U.S., British bombing of Yemen’s key port threatens renewed famine, war
November 2, 2024 Lev Koufax
Warplanes of the U.S. and Britain have launched a new attack against the Yemeni port city of Al Hudaydah.
The United States and British air forces launched a series of air strikes against the Yemeni port city of Al Hudaydah on Oct. 31. This is the second of their kind launched by Western forces against the port, specifically since the beginning of 2024.
In July, Zionist forces carpet-bombed the Al Hudaydah port region, killing six people and wounding another 80. The July strikes also destroyed oil facilities and a crucial power station. At the time, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the strikes and accused the Zionist entity of unnecessary escalation against Yemen.
The United Nations World Food Program later found that the July 20 Zionist strikes destroyed 800,000 liters of UN-owned fuel supplied for humanitarian purposes. Even the U.S.-friendly Western think tank, Human Rights Watch, condemned the strike as a “possible war crime,” citing the scorched earth nature of the strikes that targeted civilian infrastructure.
This recent round of strikes on the port, this time perpetrated directly by the U.S. and Britain, signals a dangerous escalation in the region and threatens to plunge Yemen back into a bloody civil war after an uneasy armistice has held for roughly five years. Further attacks on the port could also reintroduce famine conditions in Yemen and worsen the current cholera outbreak.
The port at Al Hudaydah is a crucial supply point for Yemen and the entire Arabian peninsula. Regarding Yemen, 70% of the country’s food imports enter via the Al Hudaydah port. Further, the port is also the entry point for over 80% of all humanitarian aid that enters Yemen.
The targeting of Al Hudaydah’s civilian port capacity is not a mistake. It is an intentional attempt to destabilize the legitimate Ansar Allah-led government of Yemen and to place the people of Yemen under siege conditions as they fight to end the genocide in Gaza. This is not the first time Western-backed forces have attempted to starve out Ansar Allah via the Al Hudaydah port.
In 2018, a U.S.-backed joint Saudi and UAE forces besieged the port city in the hopes of striking a fatal blow against the growing then-named “Houthi Movement.” That movement, now known as the Ansar Allah Yemen Government, led an uprising in 2014 against a Saudi puppet government that aimed to open the country to predatory Western monopolies. In 2014, the rebel forces captured the Yemeni capital city of Sanaa and established a new seat of government.
Four years into a bloody war between Saudi Arabian proxy forces and Ansar Allah, the Saudi and Emirate forces decided to make a move against the new Yemeni government by attacking the Al Hudaydah port. This deadly move came after years of human rights abuses against the Yemeni people. To be clear, the United States, France, and Britain supplied weapons to the Saudi forces, who used those weapons to wage a terror campaign against Ansar Allah and the citizens of Yemen.
U.S.-supplied Saudi forces began their attack on the Al Hudaydah port in June of 2018. The battle quickly intensified, engulfing the entire city and placing the port at the risk of total shutdown. The Saudi forces’ aim was the same as the U.S. forces today: to starve the people of Yemen and undermine Ansar Allah’s ability to govern Yemen.
Like today, the strategy ultimately failed, but not before it launched Yemen into famine conditions, which the country is just now recovering from. Even with that recovery, the Famine Early Warning Signs Network still considers Yemen to be in a state of acute food insecurity.
The intensity of the 2018 fighting around Al Hudaydah port, combined with the growing humanitarian crisis, was the spark that began a peace process in Yemen. The Stockholm Agreement, signed in December 2018, was the first of several ceasefire agreements that temporarily put the Saudi war on Yemen on hold. The Stockholm Ceasefire was not fully implemented until 2021 when Saudi and Emirati forces finally withdrew from the port region.
Throughout this time, the United States never actually recognized the validity of the Stockholm Agreement. That said, the United States did not reject the ceasefire plan either, until possibly now.
With its recent escalations against the Al Hudaydah port, specifically, the lifeline of Yemen, the United States threatens to launch the country back into civil war and famine, all while Yemen fights a cholera epidemic. In the week before the most recent strikes on the port, the U.S. signaled to Ansar Allah through back channels that it may formally reject the Stockholm Agreement and open the door for renewed Saudi and Emirati intervention. The U.S. would take this step to prevent Yemen from further assisting the resistance in Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon.
The United States government and military often act as if they are peace brokers. Their actions prove quite the opposite. The true greatest threat to peace and stability in the Middle East is the United States itself. Its recent brutal escalations against the free people of Yemen are stone-cold proof of that.
US warns Tehran it ‘can’t restrain’ Israel if Iran retaliates: Report
Israeli intelligence estimates that the Iranian response could be launched from Iraqi territory in the coming days
News Desk
NOV 3, 2024
(Photo credit: West Asia News Agency via Reuters)
Washington has warned Tehran that it “won't be able to hold Israel back” if the Islamic Republic retaliates to Tel Aviv’s attack against a number of Iranian military sites last month, US and Israeli officials told Axios on 2 November.
"We told the Iranians: We won't be able to hold Israel back, and we won't be able to make sure that the next attack will be calibrated and targeted as the previous one," the US official told the outlet.
The report claims the message was passed along via Switzerland. Iran and the US have not commented.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei warned on the same day that Israel will receive a “tooth-breaking” response for its actions against the Islamic Republic “and the rest of the resistance front.”
“We will do whatever is necessary in confronting arrogance, whether in terms of military and armament or politically. The Iranian people and officials will never hesitate in facing global arrogance and the criminal apparatus ruling the world order,” the Supreme Leader went on to say.
“The issue is not just about revenge, but rather acting with logic and confrontation consistent with religion, ethics, Sharia, and international laws. The issue is confronting international injustice, and for the Iranian people, confronting oppression and arrogance is a mandatory duty,” he added.
The head of Khamenei’s office also vowed that Tehran’s response “will be severe, and the enemy will regret it.”
The commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said late last month that the consequences of Israel’s attack would be “bitter and unimaginable.”
Axios reported days ago, citing Israeli intelligence estimates, that Iran is preparing its retaliation from Iraqi territory and will use a large number of drones and ballistic missiles. It said the Iranian attack could likely happen in the coming days.
Israel launched a missile and drone attack on Iranian military sites in the provinces of Tehran, Khuzestan, and Ilam during the early hours of 26 October, killing four Iranian soldiers. Iranian air defenses managed to intercept a significant portion of the incoming projectiles and thwart the majority of the strikes, according to officials.
Tehran reported limited damage to some sites and radar systems, while Israel described the attack as a total success.
The attack followed Tehran’s launching of hundreds of ballistic missiles at Israel in early October, which targeted several Israeli military bases in response to the assassination of Hamas politburo chief Ismail Haniyeh, Hezbollah secretary-general Hassan Nasrallah, and IRGC Deputy of Operations General Abbas Nilforoushan.
Israel's killing spree intensifies across Gaza as UN warns 'everyone in north at imminent risk of dying'
Tens of thousands of Palestinians remain trapped by the Israeli army in north Gaza without any access to food, water, or medicine
News Desk
NOV 2, 2024
(Photo Credit: Omar AL-QATTAA/AFP)
At least 55 Palestinians have been killed and nearly 200 injured across Gaza over the past 24 hours as Israeli jets and troops continue to lay waste to the besieged enclave.
“Israeli forces killed 55 people and injured 192 others in seven massacres of families in the last 24 hours,” the Gaza Health Ministry reported on 2 November.
Local media in north Gaza reports that two other Palestinians were killed in attacks that targeted Jabalia’s Nazla area and the vicinity of Muscat Clinic in Gaza City’s Sabra neighborhood.
Furthermore, at least three children were injured on Saturday afternoon when an Israeli drone bombed a clinic conducting a polio vaccination campaign in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood of Gaza City.
On Friday, health ministry officials announced that the death toll of the Israeli genocide has risen to 43,314 reported fatalities, with an additional 102,019 injured. However, thousands more are believed to be trapped under the rubble as Israel deliberately targets search and rescue teams and has repeatedly used tactics to shred, vaporize, and crush victims.
In the north of Gaza, tens of thousands remain trapped by the Israeli army without food, medicine, or access to emergency services.
"The entire Palestinian population in North Gaza is at imminent risk of dying from disease, famine, and violence," reads a statement issued on Friday by the acting UN aid chief Joyce Msuya, the heads of UNICEF and the World Food Programme (WFP), and other aid groups.
"Humanitarian aid cannot keep up with the scale of the needs due to the access constraints. Basic, life-saving goods are not available. Humanitarians are not safe to do their work and are blocked by Israeli forces and by insecurity from reaching people in need," they added, describing the situation for Palestinians in north Gaza as “apocalyptic.”
As the situation rapidly deteriorates, the Israeli army announced on Saturday the deployment of the brigade combat team of the Kfir Brigade to Jabalia refugee camp, marking their entry to the area over the past year as fighters from the Qassam Brigades continue to fight back against the invading troops.
Israeli army claims 'clearing' north Gaza of Hamas will take 'six months'
Israeli troops are unofficially implementing the Generals' Plan to ethnically cleanse northern Gaza
News Desk
NOV 3, 2024
(Photo credit: IDF Spokesman)
Israeli military officials have said that it will take at least six months to clear northern Gaza of ‘Hamas forces’ amid the army’s ongoing effort to besiege the area and forcibly displace the civilian population, Yedioth Ahronoth reported on 3 November.
Invading Israeli forces cut off Jabalia from Gaza City weeks ago while issuing evacuation orders and demanding civilians leave their homes and move south. The army is forcing civilians to exit through dedicated passages where they are monitored with facial recognition technology, allegedly to prevent resistance fighters from escaping.
“Thus far, some 600 suspected Hamas terrorists have been captured and detained for interrogation by security forces,” Yedioth Ahronoth claimed.
In practice, Israeli troops have used the passages to carry out mass detentions of civilian Palestinian men, separating them from their families.
CNN reports that a photo taken late last month “showed a large crowd of more than 200 people, crouching low amid the rubble of Jabalia in northern Gaza. Mostly men, many are almost naked, some are elderly, some visibly wounded. There’s at least one child among them.”
CNN adds that “They were detained and most ordered to strip by the Israeli military as they tried to flee their homes in Jabalya refugee camp, then held for hours outdoors in the cold.”
Yedioth Ahronoth acknowledged Sunday that Israeli forces are implementing part of a plan devised by former high-ranking members of the military, known as the Generals’ Plan, to forcibly displace all Palestinians in north Gaza and starve those who refuse to leave, whether civilians or resistance fighters.
At the same time, Hamas' Qassam Brigades, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad's (PIJ) Quds Brigades, and other factions continue to resist Israeli forces besieging and invading Jabalia.
Many Palestinians in north Gaza have refused to evacuate towards the south, fearing that if they cross the Netzarim Corridor, they will never be able to return.
According to the Israeli newspaper, Hamas fighters have begun to adapt their methods for battling the invading Israeli forces. They are now converting shells into high-powered explosive devices, which have proven to be an effective weapon to kill soldiers in Jabalia.
Specifically, Hamas' Qassam Brigades has been using the explosives to booby-trap buildings to target Israeli troops entering them.
“Hamas opted to use their explosive material on booby traps which were more effective than directing them at the troops maneuvering outside,” the paper wrote.
As a result, Hamas fighters were able to mislead Israeli soldiers in the operation that led to the killing of four members of the elite Multidimensional Unit 888, also known as the ‘Ghost’ Unit, earlier this week.
Rather than booby-trap the first floor of the building, as Israeli soldiers typically expect, they booby-trapped the second floor to make the soldiers believe that the building was safe.
The slain troops included one captain and three staff sergeants.
The Israeli military admitted to 19 troop deaths at the hands of the Palestinian resistance in October alone.
Israel has also continued to kill large numbers of Palestinian civilians amid the battles with Palestinian resistance fighters.
UNICEF said on Sunday that more than 50 children have been killed in the Jabalia refugee camp in the past 48 hours, with the Save the Children charity saying the high number shows “the intensity of this conflict and this war on children."
Since the start of the war, Israeli snipers have regularly and deliberately targeted children.
In July, a doctor from the United States who volunteered in Gaza described his experience treating “incinerated” and “shredded” children, including many children deliberately shot in the chest and head by Israeli snipers.
Mark Perlmutter stated, “I have two children that I have photographs of that were shot so perfectly in the chest I couldn’t put my stethoscope over their heart more accurately and directly on the side of the head in the same child. No toddler gets shot twice by mistake by the world’s best sniper. They’re dead center shots.”
Yemen warns ‘name changes, asset transfers’ will not save Israeli ships from attack
Sanaa’s forces say intelligence indicates that Israeli shipping firms are trying to avoid Yemeni attacks by registering ships under different names
News Desk
NOV 4, 2024
(Photo credit: Yemen Military Media)
Yemeni Armed Forces spokesman Yahya Saree said in a statement on 3 November that Israeli shipping firms are attempting to sell their assets, transfer their properties, or register them under different names in order to avoid Sanaa’s operations.
The spokesman affirmed that these methods will not save Israeli-linked ships from being targeted.
“Intelligence confirms that many companies operating in maritime shipping, affiliated with the Israeli enemy, are working to sell their assets and transfer their properties from shipping and maritime transport ships to other companies or register them in the names of other parties, to circumvent the punitive measures taken by the Republic of Yemen,” Saree said.
The Yemeni army “will not take into consideration any change in the ownership or flag of the Israeli enemy ships,” and warns “all concerned parties against dealing with these companies or ships as they are subject to punishment and are prohibited from crossing the Yemeni Armed Forces’ area of operations.”
The Armed Forces of Yemen’s Sanaa government started its maritime operations against Israeli shipping in November last year, inflicting significant damage on Israel’s economy and on global shipping as a whole.
Following the start of the US–UK bombing campaign against Yemen in January, Yemeni forces began targeting US and British warships. Washington launched a brutal attack on Yemen using B2 stealth bombers and bunker buster bombs in mid-October.
Sanaa has also carried out numerous drone and missile operations targeting the Israeli depth.
“In support of the Palestinian and Lebanese resistance and within the framework of the fifth phase of the escalation, the Yemeni Armed Forces' drone force carried out a qualitative military operation targeting the Israeli enemy's industrial zone in the Ashkelon region, south of occupied Palestine,” the Yemeni army announced on 29 October.
A day earlier, it said it hit three ships in the Red Sea and Arab Seas – the SC Montreal, the Maersk Kowloon, and the Motaro – with drones and missiles.
A Massacre Within a Massacre: How Journalists Reporting on Gaza Deaths Are Being Targeted
Posted by Internationalist 360° on November 3, 2024
Eva Bartlett
Palestinian photojournalist Bilal Mohamed Rajab was killed in an Israeli airstrike. – Mada Masr
Over 160 media workers have been killed and 60 detained as the methodical destruction of the brutalized Strip continues.
In spite of experiencing two Israeli wars on Gaza, I never imagined the horrific scenes coming out of northern Gaza now: Israel is exterminating the population in broad daylight, broadcast for all the world to see.
And no one is doing a damn thing to stop it.
Israel has besieged northern Gaza for weeks, preventing most humanitarian aid from entering, putting the population of 400,000 already starving Palestinian civilians in the north at severe risk of full starvation. The Israeli parliament has voted to ban UNRWA, the United Nations agency for humanitarian aid, which has been the sole lifeline for many Palestinians.
Israeli forces have also bombarded water stations and wells, as well as cutting off communications with the outside world, depriving people of access to water, and leaving them trapped and isolated.
All communications and networks in the northern Gaza Strip have been cut off due to a brutal military operation that the occupation is conducting on the Jabalia camp from all directions. In the past two weeks, Israeli occupation forces have killed 450 people in northern…
— حسام شبات (@HossamShabat) October 18, 2024
According to Euro-Med Monitor, in the last two weeks, 500 Palestinians have been confirmed dead in northern Gaza, “and thousands more have sustained injuries. Many remain unaccounted for, either in the streets or buried under the debris.”
As they have done elsewhere throughout the Gaza Strip during more than one year of genocide, Israeli forces are targeting hospitals in Gaza’s north. Euro-Med reported that, “Israeli army forces surrounded the Indonesian Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Lahia. They fired two artillery shells at the hospital, cut off its electricity, and targeted anyone moving in the area.”
The army is firing on medics and other rescuers, as they’ve done throughout 2023-2024, and as they did in 2009, when medics I was with came under Israeli sniper fire, and another medic I knew was killed by a flechette (dart) bomb. By killing the rescuers and destroying the hospitals, Israel ensures maimed Palestinians will go without medical care and probably die.
This is, of course, illegal under international law. But as Israel’s genocidal actions have shown the world, the Israeli government, army and settlers believe laws don’t apply to them. Take the horrific video of an Israeli drone precision-targeting a Palestinian child, killing it, and then bombing the civilians who ran to try to rescue the child. Par for the course for the Israeli army. Were the perpetrator one of the United States’ enemies, there would be calls for no-fly zones, sanctions and corporate media howling 24/7.
Important updates from besieged north Gaza :Israel has rigged residential zones from the Al-Tawam area to the Al-Faluja area with explosives. The Israeli occupation forces are setting explosive barrels at night and detonating them during the day , resulting in devastating…
— حسام شبات (@HossamShabat) October 18, 2024
Not content to merely murder Palestinian civilians by bombing, sniping and starvation, the Israeli army has reportedly been deploying robots with explosives and leaving booby trapped barrels to remotely detonate.
هذه الصورة من وسط مخيم جباليا، وتحديداً منطقة أبو قمر ابتداءً من شارع العلمي وبجوار منزل البلبيسي، تُظهر ما تبقى من الحي بعد تفجيره من قبل قوات الاحتلال الإسرائيلي باستخدام روبوت وبراميل متفجرة استهدفت منازل المواطنين بهدف تدميرها ومسحها من الوجود.كما يظهر في منتصف الصورة، برميل… pic.twitter.com/8FDB2fuJ32
— أنس الشريف Anas Al-Sharif (@AnasAlSharif0) October 20, 2024
The scenes which journalists have been able to publish are surreal, like science fiction, with quadcopters policing the streets. A week ago, a friend told me in a message that he had to choose between starving or risking being shot dead by Israel soldiers or quadcopters if he tried to get bread.
Some days ago, he messaged me at 4 in the morning: Israeli tanks were outside his home, the audio he sent was terrifying. He chose to stay in his home rather than endure another Nakba.
I don’t know if he is alive now.
What is happening in Jabalia is a forced displacement under the threat of weapons, documented live by Israeli drone cameras.This is the second displacement of the camp’s residents, most of whom have been refugees since the Nakba of 1948.Today, the cycle of displacement and… pic.twitter.com/Nhplrl5PqW
— أنس الشريف Anas Al-Sharif (@AnasAlSharif0) October 21, 2024
War on journalists
Earlier this month, Palestinian cameraman Fadi al-Wahidi was shot in the neck by an Israeli quadcopter, leaving him paralyzed. Aside from Al Jazeera, for which Fadi worked, most Western media and journalist projection organizations are unsurprisingly silent.
Reporters Without Borders, which I previously wrote about for its downplaying the number of Palestinian journalists killed by Israel, has no entry on Fadi. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CJP), at least, does. Its entry notes:
“Al Wahidi was critically injured in the neck by a bullet fired from an Israeli reconnaissance aircraft while Al Wahidi and correspondent Anas Al-Sharif were covering an Israeli siege on northern Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp. Both men were wearing “Press” vests and clearly identifiable as journalists.”
Anas al-Sharif – who continues to courageously report from northern Gaza – told CJP they’d been in an area “completely far from the areas of operations of the Israeli occupation forces,” and full of residents when, “an Israeli reconnaissance drone fired at us. After the shooting, we tried to move to another safer place and hide from any danger, but a bullet from the plane hit our colleague Fadi Al-Wahidi in the neck, which led to his complete paralysis.”
Wahidi has since fallen into a coma. His colleagues and friends are pleading for some sort of international intervention to allow him to be taken abroad for medical care, to save his life.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported, citing the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate (PJS), that between 7 October 2023 and 10 October 2024 168 Palestinian journalists and media workers have been killed in the Gaza Strip, including 17 women, 360 were injured, and 60 were detained.
The extermination campaign continues
It’s absolutely devastating to watch every day pass with alarming new updates from or on northern Gaza. Like Anas al-Sharif, Palestinian journalist Hossam Shabat courageously reports apocalyptic scenes of Israeli bombarding in northern Gaza.
When the paramedics brought the wounded to Kamal Adwan Hospital in north Gaza , Israeli occupation forces began heavy shelling around the hospital and then targeted the hospital’s water tanks and electricity network.
— حسام شبات (@HossamShabat) October 19, 2024
In a live update on X recently, he said:
“We are witnessing genocide and ethnic cleansing in northern Gaza, specifically in Jabalia, which is under siege from all directions. Israeli occupation forces are bombing displaced civilians, detaining them, and attempting to ethnically cleanse them. They are targeting shelters for displaced civilians, and bodies are scattered everywhere in the north, along the roads. Thousands of civilians are being forcefully displaced (ethnically cleansed) from the north.”
Meanwhile, in a bout of meaningless theatrics, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin have “demanded Tel Aviv improves the humanitarian situation in Gaza within 30 days or risk losing US military aid and face possible legal action.”
But clearly Israel’s biggest backer is spouting nonsense: there will be no cut to military aid, there will be no legal action, the US will never take a position to force Israel to cease the massacre in Gaza. In fact, giving Israel one month before any supposed repercussion is, in my opinion, giving Israel a green light to ethnically cleanse northern Gaza as quickly as possible.
Meaningless.Giving Israel another month to hopefully, maybe, allow north Gaza’s besieged, starving Palestinians access to food (or else maybe legal action!) is just a green light for Israel to ethnically cleanse them as quickly as possible. pic.twitter.com/dGt9srQEIX
— Eva Karene Bartlett (@EvaKBartlett) October 15, 2024
Israel seems hell-bent on implementing former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s ‘Five Fingers’ project, which envisioned carving Gaza into segments, all under Israeli security control. If this is Israel’s intent, we will see the same bloody scenes from northern Gaza repeated block by block Israel all over the rest of the already brutalized Strip.
Neutral for now: Persian Gulf states' gamble in the Iran-Israel showdown
With Iran's vow to retaliate against Israel, Persian Gulf states face a delicate balancing act—caught between asserting autonomy and increasing dependence on US security, all while the Resistance Axis enjoys unprecedented popularity in the region.
Mawadda Iskandar
NOV 4, 2024
Photo Credit: The Cradle
The signs of an impending Iranian response to Israel's airstrike on Iranian military interests last month are becoming clearer. Official statements from Tehran suggest a military retaliation is inevitable and could occur before the US elections on 5 November - with some reports indicating it may be launched from Iraqi territory to curb the cycle of back-and-forth escalations that began on 1 April following Tel Aviv’s targeting of the Iranian consulate in Damascus.
Both sides are seeking to establish a new deterrence balance, albeit with very different aims. Iran, whose sovereignty has been repeatedly violated, warns of the danger posed by Israel’s expansionist ambitions in the region, while Israel, as the aggressor, seems intent on dragging the entire region into chaos, banking on unwavering US support.
Two distinct camps have emerged: on one side, the Israeli-US alliance and its supporters, and on the other, the countries of the Resistance Axis, which have launched the "battle of unity" in support of Gaza. Caught between these factions is a third group, one that seeks neutrality, unwilling to pick a side for fear of compromising its own interests.
The US is struggling to maintain influence, while Israel is playing what may be its final card. The question remains: where do the Persian Gulf states stand?
Airspace restrictions and Gulf diplomacy
The Persian Gulf states have unanimously condemned Israel's 26 October strikes on Iranian sites, which came in response to Tehran's own retaliatory missile attacks earlier last month following high-profile assassinations of resistance leaders carried out by the occupation state.
Statements from the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, the UAE, Kuwait, and Oman condemned these strikes as violations of Iranian sovereignty, escalating tensions in an already volatile West Asia.
Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Qatar have taken a firm stance, refusing to allow Israel to use their airspace to launch further strikes against Iran, a position echoed by Jordan, which was prompted to officially deny it had allowed Israel to use its airspace to attack the Islamic Republic.
This reassured Tehran, which had threatened a forceful response against any country that facilitated Israeli attacks. These diplomatic messages coincided with Iran opening new channels of dialogue, including President Masoud Pezeshkian’s meeting with GCC officials, followed by Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi's diplomatic tour that included Lebanon, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, Oman, Jordan, Egypt, and Turkiye.
Despite Amman’s claim that its airspace was not used in the recent attack, videos have emerged documenting Israeli fighter jets over Jordanian skies. Similarly, Saudi Arabia claimed its airspace was not used during the strikes, raising questions about how Israeli planes refueled over such long distances. Israel subsequently admitted to using refueling aircraft to bypass Persian Gulf airspace restrictions.
Speaking to The Cradle, Lebanese military analyst Omar Maarabouni contends that "In principle, and based on and in connection with the recent Israeli attack, a group of Gulf countries, led by Saudi Arabia, stated that they prevented the Israelis from passing through their airspace, and this is something that Iranian radar can confirm or deny, and indeed the official Iranian statement confirms that these aircraft did not pass through Gulf airspace."
Maarabouni adds that agreements between the US and Persian Gulf states are defensive in nature, allowing these states to prevent US bases from being used offensively against Iran, especially since improved relations with Iran are now in their interest. Regarding alternative Israeli plans, Maarabouni says:
"It is quite clear that Israeli planes took the path associated with Syria and then Iraq towards Iran, and therefore we are talking about a distance of 2,000 km back and forth, and this is what Israel was keen to avoid over the issue of refueling, as F-35 and F-15 aircraft can travel distances exceeding 2,200 km without the need to refuel."
Jordan, he says, meanwhile, finds itself in an awkward position, having claimed that Iranian missiles breached its sovereignty, despite such missiles traveling at altitudes beyond the limits recognized under international airspace law. As Maarabouni points out:
“The one who violated Jordanian sovereignty is Israel, which fired air defense missiles into Jordanian airspace to intercept Iranian missiles, but it is unclear why Jordan has adopted the responsibility of blaming the violation of its sovereignty on both Iran and Israel."
Oil on the frontline
Persian Gulf states are wary of being dragged into the escalating conflict, especially as they attempt to close the chapter on their failing Yemen war, which backfired horribly following devastating attacks on Saudi Arabia's prized Aramco facilities in 2019.
These strikes exposed the vulnerability of the "oil for protection" security framework under US patronage. In their recent overtures to Iran, GCC states also urged Washington to pressure Israel against targeting Iranian oil infrastructure, warning of disastrous consequences for global energy markets.
Sources in the Persian Gulf, speaking on condition of anonymity, inform The Cradle that while the Gulf states were aware of the timing of Israel's attack, they were ready to mediate with the US if the situation escalated.
Following the attack's failure, these states rushed to issue condemnatory statements, emphasizing their unwillingness to be drawn into direct hostilities against Tehran, despite their quiet acceptance - and even encouragement - of actions that might undermine Iranian influence or its nuclear ambitions. The Persian Gulf monarchies are eager to shield themselves from any backlash amid rising global anger over the atrocities in Gaza and Lebanon, which have put normalization efforts with Israel on hold.
US intervention: A double-edged sword
The White House has warned Iran against retaliating to Israeli strikes, stating that the US would support Israel if attacked and floating the notion that Washington “can’t restrain” Tel Aviv in the event of further attacks from Iran.
Former hawkish US national security advisor John Bolton boasted that Israel would use Persian Gulf airspace if needed, and that “these governments may complain about this, but frankly, they see Iran as a strategic threat because of its nuclear program, as well as Iran's old support for terrorists, not only Hezbollah and Hamas, but the Houthis and Shia militias in Iraq."
The Persian Gulf states now find themselves caught between their desire for autonomy and their dependency on US security guarantees—particularly in light of the numerous US bases spread across their territories, which primarily serve to protect Washington's regional interests.
Agreements between the US and Persian Gulf states grant American forces access to airspace, ports, and military bases in these countries, providing logistical support for regional operations. While Gulf states have formally rejected offensive US operations from their territories, they still allow defensive activities.
Qatar, the only official non-NATO ally of the US, hosts the largest concentration of US forces at Al-Udeid and Al-Sailiya bases. Kuwait ranks second in terms of the quantity and quality of US assets located at four bases: Camp Doha, Arifjan, Ali al-Salem, and Buehring.
The UAE has three US bases, Al-Dhafra, Fujairah, and Jebel Ali Port, all of which provide logistical support services. As for the US facilities in Saudi Arabia, they are Eskan Village and Prince Sultan Air Base, which offer the provision of air and missile defense systems and the use of military aircraft. Bahrain hosts three bases: Juffair, Sheikh Isa, and Muharraq, and Oman hosts a similar number: Al-Masna, Thumrait, and Masira.
All of these countries fall under the domain of US Central Command (CENTCOM), which works to "counter the Iranian threat."
Last year’s Operation Al-Aqsa Flood has reignited the debate over Persian Gulf security dependence on Washington. Experts argue that the current escalation between Iran and Israel will force Gulf states to find a balance between their diplomatic rapprochement with Tehran on the one hand, and their commitment to a US-led regional security alliance on the other.
The US has sought to reassure Persian Gulf leaders, offering assistance in defending against any potential Iranian aggression. To back up its words, the US approved a $440 million sale of TOW missiles to Riyadh and authorized the sale of over $2.2 billion in weapons and ammunition to Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
Balancing public condemnation with covert cooperation
Investigative journalist Bob Woodward's new book War, which sheds light on recent GCC–Israeli dynamics, reveals that regional rulers, including those of the UAE, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar, unanimously agree - in private - on the need to eliminate Hamas, while working quietly to minimize public backlash over their covert cooperation with Israel.
After last October's Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, Persian Gulf states condemned the attack but later launched diplomatic efforts to prevent regional tensions from escalating further. Notably, these developments have disrupted key projects, including normalization with Israel and economic diversification plans, particularly in Saudi Arabia.
Iranian journalist Mohammad Gharavi tells The Cradle that the events of 7 October 2023 strained what had been positive Saudi-Iranian relations:
"The Iranians believed that a positive relationship would have a positive impact in terms of supporting the Palestinian cause, but the Saudi position was neutral despite the historical opportunity that could have been invested at home and in the Islamic environment. Unfortunately, the Palestinian issue is the prominent point of contention with the GCC, which is why we are sending messages that the opportunity is ripe to change this course."
He describes Saudi–Iranian relations as having made significant advancements in terms of coordination and cooperation since the two neighboring states struck a rapprochement deal in Beijing last year:
"Iran's reassuring messages, as well as warnings not to go too far in cooperating with the Americans and Israelis to antagonize Iran or using air, land and sea spaces to direct hostile action against it, were influential and positive and can be built upon in the coming stage, as it reflects the determination of the two countries to put aside differences in the interest of the security of the two countries and protect the strategic alliance with China and others for what it holds of economic dimensions."
Ultimately, the Persian Gulf states remain neutral – for now. Their future course, however, will depend on visible and tangible US assurances. If such guarantees are secured, the Gulf may be willing to align more openly against Iran, given that their interests clash with those of the Resistance Axis, which promotes regional independence and self-determination – ideas that resonate with the Arab masses throughout West Asia.
'Huge shortage' plagues Israeli army as losses mount in Lebanon, Gaza
Around 33 percent of males ordered to enlist have failed to show up at recruitment offices in Israel in recent years
News Desk
NOV 4, 2024
(Photo credit: Amir Cohen/Reuters)
The Israeli army is still going through a serious enlistment crisis and is currently in urgent need of 7,000 recruits, Hebrew newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth reported on 4 November.
The newspaper said Israel is dealing with a “huge shortage” in the number of soldiers needed. According to the report, there has been an annual one percent decrease in the total number of male soldiers.
Around 33 percent of males ordered to enlist have not shown up to recruitment offices in recent years, while 15 percent abandoned service and did not enlist in the reserves.
The rate of exemption for medical and psychological reasons also surged from four percent to eight percent. The report says this is the most common reason for discharge during service.
"There are 18,000 combat reserve soldiers and 20,000 combat support soldiers registered as part of the reserve force of the IDF units, and they do not join when called up," the Manpower Division of the army is cited as saying.
Brigade and Battalion commanders who were asked to deal with the situation have explained that the matter relates to “serial desertions,” and that recruits cannot be brought in “by force.”
"The situation on the ground is difficult, as the Israeli army needs 7,000 recruits urgently," the report goes on to say.
“The army claimed that it would be able to recruit 3,000 [ultra-Orthodox] Haredim (as of last August),” but throughout the last recruitment year, “only 1,200 were recruited out of about 13,000 candidates for service,” it adds.
Recruitment of ultra-Orthodox Israelis into the military has become a highly controversial issue in Israel of late.
