World Marks Six Months of 'Relentless Death and Destruction' in Gaza

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres reiterated his call for an "immediate humanitarian cease-fire, the unconditional release of all hostages, the protection of civilians, and the unimpeded delivery of humanitarian aid."

 Peace and human rights advocates on Sunday renewed calls for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza and an increase in lifesaving  humanitarian aid for its starving people as the embattled enclave  marked six months since the start of Israel's genocidal retaliation  for the October 7 attacks.

After Setting Himself on Fire, US Airman Aaron Bushnell Dies Declaring 'Free Palestine'

By Brett Wilkins

"Many of us like to ask ourselves, 'What would I do if I was alive during slavery? Or the Jim Crow South? Or apartheid? What would I do if my country was committing genocide?' The answer is, you're doing it."

"My name is Aaron Bushnell, I am an active-duty member of the United States Air Force, and I will no longer be complicit in genocide. I'm about to engage in an extreme act of protest, but compared to what people have been experiencing in Palestine at the hands of their colonizers, it's not extreme at all."

ICJ Hearings to Examine 57 Years of Israeli Occupation of Palestine

By Brett Wilkins

"Decades of injustice will finally face scrutiny," said U.N. human rights official Francesca Albanese ahead of next week's Hague hearings on the legal consequences of Israel's illegal occupation.

More than 50 countries are set to participate in next week's hearings at the International Court of Justice focusing on Israel's illegal 57-year occupation of Palestine, a forum that follows the Hague tribunal's finding last month that Israel is "plausibly" committing genocide in occupied Gaza.

The ICJ—also known as the World Court—will hold a week of hearings on the legal consequences of Israel's occupation of Palestine, which dates to the Israeli conquest of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, Gaza Strip, Syrian Golan Heights, and Egyptian Sinai Peninsula during the 1967 Six-Day War.

"The International Court of Justice is set for the first time to broadly consider the legal consequences of Israel's nearly six-decades-long occupation and mistreatment of the Palestinian people," Human Rights Watch senior legal adviser Clive Baldwin said in a statement. "Governments that are presenting their arguments to the court should seize these landmark hearings to highlight the grave abuses Israeli authorities are committing against Palestinians, including the crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution."

The West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Golan Heights remain under Israeli military occupation six decades after their conquest. The United Nations—to which the ICJ belongs—and many international NGOs contend that, despite removing its troops and settlers from Gaza two decades ago, Israel continues to occupy Gaza by controlling the besieged enclave's airspace, territorial waters, and the entry and exit of people and goods.

Since the October 7 Hamas-led attacks on Israel, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) have killed or wounded more than 100,000 Palestinians in Gaza while forcibly displacing around 90% of the population. Numerous Israeli leaders have called for the renewed physical occupation, Jewish resettlement, and ethnic cleansing of the strip.

During the current assault on Gaza, occupation forces have also killed at least 388 Palestinians, including 99 children, in the West Bank, according to U.N. human rights officials.

Israeli settlers have for decades been steadily colonizing the occupied territories under the protection of the IDF, while ethnically cleansing Palestinians whose lands and homes they steal.

Next week's hearings come on the heels of the ICJ's provisional ruling last month in a case led by South Africa—which will be the first nation after Palestine to present at next week's hearing—that Israel is "plausibly" committing genocide in Gaza. The tribunal ordered Israel to "take all measures within its power" to adhere to its obligations under Article II of the Genocide Convention.

Earlier this week, South Africa urgently appealed to the ICJ to act amid the looming threat of an Israeli ground invasion of Rafah. More than 1.5 million Palestinians, most of them refugees ordered to flee to the south of Gaza by invading Israeli forces, are crammed into what is now one of the world's most densely populated places.

On Friday, the ICJ declined to take any additional action against Israel, while reiterating that the "perilous situation" in Rafah "demands immediate and effective implementation of the provisional measures indicated by the court" in last month's ruling.

