Now We Have Your Attention 739


There have been decades of photos of dead Palestinian women and children, and kids being beaten, humilated and imprisoned by Israeli soldiers. The historic killing rate in this “conflict” has been fairly consistent at about 40:1.

None of this ever caused more than a raised eyebrow and a mild tut-tut from the western “liberal” Establishment. I can’t recall camera crews ever pursuing any zionist politicians down the street demanding that they use the word “condemn” of the latest Israeli atrocity.

The paroxysm of hatred in the political and media class, unleashed by a single day of the boot being on the other foot is instructive. It is particularly instructive in their near complete unanimity – what percentage of the discussion on broadcast TV or radio have you heard this last 48 hours given over to Palestinian or pro-Palestinian voices?

Yet it is very plain from social media that the public is by no means as unanimous in their support of Israel as are the political and media class.

But then the public are not bought and paid for.

Asymmetric warfare tends to be vile. Oppressed and colonised peoples don’t have the luxury of lining up soldiers in neatly pressed uniforms and polished boots, to face off against the opposing army in an equality of arms.

A colonised and oppressed people tends, given the chance, to mirror the atrocities perpetrated on them by their oppressor.

This of course feeds in, always, to the propaganda of the Imperialist. A paroxysm of resistance by the oppressed always ends up portrayed by the Imperialist as evidence of the bestiality of the colonised people and in itself justifying the “civilising mission” of the coloniser.

Thus the “Indian Mutiny” became a Victorian tale of rape and murder of British women and of the Black Hole of Calcutta. Thus the Mau Mau were evil butchers, and the IRA were terrorists, which is the modern term of art for those resisting evil and foreign rule.

The Israeli Ambassador to the UN yesterday described the Hamas fighters as “animal like”. This of course is not true. They are people, but people who have been crazed by unbearable levels of injustice and oppression.

I am extremely sorry for all those who die, as in all wars. I am sorry even for the deaths of individual Israeli soldiers, and more so for all the innocents who died and are now dying.

But I will not condemn Hamas.

For this I do not even need to delve into the backstory of Hamas’ initial sponsoring by Israel to split Fatah. They have grown well past that. I do not condemn Hamas because the resistance of the Palestinian people is a reflex response to their slow genocide.

Yes it is an inchoate and violent response. Of course I wish it did not have innocent victims.

The people I do condemn are the political class internationally who, with one voice, put out statements supporting “Israel’s right to self-defence”. A right they grant to the oppressor but deny to the oppressed.

Those are the people who need to be condemned.

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739 thoughts on “Now We Have Your Attention

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  • Kacper

    Hi Craig,

    I think the matter is a bit more nuanced. The situation reminds me, to a degree, of the 1944 Warsaw Uprising, when Polish militants – often, civilians armed with homemade weapons – rose against the Nazi regime. My family members also fought there. The heroic resistance brought much-needed hope to the oppressed people.

    No, Polish militants were no angels. They attacked and killed not only German soldiers, heroically, but also German civil servants and their family members, a fact not often mentioned nowadays as the partisans are widely celebrated as heroes in Poland.

    Yet the Uprising was a net negative. It was an idiotic decision resulting solely from cynical political calculations (which were linked with the approach of the Soviet Army by the way). The Germans, as it could be easily expected, responded with mass executions, murdering between 150,000 and 200,000 Polish civilians. They also went on to physically destroy (burn, bomb) most of Warsaw, including my family’s house. the outcome was death and destruction.

    There were no winners.

    Yes, we can understand emotions, we can justify them – legally, morally. But sympathy aside, Hamas’s decision to attack Israel, which was likewise driven solely by cynical political calculations, was an utterly idiotic move.

    There will be no winners.

    And this needs to be said.

    • David

      Good comment. Hatred, fear, and desperation don’t motivate people to noble behaviour, but they can be exploited (e.g. by the political calculators you mention).

      • Kacper

        People don’t normally start mass killings, unless someone gives them a gun, trains them, and tells them to open fire all together at a specific place and time. Revolutions are hardly ever spontaneous – they are complex undertakings that involve long preparations, hundreds of coordinators, and plentiful funding. I don’t think it’s correct to justify the Hamas attack simply by spontaneous hatred or fear.

        The game is clear – the attacks, which brought a well-expected Israeli counterattack on Gaza and an outpour of sympathy for the Palestinians’ plight across the Middle East, have effectively blocked the ongoing détente between Israel and a number of Sunni states (incl. in particular Saudi Arabia). That a few thousand Palestinians had to lose their lives? Too bad. Neither did the Polish Government in Exile care about thousands of deaths in 1944, sitting in their comfortable London offices and deciding on the Warsaw Uprising. What mattered to them was that the Soviet Army doesn’t become the liberating force for Poland’s capital. Solely a political propaganda goal.

        Same for Hamas, unfortunately.

        For the avoidance of doubt, I do not support and never supported Israel’s policies towards the Palestinians, and my comparison of the Nazi occupation of Poland and the Israeli occupation of Palestine is not a coincidence. But I fully detest what Hamas has now done. It will also haunt them and hurt the Palestinian cause for decades.

  • Republicofscotland

    And so it begins as our freedom of speech, even silent protest is stifled.

    “#GMP have arrested a young pro-palestinian protestor at St Peters Square #Manchester for wearing the #palestine flag. When asked, police stated it was for common law, breach of peace. They then put a section 35 on Manchester City Centre, threatening bystanders with arrest.”

    Watch the video of the non-violent young man marched-off by three burly police officers.

    https://nitter.net/j0keon/status/1712150029987692996#m

    • Paul M.

      I suggest the following experiment: If you look up “red, black, green, and white flags“, you will find several that look like the Palestinian flag. Jordan’s has a star on the triangular part. Sudan’s has the colors in different places. Kuwait’s has the triangle not coming to a complete point. UAE’s has a vertical bar instead of a triangle.

      Have a volunteer go out and wave one of the lookalike flags. If the police then arrest the volunteer, all the volunteer would say to the police is “free speech!” See if the prosecution can figure out whether the offending flag is a lookalike and not the “banned” Palestinian flag.

      • Johnny Conspiranoid

        Or they could wear little lapel flags like dickhead politiciams wear only, as palertinian flags. If they are not arrested they could try wearing slightly larger flags until they discover how large a flag is illegal.

  • Formerly T-Bear

    Like yourself, I have watched years of the Palestinian people of all ages and their carefully tended olive trees cut down, not by observant nor non-observant of the Jewish faith but by Zionists and their spawn. Zionist thuggery and terrorism founded the state and have never surrendered control of the state and all supporting institutions such as courts and media. The Zionists destroyed the political Labour party when it threatened that hold on power. Those Zionists are still firmly in command of the state and will never surrender that control, even though it may cost the Israeli population gravely. The only beneficiary seen from this event is the Zionist hold on power.

    As egregious as any loss of life is, seven and a half decades of continuous Palestinian loss can not help but form a rage that no morality or religion can forever dam, and as the world witnessed in Libya the results are ferocious when that dam breaks. The families and friends of those victims of that rage will at some point realise that the salt in Palestinian tears for their grievous losses is no less than that in the tears of their Israeli neighbours, and only by accepting that fact to heart that some modus of stopping the travesty will be found. There is no other way and Zionism is certainly a dead end(ing). Zionism cannot self correct – end it.

    Watching a media newscast in Dublin was a stomach churning experience. Nary a word of Palestinian losses other than that there were some but heart-rendering reports of Israeli losses and grief. The emotional propaganda that reason dies of suffocation. The newscast ended and the empire of lies was silenced with a click of a switch. Now if they can arrange to fuzz out and mute Ursala von der Lyin’ the world would be a much happier place.

    • Goose

      Israel’s western media sway is truly remarkable. An ethno-religious state on the verge of committing genocide and we’re expected to cry with them.

