Charlotte Church performed as part of a group singing in support of
Gaza at Barry Island Promenade. The Welsh singer has lent her voice to a
number of pro Palestine causes, calling for an immediate ceasefire on
the Gaza Strip.
The Big Sing for Gaza event took place on Saturday
at the popular tourist attraction, with fundraised for the Middle East
Children's Alliance. Church led a choir on the promenade, singing "Let
Gaza live", with the event also including kite flying, sand art and
floral tributes.
Speaking at the event, Church said: "It's been a
beautiful event, I feel very passionate about whatever I can to raise my
voice to call for a ceasefire and to call to end the occupation of
Palestine. What we're seeing happen in Palestine, what we're seeing
happen to civilians, to children to babies, to birthing mothers, it's
unbearable, it's unbearable to witness and I just (feel) like I have to
do whatever I can as one small human to be with these other wonderful
humans whose hearts are breaking over what is happened and what they are
seeing, and what's being allowed to happen.
"Our government is
complicit, America's government is complicit, and other world
governments who are complicit in this and are still sending money and
weapons to Israel. As a mother it's just too much, it needs to stop, it
needs to end. I'll keep coming out until it does. Not just a ceasefire
but an end to the occupation. Palestine has been under an apartheid
system and a military occupation in Gaza since the 60s, and a really
violent military occupation.
VATICAN NEWS reports that Cardinal Gianbattista Pizzaballa has termed the Gaza situation "objectively intolerable" and "Everyone -- religious, political, and social communities -- must do everything possible to put an end this
situation." AP notes U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres has called it a "moral outage." Former UK Prime Minister David Miliband, International Rescue Committee president, terms it "a failure of humanity" -- see video below.
Progressive US congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
called the Israeli military campaign in Gaza an “unfolding genocide” in
a scathing speech that demanded the Joe Biden White House suspend aid
to Israel’s armed forces.
“As we speak, in this moment, 1.1 million innocents in Gaza are at famine’s door,” Ocasio-Cortez said in a speech on the House floor on Friday.
Citing
30,000 Palestinian deaths in Gaza and noting 70% were women and
children, she continued: “A famine … is being intentionally precipitated
through the blocking of food and global humanitarian assistance by
leaders in the Israeli government. This is a mass starvation of people,
engineered and orchestrated.
“This was all
accomplished – much of this was accomplished – with US resources and
weapons. If you want to know what an unfolding genocide looks like, open
your eyes.”
Gaza remains under assault. Day 169 of the assault in the wave that began in October. Binoy Kampmark (DISSIDENT VOICE) points out, "Bloodletting as form; murder as fashion. The ongoing campaign in Gaza
by Israel’s Defence Forces continues without stalling and restriction.
But the burgeoning number of corpses is starting to become a challenge
for the propaganda outlets: How to justify it? Fortunately for Israel,
the United States, its unqualified defender, is happy to provide cover
for murder covered in the sheath of self-defence." CNN has explained, "The Gaza Strip is 'the most dangerous place' in the world to be a child, according to the executive director of the United Nations Children's Fund." ABC NEWS quotes UNICEF's December 9th statement, ""The Gaza Strip is the most dangerous place in the world to be a child.
Scores of children are reportedly being killed and injured on a daily
basis. Entire neighborhoods, where children used to play and go to
school have been turned into stacks of rubble, with no life in them." NBC NEWS notes, "Strong majorities of all voters in the U.S. disapprove of President Joe
Biden’s handling of foreign policy and the Israel-Hamas war, according to the latest national NBC News poll.
The erosion is most pronounced among Democrats, a majority of whom
believe Israel has gone too far in its military action in Gaza." The
slaughter continues. It has displaced over 1 million people per the US
Congressional Research Service. Jessica Corbett (COMMON DREAMS) points out, "Academics and legal experts around the world, including Holocaust scholars, have condemned
the six-week Israeli assault of Gaza as genocide." The death toll of
Palestinians in Gaza is grows higher and higher. United Nations Women noted,
"More than
1.9 million people -- 85 per cent of the total population of Gaza --
have
been displaced, including what UN Women estimates to be nearly 1 million
women and girls. The entire population of Gaza -- roughly 2.2 million
people -- are in crisis levels of acute food insecurity or worse." DPA notes today's events "brings the total number of Palestinian fatalities in the latest Gaza war to 32,142, plus 74,412 injured." Months
ago, AP noted, "About 4,000 people are reported missing." February 7th, Jeremy Scahill explained
on DEMOCRACY NOW! that "there’s an estimated 7,000 or 8,000
Palestinians missing, many of them in graves that are the rubble of
their former home." February 5th, the United Nations' Phillipe
Lazzarini Tweeted:
And the area itself? Isabele Debre (AP) reveals, "Israel’s military offensive
has turned much of northern Gaza into an uninhabitable moonscape. Whole
neighborhoods have been erased. Homes, schools and hospitals have been
blasted by airstrikes and scorched by tank fire. Some buildings are
still standing, but most are battered shells." Kieron Monks (I NEWS) reports, "More than 40 per cent of the buildings in northern Gaza have been damaged or destroyed, according to a new study of satellite imagery
by US researchers Jamon Van Den Hoek from Oregon State University and
Corey Scher at the City University of New York. The UN gave a figure of 45 per cent of housing
destroyed or damaged across the strip in less than six weeks. The rate
of destruction is among the highest of any conflict since the Second
World War."
A United Nations panel said Thursday that the Israeli military's siege of Gaza
appears "calculated to bring about the physical destruction of
Palestinian children," pointing to the growing number of kids starving
to death as Israel obstructs the delivery of humanitarian aid.
"They are cut off from food, even crumbs are not easy to find," the U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child said in a statement. "A little girl wept in front of the BBC's
camera, crying, 'I miss bread.' The occupying power has blocked or
severely restricted food and other life-essential supplies and aid."
At least 27 children have died of malnutrition or dehydration in recent
weeks, a toll that the U.N. panel said is "likely to be significantly
higher" and is "set to rise" as Israel's blockade and attacks on aid
convoys continue. An alarming analysis
released earlier this week by the Integrated Food Security Phase
Classification found that Gaza's entire population—roughly half of which
is children—is "facing high levels of acute food insecurity."
