Saudi-led coalition denies targeting prison after Yemen strike kills dozens

Issued on: 22/01/2022 - 

A man walks on the collapsed roof of a detention centre hit by air strikes in Saada on January 21, 2022. © Naif Rahma, Reuters


At least 70 people were killed in an air strike on a prison as Yemen's long-running conflict suffered a dramatic escalation Friday that drew condemnation from UN chief Antonio Guterres.

The Houthi rebels released gruesome video footage showing bodies in the rubble and mangled corpses from the attack, which levelled buildings at the prison in their northern heartland of Saada.

The Saudi-led coalition, which has been fighting the rebels since 2015, released a statement on Saturday denying it carried out the strike.

Reports of the targeting of the rebel-held facility are "baseless and unfounded", said coalition spokesman Turki al-Malki, who was quoted by the official Saudi Press Agency.

The coalition official said the prison was not placed on a "No Strike List in accordance with the agreed upon mechanism" with the United Nations' humanitarian affairs office in Yemen and had "not been reported by the International Committee of the Red Cross".

Al-Malki said the coalition would share with both agencies "the facts and details, as well as the media misinformation" by the Houthis about the facility.

Further south in the port city of Hodeida, at least three children died when air strikes by the Saudi-led coalition hit a telecommunications facility as they played nearby, Save the Children said. Yemen also suffered a country-wide internet blackout.

"The children were reportedly playing on a nearby football field when missiles struck," Save the Children said.

Eight aid agencies operating in Yemen said in a joint statement they were "horrified by the news that more than 70 people, including migrants, women and children, have been killed... in a blatant disregard for civilian lives".

They said the prison in Saada was used as a holding centre for migrants, who made up many of the casualties.

The strikes came after the Houthis took the seven-year war into a new phase by claiming a drone and missile attack on Abu Dhabi that killed three people on Monday.

They came as the UN Security Council met to discuss that attack at the UAE's request.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in a statement Friday called for "all parties to the conflict to de-escalate" and "abide by their obligations under international humanitarian law" after the Yemen strike and the attack on the Emirati capital.

'Proportionate response'

The United Arab Emirates insisted that it and other coalition members remained committed to "proportionate" responses to Huthi attacks.

"The coalition undertakes to abide by international law and proportionate response in all its military operations," UAE ambassador to the United Nations Lana Nusseibeh said.

The Security Council unanimously condemned the "heinous terrorist attacks" by the Yemeni rebels, but in a statement before the meeting the council's Norwegian presidency also strongly condemned the latest violence.

In a later statement, the UN said Guterres "reminds all parties that attacks directed against civilians and civilian infrastructure are prohibited by international humanitarian law."

Aid workers said hospitals in Saada were overwhelmed after the prison attack, with one receiving 70 dead and 138 wounded, according to Doctors Without Borders.

Two other hospitals have received "many wounded" and as night fell, the rubble was still being searched, the aid agency said.

'Horrific act'

Ahmed Mahat, Doctors Without Borders' head of mission in Yemen, said: "There are many bodies still at the scene of the air strike, many missing people."

"It is impossible to know how many people have been killed. It seems to have been a horrific act of violence."

The coalition claimed the attack in Hodeida, a lifeline port for the shattered country, but did not say it had carried out any strikes on Saada.

Global internet watchdog NetBlocks reported a "nation-scale collapse of internet connectivity".

AFP correspondents in Hodeida and Sanaa confirmed the outage.

Yemen's civil war began in 2014 when the Houthis descended from their base in Saada to overrun the capital Sanaa, prompting Saudi-led forces to intervene to prop up the government the following year.

Tensions have soared in recent weeks after the UAE-backed Giants Brigade drove the rebels out of Shabwa province, undermining their months-long campaign to take the key city of Marib further north.

On January 3, the Houthis hijacked a United Arab Emirates-flagged ship in the Red Sea.

And on Monday, they claimed a long-range attack that struck oil facilities and the airport in Abu Dhabi, killing two Indians and a Pakistani, and wounding six other people.

The attack was the first deadly assault acknowledged by the UAE inside its borders and claimed by the Houthis.

In retaliation, the coalition carried out air strikes against rebel-held Sanaa that killed 14 people.

Yemen's civil war has been a catastrophe for millions of its citizens who have fled their homes, with many close to famine in what the UN calls the world's worst humanitarian crisis.

(AFP)

Samsung pulls Singapore drag queen ad after backlash


B yAFP
Published January 21, 2022


South Korean tech giant Samsung has pulled an online advert in Singapore that featured a hijab-wearing Muslim woman hugging her drag queen son after it sparked a backlash from socially conservative corners.

LGBTQ rights remain a sensitive topic in the prosperous city-state, where a rarely invoked colonial-era law banning sex between men was upheld by the country’s High Court only two years ago.

The ad, part of a campaign called “Listen to Your Heart” for wearable tech like noise-cancelling earbuds and smartwatches, showcased the warm relationship between the mother and cross-dressing son.

But it touched off a wave of online criticism, with one group labelling it “an unfortunate attempt to push the LGBT ideology into a largely conservative Muslim community”.

“We are against the ideology of mainstreaming homosexuality and transgenderism into a conservative society,” said “We are Against Pinkdot”, a group that opposes Singapore’s gay rights movement.

Other criticism took a similar tack, with one social media user bemoaning the negative impact the ad’s message of “unlimited openness” could have on future generations of the religious community.

Ethnic Malay Muslims represent a sizeable minority in the city-state, which is majority ethnic Chinese.

Following the backlash, Samsung said it was pulling the ad from all public platforms as it “may be perceived as insensitive and offensive” to some members of the local community.

