MMR Vaccine Debate Heats Up as Media Claim ‘Vaccine Hesitancy’ to Blame for Recent Outbreaks
By Brenda Baletti, Ph.D. | The Defender | January 25, 2024
Measles outbreaks are in the news again.
In the U.S., local health departments and media reported about 16 cases of measles between December 2023 and January. The outbreaks occurred in Philadelphia, New Jersey, Georgia and Washington.
In the United Kingdom, the UK Health Security Agency reported 209 cases between January and November 2023 and about 319 cases between October 2023 and the present.
Media blamed international travel and declining vaccination rates among children as “probably” behind the outbreaks.
But Dr. Liz Mumper, a pediatrician, told The Defender it doesn’t make sense to assume the unvaccinated are to blame. She said cyclical outbreaks still occur even in populations with nearly 100% vaccination, such as college students.
Dr. Paul Thomas, a retired pediatrician and author of “The Vaccine-Friendly Plan: Dr. Paul’s Safe and Effective Approach to Immunity and Health-from Pregnancy Through Your Child’s Teen Years Paperback,” told The Defender some cases of measles are reported every year. Despite the hype around the recent outbreaks, he said, “There have not been any significant measles outbreaks in the U.S. for decades.”
The largest recent national spike in measles cases occurred in 2019 when 1,274 cases were reported, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). It was the worst year for measles in the U.S. since 1992.
Since 2019, the number of cases reported has been significantly lower: In 2020, there were 13 cases, in 2021, 49 cases, in 2022 there were 121 cases and in 2023, there were 56 cases. The post-2019 numbers also tend to be lower than the numbers from 2000-2018, which averaged around 200 per year.
Credit: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Measles is a contagious childhood viral disease characterized by a cough, runny nose and fever, followed by a generalized rash.
It was declared to be eliminated in the U.S. in 2000 — meaning there was no continuous transmission.
Mortality from measles in the U.S. declined significantly during the 20th century — 98% from 1900 to 1963, before the measles vaccine was introduced — due to advances in living conditions, healthcare and nutrition, according to Physicians for Informed Consent.
Since 2000, there have been only four measles deaths in the Americas — three in 2000 and one in 2022, according to a November 2023 CDC report.
The overwhelming majority of the approximately 130,000 measles deaths annually occur in countries in the global south that have weak health infrastructures, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Those deaths, along with measles hospitalizations in the global north, are associated with vitamin A deficiency.
“Measles can be deadly if a child does not have access to safe water and medical care,” Mumper said. “In developed countries, fatalities from measles are very rare.”
Effective treatments include vitamin A in high doses and attention to hydration status, Mumper said.
“Many natural methods to help the body fight viruses, like extra vitamin D and vitamin C are effective but not widely recommended by mainstream medicine,” she added.
Prior to the introduction of the vaccine in the U.S. in 1963, most people contracted measles and gained lifetime immunity, and the number of deaths had dropped to 0.9 per 100,000 for children under age 10.
The vaccines significantly reduced the number of reported measles cases, with efficacy rates that can be upwards of 95%, Thomas said. However, he added immunity from the vaccines wanes over time.
“From a mechanistic standpoint, the lifelong 100% natural immunity comes when measles is caught through respiratory spread. Giving a vaccine by injection may be an inherently poor substitute for Mother Nature,” Mumper said.
Approximately 83% of children globally received one dose of the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine by their first birthday in 2022.
Hotez, Offit blame the ‘anti-vaxers’ for measles outbreaks
Although case numbers have declined in the U.S. since 2020, and the recently reported cases were either among adults or children who may be too young to have completed the MMR vaccine schedule, news reports about the outbreaks consistently link them to lower post-pandemic vaccination rates among kindergarteners.
The CDC recommends two doses of the MMR vaccine, with the first dose at 12 to 15 months old and the second dose between ages 4 and 6.
The agency reported that from the 2019-20 school year to the 2021-22 school year vaccination rates for state-required vaccines among kindergarten children declined from approximately 95% to approximately 93%, and the exemption rate increased to 3.0%.
CDC data going back to 2011 show that rates typically vary from year-to-year, but consistently stay above 93%.
Thomas said the drop has been minimal and “given the loss of immunity in both children and adults in the vaccinated, this minor reduction in MMR uptake by children is not going to make a difference [in infection rates].”
Dr. Peter Hotez, a go-to “expert” for mainstream media on vaccines — and a vaccine developer and patent holder himself, who has repeatedly smeared vaccine safety advocates as “anti-science aggressors” — told ABC and CBS News that he thought the sporadic outbreaks were likely a result of lowered vaccination rates and that they were going to get worse.
“We’re just seeing now, this is the tip of the iceberg,” Hotez said. “We’re going to be seeing this in communities across the United States in the coming weeks and months because of the spillover of the U.S. anti-vaccine movement of childhood immunizations.”
