BLOOD STAINS ON AN AMBULANCE OF THE PALESTINIAN RED CRESCENT, FOLLOWING AN ISRAELI AIRSTRIKE AT THE ENTRANCE OF AL-SHIFA HOSPITAL IN GAZA CITY, NOVEMBER 3, 2023. (PHOTO: SAEED JARAS/APA IMAGES)
Israeli doctors urge the bombing of Gaza hospitals
Originally published: Mondoweiss on November 5, 2023 by Tali Shapiro & Jonathan Ofir (more by Mondoweiss) | (Posted Nov 06, 2023)
About 90 Israeli doctors have signed a letter calling for the bombing of hospitals in Gaza.
Only last week, dozens of prominent Israeli rabbis had already assured Israeli leaders that they have a right to bomb al-Shifa’ hospital in Gaza, and this week’s letter signed by “Doctors for the Rights of IDF Soldiers” urges the bombing of any and every hospital in Gaza.
LETTER IN HEBREW FROM DOZENS OF ISRAELI DOCTORS CALLING ON THE IDF TO BOMB GAZA’S HOSPITALS.
The letter states, in no uncertain terms, that due to suspicion of “terrorist activity,” the hospitals are “a legitimate target for annihilation.” They claim that “ambulances that are evacuating patients to the south in order to be treated elsewhere are at their disposal.” It does not mention that these ambulances, too, are being bombed by Israel, or that the south is also being mercilessly pummeled.
The doctors claim that “the residents of Gaza… are the ones who brought their annihilation upon themselves”–echoing the genocidal rhetoric of centrist Israeli politicians who have even claimed that “the children of Gaza have brought this upon themselves.”
The doctors apply the terms “snakes,” “wasps,” and “terrorist nests” in the dehumanization of the enemy, which appears to be expanded from Hamas to the whole of the Palestinian people.
The original letter with an initial list of 9 doctors was posted today by Quds News Network, and has already been signed by an additional 83 signatories and has been circulated by various Jewish orthodox sites (such as here and here).
We have identified the initial 9 signatories below, who include various gynecologists and pediatricians, several of them with a clear religious-Zionist settler leaning and affiliation (see some details in brackets in the signatory list).
The letters
We, the undersigned, doctors who work in the healthcare system responsibly and professionally, hereby urge:
The moment that murderous terrorist organizations built murder and terrorism headquarters as an integral part of hospitals, they turned the hospitals into legitimate targets by their own hands.
For years the citizens of Israel have suffered murderous terror, while the head of the snake and head murderers enjoy complete shelter and protection, as they built terror headquarters within the hospitals, understanding that no harm would come to them.
After the Simhat Torah [Oct. 7] massacre, the many murdered and kidnapped, and the hair-raising atrocities, which we have no room here to detail and write, there is complete agreement in the Israeli security forces that the terror organization Hamas should be eradicated to dust, which is worse than ISIS.
This is the same terror organization that isn’t above cruel murder and unprecedented atrocities towards men, women, and children–therefore, any place where its men hide and/or is used for terrorist activity is a legitimate target for annihilation, including hospitals.
Whoever mixes hospitals with terrorism must understand that he has no safe place and cannot seek refuge in hospitals in order to produce terror and enjoy protection.
Ambulances that are evacuating patients to the south in order to be treated elsewhere are at their disposal.
No more! The residents of Gaza, who saw fit to turn the hospitals into terrorist nests in an attempt to take advantage of Western morality, are the ones who brought their annihilation upon themselves–terrorism must be eliminated everywhere and in any way.
Attacking terrorist headquarters located inside of a hospital is the right of the IDF [Israeli army] and its duty.
It is unthinkable that the citizens of Israel are abandoned, and arch-murderers are protected only because they are hiding in hospitals.
After the IDF repeatedly warned the hospitals to stop the cynical use made of them for terrorism, and after all citizens were asked to evacuate the area in light of the presence of terrorists, there is an obligation to destroy the wasps’ nests and the hospitals they use to shelter them, the sooner, the better.
We, the undersigned:
Dr. Tal Nir [elected ”most dedicated doctor” under COVID in 2021, orthodox Jewish Chabad member]
Dr. Audray Azran [Gynecologist, Haifa]
Dr. Shlomi Ben-Nun [Pediatrician, retired 2022, Afula]
Dr. Hannah Katan [Religious-Zionist gynecologist, founded the Family Center at the settlement of Elkana, serves as its president]
Dr. Ori Attias [Pediatrician, Intensive Care Rambam Hospital, Jerusalem]
Dr. Hannah Kremer [family doctor at the Elkana settlement clinic]
Dr. Yeruham Priner [pediatrician, Beitar Illit settlement]
Dr. Carmit Almog [specializes in Nephrology, high blood pressure, Rabin Medical Center, Tel Aviv area]
Dr. Menuha Vilk [pediatrician, Jerusalem]
https://mronline.org/2023/11/06/israeli ... hospitals/
Unbelievable, despicable, monsters.
As previously noted, it was the vicious behavior of colonial militaries to which the term "terrorism" was first applied. Therefore, violent responses by the afflicted parties can only be called 'counter-terrorism'.
********
Secret U.S. War in Lebanon Is Tinder for Escalation of Israel–Gaza Conflict
Posted by INTERNATIONALIST 360° on NOVEMBER 5, 2023
Nick Turse
Billions in security aid to Lebanon, along with off-the-books commandos, could embroil the U.S. in a regional conflagration.
THE STATE DEPARTMENT urged U.S. citizens to leave Lebanon on Sunday “due to the unpredictable security situation.” The warning followed clashes between protesters and Lebanese security forces in a Beirut suburb near the U.S. Embassy after hundreds of Palestinians were killed last week in a blast at Al-Ahli hospital in Gaza. The unrest seems to confirm the fears of almost eight in 10 Americans that the war between Israel and Hamas will lead to a broader conflict in the Middle East.
