Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was born April 28, 1937 and died December 30, 2006. He was the fifth President of Iraq, holding that position from July 16, 1979 until 9 April 2003. He was one of the leading members of the revolutionary Arab Socialist Ba’ath Party, and afterward, the Baghdad-based Ba’ath Party and its regional organization Ba’ath Party, Iraq Region, which advocated ba’athism, an ideological marriage of Arab nationalism with Arab socialism. (Patricia Ramos, july 2013)
An especially dangerous threat to liberty occurs when members of the press collude with government agencies instead of monitoring and exposing the abuses of those agencies. Unfortunately, collusion is an all-too-common pattern in press coverage of the national security state’s activities. The American people then receive official propaganda disguised as honest reporting and analysis.
"The national security of America and the security of the world could be attained if the American leaders [..] become rational, if America disengages itself from its evil alliance with Zionism, which has been scheming to exploit the world and plunge it in blood and darkness, by using America and some Western countries. What the American peoples need mostly is someone who tells them the truth, courageously and honestly as it is.
They don’t need fanfares and cheerleaders, if they want to take a lesson from the (sept. 11) event so as to reach a real awakening, in spite of the enormity of the event that hit America.
But the world, including the rulers of America, should say all this to the American peoples, so as to have the courage to tell the truth and act according to what is right and not what to is wrong and unjust, to undertake their responsibilities in fairness and justice, and by recourse to reason..."
Saddam Hussein, INA 15-9-2002
Joe Biden & Truth - 2009
US Vice President Joe Biden said that the new administration would seek the
unvarnished truth from its spies, whether or not their information supported
the goals of the government.
The Vice President's address was greeted with loud cheers by the several hundred CIA employees who gathered for the swearing in ceremony in the foyer of the Agency's headquarters in Langley, Virginia.
Standing before the wall of 89 stars representing the CIA staff who have died in the line of duty, Mr Biden said:
"We expect you to provide independent analysis, not to engage in group think. We
expect you to tell us the facts as you know them wherever they may lead, not
what you think we want to hear." (Tim Shipman. 20-2-2009)
"We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign
ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid
to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation
that is afraid of its people …
The wave of the future is not the conquest of the world by a single dogmatic creed but the liberation of the diverse energies of free nations and free men. …
Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind." John F.Kennedy
“Human beings are members of a whole,
In creation of one essence and soul.
If one member is afflicted with pain,
Other members uneasy will remain.
If you have no sympathy for human pain,
The name of human you can not retain.”
Saadi Shirazi
(Persian poet & humanist, born in Shiraz, Iran, c. 1210)
"The post-September 11 era in the US has heralded in a new age of ideology whose discourse and world views have served not only to accommodate such extremist views as those held by Sharon, but also to provide him with a platform and an influence that were unthinkable only a year ago.
Thus while the American President is busy devising a new Manichean universe of absolute good and absolute evil, pronouncing policy on the basis of a simplistic polarization of the world, and unilaterally defining the terms while categorizing state and non-state actors accordingly, Sharon’s Israel has maneuvered itself into a position of even greater power on the world stage provided explicitly by the US."
"Holism is the most fundamental discovery of 20th century science. It is a discovery of every science from astrophysics to quantum physics to environmental science to psychology to anthropology.
It is the discovery that the entire universe is an integral whole, and that the basic organizational principle of the universe is the field principle: the universe consists of fields within fields, levels of wholeness and integration that mirror in fundamental ways, and integrate with, the ultimate, cosmic whole...." "For many thinkers and religious teachers throughout this history, holism was the dominant thought, and the harmony that it implies has most often been understood to encompass cosmic, civilizational, and personal dimensions. Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha, Lord Krishna, Lao Tzu, and Confucius all give us visions of transformative harmony, a transformative harmony that derives from a deep relation to the holism of the cosmos."
About political holism
Political holism is based on the recognition that "we" are all members of a single whole. There's no "they," even though "we" are not all alike. Because "we" are all part of the whole, and therefore interdependent, we benefit from cooperating with each other. Political holism is a way of thinking about human cultures and nations as interdependent. Political holists search for solutions other than war to settle international disagreements. Their model of the world is one in which cooperation and negotiation, even with the enemy, even with the weak, promotes political stability more than warfare.
In an overpopulated world with planet-wide environmental problems, the development of weapons of mass destruction has rendered war obsolete as an effective means to resolve disputes.
Political dualists consider political holists unpatriotic for questioning the necessity to defeat "them." In times of impending war, political dualists tend to measure patriotism by the intensity of one's hostility to the country's immediate enemy. Naturally, they would view as disloyalty any suggestion that the enemy is not evil, any call for cooperation with the enemy, any criticism of one's own country.
To political dualists, cooperation with the enemy means capitulation, relinquishment of the nation's position of dominance. At its extreme, political dualism is essentially tribalism. (Betty Craige, 16-8-1997)
Desmond Tutu & Ubuntu
"A person with Ubuntu is open and available to others, affirming of others, does not feel threatened that others are able and good, based from a proper self-assurance that comes from knowing that he or she belongs in a greater whole and is diminished when others are humiliated or diminished, when others are tortured or oppressed."
"We think of ourselves far too frequently as just individuals, separated from one another, whereas you are connected and what you do affects the whole World.
When you do well, it spreads out; it is for the whole of humanity." (Ubuntu info)
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on Friday once again stressed the importance the kingdom places on a Palestinian state.
Speaking at the Arab League summit taking place in the country, bin Salman said, according to Channel 12 News, "The Palestinian issue was and still is the main issue of the Arab countries and is at the top of the kingdom's priorities. We will not delay in providing assistance to the Palestinian people in recovering their lands, restoring their legitimate rights and establishing an independent state within the borders of 1967 with East Jerusalem as its capital.">BR>
Palestinian Authority (PA) chairman Mahmoud Abbas, who attended the summit, said that "commemorating the Nakba at the UN refutes the Zionist narrative."
In addition, he called on the Arab countries to turn to the International Criminal Court over the “Israeli occupation” and charged, "Israel violates the signed agreements and UN resolutions and adheres to the colonial Zionist project which is based on the continuation of the occupation, ethnic cleansing and apartheid."
Haaretz noted that, in a statement summarizing the summit published after its conclusion, the members of the Arab League reaffirmed their support for the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative, which stipulates that 22 Arab countries will normalize ties with Israel in return for an Israeli withdrawal from Judea and Samaria.
Israel to date has rejected the 2002 Saudi proposal...
Flashback: The Arab Peace Initiative 2002
"Abdallah bin Abdul Aziz is offering Israel full peace, including political, economic and cultural normalization, in return for a full withdrawal from the territories. This is more than a mere license to exist in peace in the region and recognition of the existence of Israel.
This is the political horizon Saudi Arabia, in consultation with Egypt, Jordan and some of the Gulf countries, is willing to give Israel: Complete integration in the region; realization of the vision of the New Middle East; economic and cultural cooperation; falafel in Damascus and stalls in the international market of Dubai; an Israeli flag in Riyadh; programming engineers in Bahrain and gas from Qatar to Israel. This initiative offers Israel the fulfillment of supremely important interests, which are supposed to ease the pain of the concessions.
The importance of the initiative lies in the fact that it is Saudi Arabia that is putting it forward. It comes from the deepest heart of the Arab, and even more importantly, the Islamic world. Saudi Arabia did so, despite the fact that it has no war or border conflicts with Israel, and despite its increasingly growing ties with Iran. A Saudi seal of approval is an Islamic seal of approval, even if it does include Iran, and it is an Arab seal of approval." (Zvi Bar'el - Ha'aretz, 1-3-2002)
"I crashed the meeting of a lobbying front that ended the life-saving General License 2023 on Syria, and is now pushing to extend Washington’s economic war for another 8 years..." Hekmat Aboukhater is a Syrian American journalist reporting from France, the US, and Syria. Hekmat hosts the WhatTheHekmat Podcast and the Conversations With Dissidents show.
Ceasar Act 2019: “It is the policy of the United States that diplomatic and coercive economic means should be utilized to compel the government of Bashar al-Assad to halt its murderous attacks on the Syrian people and to support a transition to a government in Syria that respects the rule of law, human rights, and peaceful co-existence with its neighbors.”
This July 30, I registered under an alias to join a workshop organized by the Syrian American Council (SAC), the leading voice of the lobby that aims to starve and destabilize Syria into submission to the West’s demands. The workshop instructed SAC members to advocate for the most recent Syria regime change bill, H.R. 3202, during those visits.
During the seminar, I was able to witness firsthand the impact of the anti-Syria lobby and understand the cynical tactics it employs to condemn the population of Syria to poverty and famine. Most recently, the lobby successfully ended the life-saving sanctions exemption known as General License 23 (GL 23), which allowed humanitarian aid into Syria following the catastrophic earthquake that struck the country this February. The lobby succeeded in ending GL 23 by pushing a lie that workshop leaders repeated without end: “the sanctions only affect the Syrian government and not the people.”
In truth, the sanctions have done incalculable damage to the Syrian people, as the UN’s Special Rapporteur on sanctions, Alena Douhan, noted in an interview with The Grayzone in 2021...
On August 8th, after the allotted 180-day period came to an end, The Treasury Department announced that the life saving GL 23 would not be renewed.
The European Union extended its own earthquake license through the 24th of February 2024, the United Kingdom extended its own indefinitely, yet the U.S. alone returned to a post-earthquake status quo of draconian sanctions on the Syrian people. The Biden administration’s refusal to renew the crucial exception can be largely attributed to Washington’s unchanged policy of regime change in Syria.
After eight years spent backing jihadist and sectarian groups on the ground in its dirty war on Syria, the US shifted from pushing military conflict to encouraging economic suffocation. But the end goal had not shifted, nor had the ultimatum undergirding US policy: remove Bashar al-Assad or see Syria burn.
Although the decision was ultimately Washington’s, a constellation of NGOs and non-profit groups cleared the path. This network of organizations is composed of a handful of sectarian, personal-grievance driven actors hiding behind ten national organizations that put a Syrian face on Washington’s economic war on Damascus.
In early July, the Syrian American Council (SAC) announced it was opening registration for a workshop called “Mobilizing for H.R. 3202: In-District Engagement”.
Leading this How-to-Sanction-101 workshop was none other than Wa’el Alzayat, a veteran State Department asset who proudly served “with honors” under liberal interventionists like the current USAID director, Samantha Power, and the former US ambassador to Syria, Robert Ford.
Alzayat’s neoconservative views were perhaps most clearly crystallized in a 2017 opinion piece for the AIPAC-linked Washington Institute for Near East Policy in which he pushed for US military strikes on Syria, Iraq, and Iraq...
During the SAC workshop, Alzayat directed members to push their elected representatives to back legislation meant to thwart any economic recovery in Syria.
During the workshop I got to see first hand how the Anti-Syria lobby operates and how it exploits individual ambition, financial interest, and ignorance to drive its campaign for crushing sanctions.
As the session began, the neocolonial nature of the SAC’s “policy priorities” immediately became clear when Alzayat announced the group’s first stated goal: “restoring U.S. leadership” in the state of Syria.
Alzayat inadvertently revealed the group’s actual agenda: If they could pressure US policymakers to force a ceasefire in Syria, the lobbyist explained, they’d be one step closer towards their ultimate goal of attempting to “help” the country’s northwestern and northeastern regions “become independent.”
The Arab League recently called for normalization of relations with the government of Syria led by Bashar Al-Assad.
HR 3202 requires the U.S. government to oppose the effort of these 21 countries to re-engage with Syria by intensifying sanctions on the entire Syrian population... HR 3202 also forces the United States to oppose the diplomatic efforts of Arab nations and potentially penalize them for any consequential engagement with Syria.
HR 3202 intensifies economic sanctions on Syria that are currently in place under the 2019 Caesar Act. It also bans US government recognition of Syria and requires US opposition to normalization efforts by neighboring countries.
The bill intensifies existing Caesar Act sanctions in the following ways:
• Extending the sunset date for the end of Caesar sanctions by eight years, from the end of 2024 to the end of 2032.
• Adding to the list of transactions that are singled out as subject to sanctions.
• Requiring the executive branch to respond to requests from congressional committees to place sanctions on specified foreign nationals.
The legislation would also require the US government to compile a list of individuals and entities in 14 neighboring countries who engaged in financial transactions greater than $500,000 in Assad-controlled areas of Syria, and provide a determination of whether such transactions should trigger US sanctions.
With respect to neighboring countries’ diplomatic relations with Syria, the legislation would:
• Ban US recognition of the Assad regime and require the US government to “actively oppose recognition or normalization of relations by other governments with any Government of Syria that is led by Bashar Al-Assad.”
• Require use of the full range of US government powers to “deter reconstruction activities in any areas under the control of Bashar Al-Assad.”
• Require a US government interagency strategy to oppose “any actions taken or planned by foreign governments to normalize, engage with, or upgrade political, diplomatic, or economic ties” with the Assad regime.
Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian and Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah discussed bilateral ties and regional developments in Beirut.
Iranian Ambassador to Lebanon Mojataba Amani and the Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Nasser Kana'ani were also present at the meeting. During the meeting, the two sides conferred on the latest political developments in the region and Lebanon. On Thursday, the Iranian diplomat held a meeting with the leaders of the Palestinian resistance movements of Hamas and the Islamic Jihad in the Lebanese capital.
Amir Abdollahian arrived in Beirut on Thursday afternoon. Upon his arrival at Beirut airport, the top Iranian diplomat told reporters that Iran would continue its support for Lebanon.
