iran – Radio Free

Iran arrests 98 ‘citizen-journalists’ for contact with UK-based outlet

CPJ Staff — Thu, 31 Jul 2025 17:15:48 +0000

Paris, July 31, 2025—The Committee to Protect Journalists calls on Iranian authorities to explain the grounds on which they have summoned and arrested 98 “so-called citizen-journalists” for having contact with a London-based Persian-language television channel.

“Iranian authorities must immediately clarify the legal basis for this mass detention of its citizens and cease treating those who communicate with the media as criminals,” said CPJ Chief Programs Officer Carlos Martinez de la Serna. “Labeling ordinary Iranians as ‘operational agents’ simply for their association with a news outlet is a dangerous tactic of intimidation and a blatant escalation in Iran’s violations of press freedom.

Iran’s intelligence ministry had been monitoring “the so-called citizen-journalists of the Zionist-Terrorist International Network” – a term the government uses to describe London-based Iran International – during the June 13 to 24 Iran-Israel war, state-owned Mehr News Agency reported. The ministry then “arrested and summoned 98 affiliated operational agents,” the agency said on July 28.

The ministry provided no evidence to support its allegations and did not disclose the names, locations, or legal status of those detained or summoned.

The Islamic Republic has previously arrested Iranians working with international media on vague charges, such as for “collaborating with hostile states” or “propaganda against the state.”

Iran’s reformist Ham Mihan newspaper reported that more than 100 journalists had been fired in the aftermath of the 12-day war, as authorities have cracked down on critical voices, with hundreds of arrests and several executions.

CPJ emailed Iran’s mission to the United Nations in New York for comment but received no response.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by CPJ Staff.

Iran’s plan to abandon GPS is more about a looming new ‘tech cold war’

APR editor — Mon, 28 Jul 2025 11:36:31 +0000

COMMENTARY: By Jasim Al-Azzawi

For the past few years, governments across the world have paid close attention to conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East. There, it is said, we see the first glimpses of what warfare of the future will look like, not just in terms of weaponry, but also in terms of new technologies and tactics.

Most recently, the United States-Israeli attacks on Iran demonstrated not just new strategies of drone deployment and infiltration but also new vulnerabilities. During the 12-day conflict, Iran and vessels in the waters of the Gulf experienced repeated disruptions of GPS signal.

This clearly worried the Iranian authorities who, after the end of the war, began to look for alternatives.

“At times, disruptions are created on this [GPS] system by internal systems, and this very issue has pushed us toward alternative options like BeiDou,” Ehsan Chitsaz, deputy communications minister, told Iranian media in mid-July. He added that the government was developing a plan to switch transportation, agriculture and the internet from GPS to BeiDou.

Iran’s decision to explore adopting China’s navigation satellite system may appear at first glance to be merely a tactical manoeuvre. Yet, its implications are far more profound. This move is yet another indication of a major global realignment.

For decades, the West, and the US in particular, have dominated the world’s technological infrastructure from computer operating systems and the internet to telecommunications and satellite networks.

This has left much of the world dependent on an infrastructure it cannot match or challenge. This dependency can easily become vulnerability. Since 2013, whistleblowers and media investigations have revealed how various Western technologies and schemes have enabled illicit surveillance and data gathering on a global scale — something that has worried governments around the world.

Clear message
Iran’s possible shift to BeiDou sends a clear message to other nations grappling with the delicate balance between technological convenience and strategic self-defence: The era of blind, naive dependence on US-controlled infrastructure is rapidly coming to an end. Nations can no longer afford to have their military capabilities and vital digital sovereignty tied to the satellite grid of a superpower they cannot trust.

This sentiment is one of the driving forces behind the creation of national or regional satellite navigation systems, from Europe’s Galileo to Russia’s GLONASS, each vying for a share of the global positioning market and offering a perceived guarantee of sovereign control.

GPS was not the only vulnerability Iran encountered during the US-Israeli attacks. The Israeli army was able to assassinate a number of nuclear scientists and senior commanders in the Iranian security and military forces. The fact that Israel was able to obtain their exact locations raised fears that it was able to infiltrate telecommunications and trace people via their phones.

On June 17 as the conflict was still raging, the Iranian authorities urged the Iranian people to stop using the messaging app WhatsApp and delete it from their phones, saying it was gathering user information to send to Israel.

Whether this appeal was linked to the assassinations of the senior officials is unclear, but Iranian mistrust of the app run by US-based corporation Meta is not without merit.

Cybersecurity experts have long been sceptical about the security of the app. Recently, media reports have revealed that the artificial intelligence software Israel uses to target Palestinians in Gaza is reportedly fed data from social media.

Furthermore, shortly after the end of the attacks on Iran, the US House of Representatives moved to ban WhatsApp from official devices.

Western platforms not trusted
For Iran and other countries around the world, the implications are clear: Western platforms can no longer be trusted as mere conduits for communication; they are now seen as tools in a broader digital intelligence war.

Tehran has already been developing its own intranet system, the National Information Network, which gives more control over internet use to state authorities. Moving forward, Iran will likely expand this process and possibly try to emulate China’s Great Firewall.

By seeking to break with Western-dominated infrastructure, Tehran is definitively aligning itself with a growing sphere of influence that fundamentally challenges Western dominance. This partnership transcends simple transactional exchanges as China offers Iran tools essential for genuine digital and strategic independence.

The broader context for this is China’s colossal Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). While often framed as an infrastructure and trade project, BRI has always been about much more than roads and ports. It is an ambitious blueprint for building an alternative global order.

Iran — strategically positioned and a key energy supplier — is becoming an increasingly important partner in this expansive vision.

What we are witnessing is the emergence of a new powerful tech bloc — one that inextricably unites digital infrastructure with a shared sense of political defiance. Countries weary of the West’s double standards, unilateral sanctions and overwhelming digital hegemony will increasingly find both comfort and significant leverage in Beijing’s expanding clout.

This accelerating shift heralds the dawn of a new “tech cold war”, a low-temperature confrontation in which nations will increasingly choose their critical infrastructure, from navigation and communications to data flows and financial payment systems, not primarily based on technological superiority or comprehensive global coverage but increasingly on political allegiance and perceived security.

As more and more countries follow suit, the Western technological advantage will begin to shrink in real time, resulting in redesigned international power dynamics.

Jasim Al-Azzawi is an analyst, news anchor, programme presenter and media instructor. He has presented a weekly show called Inside Iraq.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Debunking Israeli Propaganda in Times of Genocide

Paul de Rooij — Sat, 26 Jul 2025 15:02:39 +0000

We live in interesting but brutal times. It is evident that myths are biting the dust with long held narratives dissolving when exposed to the harsh and bloody reality. Nowhere is this more evident than with all the myths that propped up Israel for many decades. Israel was portrayed as a fragile yet resilient little country living in a “bad neighbourhood.” But now, given Israel’s incessant wars, much of this mythology is being jettisoned; it is no longer needed when arrogance, hubris and sadism drive the Israeli ethos. The image of the little David is giving way to a vengeful genocidal creature infused with a dash of the Old Testament….

Below is a discussion of some of the collapsing myths. Myths are built on narratives which in turn are built on descriptive words. Much of the discussion centres around clarifying the deceptive nature of words, which in turn will expose the false narratives.

Rabble really

The army is venerated in Israel, and a lot of effort is put into glorifying the military; there are festivals with singers, balloons, and blue and white pom-poms galore.¹ American Jewish girls go giddy when meeting the tanned and smiling soldiers. Of course, if one glorifies the military, then all the units can only be “élite”; even the lowliest soldier is given a sergeant rank; and of course they must be “the most moral ” in the world. It is also known by its incongruous acronym: IDF.

Contrast the glamorous image of the Israeli military with its actions in Gaza, West Bank and beyond. Israeli snipers are targeting children – extra-points for pregnant women (you can even purchase a T-shirt with “one shot, two kills ” logo on it). Soldiers are cheering when blowing up hospitals, universities, mosques, schools,…. it is no secret, it is all visible in Telegram videos or on Al_Jazeera’s newscasts. To make matters worse, GHF, the so-called Israeli “humanitarian ” group, dispenses food and water in Gaza today in such a way as to concentrate refugees, and then target them.² Soldiers are looting everywhere, and even one unit has been set up with the express intention of looting areas they’ve conquered. Looting is tolerated throughout, and even made part of its tactics on the ground.³

The Israeli military is engaged in genocide and doesn’t hide the fact. Groups of soldiers engaged in ecstatic dancing chanting “death to the Amalek ” – a biblical term for the one to be killed en masse; including women and children.⁴ Early in October 2023, the Israeli military put a 95-year-old veteran of the infamous 1948 massacres on tour to lecture the soldiers. Dressed in a military uniform, he engaged in some motivational speeches: “Be triumphant and finish them off and don’t leave anyone behind. Erase the memory of them. Erase them, their families, mothers and children. These animals can no longer live.”⁵ The pronouncements made by the military official rabbis are even worse. And one cannot forget (former Minister of Defence) Yoav Gallant’s statement: “I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed. We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly.”⁶

The Israeli airforce regularly drops huge bombs in the middle of densely populated refugee camps. According to Euromed, the total number of bombs dropped on Gaza are equivalent to all the bombs dropped on several of the major cities during WWII. And in order not to waste bombs, Israeli warplanes which couldn’t drop their ordnance in Iran during the June 2025 attack were instructed to bomb Gaza. Israelis also never miss an opportunity to profit from such events; Israelis flock to the border area to sit on sofas to witness the bombing spectacle. These war tourists have to pay extra for a cappuccino.

Israeli sadism only escalates; everyday there must be a new turn of the screw – it is not satisfied with merely bombing or shooting civilians. The latest Israeli military order is that from now on Palestinians will not be allowed to bathe in the sea.⁷ Israeli snipers, warships… will target civilians entering the sea. One Telegram video shows a gleeful Israeli soldier using mortar bombs to target civilians sitting on a beach.

The Israeli military used to be well organised and soldiers operated on the basis of strict orders. Today, the ethical rot has set in at all levels. Officers and lower soldiers alike murder, steal, torture everywhere. Soldiers perpetrate heinous crimes in full camera view, yet the perpetrators expect full impunity.

Simply put: the Israeli military can no longer be referred to as an army, but it must be described for what it actually is: a criminal rabble.

Israeli way of war

Israelis like to say that they “live in a bad neighbourhood.” In fact, it is so bad that Israel has bombed most of its neighbouring countries numerous times and attempted to murder most of the leadership in those countries.⁸ “Decapitation strikes” are deemed a great success and yet another proof of the Israeli cunning and prowess. Another target are the potential or actual negotiators. The Israeli military has murdered several negotiators in Lebanon, Gaza, Tehran (Ismael Haniyeh), and during the June 2025 attack against Iran the lead negotiator with the Americans was also murdered. And then Israel declares “ceasefires ” that impose conditions on the victims, but Israel continues to murder and bomb – there have been over 1,000 violations of the so-called ceasefire in Lebanon. Drones and warplanes fly overhead without regard to any declared ceasefire. Maybe all this is not surprising given the official Israeli (especially Netanyahu’s) disdain for “peace” which is considered to be a dirty word; they prefer “conflict management.” Ceasefires are merely meant to provide time for the Israeli military to reorganise and then bomb and murder in their “business as usual” fashion.

The Israeli military’s brutality even gets pompous sounding names like the Dahiya Doctrine. This refers to the levelling of the Dahiya neighbourhood in Beirut 2006 – it is a disproportionate level of violence “in response” to Hezbollah daring to resist the Israeli attack. And of course, Israelis justify this by seeking to reestablish “deterrence” which is yet another fraudulent military concept.⁹ But then the Israeli military applies other fraudulent and morally reprehensible doctrines, e.g., the Hannibal directive. This directive orders the Israeli military to kill Israeli Jews who may have been captured by Palestinians or other enemies. Officials prefer to kill Israelis rather than to have them taken as hostages. In fact, about half of the Israeli civilians killed on 7 October 2023 were killed by the Israeli military.¹⁰

The Israeli military justifies its actions because it is “at war.” The resistance in Gaza has no tanks, airplanes, etc. Thus the best equipped army in the world is attacking a mostly defenceless population; maybe it is a bit of a stretch to call this a “war.” Norman Finkelstein, the great historian, once made the same point and suggested that the Israeli “mowing the lawn ” attacks should be referred to as “massacres.” That is a rather more accurate and succinct descriptor; in the current historical context “genocidal actions” is perhaps more accurate.

Squatters really

A mythology surrounding the early Israeli colonists became pervasive early on. The brave sun tanned pioneers were “making the desert bloom”¹¹ conveying the notion that they were just taking over empty and unproductive land. The word that went along with this myth was that the Jewish interlopers were “settlers ” – another rather neutral word that has no association with the native population they came to displace. For some time while communal living had romantic appeal, settlers lived in kibbutzim. Young Europeans would flock to experience this only to find out a less glamorous picture often involving corruption and sexual abuse.¹²

After the 1940s, the program of ethnic cleansing saw hundreds of Palestinian towns and villages razed to the ground or simply taken over. Many Israelis took over houses and even helped themselves to furniture, carpets, etc. The takeover of houses is an on-going project with zealot usurpers using advanced mapping technology to target houses, especially in East Jerusalem. While a Palestinian family is out of a house doing normal daily chores, they find upon their return that their house has been taken over, and it is impossible to eject the squatters because the police sides with the latter.

During the late 1960s and early 1970s saw a wave of land confiscation in the West Bank, and the building of “settlements ” on top of hills. The real zealots went to Al Khalil/Hebron to take over houses, hotels, and other buildings.¹³ They even set about closing off streets so they could go undisturbed to the Ibrahimi mosque which also had been usurped by the zealots. The zealots’ aim is to constantly steal houses, and to make the life of ordinary Palestinians intolerable.

Other settlements were built as suburbs of Jerusalem or as cities with all the amenities provided at subsidised rates. Purpose-built “apartheid” roads connected these developments to the main Israeli cities, but also were meant to sever the links between Palestinian communities. And although the residents of such places are portrayed as mere suburbanites, they often clash with Palestinians when they seek to annex more land. Although annexation is such a neutral word, it hides the violence dispensed by the suburbanites to achieve their aims. The Jews recently arrived from Venezuela sought to expand the borders of their development and requested the zealots to do the dirty violent work.¹⁴ The condition for this assistance was that new arrivals would also participate in the violent eviction and usurpation of the neighbouring Palestinian land. Even the “suburbanites ” participate in violence; the soldiers are on standby to protect the usurpers.

It is important to avoid propaganda-tainted language, and to use words that clearly describe a reality and associated power relationships. For this reason many words cry out for an alternative description. The word “settler” demands a more accurate substitution, and the word “squatter” would certainly be a more suitable and accurate descriptor. It is time to stop calling the armed violent young men who harass and brutalise Palestinians in the West Bank “settlers”!

Where has “proper” gone?

Israel always has been a country with flexible and expanding borders. Yet, when it suited them, they would make a distinction between “Israel proper” and the occupied areas. The implication was that there could be negotiations regarding the occupied areas, there couldn’t possibly be negotiations about anything in Israel proper – this was conceded land, and there was nothing to talk about. And the “proper” areas expanded! After the wars of 1948, 1967, 2006… the borders of Israel “proper” expanded to incorporate newly stolen land.¹⁵ What the current batch of wars have revealed is that there is no more talk about “Israel proper”, and the reason for that is that Israel is expanding at present – stealing land in Lebanon, Syria, Gaza and the West Bank. While the borders keep expanding, the “proper” hasn’t incorporated the newly usurped land.

A feature of the “Israel proper” concept is that Israel desires to have buffer zones or no-man’s land between its “recognised” borders and its neighbours. But the buffer zones have to be on Lebanese or Syrian soil; the buffer is never on the Israeli side. The Israeli military has created a no-man’s land on the border with Gaza, but all the bulldozed land and acreage sprayed with herbicide is on the Palestinian side of the military-imposed border. And if the UN feels that it needs to conduct some face-saving military patrols, then the UN can defend Israel by sitting in the Lebanese “buffer zone”; UNIFIL shouldn’t even dream of sitting right on the border or having its soldiers cross into Israel for some R&R.

Never again?

All western societies have been indoctrinated with holocaust mythology; one constant refrain has been “never again”. Fair enough. But if any lessons were learnt then this slogan should apply to all; it should read Never again for Everybody. The Gazan population certainly should not be the victim of genocide today – yet there is no doubt that that is exactly what is going on. A brief perusal of the so-called “holocaust studies centres” around the world reveal that they have been silent during this period – they are immersed in studying the 1940s; there seem to be no lessons for the current situation. One such centre features a large “Find memory; Find humanity” slogan on its website, yet (July 2025) has absolutely nothing to say about the genocide in Gaza. It is all about selective memory and humanity.

Pogroms were violent attacks against a religious or ethnic group in the Russian Empire and usually depicted as criminal in nature. Yet today young armed Israeli Jews regularly invade Palestinian villages and towns and brutalise or murder the native population. If violence was deemed intolerable in the past, then why the silence about the ongoing pogroms in the West Bank today?

Careful what you wish for

Several so-called influencers, the contemptible creatures appearing on TikTok/Instagram, etc., called for genocide in Gaza. One of the influencers went so far as to state that if there were a button to get rid of all the Palestinians, he would press the button.¹⁶The calls for genocide are also commonly found at the podium of the Knesset. The wife of an Israeli soldier, hysterically shouted from podium not to let the sacrifice of her husband’s effort (having to work overtime) be wasted, and thus “don’t stop before…” the Israeli army exterminates all Palestinians.¹⁷

Israeli society is rather warped, and it is constantly polled about all sorts of unusual issues. One of the recent questions was “are Palestinian children in Gaza innocent?” 75% of the respondents said “no.” In one motivational speech given to the soldiers about to invade Gaza, a high ranking officer also stated “the children are not innocent” – this follows Deuteronomy’s edict to kill the women and the children.

After the first hearing about Gaza was held at the ICJ (26 January 2024) at a demonstration in London, dozens of counter-demonstrators wearing Israeli flag capes were chanting “no ceasefire.” By this time several hospitals and universities had already been destroyed. Is this what the counter-demonstrators wished to continue?

Maybe a thought experiment will demonstrate the extreme hypocrisy of these influencers and counter-demonstrators. Imagine that a Palestinian influencer were to ask for a button get rid of all Israeli Jews, or that a Palestinian politician were to utter a similar statement. What do you think the reaction would be? The ultimate hypocrisy is for Jews who bow to the mere mention of the holocaust to call for genocide against Palestinians.

While the London police did nothing to suppress the counter-demonstrators yelling support for the genocide, they do actively suppress pro-Palestinian statements against the genocide! In a recent video, the police in Scotland are even tearing down Palestinian flags.¹⁸ And in the US, Trump is actually suppressing all protests and commentary against Israeli brutality by labelling it as antisemitism.

My holy vs. your holy

About one thousand mosques and several churches have been obliterated since 2023.¹⁹ Some of the mosques/churches were centuries old and could be deemed cultural heritage sites – of course, they didn’t receive a UNESCO label because Israel blocked such designations.²⁰ The media tends to ignore the destruction of mosques or refers to Israeli justifications for their destruction. The few christian churches bombed in Gaza did elicit mention, and after the bombing of a Catholic church even Pope Leo XIV stated that “he was deeply saddened…” by the loss of life.²¹ What makes the Pope’s comment memorable is the fact that he didn’t mention that it was Israel that bombed the church. Anonymous bombs just seem to fall out of the sky.

While the intentional destruction of Palestinian holy sites or mosques doesn’t seem to merit any mention, when a synagogue is damaged this elicits a major outcry. But to highlight the double standard, the establishment of a synagogue, or purportedly finding a reference to a Tomb or mere place of sojourn by a well known rabbi, then Israeli Jews consider this to be a claim to the land. Thus an enterprising religious scholar found a reference to a Tomb of Rabbi Ashi in Lebanon, then this became a land claim.²² Israelis grab any justification to steal yet more land however flimsy the claim to the land may be.

