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Israel calls on world leaders to oppose ICJ opinion on occupation

The Cradle | November 29, 2022

On 29 November, acting Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid sent a letter to more than 50 world leaders, demanding them to oppose a Palestinian bid at the United Nations regarding an advisory position of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on Israel’s occupation of Palestine.

“This resolution is the result of a concerted effort to single out Israel, discredit our legitimate security concerns, and delegitimize our very existence,” Lapid said in the letter.

Among the recipients were the heads of government of the United Kingdom, France, Croatia, Romania, Bulgaria, the Netherlands, Slovakia, Latvia, Georgia, Brazil, Uruguay, Peru, and Vietnam.

With a majority of 98 votes in favor and 17 against, a committee of the UN General Assembly approved a resolution on 11 November requesting the ICJ to “urgently” issue a stance on the effects of Israel’s illegal occupation and colonization of Palestinian territories, The New Arab reported.

In the coming weeks, the resolution has to be voted on for a second time by the plenary of the General Assembly.

The acting Prime Minister stated that this resolution resulted from a “biased campaign” by the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva and its Commission of Inquiry, which have repeatedly denounced human rights abuses against the Palestinians.

According to Lapid, the “status of the disputed territory must be subject to direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.”

However, Israel has illegally expanded its territory since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and built settlements in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem for over 700,000 settlers, clearly violating international law.

On 13 November, Israeli authorities announced their plans to construct 9,000 new illegal settlement units over the ruins of Palestine’s Jerusalem International Airport.

The settlement plan was initially submitted for discussion last year by the Israeli-run Jerusalem Municipality but then halted due to pressure from EU member states and several rights groups; however, the plan has been revived and is under review by the municipality.

On 8 November, the ‘Elad’ settlement association in occupied East Jerusalem received roughly $7.9 million to support illegal settlements in the Palestinian town of Silwan.

November 30, 2022 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation | , , , | 10 Comments

US-Turkiye brinkmanship won’t reach a point of no return

Conflict between Ankara and Washington over Syria will likely see the two drift apart, with Turkiye aligning more closely with Eurasian powers.

By MK Bhadrakumar | The Cradle | November 28, 2022

The series of airstrikes against Kurdish militants in northern Syria by Turkish jets in the past week come amid heightened concerns over Ankara’s threat to launch a ground operation. Such actions are not without precedent, yet have thus far achieved little in terms of eradicating the security challenges posed by US-backed Kurdish fighters.

Turkiye is today addressing an existential challenge to its national security and sovereignty, stemming from the United States’ quasi-alliance with Kurdish groups in Syria over the past decade – with whom Ankara has been battling for far longer.

However, this issue is playing out within a much broader regional backdrop today. Russia now has a permanent presence in Syria and is itself locked in an existential struggle with the US in Ukraine and the Black Sea. Iran-US tensions are also acute and President Joe Biden has openly called for the overthrow of the Iranian government.

Opposing the US occupation of Syria

Suffice to say, the Syrian government, which has demanded the removal of illegal US troops from one-third of its territory for years, enjoys a congruence of interests with Turkiye like never before, particularly in opposing the American military presence in Syria.

For the US, on the other hand, continued occupation of Syria is crucial in geopolitical terms, given that country’s geography on the northern tier of the West Asian region which borders Iran and the Caucasus to the north and east, Turkiye and the Black Sea to the north, Israel to the south, and the Eastern Mediterranean to the west.

All of that would have a great bearing on the outcome of the epochal struggle for the control of the Eurasian landmass – the Heartland and the Geographical Pivot of history as Sir Halford J. Mackinder once described it in evocative terms – by Washington and NATO to counter Russia’s resurgence and China’s rise.

China’s involvement in the Astana process

A curious detail at this point assumes larger-than-life significance in the period ahead: Beijing is messaging its interest in joining the Astana process on Syria. Moscow’s presidential envoy for Syria, Alexander Lavrentiev, stated recently that Russia is convinced that China’s involvement as an observer in the Astana format would be valuable.

Interestingly, Lavrentiev was speaking after the 19th international meeting on Syria in the Astana format with his counterparts from Turkiye and Iran on November 15.

