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Davos Leaders Sing Praises of GMO Soil Microbes, But Critics Warn of ‘Irreparable Consequences’

By Brenda Baletti, Ph.D. | The Defender | January 22, 2024

The topic of “synthetic biology” — the science of reengineering living organisms to have “new abilities” geared toward solving problems in fields ranging from medicine to manufacturing to agriculture — came during several sessions held last week at the World Economic Forum (WEF) meetings in Davos, Switzerland.

Synthetic biology is the basis of the so-called “bioeconomy” valued at a trillion dollars in the U.S. and set to grow globally to over $30 trillion in the next two decades, according to Forbes. Initiatives like the Biden administration’s 2022 executive order mandating federal investment in biotech are expected to drive that growth.

Bioproducts include everything from mRNA vaccines to lab-grown meats, to bioelectronic medical devices. But much of the excitement during two of last week’s WEF panels on synthetic biology in food and agriculture — “Biology as Consumer Technology” and the “Bio-based Path to Net Zero” — centered on “biologicals,” which are genetically engineered (GE) nitrogen-fixing soil microbes.

Biologicals are farm inputs derived from living organisms like plants and bacteria rather than from fossil fuels, the source of most modern pesticides and fertilizers.

Biologicals produced through synthetic biology aren’t just living organisms, they are GE living organisms made to kill pests or to generate nutrients that are then used to fertilize plants.

They also are major money-makers for the companies that make them and for their investors, panelists were quick to point out.

Reeducating consumers to embrace processed foods

Chris Abbot, CEO of Pivot Bio Inc., maker of Proven, the first GE microbe on the market, spoke about how companies like his are “leveraging technology so that we actually can produce a product and sell it at an attractive margin” despite volatility in the commodity market.

Amy Webb, CEO and “global leader of strategic foresight” at the Future Today Institute called Pivot’s GE microbe product “amazing,” especially given that “agriculture hasn’t changed in like 14,000 years, I mean, not really, right?”

Webb was likely referring to the Neolithic revolution when humans transitioned from hunter-gatherers as agriculture emerged around the globe — something that happened approximately 12,000 (not 14,000) years ago.

The Neolithic revolution was followed by a series of major technological innovations in farming throughout the world over thousands of years.

Such innovations include many of the technological developments these new GE technologies are attempting to refine, such as the Haber-Bosch process — the industrial process that enhanced the nitrogen-fixing that is key to soil fertilization.

Abbot said his company’s GE microbes are being trained to do similar nitrogen-fixing in more efficient and less environmentally destructive ways. At some, yet unknown, point in the future, he predicted the GE microbes will be less expensive and more effective than existing synthetic fertilizers.

That GE microbes are more “sustainable” is a key part of their branding.

On the “Net Zero” panel, Ester Baiget from Novozymes, who announced her company is about to merge with engineered microbe producer Chr. Hansen, explained how her company’s products “bring us closer to Net Zero.”

“Everything we do leads to lower CO2 emission, lower chemical[s], lower waste, lower impact to the environment, healthier nutrients, higher sustainability on agriculture across the whole value chain,” she said. “We enable healthier foods, we enable sustainable foods.”

On the “Biology as Consumer Technology” panel, Dror Bin, CEO of the Israel Innovation Authority, predicted a future of “bioconvergence” where biology will merge with all scientific fields. Bioconvergence is not “imaginary,” Bin said. For example, Israel last week became the first country to approve selling cultured beef, made by Aleph Farms.

The one roadblock panelists agreed they all face when it comes to growing the bioeconomy is consumer acceptance. People are needlessly afraid of genetically modified organisms (GMOs), according to Pivot’s Abbot. “They’re not that bad. You can use them the wrong way, but we [at Pivot] use a lot less chemistry because of GMOs.”

Consumers, the panel agreed, need to be “reeducated” to embrace processed foods.

Biologics, Abbot conceded, are a little more “tricky” than synthetic fertilizers, “because you take a biologic organism, which has its own variability and they’re generally pretty fickle. And then you put it in a biological environment in soil with crazy weather that’s getting crazier every single year. And now try to predict to the earlier point how these things are all going to work.”

But that’s the exciting part, he said.

An ‘unprecedented open-air experiment’ 

Outside of the WEF, there’s less enthusiasm for GE microbes and other “food as software” synthetic biology technologies, such as precision fermentation or lab-grown meat.

A report published last August by Friends of the Earth raised concerns about the unknown and potentially disastrous risks associated with GE microbes, which are fundamentally different from the already controversial GMOs that, as panelists noted, have already been highly controversial for decades.

GE microbes are living organisms that share their genetic material easily with other species and travel vast distances in the wind. The genetic modifications released inside the microbes could move across species and geographic boundaries with unforeseen and potentially irreparable consequences, the report said.

And because they are microscopic, their numbers are vast.

“An application of GE bacteria could release approximately 3 trillion genetically modified organisms every half an acre — that’s about how many GE corn plants there are in the entire U.S.,” said Dana Perls, food and technology program manager at Friends of the Earth, in a press release.

Introducing GE microbes into agriculture represents an “unprecedented open-air genetic experiment,” the report says. “The scale of release is far larger, and the odds of containment are far smaller, than for GE crops.”

The report detailed a range of genetic mishaps that can, and in some cases, have occurred in the process of genetic engineering, including unintended DNA insertions and deletions.

It underscored that when these microbes with these potential problems are released into an environment with billions of species of other microbes — most of which science does not yet understand — along with other living things, the potential problems are myriad and serious.

No framework for assessing risks

Those risks haven’t stopped companies from releasing them. At least two GE microbes, Pivot Bio’s Proven and BASF’s Poncho Votivo seed treatments, are already being used by U.S. farmers on millions of acres of farmland.

The WEF panelists predicted the number of GE microbes on the market is set to skyrocket — especially given that the U.S. regulatory system has no framework for assessing their potential risks and greenlights them rapidly.

Panel participants said they prefer to develop their products for the U.S. market rather than the European one, which has many more regulatory barriers for genetically modified or engineered products and approval takes six years.

The U.S. regulatory framework is so unclear, according to Big Food watchdog group Food Tank, that it is hard to know how many of these products are actually on the market. But, “we are likely on the cusp of a wave of new GE biologicals moving from the lab to the field.”

Pivot launched Proven in 2019. The company, backed by major biotech investors — including the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation — raised more than $600 million in private equity based on its promise to “disrupt” agriculture by reducing the need for industrially-produced synthetic nitrogen, replacing it with “clean nitrogen” from GE microbes.

But its own scientific studies showed no reduction in nitrogen use by farmers when the GE microbe is applied.

Pivot Bio’s patent application for its GE microbe Proven, marketed as a nitrogen fertilizer, lists 29 different genes along with many proteins and enzymes that can be manipulated to “disrupt” and “short-circuit” the microbe’s ability to sense nitrogen levels in its environment and “trick” it into overproducing nitrogen.

The company’s scientists also published a study showing they were surprised to find removing genes enhanced nitrogen because it could have just as easily reduced it.

Pivot was the first company to get its GE microbes to market, but since then, several other startups and Pharma giants have gotten into the GE microbe game.

Abbot didn’t comment on his company’s studies, but he did say Pivot is scaling up its technology, aimed at creating an “enduring growth trend.”

