US Forbade Ukraine to Make Peace With Russia in March 2022 – Former German Chancellor
MOSCOW (Sputnik) – Ukraine was ready to make peace with Russia and give up its plans to join NATO during negotiations in March 2022, but eventually abandoned the idea due to pressure from the United States, former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder told the German newspaper.
“The only people who could settle the war against Ukraine are the Americans. During the peace negotiations in March 2022 in Istanbul with [then-Ukrainian chief negotiator] Rustem Umerov, the Ukrainians did not agree on peace because they were not allowed to. They first had to ask the Americans about everything they discussed,” Schroeder said in an interview with the newspaper on Saturday.
The former German chancellor said that Kiev had contacted him in 2022 to learn whether he could mediate talks with Russia, after which he had meetings with Umerov and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
MOSCOW (Sputnik) – Ukraine was ready to make peace with Russia and give up its plans to join NATO during negotiations in March 2022, but eventually abandoned the idea due to pressure from the United States, former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder told the German newspaper.
“The only people who could settle the war against Ukraine are the Americans. During the peace negotiations in March 2022 in Istanbul with [then-Ukrainian chief negotiator] Rustem Umerov, the Ukrainians did not agree on peace because they were not allowed to. They first had to ask the Americans about everything they discussed,” Schroeder said in an interview with the newspaper on Saturday.
The former German chancellor said that Kiev had contacted him in 2022 to learn whether he could mediate talks with Russia, after which he had meetings with Umerov and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Schroeder told the newspaper that the potential peace agreement included five key points. First, under the draft deal, Kiev was supposed to abandon its NATO aspirations. Secondly, Ukraine should have restored the official status of the Russian language. Thirdly, Donbas was supposed to remain part of Ukraine, but with a special territorial status, like South Tyrol, an autonomous province in Northern Italy. Fourthly, Ukraine should have received security guarantees from the permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany. The final, fifth issue under discussion was the status of Crimea, Schroeder told media.
He said that Kiev had demonstrated willingness to compromise, including on the provision about NATO membership, but the talks still failed because everything “was decided in Washington.”
“I think the Americans did not want a compromise between Ukraine and Russia,” Schroeder was cited as saying by the newspaper.
Moscow launched its special military operation in Ukraine on February 24, 2022. The Russian and Ukrainian delegations have engaged in several rounds of peace talks since then, including those in Turkiye in March 2022, but the negotiations have ultimately reached an impasse. In October 2022, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky signed a decree stating that Kiev could not hold peace talks as long as Vladimir Putin was president of Russia. #Ukraine
US Government & NewsGuard Sued by Consortium News
October 23, 2023 https://consortiumnews.com/2023/10/23/us-government-newsguard-sued-by-consortium-news/
The suit accuses NewsGuard of defaming Consortium News and the U.S. government of acting in concert with NewsGuard to violate the First Amendment.
US & NewsGuard Sued for 1st Amendment Violations, Defamation in NY Federal Court
Court Papers: Media ‘Watchdog’ Joined With US Intelligence to Suppress Foreign Policy Dissent
By Consortium News
The United States government and internet “watchdog” NewsGuard Technologies, Inc. were sued today in federal court in Manhattan for First Amendment violations and defamation by news organization Consortium for Independent Journalism, a nonprofit that publishes Consortium News.
Consortium News‘s court filing charges the Pentagon’s Cyber Command, an element of the Intelligence Community, with contracting with NewsGuard to identify, report and abridge the speech of American media organizations that dissent from U.S. official positions on foreign policy.
In the course of its contract with the Pentagon, NewsGuard is “acting jointly or in concert with the United States to coerce news organizations to alter viewpoints” as to Ukraine, Russia, and Syria, imposing a form of “censorship and repression of views” that differ or dissent from policies of the United States and its allies, the complaint says.
Watch the press conference announcing the lawsuit on Monday:
Read the entire complaint and the exhibits.
“The First Amendment rights of all American media are threatened by this arrangement with the Defense Department to defame and abridge the speech of U.S. media groups,” said Bruce Afran, Consortium News‘s attorney.
“When media groups are condemned by the government as ‘anti-U.S.’ and are accused of publishing ‘false content’ because they disagree with U.S. policies, the result is self-censorship and a destruction of the public debate intended by the First Amendment,” Afran said.
NewsGuard uses its software to tag targeted news sites, including all 20,000+ Consortium News articles an videos published since 1995, with warnings to “proceed with caution,” telling NewsGuard subscribers that Consortium News produces “disinformation,” “false content” and is an “anti-U.S.” media organization, even though NewsGuard only took issue with a total of six CN articles and none of its videos.
The suit comes at a time when many in Congress and elsewhere have charged the U.S. government with using private entities and internet platforms as proxies to suppress free speech in violation of the First Amendment.
The complaint seeks a permanent injunction declaring the joint program unconstitutional; barring the government and NewsGuard from continuing such practices and more than $13 million in damages for defamation and civil rights violations.
Kazakhstan: Government does hard sell on nuclear, but public remains wary.
It also remains to be worked out how the authorities intend to fund a project that could end up costing $12 billion.
eurasia.net Almaz Kumenov Oct 23, 2023
The authorities in Kazakhstan have for many years been toying with the idea of building a nuclear power plant, but they have lacked the nerve to take a decision in the face of strong public opposition.
