Noah Van Sciver: Comics are more easily accessible. They’re visual, so they grab people’s attention right away. It’s sort of like a sugary way to get somebody to eat their medicine, to take their pills.

Ryamond Tyler: One of my favorite things about comics is that they really lend themselves to social history. In 1912, there was this piece Eugene V. Debs wrote titled “The Cartoonist and the Social Revolution,” in which he lays out the importance of cartooning and the socialist movement. Funny enough, that was a contributing factor to why in the DSA comic Eugene V. Debs is the narrator. It was a contributing factor because he had such a favorable view of cartoonists.

The thing about radical cartooning is that it’s always been central to the Socialist movement. There were some great IWW cartoons that came out in various forms. You could look at those IWW cartoons and could get a general political sense even more so than maybe sitting down and reading Capital, Volume One.

One thing I’ll say is that, generally speaking, the ruling class gets upset about comics and cartoons throughout history. All the way back in the 18th century, there was this gentleman named William Hogarth who created a series of etchings called “A Rake’s Progress,” and it was ridiculed and widely hated by the ruling class and loved by the peasantry and workers in general. And then you can go all the way to Fredric Wertham writing Seduction of the Innocent, and it kind of speaks the same sort of denigration of the cartoon of being a medium that appeals to everyday people.

I feel like that history can be very inaccessible at times, and then the comic book can make it very accessible.

We’re at a point where comics and cartoons are as popular as they’ve ever been because of the movies and the proliferation of manga. That said, people don’t really seem to have a sense of how historical and prevalent comics have always been and how political they’ve always been, so getting that historical perspective is great. Raymond, you’ve written a number of other comics about historical social justice movements, too. What patterns do you see between all those stories?

Raymond Tyler: One of the things I often say is that there’s a hidden history in the United States, and it’s a history of people being very capable of organizing their own lives.

What you’re going to see if you read any of my other comics is people who are immensely capable of doing a great deal of organization without bureaucratic or hierarchical institutions, at least in the sense that they exist today. To put it simply, as far as a theme in history, people don’t need kings or tyrants to manage their lives… People are perfectly capable of managing their lives, their workplaces, and even the economy. This is the theme of all of my comics.

Noah, what changes to your usual comics process did you make for this project, if any? I know you’ve done some work in this space, you’ve done some autobiographical work as well, so would love to hear more about how you approached this collaboration.

Noah Van Sciver: I tried my best to use my limited skills to be as realistic as possible and not to cartoon and go for humor, which is something that I naturally, automatically have to catch myself doing. I tried to take it more seriously because my big concern doing this was that I knew if I messed up, if I slipped, one of my drawings could be used as a right wing meme. So if I’m drawing AOC, I better make sure that it’s as accurate and serious as I can make it, because I don’t want to see it wind up on X as a meme or something.

Were there any other comics that you referred to as an anchor point of what you wanted this book to feel like or be like?

Noah Van Sciver: Not that I recall. Did you have anything in mind, Ray?

Raymond Tyler: No. I mean, I will say that I actually looked at you and Paul Buhle’s Eugene V. Debs comic, and I love the way that you draw Eugene V. Debs. Some of the panels and some of the writings here were designed for you to bring out that amazing work that you did on the Eugene V. Debs comic. But besides that, I don’t think so.

Noah Van Sciver: It was great to be able to get back in touch with Debs for this comic after doing it for that book and being like, “Oh, yeah, that was a great time.” I had such a great time doing that book, and I can see it when I look at the artwork I did for it that I was having a blast. I was lost in it. And so that was a really delightful surprise when I’m like, “I get to go be with this character again.”

We interviewed Paul for the Between the Lines campaign for Partisans, which Raymond, I know you were an editor on. He has this really interesting wealth of knowledge. He’s been in the space for such a long time. Were there any lessons you learned from him either about the process of making a book or about history in general that you’d like to pass on?

Raymond Tyler: I’ve learned a great deal from Paul Buhle, to say the least, I didn’t even know how to do history comics really before I reached out to Paul Buhle. What’s wonderful about Paul is just how accessible he was. I was working on the comic about the West Virginia Mine Wars, and it was just a dream at this point of me wanting to write a comic book about one of my favorite historical events. I reached out to Paul because of all the work that he’d done before, and he made himself so available, and he ended up editing that book.

There’s such an incredible amount he’s taught me. But one of the things that I love about Paul is he’s a remarkable wealth of knowledge in a very non-pretentious way. You can just talk to him and ask him about anything, and we both share the belief that history is for everybody.

I think that would be the primary things that I learned from Paul… Also, just the people that he’s put me in contact with like Noah. I was in contact with Noah because of Paul Buhle.

Noah, how about you? Any takeaways in working for Paul? It sounds like you’ve had multiple instances.

Noah Van Sciver: Yeah, I became friends with him in probably 2014 or something. We started working together and, same thing…. I mean, he kind of educated me on the secret politics of things or things that are happening behind the scenes in the arts or in literature that I hadn’t thought about or I hadn’t known about. He still does that. If I post a comic about Little Orphan Annie on Facebook or something, he’s there to talk about Harold Gray’s odious politics or something, or especially if somebody happens to be from Wisconsin or something, he’s going to tell you all about that. He’s been a great political teacher.

What was it like working together? What was the working relationship like of building the framework of this history and story together?

Noah Van Sciver: It was great for me. It was super easy. Luckily, Ray already knew my work, so he knew sort of what it was going to turn out to look like, and as I recall, he just kind of let me do my thing, and you didn’t have too many edits or changes or anything.

Raymond Tyler: I love the comics medium, but one of the reasons I love it so much is that I get to work with folks that I just hand the script over to, and I trust them to do their best work. I was so excited to work with Noah. I told him before he hopped on, he did one of my all-time favorite books, which is Joseph Smith and the Mormons. And so when Paul was like, “I’m going to message Noah,” I was so excited. I was like, “I didn’t know that that was ever an option.”

Then, I just got to add really quick, it was such a pleasure working with the DSA Fund and the DSA NPEC.

One of the other beautiful things about comics is finding those collaborators where you’re able say, “Hey, I’ve done my piece. I’m going to hand it to you.” And it is that group effort. Nobody’s struggling or choking a project for control or a high amount of visibility.

Raymon Tyler: That’s something I talk to other writers about a lot of times because there are some writers who can be really militant about what an artist draws and where they put it, and one of the recommendations I would always make to writers, especially new writers, is work with artists that you trust and know that they know a lot more than you do about art. They’ve worked on this craft for a long time, and you can have preferences, I think, but you never want to work with an artist, and then the artist feels like they’re just drawing a panel over and over again the exact way that you want it. It just kind of ruins the whole process. So that’s always a big recommendation that I have for anyone. Hand it over and trust them to do some great work.

Noah, you alluded to this earlier—there’s a level of letting people have fun with the process, too. I work with a lot of artists on role-playing games that I make, and I’m just like, “Put whatever you want in there,” but if there’s references or specific things, depending on the gist of the game, it is nice to see what people come back with, from a writer’s perspective in terms of little Easter eggs, because art is 50% of the product.

Noah Van Sciver: Earlier you asked about why we decided to use comics tell this kind of story, and I just want to say that I really believe that comics are a machine for empathy in that it’s a very private medium. Somebody has to sit alone and read this thing. It’s a one-on-one communication, and you’re telling a story as a cartoonist or as a writer, you’re having to live in somebody else’s skin and communicate what that living is like, and then the reader is taking that in and they’re becoming the person whose story you’re telling, and it begs you to have empathy.

I think that using comics to tell these kinds of stories, stories about having empathy for others and living in other people’s skin, it’s a powerful natural tool. It’s the best way to do it, I think even better than film, because film is passive and comics are active. You have to take part in being a part of that story. So I think comics are the best way to get people to live in other people’s shoes and see what their lives are like and have empathy for them.

This content originally appeared on The Creative Independent and was authored by Sam Kusek.

A news van shared by KNBC and KVEA was defaced and vandalized during an immigration enforcement protest on June 9, 2025, in Los Angeles, California, according to videos posted on social media by multiple accounts.

The protests began June 6 in response to federal raids in and around Los Angeles of workplaces and areas where immigrant day laborers gathered, amid the Trump administration’s larger immigration crackdown. After demonstrators clashed with Los Angeles law enforcement officers and federal agents, President Donald Trump called in the California National Guard and later the U.S. Marines over the objections of California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass.

In a video posted to Instagram, a person is seen attempting to smash the van’s passenger-side window with a skateboard as a car alarm beeps in the background. The van, covered in graffiti, has a shattered front windshield.

In a separate video posted to YouTube by FreedomNewsTV on June 10, one of the defaced van’s tires is shown slashed, hissing loudly as it rapidly deflates.

KNBC and KVEA did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

This content originally appeared on U.S. Press Freedom Tracker: Incident Database and was authored by U.S. Press Freedom Tracker: Incident Database.

Growing up in the ’90s in New Jersey, my relationship with it is complicated. I think not just because of the music, but also the drug culture that seems to surround some of the scenes that perpetuate it. I’m not anti-drug. That’s a whole other conversation. But I saw, at a very young age, pros and cons of it all. I won’t name names. I won’t point fingers. I’m one of five kids. I’m the only one that didn’t really sign on to the parking lot culture that I think you know what I’m talking about.