“We believe that China’s participation in the Astana format would be very useful. Of course, we proposed this option. The Iranians agreed with this, while the Turkish side is considering it and has taken a pause before making a decision,” he explained.

Lavrentiev noted that Beijing could provide “some assistance as part of the Syrian settlement, improve the lives of Syrian citizens, and in reconstruction.”

The Chinese Foreign Ministry promptly responded to the Russian invitation, confirming that Beijing “attaches great importance to this format and is ready to work with all its participants to restore peace and stability in Syria.”

Lavrentiev didn’t miss the opportunity to taunt Washington, saying: “Of course, I believe that if the Americans returned to the Astana format, that would also be very useful. If two countries like the United States and China were present as observers in the Astana format, that would be a very good step, a good signal for the international community, and in general in the direction of the Syrian settlement.”

However, there is no question of the Biden Administration working with Russia, Turkiye, Iran, and China on a Syrian settlement at the present time. Reports keep appearing that the US has been transferring ISIS fighters from Syria to Ukraine to fight Russian forces, and to Afghanistan to stir up the pot in Central Asia.

The Astana troika are in unison, demanding the departure of US  occupation forces from Syria. Moscow knows fully well too that the US hopes to work toward shuttering Russian bases in Syria.

Turkiye’s pursuit of the US’s Kurdish allies

In fact, the aerial operations in Syria that Ankara ordered last Sunday followed a terrorist strike in Istanbul a week ago by Kurdish separatists, killing at least six people and injuring more than 80 others. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said the air strikes were “just the beginning” and that his Armed Forces “will topple the terrorists by land at the most convenient time.”

Turkish security agencies have nabbed the bomber – a Syrian woman named Ahlam Albashir who was allegedly trained by the US military. White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre hurriedly issued a statement to calm that storm: “The United States strongly condemns the act of violence that took place today in Istanbul, Turkiye.”

But Turkiye’s Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu reacted caustically to the American missive, saying that Washington’s condolence message was like “a killer being the first to show up at a crime scene.”

Conceivably, with Erdogan facing a crucial election in the coming months, the Biden Administration is pulling out all the stops to prevent the ruling AKP party from winning another mandate to rule Turkiye.

The Turkish “swing state” is crucial for US plans

The US feels exasperated with Erdogan for pushing ahead with independent foreign policies that could see Turkiye joining the BRICS and Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), and deepening his strategic ties with Russia and China – and most important, steadily mark distance from Washington and NATO’s containment strategies against Russia and China.

Turkiye has become a critically important “swing state” at this stage in the post-cold war era. Erdogan’s effort to bolster the country’s strategic autonomy lethally undermines the western strategy to impose its global hegemony.

While Erdogan keep’s Washington guessing about his next move, his airstrikes in northern Syria hit targets very close to US bases there. The Pentagon has warned that the strikes threaten the safety of American military personnel. The Pentagon statement represents the strongest condemnation by the US of its NATO ally in recent times.

Russian diplomacy forestalls Syria ground incursion 

Unsurprisingly, Russia is acting as a moderating influence on Turkiye. Lavrentyev said last Wednesday that Moscow has tried to convince Ankara to “refrain from conducting full-scale ground operations” inside Syria. The Russian interest lies in encouraging Erdogan to engage with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and pool their efforts to curb the activities of Kurdish terrorists.

Indeed, the probability is low that Erdogan will order ground incursions into Syria. This also seems to be the assessment of local Kurdish groups.

US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) Commander Mazloum Kobane Abdi, who is the Pentagon’s key interlocutor in northern Syria, has been quoted as saying that while he has received intelligence that Turkiye has alerted its local proxies to prepare for a ground offensive, the Biden administration could still convince Erdogan to back off.

That said, Erdogan can make things difficult for the US and eventually even force the evacuation of its estimated 900 military troops, shutting down the Pentagon’s lucrative oil smuggling operation in Syria and abandoning its training camps for ex-ISIS fighters in northern and eastern Syria.

