Settler attacks intensify as Palestinians face systematic displacement
Al Mayadeen | November 24, 2025
Abdullah Awad, speaking to the Financial Times, describes a reality Palestinians across the occupied West Bank know too well: armed Israeli settlers storming their land with the aim of driving them out. The attack on his family farm near Turmus Ayya, carried out by about 15 masked settlers, left his children screaming as the group smashed their home and equipment.
“The settlers had axelike sticks with nails attached. So, they intended to injure us badly or kill us. Thank God we were awake when they came, so we could move away a bit,” he said. The assault followed years of harassment, but Awad says the violence has intensified since the war on Gaza began: “There were many assaults. This was not the first, and won’t be the last . . . but since the start of the war [in Gaza], they have become more violent. The situation has changed.”
Escalating campaign of settler aggression
Across the West Bank, Palestinians are facing an orchestrated campaign to terrorize communities and seize land. Settlers have attacked farmers, burned property, and raided villages from the northern hills to the southern plains. Videos of settlers beating Palestinians, including one incident in which a masked settler clubbed a woman unconscious, reflect a growing sense of impunity.
Political analyst Ibrahim Dalalsha told FT the pattern is unmistakable, “The settlers are totally emboldened, and the attacks are spreading, in the north, centre and south [of the West Bank]… This time they are really going deep inside.”
Targeting the olive harvest, the backbone of Palestinian rural life
The olive harvest, which sustains thousands of Palestinian families, has become an annual target for settler groups seeking to disrupt livelihoods and claim new territory. This season, attacks have soared. Settlers have torched a mosque in Deir Istiya, burned cars and homes near Beit Lahm, and even stormed an industrial area close to Beit Lid.
According to UN OCHA figures, more than 260 settler assaults resulting in injuries or property destruction were recorded in October, the highest monthly total since monitoring began nearly two decades ago.
Israeli condemnations ring hollow as impunity deepens
Israeli leaders have issued belated statements condemning settler actions, but on the ground, Palestinians say nothing has changed. The army dismantled a single illegal outpost, an exception so rare it drew international attention, while settlers continue attacking communities without consequence.
The settlers who burned the Deir Istiya mosque left graffiti stating: “We’re not afraid of Avi Bluth.”
Their message was aimed at the Israeli general responsible for West Bank operations, a taunt conveying how little fear violent settlers have of the regime’s security forces.
Rights group Yesh Din reports that 94% of settler violence cases were closed without charges in the 18 years before the war on Gaza. Palestinian officials say the situation has only worsened, with the military frequently standing aside, or acting in coordination with settlers during attacks.
Dalalsha said, “In the past, when there were attacks, there were investigations. Palestinians viewed these as a sham. But at least there was a process. These days, we do not hear of anything.”
Forced displacement as policy
Settlement expansion, illegal under international law, has accelerated at a pace Palestinian rights groups describe as intentional and strategic. Reports indicate that since the start of the war on Gaza in 2023, 44 Palestinian communities have been forcibly pushed from their lands through settler assaults combined with military restrictions.
Yair Dvir of B’Tselem put it bluntly, “When you look at what is happening, there is an order to [the attacks] . . . It’s not just individuals and settlers. They are backed by the Israeli system. There is a very clear goal, which is to forcibly displace the Palestinians and force them into the big cities.”
Daily terror in towns under siege
In Sinjil, a town outside Ramallah, a newly built settler outpost has triggered relentless harassment for Palestinians. Mayor Moataz Tawafsha told the FT: “There is no day without an attack. They steal tractors, burn stuff that belongs to the farmers, prevent farmers from reaching their land. Every day. They never stop.”
Near Turmus Ayya, settlers have placed a metal cabin and tent on a Palestinian building left half-finished and raised an Israeli flag above it, a symbolic claim over land that locals have farmed for generations. The new presence has cut Palestinians off from hundreds of hectares of farmland, including thousands of olive trees.
The mayor, Lafi Adeeb Shalabi, says the aim is clear, “They are trying to destroy the history of Palestine . . . This land belonged to our families, to our great great-grandfathers,” he said. “And when we try to defend it, they say we are terrorists.”
A systematic drive to empty Palestinian land
Testimonies from across the West Bank point to a coordinated effort to dispossess Palestinian communities: settlers advancing deeper into Palestinian areas, soldiers restricting movement, homes and farms burned, and entire communities uprooted.
What was once seasonal harassment has evolved into a sustained campaign of displacement.
Dissecting the UN’s “Comprehensive Plan” for Gaza and the inevitable dead-end
By Jamal Kanj | MEMO | November 24, 2025
US policy documents on the Middle East do not reach the daylight before Israel is given the chance to filter them, and gut them. The latest UN Security Council (UNSC) 2803, Comprehensive Plan, is no exception. The Resolution perpetuates the same failed logic that has governed international diplomacy for decades. One in which Palestinian rights are conditioned, while Israeli obligations are delayed with no mechanism, timelines, or accountability for violating agreements.
Following two years of using food as a weapon of war and genocide, the UNSC adopted a US sponsored resolution, not to condemn weaponizing food, but to reward the perpetrator. The UNSC “Comprehensive Plan” for Gaza is anything but comprehensive. It is narrow, short on details, rich in contradictions, and utterly lacking any overarching purpose.
Take Paragraph 2 for instance. The Resolution “welcomes the establishment of the Board of Peace (BoP)” as a transitional international administration that will manage Gaza’s redevelopment “until such time as the Palestinian Authority has satisfactorily completed its reform program.”