In the last several years, five major agrochemical companies, Syngenta (ChemChina), BASF, Bayer-Monsanto, FMC Corp and Corteva (DowDuPont) have acquired most existing biologicals companies.

These are the same corporations that controlled the creation and distribution of GE crops in the past.

They have “a long track record,” Friends of the Earth wrote, of disregarding the environmental and health impacts of their products, systematically undermining small farmers, obstructing the regulatory process and hiding the truth about their products.

Today, these corporations are partnering with major biotech firms and startups to drive the process forward.

Companies developing microbes highlighted on the WEF panels included the Danish bioscience company Chr. Hansen, which has been working in agriculture 145 years and has an existing library of around 50,000 microbes. Indigo Ag also “enhances” natural microbes to address different agricultural challenges.

Ginkgo Bioworks tells SEC releasing GE microbes can have ‘unknown’ effects

Ginkgo Bioworks, a major player in the synthetic biology industry, is actively involved in food and drug development, including vaccines, and “cell programming platforms,” biosecurity and disease surveillance.

It designs and engineers microbes for applications ranging from cannabinoid-producing bacteria to yeast fermenting food proteins to soil microbes.

The company commercializes its GE microbes through Joyn Bio, a partnership with Bayer.

Through Joyn Bio, Ginkgo plans to further its commitment to “harnessing the power of programmable biology to enable sustainable food production and food security worldwide,” by partnering with different companies to develop “agricultural microbial solutions across crops and geographies through broad, fully-enabled technical platforms that address diverse market needs.”

For example, last month the company announced a new partnership with French biotech startup OneOne Biosciences to develop an “espresso-machine type” to “amplify” microbes with different functions, such as nitrogen-fixing, carbon sequestration, and more at the point of use.

Behind its utopian, “forward-looking statements,” according to its press releases, “Ginkgo does not give any assurance that it will achieve its expectations.”

The company’s risk report, filed with the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) and reported by the Organic Consumers Association (OCA), raised a number of concerns.

Similar to the risks highlighted by Friends of the Earth, Ginkgo told the SEC, “The release of genetically modified organisms or materials, whether inadvertent or purposeful, into uncontrolled environments could have unintended consequences,” which could be bad for business — its primary concern.

The report also stated:

“The genetically engineered organisms and materials that we develop may have significantly altered characteristics compared to those found in the wild, and the full effects of deployment or release of our genetically engineered organisms and materials into uncontrolled environments may be unknown.

“In particular, such deployment or release, including an unauthorized release, could impact the environment or community generally or the health and safety of our employees, our customers’ employees, and the consumers of our customers’ products.

“In addition, if a high-profile biosecurity breach or unauthorized release of a biological agent occurs within our industry, our customers and potential customers may lose trust in the security of the laboratory environments in which we produce genetically modified organisms and materials, even if we are not directly affected.

“Any adverse effect resulting from such a release, by us or others, could have a material adverse effect on the public acceptance of products from engineered cells and our business and financial condition. …

“We could synthesize DNA sequences or engage in other activity that contravenes biosecurity requirements, or regulatory authorities could promulgate more far-reaching biosecurity requirements that our standard business practices cannot accommodate, which could give rise to substantial legal liability, impede our business, and damage our reputation.”

“Ginkgo’s SEC filing makes clear how unleashing Frankenmicrobes into the environment might wreak havoc,” said OCA’s Alexis Baden-Mayer.

Baden-Mayer also noted that Ginkgo has acquired several synthetic biology technologies developed by longtime Monsanto scientists and CRISPR co-developer George Church.

That makes Ginkgo “Bayer’s most important partner in its ‘Food-as-Software’ scheme,” according to Baden-Mayer.

A spokesperson for RethinkX, a tech think tank and forecaster, explained “Food-as-Software” to The Defender in an email:

“Like software, food products will be continually improved through iteration as technology improves in both cost and capability and as these food component databases grow.

“Integration with information technology and the internet means that improvements in production methods and/or ingredients can be downloaded and incorporated almost instantaneously, allowing production to be fully distributed and decentralized — just like software.”

Baden-Mayer offered a more critical description of Big Food’s food-as-software vision:

“The Monsanto-Bayer business model is to ruin food and farming with pesticides and factory farms, and then, when customers clamor for ‘clean food,’ to offer it up in the form of new, lab-created synthetic Frankenfoods that can be marketed as toxin- and cruelty-free.”

Ginkgo’s report to the SEC, she wrote, “reads like a science fiction writer’s list of plots for disaster movies.”

Brenda Baletti Ph.D. is a reporter for The Defender. She wrote and taught about capitalism and politics for 10 years in the writing program at Duke University. She holds a Ph.D. in human geography from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a master’s from the University of Texas at Austin.

This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.

January 23, 2024 Posted by | Environmentalism, Timeless or most popular | Leave a comment

The genocide in Gaza is an opportunity for Ben-Gvir to get what he wants in the West Bank

Israeli Minister of Finance Bezalel Smotrich
By Ramzy Baroud | MEMO | January 23, 2024

If what is currently happening in the Israeli-occupied West Bank took place before 7 October, our attention would have been fixated completely on that part of Palestine. The ongoing Israeli genocide in Gaza, however, has distracted us from the important events underway in the West Bank, which is now a stage for the most violent Israeli military campaign since the Second Palestinian Uprising between 2000 and 2005.

At the time of writing, since 7 October more than 360 Palestinians have been killed by Israelis in the West Bank, while thousands have been wounded. Thousands more have been arrested. These numbers exceed, by far, the total number of Palestinians killed in 2022, which was already designated by the UN as the most violent year on record in the occupied territory since 2005.

How are we to understand the logic behind the Israeli violence in the West Bank, given that it is already under a brutal Israeli military occupation and the joint “security” control of the Israel “Defence” Forces and the Palestinian Authority? And if the Israelis are honest in their claim that their offensive in Gaza is not genocide against the Palestinian people per se, but a war against Hamas, why are they attacking the West Bank with such ferocity, killing people from all different political and ideological backgrounds, and many civilians, including children?

The answer lies in the growing political power of the Jewish settlers, whose presence is illegal under international law. Historically, there are two kinds of Israeli violence meted out routinely against Palestinians: violence carried out by the Israeli army; and violence carried out by Jewish settlers.

Palestinians understand fully that they are intrinsically linked. The settlers often attack Palestinians under the protection of the Israeli army, and the latter often launches violent raids on Palestinians for the sake of the illegal settlers.

In recent years, however, the relationship between these two violent entities has started to change, thanks to the rise of the far right in Israel, which is situated mostly within illegal settlements, and their supporters inside Israel. Hence, it should not be a surprise that both of the most far-right ministers in the extremist government of Benjamin Netanyahu, Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, are themselves settlers.

As soon as Ben-Gvir became National Security Minister, he began promoting the idea of establishing a National Guard. After 7 October, he managed, with direct support from Netanyahu’s government, to establish so-called civilian security teams. Israeli officials like Yair Lapid, for example, have described Ben-Gvir’s new armed group as a “private militia”. And he is right.

Although Ben-Gvir insists that the war in Gaza must continue, his actual aim from this — aside from the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian population in the territory — is to use this rare opportunity to fulfil all of the wishes of Israel’s political extremists, all at once.

