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By Bharat Dogra

On April 18 the US and UK imposed a new round of sanctions on Iran. On April 17 European Union leaders had talked aggressively about ramping up sanctions on Iran. This has happened in the wake of Iran’s April 13 attack on Israeli targets, which in turn was in response to the April 1 attack on an Iranian consulate building in Syria which killed 7 Iranian commanders and which is believed very widely, by almost everyone, to be an Israeli attack.

However while increasing sanctions on Iran, the USA and the UK have not mentioned that the Iran attack itself was in response to an Israeli attack which had killed several Iranian commanders including a very senior one. In all fairness, the USA, the UK and the European Union should have been equally critical towards both attacks, in fact more towards the first one rather than the response to it. However they chose to impose sanctions only on Iran, while ignoring the attack on Iran personnel and consulate building.

The damage suffered by Iran was clearly higher. It cannot be said that the Iran attack inflicted disproportionate damage. Was this only because of interception success by Israel and its allies? Several analysts feel that Iran had in fact deliberately avoided what could prove to be a highly fatal attack. This is the stand taken, for example, in an article published in Politico under the title ‘Iran’s Attack Seems like it was Designed to Fail, so what Comes Next?’(14 April, 2014).

In this article, author Michael Hirsh has quoted Ali Vaez of the International Crisis Group as stating about the Iranian response, “They (Iran) could have used a much higher number of projectiles, synchronized drones and missiles in a way that could have swarmed the air defense systems, and could have fired their new hypersonic missiles.” The fact that they did not resort to such ways of inflicting more definite and higher harm available to them indicates, this expert has argued, that “they (the Iran side) clearly wanted something spectacular but not fatal.”

In addition, Iran hastened to announce to the international community that from their side the matter concludes here.

Hence the response of Iran can hardly be called so dangerous or escalatory as to call for further sanctions, to add to the many that already exist.

In addition despite the desperate need for peace, there are several other signs of escalation.

On April 15 Israeli opposition leader and former Premier Yair Lapid said that under Netanyahu “Jewish terrorist violence” against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank was “out of control”. Should not such violence be seen as escalatory?

Meanwhile, to mention another worrying front, conditions continue to be very tense on the Israel-Lebanon border too. According to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a non-profit, between October 7 2023 and March 15 2024, militias like Hezbollah in Lebanon on one side and Israel on the other side exchanged at least 4,733 attacks, among them 3,952 (83%) by the Israeli side. However other estimates mention a higher number of Hezbollah attacks. Israel has evacuated 61,000 people belonging to 43 communities in the Upper Galilee region. According to ACLED, Israeli attacks in Lebanon have killed at least 357 people since October 7 2023, while on the Israeli side 22 lives have been lost.

On April 18 the leader of Yemen’s Iran- aligned Houthis, who had been attacking shipping in the Red Sea said that the group had carried out operations in the Indian Ocean and towards southern Israel. This leader Abdul Malik al Houthi said that so far 98 ships had been targeted in attempts to prevent ships heading to Israel from sailing through the Red Sea. He said such attacks would continue till the Israel offensive is Gaza is stopped.

On April 18 Ahmad Haghtalab, Iranian Guards Commander in-charge of nuclear security, said that Iran could review its ‘nuclear doctrine’ following increasing Israeli threats.

Hence it is clear that there are deeply worrying escalations at several levels in the Middle-East. All this, it should be remembered, is in addition to the extreme distress of the people of Gaza (where well over a hundred thousand people have been killed, are missing or seriously injured in the course of the six month conflict) which is almost beyond words. Those doctors and humanitarian workers who have been familiar with several conflicts have stated that they have seldom seen such extreme hunger and such terrible injuries inflicted on helpless people. There is urgent need for non-partial response and attitudes on the part of the international community which is difficult to find. On the one hand human distress is being aggravated and on the other hand the chances of escalation and a bigger conflict are increasing. Several western analysts have stated that the 1 April attack on Iranian consulate was aimed at escalation in such a way that the USA gets more directly involved, but despite this sanctions were introduced against Iran, not Israel. Hence it is important for many more countries and forces of peace to come forward for a non-partisan approach to resolving the crisis and for peace.

Bharat Dogra is Honorary Convener, Campaign to Save Earth Now.

19 April 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Rev. Deborah McEachran and Rev. Dr. Eliezer Valentín-Castañón

Cuba is going hungry. The costs of food and other basic necessities are skyrocketing. Rolling blackouts periodically plunge the island into darkness. Parents struggle to find milk for their children. For the first time in history, the government has asked the UN for food aid.

The people of Cuba are facing their worst humanitarian crisis in decades. But Maryland Senator Ben Cardin has the power to help. We, as faith leaders concerned for our siblings in Cuba, urge him to act.

When President Obama took office, he recognized that U.S.-Cuba policy needed a change. For over half a century, the powerful United States has imposed a strict embargo (considered by many to be a blockade) on the small island nation. The main consequence of this policy has been the suffering of everyday Cubans. A fettered economy, deteriorating infrastructure, lack of access to food and medicine—the costs of the blockade are borne by the entire Cuban people.

President Obama began a process of easing these harsh restrictions and thawing relations between our two nations. The people of Cuba were overjoyed; for once, their future looked bright.

