Archives: Articles

By Nilofar Suhrawardy

During his first term in office, President Donald Trump’s anti-China policies seemed as aggressive and assertive as they are now. Paradoxically, though those centred around a totally different issue, they certainly had a negative impact on US, Trump himself and of course greater part of the world. Yes, this was Trump’s claim that the disease Covid-19 was a “Chinese virus.” It was alleged that the pandemic leaked from a Chinese laboratory and Trump promoted the same. A speculation of it having been engineered as a possible biological weapon was also entertained. A team of scientists appointed by WHO conducted a 12-day investigation at Wuhan, which included a visit to the laboratory, concluded that the “lab-leak” theory was “extremely unlikely.” Irrespective of whatever was the source of Covid-virus, there is no doubt, it’s impact affected the whole world at large. There is a view, had US not made so such noise about it, most people – particularly from the developing world – would have not been affected so severely. Some ailment or other has them grappling with each year, especially during rainy season. But this is other side of the story. It may be recalled, Trump himself, as reported, was affected by the virus. Clearly, the Covid-phase strongly displayed the apparent animosity Trump entertained towards China. Banning entry from China, though with gaps, hardly succeeded in checking the spread of Covid in US and other countries. However, travel restrictions along with Covid lockdown were subsequently followed by other countries which led to a major economic downfall at several levels for all across the world, from which they haven’t yet totally recovered.

Now, it is feared, Trump’s ongoing trade war with China may spell catastrophic economic problems for the whole world with far more severe consequences with impact on US itself as it is being seen. Most countries, including strong European allies of US, seem to have been compelled to consider stronger regional unity as well as better ties with China. Clearly, China is trying to make the best of the situation by asking European countries not to be “bullied” by US. China is in favour of “teaming” with Europe against US, that is Trump’s “tariff-war.” Certainly, it is too early to expect any ally of US and one that has not entertained smooth ties with China to suddenly give importance to this offer of Beijing. Nevertheless, there is no denying Trump’s trade-war has cautioned them all of the risk of being too dependent on US. Prospects of their gradually giving greater importance to moving beyond the US-camp cannot be side-lined. The 90-day pause initiated by Trump on tariff for most countries except China has certainly given his allies sometime to consider their options and hold talks with US. During this pause until July 9, the baseline tariff remains in place. China has chosen to raise additional tariff on US goods from 84% to 125% in respond to Trump’s decision to impose 145% tariff on some Chinese goods. This is not just a tit-for-tat diplomatic feud taking place between US and China. It’s multi-lateral impact on most countries is too strong to be ignored. The manner in which their economy has been hit, with US itself not being spared, has spelt shocks for their market, loss for investors, consumers and so forth.

Ironically, from one angle, there is nothing surprising or new about economic aggression being engaged in by Trump. Iran, Syria, Libya, Iraq, Russia are among the countries against whom economic sanctions have been imposed by US and its western allies. The difference is that now even US allies face the economic aggression because of Trump’s tariff-war. Where does this place the Arab countries, which seem comfortably placed with their oil wealth? Besides, US is not a key importer of their oil. In addition, the key Gulf countries have alongside their warm times with US, maintained good ties with Russia as well as China. Economically as well as diplomatically, they don’t appear to be caught in as frustrating situation as are other countries.

Paradoxically, on one hand, while Trump has gone overboard against China in the trade-war, on the other hand, as comments from White House suggest, he is “optimistic” about a “deal” with China (April 11, 2025). “The president,” according to White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, “would be gracious if China intends to make a deal. If China continues to retaliate, it’s not good for China.” It is possible, Trump did not expect China to retaliate as it has by raising duties on US goods. Now, he is considering options of a “deal” with China. But as apparent, China is not taking him seriously nor does it give the impression of it being keen for any deal with US. Rather, China is exploring opportunities of attracting US allies to its side. In addition, Trump probably expects China to pay instant heed to his comments, prospects of which may be viewed as limited. In other words, chances of Chinese President Xi Jinping taking the initiative to hold talks with Trump regarding the “deal,” the latter has suggested, may be viewed as fairly remote. This is also marked by Chinese comments on it not backtracking in tariff-war with US but if these “infringe” on China’s interests in a “substantial way,” China will take “countermeasures” and “fight to the end.”

The impact of Chinese retaliation on US stocks is reported to be “worst” since the “Covid-crash.” Incidentally, China was Trump’s primary target during the Covid-phase and so it is in his tariff-war. China prefers facing Trump’s “war” without yielding to what has been described by China as his “bullying.” Given that this is Trump’s second term in office, he has limited time. But the same cannot be said about Xi, who has time on his side. One thing is clear, just as Covid-phase only had negative impact, this “tariff-war” has no winners, at least, at present!

Nilofar Suhrawardy is a senior journalist and writer with specialization in communication studies and nuclear diplomacy.

13 April 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Kim Petersen

Former UNSCOM weapons inspector Scott Ritter usually provides excellent analysis of geopolitical events and places them in a morally centered framework. However, in a recent X post, Ritter defends a controversial stance blaming Iran for US and Israeli machinations against Iran.

Ritter opened, “I have assiduously detailed the nature of the threat perceived by the US that, if unresolved, would necessitate military action, as exclusively revolving around Iran’s nuclear program and, more specifically, that capacity that is excess to its declared peaceful program and, as such, conducive to a nuclear weapons program Iran has admitted is on the threshold of being actualized.”

Threats perceived by the US. These threats range from North Korea, Viet Nam, Grenada, Panama, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Iran, China, and Russia. Question: Which of the named countries is aboutto — or ever was about to — attack the US? None. (Al Qaeda is not a country) So why does Ritter imply that military action would be necessitated? Is it a vestige of military indoctrination left over from his time as a marine? In this case, why is Ritter not focused on his own backyard and telling the US to butt out of the Middle East? The US, since it is situated on a continent far removed from Iran, should no more dictate to Iran what its defense posture should be in the region than Iran should dictate what the US’s defense posture should be in the northwestern hemisphere.

Ritter: “In short, I have argued, the most realistic path forward regarding conflict avoidance would be for Iran to negotiate in good faith regarding the verifiable disposition of its excess nuclear enrichment capability.”

Ritter places the onus for conflict avoidance on Iran. Why? Is Iran seeking conflict with the US? Is Iran making demands of the US? Is Iran sanctioning the US? Moreover, who gets to decide what is realistic or not? Is what is realistic for the US also realistic for Iran? When determining the path forward, one should be aware of who and what is stirring up conflict. Ritter addresses this when he writes, “Even when Trump alienated Iran with his ‘maximum pressure’ tactics, including an insulting letter to the Supreme Leader that all but eliminated the possibility of direct negotiations between the US and Iran…” But this did not alter Ritter’s stance. Iran must negotiate — again. According to Ritter negotiations are how to solve the crisis, a crisis of the US’s (and Israel’s) making.

Iran had agreed to a deal — the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) — with the five permanent members of the UN Security Council (China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) and Germany — collectively known as the P5+1 — with the participation of the European Union. The JCPOA came into effect in 2016. During the course of the JCPOA, Iran was in abidance with the deal. Nonetheless, Trump pulled the US out of the deal in 2018.

Backing out of agreements/deals is nothing new for Trump (or for that matter, the US). For example, Trump pulled out of the Paris Agreement on climate, the Trans-Pacific Partnership on trade, the United Nations cultural organization UNESCO, and the North American Free Trade Agreement, which was subsequently renegotiated under Trump to morph into the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Trade Agreement, which is now imperilled by the Trump administration’s tariff threats, as is the World Trade Organization that regulates international trade.

Should Iran, therefore, expect adherence to any future agreement signed with the US?

Ritter insists that he is promoting a reality-based process providing the only viable path toward peace. Many of those who disagree with Ritter’s assertion are lampooned by him as “the digital mob, comprised of new age philosophers, self-styled ‘peace activists’, and a troll class that opposes anything and everything it doesn’t understand (which is most factually-grounded argument), as well as people I had viewed as fellow travelers on a larger journey of conflict avoidance—podcasters, experts and pundits who did more than simply disagree with me (which is, of course, their right and duty as independent thinkers), traversing into the realm of insults and attacks against my intelligence, integrity and character.”

