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This evening's music features the Womack brothers' r&b group The Valentinos. Enjoy!

"If you always vote for the lesser of two evils, you will always have evil, and you will always have less."

-- Ralph Nader

News and Opinion

You Can’t Be A “Lesser Evil” When You’re Sponsoring A Genocide

You don’t get to apply the label “lesser evil” to a president who is backing a literal genocide. That’s not a thing. Past a certain point you’re just plain evil.

If you were to make a list of the absolute worst things a powerful leader can do, genocide and carelessness with nuclear brinkmanship should be on the very top of that list. Biden has done both of these. You can’t legitimately call such a person a “lesser evil”.

"I am personally proud of the ruins of Gaza, and that every baby, even 80 years from now, will tell their grandchildren what the Jews did."

May Golan, Israeli Minister of Social Equality & Women's Advancement
pic.twitter.com/jOEXBECOLn

— Lowkey (@Lowkey0nline) February 21, 2024

Gaza death toll set to pass 30,000, as Israel prepares assault on Rafah

The death toll in Gaza is likely to pass the grim milestone of 30,000 this week, as negotiators try to pin down a ceasefire and hostage-release deal, and the Israeli government presses ahead with plans for an attack on Rafah. The prime minster, Benjamin Netanyahu, convened the war cabinet late on Saturday for a briefing with negotiators who had been at talks in Paris.

This week, it will meet again to discuss preparations for an assault on Rafah, the southern border town where an estimated 1.5 million displaced Palestinians have sought shelter. A deal might delay that operation, but would not prevent it, Netanyahu said in an interview with CBS.

Negotiators from Israel, Qatar, Egypt and the US have agreed the “basic contours” of an arrangement during weekend talks in Paris, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan told CNN, but the final details still have to be hammered out.

Israeli media reported that the prospective deal would allow for the release of 30 or 40 hostages – women, elderly people and the wounded – in exchange for up to 300 Palestinian prisoners, and a ceasefire lasting up to six weeks. Both sides would continue negotiations during the pause for further releases and a permanent ceasefire, an Egyptian official told the Associated Press.

The break in fighting would cover the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which starts around 10 March this year, and the deal would include an increase in desperately needed aid. It is proposed after heavy international pressure over the high civilian toll and the prospect of even worse bloodshed in Rafah. After initial talks in Paris, follow-up discussions will be held in Doha and Cairo, Egyptian security sources told Reuters.

As 2-Month-Old Starves to Death in Gaza, Mosab Abu Toha Says His Own Family Is Eating Animal Feed

Israel's Forced Starvation Leads Desperate Gazans to Eat Horse Meat, Animal Feed

Efforts to deliver life-saving humanitarian aid suffered another major setback in Gaza on Saturday after officials with the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) said that deliveries to areas in the north have been suspended due to impossible conditions.

While stressing that she did not "want to make it sound like we are blaming people or describing these things as criminal acts," UNRWA's director of external relations Tamara Alrifai, explained that the "desperate behavior of hungry and exhausted people is preventing the safe and regular passage of our trucks" in northern areas.

Israel has prevented large-scale humanitarian deliveries into Gaza for months amid its relentless military onslaught despite increasingly desperate warnings from relief agencies about widespread hunger. Alrifai said UNRWA is now "stuck in a vicious cycle, where the security of our convoys are at risk, meaning we can no longer send aid, which contributes to hunger and despair."

A "shocking" poll released this week revealed that more than two-thirds of Israelis oppose aid shipments being allowed into Gaza and demonstrators at the Kerem Shalom border crossing have continued their efforts to block truck convoys from making their deliveries.

According to Washington Post reporting on Saturday, the "volume of aid delivered to Gaza has collapsed in recent weeks as Israeli airstrikes have targeted police officers who guard the convoys, UN officials say, exposing them to looting by criminal gangs and desperate civilians."

In a joint statement earlier this week, UN officials and outside relief agencies warned that the people of Gaza remain "in extreme peril while the world watches" from the sidelines.

"Diseases are rampant. Famine is looming. Water is at a trickle. Basic infrastructure has been decimated. Food production has come to a halt. Hospitals have turned into battlefields. One million children face daily traumas," said the statement which called for an immediate cease-fire, the release of hostages held by Hamas, and the backing of conditions that would again make humanitarian assistance possible.

People in #Gaza are in extreme peril while the world watches on.

No one can claim “I did not know” as the images, footage and voices of unspeakable suffering continue.

