic NYC building with banners that said, “Jews Say Stop Arming Israel,” “Arms Embargo Now,” “Jews Say Divest From Israel,” “Gaza Bombed, Wall Street Boomed,” and “Fund FEMA Not Genocide,” a reference to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which is responding to damage from hurricanes in the Southeast.
As NBC Newsreported on Monday:
Individuals representing Jewish Voices for Peace, a Jewish-led pro-Palestinian group, arrived at the exchange at 85 Broad St. as part of an “unscheduled protest” just before the stock market’s official 9:30 am opening, according to a New York Police Department spokesperson.
A number of arrests were made, the spokesperson said, but an exact figure could not immediately be obtained. An NYSE representative said at least one person had handcuffed himself between an interior and exterior door.
JVP, which said that over 200 people were arrested, posted footage of multiple protesters in red shirts chained to a door and a fence and of officers carrying away demonstrators. The group said that “police are dragging Jewish protesters by their arms and legs as they refuse to leave the global epicenter of capital on Wall Street.”
As the Israeli assault of the Gaza Strip and Lebanon continued on Monday, over 200 Jewish-led protesters, including descendants of Holocaust survivors, were arrested at the New York Stock Exchange while demanding that the United States “stop arming Israel and profiting from genocide.”
Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP)—which has led several anti-genocide protests across the country over the past year of war—said that hundreds of people joined the action in New York City. The advocacy group shared photos and videos on social media of participants in red T-shirts with messages including “Not in Our Name” and “Stop Arming Israel.”
They sat in rows outside the iconic NYC building with banners that said, “Jews Say Stop Arming Israel,” “Arms Embargo Now,” “Jews Say Divest From Israel,” “Gaza Bombed, Wall Street Boomed,” and “Fund FEMA Not Genocide,” a reference to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which is responding to damage from hurricanes in the Southeast.
As NBC Newsreported on Monday:
Individuals representing Jewish Voices for Peace, a Jewish-led pro-Palestinian group, arrived at the exchange at 85 Broad St. as part of an “unscheduled protest” just before the stock market’s official 9:30 am opening, according to a New York Police Department spokesperson.
A number of arrests were made, the spokesperson said, but an exact figure could not immediately be obtained. An NYSE representative said at least one person had handcuffed himself between an interior and exterior door.
JVP, which said that over 200 people were arrested, posted footage of multiple protesters in red shirts chained to a door and a fence and of officers carrying away demonstrators. The group said that “police are dragging Jewish protesters by their arms and legs as they refuse to leave the global epicenter of capital on Wall Street.”
“As Gaza is bombed, Wall Street booms,” the group said. “The stock prices of weapons manufacturers have skyrocketed this year. The U.S. war economy is profiting from genocide. The 50+ members of Congress who invest in arms companies get richer every day.”
As Common Dreams has reported, stocks of American war profiteers—including Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and RTX, formerly known as Raytheon—soared in response to Israel launching its assault on Gaza after the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack as well as earlier this month, after Israeli forces began a ground invasion of Lebanon and Iran fired off ballistic missiles.
“Remember that members of Congress are permitted to own stock in war manufacturing, so when they vote to send more bombs or send our loved ones to war, they profit personally,” U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) said in early October.
Tlaib, the only Palestinian American in Congress, has introduced the Stop Politicians Profiting from War Act, which would prohibit federal lawmakers along with their spouses and dependent children from trading defense stocks or having financial interests in companies that do business with the U.S. Department of Defense.
“Politicians should not be allowed to profit from genocide,” said MacArthur fellow Ros Petchesky, an 82-year-old JVP member who was active in the movement to end the war in Vietnam, and the oldest person chained to the Wall Street gates on Monday. “There can be no business as usual while the U.S. arms Israel and profits from genocide. We’re here to demand an arms embargo now.”
Report: Israel Plans To Strike Iran Before US Presidential Election
Officials told The Washington Post that Netanyahu told Biden he plans to target military sites inside Iran
by Dave DeCamp October 14, 2024, https://news.antiwar.com/2024/10/14/report-israel-plans-to-strike-iran-before-us-presidential-election/#gsc.tab=0
Israel is planning to launch its expected attack on Iran before the US presidential elections are held on November 5, The Washington Post reported on Monday.
An unnamed official told the Post that waiting any longer could be perceived as weakness and that the planned strike “will be one in a series of responses” to the Iranian ballistic missile barrage that was fired at Israel on October 1, which came in response to a series of Israeli escalations.
