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The Israel-US game plan for Gaza is staring us in the face

The western media is pretending the West’s efforts to secure a ceasefire are serious. But a different script has clearly been written in advance

JONATHAN COOK, APR 30, 2024, https://jonathancook.substack.com/p/the-israel-us-game-plan-for-gaza

One does not need to be a fortune-teller to understand that the Israel-US game plan for Gaza runs something like this:

1. In public, Biden appears “tough” on Netanyahu, urging him not to “invade” Rafah and pressuring him to allow more “humanitarian aid” into Gaza.

2. But already the White House is preparing the ground to subvert its own messaging. It insists that Israel has offered an “extraordinarily generous” deal to Hamas – one that, Washington suggests, amounts to a ceasefire. It doesn’t. According to reports, the best Israel has offered is an undefined “period of sustained calm”. Even that promise can’t be trusted.

3. If Hamas accepts the “deal” and agrees to return some of the hostages, the bombing eases for a short while but the famine intensifies, justified by Israel’s determination for “total victory” against Hamas – something that is impossible to achieve. This will simply delay, for a matter of days or weeks, Israel’s move to step 5 below.

4. If, as seems more likely, Hamas rejects the “deal”, it will be painted as the intransigent party and blamed for seeking to continue the “war”. (Note: This was never a war. Only the West pretends either that you can be at war with a territory you’ve been occupying for decades, or that Hamas “started the war” with its October 7 attack when Israel has been blockading the enclave, creating despair and incremental malnutrition there, for 17 years.)

Last night US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken moved this script on by stating Hamas was “the only thing standing between the people of Gaza and a ceasefire… They have to decide and they have to decide quickly”.

5. The US will announce that Israel has devised a humanitarian plan that satisfies the conditions Biden laid down for an attack on Rafah to begin.

6. This will give the US, Europe and the region the pretext to stand back as Israel launches the long-awaited assault – an attack Biden has previously asserted would be a “red line”, leading to mass civilian casualties. All that will be forgotten.

7. As Middle East Eye reports, Israel is building a ring of checkpoints around Rafah. Netanyahu will suggest, falsely, that these guarantee its attack meets the conditions laid down in international humanitarian law. Women and children will be allowed out – if they can reach a checkpoint before Israel’s carpet bombing kills them along the way.

8. All men in Rafah, and any women and children who remain, will be treated as armed combatants. If they are not killed by the bombing or falling rubble, they will be either summarily executed or dragged off to Israel’s torture chambers. No one will mention that any Hamas fighters who were in Rafah were able to leave through the tunnels.

9. Rafah will be destroyed, leaving the entire strip in ruins, and the Israeli-induced famine will worsen. The West will throw up its hands, say Hamas brought this on Gaza, agonise over what to do, and press third countries – especially Arab countries – for a “humanitarian plan” that relocates the survivors out of Gaza.

10. The western media will continue describing Israel’s genocide in Gaza in purely humanitarian terms, as though this “disaster” was an act of God.

11. Under US pressure, the International Court of Justice, or World Court, will be in no hurry to issue a definitive ruling on whether South Africa’s case that Israel is committing a genocide – which it has already found “plausible” – is proved.

12. Whatever the World Court eventually decides, and it is almost impossible to imagine it won’t determine that Israel carried out a genocide, it will be too late. The western political and media class will have moved on, leaving it to the historians to decide what it all meant.

13. Meanwhile, Israel is already using the precedents it has created in Gaza, and its erosion of the long-established principles of international law, as the blueprint for the West Bank. Saying Hamas has not been completely routed in Gaza but is using this other Palestinian enclave as its base, Israel will gradually intensify the pressures on the West Bank with another blockade. Rinse and repeat.

That’s the likely plan. Our job is to do everything in our power to stop them making it a reality.

May 2, 2024 Posted by | Gaza, Israel, politics international, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

How Israel violates International Law in Gaza: expert report

 https://mondoweiss.net/2024/04/how-israel-violates-international-law-in-gaza-expert-report/

The findings are illustrated by 17 specific, horrific “incidents” and 18 pages of additional incidents. This review of incidents is said to be “supported by both credible media and civil society reporting and statements by Government of Israel officials and IDF uniformed officers.” But the incidents identified are “just the most easily identifiable among a clear pattern of violations of international law, failures to apply civilian harm mitigation best practices, and restrictions on humanitarian assistance,” by Israel and the IDF, often using U.S.-provided arms.

An independent expert report lays out how Israel systematically violated U.S. and International Law in Gaza, concluding that Israel launched indiscriminate and disproportionate attacks on civilian areas due to “extremely relaxed rules of engagement.”

BY STEVE FRANCE   

 Just days after the Biden administration showered the Israeli military with billions of dollars more in lethal aid, still with no apparent effort to restrict its use on non-military populations and structures, Palestinian solidarity activists were gifted with powerful ammunition to challenge Israel’s genocidal disregard for the International and U.S. laws and norms that protect civilians in war situations.

In a sober but scathing 76-page report, publicly released on April 24, the Independent Task Force on the Application of National Security Memorandum-20 (NSM-20), details “multiple credible incidents constituting violations of international humanitarian law, military best practices, and [improper] restrictions on humanitarian assistance.” 

The volunteer and unaffiliated task force of prominent experts — including two recently departed senior State Department officials, legal scholar Noura Erekat, and a former senior “joint terminal attack controller,” Wes Bryant — was rapidly formed after President Biden signed NSM-20 on February 8, 2024. The memorandum tasked the Departments of State and Defense to report to Congress by May 8 on the compliance of Israel (and, nominally, other U.S. allies) with International Humanitarian Law and military best practices, as well as on whether it has impeded humanitarian assistance to Gaza.

Co-chair Noura Erekat said at a briefing that the task force report has two main goals: first, to “inform” State and Defense officials’ review with a selection of well-documented and assessed incidents of misuse of aid, and second, to put pressure on the agencies and the White House to act vigorously to curb the abuses. The pressure will depend on the report’s ability to focus the understanding of the media, the relevant experts, and activists on specific illustrative cases and to clearly explain the legal framework and standards that are supposed to apply.

