• Israel’s defiance on full display; Biden admin commences hand-wringing – Day 356
    [email protected] September 28, 2024 blinken, google, Hezbollah, humanitarian aid to gaza, nasrallah, Netanyahu, un general assembly walks out, West Bank


    The Israeli military conducts an airstrike on the Dahieh area located south of Beirut, Lebanon, resulting in plumes of smoke rising from the site on September 28, 2024. [Houssam Shbaro – Anadolu Agency]
    The Israeli military conducts an airstrike on the Dahiyeh area located south of Beirut, Lebanon, resulting in plumes of smoke rising from the site on September 28, 2024. [Houssam Shbaro – Anadolu Agency] (photo)
    Mass Walkout as ‘Global Pariah’ Netanyahu Addresses UN General Assembly

    Common Dreams reports:

    A large number of diplomats and other officials walked out of the United Nations General Assembly in New York City on Friday as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepared to defend his nation’s slaughter of more than 41,000 people in the Gaza Strip during the past year and over 700 in Lebanon this week.

    Journalists and critics of the “global pariah” shared photos and videos of people filing out of the hall before Netanyahu’s address—which came just a day after 25 anti-genocide protesters were arrested for blocking his motorcade in Manhattan.

    While there was some audience applause from the sparsely populated room on Friday, Al Jazeera Arabic’s Rami Ayari explained that “the people you hear cheering the PM during the speech are in the gallery who he brought for that purpose.”

    Netanyahu began his Friday address by taking aim at the world leaders who throughout the week have condemned the recent escalation against Hezbollah in Lebanon as well as the past year of Israeli forces bombing and starving Palestinians in Gaza.

    “I didn’t intend to come here this year. My country is at war fighting for its life,” Netanyahu said. “But, after I heard the lies and slanders leveled at my country by many of the speakers standing at this podium, I decided to come here and set the record straight.”

    Armed with more of his infamous maps of the Middle East, the right-wing leader went on to claim that “Israel seeks peace,” while also pledging to wage war on Hamas-governed Gaza until “total victory” and telling “the tyrants of Tehran” that “if you strike us, we will strike you.”

    Noting that Netanyahu also spoke of “savage enemies who seek to destroy our common civilization,” James Zogby, co-founder and president of the Arab American Institute, said: “Words spoken by the man who has been charged with genocide and crimes against humanity. This is a disgrace. Abusing the General Assembly platform to lie and incite.”

    JEWISH NEWS SYNDICATE (JNS) ADDS: Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the U.S. envoy to the global body, and Robert Wood, the political special affairs ambassador who tends to take her place at the Security Council, did not appear to be in the room.

    An excerpt from Netanyahu’s defiant speech to the UN – to a largely empty chamber, except for the guest area, which was filled with Israel supporters:



    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also declared,

    I say to you, until Israel – until the Jewish state – is treated like other nations, until this anti-Semitic swamp is drained, the UN will be viewed by fair-minded people everywhere as nothing more than a contemptuous farce.

    Popularity of Netanyahu’s Likud party grows as Israel pounds Lebanon: Survey

    Al Jazeera reports:

    A poll conducted by Israeli daily Maariv shows that Israel’s deadly attacks on Lebanon have significantly boosted the popularity of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party.

    If elections were held today, Likud would lead with 25 seats in the Knesset, compared with 19 for its main rival, the opposition National Unity party led by Benny Gantz, the survey showed.

    This is the first time since the war on Gaza began last year that Likud has gained such an advantage, the newspaper said.

    Blinken faces calls to resign after lying to Congress to cover for Israel’s genocide

    Middle East Monitor reports:

    US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is facing mounting pressure to resign after a report earlier this week uncovered that he misled Congress about Israel’s obstruction of humanitarian aid to Gaza.

    The 62-year-old, who is a staunch Zionist, is said to have misled the American people to maintain US weapons flow to Israel despite fears that the apartheid state is committing genocide in Gaza.

    The report details how Blinken contradicted findings from his own department’s experts and USAID in a May report to Congress, stating that Israel was not “prohibiting or otherwise restricting the transport or delivery of US humanitarian assistance” to Gaza.

    It’s believed that Blinken misled the government because US law prohibits the supply of arms to countries blocking American humanitarian aid.

    Israel is a small country lacking the means to manufacture weapons at a rate required to execute regular wars and preserve its so-called deterrence capacity.

    Israel’s ability to carry out a year-long assault on Gaza would be severely hampered without the constant supply of weapons from the US and its western allies.

    (Read the full article here.)

    RECOMMENDED READING: “Laws Of War” Biden-Blinken Style

    US to ‘adjust’ its military force posture in Middle East

    Al Jazeera reports:

    President Joe Biden directed the Pentagon to “assess and adjust as necessary US force posture” in the Middle East, the White House says, following repeated Israeli air strikes in southern Beirut collapsed at least six residential towers in the heavily populated Dahiyeh area.

    “He has directed the Pentagon to assess and adjust as necessary US force posture in the region to enhance deterrence, ensure force protection, and support the full range of US objectives,” the White House said in a statement.

    Secretary of State Blinken said Friday, “I want to be clear that anyone using this moment to target American personnel, American interests in the region – the United States will take every measure to defend our people.”

    MILITARY TIMES ADDS: The U.S. has kept an increased military presence in the Middle East throughout much of the past year, with about 40,000 forces, at least a dozen warships and four Air Force fighter jet squadrons spread across the region both to protect allies and to serve as a deterrent against attacks, several U.S. officials said.

    US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin ordered the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group, equipped with F-35C fighters to the Middle East last month.
    US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin ordered the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group, equipped with F-35C fighters to the Middle East last month. (photo)
    West Bank: Israeli forces destroy food warehouse during raid

    WAFA reports:

    A convoy of Israeli military vehicles stormed the occupied West Bank city of Qalqilya in the early hours of Friday morning.

    Israeli forces toured the city’s Kafr Saba neighborhood, where they raided a workshop and a food warehouse, destroying the contents of the latter.

    Destruction following a raid by Israeli forces in Tulkarem Camp, occupied West Bank, oPT. [East Jerusalem YMCA/ Save the Children]
    Destruction following a raid by Israeli forces in Tulkarem Camp, occupied West Bank, oPT. [East Jerusalem YMCA/ Save the Children] (photo)
    Israel accused of breaking global labor law by withholding Palestinian worker pay

    The Guardian reports:

    Ten trade unions have accused Israel of breaching international labor law by holding back pay and benefits from more than 200,000 Palestinian workers since 7 October.

    The Israeli government stands accused of “blatant” violations of the International Labor Organization’s (ILO) protection of wages convention, tipping many Palestinians into extreme poverty.

    Workers from Gaza and the West Bank, employed in Israel, did not receive payment for work completed prior to last October 7th, and have received no wages since, according to the complaint.

    A complaint filed on Friday aims to recover the wages of Palestinian workers who previously worked in Israel.

    Israel revoked work permits for about 13,000 Palestinian workers from the Gaza Strip to work legally in Israel following the Hamas attack on 7 October, according to the complaint, leaving those workers with unpaid wages from September and October. Those wages would have normally been paid on 9 October.

    An additional nearly 200,000 Palestinian workers from the West Bank employed in Israel have not been permitted to enter Israel, and have received no termination notices, according to the brief, which argues they are owed wages stipulated by their employment contracts for their previous work and subsequent months.

    The unions allege that Israel is violating the ILO’s protection of wages convention, which has been ratified by a hundred member states, including Israel in 1959…

    (Read the full article here.)

    RECOMMENDED READING: Israeli industrial zones exploit Palestinian workers, steal Palestinian land

    Scene from Jenin refugee camp
    Scene from Jenin refugee camp (screengrab)
    US’ Blinken urges diplomacy as Israel intensifies attacks in Lebanon

    Anadolu Agency reports:

    US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday called for path to diplomacy as Israel intensified its strikes in Lebanon, warning both Israel and Hezbollah to “stop firing”.

    “The most important thing to do through diplomacy is to try first to stop firing in both directions, and then to use the time that we would have in such a ceasefire to see if we can reach a broader diplomatic agreement,” Blinken told reporters at a news conference on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) in New York.

    “The path to diplomacy may seem difficult to see at this moment, but it is there, and in our judgment, is necessary, and we will continue to work intensely with all parties to urge them to choose that course,” he said.

    NOTE: Blinken’s both-sides-ism sidesteps the facts: Israel has been responsible for about 82 percent of the cross-border attacks.



    Google Was Set to Host an Israeli Military Conference. When We Asked About It, the Event Disappeared.

    The Intercept reports:

    The Israel Defense Tech Conference, aimed at tech companies working with the Israeli military, was scheduled for November at the Google for Startups campus in Tel Aviv.

    The event, according to a listing posted on the event management app Luma, was pitched at “founders, investors and innovators” looking to network and learn more about the defense tech space.

    It was co-sponsored by Google; Fusion Venture Capital; Genesis, a startup accelerator; and the Israeli military’s research and development arm, known as the Directorate of Defense Research and Development (DDR&D, or Ma’fat).

    Google was not only listed as the physical host of the event and one of its sponsors, but the event listing also included a notice that attendees “approve of sharing [their] details with the organizers (Fusion & Google)” as part of signing up.

    When The Intercept contacted Google and the other companies and venture capital firms on the event page, the event page disappeared. Google spokesperson Andréa Willis told The Intercept in an email, “Google is not associated with this event.”

    Willis did not respond when asked how this could be possible if Google is hosting and co-sponsoring the event, or why the event page went down. None of the other companies or venture capital firms on the event page responded to requests for comment.

    After months of sustained protests against Google’s relationship with Israel, the company appears to be trying to muddy that relationship, at least in the public eye, while continuing its collaboration with the Israeli military…

    (Read the full investigation here.)

    israeli espionage against the US hits 366 billion
    Israeli espionage against the US is hurting the US economy – and has been for years. (photo)
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    IMEMC Daily Reports.

    Anadolu Agency: OPINION – Israel needs to face trial for organ trafficking: Claims and confessions

    Middle East Eye: The BBC is weaponizing its Lebanon reporting to help disguise Israel’s crimes

    STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – SEPTEMBER 27:

    Palestinian death toll from October 7, 2023 – September 27, 2024: at least 42,304* (41,586 in Gaza* – 11,308 women (30%), 16,715 children as of September 5. [The Ministry’s figures have been contested by the Israeli authorities, although they have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN, and WHO. These data are supported by independent analyses, comparing changes in the number of deaths of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) staff with those reported by the Ministry, which found claims of data fabrication implausible.]

    This is expected to be a significant undercount since thousands of those killed have yet to be identified – and at least 718 in the West Bank (~148 children). This does not include an estimated 10,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 49,032 Palestinian deaths.

    Lancet: “Applying a conservative estimate of four indirect deaths per one direct death9 to the 37,396 deaths reported, it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza.

    Ralph Nader earlier estimated 300,000 Palestinians may have been killed in Gaza.

    At least 45 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons (27 from Gaza, 23 from West Bank).
    At least 41 Palestinians have died due to malnutrition (at least 37 of them children)**.
    About 1.9 million of Gaza’s 2.3 million population are currently displaced.
    Almost 500,000 Gazans are currently experiencing catastrophic levels of food insecurity.
    Palestinian injuries from October 7 – September 27: at least 101,910 (including at least 96,210 in Gaza and 5,700 in the West Bank, including 830 children). [It remains unknown how many Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.]

    Reported Israeli death toll from October 7, 2023 – September 27, 2024: ~1,457 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 293*** military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza; 25 military and civilians in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Israel) and~10,000 injured.

    The death toll from Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon since Oct. 8 has reached 1,540 including women and children, with some 5,410 injured, a Lebanese official said Wednesday. The number of displaced individuals registered in approved shelters is 77,100. The actual number of displaced people has likely surpassed 250,000.

    NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries of Israelis on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers.

    *Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so.

    **Euro-Med Monitor reports that Gaza’s elderly are dying at an alarmingly high rate. The majority die at home and are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the Strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries. Additionally, according to Euromed, thousands have died from starvation, malnourishment, and inadequate medical care; these are considered indirect victims as they were not registered in hospitals.

    ***More than 40 of the deaths listed above were Israeli soldiers killed by Hezbollah in fighting at the Israel-Lebanon border. The figure does not include the reportedly 53 Israeli soldiers – nearly 16% of the total Israeli military deaths – killed due to friendly fire in Gaza and other military-related accidents.

    † For most of the conflict, women and children accounted for about 70% of deaths in Gaza, with children making up a little over 40% of those killed, according to official statistics.

    Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here.

