Israeli raid in Jenin escalates into full-scale battle
One of the Israeli Apaches which launched airstrikes on Jenin, pictured firing flares over the West Bank city during a battle between the Israeli army and resistance fighters. 19 June, 2023. (Photo credit: AFP)
The Cradle | June 19, 2023
Israeli troops launched a massive raid into the occupied West Bank city of Jenin on the morning of 19 June, resulting in the death of five Palestinians and the injury of at least 66, Palestinian media outlets reported.
The four killed have been identified as 21-year-old Khaled Assasa, 21-year-old Qais Jabareen, Ahmad Daraghmeh, 19-year-old Qassam Sariya, and 15-year-old Ahmad Saqr.
The raid began as usual, with the Israeli army storming Jenin to make arrests and facing heavy gunfire from resistance fighters.
Confrontations escalated significantly after members of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s (PIJ) West Bank-based Jenin Brigade managed to ambush Israeli troops and detonate explosive devices targeting their military vehicles. Members of the Jenin Brigade opened fire at the vehicles following the explosions.
The Jenin Brigade named the operation “Fury of the Free.”
Israeli media outlets confirmed that seven Israeli soldiers were injured in one of the blasts, with unconfirmed reports suggesting deaths among the troops.
In a brief statement, the Jenin Brigade said: “We still have more surprises … we warn the occupation against continuing their aggression.”
As violence continued to escalate, Israeli helicopters launched airstrikes on Jenin, targeting the West Bank in an aerial attack for the first time in over 20 years.
The airstrikes were launched in order to secure the evacuation of the Israeli soldiers wounded in the resistance’s explosive attack, Israeli media said. Resistance fighters reportedly attempted to target Israeli helicopters with gunfire.
According to Palestinian media reports, the wounded Israeli soldiers remain trapped within one of the vehicles targeted in the blast.
In another brief statement, the Jenin Brigade claimed that the Israeli army was attempting to withdraw from Jenin, but the resistance was obstructing their escape from the area.
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich was quoted as saying, in response to the events in Jenin, that “the time has come” for Israel to launch a full-scale military operation against the resistance in the occupied West Bank, which has grown beyond unprecedented levels in the last two years.
“I will request an emergency meeting of the Security and Political Security Council,” Smotrich said.
For months, Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir have been calling for a wide-scale West Bank operation to root out ‘terrorism’ in the area.
However, the military establishment has been mulling over the idea and is conflicted, as some believe that a cost of such an operation would be too high.
Europe is shielding Israel under guise of combating anti-Semitism, new report finds
By Nasim Ahmed | MEMO | June 16, 2023
The chilling repercussions of the highly controversial International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of anti-Semitism have been revealed in a recent report by the European Legal Support Centre (ELSC). Titled “Suppressing Palestinian Rights Advocacy through the IHRA Working Definition of Anti-Semitism”, the report by the independent Dutch-based organisation uncovered shocking examples of the IHRA’s weaponisation against critics of Israel and the suppression of free speech under the guise of combatting anti-Semitism.
Using dozens of case studies from across Europe, ELSC showed that the endorsement, adoption and implementation of the IHRA in the European Union, its member states and the UK, has led to widespread restrictions of the right of assembly and freedom of expression. Despite strong opposition and warning against its adoption by Jewish groups, experts on anti-Semitism, academics and activists, the controversial definition has been implemented by public and private bodies as if the IHRA is legally binding. Despite qualification by advocates of the IHRA that it is “non-legally binding”, a definition of anti-Semitism which conflates criticism of Israel with anti-Jewish racism has been placed at the centre of regulatory frameworks across Europe.
Some of the shocking findings include the following: Advocates of Palestinian rights who are targeted using the IHRA suffer a range of unjust and harmful consequences, including loss of employment and reputational damage; advocates of Israel routinely weaponise the IHRA to intimidate and silence people defending Palestinian rights; allegations of anti-Semitism that invoke the IHRA within the documented cases uncovered by the ELSC found that they are overwhelmingly used to target Palestinians and Jewish people opposed to Israel’s brutal occupation.
In one of the many remarkable findings, ELSC discovered that, not only was there a failure to carry out a risk assessment prior to IHRA’s adoption, the EU appeared to lie about the checks it had conducted. When asked if the Commission had conducted a risk assessment of the implications of the IHRA on fundamental rights, the EU Commissioner on anti-Semitism, Katharina von Schnurbein, affirmed that an assessment of the consequences had indeed been carried out. “Yes, we assessed“, said Schnurbein in a tweet on 23 November 2022, in response to critics who accused the Commission of failing to carry out basic due diligence.
However, responding on 9 December 2022 to a Freedom of Information request, the European Commission acknowledged it “has not conducted ‘any fundamental rights assessment or scrutiny (…) into the human rights implications of its endorsement and/or promotion of the IHRA Working Definition of Anti-Semitism.” Details of the misleading information by the Commissioner on anti-Semitism were covered at length by the advocacy group, Law for Palestine.
Misinformation about risk assessment is just one of the many examples of underhanded practices revealed by the ELSC report. The European Commission also failed to address and reflect the diversity of positions regarding definitions of anti-Semitism. The EC not only ignored that the IHRA is highly controversial and contested, it completely ignored less controversial definitions of anti-Semitism such as the Jerusalem Declaration on Anti-Semitism, and the Nexus Document. In contrast to the EU, the US has referenced other controversial definitions of anti-Semitism.
In sharp contrast to the IHRA definition, the Jerusalem Declaration states that, “Even if contentious, it is not anti-Semitic, in and of itself, to compare Israel with other historical cases, including settler-colonialism or apartheid.” The Nexus Document is equally explicit. It states that “Paying disproportionate attention to Israel and treating Israel differently than other countries is not prima facie proof of anti-Semitism.”
