I recently read the Auckland Library copy of the 1986 book Prophecy and politics: militant evangelists on the road to nuclear war, by Grace Halsell (1923-2000). Before she died, she also published (in 1999) Forcing God’s Hand: Why Millions Pray for a Quick Rapture—and Destruction of Planet Earth. A revised 2003 edition included a “transcript of CBS 60 Minutes episode broadcast October 6, 2002 “Zion’s Christian soldiers; how conservative Christians see Israel’s role in bringing on the Second Coming of Christ” (Wikipedia). (Much more recently, in 2024, Al Jazeera ran this program: Praying for Armageddon episode one and episode two.)

Raised in Lubbock, Texas – thirteen years older than Buddy Holly – her youth was immersed in Christian Evangelical dogma. Evangelicals – from John Calvin in 1539, onwards – turned their Christianity from a faith that principally worshipped God to a faith that principally worshipped The Bible. Not only did the Bible become (holy) History, it also became (holy) Prophecy. (I have in my possession a very flash 1890s’ Bible; it dates everything, including the world’s “beginning” in the year 4004 BC.)

A picture may be worth a thousand words; a map even more so. The map here was one in wide circulation in American Evangelical circles mid-twentieth-century. It reflects the view that Israel was a necessary part of the ‘End Times’ prophecy, and that the Anti-Christ was Soviet Russia, invading Israel through Syria, aiming for a showdown centred on the Megiddo Vally, the place which gave our language the word ‘Armageddon’.

The study of End Times is called eschatology. Since the time of Calvin, a simmering obsession with End Times, has fluctuated (between warm and hot). An important epoch for End Time belief was the 1830s; note the Scottish writing/preaching of the likes of Thomas Chalmers (who Port Chalmers was named after) and Edward Irving. (I have in-law ancestry to members of Irving’s congregation.) Another time of deep concern was the early 1980s, with the reheated Cold War, and with the Reverend Jerry Falwell – David Lange’s Oxford Union foe in 1986 – playing a prominent part in Halsell’s story.

We note that these prophecies – contained in the Books of Ezekiel, Daniel and Revelation – have a renewed audience today, and that the rest of us – who are neither Evangelicals nor Christian Zionists – should be concerned. Unlike in the 1830s, the world does have weapons which can create a global firestorm, and there is a state of Israel which is behaving like a rogue state.

We also note that, following the Beirut massacres of 1982 – conducted and provoked by the “Butcher of Beirut” (Ariel Sharon), and which led to the founding of Hezbollah – Iran has become (to these Evangelicals) the joint Antichrist, along with Russia revitalised in that role; the so-called Antichrist may be easily understood as the present Russian-Iranian axis, which is today bombing – as an axis – bits of Syria. (The Iran government, unlike the Russian government, is not formally involved. But these are the joint propper-uppers of the longstanding Assad regime in Syria.)

We might also note that, again to some of these people, United States president-elect Donald Trump represents the second-coming of Christ (note the picture that comes with Praying for Armageddon.) Further, he has appointed Mike Huckerbee to the role of American Ambassador to Israel; Huckerbee is a “Third Temple” Christian Evangelist who wishes to raze Jerusalem’s Al Aqsa Mosque, an event that would most-likely precipitate all-out war.

The key point is that, from a Christian Evangelical viewpoint, its all coming together nicely. The Evangelicals (dispensationalists) expect to be saved by The Rapture. Israel will fight the Antichrist on their behalf, and prevail through a pyrrhic victory. The surviving Israelites will then submit to the now-warrior Christ, and the Evangelicals will be restored to Earth.

Fantasy! Yet so many too powerful people believe it; and a nuclear Armageddon is possible today, even if The Rapture isn’t. Those who do not understand the risks should take note. Grace Halsell tried to warn us, but her warnings are not exactly common knowledge.

Further, there are some people who are definitely not Christian Evangelicals who sometimes sound as if they might be. Take this concluding sentence from Chris Trotter, an authentic (and scarce) New Zealand left-wing intellectual: “We can only hope that Donald Trump, soon to inherit America’s sabre – and its scabbard – is learning how to rattle it like mad” (Sabre-Rattling, 30 November 2024).

*******

Keith Rankin (keith at rankin dot nz), trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand.

Esteemed Israeli intellectual Shlomo Sand published The Invention of the Jewish People in 2008 with a new edition in 2020. He sees the popular concept of peoples – popular in the late 19th century (when we were obsessed with ‘race’) and again in the last decade or so when we have renewed that obsession with race (calling it ‘ethnicity’) – as quite problematic. Cultures and languages are real of course; but we prefer to imagine ‘peoples’ in terms of shared ancestry. Thus, the Jewish People are commonly seen as the biblical descendants of Isaac, son of Abraham; with special reference to the classical Kingdom of David (Judea and classical Israel) that existed in the Levant about 3000 years ago.

There is a real problem, in that the Jewish People are commonly considered to be both an ethnicity and a religious faith. We don’t conflate these two identity markers with respect to other ‘peoples’. Simon Schama – a renowned New York based Jewish historian – introduces his television series The Story of the Jews by showing clearly that Judaism is a faith only, and not an ethnicity. Shlomo Sand notes, in his introduction to the 2020 edition, that most of the Jewish population in the year Zero CE (when Jesus Christ was a young child) were comparatively recent converts, and that the people who have lived continuously in the Levant – eg the Palestinians – will have more biblical Israeli ancestry than have the modern Jewish population.

I would like to infuse this discussion with some simple ancestral numeracy.

3,000 years ago represents about 120 generations, taking us back to our 118-times-great-grandparents. If we go back that many generations, then all people alive and dead today have precisely 1,329,227,995,784,915,872,903,807,060,280,344,576 places in our family tree for that generation; approximately a billion octillion places.

The global population in 1,000 BCE is believed to be about 50 million. That means, on average, each living person in that year features 2.66 octillion (let’s say 3 octillion) times on each of our family trees. Now of course some ancient people will feature more than others. Each Palestinian today probably features each ancient Israeli about 150 octillion times in their family tree (assuming an ancient Israeli population of less than one million). Whereas, based on Shlomo Sand’s research, each person who identifies as a Jew probably has each ancient Israeli only 15 octillion times in their 118-times-gg-parent family tree slots. Modern Palestinians are almost certainly about ten times more infused with the blood of the sons and daughters of Isaac than are the present soldiers of the Israel Defence Force (and of the ‘freedom fighters’ of Haganah and Irgun who preceded today’s IDF).

So, what are these people fighting each other over? Land. Liberal-democracy is based on the sanctity of private property, including land. Many people identifying as Israelis are living on land dubiously acquired from people identifying as Palestinian; with the descendants of the previous occupants of those lands living (and dying) today in ‘refugee camps’ in Gaza, Judea, Samaria, and Lebanon.

Why cannot these Levantine people just settle with each other, create a post-apartheid liberal secular state in which all races and religions are constitutionally equal, and compensate the descendants of the dispossessed for the loss of their land? And not further dispossess Palestinians of their land.

The time for ‘peoples’ pushing narratives about ‘other peoples’ being ‘human animals’ is truly well past; there never was a time that such narratives were appropriate. Almost more shameful is the way that too many influential people in the ‘liberal democratic west’ buy into these grotesque Israeli narratives, and don’t register concern at the suppression of narratives counter to the ‘Israel-says’ version of the news.