The panel reported that its 

“aggregate analysis of credible reports involving U.S-provided weapons by Israeli forces indicates a context of systematic disregard for fundamental principles of international law, including recurrent attacks launched despite foreseeably disproportionate harm to civilians and civilian objects, wide area attacks without prior warnings in some of the most densely populated residential neighborhoods in the world, direct attacks on civilians…and attacks against civilian objects, including those indispensable for the survival of the civilian population.”

The experts further reported:

“Israeli intelligence sources cited by credible media reports indicate that these patterns of unlawful attacks reflect reliance on an unyielding and unconditioned supply of U.S. weapons, relaxed rules of engagement, application of collective punishment, and the use of artificial intelligence technology to generate thousands of targets (including civilian police and civil defense personnel), at maximum speed and with minimal human oversight.” 

The findings are illustrated by 17 specific, horrific “incidents” and 18 pages of additional incidents. This review of incidents is said to be “supported by both credible media and civil society reporting and statements by Government of Israel officials and IDF uniformed officers.” But the incidents identified are “just the most easily identifiable among a clear pattern of violations of international law, failures to apply civilian harm mitigation best practices, and restrictions on humanitarian assistance,” by Israel and the IDF, often using U.S.-provided arms.

Just as important for non-experts is the report’s outline of exactly how the U.S. and international legal systems are supposed to protect civilians from harm — and how they are flouted. Thus, the experts point to three “fundamental rules [that] govern targeting decisions in armed conflict”: 

1 Distinguish between civilians and combatants, and between civilian objects and military objectives, with a presumption that persons or objects are protected from attack unless the information available at the time indicates that they are military objectives.

2. Take all feasible “precautions” in planning and conducting attacks to avoid or at least minimize incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, and damage to civilian objects. 


3. Respect “proportionality,” i.e., conduct no attacks that are excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated. The greater the foreseeable harm to civilians and civilian objects, the greater the foreseeable military advantage necessary to justify a particular attack. International humanitarian law (IHL) gives special protection to hospitals, clinics, and ambulances, as well as to humanitarian relief operations, and UN premises.

The report outlines the basics of “civilian harm mitigation practices,” including U.S. Defense Department practices. A key concept is “no-strike entities” (NSEs), which DOD says “may include, but are not limited to, medical, educational, diplomatic, cultural, religious, and historical sites, or other objects that do not, by their nature, location, purpose, or use, effectively contribute to the enemy’s war-fighting or war-sustaining capability.” The task force charges that Israel has “routinely and repeatedly” targeted six fundamental categories of NSEs, plus a broad array of slightly less protected entities.

Proportionality ‘rendered meaningless’

A common excuse the Israelis advance for the death and wounding of civilians is that they are being used by Hamas as “human shields.” The report notes that “taking advantage of the presence of civilians or other protected persons with intent to shield a military objective from attack constitutes a war crime.” However, U.S. military rules “affirm that an attacker shares responsibility for civilian harm with its enemies if it fails to take feasible precautions” to avoid killing shields.

NSM-20 itself spells out that its allies must “facilitate and not arbitrarily deny, restrict, or otherwise impede . . . the transport or delivery of [U.S.] humanitarian assistance and U.S. Government-supported international…humanitarian assistance.”

Outlining the “context” of Israel’s “systematic disregard for IHL,” the report cites “recurrent attacks launched despite foreseeably disproportionate harm to civilians and civilian objects, wide-area attacks without prior warnings in some of the most densely populated residential neighborhoods in the world, direct attacks on civilians or otherwise protected persons…and attacks against civilians objects, including those indispensable for the survival of the civilian population.” A high-ranking former IDF officer is quoted as condemning Israel’s “reckless conduct,” which he says “reflects an absolute assumption that the U.S. will continue to arm and finance it.”  

“Extremely relaxed rules of engagement” inconsistent with IHL also explain much of the harm done to civilians. Thus, Chief of Staff of the Israeli Air Force, Omar Tishler, has stated that neighborhoods have been attacked “on a large scale and not in a surgical manner.” 

Such attacks are facilitated by an expansion of the concept of “military advantage” in its proportionality assessments to weigh civilian harms against the advantages of “an operation as a whole,” rather than against each individual attack. That move “renders the proportionality rule meaningless,” the report says, as it’s impossible to compare the harms of a single specific attack with all the military advantages allegedly achieved or sought by the whole Gaza operation, which has lasted more than six months. 

Similarly, former U.S. Air Force drone controller Bryant noted how Israel blurs the requirement of taking precautions to protect civilians “by employing precautions it knows are ineffective,” such as texting populations whose phones are not functional.

Also “relaxed” is Israel’s use of the term terrorist. Thus, a reserve officer told Ha’aretz, “In practice, a terrorist is anyone the IDF has killed in the areas in which its forces operate.” The extensive, open-ended imposition of “kill zones” is another way to disguise genocide, an Israeli intelligence officer has explained. With a “kill zone” lasting a month or two, “you could stick with an order that anyone approaching should be shot…But we’ve been there for six months, and people have to start coming out; they are trying to survive, and that leads to very serious incidents.” 

 Lastly, Israel asserts it can block humanitarian aid, if it has “serious reasons for fearing” that relief consignments “will be diverted from their civilian destination or otherwise provide a definite advantage to the enemy’s military efforts” — a position the task force says relies on a “defective rule” from 1949 that was modified in 1977 and superseded by a rule of customary international law. Recent UN Security Council and General Assembly resolutions confirm that Israel “must allow and facilitate rapid and unimpeded humanitarian relief and may not deny such relief based on fears that a small portion of aid may be seized by armed groups.”

In conclusion, the report warns that “the Task Force’s findings raise grave concerns regarding the Administration’s compliance with both U.S. and international law, particularly with respect to security assistance and arms transfers.” It then identifies the laws in question, as well as citing “obligations under customary international law to ensure respect for international humanitarian law and to cooperate to bring serious violations of peremptory norms of general international law to an end through lawful means.”