Then came President Trump. In short order, Trump undid virtually all of the progress that Obama had made. In his last week in office, Trump even added Cuba to the State Sponsors of Terrorism list, a designation that top Democrat and Republican officials have called “bogus” and “a fiction,” and that effectively cuts investment-starved Cuba off from the international financial system.

When Biden became president, hopes of a return to the Obama approach were rekindled. After all, Biden had been Vice President at a time when easing restrictions yielded immediate benefits for Cuban civilians while winning the support of U.S. voters. But instead, Biden has kept almost all of the Trump policies in place, and the Cuban people are now paying the price.

The combination of the COVID-19 pandemic and Trump’s sanctions has ignited such a crisis that over 4 percent of the Cuban population has left the country in search of a better life in the United States in the past two years alone.

U.S.-Cuba policy is stuck in the Trump era. But as Senator Cardin prepares to retire, he has a chance to chart a new path.

Last year, Cardin assumed the powerful position of Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, taking over from the hardline pro-blockade New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez, who had to step down after being indicted on bribery-related charges.

That’s why we recently joined over thirty Maryland-based organizations, and dozens of community leaders, in sending a letter urging Senator Cardin to help end the blockade. As Senator Menendez used his position to block any measure of relief for the Cuban people, Senator Cardin can promote reform, supporting and advancing legislative efforts such as those that would repeal the Torricelli and Helms-Burton acts, and could wield his role to pressure Biden to take unilateral action, such as removing Cuba from the State Sponsors of Terrorism list.

Uniting churches, immigrant rights organizations, University of Maryland academics, Young Democrat clubs, and over a dozen ordained ministers and rabbis, we wrote: “As you are soon to depart from Congress, your actions in the coming year may define how you are remembered. It is our hope that your legacy will be as someone who is willing to transcend the inertia of the status quo and do what is right; for the people of Cuba, the United States, and the world.”

This is not a fringe demand. As our letter notes, poll after poll after poll show that most Democrats and Republicans alike support an end to the blockade. That’s to say nothing of the rest of the world; last year, the United Nations General Assembly voted to condemn the blockade by a vote 187 to 2. It was the 31st time the resolution has passed nearly unanimously.

Whatever we may make of the Cuban government, and whatever share of the responsibility it holds for the state of the Cuban economy, nothing justifies the United States intentionally starving the Cuban people. Our faiths demand that we stand up to such injustice, and build a world that respects the inherent dignity of all people.

Senator Cardin has a window of opportunity to help right a historic wrong, ease the suffering of millions, and define his legacy as a true forward-thinking leader. But that window is closing fast. It’s time for him to act.

Rev. Deborah McEachran is Pastor of the Hunting Ridge Presbyterian Church in Baltimore.

Rev. Dr. Eliezer Valentín-Castañón is the Frederick District Superintendent of the United Methodist Church’s Baltimore-Washington Conference.

19 April 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Dr. Ramzy Baroud

The distance between Gaza and Namibia is measured in the thousands of kilometers. But the historical distance is much closer. This is precisely why Namibia was one of the first countries to take a strong stance against the Israeli genocide in Gaza.

Namibia was colonized by the Germans in 1884, while the British colonized Palestine in the 1920s, handing the territory to the Zionist colonizers in 1948.

Though the ethnic and religious fabric of both Palestine and Namibia are different, the historical experiences are similar.

It is easy, however, to assume that the history which unifies many countries in the Global South is only that of western exploitation and victimization. It is also a history of collective struggle and resistance.

Namibia has been inhabited since prehistoric times. This long-rooted history has allowed Namibians, over the course of thousands of years, to establish a sense of belonging to the land and to one another, something that the Germans did not understand or appreciate.

When the Germans colonized Namibia, giving it the name of ‘German Southwest Africa’, they did what all other western colonialists have done, from Palestine to South Africa to Algeria, to virtually all Global South countries. They attempted to divide the people, exploited their resources and butchered those who resisted.

Although a country with a small population, Namibians resisted their colonizers, resulting in the German decision to simply exterminate the natives, literally killing the majority of the population.

Since the start of the Israeli genocide in Gaza, Namibia answered the call of solidarity with the Palestinians, along with many African and South American countries, including Colombia, Nicaragua, Cuba, South Africa, Brazil, China and many others.

Though intersectionality is a much-celebrated notion in western academia, no academic theory is needed for oppressed, colonized nations in the Global South to exhibit solidarity with one another.

So when Namibia took a strong stance against Israel’s largest military supporter in Europe – Germany – it did so based on Namibia’s total awareness of its history.

The German genocide of the Nama and Herero people (1904-1907), is known as the “first genocide of the 20th century”. The ongoing Israeli genocide in Gaza is the first genocide of the 21st century. The unity between Palestine and Namibia is now cemented through mutual suffering.

But it is not Namibia that has launched the legal case against Germany at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) but, rather, Nicaragua, a Central American country that is also thousands of miles away from both Palestine and Namibia.

The Nicaraguan case accuses Germany of violating the ‘Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide’. It rightly sees Germany as a partner in the ongoing genocide of the Palestinians.

This accusation alone should terrify the German people, in fact the whole world, as Germany is affiliated with genocides from its early days as a colonial power. The horrific crime of the Holocaust, and other mass killings carried out by the German government against Jews and other minority groups in Europe during WWII, is a continuation of other German crimes committed against Africans, decades earlier.