Palestinian, Lebanese Resistance Leaders
Pledge United Response to Israel, FNA, 3-9-2023
Senior leaders of the Palestinian and Lebanese resistance movement said they are firmly determined to give a united response to Israel’s aggressive policies.
Secretary General of Lebanon's Hezbollah resistance movement Seyed Hassan Nasrallah on Saturday received Saleh Al-Arouri, deputy head of the Hamas' political bureau, and Ziad Al-Nakhaleh, the secretary-general of Palestine's Islamic Jihad movement, in Beirut, presstv reported. They reiterated the firm position of all the forces of the resistance axis to confront the Israeli regime, its occupation and arrogance.
It is necessary to maintain coordination and permanent communication among the resistance movements, especially in Palestine and Lebanon, to pursue all the political, security and military developments so that appropriate decisions would be made, they said. Furthermore, the parties conducted a joint assessment of the situation in the besieged West Bank and the upsurge of the resistance movement there...
The Palestinian Authority has pledged not to publicly reject or undermine Israeli normalisation of ties with Saudi Arabia, the Media Line reported on Tuesday.
The Biden administration is working closely with Saudi Arabia to reach a normalisation deal with the occupation state. The aim is to develop a financial and political package intended to placate the Palestinians and prevent a response similar to that generated by the 2020 Abraham Accords, which established diplomatic ties between Israel, the UAE and Bahrain.
According to the American diplomat, talks are centred around a “generous financial package that will lift the Palestinian economy out of its current state.”
FlashBack - Netanyahu 9-6-2023
Saudi normalization would be quantum leap forward
[Israeli] Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in an interview aired Friday that an Israeli normalization agreement with Saudi Arabia would be “a quantum leap forward” and “would change history” if it could be achieved, while saying such a deal was one of his primary policy goals in his latest term in office.
Speaking to Sky News, the premier said he could not guarantee that a deal will happen as “it’s up to the Saudis” but that he “certainly hope[s] so.”
Saudi Arabia, Netanyahu said, “is the most influential Arab country, not only in the Arab world — I think also in the Muslim world. It would fashion I think the possibility of ending the Arab-Israeli conflict, and I think that would also help us solve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.” (Jerusalem Post Info)
New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman published a column on Tuesday in which he urged the US and Saudi Arabia not to go through with a deal to normalize Saudi-Israeli relations, claiming that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government “is not normal”.
He noted that the deal “does it all on terms that would almost certainly cause the breakup of the current Israeli ruling coalition, which is led by far-right Jewish supremacists the likes of which have never held national security powers in Israe before.”
“Alas, though, this is not the version that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel is trying to sell us. So, I want to appeal directly to President Biden and the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman: Do not let Netanyahu make you his useful idiots. You cannot have normalization with an Israeli government that is not normal. It will never be a stable U.S. ally or Saudi partner. And right now, Israel’s government is not normal,” added Friedman...
“Netanyahu has been unilaterally changing tenets of our relationship and testing us. It’s time for the United States to test his government with a clear choice: annexation or normalization,” continued Friedman, who concluded his column with a call to the US and Saudi Arabia, “Just say no.”
US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken spoke Tuesday evening (sept 5) with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and separately with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, against the backdrop of talks regarding normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia – which also include a discussion on possible concessions for the Palestinians. After Blinken's talks with Netanyahu and Abbas, US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said in a briefing at the White Houselater on Tuesday that the talks do not portend an imminent breakthrough with Saudi Arabia.
Sullivan also said that the normalization agreement will be only one of the topics in talks to be held by Brett McGurk, White House Coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa in the US National Security Council, with the Palestinian delegation in Saudi Arabia.
The US State Department referenced the conversation between Blinken and Abbas and said that "the secretary of state spoke with Abbas, and expressed concern about the ongoing violence in the West Bank. He made it clear that the US supports measures to promote the freedom and security of the Palestinian people. The secretary and the chairman of the Palestinian Authority discussed support for the two-state solution - and opposition to actions that endanger the idea."
ALBAWABA- In a significant development aimed at advancing peace efforts in Yemen, a Houthi delegation is scheduled to visit Saudi Arabia tonight. This diplomatic initiative follows intensive Omani mediation, with the Houthi lead negotiator and group spokesperson at the forefront of these efforts. This move comes on the heels of a private visit by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to Oman, where he held talks with Sultan Haitham of Oman. Reports suggest that the Yemeni crisis topped the agenda during these discussions.
Ali Alquhoum, a prominent member of the Houthi Group, took to social media to announce the delegation's forthcoming journey to Saudi Arabia. The Omani mediators, who arrived in Sana'a earlier in the day, will accompany the delegation, signaling Omani commitment to fostering peace in Yemen.
The ongoing negotiations are expected to prioritize critical humanitarian issues, including the prompt payment of salaries, lifting the blockade on the Yemeni ports and airports, the unconditional release of all prisoners, and the withdrawal of foreign forces from Yemen's territory.
Addressing these concerns lays the foundation for substantive discussions on achieving a lasting comprehensive peace in Yemen. Saudi Arabia, with the support of Omani mediators, is seeking to disengage from the Yemeni quagmire and counter the ambitions of the UAE, which has been arming and financing separatist groups in southern Yemen.
Iraq-Kurdistan Region-News
In letter to Biden, Barzani warns of Iraqi Kurdistan's collapse, urges mediation Shafaq [Iraq], 2023-09-13
Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Prime Minister Masrour Barzani has appealed to President Joe Biden to intervene in a deepening crisis with the central government in Baghdad, airing fears that the Kurdistan Region might even collapse as an entity if the crisis is left unchecked, Al-Monitor has learned.
In a letter dated Sept. 3 that was addressed to Biden and delivered to the White House only this past Sunday, Barzani wrote, “I write to you now at another critical juncture in our history, one that I fear we may have difficulty overcoming.
[W]e are bleeding economically and hemorrhaging politically. For the first time in my tenure as prime minister, I hold grave concerns that this dishonorable campaign against us may cause the collapse of … the very model of a Federal Iraq that the United States sponsored in 2003 and purported to stand by since.”
“We believe that your administration retains significant leverage with Baghdad,” Barzani said of Washington’s ability to diffuse the crisis.
The cri de coeur comes amid escalating tensions between Erbil and Baghdad over budgetary allocations, oil sales and territories that both sides claim for their own. Barzani reiterated his calls for further US engagement to help resolve the disputes in a meeting on Monday in Erbil with US Ambassador to Iraq Alina Romanowski.
With Washington’s attention focused on China and the conflict in Ukraine, Barzani’s letter is meant to jolt the administration into action before a descent into violence.
That very specter loomed in the contested oil-rich province of Kirkuk last week when Kurds and Arabs allegedly bused in by Iran-backed Shiite militia groups clashed over a court decision preventing Barzani’s Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iraq (KDP) from reclaiming its headquarters in the regional capital...
The State Department declined to comment on the letter.
Since US forces birthed the creation of a putatively democratic Iraq with the 2003 overthrow of Saddam Hussein, the sides have tussled over what share of Iraq’s budget should go to the Kurds, with successive governments in Baghdad typically failing to hand over the amount of money agreed to at any given time. This, in turn, has left the KRG struggling to pay public sector employees who are due $625 million every month. In recent years, the refusal has stemmed from Baghdad’s view that the Iraqi Kurds have since 2014 been “illegally” selling Iraqi oil produced in the Kurdistan Region via Turkey without the central government’s consent.
Iraq took the matter to an international court of arbitration, and Turkey was slapped with a $1.5 billion fine earlier this year when the Paris-based International Chamber of Commerce ruled in Baghdad’s favor.
In response, Turkey halted the flow of some 400,000 barrels per day of Kurdish crude and a further 75,000 barrels per day of Iraqi crude from the Kirkuk fields....
Iraqi Kurdish officials have long aired frustration at what they say is the United States’ growing indifference to their plight, with letters going unanswered and senior US officials no longer engaging with the same frequency as they did under the previous administration when, for instance, the energy secretary would have monthly telephone calls with Barzani.
“The American mantra is ‘we are not an occupying force anymore,’” the official briefing Al-Monitor said.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s upcoming visit to China could prove a boost for Syria’s reconstruction efforts and invigorate the sanctions-hit Arab economy, says a Syrian political analyst.
Assad will visit China in the coming weeks for high-level talks on the expansion of political and economic relations between the two countries, according to reports.
The high-profile visit, the first in 12 years by the Syrian president to China, will include a meeting between Assad and Chinese President Xi Jinping, according to Arab media reports.
Kosai Abido, a Syrian political analyst and author, told the Press TV website in an interview that the visit would allow the two countries to strengthen their time-tested friendship.
“China has throughout the years defended Syria’s territorial integrity and many times used its veto power at the UN Security Council to prevent interventions in the Arab country’s internal affairs,” he stated, referring to the all-weather ties between Damascus and Beijing.
“China also backed Syria following the outbreak of the foreign-backed militancy in the country in 2011, particularly in dealing with the illegal anti-Syria sanctions. Now this visit is a good chance to deepen cooperation,” he hastened to add. The analyst said Beijing and Damascus are likely to come up with investment agreements in line with efforts to reconstruct Syria and undo the destruction caused by foreign-backed terrorists.
aleppo: 2010, 2012 and 2013
Chinese Foreign Ministry:
An opportunity to push relations with Syria to a new level
Syrian Arab News Agency, 21 September 2003
Beijing, SANA- The Chinese Foreign Ministry affirmed that the visit of President Bashar al-Assad and First Lady Asma al-Assad to China represents an opportunity to push bilateral relations to a new level.
“We believe that President al-Assad’s visit will deepen mutual political trust and cooperation in various fields and push bilateral relations to a new level”, AFP quoted Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning as saying during the daily press conference.
“China and Syria have a deep traditional friendship, and Syria was one of the first Arab States to establish diplomatic relations with Beijing”, Ning added. “Since the establishment of diplomatic relations,76 years ago, China-Syria relations have always maintained proper development”, Ning went on to say.
President Bashar al-Assad and First Lady Asma al-Assad
began a visit to People’s Republic of China SANA, 21 September 2023
An official reception ceremony was held at Hangzhou International Airport, where President al-Assad and the First Lady were received by Minister of Commerce Wang Wentao, Vice Chairman of the Advisory Council of Zhejiang Province, Gong Xiwei, and the Chinese ambassador to Damascus and his wife. The honor guard lined up on both sides of the red carpet, and behind them was a large group of Chinese children carrying flags and chanting Chinese national and traditional songs
In the year and a half since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, the public’s frustration with the U.S. government’s avid spending in and support of Ukraine has grown.
According to a recent CNN poll, most Americans—55 percent—oppose sending more monetary and other aid to Ukraine. Additionally, 56 percent believe that the war and our involvement in it constitutes a significant threat to our national security.
An overwhelming majority—82 percent of Democrats, 75 percent of independents, and 73 percent of Republicans—is worried that the war will continue indefinitely without resolution.
Given this disturbing reality, it would not be a far stretch to suggest that both Congress and the Biden administration should provide answers for the choices they have made regarding the over $100 billion of aid that has been sent overseas since the invasion.
Ohio’s Rep. Warren Davidson, a Republican, is seeking those answers with the “Define the Mission Act of 2023.”
This bill would require President Biden to submit a report to congress that would contain a specific strategy for U.S. involvement in Ukraine.
The report would include (1) a list of specific U.S. national interests which are currently at stake in the Russo–Ukrainian War, (2) goals that President Biden thinks must be accomplished to protect our interests, (3) “an estimate of the amount of time required to achieve the objective, with an explanation,” (4) a list of how much European members of NATO are expected to contribute to the war effort over the next year, and (5) “an assessment of the impact of the Russian Federation’s dominance of the natural gas market in Europe on the ability to resolve the ongoing conflict with Ukraine.”
The deadline to sign the bill is September 26, so its future is still uncertain. If the Define the Mission Act of 2023 does go into effect, the Biden administration will be forced to reckon with the fact that it cannot hide its actions and decisions from the public forever, and that the American people deserve to be privy to the process that is sending their money overseas without their permission and enthusiasm.
Beijing, SANA- President Bashar al-Assad affirmed that Syria today is more committed to heading east because it is the political, cultural and economic guarantee for it, and that is a principle on which the Syrian politics is based.
“I thank you for paying attention to the details of this visit in order to be a successful,” President al-Assad said during his meeting with Chinese Prime Minister Li Qiang in Beijing on Monday. President al-Assad described the meeting with the Chinese President Xi Jinping in the Chinese city of Hangzhou as very successful. The announcement of the establishment of strategic partnership relations between both countries was the most important results of this meeting.
President al-Assad underlined that China plays a major role on the international level in achieving international balance in the world. He pointed out that friendship and trust between Syria and China is based on a similar history and fixed principles, and these principles are the same from which we can move towards the future.
President al-Assad considered that the relationship between the two countries could gain further strength through the three initiatives proposed by Chinses President to develop cooperation in the economic and cultural fields and create joint investment projects within the Belt and Road Initiative.
He noted that most countries in the world are looking forward to the Chinese yuan becoming a global currency to get rid of the dollar that has become the Western weapon against the countries of the world.
Li Qiang said “Development in Syria faces sanctions and siege, and therefore China is keen to take the opportunity to announce the establishment of strategic relations to provide support to Syria and transform Syria’s geographical advantages into development opportunities.” He reiterated support for Damascus in rebuilding and consolidating stability, and assured that China welcomes Syria as a partner in the Belt and Road Initiative.
