Israel turns water into slow-kill weapon against Palestinians: Gaza government

April 12, 2025 

MEMO

Palestinians living in Jabalia Refugee Camp in northern Gaza are viewed trying to meet their water needs by filling jerry cans with water distributed by tankers, in Gaza City, Gaza on April 10, 2025. [Mahmoud İssa – Anadolu Agency]

The Gaza government’s media office warned on Saturday that Israel has turned water into a slow-kill weapon systematically denying Palestinians in Gaza access to clean water and exacerbating the humanitarian crisis in the enclave, Anadolu reports.

In a statement, the media office described Israel’s actions as part of “a broader strategy of collective punishment.”

The office condemned the continued interruption of water supplies, including the severing of crucial water lines, destruction of wells and water stations, and the cutting of electricity and fuel supplies needed to operate water and sanitation facilities.

It highlighted Israel’s recent disruption of two key water lines from the Israeli company Mekorot, which supply more than 35,000 cubic meters (over 1.2 million cubic feet) of water daily to over 700,000 Palestinians in the eastern and central regions of Gaza.

According to the office, Israel also cut the electricity supply to the water desalination plant in Deir al-Balah, located in central Gaza, halting its operations entirely and leaving 800,000 people in the central and Khan Younis areas at risk of severe water shortages.

Since Oct. 7, 2023, Israel has destroyed over 90% of Gaza’s water and sewage infrastructure, while preventing repair teams from reaching the damaged facilities.

The Gaza government reiterated its calls for the international community to intervene and hold Israel accountable for “an attempt to weaponize water” and further contribute to the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza.

The Israeli army renewed a deadly assault on Gaza on March 18, shattering the ceasefire and prisoner exchange agreement that took hold in January.

More than 50,900 Palestinians, most of them women and children, have been killed in Gaza in a brutal Israeli onslaught since October 2023.

The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants last November for Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.

The Greater Israel Initiative: A Complex Expansion Vision

Exploring the multifaceted strategies, aims, and debates behind the pursuit of Greater Israel

Map of Israel: CIA employee, Public Domain

Map of Greater Israel overlaying Google map.

The concept of Greater Israel envisions a territorial extension far beyond the internationally recognized borders of the modern State of Israel. Rooted in historical narratives and biblical promises, the idea seeks to incorporate significant portions of the lands surrounding Israel, typically extending from the Nile River in Egypt to the Euphrates River in Iraq.

This comprehensive vision includes territories such as the West Bank, East Jerusalem, Gaza Strip, parts of Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan.

This experimental article was entirely written by Ithy AI (Ithy.com) on behalf of NewsVoice

Historical and Ideological Foundations

The notion of Greater Israel has a long history intertwined with the origins of modern Zionism. Early Zionist leaders, notably Theodor Herzl, laid the groundwork for creating a Jewish homeland rooted in deep historical and biblical associations with the land. Biblical texts such as Genesis 15:18 and Deuteronomy 11:24 have been cited as proof of divine promises to the Jewish people, thereby establishing a religious and moral claim to the territory.

In the 19th and early 20th centuries, these ideas evolved from a vision into a political ambition as Zionist movements began outlining plans for a state that not only secured a Jewish homeland but reclaimed historic lands. Successive generations of leaders have continued to invoke these religious and historic justifications in support of territorial expansion.

Aims of Creating Greater Israel

The effort to create Greater Israel is driven by a combination of strategic, security, and existential motivations:

Security Considerations

One of the core arguments for territorial expansion is the notion that retaining control over additional territories enhances Israel’s defensive posture. Proponents claim that by establishing buffer zones, particularly in areas such as the West Bank and parts of Syria, Israel can better withstand external threats and prevent hostile entities from gaining a foothold near its borders.

In this context, each settlement or acquired territory is seen as a step towards fortifying national security.

Existential and Identity Factors

For many in Israel, the expansion is not merely a matter of strategic calculation but also an expression of Jewish identity and historical destiny. Given the long history of persecution and displacement, the establishment of a continuous Jewish state encompassing historically significant biblical lands is perceived as an existential imperative.

The return of residents to long-lost or evacuated areas further underscores the drive to reclaim a perceived historic order.

Economic and Diplomatic Dimensions

Beyond security and identity, economic motivations have also played a role in the expansionist agenda. Control over larger territories is seen by some as a means to improve resource management, stimulate economic growth, and ensure infrastructural benefits across expanded borders.

In addition, diplomatic entanglements—especially those cemented through alliances with nations like the United States—provide the political backing necessary to justify and sustain these long-term territorial ambitions.

Strategies and Tactics Employed

Israel’s approach to creating Greater Israel is multifaceted, combining military, political, and diplomatic strategies that have evolved over decades. These methods are not static; rather, they adapt to the geopolitical environment and the internal dynamics of Israeli politics.

Settlement Expansion

One of the most visible aspects of Israel’s efforts is the continuous development of settlements in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and other disputed regions. Since the 1967 Six-Day War, there has been a systematic build-out of residential communities that gradually shift the demographic composition of these territories.

This method, sometimes described as a ”bit by bit” approach, is aimed at transforming the contours of the land with the hope of establishing irreversible facts on the ground.

Settlement expansion is often framed as a necessary security measure. By populating areas with Israelis, the government seeks to strengthen its claim and complicate any potential moves towards statehood for the Palestinians or negotiations regarding final borders.

Critics argue, however, that such movements are tantamount to de facto annexation and are widely considered illegal under international law.

Military Actions and Operations

Military initiatives have also been instrumental in furthering the goal of Greater Israel. Israeli military operations, particularly those conducted in strategically significant areas like the northern border regions and the Gaza vicinity, are often presented as preemptive measures designed to secure borders and neutralize hostile threats. Some actions can also be interpreted as steps toward territorial expansion.

In several instances, military force has been used in conjunction with settlement policies. For example, targeted operations against armed groups in neighbouring territories have allowed for the consolidation of control over strategic locations. These actions not only serve immediate security needs but also help to reinforce the broader ambition of a territorially expansive Jewish state.

Political Maneuvering and Legal Initiatives

Political discourse within Israel has played a crucial role in shaping the strategies aimed at realizing Greater Israel. Right-wing factions and extremist elements within the government have frequently articulated support for expansion policies.

Legal measures have been introduced to legitimize settlements and integrate them within the national legal framework. This has involved revisiting and sometimes revising international agreements that formerly restricted settlement activity.

Diplomatic support, particularly from allied nations such as the United States, further bolsters these initiatives. Through military aid packages, economic incentives, and diplomatic backing, international alliances have indirectly enabled the pursuit of policies that align with the Greater Israel vision.

Diplomacy and Exploitation of Regional Divisions

Another important strategic element is the exploitation of regional disunity. By capitalizing on the fragmented political landscapes of neighbouring Arab states, Israel aims to weaken collective resistance.

In some instances, policies and actions have been designed to exacerbate internal divisions within these countries, thereby reducing the likelihood of a unified opposition against Israel’s expansionist measures.

Plans like the Oded Yinon Plan—which proposed the dismemberment of larger Arab states into smaller, more manageable, and often hostile groups to Israeli influence—highlight a calculated use of regional dynamics.

Such strategies advocate for a long-term vision wherein internal strife among Arab nations could eventually enable Israel to extend its borders with relative ease.

Arguments Supporting and Criticizing the Expansion

The debate over Greater Israel is highly polarized, with both staunch defenders and vehement critics. It is important to examine the key arguments from both perspectives:
Supporting Arguments

Security Imperative

Proponents of Greater Israel argue that territorial expansion is a strategic necessity in a region fraught with hostility. Holding larger areas provides a buffer against potentially aggressive neighbours and non-state actors.

In a situation where numerous regional players and terrorist organizations pose threats, an expanded territory is seen as an insurance policy for the nation’s survival.

Historical and Biblical Claims

The historical and biblical narratives serve as a powerful legitimizing tool. Advocates contend that the Jewish people have an ancient and divinely sanctioned connection to these lands. By reclaiming territories that have been central to Jewish history for millennia, the expansion is portrayed as both an act of restoration and a fulfilment of historical destiny.

Economic and Demographic Considerations

Besides security, expansion is sometimes justified on economic grounds. Improved access to resources, the possibility of stimulating economic development in underutilized areas, and the strategic management of regional infrastructure are cited as benefits. Additionally, resettlement and demographic shifts are viewed as essential for consolidating control over contested regions.

Criticism and Challenges

International Law and Legitimacy

A significant criticism surrounding the Greater Israel project concerns its legal standing. Many view the unilateral expansion through settlement construction and military actions as violations of international law. Global organizations, including the United Nations, have largely condemned these practices, increasing diplomatic pressure on Israel.

Humanitarian and Social Impact

Expansion policies have profound implications for the local Palestinian communities. The displacement of populations, loss of livelihood, and ongoing humanitarian crises are central themes in the critical narrative. Critics argue that the expansion exacerbates regional conflicts and fuels cycles of violence that undermine prospects for lasting peace in the region.

Regional Instability

The pursuit of a Greater Israel has frequently intensified tensions in the broader Middle East. Military actions and political maneuvers aimed at consolidation often trigger backlash from neighboring states, thereby destabilizing the area further. The resulting fragile security environment makes sustained peace and coexistence even more challenging.

