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Forums - Politics Discussion - Israel-Hamas war, Gaza genocide

SvennoJ on 20 January 2024

Israel drops leaflets on Khan Younis bearing photos of captives

Israeli planes have dropped leaflets on the southern city of Khan Younis with photos and the names of 69 Israelis taken captive.

The leaflets contain a message and number, telling the Palestinians that if they want to return to their homes, they should inform the Israeli army if they recognise any of the captives. Israel estimates there are about 136 captives currently held in the Gaza Strip by Hamas.




UK conducts 50 spy missions over Gaza in support of Israel

The UK military has flown 50 spy missions over Gaza since the start of December in support of Israel, an investigation has revealed. Investigative journalism and media organisation Declassified UK said the intelligence gathering flights are conducted using Shadow R1 surveillance aircraft taking off from Britain’s controversial Akrotiri airbase in Cyprus.

It said the government refused to confirm the number of spy flights or what kind of information was passed to the Israeli army when asked. The UK military had claimed in early December, when it confirmed the flights, that it would only attempt to gather information on captives held in Gaza. “But the extraordinary number of flights, and the fact that they started nearly two months after the hostages were taken, raises suspicions that the UK is not collecting intelligence solely for this purpose,” Declassified UK said.




AIPAC donated $95,000 to US speaker who pushed through Israel aid package: Report

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) in November donated $95,000 to Mike Johnson, the speaker of the US House of Representatives, after he pushed through a $14bn aid package for Israel, the Intercept reports.

The news organisation’s analysis of the Federal Election Commission records also shows that AIPAC, the largest pro-Israel lobby group in the US, was Johnson’s top donor in 2023, with a total of $104,000. The majority of the payments came after Israel’s war on Gaza began and Johnson was elected House speaker in October.



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SvennoJ on 20 January 2024

Israeli army, settlers commit 1,124 attacks against Palestinian Bedouin communities

Bedouin communities in the occupied West Bank are being subjected to ethnic cleansing and forced displacement at the hands of Israeli forces and settlers, according to al-Baidar Organisation for Defending Bedouin Rights. Over the past year, the organisation said that the Israeli army and settlers have committed 1,124 attacks against Bedouin communities in the occupied West Bank.

The organisation pointed out that Israel is exploiting attention turned to its war on the Gaza Strip to carry out its largest mass displacement operation against Bedouin communities, summarised in physical attacks, demolishing homes, uprooting and destroying crops, seizing property and establishing new settlement outposts.

Al-Baidar reported that Israel and its settlers displaced approximately 28 Bedouin communities, comprised of 276 families and 1,593 individuals. There are 160 Bedouin communities spread out from Hebron in the south to the far north of the West Bank, as well as alongside the eastern plains and in Area C – which makes up 60 percent of the occupied territory but is under Israeli military and civil control.



Palestinians released from Israeli detention receive care at Rafah hospital

A released Palestinian man is brought to Abu Youssef Al Najjar Hospital for treatment

As we’ve been reporting, there are growing calls for an end to the mistreatment of Palestinian detainees subjected to weeks of imprisonment in unknown locations, and physical abuse by Israeli forces in Gaza. Palestinian men were held by Israeli forces for between 30 to 55 days, UN human rights official Ajith Sunghay said in a report yesterday during his visit to Gaza, where he met some of the released detainees.

 

More accounts of abuse from Palestinians released from Israeli detention

Many Palestinians are being imprisoned by Israeli forces each day and abused. Muhammad Abu Samra, one of those released, says he and other detainees were blindfolded and beaten up after being accused of carrying and using weapons.

“They transferred us to an army camp in Israel. They let dogs urinate on us and shoved sand on us. They threatened to shoot us. After two hours of being half-naked in such conditions, they moved us a few metres and told us to get ready for our execution,” he said.

Abdel Qader Tafesh, another former prisoner, says, “I only survived because of God’s will. “We’ve gone through collective punishment day in, day out. I feel very sorry for the Palestinian men, the detained teenagers who are 15,16 years old, for the torture they’ve gone through.”

‘Destroying Hamas and returning captives are conflicting’

The sister of an Israeli captive in Gaza who was shot by Israeli forces at close range as he was trying to escape shelling, has said the goals of the war stated by Israel do not align. “The goals of the war are conflicting, the destruction of Hamas and the return of the kidnapped are not in line, the fighting puts the detainees at risk and kills them,” Merav, the sister of Itay Saversky, said in an interview with Channel 12.

