I do not see how former U.S. President Donald Trump can manage his way out of his latest predicament. BUSINESS INSIDER reports:
Federal judge Tanya Chutkan on Monday imposed a limited gag order that if it stands would force the end of former President Donald Trump's social media barrages against special counsel Jack Smith and his team.
Chutkan imposed the order limiting Trump's attacks on witnesses, prosecutors, and court staff involved with his pending criminal case related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election. The former president's attorneys had argued that imposing such a restriction would unfairly limit Trump's First Amendment rights, an argument Chutkan strongly rejected. Trump's trial is scheduled for next March.
"You keep talking about censorship like the defendant has unfettered First Amendment rights. He doesn't," Chutkan, an Obama appointee, said, per the Associated Press. "We're not talking about censorship here. We're talking restrictions to ensure there is a fair administration of justice on this case."
Getting Mr. Trump to shut his mouth? You would have more luck getting him to eat just a salad for lunch.
If you thought Trump’s yearslong journey to become the sorest of sore losers by ceaselessly braying about the 2020 presidential election he lost was growing tiresome, just you wait. Monday’s order provides fresh fodder for his persecution cannon, which I’m sure will be red hot from firing as the former president processes the fact that he, like anyone facing criminal charges, can’t freely intimidate witnesses, prosecutors or court personnel.
Exactly.
This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot" for today:
Apparently Israel. He had a little plan for what Israel should do next.
On the front page of today’s New York Times website there is an editorial leading the Opinion section under the title, “Israel is fighting to defend a society that values human life.” An obvious question arises. What society is that? If you click through to the article itself a different title appears —“Israel Can Defend Itself and Uphold its Values.” Once again, an unintentional irony. But in fairness, you could argue that they are trying to appeal to people inside Israel who can be shamed.
Today’s editorial probably shows that the Times editors are in a panic about just how far Israel will go, and they are trying to rein them in using a method they hope will work — flattery. There are, of course, Israelis who do not wish to commit a second Nakba, but those in charge — well, who wants to bet on that?
In reality, Hamas attacked Israel and massacred 1,300 civilians, and Israel is responding with its own massive war crimes, which have already killed over 1,000 more civilians than Hamas did. And as detailed elsewhere on this site and even in the New York Times, it is committing war crimes. The Times is suggesting that Israel kill fewer people in a piece that whitewashes Israel’s record. You can read the piece for yourself if you have a subscription.
The “war of words” is as important as the battle itself. Propaganda is used to rally the troops, manage public perceptions and garner support. The maxim that “in war, truth is the first casualty,” accurately renders the corporate media’s weighted coverage of the 7 October attack by Hamas against the Israeli occupier.
Israel has firmly embedded the myth that it is a democratic, brave, vulnerable nation into the body politic of the United States. In their current war against the Palestinians, Tel Aviv has made sure to control the narrative and to silence dissenting voices. With the corporate media, they have established who matters, Israel, and who does not, the Palestinians.
The first casualties of the disinformation campaign have been the use of the words “war” and “conflict.” Oxford English Dictionary defines war as “a state of armed conflict between different nations or states or different groups within a nation or state.” Conflict is defined (dictionary.com) as a “struggle or clash between opposing forces.”
It is a distortion to say that what we have witnessed in Palestine is a war or a conflict. Both words imply a battle or struggle between equals or near equals, between two peoples with equal resources and claims.
As Israel conducts its aggression against the Palestinians in Gaza, the media continues to improperly frame the killing of the colonized by the Israeli colonizer as a war and/or conflict. CNN, MSNBC and National Public Radio, for example, have been using the promo, “Israel at War,” to entice viewers and listeners.
