Speakers at a pro-Palestine rally in central Auckland Tamaki Makaurau today were highly critical of the erosion of New Zealand’s once proud nuclear-free and independent foreign policy.

They also warned against being tied into a United States that is pivoting a hostile policy towards China, New Zealand’s major trading partner.

Ironically, just hours after the rally ended news broke of the unprovoked and illegal attack by Israel and the US against Iran barely eight months after a 12-day war last year.

With a theme posing the question “Is New Zealand a peace loving nation or a cog in the US war machine,” the speakers concluded that indeed the Pacific country was a “US war machine cog”.

Physicist Dr Peter Wills, a long-time activist and advocate for peace and a nuclear-free Pacific, focused on New Zealand’s role in the Five Eyes intelligence-sharing alliance.

He said the Five Eyes relationship has superseded ANZUS “or anything else”, saying while  the pact formalised in 1946 used to be intelligence, now it was the name of a five-nation military grouping.

“That’s the Anglo-Saxon countries,” he said. “Us good English-speaking people, you know, the white imperialists and colonialists of the world – the UK, USA, Canada, Australia and little old New Zealand.

“We’re all a part of it.

Eavesdropping on countries
“It used to be an intelligence agreement because they would talk about what they have listened to with other countries by eavesdropping on their radio communications and so on.

“But now everything has become so integrated, they have become the centre of war fighting.”

Explaining further, Dr Wills said: “And so they have this thing that they call C-5, which is command control for communications, computers and cyber.”

He said a top priority project was to make up a globally integrated “all domain” command and control system, which was hoped to be in place for next year.

The project had been discussed in Portsmouth, UK, in May 2024. Its purpose was to track friendly and enemy forces and send orders for attack.

“All domains – navy, land, air and space forces,” said Dr Wills, an honorary professor.

Globally integrated intelligence and military actions could be launched and directed anywhere in the world.

Countering China
It was electronic infrastructure for a superpower confrontation – to “develop a credible and effective combined all-domain command and control capability for operations to counter China”.

For Five Eyes officers overseeing these new digital and AI war-fighting systems at the Portsmouth meeting, a key objective was building the capability for confrontation with China.

“This means NZ following the US into military conflict with China,” Dr Wills said.

“We are involved in GIDE – Global Information Dominance Experiments, a new one is prepared every three months.

“And we will align with whatever is chosen by Five Eyes, either British or American.”

From an American point of view, said Dr Wills, New Zealand was a US ally, eager to play a role, “however small we are, to supporting the US around the globe”.

They also wanted NZ to get rid of its anti-nuclear legislation and return to ANZUS. This was the view of senior military officers and senior foreign affairs and intelligence officials

US ‘instability and bullying’
However, the majority of New Zealanders saw the US as a “source of instability and bullying” of New Zealand over its nuclear stand.

Dr Wills said New Zealand was influenced by the Anglo-American alliance today on many fronts, such as:

• NZ Navy ships transiting “provocatively” through the South China Sea;
• Being pressured to double military spending,;
• Being pressured to join the “anti-China” AUKUS alliance;
• The recent opening of a US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) office in Wellington; and
• New Zealand playing an increasing role in space warfare.

But Dr Wills warned people “don’t give up – they haven’t won, not even with their arguments”.

He also called on people to become better informed, such as reading Nicky Hager’s 2011 book Other People’s Wars.

NZ’s nuclear-free stance
Other speakers included nuclear-free New Zealand historian and activist Maire Leadbeater, who outlined the early trajectory of the country’s opposition to French nuclear tests in the Pacific by dispatching a frigate to Moruroa, and the campaign to declare New Zealand nuclear-free.

She said New Zealand had led the way in the 1970s and 1980s and could take a principled independent foreign policy stand again.

The rally also invoked the spirit of Kia Ora Gaza co-founder and campaigner Roger Fowler, who died last Saturday and who was farewelled at a “celebration of life” ceremony at Ngā Tapuwae Community Centre in Mangere East on Wednesday.

