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This evening's music features Chicago blues guitarist Eddie Taylor. Enjoy!

"There really is no way to face up to the Genocide in Gaza without facing up to the active support of Joe Biden, Ursula von der Leyen, Rishi Sunak and most western political leaderships – including both Labour and Conservatives in the U.K.

We also have to face the complicity of ICC Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan and a number of other western stooges operating at senior levels within international institutions. Where the World goes from here, in the face of the raw racial hatred and enthusiasm for the killing of babies that has been revealed by those in power, is very difficult for people to come to reckon."

-- Craig Murray

News and Opinion

Aaron Mate, worth a click and a full read:

Israel's genocide in Gaza has Biden's green light

As Israeli warplanes resumed bombing Gaza on December 1st, putting an end to a seven-day pause, Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s motorcade “sped out of his hotel in Israel on its way to the Tel Aviv airport,” the Washington Post reported. Before exiting Israel, Blinken claimed that he had pressed its government to prioritize “minimizing harm to innocent civilians.” But according to Axios, “Blinken didn't ask Israel to stop the operation but… said the longer the high-intensity military campaign goes on, the more international pressure will build on both the U.S. and Israel to stop it.”

Additionally, Blinken asked Israel to “make sure that a military operation in southern Gaza doesn't lead to an even higher amount of civilian casualties.” To Blinken, “minimizing harm” to the people of Gaza apparently means murdering slightly fewer of them. After more than one week of relentless Israeli attacks on civilian targets, Blinken has been forced to acknowledge that even his token requests were ignored. When it comes to Israel’s assault, Blinken said Thursday, “there does remain a gap between exactly what I said when I was there — the intent to protect civilians — and the actual results that we’re seeing on the ground.”

One month ago, the Biden administration claimed that it was pressuring Israel to use smaller bombs against the densely populated Gaza Strip. “If the United States can get those smaller munitions to Israel, American officials hope Israel will use them to mitigate the risk to civilians,” the New York Times reported on Nov. 4th. That talking point is long forgotten. “In the first month and a half, Israel dropped more than 22,000 guided and unguided bombs on Gaza that were supplied by Washington,” according to US intelligence figures obtained by the Washington Post. During this same period, the US has given Israel at least 15,000 bombs, including 2,000-pound bunker busters. So much for “smaller bombs.”

The Wall Street Journal characterizes the current US approach as “urging its top ally in the region to consider preventing large-scale civilian casualties while supplying many of the munitions deployed.” The US position is therefore akin to an accomplice continuing to re-arm a school shooter’s assault rifle while asking him to consider slaughtering fewer students. The Biden administration is so committed to fueling the carnage in Gaza that it has even invoked rare emergency powers for transferring tank ammunition without Congressional review. “The arms shipment has been put on an expedited track, and Congress has no power to stop it,” the New York Times reports.

The White House’s circumvention of Congressional review is consistent with its refusal to follow US law, which bars weapons transfers to countries that commit serious human rights abuses. The Biden administration has evaded this requirement by simply pretending that it is a helpless bystander, rather than willing accomplice.

Col. Douglas Macgregor: How Israel is Isolating the US

"Who you gonna believe, me or your lying eyes?"

Israel rejects claims it is trying to force Palestinians out of Gaza

Israel has rejected suggestions it is trying to force Palestinians out of Gaza as Arab leaders and aid officials warn its intensifying ground offensive could leave civilians with few other options. Some of the heaviest close-quarters fighting in more than two months of conflict took place over the weekend, as the Israel Defense Forces tried to consolidate control of urban centres in northern Gaza and pursued Hamas leaders in the heart of the biggest city in the south, Khan Younis. ...

The spread of the ground offensive to the south of Gaza, accompanied by heavy bombing, has created an untenable situation for the population, humanitarian organisations have said. The death toll so far is estimated at more than 18,200 and more than 1.8 million people, or about 80% of the population, have been forced from their homes since the conflict broke out on 7 October.

The UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) said 1.3 million of the displaced people in Gaza were sheltering in 154 of its facilities, which were heavily overcrowded. Aid officials have warned that cholera and pneumonia are an increasing threat among the dense camps of improvised tents along Gaza’s southern border with Egypt, as sanitation breaks down and nighttime temperatures dip. The head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said: “Gaza’s health system is on its knees and collapsing.”

In face of the catastrophic humanitarian situation, Jordan’s foreign minister, Ayman Safadi, accused Israel over the weekend of “a systematic effort to empty Gaza of its people”. The head of UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini, has said that “the developments we are witnessing point to attempts to move Palestinians into Egypt”. He wrote in the Los Angeles Times: “If this path continues, Gaza will not be a land for Palestinians any more.”

Eylon Levy, an Israeli government spokesman, rejected suggestions Israel intended to empty Gaza of Palestinians as “outrageous and false accusations”, arguing that the aim was only to persuade Palestinians to leave the principal combat areas.

Diplomacy, Not War: Daughter of Released Hostage Urges Israel to Reach Deal to Free More Captives

Gaza ceasefire negotiations unlikely to restart for weeks, diplomats say

Diplomats at the annual Doha Forum conference in Qatar have said they are not expecting any reopening of Gaza ceasefire talks for some weeks and say their resumption may turn on Israel being able to point to the killing or capture of some of Hamas’s key leaders as a sign that its military operation has achieved its purpose.

The US believes this can be achieved as early as Christmas, but different timeframes are circulating.

In the meantime, although there will be new diplomatic initiatives, including a further debate and vote on a ceasefire at the UN general assembly on Tuesday, the Biden administration is not going to apply any more pressure on Israel to end its campaign. ...

Intervening factors that could undermine Israeli efforts to delay a ceasefire include an escalation of the violence outside the region, most likely in Lebanon, a desperate breakout by displaced and starving Palestinian refugees into Egypt, and overwhelming pressure on the Israeli government to prioritise the release of the remaining hostages.

Hamas has made it clear in public and private that it will not be willing to resume negotiations on the remaining 137 hostages unless it is offered a ceasefire at the end of the process of prisoner swaps, something Israel has been unwilling to offer and that the US vetoed at the UN security council last Friday.

Israel HIDES MASSIVE Casualties As BRUTAL Combat Footage Emerges

Tlaib Says Biden Admin 'At Serious Risk' of ICC Prosecution

U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib said Monday that the Biden administration has put itself "at serious risk of prosecution by the International Criminal Court" by continuing to provide the Israeli military with weapons as it carries out grave war crimes in the Gaza Strip.

In a statement, Tlaib (D-Mich.) slammed the administration's decision late last week to bypass Congress and approve the sale of $100 million of tank ammunition to the Israeli military. The U.S. State Department notified lawmakers of its decision an hour before midnight on Friday, circumventing congressional review of the deal.

"Just hours after the U.S. vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution calling for an immediate cease-fire and the release of hostages, the Biden administration notified us that they bypassed Congress to send [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu $100 million of tank ammunition to continue to carry out war crimes and massacre innocent Palestinians," said Tlaib, the first Palestinian American woman ever elected to Congress.

"Our district didn't send President [Joe] Biden to the White House to have him facilitate the killing of innocent civilians," she added. "We didn't turn out in huge numbers to elect President Biden to have him supply the bombs for a genocide. This administration's refusal to acknowledge the human dignity of Palestinians is disturbing, and actions like this speak loud and clear."

The New York Times reported Saturday that the State Department "invoked an emergency provision in the Arms Export Control Act" to justify the move. Since the Hamas-led attack on October 7, the Biden administration has kept its arms transfers to Israel shrouded in secrecy and has tried to accelerate the flow of weapons by working around Congress.

Over the past two months, the U.S. has provided Israel with roughly 15,000 bombs—including 2,000-pound bunker busters—and nearly 60,000 artillery shells, without attaching any conditions.

An Amnesty International investigation published last week found that Israel used U.S.-made Joint Direct Attack Munitions to carry out airstrikes that killed more than 40 people from two families. Amnesty said the attacks "must be investigated as war crimes."

Legal experts and scholars have been warning since October that U.S. officials could be rendering themselves complicit in war crimes—and genocide—by continuing to arm the Israeli military as it wages indiscriminate war on the Gaza Strip.

