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By Medea Benjamin

In Superman, we’re watching something hauntingly familiar: a powerful state waging war on a trapped civilian population, a global superpower choosing complicity over justice, and a narrative war where truth is the first casualty.

Director James Gunn insists the new Superman film isn’t a political allegory, noting the script was completed before the events of October 7, 2023. But art, especially in times of global crisis, often outgrows the intentions of its creators. Whether consciously crafted or not, the world is receiving this film as a lens through which to process grief, rage, and a collective hunger for justice for the Palestinian people.

Watching the film, I couldn’t help but cheer not only for Superman—but for the people of Jarhanpur, a battered, besieged territory subjected to ongoing military assault by its high-tech neighbor, Boravia. Jarhanpur’s residents are depicted as marginalized and vilified, living in ruins under constant threat. The imagery of bombed-out buildings, displaced families, and children pulled from rubble evokes the horrors of the Israeli assault on Gaza and the mounting toll on Palestinian civilians. The people of Jarhanpur are also racially coded to align with Arab identity: darker-skinned actors, traditional garments, accents, and names.

Another parallel lies in the politics of narrative. Boravia brands Jarhanpur’s fighters as terrorists—a label the film slowly dismantles by revealing the humanity, grief, and resistance of a people struggling to survive. It’s a powerful reflection of the Palestinian experience, where the word “terrorist” is weaponized to erase history, justify massacres, and delegitimize resistance.

Boravia, portrayed as the aggressor, fits the role of villainous state all too well: overwhelming military superiority, settler-style expansionism, and a narrative of perpetual self-defense. The film’s portrayal of Boravia’s government manipulating facts and weaponizing fear mirrors Israel’s real-world disinformation campaigns—and the Western media’s complicity in amplifying them.

Superman himself initially tries to remain neutral—but neutrality collapses in the face of genocide. He ultimately sides with the oppressed, recognizing that Jarhanpur’s people are fighting for survival, dignity, and freedom. This arc mirrors the global awakening we’re seeing today, as more and more people stand with Palestinians and reject the apartheid policies and war crimes of the Israeli state.

In Superman, we’re watching something hauntingly familiar: a powerful state waging war on a trapped civilian population, a global superpower choosing complicity over justice, and a narrative war where truth is the first casualty.

Those of us who have taken a stand against Israel’s genocide should take advantage of this cultural moment. Distribute flyers at film showings. Write your own reviews. Use this film as an educational tool to expose Israel’s atrocities and uplift the righteous struggle of the Palestinian people.

And maybe—just maybe—Superman can remind us that the world community, united with the Palestinian people, can become the real superpower that defeats Boravia… I mean, Israel.

Medea Benjamin is co-founder of Global Exchange and CODEPINK: Women for Peace.

18 July 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor 

Palestinian Territory – The deaths of 21 Palestinian civilians by suffocation, crowd crush, and live fire from US security forces operating in coordination with the Israeli army at an aid distribution centre in Rafah expose the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) as an active instrument of the systematic mass killing and starvation policies imposed on Gaza.

These centres are no longer relief sites but death traps, deliberately used to lure starving crowds in scenes marked by humiliation and genocide, which constitutes a grave violation of international law and requires the immediate suspension of GHF’s operations, an urgent investigation, and full criminal accountability.

Documentation by Euro-Med Monitor’s field team revealed that the attack on Wednesday, 16 July 2025, occurred in two phases. The first happened around 4:00 a.m., when Israeli forces opened fire on thousands of civilians gathered on al-Tina Street, north of Rafah, as food aid trucks were being unloaded, resulting in multiple deaths and injuries. Despite the gunfire and casualties, thousands remained. They had no choice but to wait or starve, especially after a GHF worker told them distribution would begin at 6:00 a.m.

The second phase happened at 6:20 a.m., when crowds surged toward the outer gate of the distribution centre amid severe overcrowding and the closure of the inner gate. This led to a deadly crowd crush, with no safety measures or immediate intervention to prevent or contain the disaster.

Instead of organising the crowds and ensuring their safety, US special forces used pepper spray and fired sound bombs and tear gas at civilians trapped between the outer and inner gates, triggering panic and chaos. Thousands tried to escape, while some attempted to jump into the distribution centre to avoid overcrowding and certain death, only to be met with live fire as well.

The open fire and the resulting violent crowd crush caused the deaths of at least 21 Palestinians, including seven killed by live ammunition and 15 from tear gas inhalation and the crush, according to the Ministry of Health in Gaza.

A review by Euro-Med Monitor of several casualties found no signs of bullet wounds, supporting the conclusion that most victims died from suffocation or being trampled in a closed, overcrowded space with no protective measures in place.

Abdul Rahman B., one of the survivors, told Euro-Med Monitor’s team: “At around 6:15 a.m., a quadcopter arrived and announced that the distribution centre had been opened and required that we head to the gates.”

“People rushed frantically toward the entrances, and when we reached the front gate, we found the inner gate closed and a heavy presence of US forces accompanied by employees speaking Arabic,” said Abdul Rahman. “They asked us to step back 50 metres and enter in groups of no more than 100, but the crowding was so intense that stepping back was impossible.”

He continued: “Minutes later, they began firing sound bombs, followed by tear gas and pepper spray. People were disoriented and suffocating. Some tried to climb the fences to escape, but snipers shot them. Those who fell to the ground could not get up and were trampled. I saw women and children among the victims, and we only managed to escape by stepping over the dead bodies lying there.”

This incident demonstrates that aid distribution centres were deliberately placed in dangerous locations, designed with narrow paths enclosed by barbed-wire fences that can be easily sealed. These routes cannot accommodate the vast numbers of people in need and are fully controlled by the Israeli army, making them resemble elaborate traps for killing and humiliation rather than corridors for humanitarian aid.