Ritter continued, “The US-Iran crisis is grounded in the complexities, niceties and formalities of international law as set forth in the nuclear nonproliferation treaty (NPT), which Iran signed in 1970 as a non-nuclear weapons state. The NPT will be at the center of any negotiated settlement.”

Is it accurate to characterize the crisis as a “US-Iran crisis”? It elides that fact that it is the US imposing a crisis on Iran. More accurately it should be stated as a “US crisis foisted on Iran.”

Ritter argues, “… the fact remains that this crisis has been triggered by the very capabilities Iran admits to having—stocks of 60% enriched uranium with no link to Iran’s declared peaceful program, and excessive advanced centrifuge-based enrichment capability which leaves Iran days away from possessing sufficient weapons grade high enriched uranium to produce 3-5 nuclear weapons.”

So, Ritter blames Iran for the crisis. This plays off Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu who has long accused Iran of seeking nukes. But it ignores the situation in India and Pakistan. Although the relations between the two countries are tense, logic dictates that open warring must be avoided lest it lead to mutual nuclear conflagration. What happened when Libya dismantled its nuclear program? Destruction by the US-led NATO. As A.B. Abrams wrote, Libya paid the price for

… having ignored direct warnings from both Tehran and Pyongyang not to pursue such a course [of unilaterally disarming], Libya’s leadership would later admit that disarmament, neglected military modernisation, and trust in Western good will proved to be their greatest mistake–leaving their country near defenceless when Western powers launched their offensive in 2011. (Immovable Object: North Korea’s 70 Years at War with American Power, Clarity Press, 2020: p 296)

And North Korea has existed with a credible deterrence against any attack on it since it acquired nuclear weapons.

Relevant background to the current crisis imposed on Iran

• The year 1953 is a suitable starting point. It was in this year that the US-UK (CIA and MI6) combined to engineer a coup against the democratically elected Iranian government under prime minister Mohammad Mossadegh. Mossadegh had committed the unpardonable sin of nationalizing the British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.
• What to replace the Iranian democracy with? A monarchy. In other words, a dictatorship because monarchs are not elected, they are usually born into power. Thus, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi would rule as the shah of Iran for 26 years protected by his secret police, the SAVAK. Eventually, the shah would be overthrow in the 1979 Iranian Revolution.
• In an attempt to force Iran to bend knee to US dictate, the US has imposed sanctions, issued threats, and fomented violence.
• Starting sometime after 2010, it is generally agreed among cybersecurity experts and intelligence leaks that the Iranian nuclear program was a target of cyberwarfare by the US and Israel — this in contravention of the United Nations Charter Article 2 (1-4):

1. The Organization is based on the principle of the sovereign equality of all its Members.

2. All Members, in order to ensure to all of them the rights and benefits resulting from membership, shall fulfill in good faith the obligations assumed by them in accordance with the present Charter.

3. All Members shall settle their international disputes by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security, and justice, are not endangered.

4. All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.

• The Stuxnet virus caused significant damage to Iran’s nuclear program, particularly at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility.
• Israel and the United States are also accused of being behind the assassinations of several Iranian nuclear scientists over the past decade.
• On 3 January 2020, Trump ordered a US drone strike at Baghdad International Airport in Iraq that assassinated Iranian General Qasem Soleimani as well as Soleimani ally Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, a top Iraqi militia leader.
• On 7 October 7 2023, Hamas launched a resistance attack against Israel occupation. Since then, Israel has reportedly conducted several covert and overt strikes targeting Iran and its proxies across the region.
• Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has accused Iran of seeking nukes for nearly 30 years, long before Iran reached 60% enrichment in 2021. In Netanyahu’s book Fighting Terrorism (1995) he described Iran as a “rogue state” pursuing nukes to destroy Israel. Given that a fanatical, expansionist Zionist map for Israel, the Oded-Yinon plan, draws a Jewish territory that touches on the Iranian frontier, a debilitated Iran is sought by Israel.

Oded Yinon Plan

Says Ritter, “This crisis isn’t about Israel or Israel’s own undeclared nuclear weapons capability. It is about Iran’s self-declared status as a threshold nuclear weapons state, something prohibited by the NPT. This is what the negotiations will focus on. And hopefully these negotiations will permit the verifiable dismantling of those aspects of its nuclear program the US (and Israel) find to present an existential threat.”

Why isn’t it about Israel’s nuclear weapons capability? Why does the US and Ritter get to decide which crisis is preeminent?

It is important to note that US intelligence has long said that no active Iranian nuclear weapon project exists.

It is also important to note that Arab states have long supported a Middle East Zone Free of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDFZ), particularly nuclear weapons, but Israel and the US oppose it.

It is also important to note that, in 2021, the U.S. opposed a resolution demanding Israel join the NPT and that the US, in 2018, blocked an Arab-backed IAEA resolution on Israeli nukes. (UN Digital Library. Search: “Middle East WMDFZ”)

As far as the NPT goes, it must be applied equally to all signatory states. The US as a nuclear-armed nation is bound by Article VI which demands:

Each of the Parties to the Treaty undertakes to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control.

Thus, hopefully negotiations will permit the verifiable dismantling of those aspects of the Iranian, US, and Israeli nuclear programs (as well as the nuclear programs of other nuclear-armed nations) that are found to present an existential threat.

Ritter warns, “Peace is not guaranteed. But war is unless common sense and fact-based logic wins out over the self-important ignorance of the digital mob and their facilitators.”

A peaceful solution is not achieved by assertions (i.e., not fact-based logic) or by ad hominem. That critics of Ritter’s stance resort to name-calling demeans them, but to respond likewise to one’s critics also taints the respondent.

Logic dictates that peace is more-or-less guaranteed if UN member states adhere to the United Nations Charter. The US, Iran, and Israel are UN member states. A balanced and peaceful solution is found in the Purposes and Principles as stipulated in Article 1 (1-4) of the UN Charter:

The Purposes of the United Nations are:

1. To maintain international peace and security, and to that end: to take effective collective measures for the prevention and removal of threats to the peace, and for the suppression of acts of aggression or other breaches of the peace, and to bring about by peaceful means, and in conformity with the principles of justice and international law, adjustment or settlement of international disputes or situations which might lead to a breach of the peace;

2. To develop friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples, and to take other appropriate measures to strengthen universal peace;

3. To achieve international co-operation in solving international problems of an economic, social, cultural, or humanitarian character, and in promoting and encouraging respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion; and

4. To be a centre for harmonizing the actions of nations in the attainment of these common ends.

It seems that only by refusing to abide by one’s obligations laid out the UN Charter and NPT that war looms larger.

In Ritter’s reality, the US rules the roost against smaller countries. Is such a reality acceptable?

It stirs up patriotism, but acquiescence is an affront to national dignity. Ritter will likely respond by asking what good is dignity when you are dead. Fair enough. But in the present crisis, if the US were to attack Iran, then whatever last shred of dignity (is there any last shred of dignity left when a country is supporting the genocide of human beings in Palestine?) that American patriots can cling to will have vanished.

By placing the blame on Iran for a crisis triggered by destabilizing actions of US and Israel, Ritter asks for Iran to pay for the violent events set in motion by US Israel. If Iran were to cave to Trump’s threats, they would be sacrificing sovereignty, dignity, and self-defense.

North Korea continues on. Libya is still reeling from the NATO offensive against it. Iran is faced with a choice.

The Mexican revolutionary Emiliano Zapata knew well his choice: “I’d rather die on my feet, than live on my knees.”

Kim Petersen is an independent writer. He can be emailed at: kimohp at gmail.com.

13 April 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Abdul Bari Atwan

EDITOR’S NOTE: This editorial, written by by Abdul Bari Atwan, chief editor of the Arabic Al Rai Al Youm website, on Saturday, 12 April relates to the first talks of the Tehran-Washington negotiations that started in Muscat, Oman relating to the Iran nuclear file.

Iran succeeded in scoring a major goal against the United States in the clash of wills that began today, Saturday, in the Omani capital, Muscat, by insisting that the negotiations be “indirect,” contrary to what its American adversary wants: Namely “direct” negotiations as announced by US President Donald Trump at the White House in his meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last week, who was surprised by this shocking announcement.