Mind their comfort please

The many wars that Israel has waged recently have outraged many around the world giving rise to demonstrations and the like. Yet, the frequent media concern is with the “comfort ” of Jews witnessing the demonstrations! Although Israel is conducting a genocide, Jews should feel comfortable and not reminded of sordid events. Even a bake sale meant to raise funds for Gaza was deemed to interfere with Jewish comfort.²³ Did white South Africans living in Europe object to anti-apartheid demonstrations on the basis that it made them feel uncomfortable? Fat chance! However, in the current context several governments have appointed “anti-semitism ambassadors ” who will work to ban demonstrations or manifestations of support for the Palestinians. Maybe a case can be made that supporters of the Israeli genocide in Gaza or the unprovoked attack against Iran should be made to feel uncomfortable.

Western values and Israel

Much is made of “western values” purportedly freedom of speech, association, respect for the rule of law, and respecting immigrants. These values are what makes Europe a “garden” and everywhere else a “jungle.”²⁴ These values have also been used to justify the continued EU assistance to Ukraine, and thus war. Russia has invariably been castigated for not observing “western norms.” But, when it comes to genocidal Israel and its violent tendencies, the same insufferable politicians are silent or connive to send weapons and assistance to Israel.

Europe is meant to absorb huge migrant flows, yet Israel imposes a discriminatory migrant policy – only Jews need to apply. Israel’s incessant wars are creating migrant flows that inevitably end in Europe, and no European official seems willing to point this out. What we witness instead is that European officials travel to Egypt to offer enticements for Egypt to absorb Palestinian refugees; a few years ago the same gang offered several billion Euros to Erdogan to reduce the Syrian and Iraqi migrant flows.

Myopic history

Reading the mainstream media one would get the impression that Palestinian history started on 7 October 2023. Everything before that doesn’t seem to merit mentioning. All the “mowing the lawn” military operations aren’t a thing of the past, they are in a memory hole. The Goldstone report documenting the mass crimes committed in 2009 is also in the memory hole. Of course, it is too much to expect the mainstream media to even mention relevant history that goes back a few more years. The media don’t report on the caged nature of Gaza, surrounded by razor wire and watchtowers. And as Dov Weissglas, the advisor to Ariel Sharon, stated the residents of Gaza would be kept “on a diet” – that is, Israeli bureaucrats would calculate the minimum caloric intake needed to survive, and they would allow just this amount of aid to trickle into Gaza.

Watch our words!

While it is important to use accurate words to describe Israeli state policy, it is also important for pro-Palestinian activists to change the words they use to refer to the current reality. One finds that the word “occupation” is used often to describe the Israeli military, and even to the extent that it is used as a synonym. Similarly, the “apartheid” descriptor is used without much reflection, e.g., apartheid wall, apartheid roads, etc. Both occupation and apartheid indicate a co-existence with the native population. Apartheid meant coexisting economically, but living separately – there was an interaction between blacks and whites. The word occupation suggests that it is temporary, and that interaction is possible. But the genocide in Gaza indicates that Israel prefers erasing the Palestinians, and that way ending the occupation. The three strategists drawing up the path of the wall built in the West Bank were explicit about the temporary nature of the structure. It would remain in place to control the Palestinian population, but they foresaw that the wall will be removed once the Palestinian population has been expelled.

There is another problem with the word “apartheid.” While much effort was placed to declare that Israel was guilty of the “crime of apartheid,” it only referred to the “occupied territories.” The third class status of Palestinians living in Israel was unmentionable to those drawing up the legal case. Apartheid was deemed a crime on one side of the line, but just fine on the other side (in “Israel proper”).

Worse than 1960s apartheid in South Africa

The so-called West slowly adopted some sanctions and divestment of South Africa beginning in the 1970s; the public had engaged in some form of boycott of South African products before that. Ronnie Kasrils, the great anti-apartheid fighter and member of the African National Congress, stated that the situation now for the Palestinians is worse than that experienced by the black population at the height of the oppressive apartheid years. While Western countries grudgingly sanctioned and divested from South Africa, one wonders when will there be some official opposition to Israel’s genocidal actions.

Tough times for the propagandists

The Israelis and their supporters spent much effort painting Israel as a valiant little country trying to become a success story surrounded by hostile neighbours. Israelis were portrayed as pioneers thriving despite the odds. The propagandists working for Israel had appropriated victimhood, and justified Israel’s actions as “self defence.” Alas, all this mythology has been ruined because Israeli officialdom chose to wage wars, expel the native population, commit genocide in Gaza, attack Iran, attack Yemen, and steal yet more land from its neighbours. It requires more than lipstick to doll up this pig. Today Israeli propaganda relies on threats, and strong armed techniques to censor and muzzle dissent. Much of this is done by control over the media which seems to work in tandem with Israeli propagandists. Student protestors are threatened and even imprisoned; conscientious journalists are fired….

For all moral world citizens, the task is to oppose all the ghastly things Israel does every day, to reject their sorry justifications ( “self defence”); reject the portrayal of Israel’s proclaimed enemies (demonising Hamas, and the Palestinians in general); reject the portrayal of the Israeli military (why should anyone want to be an “ally” of this country?), reject Israel as a ethnocracy where rights and status are determined by whether or not one is Jewish (reject “Jewish democracy” if it excludes or discriminates against segment of the population; it is not much different from “white democracy” during South Africa’s apartheid years). In many ways, if one appeals to “western values”, the mantra often repeated by western officialdom, then one must also be willing to judge Israeli’s actions and institutions by the same standard. Just because Israel holds a gay pride parade doesn’t make them a beacon of shared values. Our opposition can start with acts as simple as challenging the manager of our local supermarket why they stock Israeli avocados and oranges; indeed, the boycott against apartheid in South Africa started by boycotting their oranges. But these are small steps when bolder action is needed – it is long overdue.

Notes:

The post Debunking Israeli Propaganda in Times of Genocide first appeared on Dissident Voice.

1 Erin Axelman and Sam Eilertsen’s Israelism shows this cultural phenomenon.

2 Nir Hasson, Yaniv Kubovich and Bar Peleg, “’It’s a Killing Field’: IDF Soldiers Ordered to Shoot Deliberately at Unarmed Gazans Waiting for Humanitarian Aid,” Haaretz, 27 June 2025.

3 MEE Staff, “Report reveals vast loot Israeli soldiers took from Gaza, Lebanon and Syria,” Middle East Eye, 28 February 2025. And Oren Ziv, “Rugs, cosmetics, motorbikes: Israeli soldiers are looting Gaza homes en masse,” +972 Magazine, 20 February 2024.

4 Evidence presented in January 2024 at the ICJ.

5 Rayhan Uddin, “Israel-Palestine war: Israeli veteran, 95, rallies troops to ‘erase’ Palestinian children”, Middle East Eye, 14 October 2023.

6 For a collection of genocidal statements made by Israeli officials or members of the Knesset see: “Specific Intent of Genocide: Statements made by Israeli officials indicating their clear intent to exterminate Palestinians in the Gaza Strip,” Euromed, 21 Oct 2024. A much longer list could be obtained by quoting influential rabbis in Israel.

7 Nagham Zbeedat, “’Are They Going to Ban the Air Next?’ | IDF Reiterates Ban on Gazans Entering the Sea, Last Remaining Source of Relief for Many Palestinians”, Haaretz, 13 July 2025.

8 At last count ten countries in the area had been bombed; the most recent ones are Iran and Yemen. Imagine if, say, Belgium, didn’t get along with its neighbours, and set about bombing them to the same extent – this would require bombing all of Europe.

9 The great scientist and organiser of Peace Studies programs, Anatol Rapoport, stated that the notion of deterrence is a sham because it fails due to a fallacy of composition (post hoc, propter ergo hoc). Deterrence is like the talisman effect. That is, a man was wearing a large talisman, and had this exchange with his friend:
“why are you wearing that talisman?”
“it is to keep the elephants at bay!”
“But I see no elephants.”
“You see, the talisman works!”

10 Yaniv Kubovich, “IDF Ordered Hannibal Directive on October 7 to Prevent Hamas Taking Soldiers Captive”, Haaretz, 7 July 2024. Subtitle: “there was crazy hysteria, and decisions started being made without verified information: Documents and testimonies obtained by Haaretz reveal the Hannibal operational order, which directs the use of force to prevent soldiers being taken into captivity, was employed at three army facilities infiltrated by Hamas, potentially endangering civilians as well.”

11 The “making the desert bloom” sham is wonderfully exposed in Michel Khleifi and Eyal Sivan’s “Route 181: Fragments of a Journey in Palestine-Israel”, 2003.

12 The late Israel Shahak exposed the kibbutz sham. He revealed in one of his lectures the exploitative nature of the kibbutz, the fact Palestinian labourers wouldn’t be hired, and the sexual harassment of the volunteers. Often the kibbutzim were built on stolen Palestinian land.

13 One should read about rabbi Moshe Levinger and his zealot followers to appreciate the level of brutality involved in stealing Palestinian land.

14 Article in Haaretz, but unfortunately the link to the article has expired.

15 When the Israel-Hezbollah 2006 war ended, Israeli engineering units moved the razor wire fences several hundred meters into Lebanese territory. A few days later a United Nations surveyor entered the coordinates of the fence to demarcate the newly UN approved border – it is called the Blue Line.

16 Here is one example, “Two Nice Jewish Boys” advocating for genocide in Gaza.

17 t.me/mintpress_news/7228

18 Craig Murray, “The Big Chill,” Craig Murray’s website, 17 July 2025. View the video at the bottom of the article.

19 Indlieb Farazi Saber, “A ‘cultural genocide’: Which of Gaza’s heritage sites have been destroyed?”, Al Jazeera, 14 January 2024.

20 UNESCO members who vote for the heritage site designations must be UN-states, and since the Palestinians aren’t a state, they have no standing at the UNESCO deliberations. There have been appeals to include the Church of the Nativity, Al Aqsa mosque, and a few others, but they all were blocked by the Israelis. Source: UNESCO official talking at SOAS, a university in London.

21 Ayah El-Khaldi, “Pope Leo under fire for ‘vague’ statement on Israel’s bombing of Gaza Catholic church”, Middle East Eye, 18 July 2025.

22 “Israeli settlers storm purported rabbi’s shrine in Lebanon”, Middle East Eye, 7 March 2025.

23 James Crisp, Bake sales for Gaza could stoke Jew hatred, EU warns
Fundraisers for Gaza make ‘Jews feel uncomfortable’, says Europe’s anti-Semitism tsar, 14 July 2025.

24 Just to borrow from a statement made by Josep Borrell, the former Foreign Minister of the EU.

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Paul de Rooij.

America’s Opinion Pages Overwhelmingly Supported Trump’s Attack on Iran

Bryce Greene — Fri, 25 Jul 2025 21:47:57 +0000

In the four days of coverage after President Donald Trump ordered strikes on Iran (6/21–24/25), the New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal and Washington Post responded with 36 opinion pieces and editorials. Almost half of these, 17, explicitly supported the illegal bombing, while only 7 (19%) took an overall critical view of the strikes—none of them in the Journal or the Post.

Of the critical pieces, only three (one in the Times and two in USA Today) opposed the idea on legal or moral grounds, challenging the idea that the United States has a right to attack a country that had not attacked it.

This opposition rate of less than a fifth is in stark contrast to US public opinion on the matter, which showed that 56% of Americans opposed Trump’s bombing. Why wasn’t this reflected in the range of opinions presented by America’s top press outlets? These numbers highlight just how poorly represented the views of the public are in elite media.

‘Trump’s courageous and correct decision’

Bret Stephens (New York Times, 6/22/25) argued that bombing Iran without any evidence the country intended to build a nuclear weapon was “the essence of statesmanship.”

FAIR looked at all opinion pieces in the four papers that addressed Trump’s strikes on Iran, from June 21 through June 24. Forty-seven percent (17) explicitly praised Trump’s unauthorized act of war.

Many of these cheered the aggressive assertion of US power. The New York Times’ Bret Stephens (6/22/25) lauded “Trump’s Courageous and Correct Decision,” which “deserves respect, no matter how one feels about this president and the rest of his policies.” At the Washington Post, David Ignatius (6/22/25) offered similar praise under the headline, “Trump’s Iran Strike Was Clear and Bold,” and the Wall Street Journal’s editorial board (6/22/25) declared, “Trump Meets the Moment on Iran.”

USA Today (6/22/25) published columnist Nicole Russell’s “Trump Warned Iran. Then He Acted Boldly to Protect America.” The headline was later changed to an even more laudatory: “Trump Was Right to Bomb Iran. Even Democrats Will Be Safer Because of It.” In a Wall Street Journal guest column (6/24/25), Karen Elliott House celebrated the “restor[ation] of US deterrence and credibility.”

Some directly attempted to defend the strikes’ legality. In a Post guest column (6/23/25), Geoffrey Corn, Claire Finkelstein and Orde Kittrie claimed to explain “Why Trump Didn’t Have to Ask Congress Before Striking Iran.” The piece relied extensively on the playground rhetorical tool of if they did it, why can’t I?, confidently listing earlier US presidents’ attacks that defied constitutional law, as if past violations justify the current one.

They asserted that “the operation also derives support from international law as an exercise of collective self-defense in defense of Israel,” ignoring the fact that international law does not allow you to “defend” yourself against a country that hasn’t attacked you—let alone the illogical formulation of the US engaging in “self-defense” on behalf of another country.

For the Wall Street Journal‘s art department (6/24/25), war is peace.

USA Today columnist Dace Potas (6/22/25), who called the attacks “strategically the right move and a just action,” also defended the constitutionality of Trump’s strikes, attacking Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s call to impeach Trump over the strikes:

If the president is not able to respond to a hostile regime building weapons that could destroy entire American cities, then I’m not sure what else, short of an actual invasion of the homeland, would allow for him to act.

That’s the thing about self-defense, though—it’s supposed to involve an attack.

Journal columnist Gerard Baker (6/23/25), who called the attack “judicious and pragmatic,” likewise pointed to Iran’s nuclear program, claiming that “no one seriously doubts the Iran nuclear threat”—despite both US intelligence and the International Agency for Atomic Energy concluding otherwise.

Yet another angle came from Times columnist Thomas Friedman (6/22/25), who argued that the “Attacks on Iran Are Part of a Much Bigger Global Struggle”—between the forces of “inclusion,” who believe in “more decent, if not democratic, governance,” and the forces of “resistance,” who “thrive on resisting those trends because conflict enables them to keep their people down.” Friedman called Trump’s strikes “necessary” for the right side to “triumph” in this good-vs-evil struggle.

Questions without criticism

The New York Times (6/22/25) figures you can’t go wrong by asserting total ignorance.

Of the remaining opinion pieces, ten accepted the strikes as a fait accompli and offered analysis that mostly speculated about the future and offered no anti-bombing pushback.

For instance, the Wall Street Journal published a commentary (6/23/25) asking “Can Iran Strike Back Effectively?” A New York Times op-ed (6/22/25) by security consultant Colin P. Clarke speculated about “How Iran Might Strike Back.”

The Times also published columnist W.J. Hennigan’s piece (6/22/25) that warned that “We Have No Idea Where This War Will Go.” Hennigan speculated: “It’s almost certain we haven’t seen the end of US military action in this war,” but he did not indicate whether this might be a good or bad thing.

Others were slightly more wary, such as a Times op-ed (6/23/25) headlined “What Bombs Can’t Do In Iran.” The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s Karim Sadjadpour asked, “Will this extraordinary act of war strengthen Tehran’s authoritarians or hasten their demise?” Sadjadpour tells readers that “while military strikes may expose an authoritarian regime’s weaknesses, they rarely create the conditions necessary for lasting democratic change”—yet he offers support for both possible outcomes.

Similarly, the Washington Post (6/22/25) published a triple-bylined opinion piece debating the question: “Will the US/Iran Conflict Spin Out of Control?” Participant Jason Rezaian did not criticize the bombing itself, only the lack of strategy around it, judging that Trump’s idea of “decimating Iran’s defenses and then letting them stay in power to terrorize their citizens, dissidents and opponents around the world would be a massive failure” and concluding, “my concern is that there is no plan to speak of.”

Attacking Trump, supporting war

Criticizing Donald Trump’s decision-making process, USA Today‘s Rex Huppke (6/22/25) assures readers that “of course” he hopes the bombing of Iran is “successful.”

Of the seven articles that criticized Trump’s actions, more were critical of Trump and his personality or disregard of procedure than were opposed to the illegal and aggressive actions of an empire. Three of these came from USA Today’s Rex Huppke. His first column (6/21/25) argued that “Trump may have just hurled America into war because he was mad nobody liked his recent military parade.”

His second piece (6/22/25) accused Trump of starting the war based on “vibes,” and rightly attacked the credibility of the administration, citing the numerous contradictory or false statements from US and Israeli officials. However, that column made it clear that Huppke hoped for a successful strike on Iran, even as he acknowledged it could end in “disaster”:

If Trump’s bombing of Iran proves successful—and I, of course, hope it does—it’ll be dumb luck. But if it leads to disaster, it’ll be exactly what anyone paying attention to these reckless hucksters predicted.

At the New York Times, former Biden Secretary of State Antony Blinken wrote a guest column (6/24/25) under the headline: “Trump’s Iran Strike Was a Mistake. I Hope It Succeeds.” Blinken’s primary issue with Trump’s attack was that Blinken deemed it ineffective; his secondary concern was that his own State Department achievements were being overlooked: “Mr. Trump’s actions were possible only because of the work of the Obama and Biden administrations.”

‘International authoritarianism’

It’s telling that a piece (New York Times, 6/23/25) arguing that Trump’s airstrikes were illegal has to go on to explain why that’s bad.

Of the 36 editorials and opinion pieces published by the top papers on the Iran bombing, only three (8%) explicitly opposed the bombing on legal or moral grounds. The New York Times and USA Today ran opinions grounded in legal arguments. USA Today also published human rights attorney Yasmin Z. Vafa on the human toll of this war on the citizens of Iran.

In her Times op-ed (6/23/25), Yale Law School professor Oona A. Hathaway points out that the attacks were not only unconstitutional, but in violation of international law, as Trump did not seek approval from either Congress or the UN Security Council. Hathaway was the sole opinion writer to describe Trump’s illegal actions with the same diction usually reserved for America’s enemies:

The seeming rise of authoritarianism at home is precipitating a kind of international authoritarianism, in which the American president can unleash the most powerful military the world has ever known on a whim.

USA Today‘s Chris Brennan (6/24/25) also emphasized Trump’s lack of congressional approval under the headline: “There’s a Legal Way to Go to War. Trump Flouting the Constitution Isn’t It.”

The same day in USA Today (6/24/25), Vafa—an Iranian refugee herself—brought a human angle to this conflict that is unfortunately hard to come by in the top papers’ pages. She wrote: “This kind of violence doesn’t happen in theory. It happens in living rooms. In kitchens. In schoolyards and in hospitals.”

Vafa not only raised the US’s history of destabilization in the Middle East, she also contextualized these kinds of attacks’ role in creating the refugee crises that right-wingers then use to create moral panics. “We are here because you were there,” she wrote.

The people speak

The New York Times letters page (6/22/25) once again demonstrated that the paper is well to the right of its readership.

The New York Times (6/22/25) did publish a series of letters to the editor from their readers on “The Consequences of US Strikes in Iran.” Unlike the professional columnists, many of these readers were explicitly against the bombing. One letter began: “Once again our government has launched a war against a nation that has not attacked the United States.”

Another writer wrote:

Whether President Trump’s bombing of Iran’s nuclear facilities has postponed one danger or not, it has surely destroyed the effort to limit nuclear proliferation. The damage is incalculable.