      Did people cry for white South Africans during apartheid? The answer is of course, no, we had songs topping the charts, castigating them as “a bunch of arrogant bastards who hate black people.”

      I’ve Never Met A Nice South African https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9dmoT9AfoI

      • Goose

        Controversial opinion maybe, but if the Palestinians were black, this current Israeli action would be totally unacceptable to the woke /liberal left of America and UK, EU. It’d be Black Lives matter protests on steroids.

        The US govt and leading politicians wouldn’t dare support Israel in this disproportionate collective punishment. Which is a sad reflection how western concerns are primarily expressed through culture wars these days, and not simply focused on the sanctity of human life.

  • Allan Howard

    Chris Hedges posted the following article three days ago:

    ‘Palestinians speak the language of violence Israel taught them’

    The indiscriminate shootings of Israelis by Hamas and other Palestinian resistance organizations, the kidnapping of civilians, the barrage of rockets into Israel, drone attacks on a variety of targets from tanks to automated machine gun nests, are the familiar language of the Israeli occupier. Israel has spoken this blood-soaked language of violence to the Palestinians since Zionist militias seized more than 78 percent of historic Palestine, destroyed some 530 Palestinian villages and cities and killed about 15,000 Palestinians in more than 70 massacres. Some 750,000 Palestinians were ethnically cleansed between 1947 and 1949 to create the state of Israel in 1948……

    https://canadiandimension.com/articles/view/palestinians-speak-the-language-of-violence-israel-taught-them

    For years and years commentators on the left have been making the comparison between what the Nazis did to the Jews in Germany during the 1930s (including the black propaganda demonisation) and what Israel is (and has been) doing to the Palestinians, and in one fell swoop, in effect, Netanyahu and Biden et al have turned that on its head, and transformed the victims into evil Nazis, and the oppressors into victims, and although Hamas were never gonna get sympathetic coverage from the Western media, by concocting stories about the raping of women and the beheading of babies (and pets!) they achieved their goal.

    And I can’t help thinking it was all premeditated, and Netanyahu and Biden et al knew /learnt well in advance what Hamas were planning and, as such, let it go ahead so that they could do precisely THAT.

    • Ebenezer Scroggie

      It is totally non-credible that Shin Beth/Mossad/Avan did not fully know, weeks or months in advance, exactly what was going to occur.

      Perhaps the Israeli government miscalculated the enormous scale and effect of the ‘surprise’ attack, but the fact that the Israel security services did not interdict the plot long before it took place speaks volumes.

      It’s clear that the fact it was allowed to take place at all is a clear indicator that Netanyahu intends to implement his Final Solution to “the Palestinian problem”. That is what he meant when he said that “we are going change the Middle East for generations”.

  • Colin Davis

    I haven’t seen any journalist ask any politician the question: how are you defining terrorism? The answer (if not dodged and re-dodged) will of course vary, but is almost bound to be answered in a way that makes clear the IDF itself is committing terrorism. This will be qualified by reference to the (indeed utterly unjustifiable) nature of the Hamas attack, but justifications for terrorism either cut both ways or they don’t cut at all.

    The fact (surely?) is that this is a conflict in which Israel has no moral justification at all (they stole the land they founded their state on, made no reparations, and continue to steal more) whilst the Hamas attack was a battle in which Hamas’ actions had no moral justification either. Just as, in the Second World War, Japan’s invasions had no justification, but the US’ bombing of Hiroshima had none either; and Hitler’s aggression had none and nor did the bombing of Dresden. A war can be just, and a battle not at all.

    • AG

      hmmm…. I would argue to rather not equate Palestinians with Japan / RAF US Air Force bombing.
      Someone here mentioned Warsaw Uprising. That makes more sense.
      Japan committed genocide and the US war crimes with Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Dresden et al.
      Israel has committed war crimes for decades. Additionally expelling 750.000 natives – as you yourself point out – to start with.
      Besides they have one of the biggest WMD arsenals without officially admitting.

    • Tom Welsh

      “I haven’t seen any journalist ask any politician the question: how are you defining terrorism?”

      A simple answer today might be, “Anyone who uses, or threatens to use, violence against us”. When we use extreme violence, of course, it’s always benevolent.

    • IMcK

      Neither have I heard asked by UK media, even as they disseminate the Israeli message that Gazan civilians should evacuate from northern Gaza, whether the Israeli expectation is that the bad guys (presumably ‘Hamas’, whoever they might be) will remain in situ such that they can be bombed?
      Will the citizens be allowed back after the operation?
      What could Israel’s intent be other than ethnic cleansing?

  • Peter Mo

    Seldom have I been so disgusted as hearing Tony Blinkin’s speech alongside Netanyahu. To start referring to his family and Auschwitz whilst endorsing the siege of Gaza as well as the slaughter of innocent Palestinians, who have endured so much trauma and hardship all their life, is contempt and disdain to the memory of so many Jews killed by the Nazis.

    • Goose

      Can’t sleep thinking about the suffering and fear there, it’s so infuriating.

      This is indiscriminate, disproportionate murder with US supplied weapons. Dropping apartments on kids, is this what the US stands for? Can’t believe anyone of conscience in the armed forces of the West thinks what’s happening in Gaza is remotely justified. I’d be ashamed to be Jewish too.

      As for Gazans: damned as terrorists if they do resist; ignored by the world if they don’t. If they’d have flown over the fence without weapons and sung peace songs, they’d have been shot by the IDF. Not one western politician can tell us what Gazans peaceful means of getting their message out to the world actually is.

      • U Watt

        It is impossible for it to be any clearer.

        In 2018 Gazans mounted a peaceful Great March of Return to show the world their plight. Day after day they walked, unarmed, to Israel’s military fences.

        Israel shot 8,000 with live ammunition, killing 220 including young female nurses. 36,143 total injured.

        There was not a peep of moral outrage from our sombre moral leaders in Parliament or the US Congress.

        It could not be any clearer who these people are.

        • Peter Mo

          Right now there has to be mobilization around the world protesting against the massacre of Gaza. Referring back to the Hamas incursion is no longer relevant

          • U Watt

            In a normal world it wouldn’t be relevant. But the politicians are determined that the incursion remain the only talking point. Still pretending incomprehension at its unprovoked, inexplicable horror.

            They have to somehow be seen as moral giants even while lauding that Netanyahu and his gang ethnically cleanse and genocide a trapped people.

            But for their degenerate scheme to succeed they desperately needed the “babies were beheaded” lie to be true. They had to dehumanise the victims of Netanyahu.

  • U Watt

    What is the scale of the atrocity our politicians are enabling and justifying?
    Ex-Pentagon intel advisor Marc Garlasco points out that “Israel is dropping in less than a week what the U.S. was dropping in Afghanistan in a year, in a much smaller, much more densely populated area, where mistakes are going to be magnified”.

    • Tom Welsh

      What “mistakes”? Bombs exploding anywhere in Gaza are likely to kill and maim Palestinians – and that is what the Israelis and their foreign friends want.

      Just as the Americans are delighted whenever a Russian or a Ukrainian dies.

      • Ebenezer Scroggie

        6,000 bombs, totaling 4,000 tonnes dropped on the world’s most densely populated conurbation already.

        And that’s just for starters. The genocide has only just begun.

        Now, who are the terrorists?

        • Stevie Boy

          A colleague in the military explained what these bomb figures mean in real terms:
          One pound of high explosive (semtex) is enough to totally destroy a family car.
          4,000 tons is therefore roughly equivalent to power to destroy: 8 million cars (2,000×4,000)
          Note that Gatwick Airport has parking space for around 40,000 cars.