A source close to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the Post that while Israel was coordinating with the US to some extent on its plans to attack Iran, it wouldn’t wait for a green light from the US. “The person who will decide on the Israeli response to Iran will be [Netanyahu],” the official said.
The report said that when Netanyahu spoke with President Biden last week, he said that Israel planned to hit military infrastructure inside Iran, not oil or nuclear facilities. The conversation was a factor in Biden’s decision to deploy a Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile battery to Israel.
The Pentagon announced Sunday that it was deploying the THAAD and about 100 troops to operate it “to support the defense of Israel.” Iran has vowed that it would respond to any Israeli attack on its territory, and the US deployment makes US troops a potential target of Iranian missiles.
The Post report noted how the Biden administration has been fully supportive of Israel’s invasion of Lebanon and its dramatic escalation of airstrikes against the country. A former Israeli official said the US was “giving Israel and the Netanyahu government a bear hug, but for Hezbollah.”
“It is sending THAAD and promising all kinds of weapons that we need to finish off Hezbollah, saying that we can deal with Iran later,” the former official added.
US military and diplomatic support for Israel over the past year has fueled the genocidal slaughter in Gaza and emboldened Israeli escalations across the Middle East, and has now brought the US and Iran to the brink of war. Brown University’s Costs of War project recently released a report that supporting Israel has cost the US $22.76 Billion in just one year.
Israel’s War on the United Nations
October 15, 2024, by: Dr Binoy Kampmark, https://theaimn.com/israels-war-on-the-united-nations/
The United Nations is an easy body to hate. At times, it seems to be effusion without substance, body with no backbone. It was conceived in a fit of post-war idealism, when egos were humbled and hatred briefly stemmed. Over the ruins of the Second World War, the builders were favoured over the destroyers and mischief makers – at least for a time.
On its establishment, the UN became a hostage to the political intrigues and power blocs that have continued to plague it for its duration. Of particular concern was the body’s pursuit of international law protocols – formulation, drafting and implementation. A central feature of this: resolutions passed by various bodies, the most significant being by the UN Security Council. Such measures are followed by nation states when convenient, ignored when not.
One such nation state in the mischief making class is Israel. Its relationship with the UN has often been tetchy. The Anti-Defamation League, for instance, admits that the body “played a pivotal role in the establishment of the Jewish State by passing UN Resolution 181 in 1947.” The resolution, with its hefty consequences, called for “the partition of British Mandate Palestine into two states, one Jewish and one Arab.” The same organisation, however, goes on to note with satisfaction the remarks in April 2007 by then UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon: “Unfortunately, because of the [Israeli-Palestinian] conflict, Israel’s been weighed down by criticism and suffered from bias – and sometimes even discrimination.”
For various periods of its history, Israel has felt hard done by in the international forum. The folder of resolutions against it has burgeoned. Notable ones include UNSC Resolution 242 (1967) which asserts, in accordance with the UN Charter principles, that a “just and lasting peace in the Middle East” includes the withdrawal of Israel’s armed forces from territories occupied during the Six Day War and the termination of territorial claims and affirmation of sovereignty of all States in the area. UNSC Resolution 338 (1973), passed in response to the Yom Kippur War between Israel, Egypt and Syria, called on the parties to cease hostilities within 12 hours and implement Resolution 242 “in all its parts.”
UN Resolution 2334, passed in December 2016, particularly hurt, striking at the expansionist, displacing drive of the Jewish state through settlements in occupied territory that amount to de facto colonisation. It particularly condemned “all measures aimed at altering the demographic composition, character and status of the Palestinian Territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem.” This included, among other matters, the expansion of the settlements, the transfer of Israeli settlers, the confiscation of land and the displacement of Palestinian civilians.
Instead of seeing such a measure as a clear assessment of predation in breach of international law and the principles of the UN Charter, Israel’s Ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, called it an unnecessary reward to the Palestinians “to continue down a dangerous path they have chosen” in avoiding direct negotiations with Israel. That Israel cared not a jot on that score hardly mattered.
A number of recent incidents reveals the poor regard the United Nations is held in, notably within Israel’s warring circles. Its agency aiding Palestinians, UNRWA, is threatened by two bills before the Israeli parliament that will significantly hamper its operations by evicting the body from its premise in territories within Israel’s control. The proposed laws will also abolish any associated privileges and immunities. Having failed to convince all major donors to the organisation that it should be defunded for being packed with Hamas apologists and operatives (the evidence has always been paltry on that score), the Israeli government is using a legal sledgehammer fashioned by the Knesset.
