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The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Joe Louis Walker

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Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features blues guitarist Joe Louis Walker. Enjoy!

^{Joe Louis Walker – Alligator}

"If the workers of the world want to win, all they have to do is recognize their own solidarity. They have nothing to do but fold their arms and the world will stop. The workers are more powerful with their hands in their pockets than all the property of the capitalists."

-- Joseph Ettor, IWW organizer

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News and Opinion

Million-Strong General Strike Blocked Italy for Palestine

Approximately one million people across Italy staged a general strike in support of Palestine and the Global Sumud Flotilla this week, offering a vision of solidarity sharply at odds with the one displayed by European leaders at the United Nations. Ports, train stations, and major junctions were shut down as workers, many of whom members of the grassroots union Unione Sindacale di Base (USB), brought the country to a halt.

In Rome alone, 300,000 demonstrators occupied the city’s main railway hub before marching through the streets. “The call came from Genoa’s dockworkers, and here we are: we’ve blocked everything,” the protesters proclaimed. Among those leading the crowd were firefighters’ union representatives, who told Il Manifesto: “First responders will never be complicit in genocide, and we are protesting a government that is entrapping us in rearmament.” ...

The mass character of Monday’s strike likely shook much of Italy’s political class. In recent years, the government had passed measures to restrict demonstrations and downplayed the organizing capacity of trade unions and the left. Yet weeks of continuous protests culminating in the general strike undermined these efforts.

“Workers have returned to center stage and are calling on citizens, all citizens, to stand up. They are not doing so for a contract renewal but to demand justice for a distant and tormented people,” USB declared on the day of the strike. “In this age of selfishness and individualism, this seems unthinkable. But no, solidarity between peoples and brotherhood beyond borders are not dead and buried values; on the contrary, they are alive and kicking.”

For Potere al Popolo’s Giuliano Granato, the strike also captured broader anger. “Palestine has given a name to our discontent,” he told Peoples Dispatch

“The outrage, protest, and anger over the massacre of the Palestinian people has intersected with years of oppression, repression, and deteriorating material conditions. For young people in particular, there is the absence of a future, fear, and the awareness of living in societies where only the horrendously rich and powerful have a say.”

The momentum built by the strike is set to continue. Italian dockworkers will host an international sectoral meeting on September 26–27, bringing together trade unions capable of disrupting Europe’s arms flows to Israel. National demonstrations in solidarity with Palestine are also planned for Oct. 4, as eyes remain fixed on the Global Sumud Flotilla. If Israel attempts to stop it, Italian workers have already shown they are ready to block the country — sending a signal that could inspire others to organize along the same lines.

Doctor BANNED From Gaza Tells All

Microsoft ends Israeli military use of AI, data services for its mass surveillance of Palestinians

Microsoft blocks Israel’s use of its technology in mass surveillance of Palestinians

Microsoft has terminated the Israeli military’s access to technology it used to operate a powerful surveillance system that collected millions of Palestinian civilian phone calls made each day in Gaza and the West Bank, the Guardian can reveal. Microsoft told Israeli officials late last week that Unit 8200, the military’s elite spy agency, had violated the company’s terms of service by storing the vast trove of surveillance data in its Azure cloud platform, sources familiar with the situation said.

The decision to cut off Unit 8200’s ability to use some of its technology results directly from an investigation published by the Guardian last month. It revealed how Azure was being used to store and process the trove of Palestinian communications in a mass surveillance programme. In a joint investigation with the Israeli-Palestinian publication +972 Magazine and the Hebrew-language outlet Local Call, the Guardian revealed how Microsoft and Unit 8200 had worked together on a plan to move large volumes of sensitive intelligence material into Azure. ...

Equipped with Azure’s near-limitless storage capacity and computing power, Unit 8200 had built an indiscriminate new system allowing its intelligence officers to collect, play back and analyse the content of cellular calls of an entire population. ... According to several sources, the enormous repository of intercepted calls – which amounted to as much as 8,000 terabytes of data – was held in a Microsoft datacentre in the Netherlands. Within days of the Guardian publishing the investigation, Unit 8200 appears to have swiftly moved the surveillance data out of the country.

According to sources familiar with the huge data transfer outside of the EU country, it occurred in early August. Intelligence sources said Unit 8200 planned to transfer the data to the Amazon Web Services cloud platform. Neither the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) nor Amazon responded to a request for comment. ...

The termination is the first known case of a US technology company withdrawing services provided to the Israeli military since the beginning of its war on Gaza.