But few Americans realize that the United States has long been embroiled in a wider war in Lebanon, and that U.S. forces may be a target there, as well. The U.S. has, over decades, poured billions of dollars in security assistance into Lebanon and conducted counterterrorism efforts against Hezbollah, an Iran-backed Shia group with political and military wings. Lebanon’s dominant political and military force, Hezbollah has long been designated a terrorist organization by the U.S.
In the shadow of that conflict, the U.S. has waged another “secret war” in Lebanon against Sunni terror groups like the Islamic State and Al Qaeda, according to a former four-star commander who oversaw the effort, declassified documents, former special operators with knowledge of the program, and analysts who have investigated U.S. Code Title 10 § 127e — known in military parlance as “127-echo” — which allows Special Operations forces to use foreign military units as proxies.
Attacks on U.S. forces in the Middle East have already ramped up with drone strikes on American troops in multiple locations across Iraq and Syria, and drone and missile attacks from Yemen on a U.S. Navy destroyer in the northern Red Sea. Experts say that secrecy surrounding the 127e program in Lebanon, known as Lion Hunter, whose existence The Intercept revealed last year, could embroil the U.S. in a wider war in the Middle East and pose an additional threat to U.S. troops.
Neither Special Operations Command nor Central Command, which oversees U.S. military operations in the greater Middle East, will comment on Lion Hunter and the number of U.S. troops who have been, and may still be, involved. But in a June “war powers” letter to Congress, President Joe Biden noted that “approximately 89 United States military personnel are deployed to Lebanon to enhance the government’s counterterrorism capabilities and to support the counterterrorism operations of Lebanese security forces.”
The Israeli–Palestinian conflict makes it all the more crucial that secret wars like the one carried out via the 127e program in Lebanon are subject to congressional oversight, said Katherine Yon Ebright, counsel in the Brennan Center’s liberty and national security program and author of the most comprehensive analysis of the 127e authority. “Already, we have seen U.S. forces in the region targeted over the United States’s political support for and arms transfers to Israel,” Ebright said. “Congress and the public must know where U.S. forces are deployed in the region and whether those forces are at risk of attack, particularly as Hezbollah in Lebanon contemplates joining the conflict against Israel.”
View of the destruction and damage at the scene of the suicide bombing of the American Embassy in Beirut on April 18, 1983. Photo: Peter Davis/Getty Images
A $3 Billion Partnership
The U.S. military has a long and checkered history of engagement in Lebanon, including a 1958 intervention by U.S. Marines to forestall an insurrection there. In 1983, during a civil war that lasted 15 years, bombings of the U.S. Embassy and the U.S. Marine Corps barracks in Beirut killed more than 300 people. The United States blames Hezbollah for both attacks.
On Monday, during a speech to honor those killed in the barracks bombing 40 years before, U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon Dorothy C. Shea called out Hamas and Hezbollah for trying to “rob Lebanon and its people of their bright future,” saying that the U.S. and the Lebanese people “reject the threats of some to drag Lebanon into a new war.”
Israeli President Isaac Herzog, meanwhile, has signaled a willingness to widen the current conflict. “I think Hezbollah is playing with fire,” he said. “And I want to make clear, we are not looking for a confrontation in our northern border … but if Hezbollah will drag us into war, it should be clear that Lebanon will pay the price.”
America has a long-standing relationship with the Lebanese Armed Forces, or LAF. In a country where 80 percent of the population lives in poverty, the U.S. has provided more than $3 billion in military aid since 2006. “The United States is committed to a relationship that reinforces Lebanon’s security and stability,” said Lt. Col. Karen Roxberry, a Central Command spokesperson. “The Department of Defense provides training and security assistance to help support the LAF’s counterterrorism operations and border security.”
The U.S. routinely decries “Iran’s continuing arms transfers to Hezbollah,” even as it works to arm the LAF with sophisticated weaponry. The U.S. government has facilitated almost $2 billion in Lebanese purchases through the Foreign Military Sales program, including light attack aircraft, helicopters, and Hellfire missiles. Through another program, the U.S. provided 130 armored and tactical ground vehicles. From 2016 to 2021, the United States also authorized the export of more than $82 million in U.S. military equipment to Lebanon, including $12 million in “firearms and related articles.”
The State Department did not respond to detailed questions about the full extent of U.S. security assistance to Lebanon prior to publication.
More than 6,000 members of the LAF have received training in the United States since 1970, including 120 members in 2020. Under the 127e authority, the U.S. trained, armed, advised, and directed an elite unit known as the G2 Strike Force. “The U.S. supporting proxy forces in Lebanon is part of a decades-long, overly militarized policy towards the Middle East that has ignored the root causes of the region’s turmoil and struggles and not brought the peace or stability Americans have been promised,” said Seth Binder, director of advocacy at the Project on Middle East Democracy.
The U.S. is ramping up its military presence in the Middle East, sending the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group and its roughly 7,500 sailors, along with the USS Bataan amphibious ready group, which consists of three ships carrying thousands of troops from the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit.
“By posturing these U.S. naval assets and advanced fighter aircraft in the region, we aim to send a strong message intended to deter a wider conflict,” said Pentagon Press Secretary Air Force Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder on Thursday. Binder warned that it threatens to do the exact opposite. “The administration’s rush to move forces into the region in order to ‘bolster deterrence’ is a dangerous response that puts the United States at greater risk of what the majority of Americans are afraid of: a broader war.”
