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Algerian parliament unanimously votes to support Palestine militarily

The Cradle | November 3, 2023

The Algerian parliament on 2 November unanimously voted to authorize President Abdelmadjid Tebboune to enter the Gaza-Israel war and throw his support behind Palestine.

The 100/100 vote came a day after the anniversary of Algeria’s war of liberation against French colonialism.

Algeria is the second Arab nation that looks to enter the war against Israel, following Yemen’s declaration of war just two days prior.

“We launched a large number of ballistic and cruise missiles and a large number of drones at various targets of the Zionist enemy in the Palestine Occupied Territories,” the spokesperson of the Yemeni armed forces, General Yahya Saree, said earlier this week. “We emphasize that this operation is the third operation in support of our oppressed brothers in Palestine.”

Saree then added that “the position of our Yemeni people towards the cause of Palestine is fixed and principled, and the Palestinian people have the full right to defend themselves and use their full rights.” “Our forces performed their duty in supporting Gaza and fired ballistic and cruise missiles at enemy targets in the Occupied Territories.”

Arab nations have recently been following suit in their support of the Palestinian piece; Kuwait has condemned the Israeli aggression, Bahrain has cut all diplomatic ties, and Jordan has recalled their ambassador to Israel.

Nations outside of West Asia who have voiced their support for Palestine include Cuba, Chile, Venezuela, Bolivia – who’ve cut diplomatic ties with Israel completely – Nicaragua, and others.

November 3, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Solidarity and Activism | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Countries Begin Downgrading Ties with Israel Over Relentless Bombing of Gaza

By Kyle Anzalone | The Libertarian Institute | November 1, 2023

A trio of South American countries, along with Jordan, have cut ties with Israel over the onslaught in Gaza. According to Palestinian sources, the Israeli military operations in Gaza have killed nearly 9,000 people, half of which are women and children.

On Tuesday, Bolivia took the most extreme step and cut all ties with Israel. Deputy Foreign Minister Freddy Mamani explained that Bolivia “decided to break diplomatic relations with the Israeli state in repudiation and condemnation of the aggressive and disproportionate Israeli military offensive taking place in the Gaza Strip.”

The next day, Tel Aviv responded by saying Sucre’s move was “capitulation to terrorism and to the ayatollah regime in Iran.”

Colombia and Chile announced they would recall their ambassadors to Israel. Colombian President Gustavo Petro posted on X, “I have decided to call our ambassador in Israel for consultation. If Israel does not stop the massacre of the Palestinian people we cannot be there.”

Chile posted a press release saying Santiago would also recall its diplomat.

“Given the unacceptable violations of International Humanitarian Law that Israel has incurred in the Gaza Strip, the Government of Chile has decided to recall the Chilean ambassador to Israel, Jorge Carvajal, to Santiago for consultations. …”

“Chile strongly condemns and observes with great concern that these military operations – which at this point in their development entail collective punishment of the Palestinian civilian population in Gaza – do not respect fundamental norms of International Law, as demonstrated by the more than eight thousand civilian victims, mostly women and children.”

Jordan joined the South American nations in downgrading ties with Israel. The Foreign Ministry announced it was recalling its ambassador. “Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi decided to immediately recall Jordan’s ambassador to Israel,” a statement said. The move is to reflect Amman’s condemnation of the “Israeli war that is killing innocent people in Gaza.”

While Tel Aviv receives near unconditional backing from Washington, Israel lacks the international community’s support for its war. On Monday, the UN General Assembly voted 120-14 for a ceasefire in Gaza.

After a Hamas attack in southern Israel on October 7, Tel Aviv launched a military operation. The bombing campaign and ground invasion have killed thousands of Palestinian civilians, including over 3,600 children.

November 2, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation, Solidarity and Activism, War Crimes | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

EU may become complicit in ‘genocide’ – Spanish official

RT | October 30, 2023

Spanish Social Rights Minister Ione Belarra has urged European leaders to take immediate action against Israel, including severing diplomatic ties and imposing economic sanctions, amid the intensified bombing and expanded ground operations against Hamas militants in the besieged Palestinian enclave.

She also called for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to be prosecuted for the alleged war crimes committed against civilians in Gaza.

“After this hellish night in Gaza, I have a very simple but very important message for European leaders. Do not make us complicit in genocide. Act. Not in our name,” Belarra said in a passionate video message on X on Saturday.

More than 8,000 Palestinians, including 3,342 children, have been killed in Gaza since Israel’s air campaign began, according to the latest figures from the Gaza Health Ministry. The unprecedented Hamas raid into Israel, as well as hundreds of rocket strikes on Israeli territory earlier this month, left around 1,400 people dead, while 230 Israelis and foreigners were taken hostage, according to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).

Addressing the severity of the current situation in Gaza and Israel’s disproportionate retaliation, the minister highlighted the termination of internet and telephone services in the strip, claiming that the move “has a very clear objective” of guaranteeing that “Israel commits crimes against humanity without consequences.”

“Our inaction is turning us into accomplices,” the minister stressed, arguing that “Israel believes that its international alliances guarantee its impunity.”

“We have to act now, tomorrow will be too late,” she continued, voicing her message to the EU leaders: “Cut diplomatic relations with the State of Israel. Carry out exemplary economic sanctions against those responsible for this genocide. And without a doubt, let’s take Netanyahu before the International Criminal Court, so that he can be tried for what he is, a war criminal.”

She also appealed to EU citizens to take to the streets and raise their voice so that “this genocide” comes to an end.

The IDF escalated air and ground attack on Gaza on Friday, causing a near-total communication blackout. Connectivity was partially restored over the weekend, but the Israeli blockade of Gaza continues; Netanyahu announced the “second stage” of the war against Hamas on Saturday.

October 30, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Solidarity and Activism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Place where protests didn’t happen does support Israel

By Yves Engler | October 29, 2023

Apologists for Israeli crimes are constantly gaslighting Palestinians and their supporters. They seek to make those opposing violence and colonialism feel like oppressors.

Last Friday a rally was held in front of Deputy Prime Minister Christya Freeland’s office in Toronto. Freeland recently declared that “Canada stands with Israel” and when she was foreign minister said Canada would act as an “asset for Israel” on the United Nations Security Council.

