UNRWA UNDER ATTACK

UN agency essential for millions of Palestinians

Jerusalem (AFP) – The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), shaken by accusations of staff involvement in Hamas's October 7 attack on Israel, has provided essential aid for Palestinian refugees since 1949.

AFP
Issued on: 27/01/2024 - 21:27

A truck from the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) carrying fuel arrives at the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing with Gaza on November 22, 2023, during fighting between Israel and Hamas militants 

© Khaled DESOUKI / AFP

UNRWA, financed almost entirely by voluntary state contributions, has long been criticised by Israel. The agency on Friday said it had sacked several employees accused by Israel of involvement in Hamas's attack, promising a thorough investigation into the claims which were not specified.

- Health care, education -

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency was established in December 1949 by the United Nations General Assembly after the first Arab-Israeli conflict, which broke out immediately after Israel's creation in May 1948.

The agency is charged with supplying humanitarian aid and protection for Palestinian refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including east Jerusalem, while "pending a just and lasting solution to their plight."

Palestinian refugees are "persons whose normal place of residence was Palestine during the period 1 June 1946 to 15 May 1948, and who lost both home and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 conflict," UNRWA says on its website.

Their descendents also have refugee status.

UNRWA became their sole guarantor by default of their international status.

At its founding, UNRWA served about 750,000 Palestinian refugees. Now around 5.9 million Palestinians are registered with UNRWA and can access health care, social services, microfinance and emergency aid, including during times of armed conflict.

The UN agency manages a total of around 60 camps, 19 of them in the West Bank, occupied by Israel since 1967.

More than 540,000 children study in UNRWA schools.

UNRWA in Gaza

In the Gaza Strip, controlled by Hamas since 2007, the humanitarian situation was already critical before the war between Israel and Hamas began in October.

According to UN data from August, 63 percent of Gazans suffered from food insecurity and were dependent on international aid.

More than 80 percent lived below the poverty line.

Palestinians receive bags of flour at the UNRWA distribution center in Rafah refugee camp, southern Gaza, during the Israel-Hamas war 

© SAID KHATIB / AFP

The territory, squeezed between Israel, Egypt and the Mediterranean, counts eight camps and around 1.7 million refugees, the overwhelming majority of the population of 2.4 million, according to the UN.

Among the 30,000 people employed by UNRWA, 13,000 work in the Gaza Strip, across 300 installations in an area of 365 square kilometres (140 square miles), according to the UNRWA website.

The 2018 crisis

In 2018, then-president of the United States Donald Trump, the largest contributor to UNRWA, cut its annual contribution by $300 million.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was also in power at that time, lauded Trump and said UNRWA "is an organisation that perpetuates the Palestinian refugee problem".

He also criticised the "absurd situation" under which descendants can register as refugees.

In 2019 Trump's Middle East adviser told the UN Security Council that UNRWA should be dismantled.

The same year, an internal ethics report alleged mismanagement and abuses of authority at the highest levels of the UN agency. In November 2019 the agency's chief resigned as the UN investigated.

Washington restarted its donations to UNRWA in 2021, after the election of President Joe Biden.

October 7 attack

On Friday, UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini announced: "The Israeli authorities have provided UNRWA with information about the alleged involvement of several UNRWA employees in the horrific attacks on Israel on 7 October."

As a result, he said, the staffers have been fired and an investigation begun.

Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said on Saturday that UNRWA must play no role in Gaza after the Israel-Hamas war. He said it "must be replaced with agencies dedicated to genuine peace and development."

UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini, shown in December 2023, announced the firing of several staffers 

© JEAN-GUY PYTHON / POOL/AFP/File

The US State Department said 12 UNRWA employees "may have been involved," and announced it was suspending additional funding to the agency. Several other donor countries followed.

In 2022, the United States provided almost $344 million to UNRWA. Germany was the second biggest contributor with more than $202 million, followed by the European Union, Sweden, Norway, Japan, France, Saudi Arabia, Switzerland and Turkey in the top 10.

© 2024 AFP

FRANCE 24's correspondent in Jerusalem Irris Mackler said, 

"UNRWA is an interesting organisation — it's funded independently, it has been running since 1950, and it functions in many ways as a second government in the Palestinian territories".

IT IS THE GOVERNMENT

20,000 march in Spanish capital against Gaza 'genocide'

Madrid (AFP) – Around 20,000 people marched in Madrid Saturday in support of Palestinians, a day after the UN's top court said Israel must prevent genocidal acts in its war with Hamas.

Issued on: 27/01/2024 - 

Many carried Palestinian flags or placards denouncing what they said was the 'genocide' in Gaza 

© LLUIS GENE / AFP

Many of the marchers carried banners and placards denouncing the "genocide" in Gaza, which has been under relentless bombardment and siege since the October 7 attack on Israel by Hamas.

Some carried Palestinian flags and shouted slogans denouncing Israel. Others had banners thanking South Africa for having brought the case against Israel to the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

South Africa accused Israel of breaching the 1948 UN Genocide Convention, set up after World War II and the Holocaust.

In its ruling on Friday, the ICJ said Israel must prevent genocide in its war with Hamas and allow aid into Gaza, but stopped short of calling for an end to the fighting.

The ruling was denounced by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as "outrageous" and while many countries welcomed the ruling, others, such as Britain expressed reservations.

Spain's government has been one of the most critical voices in Europe of Israel's offensive against Hamas   GAZA

© JAVIER SORIANO / AFP

Spain, one of the most critical voices in Europe of Israel's offensive against Hamas, was one of those to welcome Friday's ruling.

Relations between the two countries have soured over Madrid's position on the issue.

Israel recalled its top diplomat in Madrid in November after Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez expressed doubts about the legality of Israel's war in Gaza. She returned in January.
'Children are dying'

"They have been without water, without food, without anything, for almost 110 days," one Madrid demonstrator, 54-year-old Lobna Elnakhala, said of the situation in Gaza.

