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“People wrap themselves in their beliefs. And they do it in such a way that you can't set them free. Not even the truth will set them free.”

-- Michael Specter

News and Opinion

Liberals Are Always Trying To Distance Biden From Netanyahu, And Netanyahu From Israel

Western liberals are always doing this weird dance where they try to rhetorically create space between Biden and the atrocities of the Israeli government, working tirelessly to frame the president as an innocent passive witness to the genocide he is directly facilitating in Gaza. Those western liberals who support Israel are also simultaneously performing a second bizarre contortion in which they try to distance the Israeli state from Benjamin Netanyahu, as though Israel would be a nice, normal, non-genocidal nation if it only had a different prime minister.

Two good examples of this frantic compartmentalization campaign came out in the mass media in the last few days, with a New York Times article titled “Providing Both Bombs and Food, Biden Puts Himself in the Middle of Gaza’s War” and an Axios article titled “Biden breaks with Netanyahu but sticks with Israel”.

Both the New York Times and Axios write-ups go out of their way to inform the reader that Biden has been growing “frustrated” with the Netanyahu government — yet more examples of a trend in liberal media reporting that’s been going on for months in which spinmeisters convey the idea that Biden is secretly hopping mad at Bibi and his cohorts behind the scenes despite all of his actions and decisions and public statements conveying the opposite. The idea is to manipulate the reader into accepting that while Biden may be backing a genocide, secretly his feelings feel very upset at the people he’s backing so you should like him and vote for him anyway.

The New York Times’ Peter Baker and Michael Crowley present a poetical reframing of Biden’s genocide in which they depict this lifelong Beltway swamp monster’s self-evident depravity as a poignant story about a kindhearted leader facing difficult decisions, saying “The United States finds itself on both sides of the war in a way, arming the Israelis while trying to care for those hurt as a result.”

“From the skies over Gaza these days fall American bombs and American food pallets, delivering death and life at the same time and illustrating President Biden’s elusive effort to find balance in an unbalanced Middle East war,” write Baker and Crowley, presumably while high-fiving about their eloquent prose.

“Mr. Biden has grown increasingly frustrated as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel defies the president’s pleas to do more to protect civilians in Gaza and went further in expressing that exasperation during and after his State of the Union address this past week,” write the authors, before adding, “But Mr. Biden remains opposed to cutting off munitions or leveraging them to influence the fighting.”

That last sentence right there is all anyone needs to know about Joseph R Biden. Those are the raw facts, and everything else is narrative spin. Israel gets the actual material weapons it requires to continue its genocidal atrocities, and the readers of The New York Times get empty narrative fluff about aid drops and Biden’s feelings to help them feel okay about it.

This makes no fucking sense. Do liberals think we are stupid or something? pic.twitter.com/z1zvF8n9L5

— Revolutionary Blackout Network (@SocialistMMA) March 11, 2024

Axios’ Barak Ravid is somehow even more ham-fisted, writing that “President Biden has begun a tricky maneuver: breaking with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Gaza war strategy — while sticking with Israel and its fight against Hamas.”

“U.S. officials say Biden — and many other senior officials at the White House and the State Department — are extremely frustrated by what they see as ungratefulness by Netanyahu,” writes Ravid, because when you’re writing about Biden and Gaza in a liberal publication you’re required to work that “frustrated” angle in somewhere.

To substantiate his claim that Biden is “breaking” with Netanyahu, Ravid references Biden’s oblique finger-wagging at “the leadership of Israel” in his State of the Union address and the president’s “I told Bibi ‘You and I are going to have a come-to-Jesus meeting’” hot mic moment immediately thereafter, as well as Biden’s statement on MSNBC that Netanyahu is “hurting Israel more than helping Israel” by tarnishing Israel’s image.

Then, immediately thereafter, Ravid nullifies everything he just wrote in the preceding paragraphs by noting another quote from Biden’s MSNBC appearance: “I’m never gonna leave Israel. The defense of Israel is still critical.”

according the Israel Democracy Institute, 2/3 of Jewish Israelis support starving Gazan children to death https://t.co/Tm3JbCZqdS pic.twitter.com/UXujwhBjYb

— Nathan J Robinson (@NathanJRobinson) March 11, 2024

Liberals love pretending there’s a meaningful difference between supporting Netanyahu’s murderousness and supporting Israel, as though Israeli murderousness does not have a healthy and vibrant existence entirely independent of who its prime minister happens to be. Pinning all the blame for Israel’s depravity on one evil bad guy lets them justify their continued support for Israel despite that position’s self-evident contradiction with everything they claim to stand for.