Comparative Analysis: Strategies, Actions, and Implications


Regional and International Dynamics

Israel’s ambition to create a Greater Israel is not an isolated pursuit; it is deeply embedded in a network of regional and global relationships. The intersection of domestic policy, transnational diplomacy, and historical narratives creates a highly complex environment where actions taken by Israel resonate far beyond its immediate borders.

Internally, the debate over territorial expansion reflects broader ideological divides. While right-wing and nationalist factions advocate for an expansive approach grounded in historical rights and security imperatives, more centrist and left-wing groups often express concerns about the long-term consequences for peace and stability.

This domestic contention plays out in parliamentary debates, judicial reviews, and public discourse, influencing the pace and nature of expansionist policies.

On the international stage, the United States has historically played a pivotal role by providing political, military, and economic support to Israel. This alliance has enabled Israel to pursue controversial policies with a certain degree of impunity.

However, international criticism, especially from European and Arab nations, continues to challenge the legitimacy of expansionist measures, thereby contributing to a volatile and unpredictable diplomatic environment.
Long-Term Implications of the Greater Israel Policy

The envisioned expansion of Israel into a Greater Israel carries significant long-term implications. Should these policies continue unabated, the regional landscape could change dramatically. For instance, the fragmentation of Palestinian territories, potential annexations, and intensified conflicts with neighboring states are possibilities that could lead to a redefined Middle East.

Furthermore, cementing controversial settlement patterns and military enclaves may lock Israel into a trajectory that complicates any future peace negotiations. While security is often cited as the paramount justification, intensified antagonism might lead to persistent cycles of violence and resistance.

The long-term risks include not only regional instability but also challenges to Israel’s international standing and potential isolation due to breaches of international law.

The continuous drive to achieve a biblical and historic destiny underscores a commitment to creating an environment that, once established, could become extremely difficult to reverse. While some view this as a necessary evolution for a nation constantly under threat, others argue that it is a dangerous experiment that undermines prospects for a negotiated peace settlement and damages Israel’s broader foreign relations.

This experimental article was entirely written by Ithy AI (Ithy.com) on behalf of NewsVoice

References

Greater Israel: an Ongoing Expansion Plan for the Middle East and North Africa – MEPEI
Netanyahu revives the Greater Israel plan – Daily News Egypt
End Game: What Is Israel’s Plan in the Occupied West Bank – Al Jazeera
The Goals of Israel’s Ongoing Aggression Against Syria – Middle East Monitor
Washington’s Strategic Enabling of Greater Israel Policy – FAF

Recommended Related Queries

Explore the historical and biblical foundations of Greater Israel
Examine Israel’s settlement expansion strategies in the West Bank
Understand how military actions and diplomacy intertwine in the Greater Israel approach
Analyze the effects of Israel’s expansionist policies on regional stability
Discover international perspectives on Israel’s territorial ambitions

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José Martí: April 10 and 11

By Luis Toledo Sande

On July 6, 1878, when the Pact of Zanjón was still near, and he was far from the leadership he would achieve in the Cuban national liberation movement, José Martí wrote to Manuel Mercado: "Must I tell you how much superb purpose, how powerful a powerful outburst boils in my soul? That I carry my unhappy people in my head, and that it seems to me that their freedom will depend on a breath of mine in one day?"

He already sensed – or was aware of it – the growing importance that his revolutionary work would have. With it he achieved the recognition of his compatriots and the unity, never before achieved at that height, with which the patriotic movement arrived at the feat of 1895. Máximo Gómez called it "Martí's war", which speaks of the renewing organizational and conceptual character, with profound implications for then and for the future, that Martí imprinted on the conflict from his preparations.



On this path he created the Cuban Revolutionary Party, not only to lead the preparation of the armed struggle. In the Bases of that organization he expressed his conviction that it was urgent to give the independence movement a perspective that would lay the foundations for what he proposed with the desire to liberate and transform Cuba: to found in it "a new people and of sincere democracy."

Such a goal implied a thorough rethinking of the reality that he had known in a wide and representative portion of the world: from Spain, through several countries of our America, to the United States, where he spent the final years, about fifteen, of his life. All that experience grew and deepened with his study of the history of the world.

In the United States, which not a few had as a model of a democratic republic, he saw, in addition to the dangers that his voracity represented for our America, the irruption of a Caesarean and invasive republic, with serious consequences for the planet in general and even for the American people.

Freeing Cuba from such dangers required unity in the patriotic movement, beset by obstacles that included various conflicts, such as the antagonism between the political strands called militarism and civilism. It was urgent to reverse what the Party Bases characterized as "a society composed for slavery." That scourge continued to be "the great sorrow of the world," as Martí wrote in Simple Verses, when traditional slavery had already been abolished in Cuba.

The clashes between militarism and civilism would create confusion, and some would think that he was inclined to civilist positions, when what he was doing was forging a superior political solution. His purpose was to prevent both the militarist hypertrophies, akin to the caudillismo that continued to do so much damage in our America, and the legalism with which the Republic constituted in Guáimaro had hindered the action of the Liberation Army. But, to prevent such extremes, it would be healthy to keep alive the best heritage of the Republic of 1869, not to forget it.



Contingencies may have influenced the election of April 10 to proclaim the constitution of the Party in 1892. But Martí assumed it as an expression of homage to a Republic of which the independent Cuba, for which it was fought, deserved and should prolong the virtues embodied in a radical independence vocation and a democratic will that paid for civility.

The functioning of the Party – which was organized in emigration to evade Spanish surveillance, but in functional communication with the country – ratified in fact the aspirations of sincere democracy embraced by Martí. Its structure was simple: only two leading positions at its top, that of Delegate, the name chosen by Martí for the main position, and that of Treasurer. Both would have under their direction the numerous grassroots organizations, the clubs, as they were called following the practice already familiar in the Cuban independence movement.

These organizations – and the council bodies in which they were linked in localities where there were several of them – reproduced the simplicity of the leadership, and were guided by a functioning that cultivated centralized discipline and the ease of action and thought to make the general program defended a reality.

At all levels, the leaders were elected and recallable. They were elected with a periodicity that dynamited the notions of the "democracy" prevailing then, and today, in the world: in Martí's organization, elections were annual, and at the moment when the voting mass considered it necessary to depose any of its leaders, it could do so by voting, with order – as the preparation of a war required – but without waiting for the next electoral process.

While the treasury was governed by a rigor against corruption, the general functioning of the Party sowed seeds against bureaucratism. Structure and action required the greatest care, at the height of the ends defended. Just after the war began, and with the Spanish army in front, in his posthumous letter to Mercado, dated May 18, 1895, Martí confessed to Manuel Mercado the main objective of his endeavor: to overcome the danger represented by the United States. "What I have done until today, and will do, is for that," he wrote, in fact putting in the background the significance of the immediate end of the patriotic conflict: the necessary defeat of Spain.

If in the same letter he said: "In silence it has had to be, and as if indirectly," he did so referring to that crucial point, not to justify frustrating concealments. The newspaper Patria, also his creation, began to circulate on March 14, 1892, before the Party was proclaimed. It was not born, therefore, to function as a formal organ of the Party, but with another character: "It is a great prize to be an organ of virtuous and founding patriotism." This is how Martí defined it in "Generoso deseo," an article published in the same newspaper on April 30, 1892.



The former could make the Party a stumbling block for the radicalism of the revolutionary vanguard – headed by Martí – while the latter assured it the condition of propagator of the truth, with which it fulfilled one of the mottos of the guide's ethics: "The word is not to cover up the truth, but to tell it." he wrote in "Ciegos y desleales", which also appeared in Patria, on January 28, 1893, and which begins with this statement: "Politics is the truth".

A cardinal purpose of Martí in the war was to hold an assembly that would have a place of the first order in his efforts to reach Cuba. In the aforementioned letter he wrote to Mercado: "We continue on our way, to the center of the island, to depose, in the face of the revolution that I have raised, the authority that emigration gave me, and it was complied within, and must renew in accordance with its new state, an assembly of delegates of the visible Cuban people, of the revolutionaries in arms."

In the revolutionary program he forged, this renewal would not depend on personal prerogatives: it would be the faculty of the assembly, which he conceived in the most democratic terms possible for a war. Death, which surprised him on May 19, not only prevented him from finishing the letter, but also from reaching that assembly, which, without him, would no longer be the same. Although conjectures are avoided, it is inevitable to imagine what it would have been like with the presence of the leader capable of uniting the patriotic movement as no one had done before, and in whom the Mambi masses saw a natural president.

In his texts written during the campaign, it can be seen that he rejected the title of President, not only for himself, but in general. But would he have shirked the responsibility of that position? Wouldn't he have found another name for that mission? For the maximum leader of the Party, he coined Delegate, of clear democratic intention, and was elected to that position - which he honored with his exemplarity - in all the elections made while he lived.

The challenges that the Revolution had to face and overcome were immense, and Martí could not ignore the importance of his revolutionary zeal. He had to get to Cuba, and his resolution was to do it. To do so, he left New York on January 30, 1895 and embarked on an arduous tour of the lands and seas of the Caribbean.



To a large extent he did so with Máximo Gómez, and both faced obstacles and dangers. But if something does not appear in the numerous texts of Martí that are known, it is that he was willing to return to emigration. If he had been, why leave New York and run the dangers he ran from then on?

