Middle East Eye – October 26, 2023
Over 8,000 Palestinians killed or missing in Gaza
Israeli forces intensify arrest campaign in West Bank, while over 8,000 Palestinians killed or missing in Gaza. Palestinian groups expect Israel to flood Hamas tunnels with nerve gas
It is now the 20th day since the start of the war between Israel and Palestinian armed groups in Gaza.
It appears that in recent days, less news has been coming out of Gaza overnight, as internet and telecommunications infrastructure has been severely damaged.
If you are just tuning into our live blog coverage, here is what you may have missed over the past several hours:
Israel said it conducted a ground operation in Gaza, attacked several sites, and then withdrew. Hamas has not yet commented on the Israeli military's statement.
Biden's remarks casting doubt on the Palestinian death toll have been widely condemned as dehumanising, with the largest US Muslim rights group demanding he apologise.
More countries are joining calls for a humanitarian pause in the fighting, in order to allow aid to enter Gaza.
Biden and Netanyahu spoke on Wednesday afternoon, and they discussed efforts at locating and securing the release of Americans held captive in Gaza.
An exclusive from MEE: US officials are preparing dissent cables to voice their opposition to Biden's full-fledged support of Israel's bombing of Gaza.
Dozens more Palestinians have been arrested across the West Bank on Thursday morning.
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-palestine-war-gaza-invasion-live
Daily Sabah – October 25, 2023
Erdoğan says Hamas is not a terrorist organization
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan denounced Israel once again for its atrocities targeting Palestinians while speaking at his party’s parliamentary group meeting Wednesday.
He pointed out that almost half of the people killed by Israel’s attacks are comprised of children and their mothers. “This is sufficient to show that Israel is not acting in self-defense but commits savagery on a level with crimes against humanity. You cannot find another state or another army in the world bombing cities, hospitals, places of worship, schools and marketplaces night and day by warplanes just to kill children. The West sees Hamas as a terrorist group. I tell Israel here: The West owes you many things, but we are not indebted to Israel. Hamas is not a terrorist organization. It is a liberation group, a group of mujahideen fighting to defend its lands and people,” he said, using a word of Arabic origin.
He said that when those who stood up for the world in Russia’s war on Ukraine are silent about the massacre in Gaza, this is the “most concrete expression of hypocrisy.” Accusing countries outside the region of “adding fuel to the fire” in the name of supporting Israel, he said the U.S. would lose as it does not seem to want the world to be ruled fairly. Erdoğan earlier criticized the U.S. decision to send warships to the Eastern Mediterranean, apparently to assist Israel in case of need.
The conflict and subsequent reaction or lack thereof by the international community also gave Türkiye an opportunity to reiterate its call for a new, fair world order by reforming international institutions. Erdoğan, who slammed the United Nations Security Council for deepening the current crisis in a message issued on the occasion of the U.N. Day on Tuesday, expressed Türkiye’s concern on the issue. He said the U.N. has fallen into a state of despair and turned a blind eye to killings of children.
Türkiye’s objections to the unfair structure of the U.N. Security Council were again confirmed by recent news, he added, referring to how a Mideast cease-fire resolution was vetoed by one of the council’s five permanent members, a structure Türkiye has long cried foul over. Erdoğan reiterated his quotable slogan for U.N. reform, “The world is bigger than five,” referring to the unrepresentative nature of the U.N. Security Council’s five permanent, veto-wielding members.
‘Western hypocrisy’
The president quoted from a poem by celebrated Turkish poet Nazım Hikmet, which denounces the killing of children in wars. “No one can sleep in peace in a world where children have to hug the bodies of their parents. Nobody’s future is safe in such a world,” he said.
He stated that Israel cannot achieve anything with its current mindset, “whether you have the support of the West or others. U.S. will also lose as it failed to ensure justice and even opposed it,” he said.
He accused the West of finding excuses for inhumane attacks, “something out of their own bloody past,” referring to Western countries’ atrocities against native populations in the Americas and Africa.
Erdoğan highlighted that Türkiye never turned to racism and Jewish people know it very well. “Türkiye is the only state, the only country where anti-Semitism did not exist for centuries despite hosting Jews for centuries. The president noted that the West tried to silence criticism of Israel over Gaza attacks.