The US delegation, led by Trump Advisor Steve Witkoff, is participating in these talks from a weak and defeated position, especially after the failure of the US plan to impose tariffs on more than 200 countries worldwide. America has become friendless, and even turned its friends into enemies, especially in Europe and Southeast Asia like South Korea and Japan.

Iran, represented in the negotiations by veteran Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, the who led the negotiations for the first nuclear agreement with the six major powers in 2015 and possesses extensive experience in the art and strategies of negotiation, did not submit to the “threats and intimidation” adopted by President Trump against them.

They imposed their conditions in full on their American opponents and insisted on limiting the negotiations to the nuclear issue, not addressing other issues such as missile and drone systems, and severing ties with the arms of the resistance in Gaza, Lebanon, Yemen, and Iraq. And they got what they wanted.

The one who called for a return to a diplomatic solution to the Iranian-American crisis and backed down from his threats of a devastating military strike was President Trump. This happened when he realized the threats of military strikes, coupled with the dispatch of three American aircraft carriers and squadrons of giant B-52 bombers, had backfired.

These did not intimidate the Iranians, but prompted a response from Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who declared a state of emergency in the Iranian military, placed giant missile platforms, advanced submarines, and ground and naval forces on high alert, and threatened to destroy all military bases surrounding his country (10 bases) housing 50,000 soldiers, close the Strait of Hormuz, and prevent Gulf oil exports to the entire world.

The Iranians do not trust President Trump, who tore up the nuclear agreement in 2018, and is well aware he has become an Israeli puppet. He also realizes that America, defeated in Ukraine, did not simply march to Moscow waving white flags, ready to sell Ukraine and its people to the Russians and surrender to all of its conditions, including the annexation of a fifth of Ukrainian territory to Russia, without consulting its European allies, whom it has become embroiled in this war.

When President Trump demands that the Muscat negotiations reach a quick agreement within two months, this is due to his bitter experience in the Vienna negotiations, which lasted a year-and-a-half and ended in failure due to Iran’s cunning use of the “yes, but” theory, without offering any concessions.

We do not believe that this theory will be abandoned in the Muscat negotiations, especially since America, which is now globally hated and has lost all of its allies in the West and the East, has become weak, and is on the brink of bankruptcy due to the huge deficit in its annual general budget ($1.4 trillion) and its public debt that has reached more than $42 trillion.

What will encourage Iran to harden its position in these negotiations is China’s strong and defiant stance in the trade war against the United States. Its president, Xi Jinping, declared he will respond in kind to America and its president, and will fight this war to the end, no matter how costly the results.

He has decided to raise customs duties on American goods by a historic rate of more than 125 percent, and has given the green light to his allies in the BRICS group to declare war on the dollar and the global SWIFT financial system, through which America controls the global economy and financial movement.

Trump, wounded by the failure of his gamble to ignite a trade war, and the internal and global revolt against it, with the beginning of the decline in the value of the dollar and the escalation of the recession in the American economy as its first fruits, was forced to stop this war less than three days after its announcement under the cover of a three-month freeze on the application of customs duties.

Hence, his threats, i.e. Trump’s necessity of quickly to reach a nuclear agreement didn’t have no effect despite the threat of a crushing military strike. Iran’s respond to Trump forced him to make a major, unprecedented concessions to save face.

Iran, which has suffered significant losses in Lebanon, with the weakening of its powerful military arm in that country (Hezbollah), and in Syria with the fall of the President Assad’s regime, has made many rapid reviews internally and regionally, abandoning many of its policies pursued in recent years, after realizing that the knife is approaching its neck, and that the American-Israeli conspiracy does not only seek to destroy it and remove its military claws and fangs, but also to change the Islamic regime there.

The results of these reviews reflected in the transition from a phase of patience and long-suffering to a phase of confrontation in its military and political aspects, and the strengthening of its allied military arms, starting with the striking Yemen whose arm there is waging heroic wars not only against aircraft carriers and American warships in the Red and Arabian Seas, but also by intensifying ballistic missile and drone bombardment of the occupied Palestinian interior in Jaffa, Haifa, and Eilat, accelerating the recovery process for Hezbollah in Lebanon, and finding other ways to deliver military supplies to it.

After the historic Syrian corridor was closed with the fall of the Assad regime, America became a farce in the first months of Trump’s rule. It’s no surprise that Iran and its allied proxies are among the biggest beneficiaries and gloaters. He who laughs last laughs loudest… and the days will tell.

EDITOR’S NOTE: This editorial, written by Abdul Bari Atwan, chief editor of the Arabic Al Rai Al Youm website, on Saturday, 12 April, relates to the first talks of the Tehran-Washington negotiations that started in Muscat, Oman relating to the Iran nuclear file.

Iran succeeded in scoring a major goal against the United States in the clash of wills that began today, Saturday, in the Omani capital, Muscat, by insisting that the negotiations be “indirect,” contrary to what its American adversary wants: Namely “direct” negotiations as announced by US President Donald Trump at the White House in his meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last week, who was surprised by this shocking announcement.

The US delegation, led by Trump’s Advisor Steve Witkoff, is participating in these talks from a weak and defeated position, especially after the failure of the US plan to impose tariffs on more than 200 countries worldwide. America has become friendless, and even turned its friends into enemies, especially in Europe and Southeast Asia like South Korea and Japan.

Iran, represented in the negotiations by veteran Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, the man who led the negotiations for the first nuclear agreement with the six major powers in 2015 and possesses extensive experience in the art and strategies of negotiation, did not submit to the “threats and intimidation” adopted by President Trump.

They imposed their conditions in full on their American opponents and insisted on limiting the negotiations to the nuclear issue, not addressing other issues such as missile and drone systems, and severing ties with the arms of the resistance in Gaza, Lebanon, Yemen, and Iraq. And they got what they wanted.

The one who called for a return to a diplomatic solution to the Iranian-American crisis and backed down from his threats of a devastating military strike was President Trump. This happened when he realized the threats of military strikes, coupled with the dispatch of three American aircraft carriers and squadrons of giant B-52 bombers, backfired.

These did not intimidate the Iranians, but prompted a response from Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who declared a state of emergency in the Iranian military, placed giant missile platforms, advanced submarines, and ground and naval forces on high alert, and threatened to destroy all of the 10 military bases surrounding his country and housing 50,000 soldiers, close the Strait of Hormuz, and prevent Gulf oil exports to the entire world.

[https://twitter.com/IranObserver0/status/1910966204644143470]

The Iranians do not trust President Trump, who tore up the nuclear agreement in 2018, and is well aware he has become an Israeli puppet. He also realizes that America, defeated in Ukraine, did not simply march to Moscow waving white flags, ready to sell Ukraine and its people to the Russians and surrender to all of its conditions, including the annexation of a fifth of Ukrainian territory to Russia, without consulting its European allies, whom it has become embroiled in this war.

When President Trump demands that the Muscat negotiations reach a quick agreement within two months, this is due to his bitter experience in the Vienna negotiations, which lasted a year-and-a-half and ended in failure due to Iran’s cunning use of the “yes, but” theory, without offering any concessions.

We do not believe that this theory will be abandoned in the Muscat negotiations, especially since America, which is now globally hated and has lost all of its allies in the West and the East, has become weak, and is on the brink of bankruptcy due to the huge deficit in its annual general budget ($1.4 trillion) and its public debt that has reached more than $42 trillion.

[https://twitter.com/khaledmahmoued1/status/1910962476037923091]

What will encourage Iran to harden its position in these negotiations is China’s strong and defiant stance in the trade war against the United States. Its president, Xi Jinping, declared he will respond in kind to America and its president, and will fight this war to the end, no matter how costly the results.

He has decided to raise customs duties on American goods by a historic rate of more than 125 percent, and has given the green light to his allies in the BRICS group to declare war on the dollar and the global SWIFT financial system, through which America controls the global economy and financial movement.

Trump, wounded by the failure of his gamble to ignite a trade war, and the internal and global revolt against it, with the beginning of the decline in the value of the dollar and the escalation of the recession in the American economy as its first fruits, was forced to stop this war less than three days after its announcement under the cover of a three-month freeze on the application of customs duties.