The typical analysis of why Germany continues to support Israel is explained on the basis of German guilt over the Holocaust. This explanation, however, is partly illogical and partly erroneous.

Illogical, because, if Germany has, indeed, internalized any guilt from its previous mass killings, it would make no sense for Berlin to add yet more guilt by allowing Palestinians to be butchered, en masse. If guilt indeed exists, it is not genuine.

And erroneous, because it completely overlooks the German genocide in Namibia. In fact, it took the German government until 2021 to acknowledge the horrific butchery in that poor African country, ultimately agreeing to pay merely one billion euros in ‘community aid’, which will be allocated over the course of three decades.

The German government’s support of the Israeli war on Gaza is not motivated by guilt, but by a power paradigm that governs the relations among colonial countries. Many countries in the Global South understand this logic very well, thus the growing solidarity with Palestine.

The Israeli brutality in Gaza, but also the Palestinian sumud, resilience and resistance, are inspiring the Global South to reclaim its centrality in anti-colonial liberation struggles.

The revolution in the Global South outlook – culminating in South Africa’s case at the ICJ, and also the Nicaraguan lawsuit against Germany – indicates that the change is not the outcome of a collective emotional reaction. Instead, it is part and parcel of the shifting relationship between the Global South and the Global North.

Africa has been undergoing a process of geopolitical restructuring for years. The anti-French rebellions in West Africa, demanding true independence from the continent’s former colonial masters, in addition to the intense geopolitical competition – involving Russia, China and others – are all signs of changing times.

And, with this rapid rearrangement, a new political discourse and popular rhetoric are emerging, often expressed in the revolutionary language emanating from Niger, Burkina Faso, Mali and others.

But the shift is not happening on the rhetorical front only. The rise of BRICS as a powerful new platform for economic integration between Asia and the rest of the Global South has opened up the possibility that alternatives to western financial and political institutions are very much possible.

In 2023, it was revealed that BRICS countries are now holding 32 percent of the world’s total GDP, compared to 30 percent held by the G7 countries. There is much political value to this as four of the five original founders of BRICS are strong and unapologetic supporters of the Palestinians.

While South Africa has been championing the legal front against Israel, Russia and China are battling the US at the UN Security Council to institute a ceasefire. Beijing’s Ambassador to The Hague went as far as defending the Palestinian armed struggle as legitimate under international law.

Now that global dynamics are working in favor of Palestinians, it is time for the Palestinian struggle to return to the embrace of the Global South, where common histories will always serve as a foundation for a meaningful solidarity.

Dr. Ramzy Baroud is a journalist, author and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle.

18 April 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Andre Damon

The United States and its imperialist allies will imminently announce new sanctions targeting Iran as the US-led war drive against Tehran continues to accelerate.

In a statement Tuesday, US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said the US and its G7 allies would announce the sanctions “in the coming days.”

“We will not hesitate to continue to take action, in coordination with allies and partners around the world, and with Congress, to hold the Iranian government accountable for its malicious and destabilizing actions,” Sullivan said. He added that the US actions “continue a steady drumbeat of pressure to contain and degrade Iran’s military capacity and effectiveness and confront the full range of its problematic behaviors.”

US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said the US would impose “additional sanctions action against Iran in the coming days.” The announcement came ahead of a scheduled meeting of the Israeli war cabinet at which Israel is expected to decide whether to carry out strikes against Iran.

Increasingly, the US press is treating a military response by Israel against Iran as inevitable. In an article titled “Restraint or retribution? Israel faces dilemma in its response to Iran’s attack,” CNN wrote:

The US expects Israel’s military response will be limited in scope, a senior administration official and a source familiar with the intelligence told CNN. There is US intelligence to suggest Israel is weighing a narrow and limited strike inside Iran, the second source said.

These developments come as the imperialist powers continue to ever more directly align themselves with Israel, using Iran’s strikes over the weekend as a pretext to abandon their previous nominal criticism of the Gaza genocide. UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, in a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Tuesday, “reiterated the UK’s steadfast support for Israel’s security,” according to a UK government spokesperson.

While stating on background that the United States will not directly take part in a strike, US officials have given Israel a green light to attack Iran, reaffirming Washington’s unconditional support for Israel. On Monday, White House spokesman John Kirby declared, “This is an Israeli decision to make, whether and how they’ll respond to what Iran did on Saturday, and we’re going to leave it squarely with them.”

The escalating US-Israeli offensive against Iran comes as Israel continues its genocide against the population of Gaza. On Tuesday, an Israeli airstrike reportedly targeted a playground in Gaza’s Maghazi refugee camp, killing 11 people, most of whom were children. Al Jazeera reported that “dozens” of people were transported to hospitals following the attack.

Separately, seven police officers charged with protecting food distribution were killed in an airstrike on their vehicle. In a statement, Gaza’s interior ministry condemned the Israeli army’s “repeated, targeted attacks on security forces” throughout Gaza. It added:

We call on all parties within the international community to pressure the occupation to halt its attacks against members of the police force, who are carrying out their duties to serve and protect our people.

Al Jazeera reported that, in yet another airstrike Tuesday, several people were killed when an Israeli jet attacked a residential building in central Rafah. There are more than 1.5 million displaced Palestinians sheltering in the city, amid a looming Israeli offensive that is expected to displace hundreds of thousands of people and kill countless thousands.

