Video confirms Israeli troops fired three tank shells at Gaza’s Nasser Hospital

The Cradle | August 28, 2025
New video shows that a double-tap attack carried out by Israeli forces on a hospital in Gaza involved three separate munitions, one in the first strike and two in the second, CNN reported on 28 August.
The 25 August attack on Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Yunis in Gaza killed 22 people, including health workers, emergency response crews, and five journalists.
On the morning of the strike, Reuters journalist Hossam al-Masri was operating a live stream from an exterior stairwell on the top floor of the Nasser Hospital.
At 10:09 am, an Israeli munition targeted Masri, killing him and one other man.
Journalists and rescue workers rushed to the stairwell to look for survivors.
At 10:17 am, as rescue workers were carrying a body down the stairwell, a second and third Israeli strike, just milliseconds apart, targeted the stairwell, killing 20 more.
“One shell hits the staircase where first responders had gathered; a fraction of a second later, another explodes at almost the same spot,” CNN wrote, describing the video.
N.R. Jenzen-Jones, director of Armament Research Services, said the munitions were likely fired by two separate tanks at the same time.
“The impact of two projectiles at nearly the exact same moment suggests two tanks may have fired on the target simultaneously,” Jenzen-Jones told CNN. “It’s hard to read too much into that, but it suggests a more carefully coordinated attack, rather than a single vehicle firing at a ‘target of opportunity.’ Modern tank guns, supported by the sensors and systems of modern tanks, are very precise.”
“In gruesome video filmed after the second and third strikes, scores of bodies can be seen on the staircase on both the top floor and the floor below,” CNN added.
The five journalists killed were Reuters journalist Hossam al-Masri, Al Jazeera cameraman Mohammad Salama, Independent Arabia and AP journalist Maryam Abu Daqqa, and NBC journalist Muath Abu Taha.
Journalist Ahmad Abu Aziz later succumbed to his wounds, which were sustained in the same attack.
The fourth-floor balcony and staircase area of the Nasser Hospital was frequently used as a live camera position by Reuters, AP, and other international media outlets. Journalists also gathered in the stairwell to try to get cell service to upload their reports.
Israeli military spokespersons have repeatedly changed their story to deflect blame for the apparently deliberate killings at Nasser Medical Complex, the only hospital still operating in southern Gaza.
As international condemnation grew following the strike, the Israeli military claimed that Hamas was using a camera on the stairwell to monitor its troop movements, even though only the Reuters camera was present.
The military then claimed that six of the those killed were “terrorists” from Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ).
However, Sky News examined social media pages and obituaries for each of these six people and found that only one, Omar Abu Teim, had been a resistance fighter.
An Israeli security official speaking with CNN acknowledged that Israeli forces received authorization to strike the camera with a drone. The source said Israeli forces instead fired two tank shells, the first at the camera and the second at the crowd that gathered on the stairwell to help with rescue efforts.
“The shocking thing is why the Israeli air forces hit the journalists on the fourth floor. And when we sent our humanitarian staff to rescue them, they attacked them again,” stated Dr Mohammed Saqer, Director of Nursing at Nasser Hospital.
“What’s the point of this? Why do you insist on killing us? We are working in a humanitarian area, in a health facility. We should be protected according to international regulations and rules,” Saqer added.
The Palestinian ambassador to the UN told the Security Council on Thursday that the Israeli military’s recent “double tap” strike on the Gaza hospital was “premeditated.”
“The second strike on Nasser hospital was a premeditated strike on medics and journalists who arrived at the scene after the first strike,” stated Riyad Mansour.
“While the world demands a permanent ceasefire, Israel continues its crimes. Where else is the killing of so many civilians and journalists tolerated?”
How US-Israeli Regime Change in Iran Failed
By Kit Klarenberg | Global Delinquents |August 28, 2025
On July 29th, the Tel Aviv-based Institute for National Security Studies, a think tank that is enormously influential on Zionist entity ‘defence’ and security policy, published a document advocating for regime change in Iran, setting out potential methods by which Israel could achieve that malign end. In a bitter irony, much of the report’s contents not only attest to the implausibility of achieving such a goal, but lay bare how Benjamin Netanyahu’s calamitous ‘12 Day War’ has made this objective all the more unfeasible.
A flagrant deceit lies at the document’s core. Namely, “Israel did not set the overthrow of the regime in Iran as a goal in the war.” In reality, on June 15th Netanyahu menacingly declared the entity’s unprovoked attack on the Islamic Republic “could certainly” produce regime change. He claimed the government was “very weak”, and “80% of the people would throw these theological thugs out.” Such bold pronouncements were quickly silenced by an unprecedented and devastating missile barrage from Tehran, which Tel Aviv couldn’t repel.
Instead, INSS claims “some” military moves undertaken by the Zionist entity during the 12 Day War “were intended to undermine the foundations” of the Islamic Republic, and ignite mass public protests. However, the Institute admits “not only is there no evidence Israel’s actions advanced this goal, but at least some of them had the opposite effect.” The “clearest example” of this failure, per INSS, was Tel Aviv’s blitzkrieg of Evin prison on June 23rd – a “symbolic blow…intended to encourage public mobilization.”
As it was, scores of civilians, including prisoners and their family members, medical professionals, administrative staff, and lawyers were killed, which “aroused harsh criticism of Israel” even among “critics and opponents” of the Iranian government “inside and outside” the country, the Institute records. Western media and major rights groups condemned the action, with Amnesty International branding it a “serious violation of international humanitarian law” that “must be investigated as a war crime.”
Likewise, attacks on the headquarters of Iran’s internal security forces and IRGC branch Basij “had no noticeable effect and did not lead to eruption of public protests.” INSS suggests Israel’s reckless, indiscriminate targeting of civilian infrastructure during the conflict also neutralised any prospect of citizens taking to streets even if they were at all inclined to do so, due to concerns they may be caught in crossfire. Moreover, Tel Aviv’s belligerence elicited an intense “anti-Israel wave” among the public.
The Institute observes how Iranians “exhibited a notable degree” of “rallying around the flag” during the 12 Day War – “a willingness to defend their homeland at a critical moment against an external enemy.” IINS laments how any and all traces of public dissent in the Islamic Republic “have almost completely disappeared”, in the conflict’s wake. Today, there is no “organized, structured opposition” within or without the country capable of mobilising protesters, let alone displacing the Islamic Republic’s popular government.
Instead, Tel Aviv’s wanton bellicosity has only increased fears among Iranians that foreign powers are seeking to incite and exploit “anarchy and civil war…to impose an alternative political order” on Tehran. It also represented “the most traumatic event for the Iranian public” since the Iran-Iraq war during the 1980s. Millions of citizens, particularly younger generations external actors typically look to as regime change footsoldiers, “have now been exposed to the horrors” of “imposed” conflict – and are resultantly more united than ever against external threats.
‘Inadvertent Effects’
Meanwhile, the Islamic Republic demonstrated a “high level of internal cohesion”, and “ability to recover relatively quickly” from the Zionist entity’s initial onslaught. INSS bemoans how “there is no indication…of a significant and immediate threat to the stability” of Tehran. On top of the government enjoying “considerable support” among Iran’s “security and law enforcement apparatuses,” Mossad-controlled internal networks that initially wreaked havoc upon the 12 Day War’s eruption have been systematically hunted down, and liquidated. It will be difficult if not impossible to reconstruct them.