Hence, his threats, i.e. Trump’s necessity of quickly to reach a nuclear agreement didn’t have any effect despite the threat of a crushing military strike. Iran’s respond to Trump forced him to make a major, unprecedented concessions to save face.

Iran, which has suffered significant losses in Lebanon, with the weakening of its powerful military arm in that country (Hezbollah), and in Syria with the fall of the President Assad’s regime, undertook rapid reviews internally and regionally, abandoning many of its policies pursued in recent years, after realizing that the knife is approaching its neck, and that the American-Israeli conspiracy does not only seek to destroy it and remove its military claws and fangs, but also to change the Islamic regime there.

The results of these reviews reflected in the transition from a phase of patience and long-suffering to a phase of confrontation in its military and political aspects, and the strengthening of its allied military arms, starting with the striking Yemen whose arm there is waging heroic wars not only against aircraft carriers and American warships in the Red and Arabian Seas, but also by intensifying ballistic missiles and drone bombardment of the occupied Palestinian interior in Jaffa, Haifa, and Eilat, accelerating the recovery process for Hezbollah in Lebanon, and finding other ways to deliver military supplies to it.

After the historic Syrian corridor was closed with the fall of the Assad regime, America became a farce in the first months of Trump’s rule. It’s no surprise that Iran and its allied proxies are among the biggest beneficiaries and gloaters. He who laughs last laughs loudest… and the days will tell!

13 April 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Quds News Network

Gaza (Quds News Network)- Israeli warplanes have bombarded the Baptist Hospital in central Gaza City on Saturday, targeting critical medical facilities and sparking panic among hundreds of patients and civilians nearby.

The airstrike hit the surgical operations building and the medical oxygen generation station, vital for intensive care patients. Shortly earlier, Israeli forces had threatened to bomb the hospital, prompting a rushed evacuation of parts of the building.

The Israeli military launched two missiles directly at the hospital’s reception and emergency departments. The building is now completely out of service. The hospital’s electrical power was also cut due to the strike, leaving patients in critical condition without life-saving support.

Medical staff tried to evacuate as many patients as possible, but the short warning time made it impossible to move those in the surgery and internal medicine wards. Dozens remained trapped inside as the building took the hit.

Hundreds of patients and their families flooded the streets around the hospital in a state of fear and confusion. Warplanes continued to fly at low altitude over the area, adding to the chaos.

This is not the first time Israel has targeted the Baptist Hospital. In October 2023, an Israeli airstrike on the hospital’s courtyard killed hundreds of displaced civilians and injured dozens more. That massacre shocked the world and remains one of the deadliest attacks on a medical facility worldwide.

The Baptist Hospital, also known as the Arab Ahli Hospital, is one of the oldest hospitals in Gaza. It is operated by the Anglican Episcopal Church in Jerusalem and has long served as a refuge during times of war.

Medical teams on the ground warn that repeated attacks on hospitals are destroying Gaza’s fragile healthcare system. Many hospitals have already shut down due to strikes or fuel shortages. Now, even the few still standing face the constant threat of Israeli bombs.

International organizations have condemned Israel’s repeated targeting of medical facilities, calling it a violation of international law. However, the strikes continue, and Gaza’s wounded are left with nowhere safe to turn.

13 April 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Dr. Marwan Asmar

What should one make of the recent White House meeting between US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu?

Well, this time Netanyahu was almost summoned to the White House to be told a few home truths. This meeting was not like the first time when Netanyahu came to the White House in early February when it was all glowed to be unexpectedly told that Trump wants the USA to take over Gaza.

This time around, the meeting was more subdued, almost in a rush, like an after-thought on the part of Trump who keeps chopping and changing as he figures out how he wants to conduct America’s foreign policy in his second “robust” administration.

This time around, although Trump displayed the usual friendliness to Netanyahu, he was somewhat distant because of the tariffs the White House is set upon to start imposing on the rest of the world including best-friend Israel. Its leaders, businessmen are still in shock because Washington has slammed a 17 percent tariff on its products entering the United States.

Israeli industrialists continue to be up-in-arms. It was they who appealed to Netanyahu to seek Washington clarification because they argued that the new tariffs will cost them up to $3 billion in losses, reduce Israeli exports by 26 percent and increase unemployment by 26,000. They are already in a bad situation because of the war on Gaza but this latest step will surely cripple them further.

At the White House meeting last Monday, with a chitchat in front of the cameras that looked as if it was a rehearsed meeting with Trump dominating the conversation and everyone taking their que to speak only when they are told, he pointed out to Netanyahu that he “may not” consider reversing tariffs on Israeli exports because “we give Israel $4 billion a year. That’s a lot.” He sounded like lecturing to the Israelis.

For a man considered to be greatly influenced by the Israeli lobby that seemed to be tough talking for in the immediate conversation Trump told Netanyahu that there would be and for the first time direct face-to-face talking with Iranians about their nuclear file.

This seemed to be another unsuspecting blow. If there was a “shock” on his face, Netanyahu didn’t show it as he just nodded; the Israeli Prime Minister was looking for a tough military stance on Iran, possibly going to war and striking the country’s nuclear facilities. It was he, who persuaded Trump in 2018 to exit from the 2015 nuclear deal brokered by the UN with other world powers of Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany at the behest of the Barack Obama administration.

Now with Trump in the driving seat, and wanting a “tainted-Donald” deal, Netanyahu couldn’t but agree with an alluring American president. If he had any misgivings, he kept them to himself except to say Tel Aviv and Washington had an objective not to let Iran have nuclear weapons, but Tehran constantly said and throughout the past years that their nuclear program was for peaceful purposes unlike the clandestine extensive Israeli nuclear program.

Although he may not have outwardly shown it, Trump may have been a little irritated by Netanyahu in other ways. Take Gaza for example when Israel restarted its war on the enclave on 19 March exactly two months after a ceasefire took effect ending a 15-month genocide and which was brokered by Trump and his team lead by Steve Witkoff.

The recent talks in the White House, and shown in front of the cameras suggest Trump would have like more time for the Doha negotiations to take hold between Hamas and Israel to see the release of the 59 remaining hostages – which include one American who is still deemed to be alive – hidden in the Gaza enclave.

The relaunching of the war, and so quickly, and with the breaking of the 19 January ceasefire is adding to the tension between Washington and Tel Aviv and is sending signals that Netanyahu wants to continue the war in Gaza and doesn’t particularly care about the remaining hostages, and whether they come out of their nightmare dead or alive.

Trump, and as shown by the White House meeting, is showing a diversion from thoughts projected by Netanyahu. As well as Iran, he has told Netanyahu, he favors Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and that he has a ‘very, very good relationship with Turkey and with their leader…”, adding that “I happen to like him, and we never had a problem” and he offered to mediate between Israel on any problem between the two countries.

Such words may have suddenly added to the glum mood of the Israeli PM who fears that Turkish influence in Syria despite the fact it is Israel that is today bombarding different Syrian cities and occupying parts of their territory, a situation that increased after the toppling of the Bashar Al Assad regime on 9 December, 2024 by a new government in Damascus, and which is seen as a threat to Israeli security by Tel Aviv.

What is worrying Netanyahu is the fact Trump recognizes Turkish influence and Syria and Ankara’s relationship with the new government in Damascus, and apparenty the man in the White House, is “ok” with it.

With all this going on, Netanyahu is not sure anymore of the way the White House is going despite the fact that Washington continues to be the main supplier of weapons to Tel Aviv. But with Trump as “fickle-minded” as he is, all cards are on the table for a new and changing relationship between the USA and the rest of the world with the strong possibility of including Israel in the new international set of thinking.

Dr. Marwan Asmar holds a PhD from Leeds University and is a freelance writer specializing in the Middle East.

11 April 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Aviva Chomsky

In the colonial view of the world — and, in its own strange fashion, Donald Trump’s view couldn’t be more colonial — White European colonizers were embattled beacons of civilization, rationality, and progress, confronting dangerous barbaric hordes beyond (and even, sometimes, within) their own frontiers. Colonial violence then was a necessary form of self-defense needed to tame irrational eruptions of brutality among the colonized. To make sense of the bipartisan U.S. devotion to Israel, including the glorification of Israeli violence and the demonization of Palestinians, as well as the Trump administration’s recent attacks on Black South Africa, student activists, and immigrants, it’s important to grasp that worldview.