“We witness fascism among those staunchly defending pluralism and democracy. Türkiye will gladly embrace anybody who faces problems in their countries just because of their dignified stance (on Palestinian issue),” he said. He added that the silence over the massacre in Gaza of those who stood up for the world in the Russian war on Ukraine is the “most concrete expression of hypocrisy.”
New peace talks
Underlining that countries outside the region are “adding fuel to the fire” in the name of supporting Israel, he said Türkiye is ready to be one of the guarantors of the Palestinian side with a humanitarian, political and military presence.
“We propose organizing an international Palestine-Israel peace conference in which all influential actors in the region take part,” he said.
Erdoğan said Muslim countries must act together to secure a lasting peace in the region. “I invite all the countries with common sense and conscience to press on the Netanyahu government to turn the state of Israel back to common sense,” he said. “Perpetrators of massacres and devastation in Gaza are those who give unlimited support to Israel. As long as the innocent die in Gaza, no political stunt, no warship, no fighter planes will bring peace to the region,” he said. “The Israeli administration should turn to Türkiye for its safety, not those thousands of kilometers away. People of Israel will find a safe haven in Türkiye once their government boasting the support of those foreign powers abandon them, just like they did 500 years ago,” Erdoğan said, referring to Sephardic Jews’ migration to the Ottoman Empire, which welcomed them centuries ago as they fled persecution in Europe.
“This should not be viewed as a conflict between the Crescent and the Cross. This mindset should be abandoned if we want peace to prevail. Unity of Muslim countries will facilitate the efforts for a cease-fire and, later, permanent peace. We expect the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) to act, at least this time, in a way fitting its mission, which is defending the sacred status of Jerusalem and the Palestinian cause,” he said.
He proposed that Türkiye was ready to be a guarantor for Palestinians and organize an international Palestine-Israel peace conference. “It should be an event setting out to achieve what its predecessors, whether in Madrid or Oslo, failed to do,” he said.
He said missile attacks by Israel on Gaza and other Palestinian territories should stop. Israel should not be targeted by missiles as well, and the issue of hostages should be resolved quickly.
Erdoğan also called for an end to what he called “settler terrorism” in Ramallah and elsewhere, referring to illegal settlements.
Information Clearing House – October 25, 2023
Zionist think tank publishes blueprint for Palestinian genocide
By Kit Klarenberg
In a white paper released over a week after the Hamas-led surprise attack on Israeli military bases and kibbutzes, The Institute for National Security and Zionist Strategy outlined “a plan for resettlement and final rehabilitation in Egypt of the entire population of Gaza,” based on the “unique and rare opportunity to evacuate the entire Gaza Strip” that Israel’s latest assault on the besieged costal enclave provided.
Published in Hebrew on the organization’s website, the paper was authored by Amir Weitman, “an investment manager and visiting researcher” at the Institute who also leads the libertarian caucus of Israel’s ruling Likud Party. The document began by noting that there are 10 million vacant housing units in neighboring Egypt that could be “immediately” filled with Palestinians. Weitman then assured readers that the “sustainable plan…aligns well with the economic and geopolitical interests of the State of Israel, Egypt, the USA and Saudi Arabia.”
Weitman’s ethnic cleansing proposal echoes forced transfer plans advanced in recent days by former Israeli officials while capitalizing on evacuation orders delivered to the entire civilian population of northern Gaza by the Israeli military.
Weitman’s sinister blueprint imagined Israel purchasing these properties at a cost of $5 – 8 billion dollars, a whopping price-tag that reflects just 1 – 1.5 percent of Israel’s GDP.
“These sums of money [required to cleanse Gaza] in relation to the Israeli economy, are minimal,” Weitman posits. “Investing individual billions of dollars to solve this difficult issue is an innovative, cheap and sustainable solution.”
Weitman acknowledged that his plan virtually amounts to Israel “buying the Gaza Strip,” arguing the move would be “a very worthwhile investment” for Zionists because it would “add a lot of value over time.” He asserted local “land conditions” in the area would provide “many” Israeli settlers a high standard of living, therefore allowing for an expansion of settlements in Gush Dan near the Egyptian border, giving “a tremendous impetus to settlement in the Negev.”