“The war must stop and a prisoner exchange deal must be reached. They said that returning abductees is the priority and if not, they lie to us all the time. This is the truth they lie to us and sacrifice us, if they can’t bring back the kidnapped they have to tell the truth. “I say to all Israelis: Get out of your homes and demonstrate. Join the protesters in front of Netanyahu’s house and shout.”


The tide is starting to turn in Israel, it needs to turn a lot faster


No let-up in Israel’s bombing of Gaza

There hasn’t been any let-up in the intense bombing across the Gaza Strip and it looks like it’s all started again in the north where more residential buildings have been targeted. There appears to be a surge in the intensity and scale of the bombings, with the remaining buildings in the vicinity of al-Shifa Hospital and the western part of Gaza City and Jabalia and Beit Lahiya being hit. Air strikes in Khan Younis are particularly concentrated in the vicinity of Nasser hospital and the Jordanian field hospital.

More people were ordered to evacuate Gaza City as of yesterday evening. Four centres were ordered to evacuate immediately. There is a heightened risk for people leaving during the night, taking the coastal road to the central area. Due to the ongoing blackout and lack of communication it has been really difficult to tell if people have actually been able to evacuate.

Palestinian fighters resurgent in Jabalia, claim 4 days of attacks on Israelis

Palestinian fighters have claimed attacks on Israeli forces in the Jabalia area of northern Gaza for a fourth consecutive day, amid assessments that armed groups in Gaza are “re-infiltrating” areas in the north of the territory that Israel previously considered “cleared”.

The last time Palestinian fighters claimed four straight days of attacks in Jabalia was between December 24 and 27, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) and the Critical Threats Project (CTP) said in their latest Gaza battlefield assessment. “Palestinian fighters continued to attack Israeli forces in three areas of the northern Gaza Strip where Israeli forces previously conducted clearing operations,” the US-based think tanks said.


 

Last edited by SvennoJ - on 20 January 2024

SvennoJ on 20 January 2024

Bernie Sanders: Israeli PM has ‘made his position clear’ on Palestinian statehood

US Senator Bernie Sanders comments come following denials by President Biden that Netanyahu’s comments on Friday evinced opposition to a Palestinian state. Netanyahu doubled down on those comments on Saturday, stating that he would “not compromise” on Israeli security control of all territory west of the Jordan River, and that this “opposes a Palestinian state”.

“Netanyahu has made his position clear: He will never allow a Palestinian state, ever,” Sanders said in a statement on Saturday. “Despite the illegal and inhumane actions of Netanyahu’s government, President Biden has thus far offered unconditional support to Israel. That must change,” the statement adds.

Netanyahu rejects Biden’s statements on two-state solution

A statement from the Israeli PM’s office, reported by Reuters news service, seems to signal a break from comments the US president made yesterday on the US’s commitment to the establishment of an independent Palestinian state.

“Netanyahu, during his conversation with Biden, reiterated that after the destruction of Hamas, Israel must maintain security control over Gaza to ensure that it will no longer pose a threat,” the statement reads.

Ben-Gvir says he will always reject a Palestinian state

Israel’s hard-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir has underscored his opposition to a two-state solution in a social media post. The post follows a series of statements from Israeli officials today shooting down comments from President Biden that Israeli leaders remain open to Palestinian statehood under certain circumstances, most notably from Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich.

“I do deny a Palestinian state,” Ben-Gvir said. “Always!”

Smortich to Israeli media: Palestinian state will lead to ‘next massacre’

In comments to Israeli outlet Maariv, far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has responded to the firm US position in favour of the establishment of an independent Palestinian state after Israel’s war on Gaza ends.

“There is a broad consensus in Israel against a Palestinian state and the division of the land. Israel’s friends should understand that the push for the establishment of a Palestinian state is a push for the next massacre,” he told Maariv, referring to Hamas’s October 7 attack on Israel.

“The White House also needs to disabuse itself of the concepts that led to Israel’s national disaster,” he continued.





Settler attacks seek to ethnically cleanse Gaza and occupied West Bank: Palestinian politician

Mustafa Barghouti, a Palestinian politician and head of the National Initiative Movement, tells Al Jazeera that since October 7, attacks by illegal Israeli settlers on Palestinians have gotten “much worse”.