We cannot turn a blind eye to this human tragedy any longer. pic.twitter.com/RislB5Ilr0

— UNRWA (@UNRWA) February 23, 2024

Reflecting on the poll which showed a large majority of Israelis who actively oppose helping Palestinians avoid starvation, Mondoweiss columnist Jonathan Ofir said "one really has to pause here" and think about what is happening:

We are in a situation where Palestinians in Gaza are starving, people are consuming animal feed in their desperation. The week the UN’s World Food Programme reported people in Gaza are “already dying from hunger-related causes,” and a UNICEF nutrition screening in north Gaza found that 1 in 6 children under two years old are acutely malnourished. Israelis are not completely ignorant of this. They are supporting genocide by an overwhelming majority.

It is now mainstream within Israeli society to discuss from which age it is acceptable for children to be starved. A recent discussion on the mainstream public broadcaster news program reached a consensus between a former Mossad official and the veteran host that children over the age of 4 were legitimate to starve.

Meanwhile, Palestinians in Gaza continue to speak with reporters and describe the extreme hunger and growing famine in the north.

Abu Gibril, who spoke to Agence France-Presse, explained that he was so desperate for food at the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza that he slaughtered a pair of horses to feed his family.

"We had no other choice but to slaughter the horses to feed the children. Hunger is killing us," Gibril told AFP.

"My son wakes up in the morning and asks for a loaf of bread," said one mother interviewed by Al-Jazeera. "I answer him that there is none. We have nothing—nothing at all. All roads lead to death. If not killed by the Israeli bombardment, we will starve to death."

Alastair Crooke: Can US Cap Middle East Violence?

Netanyahu outlines plans for de facto Israeli annexation of Gaza

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu presented a document to his war cabinet on Friday entitled “The Day After Hamas Principles.” It outlines what amounts to plans for the de facto annexation of Gaza in the aftermath of Israel’s genocidal war against the Palestinians, as well as tighter control over the Israeli-occupied West Bank. As the plan declares, Israel will maintain military control indefinitely of “all of the territory west of the Jordan” River. It intends to seize territory inside the Gaza Strip to establish a so-called “security space” along its entire border. The Israeli military has already carried out large-scale demolition of homes and civilian infrastructure in northern Gaza in preparation for creating such a buffer zone.

The document also envisages the creation of an overground and underground “security flank” along Gaza’s southern border with Egypt—the only one not under immediate Israeli control—on the pretext of preventing weapons smuggling. In doing so, Israel would be in full land, sea and air control over Gaza, completing the transformation of the enclave into a giant prison camp. ...

The Netanyahu plan insists that any reconstruction in Gaza must be contingent on its demilitarisation, by which is meant not simply the removal of weapons, but Israeli supervision and control over the civilian administration and police. It calls for a “comprehensive deradicalisation program in all religious education and social institutions in Gaza…” Netanyahu intends to replace the Hamas administration inside Gaza with a puppet regime composed of local representatives “who are not affiliated with terrorist countries or groups and are not financially supported by them”—in other words, local stooges who are acceptable to the Israeli regime. ...

In another indication that Israel intends to determine international links with Gaza—in other words, foreign policy—the document declares that Israel will work to shut down the primary relief agency for Palestinians—the 75-year-old United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) and replace it with “responsible international aid organisations.” ... Citing a map displayed to the UN General Assembly last September showing Gaza and the West Bank inside the borders of Israel, UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini said that Israel’s calls to close UNRWA are “not about the agency’s neutrality.” Rather, he said, “UNRWA’s mandate to provide services to Palestine refugees within this same area is an obstacle to that map becoming a reality.”

$14 Billion US Aid Package for Israel Crafted to Prepare for ‘Multi-Front War,’ Not Just Gaza

The $14 billion in additional military aid for Israel that President Biden is seeking was designed not just for operations in Gaza but also to prepare Israel for a “multi-front war,” The Times of Israel has reported.

A senior Biden administration official told The Jewish Telegraphic Agency that the $14 billion is “for Israel to defend itself in a multi-front war and to be sure it can deter a multi-front war.”

Israel has been escalating airstrikes in Lebanon against Hezbollah, though many strikes have killed civilians. The fire across the border risks a full-blown war, and there are no signs tensions will ease anytime soon. Israeli officials have been threatening to invade if Hezbollah doesn’t move back from the Israel-Lebanon border. ...

The $14 billion for Israel is on top of the $3.8 billion the country receives from the US each year. According to The Times of Israel, It includes $5.2 billion to go toward Israeli missile defense, which is seen as a critical necessity for a war with Hezbollah.

Another $3.5 billion will replenish munitions Israel has used in Gaza. The US will use $4 billion US to refill its own stockpiles, including a contingency stockpile located in Israel that the Israeli military has been allowed to use for its operations in Gaza.