In December 2021, Tel Aviv approved plans to establish four settlements in the Negev to house 3,000 settler families.
A genocidal war to end all wars
Though Egypt has so far rejected Israeli pressure for a mass exodus of Gaza residents through the southern Rafah crossing, Weitman argued Cairo will welcome the mass exodus of Palestinian refugees as “an immediate stimulus” that will “provide a tremendous and immediate benefit to al-Sisi’s regime.”
Weitman claimed that Cairo’s major creditors — including France, Germany and Saudi Arabia — are likely to welcome a revitalized Egyptian economy, courtesy of “Israeli investment” in the Palestinians’ permanent removal. He surmizes that Western Europe will welcome “the transfer of the entire Gaza population to Egypt,” because it will significantly “reduce the risk of illegal immigration…a tremendous advantage.” Meanwhile, he expects Riyadh to embrace the move because the “evacuation of the Gaza Strip means the elimination of a significant ally of Iran.”
The ethnic cleansing of Gaza would mean an end to “ceaseless, repeated rounds of fighting, which inflame the fires of hatred against Israel.” Moreover, “closing the Gaza issue will ensure a stable and increased supply of Israeli gas to Egypt and its liquefaction,” from the vast reserves seized by Israel near Gaza’s shores.
Palestinians in turn are expected to jump at the chance to be forcibly transferred from their homes rather than “living in poverty under the rule of Hamas.” It is therefore necessary for Israel to “create the right conditions” for them to “immigrate” from Gaza to Cairo. Weitman noted that Gaza’s two million inhabitants “constitute less than 2% of the total Egyptian population, which today already includes 9 million refugees. A drop in the ocean.”
The paper ominously concluded: “There is no doubt that in order for this plan to come to fruition, many conditions must exist at the same time. Currently, these conditions are met and it is unclear when such an opportunity will arise again, if ever. This is the time to act. Now.”
“If we want to remain alive, we will have to kill and kill and kill”
As barbarous as these proposals might seem, they reflect what many Israeli officials appear to be murmuring in private, and what at least one former government spinmeister has openly pushed as an altruistic solution to the Palestinian “problem.”
“There is a huge expanse, almost endless space in the Sinai Desert, just on the other side of Gaza,” former Deputy Foreign Minister of Israel, Danny Ayalon, echoed the genocidal Zionist logic behind Weitman’s proposal in an interview with Al Jazeera’s Marc Lamont Hill. “The idea is—and this is not the first time it will be done—for them to leave over to the open areas where we and the international community will prepare the infrastructure — you know, 10 cities with food and water — just like for the refugees of Syria.”
In 2004, Zionist demographer Arnon Sofer of Haifa University laid out detailed plans for the isolation of Gaza directly to Ariel Sharon’s government. This entailed withdrawing Israeli forces from the area entirely and constructing a stringent system of surveillance and security to ensure nothing and no one went in or out without Zionist proviso. He predicted a perpetual bloodbath:
“When 2.5 million people live in a closed-off Gaza, it’s going to be a human catastrophe. Those people will become even bigger animals than they are today…The pressure at the border will be awful. It’s going to be a terrible war. So, if we want to remain alive, we will have to kill and kill and kill. All day, every day…the only thing that concerns me is how to ensure the boys and men who are going to have to do the killing will be able to return home to their families and be normal human beings.”
The Institute has put forward a clean and easy fantasy of achieving the same goal put forward by Sofer. For it to succeed, all Palestinians have to do is put down their weapons and head toward the desert of permanent exile.
Kit Klarenberg is an investigative journalist exploring the role of intelligence services in shaping politics and perceptions.
Information Clearing House – October 25, 2023
The Palestinian Tragedy: Cui Bono?
By Pepe Escobar
By now it’s fully established who is profiting from the ghastly Palestine tragedy.
As it stands we have 3 wins for the Hegemon and 1 win for its aircraft carrier nation in West Asia.