“Every Israeli thinks they have the licence to kill Palestinians,” he said. “It is now so frequent that settlers will dress as soldiers … and attack Palestinian communities.” “On top of that, the settlers are armed, and they are even more armed now with Ben-Gvir in government. He made it his mission in life to arm every Israeli settler,” he continued.

Barghouti said that “This Israeli government is a fascist one, and their clear goal is the ethnic cleansing of all Palestinians in Gaza as well as in the West Bank”. He said that the government’s goal is a repetition of the 1948 Nakba, in which 70 percent of Palestinians were expelled from their land.


 

Israel claims ‘no limit’ to aid allowed to enter Gaza as UN says it is blocking delivery

Israel’s coordination office for its activities in Palestine has claimed on X that there is “no limit to the amount of humanitarian aid that can enter the Gaza Strip,” adding that close to 10,000 aid trucks have been transferred to Gaza since October 7.

Yesterday, a report from the UN humanitarian affairs branch in Palestine stated that Israel had denied nearly 70 percent of aid missions to north Gaza in the first half of January, allowing only seven of the UN’s 29 attempts to deliver life-saving supplies. “People in Gaza are dying not only from bombs and bullets, but from lack of food & clean water, and hospitals without power & medicine,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on X earlier today.

Guterres has repeatedly and recently called for Israel to remove obstacles to the delivery of humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza, who are now facing an unprecedented hunger crisis.

Close to 10K trucks since October 7, that's less than 100 a day on average while before the war an average of 500 trucks crossed into Gaza daily. That's before Israel cut off fuel, water and electricity, razed farms and most civilian infrastructure. Less than 10% of what's needed is coming in.



UN chief: ‘I will not relent’ from Gaza ceasefire calls

Antonio Guterres says on X that the mass death of Palestinians in Gaza “must stop”.

“People in Gaza are dying not only from bombs and bullets, but from lack of food & clean water, and hospitals without power & medicine,” he wrote.

Israeli army’s ‘wholesale destruction of Gaza’ is ‘totally unprecedented’: Guterres

The secretary-general of the UN spoke about Israel’s war on Gaza at the 19th Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement in Kampala, Uganda.

Here are a few key things he said:

  • The wholesale destruction of Gaza and the number of civilian casualties caused by the Israeli army in such a short period are totally unprecedented during my mandate.
  • This includes 152 of our own UN staff members, a heartbreaking tragedy for our organisation, for their families and for those they were serving in Gaza.
  • While humanitarian workers are doing their best to deliver relief, they face constant bombardments, daily dangers to themselves and their families and the enormous constraints by damaged roads, communication blackouts and access denials.
  • Meanwhile, disease and anger are deepening, people are dying not only from bombs and bullets but from lack of food and clean water, hospitals without power and medicine and gruelling journeys to even smaller slivers of land to escape the fighting. This must stop.


SvennoJ on 20 January 2024

UN official highlights report of summary executions by Israeli forces

UN Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories Francesca Albanese has shared a report from Al Jazeera in which a Palestinian family says they saw Israeli soldiers execute a group of more than a dozen men.

“To Western governments: it is so disturbing to see you not condemning the horrendous, unspeakable crimes that ISR occupation commits in Gaza daily, IN THE SAME WAY as you did for the crimes on #Oct7,” Albanese said in a social media post on Saturday.

“The West’s double standards is what got us here. Time to end it.”


Belgium shows support for South Africa’s ICJ case

Caroline Gennez, the country’s minister of development cooperation, says on X that if the International Court of Justice issues a ruling calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, Belgium will “fully support it”.

The court is now deliberating on the case, brought by South Africa against Israel, alleging genocide in the prosecution of the war in Gaza.

 

US personnel injured in ballistic missile attack on Al-Asad Air Base in Iraq, US officials say


US personnel were injured in a ballistic missile attack on Al-Asad Air Base in Iraq, two US officials said. The attack resulted in minor injuries, two officials said, though it was not immediately clear how many personnel had been injured.

The Saturday attack appears to be the second time ballistic missiles have been used to target US and coalition forces in Iraq since October 7, 2023, when Iran-backed Shia militias began launching attacks on coalition bases after the beginning of the war in Gaza. The US and coalition forces have come under attack more than 140 times in Iraq and Syria since then, as Iranian-backed Shia militias have launched repeated drone and rockets. The use of more powerful ballistic missiles — far rarer than rockets or one-way attack drones — comes at a time of increased tension in the region as the war passes 100 days.

The Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an Iran-backed militia group, claimed responsibility for the missile attack. The group emphasized in a statement Saturday its commitment to resisting American "occupation forces" in the region and cited the attack as a response to what they referred to as the "Zionist entity’s massacres" against the Palestinian people in Gaza. US forces in Iraq and Syria operate as part of the coalition to defeat ISIS.

 



SvennoJ on 21 January 2024

Father of Palestinian-American teen shot dead in West Bank blames US support of Israel for death

The father of a Palestinian-American teenager shot dead in the occupied West Bank has blamed the United States for his son’s death, citing long-standing US military support. Hafiz Abdel Jabbar said his son Tawfic Abdel Jabbar – who was born and raised in Gretna, Louisiana, near New Orleans, but had been living with his father in the West Bank since May 2023 – was driving to have a picnic on their family farm with his friends, about 10 miles north of Ramallah, near the town of Al-Mazra'a ash-Sharqiya, on Friday.

He said an eyewitness told him that when they got there, settlers and then IDF soldiers "stopped and started shooting at them," and his son was fatally struck twice, in the head and chest, and found dead in the car.

A Palestinian state media report earlier said the teen was transported in critical condition to the Palestine Medical Complex in Ramallah, where he later died.
"Since Israel is “supported by the US government,” Abdel Jabbar, a dual-national US citizen, told CNN Saturday, “He was killed by our own bullets. My son was killed by our own government.”"

Israeli military releases footage of Khan Younis tunnel where it says around 20 hostages were held 


The Israel Defense Forces released footage Sunday of a tunnel in the city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza where it said Hamas held around 20 hostages at different times.  The tunnel was located in the center of Khan Younis and ran about 830 meters (0.51 miles) at a depth of 20 meters (66 feet), the IDF said.

There were booby traps, explosives and various obstacles inside the tunnel, according to the IDF, which said it encountered and killed several Hamas operatives as it entered the tunnel. The IDF found no hostages in the tunnel but said, based on testimonies from former hostages and DNA evidence, that about 20 hostages were held in there at different times, some of who have been released while others remain held in Gaza. 

Videos shared by the IDF show long tunnels, some of which lead to rooms with mattresses, blankets and food wrappers scattered on the floor, and kitchen and bathroom areas. The group also released photos of a pair of child’s drawings. Five-year-old former hostage Emilia Aloni drew the pictures, the IDF said Aloni’s family told them.


Did they expect to find hostages still there?


Palestinian death toll in Gaza surpasses 25,000, Hamas-run Ministry of Health says

More than 25,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since October 7, the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health said Sunday. The latest toll includes 178 people killed and 293 injured in the past 24 hours, bringing the total to 25,105 killed and 62,681 injured across the strip during the ongoing Israel-Hamas war.

CNN cannot independently verify these numbers due to the challenges of reporting from the war zone.

In an update Sunday morning, the IDF said one additional soldier had been killed in combat, bringing Israel's military death toll to 195 since Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza began.



UN Secretary General calls opposition to a two-state solution "unacceptable"

UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres called opposition to a two-state solution “unacceptable” on Sunday. “The refusal to accept the two-state solution for Israelis and Palestinians and the denial of the right to statehood for the Palestinian people are unacceptable,” he said in a post on X.

Guterres added that “the right of the Palestinian people to build their own state must be recognized by all.” On Saturday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his desire for security control over all territory west of Jordan is contrary to the existence of a Palestinian state.

In a separate post, Israel's National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir also reasserted his rejection of a Palestinian state. “I do deny a Palestinian state. Always!” Ben Gvir said on X.

So what are you going to do about it... So far harsher and harsher words have led nowhere.



 



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SvennoJ on 21 January 2024

Living and reporting the Gaza war


Situation is getting worse in Khan Younis every day

The city has been one of the main areas where the Israeli military has been operating. Israel has said they are mobilising more troops to destroy and dismantle the military infrastructure of the Palestinian fighters there. They started the military attacks from the outskirts of the city.

Right now they are pressing deeper into the main central neighbourhoods, using different military tactics. Blowing up residential buildings, forcing people to flee to Rafah. They are carrying out attacks in the vicinity of hospitals there. Also in the past hour, we have been seeing smoke on the horizon of Khan Younis as a plastic factory was targeted by the Israeli military.


‘People eat food for birds and animals, not for humans’: Jabalia resident

In videos obtained by Al Jazeera, Palestinians at the Jabalia refugee camp market in the northern Gaza Strip expressed their suffering as they looked to secure daily food sustenance amid dire shortages of flour and food in the markets and an absence of humanitarian aid. “We have no food, only some rice. We do not have flour. There is crowding over the available quantities,” one person said.