The US also appears to favour a less politicised definition that is not centred on shielding Israel and the political ideology of Zionism. In detailing its plan to combat the rise of anti-Jewish racism, the White House opted for the following definition: “Anti-Semitism is a stereotypical and negative perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred of Jews” said the strategy document, without mentioning Israel once. “It is prejudice, bias, hostility, discrimination or violence against Jews for being Jews or Jewish institutions or property for being Jewish or perceived as Jewish. Anti-Semitism can manifest as a form of racial, religious, national origin, and/or ethnic discrimination, bias, or hatred; or, a combination thereof. However, anti-Semitism is not simply a form of prejudice or hate. It is also a pernicious conspiracy theory that often features myths about Jewish power and control.”
Questions were also raised over why the EU adopted a definition that had been discarded because of its threat to fundamental rights to free expression. In 2004-2005, the European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC) published a “Working Definition of Anti-Semitism”. This definition, according to the ELSC report, featured “contemporary examples of anti-Semitism”, including examples relating to the State of Israel. The examples were criticised due to its conflation between opposition to Israel and anti-Semitism. The definition was abandoned by the EUMC’s successor body, the Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA), which removed it from its website in 2013. In its explanation for discarding the IHRA, FRA explained that it had “never been viewed as a valid definition of anti-Semitism; that the Agency was not aware of any official EU definition of anti-Semitism; and that the document was removed in a clear-out of non-official documents.”
The most serious bad-faith attempt to mislead the public in order to roll out the IHRA is the claim that the definition is “non-legally binding”. Despite promoting the IHRA as “non-legally binding”, most of the EU Member States have endorsed the IHRA as the authoritative instrument for addressing anti-Semitism which, according to the ELSC, has given the definition centred on shielding Israel and Zionism “soft law power”. EU statements and policies through which the IHRA is being applied, is said to show that it has gained law like force and impact.
“Hard-core advocates of the IHRA always intended it to have binding legal status and force” said ELSC. “The ‘non-legally binding’ provision was only added to secure its adoption by the IHRA Plenary in May 2016. Efforts have been made since, in some Member States to introduce the IHRA as a basis for legislation.
The real-life impact has been devastating for critics of Israel. The IHRA has been implemented in the UK, Austria and Germany by public and private bodies in ways that have led to widespread infringement of the fundamental rights to freedom of expression and assembly, ELSC found. Advocates of Palestinian rights, who are targeted, are said to suffer a range of unjust and harmful consequences, including loss of employment and reputational damage. IHRA is often found to be weaponised by pro-Israel advocates to intimidate and silence those advocating for Palestinian rights.
The good news is that, when challenged in court, most of the allegations of anti-Semitism based on the IHRA are found to be unsubstantiated and thrown out. Though this is a silver lining, the adoption of the IHRA has created a perverse situation which undermines democracy and the principal of “innocent until proven guilty”. In this toxic culture, some sections of the population are having to go to court to protect basic freedoms, like the right to free speech. According to the ELSC report, even though most challenges to the implementation of the IHRA were successful, the disciplinary procedures and litigation resulting from false allegations of anti-Semitism have produced a “chilling effect” on the freedom of expression and assembly.
US, Israel defense ministers discuss anti-Iran alliance
The Cradle | June 16, 2023
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant met with US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin on 15 June at the NATO summit in Brussels to discuss Iran and other important aspects of the US-Israel relationship, the Jerusalem Post reported.
Gallant discussed with Austin his claims that “Iran stimulates attacks against Israel using proxies in Syria, Lebanon, Gaza, and the West Bank, and reiterated Israel’s right to self-defense,” the Israeli paper said.
Before departing for Belgium, Gallant said he would discuss with Austin “the implementation of the joint commitment of both our countries to make sure Iran will never possess nuclear military capabilities.”
Israeli threats against Iran have intensified in recent months amid unconfirmed reports that Washington is close to reaching an interim or partial nuclear deal with Tehran through indirect talks in Oman.
Israel opposes a US nuclear deal with Iran, while Iranian officials have made clear they will only accept a full return to the nuclear deal signed with the Obama administration in 2015. The Trump administration withdrew from the deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), unilaterally in 2018. The JCPOA placed limits on Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief.
Despite US negotiations with Iran, the US military has expanded military cooperation with Israel this year and carried out exercises viewed as veiled threats against Iran, such as the Juniper Oak exercise in January.
The exercise involved 7,900 personnel, 142 combat aircraft, twelve warships, and activities across all domains (sea, air, land, space, and cyber). The main goals of the exercise were to improve interoperability and to demonstrate the ability to surge forces into the region in the event of war with Iran.
Reports emerged that the exercise simulated strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, though US officials denied this.
In March, Austin met with Gallant in Israel. At the time, Austin said that although the Biden administration “continues to believe in diplomacy,” it would “not allow Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon.”
Despite ongoing political differences between the Biden administration and the Israeli government regarding Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposed legislation to overhaul the Israeli judiciary, the military alliance between the two remains strong.
Austin said he “wanted to be here to make something very clear: America’s commitment to Israel’s security is ironclad, and it’s going to stay that way. As President [Joe] Biden said in his visit to Israel last year, ‘The connection between the Israeli people and the American people is bone deep.’ Israel is a major strategic partner for the US.”
China’s Xi Puts Forth Proposal to Settle Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
Sputnik – 14.06.2023
BEIJING – Chinese President Xi Jinping on Wednesday put forward a three-point proposal to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict during the meeting with his Palestinian counterpart, Mahmoud Abbas.