First winner is the War Party Inc., a massive bilateral scam. The White House’s $106 billion supplemental request to Congress for “assistance” especially to Ukraine and Israel is manna from Heaven to the weaponizing tentacles of the MICIMATT (military-industrial-congressional-intelligence-media-academia-think tank complex, in the legendary definition by Ray McGovern).
The laundromat will be on a roll, including $61.4 billion for Ukraine (more weapons and replenishing of U.S. stocks) and $14.3 for Israel (mostly air and missile defense “support”).
Second winner is The Democratic Party engineering the unavoidable change of narrative from the spectacularly failing Project Ukraine; yet that will only postpone the upcoming humiliation of NATO in 2024, which will reduce the Afghan humiliation to the status of sandbox child playing.
Third winner is setting West Asia on fire: the Straussian neocon psycho “strategy” conceived as a response to the upcoming BRICS 11, and everything in terms of Eurasia integration that was advanced at the Belt and Road Forum in Beijing last week (including nearly $100 billion in new infrastructure/development projects).
Then there’s the vertiginous acceleration of the project sponsored by genocidal Zionist maniacs: a Final Solution to the Palestinian question, mixing razing Gaza to the ground; forcing an exodus to Egypt; the West Bank turned into a cage; and, at the most extreme, a “Judaification of Al-Aqsa”, complete with an eschatological destruction of the third holiest place in Islam, to be replaced by rebuilding the Third Jewish Temple.
The “aristocratic bromance” enters the fray
Everything is of course interlinked. Vast swathes of the U.S. Deep State in tandem with the neocon-run “Biden” combo can ride the new bonanza side by side with the Israeli Deep State – their bubble protected by a massive propaganda barrage demonizing all forms of support for the Palestinian plight.
Yet there’s a problem. This “alliance” has just lost – perhaps irretrievably – the overwhelming majority of the Global South/Global Majority, which is viscerally Palestinian. Very well-educated Palestinians living in Gaza and suffering throughout the Unspeakable, fiercely denounce the ambiguous roles of Egypt, Jordan and the UAE while praising Russia, Iran and among Arab nations, Qatar, Algeria and Yemen.
All of the above spells out a stark continuity since the end of the USSR. Washington refused to dissolve NATO in 1990 to protect the immense profits of the weaponized tentacles of the MICIMATT. The logical consequence has been the Hegemon and NATO as a Global Robocop, in tandem, killing at least 4.5 million people in West Asia while displacing over 40 million, then killing, by proxy, at least half a million in Ukraine and displacing over 10 million. And counting.
In sharp contrast to the Empire of Chaos, Lies and Plunder, the Global South/Global Majority see the emergence of what a sophisticated Chinese scholar delightfully described as an “aristocratic bromance” at the center of the “present nexus of Universal History”.
Exhibit A is provided by Vladimir Putin commenting, “I cannot praise Xi Jinping because it would be as if I’m praising myself & that would be an embarrassing thing to do.”
Yes: Putin and Xi – those “evil autocrats” for Atlanticist totalitarian liberals – are bosom buddies and in fact soul mates. That leads our Chinese scholar to get deeper not only into their mutual understanding but also the increasingly complex links between arguably the last three Sovereign Civilization-States: China, Russia and Iran.
Our Chinese scholar shows that Putin and Xi “have practically the same reading of the geopolitical reality” apart from being the leaders of two out of three real Sovereigns”, and are “willing and capable to act rightly” in order to stop the Hegemon matrix:
“They have the understanding, the vision, the tools of power, the will and right now the favorable circumstances allowing them to put definite and definitive limits to the pretensions coming from the Anglo-Zio-American establishment.”
So it’s no wonder they are feared, despised and depicted as “existential threats” to “Western civilization”.
Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, with his eyes on realpolitik, allows himself a way more blunt assessment: “Led by the U.S., the world is steadily rolling into a deep abyss. The decisions made clearly point not only to irreversible mental deterioration, but also to loss of the remaining shreds of conscience. These decisions, both significant and minor, are glaring symptoms of the epidemic social disease.”