Remember, Ben-Gvir came to power based on the lofty promises of annexing the West Bank, expanding settlements and seizing control of Palestinian holy sites in East Jerusalem, among other extremist ideas. Al-Aqsa Mosque was a major target for him and his equally far-right followers, who believe that only by building a Third Temple on the ruins of Islam’s third holiest shrine would Israel be able to reclaim total control over the Holy Land.

Ben-Gvir’s bizarre political language could once have been dismissed as the extremism of a fringe politician.

Not any more, though. He is arguably the most powerful politician in Israel, due to his ability to use six seats in the Knesset to make or break Netanyahu’s ruling coalition.

While Netanyahu is behaving largely out of desperation to save his own political skin, his Defence Minister Yoav Gallant is fighting to redeem the tattered reputation of the army. Others, like War Council Minister Benny Gantz, are walking a political fine line so as not to be perceived as the ones who have broken Israel’s fragile political unity during a most decisive war.

None of this applies to Ben-Gvir. The man sees himself as the political descendant of the likes of the notorious late Meir Kahane; he is a fervent advocate of religious war. And since religious wars can only be the outcome of chaotic social and political circumstances, he is keen to instigate these very events that could ultimately lead to the war that he covets most.

One of the prerequisites is unhinged violence, where people are killed based on the mere suspicion of being “terrorists”. For example, on 18 January, Ben-Gvir told Israeli border police officers during a visit to a base in the West Bank, “You have complete backing from me.” He urged them to shoot at every “terrorist” — for which read “Palestinian” — even if they do not pose a threat.

Ben-Gvir perceives all Palestinians in the West Bank to be potential terrorists, the same way that Israel’s “moderate” President Isaac Herzog perceives all in Gaza as being “responsible” for the actions of Hamas. This essentially means that the Israeli security forces — soldiers and police — in the West Bank have the green light to kill Palestinians there with the same impunity as those killing Palestinians in Gaza.

Even though security and intelligence officials in Israel have warned Netanyahu against launching war on another front in the West Bank, the Israeli army has no other option but to fight that supposed “war” anyway. Why? Because it is already seen by a large constituency in Israel as a failure for its inability to prevent or respond successfully to the 7 October attacks, even after over 100 days of war in Gaza. To redeem their tarnished honour, senior officers are happy to fight a less challenging “war” against isolated and under-equipped Palestinian fighters in small parts of the West Bank.

Ben-Gvir, of course, is ready to manipulate all of this in his favour. And he is getting precisely what he wants: expanding the war to the West Bank, ethnically-cleansing Palestinians; torturing prisoners; demolishing homes; torching properties; and all the rest.

Arguably his greatest achievement so far is his ability to create a perfect amalgamation between the political interests of the settlers, the government and the security apparatus. His aim, however, is not merely to steal yet more Palestinian land, or expand a few settlements. His wished-for religious war will, he believes, lead ultimately to the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, not just from Gaza, but also from the West Bank.

The war in Gaza is a perfect opportunity for these sinister goals to be achieved. For now, this genocidal war continues to create opportunities for religious Zionism to acquire new followers, and to lay deeper roots within Israel’s political establishment. A sudden end to the war, however, could represent the marginalisation of religious Zionism for years to come.

January 23, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , , , , | 1 Comment

Israeli army, police repeat false claims of Hamas atrocities

Remains of destruction on Kibbutz Be’eri seen on October 11, 2023. (Photo credit: Lazar Berman / Times of Israel)
The Cradle | January 23, 2024

Recent claims made by a senior Israeli army officer and police spokesperson regarding alleged atrocities committed by Hamas during Operation Al-Aqsa Flood are false, Haaretz newspaper reported on 21 January.

On 20 January, Lt. Col. Guy Basson, deputy commander of the Israeli army’s Kfir Brigade, claimed in an interview with Channel 14 that fighters from Hamas’ military wing, the Qassam Brigades, murdered eight infants and a survivor of the Auschwitz concentration camp on 7 October.

Speaking to Channel 14, Basson claimed: “We get to Kibbutz Be’eri, and I’m confronted with two main scenarios. One was from the children’s nursery… where [the eight infants] were simply slaughtered and murdered.” When the interviewer asked him in response,” Did you see the children inside…?” Basson responded: “A house. Eight babies, eight dead babies.”

Basson later added: “Another image that stuck with me is Genia, of blessed memory, an elderly woman from Kibbutz Be’eri. I see the number engraved on her arm, and you say to yourself, she went through the Holocaust in Auschwitz and ended up dying on Kibbutz Be’eri.”

However, Haaretz reported that the incidents described in the interview never took place.

Haaretz reported there is no survivor of Germany’s World War II concentration camps named Genia in Be’eri.

The liberal Israeli daily noted that “Regarding the claim that eight babies were murdered in a kibbutz nursery, to this day there is no known case in any of the surrounding communities where children from several families were murdered together.”

In Kibbutz Be’eri, one baby, Mila Cohen, 10 months old, was killed on 7 October, along with her father, Ohad, when Qassam fighters shot through the door of the safe room in their home, hitting both Ohad and Mila on the other side, in an apparent bid to take them captive to Gaza.

A Kibbutz Be’eri spokesperson rejected Lt. Col. Basson’s claims, stating, “Nearly one hundred people were murdered on Kibbutz Be’eri, and the community suffered hundreds of heartbreaking incidents on that Black Saturday and over the past months, especially regarding the hostages. However, incidents such as eight murdered babies and a murdered Holocaust survivor named Genia – did not happen.”

An Israeli army spokesperson said, “The events in question will be investigated and examined. There was no intention to describe a reality that didn’t happen, and we apologize if anyone was offended. We will set the record straight and clarify to all commanders involved in the media effort.”

Channel 14 declined to respond to an inquiry by Haaretz, and the interview still appears on the channel’s social media accounts.

Haaretz notes that in another recent incident, the Israel Police spokesman for foreign media, Sgt. Dean Elsdunne, made an incorrect claim that “pregnant women were sliced open” by Qassam fighters on 7 October. The police spokesman was echoing a previous incorrect claim made by a member of the Zaka rescue organization that collected bodies for burial according to Jewish custom.

A police source said that “after the matter was checked, the incident was clarified to the police officer.”

Following the 7 October Hamas attack, Israeli army soldiers and spokespersons made numerous false claims to portray Hamas as carrying out a massacre against Israeli civilians rather than a military operation to liberate Gaza from decades of Israeli siege, blockade, and bombardment.

The army has sought to hide its own role in killing many Israeli civilians when they responded to the Hamas attack with overwhelming firepower, including from Apache attack helicopters, Merkava tanks, and armed Zik drones. In some cases, Israeli civilians were killed by the army deliberately to prevent them being taken captive to Gaza by Hamas, per the controversial Israeli military doctrine known as the Hannibal Directive.

January 23, 2024 Posted by | Deception, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , | 2 Comments

Israel minister: We will not agree to a deal that includes a ceasefire

MEMO | January 23, 2024

Israeli TV Channel 7 reported far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich saying that his party will not agree to any deal with Hamas that includes a ceasefire.

The head of the Religious Zionism Party said: “We will not agree to a deal that includes a ceasefire.”

In response, Minister of Heritage Amihai Ben-Eliyahu stated that if the war stops, his far-right party, Otzma Yehudit, will withdraw from the government.