Another wrote: “By crossing the line and attacking Iran, the United States should not be under the misconception that it has made a step toward peace.”

In fact, the only pro-bombing letter the Times published in the package was not written by an average citizen, but by Aviva Klompas, identified by the Times as “a former speechwriter for Israel.”

The Big Lie this time

Every big US aggression is sold by a Big Lie, told over and over again by policy makers and repeated ad nauseam in the press. US interventions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya and Ukraine have all been sold to the public based on Big Lies.

This time for US newspaper columnists, the Big Lie is twofold: firstly, that Iran was rejecting negotiations in favor of building a bomb; secondly, that Iran wants to build a bomb to destroy Israel. These lies rely not only on ignorance, but also on a media apparatus that repeats them until they’re accepted as an uncontested premise for all discussion.

As FAIR (10/17/17, 6/23/25) has described in the past, these claims have no basis in fact. Iran, which has long been in favor of a nuclear weapons–free Middle East, has attempted to negotiate a stable deal with the West for over a decade. Hindering this are Israel’s insistence on its undeclared nuclear arsenal, as well as both Trump and Biden’s rejection of the deal negotiated under Obama. Even if that weren’t the case, there’s no indication whatsoever that Iran, should it produce a nuclear bomb, would commit national suicide by attacking Israel with it.

These misrepresentations are made all the more egregious by the fact that there is a Mideastern country that has rejected the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which occupies neighboring lands under military dictatorship, regularly attacks and violates treaties with its neighbors, has proven repeatedly to be a bad-faith negotiator, is currently committing an internationally recognized genocide, and does all this in the name of rights given to them by God. That country is Israel. If the columnists at leading US newspapers had any consistency, they would be calling for Trump to launch a surprise attack on Israel’s nuclear facilities and stockpiles.

But they don’t do this, because they either don’t know or don’t care about the relevant history. They’re all willing to uncritically manufacture consent for the US empire.

This content originally appeared on FAIR and was authored by Bryce Greene.

Can Iran Use Sectarian Violence In Syria To Mount A Comeback?

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty — Wed, 23 Jul 2025 14:43:13 +0000

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and was authored by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

Trump’s Latin American Policies Go South

John Perry and Roger D. Harris — Wed, 23 Jul 2025 14:00:03 +0000

With the Trump imperium passing the half-year mark, the posture of the US empire is ever clearer. Whether animated by “America First” or globalism, the objective remains “full spectrum dominance.” And now with the neocon capture of the Democrats, there are no guardrails from the so-called opposition party.

Call it the “new cold war,” the “beginning of World War III,” or – in Trump’s words – “endless war,” this is the era that the world has entered. The US/Zionist war against Iran has paused, but no one has any illusions that it is over. And it won’t likely be resolved until one side decisively and totally prevails. Ditto for the proxy war with Russia in Ukraine. Likely the same with Palestine, where the barbarity of war worsened to genocide. Meanwhile, since Obama’s “pivot to Asia,” the empire is building up for war with China.

In Latin America and the Caribbean, the empire’s war on the world assumes a hybrid form. The carnage is less apparent because the weapons take the form of “soft power” – sanctions, tariffs, and deportations. These can have the same lethal consequences as bombs, only less overt.

Making the world unsafe for socialism

Some Western leftists vilify the defensive measures that Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua must take to protect themselves from the empire’s regime-change schemes. In contrast, Washington clearly understands that these countries pose “threats of a good example” to the empire. Each subsequent US president, from Obama on, has certified them as “extraordinary threats to US national security.” Accordingly, they are targeted with the harshest coercive measures.

In this war of attrition, historian Isaac Saney uses the example of Cuba to show how any misstep by the revolutionary government or societal deficiency is exaggerated and weaponized. The empire’s siege, he explains, is not merely an attempt to destabilize the economy but is a deliberate strategy of suffocation. The empire aims to instigate internal discontent, distort people’s perception of the government, and ultimately erode social gains.

While Cuba is affected the worst by the hybrid war, both Venezuela and Nicaragua have also been damaged. All three countries have seen the “humanitarian parole” for their migrants in the US come to an end. Temporary Protected Status (TPS) was also withdrawn for Venezuelans and Nicaraguans. The strain of returning migrants, along with cuts in the remittances they had sent (amounting to a quarter of Nicaragua’s GDP), further impacts their respective economies.

Higher-than-average tariffs are threatened on Venezuelan and Nicaraguan exports to the US, together with severe restrictions on Caracas’s oil exports. Meanwhile, the screws have been tightened on the six-decade US blockade of Cuba with disastrous humanitarian consequences.

However, all three countries are fighting back. They are forming new trade alliances with China and elsewhere. Providing relief to Cuba, Mexico has supplied oil, and China is installing solar panel farms to address the now-daily power outages. High levels of food security in Venezuela and Nicaragua have strengthened their ability to resist US sanctions, while Caracas successfully defeated one of Washington’s harshest migration measures by securing the release of 252 of its citizens who had been incarcerated in El Salvador’s torturous CECOT prison.

Venezuela’s US-backed far-right opposition is in disarray. The first Trump administration had recognized the “interim presidency” of Juan Guaidó, followed by the Biden administration declaring Edmundo González the winner of Venezuela’s last presidential election. But the current Trump administration has yet to back González, de facto recognizing Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

Nicaragua’s right-wing opposition is also reeling from a side-effect of Trump’s harsh treatment of migrants – many are returning voluntarily to a country claimed by the opposition to be “unsafe,” while US Homeland Security has even extolled their home country’s recent achievements. And some of Trump’s prominent Cuban-American supporters are now questioning his “maximum pressure” campaign for going too far.

Troubled waters for the Pink Tide

The current progressive wave, the so-called Pink Tide, was initiated by Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s landslide victory in 2018. His MORENA Party successor, Claudia Sheinbaum, won by an even greater margin in 2024. Mexico’s first woman president has proven to be perhaps the world’s most dignified and capable sparring partner with the buffoon in the White House, who has threatened tariffs, deportations, military interdictions, and more on his southern neighbor.

Left-leaning presidents Gabriel Boric in Chile and Gustavo Petro in Colombia are limited to a single term. Both have faced opposition-aligned legislatures and deep-rooted reactionary power blocs. Chilean Communist Party candidate Jeanette Jara is favored to advance to the second-round presidential election in November 2025, but will face a challenging final round if the right unifies, as is likely, around an extremist candidate.

As the first non-rightist in Colombia’s history, Petro has had a tumultuous presidential tenure. He credibly accuses his former foreign minister of colluding with the US to overthrow him. However, the presidency could well revert to the right in the May 2026 elections.

Boric, Petro, Uruguay’s Yamandú Orsi, and Brazil’s Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva met in July as the region’s center-left presidents, with an agenda of dealing with Trump, promoting multilateralism, and (we can assume) keeping their distance from the region’s more left-wing governments.

With shaky popularity ratings, Lula will likely run for reelection in October 2026. As head of the region’s largest economy, Lula plays a world leadership role, chairing three global summits in a year. Yet, with less than a majority legislative backing, Lula has triangulated between Washington and the Global South, often capitulating to US interests (as in his veto of BRICS membership for Nicaragua and Venezuela). Regardless, Trump is threatening Brazil with a crippling 50% export tariff and is blatantly interfering in the trial of former right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro, accused of insurrection. So far, Trump’s actions have backfired, arousing anger among Brazilians. Lula commented that Trump was “not elected to be emperor of the world.”

In 2021, Honduran President Xiomara Castro took over a narcostate subservient to Washington and has tried to push the envelope to the left. Being constitutionally restricted to one term, Castro hands the Libre party candidacy in November’s election to former defense minister Rixi Moncada, who faces a tough contest with persistent US interference.

Bolivia’s ruling Movement Toward Socialism (MAS) Party is embroiled in a self-destructive internal conflict between former President Evo Morales and his former protégé and current President, Luis Arce. The energized Bolivian right wing is spoiling for the August 17^th presidential election.

Israeli infiltration accompanies US military penetration

Analyst Joe Emersberger notes: “Today, all geopolitics relates back to Gaza where the imperial order has been unmasked like never before.” Defying Washington, the Hague Group met in Colombia for an emergency summit on Gaza to “take collective action grounded in international law.” On July 16, regional states – Bolivia, Cuba, Colombia, Nicaragua, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines – endorsed the pledge to take measures in support of Palestine, with others likely to follow. Brazil will join South Africa’s ICJ complaint against Israel.

At the other end of the political spectrum are self-described “world’s coolest dictator” Nayib Bukele of El Salvador and confederates Javier Milei of Argentina and Daniel Noboa of Ecuador. As well as cozying up to Trump, they devotedly support Israel, which has been instrumental in enabling the most brutal reactionaries in the region. Noboa duly tells Israel’s Netanyahu that they “share the same enemies.”

In February, the US Southern Command warned: “Time is not on our side.” The perceived danger is “methodical incursion” into our “neighborhood” by both Russia and China. Indeed, China has become the region’s second-largest trading partner after the US, and even right-wing governments are reluctant to jeopardize their relations with Beijing. The empire’s solution is to “redouble our efforts to nest military engagement,” using humanitarian assistance as “an essential soft power tool.”

Picking up where Biden left off, Trump has furthered US military penetration, notably in Ecuador, Guyana, Brazil, Panama, and Argentina. The pandemic of narcotics trafficking, itself a product of US-induced demand, has been a Trojan Horse for militarist US intervention in Haiti, Ecuador, Peru, and threatened in Mexico.

In Panama, President José Mulino’s obeisance to Trump’s ambitions to control the Panama Canal and reduce China’s influence provoked massive protests. Trump’s collaboration in the genocide of Palestinians motivated Petro to declare that Colombia must leave the NATO alliance and keep its distance from “militaries that drop bombs on children.” Colombia had been collaborating with NATO since 2013 and became the only Latin American global partner in 2017.

Despite Trump’s bluster – what the Financial Times calls “imperial incontinence” – his administration has produced mixed results. While rightist political movements have basked in Trump’s fitful praise, his escalating coercion provokes resentment against Yankee influence. Resistance is growing, with new alliances bypassing Washington. As the empire’s grip tightens, so too does the resolve of those determined to break free from it.

The post Trump’s Latin American Policies Go South first appeared on Dissident Voice.

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by John Perry and Roger D. Harris.

Keep fighting for a nuclear-free Pacific, Helen Clark warns Greenpeace over global storm clouds

APR editor — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 11:00:11 +0000

Asia Pacific Report

Former New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark warned activists and campaigners in a speech on the deck of the Greenpeace environmental flagship Rainbow Warrior III last night to be wary of global “storm clouds” and the renewed existential threat of nuclear weapons.

Speaking on her reflections on four decades after the bombing of the original Rainbow Warrior on 10 July 1985, she said that New Zealand had a lot to be proud of but the world was now in a “precarious” state.

Clark praised Greenpeace over its long struggle, challenging the global campaigners to keep up the fight for a nuclear-free Pacific.

“For New Zealand, having been proudly nuclear-free since the mid-1980s, life has got a lot more complicated for us as well, and I have done a lot of campaigning against New Zealand signing up to any aspect of the AUKUS arrangement because it seems to me that being associated with any agreement that supplies nuclear ship technology to Australia is more or less encouraging the development of nuclear threats in the South Pacific,” she said.

“While I am not suggesting that Australians are about to put nuclear weapons on them, we know that others do. This is not the Pacific that we want.

“It is not the Pacific that we fought for going back all those years.

“So we need to be very concerned about these storm clouds gathering.”

Lessons for humanity
Clark was prime minister 1999-2008 and served as a minister in David Lange’s Labour government that passed New Zealand’s nuclear-free legislation in 1987 – two years after the Rainbow Warrior bombing by French secret agents.

She was also head of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in 2009-2017.

“When you think 40 years on, humanity might have learned some lessons. But it seems we have to repeat the lessons over and over again, or we will be dragged on the path of re-engagement with those who use nuclear weapons as their ultimate defence,” Clark told the Greenpeace activists, crew and guests.

“Forty years on, we look back with a lot of pride, actually, at how New Zealand responded to the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior. We stood up with the passage of the nuclear-free legislation in 1987, we stood up with a lot of things.

“All of this is under threat; the international scene now is quite precarious with respect to nuclear weapons. This is an existential threat.”

Nuclear-free Pacific reflections with Helen Clark Video: Greenpeace

In response to Tahitian researcher and advocate Ena Manuireva who spoke earlier about the legacy of a health crisis as a result of 30 years of French nuclear tests at Moruroa and Fangataufa, she recalled her own thoughts.

“It reminds us of why we were so motivated to fight for a nuclear-free Pacific because we remember the history of what happened in French Polynesia, in the Marshall Islands, in the South Australian desert, at Maralinga, to the New Zealand servicemen who were sent up in the navy ships, the Rotoiti and the Pukaki, in the late 1950s, to stand on deck while the British exploded their bombs [at Christmas Island in what is today Kiribati].

“These poor guys were still seeking compensation when I was PM with the illnesses you [Ena] described in French Polynesia.

Former NZ prime minister Helen Clark . . . “I remember one of the slogans in the 1970s and 1980s was ‘if it is so safe, test them in France’.” Image: Asia Pacific Report

Testing ground for ‘others’
“So the Pacific was a testing ground for ‘others’ far away and I remember one of the slogans in the 1970s and 1980s was ‘if it is so safe, test them in France’. Right? It wasn’t so safe.

“Mind you, they regarded French Polynesia as France.

“David Robie asked me to write the foreword to the new edition of his book, Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage and Legacy of the Rainbow Warrior, and it brought back so many memories of those times because those of you who are my age will remember that the 1980s were the peak of the Cold War.

“We had the Reagan administration [in the US] that was actively preparing for war. It was a terrifying time. It was before the demise of the Soviet Union. And nuclear testing was just part of that big picture where people were preparing for war.

“I think that the wonderful development in New Zealand was that people knew enough to know that we didn’t want to be defended by nuclear weapons because that was not mutually assured survival — it was mutually assured destruction.”

New Zealand took a stand, Clark said, but taking that stand led to the attack on the Rainbow Warrior in Auckland harbour by French state-backed terrorism where tragically Greenpeace photographer Fernando Pereira lost his life.

“I remember I was on my way to Nairobi for a conference for women, and I was in Zimbabwe, when the news came through about the bombing of a boat in Auckland harbour.

‘Absolutely shocking’
“It was absolutely shocking, we had never experienced such a thing. I recall when I returned to New Zealand, [Prime Minister] David Lange one morning striding down to the party caucus room and telling us before it went public that it was without question that French spies had planted the bombs and the rest was history.

“It was a very tense time. Full marks to Greenpeace for keeping up the struggle for so long — long before it was a mainstream issue Greenpeace was out there in the Pacific taking on nuclear testing.

“Different times from today, but when I wrote the foreword for David’s book I noted that storm clouds were gathering again around nuclear weapons and issues. I suppose that there is so much else going on in a tragic 24 news cycle — catastrophe day in and day out in Gaza, severe technology and lethal weapons in Ukraine killing people, wherever you look there are so many conflicts.

“The international agreements that we have relied are falling into disrepair. For example, if I were in Europe I would be extremely worried about the demise of the intermediate range missile weapons pact which has now been abandoned by the Americans and the Russians.

“And that governs the deployment of medium range missiles in Europe.

“The New Start Treaty, which was a nuclear arms control treaty between what was the Soviet Union and the US expires next year. Will it be renegotiated in the current circumstances? Who knows?”

With the Non-proliferation Treaty, there are acknowledged nuclear powers who had not signed the treaty — “and those that do make very little effort to live up to the aspiration, which is to negotiate an end to nuclear weapons”.

Developments with Iran
“We have seen recently the latest developments with Iran, and for all of Iran’s many sins let us acknowledge that it is a party to the Non-Proliferation Treaty,” she said.

“It did subject itself, for the most part, to the inspections regime. Israel, which bombed it, is not a party to the treaty, and doesn’t accept inspections.

“There are so many double standards that people have long complained about the Non-Proliferation Treaty where the original five nuclear powers are deemed okay to have them, somehow, whereas there are others who don’t join at all.

“And then over the Ukraine conflict we have seen worrying threats of the use of nuclear weapons.”

Clark warned that we the use of artificial intelligence it would not be long before asking it: “How do I make a nuclear weapon?”

“It’s not so difficult to make a dirty bomb. So we should be extremely worried about all these developments.”

Then Clark spoke about the “complications” facing New Zealand.

Mangareva researcher and advocate Ena Manuireva . . . “My mum died of lung cancer and the doctors said that she was a ‘passive smoker’. My mum had not smoked for the last 65 years.” Image: Asia Pacific Report

Teariki’s message to De Gaulle
In his address, Ena Manuireva started off by quoting the late Tahitian parliamentarian John Teariki who had courageously appealed to General Charles De Gaulle in 1966 after France had already tested three nuclear devices:

“No government has ever had the honesty or the cynical frankness to admit that its nuclear tests might be dangerous. No government has ever hesitated to make other peoples — preferably small, defenceless ones — bear the burden.”

“May you, Mr President, take back your troops, your bombs, and your planes.

“Then, later, our leukemia and cancer patients would not be able to accuse you of being the cause of their illness.

“Then, our future generations would not be able to blame you for the birth of monsters and deformed children.

“Then, you would give the world an example worthy of France . . .

“Then, Polynesia, united, would be proud and happy to be French, and, as in the early days of Free France, we would all once again become your best and most loyal friends.”

‘Emotional moment’
Manuireva said that 10 days earlier, he had been on board Rainbow Warrior III for the ceremony to mark the bombing in 1985 that cost the life of Fernando Pereira – “and the lives of a lot of Mā’ohi people”.

“It was a very emotional moment for me. It reminded me of my mother and father as I am a descendant of those on Mangareva atoll who were contaminated by those nuclear tests.

“My mum died of lung cancer and the doctors said that she was a ‘passive smoker’. My mum had not smoked for the last 65 years.

“French nuclear testing started on 2 July 1966 with Aldebaran and lasted 30 years.”

He spoke about how the military “top brass fled the island” when winds start blowing towards Mangareva. “Food was ready but they didn’t stay”.

“By the time I was born in December 1967 in Mangareva, France had already exploded 9 atmospheric nuclear tests on Moruroa and Fangataufa atolls, about 400km from Mangareva.”

France’s most powerful explosion was Canopus with 2.6 megatonnes in August 1968. It was a thermonuclear hydrogen bomb — 150 times more powerful than Hiroshima.

Greenpeace Aotearoa executive director Russel Norman . . . a positive of the campaign future. Image: Asia Pacific Report

‘Poisoned gift’
Manuireva said that by France “gifting us the bomb”, Tahitians had been left “with all the ongoing consequences on the people’s health costs that the Ma’ohi Nui government is paying for”.

He described how the compensation programme was inadequate, lengthy and complicated.

Manuireva also spoke about the consequences for the environment. Both Moruroa and Fangataufa were condemned as “no go” zones and islanders had lost their lands forever.

He also noted that while France had gifted the former headquarters of the Atomic Energy Commission (CEP) as a “form of reconciliation” plans to turn it into a museum were thwarted because the building was “rife with asbestos”.

“It is a poisonous gift that will cost millions for the local government to fix.”

Greenpeace Aotearoa executive director Russel Norman spoke of the impact on the Greenpeace organisation of the French secret service bombing of their ship and also introduced the guest speakers and responded to their statements.

A Q and A session was also held to round off the stimulating evening.

