progressiveissuesblog

Gaza in Ruins

Updated 2024-07-16

2024-03-07 Gaza Destruction 152 days have passed since the start of Israel’s aggression on the Gaza Strip in October. Exclusive footage from Al Jazeera shows the mass destruction from the 70,000 tons of explosives Israel has dropped on the strip.    https://www.tiktok.com/@ajplus/video/7343644056628628767

2024-02-15 On the Various Possibilities for the ‘Day After’ the Siege on Gaza Ends    There are many external plans for Gaza on “the day after,” most of which take no notice of Palestinian agency or desire.  Just as there are various possible outcomes, there are several ways to describe the horror that “Israel” has inflicted on Gaza over the past approximately 130 days.   “Siege” fits nicely into the title, but it has been a 75-year siege culminating in an escalation of the violence over the past three months. Genocide more accurately describes the situation, intensified ethnic cleansing that has been the Zionist’s goal since 1948. 

As of January 4, 2024, “Israel” had dropped more than 45,000 bombs on Gaza weighing more than 65,000 tons, according to the Gaza Media Office. More than the weight and power of nearly three nuclear bombs like those dropped on Japanese cities, about 2/3 if these devices were “dumb bombs,” meaning unguided and imprecise, and they were dropped on residential areas of the Gaza Strip.

In past wars, “Israel” faced accusations of using shells that contained depleted uranium, a radioactive material that remains in the environment most likely causing cancer and birth defects for generations to come. Environmentalists who ignore these facts are complicit in whitewashing “Israel’s” scorched earth policy aimed at further ethnic cleansing.  There will no doubt be consequences from the harm done to Palestinians for many years to come, and it is up to this generation and those who come after to ensure that the thousands who are deceased will not have died in vain.

Moreover, Baroud explains that the issue will not be one state, two state, or any state, but rather the Zionist state of “Israel,” who would be free to do what they want if Palestinians are unarmed. Also of concern are the Palestinians who reside as second-class citizens within the ’48, what will happen to them? The problem, he concludes, has always been Zionism, and until it is dismantled, there can never be a just much less sustainable peace.    https://www.palestinechronicle.com/on-the-various-possibilities-for-the-day-after-the-siege-on-gaza-ends/

2023-11-22 Gaza in Ruins: Satellite Imagery Researchers Say Israel Has Destroyed or Damaged 56,000 Buildings     We speak with two researchers who lead the Decentralized Damage Mapping Group, a network of scientists using remote sensing to analyze and map the damage and destruction in the Gaza Strip since Israel’s attacks began on October 7. Radar technology shows that Israel’s bombing campaign has left about half of all buildings in northern Gaza damaged or destroyed since October 7, with at least 56,000 buildings in Gaza damaged overall. Doctoral researcher Corey Scher explains how researchers use open data to bring consistent, transparent assessments of the rapidly expanding damage in Gaza. “We’ve all been surprised at the speed of this,” says Jamon Van Den Hoek, lead of the Conflict Ecology lab.   Democracy Now! is an independent global news hour https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jD_uBLAhfgA&t=17s

.

Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

.

Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Gaza

Updated 2024-02-24

2024-01-30 Israel’s war on Gaza updates    Israeli troops have stormed Al-Amal Hospital in Khan Younis and are demanding doctors and displaced Palestinians evacuate, the Palestine Red Crescent says.

At least 16 people, including women and children, have been killed in an Israeli strike on a home in central Gaza’s Deir el-Balah, says the Red Crescent.

Hamas’s political chief reviews the new truce proposal, saying the “priority is to stop the brutal aggression against Gaza and complete withdrawal of occupation forces”.

Israeli commandos disguised as medical staff and civilians gun down three men in Jenin’s Ibn Sina Hospital in the occupied West Bank, alleging they planned to carry out “terrorist” attacks.

At least 26,751 people have been killed and 65,636 wounded in Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7. The death toll in Israel from the October 7 Hamas attacks stands at 1,139.   https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/1/30/israels-war-on-gaza-live-israeli-forces-detain-dozens-in-un-shelter-raid

2023-12-27    2023: The Year Humanity Died    As a Palestinian who was born two generations apart from the Nakba, I have never imagined that one day I would witness the genocide of my people unfold before my eyes in broad daylight.    In my happy Palestinian innocence, I believed that even if Israel was keen on repeating the Nakba, or attempting to “finish the job of 1948,” as many Israeli officials have threatened over the years, the Free World would not allow it to happen. In my wishful thinking, I believed that the world had learned its lesson since the Nakba.