“Friendship is a tree whose roots are loyalty and whose branches are kindness. “You, your excellency, are an old and dear friend of the people of China,” the Chinese Prime Minister addressed President al-Assad.
Damascus, SANA: The Belt and Road Initiative is an important Chinese economic development project that aims to develop and establish land and sea trade corridors linking more than 150 countries, and to enhance cooperation between them in various fields, which establishes a new phase that puts an end to the hegemony of the US and its Western allies over the world’s capabilities and the theft of people’s resources. As the initiative establishes a multipolar world based on equality and respect for the mutual interests of all peoples.
The One Belt One Road (OBOR), the abbreviation for the Silk Road Economic Belt and the Maritime Silk Road in the 21st century, was launched by Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2013, with the aim of strengthening trade and economic ties between Asia, Europe and Africa, through the construction of railway networks, oil and gas pipelines, electric power lines, telecommunications and maritime infrastructure, and relaunching the ancient Silk Road...
A new movie glorifying the legacy of Zionist leader and Israel’s fourth Prime Minister, Golda Meir, has been released in selected cinemas in the US and Europe.
Golda is typical Israeli propaganda. The Israeli director, Guy Nattiv, has tried to whitewash Meir’s legacy of violence and open anti-Arab racism through portraying her as the “Iron Lady” of Israel, a “lioness” who triumphed as a politician and persisted as a military leader...
Like most Zionist Israeli leaders, she is presented as someone in constant conflict between multiple loyalties to ethnic, cultural, religious and national identities.
For Meir, the conflict was resolved through the prioritising of Jewish identity exclusively. This was demonstrated in the famous exchange that she had with then US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.
In a letter to Meir, Kissinger said that he considered himself “an American first, secretary of state second, and a Jew third.” In response, she accentuated her own priorities, and how she wanted to perceive Kissinger’s relationship to Israel. “In Israel,” she pointed out, “we read from right to left.”
Golda Meir wanted to be part of constructing a Zionist state in Palestine, today’s Israel, while simultaneously denying the very existence of the Palestinians, who have lived for numerous generations on that same land.
“Peace will come when the Arabs will love their children more than they hate us,” she once said, sowing the seed of the racist notion that Arabs and Palestinians hate their children. This played a major role in the portrayal of Palestinians in US media during the Second Intifada (2000-2005). In an interview with the Sunday Times in June 1969, Meir denied the very existence of Palestinians:
“It was not as though there was a Palestinian people in Palestine considering itself as a Palestinian people and we came and threw them out and took their country from them. They did not exist.”
She maintained that line until her death in 1978. In an interview with the New York Times in 1972, she insisted: “I said there never was a Palestinian nation.”
Golda Meir was born in Kyiv in 1898. Economic hardship forced her family to emigrate to the United States in 1906, where they settled in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
In high school, she joined the Zionist group, Poalei Zion (Workers of Zion). She immigrated to British Mandate Palestine in 1921 with her husband, Morris Myerson, and settled in Kibbutz Merhavya. In 1948, David Ben-Gurion appointed Meir to be a member of the Provisional Government.
In June 1948, Meir was appointed Israel’s Ambassador to the Soviet Union. Elected to the Knesset as a Mapai member in 1949, she served as Minister of Labor and National Insurance until 1956. In June 1956, she became Foreign Minister, a post she held until January 1966.
Between 1966 and 1968, she served as Secretary-General of Mapai, and then as the first Secretary-General of the newly formed Labor Party. When Prime Minister Levi Eshkol died suddenly in early 1969, the 71-year-old Meir assumed the post of premier on March 17.
The major event of her administration was the Yom Kippur War, which broke out with massive coordinated Egyptian and Syrian assaults against Israel on October 6, 1973.
Although she and the Labor Party won the elections (postponed due to the war until December 31, 1973), she resigned 1974 in favor of Yitzhak Rabin.
We are entering the end stage of the 30-year U.S. neoconservative debacle in Ukraine. The neocon plan to surround Russia in the Black Sea region by NATO has failed.
Four events have shattered the neocon hopes for NATO enlargement eastward, to Ukraine, Georgia, and onward.
The first is straightforward. Ukraine has been devastated on the battlefield, with tragic and appalling losses. Russia is winning the war of attrition...
The second is the collapsing support in Europe for the U.S. neocon strategy. Poland no longer speaks with Ukraine. Hungary has long opposed the neocons. Slovakia has elected an anti-neocon government. E.U. leaders – including Macron, Meloni, Sanchez, Scholz, Sunak, and others – have disapproval ratings far higher than approvals.
The third is the cut in U.S. financial support for Ukraine. The grassroots of the Republican Party, several GOP Presidential candidates, and a growing number of Republican members of Congress, oppose more spending on Ukraine...
The fourth, and most urgent from Ukraine’s point of view, is the likelihood of a Russian offensive. Ukraine’s casualties are in the hundreds of thousands, and Ukraine has burned through its artillery, air defenses, tanks, and others heavy weapons.
The neocons have created utter disasters in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, and now Ukraine.
The U.S. political system has not yet held the neocons to account, since foreign policy is carried out with little public or congressional scrutiny to date. Mainstream media have sided with the slogans of the neocons.
Ukraine is at risk of economic, demographic, and military collapse. What should the U.S. government do to face this potential disaster?
Urgently, it should change course. Britain advises the U.S. to escalate, as Britain is stuck with 19th-century imperial reveries. U.S. neocons are stuck with imperial bravado. Cooler heads urgently need to prevail.
President Joe Biden should immediately inform President Vladimir Putin that the U.S. will end NATO enlargement eastward if the U.S. and Russia reach a new agreement on security arrangements... Biden foolishly refused to negotiate with Putin in December 2021. It’s time to negotiate now...
The U.S. neocons carry much blame for undermining Ukraine’s 1991 borders.
Russia did not claim Crimea until after the U.S.-backed overthrow of Ukraine’s President Viktor Yanukovych in 2014. Nor did Russia annex the Donbas after 2014, instead calling on Ukraine to honor the UN-backed Minsk II agreement, based on autonomy for the Donbas. The neocons preferred to arm Ukraine to retake the Donbas by force rather than grant the Donbas autonomy.
The long-term key to peace in Europe is collective security as called for by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE). According to OSCE agreements, OSCE member states “will not strengthen their security at the expense of the security of other States.” Neocon unilateralism undermined Europe’s collective security by pushing NATO enlargement without regard to third parties, notably Russia.
Europe – including the E.U., Russia, and Ukraine – needs more OSCE and less neocon unilateralism as key to lasting peace in Europe.
Jeffrey D. Sachs is a University Professor and Director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, where he directed The Earth Institute from 2002 until 2016..
When we invaded and occupied Iraq, we didn’t just militarily defeat Iraq’s armed forces – we dismantled their army, and their police force, along with all the other institutions that held the country together.
The educational system was destroyed, and not reconstituted. The infrastructure was pulverized, and never restored. Even the physical hallmarks of a civilized society – roads, bridges, electrical plants, water facilities, museums, schools – were bombed out of existence or else left to fall into disrepair.
Along with that, the spiritual and psychological infrastructure that enables a society to function – the bonds of trust, allegiance, and custom – was dissolved, leaving Iraqis to fend for themselves in a war of all against all.
Oh, but our intentions were good – weren’t they? In retrospect, one has to wonder.
Of course, anyone can proclaim their intentions to be anything they like, but the trick is to peel away the rhetoric and observe what is actually going on – and what actually did go on was and is a horror show. What we are witnessing in post-Saddam Iraq is the erasure of an entire country. We can say, with confidence: We came, we saw, we atomized.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has named six key principles that international relations should be built upon. The president made the remarks on Thursday (oct 5) as he spoke at the Valdai International Discussion Club in Sochi.
Moscow understands what it wants to achieve when it comes to building international relations, Putin stated, but he admitted that such a complex process can be very difficult to predict and “life might and will certainly make its own adjustments.” The Russian president then outlined six points he believes should serve as foundations for international relations.
-- “We want to live in an open, interconnected world in which no one will ever try to erect artificial barriers to people’s communication, creativity, and prosperity,” Putin said, adding that Moscow strives to not only preserve the world’s diversity, but to make said diversity the “foundation of universal development.”
-- Russia also believes the world’s countries must have “maximum representation,” so that no one nation can assert their will upon any other.
-- “No one has the right and cannot rule the world for others or on behalf of others. The world of the future is a world of collective decisions made at those levels at which they are most effective, and by those participants who are truly capable of making a significant contribution to resolving a specific problem,” he explained.
-- Russia also believes in the principle of security for all, which would ensure a “lasting peace, built on respect for the interests of everyone, from great, large states to small countries,” the president said.
“We have been talking for decades about the indivisibility of security, about the fact that it is impossible to ensure the security of some at the expense of the security of others. Indeed, harmony in this area is achievable. You just need to put aside pride, arrogance and stop regarding others as second-class partners or as outcasts or savages,” Putin noted.
-- He stressed the importance of “universal justice,” declaring that no nation should be exploited by another. “Everyone should be provided with access to the benefits of modern development, and attempts to limit it for any country or people should be considered an act of aggression, exactly that,” the president explained.
-- Finally, Putin emphasized equality, as “no one is ready to obey, to make their interests and needs dependent on anyone, and, in particular, on the richer and more powerful anymore.”
“This is not just a natural state of the international community; it is the quintessence of the entire historical experience of mankind,” the Russian president concluded.
"In the early 21st century, everybody hoped that states and peoples had learned the lessons of the expensive and destructive military and ideological confrontations of the previous century, saw their harmfulness and the fragility and interconnectedness of our planet, and understood that the global problems of humanity call for joint action and the search for collective solutions, while egotism, arrogance and disregard for real challenges would inevitably lead to a dead-end, just like the attempts by more powerful countries to force their opinions and interests onto everyone else. This should have become obvious to everyone. It should have, but it has not. It has not.."
"When we met for the first time at the club’s meeting nearly 20 years ago, our country was entering a new stage in its development. Russia was emerging from an extremely difficult period of convalescence after the Soviet Union’s dissolution. We launched the process of building a new and what we saw as a more just world order energetically and with good will. It is a boon that our country can make a huge contribution because we have things to offer to our friends, partners and the world as a whole.
Regrettably, our interest in constructive interaction was misunderstood, was seen as obedience, as an agreement that the new world order would be created by those who declared themselves the winners in the Cold War. It was seen as an admission that Russia was ready to follow in others’ wake and not to be guided by our own national interests but by somebody else’s interests.
Over these years, we warned more than once that this approach would not only lead to a dead-end but that it was fraught with the increasing threat of a military conflict. But nobody listened to us or wanted to listen to us. The arrogance of our so-called partners in the West went through the roof. This is the only way I can put it." [...]
"The Ukraine crisis is not a territorial conflict, and I want to make that clear. Russia is the world’s largest country in terms of land area, and we have no interest in conquering additional territory.
We still have much to do to properly develop Siberia, Eastern Siberia, and the Russian Far East. This is not a territorial conflict and not an attempt to establish regional geopolitical balance. The issue is much broader and more fundamental and is about the principles underlying the new international order."
A barrage of rockets slammed into southern and central Israel Saturday morning, as Hamas terrorists infiltrated the country and took over Southern Israeli towns and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel is at war.
"We are at war, not in an operation or in rounds, but at war," the prime minister said in a video statement.
"Hamas has made a grave mistake this morning and launched a war against the State of Israel. IDF troops are fighting against the enemy at every location," said Defense Minister Yoav Gallant following a situation assessment...”
The IDF was striking the southern region and communities near the Gaza Strip with multiple operational forces it said Saturday afternoon in an operation it is calling "Iron Swords."
"Operational commanders are arriving to manage the combat in all areas," explained IDF Lieutenant Colonel Daniel Hagari. "Concurrently, we have initiated the call-up of reservists for various units within the IDF."
Numerous IDF units, including special units, have been deployed to the Gaza periphery and are engaging in various combat zones to protect the residents of the southern region. Dozens of IDF warplanes attacked 17 military compounds and four operational headquarters belonging to Hamas throughout the Gaza Strip, an IDF spokesperson said.
Mohammad Deif, a senior Hamas military commander, said on Saturday the group has launched a new operation against Israel. In a rare public statement, Deif stated that 5,000 rockets had been fired into Israel early Saturday to begin “Operation Al-Aqsa Storm”, Al-Jazeera reported.
“We’ve decided to say enough is enough,” Deif said as he urged all Palestinians to confront Israel. "We have already warned the enemy before. The occupation committed hundreds of massacres against civilians. Hundreds of martyrs and wounded died this year due to the crimes of the occupation," he added.
“We announce the start of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, and we announce that the first strike, which targeted enemy positions, airports, and miltary fortifications, exceeded 5,000 missiles and shells,” he continued.
Saleh Al-Arouri, deputy chief of Hamas in the occupied West Bank, has also issued a call to arms.
“We must all fight this battle, especially the resistance fighters in the West Bank,” he said in a statement.
“The West Bank is the final word in this battle, and it can open a clash with all the settlements in the West Bank. We call on our people to participate in the battle of Al-Aqsa Flood,” he added.
The Palestinian Islamic Jihad group has also announced it is “part of this battle”..
Meantime, the Israeli Army announced a number of Palestinian fighters “have infiltrated” Israel from the Gaza Strip, without providing further information: “Residents in the area surrounding the Gaza Strip have been asked to stay in their homes,” the army said in a statement.
Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant has declared an emergency situation within a range of 80km from the Gaza Strip, according to his office.. The Israeli Army announced it has started an operation aimed at Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip.
Saturday’s operation, which is being led by Hamas, but seemingly being joined by various militant factions across the Gaza Strip, was unprecedented on many fronts. It is already being considered one of the worst Israeli security and intelligence failures in recent history due to the fact that the operation largely caught Israel off guard. Saturday morning marked the first time since Israel placed Gaza under blockade more than 16 years ago that Gaza resistance fighters were able to break through the Israeli barrier fence along the border and enter Israeli territory on foot in large numbers.
Videos surfaced on social media, posted by both Israeli and Palestinian accounts, showing masked and armed Palestinian fighters arriving in Sderot and other Israeli towns bordering Gaza in trucks equipped with large caliber guns.
Other videos showed Palestinians in large numbers, both in vehicles and on motorbikes, breaking through openings in the Gaza border fence. As the morning continued, footage showed Palestinian bulldozers breaking down parts of the fence as seemingly ordinary Palestinians crossed into the other side.
Professional video footage released by Hamas in Gaza showed its fighters taking off from Gaza using power-motorized paragliders and flying into Israeli territory.
Israeli news channels reported that Palestinian fighters reached 21 different sites inside Israel and reported several Israeli deaths and hundreds of injuries.
The Israeli military response came several hours after the surprise attack of the resistance, as Israeli air forces launched airstrikes in the Gaza Strip at approximately 10:57 a.m., targeting a hospital in the north of Gaza and killing one of its staff. Other airstrikes were reported in several locations across the strip.
20 people have been killed by Israeli airstrikes in Gaza so far, including a journalist, while over 105 were injured.
Egypt’s Al-Azhar demanded on Saturday the international community stop applying double standards to the Israel-Palestine conflict, mourning Palestinian “martyrs” and praising their resistance:
“Al-Azhar proudly salutes the efforts of the resistance of the Palestinian people and demands that the civilized world and the international community look with reason and wisdom at the longest occupation known in modern history, the occupation of Palestine by the Zionists,” the world’s leading Sunni Islamic institution said in its statement.
“This occupation is a stain on the forehead of humanity and the international community, which weighs things with two scales and knows only double standards when it comes to the Palestinian issue,” Al-Azhar added.
Al-Azhar praised the resistance of the Palestinian people and their “martyrs who have instilled in us the spirit of confidence and restored life to us after we thought it would never return,” praying to God to grant them patience, steadfastness, peace, and strength. “Every occupation will eventually end, regardless of how long or short it lasts,” it added.
On Saturday morning, Hamas launched an unprecedented attack on Israel that killed more than 350 Israelis and wounded 1864.
Fighters from the group broke out of the blockaded Gaza Strip and rampaged through nearby Israeli settlements, capturing prisoners, both soldiers and settlers.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin declared a state of war, launching retaliatory strikes in Gaza that have leveled buildings and killed over 300 Palestinians and wounded 1990.
In the West Bank, seven Palestinians have been killed since Saturday – two in Ramallah, two in Hebron, one in Jericho, one in Qalqilya, and one in Nablus, according to the Palestinian health ministry.
Lebanon's Hezbollah joined the fighting on Saturday by firing artillery shells and guided missiles at Israeli positions, with Israel bombing southern Lebanon in retaliation.
China ‘deeply concerned’ at violence,
calls for establishment of Palestinian state Al-Monitor News, 8-10-2023
China’s foreign ministry has issued a statement on the conflict, saying it is “deeply concerned” over the “escalation of tensions and violence” between the Israelis and the Palestinians.
“The recurrence of the conflict shows once again that the protracted standstill of the peace process cannot go on,” the statement said. “The fundamental way out of the conflict lies in implementing the two-state solution and establishing an independent State of Palestine.”
The ministry said China would continue to work with the international community to find a peaceful resolution and urged the other countries to act with greater urgency to facilitate peace talks between the two sides.
Qatar held a number of phone calls with top diplomats from the United States and a number of regional countries on Saturday as Israel declared war and launched a massive bombardment campaign targeting the besieged Gaza Strip.
Calls were made between Qatar’s Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani and foreign ministers from the US, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Turkiye, according to several statements from Qatar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The US, which has long failed to condemn Israel’s attacks on Palestinians and annually pumps $3 billion into Israel’s economy, stressed Israel’s right to self defence during the latest escalations. In a press conference late on Saturday, US President Joe Biden vowed to stand by Israel’s side, describing his support as “rock solid and unwavering.”
“I’ve also directed my team to remain in constant contact with leaders throughout the region, including Egypt, Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Oman, the UAE, as well as with our European partners and the Palestinian Authority,” Biden added. In a statement on Saturday, Qatar said it holds the Israeli occupation “solely” responsible for the ongoing flare ups while expressing its “deep concern” on the developments in Gaza.
“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs holds Israel alone responsible for the ongoing escalation due to its ongoing violations of the rights of the Palestinian people, the latest of which is the repeated raids on the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque under the protection of the Israeli police,” the statement said.
Israel occupied the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem in a bloody war in 1967, widely known as “the six-day war” or the Naksa, which translates to the “setback”.
Within six days, the Zionist state captured the majority of Palestine while forcibly displacing at least 300,000 Palestinians.
Saturday’s operation by Hamas, Gaza’s ruling party, is widely seen as a historic moment for Palestine, which has been living under Israeli occupation for 75 years.
Home two more than two million Palestinians, Gaza has faced an illegal Israeli air, land and sea blockade since 2007 and has been widely described as the world’s “largest open-air prison”.
Palestinians under siege live with limited electricity and water supplies while patients with severe illnesses struggle to exit the city for treatment as they require Israeli permits.
New Gaza Conflict shows that “Abraham Accords”
can’t bring Peace as Long as Israelis keep Palestinians Occupied and Stateless Juan Cole (Informed Comment), 8-10-2023
The conflict that broke out on October 7, 2023, between Palestinian militants and Israel underlined once again that the status quo, with Israel occupying 5 million stateless Palestinians, is unsustainable.
In the midst of the 2012 presidential campaign, Republican standard-bearer Mitt Romney was recording giving a fundraising speech in which he admitted that it was impractical to give the Palestinians a state and that the only thing you could do with the Israel-Palestine issue was to “kick the can down the road.”
Periodic kinetic conflicts are the price of the American elite’s studied inaction and, worse, coddling of the ugliest political forces on the Israeli side, as well as failure to offer ordinary Palestinians a dignified life that could allow them to develop alternatives to the ambitious and bloodthirsty fundamentalists who run Gaza.
More recently, the standard line from both Israeli politicians such as Binyamin Netanyahu and from American politicians such as Jared Kushner (Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East) and Biden’s Secretary of State Antony Blinken, has been that Palestinian citizenship in a state is not essential to a peace settlement.
Rather, Israel can do diplomatic deals with Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Morocco, Sudan, and now perhaps Saudi Arabia. The wealthier Middle East states could exchange technology with Israel, do joint start-ups, and engage in trade, giving a fillip to the Israeli economy that would trickle down to the Palestinians.
With rising incomes and economic well-being, the Palestinians would be content to forego rights to nationhood and would acquiesce in Israeli military rule (in the Palestinian West Bank) or Israeli siege (in the Gaza Strip).
As with all trickle-down theories, this one is a chimera, an illusion, in brief, a scam.....
While the so-called “Abraham Accords” may have allowed Arab oil billionaires and Israel tech billionaires to do some deals, those people were never at war in the first place, and their finances remained in the stratosphere out of sight of ordinary mortals.
We have seen the rise of a set of fascist parties among the Ultra-Orthodox Jews and especially those who had been encouraged or allowed by the Israeli government to squat on land owned by Palestinian families in the West Bank...
The Israeli extremists have openly been talking about illegally annexing the occupied Palestinian territories that Israel seized in 1967 and imposing full Israeli sovereignty, with the implication that the stateless Palestinians would somehow be expelled...
The rhetoric about making the Palestinians forget all about being Palestinians by luring them with a good economy always consisted of empty rhetoric. It was nothing more than a smokescreen for predatory projects of colonizing and appropriating Palestinian land or making Gaza into an open air penitentiary...
The Israeli military on Monday said it struck hundreds of Hamas and Islamic Jihad targets in the Gaza Strip overnight and had sent four combat divisions south where it continued to battle Islamist militants two days after a bloody incursion.
A military spokesman said fighting was ongoing at seven or eight locations near Gaza two days after gunmen from Islamist group Hamas killed 700 Israelis and abducted dozens more in the deadliest raid into Israeli territory since Egypt and Syria’s attacks in the Yom Kippur war 50 years ago. Hamas fighters also continued to cross into Israel from Gaza, the spokesman said.
Israeli air strikes on Sunday hit housing blocks, tunnels, a mosque and homes of Hamas officials in Gaza. The Palestinian health ministry said more than 400 people including scores of children had been killed.
“The price the Gaza Strip will pay will be a very heavy one that will change reality for generations,” said Defence Minister Yoav Gallant in the town of Ofakim, which suffered casualties and had hostages taken.
Israeli military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Conricus said the country had called in around 100,000 soldiers. “Our job is to make sure that at the end of this war, Hamas will no longer have any military capabilities to threaten Israeli civilians with, and in addition to that we also need to make sure Hamas will not govern the Gaza Strip,” he said.
Palestinian fighters took dozens of hostages to Gaza, including soldiers and civilians, children and the elderly. A second Palestinian militant group, Islamic Jihad, said it was holding more than 30 of the captives.
Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said the assault would spread to the West Bank and Jerusalem. Gazans have lived under an Israeli-led blockade for 16 years, since Hamas seized control of the territory in 2007.
“How many times have we warned you that the Palestinian people have been living in refugee camps for 75 years, and you refuse to recognise the rights of our people?” Haniyeh said.
Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi said Thursday that the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip must stay steadfast and "remain on their land," warning of "the liquidation" of the Palestinian cause... The Palestinian cause is the issue of all Arabs, the president affirmed, adding that Egypt will exert "utmost" efforts to alleviate the burden endured by the Palestinians. Egyptian security sources warned that some parties and forces plan to forcibly displace Palestinians from their land amid the Israeli retaliation for Hamas's Saturday surprise attack.
"Egypt is exerting great efforts to contain the escalation and ongoing fighting and alleviate the suffering of the Palestinian people in the strip," El-Sisi asserted.
"Our contacts with the leaders and officials never cease," he said, stressing that Egypt spares no effort to coordinate with "its Arab brothers and friends" to resolve the current crisis.
"We are keen that humanitarian and medical aid arrives in the [Gaza] Strip," the president affirmed.
Egypt, El-Sisi asserted, is ready to "harness all its capabilities and efforts toward mediation in coordination with all international and regional partners without restrictions or conditions."
He warned against the "relentless efforts by multiple parties" to derail the Palestinian issue so that it strays off the path to achieving a just peace based on the principles of the Oslo Accords, the Arab Peace Initiative, and the resolutions of international legitimacy."
These parties want, instead, to escalate the situation, leading to "zero-sum conflicts where there is no winner or loser," added El-Sisi. Peace is a strategic choice for Egypt, said the president, adding that such an approach "makes it incumbent upon Egypt not to abandon our brothers in beloved Palestine and to help them retain their capabilities and their legitimate rights."
The Egyptian foreign ministry stressed that contrary to inaccurate information, the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip has not been closed since the onset of the current crisis.
Egypt has designated North Sinai's El-Arish International Airport as a receiving point for international humanitarian assistance to be delivered to Gaza -- currently under a complete blockade by Israel.
Israel’s military orders civilians to evacuate Gaza City
ahead of possible ground invasion
Ahram onnline|AP, Friday 13 Oct 2023
Israel’s military delivered sweeping evacuation orders for almost half of Gaza’s 2.3 million people Friday ahead of a feared ground invasion, U.N. officials said.
The order sent panic through civilians and aid workers already struggling under Israeli airstrikes and a blockade.
The Israeli military sent one evacuation order directly Friday morning, warning the hundreds of thousands of civilians of Gaza City to flee deeper south into the Gaza Strip, a narrow coastal territory. Israel’s directive charged that Hamas militants were hiding in tunnels under the city.
“This evacuation is for your own safety,” the Israeli military said, in a warning it said was sent to Gaza City civilians.
The United Nations said it received a separate directive from the Israeli military shortly before midnight, giving all 1.1 million civilians of northern Gaza 24 hours to flee south.
“This is chaos, no one understands what to do,” said Inas Hamdan, an officer at the U.N. Palestinian refugee agency in Gaza City, while she grabbed whatever she could throw into her bags as the panicked shouts of her relatives could be heard around her. She said all the U.N. staff in Gaza City and northern Gaza had been told to evacuate south to Rafah.
Nebal Farsakh, a spokesperson for the Palestinian Red Crescent in Gaza City, said there was no way more than one million people could be safely moved that fast..
“The United Nations considers it impossible for such a movement to take place without devastating humanitarian consequences,” U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said.
“The United Nations strongly appeals for any such order, if confirmed, to be rescinded avoiding what could transform what is already a tragedy into a calamitous situation,” Dujarric said.
Another U.N. official said that the United Nation is trying to get clarity from Israeli officials at the senior most political level.
“It’s completely unprecedent,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly.
The number of people forced from their homes by Israel’s airstrikes soared 25 percent in a day, reaching 423,000 out of a population of 2.3 million, the U.N. said Thursday.