Tlaib echoed that warning Monday, noting that the Biden administration has opted to "give weapons to a military that is very publicly and actively committing serious war crimes and crimes against humanity."

"President Biden has seen refugee camps, hospitals, schools, and entire neighborhoods bombed," said Tlaib. "He's seen dead children pulled from the rubble in their pajamas, and rather than work for a cease-fire he's sending more weapons to keep the massacres going."

The International Criminal Court is currently conducting a war crimes investigation in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Gaza Gaslighting: US Spox Caught LYING LIVE

Israel Rejects International Pressure for Ceasefire, Signals Gaza Onslaught Will Go on for Months or Longer

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Monday rejected international pressure for a ceasefire in Gaza and signaled the brutal assault will continue for months or even longer. ...

The horrific scenes coming out of Gaza have prompted more calls for peace and negotiations, but the US is not fazed and continues to provide unconditional military support for Israel and vetoed a UN Security Council resolution calling for a ceasefire.

Speaking to The Associated Press, Gallant said Israel’s war in Gaza would “take time” and suggested that the current phase of the war, which involves constant airstrikes and heavy ground fighting, will last for weeks and that further military action against “pockets of resistance” would continue for months.

National Security Adviser Tzachi Hanegbi made similar comments over the weekend, saying that the time it will take to achieve Israel’s goals on Gaza “cannot be measured in weeks … and I’m not sure it can be measured in months.” Financial Times recently reported that Israel expects its operations in Gaza to last over a year.

Gaza journalists discuss Israel's media massacre, Western silence

UNBELIEVABLE: Zelensky Thanks GIDDY Weapons Manufacturing Heads INSIDE Biden White House

Republican senator says Ukraine may have to cede land to Russia to end war

Ukraine may need to cede land to Russia in order to end the Russian invasion there, the Republican US senator JD Vance said on Sunday.

The comments underscore how a bloc of GOP lawmakers are staunchly opposed to extending US support for Ukraine nearly two years on from when the world rallied around it after Russia’s invasion.

“What’s in America’s best interest is to accept Ukraine is going to have to cede some territory to the Russians and we need to bring this war to a close,” Vance, of Ohio, said on CNN’s State of the Union. “The idea that Ukraine was going to throw Russia back to the 1991 border was preposterous – nobody actually believed it.”

The White House recently asked Congress for $61bn in additional aid to Ukraine. Vance and every other Republican voted to block a package this week that included aid to Ukraine and Israel, seeking stronger concessions on border security.

On Sunday, Vance – whose name is being floated as a potential running mate to Donald Trump – said the Joe Biden White House needed to articulate an end goal in Ukraine. “What we’re saying to the president, and really to the entire world, is you need to articulate what the ambition is, what is $61bn going to accomplish that $100bn hasn’t,” Vance said.

Texas Woman Denied Abortion for Nonviable Fetus, Flees State, "One of Thousands" in Similar Position

Texas attorney general says he will sue doctor who gives abortion to Kate Cox

The Texas attorney general, Ken Paxton, has threatened to prosecute any doctor who provides an abortion to Kate Cox, a woman with a non-viable pregnancy, advising hospitals to ignore a court order issued on Thursday allowing her to get the procedure.

The rightwing Paxton issued the warning to three Houston-area hospitals after a Texas judge ruled this week that Cox, a pregnant woman with a lethal fetal diagnosis, may obtain an abortion under the narrow medical exceptions offered by the state bans.

In a brazen dismissal of the court’s decision, Paxton wrote that the judge’s order “will not insulate hospitals, doctors or anyone else from civil and criminal liability”.

Paxton also wrote that the hospital where Cox obtains an abortion “may be liable for negligent credentialing the physician” who performs the procedure.

The Center for Reproductive Rights filed a lawsuit on behalf of Cox after she learned last week that her fetus has trisomy 18, a fatal chromosomal condition, as well as other health issues, including a spinal abnormality. Continuing the pregnancy could threaten Cox’s life and future fertility. The 31-year-old mother of two has already rushed to the emergency room four times with severe cramping and fluid loss, but doctors have told her that their hands are tied by the state laws.