For years, members of the ultra-Orthodox community in Israel who are undergoing religious studies have been exempt from military service through one-year service deferrals. In practice, the exemption has extended even to Haredi men not actively engaged in religious study.
Tensions have ignited within Israel’s political class and between the secular and religious in Israeli society, with many believing Haredi Jews must share the burden of military service. Far-right religious members of Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition – who hold the highest number of seats – are in favor of drafting a law to codify the exemptions.
The Haredi parties in Israel's Knesset have threatened to block the passage of regular laws, including the general budget, until the law exempting Haredim from military service is enacted.
Less than four percent of the 3,000 Haredi Israelis who received recruitment orders since July to join the military have done so, Israeli army radio reported on 28 October.
The shortages coincide with Tel Aviv’s failed ground operation in southern Lebanon, in which it has incurred staggering losses since early October. Israeli troops were forced out of the village of Khiam on Saturday by Hezbollah fighters after several days of being unable to fully advance on and take control of the town.
The Lebanese resistance group says it has killed nearly 100 Israeli soldiers since 2 October.
The Israeli army also continues to take losses in the Gaza Strip, particularly in the north, where it is waging an ethnic cleansing and extermination campaign against the civilian population.
Settlers set ablaze homes, cars, and olive trees in several villages in the occupied West Bank under the protection of Israeli forces
News Desk
NOV 4, 2024
(Photo credit: Getty Images)
Israeli settlers carried out brutal attacks against Palestinians and their property, including arson, in several areas of the occupied West Bank on 4 November and the previous night.
The attacks include attempts at land theft, according to researcher Hassan Breijeh, who said on Monday afternoon that settlers “began plowing dozens of dunams of citizens' lands in the areas of Khalayel al-Loz, Khallet al-Qattan, and Khallet al-Nahla, south of Bethlehem, in preparation for seizing them.”
Settlers also attacked the village of Burqa east of Ramallah earlier on 4 November, setting fire to homes and olive trees.
The settlers stormed the village from three different entrances, WAFA news agency reported, adding that they attempted to raid an elementary school.
Palestinians in the village of Birin near Hebron were pelted by stones earlier on Monday as they were picking olives.
“The olive harvest season in the West Bank has been the subject of repeated attacks by settlers and Israeli occupation forces, which have reached the point of killing, burning, and cutting down olive trees, stealing the crops, and preventing farmers from reaching their lands,” WAFA reported.
In the Umm Nir village, troops forced families to leave the area and barred them from picking olives during the settler attacks.
The attacks were a continuation of a violent pogrom launched by armed settlers in the occupied West Bank on Sunday night.
More than 20 vehicles in the city of Al-Bireh were torched and destroyed by the settlers on the evening of 3 November and overnight.
Armed settlers opened fire at civil defense crews who were trying to put out the fires.
“The arrival of settlers to residential buildings and burning their surroundings is a dangerous indicator of the possibility of them reaching the heart of Al-Bireh or Ramallah and carrying out larger attacks,” a resident told Middle East Eye (MEE). “Settlers don’t enter the Palestinian areas without the cover of the Israeli army,” he added.
In a statement on 4 November, Hamas called for “escalating the confrontation against settlers in the West Bank.”
Over 750 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli troops and illegal settlers in the occupied West Bank since 7 October last year. Over 6,000 more have been injured.
In July, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of the West Bank is “illegal” and ordered the evacuation of all settlements.
Despite History of Fabrication, Press Uncritically Covers IDF-Provided Documents on Hamas
Bryce Greene
Washington Post depiction of the Hamas capture of an Israeli tank
The New York Times (10/12/24) says it “verified” supposed Hamas documents provided to the paper by Israel—which turns out to mostly mean that that the Israeli military “concluded the documents were real.”
Earlier this month, the New York Times (10/12/24), Washington Post (10/12/24) and Wall Street Journal (10/12/24) each published front-page articles based on different sets of documents handed to them by the Israeli military.
Israel claims it seized all the documents—in the form of meeting minutes, letters and planning documents—in its ground invasion of Gaza, and that they reveal insights into Hamas’s operations prior to the October 7 attacks. The documents include alleged evidence of Hamas’s pre-10/7 coordination with Iran, plans to blow up Israeli skyscrapers, and even a scheme to use horse-drawn chariots in an attack from Gaza.
Documents received directly from intelligence agencies should always be treated with skepticism, and that’s especially true when their government has a well-documented history of blatant lying. Yet leading newspapers took these Israeli document dumps largely at face value, advancing the agenda of a genocidal rogue state.
A history of lying
Fake “Hamas” documents were being cited in the press as recently as September 2024 (Middle East Eye, 9/9/24).
Israel’s use of fabrications to shape public perception is well known, and was put on display early in the assault on Gaza that began last October. After an explosion at Al Ahli hospital killed and injured hundreds (misreporting of which caused a great deal of confusion), the media naturally pointed the finger at Israel. The Israeli government, concerned about the public backlash, denied responsibility, claiming that the explosion was caused by a misfired rocket from Palestinian Islamic Jihad. (See FAIR.org, 11/3/23.)
To back up their claims, Israel released a recording allegedly capturing two Palestinian militants discussing Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s responsibility for the strike. However, an analysis by the firm Earshot found that the audio was the result of two separate channels being edited together (Channel 4, 10/19/23). In other words, Israel engineered a phony audio clip in an attempt to clear itself of war crimes in the public mind.
Investigations based on open sources have since come to various conclusions about the attack (Guardian, 10/18/23; Bellingcat, 10/18/23; Human Rights Watch, 11/26/23; AP, 11/22/23; Michael Kobs, 2023; New Arab, 2/19/24), but Israel’s fraudulent attempt to manipulate evidence certainly suggests that they had something to hide, and demonstrates their lack of reliability as a media source. Recently, the UN released a report accusing Israel of systematically targeting healthcare infrastructure in Gaza, making their denials of this earlier attack far less credible.
In another instance, Israel presented 3D renderings of a supposed Hamas “command center” beneath Al Shifa hospital, claiming it was based on intelligence. However, no such command center was ever found (FAIR.org, 12/1/23). Upon storming the hospital, Israel staged scenes in order to bolster claims that the facility was used by militant groups. The deception was so blatant that mainstream outlets were openly calling it out.
Recently Israel was caught actually providing fabricated documents to the press with the aim of manipulating public opinion. Earlier this year, the Israeli government provided documents to both the Jewish Chronicle (9/5/24) and the German paper Bild (9/6/24) that purportedly showed that Hamas had no interest in a ceasefire, and had a plan to sneak the late Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar out of Gaza to Iran, along with some of the remaining hostages. The reports were then uncritically repeated in outlets like the Times of Israel (9/6/24).
Shortly after these documents were published, the Israeli paper Yedioth Ahronoth (9/8/24) reported on an internal IDF investigation that found that they had been leaked to foreign media as part of a campaign to “shape public opinion on Israel.” The documents were determined to be forgeries, after a comprehensive search of all databases containing documents found in the wake of Israel’s operations. The IDF told the paper that an investigation was underway to determine the origin of the leak.
This non-exhaustive list of examples demonstrates a pattern of Israel engineering misleading narratives to shape public opinion, and fabricating the evidence needed to do so.
Questionable authenticity
The Washington Post (10/12/24) reported that “the documents’ authenticity could not be definitively established”—but there’s no trace of that doubt in the story’s headline or subhead.
Whether they are authentic or not, it is clear that the documents leaked to the Wall Street Journal, New York Times and Washington Post serve the same purpose of propagandizing on behalf of Israel. In an attempt to preserve some journalistic integrity, the Post and Times both gave separate justifications for why they believed the respective documents leaked to them were authentic.
The Post was quick to note that “the documents’ authenticity could not be definitively established,” but gave readers the impression there was reason to believe they were real. First, it claimed that the contents of the documents it received were
“broadly consistent” with US and allies’ post–October 7 intelligence assessments about Hamas’s long-range planning and complex relationship with Iran.
Then it wrote that unnamed US and Israeli officials they shared the documents with did not express concerns about their authenticity. (Iranian and Hamas officials they consulted didn’t comment on the documents but accused Israel of having a history of “fabricating documents.”)
The New York Times consulted former Hamas member Salah al-Din al-Awawdeh, whom the paper frequently quotes on matters related to Hamas, and an unnamed Palestinian analyst with “knowledge of Hamas’s inner workings.” It also said an internal Israeli military report concluded the documents were authentic, and the paper “researched details mentioned in the meeting records to check that they corresponded with actual events.” It said “Hamas and Hezbollah did not respond to requests to comment” and that Iran “denied the claims made in the minutes.”
The Wall Street Journal story did not describe any attempt to verify the authenticity, and only reported that the paper “hasn’t independently verified the documents.”
But given Israel’s track record, there is no epistemologically sound way of verifying the validity of documents provided by the Israeli government without confirmation from Hamas itself. Citing sources who say that the documents resemble Hamas documents, without noting Israel’s history of creating credible forgeries, creates a patina of credibility without actually substantiating anything.
Advancing Israel’s agenda
Haaretz (10/14/24): The documents bolster Netanyahu’s claim that Israel is “fighting a terrifying ‘axis of evil’ led by Iran that threatens to destroy Western culture as a whole.”
The Israeli paper Haaretz (10/14/24), which took the documents as authentic, argued that their release by Israel was “Aimed at Aiding Netanyahu.” While both the Times and the Post have largely advanced Israel’s agenda over the past year of bombing (FAIR.org, 10/13/23, 2/1/24, 10/7/24), both papers are considered to be on the critical end of the press spectrum in the US, particularly towards Netanyahu. As Haaretz explained, this perception enhances the propaganda value of the document leak: “The Times and the Post enjoy greater credibility when they fall in line with Israel’s narrative.”
While Haaretz made no note of the leaked documents provided to the Wall Street Journal, the article ironically acknowledged that
having them published by Fox News or even the Wall Street Journal would have looked like an Israeli public diplomacy operation rather than a legitimate journalistic investigative report.
Haaretz noted that the documents promote narratives that “Israel would be happy to burn into the world’s consciousness,” namely the well-known propaganda effort to equate Hamas with organizations that are universally reviled by Americans. The Post documents purportedly outlined a Hamas plan to blow up a skyscraper in Tel Aviv, evoking the September 11 attacks against the World Trade Center:
The Hamas documents are supposed to bolster Netanyahu’s claim that Israel isn’t fighting against a liberation movement seeking to free the occupied Palestinian people, or even against a paramilitary organization that is poorly funded and trained and lacks planes, the Iron Dome anti-missile system, tanks and artillery….
Rather, it is fighting a terrifying “axis of evil” led by Iran that threatens to destroy Western culture as a whole.
Haaretz also argued that this kind of propaganda campaign was designed to ensure that the violence continues to escalate:
In this spirit, the documents are supposed to justify Israel’s counterattack, which has so far caused enormous death and destruction in Gaza and, to an increasing degree, also in Lebanon.
Obvious PR value
Unlike the New York Times or Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal (10/12/24) acknowledged in its headline that the revelations in the documents are what “Israel says” they show.
While Haaretz overlooked the story from the Wall Street Journal, the same logic can be applied to the documents given to that paper as well. The Journal was apparently curious about the political purpose of the documents, noting that “the officials who provided the documents declined to say why they were releasing them now.”
The Journal wrote that the documents “suggest that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar was negotiating with Iran over funding for a planned large-scale assault on Israel as far back as 2021,” and gave specific dollar amounts that Iran provided to Hamas’s armed wing. The obvious public relations value of these documents was that they boosted the negative image of Iran prior to Israel’s recent attack on that country.
Israel’s campaign of genocide in Gaza and greater war in the Middle East has been successful in part because the Israeli government can count on Western press to present and contextualize facts in a way that advances their narrative. Despite Israel’s long history of fabrications, the corporate media will dutifully republish documents, statements and explanations with complete credulity.
Netanyahu’s “imaginary war narrative” strategy: “If it works, fine; if not, no big deal. We’ll try something else”
Alastair Crooke
November 4, 2024
Of course, a victory narrative was too valuable to be foregone. Yet nonetheless, unexplained events matter.
On Saturday, an Israeli force of some 100 aircraft attacked Iran from a stand-off position in Iraq, some 70 kilometres outside the Iranian border.
A Wall Street Journal author, Walter Russell Meade, Distinguished Fellow at the Hudson Institute, wrote: “Israeli warplanes didn’t only cripple Iran’s air-defence systems and inflict painful blows on its missile-producing facilities. They also sent a message that Israel knows where Tehran’s strategic vulnerabilities are, and it can destroy them any time it wants”.
Russell Mead adduces from this reading his key point: “Military forces that have access to American military technology and intelligence-gathering capabilities can wipe the floor with militaries that rely on Moscow … American technology is the gold standard in the world of defence – even more so for a country such as Israel that has significant intelligence and technological capabilities”.
The western ‘war of imagined, created reality’ thus reaches out beyond Ukraine – to arrive in Iran.
The Narrative – U.S. tech and its Intel as ‘invincible – must be maintained. To heck with the facts. There is too much at stake to forsake it for truthfulness.
A more sober and experienced observer however, notes after four days examination, that, succinctly put:
“The IAF strikes seem to have produced minimal results; it appears however that covert operatives within Iran achieved several [inconsequential] drone hits. The Israelis launched a lot of missiles [some 56] – all from maximum stand-off distance. Iran put up a LOT of air defence missiles. There are no firm reports, nor video evidence (so far) of big ballistic missile strikes on any significant Iranian targets. The Iranians say they intercepted most of the attacking missiles, but admit some got through”.
As usual, the ‘imaginary war narrative’ being broadcast is completely detached from that which can be observed from ground imagery. Russell Meade effectively was demanding the pretence that ‘we not notice’ that Israel’s attack failed – that it did not cripple air defences, nor did it devastate any significant target.
Yet, as Professor Brian Klaas writes, “the world doesn’t work as we pretend [or imagine] it does. Too often, we are led to believe it is a structured, ordered system defined by clear rules and patterns. This is the meme at the crux of the Rules Order narrative. The economy, apparently, runs on supply-and-demand curves. Politics is a science. Even human beliefs can be charted, plotted, graphed – and by using the right regression and enough data, understand even the most baffling elements of the human condition”. It is a stripped-down, storybook version of reality
Though some scholars in the 19th century believed there were laws governing human behaviour, social science was swiftly disabused of the notion that a straightforward social ‘physics’ was possible according to physical iron laws.
The most common approach today, reflecting a return to data-led modelling in political ‘science’ in the western sphere, is to use empirical data from the past to tease out ordered patterns that point to stable relationships between causes and effects.
Typically, the philosophy of dialectical materialism is viewed in some capitals as the acme of an objective scientific approach to politics and human sociology – its practitioners esteemed as ‘scientists’. By smoothing over near-infinite complexity, linear syntheses make our non-linear world appear to follow the comforting progression of a single ordered line. This is a conjuring trick. And to complete it successfully, ‘scientists’ need to purge whatever is unexpected or unexplained.
The claimed objectivity to this methodology however, essentially lies with a cultural attribute derived from the linear and teleological understanding found in Judeo-Christian traditions.
It is this belief in a ‘scientific’ and linear understanding of cyclical history which imparts the strong sense of purpose to political analysis. Professor Dingxin Zhao notes how, in contrast to other metaphysical structures, it allows believers to create a more committed zeitgeist, compelling individuals within that community to act in alignment to the anticipated teleological outcome.
It is not hard to see this teleological premise as the underpinning to today’s obsession with creating imaginary ‘victory narratives’. Professor Dingxin Zhao warns that those making linear predictions about the tide of human events according to mechanistic material ‘science’, can easily be convinced that they alone possess the correct beliefs and are aligned with the right path of analysis. And that ‘others’ simply are on the “wrong side” (such as in states that have ‘mistakenly’ come to rely on Russian military technology, rather than on America’s ‘gold standard’).
Within this dominant, hubristic paradigm of social science, our world is treated as one that can be understood, controlled and bent to our whims. It can’t.
In his bestselling book Chaos: Making a New Science (1987), James Gleick “observes that 20th-century science will be remembered for three things: relativity, quantum mechanics (QM), and chaos. These theories are distinctive because they shift our understanding of classical physics toward a more complex, mysterious and unpredictable world”, Erik van Aken writes.
Chaos theory emerged in the 1960s and in the following decades mathematical physicists recognised its insights for our understanding of real-world dynamical systems.
These key shifts have made little impact on the western paradigm of thinking however, which still is viewed by most westerners as a machine where each action, like the fall of a domino, inevitably triggers a predictable effect.
“Yet if we are in a world of unpredictability – in which nearly everything influences everything else, the word ‘cause’ begins to lose its meaning. No matter how seemingly unrelated or remote, each event converges, contributing to a complex web or matrix of causality”.
Bertrand Russell, in his On the Notion of Cause (1912-13), asserted two significant conclusions: First, that our conventional notion of causality is not grounded in physics; and second, if notions like ‘cause’ must be reducible to physics, we should eliminate our use of simplistic use of the word ‘cause’ all together.
So how can we make sense of social change when consequential shifts often arise from chaos? Whilst we search for order and patterns, we perhaps spend less time focused on an obvious but consequential truth:
Unexpected, unexplained events matter. In other words, they have a quality and meaning.
One such event seemingly happened last Saturday, when it appears that the Israeli strike on Iran suffered an unexpected ‘major hitch’ rather early in the SEAD operation (Suppressing Enemy Air Defences) to suppress and destroy Iran’s air defences. Apparently the first wave of attack was intended as the first step – once Iranian airspace had been secured – to pave the way for the subsequent F-35 strike package armed with conventional bombs.
The unexpected event – ‘Israeli media reported that an “unknown air defence system” was used to shoot down targets over Tehran province’. Reportedly, the Israeli operation was scrubbed soon after, and the victory narrative – later to be taken up by the WSJ (among many others) – was loudly proclaimed.
Of course, a victory narrative was too valuable to be foregone. Yet nonetheless, unexplained events matter.
If Israeli (or U.S.) aircraft cannot penetrate secured Iranian airspace – in whole or in part (and no Israel aircraft entered Iranian airspace on Saturday) – the entire paradigm for a U.S. or an Israeli kinetic military attack collapses: Iran has an overwhelming deeply-buried conventional missile arsenal by which to respond.
Similarly, Netanyahu’s ‘Great Victory’ paradigm implodes too – as leading Israeli intelligence commentator Ronen Bergman writes:
“A senior Israeli security official put it this way: ‘Success through failure’. Israel went to war in Gaza to achieve two goals, the release of the hostages and the dismantling of Hamas’ capabilities (not to mention its destruction in absolute and divine victory). After it failed to achieve either of these goals, another goal was added on the northern front – to return the residents safely to their homes. And it is not clear how we will achieve that goal either. Some believe that the southern front can be closed through a victory on the northern front – and now, we are sure that – if only we land a victorious blow on Iran – then it will lead to the closure of the front in the north; and this will close the front in the south, too”.
Iran says it intends to hit Israel a painful blow for last Saturday’s strike. And Israel says that it will try again to strike Iran.
How does Israel continue in this manner? Well, says the senior security official: “Perhaps the answer is “because everything is normalised. What seems to us impossible – that there is no way it will happen – suddenly happens … And everyone gets used to it, [and used] to the lack of strategy. Lack of strategy turns from a bug into a feature … Then no big deal, We’ll try something else””.
Israeli Scholar: It’s Worse Than ‘Generals’ Plan’ in Gaza
November 3, 2024
Idan Landau says what the Israeli military is actually doing in northern Gaza “is even more appalling” than the ethnic-cleansing plan outlined by a group of retired generals.
Free Palestine Die-In at the Israeli Embassy in Washington, Dec. 5, 2023. (Diane Krauthamer, Flickr, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
By Jake Johnson
Common Dreams
Much alarm has been raised over the so-called Generals’ Plan, an ethnic cleansing proposal for northern Gaza that has reportedly garnered attention in the highest reaches of the Israeli government.
But Israeli scholar Idan Landau argued in a column published in English by +972 Magazine on Friday that what the Israeli military is actually doing in northern Gaza “is even more appalling” than the plan outlined by a group of retired generals.
Landau argued that focus on the details of the Generals’ Plan has served to obscure the “true brutality” of Israel’s deadly operations in northern Gaza, which has been rendered a hellscape of death and destruction by the military assault and siege.
Landau, a professor of linguistics at Tel Aviv University, opened his column — first published in Hebrew on his blog — by pointing to two photos: one showing a celebratory event at a camp built by an Israeli settler organization just outside of the Gaza Strip, and the other showing displaced Palestinians lined up at gunpoint amid the ruins of northern Gaza.
“These photos tell a story that is unfolding so rapidly that its harrowing details are already on the brink of being forgotten,” wrote Landau.
“Yet this story could start from any point during the past 76 years: the Nakba of 1948, the ‘Siyag Plan‘ that followed it, the Naksa of 1967. On one side, displaced Palestinians with all the belongings they can carry, hungry, wounded, and exhausted; on the other, joyful Jewish settlers, sanctifying the new land that the army has cleared for them.”
The Israeli military’s dehumanization of the people of Gaza, Landau wrote, “cannot help but trigger our associations with scenes depicting the Nazis loading Jews into cattle cars.”
Landau wrote that what the Israeli army has been implementing in northern Gaza in recent weeks is “not quite” the Generals’ Plan, which entails giving Palestinians still in the region a week to leave before declaring the area a closed military zone — and designating everyone who remains a militant who can be denied humanitarian assistance and killed.
The actual strategy Israeli soldiers have been deploying in northern Gaza is “an even more sinister and brutal version” of the Generals’ Plan “within a more concentrated area.”
“The Israeli military’s dehumanization of the people of Gaza, Landau wrote, ‘cannot help but trigger our associations with scenes depicting the Nazis loading Jews into cattle cars.’ “
“The first, most immediate distinction is the abandoning of provisions for reducing harm to civilians, i.e. giving residents of northern Gaza a week to evacuate southward,” Landau wrote. “The second departure concerns the real purpose of emptying the area: while portraying the military operation as a security necessity, it was, in fact, an embodiment of the spirit of ethnic cleansing and resettlement from day one.”
“As opposed to the picture painted by the army, implying that residents in the northern areas were free to move south and get out of the danger zone, local testimonies presented a frightening reality: Anyone who so much as stepped out of their home risked being shot by Israeli snipers or drones, including young children and those holding white flags,” Landau noted. “Rescue crews trying to help the wounded also came under attack, as well as journalists trying to document the events.”
The scholar cites one “particularly harrowing video” in which a Palestinian child is seen “on the ground pleading for help after being wounded by an airstrike; when a crowd gathers to help him, they are suddenly hit by another airstrike, killing one and wounding more than 20 others.”
“This is the reality amid which the people of northern Gaza were supposed to walk, starved and exhausted, into the ‘humanitarian zone,” Landau wrote.
“Since the Israeli army began its operation in northern Gaza, it has killed over 1,000 Palestinians. The Israeli Air Force usually bombs at night while the victims are sleeping, slaughtering entire families in their homes and making it more difficult to evacuate the wounded. And on Oct. 24, rescue services announced that the intensity of the bombardment left them with no choice but to cease all operations in the besieged areas.”
The deadly military assault, Landau stressed, has been accompanied by a “starvation policy” that has severely hindered the flow of humanitarian assistance to northern Gaza.
The heads of prominent United Nations agencies and human rights organizations warned Friday that conditions on the ground in the region are “apocalyptic” and that “the entire Palestinian population in North Gaza is at imminent risk of dying from disease, famine, and violence.”
Landau noted that on Oct. 16, following pressure from the Biden administration, the Israeli government reportedly allowed 100 aid trucks to enter northern Gaza.
“The deadly military assault, Landau stressed, has been accompanied by a ‘starvation policy’ that has severely hindered the flow of humanitarian assistance to northern Gaza.”
“But journalists in the north were quick to correct the record: Nothing at all had entered the besieged areas,” Landau wrote. “On October 20, Israel denied a further request by U.N. agencies to bring in food, fuel, blood, [and] medicines. Three days later, in response to a request for an interim order by the Israeli human rights group Gisha, the state admitted to the High Court that no humanitarian aid had been allowed into northern Gaza up to that point. By this time, we are already talking about a three-week-long food siege.”
Addressing the question of “what is left for us to do” in the face of such a catastrophe, Landau wrote that “the consensus concerning the war of extermination poisons Israeli society and blackens its future so profoundly that even small pockets of resistance can proliferate stamina and hope to those who have not yet been carried away by the currents of madness.”
“We can also look for partners in this fight abroad, where the critical lever of pressure is the pipeline of American weapons,” he added.
“The struggle to end this intensifying war of extermination and transfer in Gaza, particularly in the north, is first and foremost a human fight. It is a fight for life, both in Gaza and Israel: for the very chance that life can continue to exist in this blood-soaked land. Nothing could be more patriotic.”
+972 Magazine published Landau’s column a day after Francesca Albanese, the U.N. special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, warned in a statement that “time is running out” to stop the far-right Israeli government’s attempt to “erase the Palestinians from their own land and allow Israel to fully annex Palestinian territory.”
“Genocide and a man-made humanitarian catastrophe are unfolding in front of us and in Gaza,” said Albanese. “I regret to see so many member states are avoiding acknowledging the suffering of the Palestinian people and instead look away.”
Israeli Strikes Demonstrates Limits of Western Military Might
Posted by Internationalist 360° on November 5, 2024
Brian Berletic
Israel’s most recent missile strikes on Iran reveal the limits to conventional Western military power in the Middle East, reflecting wider limits globally.
While Israel’s air force conducted a sophisticated, large-scale operation requiring well-trained, well-coordinated personnel as well as capable air-launched long-range precision guided missiles, a combination of Iranian defensive capabilities and constraints on Western (including Israeli) military industrial production limited results.
While Israel and its US sponsors are capable of larger-scale military operations, this would be within the context of open warfare – warfare US-Israeli forces and their combined industrial power would struggle to sustain.
Doubts may exist regarding Iranian resolve and resilience and whether it and its allies could outlast and outfight US-Israeli forces short of either or both the US and Israel resorting to nuclear weapons. Even if the US and its proxies, including Israel, were to prevail over Iran in the Middle East, it may come at the cost of forfeiting Washington’s pursuit of primacy elsewhere around the globe, including in Ukraine versus Russia and the Asia-Pacific region versus China.
Escalation Toward War
Long-standing US policy seeks to use Israel to provoke war with Iran, absolving Washington of responsibility while creating a pretext for Washington itself to wade into the conflict once it begins. Despite Israel lacking the conventional military power required to fight and win a war against Iran, Israel has conducted a long list of provocations to draw Iran into conflict, nonetheless, specifically to fulfill this US foreign policy objective.
Exchanges of missile strikes between Israel and Iran began in April 2024 when Israel attacked the Iranian consulate in Damascus, killing military personnel and civilians. It triggered a chain-reaction of strikes, assassinations, and retaliations, documented in a timeline laid out by the New York Times.
Iran’s first retaliatory strike in April 2024 consisted of a barrage of drones, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles two weeks after its consulate was attacked and after notifying the United States days prior, giving the US and its regional partners ample time to coordinate efforts to intercept most of the incoming weapons.
Iran’s second retaliatory strike in early October 2024 consisted of between 180-200 ballistic missiles, launched with little warning, overwhelming Israeli air defenses and inflicting significant damage to at least one Israeli air base, according to the Western media.
The two Iranian retaliatory strikes represented incremental escalation, each designed to serve as a demonstration and warning regarding Iranian capabilities including Iran’s ability to target Israel with an array of weapons, overwhelm Israeli air defenses and inflict damage at will on Israeli military targets – all of it falling short of a full-scale attack.
Israel has responded to each Iranian retaliation with additional attacks consisting of air-launched long-range precision-guided missiles. Such missiles are launched far beyond Iranian airspace, likely in Iraq after transiting Jordanian airspace, with attacks on Syrian air defenses and claims of having transited Syrian airspace used to spare Jordan diplomatic complications.
While Israeli missiles managed to strike targets in Iran, the air operations required were complex, involved dozens of aircraft and highly trained pilots, and for the second, larger strike, involved scores of missiles (over 50) according to leaked US intelligence assessments.
Despite the large, complex operation Israel launched, alleged damage dealt to Iranian targets, even according to Israeli sources, was minimal. Israel itself claimed to have hit three S-300 air defense systems. However, the term “systems” likely means individual pieces of equipment from among entire S-300 batteries which consist of several launchers, radar stations, a command center, and power generators. As was the case with Israel’s April missile strikes, these “systems” were likely radar sets.
NBC News and the New York Times both published satellite images of buildings at Iranian military and alleged missile production sites damaged by Israeli strikes. Out of over a dozen visible buildings at an alleged missile production site, one appears severely damaged. A military base allegedly struck by Israel appears to show perhaps 3 out of over 20 visible structures damaged.
Because of the complex operations required by Israeli warplanes to launch these missiles at targets in Iran well over 1,000 km from Israeli territory and the fact that Israeli warplanes must enter into foreign airspace to launch these missiles, missile strikes on Iran are risky and less sustainable than Iran’s use of ground-launched ballistic missiles from Iranian territory capable of reaching targets anywhere in Israel.
Iran is rumored to have over 3,000 ballistic missiles. Only a percentage of those missiles likely have the ability to reach Israel. The question is, what percentage?
Iran has extensive missile production facilities and was reported by Reuters in July 2024 to be expanding production even further. Israeli sources cited by Euro News claim that Iran has already exhausted a third of its “high-grade missiles” leaving about 400 “top-tier” missiles in its arsenal. However, this number, if true, likely represents a much larger number than Israel’s “top-tier” missiles capable of reaching Iran.
Even the US, with vastly greater military capabilities than Israel, has found its position in the Middle East increasingly vulnerable with Iran and its allies repeatedly demonstrating an ability to strike at US bases in Iraq and Syria. Both the US and Israel suffer from a critical shortage of air defense missiles required to defend against Iranian drones, cruise and ballistic missiles, further tilting the military balance of power in the region in Iran’s favor.
Considering the shifting balance of military power in the region, the US and its proxies are faced with a decision – acknowledge limits to Western military power and influence over the region or continue escalating toward war. Because the US is able to employ Israel as a proxy and by doing so, avoid the direct consequences of failure, it enables and encourages Israel to continue expanding a multi-front conflict with Iran and its allies including Syria, Hezbollah, and Ansar Allah despite the growing costs and risks to Israel itself.
Extreme US-Israeli Desperation, Extreme Danger
Israel and its US sponsors have the means of inflicting greater damage on Iran, but only within the context of open war – or worse – nuclear war.
Israel could use the summation of its long-range air-launched missiles on targets in Iran in waves of attacks, with US participation utilizing a much larger arsenal of air and sea-launched missiles also capable of striking Iran. These strikes could be expanded beyond military targets to include energy infrastructure and industry, undermining Iran’s economy and possibly destabilizing the nation socioeconomically.
However, the US has a finite number of these stand-off weapons and should they be used in large-scale war with Iran either by itself or its Israeli proxies, it will take years to replace depleted stockpiles, forfeiting perceived US leverage over China in the Asia-Pacific region or over Russia in Eastern Europe.
Beyond this, both the US and Israel possess nuclear weapons. Israel is thought to possess its own arsenal of missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons, including the Jericho III intercontinental ballistic missile.
Because the US has deliberately invested in maintaining plausible deniability regarding Israeli actions despite facilitating every aspect of its actions, there may be a temptation to utilize Israeli nuclear weapons as the window of opportunity closes on the successful use of conventional military power against Iran.
Israel could use nuclear weapons on Iran, setting back both its nuclear program and the production of ballistic missiles as well as civilian infrastructure and thus its economy, setting the entire nation back years if not decades and removing it for the foreseeable future as an otherwise immovable obstacle to US primacy over the Middle East.
For Washington, the best part about this option is that while many would suspect US involvement behind-the-scenes, the US could officially deny any role, and even claim it urged Israel to exercise restraint. While Israel would face unprecedented consequences for its use of nuclear weapons, for Washington, the whole purpose of employing proxies is precisely to shift the consequences of US foreign policy onto another nation while enjoying that policy’s benefits.
As extreme and reprehensible as this sounds, it should be remembered that the United States and Europe have enjoyed generations of primacy over the globe. This primacy is now in terminal decline. This has already driven the US and its partners to adopt extreme measures, including war and proxy war, around the globe.
The ongoing war in Ukraine is a byproduct of this process, as is the escalating violence between Israel and Iran in the Middle East. Growing tensions between the US and China in the Asia-Pacific region are also a result of Washington attempting to reverse its declining primacy there.
