More Palestinians killed in early morning Israeli strikes across Gaza Strip
Press TV – October 21, 2023
At least 53 Palestinians have been killed and several others injured after Israeli military aircraft carried out a fresh round of airstrikes against various residential neighborhoods across the besieged Gaza Strip.
The official Palestinian news agency WAFA reported that the warplanes bombarded several buildings in the town of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip early on Saturday, killing at least 14 people and wounding others.
The aerial raids also left several people missing beneath the rubble, according to the news agency.
At least 14 people were also killed in Jabalia town in the north of the Gaza Strip.
Moreover, Israeli fighter jets struck the eastern flank of the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, killing and wounding several people.
Israeli warplanes also pounded a number of residential buildings in the northwestern Sheikh Radwan district of Gaza City, as well as the eastern and northern parts of Beit Lahiya, WAFA reported.
Houses were hit in Khan Yunis city as Israeli aircraft pounded the southern Gaza Strip with more air raids.
There were no immediate reports about the exact number of casualties and the extent of damage caused.
The United Nations says about half of Palestinians in Gaza have been rendered homeless while still trapped inside the enclave, which is known to be one of the most densely populated places on earth.
Health officials in Gaza say the Israeli bombardment has killed at least 4,137 people since October 7, when fighters from the Hamas resistance movement launched an unprecedented large-scale attack against the occupying Israeli regime. Another 13,162 individuals have also been injured.
Ashraf al-Qudra, a spokesman for Gaza’s health ministry, confirmed that nearly 1,400 people, including 720 children, are still missing under the rubble.
Qudra also noted that 352 Palestinians were killed and 669 others wounded over the past 24 hours, including 16 victims who lost their lives in the aerial strike on the Greek Orthodox Church.
Seven general hospitals and 21 health centers are now out of service, he explained, calling for international protection of hospitals and health facilities in Gaza in light of the intensified Israeli aggression.
The senior Palestinian health official further said that 46 medical personnel were killed and 85 others injured during Israeli airstrikes. At least 23 ambulances were destroyed as well.
Rights bodies denounce West’s double standards
Meanwhile, international human rights organizations have slammed Western governments over their hypocrisy and double standards in the face of Israeli atrocities in the Gaza Strip.
Tom Porteous, the deputy program director at an international rights agency, said in a statement that while the United States and European countries denounced Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine, there was no clear condemnation of Israel’s actions in Gaza.
“Where is the clear condemnation of the cruel tightening of the 16-year closure of Gaza that amounts to collective punishment, a war crime? Where is the outrage at statements by Israeli political leaders that seek to blur the all-important distinction between civilians and combatants in Gaza even as they order ever more intense bombardment of this densely populated territory, reducing city blocks and neighborhoods to rubble? Where are the clear and unequivocal calls for Israel to respect international norms in its attack on Gaza, let alone for accountability?” he said.
He further described the West’s hypocrisy and double standards as “flagrant and obvious.”
Israel threatens to bomb Gaza hospital housing 12,000 Palestinians
Press TV – October 20, 2023
A few days after killing hundreds of people by bombing a hospital in the Gaza Strip, Israel has threatened to attack yet another such facility in the coastal sliver, which has come to house thousands of Palestinians.
On Friday, Reuters cited the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) as saying that the Israeli military had warned it to “immediately evacuate” Gaza’s al-Quds hospital.
The facility is currently rendering services to more than 400 patients. It has also turned into a refuge for around 12,000 Palestinians, who have fled there amid a relentless Israeli war that has been pounding the Palestinian territory since October 7. The war has so far claimed more than 4,000 people.
The PRCS described “70%” of the displaced Palestinians inside the hospital as “children and women,” saying they “are in imminent danger.”
“This place could turn to ashes if those threats are carried out,” it said, asking, “Is there a world power capable of stopping the threats of the Israeli occupation army to bomb hospitals with innocent civilians inside?”
The Palestinian Red Crescent issued an urgent appeal to the international community, saying, “We call on the world to take immediate and urgent action to prevent a new massacre like the one that occurred on the al-Ahli Baptist Hospital.”
More than 500 people lost their lives in an Israeli airstrike against al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza City on Tuesday. Thousands of Palestinians were present at the facility when the attack took place.