They recognized a concentration camp not a Palestinian "state," with Ali Abunimah and Asa Winstanley

Washington backing plan for Tony Blair to head transitional Gaza authority

The White House is backing a plan that would see Tony Blair head a temporary administration of the Gaza Strip – initially without the direct involvement of the Palestinian Authority (PA), according to Israeli media reports. Under the proposal, Blair would lead a body called the Gaza International Transitional Authority (Gita) that would have a mandate to be Gaza’s “supreme political and legal authority” for as long as five years.

According to reports in Haaretz and the Times of Israel, the plan is modelled on the administrations that initially oversaw Timor-Leste and Kosovo’s transitions to statehood. The proposal suggests that Gita could at first be based in el-Arish, an Egyptian provincial capital near Gaza’s southern border, and would eventually enter the territory accompanied by a UN-endorsed, largely Arab multinational force. The plan envisions “the eventual unifying of all the Palestinian territory under the PA”.

Under the plan, Palestinians would not be made to leave the territory, as had been feared would occur under previous US proposals to develop it as the “Gaza Riviera”. If approved, Blair would head a secretariat of up to 25 people and chair a seven-person board to oversee an executive body running the territory.

But any role for the former Labour leader would inevitably prompt intense controversy. After stepping down as prime minister in 2007, he took on the role of Middle East envoy until 2015 and he enjoys a high standing with many Gulf leaders. But Blair is bitterly resented by many Palestinians – who see him as having impeded their efforts to attain statehood – and more broadly across the region for his role in backing the 2003 US invasion of Iraq.

"On Our Way to Annihilation": Al Jazeera's Hani Mahmoud Reports Live from Outside Gaza City

Israel Bombs Yemen as IDF Rolls Through Gaza City, Displacing Hundreds of Thousands

Israeli forces on Thursday resumed airstrikes on Yemen—whose Houthi rebels have been launching strikes targeting Israel in solidarity with Palestine—while pushing deeper into Gaza City, killing dozens of Palestinians, displacing hundreds of thousands of others, and trapping up to 1 million more.

An Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson said dozens of warplanes and air support units pounded alleged “command headquarters of the Houthi General Staff” and other buildings used by members of the rebel army also known as Ansar Allah.

Thursday’s strikes followed last week’s IDF bombing of a media complex in the Yemeni capital Sanaa that killed 31 journalists and four other people including a child in what the Committee to Protect Journalists called the world’s deadliest single attack on media workers in 16 years.

This, after an IDF airstrike last month assassinated Houthi officials including Prime Minister Ahmed al-Rahawi. US forces—which have been bombing Yemen since 2002 as part of the so-called War on Terror—have also carried out airstrikes in Yemen that have killed and wounded hundreds of civilians.

The Israeli and US strikes came in retaliation for Houthi missile and drone attacks on Israel and Red Sea shipping. The Houthis and Iran have been the only actors in the world that have answered Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza with military force.

The latest Israeli bombing of Yemen came as IDF tanks and troops pushed deeper into Gaza City as part of Operation Gideon’s Chariots 2, an offensive aimed at conquering, occupying, and ethnically cleansing Palestinians from the embattled coastal exclave.

Gaza officials said dozens of Palestinians have been killed since dawn Thursday, including 25 aid-seekers. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said that “intensified strikes on Gaza City, including on tents, residential buildings, [and] infrastructure continue to inflict heavy casualties.”

The relentless Israeli airstrikes that hit multiple areas across Gaza City today; forcing thousands of Palestinian families to flee their homes into overcrowded and unsafe areas with no shelter, food, or medical care. pic.twitter.com/5Oj9VqtDFY

— Daniella Modos - Cutter -SEN (@DmodosCutter) September 25, 2025

Among the victims of Thursday’s IDF strikes were at least 10 children and three women killed when the houses and tents in which they were sheltering were bombed, according to The Associated Press.

UN Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator Tom Fletcher said Thursday that Palestinian children are being “killed while sleeping, playing, queuing for food and water, [and] seeking medical care.”

“They’ve been bombed, maimed, starved, burned alive, buried in the rubble of their homes, separated from their parents... scraping through the rubble for food, enduring amputations without anesthetic,” Fletcher added.

More than 300,000 Palestinians have fled for their lives amid Israel’s onslaught and engineered famine, while as many as 1 million others remain trapped in Gaza.