In other words, the recognition of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people is contingent, sequenced, and time-bound: reform first, demonstrate worthiness, satisfy outside evaluators, and then—maybe—they can “securely and effectively take back control” of their land. Meanwhile, Israel’s commitments are, at best, deliberately vague, crafted with such ambiguity allowing varying interpretations, much like UNSC Resolutions 242 and 338, written purposefully in a nebulous language that enabled Israel to evade compliance for decades.
There is not one single concrete or enforceable requirement placed on Israel: none to halt its extrajudicial assassinations, military attacks, timeline to complete withdrawal, or stop the expansion of Jewish-only colonies established on the same land reserved for the supposed Palestinian “self-determination.”
The Resolution weakens Item 7 of “Trump’s 20-point Gaza peace plan” which had called for “full aid be immediately sent into the Gaza Strip.” The new Comprehensive Plan replaced “immediately” by expressing only “the importance of the full resumption of humanitarian aid.” Israel’s already inexplicit obligations are further watered down to mere “consultation” and “cooperation,” giving the occupying power wide latitude to dictate its own interpretations and evade any real accountability.
The distortion becomes even more evident in Paragraphs 3 through 8. These sections deepen the asymmetry: Israel, whose leaders are indicted war criminals, is elevated to a co-supervisor with veto power over every stage of Gaza’s future. In effect, this Resolution upends international law by granting war criminals the final word on Gaza’s fate.
Paragraph 3, which addresses humanitarian aid, orders stringent monitoring of aid distribution inside Gaza. At the same time, there are no unequivocal demands on Israel to fully open all crossings, or stop hindering humanitarian aid delivery. The limited aid must be policed in Gaza, but the state that used food as a weapon and starved the population, is not required to do anything differently.
In Paragraph 4, a foreign-controlled “operational entities” strips Palestinians of their political agency by placing them under a technocratic committee selected from abroad and subordinate to the misnomer BoP. Yet, there is nothing in the Resolution on the freedom of ingress and egress, no mention of opening the seaport or rebuilding the airport. Furthermore, there are no tangible punitive measures, if and when, Israel fails to adhere to the UNSC Resolution.
The funding structures in Paragraphs 5–6 absolve Israel of responsibility. Gaza’s reconstruction is handed to donors and the World Bank, financed through voluntary contributions. Israel, the power that destroyed Gaza, is not asked to contribute a dollar, let alone pay reparations or assume legal responsibility for murdering and injuring 241,000 Palestinians, destroying all the universities, 97% of schools, 94% of the hospitals and 92% of the residential homes.
The heart of the resolution’s inequity is found in Paragraph 7, which authorizes a foreign military force (ISF) tasked with enforcing Palestinian demilitarization. The Palestinian Resistance must disarm, surrender weapons, accept foreign security supervision, and undergo vetting. Israel’s withdrawal, however, takes place only “when conditions allow” and to be negotiated between its army and ISF, guarantors, and the United States. Palestinians are entirely excluded from determining the terms of the Israeli withdrawal from their own land.
Even more alarming, the resolution normalizes Israeli occupation “that will remain until Gaza is properly secure from any resurgent terror threat.” An open-ended clause granting Israel a permanent military footprint in and around Gaza while granting Israel alone the power to define and determine any so-called “resurgent threat.”
Finally, Paragraph 8, mandates that any extension of international presence in Gaza must be done “in full cooperation and coordination with Egypt and Israel.” Once again, Palestinians are excluded from determining their own future. It is all left for Israel since its consent is conditional on the “full cooperation.”
Taken together, these provisions expose the true nature of the so-called Comprehensive Plan: a political instrument designed to entrench, not end, the structural inequality of occupation. And less than 72 hours following the UNSC Resolution, Benjamin Netanyahu appointed Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, two Jewish racist ministers who openly called for the ethnic cleansing and building Jewish only colonies in Gaza, to be in charge of, or more likely to undermine, the second phase of Trump’s 20-point plan.
In short, the UNSC Comprehensive Plan whitewashes Israel’s genocide and ties the future of Palestinian self-determination to a checklist that Israel is neither bound to accept nor prevented from obstructing. A Plan that will lead to exactly where previous UN Resolutions, mainly 194, 242 and 338 had gone, to an inevitable dead-end.
SHOCK POLL: 36% of Americans Believe They Experienced a Covid Shot Side Effect
By Jefferey Jaxen | November 22, 2025
The latest Rasmussen poll speaks volumes. A major flashing warning light for public health officials and political leadership. Are they paying attention? And more importantly, will they act?
Rasmussen polls are pulse checks – real-time snapshots of public sentiment and mood on key topics.
The recent Rasmussen report reveals:
- 26% say they had minor side effects from the Covid shot
- 10% reported major side effects from the vaccine
- 46% believe it is likely that side effects of COVID-19 vaccines have caused a significant number of unexplained deaths
Under Kennedy’s leadership at HHS, once authoritarian Covid shot mandates have been backed off to ‘individual-based decision-making’ but is that enough. It’s clear the current public health apparatus wants out of all aspects of the Biden administration’s Covid train wreck.
Given the mounting data and science pointing to harms, many believe the government should be doing more – namely removing the Covid shot from the market.
At the same time, The Telegraph is reporting the following:
The story was created thanks to the legal action of the independent, non-profit, non-affiliated group UsForThemUK, along with diagnostic pathologist Dr. Clare Craig, who engaged in a 2-year battle to get public transparency of the general Covid vaccine and mortality data… data that was freely shared with pharmaceutical companies but withheld from the public.
