Liberating the Palestinians

A pro-active primer

by Dan Lieberman / January 31st, 2024

The daily grind of atrocities committed on the Palestinian people continues with one trajectory ─ extinction as a people and realignment into disbursed communities. Civil protests against the destruction, heroic actions by confrontation with the oppressor, dedication to the concepts of justice and freedom, and physical and monetary sacrifices by millions of people in the world have not deterred the killing machine from its proscribed purpose. Much is said of what is being done to the Palestinians; less is said of what needs to be done for the Palestinians and prevent their genocide. Are the Palestinians doomed?

Two difficulties that confronted the Palestinians during the British Mandate were:

(1)    They were not sufficiently prepared to react to the organizational ability and duplicity of the adversarial Zionists, and
(2)    They had no central authority to guide them.

Neither difficulty has been resolved and both exist today.

No matter the atrocity committed, Israel’s well-placed supporters have plans for action to any reactions. The organized and well-received campus demonstrations protested U.S. government support for Israel’s slaughter of Gazans and were countered by discrimination complaints from a few well-placed students, by media changing the naturally charged demonstrations into artificially charged anti-Semitic rants, and by a hastily arranged House Committee investigation into the artificial charges. University presidents fell into the “anti-Semitism” trap and their errant responses showed a lack of knowledge of how to recognize duplicity and how to protect against it. Preventing mass killings of people in Gaza was no longer an important endeavor. Focus changed to one Jewish student claiming anti-Semitism; he did not feel confident when walking to class.

The conventional and unscrupulous media replayed, replayed, and replayed the October 7 attack so it became a multiplier effect and served to conveniently change the dialogue from oppression of the Palestinians to defense of Israel, and reboot the conflict so that it started from the Autumn day. The 75 last years and its tears no longer had any role in analyzing the conflict; that conflict ended and a new conflict started when Hamas attacked Israeli civilians.

The demonstrations, misinformation corrections, enlightening articles, YouTube podcasts, and Zoom meetings that feature masses dedicated to seeking justice for the Palestinians from the river to the sea serve good purposes. However, they lack the essentials of managed expression, efficient use of resources, complementary activities, combined planning, unified strategy, and, most importantly, ability to acquire and distribute huge amounts of funds for large undertakings in place of small amounts of funds for small endeavors. Efforts are duplicated, resources are wasted, harmony is lacking, organizations compete for funds, and conflagrations become dying embers. Each tomorrow is a new day of oppression and lacks continuation of the past to a new level of strategically placed advancement. The principal effect has been to augment awareness and convert the misinformed to a proper understanding of the situation. An ever-increasing number of faithful rally and dialogue together but they cannot rally those who can change the distorted dialogues and modify the perilous situation.

These are facts and perceptions of the elements in the structures that combat the carefully prepared and disciplined structures the Zionists created to pursue their objectives. Understanding the problems facing those struggling to liberate the Palestinians from oppression is the preliminary step in learning how to work around the problems and devise a meaningful strategy. The realization leads to optimism. It is impossible that the most blatant genocide in human history, the ugliness that Israel shows to a world audience, the terrible fate that faces the world as the genocide unfolds, and the deception done to the Jewish community, its identification with the genocide, will result in an ultimate and disastrous conclusion. The pain will be great and the entire world will overdose on Fentanyl.

The genocide has had only one direction ─ toward fulfillment. Without planned, coordinated, and effective strategies that reverse the direction, can the destruction be halted? Start with thoughts, recommendations, and procedures that, hopefully, can evolve into effective strategies and change a tale of lamentations to a story of glorious rescue.

Thoughts

Developing a single central authority that governs actions and fund distributions is preferred but is too complex and will meet resistance from independent organizations, which are the principal drivers of the protests. Organizations, each with a paid staff and voluntary cadres, and each having a specific purpose are an acceptable alternative to managing the strategy. Hundreds of millions of the world’s people from every continent can be accessed to support these organizations. Some organizational recommendations.

Recommendations

Legal: Initiates lawsuits and seeks changes in laws.
Fundraising: Raises large amounts of funds and authorizes distribution of the funds for activities. Managed and staffed by the most respected, credible, and trusted people.
Information source: Gathers information from several sources and makes it available to others.
Legislative: Constructs Political Action Committees (PACS) that steer voters away from pro-Israel candidates and lobby government officials.
Media access: Issues news reports, opinions, and articles to a wide range of media.
Talking points: Provides instant access for rebuttals to misinformation.
Protests and Demonstrations: Suggests and assists protests and demonstrations so they are efficient, react quickly to events, and complement one another.
Recruiting: Solicits volunteers for each activity.
Publicity and advertising: Provides media and public with information on activities.

Procedures
Talking points
Articulation of responses to outrageous reports and comments can benefit from a distribution of “talking points,” especially important for new generations who do not have historical knowledge. One example is answering the frequent reference to Jews as a people who always had a nation and deserve a nation, and framing Palestinians as an artificial construct.

The Jews are not a people. People share a common language, culture, ethnicity, descent, and history. Religion plays no role. Unless they demonstrate to each other that they observe the same religion, two Jews sitting in a café, one from Sweden and the other from Italy, would have no awareness of any commonality. If it were otherwise, why has Israel given its Jews the scaffolding of a new nation by giving them a common language, culture, descent, and history, and rejecting their previous languages, cultures, and histories? Should Mormons and Mennonites be classified as people? Proof positive! No matter where they live, Chinese, most of whom have no religion, are always identified as Chinese, due to skin tone, common language, and common culture.

The Palestinians are Arab people from the Levant. Post-World War I separation of the Levant Arabs into Lebanon, Syria, and the Palestine Mandate sub-titled the Arabs who lived in the common area of the Mandate as Palestinians. They were always a people and now are known as the Palestinian people.