Tel Aviv has declared war on a political party, Hamas. The Gaza Strip—about the size of New Jersey— home to 2.3 million Palestinians, is not a nation or a state. It has been under Israeli military occupation and blockade and can best be described as an open-air prison. Until they were able to breach Israel’s high-tech security wall separating Gaza from Israel, Palestinian fighters were trapped behind it, making a land battle with the Israeli army impossible. The sensor-equipped, 20-foot high steel and concrete wall with remote-controlled weapon and radar systems, cameras and underground sensors is an “iron wall” around Gaza.
There is no symmetry between the overwhelming power of the Israeli war machine and Hamas. Hamas has no sizable army (estimates at 40,000 fighters) no air force or navy. It relies on missiles, drones and hand gliders. Israel has the fourth largest army in the world (169,500 active duty and 360,000 reservists), a fleet of U.S.-made F-15, F-16 and F-35 fighter jets, 2,200 tanks, as well as sophisticated missile, drone and surveillance technology able to pinpoint and destroy individual targets.
The scale of the violence is already beyond imagination. More than 6,000 bombs have been dropped on the Gaza Strip in the last few days. Whole neighbourhoods have been completely destroyed, and there have already been more than 2,000 deaths, including hundreds of women and children. Tens of thousands more will follow. The Israeli government ordered the population of the northern part of the Gaza Strip to leave North Gaza by 3:00 p.m. Sunday. A ground offensive, for which more than 300,000 soldiers have been assembled, is imminent.
On Monday last week, Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant had already threatened, “There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel. We are fighting human animals, and we will act accordingly.”
It needs to be spelled out clearly: This is reminiscent of the rhetoric and methods of the Nazis, who responded to resistance with savage collective punishment. For example, in occupied Poland, Nazi forces brutally crushed the Jewish uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto in 1943 and the Warsaw Uprising in 1944, razing entire neighbourhoods to the ground and killing tens of thousands.
When politicians and the media now cite these Nazi crimes and the Holocaust to justify the massacre of the Palestinians, it is the height of cynicism and criminality.
Let me also say this clearly: When the entire ruling class in Germany stands behind Netanyahu’s scorched earth policy and supports the blockade and destruction of the Gaza Strip, they are continuing their own criminal traditions.
And the same applies to the question of antisemitism. It is not the oppressed Palestinians and the hundreds of millions of people worldwide, who express solidarity with them, who promote antisemitism but the imperialist powers.
Israeli and American officials, like many of their supporters, have called the Hamas incursion on Saturday “Israel’s 9/11”, drawing parallels between Hamas and al-Qaeda and between Israel and the United States.
“If the United States experienced what Israel is experiencing,” President Joe Biden said, “our response would be swift, decisive, and overwhelming.” The “brutality” and “the bloodthirstiness” of Hamas, he added, “brings to mind the worst rampages of ISIS.” He even repeated the sensationalist and unsubstantiated claims that Hamas fighters had “raped women” and “beheaded babies.”
Major European capitals reinforced the false analogy of 9/11 and the dangerous notion of “us vs them” by draping their most iconic buildings in Israeli flags as if to declare “they are all Israelis” just like they declared – with disastrous consequences – that “they are all Americans” after the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington, DC.
Like a well-rehearsed orchestra, Western powers condemned the “unprovoked” attacks on civilians and voiced their unconditional support for the fanatical Israeli government to do whatever it takes as long as it takes to “defend” its people against “evil.”
The degree of hysteria and the hypocrisy are as mind-boggling, as they are reckless.
Some of the images from Israel are no doubt gruesome – but the images from Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, Libya, etc have been no less horrific. Two decades of Western and Israeli wars in the Middle East have led to not thousands, but millions of Arab and Palestinian casualties
In the eyes of the West, it seems, Israel has a “duty” to defend its people, but the Palestinians don’t have the right to protect themselves as if they are people of a lesser god! Israel seemingly also has a right to defend and even expand its occupation and apartheid regime, but the Palestinians have no right to express their frustration or struggle for freedom and justice after seven decades of dispossession, oppression, and siege.