The passage of the bills, warns UN Secretary-General António Guterres, “would effectively end coordination to protect UN convoys, offices and shelters serving hundreds of thousands of people.” The provision of shelter, food and healthcare “would grind to a halt” without the agency. Some 600,000 children “would lose the only entity that is able to re-start education, risking the fate of an entire generation.”
With Israel’s broadening campaign against Hezbollah to the north, the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) is facing continuous harassment by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). Established in 1978 by the Security Council to confirm the withdrawal of Israel from Lebanon and aid Lebanese authorities restore peace and security in the area, UNIFIL has been a source of endless irritation to the IDF’s operations.
In an October 13 statement, UNIFIL revealed that two IDF Merkava tanks at 4.30 that morning had gone about the business of destroying the main gate of their post in Ramyah, near the Israeli border. The tanks forcibly entered, after which Israeli personnel demanded that the base turn out its lights. “The tanks left about 45 minutes later after UNIFIL protested through our liaison mechanism, saying that IDF presence was putting peacekeepers in danger.”
At 6.40 am, peacekeepers at the same post reported the firing of several smoke emitting rounds 100 metres to the north. “Despite putting on protective masks, fifteen peacekeepers suffered effects, including skin irritation and gastrointestinal reactions, after the smoke entered the camp.”
On October 14, persisting in its approach of impeding and harrying the peacekeeping force, the IDF halted “a critical UNIFIL logistical movement near Meiss ej Jebel, denying it passage. The critical movement could not be completed.”
The statement goes on to remind the IDF about its obligations to ensure the safety and security of the UN peacekeepers and property. Breaching a UN position violated UN Security Council Resolution 1701 (2006), while any deliberate attack on peacekeepers was aserious violation of international humanitarian law, in addition to breaching resolution 1701.
In an almost disdainful manner, the IDF suggested in a statement that the peacekeepers had entirely misunderstood the brutal encroachment. The actions had been motivated by goodwill to evacuate soldiers wounded by an anti-tank missile. “For the sake of evacuating the wounded, two tanks drove backwards, in a place where they could not advance otherwise in light of the threat of shooting, a few metres towards the UNIFIL position.” The smokescreen had been created to aid the evacuation, while the entire operation was conducted throughout with continuous contact with the UN peacekeepers. After a time, the dressing of lies becomes tatty and banal.
Typically, it fell to the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to shed some light on the mendacious fog. UNIFIL, he suggested, had to immediately withdraw its forces from southern Lebanon. “It is time for you,” stated the PM in a pointed message to Guterres, “to withdraw UNIFIL from Hezbollah strongholds and from the areas of combat.” Yet again, international law which, in this case, provides legitimacy to the UN peacekeeping operations in the area, could be treated as a tissue easily torn.
Exposed: How Israeli spies control your VPN (Virtual Private Network)
the high tech industry is inextricably linked to the Israeli military apparatus
Mint Press News, September 11th, 2024, Alan Macleod
An estimated 1.6 billion people rely on VPNs to carry out the most sensitive tasks online, from watching illegal videos to engaging in sexual or political activities. But few people know that a considerable chunk of that market—including three of the six most popular VPNs—is quietly operated by an Israeli-owned company with close connections to that country’s national security state, including the elite Unit 8200 and Duvdevan Units of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF).
Previous MintPress News investigations into Israel’s growing control over the tech industry have outlined how those units have been involved in many of Israel’s most outrageous hacking, surveillance and assassination programs, acting as spies and death squads. Unit 8200, for example, has been the source of much of the world’s most infamous spying software, including Cellebrite and Pegasus, the program used to snoop on tens of thousands of the world’s top politicians and journalists, including by Saudi Arabia, who used it to help track down and kill Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi.
Given this context, justifiable fears arise that control over a vast VPN empire could add to Israel’s influence over the online information and security world, creating backdoors for Israeli intelligence to carry out a vast kompromat operation on users around the globe.
This investigation is part of a series highlighting and detailing the power of Israel’s growing tech industry to access and control people’s data.