According to ABC — quoting Hotez, Dr. Paul Offit and the Mayo Clinic’s Dr. Gregory Poland — this is due to vaccine “misinformation” linking vaccines and autism, combined with the politicization of the COVID-19 vaccines, which Hotez said caused “an acceleration of anti-vaccine sentiments.”
Hotez has been making these arguments for years, writing a New York Times op-ed in 2020 claiming there is no link between vaccines and autism and blaming unvaccinated people for infectious disease outbreaks.
Offit said given the vaccine’s efficacy, it was “unconscionable” for parents to forgo vaccination for their children.
But there is a significant and growing body of evidence suggesting the MMR vaccine can cause autism in certain susceptible children. That includes evidence that U.S. Department of Justice lawyers suppressed testimony by their own expert witness making the link, and evidence from whistleblower William Thompson, Ph.D., that the CDC covered up its own data showing a link between vaccines and autism.
In a Substack post from 2022, Dr. Peter McCullough evaluated a study on the “Association Between Vaccine Refusal and Vaccine-Preventable Diseases in the United States,” namely measles and pertussis.
The study indicated that since measles was declared eradicated in 2000, there have been 18 published studies of 1,416 measles cases — 43.2% of the cases occurred in vaccinated people and no hospitalizations or deaths were reported.
McCullough concluded:
“Large fractions of ‘preventable disease outbreaks’ involving measles and pertussis occur because vaccines fail to provide adequate protection. Given the neuropsychiatric concerns over the MMR vaccine and the stochastic risk of allergic/immunologic reactions to any injection including components of (DTaP, Tdap) or MMR, the parental movement for vaccine choice is well justified.
“For measles and pertussis, the vaccines convey imperfect protection and breakthrough infection (vaccine failure) should receive considerable ‘blame’ by public health researchers.”
Mumper said the vaccine schedule has changed, lowering efficacy. “Vaccine efficacy was calculated to be ~94% when the first dose was given at 15 months,” she said.
“Now babies are scheduled to get the first dose at 12 months (only 85% efficacy) and their second dose at kindergarten.”
Mumper added, “People with different genotypes respond differently to MMR vaccines, so there is variable measles transmission depending on the individual’s immune response. Up to 10% of the population does not develop enough protective antibodies.”
New outbreaks lead push for adults to get another MMR
Derek Gatherer, Ph.D., a lecturer in biomedical and life sciences at Lancaster University who is funded by the U.K. government to study “vaccine hesitancy,” said the solution to the problem of measles outbreaks is more vaccination — for adults.
Gatherer published a recent article in The Conversation blaming the vaccine-hesitant for the outbreaks. He argued that even adults who are already vaccinated should consider getting more MMR jabs.
“Measles is the most infectious disease known to science — adults should consider getting another MMR vaccine,” he declared.
Gatherer conceded that the measles risk to adults is extremely small, but said “adult MMR is still worthwhile as it goes beyond just protecting the person who receives the vaccination,” stopping asymptomatic infections from spreading.
Thomas said it is not common to recommend booster shots to adults for illnesses they were vaccinated for as children. “However,” he added, “the pharmaceutical industry, backed by the CDC, has been looking at the adult population as an untapped resource to expand market share and penetration.”
Reports of cases rising in the UK
In the U.K., measles was considered eliminated in 2016, but it resurfaced in 2018.
U.K. MMR vaccination rates average 85%, down from a peak of 88.6% in 2014, with some locations reporting rates as low as 74%.
According to The Guardian, “Most experts agree that misinformation about the MMR jab is very unlikely to play a significant role in declining vaccination rates.
“It is too easy to blame anti-vaccine sentiment for the measles outbreaks,” Helen Bedford, professor of children’s health at the University College London Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health told the paper. “Although some mistrust of vaccines may play a small part, research shows that parental vaccine confidence remains high.”
Experts there pointed to pandemic disruptions in vaccination, concerns among Muslim and Jewish communities about the use of porcine gelatin in the vaccine, and also the fact that because the disease is so rare, people are less concerned about possible risks.
England’s National Health Service is launching an MMR vaccination campaign, the BBC reported, contacting 4 million parents via text, email or letter to inform them their child has not had one or two doses of the vaccine.
Brenda Baletti Ph.D. is a reporter for The Defender. She wrote and taught about capitalism and politics for 10 years in the writing program at Duke University. She holds a Ph.D. in human geography from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a master’s from the University of Texas at Austin.
This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.
Kenyan Court Ruling Obstructs Biden’s Plan for UN Force in Haiti
By Kyle Anzalone | The Libertarian Institute | January 28, 2024
The Kenyan High Court has issued a ruling that will prevent President William Ruto from sending over 1,000 police to Haiti. The Biden administration had incentivized Nairobi into agreeing to lead a multinational UN force mission in Haiti. UN Peacekeepers have a troubling legacy in Haiti, including causing a cholera epidemic that killed thousands.