*******

Keith Rankin (keith at rankin dot nz), trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand.

Since the arrival of Zionism in Palestine, the impulse of the Palestinians has not been about violence or revenge. The impulse remains the return to normal and natural life, writes Ilan Pappé.

ANALYSIS: By Ilan Pappé

“When we revolt, it’s not for a particular culture. We revolt simply because, for many reasons, we can no longer breathe.”

— Franz Fanon

Since the 1948 Nakba and arguably before, Palestine has not seen levels of violence as high as those experienced since October 7, 2023. But we need to address how this violence is being situated, treated, and judged.

Indeed, mainstream media often portrays Palestinian violence as terrorism while depicting Israeli violence as self-defence. Rarely is Israeli violence labelled excessive.

Meanwhile, international legal institutions hold both sides equally responsible for this violence, which they classify as war crimes.

Both perspectives are flawed. The first perspective wrongly differentiates between the “immoral” and “unjustified” violence of Palestinians and Israel’s “right to defend itself.”

The second perspective, which assigns blame to both sides, provides a misguided and ultimately harmful framework for understanding the current situation — likely the most violent chapter in Palestine’s modern history.

And all of these perspectives overlook the crucial context necessary to understand the violence that erupted on October 7.

This is not merely a conflict between two violent parties, nor is it simply a clash between a terrorist organisation and a state defending itself.

Rather, it represents a chapter in the ongoing decolonisation of historic Palestine, which began in 1929 and continues today. Only in the future will we know whether October 7 marked an early stage in this decolonisation process or one of its final phases.

Throughout history, decolonisation has been a violent process, and the violence of decolonisation has not been confined to one side only. Apart from a few exceptions where very small, colonised islands were evicted “voluntarily” by colonial empires, decolonisation has not been a pleasant consensual affair by which colonisers end decades, if not centuries, of oppression.

But for this to be our entry point to discuss Hamas, Israel, and the various positions held towards them in the world, one has to acknowledge the colonialist nature of Zionism and therefore recognise the Palestinian resistance as an anti-colonialist struggle — a framework negated totally by American administrations and other Western countries since the birth of Zionism, and so therefore also by other Western countries.

Framing the conflict as a struggle between the colonisers and the colonised helps detect the origin of the violence and shows that there is no effective way of stopping it without addressing its origins.

The root of the violence in Palestine is the evolvement of Zionism in the late 19th century into a settler colonial project.

Like previous settler colonial projects, the main violent impulse of the movement — and later the state that was established — was and is to eliminate the indigenous population. When elimination is not achieved by violence, the solution is always to use more extraordinary violence.

Therefore, the only scenario in which a settler colonial project can end its violent treatment of the indigenous people is when it ends or collapses. Its inability to achieve the absolute elimination of the native population will not deter it from constantly attempting to do so through an incremental policy of elimination or genocide.

The anti-colonial impulse, or propensity, to employ violence is existential — unless we believe that human beings prefer to live as occupied or colonised people.

The colonisers have an option not to colonise or eliminate but rarely cease from doing so without being forced to by the violence of the colonised or by outside pressure from external powers.

Indeed, as is in the case of Israel and Palestine, the best way to avoid violence and counter-violence is to force the settler colonial project to cease through pressure from the outside.

The historical record is worth recollecting to give credence to our claim that the violence of Israel must be judged differently — in moral and political terms — from that of the Palestinians.

This, however, does not mean that condemnation for violation of international law can only be directed towards the coloniser; of course not.

It is an analysis of the history of violence in historical Palestine that contextualises the events of October 7 and the genocide in Gaza and indicates a way to end it.

The history of violence in Modern Palestine: 1882-2000
The arrival of the first group of Zionist settlers in Palestine in 1882 was not, by itself, the first act of violence. The violence of the settlers was epistemic, meaning that the violent removal of the Palestinians by the settlers had already been written about, imagined, and coveted upon their arrival in Palestine — debunking the infamous “land without people” myth.

To translate the imagined removal into reality, the Zionist movement had to wait for the occupation of Palestine by Britain in 1918.

A few years later in the mid-1920s, with assistance from the British mandatory government, 11 villages were ethnically cleansed following the purchase of the regions Marj Ibn Amer and Wadi Hawareth by the Zionist movement from absentee landlords in Beirut and a landowner in Jaffa.

This had never happened before in Palestine. Landowners, whoever they were, did not evict villages that had been there for centuries since Ottoman law enabled land transactions.

This was the origin and the first act of systemic violence in the attempt to dispossess the Palestinians.

Another form of violence was the strategy of “Hebrew Labour” meant to drive out Palestinians from the labour market. This strategy, and the ethnic cleansing, pauperised the Palestinian countryside, leading to forced emigration to towns that could not provide work or proper housing.

It was only in 1929, when these violent actions were coupled with a discourse on constructing a third temple in place of Haram al-Sharif, that the Palestinians responded with violence for the first time.

This was not a coordinated response, but a spontaneous and desperate one against the bitter fruits of the Zionist colonisation of Palestine.

Seven years later, when Britain permitted more settlers to arrive and supported the formation of a nascent Zionist state with its own army, the Palestinians launched a more organised campaign.

This was the first uprising, lasting three years (1936-1939), known as the Arab Revolt. During this period, the Palestinian elite finally recognised Zionism as an existential threat to Palestine and its people.

The main Zionist paramilitary group collaborating with the British army in quelling the revolt was known as the Haganah, meaning “The Defence,” and hence the Israeli narrative to depict any act of aggression against Palestinians as self-defence — a concept reflected in the name of the Israeli army, the Israel Defence Forces.

From the British Mandate period to today, this military power was used to take over land and markets. It was deployed as a “defence” force against the attacks of the anti-colonialist movement and as such was not different from any other coloniser in the 19th and 20th centuries.

The difference is that in most instances of modern history where colonialism has come to an end, the actions of the colonisers are now viewed retrospectively as acts of aggression rather than self-defence.

The great Zionist success has been to commodify their aggression as self-defence and the Palestinian armed struggle as terrorism. The British government, at least until 1948, regarded both acts of violence as terrorism but allowed the worst violence to take place against the Palestinians in 1948 when it watched the first stage of the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians.

Between December 1947 and May 1948, when Britain was still responsible for law and order, the Zionist forces urbicided, that is obliterated, the main towns of Palestine and the villages around it. This was more than terror; this was a crime against humanity.

After completing the second stage of the ethnic cleansing between May and December 1948, through the most violent means that Palestine has witnessed for centuries, half of Palestine’s population was forcefully expelled, half of its villages destroyed, as well as most of its towns.

Israeli historians would later claim that “the Arabs” wanted to throw the Jews into the sea. The only people who were literally thrown into the sea — and drowned — were those expelled by the Zionist forces in Jaffa and Haifa.

Israeli violence continued after 1948 but was answered sporadically by Palestinians in an attempt to build a liberation movement.

It began with refugees trying to retrieve what was left of their husbandry and crops in the fields, later accompanied by Fedayeen attacking military installations and civilian places. It only gelled into a significant enterprise in 1968, when the Fatah Movement took over the Arab League’s PLO.