A question during the open mike session on board the Rainbow Warrior. Image: Asia Pacific Report

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

[Stephen Kinzer] Iran: The 1953 American Coup

info@alternativeradio.org — Thu, 17 Jul 2025 21:00:37 +0000

Regime change started long ago. The new version is just a change of clothes. Dwight Eisenhower was president when the U.S. overthrew the popular democratic government of Mohammad Mossadegh in Iran in 1953. What was Mossadegh’s transgression? He wanted Iran’s oil to benefit the Iranian people. The coup brought the Shah back from exile and installed him in power. What ensued was 25 years of tyranny and repression culminating in Ayatollah Khomeini’s Islamic Revolution. The Iran coup was a pivotal event of the 20th century. Virtually all Iranians know about it. Yet most Americans haven’t even heard of it. The U.S. professes that it supports democracy in the Middle East, yet when there was a democratic government in Iran, Washington destroyed it. Recorded at the Pacific Asia Museum.

This content originally appeared on AlternativeRadio and was authored by info@alternativeradio.org.

Israel uses Iran war to escalate assaults on press

Mohamed Mandour — Wed, 09 Jul 2025 18:37:12 +0000

Nazareth, Israel, July 9, 2025—Israel’s 12-day war with Iran provided Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government with an opportunity to step up its assault on the press — a trend that has since continued apace.

“Media freedom is often a casualty of war, and Israel’s recent war with Iran is no exception. We have seen Israeli authorities use security fears to increase censorship, while extremist right-wing politicians have demonized the media, legitimizing attacks on journalists,” said CPJ Regional Director Sara Qudah. “Despite hopes that we will see a ceasefire in Gaza this week, Israel’s government appears relentless in its determination to silence those who report critically on its military actions.”

After Haaretz newspaper published an interview with Israeli soldiers who said they were ordered to shoot at unarmed Gazans waiting for food aid, a mayor in southern Israel threatened to shut shops selling the popular liberal paper. This follows the government’s decision last year to stop advertising with Haaretz, accusing it of “incitement.”

Authorities are also pushing ahead with a bill to dismantle the public broadcaster, Kan, and shutter its news division, the country’s third-largest news channel. Meanwhile, government support has seen the right-wing Channel 14 grow in popularity.

Aluf Benn, editor-in-chief of Haaretz. (Photo: Courtesy of Benn)

The hostile climate fueled by Israel’s right-wing government has emboldened settler violence against journalists. On July 5, two Deutsche Welle (DW) reporters wearing press vests were attacked by Israeli settlers in Sinjil, West Bank — an incident condemned by Germany’s ambassador and the German Journalists’ Association, which called it “unacceptable that radical settlers are hunting down media professionals with impunity.” Reporters from AFP, The New York Times, and The Washington Post were also present. Palestinian journalists had to flee.

“War is a dangerous time for civil rights – rights that Netanyahu’s government is actively undermining as it moves toward dismantling democracy,” Haaretz Editor-in-Chief Aluf Benn told CPJ.

‘Broadcasts that serve the enemy’

During the Israel-Iran war of June 13 to 24, anti-press government actions included:

A June 18 military order requiring army approval before broadcasting the aftermath of Iranian attacks on Israeli military sites. Haaretz reported that this order was illegal as it was not made public in the official government gazette or authorized by a parliamentary committee.

On June 19, security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir called on Israelis who see people watching “Al Jazeera broadcasts or reporters” to report their sightings to authorities. Israel shut down the Qatari-based outlet in May 2024, and six of its journalists have been killed while reporting on Israel’s war in Gaza. Many Arabs in Israel still watch Al Jazeera broadcasts, and former Israeli officials have appeared on the network since the shutdown.

“These are broadcasts that serve the enemy,” Ben-Gvir said.

On June 20, Ben-Gvir and communications minister Shlomo Karhi issued a directive that broadcasting from impact sites without written permission would be a criminal offense.

When Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara demanded that the ministers explain the legal basis for their announcement, the ministers said she was “trying to thwart” their efforts to ensure that foreign media “don’t help the enemy target us.”

On June 23, Haaretz reported that the police’s legal adviser issued an order giving officers sweeping powers to censor journalists reporting from the impact sites.

“This directive, which primarily targets foreign media and joins a wave of police and ministerial efforts to obstruct news coverage, is unlawful and infringes on basic rights,” Tal Hassin, an attorney with Israel’s biggest human rights group, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI), told CPJ.

ACRI petitioned the Attorney General, arguing that the police adviser did not have the legal authority to issue such an order. It has not received a response.

Journalists censored, detained, and abused

CPJ subsequently documented at least four incidents involving journalists who were abused and blocked from reporting.

On June 20, police stopped a live broadcast from Tel Aviv by Turkish state-owned broadcaster TRT’s correspondent Mücahit Aydemir, although he told the officers he had the required permits, including authorization from the military censor. For several days afterwards, Aydemir received “unsettling phone calls” from unknown Hebrew-speakers, he told CPJ.

Civilian volunteer squad leader and rapper Yoav Eliasi (foreground, left), known as “The Shadow,” and other squad members select photographers at the scene of an Iranian missile attack in Tel Aviv on June 22, 2025. (Photo: Oren Ziv)

On June 21, privately owned Channel 13’s journalist Ali Mughrabi and a camera operator, who declined to be named, citing fear of reprisals, were expelled from a drone crash site in Beit She’an, northern Israel, despite showing their press accreditation. During a live broadcast, Deputy Mayor Oshrat Barel questioned their credentials, shoved the cameraperson, and ordered them to leave. She later apologized.

“What we’re experiencing isn’t just about the media — it’s about citizenship,” Mughrab, an Israeli citizen of Palestinian origin, told CPJ.

On June 22, a civilian police volunteer squad, led by far-right activist and rapper Yoav Eliasi, known as “The Shadow,” detained three Jerusalem-based, Arab Israeli journalists and one international journalist, after separating them from their non-Arab colleagues outside a building in Tel Aviv that had been damaged by an Iranian strike.

Mustafa Kharouf and Amir Abed Rabbo from the Turkish state-owned Anadolu Agency, Ahmad Gharabli, with Agence France-Presse news agency, and another journalist who declined to be named, citing fear of reprisal, were held for three hours.

Kharouf told CPJ, the unit asked them who was “Israeli” and allowed the non-Arab journalists to leave.

“One officer accused us of working for Al Jazeera, even though we showed official press credentials,” said Kharouf.

“When I showed my ID, they told me I wasn’t allowed to film because I’m not Israeli – even though they treat us like Israelis when it comes to taxes,” Gharabli told CPJ.

Armed volunteer squads have rapidly grown from four before the October 2023 Hamas attack to around 900 new units, an expansion that “had negative effects on Arab-Jewish relations,” Dr. Ark Rudnitzky of Tel Aviv University told CPJ in an email. Squad members “tend to suspect an Arab solely because they are Arab,” he said.

“It was clear they targeted the journalists because they were Arab,” said Israeli journalist and witness Oren Ziv, who wrote about the incident.

The Central District Police told CPJ via email that the journalists were “evacuated from the building for security reasons related to their safety and were directed to alternative reporting locations.”

On June 24, Channel 13 correspondent Paz Robinson and a camera operator who declined to be named were reporting on a missile strike in southern Israel’s Be’er Sheva when a woman shouted that he was a “Nazi” and “Al Jazeera” and blocked him from filming, screaming, “You came to celebrate over dead bodies.”

“After I saw the woman wasn’t backing down, I decided to leave. I’m not here to fight with my own people. I’m not a politician. I came to cover events,” Robinson told CPJ.

Earlier in the war with Iran, CPJ documented eight incidents in which 14 journalists faced harassment, obstruction, equipment confiscation, incitement, or forced removal by the police.

The Israel Police Spokesperson’s Unit told CPJ via email that police “made significant efforts to facilitate safe, meaningful access for journalists” during the war with Iran. “While isolated misunderstandings may occur…case was addressed promptly and professionally.”

CPJ’s emails to the Attorney General, Israel Defense Forces’ North America Media Desk, Ben-Gvir, and Shlomo requesting comment did not receive any replies.

Kholod Massalha is a CPJ consultant on Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory and a researcher with years of experience in press freedom and freedom of expression issues.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Mohamed Mandour.

Iranian-linked hacker group targets Iran International journalists in cyberattack

CPJ Staff — Wed, 09 Jul 2025 17:37:50 +0000

Paris, July 9, 2025—Hackers linked with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) infiltrated the Telegram accounts of current and former staff of the outlet Iran International in a targeted campaign to intimidate and silence journalists, the London-based broadcaster reported Tuesday.

The breaches were linked to two coordinated attacks – one in the summer of 2024 and another in January 2025 – that used malware-laced Telegram messages to infect staff devices, DW Persian reported.

“The use of spyware to harass journalists represents a chilling escalation in Iran’s campaign to intimidate and silence independent media,” said CPJ Regional Director Sara Qudah. “No journalist should be subjected to digital surveillance or coercion. Iran must immediately cease its transnational repression of the press.”

The operation was attributed to Banished Kitten, also known as Storm-0842, Dune, or Hanzaleh, a cyber unit within Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence led by Yahya Hosseini Panjkhi, whose identity was first revealed by the outlet’s reporting.

Outlets reported that the hacker group Hanzaleh claimed responsibility for the attack. The group has not confirmed the claim on any of its affiliated platforms.

The outlet said it has strengthened digital security and alerted authorities following both attacks.

“We remain resolute in our mission to deliver accurate, uncensored news to our audience, and we will not allow these threats — online or offline — to disrupt our work. These attempts to intimidate us will not succeed,” the channel added.

Separately, Iranian lawmakers are considering a bill that press freedom advocates warn could criminalize independent journalism tied to foreign outlets as it imposes harsh penalties, including death, for alleged collaboration with “hostile” states or media. It would also allow courts to jail journalists and bar them from public service if their reporting is deemed to cause “fear and panic” or harm “national security.”

CPJ’s email to the Iranian mission to the United Nations in New York requesting comment on the cyberattacks and the proposed law did not receive a response.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by CPJ Staff.

‘The Goal Is to Put the Words “Iran” and “Nuclear” in the Same Sentence’: CounterSpin interview with Adam Johnson on media in war mode

Janine Jackson — Tue, 08 Jul 2025 20:15:54 +0000

Janine Jackson interviewed Citations Needed‘s Adam Johnson about media in war mode for the June 27, 2025, episode of CounterSpin. This is a lightly edited transcript.

https://media.blubrry.com/counterspin/content.blubrry.com/counterspin/CounterSpin250627Johnson.mp3

AP (via PBS, 6/26/25)

Janine Jackson: We are recording June 26 in medias res, but AP’s latest gives us enough to start:

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine doubled down Thursday on how destructive the US attacks had been on Iran’s nuclear facilities, and described in detail the study and planning behind the bombing mission, but they stopped short of detailing how much the attack set back the nation’s nuclear program.

We hear also Trump saying, “I’m not happy with Israel because they have broken the ceasefire” that he, we hear, created, adding that Iran and Israel have been fighting “so long and so hard that they don’t know what the fuck they’re doing.” I can’t say that word on the radio, says the FCC, but Trump can say it because—well, you and I don’t know.

The US went to war with Iran last week without congressional, much less public, approval. But most of us only know what we know through corporate news media, and that’s a problem.

Joining us now is Adam Johnson, media analyst and co-host of the podcast Citations Needed. He’s coauthor, with In These Times contributing editor Sarah Lazare, of a couple of recent relevant pieces in In These Times. And he joins us now by phone from Illinois. Welcome back to CounterSpin, Adam Johnson.

Adam Johnson: Thank you for having me.

JJ: So we don’t know what’s going to happen with Iran. Maybe we’re not at war, that would be great, but sadly, we do know what corporate news media will do, because they’ll do what they do. We saw them pull out the playbook, scratch out Iraq, Afghanistan, Eastasia, and write in Iran; or maybe scratch down deeper to get to Iran 1953, and here we go again. It’s many things, but one thing for sure that it is is predictable.

Column (6/22/25)

AJ: So the primary thing that the news media keep doing, pundits and reporters alike, specifically Jake Tapper at CNN, which we wrote about, is they keep saying “nuclear weapons program.” And the goal, generally, is just to put the words “Iran” and “nuclear” in the same sentence, over and over and over again.

The public will largely fill in the blanks, and the media make no effort to even really point out that they, in fact, don’t have a nuclear weapon, or a nuclear weapons program, which is a really important piece of context to know, but it’s almost never mentioned. And this is according to the US intelligence’s own assessment, DNI, CIA, 19 other different intelligence agencies, all came to the same conclusion, and have since 2007.

However, pundits repeatedly say “nuclear weapons program,” but it’s not a nuclear weapons program. And there’s several instances, like I said, of Jake Tapper saying it, several people in Congress have said it. You could say maybe it’s a slip of the tongue by accident, but when basically no one else on CNN but Jake Tapper does it, it doesn’t really seem like an accident; it seems like he’s very clearly making an assertion. Now, if Jake Tapper has access to secret, proprietary intelligence that the CIA doesn’t have, maybe he should tell them?

And what we saw in the buildup to Trump’s bombing of Iran, which we now know was largely theatrical, thank God, was that the sort of ticking time bomb scenario, that he and JD Vance and others were going to the media with, was obviously, by their own admission, and by the New York Times’ own reporting, not based on any new intelligence. It was “a reassessment of old intelligence,” I believe is how the New York Times put it. There’s another name for that: It’s called ideologically motivated bullshit.

But repeatedly, the CIA, which weirdly was pushing back on this, I guess to their credit, in the Wall Street Journal and CNN, was saying, No, no, no, no. Iran’s increased enriched uranium, but it’s just a bargaining chip. It’s a way of getting the US to come to the table so they can relieve these sanctions which have crippled their economy, the only mechanism they plausibly have to do that. But they made no decision. And even if they did make a decision to build a bomb, it would take upwards of three years.

So this is the context that is completely missing or overshadowed, and there’s going to be a poll coming out. I asked one of these progressive polling groups to add it, and I don’t know when it’s going to come out, but what I’d be curious to know is, what percentage of the American public thinks that Iran currently has a nuclear weapon? I suspect it’s probably 70-some odd, 80%.

Because, again, if you say the word “nuclear” and “Iran” over and over again, people are going to have that impression. They don’t believe—why would they have a civilian program? Even though, of course, over 30 countries have a civilian nuclear program but don’t have nuclear weapons; it’s pretty common. And that is just not part of how the public interprets it.

So the public is widely misled on this issue, which, again, gives the impression of some radical cartoon “terrorist” who’s going to blow up Tel Aviv or Manhattan.

New York Times (6/28/25)

Second to that, you have a lot of the New York Times opinion section, for example, rushing to delegitimize the government, citing a very dubious poll saying 80% of Iranians want regime change, when all other polls show the number is probably closer to 40 or 50.

And, of course, how that regime change happens is very contestable; a lot of people hate Trump, but they don’t want China to come bomb us. That’s a totally different claim, right?

You had laundering of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, which is a pro-Israel think tank, you had laundering of their claims that Iran is now housing the head of Al Qaeda. This is all a rehash, word for word, of Iraq War stuff.

So the New York Times was doing its part, as were some other outlets. But for the most part, the White House seems to have wanted a “cool bombing” PR thing. And then what some suspect, and I don’t know, this is just idle speculation, is that Israel was suffering more damage than people knew. And unlike bombing South Lebanon or Gaza, Iran can actually fight back, and Israel couldn’t sustain or couldn’t maintain its defense posture.

And so they basically used this as a way of getting a ceasefire that they needed anyway. But not by lack of trying on the part of the Washington Post, which actually called for Trump to keep bombing Iran in their editorial board.

FAIR.org (6/23/25)

JJ: There are so many questions that are under the table in this conversation, which is what makes me so upset with media. Media pretend they’re posing questions, and so we’re supposed to imagine that they’ve considered them deeply, but to just draw us back to basics: If the question is, “Should the US bomb Iran?” well, the answer is no, because that’s an overt violation of domestic and international law. The Constitution forbids it, the War Powers Resolution forbids it. But for corporate media, it’s like Bryce Greene just wrote for FAIR.org, the New York Times editorial board says, “America Must Not Rush Into a War Against Iran.” Of course we can do it, but let’s keep it cute, right? These are illegal actions.

AJ: They did the exact same thing in Iraq on March 2003. They published “No War With Iraq,” But if you read it, it says no war until you let the weapons inspectors do their job.

And then in the month prior, they published an editorial in February 2003, saying if Saddam Hussein doesn’t hand over his biological and chemical weapons, that the US has to use military force. Now that’s an argument for war, because of course Saddam Hussein didn’t have biological and chemical weapons.

JJ: So he can’t show them.

New York Times (6/12/25)

AJ: So, yeah, this is the scope of debate. The scope of debate is not, “Is it justified or moral? Why is Israel not a member of the Non-Proliferation Treaty? Why do they not have IAEA inspectors?” There’s this kind of faux-liberal world order narrative.

And that’s why the IAEA report was so powerful. It was a 19 to 16 vote, it was almost along party lines, kind of pro-US/Israel, pro-Russia/pro-China.

And then, quickly, the head of the IAEA says, “Oh, no, no, don’t interpret this as us saying that in any way Iran has made a decision or is somehow accelerating an actual nuclear program.” But that’s not how it was interpreted. Like the New York Times, which had it as a head story the day Israel started bombing Iran, to give it this veneer of liberal rules enforcement, which is obviously absurd, because Israel is not subject to any of these rules. It has an estimated 100 to 300 nukes.

So the scope of debate in these editorials and these opinion sections is not “Do we have any legitimacy to be bombing Iran?” but, “Is bombing Iran the best way to stop them from enriching uranium?” which, again, is entirely within their rights under international law. They have a right to a civilian nuclear program, like any other country does.

JJ: And this is the implicit undergirding of corporate media’s debate, that some countries are “good,” and they can have world-destroying weapons—declared, undeclared, whatever. And some countries are, as Van Jones put it on CNN, “not normal.” Because, if we are looking for “normal,” we got Donald Trump! We got masked agents abducting people off the street…

Adam Johnson: “The scope of debate…is not ‘Do we have any legitimacy to be bombing Iran?’ but ‘Is bombing Iran the best way to stop them from enriching uranium?’”

AJ: And we have the US and Israel openly operating a mass starvation campaign through human genocide, not even euphemism. So I guess this is what normal countries do. They have a daily ritual killing of scores, sometimes hundreds of Palestinians that are desperately lining up for grains of rice and wheat. That’s what normal countries do.

And, again, it’s very weird. There’s this zombie liberal “rules-based order” framing that is still going on, despite the fact that there’s an unfolding genocide that’s lost all pretense of international law. And so there’s this “Oh, the US has to be a policeman and police the world” faux-liberal framework that Trump doesn’t take seriously, Netanyahu doesn’t take seriously, but the media, especially the kind of prestige editorial pages and opinion pages, the New York Times and Washington Post, have to maintain that this is still a thing.

And, of course, people like Van Jones and Jake Tapper at CNN, this idea that there’s normal countries, there’s the goodies and then there’s the baddies. And so even though the goody countries are carrying out this almost cartoon evil, completely removing a people in whole or in part from Earth, and an actual explicit starvation campaign, not even hiding it—that’s what they’re calling it; it’s very weird.

In 2003, when they did this, there was a little more kind of post–Cold War credibility, and now there’s zero. And it’s very strange to watch the vestiges of that framework still go on, regardless of the new facts, and the fact that the majority of Americans think that there’s a genocide going on. No one outside of the Washington Post editorial board and the New York Times editorial board buys any of this shit.

JJ: Exactly. And just, finally, when you try to intervene, you find yourself making arguments at a level that you don’t accept. Like, “Well, they shouldn’t attack Iran’s nuclear capacities, nuclear facilities.” They said “nuclear weapons,” but then they can suck weapons out of it, and they know that it’s still going to be read the same way.

AJ: Yeah, it’s implied.

JJ: And then you also want to say, “Well wait, there’s no evidence of Iran having weaponry.” And then you want to say, “Well, Iran’s allowed to have nuclear weaponry.” And then you have to say, “If we acknowledged Israel’s nuclear weaponry, we wouldn’t legally be allowed to arm them.” So there’s all of these unspoken things, and yet, to silence them is the price of admission to get into “serious people conversation.” And that’s obviously why a lot of people clock out of elite media, because the price of admission is too high.