A Company Like No Other
Kape Technologies is a major player in the online privacy world, one of the three giants that collectively control the market. It owns many of the world’s top VPNs, including ExpressVPN, CyberGhost, Private Internet Access, ZenMate, Intego Antivirus, and a host of tech websites that promote its products. Kape brands can be seen sponsoring a wide array of public figures, such as Tucker Carlson, Angry Video Game Nerd, Drew Gooden, Lex Fridman, Cody Ko, Uncle Roger, and Ben Shapiro.
“We are living in an era of tyranny,” Shapiro says in one video endorsing the company, adding:
“The Internet is at the frontier of a battle for control. When powerful interests want to push their agenda, they get big government and big tech to silence any voice that doesn’t fit the narrative. Americans are being forced to give up the very thing that makes Americans great: our freedom of speech. Well, I don’t like my voice being censored, I also don’t like being monitored by big Tech and big government, that’s why I use ExpressVPN [and] you should do the same.”
VPN stands for virtual private network and is a service that claims to protect your anonymity online. Instead of giving your information to an internet service provider, you provide it to the VPN company, who will scramble it, allowing users to get around government censorship and carry out activities online that they do not wish to be connected to themselves, such as purchasing banned products, partaking in certain activities, and communicating with others. Therefore, individuals trust VPNs to conceal their most sensitive activities.
Although it is headquartered in London and employs more than 1,000 people worldwide, Kape Technologies maintains a distinctly Israeli flavor. This begins with its owner, Teddy Sagi. Born in Tel Aviv, the tycoon, who previously spent time in prison for financial crimes,isestimatedto be worth $6.4 billion, making him among the top ten richest Israelis.
Sagi has a long history of working closely with the IDF and is rumored to be extremely close to Israeli intelligence. In 2019, he donated $3 million to fund hundreds of academic scholarships for discharged Israeli soldiers.
Sagi, at the Friends of the IDF Gala, said:
“It is a debt of honor for us and for me personally to express gratitude and appreciation that all of Israel’s citizens owe to you.”
………………………………Kape Technology’s connections to the Israeli security services do not end there. Indeed, the company is teeming with Israeli intelligence officials.………………………..
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. Express VPN Executive, a Former Spy
When using a VPN service, users place a large amount of trust in the VPN company itself. They must trust that it is effectively encrypting users’ traffic, securing their data and the server network infrastructure, and not doing anything else with the vast amount of sensitive information they are given. As noted previously, individuals and organizations use VPNs to carry out all manner of highly compromising activities online.
Unfortunately, Daniel Gericke, ExpressVPN’s chief technology officer (CTO) from 2019-2023, was deeply involved in such questionable practices. A Reuters investigation series revealed that Gericke was a key member of a team of spies that hacked the devices of human rights activists, journalists and government officials, stealing their data and passing it on to the government of the United Arab Emirates. The UAE used this data to track down dissidents and torture them, according to the investigation.
ExpressVPN hired Gericke (a former manager for weapons firm Lockheed Martin) after the Reuters exposé and continued to back him, even after the U.S. Department of Justice fined him $335,000 for his role in the clandestine operation. “Our trust in Daniel remains strong,” the company said in a statement. Gericke left ExpressVPN last summer after nearly four years with the company.
A Unit Like No Other
With his background as a former spy, Gericke likely fits well with many of the other top Kape Technologies leaders. Ido Erlichman, Kape CEO between 2016 and 2023, is a veteran of the Duvdevan, an elite Israeli commando unit. Described by Middle East news outlet Electronic Intifada as Israel’s “death squad,” members are given special training to disguise themselves as Palestinians in order to infiltrate enemy groups and carry out extrajudicial killings. Both the selection process and the training are exceptionally rigorous, and Duvdevan commandos often spend months or even years undercover before being assigned a mission.
The life and work of Duvdevan agents were explored and promoted in the Netflix series Fauda.
Unit 8200, meanwhile, is no less prestigious.Described as Israel’s Harvard, parents spend fortunes on extra classes for their children, who know that selection into the unit will unlock a wealth of doors in Israel’s burgeoning hi-tech industry.
But Unit 8200 is also the centerpiece of the country’s repressive state apparatus. It has created a gigantic digital dragnet that is used to constantly monitor, surveil and harass the Palestinian population,whose calls, emails and every move are clocked by the group.