The pattern before 1967 is familiar — the dispossessed used violence in their struggle, but on a limited scale, while the Israeli army retaliated with overwhelming, indiscriminate violence, such as the massacre of the village of Qibya in October 1953 where Ariel Sharon’s unit 101 murdered 69 Palestinian villagers, many of them blown up within their own homes.

No group of Palestinians have been spared from Israeli violence. Those who became Israeli citizens were subjected, until 1966, to the most violent form of oppression: military rule. This system routinely employed violence against its subjects, including abuse, house demolitions, arbitrary arrests, banishment, and killings. Among these atrocities was the Kafr Qassem massacre in October 1956, where Israeli border police killed 49 Palestinian villagers.

This same violent system was transited to the occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip after the June 1967 War. For 19 years, the violence of the occupation was tolerated by the occupied until the mostly non-violent First Intifada in December 1987. Israel responded with brutality and violence that left 1,200 Palestinians dead, 300 of them children — 120,000 were injured and 1,800 homes were demolished. 180 Israelis were killed.

The pattern here continued — an occupied people, disillusioned with their own leadership and the indifference of the region and the world, rose in a non-violent revolt, only to be met with the full, brutal force of the coloniser and occupier.

Another pattern also emerges. The Intifada triggered a renewed interest in Palestine — as has the Hamas attack on October 7 — and produced a “peace process”, the Oslo Accords that raised the hopes of ending the occupation but instead, it provided immunity to the occupier to continue its occupation.

The frustration led, inevitably, to a more violent uprising in October 2000. It also shifted popular support from those leaders who still put their faith in the diplomatic way of ending occupation to those who were willing to continue the armed struggle against it — the political Islamic groups.

Violence in 21st century Palestine
Hamas and Islamic Jihad enjoy great support because of their choice of continuing to fight the occupation, not because of their theocratic vision of a future Caliphate or their particular wish to make the public space more religious.

The horrific pendulum continued. The Second Intifada was met by a more brutal Israeli response.

For the first time, Israel used F-16 bombers and Apache helicopters against the civilian population, alongside battalions of tanks and artillery that led to the 2002 Jenin massacre.

The brutality was directed from above to compensate for the humiliating withdrawal from southern Lebanon forced upon the Israeli army by Hezbollah in the summer of 2000 — the Second Intifada broke out in October 2000.

The direct violence against the occupied people from 2000 took also the form of intensive colonisation and Judaisation of the West Bank and Greater Jerusalem area.

This campaign was translated into the expropriation of Palestinian lands, encircling the Palestinian areas with apartheid walls, and giving a free license to the settlers to perpetrate attacks on Palestinians in the occupied territories and East Jerusalem.

In 2005, Palestinian civil society tried to offer the world a different kind of struggle through the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement – a non-violent struggle based on a call to the international community to put a stop to the Israeli colonialist violence, which has not been heeded, so far, by governments.

Instead, Israeli brutality on the ground increased and the Gaza resistance in particular fought back resiliently to the point that forced Israel to evict its settlers and soldiers from there in 2005.

However, the withdrawal did not liberate the Gaza Strip, it transformed from being a colonised space into becoming a killing field in which a new form of violence was introduced by Israel.

The colonising power moved from ethnic cleansing to genocide in its attempt to deal with the Palestinian refusal, in particular in the Gaza Strip, to live as a colonised people in the 21st century.

Since 2006, Hamas and Islamic Jihad have used violence in response to what they view as ongoing genocide by Israel against the people of the Gaza Strip. This violence has also been directed at the civilian population in Israel.

Western politicians and journalists often overlooked the indirect and long-term catastrophic effects of these policies on the Gaza population, including the destruction of health infrastructure and the trauma experienced by the 2.2 million people living in the Gaza ghetto.

As it did in 1948, Israel alleges that all its actions are defensive and retaliatory in response to Palestinian violence. In essence, however, Israeli actions since 2006 have not been retaliatory.

Israel initiated violent operations driven by the wish to continue the incomplete 1948 ethnic cleansing that left half of Palestinians inside historic Palestine and millions of others on Palestine’s borders. The eliminatory policies, as brutal as they were, were not successful in this respect; the desperate bouts of Palestinian resistance have instead been used as a pretext to complete the elimination project.

And the cycle continues. When Israel elected an extreme right-wing government in November 2022, Israeli violence was not restricted to Gaza. It appeared everywhere in historical Palestine. In the West Bank, the escalating violence from soldiers and settlers led to incremental ethnic cleansing, particularly in the southern Hebron mountains and the Jordan Valley. This resulted in an increase in killings, including those of teenagers, as well as a rise in arrests without trial.

Since November 2022, a different form of violence has plagued the Palestinian minority living in Israel. This community faces daily terror from criminal gangs that clash with each other, resulting in the murder of one or two community members each day. The police often ignore these issues. Some of these gangs include former collaborators with the occupation who were relocated to Palestinian areas following the Oslo agreement and maintain connections with the Israeli secret service.

Additionally, the new government has exacerbated tensions around the Al-Aqsa Mosque Compound, permitting more frequent and aggressive incursions into the Haram al-Sharif by politicians, police, and settlers.

It is too difficult to know yet whether there was a clear strategy behind the Hamas attack on October 7, or whether it went according to plan or not, whatever that plan may be. However, 17 years under Israeli blockade and the particularly violent Israeli government of November 2022 added to their determination to try a more drastic and daring form of anti-colonialist struggle for liberation.

Whatever we think about October 7, and we do not have yet a full picture, it was part of a liberation struggle. We may raise both moral questions about Hamas’ actions as well as questions of efficacy; liberation struggles throughout history have had their moments when one could raise such questions and even criticism.

But we cannot forget the source of violence that forced the pastoral people of Palestine after 120 years of colonisation to adopt armed struggle alongside non-violent methods.

On July 19, 2024, the International Court of Justice issued a significant ruling regarding the status of the West Bank, which went largely unnoticed. The court affirmed that the Gaza Strip is organically connected to the West Bank, and therefore, under international law, Israel remains the occupying power in Gaza. This means that actions against Israel by the people of Gaza are considered part of their right to resist occupation.

Once again, under the guise of retaliation and revenge, Israeli violence following October 7 bears the marks of its previous exploitation of cycles of violence.

This includes using genocide as a means to address Israel’s “demographic” issue — essentially, how to control the land of historical Palestine without its Palestinian inhabitants. By 1967, Israel had taken all of historical Palestine, but the demographic reality thwarted the goal of complete dispossession.

Ironically, Israel established the Gaza Strip in 1948 as a receptor for hundreds of thousands of refugees, “willing” to concede 2% of historical Palestine to remove a significant number of Palestinians expelled by its army during the Nakba.

This particular refugee camp has proven more challenging to Israel’s plans to de-Arabize Palestine than any other area, due to the resilience and resistance of its people.

Any attempt to stop Israel’s genocide in Gaza must be made in two ways. First, immediate action is needed to stop the violence through a ceasefire and, ideally, international sanctions on Israel. Second, it is crucial to prevent the next phase of the genocide, which could target the West Bank. This requires the continuation and intensification of the global solidarity movement’s campaign to pressure governments and policymakers into compelling Israel to end its genocidal policies.