"Children are dying and living in a very difficult situation."

Some banners called for sanctions to be levied against Israel.

The Madrid authorities put the turn-out at 20,000.

Israel's military campaign began soon after Hamas's October 7 attack that resulted in about 1,140 deaths in Israel, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official figures.

The Madrid authorities put the turn-out at 20,000 

© Pierre-Philippe MARCOU / AFP

Militants also seized about 250 hostages and Israel says around 132 of them remain in Gaza, including the bodies of at least 28 dead captives.

Israel has vowed to crush Hamas, and Hamas-ruled Gaza's health ministry says the Israeli military offensive has killed at least 26,257 people, most of them women and children

© 2024 AFP

Macron administration promulgates controversial immigration law

The administration of French President Emmanuel Macron published the formal text of a new immigration law in its Official Journal on Saturday, with the first instructions on applying the legislation already presented to officials.


AFP 27/01/2024 - 

French President Emmanuel Macron attends the French community meeting at the French Embassy in New Delhi, India on January 26, 2024. © Ludovic Marin, AFP

By:NEWS WIRES

The law's promulgation comes after France's Constitutional Council censured 35 of its 86 articles, including contentious additions insisted on by the right, such as measures restricting access to social benefits and the introduction of immigration quotas.

While the bill was seen as one of the signature reforms of Macron's second term, some in his camp had baulked at the stricter version, with about a quarter of his allies in parliament voting against it or abstaining.

The final text upheld by the council retains key elements initially desired by the government, with a large part of it dedicated to simplifying procedures for expelling delinquent foreigners -- one of the objectives of Interior Minister Gerard Darmanin.

Read moreFrench immigration law: What are the measures deemed unconstitutional?

An article on the regularisation of undocumented workers in industries facing shortages was also kept in the text.

After the Constitutional Council's decision, Macron had called on Darmanin to do "everything in his power" to "implement the immigration law as quickly as possible", a member of the president's team told AFP.

Darmanin, who had previously said some measures were "clearly contrary to the constitution", described the council's ruling as a win for the government.
Anger on the right

The decision, however, sparked condemnation from the right, with Jordan Bardella, president of the far-right National Rally party, criticising what he called a "coup by the judges, with the backing of the president" in a post on social media platform X.

He called for a referendum on immigration as the "only solution".

The president of the conservative Republicans, Eric Ciotti, accused the council of colluding with Macron against the "will of the French people, who want less immigration".

Only three of the articles censured by the council were rejected based on their content, with the rest tossed out because they were deemed to be outside the scope of the law.


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As such, nothing is stopping parliament from voting on them again later as part of different legislation.

The Republican head of the Senate, Gerard Larcher, urged the administration to "resubmit a text that conforms to the agreement" reached with the right.

The head of the far-left LFI party, Manuel Bompard, also called for the law to be withdrawn, saying "the text validated by the Constitutional Council corresponds to the text rejected by the Assembly" and therefore has "no legitimacy".

But Interior Minister Darmanin poured cold water on the possibility of further legislation, saying the executive "will not present a bill" on the subject.

(AFP)

ICYMI

These fierce, tiny marsupials drop dead after lengthy sex fests

The Conversation
January 18, 2024 

A yellow-footed antechinus. tracylouise/Getty Images

If you are exploring our beautiful Australian wilderness this year, keep an eye out for animals behaving in interesting ways. You never know what you might see, as our research team discovered.

In 2023, our colleague from Sunshine Coast Council, Elliot Bowerman, took a two-night trip to New England National Park – its 1,500 metre-high mountain peaks are some of the loftiest on Australia’s mid-east coast.

On the afternoon of 17 August, Elliot trekked the path to Point Lookout. While inspecting some plants on the trail, he heard a rustle in the bushes ahead and peering more closely, saw something of interest. A small mammal had abruptly appeared, dragging the carcass of another mammal, which it then began to devour.

At first glance, this was not so strange. Mammals eat each other all the time. However, it is unusual to see small mammals during the day at such close quarters, so Elliot recorded the scene, taking a video on his mobile phone.

It was only several days later when looking over the footage that our research team realised it featured something rarely seen in the wild, the record of which is now published in the journal Australian Mammalogy.

A native marsupial… cannibal

The furry critter on film was an antechinus, a native marsupial denizen of forested areas in eastern, south-western and northern Australia. Antechinuses usually eat a range of insects and spiders, occasionally taking small vertebrates such as birds, lizards, or even other mammals.

But this camera footage clearly showed a mainland dusky antechinus (Antechinus mimetes mimetes), and it was eating a dead member of its own species!

Antechinuses are perhaps best known for exhibiting semelparity, or “suicidal reproduction”. This is death after reproducing in a single breeding period. The phenomenon is known in a range of plants, invertebrates and vertebrates, but it is rare in mammals.

Each year, all antechinus males drop dead at the end of a one to three week breeding season, poisoned by their own raging hormones.

This is because the stress hormone cortisol rises during the breeding period. At the same time, surging testosterone from the super-sized testes in males causes a failure in the biological mechanism that mops up the cortisol. The flood of unbound cortisol results in systemic organ failure and the inevitable, gruesome death of every male.


A mainland dusky antechinus during the mating period, with fur loss visible on the shoulder, eating another antechinus. Elliot Bowerman

Mercifully, death occurs only after the males have unloaded their precious cargo of sperm, mating with as many promiscuous females as possible in marathon, energy-sapping sessions lasting up to 14 hours. The pregnant females are then responsible for ensuring the survival of the species.

So, exactly what was happening that day at Point Lookout – why had an antechinus turned cannibal?

Cheap calories

August is the breeding period for mainland dusky antechinuses at that location. Intense mating burns calories, and at the end of winter it is cold and there isn’t as much invertebrate food about.

If there are male antechinuses dropping dead from sex-fuelled exhaustion, our thinking is that still-living male and female antechinuses are taking advantage of the cheap energy boost via a hearty feast of a fallen comrade.

