French FM under fire over ‘false’ claims about UN rapporteur
RT | February 13, 2026
A lawyers association has filed a legal complaint against French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot over his accusations against UN Palestinian rights rapporteur Francesca Albanese regarding alleged remarks she made about Israel.
Barrot this week accused Albanese of labeling Israel a “common enemy of humanity” and called for her removal from the UN Human Rights Council. Albanese has rejected the allegations as “shameful and defamatory,” insisting that in her remarks made recently in Doha she was referring to “the system” enabling genocide in Palestine and not to the Israeli people or state.
On Thursday, the Association of Lawyers for the Respect of International Law (JURDI) filed a legal complaint against Barrot, saying that his statements represent “the dissemination of false information,” undermine the independence of UN mechanisms, and could constitute a criminal offence under French law.
Barrot’s calls for Albanese to step down were later echoed by German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul and Czech Foreign Minister Petr Macinka.
Amnesty International Secretary General Agnes Callamard defended Albanese’s “vital work,” cautioning against political pressure on independent UN experts.
The UN human rights office has also voiced concern. Spokesperson Marta Hurtado warned that judicial officials and rapporteurs are increasingly subjected to personal attacks and misinformation that distract from investigating serious human rights violations.
Albanese has previously labeled Israel’s war in Gaza a “genocide,” and called for a full arms embargo and suspension of trade agreements with the country. She has been sanctioned by the US and has faced mounting accusations of bias and anti-Semitism, which she denies.
Her mandate runs until 2028, and she is due to brief the Geneva-based council next month. While there is no precedent for removing a special rapporteur mid-term, some diplomats cited by Reuters say a motion could theoretically be proposed, though strong support for Palestinian rights within the body makes it unlikely to succeed.
Israel Wants ISIS-Linked Militias To Control Rafah Crossing — The New Order in Gaza
By Robert Inlakesh | The Palestine Chronicle | February 13, 2026
As the Gaza ceasefire moves through its early stages, the partial reopening of the Rafah Crossing has triggered a struggle over who will control Gaza’s border administration. After rejecting the deployment of Palestinian Authority security forces, Israel has instead backed armed proxy groups — some linked to extremist Salafist networks — assigning them security roles in the border area, where reports of abuse have already begun to surface.
Key Takeaways
- Israel rejected Palestinian Authority forces at Rafah and instead supported alternative armed militias.
- Several Israeli-backed militias reportedly emerged from criminal networks and extremist factions inside Gaza.
- Members of these groups have been deployed near the Rafah Crossing, where abuse allegations have been reported.
- International actors monitoring the crossing are now considering escorts for civilians due to safety concerns.
- The developments raise questions about the composition of future Gaza security structures under international plans.
Control of Rafah Crossing
After rejecting the notion of allowing professionally trained Palestinian Authority security forces to patrol the Rafah Crossing, between Egypt and Gaza, Israel is now using its ISIS-linked death squads to patrol the border area. As expected, rights abuses are already being reported.
The notion that Israel was backing ISIS-linked militias was once dubbed a fringe conspiracy theory. Today, Israel is not only overtly backing ISIS and Al-Qaeda linked militants, but it directly created and controls five such militant organizations.
Amid daily Israeli violations of the agreement, the Gaza ceasefire slowly progresses between its first two loosely defined phases; one such progression has been the partial opening of the Rafah Crossing. Under this opening, the border zone – that is still occupied by the Israeli military – has been the site of a limited passing of civilians in and out of the Gaza Strip.
There have therefore been discussions about who precisely will be deployed on the Palestinian side of the crossing to perform checks on those passing through the crossing. Initially, the Palestinian Authority (PA) – based in Ramallah – attempted to propose that its well-trained security forces handle this task and that they even deploy to Gaza in order to lead through a transitional phase.
Tel Aviv has flatly rejected any role being played in Gaza by the Palestinian Authority, fearing that this could strengthen the case for Palestinian statehood. Instead, the Israelis have poured millions into backing an alternative “security force”.
Formation of Proxy Militias
Israel’s five proxy militias are composed of criminals who escaped from Gaza’s jails after Israel bombed the entrances in late 2023, in addition to opportunist thugs and longtime members of hardline Salafist movements that were long repressed by the Hamas-led authority.
Starting with the militia, led by the now deceased Yasser Abu Shabab, calling itself the “Popular Forces” – despite being perhaps the most unpopular Palestinian group to have ever existed – did not begin as the anti-Hamas militant group they present themselves as today.
They were first empowered by the Israelis after they invaded and occupied the Rafah Crossing area, working under Tel Aviv’s order to seize humanitarian aid trucks and hoard the goods they stole from the people of Gaza. Then, Abu Shabab’s men, at a time when the people of Gaza were being starved, drip-fed these donated goods onto the black market to be sold at exorbitant prices.
Only toward the end of 2024 did the Israelis begin giving Abu Shabab’s aid looters a facelift and using their contact with Western mainstream media to whitewash the crimes of these groups, selling them instead as an organic force fighting against Hamas. Corporate media outlets collaborated with the Israelis in presenting these gangsters as representing the opinions of the silent majority of Gazans.
In reality, these groups were infamous among Palestinians who saw them for what they truly were. These militias were collaborating with the Israeli military and intelligence to steal aid, helping to create societal strains amidst a coordinated and deliberate campaign of mass starvation.
These militants are not only extremist terrorists, whom Hamas had long cracked down upon, some belonging to groups that had carried out suicide bombings and other deadly attacks on Palestinians civilians, they are also convicted drug traffickers, murderers, and some stand accused of sexual violence.
In other words, Israel sought out the most despicable and criminal elements of Gaza’s population, pouring millions of dollars and weapons into terrorist militias. Many of them subscribe to a hardline Salafist doctrine, which justifies their criminal actions by allowing them to make Takfir (to declare they are non-Muslim) against the majority of Gaza’s population and even accuse them of Shirk (idol worship).