That he was not present in the war could be the desire of others, for different reasons – from wanting to take care of his precious life to, in the case of those for whom his renewing verticality could be uncomfortable, to keep him away – but he knew that his place was in Cuba, within it, fighting directly for it. He wrote one of his great farewells to Federico Henríquez y Carvajal, already on his way to war, dated March 25, 1895.

When he tells him: "For me, it is time," he does not reveal a suicidal vocation that he did not have and that in him would have been an unthinkable act of irresponsibility, but his clear understanding that his presence in the war was vital for the homeland. If he had to die in the conflict, he wanted him to be "stuck to the last trunk, to the last fighter," when there was no other worthy option than death. In the meantime, as he writes to Henríquez and Carvajal, he has much to do: "I can still serve this one heart of our republics."

He did not use vain words, and neither did he in that case. He knew what was in danger, and what was urgent: "The free Antilles will save the independence of our America, and the already doubtful and wounded honor of English America, and perhaps they will accelerate and fix the balance of the world. See what we do, you with your youthful gray hair, and I, dragging myself, with my broken heart." That is why, without a hint of vanity that he never had, he added: "I will raise the world." To do this he had to be at the center of events, not far away.

A false news story – according to which he and Gómez were already in Cuba – could have served to reinforce the arguments about his decision to arrive on the island at war. But to make it depend on that contingency is, at the very least, to trivialize reality, to underestimate the resolution by which he himself had signed in New York, as Party Delegate and together with Generals Enrique Collazo and José María Rodríguez, the latter representing Gómez, the order for the uprising that gave way to the outbreak of the conflict. And the top leaders of the revolution had to reach it: he, Party Delegate, and Gómez, head of the military branch of the organization.

Martí was not guided by masks or postmodern levities, but by the frank density of the missionary sense with which he assumed existence since, as a child, he "swore to wash away with his life" – not only with the eventuality of probable death – the crime of slavery, such as the one that Cuba continued to suffer in its condition as an oppressed nation in 1895, and especially the humble suffered in it.

That oath guided him in his responsibilities at the head of the independence movement, with the redemptive vocation in which the proclamation of the Revolutionary Party on April 10, 1892, and his arrival in Cuba, with Gómez and four other companions, through La Playita de Cajobabo, on the 11th of that month in 1895, were inscribed.

If in the selection of the first date one can see a surpassing tribute to the Republic of Guáimaro – Martí himself referred to the Party in the Homeland of the previous April 7 as an organization already standing – the date of the arrival of the expeditionaries to Cuba depended on various events. But both anniversaries have in the history of Cuba, and in the affectivity of the homeland, a closeness that goes beyond the mere chronological contingency. The tragedy of May 19, 1895 will lead to remembering other sides of the events.

RMH/Ltd

*Taken from Cubaperiodistas




Luis Toledo Sande
Cuban writer, researcher and journalist. PhD in Philological Sciences from the University of Havana. Author of several books of different genres. He has taught at the university and has been director of the Center for Martí Studies and deputy director of the magazine Casa de las Américas. In diplomacy, he has served as cultural counselor of the Cuban Embassy in Spain. Among other recognitions, he has received the Distinction for National Culture and the Social Sciences Critics Award, the latter for his book Cesto de llamas. Biography of José Martí. (Velasco, Holguín, 1950).

Argentina on the edge of the precipice, and below the demons await

By Víctor Ego Ducrot

The stagnation driven by Donald Trump's tariff policies with the intention of saving the dollar from the debacle – the debt and trade imbalance of the United States is measured in trillions – is global in nature, but it will fall most heavily on the euphemistically called developing or emerging countries.

Drums of war are beating all over the planet, except in Latin America, for now. It is enough to note that the EU is talking about a first investment in new armaments for 80 billion euros. Meanwhile, China is unfazed by Trump's broadsides and responds to them "stick by stick."

In this scenario, indebted to the impossible and isolated from the world by the atrocities said and committed by President Javier Milei – he only knows how to flatter Trump in an undignified way – Argentina is on the edge of the precipice and, down there, in hell, the demons are waiting for the Argentines.

It could be risked that the government of the ultra-right-wing lunatic entered its final stage, although, it is true, it is not yet known what the ways, forms and dates of the final outcome will be.

But the truth is that the indicators in this regard are growing. Pollsters cannot hide that the fall in the president's image and social acceptance measurements has become an apparently irreversible trend.



This has been happening in recent weeks, after the episodes of the crypto scam led by Milei and under the magnifying glass of a US federal court; the brutal repression of the protests of retirees and pensioners, and his recent statements about the Malvinas Islands in favor of the United Kingdom and in violation of the National Constitution.

To all this chaos was added the fact that the external debt is excessive. The dollars demanded from the IMF take time to arrive and therefore the Central Bank finds its reserves depleted by the flight of foreign currency that is systemic. The exchange rate crisis and in the markets in general is just around the corner.



In addition, last weekend the president flew to one of Trump's private residences in search of a photo and returned empty-handed, and amid unintelligible words about the effects that the White House's tariff restrictions will cause. Meanwhile, his foreign minister, Gerardo Werthein, a member of a family of bankers, occupies the Ministry of Foreign Affairs but for the sole purpose of attending to his business, tending to stay with one of the country's large telephone companies.

At the same time, Congress rejected the two candidates who, by irregular decree, had been proposed and appointed by the Executive Branch to be part of the Supreme Court of Justice. And on the closing of this text, the same Parliament created a commission to investigate the crypto scam, in which Milei is the main responsible.

A 48-hour general strike called by the hitherto collaborationist CGT and other labor federations is planned for this week. And the main media of the written press, TV and digital sites are doomed to predictions of various national calamities; even those most allied to Milei's fascist regime babble without being able to articulate a convincing defense.

The other aspect of the delicate political situation in Argentina is the anomie and irresponsibility of the main opposition forces, which particularly fall to Peronism in all its variants. With few exceptions, such as those of this week when they rejected the candidates for the Court and approved the aforementioned investigative commission, in Congress these forces had been giving governability to the regime of the fascist lunatic.

In the middle of a mid-term election year – the chambers of Congress and provincial legislatures are partially renewed – Kirchnerism, the hegemonic space in Peronism for the last 20 years, suffered what he called its first "exposed fracture".
The governor of the province of Buenos Aires, the most populous and therefore decisive in the national polls, Axel Kicilloff, decided to question the already injured leadership of former President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and strong turbulence is coming, especially because that province is the territory of Kirchnerist domination, or was until now. The questions are open.

However, the majority of the population lives oblivious to these ups and downs of professional politicians, battered by government adjustments, poverty, unemployment and the cost of living, all realities that are of greater magnitude than those recognized in official and private statistics.

Without a space of a seriously progressive or leftist nature with real opposition capacity, the political life of Argentines is a drift and the survival of the government of the fascist lunatic is in the hands of forces that are not exactly of a popular nature.
Milei's fate depends on how the intra-bourgeois disputes will be resolved, within the bloc made up of the decisive business groups, agriculture, mining and energy, telecommunications, media and technology companies, and some export product industries, in the not always transparent bid with the financial and speculative sectors, true experts in capital flight.

When business opportunities in some of these decisive sectors fall to a critical point, Milei and his sad troupe of unpresentables will be the past, although the future of Argentine democracy will continue to be in a state of coma or at least of dramatic uncertainty.

For the end, some portraits that come from the very bottom of the Argentine abyss.

A madman, a tarot reader and a dead talking dog are at the forefront of the country, in the midst of a global tragedy. Those were more or less the words issued on social networks by the Argentine academic, doctor of communication and historian Carlos Ciappina, colleague and colleague at the National University of La Plata (UNLP).

The madman, of course, is called Javier Milei. The tarot reader is his sister and strong voice in the government, Karina; and the dead dog that speaks from the beyond was called Conan.

But that is already known history. Perhaps less well known is that a surname, a family, which belonged to the close circle of the former president Mauricio Macri, also right-wing, now manages the Argentine economy and finances, the intelligence services and a good part of the private businesses that enjoy the privileges granted to them by the Casa Rosada.

In October of last year, colleague Giselle Leclercq, from the Buenos Aires newspaper Perfil, published an interesting journalistic x-ray of the Caputos, a who's who in that family always linked to power.

The day Javier Milei won the elections, he went on stage and thanked the young Santiago Caputo, whom he defined as "the true architect" of his campaign. His name immediately caught the eye: he was another member of a family that has been close to power for decades. Until then, the adviser was unknown to the general public, says that article.

And he adds: Santiago's influence in the government is surprising. Although he does not hold any official position, he has interference in practically all areas. Among the allies of the fascist lunatic, it is recognized that he is the one who wields power, between turbulence and constant trips with the tarot reader.



The other Caputo (Toto) was the one who signed with the IMF the largest debt in Argentina's debtor history, on behalf of then-President Macri; and he is reproducing the same scheme under Milei's mantle.

But there is a third. Nicolás "Nicky" Caputo, a lifelong friend of the aforementioned Macri and currently very active in his private businesses of all kinds, with the support of the government.

Santiago (without any previous experience in the administration, a disciple of the Ecuadorian consultant Jaime Durán Barba, always at the service of the right), Toto and Nicky are not the only acquaintances... Francisco, one of the three brothers of the presidential advisor, would be collaborating with the government in areas such as energy. The list of famous Caputos can also include Flavio and Rossana, the owners of "Caputo Hermanos", the company that was involved in the investigation into the attempted assassination of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, adds the text published by Perfil.