After all, animal flesh provides plenty of energetic bang for the buck, particularly if its owner does not have to be pursued or overpowered before being devoured.

In many areas of Australia, two antechinus species (of the known fifteen) occur together, and usually their breeding periods are separated by only a few weeks. One can imagine a scenario where individuals may not only feed on the carcasses of their own species but consume the other species as well.

An endangered silver-headed antechinus, Antechinus argentus. Andrew Baker

Each species may benefit from eating the dead males of the other. For the earlier-breeding species, females may be pregnant or lactating, which is a huge energy drain.

For the later-breeding species, both sexes need to pack on weight and body condition before their own breeding period commences.

Plausibly then, antechinus engage in orgiastic breeding and, when opportune, cannibalistic feeding.

So, the next time you are out and about in the bush, keep your eyes and ears peeled – you never know what secrets nature might reveal to you just around the next corner.

The author would like to acknowledge the co-authors of the paper, Elliot Bowerman from Sunshine Coast Council, and Ian Gynther from the Queensland Department of Environment, Science and Innovation.

Andrew M. Baker, Associate Professor in Ecology and Environmental Science, Queensland University of Technology

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

 

Mini marsupial goes from sex fests to cannibal feasts

These male marsupials give up sleep for sex

Research into holograms could improve forensic fingerprint analysis

The Conversation
January 18, 2024

'A man being fingerprinted on a legal document' [Shutterstock]

When you use your fingerprint to unlock your smartphone, your phone is looking at a two-dimensional pattern to determine whether it’s the correct fingerprint before it unlocks for you. But the imprint your finger leaves on the surface of the button is actually a 3D structure called a fingermark.

Fingermarks are made up of tiny ridges of oil from your skin. Each ridge is only a few microns tall, or a few hundredths of the thickness of human hair.

Biometric identifiers record fingermarks only as 2D pictures, and although these carry a lot of information, there’s a lot missing. A 2D fingerprint neglects the depth of the fingermark, including pores and scars buried in the ridges of fingers that are difficult to see.

I’m an educator and scientist who studies holography, a field of research that focuses on how to display 3D information. My lab has created a way to map and visualize fingermarks in three dimensions from any perspective on a computer – using digital holography.

Fingermark types

Scientists categorize fingermarks as either patent, plastic or latent, depending on how visible they are when left on a surface.

Patent fingermarks are the most visible type – bloody fingerprints at crime scenes are one example. Plastic fingermarks are found on soft surfaces, such as clay, Play-Doh or chocolate bars. The human eye can see both patent and plastic fingermarks quite easily.

The least visible are latent fingermarks. These are usually found on hard surfaces such as glass, metals, woods and plastics. To make them out, a fingerprint examiner has to use physical or chemical methods such as dusting with powder, creating chemical reactions with appropriate reagents or cyanoacrylate fuming.

Cyanoacrylate makes super glue in its liquid form, but as a gas it can make latent fingermarks visible. Researchers develop the prints by letting cyanoacrylate vapor molecules react with components in the latent fingerprint residue.

The geometric details on fingermarks are categorized into three levels. Level 1 encompasses visible ridge patterns, so loops, whorls and arches. Level 2 refers to minutiae or small details, such as bifurcations, endings, eyes and hooks.



Fingerprints have visible ridge structures, such as arches (left), whorls (middle) and loops (right), but at the microscopic level they have much finer patterns and structures. ValeriyPolunovskiy/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA

Finally, Level 3 features, such as pores, scars and creases, are too small for the human eye to resolve. This is where optical techniques like holography come in handy, since optical wavelengths are in the order of microns, small enough to make out small details on an object.

Developing fingermark holograms

Since fingermarks are usually collected as 2D pictures, and holograms display 3D information, my team wanted to develop a technique that can show all the 3D topological characteristics of a fingermark.

To do this, we’ve been collaborating with Akhlesh Lakhtakia’s group at Penn State. They developed a specialized technique that deposits a nanoscale columnar thin film layer, called a CTF, on top of the fingermark to develop and preserve it.

Columnar thin films are dense pillars of glassy material that uniformly cover the fingermark, like a dense growth of identical trees in a forest. Just as the tops of these trees would reflect the topology of the ground, the tops of these columnar thin films replicate the 3D structure of the fingermarks on which they are deposited.



Samples collected using CTF film. Banerjee Lab

To make a hologram of something like a 3D fingermark, researchers split light from a laser into two parts. One part, called the reference wave, shines directly on a digital camera. The other wave shines on the object, in this case the fingermark.

If the object is reflective, the reflected light is also directed to the digital camera and superimposed on the reference wave.

The superposition of waves – both from the reference and the object – creates an interference pattern, which is called a hologram. In digital holography, this hologram, which is a 2D picture, is recorded in the digital camera. Researchers then import the hologram to a computer, where they can use the physical laws of wave propagation to figure out where the light waves from the laser bounced off different parts of the object.

This process allows them to reconstruct the object as a 3D picture.

So, the reconstructed hologram has all the 3D details of the object, and you can now visualize the 3D object on a laptop from any perspective.

Picking up fingermarks

In 2017, our collaboration reported our first results, where we made 3D pictures of latent fingermarks using the CTF technique. We recorded holograms of the CTF-developed fingermarks with two different wavelengths of light – green and blue – generated from a laser. Using two different wavelengths allowed us to make out tiny details such as pores in the 3D reconstructions.

Lakhtakia’s research group has deposited hundreds of fingermarks on glass, wood and plastic. They’ve then let them age in different environments, at various temperatures and humidity levels, before coating them with CTF film to pick up the fingerprint. My group records the digital holograms of these fingermarks and visualizes them in 3D on a computer.

We have also started working on a better 3D fingermark analysis plan to help identify crime suspects.