Veteran Polynesian Panther Tigilau Ness and his grandson on the saxophone played a rousing rendition of the popular song “We Are All Palestinians”, created by Fowler, and South African-born activist Achmat Esau read out his poem, “Roger, I Did Not Know” in tribute.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Asia Pacific Report

New Zealand protesters have again spotlighted the country’s stake in US space militarisation today and speakers branded Rocket Lab as an alleged key link in the “IDF kill chain” as part of the Gaza genocide.

“Rocket Lab is a celebrated New Zealand success story, with a stated mission to open access to space and improve life on Earth,” said Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa  (PSNA) advocate Brendan Corbett.

“Yet many of its key contracts are with the US military and their suppliers.

“It is driven by share price increases and creating value for shareholders.”

Corbett said the global space militarisation market size was valued at US$61 billion (about NZ$100 billion) in 2025 and was projected to grow from US$66 billion this year to US$116 billion by 2034.

North America dominated space militarisation last year with a market share of more than 40 percent.

‘World war threat’
“The overwhelming majority of our human family are totally appalled at this march to militarisation of space and the threat of world war,” Corbett told the crowd in Te Komititanga Square as they marked the 123rd week of protest over the Gaza genocide.

“But not the war mongering investor class. They make more money.

“Guess what people? Increasing geopolitical rivalry and security threats propels market growth.”

A so-called “ceasefire” came into effect in Gaza on October 10, but since then Israeli violations almost daily have killed 591 Palestinians and wounded 1578 – and children dying at a rate of about two a day — with the besieged enclave facing a severe humanitarian crisis.

Overall, the death toll in the Gaza Strip has topped 72,049 with 171,691 wounded – mostly women and children — since the start of the war, according to Palestinian health authorities.

The government has raised the total number of launches allowed for Rocket Lab at its Mahia launch pad tenfold to 1000, as the cap set at 100 in 2017 is close to being breached.

However, a physics professor at Auckland University, Dr Richard Easther, told RNZ News this week that he did not trust the New Zealand Space Agency to make good decisions while the agency said it had assessed all space activities against clear legislative criteria.

Geopolitical tension
Corbett stressed the increasing geopolitical tension, rivalries and escalating security threats across the globe.

This situation was expected to encourage countries to strengthen space-based defence capabilities.

Military forces of various nations required satellites and space systems to maintain secure communications, surveillance, and navigation under hostile conditions.

“This is the Rocket Lab, Black Sky, Palantir, IDF kill chain,” said Corbett, referring to the Israeli Defence Forces, although critics prefer to characterise IDF as the IOF – “Israeli Offence Forces” in view of Tel Aviv having attacked five countries in the region last year.

“This demand drives procurement of hardened, redundant, and cyber-secure space infrastructure — ”these are the factors contributing to space militarisation market growth”.

Corbett quoted Palantir chief executive officer Alex Karp telling investors in a call last month: “Palantir is here to disrupt and make the institutions we partner with the best in the world, and when it’s necessary to scare our enemies and, on occasion, kill them.”

“Military tech companies no longer pretend they are ethical and humane,” Corbett said.

Space technologies
He explained how space militarisation included deployment and use of space technologies for military applications such as reconnaissance, communications, navigation and so on.

It involved satellites, ground systems and related technologies for defence.

“This is the market niche that fuels Rocket Lab’s business plan,” he said.

Some countries used space and counter-space capabilities and integrated them into regular military exercises.

With space militarisation, countries integrated space assets such as satellites, ground stations, and launch systems into defence operations.

“These factors are driving the overall market growth,” Corbett said. “These are the activities that are driving us to war.”

RIMPAC 2026 exercises
He cited some of the major companies involved, including Lockheed Martin Corporation, Raytheon Technologies — both investors in Rocket Lab — Northrop Gumman Corporation, Airbus Defence and Space, and others.

Other speakers included Kia Ora Gaza activist Patrick O’Dea – who reminded the crowd of nuclear-free protest success in blocking visits by US warships in the 1980s – PSNA’s Neil Scott, and Maire Leadbeater of West Papua Action Tāmaki.

O’Dea challenged the crowd top campaign against New Zealand taking part in the RIMPAC 2026 military exercises in Hawai’i during June to August and “collaborating with the IDF”.