A demonstration supporting Palestinians in Beirut on Oct. 20, 2023. Photo: Joseph Eid/AFP via Getty Images
Exempt From Vetting
Roxberry, the Central Command spokesperson, said that U.S. counterterrorism efforts in Lebanon are primarily aimed at Hezbollah. A formerly secret document obtained by The Intercept stops just short of revealing the target of the Lion Hunter program, noting only that its “activities serve to identify, isolate, and deny safe haven to [redacted].” Gen. Joseph Votel, who headed Special Operations Command from 2014 to 2016 and then Central Command until 2019, filled in the blank, noting that the effort was especially focused on Sunni extremist organizations, including the Islamic State, Al Qaeda, and affiliated terror groups.
The 127e program in Lebanon was one of 20 in operation as recently as 2019, according to the formerly secret Special Operations Command document obtained via the Freedom of Information Act. Votel said it was one of the most effective proxy war efforts of the last decade. “We often held this program up as the gold standard,” he told The Intercept, calling America’s proxies in Lebanon “motivated and capable partners who were well led and very effective at what they were doing.”
Central Command would not comment on the 127e program or proxies employed in Lebanon more generally. “We have no details to share specifically to G2 Strike Force,” said Roxberry, noting only that the Defense Department “supports broader efforts to build the LAF’s institutional capacity to train and operate its forces in a professional manner.”
Votel, who observed the G2 Strike Force firsthand, praised their capability and prowess. “In comparison to other LAF units, they had a more direct chain of command, were smaller and thus more agile and responsive and were focused specifically on offensive operations. Their mission set was smaller and better defined than normal LAF organizations,” he told The Intercept.
According to the formerly secret document, members of the G2 Strike Force undergo “comprehensive assessment” by U.S. Special Operations forces and are “subjected to counter-intelligence screening, polygraph testing, and physical and mental challenges before being selected.” But 127e programs have long been exempt from a vetting process required of other U.S. efforts supporting foreign forces under the “Leahy law.” The measure, named after former U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy, requires the U.S. to scrutinize the human rights records of forces receiving U.S. security aid.
Without such vetting, Brennan Center’s Ebright told The Intercept, the Pentagon “can end up supporting groups and individuals whose conduct may cause civilian harm, undermine U.S. credibility, and even create U.S. legal liability.”
“Congress, not the president, has the constitutional role of deciding when, where, and against whom the nation is at war,” Ebright said. “By overclassifying basic information about 127e programs, the Department of Defense hinders Congress’s ability to fulfill this role and potentially to stave off undemocratic, unaccountable U.S. involvement in a new war in the Middle East.”
https://libya360.wordpress.com/2023/11/ ... -conflict/
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine Calls on the PLO to Abstain from Schemes Hostile to the People
Posted by INTERNATIONALIST 360° on NOVEMBER 6, 2023
The Popular Front calls on the leadership of the Authority to boycott American officials and not to engage with any schemes hostile to our people.
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine called on the [Palestinian] Authority leadership to completely boycott American officials and to not engage with any proposals or initiatives put forth by these criminals whose hands are stained with the blood of the children, women, and elderly of our people in the Gaza Strip.
The horrific crimes committed by the zionist entity in the Strip, in full partnership and coordination with the American administration, require the Authority’s leadership to elevate their behavior to the level of our people’s sacrifices, and the magnitude of the crimes and the ongoing genocide around the clock in the Strip.
The Front considers that the American schemes that aim to create a new entity in the Strip, or to hand over the Strip to an administration, away from the will and approval of the Palestinian people, as rejected and doomed to failure by our people, calling on the Authority to not engage with these schemes hostile to the Palestinian people.
The American administration, which shares the occupation’s aggression against the Palestinian people, and supports it politically and militarily with the most powerful internationally banned weapons, should be targeted with all forms of resistance as is the zionist entity. The only thing required from the leadership of the Authority is to boycott it and to prevent any meetings of any of its officials with them, as the continuation of these meetings will be tantamount to legitimizing the aggression and marketing the plans hostile to our people.
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
November 6, 2023
https://libya360.wordpress.com/2023/11/ ... he-people/
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Western Propaganda Gets More Desperate as World Majority Sides with China and Russia Against the US over Gaza
Posted on November 7, 2023 by Conor Gallagher
The New York Times, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, and The Telegraph have all recently run pieces attempting to paint Russia and China as anti semitic and/or anti Israel. The propaganda comes as the US tries to discredit any attempts by Moscow and Beijing to lead more international involvement in the Palestine-Israel peace process.
Let’s start with The New York Times, which has run at least two articles in recent days in which the argument basically boils down to the following: some people in Russia and China say bad things about Jews on the Internet; therefore the governments are anti-Israel.
Here’s the New York Times in an Oct. 28 piece, “As China Looks to Broker Gaza Peace, Antisemitism Surges Online”:
But even as China seeks to turn down the temperature diplomatically, a surge of antisemitism and anti-Israeli sentiment is proliferating across the Chinese internet and state media, undermining Beijing’s efforts to convey impartiality. China has already come under pressure from the United States and Israel for its refusal to condemn Hamas for its Oct. 7 attack that started the war.
On China’s heavily censored internet, inflammatory speech critical of Israel is rampant, with commenters seemingly emboldened by that refusal. And China’s state-run media is seizing on the conflict to accuse the United States of turning a blind eye to Israeli aggression, while perpetuating tropes of Jewish control of American politics.
China Daily, a state-run newspaper, ran an editorial on Monday declaring that the United States was on the “wrong side of history in Gaza.” It said Washington was exacerbating the conflict by “blindly backing Israel.”
The piece goes on to mention other cases of private citizens making statements the Times deems questionable, such as an influencer with millions of followers who decided to call Hamas a “resistance organization” rather than a “terrorist organization.” The Times concludes:
It is hard to say whether the anti-Israeli positions in state media and antisemitism on the Chinese internet are part of a coordinated campaign. But China’s state media rarely veers from the official position of the country’s Communist Party, and its hair-trigger internet censors are keenly attuned to the wishes of its leaders, quick to remove any content that sways public sentiment in an unwanted direction, especially on matters of such geopolitical importance.