On the Caribbean island of Barbados, Great Britain’s 1688 Act “For the Governing of Negroes” proclaimed that “Negroes… are of a barbarous, wild, and savage nature, and such as renders them wholly unqualified to be governed by the Laws, Customes, and Practices of our Nation: It is therefore becoming absolutely necessary, that such other Constitutions, Laws and Orders, should be… framed and enacted for the good regulating or ordering of them, as may both restrain the disorders, rapines, and inhumanities to which they are naturally prone and inclined.”

When I read those words recently, I heard strange echoes of how President Trump talks about immigrants, Palestinians, and Black South Africans. The text of that act exemplified what would become longstanding colonial ideologies: the colonized are unpredictably “barbarous, wild, and savage” and so must be governed by the colonizing power with a separate set of (harsh) laws; and — though not directly stated — must be assigned a legal status that sets them apart from the rights-bearing one the colonizers granted themselves. Due to their “barbarous, wild, and savage nature,” violence would inevitably be necessary to keep them under control.

Colonization meant bringing White Europeans to confront those supposedly dangerous peoples in their own often distant homelands. It also meant, as in Barbados, bringing supposedly dangerous people to new places and using violence and brutal laws to control them there. In the United States, it meant trying to displace or eliminate what the Declaration of Independence called “merciless Indian savages” and justifying White violence with slave codes based on the one the British used in Barbados in the face of the ever-present threat supposedly posed by enslaved Black people.

That grim 1688 Act also revealed how colonialism blurred the lines between Europe and its colonies. As an expansionist Europe grew ever more expansive, it brought rights-holding Europeans and those they excluded, suppressed, or dominated into the same physical spaces through colonization, enslavement, transportation, and war. Enslaved Africans were inside the territory, but outside the legal system. Expansion required violence, along with elaborate legal structures and ideologies to enforce and justify who belonged and who never would, and — yes! — ever more violence to keep the system in place.

Ideas Still with Us

The legacies of colonialism and the set of ideas behind that Act of 1688 are still with us and continue to target formerly colonized (and still colonized) peoples.

Given the increasingly unsettled nature of our world, thanks to war, politics, and the growing pressures of climate change, ever more people have tried to leave their embattled countries and emigrate to Europe and the United States. There, they find a rising tide of anti-immigrant racism that reproduces a modern version of old-fashioned colonial racism. Europe and the United States, of course, reserve the right to deny entry, or grant only partial, temporary, revocable, and limited status to many of those seeking refuge in their countries. Those different statuses mean that they are subject to different legal systems once they’re there. In Donald Trump’s America, for instance, the United States reserves the right to detain and deport even green-card holders at will, merely by claiming that their presence poses a threat, as in the case of Columbia University graduate and Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil, arrested in New York but quickly sent into custody in Louisiana.

Colonial racism helps explain the Trump administration’s adulation of Israeli violence against Palestinians. In good colonial fashion, Israel relies on laws that grant full rights to some, while justifying the repression (not to mention genocide) of others. Israeli violence, like the Barbadian slave code, always claims to “restrain the disorders, rapines, and inhumanities to which [Palestinians] are naturally prone and inclined.”

South Africa, of course, is still struggling with its colonial and post-colonial legacy — including decades of apartheid, which created political and legal structures that massively privileged the White population there. And while apartheid is now a past legacy, ongoing attempts to undo its damage like a January 2025 land reform law have only raised President Trump’s ire in ways that echo his reaction to even the most modest attempts to promote “diversity, equity, and inclusion,” or that dreaded abbreviation of the Trump era, DEI, in American institutions ranging from the military to universities.

Israel, though, remains a paragon of virtue and glory in Trump’s eyes. Its multiple legal structures keep Palestinians legally excluded in a diaspora from which they are not allowed to return, under devastating military occupation, with the constant threat of expulsion from the occupied West Bank and Gaza, and in occupied East Jerusalem, where they are Israeli residents but not full citizens and subject to multiple legal exclusions as non-Jews. (Donald Trump, of course, had a similar fantasy when he imagined rebuilding Gaza as a Middle Eastern “Riviera,” while expelling the Palestinians from the area.) Even those who are citizens of Israel are explicitly denied a national identity and subject to numerous discriminatory laws in a country that claims to represent “the national home of the Jewish people” and to which displaced Palestinians are forbidden to return, even as “Jewish settlement is a national value.”

Good Discrimination, Bad Discrimination

Lately, of course, right-wing politicians and pundits in this country have been denouncing any policies that claim special protections for, or even academic or legal acknowledgement of, long marginalized groups. They once derisively dubbed all such things “critical race theory” and now denounce DEI programs as divisive and — yes! — discriminatory, insisting that they be dismantled or abolished.

Meanwhile, there are two groups that those same right-wing actors have assiduously sought to protect: White South Africans and Jews. In his February executive order cutting aid to South Africa and offering refugee status to White Afrikaner South Africans (and only them), Trump accused that country’s government of enacting “countless… policies designed to dismantle equal opportunity in employment, education, and business.” No matter that such a view of South Africa is pure fantasy. What he meant, of course, was that they were dismantling apartheid-legacy policies that privileged Whites.

Meanwhile, his administration has been dismantling actual equal opportunity policies here, calling them “illegal and immoral discrimination programs, going by the name ‘diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI).’” The difference?  President Trump is proud to kill policies that create opportunities for people of color, just as he was outraged at South Africa’s land reform law that chipped away at the historical privilege of White landowners there. His attack on DEI reflects his drive to undo the very notion of creating de facto equal access for citizens (especially people of color) who have long been denied it.

Trump and his allies are also obsessed with what his January 30th executive order called an “explosion of antisemitism.” Unlike Black, Native American, Hispanic, LGBTQIA+, or other historically marginalized groups in the United States, American Jews — like Afrikaners — are considered a group deserving of special protection.

What is the source of this supposed “explosion” of antisemitism? The answer: “pro-Hamas aliens and left-wing radicals” who, Trump claims, are carrying out “a campaign of intimidation, vandalism, and violence on the campuses and streets of America.” In other words, the ever-present barbarian threat is now embodied by “aliens” and “radicals” who challenge Israeli colonial violence and a US-dominated global order.

And — this is important! — not all Jews deserve such special protection, only those who identify with and support Israel’s colonial violence. The American right’s current obsession with antisemitism has little to do with the rights of Jews generally and everything to do with its commitment to Israel.

Even the most minor deviation from full-throated support for Israeli violence earned Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer the scorn of Trump, who called him “a proud member of Hamas” and added, “He’s become a Palestinian. He used to be Jewish. He’s not Jewish anymore. He’s a Palestinian.” Apparently for Trump, the very word “Palestinian” is a slur.

Israeli Violence Is “Stunning,” While Palestinians Are “Barbaric”

The American media and officials of both parties have generally celebrated Israeli violence. In September 2024, the New York Times referred to Israel’s “two days of stunning attacks that detonated pagers and handheld radios across Lebanon” that killed dozens and maimed thousands. A Washington Post headline called “Israel’s pager attack an intelligence triumph.” President Joe Biden then lauded Israel’s assassination of Hezbollah’s Hassan Nasrallah in September as “a measure of justice” and called its assassination of Hamas’s Yahya Sinwar a month later “a good day for Israel, for the United States, and for the world.” On Israel’s murder of the chief Hamas negotiator, Ismael Haniyeh, in the midst of U.S.-sponsored ceasefire negotiations in August, Biden could only lament that it was “not helpful.”

Compare this to the outrage professed when Columbia Middle East Studies professor Joseph Massad wrote, in an article on Arab world reactions to Hamas’s October 7th attack, that “the sight of the Palestinian resistance fighters storming Israeli checkpoints separating Gaza from Israel was astounding.” For that simple reflection of those Arab reactions, Columbia’s then-President Minouche Shafik denounced him before Congress, announcing that she was “appalled” and that Massad was being investigated because his language was “unacceptable.” He never would have gotten tenure had she known of his views, she insisted. Apparently only Israeli violence can be “stunning” or a “triumph.”