The poster announcing the rally declared: “PROTEST DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER OF CANADA CHRYSTIA FREELAND OUTSIDE HER TORONTO OFFICE”. During the rally bodies of babies were placed in front of Freeland’s office and at some point a man with an Israeli flag went directly in front of Freeland’s office in a bid to provoke the protesters. There’s video of police intervening and standing in front of the building housing Freeland’s office.

As the rally grew, it reportedly spilled onto the street and intersection directly in front of the Miles Nadal Jewish Community Centre (MNJCC). According to a Canada Files post, someone came out of the community centre to complain and film the Palestine solidarity rally. Footage was later posted to X claiming a Jewish community centre was targeted by protesters. According to multiple comments online, the initial post was deleted after being bombarded with derisive comments about their inability to look at a map. But Canada United for Israel shared the video tweeting, “Targeting a Jewish community center where there is a kindergarten is pure antisemitism. How can the anti-Israel movement justify scaring children?”

Far right Rebel News founder Ezra Levant quote tweeted that statement claiming “Hamas protesters target a Jewish kindergarten” while the head of the ‘progressive’ media watchdog CanadaLand, Jesse Brown, made a similar claim. The incident was referenced by the Toronto Sun, Toronto Star, National Post and other media.

In a transparent bid to enable Israeli violence and colonialism, apartheid apologists regularly fabricate or distort events to claim victimhood. Over two decades I’ve been privy to repeated examples of this. While I no longer consider the tactic noteworthy, an element of the psychological side of it is. In other domains it would be called gaslighting.

In brief, those screaming loudest “it’s just a Jewish institution that has nothing to do with Israel” are generally best placed to know this is untrue. Those who’ve been through the MNJCC – and similar institutions – know they are deeply Zionistic.

MNJCC operates an “Israel Connection” program and promotes the United Jewish Appeal (UJA) Toronto’s annual Walk for Israel. It hosted and cosponsored an Israeli general’s talk, which was held in tandem with the Israeli consulate.

The Thomas & Marjorie Schwartz preschool centre & Junior Kindergarten housed there has three pictures posted on MNJCC’s site. In one the kindergartners are smiling with an Israeli and Canadian flag hanging on the wall. In its “core elements” the kindergarten describes​ “Israel as a Source and Resource”.

The MNJCC elementary school shows a picture with dozens of Israeli flags. On its Instragram the Paul Penna Downtown Jewish Day School (DJDS) recently posted that “Jewish people have always had and always will have a relationship with Israel. We continue to stand in solidarity with Israel.” Days into that country’s horrific siege and violence in Gaza, DJDS posted on October 13 that “classes created inspirational cards for Israeli soldiers, and sent cards full of well wishes to former classmates now living in Israel.” The MNJCC school’s site notes, “Each year, our school warmly welcomes two young Israelis to the Paul Penna DJDS community. We are delighted to partner with UJA Federation, the Downtown Jewish Community School, and The First Narayever Congregation on this fantastic initiative. These teens have completed high school and have chosen to defer their army service in order to become Israeli ambassadors or ‘shlichim’, spending a year focused on presenting contemporary Israel to our students in passionate, creative ways.”

MNJCC has deep ties to UJA Toronto, which brings young Israeli ‘shlichim’ to live with Toronto families so they can do outreach in schools and community organizations. At the top of UJA’s website, which is prominently linked on the MNJCC site, is an Israel financial appeal and its official advocacy arm is the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs.

Alongside a link to UJA Toronto, MNJCC’s site links prominently to the JCC Association of North America. The top of that site notes “JCCs of North America Stand With Israel”.

MNJCC’s namesake funded a major project at the racist Jewish National Fund’s Canada Park, which is built on the remnants of three Palestinian villages in the West Bank. On the board of the JCC, Miles Nidal is a staunch anti-Palestinian.

Even if the target of Friday’s protest had been the JCC it would be altogether legitimate (though considering the political climate, organizers should seek to detail the JCC’s anti-Palestinianism in promotional literature). No organization that promotes and defends Israel the way MNJCC does can then claim, “we are simply Jews, not backing Israel” when it becomes convenient to deny the connection.

It’s highly manipulative for individuals who know the Miles Nadal Jewish Community Centre is part of a network of anti-Palestinian institutions to claim protesting it is antisemitic. Call the complaints what they really are: gaslighting.

October 29, 2023 Posted by | Deception, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Progressive Hypocrite, Solidarity and Activism | , | Leave a comment

Why I Support Hamas

And you should too

BY KEVIN BARRETT | OCTOBER 29, 2023

In this week’s False Flag Weekly News I outperformed Cat McGuire (for once) in saying things the ADL won’t like. Angered by the genocide of Gaza, I uttered many uncomplimentary and/or inflammatory remarks about the Chosen People and their Chosen State. But of all of the “oy vey” things I said, what the ADL will hate the most is my open declaration of support for Hamas.

And that, of course, is the most obvious reason to support Hamas: “They” really, really don’t want you to. The strategists who are trying to keep the genocide of Palestine going apparently realize that if significant numbers of Westerners start openly supporting Hamas and the rest of the Palestinian resistance, the Zionist goose will be well and truly cooked. That’s why they’ve used advanced propaganda techniques to inject the obligatory “I don’t support Hamas, but” disclaimer deep into the collective unconscious of the West in general and its relatively-Palestine-savvy people in particular.

“They” don’t really care if you deplore the massacre of thousands of Gazan women and children. “They” don’t mind if you support a two-state solution, or even a one-state solution. “They” can live with you calling for a ceasefire. “They” could care less if you utter words like apartheid or even genocide.

It’s like when Joel Stein said “I don’t care if Americans think we’re running the news media, Hollywood, Wall Street or the government. I just care that we get to keep running them.” The Zionist position is: “I don’t care if Americans think we’re committing human rights violations, apartheid, or genocide. I just care that we get to keep committing them.”

Americans complaining about Zionist human rights violations, apartheid, and genocide won’t stop those things. They will only be stopped at gunpoint. And it really does matter that people support the right of genocide victims to pick up guns and stop the genocide.