    Hover over each bar for exact numbers.
    Source: IsraelPalestineTimeline.org

    Human rights reports on Israel-Palestine (regularly updated)
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    https://israelpalestinenews.org/israel-defiance-full-display-biden-admin-commences-hand-wringing-day-356/
    Israel’s defiance on full display; Biden admin commences hand-wringing – Day 356 [email protected] September 28, 2024 blinken, google, Hezbollah, humanitarian aid to gaza, nasrallah, Netanyahu, un general assembly walks out, West Bank The Israeli military conducts an airstrike on the Dahieh area located south of Beirut, Lebanon, resulting in plumes of smoke rising from the site on September 28, 2024. [Houssam Shbaro – Anadolu Agency] The Israeli military conducts an airstrike on the Dahiyeh area located south of Beirut, Lebanon, resulting in plumes of smoke rising from the site on September 28, 2024. [Houssam Shbaro – Anadolu Agency] (photo) Mass Walkout as ‘Global Pariah’ Netanyahu Addresses UN General Assembly Common Dreams reports: A large number of diplomats and other officials walked out of the United Nations General Assembly in New York City on Friday as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepared to defend his nation’s slaughter of more than 41,000 people in the Gaza Strip during the past year and over 700 in Lebanon this week. Journalists and critics of the “global pariah” shared photos and videos of people filing out of the hall before Netanyahu’s address—which came just a day after 25 anti-genocide protesters were arrested for blocking his motorcade in Manhattan. While there was some audience applause from the sparsely populated room on Friday, Al Jazeera Arabic’s Rami Ayari explained that “the people you hear cheering the PM during the speech are in the gallery who he brought for that purpose.” Netanyahu began his Friday address by taking aim at the world leaders who throughout the week have condemned the recent escalation against Hezbollah in Lebanon as well as the past year of Israeli forces bombing and starving Palestinians in Gaza. “I didn’t intend to come here this year. My country is at war fighting for its life,” Netanyahu said. “But, after I heard the lies and slanders leveled at my country by many of the speakers standing at this podium, I decided to come here and set the record straight.” Armed with more of his infamous maps of the Middle East, the right-wing leader went on to claim that “Israel seeks peace,” while also pledging to wage war on Hamas-governed Gaza until “total victory” and telling “the tyrants of Tehran” that “if you strike us, we will strike you.” Noting that Netanyahu also spoke of “savage enemies who seek to destroy our common civilization,” James Zogby, co-founder and president of the Arab American Institute, said: “Words spoken by the man who has been charged with genocide and crimes against humanity. This is a disgrace. Abusing the General Assembly platform to lie and incite.” JEWISH NEWS SYNDICATE (JNS) ADDS: Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the U.S. envoy to the global body, and Robert Wood, the political special affairs ambassador who tends to take her place at the Security Council, did not appear to be in the room. An excerpt from Netanyahu’s defiant speech to the UN – to a largely empty chamber, except for the guest area, which was filled with Israel supporters: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also declared, I say to you, until Israel – until the Jewish state – is treated like other nations, until this anti-Semitic swamp is drained, the UN will be viewed by fair-minded people everywhere as nothing more than a contemptuous farce. Popularity of Netanyahu’s Likud party grows as Israel pounds Lebanon: Survey Al Jazeera reports: A poll conducted by Israeli daily Maariv shows that Israel’s deadly attacks on Lebanon have significantly boosted the popularity of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party. If elections were held today, Likud would lead with 25 seats in the Knesset, compared with 19 for its main rival, the opposition National Unity party led by Benny Gantz, the survey showed. This is the first time since the war on Gaza began last year that Likud has gained such an advantage, the newspaper said. Blinken faces calls to resign after lying to Congress to cover for Israel’s genocide Middle East Monitor reports: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is facing mounting pressure to resign after a report earlier this week uncovered that he misled Congress about Israel’s obstruction of humanitarian aid to Gaza. The 62-year-old, who is a staunch Zionist, is said to have misled the American people to maintain US weapons flow to Israel despite fears that the apartheid state is committing genocide in Gaza. The report details how Blinken contradicted findings from his own department’s experts and USAID in a May report to Congress, stating that Israel was not “prohibiting or otherwise restricting the transport or delivery of US humanitarian assistance” to Gaza. It’s believed that Blinken misled the government because US law prohibits the supply of arms to countries blocking American humanitarian aid. Israel is a small country lacking the means to manufacture weapons at a rate required to execute regular wars and preserve its so-called deterrence capacity. Israel’s ability to carry out a year-long assault on Gaza would be severely hampered without the constant supply of weapons from the US and its western allies. (Read the full article here.) RECOMMENDED READING: “Laws Of War” Biden-Blinken Style US to ‘adjust’ its military force posture in Middle East Al Jazeera reports: President Joe Biden directed the Pentagon to “assess and adjust as necessary US force posture” in the Middle East, the White House says, following repeated Israeli air strikes in southern Beirut collapsed at least six residential towers in the heavily populated Dahiyeh area. “He has directed the Pentagon to assess and adjust as necessary US force posture in the region to enhance deterrence, ensure force protection, and support the full range of US objectives,” the White House said in a statement. Secretary of State Blinken said Friday, “I want to be clear that anyone using this moment to target American personnel, American interests in the region – the United States will take every measure to defend our people.” MILITARY TIMES ADDS: The U.S. has kept an increased military presence in the Middle East throughout much of the past year, with about 40,000 forces, at least a dozen warships and four Air Force fighter jet squadrons spread across the region both to protect allies and to serve as a deterrent against attacks, several U.S. officials said. US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin ordered the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group, equipped with F-35C fighters to the Middle East last month. US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin ordered the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group, equipped with F-35C fighters to the Middle East last month. (photo) West Bank: Israeli forces destroy food warehouse during raid WAFA reports: A convoy of Israeli military vehicles stormed the occupied West Bank city of Qalqilya in the early hours of Friday morning. Israeli forces toured the city’s Kafr Saba neighborhood, where they raided a workshop and a food warehouse, destroying the contents of the latter. Destruction following a raid by Israeli forces in Tulkarem Camp, occupied West Bank, oPT. [East Jerusalem YMCA/ Save the Children] Destruction following a raid by Israeli forces in Tulkarem Camp, occupied West Bank, oPT. [East Jerusalem YMCA/ Save the Children] (photo) Israel accused of breaking global labor law by withholding Palestinian worker pay The Guardian reports: Ten trade unions have accused Israel of breaching international labor law by holding back pay and benefits from more than 200,000 Palestinian workers since 7 October. The Israeli government stands accused of “blatant” violations of the International Labor Organization’s (ILO) protection of wages convention, tipping many Palestinians into extreme poverty. Workers from Gaza and the West Bank, employed in Israel, did not receive payment for work completed prior to last October 7th, and have received no wages since, according to the complaint. A complaint filed on Friday aims to recover the wages of Palestinian workers who previously worked in Israel. Israel revoked work permits for about 13,000 Palestinian workers from the Gaza Strip to work legally in Israel following the Hamas attack on 7 October, according to the complaint, leaving those workers with unpaid wages from September and October. Those wages would have normally been paid on 9 October. An additional nearly 200,000 Palestinian workers from the West Bank employed in Israel have not been permitted to enter Israel, and have received no termination notices, according to the brief, which argues they are owed wages stipulated by their employment contracts for their previous work and subsequent months. The unions allege that Israel is violating the ILO’s protection of wages convention, which has been ratified by a hundred member states, including Israel in 1959… (Read the full article here.) RECOMMENDED READING: Israeli industrial zones exploit Palestinian workers, steal Palestinian land Scene from Jenin refugee camp Scene from Jenin refugee camp (screengrab) US’ Blinken urges diplomacy as Israel intensifies attacks in Lebanon Anadolu Agency reports: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday called for path to diplomacy as Israel intensified its strikes in Lebanon, warning both Israel and Hezbollah to “stop firing”. “The most important thing to do through diplomacy is to try first to stop firing in both directions, and then to use the time that we would have in such a ceasefire to see if we can reach a broader diplomatic agreement,” Blinken told reporters at a news conference on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly (UNGA) in New York. “The path to diplomacy may seem difficult to see at this moment, but it is there, and in our judgment, is necessary, and we will continue to work intensely with all parties to urge them to choose that course,” he said. NOTE: Blinken’s both-sides-ism sidesteps the facts: Israel has been responsible for about 82 percent of the cross-border attacks. Google Was Set to Host an Israeli Military Conference. When We Asked About It, the Event Disappeared. The Intercept reports: The Israel Defense Tech Conference, aimed at tech companies working with the Israeli military, was scheduled for November at the Google for Startups campus in Tel Aviv. The event, according to a listing posted on the event management app Luma, was pitched at “founders, investors and innovators” looking to network and learn more about the defense tech space. It was co-sponsored by Google; Fusion Venture Capital; Genesis, a startup accelerator; and the Israeli military’s research and development arm, known as the Directorate of Defense Research and Development (DDR&D, or Ma’fat). Google was not only listed as the physical host of the event and one of its sponsors, but the event listing also included a notice that attendees “approve of sharing [their] details with the organizers (Fusion & Google)” as part of signing up. When The Intercept contacted Google and the other companies and venture capital firms on the event page, the event page disappeared. Google spokesperson Andréa Willis told The Intercept in an email, “Google is not associated with this event.” Willis did not respond when asked how this could be possible if Google is hosting and co-sponsoring the event, or why the event page went down. None of the other companies or venture capital firms on the event page responded to requests for comment. After months of sustained protests against Google’s relationship with Israel, the company appears to be trying to muddy that relationship, at least in the public eye, while continuing its collaboration with the Israeli military… (Read the full investigation here.) israeli espionage against the US hits 366 billion Israeli espionage against the US is hurting the US economy – and has been for years. (photo) MORE NEWS: IMEMC Daily Reports. Anadolu Agency: OPINION – Israel needs to face trial for organ trafficking: Claims and confessions Middle East Eye: The BBC is weaponizing its Lebanon reporting to help disguise Israel’s crimes STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – SEPTEMBER 27: Palestinian death toll from October 7, 2023 – September 27, 2024: at least 42,304* (41,586 in Gaza* – 11,308 women (30%), 16,715 children as of September 5. [The Ministry’s figures have been contested by the Israeli authorities, although they have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN, and WHO. These data are supported by independent analyses, comparing changes in the number of deaths of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) staff with those reported by the Ministry, which found claims of data fabrication implausible.] This is expected to be a significant undercount since thousands of those killed have yet to be identified – and at least 718 in the West Bank (~148 children). This does not include an estimated 10,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 49,032 Palestinian deaths. Lancet: “Applying a conservative estimate of four indirect deaths per one direct death9 to the 37,396 deaths reported, it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza. Ralph Nader earlier estimated 300,000 Palestinians may have been killed in Gaza. At least 45 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons (27 from Gaza, 23 from West Bank). At least 41 Palestinians have died due to malnutrition (at least 37 of them children)**. About 1.9 million of Gaza’s 2.3 million population are currently displaced. Almost 500,000 Gazans are currently experiencing catastrophic levels of food insecurity. Palestinian injuries from October 7 – September 27: at least 101,910 (including at least 96,210 in Gaza and 5,700 in the West Bank, including 830 children). [It remains unknown how many Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.] Reported Israeli death toll from October 7, 2023 – September 27, 2024: ~1,457 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 293*** military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza; 25 military and civilians in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Israel) and~10,000 injured. The death toll from Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon since Oct. 8 has reached 1,540 including women and children, with some 5,410 injured, a Lebanese official said Wednesday. The number of displaced individuals registered in approved shelters is 77,100. The actual number of displaced people has likely surpassed 250,000. NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries of Israelis on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers. *Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so. **Euro-Med Monitor reports that Gaza’s elderly are dying at an alarmingly high rate. The majority die at home and are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the Strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries. Additionally, according to Euromed, thousands have died from starvation, malnourishment, and inadequate medical care; these are considered indirect victims as they were not registered in hospitals. ***More than 40 of the deaths listed above were Israeli soldiers killed by Hezbollah in fighting at the Israel-Lebanon border. The figure does not include the reportedly 53 Israeli soldiers – nearly 16% of the total Israeli military deaths – killed due to friendly fire in Gaza and other military-related accidents. † For most of the conflict, women and children accounted for about 70% of deaths in Gaza, with children making up a little over 40% of those killed, according to official statistics. Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here. Hover over each bar for exact numbers. Source: IsraelPalestineTimeline.org Human rights reports on Israel-Palestine (regularly updated) You can’t arm a genocidal state into moderation. So why does the West keep trying? How Does Israel Justify Mass Killings? It Starts in the Schools. From the Americas to Gaza: Spreading disease has long been used by colonizers to commit genocide Contrived charges of antisemitism are the new ‘Red Scare’ How Israel’s quadcopters traumatize, maim and kill Palestinians in Gaza Israeli society’s dehumanization of Palestinians is now absolute The unpublished genocide diaries of Refaat Alareer An arms embargo on Israel is not a radical idea — it’s the law Israel is redrawing the West Bank, cutting into a prospective Palestinian state Gaza breakdown: 20 times Israel used US arms in likely war crimes U.S. universities spent the summer strategizing to suppress student activism. Here is their plan. ‘Words like Slaughter:’ A comparative study of The New York Times reporting in Ukraine and Gaza Cracks in the Dome: Israel’s security mirage Israel Suddenly Has A Problem With Attacks On Population Centers Americans are always the last to know…about Israel’s crimes Does Any Other Country besides Israel have the Right to Defend Itself? ‘Raped by female soldiers’: Palestinian in leaked Sde Teiman photo speaks out Alison Weir trending on social media – what the buzz is about Israeli media’s coverage of the rape of Palestinian detainees shows support for sexual violence in service of genocide Inside Israel’s torture, rape, and dehumanization centers I’m a pediatrician. The scars I saw on Gaza’s children will take generations to heal. What Harris’s Jewish outreach director said at a private DNC afterparty ‘Strong record of supporting the U.S.-Israel relationship’: a look at Tim Walz’s votes on Palestine as a member of Congress Nearly Two-Thirds of All Campaign Funds for Cori Bush Challenger Came From AIPAC Israeli army probe covered up “friendly fire” killings on October 7 Are US officials’ investments of public funds in Israeli bonds ethical? How much is too much? Honoring the memory of a Gazan Olympic hero: Majed Abu Maraheel https://israelpalestinenews.org/israel-defiance-full-display-biden-admin-commences-hand-wringing-day-356/
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    Israel's defiance on full display; Biden admin commences hand-wringing – Day 356
    Mass walkout in UN as "global pariah" Netanyahu takes the stage; calls for Sec'y Blinken's resignation after he lied to Congress for Israel
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  • UN Delegates walk out as Netanyahu gives a speech in the UN General Assembly, calling him out for his crimes.
    #UN #Israel #UnitedNations #Walkout
    UN Delegates walk out as Netanyahu gives a speech in the UN General Assembly, calling him out for his crimes. #UN #Israel #UnitedNations #Walkout
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  • Besides genocide, Israel carries out major political assassinations – Day 297
    [email protected] July 31, 2024 Barak Hiram, BUREIJ CAMP, congressional aides, east jerusalem, Fuad Shukr, Hezbollah, humanitarian aid, Ismail Haniyeh assassination, khan younis, medical evacuation, Mohammad Jaradat, palestinian state, ramadan Sadeq, Saint Porphyrius Church, sexual violence in prison
    Besides genocide, Israel carries out major political assassinations – Day 297
    Israel assassinates Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, attempts to assassinate Hezbollah leader Fuad Shukr; total killed in Khan Youn is over 250 in 9 days; sexual violence by Israeli prison guards against Palestinians is widespread: Physicians for Human Rights in Israel; general who ordered Hannibal Directive on October 7th promoted to commander of Gaza; 80 patients evacuated for medical treatment, as thousands more wait; humanitarian aid remains stalled at border; Israeli attack on the Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius Church in Gaza City; West Bank deaths; East Jerusalem evictions catch attention of UN; Congressional aides start a public channel to air grievances about Palestine policy

    By IAK staff, from reports.

    BREAKING: Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Tehran after Israel bombs Beirut

    Electronic Intifada reports: Hamas announced early Wednesday that Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the Palestinian faction’s political wing, was assassinated in Tehran, where he was present for the inauguration of the new Iranian president.

    The assassination, in Iran no less, marks a major escalation that will likely have regional ramifications and came hours after Israel bombed Lebanon on Tuesday evening, killing three civilians, according to Lebanese state media. Israel claimed that it killed a senior Hezbollah figure in the strike, but the Lebanese resistance group had not issued a statement on the matter at the time of publication.

    Israel killed multiple members representing multiple generations of Haniyeh’s family in Gaza since October. Several leaders of Hamas have been assassinated by Israel before Haniyeh, only to be replaced and for the organization’s capabilities to grow.

    In January, Saleh al-Arouri, the deputy head of Hamas’ politburo, was killed in a strike in Beirut along with several other cadres and commanders with the group.

    Two weeks ago, Israel claimed to have killed Muhammad Deif, the secretive head of Hamas’ armed wing, in a strike in Gaza that killed at least 90 Palestinians in an area it had unilaterally declared as a humanitarian zone.

    RECOMMENDED READING: For these reasons Israel assassinated Hamas’ political leader, Ismail Haniyeh – analysis

    Qatar PM asks, ‘How can mediation succeed when one side assassinates negotiator?’


    Reuters reports: The prime minister of Qatar, which has acted as a mediator in ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas, suggested on Wednesday that the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh could jeopardise efforts to secure a truce in Gaza.

    “Peace needs serious partners & a global stance against the disregard for human life,” he added in a post on X.

    Egypt’s foreign ministry said in a statement that a “dangerous Israeli escalation policy” over the past two days had undermined efforts to broker an end to the fighting in Gaza, and “indicates the absence of Israeli political will to calm [the region] down.”

    Israeli army says it assassinated top Hezbollah commander in Beirut attack

    Andalou Agency reports: The Israeli military said late Tuesday that it assassinated Fuad Shukr, Hezbollah’s top military commander, in a strike on Beirut’s southern suburbs.

    There has been no comment from Hezbollah on the attack so far.

    “In a targeted, intelligence-based elimination, Israeli Air Force fighter jets eliminated Hezbollah’s most senior military commander and the head of its Strategic Unit, Fuad Shukr ‘Sayyid Muhsan’, in the area of Beirut,” the army said in a statement.

    The army noted that Shukr served as “Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah’s right-hand man and was Nasrallah’s adviser for planning and directing wartime operations.”

    NOTE: Israel’s attack on Hezbollah’s leader is in apparent “retaliation” after a projectile struck a community in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, killing 12 youths. Israel blamed Hezbollah, which denied the allegation.

    Indications in the hours following the incident suggest it may have been an Israeli Iron Dome missile. Kim Ghattas, a writer for The Atlantic and a Lebanon expert, told Times Radio that it is unlikely that Hezbollah ‘deliberately targeted’ the Golan Heights football pitch.

    RECOMMENDED READING: US says it would help Israel defend itself if attacked by Hezbollah

    A view of street, filled with debris, following the Israeli attack on a building in Beirut, Lebanon on July 31, 2024. The Israeli army also claimed that it killed key Fuad Shukr, Hezbollah's top military commander, in the strike.
    A view of street, filled with debris, following the Israeli attack on a building in Beirut, Lebanon on July 31, 2024. The Israeli army also claimed that it killed key Fuad Shukr, Hezbollah’s top military commander, in the strike. (photo)
    Nine Palestinians killed by Israel while transporting bodies from Bureij camp

    Al Jazeera reports: Exclusive footage obtained by Al Jazeera shows the first moments after a group of young men were targeted by the Israeli army while trying to transport bodies from the Bureij refugee camp to the Nuseirat camp on an animal-drawn cart.

    Local sources and witnesses told Al Jazeera the men were bombed when they reached Salah al-Din Street.

    The attack killed all of the men, nine in total.

    Al Jazeera’s video footage shows the bodies of the nine victims lying on the ground, and Al-Awda Hospital said it had received nine victims from Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip.

    In nine days, Israeli army killed 255 people in Khan Younis: Gaza officials

    Al Jazeera reports: A statement on Telegram says 255 people have been killed, about 300 people wounded with 31 missing in the nine-day “horrific massacre” carried out on the eastern outskirts of Gaza’s second-largest city.

    Thirty-one homes were bombed by the Israeli military while their residents were inside, the office said, adding 320 homes and residential buildings were struck in total. The army obstructed operations to reach dozens of wounded during the attack, it said.

    “We condemn in the strongest terms the Israeli occupation’s horrific massacre against civilians and displaced persons in the east of the Khan Younis governorate,” the office said.

    Accounts of sexual abuse in Israeli detention are not isolated incidents: medical group says

    Middle East Monitor reports: Physicians for Human Rights in Israel (PHRI) reportedly said yesterday it has information about other cases of Palestinian prisoners who had been sexually assaulted by Israeli soldiers in the notorious Sde Teiman detention centre in the Negev desert in southern Israel.

    PHRI said a victim of sexual violence was hospitalized three weeks ago and was in a life-threatening condition. He had injuries to the upper part of his body and a serious injury to the rectum.

    It confirmed that it knows about other cases of sexual assault that have not been disclosed, either because the victims are afraid to complain to the Israeli authorities or because the authorities did not open an investigation.

    “Mounting testimonies indicate these incidents are not isolated. They suggest systematic abuse and violence, and a blind eye to violations. The Sde Teiman torture facility must be shut down urgently, abuse across all prisons must end, and those responsible must be prosecuted,” it added in a tweet.

    On Monday, Israeli public broadcaster KAN revealed that a Palestinian detainee was gang-raped by Israeli soldiers at the Sde Teiman. The detainee was taken to a hospital with severe injuries to an intimate body part, which left him unable to walk.

    Ten Israeli reservists were detained as a result. However, far-right members of Israel’s cabinet have called on authorities to “take your hands off our fighters” and labelled the reservists “heroes”, while some tried to storm the detention centre they were being held in in an effort to free them.

    In recent months, the army has released dozens of Palestinian detainees who bear signs of torture, malnutrition and exhaustion.