The group lost its legal fight but a key admission was revealed to the public as the Telegraph writes:
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) argued that releasing the data would lead to the “distress or anger” of bereaved relatives if a link were to be discovered.
Public health officials also argued that publishing the data risked damaging the well-being and mental health of the families and friends of people who died.
The Telegraph then describes a behind-the-veil moment writing:
UsForThem, a campaign group, requested that UKHSA release the data under freedom of information laws. But the agency refused, making a number of different arguments including that publishing the data “could lead to misinformation” that would “have an adverse impact on vaccine uptake” in the public.
In America, the CDC has just updated its “Vaccine Safety’ page creating massive public buzz showing an evolution in both science and a willingness to be truthful towards the public.
Among the new admissions the CDC website now states:
Scientific studies have not ruled out the possibility that infant vaccines contribute to the development of autism. However, this statement has historically been disseminated by the CDC and other federal health agencies within HHS to prevent vaccine hesitancy.
Together, both the UKHSA and CDC’s new statements show there has been, and still is, a lockstep coordination to purposely censor information from the public when it comes to injectable pharmaceutical product lines.
Governments are desperate to avoid the Covid vaccine injury conversation eager to avoid full-blown public health revolt on unknown consequences (already happening in large sections of the population)
The American Covid vaccine space is still a dismal public relations nightmare. The PREP Act, keeping the pandemic’s unnecessary actions in effect, blocks any hope of proper compensation for the critical mass of Americans who have experienced injuries from the mandated, failed shot.
Meanwhile, the ‘science is not political’ crowd spawned an East and West Coast Alliance coalition of all blue Democrat-run states representing the high water mark of hypocrisy and groupthink. Banding together for the purpose of ignoring the facts and evidence to push the Covid shot on infants and healthy people sans pandemic emergency.
The bizarre and self-defeatist move refusing to acknowledge any new science since 2020 on the mounting dangers of the Covid shot – the alliances are not only a danger to public health but to the credibility of the very institutional trust they claim to be standing for – perfect inversion.
The harms of the Covid shot are still a real concern of the American public. Ignoring these concerns or attempting to soft-sell solutions bypassing real help for the injured will not make this flashing red light any dimmer.
Mamdani raises ‘US funding’ of Israeli genocide in Gaza during Trump meeting
US President Donald Trump meets with New York Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani in the White House in Washington, DC, on November 21, 2025. (Photo by Jim WATSON / AFP)
Press TV – November 22, 2025
In a meeting with US President Donald Trump, the newly elected New York City mayor, Zohran Mamdani, raised the issue of US funding for the Israeli genocidal war on Gaza.
The meeting at the White House on Friday was the first in-person meeting for the political opposites, who have clashed over everything from immigration to economic policy.
The 34-year-old mayor told reporters that when he spoke to New Yorkers who supported both Trump and him, the two main reasons given were a desire to “end forever wars” and an “end to the taxpayer dollars we had funding violations of human rights.”
Answering a reporter’s question, the mayor-elect reiterated that Israel has been “committing genocide” in Gaza and his assertion that US taxpayers’ dollars are helping fund it.
Mamdani clarified that he had “spoken about the Israeli [regime] committing genocide and I’ve spoken about our government funding it.”
“I shared with the president in our meeting about the concern that many New Yorkers have about wanting their tax dollars to go toward the benefit of New Yorkers and their ability to afford basic dignity,” Mamdani said.
“There’s a desperate need not only for the following of human rights but also the following through on the promises we’ve made New Yorkers.”
“I appreciate all efforts toward peace,” he added. “We’re tired of seeing our tax dollars fund endless wars, and I also believe that we have to follow through on the international human rights, and I know that still today those are being violated, and that continues to be work that has to be done, no matter where we’re speaking of.”
Trump did not comment on the matter, beyond noting that he and Mamdani feel “very strongly about peace” in West Asia.
Trump also said that he and Mamdani did not discuss the latter’s pledge to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he came to the Big Apple.
Trump had previously called the incoming New York City mayor a “radical left lunatic,” a communist, and a “Jew hater.”
As Mamdani surged in the polls to victory, Trump, a Republican, issued threats to strip federal funding from the biggest US city.
The mayor-elect has regularly criticized a range of Trump’s policies, including plans to ramp up federal immigration enforcement efforts in New York City, where four in ten residents are foreign-born.
Supremacism as an inherent aspect of the Zionist ideology
By Lucas Leiroz | Strategic Culture Foundation | November 21, 2025
A recent speech by Israeli Minister of Security Itamar Ben-Gvir clearly revealed the inherently supremacist character of Zionist ideology. Ahead of the UN Security Council vote on the implementation of the next phase of the U.S.-mediated Gaza peace plan, Ben-Gvir categorically stated that “the Palestinian people do not exist.” This statement is not merely a rhetorical provocation; it is an explicit expression of a worldview that denies the historical, cultural, and political existence of another nation based on ethnic and religious criteria.
Ben-Gvir, leader of the ultranationalist Otzma Yehudit party, argued that Palestinians are “an invention without any historical, archaeological, or factual basis.” In his view, the presence of Arabs in the region controlled by Israel does not constitute a legitimate nation and therefore does not deserve any political recognition or right to self-determination. More than denying the existence of a people, the minister asserts that the only “real” solution to the conflict would be to encourage voluntary emigration — a proposal that, in practice, amounts to the forced removal of an entire population.