  • Jack

    Israel plans to cleanse the whole of Gaza. The newest threat from Israel is that all Gazans must emigrate southward, meaning Israel will seek to simply push out the Gazans into Egypt! This is ethnic cleansing in front of us. Warcrimes galore.
    More and more the evidence is that Israel wanted just this flare-up to happen as a pretext to brutally get rid of Gaza for good.

    Meanwhile Blinken claim that this is a 911 event sigh and the lousy arab states and the corrupt PLO invite and meet the same Blinken to the arab world!?
    Hamas attack on Israel like ten 9/11s – Blinken
    Israel is obliged to respond forcefully to such an assault, the US secretary of state has said

    https://swentr.site/news/584779-blinken-israel-hamas-911/

    Blinken arrives in Jordan, to meet Palestinian president
    US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has arrived in Jordan where he will meet King Abdullah and Palestine’s President Mahmoud Abbas.
    Blinken arrived in Israel on Thursday to show US support and had meetings with Israeli PM.
    Blinken will also visit Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt

    https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2023/10/13/israel-hamas-live-iran-says-new-fronts-may-open-if-gaza-bombing-continues

    If these arab states had any decency they would of course not invite the same US that are now the reason why arab brothers and sisters are murdered in Gaza and the killing has not really begun, since the invasion will bring even more senseless violence.

  • Allan Howard

    Grant Shapps, the defence secretary, was just on BBC Breakfast and said – in passing – that Hamas have been ‘murdering babies and celebrating it’. Anyone aware of this celebrating? And on youtube numerous posters are saying that there’s footage of babies being beheaded and people being killed at the music festival, and numerous people asking them to provide links to the footage, but they never do. Check out the comments section on this video:

    Hamas issues a statement rejecting allegations that it committed crimes against women and children

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RovEtt36Kqs

    • U Watt

      The Israelis have the most refined propaganda system on earth. If they had a scintilla of evidence for these slurs the images would be being broadcast around the world on a loop.

      Biden and British politicians are equally desperate for these lies to take hold so that the people they are murdering in Gaza are rendered less than human and they are ennobled in the world’s eyes by murdering them.

      • Tatyana

        yesterday 3 photos appeared and many channels spread those 3, the same everywhere.
        One is a baby in a diaper and bodysuit on a bed in a hospital. The gloved hands of medical personnel are visible, holding the blanket around the child, the child’s head is blurred. The other two photos are burnt black remains with no definite shape. All photos were taken in a hospital setting, not at the place of discovery.

          • Jack

            Allan

            Indeed, we also have images of multiple uncensored images of palestinian babies killed. How come these killings are not shocking and condemned by the MSM and the west?

        • Goose

          Hamas probably do have psychos in their military wing’s ranks. Most militaries and armed groups do. We’ve got an ongoing SAS trial in the UK studying alleged Afghan executions. And we know the US has had its share of torture allegations and cover-ups. Pathetic that Nato are using a few provided images of unproven provenance to whitewash Israel’s genocidal attacks on civilian infrastructure in Gaza.
          —–

          Sunak says terrorism ‘must not prevail’ and UK offering Israel full support.

          Can hardly believe he’s this shallow. No recognition of the injustices faced by Gazans, the intolerable de facto occupation, in which Israel restricts and controls every aspect of Gazans’ lives. Or the power imbalance that means their cruel jailers Israel have carte blanche to expand settlements while UK officials lie about working towards a two-state solution.

          Irish Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, clearly gets it, “..I’m really concerned about what I’m seeing happening in Gaza at the moment.

          “To me, it amounts to collective punishment. Cutting off power, cutting off fuel supplies and water supplies, that’s not the way a respectable democratic state should conduct itself.”

          Meanwhile… obnoxious, unelected ‘President’ of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen is busy posting tweets with her posing with Israeli officials.

      • Dawg

        If you have a strong craving for war porn, U Watt, buy a copy of the Daily Telegraph today. Here’s the BBC’s daily round up of the morning’s headlines. Scroll down to see the Telegraph’s front page headline, which is a quote from X/Twitter:

        “This is the most difficult image we’ve ever posted. As we are writing this we are shaking. We went back and forth about posting this, but we need each and every one of you to know. This happened.”

        The line immediately below it indicates that the harrowing content can be found by turning the page:

        “The picture on Page 3 is harrowing, but The Daily Telegraph believes it is a vital portrait of a horrendous attack.”

        You might be able to glean the photos from the Twitter source:
        https://nitter.net/Israel

          • Allan Howard

            I wonder what a forensic expert would make of the blood spatter. I mean how was this infant supposedly killed? Shot, stabbed? Doesn’t look at all realistic to me.

          • Tatyana

            Allan Howard
            I don’t want to speculate, I think there are enough experts on the ground.
            But there were claims about many beheaded children, I thought that such an accusation would be supported by more serious evidence.
            I remember the gas attack in Syria. There was video of many dead women and children. Not a photo, but video with many details.
            However, the investigation faced the fact that the bodies were moved and buried; as far as I know, not even exhumation was carried out. And an inspection of the premises showed only traces of chlorine comparable to the amount that could be present in a dry cleaner, not during a gas attack. And there were discrepancies between the hole in the roof through which the gas cylinder supposedly penetrated and the dimensions of the cylinder itself. However, a long video was provided and Nikki Haley urged all countries at the UN to attack Assad immediately. So I am now very careful whether or not to take this or that photo as evidence.
            In this case, the photo does not correspond to the accusation.

          • Allan Howard

            The headline to the front-page Times article is: ‘Israel shows mutilated body’. Does it? Where precisely? And only one of the kids in the picture/photo is bloodied Pears, but thanks for posting it because its effect on me was to make me think about the absolute horror and terror that hundreds of thousands of kids in Gaza must be going through right now, and in the past five, six days.

          • Goose

            The Telegraph has a pro-Israel, genocide apologist’s agenda.

            Read any of their opinion pieces on this topic, they basically amount to, ‘how dare these oppressed people have the temerity to rise up against their masters.’
            Reading that stuff you’d believe Gazans had it good, and Hamas decided to do this because of boredom, or for shits and giggles; or because they are just unfathomably evil. Ben Wallace, in his article, comments about how his govt backed a ‘two-state solution’, knowing full well the imbalance of power required pressure solely on Israel, pressure which has been wholly absent for 25 years.

        • U Watt

          Dawg

          You’ve seen innumerable images of dead children in Palestine through the years and could see dozens more today if you watch mobile videos sent from Gaza.

          I’m talking about the unprecedented images that Joe Biden (Leader of the Free World) says he’s seen of “terrorists beheading children”.

          Have the BBC or the Telegraph been supplied with those yet? Why are they not releasing them?

          • Casual Observer

            My immediate thought is that there would be little to distinguish dead Israeli baby’s from dead Palestinian baby’s. And based upon what we’re seeing of Gaza, there must inevitably be quite a few more of the latter there ?

            As ever, two wrongs never make a right, something which most rational humans will grasp with little aid. However, bringing the murdered baby schtick into the scenario this quick does seem to suggest that our governors are sensing that opinion is not going as they would have wished ?

            As for Biden and his increasingly bizarre ramblings, in this instance quickly walked back by Whitehouse staff, they really are beyond parody now.

          • Lapsed Agnostic

            ‘Murdered baby schtick’ – that’s generally a phrase you’d only come across on Craig Murray’s blog.

            Here is the long and short of it, Casual Observer (and everyone else): Hamas has committed heinous war crimes, including against children (beheaded or not). In retaliation, Israel is committing heinous war crimes, including against children.

            P.S. ‘Whitehouse staff’ would refer to people who worked on a defunct British pornographic magazine, that was reputedly named ironically after Mary Whitehouse and pushed the boundaries in the 70’s – though compared to what British pre-teens are ‘looking at’* today would be what the Kay’s catalogue was to Tinto Brass’s Caligula (er, I’m reliably informed). Joe Biden lives in the White House. Every day’s a schoolday, as Jim McColl used to say on the Beechgrove Garden.