Unit 8200 uses this data to compile gigantic dossiers of information on Palestinians under their control, including their medical history, sex lives, and search histories, so that it could be used later for extortion. If a particular individual needs to travel across checkpoints for crucial medical treatment, permission can be suspended until they comply with Israeli requests for dirt on their peers. Information, such as if a person was cheating on their spouse or was homosexual, is also used as bait for blackmail. One former Unit 8200 soldier said that as part of his training, he was assigned to memorize different Arabic words for “gay” so that he could listen out for them in conversations.
In 2014, 43 Unit 8200 reservists went public,revealing that the unit makes no distinction between ordinary Palestinians and those engaged in violence and that Palestinians as a whole are considered enemies of the state. They also claimed that their intelligence was passed on to powerful local politicians, who used it as they saw fit.
More recently, Unit 8200’s new project, Lavender, uses artificial intelligence to select targets for the Israeli military’s bombing campaign in Gaza. A “conservative estimate” published by the medical journal The Lancet suggested that 186,000 people have died since October 7 due to Israeli bombing. Some two millionmore people have been displaced.
Unit 8200 agents have gone on to produce many of the world’s most downloaded apps, including the maps service Waze and the communications platform Viber.Perhaps the most consequential, however, is the spying software Pegasus.
Pegasus was used to spy on more than 50,000 prominent individuals around the world, including politicians such as President Emmanuel Macron of France, Prime Minister Imran Khan of Pakistan, and President Barham Salih of Iraq. Journalists, human rights defenders and members of royal families were also targeted for surveillance. The Unit 8200 veterans sold Pegasus to some of the world’s most authoritarian governments. Indian prime minister Narendra Modi, for example, used the software to dig up dirt on his political opponents, while other members of his government hacked the phone of a woman who accused the Chief Justice of India of raping her.
Known purchasers of the software include the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, as well as the governments of the UAE, Panama, and Saudi Arabia, who used the software to surveil Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi before he was assassinated by Saudi agents in Türkiye. All sales of Pegasus had to be approved by the Israeli government, who ostensibly had access to the data Pegasus’ foreign customers were accruing.
Unit 8200 veterans have even created spyware VPNs before. In 2013, Facebook purchased Onavo Protect and later heavily promoted its product to its billions of users. However, Those who downloaded it were unaware that, far from being a privacy app,Onavo was being used to surveil them to help Facebook understand the market and crush its competitors. After the scandal was made public, Facebook removed Onavo from the app store, and, as of 2019, the product is defunct.
The Spies Controlling Your Social Media
Facebook’s collaboration with Unit 8200 goes far deeper, however. This author’s 2022 MintPress News investigation found that a vast number of Unit 8200 veterans had gone on to work in senior positions at Meta, Facebook’s parent company.
Chief among these is Emi Palmor, a longtime IDF veteran and former Director General of the Israeli Ministry of Justice.Palmor is one of 21 individuals sitting on Meta’s Oversight Board, the panel that ultimately controls the political direction of Facebook, Instagram and Threads, deciding what content is appropriate and what is unacceptable and should be suppressed. As such, a Unit 8200 veteran is influencing what content billions of users see – and don’t see – online, including, presumably, on Israel’s assault on Gaza, an issue on which Facebook has consistently favored Israel and silenced Palestinian voices.
The same investigation found at least 99 former Unit 8200 agents working at Google. These included Google’s head of strategy and operations, Gavriel Goidel; its head of insights, data and management, Jonathan Cohen; and Google Waze’s head of global self-service, Ori Daniel.
Microsoft, meanwhile, hired at least 166 Unit 8200 veterans to fill its ranks, including many that went straight from the military into the company, suggesting that it is actively recruiting from the regiment.
These numbers are certainly a serious underestimate, as, under Israeli law, revealing one’s current or previous affiliation to Unit 8200 is an offense. Therefore, those found were the ones brazen enough to defy Israeli law.
Is Your Identity Safe?
Internet secrecy is a serious business. Over a billion individuals trust VPNs to hide their identities online. However, the background of Kape Technologies, from its beginnings as an adware company spamming users with advertisements to its key figures’ close connections to Israeli intelligence, raises serious concerns about its clients’ privacy.
At best, a worrying set of conflicts of interest arises when giving your data to a company with such an ethical background. But given that many of the key figures highlighted here have close connections to groups such as the Duvdevan and Unit 8200, both of which carry out wide-scale spying operations, and ExpressVPN’s former CTO reportedly working to spy on users and pass that information on to foreign governments, one cannot rule out the possibility that this is a gigantic sting operation to gather data on vast amounts of individuals,akin to what Unit 8200 is already known to do.