Meanwhile, at Harvard on October 9th, Palestine solidarity student groups quoted Israeli officials who promised to “open the gates of hell” on Gaza. “We hold the Israeli regime entirely responsible for all unfolding violence,” they wrote. Despite the fact that multiple Israeli sources were saying similar things, Republican Representative Elise Stefanik posted: “It is abhorrent and heinous that Harvard students are blaming Israel for Hamas’ barbaric attacks.” Note the use of the word “barbaric” from the slave code, repeatedly invoked by journalists, intellectuals, and politicians when it came to Hamas or Palestinians, but not Israelis.

In November 2024, when the U.S. vetoed (for the fourth time) a U.N. Security Council resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, the world was aghast. The U.N. warned that, after a year of Israel’s intensive bombardment and 40 days of the complete blockade of humanitarian supplies, two million Palestinians were “facing diminishing conditions of survival.” The U.N. Director of Human Rights Watch accused the U.S. of acting “to ensure impunity for Israel as its forces continue to commit crimes against Palestinians in Gaza.” The American ambassador, however, defended the veto, arguing that, although the resolution called for the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza, it did not provide enough “linkage.” And of course, U.S. arms, including staggeringly destructive 2,000-pound bombs, have continued to flow to Israel in striking quantities as the genocide continues.

Connecting Immigrants, Palestinians, and South Africa

Closer to home, Trump’s full-throated attack on immigrants has revived the worst of colonial language. The Marshall Project has, for instance, tracked some of his major claims and how often he’s repeated them: “Unauthorized immigrants are criminals [said 575+ times], snakes that bite [35+ times], eating pets, coming from jails and mental institutions [560+ times], causing crime in sanctuary cities [185+ times], and a group of isolated, tragic cases prove they are killing Americans en masse [235+ times].” Clearly, draconian laws are needed to control such monsters!

Trump has also promised to deport millions of immigrants and issued a series of executive orders meant to greatly expand the detention and deportation of those living in the United States without legal authorization — “undocumented people.” Another set of orders is meant to strip the status of millions of immigrants who are currently here with legal authorization, revoking Temporary Protected Status, work authorizations, student visas, and even green cards. One reason for this is to expand the number of people who can be deported since, despite all the rhetoric and the spectacle, the administration has struggled so far to achieve anything faintly like the rates it has promised.

This anti-immigrant drive harmonizes with Trump’s affection for Jewish Israel and White South Africa in obvious ways. White South Africans are being welcomed with open arms (though few are coming), while other immigrants are targeted. Non-citizen students and others have been particularly singled out for supposedly “celebrating Hamas’ mass rape, kidnapping, and murder.” The cases of Mahmoud Khalil, Rasha Alawieh, Momodou Taal, Badar Khan Suri, Yunseo Chung, and Rumeysa Ozturk (and perhaps others by the time this article is published) stand out in this regard. The Trump administration repeatedly denigrates movements for Palestinian rights and immigrants as violent threats that must be contained.

There are some deeper connections as well. Immigrants from what Trump once termed “shit-hole countries” are, in his view, not only prone to violence and criminality themselves but also inclined to anti-American and anti-Israel views, leaving this country supposedly at risk. Included in his executive order on South Africa was the accusation that its government “has taken aggressive positions towards the United States and its allies, including accusing Israel… of genocide in the International Court of Justice” and is “undermining United States foreign policy, which poses national security threats to our Nation” — almost identical wording to that used to justify the revocation of visas for Khalil and others. In other words, threats are everywhere.

Trump and his associates weaponize antisemitism to attack student protesters, progressive Jewish organizations, freedom of speech, immigrants, higher education, and other threats to his colonizer’s view of the world.

In reality, however, the United States, Israel, and White South Africa exist as colonial anachronisms in what President Joe Biden, echoing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, described (with respect to Israel) as an “incredibly dangerous neighborhood.” And Trump has only doubled down on that view.

Strange to imagine, but the planters of Barbados would undoubtedly be proud to see their ideological descendants continuing to impose violent control on our world, while invoking the racist ideas they proposed in the 1600s.

Aviva Chomsky, a TomDispatch regular, is professor of history and coordinator of Latin American studies at Salem State University in Massachusetts.

11 April 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor

Palestinain Territory – The horrific massacre carried out by Israeli forces in the Al-Shuja’iyya neighbourhood, east of Gaza City, marks a clear escalation in the ongoing genocide and a blatant denial of the Palestinian people’s right to life in the Gaza Strip. The attack represents an explicit and deliberate attempt to completely erase the Palestinian presence in Gaza.

Euro-Med Monitor’s field team documented that at approximately 9:28 a.m. on Wednesday, 9 April 2025, Israeli warplanes launched multiple airstrikes using highly destructive bombs on a densely populated residential block on Baghdad Street in the Al-Shuja’iyya neighbourhood. The attack led to the complete destruction of around ten homes, with residents still inside, resulting in the deaths of over 35 civilians and injuries to more than 50 others.

Preliminary reports indicate that dozens of people remain trapped under the rubble. Although civil defence teams were able to rescue some individuals using basic tools, rescue operations had to be suspended by evening due to the extreme dangers facing emergency workers in the targeted area.

Euro-Med Monitor’s team also documented distress calls from individuals trapped beneath the debris, pleading for help and directing rescuers to their locations. Despite the urgent need for heavy equipment to clear the rubble and reach survivors, rescue efforts relied entirely on primitive methods and manual tools. Some victims died from suffocation or untreated injuries due to delays in the rescue operations.

In addition to the massacre, Israeli warplanes bombed another house in the same neighbourhood, killing five more civilians and injuring several others. This strike was part of a broader assault on Al-Shuja’iyya that began at dawn the previous Thursday with the detonation of an explosive-laden robot, followed by widespread aerial bombardment and forced displacement orders. The assault remains ongoing.

Israeli military sources attempted to justify the massacre by claiming it targeted a ‘Hamas military commander’—a recurring narrative used to Justify the deliberate mass killing of civilians as part of a broader campaign of genocide in Gaza. Israel consistently repeats the same claim whenever global public opinion turns against its actions—alleging that it was targeting ‘militants’—to justify attacks on civilians. However, it fails to provide any verifiable evidence or permit independent bodies to assess the validity of these claims.

Making such claims does not absolve Israel of its obligations under international law, including the duty to conduct effective investigations, hold perpetrators accountable, and provide redress to victims. Nor does it relieve other states of their legal responsibilities to investigate, ensure accountability, and pursue justice for victims. The automatic acceptance of Israel’s unsupported claims effectively grants it a blank cheque to continue targeting civilians under a false legal pretext—ultimately undermining the integrity and effectiveness of the international legal system.

Even if a combatant were present or passing through the area, it would not justify the brutal massacres nor absolve Israel of its binding legal obligations under international humanitarian law. These obligations include adherence to the principles of humanity, distinction, military necessity, proportionality, and precaution—all of which must be upheld in the planning and execution of any military operation, without exception. This includes decisions regarding the methods and means of warfare, which must be designed to minimise civilian casualties and harm.

The details of the massacre—particularly the extensive destruction and high civilian death toll—leave no doubt that Israeli forces blatantly disregarded fundamental principles of international humanitarian law. The attack targeted a densely populated civilian area, predominantly affecting children, using highly destructive weapons. It was executed without distinction between military and civilian targets, and without taking the necessary precautions to prevent or minimise civilian harm. Taken together, these circumstances strongly indicate that the attack was coordinated and deliberately directed at civilians, affirming the unlawful nature of the operation and qualifying it as a grave international crime warranting prosecution and full accountability.

The mass killing of Palestinians has been normalised, eliciting nothing but silence, as though Israel can openly and without fear of moral or legal repercussions take Palestinian civilian lives. This grim reality appears to have been implicitly accepted by the international community.

The international community’s tolerance of this ongoing pattern of crimes is not merely a moral failure—it constitutes a serious breach of both state and international legal obligations. This tolerance effectively transforms the mass killing of Palestinians from a criminal act into a publicly executed policy. In this context, global silence amounts to a direct failure to uphold the legal duty to prevent and punish genocide, as mandated by the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.