A visit by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, along with shipments of U.S. weapons, offered a powerful green light to Israel to drive ahead with its grisly retaliation in Gaza, even as international aid groups warned of a worsening humanitarian crisis.
Israel has halted deliveries of basic necessities and electricity to Gaza’s 2.3 million people and prevented entry of supplies from Egypt.
“Not a single electricity switch will be flipped on, not a single faucet will be turned on and not a single fuel truck will enter," Israeli Energy Minister Israel Katz said on social media, demanding the release of captive Israelis.
Iran urges US to 'control' Israel to avert regional war
AFP, Friday 13 Oct 2023
"If the Americans want to prevent the war in the region from developing, they must control Israel," Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said, adding, "one of the goals of our trip is to stress on Lebanon's security".
Iran's foreign minister, whose government supports Hamas and other Middle East militant groups, said on Thursday opening a "new front" against Israel would depend on Israel's actions in Gaza.
Although Tehran has been a long-term backer of Hamas, Iranian officials have been adamant that the country had no involvement in the militants' attack against its arch enemy Israel on Saturday.
Nevertheless, the United States fears the opening of a second front on Israel's northern border with Lebanon if Hezbollah, another heavily armed militant group backed by Iran, were to intervene.
Speaking from Beirut's airport, the top diplomat said that Iran's regional allies, known as the "axis of resistance", could respond if Israel's Gaza offensive escalates. "The continuation of war crimes against Palestinians and Gaza will receive a response from the rest of the axes," he told reporters.
The West has been cautious about Iran since Saturday, but its leaders have warned Tehran in no uncertain terms against intervening in the war.
US President Joe Biden said on Wednesday that he had "made it clear to the Iranians: Be careful".
Blinken: ‘As long as America Exists,’ It Will Support Israel
by Dave DeCamp, antiwar.com, October 12, 2023
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken declared in Tel Aviv on Thursday that “as long as America exists,” it will support Israel, a pledge that came amid a relentless Israeli bombardment of Gaza.
“The message that I bring to Israel is this: You may be strong enough on your own to defend yourself – but as long as America exists, you will never, ever have to. We will always be there, by your side,” Blinken said alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Since Hamas launched an unprecedented attack on southern Israel on October 7, the US has shipped more military equipment to Israel, deployed an aircraft carrier strike group, and augmented its fighter jets in the region. Congress is poised to authorize more military aid on top of the $3.8 billion Israel receives each year.
“We’re delivering on our word — supplying ammunition, interceptors to replenish Israel’s Iron Dome, alongside other defense materiel. The first shipments of US military support have already arrived in Israel, and more is on the way,” Blinken said.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan criticized Western countries for remaining silent and their complicity as Israel commits war crimes by blocking access to food, water and electricity in Gaza, in violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Speaking at the Türkiye Youth Foundation (TÜGVA) meeting in Ankara on Thursday, Erdoğan said the West, especially the U.S., has chosen to fan the flames rather than de-escalate tensions in Gaza.
"Is it befitting for a country like the U.S. to restore peace, or to add fuel to fire?" Erdoğan said. He noted that it is inhumane of Israel to cut off access to water, electricity, fuel and food for 2 million Palestinians living in an area of 360 square kilometers and that it is in violation of the law of war.
"We do not want conflicts to spread to our region, instead of blindly supporting someone, we call on influential actors to reduce tension," Erdoğan said.
Sheikha Hind bint Hamad Al Thani, who also serves as the Vice Chairperson of the Qatar Foundation (an educational organisation), sent out a heartfelt message of solidarity with Gaza on Thursday...
Sheikha Hind said she is “committed to extending our support to our community in any activities you may wish to initiate in solidarity with the Palestinian cause”.
“Like so many of you, I have been witnessing the news and events unfolding in Palestine and I am horrified at the scale of murder and destruction being carried out in Gaza, and the ensuing suffering and humanitarian crisis...
Sheikha Hind signed off with an unapologetic stance in support of Palestine and its people’s right to freedom and life, saying: “Finally, let there be no doubt about this – QF always has and always will stand with Palestine.”
Sheikha Hind made her stance clear while students at some universities in Qatar have rallied against statements sent by their institutions’ main campuses in the United States in recent days; statements that have turned a blind eye to Israeli atrocities against Palestinians and the continued war crimes being perpetrated by the zionist state...
In a detailed letter, Associate Professor of Arabic Literature at GUQ, Omar Khalifah, addressed what he described as a false narrative painted by Georgetown President John J. DeGioia’s recent email.
“President De Gioia’s message suggests that Israelis were targeted simply because they were Jews.
The reference to the Jewish Sabbath, along with the invocation of the Yom Kippur War, draws a false picture of a quasi-religious war,” Khalifah asserted, further clarifying that in neither historical cases were Israelis targeted because they were Jews. “Both are political acts of resistance against a colonising, political force.”
The professor was particularly disturbed by DeGioia’s dismissal of the critical situation in Gaza...
I find peculiar the conviction of so many politicians in Europe and North America, not to mention Israel itself, that the Hamas attacks of October 7 and after justify the casual murder thousands of Palestinian noncombatants in Gaza by the Israeli armed forces, including through aerial bombardment on densely populated neighborhoods, displacement of the infirm, and denying civilians water, food and electricity....
Half of Gaza consists of children, most born after 2006 when Hamas came to power in the Strip through elections insisted upon by George W. Bush. Large numbers of these children are set to be killed, and several hundred already have been, by Israeli aerial, tank and artillery bombardment. Although the stated military objective is to destroy the Hamas guerrillas, that objective is being pursued with obvious reckless disregard for the welfare of civilian noncombatants.
Hamas viciously attacked Israel and committed unspeakable war crimes, and it is legitimate for the Israeli armed forces to go after it in a determined way.
It is not legitimate to ethnically cleanse civilians in Gaza or to blow them to smithereens in pursuit of ethno-national revenge. Anyone who thinks the latter is not happening doesn’t have eyes in their head...
The US State Department has forbidden its diplomats from calling for deescalation in Gaza and the Biden administration has rebuked Democrats who want to forestall the massacre, showing that the power elite in the United States now is embroiled in white supremacist revenge fantasies.
This bloodthirstiness is not new — Washington sacrificed up hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives in revenge for 9/11.
It was no excuse that Iraqis had nothing to do with it, just as it is no excuse that most people in Gaza had nothing to do with October 7.
US President Joe Biden will hold talks with Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, Jordan's King Abdullah and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Amman after his Wednesday visit to Israel amid Israeli deadly strikes on Gaza.
According to a statement by the White House on Monday, Biden will discuss with the three Arab leaders the humanitarian needs of civilians in the Gaza Strip, where Israel has cut off food, fuel, electricity, and much of the water.
Biden will also reiterate during the meeting that "Hamas does not stand for the Palestinian people's right to dignity and self-determination."
On Tuesday, Jordan Royal Court announced that King Abdullah II will host a quadrilateral summit in Amman on Wednesday. "The primary agenda of the summit is to discuss the critical developments in Gaza and their impact on the wider region. A key objective is to facilitate the delivery of humanitarian and relief aid to the Gaza region," the court added in a statement.
Biden plans an extraordinary solidarity visit to Israel, during which he will "demonstrate his steadfast support" for the country. However, Biden said that the Israeli occupation of Gaza would be “a big mistake.
Biden's visit comes shortly after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the US and Israel have agreed to develop a plan enabling humanitarian aid from donor states and organizations to reach Gazan civilians.
Over the past few days, Blinken has been on a Middle East tour, visiting Egypt, Jordan, Qatar, Bahrain, and Saudi Arabia between two visits to Israel.
Egypt has been communicating with the Palestinian and Israeli sides in a bid to achieve calm in Hamas-run Gaza, which has seen worsening humanitarian conditions amid unrelenting Israeli strikes over the past 10 days.
Egypt has received tons of humanitarian aid from donor countries but they remain stranded in El-Arish, North Sinai, as Israel has launched repeated strikes on the neighbouring Rafah border crossing.
Israeli strikes on the Gaza Strip have killed over 2,800 Palestinians and left nearly 11,000 injured, with the vast majority being women and children.
The ongoing missile strikes have left Gaza in ruins, with countless homes reduced to rubble, and its 2.3 million residents struggling with severe shortages of essentials like food, water, and electricity.
In a statement issued on Tuesday, Al-Azhar told the Palestinians that they should be confident that the West, despite all its military power and destructive machinery, is weak and apprehensive when confronting them because he is fighting on a land that is not his and defending outdated ideologies and doctrines.
“The Islamic nation should harness the power, wealth, resources, and assets that Almighty God has bestowed upon it to firmly stand behind Palestine and its oppressed people, who are facing an enemy that has lost its conscience, empathy, and feeling, turning its back on humanity, ethics, and the teachings of the prophets and messengers,” Al-Azhar concluded.
An Israeli airstrike on Al Ali Baptiste Hospital that killed over 600 Palestinians caused a global outcry and sparked protests across the Arab and Muslim world. After 11 days Israel has killed over 3,000 Palestinians while at least 1,400 Israelis lost their lives since the fighting broke against Hamas on 7 October.
President Joe Biden arrived in Tel Aviv on Wednesday on a rare wartime visit, pledging US support for Israel and meeting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as well as members of the war cabinet.
"We will continue to have Israel's back as you work to defend your people,” he said.
Biden briefly addressed the Gaza hospital bombing, backing the Israeli government and telling Netanyahu it “appears as though it was done by the other team.”
The White House confirmed that Biden is no longer going to Jordan.
“After consulting with King Abdullah II of Jordan and in light of the days of mourning announced by President [Mahmoud] Abbas of the Palestinian Authority, President Biden will postpone his travel to Jordan and the planned meeting with these two leaders and President [Abdel Fattah] al-Sisi of Egypt,” the White House said.
A regional official told Al-Monitor’s Jared Szuba that the decision to cancel Biden’s summit in Amman was “collective” and not a unilateral one by Jordan...
Meanwhile, intense negotiations to open the Rafah crossing continued as a blast hit the area, adding to operational problems that could delay opening the only passage out of Gaza. On Tuesday, Jordan’s King Abdullah said that neither his country nor Egypt will accept Palestinian refugees, declaring it a "red line."
Why do US Politicians target Gaza Civilians
with Bloodthirsty Rhetoric, Greenlighting Ethnic Cleansing? Dan Dinello 10/18/2023
In retaliation for Hamas’ attack of October 7, Israel enforced a total siege on Gaza, denying its 2.3 million inhabitants access to electricity, food, water and fuel while bombarding its population with a massive aerial assault whose targets include mosques, schools, and hospitals. No humanitarian supplies, except for some fuel, have been allowed into Gaza for over a week.
The situation in Gaza has reached the “level of genocide,” said Shawan Jabarin, head of the al-Haq rights group. “You wanted hell — you will get hell,” declared Israeli general Ghassan Aliyan.
Israel ordered 1 million Gazans — mostly refugees descended from refugees — to evacuate the northern part of the strip, in advance of an inevitably bloody ground invasion. The only exit from Gaza — the Rafah border crossing into Egypt — was bombed by Israel and remains closed by Egypt as of Tuesday. The United Nations said that it considered the evacuation “logistically impossible.”
Trying to “justify” the evacuation of Palestinians and the incineration of Gaza’s remaining noncombatant population — a collective punishment which is a war crime, Israeli president Isaac Herzog said that there are no innocent civilians in Gaza, a morally indefensible position: “It is an entire nation that is responsible. They could have risen up, they could have fought against the evil regime.”
Likewise, Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant defended Palestinian genocide on racist grounds when he said “We are fighting human animals, and we act accordingly.”
Inflaming already heated rhetoric, an enraged Israeli political class emphasized a dark vision of unrestrained retribution. “Israel needs to create a humanitarian crisis” to eradicate Hamas, wrote the former head of the Israeli National Security Council Giora Eiland. “Gaza will become a place where no human being can exist.”
Despite Israel’s flaunting of international humanitarian law, the U.S. government has done little publicly to discourage Israel from committing war crimes by its blocking of supplies essential to survival, its impossible evacuation order, its collective punishment, and its disproportionate killing of civilians, especially children.
A speech by President Biden last week suggested that the U.S. backed whatever Israel regarded as necessary to defend itself and defeat Hamas. But, the Palestinian people are not Hamas and defending against Hamas terrorism cannot be the mass death of Palestinians.
Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi on Wednesday declared his government’s rejection of the forced transfer of Palestinian civilians from Gaza into Sinai, suggesting Israel could instead relocate them to the Negev desert.
The statements come as Israeli air strikes continue to bombard civilian buildings and infrastructure in the besieged Gaza Strip for the 12th day, with the latest attack targeting a hospital on Tuesday killing at least 471 civilians, both patients and displaced people. Palestinians and Egyptian officials have rejected the prospect of relocating Gaza residents to Sinai, warning it would constitute a second Nakba, or another ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.
palestinians 1948 - 1949
During a joint press conference with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz at Cairo’s Ittihadeya palace on Wednesday, Sisi responded to Israeli proposals for Palestinian civilians to relocate to Egypt’s Sinai peninsula, on the border with Gaza.
“If there is an idea for transfer, there is the Negev Desert in Israel. It is entirely possible to transfer Palestinians until Israel completes its declared mission of eliminating resistance or armed groups such as Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and others in the Gaza Strip. Then, they can be returned if [Israel] desires,” Sisi said in comments that were not in the official speech published by the presidency spokesman.