In October, the UN Security Council voted for Washington’s resolution to deploy a multinational police force to Haiti aimed at restoring order in Port au Prince. The White House spent a year searching for a nation to lead the mission before Nairobi agreed.
President Ruto agreed to send more than 1,000 Kenyan troops to Haiti to act as a police force. Washington agreed to fund the mission and signed a new defense cooperation agreement with Kenya.
However, the Kenyan opposition, led by Ekuru Aukot, challenged the planned deployment at the country’s high court. On Friday, the court ruled in favor of Aukot. However, the Kenyan government plans to appeal the ruling.
The ruling is a major setback for the Biden administration’s plan to send a multinational force into Haiti to restore order. In a statement responding to the Kenyan High Court’s decision, the White House said it was committed to deploying a UN force to Port au Prince.
“The United States’ commitment to the Haitian people remains unwavering. We reaffirm our support of ongoing international efforts to deploy a Multinational Security Support mission for Haiti.” The statement continues, “and [we] renew our calls for the international community to urgently provide support for this mission.”
Deploying UN police to Port au Prince is opposed by many Haitians. UN Peacekeepers have a dark legacy in Haiti. The last UN mission to the country was plagued with sexual abuse against the Haitians. Additionally, the peacekeepers caused a cholera outbreak that killed roughly 10,000 people.
US NSA Purchasing Web Browser Data Without Warrant – Letter
By Mary Manley – Sputnik – 27.01.2024
Amid rising concerns that foreign governments may be purchasing the personal data of citizens, this recent disclosure is the latest evidence of the US government doing such.
The US National Security Agency is buying Americans’ internet browning information from commercial brokers without a warrant, according to a letter between US Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) and the Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines.
Wyden, who made the letter from Thursday public, called for US intelligence officials to cease purchasing Americans’ data unless it has been obtained in a “lawful manner”.
“As you know, U.S. intelligence agencies are purchasing personal data about Americans that would require a court order if the government demanded it from communications companies,” writes Wyden.
“Such location data is collected from Americans smartphones by app developers, sold to data brokers, resold to defense contractors, and then resold again to the government. In addition; the National Security Agency (NSA) is buying Americans’ domestic internet metadata,” he continues.
He added that “until recently, the data broker industry and the intelligence community’s (IC) purchase of data from these shady companies has existed in a legal gray area”. And that app and advertising companies did not disclose their sale and sharing of personal data with brokers nor did they “obtain informed consent”.
“The secrecy around data purchases was amplified because intelligence agencies have sought to keep the American people in the dark. It took me nearly three years to clear the public release of information revealing the NSA’s purchase of domestic internet metadata,” the senator emphasized.
The senator then points out that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) brought an action against the data broker X-Mod Social earlier this month. Wyden says that lawyers for the company admitted that they were selling data collected from phones in the US to “US military customers, via defense contractors”.
The FTC then emphasized that the sales of location data is dangerous as it can be used to track people to “sensitive locations, including medical facilities, places of religious worship, places that may be used to infer an LGBTQ+ identification, domestic abuse shelters, and welfare and homeless shelters”. They add that consumers should be made aware that their data is being sold to “government contractors for national security purposes”.
Under Secretary of Defense Ronald S. Moultrie defended the methods of government data collecting in a separate letter released by Wyden.
“I am not aware of any requirement in U.S. law or judicial opinion… that DOD obtain a court order in order to acquire, access or use information, such as CAI, that is equally available for purchase to foreign adversaries, U.S. companies and private persons as it is to the U.S. government,” he wrote.
Army General Paul M. Nakasone, the director of the NSA, also justified the agency’s actions by explaining that the NSA acquires “commercially available information” but that those acquisitions are limited. Adding that they don’t include location data from phones “known to be used in the US”, and that the “non-content” data they do buy is located abroad and is critical for the US Defense Industrial base, according to a separate letter.
“NSA understands and greatly values the congressional and public trust it has been granted to carry out its critical foreign intelligence and cybersecurity missions on behalf of the American people,” Gen. Nakasone wrote.
In the end of his letter, Wyden wrote that the US government should not be “funding and legitimizing shady industry whose flagrant violations of Americans’ privacy are not just unethical, but illegal”. He then requested that Haines direct each IC element to take on a list of actions he outlined, including taking an inventory of the information they have already collected and to discard any information that does not meet consent laws.
Canceled US Joint Exercises in Africa Shows Washington’s Influence Abroad Slipping
Sputnik – 28.01.2024
Retired CIA intelligence officer and State Department official Larry Johnson told Sputnik the move may be related to internal pressure not to work alongside “troops associated with coup governments.”