Those are the main cheerleaders of the gang that surrounds the president, an improvised group of perverts, geeks, scoundrels, white-collar thieves, people with mental problems, mythomaniacs, irresponsible, useless and opportunistic, to use the words of one of the many critics who usually write on the networks.

And we come to the end of this text but not the end of the Argentine tragedy.

RMH/VED





Victor Ego Ducrot  Argentine journalist, writer and university professor. PhD in Communication from the National University of La Plata (UNLP), Argentina; professor of History of the Twentieth Century (Chair II) at the Faculty of Journalism and Social Communication of the UNLP, where he is also in charge of postgraduate and doctoral seminars on Editorial Intentionality (A theoretical and practical model for the production and analysis of media content); Media and Criminology: Analysis and Critical Production of Narratives on Crime, Crime and Violence; Journalistic Essay or Essay Journalism and History: Emergencies and Mutations in Transit in the Twentieth and XXI Centuries. Read more... Columnist in Argentine and Latin American media. Founder and current director of the Journalistic Agency of Buenos Aires (AgePeBA). Author of numerous books, including Los sabores de la Patria; Norm; Buenos Aires 1996 and republished in 2010; The Flavors of History; Norm; Bs.As; 1997; Recolonization or Independence: Latin America in the Twenty-First Century, Norma; Bs.As., 2004, co-authored with Stella Calloni; The Overthrown (historical novel); South american; Bs.As.; 2005.

SPACE / COSMOS

International Day of Human Spaceflight Celebrated

United Nations, Apr 12 (Prensa Latina) Humanity celebrates today the International Day of Manned Space Flight, a date that remembers the feat performed in 1961 by Russian astronaut Yuri Gagarin, the first human being to travel into space.

April 12, 2025 | 00:47


Years later, in 2011, the General Assembly of the United Nations (UN) declared April 12 for such a commemoration that marks the beginning of the space age, representing one of the greatest technological advances of the twentieth century.

The objective is to reaffirm that space science and technology make an important contribution to achieving sustainable development, enhancing the well-being of peoples and States, and ensuring that their aspiration to reserve outer space for peaceful purposes is fulfilled.

On April 12, 1961, Yuri Gagarin, a pilot in the Soviet air force, took off in Vostok 1 (the world's first spacecraft with a man on board), from Baykonur, becoming at the age of 27 the first human being to travel into space and complete an orbit around the Earth, a trip that lasted 108 minutes.

During the spaceflight, simple experiments were carried out, such as drinking, eating or writing with a pencil.

One of Gagarin's phrases remained for posterity: "The Earth is blue."

The UN declaration refers to some of the most outstanding achievements in space exploration, such as: the launch of the first Earth satellite, Sputnik I in 1957, and the first woman to orbit the Earth was the Russian engineer Valentina Tereshkova, who achieved her dream on June 16, 1963. Meanwhile, the American Neil Armstrong was the first man to set foot on the Moon on July 20, 1969, and the first international space mission took place on July 17, 1965 with the docking of the Apollo and Soyuz spacecraft.

Moreover, in the last decade, humanity has had a constant presence in outer space aboard the International Space Station.

Jha/LPN

SCANNER: Svetlana Savitskaya, the second woman to see the Earth from the Cosmos

(+Photos +Video)

Moscow (Prensa Latina) Valentina Tereshkova's feat is well known: she was the first woman to go into space, and she did that feat in Vostok 6, launched in 1963, just over two years after the first manned flight into space, carried out by Yuri Gagarin.

March 25, 2025
By: German Ferrás Álvarez
Chief correspondent in Russia

Valentina's feat inspired thousands of women around the world, who saw reflected in the talent of the young and simple Russian, the possibility of achieving any goal that a representative of the so-called weaker sex proposes.

Among those inspired was Svetlana Savitskaya, who 19 years later, in 1982, was the second to fly back into space.

As Svetlana recently told Escaner, she decided to become a cosmonaut, even long before Valentina's flight, because in 1961, when the second cosmonaut in the world Germán Titov made a longer flight, she understood that a new job, a new profession, had appeared. At that time she was 13 years old.

It was then that she began to improve herself, and decided that the first thing would be to obtain the status of aviator, and if her physique allowed it, to continue striving until she reached the category of cosmonaut pilot.

She set herself the task of being a good airline pilot, because in essence there was still the criterion that only men could be cosmonaut pilots.

In addition, from a very young age she was linked to the world of aviation. Her father, Marshal Evgeny Savitsky, was commander of Soviet air defenses, participated in the Great Patriotic War and was decorated with the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

From the age of 16 she practiced skydiving without her parents' consent. In fact, it took her father a year to find out what her daughter was doing in secret.

His skill was more than obvious as he achieved 3 world records in jumps from the stratosphere and 15 in jumps from jet aircraft.

He won the world championship of aerobatic piloting held in London, something very important in his career, as this fact opened the way to any type of piloting and also allowed him to enter the exclusive Moscow Aviation Institute, in 1972.

After finishing her studies, she worked as an aviation monitor and from 1976, after completing a specialized course at the school of airplane pilots, she was awarded the title of test pilot by the Ministry of Aviation Industry of the USSR, where she learned to master more than 20 types of aircraft.

At that time she worked as one of the test pilots in the office of the famous designer Yakovlev. She was a tester of supersonic fighter jets and vertical take-off and vertical landing, of many sports aircraft and of the well-known Yak 42 passenger plane.

When the group of women cosmonauts for spaceflight in Soyuz-type spacecraft was created again, in 1980, Svetlana asked Yakovlev for permission to be part of that collective, and she combined her work as a test pilot with her training as a cosmonaut.

According to her, of the group of eight women who began the training, only she was a pilot, the rest were doctors and scientists, so she was also the skydiving coach of the group that was training.

Among the candidates was the one chosen for the flight of August 19, 1982, 19 years after Valentina Tereshkova's.

Svetlana Savitskaya traveled into space in Soyuz T-7 and returned to earth aboard Soyuz T-5, due to T-7 being docked at Salyut.

Her spaceflight lasted 7 days, 21 hours, 52 minutes and 24 seconds. Although she already had the cosmonaut pilot qualification, on that occasion she flew as a research cosmonaut and did several experiments on the station.

Later, in July 1984, she also manned the Soyuz T-12, and during her stay on the Salyut 7 space station on July 25, 1984, Svetlana became the first woman to take a spacewalk.



She remained outside the station for 3 hours and 35 minutes, successfully performing assembly work, metal cutting, and welding. At that time, she became the first woman to travel to space twice.

That second flight and exit into space, as she told Escaner, was accidental, since it was planned that after her, in 1982, another cosmonaut would fly, but in the end it was decided to postpone it, and only when it transpired that the Americans were preparing the first trip to space, was it decided to send Svetlana again, due to her experience, to do the feat.

He continued his preparation to fulfill the dream of piloting the Buran ship, which made a single successful flight, but without a crew, after which due to financial problems and the fall of the USSR, it was decided to close that program.

Then she understood that this dream was already unrealizable due to the passage of time, and decided to move into political life, a job she has done until now.
Svetlana Savitskaya is considered the last Soviet cosmonaut, since Yelena Kondakova, the next to travel into space on October 3, 1994 in the Soyuz TM-20, did so as a Russian citizen.



In her space career, in addition to technical difficulties and life risks that she took on like the rest, as a pioneering woman in this professional field she suffered the machismo of some of her colleagues, as evidenced by the words of welcome she had from them when the hatch of the Soviet space station was opened: "We have an apron ready for you, Sveta."

In an area considered exclusively for men, according to the heroine, after her first flight "no one had any questions, no one said that cosmonautics was exclusively for men. They didn't dare to say it anymore, although not everyone, of course, liked it."

After her special trips, Svetlana Savitskaya won many awards and recognitions. Among others, she was twice elected as a Hero of the Soviet Union, also decorated with two Orders of Lenin and the Order of the Badge of Honor.

He also holds a gold medal and 18 diplomas from the International Aeronautical Federation (IAF), 16 sports medals from the USSR, and a special medal for surpassing the mark of permanence in open space.

arb/to/gfa

Scientists in The United Arab Emirates Develop Artificial Lunar Soil for Space Exploration

The UAE officials announced a goal to send an Emirati astronaut to the Moon within the next decade.

Published 1 April 2025
Images: Depositphotos.com

What will the future be? An Emirati astronaut (AI-image) on the Moon and the real Hotel Burj Al Arab.


Researchers in Abu Dhabi have developed an artificial lunar soil, the Emirates Lunar Simulant, using locally sourced natural materials, as reported by Emirates News Agency (WAM), a partner of TV BRICS.

The team utilised anorthosite-rich rocks from the Semail Ophiolite complex in the UAE, which closely resemble the mineral and chemical composition of genuine lunar samples. This simulant will play a crucial role in testing space equipment and training Emirati astronauts for upcoming missions to the Moon.

The UAE officials announced a goal to send an Emirati astronaut to the Moon within the next decade. Experts emphasised that the simulant represents a significant step in enhancing the UAE's contributions to planetary science and preparing for the complexities of lunar missions.

The Emirates Lunar Simulant will be used for testing rover functionality, training astronauts, and evaluating the performance of lunar equipment.