“But transferring them to Egypt? This military operation could take years and is a risky endeavour. I must emphasise that we have not yet eradicated terrorism; we have not completed our mission.
“Egypt will bear the consequences of this, and Sinai may turn into a base for terrorist operations against Israel.
'We, in Egypt, will be responsible for that, and all the peace we have worked for will fade away as part of an idea to resolve the Palestinian issue.”
The president also warned that "millions" of Egyptians will protest against any displacement of Palestinians to Sinai...
Meanwhile, Israel has amassed tanks near the boundary with Gaza ahead of an expected ground invasion of the enclave - the first such incursion in more than nine years. The Israeli army on Friday said that civilians in the north of Gaza must leave southwards, and that they would not be allowed to return "until we say so"...
Since 1948, Israel has prevented Palestinian refugees, who were expelled by Zionist militias prior to the establishment of Israel, from returning to their native land. Currently, the estimated count of Palestinian refugees stands at more than 5.6 million.
There was a time when attacking civilians was considered a war crime. It quickly disappeared from thought in WW2 when bombing began to flatten cities; the rationale being that civilians assisted in the war effort through working in manufacturing, or doing other men’s jobs, to free them to go and fight.
So here we are again with the Middle East in turmoil and Gaza being bombed at will.
The logic of it all might be understandable as revenge to satisfy voters but if Bibi Netanyahu focused on the future, he might realize that embittering the children of today will produce the fighters of tomorrow.
Will Israel and Palestine produce another Hundred Years War as in Europe from 1337 to 1453? One could ask a further question: Are we more civilized now than in the days when armies met on a plain somewhere to determine the winner of a dispute while civilians who were going to be taxed no matter who won (and whose prior taxes were paying for the show) stayed out of the way?
The fact is Israel had a hand in creating Hamas, an Islamist group, as a foil to Yasser Arafat’s secular PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization).
Brigadier General Yitzhak Segev, the Israeli military governor in Gaza in the early 1980s, confessed to financing the group, the object being to divide the Palestinians. Arafat himself referred to Hamas as a creature of Israel. In short, the Israelis first forged political Islamists into Hamas and are now trying to blockade, besiege and bomb it out of existence.
Israeli soldiers are raiding Gaza and Netanyahu has been calling this bombing and attacks … just the beginning. Blowback is the term used to describe a situation that goes awry, and Hamas is an Israeli strategic blowback in spades.
Since the PLO now PA (Palestinian Authority) is relatively supine, Hamas has soared in popularity defeating the PA in Gaza elections.
The PA governs the portions of the West Bank that Israel allows it to. The 87-year-old Mahmoud Abbas is the president, continuing in office with his official elected term long expired. He has been referred to as Israel’s policeman and Hamas refuses to recognize him. Well educated, he earned a law degree from the University of Damascus and later a doctorate in Moscow.
President George W. Bush presented a ‘roadmap for peace’ in 2002 formally proposed by the Quartet on the Middle East which envisioned Israel and an independent Palestinian state existing side by side in peace. Anathema to the religious right and extremists who desire a Greater Israel — the road map hit a roadblock when the right wing rose to power in Israel.
Israel was quite comfortable with the status quo — leaving Palestinians in a sort of limbo trapped in Gaza or the West Bank, surrounded by a myriad of checkpoints to keep Israelis safe. That is until the Palestinians used bulldozers to break through the fences and paragliders to fly over, in a carefully planned and well rehearsed attack.
One can only hope that the lessons learned in the latest bloodletting will lead to peace after the lust for revenge has been satisfied...
Hamas blames the current war with Israel, in part, on the recent “desecration” of the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound by Israeli settlers.
These are provocations that have been going on for a long time.
Earlier this year, during Ramadan, Muslims in Al-Aqsa were observing a religious ritual called itikaf.
But Israeli police accused some worshippers of being “masked agitators”, so they stormed in with tear gas, viciously swinging batons. The assault resulted in international condemnation — and retaliatory rocket attacks on Israel from inside Gaza and southern Lebanon.
Israel responded with an aerial barrage on Lebanon and Gaza — but many at the time asked, why was this happening? Some said it would make it easier for hard-right Israeli settlers to enter Al-Aqsa compound, some of whom want the mosque torn down.
Then on October 1, thousands of settlers started to conduct provocative tours of the mosque compound.
On October 4, dozens of Israeli settlers stormed the compound, the third holiest site in Islam, while police prevented young Palestinians from entering the mosque.
In response to Hamas’s Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, Israel seems ready for a massive ground invasion of Gaza, while the US has sent a second aircraft carrier to the Mediterranean, leaving many people to wonder, when might all the death and destruction finally end?
While leaders of the Arab countries at the Cairo Summit for Peace have focused on the need to halt the war in Gaza and return to negotiations, most of the European officials in attendance were more keen on condemning Hamas for its 7th of October attack inside Israel and defending Israel's "right to self-defense."
These differences between the Arab and European delegations hindered the issuance of a final communique for the summit.
Sources told Ahram Online that a communique have not been issued as the European leaders have demanded a clear condemnation of Hamas and a recognition of Israel’s right to self-defense.
Leaders of the United Kingdom, France, Greece, Cyprus as well as the European Council have condemned Hamas’s attack as “terrorist” during their participation in the summit.
Meanwhile, they viewed the Israeli strikes that killed more than 4,000 civilians, more than half of whom are children, in the context of Israel’s right to defend itself as per international law.
During the summit, the leaders of Egypt, Jordan, Iraq and Palestine rejected targeting civilians and called for the cessation of the military operations in the strip.
Jordan’s King Abdullah II denounced global silence amid the Israeli bombing of the strip and the policies of collective punishment practiced against Palestinian civilians.
In a statement after the summit, the Egyptian Presidency said the ongoing war has disclosed a “shortcoming” in the values of the international community in addressing crises. “While we see a rush and competition to promptly condemn the killing of innocent people in a place, we find incomprehensible hesitation in denouncing the same act in another place,” the Presidency said.
In a speech at the summit, France’s Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna described Hamas as terrorist, saying that the Islamist movement seeks to destroy the state of Israel and spread chaos rather than fulfill the aspirations of Palestinians.
Similarly, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock blamed Hamas for the attacks and stressed Israel’s right to defend itself and protect its people against terrorism. She noted, however, that the fight against Hamas need to be carried out with the “greatest possible” consideration for the humanitarian situation of the innocent men, women, and children in Gaza.
British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said he called for restraint from the Israeli military “despite the incredibly difficult circumstances.”
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni claimed that the Arab countries, Israel, and the West are all “targets” for Hamas. Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis also defended Israel’s right to self-defense in accordance with international law, but affirmed that policies of collective punishment are also prohibited under the same law.
The complete Israeli blockade on Gaza has been widely slammed as a form of “collective punishment”.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) has called on Israel to “immediately” restore electricity, water and fuel to Gaza on Saturday as millions of Palestinians continue to face a devastating blockade that has pushed the enclave to catastrophic conditions.
In a statement, the international rights organisation called on Israeli authorities to restore basic resources and allow “unhindered” aid into Gaza to meet a portion of its humanitarian needs.
“While aid agencies struggle to squeeze a few trucks of humanitarian aid into southern Gaza via Egypt, the Israeli authorities are keeping their crossings with Gaza closed and refusing to flick the switch for the water and electricity supply,” Tirana Hassan, executive director of HRW, said. “There is no excuse for denying water, food, and medicine to Gaza’s civilian population. It is cruel and contrary to international law,” Hassan added.
Israeli actions in its war against Gaza, like cutting off food and water, could “harden Palestinian attitudes for generations” and weaken international support for Israel, former US President Barack Obama warned.
Obama, in rare comments on the Israel-Gaza war, said any Israeli military strategy that ignores the human costs of the war “could ultimately backfire.”
The Israeli government’s decision could also "erode global support for Israel, play into the hands of Israel’s enemies, and undermine long-term efforts to achieve peace and stability in the region,” Obama added.
While condemning Hamas’ attack on Israel and reiterating his support for Israel’s right to defend itself, Obama said: “But even as we support Israel, we should also be clear that how Israel prosecutes this fight matters.”
As President Biden has repeatedly emphasized, Israel’s military strategy should abide by international law, including those laws that seek to avoid, to every extent, the death or suffering of civilian populations, Obama added in a statement on Monday.
He said upholding international law is “vital for building alliances and shaping international opinion.” Obama emphasized that doing so is an “enormously difficult task,” noting that Israeli occupation army operations “often put civilians at risk.”
The Obama administration sought, but ultimately failed to broker, a peace deal in negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.
Since taking office in early 2021, Biden has not tried to resume long-stalled talks, saying that leaders on both sides were too stubborn and the climate was not right.
Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had a testy relationship when Obama was in office, especially when Obama's administration was negotiating a nuclear deal with Iran.
Israel envoy calls for resignation of UN chief
who said Hamas attack ‘did not happen in a vacuum’ CNBC News, Oct 25 2023
Israel’s representative to the U.N. called for the resignation of the organization’s Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, following his remarks on the Israel-Hamas conflict and action in Gaza.
Speaking on Tuesday at a meeting of the U.N. Security Council, Guterres reiterated his call for a humanitarian pause of Israel’s offensive in the Gaza Strip, which has been sealed off from Israel’s supplies of fuel, food, water and electricity. Israel is carrying out a military campaign against Palestinian militant group Hamas, which launched a multi-pronged attack against Israel two weeks prior.
While stating he has “condemned unequivocally the horrifying and unprecedented 7 October acts of terror by Hamas in Israel,” Guterres said “it is important to also recognize the attacks by Hamas did not happen in a vacuum,” pointing to “56 years of suffocating occupation” suffered by the Palestinian people.
“The grievances of the Palestinian people cannot justify the appalling attacks by Hamas,” he added. “Nothing can justify the deliberate killing, injuring and kidnapping of civilians — or the launching of rockets against civilian targets.”
In a press briefing following the U.N. Security Council meeting, Gilad Erdan, Israel’s representative to the U.N., demanded Guterres’ resignation for his comments.
“The U.N. is failing, and you, Mr. Secretary-General, have lost all morality and impartiality. Because when you say those terrible words that these heinous attacks did not happen in a vacuum, you are tolerating terrorism, and I think that the Secretary-General must resign,” he said.
“Because from now on, every day that he is here in this building, unless he apologizes immediately, today, we called him to apologize, there’s no justification to the existence of this building. ”
The diplomatic conflict with Guterres coincides with nascent tensions between the Israeli military and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which has repeatedly called for safe passage to distribute resources in the Gaza Strip and for additional supplies, critically fuel — without which, it says it will need to end operations on Wednesday night. Israel has come under fire from human rights groups, which question whether the country’s military response in the Gaza Strip has been proportionate, and whether the displacement and harm suffered by Palestinian civilians risk bringing Israel in breach of international law.
Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan is pressed during a Kan public broadcaster interview on how the current hardline government will be able to make the concessions to the Palestinians necessary to secure a normalization agreement between Israel and Saudi Arabia. Erdan recalls that in 2020 Netanyahu agreed to delay plans to annex large parts of the West Bank until 2024 in exchange for normalization with the UAE.
“All the more so [is the same kind of concession] possible when talking about a peace deal that ends the Arab-Israeli conflict, except for the Palestinians. [This] will isolate the Palestinians and leave them alone by themselves.
Under these circumstances, I’m confident that the ministers of the government will know how to make the right consideration,” Erdan says.
Wikipedia info: Gilad Erdan (born September 30, 1970 in Ashkelon) is an Israeli Likud politician. He has been Israel's ambassador to the United Nations since August 2020 and also Israel's ambassador to the United States since January 2021.
Erdan studied law at Bar-Ilan University, worked as a lawyer and was an advisor to Benjamin Netanyahu and Ariel Sharon.
At the beginning of February 2019, he was one of the signatories of a petition by the Nachala movement (a radical settler group) addressed to the (next) Israeli government, asking for the colonization of the entire Israeli-occupied West Bank with two million Jews. To this end, the Two-State Model must be abandoned and the applicable construction freeze outside the "official settlement blocs" (which the UN considers illegal).
It is a plan by Yitzchak Shamir from the 1990s. The Nachala petition talks about: The Land of Israel: One Land for One People....
In Moscow: Hamas official Moussa Abu Marzouk
demands ceasefire among other conditions for release of Israeli captives Ahram Online, Friday 27 Oct 2023
Abu Marzouk, the deputy head of Hamas' political bureau, met on Friday with Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister for Political Affairs Ali Bagheri Kani, Russian state news agency Tass said. The Iranian diplomat told Abu Marzouk that Tehran’s “priority” in negotiations is “an immediate ceasefire, providing assistance to the people and lifting the repressive blockade of Gaza,” Tass reported. The Israeli foreign ministry slammed Russia’s decision to invite Hamas representatives to Moscow as “an act of support for terrorism.”
“We welcome anyone who wants to fight alongside us," Abu Marzouk said, according to Al-Arabiya. "We are counting on our Arab brethren to reach a ceasefire," he said.
Abu Marzouk voiced his gratitude to Russia, saying they had protected Hamas twice at the UN Security Council with a veto. He added that “Russia and China represent a bloc that defends us.”
Earlier, on Thursday, the US military revealed in a statement that it had struck two facilities in eastern Syria used by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and affiliated groups.
"The precision self-defense strikes are a response to a series of ongoing and mostly unsuccessful attacks against US personnel in Iraq and Syria by Iranian-backed militia groups that began on 17 October," Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in the statement.