    Israeli Army Appoints Gen. Barak Hiram – who ordered the killing of Israelis on October 7th – as Commander of Gaza Division

    Ha’aretz reports: Brig. Gen. Barak Hiram will assume the post of commander of the Gaza Division of the Israeli army.

    On October 7th, Hiram ordered a tank commander to break into a home in Kibbutz Be’eri that he knew housed Hamas fighters and Israelis. even at the risk of harming civilians. The tank fired shells at the house, killing 12 Israelis and a number of Hamas members. Two Israelis survived the attack.

    When Hiram met with families of the Israeli victims, some of them called on him to resign, or to command another operational division. But, Hiram “insisted that precisely because he was the officer in charge in Be’eri, he is in the best position” to take over in Gaza.

    When Hiram was asked what actions should be taken as part of accepting responsibility, he said: “I will correct the mistakes that were made when I take responsibility for the division. I don’t ask for thanks for this.”

    NOTE: In January, Hiram ordered Israeli forces to blow up Al-Isra University, which they had used as a military headquarters prior to its demolition. Hiram was officially reprimanded for carrying out the demolition without prior approval from his superiors.




    Endless occupation: How Israel has always rejected a Palestinian state

    The New Arab reports: In July, Israel’s parliament, known as the Knesset, overwhelmingly passed a resolution rejecting the establishment of a Palestinian state.

    Passing with a 68-9 majority, the resolution “firmly opposes the establishment of a Palestinian state west of Jordan”.

    “If you look at all of the political parties’ platforms, they don’t believe in Palestinian freedom at all,” Palestinian human rights lawyer Diana Buttu told The New Arab.

    “When they talk about a state – and very few of them do – they’re not talking about ending the occupation. They’re talking about something less than a state, just something that they can say they’ve gotten rid of Palestinians. But they’re never talking about ending control over Palestinian lives.”

    Buttu noted the timing of the resolution’s vote is noteworthy, which came just a day before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled Israel’s occupation of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, was unlawful.

    “Israel is sending a very clear message that they will never end the occupation, that it doesn’t matter what the ICJ says, and it doesn’t matter what the world says, they’re going to hold onto it,” Buttu said.

    (Read the full article here.)

    More than 80 patients evacuated from Gaza in biggest operation since war, WHO says

    WHO reports: At least 85 sick and severely injured Palestinians from Gaza, including 35 children, were evacuated to Abu Dhabi for specialized care, the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday, Reuters reports.

    “This extremely complex joint evacuation was supported by the (United Arab Emirates), WHO and partners. It is the largest medical evacuation since October 2023,” Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus posted on X.

    The evacuated patients suffered from various severe conditions including cancer, neurological issues and cardiac diseases. They were accompanied by 63 family members and caregivers, Tedros said.

    NOTE: The World Health Organization said last month that a minimum of 7,000 to over 11,000 Palestinian patients need immediate medical evacuations.




    Gaza aid delivery still being ‘drastically impeded’, say aid agencies

    ReliefWeb reports: Many aid organizations have supplies approved and waiting to enter the Gaza Strip, but the unloading zone at the Kerem Shalom/Karam Abu Salem border crossing on the Gaza side has been full for weeks due to high insecurity, Israeli military operations and the risk of looting given the soaring needs facing Palestinian families.

    Save the Children managed to get four trucks (80 pallets) of medical supplies into Gaza on a convoy after waiting at the Kerem Shalom crossing in Israel in the heat for over a month, following hostilities on the Gaza side of the border. The pallets included standard medication such as antibiotics and heart disease medications.

    Save the Children’s teams also have 17 pallets of temperature-controlled medicines stuck in El-Arish, Egypt, including four boxes that require continuous refrigeration. Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) system only allows flatbed trucks, not the closed trucks required to transport such supplies, resulting in repeated rejections of such temperature-controlled shipments.

    Other aid agencies confirmed that they are facing similar challenges. Oxfam has water tanks, desalination units, tap stands, generators and latrines approved but unable to enter through the crossing, whilst 864 tents procured by the Norwegian Refugee Council that had been at El-Arish port arrived recently at Kerem Shalom but still remain inaccessible due to insecurity and safety concerns.


    Israeli attack on Greek Orthodox church in Gaza ‘crime against religions,’ authorities say

    Andalou Agency reports: Palestinian authorities on Tuesday called an Israeli attack on the Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius Church in Gaza City a “crime against religions.”

    Damage was reported after two missiles hit the building, where dozens of displaced Palestinian Christians have taken refuge.

    A Palestinian official said that more than 600 mosques and all three churches in Gaza have been destroyed in Israeli attacks since Oct. 7, 2023.

    “These are crimes against religions and religious teachings,” he said. “Israel does not respect anything, and its army used 2,000-pound rockets and bombs (in attacking) churches and places of worship.”

    Photos taken by Anadolu showed an unexploded ordnance on the church’s ground.

    Saint Porphyrius Church is one of the oldest Christian sites in Gaza. It was built in the 5th century and named after Saint Porphyrius, whose tomb is inside the church.

    A view of the damaged historical Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius Church, where civilians took shelter, after Israeli airstrike in Gaza City, Gaza on October 20, 2023. [Ali Jadallah – Anadolu Agency]
    A view of the damaged historical Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius Church, where civilians took shelter, after Israeli airstrike in Gaza City, Gaza on October 20, 2023. [Ali Jadallah – Anadolu Agency] (photo)
    West Bank: Palestinian in Nablus succumbs to critical injury from Israeli army gunfire

    WAFA reports: A Palestinian Tuesday evening succumbed to his critical injury from Israeli army gunfire in the occupied West Bank city of Nablus, according to security and medical sources.

    They said that Ramadan Hussein Mohammad Sadeq died of his critical injury after being shot with live rounds fired by Israeli occupation forces in the head, chest and back.

    Sadeq, 45, was shot by the gun-toting soldiers while in front of his house in the Nablus city neighborhood of Khallet al-Amoud.

    During the raid, the soldiers fired barrages of live ammunition and tear gas canisters towards civilians’ houses.

    Sadeq was rushed to a hospital in a critical condition. Attempts to resuscitate him were unsuccessful and he died afterwards.

    West Bank: Palestinian north of Hebron succumbs to injury from Israeli army gunfire

    WAFA reports: A Palestinian minor Tuesday evening succumbed to his injury from Israeli army gunfire near the Beit Einun village junction, north of the occupied West Bank city of Hebron, according to security sources.

    Mohammad Murad Mohammad Jaradat, 14, a resident of Sair, died of his injury he sustained after being hit by live rounds fired at close range on him by Israeli forces.

    The soldiers left Jaradat bleeding on the ground and prevented Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) medics from reaching him.

    2 Palestinians killed in West Bank
    Mohammad Sadeq (L) and Mohammad Murad Mohammad Jaradat (photo)
    UN concerned over Palestinian families in East Jerusalem facing eviction

    Al Jazeera reports: The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights says it’s concerned that more than 80 Palestinian families face eviction from their homes in Silwan in occupied East Jerusalem due to “unlawful” and “discriminatory Israeli laws against Palestinians”.

    In a statement, it said 87 Palestinian families, totaling 600 to 680 individuals, are facing legal proceedings initiated by Israeli settlers to evict them from their homes in the Batn al-Hawa neighborhood.

    It said the “systematic settlers’ campaign” aims to “uproot Palestinians from their homes, take over their property and implant Israeli settlers in the heart of Palestinian neighborhoods in East Jerusalem”.

    “International humanitarian law prohibits Israel from imposing its own laws in occupied territory, which includes the application of Israeli laws to evict Palestinians from their homes,” the UN said.

    Aides in Congress Create Dissent Channel to Protest Support for Israel

    New York Times reports: Since Israel began its military offensive in Gaza last fall, hundreds of congressional aides have spoken out in protest of the United States’ support for the war — many of them breaking with their bosses to do so.

    Acting anonymously to protect their coveted positions on Capitol Hill, they have written letters, circulated petitions, posted on social media and, in some cases, walked off the job to push for a cease-fire and an end to the shipments of U.S.-made weapons to Israel.

    They argue that members of Congress have refused to heed Americans’ objections — expressed through hundreds of thousands of calls, letters, emails and in-person visits to their offices — to the war and Israel’s conduct in it.

    On Sunday night, a group of at least a dozen junior staff members escalated their objections by launching a website where they and their like-minded colleagues can publish anonymous memos criticizing U.S. policy on Israel and the war in Gaza — including their own bosses’ positions — without risking retaliation.

    Organizers say the forum, known as the Congressional Dissent Channel, is modeled after the State Department’s dissent channel for Foreign Service officers. That channel was created during the Vietnam War — another conflict that opened bitter political divisions in the United States and galvanized a protest movement, particularly among young Americans.

    But while that channel is a classified internal government system in which named authors offer dissenting views that are distributed carefully and confidentially, the new website is the opposite: a public platform where anonymous congressional aides can air their criticisms and spotlight private discord within their offices.

    It is being created by the same group of staff aides that organized a pro-Palestinian staff walkout on Capitol Hill last week when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel spoke to a joint meeting of Congress, and which planned an anonymous flower vigil outside the Capitol in November to demand a cease-fire.

    DropSite News: Does Israel Really Believe It Can Win a War Against Hezbollah?

    Al Jazeera: The ICJ opinion on Israel’s occupation leaves the US facing a hard choice

    Mondoweiss: Netanyahu’s willing executioners: how ordinary Israelis became mass murderers



    STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – JULY 30:

    Palestinian death toll from October 7 – July 30: at least 39,991* (39,400 in Gaza* – 11,445 women (30%), 16,251 children as of July 22. [The Ministry’s figures have been contested by the Israeli authorities, although they have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN, and WHO. These data are supported by independent analyses, comparing changes in the number of deaths of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) staff with those reported by the Ministry, which found claims of data fabrication implausible.]

    This is expected to be a significant undercount since thousands of those killed have yet to be identified – and at least 591 in the West Bank (~140 children). This does not include an estimated 10,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 46,848 Palestinian deaths.

    Lancet: “Applying a conservative estimate of four indirect deaths per one direct death9 to the 37,396 deaths reported, it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza.

    Ralph Nader earlier estimated 200,000 Palestinians may have been killed in Gaza.

    At least 45 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons (27 from Gaza, 18 from West Bank).
    At least 41 Palestinians have died due to malnutrition**.
    About 1.7 million, or 75% of Gaza’s population are currently displaced.
    2.15 million (out of total population of 2.3 million) are projected to face Crisis or worse levels of food insecurity.
    Palestinian injuries from October 7 – July 30: at least 96,416 (including at least 90,996 in Gaza and 5,420 in the West Bank, including 830 children). [It remains unknown how man Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.]

    Reported Israeli death toll from October 7 – July 30: ~1,486 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 331 military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza; 16 in the West Bank) and~8,730 injured.

    Times of Israel reports: The IDF listed 41 soldiers killed due to friendly fire in Gaza and other military-related accidents – nearly 16%.

    NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries in Israel on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers.

    *Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so.**

    Euro-Med Monitor reports that Gaza’s elderly are dying at an alarmingly high rate. The majority die at home and are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the Strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries. Additionally, according to Euromed, thousands have died from starvation, malnourishment, and inadequate medical care; these are considered indirect victims as they were not registered in hospitals.

    † For most of the conflict, women and children accounted for about 70% of deaths in Gaza, with children making up a little over 40% of those killed, according to official statistics.

    Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here.