AJ: It is just not credible, to sit there and talk about international law; you have to have some kind of ostensibly high-minded liberal reason why you’re bombing a country. It’s just not credible, with what we’ve seen over the last two years. It’s very strange. And there’s a kind of think tank/media nexus that has to maintain this fiction, and watching them talk about Iran in such a way that was, again, every kind of terrorist cartoon, every “war on terror” framing, ticking time bomb…. Again, it doesn’t have to make any sense. It’s supposed to just be vaguely racist and vaguely feels true.

But the question in a lot of these panels was like, “What’s the best way to overthrow the regime?” You’d have a liberal on being like, “Well, we need to do the kind of meddling NED stuff and promote groups and this and that, and maybe even arm some ethnic minority groups, and maybe some Kurdish rebels.” And they’re openly just discussing how you overthrow a government.

It’s like, well, OK, so you see them as being illegitimate, can you just provide a list of the legitimate and illegitimate governments for us, and then we can figure out how the US is supposed to take out all the illegitimate ones? The whole thing is so casually chauvinist and casually imperial, they don’t even think about what they’re doing.

JJ: Exactly. Well, where do you see hope, as you are still contributing to media? You believe in journalism; where do you see daylight?

AJ: You know, I don’t. I think social media helps in some ways. Obviously I think it democratized how people receive news coming out of Gaza, but even that’s been manipulated. They see social media CEOs get dragged in front of Congress, and they get disciplined under the auspices of fighting polarization or hate speech or fake news, but it’s all to prevent media that doesn’t fall within that national security directive, quite explicitly.

So I don’t know. I think those algorithms are easily manipulated. I think that the ways in which, even though very few people actually read the New York Times editorial board or watch the Sunday shows, but the ways in which those ideological, agenda-setting institutions still manage to trickle down, and promote seriousness and the concept of seriousness and what is serious and what isn’t, is still very effective. And I don’t really see that changing anytime soon.

JJ: Corporate news media are so many steps removed from human understanding, but they convey so powerfully the air that this is how smart people think. And you can think differently, but that will make you marginal. And even critics are stuck at, like, “don’t drop bombs.” And it becomes this very stale, rehearsed conversation, and we already know where it leads.

And what corporate media won’t do is show the vigor and the work and the intelligence of diplomacy. Media could make peacemaking a heroic effort. Kristi Noem could cosplay as a negotiator. They could sell a different story if they wanted to, is my feeling. So I don’t feel like journalism per se is broken. I feel like it’s being mal-used.

Joy Reid (with Jamie Metzl) on CNN (6/25/25)

AJ: Yeah, I think to the extent to which they have done that, there’s been people saying, “Oh, the Obama deal was working.” And that’s true to an extent, but the Obama deal was still predicated on a totally arbitrary and unfair sanctions regime that is not applied to other countries. But it is correct that it was working, I mean, if one assumes that “working” is Iran not having enriched uranium. So there were some people saying that.

And Joy-Ann Reid I would like to highlight as someone who did a good job pushing back on a lot of the stuff on CNN. She was fired because of her reporting on Gaza at MSNBC. But she’s reappeared as a pundit on CNN to, I guess, play devil’s advocate, as it were. And she’s done a tremendous job, actually, going on CNN and punching down these idiots. That was kind of nice to see. It’s very rare, though. Who knows if they’ll ask her back after that.

But the debate is like, “how much should we sanction Iran?” on the far left end of the spectrum. The other end of the spectrum is “should we go for regime change and kill hundreds of thousands of people?” Instead of saying, well, OK, if we do believe in these high-minded liberal concepts of an international rules-based order, then why don’t we go back to the drawing table and come up with rules, and actually apply them equally? Come up with a system where the US allies and US client states and to a great extent the US—which of course doesn’t sign a bunch of different treaties, cluster munitions, the ICC, the International Criminal Court—why don’t we come up with an actual rules-based order, instead of just whatever the US State Department and its buddies in Tel Aviv and Riyadh think?

That would be something that would maybe be worth pursuing, but it’s not. It’s this kind of weird, zombie, fake-consistent order, where if you’re deemed as being hostile to US and Israeli and Saudi security architecture in the Middle East, you are seen as per se ontologically evil, and in urgent need of disciplining, and in urgent need of either regime change or bombing or crippling sanctions that ruin your economy.

And that’s just taken for granted. And this is not particularly liberal or very thoughtful or very worldly. It’s knee jerk. It’s chauvinist. It’s obviously oftentimes racist, and that’s what narrows the debate. There’s no sense that we should apply any of these standards to any other country.

JJ: All right then. Well, we’ll end there for now. We’ve been speaking with media analyst Adam Johnson. He’s co-host, with Nima Shirazi, of the podcast Citations Needed. His substack is called the Column, and his work on Iran and other issues, co-authored with Sarah Lazare, can be found at InTheseTimes.com. Thank you so much, Adam Johnson, for joining us this week on CounterSpin.

AJ: Thank you.

This content originally appeared on FAIR and was authored by Janine Jackson.

Academic slams NZ government over ‘compromised’ foreign policy

APR editor — Tue, 08 Jul 2025 10:43:27 +0000

Asia Pacific Report

A prominent academic has criticised the New Zealand coalition government for compromising the country’s traditional commitment to upholding an international rules-based order due to a “desire not to offend” the Trump administration.

Professor Robert Patman, an inaugural sesquicentennial distinguished chair and a specialist in international relations at the University of Otago, has argued in a contributed article to The Spinoff that while distant in geographic terms, “brutal violence in Gaza, the West Bank and Iran marks the latest stage in the unravelling of an international rules-based order on which New Zealand depends for its prosperity and security”.

Dr Patman wrote that New Zealand’s founding document, the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi, emphasised partnership and cooperation at home, and, after 1945, helped inspire a New Zealand worldview enshrined in institutions such as the United Nations and norms such as multilateralism.

Professor Robert Patman . . . “Even more striking was the government’s silence on President Trump’s proposal to own Gaza with a view to evicting two million Palestinian residents.” Image: University of Otago

“In the wake of Hamas’ terrorist attacks in Israel on October 7, 2023, the National-led coalition government has in principle emphasised its support for a lasting ceasefire in Gaza and the need for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict over the occupied territories of East Jerusalem, Gaza and the West Bank,” he wrote.

However, Dr Patman said, in practice this New Zealand stance had not translated into firm diplomatic opposition to the Netanyahu government’s quest to control Gaza and annex the West Bank.

“Nor has it been a condemnation of the Trump administration for prioritising its support for Israel’s security goals over international law,” he said.

Foreign minister Winston Peters had described the situation in Gaza as “simply intolerable” but the National-led coalition had little specific to say as the Netanyahu government “resumed its cruel blockade of humanitarian aid to Gaza in March and restarted military operations there”.

Silence on Trump’s ‘Gaza ownership’
“Even more striking was the government’s silence on President Trump’s proposal to own Gaza with a view to evicting two million Palestinian residents from the territory and the US-Israeli venture to start the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) in late May in a move which sidelined the UN in aid distribution and has led to the killing of more than 600 Palestinians while seeking food aid,” Dr Patman said.

While New Zealand, along with the UK, Australia, Canada and Norway, had imposed sanctions on two far-right Israeli government ministers, Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar ben Gvir, in June for “inciting extremist violence” against Palestinians — a move that was criticised by the Trump administration — it was arguably a case of very little very late.

“The Hamas terror attacks on October 7 killed around 1200 Israelis, but the Netanyahu government’s retaliation by the Israel Defence Force (IDF) against Hamas has resulted in the deaths of more than 56,000 Palestinians — nearly 70 percent of whom were women or children — in Gaza.

Over the same period, more than 1000 Palestinians had been killed in the West Bank as Israel accelerated its programme of illegal settlements there.

‘Strangely ambivalent’
In addition, the responses of the New Zealand government to “pre-emptive attacks” by Israel (13-25 June) and Trump’s United States (June 22) against Iran to destroy Iran’s nuclear capabilities were strangely ambivalent.

Despite indications from US intelligence and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that Iran had not produced nuclear weapons, Foreign Minister Peters had said New Zealand was not prepared to take a position on that issue.

Confronted with Trump’s “might is right” approach, the National-led coalition faced stark choices, Dr Patman said.

The New Zealand government could continue to fudge fundamental moral and legal issues in the Middle East and risk complicity in the further weakening of an international rules-based order it purportedly supports, “or it can get off the fence, stand up for the country’s values, and insist that respect for international law must be observed in the region and elsewhere without exception”.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

I Remember It, Well….

Michael Brenner — Sat, 05 Jul 2025 13:32:07 +0000

Fame is fleeting. We may be a Facebook celebrity today with ‘likes’ in the six digits, only to find as time goes by that the balance is shifting daily as we fade into the oblivion from which we emerged. Pretty much the same phenomenon is discernible in regard to the attention paid historical events. Images blur, and then most slip out of consciousness. It seems especially pronounced these days. Forgetfulness, whether due to a studied attempt to suppress the past or the kicking-in of self-defense instincts on a mass scale, reminds us of George Orwell’s “memory hole’ in 1984. As Orwell understood when he created the “memory hole” concept, the erasure or sublimation of memory makes it easier to shape the present by controlling or editing history. Doing so also serves to preserve a mythic version of a country’s identity. Most broadly, a memory hole is any psychological mechanism for the alteration or disappearance of inconvenient or embarrassing past events. Orwell’s Ministry of Truth made sure that its manipulations were complete and irreversible. What we experience today is something less draconian and directed. Memories do survive, but they usually are vague and distorted. They are prone to be blended into benign fable.

These thoughts about the transitory nature of things arose while perusing a collection of old clippings. Let’s consider some of them.

Image: ASCF News

1. Quemoy & Matsu. For those youthful readers, they are two tiny islands lying just off the coast of China but occupied by the Nationalists ensconced on Taiwan under our protection. In the late 1950s, they were a hot topic. The issue of whether and how to defend them figured prominently in the Kennedy-Nixon debates – right up there with the ‘missile gap’ (paranoid fiction) and Nixon’s 5 o’clock shadow. Pundits concluded that the debates, along with Richard Daley’s creative arithmetic in tabulating the Cook County vote, put JFK in the White House. At the time, there was widespread fear that the dispute could be the flashpoint for war with Beijing issuing 1,500 or so ‘final warnings’ that we had better turn them over to the PRC – or else. Mention the words Quemoy and Matsu these days, and the only response would be a request for the newly opened restaurant’s address.

Quemoy & Matsu yesterday; the Spratleys today.

In 1958, the PRC was an enemy. Nowadays, it is a competitor – at worst. However, too many in Washington’s corridors of power ‘need’ an enemy – for strategic, material or emotional reasons. Russia and/or Iran do not suffice. For China’s uniqueness lies in its potential – based on its very success – to challenge Americans’ atavistic article of faith that the United States is destined to serve as the world’s paramount power and leading light. America must beat the Chinese in order to confirm that foundational truth.

2. Crucial breakthroughs in anti-submarine technology – by the Soviets. As the “balance-of-terror” became institutionalized with the appurtenances of MAD, mental space opened for a fresh source of worry. Since the Pentagon & friends cannot tolerate a threat vacuum, anonymous reports started to appear which noted with alarm that the critical pillar of the deterrent triad composed of nuclear submarines carrying MIRVED missiles was in danger of being menaced by the Russkis’ development of diabolically capable attack submarines. The Cassandras claimed that their deployments gave Moscow an incentive to launch a first strike at a time of crisis.

Outcome? Nothing consequential. Sober analysis showed that the risk was inflated, our 20,000+ warhead arsenal was kept intact, and then the USSR disappeared from the strategic map. Now, of course, Putin is taken to be the avatar of Khrushchev, Russia’s hypersonic missiles are reason/excuse to accelerate our own $1 trillion upgrade, and nobody talks about submarine launched ballistic missiles (SLBM) – much less their fanciful vulnerability. Yet, they are the ultimate factor ensuring the credibility of Mutual Assured Destruction.

There is no such thing as “nuclear superiority” between the great powers. The present ‘race’ to develop more refined missile delivery systems (which the Russian are ‘winning’) will not change that basic truth. For 75 years, military planners and analysts have bandied about a variety of ideas for ‘operationalizing’ nuclear weapons.

Fortunately, they never have been activated (TNWs a partial exception). No leader of a nuclear state has placed a hovering finger over the ‘button.’ Sanity ruled their thinking/emotions. That may now have changed given that sanity is no longer a requisite for being commander-in-chief of a nuclear power.

The one state that conceivably could use a nuclear explosive as a weapon of war is rabidly, fanatical Israel.

Fulda Gap

3. Fulda Gap. For decades, anyone with the slightest claim to expertise about national security and NATO was on intimate terms with the ‘Fulda gap.’ It refers to that portion of the North German plain that represented the shortest route for the Red Army to take on its way to the Channel. The term can have a strategic as well as a territorial definition. For the ‘gap’ also was the dividing line between the bulk of the American forces in Germany who were deployed south of it and the allied forces deployed mainly to the north of it. Hence, double vulnerability. Nightmare visions of 40 Soviet armored divisions pouring through the Fulda gap spawned several innovative ‘solutions.’ They included the deployment of thousands of tactical nuclear weapons (TNWs) in Western European available to staunch an otherwise irresistible Soviet advance overwhelming outnumbered, conventionally armed NATO troops. That was a Kennedy/McNamara initiative. The TNWs were deployed; some are still in place. Fortunately, the notion that this first-use resort to n-weapons could be operationalized without setting off massive strategic exchanges was never tested. Of course, we now know that the Kremlin never contemplated such a suicidal assault – as did a few sane heads back then.

Little has been learned, though. These days, the Pentagon and NATO routinely sound the alarm that Putin’s truncated Russia poses a similar threat – despite the loss of all its Warsaw Pact allies and its Eastern European bases, despite NATO’s advance deployments to the Russian borders with Poland, the Baltics, and Finland — despite the inconvenient geographical fact that Russia’s army is 1,000 kilometers farther away from the Fulda gap. That army took three years to gain a decisive advantage over NATO’s Ukrainian auxiliaries. Moreover, there is no conceivable motive for such a crackpot move. For Russians to reach the Fulda Gap these days, they depend on tour coaches. Nobody uses the term ‘Fulda Gap’ in Washington. It’s too awkward for our war planners, but the mentality survives and thrives. History can repeat itself: first as drama, then as farce.

4. Fantasy Provocations. In 1846, many American eyed enviously the Mexican territories North and West of the Rio Grande and Baja. Texans, who were still digesting the large morsel of real estate they had torn from Santa Ana, where among them – out of pure greed, and to gain ‘strategic depth’ I suppose. President James Polk, egged on by other hawkish empire-builders among the country’s political elite, was gung-ho for conquest. He was just looking for an excuse. There being none: he fabricated one. After Texas’ accession to the Union, a crisis was created by the Texans’ demand that the border be moved south from the Nueces River to the Rio Grande (lebensraum). When Mexican President Herrera balked, Polk ordered General (later President) Zachary Taylor to invade the disputed zone. Months later, the Mexicans dared to defend their territory. Polk raged that Mexico had “invaded our territory and shed American blood on American soil” – and sent to Congress an already drafted declaration of war.

Public opinion was divided (among the vocal opponents was Congressman Abraham Lincoln), but the motto Manifest Destiny and the willful Washington government triumphed. We invaded Mexico, defeated them, occupied Mexico City and forced them to hand over the vast territory that ran to the Pacific. Probably the biggest land grab in history. Hence, Hollywood, Santa Fe, and Los Vegas.

Greenland’s Destiny is now Manifest — in the eyes of the American Presidency. So, too, Canada.

Stolen Birthright: The U.S. Conquest and Exploitation of the Mexican People

In 1898, a vigorous America feeling its oats began flexing its muscles – in Central America, in the Caribbean, in the Pacific Basin. McKinley was President. Expansionists fixed a covetous eye on the residual Spanish possessions of Cuba, Puerto Rico and – farther afield – the Philippine Islands. Spain was a decaying state whose tattered bits of empire scattered around the globe it could not defend. All that the United States needed to take them over was an excuse. As in 1848, they manufactured one. Many of us still “remember the Maine” – the U.S. flagged ship that blew up in Havana Harbor. The U.S. accused the colonial authorities there of deliberately destroying the ship. There was no plausible reason for them to do so – but it wasn’t reason that prevailed. Historians have established beyond a doubt that the Maine was sunk by an explosion that was caused by a spontaneous combustion of grain stored in its hull. No more than there was reason to believe that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11 or the aluminum tubes were the crucial ingredients of his non-existence nuclear weapons program. The outcome of the Spanish-American War: we got the dubious places we prized. We suppressed a 6-year Philippino resistance to our occupation that left about 400,000 ‘natives’ dead and devastated the country, and 40 years later, we were gone. Teddy Roosevelt rode his fame as leader of the ‘Rough Riders’ into the White House.

In Panama, too, they speak Spanish.

In 1958, we embarked on an uncannily similar performance in Indochina. That gruesome story has many chapters, punctuated in the end by humiliation and failure. The most notable repeat element was the artful fabrication of an incident that was exploited as an excuse for war: the infamous Tonkin Gulf encounter. The short version is simple. Senior Washington officials, led by Robert McNamara and McGeorge Bundy, were pressing very hard for a massive escalation of the American military intervention. JFK resisted the pressure and documentary evidence now suggests that he indeed reached the tentative conclusion to begin a withdrawal after the 1964 election. LBJ was also hesitant, but more ambivalent and in a weaker political position. McNamara and Bundy in fact sent Johnson a written ultimatum: either take the measures we are advocating, or we will denounce you as a weakling on national security during the upcoming campaign. It was a proposal that he could not refuse. So, the hunt for an excuse that would sway public opinion and justify a major war in Asia was on. It was found in a naval incident off the coast of North Vietnam. The official story was that an American vessel had been fired on by a Vietnamese gunboat. That was beefed-up as the casus belli for the disproportionate American retaliation which produced millions of casualties (mostly civilian) in all of Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and among American forces (58,000 killed). The rest is a matter of record.

So, keep a gimlet eye on the Persian Gulf. Then again, recent events tell us that these days we don’t need a contrived excuse to attack a sovereign country on the other side of the world that poses no threat to the United States.

6. 50 METRICS
In November-December 2009, President Obama found himself in a dilemma. It was the failure of the American project to foster a friendly, democratic Afghanistan. The enormous investment of military forces, cash and political advice had not paid the expected dividends. The Kabul government was incompetent, corrupt and riddled by warlord rivalry. The Taliban insurgency, spurred back to life by the ham-handed occupation, was thriving. The counter-insurgency was stymied in a stalemate. Obama’s instincts pointed him towards a lowering of the United States’ profile in acceptance that our goals were unreachable. However, no one in the administration’s national security team shared this sentiment – except for Vice-President Biden.

Under the guidance of Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, the resisters formed a cabal to prevent Obama from acting on his instincts. It included Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Mike Mullin, CIA Director David Petraeus, our newly appointed commander in Afghanistan Stanley McCrystal and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. She was selected to act as the ‘frontman’ for political reasons that included her personal standing with the President. They pressed hard for a different strategy that entailed an expansion of the residual reduced force in country by some 35,000 and a doubling down on our commitment to pre-existing objectives. Obama set aside his misgivings and yielded to the pressure. To cover himself, he took three exceptional steps. One, he lowered the size of the escalation. Two, he composed an elaborate, quasi-legal document that spelled out the terms and conditions of the strategy. It stipulated the sequence of actions and set deadlines. All of the main protagonists were obliged to sign what was a strange sort of pre-nuptial contract. Finally, Obama included 50 metrics by which to measure progress/success in the strategy’s implementation. That was done in order to avoid the fudging of future assessments and serve as benchmarks for later decisions. The punditry and the media made much of the 50 metrics which were broadly viewed as a sign of the President’s diligence and rigorous, lawyerly mind. That lasted for about 10 days. The metrics never again were to be mentioned in any public setting – or, as far as we know – in any private setting either.

