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"Crimes are not to be measured by the issue of events, but by the bad intentions of men."

-- Marcus Tullius Cicero

News and Opinion

Netanyahu orders Israeli military to build massive concentration camp inside Gaza

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has formally ordered the Israeli military to create plans for the building of a giant concentration camp on the ruins of Rafah, where the population of Gaza would be moved in preparation for their forcible expulsion, Haaretz reported Wednesday. The Israeli newspaper reported that Netanyahu made the order at a meeting of Israel’s security cabinet on Saturday, before he left for Washington to meet with US President Donald Trump.

Wednesday’s report by Haaretz adds to the growing mountain of evidence that Israel is actively moving ahead with its ethnic cleansing plan, despite the presentation in the US media that Trump and Netanyahu are seeking “peace” and a “ceasefire.”

Two days after Netanyahu ordered the military to start planning the concentration camp, Defense Minister Israel Katz announced preparations for what he called a “humanitarian city.” Katz stated that the Israeli military would patrol the camp, and that once inside, residents would not be allowed to leave. He also said that the building of the camp would be coordinated with “the emigration plan, which will happen.” On the same day as the meeting with Trump, Netanyahu said the “relocation plan” was on Israel’s agenda, calling it a “brilliant vision.”

Only last week, Haaretz reported the existence of an internal briefing by the Israeli military that the “concentration and movement of the population” is an official goal of Israel. In May, Netanyahu named the implementation of the “Trump plan” for ethnic cleansing as one of its official aims of the war.

International human rights organizations have condemned the ethnic cleansing plan. In a statement Wednesday, the Euromed Monitor called it “a deliberate effort to depopulate Gaza and impose a new demographic reality that advances a colonial project to erase the Palestinian presence.” The camp would be “built on the ruins of a destroyed city lacking even the most basic necessities of life,” the Euro-Med monitor reported. “The zone will be placed under strict security control, with severe restrictions on movement, including a ban on exiting. This effectively constitutes the establishment of a closed mass concentration camp, where the population will be forcibly held outside any legitimate legal framework.”

UN Gaza investigator Francesca Albanese says US sanctions against her a sign of ‘guilt’

Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur for the West Bank and Gaza, has responded to news that she will be sanctioned by the Trump administration with a post on X saying “the powerful punishing those who speak for the powerless, it is not a sign of strength, but of guilt”.

On Wednesday, as part of its effort to punish critics of Israel’s 21-month war in Gaza, the state department sanctioned Albanese, an independent official tasked with investigating human rights abuses in the Palestinian territories.

In two posts on Thursday, she wrote “Let’s stand tall, together” and urged international observers to focus on the crisis inside Gaza. “All eyes must remain on Gaza, where children are dying of starvation in their mothers’ arms, while their fathers and siblings are bombed into pieces while searching for food,” she wrote.

She also spoke to the Middle East Eye’s live show saying: “It looks like I’ve hit a nerve.

“My concern is there are people dying in Gaza while you and I are speaking, and the United Nations are totally unable to intervene.”

U.N. Report: Google Is Making BILLION$ Off The Gaza Genocide!

Chris Hedges: The Persecution of Francesca Albanese

When the history of the genocide in Gaza is written, one of the most courageous and outspoken champions for justice and the adherence to international law will be Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur, who today the Trump administration is sanctioning. Her office is tasked with monitoring and reporting on human rights violations that Israel commits against Palestinians. Albanese, who regularly receives death threats and endures well-orchestrated smear campaigns directed by Israel and its allies, valiantly seeks to hold those who support and sustain the genocide accountable. ...

She announced that if true, as has been reported, that the former British Prime Minister David Cameron threatened to defund and withdraw from the International Criminal Court (ICC) after it issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, which Cameron and the other former British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak could be charged with a criminal offense for, under the Rome Statute. The Rome Statute criminalizes those who seek to prevent war crimes from being prosecuted. She has called on top European Union (EU) officials to face charges of complicity of war crimes over their support for the genocide, saying that their actions cannot be met with impunity. ...

Her latest report lists 48 corporations and institutions, including Palantir Technologies Inc., Lockheed Martin, Alphabet Inc. (Google), Amazon, International Business Machine Corporation (IBM), Caterpillar Inc., Microsoft Corporation and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), along with banks and financial firms such as BlackRock, insurers, real estate firms and charities, which in violation of international law, are making billions from the occupation and the genocide of Palestinians. ...

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio condemned her support for the ICC, four of whose judges have been sanctioned by the U.S. for issuing arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant last year. He criticized Albanese for her efforts to prosecute American or Israeli nationals who sustain the genocide, saying she is unfit for service as a special rapporteur. Rubio also accused Albanese of having “spewed unabashed antisemitism, expressed support for terrorism, and open contempt for the United States, Israel, and the West.” The sanctions will most likely prevent Albanese from travelling to the U.S. and will freeze any assets she may have in the country.