            * For which read: ‘w**king over’, obvs.

          • U Watt

            Thanks Brian. That’s a powerful 5-minute summary from Gabor Mate, ending with the all-important question.

            Dawg seems not to want to answer my question.

            Perhaps Lapsed Agnostic can school us on why Joe Biden is saying he has seen pictures of “terrorists beheading children”.

            It’s a massive, game-changing claim from the Leader of the Free World if true because that would be an atrocity above and beyond anything ever heard of before.

            Why do we think the President of the United States hasn’t ordered those pictures he’s seen be released so the whole world can see?

          • Lapsed Agnostic

            Thanks for your reply, U Watt. I think President Biden has said that he’s seen pictures of beheaded children because he’s a senile p********e who often can’t control his bowel movements, let alone what comes out of his mouth half of the time.* Your mileage may vary.

            * Let’s see if I can get that past the mods this time, especially as they seem to have been very generous in not only allowing my pre-watershed salacious prose above to go through, but even correcting some of the punctuation. So thanks very much mods for that.

          • Lapsed Agnostic

            Thanks for your reply, U Watt. Well you obviously know more about this than I do – though I note that, as far as I’m aware, no other senior figure in the US administration has claimed to have seen pictures of Hamas fighters beheading children.

            Enjoy the weekend.

  • Allan Howard

    Does Hamas have any history/form of raping woman and beheading babies etc? I’ve certainly not heard of such, and the MSM would of course be reminding us of it if that was the case. To commit such atrocities would of course lead to many who support the Palestinian cause dropping their support, so I think we can safely assume that Hamas would never do such things, but if you wanted to bring that about…..

    Thing is of course if people don’t know the context and the background, then they can be easily duped and led to believe that Hamas are just a bunch of blood-thirsty terrorists who attacked and slaughtered Israelis for no reason, and in their crazed blood-thirsty state of mind they beheaded babies and men and women and peoples pets.

    The bigger the lie….. and as with the vast majority of black propaganda, it’s concocted and contrived to elicit and evoke an emotional response – ie directed at the emotions – and once emotions are triggered, rational, critical thinking goes out the window of course, the Salisbury poisonings being a perfect example.

    • Jack

      Last time Hamas used suicide bombings amongst civilians were 20 years ago, since then they have targeted the military/occupying forces. I have never heard there have been any beheading by them ever.

      Indeed it is sickening how easily people are duped. Any sensible person would of course call for deescalation, not egging, especially an occupier on in support for their killing.
      Israel must laugh how stupid many westerners are. Especially dupable is the right-wing christians, apparently having no idea how christians are treated in Israel.
      Video of israelis spitting against christian nuns https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uL555xWQeE
      Video of small israeli children harass christian believers https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20230911-israeli-children-attack-christians-in-jerusalem/

      • Cabbage

        It’s more about weaponising European and American Racism – they are ready to belive Brown Muslims are inhuman baby killing rapists, without the need for evidence – they are guillty of being Brown and Muslim.

        The apartheid regime enforced by the Zionist State Terrorist group could not exist without the racist underpinnings. It’s heartbreaking how dehumanized the Palestinians specifically but Brown Muslims/Arabs in general.

  • Brianfujisan

    Thanks for Reply Casual Observer

    But I don’t Agree it’s Two Wrongs .. I keep thinking this had to be a False Flag..There is No way the Zionist did not Know about the Impending attack . Wish Mary was still around.. .

  • Fat Jon

    I wonder if the tide is beginning to turn?

    The Daily Mail website was rec entry leading with a headline about journalists and cameramen bursting into tears after witnessing the state of Gaza City.

    The Mail also had a website report that Israel has used white phosphorous in Gaza, a substance which is prohibited internationally; although that article now seems to have been removed.

  • Allan Howard

    UN says mass relocation impossible. Well of course it is, and it’s just a pure. blatant terror tactic

    ‘Israel-Hamas live: Israel tells 1.1m Palestinians to move to southern Gaza’

    Fear and confusion in Gaza after the Israeli army tells more than 1 million trapped Palestinians living in the north of besieged enclave to move south within 24 hours ahead of expected ground offensive.

    UN says mass relocation “impossible”, could have devastating consequences. Hamas calls Israeli warning “fake propaganda”, tells residents to ignore order.

    In Beirut, Iran’s foreign minister says the war may open on “other fronts” if the bombing of Gaza continues.

    https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2023/10/13/israel-hamas-live-iran-says-new-fronts-may-open-if-gaza-bombing-continues

    • Jack

      It is obvious what this “relocation” will mean in reality, first they bomb Gaza to bits, then they move in, hold the land and eventually annex it, the palestinians are then suppose to flee to Egypt, as I said before an obvious ethnic cleansing going on.

      Quoting unnamed Egyptian sources, the statement “emphasised the danger of calls for mass population movement that will empty the [Gaza] Strip and liquidate the Palestinian issue itself. Moreover, Egyptian sovereignty is not fair game.”

      Egypt PM: “Egypt will not allow the liquidation of the Palestinian question at the expense of other parties.”
      https://www.msn.com/en-ae/news/middleeast/egypt-closes-gaza-and-israel-borders-after-warning-of-palestinian-influx/ar-AA1hY6nU

      Well Egypt, then it is high time to put the breaks on Israel.

    • Tom Welsh

      That’s like telling passengers in a crammed Underground carriage that everyone who doesn’t get into the front half will be killed.

  • AG

    new Caitlin Johnstone on Scheerpost
    Oct. 13th 2023

    “Israeli Intelligence Suddenly Knows Exactly Where Hamas Is”
    https://scheerpost.com/2023/10/13/israeli-intelligence-suddenly-knows-exactly-where-hamas-is/

    ending:

    “(…)
    Of course Israel isn’t abiding by the rules of war. They’re not even pretending to. Human Rights Watch has just issued a statement decrying Israel’s “unlawfully indiscriminate” use of white phosphorus in Gaza and in Lebanon, and an Israeli security official told the Israeli press that the IDF’s plan is to turn Gaza into “a city of tents” with “no buildings”.

    This is all publicly available information, yet the western press has the gall to use the phrase “Hamas targets” when describing Israel’s bombing campaign in Gaza? I’m sorry, but that’s demented. The only reason to do something like that would be to administer propaganda.

    The claim that Israel is targeting Hamas when it destroys buildings in Gaza is further undermined by the fact that Hamas would be taking shelter underground during this bombing campaign. As journalist Sharmine Narwani explained on Twitter, “Hamas cadres live underground in Gaza, which they have learned to do after countless Israeli bombing campaigns. The ONLY people being massacred in Gaza by Israeli terror planes right now are Palestinian civilians and Israeli POWs.”

    In reality, both the claims that Israeli intelligence was taken by surprise by the Hamas attack and that Israel is solely targeting Hamas with its Gaza strikes are highly suspect and worthy of intense scrutiny. Israel has never been averse to killing Palestinian civilians, and there’s no reason to feel confident Israeli intelligence didn’t let the attack through in order to justify longstanding agendas like the elimination of Gaza as a Palestinian territory. Both claims can be false, but from where I’m sitting it looks highly unlikely that they’re both true.”

    If you want to support Israel’s bombing campaign in Gaza then go ahead, and if you want to uncritically accept the official narrative about Saturday’s attack then you do you. But don’t piss on my leg and tell me it’s raining.
    (…)”

    p.s. naturally the Hamas attack did come at a convenient time considering those mass protests against “Bibi”.

    • Cabbage

      They didn’t let the attack through – they are genocidal racists who don’t see Palestinians as human beings. They think that if you kill someone’s children, they will be cowed, and not desire retribution, like other human beings.

      They arrogantly assumed that the people confined to the Gaza ghetto who have been under siege for 17 years, subjected to regular murder campaigns, would wait until the Zionist State Terrorist group got round to mudering them.