May 2, 2024 Posted by | Gaza, Israel, Legal | Leave a comment

Academic arrested for “statements against Zionism” as Israel intensifies anti-genocide crackdown

Jean Shaoul, WSWS, 1 May 24

This month, Israeli police arrested and detained for questioning Professor Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian, a leading Palestinian legal academic, over comments made on a podcast weeks earlier. Shalhoub-Kevorkian holds a chair in law at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and another at Queen Mary University of London.

The police said, “The detainee is suspected of making serious incitement against the State of Israel and for having said statements against Zionism and even claims that Israel is currently committing genocide in the Gaza Strip.” They added that they had found posters and pictures in her home depicting Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers as an occupying army.

Freedom of political expression in relation to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has always been restricted and there have been widespread detentions of Palestinian citizens of Israel who have publicly criticised the war in Gaza. But this is the first time an academic has been targeted over opposition to Zionism, possession of posters against the occupation and claims of Israeli genocide in Gaza—statements that pose no “security threat,” let alone any “incitement” to violence, terror and racism. Since the attorney general’s office must approve all prosecutions relating to freedom of speech, Shalhoub-Kevorkian’s detention was greenlighted not just by the police but at the very heart of government.

Her detention is part of a broader crackdown on dissent and the targeting of Israel’s critics by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s fascistic regime, aimed at intimidating and silencing Israel’s Palestinian citizens who make up 20 percent of the population. Netanyahu’s strategic goal of annexing Palestinian territory illegally occupied since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and establishing an ethno-religious regime between the River Jordan and the Mediterranean Sea means the “only democracy in the Middle East” eliminating even the tattered, democratic façade of the Israeli state.

The police confiscated books and posters from Shalhoub-Kevorkian’s home and questioned her extensively about her academic work, including articles published years ago, even though academic writing is afforded special legal protections in Israel. In her 60s, she was strip-searched, handcuffed so tightly it caused pain, denied access to food, water and medication for several hours, and held overnight in a cold cell without adequate clothing or blankets, conditions her lawyers described as “terrible” and designed to humiliate. While she was released on bail the next day, after a magistrate and a district court judge both ruled she posed no threat, days later she was summoned for further questioning.

Her lawyer, the director of the human rights organisation Adalah, Hassan Jabareen, said, “This case is unique. This is not only about one professor; it could be a [precedent] for any academic who goes against the consensus in wartime.” As he explained, “They could have asked her to come to the police station for two or three hours to discuss, investigate. To carry out the arrest like that, as if she was a dangerous person, shows the main purpose was to humiliate her. It was illegal, that’s why the magistrates court accepted my argument that she should be released and the district court confirmed it.”

Her arrest follows months of political attacks orchestrated by the Hebrew University, which likes to present itself as a model of liberalism and inclusion, in the run-up to her detention. The rector had called on her to resign in late 2023 after she signed a letter calling for a ceasefire in Gaza and describing Israel’s campaign as genocide, and she was briefly suspended over a podcast in which she discussed the tragic events of October 7 and the subsequent destruction, death, and starvation in Gaza. He had objected to her calling for Zionism to be abolished and casting doubt about some aspects of the October 7 attack, particularly reports of sexual assaults.

More than 100 academics at the Hebrew University published an open letter backing Shalhoub-Kevorkian, criticising the university for not supporting her. They wrote, “Regardless of the content of Nadera’s words, their interpretation and the opinions she expressed, it is clear to everyone that this is a political arrest, the whole purpose of which is to gag mouths and limit freedom of expression. Today it is Nadera who stands on the bench, and tomorrow it is each and every one of us.”…………………………………………………………………….. more https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2024/04/30/dxoj-a30.html

May 2, 2024 Posted by | civil liberties, Education, Israel, Legal | Leave a comment

We need an exodus from Zionism

Naomi Klein, Wed 24 Apr 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/apr/24/zionism-seder-protest-new-york-gaza-israel

This Passover, we don’t need or want the false idol of Zionism. We want freedom from the project that commits genocide in our name

.”……………………………..What I want to say to you tonight at this revolutionary and historic Seder in the Streets is that too many of our people are worshipping a false idol once again. They are enraptured by it. Drunk on it. Profaned by it.

That false idol is called Zionism.

Zionism is a false idol that has taken the idea of the promised land and turned it into a deed of sale for a militaristic ethnostate

It is a false idol that takes our most profound biblical stories of justice and emancipation from slavery – the story of Passover itself – and turns them into brutalist weapons of colonial land theft, roadmaps for ethnic cleansing and genocide.

It is a false idol that has taken the transcendent idea of the promised land – a metaphor for human liberation that has traveled across multiple faiths to every corner of this globe – and dared to turn it into a deed of sale for a militaristic ethnostate.

Political Zionism’s version of liberation is itself profane. From the start, it required the mass expulsion of Palestinians from their homes and ancestral lands in the Nakba.

From the start it has been at war with dreams of liberation. At a Seder it is worth remembering that this includes the dreams of liberation and self-determination of the Egyptian people. This false idol of Zionism equates Israeli safety with Egyptian dictatorship and client states.

From the start it has produced an ugly kind of freedom that saw Palestinian children not as human beings but as demographic threats – much as the pharaoh in the Book of Exodus feared the growing population of Israelites, and thus ordered the death of their sons.


Zionism has brought us to our present moment of cataclysm and it is time that we said clearly: it has always been leading us here.

It is a false idol that has led far too many of our own people down a deeply immoral path that now has them justifying the shredding of core commandments: thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not covet.

It is a false idol that equates Jewish freedom with cluster bombs that kill and maim Palestinian children.

Zionism is a false idol that has betrayed every Jewish value, including the value we place on questioning – a practice embedded in the Seder with its four questions asked by the youngest child.

Including the love we have as a people for text and for education.

Today, this false idol justifies the bombing of every university in Gaza; the destruction of countless schools, of archives, of printing presses; the killing of hundreds of academics, of journalists, of poets – this is what Palestinians call scholasticide, the killing of the means of education.

Meanwhile, in this city, the universities call in the NYPD and barricade themselves against the grave threat posed by their own students daring to ask them basic questions, such as: how can you claim to believe in anything at all, least of all us, while you enable, invest in and collaborate with this genocide?

