Palestine

[blindpig]

Trump Gaza: Capitalist Necrophilia
Posted by Internationalist 360° on February 27, 2025
BettBeat Media



That a U.S. president can openly advocate for what amounts to ethnic cleansing and present it as a real estate opportunity marks the complete moral death of Western “civilization.”

The moral rot at the heart of late-stage capitalism has found its most grotesque expression in Donald Trump’s AI-generated fever dream of a “transformed” Gaza, posted without shame on his own Truth Social platform. Here, in three minutes of digital hallucination – broadcast to his millions of followers – we witness the complete moral collapse of America’s ruling class, their pathological detachment from human suffering, and their messianic delusions of recreating the world in their own twisted image.

The video begins, without irony or shame, amid the apocalyptic ruins of Gaza – a land where American-supplied bombs have possibly killed over 500,000 people, of whom at least half were children. This real-world carnage serves merely as the establishing shot for Trump’s perverted utopia. The message is clear: mass death is simply the necessary prelude to profitable development.

What follows is a pornography of power that would make Napoleon blush. Golden Trump statues rise from blood-soaked earth. Wealthy tourists frolic where Palestinian children once played. Casino lights flash above mass graves. Each frame screams the truth about our ruling class: they do not see human beings; they see assets to be seized and territories to be branded.

This is not merely a promotional video. It is a manifesto of capitalism, where the machinery of mass killing serves as the advance team for real estate development. The transformation Trump envisions – from a living, breathing Palestinian society to a sterile playground for the global rich – represents the ultimate fantasy of capitalism: the complete erasure of indigenous populations and their replacement with profitable ventures.

From Pedophilia to Necrophilia

The video’s aesthetic touches betray the colonial mindset that has never left the Western ruling class. Arab women are reduced to an orientalist sexual fantasy – an AI-generated scene showing a scantily clad woman dancing intimately with Trump himself. While the — most likely accidental — inclusion of bearded trans dancers seems like a surprisingly modern progressive touch, it merely updates rather than challenges the core colonial fantasy. Whether traditional belly dancers or gender-nonconforming performers, these bodies exist purely as exotic props for the billionaire class’s entertainment. The AI-generated fever dream simply expands the menu of available sexual commodities while maintaining the same power dynamic: colonized bodies performing for the colonizer’s pleasure. It’s not progress – it’s just orientalism with a rainbow capitalist makeover.

What makes this document truly terrifying is not its cartoonish excess but its honesty. Here, finally, is the unvarnished truth about how our oligarchs view the world. The mass death in Gaza is not, in their minds, a humanitarian catastrophe – it is a business opportunity. The displacement of millions is not a tragedy – it is a chance to “develop” prime Mediterranean real estate.

This is the end game of unfettered capitalism: a system so morally bankrupt that it can broadcast its own psychopathy as a promotional video. From Epstein’s pedophilic island playground to necrophilic fever dream of a “transformed” Gaza, the billionaire class has finally dropped its civilized mask. They no longer feel the need to hide their depraved fantasies. The progression is clear – from the sexual exploitation of children in private compounds to publicly fantasizing about building luxury resorts atop mass graves. They show us exactly who they are: merchants of death who see human suffering, whether of trafficked children or bombed civilians, as merely raw material for their grotesque appetites and profits.

The Palestinian journalist Yousef Alalo, speaking with quiet dignity about the Gaza he knew – with its hotels, resorts, and families enjoying the Mediterranean beaches – provides a stark contrast to Trump’s vulgar fantasy. “Gaza would have become Singapore or Dubai,” he notes, “if Israel and the US had allowed Palestinians to build their city or extract the natural gas off their shore.” But actual development, actual prosperity for the Palestinian people, was never the goal.

We are watching, in real time, the complete merger of state violence with corporate greed, of military occupation with luxury real estate development. This is what the end of empire looks like: a gold-plated fever dream built on mountains of corpses.

The most terrifying aspect of Trump’s video is not its content but its context – the fact that it exists at all. That a U.S. president can openly advocate for what amounts to ethnic cleansing and present it as a real estate opportunity marks the complete moral death of Western “civilization.”

– Karim



https://libya360.wordpress.com/2025/02/ ... crophilia/

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Can Egypt rebuild Gaza without forcing Palestinians out?

As Gaza lies in ruins, Egypt is pushing a massive Arab-backed reconstruction plan—one that keeps Palestinians in place rather than displacing them. But with Hamas facing internal rifts, Israel tightening its grip, and Trump pushing his own agenda, can Cairo pull it off?


The Cradle's Palestine Correspondent

FEB 28, 2025


Photo Credit: The Cradle

"Whoever failed to stop the war in Gaza or deliver aid as it should have been, cannot be relied upon today to save Gazans from displacement or to secure an agreement in their favor. But we are forced to smile at Arab regimes, to navigate the four harsh years of Donald Trump, and to avoid an imminent social explosion inside Gaza." – Sources within Hamas, speaking to The Cradle.

This sentiment reflects the political reality Hamas is dealing with, as explained by sources who prefer to remain unnamed due to the sensitivities involved. Unlike previous conflicts, this war has seen a reliance on off-the-record statements from Palestinian, Israeli, and even US sources rather than official declarations.

It is within this context that remarks made by Hamas political bureau member Mousa Abu Marzouk to The New York Times can be understood. His statements, which were later denied, did not just include expressions of regret over Operation Al-Aqsa Flood but also raised the possibility of abandoning armed resistance.

The Wall Street Journal took it a step further, suggesting that Hamas’s external leadership was considering distancing itself from the Gaza-based leadership due to their differing approaches. Whether this signals a real internal divide within the movement or is part of a strategic effort to manage the international and regional backlash triggered by Trump’s return to the White House is unclear.

What is certain, however, is that a more immediate issue is now at play—the Egyptian-Arab plan for Gaza’s reconstruction, an initiative that is being framed as an alternative to Trump’s “Riviera” proposal to displace Gazans. The key question is whether Trump will accept it.

Egypt’s role in rebuilding Gaza

Egypt is at the center of this plan, given its direct border with Gaza, which makes it the primary stakeholder when it comes to both security and economic concerns. Arab countries are working with Cairo to push the initiative forward, aiming to secure international backing while preventing a scenario that would see another Nakba with Palestinians being forced out of their land.

Efforts are underway to organize a reconstruction conference that will include broad European participation, with plans to begin the first phase of rebuilding. According to Egyptian sources cited in Arab media, the approach is to reconstruct Gaza while keeping its residents in place.

The plan divides the territory into three humanitarian zones, each containing a large camp where displaced families will be provided basic necessities, including water and electricity.

To accommodate those who have lost their homes, thousands of prefabricated housing units, including caravans and upgraded tents, will be introduced in designated safe areas for a six-month period.

This will happen in parallel with debris removal, though the occupation state is currently blocking these efforts. Those backing the plan are working to ensure that the volume of aid trucks entering Gaza is restored to pre-war levels, with fuel and construction equipment included.

The scope of the reconstruction effort

The plan is expected to be funded through a combination of Arab and international sources, with around fifty multinational companies specializing in construction and urban planning involved. The goal is to build secure housing units within a year and a half across the three designated zones in Gaza.

One possibility under discussion is the creation of an Arab-led reconstruction fund, with suggestions that it could be named the “Trump Fund for Rebuilding Gaza.” Reuters has also reported that the plan includes a proposal to establish a buffer zone along the border between Gaza and Egypt to prevent the construction of tunnels, alongside the removal of rubble and the establishment of twenty temporary housing areas.

The Egyptian Engineers Syndicate has already announced its readiness to contribute to the effort, forming an advisory committee to develop a high-level technical strategy for reconstruction. The syndicate’s chairman, Tarek el-Nabrawy, emphasized that the initiative will be carried out in cooperation with the Arab Engineers Union and could take anywhere from three to five years to complete, depending on the level of international support.

Given the scale of destruction in Gaza, hundreds of companies, engineering firms, and alliances from Egypt, the Arab world, and beyond will be needed to execute the project.

The implementation of the plan follows a structured approach. The first priority is the removal of rubble, with some of the debris set to be recycled for construction purposes. This will be followed by the development of essential infrastructure, including water and sewage networks, electricity, desalination plants, and communication lines. Only once these foundational elements are in place will the urban planning phase begin, leading to the construction of homes, schools, healthcare facilities, and cultural centers.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) – favored by the US and Israel to replace Hamas in governing Gaza has also presented its own reconstruction plan. At a cabinet meeting in Ramallah on 18 February, Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa outlined a two-phase approach.

The first phase, expected to last three years, carries an estimated cost of $20 billion and will focus on emergency interventions. The second phase, for which no timeframe has been set, will emphasize large-scale reconstruction and is projected to cost at least $33 billion dollars, based on UN assessments.

Behind the scenes: Cairo’s strategic calculations

Beyond the official announcements, additional details have emerged from sources speaking to The Cradle. These sources reveal that Egypt’s reconstruction plan involves multiple parallel tracks, with the first phase alone expected to take between three and five years.

This timeline was determined based on detailed maps provided to Cairo from various sources, which have guided planning efforts within the Egyptian armed forces’ Engineering Authority. Experts have been consulted to estimate the time and resources required for implementation, ensuring that the plan remains feasible.

Egypt has historically viewed Gaza as a security issue above all else. One retired Egyptian general describes it as a region that has been “rebellious” since the time of Muhammad Ali. Even when Egypt governed Gaza between the 1950s and 1967, relations between the Egyptian military and the local population were often fraught.

The administrative unit that once managed Gaza during this period still exists in Cairo’s Nasr City, operating under military intelligence, where it maintains a vast archive on Gaza and its inhabitants. Its employees remain on the government payroll, a sign that Egypt has always kept the possibility of reclaiming control over Gaza in mind, even after the Oslo Accords and the establishment of Palestinian self-rule.

Housing and infrastructure

In terms of execution, the plan prioritizes the deployment of prefabricated housing units in well-organized clusters that will allow Gaza’s social structure to remain intact. The war has severely disrupted extended families that traditionally live near one another, and the new housing arrangements aim to restore these connections.

Over time, these temporary homes will be replaced with more permanent structures, depending on what Israel allows to enter Gaza. Meanwhile, efforts will be made to replace damaged tents with higher-quality alternatives for those still living in emergency conditions.

As reconstruction advances, additional housing units will be introduced in areas where they can be accommodated. Egyptian authorities have already identified specific locations for rubble clearance, including sites in both northern and southern Gaza.

This stands in contrast to Israel’s preference for focusing rebuilding efforts in the south. Eventually, new residential buildings will be developed, forming self-sustaining urban blocks designed to meet basic living standards. The entire process, however, will be subject to Israeli approval, as no elements of the reconstruction will be permitted to have any military function.

The project remains in its early stages, particularly as discussions continue over where construction will take place. Coastal areas are being considered as an option, given their relative safety and viability for long-term habitation. However, reconstruction efforts for schools, universities, and other non-essential institutions are expected to proceed at a slower pace.

The final hurdle: Political survival

Egypt is actively engaging with both the PA and Hamas to address issues related to compensation, housing designs, and the resettlement of displaced families. The objective is to create new residential clusters that reflect the social and cultural fabric of Gaza, while ensuring that landowners are fairly compensated.

At present, the Rafah crossing continues to operate under wartime restrictions – with the PA reportedly having assumed control of the border in early February. Goods entering Gaza must first pass through Israel’s Kerem Shalom checkpoint for inspection, where many shipments face delays or outright rejection.

The number of aid trucks allowed into Gaza has been capped at six hundred per day, a slight increase from the pre-war level of five hundred. Israel has also blocked the entry of certain materials deemed to have potential military applications, including durable tents reinforced with metal rods.

For Egypt, this project is not just about rebuilding Gaza—it is a strategic move to maintain influence, secure Persian Gulf funding, and avoid being side-lined in a post-war political reshuffle. For Hamas, it is a test of its political resilience.

For Israel, it is an opportunity to reshape Gaza while keeping security tight. For Trump, it is a challenge to his own plans. The plan’s success depends on maintaining a fragile ceasefire and securing sustained international cooperation.

With occupation forces still present along the Salah al-Din corridor, tensions remain high. Any miscalculation—whether in Cairo, Ramallah, or Washington—could derail the entire initiative.

https://thecradle.co/articles/can-egypt ... inians-out

Israeli troops stole 'mountains of cash and gold' from Gaza, Lebanon, Syria

The 'Loot Unit' seized over 180,000 weapons, enough to establish a 'small army'

News Desk

FEB 28, 2025


(Photo credit: Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

The Israeli military's “Loot Unit” has seized enough weaponry to establish “a small army,” as well as “mountains” of cash and gold since launching the wars in the Gaza Strip, southern Lebanon, and Syria, Ynet reported on 28 February.

“We don't like to just take in loot, keep it, and maintain it without making a profit from it,” admits Lt. Col. Sharon-Kotler. “I always ask what the value of this loot is?”

Soldiers from the loot unit stole “mountains of cash” in enemy territory. In one case, the loot unit seized NIS 4 million (around $1 million) from the private home of a Hamas brigade commander.

The stolen money is counted in bank machines that the military purchased for the looting unit, alongside scales for checking the value of gold bars and jewelry seized in Lebanon and Gaza.

The cash and gold are transferred in secured vehicles to the Ministry of Defense's main cash desk section in The Kirya in Tel Aviv. There, a recount is carried out and deposited in the Bank of Israel for confiscation.

So far, more than NIS 100 million (around $28 million) in cash from Gaza and Lebanon have been confiscated in this way, including various currencies such as shekels (NIS), dollars, euros, and those of Arab nations.

The special unit has also seized 180,000 items of weaponry, including a variety of anti-aircraft missiles, drones, advanced anti-tank missiles of all ranges, thousands of explosive charges, thousands of standard rifles, sniper rifles, military radios, compasses, binoculars, night vision devices, uniforms, shoes, dozens of vehicles, and even collector's treasures such as French rifles from the 1930s and rare, valuable pistols used by Hezbollah resistance fighters.

Kill All, Burn All, Loot All: Israel’s army following the same ‘Three Alls’ as the savage army of Imperial Japan?

An Israeli soldier gleefully ransacks a gift shop in Gaza after all the residents in the area were either forcibly displaced or killed. https://t.co/VqVda4juXx pic.twitter.com/bHOwaTaJwz

— Going Underground (@GUnderground_TV) December 9, 2023

The Israeli news outlet stated that Israeli commandos were sent on dozens of secret operations in southern Lebanon to locate and seize caches of weapons and ammunition intended to be used by Hezbollah's elite Radwan force for an invasion of the Galilee in northern Israel.

During the missions, the commandos familiarized themselves with the area and made preparations for the large-scale ground operation carried out by other Israeli army brigades that started in late September 2024.

One commando claimed he and others brought looted Hezbollah weapons back to Israel on foot to avoid detection.

“At first, we carried the missiles, weapons, and boxes of ammunition we found there to Israel on our backs at night, but pretty quickly, it was too much. It really broke our backs,” he stated.

Over 500 people, most of them in the reserves, serve in the loot unit under the Israeli military's central supply center in the Technology and Logistics Division (ATL), but in total, 2,400 soldiers assist in looting operations.

The looting of weapons is carried out for several purposes: First, to understand the enemy's weapons and gather intelligence for continued operations, and second, to store the weapons for future use, whether to sell or deliver them to another country or recycle them for the army's needs.

20 million shekels were already looted from Gaza and taken by the State of Israel. I wonder how much more was looted and went straight into soldiers' personal pockets. pic.twitter.com/w0PsnUnq0B

— B.M. (@ireallyhateyou) January 21, 2024

Another goal of capturing loot is to “use the enemy's weapons for deception,” Ynet wrote.

The Israeli military “turned the campaign into a war of tricks, with traps and temptations that it set against Hezbollah and Hamas, and in many cases also succeeded in trapping terrorists,” the news outlet claimed.

After the fall of former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad's government in December, Israeli soldiers entered Syrian territory and seized weapons and equipment from the disbanded Syrian army without encountering any resistance.

Soldiers collected thousands of weapons from the Syrian army, including several T-55 tanks, anti-tank missiles, large Schwaz charges, Kalashnikov rifles, and considerable amounts of ammunition.

“In general, it was very surreal for us, collecting loot from an enemy without fighting him at all, just going into his bases and loading it,” Lt. Col. Idan said.

Israeli troops boast about looting jewellery from Palestinian homes they bombed — killing, and then stealing from the dead | via @OnlinePalEng pic.twitter.com/PoWPCx6A3C

— Sarah Wilkinson (@swilkinsonbc) November 25, 2023

https://thecradle.co/articles/israeli-t ... anon-syria

Knesset prepares 'Greater Jerusalem' mass settlement expansion plan

The bill is being pushed by a member of Netanyahu’s Likud party and aims to annex the territory of several settlements surrounding occupied Jerusalem

News Desk

FEB 28, 2025


(Photo credit: UPI/Debbie Hill)

An Israeli ministerial committee is expected to approve a bill over the weekend that would legalize the annexation of illegal settlements around occupied East Jerusalem in an effort to establish a “Greater Jerusalem,” according to a report by Haaretz released on 28 February.

The bill, introduced by Likud MK Dan Illouz, aims to incorporate settlements such as Ma’ale Adumim, Beitar Illit, Givat Ze’ev, Efrat, and Ma’ale Mikhmas into a new administrative framework.