But the US is unlikely to take matters to a point of no return. A retrenchment in Syria at the present juncture will weaken the US regional strategies, not only in West Asia, but also in the adjoining Black Sea region and the Caucasus, in the southern periphery of the Eurasian landmass.

From Erdogan’s perspective too, it is not in his interest to burn bridges with the west. A bridge in disrepair remains a bridge nonetheless, which would have its selective uses for Erdogan in the times of multipolarity that lie ahead.

November 28, 2022 Posted by | Illegal Occupation | , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

German Statesman Slams EU Leaders’ Spinelessness, Demands NATO’s Dismemberment, Closure of US Bases

By Ilya Tsukanov – Samizdat – 28.11.2022

Germany has found itself reaping the consequences of the crisis in Ukraine, facing skyrocketing energy and food costs, recession and the danger of permanent deindustrialization as Washington and Brussels continue to call for more and more sanctions against Russian energy to try to “punish” Moscow for its military operation in Ukraine.

The United States and its allies have spent the entire period since 2014 preparing for a confrontation with Russia in Ukraine, Oskar Lafontaine, a veteran German statesman with over forty years of political experience under his belt, has said.

“Of course, I also mean the conflict in Ukraine, which began with the Maidan putsch in Kiev in 2014. Since then, the US and its Western vassals have been arming Ukraine and systematically preparing it for confrontation with Russia. Ukraine thus became a de facto, if not de jure, member of NATO. This backstory has been studiously ignored by Western politicians and the mainstream media,” Lafontaine told Deutsche Wirtschafts Nachrichten in an interview published Sunday.

“For more than 100 years, it has been the declared aim of US policy to prevent German business and technology from merging with Russian raw materials at all cost. It is perfectly clear that, if you take this history into account, we are dealing with a US proxy war against Russia which has been prepared for a long time,” Lafontaine said.

Crop of Spineless Leaders

Lafontaine, who has worked under Willy Brandt, Helmut Schmidt, Helmut Kohl and Gerhard Schroder, and served as president of the Bundesrat, minister president of Saarland, minister of finance, and leader of Die Linke and the SPD, blasted the current crop of German and European leaders for going along with policies which have brought Berlin to the brink of disaster.

“It is unforgivable that the SPD in particular betrayed the legacy of Willy Brandt and his policy of détente, and did not even seriously insist on compliance with the Minsk Agreements,” the politician said, referring to the 2015 peace agreements meant to restore peace to the Donbass.

Lafontaine slammed the German government over its limp-wristed response to the destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines, which he characterized as a “declaration of war on Germany.” It was “pathetic and cowardly” of the federal government to try to “sweep incident under the carpet,” despite evidence that “the USA either carried out the attack directly or greenlit it,” the politician said.

“It was a hostile act against the Federal Republic, and not only against us, and once again makes clear that we must free ourselves from American tutelage,” Lafontaine stressed. The politician pressed his country’s leaders to force the removal of all US military bases and nuclear weapons from German soil, and called for the creation of a European security architecture with France, separate from NATO, which he called an “obsolete” alliance that acts as a “tool to enforce the US’s claim to remain the sole power in the world.”

Lafontaine admitted that freeing Germany from Washington’s grip wouldn’t be easy, but stressed that he can’t see “any alternative” to such a radical step. “If we and other European countries continue to remain under US tutelage, they will push us over a cliff to protect their own interests,” he said.

“To use a hackneyed expression: We are experiencing the birth pangs of the transitional phase from a unipolar to a multipolar world order. And the question arises whether we will have a place of our own in this new world order, or be drawn into Washington’s conflicts with Moscow and Beijing as American vassals,” the politician emphasized.

Recalling his decades of experience in politics, Lafontaine lamented in decades past, German leaders, “at least in some conflicts, had German interests in mind, and did not throw them overboard in anticipatory obedience” to Washington. “You need to have a backbone when you are the head of a country. The image of Chancellor Scholz standing like a schoolboy next to President Biden when he announced that nothing would come of Nord Stream 2 was humiliating.”