It is exactly like 9/11 . . . if you mean being used as a pretext to slaughter a people. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11, for example, but that is who Bully Boy Bush and his White House immediately went after - with the help of compliant journalists like Chris Hedges.
Otherwise? Many around the globe see it much differently. Jeff Schuhrke and Sarah Lazare (IN THESE TIMES) observe, "A growing chorus of human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the Israeli group B’Tselem, have said the Israeli government has embedded the conditions of apartheid and many have been sounding the alarm about the growing humanitarian crisis in Gaza -- which has been under a land, air and sea blockade enforced by the Israeli military since 2007." US House Rep Rashida Tlaib released the following on Friday:
WASHINGTON D.C. — Today, Representative Rashida Tlaib (MI-12) released the following statement:
“I am calling for immediate de-escalation and ceasefire to save countless civilian lives, no matter their faith or ethnicity. Our government must lead with compassion for all civilians. I believe in my heart that the majority of Americans want the killing and violence to stop. War crimes cannot be answered with war crimes.
“Millions of people in Gaza—half of them children—have been given an impossible 24 hour evacuation order, but they have nowhere to go. They have been cut off from electricity, food, and water for days. Hospitals are running out of electricity to keep babies and the injured alive. The collective punishment of Palestinian civilians is a war crime, the confirmed use of white phosphorus bombs in Gaza is a war crime, yet there are no statements demanding these violations stop from the American political establishment. It is heartbreaking to witness the blanket disregard for saving civilians—including Americans—in Gaza. President Biden has not expressed one bit of empathy for the millions of Palestinian civilians facing brutal airstrikes and the threat of a ground invasion of Gaza that would intensify this humanitarian crisis.
“American Muslims and Arab Americans do not feel represented by our government right now. Many families in the U.S. seeking help to get their loved ones out of Gaza feel that Secretary Blinken is not making their safety a priority. The Biden Administration is failing in its duty to protect all civilian and American lives in Gaza. I cannot believe I have to beg our country to value every human life, no matter their faith or ethnicity. We cannot lose sight of the humanity in each other.”
###
Yes, there is little concern among officials in US government about the slaughter taking place in Gaza. People around the world are not unconcerned however. Marc Espanol (EL PAIS) notes:
From Egypt to Yemen and from Jordan to Iraq, thousands of people took to the streets this Friday or took to social media across the Middle East to show their commitment and solidarity with the Palestinian cause and denounce the total blockade and offensive launched by Israel in the Gaza Strip following the attack on Israeli territory by Hamas a week ago. The demonstration of brotherhood exhibited over the last week in the region — in contrast to the lukewarmness shown by the region’s governments and at times in defiance in banning demonstrations — has once again reflected the broad and sustained social support for Palestine, despite the acceleration over the last three years of the normalization of diplomatic and economic ties between Israel and several Arab countries. Protests also responded in some cases to calls for mobilization by Hamas leaders following prayers held after noon on Friday.
Muna Asghar (ANADOLU AGENCY) reports that protests continue over the assault on Gaza, "In the Iraqi city of Kirkuk, a group of journalists gathered in front of the Iraqi Journalists Syndicate building and turned off their cameras in a symbolic expression of solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza and against a recent series of attacks on journalists reporting in the region." Marissa Blackwood (BOLLY INSIDE) adds, "Protests in support of Palestinians have extended beyond the Middle East. Countries such as Japan, Malaysia, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka have also seen demonstrations expressing solidarity with the Palestinians in Gaza. People from different backgrounds and nationalities have come together to condemn the Israeli strikes and show their support for the Palestinian cause." In addition, Amr Salem (IRAQI NEWS) notes, "The Iraqi Parliament condemned on Sunday the Israeli aggression against people in Gaza, emphasizing the right of the Palestinians to defend their land. Iraqi lawmakers called on the Iraqi government to provide support and relief to the Palestinian people, especially in the Gaza Strip. MPs from Iraq also called on the Arab parliaments to hold an emergency session in Baghdad to come up with a decision consistent with the will of the Arab people." AL MAYADEEN adds:
Iraq will fulfill all of its duties toward the Palestinian people on numerous fronts, including aid and military assistance, Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) chairman Faleh Al-Fayyad said on Saturday as occupied Palestine suffers from a monstrous Israeli aggression.