Israel’s serial binge to elevate the concept of “crimes against humanity” to a whole new level does fit the definition of an “epidemic social disease” – and worse. Tel Aviv has embarked on a path to erase any cultural, religious, civic footprint in northern Gaza; raze it to the ground; expel its residents; and annex it. All that fully legitimized by the “rules-based international order” and its lowly vassals.
Dragging West Asia into war
It’s always instructive to compare the Israeli dream of a Final Solution with facts on the ground. So let’s call Lt Gen Andrey Gurulev, a member of the State Duma Commission for reviewing federal budget expenditures on national defense, national security and law enforcement, and a member of the Duma Committee on Defense.
Here are Gurulev’s key points:
“Israeli bombings have no effect militarily.”
“Armed people in Palestine are in shelters, civilians are dying in residential buildings. We went through this in Syria, when in Damascus, for example, they sit in underground tunnels and come out only when necessary. Hamas prepared 100%, it was not without reason that they did this, they have reserves of weapons and food. (…) The Israelis are shown in columns on tanks, on infantry fighting vehicles, what are they waiting for? Waiting for drones to fly over them? We went through this during the special military operation. Tanks in urban areas are practically ineffective.”
“The Americans are trying to drag the Middle East into war; apparently, they decided not to stand ceremoniously with Israel; in this case, the damage to Israel would be unacceptable.”
“On the two aircraft carrier groups in the Mediterranean. On board these ships, according to my calculations, there are approximately 750-800 Tomahawk missiles, which cover a decent amount of the territory of the Russian Federation (…) Our President immediately decided to put Mig-31s with Kinzhal missiles on combat duty. For some reason, everyone imagines that one plane with one Kinzhal will fly somewhere, will fly along the Black Sea, but everything is much more global. Firstly, this is the use of all reconnaissance systems linked into a single information system with the issuance of specific target instructions to control points. If an aircraft enters the airspace of the Black Sea, then it must have a support echelon protecting it from enemy air attacks, air defense systems, and everything else. This is a global set of measures to deter the American aggressor from thinking of attacking the territory of the Russian Federation. In front of us are two aircraft carrier groups, equipped to the teeth, capable of hitting targets on the territory of our country, should we just stand there and pick our noses? We must react normally.”
“If the entire Middle East is drawn into the war, aircraft carrier groups try to strike the territory of Iran, then Iran will not remain silent, they have targets ready, all critical objects, they will attack them in different ways, despite the Iron Dome and everything else.”
Pentagon analysts will certainly understand what Gurulev is saying. Not Straussian neocon psychos though.
As the “long black cloud is coming down”, to reference Bob Dylan, it’s enlightening to pay very close attention to sterling voices of experience.
So let’s turn to Dr Mahathir Mohamad: 98 years old (no, not Kissinger); spent his entire adult life in politics, most of it as the Prime Minister of a very important nation (Malaysia); knows every world leader very well, including the current ones in U.S. and Israel; and at this late stage in life, fears nothing and has nothing to lose.
Dr Mahathir does cut to the chase:
” …The crux of the matter is that all these atrocities committed by Israel on the Palestinians stems from the American support for Tel Aviv. If the American Government withdraws its support for Israel and stop all military aid to the regime, Israel would not have carried out the genocide and mass murders of Palestinians with impunity. The United States Government needs to come clean and tell the truth. Israel and its IDF are the terrorists. The United States is blatantly supporting terrorists. So what is the United States?”
No point asking those currently driving U.S. foreign policy. They would barely be able to contain the foaming in their mouths.
https://informationclearinghouse.blog/2023/10/25/the-palestinian-tragedy-cui-bono/
Information Clearing House – October 25, 2023
Israel’s war of self-deceit
When has killing more Palestinians ever resulted in better security for the Israeli society?
By Marwan Bishara
Already in its third week, Israel’s war on Gaza has so far killed more than 5,600 Palestinians, injured thousands more, and displaced more than one million. Despite calls from some quarters for a ceasefire, there seems to be no end in sight for the suffering of Gaza’s two million residents.
Having long embraced the dehumanisation of the Palestinians, Israeli society is filled with rage and the primordial drive for revenge over the killing of Israeli civilians by Hamas fighters on October 7.