Yes, the world failed the Palestinian people in 1948. Yes, it allowed Israel to carry out its ethnic cleansing and mass expulsion of Palestinians. Yes, it abandoned the Palestinian refugees, and rewarded Israel with a United Nations recognition and membership. But that was 75 years ago, the age of genocides and holocausts. A lot of progress had been made since, I told myself. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted. The U.N. evolved. Human rights groups mushroomed. Mandela won the Nobel Peace. True, genocide would occur so often and so uncontested in the decades since, but after the horrific genocides in Rwanda and Bosnia, the leaders of the Free World seemed to have had enough! They seemed adamant not to allow another genocide to happen—Never Again! Not in Palestine, not again!

Even when Israel mushroomed in size, and the settlements tripled, and the apartheid system was closing in on the Palestinians in the West Bank, and the merciless siege suffocating those in Gaza, where one million children were born and raised in captivity, I still believed that that was the peak of our suffering.    I was dead wrong. For three bloody months since the Gaza Genocide first unfolded, the Free World has sat there watching, and cheering, and mocking us to death.    https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/2023-humanity-died-gaza

2011-01-21 Noam Chomsky On Gaza   Noam Chomsky addresses the ongoing crisis in Gaza followed by a question-and-answer session with the audience. Joining Chomsky is Nancy Murray, the director of education at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Massachusetts. She is the author of Rights Matter: the Story of the Bill of Rights. Nancy holds a B.Phil. and Ph.D. in modern history from Oxford University. She has experience as a teacher, scholar and social activist in Great Britain, Kenya, and the Middle East as well as the United States, and has written widely on the themes of civil liberties, civil and human rights.    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wb9gqXBj-4A

.

Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

.

Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Free Speech

Updated 2024-04-01

2023-12-22 Israel’s Killing of Journalists in Gaza ‘Unparalleled,’ Says Watchdog     Journalists are being slain during Israel’s current assault on Gaza at a rate unseen in modern history—with more killed in the last 10 weeks alone than have been killed in any country in any whole year since records began, the Committee to Protect Journalists revealed on Thursday.   CPJ said that at least 68 media professionals—61 Palestinians, four Israelis, and three Lebanese—have been killed since the October 7 Hamas-led attacks on Israel and the Israeli military’s retaliatory obliteration of the Gaza Strip.

Of particular concern to CPJ is Israel’s “apparent pattern of targeting journalists and their families.”   “In at least one case, a journalist was killed while clearly wearing press insignia in a location where no fighting was taking place,” the group said. “In at least two other cases, journalists reported receiving threats from Israeli officials and IDF officers before their family members were killed.”     https://www.commondreams.org/news/journalists-killed-in-gaza-2666788920

2023-12-20 The Palestine Exception to Campus Free Speech    On Nov. 9, 2023, I and nine of my peers organized and participated in a sit-in at our high school’s annual Veterans Day ceremony to protest Israel’s attack on Gaza, challenge United States military and political funding of the genocide of Palestinians, and show our solidarity with the Palestinian cause. We filled rows of our gym wearing white shirts that read “Stop Israel, Stop Genocide” and held signs reading “We Are the Resistance” and “Free Palestine” during the event.

The aftermath of our disruption was swift and serious. We were humiliated by our administration, removed from leadership positions for not “reflecting school values,” and given referrals from our district for “printing political propaganda.” our school principal told us, “This is already in your permanent record”—and that there was nothing we could do to get it expunged. As seniors applying to colleges, it appeared that the marks on our records were meant to jeopardize our futures.

Schools are also cracking down on what students can discuss inside the classroom. Ali says, “I try to discuss it as much as possible in class, but recently Loudoun County Public Schools have banned a lot of pro-Palestine slogans and symbols, so there are definitely some restrictions from the admin.”    

As I processed my “punishment,” I learned that our situation wasn’t unique. In response to the constant Israeli bombings of the Gaza Strip, which, as of this writing, have killed more than 20,000 people—many of whom are children—students in high schools across the country have held pro-Palestine demonstrations, sit-ins, and walkouts, and called for an end to Israel’s violence. 

Despite attempts to censor and intimidate young organizers at U.S. high schools, students, including myself, are determined to organize against the occupation from the “Belly of the Beast,” to quote Che Guevara.   The biggest tool for young Americans is social media, which has been vital not only in educating, but in circulating news from inside Gaza into the heart of the U.S. empire.   https://www.yesmagazine.org/opinion/2023/12/20/campus-speech-palestine-gaza

2023-12-04 Free Speech at Work       The boss has far too much power to silence the political expression of employees.  

The Israel-Palestine conflict and its painful reverberations on American campuses has provoked debate about free speech versus student safety. What has gotten less publicity is free speech at work, where the boss under American law has the absolute right to fire an employee for any reason or no reason at all. With some narrow exceptions, only unionized workers and those in the civil service have some protection of their constitutional rights of speech.

In October, NYU Langone Health, a major New York hospital, summarily fired a medical resident, Dr. Zaki Masoud, at NYU Langone’s affiliate Winthrop Hospital in Mineola, Long Island, after Masoud posted a message on Instagram defending the Hamas attack of October 7. An online petition calling on the hospital to reverse course and reinstate Dr. Masoud has collected over 90,000 signatures, to no avail.  Then, to be evenhanded, Langone Health in late November fired a distinguished senior cancer researcher, Dr. Benjamin Neel, who had posted pro-Israel items on social media, including anti-Hamas political cartoons.  