GHF, established by Israel to manage its starvation policy, issued a brief statement claiming to have opened an investigation into the incident. This follows a familiar propaganda pattern: whenever starving civilians are killed, an internal investigation is announced, its results are never released, no one is held accountable, and the same crime is repeated without consequence.

An investigation by an organisation established within a framework designed to perpetuate starvation can hardly be considered credible. Given its direct role in managing starvation, GHF must be immediately dismantled and its mandate withdrawn. It operates under the guise of humanitarian work, failing as a neutral intermediary for aid delivery.

GHF functions as a field instrument of blockade, starvation, and killing by operating distribution centres designed to humiliate civilians and gather them in tightly controlled locations under the pretext of “organising” crowds. Rather than protecting those in need, it facilitates the implementation of engineered starvation and creates a closed environment where civilians are killed in the name of humanitarian aid.

Even when a threat is alleged, international law requires security forces to apply force in a proportionate and graduated manner, using lethal force only as a last resort and in response to an imminent and real threat to life. This standard was not met in the documented cases, making the killings a grave and flagrant violation of international law.

The deliberate targeting of Palestinian civilians as they seek food, along with the use of starvation as a weapon, is a clear violation of international humanitarian and criminal law. These acts constitute war crimes under the Rome Statute, including wilful killing, targeting civilians, and using starvation as a method of warfare, all of which are strictly prohibited in armed conflicts.

The widespread and systematic nature of these violations against the civilian population fulfils the elements of crimes against humanity, particularly killing, persecution, and inhumane acts causing severe suffering or serious physical or mental harm, when committed as part of a systematic attack targeting civilians.

Placing these crimes in their broader context, including the systematic destruction of means of survival, the denial of aid access, and the imposition of deadly living conditions on the civilian population, along with public incitement by Israeli political and military figures, reveals a clear and deliberate intent to destroy the Palestinian population in the Gaza Strip. According to Article II of the Genocide Convention, these acts constitute genocide, specifically through the intentional killing of members of the group and the imposition of living conditions calculated to bring about its physical destruction, in whole or in part.

The international community and complicit governments bear responsibility for the continued crimes against starving civilians at GHF-run aid distribution centres in the Gaza Strip. An immediate halt to GHF operations is essential, along with the launch of an independent international investigation leading to the prosecution of its officials before international and national courts for their involvement in systematic mass killings at distribution sites imposed by the Israeli army as a replacement for the UN mechanism that had operated in the enclave for nearly a year and a half.

International and national judicial bodies must move to hold US President Donald Trump criminally accountable for his complicity in the genocide in the Gaza Strip. This includes his adoption and direct support of the Israeli aid distribution mechanism, imposed by force and transformed into arenas of mass slaughter against starving civilians, as well as his administration’s full-scale provision of military, financial, political, and diplomatic backing that enabled Israel to commit and expand the crime for over 21 months.

The United States, through this organisation and other instruments, continues to provide political, logistical, financial, and military cover for Israel’s crimes, rendering current and former American officials, foremost among them President Donald Trump, subject to international criminal accountability.

Euro-Med Monitor calls for holding all state leaders involved in the genocide committed in the Gaza Strip accountable, whether through direct or indirect participation, by providing political, military, or financial support, or by facilitating its commission in any form. Such acts constitute criminal complicity under Article 25 of the Rome Statute. It holds states that failed to take serious measures to prevent or stop the crime legally responsible under their international obligations, particularly under the Genocide Convention.

A comprehensive and independent international investigation must be launched into the role of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation in facilitating and executing serious crimes committed against Palestinian civilians. These investigations should address the individual responsibility of the organisation’s founders, directors, logistics coordinators, team leaders, and any other staff members, whether through planning, facilitating, directly contributing, or knowingly failing to prevent the commission of crimes.

We urge all states with territorial or universal jurisdiction to open immediate criminal investigations against all individuals affiliated with the GHF and its contracted private security firms, in order to hold them accountable for their role in crimes committed against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, particularly including wilful killings, starvation, and cruel or degrading treatment.

All states, both individually and collectively, must fulfil their legal responsibilities by taking urgent action to stop the genocide in the Gaza Strip, through implementing effective measures to protect Palestinian civilians; ensuring Israel’s compliance with international law and the decisions of the International Court of Justice; preventing the implementation of the US-Israeli forced displacement plan; and holding Israel and its more powerful allies accountable for all crimes against the Palestinians in the Strip. The International Criminal Court must implement the arrest warrants for the Israeli Prime Minister and Minister of Defence at the earliest opportunity, in accordance with the principle that there is no immunity for international crimes.

The international community must also impose economic, diplomatic, and military sanctions on Israel for its systematic and grave violations of international law. These sanctions should include an arms embargo; an end to all political, financial, and military support; freezing the assets of officials involved in crimes against Palestinians; imposing travel ban on these officials; suspending the operations of Israeli military and security industries companies in international markets; banning involved companies’ access to banking services; and suspending trade privileges and bilateral agreements that provide Israel with economic benefits that enable its continued crimes.

Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor is a Geneva-based independent organization with regional offices across the MENA region and Europe

18 July 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Quds News Network

Gaza (Quds News Network)- An Israeli strike on Gaza’s only Catholic church killed three persons, including two Christian women and injured several others, including the priest, on Thursday.

The Israeli strike on the Holy Family Church, Gaza’s only Catholic church, injured six, including the priest and a child.

The priest was seen with his right leg bandaged but otherwise in good condition. Father Gabriele Romanelli was very close with the late Pope Francis.

The church was sheltering both Christians and Muslims, including several children with disabilities, according to Fadel Naem, the acting director of al-Ahli Hospital that received those wounded in the attack.

Naem told AP that at least two people were in critical condition.

The church is a short distance from the al-Ahli Hospital and the area has been repeatedly struck for more than a week, he said.

The Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem condemned the Israeli attack on the Holy Family Church in Gaza this morning, which claimed the lives of two Palestinians. In a press release, they stated: “With deep sorrow the Latin Patriarchate can now confirm that two persons were killed as a result of an apparent strike by the Israeli army that hit the Holy Family Compound this morning. We pray for the rest of their souls and for the end of this barbaric war. Nothing can justify the targeting of innocent civilians.”

The two victims were identified as Saad Issa Kostandi Salameh and Foumia Issa Latif Ayyad.

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The Israeli military admitted attacking the church and said they are aware of the “claim” regarding damage to the church and injuries at the site.

The incident is “under investigation”, the spokesman added.

Since the start of the war on Gaza, Israel has repeatedly attacked religious sites, including mosques and churches.

In October 2023, just days after the war began, Israeli forces bombed the Church of Saint Porphyrius, the Gaza Strip’s oldest, killing at least 18 people.

17 July 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor

Palestinian Territory – The Israeli army’s announcement of a new corridor dividing eastern and western Khan Yunis marks a dangerous escalation in a broader colonial project to fragment Palestinian territory.

This move paves the way for geographic and demographic restructuring in line with Israel’s long-term objectives. It serves as an additional tool to isolate areas, dismantle unity within the Gaza Strip, and reengineer realities on the ground. The aim is to entrench military control and forcibly confine the population to a narrow coastal area under inhumane conditions, functioning as a direct method of their deliberate destruction.

The Israeli army announced today the establishment of the Magen Oz corridor, a 15-kilometre military road separating eastern and western Khan Yunis. The corridor reinforces Israel’s policy of isolation and the fragmentation of Gaza’s territorial integrity. It also revives traditional colonial tools in modern form, aiming to impose a permanent reality that undermines the Palestinian presence and paves the way for depopulation.

This corridor is part of Israel’s effort to establish a permanent military presence in the Gaza Strip and reflects its disregard for any de-escalation efforts that could lead to an end to its military operations or its illegal occupation of the enclave.

The areas isolated by the new Israeli corridor cover approximately 45 per cent of Khan Yunis Governorate, equivalent to around 12 per cent of the total area of the Gaza Strip. The corridor begins at the Morag corridor south of Khan Yunis, which Israel announced in April, and extends north along Salah al-Din Street. It completely isolates the areas of Jouret Allout and Ma’an, as well as the towns of Al-Fukhari, Khuza’a, Bani Suheila, Abasan al-Kabira, Abasan al-Jadida, and the eastern parts of Al-Qarara north of Khan Yunis.

Euro-Med Monitor’s field team has documented a sharp escalation in bombing and systematic destruction in the areas east of Khan Yunis, now isolated by the new corridor. Israeli forces carried out aerial and artillery strikes, used explosive-laden robots, and then deployed heavy machinery to conceal the destruction and transport rubble to unknown locations inside Israel. The team estimates that at least 90 per cent of the buildings in these areas have been destroyed.

In its statements on operations in the Gaza Strip, the Israeli army deliberately misrepresented the construction of the new corridor, concealing the fact that it is being built over the ruins of thousands of destroyed buildings and residential homes that once stood in the area.

The destruction is not confined to buildings along the corridor but extends in all directions to surrounding areas covering several kilometres. This operation aims to erase the urban environment entirely under a false military pretext.

Similarly, when the Israeli army announces the clearing of militants from an area, it is in fact declaring its complete obliteration: total destruction, forced displacement, and the uprooting of all forms of life. This pattern was evident in the northern Gaza Strip and in Rafah, where misleading military rhetoric was used to mask mass killings, widespread displacement, and the systematic destruction of urban infrastructure, all in an attempt to conceal acts of genocide behind deceptive terminology.

This behaviour reflects an Israeli military doctrine that treats civilian presence as a threat to be eliminated. It designates homes, hospitals, and schools as “terrorist” infrastructure and considers civilians legitimate targets simply for remaining in targeted areas, in a flagrant and unprecedented breach of the most fundamental principles of international humanitarian law.

Such practices are part of a systematic process that began with the onset of the Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip, characterised by the deliberate and wide-scale destruction of entire cities and neighbourhoods. This is a direct manifestation of the ongoing genocide, now in its twenty-first month, where demolition, devastation, and forced displacement serve as primary tools of execution.

In addition to killing and wounding hundreds of Palestinians and systematically destroying the lives of approximately 2.3 million people by eliminating their basic means of survival, Israeli forces are actively working to annihilate Palestinian cities, including their architectural and cultural fabric. This is accompanied by the erasure of Palestinian national and cultural identity, the uprooting of people from their land, permanent forced displacement, denial of return, dismantling of communities, and the obliteration of collective memory, all as part of a systematic attempt to eliminate their physical and human presence and to destroy their past, present, and future.

Residential areas across the Gaza Strip are being subjected to daily destruction and repeated bombing by Israeli forces, reducing them to rubble. Heavy machinery then arrives to clear the debris and transport it into Israel, completely altering the landscape of these areas.

The ongoing pattern of comprehensive destruction targeting Palestinian towns and neighbourhoods, including homes, civilian and economic facilities, and infrastructure, clearly shows that this devastation is not driven by military necessity. Instead, it is aimed at erasing Palestinian material and cultural heritage, in grave violation of international law.

This behaviour is part of Israel’s policy of urbicide, targeting not only the Palestinian population and their properties, but also their cultural and civilisational existence. It involves erasing physical and historical traces of their connection to the land, weakening their ability to remain, and ultimately eliminating their social and physical presence to pave the way for illegal settlement projects in the Gaza Strip.

The forced displacement of Palestinians is a direct extension of Israel’s decades-long settler-colonial project, rooted in the erasure of Palestinian existence and the seizure of their land. What sets this phase apart is its unprecedented scale and severity, demonstrated by the comprehensive targeting of all 2.3 million residents of the Gaza Strip since 7 October 2023 through genocide and the denial of people’s most basic human rights. The conditions of extreme coercion and deprivation forced upon the Palestinian people represent a deliberate effort to push them out of their homeland, not by choice but as a condition for their very survival. This stands as one of the most blatant cases of planned mass displacement in modern history.