This comes as US President Joe Biden on Thursday sent a message to Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warning against strikes on US troops amid the Israeli war on Gaza.
The day before, Biden told a press conference that he had warned Khamenei of a resp onse if the attacks continued.
"My warning to the Ayatollah was that if they continue to move against those troops, we will respond, and he should be prepared. It has nothing to do with Israel," he said.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid said during the weekly Yesh Atid faction meeting today (Monday) that he intends to support the government in any decision that will bring the hostages held by Hamas back home.
"I conveyed a message to the government, by virtue of my position as the head of the opposition, that we will fully support every decision and every step and every price that will lead to the return of the abductees home. At the same time, we need to take painful steps to make sure they return home," Lapid stated. He also defined the goals of the war and stated that all of Hamas' top leaders - including those outside Gaza - must be eliminated.
"The political echelon defined the goal of the war as the elimination of Hamas' military infrastructure. I agree, of course, but to that must be added the elimination of the Hamas leadership. The State of Israel must not stop and must not let go until we kill six people: Yahya Sinwar, Mohammed Deif, Ismail Haniyeh, Saleh al-Arouri, Khaled Mashal, and Marwan Issa. All six must die.
Until they die, Israel will not have avenged the murders of Be'eri and Sderot, Kafr Aza, and Ofakim. Until they die, the Middle East will not understand that we are not messing around."
"The State of Israel needs to get them, wherever they are. Whether it's in Gaza or in other countries, it doesn't matter. We need to get them and eliminate them. It's part of the campaign. It's part of restoring deterrence," Lapid said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu drew on ancient scriptural references on Sunday, evoking the biblical nation of 'Amalek' to explain Israel's position in the ongoing conflict with Hamas, which has resulted in significant civilian casualties.
Amid the escalating conflict, Netanyahu turned to ancient scripture to elucidate Israel's stance. He quoted from First Samuel 15:3, saying, "You must remember what Amalek has done to you, says our Holy Bible. 'Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys'"
The invocation of this biblical passage serves not only as a historical reference but also as a genocidal lens through which the Prime Minister views the current conflict.
For those unfamiliar with the biblical narrative, the term 'Amalek' might be a mystery. But what is Amalek, and why has it been cited in the context of this modern conflict? The Hebrew Bible paints a picture of the Amalekite nation as a fervent adversary of the Israelites.
The name "Amalek" can denote Esau's grandson who established the nation, his descendants - known as the Amalekites, or the territories they once occupied.
The historical enmity can be traced back to the book of Exodus, which recounts the Amalekites attacking the tribe of Israel as they made their exodus from Egypt. Even though the Israelites triumphed over the Amalekites, God cursed the descendants of Amalek.
Netanyahu's invocation of 'Amalek' is symbolic, drawing parallels between ancient foes and present-day adversaries. His reference to First Samuel 15:3, which calls for the complete annihilation of the Amalekites, underscores the depth of enmity and the historical weight of the ongoing conflict.
The strife between Israel and Hamas has escalated drastically, with the war claiming more than 1,400 Israeli lives and nearly 8,000 in Gaza.
As tensions rise, the Israeli army has moved into the second phase of its campaign against Hamas. Ground forces have been deployed in Gaza, complemented by intensified assaults from the land, sea, and air, as confirmed by Netanyahu.
"There are moments in which a nation faces two possibilities: to do or die," the Israeli Prime Minister remarked. “We now face that test, and I have no doubt how it will end: We will be the victors. We will do and we will be the victors”.
Too many comments from Israeli political, military and religious leaders have suggested that all Palestinians are legitimate targets because they support Hamas or that they voted for them and are, therefore, guilty of that group’s many crimes. Here are a few:
The president of Israel said: “It is an entire nation out there that is responsible. It’s not true this rhetoric about civilians not aware, not involved. It's absolutely not true.”
An Israeli Knesset member said: “The children of Gaza brought it upon themselves.” The minister of defence described the current war this way: “We are fighting human animals.”
Statements of this kind, in which an entire group of people are demonised or seen as responsible for the actions of a few, are sheer bigotry. The very same racism when applied to other groups (like Jews, Blacks, or Native Americans) has led to pogroms, persecution, or genocide.
What about the claim that “all Palestinians support Hamas”?
Our frequent polling across Palestine and Israel provides data that easily debunks that characterisation. In our last poll in Gaza (July, 2023) only 11 per cent identified themselves as Hamas supporters, as opposed to 32 per cent identified with Fatah. Eleven per cent hardly constitutes “all Palestinians”.
As for the claim that Palestinians voted for Hamas and are therefore culpable for their behaviour, the same dangerous generalisation would hold all Americans responsible for the actions of the US government, or all Israelis, or Jews, responsible for the atrocities committed by the Israeli government...
FLASHBACK
The Palestinians are Amalek
by Michale Welton, CounterPunch, 30-1-2015
Both Christians and Jews share a common mythology: that Yahweh created the world, that the Jews are a chosen people, that they have been promised a land.
The Palestinians are Amalek. If they will not submit to Jewish rule they must, or will be, destroyed.
The basis for this is the Old Testament, the shared sacred text of Christians and Jews. One cannot argue with sacred texts! Indeed, in 1971, Golda Meir told Le Monde that Israel existed as “the fulfilment of promise made by God Himself.
"In one of the scariest and stupidest statements any Israeli official has ever made, an adviser to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said of strategy regarding Iran, 'Think Amalek'." (Steven Weiss)
Netanyahu's father, Benzion Netanyahu, was a scholar of Jewish history who exerted an outsized influence on his tight-knit family.
The elder Netanyahu held to what the greatest of 20th century Jewish historians, Salo Baron, called the “lachrymose” — or tearful — conception of Jewish history.
This view can be readily summarized in a line uttered by Benzion Netanyahu to David Remnick for a 1998 profile of Bibi in The New Yorker: “Jewish history is in large measure a history of holocausts.”
We might call this the Amalekite view of Jewish history, referring to the hated biblical foes of the Israelites whose existence should be blotted out (Exodus 17:14).
The historian’s belief that the Jews have been subjected to constant genocidal threats did not lead him to a passive fatalism, as if there were nothing that the Jews could do in the face of Amalek. Rather, it inspired his own militant Zionism, which demanded a persistent willingness to wage war against one’s enemies. Benzion Netanyahu’s methods and findings are inseparable from his deeply ingrained Amalekite worldview, according to which Jews face unrelenting hostility from the Gentile world — even when those Jews abandon their very adherence to Judaism.
Bibi Netanyahu dismisses talk of his father’s deep imprint on him as “psychobabble.”
But It is hard to disconnect Netanyahu's bellicose stance on Iran from his father’s Amalekite worldview.
Netanyahu the son does not merely see Iran as a grave threat; he regards it as comparable to the most terrifying of Jewish persecutors, the Nazis — a point he made explicitly at the March 2012 AIPAC convention and during his recent Yom HaShoah remarks. Like his father, the prime minister sees the long history of the Jews as marked by “powerlessness,” “utter defenselessness” and “the atrophy of Jewish resistance,” the antidote to which is the unapologetic and ever-ready assertion of Jewish force.
To be sure, Bibi Netanyahu is more than a mere replica of his father. Indeed, there is another facet to his personality alongside the Amalekite — that of the political pragmatist educated at MIT and trained in the art of deal making at the Boston Consulting Group. Still, it is worth reflecting on the father...
Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian will pay an official visit to Turkey on Wednesday to discuss the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine, bilateral ties and other regional developments, the Turkish Foreign Ministry announced on Tuesday.
The announcement came as Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels fired drones toward Israel’s southern city of Eilat on Tuesday in retaliation for its war against the militant group Hamas. Israel intercepted the missiles fired from the Red Sea area.
The meeting shows that “states of the region prioritize speaking to each other as they carefully manage the escalations. Iran and Turkey have had continuously close state-to-state talks and ties, even when they’ve stood at polar opposites of regional conflicts as was the case in Syria,” observed Arash Azizi, a historian at New York University...
On Tuesday, Amir-Abdollahian met in Doha with his Qatari counterpart, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani. Qatar has played a central role in negotiating between Israel and Hamas over the release of hostages.
Iran denies any links to Hamas’ Oct. 7 bloody rampage in Israel...
Amir-Abdollahian said on Sunday in an interview with CNN that Iran does not want the war “to spread out." Both Turkey and Iran have called for an immediate cease-fire. Such calls have been squarely rejected by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“In general, Tehran has sought to use the ongoing conflict in Gaza, especially the opposition of public opinion in the Islamic world to Israeli military operations, as an opportunity for diplomatic engagement,” argued Hamidreza Azizi, a visiting fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs.
“Until now, the Islamic Republic has been primarily known as a military actor in the conflict, providing military support to Palestinian groups. Now, Iranian leaders are trying to play a new diplomatic role alongside their traditional military one, viewing Turkey and Qatar as potential partners,” he told Al-Monitor.
Turkey’s rhetoric against Israel has grown increasingly harsh in parallel with the rising death toll in Gaza..
Tensions continued to escalate as Turkey’s Foreign Ministry on Tuesday condemned Israel’s bombing of the sole cancer hospital in Gaza that was built with Turkish funding, causing extensive damage...
“Israel, with the unconditional support of Europe and America, has for the past 25 days been committing crimes against humanity before the eyes of the entire world,” Erdogan told reporters on Tuesday. “Yesterday the Friendship Hospital was targeted by Israeli forces,” making it “the latest victim of Israel’s barbarity,” he added.
The Israeli army has dropped 18,000 tons of bombs on the Gaza Strip since Oct.7, or about 1.5 times the explosive force of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan in World War II, according to officials in the besieged enclave.
Speaking to the press, Salama Marouf, head of the government's media office, said Israeli forces have also destroyed 85 government buildings in Gaza, adding: "In Gaza, Israel has demolished 47 mosques and inflicted significant harm to three churches. The attacks have resulted in over 200,000 damaged buildings, with 32,500 of them rendered uninhabitable, 203 schools have sustained major damage, and 45 schools are now completely non-operational. Due to the intensity of the attacks, statistics are not yet complete."
Biden's support among Arab Americans
plummets amid Israel-Palestine conflict: Poll
Darren Lyn | Anadolu 01.11.2023
US President Joe Biden has lost an unprecedented amount of support from the Arab American community since the Palestinian group Hamas launched a surprise attack against Israel on Oct. 7 which triggered the current Israeli-Palestinian conflict, according to a new poll.
The latest numbers by the Arab American Institute show that Biden's support from Arab Americans for his 2024 reelection bid has plummeted from 59% to 17%. That is a 42% nosedive in the president's support since 2020.
The poll, which surveyed 500 Arab Americans between Oct. 23-27, also showed that Biden’s overall approval rating within the community has dropped precipitously from 74% in 2020 to 29% in 2023, "reflecting trends across the American public as a whole."
That could make a major difference in the coming presidential election, with nearly 3.7 million Arab Americans living in the US.
According to the poll, if the election were held today, 40% of Arab Americans would vote for former President Donald Trump versus just 17.4% for Biden. Another 25.1% said they were undecided...
The poll also indicated that 78% of Arab Americans are concerned about an increase in anti-Arab bigotry and 67% are concerned about an increase in anti-Semitism.
Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian said that the United States complicit in the crimes of Israel against the people of Palestine in the Gaza Strip, adding Washington is not in a position to lecture others on exercise self-restraint regarding the conflict between Palestinian resistance groups and the Zionist regime.
Amir Abdollahian made the remarks in a meeting with Head of the Political Bureau of Hamas Ismail Haniyeh in Qatar’s Doha on Tuesday.
“The region is at a critical juncture and the resistance groups in the region make decisions independently and they do not necessarily wait for political decisions,” the Iranian minister said.
“Therefore, if the war crimes of the Zionist regime continue and the scope of conflict and war widens, no party will remain unaffected by the consequences and repercussions,” he added.
He stressed that despite advising others to exercise self-restraint, the US government is actually a party to the war and is not in a position to invite others to do so.
Haniyeh, for his part, said the Palestinian resistance is at the peak of its strength and capabilities. Therefore, instead of engaging with the resistance forces, the occupying regime continues to target Palestinian civilians, he stated...
The bloody conflict in geographic Palestine comes after 75 years of equally murderous injustice.
Under international law, Palestinians have the right and duty to resist Israeli occupation, just as Israelis have the right and duty to respond to the attack on them. It is everyone’s responsibility to help resolve the injustices suffered by both groups, which does not mean supporting the cruel vengeance of some of them.
The current situation is hopeless for both sides. After three-quarters of a century of crimes, Israel can no longer lay claim to much. Its population is now divided.
Over the last few months, the followers of the Ukrainian Vladimir Jabotinsky and supporters of Jewish supremacism have seized power in Tel Aviv, despite the opposition of a small majority of the population and huge demonstrations.
Its young people, who aspire to live in peace, refuse to serve in armies to brutalize Arabs, but have joined them anyway to defend their families whom they love and their country in which they do not believe.
Legally, the Palestinians formed a state, which was granted observer status at the United Nations. On the death of Yasser Arafat, Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas was elected president. However, following Hamas’s victory in the 2007 legislative elections, and the impossibility of getting the West to accept a Hamas government, the Palestinians fought a civil war.
In the end, the West Bank was governed by Fatah, the secular party created by Yasser Arafat. Mahmoud Abbas and his inner circle are financed by the United States, the European Union and Israel. The Gaza Strip, on the other hand, is in the hands of Hamas, the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. It is governed by individuals who see Islam not as a spirituality, but as a weapon of conquest. They are mainly paid by the UK, Qatar, Israel, Turkey, Iran and the European Union.