In September, President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev opted to punt his way out of the predicament by announcing a referendum on the question.
While Tokayev is evidently in favor of nuclear power, he is eager not to be seen as acting in defiance of broader sentiment………………………………………………………………………………………..
History makes the nuclear issue particularly emotive in Kazakhstan.
For four decades, the Soviet Union used the remote expanses of the northern Kazakh SSR as a testing site for its nuclear bombs. The consequences are detailed in stark terms by Togzhan Kassenova in her 2022 book Atomic Steppe.
“Following a nuclear explosion, radioactive particles mix with dust in the air and spread into the atmosphere. In unfavorable weather, this radioactive dust sweeps up into the clouds and rain, traveling far beyond the test site. The radioactive fallout from the Polygon contaminated not only grazing lands but also water wells, soil, and vegetation. Animals fed on contaminated pastures, and people who lived in the vicinity of the Polygon drank polluted water and milk and ate meat laced with radioisotopes,” Kassenova wrote.
More recently, incidents like the colossal explosion of an arms depot in the southern town of Arys in 2019 have fueled perceptions that safety standards are often flouted by the same people who are supposed to uphold them.
Madina Kuketayeva, coordinator of Anti-NPP, a public association created to resist the plant’s construction, cites corruption as the reason officials would be unable to categorically assure high safety levels.
“But even accident-free operation of the nuclear power plant would cause irreparable damage to the ecology of Lake Balkhash, lead to its drying out, and also harm the health of local residents,” Kuketayeva told Eurasianet.
Geopolitics is a factor too.
Kazakh opponents of the plant and Russia’s war in Ukraine look with alarm at what has happened at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, which is controlled by invading Russian forces. In July, the International Atomic Energy Agency expressed its profound concern over how Russian forces had installed anti-personnel mines around the plant just as Ukrainian troops were embarking on a counteroffensive to recapture lost territory………………………
Some objections to the nuclear power plant are more narrowly technical. Aset Nauryzbayev, an economist who formerly ran state power grid operator KEGOC, says he believes that Kazakhstan is able to build the needed number of renewable energy generators by 2030. Nuclear power is outdated and overly expensive, he argued.
“The maintenance of a nuclear power plant, if it is built, will cost $1.5 billion a year, and we ordinary citizens will pay this unreasonably high price to the future owners of the nuclear power plant,” Nauryzbayev told Eurasianet.
The construction of the nuclear power plant itself will also require huge investments – anywhere up to $12 billion by some reckoning. The source of that funding has not yet been publicly discussed……. https://eurasianet.org/kazakhstan-government-does-hard-sell-on-nuclear-but-public-remains-wary #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
Sizewell Nuclear Court Case on 1st and 2nd November will be available to watch online
The Sizewell Court case on 1st and 2nd November will be available to watch
online at the link below. At present, it is expected that the court hearing
will start at 10.00am on 1st November 2023 but the actual start time on
that day will not be confirmed until the court’s daily list is published
on 31st October – the list can be found at
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/royal-courts-of-justice-cause-list/royal-courts-of-justice-daily-cause-list#court-of-appeal-civil-division-daily-cause-list
Judiciary UK (accessed) 22nd Oct 2023
#nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
The Atlantic Magazine, Covering Palestine Without Palestinians
Two weeks in and 38 articles on the topic, the Atlantic has found only one token Palestinian to write about Palestine.
SCHEERPOST, By Adam Johnson / The Real News Network, October 23, 2023
Since the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack on Southern Israel that killed 1,300 Israelis, The Atlantic has published 38 articles, podcasts, and Q&As on the assault and Israel’s subsequent retaliatory bombing campaign, which has killed over 4,000 Palestinians and counting. Only one of these pieces was written by a Palestinian, whom the story is, at least in theory, 50% about.
The writers The Atlantic has featured in the past two weeks are mostly Americans—there were also several Israeli and a few Lebanese and Lebanese-Americans, but only one Palestinian writer, Ghaith al-Omari, who is a senior fellow at the pro-Israel Washington Institiute for Near East Policy, which was founded by the pro-Israel lobbying group American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).
The article, “How the Palestinian Authority Failed Its People,” is a fairly dry and academic breakdown of the positions of the Palestinian Authority on the current crisis. Beyond this one token entry, The Atlantic has not published any Palestinian writers.
That erasure is not an accident; it is consistent with The Atlantic’s almost-uniform pro-Israel bent and its long history of excluding Palestinian voices in discussions of Palestine. Even a cursory survey of their coverage throughout the years shows that the writers whose perspectives on the conflict have been published at The Atlantic have been overwhelmingly American and Israeli in nationality and perspective……………………………………………………………………………………………
The Atlantic is not alone. In a blockbuster report published last Friday, Semafor’s Max Tani documented how MSNBC was sidelining three Muslim anchors they felt were too pro-Palestine. Jewish Currents’ Mari Cohen detailed Wednesday how CBS producers took down an interview from its online archives with Palestinian-American legal scholar and human rights attorney Noura Erakat because she didn’t play the one-noted role of grieving victim and, instead, pushed back on the interviewer’s loaded questions. “They wanted me to be up there to lament our dead,” Erakat told Jewish Currents, “but not to establish international responsibility for [their deaths].”……………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
All of this paves the way to the latest iteration of The Atlantic’s coverage of the so-called Israel-Palestinian conflict. Readers of The Atlantic are fed a steady stream of standard pro-Israel talking points and framing devices that involve putting Palestinians in a specimen jar and examining them solely through an “anti-terror” framework that set up discussions about, rather than by, those most affected by the ongoing apartheid and siege imposed by Israel. The result is more of the same rote conversations and dehumanizing, dead-end War on Terror framing, while the dead in Gaza continue to pile up.