Since the late 19th century and the arrival of Zionism in Palestine, the impulse of the Palestinians has not been about violence or revenge. The impulse remains the return to normal and natural life, a right that has been denied to the Palestinians for more than a century, not only by Zionism and Israel but by the powerful alliance that allowed and immunised the project of the dispossession of Palestine.

This is not a wish to romanticise or idealise Palestinian society. It was, and would continue to be, a typical society in a region where tradition and modernity often coexist in a complex relationship, and where collective identities can sometimes lead to divisions, especially when external forces seek to exploit these differences.

However, pre-Zionist Palestine was a place where Muslims, Christians, and Jews coexisted peacefully, and where most people experienced violence only rarely — likely less frequently than in many parts of the Global North.

Violence as a permanent and massive aspect of life can only be removed when its source is removed. In the case of Palestine, it is the ideology and praxis of the Israeli settler state, not the existential struggle of the colonised Palestinian people.

Ilan Pappé is an Israeli historian and socialist activist. He is a professor of history at the College of Social Sciences and International Studies at the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom, director of the university’s European Centre for Palestine Studies, and co-director of the Exeter Centre for Ethno-Political Studies. He is also the author of the bestselling The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine (Oneworld) and many other books. Republished with permission by the author from The New Arab.

This article was first published on Café Pacific.

The coalition government is telling New Zealanders in Iran and Lebanon to leave immediately as tensions rise in the Middle East.

“The New Zealand government urges New Zealanders in Lebanon and Iran to leave now while options remain available,” Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters said in a social media post today.

“We also recommend New Zealanders in Israel consider whether they need to remain in the country.”

The New Zealand Government urges New Zealanders in Lebanon and Iran to leave now while options remain available.

We also recommend New Zealanders in Israel consider whether they need to remain in the country.

-WP

— Winston Peters (@NewZealandMFA) August 4, 2024

It comes after the government updated its Safetravel advisory, warning people not to travel to Lebanon due to what it called the volatile security situation.

The advisory elevated Lebanon to the highest level, meaning “extreme risk”.

The United States has urged citizens to leave Lebanon on “any available ticket”, while the British Foreign Secretary warned British citizens in Lebanon to leave immediately or risk “becoming trapped in a warzone”.

Iran vowed retaliation
Iran has vowed to retaliate against Israel, which it blames for the killing of Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the Hamas political bureau, earlier this week.

Just hours before his assassination, Israel killed Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr in an air strike.

There are fears that Hezbollah — which is based in Lebanon and backed by Iran — could play a big part in any retaliation.

That, in turn, could result in a huge Israeli response.

Israel has been at war with Hamas since the resistance group’s attack on 7 October 2023 which saw nearly 1200 people killed.

Israel’s ground and air campaigns have killed more than 40,000 people in Gaza in the months since, according to Palestinian health authorities.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Hanan Ashrawi, a Palestinian political leader and a former member of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) Executive Committee, says Israel’s “gangster style assassination and extrajudicial executions” are designed to “inflame the whole region”, reports Al Jazeera.

The killings of the Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and Hezbollah military commander Fuad Shukr in Beirut, Lebanon, were carried out to “sabotage any chances” of a ceasefire deal in Gaza and regional de-escalation, Ashrawi said.

Haniyeh was a chief Hamas negotiator for a ceasefire in Israel’s genocidal war and had built up formidable diplomatic credentials across the region.

While Israel and the United States regarded him as a “terrorist”, thousands mourned him across the Middle East yesterday, demonstrated huge and widespread support and respect.

“These are attacks not just on the capitals of sovereign states but also on significant leaders to ensure total provocation [and] destabilisation,” Ashrawi wrote on social media.

“Israel is a rogue state that represents a real [and] present danger globally,” she said.

‘Maddening and shameful’
Marking the 300th day of Israel’s war on Gaza yesterday, Palestinian-American scholar Noura Erakat said it was “maddening and shameful” that the world had not been able to stop one of the “grossest, most blatant colonial genocides”.

In a post on social media, Erakat said Israel’s genocide in Gaza had featured the use of advanced weapons as well as the spread of disease, “poisoning of the earth” as well as sexual assault and torture, reports Al Jazeera.

Israel’s genocide must be remembered for what it is, Erakat said, adding “we cannot afford to lose the next battle over narrative”.

“A blight on all humanity, to ascribe shame to all who let it happen [and] glory to those who fought so that the future indeed ensures: never again,” she said.

Day 300. Its maddening and shameful we have not been able to end one of the grossest, most blatant colonial #genocides feat disease, poisoning of the earth, sexual assualt, torture, & advanced weapons. This will end & we cannot afford to lose the next battle over narrative (1/2)

— Noura Erakat (@4noura) August 1, 2024

According to an analysis of data from the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), Israel is responsible for 17,081 incidents of air/drone raids, shelling/missile attacks, remote explosives and property destruction in eight countries since October 7, including the occupied Palestinian territory, Lebanon, Syria, Egypt, Yemen, Jordan, Iran and Iraq.

A majority of these attacks were on the Palestinian territory, specifically the Gaza Strip, with 10,389 incidents accounting for more than 60 percent of the total offensives.

There were at least 6,544 incidents of Israeli attacks on Lebanon (38 percent), followed by Syria with 144 such incidents recorded.

Haniyeh funeral final ceremonies in Qatar.           Video: Al Jazeera

Released 15 Palestinian prisoners tortured
Israeli forces have released 15 Palestinian prisoners into Gaza. They were dropped off at a military checkpoint near Deir el-Balah in central Gaza. Many spoke of abuse and torture while detained.

Israel has detained thousands of Palestinians during the war in Gaza and stands accused of numerous cases of torture, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights says in a new report.

The 23-page report, released on Wednesday, noted allegations of widespread abuse of prisoners being held incommunicado in arbitrary, prolonged detention.

It was published during a tense standoff in Israel as far-right politicians and demonstrators opposed an investigation into alleged sexual abuse of Palestinian detainees by Israeli soldiers.

The death toll in the genocidal war at the 300 day mark has topped 40,000 Palestinians, including more than 16,000 children.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The War on Gaza will be etched in the memories of generations to come — the brutality of Hamas’s 7 October 2023 attack, and the ferocity of Israel’s retaliation.

In this Four Corners investigative report, The Forever War, broadcast in Australia last night, ABC’s global affairs editor John Lyons asks the tough questions — challenging some of Israel’s most powerful political and military voices about the country’s strategy and intentions.

The result is a compelling interview-led piece of public interest journalism about one of the most controversial wars of modern times.

Former prime minister Ehud Barak says Benjamin Netanyahu can’t be trusted, former Shin Bet internal security director Ami Ayalon describes two key far-right Israeli ministers as “terrorists”,  and cabinet minister Avi Dichter makes a grave prediction about the conflict’s future.

Is there any way out of what’s beginning to look like the forever war? Lyons gives his perspective on the tough decisions for the future of both Palestinians and Israelis.

‘The Forever War’ – ABC Four Corners.      ABC Trailer on YouTube

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

With an “appalling” loss of life unfolding in Gaza, it’s essential Israel halts plans for an assault on the city of Rafah, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says.

The government has hardened its position towards Israel’s actions in Gaza, saying air strikes on the southern city of Rafah should stop and Israel should not go ahead with any more ground operations.