If approved by the committee, the bill will proceed to the Knesset for a preliminary reading and, if passed, will require three readings before becoming law.

Support for the bill is strong among both the government and some opposition factions.

Haaretz quoted the left-wing Israeli association Ir Amim, which warned that the bill could pave the way for additional annexation in the occupied West Bank and serve as a major obstacle to any future political solution. Illouz defended the measure, asserting that it is a necessary step toward full Israeli sovereignty over the occupied West Bank, comparing it to previous laws passed despite international pressure.

“The law, jurisdiction, and administration of [Israel] will apply to the territory of the Jerusalem Metropolitan Area,” the bill, called the Jerusalem Metropolitan Bill, reads.

Illouz told Times of Israel that the bill represents a “vital step” and “reflects a core principle: Israel must act based on what is right, not out of fear,” adding that “Our sovereignty over Jerusalem and the Land of Israel is historically, legally, and morally justified.”

In an interview with Haaretz, the MK said it was a “major step towards full sovereignty (annexation of the West Bank).”

The Israeli government has been rapidly expanding illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank. Earlier this month, Tel Aviv issued a tender for the construction of almost 1,000 settler homes in the territory.

Concerns have grown that US President Donald Trump is planning to support Israel’s ambitions to annex the entirety of West Bank territory – which was illegally captured by the Israeli army during the 1967 war.

https://thecradle.co/articles/knesset-p ... nsion-plan

[blindpig]

When the world held its breath - the funeral of Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah

Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah and Sayyed Hashem Safieddine passed to their final resting place but the Resistance remains
vanessa beeley
Mar 03, 2025



There are some events that mark us for life. The assassination of Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah was an event that cast a dark pall over the entire region as soon as it was announced. I was in Syria at the time and it was a palpable gut-punch for the Syrians who had fought for their liberation from Zionist, US, UK, Turkish, Gulf State proxy terrorist groups for more than a decade. Hezbollah had been instrumental in that war of liberation. Sayyed Nasrallah had been a voice that all regional Resistance members had looked to for guidance, strength and the wisdom that would bring victory against oppression.

The loss of this icon of victory over tyranny created a wound that does not heal and it left a void that cannot be filled, at least not for a considerable length of time. For many who attended the funeral, it was the crushing of the last hope that Sayyed would miraculously reappear and mock his Zionist assassins.

In the morning I walked with some friends for more than an hour to the outskirts of the stadium where the funeral ceremony would take place. As we moved closer to the venue, cars carrying the yellow Hezbollah flags were stopping and offering a lift. Even at 7am the crowds were immense. The stadium had been 50% filled within 10 minutes of the doors opening at 6am. Mourners from all over the world had flown in and slept in freezing temperatures outside the doors all night to ensure their place inside.

We clambered up onto the concrete walls outside the stadium and watched as the car parks and surrounding roads began to fill with the yellow flags and crush of people coming to pay their last respects to their universal father, guide, leader and confidant. (Video at link.)

I was not the only person from the West at the event and those I have spoken to since have all remarked on the incredible groundswell of grief and collective sorrow - something you will never see in the West because we do not have any leader who represents the will of the people or epitomises the Humanity we all respond to when we are finally confronted by it, not in the halls of Parliament or Congress but in a region long dehumanized and discarded by those who rule us and take us to endless wars against these generous, kind and courageous people.



From our vantage point I watched one lady with two children, a daughter and son, as the ceremony progressed, her tears fell freely as she held the photo, presumably of the children’s father, a martyr in the latest Zionist war against Lebanon. Her daughter buried her head in her mother’s lap, her son, a little older, held back his tears to comfort his mother. Everywhere around us the grief, the loss and the anger was on full display.

Journalist Marwa Osman posted this on her Telegram channel one day after the ceremony:

I don’t know who made this video, but I swear, you made me break down in tears all over again—just as if Sayyed’s coffin was passing before us right now. Especially because of a deeply personal reason tied to the very first moment I learned of the martyrdom of this great leader.

Thank you to the one who filmed it, to the one who edited it, and a heartfelt thanks to Dr. Ahmed Yassine for sending it.

I will keep it, just as I keep the memory of Sayyed… until my last breath.

(Video at link.)

It has been admitted that senior officials in the Trump Zionist administration were keen for the Zionists to bomb the funeral where more than 1.4 million people had gathered to pay their last respects, from all over the world. Yemeni resistance leaders were among the potential targets designated by the Washington hawks.

There were rumours from various Yemeni and Iranian social media accounts that Israel decided against such action when they received messages from intermediaries that Yemen and Iran had missiles trained on the occupied territories which would be launched should Israel commit such a crime.

Despite the Emirates and Air France cancellation of flights to Lebanon on 23rd February and flights from Istanbul being subject to unusual long delays - the turn out was indicative of the support for the Resistance against the Israeli genocide in Palestine, the land grab and devastation in southern Lebanon and the annexation of Syrian territory since the international coup toppled the Syrian government in December 2024.

Israel did fly over the ceremony at low altitude twice. The roar of the jet engines was immediately drowned by the roar of the crowd. 1.4 million voices raised against the Zionist supremacists. No fear, even from the children whose fists were raised in defiance.



In many ways this demonstrated the impotence of force against an ideology that does not die with each martyr but lives on in every fibre of every being that has dedicated themselves to an end of occupation, apartheid and the disenfranchisement of their people in the region. The following video from Hoopoe media gives an idea of the scale of the ceremony: (Video at link.)

When the Zionist jets passed low over the ceremony there was one man who flung himself on the coffin of Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah to protect him in death as he did for three decades in life. Abu Ali as described by Enemy Watch:

Abu Ali Jawad "Husayn Khalil" (H) is the son-in-law of Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah (r) and his chief security officer. He was also known as “Sayyid’s Shield” due to his exceptional dedication to protecting the Secretary General of Hezbollah.

Not only is he the son-in-law of the Secretary General of Hezbollah (r), but he is also responsible for the first line of security protection for Sayyid Hassan (r). He holds a position of complete trust within Hezbollah’s leadership and is one of the 19 elite commanders tasked with ensuring Sayyid Hassan’s (r) safety. Despite his young age, he is at the top due to his extraordinary loyalty and ability to execute highly sensitive missions.

Abu Ali (H) is one of Hezbollah’s most important special commanders and one of the closest figures to the leader of the resistance. He has faced multiple assassination attempts and plays a critical role in Hezbollah’s security operations. His relentless commitment to protecting Sayyid Hassan (r) has earned him the title of “The Shield of the Leader” or “The Leader’s Armor” within Hezbollah.

For years, he has played a key role in ensuring Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah’s (r) safety through meticulously designed security plans. Despite persistent Zionist efforts to assassinate him, Abu Ali (H) has successfully kept Sayyid Hassan (r) out of harm’s way.

The Zionist regime had previously claimed that Abu Ali (H) was martyred in an assassination attempt on Sayyid Hassan (r), but in reality, he survived and continued his mission. However, on one of the rare occasions when he was separated from his constant companion, he was left behind in the convoy of martyrs, a loss that was deeply felt by Sayyid Hassan’s (r) closest aide.

For the last 15 years, Abu Ali (H) has been considered the most important security figure in Hezbollah, tasked with protecting Sayyid Hassan (r). This makes him a prime target for the Zionist regime.

Abu Ali (H) is known for his meticulous planning and seriousness in missions. In Lebanon, it is said: “No one has ever seen Abu Ali (H) smile.”

His close relationship with Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah (r) is evident, as Sayyid Hassan (r) spends most of his time with him, both day and night. Abu Ali’s (H) security advice is always taken seriously, and he has completed advanced security training, making him one of Hezbollah’s most skilled operatives.

In Lebanon, rumors spread about the martyrdom of “Abu Ali Khalil (H)” in the “Pager” bombings. This news was neither confirmed nor denied by Hezbollah’s official sources at the time. However, his sudden appearance at Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah’s (r) funeral refuted this news.

In a defining moment, Abu Ali (H) was with Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah (r) when he attained martyrdom. He himself was badly injured but did not try to leave the battlefield. Later, he recovered from his injuries, but he remains deeply affected by the loss of his leader.

To this day, Abu Ali (H) carries the sorrow of being the last survivor from the martyrdom convoy of Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah (r). May Allah protect him.

One of the most poignant elements of the ceremony was the moment the Zionist pager-attack victims came to pay their respects and to grieve the loss of their leader who had stood with them through every hardship they had faced in the long war against the threat to their very existence. The majority lost their sight, their faces scarred and burned, their hands missing fingers or completely amputated - their own disability forgotten in their grief. Their dignity intact despite the ravages of an entity that has no regard for Humanity. (Video at link.)

As the vehicles transporting the coffins of Sayyed Nasrallah and Safieddine moved to the final burial site for Sayyed Nasrallah, the crowds moved with them. The hours it took to arrive at the final resting place testament to the people not wanting to let them go. People weeping and clinging to the last physical imprint of a leader who has never deserted them and has always been their safe place in the harshest of times. The chants of allegiance echoed throughout Beirut during the ceremony and affirmed the continuance of Resistance.

"Labbayka Ya Nasrallah" (At your service, Nasrallah), "We remain committed to the pledge, Nasrallah," and "Far from us is humiliation."



As journalist Myriam Charabaty stated in her latest article covering the funeral:

No words of consolation will ever suffice—our only solace is in continuing the struggle, in standing firm upon this path, until the day the sun of liberation rises over our lands.

The following eulogy from Marwa Osman expresses perfectly the chasm of grief left behind by the final departure of Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah from this earth. Sayyed’s legacy is one of a journey that does not end until liberation is achieved and dignity restored and it is a legacy that will not die with the frail human body because those that follow the coffin are the ones who will take up the torch of Resistance and ensure that it is never extinguished: (Video at link.)

***

Please do consider subscribing to my Substack, my work depends on your support and I very much appreciate all those who already do contribute. xxx

https://beeley.substack.com/p/when-the- ... dium=email

******



Israel Begins Choking Gaza Again, Backed By Adelson Stooge Trump

Israel has once again laid siege to Gaza, this time in full coordination with the Trump administration.

Caitlin Johnstone
March 3, 2025

Israel has once again laid siege to Gaza, this time in full coordination with the Trump administration. All goods are being blocked from entering the enclave, including humanitarian aid. This comes after a 15-month US-backed Israeli bombing campaign deliberately made it impossible for people to survive in Gaza without extensive amounts of aid.

The move is an effort to pressure Hamas into changing the terms of the ceasefire deal they agreed to in January by shifting to a new Trump administration plan to extend the first phase of the deal instead of negotiating the second stage as scheduled.

So Israel is breaking international laws against collective punishment by laying siege to an aid-dependent population in order to force changes to a ceasefire deal. You might assume such a straightforward act of psychopathic criminality would be correctly conveyed by the headlines of the western press, but if you assumed such a thing you are adorably naive.

https://twitter.com/caitoz/status/1896379009409417219

As we anticipated yesterday, the official western propaganda line is spinning this to blame Hamas for rejecting a peace deal, but some of the headlines have been even worse than I would have guessed.

“Hamas rejects extending first phase of Gaza ceasefire, ties hostage release to phased deal,” reads a headline from Reuters.

“Israel halts aid to Gaza as Hamas rejects revised ceasefire proposal,” says the Financial Times.

“Israel says it will block aid going into Gaza until Hamas agrees to ceasefire extension,” says CNN.

“Israel Halts All Aid Into Gaza as Cease-Fire Expires,” says The New York Times in its signature passive-voice framing.

“Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu presses for Gaza ceasefire extension,” reads a particularly obnoxious headline about the story from Australia’s state broadcaster ABC.

https://twitter.com/muhammadshehad2/sta ... 1753116855

To be clear, it is Israel who is rejecting the ceasefire, not Hamas. Hamas already agreed to a ceasefire, and has been honoring it. It is Israel who is pushing to change the terms of the deal instead of moving forward with the deal as agreed. Israel is doing this because moving ceasefire negotiations on to their second stage would entail moving toward a commitment to lasting peace and the removal of Israeli troops from Gaza.

A new deal isn’t even necessary to extend the first phase of the ceasefire; as Muhammad Shehada noted on Twitter, phase one would renew automatically as long as phase two negotiations are ongoing. Phase one of the ceasefire isn’t the issue here: killing phase two is.

And it’s important to understand that Netanyahu never intended to move forward to the second phase of the ceasefire. As soon as the agreement was signed in January the Netanyahu-aligned factions of the Israeli press were already asserting that the prime minister would never allow the ceasefire to move on to phase two. In early February the Israeli outlet Haaretz reported that according to insider sources Netanyahu intended to sabotage the ceasefire before it could move to its second stage.

It’s important to be aware that Netanyahu always intended to sabotage the ceasefire because it shows that none of the reasons being given for Israel’s actions today are the real reasons. It has nothing to do with hostages. It has nothing to do with anything Hamas has done since the signing of the agreement. It has nothing to do with the Bibas family. Those aren’t the reasons, they’re the excuses. The excuses for Netanyahu to do what he always intended to do.

https://twitter.com/mtracey/status/1837886438903357920

It’s probably also worth noting at this juncture that Donald Trump has publicly admitted to being bought and owned by the world’s wealthiest Israeli, virulent Zionist Miriam Adelson. The president openly acknowledged on the campaign trail that the first time he was president, Miriam Adelson and her late husband Sheldon were at the White House “probably almost more than anybody” demanding favors for Israel like moving the US embassy to Jerusalem and acknowledging Israel’s illegitimate claim to the Golan Heights, which he eagerly granted. Miriam Adelson gave the Trump campaign $100 million last year.

It used to be considered an antisemitic conspiracy theory to say that Trump is controlled by Adelson cash; back in 2020 Roger Waters was internationally denounced as an evil Jew hater for saying what Trump himself openly admitted to last year. Now here we are, watching Trump rush weapons to Israel and push to permanently ethnically cleanse Gaza of all Palestinians while Netanyahu happily commits war crimes in full confidence that he will be supported by the Adelson asset in the White House.

https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/2025/03 ... oge-trump/

I would not go as far as to say Alderson 'controls' Trump any more than the extractive industries control him. Money controls Trump, if Zelensky put $100M in Trump's pocket he wouldn't be in a pickle. There of course are prejudices as factors but money talks...

******

Washington greenlights $3bn 'emergency' arms package for Israel

The Trump White House has approved nearly $10 billion worth of weapons for Israel in the span of two weeks

News Desk

MAR 1, 2025


(Photo Credit: X)

The Pentagon announced on 28 February a new arms sales deal for Israel worth nearly $3 billion that includes thousands of 2,000-pound bombs and millions worth of armored bulldozers.

State Secretary Marco Rubio presented the deal to Congress as an emergency measure, bypassing the usual review process by the House and Senate foreign relations committees.

In a statement, the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) said Rubio “has determined and provided detailed justification that an emergency exists that requires the immediate sale to the Government of Israel of the above defense articles and defense services in the national security interests of the United States, thereby waiving the Congressional review requirements.”

The deal includes $2.04 billion for 35,529 MK 84 heavy bombs and 4,000 I-2000 Penetrator warheads, $675.7 million for 201 MK 83 1,000-pound bombs, 4,799 BLU-110A/B 1,000-pound bombs, and 5,000 JDAM guidance kits, and $295 million for D9 Caterpillar bulldozers and related equipment.

This is the second weapons package to Israel the Trump White House has green-lit this month after it approved a $7.4 billion deal two weeks ago for munitions, guidance kits, and Hellfire missiles. This sale also bypassed congressional approval, a move regularly used by former president Joe Biden.

According to a report published last year by Brown University’s Costs of War project, Washington spent at least $22.76 billion between 7 October 2023 and 30 September 2024 to support Israel's genocide of Palestinians in Gaza and fuel a brutal regional war.

The amount surpasses what Washington spent during the 1973 Arab–Israeli war. It is about four times the amount Israel received in the 1980s during its war with the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) in Lebanon, its 15-year occupation of Lebanon, and the 2006 war with Hezbollah.

The White House's runaway spending to arm Israel helped US arms manufacturers outperform major stock indexes in 2024.

At least 48,388 bodies have been recovered by Palestinian rescue services in Gaza since the start of the US-Israeli genocide, with 111,803 injuries reported as of 1 March. It is estimated that thousands more remain trapped beneath millions of tons of rubble left behind by the extermination campaign.

https://thecradle.co/articles/washingto ... for-israel

[blindpig]

Trump’s latest threats ‘complicate’ Gaza ceasefire: Hamas

The US president took to social media for a ‘last warning’ to Hamas, threatening the resistance movement with ‘hell to pay’

News Desk

MAR 6, 2025


(Photo credit: Saeed Jaras/Middle East Images/AFP/Getty Images)

Hamas responded to US President Donald Trump’s latest threat on 6 March, accusing him of “complicating” the Gaza ceasefire deal further.

“These threats complicate matters regarding the ceasefire agreement and encourage the occupation government to evade implementing its terms,” a spokesman for the resistance movement, Hazem Qassem, said in a statement to Anadolu Agency (AA).

“An agreement was signed with Washington as a mediator, stipulating the release of all prisoners in three phases. Hamas fulfilled its obligations in the first phase, while Israel is evading the second phase,” he added.

“The US administration must pressure the occupation to enter negotiations for the second phase, as stipulated in the ceasefire agreement,” Qassem stressed.