I came into being a musician later in life. I was a choir kid, I was in theater, I played guitar, but I wasn’t trying to be in a band. I didn’t have the confidence to say, “I’m an artist” or anything like that in my teenage years. But I enjoyed it. I loved Ween and wrote silly songs about what I saw, not knowing anything about the future, of course—who knows that? I loved to sing and I had a couple friends who I would play guitar with, never thinking that it would be a career. I didn’t even really have a band until my 30s; I was solo up until then. My idea of a jam was a never-ending jam and being the last person in the corner with a guitar. But now, having had a deeper relationship with music and other musicians, that feeling has evolved for me.

How did it feel to settle in with the band? Was there an element of letting go?

Letting go is definitely a huge part of it. It was empowering to learn how to not feel like I had to steer the ship and to lean into each other’s ideas. I know this is not a new idea to anyone who has ever had a band; I’m having this connection and realization later in life. There’s a part of it that I’m a little embarrassed about. In my late teens, early 20s, I came out of a pretty traumatic relationship with someone who told me that anyone that would want to play with me just wanted to get into my pants. He was also very abusive, so I’ve carried those co-existingly throughout my life. My writing has stemmed from a place of healing and getting over that period of my life. It’s been a series of different ways of letting other people in, to support me and help me convey my ideas [that come] from a place I was trying to protect for so long. Having a band represents my healing process: trusting people and letting go in this way, and feeling seen by everyone I’m in the room with and letting them see me.

What did you hear in early demos that made you think, “This is working, let’s keep going”?

Everyone had their own space. I’m used to playing guitar or keys, and singing and building the demo up myself before I share it with anyone. Starting from the ground up, it’s a matter of listening and patience and knowing when to lean in and hang back. Before I knew we were writing songs, I loved it as this sonic trust fall… I’m curious what happens without forcing it to be something. There’s a lot of patience and support without the stacking of ideas… I had a lot more freedom to sing because I didn’t have to play the whole time. Everyone got to develop parts and have more movements, in a way.

You also chose to get everyone together in a communal space as opposed to a formal rehearsal studio.

I thought it would be enlightening for everyone to come and reconnect as people after Covid. To meet each other, have discourse, and have a bit of a literal band camp—to have breakfast, lunch, dinner together. The house and studio were separate. This studio, Gatos Trail in Yucca Valley, was amazing, and we were able to get to know each other in this very real way, and then go to a space where we could be in the room together and hash out songs without it feeling like we’re on the clock. After a week of going through all the songs, we had an extra two hours at the end. I was tired of hearing my own voice and was very inspired by the palette we had been honing, and I asked if we could just jam. We wrote two songs right away in that environment.

It’s so important to carve out space for the people that are choosing to be a part of your universe.

They’re giving up their life for you. I know it sounds dramatic, but it’s real. That’s why I called the band The Attachment Theory. You leave friends and your family behind and you become each other’s chosen family. You’re basically saying, “If there’s anything I’d rather do than be home and feel safe, it’s be with you.” We’re artists, and this is part of the deal. Home is everywhere, your community is everywhere, and you’re nurturing this thing. But I still feel like there’s an element of being a traveling shoe salesman. I mean that in a positive way. We believe in this and we’re nurturing a community, but it’s not like it’s getting any easier. I don’t have to tell you that.

You have an extensive backlog of ideas. How do you know when to revisit one of them?

I tend to write in my writing space, where I’m able to record enough. If I’m traveling and I have an instrument or a melodic idea, I try to get it down enough, or I’m like, “Okay, I want to pursue this when I get to a place where I can pursue this.” Most of the time, I’m feeling something deeply and I hit record, and I write a stream of consciousness to get the feeling out. Depending on the situation—if it’s days, weeks, months later—I’ll try to listen back to it with some perspective, to try to analyze what it was I was feeling. I’ll write anywhere from one to ten fragments that can be from 2 to 15 minutes long, just to get an overall feeling out… One thing I want to be better at is having more of a narrative in my writing. It’s rarely where my inspiration comes from. I’ve had writing exercises where I learned how to do that better, but most of my songs are more feelings and unfinished thoughts, ideas.

Do you feel internal or external pressure to stay creative?

I feel lucky that I don’t feel the pressure from my orbit. In my 40s, as a mom pursuing music, my concern has never been my relevance. I was a late bloomer from the get-go. My first album came out in 2009. I was late to everything. So I’ve always been behind the curve, as far as the industry is concerned. I have an understanding of that, but it hasn’t been a concern of mine.

My husband is a manager and he works with younger artists, and I understand the pressures of singles and the streaming platforms, and he helps me try to stay engaged on social media in a way that I probably wouldn’t… I feel grateful that I work with a label that is album-centric and we can focus on the record and focus on a campaign. I’m not pressured. It’s, “You tell us when you’re ready and let’s figure out the best timing for that.” [My label] Jagjaguwar has been supportive whenever I want to do something. I like to write with other people and sharpen a different tool in my belt; I think it’s always a good thing to experiment with other people and try new things. You make things according to who you’re surrounded with. Then I find the right time to put things out. But I don’t like putting too much out or putting too much on my calendar. I have an 8-year-old kid and I’m 44, and it’s just more complicated. I’d rather feel more invested when I’m ready.

Have you found your stride with balancing motherhood and your career?

I definitely haven’t figured it out, and I’m also learning that you can’t separate those things. I do feel like a crazy person going from having this performance on a theater stage and then going and chaperoning a class trip. But I know those things coincide. This is going to sound funny, but my kid is so supportive of me. Every time he’s come to the studio, we have talks about, “You know when I make a record, what happens,” and he’s like, “Oh, well, you go on tour.” “Yeah, but what’s that mean?” He’s like, “That means you’re gone.” And I’m like, “Yeah, but now you’re in real school.” The last two tours I did, it was COVID or just past COVID, where it was easier to take him. With this album, I’m more invested. I want to show the band I’m going to work this one harder for all of us, but that means more touring. My kid was so sweet, he just said, “Mom, you can’t stop singing.”

Oh my god.

Yeah. Talk about making me cry and fall on my knees. We’re going to be touring this year and next year. It’s going to be the most I’ve been gone. He understands time and space in a way where he didn’t before and you just can’t separate those things.

Years ago you got some important advice from Nick Cave about live performance and looking people in the eye. What impact has this had for you on stage?

When I walk out on stage, it takes the first three songs to shake my nerves, and usually my nerves make me teary. So the first one to three songs, I’m mostly closing my eyes and getting past the tears to the point where I can open my eyes. I try to focus on an audience member. If I can find that, great; if not, I can turn to my band and reconnect with my band. That settles me in this other way, and then I can turn back to the audience and have moments where I feel like I’m having conversations directly with them. You can’t control chemistry. You can’t control the energy of a room. You have to perform no matter what. I still believe in that part of it. Some of it can be acting. But some of it is, “How do I wield this energy to all of our benefits, and get through it to be able to do my job?” Sometimes it’s funny, sometimes it’s sad.

This content originally appeared on The Creative Independent and was authored by Jeffrey Silverstein.

As Israel unveils its final genocide push, and mass death from starvation looms in Gaza, western media and politicians are tentatively starting to speak up.

Who could have imagined 19 months ago that it would take more than a year and a half of Israel slaughtering and starving Gaza’s children for the first cracks to appear in what has been a rock-solid wall of support for Israel from western establishments.

Finally, something looks like it may be about to give.

The British establishment’s financial daily, the Financial Times, was first to break ranks last week to condemn “the West’s shameful silence” in the face of Israel’s murderous assault on the tiny enclave.

In an editorial – effectively the paper’s voice – the FT accused the United States and Europe of being increasingly “complicit” as Israel made Gaza “uninhabitable”, an allusion to genocide, and noted that the goal was to “drive Palestinians from their land”, an allusion to ethnic cleansing.

Of course, both of these grave crimes by Israel have been evidently true not only since Hamas’ violent, single-day breakout from Gaza on 7 October 2023, but for decades.

So parlous is the state of western reporting, from a media no less complicit than the governments berated by the FT, that we need to seize on any small signs of progress.

Next, the Economist chimed in, warning that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his ministers were driven by a “dream of emptying Gaza and rebuilding Jewish settlements there”.

At the weekend, the Independent decided the “deafening silence on Gaza” had to end. It was “time for the world to wake up to what is happening and to demand an end to the suffering of the Palestinians trapped in the enclave.”

Actually much of the world woke up many, many months ago. It has been the western press corps and western politicians slumbering through the past 19 months of genocide.

Then on Monday, the supposedly liberal Guardian voiced in its own editorial a fear that Israel is committing “genocide”, though it only dared do so by framing the accusation as a question.

It wrote of Israel: “Now it plans a Gaza without Palestinians. What is this, if not genocidal? When will the US and its allies act to stop the horror, if not now?”

The paper could more properly have asked a different question: Why have Israel’s western allies – as well as media like the Guardian and FT – waited 19 months to speak up against the horror?

And, predictably bringing up the rear, was the BBC. On Wednesday, the BBC Radio’s PM programme chose to give top billing to testimony from Tom Fletcher, the United Nation’s humanitarian affairs chief, to the Security Council. Presenter Evan Davis said the BBC had decided to “do something a little unusual”.