In a harrowing report published Tuesday, the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor asserted that Israeli forces are broadcasting the recorded sounds of women screaming and children crying in order to lure civilians out from under cover in order to shoot them. The Monitor reported:

Testimonies from camp residents, which were provided to the Euro-Med Monitor team, confirm that the sound of women screaming and babies crying was heard late at night on both Sunday and Monday. When some of the residents went out to investigate and tried to help, they were shot at by Israeli quadcopter drones. The sounds they had heard were, in fact, recordings played by the Israeli drones with the intent of forcing the camp’s residents out into the streets, where they could be easily targeted by snipers and other weaponry.

Another witness described the incident to Al Jazeera, saying, “Yesterday, the area was subjected to Israeli shelling. Three hours after the raids, we heard the voices of children crying out and the voice of a woman.” The witness added, “When we went out, we were subjected to heavy fire from the Israeli army and the sound was coming out of an Israeli quadcopter with four propellers.”

In a statement Tuesday, the International Rescue Committee (IRC) warned of a “public health catastrophe underway in Gaza,” declaring that “millions of Palestinians in Gaza [are] facing famine, malnutrition and disease outbreaks.” The committee warned that without an immediate ceasefire, 12,000 people were expected to lose their lives as a result of disease.

The statement quoted Dr. Seema Jilani, senior health technical advisor for emergencies at the organization, who said:

No hospitals in Gaza are fully functioning any longer. IRC staff and partners in Gaza continue to witness devastation in the health facilities that are left. Palestinians are often forced to weigh whether it is worth the risk of death or encountering violence to get to a hospital, given unprecedented attacks, total absence of medical supplies, and the burden on existing health services. Patients as young as 4 months old are dying from preventable or easily treatable diseases like pneumonia and gastroenteritis.

17 April 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Dr Marwan Asmar

In what is seen as an unprecedented international diplomatic move, the White House has asked the Tehran government if it would allow Israel to engage in a “symbolic retaliatory strike” on Iran as a “face-saving formula” and to placate domestic pressure.

The American message delivered through the Swiss Embassy in Tehran which looks after US relations there is seen as highly irregular and has been major news on the social media and a butt of all jokes and sarcasm by many bloggers and commentators.

The breaking story first appeared on The Cradle news website which quoted an Iranian official speaking in anonymity saying the Iranian government received messages from different mediators to let Israel do a symbolic strike on the country to save face and has asked Iran not to retaliate.

In turn, the source added the government in Tehran had outrightly rejected such a move. To drive their point home, the government let officials from the Islamic Revolution Guard Corp deliver a message to the USA via the Swiss Embassy, emphasizing it would respond in the strongest possible terms if Israel would strike Iran in any form.

Although most of the 300 weapons – drones, ballistic and cruise missiles – were brought down by US and British allies before they reached Israel, the Netanyahu government had been licking its wounds.

The missiles managed to penetrate some three military bases in Israel and is being seen in Iran as a major victory.

Since the series of strikes on Israel, in the early hours of Sunday morning, the Biden administration in Washington has been trying to persuade the Israeli government not to militarily respond and create a major conflagration in the Middle East.

US president Joe Biden is seeking to control the slippery-slope situation brought on by Israel’s 7-month war on Gaza. It is already facing a Houthi-led blockade in the Red Sea and the Bab Al Mandeb Straits as well as Hezbollah and other pro-Iranian Shia groups in the Lebanon, Syria and Iraq.

Therefore, it fears if Israel responds to the last Iranian attacks, it would put the whole region in a military tailspin and a prelude for a regional war.

But Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant says Israel has no choice but to respond military to the Iranian projectiles that were mainly seen over the skies of Jordan, and came from the south from Yemen fired by the Houthis.

Although they don’t like to admit it, the political and Israeli military establishments have been shocked about the scale of the Iran attacks. This is despite the fact, Israel virtually regards Syria as its military backyard with hundreds of sorties carried out on the country over the past 10 years.

It is clear Iran has penetrated the Israeli psyche this time around, although after the attacks Iranian officials let it be known through different intermediaries like Qatar, Turkey as well as the Swiss they don’t wish to escalate and their actions was in response to the Israeli strikes on their Consulate in Syria in which seven of their officials were killed.

Thus, the guessing game continues. Israelis, and from the statements of its officials continue to mull over the type of military response they want to undertake. Officials in Washington believe a hit is coming but they only ask they’d be told about in advance.

Meanwhile social media celebrities have been having a field do on Washington’s urging to Tehran to let Israel strike “symbolically.”  The views are from the X platform.

Social media reactions

Marin Prvan simply says “what is this, Kindergarten politics?,” while Sarah Wilkinson writes: “Hilariously, the US begged Iran to allow the Israeli regime to make ‘a symbolic strike’ against it to save it from embarrassment: no, says Iran.” On the other hand Alexa Heidar says: “What joke of a world we live in.”

And the list goes on. Remove a ToryMP writes the US is begging Iran to let Israel have a pity-strike while Notinmyname says: “The United Slaves of America grovelling for Israel masters.”

It is a reminder of the First Gulf War in January 1991 when the president Saddam Hussein of Iraq fired 42 scud missiles on Tel Aviv and Haifa. Then, the Israeli government was persuaded not to respond because the Bush administration was about to have its first war on Iraq.

