Tag Archives: military-industrial complex

Western War Machine is in Panic Mode

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By Salman Rafi Sheikh

Source: New Eastern Outlook

The sheer inability of the collective West to force Russia into submission in Ukraine plus the fast-changing global opinion about the West in the context of the latter’s support for Israel’s brutal war on the Gazans has put the so-called ‘liberal-democratic’ world into a panic mode. The White House has already said that it will run out of money to fund Ukraine into 2024 unless the US Congress gives approval for more funding. This has led the Western war machine – primarily led by the US – to anticipate a possible defeat. “There is no guarantee of success with us, but they are certain to fail without us”, a senior US military official told CNN recently. Without the military support, US officials now estimate, Ukraine would fall by the summer of 2024. But, in Western calculations, Ukraine’s fall does not just mean Russia’s victory; it also implies a possible collapse of NATO and the eventual downfall of the Western-dominated global political, economic, and security order.

A recent piece in the Wall Street Journal said,

“Even more important, Russia’s success in Ukraine would increase a threat to NATO’s Eastern flank—in particular the Baltic states and Poland. Outside of Europe it would embolden Moscow’s allies Iran and North Korea and provide a template for China for the military solution of the Taiwan dispute. In all those cases, the U.S. and NATO troops could find themselves in the midst of a military conflict of the sort that Ukraine fights today without direct involvement of NATO”.

Such prospects are causing severe problems. Germany, for instance, is considering shelving voluntary force and making a return to conscription. “I believe that a nation that needs to become more resilient in times like these will have a higher level of awareness if it is mixed through with soldiers,” said Jan Christian Kaack, the chief of the German Navy. This is in addition to the fact that the German army is too small to defend itself against any threat; hence, the renewed emphasis on conscription.

But Germany is not an exceptional case. In fact, it mirrors developments in the rest of Europe.  The UK, otherwise known to possess one of the best fighting forces in the world, is running into some problems of a fundamental nature. The Sky News reported earlier in the year that, a senior US general “privately told Defence Secretary Ben Wallace the British Army is no longer regarded as a top-level fighting force”. It was further reported that the “The armed forces would run out of ammunition in a few days if called upon to fight” and that “The UK lacks the ability to defend its skies against the level of missile and drone strikes that Ukraine is enduring”.

On top of it is the fact that the Russian military position in Ukraine remains strong, making it a lot harder for the West to provide enough funding. The Biden administration is facing its own challenges vis-à-vis more funding for Ukraine. As far as Europe is concerned, a recent report showed that pledges for funding made in August 2023 fell by almost 90 percent compared to the same period last year.

This is war fatigue that is being compounded by a well-sustained Russian resolve to achieve its objectives. For the West, Vladimir Putin remains “stubborn”. As Putin recently reiterated, “There will be peace when we achieve our goals… Now let’s return to these goals – they have not changed. I would like to remind you how we formulated them: denazification, demilitarisation, and a neutral status for Ukraine.”

Speaking from a position of strength – and keeping in mind the war fatigue in the West – Putin further said that Russian forces are “improving their position almost along the entire line of contact. Almost all of them are engaged in active combat. And the position of our troops is improving along [the entire line of contact.]”. This being the case, Putin conveyed no ideas of making a compromise with the West over Ukraine. Speaking from the Russian perspective, it would make no sense to offer negotiations and, thus, turn Russian tactical victories into unsustainable settlements.

Clearly, Russia has no intention of withdrawing from its victories, which is why there is a panic, especially in Europe. If Russia continues to win and the US funding stalls, Europe will be left to fend for itself. Germany’s defence minister minced no words to express this fear last Saturday when he said that the US “was losing interest in European affairs and that security tensions in the Pacific would likely leave the European Union having to fend for itself”, adding that “One can assume that the USA will be more involved in the Pacific region in the next decade than it is today – regardless of who becomes the next president,” he said. His conclusion is: “This means that we Europeans must increase our commitment to ensure security on our continent.”

In a nutshell, for the US, if the war in Ukraine was to unify the West, it is beginning to have an exactly opposite effect. There lies a very strong reason for the US to reconsider its strategy. This reconsideration can go in two directions. First, the US can withdraw from its obsession with expanding NATO to include Ukraine. Second, the US can make one last push and make Ukraine fight for as long as it can, hoping that this might break Russia. The Biden administration favours the second option, which is why it is pushing for the US$61 billion aid package. But will a Republican victory allow this to happen? A Republican victory could not only end support for Ukraine but also leave Europe in a total lurch. Tough times ahead.

Who Is to Blame for the Genocide in Gaza?

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By Eric Zuesse

Source: The Duran

Israel’s indiscriminate bombing of one of the most densely populated areas on this planet, the Gaza Strip, is genocidal because it is aimed at hospitals, schools, refugee camps, and not ONLY at possible military targets such as the Israeli regime alleges. Furthermore, Israel is harvesting body-parts of the Palestinian corpses it is generating there, as the Gaza media office reports that “After examining the bodies [of corpses that Israel’s forces delivered on December 26th to the Gazan authority at the Karam Abu Salem border-crossing], it is clear that the features of those killed had changed greatly in a clear indication that the Israeli occupation [force in Gaza] had stolen vital organs from them.”

The main difference between what Israel is doing now, and what Hitler’s Germany did in its Holocaust then, is that this time, it’s probably being done much faster because everyone who lives in that 365 km2 (141 sq mi) “the world’s largest open-air prison” called “Gaza” is being targeted to be either directly slaughtered by bombs and missiles, or else starved to death by Israel’s siege of that area; and, so, it can be much more efficiently and much faster conducted this time than when Hitler did it on an individual-by-individual basis by selecting out from the general population whom to slaughter and whom not to. This time, Israel already knows whom it will slaughter: the entire Gaza population there. It’s just like what America did when it nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki to start the Cold War against the Soviet Union in 1945. Or, as Eisenhower advised Truman to do that, “no power on earth could keep the Red Army out of that war [that “the Red Army” already actually were in] unless victory [by the U.S. alone against Japan] could come before they [the Soviet forces] could get in.” So: Truman nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki in order to win Japan for America ultimately against the Soviet Union. Truman made that decision (to start the Cold War) on 25 July 1945. And Netanyahu cannot turn back now from his commitment to “eliminate Hamas” without exterminating the Palestinians, who overwhelmingly support Hamas; and, though support by the Gazans for Hamas has increased 10% since the October attack by Hamas, support for Hamas on the West Bank is even higher, around 90% now — so: what could Netanyahu realistically hope to replace Hamas with? The answer is obvious: Israel is slaughtering the Gazans so as to avoid that problem. It will be a genocide there.