Iranian rescue workers sift through rubble inside Evin prison following Israel’s attack
Despite all this, the Institute inexplicably declares regime change in Tehran remains “a possible solution” and “worthy goal” – not just for the Zionist entity, but “the region, and the West.” The report sets out four “different strategies for overthrowing” Iran’s government, each more fantastical than the last. INSS advocates “beheading the ruling leadership” – assassinating “senior regime officials, including the Supreme Leader, his inner hive, and the heads of the political and military leadership,” arguing it might “create a reality that could develop into political change.”
The Institute alternatively suggests “a covert campaign to promote regime change, led by military, security, and political elements in Iran,” to foment a violent palace coup. Another option is “encouraging, organizing, and supporting opposition organizations in exile and training them for a quick return to Iran and taking over the centers of governmental power.” Finally, “providing aid and support to ethno-linguistic minorities while encouraging separatist tendencies and internal divisions within Iran” is mooted.
However, INSS contrarily concedes every proposed route “could lead to the opposite results of strengthening the government’s cohesion in Tehran and ‘rallying the public around the flag’,” and should thus be avoided. For example, the few Iranian diaspora who applauded the Zionist entity aggression’s against their home country, if not supported all-out insurrection in Tehran – most prominently monarchists – repulsed domestic audiences. “Large segments of the Iranian public” thus perceive them as “having betrayed Iran in its time of need”:
“Although aligning with pro-Western and pro-Israel diaspora groups that push for revolutionary change may seem natural, such associations may, in fact, undermine the credibility of internal opposition and ultimately obstruct the desired outcome.”
Similarly, the Institute warns assassinating Ali Khamenei – “raised as a possibility during the war” – “would not necessarily result in regime change,” and probably backfire spectacularly. The Islamic Republic “would likely have little difficulty selecting a successor, who could prove to be more extreme or more capable,” and the Supreme Leader’s murder “may also have inadvertent effects, such as elevating him into a martyr.” This would strengthen the government, solidify public opinion against Tel Aviv, and “complicate efforts to destabilize the regime through popular protest.”
Moreover, as a state that prides itself on religious and ethnic diversity and inclusion, “encouraging separatist tendencies” in Iran is likewise judged an ill-omened approach. INSS observes “heightened public sensitivity to any perceived foreign attempts to promote ethnic fragmentation” locally. Efforts to do so by Israel or its Anglo-American puppetmasters would inevitably “be viewed as trying to fracture the country” and rebound, “uniting large segments of the Iranian public against Israel.”
‘Capacity Problems’
No doubt disappointingly from Tel Aviv’s perspective, INSS concludes toppling the Islamic Republic “depends mainly on factors beyond Israel’s control, and on a catalyst whose prediction is elusive and may never materialize.” Despite purportedly “impressive operational successes” in the 12 Day War, the conflict amply demonstrated Zionist entity military action cannot “promote political change processes in Iran.” More generally, “historical experience shows regime change through foreign intervention brings highly questionable results at best” in West Asia:
“The US has failed to achieve the desired results in the vast majority of cases in which it has promoted moves for regime change, and Israel itself has problematic experience in intervening in another country for regime change – both in the First Lebanon War and in the considerable effort to topple Hamas in the Gaza Strip.”
Elsewhere, it’s suggested Iran “could be dragged into a strategic arms race with Israel, further depleting its already strained economic resources and deepening civilian suffering.” However, INSS acknowledges an almost inevitable upshot would be Tehran seeking nuclear weapons capability, given such an arsenal “would serve as an existential insurance policy.” In any event, “Israel, too, faces limits on its military and economic capabilities” – which is quite an understatement. Yet again though, the Institute ultimately endorses “Israel’s decision to actively act toward regime change in Tehran.”
Evidently, from the perspective of Tel Aviv and its Western sponsors, the regime change coast isn’t clear in Tehran. It is therefore imperative Iranian authorities and the public alike remain ever-vigilant of foreign-borne threats, seen and unseen. Yet, the INSS report abundantly underlines how in the 12 Day War’s wake, the Zionist entity has no good options left available, only scope for triggering far worse consequences for itself. And the Institute considerably downplays the extent to which the conflict was a counterproductive catastrophe for Israel.
It’s been reported senior entity officials had been preparing for June 13th since March, seeking to strike before Iran “rebuilt its air defenses by the latter half of the year.” The underlying plan to militarily cripple Tehran and trigger a popular revolution was in turn purportedly “carefully laid months and years in advance,” having been specifically wargamed in conjunction with the Biden administration. Israel gave Tehran its best shot, failed in its each and every objective, and was left battered.
Tel Aviv’s grand scheme to crush the Islamic Republic employed an extraordinary amount of finite munitions, at astronomical cost. A former financial adviser to the ZOF’s chief of staff has estimated the abortive campaign’s first 48 hours alone cost $1.45 billion, with almost $1 billion spent on defensive measures alone. Government economists place the daily cost of military operations at $725 million. Haaretz calculates civilian and domestic financial damage could run to many billions. This, while the entity’s economy is already barely-functioning.
Furthermore, the entity was reportedly running hazardously low on missile interceptors within five days, despite the US being cognisant of “capacity problems” for months prior, and spending intervening months “augmenting Israel’s defenses with systems on the ground, at sea and in the air.” A July report from Zionist lobby group JINSA warned, “after burning through a large portion of their available interceptors,” Washington and Israel “both face an urgent need to replenish stockpiles and sharply increase production rates.”
Grave questions abound over the pair’s ability to do either. JINSA notes US THAAD interceptors provided 60% of the entity’s air defence, expending roughly 14% of Washington’s total THAAD stockpile in the process – which “at current production rates” will take three to eight years to replenish. Iran’s “large-scale missile campaign” moreover “revealed vulnerabilities in Israeli and US air defense systems, providing lessons that Iran or other US adversaries could exploit in the future.”
In sum, the Zionist entity is a beast encircled, reduced to lashing out through desperation, not strength. Its ability to flail against not merely Iran, but the wider Axis of Resistance, without further endangering its already precarious position is extremely limited, if not non-existent. Wholly dependent on foreign support at a time polls indicate it’s the most hated ‘country’ on Earth, Tel Aviv still presumes the capability to make the next move against its adversaries. INSS’ report strongly suggests this could be its very last.
Trump revives Gaza ‘Riviera’ plan in White House meeting with Blair and Kushner
MEMO | August 28, 2025
Former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair has participated in a White House meeting led by Donald Trump and Jared Kushner to discuss Gaza’s future, a gathering that has raised alarm due to its exclusion of Palestinians and ties to a plan that many describe as a blueprint for ethnic cleansing.
The meeting, described as a “large gathering” by Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, reportedly focused on a post-war vision for Gaza that echoes Trump’s earlier calls to depopulate the besieged territory and transform it into a US-controlled “Riviera” on the Mediterranean. Witkoff framed the initiative as “well-meaning,” yet there is widespread concern over an initiative led by figures who back Gaza’s ethnic cleansing.