NYT Hamas Rape Reporter Wants Gaza To Be A 'SLAUGHTERHOUSE,' Per Liked Tweet: Rising Reacts

Shielding US Public From Israeli Reports of Friendly Fire on October 7

Since October, the Israeli press has uncovered damning evidence showing that an untold number of the Israeli victims during the October 7 Hamas attack were in fact killed by the IDF response.

While it is indisputable that the Hamas-led attackers were responsible for many Israeli civilian deaths that day, reports from Israel indicate that the IDF in multiple cases fired on and killed Israeli civilians. It’s an important issue that demands greater transparency—both in terms of the questions it raises about IDF policy, and in terms of the black-and-white narrative Israel has advanced about what happened on October 7, used to justify its ongoing assault on the Gaza Strip.

Indeed, IDF responsibility for Israeli deaths has been a repeated topic of discussion in the Israeli press, accompanied by demands for investigations. But the most US readers have gotten from their own press about the issue is a dismissive piece from the Washington Post about October 7 “truthers.”

In the wake of October 7, after Israel began its genocidal campaign against Gaza, reports began to emerge from the Israeli press of incidents in which Israeli troops made decisions to fire on Hamas targets regardless of whether Israeli civilians were present.

That the IDF’s initial reaction was chaotic at best is well-documented. Much of the early military response came from the air, with little information for pilots and drone operators to distinguish targets but orders to shoot anyway (Grayzone, 10/27/23). Citing a police source, Haaretz (11/18/23) reported that at the Supernova music festival site, “an IDF combat helicopter that arrived to the scene and fired at terrorists there apparently also hit some festival participants.” But there are also mainstream Israeli media reports that credibly suggest the IDF may have implemented a policy to sacrifice Israeli hostages.

Supernova music festival attendee Yasmin Porat had escaped the festival on foot to the nearby village of Be’eri, only to be held hostage in a home with 13 others. One of the captors surrendered and released Porat to IDF troops outside. She described how, after a prolonged standoff, Israeli tank fire demolished that home and killed all but one of the remaining Israeli hostages. Her account was verified by the other surviving hostage (Electronic Intifada, 10/16/23; Haaretz, 12/13/23). One of the Israeli victims was a child who had been held up as an example of Hamas’s brutality (Grayzone, 11/25/23).

Yedioth Ahronoth (1/12/24; translated into English by Electronic Intifada, 1/20/24)—one of Israel’s most widely read newspapers—published a bombshell piece that put these revelations in context. The paper reported that the IDF instructed its members

to stop “at any cost” any attempt by Hamas terrorists to return to Gaza, using language very similar to that of the original Hannibal Directive, despite repeated promises by the defense apparatus that the directive had been canceled.

The Hannibal Directive—named for the Carthaginian general who allegedly ingested poison rather than be captured by his enemies—is the once-secret doctrine meant to prevent at all costs the taking of IDF soldiers as hostages, even at the risk of harming the soldier (Haaretz, 11/1/11). It was supposedly revoked in 2016, and was ostensibly never meant to be applied to civilians (Haaretz, 1/17/24).

Yedioth Ahronoth reported:

It is not clear at this stage how many of the captives were killed due to the operation of this order on October 7. During the week after Black Sabbath [i.e., October 7] and at the initiative of Southern Command, soldiers from elite units examined some 70 vehicles that had remained in the area between the Gaza Envelope settlements and the Gaza Strip. These were vehicles that did not reach Gaza because on their way they had been hit by fire from a helicopter gunship, a UAV or a tank, and at least in some of the cases, everyone in the vehicle was killed.

Reports that the IDF gave orders to disregard the lives of Israeli captives have caused great consternation in Israel (Haaretz, 12/13/23). An author of the IDF ethics code called it “unlawful, unethical, horrifying” (Haaretz, 1/17/23). Yet any mention of the reports, or the debates they have inspired in Israel, seems to be virtually taboo in the mainstream US media.

The only mention of “Hannibal directive” FAIR could find in a major US newspaper the since October 7 came in a New York Post article (12/18/23) paraphrasing a released hostage who

claimed that Hamas told them the Israel Defense Forces would employ the infamous “Hannibal Directive” on civilians, a revoked protocol that once allegedly called on troops to prioritize taking out terrorists even if it meant killing a kidnapped soldier.

A version of Supernova attendee Porat’s account was related a few days later in the New York Times (12/22/23), which published a lengthy investigative report piecing together what happened across the village of Be’eri. That report included a section about the standoff at the house where Porat was held, under the subhead “A General’s Dilemma.” It did not mention Porat’s prior revelations in Israeli media and the controversy they had caused.