Unusual indeed. It played Fletcher’s speech in full – all 12 and a half minutes of it. That included Fletcher’s comment: “For those killed and those whose voices are silenced: what more evidence do you need now? Will you act – decisively – to prevent genocide and to ensure respect for international humanitarian law?”

We had gone in less than a week from the word “genocide” being taboo in relation to Gaza to it becoming almost mainstream.

Growing cracks

Cracks are evident in the British parliament too. Mark Pritchard, a Conservative MP and life-long Israel supporter, stood up from the back benches to admit he had been wrong about Israel, and condemned it “for what it is doing to the Palestinian people”.

He was one of more than a dozen Tory MPs and peers in the House of Lords, all formerly staunch defenders of Israel, who urged British Prime Minister Keir Starmer to immediately recognise a Palestinian state.

Their move followed an open letter published by 36 members of the Board of Deputies, a 300-member body that claims to represent British Jews, dissenting from its continuing support for the slaughter. The letter warned: “Israel’s soul is being ripped out.”

Pritchard told fellow MPs it was time to “stand up for humanity, for us being on the right side of history, for having the moral courage to lead.”

Sadly, there is no sign of that yet. Research published last week, based on Israeli tax authority data, showed Starmer’s government has been lying even about the highly limited restrictions on arms sales to Israel it claimed to have imposed last year.

Despite an ostensible ban on shipments of weapons that could be used in Gaza, Britain has covertly exported more than 8,500 separate munitions to Israel since the ban.

This week more details emerged. According to figures published by The National, the current government exported more weapons to Israel in the final three months of last year, after the ban came into effect, than the previous Conservative government did through the whole of 2020 to 2023.

So shameful is the UK’s support for Israel in the midst of what the International Court of Justice – the World Court – has described as a “plausible genocide” that Starmer’s government needs to pretend it is doing something, even as it actually continues to arm that genocide.

More than 40 MPs wrote to Foreign Secretary David Lammy last week calling for him to respond to allegations that he had misled the public and parliament. “The public deserves to know the full scale of the UK’s complicity in crimes against humanity,” they wrote.

There are growing rumblings elsewhere. This week France’s President Emmanuel Macron called Israel’s complete blockade on aid into Gaza “shameful and unacceptable”. He added: “My job is to do everything I can to make it stop.”

“Everything” seemed to amount to nothing more than mooting possible economic sanctions.

Still, the rhetorical shift was striking. Italy’s prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, similarly denounced the blockade, calling it “unjustifiable”. She added: “I have always recalled the urgency of finding a way to end the hostilities and respect international law and international humanitarian law.”

“International law”? Where has that been for the past 19 months?

There was a similar change of priorities across the Atlantic. Democratic Senator Chris van Hollen, for example, recently dared to call Israel’s actions in Gaza “ethnic cleansing”.

CNN’s Christiane Amanpour, a bellwether of the Beltway consensus, gave Israel’s deputy foreign minister, Sharren Haskel, an unusually tough grilling. Amanpour all but accused her of lying about Israel starving children.

Meanwhile, Josep Borrell, the recently departed head of European Union foreign policy, broke another taboo last week by directly accusing Israel of preparing a genocide in Gaza.

“Seldom have I heard the leader of a state so clearly outline a plan that fits the legal definition of genocide,” he said, adding: “We’re facing the largest ethnic cleansing operation since the end of the Second World War.”

Borrell, of course, has no influence over EU policy at this point.

A death camp

This is all painfully slow progress, but it does suggest that a tipping point may be near.

If so, there are several reasons. One – the most evident in the mix – is US President Donald Trump.

It was easier for the Guardian, the FT and old-school Tory MPs to watch the extermination of Gaza’s Palestinians in silence when it was kindly Uncle Joe Biden and the US military industrial complex behind it.

Unlike his predecessor, Trump too often forgets the bit where he is supposed to put a gloss on Israeli crimes, or distance the US from them, even as Washington ships the weapons to carry out those crimes.

But also, there are plenty of indications that Trump – with his constant craving to be seen as the top dog – is increasingly annoyed at being publicly outfoxed by Netanyahu.

This week, as Trump headed to the Middle East, his administration secured the release of Israeli soldier Edan Alexander, the last living US citizen in captivity in Gaza, by bypassing Israel and negotiating directly with Hamas.

In his comments on the release, Trump insisted it was time to “put an end to this very brutal war” – a remark he had very obviously not coordinated with Netanyahu.

Notably, Israel is not on Trump’s Middle East schedule.

Right now seems a relatively safe moment to adopt a more critical stance towards Israel, as presumably the FT and Guardian appreciate.

Then there is the fact that Israel’s genocide is reaching its endpoint. No food, water or medicines have entered Gaza for more than two months. Everyone is malnourished. It is unclear, given Israel’s destruction of Gaza’s health system, how many have already died from hunger.

But the pictures of skin-and-bones children emerging from Gaza are uncomfortably reminiscent of 80-year-old images of skeletal Jewish children imprisoned in Nazi camps.

It is a reminder that Gaza – strictly blockaded by Israel for 16 years before Hamas’ 7 October 2023 breakout – has been transformed over the past 19 months from a concentration camp into a death camp.

Parts of the media and political class know mass death in Gaza cannot be obscured for much longer, not even after Israel has barred foreign journalists from the enclave and murdered most of the Palestinian journalists trying to record the genocide.

Cynical political and media actors are trying to get in their excuses before it is too late to show remorse.

The ‘Gaza war’ myth

And finally there is the fact that Israel has declared its readiness to take hands-on responsibility for the extermination in Gaza by, in its words, “capturing” the tiny territory.

The long-anticipated “day after” looks like it is about to arrive.

For 20 years, Israel and western capitals have conspired in the lie that Gaza’s occupation ended in 2005, when Israel’s then prime minister, Ariel Sharon, pulled out a few thousand Jewish settlers and withdrew Israeli soldiers to a highly fortified perimeter encaging the enclave.

In a ruling last year, the World Court gave this claim short shrift, emphasising that Gaza, as well as the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East Jerusalem, had never stopped being under Israeli occupation, and that the occupation must end immediately.

The truth is that, even before the 2023 Hamas attacks, Israel had been besieging Gaza by land, sea and air for many, many years. Nothing – people or trade – went in or out without the Israeli military’s say-so.

Israeli officials instituted a secret policy of putting the population there on a strict “diet” – a war crime then as now – one that ensured most of Gaza’s young became progressively more malnourished.

Drones whined constantly overhead, as they do now, watching the population from the skies 24 hours a day and occasionally raining down death. Fishermen were shot and their boats sunk for trying to fish their own waters. Farmers’ crops were destroyed by herbicides sprayed from Israeli planes.

And when the mood took it, Israel sent in fighter jets to bomb the enclave or sent soldiers in on military operations, killing hundreds of civilians at a time.

When Palestinians in Gaza went out week after week to stage protests close to the perimeter fence of their concentration camp, Israeli snipers shot them, killing some 200 and crippling many thousands more.

Yet, despite all this, Israel and western capitals insisted on the story that Hamas “ruled” Gaza, and that it alone was responsible for what went on there.

That fiction was very important to the western powers. It allowed Israel to evade accountability for the crimes against humanity committed in Gaza over the past two decades – and it allowed the West to avoid complicity charges for arming the criminals.

Instead, the political and media class perpetuated the myth that Israel was engaged in a “conflict” with Hamas – as well as intermittent “wars” in Gaza – even as Israel’s own military termed its operations to destroy whole neighbourhoods and kill their residents “mowing the lawn”.

Israel, of course, viewed Gaza as its lawn to mow. And that is precisely because it never stopped occupying the enclave.

Even today western media outlets collude in the fiction that Gaza is free from Israeli occupation by casting the slaughter there – and the starvation of the population – as a “war”.

Loss of cover story

But the “day after” – signalled by Israel’s promised “capture” and “reoccupation” of Gaza – brings a conundrum for Israel and its western sponsors.

Till now Israel’s every atrocity has been justified by Hamas’ violent breakout on 7 October 2023.

Israel and its supporters have insisted that Hamas must return the Israelis it took captive before there can be some undefined “peace”. At the same time, Israel has also maintained that Gaza must be destroyed at all costs to root out Hamas and eliminate it.

These two goals never looked consistent – not least because the more Palestinian civilians Israel killed “rooting out” Hamas, the more young men Hamas recruited seeking vengeance.

The constant stream of genocidal rhetoric from Israeli leaders made clear that they believed there were no civilians in Gaza – no “uninvolved” – and that the enclave should be levelled and the population treated like “human animals”, punished with “no food, water or fuel”.

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich reiterated that approach last week, vowing that “Gaza will be entirely destroyed” and that its people would be ethnically cleansed – or, as he put it, forced to “leave in great numbers to third countries”.

Israeli officials have echoed him, threatening to “flatten” Gaza if the hostages are not released. But in truth, the captives held by Hamas are just a convenient pretext.

Smotrich was more honest in observing that the hostages’ release was “not the most important thing”. His view is apparently shared by the Israeli military, which has reportedly put that aim last in a list of six “war” objectives.

More important to the military are “operational control” of Gaza, “demilitarization of the territory” and “concentration and movement of the population”.