All states must fulfil their international obligations by pressuring Israel to halt the genocide and other serious crimes in the Gaza Strip. This includes protecting civilians, ensuring Israel’s compliance with international law and the rulings of the International Court of Justice, imposing sanctions, ending all forms of military, financial, and political support, and immediately suspending arms sales, transfers, purchases, and related export licences and military aid. Israel must be held accountable at all levels, both domestically and internationally.

States and relevant entities must also pursue accountability of countries complicit in or supportive of Israel’s crimes, most notably the United States, along with other governments that provide Israel with any form of assistance connected to these violations. This includes military, intelligence, political, legal, financial, and media support, as well as any contractual engagements that contribute to the continuation of these crimes.

Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor is a Geneva-based independent organization with regional offices across the MENA region and Europe

17 July 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Quds News Network

Gaza (Quds News Network)- More than 20,000 Palestinian women and girls have been killed in Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza, according to a new report by Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor. That’s more than one woman or girl every hour since the genocide began in October 2023.

These victims were not just numbers. They were mothers, daughters, doctors, teachers, workers, students, and leaders. Each played a vital role in holding their families and communities together.

Among the 42,620 children who lost at least one parent, around 6,500 lost their mothers.

“It’s a wound no child can truly heal from,” the report said.

Over 1 million women and girls in Gaza have been forcibly displaced. Among them are 150,000 pregnant women and new mothers. Many are giving birth in tents, bombed homes, or what’s left of destroyed hospitals, often without clean water, medical staff, or safety.

Giving birth in Gaza has become a life-threatening act, according to the report.

More than 80% of Gaza’s health facilities have been destroyed. Only five hospitals offer partial maternity services. One in every three pregnancies is now considered high-risk. One in five babies is born preterm or underweight.

Thousands of women have died from preventable causes, including childbirth complications, infections, and untreated chronic illnesses, due to Israel’s blockade and repeated targeting of Gaza’s healthcare system.

These deaths are rarely counted in the official toll. “Their absence is one of the genocide’s many hidden tolls,” Euro-Med Monitor warned.

Starvation has become a weapon. Over 95% of pregnant and breastfeeding women suffer from severe malnutrition. Families go days without food as Israel continues to block basic supplies including baby formula.

“Starving fetuses and newborns isn’t military strategy. It’s annihilation,” the group said.

Inside Israeli prisons, Palestinian women face sexual and reproductive violence. Reports describe female detainees being raped or threatened with rape, subjected to invasive strip searches, genital kicking, breast grabbing, and being denied menstrual hygiene products. Pregnant detainees are denied food and medical care.

Outside prison walls, evidence continues to mount of Israeli soldiers looting Palestinian homes and humiliating women. Hundreds of verified photos and videos show soldiers flaunting and wearing women’s underwear, desecrating personal belongings, and mocking the dead and displaced.

“This violation defiles what is sacred in our culture and faith,” said the report. “It haunts the collective memory of the Palestinian people.”

Euro-Med Monitor, along with UN investigators, says this is not accidental. Gender-based violence in Gaza is being used as a weapon of war; a systematic strategy to break, humiliate, and erase the Palestinian people.

It meets the legal definitions of genocide under the Rome Statute, including acts intended to prevent births and inflict conditions of destruction.

Gaza also now holds the world’s highest rate of child amputees. Between 3,000 and 4,000 children, many of them girls, have lost limbs in Israeli attacks. At least 10 children a day become amputees.

These girls now face lifelong trauma, without proper treatment or prosthetics. Many cannot walk, play, or even sleep without pain.

The report ends with a warning: the world must not ignore the targeted destruction of women and girls in Gaza. Their erasure is not collateral damage. It is a central feature of what human rights groups are calling a gendered genocide.

17 July 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Quds News Network

The Hague (Quds News Network)- The International Criminal Court (ICC) has rejected Israel’s attempt to cancel arrest warrants issued against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant. The decision was announced on tod by Pre-Trial Chamber I.

Israel had asked the ICC to withdraw or invalidate the warrants. It also called on the Court to suspend its investigation into crimes committed in Palestine. A senior Israeli legal team submitted the request on May 9, 2025.

But the ICC judges ruled that the arrest warrants remain valid. The judges said the Court had the legal authority to issue them. They rejected Israel’s claim that the warrants violated the suspects’ human rights or international law.

“The warrants include valid jurisdictional findings,” the judges stated. They also said that reversing a procedural ruling earlier this year did not affect the legal foundation of the warrants.

The ruling also clarified another key point. Israel wanted the ICC to pause its investigation until a final decision is made on jurisdiction. The Court refused.

Under Article 19(7) of the Rome Statute, an investigation can be suspended if a state challenges the admissibility of a case. But Israel only challenged the Court’s jurisdiction, not the admissibility. Therefore, the ICC said the investigation will go on.

The Chamber noted that only admissibility challenges can halt investigations. Jurisdictional challenges, it ruled, do not carry the same effect.

Palestine had asked to submit its own observations on Israel’s request. But the Court said it already had enough information and declined to hear additional arguments from the Palestinian side at this stage.

The decision marks a major step in the ICC’s ongoing investigation into Israeli war crimes in the occupied Palestinian territories. The Court began the investigation in 2021 and issued the arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant in November 2024.

Israel does not recognize the Court’s jurisdiction. However, the ICC has ruled that it has legal authority over the territories occupied by Israel since 1967; Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem.

The ICC’s investigation focuses on crimes committed since June 13, 2014.

Despite mounting political pressure, the Court reaffirmed its position. The investigation will move forward, and the arrest warrants remain active.