"Children in Gaza can no longer wait, as each passing minute
risks another child dying of hunger as the world looks on," the U.N.
committee said.
Children are also at high risk from ongoing Israeli bombings, which have inflicted immense physical and psychological suffering
on Gaza's children. Israel's military has killed more than 13,000
children in the territory since October 7, a figure that the United
Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) called "astronomically horrifying." Save the Children estimated
that between October and January, an average of more than 10 children
per day in Gaza lost one or both of their legs due to Israeli attacks.
"I
think these numbers that we're seeing out of Gaza are just staggering,"
Catherine Russell, UNICEF's executive director, said earlier this week.
"We haven't seen that rate of death among children in almost any other
conflict in the world."
NEW POLL: Rep. Takano’s 32-Hour Workweek Bill Popular with Likely Voters
WASHINGTON, D.C. –New independent polling
from Data for Progress shows that 57% of likely voters support
legislation to transition the U.S. from a 40-hour workweek to a 32-hour
workweek. The polling comes on the heels of Congressman Mark Takano’s (CA-39)Thirty-Two Hour Workweek Act gaining fresh momentum with Senator Bernie Sanders’ (I-VT) introduction of a Senate companion bill last week.
Key poll takeaways:
· Independents are onboard, backing the proposal by 58%-31%.
· Republicans show an openness to a 32-hour workweek, disapproving by only 44%-49%.
· Almost no education gap as likely voters both with a college degree (60%) and without a college degree (56%) support the legislation.
· Wildly popular with under 45-year-olds (68%), but also still retains majority support with over 45-year-olds (51%).
Survey details: fielded between March 15-17, sampled 1,196
likely voters nationally, has a margin of error of ± 3%, and presented a
balanced message test of a 32-hour workweek bill.
Legislation details: Rep. Takano’s Thirty-Two Hour Workweek Act
would reduce the standard workweek from 40 hours to 32 hours by
amending the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and lowering the maximum
hours threshold for overtime compensation for non-exempt employees.
The Thirty-Two Hour Workweek Act does not make any changes
or limit the number of hours that an employee may work in a standard
workweek but amends the definition of the workweek in federal law. The
majority of workers impacted would be non-exempt, hourly workers, but
some salaried workers fall under the scope of the bill’s provisions.
This legislation has the potential to increase wage-earning
opportunities for a larger number of workers by limiting the number of
hours required to reach the full-time threshold, as well as allow for
better work-life balance and overall health outcomes.
Full text of the House version of the Thirty-Two Hour Workweek Act is available here. A one pager can be found here.
Congresswoman Bush Delivers Floor Speech on Exclusion of RECA from Spending Bill
WATCH HERE: “It is past time that this body gets its priorities straight,” says Bush
Washington D.C. (Mar. 21, 2024) — Today, Congresswoman Cori Bush (MO-01) delivered a speech on the House floor to express her grave disappointment that the Radiation Exposure Compensation Reauthorization Act (RECA) was excluded from the upcoming government spending bill that is expected to pass Congress on Friday. Watch HERE or read her full remarks, as prepared for delivery, below.
Today, Congresswoman Bush released the following statement
after the text of the FY 2024 government funding bill was released
without the inclusion of RECA. Last week, Congresswoman Bush joined
Missouri House colleagues in a letter
urging both House and Senate leadership, and the Appropriations
Committees, to include RECA in the upcoming FY 2024 appropriations.
“St. Louis and I rise to express our grave disappointment
that neither the extension or expansion of the Radiation Exposure
Compensation Act is included in this spending bill.
“Decades ago, our government dumped radioactive waste in
communities across this country – including in my district. To this day,
many of my constituents are sick and dying because of their exposure.
World War II is still killing people in my district.
“We were wronged by the federal government and rather than
taking responsibility to make it right, Congress couldn’t spare one dime
on this bipartisan effort to compensate the victims.
“Why is it that we always have endless funds for war but never enough to repair the harm war has caused?
“It is past time that this body gets its priorities straight.
Take full responsibility. Clean up this waste. Compensate those harmed.
You have 78 days. I yield back.”
Third Inhaler Company Caps Prices at $35 a Month After Baldwin’s Investigation into High Costs
GSK becomes third major inhaler
manufacturer to cap prices after increased scrutiny from Baldwin;
Baldwin: “Make no mistake, our campaign against big drug companies to
lower costs is working”
WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin (D-WI)
applauds GlaxoSmithKline’s (GSK) announcement that Americans throughout
the country with asthma and COPD will pay no more than $35 for the
brand name inhalers they manufacture. With this announcement, GSK joins
AstraZeneca and Boehringer Ingelheim as the third major inhaler
manufacturer to cap the out-of-pocket costs for their inhaler products
at $35 per month in the United States. GSK, AstraZeneca, and Boehringer
Ingelheim are three of the four drug companies that Senator Baldwin
launched an investigation into, questioning the exorbitantly high costs Americans pay for inhalers compared to other countries.
“Make no mistake, our campaign against big drug companies to lower
costs is working. For far too long, big pharmaceutical manufacturers
have gotten away with jacking up the costs for those who rely on
inhalers to breathe,” said Senator Baldwin. “I launched
an investigation into these big drug companies to hold their feet to
the fire on their price gouging and since then, three out of the four
have come clean and are lowering prices for middle-class families. I
will continue to hold big pharma companies accountable and bring down
the cost for Wisconsin families.”
GSK announced
they would cap of out-of-pocket costs at $35 per month for all of its
asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) medicines, the
most prescribed portfolio of inhalers in the U.S.
The
announcement comes after Senator Baldwin has been hosting roundtable
discussions with providers, patients, and advocates on the impact of
high inhaler costs. This week, Baldwin was in Milwaukee,
which is ranked fourth among the nation’s top “asthma capitals” and
pediatric uncontrolled asthma is a leading cause of emergency room
visits, and heard from patients and providers how the high cost of
inhalers can lead to patients rationing their supply. Senator Baldwin
also was in Dane County and heard stories about the barriers patients and families face to accessing inhalers.
Earlier this year, Senator Baldwin also called on
the four biggest inhaler companies to stop unfairly locking out
generics from the market and driving up the cost of inhalers for
Americans. Specifically, in letters to AstraZeneca, Boehringer
Ingelheim, GSK, and Teva, Senator Baldwin called on the companies to
stop improperly listing patents for inhalers in the Orange Book and
stifling competition.