With Israel about to be indisputably, visibly in direct charge of Gaza again – with the cover stories stripped away of a “war”, of the need to eliminate of Hamas, of civilian casualties as “collateral damage” – Israel’s responsibility for the genocide will be incontestable too, as will the West’s active collusion.

That was why more than 250 former officials with Mossad, Israel’s spy agency – including three of its former heads – signed a letter this week decrying Israel’s breaking of the ceasefire in early March and its return to “war”.

The letter called Israel’s official objectives “unattainable”.

Similarly, the Israeli media reports large numbers of Israel’s military reservists are no longer showing up when called for a return to duty in Gaza.

Ethnic cleansing

Israel’s western patrons must now grapple with Israel’s “plan” for the ruined territory. Its outline has been coming more sharply into focus in recent days.

In January Israel formally outlawed the United Nations refugee agency UNRWA that feeds and cares for the large proportion of the Palestinian population driven off their historic lands by Israel in earlier phases of its decades-long colonisation of historic Palestine.

Gaza is packed with such refugees – the outcome of Israel’s biggest ethnic cleansing programme in 1948, at its creation as a “Jewish state”.

Removing UNRWA had been a long-held ambition, a move by Israel designed to help rid it of the yoke of aid agencies that have been caring for Palestinians – and thereby helping them to resist Israel’s efforts at ethnic cleansing – as well as monitoring Israel’s adherence, or rather lack of it, to international law.

For the ethnic cleansing and genocide programmes in Gaza to be completed, Israel has needed to produce an alternative system to UNRWA’s.

Last week, it approved a scheme in which it intends to use private contractors, not the UN, to deliver small quantities of food and water to Palestinians. Israel will allow in 60 trucks a day – barely a tenth of the absolute minimum required, according to the UN.

There are several catches. To stand any hope of qualifying for this very limited aid, Palestinians will need to collect it from military distribution points located in a small area at the southern tip of the Gaza strip.

In other words, some two million Palestinians will have to crowd into a location that has no chance of accommodating them all, and even then will have only a tenth of the aid they need.

They will have to relocate too without any guarantee from Israel that it won’t continue bombing the “humanitarian zones” they have been herded into.

These military distribution zones just so happen to be right next to Gaza’s sole, short border with Egypt – exactly where Israel has been seeking to drive the Palestinians over the past 19 months in the hope of forcing Egypt to open the border so the people of Gaza can be ethnically cleansed into Sinai.

Under Israel’s scheme, Palestinians will be screened in these military hubs using biometric data before they stand any hope of receiving minimum calorie-controlled handouts of food.

Once inside the hubs, they can be arrested and shipped off to one of Israel’s torture camps.

Just last week Israel’s Haaretz newspaper published testimony from an Israeli soldier turned whistleblower – confirming accounts from doctors and other guards – that torture and abuse are rife against Palestinians, including civilians, at Sde Teiman, the most notorious of the camps.

War on aid

Last Friday, shortly after Israel announced its “aid” plan, it fired a missile into an UNRWA centre in Jabaliya camp, destroying its food distribution centre and warehouse.

Then on Saturday, Israel bombed tents used for preparing food in Khan Younis and Gaza City. It has been targeting charity kitchens and bakeries to close them down, in an echo of its campaign of destruction against Gaza’s hospitals and health system.

In recent days, a third of UN-supported community kitchens – the population’s last life line – have closed because their stores of food are depleted, as is their access to fuel.

According to the UN agency OCHA, that number is rising “by the day”, leading to “widespread” hunger.

The UN reported this week that nearly half a million people in Gaza – a fifth of the population – faced “catastrophic hunger”.

Predictably, Israel and its ghoulish apologists are making light of this sea of immense suffering. Jonathan Turner, chief executive of UK Lawyers for Israel, argued that critics were unfairly condemning Israel for starving Gaza’s population, and ignoring the health benefits of reducing “obesity” among Palestinians.

In a joint statement last week, 15 UN agencies and more than 200 charities and humanitarian groups denounced Israel’s “aid” plan. The UN children’s fund UNICEF warned that Israel was forcing Palestinians to choose between “displacement and death”.

But worse, Israel is setting up its stall once again to turn reality on its head.

Those Palestinians who refuse to cooperate with its “aid” plan will be blamed for their own starvation. And international agencies who refuse to go along with Israeli criminality will be smeared both as “antisemitic” and as responsible for the mounting toll of starvation on Gaza’s population.

There is a way to stop these crimes degenerating further. But it will require western politicians and journalists to find far more courage than they have dared muster so far. It will need more than rhetorical flourishes. It will need more than public handwringing.

Are they capable of more? Don’t hold your breath.

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Jonathan Cook.

We speak with Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen, just back from El Salvador, where he met Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Maryland father whom the Trump administration says they forcibly transferred to an El Salvador mega-prison last month by “administrative error.” “We will keep fighting for his constitutional rights, because if we deny the constitutional rights for one person, we threaten them for everybody,” says Van Hollen. Four more Democratic lawmakers, including Congressmembers Maxwell Alejandro Frost of Florida and Yassamin Ansari of Arizona, have since traveled to El Salvador to continue pressuring for Abrego Garcia’s release.

This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.

Empathy is weakness, asserts a man, who views the world through ego-inflated grandiosity not the grandeur that is spread before him in the form of the living earth.

“The fundamental weakness of Western civilization is empathy.” — Elon Musk

When the dismal, life-defying ways of humankind (embodied by the aforementioned tech billionaire grifter) cause life to seem unbearable to my sight, I’m compelled to turn my grief-darkened vision inward; therein, I am, in moments of grace, greeted by a type of internal dawn. The first light of inner day touches my mind. The warmth of its touch stays with me as night winds howl, the ignorant gibber and rage, and foul men ascend to power.

“I can’t go on. I’ll go on.” ― Samuel Beckett, The Unnamable

There are moments, despair-pummeling hours during long, rest-deprived nights that I, pressed down by the crush of events, feel as though I simply can’t go on. Held in the thrall of grief, I cannot manage to write another word. Yet I continue to, word by word, sentence by sentence. Somehow I bear up. It remains a mystery as to how. I suspect, if I had to speculate as to the reason, the mystery in itself is exhilarating.

The rude rifting delivered by an insult comic, ridiculing vanity and human folly, is, most likely, less offensive to God (or even human sensibility) than religious fundamentalists praying for the end of the world or tech bros insisting they will deliver us to a “posthuman” paradise, wherein the serpent is empathy. .

The world does not need a savior to die — or become transhuman — for our sins. At every sunrise, inner or extant, rebirth is possible.

Before we can access our humanity, we must first genuflect before the grandeur of earthworm and galaxy. From my empathy-ridden perspective sin is committed by refusing to notice the terrible beauty of it all and allow the worst among us to do all the talking and claim the world as their entitlement. A voice resounds within me: defy the lie; resist soullessness. Because we are mortal human beings, defeat will come — but choose to be wounded by beauty.

Rubens, Saint Sebastian Tended By Two Angels, circa 1650

Only when I admit life is incomprehensible can I discern the cretinous lies passed off as truths by those who seek to gain power. Under the perpetual and pummeling uncertainty of a capitalist system, the contrived confidence of grifters will hold those who crave certainty in the thrall of tales promising false hope. Removal of dangerous outsiders is a time-tested go to of the ruthless. Thus the mark has been provided with provisional relief from anxiety, as, all the while, relieved of his money; and from the realm of political grifters, eventually, freedom of choice.

How does authoritarian rule come to be? First and foremost, because the mark has been swindled out of the ability to endure the incomprehensible — thus to endure the anxiety inherent to freedom. Hence, the calling of writers is to ask uncomfortable questions. Demagogues and grifters claim they have solutions. They have cures for all ills at hand, they lie. They will bring deliverance from troubles. Don’t question them; just fall in and be swept along in the parade of true believers.

Gabriel Pomerande, from Saint Ghetto of the Loans, 1950

Enveloped, as we are, within the present media simulacrum and building AI panopticon, a landscape of lies extends to the ends of the mind. Events, terrible in nature, unfold with the illusion of weightlessness as everything seems to be giving way and flying apart. A center made of nothing cannot hold.

Empathy is crucial as a centering principle. Set yourself in the direction of liberation by defending the dignity of the unfairly shunned. Freedom can be gained by resistance to falling into authoritarianisms’ manic, joyless parade of mass conformity; many join authoritarian movements to relieve the anxiety inherent to uncertainty and the elation – albeit illusionary – experienced by (shallow in nature) acceptance within the mass.

In a just world, those deserving of shunning are the power-seeking types of shitheels who attempt to gain authority by retailing in hatred and fear. Demagogues, inherently devoid of empathy, inflict division. In soul-making contrast, resisting their lies can serve to unite those possessed of viable hearts and dreaming souls..

Where words leave off, music begins. Poetry, the closest a verbal form can come to music insofar as revealing visions not perceptible to the temporal-locked mind. See if you recognize this Bronze Age classic:

I will search for my lost ones who strayed away, and I will bring them safely home again. I will bandage the injured and strengthen the weak. But I will destroy those who are fat and powerful. I will feed them, yes—feed them justice! — Ezekiel 34:16

First, the ineffable vision; then stranded in a valley of dry, rattling bones; then a rain from Heaven came, and the army known as flesh was restored. Then came a trickle of a stream rising from the heart of a hidden, desert temple…that makes fecund the arid land and restores life to a salt-poisoned sea.