Large-scale war and even the use of nuclear weapons may seem unthinkable, but US desperation is unprecedented. Because desperation breeds danger, unprecedented desperation breeds unprecedented danger. While many have criticized Iran’s patience and restraint regarding US-Israeli provocations, it is likely because Iran realizes time is on its side unless it provides the US and its proxies an opportunity to justify exercising what few, extreme options are capable of turning the tide back in the West’s favor.
Exterminate, Expel, Resettle: Israel’s Endgame in Northern Gaza
Posted by Internationalist 360° on November 4, 2024
Idan Landau
Debates over the details of the ‘Generals’ Plan’ distract from the true brutality of Israel’s latest operation — one that drops the veneer of humanitarian considerations and lays the groundwork for settlements.
Look at these two photos, which were both taken on Oct. 21, 2024. On the right, we see a long line of displaced people — or, more accurately, women and children — in the ruins of Jabalia refugee camp, in the northern Gaza Strip. Men over the age of 16 are separated, waving a white flag and holding up their ID cards. They are on their way out.
On the left, we see a camp built by the settler organization Nachala just outside Gaza, as part of an event celebrating the festival of Sukkot. The event was attended by 21 right-wing ministers and Knesset members and several hundred other participants, all of whom were there to discuss plans for building new Jewish settlements in Gaza. They are on their way in.
Left: Israeli settlers gather at an event celebrating Sukkot near the Gaza Strip, calling for annexation and resettlement, October 21, 2024. (Oren Ziv) Right: Displaced Palestinians line up at gunpoint in the ruins of Jabalia refugee camp. (Used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)
These photos tell a story that is unfolding so rapidly that its harrowing details are already on the brink of being forgotten. Yet this story could start from any point during the past 76 years: the Nakba of 1948, the “Siyag Plan” that followed it, the Naksa of 1967. On one side, displaced Palestinians with all the belongings they can carry, hungry, wounded, and exhausted; on the other, joyful Jewish settlers, sanctifying the new land that the army has cleared for them.
But the story of what is happening right now, on either side of the Gaza fence, revolves around what has come to be known as the “Generals’ Plan” — and what it conceals.
The blueprint
The “Generals’ Plan,” published in early September, has a very simple goal: to empty the northern Gaza Strip of its Palestinian population. The plan itself estimated that about 300,000 people were still living north of the Netzarim Corridor — the Israeli-occupied zone that bisects Gaza — although the UN put the number closer to 400,000.
During the first phase of the plan, the Israeli army would inform all of those people that they have a week to evacuate to the south through two “humanitarian corridors.” In the second phase, at the end of that week, the army would declare the whole area a closed military zone. Anyone who remained would be considered an enemy combatant, and be killed if they didn’t surrender. A complete siege would be imposed on the territory, intensifying the hunger and health crisis — creating, as Prof. Uzi Rabi, a senior researcher at Tel Aviv University, put it, “a process of starvation or extermination.”
According to the plan, providing the civilian population advance warning to evacuate guarantees compliance with the requirements of international humanitarian law. This is a lie. The first protocol of the Geneva Conventions clearly states that warning civilians to flee does not negate the protected status of those who remain, and therefore does not permit military forces to harm them; nor does a military siege negate the army’s obligation to allow the passage of humanitarian aid to civilians.
Besides, the lip service to humanitarian law falls flat when considering that the man spearheading the plan, Maj. Gen. (res.) Giora Eiland, has spent the past year calling for collective punishment against the entire population of Gaza, for treating the enclave as if it were Nazi Germany, and for allowing disease to spread as a step that will “bring victory closer and reduce harm to IDF soldiers.” After rattling off like that for 10 months, he recognized an opportunity — in consultation with a number of shadow advisors, to whom we will return — to pilot an extermination plan in northern Gaza. He diligently delivered it to politicians and the media, disguised in a mask of lies about adhering to international law.
The media and the politicians did what they always do: manufactured a distraction. While Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant hastened to deny, anonymous officials and soldiers in the field were already briefing the media that the plan was starting to be implemented.
Giora Eiland testifies during a hearing of the civil investigative committee on the October 7 massacres, Tel Aviv, August 8, 2024. (Avshalom Sassoni/Flash90)
The reality, however, is even more appalling. What the army has been implementing in northern Gaza since early October is not quite the “Generals’ Plan,” but an even more sinister and brutal version of it within a more concentrated area. One could even say that the plan itself and the intense international media and diplomatic storm it has created has helped keep everyone in the dark as to what is actually going on, and obscure the two ways in which the plan has already been redefined.
The first, most immediate distinction is the abandoning of provisions for reducing harm to civilians, i.e. giving residents of northern Gaza a week to evacuate southward. The second departure concerns the real purpose of emptying the area: while portraying the military operation as a security necessity, it was, in fact, an embodiment of the spirit of ethnic cleansing and resettlement from day one.
Attention diverted
The catastrophe in northern Gaza is growing by the minute, and the confluence of circumstances means that the unimaginable — extermination of thousands of people inside the besieged area — is no longer beyond the realm of possibility.
The current military operation began in the early hours of Oct. 6. Residents of Beit Hanoun, Beit Lahiya, and Jabalia — the three localities north of Gaza City — were ordered to flee to the Al-Mawasi area in the south of the Strip through two “humanitarian corridors.” Israel presented the attack as a means to dismantle Hamas infrastructure after the group had reestablished itself in the area, and to prepare for the possibility of Israel taking over responsibility for acquiring, moving, and distributing humanitarian aid around the Strip — in other words, for the return of the Israeli Civil Administration that governed Gaza until the “disengagement” of 2005. The first cause was only partially true, and the second was no more than a smokescreen.
For Palestinians in those areas, things looked rather different. The army attacked residents in their homes and in shelters with airstrikes, artillery, and drones, while soldiers moved from street to street demolishing and setting fire to entire buildings to prevent residents from returning. Within a matter of days, Jabalia had turned into a vision of the apocalypse.
As opposed to the picture painted by the army, implying that residents in the northern areas were free to move south and get out of the danger zone, local testimonies presented a frightening reality: anyone who so much as stepped out of their home risked being shot by Israeli snipers or drones, including young children and those holding white flags. Rescue crews trying to help the wounded also came under attack, as well as journalists trying to document the events.
One particularly harrowing video, verified by The Washington Post, shows a child on the ground pleading for help after being wounded by an airstrike; when a crowd gathers to help him, they are suddenly hit by another airstrike, killing one and wounding more than 20 others. This is the reality amid which the people of northern Gaza were supposed to walk, starved and exhausted, into the “humanitarian zone.”
An IDF drone shows displaced Palestinians forced to evacuate Jabalia, October 21, 2024. (X/Avichay Adraee/used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)
In view of this brutality, the Israeli propaganda machine spurred into action to offer a slew of excuses as to why civilians were not evacuating — primarily that Hamas was “beating with sticks” those who tried to leave. If Hamas did indeed stop civilians from evacuating, how can the army then claim that those who chose not to evacuate are terrorists condemned to be killed? But listening to the residents themselves, one could hear the same desperate cry repeatedly: “We cannot evacuate because the Israeli army is shooting at us.”
On Oct. 20, the army circulated a photo of a long line of displaced Palestinians, beside a caption worded as mundanely and numbingly as a weather forecast: “The movement of Palestinian residents continues from the Jabalia area in the northern Gaza Strip. So far, more than 5,000 Palestinians have evacuated from the area.”
Observant viewers would have noticed that all of the heads in the picture were covered: it is a line of women and children, who were not “evacuated” but forcibly uprooted. Where are the men? Taken away to unknown locations. We may yet hear of their time in Israeli detention camps a few months from now, describing the torture and abuse that have killed at least 60 Gazan prisoners since October 7.
Unlike what was stated in the “Generals’ Plan,” civilians were not given a week to evacuate, as Eiland later acknowledged; from the get-go, the army treated the northern areas as a military zone in which any movement is met with deadly fire. This is the first way in which the plan has been used as a lightning rod to divert attention and criticism from a much more brutal reality than what it proffers.
A policy of extermination
Since the Israeli army began its operation in northern Gaza, it has killed over 1,000 Palestinians. The Israeli Air Force usually bombs at night while the victims are sleeping, slaughtering entire families in their homes and making it more difficult to evacuate the wounded. And on Oct. 24, rescue services announced that the intensity of the bombardment left them with no choice but to cease all operations in the besieged areas.
Some of the most notable attacks include the bombing of a home in the Al-Fallujah area of Jabalia camp on Oct. 14, killing a family of 11 along with the doctor who came to treat them; an attack on the Abu Hussein School in Jabalia camp on Oct. 17 that killed 22 displaced people who were sheltering there; the killing of 33 people in three houses in Jabalia camp, among them 21 women, on Oct. 19; the leveling of several residential buildings in Beit Lahiya on the same day, killing 87 people; airstrikes on five residential buildings in Beit Lahiya on Oct. 26, which killed 40 people; and the massacre of 93 people in the bombing of a five-storey residential building in Beit Lahiya on Oct. 29.
The extermination operation that is currently underway in northern Gaza should not come as a surprise to anyone who has paid attention to Israel’s war crimes over the past year, and the countless investigative reports that the world’s most respected media outlets have written about them. From dropping 2,000-pound bombs where there are no military targets nearby to the regular killing of children by sniper fire to the head — these past atrocities show us what the Israeli army will continue to do if they’re not stopped.
Northern Gaza is being annihilated before the eyes of the world. Continuous bombardment is striking every corner, with martyrs falling in every street. The sound of explosions never stops, and there is no safe place for civilians. Hospitals are overwhelmed, unable to treat the… pic.twitter.com/S5SIQkXUQv
— Mahmoud Bassam محمود بسام (@Mahmoud_Bassam8) October 18, 2024
There are only three major medical facilities within the encircled area of northern Gaza, to which the hundreds of casualties of the past few weeks have been directed: the Indonesian Hospital and Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya, and Al-Awda Hospital in Jabalia. Yet the Israeli army has also subjected these hospitals to attacks, rendering them unable to treat the wounded. Reports by Doctors Without Borders and the UN have defined the situation as “immediately life threatening.”
At the start of the operation, the Israeli army ordered the three hospitals to evacuate within 24 hours, threatening to capture or kill anyone found inside them — not quite the “week of grace” stated in the “Generals’ Plan.” The army bombed Kamal Adwan and its surroundings in the early stages of the operation, before subjecting it to a three-day raid which removed it from service entirely and saw most of the doctors detained.
The army has also repeatedly bombed both the Indonesian Hospital and Al-Awda. Two patients in the former died due to the resulting power outage, before the hospital stopped functioning altogether. This is the reason why even mild injuries often end in death — because medical teams simply do not have the resources necessary to treat them.
Israel, of course, deems every house and every alley in Gaza a potential threat and a legitimate target. And what will be the excuse for denying six medical aid groups that work with the World Health Organization from entering Gaza? Most likely, it is a punishment for sending Western doctors to the Strip who later published testimonies about Israeli snipers targeting children. A UN report published shortly beforehand concluded that Israel is carrying out “a concerted policy to destroy the health-care system of Gaza” as part of “the crime against humanity of extermination.”
A policy of starvation
These attacks have been accompanied by a complete siege that has blocked all food and medical supplies from entering northern Gaza, which appears to have been an intentional starvation policy. According to the UN’s World Food Program, Israel began cutting off food on Oct. 1 — five days before the military operation.
Palestinians queue for bread at the only open bakery in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, October 24, 2024. (Abed Rahim Khatib/Flash90)
This fact received official, albeit indirect, acknowledgement in the form of a U.S. ultimatum on Oct. 15, demanding that Israel allow aid shipments to enter northern Gaza within 30 days or face a halt in U.S. weapons deliveries to Israel. This indicates, as humanitarian groups had warned, that no such aid was being allowed in before then. The 30-day grace period is laughable; as the EU’s foreign policy chief stated, within 30 days thousands of people might die of starvation.
Moreover, an exposé by Politico strengthened the feeling that like previous such “threats,” the latest demand from Washington was but an empty ceremonial gesture to reassure liberal consciences. Already in August, the top U.S. official working on the humanitarian situation in Gaza told aid organizations in an internal meeting that the United States would not countenance delaying or stopping weapon shipments to Israel to pressure it on humanitarian aid. As for the breaking of international humanitarian law, the sentiment expressed by the representative, according to one of the attendees, was that “the rules do not apply to Israel.”
Israel’s starvation policy in northern Gaza has not been limited to preventing the entry of food. On Oct. 10, the army bombed the only flour store in the area — as clear a war crime as you’ll find, forming a significant part of the genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice. Four days later, the army bombed a UN food distribution center in Jabalia, killing 10 people.
Aid agencies have provided urgent warnings about this escalating disaster, alerting as to their inability to fulfill their basic functions amid the impossible conditions Israel has created in northern Gaza. A new IPC report about hunger in Gaza predicts “catastrophic outcomes” of severe malnutrition, especially in the north.
On Oct. 16, Israeli media reported that following U.S. pressure, 100 aid trucks had entered northern Gaza. But journalists in the north were quick to correct the record: nothing at all had entered the besieged areas. On Oct. 20, Israel denied a further request by UN agencies to bring in food, fuel, blood, and medicines. Three days later, in response to a request for an interim order by the Israeli human rights group Gisha, the state admitted to the High Court that no humanitarian aid had been allowed into northern Gaza up to that point. By this time, we are already talking about a three-week-long food siege.
Since then, Israel claims to have allowed a trickle of aid trucks into northern Gaza — but without photographic evidence, it is very hard to know how many have reached their stated destination.
Winking at the right, feigning security justifications to the left
From the very start, the military rationale for such a drastic operation was questionable. Eiland spoke of “5,000 terrorists” hiding in the north, but anyone following the situation on the ground closely could see that encounters with Hamas operatives in these areas were few and far between.
Indeed, as Haaretz’s Yaniv Kubovich revealed, “commanders in the field … say that the decision to start operating in northern Gaza was made without detailed deliberations, and it seems that it was mainly intended to put pressure on the population of Gaza.” Military forces were told to prepare for the operation, the report continued, “even though there was no intelligence to justify it.”
Palestinians fleeing on the outskirts of Jabalia refugee camp, October 8, 2024. (Bilal Salem)
Furthermore, there was no unanimity among senior defense officials regarding the necessity of the maneuver, and there were plenty in both the army and the Shin Bet who thought it might endanger the lives of hostages. Sources who spoke to Haaretz testified that the soldiers who entered Jabalia “did not encounter terrorists face-to-face,” though at least 12 soldiers have since been killed in northern Gaza.
So what was the real motivation for the operation? To answer that question, we need look no further than the Sukkot event organized by settlers and their supporters on Oct. 21, titled “Preparing to Settle Gaza.” There, they laid out a vision for building Jewish settlements all across the Gaza Strip after cleansing the enclave of Palestinians. Gaza City, for example, would become “a Hebrew, technological, green city that would unite all parts of Israeli society.” And in this, at least, they are telling the truth: Israelis have always united around the displacement and dispossession of Palestinians.
That event was only the latest to call for annexation and settlement of the Strip, coming after an ecstatic January conference in Jerusalem that was attended by thousands, including no fewer than 26 coalition members. And while only a quarter of the Israeli public supports resettling Gaza, the significant presence of ministers and supporters from Netanyahu’s Likud party shows that at the political level, it is growing increasingly mainstream.
Daniela Weiss’ Nachala movement has already drawn up the plans: six settlement groups, with 700 families waiting in line. All they need is a window of opportunity — one moment when national attention is distracted (in Lebanon, the West Bank, Iran), one moment of determination in Bezalel Smotrich’s “decisive” style, and the stake will be planted across the fence.
They will call it a “military outpost” or an “agricultural farm,” a time-tested strategy of winking at the right while feigning security justifications to the left. The army will never abandon them: these are our “finest boys,” the military is their flesh and blood. And so the return shall come to pass.
The brains behind the ‘Generals’ Plan’
The observant among us could see the way the wind was blowing from the very first week of the war. While most Israelis were still wrapping their heads around the magnitude of the disaster of October 7, the settlers were already drawing maps and sticking settlement pins on them.
The wound of the “disengagement,” when the military uprooted 8,000 settlers from the Strip, was left deliberately open, never allowed to heal: a “trauma” being re-lived and passed down year after year, bleeding its poison into the infamous Kohelet Policy Forum — a right-wing think tank responsible for much of the current government’s masterplans — and to a whole row of right-wing politicians imbued with hatred and an insatiable desire for revenge.
It was the reincarnation of an old fundamental Israeli theme: the eternal victims can never sin. It is the mindset that turned the trauma of October 7, in the words of Naomi Klein, into “a weapon of war,” seamlessly infusing the Hamas attack with Holocaust imagery.
A Star of David is seen carved into a wall as Israeli soldiers operate inside Al-Shati refugee camp, northern Gaza Strip, November 16, 2023. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
And of course, far-right minister Orit Strook knew it before anyone else, predicting in May 2023: “About [resettling] Gaza — I don’t think that the people of Israel are mentally there right now, so it won’t happen today or tomorrow morning. In the long-term, I suppose there will be no choice but to do it. It will happen when the people of Israel will be ready for it, and sadly we will pay for it in blood.” How sad she really was about it is hard to tell, since the very same Orit Strook, in the midst of the war, rejoiced at the surge of new settlements and outposts in the West Bank and described it as “a time of miracles.”
What is the connection between this overflowing cauldron of messianism and the “Generals’ Plan”? That was revealed earlier this month, when Omri Maniv of Channel 12 found that although the military generals are the face of the plan, the brains behind it is the right-wing organization Tzav 9 — the group responsible for setting humanitarian aid trucks on fire before they could enter Gaza, and which was consequently sanctioned by the United States along with its founder, Shlomo Sarid.
According to Maniv’s report, it was Sarid who connected Eiland with the Forum of Reserve Commanders and Fighters, which published the plan. Among the founders of the Forum is Maj. Gen. (res.) Gabi Siboni from the Misgav Institute, which was descended from the now defunct Zionist Strategy Institute, a front organization for — surprise, surprise — Kohelet.
Over the course of years, Kohelet has perfected the ability to significantly influence the public agenda in Israel through extensions and sub-branches operating under seemingly innocuous names, with its researchers sometimes even denying any relation to it. Sarid practically quoted Kohelet’s operating manual when he explained in an internal Zoom meeting of Tzav 9 members: “We’ve come up with a clever strategy here: taking a controversial core issue, and then as civilian organizations we come and offer the solution to the government. We come from all sides. We’ve offered solutions from both the right and the left.”
Eiland was aware that Sarid and members of the Forum of Reserve Commanders and Fighters were striving to reestablish settlements in Gaza, but denied that his plan was intended to prepare the ground for it. This is what a denial by a useful idiot sounds like.
Like any good commander in the IDF Central Command, who is sent to secure a religious celebration of settlers at Joseph’s Tomb in Nablus, or to block the exits from the Palestinian villages of Kafr Qaddum and Beita, he will keep claiming that he merely provides “security” solutions that have nothing to do with the settlers’ agenda. “It’s not political,” they explain to us over and over again, while the messianists rejoice, shedding an occasional tear over “the bloody price to be paid.”
The Israeli army rounds up Palestinians at gunpoint near the Indonesian Hospital in Beit Lahiya, northern Gaza Strip. (X/AvichayAdraee)
But was he really a useful idiot? This week we learned that Israel’s political leadership is pressuring the military to prevent the residents of Jabalia from returning to their homes, “despite the fact that the objectives of the operation … have mostly been achieved.” Eiland now expects that for Palestinians, northern Gaza “will slowly turn into a distant dream. Like they have forgotten Ashkelon [Al-Majdal], they will forget that area too.” This is no longer the voice of a mindless military tactician but rather of a full-blown advocate of ethnic cleansing.
And so we have cut through all the layers of deception in the “Generals’ Plan”: contrary to what was stated, the plan itself is a war crime; the army did not provide any grace period for evacuating civilians; the military justification is questionable, and certainly in no way proportionate to the intensity of the drastic operation; and the ultimate goal of the plan is not military but political — resettling Gaza.
Israel’s window of opportunity
Right now, around 100,000 residents remain besieged in Beit Lahiya, Beit Hanoun, and Jabalia, starving and thirsty. Entire families are being massacred and entire neighborhoods flattened every day. Israel’s destruction of healthcare infrastructure and blocking of medical aid has rendered hospitals defunct, unable to care for the wounded. All the while, a partial communications blackout and the near total absence of journalists within the besieged areas keeps us largely in the dark.
Is it possible to foresee what comes next? Some will inevitably look to the United States for answers. In a few days, Americans will go to the polls in what is sure to be a close race between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. If Trump wins, the Israeli leadership can breathe a sigh of relief. He will not stop any Israeli plan, however brutal — even for the simple reason that he is not clear on what the difference between Gaza and Israel is.
Harris, for her part, will not risk the final days of her campaign by making any strong statements. She certainly won’t jeopardize the Democrats’ Jewish vote by issuing Israel a real ultimatum — in fact she has already said so. And if she wins? There’s no rush. The new president will need to study the situation. “We are closely following what is happening in Gaza, and working with our allies toward a solution to this tragic situation,” she’ll be sure to say.
Europe has no levers of influence on Israel in the immediate future, and in any case the internal difference of opinions within the EU — and, first and foremost, Germany’s resolute support for Israel — thwart any drastic shift in policy. In The Hague, the mills of justice grind slowly.
President Biden greets Vice President Harris as he arrives to deliver his State of the Union address, Tuesday, February 7, 2023. (Adam Schultz/Wikimedia Commons)
Salvation can only come from Washington, but Washington is busier every passing day with Trump’s latest scandalous statement. The poison machine of the American right, aided by Elon Musk, is already in high gear in the production of disinformation and fake news. The inevitable result will be that once again, no one will care about Palestinian bodies piling up.
All this provides Israel with a window of opportunity of a month or two, during which it can even intensify the extermination operation in northern Gaza. As far as I can see, nothing will stop it during this period, or probably even after. The intensifying war in Lebanon and Israel’s north also acts as a further smokescreen.
How many Palestinians will Israel exterminate in northern Gaza before then? The killing of over 1,000 in the four weeks since the current operation began may not sound like a lot compared to the numbers we saw at the beginning of the war, but we have to remember that the area currently under siege contains less than a fifth of Gaza’s population. Proportionally, then, this is equivalent to the record numbers in the first two months of the war, when the army killed an average of 250 people per day through incessant airstrikes. It is therefore no wonder that the residents of northern Gaza say the last few weeks have been the most difficult since the beginning of the war.
Forced out, never to return?
Barring the possibility of mass annihilation by means not yet seen, Israel appears to be choosing something of a middle ground between extermination and transfer. The extermination was intended as a form of terror and intimidation, the army’s way of persuading the residents of northern Gaza to evacuate “voluntarily.” But even that was not enough. And so soldiers were sent to shelters to round up the refugees at gunpoint and send them south, after the men were separated and taken for questioning or arrest.
On Oct. 21, the Israeli public broadcaster, Kan, published drone footage of Palestinians being rounded up and forced southward. Kan titled it “Gazans leaving Jabalia.” They are “leaving” in the same way the residents of Lyd, Al-Majdal, and Manshiyya “left” in 1948. Gazan residents themselves testify: “Whoever does not follow orders is shot.”
And so it is: women and children in one line, separated from men over the age of 16 holding up ID cards in another — a forced displacement captured by the cameras of the displacing force. In years to come, Israel will write in the history books: they left of their own accord.
Displaced Palestinians line up at gunpoint in the ruins of Jabalia refugee camp. (Used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)
And just as Israeli TV broadcasted images of this “calm departure,” journalists in Gaza reported on another bombing of a shelter in the very same refugee camp, in which 10 people were killed and 30 wounded. The testimony of a paramedic who was there reveals the horror: a drone announced from the air that residents of the compound had to evacuate, and no more than 10 minutes later, before most people had managed to leave, the site was blown up.
The “Generals’ Plan,” is thus not only a deceit but also an operational flop. The threatened population was not inclined to voluntarily evacuate into the path of flying bullets and mortar shells, preferring familiar to unfamiliar horrors as is human nature (then again, who in the Israeli army is capable of perceiving Palestinians as human?). Even extermination as an instrument of terror was not enough to persuade the residents of northern Gaza to evacuate “voluntarily.” And so infantry forces were sent to the shelters to force the displaced, at gunpoint, to come out and start marching south (after the men were separated and taken for questioning or arrest).
All the signs indicate that Israel is not planning to let the displaced return. In this sense, the destruction in northern Gaza is unlike anything we have seen before. The army really does make sure to burn, destroy, and raze every building after the Palestinians leave — and sometimes while they’re still inside. Even the Americans and the Europeans can see the writing on the wall this time.
How long will it take to totally cleanse northern Gaza of its population? It is difficult to predict exactly, between the stamina of local residents to remain, the maximum daily death toll that the army allows itself based on its own considerations, and the international reaction. Certainly, it appears that the current assault will continue for weeks to come.
In the meantime, many of those displaced are not settling south of the Netzarim Corridor but rather on the outskirts of Gaza City, afraid that if they leave the north altogether, they may never be able to return. If the army expels them from there as well, this will be yet further evidence that the cleansing operation is not being guided by operational considerations.
A fight for life
What is left for us to do? Inside Israel, we are few who see the reality in front of us with clear eyes. But what little we can do, we must.
First of all, we must tune out the heckles from the peanut gallery: from “But what about Hamas’ charter?!” to “But, Iran!” and “But they’re barbarians!” None of this is relevant in the face of the genocide that our army is carrying out as you read these words (and I don’t choose that term hastily; here are four Israeli historians that reached this conclusion, who are greater experts than I). How, exactly, does the massacre of October 7 justify the burning of schools and bakeries? What does Hamas’ charter have to do with denying medical equipment from entering Gaza, leading to wholesale death of wounded people?
Palestinians displaced from Jabalia, Beit Lahiya, and Beit Hanoun shelter in tents at Al-Yarmouk Stadium in Gaza City, November 1, 2024. (Omar Al-Qataa)
We must also ignore the caricature that is “the opposition.” The “alternative” that Israel’s “center left” offers lies between a “strategic occupation” of more territory on the one hand, and a policy of “separation” on the other that still allows the army complete freedom of action in the occupied territories or even contemplates a revival of the “Jordanian option.”
The incessant rambling about grand multilateral political arrangements only serves one purpose: an evasion from the bloody reality. It is a refusal to face our own actions, a refusal to claim responsibility for the catastrophe — for which Hamas indeed carries considerable blame, but we carry much more. And ultimately, a refusal to see Palestinians as humans, just like us.
I’ve spent countless hours reading testimonies from Gaza over the past year, and one phenomenon that struck me as particularly horrifying, even though it does not result in the most horrible crimes, is the way Israeli soldiers treat the Palestinians as if they were sheep or goats, herding them from one location to another. Like a flock of animals, snipers and drones corral them, firing live ammunition at anyone who refuses to move or takes too long. Planes and drones deliver evacuation notices and then almost immediately bomb those who did not yet manage to escape. Such dehumanization cannot help but trigger our associations with scenes depicting the Nazis loading Jews into cattle cars.
The web of crimes described here is not so abstract — a vast part of the Israeli public takes part in them. Hundreds if not thousands recorded themselves in action, while many more called for extermination outright. The majority, however, is not so explicit or smug. Most just serve the military over hundreds of days of reserve duty “because we must protect our country.” They commit crimes while giving it no thought, or half a thought, or only a silenced, trampled-upon thought.
They can come up with myriad excuses, but each one crumbles in the face of more than 16,000 dead children — over 3,000 of them under the age of 5 — who have all been identified by their name and ID numbers. And they crumble in the face of the destruction of all civilian infrastructure, which does not and cannot have a purely military purpose.
So we all bear the weight of responsibility for this, albeit some more than others. The army refusal movement arose too late and too slowly, yet it requires all encouragement and support and any voice it can be lent. The consensus concerning the war of extermination poisons Israeli society and blackens its future so profoundly that even small pockets of resistance can proliferate stamina and hope to those who have not yet been carried away by the currents of madness.
We can also look for partners in this fight abroad, where the critical lever of pressure is the pipeline of American weapons. Since October 7, this pipeline has worked at an unprecedented rate (to date, $17.9 billion worth of arms shipped to Israel), facilitating a long list of war crimes. But something else was also unprecedented: for the first time, that pipeline was somewhat impeded, even if only temporarily, when a delivery of 2,000-pound bombs was delayed ahead of the Rafah invasion.
This is merely a drop in the ocean, but it points to what needs to be done. And it would not have happened without the continuous pressure that activists put on their representatives in the Democratic establishment, which eventually percolated to the White House. Petitions, letters to congresspeople, publishing testimonies — any tool used to sway public opinion against the automatic support of Israel can help.
The struggle to end this intensifying war of extermination and transfer in Gaza, particularly in the north, is first and foremost a human fight. It is a fight for life, both in Gaza and Israel: for the very chance that life can continue to exist in this blood-soaked land. Nothing could be more patriotic.
Thirty years after making peace with the occupation state, Jordan finds itself reduced to a strategic buffer zone that exists for Israeli security – caught between broken promises and ongoing violations that pose a dangerous threat to its sovereignty and regional standing.
Khalil Harb
NOV 5, 2024
Photo Credit: The Cradle
The Wadi Araba Agreement, signed in 1994 by Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Jordanian King Hussein bin Talal, gave its signatories little time to savor its potential impact. Rabin was assassinated just a year later, and Hussein succumbed to illness five years after that.
Yet, three decades on, the agreement's tainted legacy has been dumped directly onto the Jordanian people, leaving them caught between the rigid terms accepted by their government despite the ongoing Israeli expansionist policies in the neighboring West Bank – where countless Palestinians possess Jordanian citizenship.
The preamble of the agreement proclaims an idealistic vision of "overcoming psychological barriers and promoting human dignity." However, the only barriers breached have been those between the ruling elites and a handful of wealthy businessmen.
The ‘Agreement of Shame’
The wider Jordanian public, by contrast, has remained outspoken in opposition – praising the Palestinian resistance, supporting Jordanian resistance operations on the border, expressing solidarity with Lebanon, condemning the Israeli occupation, and protesting outside its embassy. Indeed, the Wadi Araba agreement has long been dubbed the "Agreement of Shame" by many Jordanians.
On the 30th anniversary of this accord, the numerous Israeli violations of the agreement have come into sharper focus, especially after the Operation Al-Aqsa Flood operation of 7 October 2023. This raises serious questions about the actions of the Hashemite Kingdom: is it showing leniency, or merely hesitating?
The Wadi Araba agreement itself has been mangled to serve as justification for policies that, in some cases, actively facilitate Tel Aviv’s interests. An example of this is when a renowned Jordanian artist was detained and prosecuted simply for attempting to paint a mural of Palestinian resistance leader and martyr Yahya Sinwar on the walls of the Baqaa refugee camp.
While no definitive evidence suggests that Israel used Jordanian airspace in last month’s attacks on Iran, a look back at 13 April reveals that Amman allowed Israeli fighter jets to operate in its skies to counter Iranian drones and missiles launched during "Operation True Promise 1," according to an Israeli Air Force officer.
Jordan’s sovereignty in jeopardy
In July, Jordan also announced the opening of the first NATO liaison office in the West Asia and North Africa region, raising questions about the implications of such a move amidst ongoing regional conflicts. The entrance of NATO into Amman has further reinforced the perception that Jordan's “sovereignty” is increasingly compromised.
Earlier this year, Hebrew Channel 13 reported that cargo ships docked in the UAE are unloaded and transported by truck through Saudi Arabia, into Jordan, and eventually across the Jordan River into Israel, continuing on to Haifa.
What should have been a mutually desired peace between two neighboring states, grounded in UN charters and international law, has instead devolved into an outright Israeli encroachment on Jordan's regional standing and political independence – in other words, an "insult," as one Jordanian political source tells The Cradle.
These assertions contradict the announcement of the Jordanian armed forces in an official statement that “no military aircraft were allowed to cross Jordanian airspace by the warring parties in the region,” describing talk about the crossing of Israeli planes as “rumors that are not based on facts.”
Regardless, the facts reveal otherwise. A statement from Iraq's Kataib Hezbollah, received by The Cradle, confirms that there is intelligence indicating "the use of the lands of Jordan and the Hejaz desert as a corridor for Israeli aircraft," which "would not have happened without the existence of an agreement and premeditation with the Americans” who control Iraqi airspace.
The Iraqi government also lodged an official protest with the UN and the Security Council regarding Israeli violations of Iraqi airspace during attacks on Iran – violations that, according to the Jordanian source, also damaged Amman’s diplomatic relations with Baghdad and showed blatant disregard for Jordan's stability and interests.