Dual Citizenship and Immigration

Israel’s greatest weapon, even more than its military might, is infiltration into Western nations — controlling the information flow, skewing the dialogue, lobbying elected officials, and gaining intelligence

In 2010, the FBI uncovered and deported 10 unregistered Russian agents living in the U.S. as ordinary citizens and engaged in harmless activities, such as meeting people in high places to influence their attitudes and reporting American views on foreign and domestic affairs to Moscow. Multiply the number of discovered Russian agents by tens of thousands and you will have the number of Israeli expatriates in the U.S., many of whom take the opportunity to do the same for Israel, become U.S. citizens, and vote for Israel-friendly candidates. Forty years ago, synagogues refused to display the Israeli flag; after years of Israel’s infiltrators gaining positions, most synagogues display the Star of David.

A great number of Israelis have migrated to the U.S. and other Western nations in the last decades and formed a massive propaganda organization that steers Westerners to favor Israel. Israeli government ministries and the Los Angeles-based Israeli American Council, which represents Israelis across the United States and promotes their interests, estimate between 500,000 and 800,000 Israelis live in the U.S., about 150,000 live in the New York area, 120,000 in Los Angeles, and 80,000 in Miami. What are the more important voting areas in the United States? New York, California, and Florida are significant. American-Israeli dual citizens can shape the ballot in those regions and may have done that in the disputed 2000 presidential election.

This immigration needs an intensive investigation. Exposing the schemes, identifying the culprits, seeking lawsuits against the violators, and petitioning for new laws that restrict dual citizenship and guard against knavery and trickery are the most necessary activities for combatting the Israeli threat.

Demonstrations

Large and fixed demonstrations remain confined in an area and do not confront the populace. The media gives them minimum coverage. Divide some of the larger demonstrations into hundreds of smaller walking demonstrations, activists strolling miles and miles along main boulevards and through highly populated areas. Many more people will become aware of the perilous situation.

Directed Protests

Protests directed against embassies, consulates, institutions, and media that support Israel or pedal the pro-Israel agitprop have not occurred and could have strategic significance. German embassies and consulates, representatives of a democratic country that committed genocide against the African Herero people, the African Nama people, and European Jews, and now aids and abets in the genocide of the Palestinians; British embassies and consulates, representatives of a democratic country that committed massacres in Ireland, Africa, and Asia, and now aids and abets in the genocide of the Palestinians; and the United States embassies and consulates, representatives of a democratic country that committee genocide against the indigenous Americans and slaved African peoples, and now aids and abet in the genocide of the Palestinians should be targeted to reveal their involvements and for their hypocrisies.

Germany insists its present population make amends for previous genocides in which they had no involvement and instructs them to participate in the Palestinian genocide. Advocacy groups from 12 British Commonwealth countries asked King Charles III to “acknowledge the horrific impacts on and legacy of genocide and colonization of the indigenous and enslaved peoples.” The U.S., on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, respects the destruction of a foreign people in a foreign country and has no equivalent day of respect for the indigenous peoples it destroyed. Nobody asks why is an International Remembrance Day reserved for the tragedy of one ethnicity and does not include the tragedies of many other genocides. Isn’t that an insult to the other ethnicities and their descendants?

Think tanks, educational institutions, and media conglomerates that favor Israel, deceive the American people with misinformation on Israel’s role in the genocide, and actively promote the genocide deserve a daily picketing.

Confronting Legislatures

Every Representative and Senator should be confronted and asked at scheduled meetings, “Why do you commit treason by supporting a nation that is committing genocide and harms the interests of the American people? Pulverize each legislator with messages and office protests. Label them as war criminals.

Lawsuits

Lawsuits that consider defamation, violations of civil rights, violations of human rights, violations of civil laws, and recommend changes in laws challenge the genocide protection system

·         In Oakland, California, a group of American Palestinians and aid groups have filed a lawsuit against Joe Biden and accused the President of complicity in the Gazan genocide. Section 1091 of Title 18, United States Code defines genocide as violent attacks with the specific intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. Federal extraterritorial jurisdiction applies when the offender is a United States national.

·         Attempts to register AIPAC as a foreign agent have failed. More effort is needed to have the registration succeed and attend to other PACS and institutions that front for Israel. Assignment of legal organizations to do the task and raising of huge funds to support them has high priority. No room for failure.

·         In previous years, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), known for defaming those who criticize Israel, has been sued and paid damages. Charges of bigotry backfire, by George Lane, Denver Post Staff Writer, April 29, 2000

An Evergreen couple accused publicly of being anti-Semitic won a $10.5 million damage award from a federal jury Friday in a defamation lawsuit against the Anti-Defamation League. The ADL accused William and Dorothy Quigley at a 1994 news conference of perpetrating the worst anti-Semitic incident in the area since the slaying of Jewish talk-show host Alan Berg 10 years earlier. They were accused of launching “Operation Aronson,” an effort to run their Jewish neighbors out of town, and threatening to commit acts such as painting oven doors on their neighbors’ home. The jury found that the statements at the news conference, and on talk radio, were defamatory and “not substantially true.”

I can think of tens of necessary lawsuits against agencies, institutions, and government officials. A lawsuit against the state of Israel and anyone who uses the expression the “Jewish state of Israel,” which defames Jews by identifying them as guilty of genocide, should be entertained.

Economic warfare

Israel has a 100 percent advantage in its bludgeoning military warfare and, by holding back Palestinian funds and access to materials, uses economic warfare to enhance the genocide. Worldwide communities and governments that sympathize with the Palestinian cause can apply economic pressure and reduce Israel’s power on the world stage. The Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement (BDS) has had limited success; expanding its thrust into other products, sources, and recipients, including military hardware, can have a positive effect. A group devoted to seeking battlegrounds for economic warfare and interfacing with government officials to adopt economic measures, including sanctions, that can cause economic problems for Israel, is necessary. Extension of the elements of BDS to all Israel’s supporters — producers, financiers, intermediaries, marketers, retailers, and consumers tells the public that supporters of genocide cannot be tolerated.

Playing the name game

Strong and scornful words attached to an adversary leave psychological and emotional impressions that influence behavior. Israel’s media supporters always characterize Resistance groups to Israel’s oppression, namely Hezbollah and Hamas, as terrorist Hezbollah and terrorist Hamas. The juxtapositions of the spurious adjective and proper noun appear as if they are one word and the effect triggers an association with terrorism each time the Resistance group is mentioned. Although Iran has rarely engaged in international terrorism, other than maybe a tit-for-tat response to terrorism committed against its people, Iran is always, Iran, the leading sponsor of world terrorism. Throw it back at them.