First off, I remember when news media outlets in the First Amendment-loving US used to criticize China for its lack of press freedom; but the New York Times is now accusing Beijing of not cracking down enough on its news media and online discourse in order to silence criticism of Israel and the US. Good luck with that.
Inherent in this complaint from the Times is a belief that China should not try to take a balanced approach to the conflict, it must “condemn Hamas” and it cannot criticize the US approach to the conflict, nor the US’ decades-long failure to broker a peace agreement.
What’s more is that the Times is in effect concluding that the comments of random private citizens (and the government’s inability or unwillingness to censor them) in a country of 1.4 billion people is therefore the official position of the Chinese government. If we apply that same standard to the US, how easy is it to go on Twitter, Facebook, etc. and find crazy comments by Americans? Is it fair to conclude that those rantings represent US policy? In many cases, they’re not far removed from Washington’s increasingly unhinged actions throughout the world, but that still doesn’t make them the official position of the state.
A Nov. 3 piece, “In a Worldwide War of Words, Russia, China and Iran Back Hamas” goes a step further and lumps China, Russia and Iran together as backers of Hamas. The headline itself is false, and it only gets worse from there. The nut:
Iran, Russia and, to a lesser degree, China have used state media and the world’s major social networking platforms to support Hamas and undercut Israel, while denigrating Israel’s principal ally, the United States….
The campaigns do not appear to be coordinated, American and other government officials and experts said, though they did not rule out cooperation.
What does the Times cite as evidence for these claims?
The Spanish arm of RT, the global Russian television network, for example, recently reposted a statement by the Iranian president calling the explosion at Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza on Oct. 17 an Israeli war crime, even though Western intelligence agencies and independent analysts have since said a missile misfired from Gaza was a more likely cause of the blast.
Well, non-Western analysts do not agree with the West’s version of events. And it would appear that the Times is arguing that RT (and other media outlets) should censor any statements by world leaders that do not have the stamp of approval from Western intelligence agencies.
Here’s another:
A profile on X that bore the characteristics of an inauthentic account — @RebelTaha — posted 616 times in the first two days of the conflict, though it had previously featured content mostly about cricket, they said. One post featured a cartoon claiming a double standard in how Palestinian resistance toward Israel was cast as terrorism while Ukraine’s fight against Russia was self-defense.
The Times does not mention that @RebelTaha has a whopping total of 18 followers (as of Nov. 5).
The Times goes on to list “false or unverified content” across a range of social media platforms. Who exactly is supposed to “verify” all this content? The Times doesn’t say, although one would be forgiven for thinking they want Western intelligence agencies to play a role given their criticism of RT en Espanol for running information that didn’t agree with “Western intelligence agencies and independent analysts.” Who is the Times’ source for all this unverified, anti-Israel, anti-US content?
It is Rafi Mendelsohn, vice president at Cyabra, a social media intelligence company based in Tel Aviv, and the Times says that the company has tracked down at least 40,000 bots or “inauthentic accounts” in the past month. The Times does not mention that two of Cyabra’s founders served in information warfare units in the Israel Defense Forces.
The Times concludes with this gem:
The war has heightened concerns in Washington and other Western capitals that an alliance of authoritarian governments has succeeded in fomenting illiberal, antidemocratic sentiment, especially in Africa, South America and other parts of the world where accusations of American or Western colonialism or dominance find fertile soil.
Russia and China, which have grown increasingly close in recent years, appear intent to exploit the conflict to undermine the United States as much as Israel. The State Department’s Global Engagement Center, which combats state propaganda and disinformation, has in recent weeks detailed extensive campaigns by Russia and China to shape the global information environment to their advantage.
This is getting closer to what’s at the heart of the matter. Aside from the Times’ yearning for mass censorship run out of Langley, its allegations that China and Russia harbor anti semitic and anti-Israel positions are part of an effort to discredit any of their efforts to become more involved in the peace process.
China and Russia have been entirely consistent in their positions and statements on the issue. They support a two-state solution, and they believe the decades-long US peace process has obviously failed. Even if you accept that the US has been operating in good faith in its efforts to find a solution to the Palestine-Israel conflict, the very fact that the current conflict is where the situation stands after 60 years would seem to support Russia and China’s claims.
The US, however, does not want other powers muscling in on its monopoly over the never ending Palestine-Israel peace process.
Currently, China and Russia are onboard with the vast majority of the rest of the world calling for a humanitarian truce in Gaza and the US is increasingly isolated at the UN. Longer term, Moscow and Beijing are also trying to internationalize the Palestine-Israel peace process. Here’s what the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on Oct. 8 – a position it has maintained throughout the current fighting:
The recurrence of the conflict shows once again that the protracted standstill of the peace process cannot go on. The fundamental way out of the conflict lies in implementing the two-state solution and establishing an independent State of Palestine. The international community needs to act with greater urgency, step up input into the Palestinian question, facilitate the early resumption of peace talks between Palestine and Israel, and find a way to bring about enduring peace. China will continue to work relentlessly with the international community towards that end.
On the long-term answer, Beijing shares ssentially the same position of the US: a two-state solution, (which the US at least says it supports although in practice it helps Israel make that reality increasingly difficult). The US wants to maintain a monopoly on this process that only ever grows more elusive under US guidance. China wants more involvement from the international community at the UN. The US, in turn, is stonewalling those efforts at the UN.
The New York-based China Project tries to paint Beijing’s efforts in the same light as The Times, but I think inadvertently shows how rational China’s position is:
China wants to portray itself as “a great power on the one hand but a different kind of great power from the U.S. that has this kind of kinship with the Global South,” said John Calabrese, an assistant professor at American University’s School of International Service and a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute. “They’re trying to maneuver and shape their conduct in a way that can capitalize on that dual identity.”