This article originally appeared in Common Dreams on February 16th, 2024.  

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U.S. House votes to censure Michigan’s Rashida Tlaib over Israel remarks

BY: JACOB FISCHLER 

The U.S. House voted late Tuesday to censure Rep. Rashida Tlaib for remarks the Michigan Democrat has made about Israel and Palestine amid the ongoing war in the Middle East. The chamber voted, 234-188, to adopt a resolution written by Georgia Republican Rich McCormick that would censure Tlaib, the only Palestinian-American member of Congress, for a handful of statements in the month since the militant group Hamas launched a surprise attack into southern Israel. Twenty-two Democrats voted for the resolution. Michigan’s delegation was split on party lines, with all seven Democrats voting against the measure and all six Republicans voting for it.

Surrounded by a small circle of progressive lawmakers, Tlaib stood in the well of the House as Speaker Mike Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, read the results.

The censure vote came after a procedural vote to quash the resolution failed 208-213 earlier Tuesday.

The resolution was a formal statement that a majority of the chamber disapproves of Tlaib’s statements. It does not include any additional punishment such as removal from committees.

Six Republicans — Ken Buck of Colorado, Thomas Massie of Kentucky, Ryan Zinke of Montana and John Duarte, Mike Garcia and Tom McClintock of California — voted with most Democrats to table the resolution.

One Democrat, Brad Schneider of Illinois, voted against tabling it and Susan Wild, a Democrat from Pennsylvania, voted present. Eleven members did not vote.

Once again, Michigan’s delegation was divided on party lines.

Tlaib’s statements amounted to “calling for the destruction of the state of Israel and dangerously promoting false narratives regarding a brutal, large-scale terrorist attack against civilian targets inside the sovereign territory of a major non-NATO ally while hundreds of Israeli and American hostages remain in terrorist captivity,” the McCormick resolution said.

The resolution cited Tlaib’s criticism of Israel the day after Hamas’ initial attack, her dissemination of a later-debunked report that Israeli rockets destroyed a hospital in the Gaza Strip and a video last week that included the phrase “from the river to the sea,” which is widely seen as advocating for the dissolution of the state of Israel.

Tlaib has called for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Hamas’ attack has killed more than 1,400, mostly civilians. Israel’s counteroffensive has killed more than 10,000, according to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry. Most of the dead Palestinians were children, Tlaib said Tuesday.

In an emotional floor speech Tuesday, Tlaib said she was not antisemitic, but has long criticized the Israeli government. Her House colleagues were targeting her for her support of Palestinian causes and advocacy for a ceasefire, she said.

“I can’t believe I have to say this, but Palestinian people are not disposable,” she said, her voice cracking. “We are human beings, just like anyone else.”

As Tlaib paused to regain her composure, Rep. Ilhan Omar, a Minnesota Democrat who with Tlaib comprised the first two Muslim women elected to Congress, rose in a sign of support and put a hand on Tlaib’s back. Rep. André Carson of Indiana, who is also Muslim, placed a hand on Tlaib’s shoulder.

“Speaking up to save lives, Mr. Chair — no matter faith, no matter ethnicity — should not be controversial in this chamber,” Tlaib continued. “The cries of the Palestinian and Israeli children sound no different to me. What I don’t understand is why the cries of Palestinians sound different to you all. We cannot lose our shared humanity.”

Resolution criticizes Tlaib

The day after Hamas’ surprise attack, Tlaib released a statement mourning “Palestinian and Israeli lives lost” but called Israeli policy “apartheid” that would lead to “resistance.”

The resolution said the language in that statement “justified” the attack.

The resolution also criticized Tlaib for echoing reports that Israeli rockets killed hundreds at a hospital in Gaza. U.S. intelligence later debunked that report, which was initially based on information from Palestinian officials.