Listening to Americans, Israelis, and others is, of course, perfectly fine. But maybe, as the ongoing siege and potential ethnic cleansing of Palestinians escalates more and more by the day, the country’s most influential center-left publication could maybe bother publishing more than one token Palestinian. https://scheerpost.com/2023/10/23/the-atlantic-magazine-covering-palestine-without-palestinians/ #Israel #Palestine
UN Agency Warns Humanitarian Operations in Gaza on Verge of Total Collapse
October 23, 2023 https://scheerpost.com/2023/10/23/un-agency-warns-humanitarian-operations-in-gaza-on-verge-of-total-collapse/
“Without fuel, there will be no water, no functioning hospitals and bakeries,” said the UNRWA. “Without fuel, aid will not reach those in desperate need. Without fuel, there will be no humanitarian assistance.”
By Jon Queally / Common Dreams
The U.N. agency responsible for humanitarian aid and protections in the occupied Gaza Strip—battered relentlessly by Israeli airstrikes for the past two weeks—said Sunday that if fuel supplies are not restored within a matter of days, its operations will collapse entirely.
“In three days, UNRWA will run out of fuel, critical for our humanitarian response across the Gaza Strip,” said Philippe Lazzarini, the Commissioner-General of the United Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.
“Without fuel, there will be no water, no functioning hospitals and bakeries,”
Lazzarini continued. “Without fuel, aid will not reach those in desperate need. Without fuel, there will be no humanitarian assistance. No fuel will further strangle the children, women, and people of Gaza.”
Noting that the UNRWA runs the largest humanitarian operation in the Gaza Strip, he said that without fuel, “we will fail the people of Gaza whose needs are growing by the hour, under our watch.”
Following the first “totally insufficient” convoy of aid trucks allowed to enter Gaza from Egypt on Saturday, another 17 trucks were permitted Sunday. Neither of the deliveries contained fuel, which medical personnel on the ground have said is vital if the health system is to remain capable of keeping the wounded and sick alive.
With Israeli officials saying the bombardment is set to intensify, not lessen, a global demand for a cease-fire has gone unheeded by the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and its powerful allies, including the United States.
With large demonstrations in numerous U.S. and European cities over the weekend delivering the same message for a cease-fire also ringing out across the Middle East and beyond, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Saturday called for a stop in Israel’s bombardment of Gaza alongside a much larger delivery of aid.
“We must act now to end the nightmare,” Guterres said at the so-called Peace Summit in Cairo, Egypt.
Despite U.S. President Joe Biden’s continued backing of Israeli policy, including it’s bombardment of Gaza which legal scholars have said may amount to genocide—a poll last week showed two-thirds of U.S. voters back the call for a cease-fire.
As the civilian death toll continues to mount—with the latest weekend figures from the Gaza Ministry of Health putting the number killed at more than 4,600, nearly half of them children, and more than three times that wounded—UNRWA confirmed earlier on Saturday that 29 of its own staffers and volunteers, half of them school teachers, have been killed since the Israel bombing campaign began on Oct. 7.
“We are in shock and mourning,” the agency said in a social media post. “As an Agency, we are devastated. We are grieving with each other and with the families.”
In his statement on Sunday, Lazzarini called on “all parties and those with influence over them to immediately allow fuel supplies into the Gaza Strip and to ensure that fuel is strictly used to prevent a collapse of the humanitarian response.” #Israel #Palestine
A wall of silence: atom bosses remain tight-lipped over Fukushima whistleblower claims
collaboration between the IAEA and the Japanese Government over the Fukushima radioactive water releases was imperative as the continuation of sea dumping regardless of the adverse impact to the marine environment represents a ‘make or break issue’ for the nuclear industry.
Over seven weeks have passed without an acknowledgement or reply to a letter the UK/Ireland Nuclear Free Local Authorities co-signed which was sent to the UN International Atomic Energy Authority calling for transparency over claims that the organisation collaborated with the Japanese Government to ‘manage the message’ over the ocean dumping of 1.3 million tonnes of radioactive water from the Fukushima nuclear disaster site.
On 28 June, an anonymous whistleblower posted a document, seemingly issued by the Department of Nuclear Safety at the IAEA, to the website/blogsite dunrenard[1]. If genuine, the document, titled ‘IAEA REVISION PROPOSAL FOR THE FINAL REPORT OF HANDLING ALPS TREATED WATER AT TEPCO’S FUKUSHIMA DAIICHI NUCLEAR POWER STATION’, appears to indicate that the international agency has actively sought to downplay the dangers associated with discharging millions of barrels of water which remain contaminated with highly toxic tritium.