11 years and 3 administrations later, the war went on. Trump talked about a withdrawal – sort of. We didn’t leave. Desultory ‘peace’ talks between the Taliban and the debile Kabul government (complicated by the intrusion of ISIS fighters) meandered. So, were back to Richard Holbrooke’s definition of success: “We’ll know it when we see it.” For the Pentagon, ‘success’ was primarily a matter of ensuring that history doesn’t place an ‘L’ in the U.S. military’s record book. In the last weeks of his first administration, Trump conceded defeat. The chaotic withdrawal, totally mismanaged by the Pentagon, took pace under Biden. He was blamed.

Digits and statistics and equations and algorithms are the last (or first) refuge of somebody either trying to pull the wool over your eyes – or really not knowing the subject he is talking about.

The ignominious flight from the 19-year Afghan debacle put paid to the COIN/Nation Building/Democracy Promotion phase of the post-Cold War strategy for maximizing American global influence. It had been a three-pronged project now reduced to what always had been the two main elements: coercive force, and covert operations. The ‘best-of-intentions’ cover that the former provided continued to serve as propaganda tool for cudgeling hostile states on human rights grounds. However, the ranks of the true believers were reduced to a few naïve idealists.

Outright coercion has been employed with growing audacity: Syria, Libya, Iraq, Palestine, Lebanon (where it succeeded) as well as Afghanistan, Iran, Yemen (where it failed). Covert operations are employed with the same audacity spanning the globe – producing similar mixed results: Ukraine, Honduras, Bolivia, Peru, Pakistan (successful); Venezuela, Georgia, Belarus, Serbia, Kazakhstan, Mali (where it failed). This propensity for trying to dictate the political leadership of other countries now has reached its logical extremity in the outright voiding of election results that displease Washington: Romania being the outstanding example. This last is not as incongruent as it might seem; after all, this is what 50% of Americans, a majority of the ruling party, and a slice of the federal judiciary approve of/countenance when it comes to the violent insurrection of January 6.

7. The JCPOA Deal With Iran. Within hours of signing the historic, laboriously constructed agreement, President Obama said:

With respect to Iran, it is a great civilization, but it also has an authoritarian theocracy in charge that is anti-American, anti-Israeli, anti-Semitic, sponsors terrorism, and there are a whole host of real profound differences that we [have with them].

Later:

Questions have been raised about whether we have sufficient options for dealing with Iranian violations of the deal. In fact, we have a wide range of unilateral and multilateral responses that we can employ should Iran fail to meet its commitments. First and foremost, as you are aware, the snap back provision we secured in the UN Security Council is unprecedented. If at any time the United States believes Iran has failed to meet its commitments, no other state can block our ability to snap back those multilateral sanctions. Second, we and our European partners can snap our own sanctions back into place at any time should Iran fail to meet its commitments. This gives us, as well as our European partners, enormous leverage in holding Iran to its commitments under the JCPOA. Third, we also enjoy a range of other, more incremental options. These include re-imposing certain US. sanctions, and working with our European partners to do the same, as we have done in the past. Fourth, we can employ our leverage in the mechanisms agreed to with our negotiating partners, such as through the Joint Commission’s role in the procurement channel established in the JCPOA this is a mechanism Iran must use under the deal for the procurement of any materials designed for a peaceful nuclear program and in which we have the ability to block approval. Ultimately, it is essential that we retain the flexibility to decide what responsive measures we and our allies deem appropriate for any non-compliance. Telegraphing in advance to Iran the expected any potential infractions would be counterproductive, potentially lessening the deterrent effect.

— Letter to Representative Nadler

Obama was echoed by Secretary of State John Kerry:

Through these steps and others, we will maintain international pressure on Iran. United States sanctions imposed because of Tehran’s support for terrorism and its human rights record – those will remain in place, as will our sanctions aimed at preventing the proliferation of ballistic missiles and transfer of conventional arms. The UN Security Council prohibitions on shipping weapons to Hizballah, the Shiite militias in Iraq, the Houthi rebels in Yemen – all of those will remain as well….

Have no doubt. The United States will oppose Iran’s destabilizing policies with every national security tool available. And disregard the myth. The Iran agreement is based on proof, not trust. And in a letter that I am sending to all the members of Congress today, I make clear the Administration’s willingness to work with them on legislation to address shared concerns about regional security consistent with the agreement that we have worked out with our international partners.

Reply: “Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Supreme Leader of Iran, [said] Washington sought Iran’s “surrender”. “The [arrogant] Americans say they stopped Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon,” Khamenei said. “They know it’s not true. We had a fatwa (religious ruling), declaring nuclear weapons to be religiously forbidden under Islamic law. It had nothing to do with the nuclear talks.”

Neither Obama nor Trump complied with the JCPOA’s provisions calling for the lifting of economic sanctions including release of Iranian financial assets frozen in American banks. Iran did comply with its treaty commitments vis the IAEA (which predictably passed on the information to American Intelligence and military planners — a practice that continued to last week). This pattern is reminiscent of Bill Clinton’s reneging on the deal with North Korea in the 1990s.

This depiction of Iran has had two profound effects. First, it closed off the possibility of pursuing a wider détente with Iran that could permit diplomatic resolution of outstanding regional conflicts. Second, this characterization was grist for the mill for all those opposed to any normalization of relations between Washington and Tehran. Thereby, it created political circumstances that encouraged Trump’s withdrawal from the treaty and then led President Biden to take a hardline approach to a restoration of our participation. By insisting on the same, unacceptable preconditions that his predecessor demanded, Biden in effect followed the course laid down by Trump – as enabled by Obama.

Now we suffer the inevitable denouement.

Why Memory?

Each of these episodes in collective forgetfulness has its singular features, as do the lessons to be drawn from them. If we were to indulge ourselves in generalization, they could be summarized this way:

1. The erasure or blurring of past events is common and easily accomplished.
2. Doing so often is a matter of political convenience.
3. The lessons we draw from them are normally self-serving, selective and partial.
4. Retrieving with accuracy memories of those past events is technically quite simple; psychologically, it takes great willpower
The failure of collective memory can exact a very heavy penalty.

The post I Remember It, Well…. first appeared on Dissident Voice.

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Michael Brenner.

Media Celebrate International Aggression Against Iran

Gregory Shupak — Thu, 03 Jul 2025 20:34:09 +0000

Aggression is widely understood as the most serious form of the illegal use of force under international law. At the post–World War II Nuremberg Trials, British Judge Norman Birkett said:

To initiate a war of aggression…is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime, differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole.

UN General Assembly Resolution 3314 lists seven acts that constitute aggression, including:

The invasion or attack by the armed forces of a state of the territory of another State….
Bombardment by the armed forces of a state against the territory of another state, or the use of any weapons by a state against the territory of another state.

In a clear instance of such aggression, 125 US military aircraft (along with a submarine) unleashed 75 weapons against Iran on June 21, including 14 GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrators (MOPs), each of which weighs 30,000 pounds (BBC, 6/23/25). The MOPs are the most powerful non-nuclear weapons in the US arsenal (Democracy Now!, 6/23/25).

‘Brilliant military operation’

The New York Times‘ Bret Stephens (6/22/25) acknowledged that US intelligence maintained that “Iran’s leaders had not yet decided to build a bomb”—but he argued that to act “amid uncertainty…is the essence of statesmanship.”

Rather than condemning this blatant violation of international law, US corporate media commentators gushed over what the Boston Globe (6/24/25) called a “brilliant military operation.” The Wall Street Journal (6/22/25) gave President Donald Trump “credit…for meeting the moment.”

To the New York Times’ Bret Stephens (6/22/25), Trump made “a courageous and correct decision that deserves respect.” “The president acted before it was too late,” he wrote. “It is the essence of statesmanship.”

For the Washington Post’s Max Boot (6/25/25), it’s “good news…that both Israel and the United States showed they can bombard Iranian nuclear facilities and other targets at will.”

Rather than toasting aggression, these observers could have used their platforms to try to help foster a political climate that prioritizes peace and the international legal principles that could help create a less violent world.

Meanwhile, some opinion mongers thought the US was at risk of insufficiently violating international law. The Post’s editorial board (6/22/25) said Trump

should ensure that Iran’s nuclear program is demolished, as he appeared to claim it was on Saturday. This would mean the destruction of the targeted sites plus any residual weapons-building capacity.

In other words, the authors are glad that the US bombed Iran in violation of international law, and think it might be best to do more of the same.

A Journal editorial (6/23/25) put forth a similar view, warning that Trump will “squander” any “gains” that the US and Israel may have made against Iran if he “lets Iran take a breather, retain any enriched uranium it has secretly stored, and then rearm. But the last fortnight creates a rare opportunity for a more peaceful Middle East.” I’m not a big Orwell fan, but there’s something to his vision of the propaganda slogan “war is peace.”

Upside-down world

Iran “now knows Mr. Trump isn’t bluffing,” the Wall Street Journal (6/22/25) wrote. Does the paper imagine that Iran thought Trump was “bluffing” when he assassinated Qasem Soleimani, the nation’s top military leader, in 2020?

These celebrations of bomb-dropping occur in an upside-down world, where Iran is an aggressor against the United States. One form of this lie is accusing Iran of wantonly killing Americans or seeking to do so. The Journal (6/22/25) cited “1,000 Americans killed by Iran-supplied roadside bombs and other means”—referring to the dubious claim that Iran is responsible for US soldiers killed during the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq (Progressive, 1/7/20). Thus, to the editors, “Mr. Trump had to act to stop the threat in front of him to protect America.”

For Boot (6/22/25), Iran is a “predator” that the United States and Israel “will still have to deal with…for years to come.”

It would be nice to be able to assess the evidence for these allegations, but the authors don’t so much as hint at any. What is well documented, though, is that the US has been the aggressor in its longrunning war with Iran.

The US ruling class initiated the conflict by overthrowing Iran’s democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh in 1953 (NPR, 2/7/19), propping up the Shah’s torture regime for 26 years (BBC, 6/3/16; AP, 2/6/19), sponsoring the Iraqi invasion of Iran and helping Iraq use chemical weapons against Iran (Foreign Policy, 8/26/13), supporting Israel’s years-long campaign of murdering Iranian scientists (Responsible Statecraft, 12/21/20), and asphyxiating Iran’s civilian population through economic sanctions (Human Rights Watch, 10/29/19).

In other words, the US has been prosecuting a war against the Iranian people for more than 70 years, and Iran hasn’t done anything remotely comparable to the US, but the corporate media pretends that the inverse is true.

The consent manufacturers went even further, characterizing Iran as a threat to the world more generally. The Journal (6/22/25) said “Iran has been waging regional and terrorist war for decades,” and that “the world is safer” because the US bombed the country. Stephens proclaimed the Iranian government “the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism,” a claim Boot (6/25/25) echoed, writing that the nation has a “decades-long track record as the No. 1 state sponsor of terrorism.” Sickeningly, Antony Blinken (New York Times, 6/24/25), a leading architect of the genocide of Gaza’s civilian population, called Iran “a leading state sponsor of terrorism; a destructive and destabilizing force via its proxies in Lebanon, Syria, Gaza, Yemen and Iraq.”

As usual, none of these writers bothered to say which acts of “terrorism” Iran has backed, never mind provide proof. Of course, if one wanted to make a serious argument that Iran has won the planet’s “state sponsor of terrorism” gold medal, then it would be necessary to show how they trumped, say, US support for Al Qaeda in Syria. For such a case to be convincing, it would furthermore be necessary to assess where bankrolling a genocide ranks in the terror-sponsoring Olympics.

‘A grave nuclear threat’

Max Boot (Washington Post, 6/25/25): “The good news is that both Israel and the United States showed they can bombard Iranian nuclear facilities and other targets at will.”

In the fantasy world where Iran is a grave danger to the US and indeed the world, then wrongly implying that it has or is about to have nuclear weapons packs a heavier punch. The Journal (6/22/25) said, “President Trump’s decision to strike Iran’s three most significant nuclear sites on Saturday helped rid the world of a grave nuclear threat.” The editorial would later add, “Ayatollah Ali Khamenei wanted a bomb more than peace.”

Boot (6/25/25) wrote that “preliminary Israeli intelligence assessments [of the US bombing of Iran] conclude that the damage to the Iranian nuclear weapons program was more extensive—enough to set back the program by several years.” Stephens began his piece:

For decades, a succession of American presidents pledged that they were willing to use force to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. But it was President Trump who, by bombing three of Iran’s key nuclear sites on Sunday morning, was willing to demonstrate that those pledges were not hollow and that Tehran could not simply tunnel its way to a bomb because no country other than Israel dared confront it.

As FAIR contributor Bryce Greene (6/23/25) recently demonstrated, there is no proof that Iran has nuclear weapons or is close to having any. Yet the op-ed pages are peppered with insinuations that Iran’s imaginary nukes legitimize the US’s aggression against the country.

A Boston Globe editorial (6/24/25) read:

After years of insisting it would not allow Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon, Israel followed through by launching a wide-ranging attack earlier this month, assassinating nuclear scientists and military leaders and destroying many sites associated with Iran’s decades-long nuclear program. Trump initially stayed on the sidelines, until Saturday when US bombers delivered the coup de grâce, destroying—or at least heavily damaging—a key underground site that only American bunker-buster bombs could reach….

Stopping Iran, whose unofficial national motto is “Death to America,’’ from gaining a nuclear weapon has rightly been a US priority for decades.

Iran’s nuclear program is now damaged but not destroyed.

What’s missing from this chatter is that, even if we lived in an alternate reality where Iran had nuclear weapons or was hours away from having them, attacking them on these grounds would not be legitimate. After all, international law does not grant states a right to attack each other on a preventive (Conversation, 6/18/25) or pre-emptive basis (Conversation, 6/23/25). This crucial point was entirely absent in the coverage I’ve discussed.

Also overlooked are the 90 nuclear warheads that Israel is believed to have, as well as the more than 5,200 that the US reportedly possesses, none of which apparently constitute “a grave nuclear threat,” even as it’s not Iran but the US and Israel that routinely carry out full-scale invasions and occupations of nations in West Asia.

Whether it’s Iran’s supposed support for terrorism or Iran’s nonexistent and non-imminent nuclear weapons, the propaganda follows the same formula: make an unsubstantiated claim about Iranian malfeasance, and use that as a premise on which to defend Washington openly carrying out acts of aggression, perhaps the gravest violation of international law.

If you want the US and Israel to stop killing and immiserating people in Iran, remember this pattern and get used to debunking it. Because, last week’s ceasefire notwithstanding, the US/Israeli war on Iran isn’t over.

This content originally appeared on FAIR and was authored by Gregory Shupak.

Faramarz Farbod in Conversation with Yves Engler on Canada, the US, and Imperialism

Faramarz Farbod — Wed, 02 Jul 2025 23:21:38 +0000

Faramarz Farbod speaks with Yves Engler, a Canadian activist and author of 13 books, including most recently Canada’s Long Fight Against Democracy and Stand on Guard for Whom? (A People’s History of Canadian Military). The conversation explores Canada’s role in the world, its relationship with US capitalism and imperialism, Canada’s policies toward Iran and Cuba, misperceptions of Canada in the US, and the concept of Canadianism.

The post Faramarz Farbod in Conversation with Yves Engler on Canada, the US, and Imperialism first appeared on Dissident Voice.

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Faramarz Farbod.

The Plot Against Iran

Medea Benjamin — Wed, 02 Jul 2025 20:01:06 +0000

How the International Atomic Energy Agency and its director became part of the U.S.-Israeli plan for war on Iran.

This content originally appeared on The Progressive — A voice for peace, social justice, and the common good and was authored by Medea Benjamin.

‘The missiles represented hope’: Palestinians in Gaza react to Iran bombing Israel

Belal Awad, Leo Erhadt, Ruwaida Amer and Mahmoud Al Mashharawi — Wed, 02 Jul 2025 15:45:41 +0000

On Friday, June 13, after Israeli airstrikes struck Iran, Iran launched a retaliatory barrage of missiles at Israel, hitting targets in Tel Aviv. Palestinians watched Iran’s bombs fall on Israel from across the militarized border separating the Gaza Strip from Israel. The Real News Network spoke with Palestinians on the ground in Gaza, who continue to endure genocidal violence and forced starvation at the hands of Israel, about their reactions to Iran’s airstrikes.

Credits:
Producers: Belal Awad, Leo Erhardt
Videographers: Ruwaida Amer, Mahmoud Al Mashharawi
Video Editor: Leo Erhardt

Transcript

Gaza watches Iran bomb Israel: ‘The missiles represented hope’

The Real News Network — Wed, 02 Jul 2025 15:30:17 +0000

This content originally appeared on The Real News Network and was authored by The Real News Network.

The Bradbury Group features Palestinian journalist Dr Yousef Aljamal, Middle East report and political panel

Pacific Media Watch — Wed, 02 Jul 2025 00:33:29 +0000

Asia Pacific Report

In the new weekly political podcast, The Bradbury Group, last night presenter Martyn Bradbury talked with visiting Palestinian journalist Dr Yousef Aljamal.

They assess the current situation in Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza and what New Zealand should be doing.

As Bradbury, publisher of The Daily Blog, notes, “Fourth Estate public broadcasting is dying — The Bradbury Group will fight back.”

Gaza crisis and Iran tensions. Video: The Bradbury Group/Radio Waatea

Also in last night’s programme was featured a View From A Far Podcast Special Middle East Report with former intelligence analyst Dr Paul Buchanan and international affairs commentator Selwyn Manning on what will happen next in Iran.

Martyn Bradbury talks to Dr Paul Buchanan (left) and Selwyn Manning on the Iran crisis and the future. Image: Asia Pacific Report

Political Panel:
Māori Party president John Tamihere,
NZ Herald columnist Simon Wilson
NZCTU economist Craig Renney

Topics:
– The Legacy of Tarsh Kemp
– New coward punch and first responder assault laws — virtue signalling or meaningful policy?
– Cost of living crisis and the failing economy

The Bradbury Group is sponsored by Waatea News live at 8pm Tuesdays on ROVA, Youtube, SkyTV and Waatea’s main Facebook page.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by Pacific Media Watch.

Iran, Zionism, and the Limits of US Control: An Interview with Faramarz Farbod

Faramarz Farbod — Tue, 01 Jul 2025 20:28:57 +0000

The post Iran, Zionism, and the Limits of US Control: An Interview with Faramarz Farbod first appeared on Dissident Voice.

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Faramarz Farbod.

Chris Hedges: Gaza’s Hunger Games – how Israel is weaponising starvation

APR editor — Tue, 01 Jul 2025 12:17:42 +0000

ANALYSIS: By Chris Hedges

Israel’s weaponisation of starvation is how genocides always end.

I covered the insidious effects of orchestrated starvation in the Guatemalan Highlands during the genocidal campaign of General Efraín Ríos Montt, the famine in southern Sudan that left a quarter of a million dead — I walked past the frail and skeletal corpses of families lining roadsides — and later during the war in Bosnia when Serbs cut off food supplies to enclaves such as Srebrencia and Goražde.

Starvation was weaponised by the Ottoman Empire to decimate the Armenians. It was used to kill millions of Ukrainians in the Holodomor in 1932 and 1933.

It was employed by the Nazis against the Jews in the ghettos in the Second World War. German soldiers used food, as Israel does, like bait. They offered three kilograms of bread and one kilogram of marmalade to lure desperate families in the Warsaw Ghetto onto transports to the death camps.

“There were times when hundreds of people had to wait in line for several days to be ‘deported,’” Marek Edelman writes in The Ghetto Fights. “The number of people anxious to obtain the three kilograms of bread was such that the transports, now leaving twice daily with 12,000 people, could not accommodate them all.”