“We acknowledge that we have fallen short in this instance,” it added in a Facebook post earlier this week.

But Pinkdot, one of Singapore’s main gay rights groups, hit back at the “vocal conservatives” whose protests got the ad removed.

“To date, it is still unclear what these people were offended by — the fact that LGBTQ+ people exist in Singapore or that we are deserving of loving relationships, or both,” it said.

While support for gay rights is growing in some quarters, there is still resistance to greater acceptance. In 2020, more than 25,000 people signed a petition demanding that a live stream of Pride celebrations be restricted to adult viewers.

Singaporean authorities are frequently criticised for their attitude towards gay rights, but officials have defended their stance, saying the city-state remains largely conservative.

Last May, the government warned the US embassy “not to interfere” in local matters after it hosted an online gay rights forum attended by Singaporean activists.

Read more: https://www.digitaljournal.com/business/samsung-pulls-singapore-drag-queen-ad-after-backlash/article#ixzz7IgYflw78

Pakistan proud of pig-to-human heart transplant pioneer


By AFP
Published January 21, 2022

Friends and former classmates of the Pakistan-born surgeon behind the world’s first pig-to-human heart transplant say they earmarked him for greatness from his medical school days.

Karachi-born Muhammad Mansoor Mohiuddin made headlines last week as the co-founder of the US university programme that successfully transplanted the heart of a genetically modified pig into a gravely ill American man.

While hailed as a medical breakthrough, the procedure also raised ethical questions — particularly among some Jews and Muslims, who consider pigs to be unclean and avoid pork products.

None of that worried Mohiuddin’s friends and former colleagues in Pakistan, who remember him as an ace student with a passion for medicine.

“He would be so interested, always there, always available and always ready to get involved in surgery,” said Muneer Amanullah, a specialist who attended Karachi’s Dow Medical College with Mohiuddin in the 1980s.

College vice-chancellor Muhammad Saeed Qureshi said pride in Mohiuddin’s achievement had flooded the campus.

“There was exhilaration that this has been done by a graduate from this college,” he told AFP.

Mohiuddin was quick to share the limelight with a team of 50 from the University of Maryland Medical School.

“They were all experts of their respective fields,” he told AFP by phone.

“They are the best surgeons, the best physicians, the best anaesthetists, and so on.”

While the prognosis for the recipient of the pig’s heart is far from certain, the surgery represents a major milestone for animal-to-human transplants.

About 110,000 Americans are currently waiting for an organ transplant, and more than 6,000 patients die each year before getting one, according to official figures.

To meet demand, doctors have long been interested in so-called xenotransplantation, or cross-species organ donation.

“We were working on this model for 18 years,” Mohiuddin said.

“Those 18 years were dotted with different phases of frustration — as well as breakthroughs — but finally we have done it.”

The surgery is not without controversy, however, especially given Mohiuddin’s Islamic faith.

Pigs are considered unclean by Muslims and Jews — and even some Christians who follow the Bible’s Old Testament literally.

“In my view, this is not permissible for a Muslim,” said Javed Ahmed Ghamdi, a prominent Islamic scholar, in a video blog where he discussed the procedure.

But another Islamic scholar in Pakistan gave the procedure a clean bill of health.

“There is no prohibition in sharia,” Allama Hasan Zafar Naqvi told AFP, calling it a “medical miracle”.

“In religion, no deed is as supreme as saving a human life,” added Mohiuddin.

In Karachi, the surgeon’s fellow alumni feel their former colleague may now be destined for even greater glory — medicine’s top prize.

“I think… the whole team is in for it, in for the Nobel Prize,” said vice-chancellor Qureshi.

Read more: https://www.digitaljournal.com/world/pakistan-proud-of-pig-to-human-heart-transplant-pioneer/article#ixzz7IgYA9N3h

Biden’s dilemmas
By Marwan Bishara
January 21, 2022

After a strong start that included rejoining the Paris Climate Agreement and World Health Organization, both of which Trump abandoned, President Joe Biden has been, in a word, disappointing.

Over the past year, Joe Biden has talked like Barack Obama but walked like Donald Trump on foreign policy. But as he lacks the eloquence and bullishness of his predecessors, the president has fallen flat through and through.

He has failed to keep promises, issuing checks his administration could not cash. And although he criticised Trump’s policies, he so far kept much of them in place. Any good reason why the US has not rejoined UNESCO yet? For its fanciness, Biden’s ‘foreign policy for the middle class’ turned out, like Trump’s, rather nationalistic and protectionist. His commitment to make America more credible and respected around the world has failed as miserably as Trump’s commitment to ‘make America great again’. A quick balance sheet may help clarify.

In the Middle East, Biden spoke with passion and determination about democracy and human rights but went on to appease dictators like Egypt’s Abdul Fattah el-Sisi.

He has not talked to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman but has continued selling arms to Saudi Arabia despite its devastating war in Yemen, which has entered its seventh year. He has re-emphasised the importance of the two-state solution but also gave Israel the green light to do what it will to finish off Palestine through repression and illegal settlement.

And if that wasn’t enough, Biden has fully supported Trump’s policy of wedding Arab dictatorships to Israeli colonialism under the pretext of ‘peace’. The only issue where Biden actually diverged from Trump was the Iran nuclear deal, which his administration has been trying to revive, albeit incompetently.

As for transatlantic relations, Biden promised to reverse Trump’s indifference towards Europe and his insolence towards NATO but has proved just as cold and distant towards the continent.

He made the decision to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan with hardly any coordination with the European allies, a withdrawal that proved an utter disaster in its implementation, forcing US soldiers and personnel to basically flee the country in humiliation.