“First, the basis for settling the Palestinian issue is the establishment of an independent state of Palestine with full sovereignty within the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital,” Xi Jinping was quoted as saying by the Chinese national broadcaster.
Second, the Chinese president pointed out that the needs of the Palestinian economy should be met and the international community should increase humanitarian and development assistance to Palestine.
“Third, the right course of peace negotiations should be followed. Respect the historical status quo of Jerusalem’s religious shrines, refrain from radical and provocative statements and actions, promote a larger, more authoritative and more influential international peace conference, create conditions for the resumption of peaceful talks and make concrete efforts to help Palestine and Israel coexist peacefully,” Xi concluded.
Abbas is on a state visit to China from June 13-16.
Israeli Soldiers Shoot Dead Palestinian Two-Year-Old
While Blinken tells AIPAC of Team Biden’s “iron clad” support for Israel
BY PHILIP GIRALDI • UNZ REVIEW • JUNE 13, 2023
There would appear to be no limit to Israeli bestiality towards the Palestinians and likewise no limit to how much that brutality has been enabled by the positions taken by successive US governments and the national media. Indeed, the self-defined Jewish state, which ironically claims to be a democracy, is perhaps the leading human rights violator in all the world due to its officially condoned genocide directed against the Palestinian people and its bombing and killing of neighboring Syrians and Lebanese without providing any convincing evidence that it is being threatened by them.
That apartheid Israel is essentially a criminal state that blithely goes about killing and stealing from the original inhabitants of the Middle East region might well be accepted as substantially true by most observers. But even given all of that, there is sometimes a story that emerges that is so shocking and disturbing that it becomes difficult to contemplate why the rest of the world has not risen-up and demanded an end to Israeli atrocities.
One such story is the recent murder by Israeli soldiers of a two-year-old boy Mohammad al-Tamimi. Unfortunately, heavily armed Israelis illegally occupying the West Bank and killing Palestinian children is not a rare occurrence. Fully 27 children have suffered that fate in the past six months, including some children being killed by Israeli bombing and rockets in Gaza. And the stories are often the same, with the Israeli government claiming that there were “terrorist threats,” often deliberately contrived provocations that rapidly develop into shooting ranges with the unarmed Palestinians as targets.
In this case, Mohammad al-Tamini was with his father, Haytam al-Tamimi, and had just been buckled into the back seat of the family car to go on a short trip to visit an uncle in a nearby village to celebrate an aunt’s birthday. The al-Tamimis live in the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh, located twelve miles northwest of Ramallah, which passes for the capital of what fragments of land the Palestinians have been able to preserve as a symbol of their national identity. The Israelis de facto are occupiers of nearly all of the West Bank and have military outposts scattered through the region to protect the armed and illegal Jewish settlers who are constantly harassing the remaining Palestinians and destroying their crops to force them to emigrate. The remaining Palestinians in their villages and towns are constantly under siege and are subject to checkpoints, arbitrary arrests, and even murder at the hands of the Israel Defense Forces. One observer notes how the remaining Arab “communities are actually Palestinian enclaves that are prisons” with heavily armed 18 year old Israeli conscript soldiers free to run amok as they see fit. And when a Palestinian is killed, the Israeli soldiers know well that they will not in any way be punished. An Israeli peace group has calculated that between 2017 and 2021 a soldier who murdered a civilian faced only a 0.87% probability that he would be investigated and indicted. There were only 11 such indictments in those years and the punishments eventually meted out were slaps on the wrist.
On June 1st, Mohammad was the victim of a band of Israeli soldiers, who later claimed to be chasing a car from which shots had allegedly been fired at a nearby illegal Jewish settlement Neveh Tzuf. The problem with the tale is that no one heard any shots until the Israeli soldiers blocked the village entrance before arriving in the center of Nabi Saleh in their jeeps and starting shooting in all directions. They then settled in for a few hours to engage in a bit of tormenting of the local residents by beating them and even firing at them at close range. Haytam Tamimi and his son Muhammad were among five Palestinians injured during the raid.
Seated in their vehicle, Mohammad was shot through the head and his father was wounded in the shoulder, apparently by fire from a sniper. Taken to a hospital, Mohammad lingered for four days before dying on Monday June 5th. His body was returned to his village for burial, which took place on the following day, but even then the Israelis chose not to avoid interfering in what was a tragic ceremony. Before and during the funeral, the Israeli military had surrounded the village and later that afternoon, while mourners were gathered at the al-Tamimi grandparents’ home, they entered into it for the third time since Mohammad was shot, beating and shooting villagers, injuring six people. One man sustained a gunshot wound in the pelvis, with the bullet entering his intestines. A woman was struck in her face with a rifle butt while another mourner was hit in the face with a rubber-coated steel bullet.
Ironically, on same day that Mohammad died the American Secretary of State Antony Blinken addressed the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) at its annual policy summit in Washington. AIPAC, it might be observed, exists to promote Israeli interests, which should make it subject to registry under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) but no one in the White House seems interested in enforcing that particular law or any other existing legislation pertaining to secret nuclear arsenals when Israel is involved. The last president who tried to register AIPAC’s predecessor organization the American Zionist Council was John F. Kennedy, and consider what happened to him possibly as a result.
Blinken, is himself a Jew and an avowed Zionist in an Administration awash with Jews and Zionists to include President Joe Biden, a supermarket Catholic, who calls himself a Zionist and effectively swears fealty to the Jewish state. Blinken is not really very good at blaming Israel for anything and when he is with a hardline Jewish gathering like the AIPAC Summit he is fully energized while he is making the audience feel good about its love for Israel. He enthused how the US-Israel partnership “touches on every aspect of our lives, from security to business, from energy to public health. And the depth and breadth of that partnership between our governments are matched only by the strength of the ties between our peoples. This partnership between the United States and Israel is indispensable.”