The Miami Valley Regional Crime Lab in Dayton, Ohio, has graded the quality of the fingermarks captured by Lakhtakia’s research group. It will also help us develop a new method for grading the 3D holographic reconstructions, something that does not currently exist. This may involve creating categories to classify how clear the 3D renderings of the fingermarks are.

The use of fingerprints as unique identifiers has a long history, going back to ancient Babylonian and Chinese civilizations. They’ve been used for forensic purposes since the late 1890s, starting in Calcutta, India. Our work aims to build on this rich history and use cutting-edge technologies to improve fingermark analysis.


Partha Banerjee, Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Dayton

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

 

Lawfare and Covert Action: An Interim Hypothesis

by T.P. Wilkinson / January 27th, 2024

by T.P. Wilkinson

Economic history has its overt and covert sides. Now the State has been almost completely privatized, i.e., conveyed to the so-called hedge funds. It may be safe to say that the West has been converted into one huge financial derivative system.

To understand this without drowning in jargon it is easiest to describe the structure as global extortion or blackmail. As Whitney Webb has shown the murder of Jeffrey Epstein was probably a blunt attempt to eliminate one of the visible faces of the extortion hub for managing public officials. There is another level of extortion that is applied to the public purse. In foreign parts this is the manipulation of the money market through public debt. However there is also an area which has yet to be adequately mapped. For simplicity we can call this “lawfare.”

Lawfare is the application of civil and criminal judicial process to bankrupt targeted opposition by initiating litigation against regime opponents before captured venues where punitive civil damages deplete or eliminate the personal assets of individuals using ideologically constructed complaints which while not criminal are capable of mustering mass moral condemnation even without substantiation. Here the old Inquisition procedures apply where a presumption of guilt and the reversal of the burden of proof are imposed.

A second more insidious strategy is pursued which is less obvious. Analogous to classical foreign debt extortion, the State uses the threat of physical or economic penalties to conceal the use of extorted funds intended for covert action. Traditionally drug and gun dealing have been used to generate funds whose political origins have to be concealed. One reason the CIA and SIS have a vested interested in these illegal markets is that they provide money off the books for operations that — were they funded through official appropriations — would create less deniable paper trails. The deniability of an operation at arm’s length relies on hiding cash flow. This is one of the conclusions from Douglas Valentine’s work on the Bureau of Narcotics and DEA where he explained why and how these agencies became subordinated to covert action arms of the State. Thomas Röper in recent preliminary investigations found another tool by which lawfare can benefit the secret services.

Röper started by asking who and what Doctors Without Borders are and why the Russian government was accusing the group of espionage? He reported how difficult it was to find any published reports explaining where this group’s millions originate. However a crowd query produced something remarkable. At least in Germany he received multiple reports from people summoned before German courts who were told that they would receive consideration (such as in plea bargaining) if they donated money to its German franchise Ärzte ohne Grenzen. The frequency with which this was reported more than suggested a pattern or even a policy.

An extrapolation of the number of civil or criminal settlements of this sort easily pointed to double-digit millions. Now if one considers — as I have argued in the past- that the Antifa and BLM groups in the US are actually armed propaganda groups analogous to those formed in Vietnam in the CIA Phoenix Program, then the enormous million-dollar settlements in US civil actions awarded to these groups or rioters and arsonists make more sense. Namely the city governments sued have been compelled to deplete their budgets with transfers of tax money (actually public debt) to covert operatives. Thus these political warfare actions are funded openly by court judgements. The NGO, whether duly constituted or merely implied, receives public money, tax exempt and with no personal attribution or paper trail linking the flow of funds to the sponsoring entity.

How do the hedge funds benefit? Aside from arbitrage these funds have direct influence over insurance rates and other financial levers that can be applied selectively or collectively to the targeted jurisdiction or entity. Failure to empty the coffers means that the risk ratings that establish the cost of any entity’s future financing must deteriorate. In other words a punitive extortion cycle is anchored in the model.

The result is the perpetual hostage status of the target and full deniability that any planned operation underlies the action. That adds more depth to the term Webb used to title her book: One Nation Under Blackmail.

Dr T.P. Wilkinson writes, teaches History and English, directs theatre and coaches cricket between the cradles of Heine and Saramago. He is also the author of Church Clothes, Land, Mission and the End of Apartheid in South Africa. Read other articles by T.P..

 

NATO War Games a Repeat of Cold War Confrontation

by Global Times / January 27th, 2024

Illustration: Liu Xidan/GT

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) on Wednesday kicked off “Exercise Steadfast Defender 2024,” its largest military drills since the Cold War. Approximately 90,000 troops from NATO’s 31 members and Sweden are participating, with the associated exercises running until May 31. Russian media said NATO has openly admitted for the first time that the exercise is in response to a “Russian attack” and aims to convey to Western populations that “this war is inevitable.”

The exercise comes at two crucial junctures – the Russia-Ukraine conflict is entering its third year, and the US is in an election year. The conflict between Russia and Ukraine shows no signs of abating. With the Ukrainian military consistently facing setbacks on the battlefield, NATO, as the instigator of this conflict, has chosen to exert military pressure on Russia. Experts believe that NATO’s goal is to continue shaping the “Russian threat,” gain support from EU citizens for its anti-Russia policies, and justify further defense spending and economic pressure on Russia.

This NATO exercise will further escalate tensions in Europe, said Wang Xianju, a senior research fellow at the School of Global and Area Studies at Renmin University of China. The conflict between Russia and Ukraine has been ongoing for nearly two years, with the international community advocating for peace. However, NATO is going against the tide, provoking and pressuring Russia through large-scale military exercises, thus creating confrontation across the world.

Meanwhile, the attention and energy of the Biden administration are increasingly consumed by the upcoming presidential elections, making it unable to continue providing the necessary support for Ukraine’s conventional warfare. The financial and military assistance that the Western alliance can currently provide to Ukraine is insufficient to sustain its resistance against Russia. Therefore, NATO aims to use large-scale military exercises to deter Russia.