The United States military leadership has scrapped plans to hold joint exercises with several African states such as Sudan, Mali, Niger, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Burkina Faso.
According to the Washington Post, the Pentagon’s change of plans was, “at least in part,” the result of US Democrats pressuring the Biden administration to bar “troops associated with coup governments” from participating in US-led military exercises.
Exercises such as these are usually planned many months in advance, so the decision to scrap these plans means “there’s an issue with the governments that were supposed to participate,” said retired CIA intelligence officer and State Department official Larry Johnson.
Describing the military exercises’ cancellation as a “significant” development, Johnson told Sputnik that this move by the Pentagon may have also been prompted by the decision of the host African governments not to participate.
“In any event, I think what it does signify is that US influence over other countries, its ability to basically tell countries what to do and compel countries to follow US policy, is slipping, that the US influence in areas like Africa is growing weaker, not stronger,” he remarked.
Johnson also suggested that the decision by Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso to withdraw from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) may be related to this development, considering that ECOWAS is primarily regarded as an entity “under Western influence.”
According to him, the fact that these countries chose to part ways with ECOWAS and pursue “bilateral agreements among themselves” does seem like signs of them “distancing themselves from US control.”
Red Sea Crisis Is Opportunity for U.S. to Weaken Europe & China
By Finian Cunningham | Strategic Culture Foundation | January 28, 2024
The Red Sea conflict is intensifying as is the impact on commercial shipping and the global economy, according to shipping news reports.
One might think that common sense would prevail here to solve the conflict diplomatically and quickly. If a ceasefire was called in Gaza to stop the horrendous slaughter of Palestinian civilians by Israel then that would end the restrictions imposed on shipping by Yemen.
Yemeni leaders have unequivocally said so. End the genocide and we will end the interdiction on shipping.
The moral imperative to immediately end the appalling suffering in Gaza is therefore a straightforward – not to say absolutely necessary – way to restore normal navigation through the Red Sea and for wider peace in the region. It’s not a dilemma. It’s not a conundrum. And it’s inexcusable to prevaricate.
The United States has the power to end the Israeli genocide. But the Biden administration has refused to exert its control over the Netanyahu regime.
Washington has opted to escalate the military aggression in the Red Sea by launching at least eight waves of air strikes since January 11 on Yemen – the poorest nation in the Arab region, having already suffered a genocidal war at the hands of the U.S. and Britain supporting Saudi Arabia’s aggression between 2015 and 2022.
The Yemenis have in turn defiantly warned that their operations to interdict shipping will continue until the genocidal siege on Gaza has ended.
Biden even admits that the military action to deter the Yemenis is limited in achieving its supposed objectives.
So, why continue to aggravate the situation and escalate potential conflict across the region? Not only will bombing Yemen not work, but it is also inflaming violence across the Middle East and risking a head-on confrontation with Iran which is allied with the Yemenis.
As Iranian Professor Mohammad Marandi points out in our interview this week a big incentive for the U.S. and its Israeli ally is to blow up the region as a reckless and nefarious way to conceal how disastrous the defeat in Gaza is for the Americans and their Israeli client regime.
But there may be more to it. Another incentive for taking a militarized response to the Red Sea crisis is the strategic gain that this gives the United States with regard to Europe and China.
The Red Sea shipping restrictions are hitting the European and Chinese trade most acutely. American economic interests are relatively unaffected.
It is estimated that about 60 percent of China’s exports to Europe are shipped through the Red Sea, according to the Washington DC-based Middle East Institute.
Put another way, Eurostat figures indicate that 20 percent of all EU imports come from Asia via the Red Sea.
Inevitably, the longer the insecurity and hostilities persist in the Red Sea, the worse will be the damage to Europe-China trade and their economies.
Reuters reports that China is urging Iran to rein in the actions of the Ansar Allah and Yemeni armed forces in the Red Sea. That indicates how severe the impasse is impacting Chinese trade with Europe.
The Europeans meanwhile seem oblivious to the damage that the United States’ policy is inflicting on their economies. The Europeans have meekly gone along with Washington’s militarized aggression against Yemen.
It is a long-term and deeply coveted goal for Washington to cleave European trade and political relations with China. China has become the European Union’s top trading partner, surpassing the United States in that historic role.
During recent Democrat and Republican administrations, Washington has vigorously sought to undermine European-Chinese relations. The Americans have reacted testily to any trade and investment pacts signed between the two.
The Red Sea crisis is thus a handy opportunity for the United States to kill two birds with one stone.
By ramping up the shipping problems through militarizing the conditions, the U.S. can weaken the economies of Europe and China while also sticking a very big wedge between the two.
In short-term American imperial calculation that is a tantalizing gain. The U.S. consolidates its hegemonic control over the weaker European allies while damaging China’s economic power.