While ExpressVPN, CyberGhost, Private Internet Access, ZenMate and other Kape Technologies products may well be safe to use, activists and revolutionaries — particularly those who work on issues such as Palestine — should at least know the company’s history before reflexively trusting it. https://www.mintpressnews.com/exposed-how-israeli-spies-control-your-vpn/288259/
Book: THE FALL OF ISRAEL: The Degradation of Israel’s Politics, Economy & Military
“Israel is in deep trouble at home and abroad. It has become an apartheid state that is executing a genocide in Gaza. The Fall of Israel does an outstanding job explaining the causes and the evolution of the disastrous path that Israel is on.
Dan Steinbock, https://www.claritypress.com/product/the-fall-of-israel/ 15 Oct 24
The path to the obliteration of Gaza was paved by the confluence of a set of longstanding forces. This great conjuncture has transformed Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories while driving the region to the edge. In The Fall of Israel, Dr Dan Steinbock connects the dots among these lethal headwinds. What makes The Fall of Israel unique is its comprehensive scope. It covers Israel’s political, economic, social and military changes, the shifts in the Palestinian struggle for sovereignty, Israel’s degradation into apartheid rule, the attendant atrocities, the regional and global reverberations and the human and economic costs, both prior and subsequent to Israel’s fatal war on Gaza. There, its nightmarish actions have led to the engagement of the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court, renewed international boycotts, and massive domestic and international protests.
“Israel is in deep trouble at home and abroad. It has become an apartheid state that is executing a genocide in Gaza. The Fall of Israel does an outstanding job explaining the causes and the evolution of the disastrous path that Israel is on. This book deserves to be widely read by anyone interested in understanding contemporary Israel.”—JOHN MEARSHEIMER, R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science, University of Chicago and co-author of The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy
“This impressive book provides a comprehensive and incisive answer to the question how we got to where we are in Israel and Palestine today. In a very accessible manner, Steinbock narrates the making of a messianic and theocratic Israel which is a menace for the Palestinians, the region and no less important, to itself. Its downfall as the book predicts is neigh, but on the way, it wreaks havoc and destruction. This is the picture world leaders must be aware of and challenge before it is too late.” —ILAN PAPPE, Professor of History, Director of the European Centre for Palestine Studies, Author of The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine
“Eight years ago I said that Israel would not be a state in 20 years; today I reaffirm that prognosis adding only that it won’t take 12 more years. Many of my reasons for reaching that conclusion — and indeed far more — are elaborated in The Fall of Israel. Apparently, not many Americans want to know these truths — they’re too nuanced, complex, and damning; but if you happen to be in that group of us who believe strongly in the rule of law — U.S. domestic law and international humanitarian and criminal law in particular — and in democracy, then you need to read this book. When you finish, I hope you will understand that our current national path leads us straight to hell. “—LAWRENCE WILKERSON, Col, USA (Ret) and former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell
The Fall of Israel is one of the most comprehensive academic books on the Palestinian crisis. . .This book thoroughly and accurately explains significant facts about the objectives and crimes of Zionism, the likes of which are rarely found in previous academic works.”—SEYED HOSSEIN MOUSAVIAN, Middle East Security and Nuclear Policy Specialist, Princeton University
“Dr. Steinbock’s research illuminates what the public is reluctant to digest: Namely that Israel operates in open rebellion against international law, refusing to live in peace with Palestine’s native population and with neighboring States.”—ALFRED DE ZAYAS, Former UN Independent Expert on the Promotion of a Democratic and Equitable International Order
“Dr Steinbock’s book The Fall of Israel is an illuminating and intelligent contribution to our understanding of the events in the Middle East.”—DR. ERKKI TUOMIOJA, Historian and longest serving Minister for Foreign Affairs, Finland, who had a prominent role as the spokesman for European foreign policy
“The Fall of Israel explains excellently how 76 years of repression and suffering for the Palestinians has been facilitated by the unconditional American support for Israelf.”—MOGENS LYKKETOFT, Former Danish Foreign Minister and President of the United Nations General Assembly 2015-2016
“Vital reading for anyone concerned with this issue, and provides perceptive insight that is sorely needed.” —JONATHAN KUTTAB, international human rights attorney, co-founder of Nonviolence International and co-founder of the Palestinian human rights group Al-Haq
Israel intensifies genocide in Gaza and deepens killings in Lebanon
Mike Head @MikeHeadWSWS, 12 October 202, https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2024/10/12/qbdw-o12.html
Armed to the teeth by the Biden-Harris administration in the US, the Israeli regime is re-intensifying its slaughter in refugee camps, schools and hospitals in northern and central Gaza, even as it expands its invasion and bombardments in Lebanon, including the centre of Beirut.