In addition to perpetuating the Russia-Ukraine conflict, another alarming trend of NATO is its attempt to expand into the Asia-Pacific region. The outbreak and prolonged nature of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, coupled with global disorder and changes, have given NATO, which French President Emmanuel Macron once described as “experiencing the brain death,” an opportunity to catch its breath and extend its existence, and try to achieve its geopolitical ambitions through wild means.

NATO is not satisfied with its footprint in Europe and North America, therefore it continuously seeks expansion by enticing Asia-Pacific countries such as Japan and South Korea on board. It even follows the US script, hyping up the “China threat” and meddling in Asian affairs. Last week, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg claimed that NATO is not moving into Asia, yet China approaches NATO. This argument is extremely absurd and is NATO’s preparation in terms of public opinion for further expansion into the Asia-Pacific region. Former Australian prime minister Paul Keating once said that the Europeans have been fighting each other for the better part of 300 years, including giving two World Wars in the last century, and “exporting that malicious poison to Asia would be akin to Asia welcoming the plague.”

NATO is the spokesperson and enforcer of US interests, military expert Song Zhongping told the Global Times. NATO is actually dominated by the will of the US, swept up in the panic and tension incited by the US, becoming Washington’s axe, spear, and shovel. NATO claims that China’s behavior violates “NATO core principles of democracy, the rule of law, and freedom of expression,” echoing the US’ labeling of China and Russia as the “axis of evil.”

As a product of the Cold War, NATO should have been consigned to the trash heap of history after the end of the Cold War. However, under the influence of the US, NATO not only intensifies the crisis in Europe but also plots expansion into Asia. Asian countries must remain highly vigilant to this.

Global Times, where this article was first published, takes great pains to present facts and views that could help the readers better understand China. Read other articles by Global Times, or visit Global Times's website.

 

Student Solidarity: The 1934 One Day Walkout of West Winfield, New York

by J.N. Cheney / January 27th, 2024

Even the smallest of towns can see sparks of radicalism. Solidarity movements exist in several forms, from honoring the picket lines of striking workers to anti-war protests in solidarity with the innocent civilians caught in the crossfire. Student movements all throughout history have been characterized as displays of both solidarity and resistance, acting against wars, egregious abuses of power, and other entities characterized as unjust and disagreeable. In the village of West Winfield, New York, anything in the news focusing on students primarily relates to school sports, homecoming weekend, graduation, and similar events. In the mid-1930s though, students from the small village engaged in an uncharacteristic act of radical solidarity with their fellow schoolmates.

In late 1934, two students were barred from attending school functions and were soon after expelled from West Winfield Central High School. Their expulsion came after they still attended a senior dance after their activities privileges were suspended. What was the initial offense that led to these students being hit with disciplinary measures? They walked on the grass on school grounds after sod had been laid down. They didn’t maliciously try to tear up the lawn with a vehicle or dig it up in some other way, they simply walked on the grass. Annoying? Perhaps yes. An act deserving of an indefinite suspension from extracurricular activities and eventual total expulsion? No. Rather than turn away the students when they arrived at the dance, they were still able to attend and then were informed of their expulsion from the school the following Monday when they reported for classes. That not a single chaperone did anything to prevent them attending displays either a lack of care on the part of those overseeing the function, or a lack of communication from the principal to his faculty.

Seeing their peers expelled for such a minor offense didn’t sit well with the student body. In response, students ranging from 7th graders to seniors initiated a walkout the very same day that the expulsion took place. Students left the school in droves. A spur-of-the-moment, unplanned action, between 100 and 200 students (though some papers cited numbers even hire than 200) marched through the streets of West Winfield in defiance of their principal’s actions as a show of solidarity with their wrongly removed schoolmates. Their demands included the reinstatement of the expelled classmates and the removal of their principal, one H.D. Love, for his egregious abuse of power. Being that many if not all of those who walked out would be considered children, it was a great boost in morale when it was revealed that the majority of parents and townspeople approved the walkout rather than condemning their children for “disobedience.”

This mass student action would create the necessity for an emergency school board meeting that very same, with the school board knowing that if they didn’t address this problem immediately, this one day walkout held the potential to become a much lengthier battle. Six students and several locals townsfolk were also a part of this emergency meeting. No details, as far as can be seen, are available regarding what specifically happened during the deliberations between the students, the West Winfield citizens, and the West Winfield school board. That being said, the available information does show that an effective dialog occurred, and those who represented their wrongfully thrown out classmates were able to bring about the desired outcome in their brief but passionate struggle.

After a night of deliberation, the expelled were finally reinstated as students at West Winfield Central High School. There were restrictions placed on said students, restrictions that once more are not explained in the available literature, but nonetheless the students were no longer . The other demand of the student protesters, the removal of Principal Love, however, would not be met. In fact, the school board responded to this demand by saying Love’s removal was “out of the question.”

Although their demands were not fully met, the primary goal of reversing the expulsion was, with their efforts ultimately resulting in victory. The spontaneous, one day walkout of 1934 exemplifies the need for solidarity when fighting against injustice in its various forms, whether that be questionable decisions by administration or global political issues. Had only a fraction of students protested the knee-jerk expulsion, this struggle could’ve escalated to something far more protracted and difficult. That several students spanning six different grade levels heeded the call to action simultaneously displays the sense of community that many find in small town, rural areas, in addition to the strength of youth culture regarding young people’s ability to take a stand against what they see as genuine problems of varying fields. Students protests are typically seen as synonymous with movements on the college level such as the efforts against the Vietnam War, however the students of West Winfield showed that you don’t need to be at the college level to fight the good fight.

J.N. Cheney is an aspiring Marxist historian. His research primarily focuses on New York State labor history, branching into other facets of the history of socialism in the United States as well as the global socialist movement. He’s written for Midwestern Marx and has been published in their Journal of American Socialist Studies under both a penname and his given name. He is currently writing a book on the Little Falls Textile Strike of 1912. Read other articles by J.N..