And in a humiliating and abrupt move, the Biden administration stiffed France out of a $40 billion arms deal by scuttling its submarine sale to Australia. Biden later admitted that his administration’s handling of the affair was clumsy and lacked grace. Biden has also failed to get European powers, notably France and Germany, solidly behind US policy against a more bellicose Russia that has been amassing forces on its borders with Ukraine. In fact, since Biden became president, a bigger gap opened up between the US and its Western allies over how to deal with Russia.

After the EU was sidelined from talks held last week between Russia and the US, French President Emmanuel Macron has said the EU “must open its own talks with Russia rather than rely on Washington” in what seemed like a snub to the Biden administration. Biden’s failure to restore trust and commitment to transatlantic relations may not all be his fault, considering Europe’s increasingly negative perception of the US and its political system since the Trump presidency.

Excerpted: ‘Biden’s foreign policy dilemmas’

Courtesy: Aljazeera.com

‘US playing Xinjiang Card against: China 

while silent on Kashmir, Palestine’
By Asim Yasin
January 21, 2022

Islamabad: Minister for Human Rights Dr. Shireen Mazari said the United States playing ‘Xinjiang Card’ against China while silent on Kashmir and Palestine.

Pakistan-China Institute (PCI) organized a first-of-its-kind webinar on the ‘New Cold War? Playing the Xinjiang card against China" under its flagship event series, "Friends of Silk Road (FOSR)’.

The Webinar was attended by over 35 participants online and featured six speeches.The panelists discussed how the ‘Xinjiang card’ is used by the Western world, particularly the United States, to achieve their foreign policy objectives of pressuring China.

The speakers stressed that laws such as the ‘Uyghur forced labor bill’, and other legislation and policies concerning Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Tibet, are part of a larger ‘China containment’ policy.

A brief video was played which discussed how the US took a politically-motivated decision to remove the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), which is recognized as a terror outfit by the United Nations, from its’ list of terror groups.

It discussed the double standards on the part of the US to demonize China, despite being at war in the Muslim world for a couple of decades. Federal Minister for Human Rights Dr. Shireen Mazari, while speaking in the webinar said that the United States is involved in starting a New Cold War with China, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, which requires greater international cooperation.

She asserted that the United States has created laws, such as the Uyghur Forced Labour Prevention Act, to sanction China using the ‘Xinjiang card’. She questioned why the United States failed to take action against the genocide of innocent Kashmiris by the

Indian occupation forces. She asked why the US failed to speak out against the elimination of Palestinians from their homeland by the Israeli regime.

She emphasized that the US is losing power internationally due to its imperialist approach. “It also created the military alliance, AUKUS, centred on countering China in the Asia-Pacific region,” she said.

She said efforts to combat China in South Asia include massive military hardware influx and military cooperation.

Dr. Shireen Mazari said Pakistan faces a challenge of whether it will move towards economic prosperity, which is now a central norm of Pakistan’s National Security policy, or whether it will be sucked into the militarization being pushed by the United States. She said the rational route is to support the opening up of the world through international trade via the Silk Route, BRI, and CPEC projects.

Dr. Shireen Mazari concluded that Muslims have suffered the consequences of the US War on Terror and of militarization and they cannot afford to go down this route.

Chairman Senate’s Defense Committee Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed stated that political and economic power in the world is shifting from the West to the East. He agreed with Professor Jeffery Sachs who believes that the US has not been able to compete with China economically.

He cited a study by Professor Graham Allison of Harvard University that China has displaced the US as the world’s biggest hi-tech manufacturer.

He linked this with a recent report that China registered a growth of 8 percent in 2021, despite the COVID-19 pandemic. He highlighted that despite their opposition to the Belt and Road Initiative, the US launched its own copycat project, Built Back Better World.

He cited an article by Leslie H. Gelb in The New York Times titled ‘Breaking China Apart’, which stated that the US will ‘kindle separatism in China’ if it doesn’t fall in line and discussed the approach of Demonizing, Damaging, and Destabilizing countries.

He highlighted a July 2020 survey by the Ash Centre of Harvard University which found that over 90 percent Chinese support the Communist Party of China, since it has provided the Chinese people with stability, continuity, peace, and stability. Senator Mushahid Hussain concluded that while the US is engaged in creating cleavages, conflict, and encouraging confrontation, Pakistan will continue to support China on its core national interests such as Xinjiang, Taiwan, Tibet, Hong Kong, South China Sea, and BRI.

Special Aide to Prime Minister on Religious Harmony and the Middle East Hafiz Muhammad Tahir Ashrafi stated that bills or statements made by the United States regarding lack of religious freedom in Pakistan, China, and Saudi Arabia are baseless. He suggested that these statements are politically motivated, rather than fact-based.

Dr. Ejaz Akram stated that the issue of Xinjiang is a flashpoint, which is used by Western groups to rally certain parts of the Muslim world against China. Professor Li Xinguang discussed that the West fears the unity between the Confucian and Islamic Civilizations.

Ms. Saba Aslam discussed that in international politics, the Western world, which has a colonial mindset, uses narratives and sanctions to demonize others.

Ambassador Masood Khalid commented that the West aims to release a domino effect in those regions of China, such as Xinjiang, which it perceives as vulnerable.

Moreover, Gerald Mbanda from Rwanda presented the African perspective and the experience of Africa with colonialism.

The dialogue was moderated by Mustafa Hyder Sayed, Executive Director of the Pakistan-China Institute. A diverse audience of students, scholars, and the media took an active part in this webinar.