This blind fury is now channelled into a genocidal drive by the narcissism and extremism of one man: Benjamin Netanyahu, a doubled-faced, pathological liar, who has done everything and anything to stay in power.
Netanyahu’s arrogance, corruption and callousness are to blame for the country’s political and military failures that led to the October 7 attacks. He thought he could just transform all of historic Palestine into a Greater Land of Israel, by making the occupation of the Palestinian territories permanent and keeping millions of Palestinians in an open-air prison in Gaza and segregated bantustans in the West Bank – all with no repercussions.
On October 7, his arrogance finally caught up with him, because arrogance breeds stupidity. Hubris turned into humiliation, and the fiasco into farce, or as Israelis say, using Arabic words, the fashla (failure) turned fadiha (scandal).
And while Israel’s military and intelligence heads have accepted responsibility for their failures to prevent the attacks, Netanyahu has refrained from taking any responsibility, even though most Israelis blame him for their national tragedy.
Instead of resigning, the shamed and shameless prime minister cum wartime leader has gone on to wage a sadistic war with no clear strategy or endgame.
In his genocidal offensive, Netanyahu has been aided and abetted by his former Western detractors, who until recently were expressing “concern” about his plans to undermine Israel’s judiciary, through his coalition of fanatics and fascists, in order to stay out of jail.
First and foremost among them is US President Joe Biden, who went from snubbing Netanyahu for much of the year to embracing and shielding him from the wrath of Israelis and Arabs alike.
Biden has committed America to Netanyahu’s genocidal war on Gaza, offering American arms, tactical assistance in urban warfare, and diplomatic leverage. He has ordered the deployment of two aircraft carriers in the Eastern Mediterranean to protect Israel and deter the likes of Iran from intervening in the conflict.
Likewise, European leaders, who had also given Netanyahu the cold shoulder for much of the year, are now clamouring to show their support for his government and his war on Gaza. They have refused to call for a ceasefire and continued to justify the mounting Israeli war crimes as an exercise of “the right to self-defence”.
Israel’s Western stooges love to evoke international law in all the wrong ways. Israel, indeed, has the right to self-defence, but not to defend its decades-long brutal military occupation, long enabled by Western powers. It is rather the occupied and victimised Palestinian people living under the Israeli racist system of apartheid that have the right to resist their tormentor under international law.
The ongoing genocidal war – spearheaded by a failed prime minister and supported by his morally suspect Western allies – is not one of self-defence; rather, it is a war of self-deceit. Israel falsely believes that it could attain security by the sword.
But when has killing more Palestinians ever resulted in better security for Israeli society? It never has; it never will.
Imposing a hermetic blockade on Gaza and unleashing a bombing rampage to pave the way for a land invasion, Israel will face dangerous regional blowbacks. In its genocidal drive, it may, as some fear, drag the US into World War III.
Sensationally and falsely comparing Hamas’s attacks on Israel with those carried by al-Qaeda on the United States in 2001 will not help. The “war on terror” the US unleashed on the world killed even more Americans than the 9/11 attacks did, along with hundreds of thousands of mostly Muslim victims. It sowed chaos that more war and more troops could not stop for the past two decades.
If anything, the “war on terror” proves that war crimes, collective punishment and other violations of international law do not mitigate extremism; they perpetuate it as they fuel the cycles of violence – something UN Special Rapporteur on Counter-Terrorism Fionnuala Ni Aolain emphasised during a recent news conference focusing on the Israeli war on Gaza.
As the Israeli army commits more war crimes against the Palestinians of Gaza, Israelis need to have a good look at where colonialism and occupation have gotten them. Perpetual Israeli oppression, racism and killings of the Palestinians have created the conditions for greater instability, extremism and violence in Palestine and the region.
A genocidal war on Gaza will not bring peace and quiet to the Israeli society, nor to those in the West abetting it.
Marwan Bishara is an author who writes extensively on global politics and is widely regarded as a leading authority on US foreign policy, the Middle East and international strategic affairs. He was previously a professor of International Relations at the American University of Paris.
https://informationclearinghouse.blog/2023/10/25/israels-war-of-self-deceit/
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