For example, leading figures within the Israeli-backed militias have attacked Hamas for siding with Iran, as the Salafists deem the Islamic Republic to be non-Muslim due to its Shia faith.
Deployment and Reported Abuses
Last Monday, the head of the ISIS-linked “Popular Forces” Ghassan Duhine announced through the Hebrew media that his Israeli-backed forces would be playing “an important security role regarding entry and exit through the Rafah crossing”.
Days later, reports that these death squads had been deployed at Israeli-controlled checkpoints emerged, alongside accounts of abuse. One woman, whose identity was concealed, informed the BBC that the collaborator militants told her that they could help her travel to Europe if she collaborated with them.
The woman’s hands were then bound, as the ISIS-linked militants insulted and physically assaulted her. In addition to this, she testified to having been tripsearched alongside three other women.
As a result of such reports, the European Union, which has its own monitors who are active at the Rafah Crossing, later stated it would consider sending its own people to escort Palestinians to the Israeli checkpoint in order to avoid such cases in the future.
Other reports emerged, some of which were also covered by the BBC, which suggested that the personal items of Palestinian travelers were confiscated by the EU’s officials. A woman named Rabia remarked that “They took perfumes, accessories, make-up, cigarettes, headphones – everything, they didn’t leave anything with us”.
International Oversight
All of this is being carried out under the watchful eye of the International Community, as are the daily Israeli ceasefire violations that have led to the mass murder of nearly 600 Palestinians in Gaza since October 10, 2025, when the ceasefire began. The Civil Military Coordination Center (CMCC), led by the US and Israeli militaries, is made up of over 20 different countries, which watch on as Israel demolishes civilian homes, funnels millions into ISIS-linked militias, and murders civilians.
There are also now questions about the future planned “Palestinian security forces” that are vaguely mentioned in the US’s plans for Gaza, with some speculating that the five Israeli-backed groups will make up a significant portion of that planned force.
In other words, the international community is permitting ISIS-linked militants with a diverse array of criminal convictions – who have a history of committing torture, executions, armed robbery, and raids on hospitals, all under Israel’s guidance – to play “security roles” in Gaza, all so that Palestinians are robbed of any sign of future statehood.
– Robert Inlakesh is a journalist, writer, and documentary filmmaker. He focuses on the Middle East, specializing in Palestine. He contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle.
UK High Court rules Palestine Action ban unlawful
Al Mayadeen | February 13, 2026
The UK High Court ruled on Friday that the government’s proscription of Palestine Action under the Terrorism Act was unlawful.
On Friday, three judges led by Dame Victoria Sharp, president of the King’s Bench Division, concluded that the decision to ban the group was unlawful. However, the ban will remain temporarily in place to allow the government time to appeal.
From July 5 last year, membership of or public support for Palestine Action became a criminal offence punishable by up to 14 years in prison. The group had been placed on the list of proscribed organisations, categorizing it alongside internationally recognized armed groups.
The court upheld the challenge on two of four grounds. Judges found that the proscription represented “a very significant interference” with the rights to freedom of speech, peaceful assembly, and association. They also ruled that Yvette Cooper’s decision was inconsistent with her own stated policy.
Sharp described Palestine Action as an organisation “that promotes its political cause through criminality and encouragement of criminality”, but continued, “The court considered that the proscription of Palestine Action was disproportionate. A very small number of Palestine Action’s activities amounted to acts of terrorism within the definition of section 1 of the 2000 Act.”
“For these, and for Palestine Action’s other criminal activities, the general criminal law remains available. The nature and scale of Palestine Action’s activities falling within the definition of terrorism had not yet reached the level, scale, and persistence to warrant proscription,” Sharp added.
Legal and political repercussions
The judgment marks the first time an organisation banned under the Terrorism Act has successfully challenged its proscription in court.
According to the campaign group Defend Our Juries, more than 2,700 people have been arrested since the ban took effect, most under section 13 of the Terrorism Act. More than 500 individuals, including clergy, pensioners, and military veterans, have been charged.
If the proscription order is ultimately quashed, the charges could be dropped. For now, those charged remain in legal uncertainty while the ban stays in force pending appeal.
Government to appeal decision
Current home secretary Shabana Mahmood said she would challenge the ruling.
Palestine Action co-founder Huda Ammori described the decision as a “monumental victory” and said the ban was based on property damage rather than violence against individuals.
“We were banned because Palestine Action’s disruption of Israel’s largest weapons manufacturer, Elbit Systems, cost the corporation millions of pounds in profits and to lose out on multibillion-pound contracts.
“We’ve used the same tactics as direct action organisations throughout history, including anti-war groups Keir Starmer defended in court, and the government acknowledged in these legal proceedings that this ban was based on property damage, not violence against people.
“Banning Palestine Action was always about appeasing pro-Israel lobby groups and weapons manufacturers, and nothing to do with terrorism … Today’s landmark ruling is a victory for freedom for all, and I urge the government to respect the court’s decision and bring this injustice to an end without further delay.”
The case is likely to intensify debate in the United Kingdom over the balance between national security powers and civil liberties.
Villains of Judea: Haim Saban
Left, Right, it doesn’t matter. Only Israel matters to Haim Saban.
José Niño Unfiltered | February 11, 2026
Most mega-donors buy influence quietly. Jewish oligarch Haim Saban prefers to explain exactly how it works.
The question came from the stage at the 10th annual Israeli-American Council National Summit, held in Hollywood, Florida in January 2026. Shawn Evenhaim, the IAC’s board chairman emeritus, turned to the two most powerful Jewish, pro-Israel megadonors in American politics and asked them, simply, how they gain influence over politicians.
Miriam Adelson declined to answer, saying she wanted to “be truthful” but “there are so many things I don’t want to talk about.”
Haim Saban had no such reluctance.
“It’s a system that we did not create,” he said. “It’s a legal system and we just play within the system. Those who give more have more access and those who give less have less access. It’s simple math. Trust me.”