The attack against Albanese presages a world without rules, one where rogue states, such as the U.S. and Israel, are permitted to carry out war crimes and genocide without any accountability or restraint. It exposes the subterfuges we use to fool ourselves and attempt to fool others. It reveals our hypocrisy, cruelty and racism. No one, from now on, will take seriously America’s stated commitments to democracy, freedom of expression, the rule of law or human rights. And who can blame them? Americans speak exclusively in the language of force, the language of brutes, the language of mass slaughter, the language of genocide.

Israeli strike kills at least 10 children queueing for medical treatment in Gaza

At least 15 people, including 10 children, have been killed by an Israeli strike as they queued outside a medical point in central Gaza, amid intensifying Israeli attacks that left 82 people dead across the strip. The uptick in Israeli bombing came as negotiators said a Gaza ceasefire deal was in sight, but not yet achieved.

The strike on Thursday morning hit families waiting for nutritional supplements and medical treatment in front of a medical point in Deir al-Balah, medical sources said. Project Hope, which runs the facility, said operations at the clinic had been suspended until further notice.

“This morning, innocent families were mercilessly attacked as they stood in line waiting for the doors to open. This is a blatant violation of international humanitarian law,” said Rabih Torbay, the NGO’s chief executive.

The Israeli military said it had targeted a Hamas terrorist who had participated in the 7 October 2023 attack, but “regrets any harm to uninvolved individuals” and that the incident was under review. ...

Israeli strikes and gunfire killed at least 67 other people across the Gaza Strip over the past 24 hours, according to the Palestinian health ministry, including 15 people in five separate strikes in Gaza City.

‘Like a video game’: Israel enforcing Gaza evacuations with grenade-firing drones

The Israeli military has weaponized a fleet of Chinese-manufactured commercial drones to attack Palestinians in parts of Gaza that it seeks to depopulate, an investigation by +972 Magazine and Local Call can reveal. According to interviews with seven soldiers and officers who served in the Strip, these drones are operated manually by troops on the ground, and are frequently used to bomb Palestinian civilians — including children — in an effort to force them to leave their homes or prevent them from returning to evacuated areas.

Soldiers most commonly use EVO drones, produced by the Chinese company Autel, which are primarily intended for photography and cost around NIS 10,000 (approximately $3,000) on Amazon. However, with a military-issued attachment known internally as an “iron ball,” a hand grenade can be affixed to the drone and dropped with the push of a button to detonate on the ground. Today, the majority of Israeli military companies in Gaza use these drones.

S., an Israeli soldier who served in the Rafah area this year, coordinated drone attacks in a neighborhood of the city that the army had ordered to be evacuated. During the nearly 100 days that his battalion operated there, soldiers conducted dozens of drone strikes, according to daily reports from his battalion commander that +972 and Local Call reviewed.

In the reports, all Palestinians killed were listed as “terrorists.” However, S. testified that aside from one person found with a knife and a single encounter with armed fighters, the scores of others killed — an average of one per day in his battalion’s combat zone — were unarmed. According to him, the drone strikes were carried out with the intent to kill, despite the majority of victims being located at such a distance from the soldiers that they could not have posed any threat. ...

“There were many incidents of dropping grenades from drones,” said H., a soldier who served in the Nuseirat area in central Gaza. “Were they aimed at armed militants? Definitely not. Once a commander defines an imaginary red line that no one is allowed to cross, anyone who does is marked for death,” even just for “walking in the street.” In several cases, S. said, Israeli troops deliberately targeted children.

Everything You Need To Know About War With Iran (w/ Alastair Crooke) | The Chris Hedges Report

Wow. MTG doing something useful. Whoda thunkit?

Rep. Greene Wants To Remove $500 Million in Military Aid for ‘Nuclear-Armed Israel’ From NDAA

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) has said she will be introducing an amendment to remove $500 million in military aid for “nuclear-armed Israel” from the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), marking a rare acknowledgement of Israel’s nuclear weapons from a member of Congress. ...

“I’m entering amendments to strike $500 million more for nuclear-armed Israel. And it’s important to say nuclear-armed Israel, because they do have nuclear weapons,” Greene told Steve Bannon on his “War Room” podcast.

“And we already give them $3.4 billion every single year in the state, from the State Department. $3.4 billion every single year. They don’t need another $500 million in our defense budget. That’s for the American people’s defense,” Greene added. ...

The US has also provided billions of dollars in additional military aid after October 7, 2023. According to Israeli media, the US has financed roughly 70% of Israel’s war-related military spending since then.