For years, I have recommended and have used apartheid Israel as attached words. It is now legitimate to use genocidal Israel, as well as genocidal Britain, genocidal Germany, and genocidal United States.
The president of the U.S. is now genocidal Joe.
Mossad is international killer Mossad.
Why use the word anti-Semitism; it is a deceptive word that means against speaking a Semitic language. Why not use anti-Jewish or, as I have on occasions:

Anti-SemitismA refers to discrimination against Arab Semites from non-Arabs.
Anti-SemitismJ refers to discrimination against Jews from non-Jews.
Anti-SemitismAA refers to discrimination against Arab Semites from other Arabs.
Anti-SemitismJJ refers to discrimination against Jewish Semites from other Jews.

Strategy

Developing a strategy requires meetings, inputs, discussions, and certifications from many interested and well-informed people, well beyond what can be said in an article. A few thoughts.

The Zionist strategy of spreading false information, making the world feel guilty for any harm done to Jewish people, so they will believe that Jews will not survive unless they have their nation, bribing legislators by offering them funds and publicity if they show allegiance to Israel, coopting Evangelists into supporting Israel, swindling American governments into eliminating Israel’s adversaries, and convincing the public that by evicting, killing and suffocating defenseless people Israel is defending itself has already been successful. The Zionist strategy has prepared the Palestinians for their final moments and paralyzed the world into accepting the gruesome deed.

Strategies have clear objectives. The Zionists will continue and strengthen their present strategy. Intent to eliminate or neutralize all opposition, from the smallest group to the large Iran nation, will accompany the strategy of severe repression that is used to obtain their objectives — strip self-identity from the Palestinians, deny them ontological security, and accelerate deterioration of their community.

The strategy for rescuing the Palestinians has three objectives. Concurrently with attending to the objectives, Israel will know that If it continues with the genocide of the Palestinian people, does not halt the repression, and does not listen to United Nations’ directives, the three objectives will be pursued.

(1)    Modifying Western governments’ policies, especially the United States, from approval of genocidal Israel to opposing genocide Israel.

(2) Bringing Israel to economic ruin.

(3) Bringing Israel to social ruin.

The first objective is fulfilled by recruiting capable people to run the organizations, acquiring billions of dollars to fund the operations, and appealing to hundreds of millions of people to join in the liberation movement.

The second objective solicits governments to ban all exports and imports to and from Israel, and denies access to financial markets and The Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications (SWIFT), the system that powers most international money and security transfers.

The third objective solicits governments to forbid all travel to Israel and from Israel and deny Israel’s participation in every international educational, scientific, medical, and cultural organization.

Rescuing the Palestinians from genocide is a tough road. Nevertheless, it’s a road that must be carefully and urgently paved and lead to a correct destination. Now, the road is foggy and is leading to an indeterminate place.

Dan Lieberman publishes commentaries on foreign policy, economics, and politics at substack.com. He is author of the non-fiction books A Third Party Can Succeed in America, Not until They Were Gone, Think Tanks of DC, The Artistry of a Dog, and a novel: The Victory (under a pen name, David L. McWellan). Read other articles by Dan.

 

Gallup Poll Confirms America’s Soaring Corruption

by Eric Zuesse / January 30th, 2024

Whereas the national corruption ratings of the various countries by the corrupt Transparency International organization, which was a spin-off from the U.S.-controlled World Bank in 1993 created by it so that countries whose leaders resist the demands by the U.S. Government will receive from TI poor corruption-ratings that scare away international investors and thereby starve their country of international capital and force up the interest-rates that those countries have to pay on their foreign debt, the people inside a given country — its own citizens there — have a much more realistic rating of their own country’s corruptness than do the hired outside ‘experts’ that TI selects to evaluate that in accord with TI’s vague criteria. Thus, the suite of Gallup polls that Gallup published on January 30th concerning Americans’ perceptions of “Honesty and Ethics” in America provides a far more accurate indication of the amount of corruptness in this country than TI’s score on this country does. So: here, I shall present the core from that Gallup article, and then will discuss it:

Line Chart: Ethics ratings for five professions in the U.S., 1976-2023.

Trust in U.S. Senators, and in what Gallup calls “Members of Congress” (which means members of both Houses, but sometimes “Congress” is misused to refer to only members of the U.S. House of Representatives) has declined precipitously since the year 2000, when, starting on 9 December 2000, the far-right U.S. Supreme Court ‘Justice’ Antonin Scalia abruptly violated the U.S. Constitution and stopped the vote-count in the Florida U.S. Presidential contest and declared that (his fellow far-right Republican) George W. Bush had won that election (against the moderate Democrat Al Gore). This decision, by the 5-to-4 Republican majority on that Court, who butchered the Equal Protection Clause in the U.S. Consititution (in its 14th Amendment) in order to ‘justify’ their treasonous act, led to 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq on the basis of lies, and the takeover of the U.S. Government by the military-industrial complex even more than had been the case before, and thrust America into what is virtually martial law in this country (including massive censorship for the Government) ever since that time, so that America now spends more than half of the entire world’s military costs and the U.S. armamants-manufacturers get half of all that money, which causes soaring U.S. federal debt and declining new federal spending on the health, welfare, and environment, of the American people.