Senators Murray, King Lead Bipartisan Letter Urging VA Remove Barriers to Women Veterans Seeking Support for Sexual Trauma
About 1 in 3 women experience a sexual trauma during their service
Washington, D.C.—Today, U.S. Senators Patty Murray
(D-WA), Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee and the VA
subcommittee, and Angus King (I-ME) both members of the Senate Veterans
Affairs Committee, led a bipartisan group of senators in urging the
Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to prioritize mental and physical
healthcare resources for women veterans who experienced sexual trauma
during their service. In a letter
to VA Secretary Denis McDonough, Senators Murray and King lead 31 of
their Senate colleagues to urge VA to remove unnecessary barriers to
sexual assault resources through changes such as utilizing existing call
center infrastructure to inform women of the resources available to
them, expanding telehealth options, and providing female-only waiting
rooms.
Military Sexual Trauma (MST) is the term used by the VA to refer to
sexual assault or harassment during military service. Approximately 33%
of all women experience some version of MST during their active duty
service (compared to 2% of men). However, many existing VA resources are
underutilized—approximately half of women who experienced MST use the
VA programs to heal from sexual assault and harassment.
“While the VA has made many improvements over the years, we
are concerned that women veterans, specifically those who have
experienced Military Sexual Trauma (MST), continue to face barriers to
care. Healthcare access for women veterans is a growing area of
importance, as women veterans are expected to comprise 18% of the
veteran community by 2040. To address this, the VA must increase
engagement with women veterans and build trust by enforcing
accountability,1” the Senators wrote. “About one in
three women veterans have experienced MST during their service in the
military.2 Veterans who have experienced MST may face difficulties with
interpersonal relationships, have an increased risk of developing
substance use disorder.3 These issues can significantly impact the
veteran’s quality of life, make it difficult to successfully transition
into civilian life, and increase their risk of suicide. In fact, a
recent VA report found that suicide rates among women veterans jumped
over 24 percent between 2020 and 2021.4 Women veterans with histories of
MST, in particular, are at a 65 percent increased risk of suicidal
ideations compared with women who have not.”
The Senators continued, “…Once enrolled in VA care, many
women veterans with MST report needing to justify and explain their
request for treatment to their provider. This experience causes undue
stress and places an unnecessary burden on the veteran. To reduce the
stigma of seeking care for MST, the VA must educate all providers about
the high prevalence and complexities of MST. Staff at all levels of care
should be well-versed in trauma-informed care, recognize the signs and
symptoms of PTSD and MST, and understand how that impacts trust. This is
especially important for women who report MST to military legal
officials but experience significant secondary victimization, which
often impairs later help-seeking in VA facilities.”
Thank you for your hard work and dedication to our nation and its
veterans. While the VA has made many improvements over the years, we are
concerned that women veterans, specifically those who have experienced
Military Sexual Trauma (MST), continue to face barriers to care.
Healthcare access for women veterans is a growing area of importance, as
women veterans are expected to comprise 18% of the veteran community by
2040. To address this, the VA must increase engagement with women
veterans and build trust by enforcing accountability.
About one in three women veterans have experienced MST during their
service in the military. Veterans who have experienced MST may face
difficulties with interpersonal relationships, have an increased risk of
developing substance use disorder.3 These issues can significantly
impact the veteran’s quality of life, make it difficult to successfully
transition into civilian life, and increase their risk of suicide. In
fact, a recent VA report found that suicide rates among women veterans
jumped over 24 percent between 2020 and 2021. Women veterans with
histories of MST, in particular, are at a 65 percent increased risk of
suicidal ideations compared with women who have not.
While we commend the VA for providing free counseling and
evidence-based treatment for women with MST, these services are clearly
under-utilized, as only approximately half of female veterans with an
MST history use VA healthcare. To inform these women of their VA
benefits, the VA should consider employing the Women Veterans Call
Center (WVCC) to conduct additional outreach tailored to women veterans
with MST. Specifically, the VA should look to inform veterans about Vet
Centers, which provide essential services regardless of the nature of
their discharge.
Once enrolled in VA care, many women veterans with MST report needing
to justify and explain their request for treatment to their provider.
This experience causes undue stress and places an unnecessary burden on
the veteran. To reduce the stigma of seeking care for MST, the VA must
educate all providers about the high prevalence and complexities of MST.
Staff at all levels of care should be well-versed in trauma-informed
care, recognize the signs and symptoms of PTSD and MST, and understand
how that impacts trust. This is especially important for women who
report MST to military legal officials but experience significant
secondary victimization, which often impairs later help-seeking in VA
facilities.
The environment in which veterans receive MST care may trigger
post-traumatic stress symptoms.9 A large percentage of these women
veterans anticipate harassment or associate harassment with VA
facilities.10 Female-only waiting rooms for privacy, expanded VA
telemedicine capabilities, and additional programming at Vet Centers for
women would all work to create a more inclusive environment for women
veterans.
Women veterans who have experienced MST already endure so many
hardships – let’s work to eliminate any barriers to VA care so they can
access the high-quality care that they deserve.
We ask that you answer the following questions:
What is the VA doing to reduce social stigmas that prevent veterans from accessing MST treatment?
Are women veterans who are ineligible for care at a VAMC informed of
their eligibility for treatment at a Vet Center? If so, how are they
informed?
What research is the VA currently conducting or planning to conduct
to understand and prevent women veteran suicide, especially amongst
younger and older veterans?
What additional resources and care are provided to women veterans who respond “yes” when being screened for MST?
Since launching the “Don’t Wait. Reach Out.” campaign in 2021, how
many of the 2.8 million veterans who were made aware of the campaign and
reached out for help were women?
Friday, March 21, 2024. Jonathan Turley tries to incite his mob against another professor, talk of a deal for Julian Assange, Gaza remains under assault, and much more.