According to the source, this initiative will help optimise mission strategies, minimise risks, and pave the way for advancements in lunar exploration, including surface research, resource extraction, and potential construction efforts.

Additionally, UAE researchers have developed a planetary simulation chamber capable of replicating environmental conditions on the Moon, Mars, and other celestial bodies. This device simulates variables like gas composition, temperature, and solar radiation, enabling advanced research into the effects of prolonged exposure to extraterrestrial environments.

Source: TV BRICS

Cuba persists in the search for answers about kidnapped doctors

Havana, Apr 12 (Prensa Latina) Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez said today that efforts continue to clarify the situation of the doctors kidnapped in Kenya, Assel Herrera Correa and Landy Rodriguez Hernandez, who were carrying out an internationalist mission.

April 12, 2025 | 08:37

Rodríguez recalled in X that this Saturday marks six years since the kidnapping of the Cuban doctors and assured that the search for answers has the permanent attention and commitment of the highest level of the Communist Party and the Government.

Surgeon Landy Rodríguez Hernández and general practitioner Assel Herrera Correa were kidnapped on April 12, 2019 in the Kenyan city of Mandera, on the border with Somalia, and targeted by the Somali group Al Shabaab.

On February 17, 2024, news was received of the alleged death of the doctors, victims of an airstrike on February 15 carried out by U.S. military forces operating in Somalia.

As reported at the time by the Foreign Ministry, despite the multiple efforts made by the Cuban government, it was not possible to obtain information or evidence that would allow definitive conclusions to be reached and clarify whether the doctors are still alive or confirm their death.

What was possible to specify is that on the night of February 15, the Africa Command of the United States armed forces, responsible for operations in Somalia and other nations of the continent, executed an air strike in the area where the Cuban doctors were.

"Given the nature of the conflict in Somalia and the impossibility of achieving confirmation, in recent weeks the government of Cuba repeatedly requested, through direct communications and diplomatic notes to the government of the United States, precise information on the events that occurred," the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

At the insistence, the text detailed, the northern nation confirmed that an attack took place in the area where the doctors were, but without precise clarification regarding the locality.

According to the source, the United States did not respond with the urgency or seriousness required.

Arc/MKS

Cuban Foreign Minister Denounces Historical U.S. Manipulation

Havana, Apr 12 (Prensa Latina) Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez denounced today that U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio distorts history to attack Cuba and build a narrative favorable to his biography.

April 12, 2025 | 


"The bad habit of manipulating history accompanies the Secretary of State of #EEUU, both to fabricate his personal biography, and to denigrate #Cuba," Rodríguez said on the social network X.

Likewise, the foreign minister criticized Washington's political use of Cuban migrants, and described its current position of discarding them as opportunistic.

In recent days, Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel described the deportations of immigrants from the United States as unacceptable abuses of power and violations of the most basic rights of Latin American and Caribbean citizens.

Speaking at the IX Summit of leaders of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, he pointed out that many of them end up in high-security prisons with low methods, without respect for due process, without proof of guilt and in harshly repressive conditions.

He alluded to the case of Venezuelan nationals, whose only fault seems to have been lacking legal status in the United States, and despite this, he pointed out, they ended up incarcerated in prisons intended for highly dangerous criminals, without evidence that they are criminals.

Diaz-Canel lashed out at Washington's decision to once again use its naval base in Guantanamo, in illegally occupied Cuban territory, to confine migrants, an act he described as brutal and illegal, in addition to threatening the security and peace of the entire region.

He considered the unconvincing attempt of the Northern power to justify its aggressive policy by presenting itself as a victim state, "from which the rest of the world is taking advantage," he said ironically, an opportunistic distortion of history and reality.

Arc/MKS

 

Vance's misguided views on China weaken US influence

By David Gosset | chinadaily.com.cn | Updated: 2025-04-09 

A farmer harvests at a wheat field at Yantang village of Kaiyang county in Guiyang, Southwest China's Guizhou province, May 31, 2023. [Photo/Xinhua]

Anyone with even a basic understanding of European affairs would immediately recognize that James David Vance's recent speech in Munich revealed a deep ignorance of the continent's complex political and historical situation. His remarks were not only misinformed but also alarmingly superficial for someone holding such a high office. Yet, even more troubling was his most recent comment regarding Chinese people—a statement that added ignorance and a layer of toxic arrogance to his already troubling rhetoric.

In reducing the Chinese population to "peasants", Vance displayed a stunning lack of awareness and respect. Such a characterization is not only factually incorrect but deeply offensive. China is home to one of the most ancient and sophisticated civilizations in human history. To overlook this reality is to dismiss thousands of years of intellectual, cultural and scientific achievement. It is bad enough to ignore the richness of the Chinese society, but it is arguably worse to mislead one's own citizens about the true nature of one of the world's most dynamic and influential countries.

The American people deserve better. They deserve a leadership that is not only informed but also open-minded—capable of recognizing and engaging with the complexity of other societies, especially those that play a critical role in shaping the future of the global order. China, with its rapid technological advances, vibrant entrepreneurial spirit, and growing cultural influence, is not a monolithic or backward nation. Rather, it is a place of remarkable innovation and transformation. To paint it otherwise is a disservice not only to China but also to the American public.

Vance's words reveal a troubling pattern—a tendency to resort to stereotypes rather than confront the world as it actually is. Such behavior is not just unbecoming of a vice president; it is dangerous. In a time when international cooperation is more essential than ever, leaders must be bridge-builders, not flamethrowers. Mischaracterizing an entire people undermines diplomacy, sows division, and weakens America's position on the world stage.

Moreover, the implications of Vance's rhetoric go beyond international perception. By promoting such distorted views, he hampers the ability of the United States to maintain its leadership role in a rapidly changing world. The global balance of power is shifting. Emerging nations are asserting themselves with greater confidence, and the multipolar world is now a reality. In this environment, clinging to arrogance and outdated narratives is not a strategy—it's a liability.

History has shown that societies which fail to adapt, remain trapped in a mindset of superiority and condescension, ultimately fall behind. The Chinese renaissance, marked by remarkable advances in science, technology, education and infrastructure, will not be halted by the careless words of a single American politician. On the contrary, such remarks only serve to motivate and strengthen China's resolve to chart its own course and solidify its role as a global leader.

It is ironic, then, that in trying to diminish another nation, Vance may in fact be hastening the decline of his own influence. His statements reflect not strength, but insecurity—an inability to understand the present and prepare for the future. As time passes, the weaknesses in his character and the superficiality of his worldview become more evident.

America still has the potential to be a force for good in the world—a beacon of innovation, creativity and global partnership. But this will require leaders who are willing to engage with reality, who respect the dignity of all peoples, and who understand that influence is earned through wisdom and integrity, not arrogance and ignorance.

It is not China that is diminished by Vance's comments—it is Vance himself.

The author, a specialist in global affairs and sinology, is the founder of the China-Europe-America Global Initiative.

The views don't necessarily reflect those of China Daily's.

Contact the editor at editor@chinawatch.cn.

ECONOMY

Trump’s Trade War and Secret Military Arsenals

10 April 2025 - News@NewsVoice

Images by C-Span and NNSANews

Donald Trump and a W76-2 warhead.



U.S. President Donald Trump has again ignited trade tensions, particularly with China. On April 9, 2025, Trump announced a significant increase in tariffs on Chinese goods, escalating them to a staggering 125%. Simultaneously, he declared a 90-day pause on reciprocal tariffs for most other nations, a decision framed as a reprieve amidst growing economic uncertainty.Trump’s Tariff Tactics: President Trump has raised tariffs on Chinese goods to 125% while implementing a 90-day pause on tariffs for most other countries.

Economic Impact: These tariffs are projected to significantly impact China’s economic growth, potentially reducing it to as low as 4% in 2025.
Secret Weapon Claims: Trump’s recent boasts about previously undisclosed U.S. military weaponry have sparked global speculation and unease.

The Breakdown of Tariffs

The decision to raise tariffs on China follows an earlier threat to impose a 50% tariff on Chinese goods if Beijing did not withdraw its levies on U.S. products. This tit-for-tat escalation has plunged the world’s two largest economies into a full-blown trade war.

The 125% tariff means a $10 product would now attract a $12.50 tax, driving the total cost up to $22.50. These costs are typically borne by the companies importing the goods, who decide whether to pass them on to consumers.

Global Market Reactions

The immediate reaction to Trump’s announcement was a surge in global stock markets, as investors hoped to resolve the trade disputes. However, the reprieve was short-lived. China retaliated swiftly, announcing its measures targeting U.S. goods, particularly agricultural products.

This includes tariffs ranging from 10% to 15% on various U.S. agricultural products. These retaliatory tariffs cannot be waived or exempted under current regulations, further intensifying the economic standoff.

The Impact on China’s Economy

The escalating trade war is expected to have a significant impact on China’s economic growth. Investment banks are forecasting a growth rate of 4.5% for 2025, while analysts at UBS are even more pessimistic, suggesting that Trump’s tariff hikes could reduce China’s economic growth to just 4%.

This projection assumes that the Chinese government will engage in broad fiscal expansion to mitigate the negative effects. The effectiveness of China’s past strategy of rerouting exports through countries like Vietnam and Thailand to bypass U.S. tariffs is also expected to diminish as Trump erects trade barriers globally.