This short-term zero-sum thinking by the American imperial planners is of course self-defeating in the long term from the far-reaching deterioration in the global economy and international peace and security. But long-term thinking about the common global good is not a priority for U.S. capitalist imperialism. One might even say they are fundamentally in opposition.
There is a close analogy here to the Ukraine crisis. Washington has pursued hostilities with Russia as a way to undermine European-Russian trade and their wider cultural and political relations. Washington calculates that such antagonism will bolster its hegemonic ambitions. The ideologically slavish European leaders have gone along with that policy even though it has resulted in an economic and security disaster for Europe.
The European leaders are either too stupid or too brainwashed to assess what is going on and how they are being manipulated by Washington for its selfish strategic interests.
If the European regimes had any independence or integrity they would not have gone down the path of conflict with Russia in Ukraine. But as it is, they have been had by Uncle Sam – big time. What’s more, they don’t seem to realize or even care.
Likewise, the same fate of shooting themselves in the foot is occurring over the Middle East crisis. The Europeans are backing a genocide in Gaza in deference to U.S. imperialist interests and the Israeli regime. That has rebounded with the Red Sea crisis that is set to hammer EU-China trade. Rather than seeking to resolve the conflict diplomatically, the Europeans are making it worse and in the process damaging their own international standing and strategic interests.
No wonder the Americans ultimately treat their European vassals with contempt. Because they are utterly spineless and clueless.
Here’s why the ICJ ruling on genocide is a crushing defeat for Israel
The Hague-based court has not called for a ceasefire and has no enforcement power, but its decision is resounding nonetheless
By Tarik Cyril Amar | RT | January 28, 2024
The United Nations’ International Court of Justice (ICJ) has ruled on the case that South Africa had brought against Israel. Those who mistake realism for simplistic materialism – the ‘it’s only there if I can touch it’ variety – may underestimate the significance of that ruling. In reality, it is historic. Here’s why.
First, and most importantly, the court has ruled against Israel. South Africa’s well-prepared brief was over 80 pages long, closely argued, and very detailed. But its gist was simple: It had applied to the ICJ – which only handles cases between countries, not individuals – to find that Israel is committing genocide in its attack on Gaza, thereby infringing on fundamental Palestinian rights as brutally as possible.
Such a finding always takes years. For now, at this preliminary stage, South Africa’s immediate request was for the judges to decide that there is, in essence, a high enough probability of this genocide taking place to do two things: First, continue the case (instead of dismissing it) and, secondly, issue an injunction (in this context called “preliminary measures”) ordering Israel to abstain from its genocidal actions so that the rights of its Palestinian victims receive due protection.
The court has done both, with a majority of 15 to 2. One of the two judges dissenting is from Israel. Those voting, in effect, against Tel Aviv included even the president of the court, from the US, and the judge from Germany, a country that has taken a self-damagingly pro-Israel line. As to the Israeli pseudo-argument claiming ‘self-defense,’ the court rightly ignored it. (Occupying powers simply do not have that right regarding occupied entities under international law. Period.)
This is a clear victory for South Africa – and for Palestine and Palestinians – and a crushing defeat for Israel, as even Kenneth Roth, head of thoroughly pro-Western Human Rights Watch recognizes with commendable clarity.
It is true that the ICJ has no power to enforce its rulings. That would have to come through the UN Security Council, where the US is protecting Israel, whatever it does, including genocide. Yet there are good reasons why representatives of Israel have reacted with statements so arrogant and aggressive that they only further damage Tel Aviv’s badly damaged international standing:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, for instance, has displayed his legal nihilism by dismissing as “outrageous” the closely reasoned finding of the court, at which Israel had every opportunity to argue its case. Israel’s far-right Minister of National Security, convicted racist and terrorist supporter Itamar Ben-Gvir, has derided the ruling with an X post simply saying: “Hague schmague.”
And, of course, as always, everyone not toeing Israel’s line is smeared as an “antisemite”: The ICJ is now joining the UN, the World Health Organization and, by now, almost everyone and everything outside the ideological bubble of Zionism on the list of those slandered in this manner.
Notwithstanding the ICJ’s lack of an army to compel Tel Aviv to obey the law, these outbursts of rage betray great fear. You may ask why. After all, the one thing the ICJ did not do was order a ceasefire. Some commenters have focused on that fact, to argue – gleefully on the side of Israel and its allies, with great disappointment on the side of Israel’s victims, opponents, and critics – that this vitiates the ruling.