17 July 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Rima Najjar

How Mossad’s spyware, America’s silence, and the weaponization of loyalty expose a crisis in alliance, narrative, and justice

Despite billions in military aid, cutting-edge technological support, and unflinching diplomatic shielding, the United States is routinely surveilled by the very ally it sustains. Through Mossad, Israel reciprocates not with loyalty but with layered espionage — described by former CIA operative Andrew Bustamante as gifts laced with spyware and collaboration steeped in distrust. For many Americans, this moral asymmetry cuts against the intuitive link between generosity and allegiance.

In a now-viral segment of Julian Dorey’s Podcast #224, Bustamante recounts how Mossad would offer the CIA “presents” — usually tech or intelligence tools — routinely embedded with spyware. The anecdote isn’t exceptional; it’s emblematic. Mossad’s ethos, shaped by a Zionist statecraft that privileges domination over accountability, is unapologetic: deception over transparency, survival over solidarity, interests over alliances. Its guiding credo, “By way of deception, thou shalt do war,” isn’t rhetorical flourish. It’s a tactical doctrine where manipulation is sacred, ethical boundaries expendable, and strategic betrayal, even of benefactors, fully normalized.

While the CIA navigates diplomatic constraint and executive oversight, Mossad operates with doctrinal autonomy. The asymmetry is both operational and philosophical, and it reverberates negatively against Palestinians through policymaking, intelligence norms, and the moral language of alliance.

The asymmetry at the heart of the U.S.–Israel alliance — where unconditional aid meets strategic betrayal — is not a diplomatic fluke. It’s structural. Mossad’s ethos of deception, embedded in Zionist doctrine, offers a blueprint for unaccountable power: surveillance recast as partnership, aggression disguised as preemption. And U.S. policy doesn’t just tolerate this calculus — it amplifies it.

Take the 2021 Iron Dome funding debate. Despite evidence that the system shielded bombing campaigns in Gaza, lawmakers across the aisle framed it as a humanitarian imperative, divorced from on-the-ground realities. U.S.–Israel intelligence collaboration, including joint surveillance tools and biometric databases, has empowered Shin Bet’s predictive policing — marking Palestinian youth as preemptive threats based on algorithmic suspicion.

Mossad’s operations targeting U.S. diplomats or breaching counterintelligence norms are met with silence — not for lack of evidence, but because the alliance is sacrosanct. Within this schema, deception is valorized as strategic brilliance. The result: policy frameworks that privilege impunity over principle, alliance over accountability, and erasure over evidence.

Zionist statecraft doesn’t limit deception to espionage. It encodes it into the very architecture of governance. In Gaza, Israel’s doctrine of “mowing the lawn” — a euphemism for routine mass bombardment — reframes civilian annihilation as counterterrorism. The 2024 ICJ ruling that Israel’s occupation of Gaza, East Jerusalem, and the West Bank is illegal was met with escalated settlement expansion and settler militia violence, especially in Area C. These militias, often armed and protected, displace Palestinian shepherds and Bedouin communities under the guise of “security zones.” Western diplomatic cover transforms ethnic cleansing into a strategic imperative.

Such logic has precedent. The Balfour Declaration of 1917 and the Ha’avara Agreement with Nazi Germany exemplify how Zionist institutions have historically leveraged imperial power to entrench colonial dominance. Today, the pattern persists — this time through the U.S., enabling Israel’s impunity via normalized apartheid. Land seizures, movement restrictions, and denial of citizenship are branded as defensive maneuvers against a population rendered suspect by design. In this matrix, security is no longer protection — it is pretext. Realpolitik is not pragmatism — it’s the ideological lubricant for a project of erasure.

Israel’s impunity is insulated not just by military superiority or diplomatic muscle, but also by narrative armor. It re-codes transgression as necessity, dominance as defense. This ideological scaffolding leans heavily on Holocaust memory, existential anxiety, and the language of perpetual threat. Israel, as it professes to the world, does not merely defend itself — it defends “civilization” against barbarism. In this schema, preemptive strikes, indefinite detentions, and siege warfare are rebranded as moral imperatives.

Consider Mossad’s extrajudicial assassinations — across sovereign states from Lebanon to Malaysia. Rarely condemned, they’re framed as tactical genius, immortalized in Hollywood, and repackaged as heroic innovation. The logic: Israeli violence is uniquely legible, rooted in historical trauma and the burden of Jewish survival. Meanwhile, Palestinian resistance — regardless of its alignment with international anti-colonial norms — is treated as structurally illegitimate.

More insidiously, Zionist exceptionalism weaponizes the language of liberal democracy to obscure apartheid. Israel brands itself “the only democracy in the Middle East” while imposing dual legal regimes: one for Jewish settlers, another for Palestinians under occupation. Anti-Semitism discourse is instrumentalized to collapse critique of Israeli policy into hatred of Jewish people. This isn’t accidental — it’s tactical. It recasts settler colonialism as a civilizational crusade, where indigenous erasure becomes a sacred necessity.

In intelligence, this logic mirrors Mossad’s playbook: deceive, distort, dominate — not in defiance of moral codes, but in their name. Spyware-laced “gifts,” institutional infiltration, and normalization of double agency are strategic affirmations of a sacred mission. Subversion is sanctified — deception, a birthright.

The U.S. response to Mossad’s tactics isn’t shaped by ignorance. Americans working in tech are aware that Israeli industrial actors not only conduct corporate espionage frequently, but when suspected and reported, US agencies routinely refuse to investigate and prosecute flagrant incidents happening right under their noses, even when they acknowledge them. Israel’s supposed tech innovations in surveillance, monitoring, and data processing are almost never of Israeli origin.