Woman who sued Texas for abortion left state to have procedure after ‘hellish’ week

The Texas woman who sued the state for an abortion after receiving a lethal fetal diagnosis has now fled Texas in order to obtain the procedure, the Center for Reproductive Rights announced in a statement Monday.

The woman, Kate Cox, a 31-year-old mother of two from Dallas, sued Texas last week. While a lower-court judge ruled to allow Cox to receive an abortion, the Texas state supreme court on Friday paused that ruling. In her lawsuit, Cox said that continuing the pregnancy could threaten her life and future fertility.

Texas bans almost all abortions. Although the ban technically includes exceptions for cases of medical emergencies, doctors have said that the exceptions are too vague and force them to wait until their patients get sick enough to intervene.

“This past week of legal limbo has been hellish for Kate. Her health is on the line,” said Nancy Northup, president of the Center for the Reproductive Rights, which is representing Cox. “She’s been in and out of the emergency room and she couldn’t wait any longer. This is why judges and politicians should not be making healthcare decisions for pregnant people.”

Cox is believed to be the first adult woman to sue for an abortion while still pregnant since Roe v Wade was overturned last year.

LAPD helicopters cost $50m a year, more than 14 city offices’ entire budget

Los Angeles spends nearly $50m a year on its police helicopter program, or roughly $3,000 for every hour of flight, according to a new audit that raises questions about the financial and environmental impacts of the city’s aerial surveillance.

The LA controller’s report released on Monday suggests the use of LA police department (LAPD) helicopters is nearly constant across the city, and the majority of flight time is not in response to reports of major crimes, but instead for transportation, ceremonial trips or patrols. The flights are a major source of pollution and appear to disproportionately affect some communities of color, the audit said.

LAPD’s Air Support Division (ASD), which operates 17 helicopters and has more than 90 employees, costs the city an average of $46.6m a year, or $127,805 a day, the controller reported. Those yearly expenses are greater than the entire budgets of 14 other city departments, including the city clerk’s office ($34m budget); the cultural affairs office ($29.3m); civil, human rights and equity department ($17.7m); and the youth development department ($1.7m).

LAPD’s chief refuted the methodology and some findings in a letter to the controller.

The controller’s analysis of air operations from 2018 through 2022 found that there are typically two helicopters flying for 20 hours a day every day of the year, logging an average of 16,000 hours of flight time each year. The helicopters burn an estimated 761,600 gallons of fuel yearly, releasing more than 7,400 metric tons of carbon dioxide, according to the report, which said this output was equivalent to over 19m miles driven by gas-powered cars.

California children sue EPA over ‘intentional’ role in climate crisis

Eighteen California children are suing the US Environmental Protection Agency over its role in the climate crisis.

In a lawsuit filed on Sunday, plaintiffs between the ages of eight and 17 allege the federal body “intentionally” allows dangerous levels of planet-heating emissions from vehicles, power plants, fossil fuel wells and other pollution sources, despite knowledge that doing so endangers children’s health and welfare.

“We are running from wildfires, being displaced by floods, panicking in hot classrooms during another heatwave. We feel a constant worry about the future, and all around us no one is moving fast enough,” Noah, a 15-year-old plaintiff, said in a statement. (The legal filings and statements omit minors’ last names.) “The constitution guarantees every American the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness including and especially children.”

The suit, Genesis B v EPA, is the latest in a series of youth-led constitutional climate cases brought by the non-profit law firm Our Children’s Trust. In August, the firm notched a landmark win in Montana, when a judge ruled in favor of plaintiffs who alleged the state’s pro-fossil fuel policies violated their right to a clean and healthful environment, as laid out in the state’s constitution.

Another federal suit filed by Our Children’s Trust, 2015’s Juliana v United States, is also pending. In June, a US district court ruled in favor of the youth plaintiffs, allowing that their claims can be decided at trial in open court; a trial date has yet to be announced. The Juliana case names an array of government actors as defendants, including the president and several other agencies and officials. The new suit, by contrast, names just three defendants: the United States federal government, the Environmental Protection Agency and the current EPA administrator, Michael Regan.