      The other aspect is that ZST are a terrorist group of cowards, who have little or no exposure to peer level forces.
      Every time they face a peer level force, they run away – in 1948 – 2006 and now 2023.

      Yes they are capitalizing on this, but they didn’t let it through. This is existential for the ZST, the entire premise of the colonial enterprise, is that the Colonisers are safe behind Jabbotinsky’s “Iron Wall”. That’s over now, the Gaza brigade was defeated by lightly armed young men. They turned and ran. Over 500 ZST members were prevented from carrying out further crimes against humanity.

      It doesn’t matter how many people ZST kill in Gaza, that fear is not leaving the settlers, they are never going to feel safe again.

  • Jack

    Seriously, the EU are a bunch of fanatics by now:

    EU put demands on Türkiye: Pick either our civilized, noble side or pick that of Russia, Iran, Hamas, Hezbollah
    https://swentr.site/news/584799-eu-turkiye-civilizational-ultimatum/

    This weird demand came after Türkiye said it was ready to mediate in Israel/Palestine: that was apparently too much for the pro-warmongering EU politicians.

    Having seen how EU acted past days there is no way there could be a peaceful solution to Israel/Palestine and especially not Russia/Ukraine. These people will never come to their senses, as a european I always thought it was the americans that were the crazy warmongering ones, EU is about to top them and that is fast.

  • SA

    “Rishi Sunak announced British military ships and aircraft would be deployed to the region to help with humanitarian efforts and track the movement of weapons.”
    Obviously the Royal Navy is there in order to ensure the complete blockade of the already heavily blockaded Gaza Strip. The vague statement about ‘Humanitarian efforts’ is totally meaningless in the context and I doubt very much that the RN will be intervening on behalf of Palestinians in Gaza.
    So this morning on GMB ITV channel, Grant Shapps declared, without being challenged, that Hamas wants to kill “all Jews” and that is written in their charter, thereby insinuating that Israel has the right to kill all Palestinians in pursuit of the goal to liquidate Hamas.

    In fact this statement by Shapps is completely out of date. [According to Wikipedia] the original Hamas Charter “states that ‘our struggle against the Jews is very great and very serious’ and calls for the eventual creation of an Islamic state in Palestine, in place of Israel and the Palestinian Territories,[3]”
    There has been a very long controversy about this statement of the 1988 charter, but since then there have been a lot of changes in Hamas and in the Palestinian resistance movement. Notably Hamas has become more secular, since it stood for election and won the only Palestinian elections in 2006.
    A new Hamas charter was issued in 2017 to take account of changes and this states:

    “Hamas affirms that its conflict is with the Zionist project not with the Jews because of their religion. Hamas does not wage a struggle against the Jews because they are Jewish but wages a struggle against the Zionists who occupy Palestine. Yet, it is the Zionists who constantly identify Judaism and the Jews with their own colonial project and illegal entity.
    Hamas rejects the persecution of any human being or the undermining of his or her rights on nationalist, religious or sectarian grounds. Hamas is of the view that the Jewish problem, anti-Semitism and the persecution of the Jews are phenomena fundamentally linked to European history and not to the history of the Arabs and the Muslims or to their heritage.[38][39]”

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamas_Charter

    So maybe Shapps needs to educate himself before making these pronouncements.

    But the actions of the UK government so far appear to condone the intention of ethnic cleansing and genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip openly announced by the government of the state of Israel.

    • Goose

      Openly Jewish Shapps is a man who has used multiple identities in the past, variously known by the aliases Michael Green, Sebastian Fox and Corinne Stockheath. At least he should have no trouble hiding in S.America if accountability ever comes in the west for these genocide supporters.

      He’s more suited to a report on TV’s Watchdog than being quoted in a news report.

        • Goose

          The whole cabinet is atrocious. And Labour’s shad cab will represent little improvement.

          But Sunak had a successful banking career, therefore he must be intelligent, right? Being reasonable at maths and/or economics obviously doesn’t necessarily infer wisdom, expertise and the emotional intelligence you want in an ideal leader. Look at a certain Countdown presenter’s Oxbridge honed maths abilities, then contrast them against her infantile X (twitter) output. Hard to believe one person can have such contrasting ability / lack of ability.

          • Tom Welsh

            “Sunak had a successful banking career, therefore he must be intelligent, right?”

            Hahahahahahahahahahaha! Very droll indeed. Have you noticed what banking leaders have accomplished in this modern world of ours?

            This goes back to 2009, but I very much doubt if anything has changed since then:

            “According to a letter published in today’s Times (23 February 2009), Sir Terry Wogan, national institution and cornerstone of BBC radio’s popular broadcasting, could be in the wrong job.

            “The letter, entitled Odd Man Out, lists several prominent banking and Government figures, including Alistair Darling (Chancellor of the Exchequer) and Sir Terry Wogan. It points out that Sir Terry is the odd man out, as he is the ONLY one with a banking qualification!”

            https://forums.digitalspy.com/discussion/994391/wogan-in-the-wrong-job

          • Goose

            Not my assumption, but you hear it expressed among the general public. Many think Sunak is a clever man and he really isn’t. He’s more affable than that dour RW imposter Keir Starmer, but that’s about it.

            He’s a little man both literally and figuratively.

          • Stevie Boy

            The way it works, as I understand it is: Rich Mummy and Daddy pay for you to go to expensive private school; School ensures an establishment job in specific sectors – Law, Medicine, Banking or Politics; Establishment job opens doors to government roles – MP, Bank of England, Diplomat.
            There is no evidence Rich Sunak is particularly clever, he has received lot’s of grooming in the USA, the evidence is just that he has a pass on the gravy train. We’ll see where he ends up when the tories finally get fed up with him.

          • Bayard

            “There is no evidence Rich Sunak is particularly clever”

            He went to a school that selects for intelligence, but intelligence doesn’t equal wisdom.

  • AG

    It’s very minor but I post it here:

    Julian Assange has been awarded the Berlin-based cultural Konrad-Wolf Award (Wolf, a popular GDR movie director and brother of Markus Wolf, head of East German Foreign Intelligence), award by the Academy of Fine Arts, Berlin. So Assange is rather an unusual choice.
    Ken Loach received the award in 1995.

    info here:

    “Julian Assange receives the Konrad Wolf Prize 2023 in Berlin. – Akademie der Künste: His wife Stella Assange will accept the prize on his behalf on October 22 in Berlin.”
    https://www.berliner-zeitung.de/kultur-vergnuegen/ehrung-wikileaks-gruender-julian-assange-bekommt-den-konrad-wolf-preis-2023-in-berlin-li.2148296
    Jury:
    Thomas Heise is a documentary film director mainly with movies about neo-Nazism and WWII memory (not the corny ones but serious art)
    Nele Hering, born 1934, theatre director, cultural manager, founder of Hebbel Theatre in Berlin

  • Casual Observer

    BBC running a story of the arrest of a woman in Sussex under anti terror laws. Seems as though she may have said something that was construed as supporting Hamas at a public meeting.

    Looks a bit worrying now with governments moving on those who might be seen to be too vociferous in regard to events in the Holy Land ?

      • DiggerUK

        Pears, there is a body of supporters for Palestinian justice here, that view the heinous crimes of Hamas as acceptable and the heinous crimes of the Israeli state and military as murder.
        The support for killing of civilians in this conflict are arguments that represent two sides of the same venal coin.

        The only victims of such nonsense are the Palestinians. Whilst Hamas are safe in their tunnels, Palestinians are attacked in their houses. Those who argue the crimes against civilians by the Israeli state are wrong, support the same crimes by Hamas. Sheer lunacy…_

          • DiggerUK

            Of course I’m not. I do strongly believe it is the case that it is a dead child, a non combatant, a civilian baby, exactly the same as all the Palestinian babies. All totally unacceptable.