At a post-Cabinet press conference yesterday, Luxon said he was extremely concerned about the 1.5 million Palestinians sheltering in Rafah right now — and that his preference was for a complete pause in hostilities.

He said Foreign Minister Winston Peters had met with Israeli ambassador Ran Yaakoby at the Beehive on Monday to pass on the government’s concerns.

The statements come as British Foreign Secretary David Cameron has also called for the fighting to stop and for a permanent sustainable ceasefire to be put in place.

New Zealand was one of 153 countries calling for the ceasefire, Luxon told RNZ Morning Report.

He said the government was extremely concerned about the loss of life for civilians as well as the threat to regional stability in the Middle East.

‘Loss of life appalling’
“The loss of life is appalling, the humanitarian situation is deteriorating, the cost of the conflict frankly is far too high.

“We want to see a pause in hostilities and that’s why we’ve said we don’t want Israel to proceed with an assault on Rafah.”

He said it was crucial to invoke the Middle East peace process which would take action from both sides — Hamas to release the remaining hostages and stop its rocket fire on Israel while the latter would need to cease its military operations and allow increased humanitarian aid for Gaza.

“What you’re hearing overnight is a concerted position from countries all around the world saying: look, we need an immediate humanitarian ceasefire. That needs to be the pathway to the permanent sustainable ceasefire we all want to see happen.”

Israel had a massive duty to protect civilians in Gaza and consider the long-term impact of its actions on the Middle East.

“That’s why we just don’t think going into Rafah, proceeding with operations there is a way forward. We want Israel to stop and think about the consequences and getting a long-term solution in place to actually get to peace.”

New Zealand had also continued to contribute humanitarian support with another $5 million donation to the International Red Cross and the World Food Programme.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

An activist organisation is accusing the Aotearoa New Zealand police of brutality after arrests were made at a pro-Palestine protest in Lyttelton today.

About 60 people took part in the protest at Lyttelton Port this morning, and police said four people were arrested about 1pm after blocking traffic.

Protesters had blocked a tunnel and poured a liquid onto the road, a police spokesperson said.

Charges were being considered.

Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) secretary Neil Scott issued a statement saying members were “repulsed” by police actions at the protest, which he labelled “disgusting”.

“The police arrested seven people and pepper sprayed many, including senior citizens protesting peacefully,” Scott said.

Scott said the group was 17 weeks into protests calling for a ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza and for the government to condemn the violations since last month’s International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling.

Police ‘aggression’ increased
Police “aggression” toward the protest activities had been increasing during that time, Scott said, and the group wanted an investigation into officers’ actions at the latest protest.

Protest organiser Ihorangi Reweti-Peters told RNZ that police used “brute force” to stop protesters from blocking the road.

“Police were sort of rarking people up and saying, ‘come on then’, and ‘do it’.”

“Everyone was sprayed — pepper sprayed — and then the people were arrested.”

Three of those arrested had been released by early this evening, Reweti-Peters said.

Police have been contacted for comment.

• Protest organisers are planning a pro-Palestine protest at Parliament and the US Embassy in Wellington next Tuesday.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The incoming chair of the ABC, Kim Williams, must immediately move to restore the reputation of Australia’s national broadcaster by addressing concerns about the impact of external pressures on editorial decision making, says the media union.

The Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance, the union representing journalists at the ABC, today called on Williams to work with unions to support staff who were under attack, reaffirm the commitment to cultural diversity in the workplace, and uphold the standards of reporting without fear or favour that the public expected of the ABC.

MEAA welcomed the appointment of Williams, a former chief executive of News Corp Australia, noting that he had decades of media experience including senior management positions at the ABC, commercial broadcast media and arts administration in the past, and that he had been recommended by an independent nomination panel.

The acting chief executive of MEAA, Adam Portelli, said the new chair would take office at a critical time for the ABC’s future following a staff vote of no confidence in managing director David Anderson earlier this week over the handling of a crisis over pressure from pro-Israeli lobbyists in the war on Gaza.

“On Monday, union members overwhelmingly said they had lost confidence in David Anderson because of his failure to address very real concerns about the way the ABC deals with external pressure and supports journalists from First Nations and culturally diverse backgrounds when they are under attack,” he said.

“Public trust in the ABC as an organisation that will always pursue frank and fearless journalism has been damaged, and management under Mr Anderson has not demonstrated it is taking these concerns seriously.

Buttrose ‘completely out of touch’
“Following yesterday’s board meeting, the current chair, Ita Buttrose, revealed she is completely out of touch with the concerns felt in newsrooms across Australia,” Portelli said.

“Dozens of staff have told us their first hand experiences of feeling unsupported by management when under external attack and the negative impact this is having on their ability to do their jobs and on the reputation and integrity of the ABC. But Ms Buttrose failed to acknowledge these concerns.

“ABC journalists have put forward five very reasonable suggestions to restore the confidence of staff in the managing director but at this stage, Mr Anderson has not committed to an urgent meeting as they requested.”

Portelli said MEAA was optimistic that Williams would bring a more collaborative approach to dealing with issues of cultural safety and editorial integrity than had been witnessed under Buttrose.

“He must understand that nothing less than the reputation of the ABC is at stake here,” Portelli said.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Palestinian photojournalist Motaz Azaiza, who has been documenting the impact of the war in the Gaza Strip, has left the enclave for Qatar and gave his first interview there with the Doha-based Al Jazeera global news channel.

Azaiza announced on Instagram yesterday that he was leaving the besieged enclave before boarding a Qatari military airplane at Egypt’s El Arish International Airport.

However, it was unclear how he was able to leave Gaza or why he had evacuated, reports Al Jazeera.

“This is the last time you will see me with this heavy, stinky [press] vest. I decided to evacuate today. … Hopefully soon I’ll jump back and help to build Gaza again,” Azaiza said in a video.

The 24-year-old Palestinian captured the attention of millions globally — including in the South Pacific — as he filmed himself in a press vest and helmet to document conditions during Israel’s war, which has killed more than 25,000 people in Gaza.

“Motaz Azaiza – A 24-year-old man from Gaza, in 108 days, did what CNN, Fox, the BBC, and all their ‘journalism’ predecessors refused to do for 75 years.

“Humanise a people!”

– Khaled Beydoun

Israel launched its offensive after Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, killing 1,139 people and taking more than 200 people captive.

Azaiza’s coverage often took the form of raw, unfiltered videos about injured children or families crushed under rubble in the aftermath of Israeli air strikes.

He said he has had to “evacuate for a lot of reasons you all know some of it but not all of it”.

In his post, he was seen on a video about to board a grey plane emblazoned with the words “Qatar Emiri Air Force”.

I’m at Al Jazeera studios where they are streaming.
حلل يا دويري pic.twitter.com/fWoABDKD3t

— MoTaz (@azaizamotaz9) January 24, 2024

“First video outside Gaza,” he said in one clip, revealing that it was his first time on a aircraft. “Heading to Qatar.”

He also shared a video of the inside of the plane as it landed in Doha.

Palestinian photojournalist Motaz Azaiza leaves Gaza after his “heroic” humanitarian reporting . . . “we are all Palestinian.” Video: Al Jazeera

Since the start of the war, the photojournalist has amassed millions of followers across multiple platforms.