In today’s news, there is another stark example of what this increasing U.S. corruptness has led to, on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean: On January 28, the Financial Times headlined “Brussels threatens to hit Hungary’s economy if Viktor Orbán vetoes Ukraine aid: EU strategy aims to spook investors by cutting off funding to Budapest in stand-off over €50bn package”, and reported that the effort by Hungary’s leader, Viktor Orban, to halt the financial bleeding of the people of his country and even of the entire people of the EU, which is pouring unprecedentedly high sums into paying for weapons, the EU is now threatening to blacklist Hungary and drive it into an economic ailspin unless he will relent and do as they demand and approve an additional $50 billion+ in armaments and other support for Ukraine’s war with Russia. No mention is made there that the U.S. Government initiated and created the EU as part of its “Cold War” against first the Soviet Union and then (after 1991) continued it secretly against Russia. Similarly, the February 2, 2024, issue of the U.S. edition of the British The Week magazine aims to fool Americans to support further increasing the ‘defense’ budget, by posting on its front cover along with a cartoon showing an evil-looking face of Putin, the headline “Giving up on Ukraine: Will Johnson and House Republicans block desperately needed aid for Kyiv?” The story inside it says nothing about Ukraine’s having become a U.S. colony by means of Obama’s February 2014 coup there (hidden behind Kiev’s Maidan anti-corruption demonstrations) that overthrew a neutralist Government and installed a rabidly anti-Russian one that Putin finally responded to by his invasion of Ukraine on 22 February 2022. (Trust in “journalists” is shown by Gallup there as being at a record low of only 19%.)

 

Judicial Murder in Alabama

by Binoy Kampmark / January 30th, 2024

During the evening of January 25, Kenneth Eugene Smith, having failed to convince the US Supreme Court to delay his execution, became yet another victim of judicial, state-sanctioned murder.  A previous, failed effort, using lethal injection, had been made in 2022.  On this occasion, it was the state of Alabama which sought to bloody (or gas, in this instance) its copybook at the William C. Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore.  The method of execution: nitrogen hypoxia.

Smith was convicted in 1989 for murdering Elizabeth Sennett, the wife of a preacher’s wife, in a murder-for-hire killing.  His life, taken in turn, succumbed to a tawdry experiment of penological vice.  When state authorities dabble with various methods of death, they can never be anything but cruel.  Sometimes, these methods might even be unusual.

Defenders of capital punishment take refuge behind the words of the Eighth Amendment of the US Constitution, which has often functioned as a form of subversive encouragement to murderous authorities. While the amendment famously states that no cruel or unusual punishments are to be inflicted, the onus is then on officialdom to come up with a form of punishment that is not cruel, nor unusual.  And how often has death by firing squad, lethal injection, or swift decapitation been defended on those very grounds?

Nitrogen hypoxia has received much press, much of it ghoulish.  In December 2023, the US Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB) released its final report into the deaths of six poultry plant workers.  All had been victims of nitrogen asphyxiation.  Investigators found that the Foundation Food Group facility in Gainesville, Georgia was staffed by workers inadequately informed, trained or equipped to deal with deadly leaks.  Such concerns were also expressed about staff at the Atmore correctional facility.  To date, the US lacks a national standard on the managing, storing, use and handling of such cryogenic asphyxiants as liquid nitrogen.

The degrading nature of the Smith execution was also highlighted by the fact that many US veterinarians would not even stoop to using nitrogen in euthanising animals.  In 2020, the American Veterinary Medical Association stated in its euthanasia guidelines that using nitrogen was problematic for mammal species.  Such gas would also have to be “supplied in a precisely regulated and purified form without contaminants or adulterants”.

UN experts, including Morris Tidball-Binz, Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions and Alice Jill Edwards, Special Rapporteur on Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, also warned that nitrogen asphyxiation was “an untested method of execution which may subject [Smith] to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or even torture.”

None of these concerns has dissuaded lawmakers hunting for other methods of killing convicts.  Oklahoma (2015) was the first state to permit prison staff to use nitrogen gas.  Mississippi (2017) and Alabama (2018), followed.  Much of this is being propelled by crude market considerations.  The drugs used in lethal injections are becoming harder to obtain, be they because of shortages or restrictions placed on their use in executions by pharmaceutical companies.

With Alabama being the first to apply the measure, a dark interest in the minutiae of killing was taken. The state’s protocol on how the gas would be employed came under withering scrutiny.  With nitrogen gas being administered through a mask, intruding oxygen might risk triggering a stroke, creating a permanent vegetative state, or cause excruciating suffocation.  Depriving a person of oxygen could also lead to vomiting, thereby choking the victim.

With such complications in the offing, blissful, or wilful ignorance reigned among correction officials and lawmakers.  For those involved in a state’s killing machinery, be they robed judges, hungry prosecutors, or the executioners themselves, this remains a standard response.  Seedy justifications are offered: just retribution, deterrence, the confusion of novelty with humane policy.  Alabama Solicitor General Edmund LaCour was keen to emphasise the latter point with his absurd remark that his state had “adopted the most painless and humane method of execution known to man.”

Alabama officials had submitted in a court filing that they expected Smith to lose consciousness within a matter of seconds and expire in a matter of minutes.  “What we saw,” stated Smith’s spiritual adviser, Reverend Jeff Hood, “was minutes of someone struggling for their life.”

In witnessing such executions, those present commune and connive in the same scene.  They become vicarious participants, many the unintended apologists for a spectacle featuring murder.  On hand were journalists to feed on the macabre display of Smith’s demise.  “I’ve been to four previous executions,” the insatiable Alabama journalist Lee Hedgepeth told the BBC’s Newsday program, “and I’ve never seen a condemned inmate thrash in the way that Kenneth Smith reacted to the nitrogen gas.”  The session saw Smith gasping “for air repeatedly and the execution took about 25 minutes in total.”

The stern face of officialdom was supplied by John Hamm, Alabama Department of Corrections Commissioner.  For Hamm, all that was aberrant about the scene could be rationalised, reasoned, and explained.  Smith understandably held his breath as long as he could.  His movements had been involuntary; he showed expected symptoms from inhaling nitrogen gas.  He had lost consciousness quickly.  “He struggled against the restraints a little bit but it’s an involuntary movement and some agonal breathing.  So that was all expected.”

A more candid, vengeful note was struck by the state’s Attorney General, Steve Marshall.  “Tonight, Kenneth Smith was put to death for the heinous act he committed over 35 years ago: the murder-for-hire slaying of Elizabeth Sennett, an innocent woman who was by all accounts a godly wife, a loving mother and grandmother, and a beloved pillar of her community.”  Smith’s calculated death, crudely experimental and economically determined, was no less heinous, a vulgar rationalisation of cold intent, the exemplar of state cruelty.