    Hover over each bar for exact numbers.
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    https://donshafi911iamthefaceoftruth.blogspot.com/2024/07/besides-genocide-israel-carries-out.html
    Besides genocide, Israel carries out major political assassinations – Day 297 [email protected] July 31, 2024 Barak Hiram, BUREIJ CAMP, congressional aides, east jerusalem, Fuad Shukr, Hezbollah, humanitarian aid, Ismail Haniyeh assassination, khan younis, medical evacuation, Mohammad Jaradat, palestinian state, ramadan Sadeq, Saint Porphyrius Church, sexual violence in prison Besides genocide, Israel carries out major political assassinations – Day 297 Israel assassinates Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, attempts to assassinate Hezbollah leader Fuad Shukr; total killed in Khan Youn is over 250 in 9 days; sexual violence by Israeli prison guards against Palestinians is widespread: Physicians for Human Rights in Israel; general who ordered Hannibal Directive on October 7th promoted to commander of Gaza; 80 patients evacuated for medical treatment, as thousands more wait; humanitarian aid remains stalled at border; Israeli attack on the Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius Church in Gaza City; West Bank deaths; East Jerusalem evictions catch attention of UN; Congressional aides start a public channel to air grievances about Palestine policy By IAK staff, from reports. BREAKING: Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Tehran after Israel bombs Beirut Electronic Intifada reports: Hamas announced early Wednesday that Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the Palestinian faction’s political wing, was assassinated in Tehran, where he was present for the inauguration of the new Iranian president. The assassination, in Iran no less, marks a major escalation that will likely have regional ramifications and came hours after Israel bombed Lebanon on Tuesday evening, killing three civilians, according to Lebanese state media. Israel claimed that it killed a senior Hezbollah figure in the strike, but the Lebanese resistance group had not issued a statement on the matter at the time of publication. Israel killed multiple members representing multiple generations of Haniyeh’s family in Gaza since October. Several leaders of Hamas have been assassinated by Israel before Haniyeh, only to be replaced and for the organization’s capabilities to grow. In January, Saleh al-Arouri, the deputy head of Hamas’ politburo, was killed in a strike in Beirut along with several other cadres and commanders with the group. Two weeks ago, Israel claimed to have killed Muhammad Deif, the secretive head of Hamas’ armed wing, in a strike in Gaza that killed at least 90 Palestinians in an area it had unilaterally declared as a humanitarian zone. RECOMMENDED READING: For these reasons Israel assassinated Hamas’ political leader, Ismail Haniyeh – analysis Qatar PM asks, ‘How can mediation succeed when one side assassinates negotiator?’ Reuters reports: The prime minister of Qatar, which has acted as a mediator in ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas, suggested on Wednesday that the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh could jeopardise efforts to secure a truce in Gaza. “Peace needs serious partners & a global stance against the disregard for human life,” he added in a post on X. Egypt’s foreign ministry said in a statement that a “dangerous Israeli escalation policy” over the past two days had undermined efforts to broker an end to the fighting in Gaza, and “indicates the absence of Israeli political will to calm [the region] down.” Israeli army says it assassinated top Hezbollah commander in Beirut attack Andalou Agency reports: The Israeli military said late Tuesday that it assassinated Fuad Shukr, Hezbollah’s top military commander, in a strike on Beirut’s southern suburbs. There has been no comment from Hezbollah on the attack so far. “In a targeted, intelligence-based elimination, Israeli Air Force fighter jets eliminated Hezbollah’s most senior military commander and the head of its Strategic Unit, Fuad Shukr ‘Sayyid Muhsan’, in the area of Beirut,” the army said in a statement. The army noted that Shukr served as “Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah’s right-hand man and was Nasrallah’s adviser for planning and directing wartime operations.” NOTE: Israel’s attack on Hezbollah’s leader is in apparent “retaliation” after a projectile struck a community in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, killing 12 youths. Israel blamed Hezbollah, which denied the allegation. Indications in the hours following the incident suggest it may have been an Israeli Iron Dome missile. Kim Ghattas, a writer for The Atlantic and a Lebanon expert, told Times Radio that it is unlikely that Hezbollah ‘deliberately targeted’ the Golan Heights football pitch. RECOMMENDED READING: US says it would help Israel defend itself if attacked by Hezbollah A view of street, filled with debris, following the Israeli attack on a building in Beirut, Lebanon on July 31, 2024. The Israeli army also claimed that it killed key Fuad Shukr, Hezbollah's top military commander, in the strike. A view of street, filled with debris, following the Israeli attack on a building in Beirut, Lebanon on July 31, 2024. The Israeli army also claimed that it killed key Fuad Shukr, Hezbollah’s top military commander, in the strike. (photo) Nine Palestinians killed by Israel while transporting bodies from Bureij camp Al Jazeera reports: Exclusive footage obtained by Al Jazeera shows the first moments after a group of young men were targeted by the Israeli army while trying to transport bodies from the Bureij refugee camp to the Nuseirat camp on an animal-drawn cart. Local sources and witnesses told Al Jazeera the men were bombed when they reached Salah al-Din Street. The attack killed all of the men, nine in total. Al Jazeera’s video footage shows the bodies of the nine victims lying on the ground, and Al-Awda Hospital said it had received nine victims from Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip. In nine days, Israeli army killed 255 people in Khan Younis: Gaza officials Al Jazeera reports: A statement on Telegram says 255 people have been killed, about 300 people wounded with 31 missing in the nine-day “horrific massacre” carried out on the eastern outskirts of Gaza’s second-largest city. Thirty-one homes were bombed by the Israeli military while their residents were inside, the office said, adding 320 homes and residential buildings were struck in total. The army obstructed operations to reach dozens of wounded during the attack, it said. “We condemn in the strongest terms the Israeli occupation’s horrific massacre against civilians and displaced persons in the east of the Khan Younis governorate,” the office said. Accounts of sexual abuse in Israeli detention are not isolated incidents: medical group says Middle East Monitor reports: Physicians for Human Rights in Israel (PHRI) reportedly said yesterday it has information about other cases of Palestinian prisoners who had been sexually assaulted by Israeli soldiers in the notorious Sde Teiman detention centre in the Negev desert in southern Israel. PHRI said a victim of sexual violence was hospitalized three weeks ago and was in a life-threatening condition. He had injuries to the upper part of his body and a serious injury to the rectum. It confirmed that it knows about other cases of sexual assault that have not been disclosed, either because the victims are afraid to complain to the Israeli authorities or because the authorities did not open an investigation. “Mounting testimonies indicate these incidents are not isolated. They suggest systematic abuse and violence, and a blind eye to violations. The Sde Teiman torture facility must be shut down urgently, abuse across all prisons must end, and those responsible must be prosecuted,” it added in a tweet. On Monday, Israeli public broadcaster KAN revealed that a Palestinian detainee was gang-raped by Israeli soldiers at the Sde Teiman. The detainee was taken to a hospital with severe injuries to an intimate body part, which left him unable to walk. Ten Israeli reservists were detained as a result. However, far-right members of Israel’s cabinet have called on authorities to “take your hands off our fighters” and labelled the reservists “heroes”, while some tried to storm the detention centre they were being held in in an effort to free them. In recent months, the army has released dozens of Palestinian detainees who bear signs of torture, malnutrition and exhaustion. Israeli Army Appoints Gen. Barak Hiram – who ordered the killing of Israelis on October 7th – as Commander of Gaza Division Ha’aretz reports: Brig. Gen. Barak Hiram will assume the post of commander of the Gaza Division of the Israeli army. On October 7th, Hiram ordered a tank commander to break into a home in Kibbutz Be’eri that he knew housed Hamas fighters and Israelis. even at the risk of harming civilians. The tank fired shells at the house, killing 12 Israelis and a number of Hamas members. Two Israelis survived the attack. When Hiram met with families of the Israeli victims, some of them called on him to resign, or to command another operational division. But, Hiram “insisted that precisely because he was the officer in charge in Be’eri, he is in the best position” to take over in Gaza. When Hiram was asked what actions should be taken as part of accepting responsibility, he said: “I will correct the mistakes that were made when I take responsibility for the division. I don’t ask for thanks for this.” NOTE: In January, Hiram ordered Israeli forces to blow up Al-Isra University, which they had used as a military headquarters prior to its demolition. Hiram was officially reprimanded for carrying out the demolition without prior approval from his superiors. Endless occupation: How Israel has always rejected a Palestinian state The New Arab reports: In July, Israel’s parliament, known as the Knesset, overwhelmingly passed a resolution rejecting the establishment of a Palestinian state. Passing with a 68-9 majority, the resolution “firmly opposes the establishment of a Palestinian state west of Jordan”. “If you look at all of the political parties’ platforms, they don’t believe in Palestinian freedom at all,” Palestinian human rights lawyer Diana Buttu told The New Arab. “When they talk about a state – and very few of them do – they’re not talking about ending the occupation. They’re talking about something less than a state, just something that they can say they’ve gotten rid of Palestinians. But they’re never talking about ending control over Palestinian lives.” Buttu noted the timing of the resolution’s vote is noteworthy, which came just a day before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled Israel’s occupation of the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, was unlawful. “Israel is sending a very clear message that they will never end the occupation, that it doesn’t matter what the ICJ says, and it doesn’t matter what the world says, they’re going to hold onto it,” Buttu said. (Read the full article here.) More than 80 patients evacuated from Gaza in biggest operation since war, WHO says WHO reports: At least 85 sick and severely injured Palestinians from Gaza, including 35 children, were evacuated to Abu Dhabi for specialized care, the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday, Reuters reports. “This extremely complex joint evacuation was supported by the (United Arab Emirates), WHO and partners. It is the largest medical evacuation since October 2023,” Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus posted on X. The evacuated patients suffered from various severe conditions including cancer, neurological issues and cardiac diseases. They were accompanied by 63 family members and caregivers, Tedros said. NOTE: The World Health Organization said last month that a minimum of 7,000 to over 11,000 Palestinian patients need immediate medical evacuations. Gaza aid delivery still being ‘drastically impeded’, say aid agencies ReliefWeb reports: Many aid organizations have supplies approved and waiting to enter the Gaza Strip, but the unloading zone at the Kerem Shalom/Karam Abu Salem border crossing on the Gaza side has been full for weeks due to high insecurity, Israeli military operations and the risk of looting given the soaring needs facing Palestinian families. Save the Children managed to get four trucks (80 pallets) of medical supplies into Gaza on a convoy after waiting at the Kerem Shalom crossing in Israel in the heat for over a month, following hostilities on the Gaza side of the border. The pallets included standard medication such as antibiotics and heart disease medications. Save the Children’s teams also have 17 pallets of temperature-controlled medicines stuck in El-Arish, Egypt, including four boxes that require continuous refrigeration. Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) system only allows flatbed trucks, not the closed trucks required to transport such supplies, resulting in repeated rejections of such temperature-controlled shipments. Other aid agencies confirmed that they are facing similar challenges. Oxfam has water tanks, desalination units, tap stands, generators and latrines approved but unable to enter through the crossing, whilst 864 tents procured by the Norwegian Refugee Council that had been at El-Arish port arrived recently at Kerem Shalom but still remain inaccessible due to insecurity and safety concerns. Israeli attack on Greek Orthodox church in Gaza ‘crime against religions,’ authorities say Andalou Agency reports: Palestinian authorities on Tuesday called an Israeli attack on the Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius Church in Gaza City a “crime against religions.” Damage was reported after two missiles hit the building, where dozens of displaced Palestinian Christians have taken refuge. A Palestinian official said that more than 600 mosques and all three churches in Gaza have been destroyed in Israeli attacks since Oct. 7, 2023. “These are crimes against religions and religious teachings,” he said. “Israel does not respect anything, and its army used 2,000-pound rockets and bombs (in attacking) churches and places of worship.” Photos taken by Anadolu showed an unexploded ordnance on the church’s ground. Saint Porphyrius Church is one of the oldest Christian sites in Gaza. It was built in the 5th century and named after Saint Porphyrius, whose tomb is inside the church. A view of the damaged historical Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius Church, where civilians took shelter, after Israeli airstrike in Gaza City, Gaza on October 20, 2023. [Ali Jadallah – Anadolu Agency] A view of the damaged historical Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius Church, where civilians took shelter, after Israeli airstrike in Gaza City, Gaza on October 20, 2023. [Ali Jadallah – Anadolu Agency] (photo) West Bank: Palestinian in Nablus succumbs to critical injury from Israeli army gunfire WAFA reports: A Palestinian Tuesday evening succumbed to his critical injury from Israeli army gunfire in the occupied West Bank city of Nablus, according to security and medical sources. They said that Ramadan Hussein Mohammad Sadeq died of his critical injury after being shot with live rounds fired by Israeli occupation forces in the head, chest and back. Sadeq, 45, was shot by the gun-toting soldiers while in front of his house in the Nablus city neighborhood of Khallet al-Amoud. During the raid, the soldiers fired barrages of live ammunition and tear gas canisters towards civilians’ houses. Sadeq was rushed to a hospital in a critical condition. Attempts to resuscitate him were unsuccessful and he died afterwards. West Bank: Palestinian north of Hebron succumbs to injury from Israeli army gunfire WAFA reports: A Palestinian minor Tuesday evening succumbed to his injury from Israeli army gunfire near the Beit Einun village junction, north of the occupied West Bank city of Hebron, according to security sources. Mohammad Murad Mohammad Jaradat, 14, a resident of Sair, died of his injury he sustained after being hit by live rounds fired at close range on him by Israeli forces. The soldiers left Jaradat bleeding on the ground and prevented Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) medics from reaching him. 2 Palestinians killed in West Bank Mohammad Sadeq (L) and Mohammad Murad Mohammad Jaradat (photo) UN concerned over Palestinian families in East Jerusalem facing eviction Al Jazeera reports: The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights says it’s concerned that more than 80 Palestinian families face eviction from their homes in Silwan in occupied East Jerusalem due to “unlawful” and “discriminatory Israeli laws against Palestinians”. In a statement, it said 87 Palestinian families, totaling 600 to 680 individuals, are facing legal proceedings initiated by Israeli settlers to evict them from their homes in the Batn al-Hawa neighborhood. It said the “systematic settlers’ campaign” aims to “uproot Palestinians from their homes, take over their property and implant Israeli settlers in the heart of Palestinian neighborhoods in East Jerusalem”. “International humanitarian law prohibits Israel from imposing its own laws in occupied territory, which includes the application of Israeli laws to evict Palestinians from their homes,” the UN said. Aides in Congress Create Dissent Channel to Protest Support for Israel New York Times reports: Since Israel began its military offensive in Gaza last fall, hundreds of congressional aides have spoken out in protest of the United States’ support for the war — many of them breaking with their bosses to do so. Acting anonymously to protect their coveted positions on Capitol Hill, they have written letters, circulated petitions, posted on social media and, in some cases, walked off the job to push for a cease-fire and an end to the shipments of U.S.-made weapons to Israel. They argue that members of Congress have refused to heed Americans’ objections — expressed through hundreds of thousands of calls, letters, emails and in-person visits to their offices — to the war and Israel’s conduct in it. On Sunday night, a group of at least a dozen junior staff members escalated their objections by launching a website where they and their like-minded colleagues can publish anonymous memos criticizing U.S. policy on Israel and the war in Gaza — including their own bosses’ positions — without risking retaliation. Organizers say the forum, known as the Congressional Dissent Channel, is modeled after the State Department’s dissent channel for Foreign Service officers. That channel was created during the Vietnam War — another conflict that opened bitter political divisions in the United States and galvanized a protest movement, particularly among young Americans. But while that channel is a classified internal government system in which named authors offer dissenting views that are distributed carefully and confidentially, the new website is the opposite: a public platform where anonymous congressional aides can air their criticisms and spotlight private discord within their offices. It is being created by the same group of staff aides that organized a pro-Palestinian staff walkout on Capitol Hill last week when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel spoke to a joint meeting of Congress, and which planned an anonymous flower vigil outside the Capitol in November to demand a cease-fire. DropSite News: Does Israel Really Believe It Can Win a War Against Hezbollah? Al Jazeera: The ICJ opinion on Israel’s occupation leaves the US facing a hard choice Mondoweiss: Netanyahu’s willing executioners: how ordinary Israelis became mass murderers STATISTICS OCTOBER 7 – JULY 30: Palestinian death toll from October 7 – July 30: at least 39,991* (39,400 in Gaza* – 11,445 women (30%), 16,251 children as of July 22. [The Ministry’s figures have been contested by the Israeli authorities, although they have been accepted as accurate by Israeli intelligence services, the UN, and WHO. These data are supported by independent analyses, comparing changes in the number of deaths of UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) staff with those reported by the Ministry, which found claims of data fabrication implausible.] This is expected to be a significant undercount since thousands of those killed have yet to be identified – and at least 591 in the West Bank (~140 children). This does not include an estimated 10,000 more still buried under rubble (4,900 women and children). Euro-Med Monitor reports 46,848 Palestinian deaths. Lancet: “Applying a conservative estimate of four indirect deaths per one direct death9 to the 37,396 deaths reported, it is not implausible to estimate that up to 186 000 or even more deaths could be attributable to the current conflict in Gaza. Ralph Nader earlier estimated 200,000 Palestinians may have been killed in Gaza. At least 45 Palestinians have died in Israeli prisons (27 from Gaza, 18 from West Bank). At least 41 Palestinians have died due to malnutrition**. About 1.7 million, or 75% of Gaza’s population are currently displaced. 2.15 million (out of total population of 2.3 million) are projected to face Crisis or worse levels of food insecurity. Palestinian injuries from October 7 – July 30: at least 96,416 (including at least 90,996 in Gaza and 5,420 in the West Bank, including 830 children). [It remains unknown how man Americans are among the casualties in Gaza.] Reported Israeli death toll from October 7 – July 30: ~1,486 (~1,139 on October 7, 2023, of which ~32 were Americans, and ~36 were children); 331 military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza; 16 in the West Bank) and~8,730 injured. Times of Israel reports: The IDF listed 41 soldiers killed due to friendly fire in Gaza and other military-related accidents – nearly 16%. NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries in Israel on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers. *Previously, IAK did not include 471 Gazans killed in the Al Ahli hospital blast since the source of the projectile was being disputed. However, given that much evidence points to Israel as the culprit, Israel had previously bombed the hospital and has attacked many others, Israel is prohibiting outside experts from investigating the scene, and since the UN and other agencies are including the deaths from the attack in their cumulative totals, if Americans knew is now also doing so.** Euro-Med Monitor reports that Gaza’s elderly are dying at an alarmingly high rate. The majority die at home and are buried either close to their residences or in makeshift graves dispersed across the Strip. There are currently more than 140 such cemeteries. Additionally, according to Euromed, thousands have died from starvation, malnourishment, and inadequate medical care; these are considered indirect victims as they were not registered in hospitals. † For most of the conflict, women and children accounted for about 70% of deaths in Gaza, with children making up a little over 40% of those killed, according to official statistics. Find previous daily casualty figures and daily news updates here. Hover over each bar for exact numbers. Source: IsraelPalestineTimeline.org Human rights reports on Israel-Palestine (regularly updated) Israel has turbocharged West Bank housing demolitions under the cover of war Western media ignores Israeli confirmation of Hannibal Directive on 7 Oct US Should Arrest Benjamin Netanyahu When He’s in Washington Airwars investigation: Israeli airstrikes uniquely lethal (video) Hesen Jabr paid the price of conscience Gaza genocide denial Why the news media’s job is to groom us ‘Disappeared, buried, detained’: The horrors of Gaza’s missing children Hundreds of social media influencers attend Israel strategy summit in NYC Supporting Israel Is Big Business in the U.S. for Israel partisans Toys, spices, sewing machines: the items Israel banned from entering Gaza Synopsis of ICJ’s decision on Israeli occupation, reactions, and take-aways Russia attacks hospitals in Ukraine; Israel does the same in Gaza. The US response couldn’t be more different. ‘I have the prison inside me’: The emaciated Palestinian bodybuilder broken by Israel Israel has manufactured an industrial-scale version of Jim Crow rape hoaxes If Americans Knew Mobile Billboard Truck at Republican Convention Col. Douglas MacGregor: US is under the control of Israel, likens Gaza to Warsaw Ghetto Israel’s leading paper says its own army deliberately killed Israelis on October 7 Gaza has turned into Biden’s most perplexing moral and foreign policy failure ‘Suffering horrifically’: 10 months of Israel’s ‘war on children’ in Gaza Pro-Israel ADL ‘spied on’ African American activist over opposition to US-Israel police exchange programme ‘I’m bored, so I shoot’: The Israeli army’s approval of free-for-all violence in Gaza Lancet: Counting the dead in Gaza – difficult but essential ‘Revealer of Inconvenient Truths’ – Julian Assange’s Impact on Palestine Fact or Fiction: Is Israel Unfairly Singled Out for Global Condemnation? How an Israeli colonel invented the burned babies lie to justify genocide Enter your email address below to receive our latest articles right in your inbox. https://israelpalestinenews.org/besides-genocide-israel-carries-out-major-political-assassinations-day-297/ https://donshafi911iamthefaceoftruth.blogspot.com/2024/07/besides-genocide-israel-carries-out.html
    ISRAELPALESTINENEWS.ORG
    Besides genocide, Israel carries out major political assassinations – Day 297
    Israeli assassinations; sexual violence in Israeli prisons widespread; St Porphyrius Church attack; Congressional aides go public for Gaza
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  • Biden’s Legacy Should Be Forever Haunted by the Names of Gaza’s Dead Children
    Biden’s support for the terror bombing of Gaza continues his long history as a steadfast supporter of Israel’s greatest crimes.

    Jeremy Scahill November 14 2023, 12:24 p.m.
    KHAN YUNIS, GAZA - NOVEMBER 13: Palestinians including children are brought to Nasser Hospital for treatment aftermath of Israeli attack in Khan Yunis, Gaza on November 13, 2023. (Photo by Mustafa Hassona/Anadolu via Getty Images)
    As Israel intensified its attacks on Gaza last week, including strikes against multiple hospitals, and presided over a forced exodus of hundreds of thousands of civilians from their homes, President Joe Biden was asked about the chances of a Gaza ceasefire. “None,” Biden shot back. “No possibility.”

    With a death toll that has now surpassed 11,000 Palestinians, including nearly 5,000 children, the extent of Biden’s public divergence from his “great, great friend” Benjamin Netanyahu’s scorched-earth war of annihilation amounts to meekly worded suggestions of “humanitarian pauses.”

    On Friday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken remarked, “far too many Palestinians have been killed; far too many have suffered these past weeks, and we want to do everything possible to prevent harm to them and to maximize the assistance that gets to them.” These disingenuous platitudes melt into a puddle of blood when juxtaposed with the administration’s actions.

    The Biden administration has funneled weapons, intelligence support, and unwavering political backing for Israel’s public campaign to erase from the earth Gaza’s existence as a Palestinian territory. As Israeli settlers wage campaigns of terror against the Palestinians in the West Bank, the U.S. remained entrenched in its global isolation, voting last week against a U.N. resolution demanding an end to the illegal settlements. The resolution condemned illegal Israeli settlements, calling them “illegal and an obstacle to peace.” The resolution, which passed 145-7, called for “the immediate and complete cessation of all Israeli settlement activities in all of the Occupied Palestinian Territory.” Only five countries joined the U.S. and Israel in voting “no”: Canada, Hungary, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, and Nauru.