Virginia state officials ignored National Weather Service warnings about catastrophic snowstorm that left thousands stranded on interstate

Dominic Gustavo
WSWS.ORG

Officials with the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) were given information ahead of time by the National Weather Service (NWS) about a snowstorm that wreaked havoc in Northern Virginia on January 3-5. The snowstorm—which came after unusually warm weather in December—brought heavy snowfall (between 5-12 inches) and plunged the Washington D.C. region into chaos.

This image provided by the Virginia department of Transportation shows a closed section of Interstate 95 near Fredericksburg, Virginia on Monday January 2, 2022. (Photo: Virginia Department of Transportation)

The Washington Post reported last week that forecasters from the NWS provided ample warnings to VDOT officials, beginning with emails on the morning of January 2, almost 24 hours before the storm began. This was followed by an online briefing that predicted a potential “worst case scenario” of rapid snowfall leading to an accumulation of up to 12 inches around Fredericksburg. This prediction, incidentally, is precisely what occurred.

That same morning, VDOT also received a separate warning from a private forecasting company called DTN, which predicted rapid snowfall of up to 2-3 inches per hour on the morning of the 3rd, with a total accumulation of 4-8 inches for most of northern Virginia, with a few regions receiving even more.

The storm resulted in numerous deaths, widespread power outages and scores of vehicular accidents. Virginia State Police reported hundreds of car crashes and over 1,400 disabled or stranded vehicles.

The most catastrophic impact was felt by motorists on Interstate-95. A 50-mile stretch of the highway between Dumfries and Ruther Glen was blocked off after several tractor-trailers lost traction and crashed or were “jackknifed”—a position that leaves a semi-truck totally immobilized. Thousands of vehicles were trapped in the inclement weather, some for over 24 hours. Many of the passengers went without food, water or medication.

Rescue efforts fell short due to staff shortages brought on by a surge in COVID-19 infections. One man froze to death after exiting his disabled vehicle and attempting to walk to his home near Lake Anna in the midst of the storm. To the north, three people died in Montgomery County, Maryland after their vehicle collided with a snowplow. The storm also shutdown COVID-19 testing centers in the midst of a huge surge of cases in the region.

According to the Post, “[a]t 2 p.m. on Jan. 2, the Sterling office [of the NWS] delivered an online briefing to the Metro Area Transportation Operations Committee, which includes VDOT’s Northern Virginia district and other D.C.-area transportation agencies.” The Post quotes the NWS’s Christopher Strong, a warning coordination specialist, who “leaned very heavily on not just what was most likely, but also the reasonable worst case for planning.”

DTN spokesperson Lori Johnson likewise notes that the organization “provided VDOT with weather briefings on Jan. 2 and 3 at 10 a.m. and that hourly updates were available online.” The Post notes in a separate editorial that despite these warnings, it “was not until more than five hours later that the district office issued a news release about the danger of heavy snow.” Likewise, there was no effort to shutdown the major highways or even to prevent semi-trucks—a major factor in the highway disaster—from traveling that day.

Interstate 95 is the primary north-south highway on the east coast of the United States, running from Miami on the tip of Florida to the Canadian border in Maine. It passes though 15 states as well as the District of Columbia, and serves as the main link between all of the major cities on the eastern seaboard. The highway serves 110 million people, and it facilitates some 40 percent of the US GDP.

The enormous commercial importance of the highway, particularly in light of the global supply chain crisis, was almost certainly a factor behind the decision not to close down the roadway ahead of the snowstorm.

The revelations of state negligence came as the east coast was struck by another winter storm on January 17. Over 118,000 people across five states were left without power, with unusually heavy snowfall affecting southern states including the Carolinas, Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi.


In the immediate aftermath of the January 3 storm, the administration of then-Democratic Governor Ralph Northam attempted to downplay its culpability for the disaster. Northam and VDOT officials took turns claiming that the amount of snowfall could not possibly have been anticipated or that their supposedly well-publicized warnings went unheeded by thoughtless motorists. This has all been exposed as self-serving and bald-faced lies.

Northam, in what may be considered his parting words to the Commonwealth of Virginia before being succeeded by Republican Glenn Youngkin last week, appeared on a radio show a few days after the storm to say that he was “sick and tired of people talking about what went wrong” in the state’s disaster response. “Why don’t you start asking some of these individuals that were out on the highway for hours: … ‘Why did you feel it was so important to drive through such a snowstorm?’” he said.

In comments to the Post, Jonathan Porter, chief meteorologist for AccuWeather, stresses that this was, in fact, the outcome of inaction on the part of state authorities. “I’m of the mind-set that this was a completely preventable situation.”

Porter went on, “We were alarmed about it and did everything we could to get the message out… We specifically said that conditions would rapidly deteriorate and that highway chaos would ensue.” The meteorologist stated that VDOT should have issued travel bans and closed down the highways ahead of the snowstorm.

VDOT officials have promised an investigation to “address performance gaps and identify ways to mitigate the challenges faced during this incident.” Likewise, state Democrats have proposed bills to save face that would place limited restrictions for trucks on the highways when it is snowing.

The January 3 snowstorm, a relatively minor bout of inclement weather that was predicted well ahead of time, testifies to the irrationality of a social system operated on the basis of private profit. It is an episode within the much larger social catastrophe that has unfolded in the capitalist class’s homicidal response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Dems to Biden: Overhaul Drone Program That Has Killed Thousands of Civilians

"In too many instances, U.S. drone strikes have instead led to unintended and deadly consequences—killing civilians and increasing anger towards the United States."