A British-made buffer zone
On the 30th anniversary of the accords between Amman and Tel Aviv, David Schenker, who previously held the position of US assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, writes in the National Interest magazine, “At the professional echelons of the state’s military and intelligence agencies, cooperation has never been better.”
If true, this raises serious concerns. Was there prior coordination with the Jordanian regime, or did Israel simply ignore Jordanian sovereignty in its military actions while Amman helpfully looked the other way?
It is not possible to imagine that about 100 Israeli Air Force fighter jets crossed into the skies of Jordan toward Iraq without prior “coordination” with the Jordanian regime, or that it completely ignored Jordanian “sovereignty” and crossed without permission.
In either case, the situation reveals a troubling dynamic. Israel not only violated Jordan's sovereignty but has also risked dragging the country deeper into a regional war and placing it at odds with its direct Arab neighbors. By implicating Jordan as an ally in one regional axis against another, Israel's actions have clearly breached the Wadi Araba Agreement's principles.
King Abdullah's response – or lack thereof – has only intensified the controversy. He could have openly rejected these violations and, as the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, ordered the interception of Israeli aircraft entering Jordanian airspace.
Instead, reports suggest he allowed Israeli fighters to operate freely to counter Iranian threats, contrasting sharply with Jordan's proactive defense – in aid of Israel, it so happens – against dangers coming from the east, such as Iranian missiles and drones.
The recent crossing of Israeli planes through Jordanian airspace appears to be a cynical test of the so-called "Hussein–Rabin Agreement." By gradually accepting these actions, Abdullah II has turned Jordan into little more than a geographic buffer zone – a strategic extension of Israel's security reach.
Breached terms and waning authority
The Wadi Araba Agreement, in Article Two, outlines respect and recognition of each country's territorial integrity. Yet, as the Jordanian source highlights, Israeli aircraft en route to attack Iran have no business within Jordanian territory, nor do they contribute to Amman's security.
Article Three asserts that both parties should regard international borders as inviolable. If Israel's actions were indeed unauthorized, they constitute a blatant breach of a key clause, yet no official Jordanian protest has been heard.
Similar questions arise regarding Article Four, which calls for effective measures to prevent hostility or violence from each other's territories, explicitly including airspace. If Jordanian airspace was used without consent, Tel Aviv clearly violated this provision, and Amman’s silence only invites further encroachment.
Another section of the agreement prohibits either party from forming alliances with third parties that could lead to aggression against the other. Jordan's perceived weakness in the face of an Israel bolstered by western support has rendered it the junior partner in the relationship.
With diminished ties and alliances compared to the 1980s and 1990s, Jordan – particularly during Saddam Hussein's rule in Iraq – hoped that the Wadi Araba Agreement would provide security and stability for the kingdom. Instead, Jordan has conceded to Israeli ambitions, which extend across the entire region, from Iraq and Iran in the east to Syria in the north and Palestine in the west.
Clause Five of Article Four reiterates the commitment to prevent terrorism, sabotage, and violence from being launched from either party's territory. Yet Israeli disdain for Jordan's sovereignty has never been more apparent.
Unfulfilled promises and Israeli ambitions
The broader principles of the treaty even include preventing forced population movements that could negatively impact either party. Thirty years ago, this was a diplomatic euphemism aimed at ensuring Jordan would prevent Palestinian refugees from organizing to return to their homeland.
Yet today, ruling, mainstream factions in Israel openly advocate for policies that would push Palestinians into Jordan, viewing the eastern bank of the Jordan River as part of their historical land.
Two key points in Clause Seven – establishing a zone free of hostile alliances and creating a zone free of weapons of mass destruction in West Asia – are aspirations that Israel has shown little interest in upholding.
As the 30th anniversary of the Wadi Araba Agreement passes, it is clear that the accord has largely served the interests of the Israeli state, which sees it as a convenient security arrangement while treating Jordan with neglect and contempt.
King Hussein bequeathed to his son not only a monarchy but also an agreement that Israel has continually mocked, yet never so acutely as over the past year. This has transformed the Hashemite Kingdom into a mere Arab buffer zone for Israeli security – an early warning system for threats from the east front, particularly Iraq and Iran.
‘Nowhere in Israel off-limits’ for Hezbollah attacks: Naim Qassem
Secretary-General Naim Qassem’s speech came hours after Hezbollah struck an army base near Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport
News Desk
NOV 6, 2024
(Photo credit: Courtney Bonneau/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images)
Hezbollah’s new leader Naim Qassem said during his second speech as secretary-general that the resistance group is in a “defensive state” and will thwart Israeli plans for Lebanon, vowing that nowhere in Israel is safe from missile and drone attacks.
“We have now reached an Israeli aggressive war on Lebanon that has been going on for a month and ten days. It is no longer important how the war started or what pretexts caused it. What is important is that we are facing an Israeli aggression,” Qassem said.
The Lebanese resistance is “now in a defensive state” and is confronting “this aggression and its expansionist goals,” he added.
These goals include “ending Hezbollah’s presence,” while “the second step is to occupy Lebanon, even if from a distance – from the air, and by threatening, and making Lebanon similar to the West Bank,” referring to Tel Aviv’s ambition for unrestricted access to Lebanese territory and airspace. “The third is to [redraw] the map of the [region].”
“Netanyahu wanted these steps, and he started his war on Lebanon to accomplish the first step."
Qassem praised the resistance fighters on the ground, confronting Israeli army incursions into south Lebanon, which began at the very start of last month and have since completely failed to achieve Tel Aviv’s goal of pushing away Hezbollah from the border and securing the return of settlers to its north.
He said Israel thought the pager terror attacks and the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah would “make it easier for him to invade Lebanon.”
“They brought five divisions to the border, consisting of 65,000 soldiers and officers … the Israeli army wanted to reach the Litani River but faced a firm resistance,” Qassem said, noting the failure of the ground operations. “We believe that only one thing can stop this aggressive war, which is the battlefield – both on the border and against the Israeli depth,” referring to daily rocket, missile, and drone attacks.
“There is no place in the Israeli entity that is off-limits to Hezbollah planes or missiles,” he warned. He added that Hezbollah’s capabilities are in good shape.
“Our only choice is to prevent Israel from achieving its goals,” he added, noting that Hezbollah “cannot be defeated” as long as “justice” and “God” are on its side.
The Hezbollah chief also commented on the US election. He clarified that Hezbollah does not depend on regional or international politics, elections, or who will end up as president in the US, but rather depends only on the battlefield.
“We are not waiting on the American elections; whether Kamala Harris or Donald Trump succeeds, they have no value to us … we do not rely on general political movements, and we do not rely on Netanyahu being satisfied with some gains, no, we will rely on the field, and we will make Netanyahu fully realize that he is a loser in the field and not a winner,” he said.
"We have tens of thousands of trained resistance combatants [who are ready to fight],” he affirmed, revealing that Hezbollah has not yet deployed the entirety of its ground force.
He reiterated that any ceasefire talks must be based on stopping the war and respecting Lebanon’s sovereignty – something that Netanyahu has publicly stood against.
He praised the “political resistance” of Lebanon’s Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, who has rejected Israeli terms presented to Beirut by White House envoy Amos Hochstein.
“We will not beg for halting the aggression, and we will make the enemy ask for it … we are ready for a war of attrition no matter how long it lasts … Let [Israel] take its time.”
Qassem also commented on the recent Israeli landing operation and kidnapping in north Lebanon’s Batroun, in which commandos snatched Lebanese naval officer Imad Amhaz while he was attending a maritime training course.
“I demand that the Lebanese army, which is responsible for protecting the waters, issue a statement explaining the reason behind the Batroun operation.”
The army must immediately “inform us of its stance on the incident,” he said, questioning the potential role of the UNIFIL force in Lebanon and its German naval contingent.
Qassem praised Nasrallah as the “pioneer” of Hezbollah’s “era of victories,” saying he “built a resistance … that unites all segments of society.”
Nasrallah will “continue with us and we will continue with him, and the resistance will remain and grow and grow.”
The speech came hours after Hezbollah targeted a military base near Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport with a barrage of missiles, causing damage in its vicinity and a temporary halt in air traffic.
Netanyahu sacks defense minister Gallant, says 'trust cracked'
Jewish supremacist officials welcomed the move, while captives' families called it a 'further attempt' to torpedo a Gaza ceasefire deal
News Desk
NOV 5, 2024
(Photo Credit: Reuters)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fired Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on 5 November, citing a lack of mutual trust and disagreements on the “management” of the war in Gaza and Lebanon.
In a one-sentence letter handed to Gallant personally, Netanyahu tells the outgoing war chief, "Your tenure will end 48 hours from the receipt of this letter.” “I would like to thank you for your service as defense minister,” the letter, released by the premier's office, concludes.
“Unfortunately, although in the first months of the war there was trust and there was very fruitful work, during the last months this trust cracked between me and the Defense Minister,” Netanyahu said in a video statement released Tuesday night.
He also accused Gallant of indirectly aiding Israel’s enemies."
“I made many attempts to bridge these gaps, but they kept getting wider,” he said. “They also came to the knowledge of the public in an unacceptable way, and worse than that, they came to the knowledge of the enemy — our enemies enjoyed it and derived a lot of benefit from it.”
Foreign Minister Israel Katz will replace Gallant as head of the defense ministry. Gideon Saar, a minister without a portfolio who was recently rumored to be Gallant's replacement, will be appointed as foreign minister.
Jewish supremacist National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir gleefully welcomed the news, saying that “it is not possible to achieve absolute victory” with Gallant in office.
“The prime minister did well to remove him from his position,” Ben Gvir added.
Opposition leaders called on Israeli citizens to “take to the streets” to protest Gallant's firing. “Politics at the expense of national security,” National Unity chairman and former war chief Benny Gantz said via social media.
“There is no low to which this government will not sink,” added National Unity lawmaker Orit Farkash Hacohen. “A Defense Minister who announces conscription orders for thousands of Haredim is fired in the middle of a war on the eve of an [expected Iranian] attack for the sake of the evasion law.”
In March 2023, Netanyahu dismissed Gallant as defense minister after he opposed the government's planned judicial reforms. Nonetheless, the premier reversed his decision a few weeks later.
Israel dropped over 85,000 tons of bombs inside Gaza since start of genocide
The US government has steadily provided Israel with the munitions being used to ethnically cleanse the Gaza Strip
News Desk
NOV 6, 2024
(Photo Credit: Momen Faiz/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
The Israeli military has dropped more than 85,000 tons of bombs inside the besieged Gaza Strip since the start of the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza in October 2023, according to a statement by the Palestinian Environment Quality Authority.
These include the indiscriminate use of white phosphorus munitions, which are prohibited under the UN Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons.
Speaking to Wafa News Agency, Palestinian officials say the continuous bombing “has caused the destruction of vast areas of agricultural land and contaminated soil with toxic chemicals, which will hinder agriculture in the enclave for decades.”
Furthermore, the officials say Israeli attacks have caused significant damage to Gaza's water sources, “causing polluted water to seep into groundwater basins, [posing] a health and environmental crisis that endangers hundreds of thousands of residents for future generations.”
In June, the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor reported that Israel had dropped 70,000 tons of bombs inside Gaza since the start of the genocide, far surpassing the bombing of Dresden, Hamburg, and London combined during World War II. Since then, Israel has intensified its ethnic cleansing campaign in the north of Gaza, carpet bombing the region on a daily basis.
The bodies of more than 43,000 Palestinians have been recovered over the past year, with most victims being women and children. Thousands more remain buried under the rubble.
The Israeli onslaught has displaced almost the territory’s entire population as Tel Aviv continues to impose a blockade that has led to severe shortages of food, clean water, and medicine.
Earlier this year, the UN warned that removing tens of millions of tons of rubble left in the aftermath of Israel's bombardment could take 15 years and cost between $500-600 million. Moreover, rebuilding destroyed homes could take at least until 2040.
In economic terms, the UN Conference on Trade and Development said in a report released last month that if the war ends soon and Gaza returns to the status quo before 7 October 2023, it could take 350 years for its economy to return to its precarious prewar level.
West Asian leaders react to Trump victory in US elections
Israel said the election result was a ‘great victory,’ while Iran said its ‘policy does not change’ based on individuals
News Desk
NOV 6, 2024
(Photo credit: Getty Images)
Regional and world leaders reacted on 6 November to Donald Trump’s victory in being elected as the 47th president of the US, which marked the controversial businessman’s second time entering office.
“I congratulate my friend Donald Trump, who won the presidential election in the US after a great struggle and was re-elected as the President,” said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan via X on 6 November.
“In this new period that will begin with the elections of the American people, I hope that Turkiye-US relations will strengthen, that regional and global crises and wars, especially the Palestinian issue and the Russia-Ukraine war, will come to an end; I believe that more efforts will be made for a more just world,” Erdogan added.
He expressed hope that “the elections will be beneficial for our friendly and allied people in the US and for all of humanity.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and others in his government have shown joy over Trump’s re-election.
"Dear Donald and Melania Trump, Congratulations on history’s greatest comeback! Your historic return to the White House offers a new beginning for America and a powerful recommitment to the great alliance between Israel and America. This is a huge victory!” Netanyahu said on X.
“Yesssss,” wrote Netanyahu’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir.
Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri said “We urge Trump to learn from [US President Joe] Biden’s mistakes,” adding that the new president will be “tested” on his statements about being able to end the war on Gaza “within hours,” while calling for the end of Washington’s “blind support” for Israel.
Moscow has reacted cautiously to the election. Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said it was important that Trump “started talking about how America is sick and that the problems of American society need to be addressed" during his victory speech.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said "Let us not forget that we are talking about an unfriendly country, which is both directly and indirectly involved in a war against our state [in Ukraine]."
"We have repeatedly said that the US is able to contribute to the end of this conflict. This cannot be done overnight, but ... the US is capable of changing the trajectory of its foreign policy. Will this happen, and if so, how ... we will see after (the US president's inauguration in) January," he added, referring to Trump’s statements that he is capable of swiftly ending the war in Ukraine.
An Iranian government spokesperson, Fatemeh Mohajerani, said “US elections are not really our business. Our policies are steady and don't change based on individuals. We made the necessary predictions before, and there will not be a change in people's livelihoods," referring to US sanctions on Iran.
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Deputy Commander in Chief Ali Fadavi did not comment specifically on Trump’s re-election but vowed on Wednesday that Tehran is ready for a confrontation with Israel, and does not rule out US–Israeli pre-emptive attacks to try to prevent Iran’s promised retaliation to the Israeli attack on its soil last month.
The late commander of the IRGC Quds Force, Qassem Soleimani, was assassinated by a US airstrike under Trump’s administration in 2020.
In 2019, the US under Trump recognized Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, which was illegally occupied by Israel in 1967. One year earlier, Trump withdrew from the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran and reimposed harsh sanctions against Tehran in a move highly satisfactory to Israel. In 2017, he recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moved the US embassy to the occupied city.
Trump has been described as among the most staunchly pro-Israel presidents in US history. Despite this, he recently criticized Netanyahu for Operation Al-Aqsa Flood happening “on his watch.”
Hebrew newspaper Haaretz reported in June that Trump received a pledge from the widow of late US businessman Sheldon Adelson to support his presidential campaign with millions of dollars.
The report adds that Miriam Adelson seeks, in exchange, US support for Israeli annexation of the West Bank and recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the occupied territory.
Netanyahu Replaces Fired Israeli Defense Minister With ‘Another Genocidal Lunatic’
Posted on November 6, 2024 by Yves Smith
Yves here. I hate to sound like a stickler regarding the Common Dreams post reproduced below. Trying to find differences among genodicers may sound like what the Japanese call a height competition among peanuts: seemingly non-existent distinctions matter to them. Nevertheless, it is not correct to depict the newly-installed Israel Defense Minister Israel Katz as on a par with Yoav Gallant, who was just ousted by Netanyahu. By Israeli standards, Gallant is a moderate and Katz is a hard-liner.
There had long been friction between Gallant and Netanyahu. Netanyahu had even fired Gallant before, in 2023, but reinstated him after a month.
Gallant seemed surprised by his removal, although there had been signs things were getting worse between the two men. Gallant seemed to see part of his job as advocating for the IDF, which by all accounts, ex the air force, is exhausted and also suffering an unheard level of deaths and casualties. Larry Wilkerson pointed out that the injuries are at least as consequential for Israel, since the level is very high due to Israel’s proximity to front lines (ie, soldiers that might die from their wounds in other theaters of combat can usually be transported quickly to very good hospitals). And these injuries are often, as the bloodless saying goes, life-altering, such as the loss of limbs.
So Gallant’s comparative moderation seemed to come at least in part from understanding the IDF’s limits and trying to get Israel to chart a more realistic course. But the hardliner see the wars as eschatological and at least some believe God will bail them out. Netanyahu needs to keep the conflicts going to remain in office and out of jail.
A recent sign that relations between Gallant and Netanyahu had deteriorated further was when Netanyahu cancelled a Gallant trip to the US to meet with Department of Defense officials to “coordinate” as in negotiate and plan, what Israel’s response to the Iran October 1 missile strikes on Israel, which were eventually admitted to have been effective in accurately hitting military targets (and worse for Israel, largely getting through Israel’s air defenses). Netanyahu insisted Biden speak to him first. The Gallant trip was not rescheduled; instead Department of Defense personnel came to Israel.
I suspect the big reason for Netanyahu cancelling the Gallant visit was he suspected Gallant would work (as in plot) with the US as to how to curb the Israel response, particularly since the Iran success exposed how vulnerable Israel would be to another, almost certainly bigger, Iran attack. Recall Iran had said it was prepared to call things a day after its October 1 demonstration, but if Israel attacked Iran again, Iran would hit much harder and would among other things, target civilian infrastructure. The Western press reported that the US keenly wanted the Israel to make a limited retaliation, as opposed to hitting Iran’s nuclear program and oil infrastructure as it threatened. The Biden Administration desperate to forestall a widening of the war before the elections, particularly since Iran is too big well bunkered for Israel to deliver a knockout blow. Iran could easily take countermeasures that would cripple oil shipping and/or production and drive energy prices through the roof.
Now admittedly, forcing the US to come to Israel to negotiate the strike package did not seem to deliver Netanyahu the buy-in to the sort of more aggressive response he and other top officials had so loudly talked up. However, having the discussions take place in Israel would prevent Gallant and any like-minded members of his team from conversing freely.
A Times of Israel account has Netanyahu of depicting Gallant as insubordinate, as in not always executing on his and the Cabinet’s directives, and then delivering a cheap shot, by depicting Gallant as a near-traitor:
“I made many attempts to bridge these gaps, but they kept getting wider,” he [Netanyahu] said. “They also came to the knowledge of the public in an unacceptable way, and worse than that, they came to the knowledge of the enemy — our enemies enjoyed it and derived a lot of benefit from it.”
However, the televised attack gave Gallant the opportunity to tell his side of the story. Again from the Times of Israel:
Following his dismissal on Tuesday, Gallant issued a one-line statement of his own, writing on X that “the security of the State of Israel always was, and will always remain, my life’s mission.”
The statement was identical to the one he published on the night of his first firing, 18 months ago.
He elaborated at a press conference later on Tuesday night, where he appeared visibly emotional as he explained that the reason for his dismissal was threefold: the need to draft Haredi men to the IDF, the imperative to bring back the hostages from Gaza, and the need for a state commission of inquiry in the October 7 Hamas terror onslaught and ensuing war.
All three initiatives are threats to Netanyahu. The IDF has just started drafting Haredim over their fierce opposition. Their parties are part of Netanyahu’s coalition. The hostage issue is an even bigger problem for Bibi. Getting hostages returned means negotiations with Hamas. Hamas will not release them for anything less than a permanent, or at least plenty long ceasefire. A ceasefire would generate demands for new elections. An independent commission on October 7 would similarly undermine Netanyahu. Not only did the attacks take place on his watch, but a probe would also call attention to the way Netanyahu supported Hamas even before the 2006 elections that made it the leading party in Gaza out of a scheme gone pear-shaped to undermine the PLO.
The Financial Times points out that Netanyahu timed this firing (presumably also with the marked uptick of killing in Gaza) to take advantage of US election pre-occupation. From the Financial Times:
But, despite the increasingly public feuding between Gallant and Netanyahu, the timing of his sacking — which comes as Israel is in the middle of a multi-front conflict with foes including Hamas, Hizbollah and Iran — was unexpected….
Gallant has been an important interlocutor with Israel’s main ally, the US, throughout the wars, and a person familiar with the situation said announcing his sacking on the day of the American election was not a coincidence.
“Everyone knows that the Americans like Gallant,” the person added. “So [Netanyahu] chose this timing because no one [in the US] has the attention span to follow this closely [today].”
Larry Wilkerson colorfully weighed in on the Gallant sacking. He sees the shake-up as Netanyahu needing to distract attention from his military failure and domestic pressures. He also describes the number of serious injuries in Lebanon alone as 4,000, which is very high given the short duration of that campaign.
Now to the main event.
By Brett Wilkins. Originally published at Common Dreams
Palestine defenders on Tuesday accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of swapping one “genocidal lunatic” for another after the right-wing leader fired Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and replaced him with Israel Katz, who was serving as foreign minister.
“Israel just doubled down on prolonging its genocide of the Palestinians in Gaza,” journalist and genocide scholar Samira Mohyeddin said on social media following Netanyahu’s moves.
Netanyahu cited what he called a “crisis of trust” that “gradually deepened” as his reason for the changes, which came as Israel is waging war on Gaza and Lebanon while bracing for Iranian retaliation for recent Israeli attacks on the Middle East nation.
“In the midst of a war, more than ever, full trust is required between the prime minister and the minister of defense,” Netanyahu said Tuesday, according toThe Jerusalem Post. “This trust has cracked between myself and the defense minister.”
Katz, a member of Netanyahu’s Likud party, previously held several Cabinet posts, most recently as Israel’s top diplomat. He was the minister of energy and infrastructure on October 7, 2023, when Hamas-led militants launched a surprise attack on Israel that left more than 1,100 people dead—at least some killed by fratricidal fire—and over 240 others kidnapped and taken to Gaza.
Two days later, Katz issued an order to “immediately cut off the water supply from Israel to Gaza.”
“Electricity and fuel were cut off yesterday,” he said. “What was will not be. All the civilian population in Gaza is ordered to leave immediately. We will win. They will not receive a drop of water or a single battery until they leave.”
Katz’s directive followed Gallant’s order for a “complete siege” of Gaza.
“There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed,” Gallant said. “We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly.”
These statements by Gallant and Katz are cited in the International Court of Justice’s January 26 provisional order for Israel to prevent genocidal acts in Gaza. Israel—which is on trial for alleged genocide at the ICJ—has been accused of ignoring this and subsequent orders issued by the tribunal.
On Tuesday, Israeli state media reported that the Israel Defense Forces has completed its division of Gaza into two parts, and that “there is no intention to allow the residents of the northern Gaza Strip to return to their homes.”
Katz has also come under fire for declaring United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres “persona non grata in Israel” for criticizing the country’s war on Gaza, which has left more than 155,000 Palestinians in Gaza dead, wounded, or missing and millions more starving and sick.
While serving as Israel’s foreign minister, Katz was also condemned for threatening “severe consequences” for nations that officially recognize Palestinian statehood. Nearly 150 of the 193 United Nations member states recognizePalestine.
Katz also raised eyebrows in 2022 after he made a thinly veiled threat to ethnically cleanse Arab citizens of Israel. Responding to Israeli Arab students who displayed the Palestinian flag on college campuses, Katz said “remember ’48,” a reference to 1948, when Israel declared its independence amid an ethnic cleansing campaign in which more than 750,000 Arabs were expelled from Palestine to make way for Jewish settlement.
Palestinians call this mass dispossession and expulsion the Nakba, which means “catastrophe” in Arabic.
“Remember our independence war and your Nakba,” Katz said. “Don’t stretch the rope too much… If you don’t calm down, we’ll teach you a lesson that won’t be forgotten.”
“Ask your elders—your grandfathers, and grandmothers—and they will explain to you that in the end, the Jews awaken, they know to defend themselves and the idea of the Jewish state,” he added.
In one of his final acts as foreign minister, Katz on Monday initiated the process of annulling a 1967 agreement between Israel and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, which Israel accuses of being “infiltrated” by Hamas. The U.N. strongly refutes Israel’s accusation.
Ione Belarra: A New Nuremberg – Israel Must Be Prosecuted Like Nazi Germany
Posted by Internationalist 360° on November 6, 2024
Spanish MP, Ione Belarra, says Israel must be handled like Nаzi Germany instead of like аparthеid South Africa, ‘Israel must be punished instead of reintegrated.’ She emphasised that Israel’s actions must be stopped and measures put in place to ensure they do not happen again, with its leaders put on trial for their crimes.
“What needs to be done with Israel is more similar to what was done with Nazism than to what was done with South Africa. We need to keep talking about Palestine. Normalization is impunity.”
“Israel is implementing its own “final solution” in Gaza, using concentration camps (gated communities) and the total extermination of its population starting in the north of the strip. They must be stopped now and their military capabilities dismantled.”
– Ione Belarra
This is the first time that an EU politician has provided such a clear strategy to not only end the Zionist genocide in Palestine and Lebanon but also provides a way forward to bring the perpetrators to justice. Bravo!
– Vanessa Beeley
What needs to be done with Israel is more similar to what was done with Nazism than to what was done with South Africa. We need to keep talking about Palestine. Normalization is impunity. pic.twitter.com/Q4SCZgLhzc
In the Trenches, Israel Struggles on the Lebanese Battlefield
Posted by Internationalist 360° on November 7, 2024
Hassan Jouni
In a month-long ground campaign that has mobilized five divisions, advanced weaponry, and unrelenting air and naval power, Israel has failed to capture even a single Lebanese village as a resilient resistance continues to thwart any land incursion.
In recent weeks, the realities on the southern Lebanese battlefield have painted a stark picture of the challenges faced by the Israeli military.
Over a month has passed since the occupation state announced the start of its ground operations, and despite deploying massive forces – with five military divisions comprising over 50,000 soldiers, equipped with state-of-the-art weapons and supported by an enormous air and naval fleet – significant breakthroughs have been elusive.
Despite attempts to make headway across the northern border from west to east, the Israeli army’s progress has been minimal, rarely exceeding three kilometers into Lebanese territory. Their primary focus has been on the Al-Adaisa-Rab Thalateen axis, following a failed maneuver aimed at capturing Aita al-Shaab.
Aita al-Shaab: A symbolic battleground
This town, resilient and unyielding in the face of hundreds of air and artillery strikes, repelled repeated Israeli efforts to breach its defenses. When the occupation forces failed to advance along this axis, they redirected their assault towards Khiam, hoping for a breakthrough from a new direction.
Aita holds deep symbolic value for the Israeli army – its capture was seen as a moral as well as a strategic objective, owing to its reputation from the 2006 war. The enemy launched hundreds of air raids and artillery attacks, determined to destroy Aita’s homes, enter its streets, and raise their flag.
To achieve this, they maneuvered to encircle Aita from the west, hoping to isolate it from the rest of Lebanon. This was a bold tactical decision, but a costly one. Hezbollah’s resistance fighters, understanding the terrain and the vulnerabilities of their attackers, managed to sever the advancing Israeli force from its support units, ultimately forcing it to retreat.
The fierce resistance, supported by neighboring areas like Hunayn, thwarted this strategy and inflicted significant troop losses on the Israeli side.
After being forced back from Aita, the enemy shifted its sights to Al-Adaisa and Taybeh, believing that a push from the border toward the Litani River might yield better results. The settlement of Meskvaam provided the Israelis with an effective firebase due to its elevated location – but even this advantage could not break the resistance’s defenses.
Israel fails to ‘tent’ down in Khiam
Every attempt to advance was met with a fierce counterattack. The enemy tried yet again, this time from the settlement of Metulla, aiming to encircle Khiam from the east.
Once more, the resistance refused to yield, holding the high ground and preventing Israeli forces from establishing a foothold in this strategic town – a town with a proud history of struggle and a vantage point that offers a commanding view not only over Lebanon but also across the border.
It was in Khiam (which means “tents”) where the occupation forces, in collaboration with the South Lebanon Army (SLA) militia, ran a notorious prison and torture facility before being forced to withdraw in 2000.
The Israeli maneuvers in recent days reveal a pattern that speaks volumes about their strategy and its limitations. The occupation army has, in typical fashion, relied heavily on air force, artillery, and naval support to avoid direct clashes with resistance fighters.
This overreliance on long-range tactics has made the advance of ground units sluggish and ineffective. The reluctance to deploy tanks and heavy vehicles stems from fear – the dreaded Kornet missiles possessed by the resistance can take out armored targets from a distance of five to seven kilometers, making any armored advance risky.
This hesitancy has left the infantry without sufficient support, limiting their operational depth. Operating in tightly knit groups of nine to 11 soldiers, they fear capture, and this deliberate, careful movement has made them easier targets for the resistance, which has used every opportunity to strike, causing further losses.
Limitations of Israel’s strategy in the south
Despite the continuous air and artillery barrages, the resistance has retained control of the front, launching rocket and artillery attacks across the border. Many key locations have been targeted repeatedly, underscoring their strategic importance to the enemy’s operations.
As a result, the Israeli army has failed to occupy a single village in southern Lebanon. The villages along the border have suffered extensive destruction – most of their houses reduced to rubble in a manner that blatantly disregards international law, including the principles of humanitarian law – but occupation and control have remained out of reach for Israel.
The legendary determination of the resistance has sent a clear message: military decisiveness is not possible here. Any advance into Lebanon will come at a tremendous cost, and even if achieved, sustaining control will be near impossible.
History is rich with the painful memories of Israel’s past incursions into the south, and it seems they are destined to learn that lesson once again.
One of the most striking features of this current confrontation is the strategic use of drones by the resistance. These drones have proved remarkably effective at infiltrating Israeli airspace, dodging modern defense systems like the Iron Dome and David’s Sling.
The Israeli Air Force has struggled to deal with these small, flexible aerial threats, failing to intercept them despite multiple attempts. This new factor has reshaped the battlefield, introducing a significant challenge for Tel Aviv.
Drones have turned into strategic weapons. Their impact is felt not only tactically but also politically as they continue to hover over strategic locations, slipping past defenses and landing wherever they please – including the home of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and a military base near Ben Gurion Airport.
A persistent state of insecurity
While Israel’s ground maneuvers have faltered, it has tried to make up for these setbacks with aerial dominance. Intensive air raids and efforts to stop drone incursions have shifted much of the battle to the skies.
However, despite their destructive power, air operations have not altered the ground realities. Security remains elusive for Israel, especially in the north, as settlers still refuse to return “home” – a key stated objective for Tel Aviv in its war on Lebanon.
Indeed, the equation of “missing security” holds true on both sides of the border. While Lebanon endures the destruction of its homes and heritage, Israel faces a different, albeit no less impactful – insecurity.
The constant rain of rockets and the persistent drone presence have shattered the sense of safety in Israeli cities, bases, farms, and barracks. Stability, it seems, will only return when Israel is ready to recommit to the terms of UN Resolution 1701.
This is the stark reality on the ground. Southern Lebanon’s defenders have shown resilience and strength, while Israel’s campaign, despite backing from the US and superior firepower, has found itself constrained by the resilience of its opponents and the ever-evolving dynamics of modern warfare.
How Close is the Israeli Army to Collapse?
Posted by Internationalist 360° on November 7, 2024
Asa Winstanley
This collage shows several Israeli soldiers and officers who were killed in action on the Gaza border, October 7, 2023. (Israel Defense Forces)
Is the Israeli army on the verge of collapsing? That’s the question many families of soldiers recently returned from Gaza seem to be asking.
A series of interviews with more than 20 combat soldiers and their families for an article published last month by Tel Aviv news site The Hottest Place, suggests that the Israeli army is suffering from a potentially terminal crisis.
“This may be a quiet and hushed-up phenomenon,” writes journalist Revital Hovel, “but [it is] one that is continuously increasing. Many soldiers are refusing to continue fighting in Gaza and are voting with their feet.”
A year of armed resistance to the Israeli genocide in the Gaza Strip is taking its toll. Many Israeli soldiers are now refusing to fight.
Some are even dying by suicide rather than return to the field.
“The platoons are empty,” said “Rona,” the mother of one soldier. “Anyone who isn’t dead and wasn’t wounded was emotionally damaged. Very few remained who came back to fight.”
Like everyone else quoted by The Hottest Place, “Rona” used a pseudonym for fear of retaliation from the Israeli army.