His Instagram following has grown from about 27,500 to 18.25 million in the more than 108 days since October 7, according to an assessment of social media analytics by Al Jazeera.

His Facebook account grew from a similar starting point to nearly 500,000 followers. He now has one million followers on X, formerly known as Twitter.

As well as his social media posts, Azaiza has produced content for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNWRA).

I left Gaza with a broken heart and eyes filled with tears.
There was no other option after 108 days of continuous massacres against us.
It’s time to move somewhere else so I can do more work and I pray that I can be a reason to stop this war and help rebuild Gaza again.
I’ve… pic.twitter.com/kg3FwTi38d

— MoTaz (@azaizamotaz9) January 24, 2024

Social media users thanked Azaiza for his coverage of the war, many saluting him as a hero.

“Thank you for everything you have done, you have moved mountains, what you have done in the last 100 days people can’t do in their whole lifetime. You were a pivotal voice in showing the world the Israeli atrocities in Gaza. Wishing you well and safety,” one user said on X.

Another, Khaled Beydoun, wrote on Instagram, “Motaz Azaiza – A 24-year-old man from Gaza, in 108 days, did what CNN, Fox, the BBC, and all their ‘journalism’ predecessors refused to do for 75 years.

“Humanise a people!”

“I’m so glad you had the opportunity to get out, God willing, YOU WILL RETURN TO A FREE PALESTINE,” wrote another.

“We love you so deeply,” American musician Kehlani wrote, adding, “Thank you for your humanity.”

“Frame that vest. It’s the armor of one of history’s greatest heroes,” comedian Sammy Obeid said.

Pacific Media Watch sourced from Al Jazeera.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) – based in The Hague, in The Netherlands – is being asked by South Africa if the 100-day (so far) slaughter by the Government of Israel in Gaza constitutes a ‘genocide’. Thus ‘genocide’ is presented as a binary concept, in a context where there is no word for a slaughter which falls just short of the lawyers’ definition.

The Israeli government is presenting a defence, though it’s a defence based on a mix of procedural technicalities and justification; not a defence based on the normal usage of the word ‘genocide’ as historians have used it. Among other things, Israel resorts to the b-word – ‘baseless’ – which is standard response language to an allegation which is true in substance but for which the alleger might not have the required standard of proof. And Israel also ‘defends’ the accusation of genocide by justifying it, even suggesting that the real perpetrators of genocide are Hamas with their deadly assault on Israeli civilians and soldiers situated outside Gaza’s border fence on October 7. Justifying an action is different to denying it.

If the ICJ proves unwilling to apply the ‘genocide’ label to the atrocious slaughter of Gazans – a group of Palestinian people fenced into a diminishing camp, and not even able to leave as refugees – then the ICJ will not have done its job if they are unable to come up with an alternative descriptor.

A sensible solution, it seems to me, is to think of genocide as an analogue concept; not a binary. And one practical way of dealing with analogues is to use the concept of ‘levels’ or of ‘degrees’. Thus a ‘murder of the first degree’ is worse than a ‘murder of the second degree’. And a ‘level five storm’ is more damaging than a ‘level four storm’.

(Indeed New Zealand faced the Covid19 pandemic a few months after a major and fatal volcanic eruption, on Whakaari White Island. An active volcano, Whakaari was on a ‘level two’ alert when the sudden eruption happened. Tourists were on the island. Earlier in 2018 it had been on a ‘level one’ alert, the lowest for an active volcano. Then Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern went on to apply that ‘level’ terminology to Covid19 public health restrictions. Thus, in April 2020, New Zealand went into a ‘level four lockdown’.)

I propose five levels of genocide. I have no qualms about calling the gas chamber Holocaust of World War II (WW2) as a level five genocide. But we should note that WW2 contained other genocides; with the murders of Jews in the fenced-in Warsaw Ghetto mainly in 1940 and 1941 as such a genocide, with people dying in the Ghetto from “mass shootings” and “starvation”. So too, was the suppression of the Warsaw Uprising in 1944; this time the victims were mainly Poles of Slavic ethnicity. The axis-of-resistance in 1944 was international, indeed – according to Wikipedia – it included the South African Air Force. I would argue that the suppression of the Warsaw Uprising was a level four genocide. Likewise, would I label the ongoing suppression of the 2023 Gaza Uprising.

While I would not object to the Gaza Uprising of 7 October 2023 being labelled a level one genocide, I would always argue that one genocide can never be an excuse for another. (And I would note that the victims of 7 October – who included Thai nationals – died in some part because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Hamas – the perpetrator of that Gaza Uprising – did not target Thai people because of their identity. And they targeted Israelis because they were Israeli, not because they were Jewish.)

I would be inclined to categorize the systematic killing of Bosnian Muslims (Bosniaks) in the 1990s as a level two genocide. The atrocities first committed on the Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar by the military wing of the Aung San Suu Kyi government – and, by all accounts, continued by the present military administration –might be regarded as level three genocide; at least many Rohingya were able to escape as refugees to Bangladesh. Similarly, the genocides in Darfur, in the west of Sudan. The nineteenth century slow genocide of Tasmania was arguably a ‘level four’. The 1994 genocide in Rwanda would be level three or level four.

There can be little doubt that, if there was a formal system of genocide levels, the present ‘War on Gaza’ would have to be defined as a genocide. The legal arguments would be about the level, not the word.

Nothing excuses genocidal behaviour, whatever the level. Though, in almost all cases, genocides can be understood. One genocide cannot excuse another. Somewhat more difficult to understand is the patronage of genocide, such as that perpetrated by the supposedly ‘liberal’ United States’ government. An emerging trope is that of Genocide Joe (and note these cartoons by Brazilian Carlos Latuff, relayed by Iran’s Abna24). Even more difficult to understand is the Democrat Party’s promotion of Joe Biden as their 2024 presidential candidate. And the credulous media blindspots. And the liberal descendants of the perpetrators of the Warsaw Uprising just 80 years ago; supporting, at present at governmental level, another mass slaughter.

Genocide is almost certainly much more common in history than most people realise. The problem is that most genocides remain undocumented (or under-documented) by their victims; history is largely written by the conflicts’ winners. Clearly Israel would like it to remain that way, to ‘win’ and to suppress the documentation of genocide.

To leave Gazans as the majority population in Gaza would only lead to the formation of Hamas 2.0. It seems to me that the Israeli government seeks to eradicate Hamas 2.0 by today killing the children of Gaza – those who survive will become Hamas 2.0 – as well as by killing the fighters of Hamas 1.0. (And we should note that the extreme violence in Gaza is an attention-span distraction from the less intense genocide – a slower and possibly bigger genocide – of Palestinians which is taking place on the ‘West Bank’.)

Given the absence of other technical words for lower-level genocides, we should understand ‘genocide’ as an analogue concept; a spectrum that covers a whole range of targeted mass slaughters. The definitional threshold for a ‘level one genocide’ should be quite low. Whether or not the common-sense ‘levels’ approach is adopted by the international community, my sense is that – descriptively – the War on Gaza is a higher-level genocide than the successfully prosecuted 1990s’ Bosnian genocide. I would compare the War on Gaza with the two Warsaw genocides of World War 2.

Mass slaughter is too important to be downplayed due to the self-enforced use of binary semantics. Genocide cannot be magicked away by well-remunerated lawyers and technically-minded judges.