 

Oil, Natural Gas, and Capitalism

by Greg Godels / January 27th, 2024

The great powers — the leading players in the imperialist system — have always required a source for the energy to drive their economic engines. They needed energy resources to build and empower their military might; they needed energy to grow their national economies and power their vessels of trade and transportation. Indeed, their socio-economic systems would have collapsed without ample and available energy sources.

At the dawn of the capitalist industrial era, that source came mainly from coal. Coal powered the machines that grew the productivity of labor to great new heights. It is reasonable to think that only those countries with easy access to coal could then become great capitalist powers.

Beginning at the turn of the last century, oil — an abundant, efficient, and easily stored and transported energy source– became essential for the exercise of economic and military might. As modes of transportation became dependent upon petroleum products, an intense rivalry was stoked for access to oil, often found in more remote areas of the world, far removed from the great urban centers of the great capitalist powers.

At the same time, the great capitalist powers accelerated their drive to dominate the entire world. Lenin and others saw this as a higher stage of capitalist development impelled by the dominance of monopoly capitalism, finance capital, and capital export.

Access and control of energy resources played an extremely large role in motivating this development, leading to conflict and colonization over the areas offering abundant oil production.

It could be said that “oil imperialism” was a critical factor in the course of the Second World War: Japan — a country without adequate oil reserves — needed to secure resources to pursue its imperialist mission; likewise, Germany’s eastward turn was prodded by its thirst for Soviet oil.

Constituting the leading imperialist power after WWII, the US had its own adequate petroleum resources, but sought to guarantee that global oil supplies would remain available to its clients in the crusade against Communism.

After the end of the Cold War, new technologies unleashed huge reservoirs of oil and natural gas in the US. A once-stable international market was consequently disrupted, allowing US producers to reshape, even dominate, the global distribution of oil and natural gas.

But in the decades to follow the end of the Cold War, those capitalist countries that were the most trusted anti-Communist allies were relying on long-established, existing sources of energy or had turned to convenient, adjacent, transit modes from the energy giant, the now-capitalist Russia.

Europe, for example, had grown increasingly reliant on Soviet oil and gas even before European socialism’s fall. And OPEC’s distribution network and quasi-planned marketing maintained a persistent global stability of price and availability.

From where would the US, undergoing a technological revolution with fracking, take its oil and gas bonanza?

I began to discuss the US shift toward what I called “US oil and gas imperialism” seven years ago (here, here, here, here and here). I wrote in July of 2019:

US oil and gas imperialism is another feature of the new economic nationalism. With US oil production matching or exceeding every other global producer, and with natural gas extraction growing dramatically, the economic nationalists foresee the US now competing successfully for markets. The conventional explanation of the US aggression against oil-producing states must now be retired. The US is no longer solely obsessed with commanding and dominating existing oil producers– US intervention is not simply about the oil in the way it has been in the past. That is, it is not simply acquiring oil resources that motivates US aggression, but commanding oil markets as well.

Thus, the US is also out to wreck competing oil and gas producers by sanctions, disruptions, and destruction. The US corporations want the markets in order to peddle their own energy resources. The long trail of wrecked, dysfunctional, and economically strangled global oil producers attests to this new motivation and serves US energy corporations well.

I have been writing often of this shift of US imperial design for over two years. Nothing demonstrates the intent of the new energy imperialism as does the Department of Energy’s recent renaming of US natural gas as “Freedom Gas” and the product as “molecules of freedom.” This silly branding is part of the campaign to win Europe and other gas-dependent markets from Russia and Iran/Qatar. Even though US liquified “freedom gas” is 20% more expensive than Russian gas, the Trump administration bullied Germany’s Angela Merkel to agree to two new LNG terminals in Germany. Her admission that LNG from the US would not break even for at least a decade demonstrates the aggressive face of the new US energy imperialism.

US gas producers have stoked anti-Russia sentiment to draw Poland and the Baltic states into their LNG market nexus. US LNG annual exports to Portugal and Spain grew from a tiny base to nearly 20 and 30 billion cubic feet, respectively, between 2016 and 2017.

And US crude oil exports soared after the crisis in the Straits of Hormuz. US oil shipping nearly doubled in the aftermath of the mysterious “attacks” in the Persian Gulf. President Trump underscored the attractiveness of foregoing the Straits and buying from the US. Rather than taking the “dangerous journey,” Japan and PRChina should be reminded that “the US has just become (by far) the largest producer of energy in the world.” (my emphasis)

Writing in 2019, I was anticipating geopolitical events geared to shifting the natural gas market dramatically in favor of the US. I foresaw the “anti-Russia” push as targeting the natural gas market in Europe and “crisis” in the Middle East as disrupting shipments from traditional Middle East suppliers.

Hostility and conflict would be the thumb-on-the-scales to offset the higher price (lower risk) of US liquified natural gas.

Unlike the Cold War era, where the US postured as a protective shield for safe, durable, and inexpensive energy channels, the post-Cold War US policy places US immediate economic interests above the supposed alliance obligations; without consultation, the US tossed aside its role among its allies as the guarantor of peace and security and is taking on the role of international energy huckster.

In 2022, the US secured a major victory in oil and gas imperialism with the war in Ukraine. As a result of a concerted campaign to destabilize Ukraine, separate it from Russia, and coax it into NATO’s anti-Putin alliance, the US drew Russia into a long, bloody war. The war proved to be a veritable gift for the US and its energy industry. Anti-Russia hysteria provoked the US’s European allies into breaking economic ties with Russia, including the big prize–cutting off Russia’s supplies of natural gas. Seduced by Cold War-like rhetoric and fear-mongering, European countries outdid each other with belligerence, culminating in refusing cheap Russian energy resources. To seal this self-defeating move on the part of US “allies,” the US organized the destruction of crucial Russian pipelines. Left with no alternative to Russian energy, Europe turned to their US “partner.”