Ukraine Disaster

Asked whether he believed Washington has achieved its aims in Ukraine, Lafontaine said that the answer was both “yes and no,” with the principle successes being the ruined relations between Russia and the European Union, and the “sidelining” of Berlin and Brussels “as the US’s potential geostrategic and economic rivals, for the time being.”

“They are setting the policies of EU states even more than before the Ukraine conflict (thanks also to compliant politicians in Berlin and Brussels). They can also sell their dirty fracking-derived gas, and the US defense industry is doing great business,” the politician said.

“On the other hand, they have not succeeded in ‘ruining Russia’, as [German Foreign Minister Annalena] Baerbock put it… overthrowing [Vladimir] Putin and installing a puppet government in Moscow to get better access to Russian raw materials, as was the case in [Boris] Yeltsin’s time,” Lafontaine said.

“And I have the impression that Washington has now realized that they are biting on granite here. Despite massive arms deliveries to Ukraine and the dispatch of numerous ‘military advisors’, Russia, which is a nuclear power, cannot be defeated militarily. In addition, Western sanctions are proving to be a boomerang: they hurt Western states more than Russia and will cause deindustrialization, unemployment and poverty. Working people in Europe are paying the price for the world power ambitions of a mad elite in Washington and the cowardice of European leaders,” Lafontaine concluded.

November 28, 2022 Posted by | Economics, Illegal Occupation, Timeless or most popular | , , , , | 5 Comments

Reneging on Abraham Accords, Netanyahu authorises ‘soft annexation’ of West Bank

MEMO | November 24, 2022

Israel’s designate Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has been accused of breaking his agreement with Arab countries that normalised relations with the Occupation State during the current coalition negotiations. The Likud leader is reported to have agreed to move the civil administration in the West Bank from Israeli Ministry of Defence to the Ministry of Finance to appease far-right member of the Knesset, Bezalel Smotrich.

Religious Zionism will be handed the civil administration portfolio, according to Haaretz. The Ministry is hugely significant for Palestinians, as it oversees coordination of Israel’s activity in the Occupied West Bank. The agreement was reached as part of the ongoing coalition talks between Netanyahu’s Likud and Religious Zionism, which stalled once more after the parties failed to reach agreement on several other key issues.

Though details of the talks are yet to be disclosed, Likud is said to have acceded to Religious Zionism’s demand for some of the powers of the civil administration, which is under the Defence Ministry. The deal will mean that Smotrich, who is an advocate of Israel’s illegal settlement enterprise, will be handed power in approving Palestinian construction plans and settlement construction in Area C. Decisions around illegal outposts, illegal construction and work permits for Palestinians falls under the remit of the administration.

The biggest prize for Religious Zionism, which became the third largest party with 14 Knesset seats, is to seize control over affairs in the Occupied West Bank. Although past Israeli governments showed reluctance to annex the territory completely over concerns around backlash from the international community, Religious Zionism has no such fear.

Officials in Religious Zionism claimed, Wednesday, that the Party acceded to Netanyahu’s requests to forgo the defence portfolio in exchange for the Finance Ministry. The condition for the agreement is that the responsibility for settlements and the civil administration is transferred from the Ministry of Defence to the Ministry of Finance. Under International law, the West Bank is occupied, which means that the military of the occupying power oversees the territory.

Netanyahu has been accused of reneging on his deal with the Arab States by agreeing to the transfer of the civil administration. “Moving the civil administration in the West Bank from Israeli Ministry of Defence to the Ministry of Finance will be a ‘soft annexation’ of the WB & violation of the commitment Netanyahu gave the US & UAE to suspend his annexation plan,” said Israeli journalist, Barak Ravid on Twitter. “It could harm the Israel-UAE peace treaty,” Ravid added, referring to 2020 normalisation deal.

Referred to as the “Abraham Accords,” the UAE hailed the deal as victory for the two-state solution. Abu Dhabi defended its decision to normalise relations with the Occupation State by insisting that it had prevented Israel from annexing the West Bank, a threat which Netanyahu, who was the Prime Minister at the time, had issued.

It is not clear what steps the UAE will take in response. UAE Foreign Minister, Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed (ABZ) raised his concerns over Religious Zionism becoming part of a coalition with Netanyahu, during a recent visit to Israel.