Israel’s method of killing reflects a clear and deliberate policy to eradicate Palestinian civilians throughout the Gaza Strip. It spreads fear, deprives people of shelter and even momentary stability, forces repeated displacement, and imposes deadly living conditions. This is further compounded by ongoing bombardments across the Strip, including attacks on areas designated as ‘humanitarian zones’ and the targeted destruction of shelters, many of which are located within UNRWA facilities.

All countries, both individually and collectively, must fulfil their legal obligations and act urgently to stop the genocide in the Gaza Strip in all its forms. They must take all practical measures to protect Palestinian civilians. Euro-Med Monitor emphasises the need to ensure Israel’s compliance with international law and the rulings of the International Court of Justice and to guarantee accountability for its crimes against the Palestinian people. Furthermore, the arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Court against the Israeli Prime Minister and Minister of Defence must be executed at the earliest opportunity, and the Court must be allowed to bring them to international justice.

The international community must immediately impose economic, diplomatic, and military sanctions on Israel in response to its systematic and grave violations of international law. These sanctions should include a ban on the export and import of weapons involving Israel; the suspension of all political, financial, and military support or cooperation; the freezing of financial assets belonging to individuals responsible for crimes against Palestinians; and the imposition of travel bans on those individuals. Additionally, any trade privileges and bilateral agreements that provide Israel with economic advantages enabling the continuation of its actions in Gaza must be suspended without delay.

Finally, all relevant states and entities must hold complicit governments accountable—foremost among them the United States—along with other nations that provide Israel with direct or indirect support in carrying out its crimes. Any form of assistance or collaboration with Israel’s military, intelligence, political, legal, financial, or media sectors contributes to the continuation of atrocities against the Palestinian people.

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

11 April 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Dr. Ramzy Baroud

In just 24 hours, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu nominated Eli Sharvit as the new chief of Shin Bet, Israel’s internal security agency, only to quickly retract the nomination.

This episode highlights the lack of coherence in Netanyahu’s leadership, reinforcing the perception that decisions at the highest levels of government are made impulsively and without a clear plan.

It also serves as further proof that Netanyahu is easily manipulated—not just by his right-wing extremist allies in the coalition, but also by external forces, foreign governments, and, as reported by Israeli media, even his wife, Sara.

This chaotic decision-making process helps explain the deep lack of trust Israelis have in their leadership. Recent public opinion polls show that a significant percentage of Israelis lack faith in their government and are calling for new elections or Netanyahu’s resignation.

This distrust has been attributed to Netanyahu’s failure to prevent the October 7 attacks and his inability to win the war-turned genocide in Gaza.

But the issue goes beyond these failures. Israelis have lost confidence in Netanyahu because they do not see him as a leader acting in the national interest. He has become so entrenched in power that he is willing to incite civil strife in Israel just to maintain his position.

As a result, it should come as no surprise that Netanyahu is also willing to sacrifice the lives of over 15,000 children in Gaza, along with tens of thousands of innocent civilians, just to buy himself more time in office.

The Shin Bet scandal, however, is the clearest example to date of Netanyahu’s corruption and poor judgment.

Israeli politics are notoriously unstable, and coalitions rarely last long. In that context, Netanyahu’s fractious government could be seen as a reflection of Israel’s history of political instability.

The ongoing conflict between the government and the military, while unusual, can also be understood as part of a growing trend in which the Israeli right seeks to control all institutions—including the military, which has historically been seen as separate from politics.

The events of October 7, and the failed war that followed—both of which are now the subject of critical investigations—have shattered the fragile balance that allowed Netanyahu and his right-wing coalition to hold power without provoking mass dissent.

Israeli public pressure has proven to be a key factor in this balancing act. For example, the public outcry forced Netanyahu to restore former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant to his position in April 2023.

However, 18 months of war in Gaza, Lebanon, and now Syria have given Netanyahu the leverage to use the state of emergency as a tool to crush opposition, stifle dissent, and ignore calls for the war to end and for a final agreement to be reached.

He has now turned the war into a platform for pursuing an internal political agenda that he had failed to implement in the years leading up to October 7. But Shin Bet is another matter entirely.

Founded by Israel’s first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, in 1949, Shin Bet has long been the cornerstone of Israel’s internal security.

While the agency’s primary mission is counterterrorism, intelligence gathering, and providing security for Israeli officials, its role carries much greater significance for the stability of the state.

One of Shin Bet’s primary objectives is to prevent espionage and internal subversion. Given the intelligence failures exposed by the October 7 events, any significant restructuring of such a critical agency could be disastrous for Israel.

Though the head of Shin Bet reports directly to the prime minister, it has always been understood that the position should remain above political infighting. Netanyahu’s decision to fire Ronen Bar on March 2, therefore, sent shockwaves through Israeli society, even more so than his decisions to dismiss former chief of staff Herzi Halevi or Defense Minister Gallant.

Netanyahu’s actions have violated a longstanding taboo, further exacerbating Israel’s already unprecedented internal crisis.

Former Shin Bet chief Nadav Argaman has even threatened to reveal secret information, signaling that the agency is prepared to engage in this internal power struggle, which some fear could escalate into a civil war.

But the cancellation of Sharvit’s nomination, which would have filled Bar’s position, is perhaps the most revealing aspect of this crisis. It underscores Netanyahu’s erratic decision-making and empowers his opponents, who are eager to bring him down. As Israel’s opposition leader Yair Lapid has put it, Netanyahu has become “an existential threat to Israel”.

Some analysts have suggested that Netanyahu’s reversal was due to US pressure, especially since Sharvit had written an article criticizing US President Donald Trump.

While some see this as evidence that Netanyahu’s agenda is largely dictated by the US, such conclusions are oversimplified. Although the US wields significant influence, Netanyahu’s decisions are shaped by a complex array of factors.

Netanyahu is keen on presenting the withdrawal of Sharvit’s nomination not as a sign of political subservience, but rather as a strategic concession or overture to Trump. His aim is to win continued full US support for his war agenda in Gaza and across the Middle East.

Ultimately, this perpetual war agenda is not driven by any coherent political ideology. Netanyahu’s singular focus remains on maintaining his political coalition and ensuring his political survival—nothing more, nothing less.

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

10 April 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Quds News Network

Gaza (Quds News Network)- The Israeli military is preparing to turn Rafah city in southern Gaza, along with its surrounding neighborhoods, into a buffer zone along the border, Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported on Wednesday, citing military officials.

Morag Axis

Last Week, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the forces were “seizing territory” and “dividing up” Gaza.

According to OCHA, the UN humanitarian agency, the Israeli military has declared over 64% of the territory military buffer zones and “no-go” zones for civilians.

The same week, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fled Rafah and surrounding areas, as Israeli ground troops advanced to create Netanyahu’s newly announced corridor, Morag.

The Morag Corridor consists mainly of agricultural land located between Khan Younis and Rafah, stretching from east to west across the Gaza Strip.

It also includes parts of what the Israeli military had previously designated as a “humanitarian zone”.

The name “Morag” that he used refers to an illegal Israeli settlement that was established in the region between 1972 and 2005.

Troops have raided prominent residential neighbourhoods in the city – which was densely populated before the war – and indiscriminately killed civilians, including executing medics, while forcing tens of thousands to flee on foot.

The military has said its aim is to “encircle” Rafah.

A defence source told Israeli newspaper Haaretz that they were surprised by Netanyahu’s announcement that the army had seized the “Morag Axis”.

Netanyahu said that the purpose of controlling the area is to “divide” the Gaza Strip by cutting Rafah off from Khan Younis and to “increase pressure step by step so they will give us our hostages”.

Israeli forces previously attempted to control east-to-west corridors in northern Gaza, parallel to the so-called “Morag axis”, as part of military strategy to increase pressure on specific regions.

At the onset of the war, they controlled the so-called Netzarim Corridor, located between Gaza City and central Gaza, blocking the movement of people between the enclave’s north and south.

Currently, Israeli forces control the Philadelphi Corridor along Gaza’s border with Egypt in southern Rafah.

According to the terms of the January ceasefire agreement, Israeli forces were supposed to withdraw from the Philadelphi Corridor by the end of the first phase, a clause they failed to honour.

Netanyahu called the “Morag axis” the “Second Philadelphi” Corridor.