Blinken chose not to acknowledge that the “indispensable ties” between the US and the Jewish state is attributable to the large scale corruption of America’s political system by Israel and its Lobby to achieve such a status. And inevitably, Blinken made sure his friends in AIPAC understood that the Biden Administration sees the “blame” for the unrest in the Middle East just as does the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu: Iran and Palestinian “terrorists” are largely at fault and Israel is the perpetual victim. He recalled how “Over the past several years, we’ve seen a rising tide of horrific violence that’s tragically and senselessly resulted in the loss of life of scores of civilians on both sides. That violence must end; its perpetrators must face equal justice under the law. The recent acts of terrorism – including nearly 1,000 rocket attacks launched toward Israel over just three days, some of them targeting Jerusalem – demonstrate the daily threat under which Israelis are forced to live. The fatal event at the border with Egypt – which resulted in the deaths of three Israeli soldiers – is another tragic reminder of these daily dangers.”
Blinken did not seem interested in the dead Palestinian children nor in the murder of Palestinian-American Journalist Shireen Abu Akleh by Israeli soldiers back in May 2022. He is more enthusiastic when he is telling AIPAC how much US Treasury money and other goodies are flowing to a wealthy Israel from the American taxpayer, describing how “Now, we have to start from this. The US-Israel relationship is underwritten by the United States’ commitment to Israel’s security. That commitment is non-negotiable; it is ironclad. We are – we are providing $3.3 billion in foreign military financing to Israel each year. On top of that, Israel receives $500 million in funding for missile defense. Tens of millions more for new counter-drone and anti-tunneling technologies. That is in keeping with the 2016 memorandum of understanding negotiated by the Obama-Biden administration – and it is more than at any point in the history of our relationship. We’re also delivering an additional $1 billion in funding to replenish supplies for Israel’s Iron Dome, the missile defense system that we developed together and that has saved countless lives. All of this – all of this has been secured in partnership with our Congress, with bipartisan support. We’re also expanding our joint military exercises that improve how our forces work together seamlessly. This year, we have more joint exercises scheduled than at any point in our history. We’re also conducting joint research and development on advanced military capabilities, working together on cutting-edge defense systems, including Israel’s new laser-focused Iron Beam. This robust support continues to be critical in [my emphasis] maintaining Israel’s qualitative military edge, buttressing its ability to defend itself, and to advancing our national interests. America is more secure when Israel is strong.” [My emphasis]
It is interesting how Blinken concludes his argument supporting throwing bushels of money to Israel based on serving an American “national interest” and making us “more secure,” which is a complete lie, similar to what is being promoted to explain why we are in Ukraine. Maybe the Administration might consider some new talking points as the lies are getting ever more preposterous and the deficit spending of trillions of dollars has reached the point of no return. Blinken also lies big time when he attempts to resurrect the totally dead two state solution to Israel-Palestine, saying “Israel was founded — our partnership was built — on democratic values which include equal access by all people to their rights. And a two-state solution is vital to preserving Israel’s identity as a Jewish and democratic state.”
Blinken should perhaps be someday reincarnated as a Palestinian who has just lost his livelihood and home to an “equal access” Jewish settler and who every day experiences the Israeli organized increasing state violence that is directed against him. That might provide a different perspective. And it is interesting to note that the threat to Blinken’s imaginary two-state solution is also framed as coming from the Palestinians rather than from Israel. He denounced in his speech to AIPAC “any actions taken by any party that undermine the prospects of a two-state solution. That includes acts of terrorism, payments to terrorists in prison, violence against civilians, incitement to violence.” Take note that bombing and shooting children is not included, which is an Israeli speciality.
And, by the way Mr. Blinken, Israel was not founded on “democratic values.” It engaged in a massive program of ethnic cleansing that defined its creation — the Nakba for Palestinians, which killed thousands and drove at least 650,000 civilians from their homes. For the first 19 years of Israel’s existence, its Arab “citizens” were ruled under martial law and since then Palestinians have been legally discriminated against with Jewish supremacy and entitlement serving as the defining characteristics of the state.
Interestingly, in contrast to Blinken and Biden, at least one US Senator appears to have a conscience regarding dead people and he is surprisingly enough a Democrat! Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, is calling on the Joe Biden administration to “publicly release its findings” into the shooting death of Shireen Abu Akleh. Van Hollen believes that a report compiled by the US security coordinator for Israel and the Palestinian Authority shortly after the fact provides important information about the “the conduct of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) unit involved in that operation as well as other IDF units operating in the West Bank.” He commented “I strongly believe that its public release is vital to ensuring transparency and accountability in the shooting death of American citizen and journalist Shireen Abu Akleh and to avoiding future preventable and wrongful deaths – goals we should all support.” Van Hollen has been denied access to the classified State Department report over the past eleven months, which has been attributed to Biden Administration desire to block any demands for accountability on the part of Israel.
Van Hollen obviously was not briefed on the fact that Israel has a White House approved license to kill Americans and just about anyone else due to its “chosen” status. He should check out what happened to the death by Israeli army bulldozer of Rachel Corrie in 2003 and to the 34 sailors murdered and another 172 wounded by an Israeli attack on the USS Liberty on June 8th, 1967. When the Liberty was struggling to stay afloat President Lyndon Johnson ordered a cover-up which has led to Washington de facto taking orders from Tel Aviv and paying what amounts to an annual tribute to Israel as outlined in some detail by Blinken in his AIPAC speech. So, there you have it. We have on one hand a militarized ethno-religious state that rules over a suppressed minority with terror and killing that is being coddled by both US Republican and Democratic administrations because of Jewish power and, more to the point, the corruption obtainable by money and knowing how to use it for political advantage.