Numerous world leaders have vehemently denounced the massacre. Major cities across the world have also turned into the scene of angry demonstrations against Tel Aviv’s indiscriminate campaign of bloodshed and destruction against the Palestinian territory.
The regime has been responsible for numerous deadly offensives against hospitals and other healthcare facilities across Gaza through both its near-daily attacks against the coastal sliver and several wars that it has waged against the territory in the past.
Israeli economy plunges into recession
The Cradle | October 20, 2023
Israeli economists have reported a major recession due to the ongoing war against the Palestinian resistance factions.
“Israel has entered the war, and it is in a recession, and trade is currently zero,” Israeli daily business paper, The Marker, noted.
The Israeli economy has taken a serious hit at the hands of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, losing $3 billion in damages on the first day of the war alone, a state that some economists say is worse than it was during their 2006 war with Hezbollah.
The Marker report went on to say, “the second week of the war is about to end, a week when there is almost no trade in Israel, and many are trying to stay with their heads above the water, afraid of the future – and they still don’t know who will compensate them and when?”
US economic risk analysis firm Moody’s has put the Israeli A1 rating, a high rating attractive to any investor, on hold, given the current crisis.
Fitch Ratings had also negatively reviewed Israeli economic status, placing their credit score on a negative watch earlier this week.
“While not our base case, such large-scale escalation, in addition to human loss, could result in significant additional military spending, destruction of infrastructure, sustained change in consumer and investment sentiment and thus lead to a large deterioration of Israel’s credit metrics,” Fitch Ratings wrote in a statement.
No previous war or global economic crisis has downgraded Israel’s rating by any of the major economic rating companies. These downgrades can make future trade more difficult for Israel.
Interest rates are at the highest they have been since the 2006 war with Lebanon.
According to a Bloomberg report, the shekel is among the world’s worst-performing currencies this month despite a $45 billion package of emergency measures.
Two days after the start of the current war, on 9 October, the Bank of Israel sold off $30 billion in foreign reserves in an attempt to prevent the currency from further falling under the dollar.
This increasing economic decline is an addition to the already faulty economy.
The EU has discredited itself in the Israel-Palestine conflict
By Timur Fomenko | RT | October 20, 2023
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s showboating in support of Israel in the current Middle East conflict has reportedly provoked a backlash from EU lawmakers and diplomats.
When the Israel-Gaza war broke out just over a week ago, von der Leyen made the decision to offer unconditional support to West Jerusalem rather than urge for calm or mediation, having Israel’s flag projected onto the European Commission headquarters and paying a visit to Israel herself. She clearly did so out of an inclination to appear in line with the US. But her actions have aged poorly as reports of civilian deaths and humanitarian disaster in the besieged Gaza Strip continue to mount.
Anyone familiar with von der Leyen knows that she is an unapologetic neoconservative and transatlanticist who is single-handedly undermining the autonomy, respect, and foreign policy stature of the EU by actively working to make the bloc subordinate to the US in multiple areas, all while attempting to showcase herself as a true regional leader. If the EU sees itself in a fundamental competition with China and Russia, there could not be a worse advert to the rest of the world than her leadership, and her Israel blunders may be her most damaging decisions yet.
Von der Leyen’s foreign policy legacy involves dragging the EU into several confrontations it could have done without. This week, she is heading to Washington DC to try to forge a deal on steel and aluminum trade targeted at China, but that will ultimately result in throwing the EU market under the bus, again. Other acts have included backing the American position on Ukraine and striving for full escalation of the war there, promoting energy decoupling with Russia, as well as inventing the term “de-risking” with China and seeking to undermine the bloc’s lucrative relationship with Beijing. Throughout this, she has been repeatedly eager to pull large sums of money out of thin air and propose fantasy projects which amount to little more than posturing, and which her office alone is not even able to authorize.
For example, that includes offering Belarus billions if it goes ahead with a US-backed regime change, or inventing numerous “infrastructure” schemes to compete with China, such as the Global Gateway, among other things. She has thus repeatedly used the stature of her office to follow American objectives and try to shape the continent without establishing any kind of due consensus. Almost immediately after the war in Gaza broke out, the European Commission announced all EU aid to Palestine would be frozen. Regardless of what you think of Hamas, with hindsight that decision now appears spiteful, reactionary and inhumane, which tells you how fast the Commission was to jump to the American position of unconditional support for Israel.