“Nothing Left to Destroy”

The area, located between the Philadelphi Corridor to the south and the Morag Corridor to the north, was home to around 200,000 Palestinians before the Israeli assault. In recent weeks, however, it has been left almost entirely deserted following widespread destruction caused by the Israeli military.

The military has refrained until now from turning large cities like Rafah into the buffer zone, Haaretz said.

According to Haaretz, citing defense officials, the move to include Rafah came after Israel’s decision to resume the assault in February, and against the backdrop of Netanyahu’s statement that Israel would seize large areas of Gaza.

In some respects, it appears the army is seeking to replicate in the south the methods it employed in northern Gaza, Haaretz added.

The buffer zone covers a vast area – approximately 75 square kilometers (about 29 square miles), roughly one-fifth of the Gaza Strip. It would effectively turn Gaza into an enclave within Israeli-controlled territory, cutting it off from the Egyptian border. According to the sources, this consideration played a central role in the decision to focus on Rafah.

The sources added that the move is also intended to create new levers of pressure on Hamas.

According to the Israeli newspaper, there is a growing understanding withing the militart that Israel is unlikely to receive international backing – including from Washington – for a prolonged assault in Gaza.

As a result, the military is preparing to concentrate its operations in areas where it believes it can maximize the pressure on Hamas’ leadership.

As part of its preparations, the military is already working to expand the Morag Axis, demolishing structures along its path. In some sections, it will be several hundred meters wide, and in certain areas, it could exceed a kilometer.

According to defense sources, it has yet to be decided whether the entire area will simply be designated a buffer zone that is off-limits to civilians – as has been done in other parts of the border area – or whether the area will be fully cleared and all buildings demolished, effectively wiping out the city of Rafah.

However, the military’s new activity in the area is not limited to the stretch between Morag and Philadelphi corridor. In recent weeks, soldiers have begun taking up positions along the entire perimeter, in what appears to be a preliminary move, Haaretz said.

“There’s nothing left to destroy in the buffer zone,” said a commander who served for more than 240 days in Gaza during the Israeli assault and took part in demolishing structures and clearing operations along the buffer zone and the Netzarim corridor.

“The entire area is unfit for human habitation. There’s no need to send so many soldiers into these places.”

Reservist commanders and soldiers said that the military is repeating the same messages it used at the start of the war, without confronting the reality on the ground.

“I can’t believe that after a year and a half, we’re back to square one,” said a soldier from a reserve brigade currently serving in the Gaza Strip. “We’re being sent to destroy what’s already been destroyed, without anyone knowing how long it will take, what the actual goal is or what level of operational success is needed for the forces to complete the mission.”

10 April 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Kevin Reed

The campaign of genocide and expulsion of Palestinians from Gaza by US imperialism and Israel continued with intensity on Tuesday, one day after the war criminal Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with President Donald Trump in the White House.

In the past 48 hours, Israeli airstrikes in Gaza killed at least 38 Palestinians and wounded 55, including children. Many casualties occurred in the Shujaiya area of Gaza City due to a strike on a residential building. Shujaiya is one of the largest neighborhoods of Gaza, which once held as many as 100,000 people, and is in the southern quarter of Old City of Gaza and outside of the city walls.

The dense population and overcrowding by refugees living in tents near the residential building were certainly known by the Israeli military. This was the reason the four-story structure was targeted. The building was right next to the al-Hawashi mosque. A total of eight homes were destroyed, along with significant damage done to nearby structures.

Israel justified its murderous targeting of civilians, as it has done continuously over the past 18 months, by claiming it was seeking to “eliminate” a senior Hamas militant who was in the area. While no name or evidence was provided, at least 23 people, including eight women and eight children, were killed.

A report by Al Jazeera described the scene:

Emergency responders and neighbours who narrowly escaped death have been digging with their bare hands to get through the rubble amid an absence of equipment.

Anas el-Titr, who lived in one of the homes that was hit by the Israeli warplanes, said:

They have nothing to do with the fighting. They are children, they are innocent. … They are women staying at their homes. They have nothing to do with the fighting. Why would they hit them?

With ambulances full, many of the victims had to be transported using donkey carts. Emergency workers, who are being killed by Israeli attacks at an alarming rate, are overwhelmed.

The ongoing conflict has severely impacted various regions within Gaza, leading to significant civilian casualties and exacerbating the humanitarian crisis.

After his private meeting with Trump on Monday, Netanyahu took questions from the press in the White House and said that a plan was being developed for “enabling the people of Gaza to freely make a choice to go wherever they want,” and that the US and Israel were working with several countries who will agree to take Palestinians. This was, of course, a blatant articulation of the goal of the ethnic cleansing in Gaza, since staying there was not one of the “free choices” being offered to Palestinians.

In another strike, the medical charity Doctors Without Borders said an Israeli attack hit close to its clinic in the so-called safe zone of al-Mawasi in southern Gaza. Meanwhile, a strike on a home in Deir al-Balah in central Gaza killed 11 people, including five children as young as two, according to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, which received the bodies. Four more people were killed in a separate strike that hit a house in Deir al-Balah, it said.

A strike in the northern town of Beit Lahiya flattened a home and killed a family of seven, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. A separate strike hit a group of people in an open area northwest of Gaza City, killing four people, including one who was planning to get married next week, the ministry said.

Six weeks have now passed since Israel imposed a total blockade of Gaza impacting 2.3 million people there. Food that was stockpiled during the short-lived ceasefire is running out, while emergency meal distributions are ending, bakeries have closed down, and markets are empty.

The international farmers organization La Via Campesina issued a press release on Tuesday urging emergency action to prevent “extermination by starvation and collapse of life in Gaza.” The statement denounces the Israeli engineered famine in Gaza, with 93 percent of Palestinians facing acute food insecurity, bringing Gaza to (Integrated Food Security Phase Classification) IPC Phase 5—extermination by starvation—the highest level of food insecurity, which indicates widespread death due to starvation, extremely critical acute malnutrition and collapse of livelihood systems.

The statement goes on:

Bread has disappeared from markets; Palestinians are dying from dehydration and untreated wounds; all bakeries and flour mills have been destroyed; fuel, water, electricity and medical supplies remain blockaded.

These acts clearly satisfy the elements of genocide as defined under Article II(c) of the Genocide Convention, namely, the “deliberate infliction of conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction of a group in whole or in part.”

Because every mechanism to date—including diplomatic pressure, legal proceedings and even declared ceasefires—has failed to stop Israel’s genocide and engineered starvation in Gaza, we issue this urgent call for immediate action to pressure and mobilize for multilateral State-led humanitarian aid corridors and protective forces to halt the escalated extermination in Gaza.

On Monday, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) published its Humanitarian Situation Update #278 on the Gaza Strip. The statement said Gaza Strip is experiencing a worsening humanitarian crisis as water, sanitation and food shortages intensify due to severe restrictions and infrastructure damage.

A drastic reduction in water supply, combined with power outages and fuel shortages, has significantly affected access to safe drinking water. Of the three Mekorot water pipelines from Israel, only one remains functional, while the main desalination plant has reduced its output by 85 percent. UNICEF reports that drinking water availability has dropped to six liters per person per day and could fall even further, increasing the risk of disease outbreaks, especially among children.

The sanitation conditions in Gaza are deteriorating, the OCHA report states, placing immense strain on healthcare facilities. Over 250 medical centers lack essential infection prevention supplies; and hospitals, already overwhelmed with casualties, are struggling with dwindling medical resources. The ongoing blockade on aid since early March has further exacerbated the crisis.

Malnutrition is rising sharply, with infant nutrition supplies nearly gone, forcing families to use unsafe alternatives mixed with contaminated water. UNICEF has warned that thousands of pallets of lifesaving aid remain blocked from entering Gaza, emphasizing that this is not a matter of charity but an obligation under international law.

The collapse of food production has added another layer of life-threatening hardship. Farmers face irrigation shortages, herders are losing livestock at alarming rates, and fishers struggle with security risks and equipment shortages. The destruction of agricultural infrastructure and the continued restrictions on movement have made access to food increasingly difficult. With essential resources dwindling and humanitarian space shrinking, the people of Gaza, particularly children and vulnerable groups, are facing an escalating crisis that threatens their survival.

10 April 2025

Source: countercurrents.org