    As the capitals of major world cities have seen massive protests on a scale not registered since the 2003 Iraq invasion, Netanyahu has been on a U.S. media blitz, appearing on Sunday talk shows to cast the stakes of his war “to destroy Hamas” as akin to World War II. “Without it none of us have a future. And it’s not only our war, it’s your war too. It’s the battle of civilization against barbarism,” he said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “And if we don’t win here, this scourge will pass. The Middle East will pass to other places. The Middle East will fall. Europe is next. You will be next.”

    Netanyahu has brazenly exploited the grief of Israeli citizens whose lives were torn apart on October 7 when Hamas launched a series of coordinated attacks inside Israel. Those raids resulted in the deaths of 846 civilians, 278 Israeli soldiers, and 44 police officers, according to the latest figures provided by Israel. Some family members of the victims, as well as relatives of the 240 hostages taken by Hamas and other militant groups — among them infants and the elderly — have emerged as some of the most vocal critics of Netanyahu’s government. A small number have spoken out against his attacks on Gaza, though their voices are largely drowned out by pro-war voices in Western media coverage.

    “I beg you, I beg also my government, and the pilots and soldiers, who may be called to go into Gaza. Don’t agree. Protect the area around the Gaza Strip, but don’t agree to go in and kill innocent people,” said Noy Katsman, whose older brother Hayim was killed on October 7 at the kibbutz he had lived on for a decade. Maoz Inon’s parents were also killed that day. “Today, Israel is repeating an old mistake it made many times in the last century. We must stop it,” Inon wrote. “Revenge is not going to bring my parents back to life. It is not going to bring back other Israelis and Palestinians killed either. It is going to do the opposite. It is going to cause more casualties. It is going to bring more death.”

    Over the past month, Biden has cast doubt on the extent of Palestinian civilian deaths, defended Netanyahu’s violent extremist agendas, and made clear that the U.S. position amounts to this: collectively punishing Palestinians for the actions of Hamas falls under the doctrine of “self-defense.” Biden has stood by Israel as government officials have openly described an agenda of ethnically cleansing Palestinians, proclaiming a “Gaza Nakba,” threatening to do to Beirut what Israel has done to Gaza, labeling hospitals and ambulances “legitimate military targets,” and accusing U.N. workers of being Hamas and journalists of being “accomplices in crimes against humanity.” More than 100 U.N. workers and at least 40 journalists and media workers have been killed in Gaza since October 7. Approximately one in 200 Palestinians have died in Gaza since the start of Israel’s attacks.

    National security adviser Jake Sullivan, when asked Sunday on CNN if Israel is abiding by the rules of war, replied, “I’m not going to sit here and play judge or jury on that question. What I’m going to do is state the principle of the United States on this issue, which is straight forward: Israel has a right, indeed a responsibility, to defend itself against a terrorist group.” The U.S. is simultaneously increasing the flow of weapons to Israel — and Biden proposed $14.5 billion in additional military assistance — while its senior national security official cannot state whether Israel is conducting operations in contravention of international law.

    Keenly aware of the growing opposition to Israel’s war at home and abroad, and even within his own administration, Biden and his advisers have sought to push a narrative that they are seeking to moderate Israel’s tactics. They make sure the U.S. press know that Biden had urged against a full-scale ground invasion, proposed limited pauses to the bombing, and expressed concerns about the humanitarian crisis for Palestinian civilians. On Monday, after days of relentless Israeli attacks on Gazan hospitals and desperate pleas from international doctors and health and aid organizations, Biden finally addressed the issue, but only after being directly asked. “Hospitals must be protected,” he said in response to a question from the press. “My hope and expectation is that there will be less intrusive action relative to hospitals.”

    The White House’s mounting effort to spin itself as being concerned about civilian deaths and doing all it can to urge Israel to avoid massacring civilians on an industrial scale is an effort to obfuscate the U.S. role as Israel’s central ally enabling this slaughter. It is a grotesque parlor game that only works if facts and history don’t matter. And in Biden’s case, that history is extensive.

    NEW YORK, UNITED STATES - 2023/11/09: Students, teachers, and pro-Palestinian allies march through Midtown Manhattan during a Student Walkout protest calling for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Since October 7, the Israeli army's bombardment of the Palestinian enclave, in retaliation for the Hamas attack on Israel that killed over 1,400 people, has seen thousands of buildings razed to the ground, more than 10,000 people killed and 1.4 million displaced whilst Gaza remains besieged. (Photo by Michael Nigro/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images)
    Students, teachers, and Palestine solidarity allies call for a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel during a student walkout in Manhattan on Nov. 9, 2023.
    Photo: Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images
    Support for Israel’s Wars

    For 50 years, Biden has been consistent in his support for Israel’s wars against the Palestinians. Time and again he has backed and facilitated campaigns of terror waged by a nuclear power against a people who have no state, no army, no air force, no navy, and an almost nonexistent civilian infrastructure. As Gaza burns in a smoldering pyre of death and destruction, 80-year-old Biden may be overseeing the final act in his devotion to Israel’s most extreme agenda. His legacy should be forever haunted by the names of the dead children of Gaza, thousands of whom have died in a matter of weeks under the hellfire of U.S.-manufactured weapons and support.

    Biden has been in public office longer than almost any U.S. politician in history. His career in the U.S. Senate began on the eve of the 1973 Arab–Israeli war when he traveled to meet Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir. “I sat across the desk for an hour as she flipped those maps up and down, chain smoking, telling me about the [1967] Six Day War,” Biden said. He called it “one of the most consequential meetings I’ve ever had in my life.” But, as has been in the case with more than a few of Biden’s vignettes about his central role in historical events, in his numerous and varied retelling of that story, he seems to have exaggerated how important that meeting was to Meir and the Israelis.


    Related

    Joe Biden: Career Defender of Israel’s Crimes and Impunity

    Over the ensuing decades and up to the current horrors being inflicted on the people of Gaza, Biden has operated as one of the staunchest promoters of Israel’s colonialist agenda, often defending Israel’s disproportionate use of force, collective punishment, and at times outright massacres. “Were there not an Israel, the United States would have to invent an Israel to protect her interests in the region,” Biden said on the Senate floor in 1986. He repeated that same line earlier this year during a July visit by Israeli President Isaac Herzog to Washington. During Biden’s trip to Israel last month, as Israel intensified its attacks on Gaza and the civilian death toll skyrocketed, he told Netanyahu and his war cabinet, “I don’t believe you have to be a Jew to be a Zionist, and I am a Zionist.”

    Building support for Israel’s military might and funneling money and political support to Israel has been a central component of Biden’s career-long foreign policy agenda. He is fond of calling himself “Israel’s best Catholic friend.” In 2016, during a visit to Israel, Netanyahu heaped praise on Biden, then vice president. “The people of Israel consider the Biden family part of our family,” he said. “I want to thank you personally for your, for our personal friendship of over 30 years. We’ve known each other a long time. We’ve gone through many trials and tribulations. And we have an enduring bond that represents the enduring bond between our people.”

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    There is one story from these decades of Biden’s dedication to Israel that seems eerily prescient given the bloodbath playing out in Gaza right now. It took place early in the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982. In public, Biden was neither a cheerleader for the invasion nor an opponent. But in a private meeting of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee with Prime Minister Menachem Begin in June 1982, Biden’s support for the brutality of the invasion appeared to outstrip even that of the Israeli government.

    As the Israeli prime minister was grilled in the Senate over Israel’s disproportionate use of force, including the targeting of civilians with cluster bomb munitions, Biden, in Begin’s words, “rose and delivered a very impassioned speech” defending the invasion. Upon his return to Israel, Begin told Israeli reporters he was shocked when Biden “said he would go even further than Israel, adding that he’d forcefully fend off anyone who sought to invade his country, even if that meant killing women or children.” Begin said, “I disassociated myself from these remarks,” adding, “I said to him: No, sir; attention must be paid. According to our values, it is forbidden to hurt women and children, even in war. Sometimes there are casualties among the civilian population as well. But it is forbidden to aspire to this. This is a yardstick of human civilization, not to hurt civilians.”

    Coming from Begin, the comments were striking, because he had been notorious as a leader of the Irgun, a militant group that carried out some of the worst acts of ethnic cleansing accompanying the creation of the state of Israel, including the 1948 Deir Yassin massacre. The details of his exchange with Biden about Lebanon did not receive attention in the U.S. press. Instead, the New York Times focused on what it termed the “bitterest exchange” between Biden and Begin over the issue of Israeli settlements, which Biden opposed because, he said, it was hurting Israel’s reputation in the U.S. “He hinted — more than hinted — that if we continue with this policy, it is possible that he will propose cutting our financial aid,” Begin alleged.

    Over the years, Biden has referenced this confrontation when explaining his opposition to the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank as a disagreement among very good friends. Biden has long argued that these expansions undermine prospects for a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, though his rhetoric has often been contradicted by his actions, as was the case with his opposition to last week’s U.N. vote labeling the settlements illegal.

    US Vice President Joe Biden speaks at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee?s (AIPAC) annual policy conference at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, DC, May 5, 2009. AFP PHOTO / Saul LOEB (Photo credit should read SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)
    U.S. Vice President Joe Biden speaks at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s annual policy conference in Washington, D.C., on May 5, 2009.
    Photo: Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images
    “Innocents Got Killed”

    In the 1990s, as Biden solidified his reputation as a top foreign policy senator, he often helped shepherd legislation and funding packages to Israel that human rights groups and international aid organizations said would hinder efforts at brokering lasting peace and further entrench the state of apartheid imposed on millions of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

    Biden was an early proponent of moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, a move that finally took place in 2018 under the Trump administration. In 1995, Biden helped pass a Senate resolution demanding that the embassy be moved by May of that year. Despite objections that it would harm ongoing Israeli–Palestinian peace talks by deciding a key issue by fiat, Biden said the move would send a positive signal to the region. “To do less would play into the hands of those who would do their hardest to deny Israel the full attributes of statehood,” Biden said.

    In 2001, following rare public criticism from the Bush administration directed at Israel’s policy of assassinating suspected Palestinian militants, Biden defended Israel’s right to carry out such killings and even rebuked President George W. Bush for criticizing them. “My view has always been that disagreements between Israel and the United States, those differences should be aired privately, not publicly,” Biden said. He also defended the legality of targeted killings, which at the time were considered highly questionable by legal experts for occurring outside a declared conflict. “I don’t believe this is a policy of assassinations,” Biden said, referring to the targeting of suspected Hamas members. “There is in effect a declared war, a declaration by an organization that has said its goal is to do as much as it can to kill Israeli civilians.”

    In July 2006, Israel was bombing both Gaza and southern Lebanon, with Biden cheering it on. The Israelis, Biden said on MSNBC, “have in both cases, both in Gaza and in southern Lebanon, done the right thing.” In the face of international condemnations of Israel’s brutality in its attacks, Biden defended Israel. “I find it fascinating — people talk about, ‘Has Israel gone too far?’ No one talks about whether Israel’s justified in the first place,” he said on “Meet the Press.” Unless critics of Israel recognize that it was a victim of terrorism, he said, “I think it’s awful — I think it’s a secondary question whether Israel’s gone too far.”

    Biden said his “only criticism of the Israelis is they’re not that great at public relations.” He compared Israel’s attacks on Gaza and Lebanon to the U.S. invasion and occupation of Afghanistan after the September 11 attacks. “It’s a little bit like the same thing we had when we went into Afghanistan,” Biden said at a press conference in July 2006. “We went into Afghanistan, remember, we took out a wedding party by accident? Remember, we took out — with these very sophisticated missiles we had, we accidentally killed some citizens? Was ever a war more justified than us going into Afghanistan? I can’t think of any war since World War II more justified. Yet innocents got killed in us trying to protect America’s interests.” By August 2006, more than 1,000 people were killed in Israel’s war against Lebanon, and UNICEF estimated that 30 percent of the casualties were children.

    During his time as vice president, Biden often played the role of placating his friend Netanyahu who famously loathed President Barack Obama. During those eight years, Obama largely maintained long-standing U.S. posture of showering Israel with weapons and other aid despite repeated political spats with Netanyahu, most prominently over Iran and Israeli settlements. During numerous episodes when Israel unleashed gratuitous violence, drawing international condemnation, Biden served as Israel’s most prominent American defender.

    In the early summer of 2010, a group of mostly Turkish activists attempted to deliver a flotilla of humanitarian aid to the besieged Gaza Strip. The attempt was interdicted by the Israeli military, which launched a raid on one ship that resulted in the deaths of nine people, including one American citizen. The raid triggered an international outcry and led to a diplomatic crisis between Israel and Turkey, while drawing further attention to the civilian impact of the ongoing Israeli siege of Gaza.

    Biden took the lead in defending the raid to the U.S. public. In an interview with PBS, he described the raid as “legitimate” and argued that the flotilla organizers could have disembarked elsewhere before transferring the aid to Gaza. “So what’s the big deal here? What’s the big deal of insisting it go straight to Gaza?” Biden asked about the humanitarian mission. “Well, it’s legitimate for Israel to say, ‘I don’t know what’s on that ship. These guys are dropping eight — 3,000 rockets on my people.’” No weapons were ever found on the ship, only humanitarian supplies. Amid the fury that the raid generated and the muted response from Obama, Biden’s remarks were welcomed by AIPAC spokesperson Josh Block, who said at the time, “We appreciate the many strong statements of support for Israel from members of Congress and the vice president today.”

    After the 2014 Gaza war — a seven-week Israeli ground invasion that killed more than 2,000 Palestinians (two-thirds of them civilians) and caused widespread displacement and destruction of civilian infrastructure — Biden boasted of how the Obama administration had “steadfastly stood before the world and defended Israel’s right to defend itself,” declaring, “We have an obligation to match the steel and the spine of the people of Israel with an ironclad, nonnegotiable commitment to Israel’s physical security.”

    In May 2021, a few months into Biden’s presidency, Israel intensified its ethnic-cleansing campaign against Palestinians in East Jerusalem, forcibly evicting people from their homes to hand them over to Israeli settlers. The incendiary situation was then exacerbated during a Ramadan siege by Israeli forces at one of the holiest sites in Islam, Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. In response, Hamas began launching rockets into Israel. Netanyahu retaliated by ordering a massive 11-day bombing campaign against Gaza, striking residential buildings, media outlets, hospitals, and a refugee camp.

    As the civilian death toll among Palestinians began to rise, Ned Price, the State Department spokesperson, characterized the operation as Israel exercising its right to self-defense. When he was then asked whether the principle of self-defense also applied to Palestinians, he struggled to answer before saying, “Broadly speaking, we believe in the concept of self-defense. We believe it applies to any state.” When Matt Lee of The Associated Press pointed out that Palestinians do not have a state, Price said, “I’m not in a position to debate the legalities from up here.”

    More than 250 Palestinians died during Israel’s siege, including dozens of children. More than 70,000 Palestinians were displaced. Throughout the bombing, the U.S. staunchly defended Israel’s disproportionate attacks, with Biden declaring on May 16, “there has not been a significant overreaction” from Israel before pivoting to condemn Hamas’s firing of rockets into civilian areas of Israel.

    GAZA CITY, GAZA - NOVEMBER 8: Palestinians who left their houses and live at the Nassr hospital, are trying to feed their children during food shortages as the Israeli attacks continue in Gaza City, Gaza on November 8, 2023. (Photo by Abed Zagout/Anadolu via Getty Images)
    Displaced Palestinians at Nassr hospital try to feed their children during food shortages on Nov. 8, 2023.
    Photo: Abed Zagout/Anadolu via Getty Images
    Evidence of Genocidal Intent

    Following Hamas’s horrifying attacks on October 7, Biden and his administration have defended Israel’s mass bombardment of Gaza, and U.S. weapons shipments have been accelerated. Biden called his proposal for additional military support an “unprecedented commitment to Israel’s security that will sharpen Israel’s qualitative military edge,” saying, “We’re going to make sure other hostile actors in the region know that Israel is stronger than ever.”

    This crisis has undoubtedly solidified Biden’s legacy as one of the premiere American defenders of Israel’s crimes, including disproportionate attacks against an overwhelmingly defenseless civilian population, in the history of U.S. politics.

    In an alternate reality — one where the rule of law is applied equally to all states — Israeli leaders would likely face war crimes charges for the razing of Gaza. Leading genocide scholars and international law experts have cited the statements of Israeli officials about the aims of their operations in Gaza as potential evidence of “genocidal intent.” A coalition of international lawyers representing Palestinian rights groups has already petitioned the International Criminal Court to open a criminal inquiry and issue arrest warrants for Netanyahu and other officials.

    Such attempts at accountability should not focus solely on Israeli leaders, according to some U.S. constitutional law organizations. The U.S. is Israel’s premiere bankroller and arms dealer, not to mention its political defender. There are several U.S. laws and treaties that prohibit support for, and failure to prevent, genocidal activities. Among these is the Genocide Convention Implementation Act, signed into law in 1988. Its sponsor? A senator named Joe Biden.


    Related

    Palestinians Sue Biden for Failing to Prevent Genocide in Gaza

    On Monday, the Center for Constitutional Rights filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of Palestinians in Gaza seeking to block the Biden administration from providing further military aid to Israel. The suit names Biden, Blinken, and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. “They have continued to provide both military and political support for Israel’s unfolding genocidal campaign while imposing no red lines,” said Katherine Gallagher, one of the lawyers who filed the case. “The United States has a clear and binding obligation to prevent, not further, genocide. They have failed in meeting their legal and moral duty to use their considerable power to end this horror. They must do so.”