This response is consistent with China’s decades-long diplomatic support for Palestine and calls for a two-state solution, even as China and Israel have developed a close economic relationship since establishing diplomatic ties in 1992. Beijing’s posture also aligns China with its partners in the Middle East and will serve its regional interests there.
Of course, the US insists neutrality is not an option for China – just like the conflict in Ukraine – as Washington prefers to paint political disagreements in terms of good and evil with the US naturally on the side of the angels. Western governments and media are apparently no longer capable of enough critical thought to realize geopolitics are more complicated than this and that viewing international relations in this light guarantees endless conflict.
But that is where we are. And the US, rather than voluntarily cede its almost complete control over the Palestine-Israel peace process, is attempting to discredit China and Russia with the charges of being anti-Israel and/or anti semitic. For example, US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer criticized China for not showing enough sympathy or support for Israel.
“I urge you and the Chinese people to stand with the Israeli people and condemn these cowardly and vicious attacks,” said Schumer.
Of course, even Schumer must realize that if China were to “condemn” Hamas and “stand with” Israel, its neutral position in any future peace negotiations would evaporate and it would harm China’s position elsewhere in the Middle East.
***
Elsewhere in the propaganda war to discredit China we have the Wall Street Journal running an Oct. 31piece about Baidu and Alibaba maps of the Middle East:
Internet users in China are expressing bewilderment that the name Israel doesn’t appear on leading online digital maps from Baidu and Alibaba, an ambiguity that matches Beijing’s vague diplomacy in the region and contrasts with its attentiveness to maps generally.
Baidu’s Chinese language online maps demarcate the internationally recognized borders of Israel, as well as the Palestinian territories, plus key cities, but don’t clearly identify the country by name. The same is true with online maps produced by Alibaba’s Amap, where even small nations like Luxembourg are clearly marked. Neither company responded to questions on Monday. It is unclear whether the development is new, though it has been discussed by Chinese internet users since war broke out.
China’s government has over the years cried foul and levied fines over maps published elsewhere online, such as on hotel websites, for failing to strictly adhere to Beijing’s territorial claims, like leaving off a nine-dotted line stretching around the South China Sea that isn’t internationally recognized.
The UK’s Telegraph ran a similar story, declaring it a “major provocation from China,” and more and more outlets picked up the story. Soon, it was “Chinese companies remove ‘Israel’ from digital maps as Xi backs Palestine.” Pekingnology, which is a project of former Xinhua reporter Zichen Wang, pointed out a problem with the Journal’s claims and another with its conclusion, writing that:
It’s not a recent development with some questioning the labels as far back as 2021.
China’s official map service shows both the names of Israel and Palenstine.
***
The Financial Times ran sloppy propaganda about an anti-Semitic riot at Makhachkala airport in Dagestan, Russia. Gilbert Doctorow has been all over that and you can read his insightful observations here and here.
Essentially a US and Ukrainian PsyOp helped instigate the chaos that was quickly brought under control by Russian police. It was, however, embarrassing for Moscow and not just the Financial Times, but also the US State Department pounced to make claims about pogroms in Russia. From RT:
Speaking during a press briefing in Washington DC on Monday, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said: “I saw the video, as I’m sure all of you did. It looked like a pogrom to me.”
His assessment was echoed the same day by John Kirby, coordinator for strategic communications at the National Security Council in the White House.
“Some people have compared it to the pogroms of the late 19th and early 20th century, and I think that’s probably an apt description,” he stated.
Kirby went on to allege, falsely, that the Kremlin had failed to condemn the Makhachkala riot.
Other news outlets like RFE/RL are now running pieces about Jews living in fear in Russia. Why? Much like with China, it was apparently Moscow’s failure to condemn Hamas and show enough support for Israel.
Of course, Russia, while maintaining a position on Palestine-Israel similar to China, has been much more outspoken in its criticism of the US, blaming Washington for not only failing to achieve peace between Palestinians and Israel but also claiming that its entire peace process has been a charade. While acknowledging that the Hamas terror attack started this current phase of violence, Russian President Vladimir Putin added the following at an Oct. 30 meeting with the Russian security council:
I will repeat again: the ruling elites of the United States and its satellites are behind the tragedy of the Palestinians, the massacre in the Middle East in general, the conflict in Ukraine, and many other conflicts in the world – in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and so on. This has become obvious to everyone. It is they who install their military bases everywhere, who use military force on every pretext and without any pretext, who send weapons to conflict areas. They are also channelling financial resources, including to Ukraine and the Middle East, and fuelling hatred in Ukraine and the Middle East.
They are not achieving results on the battlefield, so they want to split us from within, as far as Russia is concerned, to weaken us and sow confusion. They do not want Russia to participate in solving any international or regional problems, including in the Middle East settlement. They are not satisfied at all when someone does not act or speak exactly as they are instructed. They believe only in their own exclusivity, in being allowed to do anything.
They do not need durable peace in the Holy Land; they need constant chaos in the Middle East. Consequently, they are trying hard to discredit countries that are insisting on an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, on ending the bloodshed, and that are ready to make a real contribution to resolving the crisis, rather than parasitising on it. They are even attacking, ostracising and trying to discredit the UN and the clear position of the global community.
I would like to note that, unlike the West, our approaches towards the situation in the Middle East have always lacked mercenary interests, intrigues and double standards. We have stated and continue to openly state our position, which does not change every year. The key to resolving the conflict lies in establishing a sovereign and independent Palestinian state, a full-fledged Palestinian state. We have repeatedly said this openly and honestly during our contacts with the Palestinian and Israeli leaders.