Killing a two-year-old little boy sitting in a car with his father is only the most recent of Israel’s war and human rights crimes, but it is particularly heinous and no one in the White House or State Department dares say squat. The murders in Palestine and the fantasy denial of Israeli culpability for anything by Blinken and Biden as well as by Donald Trump when he was in office speak for themselves. Who really rules the United States? What kind of monsters have we become under neocon/Zionist control? Is the bell that is tolling ringing for the demise of us as a nation? Ask about all those things now, because when Biden’s War on Antisemitism really goes into high gear one will likely be facing a jail sentence just for daring to pose those questions.
Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.
Permanent Apartheid in Palestine: This is why Israel wants to reactivate E1 Plan
By Ramzy Baroud | MEMO | June 12, 2023
The Israeli government is at it again, actively discussing the construction of thousands of illegal settlement units as part of a massive settlement expansion scheme known as E1.
Though Israeli construction in the East Jerusalem area has supposedly been halted under international pressure, the Israeli government has found ways to keep the plan alive.
It did so through constant expansion of the various settlements in the name of ‘natural expansion’, confiscation of Palestinian land and the ruthless yet routine demolition of Palestinian homes.
But why does Washington, Israel’s main defender and benefactor, oppose, at least verbally, the construction in E1, while turning a blind eye to illegal construction throughout the West Bank?
The answer lies in the fact that E1 will further expand the Jerusalem municipal boundaries, minimise any Palestinian demographic presence in the city (from the current 42 per cent to about 20 per cent), and prejudice any political solution that includes East Jerusalem.
East Jerusalem is a Palestinian city, occupied by Israel during the June 1967 war. It is recognized by the United Nations and international law as part of the Occupied Palestinian Territory. Israel should have neither legal rights nor jurisdiction there.
Washington, which rarely cares about the rights of Palestinians, is concerned that, without East Jerusalem as part of the political equation, any discussion of a ‘two-state solution’ will become forever obsolete.
In other words, the US is more worried about the political, not territorial consequences of the Israeli decision. Indeed, the US’s entire political program in Palestine and Israel is situated within the two-state solution template. Without it, Washington’s role would cease to serve any purpose.
This is precisely why US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, criticized Israeli settlements during his speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) on 5 June.
Though he covered the habitual US commitment to Israel’s security, describing it as “non-negotiable” and “ironclad”, he also warned against “any move toward annexation of the West Bank … disruption of the historic status quo at holy sites (and) the continuing demolitions of homes.”
These steps, and more, will “damage prospects for two states”, the cornerstone of US foreign policy in the Middle East.
Israel, on the other hand, is neither interested in a two-state, one-state nor any ‘solution’ to its military occupation and apartheid in Palestine. Instead, Tel Aviv is working towards a specific end, a formula of permanent domination, one that would satisfy its quest for ‘security’, demographic superiority and ‘defensible’ borders.
It matters little that Israel’s vision for its own border lines is largely inconsistent with international law. All that matters to the current, in fact, all Israeli governments, are the ‘national interests’ of the country’s Jewish population, whose future has been linked to the crushing of political aspirations and civil rights of the country’s native Arab, Palestinian inhabitants.
Jerusalem’s particular significance stems from two factors: one, its historical, spiritual, economic and administrative centrality to all Palestinians and, two, the fact that it has been the Holy Grail of Israel’s settler colonialism in Palestine for the last 75 years.
A quick look at the map of Occupied East Jerusalem is enough to explain Israel’s ultimate motive in the Palestinian city: Maximum land with an absolute Jewish majority.
For this to take place, much work has to be done, namely ensuring the territorial continuity between the massive illegal Jewish settlement of Ma’ale Adumim and Jerusalem.
Israel’s motives are not a secret. A long report by the Zionist Jerusalem Centre for Public Affairs champions and illustrates Tel Aviv’s objectives in detail. The report warns against allowing “security and urban discontinuity between Jerusalem and Ma’ale Adumim, or the reversion of Jerusalem to a border-town status … that would preclude the city’s eastward development.”
The reference to ‘eastward development’ is particularly dangerous, as many illegal Jewish settlements have purposely been planted in various parts of the West Bank, all the way to the Jordan Valley for the sole purpose of linking them all up, thus dividing the West Bank into two main regions, south and north.
Considering the current administration and ‘security’ divisions of the Occupied West Bank, a major territorial division will deny Palestinians any sense of physical continuity, let alone statehood. In other words, apartheid will become permanent and, from Israel’s perspective, also sustainable.
As for the westward expansion, connecting Ma’ale Adumim to the so-called “metropolitan Jerusalem” through construction in E1 will help Israel resolve a fundamental component of its expansionist strategy. According to the Zionist Jerusalem Centre, such a merger will “incorporate both settlement and security as two vital, complementary components of Israel’s national interest.”
And, wherever there is Israeli construction in Occupied Palestine, there is always the destruction of Palestinian properties and confiscation of land.
According to the European Union Office in Palestine, in 2022, 28,208 illegal settlement units “were advanced” in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, compared to 22,030 in 2021. A higher number is expected in 2023.
As for Palestinian home demolition, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) paints a grim picture: in the first quarter of 2023 alone, 290 Palestinian structures in East Jerusalem and the West Bank were demolished or seized. This represents an increase of 46 per cent, compared to the same period of the previous year.
East Jerusalem has had a major share of this destruction, specifically 95 homes and other structures between 1 January and 28 March, according to the World Council of Churches. The outcome has been the displacement of 149 Palestinians. Among them, 88 children have been rendered homeless.