But this time there is a widespread feeling it has gone too far. Rather than allowing Europe to have staked out a moderate position on the Gaza conflict, even if it would not be too sympathetic to Palestine, the decision was essentially outsourced to the US, discrediting the EU and only serving to contribute to the growing backlash starting to emerge among Muslim communities in response to the conflict. For countries such as France, this is disastrous. This hurts the EU’s image across the Islamic world and the Global South by seemingly siding with the oppressors.
Soon enough, a series of embarrassing U-turns followed, including the reinstatement of aid, combined with tweets in Arabic, but the damage had already been done, because Israel has long been given the green light to pursue unparalleled destruction in Gaza, at seemingly whatever the cost. In doing so, von der Leyen has in fact undermined, in yet another way, the bloc’s ability to present itself as a serious and comprehensive political actor. She seems to have no love for the idea that the EU should have strategic autonomy and be capable of calibrating its own interests and place in the world, and would prefer that it instead be a simple parrot of the US.
Of course, if she took into greater consideration the interests and positions of member states it would be less of a problem. But she does not and instead essentially serves as a completely disruptive force, in practice undermining European diplomacy and preventing the EU from building relations with a wide range of states. In the end, this favors only the US.
Israel’s Negev prison new ‘Abu Ghraib’: Official
The Cradle | October 19, 2023
Broken limbs and severe beatings are among the extreme tactics being used by Israeli officials inside the Negev prison on Palestinian detainees since the start of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood on 7 October.
“Many prisoners have had their limbs, legs, and hands broken, and after the beatings, their comrades could no longer recognize them.
The Negev prison has become like Abu Ghraib, a center of brutality and savage treatment towards the heroic prisoners,” reads a statement issued on 19 October by the head of the Palestinian Prisoners and Ex-Prisoners Affairs Commission.
“‘Israel’ is making the Palestinian prisoners pay the price for its failures, acting solely with a spirit of revenge,” Fares adds.
Last week, the Negev prison administration also cut off all water and electricity to all sections of the prison as part of the collective punishment approach by Tel Aviv.
The Israeli prison system is considered excessively brutal for incarcerated Palestinians, especially those convicted for resisting the occupation. Methods used by Israel against prisoners include physical torture, mental abuse, sleep deprivation, and sexual assault.
Additionally, prisoners with severe illnesses are intentionally neglected and left to die, as in the recent case of cancer-stricken resistance fighter Nasser Abu Hamid.
Over 850 Palestinians have been detained in less than two weeks, as Tel Aviv has launched daily arrest campaigns in the occupied West Bank while laying siege on the Gaza Strip’s civilian population.
Since Wednesday night, at least 120 Palestinians have been detained by Israeli troops in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem.
According to local sources, in the city of Tulkarem, Israeli raids have been ongoing for over 12 hours. Tel Aviv also deployed bulldozers to destroy the streets and infrastructure of the Nour Shams refugee camp.
Resistance against the Israeli incursions has also been constant, with Palestinian fighters fighting back and destroying Israeli vehicles across the West Bank.
Israeli soldiers and armed settler militias have killed at least 69 Palestinians in the West Bank and Jerusalem since the start of the campaign of genocide unfolding in the Gaza Strip.
New York Attorney General Letitia James Demands Censorship of Speech Regarding Israel-Hamas Conflict
By Cindy Harper | Reclaim The Net | October 19, 2023
New York’s state attorney general, Letitia James, has learned nothing after the state was sued for its “anti- hate” law that was an affront to free speech and the First Amendment.
James is demanding social media companies shed light and provide clarification on their actions regarding “hate speech” and calls for violence posted on their platforms.
James has dispatched letters to a host of tech giants including Google and Meta, along with others such as X, TikTok, Reddit, and neutral video platform Rumble. The letters contain probing questions on their handling of calls for violence that have become rampant across their platforms recently.
We obtained a copy of the letters for you here.
The pro-censorship AG seeks to understand the platforms’ strategy about content moderation policies and how these are applied to mitigate the propagation of alleged hate-filled threats.
James wrote: “In the wake of Hamas’ unspeakable atrocities, social media has been widely used by bad actors to spread horrific material, disseminate threats, and encourage violence. These platforms have a responsibility to keep their users safe and prohibit the spread of violent rhetoric that puts vulnerable groups in danger.”