Blair’s presence at the meeting has drawn scrutiny given previous involvement of staff from his institute with a project widely linked to this so-called “Riviera Plan”. Earlier reporting by the Financial Times (FT) revealed that staff from Blair’s Institute for Global Change took part in discussions involving an economic development slide deck that envisioned a depopulated Gaza rebranded as a smart zone for luxury tourism and offshore development. Although the Blair Institute has stressed that it neither authored nor endorsed the plan, the participation of its staff has raised questions.
Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and former Middle East adviser, has long been an advocate of such proposals. In February 2024, he remarked on the “value” of Gaza’s waterfront and publicly suggested Israel should “move the people out” and redevelop the territory. That statement closely mirrors Trump’s suggestion that the US could oversee the reconstruction of Gaza once its population is expelled.
Trump’s White House has been consulting Kushner for months on the future of Gaza and is reported to have collaborated with economists like Joseph Pelzman, who openly advocated for razing Gaza entirely and relocating its residents. The academic, speaking on an Israeli podcast, outlined a plan to dig up all infrastructure and “move [the locals] around,” suggesting Egypt—described as “bankrupt”—could be pressured into accepting the displaced population.
No Palestinian officials or representatives were present at the meeting. Nor were any Arab states reportedly invited, despite the meeting’s sweeping implications for regional stability. Instead, the attendees included Israeli Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, a close confidant of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The absence of Palestinian voices and the involvement of figures like Kushner, who has dismissed Palestinian statehood and backed Israeli settlement expansion, has intensified criticism.
For Blair, a former Quartet envoy to the Middle East, participation in such a meeting, alongside proponents of Gaza’s ethnic cleansing, is especially controversial. A source close to Blair told the FT that his attendance was driven by a desire to restart a political process and secure a two-state solution, claiming “it is absolutely not and never was about forcible displacement.”
The “Riviera” vision for Gaza has been condemned by Palestinian civil society, international legal scholars and numerous human rights organisations as a dangerous fantasy rooted in colonial logic. Turning a traumatised, war-ravaged land into a playground for foreign investors, while its indigenous population is exiled, has been likened to historical settler projects where violence, displacement and economic opportunism went hand in hand.
The meeting took place just as Israel prepares a fresh ground assault on Gaza City, and after Hamas accepted a ceasefire plan that Israel then rejected. In parallel, Trump officials have worked to block Palestinian statehood initiatives at the UN, pressuring allies including the UK, France and Australia to fall in line.
The price of genocide: How US funding sustains an unraveling Israeli economy
By Ramzy Baroud | MEMO | August 28, 2025
In an important step toward the economic isolation of Israel due to its genocide in Gaza, Norway’s Government Pension Fund Global has decided to divest from yet more Israeli companies.
Norway’s sovereign wealth fund is the world’s largest, with total investments in Israel once estimated at $1.9 billion. The decision to divest was taken gradually but is consistent with the Norwegian government’s growing solidarity with Palestine and rising criticism of Israel.
Taking a leading role along with Spain, Ireland, and Slovenia, Norway has been a vocal European critic of the Israeli genocide and man-made famine in Gaza, actively contributing to the International Court of Justice’s investigation into the genocide, and formally recognising the state of Palestine in May 2024. This diplomatic and legal stance, coupled with its financial divestment, represents a coherent and escalating effort to hold Israel accountable for the ongoing extermination of Palestinians.
The Israeli economy was already in a state of freefall even before the genocide. The initial collapse was related to the deep political instability in the country, a result of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his extremist government’s attempt to co-opt the judicial system, thus compromising any semblance of “democracy” remaining in that country. This resulted in a significant lowering of investor confidence.
The war and genocide, beginning on 7 October 2023, only accelerated the crisis, pushing an already fragile economy to the brink. According to reports from the Israel Ministry of Finance, foreign direct investments in Israel fell by an estimated 28 per cent in the first half of 2024 compared to the same period in 2023.
Any supposed recovery in foreign investments, however, was deceptive. It was not the outcome of a global rallying to save Israel, but rather a consequence of a torrent of US funds pouring in to help Israel sustain both its economy and the genocide in Gaza, along with its other war fronts.
Israel’s Gross Domestic Product was estimated by the World Bank to be around $540 billion by the end of 2024. The war on Gaza has already taken a considerable bite out of Israel’s entire GDP. Estimates from Israel itself are complex, but all data points to the fact that the Israeli economy is suffering and will continue to suffer in the foreseeable future. Citing reports from the Bank of Israel and the Ministry of Finance, the Israeli business newspaper Calcalist reported in January 2025 that the cost of the Israeli war on Gaza had already reached more than $67.5 billion. That figure represented the costs of the war up to the end of 2024.
Keeping in mind that the ongoing war costs continue to rise exponentially, and with other consequences of the war—including divestments from the Israeli market by Norway and other countries—future projections for the Israeli economy look very grim. The Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics reported that the Israeli economy, already in a constant state of contraction, shrunk by another 3.5 per cent in the period between April and June 2025.
This collapse is projected to continue, even with the unprecedented US financial backing of Tel Aviv. Indeed, without US help, the precarious Israeli economy would be in a much worse state. Though the US has always propped up Israel—with nearly $4 billion in aid annually—the US help for Israel in the last two years was the most generous and critical yet.
Israel is the recipient of $3.8 billion of US taxpayer money per year, according to the latest 10-year Memorandum of Understanding signed in 2016. Equally, if not more valuable than this large sum are the loan guarantees, which allow Israel to borrow money at a much lower interest rate on the global market. The backing of the US has, therefore, enabled investors to view the Israeli market as a safe haven for their funds, often guaranteeing high returns. This applies to the Norwegian sovereign wealth fund as it did to numerous other entities and companies.
Now that Israel has become a bad brand, affiliated with unethical investments due to the genocide in Gaza and growing illegal settlement expansion in the West Bank, the US, as Israel’s main benefactor, has stepped in to fill the gaps.
The US emergency supplemental appropriations act of April 2024 allocated a total of $26.4 billion for Israel. While much of the money was earmarked for defense expenditures, in reality, most of it will percolate into the Israeli economy. This amount, in addition to the annual military aid, allows the Israeli government to minimize spending on defense and allocate more money to keep the economy from shrinking at an even faster rate.
Additionally, it will free the Israeli military industry to continue producing new, sophisticated military technology that will ensure Israel’s continued competitiveness in the arms market. The military-industrial complex, a significant part of the Israeli economy, is thus not only sustained but given a fresh impetus by American aid, ensuring the war machine continues to function with minimal financial disruption.
All of this should not diminish the importance of divestment from the Israeli financial system. On the contrary, it means that divestment efforts must increase significantly to balance out the US push to keep the Israeli economy from imploding.
Moreover, this should also make US citizens, who object to their government’s role in the genocide in Gaza, more aware of the extent of Washington’s collaboration to save Israel, even at the price of exterminating the Palestinians. Indeed, the flow of funds from the US is not a passive action; it is an active collaboration that directly enables the Israeli genocide in Gaza.
Compound Crime: Three wounded journalists being denied medical evacuation
Palestinian Information Center – August 27, 2025
GAZA – The Palestinian Journalists Protection Center (PJPC) issued an urgent appeal on Wednesday, demanding the immediate medical evacuation of several Palestinian journalists who sustained severe injuries in a direct Israeli strike on the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Yunis, southern Gaza Strip.