The Iraqi city of Mosul was largely destroyed during fighting between U.S.-led coalition forces and Islamic State militants in 2017. Thousands of civilians were killed or wounded, many of them by ferocious U.S. and allied aerial bombing. (Photo: Ahmad al-Rubaye/AFP via Getty Images)


BRETT WILKINS

COMMONDREAMS

January 20, 2022

A group of 50 Democratic U.S. lawmakers on Thursday sent a letter to President Joe Biden focusing on the "inexcusable" number of noncombatants killed by drone strikes in the 20-year so-called War on Terror and urging his administration to "review and overhaul" American counterterrorism policy to "center human rights and the protection of civilians."

"In far too many cases, rather than achieving the policy goal of eliminating hostile combatants to preserve U.S. national security, lethal U.S. strikes have instead killed thousands of civilians."

"The continuation of status quo policies that have flouted executive and congressional oversight and resulted in devastatingly high numbers of civilian casualties would run contrary to the Biden administration's commitments to end our forever wars, and promote human rights and our core democratic values," the letter—which is led by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), and Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.)—states.

"Over successive administrations spanning nearly two decades, presidents have claimed virtually unlimited, unilateral power to use lethal force around the world and without congressional authorization, killing not only armed actors but also innocent civilians—even American citizens," the lawmakers add.

"In too many instances, U.S. drone strikes have instead led to unintended and deadly consequences—killing civilians and increasing anger towards the United States," the signers note.

The letter cites figures by the monitoring group Airwars estimating that "as many as 48,000 civilians across seven countries have reportedly been killed by U.S. strikes over the past two decades." That figure includes not only drone attacks but all aerial bombardment.

"These inexcusable figures reflect an uncomfortable truth: In far too many cases, rather than achieving the policy goal of eliminating hostile combatants to preserve U.S. national security, lethal U.S. strikes have instead killed thousands of civilians, including children," the letter states.

The Democrats' letter followed publication by The New York Times of video footage of an August 29 U.S. drone strike that killed 43-year-old Afghan aid worker Zamarai Ahmadi and nine of his relatives—including seven children—in the capital city of Kabul.

The U.S. military said the Kabul strike was carried out in the belief that Ahmadi was loading explosives into his car, and that an attack by militants of the so-called Islamic State (ISIS) on Kabul's international airport was imminent. U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. Mark Milley called the bombing a "righteous strike."

However, investigations by the Times and The Washington Post, as well as the Pentagon's own probe, concluded that—contrary to the military's claims—there were no explosives in the car, and that the men accused of suspicious behavior were engaged in activities related to Ahmadi's work.

The letter cites the Kabul strike, as well as a March 18, 2019 U.S. airstrike in Baghuz, Syria carried out by a secret drone task force in which around 70 civilians died—and which military officials allegedly tried to cover up—as proof of the need for fundamental reform.

"Without systematic reforms centered on human rights and international law, the status quo will continue to undermine counterterrorism objectives, produce significant human and strategic costs, and erode the rule of law and the United States' image abroad," the lawmakers assert.

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"When there is little policy change or accountability for repeated mistakes this grave and this costly, it sends a message throughout the U.S. armed forces and the entire U.S. government that civilian deaths—including deaths where there was no military target—are the inevitable consequence of modern conflict, rather than avoidable and damaging failures of policy," they add.

The letter also comes a day after Reps. Pramilia Jayapal (D-Wash.) and Barbara Lee (D-Calif.)—both signatories—introduced a resolution calling for a new American foreign policy that centers nonviolent solutions and eschews militarism and bloated Pentagon budgets.

Lee, who in 2001 was the only member of Congress to vote against the Authorization for the Use of Military Force that authorized the open-ended and continuing War on Terror, said that "the post 9/11 wars taught us that perpetual war takes countless lives, wastes trillions of dollars, and does not make us any safer."

In a statement, Warren said that "we cannot ignore the terrible consequences of U.S. drone strikes over several administrations. I've long pushed for greater accountability for civilian casualties, and the president should seize this moment to systematically reform our counterterrorism strategy."

Murphy argued that "when U.S. strikes kill civilians abroad, it's both a moral failure and national security liability."

"There's no doubt Biden takes this issue more seriously than [former President Donald] Trump, but we can and must do better," he added. "The U.S. should use force only lawfully and as a last resort, and when civilians die, there has to be accountability. That accountability simply has not been happening."

The Marine who marched on the Philippines — and then on Washington
By Jonathan M. Katz
Jan 20, 2022

"Gangsters of Capitalism: Smedley Butler, the Marines, and the Making and Breaking of America's Empire" by Jonathan M. Katz is available for purchase now. (Jonathan M. Katz and St. Martin’s Publishing Group)

Smedley D. Butler was the most celebrated warfighter of his time — the recipient of two Medals of Honor, who served in nearly every major overseas conflict from 1898 until the eve of World War II. But as award-winning journalist Jonathan M. Katz details in his new book, “Gangsters of Capitalism: Smedley Butler, the Marines, and the Making and Breaking of America’s Empire” (St. Martin’s Press, 2022), after his retirement from the Marine Corps in 1931, Butler became a warrior against war. He decried his storied record, warned about the rise of fascism in America, and said he had been a “racketeer for capitalism.”

In this exclusive excerpt from the book, Katz writes about one of the events that helped foster Butler’s more radical turn: the Bonus March of 1932.


Smedley D. Butler addressing the Bonus Marchers in Anacostia Flats, Washington, D.C., July 19, 1932. (Still from Fox Movietone News outtake, Moving Image Research Collections, University of South Carolina)

Over the spring of 1932, veterans from every corner of the country began making their way to Washington, D.C. Calling themselves the Bonus Expeditionary Force, they set up encampments across Washington. By July, there were some forty-five thousand veteran protesters, wives, and children living in shacks in the shadow of the Capitol dome.