Moments earlier, when asked whether Jewish community influence in the United States was weakening, Saban dismissed the anxiety with characteristic confidence. “I can tell you,” he told the 3,500 assembled Israeli-Americans, “that my influence is not weakening.”
To understand why Saban could say that with a shrug, you must go back to where he started.
Haim Saban was born on October 15, 1944, in Alexandria, Egypt. In 1956, amid anti-Jewish hostility following the Suez Crisis, the Saban family fled Egypt and immigrated to Israel, settling in a rough Tel Aviv neighborhood where they shared a communal bathroom, as Saban frequently recounts, “with a hooker and her pimp.” A school principal told the young Saban he was “not cut out for academic studies.” He served in the Israel Defense Forces during both the Six Day War and the Yom Kippur War.
In 1966, he became bassist for the Israeli rock band The Lions of Judah despite not knowing how to play bass, conditioning his work booking their gigs on becoming their musician. The band signed with Polydor and appeared on the BBC, but money ran dry. By the early 1970s, Saban had relocated to France, where he and partner Shuki Levy built a niche creating theme music for American TV shows broadcast overseas, providing the music free while retaining the rights.
The business generated 15 gold and platinum records and $10 million annually within seven years. But the empire rested on a fault line. A 1998 Hollywood Reporter investigation revealed that Saban had not actually composed all 3,700 works credited to his name. Ten composers threatened legal action, and Saban quietly settled out of court.
Saban moved to Los Angeles in 1983 and founded Saban Entertainment in 1988. His breakthrough came after eight years of failed pitches when Fox agreed to buy his Americanized adaptation of a Japanese children’s show. The result was Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, which debuted in 1993 and generated over $6 billion in toy sales.
The franchise’s success came with costs. In 1998, the Screen Actors Guild declared Saban Entertainment “unfair to performers” and accused the company of “economic exploitation of children,” ordering members not to work for his shows. Power Rangers was produced non-union, with child actors denied residuals and subjected to hazardous conditions. In 2001, Fox Family Worldwide sold to The Walt Disney Company for $5.3 billion.
In 2003, Saban led a consortium acquiring a controlling stake in ProSiebenSat.1 Media, Germany’s largest commercial television company. He reportedly received the call confirming the deal while standing in the Dachau crematorium with his son. The consortium sold its stake in 2007 for roughly three times what they paid.
In 2006, Saban Capital Group led a consortium acquiring Univision Communications, the largest Spanish-language broadcaster in the United States, for approximately $13.7 billion. It sold in 2020 for around $800 million for a 64% stake, making the investment one of the most expensive failures in media history.
What Saban lost in money, he appeared to gain when it came to consolidating pro-Zionist narratives In Spanish-speaking media. Critics at Al Jazeera noted that Univision’s 2011 documentary “La Amenaza Iraní” (The Iranian Threat), examining Iran’s alleged ties to Latin American governments, “regurgitate[d] all the pro-war right’s by now familiar talking points about nefarious Islamists acting in concert with leftist Bolivarians to bring Terror to the US’ doorstep.” It was screened for English-speaking audiences at the Hudson Institute, a neoconservative Washington think tank that routinely pushes a hardline Zionist agenda. The SourceWatch project characterized Univision’s channels as having “been used to broadcast pro-Israeli propaganda” under Saban’s ownership.
The Univision-Clinton entanglement deepened the scrutiny. A 2014 early childhood initiative between Univision and the Clinton Foundation featured Hillary Clinton’s face in five of seven promotional slides on Univision’s website. When the network later reported on allegations that foundation donations had influenced Clinton as Secretary of State, Univision did not disclose its own foundation partnership.
Across both business and politics, Saban operated under a single guiding principle: advancing what he believed to be in Israel’s best interests. “I’m a one-issue guy,” he said publicly, “and my issue is Israel.”
His three-pronged strategy, outlined at his own Saban Forum, is to fund political campaigns, bankroll think tanks, and control media. He gave the Democratic National Committee a single gift of $7 million in 2002, at the time the largest donation in DNC history. His total giving to Clinton causes exceeded $27 million, including a $13 million founding grant to establish the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at Brookings, then the largest donation in Brookings history. He recruited Martin Indyk, former U.S. Ambassador to Israel and former AIPAC deputy research director, to run it.
He funds the Saban National Political Leadership Training Seminar through AIPAC, providing up to 300 college students with pro-Israel advocacy training annually. He was an early donor to the IAC beginning in 2008, briefly partnered with Sheldon Adelson on Campus Maccabees, an anti-BDS initiative, from 2013 to 2015, then quietly pulled out to preserve his standing with Clinton.
Notably, Saban played a behind-the-scenes role in the Abraham Accords, advising UAE Ambassador Yousef Al Otaiba to publish an op-ed warning against Israeli annexation of the West Bank, helping him place and translate it into Hebrew, and privately urging UAE Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed to normalize relations with Israel. Jared Kushner credited that op-ed as a catalyst for the normalization talks.
As mentioned before, Saban is a flexible strategist when it comes to dealing with Left and the Right. He has forged close ties with Ariel Sharon, who moved him in a more hawkish direction on security matters. “History proved that Sharon was right and I was wrong,” Saban has said. “In matters relating to security, that moved me to the right. Very far to the right.”
When Saban decided in 2014 that Obama might strike a bad deal with Iran, he did not mince words at the Israeli American Council. “I would bomb the living daylights out of these sons of bitches.” Despite being a reliable donor to the Democratic Party, Saban has shown a willingness to attack people in the party who deviate from the Zionist consensus. He labeled DNC chair candidate Keith Ellison “clearly an anti-Semite.” When Joe Biden conditioned weapons shipments to Israel in 2024, Saban sent an angry email calling it a “bad,,,bad,,,bad,,,decision” and arguing there were “more Jewish voters, who care about Israel, than Muslim voters that care about Hamas.”