Despite the unprecedented horrors the Israeli occupation army has been inflicting in Gaza and Lebanon for the last year, many of the surviving soldiers have been mentally scarred by their experiences.
Burnout
“There is a constant hidden dropping out from fighting,” said “Idit,” a second mother. “This is not a conscientious objection, but rather dropping out due to burnout.”
According to “Rona,” the army’s morale was already catastrophically low even before Israel carried out a series of assassinations in Lebanon ahead of the attempted ground invasion that began on 1 October.
Her son told her that, “I don’t know what army they’re planning to go into Lebanon with, but there is no army. I’m not going back to the battalion.”
This might help explain why, one month on, the Israeli military has failed to advance any significant distance into South Lebanon, and almost 100 soldiers have been killed in the attempt.
According to The Electronic Intifada’s contributing editor and military analyst Jon Elmer, Israel has admitted to the killing of 70 of its soldiers on the Lebanese front alone since the invasion began.
Hizballah, the Lebanese resistance group stopping the Israelis, says that it has killed 90.
Yet this apparent breakdown of the Israeli army is neither only a recent phenomenon nor limited to Lebanon.
“Refusal and mutiny”
“Many parents relate that the breakdown of the combat soldiers’ morale started as early as April, when the IDF [Israeli military] got bogged down in Gaza,” Hovel wrote in The Hottest Place.
“I call it refusal and mutiny,” said “Inbal,” a third soldier’s mother. “They come back to the same buildings [in Gaza] they had cleansed [sic – cleared out], and they get booby trapped again, every time. They were in the Zaytoun neighborhood [of Gaza City] three times already. They understand that it is pointless and useless.”
“Yael,” a fourth mother, said: “I talked with my son, and he told me: ‘We’re like ducks in a shooting gallery, we don’t know what we’re doing here. It’s a second and third time that we return to the same places. The hostages are not coming back, and you see that it is not ending, and along the way soldiers are wounded and killed. It seems futile.’ That was in March.”
Another soldier, “Uri,” related directly to The Hottest Place that three officers from his company were killed when an anti-tank missile hit a house they had occupied in Khan Younis, southern Gaza.
“All the officers went to the second floor of a building, and they were there together, close to one another, looking out the window,” said Uri. “A missile entered the building from another window and hit them. The whole company had to evacuate them … We were finished; we all wanted to go on home leave, and they decided to leave us in there [in Gaza] anyhow.”
This “turning point” experience eventually led him to refuse to return to the fighting in July. “I started crying on a lawn and said that I couldn’t take it anymore. I was emotionally done. I told my commander that I couldn’t take it anymore.”
Death by suicide
The article in the Tel Aviv publication is among a rash of similar pieces published in Israeli and Western media in recent weeks. The goal is often to elicit sympathy for the genocidal Israeli soldiers who are currently carrying out a holocaust in Gaza.
But some of these articles give away perhaps more than their authors intend.
In possibly the most notorious such article, CNN told the story of Eliran Mizrahi, an Israeli soldier who drove a military bulldozer. Mizrahi died by suicide in June this year, reportedly only two days after he was called up to return to Gaza.
According to Guy Zaken, Mizrahi’s co-driver who spoke to CNN, he and his fellow soldiers would “run over terrorists, dead and alive, in the hundreds.”
He graphically explained how, “everything squirts out” from under the bulldozer.
Israelis commonly use the word “terrorist” to describe any Palestinian.
Mizrahi and Zaken proudly boasted on an Israeli TV channel earlier this year that they had destroyed the houses of 5,000 “terrorists” — before claiming that effectively all houses in Gaza belong to “terrorists.”
Videos and other posts soon emerged online of Mizrahi posting evidence of his crimes on his own social media.
Same D9 operator, Guy Zaken, with his friend Eliran Mizrahi, who killed himself recently, were interviewed in April. They said they destroyed 5,000 houses of “terrorists”, but when asked “how did you know they were terrorists?” they clarify that every house is terrorist’s house. https://t.co/EkWwqt93ty pic.twitter.com/sTeOMPCiKX
— B.M. (@ireallyhateyou) June 27, 2024
November 7, 2023: “Wipe out the seed of Amalek!”
On October 7 he wrote: “Erase, flatten, do not leave a trace!!! Now more than ever!!!”
October 25: “Whoever plays with fire shouldn’t be surprised when he’s being burnt good!!! And we haven’t even started!!!” pic.twitter.com/maqd2BesJ6
— B.M. (@ireallyhateyou) June 8, 2024
On May 21st, I published and translated photos about Eliran Mizrahi, a reserve soldier in the engineering corps who was always posting about the war crimes he committed in Gaza. (The post is pinned)
Eliran Mizrahi, who fought in the Gaza Strip since October 7th, ended his life… pic.twitter.com/gxRenrjjIJ
— Khaled Yousry (@KhaledYousry22) June 9, 2024
According to CNN, “Zaken says he can no longer eat meat, as it reminds him of the gruesome scenes he witnessed from his bulldozer in Gaza, and struggles to sleep at night, the sound of explosions ringing in his head.”
Despite his enthusiastic execution of Israel’s genocide in the Gaza Strip, Mizrahi was initially refused burial in a military cemetery by Israel, apparently because he wasn’t technically an active duty solider at the time of his death (Haaretz later reported that this decision was overturned after his relatives led a public outcry).
It is possible that suicide among Israeli soldiers may be a hushed-up epidemic right now.
According to CNN, thousands of soldiers “are suffering from PTSD or mental illnesses caused by trauma during the war. It is unclear how many have taken their own lives” as the Israeli military has not provided official figures.
Another high profile case recently featured in the Israeli press was 38-year-old Asaf Dagan, a veteran air force pilot who died by suicide last month.
His suicide note circulated online, apparently released by his family in an effort to pressure the authorities into agreeing to the military burial he has also been denied.
Haaretz reported that Dagan had been diagnosed as suffering from years of post-traumatic stress disorder.
“Dagan’s family cannot tell whether the source of his suffering were traumatic events he witnessed during the Second Lebanon War” in 2006, the paper reported, “or guilt about the bombings he took part in.”
The moral decay +disintegrasion of Israel’s social cohesion are manifested today by the arrest of 7 Israeli Jews who spied for yrs for Iran by gathering info on IAF bases&Mossad. They did it for money. Recently 13 Israeli Jews were arrested for knowingly spying for Iranian intel
— Yossi Melman (@yossi_melman) October 21, 2024
In a related twist last month, Israeli intelligence agencies announced that they had broken up two alleged Iranian spy rings – one of them entirely composed of Israeli Jews.
Yossi Melman, intelligence correspondent for Haaretz, described the very idea that some Israeli Jews are now willing to work for Iran against Israel as a sign of what he described as “the moral decay and disintegration of Israel’s social cohesion.”
Melman reported for the Tel Aviv paper that “the Shin Bet [intelligence agency] and police have arrested 14 Israelis on suspicion of spying for Iran. Since the arrests were made during wartime, the accusations are very severe. The suspects represent two separate rings recruited and controlled by agents of the Iranian ministry of intelligence.”
Despite claiming that the alleged spies were mainly motivated by money, Melman wrote that “the painful truth which cannot be ignored is that more and more Israeli Jews are ready to spy for Iran.”
He claimed that “in the last six months more than 20 Israelis were arrested by the Shin Bet and charged with espionage for Iran’s ministry of intelligence.”
These 20 alleged spies “are Israelis from various walks of life,” Melman claimed.
“Males and females, young and old, from across the country. They represent the mosaic of Israeli society: a yeshiva student from Beit Shemesh, a psychology student from a college in Ramat Gan, a businessman from Ashkelon and two new immigrants from Belarus and Ukraine.”
Melman explained the situation as he sees it: “Many Israelis are depressed because they don’t see an end to [Benjamin] Netanyahu’s belligerent policies. The economy is deteriorating and the government doesn’t offer hope to its citizens. All these are fertile ground for the cultivation of spies.”
It also seems to be fertile ground for the possible collapse, or at least severe degradation, of the Israeli military. With no end in sight to the war of attrition being waged by the resistance, the challenges for Israel’s military will only continue to mount.
A collapse may still be a long way off, but for Palestinian and Lebanese people, it could not come soon enough.
Ilan Pappé: The Birth of Israel and the Death of Zionism
Posted by Internationalist 360° on November 4, 2024
Middle East Eye
Can Zionism survive the current war in Gaza?
Israeli historian Ilan Pappé believes it can’t. In fact, he argues that the liberation of Palestine is an inevitability.
Pappé is the author of 24 books on the Israel-Palestine conflict, and most recently published two books: ‘Lobbying for Zionism on Both Sides of the Atlantic’ and ‘A Very Short History of the Israel-Palestine Conflict’.
This week on The Big Picture Podcast, we sit down with Ilan Pappé to talk about where the Zionist project originates, why it embraced settler colonialism and why he believes it will ultimately fail to achieve its goals.
Middle East Eye
At the time of writing, war is spreading throughout West Asia. Of course, this is widely understood as an outgrowth of Israeli expansion and the ongoing genocide of Palestinians in Gaza. This week’s guest is back on Downstream to provide a century’s worth of historical context to enrich the way in which we think about the ongoing crisis.
Israel approves 'deportation law' targeting families of Palestinians behind resistance operations
Relatives can also be deported for 'expressing support' for the operations or 'not taking necessary measures to prevent them'
News Desk
NOV 7, 2024
(Photo Credit: Ilia Yefimovich/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images)
The Israeli Knesset on 6 November voted 61-41 to give final approval to a law that allows authorities to deport family members of Palestinians who carry out armed operations against Israelis to the Gaza Strip and "other locations."
The controversial law, proposed by Likud lawmaker Hanoch Milwidsky, states that relatives living in occupied East Jerusalem and the 1948 occupied territories may be deported by the Interior Minister to Gaza "or another destination determined by the circumstances" if they “knew in advance of the terrorist's plan and did not take necessary measures to prevent it.”
Parents, siblings, children, and spouses of the so-called “terrorists” would be targeted by the law. They can also be deported on the basis of expressing "support or sympathy" for the act of "terrorism" committed or for publishing “praise, admiration, or encouragement.”
“Israeli citizens who meet the criteria will be deported for at least seven years and up to 15 years. Non-citizen deportees will face a minimum of 10 years and up to 20 years. Additionally, the police will have the authority to enforce deportations, ‘including the power to enter any premises, remove individuals, and use reasonable force,'" reports Israeli daily Haaretz.
The approved law includes a provision that allows children convicted of capital offenses considered as “terrorism” to be sentenced to prison from the age of 12.
Palestinian resistance operations in Israeli cities have significantly surged since the start of the genocide in Gaza last year. In early October, seven Israelis were killed and 16 others injured during a shooting operation in the heart of Tel Aviv.
The deportation law comes on the heels of a draft law approved by the Knesset that gives the education ministry permission to order the prevention of the transfer of budgets to schools on the grounds that a "terrorist act" could be taking place.
This law specifically targets Palestinian schools in occupied East Jerusalem, claiming they "incite minors against the state of Israel".
Last month, the Knesset passed two laws banning the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) from operating inside Israel, Gaza, the occupied West Bank, and occupied east Jerusalem.
Violent clashes renew in eastern Syria between US proxies, Arab tribes
The clashes in Deir Ezzor come on the heels of battles between the Syrian army and ISIS fighters near a US-controlled base in the Syrian desert
News Desk
NOV 7, 2024
(Photo Credit: Baderkhan Ahmad/AP)
Armed clashes broke out between the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and militants from local Arab tribes in eastern Syria's Deir Ezzor governorate on 7 November, according to field sources who spoke with Al Mayadeen.
The clashes reportedly broke out when the SDF launched attacks on the city of Mayadin, located on the western bank of the Euphrates River.
"The Arab clans responded to the source of the fire, which led to the outbreak of violent clashes with machine guns between the two sides," the Lebanese daily reported.
Arab tribes in US-occupied northeast Syria have been in open revolt against the Kurdish-run Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES) for more than a year.
Despite brief instances of de-escalation, tensions and armed clashes between the two sides have reignited several times. Late last year, reports said that the Arab clans were coordinating with and receiving military aid and training from the Syrian Arab Army (SAA).
In September, about 10,000 members from prominent Syrian Arab tribes gathered for the Fifth Syrian Tribes and Clans Forum in the city of Homs, where they publicly rejected the US occupation of Syria and expressed full support for the government of President Bashar al-Assad and the regional Axis of Resistance.
Weeks after the forum, officials from the Syrian government reportedly welcomed a Kurdish delegation from the so-called National Initiative for Dialogue in Jazira with the aim to bring “viewpoints closer together to conduct a dialogue between the Syrian state and the Kurdish parties.”
“The Jazira region has essentially become a battleground where the US now reaps consequences from its forced occupation of Syrian territory, disregarding the impact on Syrian territorial unity and the strife it sows among the population. ,” The Cradle columnist Haidar Mustafa wrote in August.
Thursday's clashes broke out just hours after the SAA repelled an attack by ISIS on one of its checkpoints in the country’s Al-Badia desert near the vicinity of the US-controlled “55-kilometer area” surrounding the Al-Tanf base.
A day earlier, Trump ally and former presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. claimed that the new president wants to withdraw US troops from Syria.
Several civilians were killed, and a number of Lebanese army and UNIFIL troops were injured on 7 November in an Israeli airstrike on a convoy belonging to the interim force in the southern Lebanese city of Saida (Sidon) as it was passing through a military checkpoint.
“The Israeli enemy targeted a car while it was passing through the Awali checkpoint [in] Sidon, which led to the martyrdom of three citizens who were inside it, in addition to the injury of three soldiers from the checkpoint personnel and four members of the Malaysian unit working within UNIFIL, while the unit's vehicles were passing through the aforementioned checkpoint,” the Lebanese army said.
UNIFIL announced that five of its soldiers “sustained minor injuries while in a convoy transporting recently arrived troops to Lebanon.”
“The convoy was passing through Sidon when a drone attack occurred nearby. They were immediately treated by the Lebanese Red Cross and then continued on to their positions in southern Lebanon,” the statement added.
Israel has repeatedly targeted the Lebanese army and UNIFIL troops since expanding its assault on Lebanon in September.
Several Lebanese soldiers have been killed since last month.
UNIFIL spokesman, Andrea Tenenti, confirmed on 18 October that Israeli forces are deliberately targeting UN troops deployed on the border.
“The Israeli army’s targeting of UNIFIL forces was deliberate, contrary to what Israeli officials say.” He said that Israel targeted “UNIFIL several times, including five deliberate times.”
Israel has killed around 2,000 people and displaced more than a million since expanding its assault on Lebanon in September.
Tel Aviv has rejected any diplomatic solution that does not include continued military access to Lebanese airspace and territory.
Israeli army Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi signaled on Wednesday that Israel is preparing to further expand its offensive against Lebanon.
Hezbollah has inflicted severe losses on invading troops that began operating in Lebanon at the start of October. The Israeli army has been unable to advance deeper than a few kilometers into southern Lebanon, and has resorted to blowing up entire homes and neighborhoods.
Israel Passes Law to Imprison Palestinian Children Aged 12
Israeli occupation forces take a Palestinian child prisoner. X/ @SprinterFamily
November 8, 2024 Hour: 9:59 am
The bill was introduced by the ultranationalist Jewish Power party.
On Thursday night, the Israeli Parliament (Knesset) approved a temporary provision allowing judges to sentence minors as young as 12 to prison if they are found guilty of murder for “terrorist” motives.
Minors aged 12 to 14 can be sentenced to prison and held in a facility until they turn 14, at which point Israeli law permits transferring them to jail.
In Israel, criminal responsibility starts at age 12, but prison sentences could only be applied from age 14. The new provision is temporary, set to be in force for five years, but it may be renewed in two-year periods after its expiration.
A similar law was in effect from 2016 to 2020 but was not renewed. The bill was introduced by members of the ultranationalist Jewish Power party, led by the National Security Minister, settler Itamar Ben Gvir.
Since late October, the Israeli Parliament has passed a series of controversial measures, including banning the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), deporting relatives of “terrorists” to Gaza, and dismissing teachers for expressing support for the Palestinian cause.
The Zionist state often uses the term “terrorist” indiscriminately to refer to those suspected of engaging in resistance actions against the Israeli occupation in the West Bank or Gaza. The Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) condemned the law, accusing the Israeli authorities of punishing children for their “resistance and rejection of the occupation, in violation of international treaties” on children’s rights.
Hamas recalled that Israeli forces have killed more than 17,000 children during their offensive against Gaza, and called on the international community to “stand up to this fascist law.”
'Pogrom' Against Hooligans Accusations Follow A Zionist Propaganda Scheme
There are two recurring schemes in pro-Zionist propaganda:
In any conflict the Zionists (or Jews) are always the victims.
Conflicts with Zionists always occur out of nowhere, i.e without any provocations and outside of any context. They are thus pure anti-semitism.
On October 7 2023, following provocations of radical Zionists at the Al Aqsa mosque, Hamas soldiers and random Gazans broke from their open air prison and attempted to take Israeli hostages. These were to be exchanged for Arab prisoners in Israeli hands. During the operation the Israeli military ordered its forces to follow the Hannibal directive which says that any potential Israeli hostage shall be killed before it is taken to Gaza.
Various reports have since shown that the majority of those killed on that day were Arabs from Gaza. The majority of Israeli casualties of that day were caused by the Israeli military, primarily by its helicopter forces which fired Hellfire missiles and machine cannons against random cars fleeing the scene.
But the Zionist friendly media reported the Hamas excursion as unprovoked. It seemed to have happened without any context. But there is a context of more then 70 years of expulsion and killing of Arabs up to today.
It also depicted the killed Israeli as the victims killed by the Arab attackers even as Israel's own military admitted that it had killed a large share of them.
A recent incident in Amsterdam follows a similar scheme.
Israel decries ‘pogrom’ in Amsterdam as soccer fans come under attack by rioters - Times of Israel, Nov 8 2024
All Israelis accounted hours after 10 injured, many besieged in hotels as gangs of hooligans — apparently Muslims and Arabs — ambush, beat Israelis after game
The headline suggests that:
The Zionist 'soccer fans' were the sole victims.
There was no context, i.e. the attack was presumably unprovoked.
Both points are, of course, wrong.
Some context, not mention in recent reports, can be found in a three days old Jerusalem Post report:
Just in case: Mossad agents to join Maccabi Tel Aviv FC trip to Amsterdam - JPost, Nov 5 2024
After a disappointing 1-0 league loss to Ironi Kiryat Shmona, Maccabi Tel Aviv is refocusing on European competition, set to face Ajax in Amsterdam on Thursday night.
...
As with all Israeli teams playing in Europe over the past year, security concerns are paramount. On Tuesday, Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf reported that, in addition to Maccabi’s regular security personnel, Mossad agents will join the team in Amsterdam to provide maximum protection.
Maccabi fans are long known for their racist behavior:
In 2014, a group [of Maccabi] fans reportedly shouted racist slurs in the direction of Mahran Radi, an Arab-Israeli who was then playing for the club. Graffiti was also sprayed around Tel Aviv.
It allegedly said "we don't want Arabs at Maccabi!" and "Radi is dead".
In June, Israel’s “Kicking Out Racism” initiative tried to quantify the amount of racist language used by the fans of various football clubs. They found that Maccabi was second only to Beitar Jerusalem in terms of the quantities witnessed by researchers.
It is alleged those same sentiments were on display in Amsterdam this week, with fans chanting racist slogans, as well as refusing to mark a minute’s silence for the victims of the flooding in Spain.
Minor riots with Maccabi fans actually took place on two nights. On the night of the 6th to 7th November, a day before a game against Ajax Amsterdam, hooligan soccer fans of Maccabi Tel Aviv, presumably under Mossad 'protection', teared down Palestinian flags from private Dutch dwellings (video) and attacked Dutch taxi drivers of Arab descent:
Taxi Driver @DutchTaxiDriver - 2:55 UTC · Nov 7, 2024
Schandalig en onacceptabel: een Amsterdamse taxichauffeur aangevallen en mishandeld door Maccabi hooligans. Dit geweld moet stoppen. Steun voor onze chauffeurs die onze stad draaiende houden, ook in moeilijke tijden. #StopGeweld #Amsterdam #RespectVoorChauffeurs #Ajax
Outrageous and unacceptable: an Amsterdam taxi driver attacked and abused by Maccabi hooligans. This violence must stop. Support our drivers who keep our city running, even in difficult times. #StopGeweld #Amsterdam #RespectVoorChauffeurs #Ajax
Video
As The British Mail Online reported yesterday:
Israeli football hooligans tore down Palestine flags as they marched through Amsterdam in a Wednesday night of chaos ahead of Maccabi Tel Aviv's visit to Ajax.
Videos show dozens of hooded figures dressed fully in black cheering and chanting 'f*** you Palestine' and 'ole' as one climbed halfway up the front of a building and removed a flag on the Rokin, a major street.
Footage also shows one thug thumping a taxi with crowbar before the driver takes off, while there have been reported clashes between the visiting hooligans and cabbies.
Meanwhile, clips shared by a prominent pro-hooligan page depict bust-ups purported to be between Maccabi fans and a group of Moroccan Ajax supporters.
On the evening of November 7 Maccabi Tel Aviv lost its game against Ajax Amsterdam. Ajax won 5 to 0.
Before the game a minute of silence was asked for victims of flooding in Spain. The Mossad directed Maccabi hooligans ignored it.
After the game more scuffles and riots reportedly happened. But this time the Zionist hooligans were apparently in a minority against a group of pro-Palestinian Ajax fans and had to flee to their hotels.
Today the justified action against the outrageous, Mossad protected, behavior of Maccabi hooligans is called a progrom.
A convenient result for the Mossad people who have planned and incited this provocation.
Posted by b on November 8, 2024 at 15:04 UTC | Permalink
Israel bars soldiers from going to the Netherlands after pro-genocide mob sparks street violence
Clashes erupted after Israeli football fans chanted slurs against Arabs, interrupted the moment of silence held for the Valencia flood victims, and violated private property across the city by tearing down Palestinian flags
News Desk
NOV 8, 2024
(Photo credit: Beeld JEROEN JUMELET/ANP)
Israel’s army said on 8 November that soldiers are barred from traveling to the Netherlands after pro-Palestine Dutch football fans in Amsterdam attacked Israeli supporters of the Maccabi Tel Aviv team – some of who are soldiers in the military.
“In accordance with the assessment of the situation, it was decided to ban all IDF servicemen from flying to the Netherlands until further notice,” the Israeli army said in a statement.
“Exceptional requests will be examined individually,” the statement added.
Dutch Prime Minister, Dick Schoof, said via X on Friday that he “followed the news from Amsterdam with disgust” after the “completely unacceptable anti-Semitic attacks on Israelis.”
“I am in close contact with all those involved. Just now, in a call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, I emphasized that the perpetrators will be tracked down and prosecuted.”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office called it a “horrifying incident,” with several other Israeli leaders and officials expressing outrage.
Thousands of Israelis are waiting to be evacuated from the country. Tel Aviv walked back a decision to send an Israeli army rescue mission. "It was decided that it is not necessary to send a professional rescue mission to the Netherlands,” said Netanyahu's office. Efforts will instead focus on bringing Israelis back via civilian flights.
According to Amsterdam police, five people have been hospitalized and 62 arrested. The police said they have launched an extensive investigation into the acts of violence committed throughout that night.
Amsterdam Mayor Femke Halsema said she is working to determine the amount of violence that was committed against the Israelis, adding that the number of people wounded or detained remains unclear.
The incident took place on 8 November, prior to a football match between Dutch team AFC Ajax and Israel’s Maccabi Tel Aviv, as part of the UEFA Europa League.
Several videos were posted on social media showing Dutch fans, some of Arab and Turkish descent, harassing or attacking Israeli fans.
“This is for the children, motherfucker,” a fan is heard telling an Israeli in one of the videos. “Free Palestine now, Free Palestine now. You want to kill kids?” Other similar videos emerged online.
One Israeli ended up in the Amsterdam canal after being chased. “Say free Palestine, and we’ll go,” one of the fans says, as seen in footage on social media. Others were reportedly thrown into the canal.
Maccabi Tel Aviv hooligans find out after singing zionist chants and attacking citizens in Amsterdam, they thought they’re in Israel and they can do whatever they want without consequences.
One of them jumped in the river to escape and ended up saying “Free Palestine” pic.twitter.com/NlVH2XlGTK
— Suppressed News. (@SuppressedNws) November 8, 2024
Israeli fans had been provoking people in the area with racial slurs and songs that included lyrics such as “no schools in Gaza because there are no children left” and “Let the IDF win to fuck the Arabs.” Some tore down Palestinian flags as well, prompting locals to retaliate.
The incident comes as pro-Palestinian sentiment in the world of football has been witnessing a surge.
Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) fans unfurled a massive “Free Palestine” banner before their team’s game against Atletico Madrid on Wednesday, as part of the UEFA Champions League. French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said it was “unacceptable” and that he would demand “explanations” from the club.
UEFA said PSG will not face any “disciplinary” action “because the banner that was unfurled cannot be in this case considered provocative or insulting."
Yemen targets Israel’s Nevatim airbase with Palestine-2 missile
The Yemeni army also announced that it shot down a 12th US MQ-9 in Yemen’s Al-Jawf region
News Desk
NOV 8, 2024
(Photo credit: Yemen Military Media)
The Armed Forces of Yemen’s Sanaa government targeted Israel’s Nevatim airbase in the Negev desert with a Palestine-2 ballistic missile on 8 November.
“The missile force of the Yemeni Armed Forces carried out a qualitative military operation targeting the Nevatim air base in the Negev region in southern occupied Palestine with a hypersonic ballistic missile Palestine-2, and it reached its target,” the Yemeni army said in a statement.
It also announced shooting down another “American MQ-9 aircraft while it was carrying out hostile missions in the airspace of Al-Jawf Governorate at dawn today, Friday.”
This was the 12th US MQ-9 shot down by Yemeni forces. Each one is valued at around $30 million.
The statement vowed that Yemeni operations will not cease until the wars in Gaza and Lebanon are ended, and until the blockade of the besieged strip is lifted.
The Israeli army claimed that the missile was intercepted.
Sanaa’s forces, which are merged with the Ansarallah resistance movement in Yemen, have continued to target Israeli-linked vessels and ships bound for Israel – remaining undeterred by frequent US attacks on its soil. The Yemeni army has also launched several missile attacks at the Israeli depth – including on 22 October, when it announced targeting a base in the Tel Aviv area with a Palestine-2 missile.
The Nevatim air base targeted by Yemen was one of the Israeli military sites which were bombarded with Iranian ballistic missiles on 1 October – during Operation True Promise-2, which was carried out in response to the assassination of Hamas and Hezbollah leaders Ismail Haniyeh and Hassan Nasrallah.
The Iranian missiles caused significant damage at the Nevatim base, according to satellite imagery.
Tel Aviv and Washington are currently on high alert over Tehran’s promised retaliation to an Israeli attack which targeted some of its military sites in late October. Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei has said that the response will be “tooth-crushing.”
Trump looking to 'drastically throttle' Iran's oil sales: Report
Trump’s advisors also reportedly support an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear and energy facilities
News Desk
NOV 8, 2024
(Photo credit: AP/Manuel Balce Ceneta)
US President-elect Donald Trump plans to “drastically increase sanctions on Iran and throttle its oil sales as part of an aggressive strategy” to undercut Tehran’s support for its allies in the Axis of Resistance and its nuclear program, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on 8 November.
Trump took a hostile stance toward Iran in his first term by canceling the nuclear deal (the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA), which gave Iran sanctions relief in exchange for limits on its nuclear energy program.
He also imposed a “maximum pressure” sanctions strategy on Iran and assassinated the widely popular Iranian Quds Force general, Qassem Soleimani, who led the fight against US-backed extremist groups, ISIS and the Nusra Front, in Iraq and Syria.
According to people briefed on Trump’s early plans, the new team intends to “move rapidly to try to choke off Iran’s oil income, including going after foreign ports and traders who handle Iranian oil. That would re-create the strategy that the former president adopted in his first term, with mixed results.”
“I think you are going to see the sanctions go back on, you are going to see much more, both diplomatically and financially, they are trying to isolate Iran,” a former White House official told the WSJ.
“I think the perception is that Iran is definitely in a position of weakness right now, and now is an opportunity to exploit that weakness.”
However, “The officials familiar with Trump’s plan didn’t provide details of how precisely he would increase the pressure on Iran,” the WSJ added.
Israel and Iran have exchanged multiple attacks over the past year. The back-and-forth was initiated by Israel when it bombed the Iranian consulate in Damascus, Syria on 1 April, killing Iran’s top general Soleimani and several other Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commanders.
On 26 October, Israel launched strikes inside Iran, targeting Tehran’s missile-production capabilities and air defenses.
Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei has promised a harsh response.
Brian Hook, a former state department official and Iran hawk who led the US “maximum pressure” campaign during Trump’s first term, is expected to receive a top national security job in his second term.
In an interview with CNN, Hook noted that Trump has pledged to “isolate Iran diplomatically and weaken them economically” to prevent it from supporting the Axis of Resistance.
Hamas, Hezbollah, Yemen, and the Islamic Resistance in Iraq have all worked with Iran to resist Israel’s ongoing genocide of Palestinians in Gaza.
“It’s going to be maximum pressure 2.0,” said Robert McNally, a former US energy official.
With China being Iran's largest oil purchaser, McNally told the WSJ that Trump may pressure Iran by imposing US bans on Chinese ports that receive Iranian oil.
Helima Croft, the chief commodities strategist at Canadian broker RBC Capital Markets, told the WSJ that Trump’s senior advisors have expressed strong support for an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear and energy facilities.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has advocated attacking the Islamic Repubic's nuclear facilities for many years, is a strong supporter of Trump.
Mick Mulroy, a top Pentagon official for the West Asia region in Trump’s first term, stated that the president-elect may nevertheless be willing to strike a new deal with Iran, but only “if it’s his deal.”
In response to Trump’s election earlier this week, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian stated, “To us, it does not matter at all who has won the American election because our country and system relies on its inner strength.”
Netanyahu accused of doctoring transcripts of wartime meetings
The Israeli police are investigating 'criminal incidents' in which Netanyahu sought to hide discussions of war crimes allegations from international courts
News Desk
NOV 8, 2024
(Photo credit: Screenshot/GPO)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is being investigated on suspicion of secretly making changes to the minutes of a meeting that dealt with the “preparation for proceedings against Israel in The Hague,” Yedioth Ahronoth reported on 8 November.
Earlier this week, the Israeli media reported the police were investigating the prime minister for “criminal incidents” in which he edited the transcripts of his cabinet meetings during the early days of the war on Gaza that began on 7 October last year.
Reports emerged in the Israeli media earlier this year that Netanyahu faced allegations of trying to make his “conversations regarding the management of the war in Gaza untraceable.”
The Israeli state faces charges of intent to commit genocide at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), while Netanyahu and his Defense Minister Yoav Gallant face allegations of war crimes, including the crime of extermination, at the International Criminal Court (ICC). Both courts are located at the Hague, Netherlands.
On 20 May, ICC prosecutor Karim Khan stated that his office filed an application for arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant, as well as Hamas leaders Yahya Sinwar, Ismail Haniyeh and Mohammed Deif.
However, five months later, ICC judges have yet to decide if they will issue the warrants or not, prompting widespread criticism of the court.
The case brought by South Africa against Israel at the ICJ for breaching the genocide convention during its war on Gaza is also ongoing.
On Thursday, Ireland announced it intends to join South Africa's genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice before the end of the year.
Israel has failed to comply with a preliminary ICJ ruling in late January, which required Israel to take all necessary measures to prevent acts falling within the scope of Article II of the Genocide Convention.
Yedioth Ahronoth writes that in addition to altering cabinet discussions regarding the Hague, Netanyahu is suspected of altering security reports which would have recorded Netanyahu’s response to any accounts that Hamas was attacking Israeli settlements during Operation Al-Aqsa Flood early in the morning on 7 October, the paper points out.
Senior figures in the security establishment allegedly fear that efforts were being made to edit the minutes of wartime discussions held with Netanyahu after discovering discrepancies between transcripts of the meetings and what officials in attendance had heard first-hand.
The manufactured 'pogrom': Weaponizing chaos in Amsterdam
The western world and mainstream media have once again jumped on an opportunity to conflate anti-Zionism with antisemitism after Israeli football hooligans, protected by the Mossad, wreaked havoc on the streets of Amsterdam, deliberately provoking a harsh response.