We have to start with stupidity -- and if it's campus stupidity, chances are we're talking fish-eyed, oily skinned crack-a-toa smelling Jonathan Turley. The Sweetheart of The Federalist Society is an idiot. He is a dangerously under-educated person who always thinks he knows everything but he usually doesn't. This week, he hit on "mendacity" and thought he was capturing Tennessee Williams' CAT ON A HOT TIN ROOF. No, you uneducated hick, Big Daddy is taught about mendacity by Brick -- his bisexual son -- though Turley wouldn't know that either because a theater masterpiece, an American classic play exists in his tiny mind only as a film. He's just so damn stupid.
And I've had to hear about all week from friends unlucky enough to be professors at the same college. Crack-a-toa. Your colleagues wish you would learn to wash your ass. Your crack stinks and nobody wants to walk behind you, Turley. Use some soap and water.
But what has them ticked off with him this week is his attack on another professor.
Professor Letiecq views marriage as “the belief that a family composed of a cisgender heterosexual married couple ... and is necessary for ensuring White, heteropatriarchal supremacy in America.”...https://t.co/1wgErGqQa2
...The dominance of such scholarship in academia is concerning with the declining number of conservative or libertarian voices on faculties. These publications are far less likely to publish a work by an academic espousing the value of a traditional family unit. The result is a…
As one of his Turley's (male) colleagues asked me, "Is he trying to be Libs of TikTok?"
It would appear so.
Before we go further, let me note the first sentence of his article -- not his Tweet:
George Mason Professor Bethany Letiecq is at the center of a firestorm of controversy over his article in the Journal of Marriage and Family declaring that the institution of marriage plays a key role in white supremacy.
For starters, Bethany Letiecq is not a "he" and never has been a "he" so there is no "his article." In his first sentence of a piece he wrote and posted March 16th, he misgenders the person he's attacking. In the first sentence.
And why he is attacking her. She wrote a scholarly piece. He apparently doesn't like it. We all get that right, how his pretense of being for free speech is really just for speech he agrees with -- he's made that clear in the last three years with his attacks on LGBTQ+ people and his silence when they're free speech rights are violated.
Doctor of Jurisprudence
Bethany has a doctorate. Jonathan? Not really. He's got the legal equivalent of a doctorate (a doctor of jurisprudence -- basically a tech degree in law -- a very limited field of study). But Bethany has a doctorate and she's not writing for a legal journal. I don't think the idiot Turley understands the social sciences. Her article would attract agreement pieces, disagreement pieces, pieces arguing you're-half-right-but-you're-half-wrong. He doesn't understand the periodicals or for that matter a family studies symposium. He understands nothing.
A classic in Bethany's field (family studies) is Stephanie Coontz' THE WAY WE NEVER WERE: AMERICAN FAMILIES AND THE NOSTALGIA TRAP. I love that book -- I agree with it but I love it because of all the conversations it has inspired. Some, like me, agree with Coontz, some feel she's 100% wrong, some find sections to build on and continue the conversation -- Bethany's continuing the conversation. Turley doesn't know that because he doesn't know anything about family studies, about feminism, about anything but here he is pretending because he's got a small dangling Y chromosome, he's an expert on everything.
Turley knows nothing about the social sciences, knows nothing about what gets published and what doesn't in family studies periodicals, he doesn't know anything -- again, he doesn't even know to wash his own ass leading his co-workers to complain about his crack odor. (Disclosure, I labeled it crack-a-toa. His peers complained to me about his stinky ass, I labeled it crack-a-toa.)
He doesn't even know enough, six days after posting his attack on Bethany, to change "his article" to "her article."
Grasp as he attacks a professor for a piece she wrote -- a piece that is not in his area of expertise or even his area of rudimentary comprehension -- that he has still refused to write one word about all of Clarence Thomas' many ethical scandals revealed in the last 12 months. This huge Supreme Court news but 'legal scholar' Turley won't say a word against his beloved.
But he will take the time to attack a woman who wrote a scholarly article that makes an argument he disagrees with. He's trying to incite people against her -- 'She's the reason that others don't get published!' He is trying to stir up an attack on her. He's done that repeatedly as the advance man for FOX "NEWS" over the years.
He's hated on campus. And I'll be really shocked if he's not told to narrow his scope because his attack on this professor has everyone appalled. And they should be.
He concludes his attack on Bethany with this:
My disagreement with the paper of Professor Letiecq does not mean that I do not believe that it should have been published. It is provocative and challenging. My concern is the dominance of such scholarship in academia with the declining number of conservative or libertarian voices on faculties. These publications are far less likely to publish a work by an academic espousing the value of a traditional family unit. The result is a new type of orthodoxy and intolerance in higher education.
What a weasel. He has no proof that her piece getting published silenced others. But isn't that the FOX "NEWS" way -- make charges that attack others without backing them up. There is no backing for his claim that people were silenced because Bethany was published. But his lie fuels the wallow-in-victimhood status that too many conservatives in the US embrace as their safety blanket. 'I'm a scared, I'm a scared, the mean old world is out to get me.'
The paper was published over a month ago but the conservative mob just got started attacking it recently which is why Jonathan's on board. It's like when he tried to turn a mob on Target, remember? There's nothing controversial about noting that marriage was property rights (for the male) historically or that slavery existed in the US and legal marriage was denied in most cases to slaves.
But butt hurt babies like Jonathan Turley need to get their cranky rage out so they throw a tantrum and attack a writer.
Bethany's now on "The Professor Watchlist" and all the butt hurt babies like Turley are gunning for her. What a great way to pretend you support free speech.
I really understand why a professor (male) at Turley's campus says, "Every time I see that prissy face of his, I just want to punch him out." He does bring out that "This Waitress" vibe.
So I want to kill this waitress She's worked here a year longer than I If I did it fast you know that's an act of kindness
But I believe in peace I believe in peace, bitch I believe in peace I believe in peace I believe in peace, bitch I believe in peace
-- "The Waitress," written by Tori Amos, first appears on her UNDER THE PINK.
Since we believe in peace, we'll just hit Jonathan with a reading list -- a brief one -- and the hope that someone will read the books to him:
Stephanie Coontz's MARRIAGE, A HISTORY: FROM OBEDIENCE TO INTIMACY, OR HOW LOVE CONQUERED MARRIAGE
Stephanie Coontz' THE WAY WE REALLY ARE: COMING TO TERMS WITH AMERICA'S CHANGING FAMILIES
Annette Lareau's UNEQUAL CHILDHOODS: CLASS, RACE, AND FAMILY LIFE
The
U.S. Justice Department is considering whether to allow Julian Assange
to plead guilty to a reduced charge of mishandling classified
information, according to people familiar with the matter, opening up
the possibility of a deal that could eventually result in his release
from a British jail.