Trump’s ”Secret Weapon”: Fact or Fiction?

Adding to the global unease, President Trump has made several claims about the existence of previously undisclosed U.S. military weaponry. In one instance, Trump boasted about a ”super duper missile” that could fly ”17 times faster” than anything America’s adversaries possess. He has also alluded to a ”secret nuclear weapon” and a ”weapon system that nobody’s ever had in this country before.”

The W76-2 Warhead

Some experts speculate that Trump may have been referring to the W76-2 warhead, a low-yield nuclear weapon deployed on Trident II D-5 missiles carried aboard Navy ballistic missile submarines. While this warhead’s existence was known, its deployment’s timing was initially kept secret.

However, experts suggest the claim of a revolutionary weapon is an overstatement. Low-yield atomic bombs have existed since the 1950s, but their deployment on strategic systems is unprecedented and controversial.

Hypersonic Weapons

Trump has also mentioned his interest in hypersonic weapons, often without using the specific term. Hypersonic weapons are designed to travel at speeds over Mach 5, making them difficult to intercept. While the U.S. is actively developing hypersonic weapons, details of these programs are mainly classified.

Russia has already deployed hypersonic weapons, such as the Kinzhal, Oreshnik, and Zircon missiles, which give it a potential advantage in this area.

The Implications of Trump’s Claims

The implications of Trump’s claims are multifaceted. On one hand, they could deter potential adversaries and project an image of the U.S.’s alleged military superiority. On the other hand, they could increase global tensions and spur an arms race as other nations seek to match or surpass U.S. military capabilities. The lack of transparency surrounding these claims also raises concerns about the potential for miscalculation and escalation in times of crisis.

China Responds with Assertiveness and Caution

Amidst the escalating trade war and the unveiling of supposed U.S. military advancements, China has adopted a posture of assertive defense and cautious diplomacy. Beijing has consistently emphasized its commitment to protecting its interests while advocating for a return to dialogue and cooperation.

Retaliatory Measures

In direct response to the increased tariffs imposed by the U.S., China has implemented retaliatory measures targeting U.S. agricultural products. These tariffs, ranging from 10% to 15%, aim to exert economic pressure on the U.S. and demonstrate China’s resolve to defend its monetary sovereignty. Unlike previous tariffs, these cannot be waived, signaling a firm stance.

Travel Advisories

Adding another layer to the countermeasures, the Chinese Ministry of Culture and Tourism issued a travel advisory cautioning its citizens about the risks of visiting the U.S. The advisory cited the deterioration of China-U.S. economic relations and concerns over safety in the U.S., urging Chinese tourists to exercise caution. This move is likely to impact tourism revenue in the U.S.

Commitment to Peaceful Development

Despite the tensions, China has reiterated its commitment to peaceful development and win-win cooperation. Chinese officials have emphasized the importance of resolving trade disputes through dialogue and negotiation, underscoring the mutual benefits of a stable and cooperative relationship. This approach reflects China’s broader foreign policy strategy of promoting multilateralism and global governance.

Visualizing the Trade War: Key Indicators

The following table illustrates the key indicators reflecting the trade war between the U.S. and China, showcasing the economic impact and the escalating tensions:

Trade War April 2025 – Key Indicators Table by Ithy.com

Decoding Trump’s Tariff Strategy: KTLA 5 News AnalysisThis video from KTLA 5 News provides a concise breakdown of President Trump’s decision to implement a 90-day pause on most tariffs while simultaneously increasing tariffs on Chinese imports. The analysis highlights the immediate market reactions and potential implications for global trade.

References

Reuters:  In stunning U-turn, Trump walks back some tariffs, triggering historic market rally

RT: US has secret weapons – Trump

RT: Trump hikes China tariff

BBC: What are tariffs, how do they work and why is Trump using them?

Al Jazeera: Trump’s tariff war: What’s at stake for China’s economy?

CNBC: Trump tariffs: White House seeks to isolate China with 125% import duties

NewsVoice is an online Swedish news and debate channel that started in 2011. The purpose is to publish independent news, debate articles and comments as well as analyzes.
News@NewsVoice
news@newsvoice.se

ECONOMY

Trump’s Tariff Policy Leads the US to Economic System Collapse

Analysis

9 April 2025 - News@NewsVoice

Images by GrokAI and Whitehouse.gov composed by NewsVoice
A rusty train on a collapsed bridge and Donald Trump looking for rare earth metals



Trump’s tariff policy ignores the fact that the US economy is highly dependent on imports of rare metals. Tariffs on these goods, therefore, risk leading to an economic collapse in the US. If Trump wants to save the US from a financial sinkhole, he should tear down his ill-conceived policies if he wants to make the US Great Again.

By Hedi Bel Habib, Independent commentator, Doctor of Philosophy, researcher with long experience of analytical work in government, including 15 years in the Cabinet Office.
The US is extremely dependent on rare metal imports

The US relies heavily on imports to meet its needs for critical minerals. These include nickel, cobalt, copper and lithium – essential components for both industry and defence.

U.S. rare earth imports by country of origin 2019-2022. Published by Madhumitha Jaganmohan, May 22, 2024

In 2024, the United States relied on China, Malaysia, Japan and Estonia for 80% of its critical mineral needs, according to the USGS. The United States has only one functioning rare earth mineral mine, owned by MP Materials.

At the same time, the US has one of the world’s slowest processes for opening new mines. According to existing analyses, it can take up to 29 years to start a mine in the country, which is the second slowest in the world. At the same time, China dominates the global production and processing of critical minerals, making the US dependent on foreign suppliers.
Counter-tariffs could lead to systemic collapse in the US

China has already announced that it will impose tariffs on seven types of rare earth minerals on which the US is extremely dependent. China is the world leader in rare metals, refining 90% of the world’s total production.

This means that China can already hamper the development of sectors such as defense, technology and the green transition. It is not just economic development that is being damaged. A shortage of these rare metals means that the US’s most advanced defense systems risk going from superior to obsolete.

The US defense industry has a growing need for critical minerals. To meet this, the US is trying to secure supplies by laying claim to Greenland or a forced agreement with Ukraine.



According to the US president, the Ukraine peace talks concerns rare earth minerals worth $500 billion, among other things. However, according to commodity experts, Ukraine lacks mineable rare earth minerals.

Greenland’s resources are also significantly lower than those of China, the biggest US importer. Data from the United States Geological Survey (USGS), shows that China is the world’s largest producer of critical metals and has the biggest rare earth mineral reserves – which as a result means that many countries across the world rely on China to meet their supply and demand for rare earth minerals.

China’s restriction on rare earth mineral exports not only affects the United States, but also causes structural damage to the entire world economy, as rare metals are used in radar, lasers, fighter jets, wind turbines, nuclear power plants, electric cars, electronics, lighting and cancer treatment.

China’s latest move in the trade war to restrict exports of rare earth minerals has the potential to have a major impact on the ability of all countries to produce key products.


Trump needs to do what Einstein did

Albert Einstein said:

“Problems cannot be solved with the same mindset that created them. It takes a completely new way of thinking to solve the problems we created with the old way of thinking”.

Einstein also said that ill-defined problems cannot be solved. If he had one hour to save the world, he would spend 55 minutes defining the problem and the remaining five minutes on the solution.

Trump has not done what Einstein did. He is raising a barrage of tariffs to solve America’s trade problems, without defining the problem itself. If Trump wants to make America Great Again, he should learn from Einstein and reverse his ill-conceived tariff policy. This is the only way to save the US from an economic sinkhole.

Related

Wang Peng: China Resilient in Facing US Global Tariff War

Hedi Bel Habib: Trump’s Tariffs is a Lose-Lose Strategy for the Entire World Economy



NewsVoice is an online Swedish news and debate channel that started in 2011. The purpose is to publish independent news, debate articles and comments as well as analyzes.
News@NewsVoice
news@newsvoice.se

\

Trump’s Tariffs is a Lose-Lose Strategy for the Entire World Economy

 5 April 2025 - News@NewsVoice

Photo by Daniel Torok, Public Domain

President Donald Trump signs an executive order on the administration's tariff plans at a “Make America Wealthy Again” event on Wednesday, April 2, 2025, in the White House Rose Garden.

Donald Trump’s tariffs are aimed at the EU and other countries because of the US foreign trade deficit, but a closer analysis shows that these measures are based on an outdated and one-sided view of the functioning of the economy and trade flows, resulting in a lose-lose strategy for the entire world economy.

By Hedi Bel Habib, independent commentator, PhD, researcher with long experience of analytical work in public administration of Sweden, including 15 years in the Government’s Cabinet Office

Trump’s tariffs are one-eyed measures

Trump’s tariffs are designed based on an analysis that focuses only on trade flows of goods. However, trade flows between countries consist of both goods and services. Eurostat data show that in 2023, the EU had a surplus of €157 billion in trade in goods with the United States. However, according to Eurostat data, the EU had a deficit of €109 billion in trade in services in 2023.

The figure below shows that the EU has a trade surplus in goods, while the United States has a surplus in services. The EU had a surplus of €48 billion in 2023, representing only 3% of the total trade flow of €1600 billion.



The US is a big winner as the EU moves towards a growing service economy

The economic importance of services has increased in the broader economy. Services now account for three-quarters of EU GDP, represent two-thirds of employment and create 9 out of 10 new jobs in the EU.