Anis Raiss
NOV 10, 2024
Photo Credit: The Cradle
For the first time in living memory, mainstream media has risen to defend football hooliganism. On 6 November, Tel Aviv’s traveling thugs arrived in Amsterdam, beginning their rampage by tearing down Palestinian solidarity flags, chanting racist slurs like “Let the IDF win to f** the Arabs,” and attacking taxi drivers.
By the night of 7 November, as their team faced Ajax, their provocations escalated into a full-blown spectacle of chaos, spilling into the city both before and after the match. Yet, in an extraordinary twist, the provocateurs who left a trail of havoc were transformed into victims. Imagine a rowdy guest smashing bottles at the bar, getting shoved out the door, and then calling the police to report being assaulted. That’s the level of irony we’re witnessing here — a tale as inflated as it is easily debunked.
The mainstream narrative, amplified by Israeli outlets, would have you believe Amsterdam had hosted a premeditated attack on Jews — a “pogrom” so harrowing that emergency evacuation flights were required to whisk the supposed targets to safety.
Dutch right-wing politicians and media wasted no time in seizing the moment, re-framing the incident to suit their agendas.
This investigation will unravel how the night’s events were weaponized — not only to conflate anti-Zionism with antisemitism, but to stoke fears of Islamic communities in Europe.
Beneath the headlines lies a more complex story: hooligan provocation, citizen frustration, and the calculated exploitation of crisis for political gain.
The timeline goes as follows:
6 November: The arrival of chaos
The chaos in Amsterdam began on 6 November, with the surreal sight of a state dispatching its premier intelligence agency to act as bodyguards for a fanbase notorious for racist chants and violent behavior. Mossad agents, ostensibly sent to ensure “security,” arrived alongside the first wave of Tel Aviv’s traveling hooligans.
Far from embodying the spirit of sportsmanship, these provocateurs wasted no time stirring tensions, tearing down Palestinian solidarity banners, and setting the stage for the disorder that would engulf the city in the days to come.
Provocations begin: Palestinian solidarity banners, displayed by local residents in support of Gaza, became their first targets. These banners were torn down with an air of impunity, an act of symbolic violence that set the stage for further unrest.
Clashes with taxi drivers: The provocations didn’t stop there. Clashes erupted with local taxi drivers after one hooligan reportedly destroyed a cab, leading to physical altercations. These incidents, now confirmed by Amsterdam Police, hinted at the unrest to come but received little attention from authorities, who appeared unprepared to manage the growing tension.
Hooligans take refuge in Holland Casino: The cab drivers' pursuit forced the hooligans into retreat. Desperate and outmatched, the same provocateurs who had flaunted their arrogance earlier now gambled for their safety, seeking refuge in the Holland Casino. Cornered and with no cards left to play, they dialed the police for assistance — a stunning reversal for a group that had spent the evening rolling the dice on chaos and provocation.
7 November: Match day chaos
Hateful Chants and disrespect for remembrance: Hours before the Europa League match between Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv, the streets of Amsterdam were filled with the hateful echoes of the hooligans’ chants. Phrases like “Death to Arabs” and “There are no schools in Gaza because there are no children left” pierced the air, turning the city into a stage for their aggressive rhetoric.
Inside the stadium, during a one-minute silence to honor victims of a recent flood in Valencia, they disrupted the moment with loud hollering and shouting, mocking the solemnity of the occasion and further enraging locals.
Post-Match vigilantism: After the game, simmering tensions erupted into confrontations as local citizens, frustrated by both the hooligans’ provocations and the ongoing genocide in Gaza, took matters into their own hands.
Near Central Station, Tel Aviv hooligans were seen in large groups, pulling metal poles from the ground to use as weapons while moving toward the city center—a hub for cab drivers, many of whom are of Moroccan descent. Groups of Amsterdam residents began hunting down the Tel Aviv hooligans, delivering harsh beatings to some and publicly confronting others.
Videos circulating on social media captured these acts of vigilantism, including one where a hooligan was thrown into an Amsterdam canal and forced to chant “Free Palestine.” In another, locals were seen shouting at the beaten hooligans, condemning them with comments referencing the atrocities in Gaza, such as, “You attack women and children, but now you face us.”
The situation begged the question: How could an Israeli team like Maccabi Tel Aviv, with its fanbase notorious for racism and violence, be allowed to compete in UEFA tournaments, especially while Israel stands accused by the ICC of complicity in genocide? This stark contrast becomes even more glaring when compared to the treatment of Russian teams, which have been banned from international competitions and even excluded from the Olympics due to geopolitical conflicts. Yet, Israel’s ongoing occupation and alleged war crimes seemingly do not warrant the same level of accountability, exposing a glaring double standard in the realm of global sports governance.
8 November: Manufacturing a pogrom
Mainstream Dutch media, amplified by Israeli and Western outlets, rapidly reframed the events as a “pogrom” targeting Jews, erasing the context of hooligan provocations that had sparked the clashes. Reports sensationalized the violence, describing it as premeditated antisemitic attacks. In an almost farcical twist, some claimed emergency evacuation flights were arranged to rescue the supposed victims, conjuring images of 19th-century Russia with mass murders and burning villages.
The exaggerated narrative conveniently shifted the focus from the hooligans’ provocations to a carefully constructed portrayal of victimhood.
Political opportunism: Dutch right-wing politicians wasted no time amplifying the narrative, with Geert Wilders leading the charge like a conductor orchestrating a symphony of outrage, his notes echoing through media channels.
After his call with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, Wilders condemned the events as shameful antisemitism and vowed to protect Dutch Jews. At his side, Dilan Yesilgöz, like a dutiful first violinist, harmonized his message, amplifying the framing of a nation under siege by intolerance. Even King Willem-Alexander joined the chorus, expressing his and Queen Máxima’s shock at the “violence against Israeli guests” and warning against the dangers of ignoring antisemitism, invoking historical parallels to past atrocities.
Together, their voices turned a night of chaos into a carefully crafted crescendo of victimhood, obscuring the provocations that had sparked the backlash.
By the end of November 8, the story was no longer about hooligan aggression but had been rewritten to serve political and media agendas, shifting attention from the truth to a spectacle of moral outrage.
Conflating Anti-Zionism with Antisemitism: The role of Dutch politicians and lobby groups
The Amsterdam incidents became fertile ground for Dutch politicians and media to conflate anti-Zionism with antisemitism, reframing legitimate outrage over Israeli policies into a broader narrative of victimhood and fear-mongering.
At the forefront of this narrative were two prominent figures: Geert Wilders, leader of the far-right Party for Freedom (PVV) and a vocal advocate for Israeli ultranationalist interests, and Dilan Yeşilgöz, the newly anointed face of the Dutch liberal party VVD and a key figure in the current coalition government.
Wilders, known for his polarizing rhetoric and staunch pro-Israel stance, has long positioned himself as a defender of "Western values" against what he portrays as the dual threats of Islam and criticism of Israel.
Dilan Yeşilgöz: The groomed voice of Hasbara
Once the Minister of Justice, Yeşilgöz is now a prominent figure in the Dutch government, having run for prime minister as the VVD leader. Her rise to prominence has been accompanied by her unflinching alignment with Israeli narratives, a relationship solidified during a 2019 CIDI-sponsored “study trip” to Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories.
Critics have labeled such trips as "grooming missions," designed to provide politicians with a one-sided view of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, effectively embedding pro-Israel bias into their policymaking.
The controversy surrounding Yeşilgöz's trip deepened when it was revealed that portions of her travel costs were covered by restitution funds meant for the Dutch Jewish community — funds intended to compensate for losses during the Holocaust.
Her participation in the trip and subsequent actions, such as labeling consumer boycotts of Israeli settlement products as antisemitic, underscore how she has become a key player in advancing the agenda of CIDI, often described as the Dutch counterpart to AIPAC.
Geert Wilders: Israel's loyal advocate
Geert Wilders, leader of the Dutch far-right Party for Freedom (PVV), has long-standing ties to Israel, having visited the country over 40 times. His connections include relationships with prominent Israeli figures such as Amos Gilad and Zeev Boker.
Amos Gilad is a retired Major General in the Israel Defense Forces and has served as the director of policy and political-military affairs at the Israeli Ministry of Defense. Zeev Boker is a seasoned Israeli diplomat who has held positions including ambassador to Ireland and Slovakia. These associations underscore Wilders' alignment with Israeli ultranationalist politics.
Wilders' rhetoric often mirrors far-right Israeli talking points, notably his assertion that "Jordan is the only Palestinian state." He consistently conflates anti-Zionist criticism with antisemitism. Following the Amsterdam incidents, Wilders amplified the "pogrom" narrative and made a symbolic appearance at Schiphol Airport to meet with Israeli officials, reinforcing his unwavering allegiance.
This act, while largely performative, highlighted the deep intertwining of Wilders' political brand with Israeli interests, raising questions about the influence of foreign powers on domestic politics.
Adding to his connections, Wilders spent time living on a kibbutz in Israel during his youth, further cementing his personal and ideological ties to the country. In response to Amsterdam Mayor Femke Halsema's condemnation of the violence against Israelis — where she stated, "That this happened in Amsterdam is unbearable and unacceptable" — Wilders called for her resignation, accusing her of failing to maintain public order.
De Telegraaf: The amplifier of Zionist narratives
A crucial player in spreading this narrative was De Telegraaf, the largest newspaper in the Netherlands and a stalwart of tabloid-style journalism.
Often compared to fast food for its sensationalism and lack of depth, De Telegraaf has a legacy that continues to haunt it. During World War II, it was the only major Dutch newspaper to remain operational under Nazi oversight, eventually serving as a mouthpiece for SS propaganda.
Although heavily sanctioned after the war, the stain of its wartime collaboration has earned it the enduring moniker of a foute krant (wrong newspaper).
True to form, De Telegraaf threw itself behind the far-right narrative surrounding the Amsterdam incidents.
Its pages framed the events as a premeditated antisemitic attack while deftly sidestepping the provocations of Tel Aviv’s hooligans. The paper’s editorial line seemed tailor-made to echo the agenda of CIDI, the pro-Israel lobbying group in the Netherlands, which has long blurred the lines between criticism of Israeli policy and outright antisemitism.
But the real spectacle lies in De Telegraaf’s editorial arsenal — a coterie of columnists and writers who labor tirelessly to push back the genie that alternative media has unleashed. This genie — the unsanitized truths of the occupation of Palestine, the ongoing genocide in Gaza, and the international outcry over Israeli policies — is what De Telegraaf seeks to shove back into the bottle with every op-ed and headline.
Maccabi Tel Aviv: A club steeped in racism and aggression
The events in Amsterdam were not an isolated display of hooliganism but part of a larger pattern tied to the culture surrounding Maccabi Tel Aviv. Known for its aggressive and racist fan base, the club has long been associated with some of the worst examples of bigotry in Israeli football.
The New Israel Fund’s initiative, “Let’s Kick Racism and Violence Out of Israeli Soccer,” reported that Maccabi Tel Aviv fans were responsible for 65 incidents of racist chanting during the 2022-2023 season alone.
These included slurs such as “monkey” directed at Black players and “death to Arabs,” chants that have become disturbingly normalized in the club’s culture. Despite laws intended to curb such behavior, enforcement has been weak, leaving this toxic environment to flourish.
This hostility is not limited to opposing teams. In a well-documented incident in August 2014, Maccabi supporters turned on their own Arab-Israeli midfielder, Maharan Radi, verbally assaulting him during training sessions and matches. Fans even stormed the pitch to hurl slurs at Radi, an act that led to arrests but highlighted the entrenched racism within the club’s ranks.
While authorities pledged zero tolerance for such behavior, it remains a defining characteristic of Maccabi Tel Aviv’s fan base — a reflection of deeper societal fractures.
As the dust settles, Geert Wilders demands a parliamentary debate, pressing the question: will Mayor Femke Halsema resign under mounting pressure?
Meanwhile, tributes pour in for the locals and cab drivers who stood their ground, defending the city against the hooliganism protected by Mossad agents and standing firm against Israeli provocations.
Beyond Amsterdam, Israel has eagerly embraced this event as an opportunity to bind a divided nation. By framing the Amsterdam incidents as part of a global wave of antisemitism, Israel amplifies its siege mentality, rallying citizens under the banner of existential threat while deflecting attention from the atrocities in Gaza.
Israeli ministers want issue of captives in Gaza to be solved 'naturally and tragically': Report
Israeli media says the extremist ministers in Netanyahu's cabinet want the captives held by the Palestinian resistance in Gaza to die as a pretext to expand the occupation of Gaza
News Desk
NOV 10, 2024
(Photo credit: Israeli army)
The Israeli government is waiting and hoping for the captives held by Hamas in Gaza to die while expanding the military occupation of territory in Gaza as part of a broader effort to cleanse the strip of Palestinians and to build Jewish settlements, Yedioth Ahronoth reported on 10 November.
The Hebrew media paper reported that "According to every intelligence report that is submitted to the cabinet ministers, the situation of the dozens of abductees who are still alive in the captivity of Hamas is getting worse from week to week."
"As long as the negotiations are not restarted, the problem of the abductees will be solved naturally and tragically, according to some right-wing ministers. The resistance of those ministers to release hundreds of terrorists will be redundant," the paper added.
Since Hamas' Qassam Brigades took around 250 Israeli soldiers and civilians captive on 7 October last year, it has sought to release them in exchange for a ceasefire, the release of thousands of Palestinians held captive in Israeli prisons, and an end to the Israeli siege of Gaza that began in 2007.
However, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his fellow ministers, Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, have successfully sabotaged ceasefire negotiations, preferring to extend the war, destroy Gaza, and annex its territory to ultimately build Jewish settlements.
Israeli forces have killed many of the captives, both by bombing the locations in Gaza where Hamas was holding them and by opening fire and killing them directly.
If ceasefire negotiations are not quickly resumed, the remaining 70 captives who remain alive will likely die, providing Netanyahu with the pretext to move forward with the permanent occupation of Gaza.
"The deaths in captivity of another 20-30 hostages will be swallowed up in the sea of mourning for the fallen soldiers, and then, when public anger is channeled against Hamas, the Israeli leadership will not be in a hurry to withdraw from the Gaza territory that the IDF captured from the terrorist organization - ministers and MKs on the right do not hide their ambitions to establish [Jewish] settlements there," Yedioth Ahronoth wrote.
The Hebrew paper adds that the slow death of the captives and Israel's increased control over Gaza territory are moving forward in tandem.
"These are actually two trends that are expanding quietly … One is the expansion of the occupied IDF territory and establishment [of military bases] within it. The second is the government's ignoring of the abductees' death throes. The two trends, unfortunately, will merge at some point in the future."
The expansion of territory occupied by the Israeli army is illustrated by the construction of a massive military base in the Netzarim Corridor, Yedioth Ahronoth says.
The corridor was initially constructed as a road to bisect Gaza from north to south. However, in recent months, the corridor has doubled its area to about 56 square kilometers, making it a large Israeli military enclave in the heart of the northern Gaza Strip.
Today, the army is pressuring the approximately 300,000 Gazans remaining in the north of the Gaza Strip to cross to the south, Yedioth Ahronoth says.
"The most important part of this base is the innovative coastal barrier through which, the army hopes, a large mass of the Palestinian population will soon pass to the south of the strip, with the expansion of pressure on the Jabalia area."
"The army established a large outpost on the beach to identify the tens of thousands it hopes will arrive soon and cross south. This will happen, the army hopes, with the expansion of the ground raid in Jabalia to other areas and neighborhoods in Gaza itself. In the base, apart from the interrogation rooms and the temporary detention cells."
The Israeli army has been abducting Palestinian men en mass at checkpoints as they move south. The men are then stripped to their underwear and taken on trucks to detention facilities, where they are regularly tortured and raped.
In addition, the army plans to copy the Netzarim Corridor model and implement it at the Philadelphi Corridor on the Gaza-Egypt border as well, specifically in the area where the Gush Katif settlement bloc was located before the 2005 evacuation plan, Yedioth Ahronoth says.
Israel moves ahead with plans for ‘permanent presence’ in Gaza: Report
Israeli forces have expanded the Netzarim corridor into a large military base, and has put in place a plan to split Gaza into three separate zones
News Desk
NOV 10, 2024
(Photo credit: AFP via Getty Images)
The Israeli army has established permanent military installations in Gaza, aimed at setting up a long-term presence and splitting the strip into three separate zones, Hebrew newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth reported on 10 November.
According to the report, the Israeli army plans to separate northern, central, and southern Gaza from each other. The Netzarim corridor – which was established in the early months of the war and has effectively split Gaza into north and south – will play a vital role in this plan, the report adds.
It has since been deleted from the newspaper’s electronic site, Ynet.
Netzarim has reportedly been transformed into a large military base, around eight kilometers long and seven kilometers wide, including detention centers and interrogation facilities, as well as permanent residences for soldiers, as reported by Yedioth Ahronoth in August.
It has also been equipped with electricity, water, and communication facilities – as well as a checkpoint aimed at detaining Palestinians who have been pushed out of the northern strip toward the south.
Israeli geo-analyst Ben Tzion Macales reported on 9 November that Israeli forces have established a new corridor in northern Gaza’s Jabalia – named the Meflasim corridor – which cuts off Beit Hanoun, Beit Lahia, and Jabalia from Gaza City.
“These urban surveying operations that Israel has carried out and is carrying out in the Gaza Strip aim to re-engineer the urban geography of the Gaza Strip in a manner consistent with Israeli security requirements,” according to Palestinian Telegram channel I’lam al-Shimal.
Israeli troops are unofficially implementing the Generals’ Plan in northern Gaza – which aims to kill or expel all the remaining residents to transform the area into a permanent military zone.
"No one is returning to the northern area. There is no return to the north, and there will not be," Israeli Brigadier General Itzik Cohen told journalists this week, admitting that over 50,000 Palestinians have been forcibly displaced from the north.
The city of Jabalia and its refugee camp have been the focus of this extermination and ethnic cleansing campaign, which has been ongoing for well over a month now.
Haaretz editor-in-chief Aluf Benn wrote in an article published on 9 September that the Israeli military will “strive to complete its takeover of the northern Gaza Strip from the previous border to the Netzarim corridor. We can predict that this area will then gradually be made available for Jewish settlement and annexation to Israel.”
Despite the extremely difficult conditions that have been imposed on the north of Gaza by the Israeli army – including starvation – the Palestinian resistance continues to fight.
“The fighting in Jabalia is proving to be among the most difficult fighting since the beginning of the war,” Israel Hayom wrote on 5 November. It added that hundreds of buildings have been booby-trapped, resulting in casualties among soldiers.
Israeli army allows 'systematic looting' of Gaza aid shipments: Report
Aid workers are often forced to pay protection money, and are prevented by army forces from traveling via safer routes
News Desk
NOV 11, 2024
(Photo credit: New York Times)
The Israeli army has been permitting the looting of humanitarian aid trucks by desperate gunmen and “gangs” upon their entry into the Gaza Strip, Haaretz newspaper reported on 11 November.
The gunmen have been blocking roads through which trucks enter the strip via the Kerem Shalom border crossing, according to the report. The area is under the complete control of Israeli forces, who “turn a blind eye,” it adds.
“Since some of the aid groups refuse to pay protection money, the aid often ends up sitting in warehouses that are under Israeli army control,” Haaretz wrote.
“The armed attacks take place just a few hundred meters away from Israeli troops. Some aid groups say attacked truck drivers have even sought help from the IDF, but the army has refused to intervene. Moreover, they say, the army bars them from taking alternate roads that are considered safer,” it cited sources in Gaza as saying.
“I tried everything. We wanted to travel through other roads, but the IDF forbade us,” said a senior aid official in the strip.
As per the report, other aid groups end up agreeing to pay the protection fees.
“I saw one Israeli tank and a Palestinian armed with a Kalashnikov [rifle] just 100 meters [around 325 feet] from it. The armed men beat the drivers and take all the food if they aren't paid [protection money],” the aid official added.
Haaretz cites army sources as saying that in the past, troops have attacked the looters, but aid workers got injured in the process. The army has referred to the area as the “looting zone.”
“The looting of the convoys reflects the complete anarchy that prevails in Gaza due to the lack of any functioning civilian government. In several cases, they add, the last remnants of the local police forces tried to take action against the looters, but were attacked by Israeli troops who view them as part of Hamas,” the daily’s sources say.
Aid groups say there is no solution except the establishment of a police force – either local or international – to be stationed in Gaza. Yet the Israeli government and army reject this, and insist that the military must be responsible for aid distribution.
Late last month, the Government Media Office in Gaza confirmed that Israel was still preventing the entry of hundreds of thousands of humanitarian aid trucks into the besieged Gaza Strip.
Since Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, Israel has blocked “more than a quarter of a million trucks of aid and goods,” the statement said.
The Israeli army has also repeatedly allowed settlers to intercept and vandalize aid trucks and the contents they carry prior to their entry into Gaza.
The Guardian said in a report earlier this year that Israeli security officials have tipped off settlers on the location of aid trucks, allowing them to block and attack the vehicles en route to Gaza.
Trump taps supporter of Israel's genocide in Gaza for UN ambassador post
Congresswoman Elise Stefanik has called for sending as many weapons as needed to ensure 'Israel's 'total victory' in Gaza
News Desk
NOV 11, 2024
(Photo credit: Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)
Elise Stefanik, a pro-Israel Republican congresswoman from New York, will be appointed as the next US ambassador to the United Nations (UN), President-elect Donald Trump confirmed on 11 November.
“I am honored to nominate Chairwoman Elise Stefanik to serve in my cabinet as US ambassador to the United Nations. Elise is an incredibly strong, tough, and smart America–First fighter,” Trump told the New York Post.
“I am truly honored to earn President Trump's nomination to serve in his cabinet, as US ambassador to the United Nations,” Stefanik said in a statement to the Post in response to the announcement.
“I stand ready to advance President Donald J. Trump's restoration of America First peace through strength leadership on the world stage on day one at the United Nations,” she added.
Liberal Israeli daily newspaper Haaretz commented that Stefanik is widely expected to focus on combating criticism at the UN of Israel's military campaign in Gaza, which has killed over 43,000 Palestinians, the majority of whom are women and children.
In May, as Israel was bombing and starving civilians during a ground campaign in Rafah in southern Gaza, she told a caucus in the Israel Knesset that the US should supply "the state of Israel with what it needs, when it needs it, without conditions to achieve total victory in the face of evil."
Representative Stefanik gained international notoriety during congressional hearings this spring in which the presidents of several top US universities were smeared as "anti-Semitic" for allowing students to protest Israel's genocide of Palestinians in Gaza.
Stefanik also cited the alleged rise in anti-Semitism in her statement, saying, “The work ahead is immense as we see antisemitism skyrocketing coupled with four years of catastrophically weak US leadership that significantly weakened our national security and diminished our standing in the eyes of both allies and adversaries.”
Members of the Israeli lobby in the US have long cited false claims of anti-Semitism to shield Israel from criticism of its decades-long occupation of the Palestinian territories and human rights violations committed by the Israeli army.
Haaretz journalist Gideon Levy observed in 2019 that “the Israeli propaganda and the Jewish propaganda in recent years made it as a systematic method, whenever anybody dares to raise questions or to criticize Israel, he is immediately and automatically labeled as anti-Semite, and then he has to shut his mouth, because after this, what can he say?”
Netanyahu's abrupt firing of US-favored Defense Minister Gallant took place under the cover of US elections, in a move intended to safeguard his coalition and stack his cabinet with a line up of hardliners committed to war.
Nabih Awada
NOV 11, 2024
Photo Credit: The Cradle
The sacking of Yoav Gallant, Israel’s minister of defense, by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has plunged the occupation state into yet another political crisis amid the ongoing turmoil since last year’s Operation Al-Aqsa Flood and the ensuing war on Gaza and now Lebanon.
These conflicts have led to a staggering toll of nearly 200,000 martyrs and missing persons, along with countless injured and prisoners.
The timing of Gallant’s dismissal was terrible, at least according to Israeli columnist Nahum Barnea, who wrote in Yedioth Ahronoth: “This is how democracy dies.”
Netanyahu chose to remove his defense minister just as voting was getting underway in the United States, marking the dramatic return of Donald Trump – overseer of the Abraham Accords – to the White House in a landslide political comeback.
Poor timing or tactical move?
It appeared to be a calculated move by Netanyahu, possibly to avoid a repeat of the catastrophe last March when he faced a national backlash for dismissing Gallant after the latter opposed judicial reforms. At that time, Gallant had publicly warned about the reforms’ impact on reservists, which prompted mass protests throughout Israel.
The Histadrut trade union called a strike, effectively paralyzing Israel's economy, and the White House issued a stern warning, leading Netanyahu to reverse his decision. Gallant returned to his office in Tel Aviv with the backing of the streets, the economists, the military, and even US President Joe Biden.
The “terrible timing” lies precisely here. Within just three minutes of making the decision, Netanyahu sent Gallant a letter of dismissal – journalist Amit Segal, known to be close to Netanyahu, broke the news. The Israeli defense minister, amid an ongoing war on seven fronts, was informed he would be relieved of his duties, effective within 48 hours as stipulated under Article 20 of the Basic Law.
Why Gallant had to go
The reasons behind Gallant's controversial dismissal were manifold, rooted in three key problems that Gallant himself highlighted:
The first issue was army conscription. Gallant insisted that “everyone eligible must join the army.” This was in direct response to a law exempting ultra-Orthodox Haredim from military service, which was being tabled in the Knesset.
Gallant retaliated by ordering the enlistment of 7,000 religious students – a direct challenge to the Haredim. This decree came in the midst of fierce threats from influential rabbis, such as Rabbi Admur Gur, that the government coalition could collapse if laws promoting military evasion and special nursery support were not passed.
These laws were critical for the Haredim as they allowed males to focus on religious studies without facing military obligations, offering significant privileges to typically large ultra-Orthodox families. The rabbis’ condition was clear: if the government did not pass both the military exemption law and financial support for day nurseries, they would not approve the 2025 budget.
Other motives at play
In Israel, if the budget is not passed, the government collapses automatically – a consequence Netanyahu was desperate to avoid. To keep his coalition intact, Netanyahu had to act swiftly and get rid of Gallant.
The second reason, no less important, involved the return of prisoners of war from Gaza. This was a highly sensitive topic and a source of deep friction between Netanyahu, Gallant, and other senior officials in Israel's military and intelligence services.
Throughout the past year, there have been ongoing debates about whether to prioritize negotiations for a prisoner exchange over the expansion of Israel's military operations on its various borders. Gallant and some in the army argued for prioritizing a deal, while Netanyahu, along with Bezalel Smotrich, Itamar Ben Gvir, and several hardline military commanders, believed in maintaining military pressure on Hamas to force its submission.
Initially, a consensus appeared to exist across the security and political establishment, especially after Gallant and Chief of Staff Herzi Halevy proposed a preemptive strike on Lebanon – an action only postponed due to Biden’s direct intervention during a conversation with Netanyahu on 11 October.
Yet, cracks soon emerged as the realities of the Gaza ground maneuvers became clear. Disagreements resurfaced, primarily about whether “absolute victory” in Gaza was more important than freeing the hostages.
Gallant, Halevy, the Shin Bet chief, and the head of Mossad all believed the lives of hostages should take priority, even if it meant pausing military actions. All three are now rumored to be in Netanyahu’s crosshairs for dismissal.
Intelligence failures
Finally, there was the investigation into the failures of 7 October, with calls for an independent judicial probe to determine accountability for the catastrophic security lapse. Netanyahu staunchly opposed this, knowing that such an investigation could endanger his own position at the top.
The scale of the failure on 7 October was monumental, and Israel's political, military, and security leaderships were under immense scrutiny. It is no secret that Netanyahu wishes to prolong the war for his own political survival, making battlefield achievements appear to compensate for the disastrous events of that fateful day. However, the debate over accountability grows louder by the day, and the demands for justice are increasingly urgent.
In addition to these key issues, Netanyahu may have also had three other files in mind – issues that he used as pretexts to justify Gallant's dismissal:
First, there were the leaks of sensitive security documents related to Gaza, known as the “Sinwar Files,” which implicated the Shin Bet. Although these files fell under Ronen Bar’s jurisdiction, the main suspicion pointed to individuals close to Netanyahu. Gallant’s removal might also have served as a message to rein in Bar, as some Israeli commentators have suggested.
Second, the immense failure surrounding Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, which again put Chief of Staff Halevy in the spotlight for alleged negligence.
And third, Mossad Chief David Barnea, who is responsible for handling negotiations, might also find himself targeted by Netanyahu. There is speculation that the latter is seeking to turn the former into a scapegoat amid the changes in Washington, with Donald Trump set to take office in two months’ time.
Netanyahu’s power grab
Despite all these tensions, Benjamin Netanyahu has positioned himself as de facto minister of defense – although officially, the role was assigned to Foreign Minister Israel Katz. This move, noted by Ron Ben-Yishai in Yedioth Ahronoth, shows Netanyahu's intention to consolidate power while side-lining anyone who opposes him.
Removing Gallant has had both local and international ramifications. Locally, Netanyahu has brought his opponents together in what appears to be a calculated photo opportunity. He was seen sitting for the first time with Gantz, who condemned Gallant’s removal as a politically motivated decision, and Yair Lapid, the opposition leader, who called the move madness and accused Netanyahu of risking Israel’s security for political survival.
They were flanked by Avigdor Lieberman, leader of Yisrael Beytenu, who demanded Netanyahu’s resignation, and Yair Golan, the leader of the Democrats (the Labor and Meretz alliance), who called for protests.
On the international front, all eyes are on 20 January – the inauguration date of US President Trump. What happens next could redefine the relationship between Tel Aviv and Washington. The question on everyone's mind: will Netanyahu hand Trump the key to Israel's defense headquarters in Tel Aviv, just as he recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital during his last term?
'Worn out' Israeli reservists refuse service citing fear of 'endless' deployment: Report
Reservists in the Israeli army increasingly say they are unwilling to disrupt their lives to fight for long periods in Lebanon and Gaza
News Desk
NOV 11, 2024
(Photo credit: Michael Giladi/Flash90)
The Israeli army has recently identified a marked decrease in the number of people reporting for reserve service, including among the soldiers from the combat units fighting in Gaza and Lebanon, Yedioth Ahronoth reported on 11 November.
In the first months of the war on Gaza that began on 7 October last year, the rate of those who showed up was more than 100 percent. The ranks in all reserve units were full, and additional reserve personnel volunteered to join the army to fight. However, in recent weeks, the numbers reporting for service have dropped to between 75 to 85 percent.
The army attributes this to the expanding use of reservist soldiers, which is expected to continue well into the year 2025. A senior security official confirmed that the reserve fighters will have to serve at least 100 days next year.
“The resource of reservists is not unlimited, and it is very difficult for people to be so absent in the midst of daily life. That is why there is a silent refusal to report for service, without protests or in a public way. They cannot be argued with, or demanded by force to come,” army sources told Yedioth Ahronoth.
Speaking to the Knesset, reserve soldier Yonatan Kidor expressed his frustration: “My battalion was called to a reserve order at the end of September, which was supposed to be limited in time, and two days after we were recruited, the order was opened until further notice.”
“We were supposed to be released two weeks ago already, and right now, we are in the reserves without end … we and our families on the home front are being worn out.”
He added, “There are brigades that serve 300 to 350 days in a row. There is no end on the horizon, no future, and no trust … End this war in some way.”
In addition, security officials warn that funding has not yet been secured to keep paying the generous financial packages reservists received last year, which amounted to tens of thousands of shekels per officer.
The disdain for the reserve fighters is evidenced, the Hebrew language paper notes, by the Israeli military's continued use of “Open Order 8,” which allows the army to call up any reservist with zero notice. The order is intended to be used sparingly only in emergency situations when a war erupts but has now been used for 14 months.
The army is also advocating for the passage of a new reserve law that would double or triple the number of reserve days each soldier would serve per year compared to the years before the war, along with the extension of mandatory service from 32 months to three full years.
These two amendments to the law have not been passed yet due to political considerations. Many serving in the army and the political forces representing them are angered by the continued refusal of approximately 60,000 ultra-Orthodox to serve in the army.
Reservist Michael Sasson said: “I am very angry. I know there is a lot of anger. We are constantly coming to the reserves. There are 30,000 young people who can enlist. I am a right-wing, religious, and a settler. I am angry about what happened. ”
Netanyahu's abrupt firing of US-favored Defense Minister Gallant took place under the cover of US elections, in a move intended to safeguard his coalition and stack his cabinet with a line up of hardliners committed to war.
Nabih Awada
NOV 11, 2024
Photo Credit: The Cradle
The sacking of Yoav Gallant, Israel’s minister of defense, by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has plunged the occupation state into yet another political crisis amid the ongoing turmoil since last year’s Operation Al-Aqsa Flood and the ensuing war on Gaza and now Lebanon.