A recent poll in America found that by an overwhelming margin, far more Americans think that Hamas aims to genocide Israelis than think that Israelis aim to genocide Gazans. However, that finding is not surprising when one recognizes that the U.S. Government itself is a 50-50 partner with Israel’s Government in perpetrating this genocide; and, as I reported on December 8th, “Biden backs Israel’s policy to eliminate all Gazans” but that he constantly denies it by alleging that he is pressuring Netanyahu to discontinue doing it — even while it is the case that though Israel is supplying the troops to do it, the U.S. is supplying the weapons and the bombs and the missiles and the satellite intelligence that enables them to do it. This is a genocide that is being done by two means: Israel supplies the troops, and America supplies the intelligence and the weapons, to do it. Both are equally responsible for it.

Furthermore, America, all alone at both the U.N. Security Council and in the General Assembly, is the only nation that is blocking from either and both U.S. bodies a resolution condemning this genocide and condemning Israel for doing it. Of course, since the U.S. regime holds itself out as being superior to and above the United Nations, and the U.N. organization effectively allows that, there are NO resolutions at the U.N. that blame the U.S. regime for this genocide — though it is a 50-50-participant in perpetrating it. Or: as Israel’s Jewish News Service reported on November 27th:

Israel’s dependence on the United States was stated bluntly by retired IDF Maj. General Yitzhak Brick in an interview earlier this week.

“All of our missiles, the ammunition, the precision-guided bombs, all the airplanes and bombs, it’s all from the U.S. The minute they turn off the tap, you can’t keep fighting. You have no capability. … Everyone understands that we can’t fight this war without the United States. Period.”

On December 26th, Dave DeCamp at antiwar dot com headlined “US Has Delivered Over 10,000 Tons of Weapons to Israel Since October 7: Over 240 US cargo planes and 20 ships have made deliveries to Israel” and reported that

Two hundred and forty-four American cargo planes and 20 ships have delivered over 10,000 tons of military equipment to Israel since October 7 to support the massacre in Gaza, Israel’s Channel 12 reported on Monday.

The US support has been crucial in Israel’s ability to keep up its relentless bombardment of Gaza. The Washington Post reported on December 9 that, up to that date, Israel dropped over 22,000 US-provided bombs on the Gaza Strip.

The Pentagon has refused to disclose what types of weapons it’s been sending to Israel, but media reports have revealed some details. The Wall Street Journal reported on December 1 that the US had shipped 15,000 bombs and 57,000 155mm artillery shells to Israel since October 7. …

US officials claim they are “concerned” about the massive civilian casualty rate in Gaza, but the Biden administration continues to provide unconditional military aid for the slaughter. A report from +972 Magazine revealed that Israel is intentionally targeting civilian areas as part of its war strategy.

Biden’s protestations of innocence in this genocide are just more lies from him. He is equally to blame for it along with Netanyahu.

Humanity Under Assault by the Elites – When Will We Have Had Enough?

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By Phil Butler

Source: New Eastern Outlook

“I speak of peace, therefore, as the necessary rational end of rational men. I realize that the pursuit of peace is not as dramatic as the pursuit of war–and frequently the words of the pursuer fall on deaf ears. But we have no more urgent task.” – John F. Kennedy

For most people, it’s difficult to imagine much of what’s happening today. And this is why so many seem in the dark about what we should do to alleviate our problems. Looking at the situation in which a proxy is being waged on Russia from Ukraine, nothing seems to add up. The same is true for the genocide now going on in Gaza. And when we superimpose problems like curing cancer and other diseases, environmental problems, and failing economies, the only thing we can see is that our leaders have failed miserably at prioritising. It’s also obvious that we, the people, are the farthest thing from their minds.

Regarding visualisation, there’s no bigger confusion than grasping just how much money the Western powers are shovelling into the war against Russia. So far, something like $233 billion has been donated to Ukraine. The top donors are the EU($90B) and the United States ($73B). Interestingly, most of the EU funding has been aimed at financial aid, while the US donates are mostly military aid. Neither the EU nor the US spent much on humanitarian aid, at least not by comparison. But then, humanitarian money does not go into the pockets of the elites, now does it? The arms companies and financial institutions seem to be leveraging this Ukraine mess for a return on assets. But that’s another story. Now, I’d like to compare spending on Ukrainian and Israeli wars against efforts that do help human beings.

Let’s look at one of humanity’s most dreaded killers: cancer. In total, global oncology spending in 2022 was $193 billion. The numbers are far more telling in key research, where funding often comes from philanthropy. The Lancet reported recently that some 66,388 awards with a total investment of about $24.5 funded research for 2016–20. And now these figures have nosedived. In 2020, there were 19.3 million cases and 10 million deaths from the dreaded disease.

If we look at how many people are starving on our planet, it’s appalling to think of billions thrown away on unwinnable wars for the sake of selling weapons. In 2021, U.N. World Food Programme Executive Director David Beasley said it would take an estimated $40 billion annually to end world hunger by 2030. Let’s think about that for a moment. Each day, 25,000 people, including more than 10,000 children, die from hunger and related causes. Envision the lost potential of all those children perishing, if you can. Beasley went on to etch the situation in stone with this statement:

“There is 400 trillion dollars’ worth of wealth on the earth today, and the fact that 9 million people die from hunger every year… Shame on us. In the height of COVID, billionaires’ net worth increase was $5.2 billion per day. At the same time, 24,000 people die per day from hunger. Shame on us. Every hour, the net worth of billionaires during the height of COVID was a substantial $216 million per hour. Yet 1000 people per hour were dying from hunger… Shame on us.”