Dr Asmar is a writer from Amman covering Middle East Affairs

17 April 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Andre Damon

The imperialist powers have responded to Iran’s strikes on Israel Saturday with an outpouring of condemnation.

“I condemn these attacks in the strongest possible terms,” US President Joe Biden declared, reaffirming “America’s ironclad commitment to the security of Israel.”

The G7 group of imperialist powers said in a statement, “We … unequivocally condemn in the strongest terms Iran’s direct and unprecedented attack against Israel.” It added, “Iran has further stepped toward the destabilization of the region and risks provoking an uncontrollable regional escalation.”

These statements by the imperialist warmongers, repeated by every major NATO power, are the height of hypocrisy. The force “provoking an uncontrollable regional escalation” in the Middle East is Israel and its imperialist backers.

Let us get the timeline accurate. Iran’s strike was a response to the April 1 attack by Israel on an Iranian embassy in Syria that killed seven top-level Iranian military officers, including two generals.

In response to Israel’s flagrantly illegal and murderous attack on what was, under international law, Iranian soil, the imperialist powers effectively endorsed it. US Ambassador to the UN Robert Wood declared that “terrorist leaders and elements were allegedly present at this facility.” The US, France and the UK vetoed a resolution in the UN Security Council condemning Israel’s attack.

Now, the imperialists are falling over themselves to condemn Iran’s response to Israel’s action. This is all the more striking given that Iran’s action was largely symbolic. The Iranian government announced Saturday’s strike to countries in the region 72 hours in advance in an effort to limit the impact. As Reuters reported Sunday, “Iran gave wide notice days before Saturday’s drone and missile attack on Israel allowing mass casualties and rampant escalation to be averted.”

The imperialist powers are asserting that they and their proxies can kill as many people as they want, carry out targeted assassinations and act in complete violation of anything resembling international law. But any response, even of the most minimal character, is denounced as a crime. This is the basic law of colonialism and imperialism.

While Biden “condemns” the actions of Iran, he does not extend the same language to Israel’s onslaught against Gaza, which is being funded, armed and politically supported by the United States and other imperialist powers.

Israel is actively carrying out a genocide against the population of Gaza, already having killed at least 40,000 people. It is systematically displacing, starving and bombing an entire population of 2.2 million people and methodically and deliberately murdering doctors and aid workers.

The genocide in Gaza is developing into a regional war, which can very quickly draw in the entire globe.

To the extent that the Biden administration is stating, generally on background rather than through official pronuncements, that it would prefer that Israel not respond with immediate military strikes, this is determined by tactical considerations.

Some of these considerations were laid out in an op-ed in the New York Times by Bret Stephens under the headline, “For Israel, Revenge Should Be a Dish Served Cold.”

“As a matter of self-defense,” Stephens wrote, “Israel has every moral and legal right to respond in kind—and then some. It is not enough for Israel to demonstrate its capacity for defense, as it did over the weekend. It must also re-establish its capacity for deterrence. That is, it needs to show Iran’s leaders that the price for bringing their war against Israel out of the shadows will be unbearably high, and is therefore not to be repeated.”

Stephens counsels against, however, an all-out assault on Iran. “Israel has an unfinished war against Hamas in Gaza, and a direct Israeli attack on Iran could trigger a second full-scale war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, if not with Iran itself. Most Israelis understand that particular war will have to be fought sooner or later—perhaps before the end of the summer—and that it will be probably much tougher on them than the Gaza war has been so far.” (Emphasis added)

In other words, it is first necessary to finish the genocide in Gaza, before turning to the “much tougher” task of war with Iran.

Sections of the US political establishment are openly advocating a full-scale war, asserting that the Biden administration is not going far enough in supporting an Israeli war against Iran. The Wall Street Journal wrote in an editorial, “The attack should at least cause Mr. Biden and his fellow Democrats to end their cold war with Israel over Gaza and recognize that this is really a war against Iran.”

It continued, “Leaders in both parties should also start telling the truth to Americans about the new world of global threats. Russia, China, Iran and North Korea are all on the march and working together.”

The Israeli cabinet has been deliberating over the past day on what actions to take, and there are evidently divisions within the regime itself.

Moreover, while Israel is imperialism’s attack dog in the Middle East, the US is not in complete control of what it will do. In any event, the Biden administration has reaffirmed that if Israel does take action, it will have full support.

Appearing on Meet the Press, White House spokesman John Kirby declared, “Whether and how the Israelis respond is going to be up to them.”

Asked, “If Israel does decide to move forward with retaliatory strikes, will the United States support Israel?” Kirby replied that US “support for Israel’s self-defense will stay ironclad. It will not change.”

The United States responded to the events of October 7 by launching a major military offensive throughout the Middle East, with Iran as the central target. Within days, the US surged an armada of warships and hundreds of aircraft to the region, which it has used to launch dozens of illegal airstrikes over the past six months.

The US offensive in the Middle East is a crucial element of an unfolding global war, with Russia and China as the main targets. The subjugation of Iran, lying at the heart of Eurasia, is a critical component of the United States’ drive for global military domination.