In the most recent attacks in Gaza, at least 22 people were killed yesterday in an air strike in Jabalia—the largest of Gaza’s eight historic refugee camps—in northern Gaza. Dozens were injured, with some ambulances unable to help rescue efforts due to fuel shortages.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) issued virtually impossible orders for residents, hospitals and healthcare centres across the area to evacuate, placing thousands of people, including healthcare workers and their maimed patients, directly in danger.
A strike on a school sheltering displaced people in the central Gaza city of Deir al-Balah also killed at least 28 people, including a child and seven women, according to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, where bodies were taken. It said several other people were wounded.
Gaza’s Health Ministry said 61 Palestinians were killed and 231 were wounded in the latest 24-hour reporting period.
Thousands of people are trapped in Jabalia as Israeli forces continue to attack the area, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said. “Nobody is allowed to get in or out, anyone who tries is getting shot,” Sarah Vuylsteke, MSF project coordinator, said in a post on X.
The Israeli army issued evacuation orders for residents in the camp on October 7, “while carrying out attacks at the same time, preventing people from leaving the area safely,” MSF said.
Forced evacuations and bombing of neighbourhoods are turning Gaza’s north into “unhabitable ruins,” MSF added.
Haydar, an MSF driver inside the camp, said: “We were staying at the Al-Yemen Al-Saeed Hospital, but they bombed it. About 20 people were killed. I don’t know what to do, at any moment we could die. People are starving. I am afraid to stay, and I am also afraid to leave.”
United Nations officials voiced concerns yesterday that the Israeli offensive, as well as evacuation orders in northern Gaza, might affect the second phase of a polio vaccination campaign set to start next week.
Aid groups carried out an initial round of vaccinations last month after a baby was partially paralysed by the Type 2 polio virus in August, the first such case in the territory in 25 years.
“I am, of course, concerned about the developments in the north, and specifically with these evacuation orders,” the World Health Organization’s representative in occupied Palestinian territory, Rik Peeperkorn, told reporters in Geneva.
Peeperkorn said three attempts by the UN health agency and its partners to assist and evacuate patients from northern Gaza hospitals under evacuation orders have been thwarted this week.
This renewed Israeli offensive, combined with systematic starvation and denial of medical access, underscores the genocidal intent of the Netanyahu government. By the official Gaza health statistics, the IDF has killed more than 42,000 people, mostly women and children over the past 12 months, but the true toll may be closer to 200,000, counting the unrecovered bodies beneath the rubble.
Israel’s assault on Lebanon is widening and deepening at the same time. On Thursday night, 22 people were killed and 139 wounded in strikes in the heart of Beirut, Lebanon’s capital, said caretaker Prime Minister Najib Makati.
Videos published by local news channels showed chaotic scenes following the attacks on Ras el-Nabaa and al-Nuweiri in Beirut. The strikes hit densely-populated residential areas. Many residents left their apartments in the high-rise blocks in the area and gathered in courtyards as emergency services rushed to the scene.
Israel did not issue evacuation warnings ahead of the strikes, which were the deadliest on central Beirut since the IDF offensive began last month. The area is outside the city’s southern suburbs, which Israeli forces have already pulverised.
The bombardments allegedly targeted Wafiq Safa, who heads Hezbollah’s liaison and coordination unit working with the Lebanese government, and is therefore considered a political figure rather than a military one. That marks a heightening of the Israeli aggression.
A US-made munition was used in the strikes, the Guardian reported. The newspaper found remnants of a US-manufactured joint direct attack munition (JDAM) amid the debris of a building that was reduced to rubble.
According to the report, “JDAMs are guidance kits built by the US aerospace company Boeing that attach to large ‘dumb bombs’ ranging up to 2,000 lbs (900kg), converting them into GPS-guided bombs.”
Earlier in the day, Israel warned Lebanese civilians not to return to their homes in the south of the country. The IDF soldiers were pushing on with their ground “incursion” inside Lebanon, as its fighter jets attacked more than 110 targets in the country in a single day.