And when crowds became unruly, as in Gaza, the German troops fired deadly volleys that ripped through emaciated husks of women, children and the elderly.

This tactic is as old as warfare itself.

Ordered to shoot
The report in the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz that Israeli soldiers are ordered to shoot into crowds of Palestinians at aid hubs, with 580 killed and 4,216 wounded, is not a surprise. It is the predictable denouement of the genocide, the inevitable conclusion to a campaign of mass extermination.

Israel, with its targeted assassinations of at least 1400 health care workers, hundreds of United Nations (UN) workers, journalists, police and even poets and academics, its obliteration of multi-story apartment blocks wiping out dozens of families, its shelling of designated “humanitarian zones” where Palestinians huddle under tents, tarps or in the open air, its systematic targeting of UN food distribution centers, bakeries and aid convoys or its sadistic sniper fire that guns down children, long ago illustrated that Palestinians are regarded as vermin worthy only of annihilation.

The blockade of food and humanitarian aid, imposed on Gaza since March 2, is reducing Palestinians to abject dependence. To eat, they must crawl towards their killers and beg. Humiliated, terrified, desperate for a few scraps of food, they are stripped of dignity, autonomy and agency. This is by intent.

Yousef al-Ajouri, 40, explained to Middle East Eye his nightmarish journey to one of four aid hubs set up by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF). The hubs are not designed to meet the needs of the Palestinians, who once relied on 400 aid distribution sites, but to lure them from northern Gaza to the south.

Israel, which on Sunday again ordered Palestinians to leave northern Gaza, is steadily expanding its annexation of the coastal strip. Palestinians are corralled like livestock into narrow metal chutes at distribution points which are overseen by heavily armed mercenaries. They receive, if they are one of the fortunate few, a small box of food.

Al-Ajouri, who before the genocide was a taxi driver, lives with his wife, seven children and his mother and father in a tent in al-Saraya, near the middle of Gaza City. He set out to an aid hub at Salah al-Din Road near the Netzarim corridor, to find some food for his children, who he said cry constantly “because of how hungry they are.”

On the advice of his neighbour in the tent next to him, he dressed in loose clothing “so that I could run and be agile.” He carried a bag for canned and packaged goods because the crush of the crowds meant “no one was able to carry the boxes the aid came in.”

Massive crowds
He left at about 9 pm with five other men “including an engineer and a teacher,” and “children aged 10 and 12.” They did not take the official route designated by the Israeli army. The massive crowds converging on the aid point along the official route ensure that most never get close enough to receive food.

Instead, they walked in the darkness in areas exposed to Israeli gunfire, often having to crawl to avoid being seen.

“As I crawled, I looked over, and to my surprise, saw several women and elderly people taking the same treacherous route as us,” he explained. “At one point, there was a barrage of live gunfire all around me. We hid behind a destroyed building. Anyone who moved or made a noticeable motion was immediately shot by snipers.

“Next to me was a tall, light-haired young man using the flashlight on his phone to guide him. The others yelled at him to turn it off. Seconds later, he was shot. He collapsed to the ground and lay there bleeding, but no one could help or move him. He died within minutes.”

He passed six bodies along the route who had been shot dead by Israeli soldiers.

Al-Ajouri reached the hub at 2 am, the designated time for aid distribution. He saw a green light turned on ahead of him which signaled that aid was about to be distributed. Thousands began to run towards the light, pushing, shoving and trampling each other. He fought his way through the crowd until he reached the aid.

“I started feeling around for the aid boxes and grabbed a bag that felt like rice,” he said. “But just as I did, someone else snatched it from my hands. I tried to hold on, but he threatened to stab me with his knife. Most people there were carrying knives, either to defend themselves or to steal from others.

Boxes were emptied
“Eventually, I managed to grab four cans of beans, a kilogram of bulgur, and half a kilogram of pasta. Within moments, the boxes were empty. Most of the people there, including women, children and the elderly, got nothing. Some begged others to share. But no one could afford to give up what they managed to get.”

The US contractors and Israeli soldiers overseeing the mayhem laughed and pointed their weapons at the crowd. Some filmed with their phones.

“Minutes later, red smoke grenades were thrown into the air,” he remembered. “Someone told me that it was the signal to evacuate the area. After that, heavy gunfire began. Me, Khalil and a few others headed to al-Awda Hospital in Nuseirat because our friend Wael had injured his hand during the journey.

“I was shocked by what I saw at the hospital. There were at least 35 martyrs lying dead on the ground in one of the rooms. A doctor told me they had all been brought in that same day. They were each shot in the head or chest while queuing near the aid center. Their families were waiting for them to come home with food and ingredients. Now, they were corpses.”

GHF is a Mossad-funded creation of Israel’s Defense Ministry that contracts with UG Solutions and Safe Reach Solutions, run by former members of the CIA and US Special Forces. GHF is headed by Reverend Johnnie Moore, a far-right Christian Zionist with close ties to Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu.

The organisation has also contracted anti-Hamas drug-smuggling gangs to provide security at aid sites.

As Chris Gunness, a former spokesperson for the United Nations Relief and Work Agency (UNRWA) told Al Jazeera, GHF is “aid washing,” a way to mask the reality that “people are being starved into submission.”

Disregarded ICC ruling
Israel, along with the US and European countries that provide weapons to sustain the genocide, have chosen to disregard the January 2024 ruling by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) which demanded immediate protection for civilians in Gaza and widespread provision of humanitarian assistance.

“It’s a killing field” says a headline in the Ha’aretz newspaper. Image: Ha’aretz screenshot APR

Ha’aretz, in its article headlined “‘It’s a Killing Field’: IDF Soldiers Ordered to Shoot Deliberately at Unarmed Gazans Waiting for Humanitarian Aid” reported that Israeli commanders order soldiers to open fire on crowds to keep them away from aid sites or disperse them.

“The distribution centers typically open for just one hour each morning,” Haaretz writes. “According to officers and soldiers who served in their areas, the IDF fires at people who arrive before opening hours to prevent them from approaching, or again after the centers close, to disperse them. Since some of the shooting incidents occurred at night — ahead of the opening — it’s possible that some civilians couldn’t see the boundaries of the designated area.”

“It’s a killing field,” one soldier told Ha’aretz. “Where I was stationed, between one and five people were killed every day. They’re treated like a hostile force — no crowd-control measures, no tear gas — just live fire with everything imaginable: heavy machine guns, grenade launchers, mortars. Then, once the center opens, the shooting stops, and they know they can approach. Our form of communication is gunfire.”

“We open fire early in the morning if someone tries to get in line from a few hundred meters away, and sometimes we just charge at them from close range. But there’s no danger to the forces,” the soldier explained, “I’m not aware of a single instance of return fire. There’s no enemy, no weapons.”

He said the deployment at the aid sites is known as “Operation Salted Fish,” a reference to the Israeli name for the children’s game “Red light, green light.” The game was featured in the first episode of the South Korean dystopian thriller Squid Game, in which financially desperate people are killed as they battle each other for money.

Civilian infrastructure obliterated
Israel has obliterated the civilian and humanitarian infrastructure in Gaza. It has reduced Palestinians, half a million of whom face starvation, into desperate herds. The goal is to break Palestinians, to make them malleable and entice them to leave Gaza, never to return.

There is talk from the Trump White House about a ceasefire. But don’t be fooled. Israel has nothing left to destroy. Its saturation bombing over 20 months has reduced Gaza to a moonscape. Gaza is uninhabitable, a toxic wilderness where Palestinians, living amid broken slabs of concrete and pools of raw sewage, lack food and clean water, fuel, shelter, electricity, medicine and an infrastructure to survive.

The final impediment to the annexation of Gaza are the Palestinians themselves. They are the primary target. Starvation is the weapon of choice.

Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist who was a foreign correspondent for 15 years for The New York Times, where he served as the Middle East bureau chief and Balkan bureau chief for the paper. He is the host of show “The Chris Hedges Report”. This article is republished from his X account.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Operation Midnight Hammer: Were Iran’s Nuclear Facilities Damaged?

Binoy Kampmark — Tue, 01 Jul 2025 12:00:38 +0000

The aftermath of Operation Midnight Hammer, a strike by the US Air Force on three nuclear facilities in Iran authorized by President Donald Trump on June 22, was raucous and triumphant. But that depended on what company you were keeping. The mission involved the bombing of the Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant, the uranium-enrichment facility at Natanz, and the uranium-conversion facility in Isfahan. The Israeli Air Force had already attacked the last two facilities, sparing Fordow for the singular weaponry available for the USAF.

The Fordow site was of particular interest, located some eighty to a hundred metres underground and cocooned by protective concrete. For its purported destruction, B-2 Spirit stealth bombers were used to drop GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator “bunker buster” bombs. All in all, approximately 75 precision-guided weapons were used in the operation, along with 125 aircraft and a guided missile submarine.

Trump was never going to be anything other than optimistic about the result. “Monumental Damage was done to all Nuclear sites in Iran, as shown by satellite images,” he blustered. “Obliteration is an accurate term!”

At the Pentagon press conference following the attack, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth bubbled with enthusiasm. “The order we received from our commander in chief was focused, it was powerful, and it was clear. We devastated the Iranian nuclear program.” The US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force Gen. Dan Caine, was confident that the facilities had been subjected to severe punishment. “Initial battle damage assessments indicate that all three sites sustained extremely severe damage and destruction.” Adding to Caine’s remarks, Hegseth stated that, “The battle damage assessment is ongoing, but our initial assessment, as the Chairman said, is that all of our precision munitions struck where we wanted them to strike and had the desired effect.”

Resort to satellite imagery was always going to take place, and Maxar Technologies willingly supplied the material. “A layer of grey-blue ash caused by the airstrikes [on Fordow] is seen across a large swathe of the area,” the company noted in a statement. “Additionally, several of the tunnel entrances that lead into the underground facility are blocked with dirt following the airstrikes.”

The director of the Central Intelligence Agency, John Ratcliffe, also added his voice to the merry chorus that the damage had been significant. “CIA can confirm that a body of credible intelligence indicates Iran’s Nuclear Program has been severely damaged by the recent, targeted airstrikes.” The assessment included “new intelligence from a historically reliable and accurate source/method that several key Iranian nuclear facilities were destroyed and would have to be rebuilt over the course of years.”

Israeli sources were also quick to stroke Trump’s already outsized ego. The Israel Atomic Energy Commission opined that the strikes, combined with Israel’s own efforts, had “set back Iran’s ability to develop nuclear weapons by many years.” IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir’s view was that the damage to the nuclear program was sufficient to have “set it back by years, I repeat, years.”

The chief of the increasingly discredited International Atomic Energy Agency, Rafael Grossi, flirted with some initial speculation, but was mindful of necessary caveats. In a statement to an emergency meeting of the IAEA’s 35-nation Board of Governors, he warned that, “At this time, no one, including the IAEA, is in a position to have fully assessed the underground damage at Fordow.” Cue the speculation: “Given the explosive payload utilised and extreme(ly) vibration-sensitive nature of centrifuges, very significant damage is expected to have occurred.”

This was a parade begging to be rained on. CNN and The New York Times supplied it. Referring to preliminary classified findings in a Defense Intelligence Agency assessment running for five pages, the paper reported that the bombing of the three sites had “set back the country’s nuclear program by only a few months”. The strikes had sealed off the entrances to two of the facilities, but they were not successful in precipitating a collapse of the underground buildings. Sceptical expertise murmured through the report: to destroy the facility at Fordow would require “waves of airstrikes, with days or even weeks of pounding the same spots.”

Then came the issue of the nuclear material in question, which Iran still retained control over. The fate of over 400 kg of uranium, which had been enriched to 60% purity, is unclear, as is the number of surviving or hidden centrifuges. Iran had already informed the IAEA on June 13 that “special measures” would be taken to protect nuclear materials and equipment under IAEA safeguards, a feature provided under the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Any transfer of nuclear material from a safeguarded facility to another location, however, would have to be declared to the agency, something bound to be increasingly unlikely given the proposed suspension of cooperation with the IAEA by Iran’s parliament.

After mulling over the attacks for a week, Grossi revisited the matter. The attacks on the facilities had caused severe, though “not total” damage. “Frankly speaking, one cannot claim that everything has disappeared and there is nothing there.” Tehran could, “in a matter of months,” have “a few cascades of centrifuges spinning and producing enriched uranium.” Iran still had the “industrial and technological” means to recommence the process.

Efforts to question the thoroughness of Operation Midnight Hammer did not sit well with the Trump administration. White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt worked herself into a state on any cautionary reporting, treating it as a libellous blemish. “The leaking of this alleged report is a clear attempt to demean President Trump and discredit the brave fighter pilots who conducted a perfectly executed mission to obliterate Iran’s nuclear program,” she fumed in a statement. “Everyone knows what happens when you drop 14 30,000-pound bombs perfectly on their targets.”

Hegseth similarly raged against the importance placed on the DIA report. In a press conference on June 26, he bemoaned the tendency of the press corps to “cheer against Trump so hard, it’s like in your DNA and in your blood”. The scribblers had to “cheer against the efficacy of these strikes” with “half-truths, spun information, leaked information”. Trump, for his part, returned to familiar ground, attacking any questioning narrative as “Fake News”. CNN, he seethed, had some of the dumbest anchors in the business. With malicious glee, he claimed knowledge of rumours that reporters from both CNN and The New York Times were going to be sacked for making up those “FAKE stories on the Iran Nuclear sites because they got it so wrong.”

A postmodern nonsense has descended on the damage assessments regarding Iran’s nuclear program, leaving the way clear for overremunerated soothsayers. But there was nothing postmodern in the incalculable damage done to the law of nations, a body of acknowledged rules rendered brittle and breakable before the rapacious legislators of the jungle.

The post Operation Midnight Hammer: Were Iran’s Nuclear Facilities Damaged? first appeared on Dissident Voice.

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Binoy Kampmark.

Australia Backs US Strike on Iran

Binoy Kampmark — Mon, 30 Jun 2025 07:34:27 +0000

The initial statement from Australian government sources was one of constipated caution and clenching wariness. Senator Penny Wong’s time as head of the Department of Trade and Foreign Affairs has always been about how things come out, a process unsatisfyingly uncertain and unyielding in detail. Stick to the safe middle ground and sod the rest. These were the cautionary words of an Australian government spokesperson on June 22: “We have been clear that Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile program has been a threat to international peace and security.”

That insipid statement was in response to Operation Midnight Hammer, a strike on three nuclear facilities in Iran by the US Air Force, authorised by US President Donald Trump on June 22. With such spectacular violence came the hollow call for diplomatic prudence and restraint. There was an important difference: Tehran, not Israel or Washington, would be the subject of scolding. Iran would not be permitted nuclear weapons but jaw jaw was better than war war. “We note the US president’s statement that now is the time for peace,” stated the spokesperson. “The security situation in the region is highly volatile. We continue to call for de-escalation, dialogue and diplomacy.”

Within twenty-four hours, that anodyne position had morphed into one of unconditional approval for what was a breach of the United Nations Charter, notably its injunction against the threatened or actual use of force against sovereign states in the absence of authorisation by the UN Security Council or the necessity of self-defence. “The world has long agreed Iran cannot be allowed to get a nuclear weapon, and we support action to prevent this. That is what this is,” accepted Wong.

This assessment was not only silly but colossally misguided. It would have been an absurd proposition for the US to make the claim that they were under imminent threat of attack, a condition seen as necessary for a pre-emptive strike. This was a naked submission to the wishes of a small, destabilising and sole (undeclared) nuclear power in the Middle East, a modern territorial plunderer celebratory of ethnonational supremacy.

The Australian position, along a number of European states, also failed to acknowledge the General Conference Resolutions of the International Atomic Energy Agency (in particular GC(XIXI)/RES/444 and GC(XXIV)/RES/533) declaring that “any armed attack on and threat against nuclear facilities devoted to peaceful purposes constitutes a violation of the United Nations Charter, international law and the Statute of the Agency.”

Wong also misrepresented the circumstances under which Iran was told they could negotiate over their nuclear program, erroneously accepting the line from the Trump administration that Tehran had “an opportunity to comply”. Neither the US diplomatic channel, which only permitted a narrow, fleeting corridor for actual negotiations, nor Israel’s wilful distortion of the IAEA’s assessment of Iran’s uranium enrichment plans and prevarication, ever gave chance for a credible resolution. Much like the calamitous, unlawful invasion of Iraq in 2003 by a crew of brigand nations – the merry trio of US, UK and Australia stood out – the autopilot to war was set, scornful of international law.

Wong’s shift from constipated caution to free flow approval for the US attack, with its absent merits and weighty illegalities, was also a craven capitulation to the warmonger class permanently mesmerised by the villain school of foreign relations. This cerebrally challenged view sees few problems with attacking nuclear facilities, the radioactive dangers of doing so, and the merits of a state having them in the first place.

The US attack on Iran found hearty approval among the remnants of the conservative opposition, who tend to specialise in the view that pursuing a pro-Israeli line, right, wrong, or murderous, is the way to go. Liberal Senator and former Australian ambassador to Israel, David Sharma, thought the Albanese government’s initial response “underwhelming and perplexing”, claiming that support for this shredding of international law “a straightforward position for Australia to adopt”. Sharma is clearly getting rusty on his law of nations.

His side of politics is also of the view that the attacked party here – Iran – must forgo any silly notion of self-defence and retaliation and repair to the table of diplomacy in head bowed humiliation. “We want to see Iran come to the negotiating table to verify where that 400 kilos of enriched uranium is,” stated a very stern opposition home affairs minister, Andrew Hastie. “I’m very glad to see that Penny Wong has essentially endorsed our position and I’m glad we have bipartisanship on this.”

Australia’s response has been that of the weary poltroon. Little has been asked about Canberra’s standout complicity in assisting the US imperium fulfil its global reach when it comes to striking targets. The role of the intelligence signals facility in Pine Gap, cutely and inaccurately called a joint venture, always lends its critical role to directing the US war machine through its heavy reliance on satellite technology. Wong, when asked about the role played by the facility in facilitating the attacks on Iran, had little to say. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was also cold towards disclosing any details. “We are upfront, but we don’t talk about intelligence, obviously. But we’ve made very clear this was unilateral action taken by the United States.”

At least on this occasion, Australia did not add its forces to an illegal adventure, as it all too wilfully did in 2003. Then, Iraq was invaded on the spurious grounds that weapons of mass destruction not only existed but would somehow be used either by the regime of Saddam Hussein or fictional proxies he might eventually supply. History forever shows that no such weapons were found, nor proxies equipped. But the Albanese government has shown not only historical illiteracy but an amnesia on the matter. Unfortunately, it’s the sort of amnesia that has become contagious, afflicting a goodly number of Washington’s satellites, vassals and friendly states.

The post Australia Backs US Strike on Iran first appeared on Dissident Voice.

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Binoy Kampmark.

Clark warns in new Pacific book renewed nuclear tensions pose ‘existential threat to humanity’

APR editor — Sun, 29 Jun 2025 12:01:29 +0000

Asia Pacific Report

Former New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark has warned the country needs to maintain its nuclear-free policy as a “fundamental tenet” of its independent foreign policy in the face of gathering global storm clouds.

Writing in a new book being published next week, she says “nuclear war is an existential threat to humanity. Far from receding, the threat of use of nuclear weapons is ever present.

“The Doomsday Clock of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists now sits at 89 seconds to midnight,” she says in the prologue to journalist and media academic David Robie’s book Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage and Legacy of the Rainbow Warrior.

Writing before the US surprise attack with B-2 stealth bombers and “bunker-buster” bombs on three Iranian nuclear facilities on June 22, Clark says “the Middle East is a tinder box with the failure of the Iran nuclear deal and with Israel widely believed to possess nuclear weapons”.

The Doomsday Clock references the Ukraine war theatre where “use of nuclear weapons has been floated by Russia”.