Economic Policy Institute explains just when employee free speech is protected and when it is not. As EPI explains, workers have suffered retaliation for failing to support the boss’s preferred political candidate, for refusing to attend mandatory Bible study, and for speaking out during COVID against unsafe working conditions.

Ironically, the right wing, which has never been solicitous of worker rights of free expression, has backed into greater support of individual liberties via its claims, partly upheld by the Supreme Court in the Masterpiece Cakeshop case, that an individual may refuse service to a gay couple based on religious beliefs. That logic is dubious because it could override all of the protections of the great civil rights cases of the 1960s, by allowing explicit discrimination against Blacks, Jews, gays, and anyone else.   https://prospect.org/blogs-and-newsletters/tap/2023-12-04-israel-palestine-free-speech-workplace/

.

Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

.

Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Documentaries Palestine-Israel

Updated 2024-07-16

Al Jazeera https://doc.aljazeera.net/

5 Broken Cameras A documentary on a Palestinian farmer’s chronicle of his nonviolent resistance to the actions of the Israeli army. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2125423/

Al-Nakba debate | Featured Documentary    https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/relatedvideo?q=Al%20Nakba%20and%20The%20Price%20of%20Oslo&mid=A06B84DD5E433E09E741A06B84DD5E433E09E741&ajaxhist=0

Best Documentaries about the Israel and Palestine Conflict: Unbiased Insights  https://www.factualamerica.com/blog/lists/best-documentaries-about-the-israel-and-palestine-conflict#

Budrus: It Takes a Village to Unite the Most Divided People on Earth (2010) Follows a Palestinian leader who unites Fatah, Hamas and Israelis in an unarmed movement to save his village from destruction. Success eludes them until his 15-year-old daughter jumps into the fray. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1542411/

Death in Gaza (2004) The harrowing documentary that portrays the horror of the Israeli conflict and the resulting death of its director, James Miller. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0412631/

Disturbing the Peace DISTURBING THE PEACE is a story of the human potential unleashed when we stop participating in a story that no longer serves us and, with the power of our convictions, take action to create new possibilities. DISTURBING THE PEACE follows former enemy combatants – Israeli soldiers from elite units and Palestinian fighters, many of whom served years in prison – who have joined together to challenge the status quo and say “enough.’  https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5503512/

Gaza Fights for Freedom Filmed during the height of the Great March Of Return protests, it features exclusive footage of demonstrations where 200 unarmed civilians have been killed by Israeli snipers since March 30, 2018.  https://www.imdb.com/title/tt10825504/

Israel and the Arabs: Elusive Peace World leaders comment on the unraveling peace process and continued violence between Israelis and Palestinians from 1999 to 2005. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0815183/

Israel vs Israel To many of their fellow Israelis, they are traitors. They are attacked, arrested and demonized. Yet Israelis like Yehuda Shaul, leader of ‘Breaking the Silence’ and Jonathan Pollack from ‘Anarchists Against the Wall’ continue to struggle for a more peaceful Middle East. They believe that they can save their state by putting an end to the military occupation.  https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1753960/

ISRAELISM   When two young American Jews raised to unconditionally love Israel witness the brutal way Israel treats Palestinians, their lives take sharp left turns.   They join a movement of young American Jews battling the old guard to redefine Judaism’s relationship with Israel, revealing a deepening generational divide over modern Jewish identity.  https://www.israelismfilm.com/, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HvWzpjMhLAs, https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/nov/12/israelism-documentary-american-jewish-israel-palestine-conflict , https://jewishjournal.com/commentary/columnist/editors-note/359405/the-film-israelism-assaults-the-truth-and-hurts-palestinians/

The Law in these Parts (2012) Can justice truly be served in the occupied territories given the current system of law administered by Israel for Palestinians?  https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2069916/

Life in Occupied Palestine: Eyewitness Stories & Photos Anna Baltzer, the Jewish-American granddaughter of Holocaust refugees, provides a straightforward account of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, while chronicling the almost unbearable living conditions of Palestinians under the Occupation.  https://www.imdb.com/title/tt16749956/

The Lobby – USA Watch the film the Israel lobby didn’t want you to see   https://progressiveissuesblog.com/2023/10/29/documentary-the-lobby-usa/

Louis Theroux: The Ultra Zionists Louis Theroux visits a small group of ultra-nationalist Jewish settlers. This documentary provides an in-depth look at the lives and beliefs of Jewish settlers living in the disputed territories of West Bank, Israel. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1857772/

Netanyahu, America & the Road to War in Gaza  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-vzy4tYfaI