The most recent event cited in the resolution was Tlaib’s tweet on Friday showing a video with pro-Palestinian protestors chanting “from the river to the sea.” The slogan, which refers to the Jordan River and Mediterranean Sea, is seen as a call to disband the state of Israel and grant the land to the Palestinian people.

In a follow-up tweet Friday, Tlaib called the slogan “an aspirational call for freedom, human rights and peaceful coexistence.”

Rep. Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat who is Jewish, led the floor debate against the resolution.

Raskin and Tlaib disagree about aspects of Israel-Palestine relations, but Raskin, a former constitutional law professor, said Tlaib was entitled by the First Amendment to speak her mind.

“The phrase ‘from the river to the sea’ is abhorrent to me, even with her public explanation of what she means by it, which is very different from what Hamas says,” Raskin said. “But I would never think of punishing her or disciplining her because we disagree about that.”

McCormick responded that the resolution had nothing to do with Tlaib’s right to free speech, but was about the House taking a position.

“This is not about a First Amendment issue,” he said. “Rep. Tlaib has the right to spew antisemitic vitriol, even calling for the destruction of the Jewish state. But the House of Representatives also has the right to make it clear that her hate speech does not reflect the opinion of the chamber. And that’s what this resolution is about.”

 Pro-Palestinian rally in Detroit, Oct. 18, 2023 | Violet Klocko

Another resolution

The vote was the second time in as many weeks the House considered a resolution censuring Tlaib. The chamber voted Nov. 1 to quash a similar resolution sponsored by Georgia Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene.

The chamber is scheduled to vote again late Tuesday on another motion to table Greene’s resolution.

The vote last week occurred before Tlaib’s tweets that included “from the river to the sea.”

If the House votes Tuesday to proceed to the Greene resolution, a vote on both that measure and the McCormick resolution are expected Wednesday.

This article originally appeared in the Michigan Advance on November 9th, 2023.  

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Is Democratic Establishment Ready to Lose with Biden in '24?

The president has lost many of the activists who are needed to inform the ill-informed, to organize get-out-the-vote campaigns and mobilize occasional voters.

• By JEFF COHEN

If you get your news from Biden-protecting outlets (MSNBC is just the most extreme of many), you’ve been warned daily that the Trump movement is preparing to steal the 2024 election. It’s a totally legitimate worry – given that MAGA forces nearly stole the 2020 election.

But there’s another totally legitimate worry that Biden-friendly media don’t like to discuss – that Joe Biden is such a weak candidate, he’s likely to lose a fair-and-square election in 2024. And likely to lose even to the discredited, unstable, repeatedly indicted Trump.

The New York Times/Sienna College poll of registered voters released Sunday should cause alarm: Biden is trailing Trump in head-to-head match-ups in five of the six most crucial battlegrounds states – all of which Biden won in 2020. The president trails Trump in Nevada by more than 10 points. He trails Trump in Georgia by six points, in Arizona and Michigan by five points, and in Pennsylvania by four points. (Only in Wisconsin does Biden lead, and that’s by only two points.)

If your news diet is provided by MSNBC or other pro-Biden corporate outlets, you may have heard Biden likened to the second coming of FDR, a savior to the working classes. That’s not how the working classes see him. They see him as economically ineffectual, especially in dealing with inflation. “Bidenomics” may be a success story in the studios of MSNBC or CNN or NPR; it’s not seen that way by the voting masses.

In fairness to Biden-allied media, many of those who voted for Biden in 2020 – but now tell pollsters they won’t do so in 2024 – are “low-information voters.” While some are misinformed by right-wing outlets, most don’t pay close attention to news or politics. You can tell that from the ill-informed quotes they gave to the Times.

But in my view, the new poll actually understates the problems for Biden. The president has lost many of the activists who are needed to inform the ill-informed, to organize get-out-the-vote campaigns and mobilize occasional voters. These activists are often highly informed. Indeed, they are so well-informed that they know all too well about Biden’s policy reversals and broken promises. For example, thousands of climate activists mobilized in swing states to help Biden defeat Trump in 2020. Will they in 2024?