Ezekiel is not promulgating prophecy about real estate — he was referring to the heart of humanity.

We will be lost in a valley of bones until repentance enters and brings to restoration the dry hearts of a worldview that permits genocide and ethnic cleansing and regards empathy as a weakness of character.

“The Vision of The Valley of The Dry Bones” by Gustave Doré

Ezekiel’s vision unfolds as poetry. Hence it is true…in the lexicon of the heart.

A devotee of literalism would sneer at the assertion, “So, you’re saying, an acrid valley strewn with sun-bleached skeletal remains, upon hearing the voice of God, was restored then rose as an army of flesh? Have you over-indulged in edibles? How can you pretend that is even possible?”

No, the edibles remain untouched, and yes, from the numinous perspective of poetic vision, it is possible. A transformation of vision has come to be. Poems are reflections of the human psyche, our hub of Anima Mundi i.e., The Soul Of The World. Remember, a poet does not create a poem; the poem creates the poet. In this way, poetry begets the flesh of essential being.

Therefore from the perspective of the psyche it is not only possible but a vital aspect of human existence. Deliverance from dry despair can be remedied by a flowing stream of hope. The heart, revitalized, will soldier forth as the army of your living flesh.

Yet, a culture dominated by crackpot realists insist you are the sum total of your bank account, that your persona is defined by your car and place of dwelling. Is it not a mystery as to why people are depressed and desperate. Why, in a consumer culture, the citizenry become hapless marks of grifters retailing in sleight-of-hand corporatism and bait-and-switch politics. And empathy is scorned as an enemy of the state and a threat to the common good.

Antithetical to the storylines of the grift, from the poetic imagination, enigmatic visions glide into the minds as wheels within wheels of fire; the thoughts of the heart flow forth and restore to living abundance the Dead Sea within you.

Crazy talk, huh? From the vantage point of my internal Ezekiel, my ragged, defrocked, enslaved-by-empire seer within, the anguish of the times is being inflicted by capitalist con men — not by poets chanting of the anguish felt in the heart witnessing the hideous mess created by crackpot realism. To wit, transitioning from prose to verse, a dispatch from the landscape of visions and renewal:

A ravine in my heart;
nocturnal creatures slink and prowl.
Moonlight issues forth from my mouth;
reflected on cold city steel — I tremble.
The sky is the dark blood of the redeemers’ wounds;
the rain-renewed creek wails out the birth cries of newborns.
March winds buffet my thoughts — night spirit, what are you demanding?
With every year, sustained eye contact is made with the inscrutable gaze of my dead.

(Postscript: A poem, a comedy routine, a parcel of prose achieves to be a prayer of communion dispatched toward the greater world from inner terrains of loneliness. Yet, once sent, the missive has forgotten the name of its author. Living force that it is, it seeks connection and merges with the living force that is the reader. At that point, its creator might not recognize it in passing while amid the clamor within the agora of the imaginal. This kind of loneliness is inconsolable. It is lonely as the Moon; the Sun’s caress will never reach her dark side. Yet her borrowed luminosity bestows night here on earth with the ache inflicted by beauty.)

Living day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute can unfold in meaning, with purpose, even beauty. Convinced otherwise, one is diminished; one’s essences become fragmented to shards. Yes, the times are ugly — yet there exists a possibility of surrendering to the beauty that is bestowed, odd as it seems, by lamentation and/or the humor of knowing what has been lost to folly. Existence is laughing near you – not at you. Thus a crack opens in persona where ensoulment can enter and take up long term residence.

Enchantment beckons; blunder towards its scintillation and caress; insist reluctant types come along for the ride. Yes, all concerned can be brought to ruin — but, as is the case with a fine piece of clothing, what good is persona that is never worn outside of the house?

After your inevitable downfall make the soul your bed of recovery.

Moments of fulfillment and wisdom do not give themselves over into companionship with those who, by reflex, reject life out of fear of losing a type of vanity revealing itself as a forced innocence, evinced far too long into life. Moreover, the compulsive pursuit of happiness is the stuff of vacationing on one of those crass cruise ships sloshing between hyper-commodified port cities.

“You lose your grip, and then you slip into the masterpiece.” — A Thousand Kisses Deep, Leonard Cohen

There is a force within driving you to be used by life. Ignore it and you will bore yourself and others blind.

The woundings incurred by living life on life’s terms are a crucial aspect of it all.

The scars inflicted will heal into a braille by which you will tell your life’s tale.

Frida Kahlo, The broken column

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Phil Rockstroh.

“Vietnam’s harsh sentencing of blogger Duong Van Thai is grotesque and an outrage, particularly amid allegations he was kidnapped in Thailand and forcibly sent back to Vietnam for wrongful prosecution,” said Shawn Crispin, CPJ’s senior Southeast Asia representative. “The real criminal in this instance is the Vietnamese state. Thai should be released immediately and allowed to leave Vietnam.” 

Thai was convicted October 30 in a one-day, closed-door trial at the Hanoi People’s Court, of “making, storing, disseminating or propagating information, documents, and items aimed at opposing the Socialist Republic of Vietnam” under Article 117 of Vietnam’s penal code, according to multiple reports.

In 2019, Thai fled to Thailand, fearing persecution for his journalism, and was given refugee status by the United Nations refugee agency’s office in Bangkok. He was interviewing for third-country resettlement at the time of his apparent abduction and deportation to Vietnam, according to multiple reports.

Thai posts political commentary, critical of government policies and leaders, to his around 119,000 followers on his Tin Tuc 24H YouTube channel, which has been disabled. He previously ran the Servant’s Tent online news platform, which reported critically on the ruling Communist Party and its top members, and is a member of the banned Independent Journalists Association of Vietnam.

CPJ’s email to Vietnam’s Ministry of Public Security about Thai’s conviction did not immediately receive a response. Vietnam was the world’s fifth-worst jailer of journalists, with at least 19 reporters behind bars on December 1, 2023, at the time of CPJ’s latest prison census. 

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

He repeated the claim while making an address in Bhubaneswar on September 17. He said, “…in Karnataka, where their (Congress) government is in power, they committed an even greater offence by placing an idol of Lord Ganesha behind bars…”

Bhubaneswar, Odisha: PM Narendra Modi says, “People hungry for power are troubled by Ganesh Chaturthi celebrations. You might have noticed that Congress and its ecosystem have been agitated in recent days because I participated in Ganesh Puja. Furthermore, in Karnataka, where… pic.twitter.com/BbNpH1m9v8

— IANS (@ians_india) September 17, 2024

A picture of an idol of Hindu deity Ganesha in a police van had already gone viral on social media when PM Modi mentioned it in Haryana.

Bengaluru South MP Tejasvi Surya shared the image on X on September 13, 2024, and claimed that Congress was “hell-bent on insulting our dieties, & belittling the belief and faith of millions of Hindus(?)” (sic) (archive)

This visual of Lord Ganesha in a police vehicle is terrifying.

Why is the Congress hell-bent on insulting our dieties, & belittling the belief and faith of millions of Hindus? pic.twitter.com/mFux03khJg

— Tejasvi Surya (@Tejasvi_Surya) September 13, 2024

The image was also shared by X user Girish Bharadwaj (@Girishvhp), who identifies himself as a ‘Swayamsevak’ on his X bio and is associated with the Vishwa Hindu Parishad. He claimed that “Bhagavan Ganesha… was detained by the Karnataka police.” He also wrote that “the arrest followed a protest condemning the incident of stone-pelting by Muslims on a Ganesh procession in Nagamangala, Mandya.” (archive)

𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐢𝐦𝐚𝐠𝐞 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐡𝐚𝐮𝐧𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐇𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐮𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐊𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐚—

Bhagavan Ganesha, along with Hindu activists, was detained by the Karnataka Police. The arrests followed protests condemning the stone-pelting by Muslims on a Ganesha procession… pic.twitter.com/IZs40dPQHI

— Girish Bharadwaj (@Girishvhp) September 13, 2024

At the time of this article being written, the tweet was viewed over 2.6 Lakh times and reshared close to 5,000 times.

Several X users, including top BJP leaders, amplified the claim. They include BJP national general secretary B L Santosh (@blsantosh), Karnataka state BJP president Vijayendra Yediyurappa (@BYVijayendra), national spokesperson Shehzad Poonawala (@Shehzad_Ind), the party’s Bengaluru Central MP P C Mohan (@PCMohanMP), Varun Kumar Rana (@VarunKrRana), Manish Kashyap son of Bihar (@ManishKasyapsob), Shalendra Sharma (@Shalendervoice), Jitendra Pratap Singh (@jpsin1) and several others.

Media outlets, too, reported on the incident. News agency ANI (@ANI) reached out to Maharashtra chief minister Eknath Shinde for a byte on the viral claim and amplified the claim that “an idol of Ganapati had been seized.” (archive)

#WATCH | On Ganapati idol row in Karnataka, Maharashtra CM Eknath Shinde says, “It is unfortunate. They have stopped the celebration of Lord Ganapati and the idol of Ganapati has also been seized. The people of Maharashtra, the people of the country, will not sit without giving… pic.twitter.com/fgmnsimqq5

— ANI (@ANI) September 14, 2024

Republic reported the PM speech and mentioned that the incident had taken place in Nagamangala taluk. The headline said, “Even Ganpati Being Put Behind Bars in Congress-Ruled Karnataka: PM Modi”. The subhead mentioned, “Today the situation has become such that even Ganpati is being put behind bars in the Congress-ruled Karnataka”, said PM Modi.”