November 25, 2022 Posted by | Deception, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation | , , , , | 2 Comments

Russia: Turkish Ground Operation in Syria Could Cause Increased Terrorist Activity

Al-Manar | November 25, 2022

The Russian government warned Thursday that a military ground operation by Turkey against Kurdish groups in northern Syria could lead to “an increase in terrorist activity,” following threats to that effect by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

“We understand Turkey’s concerns about threats to its national security, but we also believe that a ground operation on Syrian territory will only increase tensions in the region and lead to an increase in terrorist activity,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has said.

Thus, she stressed that Moscow “maintains close contacts with Turkey on the situation in Syria” and defended that the best way to solve security problems is a direct dialogue between Ankara and Damascus, as reported by the Russian news agency TASS.

Erdogan stressed on Wednesday that the new bombing campaign against Kurdish groups in Iraq and Syria “is only the beginning” and reiterated that Ankara will launch ground operations “when it deems appropriate.”

He also said he did not rule out a conversation with his Syrian counterpart, Bashar Al-Assad, to address the situation.

The Turkish operation, dubbed ‘Sword Claw’ was launched following the Nov. 13 bombing in Istanbul, which left six dead and which Turkey blames on the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). However, both the group and the SDF have disassociated themselves from what happened and have expressed their condolences to the victims.

November 25, 2022 Posted by | Illegal Occupation | , , | 2 Comments

Yemen and KSA inch forward with ceasefire talks despite ‘deliberate obstruction’ by US

Photo Credit: AP Photo/Hani Mohammed
The Cradle | November 12, 2022

Talks between Yemeni and Saudi delegations in Oman have continued “uninterrupted” since the end of the UN-brokered ceasefire on 2 October, according to sources in the know that spoke with Lebanese daily Al Akhbar.

The report claims the Saudi delegation has shown “remarkable flexibility” in several of the outstanding issues, most notably offering to secure funding for the payment of state employees’ salaries.

They have also shown openness to lift road blockades and to allow flights from Sanaa International Airport to reach more destinations than the two currently allowed: Jordan and Egypt.

Nonetheless, issues still remain, as Riyadh reportedly wants to publicly label these measures as “helping the brothers in Yemen,” not as compensation for seven years of war.

Yemeni officials allegedly shot down this idea, as it would misrepresent Riyadh’s role in ravaging Yemen and pushing it to the brink of famine. Moreover, they have also rejected an offer for the head of Yemen’s Supreme Political Council, Mahdi al-Mashat, to lead an official delegation to the Saudi capital.

Earlier this month, The Washington Institute published a report based on a visit to the kingdom by Executive Director Robert Satloff and David Schenker, in which they assert that “Saudi Arabia clearly wants out of the [Yemen] conflict today.”

However, the behind-the-scenes progress to achieve this goal comes despite increased efforts by the Saudi-led coalition, Israel, the US, and the UK to consolidate their military presence in southern Yemen and on the country’s islands.

Earlier this week, Mashat warned that the US role in the ceasefire talks “is malicious and dangerous.”

“The armistice negotiations had previously reached a level of good understanding, but the US envoy, Tim Linderking, deliberately sabotaged them during his most recent tour of the region,” the head of Yemen’s Supreme Political Council said on 7 November.

“The US is trying to impede any sincere efforts to achieve sustainable peace in Yemen,” Yemen’s Ansarallah resistance group warned in a statement earlier this month.

According to the sources who spoke with Al Akhbar, the growing rift between Washington and Riyadh has spilled over onto their cooperation in Yemen, as the US now favors “interim solutions” rather than a comprehensive end to the war in order to maintain a “playing card” to use against Saudi leaders.

November 12, 2022 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

Pentagon exploits post 9/11 laws to wage ‘secret wars’ worldwide: Report

The Cradle | November 9, 2022

A report released last week by the New York University School of Law’s Brennan Center for Justice details how the US Department of Defense (DoD) has been allowed to covertly deploy troops and wage secret wars over the past two decades in dozens of countries across the globe.