U$A

 5 Peace Activists Arrested for Disrupting UNRWA Hearing, Demand Humanitarian Aid for Gaza

by Codepink / January 30th, 2024

WASHINGTON — Five peace activists were arrested today as CODEPINK and other organizations disrupted the House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing titled “UNRWA Exposed: Examining the Agency’s Mission and Failures.” The protest aimed to draw attention to the urgent need for humanitarian aid in Gaza.

The disruption comes in the wake of the International Court of Justice’s recent ruling, which found South Africa’s charge of genocide against Israel to be credible. The court issued provisional measures demanding that Israel cease the killing of Palestinians and restore the flow of humanitarian aid to Gaza. Despite these urgent calls, Israel has retaliated by accusing UNRWA members of aiding and abetting Hamas’s attack on October 7th. In response, the United States made the drastic decision to completely cut off funding to UNRWA, jeopardizing vital aid to the people of Gaza who are facing dire circumstances.

“UNRWA is the lifeline for people who are starving; cutting its funding is just inhumane,” stated Medea Benjamin, co-founder of CODEPINK.

United States citizens are voicing their outrage at their country’s complicity in what they see as the intentional ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. Many believe that decision-makers are influenced by lobbying efforts from groups like AIPAC, which is perceived as a de facto lobbying firm for the State of Israel.

Jay Waxse from 7 Circles Alliance expressed concern, stating, “To so casually take away humanitarian aid from an entire people based on one criterion that is not withheld within our military or police in this country is severely troubling.”

Retired Colonel and former State Department member Ann Wright emphasized the critical importance of UNRWA funding for the health and security of the people of Gaza, calling the suspension of funding by the US “criminal” and “outrageous.”

CODEPINK and its supporters demand the immediate reinstatement of funding to UNRWA to ensure the well-being of the people of Gaza.

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Codepink is a women-led grassroots organization working to end U.S. wars and militarism, support peace and human rights initiatives, and redirect our tax dollars into healthcare, education, green jobs and other life-affirming programs. Read other articles by Codepink, or visit Codepink's website.

Farmers block roads in Greece, Italy as protests spread across Europe

2024/01/31

Farmers' in their tractors protest against EU agricultural policy. Italy's Deputy Prime Minister Salvini from the right-wing governing party Lega blamed the EU Commission in Brussels for the protests. 

Marco Alpozzi/LaPresse via ZUMA Press/dpa

Greek farmers blocked the country's most important north-south motorway linking Athens and Thessaloniki with their tractors on Wednesday, while farmers also blocked some roads in Italy.

The Greek farmers were protesting against the rise in fertilizer and diesel prices, ERT News reported.

They also criticized the government because compensation for last year's severe natural disasters was too low and had not been paid out in some cases.

In 2023, there were severe fires and floods in parts of Greece, which destroyed farmland and crops in many places.

It is unclear how long the motorway blockade around 150 kilometres north of Athens will last.

Angry farmers had already protested in almost all regions in the past few days and temporarily blocked the most important border crossing to Turkey near the harbour town of Alexandroupolis.

According to the farmers' organizations, they are planning to paralyse the port city of Thessaloniki with their tractors in the coming days, where Greece's largest agricultural trade fair Agrotica is taking place from Thursday to Sunday.

Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis promised to support the farmers with special measures. However, he called on them not to harm the country with blockades.

"As serious as the demands of one professional group may be, they must not lead to the penalization of all citizens and violate the rights of society," he said on television.

Several hundred farmers also demonstrated in Italy on Wednesday against European agricultural policy and in favour of receiving state subsidies.

In various regions of the country, they obstructed road traffic with tractors. In some places, roads were completely blocked.

The regions affected included Tuscany, Lombardy and Calabria.

Protests also took place on the Mediterranean island of Sardinia.

FRANCE

 

Protesting farmers encircled Paris with traffic-snarling barricades Monday, using hundreds of lumbering tractors and mounds of hay bales to block highways leading to France's capital to pressure the government over the future of their industry, which has been shaken by repercussions of the Ukraine war. The blockading of major thoroughfares around Paris — host of the Summer Olympics in six months — and protests elsewhere in France promised another difficult week for new Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, less than a month into the job. Protesters said Attal’s attempts last week at pro-agriculture measures fell short of their demands that producing food should be more lucrative, easier and fairer. Farmers responded with the deployment Monday of convoys of tractors, trailers and even rumbling harvesters in what they described as a “siege" of Paris to gain more concessions. Some protesters came with reserves of food and water and tents to stay at barricades if the government doesn’t cede ground. As France's protesting farmers encircle Paris with tractor barricades, vowing an all-out 'siege', FRANCE 24's François Picard is joined by Fabienne KELLER, French MEP, Renew Europe Group.

In pictures: French farmers maintain 'siege' of Paris in standoff with government

Protesting farmers prepared to encircle Paris with traffic-snarling barricades for a second day Tuesday, using hundreds of lumbering tractors and mounds of hay bales to block highways leading to France's capital to pressure the government over the future of their industry, which has been shaken by repercussions of the Ukraine war.

Issued on: 30/01/2024 

Farmers sit on a highway after spending the night at a barricade in Aix-en-Provence, southern France, Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2024. © Daniel Cole, AP

By: FRANCE 24

The blockading of major thoroughfares around Paris – host of the Summer Olympics in six months – and protests elsewhere in France promised another difficult week for new Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, less than a month into the job.

Attal's government was expected to announce new measures on Tuesday following talks with farmers' unions, after pro-agriculture measures unveiled last week fell short of their demands that producing food should be more lucrative, easier and fairer.

Farmers block traffic on the A4 highway near Paris on January 29, 2024

 © Yves Herman, Reuters

Farmers deployed convoys of tractors, trailers and even rumbling harvesters on Monday in what they described as a “siege" of Paris to gain more concessions. Some protesters came with reserves of food, water and tents to stay at barricades if the government doesn’t cede ground.

Read moreWhy French farmers are up in arms: fuel hikes, green regulation, EU directives

“We've come to defend French agriculture," said Christophe Rossignol, a 52-year-old farmer of organic orchards and other crops. Tractors at the barricade east of Paris were parked so they formed what looked like an ear of wheat when seen from the air.