Jews, who think of themselves as paradigmatic genocide victims, should be the first to support armed resistance against genocide. And indeed, the smartest and most courageous Jews do. Check out what David Rovics has to say about Al-Aqsa Flood being the new Warsaw Ghetto uprising:

Hamas is the closest thing to an elected government the Palestinians have.  In fact, the last time they had a real election in the Occupied Territories of the West Bank and Gaza, Hamas won by a landslide….Physically fighting back against an occupying army, according to international law that all the countries in the world have signed on to long ago, is justified, and is not “terrorism.”

Why Supporting Hamas Is Strategically Savvy

In any struggle between two sides, the outcome will be largely determined by the intensity of support enjoyed by each party to the conflict. Small, weak countries like Vietnam and Afghanistan were able to defeat the mighty USA because they were far more intensely committed to ending US occupation than Americans were committed to maintaining it. Like the Palestinians today, they were willing to accept a lopsided casualty ratio as they continued raising the price of occupation to the point that the occupier opted to stop paying it.

The Western propaganda apparatus currently allows and tacitly encourages pro-Zionist intensity, while making pro-Resistance intensity taboo. “I stand with Israel” is acceptable, even mandatory; “I stand with Hamas” is practically illegal and unthinkable.

When Side A is passionately and intensely supporting its fighters, while Side B mumbles apologies and obligatory disclaimers, obviously Side A will enjoy a morale advantage that will translate into an advantage on the battlefield. But when Side A is a criminal aggressor and genocide perpetrator, it may find it difficult to maintain its intense support, and to prevent neutral people who care about justice from becoming passionate supporters of the other side. So it will use every propaganda trick in the book to prevent neutrals and lukewarm supporters of the other side from becoming brazen and passionate.

The best way to change that pro-genocide Overton Window is to throw a brick through it. And tied to that brick, a simple message: “I SUPPORT HAMAS.”

Pro-Vietnam-War people really hated it when Jane Fonda high-fived Hanoi as thousands of Americans gathered in the streets to shout their support for the Viet Cong: “Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Minh, the NLF is going to win!” But that, and US troops fragging their officers, is what ended the war. Humanitarian complaints about napalmed babies and My Lai massacres were only useful insofar as they pissed off enough people to the point that they realized that the Vietnamese resistance fighters were the good guys, and Uncle Sam was the villain, and that all decent people had a moral duty to support the Vietnamese resistance. That shifted the Overton Window radically, to the point that “withdraw ASAP and to hell with the consequences” became a middle-of-the-road position and then a political reality.

If we can get a small but noticeable number of Americans openly and brazenly cheering for Hamas at the top of their proverbial lungs, it will have the same effect on ZOG that Al-Aqsa Flood had on Israelis: It will drive them crazy, puncture their inflated sense of invulnerability, and incite them to lash out in irrational and strategically counterproductive ways. ZOG’s mask will come off, and it will show its psychotic, genocidal face to America, just as the Israelis have shown theirs to the region, the BRICS nations, and the Global South.

And the Overton Window will shift. Pretty soon “end aid to Israel” and “one-state solution” will become middle-of-the-road positions and then political realities.

Why Supporting Hamas Is Your Moral Duty

I began by explaining why supporting Hamas is strategically savvy, rather than addressing the moral argument, because much of my audience already understands what I am now about to say. For them, the strategic benefits of supporting Hamas may not be evident, even though the moral arguments are.

So I risk belaboring the obvious in stressing that the most important point—the forest that people miss while peering at the trees—is that the Palestinian cause is just, and the Zionist one unjust. Every just war theory, whether Christian, Islamic, or secular, is based on the non-aggression principle: The side that initiates aggression, in this case by crossing the seas to invade and murder and steal the other side’s land and property, is in the wrong, while those fighting to stop that aggression are in the right. No sane person who takes the time to study the history of Palestine in a reasonably comprehensive and unbiased way can fail to conclude that there has never been a war in history that has been more obviously and completely just than the Palestinian war against Zionist invasion, occupation, and genocide.

And of all the big lies uttered in history, there has never been a bigger one than “The Israeli-Palestine conflict? It’s complicated.” No it isn’t. And it isn’t a conflict, it’s a genocide. The rights and wrongs are not the least bit complicated.

Zionist attempts to obfuscate the injustice of their genocidal project are so absurd that they would be hilarious if there were not right now more than a thousand Gazan children buried beneath the rubble of what used to be their homes, suffering and dying slowly in some cases, expiring quickly and mercifully in others. Consider the most popular excuses:

“Yahweh gave us Palestine 3,000 years ago. Surely that should count for something! What?! You don’t honor Yahweh’s 3000-year-old real estate deals?!!”

*“We deserve Palestine because of the Holocaust. So why isn’t Israel in Germany? Umm… next excuse!”

“We are an ethnic group so we deserve a state of our own. And yes, we know that there are tens of thousands of ethnic groups on Earth, and that virtually none of them have states, but we are just so special that we deserve one! And if you don’t agree, you are anti-Semitic!”

“We have gotten into terrible conflicts with every neighbor we’ve ever had, and have been expelled from more than 100 countries for no reason at all except that our neighbors like to pointlessly persecute us, so you ought to sympathize and side with us no matter what we do.”

“There are lots of terrible injustices, so if you complain about this one, you must be an anti-Semite!” Alternate version: “Genghis Khan (or Pol Pot or Stalin or Hitler) killed more people than we have, so why are you attacking us, you anti-Semite?”

“The Palestinians and their supporters, as we portray them in our propaganda machine, are very bad, wicked people, so you should cheer for us as we steal their stuff and exterminate them.”

“We are a democracy even though we murdered or expelled most of the people who should be voting in our elections.”

“Israel’s existence is really, really beneficial to US national security, even though it makes billions of people in geopolitically-crucial energy-rich countries hate America’s guts.”

“You have to support us because we call our enemies ‘terrorists’ and other nasty names.”

And when all else fails:

“Support us and do what we say, or you’ll never work in this town again!”