Occupation 101 A thought-provoking and powerful documentary film on the current and historical root causes of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and U.S. political involvement. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0807956/

The Occupation Of The American Mind: Israel’s Public Relations War in the United States (2016) According to Al Jazeera, the film seeks to show how information warfare waged by Israel and its supporters distorted the truth about the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, and won over the hearts and minds of Americans for the last 50 years. In other words, The Occupation of the American Mind seeks to explore the United States’ steadfast support for Israel in the face of the latter’s controversial actions. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Occupation_of_the_American_Mind

The Price of Oslo (Episode 1 &2) | Al Jazeera World Documentary    https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/relatedvideo?q=Al%20Nakba%20and%20The%20Price%20of%20Oslo&mid=F82944223508E65A4F55F82944223508E65A4F55&ajaxhist=0 ,  and  https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/relatedvideo?q=Al%20Nakba%20and%20The%20Price%20of%20Oslo&mid=15319DE0AB3071AF4E0015319DE0AB3071AF4E00&ajaxhist=0

Palestine Is Still the Issue A documentary about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that has lasted for more than 50 years. Contains some interviews with the children in this conflict. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0383551/

Pro – Israel Documentaries  https://www.amazon.com/s?k=israel+documentary&i=dvd&adgrpid=1332608656903378&hvadid=83288111894457&hvbmt=be&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=88216&hvnetw=o&hvqmt=e&hvtargid=kwd-83288382961817%3Aloc-190&hydadcr=13427_

Promises Several Jewish and Palestinian children are followed for three years and put in touch with each other, in this alternative look at the Jewish-Palestinian conflict. The three filmmakers followed a group of seven local children between 1995 and 1998. They all have a totally different background. These seven children tell their own story about growing up in Jerusalem.  https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0282864/

SEEING THROUGH the WALL, Meeting Ourselves in Palestine & Israel This film follows 18 Americans Jews to Israel and Palestine, as they seek to understand what life is like in the Occupied Territories and in East Jerusalem. The journey becomes an intense encounter not only with the people they meet, but also with their own preconceptions – an experience that for many of the travelers is transformative. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6795772/

Tears of Gaza (2010) The film offers an unyielding portrayal of the Gaza-Israel war during the 2008-2009 conflict, specifically the devastating impact on the lives of innocent Gazan civilians. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6795772/

This Is My Land How do the Palestinian and Israeli (Arab and Jewish) education systems teach the history of their nations? https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3884216/

With God on our Side The minute your pastor justifies apartheid, violence and invasion by wrongly quoting a holy book and causes you to become prejudiced against other people or group, you lose the heart of God. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1766204/

.

Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

.

Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

China

Updated 2024-01-01

2023-12-28 China’s military lashes out at US after breakthrough talks    China’s defence ministry lashed out at the United States on Thursday, a week after their top military officials resumed high-level talks, criticising its continued meddling in the Asia Pacific region and saying it maintained a “Cold War” mindset.   

Both sides had pledged at the talks to work towards restoration of contacts to avert miscalculation and misunderstanding, with the U.S. calling for “more work” to ensure military communications stayed open and reliable.  But a Chinese defence ministry spokesperson took a more hawkish tone at the year’s last regular press conference.  “The United States continues to strengthen its Asia-Pacific deployments, this is full of a Cold War mindset,” the spokesperson, Wu Qian, said on Thursday.    “Its goal is for its own selfish gains and to maintain its hegemony. Its nature is to stoke confrontation.”    https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/china-s-military-lashes-out-at-us-after-breakthrough-talks/ar-AA1m92fH

2023-10-20 China and Russia plan to work together for a two-state solution for Israel and the Palestinians    China and Russia share the same position on the Palestinian issue and plan to try to work together to cool the situation and help establish a two-state solution for Israel and the Palestinians, a top Chinese envoy said Friday.

 “The fundamental reason for the current situation of the Palestine-Israel conflict is that the Palestinian people’s lawful national rights have not been guaranteed,” Zhai said, according to a statement released on Friday by the Chinese foreign ministry.    The two countries want to “play a positive role in resuming talks for peace between Palestine and Israel, truly implementing the two-state solution, and promoting a comprehensive, just and enduring solution to the Palestinian question at an early date,” Zhai said.   https://apnews.com/article/china-middle-east-envoy-israel-gaza-c08587a566ff38fec882118a0e117c3a

.

Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

.

Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Canada

Update 2024-08-24

2024-07-26 Jewish National Fund of Canada Has Its Charitable Status Revoked      Score a significant victory against apartheid, genocide and Canada’s most significant contribution to Palestinian dispossession. The powerful Jewish National Fund of Canada has reportedly had its charitable status revoked.

Under pressure from Independent Jewish Voices (IJV) and others the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) instigated an audit of the JNF in 2018. JNF Canada was eventually forced to differentiate itself from its parent organization in Israel and to stop “co-mingling” its funds with that organization. JNF Canada was also instructed to stop assisting projects in the illegally occupied West Bank and initiatives supporting the Israeli military.  But apparently it failed to fulfill the Revenue Agency’s requests and now the CRA has rescinded its ability to grant donors tax credits.

