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Category: War

After failing to win the Nobel Peace Prize, Trump prepares for war in Venezuela

After failing to win the Nobel Peace Prize, Trump prepares for war in Venezuela

Nancy A. Youssef, Gisela Salim-Peyer, and Jonathan Lemire write: As a naval aviator, Alvin Holsey trained to conduct missions that required precise targeting. For years, his job was to fly helicopters over potential targets and, using radar and other detectors, assess whether they posed a threat to the United States; if so, he had to determine whether to launch an attack. On September 2, Holsey, now an admiral leading the U.S. military’s southern command, was put in charge of a…

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As Palestinians agree to let technocrat committee run Gaza, an appeal for Marwan Barghouti’s release

As Palestinians agree to let technocrat committee run Gaza, an appeal for Marwan Barghouti’s release

The Guardian reports: The main Palestinian factions have said they have agreed that an independent committee of technocrats would take over the running of Gaza after Hamas said it had received “clear guarantees” from mediators that “the war has effectively ended”. A joint statement published on the Hamas website said the groups had agreed in a meeting in Cairo to hand “over the administration of the Gaza Strip to a temporary Palestinian committee composed of independent ‘technocrats’, which will manage…

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‘We estimate that nearly one million of Gaza’s 1.1 million olive trees have been destroyed’

‘We estimate that nearly one million of Gaza’s 1.1 million olive trees have been destroyed’

Mohamed Suleiman writes: The last time Hajj Suleiman Abdel-Nabi witnessed a normal olive harvest was three years ago. Days before the “ceasefire” went into effect on October 10, the 75-year-old farmer took a saw to what remains of his three-dunam (about three quarters of an acre) olive farm in southern Gaza’s Al-Mawasi area. Alongside the massive destruction of homes and civilian infrastructure wrought by Israel’s two-year war on Gaza, the toll on agriculture and farmland in the enclave has been…

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Robert Malley talks about the Gaza ceasefire and U.S. double standards on Israel

Robert Malley talks about the Gaza ceasefire and U.S. double standards on Israel

  For more on the state of the Gaza ceasefire and the future of Palestine, we speak with Robert Malley, co-author with Hussein Agha of the new book Tomorrow Is Yesterday: Life, Death, and the Pursuit of Peace in Israel/Palestine. Malley is a veteran negotiator involved in previous U.S.-backed peace talks between Israel and Palestinian leadership. He says despite the many flaws in the Trump plan, including “deciding everything for Palestinians without Palestinians having a voice,” it has at least…

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What happened in Gaza is far worse than many Americans want to believe

What happened in Gaza is far worse than many Americans want to believe

Lydia Polgreen writes: For many Americans, there might be a temptation to disbelieve the enormity of what has happened in Gaza. After all, it is a catastrophe funded by our money, made possible by our weapons, condoned by our government and carried out by one of our closest allies. It’s little wonder that some want to downplay the damage. Their defense is to cast doubt on the numbers. It goes something like this: The death toll, counted by the Hamas-run…

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Prominent Jews across the globe call on UN and world leaders to sanction Israel

Prominent Jews across the globe call on UN and world leaders to sanction Israel

The Guardian reports: Prominent Jewish figures around the world are calling on the United Nations and world leaders to impose sanctions on Israel over what they describe as “unconscionable” actions amounting to genocide in Gaza. Over 450 signatories, including former Israeli officials, Oscar winners, authors and intellectuals have signed an open letter demanding accountability over Israel’s conduct in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem. The letter’s release comes as EU leaders meet in Brussels on Thursday amid reports…

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Stephen Miller is directing Trump’s war on drug boats

Stephen Miller is directing Trump’s war on drug boats

Jonathan Blitzer writes: Late this summer, James Story, who served as U.S. Ambassador to Venezuela for three years of Donald Trump’s first term and for two of Joe Biden’s, felt that anything was possible in the relationship between Washington and Caracas. It had been six years since the U.S. closed its Embassy in Venezuela, to protest the rule of the Socialist authoritarian Nicolás Maduro. The issue of how to dislodge Maduro’s regime has been an American political conundrum for at…

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One target at a time: The logic that helped Israeli liberals commit genocide

One target at a time: The logic that helped Israeli liberals commit genocide

Yuval Abraham writes: A few months after October 7, I enrolled in an introductory course on genocide at the Open University of Israel. The lecturer began the first class by telling us — about 20 Jewish-Israeli students gathered on Zoom — that by the end of the semester we would understand exactly what genocide entails and be able to explain why Israel is not committing genocide in Gaza. In a nutshell, his argument was this: At most, Israel might be…

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Israel heavily bombs Gaza in major ceasefire violation