The false idol of Zionism has been allowed to grow unchecked for far too long.

So tonight we say: it ends here.

Our Judaism cannot be contained by an ethnostate, for our Judaism is internationalist by nature.

Our Judaism cannot be protected by the rampaging military of that state, for all that military does is sow sorrow and reap hatred – including against us as Jews.

Our Judaism is not threatened by people raising their voices in solidarity with Palestine across lines of race, ethnicity, physical ability, gender identity and generations.

Our Judaism is one of those voices and knows that in that chorus lies both our safety and our collective liberation.

Our Judaism is the Judaism of the Passover Seder: the gathering in ceremony to share food and wine with loved ones and strangers alike, the ritual that is inherently portable, light enough to carry on our backs, in need of nothing but each other: no walls, no temple, no rabbi, a role for everyone, even – especially – the smallest child. The Seder is a diaspora technology if ever there was one, made for collective grieving, contemplation, questioning, remembering and reviving the revolutionary spirit.

So look around. This, here, is our Judaism. As waters rise and forests burn and nothing is certain, we pray at the altar of solidarity and mutual aid, no matter the cost.

We don’t need or want the false idol of Zionism. We want freedom from the project that commits genocide in our name. Freedom from an ideology that has no plan for peace other than deals with murderous theocratic petrostates next door, while selling the technologies of robo-assassinations to the world.

We seek to liberate Judaism from an ethnostate that wants Jews to be perennially afraid, that wants our children to be afraid, that wants us to believe the world is against us so that we go running to its fortress and beneath its iron dome, or at least keep the weapons and donations flowing.

That is the false idol.

And it’s not just Netanyahu, it’s the world he made and that made him – it’s Zionism.

What are we? We, in these streets for months and months, are the exodus. The exodus from Zionism.


And to the Chuck Schumers of this world, we do not say: “Let our people go.”

We say: “We have already gone. And your kids? They’re with us now.”

  • Naomi Klein is a Guardian US columnist and contributing writer. She is the professor of climate justice and co-director of the Centre for Climate Justice at the University of British Columbia. Her latest book, Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World, was published in September
  • This is a transcript of a speech delivered at the Emergency Seder in the Streets in New York City

May 1, 2024 Posted by | Israel, Religion and ethics | Leave a comment

Israel ‘undoubtedly’ committing genocide says Holocaust scholar Amos Goldberg

By MEE staff, 29 April 2024  https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-undoubtedly-committing-genocide-holocaust-scholar-amos-goldberg

Israeli researcher from Hebrew University argues that what is happening in Gaza does not need to resemble the Holocaust to qualify as genocide.

A professor of Holocaust history at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Amos Goldberg, has said that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.

In an opinion piece published by The Palestine Project, he argued that the scale of killing and destruction inflicted by Israel on Gaza, constitutes a “deliberate crushing of Palestinian existence in Gaza”.

“It’s so difficult and painful to admit it, but despite all that… we can no longer avoid this conclusion. Jewish history will be henceforth stained,” Goldberg said.

The professor argued that what is happening in Gaza does not need to resemble the Holocaust in order to qualify as a genocide, saying that although each genocide is different, they are all motivated by “an authentic sense of self defence”.

“Israelis mistakenly think that to be viewed as such a genocide needs to look like the Holocaust,” he wrote.

“They imagine trains, gas chambers, crematoria, killing pits, concentration and extermination camps, and the systematic persecution to death of all members of the group of victims to the last one.”

Equally, he said, Israelis imagine that the victims of a genocide are not involved in violent activity, as with the Holocaust. “This is also not the case in Gaza,” he wrote.

Citing a series of genocides including the Srebrenica massacre, where 8000 Bosnian Muslim men were murdered by Bosnian Serb forces, and the Tutsi genocide in Rwanda, where 800,000 people were slaughtered by the Hutus, he argued that, “in all these cases, the perpetrators of the genocide felt an existential threat, more or less justified, and the genocide came in response.”

In January, the International Court of Justice found a “plausible” risk that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.

According to the Palestinian health ministry, Israel has killed at least 34,488 people in Gaza since 7 October, mostly women and children. Israel estimates that 129 hostages seized by Hamas-led fighters are still in Gaza, including 34 the military says are dead.

May 1, 2024 Posted by | Israel, Religion and ethics | Leave a comment

Why Iran may accelerate its nuclear program, and Israel may be tempted to attack it

Bulletin, By Darya Dolzikova, Matthew Savill | April 26, 2024

On April 19, Israel carried out a strike deep inside Iranian territory, near the city of Isfahan. The attack was apparently in retaliation for a major Iranian drone and missile attack on Israel a few days earlier. This exchange between the two countries—which have historically avoided directly targeting each other’s territories—has raised fears of a potentially serious military escalation in the region.

Israel’s strike was carried out against an Iranian military site located in close proximity to the Isfahan Nuclear Technology Center, which hosts nuclear research reactors, a uranium conversion plant, and a fuel production plant, among other facilities. Although the attack did not target Iran’s nuclear facilities directly, earlier reports suggested that Israel was considering such attacks. The Iranian leadership has, in turn, threatened to reconsider its nuclear policy and to advance its program should nuclear sites be attacked.

These events highlight the threat from regional escalation dynamics posed by Iran’s near-threshold nuclear capability, which grants Iran the perception of a certain degree of deterrence—at least against direct US retaliation—while also serving as an understandably tempting target for Israeli attack. As tensions between Israel and Iran have moved away from their traditional proxy nature and manifested as direct strikes against each other’s territories, the urgency of finding a timely and non-military solution to the Iranian nuclear issue has increased.

A tempting target. While the current assessment is that Iran does not possess nuclear weapons, the Islamic Republic maintains a very advanced nuclear program, allowing it to develop a nuclear weapons capability relatively rapidly, should it decide to do so. Iran’s “near-threshold” capability did not deter Israel from undertaking its recent attack. But Iran’s nuclear program is a tempting target for an attack that could have potentially destabilizing ramification: The program is advanced enough to pose a credible risk of rapid weaponization and at a stage when it could still be significantly degraded, albeit at an extremely high cost.