Polling by the Israel Democracy Institute has found that three-quarters of Jewish Israelis support Netanyahu’s planned assault on Rafah, which the prime minister has said will proceed as planned despite Biden’s empty bloviations that doing so would be crossing a “red line” with this administration. Polls also found that 68 percent of Jewish Israelis oppose any humanitarian aid entering Gaza via any agency at all, which is to say they support starving huge numbers of Gazan civilians to death.

Israeli violence isn’t the product of Netanyahu, Netanyahu is the product of Israeli violence. He built his political career upon popular sentiments that were already in place long before he turned up. If it wasn’t him inflicting violence and abuse on Palestinians it would be someone else, and it has been in the past, and it will continue to be for as long as Israel exists.

There is no state of Israel that is separate or separable from the violence, abuse, apartheid and racist indoctrination necessary for its continued existence. Liberals like to pretend they live in this imaginary fantasyland where a nice and peaceful Israel is possible, despite Israel’s entire historical existence making an obvious lie of this premise.

Israeli violence is not distant from Israel; they are fully united. Israel is not distant from Netanyahu; they are not meaningfully distinct. Netanyahu is not distant from Biden; they are partners in every way that matters. Liberals only try to compartmentalize these things away from each other to stave off the cognitive dissonance inherent in their contradiction-soaked worldview.

Aid Workers Say Israel Must End Attack on Gaza, Open Aid Routes

Israeli human rights groups accuse country of failing to abide by ICJ’s Gaza aid ruling

Twelve of Israel’s most prominent human rights organisations have signed an open letter accusing the country of failing to comply with the international court of justice’s (ICJ) provisional ruling that it should facilitate access of humanitarian aid into Gaza.

The court in The Hague made a number of legal requirements of Israel when it issued a provisional ruling in late January in response to South Africa’s complaint accusing the state of committing genocide in its military campaign in Gaza. The requirements included taking all measures to prevent intentional harm to civilians, facilitating immediate humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip, preventing and punishing direct or public incitement to genocide, and preserving evidence of any wrongful acts committed during the country’s war against Hamas.

In their letter, the rights groups say Israel was legally obliged to implement the measures ordered by the court but had so far failed to do so. Signatories to the letter include the military whistleblower group Breaking the Silence and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel. “The ICJ order is a legal obligation to end the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza. It must be abided by, not only to ease the urgent suffering of civilians but for the sake of humanity as a whole,” the letter says. It also notes that the ICJ urged Hamas to immediately and unconditionally release all Israeli hostages. ...

“As members of Israel-based civil society committed to human rights and the rule of law, we condemn the fact that Israel has so far failed to change its behaviour based on the measures imposed by the ICJ, as well as the fact that humanitarian aid to Gaza dropped by 50% in the month following the ruling,” the letter says. “We call for an immediate ceasefire, which must include the return of the hostages. We urge the Israeli government to comply with the ICJ order and implement the court’s provisional measures, which are essential to mitigating and overcoming the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.

“Moreover, we call on the international community to use its collective influence to promote and support an immediate ceasefire and the implementation of the provisional measures, and to increase its efforts to ensure that the Israeli hostages are returned from Gaza.”

Queen Rania CONDEMNS Famine in Gaza: ‘Slow-Moving Mass Murder of Children’

Hundreds of Palestine supporters protest Israeli real estate event at New Jersey synagogue

Hundreds of people marched through the suburb of Teaneck, New Jersey, on Sunday, in protest of a real estate fair held in the Keter Torah synagogue that featured an Israeli company pitching properties in Israel and the occupied West Bank. Organized by several Jewish organizations including the Northern New Jersey branch of Jewish Voice for Peace, along with Teaneck for Palestine, the protestors marched 1.4 miles from the Teaneck Armory to the synagogue, waving flags, beating drums and chanting “Free Palestine!”

The real estate company, called My Home in Israel, has organized several exhibitions across cities in Canada and the US, including Teaneck, a commuter town on the outskirts of New York City. According to its website, the company boasts luxury apartments, mini penthouses and villas for sale across Israel and the occupied West Bank. At least two apartment complexes offer an “urban living experience in a perfect environment” in the settlement of Ariel, near the West Bank city of Nablus.