Studies have shown that services play a key role in productivity, competitiveness, and inclusive growth in the modern economy. They can also impact the manufacturing sector, which often uses services as inputs in production processes and sells products together with services.

Looking at the EU’s trade balance in services, we can see that the EU has the largest trade deficit with the United States in this sector. In 2022, this deficit reached almost €100 billion

. 

Source: Eurostat
Counterproductive tariffs could deprive the US of its growing trade surpluses within the EU and the rest of the world

Trump’s tariff measures on trade in goods ignore the fact that the services sector is currently the backbone of the US economy. In 2021, the services sector accounted for 77% of US GDP

.

Source: Focus Economics

In 2023, US services exports amounted to $1026.6 billion, and US services imports were $748.2 billion. Today, the United States has a significant services trade surplus with Canada, China, Europe, and most other major economies.

These services are mainly dominated by world-class American companies such as Microsoft Corp, Google, Meta Platforms Inc, Amazon.com Inc, Tesla Inc, major banks, insurance companies, universities, healthcare providers, movie studios, and publishers. They can take many forms.

For example, Tesla makes money from licensing its intellectual property, while educating an international student is considered an export of a service.

Against this backdrop, creating tariff barriers in the shrinking manufacturing sector of the economy with a single-minded focus on trade in goods risks unnecessarily fueling inflation globally while destroying the US’s ever-growing trade surplus in services exports to the EU and the rest of the world. Therefore, Trump’s tariffs can be seen as a lose-lose strategy for the entire world economy.



Related

White House: Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Declares National Emergency to Increase our Competitive Edge, Protect our Sovereignty, and Strengthen our National and Economic Security

NewsVoice is an online Swedish news and debate channel that started in 2011. The purpose is to publish independent news, debate articles and comments as well as analyzes.
News@NewsVoice
news@newsvoice.se

It's not just a trade war... and it's just getting started

By Sergio Rodríguez Gelfenstein

We do not know the impact that the imposition of 10 percent tariffs on their exports by the Trump administration will have had on the inhabitants of Heard and McDonald Islands.

Most likely, we will never know, because the population of these territories is composed only of penguins, seals, turtles and seabirds. It has been more than ten years since the last time a human set foot on such rocky islets of 412 km² located halfway between Australia and Africa, whose economic activity based on the production of elephant seal oil and seal hunts ended in 1877.

This decision allows us – in some way – to understand the dimension of the recent measures taken by the United States in order to unleash a "trade war" against the world, which represents a real systemic hecatomb whose consequences are yet to be seen.

It does not seem easy to do this exercise, seasoned economists speak of "the end of globalization", "systemic catastrophe" or "destruction of the world trading system by a basic economic fallacy", according to the renowned professor of economics at Columbia University Jeffrey Sachs, who assures that Trump erroneously claims that the United States' trade deficit is due to the fact that the rest of the world has cheated him.



Another authoritative opinion, that of the American Economic Association, points out that "the formula used to set tariffs, published by the Office of the United States Trade Representative, has an error and lacks economic logic," assuring that "the calculation of tariffs has no support either in economic theory or in the legal framework of international trade." This prestigious institution considers that if the calculation errors were corrected, the country's economy could be boosted, favoring trade liberalization and reducing the risk of a possible recession.

So Trump's actions have no theoretical basis even in the economic doctrine of capitalism. However, it is not a matter of simplifying by saying that what is happening is total madness. I don't think so, I don't think that the world is suffering a strong systemic collapse motivated by a psychiatric dysfunction of the head of the administration of the most powerful country on the planet.

I think that everything obeys a coldly elaborated and calculated plan. Politics is a rational fact in which the subjective has a greater or lesser influence to the extent of the protagonism of the actors, whether they are individual or collective. But when the irrational exceeds the tangible, we are facing a situation that goes beyond the normal limits of analysis. Psychiatrists and psychologists would have to transform themselves into social scientists to explain what is happening.

It is not madness, but rather stupidity, stupidity, foolishness or whatever you want to call it. And these are not traits that characterize mental illness, but expressions of capitalist arrogance and arrogance as a response to a situation in which things are not going as desired, that is, in the same way that has been happening at least for the last 250 years or, many millennia before if we stick to the existence of class societies where the powerful have imposed will by force.

As if he were a monarch who holds all the powers, Trump overrides the legislative and judicial powers, disrupting with his practice the chimera of the balance of dominions assumed by liberal rhetoric. But just as Rome had Caligula and the Ottoman Empire Suleiman, Trump will fall by the very force of the system that he intends to overthrow in order to maximize the wealth of a minority sector of the American plutocracy.

In a supremacist attitude never before raised by another American president, Trump, acting even outside of a minimum rationality, assumes that his country has a power and a planetary mandate that cannot be questioned. His egomaniacal and arrogant mentality does not allow him to recognize mistakes, so he has surrounded himself with friends and family who praise him too much and always find him right.



Three months have passed since his arrival to the presidency of the United States, the world has not yet woken up from measuring the consequences of what it observes on the surface, to begin to glimpse that what is happening goes beyond a simple tremor that is felt in the crust to understand that in reality it is at the epicenter of a violent earthquake in the deepest part of the structure of the capitalist system. It is not just a matter of "making America great again", above all, what Trump is trying to do is to save the dollar, to save the hegemony of the United States and to save the capitalist system that is struggling with contradictions typical of its imperialist stage when the immeasurable growth of monopolies destroys the competition that is intrinsic to the system.

This is not new, already in the 70s of the last century a crisis of structural dimensions began to which an attempt was made to respond by implementing neoliberalism at a planetary level, assuming that it would be the panacea to overcome what was considered a superficial and cyclical impasse. This brought higher levels of exploitation of wage earners, violation of the most elementary norms and values of liberal democracy that had sustained the system for two centuries and the generation of conflicts and wars to activate the military industrial apparatus as a way out of the crisis.

However, since the measures taken over half a century have not aimed to solve the underlying problem, it has deepened to the point of becoming unmanageable. The U.S. deficit reached $59 billion in 1980. In that same year, the total federal debt amounted to $914 billion, an increase of $532 billion since 1970. On January 2, 2025, the debt limit was reinstated at $36.104 trillion, while the deficit was $2 trillion or seven percent of GDP. It is worth remembering that in that period Republican and Democratic presidents have governed, so it makes no sense to blame one or the other, much less take a position as if that were the cause of what is happening, while trying to hide the systemic crisis.

Sachs explains that "a country's trade deficit (or, more precisely, its current account deficit) does not indicate unfair trade practices by surplus countries. It indicates something else entirely. A current account deficit means that the deficit country spends more than it produces. That is, it saves less than it invests."

In the case of the United States, a way of life must be maintained based on chronic waste, especially by the ruling class and a middle class that spends, believing that it is immune to the ups and downs of the economy. Sachs also refers to this crisis as motivated by "chronically high budget deficits resulting from tax cuts for the rich, combined with trillions of dollars wasted on useless wars. The deficits are not the perfidy of Canada, Mexico and other countries that sell more to the United States than the United States sells to them."

The United States must sustain 800 military bases around the world, in which one million 240 thousand totally unproductive soldiers must be maintained by the State. It must also finance 11 aircraft carrier task forces that are in constant and unnecessary movement throughout the oceans of the planet. By the way, it is good to remember that the Houthis of Yemen, the poorest country in West Asia, have taken it upon themselves to demonstrate their total inefficiency. According to Trump, war in its warlike expression is not the best business for the United States, so he resorts to economic warfare thinking that this expedient can lead the United States to victory.

However, it should not be forgotten that, conceptually, "war is the continuation of politics by violent means" and that according to Lenin, "politics is the concentrated expression of the economy", so that everything that is happening has solely and exclusively economic causes, i.e. the economic crisis of capitalism and the United States.



To suppose – as Trump does – that this war is going to be won by increasing tariffs and that this is going to lead the countries of the world to eliminate their own, that companies are going to move ipso facto to the United States, that each country is not going to manipulate its currencies as a protective measure and that everyone is going to turn to buying American products... produced in the United States, is still a chimera of an arrogant spoiled brat.

Some of the consequences of these measures are already beginning to be perceived. The first to be hit is the people of the United States themselves. Some of the most renowned U.S. economists have announced that their country's trade deficit cannot be closed, on the contrary, they believe that the measures taken will impoverish American citizens and harm the rest of the world. Justin Wolfers, professor of economics at the University of Michigan, believes that the cost of living in his country will increase by six percent as companies pass on the additional costs to consumers. On the other hand, despite the contrary opinion of the administration's spokesmen, JPMorgan analysts predict that Trump's tariffs will most likely plunge the global economy into a recession this year.

In another area, it seems that the pro-Trump bloc in the U.S. Congress is beginning to crack. Four Republican senators joined Democrats in rejecting Trump's tariff policy in a key vote. This decision led the Senate to adopt a 51-48 resolution aimed at blocking the Trump administration's proposed tariffs on Canadian imports.

Likewise, in an unexpected response for Trump, China, which will now face a 125 percent tariff on its exports to the United States, has responded to every escalation by Washington. This could substantially increase the prices of several goods that Americans buy from China. Washington imported $439 billion in goods from China last year, the second main source of imports behind Mexico. It does not seem possible that the United States can win this "trade war" against China. Already during his last administration, the current president tried a conflict of similar characteristics, but much more limited, and lost it.