The price of Israel’s major plans in East Jerusalem and the rest of the West Bank is not just humanitarian. It is essentially political, aimed at cutting off Palestinian communities from one another, isolating Jerusalem completely, and ensuring a Jewish demographic majority for generations to come.
Though Secretary Blinken tries to emphasise the danger of such actions to the two-state solution, the real danger lies in the fact that such measures threaten the very fabric of Palestinian society and the political future of the Palestinian people.
Israel’s quest to reactivate its E1 plan requires not just mere condemnation, but tangible and decisive action, especially as Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right government is more unhinged than ever before.
Tel Aviv to Announce Plans For Thousands of New Settlement Units in West Bank
By Connor Freeman | Libertarian Institute | June 12, 2023
Israel has informed the White House that it intends to announce the planning and building of thousands of new settlement units in the occupied West Bank later this month, according to US and Israeli officials speaking to Axios. One of the sources told the outlet, at a minimum, the plan includes 4,000 new housing units being built in existing West Bank settlements.
The Joe Biden administration is ostensibly opposed to these moves as the settlements are seen as undermining prospects for a two-state solution in Palestine. However, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s governing coalition includes extremist settlers dead set on substantial colonial expansion, eyeing annexation of the West Bank, and this has not diminished US support.
According to the report, the White House wants Tel Aviv to either cancel its plans or at least tone down the announcement to draw as little attention as possible. This seems unlikely even though the US provides almost $4 billion per year to Israel in military aid.
Jewish only colonies, or settlements, which continue to be built inside these territories – militarily occupied for almost sixty years – are illegal per international law. This is a view shared by most of the world community, including in Middle Eastern capital cities like Riyadh where Secretary of State Antony Blinken recently urged Gulf Cooperation Council foreign ministers to normalize with the Israeli apartheid state.
The Israeli government is also facing criticism from its supporters for temporarily shelving a meeting to discuss a plan for settlement expansion in the West Bank’s E1 area. Located between Jerusalem and the Maale Adumim settlement, the area is highly sensitive. If a Jewish-only settlement is built there it would remove any remaining territorial contiguity between the northern and southern West Bank. Thus, these additional “facts on the ground” would make a future Palestinian state even more unviable.
On Monday, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, the extremist leader of the Religious Zionism party, vowed “we will have big news for the settlements in the West Bank imminently.” Smotrich holds sweeping powers over the West Bank including the approval of new settlements and the demolition of Palestinian homes.
2022 was one of the deadliest years for Palestinians in the West Bank since 2005, according to the UN. Since taking power last December, the current regime in Israel has waged a brutal bombing campaign in the Gaza Strip which murdered 33 people, while Israeli forces and settlers have killed at least 119 Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem so far this year.
Muhammad Tamimi, a two-year old Palestinian boy from the Nabi Saleh village in the West Bank, succumbed to his wounds last Monday after he was shot in the head by the Israeli army.
Germany squandering billions on Israel’s Arrow-3 missile defence system
MEMO | June 10, 2023
Germany squandering almost 4 billion euros ($4.30 billion) on Israel’s Arrow-3 missile defense system is a prime example of financial mismanagement. Astonishingly, the government plans to request advance payments of up to 560 million euros from lawmakers, revealing a complete disregard for responsible spending. The Arrow-3 system, supposedly designed to intercept ballistic missiles outside the earth’s atmosphere, is nothing more than an overpriced addition to Israel’s already extensive missile defense arsenal.
Despite its lofty claims, the Arrow-3 merely serves as the extravagant crown jewel of Israel’s defense array, spanning from the unnecessary short-range rocket interception capabilities of Iron Dome to the extravagant long-range missile destruction capabilities of Arrow-3. Germany’s acquisition of this system showcases a distorted sense of priorities and a blatant waste of taxpayers’ hard-earned money.
The government aims to finalize a government-to-government deal with Israel by the end of the year, leaving little room for rational decision-making or exploring alternative, more sensible options. Astonishingly, the procurement documents prepared for parliament reveal that Germany will forfeit part or all of its advance payments if the deal falls through, essentially guaranteeing compensation to Israel for costs they may incur. This reckless arrangement further burdens German taxpayers and highlights the government’s lack of fiscal prudence.
Even more concerning is the fact that Germany’s air force is expected to take delivery of the Arrow-3 system, now costing a staggering one billion euros more than initially planned, by the fourth quarter of 2025. Such an inflated expenditure raises serious questions about the government’s judgment and its ability to allocate funds responsibly.
It is worth noting that Germany’s justification for this extravagant purchase, using Russia’s conflict in Ukraine to argue for a shortage of ground-based air defense systems, is nothing more than a flimsy pretext. While medium-layer defense systems like Raytheon’s Patriot units or the more recent IRIS-T system provide sufficient coverage, Germany’s decision to acquire the Arrow-3 demonstrates a foolish preoccupation with unnecessary high-layer defense.
By indulging in such a costly acquisition, Germany jeopardizes the allocation of funds for crucial areas such as infrastructure, social programs, and economic development. The government’s skewed priorities raise serious concerns about its commitment to the well-being of its citizens and the prudent management of public resources.
Israel displaces more Palestinian families in occupied Jerusalem
MEMO | June 7, 2023
The Israeli occupation authorities demolished several Palestinian homes in occupied Jerusalem on Tuesday, displacing three extended families, Anadolu has reported.
Eyewitnesses told the news agency that Israeli police officers accompanied the team from the Jerusalem municipality that demolished the house owned by the Totah family in Wadi Al-Juz. The house was built 24 years ago. Yesterday’s demolition was the fourth for this family; three other homes were demolished in March because they didn’t have building licences. A stable near the house was also demolished.