They are wrong. As, for instance, the Palestinian legal expert Nimer Sultany (based at the London School of Oriental and Asian Studies) has explained, a direct ceasefire order was always unlikely. There are several reasons for that: The ICJ cannot issue such an order to Hamas, so issuing one to Israel alone would have been difficult in principle and, by the way, would also have provided ammunition for Israeli propaganda. Since only the UN Security Council could give teeth to the ICJ’s ruling, trying to decree such a one-sided ceasefire would have made it easier for the US to sabotage the Council by discrediting the court’s ruling as biased. Although it was consistent for South Africa to ask for a ceasefire at the ICJ, the best institution to order one is still the Security Council. And it is plausible to interpret the specific demands that the ICJ has made of Israel as practicable only under an official or de-facto ceasefire. Indeed, Arab countries are now, it seems, gearing up to take that position and use the court’s ruling to demand a ceasefire at the Security Council. This may very well fail again, but even that failure will serve to weaken the position of the US, Israel’s vital sponsor.
Beyond the issue of the ceasefire, there are other – and, from an Israeli perspective, probably more frightening – factors. For even if the US keeps shielding Israel, this is a bigger world. Western governments and politicians that have supported Tel Aviv unconditionally – with arms, diplomatic and public-relations cover, and by repressing Israel’s critics – will feel a chill: The UN Genocide Convention and the Rome Statute don’t just condemn perpetrating a genocide but also not preventing or being complicit in one.
With the ICJ now having confirmed at the very least that genocide is probable enough to merit a case and require immediate action, Joe Biden, Antony Blinken, Ursula von der Leyen, Olaf Scholz, Rishi Sunak, Keir Starmer, Emmanuel Macron, Annalena Baerbock, to name only a few, should start worrying: While the ICJ does not go after individuals, the International Criminal Court (ICC) does. Despite dragging its feet as much as it could, it is now especially likely to be compelled to open a full-fledged investigation.
In addition, cases can also be brought under national jurisdictions. All of this will take years. But it could end very badly for hubris-addled Western politicians who never imagined that such charges could escape their control (where they serve as politicized tools to go after African leaders and geopolitical opponents) and become their very own, potentially life-changing problem. In sum, the cost of siding with Israel has gone up. Not all but most politicians are solid opportunists. Tel Aviv will find it harder to mobilize its friends.
It is true that some Western governments and leaders, for instance, Canada or Rishi Sunak, have hurried to show their disdain for international law by attacking the ICJ’s ruling. But there’s an element of desperate bravado, of whistling in a darkening forest. And there’s a Catch-22 as well: Because, the more representatives of the West display their arrogance, the more they alienate the world. They may think that they are relieving Israel’s isolation. In reality, they are joining it on its downward trajectory: They are showing, once again, that their touted “rules-based order” is the opposite of the equal rule of international law for all.
Non-Western powers like China and Russia that have long resisted the hypocrisy of that ‘rules-based order’ and are not complicit in Israel’s atrocities, are earning global good will and geopolitical advantage. Hence, their positions and strategy will be confirmed by the ICJ ruling. This, as well, will weaken Israel further in the international arena.
If the world is bigger than the US or the West, it also contains much more than politics in the narrow sense of the term. In the realm of narratives, this is also a harsh setback for Israel and its supporters: Those who arrogantly dismissed the South African case as baseless or “a mockery,” for instance in The Economist, are now paying with their credibility. Their value as weapons in Israel’s struggle for global public opinion is reduced.
Last but not least, the domains of politics and narratives intersect, of course, with that of war: It is inevitable that those fighting Israel with arms will feel encouraged, and rightly so. For forces such as the Palestinian Resistance, the Ansar Allah (Houthi) movement de facto ruling Yemen, Hezbollah, and Iran, this ICJ ruling coincides with Israel’s military failure in Gaza: For while its troops have massacred civilians (and obsessively recorded proud evidence of their crimes that is now coming to haunt them), they are far from either “eradicating Hamas” (the putative war aim) or freeing the hostages by force. Seeing that Israel’s international isolation is getting worse, its opponents will have ever less reason to give up.
This, in short, was a great setback for Israel. Its political model, combining apartheid, militarism, and a might-makes-right outlook, is not ‘working’ any longer, not even on its own terms. The future is not predictable. That Israel will be in worsening trouble is.
Tarik Cyril Amar is a historian from Germany working at Koç University, Istanbul.
MAGA and Progressive Lawmakers Unite to Lambast Biden’s Attacks on Houthis
By Ekaterina Blinova – Sputnik – 28.01.2024
US representatives and senators of all stripes have subjected the president to sharp criticism over his strikes in Yemen.
US President Joe Biden’s recent air strikes on Houthi rebels in Yemen have provoked cross-party criticism in Congress.
Representatives Cori Bush (D-Mo.), Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), Marjorie Taylor Green (R-Ga.), and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), as well as other 12 House Democrats and six Republicans, have joined ranks to express “serious concerns” about the “unauthorized” strikes.
“We believe the US’ unauthorized strikes in Yemen violate the Constitution and US statute,” wrote the lawmakers, arguing that Congress has the sole power to declare war and authorize military action.