As civilians in Gaza are being massacred day after day, Biden’s one-sided “I stand with Israel” policy is losing him countless young activists and racial justice organizers who mobilized for him against Trump in 2020.

As civilians in Gaza are being massacred day after day, Biden’s one-sided “I stand with Israel” policy is losing him countless young activists and racial justice organizers who mobilized for him against Trump in 2020. In Michigan and other swingstates, Arab and Muslim activists who detest Trump have said they won’t vote for Biden, let alone mobilize for him.

Let me be clear about my own position: On every issue where Biden’s policies are mediocre (like on climate or the corporate greed that has fed inflation) or awful (like Israel-Palestine), Trump’s policies are even worse. Far worse. That’s not debatable.

But the “not-as-bad-as-Trump” pitch is obviously not satisfying many Democratic-leaning voters and activists, especially young progressives who are angry with Biden over Gaza civilian deaths and other failings.

As my RootsAction colleagues and I have been pointing out for the last year via the Don't Run Joe and then Step Aside Joe campaign, there’s a major split between Democratic Party leaders and donors on the one hand, and Democratic voters on the other. Polls have long shown that the Democratic base does not want Biden to run in 2024. But Democratic leaders and officials have ignored the party’s core constituencies.

As for the big donors who’ve funded Biden for years (some of whom donate to both parties), they’d rather lose with Joe than risk the election of a change-oriented Democrat they don’t know well or can’t control.

There is only one scenario that offers hope for November 2024: the increasingly unpopular Joe Biden announces in the coming weeks that he won’t be seeking reelection (President Johnson took that step in March 1968). This would lead to a wide-open primary process featuring competition between Vice President Harris (with approval levels even lower than Biden’s) and various senators, Congress members, governors and activists.

In an open primary process, the activist base of the party – which is more progressive than the party leadership on every issue from racial justice and economics to climate and foreign policy – could exert its influence and make demands on the candidates. For example: given that most activist Democrats don’t believe “self-defense” justifies the day-in day-out massacre of Palestinian civilians, there’s a real possibility that the winning Democrat would have a more even-handed approach to the Israel-Palestine conflict.

What’s needed is a democratic and transparent primary process. Such a process could enable the party to unify and rally behind a Democratic nominee who is capable of soundly defeating Trump and Trumpism. 

The opinions expressed here are solely the author’s and do not reflect the opinions or beliefs of the LA Progressive.

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'Let Gaza Live!': A Month Into Israeli War, Massive US Protests Demand Cease-Fire

By Jessica Corbett

"We came here to let our voices be heard," said one demonstrator in Washington, D.C. "Every human is entitled to basic human rights, not killing kids, not torturing people."

Huge crowds of protesters filled the streets of Washington, D.C. and other U.S. cities on Saturday to demand a cease-fire in Israel's war on Hamas, which has killed and wounded thousands of Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip over the past month.

"We came here to let our voices be heard and our hearts and hoping we'll change the way people see this conflict," 70-year-old Manar Ghanayem toldThe Washington Post in the nation's capitol, where demonstrators gathered in and around Freedom Plaza.

"Every human is entitled to basic human rights, not killing kids, not torturing people," added Ghanayem, who traveled from North Carolina to march in D.C. with more than a dozen friends and family members, including young grandchildren.

Ghanayem also said that she voted for U.S. President Joe Biden in 2020 but was outraged by his response to the war. As she put it, "I can't believe Biden is turning a blind eye to this and gave Israel the green light."

Rather than advocating for a cease-fire, the Biden administration has pushed for "humanitarian pauses" in what critics are calling Israel's "genocidal" air and ground assault of Gaza—launched after a Hamas-led surprise attack on Israel on October 7.