In its Frequently Asked Questions page, the company says that a foreign resident “can carry out a real estate transaction in Israel, from start to finish, even without coming to Israel”.

Israel’s settlements in the West Bank are widely considered illegal under international law. The US recently restored its position that they are “inconsistent” with international law, a position it had abandoned under the Trump administration. The “Great Israeli Real Estate Event” has inflamed existing tensions in Teaneck, a town of approximately 41,000 residents and home to large Jewish and Muslim populations that has seen a series of protests and counterprotests since the October 7 attacks on Israel and the subsequent Israeli offensive in Gaza. ...

The New Jersey chapters of the Council on American-Islamic Relations and American Muslims for Palestine have called for a federal investigation into the event, saying that it is “deeply concerning to see anyone use a house of worship to allegedly flout international law by selling off stolen land”.

Scott Ritter: How Close Is US to War?

Union Decries GOP Subpoena Over Gaza Resolution as 'Attack' on Free Speech

Free speech defenders on Monday condemned Republican North Carolina Congresswoman Virginia Foxx's subpoena of a labor union after its members overwhelmingly voted in favor of a resolution calling for a Gaza cease-fire and condemning Israeli genocide, apartheid, and other crimes in Palestine.

The Association of Legal Aid Attorneys (ALAA) Local 2325 of the United Auto Workers (UAW) voted 1,067-570 in December to approve a sweeping resolution endorsing the international Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement for Palestinian rights and condemning Israel's "occupation, ethnic cleansing, and genocide" in Palestine. The measure called for an end to these and other human rights violations as well as "an immediate cease-fire" in Gaza and an end to the Israeli siege on the embattled Palestinian territory.

According to HuffPost, several of the measure's organizers are Jewish. On Monday, ALAA president Lisa Ohta told the outlet that "we stand by our resolution in support of a free Palestine, which was passed overwhelmingly after a full membership vote."

"This is a transparent attack on our union's democratic processes and freedom of speech," Ohta said of Foxx's move.

Foxx—who chairs the House Committee on Education and the Workforce—said she was serving the subpoena because the union was "obstructing" an inquiry into the "divisive, antisemitic resolution."

The congresswoman previously accused the union of supporting a resolution that "calls for an economic boycott of Israel, fails to acknowledge the horrific actions committed by Hamas on October 7, 2023, and puts Jewish union members in a compromising position."

Foxx further charged that the measure "alienated a sizeable portion" of the union's membership while forcing Jewish members "to take a position critical on their faith, Israel, and Israel's sovereignty."

ALAA had originally planned to vote on the resolution on November 17. However, four union members filed a lawsuit in state court that resulted in a temporary restraining order blocking a vote. In December, a federal judge lifted the order, in part because it violated union members' First Amendment rights.

Foxx, who is 80 years old, has gained national prominence since the October 7 attacks and Israel's genocidal retaliation for leading congressional probes into antisemitism on college and university campuses.

US Intelligence ‘Threat Assessment’ Says Hamas Isn’t Going Away

An annual “threat assessment” compiled by US intelligence agencies was released on Monday and said that Israel will likely face resistance from Hamas for years to come, another sign that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s stated goal of “eradicating” the Palestinian group isn’t realistic. ...

The assessment aligns with an Israeli military intelligence document that was circulated last month and said even if Israel succeeded in dismantling Hamas as an organized military force, the group would still exist as “a terror group and a guerrilla group.” Other reports have said Israel is struggling to destroy the vast tunnel network underneath Gaza that is key to Hamas’s survival and is far more expansive than Israel initially thought. ...

The assessment also said that Iran had no role in Hamas’s October 7 attack and acknowledged Tehran is not seeking a nuclear weapon. “Iran is not currently undertaking the key nuclear weapons-development activities necessary to produce a testable nuclear device,” the report reads.

The report acknowledges that Iran’s increases in uranium enrichment since the US tore up the nuclear deal in 2018 were to gain leverage for negotiations, not seek a bomb. “Iran uses its nuclear program to build negotiating leverage and respond to perceived international pressure,” the assessment says.