Addressing Biden himself, they continued: “We urge your Administration to seek authorization from Congress before involving the US in another conflict in the Middle East, potentially provoking Iran-backed militias that may threaten US military service members already in the region, and risking escalation of a wider regional war,” the letter said, as quoted by Axios.
Since January 12, the US and its allies have been carrying out strikes with cruise missiles and precision-guided bombs against the Houthis in Yemen.
The US-led coalition has conducted 11 strikes against the Shiite militia so far in response to the Houthis targeting Israel-linked vessels in the Red Sea in a bid to force Tel Aviv to halt military actions against Palestinians in Gaza.
Earlier this week, another bipartisan group of senators questioned Washington’s effort to protect foreign ships in the Red Sea.
“As Commander-in-Chief, you have the power and responsibility to defend the United States under Article II of the Constitution,” a letter signed by Senators Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Todd Young (R-Ind.), Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) said. “However, most vessels transiting through the Red Sea are not US ships, which raises questions about the extent to which these authorities can be exercised.”
Commenting on the strikes on Yemen targets, the lawmakers drew attention to the fact that “there is no current congressional authorization for offensive US military action against the Houthis.”
“[U]nless there is a need to repel a sudden attack, the Constitution requires that the United States not engage in military action absent of a favorable vote of Congress,” the lawmakers insisted.
While non-interventionists on both sides of the US political aisle are urging Biden to show restraint, the hawks are chastising the president for not doing enough against the Yemen Shiite group.
For his part, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) lambasted the president for “failing to sufficiently exercise the authority he has.”
“[Biden’s] played whack-a-mole against warehouses and launch sites, but left the terrorists’ air defenses and command-and-control facilities intact,” argued McConnell.
McConnell highlighted the 2002 authorization for the use of military force (AUMF) that empowered then-US President George W. Bush to kick off the Iraq War. In 2023, US lawmakers sought to strip US presidents of the AUMF; however, the legislative measure got stuck in the US Congress.
Not only US lawmakers but also right- and left-wing American scholars have recently warned the Biden administration against escalating tensions in the Middle East.
They particularly argued that the cost of the global trade disruption caused by the Red Sea crisis would be far less than the cost of the US operations against Yemen, especially given the risk of a clash with Iran, which traditionally supported Shiite militias in the small Middle Eastern state. A larger regional war is looming, they warned.
Pentagon contradicts White House about US troop presence in Yemen
The Cradle | January 28, 2024
US defense officials claim they have no boots on the ground in Yemen, despite a recent acknowledgement that US forces are indeed present in the war-torn Gulf state, a 27 January report from The Intercept shows.
On 17 January, a journalist asked US Defense Department press secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder if he could give assurances that the US had no troops on the ground in Yemen. Ryder responded, “I’m not aware of any U.S. forces on the ground.”
However, the White House reported to Congress on 7 December that “A small number of United States military personnel are deployed to Yemen to conduct operations against al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula and ISIS.”
Erik Sperling, the executive director of Just Foreign Policy, who worked on Yemen as a Capitol Hill staffer, told The Intercept it is possible Brig. Gen. Ryder “is trying to skirt the question to avoid greater scrutiny.”
Pentagon officials also deny that the US is at war with Yemen despite bombing it.
“We don’t think that we are at war,” Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh said on 18 January. “We don’t want to see a regional war.”
One journalist in the press briefing responded, saying, “We’ve bombed them five times now … if this isn’t war, what is war?”
This month, the US began a new bombing campaign against Yemen, which is now primarily governed by the Ansarallah resistance movement. With US and UK backing, Saudi Arabia and the UAE fought a war against Ansarallah between 2015 and 2022.
This month’s US bombing campaign came after Ansarallah-led Yemeni forces began attacking Israeli-linked shipping vessels in the Red Sea. Ansarallah wishes to stop the Israeli military campaign on Gaza, which has killed over 26,000 Palestinians and is widely viewed as constituting genocide.
But as the US bombing campaign in Yemen began, “defense officials suddenly became more reticent about the American military presence in Yemen,” The Intercept noted.
Though US officials claim their forces are in Yemen to fight Al-Qaeda-linked groups, a BBC investigation released on 22 January revealed that the UAE, a close US ally, has hired Al-Qaeda militants to fight for the Southern Transitional Council (STC), the Emirati-backed government in sparsely populated eastern Yemen.
A whistleblower cited in the investigation provided the BBC with “a document with 11 names of former Al-Qaeda members now working in the STC,” among them former high-ranking operatives of the extremist group.
Nasser al-Shiba, a former high-ranking Al-Qaeda member, is now the commander of the of the STC’s armed units, several sources told the BBC.
