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"As societies grow decadent, the language grows decadent, too. Words are used to disguise, not to illuminate, action."

-- Gore Vidal

News and Opinion

Westerners Have An Absolutely Psychotic View Of Airstrikes

Canadian online outlet The Breach has published a letter by CBC’s senior manager of journalistic standards Nancy Waugh which highlights perfectly the bizarre psychological relationship that westerners have with bombs and airstrikes in foreign countries.

In response to multiple complaints from a retired Humber College professor about the wildly biased language that Canada’s state broadcaster has been using to describe Israel’s war on Gaza, Waugh acknowledged that the CBC routinely uses words like “murderous,” “vicious,” “brutal,” “massacre,” and “slaughter” to refer to the October 7 Hamas attack while using far less emotionally charged words like “intensive,” “unrelenting,” and “punishing” to describe Israel’s actions in Gaza over the last three months.

Waugh defended this extreme discrepancy by saying that Israel’s attacks in Gaza differ from the Hamas attack on Israelis in that Israel’s killings are done “remotely”.

“Different words are used because although both result in death and injury, the events they describe are very different,” Waugh wrote. “The raid saw Hamas gunmen stream through the border fence and attack Israelis directly with firearms, knives and explosives. Gunmen chased down festival goers, assaulted kibbutzniks then shot them, fought hand to hand, and threw grenades. The attack was brutal, often vicious, and certainly murderous.”

“Bombs dropped from thousands of feet and artillery shells lofted into Gaza from kilometers away result in death and destruction on a massive scale, but it is carried out remotely,” Waugh continued. “The deadly results are unseen by those who caused them and the source unseen by those [who] suffer and die.”

CBC actually believes its sanitized descriptions of Israeli violence against Palestinians are justified.

In an email obtained by The Breach, CBC justifies its weak language because Israel kills Palestinians "remotely" instead of face-to-face.https://t.co/oUhjcOUkQl

— The Breach (@TheBreachMedia) January 8, 2024

I’ve written a number of essays trying to point at the baseless and irrational way westerners view military explosives as a far more civilized and humane way of killing human beings than bullets or blades, but I’ve never written anything that sums it up as clearly as this frank admission by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s senior manager of journalistic standards.

Military explosives rip human bodies apart. They burn people alive. They trap them under rubble where they die excruciatingly slowly in one of the most horrifying ways imaginable. They leave people without limbs. They dismember and disfigure children for life. Many of the most agonizing deaths in human history have been caused by bombs.

There are thousands of Gazans who have yet to be counted among the dead because their bodies are still buried under the rubble of fallen buildings. Many of them would not have died instantly. Some are still alive, waiting for days in a state terror and searing pain for a rescue that will never come. 

A UNICEF report released last month said that more than a thousand children had had one or both legs amputated since October 7 as a result of damage received by US-sponsored Israeli airstrikes, a number which would be significantly higher by now. We know that many such amputations have occurred without anaesthesia, because Israeli siege warfare has cut off Gaza’s healthcare system from the necessary supplies.

If this is not vicious, then nothing is vicious. If this is not brutal, then nothing is brutal. If this is not murderous, then nothing is murderous. But it doesn’t get labeled as such by the western press, because it is being done “remotely”.

The belief that these attacks should be considered less vicious and brutal because they are launched from a distance by people who won’t see their effects is as psychologically immature as a little girl who believes you can’t see her because she has covered her own eyes. An attack which kills and maims and tortures doesn’t cease to be brutal and vicious just because it looks like a blip on a screen to you. Human suffering isn’t made less acute or less significant by being far away.

But this is how most westerners see the use of military explosives these days. We’re so used to hearing about our government and its allies raining bombs upon the middle east and Africa that we’ve developed a kind of immunity to the psychological impact of exactly what that means in reality. The typical western mind has come to view bombings more like a weather event that simply occurs in those places, like how south Asian countries experience monsoons.

In reality, bombings are no less savage than attacks by guns, grenades, knives or machetes. In fact they actually allow for more savagery to take place, because they kill so much more efficiently, and because the troops who use them can keep killing and killing without losing morale and accumulating mental trauma from the horrors they have been inflicting upon their fellow human beings.

Dead is dead. Dismembered is dismembered. Pain is pain. Anguish is anguish. The unexamined assumption that the western empire’s prefered methods of killing are less brutal and murderous than those of an impoverished militant group is a psychological defense mechanism we have put in place to shelter ourselves from knowledge of our own brutality and murderousness.