Trump renewed his threat against Hamas, which he has made several times, in a post on his Truth Social platform late on 5 March.

“’Shalom Hamas’ means Hello and Goodbye – You can choose. Release all of the Hostages now, not later, and immediately return all of the dead bodies of the people you murdered, or it is OVER for you,” the president said, calling Hamas “sick and twisted.”

“I am sending Israel everything it needs to finish the job, not a single Hamas member will be safe if you don’t do as I say. I have just met with your former Hostages whose lives you have destroyed. This is your last warning!” he added.

“For the leadership, now is the time to leave Gaza, while you still have a chance. Also, to the People of Gaza: A beautiful Future awaits, but not if you hold Hostages. If you do, you are DEAD! Make a SMART decision. RELEASE THE HOSTAGES NOW, OR THERE WILL BE HELL TO PAY LATER!” his post went on to say.

Since before he took office in January, Trump has repeatedly threatened Hamas with “hell” if Israeli captives are not released from Gaza. Last month, he repeated the threat, and said “all bets are off” if all the captives were not released simultaneously.

The captives are supposed to be released in several batches, each time in exchange for Palestinian prisoners, according to the Gaza ceasefire deal.

Trump’s latest threat comes as Israel is obstructing the ceasefire agreement from moving forward by demanding an extension of the first phase in violation of the deal. It seeks to deviate from the exchange protocol by securing the release of as many captives as possible in an extended phase one.

Hamas has rejected any extension and is demanding strict adherence to the agreement and international pressure on Israel.

Tel Aviv has also cut off Gaza’s access to humanitarian aid and is considering cutting off water and electricity to the strip.

The US president has approved massive arms sales to Israel during the ceasefire, while Tel Aviv has been increasingly threatening a return to war and says it will accept nothing less than a full dismantlement of Hamas.

The new threat from Trump also coincided with a report by Axios saying that Hamas and the US government have been holding direct talks in “secret” to negotiate a release of US citizens from captivity and “the possibility of a broader deal to end the war.”

While Israel was consulted, it reportedly learned about parts of the discussions through other channels rather than direct US coordination.

“Israel is very concerned about the Trump administration’s direct talks with Hamas,” a source told Hebrew newspaper Israel Hayom.

https://thecradle.co/articles/trumps-la ... fire-hamas

The prez is insane.

Arab leaders endorse Egypt's $53bn plan for Gaza reconstruction, reject forced displacement of Palestinians

The Egyptian plan calls for the Palestinian Authority to manage Gaza while rejecting President Trump's call to ethnically cleanse the strip

News Desk

MAR 4, 2025


(Photo credit: The Peninsula)

An Arab summit convened in Cairo on 4 March adopted an Egyptian plan for the reconstruction of Gaza in a bid to counter US President Donald Trump's proposal to forcibly expel Palestinians from the strip while turning it into a “Middle East Riviera” for Israel's Jewish settlers.

The final statement from the summit called for finding a realistic alternative to the displacement of the Palestinian people and, before that, the categorical rejection of their displacement from their land or within it.

It also condemned the “starvation and scorched earth policies” pursued by Israel to forcibly displace Palestinians and stressed the importance of implementing the second and third stages of the Gaza ceasefire agreement, which call for a complete Israeli withdrawal from the strip.

The statement also condemned Israel's attacks on Syria and its incursions into Syrian territory while calling on the international community to compel Israel to stop these violations.

A detailed draft of the Egyptian plan obtained by Sputnik envisions setting aside $53 billion to reconstruct Gaza and forming a committee to manage it for six months in preparation for the return of the Palestinian Authority (PA).

As part of the Egyptian plan, an international conference for the reconstruction of Gaza in Cairo will be held later this month. At the same time, a trust fund will be set up to receive contributions from donor nations.

The draft of the plan added that “implementing reconstruction requires arrangements for transitional governance and providing security in a way that preserves the prospects of a two-state solution.”

The Egyptian plan anticipates that the early recovery phase will last six months and require $3 billion, while the first reconstruction phase will last for two years and cost $20 billion.

The second reconstruction phase is expected to last two and a half years and cost $30 billion.

PA President Mahmoud Abbas also addressed the summit, saying that a working committee had been formed to prepare for taking up security “responsibilities after restructuring and unifying its cadres present in the Gaza Strip and training them in Egypt and Jordan.”

The Jordan Times observed that while several Arab heads of state participated in Tuesday's summit, de facto Saudi ruler Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) was “notably absent, sending his top diplomat instead.”

https://thecradle.co/articles/arab-lead ... lestinians

Trump rejects Egypt's Gaza plan, stands by ethnic cleansing 'vision'

Arab states have endorsed an Egyptian reconstruction plan for Gaza that rejects any displacement of Palestinians

News Desk

MAR 5, 2025


(Photo credit: AP)

Washington has rejected the Egyptian post-war Gaza proposal put forward by Arab states at a summit in Cairo this week, doubling down on US President Donald Trump’s vision for the expulsion of Palestinians and the takeover of the strip.

“The current proposal does not address the reality that Gaza is currently uninhabitable and residents cannot humanely live in a territory covered in debris and unexploded ordnance,” US National Security Council spokesman Brian Hughes said in a statement on 4 March.

“President Trump stands by his vision to rebuild Gaza free from Hamas. We look forward to further talks to bring peace and prosperity to the region,” the statement added.

At a highly anticipated summit in Cairo on Tuesday, Arab states endorsed an Egyptian plan to reconstruct the Gaza plan. The plan would see Hamas give up governance of Gaza. A detailed draft of the Egyptian plan obtained by Sputnik envisions setting aside $53 billion to reconstruct the strip and forming a committee to manage it for six months in preparation for the return of the Palestinian Authority (PA).

As part of the Egyptian plan, an international conference for the reconstruction of Gaza in Cairo will be held later this month. At the same time, a trust fund will be set up to receive contributions from donor nations. The draft of the plan added that “implementing reconstruction requires arrangements for transitional governance and providing security in a way that preserves the prospects of a two-state solution.”

The Egyptian plan anticipates that the early recovery phase will last six months and require $3 billion, while the first reconstruction phase will last for two years and cost $20 billion. The second reconstruction phase is expected to last two and a half years and cost $30 billion.

Egypt’s proposal categorically rejects any displacement of Palestinians. Hamas welcomed the plan in a statement on Wednesday.

Trump announced in February that Washington aims to take over Gaza and expel its residents. He claimed the initiative strives to find a safer location for Palestinians while international development teams take charge of reconstructing the battered and besieged strip.

The president said his plan aims to transform Gaza into a “Middle East Rivera.”

He has since backtracked, claiming in late February that he does not wish to impose the plan by force but will recommend it.

Trump said during a speech in Congress on Tuesday, “we are bringing back our hostages from Gaza” – making no other references to the Gaza ceasefire or his plan for the strip.

Israel has been blocking the ceasefire from moving forward to the second phase, and is reportedly making plans for a resumption of war against Gaza.

https://thecradle.co/articles/trump-rej ... ing-vision

******



Trump’s Demented Gaza Threats, And Other Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix

US presidents kill civilians all the time, but it’s highly unusual for them to explicitly threaten a civilian population with extermination in a statement addressed directly to them

Caitlin Johnstone
March 6, 2025

❖

In a statement addressed “to the People of Gaza,” President Trump warned on Wednesday that “A beautiful Future awaits, but not if you hold Hostages. If you do, you are DEAD!”

Again, this was explicitly addressed to the entirety of Gaza’s population, not only to Hamas. US presidents kill civilians all the time, but it’s highly unusual for them to explicitly threaten a civilian population with extermination in a statement addressed directly to them; you have to go back to the leaflets President Truman dropped on Japan warning of nuclear annihilation in 1945 to find anything like this.

At the same time, Israel is reportedly preparing a “hell plan” in which it will resume its genocidal onslaught and cut Gaza off from electricity and water if Hamas refuses to accept Israel’s revised terms for the ceasefire deal in the coming days. The plan to cut off water is especially terrifying, as it would lead to mass civilian deaths relatively quickly.

❖

All of Trump supporters’ reasons for supporting Trump are invalidated by his positions on Israel.

“He puts America first” — he puts Israel first.

“He’s making peace” — he’s assisting Israel’s mass murder and tyranny.

“He supports free speech” — but not speech which criticizes Israel.

❖

The current Israel apologist line on the IDF’s siege on Gaza is that Israel isn’t obligated to feed people it’s at war with, which is idiotic in a couple of different ways.

Firstly, saying Israel doesn’t have to feed Gaza is like saying you don’t have to feed the people in a prison or a hospital. Yes you obviously do you psychopath, it’s an area you’ve enclosed and made fully dependent on outside aid.

But also, Israel doesn’t even feed Gaza. They’re currently stopping other people from feeding Gaza, which is like putting security outside of a hospital or prison to make sure nobody can bring in the essential aid you’re not providing.

❖

Sixty-one Palestinian detainees have reportedly died since October 7 because of the cruel treatment they receive at the hands of their captors. Israeli hostages died because Israel was dropping bombs and laying siege on the place where the prisoners were, while Palestinian hostages are dying because Israel tortures, rapes, starves and abuses them. Israel kills Palestinian hostages and Israeli hostages.

❖

People tell me “Caitlin I like what you say about Gaza, but I hate what you say about Ukraine!”

Okay well that’s because you’re only partially awake to the abuses of the western empire. Gaza is much, much easier to understand than Ukraine. You’ve still got a lot of learning to do.

❖

I can understand why some antiwar people backed Trump over Harris; there were arguments to be made that he was the lesser warmonger. What I cannot understand is how anyone who seeks peace can continue defending him now that he’s in office, though. It’s just bootlicking at this point.

Defending Trump by babbling about how bad Kamala Harris was is like defending the US invasion of Iraq by saying “Oh so I guess you wish Hitler had won WWII.” The election is in the past. It was four months ago. It has no relevance to current criticisms of Trump’s actions.

It annoys me how Trumpers will do this in anti-war circles. The other day I criticized the president’s actions in Gaza and got multiple MAGA people in my mentions babbling about Kamala Harris. It’s like, who? I’ve practically forgotten who Harris even is. I’m busy criticizing the actual empire as it actually presently exists. If Harris had won I’d be criticizing her, but she didn’t, so I focus on Trump. That’s what anyone who isn’t a blind partisan bootlicker would do.

They did this throughout Trump’s first term with Hillary Clinton. “Okay sure his Yemen veto was bad but I’d rather have him than Hillary.” Okay, so? Why are you interrupting important criticisms of the powerful to prattle about an irrelevant former Democratic presidential candidate? How could you possibly even think that’s something worth saying?

No matter how bad Kamala Harris or Hillary Clinton were, it doesn’t magically make Trump good. That’s like thinking cancer is good just because heart disease is bad. It’s shitbrained thinking, and it’s become a real pet peeve of mine.

❖

In the west we have the saying “talk is cheap”, but what’s funny is that there’s absolutely nothing in western society that reflects this as our actual position. The politicians who talk the biggest talk are the ones who get into power. The promotions, investments and business loans go to the people who talk the best game. Our whole society is perpetually marinating in propaganda where skillful manipulators use words to influence the way people think, speak, vote, work, spend, and behave at mass scale.

Talk is not cheap in western society. Talk is highly valued and handsomely rewarded. Talk is our most prized product.

Interestingly I have read that in China the exact opposite is the case. Very little value is placed on talk. The politicians who are elevated to prominence are the ones who have proved themselves with accomplishments over the years. Western businessmen sometimes struggle in China because their whole careers they’ve learned that making big deals comes down to talking big talk, but Chinese businesses are only interested in whether you have a solid track record of coming through with the goods. Even between family members and romantic partnerships there’s a lot less emphasis on saying “I love you” and a lot more emphasis on showing your love with deeds, because in China, talk really is cheap.

And funny enough that’s how we’re seeing things play out on the world stage: the west pouring immense amounts of resources into propaganda, cultural domination and soft power influence operations while China quietly surges ahead in more and more fields every year. We’re talking while China is doing.

https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/2025/03 ... ve-matrix/

[blindpig]

Jonathan Cook: Israeli Hostages & the Ceasefire
March 7, 2025

There is a pressing reason to keep our attention focused on the role of the Hannibal directive, writes Jonathan Cook. It relates to what is happening right now.


Palestinians in Gaza on Jan. 29, after the ceasefire announced earlier in the month. (Jaber Jehad Badwan, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0)

By Jonathan Cook
Jonathan-Cook.net

Those of us who keep banging on about Israel’s use of the so-called Hannibal directive on Oct. 7, 2023, — in which Israel killed its own citizens to stop them being taken captive by Hamas — have been smeared as excusing Hamas crimes that day.

That is not why we flag the issue.

In part, it is because some of the most horrifying images from Oct. 7 of charred bodies and wrecked cars and homes in Israel — adduced as evidence of an especial barbarism that is supposedly typical of Palestinians — were almost certainly caused by Israel invoking its scorched-earth directive that day.

Those images became central to the propaganda blitz launched by Israel and its apologists to justify the mass slaughter of Gaza’s children over the subsequent 17 months.

But there is also a far more urgent and pressing reason to keep our attention focused on the role of the Hannibal directive. And it relates to what is happening right now.

[President Donald Trump has issued military threats about the consequences of not handing over Israeli hostages that Hamas says, if carried out, break the terms of the ceasefire.]

Israel and the U.S. are still applying the Hannibal directive — against the Israeli captives held in Gaza.

The point of the directive has always been to stop the enemy being able to use Israeli hostages as leverage to draw Israel into negotiations — primarily to pressure it to hand over any of the thousands of Palestinian hostages it holds in its prison-torture camps. Many of them have never been charged or tried.

Israel and the U.S. tell us they need to carpet bomb Gaza — in what amounts to a “plausible” genocide, according to the world’s highest court — to force Hamas to return the Israeli captives. But in fact, Israel and the U.S. are recklessly killing those very same captives through their actions.

Why? So they don’t have to negotiate over a ceasefire. So they can carry on with the genocide, without pressure to deal with the fate of the Israelis held in Gaza.


“Bring Them Home” — a giant lights sign by artist Nadav Barnea at Charles Bronfman Auditorium, Heichal Hatarbut, Tel Aviv, Jan. 3, 2024. (Yossipik, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0)

It was exactly the same reckless approach on Oct. 7, when Israel showed it was indifferent as to whether Israelis lived or died so long as they weren’t taken captive.

[See: What We’re Not Hearing About Oct 7]

That’s why — in one instance we know about — the Israeli military fired into a home in Kibbutz Be’eri, knowing that there were a dozen or more Israelis inside, including children.

The army was completely indifferent as to whether those Israelis would be killed as a result. All but two were. Those witnesses are the main reason we know what really happened.

That’s why Israel’s Apache helicopters recklessly fired on hundreds of cars fleeing the Nova music festival, indifferent to whether the cars contained Hamas fighters or Israeli citizens.

Even the former defence minister, Yoav Gallant, admits the directive was invoked that day.

We’ll never know how many Israelis were killed – in part because Israel will never let us know. It’s even buried many of the destroyed cars to stop a forensic investigation.



But what we do know with certainty is that the Israeli military killed many Israelis on Oct. 7.

Western media have studiously refused to report on the issue of the Hannibal directive, even though it is all over the Israeli media. (See here, here, here and here.)

That is more than just a failure by Western media outlets. It is a crime against journalism — if not complicity in the genocide itself.

Western publics need to know that the Hannibal directive was invoked for a very simple reason: It is a crucial piece of information for assessing the credibility of Israeli and U.S. claims that they are trying to get the Israeli captives back alive and to properly weigh Israel’s motives in returning to the genocide in Gaza.

Notice how, in Trump’s latest deranged tweet, he accuses Hamas of “murdering” the Israelis held in Gaza. That’s pure, Israeli-inspired disinformation.



It is clear that most, if not all, of the dead captives were killed not by their Hamas captors but by Israel’s massive, reckless 15-month bombardment of the tiny territory of Gaza. That same bombardment, the equivalent of six Hiroshimas, has leveled Gaza and killed many tens of thousands — maybe hundreds of thousands — of Palestinians.

Why is Trump so eager to misdirect us?

Because he wants to win our support for Israel’s continuation of its slaughter of the people of Gaza and justify his own decision to supply, as his predecessor did, the weapons needed to continue that genocide.

After all, Trump makes his own genocidal intent expressly clear in addressing “the people of Gaza” and telling them that they will all be “DEAD” if the Israeli captives aren’t handed over. Yet “the people of Gaza” have no control over whether the captives are released.

Notice too that Trump calls Hamas “sick and twisted” for holding on to the bodies of dead Israeli captives, even though it is Israel that is violating the ceasefire agreement that would see those bodies returned.

This has become a further rationalisation by Israel and the U.S. for killing “the people of Gaza.” But Hamas learnt the value of using dead bodies as bargaining chips directly from Israel.

For years, the Israeli government has had a policy of refusing to return to their families the corpses of those Palestinians it has killed, including while in its torture camps. This violation of international law long predates Oct. 7. The Israeli courts have repeatedly approved the policy, accepting the government’s view that the bodies should be held as “bargaining chips.” It gave its backing again in January.

So if Hamas is “sick and twisted,” it is only because Israel is even more sick and twisted. If Trump thinks the people of Gaza deserve a genocide because of their leaders’ “sick and twisted” decisions, should he not be consistent and argue that the people of Israel deserve a similar fate for their own leaders’ “sick and twisted” decisions?