***
So what to make of the recent reporting from The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, and The Telegraph?
I think it can be argued that the standards of Western propaganda are slipping, for one. But it also makes sense, from a US perspective, to paint Moscow and Beijing in this light as Washington does not want China and Russia to play a role in any Palestine-Israel peace process – one that the US has monopolized for decades. The global majority is ready for a new, more even handed approach – as evidenced by the increasingly lopsided UN votes that sees the US evermore isolated.
So the US can try to weaponize charges of antisemitism against Russia, China and the majority of the world that opposes apartheid and ethnic cleansing, but it will only be forestalling the inevitable. As the relative power of the US declines, Israel will eventually have to take into account the position of the world majority.
Now there has been speculation that the neocons in Washington feel their time running out with the pliable Biden and so want to go big before going home by attacking Iran and others in the Middle East. Likewise, Israel might be trying to maximize all its territorial gains before Biden exits.
The sad irony in all this for the neocons and the Zionists is that their efforts to preserve their systems only result in more self harm, worsening their longterm position. And reasonably so because the systems they have constructed – whether apartheid or a global empire – were never sustainable.
Both are overextended, facing internal crises, believe all political problems can be solved with force, and both are in a perpetual panic about all their enemies – real or imagined. The good news is their actions are hastening their demise; the bad is there is no real limit to the amount of destruction they can cause.
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2023/11 ... -gaza.html
The Marvel Comic Universe is the key to understanding why this propaganda works: the audience has been primed.
Iran’s Proposed Embargo Could Cause Chaos in Oil Markets
Posted on November 7, 2023 by Yves Smith
Yves here. Note that Iran had earlier called for an oil embargo against Israel only, which at the time was clearly intended to be largely symbolic (Israel imports little oil) but still get the Islamic oil producing stated to act together. The anger across the Middle East has reached such a level that going directly to an embargo against Israel and all its backers is reasonably likely, particularly since it’s an escalation to which the US and Israel would be bereft of good responses. They certainly can’t attack all or even some oil producers to bring them to heel.
By Simon Watkins, a former senior FX trader and salesman, financial journalist, and best-selling author. He was Head of Forex Institutional Sales and Trading for Credit Lyonnais, and later Director of Forex at Bank of Montreal. He was then Head of Weekly Publications and Chief Writer for Business Monitor International, Head of Fuel Oil Products for Platts, and Global Managing Editor of Research for Renaissance Capital in Moscow. He has written extensively on oil and gas, Forex, equities, bonds, economics and geopolitics for many leading publications, and has worked as a geopolitical risk consultant for a number of major hedge funds in London, Moscow, and Dubai. Originally published at OilPrice
*Iran has urged OPEC members to halt oil exports to countries supporting Israel, echoing the 1973 oil embargo, which dramatically increased oil prices and altered global economies.
*The call for an embargo is a response to the Israel-Hamas conflict, with the potential to significantly disrupt global oil supply and prices.
*As it now stands, there is every chance of a military or diplomatic misstep occurring in the Israel-Hamas War that may see a widening out of the conflict.
Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, last week called on the Islamic members of OPEC to halt oil exports to Israel immediately. Given that Israel buys virtually none of its oil from Islamic members of OPEC – purchasing mainly from Azerbaijan, the U.S., Brazil, Nigeria, and Angola instead – this would seem in and of itself a somewhat peculiar threat to make. But that is not the actual threat being made by Iran’s spiritual leader, with the full backing of the practical guardians of the 1979 Islamic Revolution – the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). The real threat is that Iran is angling for a full oil embargo from all Islamic OPEC member states on countries that support Israel in its war against Islamic militant group Hamas. Saudi Arabia did exactly the same thing in 1973 for exactly the same reason – a war between Israel and Islam, as it also sought to portray it – with devastating results for oil prices, Western economies, and global geopolitical alliances for decades to come, as analysed in full in my new book on the new global oil market order.
Back in 1973, Egyptian military forces moved into the Sinai Peninsula, while Syrian forces moved into the Golan Heights – two territories that had been captured by Israel during the Six-Day War of 1967. By attacking from multiple points on the holiest day of the Jewish faith, Yom Kippur (the same attack method and religious date as the 7 October Hamas attacks used 50 years later) the two Arab countries thought they could take Israel off guard. And they did, for a while at least, finding increasing military support from Saudi Arabia, Morocco, and Cuba, and broader support from Algeria, Jordan, Iraq, Libya, Kuwait, Tunisia, and North Korea. The War ended on 25 October 1973 in a ceasefire brokered by the United Nations.
Around the same time as this, though, OPEC members – plus Egypt, Syria, and Tunisia – began an embargo on oil exports to the U.S., the U.K., Japan, Canada, and the Netherlands in response to their collective supplying of arms, intelligence resources, and logistical support to Israel during the War. As global supplies of oil fell, the price of oil increased dramatically, exacerbated by incremental cuts to oil production by OPEC members over the period. Gas prices also rose, as historically around 70 percent of them are comprised of the price of oil. By the end of the embargo in March 1974, the price of oil had risen around 267 percent, from about US$3 per barrel (pb) to nearly US$11 pb. This, in turn, stoked the fire of a global economic slowdown, especially felt in the net oil importing countries of the West.
Some later branded the embargo a failure, as it did not result in Israel giving back all the territory that it had gained in the Yom Kippur War. However, in a broader sense, as also analysed in full in my new book on the new global oil market order, the wider war had been won by Saudi Arabia, OPEC and other Arab states in shifting the balance of power in the global oil market from the big consumers of oil (mainly in the West at that time) to the big producers of oil (mainly in the Middle East at that point). This shift was accurately summed up by the then-Saudi Minister of Oil and Mineral Reserves, Sheikh Ahmed Zaki Yamani, who was widely credited with formulating the embargo strategy. He highlighted that the effects on the global economy of the oil embargo marked a fundamental shift in the world balance of power between the developing nations that produced oil and the developed industrial nations that consumed it.