*******

Keith Rankin (keith at rankin dot nz), trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand.

Pacific Media Watch

Al Jazeera’s senior political analyst Marwan Bishara says Israel’s legal team “started off weak” but made a few strong points near the end.

Bishara said the lawyers’ efforts at the genocide hearings at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague yesterday to deflect blame for Israel’s attacks and ignore the context of Israel’s 75-year occupation of Palestine came across as “illogical”, the Al Jazeera video clip reports.

Their claims that Israel’s forces are “trying to protect, rather than harm”, civilians were also unconvincing, he said, given the toll of the war: 23,357 Palestinians, including 9,600 children, since October 7.

However, Bishara said Israel’s lawyers did well to zero in on the jurisdiction of the ICJ — pointing out that the court must specifically prove Israel was guilty of genocidal intent, not any other violations.

“You can claim Israel has committed heinous crimes, but if they do not fall under the framework of genocide, the court has no jurisdiction,” Bishara said.

Speaking to reporters outside the ICJ in The Hague, Palestinian Foreign Ministry official Ammar Hijazi said Israel’s legal team was not “able to provide any solid arguments on the basis of fact and law”.

“What Israel has provided today are many of the already debunked lies,” he added, referring to, among others, Israeli clams that hospitals in Gaza were being used as military bases.

“Additionally, we think that what the Israeli team today has tried to provide is the exact thing that South Africa came to the court for — and that is, nothing at all justifies genocide.”

Thomas MacManus, a senior lecturer in state crime at Queen Mary University of London, said the ICJ was likely to see a “massive disconnect” between the picture Israel painted of its humanitarian concern for Gaza and “the reality on the ground where UN agencies say people are starving, lacking water, and seeing attacks on hospitals, schools, and universities.”

‘Nothing can ever justify genocide’
South Africa’s Minister of Justice Ronald Lamola told media “Self-defence is no answer to genocide”.

Here are the main points from his interaction:

• “”Israel failed to disprove South Africa’s compelling case that was presented;
• Israel tells the court that statements read out by senior Israeli political, military and civilian society leaders are simply rhetorical, and we shall not ascribe them any importance;
• “There is no debate about what Prime Minister Netanyahu’s term ‘Amalek’ means and how it is understood by soldiers fighting on the ground and by the Israelis;
• “How can you ignore Netanyahu’s statement, the statement of the defence minister and the ground forces? That is a clear implementation of policy.
• “Israel chose to focus extensively on the events of October 7. South Africa has not ignored this event as Israel alleged because it has unequivocally condemned and continues to condemn October 7; and
• “Self-defence is no answer to genocide. Nothing can ever justify genocide.”

Marwan Bishara comments on the Israeli ICJ defence. Video: Al Jazeera

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

South Africa has accused Israel of “genocidal intent” over its war on the besieged enclave Gaza Strip, and pleaded with judges at the UN International Court of Justice (ICJ) to issue an interim order demanding Israel halt its military offensive in the embattled territory, reports Middle East Eye.

South African lawyer Adila Hassim told judges at The Hague that “genocides are never declared in advance, but this court has the benefit of the past 13 weeks of evidence that shows incontrovertibly a pattern of conduct and related intention that justifies as a plausible claim of genocidal acts”.

“Israel deployed 6000 bombs per week . . . No one is spared. Not even newborns.

UN chiefs have described it as a graveyard for children,” she said told the court on the opening session of the two-day preliminary hearing.

“Nothing will stop the suffering except an order from this court.”

Israel’s ongoing three-month war in Gaza has killed more than 23,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, lawyers told the court.

Most of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million has been displaced, and an Israeli blockade severely limiting food, fuel and medicine has caused a humanitarian “catastrophe”, according to the UN.

‘Genocidal in character’
South Africa submitted its case against Israel at the ICJ last month and has said Israel’s actions in Gaza are “genocidal in character because they are intended to bring about the destruction of a substantial part of the Palestinian national, racial and ethnic group”.

Tembeka Ngcukaitobi, another South African lawyer and legal scholar at the hearing, said Pretoria was not alone in drawing attention to Israel’s genocidal rhetoric.

He said that at least 15 UN special rapporteurs and 21 members of the UN working groups had warned that what was happening in Gaza reflected a genocide in the making.

Video: Middle East Eye

Ngcukaitobi added that genocidal intent was evident in the way Israel’s military was conducting attacks, including the targeting of family homes and civilian infrastructure.

“Israel’s political leaders, military commanders and persons holding official positions have systematically and in explicit terms declared their genocidal intent.”

Ngcukaitobi said the “genocidal rhetoric” had become common within the Israeli Knesset, with several MPs calling for Gaza to be “wiped out, flattened, erased and crushed”.

Israeli defence
On Wednesday, Nissim Vaturi, a member of Israel’s ruling Likud party, said it was a “privilege” for his country to appear at The Hague as he doubled down on earlier remarks where he said there were “no innocent people” in Gaza.

This is the first time Israel is being tried under the United Nations’ Genocide Convention, which was drawn up after the Second World War in light of the atrocities committed against Jews and other persecuted minorities during the Holocaust.

During yesterday’s proceedings, Professor Max du Plessis, another lawyer representing South Africa, said Israel had subjected the Palestinian people to an oppressive and prolonged violation of their rights to self-determination for more than half a century.

Dr Du Plessis added that based on materials shown before the court, the acts of Israel were plausibly characterised as genocidal.

“South Africa’s obligation is motivated by the need to protect Palestinians in Gaza and their absolute rights not to be subjected to genocidal acts.”

Genocide cases, which are notoriously hard to prove, can take years to resolve, but South Africa is asking the court to speedily implement “provisional measures” and “order Israel to cease killing and causing serious mental and bodily harm to Palestinian people in Gaza”.

Thank you Madiba. Thank you South Africa. 🇿🇦 🇵🇸#ICJ #ICJGenocideConvention pic.twitter.com/9xjdSR40MI

— Dr. Omar Suleiman (@omarsuleiman504) January 11, 2024

Three hour hearing
Yesterday’s hearing consisted of three hours of detailed descriptions detailing what South Africa says is a clear example of genocide. Israel will today have three hours to respond on Friday.

The spokesperson of the Israeli Foreign Affairs, Lior Haiat, hit out at the comments made in the hearing, calling it “one of the greatest shows of hypocrisy,” and demonstrated “false and baseless claims.”

He also accused South Africa of “functioning as the legal arm of the Hamas terrorist organisation”.

As South Africa did in its 84-page legal filing ahead of the case, the country’s Minister of Justice Ronald Lamola repeated that he “unequivocally condemns Hamas” for the October 7 attack on southern Israel.

Republished from Middle East Eye.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Reporting Israel’s war on Gaza has become the greatest credibility challenge for journalists and media of our times. The latest assassination of an Al Jazeera photojournalist yesterday while documenting atrocities has prompted a leading analyst to appeal to global journalists to “take a stand” to protect the profession.

The killing of Hamza Dahdoud, the 27-year-old eldest son of Al Jazeera Gaza bureau chief Wael Dahdouh, along with freelancer Mustafa Thuraya, has taken the death toll of Palestinian journalists to 109 (according to Al Jazeera sources while global media freedom watchdogs report slightly lower figures).