A campaign of lies and disinformation have helped to shred international law over the past year and half. And one of the biggest lies is the pretence that, in slaughtering Gaza’s children, Israel has been acting in the interests of Israelis held in the enclave.

https://consortiumnews.com/2025/03/07/j ... ceasefire/

( I soo don't give a fuck about the Zionist hostages. Anyone who does has no sense of justice or proportion.)

******

Israel: Kill the king to preserve the kingdom?

Netanyahu’s rule has deepened Israel’s internal fractures and global isolation, testing the patience of its closest allies. As Tel Aviv’s dependence on the US grows, the question looms: will the Americans dethrone the king to save their kingdom?


Mohamad Hasan Sweidan

MAR 7, 2025


Photo Credit: The Cradle

A survey of Israeli and US media commentary reveals growing concern among experts that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s continued rule is driving the occupation state into escalating internal and external crises.

His policies are deepening domestic divisions, undermining social and political cohesion. Simultaneously, his handling of regional challenges is exacerbating Israel’s international isolation, exposing it to long-term strategic vulnerabilities.

Netanyahu and regional chaos

Hans Christian Andersen’s classic fable The Emperor’s New Clothes tells the story of a ruler so consumed with vanity that he is duped into believing he is wearing a magnificent outfit –one that, according to his deceitful tailors, only the wise can see.

In reality, he is parading through the streets naked, yet no one dares speak the truth until a child exclaims, “The emperor is naked!” The emperor, though exposed, chooses to continue his procession, pretending nothing is amiss.

The tale has become a universal metaphor for mass denial in political and social affairs. Today, Israeli commentators invoke it to illustrate how Netanyahu’s purported strengths are illusions, while his failures are evident to all who dare to look.

Carl von Clausewitz, in his seminal work On War, defines war as “the continuation of politics by other means.” However, a lesser-quoted warning from Clausewitz cautions “not to take the first step without thinking what may be the last.” This is a lesson Netanyahu has consistently failed to learn from his American mentors.

Following the 11 September attacks, the Bush administration launched wars in Afghanistan and Iraq without clear exit strategies, culminating in humiliating US withdrawals. Netanyahu’s response to Operation Al-Aqsa Flood set in motion a similar course of upheaval across West Asia. But his real test lies in what comes next: What is his exit strategy from the chaos he unleashed?

An article on The Hill from last year notes that Netanyahu has “a reputation for being a master political tactician within the context of Israeli politics … but what is unequivocal is that he is a lousy strategist.”

Domestically, his reliance on extremist allies to maintain his coalition has exacerbated social divisions and eroded trust in state institutions, including within Israel's military and intelligence agencies. Netanyahu's attempt to reshape Israel’s judiciary alienated broad segments of Israeli society, including key figures from the security establishment, at a time when national unity is fragile.

His long-standing strategy of allowing Hamas to form a counterbalance to the Palestinian Authority (PA) – aimed at preventing the emergence of a Palestinian state – has now spectacularly backfired. How, Israelis ask, does Netanyahu now claim to want to eradicate the very Palestinian resistance whose growth, albeit through indirect channels, he sought to ensure?

Moreover, his refusal to take responsibility for the failures that led to 7 October – including impeding investigations into the day's events – coupled with his reluctance to present a post-war plan for Gaza, has fueled public outrage and reinforced perceptions that Netanyahu prioritizes his political survival over national security.

In short, the Israeli prime minister's ambitions, according to growing Israeli public and establishment sentiment, is to preserve king over kingdom.

A strategic liability for Washington?

Under Netanyahu, Israel has become increasingly isolated. The International Criminal Court’s (ICC) 2024 arrest warrants for Netanyahu and former defense minister Yoav Gallant further restricted his international mobility and deepened Tel Aviv’s diplomatic crisis.

His government’s aggressive expansion of illegal Jewish settlements and refusal to engage in meaningful negotiations over Palestinian statehood have alienated key Arab partners, derailing Saudi–Israeli normalization and reversing the momentum of the Abraham Accords.

Netanyahu has failed to contain the regional chaos he initiated in October 2023. The future of Gaza and Lebanon remains uncertain, the trajectory of Israeli confrontation with Iran is unclear, and even Tel Aviv’s role in Syria remains ambiguous.

Meanwhile, Netanyahu’s defiance of US calls for restraint and his machinations to avoid ceasefire deliverables have strained relations with Washington, where he is increasingly viewed as an impediment rather than an ally.

The most pressing issue is how Netanyahu’s rule affects Israel’s strategic dependence on Washington. The events following 7 October revealed Tel Aviv’s inability to sustain a prolonged confrontation in West Asia without direct American financial, military, and intelligence investments. In other words, Israel has been exposed as strategically vulnerable – its success contingent solely upon unwavering US support.

Strategic exposure in international relations refers to the degree to which a state is vulnerable to external pressures, threats, and dependencies. Israel’s security, stability, and strategic interests now hinge on US engagement.

After Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, Israelis recognized the extent of their reliance on Washington, forcing the US into deeper regional entanglement on Tel Aviv’s behalf. This has sparked growing frustration among US policymakers, who see Israel’s increasing dependence as a liability. Some are now asking: Has Netanyahu’s Israel become a burden?

Growing consensus against Netanyahu

Steven Simon, former director for Middle East and North Africa affairs at the US National Security Council, argues that continued American support for Israel no longer serves US strategic interests. In his book Grand Delusion: The Rise and Fall of American Ambition in the Middle East, Simon urges Washington to reassess its relationship with Tel Aviv.

Many analysts in the US and Europe now regard Netanyahu as an obstacle not just to Israeli democracy but to the interests of Israel’s allies. Journalist Simon Tisdall, writing for The Guardian/Observer, contends that Netanyahu’s intransigence over Gaza has dangerously undermined the US-led global order. In Washington, there is a growing sense that Netanyahu “doesn’t really listen” to his closest ally – an alarming sign for US policymakers.

As Tisdall wrote in November 2023:

“Whether the question is Gaza’s future, Palestinian statehood, the Iranian threat or honest democratic governance, Netanyahu is a liability, more so now than before the war.”

Even US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer – a staunchly pro-Israel Jewish Democrat – delivered an unprecedented public condemnation of Netanyahu last year, declaring that the Israeli prime minister had “lost his way” and calling for new elections.

Given this backdrop, the fundamental question emerges: Many influential voices in Washington increasingly believe that safeguarding US interests requires Netanyahu’s removal. So, does preserving the kingdom today require getting rid of the king?

https://thecradle.co/articles/israel-ki ... he-kingdom

Yemen gives Israel four-day ultimatum to stop blocking Gaza aid

Sanaa says it is ready to reimpose a blockade on Israeli-linked ships in regional waters if the ceasefire violations continue

News Desk

MAR 7, 2025


(Photo Credit: AFP via Getty Images)

The leader of Yemen's Ansarallah resistance movement, Abdul Malik al-Houthi, announced on 7 March a four-day grace period for Israel to resume ceasefire talks and lift its blockade on humanitarian aid for Gaza, threatening to resume Sanaa's naval operations against Israeli-linked ships.

"We meet the siege with a siege," Houthi emphasized, adding that Yemen “cannot stand by and watch the Israeli enemy’s aggressive approach in starving the Palestinian people in Gaza.”


“We do not just issue statements, but we can support the Palestinians in several areas,” the Ansarallah leader said, pointing out that "in the course of implementing the ceasefire in Gaza, it was clear that the Israeli enemy was procrastinating in fulfilling its obligations, especially those related to the humanitarian file.

The Ansarallah-led Yemeni Armed Forces (YAF) ceased military operations in support of Palestine following the start of a US-sponsored ceasefire in Gaza earlier this year. Since November 2023, the YAF repeatedly targeted US, UK, and Israeli-linked commercial ships and western warships in the Red Sea, the Indian Ocean, and the Mediterranean Sea.

Sanaa's efforts to stop the US-Israeli genocide in Gaza prompted an illegal war initiated by Washington and London, resulting in hundreds of airstrikes in the Arab world's poorest nation.

Despite the western onslaught, the YAF were undeterred in their military campaign and forced several US aircraft carriers and European warships out of the Red Sea. The country has also downed 15 US MQ-9 Reaper drones and recently fired its air defenses on a US F-16 jet.

A year ago, the former US Special Envoy for Yemen, Timothy Lenderking, admitted that “there is no military solution” for Yemen.

“I don’t think people really understand just kind of how deadly serious it is what we’re doing and how under threat the ships continue to be,” Commander Eric Blomberg with the USS Laboon told US media last year.

Houthi's warning comes almost a week after Israel reimposed a total blockade on humanitarian aid shipments for Gaza after obstructing the ceasefire agreement from moving forward by demanding an extension of the first phase.

Hamas has rejected any extension of phase one and is demanding strict adherence to the agreement and international pressure on Israel.

“The resumption of war on Gaza will be met with the entire [Israeli] enemy entity coming under fire ... If the war returns to Gaza, we will intervene with support through various military means,” Houthi warned on Sunday.

https://thecradle.co/articles/yemen-giv ... g-gaza-aid

Hundreds of Israeli settlers pour into south Lebanon under army protection

The Lebanese army condemned the settler incursion into south Lebanon as a ‘blatant violation’ of the ceasefire agreement

News Desk

MAR 7, 2025


(Photo credit: X)

Hundreds of Israeli settlers crossed the border into Lebanese territory on 7 March under the protection of the Israeli army in order to visit what they say is the tomb of a fourth-century rabbi.


At dawn on Friday, around 800 Hasidic settlers gathered to pray at the tomb of Rabbi Rav Ashi.

The site sits directly on the Blue Line between an Israeli army post and a UNIFIL base, overlooking the southern Lebanese village of Houla in the Marjayoun district.

According to southern Lebanese tradition, the site is the shrine of the 15th Muslim scholar Shaykh al-Abbad.

“For the first time, the visit to the tomb was accompanied by the IDF,” the Israeli Broadcasting Corporation (KAN) reported.

Hebrew media had reported a day earlier that the Israeli army was preparing to supervise a visit of hundreds of settlers to the area after previous attempts in recent months saw Israelis cross the border without coordinating with their military, clashing with soldiers and getting arrested.

“Elements of the enemy forces deliberately brought in settlers to visit an alleged religious shrine in the Abbad-Hola area in the south, which represents a blatant violation of Lebanese national sovereignty,” the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) said in a statement.

“The entry of settlers from the Israeli entity into Lebanese territory is one aspect of the enemy’s persistence in violating international laws, resolutions, and relevant agreements, especially Resolution 1701 and the ceasefire agreement,” it added, stressing that army command is “following up on the issue in coordination with the five-member committee supervising the ceasefire agreement” and with UNIFIL.

This is not the first time settlers enter south Lebanon. During ground battles with Hezbollah in November last year, an Israeli army commander illegally brought a researcher into the country to inspect an ancient fortress. He was killed in an ambush carried out by the Lebanese resistance along with one Israeli soldier.

The army’s Golani Brigade chief of staff took responsibility for the incident and resigned.

Israeli settler groups have advocated for the establishment of illegal settlements in Lebanese territory and have called for the annexation of south Lebanon. In December, after the ceasefire, an extremist settler group claimed it had entered Lebanon and established an outpost. The Israeli army said the incident happened on Israel’s side of the border, and that the group was dispersed.

Israeli forces continue to occupy Labbouneh, Mount Blat, Owayda Hill, Aaziyyeh, and Hammamis Hill, despite the ceasefire implementation and withdrawal deadline expiring on 18 February.

Tel Aviv has violated the ceasefire agreement over 1,300 times with non-stop attacks and infiltration of Lebanon’s airspace since the deal was signed in November last year.

https://thecradle.co/articles/hundreds- ... protection

[blindpig]

The eyes and ears that decapitated Hezbollah

As Hezbollah reels from a wave of assassinations deep within its strongholds, an unseen war rages – one fought not with bullets, but with hacked signals, infiltrated networks, and a digital battlefield where every movement is mapped before it happens.


Anis Raiss

MAR 14, 2025


Photo Credit: The Cradle

They were not killed on the battlefield. One by one, inside operation rooms, secured buildings, and what were supposed to be safe houses in Dahiye – Beirut's southern suburb – Hezbollah’s commanders, members, and operatives were assassinated.

Fuad Shukr, Ibrahim Aqil, Ali Karaki, Nabil Kaouk, Mohammad Srour, Ahmed Mahmoud Wehbe. Then, the unthinkable: Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah himself. Just days later, his successor, Hashem Safieddine, was assassinated too. Israel boasted of its success – eliminating West Asia's most charismatic resistance leader and his replacement in the span of a week.

These were not chaotic wartime deaths. They were calculated assassinations, executed with precision – not through street-level infiltrations, but through surveillance, intercepted signals, and compromised security systems.
Hezbollah had once been disciplined, insular, and near-impenetrable. But years of war in Syria forced the organization to expand its ranks dramatically to sustain its military intervention in the neighboring state. Yezid Sayigh of the Carnegie Middle East Center notes that Hezbollah “went from being highly disciplined and purists to someone who ... let in a lot more people than they should have.” The structure that once ensured its security had stretched thin, leaving the group more exposed.

Miri Eisin, a former Israeli intelligence officer – now a senior fellow at the International Institute for Counterterrorism – explained that after the 2006 war on Lebanon, Israel no longer viewed Hezbollah as just a guerrilla force but as a complex “terror army.” This new assessment forced Israeli intelligence to go deeper, scrutinizing Hezbollah’s internal networks, leadership dynamics, and vulnerabilities with unprecedented intensity.

This effort, which included AI-driven analysis of Hezbollah’s communication patterns, allowed Israel to gradually compile a detailed map of the organization’s high-ranking figures and their movements.
Dahiye’s silent informants
Walking through Haret Hreik, Ghobeiry, and other sectors of Dahiye, security cameras, predominantly Chinese-made, are ubiquitous. Behind the counters of butcher shops and bakeries, in electronic repair stores and money exchanges, they quietly capture the daily rhythms of Dahiye. Their distributor in Beirut, Bachir Hanbali Est., supplies an overwhelming number of these surveillance systems, primarily from Dahua Technology.

Dahua's reach in Lebanon is extensive, with cameras installed not only in commercial spaces but also in some municipal and privately owned security networks.

Alongside Israel’s mastery of signal interception and frequency-hopping surveillance, these devices may have played a critical role in the decimation of Hezbollah’s top leadership.
In almost every shop and establishment, a monitor sits behind the counter, displaying live footage from a security camera – one lens pointed inside, capturing the aisles, shelves, and cash register, and the other fixed on the street, watching the ebb and flow of pedestrians and scooters. The devices are mass-produced, sold in bulk, and installed without a second thought – the kind of cameras that flood international markets: cheap, functional, and forgettable.
But Dahua cameras have long been riddled with vulnerabilities. Their systems have been repeatedly compromised, with security flaws allowing attackers to seize full control of devices remotely. One of the most egregious incidents occurred in 2017 when researchers discovered a hidden administrator account – username 888888 – embedded within thousands of Dahua DVRs, NVRs, and IP cameras. The flaw enabled remote logins, giving full access to the device.
By 2021, new vulnerabilities emerged. Authentication bypasses (CVE-2021-33044) allowed attackers to hijack Dahua cameras without credentials, making it easier to exploit security gaps. Dahua’s reliance on cloud-based storage also posed new threats; through services like ThroughTek Kalay, attackers could siphon live footage remotely, intercepting real-time visuals from Dahiye’s shops and streets. Further analysis revealed that a significant portion of Dahua cameras in Beirut’s southern suburbs were never patched, leaving them vulnerable to remote access breaches.
Patching vulnerabilities is often an afterthought. By 2021, at least 1.2 million Dahua cameras remained exposed on public networks and indexed on Shodan – a search engine for internet-connected devices. In 2023, a vulnerability (CVE-2023-6913) in Dahua’s consumer brand Imou allowed hackers to hijack camera feeds simply by embedding malicious commands into QR codes.

Israel's cyber warfare: Mapping, watching, killing

Israel has developed an extensive cyber-espionage industry capable of exploiting these vulnerabilities. One of the most significant players in this domain is Toka, a firm founded by former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak and ex-occupation army cyber chief Yaron Rosen. Toka specializes in hacking security cameras, enabling operators to locate, breach, and monitor surveillance systems without detection.

The company’s technology is particularly effective against outdated or insecure camera models, making Dahua’s widespread usage in Hezbollah strongholds an exploitable weakness.

Internal documents obtained by Haaretz revealed the extent of Toka’s capabilities. AI-powered software maps every security camera in a target area, infiltrates their systems, and builds a comprehensive heatmap of movement patterns.

The assassination of Hezbollah operative Abbas Ahmad Hamoud in February 2025 demonstrated how this system operates in real-time. Footage from a compromised juice bar security camera surfaced within hours, showing Hamoud and his associate moments before the strike.

The rapid retrieval of such footage underscores the scale of cyber espionage embedded in Hezbollah’s strongholds.

The double breach: Signals and surveillance

Lebanon's maze of security cameras is likely, by now, mapped, all compromised, and all feeding intelligence in real-time. AI-powered facial recognition software processes the data, flagging known faces, cross-referencing them against existing databases, and building a heatmap of Hezbollah commanders, operatives, and members. But it does not stop there.