Protesters marched with banners declaring “Break the Rocket Lab kill chain” and “Rocket Lab – death for money” to Queens Wharf where a visiting Norwegian cruise ship Viking Orion (1000 passengers) was moored.

This article was first published on Café Pacific.

New Zealand’s Space Minister Judith Collins was warned just two months into Israel’s war on Gaza that new BlackSky satellites being launched from NZ could be used by that country’s military, reports Television New Zealand’s 1News.

According to a network news item on Friday, government documents showed officials had recommended the launches go ahead in spite of risks, saying there were no restrictions on trade with Israel.

Minister Collins gave the green light and RocketLab began launching the the Gen-3 BlackSky satellites from Mahia Peninsula earlier this year.

In the documents, obtained by 1News political reporter Benedict Collins under the Official Information Act, Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment officials said while there were risks, the positives outweighed the negatives.

The officials’ advice on the satellite launches stated: “While it poses risks, there is a net good associated with commercially available remote sensing due to the wide range of applications,” 1News said.

One risk they identified related to Israel, but they said there were mitigating factors.

“There are no United Nations Security Council sanctions on Israel, and New Zealand does not implement autonomous sanctions outside the context of the conflict in Ukraine,” they advised the minister.

“There are also no policy restrictions on New Zealand’s trading relationship with Israel.”

World court warnings
However, over the two years of war on Gaza since 7 October 2023, several nonbinding legal opinions by the world’s highest court and UN agencies have warned Israel about its illegal occupation of the Palestinian territories and also warned countries and companies about complicity with the pariah Zionist state.

In the latest ruling this week, the International Court of Justice said Israel was obliged to ease the passage of aid into Gaza, stressing it had to provide Palestinians with “basic needs” essential to survival.

The wide-ranging ICJ ruling came as aid groups were scrambling to scale up much-needed humanitarian assistance into Gaza, seizing upon a fragile ceasefire agreed earlier this month.

ICJ judges are also weighing accusations, brought by South Africa, that Israel has broken the 1948 UN Genocide Convention with its actions in Gaza.

Another court in The Hague, the International Criminal Court (ICC), has issued arrest warrants for Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.

According to 1News, the NZ documents also show that when MBIE officials recommended the application be approved they were aware experts at the UN were warning a possible genocide could unfold in Gaza and that schools and hospitals were being bombed.

‘Appalling’ decision
The officials’ advice came in December 2023, two months after the Hamas attacks on Israel which left 1200 people dead. Israel in response launched a retaliatory offensive in Gaza that has killed more than 68,000 people, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.

Minister Collins said this week the decision had been the right one.

“We don’t have sanctions on Israel, we’re not at war with Israel, Israel is not our enemy,” she said.

But Green Party co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick said it was an “appalling” decision that could fuel human rights abuses, reports 1News.

Officials at New Zealand’s space agency declined to be interviewed by 1News about Blacksky and RocketLab did not respond to a request for an interview with its founder Sir Peter Beck.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Hundreds of Palestinians released from Israeli prisons in recent days have described scenes of systematic torture, starvation, and humiliation.

Their accounts, gathered by The Guardian, TRT, Al-Mayadeen, Quds News Network, and Palestine Online, among others, offer a rare glimpse into what human rights organisations call a “policy of abuse” targeting Palestinian detainees.

According to the reports, many of the freed prisoners returned to Gaza emaciated, injured, and traumatised, some learning only after their release that their families had been killed during Israel’s war on the besieged Strip.

In testimony published by The Guardian, 33-year-old Naseem al-Radee recalled the moment Israeli prison guards “gave him a farewell gift” before his release.

“They bound his hands, placed him on the ground and beat him without mercy,” the report said, describing how Radee’s first sight of Gaza after nearly two years was “blurry,” the result of a boot to the eye.

Radee, a government employee from Beit Lahia, was kidnapped by Israeli soldiers at a displacement shelter in Gaza in December 2023. He spent 22 months in detention, including 100 days in an underground cell, before being released alongside 1700 other Palestinians this week under the ceasefire agreement.