US INTEL: Bibi Government NEAR COLLAPSE

Israeli Settlements Expand by Record Amount, UN Rights Chief Says

Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories have expanded by a record amount and risk eliminating any practical possibly of a Palestinian state, the U.N. human rights chief said on Friday.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said that the growth of Israeli settlements amounted to the transfer by Israel of its own population, which he reiterated was a war crime. The U.S. Biden administration said last month the settlements were "inconsistent" with international law after Israel announced new housing plans in the occupied West Bank.

"Settler violence and settlement-related violations have reached shocking new levels, and risk eliminating any practical possibility of establishing a viable Palestinian State," Turk said in a statement accompanying the report which will be presented to the Human Rights Council in Geneva in late March. ...

The 16-page report, based on the U.N.'s own monitoring as well as other sources, documented 24,300 new Israeli housing units in the occupied West Bank during a one-year period through to end-October 2023, which it said was the highest on record since monitoring began in 2017.

Yemen: Houthis allegedly target ‘US ship Pinocchio’ as US-British airstrikes kill 11

Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthis targeted what was described as the “US ship Pinocchio” in the Red Sea with missiles, according to a speech by the group’s military spokesperson, televised early on Tuesday. According to public databases operated by Equasis and the UN’s International Maritime Organization (IMO), the Pinocchio is a Liberian-flagged container ship that is owned by Singapore-registered company Om-Mar 5 Inc.

Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Sarea said the group will escalate their military operations in the Islamic holy month of Ramadan in solidarity with Palestinians during the war in Gaza.

Houthis’ Red Sea attacks have disrupted global shipping, forcing firms to reroute to longer and more expensive journeys around southern Africa, and stoked fears that the Israel-Gaza war could spread to destabilise the wider Middle East.

On Monday, airstrikes attributed to a US-British coalition hit port cities and small towns in western Yemen, killing at least 11 people and injuring 14 while defending commercial shipping, a spokesperson for Yemen’s internationally recognised government told Reuters. At least 17 airstrikes were reported in the country, including in the principal port city of Hodeidah and at Ras Issa Port, according to Al Masirah, the main Houthi-run television news outlet.

Biden budget promotes war in Ukraine, Mideast, China and at US-Mexico border

The White House released a draft budget outline Monday afternoon that has two entirely separate audiences: working people, who get false promises, and the financial oligarchy, who get money, money, money. For the mass of the American population, the Biden administration makes demagogic promises of social spending to be financed by tax increases on the wealthy, pledges that will be discarded as soon as the election campaign is over. For the financial aristocracy and the military-intelligence apparatus, Biden proposes record spending on the military and on domestic and border police repression, together with trillions in interest payments—nearly $5 trillion over the next ten years—going straight into the coffers of Wall Street and the billionaires.

Naturally, the corporate-controlled media devotes virtually all its coverage to the pie-in-the-sky promises of social benefits that have no purpose except to try and fool the population in an election year, while saying very little about the ongoing military build-up and nothing at all about rising interest payments, which will soon be one of the largest components of the federal budget.

The social spending components can be detailed briefly. Biden proposes to restore the Child Tax Credit, enact a new tax credit for first-time home buyers, establish universal prekindergarten, 12 weeks of paid family leave, substantial forgiveness of college student loan debt and subsidies for an array of other social services. All this is to be paid for by raising the corporate income tax to 28 percent (restoring only half the cut from 35 percent to 21 percent enacted under Trump in 2017), and increasing various other taxes on the wealthy.

This is, to put it politely, a political fairy tale. Biden made no serious attempt to push through such policies in 2021–22, when the Democrats controlled the House and Senate, allowing a handful of right-wing Democrats in the Senate to block most of it. With Republicans in control of the House, and potentially in control of the Senate after the next election, there is no prospect of any of this being passed.

In any case, the Democratic Party would not enact these measures if it had total control, because the vast bulk of spending is earmarked for wars in Ukraine, the Middle East and, further down the road, against China in the Indo-Pacific. The promises of social spending are brazen lies that will be discarded on November 6, if not sooner. The heart of the budget is what it provides for the Pentagon, a record $850 billion in discretionary budget authority for Fiscal Year (FY) 2025, which begins on October 2024. This represents a 4.1 percent increase of the budget for FY 2024, which has still not yet been approved by Congress.

Next stop for Democratic ‘uncommitted’ vote campaign for Gaza: Washington

The movement among Democrats to cast a Gaza protest vote against President Joe Biden in the primary election moves to Washington state on Tuesday.