Among the nations in West Asia affected by these so-called ‘security cooperation authorities’ are Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen; however, they also include many African and Latin American nations.

Known as ‘security cooperation authorities,’ they were passed by the US Congress in the years following the 11 September attacks, and are a continuation of the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF), a piece of legislation that has been stretched by four successive governments.

According to the report, the AUMF covers “a broad assortment of terrorist groups, the full list of which the executive branch long withheld from Congress and still withholds from the public.”

Following in this tradition, the ‘security cooperation authorities’ being abused by the Pentagon are Section 333 and Section 127e of Title 10 of the United States Code (USC).

Section 333 authorizes the US army to “train and equip foreign forces anywhere in the world,” while Section 127e authorizes the Pentagon to “provide support to foreign forces, paramilitaries, and private individuals who are in turn supporting US counterterrorism operations,” with a spending limit of $100,000,000 per fiscal year.

However, thanks to the vague definition of ‘support’ and ‘training’ in the text of these laws, both Section 333 and Section 127e programs have been abused to target “adversarial” groups under a strained interpretation of constitutional self-defense; they have also allowed the US army to develop and control proxy forces that fight on behalf of – and sometimes alongside – their own.

As a result of this, in dozens of countries, these programs have been used as a springboard for hostilities, with the Pentagon often declining to inform Congress or the US public about their secret operations under the reasoning that the incidents are “too minor to trigger statutory reporting requirements.”

“Researchers and reporters uncovered Section 127e programs not only in Afghanistan and Iraq, but also in Cameroon, Egypt, Kenya, Lebanon, Libya, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Somalia, Syria, Tunisia, and Yemen,” the report highlights.

Researchers also point out that defense authorities “have given little indication of how [they] interpret Section 333 and 127e.”

Even more concerning, and ignoring the damage caused by these ‘anti-terror’ laws, the US Congress recently expanded the Pentagon’s security cooperation authorities, particularly with Section 1202 of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).

Section 1202 allows the US army to allow “irregular warfare operations” against “rogue states” like Iran or North Korea, or “near-peers,” like Russia and China.

The report comes at a time when the US army and its proxy militias are accused of illegally occupying vast regions of Syria and Yemen, looting oil from the war-torn countries, just over a year after their brutal occupation of Afghanistan ended. Moreover, a former US official on Tuesday revealed that anti-Iran militias are being armed in the Iraqi Kurdistan Region (IKR), where both the CIA and the Mossad are known to operate.

November 11, 2022 Posted by | Deception, Illegal Occupation, War Crimes | , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Israel builds fake cemeteries around Al-Aqsa Mosque, says Palestinian committee

MEMO | November 8, 2022

The Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa Mosque Committee of the Palestinian Legislative Council accused the Israeli occupation authorities yesterday of constructing fake cemeteries around Al-Aqsa Mosque, Quds Press has reported.

According to the head of the Committee, Ahmad Abu Halabiyeh MP, this was an attempt to forge “evidence” to “prove” a historic Jewish presence in the Palestinian, Arab and Islamic holy city.

“Recently, the Israeli occupation has built hundreds of tombs to prove that the Jewish existence dates back hundreds of years,” explained Abu Halabiyeh. Around 300 fake tombs have been built in Jabal Al-Zaytoun, east of Al-Aqsa Mosque, he said, and 200 others in Wadi Al Hilwa in Silwan, south of the mosque, in addition to hundreds more in different areas across occupied Jerusalem, mainly in the Old City.

The MP pointed out that these tombs were built over the past two years. One area, he said, has even been called the “Jewish Cemetery”.

“This is a clear distortion of history, as well as proof that the Israelis are intruders,” added Abu Halabiyeh. Building tombs without human remains inside, he stressed, reinforces settlement projects and serves the occupation’s interests.

Israeli aggression against and within Al-Aqsa Mosque occurs on a daily basis, he concluded.

November 8, 2022 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation | , , , | 3 Comments

US, UK preparing for fresh escalation in Yemen: Ansarullah

Ali al-Qahoum, a member of the Yemeni popular resistance Ansarullah movement’s Political Bureau (Courtesy of al-Mayadeen)
Press TV – November 6, 2022

Yemen’s popular resistance Ansarullah movement warns about the United States and the UK’s fresh malicious intentions in the war-ravaged country.