"The plans to displace the people of Gaza are unrealistic and cannot be implemented," Al-Fayyad told Al Mayadeen. "It is impossible for Iraq to be a gateway to inflict harm on Palestinians; it will be a platform to support them."
"Operation Al-Aqsa Flood showed the Israeli occupation as shaken, and the United States is a key accomplice in the [Israeli] occupation's crimes," he said. "The Resistance's actions are all a reaction to the occupation's crimes."
The Iraqi Resistance chief underlined that his country would be the main pillar of support for the Palestinian Resistance, pledging to not allow the United States to support the occupation against the Palestinian people.
The Iraqi Parliament, al-Fayyad revealed, will hold an extraordinary session on Sunday in support of Gaza, and will collect donations to that end.
RUDAW seeks out a variety of opinions and we'll note this one:
Haider Barzanji, political scientist researcher
Decades have passed since the Palestinian issue first entered the global
media and political landscape. Yet the international community
continues to overlook this central issue.
Iraq has been and still is supportive of the Palestinian cause, and does
not abandon it regardless of the consequences. This is a matter both of
humanitarian concern and religious significance, as well as an issue of
what’s right and wrong. In its clear and frank statement, the Iraqi
government naturally supports the Palestinian people, as it’s the
correct thing to do.
However, should the Iraqi government fail to provide tangible assistance
to the Palestinian people, it would risk being seen by the Iraqi people
as complicit in the human rights infringements and breaches of
international law committed by Israel, including the Gaza attacks and
the imposed blockade.
To address the Palestinian issue, it is imperative that effective
international measures - Iraq included - be implemented to quell
violence and promote peaceful resolutions. These efforts should stress
the importance of justice and human rights.
UK SOCIALIST WORKER quotes Iraqi activst Alaa al-Arabyia stating, "We, as Iraqis, know the pain of having an occupier on our land." Exactly. It's a point that can't be missed. At TRUTHOUT, Rabbi Brant Rosen notes, "I am filled with horror hearing the cries for vengeance voiced by the Israeli government and media, and witnessing the shattering military response that Israel has unleashed on the people of Gaza. Israel has now shut off all electricity and water for over 2 million Palestinians as the military wreaks complete and total devastation across that tiny strip, attacking hospitals, schools, mosques, marketplaces and apartment buildings. As of this writing, the death toll has risen to more than 1,500, with 5,600 wounded. More than 350,000 people have been rendered homeless -- and these numbers will almost certainly rise significantly in the coming days and weeks." For every thoughtful assessment like the Rabbi's, we are inflicted with idiots who know nothing. For example, Amy Schumer who Ruth rightly calls out in "Amy Schumer's an idiot." Is Schumer really that stupid (possibly) or is she part of an effort at opinion management? Former British Ambassador Craig Murray (ZNET) observes, "The bought and paid for media and political class in the west are extremely nervous, throughout the western world. Now they have come to the final genocide for which zionism has always aimed, they face a good deal of popular resistance." And that's why they try to clamp down on reality -- aided by (and catering to) the US State Dept which if shaking in fear over the thought that the American people might do the math themselves and figure out how they're being lied to. Jessica Corbett (COMMON DREAMS) notes:
As Israel on Friday bombarded civilians in Gaza and prepared for a ground invasion in response to Hamas' recent attack, U.S. State Department leadership reportedly instructed officials not to publicly use some terms that would advocate for less violence.
According to HuffPost, which reviewed official emails, "State Department staff wrote that high-level officials do not want press materials to include three specific phrases: 'de-escalation/cease-fire,' 'end to violence/bloodshed,' and 'restoring calm.'"