Iran views its nuclear program as a deterrent against direct US strikes on or invasion of its territory, acting as an insurance policy of sorts against invasion following erroneous Western accusations over its nuclear program, ala Iraq in 2003. That’s to say, during an attempted invasion, Iran could quickly produce nuclear weapons……………………………

Israel sees the Iranian nuclear program as an existential threat and has long sought its elimination. For this reason, reports that Israel might have been preparing to target Iranian nuclear sites as retaliation for Iran’s strikes against its territory came as little surprise……………………………………………………………………….

A range of bad options. The possibility of Iranian weaponization and Israeli attacks on Iran’s nuclear sites could lead to a serious escalation spiral and, potentially, a wider military conflict in the region……………………………………………………………

Following past instances of Israeli sabotage against the Iranian nuclear program, Tehran has doubled down—rebuilding damaged sites, hardening facilities, and ramping up its nuclear activity. The same is likely to be true should Iranian facilities be targeted directly this time, only to a greater degree. The shift from a proxy conflict between Iran and Israel to a direct engagement will only increase the value Iran places on its nuclear program as a deterrent against further direct attack on its territory and US military intervention. Should Iran assess that its regional proxies and its missile and drone capabilities have been insufficient to deter Israel from conducting direct strikes against its strategically significant nuclear program, Tehran may see the actual weaponization of its nuclear program as the only option left that can guarantee the security of the Iranian regime……………………………………………………………………………………………………………. more https://thebulletin.org/2024/04/why-iran-may-accelerate-its-nuclear-program-and-israel-may-be-tempted-to-attack-it/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=MondayNewsletter04292024&utm_content=NuclearRisk_IranNuclearProgramIsrael_04262024

April 30, 2024 Posted by | Iran, Israel, politics international | Leave a comment

Biden Wanted To Sanction An Israeli Battalion But He Didn’t Because Israel Said No

CAITLIN JOHNSTONE, APR 27, 2024

The Biden administration has reportedly canned its plans to issue sanctions on an extremist IDF unit for human rights violations in the occupied West Bank, following backlash from Israel and its high-powered supporters within the US government.

Axios reports:

The State Department has put on hold its intention to impose sanctions on the Israel Defense Forces “Netzah Yehuda” battalion for human rights violations in the occupied West Bank and is reviewing the issue in light of information Israel provided in recent days, U.S. sources familiar with the issue said.

Why it matters: The review is part of a consultation process outlined in an agreement between the U.S. and Israel. But Secretary of State Antony Blinken has also been under extensive pressure from the Israeli government, members of Congress and some senior Biden administration officials to reconsider the possible sanctions.

The big picture: The Biden administration had intended to withhold U.S. military aid and training from the Netzah Yehuda battalion — an unprecedented move in the history of relations between the countries.

As Dr Assal Rad has highlighted on Twitter, this decision follows a sequence of events in which ProPublica revealed that Secretary of State Antony Blinken was ignoring his own State Department’s recommendation to sanction Israeli military units that have been credibly accused of human rights abuses like rape and torture, after which Blinken announced that he was preparing to issue sanctions after all. This announcement was met with outrage from Israel and its apologists, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu penning a furious screed calling the planned sanctions “the height of absurdity and a moral low”. Those planned sanctions are now canceled.

Or to put it more simply, the Biden administration had planned to sanction an IDF battalion, but it didn’t because Israel said no………………………………………………………………………………… more https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/biden-wanted-to-sanction-an-idf-unit?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=144069670&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

April 30, 2024 Posted by | Atrocities, Gaza, Israel, politics international, USA | Leave a comment

Why Iran may accelerate its nuclear program, and Israel may be tempted to attack it

Iran’s nuclear sites will continue to present a tempting target for Israel in any further escalation of the conflict between the two.

The Bulletin, By Darya Dolzikova, Matthew Savill | April 26, 2024

On April 19, Israel carried out a strike deep inside Iranian territory, near the city of Isfahan. The attack was apparently in retaliation for a major Iranian drone and missile attack on Israel a few days earlier. This exchange between the two countries—which have historically avoided directly targeting each other’s territories—has raised fears of a potentially serious military escalation in the region.

Israel’s strike was carried out against an Iranian military site located in close proximity to the Isfahan Nuclear Technology Center, which hosts nuclear research reactors, a uranium conversion plant, and a fuel production plant, among other facilities. Although the attack did not target Iran’s nuclear facilities directly, earlier reports suggested that Israel was considering such attacks. The Iranian leadership has, in turn, threatened to reconsider its nuclear policy and to advance its program should nuclear sites be attacked.

These events highlight the threat from regional escalation dynamics posed by Iran’s near-threshold nuclear capability, which grants Iran the perception of a certain degree of deterrence—at least against direct US retaliation—while also serving as an understandably tempting target for Israeli attack. As tensions between Israel and Iran have moved away from their traditional proxy nature and manifested as direct strikes against each other’s territories, the urgency of finding a timely and non-military solution to the Iranian nuclear issue has increased.

A tempting target. While the current assessment is that Iran does not possess nuclear weapons, the Islamic Republic maintains a very advanced nuclear program, allowing it to develop a nuclear weapons capability relatively rapidly, should it decide to do so. Iran’s “near-threshold” capability did not deter Israel from undertaking its recent attack. But Iran’s nuclear program is a tempting target for an attack that could have potentially destabilizing ramification: The program is advanced enough to pose a credible risk of rapid weaponization and at a stage when it could still be significantly degraded, albeit at an extremely high cost.

Iran views its nuclear program as a deterrent against direct US strikes on or invasion of its territory, acting as an insurance policy of sorts against invasion following erroneous Western accusations over its nuclear program, ala Iraq in 2003. That’s to say, during an attempted invasion, Iran could quickly produce nuclear weapons. This capability allows Iran’s leadership to engage in destabilizing activities in the region with a (perceived) limited likelihood of retaliation against its own territory. Concerns over escalation and a potential Iranian push toward weaponization of its nuclear program may have been one of multiple considerations that contributed to the US refusal to take part in Israeli retaliatory action following Iran’s April 13 strikes on Israel.