    It is unfathomable, given the current world order, that any meaningful legal accountability will be served on U.S. or Israeli leaders. But on a moral level, it is important to remember these legal efforts to confront the slaughter and the complicity of Biden and other Western leaders. The U.S.-enabled horrors of the past five weeks should remain a bloody, permanent stain on the fabric of Biden’s political career and legacy. Among the U.S. political elite, it will simply be noted as Biden doing his job.


    https://theintercept.com/2023/11/14/gaza-israel-genocide-biden-legacy/
    Biden’s Legacy Should Be Forever Haunted by the Names of Gaza’s Dead Children Biden’s support for the terror bombing of Gaza continues his long history as a steadfast supporter of Israel’s greatest crimes. Jeremy Scahill November 14 2023, 12:24 p.m. KHAN YUNIS, GAZA - NOVEMBER 13: Palestinians including children are brought to Nasser Hospital for treatment aftermath of Israeli attack in Khan Yunis, Gaza on November 13, 2023. (Photo by Mustafa Hassona/Anadolu via Getty Images) As Israel intensified its attacks on Gaza last week, including strikes against multiple hospitals, and presided over a forced exodus of hundreds of thousands of civilians from their homes, President Joe Biden was asked about the chances of a Gaza ceasefire. “None,” Biden shot back. “No possibility.” With a death toll that has now surpassed 11,000 Palestinians, including nearly 5,000 children, the extent of Biden’s public divergence from his “great, great friend” Benjamin Netanyahu’s scorched-earth war of annihilation amounts to meekly worded suggestions of “humanitarian pauses.” On Friday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken remarked, “far too many Palestinians have been killed; far too many have suffered these past weeks, and we want to do everything possible to prevent harm to them and to maximize the assistance that gets to them.” These disingenuous platitudes melt into a puddle of blood when juxtaposed with the administration’s actions. The Biden administration has funneled weapons, intelligence support, and unwavering political backing for Israel’s public campaign to erase from the earth Gaza’s existence as a Palestinian territory. As Israeli settlers wage campaigns of terror against the Palestinians in the West Bank, the U.S. remained entrenched in its global isolation, voting last week against a U.N. resolution demanding an end to the illegal settlements. The resolution condemned illegal Israeli settlements, calling them “illegal and an obstacle to peace.” The resolution, which passed 145-7, called for “the immediate and complete cessation of all Israeli settlement activities in all of the Occupied Palestinian Territory.” Only five countries joined the U.S. and Israel in voting “no”: Canada, Hungary, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, and Nauru. As the capitals of major world cities have seen massive protests on a scale not registered since the 2003 Iraq invasion, Netanyahu has been on a U.S. media blitz, appearing on Sunday talk shows to cast the stakes of his war “to destroy Hamas” as akin to World War II. “Without it none of us have a future. And it’s not only our war, it’s your war too. It’s the battle of civilization against barbarism,” he said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “And if we don’t win here, this scourge will pass. The Middle East will pass to other places. The Middle East will fall. Europe is next. You will be next.” Netanyahu has brazenly exploited the grief of Israeli citizens whose lives were torn apart on October 7 when Hamas launched a series of coordinated attacks inside Israel. Those raids resulted in the deaths of 846 civilians, 278 Israeli soldiers, and 44 police officers, according to the latest figures provided by Israel. Some family members of the victims, as well as relatives of the 240 hostages taken by Hamas and other militant groups — among them infants and the elderly — have emerged as some of the most vocal critics of Netanyahu’s government. A small number have spoken out against his attacks on Gaza, though their voices are largely drowned out by pro-war voices in Western media coverage. “I beg you, I beg also my government, and the pilots and soldiers, who may be called to go into Gaza. Don’t agree. Protect the area around the Gaza Strip, but don’t agree to go in and kill innocent people,” said Noy Katsman, whose older brother Hayim was killed on October 7 at the kibbutz he had lived on for a decade. Maoz Inon’s parents were also killed that day. “Today, Israel is repeating an old mistake it made many times in the last century. We must stop it,” Inon wrote. “Revenge is not going to bring my parents back to life. It is not going to bring back other Israelis and Palestinians killed either. It is going to do the opposite. It is going to cause more casualties. It is going to bring more death.” Over the past month, Biden has cast doubt on the extent of Palestinian civilian deaths, defended Netanyahu’s violent extremist agendas, and made clear that the U.S. position amounts to this: collectively punishing Palestinians for the actions of Hamas falls under the doctrine of “self-defense.” Biden has stood by Israel as government officials have openly described an agenda of ethnically cleansing Palestinians, proclaiming a “Gaza Nakba,” threatening to do to Beirut what Israel has done to Gaza, labeling hospitals and ambulances “legitimate military targets,” and accusing U.N. workers of being Hamas and journalists of being “accomplices in crimes against humanity.” More than 100 U.N. workers and at least 40 journalists and media workers have been killed in Gaza since October 7. Approximately one in 200 Palestinians have died in Gaza since the start of Israel’s attacks. National security adviser Jake Sullivan, when asked Sunday on CNN if Israel is abiding by the rules of war, replied, “I’m not going to sit here and play judge or jury on that question. What I’m going to do is state the principle of the United States on this issue, which is straight forward: Israel has a right, indeed a responsibility, to defend itself against a terrorist group.” The U.S. is simultaneously increasing the flow of weapons to Israel — and Biden proposed $14.5 billion in additional military assistance — while its senior national security official cannot state whether Israel is conducting operations in contravention of international law. Keenly aware of the growing opposition to Israel’s war at home and abroad, and even within his own administration, Biden and his advisers have sought to push a narrative that they are seeking to moderate Israel’s tactics. They make sure the U.S. press know that Biden had urged against a full-scale ground invasion, proposed limited pauses to the bombing, and expressed concerns about the humanitarian crisis for Palestinian civilians. On Monday, after days of relentless Israeli attacks on Gazan hospitals and desperate pleas from international doctors and health and aid organizations, Biden finally addressed the issue, but only after being directly asked. “Hospitals must be protected,” he said in response to a question from the press. “My hope and expectation is that there will be less intrusive action relative to hospitals.” The White House’s mounting effort to spin itself as being concerned about civilian deaths and doing all it can to urge Israel to avoid massacring civilians on an industrial scale is an effort to obfuscate the U.S. role as Israel’s central ally enabling this slaughter. It is a grotesque parlor game that only works if facts and history don’t matter. And in Biden’s case, that history is extensive. NEW YORK, UNITED STATES - 2023/11/09: Students, teachers, and pro-Palestinian allies march through Midtown Manhattan during a Student Walkout protest calling for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Since October 7, the Israeli army's bombardment of the Palestinian enclave, in retaliation for the Hamas attack on Israel that killed over 1,400 people, has seen thousands of buildings razed to the ground, more than 10,000 people killed and 1.4 million displaced whilst Gaza remains besieged. (Photo by Michael Nigro/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images) Students, teachers, and Palestine solidarity allies call for a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel during a student walkout in Manhattan on Nov. 9, 2023. Photo: Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images Support for Israel’s Wars For 50 years, Biden has been consistent in his support for Israel’s wars against the Palestinians. Time and again he has backed and facilitated campaigns of terror waged by a nuclear power against a people who have no state, no army, no air force, no navy, and an almost nonexistent civilian infrastructure. As Gaza burns in a smoldering pyre of death and destruction, 80-year-old Biden may be overseeing the final act in his devotion to Israel’s most extreme agenda. His legacy should be forever haunted by the names of the dead children of Gaza, thousands of whom have died in a matter of weeks under the hellfire of U.S.-manufactured weapons and support. Biden has been in public office longer than almost any U.S. politician in history. His career in the U.S. Senate began on the eve of the 1973 Arab–Israeli war when he traveled to meet Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir. “I sat across the desk for an hour as she flipped those maps up and down, chain smoking, telling me about the [1967] Six Day War,” Biden said. He called it “one of the most consequential meetings I’ve ever had in my life.” But, as has been in the case with more than a few of Biden’s vignettes about his central role in historical events, in his numerous and varied retelling of that story, he seems to have exaggerated how important that meeting was to Meir and the Israelis. Related Joe Biden: Career Defender of Israel’s Crimes and Impunity Over the ensuing decades and up to the current horrors being inflicted on the people of Gaza, Biden has operated as one of the staunchest promoters of Israel’s colonialist agenda, often defending Israel’s disproportionate use of force, collective punishment, and at times outright massacres. “Were there not an Israel, the United States would have to invent an Israel to protect her interests in the region,” Biden said on the Senate floor in 1986. He repeated that same line earlier this year during a July visit by Israeli President Isaac Herzog to Washington. During Biden’s trip to Israel last month, as Israel intensified its attacks on Gaza and the civilian death toll skyrocketed, he told Netanyahu and his war cabinet, “I don’t believe you have to be a Jew to be a Zionist, and I am a Zionist.” Building support for Israel’s military might and funneling money and political support to Israel has been a central component of Biden’s career-long foreign policy agenda. He is fond of calling himself “Israel’s best Catholic friend.” In 2016, during a visit to Israel, Netanyahu heaped praise on Biden, then vice president. “The people of Israel consider the Biden family part of our family,” he said. “I want to thank you personally for your, for our personal friendship of over 30 years. We’ve known each other a long time. We’ve gone through many trials and tribulations. And we have an enduring bond that represents the enduring bond between our people.” Most Read There is one story from these decades of Biden’s dedication to Israel that seems eerily prescient given the bloodbath playing out in Gaza right now. It took place early in the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982. In public, Biden was neither a cheerleader for the invasion nor an opponent. But in a private meeting of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee with Prime Minister Menachem Begin in June 1982, Biden’s support for the brutality of the invasion appeared to outstrip even that of the Israeli government. As the Israeli prime minister was grilled in the Senate over Israel’s disproportionate use of force, including the targeting of civilians with cluster bomb munitions, Biden, in Begin’s words, “rose and delivered a very impassioned speech” defending the invasion. Upon his return to Israel, Begin told Israeli reporters he was shocked when Biden “said he would go even further than Israel, adding that he’d forcefully fend off anyone who sought to invade his country, even if that meant killing women or children.” Begin said, “I disassociated myself from these remarks,” adding, “I said to him: No, sir; attention must be paid. According to our values, it is forbidden to hurt women and children, even in war. Sometimes there are casualties among the civilian population as well. But it is forbidden to aspire to this. This is a yardstick of human civilization, not to hurt civilians.” Coming from Begin, the comments were striking, because he had been notorious as a leader of the Irgun, a militant group that carried out some of the worst acts of ethnic cleansing accompanying the creation of the state of Israel, including the 1948 Deir Yassin massacre. The details of his exchange with Biden about Lebanon did not receive attention in the U.S. press. Instead, the New York Times focused on what it termed the “bitterest exchange” between Biden and Begin over the issue of Israeli settlements, which Biden opposed because, he said, it was hurting Israel’s reputation in the U.S. “He hinted — more than hinted — that if we continue with this policy, it is possible that he will propose cutting our financial aid,” Begin alleged. Over the years, Biden has referenced this confrontation when explaining his opposition to the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank as a disagreement among very good friends. Biden has long argued that these expansions undermine prospects for a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, though his rhetoric has often been contradicted by his actions, as was the case with his opposition to last week’s U.N. vote labeling the settlements illegal. US Vice President Joe Biden speaks at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee?s (AIPAC) annual policy conference at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, DC, May 5, 2009. AFP PHOTO / Saul LOEB (Photo credit should read SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images) U.S. Vice President Joe Biden speaks at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s annual policy conference in Washington, D.C., on May 5, 2009. Photo: Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images “Innocents Got Killed” In the 1990s, as Biden solidified his reputation as a top foreign policy senator, he often helped shepherd legislation and funding packages to Israel that human rights groups and international aid organizations said would hinder efforts at brokering lasting peace and further entrench the state of apartheid imposed on millions of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. Biden was an early proponent of moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, a move that finally took place in 2018 under the Trump administration. In 1995, Biden helped pass a Senate resolution demanding that the embassy be moved by May of that year. Despite objections that it would harm ongoing Israeli–Palestinian peace talks by deciding a key issue by fiat, Biden said the move would send a positive signal to the region. “To do less would play into the hands of those who would do their hardest to deny Israel the full attributes of statehood,” Biden said. In 2001, following rare public criticism from the Bush administration directed at Israel’s policy of assassinating suspected Palestinian militants, Biden defended Israel’s right to carry out such killings and even rebuked President George W. Bush for criticizing them. “My view has always been that disagreements between Israel and the United States, those differences should be aired privately, not publicly,” Biden said. He also defended the legality of targeted killings, which at the time were considered highly questionable by legal experts for occurring outside a declared conflict. “I don’t believe this is a policy of assassinations,” Biden said, referring to the targeting of suspected Hamas members. “There is in effect a declared war, a declaration by an organization that has said its goal is to do as much as it can to kill Israeli civilians.” In July 2006, Israel was bombing both Gaza and southern Lebanon, with Biden cheering it on. The Israelis, Biden said on MSNBC, “have in both cases, both in Gaza and in southern Lebanon, done the right thing.” In the face of international condemnations of Israel’s brutality in its attacks, Biden defended Israel. “I find it fascinating — people talk about, ‘Has Israel gone too far?’ No one talks about whether Israel’s justified in the first place,” he said on “Meet the Press.” Unless critics of Israel recognize that it was a victim of terrorism, he said, “I think it’s awful — I think it’s a secondary question whether Israel’s gone too far.” Biden said his “only criticism of the Israelis is they’re not that great at public relations.” He compared Israel’s attacks on Gaza and Lebanon to the U.S. invasion and occupation of Afghanistan after the September 11 attacks. “It’s a little bit like the same thing we had when we went into Afghanistan,” Biden said at a press conference in July 2006. “We went into Afghanistan, remember, we took out a wedding party by accident? Remember, we took out — with these very sophisticated missiles we had, we accidentally killed some citizens? Was ever a war more justified than us going into Afghanistan? I can’t think of any war since World War II more justified. Yet innocents got killed in us trying to protect America’s interests.” By August 2006, more than 1,000 people were killed in Israel’s war against Lebanon, and UNICEF estimated that 30 percent of the casualties were children. During his time as vice president, Biden often played the role of placating his friend Netanyahu who famously loathed President Barack Obama. During those eight years, Obama largely maintained long-standing U.S. posture of showering Israel with weapons and other aid despite repeated political spats with Netanyahu, most prominently over Iran and Israeli settlements. During numerous episodes when Israel unleashed gratuitous violence, drawing international condemnation, Biden served as Israel’s most prominent American defender. In the early summer of 2010, a group of mostly Turkish activists attempted to deliver a flotilla of humanitarian aid to the besieged Gaza Strip. The attempt was interdicted by the Israeli military, which launched a raid on one ship that resulted in the deaths of nine people, including one American citizen. The raid triggered an international outcry and led to a diplomatic crisis between Israel and Turkey, while drawing further attention to the civilian impact of the ongoing Israeli siege of Gaza. Biden took the lead in defending the raid to the U.S. public. In an interview with PBS, he described the raid as “legitimate” and argued that the flotilla organizers could have disembarked elsewhere before transferring the aid to Gaza. “So what’s the big deal here? What’s the big deal of insisting it go straight to Gaza?” Biden asked about the humanitarian mission. “Well, it’s legitimate for Israel to say, ‘I don’t know what’s on that ship. These guys are dropping eight — 3,000 rockets on my people.’” No weapons were ever found on the ship, only humanitarian supplies. Amid the fury that the raid generated and the muted response from Obama, Biden’s remarks were welcomed by AIPAC spokesperson Josh Block, who said at the time, “We appreciate the many strong statements of support for Israel from members of Congress and the vice president today.” After the 2014 Gaza war — a seven-week Israeli ground invasion that killed more than 2,000 Palestinians (two-thirds of them civilians) and caused widespread displacement and destruction of civilian infrastructure — Biden boasted of how the Obama administration had “steadfastly stood before the world and defended Israel’s right to defend itself,” declaring, “We have an obligation to match the steel and the spine of the people of Israel with an ironclad, nonnegotiable commitment to Israel’s physical security.” In May 2021, a few months into Biden’s presidency, Israel intensified its ethnic-cleansing campaign against Palestinians in East Jerusalem, forcibly evicting people from their homes to hand them over to Israeli settlers. The incendiary situation was then exacerbated during a Ramadan siege by Israeli forces at one of the holiest sites in Islam, Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. In response, Hamas began launching rockets into Israel. Netanyahu retaliated by ordering a massive 11-day bombing campaign against Gaza, striking residential buildings, media outlets, hospitals, and a refugee camp. As the civilian death toll among Palestinians began to rise, Ned Price, the State Department spokesperson, characterized the operation as Israel exercising its right to self-defense. When he was then asked whether the principle of self-defense also applied to Palestinians, he struggled to answer before saying, “Broadly speaking, we believe in the concept of self-defense. We believe it applies to any state.” When Matt Lee of The Associated Press pointed out that Palestinians do not have a state, Price said, “I’m not in a position to debate the legalities from up here.” More than 250 Palestinians died during Israel’s siege, including dozens of children. More than 70,000 Palestinians were displaced. Throughout the bombing, the U.S. staunchly defended Israel’s disproportionate attacks, with Biden declaring on May 16, “there has not been a significant overreaction” from Israel before pivoting to condemn Hamas’s firing of rockets into civilian areas of Israel. GAZA CITY, GAZA - NOVEMBER 8: Palestinians who left their houses and live at the Nassr hospital, are trying to feed their children during food shortages as the Israeli attacks continue in Gaza City, Gaza on November 8, 2023. (Photo by Abed Zagout/Anadolu via Getty Images) Displaced Palestinians at Nassr hospital try to feed their children during food shortages on Nov. 8, 2023. Photo: Abed Zagout/Anadolu via Getty Images Evidence of Genocidal Intent Following Hamas’s horrifying attacks on October 7, Biden and his administration have defended Israel’s mass bombardment of Gaza, and U.S. weapons shipments have been accelerated. Biden called his proposal for additional military support an “unprecedented commitment to Israel’s security that will sharpen Israel’s qualitative military edge,” saying, “We’re going to make sure other hostile actors in the region know that Israel is stronger than ever.” This crisis has undoubtedly solidified Biden’s legacy as one of the premiere American defenders of Israel’s crimes, including disproportionate attacks against an overwhelmingly defenseless civilian population, in the history of U.S. politics. In an alternate reality — one where the rule of law is applied equally to all states — Israeli leaders would likely face war crimes charges for the razing of Gaza. Leading genocide scholars and international law experts have cited the statements of Israeli officials about the aims of their operations in Gaza as potential evidence of “genocidal intent.” A coalition of international lawyers representing Palestinian rights groups has already petitioned the International Criminal Court to open a criminal inquiry and issue arrest warrants for Netanyahu and other officials. Such attempts at accountability should not focus solely on Israeli leaders, according to some U.S. constitutional law organizations. The U.S. is Israel’s premiere bankroller and arms dealer, not to mention its political defender. There are several U.S. laws and treaties that prohibit support for, and failure to prevent, genocidal activities. Among these is the Genocide Convention Implementation Act, signed into law in 1988. Its sponsor? A senator named Joe Biden. Related Palestinians Sue Biden for Failing to Prevent Genocide in Gaza On Monday, the Center for Constitutional Rights filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of Palestinians in Gaza seeking to block the Biden administration from providing further military aid to Israel. The suit names Biden, Blinken, and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. “They have continued to provide both military and political support for Israel’s unfolding genocidal campaign while imposing no red lines,” said Katherine Gallagher, one of the lawyers who filed the case. “The United States has a clear and binding obligation to prevent, not further, genocide. They have failed in meeting their legal and moral duty to use their considerable power to end this horror. They must do so.” It is unfathomable, given the current world order, that any meaningful legal accountability will be served on U.S. or Israeli leaders. But on a moral level, it is important to remember these legal efforts to confront the slaughter and the complicity of Biden and other Western leaders. The U.S.-enabled horrors of the past five weeks should remain a bloody, permanent stain on the fabric of Biden’s political career and legacy. Among the U.S. political elite, it will simply be noted as Biden doing his job. https://theintercept.com/2023/11/14/gaza-israel-genocide-biden-legacy/
    THEINTERCEPT.COM
    Biden’s Legacy Should Be Forever Haunted by the Names of Gaza’s Dead Children
    Biden’s support for the terror bombing of Gaza continues his long history as a steadfast supporter of Israel’s greatest crimes.
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  • ‘Operation Al-Aqsa Flood’ Day 34: Children who survive the bombs may die of starvation, disease, and dehydration
    Leila WarahNovember 9, 2023
    A Palestinian father carries his child as he marches with a crowd of Palestinians from northern Gaza to southern Gaza amidst a relentless Israeli bombing campaign, and orders by the Israeli military for Gazans to leave the northern part of the strip.
    Palestinians flee to the southern Gaza Strip on Salah al-Din Street in Bureij, Gaza Strip, on Wednesday, November 8, 2023. Photo by STR apaimages
    Casualties