Refuting the extant arguments for Israel’s existence would be superfluous and an insult to the reader’s intelligence. They are not even arguments, just inarticulate, incoherent grunts and howls of tribally-intoxicated psychopathy.

But it may be worth unpacking one of them: the “terrorist” blood libel. Terrorism is usually defined as “A military tactic consisting of deliberately attacking civilians to incite fear and achieve a political objective.” And that is exactly what “Israel” is: A terrorist organization. Zionist terrorists have been attacking and terrorizing the civilian population of the territory they invaded, namely Palestine, ever since they got there. The various Zionist terror groups were so drunk on terrorism that they even terrorized each other, as well as their fellow aggressors and invaders, the British, in a bloody orgy of terror that has no parallel in modern history. Much of the story can be found in Thomas Suarez’s State of Terror: How Terrorism Created Modern Israel.

So the conflict is between terrorists who crossed the seas to attack the Palestinian civilian population in order to kill some and scare the others into leaving; and the civilian population they have been terrorizing. On one side, the Zionist terrorists; on the other, the Palestinian anti-terrorist Resistance. In this as in so much else, the Zionist propaganda machine has turned reality on its head.

Today, the Zionist terrorists continue to deliberately target and mass-murder Palestinian civilians by the thousands. About two-thirds of the Palestinians they kill are women and children. The Zionists probably kill about a hundred civilians for every Hamas fighter. Compare that to al-Aqsa Storm, the Hamas operation that killed roughly equal numbers of Israeli military fighters and civilians. And of the civilians killed in al-Aqsa Storm, the majority were killed by the Israeli military, whether accidentally in crossfire, or deliberately in accordance with the Hannibal Directive, which recommends eliminating both hostage-takers and hostages using overwhelming firepower in order to prevent the enemy from using hostages as a bargaining chip.

Hamas, unlike the Zionists, primarily targets the Israeli military, when it can. Clearly, al-Aqsa Storm primarily targeted the IDF. Hamas’s orders were to take hostages, but to avoid killing unarmed civilians. And while there may have been a few instances of Palestinians killing civilians, photo evidence proves that the worst carnage—music festival goers caught in heavy artillery crossfire, houses and kibbutzes and other buildings full of people destroyed by tank and artillery shells—was perpetrated by the IDF. Hamas soldiers, carrying light weapons, could not possibly have caused that kind of damage, or killed those large numbers of people.

This and most of the rest of the damage to civilians on October 7 was meted out by Israeli heavy weapons, not Hamas’s light firearms

But what about the rockets? Since unlike Israel, Hamas doesn’t enjoy billions of dollars worth of of US-taxpayer-provided weaponry, it fires relatively unsophisticated rockets that cannot take out hardened military targets, but do frighten and occasionally harm Israeli “civilians.” So… is that terrorism? No—because Israelis are settlers, not civilians. Under international law, military resistance against occupation, including targeting settlers, is legitimate. So we can argue about proportionality—I would assert that Hamas errs on the side of mercy by doing a whole lot less settler-killing than it has every right to be doing — but at the end of the day, international law, morality, and basic common sense dictate that Hamas’s use of rockets to retaliate against massive genocide is justifiable… and rational, as part of a multi-pronged strategy to keep raising the costs of occupation to the point that the genocidal occupier will finally take Helen Thomas’s advice and “get the hell out of Palestine.”

Arguing with Orwell’s O’Brien

You know who has lost the argument not only by Godwin’s law a.k.a. reducto ad Hitlerum, but also by which party feels the need to use coercion to force the other party to shut up. The Zionist terrorists have not only lost the argument, they have no argument. No wonder they ceaselessly invoke Hitler and the Nazis. And no wonder they constantly run professors out of universities, get media personalities fired, launch specious persecutions and prosecutions, and generally terrorize everyone into going along with their genocidal absurdities.

Arguing with a Zionist is like arguing with Orwell’s O’Brien: He knows he’s full of shit, has no compunctions about it, and is going to do whatever it takes to ruin your life.

By saying “I like Hamas,” I’m supporting an anti-terrorist group that the Zionist terrorists have falsely and mendaciously labeled, in true Orwellian fashion, “terrorists.” Maybe they’ll try to get me prosecuted for “material support for anti-terrorism,” though I haven’t mailed so much as a dirham to Hamas, POB 123, Gaza Strip, Occupied Palestine, nor have I contributed to any Hamas GoFundMe’s or bought any donuts from the nice little old Hamas ladies at the local mosque. (If they were selling baclava, I’d consider it.)

If you’re honest with yourself, you’ll probably have to admit that the reason that you haven’t yet come around to openly supporting Hamas is fear: fear of what the Zionists might do to you. Well, I’m here to tell you that fear isn’t the right word for that. The correct word is cowardice.

The Palestinians continue to unite in resistance to genocide, even as the Zionists respond by forcing their children to die agonizing deaths, by the thousands, beneath mountains of rubble. And you can’t even openly and publicly admit that you support that Resistance? Come to think of it, maybe cowardice isn’t the right word. It isn’t strong enough.

Come on, grow some stones. Say it with me: “I… SUPPORT… HAMAS.”

Video link

October 29, 2023 Posted by | Book Review, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Solidarity and Activism | , , , | Leave a comment

Iran vows to ignore US warnings on Israel

RT | October 29, 2023

Tehran will ignore US warnings not to intervene in the Hamas-Israel conflict, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi has said. He also blasted the West over alleged reluctance to help end the hostilities.

In an interview with Qatar-based Al Jazeera on Saturday, Raisi said that Washington “is asking us not to move while providing broad support to the Zionist entity… This is an invalid demand.”

The Iranian president also claimed that Israel’s expanded ground operations in Gaza were a failure, describing it as “the second victory [for Palestinians] following [the launch of] Operation al-Aqsa Storm,” referring to the initial surprise attack by Hamas on Israel on October 7.

He also said that the United States had sent messages to the ‘Axis of Resistance’ – referring to an informal alliance of anti-Western and anti-Israel forces in the Middle East – and “received a practical and public answer on the ground.”