Many surveillance systems now integrate voice recognition, scanning intercepted audio for familiar voices, matching speech patterns to individuals. A commander steps into a cafe for a quiet meeting and orders tea in a distinct tone – the system picks it up, flags the voiceprint, and updates his location.

However, it is not just about tracking individuals, but also mapping their hideouts: AI-powered surveillance tools track clusters of movement, identifying locations that serve as unofficial meeting points. A small storefront where the same group of men routinely gather? Flagged. A quiet teahouse where certain figures regularly converge at odd hours? Noted. An apartment where multiple high-ranking figures have appeared separately over the course of a month? Marked as a probable safe house.

If cameras were the eyes of Israeli intelligence, then intercepted signals were its ears. For years, Hezbollah has relied on encrypted, frequency-hopping communications to prevent Israeli interception. The principle is simple, at least in theory. Rather than transmitting over a single radio frequency, the signal jumps unpredictably across multiple frequencies in a sequence known only to the sender and receiver. It is like trying to listen in on a conversation where every word is spoken in a different room, on a different floor, and in a different building. Unless you know the pattern, the message remains fragmented and inaccessible.

This technique, Frequency-Hopping Spread Spectrum (FHSS), has been the backbone of secure military communications since the Cold War. The Americans used it to evade Soviet interception. The Soviets developed countermeasures to break it. Iran, watching how its unencrypted radio signals were intercepted by both Iraq and US intelligence during the 1980s, understood its necessity and built its own FHSS-based systems to shield its own and Hezbollah’s battlefield communications.

By the 2006 Israeli war on Lebanon, this technology was already proving its worth. Hezbollah fighters, equipped with Iranian-supplied encrypted radios, not only avoided Israeli interception but actively eavesdropped on the Israeli forces' communications. Israeli soldiers walked into ambushes without knowing how their locations had been exposed. That war ended with a realization for Tel Aviv. Israel was being outmaneuvered in the electronic warfare domain. The same tactics that had once allowed them to dominate Arab armies were now being used against them.
So, following the 2006 war – which did not succeed in delivering a decisive blow to Hezbollah – Israel’s intelligence apparatus, particularly Unit 8200 and the military intelligence directorate, Aman, intensified their data-gathering efforts on the group.

Israel's devastating counter

Tel Aviv’s counter-strategy has been methodical. The titan of Israel's defense contractors, Elbit Systems, has developed advanced electronic warfare platforms capable of detecting, analyzing, and breaking frequency-hopping transmissions.

To understand how this works, imagine a net cast over an ocean of radio frequencies. Instead of listening to a single channel, Elbit’s COMINT/DF Solutions (communications intelligence) platforms scan entire bands of frequencies at once. The moment a transmission appears – no matter how briefly before it hops – the system detects it, logs it, and begins reconstructing the pattern.
At first, it is just noise – a scattered series of signals appearing and disappearing across different channels. But with time, patterns emerge. The algorithm starts predicting when and where the next hop will occur. The signal stops being a ghost and becomes a traceable entity. Once the pattern is cracked, the next step is pinpointing the source. Every radio transmission leaves a footprint – a burst of electromagnetic energy that spreads outward. Elbit’s direction-finding (DF) technology works by deploying multiple receivers (SIGINT-payloads) into several of its unmanned aerial vehicles, like the Hermes 450 and 900 and SKYLARK 3, across an area, triangulating signals to pinpoint exact locations for targeting.

Beyond Toka, Israeli firms such as Candiru and Paragon Solutions have developed malware to infiltrate cloud-stored data. Candiru’s flagship spyware, Devil’s Tongue, allows attackers to compromise personal devices, including PCs and smartphones, specifically in West Asia. Unlike Toka, which hijacks IoT devices, Candiru’s malware infects operating systems, providing direct access to cloud-stored security footage.

This is particularly significant because modern surveillance cameras do not just store footage locally; many upload their recordings to cloud servers accessible through mobile apps, browser portals, or network backups. If a shop owner stored security footage remotely, Candiru’s malware could siphon it directly from his cloud account, bypassing the need to hack the camera itself.

Another Israeli firm, Paragon Solutions, takes this concept further. Its spyware tool, Graphite, extracts data from cloud backups – not only videos, but also logs, timestamps, and metadata. This allows Israeli intelligence to reconstruct entire networks of activity, detailing who entered a building, when, and from which direction.

Paragon was founded by Brig. Gen. (res.) Ehud Schneorson, the former commander of Israel’s elite cyber-intelligence Unit 8200, along with former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak – who founded Toka.
In December 2024, Paragon was acquired for $500 million by AE Industrial Partners, a US private equity giant. Depending on its expansion, the deal could reach $900 million, a valuation that underscores just how lucrative and strategically valuable this technology has become. With Barak’s fingerprints on both Paragon and Toka, the ties between Israeli cyber-warfare firms and western intelligence interests are becoming increasingly difficult to ignore.
Hezbollah's next steps

Hezbollah has endured war and assassinations before and sprung back stronger than ever – namely, the murder of the resistance movement's secretary-general Abbas al-Musawi in 1992 and the targeted killings of Mustafa Badreddine and Imad Mughniyeh, architects of Hezbollah’s military strategy. These dealt heavy blows but did not dismantle the organization's command.
Even the assassination of Iranian Quds Force Commander Qassem Soleimani, a figure whose influence extended deep into Hezbollah’s strategic doctrine, did not fracture the Axis of Resistance.
The assassinations in Dahiye - 172 commanders killed, including six from the Jihadi Council, 15 heads of units, and numerous second-level commanders – were a brutal wake-up call and will usher in a period of evaluation and recalibration, one that may involve shifts in command, logistics, intelligence, and economic management.

Israelis are already claiming that Hezbollah's tech revival will be led by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), though there is no credible evidence of this. In one such instance, the Israeli research outfit Alma Center has alleged that the IRGC has mobilized five units to aid Hezbollah’s technological and logistical reconstruction.

While Iranian expertise in cyber operations, intelligence gathering, and electronic warfare is well documented, these assertions are based on Israeli assessments and have not been independently verified.​

What will, however, be interesting to watch is whether the Lebanese resistance group will reap any benefits from the Iran–Russia Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, which includes the provision of secure battlefield communication systems resistant to NATO-grade electronic warfare. Iran's access to Russian Azart tactical radios could also potentially enhance Hezbollah’s ability to evade Israeli SIGINT.

For residents of Dahiye, beneath their grief, the questions come hard and fast: What now? What happens when an entire command structure is decimated? Who takes their place? What lessons are drawn from this?
The answers point in one direction: a technology revolution in the battlefield - where information precision matters more than firepower. A revitalized resistance that can match Israel's technological edge. Hezbollah had that edge in 2006; Israel reversed it in 2024.

In a recent interview on Al Mayadeen TV, senior Hezbollah official Nawaf Moussawi openly admitted that negligence and operational shortcomings contributed to the martyrdom of Hassan Nasrallah. Acknowledging it is one thing. Closing the gap is another. If Hezbollah fails to close its vulnerabilities, the next assassination will not just be inevitable - it is already in motion.

https://thecradle.co/articles/the-eyes- ... -hezbollah

'We are holding slaves': Israeli soldier reveals systematic use of Palestinian 'human shields' in Gaza

The soldier revealed that the Israeli Military Police are investigating just a few cases to give the impression that the practice is rare

News Desk

MAR 14, 2025


(Photo credit: Oren Cohen/Flash90)

An Israeli soldier disclosed in a March 14 Haaretz op-ed that the military's practice of using Palestinians as human shields in Gaza is far more common than acknowledged and that a recent investigation was intended to create the false impression that such incidents are infrequent.

“I saw that six investigations were opened by the Military Police (MP) regarding the use of Palestinians as human shields, and I almost choked. I've seen cover-ups in my life, but this is a new low,” the soldier expressed.

“In Gaza, human shields are used at least six times a day. If the Military Police want to do their job seriously, they should open at least 2,190 investigations. But the MP just want to pretend to the world that we're investigating ourselves, so they find a few scapegoats and pin everything on them,” the soldier stated, following nine months of combat in the strip.

He explained that Palestinian civilians were forced to enter homes in Gaza to check for Hamas fighters or explosives and make sure it was safe for the soldiers to enter themselves. The soldiers refer to Palestinians forced to clear homes in this way as “Shawish” or “slaves.”


Sometimes, Shawish are sent to houses simply to set fire to or blow up the house.

During the first months of the Israeli ground invasion, soldiers primarily used dogs or robots to clear homes. However, the practice of using civilians as human shields expanded over time.

“I didn't understand back then how common it would become. Today, almost every company holds 'Shawish,' and infantry forces don't enter a house before the 'Shawish' clears it,” he explained.

This means there are at least four Palestinians held against their will as human shields in each platoon, 12 in each battalion, and 36 in each brigade.


I translated Al Jazeera’s exclusive report on footage showing Palestinians being used as human shields

The footage reveals instances such as forcing men to search for explosives, tying them with ropes & throwing them into tunnels, and using injured to search for fighters pic.twitter.com/hEla1ZFoq1

— Younis Tirawi | يونس (@ytirawi) June 30, 2024

According to the soldier, the most senior levels of the Israeli military in Gaza have known about human shields for more than a year, and no one tried to stop it. “On the contrary, it was defined as an operational necessity.”

“We're holding a group of slaves, and the MP are trying to cover it up with six investigations,” the soldier concluded.

The military's use of human shields story was first revealed by Haaretz in August last year. A senior military source there said that both the Chief of Staff and the outgoing Southern Command Major General knew about the procedure.

https://thecradle.co/articles/we-are-ho ... ds-in-gaza

US, Israel in 'secret talks' with African states to take in forcibly expelled Palestinians: Report

Israel is taking Trump’s ethnic cleansing campaign for Gaza seriously, and has set up a ‘migration administration’ to push Palestinians out of the strip

News Desk

MAR 14, 2025


(Photo credit: Reuters)

The US and Israel have been making contacts with African states to discuss the potential resettlement of Palestinians from Gaza to their territories, according to an AP report released on 14 March.

The US–Israeli contacts with Sudan, Somalia, and Somaliland aim “to discuss using their territories as potential destinations for resettling Palestinians,” US and Israeli officials told AP.

“Separate outreach from the US and Israel to the three potential destinations began last month, days after [US President Donald] Trump floated the Gaza plan alongside [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu,” US officials said, adding that Israel is “taking the lead in the discussions.”

It is “unclear how much progress the efforts made or at what level the discussions took place,” according to the report. The talks are supposed to be “secret.”

Sudanese officials told AP that they have rejected US proposals for such a plan. Officials from Somalia and Somaliland said they were not aware of the discussions. Sudan was part of the 2020 Abraham Accords, which saw several Arab states, including the UAE, normalize ties with Israel.

Last month, Trump announced his controversial plan to transform Gaza into the “Riviera of the Middle East.” The president said his plan would involve the US taking ownership of Gaza and expelling the entirety of its population to bring in international development teams and begin work on reconstruction.

He claimed the expulsion of Palestinians would be to move them to a safer location, but later confirmed that his plan does not include their right to return to their land.

In late February, Trump backpedaled from his position, saying he does not wish to impose the plan by force but will recommend it. “We are not expelling anyone from the Gaza Strip,” he told reporters ahead of his meeting with Irish Prime Minister Micheal Martin on 12 March.

Despite this, a US official said in early February that Trump “stands by his vision,” rejecting a proposal put forward by Egypt for a reconstruction and post-war solution plan for Gaza that does not involve any further displacement of its population.

Arab states have rejected Trump’s plan and have officially endorsed the Egyptian initiative. Israel, on the other hand, has praised what many see as an attempt to ethnically cleanse Gaza.

Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said on 9 March that the government would establish a “migration administration” to facilitate the expulsion of Palestinians from their homes and lands in the Gaza Strip.

“We are establishing a migration administration, we are preparing for this under the leadership of the Prime Minister and Defense Minister [Israel Katz],” Smotrich said at the Knesset. “The budget will not be an obstacle,” he added. The new “migration administration” would be under the Israeli Ministry of Defense, with the goal of expelling all Palestinians as quickly as logistics allow.

“If we remove 5,000 a day, it will take a year,” Smotrich said. “This is a huge logistical operation – not just the bus that takes them, we need to know who is going, to which country, what ages, vocational training, a huge operation, we are preparing.”

Smotrich claimed that “sources in the American government” agreed “that it's impossible for two million people with hatred towards Israel to remain at a stone's throw from the border.”

The AP report was not the first to reveal potential plans to expel Palestinians to Africa.

According to a report from Israel’s Channel 12 last month, Morocco, the Puntland State of Somalia, and the Republic of Somaliland are being considered as places to relocate Palestinians as part of Trump’s controversial plan.

Puntland and Somaliland seek international recognition of their sovereignty over Somali territory, while Morocco seeks recognition of its sovereignty over the occupied Western Sahara.

The report said Trump’s government may use this to push forward his proposal for Gaza.

https://thecradle.co/articles/us-israel ... ans-report

[blindpig]

US bombs Sanaa as Trump threatens to 'rain hell' on Yemen over Gaza support

The new raids follow Washington easing restrictions on US commanders to authorize airstrikes and special operations beyond conventional battlefields, broadening target options

News Desk

MAR 15, 2025


(Photo Credit: X)

US and British warplanes launched a new round of airstrikes on a residential neighborhood in the Shuaab district of the Yemeni capital, Sanaa, late on 15 March, killing at least nine civilians and injuring several more.

"The explosions were violent and shook the neighborhood like an earthquake. They terrified our women and children," a resident of the area told Reuters.


BREAKING | US warplanes launch airstrikes on the Yemeni capital Sanaa. pic.twitter.com/m8xKGZ0ehd

— The Cradle (@TheCradleMedia) March 15, 2025
"Our brave Warfighters are right now carrying out aerial attacks on the terrorists’ bases, leaders, and missile defenses to protect American shipping, air, and naval assets and to restore Navigational Freedom,” US President Donald Trump said in a social media post following the attacks.

“No terrorist force will stop American commercial and naval vessels from freely sailing the Waterways of the World,” Trump added. In his post, the US president also threatened Iran, demanding the country stop providing support for the ruling Ansarallah resistance movement.

“This strike [in Yemen] is a warning to Iran, which supports Yemen and the Houthis. We will not tolerate Houthi attacks on our soldiers, ships, and aircraft,” US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said.

The midnight attack marks the first western airstrikes to hit Yemen since the Gaza ceasefire deal took effect in January. It also comes days after Trump added Ansarallah back to the list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO).

Earlier this week, the Yemeni Armed Forces (YAF) announced the reinstatement of a ban on all Israeli vessels passing through designated operational areas in the Red Sea, Arabian Sea, Bab al-Mandab Strait, and Gulf of Aden, following the expiration of the deadline set by Ansarallah leader Abdul Malik al-Houthi for Israel to permit aid into Gaza.

"Any Israeli ship attempting to violate this ban will be targeted in the declared area of ​​operations. This ban will continue until the crossings to the Gaza Strip are reopened and aid and food and medicine supplies are allowed to enter,” a YAF statement stressed.

Sanaa's efforts to stop the US-Israeli genocide in Gaza prompted an illegal war initiated by Washington and London in January 2024, resulting in hundreds of airstrikes in the Arab world's poorest nation.

Despite the western onslaught, the YAF were undeterred in their military campaign and forced several US aircraft carriers and European warships out of the Red Sea. The country has also downed 15 US MQ-9 Reaper drones.

https://thecradle.co/articles/us-bombs- ... za-support

*****

Israel Kills 4 Journalists In Gaza In Deadliest Attack Since Truce, 9 Dead In Total


A shelter of a Palestinian family among the rubble of destroyed buildings during the holy month of Ramadan in Jabaliya refugee camp. Photo: EFE/EPA/MOHAMMED SABER

March 15, 2025 Hour: 5:26 pm

At least four of the nine Gazans killed this Saturday by Israeli drone strikes in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza, are media workers, the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate confirmed.

“The Syndicate condemns the attack on a media and humanitarian aid team in Gaza and demands accountability for the (Israeli) occupation,” the group said today in a statement.

According to this organization, four of the nine dead are: Bilal Abu Matar, Palestinian editor, as well as Mahmud al Sarraj, Bilal Aqila and Mahmud Asleem, cameramen.

It is believed that at least three of the other victims were aid workers who were part of an aid distribution team with a vehicle from the Al Khair Foundation, based in the United Kingdom, but it is not yet confirmed whether or not they were affiliated with this organization.


“Journalists are being subjected to a deliberate campaign of assassinations and direct executions, in a blatant attempt to silence the truth and prevent media coverage of the atrocities being committed against the civilian population,” the Syndicate continued, calling it a “war crime and a flagrant violation of International Law.”

Since the beginning of the war in Gaza in October 2023, and despite the ceasefire, at least 170 journalists and media workers have been killed: 162 Palestinians – not counting the four from today -, two Israelis and six Lebanese, according to data from the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).

The Israeli army, in a statement and without providing evidence, confirmed that it attacked two alleged militants who they say were operating “a drone that posed a threat to the troops” in Beit Lahia, as well as bombing a vehicle in which other people were traveling who picked up the drone from the ground.