“There is one federal agency explicitly tasked with keeping the air clean and controlling pollution to protect the health of every child and the welfare of a nation – the EPA,” Julia Olson, founder and chief legal counsel of Our Children’s Trust, said in a statement. “The agency has done the opposite when it comes to climate pollution and it’s time the EPA is held accountable by our courts for violating the US constitution and misappropriating its congressionally delegated authority.”

Quarter of world’s freshwater fish at risk of extinction, according to assessment

Nearly a quarter of the world’s freshwater fish are at risk of extinction due to global heating, overfishing and pollution, according to an expert assessment.

From the large-toothed Lake Turkana robber in Kenya to the Mekong giant catfish in south-east Asia, many of the world’s freshwater fish are at risk of disappearing, the first International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) red list assessment of the category has found.

Nearly a fifth of all threatened freshwater species are affected by climate change, from impacts such as falling water levels, shifting seasons and seawater moving up rivers. Of the assessed species, 3,086 out of 14,898 were at risk of vanishing. ...

The Atlantic salmon, previously common and classified as a species of least concern, is now near threatened on the IUCN red list after its global population fell by 23%, having vanished from many rivers in the UK. The fish, which lives in both fresh and saltwater, has been affected by widespread habitat loss, global heating and dams that block access to breeding sites. Breeding with farmed salmon has also weakened their ability to adapt from global heating while invasive Pacific pink salmon is spreading across northern Europe.

“Freshwater fishes make up more than half of the world’s known fish species, an incomprehensible diversity given that freshwater ecosystems comprise only 1% of aquatic habitat. These diverse species are integral to the ecosystem, and vital to its resilience. This is essential to the billions of people who rely upon freshwater ecosystems, and the millions of people who rely on their fisheries,” said Kathy Hughes, co-chair of the IUCN species survival commission freshwater fish specialist group.

Climate Activists Outraged as COP28 Draft Text Drops Call for Fossil Fuel Phaseout

COP28 on 'Verge of Complete Failure' as Draft Omits Fossil Fuel Phaseout

The most recent draft text of the agreement world leaders are hoping to reach by the end of the United Nations Climate Change Conference on December 12 does not include any mention of a phaseout of fossil fuels.

Instead, the document released Monday calls for "reducing both consumption and production of fossil fuels, in a just, orderly, and equitable manner so as to achieve net zero by, before, or around 2050 in keeping with the science." ...

An agreement to phase out fossil fuels at COP28 has been a major demand of civil society groups and influential delegations including the European Union and nations especially vulnerable to the climate crisis, according to Reuters. The call comes as nations' current pledges under the Paris agreement put the world on a path for 2.9°C of warming, even as 2023 is almost certain to be the hottest year on record.

Also of Interest

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

Craig Murray: Stopping Genocide

Israel Apologists Are Psychopaths

The Harvard and UPenn presidents walked into a trap in Congress

United Nations Honor, United States Shame in Gaza

If Everything Is Antisemitic Then Nothing Is

Palestine - Occupation Forces Have Serious Losses

Israeli soldier makes video vandalising Palestinian shop in Gaza

Ukrainian trial demonstrates 2014 Maidan massacre was false flag

Russia claims arrest of Ukrainian assassin network

Russia Is An Imperial State While America Is A Plutocratic Oligarchy

Google loses antitrust trial to Fortnite maker Epic Games

Pro-Israel Journalist DEBATES Briahna Joy Gray

Israel Dropped US MADE White Phosphorous

The West Bank after Oct 7: repression and ethnic cleansing

Max Blumenthal: (TheGrayZone) - Netanyahu’s next move? The World is Watching!

A Little Night Music

Eddie Taylor – Big Town Playboy

Eddie Taylor - Ride 'Em On Down

Eddie Taylor - Leave this neighbourhood

Eddie Taylor - Stop Breaking Down

Eddie Taylor – Bad Boy

Eddie Taylor – Playboy Boogie

Eddie Taylor – Jackson Town

Eddie Taylor – Feel Like Jumping

Eddie Taylor – Stroll Out West