The NFLA’s first covered this story and our disquiet at the revelations in a media release dated 3 July:
https://www.nuclearpolicy.info/news/cover-up-did-atom-bosses-collude-to-manage-message-of-japanese-plan-to-poison-pacific/
One of the recipients of the leaked document was Mr Tim Deere-Jones, a graduate in Marine Studies from Cardiff University. Tim, an independent marine pollution researcher and consultant since 1983, is highly regarded by the many international organisations who have engaged him in their campaigns against the damage caused to our oceans and inland waterways by radioactive and other contaminants.
Tim was incensed that the Japanese Government was quick to condemn the claim that Japan had pressurised the IAEA to remove ‘negative information’ about the environmental impact that would result from the radioactive waste discharges from the final report, but also noted that on the claims themselves the IAEA made no comment.
Keen to seek clarification and action on the veracity of the whistleblower’s claims, Tim went right to the top of the IAEA and penned a letter to the head of the management office for the Deputy Director General. Here he explains why:
“To date there has been no detectable independent action to investigate and test the veracity of the whistleblower’s claims against the claim of non-interference made by the Government of Japan.
“I fear that if this is scenario is allowed to continue the whistleblower’s action and disclosure will be historically characterised by the Government of Japan statement, sink into obscurity and be forgotten and the whistleblower’s heroic action will have been wasted, while he/she is still under threat of investigation, identification, and penalty.
“My disclosure request to the IAEA is intended to elicit a direct response from the agency to the claims made by the whistleblower as to date my online media searches have yet to reveal any related statement made by the organisation.
“This creates the impression that the Government of Japan has been acting as the IAEAs mouthpiece in respect of the whistleblower disclosure and that the IAEA would prefer NOT to be associated in anyway with the issue, to the extent that it has not made any public statement”.
Tim’s request for disclosure, submitted by registered post to the IAEA’s Vienna office and by email to the official account on 1 September, was backed by five British anti-nuclear groups and individuals from Europe and the Pacific Ocean, representing commercial fishers, other marine stakeholders, and coastal zone and Pacific Island communities.
Although the registered letter was tracked as received at the Vienna office on 9 September, Tim has yet to receive any response from the agency, and on 16 October sent a reminder:
“I have concluded that the absence of a receipt or response is a clear indication of the IAEA’s resistance to any discussion of the issues raised.
“My reading critique of the IAEAs final report to TEPCO re the issue of the ALPs treated water release certainly supports the drift of the whistleblower statement”.
Amongst the co-signatories to the letter, which is reproduced at the end of this press release, were the NFLAs, which have objected in letters to Japanese Ministers, senior officials at TEPCO (the nuclear operator), and the United Nations to the discharge of radioactive water from Fukushima, and signed a partnership agreement with its counterparts, Mayors for a Nuclear Power Free Japan, to collaborate in opposing the plan.
Though disappointed at the continued wall of silence, Chair Councillor Lawrence O’Neill is unsurprised that the IAEA remains tight-lipped:
“Sadly, the duties of disclosure required of public bodies in the UK through the Freedom of Information Act do not apply to an international agency based in Vienna and the IAEA’s statutes appear to contain no provisions for transparency or external accountability, despite the agency being funded by the member states, and so the taxpayers, of the United Nations.
“Although the organization claims to want to become more open, the lack of a response, or even an acknowledgement, to our legitimate request for information belies the fact that, on controversial issues, a culture of secrecy still prevails.”
Tim believes that collaboration between the IAEA and the Japanese Government over the Fukushima radioactive water releases was imperative as the continuation of sea dumping regardless of the adverse impact to the marine environment represents a ‘make or break issue’ for the nuclear industry. He has produced a short paper explaining his reasoning, which also appears at the end of this media release.
For further information about this media release please contact NFLA Secretary Richard Outram by email to richard.outram@manchester.gov.uk or telephone 07583097793
1. https://dunrenard.wordpress.com/2023/06/28/will-this-whistleblower-be-heard-by-anyone/
Notes to Editors:
The reminder sent to Ms Margaret Doane, Head, Department of Management Office of the Deputy Director General, IAEA, 16 October 2023
#nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
US vetoes UN Security Council action on Israel, Gaza
By Michelle Nichols, October 19, 2023
UNITED NATIONS, Oct 18 (Reuters) – The United States vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution on Wednesday that would have called for humanitarian pauses in the conflict between Israel and Palestinian Hamas militants to allow humanitarian aid access to the Gaza Strip.
The vote on the Brazilian-drafted text was twice delayed in the last couple of days as the United States tries to broker aid access to Gaza. Twelve members voted in favor of the draft text on Wednesday, while Russia and Britain abstained……………………………………………………………………
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Wednesday called for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire to allow for the release of hostages and humanitarian aid access to Gaza. https://www.reuters.com/world/us-vetoes-un-security-council-action-israel-gaza-2023-10-18/–*Israel #Palestine #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
White House Seeks $105 Billion To Arm Israel, Ukraine, and Taiwan
The Biden administration released details about its massive proposal to provide arms to Israel and Ukraine, as well as funds to build up military assets in the region surrounding China.
SCHEERPOST By Kyle Anzalone / Antiwar.com, October 21, 2023
On Friday, the White House rolled out its proposed $105 billion bill to arm Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. The legislation also includes funding for the border and humanitarian assistance. US officials say over $50 billion will go to American weapons manufacturers.