Mahmoud Khalil files $20m claim against Trump administration for false imprisonment

Lawyers for Mahmoud Khalil, the Columbia University graduate and Palestinian activist who was detained by the Trump administration for months, have filed a claim for $20m in damages against the administration, alleging Khalil was falsely imprisoned, maliciously prosecuted and smeared as an antisemite as the government sought to deport him over his prominent role in campus protests. The filing – a precursor to a lawsuit under the Federal Tort Claims Act – names the Department of Homeland Security, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the state department.

Khalil, 30, was released from US immigration detention last month after having been held for more than three months over his activism against Israel’s war on Gaza. He has become the most high-profile of the students who have been arrested by the Trump administration for their pro-Palestinian activism. ...

Asked by the Guardian to respond to allegations made by the Trump administration, which has fought for months to keep him detained, that his pro-Palestinian organizing constituted a national security threat, he said: “Trump and his administration, they chose the wrong person for this. That doesn’t mean there is a right person for this. There is no right person who should be detained for actually protesting a genocide.” ...

Trump administration officials had accused Khalil of antisemitism and of pro-Hamas advocacy, although they did not provide evidence at any point during his arrest or detention.

Lula threatens 50% tariff on US goods in retaliation for Trump levy on Brazil

Brazil threatened to hit back against Donald Trump’s plan to introduce 50% tariffs on its exports with its own 50% tariff on US goods, setting the stage for a precipitous trade war.

“If he charges us 50%, we’ll charge him 50%,” Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the Brazilian president, told local news outlet Record, a day after Trump threatened to impose steep duties on Brazilian goods and accused the country of conducting a “witch-hunt” against its former president Jair Bolsonaro, who is facing a trial over his attempt to overturn his 2022 election defeat.

Brazil could appeal to the World Trade Organization, propose international investigations and “demand explanations”, Lula suggested. “But the main thing is the Reciprocity Law, passed by Congress,” he told Record, referring to recent legislation designed to defend Latin America’s largest economy from tariff attacks. ...

Trump has already pledged to retaliate if Brazil retaliates against his attack, with US tariffs due to come into force on 1 August. “If for any reason you decide to raise your Tariffs, then, whatever the number you choose to raise them by, will be added onto the 50% that we charge,” he wrote in a letter to Lula on Wednesday, published on social media.

Pepe Escobar : Why Trump Fears BRICS

Brazilians Rally Around Lula After Trump Tariff Threat

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva may have gotten a political boost thanks to the intervention of U.S. President Donald Trump.

On Wednesday, Trump announced he was slapping all Brazilian imports with a 50% tariff to protest the criminal trial of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, a longtime Trump ally who was indicted on charges related to an alleged coup plot to illegally remain in power after he lost the 2022 general election.

However, it does not appear that Trump's intervention into Brazil's domestic politics is helping Bolsonaro in the court of public opinion and Brazilian publication Globo reports that Brazilians have been swarming the U.S. president's Instagram account and leaving messages telling him to "leave Brazil in peace" while insisting their country is "not a lawless land."

In an analysis piece published by the São Paulo-based Folha, journalist Igor Gielow declared that Bolsonaro was an "immediate loser" of Trump's decision, as in the past he has declared Trump to be his political idol and the two are generally seen as joined at the hip. What's more, Gielow argues that the Trump tariffs are most likely to hurt Brazil's agribusiness sector, which is where the core of Bolsonaro's political support lies.

Lorrena Rodrigues, a columnist at the more conservative newspaper Estadão, argued that Trump had given a "gift" to Lula by giving his party the opportunity to focus public attention away from domestic problems and "to exploit a patriotism that used to be the monopoly" of the country's right-wing opposition party.

Rodrigues also said that Trump's tariffs against Brazil had no economic justification given that the United States runs a trade surplus with the country, which makes it seem as though Trump "wants to interfere in the internal politics and the justice system of Brazil through international commerce," which is not something likely to be popular in the country.

A leading editorial published in Estadão delivered even harsher criticism of the American president, whom it likened to a member of the mafia.

"Trump is using the threat of import tariffs on Brazil to obligate the country to surrender to his absurd demands," wrote the editors, who further said that Trump "lied shamelessly in his letter to justify the drastic measure" he imposed on Brazil. The editorial concluded by imploring "true Brazilians" to "not let yourselves be the dogs of an American president who shames the ideas of democracy."

Globo also reports that members of the conservative opposition party held an emergency meeting to discuss how to respond politically to Trump's tariffs. One unnamed Senate leader who spoke with the publication described Trump's surprise announcement as "a shot in the foot."

"Who's going to be in favor of this?" the Senate leader wondered. "Who's going to go against their own country?"

Brazilians have for decades been suspicious of the United States' intentions toward their national sovereignty since the U.S. backed a military coup in 1964 that ousted its democratically elected left-wing government and replaced it with a dictatorship that lasted for more than two decades.