In addition, this afternoon a Gazan child also died from an Israeli gunshot to the head in Beit Lahia, while a woman was injured in the back, according to medical sources cited by the official Palestinian news agency, Wafa. The Israeli army has not yet commented on this.

https://www.telesurenglish.net/israel-k ... -in-total/

*******

‘Israeli’ Settlers Set Fire to Homes in Northern West Bank as Military Onslaught on Tulkarm Rages
March 15, 2025


'Israeli' settlers storm the village of Duma, Nablus, West Bank, setting Palestinian homes ablaze and opening fire on residents. Photo: File Image/PressTV.

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Hundreds of ‘Israeli’ settlers, escorted by the regime troops, have stormed villages and set fire to Palestinian homes in the northern West Bank.

Media reports, quoting local sources, said settlers stormed the Palestinian village of Kifl Haris, near Nablus, on Friday.

‘Israeli’ forces sealed the village off in the early hours of this morning under the pretext of [the settlers] visiting religious sites.

‘Israeli’ settlers also stormed two other villages in the same area.

Local sources said settlers set fire to three Palestinian-owned homes and two vehicles in the village of Duma, south of Nablus.

They also sneaked their way into the village’s Khirbet al-Marajim area, where they set ablaze three homes along with two vehicles.

The regime forces also fired live ammunition, tear gas, and sound bombs towards residents who attempted to reach the burning homes to extinguish the flames.


In al-Khalil, ‘Israeli’ forces abducted six Palestinians while settlers attacked an archeological site and the agricultural crops.

Palestinian official news agency Wafa confirmed that settlers raided the archaeological site of Tell Ma’in, south of al-Khalil.



The ‘Israeli’ military fired sound bombs and tear gas against Palestinians staging a peaceful march for the reopening of the main road in the village of Kafr Qaddum, east of Qalqilya.

The ‘Israeli’ military closed the main entrance of the village that connects it to Nablus with a permanent roadblock in 2003.

Plumes of smoke were seen rising in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin as ‘Israeli’ forces continued demolitions.

Elsewhere in the West Bank, the city of Tulkarm and its refugee camp remains the scene of ‘Israeli’ demolition and detention campaign for 47 days in a row.

‘Israel’s’ quick, deliberate destruction of the Tulkarm and Nur Shams camps has uprooted thousands of inhabitants and upended countless lives in days.

‘Israeli’ troops also stormed the courtyards of al-Aqsa Mosque where Palestinians gathered for dawn prayers in the holy month of Ramadan.

Palestinian resistance movement Hamas says ‘Israel’s’ restrictions on Palestinians at Al-Aqsa mosque constitute religious escalation and systematic targeting of Muslims’ rituals in the holy month of Ramadan.

Hamas has also called on Palestinians to protect Al-Aqsa Mosque co against efforts for its Judaization.

Since ‘Israel’s’ assaults began on the West Bank on January 21, ‘Israeli’ soldiers have forced at least 40,000 Palestinians from their homes.

https://orinocotribune.com/israeli-sett ... arm-rages/

(Were somebody to detonate a nuke in Tel Aviv I would not shed a tear.)

[blindpig]

Dr. Abu Safiya: “A Person Creates History, and History is Built Upon the Stands One Takes”
Posted by Internationalist 360° on March 15, 2025
Aseel Saleh


Scenes from Israel’s siege on Kamal Adwan Hospital. On the left, the last photo of Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya as he walks towards Israeli tanks. On the right, IOF forced health workers and patients to strip and evacuate the hospital.

Despite being interrogated for 13 consecutive days, and subjected to brutal torture and abuse, a Palestinian lawyer confirmed that Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya has kept his morale high.

After over two months of imprisonment in Israeli jails, new information has been revealed about Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya, the director of Kamal Adwan hospital in Gaza. According to Palestinian lawyer Ghaid Qassem, who visited Dr. Abu Safiya last week, he has gone through long periods of sustained interrogation and torture and several prison transfers.

Dr. Abu Safiya was arrested amid a brutal siege of Kamal Adwan Hospital by Israeli forces, which culminated on December 27, when the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) set Kamal Adwan Hospital on fire. The IOF also ordered 350 people, including 75 patients and their escorts, along with 185 medical staff to evacuate the hospital.

In the months prior, Dr. Abu Safiya had been using his own social media page and giving interviews on local and western media in order to provide constant updates about Israel’s siege of the hospital and pleading for international institutions to take action to stop Israel’s attacks. He had become a visible spokesperson for the people of Gaza during the genocide and in particular, the healthcare workers who have faced disproportionate levels of violence as they struggled to keep the healthcare system online amid Israel’s blockade and targeted attacks.

While media reports had circulated indicating that Dr. Abu Safiya was set to be freed in the final stage of the first phase of the Hamas-Israel prisoners-for-captives swap deal at the end of February, Israel continues to imprison the hospital director, in defiance of the massive international campaign demanding his release.

Abu Safiya’s abuse and solitary confinement in Israeli detention

Prior to meeting Qassem on Thursday, March 6, Abu Safiya was only allowed to see a lawyer once throughout over two months of detention. During his imprisonment, he spent a couple of weeks in solitary confinement inside Israel’s infamous Sde Teiman detention camp, which he described as a “slaughterhouse”.

While at Sde Teiman, Dr. Hussam reported being “forcibly stripped, having his hands shackled, and being made to sit on sharp gravel for approximately five hours by Israeli forces.”

Moreover, he was subjected “to severe physical abuse, including beatings with batons and electric shock sticks, as well as repeated blows to the chest.”

The Palestinian doctor was later transferred to Ofer prison in the occupied West Bank, where he was placed in solitary confinement for 25 days, then he was moved to section 24 with other detainees from Gaza.

Qassem clarified that section 24, alongside section 23, is designated for prisoners from Gaza to keep them isolated from other Palestinian prisoners from the West Bank and the territories that were occupied by Israel in 1948.

Horrific accounts from the “slaughterhouse”

Based on Abu Safiya’s accounts, as well as other prisoners she met, Qassem described the conditions inside Sde Teiman, stating: “if we talk about this prison, it is a slaughterhouse in every sense of the word. The torture, violations, and starvation are unprecedented.”

The lawyer provided further details of atrocities practiced against Palestinian prisoners in the notorious detention facility, which included shackling prisoners for 10 months straight, denying amputees medical care, binding elderly detainees and blindfolding them.

In addition, prisoners narrated how they endure freezing temperatures in open-air cages, where they are constantly exposed to wind and rain, forced to sit on the ground, prevented from speaking, praying, or even reading the Quran.

In terms of psychological torture, Qassem was informed that the “Israeli intelligence often tells prisoners in Sde Teiman that their entire families have been killed, whether true or not”. “Such tactics leave deep psychological scars,” she said.

Israel placed Abu Safiya under “unlawful combatant” status

On February 12, the head of the IOF’s Southern Command, Yaron Finkelman, issued an order to detain Abu Safiya under the “unlawful combatant law” instead of conducting a standard legal trial,” according to the Palestinian Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights.

Qassem explained that Israeli authorities resorted to classifying Abu Safiya as an “unlawful combatant” as they could not build a case against him after failing to find any evidence against him following 45 days of interrogation.

With this classification, they stripped Abu Safiya of his basic legal rights, including representation or a formal indictment, and justified the repeated extension of his detention without charge.

Prolonged consecutive interrogation sessions and brutal torture

The testimonies of the Palestinian lawyer revealed that Abu Safiya was subjected to prolonged interrogation sessions throughout 13 consecutive days, and that each interrogation session lasted about 8 to 10 hours. Abu Safiya also experienced torture and beating, in addition to verbal and psychological abuse.

Qassem referred to the forced media appearance of Abu Safiya in an interview aired by Israel’s Channel 13, late February as evidence of the psychological abuse Abu Safiya endured.

The attorney pointed out that Abu Safiya was not aware that the interview was recorded. “He was caught off guard by the filming. He was not informed, and after the interview, he was isolated, humiliated, beaten, and tortured,” she said.

For many, the Israeli occupation authorities aimed to demoralize Abu Safiya and his supporters over the globe by filming him exhausted and shackled. Nevertheless, Qassem confirmed the steadfastness that Abu Safiya demonstrated.

Unshaken by the gross inhumane treatment and torture he suffered, the resilient iconic Palestinian doctor told Qassem: “a person creates a history, and history is built upon the stands one takes. Such history is to be recorded and taught to others.”

https://libya360.wordpress.com/2025/03/ ... one-takes/

******

Jenin camp '100 percent destroyed' after two-month Israeli siege

Over 43,000 Palestinians have been forcibly displaced from their homes in Jenin and Tulkarem

News Desk

MAR 17, 2025


(Photo credit: AFP)

The Municipality Director of the occupied West Bank’s Jenin, Mamdouh Assaf, said on 17 March that the city has been almost completely destroyed by the Israeli siege and assault, which has been ongoing for nearly two months.

“Jenin has been under full occupation for 56 days, and 3,200 homes have been evacuated,” Assaf said, adding that “one-hundred percent of the Jenin Refugee Camp has been leveled, and 85 percent of the streets in Jenin have been destroyed.”

“Life is completely disrupted in Jenin, and we have around 8,000 commercial establishments completely closed. Entire neighborhoods surrounding Jenin Camp have had their residents displaced,” the municipality director went on to say.

The Israeli army launched a widescale operation against the city of Jenin on 21 January, invading and besieging its refugee camp and beginning a systematic campaign of destruction and displacement.

The operation quickly expanded to include other cities in the occupied West Bank – namely Tulkarem, which has been under attack for 50 days. The city's two main camps – Nour Shams Refugee Camp and Tulkarem Refugee Camp – have bore the brunt of the attack.

Over 43,000 people have been displaced in both Jenin and Tulkarem. At least 47 have been killed, and dozens of others injured.

Israeli forces have destroyed hundreds of homes and buildings in both cities with explosives and bulldozers. Several areas of the Jenin and Tulkarem camps have been taken over and transformed into military posts.

In late February, Israeli tanks entered Jenin Refugee Camp for the first time since the Second Intifada in 2002.

Israel’s Defense Minister Israel Katz said last month that the Israeli army is planning to remain deployed in the occupied West Bank's refugee camps for “the next year.”

Meanwhile, Palestinian Authority (PA) security services continue to crack down on the resistance in both Tulkarem and Jenin in coordination with the Israeli army.

https://thecradle.co/articles/jenin-cam ... aeli-siege

Hamas has rebuilt forces to over 25,000 fighters: Israeli lawmakers

The Knesset members have called for an urgent committee hearing with the participation of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and War Minister Israel Katz, stressing Israel's failure to meet its war goals and return Israeli captives from Gaza

News Desk

MAR 16, 2025


(Photo credit: Mohammed Salem, Reuters)

A group of Israeli Knesset members (MKs) said on 16 March that Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) have "restored their military strength" in Gaza and that the Israeli military has failed to achieve its war goals amid stalled ceasefire negotiations, Israeli newspaper Walla reported.

"In recent days, we have been informed that the military strength of Hamas and Islamic Jihad has been restored, such that Hamas has over 25,000 and Islamic Jihad has over 5,000 armed terrorists," stated the Knesset members.

The MKs, including opposition members of the Foreign Affairs and Security Committee, made the claim in a petition they sent calling for an urgent committee hearing with the participation of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and War Minister Israel Katz.

A committee hearing is necessary due to the "failure to achieve the war's goals and the harm to security and national interests."

MKs Gadi Eisenkot, Ram Ben Barak, Meir Cohen, Elazar Stern, Moshe Tor Paz, Sharon Nir, and Merv Michaeli signed the petition.

"In the past month, the Israeli government has not fulfilled its responsibility as the supreme commander of the IDF, and is not advancing the war goals of returning the kidnapped and destroying Hamas' military and governmental power," the petition stated.

The MKs further claimed that Netanyahu and his ministers are acting in violation of war cabinet decisions to "realize the goal of returning the abductees" and to immediately conscript ultra-Orthodox Jewish Israeli men studying the Torah in religious schools known as Yeshivas.

Efforts to exchange Israeli captives in Gaza for Palestinians in Israeli prisons have stalled in recent weeks, with Israel refusing to move to the next phase of a ceasefire agreement reached with the Palestinian resistance in January.

Late on Saturday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu instructed Israeli negotiators to continue the negotiations based on a proposal by US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff that calls for the "immediate release of 11 living hostages and half of the deceased hostages."

Earlier, Hamas said it was ready to accept a previous proposal from US envoy Adam Boehler, which called for the release of a living Israeli-US soldier, Edan Alexander, along with the bodies of four other Israeli-US citizens in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.

After Boehler held direct talks with Hamas officials, Israeli leaders became angry, and President Donald Trump removed him from his position.

Hamas is seeking a permanent end to the war, a complete Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, the reopening of border crossings for aid, and the release of Palestinian prisoners.

Israel is seeking to extend the first phase until mid-April and insists that any transition to the second phase must include "the total demilitarization" of Gaza.

Despite the existing ceasefire, the Israeli military continues to conduct near-daily air strikes in Gaza.

On Saturday, Israeli airstrikes in the city of Beit Lahia in northern Gaza killed nine people, including aid workers and Palestinian journalists. Four young Palestinian boys were killed by an Israeli drone strike while scavenging for firewood on Friday.

https://thecradle.co/articles/hamas-has ... -lawmakers

I read that final paragraph and the words of the genocidal US general during the 'Winning of the West', echo in my head, "Nits breed lice."

Does the fact that the USA, like the Zionists entity, was founded on ethnic cleansing and genocide have anything to do with US connivance?

[blindpig]

The Kingdom of Judea vs. the State of Israel
Posted by Internationalist 360° on March 17, 2025
Alastair Crooke


Many Israelis Still Protesting Netanyahu and the Gaza War

Israel is deeply fractured. The schism has become bitter and heated as both sides see themselves to be in an existential war for the future of Israel. The language used has become so venomous (particularly in reserved channels in Hebrew) that calls for a coup and for civil war are far from uncommon.

Israel is nearing the precipice and the seemingly irreconcilable differences may soon erupt into civil unrest – as Uri Misgav writes this week, the “Israeli spring” is on its way.

The point here is that President Trump’s utilitarian and determinedly transactional style may work effectively in the secular western hemisphere, but with Israel (or Iran) Trump may find little or no traction amongst those with an alternative weltanschauung that expresses a fundamental different concept of morality, philosophy and epistemology, to the classic western deterrence paradigm of material ‘carrots and sticks’.

Indeed, the very attempt to impose deterrence – and to threaten ‘all hell breaking out’ if his injunctions are not followed – may produce the opposite to that which he seeks: i.e. it may trigger new conflicts and wars.

An angry plurality in Israel (led for now, by Netanyahu) have taken the reins of power after a long march through the institutions of Israeli society, and now have their sights focussed on dismantling the ‘Deep State’ within Israel. Equally, there is a furious push-back to this perceived take-over.

What exacerbates this societal fracture are two things: Firstly, it is ethno-cultural; and second it is ideological. The third component is the most explosive – Eschatology.

At the last national election in Israel, the ‘underclass’ finally broke the glass ceiling to win election and to take office. The Mizrahi (Jews from the Middle East and North Africa) have been long treated as the poorer, lower order in society.

The Ashkenazi (European, largely liberal-secular Jews) form much of the urban professional (and until recently) the security class. These are the élites whom the coalition of National Religious and Settler Movement displaced at the last election.

This present phase to a long struggle to power perhaps can be put at 2015. As Gadi Taub has recorded,

“It was then, Israel’s Supreme Court judges removed sovereignty itself—that is, the power of final decision over the whole realm of law and politics—from the elected branches of government and transferred it to themselves. One unelected branch of government officially holds power, against which there are neither checks, nor balances, by any counterforce”.

In the optic of the Right, the self-awarded power of Judicial Review, gave to the Court power, Taub writes,

“to prescribe the rules of the political game – and not just its concrete results”. “Law enforcement then became the huge investigative arm of the press. As was true of the “Russiagate” hoax, The Israel Police and State Attorney were not so much collecting evidence for a criminal trial as they were producing political dirt for leaks to the press”.

The ‘Deep State’ in Israel is a consuming point of contention for Netanyahu and his cabinet: In a speech at the Knesset this month – as one example – Netanyahu savaged the media, accusing news outlets of “full cooperation with the deep state” and of creating “scandals”. “The cooperation between the bureaucracy in the deep state and the media didn’t work in the United States, and it won’t work here”, he said.

Just to be clear, at the time of the last general election, the Supreme Court was composed of 15 Judges, all of whom were Ashkenazi, bar one Mizrahi.

Nevertheless, it would be wrong to see the war of the rival blocs as some arcane dispute about the usurpation of executive power – and a lost ‘separation of state powers’.

The struggle is rooted rather, in a profound ideological dispute about the future and character of the State of Israel. Will it be a messianic, Halacha state obedient to Revelation? Or, in essence, will there be a democratic, liberal, largely secular ‘state’. Israel is shredding itself on the blade of this debate.

The cultural component is that the Mizrahim (loosely defined) and the Right view the European liberal sphere as barely truly Jewish. Hence their determination that the Land of Israel should be wholly immersed in Jewishness.

It was the events of 7 October that absolutely crystalized this ideological struggle, which is the second key factor largely mirroring the general schism.

Israel’s classical security vision (dating from the Ben-Gurion era) was configured to provide an answer to the enduring Israeli dilemma: Israel cannot impose an end to conflict on its enemies, yet at the same time, it cannot maintain a large army in the long term.