US exports of oil to Europe more than doubled between 2021 and today. Likewise, disrupting natural gas distribution has paid off for the US with liquid natural gas (LNG) exports nearly doubling from 2018 to 2022. Quoting the Wall Street Journal:

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine kicked U.S. [LNG] exports into overdrive. Since March 2022, U.S. developers have signed 57 supply agreements representing about 73 million metric tons of LNG annually… more than four times the number of contracts they signed between 2020 and 2021.

Many of these contracts run for 20 years and underpin the construction of terminals that have yet to be built. LNG exports are expected to more than double [again!] from current levels by the end of this decade…

Thus, thanks to the war in Ukraine, US allies had the privilege of incurring the costs of liquefaction, shipping, and building LNG terminals to show their solidarity with the US-instigated war.

Foolishly, European leaders rushed to show their support for the war, even at tremendous cost to their own economies.

Likewise, the unfolding war in the Middle East plays into the hands of the US oil and natural gas imperialists. As the WSJ concedes:

In the longer term, the Red Sea situation could bring more business for U.S. LNG shippers, which are building out export capacity at Gulf Coast facilities and are vying for big contracts with big buyers in Europe, analysts said.

The percentage of LNG tankers set to pass through the Suez Canal has dropped to its lowest point in at least a decade.

But the LNG will be coming from the West, thanks to the beneficence of the US government anticipating the changing energy market!

Paul Hannon and William Boston put it well: “For the second time in three years, a conflict in Europe’s neighborhood is threatening to weaken a struggling economy, while a more robust U.S. is watching from a safe distance.”

It is indeed an odd ally that takes advantage of the sacrifices that it imposes upon its friends to make. While US capitalism has enjoyed strong growth, thanks to two wars in other lands, its European friends have endured inflation and stagnation.

Germany, led by Social Democrats and Greens, has met the US-led call to war with enthusiasm, militarism, and aggression unseen since the Second World War. Germany has materially supported Ukraine second only to the US and matched the US’s shuttering of economic relations. Where the US has shown healthy growth for 2023, Germany has fallen into recession, its industrial sector racked by high energy costs and supply shortages — a steep price to pay for following US leadership. “‘The threat of deindustrialization is real,’ said Max Jankowsky, chief executive of GL Giesserei Lossnitz, a 175- year-old foundry in the eastern German state of Saxony.” German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s popular satisfaction is the lowest for a chancellor since 1997. Germany — the leading power in the European Union, an industrial giant, the world’s fourth largest economy — has been brought to its knees by US oil and gas imperialism.

The people, and especially the left, need a constant reminder of the material interests behind global imperialism and the mechanism that powers it.

Imperialism is not a consequence of bad leadership from Trump, Biden, Johnson, or Modi or their ilk; it is not the product of neoliberalism or any other ideology; it is not the result of a lust for power. In short, imperialism is not a matter of moral choice or competence. Instead, it is an imperative of capitalism in its modern form. It is an expression of the rivalries generated by capitalist competition for markets, resources, and most tellingly, profits. When that competition reaches its greatest intensity, war ensues.

Some would like to believe that we can break the link between capitalism, exploitation, inequality, poverty, environmental degradation, and war. They aver that a benign capitalism, regulated by enlightened governments, can escape the imperialist system. History shows no such eventuality. People are awakening to the impossibility of “fixing the system.”

The left overlooks this at its peril.

Greg Godels writes on current events, political economy, and the Communist movement from a Marxist-Leninist perspective. Read other articles by Greg, or visit Greg's website.

False Witnesses and No Evidence

The Tangled Truth of a Death Row Inmate

by Nancy Lockhart, M.J. / January 27th, 2024

In a case that has captured the attention of both legal experts and the public, Willie Jerome Manning stands convicted of a crime that he did not commit. The conviction of Mr. Manning who was sentenced to death for the murders of two Mississippi State students, now faces scrutiny due to newly discovered evidence pointing toward his wrongful conviction. This isn’t the first time evidence has been presented to the court based on untruthful testimonies about Willie Manning by witnesses eager to cut deals with the state by providing false testimonies.

Exonerated for the Elderly Mother and Daughter Murders

Mr. Manning was unjustly condemned to death for two separate double murders and has been exonerated of the 1993, case of murdering an elderly mother and daughter in Starkville, Mississippi. The Mississippi Supreme Court recognized vital evidence was hidden, showing that the state’s main witness lied for self-benefit.

The State’s Case against Willie Manning

Two college students, Tiffany Miller and Jon Steckler were found murdered on December 11, 1992. Four months later, in April of 1993, Manning became a primary suspect. The Oktibbeha County Mississippi Circuit Court appointed post-conviction lawyers twice. Both times the attorneys withdrew because they were not familiar with state post-conviction and federal habeas corpus practices. Meanwhile, an exceptionally experienced attorney in post-conviction and federal habeas corpus practice had the desire to represent Mr. Manning, and the circuit court of Oktibbeha County Mississippi ignored the attorney’s motion.

In the parking lot of an apartment building, Tiffany Miller’s vehicle was discovered double-parked. The car was a two-seater and evidence that Jon Steckler had been run over was clear from his blood found underneath the vehicle.  Sheriff Dolph Bryan assumed a connection between the murders and a previous car break-in. Bryan’s theory lacked concrete evidence as he believed the murder victims interrupted a theft in progress from John Wise’s car burglary. The break-in occurred at a fraternity house parking lot on the campus of Mississippi State University. The burglarized car belonged to Wise, who reported missing items which included a leather jacket, a portable CD player, and a brass restroom token. Some of the local businesses used brass tokens for entering their restrooms, and one was found near the murder victims, about five miles from the house Willie lived in with his mother. John Wise declared that the discovered coin exhibited a shiny appearance, contrasting with his own, which did not.