    Gaza

    10,818 Killed, 4,412 including children

    26,905 injured

    West Bank

    175 Palestinains Killed

    Key Developments

    Palestinian Ministry of Health: “nowhere in Gaza is safe”.
    UNRWA: 92 agency staff have been killed since October 7, the “highest number of United Nations aid workers killed in a conflict in the history of the United Nations.”
    UNRWA: 160 people sheltering in UNRWA school facilities share a single toilet; one shower unit for every 700 people
    Palestinian lawmaker Rashida Tlaib was censured by the House of U.S. Representatives over the phrase “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free”
    70 Democrats sign onto a statement condemning the “river to the sea” phrase “as a rallying cry for the destruction of the State of Israel and genocide of the Jewish people.”
    The Israeli parliament passes “draconian” law criminalizing ‘consumption of terrorist materials’, the latest development in Israel’s censorship war against Palestinians.
    Israeli forces arrested Palestinian politicians in Israel, including the head of the High Follow-Up Committee for Arab Citizens of Israel, Mohammad Barakeh, and former Knesset member Haneen Zoabi, reports Wafa.
    Two mosques were completely destroyed in the attack on Khan Younis on Wednesday: Khalid bin al-Walid and al-Ikhlas mosques, according to the Interior Ministry in Gaza.
    The U.S. carried out a strike on a facility in eastern Syria, the second U.S. attack on the country since October 7, in “response to attacks on American personnel in Iraq and Syria” over the past weeks, killing at least nine people, according to the Pentagon.
    An American drone was shot down off the coast of Yemen by the country’s pro-Iranian Houthi rebels, U.S. officials confirmed to Reuters and AFP.
    Israeli airstrikes have hit eight hospitals in the Gaza Strip in the last three days, according to Gaza’s government media office.
    Treating patients in ‘corridors, on the floor, and outdoors’

    Israel has subjected Gaza’s population to five weeks of incessant bombing while denying over two million people trapped in the besieged enclave necessities, including food, water, medical care, and fuel.

    Hospitals, in particular, have been targeted during the ongoing aggression and hard hit by the tight siege.

    Al Jazeera reported three people were killed and dozens of others injured after Israeli airstrikes hit the vicinity of Al-Nasr Hospital in western Gaza at dawn on Thursday, adding that Israel also fired several missiles around Gaza City’s Al-Shifa Medical Complex, resulting in missile fragments falling into the hospital courtyard.

    Similarly, the vicinity of Al-Quds Hospital in the north of Gaza has been subjected to daily bombardment since Sunday, according to Nebal Farsakh, a spokesperson for the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS).

    On Wednesday, PRCS reported the Israeli bombardment near Al Quds Hospital resulted in all roads leading to the hospital being closed and medical teams being unable to leave the hospital to reach the injured.

    The organization added that the hospital was facing “an acute shortage of fuel and was expected to run out of fuel today,” so they have curtailed most operations in an attempt to ration what is left.

    “We have about 500 patients inside the hospital. We have 15 patients in the ICU. They are wounded and on respirators. We have newborns in incubators. We have 14,000 displaced people, the majority of whom are women and children,” Farsakh told Al Jazeera, adding that they have had to “stop four ambulances from working.”

    “Patients are undergoing immense and unnecessary pain as medicines and anesthetics are running out. In addition, tens of thousands of displaced people have sought shelter in the hospital’s parking lots and yards,” Farsakh said.

    The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini and the World Health Organisation (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a joint statement that doctors in Al-Shifa, where the conditions are “disastrous,” doctors are being forced to treat the sick and injured in “corridors, on the floor, and outdoors” as emergency rooms are overflowing.

    “Without fuel, hospitals and other essential facilities such as desalination plants and bakeries cannot operate, and more people will most certainly die as a result,” they said.

    Alexandra Saieh of Save the Children underscored that the children who are not killed by bombs may die of starvation, disease, and dehydration.

    “The situation is catastrophic. Civilians, especially children, continue to pay the heaviest price for the ongoing violence. If we don’t have a ceasefire, the numbers will continue to worsen,” she stated, according to Al Jazeera.

    On Wednesday, The Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) said 106 trucks from the Egyptian Red Crescent, loaded with aid and five ambulance vehicles from Kuwait, crossed through the Egypt Rafah border crossing; however, none contained much-needed fuel.

    The organization says 756 trucks have entered the besieged enclave since October 21, which is still far below what the besieged enclave needs. In contrast, before October 7, the besieged enclave would receive about 500 truck deliveries daily.

    A convoy with much-needed medical supplies was delivered to Gaza’s main hospital, al-Shifa, according to Ghebreyesus and Lazzarini.

    However, the supplies are “far from sufficient to respond to the immense needs” in Gaza, as the situation at al-Shifa Hospital is “disastrous,” and medical facilities across the besieged enclave are running out of supplies and fuel.

    “The ability of hospitals and medical facilities to operate is paramount, especially during conflicts,” the statement continued.

    Israeli military spokesperson Daniel Hagari presented video, photographs, and audio recordings that allegedly pointed to a Hamas building tunnel under hospitals.

    However, an investigation conducted by Al Jazeera found no grounds to support Israel’s claims of a Hamas tunnel under hospitals and, specifically, under the Sheikh Hamad Hospital in north Gaza.

    Similarly, Mohammed al-Emadi, the chairman of the Qatari Committee for the Reconstruction of Gaza, described Israel’s allegation as a “blatant attempt to justify the occupation’s targeting of civilian facilities, including hospitals, schools, gatherings of population and shelters of displaced people.”

    Fighting on the ground continues

    As civilians continue fighting for their lives across the Gaza Strip, the Israeli military has continued its advancement into northern Gaza.

    “I’d like to put to rest all kinds of false rumors we’re hearing from all kinds of directions, and reiterate one clear thing: There will be no ceasefire without the release of our hostages,” Netanyahu said on Wednesday.

    That same day, after 10 hours of battle, the Israeli army said they took control of a Hamas outpost in Jabalia, north of Gaza City, saying their soldiers confronted and killed Hamas figures, adding that they confiscated weapons and destroyed tunnel shafts.

    “Since the beginning of the fighting, 130 tunnel shafts have been destroyed,” the military said.

    “Soldiers of the Nahal Brigade conducted operational activity at a Hamas training post in northern Gaza. Tunnels were located under the post, and after they were exposed, the shafts in the post were destroyed.”

    Hamas, who has accused Israel of spreading lies in the past, has not commented on the statement.

    While Israelis call for Jews to resettle in Gaza, their government says they have “no intention” of reoccupying Gaza or controlling it for a long time, the Reuters news agency reported, quoting an unnamed senior Israeli official.

    During a televised address on Wednesday, Deputy Hamas chief Saleh al-Arouri clarified that the Hamas attack on October 7 was launched mainly to “ensure the freedom and independence of our people, which begins with the freedom of our political prisoners.”

    “All of our prisoners must be released from prisons,” Arouri said, reiterating Hamas’s readiness for a “comprehensive deal.”

    “Take everyone we have and give us all of the prisoners you have,” he proposed, referring to the captives taken from Israel on October 7 and Palestinian political prisoners being held in Israeli jails.

    “It’s best to take your hostages alive. Come forward and agree to an exchange deal now.”

    “This issue cannot be resolved except via a trade within each of these categories [of prisoners and captives] or in a comprehensive process that includes everyone,” Qassam Brigades spokesperson Abu Obeida said in a televised address on Al-Aqsa T.V.

    West Bank: ‘Enough is enough’

    The situation in the West Bank continues to worsen as Israeli soldiers and settlers continue their deadly attacks on Palestinians.

    In the last 24 hours alone, Israeli forces have killed at least 12 Palestinians.

    In Jenin, the north of the West Bank, the Palestinian Ministry of Health reported nine Palestinians were killed during an Israeli military raid on Thursday morning in the Palestinian city.

    Two Palestinian men were killed overnight on Wednesday by Israeli forces during a violent military incursion in Hebron and Bethlehem, according to Wafa.

    In Hebron, Anas Abu Atwan, 25, was killed after being shot in the chest in the village of Tabqa.

    In Bethlehem, Mohammad Thawabta, 51, from Beit Fajjar, died of wounds sustained during Israeli forces’ incursion into Bethlehem on Wednesday, injuring 19 people were wounded by live bullets and five by shrapnel.

    The 12th Palestinian died from critical wounds after being shot by Israeli forces Thursday morning in al-Amari refugee camp, Ramallah.

    Israel’s mass arrest campaign has also continued, detaining over 2,200 Palestinian men and women since October 7, according to the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club.

    Ahed Tamimi, a 22-year-old prominent Palestinian activist from the Ramallah-area village of Nabi Saleh, was beaten in custody after being reported earlier this week for alleged social media activity, reported Al Jazeera journalist Dena Takruri, citing Tamimi’s mother.

    “Her mom received a call from a lawyer who was visiting another female Palestinian prisoner. That prisoner informed her lawyer of Ahed’s status [and] to notify her family,” Takruri said.

    Human rights organizations such as the U.K.-based group Amnesty International recorded “horrifying cases of torture and degrading treatment of Palestinian detainees” amid the “spike in arbitrary arrests.”

    Israeli news outlet Haaretz has also noted an increase in Israeli soldiers openly documenting their abuse of Palestinians online.

    As tensions rise in the West Bank, Al Jazeera said an armed Palestinian fighter reportedly shot two Israeli settlers near the illegal Israeli settlement of Itamar, east of Nablus, and one of them is now in critical condition.

    Conditions in the occupied West Bank are becoming “increasingly dire,” says U.N. humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths, outlining the number of Palestinians, including dozens of children, who have been killed, injured, and displaced since October 7.

    “Enough is enough,” he said.


    U.S. representatives ignore constituents, staffers calling for ceasefire

    The Biden administration has continued to offer its unwavering support to Israel’s mass slaughter of Palestinian civilians in Gaza while repeatedly rejecting pressure to support a ceasefire. Instead, U.S. President Joe Biden is supporting a “pause” in the fighting to allow captives in Gaza a safe evacuation.

    White House Spokesman John Kirby told reporters that the pause would be localized, temporary, and short, “hours to days,” depending on the need.

    “So it would be an agreement that for a set period of time in these agreed coordinates, there would be a pause in the fighting,” Kirby said.

    “That doesn’t mean there won’t be, or couldn’t be, fighting outside that zone during that same period of time. So all of that has to get factored in, and I have no doubt that on the Israeli side, as they look at each proposal, they’ll think about the potential impact on their military operations on the ground or in the air.”

    On Tuesday, democratic lawmaker Rashida Tlaib was censured by the House of U.S. Representatives, claiming she was “promoting false narratives regarding the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel and for calling for the destruction of the state of Israel.”

    According to the House, a censure is a “deep disapproval of Member misconduct that, nevertheless, does not meet the threshold for expulsion.”

    Taliba rejected the charge, which condemned her use of the phrase “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” and described it as “widely recognized as a genocidal call to violence to destroy the state of Israel and its people to replace it with a Palestinian state extending from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea.”

    Progressive Jewish American senator Bernie Sanders slammed the U.S. for the censure of Talib. Describing it as “Pathetic and shameful.”

    In response, Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib delivered a speech on the House floor “on the attempts to silence her” while expressing her gratitude for the countless Jewish Americans across the country standing with Palestine.

    “I’m the only Palestinian American serving in Congress, Mr. Chair, and my perspective is needed here now more than ever. I will not be silenced, and I will not let you distort my words,” she said.

    Tlaib also used the opportunity to highlight Israel’s extensive list of human rights violations against Palestinians in Gaza, including collective punishment, the use of white phosphorous bombs, and the denial of food, water, electricity, and medical care to “millions of people with nowhere to go.”

    “We will continue to call for a ceasefire, Mr. Chair, for the immediate delivery of critical humanitarian aid to Gaza, for the release of all hostages and those arbitrarily detained, and for every American to come home.”

    Following her speech, more than 100 congressional staffers staged a walkout as they demanded a ceasefire in Gaza.

    “Our constituents are pleading for a ceasefire, and we are the staffers answering their calls,” the staffers said, “Most of our bosses on Capitol Hill are not listening to the people they represent. We demand our leaders speak up.”

    Hours later, Democratic Congresswoman Sara Jacobs withdrew her proposal to censure Republican Brian Mast for the racist comments he made on the House floor last week likening Palestinian civilians to Nazis, according toThe Hill.

    The comment in question: “As a whole, I would encourage the other side to not so lightly throw around the idea of innocent Palestinian civilians, as is frequently said. I don’t think we would so lightly throw around the term innocent Nazi civilians during World War II.”

    While expressing their continued support for U.S. aid to Israel, U.S. senators have asked the Biden administration to clarify Israel’s “strategy in Gaza” in a letter signed by Twenty-six lawmakers, including more than half of all democratic senators.

    The senators asked for an “assessment of the viability of Israel’s military strategy in Gaza” and an “achievable plan” to govern Gaza after the fighting ends as well as “assessment of the viability of Israel military strategy in Gaza” and an “achievable plan” to govern Gaza after the war ends.

    Meanwhile, Israel’s war cabinet minister, Benny Gantz, says Israel has not set a limit for its current Gaza ground operation in Gaza, reported Israeli media.

    “On the question of the operation’s length, there are no limitations,” Gantz said on Wednesday.

    “The war here is for our existence and for Zionism, and so I can’t provide an estimate of the length of each stage in the war and the fighting that will continue after. We can’t retreat from our strategic objective.”

    Following his war on the besieged enclave, Netanyahu told ABC News that Gaza should be governed by “those who don’t want to continue the way of Hamas” without elaborating.