Organizers with Vote Uncommitted WA have been working for two weeks to ramp up outreach to voters via phone, text, online and in-person connections to explain how they can use their primary ballots to check “uncommitted delegates” to send a message to Biden in support of a permanent ceasefire.

They were inspired first by the turnout for the uncommitted vote in Michigan, which received more than 100,000 votes, and have learned from organizers there how to get the word out quickly.

A “multiracial, multifaith, anti-war coalition” came together to push uncommitted in Washington, said Rami Al-Kabra, a city council member in Bothell, Washington, who is helping to organize the Washington uncommitted vote. It got a boost from two major unions’ local chapters: the state’s largest, the United Food and Commercial Workers, and the American Federation of Teachers.

The uncommitted push saw big turnout in Minnesota as well, where organizers had one week to convince voters to use their vote to call for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. Nearly 46,000 Minnesota Democrats voted uncommitted, making up 19% of ballots cast and winning 11 delegates to the Democratic convention. In Hawaii on 6 March, uncommitted snagged 29% of the nearly 1,600 Democratic primary votes cast, the highest percentage so far, getting seven delegates.

CNN admits; Gas station Russia crushing US & Europe in ammo production

Trump ‘will not give a penny to Ukraine’ if he wins, Hungary’s Viktor Orbán says

Donald Trump “will not give a penny” to Ukraine if he is re-elected US president, the far-right Hungarian prime minister, Viktor Orbán, said after a controversial meeting with Trump in Florida. “He will not give a penny in the Ukraine-Russia war,” Orbán told state media in Hungary on Sunday. “Therefore, the war will end, because it is obvious that Ukraine can not stand on its own feet.”

According to Orbán, Trump has a “detailed plan” to end the Ukraine war, which began two years ago when Russia invaded.

The US and its allies have supported Ukraine but further US aid is held up in Congress, having passed the Senate with bipartisan support only to be blocked in the House, which is controlled by far-right Trump allies.

Calling Trump “a man of peace”, Orbán said: “If the Americans don’t give money and weapons, along with the Europeans, the war is over. And if the Americans don’t give money, the Europeans alone can’t finance this war. And then the war is over.” (This would likely mean Ukraine losing the war to Russia.)

Trump PANICS After Floating Social Security Cuts

ACLU fights AGAINST Worker Rights, When POLITICAL CORRECTNESS Bites You BACK

Bill Demanding Justice for Breonna Taylor Would Ban No-Knock Warrants Nationwide

Rights advocates on Monday applauded U.S. Rep. Morgan McGarvey for taking a "bold step toward healing and justice" by introducing the Justice for Breonna Taylor Act, which would ban nationwide the kind of no-knock warrants that led to the 26-year-old woman's death in 2020.

Nearly four years to the day after Taylor was killed by police officers who forcibly entered her home in Louisville, Kentucky without warning, after allegedly lying to obtain the no-knock warrant, McGarvey (D-Ky.) joined Sens. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Cory Booker (D-N.J.) in proposing the bill.

Louisville and Kentucky policymakers have both prohibited or severely restricted no-knock warrants since Taylor's killing.

"Louisvillians remember Breonna Taylor and are still grieving the tragedy of her inexcusable killing by police. After Breonna's death, we passed a ban on no-knock warrants at the state and local level—if we can do this in Kentucky, we can do this nationally," said McGarvey. "The Justice for Breonna Taylor Act is going to protect people and keep our communities safe."

Under the proposal, federal law enforcement and state and local police departments that receive federal funding would be prohibited from executing no-knock warrants.

Amber Duke, executive director of the ACLU of Kentucky, denounced no-knock warrants as "legalized home invasions that put lives at risk on either side of a door."

In Taylor's case, police officers used a battering ram to break down the door to the Louisville apartment shortly after midnight on March 13, 2020.

They had been investigating two men for suspected drug dealing, including one who had previously been romantically involved with Taylor and who they believed had used Taylor's apartment to receive packages.

"We know it was Breonna Taylor's dream to save lives," Duke said of the emergency room technician, "and this proposed legislation would do just that. We applaud Congressman McGarvey and the bill's co-sponsors for taking this bold step toward healing and justice."

The legislation was introduced as federal authorities announced former Officer Brett Hankison will face a jury for a third time in the case.

None of the officers involved in the shooting have ever been charged with killing Taylor, but Hankison was charged by the state of Kentucky for endangering Taylor's neighbors. He was acquitted in March 2022 and the U.S. Justice Department then charged him with civil rights violations. A federal jury deadlocked in that trial.