What is evident in this speech is the crystallization of a supremacist logic: defining one’s own group as the exclusive holder of rights over the land, history, and political narrative, while the other group is dehumanized and reduced to a threat to be eliminated or marginalized. This perspective is not isolated. Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich recently reinforced the idea that a Palestinian state “will never be established,” demanding that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu communicate this unequivocally to the world.
These statements highlight a crucial point that many international analyses hesitate to address: Zionist ideology has an essentially supremacist and deeply racist core. The denial of Palestinian existence, the exclusion of the Arab population from the national narrative, and the promotion of forced emigration policies reflect a conception of the state based on the supremacy of one ethno-religious group over all other historical inhabitants of the region.
It is important to emphasize that this vision directly contrasts with international law and global consensus on the recognition of the Palestinian people. Currently, the State of Palestine is recognized by 157 countries, including four of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council. Nevertheless, figures such as Ben-Gvir and Smotrich remain steadfast in defending policies that deny any possibility of Palestinian coexistence or self-determination.
Moreover, Ben-Gvir’s rhetoric does not emerge in a political vacuum: it is part of a broader project of exclusion and supremacy within Israel’s domestic context, but it also directly influences the country’s foreign policy, affecting international negotiations and peace plans. By treating Palestinians as nonexistent, the Israeli government positions itself against diplomatic solutions that respect equal rights, such as the widely endorsed two-state solution supported by multiple international actors.
The supremacist nature of Zionist ideology cannot be reduced to mere political differences or territorial disputes. It is a worldview that establishes racial and historical hierarchies, justifying the disregard for the rights of an entire people based on the supposed “superiority” of another. By delegitimizing Palestinian existence, Ben-Gvir exposes a logic of total exclusion that threatens not only regional stability but also universal principles of justice and national sovereignty.
In summary, the recent statements of Israeli leaders reveal that the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is not merely a territorial or strategic dispute, but also a struggle against an ideology rooted in the denial of the other. Understanding ideological Zionism through the lens of supremacism is crucial for any serious analysis of the contemporary Middle East and demonstrates that, until the humanity and rights of the Palestinian people are recognized, the ongoing genocide in Gaza will not cease.
EU conference in Brussels links Gaza recovery funds to PA reforms
The Cradle | November 21, 2025
The EU held a donor conference in Brussels on 20 November to discuss reconstruction and post-war governance in the Gaza Strip, with several countries signing a reform-linked financial support package for the Palestinian Authority (PA).
Sixty delegations participated in the conference in Brussels. Four EU members states – Germany, Luxembourg, Slovenia, and Spain – signed commitments confirming €82 million ($95 million) in support for the PA, which was already previously pledged.
This came as part of the new €1.6 billion ($1.85 billion), EU multi-year program for Palestinian recovery, unveiled earlier this year. In total, €88 million ($101.4 million) was pledged this year. The contributions will be channeled through the Palestinian-European Socio-Economic Management and Assistance Mechanism (PEGASE).
The disbursement of the funds is dependent on specific reforms that the PA must carry out first.
No new pledges were made during the donor conference on Thursday.
“Our aim is to strengthen governance, build a more resilient economy, stabilize finances, improve services for the population, and create conditions for future effective governance across all territories,” said EU commissioner for the Mediterranean Dubravka Suica.
“Our financial support is linked to the PA reform agenda, which, of course, they committed to implement,” Suica added. “Switzerland, New Zealand, Norway, Turkiye, which are not members of the European Union, are looking forward to their pledges to use this mechanism … which is controlled and assures that money goes in the right place.”
Chief of the EU Ursula von der Leyen said the bloc was “committed to working towards a Palestinian state with a reformed, well-functioning Palestinian Authority at its core.”
A follow-up conference will be held in Egypt to secure more funding.
Three days ago, the UN passed a US-drafted resolution to approve the second phase of US President Donald Trump’s ceasefire plan.
The initiative includes deploying international forces to Gaza to disarm the resistance, and allows Israel to maintain a presence inside the strip until the disarmament is complete. Hamas and the other factions have outright rejected the resolution.
The Trump plan includes an eventual return of the PA to Gaza, conditional on reforms that must be carried out by Ramallah. However, Tel Aviv has not signed off on PA governance in the strip.
Ramallah has already begun carrying out reforms at the request of Washington, Arab states, and western countries, including last year, when it ended its policy of stipends to the families of Palestinian prisoners convicted for resistance operations or attacks against Israelis.
Tel Aviv and Washington have referred to this policy as “pay-to-slay.”
In September, the French and UK governments announced their recognition of a Palestinian state. According to a report by The Telegraph that month, London and Paris conditioned their recognition of Palestine on an “overhaul” of the Palestinian education system.
PA President Mahmoud Abbas is “under pressure to drive through reforms to the Palestinian school curriculum in an effort to placate Israeli concerns over anti-Semitism,” the report said, adding that other political reforms and elections are also on the list of demands.
Last month, the Times of Israel reported Abbas sacked his finance minister for continuing payments to the families of prisoners in defiance of Israeli and western demands.
The PA was formed in the aftermath of the 1993 Oslo Accords between Israel and the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO). Abbas was elected as president in 2005, and has been in power since then despite the expiry of his term in 2009.
Despite years of deep security coordination between Ramallah and Tel Aviv, and the PA cracking down on West Bank resistance on behalf of Israel, the authority is facing an Israeli campaign of financial strangulation and is constantly accused of encouraging terrorism and antisemitism.