“We go from crisis to crisis,” Rossignol said. Some vehicles carried placards declaring “No food without farmers” and “The end of us would mean famine for you”.

Farmers gather at bonfires on a highway near Argenteuil, north of Paris, on January 29, 2024. © Christophe Ena, AP

The barricades highlighted gulfs in economic and social opportunity between town and country in France. Protesters said they felt ignored by government ministers they accused of rarely venturing to farms and getting their shoes dirty.

The government announced a deployment of 15,000 police officers, mostly in the Paris region, to stop any effort by protesters to enter the capital. Officers and armored vehicles also were stationed at Paris’ hub for fresh food supplies, the Rungis market.

03:36


Paris region traffic authorities reported blockages on the A1 highway just north of the city's main international airport, on the A4 near the Disneyland theme park east of the capital and on other usually busy highways.

“Our goal isn’t to bother or to ruin French people’s lives,” Arnaud Rousseau, president of the influential FNSEA agricultural union, said on RTL radio. “Our goal is to put pressure on the government to rapidly find solutions out of the crisis.”
"Our end will be your hunger" reads the writing on a farmer's van parked on a highway near Argenteuil, north of Paris, on January 29, 2024. © Christophe Ena, AP

Farmers in neighbouring Belgium also set up barricades to stop traffic reaching some main highways, including into the capital, Brussels. Most protests are happening in the French-speaking part of the country.

A farmer from Tournai in western Belgium, Clémente Glorieux, said agricultural producers are “fed up. At some point, rules and constraints are imposed on us, whether administrative or financial. This has been harmful for a while now, so we’re starting to ask ourselves questions about our future”.

A map of the planned roadblocks around Paris. 

© Studio graphique France Médias Monde

Glorieux and farmers at barricades around Paris said they aim to keep protesting at least until Thursday, when leaders from the European Union's 27 nations are to meet in Brussels for a summit focused on financial support for Ukraine.

"We have everything we need to eat, barbecues, and a wall of hay to shield ourselves from the wind. We have the equipment and we’re settling in alright!” said Paris-region farmer and protester Jean-Baptiste Benoit.

Read more  Fewer, older, poorer: France’s farming crisis in numbers

The movement in France is another manifestation of a global food crisis worsened by Russia's nearly two-year full-scale war in Ukraine, a major food producer.

French farmers assert that higher prices for fertilizer, energy and other inputs for growing crops and feeding livestock have eaten into their incomes.

The protests over price pressures, taxes and green regulation echo grievances voiced by many farmers across Europe. 

© Yves Herman, Reuters

Protesters also argue that France's massively subsidized farming sector is over-regulated and hurt by food imports from countries where agricultural producers face lower costs and fewer constraints. Rousseau used Ukrainian sugar producers as an example, saying their soaring exports to Europe since Russia invaded in February 2022 are “untenable” for European counterparts.

Taxi drivers with other grievances also organized drive-slow protests Monday, adding to the traffic chaos in the Paris area and other parts of the country. Authorities recommended that road users switch to public transport if possible.

(FRANCE 24 with AP)

Democratic senators push DEA to 'swiftly deschedule' marijuana

Brett Wilkins,

 Common Dreams
January 31, 2024 

A fully budded marijuana plant ready for trimming is seen at the Botanacare marijuana store ahead of their grand opening on New Year's day in Northglenn, Colorado

 REUTERS/Rick Wilking/File Photo

A dozen U.S. senators on Tuesday urged the Biden administration to "swiftly deschedule" marijuana, which remains in the most restrictive federal criminalization category despite being legal for recreational or medicinal use in a majority of states.

In a letter to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland and Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) Administrator Anne Milgram led by Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and John Fetterman (D-Pa.), the lawmakers reject the Department of Health and Human Services' August 2023 recommendation to reclassify cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III under the Controlled Substances Act (CSA).

According to the DEA, Schedule I drugs—which in addition to marijuana include heroin, MDMA, LSD, and peyote—have "no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse." Schedule III drugs include Tylenol with codeine, ketamine, and anabolic steroids.

"While rescheduling to Schedule III would mark a significant step forward, it would not resolve the worst harms of the current system. Thus, the DEA should deschedule marijuana altogether," the senators wrote. "Marijuana's placement in the CSA has had a devastating impact on our communities and is increasingly out of step with state law and public opinion."

A record 7 in 10 voting-age Americans believe marijuana should be legal, according to Gallup polling published last November, a day after voters made Ohio the 24th state to legalize adult recreational use of the plant.

While thousands of people—exclusively U.S. citizens and permanent residents—have been pardoned for simple federal marijuana possession convictions following presidential proclamations issued in 2022 and last month, Biden has been criticized for refusing to take more meaningful steps to legalize a plant used by half of Americans at least once in their lives.

"The Biden administration has a window of opportunity to deschedule marijuana that has not existed in decades and should reach the right conclusion—consistent with the clear scientific and public health rationale for removing marijuana from Schedule I, and with the imperative to relieve the burden of current federal marijuana policy on ordinary people and small businesses," the senators wrote.

Last September, the U.S. Senate Banking Committee voted 14-9 for the Secure and Fair Enforcement Regulation Banking Act, which would legally protect banks and credit unions that serve cannabis businesses and bar federal regulators from ordering financial institutions to close their accounts.

In addition to Warren and Fetterman, the senators who signed Tuesday's letter are: Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.), Peter Welch (D-Vt.), Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), and Alex Padilla (D-Calif.).

"Classifying marijuana as a Schedule I drug—something more dangerous than cocaine or fentanyl—has harmed communities and denied critical relief to vulnerable patients," Gillibrand said on social media Sunday. "It's time to legalize and deschedule marijuana altogether."

The first flowers evolved before bees – so how did they become so dazzling?

The Conversation
January 30, 2024 

Wild Flowers (Shutterstock)

Colorful flowers, and the insects and birds that fly among their dazzling displays, are a joy of nature. But how did early relationships between flower colour and animal pollinators emerge?