Albania asked to arrest chief rabbi over alleged war crimes in Gaza

Albanian authorities are being urged to arrest and try the country's chief rabbi for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed as part of Israel's genocide in Gaza, Middle East Eye can exclusively reveal. On Wednesday, a case against Yoel Kaplan, an Israeli-American citizen, active Israeli soldier and head of Albania’s small Jewish community, was submitted to the prosecutor general in Tirana. Kaplan divides his time between Israel, Albania and Thessaloniki, Greece, where he also leads a small Jewish community. He has been photographed in Gaza and videos show him in uniform with the 55th battalion of the Israeli army's 98th division.

The International Centre of Justice for Palestinians (ICJP), a UK-based rights group, said on Wednesday that it had “filed a formal notice to Albanian police regarding a member of the [Israeli army] suspected of participating in war crimes. We have reason to believe that this individual is currently present within Albanian jurisdiction, and that domestic police must urgently investigate and arrest them,” the statement said. ICJP did not name the suspect for legal reasons.

Sources in Albania confirmed to Middle East Eye that the suspect is Kaplan. In March, the ICJP launched the Global 195 Coalition, an international legal network pursuing Israeli war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Gaza. ...

Albania's chief rabbi, who was appointed by the government in 2010 without the blessing of much of the country's tiny Jewish population, is being pursued under Article 7 of Albania’s criminal code, which covers foreign citizens who commit crimes abroad, including “crimes against humanity.” As a signatory to the International Criminal Court (ICC) and International Court of Justice (ICJ), Albania is obliged to investigate, ICJP says.

Douglas Macgregor: "War is Inevitable"

Iran snapback sanctions loom as UN security council set to vote on nuclear programme

A final Russian attempt to defer the snapback of large-scale UN sanctions on Iran is expected to fail at the UN security council on Friday after European countries rejected last-minute Iranian offers to give UN weapons inspectors limited access to its bombed nuclear sites. Russia will call for the reimposition of the sanctions to be deferred for six months to give more time for diplomacy, but European diplomats are confident that Russia will not get the nine votes it needs on the security council for the snapback to be deferred. The last time Russia put the same issue to a vote it received only four votes.

Europe decided to reimpose the sanctions after a last set of talks at the UN in New York failed to extract an offer from Iran that Europe was prepared to accept.

European diplomats said that Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, made a final offer to allow UN weapons inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) access to only one of its bombed nuclear sites, as opposed to all of them. Araghchi also said Iran would return with a proposal on how to handle the 400kg of highly enriched uranium in its possession within 45 days, down from a previous offer of 90 days. In return, Iran asked for the threat of the reimposition of all UN sanctions to be lifted permanently.

The reimposition of the UN sanctions marks a serious deterioration in Iranian relations with the west and may have political ramifications inside Iran.

Syrian voices respond to Democracy Now!'s one-sided coverage of dirty war

War criminals fuel bills are higher ...

Netanyahu flies circuitous route to UN summit ‘to avoid arrest’ in Europe

Benjamin Netanyahu has again taken a significantly longer flight route than necessary, avoiding the airspace of several European countries, this time while en route to the UN in New York. The Israeli prime minister, who has an international criminal court arrest warrant against him for alleged crimes including starvation as a method of warfare, made a trip that flight-tracking data showed followed the Mediterranean Sea, rather than a more direct route over the continent.

The Wing of Zion, Israel’s equivalent of the US’s Air Force One, did cross territory over Greece and Italy but then turned south towards the strait of Gibraltar before heading across the Atlantic. The Israeli government did not give an official reason for the routing, although Israeli media reported it was to avoid overflying a country that would be obliged to arrest him.

Shorter, more fuel-efficient routes may have flown across France, Spain, Portugal, Ireland and the UK. Those countries have all signed the ICC statute and would be legally required to arrest and surrender Netanyahu to The Hague-based court if he entered their territory.

While there is disagreement over whether a country’s military should enforce the rule by forcing a plane to land, the case would be much clearer if Netanyahu’s plane were to make an unscheduled or emergency landing.

Ex-FBI director James Comey indicted on two charges

James Comey, the former FBI director and one of Donald Trump’s most frequent targets, was indicted on Thursday on one count of making a false statement to Congress and one count of obstruction of justice, in the latest move in the president’s expansive retribution campaign against his political adversaries.

“No one is above the law. Today’s indictment reflects this Department of Justice’s commitment to holding those who abuse positions of power accountable for misleading the American people,” Pam Bondi, the US attorney general, said in a statement on Thursday. Trump celebrated the charges in a post on Truth Social.