These conflicts have led to a staggering toll of nearly 200,000 martyrs and missing persons, along with countless injured and prisoners.
The timing of Gallant’s dismissal was terrible, at least according to Israeli columnist Nahum Barnea, who wrote in Yedioth Ahronoth: “This is how democracy dies.”
Netanyahu chose to remove his defense minister just as voting was getting underway in the United States, marking the dramatic return of Donald Trump – overseer of the Abraham Accords – to the White House in a landslide political comeback.
Poor timing or tactical move?
It appeared to be a calculated move by Netanyahu, possibly to avoid a repeat of the catastrophe last March when he faced a national backlash for dismissing Gallant after the latter opposed judicial reforms. At that time, Gallant had publicly warned about the reforms’ impact on reservists, which prompted mass protests throughout Israel.
The Histadrut trade union called a strike, effectively paralyzing Israel's economy, and the White House issued a stern warning, leading Netanyahu to reverse his decision. Gallant returned to his office in Tel Aviv with the backing of the streets, the economists, the military, and even US President Joe Biden.
The “terrible timing” lies precisely here. Within just three minutes of making the decision, Netanyahu sent Gallant a letter of dismissal – journalist Amit Segal, known to be close to Netanyahu, broke the news. The Israeli defense minister, amid an ongoing war on seven fronts, was informed he would be relieved of his duties, effective within 48 hours as stipulated under Article 20 of the Basic Law.
Why Gallant had to go
The reasons behind Gallant's controversial dismissal were manifold, rooted in three key problems that Gallant himself highlighted:
The first issue was army conscription. Gallant insisted that “everyone eligible must join the army.” This was in direct response to a law exempting ultra-Orthodox Haredim from military service, which was being tabled in the Knesset.
Gallant retaliated by ordering the enlistment of 7,000 religious students – a direct challenge to the Haredim. This decree came in the midst of fierce threats from influential rabbis, such as Rabbi Admur Gur, that the government coalition could collapse if laws promoting military evasion and special nursery support were not passed.
These laws were critical for the Haredim as they allowed males to focus on religious studies without facing military obligations, offering significant privileges to typically large ultra-Orthodox families. The rabbis’ condition was clear: if the government did not pass both the military exemption law and financial support for day nurseries, they would not approve the 2025 budget.
Other motives at play
In Israel, if the budget is not passed, the government collapses automatically – a consequence Netanyahu was desperate to avoid. To keep his coalition intact, Netanyahu had to act swiftly and get rid of Gallant.
The second reason, no less important, involved the return of prisoners of war from Gaza. This was a highly sensitive topic and a source of deep friction between Netanyahu, Gallant, and other senior officials in Israel's military and intelligence services.
Throughout the past year, there have been ongoing debates about whether to prioritize negotiations for a prisoner exchange over the expansion of Israel's military operations on its various borders. Gallant and some in the army argued for prioritizing a deal, while Netanyahu, along with Bezalel Smotrich, Itamar Ben Gvir, and several hardline military commanders, believed in maintaining military pressure on Hamas to force its submission.
Initially, a consensus appeared to exist across the security and political establishment, especially after Gallant and Chief of Staff Herzi Halevy proposed a preemptive strike on Lebanon – an action only postponed due to Biden’s direct intervention during a conversation with Netanyahu on 11 October.
Yet, cracks soon emerged as the realities of the Gaza ground maneuvers became clear. Disagreements resurfaced, primarily about whether “absolute victory” in Gaza was more important than freeing the hostages.
Gallant, Halevy, the Shin Bet chief, and the head of Mossad all believed the lives of hostages should take priority, even if it meant pausing military actions. All three are now rumored to be in Netanyahu’s crosshairs for dismissal.
Intelligence failures
Finally, there was the investigation into the failures of 7 October, with calls for an independent judicial probe to determine accountability for the catastrophic security lapse. Netanyahu staunchly opposed this, knowing that such an investigation could endanger his own position at the top.
The scale of the failure on 7 October was monumental, and Israel's political, military, and security leaderships were under immense scrutiny. It is no secret that Netanyahu wishes to prolong the war for his own political survival, making battlefield achievements appear to compensate for the disastrous events of that fateful day. However, the debate over accountability grows louder by the day, and the demands for justice are increasingly urgent.
In addition to these key issues, Netanyahu may have also had three other files in mind – issues that he used as pretexts to justify Gallant's dismissal:
First, there were the leaks of sensitive security documents related to Gaza, known as the “Sinwar Files,” which implicated the Shin Bet. Although these files fell under Ronen Bar’s jurisdiction, the main suspicion pointed to individuals close to Netanyahu. Gallant’s removal might also have served as a message to rein in Bar, as some Israeli commentators have suggested.
Second, the immense failure surrounding Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, which again put Chief of Staff Halevy in the spotlight for alleged negligence.
And third, Mossad Chief David Barnea, who is responsible for handling negotiations, might also find himself targeted by Netanyahu. There is speculation that the latter is seeking to turn the former into a scapegoat amid the changes in Washington, with Donald Trump set to take office in two months’ time.
Netanyahu’s power grab
Despite all these tensions, Benjamin Netanyahu has positioned himself as de facto minister of defense – although officially, the role was assigned to Foreign Minister Israel Katz. This move, noted by Ron Ben-Yishai in Yedioth Ahronoth, shows Netanyahu's intention to consolidate power while side-lining anyone who opposes him.
Removing Gallant has had both local and international ramifications. Locally, Netanyahu has brought his opponents together in what appears to be a calculated photo opportunity. He was seen sitting for the first time with Gantz, who condemned Gallant’s removal as a politically motivated decision, and Yair Lapid, the opposition leader, who called the move madness and accused Netanyahu of risking Israel’s security for political survival.
They were flanked by Avigdor Lieberman, leader of Yisrael Beytenu, who demanded Netanyahu’s resignation, and Yair Golan, the leader of the Democrats (the Labor and Meretz alliance), who called for protests.
On the international front, all eyes are on 20 January – the inauguration date of US President Trump. What happens next could redefine the relationship between Tel Aviv and Washington. The question on everyone's mind: will Netanyahu hand Trump the key to Israel's defense headquarters in Tel Aviv, just as he recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital during his last term?
Israeli Army Responsible for Chemical Contamination in Gaza: Erdogan
Food soaked in the blood of victims of Israeli bombings in Gaza, Nov. 12, 2024. X/ @AhmedBa95151837
November 12, 2024 Hour: 9:16 am
Those responsible for this serious humanitarian and environmental disaster must be held accountable, he said.
On Tuesday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan denounced the chemical contamination of the Gaza Strip caused by Israeli military bombings.
“Israel’s attacks on Palestine and Lebanon continue, causing large-scale massacres and loss of life,” he said during his speech at the COP29 Climate Summit held in Baku.
“The chemicals seeping into the ground and underground are already affecting the future of Gaza’s children. We believe those responsible for this serious humanitarian and environmental disaster must be held accountable before international courts,” Erdogan explained.
At a joint summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the Arab League, the Turkish leader also sent a message to the leaders of the Muslim nations criticizing them for their relative inaction regarding the genocide in Gaza.
“Several Western nations have offered Israel extensive military, political, economic, and moral support, whereas Muslim countries’ inadequate response has allowed the crisis to worsen. Israel aims to settle in Gaza, eliminate Palestinian presence in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and eventually annex the territory. Progress toward this goal is ongoing, and we must intervene,” he warned, as reported by the Free Press Kashmir.
During his speech, Erdogan also took the opportunity to announce Turkey’s official bid to host the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP31) in 2026.
In this context, Erdogan highlighted his country’s commitment to environmental sustainability and achieving carbon neutrality by 2053. He noted that Turkey’s installed wind and solar energy capacity has reached 31,000 megawatts, with a goal of reaching 120,000 megawatts by 2035.
The Turkish president also emphasized that his country, one of the most affected by the climate crisis, has launched a water efficiency campaign and a national reforestation initiative.
“All these efforts entail significant economic costs. We have adopted the Pact for the Future for a just and sustainable world for future generations,” concluded the Turkish leader.
Chris Hedges: Genocidal Scorecard
November 12, 2024
U.N. Special Rapporteur Albanese’s report is an an urgent appeal for a full arms embargo and sanctions on Israel until the genocide of Palestinians is halted.
Bibi on Board – by Mr. Fish.
By Chris Hedges
Scheerpost
A United Nations report, published last month, lays out in chilling detail the advances made by Israel in Gaza as it seeks to eradicate “the very existence of the Palestinian people in Palestine.”
This genocidal project, the report ominously warns, “is now metastasizing to the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.”
The Nakba or “catastrophe,” which in 1948 saw Zionist militias drive 750,000 Palestinians from their homes, carry out more than 70 massacres and seize 78 percent of historic Palestine, has returned on steroids.
It is the next and, perhaps, final chapter in “a long-term intentional, systematic, State-organized forced displacement and replacement of the Palestinians.”
Francesca Albanese, the U.N. special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, who issued the report, titled “Genocide as colonial erasure,” makes an urgent appeal to the international community to impose a full arms embargo and sanctions on Israel until the genocide of Palestinians is halted.
She calls on Israel to accept a permanent ceasefire. She demands that Israel, as required by international law and U.N. resolutions, withdraw its military and colonists from Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.
At the very least, Israel, unchecked, should be formally recognized as an apartheid state and persistent violator of international law, Albanese states. The U.N. should reactivate the Special Committee Against Apartheid to address the situation in Palestine, and Israel’s membership in the U.N. should be suspended.
Short of these interventions, Israel’s goal, Albanese warns, will likely come into fruition.
Albanese on April 10 during an EU Parliament public hearing on Gaza in Brussels. (The Left, Flickr, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
You can see my interview with Albanese here.
“This ongoing genocide is doubtlessly the consequence of the exceptional status and protracted impunity that has been afforded to Israel.” she writes.
“Israel has systematically and flagrantly violated international law, including Security Council resolutions and [International Criminal Court] ICJ orders. This has emboldened the hubris of Israel and its defiance of international law. As the ICC Prosecutor has warned, ‘if we do not demonstrate our willingness to apply the law equally, if it is seen as applied selectively, we will be creating the conditions of its complete collapse. This is the true risk we face at this perilous moment.’”
The U.N. report comes amid an Israeli blockade of northern Gaza where over 400,000 Palestinians are enduring a starvation siege and constant airstrikes in an attempt to depopulate the north. Israeli forces have killed 1,250 Palestinians in the assault, launched on Oct. 5, a medical source told Al Jazeera.
Reports from northern Gaza are difficult to obtain as internet and phone services have been cut and the few journalists on the ground continue to be killed. Israel’s ground and aerial assaults are centered on Jabaliya, Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun. Civil defense units say they have been barred by Israeli forces from reaching the sites of recent strikes and their crews have been attacked.
‘Death Marches of Past Genocides’
IDF armored bulldozer near Jabalia, Gaza, November 2023. (IDF Spokesperson’s Unit, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0)
Israel has ordered Palestinians to flee to designated “safe zones,” but once in these “safe zones” they have been attacked and ordered to move to new “safe zones.”
“Displaced people have been systematically chased down and targeted in shelters, including in United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) schools, 70 percent of which Israel has repeatedly attacked.”
In May, Israel’s Rafah invasion caused the displacement of nearly one million Palestinians, driven into southern Gaza because of Israeli evacuation orders, into “uninhabitable wastelands of rubble, sewage and decomposing bodies,” Albanese notes.
By August, 90 percent of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million Palestinians were displaced “under dire conditions,” according to the U.N.
The months of “relentless shunting of weakened humans from one unsafe area to another — fleeing bombs and bullets, with minimal chances of escape, amid loss, fear and grief, and with little access to shelter, clean water, food and healthcare — have inflicted incalculable harm, especially on children,” the report reads.
“The movement of displaced Palestinians resembles the death marches of past genocides, and the Nakba. Forced displacement severs connection with the land, undermining food sovereignty and cultural belonging, and triggering further displacement. Communal bonds are broken, the social fabric shredded and reserves of resilience depleted. Systematic forced displacement contributes to ‘the destruction of the spirit, of the will to live, and of life itself.’”
The constant displacement — many Palestinians have been displaced nine or 10 times — from one part of Gaza to another is accompanied by calls from Israeli officials to “renew settlements in Gaza” and encourage the “voluntary transfer of all Gazan citizens” to other countries.
Israel has killed at least 43,163 people in Gaza and wounded 101,510 in Israeli attacks since Oct. 7, 2023. An estimated 1,139 people were killed – some by Israeli forces – in Israel during the incursion by armed Palestinian fighters into Israel and more than 200 were taken captive.
In Lebanon, at least 2,787 people have been killed and 12,772 wounded since the Israeli assault on Gaza began, with 77 killed in strikes across the country on Tuesday alone.
The report found evidence that Israel has carried out “more than 93 massacres.”
U.N. investigators concede the numbers of dead in Gaza are probably a vast undercount given that at least 10,000 people, including 4,000 children, are missing, probably buried under the rubble, where “the voices of those trapped and dying are often audible.” Other Palestinians, an “uncertain number,” have been seized by Israel forces and “disappeared.”
Israel has repeatedly attacked aid distribution sites, tent encampments, hospitals, schools and markets “through the indiscriminate use of aerial and sniper fire.”
The report notes that “at least 13,000 children, including more than 700 babies, have been killed, many shot in the head and chest” while approximately “22,500 Palestinians have sustained life-changing injuries.”
“The disturbing frequency and callousness of the killing of people known to be civilians are ‘emblematic of the systematic nature’ of a destructive intent,” the report reads.
“Six-year-old Hind Rajab, killed with 355 bullets after pleading for help for hours; the fatal mauling by dogs of Muhammed Bhar, who had Down’s Syndrome; the execution of Atta Ibrahim Al-Muqaid, an older deaf man, in his home, later bragged about by his killer and other soldiers on social media; the premature babies deliberately left to die a slow death and decompose in the intensive care unit at Al-Nasr Hospital; the elderly man, Bashir Hajji, killed en route to southern Gaza after appearing in a propaganda photograph of a ‘safe corridor;’ Abu al-Ola, the handcuffed hostage shot by a sniper after being sent into Nasser Hospital with evacuation orders. When the dust settles on Gaza, the true extent of the horror experienced by Palestinians will become known.”
The genocide has turned the landscape into a toxic wasteland.
“Nearly 40 million tons of debris, including unexploded ordnance and human remains, contaminate the ecosystem,” the report goes on.
“More than 140 temporary waste sites and 340,000 tons of waste, untreated wastewater and sewage overflow contribute to the spread of diseases such as hepatitis A, respiratory infections, diarrhea and skin diseases. As Israeli leaders promised, Gaza has been made unfit for human life.”
In a further blow, the Israeli Parliament last month approved a bill to ban UNRWA a lifeline for Palestinians in Gaza, from operating on Israeli territory and areas under Israel’s control. The ban almost certainly ensures the collapse of aid distribution, already crippled, in Gaza.
Deadliest Conflict for UN Workers
Flag at half-mast at U.N. headquarters to honour colleagues killed in Gaza, Nov. 13, 2023. (UN Photo/Evan Schneider)
As of Oct. 20, 233 UNRWA workers have been killed in Gaza since Oct. 7, 2023, making it the deadliest conflict for U.N. workers.
Israel has expanded its “buffer zone” along the Gaza perimeter to 16 percent of the territory, in the process leveling homes, apartment blocks and farms. It has pushed over 84 percent of the 2.3 million people in Gaza into “a shrinking, unsafe ‘humanitarian zone’ covering 12.6 percent of a territory now reconfigured in preparation for annexation.”
Satellite imagery indicates that the Israeli military has built roads and military bases in over 26 percent of Gaza, “suggesting the aim of a permanent presence.”
The blockade of food is accompanied by the destruction of water treatment plants, sewage systems, reservoirs, aid convoys, healthcare facilities and food distribution points — crowds of desperate people waiting for food “have been massacred” by Israeli soldiers.
Israel has all but obliterated medical facilities and services in Gaza. It has damaged 32 of 36 hospitals, with 20 hospitals and 70 of 119 primary healthcare centers incapacitated. By this August it had attacked healthcare facilities 492 times.
Israel besieged Al-Shifa Hospital for the second time in March and April, killing more than 400 people and detaining 300, including doctors, patients, displaced persons and civil servants. It carried out a forced evacuation of all but 100 of 650 patients in Al-Aqsa hospital.
“In August,” the report reads,
“entry permits for humanitarian organizations nearly halved. Access to water has been restricted to a quarter of pre-7 October levels. Approximately 93 per cent of the agricultural, forestry and fishing economies has been destroyed; 95 per cent of Palestinians face high levels of acute food insecurity, and deprivation for decades to come.”
“In recent months, 83 percent of food aid was prevented from entering Gaza, and the civilian police in Rafah were repeatedly targeted, impairing distribution,” the report notes. “At least 34 deaths from malnutrition were recorded by 14 September 2024.”
These measures “indicate an intent to destroy its population through starvation.”
Palestinians detained by Israeli forces
“have been systematically abused in a network of Israeli torture camps. Thousands have disappeared, many after being detained in appalling conditions, often bound to beds, blindfolded and in diapers, deprived of medical treatment, subjected to unsanitary conditions, starvation, torturous cuffing, severe beatings, electrocution and sexual assault by both humans and animals. At least 48 detainees have died in custody.”
The report cites the role of the Israeli media in “inciting” the genocide “by helping to foster an unchecked genocidal climate.”
The report criticizes the Israeli media for platforming “proponents of genocide” and withholding “facts from the Israeli public.” At the same time, the Israeli military has killed over 130 Palestinian journalists.
Palestinians are equated with the Amalek, the Biblical enemies of the Israelites, as well as Nazis, to justify their extermination.
Accelerated Attacks on West Bank
Israeli forces in Jenin in the Occupied West Bank on Sept. 2. (IDF Spokesperson’s Unit, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0)
Albanese’s report, in a section titled “Risk of genocide in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem,” notes that Israel has accelerated its lethal attacks, detentions and land seizures in the West Bank.
“Genocidal conduct in Gaza set an ominous precedent for the West Bank,” it notes.
In May 2024, the governance of the West Bank was “officially transferred from military to civilian authorities — further de jure annexation — and placed under [Bezalel] Smotrich, a committed Eretz Yisrael politician,” the report reads. “The largest single land appropriation in 30 years was then approved.”
Smotrich, the minister of finance, claims there are “two million Nazis” in the West Bank. He has threatened to turn parts of the West Bank into “ruined cities like in the Gaza strip” and stated that starving the entire Gaza population was “justified and moral,” even if 2 million people died. Minister of Foreign Affairs Israel Katz has also called for the West Bank to receive the same treatment as Gaza.
Thousands of Palestinians in the West Bank towns of Jenin, Nablus, Qalqilya, Tubas and Tulkarem live for days under curfew, making it difficult to access food and water. As in Gaza, the Israeli army, during its Operation Summer Camps, has “targeted ambulances, blocked entrances to hospitals and laid siege to Jenin Hospital. Bulldozers destroyed streets and electricity and public health infrastructure.”
Drones and war planes carry out airstrikes. Israeli roadblocks, checkpoints and blockades make travel difficult or impossible. Israel has suspended financial transfers to the Palestinian Authority, which nominally governs the West Bank in collaboration with Israel. It has revoked 148,000 work permits for those who had jobs in Israel.
“The gross domestic product (GDP) of the West Bank contracted by 22.7 percent, nearly 30 percent of businesses have closed, and 292,000 jobs have been lost,” the report reads. Over 692 Palestinians — “10 times the previous 14 years’ annual average of 69 fatalities,” have been killed and more than 5,000 have been injured. Of the 169 Palestinian children who have been killed, “nearly 80 percent were shot in the head or the torso.”
Since August, in the Jenin refugee camp “approximately 180 homes were levelled and 3,800 structures damaged, destroying or damaging power supplies, public services and amenities, displacing thousands of families and causing widespread disruption. More than 181,000 Palestinians have been affected, many multiple times.”
The report dismisses the claim that Israel is carrying out the assault in Gaza and the West Bank to “defend itself,” “eradicate Hamas” or “bring the hostages home,” charging that these claims are “camouflage,” a way of “invisibilizing the crime.” Genocidal intent, as Judge Dalveer Bhandari from the ICJ points out, “may exist simultaneously with other, ulterior motives.”
Rather, the incursion into Israel by Hamas and other resistance fighters on Oct. 7 “provided the impetus to advance towards the goal of a ‘Greater Israel.’”
“In the context of Israel ignoring the ICJ directive to end the unlawful occupation, the aim to eradicate resistance contradicts the rights to self-determination and to resist an oppressive regime, protected by Customary International Law,” the report reads.
“It also portrays the entire population as engaged in resistance and therefore eliminable. By continuing to suppress the right to self-determination, Israel is replicating historical instances in which self-defence, counter-insurgency or counter-terrorism were used to justify destruction of the group, leading to genocide.”
It notes that Israel, rather than abiding by the 1993 Oslo Accords, which were supposed to lead to a two-state solution, increased its colonies in the West Bank from 128 to 358 and the numbers of Jewish settlers “have grown from 256,400 to 714,600.”
Israel passed the 2018 Nation State Law that asserts exclusive Jewish sovereignty over “Eretz Yisrael” and names “Jewish settlement” on occupied Palestinian land a “national priority.” It cultivates “a political doctrine that frames Palestinian assertions of self-determination as a security threat to Israel” and uses it “to legitimize permanent occupation.”
“The current intent to destroy the people as such could not be more evident from Israeli conduct when viewed in its totality,” the report states.
A leaked Israeli Ministry of Intelligence “concept paper” from October 2023 outlines the plan to expel the entire Gaza population to Egypt and recolonize Gaza. It is a plan Israel appears to be following.
Albanese writes that Israel is replicating the patterns of past genocides. It creates through its rhetoric a “vengeful atmosphere” that conditions soldiers to be “willing executioners.” It claims it is acting in self-defense while targeting a civilian population.
It is obliterating the infrastructure that sustains life, a process of “genocide by attrition.” It uses starvation as a weapon. It is attempting to hide its crimes by killing Palestinian journalists and U.N. workers and blocking international agencies and the international media from Gaza.
We have seen genocide before. We have also seen the complicity or silence of nations that have the power to intervene. History doesn’t repeat itself, but too often it rhymes.
Transcript of Press TV interview about Netanyahu’s court appearance
Transcription submitted by a reader
PressTV: 0:00
The Israeli Prime Minister has reportedly requested a two and a half month extension from the court to prepare for his upcoming corruption trial. According to Israeli media, Benjamin Netanyahu’s lawyers claim it has been impossible for the Prime Minister to focus on his legal defense due to Israel’s ongoing wars in Gaza and Lebanon. Netanyahu has been charged with fraud, bribery, and the breach of trust in three cases that were filed in 2019. He’s been scheduled to testify at a court on December 2. The Israeli Prime Minister has been faced with widespread protests as he is accused of trying to prolong the wars in Gaza and Lebanon in order to circumvent his legal troubles.
0:42
Gilbert Doctorow is an independent international affairs analyst who joins us from Brussels. Welcome, sir. You know, we’re trying to figure out what’s going on here; maybe you can help us out. Because you have on the one hand these supposed leaks coming from the office of Netanyahu. On the other hand it is said there are many different dynamics.
Maybe I shouldn’t get into all of it, but basically is Netanyahu trying to have leaks doctored or released in order to prolong the war as it’s been stated in some of the contents of the leak? And in essence, when the war gets prolonged, then his trial gets delayed.
Gilbert Doctorow, PhD: 1:24
I agree completely with your formulation, but I’d like to put it in a broader context. What he’s being charged with is child’s play compared to the crimes against humanity that he’s now perpetrating. And I think it is unseemly that the Israeli opposition and courts are pursuing him in what is effectively judicial persecution and are ignoring his liability, his judicial liability before the International Criminal Court for genocide that he’s now perpetrating. What I’m saying here is that the opposition, the liberal progressive opposition in Israel is as guilty, is as complicit in the genocide that Netanyahu is perpetrating as he is, because they are pursuing trivia and ignoring major crimes against humanity.
2:24
It would be most appropriate if they imposed on the president of Israel, who is himself also in up to his neck in the genocide issue, to issue an amnesty to Mr. Netanyahu on condition that he leave the country at once and not come back. This would solve, this would remove the single biggest factor in the continuing genocide: Mr. Netanyahu himself.
PressTV: 2:56
If there is a, if– there _is_ obviously a concerted effort for Netanyahu to continue, however, with this genocidal war. Now, given the fact that you’ve laid out the information there about what he’s guilty of and it remains to be seen whether he’s going to be charged for this, even though the ICJ has come out and found him guilty of the war crimes. Why is there such a push? Let me put it this way, is he becoming more and more isolated even within his own circles when it comes to pursuing this genocidal war? Because we are seeing at this point the dismissal of the Minister of Military Affairs, Galant and others who, particularly the opposition, who are against Netanyahu now after the dismissal.
Doctorow: 3:44
We have to ask what kind of opposition to Netanyahu is there an Israel? Is it strictly also others who are vying for power, who are ambitious to take power into their hands? Or is it people of principle who understand the crimes that he is committing and say, “Basta, enough. Time for him to go”? He should be given marching orders to leave the country or to face deportation directly to the courts who have him under accusation in the Netherlands. Otherwise, failing that, all of the opposition, all these wonderful liberal lawyers in Israel, are complicit in genocide.
PressTV: 4:30
And final question here. We have an incoming President of Donald Trump in a matter of 90 days or a little bit less now. Do you think there is going to be any change, first of all to end the genocide, as Donald Trump has said that he wants these wars to end, including the one in Lebanon. But given the fact that there’s this 90-day window, I mean, that’s a long time. So are we going to see anything happen there with him coming into the White House?
Doctorow: 5:04
I think we will see a difference, and I would not make any hasty judgments about Mr. Trump and his position on Gaza and on the Palestinians, based on his first term in office. What the Israelis have done in the last year is hideous. And I don’t think that Mr. Trump and the people around him are indifferent to that, even if he has some people like RFK Jr., who are on the wrong side of this issue. Nonetheless, he won in a number of states because of the Arab [involvement]–
PressTV: 5:43
Hmm, looks like we lost Gilbert Doctorow. Yes, we have lost him. Anyway, I’d like to thank Dr. Doctorow for his contribution here. We’re going to move on with the news.
Doctorow puts too much faith in 'deciders', be they Putin, Trump or Bibi. They are interactive parts of their environment. As for Trump not being indifferent to the genocide, Gilbert needs lookup 'solipsist'.
******
Saudi-Iranian Relations Warm as Middle East Braces for Trump’s Return
Posted on November 12, 2024 by Yves Smith
Yves here. Anyone cozying up to Iran is an admission against interest for a US messaging outlet like RFE/RL and so should be taken seriously. The uptick in visible moves to improve Saudi-Iran ties looks to be yet another Trump-proofing move.
UPDATE 7:25 AM EST: A just-released story at the Financial Times provides additional confirmation. From Gulf states wary of return to Donald Trump’s ‘maximum pressure’ against Iran:
Saudi Arabia and the UAE have signalled they remain committed to de-escalation with Iran as they prepare for the return of Donald Trump, hoping he can end a year of war in the Middle East but wary his unpredictability could inflame tensions further….
….the Gulf’s two powerhouses — Saudi Arabia and the UAE — have changed tack, seeking to engage with Tehran amid doubts about the US’s commitment to their security. This became more urgent after Hamas’s October 7 2023 attack against Israel triggered a wave of regional hostilities and heightened tensions between the US and Iran, with both Riyadh and Abu Dhabi seeking to remain on the sidelines….
In a sign of Riyadh’s desire to maintain its cold peace with Iran, Prince Mohammed on Monday hosted senior Iranian officials at an Arab-Muslim conference in Jeddah in which he accused Israel of committing genocide in Gaza. He also condemned Israel’s strikes on Iran, calling on the international community to stop hostile actions on Iranian territory.
Separately, Anwar Gargash, the UAE’s presidential adviser, told a conference in Abu Dhabi on Monday that the incoming Trump administration must pursue a “comprehensive” approach instead of “reactive and piecemeal” policies.
The comments underlined the shift in Saudi and Emirati thinking since they actively courted Trump after he took office in 2017 following years of Arab frustration with US policy swings and a sense of disengagement from the region.
By RFE/RL. Cross posted from OilPrice
The Chief of Staff of Saudi Arabia’s armed forces made a rare visit to Iran, signaling a strengthening of ties between the two countries.
The visit comes amidst a backdrop of shifting political dynamics in the Middle East, including the recent election of Donald Trump.
The warming relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran could have significant implications for regional security and stability.
The general chief of staff of Saudi Arabia’s armed forces, Fayyad al-Ruwaili, met his Iranian counterpart, Mohammad Baqeri, in Tehran during a rare visit on November 10.
Iran’s official IRNA news agency said they discussed the development of defense diplomacy and bilateral cooperation without offering any details.
Iranian media said Baqeri had discussed regional developments and defense cooperation with Saudi Defense Minister Prince Khalid bin Salman al-Saud last year.
Ruwaili is only the second high-profile Saudi official to travel to Tehran since Iran and Saudi Arabia agreed to restore diplomatic relations after seven years following Chinese-brokered talks in March 2023. Previously, Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan visited Iran in June 2023.
Sunni-majority Saudi Arabia severed ties with Shi’a-dominated Iran in 2016 after its diplomatic compounds in Tehran and Mashhad were attacked by protesters over Riyadh’s execution of Shi’ite cleric Nimr al-Nimr.
The trip comes days after the election of Donald Trump, whose second term as U.S. president begins in January. He has pledged to bring peace to the Middle East, where U.S. ally Israel is engaged in wars against Iranian-backed groups in Gaza and Lebanon.
Hamidreza Azizi, a fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, said the timing of the trip was significant because it comes as various countries are preparing for a second Trump presidency.
He said the Saudis’ decision to send their top military official to Tehran “is a signal that they are committed” to the detente process that started last year and that “they don’t want Trump’s election to jeopardize the recently improving relations with Iran.”
Separately, Iranian President Masud Pezeshkian spoke with Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman on the phone and discussed expanding bilateral relations, according to Pezeshkian’s office.
Trump had good relations with Persian Gulf Arab states in his first tenure in office and worked on normalizing relations between Arab states and Iran’s archfoe, Israel.
Saudi Arabia has not normalized relations with Israel but Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, is said to have discussed the possibility of normalization with Saudi Arabia since 2021.
In another sign of warming relations, Saudi Arabia announced last month that it held military drills with Iran in the Sea of Oman.
Beirut rejects 'ceasefire deal' with Israel 'at Lebanon's expense'
Israel’s Defense Ministry said there will be no solution that does not ensure Tel Aviv’s right to continue attacking Lebanon
News Desk
NOV 12, 2024
(Photo credit: Reuters)
Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri told AlJoumhouria newspaper on 12 November that Beirut rejects any settlement “that achieves Israel’s interests” at Lebanon’s expense.
“Any solution or settlement that achieves Israel's interests at the expense of Lebanon and its sovereignty is rejected. Is there any sane person who believes that we will agree to a settlement or solution that achieves Israel's interests at the expense of Lebanon and its sovereignty?” Berri said.
“Lebanon's position on any settlement is a ceasefire and the implementation of Resolution 1701 without a single word,” he added.
When asked about Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz’s comments on Sunday about Israel having defeated Hezbollah, Berri said: “What victory are they talking about? Did they win in Gaza? 13 months of war on the Strip, and they were unable to return the prisoners, and they were unable to defeat Hamas. On the contrary, Hamas is still fighting and resisting fiercely, and the Israeli prisoners are still in its possession.”
“In Lebanon, they assassinated Hezbollah leaders, destroyed homes, demolished civilian buildings, and killed civilians. Is this a victory? Did they win on the ground? Did these assassinations and all this destruction and killing enable them to win?” he added.
Berri’s comments followed a statement by Katz on 12 November, in which he vowed to continue attacking Lebanon until the goals of the war are achieved, rejecting any prospect of a ceasefire agreement.
“In Lebanon, there will be no ceasefire and no respite. We will continue to hit Hezbollah with full force until the goals of the war are achieved,” the Israeli defense minister said.
“Israel will not agree to any arrangement that does not guarantee Israel's right to enforce and prevent terrorism on its own, and meeting the goals of the war in Lebanon, disarming Hezbollah and withdrawing them beyond the Litani River and returning the residents of the north safely to their homes,” Katz added.
The defense minister had said on 10 November that Israel has defeated Hezbollah.