"He shouldn't be the only one charged," attorney Lonita Baker, who represents Taylor's mother and sister, toldThe Washington Post."But the reality is that's where we stand and that's better than nothing."

California officer shoots and kills boy, 15, holding gardening tool

A sheriff’s deputy in southern California shot and killed a 15-year-old boy who was holding a gardening tool, officials said. The San Bernardino county sheriff’s department was responding to a 911 call on Saturday from a family reporting that a boy, identified as Ryan Gainer, was attacking his family at their home in Apple Valley, east of Los Angeles. The department said he was holding a 5ft gardening tool and approaching the first deputy who arrived at the scene when the deputy shot him. Gainer was later taken to a hospital where he died.

A lawyer for the family said Gainer was a cross-country runner who had autism and said the fatal shooting did not appear to be warranted. The sheriff’s department released 911 audio and partial body-camera footage to the Guardian on Monday, but the clips do not capture the moment of the shooting, and a spokesperson declined to release additional video. ...

The department released two roughly 15-second body-camera clips, but both clips end before the shooting. Footage from one deputy showed him arriving at the home, where the front door was open. A man inside could be heard saying: “He’s got a stick in his hand.” Gainer then appeared and started quickly walking out of the home toward the deputy, who pointed his gun toward the boy and shouted: “Get back, get back, or you’re going to get shot.” The deputy appeared to be walking backward, then running away from the boy, pointing his gun at him. The other clip captured that same moment from another deputy who was arriving and standing at a distance. Gainer appeared to be holding the tool over his head, but it is unclear what he was doing as he was shot.

A department spokesperson said it would not be releasing full body-camera footage on Monday and declined to say where Gainer was shot, how many bullets were fired and if multiple deputies had shot him. The spokesperson also declined to name the deputies on scene and said the case was still under investigation.

“There are great questions as to whether it was appropriate to use deadly force against a 15-year-old autistic kid who was having an episode,” said DeWitt Lacy, a civil rights lawyer representing the family. “We need to see the video and the moment of the shooting … but it doesn’t seem like anyone was in imminent danger of death or great bodily injury.”

Robert Hur TESTIFYING on Biden’s Age and Documents Case As Media RUNS COVER for POTUS

Pro-Israel group spent millions in tight race for southern California House seat – and lost

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac), the most powerful pro-Israel lobby group in the US, poured more than $4.5m into an Orange county congressional race in hopes of keeping Dave Min from advancing to the November election.

But on Tuesday, the California state senator did exactly that – outpacing his Democratic competitor Joanna Weiss to come in second in the primary for the seat of Congresswoman Katie Porter. ...

Aipac has spent millions of dollars against progressive candidates who have been critical of Israel this year and in recent election cycles. But the conflict in the Middle East was not a major issue in the primary race. Min’s positions regarding Israel aren’t particularly radical – he has criticized the country’s move to expand settlements in the West Bank and blamed the Israeli prime minister, Bibi Netanyahu, for “security failures” around the 7 October 2023 attacks, but has not publicly called for a ceasefire.

Still, he was hit with a barrage of attack ads. The ads from United Democracy Project, Aipac’s Pac, didn’t mention Min’s position on Israel but instead highlighted his arrest for drunk-driving last spring. “Dave Min wants your trust, but Min was arrested for drunk-driving – putting us all at risk,” one TV commercial said.

The ads heightened an already tense race between Min and Weiss, an attorney who was backed by Emily’s List and has repeatedly brought up Min’s arrest. Weiss argued that the arrest made Min vulnerable to Republican attacks, and that Democrats needed a stronger candidate for a district that Porter only narrowly held in 2022. While their positions on Israel have been similar, Weiss received large donations from Aipac donors. But in the end Min won out, receiving 26% of the vote to Weiss’s 19.3%, according to early returns. Republican Scott Baugh received 32.5%.

Non-Whites FLEE Democratic Party

Groups Form 'Reject AIPAC' Coalition to Fight Israel Lobby's Attacks on Progressives

U.S. progressive groups "working together to take on the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and its affiliated dark money super PACs" on Monday announced the launch of the Reject AIPAC coalition, which is urging candidates for federal office to not accept endorsements or contributions from the nation's most prominent Zionist lobby.