Meanwhile, the Israeli occupation authorities forced the Burkan, Nassar and Al-Tawil families to demolish their own homes, which consisted of five apartments in Silwan’s Wadi Qaddoum. The families either had to demolish their homes or pay large fines to have the municipality do it. At least 30 people were rendered homeless by the demolitions, including children.
Earlier this week, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported that the Israeli occupation authorities have demolished, forced local people to demolish or seized 290 Palestinian-owned structures across the West Bank and Jerusalem in the first quarter of 2023.
“All but 19 of the structures were targeted for lacking building permits, which are nearly impossible for Palestinians to obtain,” explained OCHA. “As a result, 413 people, including 194 children, were displaced, and the livelihoods or access to services of over 11,000 others were affected.”
OCHA added that, “The number of structures targeted in the first quarter of 2023 has increased by 46 per cent compared with the same period in 2022, which already saw the highest number of demolitions recorded in the West Bank and Jerusalem since 2016.”
Is a Change of Course at State Department Coming?
Some senior officers are retiring but who and what will replace them?
BY PHILIP GIRALDI • UNZ REVIEW • JUNE 6, 2023
There are a lot of anonymous bureaucrats that man the offices in the nation’s capital. If one were to mention the name Wendy Sherman at a Washington DC cocktail gathering it is likely that few in the room will have ever heard of her, but she has long been one of the most important players in Democratic Party administrations when it comes to foreign policy in key parts of the world. Sherman, the Deputy Secretary of State, will be retiring this summer after more than thirty years with the Foreign Service. She has been a fixture in often controversial top level policy making since Bill Clinton was in the White House, where she served as a top adviser to Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, also taking on the role of lead negotiator in the ultimately unsuccessful talks to stop North Korea’s ballistic missile program in the late 1990s. With a return to power of the Democrats in 2008, she served as Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs under Obama. To her credit, she was a lead negotiator with Iran on the 2015 nuclear agreement (JCPOA), which Donald Trump acting on bad advice subsequently withdrew from.
More recently, Sherman has been a key part of the Biden administration’s efforts to develop strategies to confront China in the Indo-Pacific and elsewhere whenever Beijing has sought to develop trade relationships with key suppliers of essential raw materials. This has included putting pressure on allies like Australia and New Zealand in the Pacific to reject Chinese commercial initiatives, elevating what began as competitive trade policies into a perception that China was becoming a threat to American national security. Sherman also played a significant role in encouraging international diplomatic and military support for Ukraine after Russia’s invasion.
Sherman’s current position as State Department number two was bestowed on her by President Joe Biden. Her comments relating to her retirement reveal something of her own philosophy as well as the views of the current administration. She said “The arc of history will only bend toward justice if people of conscience steer it in the right direction. That it is our job to have courage, to collaborate with others and seek out common ground, to persist against the odds, to use our voice and our power for good—to keep faith with the promise of our democracy and to never, ever lose hope. Diplomacy is not for the faint of heart…”
Secretary of State Antony Blinken not surprisingly praised Sherman’s career, saying that “President Biden asked Wendy to serve in this role because he knew he could count on her to help revitalize America’s alliances and partnerships and manage our complex relationships with competitors.” Blinken described Sherman’s lengthy career as a diplomat in a statement after her resignation was announced, saying she has “helped lead our engagement in the Indo-Pacific, the region where the history of the 21st century will be written. She has deepened our bonds with our friends around the world, especially with the Republic of Korea, Japan, and the European Union. She has overseen our efforts to strengthen the Department’s capabilities to manage our relationship with the People’s Republic of China, and built greater convergence with allies and partners… Her remarkable career – which spans more than three decades, three presidents, and five secretaries of state – addressed some of the toughest foreign policy challenges of our time. Our nation is safer and more secure, and our partnerships more robust, due to her leadership.”
One can expect kind words wrapped around positive government-speak both from Blinken and from Sherman herself after her admittedly long years of service, but there is something manifestly false about the euphoria over a US foreign policy that has during the Biden time in office eschewed diplomacy in favor of military threats and thousands of punitive Treasury Department sanctions. If anything, contradicting Blinken, the United States is in no way “safer and more secure” thanks to his and Wendy Sherman’s efforts, quite the contrary. It has, inter alia, converted major powers Russia and China, who were actively seeking normalized relations, into de facto enemies with all that implies, a result that, even if it does not turn into World War 3, might well mean the end of the dollar as the world’s reserve currency as the world moves towards increased financial and banking system multipolarity.
If Sherman and Blinken, acting on behalf of Joe Biden, have had a success it would consist of getting the allegedly defensive alliance NATO on board the China-phobia train, with Beijing joining Russia as one of the two great autocratic “threats to democracy.” At the end of June 2022, Jens Stoltenberg, the NATO Secretary General, declared that China does represent “serious challenges” to the alliance, which, for the first time agreed to include “threats posed by Beijing” into plans for its “future strategy” concept (PDF), joining Russia as a threat to “NATO’s interests, security and values.” Stoltenberg explained how “We now face an era of strategic competition … China is substantially building up its forces, including in nuclear weapons, bullying its neighbors, including Taiwan. China is not [yet] our adversary but we must be clear-eyed about the serious challenges it represents.”
Antony Blinken also climbed on to the horse that Stoltenberg was riding, commenting in familiar terms how “One of the things that [China’s] doing is seeking to undermine the rules-based international order that we adhere to, that we believe in, that we helped build. And if China’s challenging it in one way or another, we will stand up to that.” That the rules-based order is little more than a contrivance to maintain political and military dominance by Washington and its friends is by now clear to everyone except the people sitting in and around the White House, most particularly to include Blinken and Sherman.