Whatever the immediate developments in the coming days, the regional war throughout the Middle East, as part of an expanding global war, is spiraling dangerously out of control. The world stands closer to nuclear conflict than at any time since the Second World War. Nothing can stop this expanding global war except the development of a mass anti-war movement oriented to and based on the working class.

15 April 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Dr. Binoy Kampmark

While the Australian government continues to pirouette with shallow constancy on the issue of Israel’s war in Gaza, making vacuous utterances on Palestinian statehood even as it denies supplying the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) with weapons (spare parts, it would seem, are a different, footnoted matter), efforts made to unearth details of the defence relationship between the countries have so far come to naught.

The brief on Australian-Israel relations published by the Department of Trade and Foreign Affairs is deplorably skimpy, noting that both countries have, since 2017, “expanded cooperation on national security, defence and cyber security.”  Since 2018, we are told that annual talks have been conducted between defence officials, while Australia appointed, in early 2018, a resident Defence Attaché to the embassy in Tel Aviv.  What is conspicuously absent are details of the Memorandum of Understanding on defence cooperation both countries signed in 2017.

A little bit of scrapping around reveals that 2017 was something of a critical year, a true bumper return.  The Australia-Israel Defence Industry Cooperation Joint Working Group was created that October.  A following Australian Defence media release notes the group’s intention: “to strengthen ties between Australia and Israel, explore defence industry and innovation opportunities, identify export opportunities, and support our industries to cooperate in the development of innovative technologies for shared capability challenges.”

The intentions of the group were well borne out.  Defence contracts followed with sweet indulgence:  the February 2018 contract between Israel-based Rafael Advanced Defence Systems with Australia’s Bisalloy Steels worth A$900,000; an August 2018 joint venture between the Australian defence engineering company Varley Group and Rafael, behind such “leading weapons systems” as “the Spike LR2 anti-tank guided missile”; and the Electro Optic Systems-Elbit Systems agreement from 2019 responsible for developing “a modular medium-calibre turret that can be configured for a range of platforms, including lightweight reconnaissance and heavy fighting vehicles.”

In February this year, Elbit Systems, Israel’s notorious drone manufacturer and creator of the Hermes 450 aerial device responsible for this month’s killing of seven World Central Kitchen aid workers including the Australian national, Lalzawmi “Zomi” Frankcom, was rewarded with a A$917 million contract.  Business, even over bodies, exerts a corrupting force.

In a heartbeat after the outbreak of the latest Gaza War last October, the Australian Greens filed a Freedom of Information (FOI) request seeking a copy of the barely mentioned MOU.  After a period of three months, the Australian Defence Department reached the boring conclusion that the application should be rejected.  It fell, the argument went, within the category of exemptions so treasured by secretive bureaucrats keen to make sure the “freedom” in FOI is kept spare and bare.

What follows is repulsive to intellect and denigrating to morality.  “The document within the scope of this request,” went the letter from the Defence Department, “contains information which, if released, could reasonably be expected to damage the international relations of the Commonwealth.” The MOU “contains information communicated to Australia by a foreign government and its officials under the expectation that it would not be disclosed.”  Releasing “such information could harm Australia’s international standing and reputation.”

A telling, and troubling role was played by Israel in the process.  With characteristic, jellied spinelessness, Australian defence officials notified Israel of the FOI request in December 2023.  In February, the Netanyahu government responded with its views, of which we can only speculate.  The Greens were duly informed by the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) that the relevant decision maker in Defence “will consider the foreign government’s consultation response to make an informed and robust decision.”  With such words, a negative response was nigh predictable.

Greens Senator David Shoebridge, in responding to the decision, was adamant that, “There is no place for secret arms treaties and secret arms deals between countries.”  Furthermore, there was “no place for giving other countries veto power over what the Australian government tells the public about our government defence and arms deals.”  The case is even more pressing given allegations of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide taking place in the Gaza strip.

This regrettable episode retains a certain familiar repulsiveness.  Unfortunately for devotees of open government, a fraught term if ever there was one, Australia’s FOI regime remains stringently archaic and pathologically secretive.

Decision makers are given directions to frustrate, not aid applications to reveal information, notably on sensitive topics such as security, defence and international relations.  Spurious notions about damage to international relations are advanced to ensure secrecy and the muzzling of debate.  The OAIC has also shown itself to be lamentably weak, tardy and inefficient in reviewing applications.  In March 2023, it was revealed that almost 600 unresolved FOI cases had bottled up over the course of three years.

The latest refusal from the Defence Department to disclose the Israel-Australian MOU to members of Parliament, a decision reached after discussions with a foreign power (that fact is staggering and disheartening in of itself), betrays much doubletalk regarding defence ties between Canberra, the IDF, and the Israeli government.  More than that, it confirms that those in Canberra are being steered by other interests, longing for the approval of foreign eyes and foreign interests.

Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge.

14 April 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Dr Marwan Asmar

[https://twitter.com/HadiNasrallah/status/1779281620479975507]

Israel is under attack by incoming Iranian drones and ballistic missiles. The Jordanian skies lit up with passing missiles and drones as they made their way to Israel

[https://twitter.com/officejjsmart/status/1779287237638939047]

They were heard over the Jordanian skies at around 2 am local time, Sunday, 14 April, 2024. A series of booming noise was heard as the trajectory objects made their way over the Jordanian capital, Amman.

The number of those fired from Iran varied from 50, 100, 150 and 200 missiles. The social media blustered over the figures.