The new kill zone: Gaza’s borders after the ‘ceasefire’
By Ramzy Baroud | MEMO | November 20, 2025
The so-called Gaza ceasefire was not a genuine cessation of hostility, but a strategic, cynical shift in the Israeli genocide and ongoing campaign of destruction.
Starting on 10 October, the first day of the announced ceasefire, Israel transitioned tactics: moving from indiscriminate aerial bombardment to the calculated, engineered demolishing of homes and vital infrastructure. Satellite images, corroborated by almost hourly media and ground reports, confirmed this methodical change.
As direct combat forces seemingly withdrew to the adjacent “Gaza envelope” region, a new vanguard of Israeli soldiers advanced into the area east of the so-called Yellow Line, to systematically dismantle whatever semblance of life, rootedness, and civilisation remained standing following the Israeli genocide. Between 10 October and 2 November, Israel demolished 1,500 buildings, utilising its specialized military engineering units.
The ceasefire agreement divided Gaza into two halves: one west of the Yellow Line, where the survivors of the Israeli genocide were confined, and a larger one, east of the line, where the Israeli army maintained an active military presence and continued to operate with impunity.
If Israel truly harbored the intention of, indeed, evacuating the area following the agreed-upon second phase of the ceasefire, it would not be actively pursuing the systematic, structural destruction of this already devastated region. Clearly, Israel’s motives are far more insidious, centered on rendering the region perpetually uninhabitable.
Aside from leveling infrastructure, Israel is also carrying out a continuous campaign of airstrikes and naval attacks, relentlessly targeting Rafah and Khan Yunis in the south. Later, and with greater intensity, Israel also began carrying out attacks in areas that were, in theory, meant to be under the control of Gazans.
According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health in Gaza, 260 Palestinians have been killed and 632 wounded since the commencement of the so-called ceasefire.
In practice, this ceasefire amounts to a one-sided truce, where Israel can carry out a relentless, low-grade war on Gaza, while Palestinians are systematically denied the right to respond or defend themselves. Gaza is thus condemned to relive the same tragic cycle of violent history: a defenseless, impoverished region trapped under the boot of Israel’s military calculations, which consistently operate outside the periphery of international law.
Before the existence of Israel atop the ruins of historic Palestine in 1948, the demarcation of Gaza’s borders was not driven by military calculations. The Gaza region, one of the world’s most ancient civilisations, was always seamlessly incorporated into a larger geographical socio-economic space.
Before the British named it the Gaza District (1920-1948), the Ottomans considered it a sub-district (Kaza) within the larger Mutasarrifate of Jerusalem – the Jerusalem Independent District.
But even the British designation of Gaza did not isolate it from the rest of the Palestinian geography, as the borders of the new district reached Al-Majdal (today’s Ashkelon) in the north, Bir al-Saba’ (Beersheba) in the east, and the Rafah line at the Egyptian border.
Following the 1949 Armistice Agreements, which codified the post-Nakba lines, the collective torment of Gaza, as illustrated in its shrinking boundaries, began in earnest. The expansive Gaza District was brutally reduced to the Gaza Strip, a mere 1.3 per cent of the overall size of historic Palestine. Its population, due to the Nakba, had explosively grown with over 200,000 desperate refugees who, along with several generations of their descendants, have been trapped and confined in this tiny strip of land for over 77 years.
When Israel permanently occupied Gaza in June 1967, the lines separating it from the rest of the Palestinian and Arab geography became an integral, permanent part of Gaza itself. Soon after its occupation of the Strip, Israel began restricting the movement of Palestinians further, sectionalising Gaza into several regions. The size and location of these internal lines were largely determined by two paramount motives: to fragment Palestinian society to ensure its subjugation, and to create military ‘buffer zones’ around Israeli military encampments and illegal settlements.
Between 1967 and Israel’s so-called ‘disengagement’ from Gaza, Israel had built 21 illegal settlements and numerous military corridors and checkpoints, effectively bisecting the Strip and confiscating nearly 40 percent of its land mass.
Following the redeployment, Israel retained absolute, unilateral control over Gaza’s borders, sea access, airspace, and even the population registry. Additionally, Israel created another internal border within Gaza, a heavily fortified “buffer zone” snaking across the northern and eastern borders. This new area has witnessed the cold-blooded killing of hundreds of unarmed protesters and the wounding of thousands who dared to approach what was often referred to as the “kill zone.”
Even the Gaza sea was effectively outlawed. Fishermen were inhumanely confined to tiny spaces, at times less than three nautical miles, while simultaneously surrounded by the Israeli navy, which routinely shot fishermen, sank boats, and detained crews at will.
Gaza’s new Yellow Line is but the latest, most egregious military demarcation in a long, cruel history of lines intended to make the lives of the Palestinians impossible. The current line, however, is worse than any before it, as it completely suffocates the displaced population in a fully destroyed area, without functioning hospitals and with only trickles of life-saving aid.
For Palestinians, who have been battling confinements and fragmentation for generations, this new arrangement is the intolerable and inevitable culmination of their protracted, multi-generational dispossession.
If Israel believes it can impose the new demarcation of Gaza as a new status quo, the next few months will prove this conviction devastatingly wrong. Tel Aviv has simply recreated a much worse, inherently unstable version of the violent reality that existed before 7 October and the genocide. Even those not fully familiar with the deep, painful history of Gaza must realise that sustaining the Yellow Line of Gaza is nothing more than a dangerous, bloody illusion.