So what comes next as the featured act post Wendy Sherman? It should be noted that the State Department top level is completely staffed by Jewish Americans who are politically-speaking neocons with close ties to Israel who also believe that the maintenance of total military dominance by the United State is good both for them and good for the Jewish state. All of them are Russo-phobes for various reasons often related to the history of Jews in Russia. Sherman recently participated in discussions in Washington with her Israeli counterpart intended to “…further deepen and expand the US-Israel relationship.” Someone should tell her that it is already far deeper than it should be if one were to go by American interests.
The current third in line at State is the notorious Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland who started the problems in Eastern Europe when she worked with her colleagues to overthrow and replace the existing government in Ukraine in 2014. Nuland, who recently spilled the beans about direct US involvement in the Ukraine war, is married to leading neocon Robert Kagan. It has often been observed that neocon foreign policy, which originated with the Republican Party and is based on maintaining a US government monopoly on forms of international violence, has now come to dominate both parties.
If Biden chooses to pull a rabbit out of his hat and comes up with a replacement for Wendy Sherman who is actually in favor of active diplomacy as a mechanism to avoid war, I and many others will be pleasantly surprised and even astonished. More likely it will be Nuland or a Nuland clone or possibly someone having all the Democratic Party boxes checked, i.e. black, Jewish and a transexual who uses the right pronouns and pretends to be a woman. The fundamental problem is that the United States government is no longer run by people capable of acting in rational self-interest, which would mean doing things for the good of the country. The system is in reality broken and it is now clear that something has gone terribly wrong. The sad truth is that the United States is in decline, wallowing in debt and corruption, and Joe Biden and company have lost control, lying and misrepresenting nearly everything. So good bye Wendy! It was great having you at State where you and your friends turned competitors into enemies. It will be interesting to see what happens next!
Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.
Israel simulates Iran war after Tehran cleared of nuclear allegations
The Cradle | June 5, 2023
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu renewed his threats of military action against Iran and its nuclear facilities on 4 June while holding an underground mock assessment with the security cabinet in coordination with Israel’s ongoing military drill, dubbed Firm Hand.
The security cabinet meeting, held in a military command bunker in Tel Aviv, aims to “simulate decision-making by the political echelon during a potential multi-front war,” Times of Israel reported.
“We are committed to acting against Iran’s nuclear program, against missile attacks on Israel, and the possibility of these fronts joining up,” Netanyahu said in a video statement from the bunker.
“The reality in our region is changing rapidly. We are not stagnating. We are adjusting our war doctrine and our options of action in accordance with these changes, in accordance with our goals which do not change,” the prime minister said.
He went on to say that Israel is confident that “we can handle any threat on our own,” slamming efforts to revive the 2015 nuclear deal under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
Netanyahu’s comments come just days after the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) decided to shut down one of its major probes into Iran’s nuclear program, ruling that near-weapons grade uranium found in Iran was merely residual and cannot be used to build a nuclear bomb.
The IAEA’s decision has left Israel “on edge,” an unnamed official told Israeli media last week. The Israeli security cabinet meeting also comes as reports have been suggesting that Washington may be looking to restart nuclear talks.
In August last year, a deal was close to materializing, however, an Israeli pressure campaign and anti-Iran protests stalled efforts once again.
The ongoing drill program began at the end of last month, and aims to simulate the type of conflict which Israel has been concerned most about lately, a ‘multi-front war.’
These concerns were exacerbated in Israeli media in the past two days, after a lone Egyptian officer infiltrated Israel through the border and carried out a rare and daring operation, killing three Israeli soldiers.
Featured Video
Pressure to REMOVE TRUMP FROM OFFICE Growing
or go to
Aletho News Archives – Video-Images
From the Archives
UK Researchers: Tax Food to Reduce Climate Change
I doubt these professors have anything to fear from a food tax
By Eric Worrall | Watts Up With That? | November 19, 2016
A group of researchers in Oxford University, England have suggested that imposing a massive tax on carbon intensive foods – specifically protein rich foods like meat and dairy – could help combat climate change. […]
This proposal, from a group of people who have probably never missed a meal in their lives, is totally obscene. High income countries often have a lot of poor people who would be hard hit by increases in the price of food.
Needlessly exacerbating the risk poor people don’t get enough to eat, especially children and pregnant mothers, who are especially vulnerable to adverse health impacts from lack of protein in their diet – if this ghastly proposal is ever implemented, future generations will look upon it as a crime against humanity. – Read full article
Blog Roll
Aletho News- Iran, Saudi FMs hold phone talks as Persian Gulf states rethink US ties
- The Illusions of Western Virtue: Ursula von der Leyen and Europe’s Moral Bankruptcy
- AIPAC-backed candidates lose New York primaries as voters reject pro-genocide lobby
- The West’s Post-Soviet ‘Democracy’ Playbook
- UK suppressed intel on Sudan genocide to protect UAE ties: Report
- Starmer’s exit exposes dirty secret: UK can’t afford Ukraine War
- Putin Warns the West: Russia Is Ready
- BEN-GVIR: “ALL OF LEBANON MUST BURN” — w/ Mouin Rabbani
- There Are No Budget Constraints In New York City: “Coastal Resiliency” Edition
- The UN’s plan to levy taxes on global trade is a sinister power grab
- If Americans Knew
- Israel’s Attacks on Gaza’s Children (Photos)
- ‘His only crime is that he is a Palestinian doctor’
- ‘Killed pursuing her dream’: Gaza girl on her way to school dies in Israeli drone strike
- Unbelievable pressure on Gaza from Israel, “Board of Peace” – Daily Update
- UN: Israel Continues to Commit Genocide and Other Atrocity Crimes by Deliberately Targeting Palestinian Children
- 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
- 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 