The Biden administration is proposing a massive aid package as it has struggled to get Congress to appropriate more funds for the proxy war in Ukraine. The largest portion of money is for Ukraine at $61.4 billion. The White House wants enough money for Ukraine to fund Kiev through the 2024 election.
National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan described the aid as critical to American national security and demanded Congress pass the bill. “This budget request is critical to advancing America’s national security and ensuring the safety of the American people,” Sullivan said. “The world is closely watching what Congress does next.”
Israel will receive $14.3 billion in assistance, with $10.6 billion for air and missile defense support.The aid would be in addition to the $3.8 billion Tel Aviv from Washington in security assistance annually……………………………………………
The bill includes $7.4 billion for several initiatives to increase Washington’s military posture in the Indo-Pacific. That includes $2 billion in grants for foreign governments to buy American weapons. Taiwan will receive a portion of that money, although US officials did not provide a detailed breakdown.
Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Shalanda Young, explained that nearly half of the money will go to American arms makers. “This supplemental request invests over $50 billion in the American defense industrial base, ensuring our military continues to be the most ready, capable, and best-equipped fighting force the world has ever seen,” she said.
Young claimed that the spending would bolster the American economy and create jobs. However, a study indicated that military spending costs more jobsthan it creates……………..
A small number of Republican represenatives have hindered Congress from passing additional funds for Ukraine. The Biden administration hopes to push several GOP members of Congress to vote for the bill by combining funding for Taiwan, Israel, and the border with Ukraine. https://scheerpost.com/2023/10/21/white-house-seeks-105-billion-to-arm-israel-ukraine-and-taiwan/ #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
Ralph Nader: Biden Returns Empty-handed, Except for a Huge Bill for the American Taxpayers
Biden wants Congress to approve $14 billion for Israel to address the colossal failure of Netanyahu’s extremist coalition to protect its own citizens on the border.
By Ralph Nader / Nader.org https://scheerpost.com/2023/10/22/ralph-nader-biden-returns-empty-handed-except-for-a-huge-bill-for-the-american-taxpayers/
If President Joe Biden were a pony, instead of a perennial warhorse (e.g., gung-ho for Bush/Cheney’s criminal destruction of Iraq), he would have his tail between his legs on his return from a one-day trip to Israel. He failed to achieve any immediate, critical objectives while the ongoing destruction of Gaza and the defenseless Palestinians continues.
Did Biden get Israel and Egypt to allow the exit of hundreds of American citizens fleeing the Gazan firestorm? No!
Did Biden open up corridors for humanitarian aid to the babies, children, women, elderly and other civilians in Gaza who had nothing to do with the October 7th Hamas homicide/suicide attack on Israelis? No!
To the contrary, earlier in the week he cruelly ordered his UN Ambassador to veto a widely supported resolution calling for a humanitarian ceasefire.
Did he forcefully double down on his earlier counsel to the Israeli government to obey the laws of war, then and now, being openly violated? No! He continued his silence after the Israeli Defense Minister ordered his soldiers with the genocidal command, “No electricity, no food, no fuel, no water…” That death sentence includes patients in hospitals who must endure the carpet bombing of this long-time blockaded tiny strip of desert land holding 2.3 million people. (See, Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide).
Did Biden press for the exchange of Hamas’ hostages for the release of Palestinian prisoners, including young Palestinians, who have been in Israeli jails for years without due process or charges? No! Worse, Biden failed to object to the Israeli military stating that the release of over 200 Israeli hostages is a “secondary priority” to smashing Hamas and Gaza “into the Stone Age.” This policy flouts the moral codes of many venerable Judaic sages described in an October 19, 2023, New York Timescolumn by Mikahel Manekin titled “The Safety of the Hostages Must Come First.” Israel conducted two prisoners for hostages’ exchanges, one in 2004 and one in 2011.
Did Biden, in strong terms, tell the Israeli politicians that they have already exacted revenge many times over on the stateless people of Gaza – in civilian lives lost, injuries, related spread of disease, destitution and destruction? Did he say it is inhumane and counterproductive to bomb hospitals, clinics, schools, mosques, churches, apartment buildings, water mains, electric networks and ambulances, all of which is in violation of civilized norms and rules of war? Of course not. He greenlighted Israel’s genocidal warfare from the beginning of the Israeli assault and sent U.S. weaponry. He is enabling other actions of “co-belligerency” against the defenseless Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
Did he even get the 20 trucks of humanitarian aid waiting at the Rafah crossing – also bombed by the Israelis – from Egypt into Gaza before he left? No!
Biden did come back with a bill for the American taxpayers – who for decades have been forced to pay for these Israeli wars. Now Biden wants Congress to approve $14 billion for Israel to address the colossal failure of Netanyahu’s extremist coalition to protect its own citizens on the border. (Adding only $100 million for Palestinian relief).
That sum of money, to be authorized without any Congressional hearings or Congressional oversight, is greater than the combined annual budgets of the FDA, OSHA, NHTSA and the section of HHS, whose missions are to reduce the loss of hundreds of thousands of preventable American fatalities in the workplace, on the highways, and in the marketplace and the hospitals. (See, the 2016 peer-reviewed study from the John Hopkins University of Medicine).