In a press statement, PJPC confirmed that three journalists suffered life-threatening injuries that also jeopardize their professional futures. The wounded journalists are Mohammed Fayeq, who is suffering from partial paralysis that could become total; Jamal Baddah, whose right leg was amputated; and Hatem Omar, who sustained shrapnel wounds to the head.
The center stressed that the ongoing refusal to allow medical evacuation for the wounded journalists constitutes a “compound crime,” adding to the long list of Israeli violations against Palestinian journalists, who have paid a steep price while covering the war in an effort to bring the truth to the world.
PJPC urged international media organizations and press freedom bodies to take immediate action and pressure for the urgent evacuation of the injured journalists so they can receive proper treatment outside Gaza, before it is too late.
On Monday, 20 Palestinians were killed, including journalists and civil defense workers, in a double Israeli airstrike that targeted the Nasser Medical Complex in southern Gaza.
US-Israeli scheme for Lebanon includes forced displacement, turning Beirut suburb into ‘refugee camp’: Report
The Cradle | August 27, 2025
There is a new US plan for a “clampdown” on Beirut’s southern suburb, which could potentially see the area come under the control of a foreign or Arab security force, according to a report released by Al-Akhbar newspaper on 27 August.
The southern suburb, a strong base of support for Hezbollah, was heavily bombarded by Israel during its brutal war on Lebanon last year. The suburb has been repeatedly hit by airstrikes since the ceasefire took effect.
According to Al-Akhbar, the plan aims to “treat the southern suburbs just like Palestinian refugee camps.”
The 1969 Cairo Agreement for years allowed Palestinian groups a degree of autonomy over refugee camps in Lebanon. Despite the agreement being declared null in the 1980s, the status of the camps has remained more or less the same.
However, Lebanese troops maintain checkpoints and a heavy presence around the camps. Palestinian camps in Lebanon have recently begun a symbolic disarmament process in line with the state’s efforts to monopolize control of weapons in the country.
The Al-Akhbar report frames the new US plan as part of Washington’s broader goal of disarming Hezbollah, which the Lebanese government vowed to achieve in a cabinet session in early August.
“The US proposal envisions checkpoints at all entrances [of the Beirut suburb], thorough searches of individuals and vehicles, and a tight control on goods, materials, and money flows. This mission would not be handed to the Lebanese army. Instead, the plan calls for a foreign security force, possibly an Arab one, to take on the task,” it said.
Al-Akhbar also said the plan falls in line with US efforts to “empty the southern border region.”
A recent report by Axios said there is a US plan for a “Trump economic zone” near the southern border, aimed at preventing Hezbollah from re-establishing its presence there. The report said this would happen with the help of Gulf financing.
During a press conference in Lebanon’s Presidential Palace on Tuesday, US envoy Tom Barrack confirmed plans for the economic zone.
“We have to have money coming into the system. The money will come from the Gulf. Qatar and Saudi Arabia are partners and are willing to do that for the south (of Lebanon) if we’re asking a portion of the Lebanese community to give up their livelihood,” Barrack said.
“We have 40,000 people that are being paid by Iran to fight. What are you gonna do with them? Take their weapon and say ‘by the way, good luck planting olive trees?’ It can’t happen. We have to help them,” he added, referring to Hezbollah members.
“We, all of us, the Gulf, the US, the Lebanese are all gonna act together to create an economic forum that is gonna produce a livelihood,” he went on to say.
This economic zone reportedly serves as an ethnic cleansing plan to remove residents of the southern border villages and prevent the return of those already displaced from there.
Lebanese MP and former head of Lebanon’s General Security Directorate Jamil al-Sayyed said in a post last week that “Envoy Tom Barrack has received the Israeli response to his mediation over the south.”
“The response included a ceasefire, the handing over of prisoners, and border demarcation, according to the following conditions: Lebanon must grant Israel the right to remain inside 14 villages and to fully or partially evacuate their residents. The villages Israel demanded in their entirety are: Odaisseh, Kfar Kila, Houla, Markaba, and Aita al-Shaab. The villages where Israel demanded to establish permanent military sites on their outskirts and forests are: Khiam, Ramiya, Yaroun, Aitaroun, Alma al-Shaab, Al-Dhayra, Marwahin, Maroun al-Ras, and Blida,” he added.
“If this news is true, and becomes official tomorrow or soon, it may be celebrated in our country as an ‘achievement’ similar to yesterday’s celebration over the symbolic handover of weapons in Burj al-Barajneh camp,” Sayyed went on to say.
Tom Barrack’s imperial tantrum in Beirut: When entitlement speaks
By Tala Alayli | Al Mayadeen | August 26, 2025
Thomas Barrack, Washington’s special envoy, breezed into Beirut today oozing of the usual arrogance, condescension, and the smug self-righteousness that American officials have long mistaken for diplomacy. In what he must have thought was a moment of wit, Barrack dismissed the Lebanese press as “uncivilized,” even likening journalists’ actions to those of animals.
It is telling, of course, that the representative of a country responsible for the post-1991 siege that killed half a million Iraqi children, which former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright described as “worth it”, turning Afghanistan into an endless graveyard, and underwriting the daily massacres in Gaza, would accuse others of lacking civility.
American officials seem to have mastered this peculiar art: bombing entire nations by morning, then lecturing those nations on decorum by afternoon.
Barrack’s performance is not a slip of the tongue, but a look into the imperial psyche. To him, like most of Western society, Lebanon is not a sovereign country with a free press and a tradition of political debate; it is a space to be managed, where we are expected to smile politely while being lectured on democracy and modernity. Arabs are not clever, competent, and equal human beings, but mindless herd societies that must be subjugated.
And what is civility either way? Surely not the baby-killing machine in Gaza, which has been endlessly praised by the United States, the same administration calling us animalistic. Perhaps the definition must be de-Americanized to make sense.
Besides, it is almost comical that Thomas Barrack, a man who once found himself charged with embezzlement and caged in his house on arrest in the United States with a monitor chained to his ankle, now parades around Lebanon as a moral authority. This is the same envoy whose career has been shadowed by allegations of corruption and shady financial dealings.
If anything, Barrack’s legal entanglements reveal a pattern: entitlement is not just a political habit for American officials, it is a personal one. He walks into Lebanon not as a humbled man marked by scandal, but as an imperial messenger who believes that his past sins are irrelevant, that he is owed respect simply because he carries Washington’s seal.
The irony is maddening: an envoy representing an empire that thrives on plunder, brutality, and deceit, scolding journalists for their supposed lack of manners.
Then leave!
Perhaps the most infuriating was Barrack’s sense of self-importance. “Do you think this is fun for us? Do you think it is economically beneficial for Morgan and I to be here, putting up with this insanity? If that’s not how you’d like to operate, we’re gone.”
Does Barrack think it is fun for us to sit and witness his condescension? Or watch “Israel” obliterate our homes with US-made weapons? Or listen to American-Israeli discourse about how to make the region more agreeable to those who want to overtake our resources, our lands, our lives?