“JUSTICE IN AMERICA! One of the worst human beings this Country has ever been exposed to is James Comey, the former Corrupt Head of the FBI,” he wrote in a post. “Today he was indicted by a Grand Jury on two felony counts for various illegal and unlawful acts. He has been so bad for our Country, for so long, and is now at the beginning of being held responsible for his crimes against our Nation. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”

The indictment came shortly after Trump instructed Bondi to “move now” to prosecute Comey and other officials he considers political foes, in an extraordinarily direct social media post trampling on the justice department’s tradition of independence. The charges came less than a week after Lindsey Halligan was installed as the top federal prosecutor in the eastern district of Virginia, after Trump fired her predecessor, Erik Siebert, after he declined to bring charges against Comey over concerns there was insufficient evidence.

Why Capitalism Holds Your Jobs HOSTAGE and Crashes Out Constantly w/ Prof. Wolff

Trump says US will impose new tariffs on heavy trucks, drugs and kitchen cabinets

Donald Trump on Thursday announced a new round of punishing tariffs, saying the United States will impose a 100% tariffs on imported branded drugs, 25% tariff on imports of all heavy-duty trucks and 50% tariffs on kitchen cabinets. The US president also said he would start charging a 30% tariff on upholstered furniture next week.

He said the new heavy-duty truck tariffs were to protect manufacturers from “unfair outside competition” and said the move would benefit companies such as Paccar-owned Peterbilt and Kenworth and Daimler Truck-owned Freightliner.

Trump has launched numerous national security inquiries into potential new tariffs on a wide variety of products. He said the new tariffs on kitchen, bathroom and some furniture were because of huge levels of imports which were hurting local manufacturers. “The reason for this is the large scale ‘FLOODING’ of these products into the United States by other outside Countries,” Trump said, citing national security concerns about US manufacturing.

The US Chamber of Commerce urged the department not to impose new tariffs, noting the top five import sources are Mexico, Canada, Japan, Germany, and Finland “all of which are allies or close partners of the United States posing no threat to U.S. national security”.

Larry C. Johnson & Larry Wilkerson: Charlie Kirk’s Story COLLAPSES – Is America Gearing Up for WAR?

Trump signs memo targeting ‘domestic terrorism’ amid fears of crackdown on the left

Donald Trump issued a presidential memorandum on Thursday aimed at reining in what he has called a radical leftwing domestic “terror network” but which seemed likely to meet fierce legal pushback from critics depicting it as a licence for a broad crackdown on his political opponents.

Prompted by journalists, Trump suggested that George Soros, the billionaire Hungarian-born philanthropist who funds the Open Society Foundations, could be in his sights. He also identified Reid Hoffman, a billionaire venture capitalist, adding: “I hear about him. Maybe it could be him. It could be a lot of people.”

Earlier, the Open Society Foundations had hit back at reports that the justice department was planning to target the group and criticized the Trump administration for “politically motivated attacks on civil society”.

Hina Shamsi of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) said in a statement: “After one of the most harrowing weeks for our first amendment rights, the president is invoking political violence, which we all condemn, as an excuse to target non-profits and activists with the false and stigmatizing label of ‘domestic terrorism’. This is a shameful and dangerous move.” ...

Surrounded by members of his cabinet, Trump said the goal was to target “the funders of a lot of these groups”, some of whom he claimed to know. But he was vague when asked which groups he meant or who the funders were. “These are anarchists and agitators, professional anarchists and agitators, and they get hired by wealthy people, some of whom I know, I guess, probably know,” he said. “You wouldn’t know at dinner with them. Everything’s nice, and then you find out that they funded millions of dollars to these lunatics.”

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‘Hidden costs’ of climate emergency are worsening California’s affordability crisis

The climate emergency is significantly increasing costs for California households in the form of rising utility bills, lost wages and growing healthcare expenses, worsening the state’s affordability crisis, according to a sweeping new report. The average American born in 2024 will likely face up to $500,000 in additional lifetime costs from climate crisis, and those who experience more severe effects will see up to $1m in costs, the Costs of Climate Change: Financial and Economic Impacts on California report states.

The analysis from the Center for Law, Energy & Environment at the University of California, Berkeley, commissioned by the environment and economy non-profit Next 10, examines more than 100 primary sources together for the first time to provide a deeper look at what researchers describe as the “hidden costs” of the climate crisis in California. ... California has long been one of the most expensive states in the nation with its high cost of living and expensive housing. Meanwhile, a recent report revealed that since the rollback of pandemic era policies, California has developed the highest poverty rate in the US, alongside Louisiana.

The state has also had to grapple with increasingly extreme weather fueled by climate change from devastating and deadly wildfires, year after year, that displace entire communities and spread smoke across the region to grueling heatwaves and intense winter storms. In January, wildfires tore through the LA communities of Altadena and the Pacific Palisades, killing 31 people and destroying more than 18,000 structures.