Lastly, still not calling a ceasefire, Biden is disregarding his own military’s private advice against an Israeli ground invasion of Gaza as raising the risk of a larger war in the Middle East that would clearly be against the national interests of the American people and U.S. security.
He could have done what President Eisenhower did in 1956, when he demanded that the Israeli, British and French attack on Egypt stop immediately.
And stop, they did!
After all, the U.S. has some influence over Israel, to put it mildly. The U.S. endorses all Israeli aggressions (including Israel’s admission to bombing hundreds of sites in Syria, mired in its civil war and no threat, in addition to striking Damascus International Airport). All with U.S. advanced weapons, and billions of dollars in annual aid to Israel, a prosperous military, technological and economic superpower. In fact, Israel’s social safety net is better than that of the U.S.!
Biden provides total diplomatic cover in the U.S. with Washington’s automatic UN vetoes, and pressures allies to follow the party line.
Moreover, Biden seems unwilling to recognize the historical origins of this conflict that now has mighty Israel occupying, colonizing, brutalizing and stealing land and water from the twenty-two percent of the original Palestine left for millions of Palestinians under Israeli daily control.
Biden should take a moment in the Oval Office to read page 121 of the book “The Jewish Paradox” by Nahum Goldman (January 1, 1978), the head of the World Zionist Organization. He quotes the leading Founder of the Israeli state, David Ben-Gurion as candidly saying to him: “If I were an Arab leader, I would never sign an agreement with Israel. It is normal; we have taken their country. It is true God promised it to us, but how could that interest them? Our God is not theirs. There has been Anti-Semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They see but one thing: we have come and stolen their country. Why would they accept that?”
Today’s Israeli leaders refuse to demonstrate this degree of empathy. Instead, they provoke and deny the creation of a Palestinian state, envisioned by the Oslo Accords they signed in 1993, hurl the most racist epithets (“animals,” “vermin,” “snakes,”), and make sure the politicians in the U.S. Congress never utter the words “Palestinians also have a right to defend themselves” as violently subjugated victims of Israel the superpower.
Many members of Congress who demand giving Israel whatever money and weaponry it wants for whatever it does, violating human rights under international law in its illegal occupations and blockade, turn around and vote against the child tax credit, worker health and safety, universal healthcare, paid family leave and daycare for Americans. Their viciousness – as with the homicidal outburst of Gen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) against all Palestinians, and Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) a Harvard Law graduate, saying “As far as I’m concerned, Israel can bounce the rubble in Gaza…” set new levels of depravity.
A few Senators see it differently, especially Senator Bernie Sanders (D-VT) who noted “…it is no secret that Gaza has been an open-air prison” with “horrendous living conditions,” and that “children and innocent people do not deserve to be punished for the acts of Hamas.”
Little known is that Israel and the U.S. fostered and funded the rise of Hamas as a religious counterpoint to the secular Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO). It was established in 1987 following the first intifada uprising. A 2009 The Wall Street Journal article titled: “How Israel Helped to Spawn Hamas” noted:
“Instead of trying to curb Gaza’s Islamists from the outset, says Mr. Cohen, Israel for years tolerated and, in some cases, encouraged them as a counterweight to the secular nationalists of the Palestine Liberation Organization and its dominant faction…”
To Biden and the Congressional “howlers” for the death of civilian innocents, historical facts matter little. Hamas’ lethal attack on October 7th was preceded by far greater numbers of Israeli violent attacks over the past decades taking four hundred times the number of innocent Palestinian lives, injuries and other casualties than inflicted on innocent Israelis.
Israel’s carpet bombing of Gaza will take twenty times or more lives of innocent Palestinians than those killed by Hamas on October 7th with the casualty toll of direct fatalities and the loss of life from the devastation of life-sustaining water, food, medicine, shelter and other hospital/clinic emergency infrastructure.
Also conveniently forgotten is the detailed peace offer to Israel in 2002, by 22 member states of the Arab League to establish diplomatic and trade relations with a recognized Israel in return for its retreating to the 1967 borders and creation of a Palestinian two-state solution. The Israel extremists in Congress and President G.W. Bush declined even to respond to this proposal. (See, the March 29, 2002 New York Times article: Mideast Turmoil; Text of the Peace Proposals Backed by the Arab League).
It is incumbent on the supreme military superpower in the region to take the initiative for peace over the powerless victims under its thralldom. That country is, of course, high-tech Israel, bristling with the latest weapons and nuclear atomic bombs.
Both the brave Israeli human rights groups and those courageous human rights Israelis standing shoulder to shoulder over the years striving to conduct non-violent civil disobedience at the besieged Palestinian village level, only to be dispersed by Israeli soldiers, know the real obstacle to peace. It is the plan by the right-wing Israeli parties to annex the entire Palestinian West Bank (nearly attempted under Donald Trump) and forcefully drive Palestinians into Jordan and Egypt.
Joe Biden is skilled at shedding tears at memorials of grief in this country. But he runs dry when the recurring catastrophes befalling Palestinians beg for his presidential compassion and actual deeds.
He will not escape history’s judgment. #Israel #Palestine
Decontaminating Fukushima: have the billions spent been worth it?