In truth if you look at all the death, destruction, suffering and pain that Israel has inflicted on Gaza since October 7, there is no question that Israel is vastly more vicious, brutal and murderous than Hamas has ever been, and so are its allies who are supporting its actions. The only way to believe otherwise would be to psychologically hide away from the reality of what’s actually happening, which is as truth-based and mature as the kid with her hands over her eyes saying “Now you can’t see me!”

Matt Hoh: Is Israel Losing Both Wars?

Antony Blinken arrives in Israel amid fresh US push to stop war spreading

The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has landed in Israel for potentially difficult meetings with Israeli leaders and officials who have repeatedly proved resistant to pressure from Washington over their conduct of the war against Hamas.

Blinken flew late on Monday night from the Saudi oasis town of AlUla where he held talks with the crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, on a Middle East tour aimed at reaching a consensus on Gaza’s future. He said key Arab states and Turkey had agreed to begin planning for the reconstruction and governance of Gaza once Israel’s war against Hamas ended.

The secretary of state said Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Turkey “agreed to work together and to coordinate our efforts to help Gaza stabilise and recover, to chart a political path forward for the Palestinians and to work toward long-term peace, security and stability in the region as a whole”.

He added that the Saudis and other Arab leaders were still interested in pursuing normalisation of relations with Israel but only on the basis of an enduring Israeli-Palestinian political settlement. ...

On his fourth trip to the Middle East in three months, Blinken will try to convince the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to begin serious negotiations on postwar governance in Gaza, to do more to protect civilians in Gaza, and to allow more aid into the territory.

How apartheid history shaped South Africa’s genocide case against Israel

Israel has denounced South Africa’s legal action at the international court of justice accusing Israel of genocide and war crimes in Gaza as amounting to support for Hamas. Israel called the charge that it was intentionally killing thousands of Palestinian civilians – which the ICJ is expected to start hearing on Thursday – a “blood libel”. Jewish organisations in South Africa accused the ruling African National Congress of siding with terrorism and antisemitism.

But South Africa’s lawsuit seeking a halt to the Israeli assault on Gaza in response to the Hamas cross-border attack in October comes after years of deteriorating relations rooted in the ANC’s decades-long support for the Palestinian cause and the legacy of Israel’s close military alliance with the apartheid regime during some of the most oppressive years of white rule. ...

Israel and apartheid-era South Africa developed a close military alliance that included collaboration on nuclear weapons, even though many of the Afrikaner leaders of the time had a history of deep antisemitism. John Vorster, the then prime minister, was feted on a visit to Jerusalem in 1976 despite having been interned during the second world war for Nazi sympathies and membership of a fascist militia that burned Jewish-owned properties.

After the ANC came to power in 1994 it established full diplomatic relations with Palestine while ties with Israel deteriorated over time. The foreign ministry in Pretoria said it maintains only “limited political and diplomatic interaction” because of Israel’s “antagonistic attitude” toward peace talks with the Palestinians and “disregard for international law regarding the rights of the Palestinians and their territories”. In 2019, South Africa downgraded its embassy in Tel Aviv to the status of a liaison office after the Israeli military killed more than 220 Palestinian protesters inside Gaza, mostly unarmed civilians, during months of protests. The ANC called the Israeli government and military “an outcast and blight on humanity”. ...

Relations will not be improved by South Africa’s choice of John Dugard to head its legal team at the ICJ. Dugard served as the UN special rapporteur for human rights in occupied Palestine during the 2000s. His reports accused Israel of constructing a system of Jewish domination over Palestinians, of violating the 1973 international convention against apartheid and of committing war crimes. He also accused the Israeli army of collaborating in “settler terror” against Palestinians.

800+ Global Groups Back South Africa's Genocide Case as ICJ Prepares for Hearing

An international peace coalition announced Monday that more than 800 civil society organizations from across the globe have endorsed its sign-on letter distributed to world governments, urging leaders to join South Africa in formally accusing Israel of genocidal violence at the United Nations' highest judicial body.

When Common Dreams first reported on the sign-on letter last Wednesday, just over 100 groups had joined the call.

The surge of support comes as the International Court of Justice (ICJ), also known as the World Court, is scheduled to hold a hearing on South Africa's case on Thursday and Friday.

The International Coalition to Stop Genocide in Palestine (ICSGP)—which includes the National Lawyers Guild, the Black Alliance for Peace, World Beyond War, and Progressive International, among other groups—is calling on governments to "reinforce [South Africa's] strongly worded and well-argued complaint by immediately filing a Declaration of Intervention" at the court.