Saban’s fierce advocacy for Israel is inseparable from his identity. Haim Saban currently holds dual Israeli-American citizenship. The Jerusalem Post ranked him number one on its list of the 50 Most Influential Jews in 2016. Israeli TV host Dana Weiss once called him “our rich uncle.”
In Saban’s political universe, the traditional left-right spectrum is little more than a convenient vehicle—to be boarded or abandoned depending on which direction best serves the project of Israeli dominance in the Middle East.
Germany demands UN Rapporteur Albanese resign, joining France
Al Mayadeen | February 12, 2026
Germany has called for the resignation of UN Special Rapporteur for the Palestinian Territories Francesca Albanese, following remarks she made about the Israeli occupation regime during a forum organized by the Al Jazeera network in Doha.
German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said on Thursday that Albanese was no longer fit to continue in her mandate, citing what he described as repeated inappropriate statements.
“I respect the UN system of independent rapporteurs. However, Ms Albanese has made numerous inappropriate remarks in the past. I condemn her recent statements about Israel. She is untenable in her position,” Wadephul wrote on X.
Germany calls for Albanese’s resignation one day after France issued a similar demand, escalating diplomatic pressure on the UN official.
France calls for Albanese’s resignation
On Wednesday, France formally urged Albanese to step down over the same remarks.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot told lawmakers: “France unreservedly condemns the outrageous and reprehensible remarks made by Ms Francesca Albanese, which are directed not at the Israeli government, whose policies may be criticised, but at Israel as a people and as a nation, which is absolutely unacceptable,” arguing that the comments went beyond criticism of Israeli government policies and instead targeted “Israel” as a state and people.
Albanese’s Remarks at the Forum
Speaking via videoconference at the Doha forum on Saturday, Albanese criticized what she described as global complicity in the war on Gaza.
“The fact that instead of stopping Israel, most of the world has armed, given Israel political excuses, political sheltering, economic and financial support is a challenge. The fact that most of the media in the Western world has been amplifying the pro-apartheid genocidal narrative is a challenge. And here also lies the opportunity. Because if international law has been stabbed in the heart, it is also true that never before has the global community seen the challenges that we all face. We who do not control large amounts of financial capital, algorithms, and weapons now see that we, as humanity, have a common enemy, and that freedoms, the respect of fundamental freedoms, are the last peaceful avenue, the last peaceful toolbox that we have to regain our freedom.”
Following the controversy, Albanese posted the full video of her speech on X, writing:
“My full AJ Forum speech last week: the common enemy of humanity is THE SYSTEM that has enabled the genocide in Palestine, including the financial capital that funds it, the algorithms that obscure it and the weapons that enable it.”
Albanese has denied that her remarks described “Israel” as the “common enemy of humanity.”
In an interview with France 24, she denounced what she called “completely false accusations” and “manipulation” of her words.
“I have never, ever, ever said ‘Israel is the common enemy of humanity’,” Albanese told the broadcaster.
She contended that her comments were being misrepresented and maintained that she was referring to broader systemic structures enabling violations of international law in Gaza.
Mounting Diplomatic Pressure on the UN Mandate
The coordinated calls from Germany and France add to a growing campaign of political pressure surrounding Albanese’s mandate as UN special rapporteur for the Palestinian territories.
Her tenure has increasingly drawn opposition from Western governments, particularly following her reports on Gaza and her calls for accountability mechanisms, including action at the International Criminal Court. The US sanctions imposed in July 2025 marked an unprecedented step against a UN mandate holder and signaled Washington’s direct challenge to her work.
Hamas official says Netanyahu joining ‘peace council’ is a farce
MEMO | February 12, 2026
Osama Hamdan, a leader in the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), said on Wednesday that the joining of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court, to the so-called “Peace Council” represents “the farce of the era.”
In remarks broadcast by Al Jazeera, Hamdan said the movement had not received from mediators any draft or official proposals concerning the weapons of the resistance.
He stressed that Hamas has not officially adopted any decision regarding freezing its weapons, and that its national position is firm in considering resistance a legitimate right as long as the occupation exists.
Hamdan stressed that the Palestinian people reject any form of external guardianship and cannot accept international forces replacing the Israeli army inside the Gaza Strip.
He added that the movement had contacted the Indonesian government and made clear that the role of any international force should be limited to deployment along the borders of the Gaza Strip to separate it from the occupation.
He said that any international stabilisation force, if established, should work to prevent attacks against the Palestinian people, in line with the plan proposed by US President Donald Trump.
Jeffrey Epstein’s ‘one single cause’: Israel
The Take | Al Jazeera | February 10, 2026
What do we know about Jeffrey Epstein’s ties to Israel? We talk with Craig Mokhiber, who spent decades inside the UN system, about what millions of newly released files reveal about Epstein’s effort to reshape the Middle East in Israel’s favor, why this story remains underreported, and what it means for how power operates globally.
In this episode:
Craig Mokhiber (@craigmokhiber), Human Rights Lawyer and Former UN Official
View on Rumble
Episode credits:
This episode was produced by Marcos Bartolomé, Chloe K. Li, and Tamara Khandaker, with Melanie Marich, Maya Hamadeh, Tuleen Barakat, and our guest host, Kevin Hirten. It was edited by Alexandra Locke.
Our sound designer is Alex Roldan. Our video editors are Hisham Abu Salah and Mohannad al-Melhemm. Alexandra Locke is The Take’s executive producer. Ney Alvarez is Al Jazeera’s head of audio.
First Gaza, then the world: The global danger of Israeli exceptionalism
By Ramzy Baroud | MEMO | February 11, 2026
While many nations occasionally resort to a “state of exception” to deal with temporary crises, Israel exists in a permanent state of exception. This Israeli exceptionalism is the very essence of the instability that plagues the Middle East.