HuffPost noted that "when reached for comment on the directive, a State Department official said they would not comment on internal communications." However, others were quick to blast the policy as "disgusting," "maddening," and "pretty shocking."
Guardian columnist Moira Donegan called it "a horror and a moral abdication that we, Americans, can never atone for."
Adam Shapiro, director of advocacy for Israel-Palestine at Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), said that "if you work at the U.S. Department of State and you believe that you are there for diplomacy and making the world a better place—now is the time for resignations and collective action."
"This is unconscionable and will leave an indelible stain," added Shapiro, who was far from the only critic to call the directive " unconscionable."
Julia Conley (COMMON DREAMS) reports, "As the Biden administration's intent to silence dissent against the United States' backing of the Israel Defense Forces' onslaught in Gaza became increasingly clear Friday night, at least 80 Jewish Americans and other supporters of Palestinians' human rights were arrested for protesting outside the homes and offices of a number of Democratic lawmakers, where they demanded the U.S. government join growing calls for a cease-fire." Not everyone is falling in line with the propaganda as Brett Wilkins (COMMON DREAMS) points out, "55 House Democrats on Friday urged U.S. President Joe Biden to pressure Israel to limit harm to civilians ahead of an anticipated massive ground assault on the besieged territory, home to 2.3 million people." It's not just the US government spitting out lies as Stuart Littlewood (DISSIDENT VOICE) points out:
Our monarch King Charles III has graciously favoured us with a royal opinion. “His Majesty is appalled by and condemns the barbaric acts of terrorism in Israel,” a palace spokesperson said. And a spokes for Prince William and his wife, Kate, said they were “profoundly distressed by the devastating events that have unfolded in the past days. The horrors inflicted by Hamas’ terrorist attack upon Israel are appalling; they utterly condemn them. As Israel exercises its right of self-defence, all Israelis and Palestinians will continue to be stalked by grief, fear and anger in the time to come.” No mention of the “barbaric” day-to-day terror tactics by Israel which led up to the present crisis. Or the Palestinians’ right of self-defence.
A response to these attempts to humiliate and punish could simply be: “and when did you last condemn Israel for its 75 years of atrocities?” Or “if Hamas committed war crimes why is Israel responding with even bigger war crimes?”
More voices are needed to stop the slaughter, many more, let alone to push back on all the lies from various governments. Rebecca Marie Goldschmidt (COUNTERPUNCH) notes, "People will continue to die until we ALL demand the defunding of the Israeli military, an end to the occupation, the return of Palestinians to their homelands, and dignity for everyone. Listen to Palestinians. Listen to those who brought down Apartheid South Africa. Listen to the children, the cries of so many children and young people. Listen to the former soldiers and the war resisters. This is all just part of the larger scam of war profiteering and the corporate nuclear agenda that is holding us all hostage against each other." The refusal of some to speak out is why this assault continues and why so many people are being wounded and killed. Ibtisam Mahdi (THE NATION) reports:
Dr. Mohammad Abu Salmiya, the director general of Dar Al-Shifa (House of Healing) Hospital and the chairman of the Emergency Committee in the Gaza Strip, has said that if the world does not intervene to stop Israel’s bombardment and intensified siege of the Gaza Strip, “We will be in a catastrophic health situation, and the health system at Al-Shifa Hospital will collapse within hours.”
Abu Salmiya spoke to me on Thursday afternoon from the hospital, trying to juggle his responsibilities to staff and patients with his determination to keep journalists informed about the crisis at the medical center. He was clearly exhausted and overwhelmed by the chaos.
“The scene is tragic. We are witnessing unprecedented numbers almost every hour, reaching 100 wounded and 20 martyrs every hour. We have never witnessed these numbers before.”
The capacity of Al-Shifa Hospital, one of the largest hospitals in the Gaza Strip, has reached its limit, he said. Doctors have been forced to place the wounded in corridors, pathways, and on the floor to perform urgent treatment on them.