Two-hundred-sixteen million dollars per hour! I’ll wager the vast majority of that wealth had nothing whatsoever to do with helping human beings, curing disease, or stopping the endless wars. Moving on, let’s look at the homeless/poverty situation worldwide. In 2021, there were 150 million homeless people worldwide. While so many people here in Greece and other countries in Europe strive to go live in the United States, few realise that over 18% of the people living in my country live below the poverty line. And no one wanting to become American realises that the overwhelming solution to poverty in my country is to punish and imprison the poor (Homelessness World Cup). Using only what’s been spent on Ukraine so far, the U.S. Government could have issued a check for $1,825 to each of the 40 million homeless people in the country. That’s two or even three months’ rent for all homeless people in the USA.

Even in highly developed countries like Germany, more than 14.8% of the people are living beneath the national poverty line. Interestingly, some Latin American countries equal or better poverty rate than North American or some European countries. Take Argentina as an example. The situation there is no worse than it is in the United States. In Chile, only 9% of the population lives in dire circumstances. Unbelievably, there are countries like Bangladesh, traditionally thought of as the world’s poorest countries, where less than 13% of the population lives below the poverty line. In Romania, 26% of the people live in extreme poverty, and in neighbouring Bulgaria, the rate is almost 24%.

Turning to more practical matters that bear on quality of life and efficiency, we find the United States of America ranks 13th out of 141 countries in overall infrastructure. What a stunning achievement for the richest (supposedly) country in the world! After all, how do we balance what a country’s wealth is? What is the negative value of a dangerous, rusty bridge or a pothole in a road so deep you can hear Chinese being spoken from its depths? How bad is 13th place? Well, the American Society of Civil Engineers estimated that it would take 50 years to complete only the necessary repairs on more than 46,000 deteriorated bridges in the country. Both the Trump and Biden administrations promised to pour more money into the problem, but so far the US of A is still crumbling. So that you understand, Spain, Singapore, South Korea, Japan, and eight other countries have better quality infrastructures than the US. Remember I mentioned at the beginning, prioritisation? Is it possible that the Spaniards are doing more to care for their own people than America? Does Spain start proxy wars on Russia’s borders? I do not see Spanish ships in the South China Sea provoking war.

Since we landed in Spain, let’s take a look at some interesting facts about their quality of life. For instance, the Spanish Constitution includes a right to housing. The reality of homelessness there is that less than 8.5% of the population is homeless, and most of those live in shelters. Spain ranked 27th out of OF 189 countries in the Human Development Index Rankings.  Romania was 49th, the USA was 17th, Chile 43rd, and South Korea was 23rd. For me at least, what is significant in these numbers is the wide disparity in position in a world that was supposed to be some globalisation miracle a couple of decades ago. Despite all the PR and belly-rubbing the people of Earth have received, things in most countries are just not getting better. And trillions are being spent on wars and corporate machinations that steal from our prosperity.

Returning to my thesis, we must add the humongous waste of money that has gone to the state of Israel, Saudi deals, and the new monies soon to flow in that direction simply to eradicate or force migrate the Palestinians. Before the current crisis, the Biden administration had pledged $14.3 billion in aid to Israel since the October 7th Hamas campaign against the Israelis began. But this figure is a bit misleading if we want to see just how massive the American sacrifice for Israel has been. Since World War II, the United States has given Israel more aid than any other nation, currently more than $260 billion. To wrap things up for this report, the U.N. says the conflict in Yemen is one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. Saudi Arabia does not receive American aid through loans, grants, or gifts pegged for killing Yemenis. However, the US Accounting Office reported that between 2015 and 2021, the US Department of Defense supplied more than $54.6 billion in military support for the Saudis and the United Arab Emirates. Now, imagine what human strife could be alleviated with these hundreds of billions combined with the trillions spent on failed US wars across the globe.

For those who enjoy simple examples of what could be. There are over 33,000 homeless veterans who fought these wars for the United States. The billions in military support only for Saudi Arabia would be enough to gift each one of those vets $1.7 million. You do the math. What is being spent to kill millions of us, could save the millions being killed PLUS millions of others starving, wasting away, or swept away by disasters. Now you tell me when the time will be right to get out the torches and pitchforks.

2023 – The Year the World Saw the U.S. Emperor as Naked… and Grotesque

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Seeing the naked truth is usually the first step before we can go on to realize the truth of beauty and decency. We might hope that the world is taking that first step.

By SCF Editorial

Source: Strategic Culture Foundation

American President Joe Biden likes to talk about “inflexion points” when he is lecturing about world affairs and the supposed superiority of the United States. This year is indeed an inflexion point.

It was the year that the entire world saw the truly hideous and criminal nature of U.S. power.

Washington’s fuelling of the futile conflict in Ukraine and the despicable slaughter in Gaza is a wake-up call for the entire world. The United States stands barefaced and grotesque as the primary purveyor of war. There can be no doubt about that. For many it is shocking, scandalous and frightening.

Tragically, it seems, for the world, every year’s end is an occasion to witness and lament conflicts, wars and suffering over the preceding 12 months. Often the causes of wars and suffering are seemingly unfathomable.

However, this year seems to be unique. The year ends with a horrendous massacre in Gaza that is unprecedented and perpetrated by Israel with the full support of the United States. The scale of deliberate mass killing in Gaza makes it a genocide. The fact that this abomination is occurring at Christmas time when the world is supposed to celebrate the divine birth of Jesus Christ – the Prince of Peace – in the very place where he was born some 2,000 years ago makes the abomination all the more profane and damning.

What is particularly wretched is that the heinous destruction of children is happening in full view of the world. There is no remorse or pretence. It is full-blown premeditated murder done with cruelty and sickening impunity.

Virtually the whole world is horrified by the devastating, relentless violence and absolute violation of international law. The butchery by the Israeli regime cannot in any way be rationalized by the previous attack on Israel by Palestinian militants on October 7. Those killings by Hamas have been cynically used as a pretext for the subsequent and ongoing annihilation of Palestinian civilians.

This genocide could not happen without the crucial support of the United States for the Israeli regime. Financially, militarily and diplomatically, Washington is sponsoring the horror in Gaza as well as the Occupied West Bank.

This week saw the U.S. once again obstructing calls at the United Nations for a ceasefire and the urgent supply of humanitarian aid to more than two million people. The World Food Program has declared a catastrophic famine in the coastal enclave after more than 70 days of bombing and blockade by the Israeli regime. More than 20,000 people – mainly women and children – have been slaughtered with up to 7,000 more missing, presumably dead. Israeli troops are carrying out mass executions of terrified and traumatized human beings, according to UN rights monitors.