The evidence indicates that, beyond his promises and despite his overwhelming rhetoric and decisive decisions, Trump has not been able to occupy Greenland, has not been able to impose his plan for Gaza and did not stop the war in Ukraine in 24 hours. Europe, the Arab countries and Russia respectively, have prevented him from doing so. Nor has it been able to sell the 100,000 five-million-dollar visas it offered. Likewise, no one in the world has stopped calling the Gulf of Mexico by its name.



Even on the issue of deportations, it has been "more the noise than the cabuya". Without ceasing to consider that this has been done outside of international law and even of the institutions and laws of the United States itself, the Trump administration has not been able to fulfill what it has proposed. In this regard, my colleague and friend Antonio García reminds me that: "with respect to deportations, one aspect that has gone under the table is that Trump, in a period similar to what he has done so far in his term, has deported fewer people than Obama and Biden. Biden's deportations were a scandal compared to others. In 2024 alone they reached almost 300 thousand, [...] in a similar period it exceeded those carried out by Trump. So Trump's 'massive' deportations have been a failure. That is the reason why he has needed to make a scandal with the Tren de Aragua and the illegal deportations to El Salvador in order to hide his failure."
Similarly, it seems that no one has explained to Trump the real situation of the United States. According to figures provided by the Wofnon portal, when in 2008 the GDP per capita of the European Union was 37,203 dollars, that of the United States was 48,570, a difference of 11 thousand dollars. In 2023, that of the European Union was 41,422 while that of the United States reached 82,769 dollars, that is, double. Under these conditions, does anyone believe that a European businessman will move his factories to the United States where he has to pay double wages to produce the same as in Europe at half price or in Asia where he pays 20 percent?

Another element of analysis is the collapse of the stock markets, which have not stopped falling since the announcement of the imposition of tariffs by Trump. The figures have ranged from -2.77 percent of Japan's Nikkei index to Apple's nine percent fall.
The United States' hitherto allies, still subject to it by their subordination in NATO and by military bases that provide them with security and defense, have cried foul. From Germany to Australia, from Switzerland to Japan and from France to Sweden, they have spoken of "unrest" and "tariffs more harmful than expected." The government of Belgium, NATO's host country, said that the United States "will end up burning itself by dint of playing with matches"... Others, such as the presidents of Argentina and Ecuador, show full subordination by being content with the tariffs imposed on their countries because they are lower than those of others.

But what is perhaps most important and forward-looking is the reaction of the people of the United States. In demonstrations only compared to those that opposed the war in Vietnam in the 70s of the last century, and under the slogan "Hands off!", around 1,200 demonstrations were held in a single day, last Saturday, April 5, in the 50 states of the U.S. Union in which more than 150 social groups and around 500,000 citizens participated to express their repudiation and rejection of the measures taken by Trump that affect their economic situation and their labor and human rights.

This conflict that Trump has initiated is not circumstantial or short-term, it does not have a tactical character. It is a mistake to characterize and analyze it as such. No. It is structural, long-term and strategic in nature. What is at stake is the survival of capitalism on the one hand and the survival of humanity on the other... and it is just beginning.



Lenin already pointed this out in 1916: "The epoch of the highest stage of capitalism shows us that certain relations are being established among capitalist groups based on the economic division of the world; at the same time, and in connection with this, certain relations are growing between political groups, between states, on the basis of the territorial division of the world, of the struggle for the colonies, of the 'struggle for spheres of influence'.

From this more than 100 years ago, much has changed in the world, but the essence is the same. This is a systemic conflict, it is much more than a trade war or a geopolitical confrontation. Even one of the largest billionaires on the planet, the American investor and hedge fund manager Ray Dalio, says it, who today, April 9, in his account X stated that: "The most important thing to keep in mind is that we are seeing a classic rupture of the main monetary, political and geopolitical orders. This type of collapse occurs only once in a lifetime, but it has occurred many times in history when similar unsustainable conditions occurred."
Dalio added that we are witnessing the collapse of the geopolitical order because, according to him, "the era of U.S. dominance has ended as a result of Washington's unilateral approach that has been embodied in the trade war, geopolitical warfare, technological warfare and, in some cases, the military wars that it has led."

If someone asks why the United States attacks those who until recently were its allies, Lenin also has the answer: "... Intrinsic to imperialism is the rivalry between several great powers to seize hegemony, that is, to seize territories, not so much directly for themselves, but to weaken the adversary and undermine their hegemony..."
As I said before, this is just beginning...

RMH/SRG



Sergio Rodríguez Gelfenstein
Bachelor's degree in International Studies, Master's degree in International and Global Relations. PhD in Political Studies, he has an extensive and varied essay and journalistic work. To date he has published 17 books of his authorship and others coordinated as well as numerous articles and essays in almost 20 magazines in Venezuela, Mexico, Chile, Peru, Brazil, Argentina and the Dominican Republic among others, he has coordinated, compiled and participated in several collective publications in approximately 10 countries of Latin America and Europe, in addition to several small thematic books. His weekly opinion articles circulate in several newspapers and internet portals in about 15 countries in Latin America, Europe and Western Asia. He is an international columnist for the program Jugo de Limón hosted by journalist Sandra Russo on the Radio de las Madres de Plaza de Mayo. Buenos Aires. Argentina His published books are: • "When Fidel is not here", Vice-Rectorate Administrative - UCV, October 1993 • "The possibility of continuing to dream. The social sciences of Ibero-America on the threshold of the twenty-first century" (coordinator), Asturias, Spain. May 2000. • "Plan Colombia, globalization and hegemonic interests of the United States in Latin America" CDB Publications, Caracas, November 2000. • "Puerto Rico, a case of colonialism in a global world" Benemérita Universidad de Puebla. Mexico. 2003. • The Other Frontier Migration Policy in Chiapas (coord.) Government of the State of Chiapas. Mexico. 2006. • Paradiplomacy, the international relations of local governments (Coord.) H. Chamber of Deputies of Mexico LIX Legislature/ Government of the State of Chiapas. Mexico/ Miguel Ángel Porrúa, bookseller-publisher. Mexico City. 2006 • "Middle East and North Africa, a historical perspective", Ministry of People's Power for Communication and Information. Caracas. October 2011. • "The grass has caught fire throughout the continent. Stories of Our America". Center for Political and Social Studies of Latin America (CEPSAL) of the Universidad de los Andes (ULA). Mérida. Venezuela. 2012 • "The Time of Attempts. From the World Crisis to the CELAC Summit. File. Peru. August 2012. • "Missile Crisis. Cuba. October 1962". Claves Collection. Ediciones Correo del Orinoco. Caracas. Venezuela. January 2013. • "The balance of power. The reasons for the balance of the international system". Chilean edition. Ceibo Editions. Santiago de Chile. March 2014. And in Argentina. Editorial Biblos. Politeia Collection. Buenos Aires. August 2014 • "Colombia. Saying goodbye to war". Chilean edition. University of Chile Radio Press. Santiago de Chile. April 2016. • "Crazy World where I was born. An International System in Permanent Transformation". University of Chile Radio Press. Santiago de Chile. May 2017. • "The controversy between Bolívar and Irvine. The birth of Venezuela as an international actor". Vadell Hermanos Editores. Caracas, November 2018 • "China in the XXI Century: The Awakening of a Giant. Editions in Venezuela, Argentina, Chile, Panama, Dominican Republic, Mexico and Peru and in print in China and Puerto Rico. • "A monument among the most cultured nations. The treaties of Trujillo and the meeting between Bolívar and Morillo in Santa Ana", Monte Ávila. Caracas. Latin American Editors November 2020. • "Pandemic Imperialism. Latin America in the New Geopolitical Configuration" (Co-authoredwith Jorge Elbaum) Acercándonos Ediciones. Buenos Aires November 2020 • "From Bush to Trump. From the war on terrorism to the trade war" Acercándonos Ediciones. Buenos Aires. April 2021. • "Manuel Rodríguez en tres tiempos" (Comp.) América en Movimiento. Valparaiso. Chile. September 2020 • "The majestic march. The meeting between Bolívar and San Martín in Guayaquil. Monte Ávila. Caracas. Latin American Editors/ Approaching Editions. Buenos Aires. July 2022. • "NATO against the world. The conflict in Ukraine as an expression of the change of era". (Co-authored with Jorge Elbaum) Approaching Editions. Buenos Aires. September 2022 He has participated as a speaker in around 160 events national and international scientists and has also carried out work professor at the undergraduate and graduate level in Venezuela (Central University of Venezuela (UCV), Pedro Gual Diplomatic Academy, Institute of Advanced Studies (IDEA) and Venezuelan School of Planning), Mexico (University of Sciences and Arts of Chiapas) and China (University of Shanghai) to add to his research activity. He has received distinctions and decorations, including the 2016 National Journalism Award of Venezuela and the Aníbal Nazoa Award of the Necessary Journalism Movement. He was an advisor for the preparation of the Strategic Agenda for Foreign Policy of Ecuador 2009-2010 He was Coordinator of International Relations of the Government of Chiapas, Mexico, Director of International Relations of the Presidency of Venezuela, Advisor to the Presidency of Telesur and Ambassador of Venezuela in Nicaragua. Since March 2016 he has been a Visiting Scholar at the Center for Global Studies and the Graduate School of the University of Shanghai. China.