The end of the oil embargo in 1974 also marked a decisive shift in the foreign policy of the U.S. towards the Middle East. From around April 1933 (when the U.S.’s Standard Oil made a one-off US$275,000 payment to Saudi Arabia – equivalent to around US$6.5 million in 2023 – to secure the exclusive rights to drill across the entire Kingdom), the fate of the Middle East’s oil supplies had largely been governed by the several formal and informal networks centred around Western international oil companies (IOCs), just as Sheikh Yamani had said. This had changed after the OPEC oil embargo was lifted in March 1974 but, as also analysed in full in my new book on the new global oil market order, under the guidance of Henry Kissinger (U.S. National Security Advisor from 1969 to 1975, and Secretary of State from 1973 to 1977) the new U.S. foreign policy towards the Middle East had the single objective of ensuring that the U.S. and its allies were never again held hostage by Middle Eastern oil producers. The policy, as fully detailed in the book, was a variant of the triangular diplomacy that Kissinger had been using to great effect in the U.S.’s dealings with Russia and China, with the use of ‘constructive ambiguity’ in the language used in dealing with the countries involved. In short, this meant the U.S. appearing to be on the side of various elements of the Arab world but, in reality, seeking to exploit their existing weaknesses to set one against another. Although this strategy provide successful for many decades, it has been challenged more recently by Russia and then China, with considerable success in wooing several major Middle Eastern oil countries away from the U.S.’s sphere of influence and into their own. These include the two powerhouse countries of the region – Iran and Saudi Arabia – which back on 10 March agreed a stunning historic deal to reestablish relations, brokered exclusively by China.
As it now stands, there is every chance of a military or diplomatic misstep occurring in the Israel-Hamas War that may see a widening out of the conflict. That would be the perfect point for Iran to push for a simultaneous widening out of an oil embargo on Israel alone into a broader one covering all its supporters in the West. Already, on 16 October Iran’s Foreign Minister, Hossein Amir Abdollahian, warned that its regional network of militias would open “multiple fronts” against Israel if its attacks continue to kill civilians in Gaza. It seems highly likely that the first new front would be a full activation of Hezbollah in Lebanon, to Israel’s direct north – a 100,000-strong very well-equipped fighting force funded and trained by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) that dwarfs the fighting capabilities of Hamas in all respects. Israel has already stated that its mission is to “annihilate Hamas” and has launched ground operations into Palestine for as long as it takes to do so. Additionally, on 21 October, Israel’s Minister of Economy, Nir Barkat, said that if Hezbollah fully joins the war then Israel would “cut off the head of the snake” and launch a military attack against Iran. A third front could also be opened by Iran, using its own IRGC and proxy militant forces stationed in Syria, to Israel’s northeast.
So, what would a broader oil embargo look like? According to the latest assessment by the World Bank, a loss in global crude oil supply of 6-8 million bpd – which it refers to as a “large disruption” scenario comparable to the 1973 Oil Crisis – would result in a 56-75 percent increase in prices to between $140 and $157 a barrel. However, a broadening out of the embargo on Israel by the Islamic members of OPEC, as called for by Iran, would likely lead to a much bigger loss of global oil supplies than the World Bank has calculated. The Islamic members of OPEC are Algeria, with an average crude oil production rate of around 1 million barrels (bpd), Iran (3.4 million bpd), Iraq (4.1 million bpd), Kuwait (2.5 million bpd), Libya (1.2 million bpd), Saudi Arabia (9 million bp), and the UAE (2.9 million bpd). This totals just over 24 million bpd – or about 30 percent – of the current average total global production of about 80 million bpd.
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2023/11 ... rkets.html
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Turks demonstrate at Incirlik air base against US support for Israel
Turkyie's President Erdogan has issued statement's condemning Israel's bombing campaign on Gaza but has not taken any concrete steps to support the Palestinian resistance
News Desk
NOV 5, 2023
Protesters clash with riot police during a demonstration outside the US-Turkish Incirlik Air Base in Adana, Türkiye, November 5, 2023 (Photo credit: AP / Mehmet Sancakzade)
Pro-Palestinian protesters gathered on 5 November outside the Incirlik Air Base in southeastern Turkiye to protest US support for Israel’s bombing campaign in Gaza that has now killed almost 10,000 Palestinians, the majority women and children.
The Incirlik base is owned by Turkiye but hosts US warplanes and nuclear weapons, enabling the US to project power through out West Asia and to threaten Russia.
In 2012, Turkiye set up a “nerve center” either in or near Incirlik to provide weapons in coordination with the US to Jihadist groups seeking to topple the Syrian government starting in 2011.
Sunday's protest was organised by the IHH humanitarian relief fund, which in 2010 led a flotilla of ships full of peace activists to Gaza to break the Israeli blockade on the enclave. Israeli forces attacked the flotilla, raiding its ships from helicopters and killing ten Turkish activists.
During today's demonstration, police stepped in when some protesters broke the barricades, trying to enter the airbase.
Video on social media showed hundreds of people waving Palestinian flags running across a field chased by the police, who used water cannons to disperse the crowds.
There were no reports of injuries or arrests.
Bulent Yildirim, the IHH head, said in a speech that there were protests against the attacks on Gaza all over Europe and the US, adding that he hopes to see more demonstrations like this.
In his speech, Yildirim warned protesters to refrain from trying to enter the base.
"Do not clash with the police. The police are as concerned about Gaza as you are," he said.
The IHH protest was timed to coincide with a visit to Ankara by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who was to arrive late Sunday and meet Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan on Monday.