[Much more at the link. -js]

U.S. Terrorism Laws Are "Anti-Palestinian at the Core," Chill First Amendment

To 'Push' Biden on Gaza, Beto O'Rourke Latest to Back 'Uncommitted' Campaign in Michigan

Texas Democrat Beto O'Rourke became the latest high-profile member of the party to back the push for Michigan voters to tick the "uncommitted" box on the primary ballot next week as a way to protest President Joe Biden's unconditional support of Israel's unyielding assault on the people of Gaza.

"I do think it makes sense for those who want to see this administration do more, or do a better job, to exert that political pressure and get the president's attention and the attention of those on his campaign so that the United States does better," said the former congressman who has run for both president and the U.S. Senate.

In an interview with the Michigan Advance on Friday, O'Rourke explained that he was partly influenced by a recent New York Times op-ed by Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud which argued that "no amount of landmark legislation" passed by the Biden administration "can outweigh the more than 100,000 people killed, wounded, or missing in Gaza. The scales of justice will not allow it."

O'Rourke said he agrees "with the aims and the goals" of the grassroots campaign in Michigan that is urging Democrats to use Tuesday's primary contest, in which Biden faces no real opponent, as a way to express the deep frustration many voters in the state are feeling over the carnage in Gaza.

Michigan Voters STUN MSNBC: 'Never Biden'

'If This Isn't Genocide, I Don't Know What Is,' Says Lula of Israeli Attack on Gaza

Just days after Brazil's President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was announced to be 'person non grata' by the Israeli government for critical comments he made about its conduct in Gaza, the leftist leader known as Lula remained outspoken over the weekend as he condemned the military onslaught that has claimed nearly 30,000 lives, mostly innocent civilians, in just over four months.

"What the Israeli government is doing to the Palestinian people is not war, it is genocide,” Lula thundered in remarks Friday during an event in Rio de Janiero. "They are killing women and children. There are thousands of children dead and thousands missing. It's not soldiers who are dying, but women and children who are dying inside the hospitals."

He continued: "If this isn't genocide, I don't know what is."

Lula has more vigor than every center-left politican in the West put together. pic.twitter.com/3JJM70quu8

— Bhaskar Sunkara (@sunraysunray) February 25, 2024

In his remarks, Lula condemned the failure of the UN Security Council to intervene in a meaningful way to stop the carnage in Gaza. On Feb. 19, the United States once again used its veto power to reject a resolution calling for an immediate cease-fire.

The UNSC "represents nothing," he said. "It does not take any decisions, it does nothing for peace," he added, while decrying the amount of "hypocrisy in the world today" when it comes to political leadership.

Victoria Nuland ADMITS U.S. Money To Ukraine LINING Defense Contractor's Pockets

Zelensky's BLATANT LIE: Claims 10-1 Russian Casualties

Zelenskiy says 31,000 soldiers killed, giving figure for first time

Volodymyr Zelenskiy has given a figure for the number of Ukrainian battlefield deaths in the war with Russia for the first time, acknowledging that 31,000 soldiers have been killed and saying 2024 will be decisive for the outcome of the conflict.

Speaking in Kyiv a day after the two-year anniversary of Vladimir Putin’s invasion, the Ukrainian president said he believed his country would win despite recent military setbacks. He conceded western weapons were in short supply and were crucial at a time when his troops were spectacularly outgunned.

They were running low on ammunition and at one point late last year were firing one shell for every twelve unleashed by the Russians, he said. The ratio was now 1:7. “They have a great superiority,” he admitted.

He refused to say how many Ukrainian service personnel had been wounded, saying such details might help Moscow, but that western estimates of the number of Ukrainian dead were too high. US officials have suggested 70,000 soldiers killed and 120,000 wounded. ...

Zelenskiy described 2024 as “a turning point” and said the outcome of November’s US presidential election would be a key factor. If Donald Trump wins a second term in office, he is expected to pull the plug on aid to Kyiv. “This year will define the format of the ending of the war,” Zelenskiy said.

TRUMP Destroys Nikki Haley in SC; Democrats May Do JANUARY 6 2.0 If Trump Wins

Nikki Haley says ‘I have a duty’ to stay in race despite latest loss to Trump

Nikki Haley will travel to Michigan on Sunday after suffering a decisive loss in her home state of South Carolina, marking her fourth straight defeat in the Republican presidential primary. Donald Trump continued his undefeated streak with a double-digit win in South Carolina, further cementing his hold on the Republican party and raising more questions about Haley’s decision to remain in the primary.