[https://twitter.com/Ali_Al_SmAdi/status/1779286263540977692]

Later on, news sources suggested 400 and 500 missiles were expected to reach Israel’s strategic depth. And later another figure was branded about of 1500 missiles that targeted Israel.

But there was immediate speculation about the origins of these missiles with observers suggesting they may have come from Shiite groups in Iraq, Hezbollah in Lebanon and/or from the Houthis from Yemen.

[https://twitter.com/salardigione/status/1779274870204899331]

Social media pundits were quick to videoclip the missiles over the skies of Amman which very quickly dominated the social media.

The United States on hearing about the launch of the drones and missiles from Iran’s western part, Saturday evening – around 1700 kilometers away from Israel -quickly promised it would seek to intercept these trajectories.

Very quickly also Jordan quickly closed its airspace to any incoming and outgoing flights with Iraq also closing to airspace. Jordan’s Civil Aviation Regulatory Authority (CARC) announced the extension of the closure of the Kingdom’s airspace until 11 a.m. local time (8 a.m. UTC). This came in a statement following an earlier announcement statement issued the previous evening.

Dr Asmar is an Amman-based writer covering Middle East Affairs

14 April 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Feroze Mithiborwala

Iran made all the due preparations over the last few days and then struck Israel with a mighty series of blows with its drones and cruise missiles. Iran’s retaliation was its answer to the Israeli attack on the Iranian consulate in Damascus. Now the Iranians have answered, as they promised they would and have struck military and other targets in Israel.

Iran ensured that none of the US bases in the region, in Iraq, Syria, or the Gulf countries, or Turkey would retaliate – none! If the US did, the the Axis of Resistance would strike at the US bases, ensuring their utter destruction. Until now, the USS Carney too has not struck Iran, and the UK has backed out from any role whatsoever.

In case of Israeli attacks, the Axis of Resistance has further warned of great escalation on the Lebanese front, where the Hezbollah could take Israeli (Occupied Palestine 1948) territory all the way till Haifa. Syria too will move into the Golan Heights and reclaim its sovereign territory held by Israel since 1967.

The Yemeni Houthi government continues to stand guard on the Red Sea, with Iran controlling the Hormuz Strait, the entry to the Persian Gulf.

Iran’s attack on the psychopathic mass murderer Judeo-Nazi entity of Israel has boosted the morale of the people and nations across the region and across the world. There are celebrations on the streets of Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Yemen, Jordan, with more and more countries joining the celebrations.

Israel has made a great strategic error by directly attacking Iran, thus now directly drawing Iran into the fast unfolding regional war. Iran had no choice, but to retaliate against the Israeli attacks on its consulate in Damascus. Israel, after facing a strategic military defeat in Gaza, wanted to expand the war, drawing in Iran, and then would follow the US & the rest of the Anglo-Zionist Western alliance.

After the Iranian retaliation, now will Israel escalate the war further?

Will the US too attack Iran from its aircraft carriers on standby?

What will be the role of Russia in the fast-unfolding war? Russia has a strategic alliance with Iran, as is evident from their military & political cooperation in Syria to Ukraine. China too will surely stand with Russia and Iran.

So even as deep cracks are appearing within the Western alliance, the nations that constitute the Global South, the World Majority are fast uniting. The nations of Asia, Africa, the America’s, are fast uniting for the cause of Palestine, which is the central geopolitical issue and the greatest moral issue of our times.

If the US attacks Iran, its illegal bases, its illegal presence in Syria, in Iraq will come under massive attack and the US will yet again have to flee in ignominy, just as they did from Vietnam & Afghanistan.

Due to the ongoing Holocaust of the Palestinian people, Israel is deeply isolated internationally, a pariah, a war criminal entity. Israel is deeply divided within and not even the war has managed to unite the country. Netanyahu is highly unpopular, and his extreme rightwing bunch of extremist Judeo-Nazi psychopaths, the Gvir’s, the Smotrich’s, are dragging Israel towards certain defeat.

If the war came to a halt, Netanyahu will lose power, he will have to resign. He faces serious corruption charges with hearings still pending in the Supreme Court. Netanyahu will go to prison, which is why he is desperately prolonging the war.

If an election were held today, Netanyahu and his ultra-rightwing fanatical Jewish Bloc will lose. Israel has lost all sense of direction, be it in terms of political strategy, both at home or abroad, or on the battlefield. Thus, even after committing a Holocaust, Israel has been unable to defeat the Palestinian resistance, or break the will of the Palestinian people, who refuse to surrender. Thus, despite the Hiroshima-Nagasaki scale of bombings, the mass murder, the torture, the famine and starvation conditions created by the Israeli Nazi entity – Gaza still stands, Palestine still stands!!

Now, Iran, the Axis of the Regional Resistance, Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen are ready to proceed with the “Last War of Independence”. The freedom and liberty of all of the West Asian region is at stake, of the World is at stake. We are witness to the collapse of US-led Western imperialism & Zionism.

The Global South, the Global  Majority stand with Palestine! The People of the world, which include the majority of the people of the West, including a few governments like Ireland & Spain, too stand with Palestine. It’s now down to a handful of Zionist occupied regimes in the US, UK, Germany, France and Canada. They yet, shamefully support, arm, finance the colonial settler occupation, the ethnic cleansing, the war crimes, the genocide, and the Holocaust of the Palestinian nation. These Western regimes too are increasingly isolated, mere pariah states.