Therefore, Israel – in this optic – had to rely on a reserve army that needed adequate security warning before any war occurred. Advance intelligence warning of coming war therefore, was a paramount requirement.

And that key presumption blew apart on 7 October.

The shock and sense of collapse arising from 7 Oct led many to think that the Hamas attack had irrevocably broken the Israeli concept of security – the policy of deterrence had failed and the proof of that was that Hamas was not deterred.

But here, we approach the crux of the Israeli internal war: What was destroyed on 7 Oct was not just the old security paradigm of the Labour Party and the old security elites. It did that; but what arose from its ashes was an alternative weltanschauung that expressed a fundamentally different concept in philosophy and epistemology to the classic deterrence paradigm:

“I was born in Israel; I grew up in Israel … I served in the IDF”, says Alon Mizrahi;

“I was exposed to it. I was indoctrinated this way, and for many years of my life I believed it. This represents a serious Jewish problem: It is not just [a matter of one mode of] Zionism … How can you teach your children – and this is almost universal – that everyone who is not Jewish wants to kill you. When you put yourself in this paranoia, you give yourself permission to do anything to everyone … It is not a good way to create a society. It is so dangerous”.

See here in the Times of Israel an account of a High School presentation (post-7 Oct) on the Morality of Wiping out Amalek: A student raises the question: “Why do we condemn Hamas for murdering innocent men, women, and children – if we are commanded to wipe out Amalek?”

“How can we have normality tomorrow”, Alon Mizrahi asks, “if this is who we are today”?

The National Religious Right is leading the charge for a radical change to the Israeli concept of security; they no longer believe in the classic Ben Gurion paradigm of deterrence – particularly in the wake of 7 October. Nor does the Right believe in reaching any settlement with the Palestinians – and absolutely does not want a bi-national state. In the concept of Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s security theory henceforth must include a continuous war against Palestinians – until they are expelled or eliminated.

The Old (Liberal) Establishment is outraged – as one of its members, David Agmon (former IDF Brigadier-General and former bureau chief to Netanyahu), articulated this week:

“I accuse you, Bezalel Smotrich, of destroying religious Zionism! You are leading us to a state of Halacha and Haredi Zionism, not religious Zionism … Not to mention the fact that you joined the terrorist Ben Gvir, who diverts lawbreakers, hillbilly boys, to continue breaking the law, who attacks the government, the judicial system, and the police under his responsibility. Netanyahu is not the solution. Netanyahu is the problem, he is the head of the snake. The protest should act against Netanyahu and his coalition. The protest should demand the overthrow of the malicious government”.

Netanyahu is in one sense secular; but in another, he embraces the Biblical mission of Greater Israel – with all its enemies annihilated. He is, (if you like a label) a neo-Jabotinskyist (his father was private secretary to Jabotinsky), and, in practice, exists in a relationship of mutual dependency with figures like Ben Gvir and Smotrich.

“What do these people want?”, asks Max Blumenthal; “What is their ultimate goal?”

“It is apocalypse”, warns Blumenthal, whose book Goliath traces the rise of Israel’s eschatological Right:

“They have an eschatology that is based on the Third Temple ideology – in which the Al-Aqsa Mosque will be destroyed and be replaced with a Third Temple and traditional Jewish ritual will be practiced”.

And in order to bring that about, they need a ‘Big War’.

Smotrich always has been frank about this: The project of ultimately removing all the Arabs from the ‘Land of Israel’ will require an emergency – a ‘big war’ – he has said.

The big question is: Do Trump and his team grasp any of this? For it has profound implications for Trump’s methodology of transactional deal-making. ‘Carrots and Sticks’ and secular rationality will carry little weight amongst those whose epistemology is quite different; those who take Revelation literally as ‘truth’, and who believe it commands complete obedience.

Trump says he wants to end the conflicts in the Middle East, and bring about a regional ‘peace’.

His secular, transactional approach to politics, however, is wholly unsuited to resolving eschatological conflict. His bravura style of threatening ‘all hell will break out’ if he doesn’t get his way will not work, when one or other party actually wants Armageddon.

“All hell break out”? ‘Bring it on’, might well be the response Trump gets.

https://libya360.wordpress.com/2025/03/ ... of-israel/

*******

Israel restarts Gaza genocide, kills hundreds in overnight blitz

The ceasefire's collapse comes as US warplanes continue to bomb Yemen, which has pledged to remain steadfast in its support for Palestinians and 'escalate the confrontation'

News Desk

MAR 18, 2025


(Photo Credit: @EyeonPalestine)

The Israeli military resumed its air raid campaign on the Gaza Strip in the early hours of 18 March, killing at least 300 Palestinians and injuring many more in airstrikes on humanitarian shelters and tent camps.

Airstrikes were reported in Gaza City, Deir al-Balah, Khan Younis, and Rafah in the south, which was also hit by artillery attacks from Israeli tanks. Images shared on social media show many children among the victims of the midnight bombardment.


The Ministry of Health in Gaza: Over 200 Palestinians have been killed the recent Israeli airstrikes in Gaza.

ارتفاع عدد الشهداء إلى أكثر من 200 شهيد و المئات من المصابين في القصف الاسرائيلي على قطاع غزة. pic.twitter.com/o1hb1pGRKd

— Eye on Palestine (@EyeonPalestine) March 18, 2025
"Our teams are facing major difficulties working in the sector due to multiple targets being struck simultaneously," the Gaza Civil Defense reported after the aggression began.

"We hold the criminal Netanyahu and the Nazi-Zionist occupation fully responsible for the repercussions of the treacherous aggression on Gaza and for the defenseless civilians and our besieged Palestinian people," Hamas said in a statement.

The Palestinian resistance movement also urged the ceasefire mediators to hold the Israeli government “fully responsible for violating and overturning the agreement.”

Prime Minister and wanted war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu instructed the military to take "strong action" against Hamas in Gaza, accusing the group of refusing to release captives and “rejecting all ceasefire proposals.”

"Israel will, from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength," Netanyahu's office said in a statement.

Terrifying scenes out of Gaza, as Israel renews bombardment, targeting whatever remains of residential buildings. This is following two weeks of a complete siege on Gaza to starve Palestinians & drone strikes that have killed dozens, including several aid & media workers in… pic.twitter.com/tn16o4PofK

— Sana Saeed (@SanaSaeed) March 18, 2025
As the Israeli genocide of Palestinians resumed in Gaza, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt revealed that Tel Aviv notified Washington ahead of time of its “extensive strikes.”

“All of the terrorists in the Middle East… Iranian-backed terror proxies and Iran themselves should take President Trump seriously when he says he’s not afraid to stand for law-abiding people,” Leavitt told Fox News.

Hours earlier, US warplanes bombed several cities in Yemen for the fourth consecutive night as Washington continued to expand its illegal war on the country.

"We condemn the Zionist enemy's resumption of aggression against the Gaza Strip and the targeting of defenseless civilians. The aggressive raids launched by the Israeli enemy this morning against the Gaza Strip coincided with the US aggression against Yemen and followed weeks of starvation of the Palestinian people," a statement from Yemen's Supreme Political Council reads.

“The Palestinian people will not be left alone in this battle, and Yemen will continue to support and escalate the confrontation.”

Israel's return to bloodshed in Gaza comes two weeks into a complete aid blockade and repeated attempts to stall negotiations for phase two of the US-sponsored ceasefire that went into effect in January.

At least 151 Palestinians were killed since the start of the ceasefire and its collapse on Tuesday.

Gaza’s Government Media Office reports more than 61,700 Palestinians have been killed since the start of the western-backed genocide, with thousands more missing under the rubble.

https://thecradle.co/articles/israel-re ... ight-blitz

Gaza food kitchens shut down 16 days into Israeli blockade

More than 10,000 aid trucks have been blocked from entering Gaza as part of Israel's 'systematic policy of starvation'

News Desk

MAR 17, 2025


(PHoto credit: REUTERS/Mohammed Salem)

Israel's most recent blockade of Gaza has reached day 16, deepening the humanitarian crisis in the strip and forcing desperately needed community kitchens and bakeries to shut down, Al Jazeera reported on 17 March.

“The operator of 10 charity food kitchens and other humanitarian services in the Gaza Strip says only two food distribution centers are now open after Israel's blockage of all humanitarian goods,” the Qatari news outlet stated.

“We had 80 pots every day that we were serving to people. Now we're working on about 20,” Omar Abuhammad, coordinator with the Heroic Hearts organization, told Al Jazeera.

Before Israel imposed the blockade, the kitchens were providing food for about 40,000 people in central Gaza's Deir al-Balah. But now, only 10,000 Palestinians are receiving meals.

“As the main source of food for them, we no longer have the ability to serve them,” Abuhammad said.

Director of the Government Media Office in Gaza, Ismail al-Thawabta, stated on Monday that more than 10,000 aid trucks have been blocked from entering Gaza as part of a “systematic policy of starvation against the Palestinian people.”


“The occupation has also denied entry to 850 fuel and cooking gas trucks, leading to a complete paralysis of the transportation sector, the closure of bakeries, and a total halt to humanitarian operations,” Thawabta added.

Hassan Radwan, a displaced Palestinian from Gaza, told AP about his reliance on food from aid groups.

“In light of many crises, the closure of crossings for two consecutive weeks, we suffer greatly from a shortage of flour and a shortage of food. As you can see, now we get our daily sustenance from the charity,” Radwan stated.

“In the past, we did not depend on charity in any way. But today, we are forced to come to the charity due to scarcity of materials. Materials are very scarce, a shortage of water, shortage of food, and a shortage of everything,” he added.

Tel Aviv imposed its most recent blockade on Gaza to pressure Hamas into allowing Israel to abandon the ceasefire agreement reached in January.

Hamas is seeking an end to the war, the withdrawal of Israeli forces, and the free flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza.

Israeli leaders are aiming to resume the war, forcibly expel Gaza's 2.3 million residents, and annex the strip to build settlements for Jewish Israelis.

The UN children's agency UNICEF called the situation “urgent” and demanded Israel restore access to water and electricity to prevent further loss of life in the enclave, which has been devastated by 18 months of Israeli bombing and siege.

Despite the ceasefire, Israeli forces continue to bomb Gaza.

On Monday, three Palestinian men were killed by an Israeli drone in Bureij Refugee Camp in central Gaza.

“We were sitting, and suddenly, the drone came on top of our heads. I felt very scared, and I moved to stay near the rubble of our home,” a survivor of the bombing shared with Al Jazeera.

“The young men were busy, not very far away from me, collecting firewood. But without warning, a missile hit them. Some other people were injured. We climbed a hill to try to help them, and we were shocked to see a quadcopter overhead. We are so terrified.”

Israel's army said the men were “terrorists” planting bombs near its troops.

Also on Monday, US President Donald Trump's special envoy to the region, Steve Witkoff, said the administration is “exploring” alternatives for forcibly expelling Palestinians from Gaza under the pretext of providing them a better life.

“I mean, I think we're exploring … all alternatives and options that lead to a better life for Gazans, and, by the way, for the people of Israel,” Witkoff said in an interview with journalist Margaret Brennan.

https://thecradle.co/articles/gaza-food ... i-blockade


The technology is different but the goal is the same.

Jenin camp '100 percent destroyed' after two-month Israeli siege

Over 43,000 Palestinians have been forcibly displaced from their homes in Jenin and Tulkarem

News Desk

MAR 17, 2025


(Photo credit: AFP)
.
The Municipality Director of the occupied West Bank’s Jenin, Mamdouh Assaf, said on 17 March that the city has been almost completely destroyed by the Israeli siege and assault, which has been ongoing for nearly two months.

“Jenin has been under full occupation for 56 days, and 3,200 homes have been evacuated,” Assaf said, adding that “one-hundred percent of the Jenin Refugee Camp has been leveled, and 85 percent of the streets in Jenin have been destroyed.”

“Life is completely disrupted in Jenin, and we have around 8,000 commercial establishments completely closed. Entire neighborhoods surrounding Jenin Camp have had their residents displaced,” the municipality director went on to say.

The Israeli army launched a widescale operation against the city of Jenin on 21 January, invading and besieging its refugee camp and beginning a systematic campaign of destruction and displacement.

The operation quickly expanded to include other cities in the occupied West Bank – namely Tulkarem, which has been under attack for 50 days. The city's two main camps – Nour Shams Refugee Camp and Tulkarem Refugee Camp – have bore the brunt of the attack.

Over 43,000 people have been displaced in both Jenin and Tulkarem. At least 47 have been killed, and dozens of others injured.

Israeli forces have destroyed hundreds of homes and buildings in both cities with explosives and bulldozers. Several areas of the Jenin and Tulkarem camps have been taken over and transformed into military posts.

In late February, Israeli tanks entered Jenin Refugee Camp for the first time since the Second Intifada in 2002.

Israel’s Defense Minister Israel Katz said last month that the Israeli army is planning to remain deployed in the occupied West Bank's refugee camps for “the next year.”

Meanwhile, Palestinian Authority (PA) security services continue to crack down on the resistance in both Tulkarem and Jenin in coordination with the Israeli army.

https://thecradle.co/articles/jenin-cam ... aeli-siege


The PA are the Sondercommandos of Palestine

******


Palestinians walk amid the rubble of destroyed homes and buildings in Jabaliya, northern Gaza Strip on Friday, March 14, 2025. [Photo: AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi]

Echoing Nazi “Madagascar plan,” U.S. and Israel seek to displace Palestinians to East Africa
Originally published: World Socialist Web Site (WSWS) on March 14, 2025 by Andre Damon (more by World Socialist Web Site (WSWS)) | (Posted Mar 17, 2025)

The U.S. and Israeli governments have opened up discussions with officials from Sudan, Somalia and the internationally unrecognized breakaway Somaliland over the mass expulsion of Palestinians in Gaza and their forcible relocation to those countries.

The talks were first reported by the Associated Press (AP) Friday and separately confirmed in a report in the Financial Times.

The ongoing discussions mirror the “Madagascar Plan,” the proposal by officials of Nazi Germany to resettle Europe’s Jews to Madagascar, the then-French island colony just off Africa’s southeast coast. The plan marked a key transition point to the Holocaust, in which the leaders of Nazi Germany carried out the mass extermination of the Jews instead of merely deporting them.

Somalia has one of the lowest Human Development Index rankings in the world, with widespread poverty, food insecurity and lack of access to healthcare and education. Sudan has experienced decades of civil war, triggering ethnic killings, sexual violence and mass displacement affecting millions of people.

The AP reported that “The contacts with Sudan, Somalia and the breakaway region of Somalia known as Somaliland reflect the determination by the U.S. and Israel to press ahead” with Trump’s plan to ethnically cleanse Gaza.

Asked to comment on the revelations by the AP, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said Israel was building a “very large emigration department” within the Ministry of Defense.

In February, Trump announced his plan to ethnically cleanse and annex Gaza for the United States. “We’re going to have Gaza,” Trump said. “We don’t have to buy. There’s nothing to buy. We will have Gaza…. We’re going to take it,” Trump said on February 11.

The AP reported that separate outreach efforts by the United States and Israel to the three potential destinations began last month, shortly after Trump and Netanyahu introduced the Gaza plan. The officials also noted that Israel was primarily leading these discussions.

The AP reported:

Two Sudanese officials, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive diplomatic matter, confirmed that the Trump administration has approached the military-led government about accepting Palestinians. One of them said the contacts began even before Trump’s inauguration with offers of military assistance.

Trump’s plan to displace the people of Gaza is a flagrant violation of the prohibition under the Fourth Geneva Convention of the forcible transfer of civilians during armed conflicts. And his plan to steal their land violates the 1970 United Nations treaty, ratified by the United States, which stipulates that “The territory of a State shall not be the object of acquisition by another State resulting from the threat or use of force.”

Michele Zaccheo, a UN spokesperson in Geneva, responded to the AP’s report by saying:

Any plan that could or would lead to the forced displacement of people or any type of ethnic cleansing is something that we would obviously be against, as it is against international law.

Last weekend, Finance Minister Smotrich said the Israeli government was creating an administration for the “voluntary” migration of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip. “We are establishing a migration administration, we are preparing for this under the leadership of the prime minister and defense minister,” he said.

Endorsing Trump’s proposal for the ethnic cleansing of Gaza, he continued, “If we remove 5,000 a day, it will take a year,” adding,

logistics are complex because you need to know who is going to which country. It’s a potential for historical change.

The ongoing preparations for the ethnic cleansing of Gaza take place as Israel continues its total blockade of food, water and electricity into Gaza, which is aimed at either starving the population of Gaza to death or forcing it to relocate through famine. For 13 days, no food or water has entered Gaza, and food insecurity and starvation are spreading.

Gaza’s government media office reported that 80 percent of its citizens have lost access to food sources, and 90 percent of the population is without reliable access to clean water. A quarter of Gaza’s remaining bakeries have been forced to shut down due to shortages of supplies, while others are on the verge of closing. The office reported that 150,000 people are suffering from either chronic disease or war wounds and are facing major shortages of medical supplies.

Olga Cherevko, a spokesperson for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), told Al Jazeera that there is “fear, alarm and concern that supplies are running out.”

She continued, “The water and sanitation situation was already dire with most of the facilities destroyed during the months of fighting.” She added that the Israeli cutoff of electricity to Gaza “reduces access to drinking water to about 600,000 people.”