The declarations could increase the likelihood that the ICJ sides with South Africa in the case, says the coalition.

In recent days, Turkey, Malaysia, and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, which represents 57 member-states, have all endorsed South Africa's 84-page claim, which details genocidal rhetoric in public statements made by high-level Israeli officials as well as the Israeli military's actions in Gaza.

Jordan's government also said Thursday that it "will be preparing the necessary legal documents in consultation with legal experts to support South Africa's file," according toThe New Arab, suggesting it is preparing a Declaration of Intervention.

"Members of ICGSP are working closely with a number of other countries that are in the process of doing the same," said the coalition.

Israel Demands US OCCUPY Gaza For Them

'Horror Is Growing By the Minute,' Says Rights Group, as Israel Starves Gaza

The Israeli government "can, if it chooses to," save more than 2 million people who are starving in Gaza by ending its blockade on aid, an Israel-based human rights group emphasized in a report on Monday, condemning the country for continuing to allow just a fraction of the food needed in the enclave through border crossings as it relentlessly bombs civilian targets.

"Everyone in Gaza is going hungry," said B'Tselem in the dispatch, bluntly titled, "Israel Is Starving Gaza."

The organization pointed to a recent analysis by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification Famine Review Committee from late last month, which found that about 93% of Gaza's over 2 million people were suffering from "acute food insecurity" at Phase 3, while more than 15%—378,000 people—were already at the most dire classification, Phase 5, with "extreme food shortages, hunger, and exhaustion."

By February 7, the entire population of Gaza is expected to reach Phase 3, and "if current conditions persist," said B'Tselem, "there is significant risk that famine will be declared throughout the entire Gaza Strip within six months."

"Such a declaration is made when 20% of households read Phase 5, when 30% of children suffer from extreme malnutrition, and when two adults or four children out of 10,000 die of hunger every day," said the group.

Before Israel began its U.S.-backed bombardment of Gaza in retaliation for Hamas' October 7 attack, about 80% of Gaza residents relied on humanitarian aid to survive.

Israel's destruction of cultivated fields, bakeries, food warehouses, and factories has meant that residents now wholly depend on food supplies from outside Gaza.

That aid is still available, B'Tselem stressed, but cannot reach people because "Israel is deliberately denying the entry of enough food to meet the population's needs."

Austin's mystery surgery highlights White House Middle East political infighting

US Officials Think Netanyahu Might See War in Lebanon as Key to Political Survival

Some US officials are concerned that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu might see an expanded war in Lebanon as key to his political survival, The Washington Post reported on Sunday.

Polls show the majority of Israelis want Netanyahu to resign once the campaign in Gaza is over, giving him the incentive to continue the slaughter and escalate the situation into a regional conflict that draws in the US.

Hezbollah and its leader Hasan Nasrallah, on the other hand, are not seeking a wider war, according to the US officials who spoke with the Post. But the two sides continue to trade significant fire across the border, which has increased since Israel escalated the situation by launching a drone strike in Beirut last week that killed a senior Hamas official.

Israel admits deliberately targeting journalists in strike that killed son of Al Jazeera bureau chief

The number of journalists killed by Israel in Gaza grew to 109 on Sunday with a targeted drone strike on the car of Al Jazeera reporter Hamza al-Dahdouh, killing him alongside fellow journalist Mustafa Thuraya. Hamza was the eldest son of the Al Jazeera Gaza bureau chief, Wael al-Dahdouh, and the fifth member of al-Dahdouh’s family to be killed in a series of deliberate and targeted murders by the criminal US-backed Israeli regime. ...

In a statement published after hours of silence in the face of questions by reporters, the Israeli military confirmed that it deliberately targeted the journalists’ vehicle, referring to the murdered men as “suspects.”

The statement declared:

An Israeli military aircraft identified and struck a terrorist operative who was operating an aircraft that posed a threat to troops. We are aware of reports that during the strike, two other suspects who were in the same vehicle as the terrorists were also hit.

The third man in the car was Hazem Rajab, a photojournalist whose responsibilities include operating photographic drones. The group of journalists was in reality targeted for performing their professional obligations in what Israel officially designated a “safe zone” for civilians.

Speaking in Qatar on Sunday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was asked whether the United States condemned the targeting of journalists by Israel. Blinken refused to condemn either the murder of Hamza or Israel’s practice of deliberately killing journalists, instead shedding crocodile tears about what a “tragedy” his death was. ...