Germany Turns an X Post Into a Police Raid at Dawn
By Christina Maas | Reclaim The Net | November 18, 2025
The story starts with a tweet that barely registered on the internet. A few hundred views, a handful of likes, and the kind of blunt libertarian framing that is common on X every hour of every day.
Yet in Germany, that tiny post triggered a 6am police raid, a forced phone handover, biometric collection, and a warning that the author was now under surveillance.
The thing to understand is that this story only makes sense once you see the sequence of events in order.
The story goes like this:
- A man in Germany, known publicly only as Damian N., posts a short comment on X, calling government-funded workers “parasites.”
- The post is tiny. At the time he was raided, it had roughly a hundred views. Even now, it has only a few hundred.
- Despite the post’s obscurity, police arrive at Damian’s home at six in the morning.
- He says they did not show him the warrant and did not leave documentation of what they seized.
- Police pressured him to unlock his phone, confiscated it, took photos, fingerprints, and other biometric data, and even requested a blood sample for DNA.
- One officer reportedly warned him to “think about what you post in the future” and said he is now “under surveillance.”
- The entire action was justified under Section 130 of the German Criminal Code, which is meant to prohibit inciting hatred against protected groups.
- Government employees are not such a group, which makes the legal theory tenuous at best.
- Damian’s lawyer says the identification procedures and possibly the raid itself were illegal.
That is the sequence. A low-visibility political insult becomes a criminal investigation involving home searches, device seizure, and biometric collection.
The thing to understand is that this is not about one man’s post. It is about a bureaucracy that treats speech as something to manage and a set of enforcement structures that expand to fill the space they are given.
Start with the enforcement context. Germany has built a sprawling ecosystem around “online hate”: specialized prosecutor units, NGO tip lines, and automated scanning for taboo keywords.
The model is compliance first and legal theory second.
Once you create an apparatus like this, it behaves the way bureaucracies behave. It looks for work. It justifies resources by producing cases. A tiny X post with inflammatory language becomes a target because it contains the right keyword, not because it has societal impact.
Police behavior fits the same pattern. Confiscating phones is strategically useful because it imposes real pain without requiring a conviction.
Even prosecutors have said that losing a smartphone is often worse than the fine.
Early-morning raids create psychological pressure. Collecting biometrics raises the stakes further. None of this is about public safety. It is about creating friction for saying the wrong thing.
The legal mismatch is the tell. Section 130 protects groups defined by national, racial, religious, or ethnic identity.
There is also the privacy angle, which becomes impossible to ignore. Device access, biometrics, DNA requests: these are investigative tools built for serious crimes.
Deploying them against minor online speech means the line between public-safety policing and opinion policing has already been crossed. Once a state normalizes surveillance as a response to expression, the hard part becomes restoring restraint.
It is a deterrence strategy, not a justice strategy. And it reinforces why free speech and strong privacy protections matter. Without them, minor speech becomes an invitation for major intrusion.
The counterintuitive part is that the smallness of the post makes a raid more likely, not less.
High-profile content generates scrutiny and political costs. Low-profile content discovered through automated or NGO-driven monitoring is frictionless to act on. Unless people are reading Reclaim The Net, most people never hear of these smaller cases.
Looking ahead, the pressure will only increase. As more speech moves to global platforms that are harder to influence, local governments will lean more heavily on domestic law enforcement as their lever of control.
That means more investigations that hinge on broad interpretations of old statutes and more friction between individual rights and bureaucratic incentives.
This is particularly true in Germany and places like the UK, where the government doesn’t seem to feel any shame about raiding its citizens over online posts.
Palestinian leader Barghouti subjected to brutal torture in Israeli prison, says advocacy group
Jailed Palestinian leader Abdullah Barghouti
Press TV – November 18, 2025
A Palestinian prisoners’ advocacy group says jailed Hamas leader Abdullah Barghouti has faced extreme physical and psychological torture at the maximum-security Gilboa Prison in the northern part of the Israeli-occupied territories since his abduction more than two decades ago.
The Asra Media Office (AMO) announced in a statement on Monday that 53-year-old Barghouti is currently enduring conditions that have been described as “a form of slow execution,” aimed at one of the leading figures of the Palestinian Captive Movement. Concerns have been raised that his life could be at risk at any moment.
The statement disclosed that the prison administration has been systematically and repeatedly targeting Barghouti with assaults for more than 25 months.
Prison guards storm his cell relentlessly, day and night, often accompanied by dogs. They taunt him, claiming they missed assaulting him, before three of them restrain him and viciously attack him with batons. The beating leaves him with severe injuries, including bleeding and deep wounds.
His fellow inmates are left to care for him, using torn fabric and rudimentary cleaning supplies to tend to his wounds.
Barghouti, currently serving 67 life sentences, is enduring severe, untreated injuries. These include fractures in his right elbow and hand that have persisted for more than three months, a broken pinky finger on his left hand, two fractured ribs, torn tendons, and a drastic weight loss of approximately 35 kilograms caused by starvation and inadequate nutrition.
The rights group added that guards have doused him with water before subjecting him to electrocution and confined him to a cell infested with scabies, resulting in painful boils all over his body. To minimize the risk of further infection, he now resorts to sleeping on the floor.
Barghouti currently struggles with significant difficulty in moving his hands, with one almost completely paralyzed. Despite his condition, Israeli prison authorities deny him any form of medical treatment, including pain relief, and block human rights organizations from reaching out to him.
The AMO asserted that Barghouti’s suffering is part of a broader campaign against the leadership of the Captive Movement.
It emphasized that the mistreatment he endures surpasses mere punishment, amounting to a calculated effort to end his life, underscoring the urgent need for international intervention.