Revoking JNF Canada’s charitable status has been long in the making and has come at some cost for many individuals.   https://truthout.org/articles/jewish-national-fund-of-canada-has-its-charitable-status-revoked/

2024-03-19  ‘A Small Step Forward’: Canadian Parliament Backs Ending Arms Exports to Israel   Canada’s Parliament on Monday approved a nonbinding resolution calling on the government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to cut off the country’s arms exports to Israel, demand an immediate cease-fire and the release of hostages, and support international legal efforts to hold perpetrators of war crimes accountable.

The measure, led by Canada’s New Democratic Party (NDP), passed in a 204-to-117 vote after private negotiations between Trudeau’s Liberal government and the NDP produced significant changes to the original text, including the removal of language calling for “sanctions on Israeli officials who incite genocide.”   https://www.commondreams.org/news/canadian-parliament-israel-arms-exports

2024-03-09 Canada, Sweden Restore UNRWA Funds as Report Accuses Israel of Torturing Agency Staff     “The work that UNWRA does cannot be overstated,” said Canadian lawmaker Salma Zahid. “It will save lives as we have seen the visuals of children dying of hunger in Gaza. The need for immediate aid is non-negotiable.”  https://www.commondreams.org/news/unrwa-funding-2667469058

2024-02-15 Amidst Israel’s slaughter in Gaza, Canadian NDP Leader Kowtows to Israel Lobby     On Tuesday Singh once again followed the Israel lobby in smearing internationalist, social justice, minded activists. In response to faux outrage instigated by the former head of the fascistic Jewish DefenSe League Meir Weinstein, Singh claimed that an anti-genocide march that passed by Mount Sinai Hospital “targeted” the Toronto institution “because of its ties to the Jewish community”.  The baseless claim contributes to anti-Palestinian racism and distracts attention from Canada’s complicity in Israel terrorizing 1.5 million people in Rafah.    

Outside a bowling hall in a Montreal on Sunday I tried to ask Singh whether he agreed with South Africa that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. He refused to answer and a member of his RCMP detail told me I didn’t have the right to “bother” the NDP leader, pushing me away and knocking my phone out of my hands.  https://www.palestinechronicle.com/amidst-israels-slaughter-in-gaza-canadian-ndp-leader-kowtows-to-israel-lobby/

2024-01-12 Canada dismisses South Africa’s genocide case against ‘Israel’ at ICJ     On Friday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stated that Canada does not endorse the argument presented by South Africa at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which posits that “Israel” is responsible for committing acts of genocide in the Gaza Strip.

In response to the escalating civilian casualties in the Gaza Strip, South Africa has filed a claim aiming to establish that “Israel’s” military campaign in Gaza constitutes genocide. The claim asserts that the campaign specifically targets Palestinians as a national, racial, and ethnic group.   Today marked the second day of public hearings on the case, with South African Justice Minister Ronald Lamola declaring earlier today that “Israel” failed to disprove the accusations of genocide.

“Canada right now is directly engaged in at least five different cases at the ICJ because we believe in the importance of that as an institution, but our wholehearted support of the ICJ and its processes does not mean that we support the premise of the case brought forward by South Africa,” Trudeau said.     https://english.almayadeen.net/news/politics/canada-dismisses-south-africas-genocide-case-against-israel

2023-12-20 Justin Trudeau’s belated and shameful volte face on Gaza    Some of Israel’s most prominent enablers now claim to abhor the scope of Israel’s wanton killing of Palestinians with a barrage of bullets, bombs, and rampaging bulldozers.  Earlier this week, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak joined France and Germany in calling for a “sustainable ceasefire” to stop the killing.    https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/justin-trudeau-s-belated-and-shameful-volte-face-on-gaza/ar-AA1lNgLE

2023-11-17 Canadian lawyers warn Justin Trudeau they will seek genocide prosecution       On Thursday, Canadian lawyers served a notice of intent to seek prosecution of Canadian officials complicit in Israel’s war crimes in Gaza.   Canada’s arms exports to Israel have risen in recent years. The notice follows the filing of a federal lawsuit in the US, earlier this week, against President Joe Biden and his secretaries of state and defense to stop them from further aiding and abetting Israel’s genocide in Gaza.   