Also, if billions in military aid to the mega-maniacal occupiers is economically beneficial, then surely a trip to Beirut at the US’s own discretion is not a bank-shatterer.
If journalists doing their jobs was slightly too overwhelming for a diplomat who is certainly used to press conferences as such, then said diplomat must rethink his competence.
And if decorum and mutual respect are an overload of work, then leave!
What is it about humiliation?
Yet what is most shameful is not only Barrack’s insult. Such condescension is expected from American envoys. His companion, Morgan Ortagus, once strutted into the Baabda Palace and cheerfully applauded the terrorist pager operation that left thousands of citizens, including children, wounded and blind. “Israel”-born Amos Hochstein once got his afternoon coffee from a Starbucks at a moment of peak boycott and gladly allowed a desperate Lebanese bourgeois citizen to pay.
Equally shameful is the silence that followed. A room full of journalists, veterans of a region where press freedom is under constant attack, sat in silence. Not one voice rose to challenge him.
The Lebanese press corps prides itself on resilience. In a country where journalists have been assassinated, bombed, and silenced, surviving in the profession is no small feat. Yet resilience without dignity is hollow.
What good is endurance if it does not sharpen your spine? What meaning does the word “journalist” carry if you cannot call power to account, especially when that power spits in your face?
Thomas Barrack was a temporary guest; he’s on our land, in our home. When the Trump administration leaves office, he will go back to being an irrelevant nobody. He should not have been allowed to shame the people of this country into silence.
By letting his words pass unchecked, today’s journalists failed not only themselves but the very people they claim to represent. Journalism is not stenography. It is not about politely recording the musings of foreign officials, no matter how insulting. It is about holding those officials accountable, about asking uncomfortable questions, about reminding every diplomat and politician that they are guests in this country, not its overlords.
Dignity, unfortunately, cannot be faked. It is not something anyone can claim retroactively, in editorials or late-night debates. It must be demonstrated in the moment. And this is a disease Lebanon has been plagued with. Only a few understand the true meaning of dignity, while others embarrassingly fail to embody it.
Let us be brutally honest: the American envoy insulted Lebanese journalists to their faces and walked away unscathed. Tomorrow, he will fly back to Washington or to whichever embassy compound he calls home, and he will report that Lebanon is pliable, that it can be insulted with impunity, that this country is still a stage for American entitlement.
Potato Potato, Dignity… Delusion
Lebanon is no stranger to foreign interference. From colonial mandates to military occupations to today’s endless meddling, the country has had to endure a parade of foreign “experts” and “envoys” who arrive with prescriptions and leave with nothing but disdain for the very people they claim to advise.
But through it all, Lebanon’s press has often stood as a thorn in the side of power. That tradition is not something to be taken lightly.
Thomas Barrack’s words today were contemptuous, yes, but they were also a test of whether Lebanese journalists still have the fire to defend their dignity, to insist that Lebanon is not an American playground, that its press is not an expendable backdrop for imperial theatrics. That test was failed.
We cannot afford such failures in today’s political climate. With Gaza burning under Israeli bombs, with Western governments spewing propaganda to justify genocide, with Arab sovereignty under constant threat, the role of the press has never been more urgent.
The journalist’s duty is not to play pleasant host to foreign arrogance but to confront it. To expose it. To ridicule it when it deserves ridicule, and to eviscerate it when it crosses the line of civility.
Right now, the people who sat in that room, deluded by a false sense of dignity, instead of protesting the plain enslavement, have become a laughingstock to those who understand true pride. They have become sitting ducks in front of those who play God.
How disappointing.
These “Iran Bombings” in Australia Are a Setup for Further False Flags
By Andrew Anglin | Daily Stormer | August 26, 2025
As we get ready for the next round of the Iran war, Western governments need to come up with an explanation as to why we are going to war for Israel beyond “shielding Jews from blowback as a result of their genocide in Gaza.”
Enter: “Iranian backed terror.”
You have probably heard the claim in various Jewish media that Iran is a “state-backer of terrorism.” However, this claim, when dissected, does not refer to ISIS or al-Qeada style terrorism, but rather is a reference to Iran’s funding of various militias around the Middle East. For example, the media categorizes Iran’s support for Hezbollah and the Houthis as “backing terrorism.” Whatever you think of the militias Iran does back, this is something different than blowing up buildings or running people over with a big truck in Europe or America.
There have been some shaky claims of Iran sponsoring bombings in Saudi and Argentina in the 1990s, and in 2012, India said Iranians tried to kill an Israeli diplomat with a bomb. The same guy was accused of doing a bombing in Thailand, however, and after being extradited to Thailand from Malaysia, the Thai authorities refused to charge him and released him to Iran.
All of this is to say that this week’s accusations by the Australian Prime Minister that the Iranian government was behind the bombing of a synagogue and a Jewish deli in Australia are something different than we’ve seen before. The Melbourne synagogue was bombed on December 6th of last year. The Sydney deli, which burned up last October, was not even originally investigated as foul play by the cops. No one died in either “attack.”
As those who study the Jews are all too aware, Jewish very often commit hate crimes against themselves. Even before terrorism was a thing, Jews would regularly burn down their own properties to collect insurance money. The term “Jewish lightning” is in the lexicon to refer to anyone burning down their own property for the insurance, as Jews were so famous for this behavior (similarly to how a non-Jewish person viewed as greedy might be called “Shylock”).
It’s maybe worth noting that since the bombing, the rabbi from the synagogue in question has been on a donations tour, and with the announcement it was Iran, is on another tour asking for even more free money.
What’s more, if these were indeed intentional attacks from someone, their timing, in the middle of the Gaza genocide, could mean that literally anyone could be responsible. Although Moslems would probably be more likely, it is not hard to imagine a non-Moslem outraged at the scenes on TikTok doing something like this. On its face, blaming the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps for the bombing of a random deli and synagogue in Australia sounds ridiculous, and it seems they would be some of the last people on the list of suspects.
Even if you believe Iran was responsible for the attacks they were accused of in the 1990s and then the 2012 events, those were all political or military targets. The idea of a serious military organization ordering random restaurants and synagogues in a random country blown up is silly. Iran is capable of sending rockets at Israel, they are capable of cutting off Israel’s access to shipping lanes. It makes no sense they would sink to street level random acts of random violence, which would not need any central planning.
Further, the fact that the firebombing would not need to be centrally planned means that it would be impossible to trace it to Iranian authorities. What would even be the claim? That they found text messages from a general in the IRGC? And that it took them nearly a year to find these text messages?
The identities of the accused have not been revealed, but the claim by the government is that they are street criminals who also committed other crimes who the IRGC hired through their networks to carry out these very serious firebombings that had no political purpose and where no one even died.
Here’s the Thing
This announcement by the weasel Prime Minister Anthony Albanese that Iran ordered the bombing of these random civilian locations in a white, Western country has been a top news story all over the world. Although no one is likely to look too deeply into it, because again, literally no one died, this gets the idea that “Iran is funding terrorist attacks on civilians” into the minds of the masses of the people.