The concept of the state of exception dates back to the Roman justitium, a legal mechanism for suspending law during times of civil unrest. However, the modern understanding was shaped by the German jurist Carl Schmitt, who famously wrote that the “sovereign is he who decides on the exception.” While Schmitt’s own history as a jurist for the Third Reich serves as a chilling reminder of where such theories can lead, his work provides an undeniably accurate anatomy of raw power: it reveals how a ruler who institutes laws also holds the power to dismiss them, under the pretext that no constitution can foresee every possible crisis.
It is often argued that Israel, a self-described democracy, still lacks a formal constitution because such a document would force it to define its borders—a problematic prospect for a settler-colonial regime with an insatiable appetite for expansion.
But there is another explanation: by operating on “Basic Laws” rather than a constitution, Israel avoids a comprehensive legal system that would align it with the globally accepted foundations of international law. Without a constitution, Israel exists in a legal vacuum where the “exception” is the rule. In this space, racial laws, territorial expansion, and even genocide are permitted so long as they fit the state’s immediate agenda.
Isolating specific examples to illustrate this point is a daunting task, primarily because nearly every relevant pronouncement from Israeli officials—particularly during the genocide in Gaza—is a textbook study in Israeli exceptionalism.
Consider Israel’s relentless assault on UNRWA, the UN-mandated body responsible for the survival of millions of Palestinian refugees. For decades, Israel has sought the dismantling of UNRWA for one reason: it is the only global institution that prevents the total erasure of Palestinian refugee rights.
These rights are not mere grievances; they are firmly anchored in international law, most notably via UN Resolution 194.
While UNRWA is not a political organization in a functional sense, its very existence is profoundly political. First, it stands as the institutional legacy of a specific political history; second, and more crucially, its presence ensures the Palestinian refugee remains a recognized political entity. By existing, UNRWA preserves the status of the refugee as a subject with the legal right to demand a return to historic Palestine—a demand that the “state of exception” seeks to permanently silence.
In October 2024, Israel unilaterally legislated the closure of UNRWA, once more asserting its “exception” over the entire framework of the United Nations. “It is time the international community (…) realizes that UNRWA’s mission must end,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had already declared on January 31, 2024, signaling the coming erasure. This rhetoric reached its physical conclusion on January 20, when the UNRWA headquarters in occupied Jerusalem were demolished by the Israeli military in the presence of National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.
“A historic day!” Ben-Gvir announced on that same date. “Today these supporters of terror are being driven out.” This horrific act was met with bashful responses, mute concerns, or total silence by the very powers tasked with preventing states from positioning themselves above the law.
By allowing this Israeli “exception” to stand unchallenged, the international community has effectively sanctioned the demolition of its own legal foundations.
In the past, Israeli leaders masked their true intentions with the language of a “light unto the nations,” projecting a beacon of morality while practicing violence, ethnic cleansing, and military occupation on the ground. The genocide in Gaza, however, has stripped away these pretenses. For the first time, Israeli rhetoric fully reflects a state of exception where the law is not just ignored, but structurally suspended.
“No one in the world will let us starve two million citizens, even though it may be justified and moral until they return the hostages to us,” Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich admitted on August 5, 2024. This “justified and moral” stance reveals a localized morality that permits the extermination of a population as an ethically defensible act. Yet Smotrich also lied; the world has done nothing practical to dissuade Israel from its savage pulverization of Gaza.
The global community remained idle even when Smotrich declared on May 6, 2025, that Gaza would be “entirely destroyed” and the population “concentrated in a narrow strip.” Today, that vision is a reality: a genocide-fatigued population is confined to roughly 45% of the territory, while the remainder stays empty under Israeli military control.
Netanyahu himself, who has stretched the state of exception beyond any predecessor, defined this new reality during a cabinet meeting on October 26, 2025: “Israel is a sovereign state… Our security policy is in our own hands. Israel does not seek anyone’s approval for that.” Here, Netanyahu defines sovereignty as the raw power to act—genocide included—without regard for international law or human rights.
If all states adopted this, the world would fall into a lawless frenzy. In his seminal State of Exception, Giorgio Agamben diagnosed this “void”—a space where law is suspended but “force of law” remains as pure violence. While his recent stances have divided the academic community, his critique of the exception as a permanent tool of governance remains an indispensable lens for understanding the erasure of Palestinian life.
Israel has already created that void. In the hands of a genocidal settler-colonial society, the state of exception is a relentless nightmare that will not stop at the borders of Palestine. If this “exception” is allowed to become the permanent regional rule, no nation in the Middle East will be spared. Time is of the essence.
World’s largest shipping firm facilitates US trade with illegal Israeli settlements
The Cradle | February 9, 2026
The world’s largest shipping firm, Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC), has been transporting goods from the illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank to the US, including via European ports.
According to a joint investigation by Al-Jazeera and the Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) published on 9 February, commercial documents obtained through US import databases show that between 1 January and 22 November 2025, MSC facilitated at least 957 shipments of goods from Israeli settlements to the US.
Of these shipments, more than half transited through European ports, including 390 in Spain, 115 in Portugal, 22 in the Netherlands, and two in Belgium.
MSC is privately owned by Italian billionaire Gianluigi Aponte and his Italian-Israeli wife, Rafaela Aponte-Diamant.
“Israeli settlements are widely considered illegal under international law, because they are built on occupied territory, in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention,” noted Nicola Perugini, senior lecturer in international relations at the University of Edinburgh.
“Commercialising products from these settlements effectively supports the illegal settlements,” she affirmed.
A wide range of products are produced in the settlements, from food items and textiles to skin care and natural stones, Al-Jazeera noted.
Israel conquered the West Bank and Gaza during the Six-Day War in 1967 and has sought to oust the native Palestinian Muslims and Christians and replace them with Jewish Israelis in an effort to create “Greater Israel.”
Professor Perugini called on states to ban trade with illegal settlements entirely. “You cannot normalize the profits of an illegal occupation,” he said.
The US and EU allow imports of products from Israeli settlements, despite policies formally acknowledging the settlements are illegal.
MSC also facilitates shipments from the US and Europe to the Israeli settlements.