The lawyers, who are part of the legal working group of the International Centre of Justice for Palestinians, warn that the Canadian government – including Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Minister of Foreign Affairs Melanie Joly – are risking complicity in war crimes and crimes against humanity.   “It is a crime to supply arms to a state with knowledge that they will be used for war crimes and genocide,” the notice explains.   “The Government of Canada should also be aware that international criminal tribunals have previously examined the responsibility of those who have substantially contributed to a crime by providing encouragement and moral support to the perpetrators where the perpetrators are aware of this support,” it adds.   https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/nora-barrows-friedman/canadian-lawyers-warn-justin-trudeau-they-will-seek-genocide-prosecution

2023-11-17 ICJP’s Legal Working Group for Canadian Accountability issues Canadian government with notice of intention to seek prosecution of politicians for complicity in war crimes in Gaza      The ICJP’s Legal Working Group for Canadian Accountability (ICJP LWGCA) has issued a notice to the Government of Canada of its intention to prosecute Canadian officials for their role in aiding and abetting Israel’s perpetration of war crimes.  The notice was issued to leading members of the Liberal government, including Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Minister of Foreign Affairs Mélanie Joly, Minister of National Revenue Marie-Claude Bibeau, and Minister of Justice (Attorney General) Arif Virani.    The notice included a stark warning that Canadian government officials could be individually liable and face charges before the International Criminal Court if there is evidence they have aided and abetted Israeli war crimes and crimes against humanity (a violation of Article 25(3)(c) and (d) of the Rome Statute). https://www.justpeaceadvocates.ca/icjps-legal-working-group-issues-canadian-government-with-notice-of-intention-to-seek-prosecution-of-politicians-for-complicity-in-war-crimes-in-gaza/

.

Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

.

Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

1948 Palestine War (see Nakba)

Updated 2023-12-31

1948 Palestine War – Wikipedia     The 1948 Palestine war was fought in the territory of what had been, at the start of the war, British-ruled Mandatory Palestine. It is known in Israel as the War of Independence  and in Arabic as a central component of the Nakba  It is the first war of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and the broader Arab–Israeli conflict. During the war, the British terminated the Mandate and withdrew, ending a period of rule which had begun in 1917, during the First World War. Beforehand, the area had been part of the Ottoman Empire. In May 1948, the State of Israel was established by the Jewish Yishuv, its creation having been declared on the last day of the Mandate. During the war, around 700,000 Palestinian Arabs were displaced    

After the war, the former territory of the mandate was divided among the State of Israel, which captured about 78% of it, the Kingdom of Jordan (then known as Transjordan), which captured and later annexed the area that became the West Bank, and Egypt, which captured the Gaza Strip, a coastal territory on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, in which the Arab League established the All-Palestine Government.   

The war had two main phases, the first being the 1947–1948 civil war, which began on 30 November 1947,[19] a day after the United Nations voted to adopt the Partition Plan for Palestine, which divided the territory into Jewish and Arab sovereign states, and an international Jerusalem (UN Resolution 181). Partition was accepted by the Jewish leadership, but rejected by Palestinian Arab leaders and the Arab states.[20] This phase of the war is described by historians as the “civil”, “ethnic” or “intercommunal” war, as it was fought mainly between Jewish and Palestinian Arab militias, supported by the Arab Liberation Army and the surrounding Arab states. Characterised by guerrilla warfare and terrorism, it escalated at the end of March 1948 when the Jews went on the offensive and concluded with their defeating the Palestinians in major campaigns and battles, establishing clear frontlines. During this period the British still maintained a declining rule over Palestine and occasionally intervened in the violence.[21][22]

 The British terminated the Mandate at midnight at the end of 14 May 1948. On that day, the last remaining British troops and personnel departed the city of Haifa and the Jewish leadership in Palestine declared the establishment of the State of Israel. This was followed the next day by the invasion of Palestine by the surrounding Arab armies and expeditionary forces.

The invasion marked the beginning of the second phase of the war, the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. The Egyptians advanced on the southern coastal strip and were halted near Ashdod; the Jordanian Arab Legion and Iraqi forces captured the central highlands of Palestine. Syria and Lebanon fought several skirmishes with the Israeli forces in the north. The Jewish militias, organised into the Israel Defense Forces, managed to halt the Arab forces. The following months saw fierce fighting between the IDF and the Arab armies, which were being slowly pushed back. The Jordanian and Iraqi armies managed to maintain control over most of the central highlands of Palestine and capture East Jerusalem, including the Old City. Egypt’s occupation zone was limited to the Gaza Strip and a small pocket surrounded by Israeli forces at Al-Faluja. In October and December 1948, Israeli forces crossed into Lebanese territory and pushed into Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, encircling the Egyptian forces near Gaza City. The last military activity happened in March 1949, when Israeli forces captured the Negev desert and reached the Red Sea. In 1949, Israel signed separate armistices with Egypt on 24 February, Lebanon on 23 March, Transjordan on 3 April, and Syria on 20 July. During this period the flight and expulsion of the Palestinian Arabs continued.    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_Palestine_war

.

Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

.

Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

BRICS Consortium

Updated 2023-12-31

2023: The Year the Bubble of US Leadership Burst   If Ukraine exemplifies yet another iconic U.S. military failure, and BRICS the changing of the guard in the economic realm, the sadistic savagery in Gaza repudiates the moral right of the U.S. to lead… anything.