When it was created, Hamas was financed by the United Kingdom. It was supported by the Israeli secret services to weaken Yasser Arafat’s Fatah.
Israel then fought it and assassinated its religious leader, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. Then, once again, Israel used Hamas to eliminate the leaders of the Marxist Palestinian Resistance. Hamas fighters accompanied by Mossad agents and Al-Qaeda jihadists attacked the Palestinian Yarmouk camp at the start of the war against Syria. But today, once again, Hamas is fighting its erstwhile ally, Israel...
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Saturday he was breaking off contact with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu due to Israel's actions in Gaza.
"Netanyahu is no longer someone we can talk to. We have written him off," Turkish media quoted Erdogan as saying.
Erdogan's remarks came a week after Israel said it was "re-evaluating" its relations with Ankara because of Turkey's increasingly heated rhetoric about Israel's war crimes in Gaza. Israel had earlier withdrawn all diplomats from Turkey and other regional countries as a security precaution. Israeli forces have encircled Gaza's largest city, as more than 9,400 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have been killed in relentless Israeli strikes and an intensifying ground invasion.
Erdogan said Saturday that Turkey was not breaking off diplomatic relations with Israel. "Completely severing ties is not possible, especially in international diplomacy," Erdogan said.
He said MIT intelligence agency chief Ibrahim Kalin was spearheading Turkey's efforts to try and mediate an end to the Israeli war: "Ibrahim Kalin talking to the Israeli side. Of course, he is also negotiating with Palestine and Hamas," Erdogan said.
But he said Netanyahu bore the primary responsibility for the violence and had "lost the support of his own citizens". "What he needs to do is take a step back and stop this..."
[Israeli] Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made clear on Friday afternoon, in a statement to the press before the start of Shabbat, that Israel will not agree to a ceasefire in Gaza without the release of the hostages being held by Hamas.
“Our forces are operating in all sectors and with all their might. Our victory will be sharp and clear.It will deliver a message to our enemies, a message that will resonate for generations,” stated Netanyahu.
“I tell you, and I tell them - they will be defeated.We will not let up until victory, until the goals we set are achieved - the elimination of Hamas, the return of our hostages and the return of security to our citizens and our children,” he added....
“Regarding the north - I repeat and say to our enemies: Do not underestimate us. A mistake will cost you dearly.A mistake will cost you a price you can't even imagine,” warned Netanyahu in the remarks, which came as Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah gave a speech.
“At the same time, we continue to operate on the political front. I met with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken this morning... “
“I made it clear that we continue with all our might, and that Israel refuses a temporary ceasefire that does not include the release of our hostages. Israel does not allow entry of fuel into the Gaza Strip and opposes the transfer of funds to the Gaza Strip.”
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken made a surprise visit to Baghdad on Sunday following a trip to the occupied West Bank earlier in the day. Iraqi Prime Minister Mohamed Shia al-Sudani met Blinken, the premier's office said, with the two expected to discuss the risks of escalation in Israel's war with Hamas. Since the start of the Israeli war on Gaza, a series of rocket and drone attacks have targeted military bases hosting US forces in Iraq.
"I made very clear that attacks or threats coming from militias that are aligned with Iran are totally unacceptable," Blinken said on Sunday. "We will take every necessary step to protect our people," he added during a meeting with Sudani.
Washington has accused Iran of having a hand in the attacks which have also targeted American troops in Syria.
Most of the attacks have been claimed by a group known as "Islamic Resistance in Iraq", according to Telegram channels affiliated with Iraqi factions close to Tehran.
Figures released by the Pentagon on Friday showed that between October 17 and November 3 there were 17 attacks in Iraq and 12 in Syria. Some 2,500 American troops are deployed in Iraq, tasked with advising their Iraqi counterparts in the fight against the Islamic State group.
Iraq's prime minister has repeatedly called for a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and has described Israel's military operation in the coastal territory as a "genocide" against the Palestinian people. Iraq does not recognise Israel as a state and its government is close to Iran, which in turn backs Hamas.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas decried Sunday Israel's "genocide" in the Gaza Strip, in remarks to visiting U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
"I have no words to describe the genocide and destruction suffered by our Palestinian people in Gaza at the hands of Israel's war machine, with no regard for the principles of international law," Abbas told Blinken in Ramallah, in remarks carried by official Palestinian news agency Wafa.
The comments came as Blinken made a surprise visit to the West Bank as part of his Middle East tour, the office of the Palestinian president said.
In his sit-down with Abbas, Blinken said Palestinians in Gaza “must not be forcibly displaced,” and the pair discussed “the need to stop extremist violence against Palestinians” in the West Bank, a U.S. State Department spokesman said... Blinken last week told a Senate hearing Abbas’s Palestinian Authority should retake control of Gaza, even though it currently exercises only limited autonomy in parts of the West Bank and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has long sought to sideline it.
Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei reaffirmed Iran’s all-out support for Palestine as the permanent principle of Tehran’s policy.
Ayatollah Khamenei made the remarks in a meeting with the Head of Hamas political bureau Ismail Haniyeh, as Israel’s more than 12,000 strikes in Gaza since early October have killed nearly 10,000, mostly children and women, and damaged civilian infrastructure, including hospitals, United Nations shelters and refugee camps.
“Supporting the Palestinian resistance forces vis-à-vis the Zionist occupiers is the Islamic Republic of Iran’s permanent policy,” Ayatollah Khamenei said in a recent meeting with Haniyeh in Tehran.
Tehran has made no secret of its backing for Palestinian resistance movements, Hamas and the Islamic Jihad. Iranian officials have repeatedly stressed the necessity for arming the Palestinians with weapons and equipment to enable them to defend themselves.
But, Iranian officials have denied claims that Tehran helped Palestinian fighters to plan the multi-front attack on Israel...
Tehran stresses the resistance groups are currently considering various options in response to the Israeli regime act of aggression and relentless bombardment of the Gaza Strip. Iran warns the resistance movements would adopt appropriate measures if the Israeli regime continues its relentless bombardment of the besieged Gaza Strip, and Palestinian fighters do not face a shortage in weapons and munitions and are ready for a long battle with the Zionist regime...
Gaza is one of the most densely populated places on Earth, where some 2 million people live in an area of 140 square miles. It has been almost completely cut off from the rest of the world for nearly 17 years. More than half of its population lives in poverty and is food insecure, with nearly 80% of its population relying on humanitarian assistance.
More than 1.5 million people in densely packed Gaza have fled their homes for other parts of the territory in a desperate search for cover, with critical aid only trickling in.
But Netanyahu told ABC News the war would continue until Israel had restored "overall security" control of Gaza.
"Israel will for an indefinite period have the overall security responsibility," he said.
Netanyahu's comments came after the White House said the Israeli leader had discussed potential "tactical pauses" in a phone call with US President Joe Biden on Monday. But no agreements were announced and the pair did not broach the possibility of a ceasefire.
While the United States is seeking a humanitarian "pause" in the fighting, several countries and UN agencies have repeatedly called for an immediate ceasefire.
Netanyahu said that there will be no ceasefire - general ceasefire -, without the release of the Israelis held in captivity by the Pastinians resistance groups.
"As far as tactical, little pauses -- an hour here, an hour there -- we've had them before. I suppose we'll check the circumstances in order to enable goods -- humanitarian goods -- to come in or individual hostages, to leave," he added.
The Israeli occupation army said it had pounded Gaza with "significant" strikes on 450 sites over 24 hours since Sunday morning. Israeli infantry and tanks have flooded the northern half of the Gaza Strip and tightened an encirclement of Gaza City, effectively splitting the territory in two.
Israel withdrew its troops from the Gaza Strip in 2005 but maintained a total blockage of the strip.
A year later, Hamas won elections in Gaza, and took control of the territory in 2007, while Israel controled all exists, see, air and water. The Fatah party of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, which dominates the Palestinian Authority, only exercises limited autonomy in parts of the occupied West Bank.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken suggested last week that the Palestinian Authority should retake control of Gaza after the war, and visited the West Bank to meet Abbas on Sunday.
But senior Hamas official in Lebanon, Osama Hamdan, said they would never accept a puppet government in Gaza...".
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Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei reaffirmed Iran’s all-out support for Palestine as the permanent principle of Tehran’s policy.
"The national security of America and the security of the world could be attained if the American leaders [..] become rational, if America disengages itself from its evil alliance with Zionism, which has been scheming to exploit the world and plunge it in blood and darkness, by using America and some Western countries.
US Vice President Joe Biden said that the new administration would seek the
unvarnished truth from its spies, whether or not their information supported
the goals of the government. 
"The post-September 11 era in the US has heralded in a new age of ideology whose discourse and world views have served not only to accommodate such extremist views as those held by Sharon, but also to provide him with a platform and an influence that were unthinkable only a year ago. 
Political holism is based on the recognition that "we" are all members of a single whole. There's no "they," even though "we" are not all alike. Because "we" are all part of the whole, and therefore interdependent, we benefit from cooperating with each other. Political holism is a way of thinking about human cultures and nations as interdependent. 
Although the decision was ultimately Washington’s, a constellation of NGOs and non-profit groups cleared the path. This network of organizations is composed of a handful of sectarian, personal-grievance driven actors hiding behind ten national organizations that put a Syrian face on Washington’s economic war on Damascus. 
The Palestinian Authority has pledged not to publicly reject or undermine Israeli normalisation of ties with Saudi Arabia, the Media Line reported on Tuesday. 
New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman published a column on Tuesday in which he urged the US and Saudi Arabia not to go through with a deal to normalize Saudi-Israeli relations, claiming that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government “is not normal”.
Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Prime Minister 
Since US forces birthed the creation of a putatively democratic Iraq with the 2003 overthrow of Saddam Hussein, the sides have tussled over what share of Iraq’s budget should go to the Kurds, with successive governments in Baghdad typically failing to hand over the amount of money agreed to at any given time. This, in turn, has left the KRG struggling to pay public sector employees who are due $625 million every month.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s upcoming visit to China could prove a boost for Syria’s reconstruction efforts and invigorate the sanctions-hit Arab economy, says a Syrian political analyst.
Golda is typical Israeli propaganda. The Israeli director, Guy Nattiv, has tried to whitewash Meir’s legacy of violence and open anti-Arab racism through portraying her as the “Iron Lady” of Israel, a “lioness” who triumphed as a politician and persisted as a military leader...
The first is straightforward. Ukraine has been devastated on the battlefield, with tragic and appalling losses. Russia is winning the war of attrition...
When we invaded and occupied Iraq, we didn’t just militarily defeat Iraq’s armed forces – we dismantled their army, and their police force, along with all the other institutions that held the country together. 
“We’ve decided to say enough is enough,” Deif said as he urged all Palestinians to confront Israel. "We have already warned the enemy before. The occupation committed hundreds of massacres against civilians. Hundreds of martyrs and wounded died this year due to the crimes of the occupation," he added.
Israeli air strikes on Sunday hit housing blocks, tunnels, a mosque and homes of Hamas officials in Gaza. The Palestinian health ministry said more than 400 people including scores of children had been killed.
Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi said Thursday that the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip must stay steadfast and "remain on their land," warning of "the liquidation" of the Palestinian cause...
Israel’s military delivered sweeping evacuation orders for almost half of Gaza’s 2.3 million people Friday ahead of a feared ground invasion, U.N. officials said.
Sheikha Hind bint Hamad Al Thani, who also serves as the Vice Chairperson of the Qatar Foundation (an educational organisation), sent out a heartfelt message of solidarity with Gaza on Thursday...
The situation in Gaza has reached the “level of genocide,” said Shawan Jabarin, head of the al-Haq rights group. “You wanted hell — you will get hell,” declared Israeli general Ghassan Aliyan.
Israel’s representative to the U.N. called for the resignation of the organization’s Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, following his remarks on the Israel-Hamas conflict and action in Gaza.
Erdan studied law at Bar-Ilan University, worked as a lawyer and was an advisor to Benjamin Netanyahu and Ariel Sharon.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid said during the weekly Yesh Atid faction meeting today (Monday) that he intends to support the government in any decision that will bring the hostages held by Hamas back home.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu drew on ancient scriptural references on Sunday, evoking the biblical nation of 'Amalek' to explain Israel's position in the ongoing conflict with Hamas, which has resulted in significant civilian casualties.
The Hebrew Bible paints a picture of the Amalekite nation as a fervent adversary of the Israelites. 
Netanyahu's father, Benzion Netanyahu, was a scholar of Jewish history who exerted an outsized influence on his tight-knit family. 
Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian said that the United States complicit in the crimes of Israel against the people of Palestine in the Gaza Strip, adding Washington is not in a position to lecture others on exercise self-restraint regarding the conflict between Palestinian resistance groups and the Zionist regime.
Erdogan's remarks came a week after Israel said it was "re-evaluating" its relations with Ankara because of Turkey's increasingly heated rhetoric about Israel's war crimes in Gaza. Israel had earlier withdrawn all diplomats from Turkey and other regional countries as a security precaution.
[Israeli] Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made clear on Friday afternoon, in a statement to the press before the start of Shabbat, that Israel will not agree to a ceasefire in Gaza without the release of the hostages being held by Hamas.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas decried Sunday Israel's "genocide" in the Gaza Strip, in remarks to visiting U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
More than 1.5 million people in densely packed Gaza have fled their homes for other parts of the territory in a desperate search for cover, with critical aid only trickling in.