Israeli strikes have killed at least 2,169 people, wounded more than 10,000 and displaced more than 1.2 million people in Lebanon over the past year, the Lebanese government said in its daily update.
Israel’s flagrant assault on Lebanon, which it last invaded in 2006, was further demonstrated when an Israeli airstrike killed two Lebanese soldiers and wounded three others. That was just hours after the Israeli military fired on the headquarters of UNIFIL, the UN peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon, for the second time in as many days.
Two UNIFIL soldiers were also injured on Friday by an Israeli strike near their monitoring watchtower.
In the statement posted to X, UNIFIL also said an IDF bulldozer knocked over barriers at a UN position near the “Blue Line,” the unofficial demarcation line between Israel and Lebanon.
“Any deliberate attack on peacekeepers is a grave violation of international humanitarian law,” the statement concluded.
UNIFIL has some 10,000 personnel, with Italy, France, Malaysia, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India among the biggest contributors. It was created to oversee the withdrawal of Israeli troops from southern Lebanon after Israel’s 1978 invasion and was expanded after the 2006 Israeli invasion, allowing its troops to deploy along the Israeli border.
Various imperialist governments, including the US, UK, France, Italy and Spain, issued statements condemning the attacks on UNIFIL as serious violations of humanitarian international law and UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which ruled that UNIFIL personnel would replace the Israeli forces occupying southern Lebanon.
But the same governments are continuing to facilitate and arm Israel’s barbarism.
US President Joe Biden reaffirmed his “ironclad” support for Israel during a 30-minute phone call with Netanyahu on Wednesday, the White House said. Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate, joined the call, which reportedly discussed Israel’s plans to strike Iran.
“The president affirmed Israel’s right to protect its citizens from Hezbollah, which has fired thousands of missiles and rockets into Israel over the past year alone, while emphasizing the need to minimize harm to civilians, in particular in the densely populated areas of Beirut,” the White House said.
The latter phrase is another desperate bid, in the face of widespread opposition among workers and youth in the US and globally, to cover up US imperialism’s responsibility for the ongoing slaughter in Lebanon, as well as Palestine. The US provides Israel at least $3.8 billion in military aid annually, and the Biden-Harris administration has authorised $14 billion in further assistance to its proxy to help fund the genocide and a wider war for domination over the resource-rich and strategic Middle East, directed against Iran, Russia and China.
On Wednesday, the Socialist Equality Party in the US hosted a live-streamed discussion to mark the one-year anniversary of the Gaza genocide, analysing the historical roots of the US-Israeli rampage in the Middle East and advancing a socialist strategy to stop it.
The event, featuring SEP National Secretary Joseph Kishore, WSWS Labor Editor Jerry White and WSWS International Editorial Board Chairman David North, referenced the centuries of colonial rule in the Middle East, the ethnic cleansing of Palestine, Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian territory since 1967, and the brutal US wars throughout the region since 1991.
U.S. to Deploy Missile Defense System and About 100 Troops to Israel
The Pentagon announced it would send the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense battery and its crew as Israel considered retaliatory attacks against Iran.
NY Times, By Helene Cooper, Reporting from Washington, Oct. 13, 2024
The United States is sending an advanced missile defense system to Israel, along with about 100 American troops to operate it, the Pentagon announced on Sunday. It is the first deployment of U.S. forces to Israel since the Hamas-led attacks there on Oct. 7, 2023.
President Biden directed Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III to deploy the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system, or THAAD, and its crew, Maj. Gen. Patrick Ryder, the Pentagon press secretary, said in a statement on Sunday.
The move will put American troops operating the ground-based interceptor, which is designed to defend against ballistic missiles, closer to the widening war in the Middle East. It comes after Iran launched about 200 missiles at Israel on Oct. 1 and as Israel plans its retaliatory attack.
The THAAD battery, a mobile defense system, will give the Israel Defense Forces another layer of protection to defend cities, troops and installations from short- and intermediate-range ballistic missiles like those deployed by Iran in its last attack…………………………………………………………………………………
late last month, the Pentagon said that it would send a “few thousand” American troops to the Middle East as Israel intensified its attacks on Hezbollah in Lebanon, with one official putting the figure between 2,000 and 3,000. The United States also sent a THAAD battery along with other air defense systems to the region weeks after the attacks on Oct. 7, 2023. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/13/us/politics/us-missile-defense-iran-israel.html?unlocked_article_code=1.R04.e14E.qqRr91Mg9WWs&smid=em-share—
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