Fact Check

A relevant keyword search led us to a report by The News Minute. Headlined “Controversy erupts in Bengaluru over Ganesha idol in police van: What really happened?”, the report narrates the sequence of events which resulted in the idol of Ganesha in a police van.

The report says, “The incident unfolded during a protest at Bengaluru’s Town Hall on September 13, where protesters had gathered to demand a probe by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) into the communal clash that erupted in Mandya district during Ganesh Chaturthi celebrations. Around 11:30 am, a group of protesters gathered at the Town Hall, with one of them carrying a Ganesha idol on a pedestal. The protest was organised by the Bengaluru Metropolitan Ganesh Utsava Committee.

The problem started as city regulations allow protests only at Freedom Park. Protests at all other locations are clamped down by the police, following a Karnataka High Court order.

“In an effort to manage the situation, a police officer placed the idol in an empty police van intended for the protesters. The move was to protect the deity. But it created confusion and resulted in accusations after the photos went viral,” a police official told TNM.

The police detained around 40 protesters, and the Ganesha idol was later immersed in Ulsoor lake by the authorities.”

A report in The Times of India corroborates this. It says, “… around 25 people had gathered, with one protester boldly holding up a 1ft-tall Ganesha idol on a pedestal. As per city rules, protests are only allowed at Freedom Park, so police arrived swiftly, ready to detain the crowd.”

The official X handle of DCP central division of Bengaluru Police (@DCPCentralBCP) issued a statement in this regard.

The first of their tweets said, “Clarification regarding viral social media posts stating that authorities snatched Ganesh idol from devotees going for immersion near Town Hall in Bengaluru…”

Clarification regarding viral social media posts stating that authorities snatched Ganesh idol from devotees going for immersion near Town Hall in Bengaluru…

— DCP Central Division,ಉಪ ಪೊಲೀಸ್ ಆಯುಕ್ತ ಕೇಂದ್ರ ವಿಭಾಗ (@DCPCentralBCP) September 15, 2024

A subsequent tweet mentioned that on September 13, 2024, Hindu groups defied High Court orders and protested at Bengaluru’s Town Hall over the Nagamangala incident. To this, the Karnataka police detained the demonstrators, and the Ganpati idol was later immersed by the authorities following rituals. They also shared pictures of the idol immersion.

On Sept 13, 2024, Hindu groups protested at Bengaluru’s Town Hall over the Nagamangala Ganesh procession incident, defying a HC order. Demonstrators detained. Ganapati idol was later immersed by authorities with rituals. pic.twitter.com/GUKF6gla1e

— DCP Central Division,ಉಪ ಪೊಲೀಸ್ ಆಯುಕ್ತ ಕೇಂದ್ರ ವಿಭಾಗ (@DCPCentralBCP) September 15, 2024

The readers should also note that within a short span of time, the idol was taken out of the van and shifted to a police jeep. The TOI report mentioned above states, “…the sight of the lonely Ganesha in the van caught the eye of photographers, and police soon realised how the scene might escalate. In a flurry of action, a police officer rushed back to the van, carefully retrieved the idol, and moved it to a police jeep.”

There is video evidence to corroborate this:

What Happened in Nagamangala?

Several news reports documented an incident at Nagamangala, Mandya, on September 11, 2024, against which the demonstrators were agitating in Bengaluru. Clashes reportedly broke out between two groups during a Ganesh idol immersion procession. As many as 52 people had been arrested. The Economic Times writes, “According to police, an argument broke out between two groups, when the Ganesh idol procession by devotees from Badarikoppalu village reached a place of worship on Wednesday, and some miscreants hurled stones, which escalated the situation. Following the clashes between the two groups, a few shops were vandalised and goods torched and vehicles set on fire on Wednesday night, they added.”

To sum up, that the viral social media claims that police ‘detained’ or ‘arrested’ Hindu deity Ganesha are false. The photo of the Ganesha idol in a police van was clicked after policemen had retrieved the idol from the protesters in Bengaluru. The claim by PM Modi, too, is hence misleading.

The Times of India report mentioned in this story got the headline wrong as it claimed that the entire ruckus took place in Mandya.

Ankita Mahalanobish is an intern at Alt News.

The post Ganesha idol in Bengaluru police van: Viral claims misleading; PM Modi leads Right Wing’s misinformation campaign appeared first on Alt News.

This content originally appeared on Alt News and was authored by Ankita Mahalanobish.

Vietnam is among the states that claim at least part of the waterway and it has been seeking to strengthen its maritime capabilities, including with purchases of defense technologies and equipment.

Giang’s trip, to Sept. 16, is his first official visit to the U.S. since he took office in April 2021.

Hanoi and Washington upgraded their relations to the top tier of comprehensive strategic partnership in September 2023, during a visit by U.S. President Joe Biden to Vietnam.

Yet their security and defense cooperation, deemed highly sensitive as the two countries fought each other in the past, remains limited and has focused mainly on the legacies of the Vietnam War, such as searching for American soldiers missing in action and decontamination of areas affected by toxic chemicals.

Gen. Giang and his counterpart, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, had a meeting on Monday at the Pentagon, during which they “underscored the importance of working together to overcome war legacies,” according to a summary provided by the Department of Defense.

They also “discussed opportunities to deepen defense cooperation, including on defense trade, industrial base resilience, and information sharing,” the department said without providing  further details.

Shopping list

According to the U.S. government, from 2016 to 2021, it authorized US$29.8 million – a relatively small amount – in defense articles to Vietnam via direct commercial sales. The Defense Department also has more than $118 million in active foreign military sales to Vietnam, mainly of trainer aircraft.

This budget would be greatly expanded if Vietnam decided to procure more U.S. equipment, analysts say.

“Defense equipment suppliers and subcontractors can expect increased demand for naval combatants, aerial defense, intelligence systems, and surveillance and reconnaissance equipment,” the U.S. government’s International Trade Administration said in its commercial guide.

“Maritime security and air defense is where Vietnam has the biggest need, but I would expect Vietnam would start with maritime security first, as this dovetails with U.S. expectations,” said Alexander Vuving, a professor at the Daniel K. Inouye Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies in Hawaii

“But there is no clear-cut distinction between maritime security and air defense. For example, aircraft, radars and missiles are essential in both,” Vuving told Radio Free Asia.

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The United States and Vietnam signed in 2015 a so-called Joint Vision Statement on defense relations – their most important document setting out defense cooperation, in which maritime security was highlighted.

The U.S. has given the Vietnam coast guard two Hamilton-class cutters – a third one is scheduled to be delivered in the near future – as well as tactical drones and patrol boats.

Veteran regional military watcher Mike Yeo said that coast guard cutters “would be an obvious item” on Hanoi’s shopping list.

“But another possibility is the approval for transfer of subsystems to Vietnam such as jet engines for Korean FA-50 light attack planes should Vietnam decide to buy them,” Yeo said. 

“Vietnam hasn't bought the FA-50 yet but it seems like a logical choice going forward and as the engine used is a U.S. design an export clearance will be needed for any buyers,” he added.

Not targeting China

The United States lifted its lethal arms embargo on Vietnam in 2016, enabling it to procure U.S. equipment but “it will depend mainly on Vietnam's needs and the prices,” said Vuving.

Vietnam’s defense budget has not been made public, but could be about $7.8 billion in 2024, according to GlobalData. It remains dependent on cheaper Russian arms and equipment but there are efforts to diversify supplies with a major defense expo in Hanoi in 2022 and a second one slated for this December.

Before the meeting with Gen. Giang on Monday, Secretary Austin said his department had accepted an invitation to the event that is due to be attended by defense suppliers from dozens of countries including Russia, India, the United Kingdom, Israel and France.

Vietnam’s big neighbor China did not attend the first Vietnam Defense Expo and has yet to confirm its attendance at the second.

Hanoi is always cautious not to antagonize Beijing while deepening ties with Washington, insisting that any effort to modernize its military is purely for self-defense and not aimed at any  country.

“China will watch Vietnam-U.S. relations very closely,” said Vuving. “Beijing is unhappy with any progress in U.S.-Vietnam relations.” 

Edited by Mike Firn.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Staff.

CODEPINK has maintained from the start that Nour Jaghama, a Palestinian-American, never made physical contact with Rep. Van Orden. However, law enforcement insisted on taking action based on Van Orden's claims due to his position as a U.S. Congressman.

Following a thorough investigation, including the review of body cam footage, the Milwaukee District Attorney concluded that no crime had been committed and dropped the charges. Despite this, Rep. Van Orden continues to spread false claims of being assaulted and injured to his constituents, the media, and on social media.

The false accusations have sparked a wave of death threats and hate messages directed at CODEPINK, including one currently under investigation by the FBI. Here is an example of the threats received:

"Contact: (815) 284-4661 (m) jeffdkcjka@yahoo.com
Fuck you CUNT bitches. Hurt another Republican senator and it will be the LAST person you hurt CUNTS. Hamas should die and rot in Hell."