Israel sees the Iranian nuclear program as an existential threat and has long sought its elimination. For this reason, reports that Israel might have been preparing to target Iranian nuclear sites as retaliation for Iran’s strikes against its territory came as little surprise. Israel’s attack on military installations near Iranian nuclear facilities—and against an air defense system that Iran has deployed to protect its nuclear sites—appears to have been calibrated precisely to make the point that Israel has the capability to directly attack heavily-protected nuclear sites deep inside Iran. Some commentators have speculated that subsequent strikes on Iranian nuclear sites may still be desirable or necessary.

In this context, Iran’s nuclear sites will continue to present a tempting target for Israel in any further escalation of the conflict between the two. Moreover, Israel may also conclude that its own undeclared nuclear capability has failed to act as a deterrent against two major assaults on its territory. The attacks by Hamas on October 7 and Iran on April 13 probably added to Israel’s sense of strategic vulnerability, although that perception may have been partly alleviated by the largely successful defense against Iran’s attempted drone and missile strikes.

Israel has historically targeted Iran’s nuclear program through relatively limited sabotage in the form of cyber-attacks, assassinations of scientists, and bombs placed at Iranian nuclear facilities. This strategy has allowed Israel to repeatedly roll the clock back on Iran’s nuclear progress while maintaining some level of credible deniability and avoiding further military escalation, therefore largely remaining within the “rules” established by Israel and Iran in conducting their shadow war. Now, with both countries openly striking each other’s territory, Israel may see this as an opportunity—or feel compelled—to target Iran’s nuclear facilities directly.

A range of bad options. The possibility of Iranian weaponization and Israeli attacks on Iran’s nuclear sites could lead to a serious escalation spiral and, potentially, a wider military conflict in the region……………………………………………………………………………………………………. more https://thebulletin.org/2024/04/why-iran-may-accelerate-its-nuclear-program-and-israel-may-be-tempted-to-attack-it/

April 27, 2024 Posted by | Israel, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Norman Finkelstein on Israel Palestine

April 27, 2024 Posted by | Gaza, Israel, weapons and war | Leave a comment

UN report demolishes Israeli propaganda campaign against UNRWA

Israel has waged a multi-year campaign against the UN aid group for Palestinian refugees in hopes of eradicating the right of return

The Cradle, News Desk, APR 22, 2024

Israel has failed to provide any evidence of its claims that employees of the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) are members of “terrorist organizations,” according to an independent review led by former French foreign minister Catherine Colonna.

In January, Israel claimed without evidence that some UNRWA staff – until then the primary conduit of humanitarian aid into the besieged and bombed Gaza Strip – were members of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and had participated in the Hamas-led attack on Israeli military bases and settlements on 7 October, known as Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.

The Israeli allegations promptly caused the US and other western nations to cut funding to UNRWA. This came amid reports from rights groups that Israel was using starvation as a weapon against the 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza.

The Guardian reported on 22 April that the “Colonna report,” which was commissioned by the UN in the wake of Israeli allegations, found that UNRWA had regularly supplied Israel with lists of its employees for vetting, and that “the Israeli government has not informed UNRWA of any concerns relating to any UNRWA staff based on these staff lists since 2011.”

The Guardian added that most donor nations have resumed their funding in recent weeks. However, UK ministers had said they would wait for the Colonna report to decide whether to resume funding. The US Congress has since banned any future financial support of UNRWA.

The Colonna review was drafted with the help of three Nordic research institutes and will be published later on Monday.

It confirms that Israel has yet to provide any evidence of its claims………………………………………………..

more https://thecradle.co/articles/un-report-demolishes-israeli-propaganda-campaign-against-unrwa

April 26, 2024 Posted by | Israel, spinbuster | Leave a comment

Israeli Strikes in Rafah Kill 22, Including 18 Children

The bombardment came after the House approved $26 billion in spending to support the Israeli slaughter of Palestinians

by Dave DeCamp April 21, 2024  https://news.antiwar.com/2024/04/21/israeli-strikes-kill-22-in-rafah-including-18-children/

Israeli strikes hit the southern Gaza city of Rafah Saturday night into Sunday morning, killing 22 people, including 18 children, The Associated Press reported.

The bombardment came just hours after the US House of Representatives passed a $26 billion bill that includes about $17 billion in military aid for Israel to support the slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza.

According to AP, one of the overnight strikes killed a man, his wife, and their three-year-old child. The woman was 30 weeks pregnant, and medical staff at the nearby Kuwaiti hospital were able to save the baby. The second strike killed two women and 17 children.

Gaza’s Health Ministry said on Sunday that the number of Palestinians killed in the Strip has reached 34,097, and 76,980 more have been wounded. The death toll is considered a low estimate since it doesn’t take into account people who are dead under the rubble.


Rafah is packed with over 1 million Palestinian civilians and has been getting hit with near-daily Israeli strikes. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been threatening to launch a full-scale invasion of the city.

The US has claimed that it’s concerned about Netanyahu’s plans to invade Rafah but is not putting any real pressure on Israel since it continues to provide military aid and political support. US and Israeli officials discussed the potential assault last week, and the White House said the two sides had a “shared objective to see Hamas defeated in Rafah.”

On Sunday, Netanyahu thanked the US for the new aid being passed through Congress and vowed to escalate in Gaza. “In the coming days, we will increase the military and diplomatic pressure on Hamas because this is the only way to free our hostages and achieve our victory,” he said.

April 24, 2024 Posted by | Gaza, Israel, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Israel Is Turning Hospitals Into Mass Graves While The West Fixates On ‘Antisemitism’

CAITLIN JOHNSTONE, APR 22, 2024, https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/israel-is-turning-hospitals-into?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=143854121&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
—

A mass grave created by the IDF has been uncovered at a Gaza hospital, where Palestinian civilians appear to have been the victims of a gruesome massacre.

“Bah, that’s old news Caitlin,” you may be saying. “We already know about the massacre and mass graves which were discovered a few weeks ago at the al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza.”