With the attacks on the World Trade Center in 2001, the FBI had previously coordinated an attempted bombing of the same buildings in 1993 as a kind of precursor. Then you had the second attack, with the airplanes, lead to an invasion of Afghanistan. Then, in the weeks and months after 9/11, someone was sending Anthrax all around to media and government people, which is when the media/government started talking about Iraq as working with the al-Qeada. In 2008, they then said it was actually some random white guy that did the anthrax. He was, conveniently, already dead.
This is the note that was with the Anthrax sent to Tom Brokaw:

The FBI never really bothered to try to explain why a white guy would do that.
But refencing the Anthrax mailed around, Colin (pronuonced “Colon” for some reason) Powell brought white powder as a prop to his UN presentation on the need to. invade Iraq,
There was an ongoing triangle of disinformation and fake news passing from the New York Times, Dick Cheney, and Fox News. They were accusing Saddam of all kinds of things, just like they are with Iran right now, but the core of it was Cheney’s “Sinister Nexus of Terror.”
You still had the steam from 9/11 when they did the Iraq war less than two years later. But with Iran now, are we really supposed to do a massive war because of October 7th? Or is there going to need to be something more significant to motivate people?
I would very much expect that this Australian cafe and synagogue is the beginning of something bigger. With 9/11 and the Anthrax, when people were saying “oh they can’t be false flags, the government wouldn’t do that,” it was like “well, they started fake wars and killed like a million people, so why wouldn’t they blow up some buildings or send some powders?”
Looking back now, it feels like the “12 Day War” (the term they are using for the back and forth between Israel and Iran that involved Trump also dropping bombs on Iran) was a kind of probing event, where they wanted to see what Iran had. I think they were possibly a bit surprised at how capable Iran was. They were not the superpower capable of wiping Israel off the map that Scott Ritter had told everyone they were, but they were able to hit Israel and with missiles and cause real damage, and it was going to be impossible for Israel to keep going much longer before they were running out of their interceptor missiles.
Israel’s view on Iran has not changed, they are saying they are going to attack them again, and there is no way they can do it without the US, and involving the US on a large scale will probably take more than some all caps Trump tweets.
Obviously, at this point, huge numbers of people are going to be saying “false flag,” even if it is something on the scale of 9/11. So I don’t claim to know how this would work. If I was Donald Trump, I’d be worried the Mossad was going to assassinate me and blame Iran. That would get all the Trump supporters behind a war and it would leave leftists confused as to how they should feel, because if they said “false flag,” they might feel like they were defending Trump. Also, there has already been a “foreshadowing” event where Trump was allegedly scraped on the ear. And, I would add, that a personality like Trump getting shot would just generally be a bigger shock to the world than a bombing, which we’ve all already seen a lot of.
Or maybe I’m wrong and there is already enough noise and there doesn’t need to be some big event to justify further action in Iran. I guess the issue is that I don’t know really what it would take. If there needed to be an Iraq style invasion, then you would need some pretty big justification. But no one understands the logistics of this war. Like I said, I think the first thing was a test as much as anything.
But there are a lot of questions.
If there was large scale bombing of Tehran, could they do a “regime change” from the air? If so, could they keep shooting rockets without a “regime”? How stable is the domestic situation in the country? How do the Arabs, Azeris, and other minorities feel? (I think we know how the Kurds feel, lol. But the others, who knows? I don’t know. I do know that Persians are barely half the population.) Are there terrorists that can be moved in through Azerbaijan? What happened all those terrorists in Syria now that their guy is in charge? Can they be moved through Iraq and into Iran? It’s much more mountainous in Iran.
This is a lot different than when ISIS was able to just roll around wherever on the flats in the Iraqi/Syrian desert.
The mountains also provide a lot of cover for hydra-type break-off groups to operate if the government falls or is at least incapable of operating normally. I’m sure they have caves loaded up with drones and cheap missiles, and as we saw in the 12 Day War, the cost of shooting them down is too much for Israel to absorb. Even if they have infinity money from Big Daddy Donald, they can’t make that many interceptor missiles.
Those are some of the big questions. There are more questions. I’m sure the people within intelligence have better estimates than I would be able to come up with as to what the answers to these questions might be, but I think even US/Israeli intelligence can’t give definite answers regarding most of these factors.
What I do think is that slowly drilling away at it until the armor cracks like they did with Syria is not a potential strategy given that unlike Syria, Iran can hit Israel with missiles. So I’m sure what Bibi wants is the full force of the US military to be brought to bear in a full invasion type war. And for that to happen, it is most likely that something very extreme would have to precipitate it.
Photojournalist resigns from Reuters over its ‘betrayal of journalists’ in Gaza

MEMO | August 26, 2025
Canadian photojournalist Valerie Zink has resigned after eight years with Reuters, criticizing the news agency’s stance on Gaza as a “betrayal of journalists” and accusing it of “justifying and enabling” the killing of 245 journalists in the Palestinian enclave, Anadolu reports.
“At this point it’s become impossible for me to maintain a relationship with Reuters given its role in justifying and enabling the systematic assassination of 245 journalists in Gaza,” Zink said Tuesday through the US social media company X.
Zink said she worked as a Reuters stringer for eight years, with her photos published by many outlets, including The New York Times, Al Jazeera, and others worldwide.
She criticized Reuters’ reporting after the killing of Anas Al-Sharif and an Al Jazeera crew in Gaza, accusing the agency of amplifying Israel’s “entirely baseless claim” that Al-Sharif was a Hamas operative, which was “one of countless lies that media outlets like Reuters have dutifully repeated and dignified,” she said.
“I have valued the work that I brought to Reuters over the past eight years, but at this point I can’t conceive of wearing this press pass with anything but deep shame and grief,” Zink said.
Zink also emphasized that the agency’s willingness to “perpetuate Israel’s propaganda” has not spared their own reporters from Israel’s genocide.
“I don’t know what it means to begin to honour the courage and sacrifice of journalists in Gaza, the bravest and best to ever live, but going forward I will direct whatever contributions I have to offer with that front of mind,” Zink highlighted, reflecting on the courage of Gaza’s journalists.
“I owe my colleagues in Palestine at least this much, and so much more,” she added.
Referring to the killing of six more journalists, including Reuters cameraman Hossam Al-Masri, in Israel’s Monday attack on the Nasser hospital in Gaza, Zink said: “It was what’s known as a “double tap” strike, in which Israel bombs a civilian target like a school or hospital; waits for medics, rescue teams, and journalists to arrive; and then strikes again.”
Zink underlined that Western media is directly culpable for creating the conditions for these events, quoting Jeremy Scahill, who said major outlets—from the New York Times to Reuters—have served as “a conveyor belt for Israeli propaganda,” sanitizing war crimes, dehumanizing victims, and abandoning both their colleagues and their commitment to true and ethical reporting.
She said Western media outlets, by “repeating Israel’s genocidal fabrications without determining if they have any credibility” and abandoning basic journalistic responsibility, have enabled the killing of more journalists in Gaza in two years than in major global conflicts combined, while also contributing to the suffering of the population.
The new fatalities among the media personnel in Gaza brought the number of Palestinian journalists killed in Israeli attacks since October 2023 to 246.
Israel has killed more than 62,700 Palestinians in Gaza since October 2023. The military campaign has devastated the enclave, which is facing famine.
Last November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.