The United States is arming Israel to the hilt and enabling it. U.S. President Joe Biden has pointedly refused to join international demands for a ceasefire. The United Nations has voted by an overwhelming majority for a cessation of the violence. Washington has repeatedly rejected the world’s pleas because the Biden administration is obscenely amplifying Israeli lies and distortions. “Unwavering, unshakable support” is how the White House arrogantly boasts about it without a hint of shame that it is self-indicting.

Tens of thousands of tonnes of munitions have been flown to Israel to carry out “indiscriminate bombing” (Biden’s own admission). One-tonne bunker-buster bombs have been dropped deliberately on refugee camps and hospitals. And still, the Pentagon shamelessly refuses to impose any red lines on the use of its munitions.

This genocide has Israeli fingers on the triggers but it is ultimately an American-sponsored genocide. Based on Nuremberg principles, Joe Biden and Benjamin Netanyahu would be both in the dock, accompanied by Antony Blinken, Jake Sullivan, Lloyd Austin and their counterparts in Tel Aviv.

If there were previous international doubts about Washington’s systematic criminality, the whole world knows for certain now.

Significantly, too, American citizens are also repulsed by the barbarity and the fact that their government is an accomplice in a historic crime against humanity. Polls show that Biden is one of the most unpopular presidents ever, and his culpability for the genocide in Gaza is a primary reason for the widespread disgust, especially among younger Americans.

As things stand, there is a fair chance that 81-year-old incumbent Democrat will lose the presidential election in 2024 – less than 11 months away. Not that any of the Republican contenders are qualitatively better. American politics are in a crisis of chaos.

But this is not just about Biden or other individual U.S. politicians. The United States government and much of the corporate-controlled media stand full square behind Israel’s crimes. That has always been the case since the Israeli state was formed in 1948 through Washington’s skulduggery at the newly established United Nations, together with the old colonial power, Britain – the author of the infamous and treacherous Balfour Declaration that instigated Zionist dispossession of the indigenous people in the Holy Land, or what London called its Palestinian Mandate.

Decades of duplicity and dissembling as a peace broker in the Middle East have been blown away by the horrendous massacre that has culminated at the end of 2023. Israel is carrying out a Final Solution that is comparable to the atrocities of Nazi Germany. The Zionist regime has cynically used the Holocaust against Jews as a cover for its genocide against Palestinians. And many decent Jews around the world, including Holocaust survivors, are rightly mortified by the depraved association exploited by the Zionist regime.

What is happening in Gaza may be seen as a shocking revelation for the world of historic proportions. It is an eye-opener of the violence and lawlessness that the U.S. emperor has been systematically engaged in since it became the dominant world power almost a century ago. Following the Second World War and the defeat of European fascism – largely by the Soviet Union – the United States has taken up the fascist mantle, albeit unspoken and disguised with pretensions claims of democratic virtue. No other nation has waged as many wars and conflicts over the past eight decades as the U.S. The death toll from American imperialism runs to tens of millions of people with victims on every continent.

The conflict that erupted in Ukraine in February 2022 is another manifestation of Washington’s imperialist machinations. That war is approaching its third year and shows no sign of ending because the U.S. continues to weaponize the Neo-Nazi regime in Kiev, a regime that Washington and its European NATO allies installed in 2014 through a coup d’état. The hostilities in Ukraine – the biggest in Europe since the Second World War – were fomented by the United States as a proxy war to defeat Russia. The war could have been avoided if the U.S. and its European vassals had negotiated a diplomatic solution to NATO’s expansionist threat to Russia.

Russian President Vladimir Putin did not want a war in Ukraine. Respected American commentators like John Mearsheimer, Jeffrey Sachs and Scott Ritter have all confirmed with extensive analysis that Washington and its European allies are primarily responsible for creating the conflict – one that has cost the lives of as many as 400,000 Ukrainian soldiers and the displacement of 10 million civilians across Europe. Nearly $200 billion in Western public money has been wasted so far. Biden and the European Union want to donate another $100 billion to prolong this futile war.

America’s wars were always officially rationalized with some seeming plausible cause or mission. In the early decades of the Cold War, Washington claimed to be defending the “Free World” against Communist aggression in Korea, Vietnam, Africa and Latin America. When the Cold War supposedly ended in 1990-91 after the collapse of the Soviet Union due to its internal political problems, we then saw a spate of U.S. wars around the world against drugs, terrorism, weapons of mass destruction and – most absurdly – defense of human rights.

The latest war in Ukraine is purportedly to defend democracy and sovereignty (of a Nazi Waffen SS-adulating regime in Kiev installed by the CIA!).

Nonetheless, the genocide in Gaza is the culmination, the final act. This is where all the history of U.S. crimes and fraudulence as a “noble exceptional democratic leader” finally comes unstuck.

It is an infernal climax for a global power, arguably the world’s first and last imperialist global hegemon. The whole of humanity can now see that all the American rhetoric and vanity is nothing but an ugly lie. The emperor is naked in all his crimes. The blood of children on his hands, his mouth drooling with lies. It was always so, but now universally evident.

One might ask, where do we go from here? Despite the abominable cruelty, suffering and misery, one can still hope that humanity will eventually find a way to live in peaceful coexistence. By respecting all those who abide by international law and basic moral precepts. Arguably, most of humanity is willing and capable of living in peace.

But to achieve that peace there must be no illusions and lies. There must be accountability and genuine atonement.

U.S. imperial power is damned. There’s no going back or reform. The capitalist economic system – evolved as oligarchic fascism and its two-party puppet show – driving imperialist barbarism must be called out and overturned. Biden is doomed, and Trump and so on are just more false prophets.

Seeing the naked truth is usually the first step before we can go on to realize the truth of beauty and decency. We might hope – for the sake of peace and ending much of the suffering – that the world is taking that first step.

US And Israel Ensure Palestinians Will Spend Christmas In Living Hell

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As U.S. leaders celebrate Christmas with their families, Palestinians will be mourning the loss of their loved ones.