This situation underscores the unacceptable nature of a U.S. Congressman using his position to defame a private citizen and incite violence. The public must hold elected officials accountable for such abuses of power.

The ethics complaints are attached. For more information or to request further details, please contact Melissa at melissa@codepink.org.

This content originally appeared on Common Dreams and was authored by Newswire Editor.

NATO is utilizing artificial intelligence to track Russian aircraft and fueling stations, the US-led bloc’s Assistant Secretary General for Innovation, Hybrid and Cyber, David van Weel, has revealed.

Speaking at the NATO-Ukraine Defense Innovators Forum at AGH University of Krakow, Poland, the top official pledged to deepen cooperation with Kiev, with a new agreement on “battlefield innovation” already in sight.

“The energy for more collaboration between Ukrainian and Allied innovation ecosystems was contagious, and is exactly why Allies and Ukraine are working together on a new innovation agreement in the NATO-Ukraine Council,” van Weel stated.

As an example of the integration of various AI solutions, he said the bloc utilizes it to analyze satellite imagery in order to track and count Russian aircraft and fueling stations. The assistant secretary general said that using AI in such a manner was in accord with NATO’s principles on ethical Al use.

“It’s low-risk,” van Weel said. “Nobody gets killed if you get the number off.”

In recent months, Ukraine has reportedly ramped up its effort to strike Russian airfields, both those close to the combat zone and deep inside the country’s territory. Moscow appears to have significantly expanded its use of frontline aviation as well, primarily to launch aerial bombs fitted with UMPK (Universal Glide and Correction Module) winged guidance kits.

Various Ukrainian military sources have noted the growing use of UMPK-fitted bombs by Russia, attributing frontline setbacks to the effectiveness of the weapon.

UMPK modules, widely regarded as an analogue of US-made Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) kits, fit most freefall bombs in Russia’s arsenal. They are frequently upgraded with thermobaric and cluster munitions, which have already been observed being used on the frontline.

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

Last week, Ho Chi Minh City’s People’s Court convicted Lan, 68, of bribery, embezzlement and violating banking regulations. More than 80 others were given lengthy prison terms for their involvement.

Lan owned 91.5% of Saigon Commercial Bank and over 10 years ordered bank officials to approve more than 2,500 loans to shell companies she controlled, causing the bank to lose the equivalent of US$27 billion.

Lan ordered subordinates to bribe auditors at the State Bank of Vietnam to cover her tracks, according to state media. Head banking inspector Do Thi Nhan received US$5.2 million in bribes, while deputy chief inspector Nguyen Van Hung received US$300,000, the reports said.

The case demonstrates poor management capacity and has damaged trust of the Communist Party and government, experts said, and will cause foreign investors to think twice before betting on the Southeast Asian nation.

The case is “unprecedented … even on a global scale,” said U.S.-based attorney Dang Dinh Manh. He called the failure of prosecutors to hold officials from the Ministry of Finance and State Bank accountable “highly unreasonable.”

“This reflects the regime’s irresponsibility towards the financial system, the national banking system, and the rights and interests of innocent people,” he said. “Given the current political situation in Vietnam, maintaining an authoritarian regime without control over state power continues to be a favorable condition for serious corruption.”

‘Unstable’ financial system

Experts interviewed by international media outlets described the sentence as a part of the “Blazing Furnace” anti-corruption campaign launched by Communist Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong and suggested it would harm Vietnam’s image at a time when foreign investors are seeking to move their operations out of neighboring China.

They called the Van Thinh Phat case an example of a power struggle within the senior ranks of the party that is shaking investor confidence and questioned why more high-level officials weren’t held responsible when the scandal occurred under their watch.

The case shows that Vietnam’s financial sector is “unstable,” said Vu Tuong, the head of the political science department at the University of Oregon. And while the government may hope that it would reflect a determination to fight corruption, it also lays bare poor management capacity, he said.

“The political impact is a decline in trust in the Communist Party and the government,” Tuong said.

Observers noted that the court ruling focused only on punishing Lan and Saigon Commercial Bank, and recovering assets, while failing to address how to compensate the bank’s customers, who were the direct victims of the fraud.

Van Thinh Phat Group and its affiliates were accused of illegally issuing bonds to raise money from investors from 2018 to 2020. Lan's company issued 25 bonds worth US$1.24 billion, all through proxies, and sold to buyers through Saigon Commercial Bank.

Last week’s verdict ignored the losses of an estimated 42,000 victims who bought the fraudulent products.

Investigators have said Lan will face additional charges in another trial that will address the bond fraud, although investors are likely to bear some of the blame for failing to thoroughly research Van Thinh Phat Group and the high-interest rate it promised.

Compensating victims

Manh, the U.S.-based attorney told RFA that the thousands of customers who deposited money into Saigon Commercial Bank should be made whole.

“Returning the exact amount of money stolen from the victims is entirely justifiable and legal,” he said in an interview. “The exclusion of the 42,000 victims from the legal proceedings … was a deliberate action aimed at identifying all assets being seized by the prosecuting authority from Van Thinh Phat Group, Lan, and other defendants as illegally acquired property for confiscation.”

Manh said that involving them in the second phase of the case, if that trial proceeds, “would be entirely meaningless” as the seized assets would no longer be available at that point.

“Therefore, the 42,000 victims will have been robbed twice,” he said.

Tuong at the University of Oregon said that the fact that Saigon Commercial Bank hasn’t been dissolved suggests that Vietnam's government is trying to save it through debt restructuring negotiations or by finding a buyer who is willing to purchase the debts at a reduced price.

“As long as Saigon Commercial Bank allows customers to withdraw money freely, we cannot definitively conclude that the customers have suffered losses,” he said. “If depositors demand withdrawals from the bank en masse, and Saigon Commercial Bank does not have enough money … then it must declare bankruptcy or the government must dissolve it.”

“If I were one of the businessmen who wasn’t arrested,” he said, “I would transfer my capital abroad as soon as possible, because I don’t know when it will be my turn.”

Translated by Anna Vu. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Vietnamese.

Judges at Ho Chi Minh City’s People’s Court said she was guilty of bribery, embezzlement and violating banking regulations.

Lan owned a 91.5% stake in Saigon Commercial Bank and, over the course of 10 years, ordered bank officials to approve more than 2,500 loans to shell companies she controlled, causing the bank to lose the equivalent of US$27 billion.

Lan ordered subordinates to bribe auditors at the State Bank of Vietnam to cover her tracks.

Head banking inspector Do Thi Nhan received $5.2 million in bribes, while deputy chief inspector Nguyen Van Hung received $300,000, state media said.

A family member told Reuters Lan planned to appeal the verdict.

Edited by Elaine Chan.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Staff.

We speak with Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland about the U.S. response to Israel’s brutal offensive on Gaza, which has killed over 32,000 Palestinians. Van Hollen expresses “strong frustration with the Biden administration,” which “needs to do a lot more” to hold Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accountable. Defying Biden’s warnings against a full-scale ground operation in Rafah, Netanyahu continues to promise an invasion of the city, where 1.4 million forcibly displaced people from across Gaza are sheltering. “At the end of the day, Prime Minister Netanyahu simply ignores the president of the United States, and so we need to do more to make Netanyahu accountable for our requests,” says Van Hollen, who warns Biden against “getting dragged into the planning of a Rafah invasion” and becoming “complicit in Netanyahu’s actions.” The senator also discusses U.S. funding of UNRWA and Israeli leaders blocking aid for Gaza. “For goodness’ sakes, lift the restrictions that are in place that are creating this humanitarian disaster in Gaza.”

This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.

Belgium accounts globally for 17% of Russia’s exports, behind only China and Spain.

Later in an interview with the Financial Times, Van der Straeten said she was “not happy” about the fact that Russian gas kept flowing into Europe. She then understated Belgium’s share of Russian gas, indicating it was merely 2.8% of Europe’s imports that remained in Belgium, the rest was “in transit”. How wrong or misleading her statement was is revealed by the Global Witness NGO.

She admitted, though Belgium supports sanctions on Russian fuel, it was unlikely to happen. It would require the unanimous support of all EU members.

Earlier this week, Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer admitted that Russian LNG was difficult to replace, pointing out that while it was “not cheaper than any other” gas, the way the pipeline system is arranged in Europe makes it difficult to substitute.

There is no end to excuses and pretexts in explaining why Europe must continue to import Russian hydrocarbons. Amazing. No word about the European economy which is at the brink of total collapse. Maybe Germany has already passed the point of no return.

And no word, of course, that this suicidal path to follow the Washington Masters and their overlords dictate is due to an utterly corrupt European leadership, combined with the equally corrupt strongest economy’s leadership, Germany – something that has hardly been seen in recent history.

How vassalic must you be to commit suicide on the orders of Washington and the corporate financial overlords who pulls the strings on Washington, pretending to run the world.

And they may if we just stand by and watch.

See also this by Dr. Paul Craig Roberts about the west’s lost integrity – “The Disappearance of Integrity: Organized Suppression of the Facts, Only Writers Who Support ‘Official Narratives’ Are Tolerated.”