People often perceive climate change as a set of future costs, but the consequences are already impacting people in unexpected ways, including inflation, food prices and availability, and insurance, said Ken Alex, with UC Berkeley’s Center for Law, Energy and Environment. ... “It’s not a future set of abstract numbers. It’s real and it’s immediate,” he added.

The report highlights the far-reaching impacts of the January wildfires, among others, which resulted in $4.6bn in GDP losses and nearly $300m in lost wages for workers and businesses, eliminating generations of family wealth. Between 2017 and 2021, there were about $60bn in income losses across the state due to wildfires, according to a Moore Foundation report cited in the analysis. Californians are facing skyrocketing power bills at the same time, and wildfire-related costs account for up to 13% of recent increases, the report states. Extreme heat further increases electricity costs each day, as when temperatures reach 95F, electricity costs rise by 1.6%.

BP predicts higher oil and gas demand, suggesting world will not hit 2050 net zero target

BP has raised its forecasts for oil and gas demand, suggesting the global net zero target for 2050 will not be met and highlighting a slowdown in the transition to clean energy. The energy company’s closely watched annual outlook report has estimated that oil use is on track to hit 83m barrels a day in 2050, a rise of 8% compared with its previous estimate of 77m barrels a day.

The current trajectory of the energy transition means natural gas demand could hit 4,806 cubic metres a year in 2050, BP said, up 1.6% from its previous estimate of 4,729 cubic metres. To meet global net zero targets by 2050 the fall in oil demand would have to occur sooner, and with greater intensity, dropping to about 85m barrels a day by 2035 and about 35m barrels by 2050, BP said.

The world currently consumes about 100m barrels a day of oil. BP said it expects oil demand to peak at 103m barrels a day in 2030, five years later than previously forecast.

Spencer Dale, the BP chief economist, added that geopolitical tensions, such as the war in Ukraine, conflicts in the Middle East and increasing use of trade tariffs had intensified demands around national energy security. “For some, it may mean reducing dependency on imported fossil fuels, and accelerating the transition to greater electrification, powered by domestic low-carbon energy,” he said. “We may start to see the emergence of ‘electrostates’.”

However, the report found that it could also give rise to an increased preference for domestically produced rather than imported energy.

Big trees in Amazon more climate-resistant than previously believed

The biggest trees in the Amazon are growing larger and more numerous, according to a new study that shows how an intact rainforest can help draw carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and sequester it in bark, trunk, branch and root.

Scientists said the paper, published in Nature Plants on Thursday, was welcome confirmation that big trees are proving more climate resilient than previously believed, and undisturbed tropical vegetation continues to act as an effective carbon sink despite rising temperatures and strong droughts.

However, the authors warned this vital role was increasingly at risk from fires, fragmentation and land clearance caused by the expansion of roads and farms.

“It is good news but it is qualified good news,” said Prof Oliver Phillips from the University of Leeds. “Our results apply only to intact, mature forests, which is where we are watching closely. They suggest the Amazon forest is remarkably resilient to climate change. My fear is that may count for little, unless we can stop the deforestation itself.”

This caution comes as Brazil plans to pave a major road – the BR-319 – through the central Amazon, close to one of the last regions that still has large areas of pristine forest. Bolivia also continues to clear trees at an alarming rate for soy plantations and cattle ranching.

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Also of Interest

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

Free Speech and Its Discontents

How a little-known embassy aide hijacked US Israel policy

Collaborate or leave: Israel’s cruel ultimatum to humanitarian groups in Gaza

Why Trump’s Alleged Shift On Ukraine Isn’t One

Sarkozy says he will ‘sleep in jail but with head held high’ after conviction

US authorities remove Trump-Epstein statue from National Mall

Study of 1m-year-old skull points to earlier origins of modern humans

Max Blumenthal: Charlie Kirk, Israel, and war with Iran

STOP funding genocide with your bank account and grocery bag

Israel FINALLY Gets The South Park Treatment

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A Little Night Music

Joe Louis Walker – T-Bone Shuffle

Joe Louis Walker – Uhh

Joe Louis Walker – Blues Of The Month Club

Joe Louis Walker – I'll Get To Heaven On My Own

Joe Louis Walker - Slow Down GTO

Joe Louis Walker & the Bosstalkers - Don't Know Why

Joe Louis Walker - Eyes Like A Cat

Joe Louis Walker - Don't Let Go

Joe Louis Walker – Since You've Been Gone

Joe Louis Walker – Live At Sellersville March 1st, 2025

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