The cause that drew them was known as the “bonus.” Veterans’ benefits had been minimal in the last World War. Many had come home from Europe to find their savings drained and jobs gone. In 1924, Congress had finally passed a bonus bill over President Coolidge’s veto, mandating that most who served during the mobilization would get $1 of back pay for each day of home service and $1.25 for each day abroad. But there was a catch: if the sum was more than $50, it would only be paid to the veteran’s survivors after they died or in 1945, whichever came first.

When the Great Depression hit, many veterans realized their green-bordered bonus certificates was their only asset that still held any value. In 1931, an Army veteran named Joseph T. Angelo walked four days from his home in New Jersey to Washington to demand the bonus be paid immediately. In response, Congress passed a bill allowing veterans to cash in part of their IOUs as loans. But President Hoover vetoed it, warning it would set a dangerous precedent by breaking “the barriers of self-reliance and self-support in our people.” The protesters’ goal in 1932 was to change his mind and force Congress’s hands.

Many Washingtonians were sympathetic to the BEF. A D.C. police captain named Sidney Marks, sent to evict the largest encampment — on the mudflats across the Anacostia River — instead told the protesters they had his support. The marchers renamed the site Camp Marks in his honor.

But the federal and military establishments were not as pleased. They denounced the occupiers as Communists and radicals. Most alarming to some, veterans of all skin colors were living in the bonus camps side by side at a time when the District of Columbia and military were strictly segregated by race.

On July 16, the Senate adjourned without taking the latest bonus bill up, effectively killing the measure. Senators left just before midnight, fleeing through the underground tunnels beneath the Capitol to avoid confronting marchers. Hoover headed to his Shenandoah summer retreat.

As dejected marchers began to take federal agents’ offers for train tickets home, the organizer of the BEF, Walter W. Waters, sent an urgent invitation to the one senior military man who had taken a public position in support of the veterans — the one officer whom he knew the veterans would listen to.

Smedley Butler arrived at Camp Marks on July 19, accompanied by his son Smedley Junior, on summer break from MIT. They strolled around the shanty town, greeting men Butler had last seen shuffling through his mudhole camp in France. Word spread, and soon thousands converged around a wooden stage to hear what Old Gimlet Eye had to say.

Smedley took off his sport coat, rolled up his sleeves, and tucked his polka dot tie between two shirt buttons so it wouldn’t flop around. A line of sun-worn U.S. flags waved behind him. Waters introduced Butler as “a real soldier, a real man, a real gentleman, and a real comrade” — noting, in case anyone had forgotten, the two Medals of Honor.

Butler looked over the crowd, now totaling about sixteen thousand stalwarts. He told the marchers what an honor it was to be among fellow soldiers; how it made him “so damn mad” to hear people calling them tramps. “By God, they didn’t speak of you as tramps in 1917 and ‘18!” he said to applause. “I mean just what I say. I don’t want anything,” he assured, his tie now loose and arms flying wildly through the air. “Nobody can kick me anymore. I’ll say what I please.”

His thinning hair was now thoroughly mussed, his throat hoarse, but his lungs were filled with anger — at how the veterans were being treated, at the state of the country, at the ruins of his own career. “This is the greatest demonstration of Americanism we have ever had! Pure Americanism. Willing to take this beating as you’ve taken it, stand right steady. You keep every law! And why in the hell shouldn’t you? Who in the hell has done all the bleeding for this country, and for this law, and this Constitution anyhow, but you fellas?” The veterans roared back in reply.

“But don’t — don’t! — take a step backward,” he warned. “Remember that as soon as you haul down your camp flag here and clear out — every one of you clears out — this evaporates in thin air. And all this struggle will have been no good.”

Unable to bear the thought of leaving, Smedley and Smedley Junior stayed the night at Camp Marks, trading war stories with the protesters late into the night. The next morning, they shared a breakfast of potatoes, black coffee, and hard bread with them before departing.

Inspired by Butler, thousands of marchers stayed. Gen. Douglas MacArthur, the U.S. Army chief of staff, instructed his adjutants to draw up plans to evict the veterans by force. MacArthur also secretly began moving combat vehicles, machine guns, and tanks to Fort Myer, just outside Washington.

On July 28, nine days after Butler’s speech, policemen fatally shot two marchers in an attempt to evict the BEF from an abandoned building next to the Capitol. MacArthur ordered his aide — forty-one-year-old Maj. Dwight Eisenhower — to put on his uniform and join him in the streets to oversee the final maneuver in person.

Around 4:30 p.m., a reporter spotted four hundred Army infantrymen fixing bayonets and putting on gas masks. Army grenades exploded on the National Mall, releasing gas laced with Adamsite — a chemical weapon that can cause vomiting, asphyxiation, and, under certain circumstances, death. Cavalry, led in the saddle by George Patton, charged into a crowd of spectators. Tear gas and smoke from hundreds of burning shacks blotted out the view of the Capitol dome.

At 9:00 p.m., MacArthur announced that Camp Marks was to be destroyed. Gen. George Van Horn Moseley rushed a message from Hoover ordering the chief of staff not to cross the Anacostia River. MacArthur ignored the president. He positioned tanks on the bridge to cut off the camp from the city, then ordered the camp burned to the ground. Scores were injured. A twelve-week-old baby whose impoverished parents had brought him to Camp Marks choked on Adamsite and died soon after.