Fidan cooperated closely with US officials in supporting Jihadist groups in Syria, including the Nusra Front and ISIS, which are both Al-Qaeda offshoots.
Blinken traveled to Israel on Friday to press for a humanitarian pause to the fighting to allow aid to reach Gaza, but his requests were rejected by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Blinken then traveled on Saturday to Jordan to meet with Arab leaders, who demanded the US support efforts for a ceasefire. Blinken rejected the idea of a ceasefire, claiming Israel was free to continue bombing Gaza in “self-defense.”
Nearly 1,000 people also rallied Sunday outside the US embassy in Ankara, according to an AFP photographer at the scene.
Last month, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan led a massive rally in Istanbul last month that he said was attended by 1.5 million people. At the rally, Erdogan called Israel an "occupier" that was acting like a “war criminal.”
Despite strong rhetoric condemning Israel, Erdogan continues to allow oil from Azerbaijan destined for Israel to pass through Turkish pipelines and be loaded at the port of Ceyhan to tankers for delivery to Haifa.
Erdogan cooperated closely with Netanyahu to facilitate the flow of Kurdish oil from northern Iraq via Turkiye to Israel starting in 2014, against the wishes of Iraq’s central government in Baghdad.
Before war erupted between the Hamas-led Palestinian resistance and Israel on 7 October, Erdogan and Netanyahu were in talks to build a natural gas pipeline from Israel to Turkiye, which would allow Tel Aviv to export its gas to Europe.
https://new.thecradle.co/articles/turks ... for-israel
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UNIFIL Warns of Escalation on Lebanon's Southern Border
Israeli occupation forces, Nov. 7, 2023. | Photo: X/ @JackStr42679640
Published 7 November 2023 (2 hours 57 minutes ago)
Attacks against civilians constitute a violation of international law and are considered "war crimes."
On Monday, Andrea Teneti, the spokesperson for the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) said the potential for escalation on the Lebanese-Israeli border is clear and must be stopped.
"We heard tragic reports about the killing of four civilians, including three girls and a woman, in the vicinity of Aitaroun in southern Lebanon," Tenenti said.
He reiterated that attacks against civilians constitute a violation of international law and are considered "war crimes," calling for a cease-fire in southern Lebanon to "stop harming more people."
On Sunday, an Israeli drone attack hit a vehicle in the southern Lebanese village of Aitaroun, killing three children and their grandmother while injuring their mother.
Confrontations on the Lebanese-Israeli border continued on Monday, with Israeli forces attacking the outskirts of Naqoura and targeting Jabal Blat and the outskirts of the southern town of Marwahin with artillery shells, killing two Hezbollah fighters, said the NNA report.
It raised the number of casualties among members of the Shiite military group to 66. For its part, Hezbollah announced that its fighters targeted Israeli sites in al-Malikiyah and Jal al-Deir with missiles and attacked the technical equipment at Israel's al-Rahib military site.
On the same day, some 30 rockets were launched from Lebanon toward northern Israel, triggering Israeli artillery fire in response, Israel's military said in a statement. Hamas claimed responsibility for the rocket attack, saying 16 rockets were launched.
https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/UNI ... -0003.html
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German people’s movements march in solidarity with Palestine
As thousands took to the streets in Germany, people’s movements condemned the government’s crackdown on solidarity with Palestine. They also spoke out against the Olaf Scholz government’s complicity in Israel’s war on Gaza
November 06, 2023 by Peoples Dispatch
German activists protest in solidarity with Palestine. Photo: DIE LINKE Neukölln
On Saturday, November 4, thousands of people marched in Berlin in solidarity with Palestine and demanding an end to the ongoing genocide in Gaza by Israel. In the march called by various groups including the Palestine Campaign, Palestine Speaks, Jewish Bund, Migrantifa Berlin, Diem 25, and Klass gegen Klass, people marched holding placards and banners that read Stop Genocide, Free Palestine, Anti-Zionism is not Anti-semitism, etc. Protesters also raised the Palestine flag over the Neptune Fountain in Berlin. The march took place under heavy police surveillance due to the hostile attitude of the government towards pro-Palestine protests in Germany. Meanwhile, sections within the conservative Christian Democratic Union and other right-wing groups came out against the march and accused the government of not properly implementing the November 2 ban imposed on pro-Hamas activity and the prisoner solidarity group Samidoun.
The Palestine Campaign said that “the German government led by Olaf Scholz continues to offer Israel its unconditional support. The city of Berlin banned almost all protests in solidarity with Palestine, banned symbols of Palestinian identity from our schools, and triggered a wave of police violence against Palestinians and their supporters, with hundreds of people arrested. In the face of this escalation of the decades-long Israeli occupation of Palestine and restrictions on free expression in Germany, we need to take to the streets for Palestine, in more numbers than ever before.”
On Friday, hundreds of students and employees of the Free University of Berlin also organized a Palestine solidarity demonstration. They condemned the criminalization of Palestine solidarity in Germany, especially the ban on Samidoun.
Klass gegen Klass stated that “even the UN speaks of war crimes in the Israeli bombings of hospitals, schools, and refugee camps, while in Germany, the government, all established parties, and the media justify genocide carried out by Israeli army in the name of the “fight against Hamas terror.”
Socialist German Workers’ Youth (SDAJ) stated that “the ground offensive and Israel’s war against Palestine must be stopped immediately, humanitarian aid and rescue measures should be started immediately, the benign German silence on the war must be ended and the German Bundeswehr must not intervene in the conflict under any circumstances.”
Meanwhile, Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza continued unabated for the fifth week as the death toll neared 10,000. Over 30,000 people have been injured and over 1.4 million Gazans displaced.
https://peoplesdispatch.org/2023/11/06/ ... palestine/
@ejmalrai - 7:21 UTC · Nov 11, 2023