The circumstances surrounding the detention of Palestinian inmates by Israel are unacceptable and characterized by inadequate hygiene standards. Moreover, Palestinian detainees have endured persistent torture, harassment, and oppression.
Palestinian detainees have consistently participated in indefinite hunger strikes to express their frustration over their unjust imprisonment.
Human rights organizations say that Israel continues to violate the rights and freedoms granted to abductees as stipulated by the Fourth Geneva Convention and international laws.
According to the Palestine Detainees Studies Center, around 60 percent of Palestinian detainees in Israeli prisons suffer from chronic illnesses, with many having passed away either during their incarceration or after their release due to the seriousness of their health issues.
UK Government Caught Hiding COVID Shot–Death Data “To Prevent Distress or Anger”
By Nicolas Hulscher, MPH | FOCAL POINTS | November 15, 2025
Today, The Telegraph revealed that the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) has refused to publish anonymized data that would likely show strong evidence of a link between COVID-19 “vaccines” and mass deaths.
According to the report, UKHSA justified the secrecy by claiming that releasing the figures could cause “distress or anger” among bereaved families if a connection were discovered.
Even more concerning: The same dataset — mapping vaccination dates to dates of death — was provided to pharmaceutical companies but NOT released to the public. UKHSA also claimed that publishing the numbers could “lead to misinformation” or impact vaccine uptake.
For two years, the campaign group UsForThem fought to obtain the anonymised dataset through FOI requests. UKHSA refused every time. Ultimately, the Information Commissioner sided with the agency, allowing the data to remain hidden indefinitely.
MPs and peers had already sounded the alarm last year, urging the government to release the data “immediately,” noting that it had been quietly shared with vaccine manufacturers.
Intentionally withholding critical vaccine-safety data carries serious legal consequences, including but not limited to Misconduct in Public Office, Corporate Manslaughter or Gross Negligence Manslaughter, breaches of statutory duties under public-health and disclosure laws, and potential Fraud by omission or abuse of position.
Epidemiologist and Foundation Administrator, McCullough Foundation
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UK Government Wins 2-Year Battle to Withhold Data Linking COVID Vaccines to Excess Deaths
Swiss probe links Ali Abunimah detention to Israeli political pressure
Al Mayadeen | November 17, 2025
A Swiss parliamentary investigation has revealed that the detention and expulsion of Palestinian-US journalist Ali Abunimah in January were the result of political interference and undisclosed ties between senior Swiss officials and Israeli interests. The findings have raised alarms about institutional bias and shrinking space for Palestine advocacy in Europe.
The Control Commission of the Council of States released its report last week, confirming that Nicoletta della Valle, then-head of Switzerland’s federal police agency (Fedpol), personally intervened to impose an entry ban against Abunimah. The decision, investigators found, “deviated from standard practice” and was implemented in a manner they described as “unsatisfactory” and “particularly problematic.”
Abunimah, the executive director and co-founder of The Electronic Intifada, had entered Switzerland legally and was scheduled to speak at a public event before being detained without warning by plainclothes officers. He was held incommunicado for three days and deported without due process.
Della Valle’s ties to Israeli interests raise conflict concerns
The report detailed how Zurich police initially requested a ban before Abunimah’s arrival. Fedpol rejected the request after consulting intelligence and immigration agencies. However, following a phone call from the commander of Zurich’s cantonal police, della Valle reversed that decision, without new evidence, and verbally instructed her staff to enforce the ban after Abunimah had already entered the country.
Critics have pointed to Della Valle’s post-retirement role at Champel Capital, an Israeli investment firm with ties to high-ranking Israeli officials, including Major General Giora Eiland and politician Amir Weitmann. Both men are known for advocating extreme measures against Gaza and its population. Della Valle’s name has since been quietly removed from the firm’s website.
Abunimah said the findings confirmed that “serious irregularities and abuses of power” were carried out to suppress public criticism of “Israel’s” genocide in Gaza. He noted that the entry ban violated basic democratic rights and was politically motivated.
UN experts condemn growing restrictions on Palestine advocacy
International human rights bodies have condemned Abunimah’s detention and broader crackdowns on critics of the Israeli occupation in Europe.
Francesca Albanese, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories, warned at the time of a “toxic climate” for freedom of speech, while UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression, Irene Khan, called the repression of Palestinian voices “alarming” and “unjustifiable.”
The parliamentary report reconstructs a clear pattern of intervention. Authorities confirmed that Abunimah posed no threat, but the entry ban was forced through via irregular backchannel influence. Della Valle’s personal directive to override procedural safeguards has become the centerpiece of a growing scandal.
Swiss Zionist lobbying under scrutiny following revelations
The case has intensified scrutiny of Swiss institutions and their connections to Zionist lobbying networks. Switzerland hosts a wide range of organizations affiliated with the global Zionist movement, including the Swiss Zionist Federation, KKL-JNF, Keren Hayesod, and the Jewish Agency’s Swiss branch, all of which have supported illegal settlement activity and lobbied for policies targeting Palestinian advocacy.
Parallel groups, such as the Switzerland-“Israel” Society (GIS), the Swiss Federation of Jewish Communities (SIG), and CICAD, as well as newer outfits like NAIN, have pushed for bans on the Palestinian Resistance in Gaza, cuts to UNRWA funding, and efforts to equate anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism.
Observers say these organizations shape political narratives and influence policymakers, enabling state repression of pro-Palestinian voices under the guise of combating hate speech.