Ukraine is an epochal failure for the U.S. in all dimensions, the worse for having been entirely self-inflicted.  Then, Ukraine accelerated the growth of the BRICS consortium. This group, originally made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa (hence, the acronym) aims to bypass the U.S.-dominated global trading system, instead building one that allows nations of the Global South to not simply be milked of their wealth by the West, but to prosper in their own right. In August, it named six new nations for membership: Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia.

These now-11 nations contribute a combined 37% of global GDP, versus 30% for the Western G7 bloc. They are explicitly committed to dethroning the dollar as the world’s international reserve currency, by, among other things, trading with each other in non-dollar currencies. Russia and China, for example, no longer use dollars in trade between themselves.

Of key significance is the composition of the new members. Half of them are major oil exporters, among them, importantly, Saudi Arabia, a formerly staunch U.S. ally. With Russia, they produce 44% of the world’s oil. Why is this important? The dollar’s status as international reserve currency is closely tied to oil. Until recently, oil was only sold in dollars, meaning that all of the world’s nations had to acquire dollars to be able to buy oil. So, when BRICS+ oil exporters begin accepting payment for their oil in non-dollar currencies, it is the dollar that will be damaged.   Nations will no longer need dollars to buy oil. That means they will not need to “buy” dollars by purchasing U.S. Treasury securities. That will make it almost impossible for the U.S. to fund its massive budget and trade deficits, which are financed—that’s right—by selling treasures to other nations. That day is fast approaching, as seen in Saudi Arabia announcing this year that it will begin accepting payment for oil in Chinese yuan.

The growth of BRICS, its economic clout, its explicit de-dollarization agenda, and the centrality of oil-exporting nations in its members will prove like the water shifting in the bottom of a rowboat. It will decisively reverse the primacy of the U.S. and the West in global economic affairs. The damage isn’t all landed, yet, and won’t be for many years, but the direction is clear and irreversible. There’s a new economic sheriff in town.  https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/2023-us-leadership-bubble-burst

.

Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

.

Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Auschwitz Museum

Updated 2024-01-15

2023-12-30 ‘Doctors Against Genocide’ Scraps Event At Holocaust Museum, Apologizes After Uproar: ‘Misunderstanding’   A group of doctors, “Doctors Against Genocide,” planned an event at the U.S. Holocaust Museum to raise awareness about the violence in Gaza.  However, the announcement sparked backlash, leading to the event’s cancellation.   The group clarified that the intention was to express empathy for Holocaust victims and learn from the museum’s genocide education initiatives.  They emphasized their stance against all forms of hate, including antisemitism.

“As Doctors Against Genocide we wish to address misconceptions surrounding our Holocaust Museum event which has been misrepresented as an anti-Semetic gathering,” the group wrote.   “We had recently announced a planned visit to the Holocaust Memorial Museum as a way to educate and engage the medical community.”   “We wanted to learn from the Museum’s initiatives in genocide education and prevention to inform our own efforts as an organization dedicated to preventing war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide around the world,” the group said.   “It was not our aim to protest inside or outside the museum, nor is it our intent to minimize the important work done by the Holocaust Memorial Museum. We are deeply affected by the horrors of the Holocaust and are moved to prevent similar atrocities.”  https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/doctors-against-genocide-scraps-event-at-holocaust-museum-apologizes-after-uproar-misunderstanding/ar-AA1mdFHq

2023-12-19 Israeli Official: Gaza Should Be FLATTENED “Like Auschwitz Today”     Local Israeli politician David Azoulai of Metula said Gaza should be “flattened completely, just like Auschwitz today.” Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian discuss on The Young Turks.   “A local Israeli council head suggested in a radio interview that Gaza should be “flattened completely, just like Auschwitz today,” the latest Israeli official to publicly call for the annihilation of the besieged Palestinian enclave.   David Azoulai, a political leader for the northern Israeli town of Metula, made the remark Sunday in an interview with Tel Aviv’s Radio 103FM. He went further, suggesting that Palestinians in Gaza be forcibly sent to refugee camps in Lebanon. Metula sits near the Israel-Lebanon border.”  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zlPUPqxLNQ

2023-12-18 Auschwitz Museum Decries Israeli Mayor’s ‘Sick’ Call to ‘Empty’ Gaza       The Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Poland on Sunday decried what critics called genocidal remarks by the mayor of an Israeli town who said all of Gaza should be ethnically cleansed of Palestinians and turned into a museum like the notorious Nazi death camp.

“The whole Gaza Strip needs to be empty. Flattened. Just like in Auschwitz,” Metula Mayor David Azoulai said in a radio interview on Sunday, according toThe Times of Israel. “Let it be a museum for all the world to see what Israel can do. Let no one reside in the Gaza Strip for all the world to see, because October 7 was in a way a second Holocaust.”