In a study published in Proceedings of the Royal Society, we have unravelled this mystery by analyzing the visual environments in which the ancestors of today’s bees foraged from flowers.

We measured and analyzed the light reflected from today’s flowers, as well as the rocks, soil, sticks, bark and leaves that form their natural backgrounds.

From this data we built computer simulations that recreate the ancient visual environment when the first flowers emerged.

Insect color vision came before flowers

Today, bees are prolific pollinators of flowering plants, including food crops. Bees use colour vision based on ultraviolet, blue and green sensitive photoreceptors (light-sensing cells) to detect and discriminate the most rewarding flowers. In comparison, most humans perceive colour using blue, green and red sensitive photoreceptors.

When the first flowers evolved during the Mesozoic era, between 252 million and 66 million years ago, the ancestors of bees had to orientate themselves, maintain stable flight, avoid collisions, and find food among natural backgrounds. We suspect their visual systems may have been influenced by evolution to efficiently operate in that environment.

By the time the first flowering plants appeared, bees’ ancestors had already evolved colour vision – and we know it has stuck around throughout the evolutionary history of bees.

So, while bees weren’t initially around, their ancestors were. Flower colors likely evolved the vivid colours we see today to suit this ancient visual system. At the same time, the first bees emerged as the most efficient pollinators.

What colour were flower backgrounds on the ancient Earth?

Australia is an ideal place to collect data on natural background materials that early insects would have seen, as it is a geologically ancient continent.

We collected background samples from across Australia and measured their reflective properties using a tool called a spectrophotometer.

We used this data to create a database of materials that would have been present in the visual environment of flying insects more than 100 million years ago – when the first flowers appeared.

Flower colour evolved in response to bee colour vision

For our collection of natural backgrounds, insect and bird pollinated flowers, we calculated marker points – rapid changes in the intensity of light reflected from a surface, within a small wavelength band.

These marker points identify the key visual features of colored surfaces, and we can use them for statistical testing of the evolutionary process.

We then wrote computer simulations to generate possible flower backgrounds. By analysing their marker points, we tested the visibility of today’s flowers against the simulated backgrounds.

Interestingly, we showed that the distribution of marker points on petals from plants pollinated by bees clearly indicates these flowers are “salient” – that is, they stand out as stronger signals from natural backgrounds.

This finding matches with previous studies suggesting that in the Northern Hemisphere and Australia, flowering plants evolved colour signals to facilitate colour perception by bees.

The very first flowers were likely a dull greenish-yellow colour and initially pollinated by flies. However, as the first bees – with their tuned vision systems – started pollinating flowers, the flowers likely evolved new colours to match the bees’ visual capabilities.

The process of natural selection seems to have driven flower colors to stand out from their backgrounds in the eyes of pollinators.

Birds were involved, too

Birds became established as flower visitors millions of years after insect pollination evolved. Bird vision uses four types of color photoreceptors, and they can see long-wavelength red colors that bees cannot easily process against natural backgrounds.

Our analysis confirmed that bird-pollinated flowers evolved marker points towards longer wavelengths than bee-pollinated flowers. Our new discovery also showed that these flowers systematically differ from natural backgrounds.

As Earth’s climate changes, it is important to consider what might happen to ecosystems and our food production systems in a world without bees. It is vital that we understand how pollination and plant reproduction may be altered.

Our research shows that bees are a major driver of floral evolution. Unless we protect these insects and their habitat, we will lose fundamental and beautiful aspects of life we all enjoy and need.

Adrian Dyer, Associate Professor, Department of Physiology, Monash University; Alan Dorin, Associate Professor, Faculty of Information Technology, Monash University; Jair Garcia, Researcher and analyst, Monash University, and Mani Shrestha, Senior Researcher and International Fellow, Disturbance Ecology, University of Bayreuth, Germany, Bayreuth University


This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Return of hungry sea otters protects key coastal ecosystem: study

Agence France-Presse
January 31, 2024 

Otter (Photo by USFWS Pacific Southwest Region/Flickr)

Back from the brink of extinction, sea otters in central California have started restoring the degraded landscape of a key estuary -- thanks to their insatiable appetite for crabs, according to a study published on Wednesday.

The research depicts the ripple effects of the sea otters' return to Monterey Bay, California, highlighting how successful conservation efforts can improve the health and resilience of whole ecosystems.

Once hunted for their fur to the verge of local extinction, sea otters have made a dramatic recovery in central California after more than four decades of extensive conservation efforts in the region.

The otters have returned to coastal kelp forests and the the salt marsh-dominated coastal estuary, Elkhorn Slough.

And their return has heralded wide-ranging improvements around the estuary, a critical habitat that protects the shoreline.

In a new paper published in Nature, scientists in the United States and Canada found that the marine mammal slowed the erosion of parts of the estuary by up to 90 percent between the time they recolonized the area in the mid 1980s and 2018.

"One of the most remarkable things about this is that it's truly a conservation success story," study author Christine Angelini, director of the Center for Coastal Solutions at the University of Florida, told AFP.

Previous studies on salt marshes have shown the physical and chemical explanations for erosion.

But this study points a pincer at another culprit -- the shore crab.


These abundant crabs eat plant roots, burrow into the salt marsh soils and eventually can cause erosion and even collapse.

Sea otters stabilize coastal ecosystem 

© Julia Han JANICKI, Anibal MAIZ CACERES / AFP

Sea otters eat around 25 percent of their body weight every day and researchers said they have an especially large appetite for these crabs.

"After a few decades, in areas the sea otters had recolonized, salt marshes and creekbanks were becoming more stable again, said lead author Brent Hughes, associate professor of biology at Sonoma State University, in a statement.

This was "despite rising sea levels, increased water flow from inland sources, and greater pollution".

'Crab feast'

Researchers combined decades of data, over 35,000 observations of sea otters and three years of experiments manipulating the presence of top predators in a salt marsh ecosystem.

Top predators have declined in nearly every ecosystem on Earth, but conservation efforts over the past decades have helped recover species like wolves, brown bears, and eagles.

And growing research shows that reintroduction can have a wide-ranging impact on restoring ecosystems.