Assange,
the divisive WikiLeaks founder, is fighting a drawn-out legal battle
with the British government to avoid being extradited to the U.S. to
face trial for publishing thousands of confidential U.S. military
records and diplomatic cables around 2010. A U.K. court is currently
considering whether to allow a last-ditch appeal by the 52-year-old.
After U.S. prosecutors charged him in 2019, U.K. law-enforcement
officials apprehended him, and he has been in a London prison ever
since.
Justice
Department officials and Assange’s lawyers have had preliminary
discussions in recent months about what a plea deal could look like to
end the lengthy legal drama, according to people familiar with the
matter, a potential softening in a standoff filled with political and
legal complexities. The talks come as Assange has spent some five years
behind bars. U.S. prosecutors face diminishing odds that he would serve
much more time even if he were convicted stateside.
The
discussions remain in flux, and talks could fizzle. Any deal would
require approval at the highest levels of the Justice Department. Barry
Pollack, a lawyer for Assange, said he has been given no indication that
the department will take a deal. A Justice Department spokesman
declined to comment.
Citing the report yesterday on DEMOCRACY NOW!, Amy Goodman noted, "Assange has
been held in London’s Belmarsh Prison since 2019 awaiting possible
extradition to the United States, where he faces up to 175 years in
prison for publishing classified documents exposing U.S. war crimes."
Since 2003, the leaders of US/UK have illegally invaded Iraq, killing a million people; helped Saudi impose a man-made famine on Yemen, pushing 2.3m kids to starvation; and armed Israel’s genocide in Gaza.
In
learning that the US tabled a draft UN Security Council resolution on
Wednesday calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, some may be
tempted to think: “Better late than never.” But the human cost of this
war – The Nationalreported on Thursday that more than 800
Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the start of Ramadan – makes
clear the lethal consequences of diplomatic failure.
Security
Council resolutions may be legally binding, but several countries –
including Israel – have ignored them in the past. Many people who want
to see an immediate halt to the bloodshed will understandably wonder
what practical benefit such a resolution would have for the 2.3 million
Gazans living in fear of their lives. Nevertheless, the fact that it is
the US, Israel’s main backer, which is now endorsing calls for a
ceasefire is significant, particularly when one looks at the wider
pressure being exerted on Israel’s bellicose leadership.
There
is increasing divergence between the White House and the Israeli
government. US President Joe Biden has publicly described an Israeli
military assault on the overcrowded Gazan city of Rafah as a mistake.
One of Mr Biden’s political supporters, Senate Majority Leader Chuck
Schumer – a senior pro-Israel figure in Washington – recently described
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as an obstacle to peace.
Washington has also held talks with one of Mr Netanyahu’s main political
rivals, Israeli war cabinet member Benny Gantz.
But pressure on the Israeli government is coming from other quarters,
too. Canada's decision this week to suspend future arms exports to
Israel may not be a major move in terms of weaponry – Ottawa is not a
major supplier to Israel’s armed forces – but it was a significant
warning shot from a long-term western ally. Elsewhere, Israel appears to
be losing control of the narrative as prominent international actors
make clear their objections to the Gaza war.
Forensic. Sober. Clear-sighted. Scrupulous. Al Jazeera’s investigative unit has produced a film that tells the story of what really happened on 7 October.
This authoritative documentary does not flinch from detailing the
atrocities and war crimes carried out by Hamas. But it shows beyond
reasonable doubt that many of the lurid accounts that emerged from Israeli sources were false.
Deeply inflammatory stories, whether concerning allegations of mass
rape or the beheading and burning of babies, were either unsupported by
evidence or straightforward lies. Yet, they prepared the way for the
murderous savagery of the ensuing Israeli assault on Gaza, which has been described by the International Court of Justice as a plausible genocide.
Al Jazeera painstakingly analyses how these accounts entered the
public domain. This involves a sustained look at Zaka, Israel’s
emergency response unit of trained paramedics who handle terrorist
episodes and homicides.
Al Jazeera shows how Zaka gave details of atrocities that never happened, including of burned and beheaded babies, which made headlines around the world and were used for maximum propaganda effect by Israel to gain sympathy.
One Zaka employee, Yossi Landau, told reporters that Hamas burned to
death “two piles of 10 children each” in a house in Kibbutz Be’eri.
This account was pounced on by the media, and a version was repeated
by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a conversation with US President Joe Biden: “They took dozens of children, bound them up, burned them and executed them.”
But as Al Jazeera shows, these accounts were untrue. An examination
of the list of the dead showed that two 12-year-old twins were
tragically killed when police and soldiers stormed the house in Be’eri,
but there were no other children at that location, the documentary
notes.
More generally, the list reveals that two babies died on 7 October.
One was killed when a bullet was fired through a door, while the other
died following an emergency caesarean section after the mother was shot.
Neither was burned or beheaded.
AMYGOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh.
NERMEENSHAIKH: We look now at a new report
published by the research group Forensic Architecture, which counters
Israel’s argument at the International Court of Justice that it followed
humanitarian policies to safeguard civilian life in Gaza. South Africa
argued in January before the ICJ that Israel
was guilty of genocide during its war on Gaza. The report argues that
what Israel says are humanitarian evacuations in Gaza actually amount to
the forced displacement of Palestinians, which is a war crime.
AMYGOODMAN:
For more, we’re joined in London by Eyal Weizman, a British Israeli
architect born in Haifa. He’s founder and director of Forensic
Architecture, a professor of spatial and visual cultures at Goldsmiths
College at the University of London. He’s the author of several books,
including Hollow Land: Israel’s Architecture of Occupation and The Least of All Possible Evils: A Short History of Humanitarian Violence.
He’s also a member of the Technology Advisory Board of the
International Criminal Court and of the Center for Investigative
Journalism.
Eyal, welcome to Democracy Now! As we come to air right now,
the United States has presented a resolution to the U.N. Security
Council for a temporary ceasefire. I’m wondering if you could respond to
that and Netanyahu only speaking with Republicans, behind closed doors
— now he might be addressing a joint session of Congress, if the House
speaker decides to invite him — saying that Rafah invasion will happen.