A freed Palestinian prisoner speaks in pain about the horrors and inhumane treatment inside Israeli occupation prisons. pic.twitter.com/KqNJjX2mza

— PALESTINE ONLINE 🇵🇸 (@OnlinePalEng) October 13, 2025

“They used teargas and rubber bullets to intimidate us, in addition to constant verbal abuse and insults,” The Guardian cited Radee as saying regarding his time in Nafha prison in the Naqab desert.

“They had a strict system of repression; the electronic gate of the section would open when the soldiers entered, and they would come in with their dogs, shouting ‘on your stomach, on your stomach,’ and start beating us mercilessly”, the testimony continued.

According to the report, cramped and unsanitary cells, fungal infections, starvation, and routine beatings defined his captivity. Upon release, Radee tried to call his wife, only to learn that she and all but one of his children had been killed during his detention.

“I was very happy to be released because the date coincided with my youngest daughter Saba’s third birthday,” he said.

“I tried to find some joy in being released on this day, but sadly, Saba went with my family, and my joy went with her.”

Sound torture
Also speaking to The Guardian, 22-year-old university student Mohammed al-Asaliya described contracting scabies in prison and being denied treatment.

“There was no medical care,” he said. “We tried to treat ourselves by using floor disinfectant on our wounds, but it only made them worse. The mattresses were filthy, the environment unhealthy, our immunity weak, and the food contaminated.”

He recalled an area “they called ‘the disco,’ where they played loud music nonstop for two days straight.”

The sound torture, he said, was combined with physical abuse: “They also hung us on walls, sprayed us with cold air and water, and sometimes threw chilli powder on detainees.”

By the time of his release, Asaliya’s weight had dropped from 75 kg to 42 kg.

‘We died a thousand times a day’
In testimony recorded by Palestine Online, journalist and former detainee Shadi Abu Sido described what he called “unimaginable torture”.

“They used to say: ‘Take, eat.’ But I didn’t want anything for myself. About 1800 of us were released, and thousands are still inside,” Abu Sido recounted.

“If you die once a day, we have died a thousand times a day, each day. We didn’t know the day, the hour, or even the date.

“We forgot what sleep feels like, how food tastes. In the middle of the night, they would splash water on us, in our cells.”

In another video posted by Palestine Online, Abu Sido added:

“They torture and abuse us in every possible way, physically and psychologically. We don’t sleep; they threaten us about our children. ‘We killed your children, we killed your children. There is no Gaza’.”

“I entered Gaza and I found a scene from the Day of Judgment,” he said.

‘I made this for my daughter’
In a video published by Al-Mayadeen, another recently freed detainee collapsed in tears as he learned that his entire family had been killed. Holding a handmade toy he crafted in prison, he said:

“My children are dead. I made this for my daughter. Her birthday was on October 18; my daughter was two years old. Bara is eight years old.

“My beloved ones have been killed.”

‘They amputated my leg’
Speaking to TRT World, Palestinian prisoner Jibril al-Safadi described the brutality that cost him his leg:

“My leg was amputated in prison due to severe torture. The situation was tough: relentless suffering. There were savage beatings and horrible torture,” he said. “They transferred me to Sde Teiman.

“There was no medical care. They amputated my right leg.

We faced everything you can expect, even the dogs’ raping, torturing of detainees. Killing men is usual, like it’s an ordinary thing.”

A system of abuse
The Guardian report cited Palestinian medical officials in Gaza who confirmed that many detainees arrived “in poor physical health,” bearing “bruises, fractures, wounds, and marks from restraints that had bound their hands tightly.”

Eyad Qaddih, the director of public relations at Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza, reportedly said many of the released prisoners had to be transferred to the emergency room.

“The signs of beating and torture were clearly visible,” he told The Guardian.

The report cited the Israeli NGO Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI), as saying that about 2800 Palestinians from Gaza remain in Israeli prisons without charge.

Most were detained under emergency laws amended after October 7, 2023, allowing for indefinite administrative detention of anyone deemed an “unlawful combatant”.