Raisi went on to accuse the US and some unnamed European countries of “obstructing the ceasefire in Gaza,” calling such policies “a crime.” He added that “the United States’ calculations in the region are completely wrong, and said it will not achieve its goals with a new Middle East,” stressing that Tehran’s support for the Palestinians “is not subject to compromise.”

After the Hamas attack on Israel earlier this month, US President Joe Biden pledged unconditional support for Israel while warning Iran to be “careful.” At the same time, he stopped short of backing a cessation of hostilities, with several US media outlets reporting that the State Department had distributed a memo to its diplomats advising them to avoid calling for “de-escalation” or a “ceasefire” in Gaza.

Publicly, Biden has said that ceasefire talks cannot begin until Hamas releases more than 200 hostages. Meanwhile, on Monday, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell called for a “humanitarian pause” in the conflict, saying he believed there was consensus among the bloc’s members on the matter.

Raisi’s comments come after Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian warned the US that “new fronts will be opened up” against Washington if it does not change its policies in the Middle East, including its unequivocal support for Israel.

October 29, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Solidarity and Activism | , , , , | Leave a comment

Iran, Russia, Hamas officials discuss Gaza-Israel war in Moscow

The Cradle | October 27, 2023

Authorities from Iran, Russia, and the Palestinian resistance group Hamas met on 27 October at the Iranian Embassy in Moscow to discuss the Gaza-Israel war.

Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri Kani was invited by his Russian counterpart, Mikhail Bogdanov, to discuss a potential ceasefire between Palestine and Israel with Mousa Mohammed Abu Marzouk, a senior Hamas official.

“Inviting the movement’s leadership to visit Moscow is a message to the whole world that Russia considers Hamas a national liberation movement and not a terrorist movement,” Abu Marzouk told Russian media on Friday, noting that President Vladimir Putin “graciously did justice to the Hamas movement and the struggle of the Palestinian people and protected it politically in the Security Council and the UN.”

During Thursday’s meeting, Kani solidified Tehran’s “undoubtable” support for Palestine. “Tehran’s priorities in talks with foreign sides are declaring an immediate ceasefire, providing aid to people, and lifting the repressive blockade of Gaza,” the Iranian Embassy in Moscow quoted the Iranian official.

Iranian and Russian diplomats held separate talks and discussed the need for a ceasefire in the war between Palestine and Israel and the urgency of delivering humanitarian aid to Gaza.

A member of Hamas’ political bureau revealed to Sputnik that the Hamas delegation discussed the region’s future and how this differs from the US narrative.

Israeli authorities were not pleased with the meeting held in Moscow, saying that this was a show of Russia’s support for Hamas.

“Israel condemns the invitation of senior Hamas officials to Moscow, which is an act of support of terrorism and legitimizes the atrocities of Hamas terrorists,” Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Lior Haiat said on social media. “We call on the Russian government to expel the Hamas terrorists immediately.”

Russia has actively monitored the situation between Palestine and Israel, putting forward multiple draft resolutions in the UN Security Council to reach a ceasefire in Gaza. However, the US and its allies have struck down these resolutions.

October 27, 2023 Posted by | Solidarity and Activism | , , | Leave a comment

Campaign against US, UK arms sale to Israel gains further steam across world

Press TV – October 25, 2023

A new campaign to shut down weapons companies in the US and UK over providing arms to the Israeli regime has gained further momentum, expanding across northern America, Europe and Australia.

The campaign, titled Palestine Action, was launched days after Israel waged a large-scale war on Gaza on October 7, which has claimed the lives of thousands of innocent Palestinians, including women and children.

On October 12, the organizers of Palestine Action US took direct action against Israel’s largest weapons manufacturer, Elbit Systems at its so-called “Innovation Center” in the US city of Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Activists blockaded Elbit’s main entrance and defaced the building with red paint and graffiti, rebuking Elbit for profiteering from Israeli war crimes against Palestinians.

“Elbit Systems will not conduct business as usual in our city, while their weapons are mass murdering the Palestinian people right now,” the activists said. “What Israel is doing to Palestine is nothing short of a genocide and Elbit has blood on their hands.”

Elbit’s Cambridge office has since then been targeted multiple times, with activists spraying the building with upper-case slogans that read, “ELBIT PROFITS FROM GENOCIDE,” and “WAR CRIMINALS WORK HERE.”

Data in media reports show Elbit supplies 85% of Israel’s military drone fleet, along with bullets, tear gas, land-based equipment, and internationally banned weapons.

“A child is being murdered every 15 minutes in Palestine,” Palestine Action US said on its website. “These bombing attacks not only serve to ethnically cleanse Gaza but will be used by Elbit to market their arms to repressive regimes around the world. By striking Elbit, we disrupt a crucial link in the military apparatus of Western imperialism.”

In a new development on Wednesday, Palestine Action US said the activists protested against Elbit Systems at Wentworth Institute of Technology in Boston and disrupted the Israeli firm’s recruitment process.

“Elbit Systems, you will not find peace ANYWHERE in Boston. We will keep confronting you wherever you show up. Genocide profiteers are not welcome in our city. We will shut you down,” Palestine Action US said in a post on its X social media account.

Palestine Action US also announced in other posts the expansion of the anti-Israel campaign in other countries.

Palestine Action US has called on the international community to recognize the profound terror and grief Palestinians have been experiencing for generations, and move to put an end to the 75-year-long Israeli genocide “still unfolding before our eyes.”

“As long as we allow Elbit to operate in our communities, every one of us has blood on our hands,” it added.

Israel waged war on Gaza on October 7 after Palestinian resistance groups launched Operation Al-Aqsa Storm, a surprise attack into the occupied territories in response to the occupying regime’s intensified crimes against the Palestinian people.

The Israeli attacks on Gaza have targeted places of gathering, including hospitals, schools, mosques and churches, displacing more than one million in the densely-populated region, which is home to more than 2 million people.

According to the Palestinian health ministry, the Israeli aggression against the Gaza Strip has so far killed more than 6,000 people and left over 18,000 others wounded.

October 25, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Solidarity and Activism, War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

Israel’s ambassador pushes to shut down pro-Palestinian activism

By Yves Engler | October 21, 2023

Israel wants Canada to criminalize growing displays of solidarity with Palestinians.