Israel heavily bombs Gaza in major ceasefire violation

Middle East Eye reports: Heavy Israeli bombing rocked the Gaza Strip on Sunday, killing at least 15 Palestinians, in a major violation of the ceasefire. More than 100 air strikes were reported in Rafah and Khan Younis in the south, Jabalia in the north, and parts of central Gaza. Among the sites hit were a cafe, a mobile phone charging station, a group of journalists and a house sheltering displaced people. The Israeli military said the strikes were in response…

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Gaza must decide its own political future — before the world does for us

Gaza must decide its own political future — before the world does for us

Mahmoud Mushtaha writes: On Monday, world leaders gathered in Sharm El-Sheikh to promote what they described as a new “path toward peace” in Gaza. The summit was ostensibly intended to consolidate the phases of the ceasefire and outline a long-term governance and reconstruction plan for the Strip. Yet it ended with an ambiguous roadmap and an uncertain future for Palestinians — who, as usual, were entirely left out from the conversation. No representatives from Gaza were present in those meetings,…

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Gaza aid still critically scarce as Israelis kill Palestinians for crossing an invisible line

Gaza aid still critically scarce as Israelis kill Palestinians for crossing an invisible line

The Guardian reports: Aid remains critically scarce in Gaza one week into the ceasefire, humanitarian agencies have warned, as Israel delays the entry of food convoys into the territory. The Israeli government and Hamas continue to trade blame over violations of the truce. The UN World Food Programme (WFP) said on Friday that it had brought about 560 tonnes of food a day on average into Gaza since the ceasefire began, but it was still below what was needed. Its…

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Life in Gaza may go from utter hell to mere nightmare. What happens now?

Life in Gaza may go from utter hell to mere nightmare. What happens now?

Hussein Agha and Robert Malley write: Donald Trump’s peace plan for Gaza demands atonement from Palestinians for the horrific acts of 7 October, not from Israel for the barbarity that followed. It calls for Gaza’s deradicalization but not an end to Israel’s messianism. It micromanages the future of Palestinian governance while saying nothing about the future of Israel’s occupation. It is riddled with ambiguities, devoid of timetables, arbiters or consequences for inevitable eventual violations. If all goes according to plan…

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Trump authorizes covert CIA action in regime-change campaign targeting Venezuela

Trump authorizes covert CIA action in regime-change campaign targeting Venezuela

The New York Times reports: The Trump administration has secretly authorized the C.I.A. to conduct covert action in Venezuela, according to U.S. officials, stepping up a campaign against Nicolás Maduro, the country’s authoritarian leader. The authorization is the latest step in the Trump administration’s intensifying pressure campaign against Venezuela. For weeks, the U.S. military has been targeting boats off the Venezuelan coast it says are transporting drugs, killing 27 people. American officials have been clear, privately, that the end goal…

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‘Peace deal’ or not, Gaza remains the holocaust of our time

‘Peace deal’ or not, Gaza remains the holocaust of our time

Niamh Ni Bhriain writes: Abdullah Ahmed Jihad al-Hasani, a baby boy, not yet one year old. Masah Mohammad Hamza al-Rifi, a baby girl, not yet one year old. Celine Ahmed Mufid al-Yaziji, a baby girl, not yet one year old… a baby… not yet one year old. Somebody’s whole world, gone in an instant. In Amsterdam, as the first winds of autumn swept through the city, the names of 69,000 people killed in Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza were read…

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As the perpetrators of Gaza’s genocide pose as its saviours, survivors return home – to a wasteland

As the perpetrators of Gaza’s genocide pose as its saviours, survivors return home – to a wasteland

Nesrine Malik writes: Today, Sharm el-Sheikh will host the most high-profile gathering of global leaders in the Middle East of recent years. Donald Trump, Keir Starmer, Emmanuel Macron, Pedro Sánchez and others are meeting “to end the war in the Gaza Strip, enhance efforts to achieve peace and stability in the Middle East, and usher in a new era of regional security and stability”. If the ceasefire holds, this language is an augur of the future. One where there is…

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Wajahat Ali + Mehdi Hasan: Trump wants Nobel Peace Prize for war, insurrection and indicting Letitia James

Wajahat Ali + Mehdi Hasan: Trump wants Nobel Peace Prize for war, insurrection and indicting Letitia James

  A desperate Trump Administration is attempting to distract from the Epstein Files and its disastrous economic policies by indicting Letitia James and declaring war on American critics. As I went live with Zeteo founder Mehdi Hasan, news broke that a grand jury had indicted Letitia James, the New York Attorney General, who successfully prosecuted Trump for fraud. Even though this is another chilling escalation in Trump’s reckless, dangerous, and cankled march towards authoritarianism, it shouldn’t be surprising.