            The killing of civilians is a crime against humanity, no matter who pulls the trigger…_

        • Bayard

          “Pears, there is a body of supporters for Palestinian justice here, that view the heinous crimes of Hamas as acceptable and the heinous crimes of the Israeli state and military as murder.”

          We are now on page 6 of comments and I have yet to see anyone viewing the heinous crimes of Hamas as acceptable. Perhaps I have missed it, in which case you could oblige me by supplying a link, but remember, “acceptable” is not the same as “understandable”, nor is expressing scepticism as to whether said “heinous crimes” are anything other than a product of a propagandist’s fertile imagination viewing them as “acceptable” either.

        • Justin

          It’s not just in a ‘local rag’, SA: I saw the same story on the sidebar of the Daily Mail page when I was archiving the article about the weeping journalist. Here’s the (non-archived) link:
          https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12627203/woman-arrested-student-praised-hamas-speech-brighton-university-sussex.html

          I see it’s also in the Daily Express, as well as the websites of mainstream internet and broadcast media such as ITV, MSN, Yahoo, etc. (So that should probably rectify the remaining 50% doubt.)

          People should be free to have that opinion, and to relate it to others in discussion. Celebrating or publishing it gets into trickier territory, though, due to the intended effect on other people. The law on this has tightened up recently, and on Tuesday the Home Sec Suella Braverman issued a stern letter to police chiefs directing them to suppress activity that could be construed as promoting Hamas. It is already illegal (under the Terrorism Act 2000) to “glorify” or “invite support for” proscribed organisations, though the stricture is rarely enforced and the interpretation of the terms would be subject to challenge in court. Braverman may have overplayed her hand by trying to take action against flag-waving and other expressions of personal belief, as her guidance conflicts with fundamental civil liberties.

          The Palestine Solidarity Group is urging people to protest against the ban, so it could get tested in court pretty soon.

          • Tom Welsh

            “Celebrating or publishing it gets into trickier territory, though, due to the intended effect on other people”.

            Let me see if I have this straight. Celebrating or publishing certain information in an attempt to influence other people’s opinions should be illegal in a democracy.

            Is that right?

          • Justin

            ” … should be … ”
            That’s a claim about ethics, not law. If you want to exchange opinions about it, join a philosophy club.

            Can people go to jail for things they say, or write or post, or tweet? Yes, of course. Ask Craig Murray.

          • Justin

            I’m not aware of anything preventing you discussing the ethics of terrorism legislation or its relationship to democracy, Tom. But you asked me to “clarify” my position on an ethical matter I didn’t address. It’s not off topic, it’s just an abrupt switch from a factual discussion about the law to a moral argument about personal values. By all means, throw the floor open for anybody and everybody to give their views on that. There are some strong opinions about the creeping authoritarianism in Britain, and you can congratulate, castigate or condemn as you please. I’m reading and learning about the range of opinions, and I’m grateful for you and others taking the time to state your views and defend them.

          • pretzelattack

            I don’t know what it is, it’s on a level with the Canadian Parliament applauding the SS soldier, if it’s true. i mean, we know Zelensky supports neonazis in Ukraine, and their precious monuments, and we know he supports Israel.

          • Tatyana

            I wish some honest journalist came to Zelensky with direct question – did you klit the monument to Bandera in colors of the Israeli flag.
            This would definitely clarify the situation. Reuters and BBC sit there in Kiev, right? Hope they are interested.

        • Dawg

          Dearie me. That’s an obvious fake photo, pretzelattack. The flag colours are superimposed on the photo – notice how the blue shade which appears between the columns is perfectly aligned with the image on the columns: is it supposed to have been projected onto the sky? What is this new projection technology that manages to cast a perfectly aligned patch of darker colour onto the clouds? (This ain’t Gotham City, y’know.)

          • pretzelattack

            maybe it is. would you have thought the Canadian Parliament, enthusiastically led by the Canadian Prime Minister, would give a heartfelt standing ovation to an SS soldier in World War 2? I would have thought that was an Onion headline before it happened. Zelensky himself is an obvious fake, a man with a Jewish Father who ran and won on a peace platform standing and applauding a guy who joined the SS so he could kill Jews and Poles. maybe some of the more ignorant Canadian politicians didn’t put two and two together in that moment, but I guarantee you Zelensky was aware who the people fighting the USSR in World War 2 were. that’s the biggest joke of all.

            if there are technical details that show it was altered, fine. but there is nothing inherent in the story itself that is implausible. you might say Zelensky wouldn’t be that tone deaf; i think he has been playing the piano for a deaf audience for so long that that doesn’t even matter to him anymore.

      • Goose

        Much inconsistency in application…

        Comment after comment on the Telegraph today, urging “Nuke Iran problem solved!” and similar.

        Post ‘Nuke Israel problem solved’ …no doubt outrage followed by deletion ensues.

      • Cabbage

        The bulldozers tearing down the aparthied fence, while weeping palestinians touched their land for the first time in generation, is beautiful and inspiring.

        I can’t find the video just at the moment with the man crying, but it’s exactly as she described, beautiful to watch the Apartheid barrier be torn down. This is from the guardian, which stripped the Audio, and cuts off before the man I’m talking about is show, but you can see the Bulldozer tearing down the Aparthied fence, surrounding the Gaza Ghetto https://youtu.be/Yezlk8tfpbU

        The ZST propaganda is (1) unevidenced, (2) flagrantly untrue.

        ““I felt joy and started crying. People began to cry and prostrate because they had entered the land that they were displaced from in 1948. We were in a state of amazement as we walked around, free, in our lands, outside the prison that is Gaza. We felt that we were in control of our lands.”

        The scenes in front of him were “bewildering”. Particularly, he said, seeing Israeli soldiers submissive to Palestinian fighters.

        “Those at the border who we had witnessed firing at children and young men, killing us in the past, we were now seeing them at their weakest.””

        https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-palestinian-journalist-crossed-first-time-felt-freedom

  • Peter

    Oh how ‘the West’ (the werst) is sinking deep under the waves of its own self-created swamp of moral degeneracy. By ‘the West’ I am of course referring to the western, so called, ‘elites’ – the political and media classes.

    I have been reluctant to comment on the current events in Israel-Palestine because, as of yet, I simply don’t have the words … .

    However, this morning I heard the most despicable, disgusting, deeply beneath contempt, comments I have ever heard, and I’ve heard some, from a member of the British government.

    Grant Shapps, the British Secretary of State for Defence, in comments referred to above by Allan Howard, this morning gave his full backing to Israel’s demand that over one million Gazans leave their homes within the next 24 hours and move south under threat of immediate military assault – bombs, bullets and shells to you and me. This in the midst of the constant widespread bombing of Gaza, where almost half a million residents are already displaced and where the entire population have had their access to the necessities of life – power, food, water – cut off. Grant Shapps and the British government, my government, fully support this.

    Who has the words to describe these depths of depravity?

    Shapps, of course, was not able, or willing, to state directly that this is his and the government’s policy because to do so would deservedly bring down upon his and the government’s heads unprecedented public, national and international opprobrium. It would also quite possibly make them a party to war crimes and crimes against humanity. Instead of stating it clearly when asked he constantly came up with evasive circumlocutions and oblique comments to say ‘yes, that is the policy, but I just won’t say so’.

    One tiny ray of light in all of this is that BBC News at least has resiled from its Ukrainian role of providing lies, deception, propaganda and support for nazis, to taking a relatively even hand with respect to Gaza – though I hear that that may not have been the case on QT last night.

    From Ukraine to Gaza, from 1945 to here, is this the end of ‘the West’? It looks like it to many, as many now look to Russia and China for a moral lead and a way out of this.