In 2025, MSC facilitated at least 14 shipments from the Italian port of Ravenna, listing the names and zip codes of Israeli settlements as recipients.
MSC also holds cooperation and vessel-sharing agreements with Israel’s publicly held cargo shipping company, ZIM.
Such shipments may be illegal under international law following a 2024 opinion by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) advising that third states are obliged to “prevent trade or investment relations that assist in the maintenance of the illegal situation created by Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.”
The ICJ opinion does not directly address the responsibility of private corporations like MSC.
PYM, a grassroots, international pro-Palestinian movement, found last year that Danish shipping firm Maersk, the world’s second largest, also ships products to and from Israeli settlements.
According to UN estimates, businesses located in illegal settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem contribute about $30 billion to the Israeli economy each year.
Settlement businesses are often unusually profitable as they are established on stolen Palestinian land that the company has not paid for.
Israel has recently accelerated efforts to expand the E1 settlement project, designed sever the West Bank into two parts, isolate it from East Jerusalem, and ensure a two-state solution becomes impossible.
The plan calls for constructing 3,500 apartments next to the existing settlement of Maale Adumim.
On Sunday, the Israeli government approved sweeping changes to land registration and civil control in the occupied West Bank, which will dramatically expand settlement construction, Middle East Eye (MEE) reported on Monday.
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and Defense Minister Israel Katz said the policy changes are intended to pave the way for expanded settlements and land seizures.
Under the new measures, the military will be allowed to demolish Palestinian buildings and homes for which Israel refused to issue a building permit in areas A and B of the West Bank
The changes would also open West Bank land registries to the Israeli public, enabling settlers to identify Palestinian landowners and pressure them to sell their land.
Making ownership records public could also make it easier for settlers to forge claims over Palestinian land, and thereby seize Palestinian land through Israeli courts, MEE added.
The measures also loosen restrictions on the sale of Palestinian land to Israelis, overturning a Jordanian-era law prohibiting transfers to non-Palestinians.
Washington’s Gaza ‘master plan’: A mere PowerPoint presentation
Trump allies are selling Gaza reconstruction as a futuristic AI-powered utopia that not even the Israeli army believes will happen
By Robert Inlakesh | The Cradle | February 10, 2026
“We have a master plan … There is no Plan B,” remarked Jared Kushner last month, during a Board of Peace (BoP) presentation about Gaza reconstruction at the World Economic Forum (WEF) at Davos. What has become apparent is that no coherent Plan A exists either.
Although Kushner’s father-in-law, US President Donald Trump, was granted the legitimacy to build what he calls the BoP on the back of pledges to implement his “20-point peace plan” and Gaza ceasefire, the BoP’s charter is notably absent of any reference to Gaza.
Furthermore, United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolution 2803, which legally authorized the BoP and was explicitly about the Gaza ceasefire, was deliberately vague on how any concepts proposed in the resolution would be implemented. It deliberately avoided outlining any mechanisms or obligations for reconstruction. Instead, two parallel schemes emerged.
The first was the Gaza Reconstitution, Economic Acceleration and Transformation Trust (GREAT Trust) – a 38-page document proposing to pay Palestinians $5,000 each to leave the territory. Crafted by Israeli figures previously involved in the discredited Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), the plan, which envisions “AI-powered, smart cities,” was less a roadmap for peace than a blueprint for ethnic cleansing.
That same foundation, backed by US private military contractors (PMCs), had already drawn international condemnation for herding civilians into “aid zones” only to open fire. More than 2,000 Palestinians were killed in those operations.
PowerPoint colonialism
Later, in December, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) exposed that another proposal was put into circulation among US-allied nations in the Arab and Muslim world. The 32-page PowerPoint presentation, titled “Project Sunrise,” was set forth by Kushner and US envoy Steve Witkoff.
Like the preceding proposal, the new vision outlined a similar AI-smart city model, but added even more elements, such as high-speed rail infrastructure. According to the PowerPoint slides, the total cost of this 10-year reconstruction endeavor would amount to $112.1 billion, for which the US would commit to footing 20 percent of the bill.
Back then, Steven Cook, a senior fellow for the Middle East Program at the Council on Foreign Relations think tank, told WSJ that “they can make all the slides they want,” adding that “no one in Israel thinks they will move beyond the current situation and everyone is okay with that.” US Secretary of State Marco Rubio had even expressed his concerns over how realistic the plan will be, especially when it comes to potential foreign investment.
Then came Kushner’s presentation at Davos, which instantly made headlines and was presented as a brand new proposal called the “master plan.” According to Kushner, the project for a “new Gaza” would now only cost $25 billion.
However, upon further investigation, it is clear that what Kushner was presenting was simply “Project Sunrise,” which was evident as the PowerPoint he used was filled with the same exact slides from December. In other words, nothing particularly new was being placed on the table that had not already been released over a month prior.
“New Gaza” is a lab rat colony
Speaking to The Cradle, Akram, a Gaza resident from Al-Bureij, states that the situation on the ground does not reflect any of the positivity that appears in the media. “The Israelis won’t let us even have mobile homes or proper structures to live in, they still bomb us every day, and then we see AI images of Gaza becoming richer than Israeli cities?” he says, with bitter sarcasm. He added:
“Listen, do you really think they carried out genocide for two years and destroyed all our homes, only to build us a paradise, and that this will all happen if the resistance gives up its weapons? No. They are trying to tease us, like they always did, by saying, ‘if you give up your weapons, you will become Singapore.’ Nobody believes it.”
Shortly after Akram spoke to The Cradle, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivered a speech to a special session of the Knesset, in which he made it clear that “the next stage is not reconstruction.” Instead, he asserted that disarmament would characterize Phase 2 of the ceasefire.
In his “master plan” presentation, Kushner claimed that the major task of clearing Gaza’s rubble would only take two to three years. Yet, according to UN figures, this task was estimated to take up to 15 years, with costs expected to exceed $650 million.