The Conversation, Jim Smith, Professor of Environmental Science, University of Portsmouth, October 24, 2023
The Chernobyl and (to a lesser extent) Fukushima nuclear accidents contaminated large areas of land with low-level radioactivity. After both accidents, huge efforts were taken to decontaminate the affected areas.
But a recent study at Fukushima raises doubts about whether these decontamination efforts were worthwhile. Less than one-third of the population has returned to the evacuated zones and extensive areas of forest in the region remain contaminated.
Following the accident at Fukushima Daiichi in 2011, approximately 1,100 square kilometres were evacuated, resulting in the relocation of more than 100,000 people from their homes. A contaminated area about eight times larger remained inhabited, albeit subject to continuous radiation monitoring.
The dominant source of radiation exposure for people stemmed from gamma rays emitted by contaminated soils, pavements, roads and buildings. The objective of the decontamination operation was to ensure that the general public received an annual dose from Fukushima’s radioactivity of less than 1,000 microsieverts (µSv) above the natural background level. The average natural radiation dose in Japan stands at 2,200 µSv per year.
Radiocaesium, which is the most important long-lived radioactive element emitted by the accident in terms of radiation dose, adheres to soil particles very strongly. Consequently, the decontamination of agricultural land primarily involved removing the top 5cm of soil. In urban areas, decontamination efforts entailed the removal of topsoil from sports fields, as well as sandblasting or pressure washing hard surfaces, and pressure washing drains and gutters.
These efforts reduced doses by about 60% in residential areas and farmland, allowing people to return to their homes in a large part of the evacuated area. This is a far cry from Chernobyl, where extensive decontamination initiatives were ultimately abandoned, leaving huge evacuated areas that remain empty to this day. But was undertaking decontamination in Fukushima worthwhile?
Costs and benefits
Decontaminating the land in Fukushima has cost tens of billions of dollars. The process has, unfortunately, also caused substantial radiation exposure for the workers involved, and has generated huge amounts of radioactive soil waste. But the question of whether to decontaminate land is complex and only partially related to scientific evidence.
On the one hand, decontamination provides reassurance that radiation is being “cleaned up” and that doses are being reduced. But it can also give the impression that low-level radiation is more dangerous than it actually is.
Dose rates were not dangerously high in many areas of Fukushima that were subject to decontamination. In fact, doses were relatively low in the first year following the accident (less than 12,000 µSv), and these levels decreased significantly in subsequent years.
These levels fall within the natural range people are exposed to from radioactivity in rocks, soils, building materials and cosmic radiation worldwide (typically between 1,000 µSv and 10,000 µSv per year, but sometimes higher).
On balance, I think the reassurance that contamination was being cleaned up was valuable in many areas where people remained living. Decontamination also allowed agricultural land to be returned to productive use more quickly. However, the process of removing topsoil had the side effect of damaging soil fertility.
Accidental rewilding
In the evacuated zone where dose rates were around ten times higher, it’s less clear that decontamination was beneficial. Only 30% of people have returned to their homes in the decontaminated part of this area and much of the land in the most contaminated so-called “difficult to return zone” remains abandoned.
A better option may have been to declare most of this zone a nature reserve and allow managed rewilding of the area. Rewilding is happening to a large extent anyway, as it has at Chernobyl. It would also have avoided decontamination workers being exposed to radiation and allowed more financial support to help people relocate.
But this is a complex decision that needs to consider the views of many stakeholders, not least the evacuated people themselves.
Fukushima’s contaminated forests
The land in and around the region’s towns and villages has generally been decontaminated effectively. However, much of the Fukushima Prefecture (71%) is covered by forest. Most of this forest remains contaminated.
The persistence of radiocaesium in ecosystems, particularly in forests, has been known for many decades. Globally, radiocaesium levels in wild foodstuffs such as mushrooms, edible plants, game animals and freshwater fish tend to be higher than those found in agricultural systems.
Wild boar in certain regions of Germany, for instance, still exhibit radicaesium levels exceeding consumption limits as a consequence of both Chernobyl and historical nuclear weapons testing. Restrictions on the consumption of forest products have lasted for decades following the Chernobyl incident. And they are expected to persist in many forested areas of Fukushima too.
Radiocaesium lingers in forests due to the prevalence of organic soils and the absence of fertiliser application. Low nutrient levels facilitate the absorption of radiocaesium by plants. This is mainly attributed to radiocaesium’s chemical similarity to potassium, a crucial plant nutrient.
Forests do pose a wildfire risk. There have been many forest fires in the vicinity of Chernobyl since the accident. But radiation doses from smoke inhalation are extremely low, even for firefighters, and the fires have not significantly redistributed radioactivity.
There are no easy answers regarding clean up after a nuclear accident. Japan has made huge and often successful efforts to reduce radiation doses and reassure people living in or returning to the affected areas. But low-level radiation remains everywhere, particularly in forests……….. https://theconversation.com/decontaminating-fukushima-have-the-billions-spent-been-worth-it-215836 #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes.
China-Russia in a nuclear sub counter to AUKUS
China’s Type 096 nuclear submarine draws on Russian tech and expertise and once operational will bring US mainland into closer missile range
Asia Times, By GABRIEL HONRADA, OCTOBER 23, 2023
China is making new quiet nuclear submarines with Russia’s expert assistance, an answer to the AUKUS alliance and the latest sign of the two powers’ converging strategic interests against the United States and its Pacific allies
The project could make it harder for the US and its allies to track China’s submarines in crucial theaters including the South China Sea and represents a direct challenge to US undersea dominance in the Pacific.