“We struggle to survive bombs but frankly we try to survive hunger more. Finding food for the family, for the children, has become a more challenging adventure than surviving war,” says Amer, 32, a father of three who lives in northern Gaza. He messaged the Reuters news agency via eSIM card, residents’ only tool to connect with the outside world because of a ninth day of a communications blackout.

The price of flour has surged along with other food items that are hard to come by in the impoverished territory. “Amid the famine threatening residents of northern Gaza, the people began to grind what is available to make flour, starting with corn and reaching to animal food,” Anas al-Sharif, a Palestinian freelance journalist reporting from northern Gaza, posted on X.


Palestinians shop for food and clothes at the local bazaar as daily life continues in the shadow of war in Jabalia, January 15

“We have been living in suffering for 104 days. Today we are searching for our daily food. There is no flour or wheat. People eat corn, and this is food for birds and animals, not for humans” another person said. “The average citizen in Gaza lives from day to day. We try to secure flour and ready-made bread, but unavailable. People do not have money. The situation is very difficult.”

 

Israeli military claims ‘many Palestinians joined Hamas after war’

Israeli military officials have been cited by Israel’s Channel 12 as saying that the number of Hamas fighters in Gaza was greater than they expected. The army also reportedly claimed that many Palestinians in Gaza joined the group that rules the enclave after the war.

“The number of rockets and the length of the tunnels in Gaza surprised us, which means that the duration of the war will be much longer than we had planned,” the report said. It also said that senior officials in the Israeli army “admit that there is no military possibility to release all abductees”.

That's one way to 'back up' the claim of 9,000 Hamas terrorists killed


About 1,000 injured Gaza residents treated on French warship

The injured residents of Gaza are being treated in a French field hospital aboard a ship off the coast of Egypt. The Dixmude, a French helicopter carrier, has been docked in the Egyptian port of El Arish, 50km (30 miles) west of the Gaza Strip, since November last year.

The vessel has 70 medical staff and is equipped with wards as well as operating theatres. Nearly 120 injured people have been hospitalised on board, while hundreds more have been seen for outpatient consultations, including follow-ups on injuries and psychiatric issues, Captain Alexandre Blonce told Reuters news agency, calling it an “unprecedented mission”.



A drop in  the ocean of need and every wounded patient first needs to be cleared through the Rafah checkpoint. A lot more of these hospital ships are needed and docked directly in or near the port of Gaza.



Palestinian tax revenue remains frozen in Norway

The Palestinian Authority (PA) hasn’t changed its position since November when Israel said it would release the tax revenue money but deduct the portion usually allocated to Gaza and the salaries of the 50,000 plus civil servants there. Since then the position has been the same on both sides. It’s a very dire situation. The PA has lost about $2.3bn in revenue since the beginning of this war. The economy here is really at a standstill.

Those tax revenues are to pay the 140,000 plus civil servants here in the occupied West Bank and the 50,000 in Gaza. But you also have another lack of income because 150,000 Palestinian workers cannot go into Israel anymore and cannot get their wages.

The PA thinks if Israel does not release the allocation for both the occupied West Bank and for Gaza then it is creating further divisions between the two places. The PA wants to send the message that there is only one PA and only one Palestinian people. The US came up with a mechanism by which that money could go to a fund in Norway. At the moment, that money is frozen in Norway as they can’t reach a compromise.

Living under occupation



Like every night, raids across the occupied West Bank

At least 15 Palestinians were detained and this is something that’s occurring every single night since October 7. You have short raids like what happened overnight when the Israeli soldiers retreated. You also have raids that last days like the one that happened in Tulkarem a few days ago that lasted about 45 hours. Previously, you had one in Jenin.

All that is putting a lot of pressure on the Palestinians because the Israeli incursions also come with the destruction of livelihoods.

 

 



SvennoJ on 21 January 2024

US network tv adding to the dehumanization, painting student protests as antisemitic, brain washing, leading to murder.

https://jewishinsider.com/2024/01/law-order-takes-on-campus-antisemitism-with-a-violent-twist/

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has made it onto ‘Law & Order’

https://forward.com/culture/film-tv/576818/israel-palestinian-hamas-law-and-order/

During the pandemic, many critics wondered how long it would take for lockdowns to filter into the reality of TV shows. (A while, and even then, it was largely ignored; audiences wanted escapism.) Now, amid the political turmoil and campus debates around the Israel-Hamas war, we don’t need to wonder how long the news will take to arrive on network television; it took 103 days.