He added that he feels frustrated because Hamas has not been defeated yet.

Smotrich has previously called for encouraging the “voluntary migration” of Palestinians from Gaza. Such an exodus of Palestinians from the besieged enclave would presumably be followed by the re-occupation of the Strip by Israeli authorities and its resettlement by illegal Jewish settlers.

January 23, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, War Crimes | , , , | 1 Comment

Israeli military’s blunders, brazen lies, failures sum up 110 days of war on Gaza

By Shabbir Rizvi | Press TV | January 23, 2024

Since the beginning of the Israeli regime’s ground operation against Gaza in late October, the regime forces have been met with fierce resistance by Palestinian fighters, prompting military experts to predict that Israeli troops would not find it easy to meet any of their objectives.

Nearly three months into the ground assault, these military analysts have been proven correct.

In the latest, at least 24 Israeli troops were declared killed in less than 24 hours on Tuesday, laying bare the fragility of what many have described as the “TikTok occupation army.”

The Israeli regime has not met a single objective. Instead, it has attempted to cover up its losses, committed egregious war crimes resulting in a genocide case against it at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), and spent nearly $246 million per day on sustaining its genocidal war on Gaza.

The Tel Aviv regime, which has launched a Western-focused campaign to have the hundred-some Israeli captives held by Hamas released, has not been able to secure the release of any of them so far.

In fact, the one opportunity Israeli forces had to secure their release, they instead shot them. Coupled with this embarrassment was the retreat of Israeli troops, including the infamous Golani brigade.

Facing pressure from the inevitability of military, political, and economic disaster, Zionist officials have been contradicting each other at every corner, smacking of frustration from their losses.

For example, an Israeli war minister admits that “Hamas is far from being defeated in Gaza,” while another spokesperson says that Hamas has been completely dismantled in the north.

These contradictory statements usher in more public distrust as to what is really happening on the battlefield. They also expose the dilemma the regime is facing in the face of indomitable resistance.

The Israeli regime is notorious for brazenly lying and covering up its losses while inflating its “successes.” So in order to find the truth, we must observe the battlefield itself.

Just over a week after Israeli forces announced the “dismantlement” of Hamas in the north, a barrage of 50 rockets launched from northern Gaza by the movement’s armed wing Qassam Brigades hit buildings in surrounding settlements in the occupied Gaza envelope.

The operations of Qassam Brigades are giving jitters to Israeli settlers still in the area, as Zionist forces again failed to ensure their safety, especially after downplaying the existence of threats in north Gaza.

Furthermore, thousands of Zionist settlers from the Gaza Envelope who flocked out of the occupied territories in the wake of the Al-Aqsa Storm (Al-Aqsa Flood) operation have yet to return home.

As one former settler told Israel’s Channel 13 recently, it is “not only due to the threat of rockets … no one knows if the Palestinians from Gaza can reach us. No one knows where their tunnels extend to.”

“I have been living in Sderot for years, and I cannot count the times they told us that Hamas is deterred,” he was quoted as saying, laying bare the hollow rhetoric of the Israeli military.

Meanwhile, the Al-Qassam Brigades and other resistance factions remain strong. This is through demonstrable proof – over 100 days after the start of Operation Al-Aqsa Storm (Al-Aqsa Flood), the resistance groups are able to launch rockets as far as Tel Aviv at will.

Al-Qassam Brigades routinely (nearly daily) upload videos of their fighters confronting Zionist tanks and personnel head-on and at point-blank range, posting the destruction of Israeli forces for the world to see.

Where just a few days ago Israeli military officials announced the withdrawal of Israeli forces to give them time to lick their wounds and regroup, the political pressure amassed on the Netanyahu regime has now forced some brigades from the Israeli regime back into Northern Gaza, where they continue to be met with fierce resistance.

Clearly, the claim of Hamas’ dismantlement has been proven false.

Hamas’ leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, says that Al Qassam is “smashing the Israeli army and will continue to do so,” and that Hamas “will not submit to the conditions of the occupation.”

Israel now faces the same resistance but with worn-out soldiers and less numbers.

Though thousands of soldiers still fight in Gaza, it is nowhere near as much quantity as it was just under a month ago. Thousands have backed out under “strategic withdrawal” while thousands more suffer injury and permanent disability.

To dilute the success of Palestinian resistance, the Israeli occupation has ordered hospitals not to cover the losses from Gaza. A spokesman declares that the order violates “press freedom, but claims that the logic behind the new procedure is the desire to maintain the dignity of the injured and their families.”

To date, Hamas has claimed the destruction of thousands of troops and over one thousand vehicles

The same battlefield ferocity cannot be said of Israeli forces. Resorting to aerial bombardments that only slaughter innocent civilians, the Israeli military has yet to claim a categorical battlefield win, instead filming themselves bullying and assaulting civilians and destroying their homes and neighborhoods.

The statements and videos from Al Qassam are not just demonstrations of Hamas’ battlefield skills. They also serve as a weapon against the Zionist entity itself, forcing Israeli settlers to reckon with the fact that the Israeli military cannot protect them, as they cannot even protect themselves.

Tamer Eidam, a settler and “head of the Sdot Negev regional council” has reported that the Netanyahu regime is going as far as bribing settlers to return to the Gaza envelope, without “removing the security threat.” The feelings among settlers are also the same in north-occupied Palestine, fearing Hezbollah strikes and lack of Israeli military protection.

Netanyahu insists on the return of settlers to the Gaza envelope while simultaneously asserting that the aggression on Gaza could last until 2025, as Western media and Israeli outlets report.

Meanwhile, sirens ring nearly daily due to incoming rockets from the besieged Gaza Strip.

Here lies the turbulent political landscape. Netanyahu and his officials are in direct contradiction with the assessment of the military, and within themselves, resulting in no certainty for their troops or their settlers.

Where Netanyahu promises safety and security, Al Qassam responds with barrages of rockets. And where the regime’s military affairs minister Yoav Gallant promises the elimination of Hamas, worn-out Israeli troops are met with ambushes and fierce resistance.

The scenes and reports of Israeli military withdrawal in Gaza succinctly underscore the fate of the Netanyahu regime.

The regime, which was already unpopular amongst settlers and routinely being protested against, now faces more heat from its own settlers, as facts surface from October 7 proving the usage of the infamous “Hannibal Directive.”

The directive was created to ensure civilians and soldiers are not captured by enemy fighters in order to force the Israeli regime into hostage negotiations. The directive purportedly says the capturing of any civilians or soldiers should be stopped by any means necessary – including killing them.

New details have emerged that Israeli forces not only deliberately opened fire on settlers and their own soldiers at the “Nova Festival,” but also within Israeli settlements, indiscriminately killing hundreds of Israelis.

The Tel Aviv regime lays the blame for these deaths on Hamas while destroying evidence that would tie the deaths to its own forces.

This directive comes into direct contradiction with the public occupation demand to free Israeli captives

Culminating failures of the security apparatuses of the occupation have resulted in heated war cabinet meetings that have resulted in further division within Israeli leadership, to the point of Netanyahu even demanding lie detector tests.

Zionist reports say that ministers have stormed out of meetings, or even turned meetings into nasty shouting matches where little “progress” was made.