On Thursday, the UN’s Independent International Commission of Inquiry (COI) on the Occupied Palestinian Territory accused Israel of genocidal acts targeting the reproductive rights of Palestinians. The report was the first time that a UN committee officially and formally asserted that Israel has committed genocidal acts.

The commission declared:

Israeli authorities have destroyed in part the reproductive capacity of the Palestinians in Gaza as a group, including by imposing measures intended to prevent births, one of the categories of genocidal acts in the Rome Statute and the Genocide Convention.

The report explained:

Sexual and reproductive healthcare facilities have been systematically destroyed across Gaza, including maternity hospitals and maternity wards of hospitals and Gaza’s main in-vitro fertility clinic.

The mounting evidence of Israel’s plans to ethnically cleanse Gaza and systematically exterminate the Palestinian population only underscores the criminality of the drive by the Trump administration to persecute opponents of the Gaza genocide, including Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil, who was arrested this week and is being held incommunicado and facing deportation for opposing the Gaza genocide.

https://mronline.org/2025/03/17/echoing ... st-africa/

"Never again", a mouth full of sand.

[blindpig]

As Israel Reignites Genocidal Apocolypse, History Will Judge the Executioners and All the Devils Who Watched and Did Nothing.
Posted by Internationalist 360° on March 18, 2025
BettBeat Media



The skies over Gaza have darkened once again with the smoke of destruction. What we are witnessing is not warfare but the methodical erasure of human existence – a calculated annihilation that defies description yet demands our witness. Israel has unleashed what can only be called an apocalyptic nightmare upon Gaza, fulfilling the chilling promise made by Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich weeks earlier. This is genocide unfolding before our eyes, again —Israel’s torture, rape and death machine will not and cannot stop.

I repeat: Israel will not stop. Why would it? The world has given it carte blanche for atrocity. It bombs Syria with impunity, seizes Syrian territory without consequence, strikes Lebanon and Yemen without fear. It commits sexual violence against Palestinian men, women, and children—documented on video for all to see. It films its own torture sessions like trophies. It reduces hospitals to rubble, universities to ash, transforms doctors into casualties and journalists into corpses. It murders mothers cradling infants, aid workers carrying medicine, children sleeping in beds. ISRAEL-CAN-DO-ANY-THING.

Make no mistake, as I have written many times before, if the world fails to end zionism, zionism will end the world.

Most are Under Six Years Old

The death toll mounts with each passing hour. Over 400 Palestinians slaughtered in relentless airstrikes, with no pretense of military necessity. Among the dead lie at least 174 children – innocent lives extinguished without remorse or hesitation. Countless others remain trapped beneath mountains of concrete and twisted metal, their fates sealed.

The evidence of this atrocity is seared into the consciousness of anyone who dares to look: a baby in a rainbow-patterned jumpsuit, lifeless. A child’s bloodied face beneath a Mickey Mouse shirt. A toddler with burns marring her delicate features. Fathers cradling their daughters for the final time – one gently playing with her hair, another wailing over her favorite pajamas now stained crimson.

Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, a Californian surgeon volunteering in Gaza, described scenes of “utter carnage” following the strikes. “Mostly children,” he reported, his voice heavy with anguish. “The other half are mostly women.” Of the six surgeries he performed overnight, half were on children under six years old. “Most of them are going to go on to die,” he acknowledged, the weight of inevitability crushing his medical expertise.

We Must Haunt Them Until the End of Days.

While Palestinians bleed, language itself becomes a weapon wielded against truth. CNN’s breaking news claimed Israel was merely “carrying out extensive strikes against Hamas,” casting “doubt on the fragile ceasefire” – as if hundreds of civilian deaths represented anything but its complete obliteration. The New York Times insisted these apocalyptic bombardments were “targeting Hamas,” knowing full well the disproportionate slaughter of innocent children.

Western media has become not just complicit but an active accomplice in genocide. These institutions have abandoned all pretense of journalistic integrity, choosing instead to launder Western war crimes through sanitized language and deliberate omissions. They contort themselves to avoid words like “genocide” and “occupation,” yet rush to label Palestinian resistance as “terrorism.” Media executives, editors, and journalists who participate in this deadly propaganda campaign bear moral responsibility for every bomb that falls. Their hands are stained with the same blood as those who pull the triggers and drop the bombs.

We must haunt them until the end of days.


The skies above Gaza burn orange as airstrikes transform residential buildings into infernos.

This so-called “ceasefire,” in effect since January 19th, had already been violated repeatedly, with over 150 Palestinians killed before this latest massacre. During the same period, only one Israeli died in Gaza – killed accidentally by Israeli forces. The stark contrast reveals the racial calculus that determines whose lives matter in this conflict.

Beyond the immediate violence lies the systematic strangulation of survival itself. Israel has imposed a total blockade on Gaza, preventing food, medicine, and all humanitarian aid from reaching a desperate population. Prices for basic necessities have surged 200%, creating famine conditions deliberately engineered by policy. Even Zionist apologist British Foreign Secretary David Lammy briefly acknowledged this as “a breach of international law” before his complicit government swiftly backpedaled.

“History will judge not just the executioners but all the devils who watched and did nothing.”

Where the Hell is the World?

Now Israel orders mass evacuations, forcing yet another displacement of a traumatized population. The stage is being set for the complete destruction of what little infrastructure and life remain, facilitating what former President Trump has already green-lit: “all hell breaking out”.

No crime in history has been so thoroughly documented by its victims, so extensively evidenced by experts, or so openly confessed to by its perpetrators. There are no excuses, no hiding places. Those who commit, facilitate, or remain silent in the face of this genocide bear the weight of complicity.

Where the hell is the world? One and a half years in, and the entire international community—with all its lofty institutions, treaties, and declarations—stands paralyzed as a tiny speck of a nation systematically erases an ancient civilization from the face of the earth.

The much-heralded “multipolar world” has revealed itself as nothing but a cruel farce—major powers like China, Russia, and Brazil posture from the sidelines, offering hollow statements and performative concern while blood floods the streets.

They watch, they “condemn,” they “urge restraint,” yet they do nothing as the United States arms and shields Israel in its methodical erasure of Palestine. Together they bomb the cradle of civilization—our shared human heritage—back into the stone age, destroying libraries, museums, universities, and archaeological sites that have stood for millennia. Not just Palestinian lives, but humanity’s very memory is being systematically obliterated, and the world’s powers respond with nothing but diplomatic theater.

The United Nations stands impotent, its resolutions ignored with impunity. International courts issue warrants that go unenforced—except when it’s another brown-faced leader who needs arrested. Arab nations that once thundered with solidarity now bow shamefully to the white man and his Zionist collaborator, betraying decades of promised brotherhood. Human rights organizations document atrocities that pile up like corpses in unmarked graves—evidence gathered for a justice that simply never arrives.

Every humanitarian principle, every international law, every diplomatic norm lies shattered like Gaza’s hospitals, schools, and homes. The deafening silence of global leaders betrays their complicity. Their inaction speaks volumes—Palestinian lives are deemed expendable, their suffering a tolerable price in the calculus of geopolitical interests and arms deals. What an absolute failure humanity is.

What use have our vaunted “liberal institutions” when they stand exposed as empty facades—powerless by design? The UN issues resolutions, the ICJ orders a halt to genocide, the ICC threatens prosecutions—yet the slaughter not only continues but intensifies in real time, streaming directly to our devices. We witness the rape, torture, burning, and bombing of innocent civilians in high definition, as if the perpetrators are taunting the world with their impunity. And what do these hallowed institutions deliver? Nothing but carefully worded statements that evaporate into the ether while Palestinian blood soaks into concrete.

The architects of this horror are not merely unpunished—they are rewarded. Western powers rush to supply more weapons, transfer billions in funding, and provide absolute diplomatic cover at every turn. They label themselves “the rules-based order” while systematically shredding international law to protect their client state. History will render its verdict not only against the executioners but against all the complicit monsters who watched, who knew, who could have acted but chose to look away. Their names will be carved into monuments of shame, their legacies forever stained with the blood they pretended not to see gushing forth before their eyes.

Mark my words: history will judge not just the executioners but all the devils who watched and did nothing.

As fires rage across Gaza and children’s bodies are pulled from rubble, we must face this terrible truth: we are witnessing — again — a bloody genocide in real time. Our silence is not neutrality – it is permission. Our voices may be all that stands between the people of Gaza and their complete annihilation.

https://libya360.wordpress.com/2025/03/ ... d-nothing/

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Israel readies new ground invasion of Gaza: Report

The Russian mission to the UN says it has intelligence that the Israeli army is preparing for a new ground operation in the besieged enclave

News Desk

MAR 18, 2025


(Photo credit: Ali Jadallah/Anadolu/Getty Images)

The renewed Israeli military operations in Gaza that have killed over 400 Palestinians in 24 hours are open-ended and expected to expand, including through a possible ground invasion.

“Israel will, from now on, act against Hamas with increasing military strength,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said on 18 March.

An Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity with AP, said Israel was striking Hamas’s military, leaders, and infrastructure and planned to expand the operation beyond air attacks.

“The goal of the surprise strike we launched in Gaza is to bring Hamas back to the negotiating table and secure the release of at least 10 kidnapped soldiers alive. If that doesn't happen, we'll see ground forces as well,” reported Israel's Channel 14 military correspondent Hillel Biton-Rosen.

The Russian Deputy Representative raised the possibility of a renewed ground invasion to the UN.

“We have information that the Israeli army is preparing for a ground operation in the Gaza Strip,” the Russian mission stated.

“The situation is worsening due to Israel’s refusal to provide for the needs of a people under occupation. Protecting civilians is not among the principles and methods of the Israeli army,” the statement added.

The threat of a ground invasion accompanied a warning from Israel’s Defense Minister, Israel Katz. He stated the “gates of hell will open in Gaza” if the remaining captives held by Hamas are not released.

“We will not stop fighting until all of our hostages are home and we have achieved all of the war goals,” Katz added.

In contrast, Israeli newspaper Ynet suggested the current military operation might not include a ground invasion.

“The resumption of fighting in the strip is currently limited to an air operation – codenamed ‘Pride and Sword’ – and does not include a new ground invasion of Gaza.”

“Israel is seeking to push Hamas to advance negotiations on the deal, or at least to complete an additional phase of it,” the Hebrew paper stated.

https://thecradle.co/articles/israel-re ... aza-report

******

Mass Graves Unearthed at Gaza’s Al-Shifa Hospital: 61 Bodies Recovered
March 18, 2025


Mass graves in Gaza following Israel's withdrawal. Photo: The Palestine Chronicle/video grab.

Civil Defense teams in Gaza have exhumed 61 bodies buried at Al-Shifa Hospital, continuing their recovery efforts from the war zone where more than 180 Palestinians were temporarily buried.

Civil Defense teams continued efforts on Saturday to retrieve the bodies of 61 Palestinians buried in the grounds of Gaza’s al-Shifa Hospital during Israel’s months-long military assault on the enclave.

The Gaza Health Ministry said the exhumation process began on March 13, 2025, as teams worked to recover remains for proper burial, the Anadolu news agency reported.

On the first day, Civil Defense workers retrieved 48 bodies, including 10 unidentified individuals. On the second day, 13 more bodies were recovered, three of which remain unidentified.

Known bodies were returned to families, while others were sent to forensic authorities, the report added.

Authorities estimate around 160 bodies were buried in the hospital’s yard during the war, with several more days needed to complete the recovery process.

Repeated Attacks
Shifa Hospital, once Gaza’s largest medical facility, served 460,000 people annually before the war, providing emergency care, surgeries, dialysis treatments, and maternal health services.

Israeli forces repeatedly stormed and destroyed Shifa Hospital throughout the war.

The first major raid occurred on November 16, 2023, lasting ten days. A second incursion on March 18, 2024, continued until April 1, during which Israeli troops demolished hospital sections, burned buildings, and carried out killings inside and around the facility, rendering it completely inoperable.

Munir Al-Barsh, Director-General of Gaza’s Health Ministry, told Anadolu in January 2025 that over 95 percent of the hospital’s buildings and equipment were destroyed during the military assault.

Ceasefire Violations
A ceasefire and prisoner exchange deal in effect since January 19, has halted Israel’s brutal assault, which killed over 48,500 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and left Gaza in ruins. However, Israel has violated the ceasefire on numerous occasions, resulting in the deaths of Palestinians.

On Saturday, nine Palestinians were killed, including four journalists, in an Israeli airstrike on the town of Beit Lahia in northern Gaza. According to reports, an Israeli drone targeted a gathering of civilians twice.

In another ceasefire violation on Thursday, two Palestinian children were killed, and two women injured by Israeli drone fire in eastern Gaza City and Beit Hanoun in the north of Gaza.

Three Killed Every 24 Hours
Israel has killed 150 Palestinians—an average of three people every 24 hours—since the ceasefire took effect on January 19, 2025, according to the Geneva-based Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor.

In its latest report, the rights group said its field team has documented Israeli sniper and drone attacks since the ceasefire went into effect, as well as the continued use of the humanitarian blockade “as a weapon of slow death by starvation” in Israel’s military assault on the enclave.

The ongoing killings by the Israeli army are carried out by snipers and drones, including quadcopter aircraft, which target Palestinian civilians,” Euro-Med Monitor said.

Phase One of the ceasefire and prisoner exchange agreement expired on March 1, with Israel immediately announcing that all aid will be blocked from entry into Gaza. Since then, Israel has also cut off all electricity and water supply to the enclave.

(The Palestine Chronicle)

https://orinocotribune.com/mass-graves- ... recovered/

[blindpig]

Israel Makes Its Most Explicit Statement Of Genocidal Intent Yet

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz has published an explicit statement of genocidal intent toward the people of Gaza, threatening civilians in the enclave with collective punishment in the form of “total devastation” if they do not find a way to overthrow Hamas and free all Israeli hostages.

Caitlin Johnstone
March 20, 2025


Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz has published an explicit statement of genocidal intent toward the people of Gaza, threatening civilians in the enclave with collective punishment in the form of “total devastation” if they do not find a way to overthrow Hamas and free all Israeli hostages.

Katz’s statement reads as follows:

“Residents of Gaza, this is your final warning. The first Sinwar destroyed Gaza, and the second Sinwar will bring upon it total ruin. The Israeli Air Force’s attack against Hamas terrorists was only the first step. What follows will be far harsher, and you will bear the full cost.

“Evacuation of the population from combat zones will soon resume. If all Israeli hostages are not released and Hamas is not kicked out of Gaza, Israel will act with force you have not known before.

“Take the advice of the U.S. President: return the hostages and kick out Hamas, and new options will open up for you — including relocation to other parts of the world for those who choose. The alternative is destruction and total devastation.”

When Katz says “Take the advice of the US president,” he is referring to a statement made by President Trump earlier this month which made essentially the same threat addressed “to the People of Gaza,” saying, “A beautiful Future awaits, but not if you hold Hostages. If you do, you are DEAD! Make a SMART decision. RELEASE THE HOSTAGES NOW, OR THERE WILL BE HELL TO PAY LATER!”

When I criticized the US president for these remarks which explicitly threaten Gaza’s civilians, I got a deluge of Trump supporters telling me he wasn’t really talking about “the people of Gaza” as he said, but was rather speaking only about the ones who are actively holding hostages. Katz’s statement makes it abundantly clear that they were wrong, and that those of us who called a spade a spade at the time were correct.

The Israeli defense minister is simply following Trump’s position and reiterating what everyone who isn’t a blinkered partisan hack knew Trump was saying two weeks ago. He is doing this in exactly the same way Benjamin Netanyahu followed Trump’s position on ethnically cleansing Gaza last month by enthusiastically endorsing the plan Trump put forward to permanently remove all Palestinians from the enclave. Trump puts forward the plan, and Israeli officials put it into action.

So you’ve got both the US and Israeli governments openly threatening the entire population of the Gaza strip with the war crime of collective punishment if they don’t somehow kick Hamas out of Gaza, and additionally announcing the intent to inflict “total devastation” upon that population if they do not.

This is about as explicit an admission of genocidal intent as you can possibly come up with.

In its genocide case against Israel in the International Court of Justice, South African prosecutors compiled a mountain of evidence of Israeli officials announcing the intent to commit genocide in Gaza, such as Netanyahu describing Gaza’s population as “Amalek” in reference to a Bible story about a people who were completely annihilated on the orders of God, or former Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant describing Palestinians in Gaza as “human animals” while declaring a “total siege” on the enclave.

Al Jazeera’s Raz Segal and Penny Green wrote the following regarding the ICJ case last year:

“The crime of genocide has two elements — intention and execution — both of which have to be proven when accusations are made… Intention is usually harder to prove when accusations of genocide are made; the petitioner has to be able to prove “intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such,” in the language of the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. But in Israel’s case, intention too has been laid bare by an ample amount of evidence — as the South African legal team pointed out.”

And Katz’s statement is probably the most clear and explicit admission yet. It’s hard to imagine a clearer declaration of genocidal intent than delivering a video statement addressed to a civilian population threatening them with “total devastation” if they don’t do as they’re told.

We may be sure that these statements by Katz and Trump have been added to files held by those who hope to successfully prosecute these monsters for war crimes one day. We may also be sure that they will be recorded in what will eventually be seen as one of the darker chapters in our civilization’s history.

https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/2025/03 ... ntent-yet/