Emotional responses and a wave of condemnation has thrown the spotlight on the toll faced by reporters and their families.

Wael Dahdouh, 52, lost his wife, daughter, grandson and 15-year-old son on October 25 in an earlier Israeli air raid that hit the house they were sheltering in. After mourning for several hours, Dahdouh senior was back on the job documenting the war.

Just under 20 months ago, Al Jazeera’s best known correspondent, Shireen Abu Akleh, was fatally shot by an Israeli sniper while reporting on the Occupied West Bank on 11 May 2022 in what Paris-based Reporters Without Borders (RSF) condemned by saying this “systematic Israeli impunity is outrageous.”

The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists protested about the killing of Hamza Dahdoud and Thuraya, saying it “must be independently investigated, and those behind their deaths must be held accountable”.

But few journalists would accept that this is anything other a targeted killing, as most of the deaths of Palestinian journalists in the latest Gaza war have been – a war on Palestinian journalism in an attempt to suppress the truth.

‘Nowhere safe in Gaza’
Certainly, Al Jazeera’s Palestinian-Israeli political affairs analyst and Marwan Bishara, who was born in Nazareth, has no doubts.

Speaking on the 24-hour Qatari world news channel, with at least 22,835 people killed in Gaza – 70 percent of them women and children — he said: “Nowhere is safe in Gaza and no journalists are safe . . . That tells us something.

“Killing the messenger”: Marwan Bishara’s interview with Al Jazeera — more tampering over the message? There is nothing “sensitive” in this clip.

“It is understood they are war journalists. But still the fact that more than 100 journalists were killed within three months is breaking yet another record in terms of killing children, and destruction of hospitals and schools, and the killing of United Nations staff.

“And now with 109 journalists killed this definitely requires a certain stand on the part of our colleagues around the world. Not just in a higher up institution.

“I am talking about journalists around the world – those who came to cover the World Cup in Doha for labour rights, or whatever. Those who are shedding tears in the Ukraine, those who are trying to cover Xinjiang in China [persecution of the Uyghur people], those who are claiming there are genocides happening right, left and centre – from China to Ukraine, to elsewhere.

“The same journalists who see in plain sight what is happening in Gaza should – regardless if we disagree on Israel’s motives, or Israel’s objectives in this war – must agree that the protection of journalists and their families is indispensable for our profession. And for their profession,” Bishara said.

“Journalists, and journalism associations and syndicates around the world – especially in those countries with influence on Israel, as in Europe, or the United States; journalists need to take a stand on what is going on in Gaza.

‘Cannot go unanswered’
“This cannot continue and go on unanswered. What about them?

“They’re going to be from various media outlets deploying journalists in war-stricken areas. They will have to call for the defence of journalists and their lives and their protection.

“This cannot go on like this unabated in Gaza,” Bishara added, as Israeli defence officials have warned the fighting could go on for another year.

The South African genocide case filed against Israel in the International Court of Justice seeking an interim injunction for a ceasefire and due for a hearing later this week could pose the best chance for an end to the war.

Bishara has partially blamed Western news networks for failing to report the war on Gaza accurately and fairly, a criticism he has made in the past and his articles about Israel are insightful and damning.

His call for a stand by journalists has in fact been echoed in some quarters where “media bias” has been challenged, opening divisions among media groups about fairness and balance that have become the most bitter since the climate change and covid pandemic debates when media “deniers” and “bothsideism” threatened to undermine science.

In November, more than 1500 journalists from scores of US media organisations signed an open letter calling for integrity in Western media’s coverage of “Israeli atrocities against Palestinians”.

Israel has blocked foreign press entry, heavily restricted telecommunications and bombed press offices. Some 50 media headquarters in Gaza have been hit in the past month.

Israeli forces explicitly warned newsrooms they “cannot guarantee” the safety of their employees from airstrikes. Taken with a decades-long pattern of lethally targeting journalists, Israel’s actions show wide scale suppression of speech.

In the United Kingdom, eight BBC journalists wrote an open letter in late November to Al Jazeera accusing the British broadcaster of bias in its coverage of Gaza.

A 2300-word letter claimed that the BBC had a “double standard” and was failing to tell the Israel-Palestine conflict accurately, “investing greater effort in humanising Israeli victims compared with Palestinians, and omitting key historical context in coverage”.

What is next? He lost everyone!!! Literally!!! #GazaGenocide pic.twitter.com/1LVh4eruIt

— Palestine News (@palestine) January 7, 2024

In Australia, another open letter by scores of journalists and the national media union MEAA called for “integrity, transparency and rigour” in the coverage of the war and joined the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), RSF and others condemning the Israeli attacks on journalists and journalism.

Leading Australian newspaper editors of The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age and the Nine network hit back by banning staff who had signed the letter. According to the independent Crikey, a senior Nine staff journalist resigned and readers were angrily cancelling their newspaper subscriptions over the ban.

Crikey later exposed many editors and journalists who had made junket trips to Israel and is currently keeping an inventory of these “influenced” media people — at least 77 have been named so far.

In The Daily Blog, editor Martyn Bradbury has also questioned how many New Zealand journalists have also been influenced by Israeli media massaging. Bradbury wrote:

“If Israel has sunk that much time and resource charming Australian journalists and politicians, the question has to be asked, [has] the pro-Israel lobby sent NZ journalists and politicians on these junkets and if they have, who are they?”

He wrote to the NZ Press Gallery, the “journalist union” and media companies requesting a list of names.

Pacific journalists ought to be also added to the list.

I have just returned from a two-month trip in the Mediterranean, Red Sea and Australia. After a steady diet of comprehensive and well backgrounded reporting from global news channels such as TRT World News and Al Jazeera (which contrasted sharply in quality, depth and fairness with stereotypical Western coverage such as from BBC and CNN), I was stunned by the blatant bias of much of the Australian news media, particularly News Corp titles such as The Australian and The Advertiser in Adelaide.

Some examples of the bias and my commentaries can be seen here, here, here, here, here and here.

A pithy indictment of much of the Western reporting — including in New Zealand — can be read in the Middle East Eye and other publications.

Exposing much of the Israeli propaganda and fabricated claims since October 7 (and even from time of The Nakba in 1948), award-winning columnist Peter Osborne wrote:

“I am haunted by one other consideration. It is not just that Western commentators, columnists and chat show hosts often don’t know what they are talking about. It’s not even that they pretend they do.

“It’s the comfort of their lives. They sit in warm, pleasant studios where they earn six-figure sums for their opinions. They take no risks and convey no truths.”

A polar opposite from the Gaza carnage and the risks that courageous Palestinian journalists face daily to bear witness. They are an inspiration to the rest of us.

Dr David Robie is editor and publisher of Asia Pacific Report and Café Pacific.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

In this the twelfth episode of A View from Afar for 2023 political scientist Dr Paul Buchanan and Selwyn Manning note and discuss some of the big world events that have occurred and are occurring in 2023.

And in particular, Paul and Selwyn discuss the rise of the Global South; evaluate the the wars that continue to rage in Ukraine and Gaza; and tensions in the South China Sea.

Plus they note, with particular reference the trends that will become prominent in 2024, including the decline of Western democracies and a rightward turn in many places (including in Argentina and New Zealand in their respective 2023 elections).

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE:

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RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

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