PCATI’s executive director, Tal Steiner, said that “the amount and scale of torture and abuse in Israeli prisons and military camps has skyrocketed since October 7.”

She described the escalation as “part of a policy led by Israeli decision-makers such as Itamar Ben-Gvir and others.”

Ben-Gvir, Israel’s far-right National Security Minister, has repeatedly bragged about providing Palestinian prisoners with “the minimum of the minimum” food and supplies.

The Guardian reports: In total, 88 Palestinians were released from Israeli prisons and sent to the occupied West Bank on Monday – the other nearly 2000, a number that includes about 1700 Palestinians seized from Gaza during the war and held without charge, were sent back to Gaza, where a minority would travel on to neighbouring countries.

Before Monday’s release, 11,056 Palestinians were held in Israeli prisons, according to statistics from the Israeli NGO HaMoked in October 2025. At least 3500 of those were held in administrative detention without trial. An Israeli military database has indicated that only a quarter of those detained in Gaza were classified as fighters.

Republished with permission from The Palestine Chronicle

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Benjamin Netanyahu insisted, until just hours before Donald Trump’s arrival, that the war in Gaza would not stop. Then, standing in the Knesset before Israel’s hardline ministers, Trump announced that it had — and whisked a delegation of world leaders to Egypt to formalise the ceasefire before a global audience.

The message was unmistakable: Israel’s prime minister could no longer block peace without suffering public humiliation. Facing ministers who, only a day earlier, had vowed to press on with the war, Trump imposed an abrupt reversal — one that only he could engineer.

He came to Jerusalem not merely to speak, but to enforce the deal already reached and leave Netanyahu no choice but to comply or lose face.

He then carried that spectacle to Sharm el-Sheikh, gathering heads of state and government from the Middle East, Asia, and Europe to witness and sign the cessation of war.

The first phase — halting hostilities and exchanging prisoners — represented the sole ground on which both sides could agree. But the phases that follow are riddled with complications: a path of shifting sands, vague clauses, and undefined timelines, where the devil hides in every single point.

Trump’s declaration, messages and summit
Trump’s arrival in Israel was theatrical. He entered the Knesset, addressed lawmakers and ministers, praised Netanyahu’s wartime leadership, and then made a sweeping proclamation: the war was over.

That was a bold reversal from the very ministers he faced only hours earlier, who had publicly affirmed their intention to continue the conflict.

The symbolism mattered more than the logic. By announcing the end of the war in Israel’s Parliament, Trump cornered Netanyahu in front of his hardline allies and the world.

If the Israeli leader dared to resume hostilities, he would be defying not only his own coalition but a global consensus. Trump also asked President Isaac Herzog — then present — to pardon Netanyahu from his ongoing corruption charges, invoking the president’s constitutional prerogative.

The gesture fused diplomacy, domestic politics, and Israeli justice in a single, calculated act of theatre.

From Israel, Trump flew to Egypt, where on 13 October 2025 many of the world’s leaders convened at the Sharm el-Sheikh Peace Summit to formalise the Gaza ceasefire.

The event was co-chaired by Trump and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. The summit hosted delegations from approximately 27 countries, representing leaders from the Middle East, Europe, Asia, and international organisations.

The guest list included Emmanuel Macron, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Keir Starmer, Friedrich Merz, Pedro Sánchez, Mahmoud Abbas, António Guterres, António Costa, and the Arab League’s Ahmed Aboul Gheit.

Notably absent were formal representatives of Hamas and Israel itself. Netanyahu had accepted the invitation initially but later declined, citing a conflict with a Jewish holiday and diplomatic pressure from certain participants.

Many leaders refused to meet with him and declined the invitation for that very reason.

At the summit, Trump, Sisi, the Qatari Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, and Erdoğan signed what was called the Trump Declaration for Enduring Peace and Prosperity — a symbolic document laying out commitments to maintain the ceasefire, support reconstruction, and discourage future conflict.

By bringing so many leaders together in one place, Trump embedded the ceasefire into a global diplomatic architecture, making it harder for Netanyahu and his extremist ministers to reverse course without triggering international backlash.