The season premiere of Law & Order — the original, not one of the many spin-offs — aired last night. The episode, titled “Free Expression,” manages to cram just about every major headline even tangentially related to Israel from the past few months into its hour run time.

The episode opens with the murder of the Jewish president of the fictional Hudson University, who is in the midst of being scrutinized for plagiarism. He’s stabbed in front of a Manhattan store called “Cohen’s Bagels” that a group has graffitied with blue Stars of David. 


The cops find many people disgruntled about the president’s leadership. Some Jewish professors and donors felt he allowed pro-Palestinian student groups and protesters too much leeway, and criticized him for failing to release a statement condemning Hamas after the Oct. 7 attack. Pro-Palestinian students and professors, meanwhile, were mad at the president for canceling their film symposium and say he’s “a puppet of the Zionist regime.”

In case you haven’t been reading the news, that’s a reference to Harvard’s former president Claudine Gay, who stepped down amid accusations of plagiarism and criticism over her handling of Oct. 7 and its aftermath, and another to the campus controversy over repeated cancellations of on-campus screenings of Israelism, a documentary some donors and activists have accused of antisemitism.

There are also protesters ripping down hostage posters, a character who says that “from the river to the sea” is code for destroying Israel, and even a throwaway line about transgender athletes, all of which makes for about as heavy-handed an episode as you could possibly imagine. 

The interesting part of the episode, however, is its own strange participation in exactly the same kind of careful line-toeing that it’s trying to criticize.

It’s clear where Dick Wolf, the series creator who co-wrote the episode, stands on the issues at hand. The pro-Palestinian protesters are presented as brainless agitators who speak in a Valley-girl whine. And — spoiler alert — one of them is the murderer, “brainwashed” by an unrepentant pro-Palestinian professor. (“She thought Oct. 7 was justified,” says one former student of hers, scoffing. “I mean I support innocent Palestinians but come on. That was a flat-out act of terror.”) The pro-Palestinian left couldn’t really come across any worse.


But lest anyone accuse the show of bias, there’s a Jewish, Zionist murderer too, who ends up shooting and killing one of the student protesters. He’s quickly dispatched by the police — he’s shot when he points the gun at a cop — which allows the show to avoid having to dig in too deeply into Jewish extremism around the war. Still, it’s important to the show that he exists; after all, in the Law & Order system, the people are represented by two separate yet equally important groups — the pro-Israel advocates, and the pro-Palestinian ones, and they’re both killers.


Law & Order is not prestige TV; it’s a basic network crime serial, albeit one that has made its name off of being at least somewhat socially relevant. People are not coming to it for biting social commentary, or to help them form their views about the war or campus debates (which is not to say it won’t influence them). It probably could have gotten away without its one, throwaway, pro-Israel bad guy.

But Law & Order, once upon a time, was kind of progressive, at least for a network crime serial. It took on issues of gender-based violence, abortion, race in policing. It was actually, tangentially, part of the same culture war that “Freedom of Expression” portrays as shallow.

So for all its depiction of today’s political battles as inane, and at times insane — the manipulative professor says, in court, that “the Jewish elite will stop at nothing in order to silence me” — Law & Order remains part of them. After all, what is TV if not culture?


Tehmina Sunny as the pro-Palestine Professor Nasser.


I just watched the episode (wasn't planned, just thought to give Law & Order another chance as it was pretty decent in the past, watched it on and off since the 90s) and agree with this assessment. The show ended with Nassar (Name of the hospital in Khan Yhounis currently still under attack) proclaiming she was proud of her student for the murder...


They could have tackled the shooting of 3 Palestinian students in Vermont or base a fictional story on that
https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/29/us/palestinian-college-students-shot-vermont/index.html

It's clear where the bias is.



SvennoJ on 21 January 2024

‘Bombing all around us’, says Nasser Hospital doctor

Dr Ahmed al-Moghrabi, the head of the plastic surgery and burns department at Khan Younis’s Nasser Hospital, explained that shortly before speaking to Al Jazeera, the sound of Israeli bombing had been heard near the hospital. “[I expect] the ambulances will bring patients from these explosions, as a result of the bombing,” said al-Moghrabi.