In a bid to amplify calls to ban Palestine solidarity marches, Israel’s ambassador Iddo Moed told the Canadian Press on Thursday, “I don’t think that democracies allow people to hate and to incite, and I think that that is something that is looked at very carefully in many places, including Canada.” He added, “when is a line crossed that is between supporting a cause and between changing our values in a way that incites hatred and violence and even glorification of horrendous terrorist attacks.”

As a purported example of the “hatred” Moed is referring to, the CP story reported “One sign spotted at the Oct. 9 protest outside Toronto’s Nathan Phillips Square read: ‘Occupation is a crime, resistance is a response.’”

Moed is seeking to boost a push to change Canada’s criminal code. Last week the Globe and Mail published “Rallies raise question of whether Canada should have a law against public cheering of terrorism” and the National Post’s John Ivison called for federal legislation to criminalize the protests in “Tolerating the glorification of terror and slaughter is societal suicide”. Similarly, the host of CBC’s Power & Politics David Cochrane asked foreign affairs minister Melanie Joly whether Canadians participating in Palestine solidarity rallies should be prosecuted for supporting terrorism while National Post reporter Tristin Hopper mused about banning the Palestinian flag. On Twitter Hopper noted, “So when do we declare the Palestinian flag a hate symbol? I’m not seeing a lot of them being waved by people who *don’t* support mass-murder.”

Taking a page from Hopper’s line of thinking, a principal at an Ottawa elementary school recently asked a student to remove the Palestinian flag as their profile picture. “We will follow up with your family because we want to keep all students feeling safe, welcome and included in our classrooms,” the principal is recorded saying.

This isn’t an isolated case. On Thursday prominent Toronto teacher Javier DaVila tweeted, “I’ve received dozens of reports from parents of children in Ontario education who’ve been targeted, attacked or suspended for wearing Keffiyehs, displaying Palestinian flags, expressing solidarity with or even saying Palestine.”

In a bid to blunt opposition to Israel’s genocidal policies, the media and politicians have hounded CUPE Ontario leader Fred Hahn and Hamilton NDP MPP Sarah Jama. They’ve also vilified student unions standing for Palestinian rights and called for them to be defunded.

While they obsess about one-sided student union statements, the media has all but ignored racism spouted by more influential pro-Israel actors. They are uninterested that the head of Montreal’s Federation CJA told an audience, which included multiple elected officials, that “the barbarians are at the gate” or that Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs hosted a speaker days after he tweeted an image of an Israeli military boot crushing a Palestinian cockroach. The leaders of the four main political parties spoke at the same CIJA conference.

Without a hint of awareness of the irony, organizations that proclaim Israel as “the only democracy in the Middle East” and condemn anyone who draws parallels between Nazi behaviour and Israel’s, as well as newspaper columnists who decry leftists when they “de-platform” right wingers, target the jobs of Palestine’s supporters.

Zionist campaigners have targeted multiple individuals’ livelihoods. Under outside pressure, a number of public servants are being “probed for anti-Israel posts” while a doctor who has done humanitarian work in Gaza and elsewhere, Ben Thomson, was suspended by Mackenzie Health for his Palestine advocacy. Air Canada even fired a pilot for posting Palestine protest photos on social media.

In response to the witch-hunt, Labour 4 Palestine has launched an action campaign titled “Defend free speech. Stop the attack on Palestine solidarity.” For its part, Scholar Strike Canada released a statement condemning “University Administrators and the Western media for their ongoing Threats against Scholars and Students in Solidarity with Palestinian People in Gaza.” In response to the Ontario premier’s smears, Jama formally threatened a defamation suit against Doug Ford.

Notwithstanding the witch-hunt, tens of thousands of Canadians have taken to the streets in recent days. On Tuesday night multiple thousands rallied and marched in emergency protests in Montreal, Ottawa, Calgary and Toronto against Israel killing hundreds at the Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza. A few days earlier more than 5,000 marched in Montréal against Canada’s complicity with Israel’s genocidal violence in Gaza.

More protests are planned Friday and this weekend. The best way to respond to repression of solidarity is to amplify Palestine solidarity work.

October 22, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Solidarity and Activism, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Conscience of humanity shaken by targeting of civilians in Gaza: Pakistani envoy

Press TV | October 18, 2023

The Israeli regime’s “deliberate, indiscriminate and disproportionate” targeting of civilians in the besieged Gaza Strip goes against all norms of civility and violates international law, says Pakistani ambassador to Tehran.

In an interview with the Press TV website on Tuesday, hours before an Israeli air raid on a Gaza hospital killed more than 700 Palestinians, Muhammad Mudassir Tipu said the “conscience of humanity has been shaken” by the unrelenting massacre of Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip.

“The conscience of humanity has been shaken by watching innocent civilians, children, older people, pregnant woman being killed; buildings being razed to ground; water and electricity being cut off; massive blockades; and the use of massive ammunition by the Israeli military forces,” he stated.

“That is why people are showing solidarity with the Palestinians, who are symbolizing their struggle for justice, all over the world.”

Demonstrations have been held worldwide in recent days in solidarity with the oppressed people of Palestine amid the new wave of Israeli genocidal bombardment of the besieged coastal strip.

One of the biggest demonstrations was held in Pakistan’s port city of Karachi, where tens of thousands took to the streets following a call given by a local political party with the support of trade unions.

Tipu said the “sense of righteousness is deeply ingrained in the minds” of the people in Pakistan.

“We stand for those principles that are morally justified and right rather than the ones propagated for political and hegemonic ambitions. Pakistanis also believe in the equal application of international law and norms rather than using one set of laws for one country and another set of laws for another country,” he remarked in a conversation with the Press TV website.

“We can’t have double standards and false moral equivalences to justify unjustifiable and illegitimate positions,” the Pakistani envoy hastened to add.

The death toll in the Israeli aerial bombardment in the Gaza Strip has risen to 3,000, including at least 700 children, with tens of thousands of others displaced after the Israeli evacuation orders.