In response, the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Oświęcim, southern Poland wrote on social media that “David Azoulai appears to wish to use the symbol of the largest cemetery in the world as some sort of a sick, hateful, pseudo-artistic, symbolic expression.”  “Calling for acts that seem to transgress any civil, wartime, moral, and human laws, that may sound as a call for murder of the scale akin to Auschwitz, puts the whole honest world face-to-face with a madness that must be confronted and firmly rejected,” the museum added. “We do hope that Israeli authorities will react to such shameful abuse, as terrorism can never be a response to terrorism.”  https://www.commondreams.org/news/israel-genocidal-statements

2023-11-30 Why is the Auschwitz museum justifying Israel’s genocide?    Israel has been sending its teenagers to visit the Auschwitz death camp in Poland for years, trips that by some accounts have made them more xenophobic and nationalistic, rather than instilling universal lessons from the Holocaust.

The international council of the Auschwitz museum earlier this month issued a statement supporting Israel’s genocide in the Gaza Strip under the banner of “self-defense.”   This grotesque move by an institution whose alleged mission is “to warn against indifference” to the kinds of atrocities perpetrated by the Nazis at the infamous Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp, came on 18 November.   This was after weeks of merciless Israeli bombing which had by that time killed more than 13,000 Palestinians, including 5,500 children.

To find a historical comparison for so many large bombs in such a small area, we may “have to go back to Vietnam or the Second World War,” Marc Garlasco, a military adviser for the Dutch organization PAX and a former senior intelligence analyst at the Pentagon, told the Times.  And yet the official guardians of the memory of the estimated 1.1 million people murdered at Auschwitz are not flinching.   “Threatened in its existence, the State of Israel has the right to self-defense in accordance with international law and the principles of humanitarianism,” the Auschwitz council said.   “The existence of a free, sovereign and democratic Jewish state is one of the pillars of world peace,” it asserted, dropping any pretense of political neutrality.    https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/why-auschwitz-museum-justifying-israels-genocide

.

Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

.

Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World

Anti-Muslem

Updated 2024-02-23

2024-01-29 ‘Relentless Hate’: Late 2023 Saw Surge in Anti-Muslim Crimes, Discrimination     “The way to stop the hate is to end the apartheid, occupation, and genocide occurring in Palestine,” said one CAIR leader.    Nearly four months into Israel’s war on the Gaza Strip, the largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy group in the United States on Monday highlighted that the U.S. saw a dramatic rise in Islamophobic hate during the final three months of 2023.

In line with data released last month, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) revealed that it received 3,578 complaints from October through December—a 178% jump from a similar three-month period the previous year.https://www.commondreams.org/news/rise-in-islamophobia

2023-12-19 Jewish Groups Line Up In Support Of Biden’s Muslim Court Pick Assailed By GOP    Fifteen Jewish organizations on Tuesday pledged their “strong support” for President Joe Biden’s historic Muslim court pick Adeel Mangi ― days after Republican senators subjected him to hostile and Islamophobic questioning in his confirmation hearing.

“Having ethical and unbiased judges is ingrained in our Jewish teachings in which we are taught that ‘judges need to be people of strength through good deeds,’” reads the groups’ letter to all 100 senators, obtained by HuffPost. “It is clear to us that Adeel A. Mangi is a person of strength and good deeds, as evidenced by his career, devotion to his community, and commitment to religious freedom and civil rights.”   The letter is signed by the National Council of Jewish Women, Bend the Arc: Jewish Action, Carolina Jews for Justice, The Shalom Center, and others. The groups collectively represent more than a million people nationwide.  The Jewish groups’ letter comes after Mangi, who is a partner at Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler LLP, endured a series of offensive and irrelevant questions from Republicans in the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday.

GOP Sens. Ted Cruz (Texas), Tom Cotton (Ark.) and Josh Hawley (Mo.) yelled at and interrupted Mangi throughout his hearing. They demanded that he share his personal views on the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the Oct. 7 attack in Israel and the Israeli-Hamas conflict in general. They also repeatedly tried to tie him to pro-Palestinian comments made by people he didn’t know, and to events he didn’t know about.

On Friday, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the largest Muslim civil rights organization in the country, condemned all three Republican senators for their behavior.  “Singling out a Muslim judicial nominee and forcing him to answer ‘gotcha questions’ about the Middle East simply because of faith or because of his tangential connections to Muslims who comment on the Middle East is Islamophobic and un-American,” said Edward Ahmed Mitchell, CAIR’s national deputy director. “So is raising the hateful trope that presumptively assumes that Muslims are antisemitic.”  https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/jewish-groups-line-up-in-support-of-biden-s-muslim-court-pick-assailed-by-gop/ar-AA1lLelV

.

Categorized Directory: News and Articles about Israel- Palestine Conflict

Palestine and Israel

.

Specific Issues Index

from Creating Better World