With fears growing that the Nasser Hospital will face an attack similar to the devastating Israeli attack on al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, thousands of displaced people who have sought shelter in the hospital and its grounds have fled. Al-Moghrabi is worried about what may come. “If it happens, it will be a real horror,” he told Al Jazeera. “I pray to God that this will not happen… We are not a target. I know that Israel has already crossed all red lines… but this is the main hospital in the south of Gaza. I hope that this will not happen. If it happens, I cannot tell you how catastrophic it will be.”

Al-Moghrabi has attempted to get his own family out of the Nasser Hospital, where they have been sheltering. But a trip to Rafah was fruitless. “[I’m] staying at Nasser to face my fate,” al-Moghrabi said. “Whatever it will cost, I’ll be here at Nasser with my family. There is no place to go. There is no safe place. Rafah is a populated area, there is no clean water, no food, nothing there. Even I couldn’t find a tent for my family there, so I brought my family back to Nasser Hospital.”

“I feel… as a surgeon here, that Israel is fighting women and children… How many of us have to do die… How many days do we have to go on in this situation?”




Soldiers ‘fell in vain’ if Israel accepts deal with Hamas, says Netanyahu

Despite growing calls from Israelis – including leading politicians – pointing out the incompatibility of Israel’s stated twin war goals of eradicating Hamas and freeing captives held in Gaza, the prime minister has rejected the possibility of a deal to end the war.

“In exchange for the release of our hostages, Hamas demands an end to the war, the withdrawal of our forces from Gaza, the release of all murderers and rapists from Nukhba [Hamas’s elite forces] and the continuation of Hamas in power,” said Netanyahu. “If we accept this, our soldiers have fallen in vain. If we accept this, we won’t be able to guarantee the safety of our own citizens. We will not be able to bring evacuees home safely and the next October 7 will only be a matter of time.”

Critics have accused Netanyahu of continuing the war in the hope of extending his stay in power.

‘There is no peace camp’ in Israel

Al Jazeera’s senior political analyst Marwan Bishara says if elections were to be held in Israel, a general like Benny Gantz and Gadi Eisenkot would likely replace Netanyahu. “This is the alternative to Netanyahu – either fascists and fanatics to his right or warmongers to his left or any one in his [Likud] party that’s probably just as hardline as he is,” Bishara said.

“That’s the problem in Israel today; after 75 years of occupation, dispossession, sieges and so forth, it’s becoming so radicalised that there is no peace camp.”

 



A Historical Perspective on the Gaza war

Eugene Rogan, professor of modern Middle Eastern history, and a fellow at St. Antony’s College, Oxford, talks about the vicious cycle of violence, how a Palestinian state (2 state solution) is the only solution and both Israel and Palestinians need new governments to allow this to work. He also talks about the upcoming elections and that the US is the only one that can have any effective way to say No to the war at this point.




hellobion2 on 21 January 2024

This whole conflict is reminding me of the Fallout game series.



BiON!@ 

SvennoJ on 21 January 2024

This current conflict doesn't remind me of anything as I have never seen a more blatantly supported, defended by many, genocide in all my life.


At least DeSantis stepped out of the race (not that he would beat Trump who is just as bad anyway)

Ron DeSantis suspends US presidential campaign; here’s what he has said about Palestine

The Florida governor has been a staunch supporter of Israel, even by the normally pro-Israel standards of mainstream US politicians. In the last presidential debate, DeSantis expressed openness to backing the ethnic cleansing of Gaza.

“If they make the calculation that to avert a second Holocaust, they need to do that – I think some of these Palestinian Arabs – Saudi Arabia should take some, Egypt should take some,” he said.

DeSantis also banned a Palestinian student organisation from state universities in Florida. Moreover, he has said that the occupied West Bank is not occupied. “Judea and Samaria are not occupied territory,” DeSantis said in July, referring to the West Bank by a Biblical name used by Israel. He added that Israelis have “the strongest claim of right” to the Palestinian territory.


‘Enough is enough’: British MP urges ending arms sales to Israel

Labour Party legislator Richard Burgon has also called on the United Kingdom’s government to push for a UN Security Council ceasefire resolution.

“25,000 dead in Gaza. The Israeli PM making it clear he’s against any two-state solution,” Burgon wrote in a social media post. “Yet all we get from our Government is empty words. Enough is enough.”






Netanyahu rejects Hamas’ conditions for the release of hostages

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will not accept Hamas' demand for an end to the war in exchange for the release of hostages held in Gaza, he said Sunday. “I work on this around the clock. But to be clear: I reject outright the terms of surrender of the monsters of Hamas,” he said.