Sea otters eat around 25 percent of their body weight every day

 © MARIO TAMA / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File

In this case researchers said sea otter conservation has unlocked several decades worth of benefits.

"It would cost tens of millions of dollars for humans to rebuild these creek banks and restore these marshes," said study author Brian Silliman, professor of Marine Conservation Biology at Duke University.

"The sea otters are stabilizing them for free in exchange for an all-you-can-eat crab feast."

© 2024 AFP

'Not a trustworthy individual': Teamsters Exec says Trump has 'zero' chance of winning union support

TRUMP IS A SCAB  

SHAWN FAIN UAW 

M.L. Nestel
January 31, 2024 

(JEFF KOWALSKY/AFP)

Trump is courting the Teamsters for their prized endorsement, but an exec with the union whose members run 1.3 million deep says the former president can't erase his past and therefore he should save his breath

"I would say zero," John Palmer, Vice President At-Large of the Teamsters, said in a Wednesday interview on CNN. "I don't believe he does have a chance."

Palmer skipped a Wednesday roundtable powwow with former President Donald Trump and Teamsters Union brass in Washington where Trump made his best pitch to blue-collar workers that helped him march passed Hillary Clinton in 2016 and will be a focal part in key battleground states like Wisconsin and Michigan to determine what happens come November.

Trump left upbeat, calling it “a very productive meeting."

He admitted that nabbing the endorsement would be a long shot, but, “Stranger things have happened.”

“Usually a Republican wouldn’t get that endorsement,” said Trump. “But in my case it’s different because I’ve employed thousands of Teamsters and I thought we should come over and pay our respects. As you know, a big part of the voting bloc votes for me.”

Palmer believes the public seeing Trump's posture dangles false hope.

"I was disappointed in the appearance, particularly the press conference that occurred after the meeting," Palmer said. "It's a tacit endorsement. He is not going to go anything for labor. Never has. Frankly, he's not a trustworthy individual."

Palmer pointed to numerous reasons he believes Trump can't be trusted.

They include crossing the picket line when IATSE (International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees) picketed "The Apprentice."

Watch the video below or click the link.

Monaco royals rocked by new claims over offshore assets

Agence France-Presse
January 29, 2024

Charlene and Albert (AFP)

Claims by a former close confidant of Monaco's royal family that part of its fortune is placed in tax havens have rocked the affluent city state, in the latest scandal facing the palace under Prince Albert II.

The new controversy erupted after French newspaper Le Monde last week published the allegations, which it said were based on detailed notes the palace's wealth manager made while working for the family.

Claude Palmero was for more than two decades in charge of managing the palace's assets, first for Rainier III, the husband of American actress Grace Kelly, and then their son Prince Albert when he became ruler of Monaco in 2005.

But the wealth manager, who took over from his father in 2001, was unexpectedly forced to step down last year, and he has since tried to sue the monarch over his dismissal.

Le Monde reported that, according to five books of notes Palmero took with him when he left the palace, some royal funds have been placed offshore over the years in the tax havens of Panama and the British Virgin Islands.

Jean-Michel Darrois, a lawyer for Prince Albert, confirmed to AFP that "offshore companies were indeed created in Panama in 1984 in the time of Rainier III".

But Albert II had "several times" asked his money manager to resolve the situation, "which he did not do", Darrois said.

"Since Palmero's replacement, all this is being liquidated."

Darrois said there had also been offshore companies set up in 2002 -- before Prince Albert's reign too -- in the UK overseas territory of the British Virgin Islands.

Palmero had for several years stopped paying fees on these.

This meant the firms had been struck off the registry and made it difficult for the royal family to claim what was rightfully theirs, he said.

'In their strictest interest'

But lawyer Marie-Alix Canu-Bernard, who represents the asset manager, said "Palmero never did anything without the knowledge of those employing him".

"Quite the contrary. It was always done in perfect agreement with them and in their strictest interest," she said.

It was not immediately clear why the royal family might place funds offshore as Monaco does not impose income or wealth tax on any of its nationals.

But sources close to the case say they might have hoped to prevent the press or anyone else from poking around in their financial affairs.

Monaco, the world's second-smallest country after the Vatican, has been ruled by the Grimaldi dynasty since 1297.

In recent decades its lack of tax and sunny climate have attracted many celebrities and wealthy individuals, and caused a real estate boom on the rocky outcrop of some two square kilometres (0.75 square miles).

Property sells for astronomical sums in the statelet.

According to official figures, the 88 new flats on sale in Monaco in 2022 went for a total of 1.2 billion euros ($1.3 billion).

Palmero was among four people close to Albert accused of schemes linked to property development in allegations posted on a website called the Dossiers du Rocher ("Rock Files") from 2021.


They have accused a property tycoon named Patrice Pastor -- who owns a large share of the market -- of being behind the website but he has strongly denied this.

Palmero, who had tried to curb Pastor's role in the sector, believes he convinced the prince to fire him.

'Confidential'

Since his dismissal, Palmero has tried and failed to sue the royal family through the Monaco legal system.

This month he filed a complaint with the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, saying he had not received a fair trial in Monaco.

The ECHR is a court of the 46-member Council of Europe, to which Monaco belongs.

Palmero's lawyers Canu-Bernard and Christophe Llorca say he has also filed a complaint in Monaco against the royal family for "attempted extorsion and theft".

The royal family has in turn officially accused their former wealth manager of "breach of trust" and "stealing documents".

In its report, Le Monde described Palmero overseeing allowances for members of the royal household, including the prince's sisters Caroline and Stephanie and his wife Charlene and commenting on their expenses.

The Monaco-Matin newspaper in the statelet has accused Palmero of airing private matters in public.

But Palmero's lawyers defended him, saying he had told Le Monde that his notes -- handed over to Monaco authorities as part of another investigation -- were "confidential and not supposed to be shown".

The controversy comes after the Council of Europe last year warned Monaco over shortcomings in its anti-money laundering efforts.

Monaco on Friday said a new Monegasque Authority for Financial Security would start work this week to fight money laundering and other types of corruption.

© Agence France-Presse