Legal challenge underway
Abunimah is now taking legal action in Zurich and at the federal level, with his legal team preparing further filings based on the parliamentary commission’s findings. His case has become emblematic of growing concerns about freedom of expression in Europe and the ability of foreign-linked networks to suppress dissent through state institutions.
“These grave violations of democratic and human rights were carried out to prevent me from speaking at lawful public events, organized by Swiss citizens and residents, calling for an end to ‘Israel’s’ genocide in Gaza,” Abunimah said in a social media post.
Red ribbons in London: A silent uprising bringing Palestinian hostages back into view
By Adnan Hmidan | MEMO | November 16, 2025
Walking through Westminster, in the quiet rush of central London, flashes of red caught my attention — ribbons tied to lampposts, railings, and street fixtures. They were not adverts or campaign posters, but dense, symbolic gestures: spontaneous in form, unmistakable in meaning. They returned to public sight faces that have long been hidden behind prison walls — Palestinian hostages abducted by the occupation from homes and hospitals, held without trial under a system that resembles nothing but the law of the jungle.
These ribbons seemed like individual efforts, small and uncoordinated, yet unified in what they were trying to say: that the Palestinian hostage file remains locked in darkness, despite being one of the most devastating human crises. Thousands have been torn from their lives with no charges, no legal process, no daylight.
Of the nearly 9,100 Palestinians currently detained, it is estimated that almost a third are effectively treated as hostages; abducted and denied even the bare minimum of legal rights or guarantees.
A language that must reclaim its meaning
For years, the word “prisoner” has been used broadly. But what the occupation practises is not detention — it is abduction. People are taken from their beds or hospital rooms and disappear for indefinite periods, without charges, court hearings, or the most basic procedural rights.
The figures alone reveal the scale of the crisis:
3,544 held under administrative detention without trial
400 children
53 women
16 doctors
117 Palestinian hostages killed in the past two years alone during the genocide in Gaza
These individuals cannot honestly be called “prisoners.” They are hostages in every legal and moral sense — seized outside any legitimate framework by a state whose own foundations rest on dispossession and violation.
Red… a colour that bears witness, not beauty
The choice of red is self-explanatory. It is the colour of spilled blood, of injustice endured, of wounds that never fully heal.
These ribbons may hang quietly across London, but the question they raise is anything but quiet:
How can thousands of people be abducted in this way, while the world remains unable — or unwilling — to see them?
No one is asked to lead a campaign or become an activist. What is needed is recognition, a wider awakening to a file packed with human lives, daily suffering, families searching, and children growing up in absence.
Stories hanging from lampposts… so memory does not fade
Seeing the ribbons brought back the painful stories that fill this file:
The child pulled from his bed because soldiers deemed him a “threat,”
The woman taken from her home in front of her children,
The doctor who vanished from an operating room and never returned,
Those subjected to torture and enforced disappearance,
And the testimonies of rape and sexual abuse recently documented by international organisations.
These stories need no embellishment; their truth is weight enough. They also echo Steve Biko’s famous line:
“The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.”
These red ribbons feel like a modest attempt to unsettle that weapon.
Catherine Connolly’s victory: Europe’s moral rebellion against the Israeli occupation
When execution becomes a celebration
It is difficult to grasp that the occupation’s National Security Minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, celebrated inside the Knesset after passing a law permitting the execution of Palestinian detainees.
More troubling still is how easily such a moment can pass as a routine political step — as though it were merely another debate rather than a descent into deeper, institutionalised brutality.
When a state legalises killing those it has abducted without trial, imprisonment ceases to resemble detention. It becomes just one point on a chain that runs from abduction to torture to death.
The rising number of Palestinians dying inside Israeli prisons is not an exaggeration — it is an expanding reality.
Preserving memory before preserving the body
Red ribbons do not claim to liberate anyone, nor do they replace political or legal work. But they accomplish something essential: they return faces to public view and stop stories from being buried in darkness.
The Palestinian hostage file needs wider adoption and genuine engagement. It is a file overflowing with pain and heavy with violations, yet among the least addressed internationally.
Ribbons cannot break iron bars.
But they can remind the world that behind every statistic is a human being waiting to be rescued from disappearance.
Justice begins when we choose to see.
And sometimes, the first step toward that justice is nothing more than a small red thread tied to a lamppost in a distant city.
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From glorious millennia to death and destruction: Zionists rewrite Palestine’s story
By Miko Peled | MintPress News | September 20, 2021
One of the great tragedies of Palestine is that almost every day there is a commemoration of one massacre or another, the death of a child or destruction of a home or village, leading one to think that the Palestinian narrative is one of death and destruction, which is what Israel wants people to think. But the truth is that this is not the case. The Palestinian narrative is one of a glorious history with periods of great sadness and tragedy. It is the Zionist story that is full of killing, stealing and destruction and not, as they try to sell it, one of creation and growth.
September 16, 2021, marked 39 years since the massacres at Sabra and Shatila refugee camps in Lebanon. As people remember and mourn the thousands of unarmed civilians who were butchered and the countless who survived suffering terrible injuries and emotional scars, we must also remember the man that stood behind this bloodbath.
This was a man whose complicity even the Israeli authorities could not ignore, the former general and renowned war criminal Ariel Sharon. And although he was momentarily penalized and banished from politics, he very quickly returned, and for a quarter of a century, he was the most powerful and influential man in Israeli politics. … continue
Blog Roll
Aletho News- US Military: Who’s Pulling the Strings? /Lt Col Daniel Davis
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