Netanyahu said Hamas has demanded an end to the war, the release of Palestinian prisoners and the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza in exchange for the release of the hostages. “If we agree to this, our soldiers fell in vain. If we agree to this, we will not be able to guarantee the security of our citizens,” the prime minister said. 

Some context: Netanyahu's comments come amid a report in the Wall Street Journal that the US, Egypt and Qatar want Israel to join a new phase of talks with Hamas that would start with the release of hostages and lead to the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza.

Netanyahu said he communicated his objections to US President Joe Biden over the weekend, and reiterated comments he made last week about Israel controlling all territory west of Jordan. 

Israel gives far-right minister power to freeze Palestinian payments if even "a single shekel" reaches Gaza

“Not a single shekel will go to Gaza. Period,” far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich wrote after Israel's security cabinet approved a measure that gives him the power to freeze funds intended for the Palestinian Authority, if the PA transfers those funds to Gaza.

Under existing agreements, Israel collects tax revenue on behalf of the Palestinian Authority on Palestinian imports and exports. Since Hamas launched its attacks on Israel on October 7, 2023, the Israeli government has refused to disburse the full amount of taxes collected, which are primarily used by the Palestinian Authority to pay public employees and retirees.

The funds collected by Israel will now be transferred to Norway as a third party, then be sent to Ramallah — excluding the sum earmarked for Gaza — which would remain frozen in Norwegian hands, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in a statement on Sunday. The United States and Norway will help oversee and facilitate the agreement. “Any violation of the agreement allows the Minister of Finance to immediately freeze all of the Palestinians' repayment funds,” the prime minister’s office said.

Hussein al-Sheikh, a top official with the Palestine Liberation Organization, immediately rejected the Israeli plan, calling it "piracy" and urging the international community to stop it.

Remember: Smotrich has come under fire for recent comments advocating for the voluntary migration of Palestinians from Gaza, and the reestablishment of Israeli settlements there.

Palestinian industries falter as Israel bombs Gaza, locks down West Bank

As the occupied West Bank roils with near-daily Israeli raids, settler attacks and killings of Palestinians, an overlooked impact of the violence is starting to take its toll. The past few months, Muhanad Nairoukh, the manager of one of the three biggest aluminium factories in the occupied West Bank, tells Al Jazeera, have been the worst for production and profits in a long time.

Life in the occupied West Bank is becoming more dangerous and complicated for the people living there and alongside that, industry has crawled to a near halt as a result of Israeli actions, making it impossible to have “business as usual”. Every aspect of industry is affected, from raw materials, to paying for inputs and getting paid for products.

The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) estimated at the end of December that the overall economic losses in Palestine, since the beginning of the Israeli aggression on Gaza, reached around $1.5bn during the initial months of the war, equivalent to approximately $25m per day, excluding direct losses in properties and assets.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/1/21/palestinian-industries-falter-as-israel-bombs-gaza-locks-down-west-bank

Israel’s construction sector worst hit by the Palestinian labour shortage

Raja Khalidi, the director general of the Palestine Economic Policy Research Institute, spoke to Al Jazeera about how the shortage of Palestinian labour impacts the Israeli economy. Here is a summary of his main points:

  • The 180,000 Palestinians who were working until October in Israel, of whom around 130,000 held permits from the Israeli government, were an essential component of the Israeli construction and agricultural sectors – and, to a lesser extent, the industry and tourism-related sectors.
  • The agreement to allow more Indians to work in Israel is a stopgap measure.
  • The Israeli preference for Palestinian workers over migrant workers is precisely because they go home every night. So down the road, there will be all sorts of problems regarding these workers from other countries who will face racial discrimination as well as class discrimination.
  • The first economic wave from the war on Gaza to hit the occupied West Bank was an overnight cessation of worker pay, which was bringing in about $4bn annually, almost 20 percent of the territory’s income.
  • That was compounded by the local impacts of settler violence and Israeli blockades of cities and villages as well as Israel withholding tax revenue.

What’s the cost of the war on Gaza for Palestine and Israel?

The cost of waging war on Gaza has risen to nearly $60bn for Israel. Government spending is soaring in order to pay for bombs and bullets. But, revenues are dropping and Israelis are hunkering down. If the war expands to the wider region, the expense could mount even further.



Eh the US will pay for it....