This is just the beginning. The EU Russian energy apologists start talking about energy imports from Russia – and how it is necessary for now – but also how to wean themselves off Russian energy dependence very, very soon.

The Guardian puts it this way: “EU countries bought 22m cubic meters of Russian LNG between January and July 2023, compared with 15m during the same period in 2021, Global Witness said. “Buying Russian gas has the same impact as buying Russian oil. Both fund the war in Ukraine, and every euro means more bloodshed.”

This is, of course, a mainstream media blow on Russia. Never a reason or history on how NATO provoked the war in Ukraine.

This is just part of the story. What the holy west and particularly the vassal-EU does not mention are the other more than 100 essential products they keep importing from Russia at ever larger quantities, and – yes – despite the sanctions.

These table speak for themselves:

And the list goes on – another 82 lines of imports.
2022 EU Imports from Russia are the 3 largest since 2013, despite sanctions.

People are fooled.
Europe cannot live without imports from Russia.
So, what are the sanctions for?
Propaganda?
Russia bashing?
Your mind control?

Another legitimate question one may ask: why does Russia sell to the sanctioning countries? Russia does not really need Europe and the US for trade and for economic survival.

President Putin’s Press Secretary, Dmitry Peskov, recently said that Russia is doing well and growing, despite western sanctions. See this.

Russia is well integrated into the Asian complex.  It is a co-founder of the original BRICS and now the new BRICS-11. Russia is also a key player in the Global South which becomes ever more important on the global stage.

Uranium imports by the US and Europe from Russia is another unwritten sheet and rarely published news. Russia sold about $1.7 billion in nuclear products to firms in the U.S. and Europe, and this despite the western stiff sanctions, due to the western provoked war in Ukraine. The West calls it a Russian invasion. In reality, it was a NATO-triggered move for preserving Russian sovereignty – and against some 20 to 30 war-grade biolabs in the Ukraine, built and funded by the US. See this.

The United States’ uranium purchases from Russia have doubled since last year. The U.S. bought 416 tons of uranium from Russia in the first half of the year, more than double the amount for the same period in 2022 and the highest level since 2005.

One may question the seriousness of the US Russia bashing, especially since according to a report by RT, Russia is supplying the U.S. only with enriched uranium, a critical component for civil nuclear power generation, but also for nuclear weapons – according to a report by RT.  How come Russia is selling Washington Weapon-grade enriched uranium?

See full report.

Given the foregoing inconsistencies with “sanctions” – mind you, highly publicized sanctions – how serious can the West be taken?

The world must wake up. People of western countries, whose democracy has long been abolished, trampled by the tyrannical western powers “rules-based order”, must stand up against these rulers, invent alternatives to their corporate financial empires and build a world of peace and harmony outside the dictatorial matrix.

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Peter Koenig.

"News and official documents said that defendant Le Van Manh was executed on the morning of September 22, 2023," said Luan.

A death notice dated September 22, 2023 from the People's Committee of Thu Phong commune, Cao Phong district, Hoa Binh province, posted widely on social media said that death row prisoner Le Van Manh, born in 1982, died at 8:45 a.m. on September 22, 2023 at a Hoa Binh Provincial Police execution facility.

Upon receiving news of the imminent execution last week, Manh’s family said they did not accept the verdict because it was an unjust sentence. They said they would continue to protest his innocence to authorities in Hanoi.

In 2005, when he was 23 years old, Le Van Manh was sentenced to death for allegedly raping and killing a female student in the same village earlier that year.

The case occurred on March 21, 2005, but it was not until April 20 that police arrested Manh on a robbery charge in another case.

After four days of detention Manh was prosecuted for murder and child rape.

Manh’s mother Nguyen Thi Viet told Radio Free Asia her son said that he had been tortured to force him to confess.

During the trial lawyers requested an examination of the defendant's body to determine whether he had been tortured, but the court refused.

A day before the execution – September 21 – the European Union delegation along with the embassies of Canada, the United Kingdom and Norway in Vietnam issued a joint statement calling on Hanoi to stay execution of the sentence.

“We strongly oppose the use of capital punishment at all times and in all circumstances, which is a cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment and can never be justified, and advocate for Vietnam to adopt a moratorium on all executions,” said the statement posted on the EU delegation’s Facebook page.

This is the second joint statement by the EU and the UK, Norway and Canada on the death penalty in Vietnam in the last two months. Late last month, they issued a statement calling on Vietnamese authorities to stay the execution of Nguyen Van Chuong, who was convicted of murder in Hai Phong in 2007.

Translated by RFA Vietnamese. Edited by Mike Firn and Elaine Chan.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Vietnamese.

We speak with Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland about his call for the U.S. State Department to declassify a report on the killing of Palestinian American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh by an Israeli soldier in the occupied West Bank last year. The Al Jazeera reporter was covering an Israeli military raid just outside the Jenin refugee camp and was clearly marked as press. “It’s my belief that the United States has an absolute obligation to get to the bottom of what happened, to hold the individuals accountable, or, in this case, potentially the IDF unit accountable,” says Van Hollen. The report is by the U.S. security coordinator for Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.

I too felt a quake, a shiver down my spine as associations tumbled through my mind.  Poems, songs, memories of other early morning walks in spring.  Intoxication, elation, the horripilation that accompanies spring’s rising, the sexual excitement.  Hope, and the loose feeling of being forever young.  No solution to anything, just reverence for existence.  Nothing changed, except a few years.

In quickly putting into words what I felt a half-hour ago, I drew on a vast store of personal and cultural memories that came to me with little thought as I was walking home.  Words strung together without thinking.  You have just read them.  I felt impelled to tell them.

Now as I sit and contemplate, I think about culture and what it might mean.  In my case, I was gifted by my parents and schools with the love of poetry and art from a young age.  I know well that everyone is not so lucky and that, in any case, culture has many meanings.  “Culture,” writes Raymond Williams, “is one of the two or three most complicated words in the English language.”  From its original verbal meaning to cultivate the land to high, low, and middlebrow culture onto so many other meanings and conflicts that are often tied up with social class issues. There are cultures and culture.

When I say cultural memories, I mean my memories, no one else’s.

I learned early on that the music of verse, the sound of birds in the trees, the rush of a creek murmuring over rocks, the lilt of words spoken passionately, the placement of a certain blue paint on a canvas, a singer’s voice flying with a tune of joy or sadness, and a instrument’s vibrations were all connected to the reverence I felt as an altar boy tolling the bells and repeating Latin responses, whose full meaning I couldn’t grasp amid the incense and candle smoke: Et introibo ad altare Dei: ad Deum qui laetificat juventutem mea – “And I go to the altar of God, to God who gives joy to my youth.”

It was the sound of the bells that entranced me, and that I was allowed to ring them.  To sound in, to participate in the ancient ritual that created a musical enclave from the beyond. I knew then, as I know now, that God has many altars, and that reverence before them and their mysteries is the right refrain.   Bob Dylan singing “Ring Those Bells” comes to mind:

Ring them bells, ye heathen
From the city that dreams
Ring them bells from the sanctuaries
’Cross the valleys and streams
For they’re deep and they’re wide
And the world’s on its side
And time is running backwards
And so is the bride

So while it is not necessary to draw on stored cultural memories to appreciate the birds in the trees on nature’s altar on a beautiful spring morning, for me it enriched the experience.  You may have heard echoes of Yeats, Van Morrison, and others in my words, but the reality of the world I described would be the same for those who never heard of these artists, who find their inspiration in the terrible beauty of nature and have other associations.

Are we really at home in our interpreted world, a poet once asked?  It is a good question.  This poet was Rilke, who wrote in the Duino Elegies :

For beauty is nothing/but the beginning of terror/which we are still just able to endure/and we are so awed because it serenely/disdains to annihilate us/Every angel is terrifying/And so I hold myself back and swallow the call note of my dark sobbing/Ah, whom can we ever turn to in our need?

Whom can we ever turn to in our need?

Everyone carries different associations that come to us when we are not thinking but are only immersed in our experiences.  Snatches of trace memories, images, words, sounds, smells, the look of light, etc. that usually occur slightly after the first encounter with natural phenomena.  One doesn’t have to know Shakespeare or William Wordsworth to experience nature’s beauty.  Nor it’s terrors. Yet I must admit I am partial to words like these from Wordsworth:

Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind;
In the primal sympathy
Which having been must ever be;
In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of human suffering;
In the faith that looks through death,
In years that bring the philosophic mind.

But whatever our backgrounds, we are all interpreters of our world and words are our fundamental way of doing so.  Words and metaphors that lead us to myth and art, even when its expression is wordless sound or pictures.  Words that are often unacknowledged prayers to an unknown God.

For many years I taught what are called the liberal arts.  This was an extension of my own education in the classics, philosophy, theology, and sociology, disciplines divided in name only but married in reality to science, literature, history, languages, etc.  It is all one study when rightly understood.  But our schools and  universities have been abandoning this approach for the sterility of numbers and the cold dead hand of technology and digital dementia.  For specialization, where professors know nothing outside their limited disciplines.  For the study of the parts without any sense of the whole.

A new Dark Age is closing upon us, as Max Weber noted more than a century ago when he described the people who run our societies and educational institutions as “specialists without spirit, sensualists without heart; this nullity imagines it has attained a level of civilization never before achieved.”