READ ALSO: China ‘shocked’ over Israeli killing of journalists in Gaza
The Palestine Chronicle case: When truth becomes the crime
By Mohamed El Mokhtar | MEMO | August 26, 2025
The Palestine Chronicle is not a militant organisation. It is a modest, independent publication, sustained by small donations and animated by a singular mission: to bear witness. It tells the untold stories of Palestine, documenting dispossession, resistance, and the endurance of a people condemned to silence. In a media landscape dominated by powerful conglomerates repeating the language of governments, the Chronicle insists on a journalism of proximity — grounded in daily lives, in the rubble of Gaza, in voices otherwise erased. Its true offense, in the eyes of its detractors, is not invention but truth.
At the heart of this endeavor stands Ramzy Baroud. His career is the antithesis of clandestine. For decades he has written, taught, and spoken in public, producing books translated into multiple languages, contributing columns to international publications, addressing audiences in universities and public forums across continents. He is not a shadowy figure; he is a man whose work has been consistent, transparent, and intellectually rigorous. His life is not untouched by the tragedy he describes: many members of his family were killed under Israeli bombardments. Yet while mainstream media rushed to amplify unproven allegations against him, they remained deaf to his personal grief. His tragedy was ignored, his integrity overlooked, his voice distorted — because his engagement is unbearable to those who would prefer silence.
A crime of conscience, not of law
He is an engaged journalist in the noblest sense: independent, lucid, unflinching. His so-called crime is not collusion with violence but fidelity to memory. That is why he is demonised — not for what he has done in law, but for what he represents in conscience. America, unable to silence Palestinian voices through censorship alone, now instrumentalises its justice system to achieve by indictment what it failed to achieve by argument. Having harassed universities, intimidated students, and punished professors for their solidarity with Gaza, it turns the courtroom into a new battlefield. And Congress, captive to the whims of its Zionist masters, joins the manhunt, targeting a journalist for the sole offense of telling the truth of his people. As for the mainstream press, it chooses cowardice: ignoring his family’s suffering, ignoring the emptiness of the charges, while echoing the accusations of power as if they were evidence.
Law twisted into a weapon
The complaint filed against Ramzy Baroud and the organization (People Media Project) that runs the Palestine Chronicle rests on the Alien Tort Statute, grotesquely overstretched to criminalise editorial decisions rather than acts of war. It alleges that by publishing articles from Abdallah Aljamal — described by Israel as a Hamas operative killed during a hostage rescue — the Chronicle “aided and abetted” terrorism. But here lies the first fissure: this characterisation of Aljamal comes exclusively from Israeli military sources, themselves a belligerent party. It has never been independently verified. The claim that he was both a journalist and a Hamas operative remains an allegation, not an established fact. To treat it as judicial evidence is to replace proof with propaganda.
Even if—hypothetically—Aljamal had, at the demand of a militant group, harbored hostages, such a circumstance would not in itself render him culpable: what ordinary civilian in a war zone can refuse the command of militants under threat of force? And even if it occurred, how could Ramzy Baroud have known of it? Even taken at face value, the allegation collapses upon scrutiny. No evidence demonstrates that the Chronicle or its editor had actual knowledge of Aljamal’s supposed operational role, nor that modest freelance payments — if any at all — bore any causal nexus to hostage-taking. The federal judge, in February 2025, dismissed the original complaint precisely for lack of proof of knowledge or intent. The plaintiffs returned with an amended filing, repackaged in rhetoric and pathos, but still devoid of the material elements required under international law: actus reus (a substantial contribution to the crime) and mens rea (intent or knowledge).
To equate the publication of articles with material support for terrorism is not jurisprudence but a juridical contortion. It is the substitution of law by politics, the criminalisation of journalism under the mask of counterterrorism. What is sought is not justice but intimidation — to cast suspicion on every Palestinian voice, to brand their words as weapons, their witness as crime.
Thus the legal emptiness is evident:
- Jurisdiction overstretched: the Alien Tort Statute (ATS) was never intended to criminalise editorial contracts.
- Elements unmet: no proven knowledge, no intent, no substantial assistance.
- Factual foundation unstable: the Hamas label rests on unverified allegations from one warring party.
- Political aim transparent: to silence Palestinians and punish one of their most articulate representatives for his independence.
This case is not justice. It is intimidation. It is not law. It is propaganda dressed in the robes of a courtroom. The allegation against Ramzy Baroud rests not on proof, but on the word of a belligerent army. An army that bombs, besieges, and kills — and then dictates who is journalist, who is terrorist, who is fit to speak. To transform those claims into evidence is to surrender law itself to war.
Ramzy Baroud is not a conspirator. He is a journalist of record, a man of books, a teacher, a witness. His own family has been buried under rubble. And yet, America has not mourned them, has not spoken of them. Instead, it chooses to hunt him — to turn his grief into accusation, his fidelity into crime.
Some congressmen have joined this manhunt, eager to please their Zionist patrons. Universities have been disciplined, their students silenced. The press, that great sentinel of truth, has abandoned him, repeating only the charges while ignoring his suffering. This is not democracy. It is servitude.
The elements of law are absent. There is no actus reus, no mens rea, no causal link. There is only suspicion. There is only the will to silence.
And so the true purpose stands naked: to criminalise the Palestinian word, to punish a journalist for speaking the truth of Gaza, to make an example of him so that others will be afraid to write.
But intimidation is not justice. A trial without evidence is not law. And silencing the witness will not erase the truth.
Law or servitude
Here one hears Thurgood Marshall’s axiom: “The Constitution does not permit the discrimination of silence.” One hears Cochran’s defiance: “If the proof is not there, the case cannot stand.” One hears Vergès exposing the colonial reflex that brands resistance as terror. One hears Vedel’s warning: that when law is bent to politics, law ceases to exist.
Ramzy Baroud stands here not accused, but accusing. He accuses a system that bends to power, a Congress that bows to lobbyists, a press that betrays its duty, and a nation that dares call itself free while shackling its own justice.
Therefore, the American justicial system has a choice: to lend its authority to propaganda, or to defend the very principle that sustains law — that guilt must be proven, not declared. To condemn Ramzy Baroud would be to condemn journalism itself. To acquit him is to restore some dignity to justice. The choice is clear.
Here is why the Israeli occupation of Gaza won’t work
By Robert Inlakesh | Al Mayadeen | August 26, 2025
At every key juncture of the Zionist regime’s “seven front war”, it has announced new plans that it will claim are going to defeat Hamas or that they will reach a ceasefire agreement. The truth is that they have no intention of reaching a negotiated settlement, nor do they have a plan to achieve “victory” in Gaza.
At the beginning of the Zionist entity’s ground invasion of the Gaza Strip, in late October of 2023, its military campaign had focused on northern Gaza. For those who remember, the major goal of their operation at the time was to take control of al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, claiming it to be a “Hamas command and control center”.
Back then, the Western corporate media reported that US intelligence reports supported the notion that at the very least, there was a Hamas “command node” based there, as the Israeli army released CGI footage featuring an extensive tunnel network under the hospital.
After committing various massacres, in and around al-Shifa Medical Complex, it became clear that the claims were all lies and no Hamas infrastructure existed underneath the hospital. However, the Israelis and their Western allies did not admit that the entire military operation was based upon a pack of lies and that no Hamas targets were there; instead, they simply moved on to the next major set of lies, as the Zionist military finished off its genocidal missions in northern Gaza.