This is because American foreign policy reflects ideological alignment with Israel guided by beliefs that frame power as virtue. Through exceptionalism, the U.S. views itself as morally superior and selectively applies standards of accountability. Liberal hegemony drives efforts to remake the world in its image, promoting democracy and markets through military and diplomatic dominance. Coupled with a commitment to military primacy, these ideologies filter which actions are condemned, and which are excused. This framework makes criticism of allies like Israel politically off-limits.

These US ideological blinders find a parallel in Zionist exceptionalism, a belief system that frames Israel as uniquely entitled to moral and political legitimacy regardless of its actions. Zionist exceptionalism positions Israeli identity as singularly virtuous or historically burdened, allowing its violence to be rationalized while Palestinian resistance is pathologized. Through this lens, institutions — from media to academia — internalize and reproduce a hierarchy of legitimacy that shields Israeli conduct from scrutiny and casts Palestinian survival as suspect:

· Media Framing

Western news outlets routinely sanitize Israeli violence. Airstrikes on Gaza become “clashes,” settler pogroms morph into “tensions,” and apartheid infrastructure is relabeled as “security measures.” Palestinian death tolls are framed as collateral, not structural. When Pegasus spyware infiltrates journalists’ devices, the story is tech anomaly — not political scandal. This reframing immunizes Israel from the condemnation reserved for other regimes.

· Academic Gatekeeping

In elite institutions, Palestine is cordoned into conflict studies or security modules, where strategy is foregrounded and ethics obscured. Pro-Israel funding shapes hiring, grants, and symposia — curbing inquiry. Palestinian scholars face visa barriers, censorship, and academic isolation. Epistemic sovereignty itself becomes suspect. The unspoken rule: only certain voices may speak on occupation.

· Diplomatic Shielding

Despite mounting documentation — UN reports, ICC investigations, human rights testimonies — Israel evades accountability. U.S. vetoes act as firewall. Joint intelligence agreements elevate Mossad as a strategic partner, even amid exposed deception. The irony is brutal: the very tools of international law and diplomacy are weaponized to preserve Zionist impunity.

The network of global complicity described above doesn’t just excuse asymmetry — it operationalizes it. Mossad’s espionage becomes cleverness; Israeli apartheid is cast as pragmatism; Palestinian survival is treated as threat.

Challenging U.S. indulgence is not an editorial choice — it is a geopolitical imperative. To confront Zionist impunity, we must dismantle the narratives that sustain it. That means building systems where Palestinian testimony, memory, and resistance are treated not as exceptional — but as authoritative. It means decoupling legitimacy from militarized alliances, and redefining security not as domination, but as dignity.

This is a moral reckoning. It demands stripping espionage of glamour, exposing diplomacy’s complicity, and confronting the ideological machinery that enables betrayal. In doing so, we don’t merely name the asymmetry — we reject it. We counter it with frameworks of accountability, transparency, and liberation — rewriting the script that has too long cast domination as Palestine’s destiny. That script is over.

Rima Najjar is a Palestinian whose father’s side of the family comes from the forcibly depopulated village of Lifta on the western outskirts of Jerusalem and whose mother’s side of the family is from Ijzim, south of Haifa.

16 July 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Brett Wilkins

Ministerial delegates from more than 30 nations gathered in the Colombian capital Bogotá Tuesday for an emergency summit focused on “concrete measures” to end Israel’s U.S.-backed genocide in Gaza and other crimes against occupied Palestine.

The two-day Hague Group summit ultimately aims to “halt the genocide in Gaza” and sois led by co-chairs Colombia—which last year severed diplomatic relations with Israel—and South Africa, which filed the ongoing genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) joined by around two dozen countries. Progressive International first convened the Hague Group in January in the eponymous Dutch city, which is home to both the ICJ and International Criminal Court (ICC), whose rulings the coalition is dedicated to upholding.

“This summit marks a turning point in the global response to the erosion and violation of international law,” South African Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Ronald Lamola said ahead of the gathering. “No country is above the law, and no crime will go unanswered.”

Colombian Deputy Foreign Minister Mauricio Jaramillo Jassir said before the summit: “The Palestinian genocide threatens the entire international system. Colombia cannot remain indifferent in the face of apartheid and ethnic cleansing. The participating states will not only reaffirm their commitment to opposing genocide, but also formulate concrete steps to move from words to collective action.”

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BfZXQK01t-Q]

That action includes enforcement of ICC arrest warrants issued last year for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, his former defense minister, for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza including murder and forced starvation in a war that has left more than 211,000 Palestinians dead, maimed, or missing since October 2023, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

Hague Group members Bolivia, Cuba, Honduras, Malaysia, Namibia, and Senegal will attend the summit. Algeria, Bangladesh, Botswana, Brazil, Chile, China, Djibouti, Indonesia, Iraq, Ireland, Lebanon, Libya, Mexico, Nicaragua, Oman, Pakistan, Palestine, Qatar, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Uruguay, and Venezuela will also take part.

Notably, so will NATO members and U.S. allies Norway, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, and Turkey. Like Israel, the United States denies there is a genocide in Gaza, despite growing international consensus among human rights defenders, jurists, and genocide experts including some of the leading Holocaust scholars in Israel and the United States.

A spokesperson for the U.S. State Department—which has sanctioned ICC judges and United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories Francesca Albanese for seeking accountability for Israeli crimes—told Jewish News Syndicate Monday that the United States “strongly opposes efforts by so-called ‘multilateral blocs’ to weaponize international law as a tool to advance radical anti-Western agendas.”

The spokesperson added that the Trump administration “will aggressively defend our interests, our military, and our allies, including Israel, from such coordinated legal and diplomatic warfare,” even as U.S. allies take part in the summit.

Undaunted by U.S. sanctions, Albanese is among several U.N. experts who spoke at the summit, which she hailed as “the most significant political development in the past 20 months.”

[https://twitter.com/ProgIntl/status/1945186308013359484]

In prepared remarks, Albanese—who earlier this month said that “Israel is responsible for one of the cruelest genocides in modern history”—told attendees that “for too long, international law has been treated as optional—applied selectively to those perceived as weak, ignored by those acting as the powerful.”