  • Republicofscotland

    The dis-united kingdom government – the Zionist whores that they are – are giving the Jewish community in England a whopping £3 million quid, because this very rich sector of English society has made it clear they don’t feel safe after the Palestinian uprising against their oppressors.

    Meanwhile the slaughter of civilians (including children) in the concentration camp known as the Gaza Strip continues. The Zionist oppressive forces have barked out their orders that those oppressed Palestinians in the North of the concentration camp must move to the South of it. This is highly unlikely, because one million people cannot just up-sticks and move to the South. I fear that those who cannot move will be killed by bombing and the inevitable boots on the ground in the Gaza Strip by the occupying Zionist forces.

    It looks like no quarter will be given by the Zionist murderers when they enter the open air prison.

    “Israel’s president is denying the concept of innocent civilians, on the brink of a major military offensive. A very bad sign. ”

    https://nitter.net/henrymance/status/1712811314299490353#m

    • DiggerUK

      “the Palestinians uprising against their oppressors” …. Rubbish, this was a Hamas attack that made no distinction between Israeli military personnel and civilians. The military are legitimate targets, not the civilians. There is no justification for slaughtering civilians, two wrongs don’t make a right.

      Now it is the Palestinian civilians in Gaza who are once again suffering, not Hamas gangsters in their tunnels…_

      • Republicofscotland

        DiggerUK

        Hamas probably couldn’t exist without the will of the Palestinian people, like the IRA – those that oppose such bodies often appeal to their allies to have them proscribed. Remember one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.

        Civilians and settlers are two different things, as described here: the latter is armed and dangerous and willing to do whatever it takes to steal Palestinian lands.

        https://thegrayzone.com/2023/10/11/beheaded-israeli-babies-settler-wipe-out-palestinian/

        In any case Hamas, the Palestinians, have the RIGHT to take up arms and attack the occupying forces of the Zionists in whatever form they take. Settlers, or any person going to the apartheid-occupying regime of Israel to live, know beforehand that they are going to live on stolen lands and by doing so they are causing the displaced Palestinian people great hardship.

        UN General Assembly resolution 37/43 adopted in 1982, allows the Palestinians to eject these squatters by whatever means necessary.

        The International community knows fine well who the lands of Palestine belong to, and it’s not the Zionists or their incoming squatters: it’s the Palestinians – but for around eighty years the international community has brought shame on humanity by allowing this oppressive apartheid regime to continue to murder and displace the Palestinian people. The ICC is a joke, as is Nato. The UN is hopeless, and the EU is utterly complicit by its support for the murdering regime.

        https://nitter.net/kennardmatt/status/1710609969085554916#m

        https://thegrayzone.com/2023/10/11/beheaded-israeli-babies-settler-wipe-out-palestinian/

        • U Watt

          Children beheaded. Joe Biden says he’s seen pictures. Therefore Israel can legitimately defend “herself” with genocide and ethnic cleansing.

      • Peter

        As I have mentioned previously, Brian Berletic and Angelo Giuliano on The New Atlas have made a strong case for the argument that Hamas is an Israeli/western creation formed to foment division in the Palestinian population and political class and that now, perhaps or perhaps not out of control, they are taking the logic of that to its extreme conclusion and providing the Israeli government with the pretext for taking over all the land of Gaza.

        Scott Ritter, speaking to Ania K of ‘Through The Eyes Of’ makes a similar argument. Though not necessarily taking it to the same logical conclusion as Berletic he nonetheless makes a very strong case.

        See both from the start:

        The New Atlas: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Btg91hY3Xww

        Through The Eyes Of: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KM5-qF91Ky4

      • Bayard

        “Rubbish, this was a Hamas attack that made no distinction between Israeli military personnel and civilians.”

        It must be true, it was in the Daily Telegraph.

    • Tom Welsh

      “Israel’s president is denying the concept of innocent civilians, on the brink of a major military offensive. A very bad sign”.

      I would have thought it a very bad precedent for Israeli civilians.

    • Pigeon English

      R S
      Isn’t it funny that Israelis are not opening North Check point for civilians and tell them to leave Gaza? They want to send them to Egypt
      with No Return .

  • Jack

    Oh come on Putin stop talking like a pathetic western diplomat

    Israel has right to self-defense – Putin
    https://swentr.site/russia/584817-putin-israel-defense-existence/

    No, Israel have no right to level whole of Gaza. As usual is Russia slow on realizing what is going on and China is nowhere to be seen, India have taken a pro-israeli stance and Brazil stands neutral. If this is BRICS in a critical situation, to hell with it.

    Meanwhile in Gaza, many people refuse to leave, wondering where the int. community is, just look at the video, these are children
    https://nitter.net/syedumar584/status/1712786365820318042#m

    Moving to Jordan, protesting jordanians are met with pro-israeli corrupt police forces:
    https://nitter.net/Lowkey0nline/status/1712761566716694972#m

    • DiggerUK

      Putin is spot on, everybody has the right to defend themselves, even if you don’t like them. Anyway, he is talking about Israel defending themselves against Hamas, not the Palestinian people…_

      “….Israel “certainly” has the right to defend itself against Hamas’ brutality, Russian President Vladimir Putin has said….”

      “….The Jewish state can only have peace if Palestinians have a nation of their own, the Russian president has said….”

      • Jack

        DiggerUK

        No, once again, Israel have no right to defend itself being the occupier. The party that has the right to defend themselves is the party you don’t like – thus you are not granting Palestinians the right to use force to get the occupier out.

      • Bayard

        “Putin is spot on, everybody has the right to defend themselves, even if you don’t like them. Anyway, he is talking about Israel defending themselves against Hamas, not the Palestinian people”

        Then why is the Israeli state attacking the Palestinian people and not Hamas?

  • Republicofscotland

    Possibly why the Zionist apartheid regime known as Israel gets away with murder: other countries have broken International Law on many occasions, so it has become the norm to break it.

    “Back at that time, David Reisner, who had previously headed the unit, explained Israel’s philosophy to Haaretz: “What we are seeing now is a revision of international law. If you do something for long enough, the world will accept it.

    “The whole of international law is now based on the notion that an act that is forbidden today becomes permissible if executed by enough countries.”

    Israel’s meddling to change international law goes back many decades.”

    “As Western politicians line up to cheer on Israel as it starves Gaza’s civilians and plunges them into darkness to soften them up before the coming Israeli ground invasion, it is important to understand how we reached this point – and what it portends for the future.”

    https://www.declassifieduk.org/lawless-in-gaza-why-britain-and-the-west-back-israels-crimes/

    The omens for me are that if Israel gets away with what it has done, and is about to do to the oppressed people of Palestine, then for many countries International Law will become a joke, and force will rule over law depending on who has the bigger guns and more allies. In my opinion this is already happening today.

    • Tom Welsh

      It is quite natural and understandable that international laws that are broken with impunity become dead letters and are generally ignored. The same is true, by the way, of international bodies that presume to lay down the law. When they are seen to be biased and partial, allowing some nations to get away with acts for which they severely castigate others, they themselves fall into disrepute and are ignored.

      It is an unavoidable consequence of propounding “laws” that lack any enforcement mechanism. Even at school, if a teacher forbids some act yet never punishes those children who go on doing it, soon others will do it and the teacher’s authority will melt away to nothing.

      In the ringing words of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, “To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt”.

      Ever since the UN was founded, the USA and its pals have claimed to enforce its laws against any nation which they wish to harm; but never do so against their friends and allies. Since Israel occupied the Golan Heights in 1967, the UN has told it many times to leave and return the land to Syria. Israel merely ignores such resolutions.

      Conclusion: the UN is a useless waste of space.

      • AG

        “getting away with war crimes”

        Let’s consider:

        Shortly before the 1948 founding “act”, in a British poll among Jews in Palestine, 25% spoke out against a state named “Israel” because they feared that such a state would destroy the network and communities where Arabs and Jews lived together peacefully, and instead would bring about much death and destruction.