Blinken is a key enabler and supporter of Israel’s policy of massacring journalists. The United States has never condemned the practice and maintains its position that there are no “red lines” for what Israel is allowed to do. The United States has provided Israel with 10,000 tons of military equipment over the past three months, delivered by over 200 cargo planes.

Palestinians desperate to flee Gaza pay thousands in bribes to ‘brokers’

Palestinians desperate to leave Gaza are paying bribes to brokers of up to $10,000 (£7,850) to help them exit the territory through Egypt, according to a Guardian investigation.

Very few Palestinians have been able to leave Gaza through the Rafah border crossing but those trying to get their names on the list of people permitted to exit daily say they are being asked to pay large “coordination fees” by a network of brokers and couriers with alleged links to the Egyptian intelligence services.

One Palestinian man in the US said he paid $9,000 three weeks ago to get his wife and children on the list. The family have been sheltering in schools since the 7 October attacks. On the day of travel, he was told his children’s names were not listed and he would have to pay an extra $3,000. He said the brokers were “trying to trade in the blood of Gazans”.

“It’s very frustrating and saddening,” he said. “They are trying to exploit people who are suffering, who are trying to get out of the hell in Gaza.” His family have yet to leave.

White House says Lloyd Austin will stay in job despite ‘lack of transparency’

The White House has said that the US defense secretary, Lloyd Austin, will stay in his job but noted his “lack of transparency” and called for a review of procedures after he spent three days in hospital without informing the president.

The White House spokesperson, Karine Jean-Pierre, also said that Austin retained Biden’s confidence, and John Kirby, the national security council (NSC) spokesperson, told reporters on Air Force One: “There is no plan for anything other than for Secretary Austin to stay in the job.”

Kirby said Joe Biden “respects the fact that Secretary Austin took ownership for the lack of transparency” but added there would be a review of procedures in the wake of the incident, “to try to learn from this experience”. He added there was an “expectation” that if a cabinet member was hospitalized, “that will be notified up the chain of command”.

Austin remained in hospital on Monday, according to the Pentagon, but was moved out of intensive care and was said to be “recovering well. It was also revealed that the defence secretary first went to hospital on 22 December for an unspecified medical procedure, returning home the following day. He was then taken to the Walter Reed national military medical center in Washington on Monday 1 January, experiencing “severe pain” after taking part in NSC discussions that morning on a strike against an Iranian-backed militia leader in Iraq.

French PM Élisabeth Borne quits as Macron seeks boost before EU elections

France’s prime minister, Élisabeth Borne, has resigned after days of increasingly feverish speculation about an imminent government reshuffle. The president, Emmanuel Macron, who is seeking to give a new impetus to his second mandate before European parliament elections and the Paris Olympics this summer, thanked Borne for her “exemplary work in the service of the nation”.

“You have put our project into effect with the courage, engagement and the determination of a stateswoman,” Macron tweeted.

In her resignation letter, Borne said it was “more necessary than ever to continue the reforms” being pursued by the government. “I wanted to tell you how passionate I have been about this mission,” she wrote, adding that she was “guided by the constant concern, which we share, to achieve rapid and tangible results for our fellow citizens”.

Nevertheless, she made it clear the decision to go had not been hers and that she had taken note of the president’s wish to appoint a new prime minister. ...

The reshuffle comes five months before the European parliament elections, with Eurosceptics expected to make record gains at a time of widespread public discontent over surging living costs and the failure of European governments to curb immigration. Opinion polls show Macron’s party trailing that of the far-right leader Marine Le Pen byeight to 10 points before the June vote.

2023 saw record killings by US police. Who is most affected?

Police in the US killed at least 1,232 people last year, making 2023 the deadliest year for homicides committed by law enforcement in more than a decade, according to newly released data.

Mapping Police Violence, a non-profit research group, catalogs deaths at the hands of police and last year recorded the highest number of killings since its national tracking began in 2013. The data suggests a systemic crisis and a remarkably consistent pattern, with an average of roughly three people killed by officers each day, with slight upticks in recent years.

The group recorded 30 more deaths in 2023 than the previous year, with 1,202 people killed in 2022; 1,148 in 2021; 1,160 in 2020; and 1,098 in 2019. The numbers include shooting victims, as well as people fatally shocked by a stun gun, beaten or restrained. The 2023 count is preliminary, and cases could be added as the database is updated. ...

The record number of police killings happened in a year that saw a significant decrease in homicides, according to preliminary reports of 2023 murder rates; one analyst said the roughly 13% decrease in homicides last year appears to be the largest year-to-year drop on record, and reports have also signaled drops in other violent and property crimes.