Also, the arms control architecture for Europe is unravelling, leaving the continent much less secure. India and Pakistan both have nuclear arsenals, she says.

“North Korea continues to develop its nuclear weapons capacity.”

‘Serious ramifications’
Clark, who was also United Nations Development Programme administrator from 2009 to 2017, a member of The Elders group of global leaders founded by Nelson Mandela in 2007, and is an advocate for multilateralism and nuclear disarmament, says an outright military conflict between China and the United States “would be one between two nuclear powers with serious ramifications for East Asia, Southeast Asia, the Pacific, and far beyond.”

She advises New Zealand to be wary of Australia’s decision to enter a nuclear submarine purchase programme with the United States.

“There has been much speculation about a potential Pillar Two of the AUKUS agreement which would see others in the region become partners in the development of advanced weaponry,” Clark says.

“This is occurring in the context of rising tensions between the United States and China.

“Many of us share the view that New Zealand should be a voice for de-escalation, not for enthusiastic expansion of nuclear submarine fleets in the Pacific and the development
of more lethal weaponry.”

Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage and Legacy of the Rainbow Warrior . . . publication July 2025. Image: Little Island Press

In the face of the “current global turbulence, New Zealand needs to reemphasise the principles and values which drove its nuclear-free legislation and its advocacy for a nuclear-free South Pacific and global nuclear disarmament.

Clark says that the years 1985 – the Rainbow Warrior was bombed by French secret agents on 10 July 1985 — and 1986 were critical years in the lead up to New Zealand’s nuclear-free legislation in 1987.

“New Zealanders were clear – we did not want to be defended by nuclear weapons. We wanted our country to be a force for diplomacy and for dialogue, not for warmongering.”

Chronicles humanitarian voyage
The book Eyes of Fire chronicles the humanitarian voyage by the Greenpeace flagship to the Marshall Islands to relocate 320 Rongelap Islanders who were suffering serious community health consequences from the US nuclear tests in the 1950s.

The author, Dr David Robie, founder of the Pacific Media Centre at Auckland University of Technology, was the only journalist on board the Rainbow Warrior in the weeks leading up to the bombing.

His book recounts the voyage and nuclear colonialism, and the transition to climate justice as the major challenge facing the Pacific, although the “Indo-Pacific” rivalries between the US, France and China mean that geopolitical tensions are recalling the Cold War era in the Pacific.

Dr Robie is also critical of Indonesian colonialism in the Melanesian region of the Pacific, arguing that a just-outcome for Jakarta-ruled West Papua and also the French territories of Kanaky New Caledonia and “French” Polynesia are vital for peace and stability in the region.

Eyes of Fire is being published by Little Island Press, which also produced one of his earlier books, Don’t Spoil My Beautiful Face: Media, Mayhem and Human Rights in the Pacific.

Greenpeace executive director Dr Russel Norman is launching Eyes of Fire at the Ellen Melville Centre Pioneer Women’s Hall at 6pm on the bombing anniversary day, July 10, following a memorial vigil in the morning on board the current flagship Rainbow Warrior III.
Eyes of Fire microsite (Little island Press)

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

How they got Trump to bomb Iran

The Grayzone — Sun, 29 Jun 2025 03:40:33 +0000

This content originally appeared on The Grayzone and was authored by The Grayzone.

‘Bridge for peace – not more bombs,’ say CNMI Gaza protesters

APR editor — Sun, 29 Jun 2025 03:23:01 +0000

By Bryan Manabat in Saipan

Advocacy groups in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) disrupted the US Department of Defense’s public meeting this week, which tackled proposed military training plans on Tinian, voicing strong opposition to further militarisation in the Marianas.

Members of the Marianas for Palestine, Prutehi Guahan and Commonwealth670 burst into the public hearing at the Crowne Plaza hotel in Garapan, chanting, “No build-up! No war!” and “Free, free, Palestine!”

As the chanting echoed throughout the venue on Wednesday, the DOD continued the proceedings to gather public input on its CNMI Joint Military Training proposal.

READ MORE: Other protests for Palestine reports

The US plan includes live-fire ranges, a base camp, communications infrastructure, and a biosecurity facility. Officials said feedback from Tinian, Saipan and Rota communities would help shape the final environmental impact statement.

Salam Castro Younis, of Chamorro-Palestinian descent, linked the military expansion to global conflicts in Gaza and Iran.

“More militarisation isn’t the answer,” Younis said. “We don’t need to lose more land. Diplomacy and peace are the way forward – not more bombs.”

Saipan-born Chamorro activist Anufat Pangelinan echoed Younis’s sentiment, citing research connecting climate change and environmental degradation to global militarisation.

‘No part of a war’
“We don’t want to be part of a war we don’t support,” he said. “The Marianas shouldn’t be a tip of the spear – we should be a bridge for peace.”

The groups argue that CJMT could make Tinian a target, increasing regional hostility.

“We want to sustain ourselves without the looming threat of war,” Pangelinan added.

In response to public concerns from the 2015 draft EIS, the DOD scaled back its plans, reducing live-fire ranges from 14 to 2 and eliminating artillery, rocket and mortar exercises.

Mark Hashimoto, executive director of the US Marine Corps Forces Pacific, emphasised the importance of community input.

“The proposal includes live-fire ranges, a base camp, communications infrastructure and a biosecurity facility,” he said.

Hashimoto noted that military lease lands on Tinian could support quarterly exercises involving up to 1000 personnel.

Economic impact concerns
Tinian residents expressed concerns about economic impacts, job opportunities, noise, environmental effects and further strain on local infrastructure.

The DOD is expected to issue a Record of Decision by spring 2026, balancing public feedback with national security and environmental considerations.

In a joint statement earlier this week, the activist groups said the people of Guam and the CNMI were “burdened by processes not meant to serve their home’s interests”.

The groups were referring to public input requirements for military plans involving the use of Guam and CNMI lands and waters for war training and testing.

“As colonies of the United States, the Mariana Islands continue to be forced into conflicts not of our people’s making,” the statement read.

“ After decades of displacement and political disenfranchisement, our communities are now in subservient positions that force an obligation to extend our lands, airspace, and waters for use in America’s never-ending cycle of war.”

They also lamented the “intense environmental degradation” and “growing housing and food insecurity” resulting from military expansion.

“Like other Pacific Islanders, we are also overrepresented disproportionately in the military and in combat,” they said.

“Meanwhile, prices on imported food, fuel, and essential goods will continue to rise with inflation and war.”

Republished from Pacific Island Times.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Why manufacturing consent for war with Iran failed this time

APR editor — Sat, 28 Jun 2025 19:02:21 +0000

COMMENTARY: By Ahmad Ibsais

On June 22, American warplanes crossed into Iranian airspace and dropped 14 massive bombs.

The attack was not in response to a provocation; it came on the heels of illegal Israeli aggression that took the lives of more than 600 Iranians.

This was a return to something familiar and well-practised: an empire bombing innocents across the orientalist abstraction called “the Middle East”.

That night, US President Donald Trump, flanked by his vice-president and two state secretaries, told the world: “Iran, the bully of the Middle East, must now make peace”.

There is something chilling about how bombs are baptised with the language of diplomacy and how destruction is dressed in the garments of stability. To call that peace is not merely a misnomer; it is a criminal distortion.

But what is peace in this world, if not submission to the West? And what is diplomacy, if not the insistence that the attacked plead with their attackers?

In the 12 days that Israel’s illegal assault on Iran lasted, images of Iranian children pulled from the wreckage remained absent from the front pages of Western media. In their place were lengthy features about Israelis hiding in fortified bunkers.

Victimhood serving narrative
Western media, fluent in the language of erasure, broadcasts only the victimhood that serves the war narrative.

And that is not just in its coverage of Iran. For 20 months now, the people of Gaza have been starved and incinerated. By the official count, more than 55,000 lives have been taken; realistic estimates put the number at hundreds of thousands.

Every hospital in Gaza has been bombed. Most schools have been attacked and destroyed.

Leading human rights groups like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have already declared that Israel is committing genocide, and yet, most Western media would not utter that word and would add elaborate caveats when someone does dare say it live on TV.

Presenters and editors would do anything but recognise Israel’s unending violence in an active voice.

Despite detailed evidence of war crimes, the Israeli military has faced no media censure, no criticism or scrutiny. Its generals hold war meetings near civilian buildings, and yet, there are no media cries of Israelis being used as “human shields”.

Israeli army and government officials are regularly caught lying or making genocidal statements, and yet, their words are still reported as “the truth”.

Bias over Palestinian deaths
A recent study found that on the BBC, Israeli deaths received 33 times more coverage per fatality than Palestinian deaths, despite Palestinians dying at a rate of 34 to 1 compared with Israelis. Such bias is no exception, it is the rule for Western media.

Like Palestine, Iran is described in carefully chosen language. Iran is never framed as a nation, only as a regime. Iran is not a government, but a threat — not a people, but a problem.

The word “Islamic” is affixed to it like a slur in every report. This is instrumental in quietly signalling that Muslim resistance to Western domination must be extinguished.

Iran does not possess nuclear weapons; Israel and the United States do. And yet only Iran is cast as an existential threat to world order.

Because the problem is not what Iran holds, but what it refuses to surrender. It has survived coups, sanctions, assassinations, and sabotage. It has outlived every attempt to starve, coerce, or isolate it into submission.

It is a state that, despite the violence hurled at it, has not yet been broken.

And so the myth of the threat of weapons of mass destruction becomes indispensable. It is the same myth that was used to justify the illegal invasion of Iraq. For three decades, American headlines have whispered that Iran is just “weeks away” from the bomb, three decades of deadlines that never arrive, of predictions that never materialise.

Fear over false ‘nuclear threat’
But fear, even when unfounded, is useful. If you can keep people afraid, you can keep them quiet. Say “nuclear threat” often enough, and no one will think to ask about the children killed in the name of “keeping the world safe”.

This is the modus operandi of Western media: a media architecture not built to illuminate truth, but to manufacture permission for violence, to dress state aggression in technical language and animated graphics, to anaesthetise the public with euphemisms.

Time Magazine does not write about the crushed bones of innocents under the rubble in Tehran or Rafah, it writes about “The New Middle East” with a cover strikingly similar to the one it used to propagandise regime change in Iraq 22 years ago.

But this is not 2003. After decades of war, and livestreamed genocide, most Americans no longer buy into the old slogans and distortions. When Israel attacked Iran, a poll showed that only 16 percent of US respondents supported the US joining the war.

After Trump ordered the air strikes, another poll confirmed this resistance to manufactured consent: only 36 percent of respondents supported the move, and only 32 percent supported continuing the bombardment

The failure to manufacture consent for war with Iran reveals a profound shift in the American consciousness. Americans remember the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq that left hundreds of thousands of Afghans and Iraqis dead and an entire region in flames. They remember the lies about weapons of mass destruction and democracy and the result: the thousands of American soldiers dead and the tens of thousands maimed.

They remember the humiliating retreat from Afghanistan after 20 years of war and the never-ending bloody entanglement in Iraq.

Low social justice spending
At home, Americans are told there is no money for housing, healthcare, or education, but there is always money for bombs, for foreign occupations, for further militarisation. More than 700,000 Americans are homeless, more than 40 million live under the official poverty line and more than 27 million have no health insurance.

And yet, the US government maintains by far the highest defence budget in the world.

Americans know the precarity they face at home, but they are also increasingly aware of the impact US imperial adventurism has abroad. For 20 months now, they have watched a US-sponsored genocide broadcast live.

They have seen countless times on their phones bloodied Palestinian children pulled from rubble while mainstream media insists, this is Israeli “self-defence”.

The old alchemy of dehumanising victims to excuse their murder has lost its power. The digital age has shattered the monopoly on narrative that once made distant wars feel abstract and necessary. Americans are now increasingly refusing to be moved by the familiar war drumbeat.

The growing fractures in public consent have not gone unnoticed in Washington. Trump, ever the opportunist, understands that the American public has no appetite for another war.

‘Don’t drop bombs’
And so, on June 24, he took to social media to announce, “the ceasefire is in effect”, telling Israel to “DO NOT DROP THOSE BOMBS,” after the Israeli army continued to attack Iran.

Trump, like so many in the US and Israeli political elites, wants to call himself a peacemaker while waging war. To leaders like him, peace has come to mean something altogether different: the unimpeded freedom to commit genocide and other atrocities while the world watches on.

But they have failed to manufacture our consent. We know what peace is, and it does not come dressed in war. It is not dropped from the sky.

Peace can only be achieved where there is freedom. And no matter how many times they strike, the people remain, from Palestine to Iran — unbroken, unbought, and unwilling to kneel to terror.

Ahmad Ibsais is a first-generation Palestinian American and law student who writes the newsletter State of Siege.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Eugene Doyle: Why Asia-Pacific should be cheering for Iran and not US bomb-based statecraft

APR editor — Sat, 28 Jun 2025 06:36:33 +0000

ANALYSIS: By Eugene Doyle

Setting aside any thoughts I may have about theocratic rulers (whether they be in Tel Aviv or Tehran), I am personally glad that Iran was able to hold out against the US-Israeli attacks this month.

The ceasefire, however, will only be a pause in the long-running campaign to destabilise, weaken and isolate Iran. Regime change or pariah status are both acceptable outcomes for the US-Israeli dyad.

The good news for my region is that Iran’s resilience pushes back what could be a looming calamity: the US pivot to Asia and a heightened risk of a war on China.

There are three major pillars to the Eurasian order that is going through a slow, painful and violent birth. Iran is the weakest. If Iran falls, war in our region — intended or unintended – becomes vastly more likely.

Mainstream New Zealanders and Australians suffer from an understandable complacency: war is what happens to other, mainly darker people or Slavs.

“Tomorrow”, people in this part of the world naively think, “will always be like yesterday”.

That could change, particularly for the Australians, in the kind of unfamiliar flash-boom Israelis experienced this month following their attack on Iran. And here’s why.

US chooses war to re-shape Middle East
Back in 2001, as many will recall, retired General Wesley Clark, former Supreme Commander of NATO forces in Europe, was visiting buddies in the Pentagon. He learnt something he wasn’t supposed to: the Bush administration had made plans in the febrile post 9/11 environment to attack seven Muslim countries.

In the firing line were: Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, the Assad regime in Syria, Hezbollah-dominated Lebanon, Gaddafi’s Libya, Somalia, Sudan and the biggest prize of all — the Islamic Republic of Iran.

One would have to say that the project, pursued by successive presidents, both Democrat and Republican, has been a great success — if you discount the fact that a couple of million human beings, most of them civilians, many of them women and children, nearly all of them innocents, were slaughtered, starved to death or otherwise disposed of.

With the exception of Iran, those countries have endured chaos and civil strife for long painful years. A triumph of American bomb-based statecraft.

Now — with Muammar Gaddafi raped and murdered (“We came, we saw, he died”, Hillary Clinton chuckled on camera the same day), Saddam Hussein hanged, Hezbollah decapitated, Assad in Moscow, the genocide in full swing in Palestine — the US and Israel were finally able to turn their guns — or, rather, bombs — on the great prize: Iran.

Iran’s missiles have checked US-Israel for time being
Things did not go to plan. Former US ambassador to Saudi Arabia Chas Freeman pointed out this week that for the first time Israel got a taste of the medicine it likes to dispense to its neighbours.

Iran’s missiles successfully turned the much-vaunted Iron Dome into an Iron Sieve and, perhaps momentarily, has achieved deterrence. If Iran falls, the US will be able to do what Barack Obama and Joe Biden only salivated over — a serious pivot to Asia.

Could great power rivalry turn Asia-Pacific into powderkeg?
For us in Asia-Pacific a major US pivot to Asia will mean soaring defence budgets to support militarisation, aggressive containment of China, provocative naval deployments, more sanctions, muscling smaller states, increased numbers of bases, new missile systems, info wars, threats and the ratcheting up rhetoric — all of which will bring us ever-closer to the powderkeg.

Sounds utterly mad? Sounds devoid of rationality? Lacking commonsense? Welcome to our world — bellum Americanum — as we gormlessly march flame in hand towards the tinderbox. War is not written in the stars, we can change tack and rediscover diplomacy, restraint, and peaceful coexistence. Or is that too much to ask?

Back in the days of George W Bush, radical American thinkers like Robert Kagan, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld created the Project for a New American Century and developed the policy, adopted by succeeding presidents, that promotes “the belief that America should seek to preserve and extend its position of global leadership by maintaining the preeminence of US military forces”.

It reconfirmed the neoconservative American dogma that no power should be allowed to rise in any region to become a regional hegemon; anything and everything necessary should be done to ensure continued American primacy, including the resort to war.

What has changed since those days are two crucial, epoch-making events: the re-emergence of Russia as a great power, albeit the weakest of the three, and the emergence of China as a genuine peer competitor to the USA. Professor John Mearsheimer’s insights are well worth studying on this topic.

The three pillars of multipolarity
A new world order really is being born. As geopolitical thinkers like Professor Glenn Diesen point out, it will, if it is not killed in the cradle, replace the US unipolar world order that has existed since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Many countries are involved in its birthing, including major players like India and Brazil and all the countries that are part of BRICS. Three countries, however, are central to the project: Iran, Russia and, most importantly, China. All three are in the crosshairs of the Western empire.

If Iran, Russia and China survive as independent entities, they will partially fulfill Halford MacKinder’s early 20th century heartland theory that whoever dominates Eurasia will rule the world. I don’t think MacKinder, however, foresaw cooperative multipolarity on the Eurasian landmass — which is one of the goals of the SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organisation) – as an option.

That, increasingly, appears to be the most likely trajectory with multiple powerful states that will not accept domination, be that from China or the US. That alone should give us cause for hope.

Drunk on power since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the US has launched war after war and brought us to the current abandonment of economic sanity (the sanctions-and-tariff global pandemic) and diplomatic normalcy (kill any peace negotiators you see) — and an anything-goes foreign policy (including massive crimes against humanity).

We have also reached — thanks in large part to these same policies — what a former US national security advisor warned must be avoided at all costs. Back in the 1990s, Zbigniew Brzezinski said, “The most dangerous scenario would be a grand coalition of China, Russia, and perhaps Iran.”

Belligerent and devoid of sound strategy, the Biden and Trump administrations have achieved just that.

Can Asia-Pacific avoid being dragged into an American war on China?
Turning to our region, New Zealand and Australia’s governments cleave to yesterday: a white-dominated world led by the USA. We have shown ourselves indifferent to massacres, ethnic cleansing and wars of aggression launched by our team.

To avoid war — or a permanent fear of looming war — in our own backyards, we need to encourage sanity and diplomacy; we need to stay close to the US but step away from the military alliances they are forming, such as AUKUS which is aimed squarely at China.

Above all, our defence and foreign affairs elites need to grow new neural pathways and start to think with vision and not place ourselves on the losing side of history. Independent foreign policy settings based around peace, defence not aggression, diplomacy not militarisation, would take us in the right direction.

Personally I look forward to the day the US and its increasingly belligerent vassals are pushed back into the ranks of ordinary humanity. I fear the US far more than I do China.

Despite the reflexive adherence to the US that our leaders are stuck on, we should not, if we value our lives and our cultures, allow ourselves to be part of this mad, doomed project.

The US empire is heading into a blood-drenched sunset; their project will fail and the 500-year empire of the White West will end — starting and finishing with genocide.

Every day I atheistically pray that leaders or a movement will emerge to guide our antipodean countries out of the clutches of a violent and increasingly incoherent USA.

America is not our friend. China is not our enemy. Tomorrow gives birth to a world that we should look forward to and do the little we can to help shape.

Eugene Doyle is a writer based in Wellington. He has written extensively on the Middle East, as well as peace and security issues in the Asia Pacific region. He contributes to Asia Pacific Report and Café Pacific, and hosts the public policy platform solidarity.co.nz