The sheriff created a scenario of the perpetrator forcing Miller and Steckler into Miller’s car, with Tiffany Miller sitting on Willie Manning’s lap and Jon Steckler driving. After reaching the destination, the sheriff surmised that the victims were forced out of Miller’s car and shot, after which the murderer drove the car to an apartment complex and abandoned it. Sheriff Dolph Bryan orchestrated this entire crime scene without physical evidence or witnesses.

This investigation resulted in Manning’s conviction, which was partially based on the discovery of a hair fragment belonging to a Black individual in Miller’s car. The hair fragment was admitted as evidence, and as a result, the sheriff and prosecutor implied Mr. Manning’s presence in the vehicle. The Department of Justice has acknowledged that the FBI’s hair analysis testimony at Manning’s trial was unreliable and false.  Mr. Manning is actively contesting his conviction of the double homicide.

Fabricated Testimonies and Sheriff Dolph Bryan

The case against Willie Manning is fundamentally weak, as it’s characterized by speculative assumptions from Sheriff Bryan, fabricated testimonies, and questionable forensic analysis, including the use of discredited hair follicle science. Willie Manning was convicted on jailhouse informant testimony made by Earl Jordan, Frank Parker, and Renee Hathorn. Each of the sheriff’s informants was facing prison time for criminal charges. Every jailhouse informant gave fabricated testimonies in return for reduced sentences or total exoneration, with two of them receiving financial rewards.

According to Earl Jordan’s affidavit, the sheriff indirectly made it clear that he would assist Jordan with his habitual offender charges in exchange for helping him with Manning. The sheriff and Jordan met four or five times and Jordan’s testimony was fabricated under the sheriff’s influence. In exchange, Jordan received some reward money and a 3-year sentence reduced to time served. Jordan submitted an affidavit because Dolph Bryan was no longer the sheriff. Bryan served as sheriff of Oktibbeha County from 1976-2012.

Similarly, Frank Parker’s testimony included claims of overhearing Manning confess to a cellmate about disposing of a gun and admitting to the murders. An affidavit from Willie’s cellmate challenges the credibility of this statement. Parker also stated he was fleeing charges in Texas and turned himself in at the jail in Mississippi.

Parker’s uncle, who housed Frank for over a decade, informed law enforcement about his nephew’s longstanding dishonesty. He recounted an incident where, during their absence, Frank cleared out their house and pawned their valuables. Frank’s uncle filed charges against him and subsequently informed law enforcement in Oktibbeha County that he would not consider Frank as a witness in any case, due to his lack of trustworthiness.

Renee Hathorn was Willie’s girlfriend at the time and her role was particularly pivotal. Hathorn testified against Manning for the defense. In an affidavit, she states that Sheriff Dolph Bryan pressured her into getting Willie to confess to the murders of Steckler and Miller. He never did, he consistently maintained his innocence. She also visited with Willie in his jail cell at night from time to time, while wearing a wire. Sheriff Dolph Bryan also met with her to discuss and rehearse her trial testimony. Before testifying during the trial, the sheriff gave her money, paid her bills sometimes, and also paid for some furniture. He additionally picked her up and purchased food from a fast food restaurant. Hathorn was facing from 8-10 years in prison and additional years on parole for a total of 33 bad checks in Oktibbeha and Lowndes Counties. She additionally states that she accrued bad check charges in Macon, Clay, and Jackson counties. She owed more than $10,000 in fraudulent checks and court fees. All of this was erased in exchange for her fabricated testimony. Additionally, she received $17,500 in reward money.

No Witnesses, Physical Evidence, DNA, Fingerprints or Fibers

The forensic analysis of hair by the FBI failed to conclusively establish a match between the hair discovered in the vehicle, where two students from Mississippi State were allegedly apprehended, and Willie Jerome Manning. The initial classification of the hair as originating from a Black individual was a critical factor in implicating Mr. Manning in the murder. There is an absence of definitive physical evidence connecting Manning to the crime. There are no witnesses, fingerprints, DNA, or blood, and there are not any fibers. The prosecution’s argument hinged primarily on the testimony of prison informants and a hair that the FBI initially claimed was consistent with a Black person. However, the FBI later withdrew this claim, admitting that such a conclusion surpasses the scientific validity of hair analysis, thereby rendering it unreliable and scientifically unsound.  Mr. Manning underwent trial, was found guilty, and subsequently sentenced to death row, based on contrived testimonies from jailhouse informants, prepared and orchestrated by Sheriff Dolph Bryan.

The prosecution in Willie Manning’s case relied on several key pieces of fabricated evidence. Testimonies from informants such as Earl Jordan and Frank Parker, who later admitted their statements were false and put them under pressure in exchange for wiping their criminal slates clean.

The role of the prosecutor was crucial in assembling and presenting these elements as part of the case against Manning. The prosecution’s case against Mr. Manning included forensic evidence, deemed unreliable. An expert asserted that bullets recovered from a tree in Manning’s yard were discharged from the same firearm used in the students’ murder, claiming this to the exclusion of all other firearms globally. However, current forensic science discredits such bullet comparisons as invalid. Mr. Manning has submitted a new petition to the Mississippi Supreme Court to contest his convictions in this case. Should this petition be rejected, it could lead to the court setting an execution date for him.

This article was composed using information sourced from the following petition:

Willie Jerome Manning, Petitioner, v. State of Mississippi, Respondent. In The Supreme Court of Mississippi, No. 2023-DR-01076. Motion for Leave to File Successive Petition for Post-Conviction Relief. Attorneys: Krissy C. Nobile, Robert S. Mink, Sr., David P. Voisin,  Clocked: September 29, 2023, 19:24:16.

Nancy Lockhart is an analyst and strategist specializing in cases of grave injustices. E-mail: TheWrongfulConviction@gmail.com. Voicemail: (914) 984-7990. Visit https://nancylockhart.net for the latest updates and discover methods of advocating to assist Willie Mannings campaign. Read other articles by Nancy.