Ali al-Qahoum, a member of Ansarullah’s Political Bureau, raised the alarm during an exclusive interview with Lebanon’s al-Mayadeen television network on Sunday.

There is “a direct US military presence in Yemen, and an influx of US forces, specifically in Hadhramaut,” he said, referring to Yemen’s biggest province, which spans from the country’s center towards its eastern areas.

“There is also an influx of British forces into al-Mahrah,” he added, referring to Yemen’s second-largest province that neighbors Hadharamaut to the east.

The US and the UK were preparing for a fresh round of escalation in Yemen, he further warned without elaborating.

The Western countries have been contributing heavily and unabatedly to a war of aggression that a Saudi Arabia-led coalition has been waging against Yemen since 2015.

The coalition has been seeking, unsuccessfully though, to restore Yemen’s power to the country’s former Western- and Riyadh-aligned officials. The war has killed hundreds of thousands of Yemenis and spawned the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

Washington and London have been providing the coalition with direct arms, logistical, and political support, including through outfitting it with precision-guided ammunitions that the Saudi-led forces have been using amply against Yemen’s civilian population.

Al-Qahoum said new US and British military delegations had arrived in Yemen earlier this week.

Reporting on Wednesday, Yemen Press Agency cited informed local sources as saying that Hadhramaut’s Provincial Governor, Mabkhout bin Madi, had held a face-to-face meeting with the US delegation in his office.

The Ansarullah official, however, asserted that despite the Western states’ apparent preparations for a new flare-up in Yemen, “the Yemenis are ready to defend their dignity and every inch of their country.”

“Ansarullah has military capabilities that preserve Yemen’s sovereignty and independence,” he added.

November 7, 2022 Posted by | Illegal Occupation | , , , | Leave a comment

Netanyahu says to ‘neutralise’ Lebanon maritime deal

MEMO | October 31, 2022

Israeli leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, said Monday he will “neutralise” a recent maritime border deal with Lebanon if he is elected prime minister.

“I will behave as I did with the Oslo Accords,” Netanyahu said in an interview with Army Radio.

He said that the Oslo Accords with the Palestinians “were not cancelled, they were neutralised.”

The former premier, however, did not detail his specific intentions for the border agreement with Lebanon during his Monday’s interview.

Last week, Israel and Lebanon signed a US-mediated deal to demarcate maritime border between the two countries. The deal covers an area in the Mediterranean Sea, which contains part of the Karish gas field and Qana, a prospective gas field.

Netanyahu had termed the maritime deal as “illegal”, saying he would not be bound by it. He argued that Prime Minister, Yair Lapid, and Defense Minister, Benny Gantz, “didn’t want to extract the gas in the first place, but now they want to surrender it to Hezbollah.”

Israeli voters will go to polling stations on Tuesday in the country’s 5th legislative election in less than four years.

Opinion polls suggest that Netanyahu, the leader of the right-wing Likud Party, could come within a single seat of an outright majority in the Knesset (Israel’s parliament).

October 31, 2022 Posted by | Illegal Occupation | , , | 1 Comment

Yemeni army carries out ‘warning’ operation against Greek tanker

The Cradle | October 22, 2022

Yemen’s Armed Forces announced on 21 October they carried out a “warning” drone strike on Al-Dabba port of Hadhramaut in order to prevent a Greek tanker, the Nissos Kea, from looting oil from the facility.

This was the first attack carried out by Yemen’s forces since the expiration of the UN-brokered truce agreement on 2 October.

The country’s official military spokesman, Brigadier General Yahya Saree, said in a statement that “the oil ship violated the decision issued by the competent authorities to ban the transportation and export of Yemen’s sovereign oil derivatives.”

“The warning message came after addressing the authorities of that ship, and informing them of the decision based on Yemeni laws … The ship was dealt with through cautionary measures, through which we were keen to preserve the safety of its crew and the security of Yemen’s infrastructure,” Saree added.