The regime is torn between two demands: first, the demand for the return of Israeli captives with the restoration of settlements, and second, the destruction of Palestinian resistance.

Pursuing the latter risks the failure of the former as Israeli bombs have killed captives, and pursuing the former concedes defeat to the day one objective of “eliminating Hamas.”

The Zionist regime believes it can save face by conducting a flagrant genocide in front of the world. But this is a severe miscalculation. It has only brought them to the ICJ in the Hague and launched a worldwide campaign in support of Palestinian resistance. Through this horrific crime, they have crossed the point of no return.

Furthermore, other allies of the Palestinian cause – including Yemen, Hezbollah, and Iraqi resistance groups, now exert pressure on American forces in the region, with the potential to escalate into a regional war.

Hamas and the Palestinian resistance have put the Israeli occupation into a box. The very stability of the occupation is falling apart, as public distrust of the Netanyahu regime and the occupation forces itself flourishes.

While protests grow and ministers argue amongst themselves, Al Qassam taunts the occupation with rockets and videos of destroyed Merkava tanks.

Hence, the Zionist regime must reckon with the inevitability of its crushing defeat.

Shabbir Rizvi is a Chicago-based political analyst with a focus on US internal security and foreign policy.

January 23, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, War Crimes | , , , , | 5 Comments

Israel loses control of its borders

By Khalil Harb | The Cradle | January 23, 2024

Israel once reigned supreme on the back of some immovable narratives: widely spun myths of a “promised land,” a “land without a people,” the “only democracy in the Middle East,” and the “only secure place for Jews in the world.” Today, those lofty soundbites lie in tatters, with the occupation state reeling from an unprecedented blow to its foundational ideas.

This transformation has unfolded with unexpected intensity since the 7 October Al-Aqsa Flood resistance operation and Israel’s devastating, genocidal war on Gaza.

But it is not just the challenge of narratives that has Israel on its back feet. For the first time in its 76-year history, Israel’s entire security calculations have been turned upside down: the occupation state is today grappling with buffer zones inside Israel. In past wars, it was Tel Aviv that established these “security zones” inside enemy territory — advancing Israel’s strategic geography, evacuating Arab populations near their state border areas, and fortifying its own borders.

This shift can be attributed to various factors, including vulnerabilities within the so-called “Arab Ring States” (Egypt, Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon). Throughout its history, Israel has consistently exerted military and political dominance, enforcing security measures on neighboring states, with the unconditional backing of allies like the US and Britain.

Israel’s new border realities 

But in this current war, Tel Aviv is slowly understanding that the equations and calculations of military confrontation have fundamentally changed — a process that began in 2000 when the Lebanese resistance, Hezbollah, forced Israel to withdraw from most occupied territories in southern Lebanon.

Today, Israel is horrified to find itself retreating from direct confrontation lines with its arch-enemies in Gaza and Lebanon. The formidable capabilities of the resistance now include drones, rockets, targeted projectiles, tunnels, and spanking new shock tactics, casting doubt on the feasibility of Israeli settlers remaining safe in any of Israel’s border perimeters.

There is now one common refrain among settlers in the north and south of occupied Palestine: “We will not return unless security is restored on the border.”

But prospects for their return appear elusive at present. The Israeli Defense Ministry, which pledged a swift and decisive war to safeguard its settlers over 100 days ago, is now actively devising plans to shelter approximately 100,000 people along the northern border, deeper inside its territory. This measure could involve evacuating settlements that may come under fire during any future military escalation with Hezbollah in Lebanon.

This situation implies three critical outcomes: any immediate return of settlers remains unlikely, additional evacuations are anticipated, and numerous Israeli families – in the interim – may establish permanent settlements in other, more secure locations at a much further distance from the borders with southern Lebanon and the Gaza envelope.

Failed objectives and the northern front 

Preliminary reports from settler councils in the north assessed settler “displacement” to be around 70,000 in the initial weeks of the conflict. Subsequent reports, however, suggest a vastly higher figure of approximately 230,000.

Against this backdrop, Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah emphasized a crucial point in his 3 January speech. He referenced Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant’s concern that Israelis are not only reluctant to reside in the border regions, but that their apprehension about remaining in any part of Israel will also likely rise if Tel Aviv’s war fails to achieve its stated objectives.

Indeed, since 7 October, a significant toll has been exacted on Israeli forces, with 13,572 “soldiers and civilians” wounded in the battles in Gaza and along the northern border with Lebanon, as reported by Yedioth Ahronoth.

One suspects those numbers may be underreported. Skepticism has recently grown over the accuracy of the Israeli Ministry of Health’s data, with various experts, independent sources, and media investigations suggesting a considerably higher casualty count. The IDF Handicapped Organization, for example, estimates that approximately 20,000 individuals have been disabled in the ongoing war — a number much higher than the health ministry’s findings.

The secrecy surrounding Israeli casualties is particularly evident on the Lebanese war front, where data is virtually nonexistent, and Tel Aviv’s military censorship tightly controls all information flows. This leads to a critical question regarding Israel’s ability to establish strategic “border” equations as a compensatory measure for what appears to be a military and political setback in achieving its stated war goals — which include the elimination of Hamas and the release of all captives.

Moreover, doubts arise about Israel’s capacity to wage a major war in the north given its clear shortcomings in its southern military campaign, in which it faced heavily besieged adversaries with multiple vulnerabilities. The Lebanese resistance, in comparison to its Gazan counterparts, boasts considerable and many unknown military capabilities, which it can exercise from within a sovereign state that is neither besieged nor landlocked. Furthermore, Hezbollah, which singlehandedly routed Israel from its territories in both 2000 and 2006 — makes it plain that it has thus far revealed and utilized only a fraction of its new military capabilities.

Decolonization in progress 

In November, Hezbollah’s introduction of the Burkan missile, a domestically-made weapon with a range of up to 10 kilometers and destructive power of 500 kilograms of explosives, adds a potent dimension to the confrontation.

While Hezbollah has primarily targeted Israeli military barracks and troop gatherings with the Burkan, hundreds of guided missiles such as Kornet and Katyusha rockets have been employed with precision against specific targets within empty residential settlements, extending up to 10 kilometers in geographic depth from Lebanon’s border.

As of the onset of 2024, Hezbollah has conducted over 670 military operations against all 48 Israeli outposts, spanning from Naqoura in the west to the occupied-Shebaa Farms in the east, along with 11 rear military positions.

This is a major advancement in the Lebanese resistance’s border strategy. For 15 years — from 1985 to 2000 — Israel struggled to defend its “border strip” in southern Lebanon. Today, it faces many hundreds of attacks on its positions in northern Palestine, but fears opening a second war front that could complicate its already militarily draining Gaza campaign.

The so-called “defense” line along the border with Lebanon is now heavily compromised. Deemed insufficient for safeguarding the hundreds of thousands of Israeli settlers in the north, the recently displaced residents are demanding assurances about the future safety of that zone and their ability to return.

In December, the head of the Upper Galilee Regional Council revealed that the Israeli government had effectively created a buffer zone approximately 10 kilometers wide by evacuating towns in the north. This area, stretching from Mount Hermon in occupied Syria to Ras al-Naqoura, is reported to be nearly devoid of residents, with Israeli forces predominantly present.