No no, that’s a different mass grave from a different IDF massacre at a completely different Gaza hospital. The now completely destroyed al-Shifa Hospital was in Gaza City; I’m talking about the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis, where some 210 bodies have reportedly been discovered in a mass grave after Israeli forces withdrew from the city earlier this month. Two different massacres, two different hospitals, two different mass graves full of Palestinian civilians.

The IDF are just attacking hospitals and mowing down civilians and trying to bury the evidence of their crimes, so naturally we’re seeing the western political-media class focus very hard on the problem of antisemitism allegations on college campuses.

“Biden denounces antisemitism on college campuses amid Columbia protests,” reads a new headline from The Washington Post.

“As Protests Continue at Columbia, Some Jewish Students Feel Targeted,” The New York Times urgently warns us.

“White House condemns ‘blatantly antisemitic’ protests as agitators engulf Columbia University,” blares Fox News.

“Columbia University faces full-blown crisis as rabbi calls for Jewish students to ‘return home’,” says CNN.

“Columbia University: White House condemns antisemitism at college protests,” the BBC reports.

Getting far less attention than the fact that some Zionist university students are feeling uncomfortable feelings because other students say Palestinians are human beings is the fact that Israel is establishing a pattern of massacring civilians and burying them in mass graves outside hospitals in Gaza, or the fact that the IDF has been butchering children in Rafah, or the fact that the International Criminal Court is reportedly considering charging Benjamin Netanyahu and other Israeli officials for war crimes.

Those matters are important, just not nearly as important as how some western Jews feel emotionally upset about pro-Palestine protests. For that, the world must stop spinning on its axis until this extremely egregious problem has been addressed.

All the western spin and distortion around Israel’s mass atrocities in Gaza these last six months have revolved around centering feelings over human lives. How western Jewish Zionists are feeling about pro-Palestine sentiments. How Joe Biden’s feelings secretly feel about Netanyahu. How Israelis feel about October 7. 

Wherever there’s an opportunity to focus the narrative on what feelings are being felt by a politically convenient population, the western press fall all over themselves to do so with tumescent enthusiasm. Wherever there’s an opportunity to focus on Israeli atrocities, the western press are nowhere to be found.

If you belong to a group that isn’t supported by the western empire, you can see your entire family murdered right in front of you and the western political-media class still won’t consider you a victim. If you belong to a group that the empire regards as human, then even someone offending your feelings will be viewed as an unforgivable hate crime.

April 23, 2024 Posted by | Atrocities, Gaza, Israel | Leave a comment

Stuxnet – how a simple USB stick sabotaged Iran’s nuclear plan in a ‘world-first’ showdown

‘There is an acceptance you cannot guarantee your cyber security – someone motivated enough can probably get into your system.

https://metro.co.uk/2024/04/20/a-computer-worm-sabotaged-irans-nuclear-plan-a-world-first-showdown-20666834/

Tensions between Iran and Israel are near a boiling point after the firing of hundreds of rockets into Israel and its latest military response.

But the conflict has brewed for years, including sabotage of Iran’s nuclear programme with the help of one spy and a single USB stick.

That same device contained the infamous Stuxnet worm.

It infiltrated the Iranian nuclear programme in 2010, marking the first time a country attacked the critical infrastructure of another state.

A cyber expert has shared how Stuxnet damaged an Iranian nuclear plant and if the UK is safe from similar malicious attacks.

Dr Gareth Mott, research fellow at the RUSI Royal United Services Institute think-tank in London, said that before 2010 similar attacks might have happened, but in the shadows.

However, with Stuxnet, researchers found ‘the code of the malware was way more advanced.’

He told Metro.co.uk: ‘They had years to develop it. It was no small-scale criminal developing it.’

Who was behind Stuxnet?

Signs point to Israel and the US to be responsible for the sophisticated worm.

He said: ‘Israel views Iran as a nemesis. In their view, Iran was developing uranium for nuclear weapons. Iran said it was for civilian systems.’

What Iran was doing was ‘not clandestine’.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) monitors its programme and it is alerted ‘when the pod is opened.’

However, it is ‘hypothetically possible to abuse it,’ he said.

As an ally of Israel, the US got involved in the plan to target Iran’s nuclear facilities.

The development of Stuxnet began in 2005 years before it was smuggled into Natanz nuclear plant by a spy.

How Stuxnext caused a shutdown

Iranian nuclear sites, just like facilities in the UK, are carefully protected against attacks.

It means they are not connected to the Internet to avoid intrusions.

In the uranium enrichment facility, the radioactive chemical element spins around quickly in centrifuges to enrich it.

Dr Mott said: ‘The system is not connected to the Internet, it is air gapped. It is disconnected from the Internet. It is one of the best systems.’

But it has one weakness – USB ports.

He explains: ‘But you can put a USB drive in. You have to have a port to do any updates. That means an attack, if you can get malware on a USB drive and into the critical system, maybe you can disrupt it.’

When the top-secret tool was ready in 2009, Israelis and Americans wanted to use it.

But it did not work as intended so experts designing the worm went back to base and ‘worked what was wrong, in laboratory conditions.’

The US was hesitant and told their partners to wait, but the ‘Israelis went ahead and used it anyways,’ the expert said.

Uranium has to be spun around in a ‘very controlled manner,’ but the malware made the system ‘too quickly and slow down and too quickly again,’ he explained.

‘The system started to wobble and began to collapse.’

It also ‘tricked’ the control panel which would normally spot if the centrifuges were spinning at a risky speed and fix it, making it look like ‘things were fine, but it wasn’t’, Dr Mott said.

As a result of the worm, the Iranian uranium enrichment programme was ‘broken,’ he said.

It is thought to have been set back by several years, tech publication Dark Reading estimated.

Stuxnet highlights how something as innocent as a USB port compromise national security.

In the UK, a senior IT worker at the Sellafield nuclear plant was fired after she had downloaded sensitive data onto a USB stick and dropped it in a car park.

Stuxnet’s existence was revealed after it was found on thousands of infected computers across the world despite, on paper, the Iranian system had no internet connection.

‘Somehow it got released. Maybe one of the scientists took it home to research it.’

Cyber researchers saw it was ‘very advanced’ after ‘years in the making and a lot of money.’

Stuxnet was significant because at the time no country in the world had declared it had a cyber weapon.