By Michel Moushabeck

Source: The Free Thought Project

As our hopes for an extended ceasefire are dashed and Israel’s war on Gaza is now in its third month, the dire conditions that Palestinians are living under — hunger, lack of drinking water, infectious diseases, displacement, and fear of dying from the nonstop bombardment — continue to worsen as the U.S. supports Israel’s relentless assault on the besieged, occupied and now largely houseless population of Gaza.

How will the children endure the harsh conditions during the coming winter months as the torrential rains flood the streets of Gaza, the temperature starts to drop and illnesses become more rampant? How will 2.3 million Gazans — 90 percent of them displaced from their homes — be able to stay warm in their makeshift shelters? Who will give the displaced refugees the needed medical attention now that so many hospitals have been bombed and/or evacuated and so many doctors and nurses have been killed, including at least 300 aid workers? Who will bring us the truth and report on the ongoing atrocities wrought on Palestinian civilians now that 92 fine journalists have perished in the past nine weeks?

On December 14, the World Health Organization announced that it had delivered 4,200 body bags, underscoring the critical need to safeguard civilians from the risk of infection. Additionally, the shortage of latrines in shelters has given people no choice other than open defecation. As a result, the Palestinian Ministry of Health said: “There have been significant increases or increased risk of outbreak in some communicable diseases and conditions such as diarrhea, influenza, chicken pox, meningitis, jaundice, impetigo acute respiratory infections, skin infections and hygiene-related conditions like lice and scabies.”

Israeli snipers opened fire on several hundred Christian worshipers inside Gaza’s The Holy Family Catholic Church, in the Zeytun area, murdering a mother and her daughter, and received strong condemnation from the Vatican. An Al Jazeera journalist shook as he described how Israeli bulldozers crushed sick and injured civilians taking shelter outside the Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, burying some alive — abominable and beyond human comprehension.

I can’t even begin to imagine a worse nightmare. The scenes of massive devastation are apocalyptic. The images of Palestinian civilians stripped down to their underwear, with hands strapped behind their backs, terrified, humiliated, and paraded like cattle by Israeli forces in the streets are utterly inhumane and disgusting.

You know that the world is broken when a country is given the freedom to annihilate another people as the world watches in real time. This should shake each and every one of us to the core.

While our elected officials will soon be going on their holiday recess to celebrate Christmas with their families, friends and loved ones in the warmth of their homes, Palestinian families will be huddling in cold tents or makeshift shelters shivering as they mourn the loss of loved ones. Many will still be searching with their bare hands for their children that remain missing under the rubble. It is estimated that more than 25,000 children have been orphaned since the start of the Israeli bombardment.

No one can doubt our elected officials’ complicity in fueling the ongoing genocide — committed and reported on in real time — by voting to send Israel an additional $14.3 billion in military aid, including the State Department’s bypassing of Congress to approve the expedited airlifting of 14,000 tank shells to slaughter more Palestinian civilians. I hope that they will wake up and realize — if they have a grain of compassion — what they have done and the extent of the death and destruction caused by their actions. Their unwillingness to demand an immediate ceasefire and stop the carnage has enabled the killing of nearly 20,000 civilians — 8,000 of whom are children — injured more than 50,000, displaced more than 1.9 million inhabitants of Gaza, and has drawn widespread outcry worldwide.

Before October 7, nearly 500 trucks were allowed to enter Gaza daily. The food and medical supplies they carried were barely enough to sustain the besieged population suffering from a 17-year blockade. Today, very few aid trucks are allowed into Gaza. Food has become very scarce; farms have become bombed-out war zones with massive craters; and Israeli forces are flooding Gaza with seawater, rendering agriculture impossible and drinking water undrinkable. Starvation is setting in and we are told by the World Food Program that 9 out of 10 people in Gaza cannot eat every day. This horrific situation will likely get worse if aid trucks continue to be prevented from entering the enclave.

Do U.S. politicians believe that the limitless death and destruction wreaked upon the people of Gaza is a just and moral assault, or are they afraid they’ll be accused of antisemitism and lose AIPAC campaign contributions if they call for a ceasefire? How many times do they need to be reminded that ethnic cleansing is a war crime?

In Israel “there is no voice calling to stop the bloodbath,” Israeli journalist Gideon Levy laments in Ha’aretz. “We’ve never before had a war like this, a war of complete consensus, a war of total silence ….”

But while it appears to most of us on the outside that, as Levy said, “it is a unanimous war,” it is important to point out that opposition does exist despite the Israeli government’s aggressive crackdown on dissent. Protests in Israel have been largely repressed, silenced and criminalized. Numerous critics of the Israeli government have been attacked, jailed, harassed, interrogated, and warned about speech, protests, or social media posts that call for a ceasefire.

Masha Gessen, in her November 8 article for The New Yorker, outlines the various methods used by Israeli right-wing mobs and the Israeli security services to instill fear in peace activists who are opposed to Israel’s genocidal policies in Gaza. She quotes Kobi Shabtai, the head of Israeli police, who announced that protests against Israeli actions in Gaza would not be tolerated. He said: “Anyone who wishes to identify with Gaza, is welcome to — I will put him on the buses that are heading there now.”

Palestinian citizens of Israel, who comprise nearly 21 percent of the citizenry, have relatives in Gaza who were displaced, lost their homes, or were injured or killed in the Israeli bombardment. While there is outrage and opposition among Jewish peace activists, Israeli Arabs are the ones who suffer the most of Israel’s repressive practices. According to the Adalah Legal Center, they have been targeted by employers and academic institutions, and terrorized by right-wing mobs and subjected to surveillance by Israeli intelligence. A friend in Bethlehem told me that a Palestinian flag emoji can get you fired; a watermelon — because it has the same colors as the Palestinian flag — can get you arrested; and a keffiyeh around the neck can get you beaten up. Legendary human rights lawyer, Lea Tsemel, who has represented hundreds of jailed Palestinians, said that it is unprecedented that “people were getting arrested for social media posts and even likes.”

In the days and months ahead we shall see increased opposition in Israel, especially in the wake of reports that Israeli forces shot and killed three Israeli hostages even though they were holding white flags and were shirtless to show that they have not strapped themselves with suicide bombs. This tragic incident compelled protesters to set up tents outside the Israel’s Ministry of Defense in order to pressure the Netanyahu government to step up its negotiations for the hostage release. It is worth noting here that if those killed were Palestinians, it would not be newsworthy in U.S. or Israeli corporate media.