At the so-called Kibbutz Manara border, a settler told Hebrew Radio North that 86 of the settlement’s 155 homes had been completely destroyed by Hezbollah rocket fire, raising the question of whether settlers would even have homes to return to.

Even if Israel dares to launch a full-scale aggression against Lebanon, just as it has faltered in besieged Gaza for 17 years, it will not be able to guarantee its success in achieving its objectives on the Lebanese front.

A land of false promises 

The days when Israel could impose security arrangements on its Arab neighbors through military force and political machinations are gone.

Previously, Israel attempted to establish a security strip inside southern Lebanon through operations like the 1978 “Litani Operation.” This vision ultimately collapsed in 2000, with the occupation state’s humiliating withdrawal from Lebanon.

Israel now seems to be revisiting this approach — via American intermediaries — aiming to clear the southern Litani of resistance factions by brandishing the threat of war against all of Lebanon. This is a perilous strategy, particularly given the precarious position of its army in Gaza.

Israel’s tactics of bulldozing and bombing entire residential areas in the northern and eastern parts of the Gaza Strip, ostensibly to create a security strip with a depth of up to 2 kilometers, have hit a hard wall. Even its US ally has raised objections about the territorial delineation from Gaza, and the military efficacy of such measures. But more importantly, the Lebanese and Palestinian resistance appear prepped to mirror Tel Aviv’s ploys by eliminating Israeli habitation in the Gaza envelope and northern Palestine.

‘Destroy our neighborhoods, and we will destroy yours.’ This is surely not a response expected by Israel, whose military and political leadership are unaccustomed to repercussions for their aggressions. This new tit-for-tat that the occupation state appears unequipped to counter only further highlights Israel’s fragility and irreversible decline.

January 23, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

All of Israel’s calculations lie in ruins

MEMO | January 23, 2024

Israel’s withdrawal of Division 36 from Gaza will not be the last withdrawal, as with the start of the Israeli ground offensive 20 days after the devastating Al-Aqsa Flood Operation, and with the mad rush to destroy all of Gaza, both humans and stones, they increased the number of invading forces until they reached about six divisions, with more than 120,000 soldiers, most of them elite brigades. Today, that number has been reduced to half after the occupation army’s human losses doubled and it suffered accumulated failure in the northern Gaza Strip and the central camps. Moreover, it continues to fail in Khan Yunis, the capital of the south, despite the genocidal holocausts it is committing, with 100,000 Palestinians falling victim to them, between those killed, wounded, or missing under the rubble. Moreover, they displaced two-thirds of the population of Gaza, with more than a million Palestinians being displaced to Rafah in the south.

The astonishing irony in everything that has happened and is happening is that the Palestinian people, who were left alone by those closest to them, except for a few, are the ones who made the difference with their legendary steadfastness, and the resistance factions made a difference with their remarkable ingenuity. The American-Israeli enemy is now in the position of defeat in the war that is ending its fourth month without achieving any of its stated goals. It hasn’t been able to uproot Hamas, or even weaken it, nor was it able to free its captives using armed force. Moreover, it hasn’t managed to win the media war and psychological battles, despite the huge differences in weapons, capabilities and the latest technology which are in favour of the invaders. Instead, it only managed to commit thousands of genocidal massacres against innocent, defenceless civilians, especially children, infants and women.

The resistance has displayed an extremely superior fighting doctrine. It films many of its battles with sound and video, thus intensifying the psychological and popular pressure on the Israeli governments both in Tel Aviv and Washington; dashing their hopes of creating any impression of an existing or potential victory.

The resistance implemented its precise attack plan on the morning of 7 October and proved that it prepared and implemented an effective defensive plan to confront the ground raids that it had expected in advance, while the Israeli enemy was suffering from confusion. The enemy believed that it would only be a few days or weeks before everything was over and they used everything in the American-Israeli military arsenal without achieving anything they wanted. Instead, they got lost in the muddy maze and were forced to change their military plans each day.

The belief was always that Israel knew what it wanted and that its dependence on American support guaranteed it decisive victory in lightning wars. However, the Israelis were surprised and shocked by what happened, as this is the longest continuous and consecutive Arab-Israeli war, and the Arab side is represented only by the Palestinian resistance factions. They had wanted it to be a war that would exhaust the energy of popular Palestinian steadfastness, and burn the Palestinian consciousness by pushing it towards a new Nakba and displacing the Palestinians from their lands, as was the case in the Nakba of 1948, but the Israeli-American policy-makers overlooked the fact that the situation had completely changed and that that the Palestinian people learned the lesson of the first Nakba a long time ago. They knew that leaving their beloved land would mean they would not return and that the enemy is not an invincible force. Israel has not won any war that followed the 1967 aggression, neither in the war of attrition on the Egyptian front, nor in the 1973 war, or in the war in Lebanon and its south. Nor did it win the multiple wars against Gaza.

The accumulation of the new Palestinian awareness, with the doubling of the number of Arab residents in all of historic Palestine, and it is exceeding the numbers of Jews brought to settle, who then fled through reverse migration, have all had a tangible effect in the shift in its image.

The new Palestinian generations have become increasingly aware of the reality of the present time, their creative struggle based on the most educated environment in the entire Arab world, the fierceness of the adversities they faced that made them capable individuals, and the involvement of many in a wave of resistance of a different kind, which developed from confronting the highest technological value possessed by the enemy with the sense of martyrdom that is the highest human value, and by acquiring weapon technology that challenges the enemy’s technology. Hence, the new resistance reduced the differences in the enemy’s technological superiority, while supplementing the combat doctrine which has a martyrdom nature with creative arts, until the new resistance turned into an invincible force, and its level of self-confidence increased steadily, reaching its peak after proving its ability to strategically deceive and humiliate the enemy army in the Al-Aqsa Flood Operation. It managed to infiltrate its superior technological fortifications and drag it into the maze of death in Gaza, in which the enemy appeared arrogant, boasting its equipment and numbers above ground, while the resistance suddenly appeared like ghosts from unexpected places.

They emerged from cities of underground tunnels, which were dug based on brilliant engineering, and every time the enemy thought it figured out the secret and demolished the tunnels it found, others mysteriously appeared. This prompted the New York Times newspaper to announce a few days ago the American and Israeli failure to uncover the maps of the Palestinian tunnels, despite the research that has been nonstop, not stopping for even a day or a minute, using the most advanced military technology. Israel, along with the US, had estimated that the tunnels extended 500 kilometres underground or a little more, while today’s estimates indicate the tunnel networks extend 720 kilometres, making the enemy’s wars endless, perhaps even if the fighting continued for 1,000 days. This escalates the enemy’s state of mental agitation, with the enemy leaders losing their mind, since they started a war that they do not know when it will end, not even roughly.

All of their calculations were ruined and now, in the current dilemma, the Israeli government in Washington is trying in vain to be more sensible and advise the Israeli government in Tel Aviv to gradually withdraw from the war, while Benjamin Netanyahu’s government seems stuck in the maze, and arguments are flaring up between the political level and the military level.