Federal agents use force during immigration raid at two California farms

Federal immigration officials carrying out raids on two southern California cannabis farms clashed with protesters, firing chemical munitions that sprayed what looked like smoke into the air to disperse the crowd.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents accompanied by national guard troops in military-style vehicles turned up at two locations operated by Glass House Farms, one in the Santa Barbara county town of Carpinteria, about 90 miles (145km) north-west of Los Angeles, and one in the Ventura county community of Camarillo, about 50 miles from LA.

Television images showed dozens of demonstrators gathered on a road between fields where uniformed officers stood in a line across from them. In other images, white and green smoke could be seen as protesters retreated, and others showed protesters shouting at agents wearing camouflage gear, helmets and gas masks. It wasn’t clear why authorities threw the canisters or whether they released chemicals.

An image from KTLA showed people sitting against a wall with their hands bound in front of them; it wasn’t clear whether they were workers or protesters. The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to requests for comment.

Writing on the social media platform X, California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, shared video of children fleeing from chemical agents fired by federal agents at protesters on Thursday during the immigration raid in Camarillo. “Kids running from tear gas, crying on the phone because their mother was just taken from the fields,” Newson commented on the images. “Trump calls me ‘Newscum’ – but he’s the real scum.”

Judge Blocks Trump Birthright Citizenship Order; DOJ Caught Lying About Men Sent to El Salvador

US state department announces plan to lay off nearly 15% of its domestic staff

The US state department has announced that it plans to move forward with mass layoffs as part of the most significant restructuring of the country’s diplomatic corps in decades. Officials say the cuts will align their mission with Donald Trump’s vision of America first.

The layoffs, which are commonly called reductions in force (or RIFs), along with voluntary redundancies, will affect nearly 15% of the state department’s domestic staff. A senior state department official said that was close to 1,800 people. The restructuring will also see several hundred bureaus merged or eliminated entirely. The department advises the president and leads the US in foreign policy issues.

The state department went forward with the layoffs, which were long expected, after the supreme court sided this week with the Trump administration against a federal judge’s hold on plans for mass government firings that could affect hundreds of thousands of federal employees.

“In the coming days, the department will be communicating to individuals affected by the reduction in force. First and foremost, we want to thank them for their dedication and service to the United States,” read a memo attributed to Michael Rigas, the deputy secretary for management and resources, announcing the layoffs.

State department officials said they wanted to eliminate redundant positions and agencies, noting that there were three offices at the state department managing sanctions policy, and that other offices had “proliferated” under Bill Clinton during the post-cold war era.

Why Establishment Dems WON'T ENDORSE Zohran Mamdani

Extreme heat could lead to 30,000 deaths a year in England and Wales by 2070s, say scientists

More than 30,000 people a year in England and Wales could die from heat-related causes by the 2070s, scientists have warned. A new study calculates that heat mortality could rise more than fiftyfold in 50 years because of climate heating. Researchers at UCL and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine compared different potential scenarios, looking at levels of warming, measures to mitigate and adapt to the climate crisis, regional climatic differences and potential power outages. They also modelled the ageing population.

Between 1981 and 2021, there were on average 634 heat-related deaths in England and Wales a year. The research, published in PLoS Climate, found that – in the worst-case scenario of 4.3C of warming by the end of the century and assuming minimal adaptation to mitigate the effects – heat-related deaths would increase sixteenfold to 10,317 in the 2050s, and would exceed 34,000 by the 2070s.

Even if temperature rises are limited to 1.6C of warming over preindustrial levels and high levels of adaptation are put in place, annual heat-related deaths will still increase up to sixfold by the 2070s.

The record-setting hot summer of 2022 – when temperatures reached 40.3C in Coningsby, Lincolnshire – had 2,985 excess heat deaths, indicating a potential “new normal” by as early as the 2050s, the research concluded.

Ex-NOAA Official on TX Flood: Trump Breaking "Disaster Response Chain" as Climate Crisis Escalates

Also of Interest

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

Rubio in bind as he seeks to reassure Asia, even as region faces punishing Trump tariffs

Dean Phillips' Attack on Mamdani Is an Attack on 'Millions of Working-Class People,' Progressives Say

Azerbaijan's game against Russia

Epstein’s Dead So Why Is His Bank Account STILL Moving Millions!?!

A Little Night Music

Jimmy Dawkins & Hip Linkchain - Hideaway

Hip Linkchain ~ Call Muddy Waters

Hip Linkchain - Diggin' My Potatoes

Hip Linkchain ~ Somebody Loan Me A Dime

Jimmy Rogers & Hip Linkchain ?– Blow Wind Blow

Hip's Jam - Hip Linkchain

Hip Linkchain ~ You Left Me With A Broken Heart

Jimmy Dawkins & Hip Linkchain - Mother In Law Blues

Hip Linkchain - Cold Chills

Hip Linkchain - House Cat Blues