This month, Reuters reported that China is producing a new generation of nuclear-armed submarines, citing evidence that its Type 096 nuclear ballistic missile (SSBN) submarine will be operational before the end of the decade. The report said that breakthroughs in the submarine’s quietness have been aided partly by Russian technology……………………………………..more https://asiatimes.com/2023/10/china-russia-in-a-nuclear-sub-counter-to-aukus/ #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
Congress calls for third US nuclear submarine yard to meet American and AUKUS obligations
Defense Connecg, 20 OCTOBER 2023, By: Stephen Kuper
“………………………………….. the US Navy and its supporting industrial architecture, once the unassailable leader and security guarantor for much of the world and the global economy, is now a shadow of its former might.
This has left the US Navy and its global partners, including the Royal Australian Navy, to face an increasingly uphill battle to field a range of next-generation capabilities ranging from hypersonic weapons, through to advanced surface and submarine capabilities.
…………………..In response to these mounting concerns, the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States released an updated final report, titled, America’s Strategic Posture: The Final Report of the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States, detailing the make-up of America’s critical strategic capabilities, namely the nuclear submarine fleet.
A third yard is critical to meet American and AUKUS obligations
Of particular importance for Australia is what is by now the well-documented lack of capacity in the existing US submarine construction yards to meet the stated minimum requirements identified by the US Navy.
The dual demands of replacing the remaining Los Angeles Class attack submarines and the Ohio Class ballistic missile submarines has already stretched the US defence industrial base to capacity, prior to the added layer of complexity required to support the trilateral AUKUS agreement.
……..The commission report suggests that the Pentagon, “increase shipbuilding capacity, by working with industry to establish or renovate a third shipyard dedicated to production of nuclear-powered vessels, with particular emphasis on nuclear-powered submarines”.
However, given the immense cost required to bring a third yard from either a green field or brown field site, government spending would be required the Pentagon has been told, this is particularly important when you account for the maintenance and sustainment requirements of nuclear-powered submarines on top of the construction phase.
Highlighting just how monumental this task is, the report states, “In the sea leg, the Navy is scheduled to construct one Columbia Class submarine per year and sustain the Ohio Class in parallel relying on the same infrastructure for both (manufacturing facilities, dry docks, etc). Additionally, this same workforce and industrial base also support Virginia Class submarine production.”
Such a balance isn’t without trade offs, with the Pentagon warning that, “As a result, the Navy must consider schedule trade offs between the two classes of submarines. The [Office of Management and Budget] as well as the Commission are skeptical that the current infrastructure can simultaneously support conventional and nuclear sustainment, modernisation, and construction as scheduled. The AUKUS agreement may place further stress on this capacity.”
……………………………………………………… the US Navy and its allies, including Australia, are facing stagnating or declining defence budgets (in real terms) as a result of increasingly costly technology-heavy platforms, coupled with continuing societal atomisation and disconnection from the principles of liberal democracy,…………………………………………………………..
Final thoughts
Importantly, in this era of renewed competition between autarchy and democracy, this is an uncomfortable conversation that needs to be had in the open with the Australian people, as ultimately, they will be called upon to help implement it, to consent to the direction, and to defend it should diplomacy fail………. https://www.defenceconnect.com.au/industry/12977-congress-calls-for-third-us-nuclear-submarine-yard
St. Louis businessman charged with kickback scheme involving nuclear weapons parts
St Louis Post Dispatch, Katie Kull, Oct 19, 2023
ST. LOUIS — A local businessman is facing federal charges in Kansas after authorities say he sent kickbacks and bribes to an engineer at a nuclear weapons parts manufacturer in exchange for subcontracts.
Richard W. Mueller, 63, was indicted Wednesday on six federal charges, including wire fraud and lying to federal agents, after authorities said he paid Kansas engineer Michael Clinesmith more than $1 million in exchange for steering contracts to Mueller’s businesses over the course of a decade………………………………………………………………….. more https://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-courts/st-louis-businessman-charged-with-kickback-scheme-involving-nuclear-weapons-parts/article_7a7fff2c-6eb7-11ee-a26a-3f5922548456.html #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
Nuclear regulator raps EDF over cyber compliance
The Office for Nuclear Regulation says EDF has come up short on needed measures to improve cyber security standards at several critical UK nuclear facilities
France-headquartered energy giant EDF has been singled out by the UK’s
Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) and placed under significantly enhanced
regulatory attention for cyber security – the highest possible level of
scrutiny – after the critical national infrastructure (CNI) operator failed
to comply with previously made commitments to enhance its cyber security
posture.
Computer Weekly 19th Oct 2023
https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366556335/Nuclear-regulator-raps-EDF-over-cyber-compliance #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes
1 This Month
23-25 October – on Zoom – World BEYOND War’s annual global conferenc
Shut down the radiation-damaged Heysham nuclear reactors now
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
Say No to NASA’s Reckless Nuclear Reactor on the Moon
Say No to NASA’s Reckless Nuclear Reactor on the Moon
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