As she addressed supporters at an election night party in Charleston on Saturday, Haley deftly framed her candidacy as a moral imperative for the many voters who express dissatisfaction with a potential rematch between Trump and Joe Biden in November.

“I said earlier this week that no matter what happens in South Carolina, I would continue to run for president. I’m a woman of my word,” Haley said. “In the next 10 days, another 21 states and territories will speak. They have the right to a real choice, not a Soviet-style election with only one candidate. And I have a duty to give them that choice.”

MSM Declares Russiagate VINDICATED, Hunter Biden-Burisma Corruption a HOAX

Abandoned pipelines could release poisons into North Sea

Decaying oil and gas pipelines left to fall apart in the North Sea could release large volumes of poisons such as mercury, radioactive lead and polonium-210, notorious for its part in the poisoning of Russian defector Alexander Litvinenko, scientists are warning.

Mercury, an extremely toxic element, occurs naturally in oil and gas. It sticks to the inside of pipelines and builds up over time, being released into the sea when the pipeline corrodes. Some methylmercury, the most toxic form of the metal, is released by the pipelines although other forms can be converted into it. The international Minamata convention on mercury states that high levels in dolphins, whales and seals can lead to “reproductive failure, behavioural changes and even death”. Seabirds and large predatory fish such as tuna and swordfish are also particularly vulnerable.

Lhiam Paton, a researcher from the Institute for Analytical Chemistry at the University of Graz who has raised the alarm over the mercury pollution, told the Guardian and Watershed Investigations that “even a small increase in mercury levels in the sea will have a dramatic impact on the animals at the top of the food web”.

There are about 27,000km (16,800 miles) of gas pipelines in the North Sea, and scientists predict the amount of the metal in the sea could increase anywhere from 3% up to 160% from existing levels. In some countries, such as Australia, companies are required to remove them when the oil well stops operating. But in the North Sea companies are allowed to leave them to rot away.

Paton, whose work is published in the Journal of Hazardous Materials, said: “Pipelines left on the seabed may be holding onto considerable amounts of mercury which is waiting to be released into the local marine environment if the pipelines are left to corrode away as they are after decommissioning. There is no way to predict the impact of this right now but we do know that the bioaccumulation of mercury within the marine food web is already dramatic and an increase in oceanic mercury concentrations will only come with downsides.”

Antarctica sea ice reaches alarming low for third year in a row

For the third year in a row, sea ice coverage around Antarctica has dropped below 2m sq km – a threshold which before 2022 had not been breached since satellite measurements started in 1979.

The latest data from the US National Snow and Ice Data Center confirms the past three years have been the three lowest on record for the amount of sea ice floating around the continent.

Scientists said another exceptionally low year was further evidence of a “regime shift”, with new research indicating the continent’s sea ice has undergone an “abrupt critical transition”.

Antarctica’s sea ice reaches its lowest extent at the height of the continent’s summer in February each year. On 18 February the five-day average of sea ice cover fell to 1.99m sq km and on 21 February was at 1.98m sq km. The record low was 1.78m sq km, set in February 2023. Whether the current level represents this year’s minimum won’t be known for another week or two.

Also of Interest

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

Israel Supporters Are Some Of The Worst People In The World

State Dept downplays reports of Israeli soldiers sexually abusing, slaughtering Palestinian women

US Defends Israeli Occupation at World Court

The Most American Thing That Has Ever Happened

Spin Cycle

We started a group chat to help fellow doctors in Gaza. Then it went quiet

Israel – Imperialism’s MVP (Most Valuable Proxy)

Biden DOJ Indicts Journalist for Tucker Carlson Leaks

After Two Months of High-Voltage Shock Treatment, Argentina’s Economy Is Screaming at Top of Its Lungs

The latest billionaire trend? Doomsday bunkers with a flammable moat

‘Does rewilding sort climate change? Yes!’: UK expert says nature can save planet and not harm farming

Russia advancing, Ukraine gains erased. NYT, CIA spy war in Ukraine

Ray McGovern: How CIA Helps Ukraine Military

A Little Night Music

The Valentinos - It's All Over Now

The Valentinos - I'm Gonna Forget About You

The Valentinos - I'll Make It Alright

The Valentinos - Darling, Come Back Home

The Valentinos - Sweeter Than The Day Before

The Valentinos - Put Me Down Easy

The Valentinos - What About Me

The Valentinos - Don't Go Away

The Valentinos - Everybody Wants To Fall In Love

The Valentinos - Rock In The Cradle Of Love