After speaking with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the beginning of the war, Biden said that "my administration's support for Israel's security is rock solid and unwavering." He quickly asked Congress for $14.3 billion for the Israeli war effort, on top of the typical $3.8 billion in annual U.S. military aid.

"Americans do not support the genocide in Palestine, we do not support the occupation, yet we are being robbed of our own resources in order to fund this oppression," said CodePink organizer Nour Jaghama earlier this week. Her anti-war group is a part of a broad coalition that supported Saturday's demonstrations in the United States.

"We need to show our government that we are outraged at them for forcing us to participate in such a disgusting and devastating attack on humanity," Jaghama continued. "As Americans, we have a responsibility to our brothers and sisters in Palestine to fight for them however we can."

Jaghama also delivered a speech on Saturday. According to CodePink:

"One of the most prominent questions we need to ask ourselves is: Why we can hear these words and firsthand accounts from Gaza yet the genocide still continues? Why do only 18 representatives and ONLY ONE senator support a cease-fire? And why does President Biden insist on funding Netanyahu's genocide?" she asked the crowd...

She then aimed her questions directly at President Biden: "Is this how you want to be remembered? A genocidal, destructive, warmonger? Shame! Look at this crowd, clearly the American people do not agree with your genocidal plans. You must call for a cease-fire now or solidify your position as one of the most inhumane presidents in American history. The American people demand a cease-fire, an end to the occupation, and the full liberation of Palestine."

Demonstrators in D.C. carried signs with messages like "Stop U.S.-funded genocide," "Cease-Fire Now," and "Let Gaza Live!"

Sharing a photo from the D.C. gathering on social media, Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) said: "Solidarity with the hundreds of thousands of people nationwide who marched in support of a #CeasefireNOW. Our pro-peace, pro-humanity movement is strong and it is growing daily."

The Saturday actions followed weeks of protests at places including congressional offices and major transit stations. Jewish Voice for Peace noted Monday that "Jewish people all throughout the United States are protesting in unprecedented numbers against Israel's destruction of Gaza and the United States' unwavering support."

Protesters, supporters, and journalists shared updates on social media.

New York, New York:

Minneapolis, Minnesota:

Olympia, Washington:

San Francisco, California:

(Photo: Brett Wilkins)

(Photo: Brett Wilkins)

(Photo: Brett Wilkins)

The Associated Pressreported that U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Saturday "met with Arab foreign ministers in Jordan a day after talks in Israel with... Netanyahu, who insisted there could be no temporary cease-fire until all hostages held by Hamas are released."

Officials in Israel say Palestinian militants are holding around 240 hostages and more than 1,500 Israelis have been killed over the past four weeks. According to the Gaza Health Ministry, Israel's war on the besieged enclave has killed over 9,400 Palestinians. Amid a surge in settler violence, 144 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank.

Israel has faced global criticism for cutting off the people of Gaza from food, water, fuel, and medicine as well as bombing homes, schools, medical facilities, religious buildings, and a refugee camp. Some citizens of Israel have joined in worldwide demands for International Criminal Court action on "escalating Israeli war crimes and genocide."

Pro-Palestinian protests were also held around the world on Saturday, including in Berlin, Germany; Dhaka, Bangladesh; London, England; Paris, France; Milan, Italy; Santiago, Chile; and Tokyo, Japan. Scientist and organizer Lucky Tran said on social media that "we are witnessing the biggest global anti-war protests since the Iraq War in 2003."

In the United Kingdom, tens of thousands of people blocked London's Oxford Circus and Piccadilly Circus, then marched to Trafalgar Square. Al Jazeera reported that "protesters held 'Freedom for Palestine' placards and chanted 'cease-fire now' and 'in our thousands, in our millions, we are all Palestinians.'"

This article originally appeared in Common Dreams on November 4th, 2023.  

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While Israeli Media Examine Government Failure, US Papers Push ‘National Unity’ , FAIR

Palestinian resistance in Gaza launches historic surprise attack against Israel, Peoples' Dispatch

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