No Merry Christmas in the Land of Christ

As Americans celebrate the holiday season and enjoy a merry Christmas with their families, and children in the U.S. and Europe are busy rehearsing nativity or Christmas plays at school, it will not be merry at all in Palestine, the birthplace of Christ. In the Holy Land, where Palestinian baby Jesus was born in a manger and where Christ’s message of love, compassion and caring for the oppressed was heard for the first time, Palestinians live their lives in daily fear under the gun of Israeli soldiers and armed settlers. According to UNRWA, the United Nations refugee authority, 271 Palestinians, including 69 minors, have been killed by Israeli security forces in the West Bank this year — a record since the Second Intifada.

In the West Bank town of Jenin, residents have emptied the streets and children hide indoors as Israeli tanks and snipers raid the city. The Jenin Refugee Camp has been targeted with drones and repeatedly invaded with armored bulldozers that tear up streets. Since October 7, 58 Palestinians have been killed in Jenin alone. Last week, Israeli soldiers stormed Jenin’s Freedom Theatre, a renowned cultural institution, ransacking the place, knocking down walls, destroying theater and office equipment, confiscating computers and assaulting theater staff. They later beat up, handcuffed, blindfolded and abducted Mustafa Sheta, the Freedom Theatre’s general manager, and Ahmed Tobasi, the theater’s artistic director, from their homes. Zoe Lafferty, the theatre’s associate director, described the attack to the Middle East Eye as a form of “cultural genocide.”

In any given year, around Christmastime, the Church of Nativity receives hundreds of thousands of visitors and worshipers. This year, Bethlehem — home to more than a quarter of a million Palestinians — is besieged like other towns in the West Bank. It is shrouded in darkness, sadness, tears and agony. Since October 7, a large number of people were rounded up in Bethlehem and put in jail without being charged under Israel’s “administrative detention” policy.

The Patriarchs and Heads of the Churches in Jerusalem declared the cancellation of Christmas celebrations in a solemn announcement on November 10. The Church of Nativity has canceled its Christmas festivities, put away its Christmas decorations, and instead of the church’s normal nativity scene, it placed baby Jesus on top of a pile of rubble inside the church.

Munther Isaac, the church’s pastor, explained his decision in his Sunday sermon in Arabic and said:

This is precisely the meaning of Christmas. This year due to the death, destruction, and rubble in our land, this is how we welcome ‘the King of Glory’ … Christmas is the presence of baby Jesus with those who suffer … If Christ were to be born today, he would be born under the rubble. I invite you to see the image of Jesus in every child killed and pulled from under the rubble … Yes, Christmas celebrations are canceled this year, but Christmas itself is not, and will not be canceled, for our hope cannot be canceled. Jesus’ birth is our hope; Jesus is our hope.

U.S. Ensures UN Fails to Stop the Genocide

On December 8, the UN secretary-general invoked Article 99 of the UN Charter to trigger a vote for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. Many lives could have been saved had the U.S. not used its veto power and cast the single “no” vote. The U.S.’s veto of the ceasefire resolution — despite the fact that the vast majority of the people in the U.S. support a ceasefire — shows the people of this country and the world at large that the Biden administration’s allegiance is not to public opinion or international law, but to the apartheid state of Israel.

Four days after the Security Council vote, the UN General Assembly held an “emergency special session” under the “Uniting for Peace” resolution. This session is applicable when the Security Council fails to exercise its primary responsibility for international peace and security due to the veto of a permanent member. During the special session, the UN General Assembly voted overwhelmingly in favor of a resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire. The result was 153 votes in favor, 23 abstentions and 10 votes against. The negative votes were cast by the U.S., Israel, two EU countries (Austria and Czech Republic), Guatemala, Liberia, Micronesia, Nauru, Papua New Guinea and Paraguay.

While this “binding” vote shows that the U.S. and Israel are isolated and that most countries in the world want an immediate ceasefire, we know from past UN resolutions that Israel is unlikely to comply, having previously ignored more than 40 UN resolutions since its establishment.

National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan met with Israeli leaders last Thursday and delivered President Joe Biden’s message: Israel should switch to more precise tactics in about three weeks. But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeated over the weekend that Israel will need to continue the “high-intensity” phase for more than another two months in order to achieve its goal of “eradicating Hamas.”

During his visit to Tel Aviv on Monday, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said, “Hamas is determined to doom both Israelis and Palestinians to an unending cycle of suffering and strife.” He added: “So make no mistake: Hamas should never again be able to project terror from Gaza into the sovereign state of Israel. And we will continue to work together for a safer, more secure future for Israel, and a brighter future for the Palestinians.”

With a fresh supply of U.S.-made bombs and ammunition, the U.S.-backed Israeli war on the Palestinians of Gaza appears to have no end in sight.

As U.S. leaders celebrate Christmas with their families, Palestinians 

No Virginia, That’s Not Snow over Gaza and Lebanon for the Holiday; it’s White Phosphorus Sent by Uncle Sam

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Netanyahu’s, Biden’s and Blinken’s Chanukah Bombing of Gaza:

Images of white phosphorus shells releasing their deadly cargo on Gaza (courtesy of from Snopes 10/13/2023 report)

By Dave Lindorff

Source: This Can’t Be Happening!

Evidence is mounting that Israel is firing shells that disperse illegal white phosphorus on targets — a gruesome weapon supplied to Israel by and manufactured in the US, and which the US has, in contravention to a  UN ban, itself used in Syria, Iraq and other conflicts.

White phosphorus  or WP is widely opposed as a weapon of war because the phosphorus, put on small bits of felt  released and scattered from the air from a burst cannon shell, grenade or bomb, ignites on contact with atmospheric oxygen and burns at a very high temperature. On contacting human flesh it burns straight down through skin and muscle to the bone, is terribly painful, and can cause painful death or lasting injuries. 

Israel was caught having used the weapon in southern Lebanon on Oct. 16, as reported in the Washington Post, in an attack that burned several homes and at least nine civilians when Israel’s military responded to shelling by Hezbollah. The Israeli military initially denied using the weapon, but spent shell casings identifying them as white phosphorus shells and with markings showing they were made by US arms makers, discovered by a Post reporter on the ground there, were unmistakable. So was the obvious Israeli lie that the phosphorus weapon was only used to create a smoke screen to protect Israeli troops (who in truth were not in Lebanon!).