‘In 2013 UK did it, and we now have an offensive [cyber] arsenal,’ the expert said.

‘We have always conducted espionage, but we are now doing it with cyber tools.’

Following Stuxnet, Iran grew its cyber offensive capabilities, making it a ‘regionally significant power but internationally it is not,’ he said.

However, in the cyber and Internet space ‘they punch above their weight,’ with hackers and researchers embedded in the cyber command of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.

Israel has its own cyber force, Unit 8200, which is the country’s version of UK’s GCHQ and the American NSA.

Cyber attacks from Iran to Israel have ‘stepped up since October 7’ when Hamas launched its deadly attack in Israel, followed by destruction of Gaza in Palestine by the Israeli army, with more than 30,000 people killed and 70,000 injured in the unlawfully blockaded strip of land, according to the UN.

Last weekend, Israeli authorities said they have seen ‘no rise in cyber incidents, but researchers have observed cyber attacks have doubled or tripled,’ Dr Mott said.

He suspects they are ‘low-level attacks which Israel will respond to to ‘disrupt Iran.’

Continue reading →

April 22, 2024 Posted by | Israel, Reference, technology | Leave a comment

Finkelstein: Israel Is Prepared to Drag the Rest of the World Down with Them

April 22, 2024 Posted by | Israel, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Israel: the road to Masada

historical Masada is a rationalization for a future Masada —another crazy sect – of Jewish true believers self-destructing—Zionists.

In 73 A.D., legend has it, 960 Jewish rebels under siege in the ancient desert fortress of Masada committed suicide rather than surrender to a Roman legion.

News Forensics JULIAN MACFARLANE, APR 16, 2024

The Iran attack story continues to unfold. Everybody has an opinion – but we still don’t actually know what really happened. As a result, some think the attack was a victory for Iran. Others, even those on the Left, think not. Finian Cunningham calls it “lame retaliation”.

The Iranians say they gave the American 72 hours’ notice.

Pepe Escobar says that the Iranians and Americans met in Oman and the Iranians told the Americans their attack would be on military bases only. And…

THE SHADOWPLAY So this is how it happened. Burns met an Iranian delegation in Oman. He was told the Israeli punishment was inevitable – and if the US got involved then all US bases will be attacked, and the Strait of Hormuz would be blocked. Burns said we do nothing if no civilians are harmed. The Iranians said it will be a military base or an embassy. The CIA said go ahead and do it.

The Americans of course deny this.

So, somebody’s lying.

Over the years the Iranians have shown a tendency to exaggerate – usually about military capability—but they do not usually lie directly.

The US however doesn’t just fib a bit – it likes really really big lies. For America, the truth is whatever is most convenient for its policies, knowing that the media will always propagate Official Doctrine, just as in the Middle Ages the Vatican could be sure it’s pronouncements would be heard in sermons all over Europe, and believers would take them to heart. Those who dissented could be burned at the stake. We don’t do that — we have Belmarsh prison.

As Putin says, the US is the Empire of Lies.

In this case, the Americans keep on changing their story.

At first, the American said there were 170 drones and 30 cruise missiles. They did not mention ballistic missiles.

Now, the number is 170 drones, 30 cruise missiles, and 100 ballistic missiles. T The media are talking up MIRVs and hypersonic weapons.

The US number now is the same as the IDF was claiming in the beginning. but it seems the number is going up.

The IDF insists that its ”David Sling” system intercepted 99% of 120 missiles breaching its airspace.

The Americans and Brits intercepted only drones apparently—47% of the drones— which means that about 80 entered Israeli airspace to add to the other hardware hurtling through Israeli skies.

Israelis say — or at least said — there were only two hits – with an unrealistically high percentage of interception. According to some Western analysts, however, the Iranians achieved a 6% success rate and 9 hits on Israeli targets— with both drones and missiles.

Israeli missile interceptors are impressive in the sky…………………………………………………………………………….

Given 72 hours advance warning, Western media speculate the Israelis should have been able to do a lot better, especially with US support.

Now we hear talk of MIRV missiles (multiple warheads) or hypersonic missiles which neither the Americans nor the Israelis would be able to intercept at all, much less 99%.

The Iranians may have, in fact, experimented with both kinds of sophisticated weaponry – but not in any quantity.

The fact that the Israelis were able to down so many “projectiles” – albeit at a cost of $3 billion suggests that the Iranians were, as I posited before, mostly using old stuff, demonstrating that even with that they could get through.

That said, while American sources are admitting nine hits, there may have been more as Andrei Martynov suggests.

So what happens if shit hits the fan? What if Finian Cunningham is right? What if the Israelis mistake the message and escalate?

The Iranians have promised a gloves off response of a magnitude perhaps 100 times greater.

The Russian Playbook

Netanyahu is Israel’s Zelensky. Israel is America’s Ukraine.

By contrast, Iran seems to be following the Russian playbook.

Their attack was classic Russian tactics. Drones, decoys air defense systems, followed by missiles of different types. Precision targeting. Avoidance of civilian casualties. Restraint

IF Israel mounts a major attack against Iran, it is likely to be vicious – just like Ukrainian attacks in Ukraine. Therefore, you can expect Iranians to apply other successful Russian strategies.

John Helmer has suggested Iran might adopt Russia’s current strategy of attacking critical infrastructure. That means Israel’s offshore oilfields and especially power stations – the electrical grid—which are highly vulnerable— and unlike in the Ukraine, localized……………………………….

Masada

Does history repeat itself? Of course it does.

Everyone thinks it doesn’t.

That’s because no one really knows – or wants to know – what happened in the first place—we mythologize and fictionalize events in the past to correspond to present day realities and needs.

Masada never happened as Israelis think it did – so they have learnt nothing. That thing about history —we don’t want to learn and when it repeats we don’t know what’s happening..

Masada? It wasn’t the Romans that “done it”.

It was a crazy sect of Jewish true believers who self-destructed.

That historical Masada is a rationalization for a future Masada —another crazy sect – of Jewish true believers self-destructing—Zionists.

April 22, 2024 Posted by | Iran, Israel, weapons and war | Leave a comment

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