“Now it is our job to continue to put pressure in order to bring about the fruits of that victory,” he said.
Tel Aviv has demanded a “unilateral” ceasefire from the Lebanese side – while insisting on the right to maintain military access to Lebanese territory and airspace. Despite this, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar claimed on 11 November that there is “certain progress” on a Lebanon ceasefire. “We are working with the Americans on the issue,” he said.
Hezbollah has killed over 100 Israeli soldiers and has destroyed dozens of Israeli tanks and vehicles since Tel Aviv began its failed ground operation in south Lebanon at the start of October, according to the Lebanese resistance’s Operations Room.
Israeli forces have been unable to advance deeper than a few kilometers into border villages due to the fierce resistance and heavy losses they are taking. They have instead resorted to rigging and detonating entire towns.
Hezbollah rockets injured several Israelis and caused significant damage in several settlements in the Haifa district on 11 November. The rockets were fired from a Lebanese border village where Israeli troops have been operating for over a month.
While filming the rocket launches from south Lebanon on Monday, Israeli troops are heard saying: “We cleared this area. How could this happen?”
Haifa mayor warns city ‘at standstill’ due to heavy Hezbollah attacks
Israelis fled from the Haifa district in droves after rockets from Lebanon caused heavy damage and injuries in several settlements in the Krayot area
News Desk
NOV 12, 2024
(Photo credit: AFP)
Mayor of Haifa Yona Yahav said on 12 November that Hezbollah’s rocket attacks against the area a day earlier have forced residents to flee in panic and shops to shutter.
“The city of Haifa has received an unprecedented economic blow. Everything has come to a standstill, the streets are empty, and the shops are closed,” Yahav said on Tuesday.
“The moment Haifa is economically undermined, this will affect all of Israel. Israel will only be strong if the north is strong,” he added.
Following Hezbollah’s attacks on the Krayot settlement cluster near Haifa on Monday, images circulated on social media showing Israelis fleeing the area in droves and large traffic jams on the streets.
Hundreds of rockets were fired at the Israeli north on 11 November, including at least 100 toward the settlements of Kiryat Ata, Kiryat Yam, and Kiryat Bialik in the Krayot cluster of settlements not far from Haifa.
A police academy in Kiryat Ata was damaged, while several vehicles were destroyed or lit ablaze. Homes and buildings also sustained damage, and at least seven Israelis were injured.
Hezbollah operations since the start of the war have already negatively impacted the economy in Israel’s north.
The Haifa district has come under intensive bombardment by Hezbollah on a near daily basis since Israel expanded its assault on Lebanon in September. Businesses in Haifa have begun to suffer.
Recent days have seen the Lebanese resistance’s drones reach as far as the Tel Aviv suburbs. Hezbollah targeted the Tel Aviv area with rockets on Tuesday afternoon, causing sirens to blare and forcing settlers into shelters.
Hezbollah has rejected Israel’s claims that its capabilities have been degraded, and vows that it is ready to fight a long war. Hezbollah’s head of media relations Mohammad Afif said on Monday that there are weapons that have yet to be revealed.
“We have more,” he warned, adding that the use of new weapons will be “decided by the resistance leadership” under “appropriate management.”
He also stated that Israel will not achieve its goals as long as it cannot control any ground in south Lebanon, and that killing civilians and destroying infrastructure will not bring it victory.
‘Madness in Haifa Bay’: Hezbollah Rockets Set Fire to ‘Israeli’ North
November 13, 2024
The aftermath of Hezbollah rocket impacts in the Krayot settlement cluster, November 11, 2024. Photo: Social media.
Several Hezbollah rockets made impact in settlements in the Haifa district on November 11, which were launched from an area near the southern Lebanese border where the Israeli army is currently operating.
Video footage filmed by Israeli troops in south Lebanon is circulating on social media, showing the rockets being fired at several settlements.
Footage on social media also showed the impacts in several settlements in the Haifa district, including Kiryat Ata, Kiryat Yam, and Kiryat Bialik in the Krayot cluster of settlements.
A police academy in Kiryat Ata was damaged, while several vehicles were destroyed or lit ablaze.
“In defense of Lebanon and its people, the Islamic Resistance fighters targeted, at 02:10 in the afternoon of Monday 11-11-2024, the Krayot area north of the occupied city of Haifa with a rocket salvo,” Hezbollah said in a statement.
Around 230 rockets were fired from Lebanon toward Israeli military sites and settlements on 11 November, with 100 of them fired at the Krayot settlements in the Haifa district. At least seven Israelis were wounded. Hebrew media referred to the event as “madness in Haifa Bay.”
According to Al Mayadeen‘s correspondent, “two ballistic missiles were launched after the last salvos” which targeted the Haifa area.
The Lebanese resistance launched several other attacks on Monday, including a rocket attack on the Katzrin settlement in the occupied Golan Heights. It also continued to confront Israeli forces operating on the Lebanese border, who have failed to occupy or take control of a single village since early October.
“The Mujahideen of the Islamic Resistance targeted, at 4:35 PM on 11-11-2024, a house in which Israeli enemy soldiers were entrenched on the Sari Heights on the northwestern outskirts of the town of Kfar Kila, with a guided missile, killing and wounding them,” Hezbollah said on Monday afternoon.
Head of Hezbollah’s Media Relations Office Mohammad Afif vowed in a speech on November 11 that the Lebanese resistance is prepared for a prolonged war—while clarifying that no substantial proposals for a ceasefire have been offered to Lebanon.
“We are ready for a long war with the occupation at all levels, whether on the front or in the interior,” Afif said.
“Our answer to the claims of a number of Israeli officials, that Hezbollah’s missile stockpile has declined to about 20 percent of our actual capabilities, is clear on the ground … Our missiles last week reached the suburbs of Tel Aviv and Haifa, and centers and camps were bombed for the first time in the Golan and in Haifa,” he affirmed.
“After 45 days of bloody fighting, with five military divisions, two brigades, and 65,000 soldiers, [Israel] is still unable to occupy a single Lebanese village … Our will to fight that is unbreakable,” Afif added.
The Israeli army’s Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi said last week that the Zionist entity is planning “for the continuation of the fighting in Lebanon, including the expansion and deepening of the [ground] maneuver.”
Destruction in the Gaza Strip caused by Israeli bombing (Photo: AFP / Said Khatib)
The crude testimony of two UN rapporteurs before members of Congress not only exposed the inhuman conditions in the Gaza Strip but also exposed the "timid" international legislation, incapable of preventing a genocide such as the one the Palestinian people are experiencing.
Every day a new atrocity in Gaza shakes our hearts and our consciences. Yesterday, Saturday, October 26, Israeli army raids in the Khan Yunis refugee camp in the south of the Strip exterminated entire Palestinian families, including children. On Friday, October 25, Israel opened fire on hospitals in the north and bombings against schools such as those in Nuseirat left dozens dead. And so it went on day after day, to the point that Palestinian rescue groups had to temporarily suspend their work because they were the targets of constant attacks.
This horror, which has been going on for more than a year, was described in detail and with reliable data last Monday, the 21st, in the Chamber of Deputies of Argentina by five United Nations officials invited by the Parliamentary Friendship Group (GPA) with Palestine in collaboration with the League of Arab States in our country. The reports of the five UN rapporteurs - presented virtually, to a full room, but with no media coverage - moved the diplomatic representatives, deputies, representatives of various religious cults and the general public who attended the discussion.
As an example, two of the five testimonies given by UN specialists will be reproduced here: one on the atrocities suffered specifically by women, girls and adolescents - added to everything else that is endured in a war - and another on the situation related to water and epidemics.
"The state of our world is unsustainable due to impunity, inequality and uncertainty," said Congresswoman Lorena Pokoik, quoting UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres. Pokoik spoke on behalf of the members of the GPA of Argentina. "We are here to reflect on the humanitarian crisis that Palestine is going through and to raise our voices in a call for peace for the good of the people who suffer from this conflict and for the good of all humanity," she continued. In addition to Pokoik, the discussion table included the ambassador of the League of Arab States to Argentina, Sesham Hassan Ahmed Abdel Wahab; the deputies Carolina Gaillard, Mónica Macha and Vanina Biasi and the deputy Pedro Carro.
The five rapporteurs were Francesca Albanese (Italian), Dorothy Estrada (Mexican), Paula Gaviria Bentacur (Colombian), Astrid Puentes (Colombian) and Pedro Arrojo (Spanish), each knowledgeable in different legal, cultural and political traditions, but with a common link: international law and human rights (HR).
Being a woman and a girl
"The suffering is disproportionate," said Dorothy Estrada, rapporteur on discrimination against women and girls in Gaza and Palestine, both alarmed and furious. "In addition to the armed conflict, there are human rights violations linked to gender and age, which are even more atrocious. According to the data we have, in Gaza there has been evidence of psychological violence, sexual torture in atrocious humane conditions and rape used as a weapon."
"Although it is impossible to know the exact figures, the most sober estimates speak of one million displaced women and 10,000 women killed since the beginning of the conflict in October 2023. More than 6,000 mothers have died, leaving more than 19,000 children orphaned," Estrada continued. "Girls and adolescents are at high risk of falling into child labor, sexual exploitation, child or forced marriage, and situations of human trafficking. Older women, those who are alone or isolated, or disabled, are also exposed to very serious situations," she stressed.
"Pregnant women in labour or post-partum, with hospital infrastructure destroyed, lack healthcare. There is no anaesthesia, not even for caesarean sections. The conditions are atrocious for them and for their newborns because there is also a lack of the most vital medicines, and there are power cuts due to lack of fuel," she explained.
"This is not a humanitarian crisis caused by a natural disaster, but rather one that is the result of specific human actions," Estrada said. "There is a lack of basic necessities, such as food, water, menstrual supplies for a dignified period. The minimum requirements demanded by international human rights law do not exist. Women are having to bury their children, they are having to wander from one place to another, they are living in enormous precariousness and absolute insecurity," she added.
"We ask for the rights of women who are violated day after day. Women are essential for building a sustainable and lasting peace and for real possibilities of reconciliation," the rapporteur concluded.
Water, a vital necessity
Pedro Arrojo, Special Rapporteur for Human Rights, Sanitation and Water Services, reported on the dramatic situation faced by 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza, “although 1.7 million of them did not choose to live there and were forced by Israel.” “The normal consumption of any of us, in our homes, is one hundred liters of water per day per person. According to the World Health Organization, in a situation of absolute and extreme emergency, human beings need at least 15 liters of water per day per person for a dignified life. The 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza have access to only 4.7 liters each per day,” criticized Arrojo.
Worse still, the water consumed is salinized and contaminated. The Strip has only one natural source of fresh water, the coastal aquifer. "Before the war, due to the large number of people, three times more water was required than the aquifer's replenishment capacity, so this source became massively salinized by marine intrusion," he said.
"Even before the war, the sanitary infrastructure was poor because 70% of the construction materials needed for the sanitation plants were considered by Israel as 'dual-use materials' (civil and military) and, therefore, they prevented their arrival. As a result of all this, the aquifer is not only salinized but also contaminated by fecal fluids," he explained.
How did the Palestinians get drinking water before the war? Arrojo explained that "for 15 years there were desalination plants financed by the European Union and Unicef, in addition to a very limited supply of water sold by the Israeli public company, Mekorot, which arrived through three pipelines." For this reason, drinking water "was only enough for 40% of the 2 million-odd inhabitants." "For 15 years, the human rights of the Palestinians have not been respected because of the Israeli blockade," he said.
"This was made worse by the war, because Israel immediately cut off power and water supplies to Mekorot. The power cuts brought desalination plants and the few sanitation stations to a standstill. And this is not 'collateral damage.' During this year of war, there have been bombings, sabotage and very precise bombings of wells and water tanks, pumping stations, etc. The result is that the population has 4.7 litres per person per day," he said, adding that "this has led to several epidemics of diarrhoea - 70,000 per week for several months, mostly among children - and the risk of cholera and polio epidemics, without medical attention."
"Thousands upon thousands of children killed silently. This is not against the combatants. This is not aimed at winning a war. It is part of a logic that indiscriminately goes against the population and is theorized in high-level statements from the government and the Israeli army, which call Palestinian children 'children of darkness' to justify their extermination," Arrojo said.
The Spanish rapporteur, deeply moved, admitted that "it is very difficult for him to speak about this issue because it is tremendously inhumane and because it puts at risk not only an entire people but also international law, which is being violated with an unacceptable complicit silence from the main powers and a large part of the world."
For Arrojo, the situation in Western Asia is putting "the very existence of the UN at risk." "The timid international legislation that we have made to prevent genocides such as the one committed against the Jewish people and the one that is being committed against the Palestinians today is at risk," he added.
The legislative commission to achieve a ceasefire and to ensure compliance with the human rights of Palestinians is in the process of being formed. The contribution is extremely valuable and is in line with the values of the Argentines. It is a great example to follow and encourage.
Global Fury After State Dept Claims Israel Not Violating US Law by Blocking Gaza Aid
Posted on November 13, 2024 by Yves Smith
Yves here. Apologies for not having my own post in this slot. I lost power for over an hour, and with a feeble old battery in my computer, I decided to work on something I could get done.
But it is separately useful to run this piece. The horrors in Gaza are if anything accelerating, and now compounded by Gaza-like attacks on Beirut. But between Israel succeeding in curtailing coverage via murdering journalists and much of the world falling into tragedy fatigue, new abuses and variants of old ones are not getting the attention they warrant.
The latest humanitarian aid charade confirms what a immoral, cruel, and cynical country the US is, deserving of only rebuke around the world. The Biden Administration first tried the obvious ruse of saying Israel had to let more aid in, intended as a sop to Muslim and anti-war voters, but with the deadline after November 5, so Israel could fall short with no effect on the election.
This tweet in today’s Links shows how the Israelis are not just blocking aid but destroying it:
Look at what our team @EuroMedHR documented yesterday and today..
Yesterday, Israel allowed a humanitarian aid truck into a shelter in the town of Beit Hanoun, amidst widespread media coverage.
This morning, Israeli forces stormed the shelter, killed some civilians, forcibly… pic.twitter.com/OzDxtqkXSc
— Ramy Abdu| رامي عبده (@RamAbdu) November 12, 2024
But in the US, supporting genocide is a bipartisasn affair.
By Brett Williams, staff writer at Common Dreams. Originally published at Common Dreams
Human rights advocates around the world reacted angrily to Tuesday’s U.S. State Department determination that Israelis not violating humanitarian law—even as its forces annihilate Gaza and block aid from entering the embattled Palestinian enclave.
Last month, the Biden administration—which has approved tens of billions of dollars in military aid for Israel and provided nearly unconditional diplomatic support since October 2023—sent a letter to the Israeli government threatening to cut off U.S. arms transfers if it failed to take “urgent and sustained actions” to improve humanitarian conditions in Gaza within 30 days.
Asked during a Tuesday press conference if the Israeli government has met the letter’s demands, State Department spokesperson Vedant Patel said that “we have not made an assessment that they are in violation of U.S. law.”
“The overall humanitarian situation in Gaza continues to be unsatisfactory,” Patel continued. “But in the context of the letter, it’s not about whether we find something satisfactory or not; it’s what are the actions that we’re seeing.”
“These actions that we have seen, we think that these are steps in the right direction,” he added, citing the limited reopening of the Erez border crossing between Gaza and Israel. “We want to see more steps. We want to see these steps sustained over a significant period of time, and ultimately, we want to see these steps have a result on the situation.”
Patel insisted that the Biden administration is “not giving Israel a pass.”
State Department: “We have not made an assessment that Israel is violating U.S. law.”
This comes as eight major international humanitarian organizations published a letter today, stating Israel has failed to meet U.S.-set aid requirements by the deadline.
(Reporter… pic.twitter.com/ZnpovfuYzU
— Drop Site (@DropSiteNews) November 12, 2024
However, humanitarian aid groups accuse Israel of causing ” apocalyptic” conditions in northern Gaza, where thousands of civilians including many women and children have been killed or wounded while others face imminent famine under a plan to starve out the population in order to ethnically cleanse the area.
On Tuesday, a coalition of eight international humanitarian groups including Oxfam International, CARE, Norwegian Refugee Council, Save the Children, and others published a report titled The Gaza Scorecard: Israel Fails to Comply With U.S. Humanitarian Access Demands in Gaza, which found that Israel has failed to fully comply with any of the 19 specific demands in the Biden administration’s letter.
The scorecard noted:
The principals of the Inter-Agency Standing Committee now assess that “the entire Palestinian population in North Gaza is at imminent risk of dying from disease, famine, and violence.” The findings of this scorecard underscore Israel’s failure to comply with U.S. demands and international obligations. Israel should be held accountable for the end result of failing to ensure the adequate provision of food, medical, and other supplies to reach people in need.
“While Israel manipulates the U.S. by allowing some aid trucks into other parts of Gaza in the days leading up to the deadline, the performative act did not bring any humanitarian aid to the besieged northern neighborhoods of Gaza,” said Raed Jarrar, advocacy director at Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN). “Even more concerning, no forcibly displaced Palestinian from the northern neighborhoods of Gaza has been allowed to return home.”
Last month, Biden gave Israel 30 days to increase the number of aid trucks it allows into Gaza to 350/day, or risk losing access to American military aid under US law.
Those 30 days are now up. Israel has let in just 54/day, on average. https://t.co/UZerAHsxXP pic.twitter.com/nowa3sOHCK
— Stephen Semler (@stephensemler) November 12, 2024
Indeed, the IDF said it has “no intention of allowing the residents of the northern Gaza Strip to return to their homes.”
At the same time, relief workers describe deadly dangers faced by Palestinians who try to flee besieged areas including the Jabalia refugee camp, site of some of the war’s worst massacres, including indiscriminate Israeli targeting of refugees without regard for age or gender.
The International Court of Justice in The Hague is in the lengthy process of determining if Israel’s atrocities amount to violations of the Genocide Convention. While it is weighing the evidence in the South Africa-led case, the ICJ has issued a series of provisional orders directing Israel to prevent genocidal acts, halt its assault on Rafah, and stop blocking humanitarian aid from entering Gaza. Critics accuse Israel of flouting all three orders.
“As a signatory to the Genocide Convention, the U.S. is obligated to prevent acts of genocide and to avoid complicity in them,” DAWN stressed on Tuesday. “The U.S. should halt its military support for Israel to comply with its convention obligations and uphold international legal norms.”
The US demanded that Israel increase aid into Gaza. Israel reduced aid.
The US warned of consequences. There will be none.
This will be the Biden administration’s legacy: Unconditional support for war crimes and complicity in genocide. https://t.co/rXWMGhjXZ6
— IMEU Policy Project (@imeupolicy) November 12, 2024
This is not the first time that the Biden administration has officially denied that Israel has violated humanitarian law during the Gaza war. In March, the State Department accepted Israel’s assertion that the country is using U.S.-supplied arms in compliance with international law, even as more than 100,000 Palestinians had been killed or wounded in Gaza up to that date. The casualty figure has since increased by about 50%.
Congressional progressives and human rights groups pushed back on the Biden administration’s claim. In April, a leaked memo revealed that officials at the United States Agency for International Development warned Secretary of State Antony Blinken that Israel was indeed breaking the law by blocking aid from entering Gaza. Another leaked State Department memo raised “serious concern” over Israeli noncompliance with humanitarian law and slammed Israel’s claims of legal U.S. weapons use as “neither credible nor reliable.”
Palestine advocates fear the Biden administration’s refusal to suspend arms shipments to Israel—as experts argue is required under the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 and Leahy Laws—will open the door for Republican President-elect Donald Trump to back Israeli crimes such as the annexation of Palestinian territories including the West Bank.
This sums up the failures of the Democratic Party—repeatedly refusing to fulfill promises to its own voters.
Whether it's refusing to end weapons sales to Israel or refusing to stand up to billionaires & corporate power, the Democratic Party brand right now is bait-and-switch. https://t.co/3V9LQAhWDR
— Justice Democrats (@justicedems) November 12, 2024
“By spending over a year ignoring U.S. law on supplying arms, the Biden administration has handed Trump an excuse to ignore any law he wants,” Center for International Policy executive vice president Matt Duss said Tuesday on social media. “And they will have nothing to say about it.”
Duss called the Biden administration’s new determination “predictable, pathetic, and blatantly illegal.”
Hezbollah attacks Israeli army's Tel Aviv HQ twice in one day
Known as 'The Campus,' the Kirya base in densely populated Tel Aviv has served as the Israeli army's headquarters since its founding in 1948
News Desk
NOV 13, 2024
(Photo credit: Tamar Matsafi)
Hezbollah announced on 13 November it had successfully targeted the Israeli military’s Kirya base in Tel Aviv, home to the Defense Ministry, General Staff, War Room, and Air Force Command and Control Center, twice in the same day.
“The Islamic Resistance launched, for the first time, an aerial operation with a squadron of qualitative assault drones targeting the Kirya Base … in Tel Aviv, hitting their targets precisely at 3:30 pm on Wednesday,” a statement from Hezbollah said.
Israeli media denied the report, claiming, “There is currently no indication that any drones reached central Israel or came near army headquarters.”
The Islamic resistance movement later issued a second statement saying that it struck the Kirya base a second time, at 6:15 pm, with Qader 2 ballistic missiles, which hit “their targets precisely.”
Hezbollah also announced the targeting Wednesday of the Glilot Base, the headquarters of the Military Intelligence Unit 8200, in the suburbs of Tel Aviv, with a qualitative missile barrage.
The Islamic resistance movement successfully targeted the Glilot Base base two weeks ago, on 2 November.
A squadron of Hezbollah attack drones Hezbollah also targeted Israel’s Amos base on Wednesday. The base is an important transport and technology readiness hub for Israel’s northern region, located 55 km from the Lebanese-Israel border.
Almost two months after the start of Israel’s massive bombing campaign targeting Lebanon, Hezbollah remains capable of striking military targets deep with Israel while repelling the ongoing Israeli ground invasion of the country.
Israeli forces have been able to destroy many Lebanese villages near the Israeli border area but have not been able to breach Hezbollah’s first line of defenses, while taking heavy casualties.
Earlier Wednesday, Hebrew media outlets reported a “very difficult incident” in which several Israeli troops were killed in southern Lebanon, coming as Tel Aviv has recently announced an expansion of its ground operation in the country.
According to Sky News Arabia, nine Israeli soldiers were killed in a booby-trapped building in south Lebanon, and others were wounded. The soldiers were in the building when the explosives were detonated.
On Tuesday, the Israeli army announced it had begun the second phase of its ground operation in southern Lebanon in an effort to advance toward Hezbollah’s second line of defense.
“The Israeli army has initiated the second phase of the ground maneuver in southern Lebanon, with the 36th Division advancing toward Hezbollah’s second defensive line,” Israeli newspaper Maariv reported.
In response, Hezbollah announced that the Israeli army’s decision “will only lead to disappointment, and its inevitable harvest will be more losses and failures; ‘Our mujahideen are waiting.'"
“The resistance has taken all measures within its defensive plans to enable it to fight a long battle to prevent the enemy from achieving its goals,” the Islamic resistance movement added.
The state-backed settler war to annex the West Bank
With an indebted Trump soon to be back in the White House, Tel Aviv is orchestrating a calculated campaign of militia formation and settler violence to seize control of the West Bank, aiming for annexation and the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian communities.
Robert Inlakesh
NOV 13, 2024
Photo Credit: The Cradle
Despite Israel's ongoing genocide in Gaza and military aggression against Lebanon, Tel Aviv is preparing to unleash its fanatical Jewish settlers in a coordinated war against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, aiming to ethnically cleanse what remains of the territory and pave the way for further annexation.
Adding fuel to the fire, billionaire Miriam Adelson, the wealthiest Israeli in the world, bankrolled Donald Trump's “huge victory” in his successful presidential campaign with one clear condition: support for annexing the West Bank.
Last month The Times of Israel noted that the wealthy widow “is carrying on a legacy she built with her late husband, casino magnate Sheldon Adelson,” and that “The Adelson family has long been one of the largest sources of campaign money for Republican candidates and has backed Trump during each of the last three general elections.”
The complete consolidation of the West Bank
Speaking to The Cradle, Ubai al-Aboudi, executive director of Palestinian rights group ‘Bisan Center,’ says that “the Israeli settlers are preparing to carry out a major attack, to ethnically cleanse the Palestinian population,” adding that this attack will be particularly focused on completely erasing Palestinians from what is known as Area C, which constitutes roughly 60 percent of the West Bank.
That escalation has already begun. On 4 November, armed settlers launched a brazen assault on the Palestinian city of Al-Bireh, marking a surge in the violence that has gripped the West Bank. In October alone, settlers carried out at least 1,490 attacks against Palestinians, their property, and their land – often under the supervision and protection of occupation soldiers.
In the past, extremist settler attacks against Palestinians were characterized by their spontaneous nature and uncoordinated thuggery, but this has begun to change. During a recent interview with Israel’s Channel 7 News, West Bank Settlement Council leader Israel Gantz commented on a meeting he had with the recently sacked Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant:
“We asked that the West Bank be treated as Jabalia, Rafah, and the villages of southern Lebanon were treated, which means displacing the residents, killing the terrorists in these villages, cleansing the terrorist infrastructure, confiscating the weapons and then returning them to their villages.”
While the statement includes the idea of returning Palestinians to their villages, if such an operation replicated Gaza and southern Lebanon, there would be no village to return to. Gantz also requested that Palestinian villages bordering illegal Jewish settlements be ‘cleansed’ due to the potential security threat posed to Israelis living there – both ideas reportedly opposed by Gallant.
On 5 November, however, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu replaced Gallant and handed the defense minister position to long-time ally Israel Katz. While serving in his previous role as Israel’s foreign minister, Katz openly called for expelling Palestinians from their homes in the West Bank, unlike his predecessor.
‘Organized militias’
Last November, it was revealed that National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir had ordered the police to stop enforcing the law against West Bank settlers.
This is why the armed settler assault on Al-Bireh was seen as so significant. As Netanyahu reshuffles his cabinet to include a full deck of right-wingers, many of whom are themselves West Bank settlers, these groups are becoming even more brazen.
The assault on Al-Bireh was particularly alarming – a “pogrom-style attack,“ according to Aboudi, as “they feel emboldened by the impunity they enjoy.” Rampaging settlers burned 18 vehicles and two apartments while Israeli soldiers looked on.
One West Bank Palestinian described to The Cradle how settlers showed up outside her home armed with Molotov cocktails, but “were luckily scared off” prior to assaulting family members:
“I had just left my home prior to the attack, but I knew something was wrong because the soldiers were acting very violently at all the checkpoints as I was leaving … you have to understand that these kinds of attacks don’t happen without the soldiers participating in some way.”
“The settlers are acting more and more like organized militias; they are an extension of the Israeli army working towards an agenda of ethnic cleansing,” insists Aboudi, affirming that this year’s attacks have been dramatically increasing. According to statistics, settler violence has been escalating every year since 2021, reaching an unprecedented number of attacks in 2024.
Through the use of state-backed settler ‘defense squads,’ Israel has managed to ethnically cleanse 16 Palestinian communities in the southern hills of Al-Khalil (Hebron). In 2023, it was discovered that the Israeli army had established the ‘Desert Frontier’ unit, comprised of the most extremist Jewish settlers from the notorious ‘Hilltop Youth’ group. Human rights groups have also documented the use of Israeli standard-issue rifles by West Bank settlers attacking Palestinians, all pointing toward state complicity in these attacks.
According to Aboudi, “around 700 [Israeli] roadblocks cut off Palestinian villages from each other.” Set up by occupation forces, the roadblocks provide cover for “attacks from violent settlers who target Palestinians passing by … greatly affecting the ability to even travel safely across the West Bank.” The attackers can rely on unconditional impunity from Tel Aviv, he explains:
“They feel that they have enough resources, weapons, arms, political backing, to commit whatever crime they choose."
Trump and West Bank annexation
Yossi Dagan, the settler leader of Samaria Regional Council, recently purchased some 500 rifles to arm and prepare “emergency security teams” in anticipation of a war in the West Bank. In September, Israel declared the West Bank a “combat zone,” and created closed military zones as buffers surrounding the illegal Jewish settlements.
Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s finance minister who was recently gifted control of settlement affairs for the occupied Palestinian territories, issued a public call for annexation in late October. As a longtime West Bank settler himself, Smotrich openly works on behalf of a 2017 settler movement proposal, outlined in a document entitled ‘Decisive Plan,’ which seeks to double the settler population of the West Bank.
If this is combined with Israel’s decision to begin transferring the Israeli settler population from military to civil control, it becomes clear that the process of annexation is already underway.
With the victory of Donald Trump in the recent US elections, it is more than likely that Netanyahu views annexation of the West Bank to suddenly be a very viable option, despite the historic opinion delivered by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in July that declared Israel's occupation of the territories to be a violation of international law and demanded that Tel Aviv end its occupation, dismantle all settlements, pay reparations for damages to Palestinians, and facilitate the return of all displaced natives.
But Trump's sweeping electoral victory was aided by uber-Zionist Adelson’s contribution of $100 million to his campaign, with the single request that the Republican leader permit Israeli annexation of the West Bank.
Recall too that the Adelsons financed Trump's first presidential bid, in 2016, with the quid pro quo that the Republican leader move the US embassy in Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and recognize the Holy City as Israel’s undivided Capital – a promise that Trump implemented in 2018.
Now, Miriam Adelson is pushing for the annexation of the West Bank. Combined with the surge in settler violence, the formation of Jewish militias, military training programs for settler civilians, and the distribution of 120,000 rifles, a calculated strategy is taking shape. This is not just about sporadic attacks – it is a deliberate, state-backed campaign to alter the demographics of the West Bank permanently in line with the expansionist, settler-colonial ideology of the most extremist coalition government in Israel's history.
Israeli army 'will not leave Gaza before 2026': Report
Tel Aviv has established several permanent military installations across the entirety of the Gaza Strip
News Desk
NOV 13, 2024
(Photo credit: X)
The Israeli army is rapidly accelerating its plans to establish a permanent presence in the Gaza Strip, where it will likely remain until at least the end of 2025, according to a 13 November report by Israel’s Haaretz newspaper.
“The work is progressing at full speed,” the newspaper reported.
“Wide roads are being built, cellular antennas are going up, water, sewage, and electricity networks are going in, and of course, there are the buildings, some portable and others less so,” it added.
These plans have included the systematic destruction of buildings across Gaza, with the aim of ensuring that resistance fighters cannot hide in them.
Israeli forces, as part of their extermination and expulsion campaign in northern Gaza, have forced tens of thousands out of their homes to transform the area into a military zone. Haaretz confirms that many Palestinians have refused to leave, despite artillery shelling which targets areas that remain inhabited.
The construction work and setting up of permanent outposts have not been limited to the north.
“According to the plan that is being carried out, the army is acting to hold no fewer than four large areas in different parts of the Strip. One of the most prominent of them is the Netzarim corridor,” Haaretz said.
The Netzarim corridor, which cuts Gaza into two and prevents the return of displaced Palestinians to the northern strip, was established in the early months of the Gaza war and has since been transformed into an extensive military facility with detention centers and permanent housing for soldiers.
The Haaretz report adds that a “combat graph for 2025” has been distributed to troops in recent weeks.
“The way it looks on the ground, the IDF won't leave Gaza before 2026,” a brigade officer in Gaza told the newspaper. “When you see the roads being paved here, it's clear that this isn't intended for the ground maneuvers or for raids by the troops into various places. These roads lead, among other places, to the places from which some of the settlements were removed.”
“I don't know of any intent to rebuild them; that isn't something we're told explicitly. But everyone understands where this is going,” the officer added.
Hebrew newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth reported on 10 November that the Israeli army has established permanent military installations across Gaza aimed at setting up a long-term presence and splitting the strip into three separate zones.
According to the report, the Israeli army plans to separate northern, central, and southern Gaza from each other. Several new land corridors have been established in recent months, including one which aims to cut off the northern cities Beit Hanoun, Beit Lahia, and Jabalia from Gaza City.
The Israeli government denies that Tel Aviv is working for the reestablishment of Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip, which were evacuated in 2005. Yet soldiers in Gaza and government officials openly express their aspirations to force out Palestinians from the strip and recreate the Gush Katif settlement bloc – as it was referred to in the past.
Last month, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party organized a conference under the title “Preparing to Settle in Gaza.” It was attended by several government ministers.
Haaretz reported earlier this year that Israel’s “indefinite” presence in Gaza is gradually paving the way for illegal settlement in the strip.
pic.twitter.com/NlVH2XlGTK
State Department: “We have not made an assessment that Israel is violating U.S. law.”