        Then 3/4 mio. natives were driven off their land, many killed, etc.

        Israel was founded on this bloodshed nonetheless.
        Against the better judgement, therefore, of a not-insignificant minority of its own people.

        Same fate of “Zionism” of the 19th century, which had very progressive branches that did not prevail.
        In fact the term “Zionism”, which originally was ‘inclusive’ was turned onto its head.

        The UN adopted Article 13 demanding the right to return for the Palestinians in 1948.

        All these things happened 80 years ago. For 80 years they have gotten away with it. So nothing of this is new.

        Only the destruction of Palestine as an entity and possible body of a future state has never been stopped and worsened every decade.

    • Tom Welsh

      “…if Israel gets away with what it has done, and is about to do to the oppressed people of Palestine, then for many countries International Law will become a joke…”

      Too late.

  • Goose

    Axel Springer publishing group in Germany is going into overdrive pushing pro-Israel propaganda pieces, lest the German population realise they’re being encouraged to support genocide. BILD Zeitung, Die Welt, Fakt all running heavy pro-Israel propaganda, dehumanising the Palestinians as some sort of untermensch, only fit for eradication.

    Wikispooks explained how this publishing group was set up post war, by a Nazi propagandist, Axel Springer; he was aided by the CIA and MI6. Axel switched his allegiances from promoting racism under the Third Reich to promoting neoliberalism, US hegemony, US exceptionalism, and Neocon wars of aggression, as if without missing a beat due to the ideological symmetry to Nazism. Of course they’re supportive of hard-right Netanyahu and his expansionist agenda.

    • AG

      these are the official Springer values which you agree with if you sign a contract working for Springer.

      https://www.axelspringer.com/en/values

      Axel C. Springer
      Values

      The Essentials were formulated by Axel Springer in 1967 and have been updated over the decades in order to adapt them to the social understanding of our company and our view of the world.

      We stand up for freedom, the rule of law, democracy and a united Europe.
      We support the Jewish people and the right of existence of the State of Israel.
      We advocate the transatlantic alliance between the United States of America and Europe.
      We uphold the principles of a free market economy and its social responsibility.
      We reject political and religious extremism and all forms of racism and sexual discrimination.

      p.s. its like calling a ministy of information “ministry of truth”. Its name already gives it away.

      • Goose

        At first reading it almost seems reasonable, but in practice even having such a framework tends to lead to groupthink and an extreme ideological stance. One whereby ordinary journos and opinion writers feel pressure to outdo each other and impress the higher-ups (editors), by displaying their utmost loyalty via narrative compliance.

        • AG

          Additionally the problem is that this “thing” exists at all.

          You are liable to your employer in your political and social analyses as a “journalist”.
          This concept compromizes the very idea of a free press.

          The terms are not just suggestions. They are terms of contract. And everybody sticks to it.

          There is no better explanation for WELT POLITICO (by now Springer) BILD of course and its other platforms writing the things they do.

          Just ask yourself what they do NOT stand for by filling out the blanks:

          “We support the Jewish people and the right of existence of the State of Israel.”- which means what?
          Support everything the Israeli government does and says. No word of Palestine, naturally.

          Why not instead, if at all, suggest some peace in the Middle East bullshit and supprt peaceful bla-bla on all sides.

          Or just refer to the United Nations which is in fact the only legitimate body in this matter. Wouldn´t be difficult :

          “We support the United Nations in keeping world peace and upholding the Declaration of Human Rights.”

          Thats when you know its meaningless but at least genuine.

          Same goes with the others:

          “We advocate the transatlantic alliance between the United States of America and Europe.” Which means anti-Russian.

          “We uphold the principles of a free market economy and its social responsibility.”
          Which means capitalist and anti-Socialist and anti-union and anti-labour.

          This is a stern US-imperialist agenda as it has been propagated in Germany since 1945.
          It has to appear reasonable to folks just skimming it.

          That´s how good propaganda a.k.a. PR is done, but don´t let them fool us.

          You have to not think like a sane person but like an asshole lawyer or corrupt diplomat.
          Unless its not written out its not there.

          • Goose

            Yep, those ‘rules’ get interpreted in the most extreme way possible.

            In the UK we had a wholly false, manufactured antisemitism ‘crisis’ in the opposition Labour party. The response from that party was to adopt measures so extreme that it’s almost impossible to mention Israel without infringing some rule or another. The leader of the Labour party has all but prostrated himself before the most extreme elements of the British Jewish community. No exaggeration to say the Board of Deputies have the power to get shadow ministers fired such is the servile nature of Starmer.

      • Tom Welsh

        “We support the Jewish people and the right of existence of the State of Israel”.

        In isolation, with no mention of any other peoples or states, that almost amounts to a statement that they don’t matter.

        Including, curiously enough, Germany – Springer’s own country.

  • Republicofscotland

    This is a pertinent point for what is about to unfold in the Gaza Strip.

    “Israel was 100% aware that cutting off power to Gaza would make it almost impossible for Palestinians to record and publish footage of its coming war crimes. They struck a fatal blow to citizen journalism in Gaza, thereby blinding the whole world to what’s happening there.”

    https://nitter.net/caitoz/status/1712797090328563886#m

    The Zionists have already taken out the IRIB to stop information on their atrocities reaching the outside world.

  • Allan Howard

    The WSWS posted this yesterday:

    ‘German parliament in a war frenzy

    October 12, 2023 will go down in history as the date on which all the parties represented in the Bundestag (federal parliament), from the Left Party to the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), closed ranks and unanimously declared their support for a policy of unrestrained militarism and political repression.

    The Bundestag gave the Israeli government carte blanche to take cruel revenge on the Palestinian population for the uprising in Gaza and promised to support it by all available means. It threatened with military retaliation all regional organisations and powers that dared to help the Palestinians and pledged to prosecute, punish, and suppress any expression of sympathy with the Palestinians in Germany.

    By the time the Bundestag met on Thursday, the Israeli government had long made it clear that it was planning war crimes on a massive scale. It had already begun to turn the Gaza Strip, where more than two million people live crammed into a tiny space with no means of escape, into a hell…….

    https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/10/13/mzjn-o13.html

    If Germany (and the US and the UK and other European countries et al) had brought pressure to bear on Israel decades ago to resolve the situation with the Palestinians none of this would be happening and, as such, they are just as culpable for all the death and destruction and violence and devastation. The irony is that the German political class stand steadfastly with Israel because of what happened during the Nazi era, and because of the Holocaust, and yet what they are defending is, in effect, what the Nazis did to the Jews in Germany during the 1930s. One assumes that they are ashamed of what happened in this period as well, so it beggars belief that they have supported Israel in their subjugation and oppression and tyranny and demonisation of the Palestinians.

  • Peter Mo

    The IDF have hit and killed a clearly marked Press group in Lebanon. Seems it’s always part of Israel strategy.
    Watched the Qatar press conference with Tony Blinken. What a piece of evil work this Blinken is. Quite shocking. The Qatar emir came across quite reasonable.

  • Goose

    Don’t understand the lack of Arab solidarity, it really hurts the Palestinian cause. Jordan and Egypt especially could make things very difficult.
    And threats to them from the US around ending military aid, wouldn’t be carried through, because the US enjoys the stability these placid regimes provide.
    Having these countries fall to anarchy, ruled by people willing to funnel arms in much the same way Nato has to Ukraine, plus let the likes of Kadyrov’s men slip in. Well, it would leave the expansionist settlements in the West Bank as no longer feasible.

    • Tom Welsh

      Most Arab (and some other Muslim) nations are cut-and-paste jobs assembled from maps by European and US colonialists.

      Across much of the Muslim world there is nothing really solid between the tribe and the entire Muslim community.

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