Reject AIPAC says it "will organize Democratic voters and elected officials to reject the destructive influence of the Republican megadonor-backed AIPAC on the Democratic primary process and our government's policy towards Palestine and Israel."

"We have watched as AIPAC has done everything it can to silence growing dissent in Congress against [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu's assault on Gaza—which has killed over 31,000 Palestinians—even as Democratic voters overwhelmingly support a cease-fire and oppose sending more blank checks to the Israeli military," the coalition said in a statement.

"Now, AIPAC's Republican donor-funded super PAC is threatening to spend $100 million targeting the handful of Black and brown members of Congress who have led the calls for a cease-fire and the equal protection of Palestinian and Israeli lives," the groups continued.

Reject AIPAC members include Justice Democrats, Jewish Voice for Peace Action, IfNotNow, Working Families Party, Sunrise Movement, MPower Change Action Fund, Democratic Socialists of America, Our Revolution, Peace Action, National Iranian American Council, and Gen-Z for Change.

"For too long, AIPAC and its Republican megadonors have demanded our elected leaders unconditionally support the Israeli military and government—or else," Jewish Voice for Peace said on social media, adding, "Enough."

The coalition's launch comes as AIPAC taps a $100 million war chest from its United Democracy Project super PAC in a bid to defeat not only pro-Palestine congressional candidates but also anyone deemed insufficiently supportive of Israel as it wages a genocidal war on Gaza while perpetrating apartheid, occupation, settler colonization, and ethnic cleansing across the Palestinian territories.

Europe unprepared for rapidly growing climate risks, report finds

Europe is not prepared for the rapidly growing climate risks it faces, the European Environment Agency (EEA) has said in its first risk assessment. From wildfires burning down homes to violent weather straining public finances, the report says more action is needed to address half of the 36 significant climate risks with potentially severe consequences that it identifies for Europe. Five more risks need urgent action, the report says. ...

The report looks at how severe the climate threats are and how well prepared Europe is to deal with them. It says the most pressing risks – which are growing worse as fossil fuel pollution heats the planet – are heat stress, flash floods and river floods, the health of coastal and marine ecosystems, and the need for solidarity funds to recover from disasters.

When the researchers reassessed six of the risks for southern Europe, which they described as a “hotspot” region, they found urgent action was also needed to keep crops safe and to protect people, buildings and nature from wildfires. There is increasing evidence of adaptation but “it’s certainly not enough”, said Robbert Biesbroek, a report author from Wageningen University, who also co-led the chapter on Europe in the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report on adaptation. ...

The report also warns of “cascading and compounding” risks, which it says current stress tests in the financial sector are likely to underestimate. Hot weather will dry out southern Europe, for instance, killing crops and shrinking water supplies, but will also harden soils, making flash floods more likely, and dry out vegetation, meaning wildfires can spread faster. Governments trying to respond to several crises will be more stretched for resources, as will communities that fail to prepare. “The risks are simply outpacing the developments of policies,” said Blaž Kurnik, the head of the EEA impacts and adaptation group.

Also of Interest

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

World Is Watching UN’s Response to Israel’s Crimes

Patrick Lawrence: Old Man Shouting

UN expert: Israel is engineering famine in Gaza

Israeli forces attack Muslim worshippers at al-Aqsa during first night of Ramadan

Palestinian city Jericho names street after 'martyr' Aaron Bushnell

Market Gives Vote of No Confidence in Latest Israel Genocide, Um, War-Financing Bonds

Poland’s Foreign Minister Confirms NATO Troops Are in Ukraine

Why Non-White Voters Are Moving Away From Democrats

“You Are Betraying Your Ancestors”: A Message To Joe Biden From the Graveyard Where His Ancestors Are Buried

Artist defends Tate Britain’s display of ‘undeniably racist’ Whistler mural

Queen Rania of Jordan: ‘This is a man-made, an Israeli-made disaster’

A Little Night Music

Georgia White - Hot Nuts (Get 'em from the Peanut Man)

Georgia White - Trouble in Mind

Georgia White - The Blues Ain't Nothin' But A Woman Cryin' For Her Man

Georgia White - I'll Keep Sittin' On It

Georgia White - The Stuff Is Here

Georgia White - I Just Want Your Stingaree

Georgia White - Dead Man´s Blues

Georgia White - Your Worries Ain't Like Mine

Georgia White - Daddy Let Me Lay It on You

Georgia White - Alley Boogie