Netanyahu and his most extreme and criminal companions, the likes of Itamar Ben-Gvir, Bezalel Smotrich, Miri Regev and others, sense the end of their government with the imminent defeat. They know that no one will take responsibility for the defeat and are throwing blame on the occupation army and its leaders. They are provoking Defence Minister Yoav Gallant and mocking the Chief of Staff General Herzi Halevi, while the latter is holding them responsible, saying that the political level did not set achievable goals for the war and “military achievements” were lost due to the government’s chaos. Meanwhile, the expanded war council formed by Netanyahu, and joined by the National Unity Party, is also suffering from increasing defections, and its leaders are going against Netanyahu’s will and the will of his ministers, openly participating in demanding Netanyahu’s dismissal, whether because of the failure to reach prisoner exchange deals with Hamas or in response to the opposition’s desire to hold early elections.

The leader of the National Unity Party, Benny Gantz, appears to be reserved in assessing the results of the war, calling for making the goal of returning the captives or hostages the top priority, regardless of the price that Israel must pay, in reference to Hamas’ plan to stipulate stopping the aggression before resuming prisoner negotiations. Meanwhile, Gantz’s colleagues seemed more frank and accepted Israel’s loss. This is being openly supported by Gideon Sa’ar, who rebelled against Netanyahu and left the Likud Party years ago. This is in addition to a petition signed by 176 former Israeli military commanders, all of them calling for an end to the army’s bleeding and reaching a long permanent truce until everything that happened and is happening can be reviewed.

However, Netanyahu is rushing, like a blindfolded bull, to his death in the dustbins of history, and is challenging everyone, including the International Court of Justice (ICJ). He realises that the end of the war will bring the end to his political career and fears the increased popularity of Gantz and his colleagues within Israel. He dreamt and still dreams of the illusion of eliminating Hamas and the resistance brigades, while the most likely outcome of the war seems to be the elimination of Netanyahu.

This article first appeared in Arabic in Al-Quds Al-Arabi on 19 December 2024

January 23, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular | , , , | Leave a comment

Understanding China’s Navigation of the Gaza War

By Salman Rafi Sheikh – New Eastern Outlook – 23.01.2024 

China has once again called for a comprehensive and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, including a globally agreed timeline for the creation of a separate state for the people of Palestine. China’s position, which many in the West see as singularly pro-Arab, has been consistent ever since the beginning of the present phase of Israel’s war on Gaza, which has already killed more than 23,000 civilians, including more than 10,000 Children. China has been trying to navigate the crisis in a way that guards its main interests, i.e., its multi-billion dollar investment across the region. A wider war in the region could hurt China’s interests more than it could hurt any other extra-regional power. China has a deep economic presence in most of the Arab world. Although it has sound economic ties with Israel too, those with the Muslim world in the Middle East, including Iran, clearly outweigh its ties with Israel. China’s collective investment in the Middle East and North Africa is above US$239 billion. This is on top of their bilateral trade, which crossed US$330 billion in 2021.

By contrast, the China-Israel bilateral trade is less than US$25 billion. Until 2018, China was a major investor in Israel, especially in the tech sector. However, due to the mounting US pressure over Chinese investments coming with potential “security risks”, China’s investments have cooled down. These investment and trade trends are shaping China’s options to navigate the present crisis. On the one hand, these trends explain a) why China has taken a pro-Arab position, and b) why China fears a wider war in the region. Not only, a wider war could impact billions of dollars but also put almost a million Chinese nationals based in the region working on numerous projects in serious jeopardy. Evacuating these many people will be a nightmare.

Beijing learnt a crucial lesson when NATO invaded Libya in 2011. When NATO invaded Libya in 2011, it cost China a lot. According to figures released by the Chinese government itself, 75 Chinese companies, including 13 state-owned companies, were involved in Libya in about 50 joint projects. More than 35,000 Chinese workers were there. The China State Construction Engineering Corporation said that its residential construction project worth US$2.68 billion was under threat. The China Railway Construction Corporation reported that it had to leave US$4.24 billion worth of unfinished projects in the country. The State-run Metallurgical Corporation of China said that it had suspended two projects in Libya that have a remaining value of 5.13 billion yuan.

China cannot afford a similar scenario, which will have a much bigger impact than Libya – not only because investments worth hundreds of billions of dollars will be adversely affected but also because this war will most certainly create a global energy crisis that would affect China’s economy that relies quite heavily on oil imports from this region. China, therefore, not only detests the already ongoing war but also fears its expansion. Therefore, Beijing, alongside Russia and its allies in the region, is pushing to block any possibilities of a wider conflagration.

Besides the economic logic, a more social-cum-security logic is also at play for Beijing. Taking anti-Palestine and pro-Israel/pro-US positions can also put Beijing in the line of the fire of religious extremism. China has a sensitive “Muslim problem” in its Xinjiang region. Beijing believes that taking a pro-Palestine position will help it a) reinforce its pro-Muslim credentials, reform its image in the wider Muslim world and help against Western propaganda that accuses China of running “concentration camps”, and b) help prevent radicalisation from spreading within its borders. A pro-Israel position, on the contrary, could make Beijing a target of jihadi forces not only within its borders but also outside, i.e., in Pakistan, Afghanistan, etc.

This position also has a geostrategic calculus. This strategy is tied to what came to be known as China’s “new security architecture for the Middle East” that Foreign Minister Wany Yi unveiled in September 2022. The minister highlighted this vision, saying that the “new security concept” is based on common, comprehensive, cooperative, and sustainable security. More importantly, it seeks to establish the Middle Eastern countries’ dominant position (as opposed to as extraterritorial players), who not only abide by the purposes and principles of the UN charter but also directly boost regional security.

Boosting the Middle Eastern states as dominant players is a key element of China’s push for a multipolar world order. Therefore, by taking a pro-Arab position, Beijing is basically reinforcing the Arab world’s position vis-à-vis not only Israel but also the collective West so that the latter behaves in a way that takes these states’ interests into account while pushing for a just solution to what China considers the “core” issue affecting the region since the end of the Second World War.

Multiple interests are at stake that Beijing wants to protect by taking this pro-Arab position. Thinking otherwise, were Beijing to take a pro-Israel position, it would not serve any of these objectives. For instance, a pro-Israel position will directly boost Israel’s position vis-à-vis the Arab world. It might even encourage Israel to expand the war to implement its version of the “final solution” on the Palestinians. The war, in this context, is more likely to expand than in a situation where China (and Russia) stand with the Arab world and their anti-US/anti-Israel position might boost the Arab world’s national power potential that might deter Israel’s brutal pursuit of the so-called “Greater Israel” at the expense of millions of lives.

Salman Rafi Sheikh is a research-analyst of International Relations and Pakistan’s foreign and domestic affairs.

January 23, 2024 Posted by | Economics, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , | 2 Comments

Lavrov debunks US claim on Ukraine talks

RT | January 23, 2024

Moscow has never closed the door to dialogue to end the Ukraine conflict, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Tuesday, reiterating that the country’s key goal remains stopping NATO’s unchecked expansion towards its borders.

In a rare interview with CBS News in New York, where he arrived to take part in UN meetings on Ukraine and the Middle East, Lavrov rejected a recent claim by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who alleged that Moscow has shown no “willingness… to engage, to negotiate in good faith” to end the conflict with Kiev.

“It’s not true,” Lavrov stressed, adding that Russia has always been ready to discuss “any serious proposal” that addresses the situation on the ground and the root causes of hostilities. Moscow is also willing to reach a solution “which would guarantee legitimate national interests of Russia and the Ukrainian people,” the diplomat stated.