According to Hadhramaut’s governor in the Saudi-backed Presidential Council, Mabkhout ibn Madi, the ship was meant to arrive at Al-Dabba port a week ago, but remained stationed outside of Yemeni waters due to threats issued against the Greek Ministry of Transport.

“Greece transmitted these threats to us, and to the Ministry of Oil,” Ibn Madi said. Following the ship’s entry into Al-Dabba port, however, its crew ignored the warning issued earlier this month by Yemen’s Supreme Economic Committee and proceeded to attempt an oil looting operation.

According to exclusive sources, the drone strike targeted the area between the Greek ship and the port buoy, sending a “clear military message,” but not compromising the safety of the tanker’s crew, as planned. This is not the first time a Greek vessel is involved in the looting of Yemen’s natural resources.

“The American envoy has been communicating for two weeks with mediators in Sanaa to allow the tanker to ship oil from Al-Dabba port,” the sources added.

As Washington and its allies face a severe energy crisis of their own making, the US is in desperate need of immediate sources of energy, a likely reason that its envoy pressured Sanaa to allow the Greek tanker to make off with the oil. As a result of this energy crisis, US forces have stepped up their oil looting operations in Syria.

The Yemeni operation comes as a renewal of the several warnings issued by the Armed Forces and the Ansarallah resistance movement against the international oil companies operating in the country, and against the Saudi-led coalition, who have consistently plundered Yemen’s oil.

The Saudi-backed government, however, has claimed to have intercepted the operation.

October 22, 2022 Posted by | Illegal Occupation | , | Leave a comment

White House dismisses scathing UN report against ‘unfairly targeted’ Israel

The Cradle | October 21, 2022

US State Department spokesman Ned Price alleged on 20 October that Israel is “unfairly targeted in the UN,” in the wake of a scathing report released by the ongoing UN Commission of Inquiry (COI) investigating human rights abuses committed by Tel Aviv during the 74-year occupation of Palestine.

“Israel is consistently unfairly targeted in the UN system, including in the course of this commission of inquiry,” Price told reporters during a news conference on Thursday.

“No country, the record of no country, should be immune from scrutiny, but no country should also be targeted unfairly. And that’s the principle that we seek to uphold,” he claimed.

In their report, the COI determined that “the occupation of Palestinian territory is unlawful under international law due to its permanence and the Israeli government’s de facto annexation policies.”

The COI report also refers to numerous statements made by the UN secretary general and UN member states concerning the Russia-Ukraine war, in which officials reaffirmed that the “unilateral annexation of a State’s territory by another State is a violation of international law and is null and void.”

Speaking to reporters, COI chair Navi Pillay stressed that just last week, “143 member States including Israel … voted in favor of a General Assembly resolution reaffirming this.”

“Unless universally applied, including to the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, this core principle of the United Nations Charter will become meaningless,” she added.

In a second report also released on Thursday – and set to be presented to the UN General Assembly on 27 October – the COI requested an urgent advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) “on the legal consequences of the continued refusal on the part of Israel to end its occupation.”

“Actions by Israel constituting de facto annexation include expropriating land and natural resources, establishing settlements and outposts, maintaining a restrictive and discriminatory planning and building regime for Palestinians and extending Israeli law extraterritorially to Israeli settlers in the West Bank,” the UN officials conclude in their report.

Since the start of this year, at least 105 Palestinians – including 26 children – have been killed by Israeli troops, making 2022 the deadliest year since 2006 for Palestinians residing in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem.

On top of this, Tel Aviv currently holds 4,500 Palestinians in prison, 730 of whom are held without charge and mainly on the basis of ‘secret evidence.’

Children as young as 12 are subjected to arbitrary arrests and detention measures by the occupation government. Just last month, a seven-year-old Palestinian boy fell to his death after being chased by Israeli soldiers.

But despite the countless deaths and wanton destruction caused by Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza Strip and violent raids across the West Bank, Israeli authorities maintain a policy of “not apologizing” for their war crimes, under the full support of the US.

October 22, 2022 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture | , , | 2 Comments

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