At a press conference, MacArthur asserted that he had prevented a Communist revolution. “I think as a military maneuver, if you can call a thing of this kind a military maneuver, that it was unique. I have been in many riots, but I think this is the first riot I ever was in or ever saw in which there was no real bloodshed.” MacArthur was likely thinking of his experiences in the Philippines and Mexico, though he could have been talking about the military’s experience suppressing uprisings and dissent around the world.

Those who watched it could not believe that scenes they associated with the imperial periphery had taken place in the nation’s capital. A reporter who witnessed the violence commented: “God, that I should see such things in the United States.”

Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s handiwork: the Bonus Marchers’ encampment in flames in front of the U.S. Capitol, July 28, 1932. (National Archives and Records Administration)

The “Battle of Washington,” as MacArthur’s assault on the Bonus March became known, was a clarifying moment. For Butler, it hardened a growing conviction that the key fault line in America was class: Wall Street and those who carried out its wishes against the “little guy.” That fall, he tried out a version of the idea he’d been mulling since Nicaragua: that America’s wars were started by capitalists at the expense of the soldiers sent to fight them. “When the war is over,” Butler told a crowd in New York, “the soldier comes back, is given a march up Fifth Avenue, and as soon as he is disbanded at the end of the march the capitalists say, ‘To hell with him’ and start all over again.”

Franklin Delano Roosevelt read about the burning of Camp Marks in his bedroom at the governor’s mansion in Albany. He could not believe Hoover had turned the army loose on U.S. citizens, nor how far MacArthur had gone. It was a wonder, Roosevelt told his friend and adviser Rexford Tugwell, that there hadn’t been “more resentment, more radicalism, when people were treated that way.” FDR was in a unique position to do something about it. Four weeks before MacArthur’s assault, he had accepted the Democratic nomination for president, promising “a new deal for the American people.” Butler crossed party lines to campaign for him, calling himself a “Hoover-for-Ex-President Republican.” Roosevelt won in a landslide that November.

The Roosevelt who moved into the White House in March 1933 was still the ex-Navy official who had helped plan the invasion of Veracruz, supervise the brutal occupations of Haiti and the Dominican Republic, and oversee the colonial district around his “Uncle Ted’s vast public work” in Panama. Yet Roosevelt was horrified by the approval with which his empire-building peers greeted MacArthur’s assault on American citizens — veterans who had just been asking for their government’s help in a crisis. The president told Tugwell that he sensed in the United States “an impulse among a good many ‘strong’ men, men used to having their way, mostly industrialists who directed affairs without being questioned, a feeling that democracy had run its course and that the totalitarians had grasped the necessities of the time. People wanted strong leadership; they were sick of uncertainty, anxious for security, and willing to trade liberty for it.”

Millions of Americans were turning to demagogues like Father Charles Coughlin, a Catholic priest who used his nationally syndicated radio show to defend Hitler and spread conspiracy theories of a worldwide “Judeo-Bolshevik” plot. The “Nazi-minded among American leaders,” as Roosevelt called them, were more fond of the dictatorial MacArthur. His greater “charm, tradition, and majestic appearance” put a high-class and distinctively American shine on the naked repression he unleashed against the Bonus Marchers.

Indeed, the divide between outright fascism and the American elite was paper thin at the depths of the Depression. U.S. corporations not only remained in Germany after Hitler became chancellor in early 1933, but courted Nazi approval. There was money in it: Coca-Cola, General Motors, and IBM all saw their German profits surge in the wake of the Nazi ascent. The most influential of all U.S. businessmen, Henry Ford, had long since entered into a mutual admiration society with the soon-to-be führer. Hitler heaped praise on Ford’s antisemitic writings, and had told a U.S. reporter a decade earlier: “We look on Heinrich Ford as the leader of the growing Fascisti movement in America.”

Germany and the United States were in many ways sister empires, who had risen at roughly the same time to challenge the older powers of Europe. Now Germany, defeated and humiliated, was turning its imperialism inward in the form of fascism.

The question for all Americans was if they would do the same. MacArthur’s answer in the burning of the bonus camps seemed to be a resounding yes.

Roosevelt chose otherwise. He resolved to show “that democracy in the United States — limited and flawed though it remained — was better kept than abandoned, in the hope of strengthening and extending it,” as the historian Eric Rauchway has written. He would do so by remaking the relationship between government, business, and the people through New Deal programs, including massive spending on public works, social insurance, and support for labor unions. FDR did so knowing that, if he failed, he could be ushered from office — and, more dangerously, that a fascist turn could happen in the United States. All that was missing, as the president told Tugwell, was a leader: “the familiar symbolic figure — the man on horseback — to give it realism.”

From “Gangsters of Capitalism” by Jonathan M. Katz. Copyright © 2022 by the author and reprinted by permission of St. Martin’s Publishing Group.

Jonathan Myerson Katz, author of “Gangsters of Capitalism: Smedley Butler, the Marines, and the Making and Breaking of America’s Empire,” received the James Foley/Medill Medal for Courage in Journalism for reporting from Haiti. His first book, “The Big Truck That Went By,” was shortlisted for the PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Nonfiction and won the Overseas Press Club’s Cornelius Ryan Award, the J. Anthony Lukas Work-in-Progress Award, and the WOLA/Duke Book Award for Human Rights in Latin America. His work appears in The New York Times, Foreign Policy, and elsewhere. Katz has received fellowships from New America and the Logan Nonfiction Program. He lives with his wife and daughter in Charlottesville, VA. His newsletter can be found at theracket.news. Follow him on Twitter at @KatzOnEarth.