EYALWEIZMAN:
Yeah. If a Rafah invasion will happen, we will see the humanitarian
disaster, the man-made humanitarian disaster imposed on Gaza, just
aggravated to levels that we haven’t yet experienced. In Rafah, we have a
huge part of the Palestinian people evacuated to living in inhumane
conditions where there are famine and lack of basic humanitarian
provisions, in something that is called a “safe zone.” And I think that
it’s important to understand that there is no safe place in Gaza.
Although Israel is designating part of the Strip as so-called safe areas
and ordering the population to evacuate to them, it continuously
imposes on these areas conditions that amount to unlivable conditions
and in continuation of its genocidal policies.
So, what we need to — my comment to that is, rather than allowing any
or entertaining any specific plans and provisions, you know, that the
U.S. is discussing now with the Israelis about allowing them to attack
Rafah under certain conditions, we need to see immediate ceasefire
across the board in all places of Gaza, in order to allow for the
rebuilding of the Strip, in order to allow for humanitarian provision to
reach each and every Palestinian in the north and in the south.
NERMEENSHAIKH:
Well, Eyal Weizman, the proposal that the U.S. has put forth — this is
before we turn to your report. The proposal that the U.S. has put forth
for a temporary ceasefire is reportedly for the release of Israeli
hostages and allowing more humanitarian aid into Gaza. You wrote in a piece — I want to ask you about a piece you wrote for the London Review of Books
in November in which you document — the piece is headlined “Exchange
Rate,” where you document the change in Israel policy with respect to
its hostages. So, if you could talk about the way that that’s played
out? You wrote the piece in November. If you could talk about the way
that’s played out, and how you think that might affect what happens now,
going forward, with respect to the hundred or so hostages who remain,
who are reportedly still alive?
EYALWEIZMAN:
I think that what you see in all negotiations around the captives and
the Palestinian prisoners sitting in Israeli prisons, some of them on
administrative detentions without charge, thousands of them, is that
Israel has been creating and enlarging its bank of prisoners in order to
create — in order to allow it to change the exchange rate. The title of
that piece in the LRB
was “Exchange Rate,” and it was looking at the history of Palestinian
resistance to Israeli occupation through the capture of captives, from
— really, from the famous airplane hijacks of the '70s all the way to
the present, the way in which Palestinians forced Israel into — the only
way that Palestinians could actually affect and release their prisoners
is through capturing Israeli captives. Over the years, the exchange
rate has changed favorably to the Palestinians. And what you're seeing
is that Israel is now arresting people in order — Palestinians, again,
and holding them in administrative detention, in order to beef up its
bank of captives.
More than that, you could see that in the reports on the negotiation,
the fate of those people that have been purportedly evacuated into safe
areas is being brought into the equation. One way of thinking about it
is to say, of course, Hamas or Palestinian factions in Gaza are holding
over 100 Israeli captives, and Israel is holding close to 2 million
Palestinian captives and bargaining for their return home in exchange
for its prisoners. And that is obviously patently illegal, according to
international law. And the fact that even that is being brought into the
negotiation testifies that that was the intent of holding them away
from their home as a bargaining chip towards that. So, you have an
exchange rate now that is 200 million Palestinians displaced — sorry, 2
million Palestinians displaced, 100 Israeli captives, and this is really
where the negotiations are going.
NERMEENSHAIKH: Eyal Weizman, let’s turn to your report,
the Forensic Architecture report, which is headlined “Humanitarian
Violence in Gaza.” If you could begin just by explaining — the two words
don’t normally come together, “humanitarian” and “violence.”
EYALWEIZMAN: Right.
NERMEENSHAIKH:
If you could explain what you mean by that? Of course, you’ve also
written a book on this. And then lay out the three phases of mass
displacement that you document in the report.
EYALWEIZMAN:
Yeah. So, you know, we think about humanitarian principles — and part
of them is international humanitarian law, so-called the laws of war —
as being there to protect civilians. But a certain manipulation of
international humanitarian law allows you to have operational advantage,
or, in this case, advantage in negotiation over the captives in this
particular way. So, there is a principle, an accepted principle, in
international — in humanitarianism that if you want to evacuate a
population into a safe zone, that safe zone needs to have several
conditions. There needs to be proper medical care. There needs to be
proper food and housing in these areas. Israel has evacuated — ordered
the evacuation of Palestinians from within Gaza and from the north to
the south into areas that were repeatedly under attack, into areas with
no housing, no medical care, and now that we see no food is being
provided in it, or very little, or not sufficient levels of aid within
that. So, that is, firstly, you know, the kind of the principle of using
a humanitarian principle that is purportedly used in order to save, in
order to treat civilians and take them out of harm’s way, in order to
achieve Israel’s operational objectives in this attack on Gaza, and that
is to exercise pain on the civilian population to generate levels of
destruction and harm that would deter Palestinians from ongoing
resistance to the Israeli occupation.
And it’s becoming more and more clear that the harm, that the levels
of destruction that we’re seeing, that the level of displacement that
we’re seeing, are not the byproduct and not the collateral effects of
this conflict, but really the only thing that Israel has achieved during
that war. It hasn’t achieved any of its tactical aims. It hasn’t
dismantled Hamas as an operative force. It hasn’t captured the Hamas
leadership. It hasn’t freed hostages, except of in very rare situations.
What it has done is create an equation in which the civilian population
is being put in harm’s way in order to bargain against their return
back to the north, to north of Gaza, in order to effectively achieve
what tactically Israel has not achieved.
So, in relation to the stages, a week or so after the October 7th
attack, Israel has given the entirety of the north of Gaza an evacuation
order. They were ordered to leave the north of Gaza, home to over a
million Palestinians, the center of Palestinian political, cultural
life, was actually ordered to cross Wadi Gaza, which divides, according
to them, Gaza into north and south. That was the first stage. And after
the ceasefire, the temporary ceasefire in which some prisoner exchange
was happening at the beginning of December, what Israel has done is
releasing an interactive map online, dividing Gaza into kind of a
gerrymandered 623 zones. It was very difficult, with people that we
spoke to in Gaza, to understand whether they are in zone number 546 or
547. The map was extremely confusing. It was released online at a time
of very frequent internet and power cuts, or it was communicated via
leaflets that were unevenly distributed. It was an incredibly confusing
system that led to the ongoing displacement of Palestinians from one
zone to the other. So, when they were — after they were ordered to all
move into southern Gaza, from different parts in the southern part of
Gaza, they were ordered to go into different places.