Analyzing this through a lens of censorship and free speech becomes all the more critical now. This is not merely a question of inflammatory content but also concerns the elasticity of these platforms’ policies, which could potentially threaten the core tenets of free speech.
It forces one to question what might be classified as “hate speech” under these policies and what could potentially be deemed a permissible expression of personal beliefs.
James has called on these companies to explain their tactics for combating such threats and their plans to ensure online platforms are not misused for promoting terror activities, concluding: “I am calling on these companies to explain how they are addressing threats, and how they will ensure that no online platform is used to further terrorist activities.”
FIRE, who is already part of a lawsuit against James for a previous New York censorship law that has been accused of violating the First Amendment, wrote to James and requested that she retract her letter.
FIRE, writing in its capacity as counsel for neutral video platform Rumble, demanded the “immediate and unequivocal retraction of [James’] October 12, 2023 investigation letters to six internet platforms, including Rumble.”
In the letter seen by Reclaim The Net, FIRE’s attorneys say James’ demand letters “violate (1) a federal district court’s injunction against the enforcement of New York General Business Law § 394-ccc (the Online Hate Speech Law); (2) the active stay of all proceedings in that case as to Rumble; and (3) the First Amendment rights of the Investigated Platforms and their users.”
James has until the end of the day today to respond.
West has ‘lost’ Global South over Israel hypocrisy – FT
FILE PHOTO: Destruction in Gaza © Mustafa Hassona / Anadolu via Getty Images
RT | October 19, 2023
Attempts by the US and its allies to “paint Moscow as a global pariah” have been “poisoned” by their rush to support Israeli retaliation against Hamas in Gaza, the Financial Times reported on Wednesday, citing more than a dozen officials.
Western nations have long framed the Ukraine conflict as an act of “unprovoked aggression” and blasted Moscow for the suffering of civilians.
However, the same nations have appeared reluctant to condition their support for Israel on exercising restraint in the wake of the deadly incursion by the Palestinian militant group Hamas, earlier this month. Israel has cut off essential supplies to the enclave and subjected it to intense bombardment.
“We have definitely lost the battle in the Global South,” one senior G7 diplomat was quoted as saying. “All the work we have done with the Global South [over Ukraine] has been lost… Forget about rules, forget about world order. They won’t ever listen to us again.”
“What we said about Ukraine has to apply to Gaza. Otherwise we lose all our credibility,” the official added. “The Brazilians, the South Africans, the Indonesians: why should they ever believe what we say about human rights?”
Meanwhile, an Arab official noted an apparent lack of consistency: “if you describe cutting off water, food and electricity in Ukraine as a war crime, then you should say the same thing about Gaza.”
White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan was confronted over the issue on CNN. Host Jack Tapper stressed that “civilians are civilians” regardless of where they reside. The official declined to say whether Washington was putting pressure on Israel to let supplies into Gaza.
According to The Huffington Post, the US State Department last week instructed high-level diplomats working in the Middle East not to use three specific phrases regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: “de-escalation/ceasefire,” “end to violence/bloodshed,” and “restoring calm.”
This week, a Russian-proposed draft resolution denouncing violence against civilians and urging a ceasefire was rejected by the UN Security Council. Another one submitted by Brazil was later vetoed by the US, after 12 members voted for it.
Russia abstained on the second proposal, after its amendment to include a call for a truce was rejected.
“You, colleagues, will certainly come up with some formal justification citing ‘unbalanced language,’ but at this point they would sound pathetic. You have made your choice,” Moscow’s envoy, Vassily Nebenzia, said about the non-inclusion of the wording.
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From the Archives
The US-Iran Scenario That Most Scares Israel
By Ali Haydar | Al-Akhbar | October 9, 2013
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a series of threats toward Iran and its interlocutors in the West, including the US, as serious negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program seem more plausible.
As a possible rapprochement looms between the US and Iran, Netanyahu has attempted to impose impossible Israeli conditions on the negotiators, such as the full dismantling of Iran’s nuclear program, not to mention threatening military force.
Whatever the deal that could materialize between Iran and the West, Israel is going to find itself before an open-ended path. One can foresee three possible scenarios… continue
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