Rep. Lauren Boebert Asked Jews Touring Capitol If They Were Doing 'Reconnaissance'

She told BuzzFeed News it was a joke, adding that she's "too short to see anyone’s yarmulke."


Lydia O'Connor
01/20/2022 

Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) has a history of leveling religious attacks.
MICHAEL REYNOLDS VIA GETTY IMAGES

Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), who has a history of propping up conspiracy theories and instigating religious attacks, asked a group of Jewish people touring the U.S. Capitol on Thursday if they were there to do “reconnaissance,” BuzzFeed News reported.

According to those present for the conversation, Boebert crossed paths with the group, some of whom were wearing yarmulkes and had traditional Orthodox beards, outside an elevator and looked at them “from head to toe” before making the remark.

A rabbi in the group, which was there for a meeting with Rep. Thomas Suozzi (D-N.Y.), told BuzzFeed News that he was “very confused” and “not sure to be offended or not” about the question.

“When I heard that, I actually turned to the person standing next to me and asked, ‘Did you just hear that?’” he said, noting Jewish people have been “very sensitive” to possible anti-Semitism, especially on the heels of a hostage situation at a synagogue in Texas last weekend.

Reconnaissance typically refers to military forces scouting an area in order to obtain information about enemy forces.

Boebert told BuzzFeed that she simply “saw a large group and made a joke” related to the controversy over a late-night tour of the Capitol she led before the Jan. 6, 2021, storming of the building. Angry at media coverage of reports about a group tour, Boebert said at the time that “no reconnaissance tour occurred.”

As for her remark on Thursday, Boebert told BuzzFeed News that some people there “got it” and knew it was a joke.

“I’m too short to see anyone’s yarmulkes,” she added.

She didn’t immediately respond to HuffPost’s requests that she elaborate on the “reconnaissance” remark.

Suozzi told BuzzFeed News following the incident that lawmakers have a responsibility to be careful with the words they use.

“The bottom line is that everyone, especially members of Congress, have to be very, very thoughtful in the language they use,” he said. “Because when you’re a member of Congress, you have an important role to play in society. You can’t be cavalier in the comments you make, especially if they could be perceived as being antisemitic, or discriminatory.”

Boebert has not shied away from religious insults in the past and has repeatedly called Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), who is Muslim, a member of the “jihad squad,” likening her to an Islamic terrorist.

She has also promoted conspiracy theories about the 2020 presidential election and the QAnon movement, insisting that many Democrats would soon be arrested for widespread corruption.

Early Treatment Could Tame Peanut Allergies in Small Kids

The researchers gave increasing amounts of peanut protein powder to a group of toddlers to build up their tolerance for peanuts

By Candice Choi • 

Young children might be able to overcome their peanut allergies if treated at an early enough age, according to a study published Thursday.

The researchers gave increasing amounts of peanut protein powder to a group of toddlers to build up their tolerance for peanuts. After 2 1/2 years, close to three-quarters could tolerate the equivalent of 16 peanuts without an allergic reaction. Six months after treatment stopped, one-fifth still had the same tolerance.

The approach seemed to work best in the youngest children and those with milder allergies, the researchers reported Thursday in the journal Lancet.

The findings suggest there’s “a window of opportunity” early in life when treatment could have a lasting impact, said Dr. Stacie Jones, a study co-author from the University of Arkansas for Medical Services. But she said more research is needed to determine how long the effect might continue.

A treatment for peanut allergies already exists but it is only approved for ages 4 and older, and the protection it provides is for the accidental exposure to small amounts of peanuts. Children are still supposed to avoid eating the nuts, and carry an EpiPen or other medicine for allergic reactions. It also uses peanut powder, but when children stop taking the treatment, the protection stops.

Jones and her colleagues tested a similar approach on younger children to see if their immune systems could be changed if treated at an earlier age. She helped lead a study for the current treatment, Aimmune Therapeutics' Palforzia, and has consulted for the company.

About 2% of children in the U.S. have peanut allergies, which can cause severe reactions and be a source of constant worry for parents. Some children outgrow the allergy, but most have to continue avoiding peanuts for life. To prevent the allergies from developing, health experts in recent years have encouraged parents to feed babies with peanut-containing foods early on.

The new government-funded study involved 146 children in the U.S. ages 1 to 3. They were given daily doses of peanut powder mixed in food or a dummy powder — oat flour. When the treatment ended, 71% of those who got the peanut powder could tolerate the equivalent of 16 peanuts. Six months later, 21% still could. In the dummy powder comparison group, 2% could tolerate 16 peanuts at the end of the treatment and six months later.

Most of the children had a reaction during treatment, mostly mild to moderate. Some in the peanut group required treatment with an EpiPen.

The research “really supports something that we thought for a while in the field," said Dr. Joyce Hsu, an allergy specialist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston who was not involved in the study. “Children’s immune systems are generally more malleable when they are younger.”

Hsu’s clinic offers an allergy treatment with peanut protein for children ages 4 months and older. As with Palforzia, Hsu noted it is intended to protect against accidental ingestion, and that children are still supposed to avoid peanuts. She said there has been a lack of strong data about treating peanut allergies in infants and very young children.

In a commentary published with the study, other allergy experts noted the wide availability of the peanut powder used in the study. They said the treatment is a reasonable option that’s ready for real-world implementation, under the guidance of an allergy specialist.

Dr. John Kelso, an allergy specialist at Scripps Clinic in San Diego, said the findings should give doctors more confidence to try the treatment for toddlers, and offer it to parents. But he noted that it's still not clear whether any tolerance would have a limit or how it might change over time.

“There still needs to be some caution about thinking of this as a cure,” he said

___

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