“This double standard has eroded the very foundations of the legal order,” she argued. “That era must end.”

According to Albanese:

The world will remember what we, states and individuals, did in this moment—whether we recoiled in fear or rose in defense of human dignity. Here in Bogotá, a growing number of states have the opportunity to break the silence and revert to a path of legality by finally saying: Enough. Enough impunity. Enough empty rhetoric. Enough exceptionalism. Enough complicity. The time has come to act in pursuit of justice and peace—grounded in rights and freedoms for all, and not mere privileges for some, at the expense of the annihilation of others.

The Israeli Mission to the United Nations told Jewish News Syndicate that “what the event organizers, and perhaps some of the countries attending, forget is what triggered this conflict—namely, the butchering of 1,200 innocent souls on October 7, and how 50 Israelis remain in brutal captivity to this day by Hamas in Gaza.”

“Attempting to exert pressure on Israel—and not Hamas, who initiated and are prolonging this conflict—is a moral travesty,” the mission added. “The war will not end while hostages remain in Gaza.”

In addition to the ICC warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant, the ICJ—whose ruling in the genocide case is not expected for years—has ordered Israel to prevent genocidal acts in Gaza, to stop blocking lifesaving humanitarian aid from entering the strip, and to halt its assault on Rafah. Israel has ignored all three orders.

“The choice before us is stark and unforgiving,” Colombian President Gustavo Petro wrote in The Guardian last week. “We can either stand firm in defense of the legal principles that seek to prevent war and conflict, or watch helplessly as the international system collapses under the weight of unchecked power politics.”

“While we may face threats of retaliation when we stand up for international law—as South Africa discovered when the United States retaliated for its case at the International Court of Justice—the consequences of abdicating our responsibilities will be dire,” Petro continued. “If we fail to act now, we not only betray the Palestinian people, we become complicit in the atrocities committed by Netanyahu’s government.”

“For the billions of people in the Global South who rely on international law for protection, the stakes could not be higher,” he added. “The Palestinian people deserve justice. The moment demands courage.”

Brett Wilkins is a staff writer for Common Dreams.

16 July 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Quds News Network

Gaza (Quds News Network)- At least 21 starving Palestinians were killed Wednesday morning while seeking aid at a US- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) distribution site in southern Gaza, after chaos broke out when American mercenaries trapped the crowd and used pepper spray.

What Happened?

According to local sources, when the GHF aid distribution point in northern Rafah opened, starving civilians rushed from long distances and were funneled through a narrow corridor to reach the site.

When they reached, American mercenaries closed the gate and sprayed pepper spray, causing mass panic and suffocation due to the gas and overcrowding. So far, more than 20 people have been killed.

According to survivors, the American mercenaries deliberately closed the gate as aid seekers arrived, causing crushing overcrowding. The Americans then began spraying pepper spray and tear gas, which led to panic and chaos, resulting in people being trampled and killed.

One survivor said there were thousands of aid seekers, adding that these are “not aid sites” but “mass death traps” designed to lure starving people.

Another survivor, while bidding farewell to a relative, said, “The Americans killed him.”

According to medical sources, the majority of the victims were children and fathers who have been starved for months by Israel.

False Accusations

The controversial foundation confirmed the killings, saying “at least 19 of the victims were trampled and one was stabbed amid a chaotic and dangerous surge, driven by agitators in the crowd.”

However, the GHF claimed that “elements within the crowd – armed and affiliated with Hamas – deliberately fomented the unrest,” without providing any evidence.

GHF personnel identified multiple firearms in the crowd, the organisation alleged, adding that a US worker was threatened with a firearm by someone in the crowd.

The GHF didn’t mention that American mercenaries attacked the aid seekers, leading to chaos and deaths.

In response, Gaza’s Government Media Office slammed GHF’s “false and misleading statement”.

The Office explained what happened:

• This morning, 21 people were killed — 15 from suffocation and 6 by direct gunfire, with dozens more injured.
• GHF called on hundreds of thousands of civilians to receive aid at a center named ‘SDS3’ in southern Gaza. Once thousands of starving people were gathered inside the narrow iron corridors, deliberately designed to restrict movement, the gates were locked.
• Staff of this “criminal organization”, along with Israeli soldiers, sprayed pepper gas and opened fire on the starving crowd, who had come seeking aid.
• This resulted in mass suffocation, stampedes, and immediate deaths within an enclosed area with no exits, a setting clearly designed to cause killings.
• Testimonies from 14 eyewitnesses consistently confirm what happened. The Government Media Office had earlier released verified video evidence showing members of this American-backed organization firing directly at civilians.
• GHF’s attempt to shift blame onto innocent civilians or Palestinian factions is a transparent and unacceptable tactic aimed at evading legal, ethical, and humanitarian responsibility for a deliberate massacre.
• This is not an isolated incident. To date, over 870 civilians have been killed near or at GHF aid sites, more than 5,700 injuried, and 46 others went missing, making it a “direct participant in the genocide and starvation campaign carried out by the Israeli occupation.”

“Mass Death Traps”

Since the GHF started its operations on May 27 in Gaza, over 800 aid seekers have been killed by Israeli forces and American mercenaries and over 5,200 others injured, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

Additionally, 46 others have been reported missing after heading to the GHF sites to obtain food.

Israeli mass killings of aid seekers near GHF aid sites have become a grim daily reality amid chaotic scenes, as desperate Palestinians are given only a narrow window to rush for food and are targeted by Israeli forces.

Palestinians in Gaza and the UN described these sites as “mass death traps” and “slaughterhouses”.

On March 2, Israel announced the closure of Gaza’s main crossings, cutting off food, medical and humanitarian supplies, worsening a humanitarian crisis for 2.3 million Palestinians, according to reports by human rights organisations who have accused it of using starvation as a weapon of war against Palestinains.

An Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report in May warned that almost a quarter of the civilian population would face catastrophic levels of food insecurity (IPC Phase Five) in the coming months.

After more than 80 days of total blockade, starvation, and growing international outrage, limited aid has allegedly been distributed by the GHF, a scandal-plagued organization backed by the US and Israel, created to bypass the UN’s established aid delivery infrastructure in the Gaza Strip.

Most humanitarian organisations, including the UN, have distanced themselves from GHF, arguing that the group violates humanitarian principles by restricting aid to south and central Gaza, requiring Palestinians to walk long distances to collect aid, and only providing limited aid, among other critiques. They have also said the model would increase forced displacement in Gaza.

The UN confirmed that Israel is still blocking food from reaching starving Palestinians with only a few trucks of aid having reached Gaza.

Doctors Without Borders (MSF) warned that “weaponizing aid in this manner may constitute crimes against humanity.”

“Every day Palestinians are met with carnage in their attempts to receive supplies from the insufficient amount of aid trickling into Gaza,” MSF said.

The commissioner-general of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), Philippe Lazzarini, condemned the “lethal” US-Israel aid distribution mechanism in Gaza. In a post on X, Lazzarini indicated that Palestinian lives “have been so devalued”.

“It is now the routine to shoot & kill desperate & starving people while they try to collect little food from a company made of mercenaries,” he said.

“Inviting starving people to their death is a war crime. Those responsible of this system must be held accountable. This is a disgrace & a stain on our collective consciousness.”

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said that the US-backed aid distribution mechanism is “inherently unsafe” and “it is killing people.”

“Any operation that channels desperate civilians into militarized zones is inherently unsafe. It is killing people,” Guterres told reporters.

Guterres said UN-led humanitarian efforts are being “strangled,” aid workers themselves are starving and Israel, as the occupying power, is required to agree to and facilitate aid deliveries into and throughout the Palestinian enclave.

“People are being killed simply trying to feed themselves and their families. The search for food must never be a death sentence,” Guterres told reporters.

According to a Haaretz report, conversations with officers and soldiers reveal that commanders ordered forces to shoot at crowds waiting for food near or at the US-backed GHF aid sites to drive them away or disperse them, despite posing no threat.

“It’s a killing field,” one soldier said.

“Where I was stationed, between one and five people were killed every day. They’re treated like a hostile force – no crowd-control measures, no tear gas – just live fire with everything imaginable: heavy machine guns, grenade launchers, mortars. Then, once the center opens, the shooting stops, and they know they can approach. Our form of communication is gunfire.”

In a recent statement, the Israeli military admitted that its forces “harmed” Palestinian civilians at US-Israeli aid distribution centers in Gaza. The army claimed new field instructions were issued based on “lessons learned.”

A new Associated Press report with leaked footage also detailed how American contractors at GHF aid sites used live ammunition, stun grenades and pepper spray against starving Palestinians seeking food.

16 July 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Sony Thang

I’m Vietnamese.

In 1954, Western powers decided to split Vietnam in two. Not because we asked for it. Not because it was just. But because it served their imperial interests. The South was handed to a US-backed regime we never chose, and this foreign-imposed division was packaged as a “solution.” We were told to accept it, and there would be peace. That half a country was better than none.

But we refused.

Vietnam is not a bargaining chip. We are not a piece of land to be divided and labeled “free” by strangers. When we stood against partition, they called us unreasonable. They called us terrorists. They said we were the problem.

Sound familiar?

Just a few years earlier, in 1947, the same powers had pushed a partition plan for Palestine. Not because the Palestinians agreed, but because foreign powers demanded it. More than 77 years later, the same script is still being used.

Palestinians are told to accept foreign-imposed divisions. To settle for “solutions” written by others. To be grateful for the fragments of their homeland they’re allowed to keep. They’re expected to forget the villages destroyed, the graves of their ancestors, the keys to their stolen homes, and the olive trees they once nurtured.

Vietnam was told to settle for half. We refused. So did Palestine.

They were told to accept UN Resolution 181, just as we were told to accept the Geneva Accords. But we knew that real peace cannot be forced. And it certainly isn’t peace if it begins with erasure. There’s no justice in a deal that demands surrender.

We fought not because we hated peace, but because peace without freedom is a lie. Half a land means half a people. And we proved them wrong. Today, Vietnam is whole. Not North. Not South. But united.

Palestinians understood this too. That’s why they rejected partition. That’s why they continue to resist. 

People often claim that Palestine was never a state. But neither were many other colonized nations. Algeria. Kenya. Ireland. Apartheid-era South Africa. None had internationally recognized statehood, yet no one suggests they should have accepted colonial rule for that reason alone.

Colonialism doesn’t ask whether you had embassies or a parliament. It only asks whether it can get away with taking your land.

Palestinians had land. They had memory. They lived lives rooted in soil long before anyone came to redraw their borders. Denying them statehood simply holds them to a standard no colonized people could ever meet.

Vietnam prevailed because we remembered who we were.

Palestinians remember too.

And that memory threatens those whose power depends on historical amnesia.

In 1973, Lê Đức Thọ became the only person in history to refuse the Nobel Peace Prize. He did not reject it out of pride, but because he understood there could be no peace while US bombs were still falling. Peace cannot be awarded by the same hands that drop napalm. By walking away from global applause, he kept his dignity and reminded the world that peace without justice is nothing but theater.

Today, Palestinians are once again being told to accept less, to surrender more, and to thank their occupiers for whatever remains.

But like Vietnam, they refuse.

They refuse to disappear quietly.

And they will not trade their freedom for silence.

One day, like us, they too will be whole again.

Because the land remembers.

And so do the people.

___________________________________________

Sony Thang is a Vietnamese writer

15 July 2025

Source: countercurrents.org