The Pakistani ambassador said massive pro-Palestine demonstrations must be seen in the context of years of forced and illegal occupation of Palestinian territory and repressive policies against its people.

“Our cause resonates with the cause of the hapless Palestinians who are facing unspeakable brutality and massive use of force on the civilians as well as an overwhelming use of military might over its innocent people,” he asserted.

Tipu also “appreciated” the role of the Iranian leadership in “standing up for the oppressed people of Palestine and making resolute efforts to halt and reverse the conflict in Gaza consistent with international norms.”

“The great Iranian leadership has also unambiguously urged for a just resolution of this historic injustice,” he remarked, adding that the foreign ministers of Pakistan and Iran had a phone conversation on Monday in which they “discussed this grave situation” in Palestine.

On Pakistan’s interim Prime Minister Anwaar ul Haq Kakar’s statement on Saturday that the Israeli aggression in the Gaza strip should be seen in the context of years of illegal Israeli occupation, the Pakistani envoy said he “clearly and unambiguously outlined Pakistan’s position on this crisis.”

He also dismissed any speculation about Pakistan mulling normalization with the Israeli regime.

“Pakistan’s Foreign Minister, Mr. Jalil Abbas Jilani has categorically articulated that “there is absolutely no move to recognize Israel. Our position is very clear. We take decisions based on our interests and the interests of the Palestinians,” he told the Press TV website.

“I must emphasize that Pakistan is a sovereign country, with enormous capabilities, and would always take decisions of vital importance independently.”

He hastened to note that Islamabad “wishes to seek a just resolution” of the issue of Palestine so that “regional peace, development, and growth can take place and a sense of equity and justice prevails.”

October 18, 2023 Posted by | Progressive Hypocrite, Solidarity and Activism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , , , | Leave a comment

He was killed while holding the flag of Palestine

By Diana Khwaelid | International Solidarity Movement | October 14, 2023

The martyr Qassim Hakam Qassim, 24, was one of the young people who answered the call to participate in a mass demonstration in solidarity with Gaza in the city of Tulkarm, in the West Bank.

The martyr Qassim, who grew up in the Tulkarm refugee camp and who has 6 siblings, did not neglect the blood of the martyrs who were killed for Palestine and came out to express solidarity with the people of Gaza, holding the flag of Palestine.

Since the beginning of the demonstration, which took place on Friday 13th of October 2023, Qassim tried to place the flag of Palestine close to the Sanaoz Israeli checkpoint, near the apartheid wall, to affirm the existence of the Palestinian people and their right to reclaim the lands occupied and controlled by the Israeli occupation.

Qassim did not survive the bullet of an Israeli sniper who was watching him from the very beginning. He was hit directly in the head area and died instantly.

An atmosphere of anger and sadness prevailed in the Tulkarm refugee camp, for the funeral of the body of the young man. His family and friends took one last look at him.

He was prayed for at the Al-Salam mosque in the camp, as Palestinians chanted angrily, condemning the continuing murders committed by the Israeli occupation forces in the West Bank and Gaza.

Qassim’s message is not gone: other young Palestinians will follow his path. The message and the voice of liberation do not die when the body dies.

October 15, 2023 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Solidarity and Activism, Subjugation - Torture | , , , | Leave a comment

Decades before Snowden, this American patriot waged war against illegal surveillance in the US

In the 1970s, US Army Captain Christopher Pyle blew the lid on government agencies’ domestic spying

Former undercover agent Christopher Pyle testifies in the Senate that the Army has spied on politicians and thousands of ordinary Americans, February 24, 1971. © Bettmann Archive/Getty Images
By Robert Bridge | RT | October 11, 2023

In 1970, a US Army captain went rogue after he discovered that the military was conducting surveillance on dissidents across the country, thus sparking the first effort in modern times to tame US intelligence.

In 1968, almost half a century before the world heard the name of Edward Snowden, the former NSA contractor who blew the whistle on a US-run global surveillance system, Christopher Pyle, an Army captain who taught law at the Army’s intelligence school at Fort Holabird, Maryland, was about to do something no less memorable.

After Pyle had concluded one of his popular lectures on civil disorder, which focused on how the military could better quell riots in those highly volatile times, a military officer directly involved in such operations approached him with the request for a meeting. Several days later, Pyle was escorted into a large warehouse facility that once had been used to assemble railroad engines. In his 2006 book, No Place to Hide, Robert O’Harrow described what happened next.

“Pyle walked into the cage, where an officer showed him books containing mug shots. He looked in the first volume and saw a familiar face. It was Ralph David Abernathy, Martin Luther King’s assistant. Officers called the books the ‘black list.’”

“Outside the cage, Pyle saw more than a dozen teletype machines. The head of the CONUS [acronym for Continental United States] intelligence section told him they were spitting out reports from some fifteen hundred Army operatives about demonstrations with twenty people or more. Pyle was starting to understand how naive he’d been. He began formulating a plan. He would be getting out of the Army soon. He could tell the world about what was going on. When he joined the Army he took an oath to defend the country against all enemies, here and abroad. In his mind now, that included the Army’s intelligence operation. They turned in their security badges and left the building.”

And thus was born one of the most consequential whistleblowers of the post-World War II era.

In January 1970, Pyle, now a full-fledged private citizen, penned an article for the Washington Monthly entitled, ‘CONUS Intelligence: The Army Watches Civilian Politics.’ The explosive opening paragraph said it all: “[t]he U.S. Army has been closely watching civilian political activity within the United States. Nearly 1,000 plainclothes investigators … keep track of political protests of all kinds – from Klan rallies in North Carolina to anti-war speeches at Harvard.”

Immediately, some US media swung into action as journalists began hounding the Department of Defense and the US Army to determine the veracity of the claims. Given Pyle’s extreme proximity to the subject matter at hand, however, it soon became clear that Uncle Sam got caught with his hand in the proverbial cookie jar.

Pyle’s revelations were enough to prompt Congress, as well as a slew of litigation lawyers, to sit up and take notice. The chair of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Senator Samuel James Ervin, a self-described “country lawyer” from North Carolina, worked together with Pyle to investigate and expose the clandestine domestic spying program.