These figures are also dated, having been produced in July 2024, so they do not account for over a year of destruction. Israel has not stopped its round-the-clock demolition of Palestinian infrastructure since the so-called ceasefire took effect on 8 October 2025.
A humanitarian NGO official working in Gaza tells The Cradle that even the ceasefire’s Civil Military Coordination Center (CMCC), ostensibly set up to enforce humanitarian standards, now functions as a system of “intimidation” that “violates basic morality.”
On 21 January, Drop Site News reported on leaked documents that revealed plans to create an “Israeli Panopticon” city, to be constructed in territory remaining under its control in southern Gaza’s Rafah. The Guardian then reported that the UAE is seeking to bankroll the project. The leaked blueprints described a “case study” city where residents would be monitored around the clock, like lab rats, and forced to submit biometrics to enter.
Rafah as the prototype prison
The UAE has been accused of backing the five ISIS-linked militant groups Israel created to fight Hamas, which it previously intended to rule over a similar style concentration camp city in Rafah. In fact, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz had even ordered the construction of such a “community” during the 60-day ceasefire in early 2025. The Israelis have long intended to displace 600,000 Palestinians to such a gated facility.
The Emirati connection in this scheme goes beyond its recent offer to fund such a concentration camp city; it dates all the way back to January 2024, when it officially opened six water desalination plants along the Egyptian side of the Gaza border area, coincidentally capable of supplying 600,000 people with water.
Prior to the ceasefire and the collapse of the privatized aid scheme, the plot was to use the GHF PMCs in order to lure civilians into such a city area. Once they get there, the Palestinians who enter would be under the rule of Israel’s ISIS-linked proxy militias.
According to forensic architecture analysis, Israel is once again preparing land in order to implement such a project. Meanwhile, UG Solutions – the firm that hired the GHF’s PMCs – is again advertising job opportunities in the besieged territory.
Dispossession in disguise
Despite the dizzying array of slogans – BoP, GREAT, Sunrise, Panopticon – the outcome remains the same with no reconstruction, no sovereignty, and no end to occupation. The various schemes are less about peace and more about forcing Palestinians into containment zones policed by Tel Aviv and its regional clients.
From “Gaza Riviera” fantasies to proposals limiting reconstruction to areas under Israeli military control, what’s on offer amounts to PowerPoint projectionism. A revolving door of schemes and slogans has produced nothing substantive. Instead, the Israeli military continues its daily war of erasure on Gaza’s land, people, and future.
Even Kushner’s $25-billion fantasy is just that: a fantasy. In the three months since the UN resolution, all Washington has offered is AI-generated cityscapes and recycled decks. The only real plan on the table remains the one being implemented daily – the destruction of Gaza.
Is Nixing Aid to Israel a Poison Chalice?
Ending the existing arrangement could result in even more extensive forms of involvement
By Kelley Beaucar Vlahos | The American Conservative | February 9, 2026
There is a lot of talk about getting rid of the massive agreement that guarantees Israel billions of dollars in military aid each year. And it’s not just critics of Israel: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Senator Lindsey Graham have even said they want to “taper off” the money because Israel is ready to stand on its own two feet.
But while a debate over the annual package would be a most welcome one given the enormous sums of American taxpayer money that has flowed to Israel’s wars in recent years, it is important to keep an eye on what might be a bait and switch: trading one guarantee for a set of others that might be less transparent and more expensive than what’s on the books today.
When President Bill Clinton announced the first Memorandum of Agreement, a 10-year, $26.7 billion military and economic aid package to Israel, he expressed hope that it would complement the advancement of the Oslo Accords, the peace process he had shepherded between the Israelis and Palestinians earlier in his term.
The peace process tied to Oslo pretty much fell apart after expected Israeli withdrawals from the West Bank as outlined in the Wye River Agreement in 1998 never happened; today Israeli settlements considered illegal under international law have exploded, with more than 700,000 settlers living there today and Israelis controlling security in most of the territory. But the 10-year MOU lived on.
Not only has it been renewed through the Bush and Obama administrations; the total outlays have increased. The current one, signed in 2016, pledged $38 billion over the decade, just under $4 billion a year and now all of it military aid. According to the Council on Foreign Relations, Israel is by far the biggest recipient of U.S. aid in history, some $300 billion since its founding, with the greatest proportion coming from those MOUs.
Supporters of the aid say it comes with military and strategic partnerships that are supposed to help keep the neighborhood safe for the U.S., Israel, and its “allies” (there are no treaty allies in the region), but the last 40 years have been pockmarked with wars and waves of human displacement and misery. Beyond financially and militarily supporting Israel’s wars, the U.S. has been bombing, regime-changing, occupying, and fending off terrorist insurgencies created by its own policies in Central Asia, the Horn of Africa, and the Middle East since 1999. Today, with Israel’s encouragement, President Donald Trump is poised to bomb Iran for the second time in his current term in office.
On February 3 the Congress passed the latest installment of the current MOU—$3.3 billion. It was a bipartisan affair, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer assuring a group of Jewish leaders the previous weekend, that “I have many jobs as leader … and one is to fight for aid to Israel, all the aid that Israel needs.”
But not everyone is on board with the open spigot. And a spigot it is. According to CFR, the U.S. gave $16.3 billion (which included its annual $3.8 billion outlays) to Israel after the Oct. 7, 2023 attacks. Israel’s retaliation for those attacks, which killed 1,200 Israelis, has resulted in more than 71,000 recorded Palestinian deaths in Gaza so far, a blockade that has left the 2 million population there largely homeless, starving, sick, and unsafe. Americans have reacted by rejecting the prospects of further aid, with a plurality now—42 percent—saying they want to decrease if not stop aid altogether. That is up from the mid-20 percent range in October 2023.