Israel is led by deranged, insane racist, supremacist cabal of Judeo-Nazi fanatics, and when a state is led by such delusional maniacs, their words, their actions and their misdeeds, lead to the eventual collapse and the destruction of that nation. The destruction of Israel is directly proportional to the growing Jewish fanaticism and the increasing genocidal war crimes against the Palestinian population.

The consequences of the “October 7 Gaza Ghetto Uprising” have indeed been far reaching & it has upset all of the Israeli & US calculations. They have been unable to comprehend and decipher the depth of its meaning and strategic impact that it would have.

The October 7 Palestinian uprising was a desperate “Call for Freedom”, a call that much of the world was deaf to, blind to, but is now hearing, seeing, heeding…..

The end of the Israeli Occupation of Palestine draws closer and closer.

Palestine will be free. After decades of Persecution and Crucifixion, the world is witnessing the Resurrection of the Palestinian nation.

All the Palestinians are soon coming back home, and We, with them.

Feroze Mithiborwala is Founder-National Gen. Sec. India Palestine Solidarity Forum

14 April 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Dr Marwan Asmar

Gaza no more! All of its 364-kilometers have been totally destroyed and obliterated. If the Israeli army had the capability, they would have wiped it off the face of the earth. But the resistance is another story. They stand strong and unflinching.

Israel has barely scratched the surface in “eradicating” Hamas and the other Palestinian groups. By all counts, and despite its colossal destruction, they give as good as they get and even better.

The Israelis, their politicians and army stand bewildered. The only thing they are doing is more destruction and bombing. They are bombing towns, cities and neighborhoods a second, third and fourth times simply because the resistance is too strong. They are bogged down. In Gaza there is no “cleaning operations”.

But it has been tough for the Palestinians in this smallest enclave in the world. Its destruction has been magnified and brutal.

“Every time I walk the streets of Gaza, I am overwhelmed by the desire to cry over what the city has become,” Bayan Abu Sultan writes on her X platform page @BayanPalestine.

“The smell of the blood of the martyrs’ wafts in every neighborhood,” the journalist whose home behind Al Shifa hospital was destroyed by the Israeli army says.

“The rubble extends as far as the eye can see in every direction,” the journalist who lived some of the worst onslaught on Al Shifa hospital by the Israel army, and was thought killed at one time points out.

https://t.me/QudsNen/101402

Gaza no more!

“The garbage has piled up to an extent that prevents the continuation of normal life, and the features of the people only appear helpless.

Gaza has become uninhabitable,” she adds.

Quoting from what she said the Quds News Network points out “female Palestinian journalist Bayan Abu Sultan says after more than six months of brutal Israeli genocide, Gaza has become uninhabitable.

At one time when the Israeli army raided Al Shifa Hospital and started killing many of its people and destroyed its surrounding the French Reporters Sans Frontiers sounded the alarm bells that she may have been killed by the Israelis because she disappeared from the radar screen after 18 March.

Despite the mass slaughter, killing and destruction – 33,000 killed, 76,000 injured, 1.9 million displaced out of a total population of 2.3 million – many observers, a lot are Jewish and Israelis says after seven months of war on Gaza, it is Israel which is being defeated.

Many of the Hebrew media and newspapers are talking about a major defeat for Israel in its seventh months of war on Gaza. The daily Yedioth Ahronot headlines its report as “Israel defeated and Isolated” saying “the Israeli regime” is “defeated in the war against the Gaza Strip and is in sever isolation.”

The daily paper says the government and army has failed and “the main reason for this failure is the short-sighted party policy pursued by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.”

Haaretz,  another influential daily, writes: “We shouldn’t say that [word defeat] but there is no other option “We are defeated, it’s a total defeat.” Quoting the paper one blogger points out “admitting defeat is a matter of time…the entity is paying the price for its crimes”.

Adding insult to injury, he says none of the Israeli objectives were achieved in the war, only victories against women and children.

And Haim Ramon, an ex-Justice Minister, agrees. He says Israel has indeed, been strategically defeated in its war on Gaza. He made the comments in a radio interview quoted by the Hebrew Maariv newspaper.

And further to that, former Israeli Deputy Chief of Staff Yair Golan says that the Israeli army is stuck in Gaza without any real goals and/or exit strategy to leave the enclave.

One blogger (@HealthRanger) put it this way: “Israel’s only real military capabilities lie in bombing and slaughtering innocent, unarmed women and children who have no weapons, no air defenses and no armor.” He points out the IDF is “snowflake” and has been defeated whilst “Israel has only destroyed its reputation with the entire world.”

He says “Netanyahu has put Israel on a path of self-destruction that will earn the Zionists a place in history alongside the worst genocidal murderers the world has ever known”.  Another blogger says Israel has “lost everything against the civilians of Gaza” whilst “Hamas has not been defeated and Israel appears for what it is: A genocidal state that aims only to take Gaza.

Finally, another Jewish blogger says in this war Israel sends the best of its soldiers but they return back handicapped, crippled and no longer of any use to the army that is if they are not killed.

Dr Asmar is based in Amman and covers Middle East affairs

13 April 2024

Source: countercurrents.org