Israel has also been charged with using white phosphorus in its two-month massive attack on Gaza, in particular over crowded parts of Northern Gaza (see photo which shows the characteristic burning trails of phosphorus falling from an opened shell in mid-air, a familiar image from the US invasion of Iraq in 2003-4). 

Meanwhile, the fact-check outfit Snopes has issued a damning report by investigative reporter Alex Kasprak that concludes that while the evidence may not provide absolute confirmation regarding white phosphorus shell use in Gaza, the  available photos and videos “are strong evidence in support of that conclusion.” 

The use of white phosphorus as a weapon in the Gaza War is particularly horrific because most Palestinians there have no shelter.  The concrete buildings they had lived in might have helped protect them, but have largely been destroyed thanks to Israel’s carpet-bombing and shelling of their homes and apartment buildings. Now much of the Gaza population lives on the streets, sleeping on sidewalks or empty lots, and is completely exposed to contact with any falling white phosphorus —- this at a time when hospitals are no longer functioning anywhere in Gaza. 

When accused of using white phosphorus in Iraq, particularly on occasions like the total destruction of Fallujah in a 2004 revenge attack that Israel might well be using as a model for its much larger current attack on Gaza, the Pentagon and Bush administration lied by claiming the phosphorus weapon was only being used to “light up the area,” not to kill troops or civilians. But that lie was exposed by the weapon’s results: the many civilians horribly burned or killed by white phosphorus — and also by the photos taken in daytime showing the distinctive white smoke trails coming down from the air against a bright blue sky when no artificial light was required. 

It all amounts to one more charge of war crimes against Israel (and the US) in addition to the major war crime of launching a war of collective punishment and revenge upon the 2.3 million captive and suffering residents of Gaza by the Israeli government and military that is charged with assuring their well-being in a captive territory from which they cannot leave at will and which is dependent upon Israel for currently barred food, water, electricity and access to medical supplies.

Already, the IDF war on Gaza—when one factors in all the missing and now dead victims buried under buildings collapsed over the past nine weeks by Israel’s record bombing campaign— has claimed the  lives off over one-percent of the Palestinian population trapped in the fenced-in and walled-off territory. And the IDF’s brutal one-sided campaign, now in its eighth week, continues full force, with the US, the supplier of the ammunition, including white phosphorus 155-millimeter cannon rounds, refusing to pull the plug and demand a cease fire. 

Obviously most of the known 18,000 Palestinian deaths and the thousands of unknown deaths from building collapses have been killed by “ordinary” bombs and explosive howitzer and tank shells or gunfire, But while white phosphorus attacks may not be adding that many victims to that list, relatively speaking, it speaks to the viciousness of the Israeli military that has chosen to use this weapon, as well as of the US military for keeping such bombs and shells in its inventory and supplying them to such a racist, apartheid state. (As for the US, where’s the surprise in learning that the nation that invented “stickier’ napalm, not to mention atomic bombs, doesn’t just use white phosphorus weapons, but like a oxycontin dealer trying to support his own habit is pushing them on other countries.)

Nixon and Kissinger had their wretched, criminal  Christmas Bombing of North Vietnam by B-52 bombers over three decades ago in 1972. Netanyahu, Biden and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken are now having their own Chanukah Bombing, which, if the US-backed Iraeli blitz continues for another two weeks will be a Christmas Bombing 2.0.

US Seeks Plausible Deniability as it Lights Middle East on Fire

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By Brian Berletic

Source: New Eastern Outlook

A surprising change of tone came from the Pentagon in early December. After weeks of devastating Israeli military operations inside Gaza, the US Secretary of Defense implored Israel to demonstrate restraint and concern for the civilian population.

The Hill in its early December 2023 article, “Israel risks ‘strategic defeat’ if civilians aren’t protected, Pentagon chief says,” would report:

Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said Israel risks a “strategic defeat” if it does not work to protect Palestinian civilians in Gaza amid its war on militant group Hamas in the region. “The center of gravity is the civilian population and if you drive them into the arms of the enemy, you replace a tactical victory with a strategic defeat…”

The article also noted:

The Biden administration has issued caution that a campaign in southern Gaza must be carried out more precisely than Israel did in the first leg of the war.

After a century of American military aggression killing millions (mostly civilians) around the globe, everywhere from Southeast Asia to North Africa, across the Middle East and deep into Central Asia, is Washington finally finding a sense of humanity?

No.

All while US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin attempted to convince the world that Washington cares about the Palestinian civilian population, the US continues flooding the Israeli arsenal with US-made weapons, enabling the campaign of indiscriminate brutality.

Bloomberg in its November 2023 article, “US Is Quietly Sending Israel More Ammunition, Missiles,” would report:

The Pentagon has quietly ramped up military aid to Israel, delivering on requests that include more laser-guided missiles for its Apache gunship fleet, as well as 155mm shells, night-vision devices, bunker-buster munitions and new army vehicles, according to an internal Defense Department list. 

The weapons pipeline to Israel is extending beyond the well-publicized provision of Iron Dome interceptors and Boeing Co. smart bombs. It continues even as Biden administration officials increasingly caution Israel about trying to avoid civilian casualties in the Gaza Strip.

Israel could not continue its military operations and the subsequent destruction of Gaza’s civilian population without this US military aid. Israel also continues to enjoy US political protection within the halls of the United Nations.

Washington cannot even say it didn’t know its weapons would be used by Israel to carry out this indiscriminate brutality because Israeli military representatives openly declared they would before their military operations into Gaza even began.

The Guardian in their October 10, 2023, article, “‘Emphasis is on damage, not accuracy’: ground offensive into Gaza seems imminent,” admitted:

IDF spokesperson R Adm Daniel Hagari made the startling admission that “hundreds of tons of bombs” had already been dropped on the tiny strip, adding that “the emphasis is on damage and not on accuracy…”

Why then does Washington want the world to believe it has growing concerns over the nature of Israel’s military operations in Gaza, and more specifically, concerns regarding the brutality Washington is admitting is being used against the civilian population?