Lawsuit Filed Against Biden, Blinken, and Austin’s Complicity in Gaza Genocide
Al-Manar | January 27, 2024
The Center for Constitutional Rights in America (CCR) has filed a lawsuit accusing President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin of being “complicit in the crimes of genocide committed by `Israel` in the Gaza Strip.”
On Friday, a federal court in Oakland, California, held a hearing to consider this lawsuit, which Judge Jeffrey White described as the most challenging case for the court.
Legal representatives for Biden, Blinken, Austin, and the Center for Constitutional Rights were present at the hearing session. Attorneys, activists, and medical professionals from Gaza provided testimonies, elucidating the adversities faced by Palestinians in the Strip.
According to media reports, the plaintiffs emphasized in their pleadings that the current US administration is allegedly contravening the 1948 Genocide Convention by supplying weaponry to the Zionist entity. Conversely, the defense asserted that the court lacks jurisdiction to adjudicate on this matter.
The Center for Constitutional Rights in the United States, focusing on civil liberties, initiated a civil lawsuit against Biden, Blinken, and Austin last November. This legal action was taken on behalf of Palestinian organizations, Palestinians in Gaza, and American citizens with relatives in the Strip.
The plaintiffs allege that Biden and his ministers failed to leverage their substantial influence to set conditions or limits on Zionist aggression against Gaza.
Featured Video
MIT Professsor Ted Postol: Patriot Missile Capabilties
or go to
Aletho News Archives – Video-Images
From the Archives
Jewish Guilt is the Discourse of The Goyim
By Gilad Atzmon | April 24, 2018
For quite some time the British have accepted that British Jewish organizations have hijacked the political discourse. As has happened in other Western countries, the British political establishment has engaged is a relentless rant against antisemitsm. Sometime the focus drifts for a day or two. An alleged ‘Russian nerve gas attack’ provided a 48 hour pause. Occasionally we bomb Arabs in the name of ‘human intervention’ only to realize a day or two later that we have, once again, followed a premeditated foreign agenda. But, somehow, we always return to the antisemitism debate, as if our media and politicians are a herd of flies gravitating to a pile of poop. … continue
Blog Roll
Aletho News- Is there a future for the U.S. strategy in the Arctic?
- UN inquiry finds Israel ‘intentionally’ targeting Palestinian children in Gaza, occupied West Bank
- Citizens Around the World Demand Israel’s Expulsion From the United Nations
- ‘Israel not party to US-Iran talks, will continue full operations in Lebanon,’ Israeli far-right minister says
- Two killed in brazen Israeli ceasefire violation in southern Lebanon
- Which Country Is the Big Loser from the Ramadan War?
- Israeli Intel Whistleblower: Israel Ended Clinton Iran Deal With Epstein Blackmail
- MIT Professsor Ted Postol: Patriot Missile Capabilties
- Israel Brings The War Rhetoric Towards Türkiye
- The Swiss summit of imperial humiliation
- If Americans Knew
- Bari Weiss, Free-Speech Fraud & Zionism Promoter, Would Rather Deport Than Debate
- ‘Doctor of the Poor’: Israeli Occupation Arrests Prominent Palestinian Physician
- Search for Your Church (and see if it has been targeted by the Israeli gov’t)
- Mark Levin Flying to Israel as Netanyahu Reportedly Seeks to ‘Leverage’ Levin to Trash Trump’s Iran Deal
- Watch: Zionist Brags about Israel’s Power to Get the World to Do What Israel Wants
- In Gaza, another senseless death on what should have been a joyous day – Daily Update
- The Republican & Democratic Politicians Trying to Scuttle Iran Agreement
- Israel’s continued targeting of civilians in Lebanon renders ceasefire meaningless
- U.S. intelligence warns Israel is likely to undermine Iran peace deal, officials say
- In Gaza, Fathers Can’t Promise Their Children Food, Safety, or Even Survival
- No Tricks Zone
- 3 New Studies Find Increasing Trends In Solar Radiation Since The 1980s – Easily Explaining Warming
- THE TRANSCEIVER PARADOX: Why Organoid Intelligence (OI) Could Become Our Ultimate Alien Predator
- German Wind Turbines Face Regulatory Shutdown Due To Excessive Noise
- New Study: Chile’s Relative Sea Level Was 3.2 Meters Higher Than Today During The Mid-Holocene
- Beyond The Pitch: Why FIFA’s World Cup Is One Of Humanity’s Best Investments
- Climate Alarmists Now Using Natural Phenomena To Support Their Claims
- New Study: Significant CO2 Fluxes From Non-Volcanic Sources Are Largely Neglected In Carbon Budgets
- Women Climate Scientists Being Harassed, Insulted By Skeptics, Claims Berkeley Earth Researcher
- Germany’s Longterm Spring Climate Data Show “No Climate Trend”
- New Study: Solar Photovoltaic, Wind Power Fail To Meet Annual Energy Demands 62% Of The Time
Aletho News 