And what the report is showing is the systematic and ongoing use of
these evacuation orders were meant to achieve that population
displacement and that people were continuously being put in harm’s way.
The routes, the so-called safe routes, along which Palestinians were
ordered to evacuate were attacked. Areas where they went to had no
provisions and very often were attacked themselves. So, we cannot see
that humanitarian policy, so-called humanitarian policy, of the Israeli
forces — and the argument that the Israelis put forward in The Hague
that, you know, they are not in violation of the Genocide Convention
because they apply humanitarian principle, but we cannot see it as
anything else but part of the genocidal campaign that is actually
inflicted on Palestinians in Gaza.
AMYGOODMAN:
And now, of course, if Netanyahu does succeed in a full-scale ground
invasion of Rafah, they will go back to all these places they were
forced to flee. And they talk about, “No worries, Palestinian civilians
will be protected in these humanitarian zones.” Eyal Weizman, if you
could respond to that? And also, just for people to understand, your
organization is so unusual, and it also operates in several different
countries, you yourself born in Haifa. If you could explain how you do
what you do? We are also showing a series of maps, where you show the
stages, one, two, three. You’ve done so many different investigations,
from who killed Shireen Abu Akleh, the great Al Jazeera Arabic reporter
— when Israel was saying caught in crossfire, you proved the opposite:
She was killed by an Israeli sniper — among other things. Can you talk
about what Forensic Architecture does, and what you, as an Israeli
British architect, are doing in this kind of analysis — an architect?
EYALWEIZMAN:
Yeah, thank you for asking that. Of course, the nature of the Israeli
occupation in Gaza and the West Bank, and throughout Palestine complete,
makes use of architecture as part of the violence applied on
Palestinians. So, starting from the location of settlements on hilltops
in a way that divide the Occupied Territories, surveys it, bisect
Palestinian-built fabric, the design of roads, the provisional
infrastructure, you could say that settler colonialism is
architecturally enacted.
In Gaza, obviously, we had settlements in Gaza up until 2005, when
they were evacuated, but after that, the Gaza envelope is a system of
civilian and military infrastructure that included a number of fences
and earth berms and military facilities, as well as kibbutzim and
moshavim. These are agrarian settlements that are part of what Israel
always called its regional defense.
Of course, all that system was attacked on October 7th. So you could
see how architecture is mobilized as part of the system of control and
occupation of Palestinians. You could see why Palestinians would attack
that system of infrastructure — and this is without commending and, of
course, not supporting the killing and abduction of civilians.
But I think that architecture is a key part of that, of understanding
the conflict, the long history of Israel’s settler colonization, and
also understanding what is happening in Gaza now. It is happening in
urban environment. And one has to understand what this urban
environment, that has been created over the years of — you know, since,
really, the Gaza Strip was created as a historical anomaly in 1948, when
it was carved out as a kind of concentration area for refugees,
becoming one of the densest parts of the world, most densely inhabited
part of the world. How do you control population centers? And a lot of
thinking was done from the Israeli side in terms of thinking about the
control of Palestinians as an urban problem.
And what we see now happening in Gaza is the shaping of Gaza for, you
know, the day after. Would it come now? Would it come in weeks, in
months? We do not know. But what we see is Israel actually shaping the
built fabric, destroying all homes and agricultural areas in a huge
buffer zone along the border, creating east-west routes, not only the
famous one that we know, around Deir al-Balah, but all throughout that
very long and thin strip of territory, the Gaza Strip, we see it being
truncated, almost cut like salami, with routes and military
infrastructure that would be there in order to isolate and divide
different parts of the Gaza Strip, if resistance continues, from the
Palestinian parts.
And so, architecture — if architecture is really the means by which
Israel exercises control, we, architects, and the organization that I
run, Forensic Architecture, is — you know, has many architects working
with us, but also open-source investigators, journalists, lawyers, etc. —
we are monitoring things from a cartographic, spatial and architectural
perspective. We work very closely, and we have a partner organization
in Ramallah, the Al-Haq Forensic Architecture Unit, because we
understand that working in Palestine, like working anywhere else in the
world — Forensic Architecture has also got offices in Mexico, in Bogotá;
now we’re starting one in Istanbul, in Athens, in many other places in
the world. But understanding the lived reality, understanding the way
that architecture is used as an oppressive mechanism requires also the
lived experience — understanding the lived experience of people there.
And therefore, when we’ve done that report that you mentioned, we’ve
been in touch with — we’ve been in touch with Palestinians on the
ground, we’ve been in touch with medical professionals, with doctors, in
understanding the conditions in the so-called safe zones. And as I say,
there are no safe areas in Gaza.
We’ve tried to understand the spatial logic of that campaign. And we
could see that one of the main strategic tools for Israel to control and
afflict that pain on Gaza is through the evacuation orders, and that
they have been spatially designed — initially, again, dividing north
Gaza from south Gaza, and then dividing it into 600 Tetris parts, if you
like, in which, you know, you would get very a confusing order in which
your number would come up, and you would be told to go from that number
zone into another number zone. Do you get this message? Do you
understand it? And also, on the way, you’d be attacked. And the zone in
which you’re being evacuated to is itself unsafe and unlivable.
So, here what we see is the abuse of humanitarian principles to
further Israeli genocidal campaign. And this is why we call that report
“Humanitarian Violence.” We need to be very, very wary when we are
speaking about humanitarian principles in war, because very often
militaries — not only the Israeli militaries, but, you know, Western,
Northern, global — militaries from the Global North, when they engage in
urban warfare in parts of the Global South, they are applying
humanitarian principles — they’re playing international law in a
particular way that does not contain violence, that actually amplifies
it.