“Violence is trending downwards at an unprecedented rate, but the exception to that seems to be the police, who are engaging in more violence each year,” said Samuel Sinyangwe, a policy analyst and data scientist who founded Mapping Police Violence. “It hits home that many of the promises and actions made after the murder of George Floyd don’t appear to have reduced police violence on a nationwide level.” ... In 2023, Black people were killed at a rate 2.6 times higher than white people, Mapping Police Violence found. Last year, 290 people killed by police were Black, making up 23.5% of victims, while Black Americans make up roughly 14% of the total population. Native Americans were killed at a rate 2.2 times greater than white people, and Latinos were killed at a rate 1.3 times greater.

"Complete Hypocrisy": Bree Newsome Bass on Biden Fighting Racism While Funding Gaza Genocide

Biden Should Be ASHAMED For LYING to Black Voters At Mother Emanuel Church: Sabby Sabs

Global heating will pass 1.5C threshold this year, top ex-Nasa scientist says

The internationally agreed threshold to prevent the Earth from spiraling into a new superheated era will be “passed for all practical purposes” during 2024, the man known as the godfather of climate science has warned.

James Hansen, the former Nasa scientist credited for alerting the world to the dangers of climate change in the 1980s, said that global heating caused by the burning of fossil fuels, amplified by the naturally reoccurring El Niño climatic event, will by May push temperatures to as much as 1.7C (3F) above the average experienced before industrialization.

This temperature high, measured over the 12-month period to May, will not by itself break the commitment made by the world’s governments to limit global heating to 1.5C (2.7F) above the time before the dominance of coal, oil and gas. Scientists say the 1.5C ceiling cannot be considered breached until a string of several years exceed this limit, with this moment considered most likely to happen at some point in the 2030s.

But Hansen said that even after the waning of El Niño, which typically drives up average global heat, the span of subsequent years will, taken together, still average at the 1.5C limit. The heating of the world from greenhouse gas emissions is being reinforced by knock-on impacts, Hansen said, such as the melting of the planet’s ice, which is making the surface darker and therefore absorbing even more sunlight.

“We are now in the process of moving into the 1.5C world,” Hansen told the Guardian. “You can bet $100 to a donut on this and be sure of getting a free donut, if you can find a sucker willing to take the bet.”

Where has all the honey gone? Scientists point to factors in declining yields

It’s a question that has bedeviled beekeepers across the US in recent years: where has all the honey gone? Scientists now say they have some answers as to why yields of honey have declined, pointing to environmental degradation that is affecting all sorts of bees, and insects more generally.
The amount of honey produced by honeybee colonies in the US has dropped by around half a pound, on average, per colony in the past decade, US government data shows, even as the number of managed colonies increased slightly.

“You go to meetings with beekeepers and you’ll hear all the time they are not producing honey like they used to,” said Gabriela Quinlan, a research fellow in Penn State’s department of entomology and center for pollinator research. “It’s something we see across the board in different states.”

A new study, led by Quinlan, has analyzed the factors affecting the amount of flowers growing in different regions, which is a key factor in the amount of honey produced by honeybees after they forage. Honeybees need nectar, pollen and water, collected from the surrounding environment, to make honey.

The research found that several factors are hampering honeybees’ ability to create honey, including an explosion in the use of herbicides, the conversion of previously flower-rich land into monocultural farmland and a decline in soil productivity.

Also of Interest

Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.

Israel Seen as Even More Likely to Launch War with Lebanon as Fate of ICJ Suit Uncertain Due to China and Russia Doubts

The Spectacular Failure of the Zionist Project

The Abject Failure of Nearly Every Member of Congress on Gaza

Patrick Lawrence: What Is Said and What Is Done

Epstein had ‘sex tapes’ of Prince Andrew and Bill Clinton, witness claimed

Israeli Politician BACKS Genocide Charges

Mehdi Hasan F*cked Around & Found Out!

Germany protests. WSJ, Poland hiding Nord Stream info. Elenksy, Crimea counter-counteroffensive

A Little Night Music

Floyd Dixon - Hey Bartender

Floyd Dixon - Call Operator 210

Floyd Dixon - Rockin' At Home

Floyd Dixon - Don't Leave Me, Baby

Floyd Dixon & Johnny "Guitar" Watson - Let's Go Smitty

Floyd Dixon - When I Get Lucky

Floyd Dixon - 450 Pound Woman

Floyd Dixon - Sad Journey

Floyd Dixon - Wine,Wine,Wine

Floyd Dixon - Dance the Thing