Beyond Americans’ aversion to funding the slaughter of civilians in Gaza, a conservative fissure over continued, unconditional support for Israel has opened wide over the last year, exposing another rationale for discontinuing the aid: It is not “America First.” It not only siphons off aid from much needed renewal at home, but forces Washington to aid and abet another country’s foreign policy, which is increasingly counterproductive and contrary to our own politics and values.
The region is not safer, and moreover, it has not allowed for the United States to reduce its military footprint as guarantor of security there.
One then-congresswoman, Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), was vocal in her opposition to this aid. Israel, she pointed out, has nuclear weapons and is “quite capable of defending itself.” She has pointed out Israel’s universal health care and subsidized college tuition for its citizens, “yet here in America we’re 37 trillion dollars in debt.”
Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY.) posted on X that he voted against the spending bill on February 3 in part to deny Israel the $3.3 billion in aid. He has said the aid takes money out of Americans’ pockets and proliferates human suffering in our name. “Nothing can justify the number of civilian casualties (tens of thousands of women and children) inflicted by Israel in Gaza in the last two years. We should end all U.S. military aid to Israel now,” he said in May of last year.
In an interview with The American Conservative last week, he said he is speaking for his Kentucky district and despite a retaliatory 2026 primary challenge driven largely by Trump and donors linked to the American Israel Political Affairs Committee (AIPAC), he will continue to raise the issue in Congress. He said he has asked his GOP constituents every year whether to maintain, increase, or cut Israel annual aid since 2012.
“I’ve polled that every election cycle in my congressional district among likely Republican voters, and this was the first year that a majority of people answered nothing [no aid] at all, or less,” said Massie. “It’s not a third rail back home. It’s a third rail inside of the Beltway.”
According to reports last month, Israel is “preparing for talks” with the Trump administration to renew the MOU for another 10 years. One might be flummoxed to hear, however, that Netanyahu is giving interviews in which he says he wants to “taper off” American aid in that decade “to zero.” Israel has “come of age” and “we’ve developed incredible capacities,” he said in January.
Immediately after, Graham, who seems to spend more time in Israel than Washington these days, said he heartily agreed and hoped to end the aid sooner. “I’m going to work on expediting the wind down of the aid and recommend we plow the money back into our own military,” he said. “As an American, you’re always appreciating allies that can be more self-sufficient.”
The idea of self-sufficiency and furthermore the concept of Israel releasing itself from any “ties” that might come from the aid is not a new one among supporters here and especially the hardline right in Israel. “Cut the US aid, and Israel becomes fully sovereign,” Laura Loomer charged on X in November. In March of last year, the Heritage Foundation called for gradually reducing the direct grants in the next MOUs starting in 2029 and transitioning gradually to more military cooperation and then finally arms transfers through the Foreign Military Sales by 2047.
Israel, the report concludes, should be “elevated to strategic partner for the benefit of Israel, the United States, and the Middle East. Transforming the U.S.–Israel relationship requires changing the regional paradigm, specifically advancing new security and commercial architectures.” The plan also leans heavily on future Abraham Accords ensuring trade and military pacts with Arab countries in the neighborhood.
Therein lies the fix, say critics. The reason these staunch advocates of Israel including Netanyahu, the most demanding of its leaders over the last 30 years by far, is willing to forgo MOU aid, is that they envision it will come from somewhere else, less politically charged.
“The emerging plan is to substitute formal military funding—known as Foreign Military Financing—with greater U.S. taxpayer-funded co-development and co-production of weapons with Israel,” says the Institute for Middle East Understanding, which adds that instead of extricating from Israel’s messes, the U.S. will be further “enmeshed” in them.
The think tank points out that the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD), the most unreconstructed pro-Israel organ in the United States, came out with its own report on the aid, and surprise, also advocated phasing out the MOU. In addition to a commitment by Israel to spend more of its GDP on defense and other co-investments with the U.S. on research and development, the U.S. would “provide Israel $5 billion each year through what would be known as a Partnership Investment Incentive—or PII. This PII would provide funding via existing foreign military financing (FMF) mechanisms that Israel would use to procure American military hardware.” The difference would be that it would have to be spent entirely in U.S. industry and on cooperative partnerships in the region, all while maintaining Israel’s “Qualitative Military Edge.”
Geoff Aronson, longtime Middle East analyst and occasional TAC contributor, said the aid has been “an important if not vital component in ensuring American and Israeli hegemony in the region” and is linked intrinsically to balancing U.S. strategic relations and normative Israeli peace with Egypt and Jordan, which gets billions in military aid (not as much) from the U.S. too. None of this is going to go away, he surmised to TAC.
“The question that is being posed is how can we continue to support Israel’s ability to work its will in the region without committing ourself to X, Y, Z or committing to a new partnership, a new agreement,” he said. “Watch what you wish for, because it might come true.”
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From the Archives
The Geopolitics behind the War in Yemen (I)
By Mahdi Darius NAZEMROAYA | Strategic Culture Foundation | 30.03.2015
The United States and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia became very uneasy when the Yemenese or Yemenite movement of the Houthi or Ansarallah (meaning the supporters of God in Arabic) gained control of Yemen’s capital, Sanaa/Sana, in September 2014. The US-supported Yemenite President Abd-Rabbuh Manṣour Al-Hadi was humiliatingly forced to share power with the Houthis and the coalition of northern Yemenese tribes that had helped them enter Sana. Al-Hadi declared that negotiations for a Yemeni national unity government would take place and his allies the US and Saudi Arabia tried to use a new national dialogue and mediated talks to co-opt and pacify the Houthis.
The truth has been turned on its head about the war in Yemen. The war and ousting of President Abd-Rabbuh Manṣour Al-Hadi in Yemen are not the results of «Houthi coup» in Yemen. It is the opposite. Al-Hadi was ousted, because with Saudi and US support he tried to backtrack on the power sharing agreements he had made and return Yemen to authoritarian rule. The ousting of President Al-Hadi by the Houthis and their political allies was an unexpected reaction to the takeover Al-Hadi was planning with Washington and the House of Saudi. … continue
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