I’ll give you another example for that: warnings. You know, you could
think that to warn a population is actually something that could be
very, very helpful. It could save lives. But, actually, the aims of
these warnings, or what is implied in them — and sometimes explicitly
mentioned — is that if you do not heed the warning, you would be
considered potentially part of the armed resistance in a particular
area. That means you get redesignated from a protected civilian to a
nonprotected either voluntary human shield or part of a resistance, if
you do not heed the warning. So, in a sense, with one legal tool, you
created the redesignation of a big part of the population, and you
basically let the blood in that way. So, humanitarianism, when it
— those principles, when they’re using in such a brutal campaign, it
could be actually part of the problem, rather than something that is
moderating and defending civilians.
NERMEENSHAIKH:
Eyal Weizman, if we could talk a little bit more about that? The scale,
just to point out, just to give us a sense of the scale of the crisis
of mass expulsions, at the moment, almost 70% of the total area of the
Gaza Strip has been issued evacuation orders. If you could say, very
quickly, in terms of the International Court of Justice ruling, what
does your report suggest about the defense that Israel presented?
EYALWEIZMAN:
Yeah, that the defense is completely inapplicable. We will show how —
and we have shown how — Israeli military, the occupation forces, when
they maneuver through — if you look at things in relation to each other,
if you look at military maneuver, you look at areas that have been
bombed, as we have, through speaking to people, through analyzing
videos, through looking at satellite imagery, we have a good
understanding, we have a good map of what are the areas that have been
bombed. Overlay that with the so-called safe zones, overlay them with
Israeli military maneuver, and what you see is, A, civilians are being
evacuated into areas that have been bombed, that have no facilities, and
are continuously bombing — they are still being bombed as Israel has
ordered civilians into them. And you see, in some cases, Israeli
military maneuver, Israeli invasion into the area it itself designated
as safe zones.
So, in a sense, you see those categories operating in relation to
each other as part of an overall strategy, rather than you’re seeing
humanitarian principle pushing against military violence and moderating
it. You see it has become one of the tools in the Israeli campaign
toolbox to generate that level of destruction in Gaza. So, you know,
you’re speaking about 70% of the area is being displaced. And the
proportion —
AMYGOODMAN: Eyal, we have 10 seconds.
EYALWEIZMAN:
The proportion of people displaced is much higher, and the proportion
of civilian infrastructure destroyed is almost complete. So, look at
those things together and understand the militarization of humanitarian
principles.
AMYGOODMAN:
Eyal Weizman, we clearly have so much to talk about. We’d like to ask
you to stay, and we’ll post Part 2 online at democracynow.org. Eyal
Weizman is a British Israeli architect, founder and director of Forensic
Architecture. We’ll link to the new report,
“Humanitarian Violence: Israel’s Abuse of Preventive Measures in Its
2023-2024 Genocidal Military Campaign in the Occupied Gaza Strip.”
Gaza remains under assault. Day 168 of the assault in the wave that began in October. Binoy Kampmark (DISSIDENT VOICE) points out, "Bloodletting as form; murder as fashion. The ongoing campaign in Gaza
by Israel’s Defence Forces continues without stalling and restriction.
But the burgeoning number of corpses is starting to become a challenge
for the propaganda outlets: How to justify it? Fortunately for Israel,
the United States, its unqualified defender, is happy to provide cover
for murder covered in the sheath of self-defence." CNN has explained, "The Gaza Strip is 'the most dangerous place' in the world to be a child, according to the executive director of the United Nations Children's Fund." ABC NEWS quotes UNICEF's December 9th statement, ""The Gaza Strip is the most dangerous place in the world to be a child.
Scores of children are reportedly being killed and injured on a daily
basis. Entire neighborhoods, where children used to play and go to
school have been turned into stacks of rubble, with no life in them." NBC NEWS notes, "Strong majorities of all voters in the U.S. disapprove of President Joe
Biden’s handling of foreign policy and the Israel-Hamas war, according to the latest national NBC News poll.
The erosion is most pronounced among Democrats, a majority of whom
believe Israel has gone too far in its military action in Gaza." The
slaughter continues. It has displaced over 1 million people per the US
Congressional Research Service. Jessica Corbett (COMMON DREAMS) points out, "Academics and legal experts around the world, including Holocaust scholars, have condemned
the six-week Israeli assault of Gaza as genocide." The death toll of
Palestinians in Gaza is grows higher and higher. United Nations Women noted,
"More than
1.9 million people -- 85 per cent of the total population of Gaza --
have
been displaced, including what UN Women estimates to be nearly 1 million
women and girls. The entire population of Gaza -- roughly 2.2 million
people -- are in crisis levels of acute food insecurity or worse." AFP notes, "The health ministry in Gaza said today that at least 31,988 people have
been killed in the territory during more than five months of war." Months
ago, AP noted, "About 4,000 people are reported missing." February 7th, Jeremy Scahill explained
on DEMOCRACY NOW! that "there’s an estimated 7,000 or 8,000
Palestinians missing, many of them in graves that are the rubble of
their former home." February 5th, the United Nations' Phillipe
Lazzarini Tweeted:
And the area itself? Isabele Debre (AP) reveals, "Israel’s military offensive
has turned much of northern Gaza into an uninhabitable moonscape. Whole
neighborhoods have been erased. Homes, schools and hospitals have been
blasted by airstrikes and scorched by tank fire. Some buildings are
still standing, but most are battered shells." Kieron Monks (I NEWS) reports, "More than 40 per cent of the buildings in northern Gaza have been damaged or destroyed, according to a new study of satellite imagery
by US researchers Jamon Van Den Hoek from Oregon State University and
Corey Scher at the City University of New York. The UN gave a figure of 45 per cent of housing
destroyed or damaged across the strip in less than six weeks. The rate
of destruction is among the highest of any conflict since the Second
World War."
The threat from President Donald J. Trump to his vice president, Mike
Pence, was clear and direct: If you defy my effort to overturn the 2020
election by certifying the results, your future in Republican politics
is over.
“Mike, this is a political career killer
if you do this,” Mr. Trump told Mr. Pence by phone on the morning of
Jan. 6, 2021, according to the White House valet who was with the
president for much of the day and told Congress he had overheard the
conversation.
The testimony of Mr.
Trump’s valet, provided to the now-defunct House Jan. 6 Committee in
2022 but not previously released publicly, offers a rare firsthand look
into the former president’s behavior in the hours before, during and
after a mob of his supporters stormed the Capitol seeking to halt the
certification of President Biden’s victory.