    “I think Israel will, for an indefinite period, have the overall security responsibility because we’ve seen what happens when we don’t have it. When we don’t have that security responsibility, what we have is the eruption of Hamas terror on a scale that we couldn’t imagine,” he said.

    ‘It’s time for sanctions against Israel’

    Every day Israel continues their ruthless bombardment of Gaza, they experience more diplomatic fallout.

    Turkey’s President Erdogan says Israel is “crushing all humanitarian values.”

    “Israel continues to bomb schools, mosques, churches, hospitals, crushing all humanitarian values,” Erdogan said, adding that 73 percent of those killed are women and children.

    On Wednesday, Italian Defense Minister Guido Crosetto told reporters that Italy will send a hospital ship to the coast of Gaza with 170 staff members and 30 people trained for medical emergencies to help treat victims.

    The Prime Minister of Malaysia, which has a long history of supporting Palestine and advocating for a two-state solution, denied the U.S. proposed legislation for unilateral sanctions against Hamas, targeting the Palestinian resistance group as well as foreign supporters.

    “We only recognize decisions of the United Nations Security Council that are considered multilateral,” Al Jazeera quoted Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim as telling the parliament.

    Belgian’s Deputy Prime Minister Petra De Sutter is urging Belgium to adopt sanctions on Israel and is calling for investigations into the bombings of hospitals and refugee camps in the Gaza Strip.

    “It is time for sanctions against Israel. The rain of bombs is inhumane,” Reuters reported her saying.

    “It is clear that Israel does not care about the international demands for a ceasefire,” she continued, adding that those responsible for war crimes should be banned from the E.U.

    Before you go – we need your support

    At Mondoweiss, we understand the power of telling Palestinian stories. For 17 years, we have pushed back when the mainstream media published lies or echoed politicians’ hateful rhetoric. Now, Palestinian voices are more important than ever.

    Our traffic has increased ten times since October 7, and we need your help to cover our increased expenses.

    Support our journalists with a donation today.
    ‘Operation Al-Aqsa Flood’ Day 34: Children who survive the bombs may die of starvation, disease, and dehydration Leila WarahNovember 9, 2023 A Palestinian father carries his child as he marches with a crowd of Palestinians from northern Gaza to southern Gaza amidst a relentless Israeli bombing campaign, and orders by the Israeli military for Gazans to leave the northern part of the strip. Palestinians flee to the southern Gaza Strip on Salah al-Din Street in Bureij, Gaza Strip, on Wednesday, November 8, 2023. Photo by STR apaimages Casualties Gaza 10,818 Killed, 4,412 including children 26,905 injured West Bank 175 Palestinains Killed Key Developments Palestinian Ministry of Health: “nowhere in Gaza is safe”. UNRWA: 92 agency staff have been killed since October 7, the “highest number of United Nations aid workers killed in a conflict in the history of the United Nations.” UNRWA: 160 people sheltering in UNRWA school facilities share a single toilet; one shower unit for every 700 people Palestinian lawmaker Rashida Tlaib was censured by the House of U.S. Representatives over the phrase “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” 70 Democrats sign onto a statement condemning the “river to the sea” phrase “as a rallying cry for the destruction of the State of Israel and genocide of the Jewish people.” The Israeli parliament passes “draconian” law criminalizing ‘consumption of terrorist materials’, the latest development in Israel’s censorship war against Palestinians. Israeli forces arrested Palestinian politicians in Israel, including the head of the High Follow-Up Committee for Arab Citizens of Israel, Mohammad Barakeh, and former Knesset member Haneen Zoabi, reports Wafa. Two mosques were completely destroyed in the attack on Khan Younis on Wednesday: Khalid bin al-Walid and al-Ikhlas mosques, according to the Interior Ministry in Gaza. The U.S. carried out a strike on a facility in eastern Syria, the second U.S. attack on the country since October 7, in “response to attacks on American personnel in Iraq and Syria” over the past weeks, killing at least nine people, according to the Pentagon. An American drone was shot down off the coast of Yemen by the country’s pro-Iranian Houthi rebels, U.S. officials confirmed to Reuters and AFP. Israeli airstrikes have hit eight hospitals in the Gaza Strip in the last three days, according to Gaza’s government media office. Treating patients in ‘corridors, on the floor, and outdoors’ Israel has subjected Gaza’s population to five weeks of incessant bombing while denying over two million people trapped in the besieged enclave necessities, including food, water, medical care, and fuel. Hospitals, in particular, have been targeted during the ongoing aggression and hard hit by the tight siege. Al Jazeera reported three people were killed and dozens of others injured after Israeli airstrikes hit the vicinity of Al-Nasr Hospital in western Gaza at dawn on Thursday, adding that Israel also fired several missiles around Gaza City’s Al-Shifa Medical Complex, resulting in missile fragments falling into the hospital courtyard. Similarly, the vicinity of Al-Quds Hospital in the north of Gaza has been subjected to daily bombardment since Sunday, according to Nebal Farsakh, a spokesperson for the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS). On Wednesday, PRCS reported the Israeli bombardment near Al Quds Hospital resulted in all roads leading to the hospital being closed and medical teams being unable to leave the hospital to reach the injured. The organization added that the hospital was facing “an acute shortage of fuel and was expected to run out of fuel today,” so they have curtailed most operations in an attempt to ration what is left. “We have about 500 patients inside the hospital. We have 15 patients in the ICU. They are wounded and on respirators. We have newborns in incubators. We have 14,000 displaced people, the majority of whom are women and children,” Farsakh told Al Jazeera, adding that they have had to “stop four ambulances from working.” “Patients are undergoing immense and unnecessary pain as medicines and anesthetics are running out. In addition, tens of thousands of displaced people have sought shelter in the hospital’s parking lots and yards,” Farsakh said. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini and the World Health Organisation (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a joint statement that doctors in Al-Shifa, where the conditions are “disastrous,” doctors are being forced to treat the sick and injured in “corridors, on the floor, and outdoors” as emergency rooms are overflowing. “Without fuel, hospitals and other essential facilities such as desalination plants and bakeries cannot operate, and more people will most certainly die as a result,” they said. Alexandra Saieh of Save the Children underscored that the children who are not killed by bombs may die of starvation, disease, and dehydration. “The situation is catastrophic. Civilians, especially children, continue to pay the heaviest price for the ongoing violence. If we don’t have a ceasefire, the numbers will continue to worsen,” she stated, according to Al Jazeera. On Wednesday, The Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) said 106 trucks from the Egyptian Red Crescent, loaded with aid and five ambulance vehicles from Kuwait, crossed through the Egypt Rafah border crossing; however, none contained much-needed fuel. The organization says 756 trucks have entered the besieged enclave since October 21, which is still far below what the besieged enclave needs. In contrast, before October 7, the besieged enclave would receive about 500 truck deliveries daily. A convoy with much-needed medical supplies was delivered to Gaza’s main hospital, al-Shifa, according to Ghebreyesus and Lazzarini. However, the supplies are “far from sufficient to respond to the immense needs” in Gaza, as the situation at al-Shifa Hospital is “disastrous,” and medical facilities across the besieged enclave are running out of supplies and fuel. “The ability of hospitals and medical facilities to operate is paramount, especially during conflicts,” the statement continued. Israeli military spokesperson Daniel Hagari presented video, photographs, and audio recordings that allegedly pointed to a Hamas building tunnel under hospitals. However, an investigation conducted by Al Jazeera found no grounds to support Israel’s claims of a Hamas tunnel under hospitals and, specifically, under the Sheikh Hamad Hospital in north Gaza. Similarly, Mohammed al-Emadi, the chairman of the Qatari Committee for the Reconstruction of Gaza, described Israel’s allegation as a “blatant attempt to justify the occupation’s targeting of civilian facilities, including hospitals, schools, gatherings of population and shelters of displaced people.” Fighting on the ground continues As civilians continue fighting for their lives across the Gaza Strip, the Israeli military has continued its advancement into northern Gaza. “I’d like to put to rest all kinds of false rumors we’re hearing from all kinds of directions, and reiterate one clear thing: There will be no ceasefire without the release of our hostages,” Netanyahu said on Wednesday. That same day, after 10 hours of battle, the Israeli army said they took control of a Hamas outpost in Jabalia, north of Gaza City, saying their soldiers confronted and killed Hamas figures, adding that they confiscated weapons and destroyed tunnel shafts. “Since the beginning of the fighting, 130 tunnel shafts have been destroyed,” the military said. “Soldiers of the Nahal Brigade conducted operational activity at a Hamas training post in northern Gaza. Tunnels were located under the post, and after they were exposed, the shafts in the post were destroyed.” Hamas, who has accused Israel of spreading lies in the past, has not commented on the statement. While Israelis call for Jews to resettle in Gaza, their government says they have “no intention” of reoccupying Gaza or controlling it for a long time, the Reuters news agency reported, quoting an unnamed senior Israeli official. During a televised address on Wednesday, Deputy Hamas chief Saleh al-Arouri clarified that the Hamas attack on October 7 was launched mainly to “ensure the freedom and independence of our people, which begins with the freedom of our political prisoners.” “All of our prisoners must be released from prisons,” Arouri said, reiterating Hamas’s readiness for a “comprehensive deal.” “Take everyone we have and give us all of the prisoners you have,” he proposed, referring to the captives taken from Israel on October 7 and Palestinian political prisoners being held in Israeli jails. “It’s best to take your hostages alive. Come forward and agree to an exchange deal now.” “This issue cannot be resolved except via a trade within each of these categories [of prisoners and captives] or in a comprehensive process that includes everyone,” Qassam Brigades spokesperson Abu Obeida said in a televised address on Al-Aqsa T.V. West Bank: ‘Enough is enough’ The situation in the West Bank continues to worsen as Israeli soldiers and settlers continue their deadly attacks on Palestinians. In the last 24 hours alone, Israeli forces have killed at least 12 Palestinians. In Jenin, the north of the West Bank, the Palestinian Ministry of Health reported nine Palestinians were killed during an Israeli military raid on Thursday morning in the Palestinian city. Two Palestinian men were killed overnight on Wednesday by Israeli forces during a violent military incursion in Hebron and Bethlehem, according to Wafa. In Hebron, Anas Abu Atwan, 25, was killed after being shot in the chest in the village of Tabqa. In Bethlehem, Mohammad Thawabta, 51, from Beit Fajjar, died of wounds sustained during Israeli forces’ incursion into Bethlehem on Wednesday, injuring 19 people were wounded by live bullets and five by shrapnel. The 12th Palestinian died from critical wounds after being shot by Israeli forces Thursday morning in al-Amari refugee camp, Ramallah. Israel’s mass arrest campaign has also continued, detaining over 2,200 Palestinian men and women since October 7, according to the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club. Ahed Tamimi, a 22-year-old prominent Palestinian activist from the Ramallah-area village of Nabi Saleh, was beaten in custody after being reported earlier this week for alleged social media activity, reported Al Jazeera journalist Dena Takruri, citing Tamimi’s mother. “Her mom received a call from a lawyer who was visiting another female Palestinian prisoner. That prisoner informed her lawyer of Ahed’s status [and] to notify her family,” Takruri said. Human rights organizations such as the U.K.-based group Amnesty International recorded “horrifying cases of torture and degrading treatment of Palestinian detainees” amid the “spike in arbitrary arrests.” Israeli news outlet Haaretz has also noted an increase in Israeli soldiers openly documenting their abuse of Palestinians online. As tensions rise in the West Bank, Al Jazeera said an armed Palestinian fighter reportedly shot two Israeli settlers near the illegal Israeli settlement of Itamar, east of Nablus, and one of them is now in critical condition. Conditions in the occupied West Bank are becoming “increasingly dire,” says U.N. humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths, outlining the number of Palestinians, including dozens of children, who have been killed, injured, and displaced since October 7. “Enough is enough,” he said. U.S. representatives ignore constituents, staffers calling for ceasefire The Biden administration has continued to offer its unwavering support to Israel’s mass slaughter of Palestinian civilians in Gaza while repeatedly rejecting pressure to support a ceasefire. Instead, U.S. President Joe Biden is supporting a “pause” in the fighting to allow captives in Gaza a safe evacuation. White House Spokesman John Kirby told reporters that the pause would be localized, temporary, and short, “hours to days,” depending on the need. “So it would be an agreement that for a set period of time in these agreed coordinates, there would be a pause in the fighting,” Kirby said. “That doesn’t mean there won’t be, or couldn’t be, fighting outside that zone during that same period of time. So all of that has to get factored in, and I have no doubt that on the Israeli side, as they look at each proposal, they’ll think about the potential impact on their military operations on the ground or in the air.” On Tuesday, democratic lawmaker Rashida Tlaib was censured by the House of U.S. Representatives, claiming she was “promoting false narratives regarding the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel and for calling for the destruction of the state of Israel.” According to the House, a censure is a “deep disapproval of Member misconduct that, nevertheless, does not meet the threshold for expulsion.” Taliba rejected the charge, which condemned her use of the phrase “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” and described it as “widely recognized as a genocidal call to violence to destroy the state of Israel and its people to replace it with a Palestinian state extending from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea.” Progressive Jewish American senator Bernie Sanders slammed the U.S. for the censure of Talib. Describing it as “Pathetic and shameful.” In response, Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib delivered a speech on the House floor “on the attempts to silence her” while expressing her gratitude for the countless Jewish Americans across the country standing with Palestine. “I’m the only Palestinian American serving in Congress, Mr. Chair, and my perspective is needed here now more than ever. I will not be silenced, and I will not let you distort my words,” she said. Tlaib also used the opportunity to highlight Israel’s extensive list of human rights violations against Palestinians in Gaza, including collective punishment, the use of white phosphorous bombs, and the denial of food, water, electricity, and medical care to “millions of people with nowhere to go.” “We will continue to call for a ceasefire, Mr. Chair, for the immediate delivery of critical humanitarian aid to Gaza, for the release of all hostages and those arbitrarily detained, and for every American to come home.” Following her speech, more than 100 congressional staffers staged a walkout as they demanded a ceasefire in Gaza. “Our constituents are pleading for a ceasefire, and we are the staffers answering their calls,” the staffers said, “Most of our bosses on Capitol Hill are not listening to the people they represent. We demand our leaders speak up.” Hours later, Democratic Congresswoman Sara Jacobs withdrew her proposal to censure Republican Brian Mast for the racist comments he made on the House floor last week likening Palestinian civilians to Nazis, according toThe Hill. The comment in question: “As a whole, I would encourage the other side to not so lightly throw around the idea of innocent Palestinian civilians, as is frequently said. I don’t think we would so lightly throw around the term innocent Nazi civilians during World War II.” While expressing their continued support for U.S. aid to Israel, U.S. senators have asked the Biden administration to clarify Israel’s “strategy in Gaza” in a letter signed by Twenty-six lawmakers, including more than half of all democratic senators. The senators asked for an “assessment of the viability of Israel’s military strategy in Gaza” and an “achievable plan” to govern Gaza after the fighting ends as well as “assessment of the viability of Israel military strategy in Gaza” and an “achievable plan” to govern Gaza after the war ends. Meanwhile, Israel’s war cabinet minister, Benny Gantz, says Israel has not set a limit for its current Gaza ground operation in Gaza, reported Israeli media. “On the question of the operation’s length, there are no limitations,” Gantz said on Wednesday. “The war here is for our existence and for Zionism, and so I can’t provide an estimate of the length of each stage in the war and the fighting that will continue after. We can’t retreat from our strategic objective.” Following his war on the besieged enclave, Netanyahu told ABC News that Gaza should be governed by “those who don’t want to continue the way of Hamas” without elaborating. “I think Israel will, for an indefinite period, have the overall security responsibility because we’ve seen what happens when we don’t have it. When we don’t have that security responsibility, what we have is the eruption of Hamas terror on a scale that we couldn’t imagine,” he said. ‘It’s time for sanctions against Israel’ Every day Israel continues their ruthless bombardment of Gaza, they experience more diplomatic fallout. Turkey’s President Erdogan says Israel is “crushing all humanitarian values.” “Israel continues to bomb schools, mosques, churches, hospitals, crushing all humanitarian values,” Erdogan said, adding that 73 percent of those killed are women and children. On Wednesday, Italian Defense Minister Guido Crosetto told reporters that Italy will send a hospital ship to the coast of Gaza with 170 staff members and 30 people trained for medical emergencies to help treat victims. The Prime Minister of Malaysia, which has a long history of supporting Palestine and advocating for a two-state solution, denied the U.S. proposed legislation for unilateral sanctions against Hamas, targeting the Palestinian resistance group as well as foreign supporters. “We only recognize decisions of the United Nations Security Council that are considered multilateral,” Al Jazeera quoted Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim as telling the parliament. Belgian’s Deputy Prime Minister Petra De Sutter is urging Belgium to adopt sanctions on Israel and is calling for investigations into the bombings of hospitals and refugee camps in the Gaza Strip. “It is time for sanctions against Israel. The rain of bombs is inhumane,” Reuters reported her saying. “It is clear that Israel does not care about the international demands for a ceasefire,” she continued, adding that those responsible for war crimes should be banned from the E.U. Before you go – we need your support At Mondoweiss, we understand the power of telling Palestinian stories. For 17 years, we have pushed back when the mainstream media published lies or echoed politicians’ hateful rhetoric. Now, Palestinian voices are more important than ever. Our traffic has increased ten times since October 7, and we need your help to cover our increased expenses. Support our journalists with a donation today.
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