Pyle and Ervin eventually spent countless hours delivering testimony before various congressional meetings over a span of several years. The first fruit of their labors came with passage of the Privacy Act of 1974. Signed into law by President Gerald R. Ford on December 31, 1974, the legislation states: “No agency shall disclose any record which is contained in a system of records by any means of communication to any person, or to another agency, except pursuant to a written request by, or with the prior written consent of, the individual to whom the record pertains…” In other words, although the law didn’t actually stop the US Army or intelligence agencies from infiltrating civil action groups and public demonstrations, it did hamper the feds from disclosing the identities of the activists without their foreknowledge.

To this end, Pyle served as a consultant for three Congressional committees: the Subcommittee on Constitutional Rights on the Judiciary Committee (1971-1974), the Committee on Government Operations (1974), and the Select Committee to Study Government Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities (1975).

According to Pyle, as a result of those successful investigations, “the entire US Army Intelligence Command was abolished and all of its files were burned.” For his actions, Pyle ended up on then-President Richard Nixon’s notorious “Enemies List.”

Given the severity of their overall findings, however, the congressional investigations triggered by the US Army captain did not stop there.

1975, the ‘Year of Intelligence’  

On January 27, 1975, by a vote of 82 to 4, the US Senate created the so-called Church Committee, chaired by Democrat Senator Frank Church, to further examine abuses by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), National Security Agency (NSA), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). The House carried out its own set of investigations with the Pike Commission and the Rockefeller Commission, thereby prompting the media to label 1975 as the ‘Year of Intelligence,’ and not in a way that was flattering to the intelligence community.

Pyle lent his expertise to the ambitious Church Committee, headed by Iowa Senator Frank Church, which discovered a number of questionable, unethical and outright illegal activities by the CIA between 1959 and 1973. Detailed in a series of reports dubbed the ‘Family Jewels’, these activities included conducting physical surveillance on journalists, amassing files on nearly 10,000 Americans connected to the antiwar movement, funding behavior modification research on unwitting subjects, and plots to assassinate foreign leaders, including Cuban President Fidel Castro and DR Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba.

The most impactful discovery made by the Church Committee, however, was that of Project SHAMROCK. Started in 1940 during World War II and running into the 1970s, the NSA was given secret authority to access all incoming, outgoing, and transiting telegrams via the Western Union and its associates RCA and ITT. At the peak of Project SHAMROCK, 150,000 messages were captured and analyzed by NSA personnel in a month. The pertinent information contained in these messages was then forwarded to other intelligence agencies, including the CIA, FBI, Secret Service and the Department of Defense. This formed the basis of the so-called ‘Watch List’ of the 1970s that included thousands of American citizens, including high-ranking politicians, celebrities, academics and antiwar activists.

The findings led Senator Frank Church to conclude that Project SHAMROCK was “probably the largest government interception program affecting Americans ever undertaken.”

Based on the recommendations of the Church Committee, Congress passed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) of 1978. Under FISA, the government is required to obtain warrants to conduct electronic surveillance against individuals from a special court. Such a warrant requires “probable cause to believe” that the surveillance target is a foreign government or organization, or an agent thereof, “engaging in clandestine intelligence activities or international terrorism,” as per a Department of Justice (DOJ) clarification.

Yet, as we shall see, even this minor legislative hurdle would prove too cumbersome for the Bush administration in its war on terror.

Privacy in the age of terrorism

The tireless work of the Church Commission was put to a test in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks as US lawmakers from both sides of the political aisle were prepared to sacrifice citizens’ privacy in the name of national security. Thus, less than one week after three hijacked aircraft toppled the World Trade Center and damaged the Pentagon, killing some 3,000 people in the process, one of the most comprehensive plans for conducting surveillance on American civilians and individuals worldwide – the USA PATRIOT ACT (an acronym for ‘Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act’) – was already being disseminated to members of Congress.

Arguably the most controversial part of the Patriot Act is contained in Section 215 of the 342-page document, which calls for sweeping government powers against private and public enterprises, individuals, and personal privacy. Most crucially, Section 215 did away with the requirement that the target of the records search be a non-US citizen and “an agent of a foreign power.” American citizens were now legitimate targets as well.

In the Senate, the Patriot Act passed in a 99 – 1 vote. The only senator to vote against it was Wisconsin Democrat Russell Feingold. “There is no doubt,” he declared on the Senate floor before the historic vote, “that if we lived in a police state, it would be easier to catch terrorists…But that would not be a country in which we would want to live.”

Even with this widening of surveillance powers, then-US President George W. Bush, as part of the global ‘War on Terror’ that he declared following the events of 9/11, ordered the NSA to tap the communications of an untold number of people in the US, including citizens, without the warrants demanded by the FISA court – despite the fact that between 1979 and 2005, only four out of over 15,000 warrant requests were rejected by the FISA court.

Christopher Pyle, who was still committed to his cause over 30 years after he chose to become a whistleblower, labeled Bush “a criminal” for violating the FISA law and suggested that he should be impeached.

“The Constitution says he must take care that all laws be faithfully executed, not just the ones he likes,” Pyle said during an interview with Democracy Now in 2005. “The statute says … that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act is the exclusive law governing these international intercepts, and he violated it anyway. And the law also says that any person who violates that law is guilty of a felony, punishable by up to five years in prison. By the plain meaning of the law, the President is a criminal.”

More recently, Christopher Pyle, 83, who now works as Professor Emeritus of Politics at Mount Holyoke College, spoke out on behalf of Edward Snowden, the former NSA contractor turned whistleblower who revealed a massive global intelligence program run by the so-called Five Eyes, a once-secretive intelligence alliance comprising Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States.

“He’s just an ordinary American,” Pyle explained in 2013. “He’s trying to start a debate in this nation over something that is critically important. He should be respected for that and taken at face value and we should move on to the big issues, including the corruption of our system that is done by massive secrecy and by massive amounts of money and politics.”

Robert Bridge is an American writer and journalist. He is the author of ‘Midnight in the American Empire,’ How Corporations and Their Political Servants are Destroying the American Dream.

October 11, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Solidarity and Activism, Timeless or most popular | , , , | Leave a comment

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