Failing to inflict any major blow, let alone a total defeat upon Hamas or any of the some dozen Palestinian armed groups in northern Gaza, then came the claim that “the real Hamas headquarters” were in Khan Younis. In December of 2024, again with the full backing of their Western allies and their media machines, the Israelis launched the invasion of Khan Younis.
After besieging Khan Younis in January of 2024, they eventually made it their final mission to assault the Nasser Hospital, again claiming that it was used by Hamas as a major base. By this time, the Israelis had launched a campaign to systematically target every hospital their forces worked in the vicinity of, seizing medical workers and the injured as captives, inflicting massacres, setting up bases inside the hospitals, and always claiming that Hamas was there.
As the military campaign on the ground waged on, the Israeli public realised that they were not even one step closer to the “total defeat” of Hamas that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had promised them. So then began the talk of invading Rafah.
Israeli political leaders vowed that without invading Rafah, they could not “win the war”. They claimed that tunnels were leading into Gaza from Egypt, despite knowing they were all sealed off around a decade ago.
In the lead-up to the invasion of Rafah, a massive deception campaign was launched with the full unquestioning complicity of the Western media. We heard about then US President Joe Biden’s alleged “red line” being Rafah. Up until that point, we had also heard about Biden hanging up the phone on Netanyahu, yelling at him and even swearing, for which there was never any evidence produced.
We had the propaganda of a “Christmas ceasefire” and a “Ramadan ceasefire”, with even the UN Security Council voting on the temporary Ramadan ceasefire that never materialised. The public was also informed about all of the alleged hard work that the US government was doing to achieve a ceasefire, which we would later learn never happened from Israeli media leaks; Biden never once asked his Israeli allies for a ceasefire.
In the lead-up to the invasion of Rafah, which would eventually happen on May 6 with full US support, we heard two main narratives. One warned of the impending humanitarian disaster after the Israelis had displaced the majority of the population to Rafah, the second was the idea that this would mean the defeat of Hamas and would rob the group of its financing networks.
Evidently, the Israelis launched their invasion, and unsurprisingly, it was more of the same; they continued mass murdering civilians and destroying Gaza’s infrastructure. Hamas still lived. There were even initiatives then like the failed US military aid pier, which only appeared to have been used one time, for a deadly military operation in Nuseirat that killed around 300 civilians to seize back Israeli captives.
Fast forward to October 2024, when we began to hear about the infamous “General’s Plan”, an operation that was again sold by the Israeli regime and its media as the final blow to end Hamas by besieging northern Gaza entirely and then starving out the remaining fighters. This went on for months, until there was a ceasefire declared in January.
On March 18, the Israelis violated the Gaza Ceasefire. Then came an escalation in its genocidal campaign against civilians in the territory, an uptick once again in the bombardment, coupled with the total blockade on all aid into the territory that would last over 80 days.
For some time after violating the ceasefire, the Israeli media and regime’s officials promoted the idea of a new operation that was going to be the most explosive yet and the final blow against Hamas. They spoke of potentially new weapons and strategies, hyping up the campaign to be a game changer.
The May offensive was then labelled “Operation Gideon’s Chariots”, dubbed “Phase 2” of the Gaza war. First, the Israeli media hyped it up and put out reports that 20,000 reservists had been called up to duty, then we heard 60,000, the next day 50,000, some even claimed 100,000 soldiers would be used to invade Gaza.
The real result was a few small incursions into the outskirts of major cities and camps, which were met with deadly ambushes carried out by the Palestinian resistance. “Gideon’s Chariots” was a game changer, but repeated the exact same cowardly strategy as every Israeli operation before it.
So now we have the approval of plans to “occupy Gaza”. Originally, the idea communicated across Israeli media platforms was that all of Gaza would be occupied, which is what Netanyahu would go on to claim. Then it went back and forth between all of the territory and just Gaza City, which is not the established goal of the newly approved operation.
Logistically, this plan makes no sense for an already overburdened Zionist military force that does not want to fight in the Gaza Strip at all anymore. They’ll need an absolute minimum of 200,000 soldiers just to occupy Gaza City, a plan that, according to Israeli military analyst,s will take between 2 to 5 years to properly complete.
On top of this, the strategy runs contrary to the Israeli military’s doctrine and strategy that it has followed throughout the entire war. The reality on the ground is that with the exception of a limited number of special forces operations, the Israeli army never targeted Hamas. They invaded with the intention of making Gaza unlivable and have systematically dismantled the territory’s infrastructure, while inflicting a genocide.
The truth is that they have no military strategy to defeat Hamas. They don’t even have an answer as to how to end the fighting at all, even as their allied Arab regime attempts to give them solutions. A ceasefire would happen within a day if they wanted it to, but they clearly don’t, and no Israeli politician even accepts the notion of the Palestinian Authority taking over Gaza because they believe it will lead to a so-called “Two-State solution”.
So here we are again, back to the same old tired Israeli script. They send negotiating delegations with no intention of reaching deals and launch new operations that will ultimately fail to achieve anything other than continuing the slaughter of civilians.
The Zionist Entity has done everything except actually target and try to fight the Palestinian Resistance on the ground, hiding in fortified areas and inside their military vehicles, occasionally getting picked off by ambushes. This is also why they have no battle footage despite having fought for 22 months, because they only engage in armed clashes on the ground when they are being attacked by the Palestinian armed groups. There is no real army, it’s a glorified police force that was built to bully teenagers, with a sophisticated intelligence apparatus and air force behind it.
It appears very unlikely that we will see Israeli soldiers manning checkpoints in between tent cities in Gaza and managing everyday life like we see in the occupied West Bank. Simply put, they are too cowardly for this task, and unlike the case in the West Bank, it will be extremely dangerous for them to do this, costing them thousands of casualties over a long period of time.
More likely than not, this has all been psychological warfare, as the Israeli military prepares to attack on a different front. Although it does seem likely they will launch some kind of operation in northern Gaza, one which will accelerate its mass murder of civilians, but will fail to achieve its stated objectives.
Jerusalem churches say their staff will not leave Gaza City

Palestinian Information Center – August 26, 2025
OCCUPIED JERUSALEM – The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate and the Latin Patriarchate in Occupied Jerusalem have said that their staff will not evacuate Gaza City, ahead of the Israeli occupation regime’s declared intent to take control of the city, where hundreds of thousands of civilians live.
In a joint statement on Tuesday, the patriarchates said that the Greek Orthodox compound of Saint Porphyrius and the Holy Family Church compound have been refuges for hundreds of civilians since the outbreak of war in October 2023, among them elderly people, women, and children.
“Among those who have sought shelter within the walls of the compounds, many are weakened and malnourished due to the hardships of the last months. Leaving Gaza City and trying to flee to the south would be nothing less than a death sentence. For this reason, the clergy and nuns have decided to remain and continue to care for all those who will be in the compounds,” they said.
They criticized Israel’s announced attack, saying “there can be no future based on captivity, displacement of Palestinians or revenge.”
The patriarchates called on the international community to act for an end of this deadly and destructive war.