Washington’s History of Pleading Peace While Pursuing War 

Washington wants plausible deniability. The US has for years followed a familiar pattern of attempting to covertly provoke nations and regions into conflict while publicly appearing to pursue reconciliation and peace.

For example, the US for years rhetorically supported the Minsk agreements regarding reconciliation within Ukraine, all while deliberately building up Ukraine’s military capabilities to empower and encourage the widening violence in eastern Ukraine and the eventual provocation of Russia to become directly involved in the conflict.

Likewise, the US officially maintains a “One China” policy in regards to the status of Taiwan, recognizing it as an integral part of Chinese territory, yet unofficially Washington has done everything in its power to undermine the policy and provoke war with China over its efforts to support separatism in Taipei.

Officially, the US supports the two-state solution regarding Israel and Palestine. Unofficially, and sometimes quite openly, the US has supported the most extreme elements within both Israel and among Palestinians to ensure no such peace agreement is ever possible.

Israel as the Eager Provocateur 

The intention by Washington to use Israel as a proxy and provocateur within the Middle East is well documented within US government and corporate-funded policy think tank papers. One such paper, published by the Brookings Institution in 2009 titled, “Which Path to Persia? Options for a New American Strategy Toward Iran,” focuses on containing Iran politically, militarily, and economically. It lays out options for disarming Iran and for overthrowing its government through US-sponsored sedition or US military intervention. Beyond the US and groups the paper sought to use as proxies within Iran, the paper also cited Israel as an eager regional proxy that could attack Iran, triggering a regional war that the US could then appear “reluctant” to join. The goal, of course, is to appear that the US sought peace, being left with no choice but war, all while a US-led war was the objective to begin with.

The paper notes:

…it would be far more preferable if the United States could cite an Iranian provocation as justification for the airstrikes before launching them. Clearly, the more outrageous, the more deadly, and the more unprovoked the Iranian action, the better off the United States would be. Of course, it would be very difficult for the United States to goad Iran into such a provocation without the rest of the world recognizing this game, which would then undermine it. (One method that would have some possibility of success would be to ratchet up covert regime change efforts in the hope that Tehran would retaliate overtly, or even semi-overtly, which could then be portrayed as an unprovoked act of Iranian aggression.)

It also says:

“In a similar vein, any military operation against Iran will likely be very unpopular around the world and require the proper international context—both to ensure the logistical support the operation would require and to minimize the blowback from it. The best way to minimize international opprobrium and maximize support (however, grudging or covert) is to strike only when there is a widespread conviction that the Iranians were given but then rejected a superb offer—one so good that only a regime determined to acquire nuclear weapons and acquire them for the wrong reasons would turn it down. Under those circumstances, the United States (or Israel) could portray its operations as taken in sorrow, not anger, and at least some in the international community would conclude that the Iranians “brought it on themselves” by refusing a very good deal.”

Here, the paper admits Iran does not seek war, but could be provoked into one anyway, and notes that the US, or Israel, could then carry out military aggression against Iran having convinced the world they did so reluctantly.

Israel factors so heavily in US plans to provoke war with Iran, it was given its own chapter in the paper. Chapter 5 of the paper is titled, “Leave it to Bibib: Allowing or Encouraging an Israeli Military Strike,” and notes how a war started by Israel could then be cited as a pretext for the US itself to join in afterwards, and most importantly, appear to do so “reluctantly.”

Thus, as Israel continues destroying Gaza, targeting the civilian population deliberately, knowingly triggering unrest across the region which in turn is placing pressure on Arab governments as well as Iran’s to respond, the stage is being set for the possibility of wider conflict.

As Israel attacks, invades, and erases Gaza, it is also targeting Hezbollah in Lebanon. Both the US and Israel have already carried out strikes in Syria. The goal is to trigger a conflict the US and Israel can portray as an act of aggression against either or both to then expand military operations across the whole region.

US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin posing as concerned for the Palestinian population all while arming Israel to continue indiscriminately brutalizing them, is being done to convince the world the US is pleading peace all while in actuality pursuing wider war.

The US used the proxy war in Ukraine to reorder Europe and reassert hegemony over the continent, rolling back European cooperation with both Russia and China. The US likely seeks to repeat a similar process in the Middle East where relations are improving within the region between Iran and Saudi Arabia, and between Syria and the rest of the Arab World. The region also collectively continues moving closer with Russia and China as well as toward multipolarism.

Only time will tell if the region continues successfully moving out from under generations of Western hegemony – first under the British Empire and now under the US – or if the US will successfully trigger regional conflict that can divide, destroy, and disrupt this process, just as it has in Europe.

House Passes $886 Billion National Defense Authorization Act

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The bill extends Section 702 of FISA, which allows mass warrantless surveillance of Americans

By Dave DeCamp

Source: Antiwar.com

On Thursday, the House passed the $886 billion 2024 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which funds the Pentagon and some military spending for other government agencies. The NDAA has already been passed by the Senate and now heads to President Biden’s desk.

The NDAA includes a provision to extend Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence, which allows mass warrantless surveillance of Americans. US government agencies portray the law as designed to target foreigners outside of the US, but it allows the collection of any communications they have with Americans, including emails and text messages.

Section 702 was due to expire at the end of this year, but the NDAA extends it to April 19, 2024. According to Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), the House only needed 143 votes to strip the extension out of the NDAA, but only 118 House members voted “nay,” including 73 Republicans and 45 Democrats.

“Here are the 118 Representatives who voted to protect your right to privacy. (Nay to FISA warrantless surveillance as part of NDAA),” Massie wrote on X with a picture of the roll call. “We lost but it was close. We needed 143 votes (1/3) to stop FISA since they suspended the rules to bring it to the floor.”

The mammoth $886 billion NDAA is $28 billion more than what was approved last year. President Biden is seeking another $111 billion to fund military aid for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan on top of regular military spending, but Republicans are holding out until Democrats agree to a deal on significant changes to border policies.

The new NDAA includes several amendments to fund the US and allied military buildup in the Indo-Pacific that’s aimed at China. One amendment allows the Pentagon to transfer three nuclear-powered Virginia-class submarines to Australia as part of the AUKUS military pact the US, Britain, and Australia signed in 2021 to prepare for a future war with China.