Lavrov reiterated that Russia is prepared to listen to anyone interested in establishing “justice” in relations between Moscow and Kiev. He insisted, however, that this would require the West to stop its policy of “using Ukraine as an instrument of war against Russia.”

Lavrov recalled that Russia has long voiced concerns about NATO expansion. “The goal is very simple… we’ve been warning publicly since 2008… that NATO’s expansion against all promises [to Russia and the Soviet Union]… was going too far,” he said.

At a 2008 summit in Bucharest, NATO leaders declared that Ukraine would eventually become part of the alliance, sparking a backlash from Russia, which has traditionally viewed the US-led military bloc’s expansion towards its borders as an existential threat.

In December 2021, weeks before the start of the Ukraine conflict, Moscow submitted a draft of security guarantees to the US and NATO, demanding that the West ban Kiev’s accession to the bloc and retreat to its borders as of 1997. The overture, however, was rebuffed.

Officials from Moscow and Kiev said the two sides were close to reaching a peace deal early in the Ukraine conflict, with a key Russian demand being that the neighboring country recommit to neutral status and abandon its NATO ambitions. According to numerous reports, the process was derailed by then-UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who convinced Ukraine to continue fighting.

January 23, 2024 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

DC Think Tank: House Could Kill Ukraine Aid Bill

By Ekaterina Blinova – Sputnik – 23.01.2024

House Republicans could block a hefty Ukraine aid package even if a bipartisan border security and immigration deal is passed, suggests the latest report by the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.

Republican and Democratic senators have engaged in a series of negotiations regarding President Joe Biden’s proposed $100 billion package for Ukraine. Senate leaders, Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), have expressed optimism about the bipartisan Ukraine aid-border security agreement’s prospects.

Last year, the multi-billion package for Ukraine, as well as aid for Israel and the island of Taiwan, became stuck in the US Congress after the GOP deemed the border security issue to be an absolute priority.

According to Blaise Malley, a reporter for Responsible Statecraft and a former associate editor at The National Interest, it is uncertain whether the House of Representatives would align with the upper chamber’s position, despite the bipartisan agreement on border issues being on the horizon.

Malley referred to House Speaker Mike Johnson’s firm stance with regard to the implementation of sweeping migration reforms and his concerns about Ukraine aid oversight and Kiev’s strategy.

“We need the questions answered about the strategy, about the endgame and about the accountability for the precious treasure of the American people,” Johnson told journalists after a January 17 meeting with President Biden and other congressional leaders at the White House. The House speaker also stressed that the border issue should still come first. Rep. Johnson has a record of consistently voting against Ukraine aid in the past.

A GOP conference on Ukraine aid is due to be held on January 24 following the request by a group of Senate Republicans, led by Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), Malley noted, adding that support for further bankrolling Ukraine is beginning to steadily wither among House Republicans.

What’s more, some GOP lawmakers even threatened to introduce a “motion to vacate” against the incumbent House speaker, if he allows another package of Ukraine aid to pass.

“Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene tells me ‘I would introduce the motion to vacate myself’ if Speaker Johnson passes funding to Ukraine,” Axios congressional reporter Andrew Solender tweeted on January 17.

Last October, the so-called Freedom Caucus forced then-Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy to step down after Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida forced the vote on the “motion to vacate.”

According to Malley, Speaker Johnson is unlikely to go against the Freedom Caucus for many reasons, one of which is that it may upend his relations with leading Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.

But that is not all: the multi-billion aid bill, which also includes at least $10 billion for Israel, has come under scrutiny from some Democratic congressmen who are seeking to obligate Tel Aviv to observe human rights in its war against Gaza. Since the conflict started, 25,105 Palestinians have been killed in the region, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

The RS reporter pointed out that 18 Senators on January 19 announced their support for an amendment to the national security supplemental that would require “that the weapons received by any country under this bill are used in accordance with US law, international humanitarian law and the law of armed conflict.”

“The path to passing this legislation is filled with roadblocks and question marks,” Malley wrote. “Biden has implored Congress to approve his proposal as soon as possible, but even as incremental progress is made, final passage still appears to be a ways away.”

January 23, 2024 Posted by | War Crimes | | 1 Comment

Belgium to Allocate $663Mln to Ukraine From Profits Made From Russia Frozen Assets – Reports

Sputnik – 23.01.2024

BRUSSELS – Belgium will allocate 611 million euros ($663 million) to help Ukraine in 2024 from the profits received from the frozen assets of Russia, La Libre newspaper reported on Tuesday, citing Defense Minister Ludivine Dedonder.

The funding will be provided from the interests on the accounts of Russia’s frozen assets in the country, the newspaper reported.

Last year the US proposed G7 working groups to look at possible ways to seize $300 billion in frozen Russian assets. The EU, and the UK have stressed that the money received via the confiscation would not be easily accessible and would also be insufficient to cover Ukraine’s reconstruction needs. Besides, the countries have noted that the confiscation of Russian assets should not occur to the detriment of providing financial support to Kiev in 2024.

Moscow has maintained that any attempt to confiscate its frozen assets would violate international law. The Russian Foreign Ministry has dismissed the freezing of Russian assets as theft.

“Those who are trying to initiate this, and those who will implement it, must understand that Russia will never leave those who did this alone. And it will constantly exercise its right to a legal battle, internationally, nationally or otherwise. And this, of course, will have — both Europeans and Americans understand this very well — it will have legal consequences for those who initiated and implemented it,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said commenting on the issue.

Last year, Russian President Vladimir Putin dubbed the West’s asset seizure an “unseemly business,” and stressed that “stealing other people’s assets has never brought anyone good”.

January 23, 2024 Posted by | Economics | , | Leave a comment

The Climate Change Committee Must Pay The Penalty For False Advice

By George Lawson | Not A Lot Of People Know That | January 23, 2024

It seems to me that the falsification of data on the weather, perpetrated by Mr Stark and the Climate Change Committee, has far wider implications than the crime itself. It was due to the Climate Change Committee’s false information to parliament that the Net Zero fiasco was brought into law by the Teresa May government with wide government support before she was forced out of office. Net Zero, as we all know, has been a very expensive failure, and will be seen as the most costly and useless law that has ever been passed by our legislators.

The law has indirectly been responsible for increasing fuel prices to the public and pushed up business costs and prices, making products uncompetitive. It is responsible for increasing the cost of living for everyone across the nation, and has drained many billions of pounds from our overstretched government finances. The effects of these avoidable negative factors on our nation are simply incalculable, but what we do know is that Stark’s blatant lies have been responsible for trashing the country’s economy.

Mr Sunak now has good cause to do two things to affect a recovery of our lost economy. He should immediately close down the wasteful and lying Climate Change Committee, as this is the most expensive lie, by far, than the many lies they have included in their reports over the years, and bring in legislation to overturn the ridiculous economy – sapping Net Zero law. If he does this he will be supported by 99 per cent of the population, it will also increase his reputation massively for when the next election happens.

Finally, Stark, together with the Chairman of the Climate Change Committee, should be brought before a full committee of enquiry to answer for his lies, and if found guilty of intentionally misleading Parliament, he should be sent to prison. Such terrible lies to enhance his reputation at such a cost to the nation, should not go unpunished.

January 23, 2024 Posted by | Economics, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | | Leave a comment

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