Israel’s unfulfilled objectives
Despite the scale of destruction, Israel failed to achieve any of its declared military or political objectives in Gaza. The circumstances of this devastating war were unprecedented — and yet, even with such intensity, Israel failed to ethnically cleanse Gaza or alter its demographic reality.

It did not eliminate Hamas or its leadership; it could not rescue its captives through force; it failed to dismantle the movement’s military infrastructure or install a new governing authority in the enclave.

After months of bombardment, Israel still controlled only half of Gaza and faced renewed armed resistance in areas it claimed to have “cleared”. The campaign, designed to restore deterrence, instead exposed Israel’s limitations: overwhelming firepower, backed fully by the United States, but diminishing strategic capacity.

Internationally, the assault deepened Israel’s isolation, eroded its moral legitimacy, and unified global opinion against it. What Netanyahu had promised as a decisive victory ended in a political and military stalemate — the very failure that forced Trump’s intervention.

Many Arab leaders refused to meet with Netanyahu, and Trump himself failed to bring him to Sharm el-Sheikh.

Why Trump intervened
Netanyahu had long survived politically by delaying agreements, shifting blame, and keeping his options open. But this time, the war had devastated Gaza to such an extent that global public opinion — and even international institutions, including the United Nations — began to describe Israel’s actions as genocide.

Israel’s reputation, and Netanyahu’s with it, lay in ruins.

Trump’s intervention offered a lifeline. By casting himself as the architect of peace, he provided Netanyahu with an escape route — a political rescue disguised as diplomacy.

Netanyahu’s coalition, under pressure from its far-right partners, had no credible argument left against a deal once it was validated by world leaders. Trump’s carefully staged ceasefire left Netanyahu with only two choices: resist and face international isolation and sanctions, or comply and survive politically.

Trump also reminded Netanyahu, both publicly and privately, that Israel’s campaign had depended entirely on American weapons.

“He called for different kinds of weapons all the time,” Trump said — a remark that exposed the scale of US complicity. The message was unmistakable: if Israel defied the ceasefire, the stream of arms that had sustained its war could be cut off.

It was an implicit acknowledgment from Trump himself of Washington’s partnership in the devastation of Gaza — a conflict that killed and wounded more than 10 percent of the enclave’s population.

The bombs that rained down on civilians had been supplied on a fast track, lavishly and without restraint, enabling the destruction that Trump now sought to end.

The fragile structure of the deal
The agreement Trump brokered was only the first stage. It prioritised the release of hostages and prisoners — a symbolic and political victory — but left withdrawal, reconstruction, governance, and disarmament undefined.

Netanyahu accepted phase one, but the path ahead is laced with traps. He intends to resume operations against Hamas, undermine clauses he dislikes, and prevent the formation of a Palestinian authority capable of governing Gaza.

Resistance groups are unlikely to lay down all arms; they may surrender heavy weapons like missiles while keeping small arms, ensuring that Israel remains vulnerable to renewed attacks.

The result is de facto partition: Palestinians control parts of Gaza while Israel holds the rest. Each side asserts authority over its zone, and both will use pressure to influence the other.

Netanyahu’s political calculus
Domestically, Netanyahu faces a precarious balancing act. If President Herzog pardons him, it removes the legal threat but not the political cost of the failures of October 7.

Critics will question why Israel did not negotiate a prisoner exchange earlier, when more hostages might have survived.

Should his popularity fall, Netanyahu may dissolve his government and call snap elections — likely before October 2026 — to regain legitimacy. The far-right ministers in his coalition, such as Itamar Ben Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, are unlikely to respect the ceasefire.

Nevertheless, they, along with Netanyahu who shares the same objective, have no intention of conceding Palestinian statehood or allowing lasting peace. Trump’s deal restricts Netanyahu’s room for manoeuvre, but whether he abides by it or quietly undermines it remains to be seen.

Trump positioned himself as the guarantor of the ceasefire. For the remaining three years of his mandate, Netanyahu will be constrained: he cannot break the agreement without triggering diplomatic consequences.

But ending the Gaza campaign is not the same as resolving the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, which remains untouched. Trump’s envoys, Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, remain in Israel to monitor Netanyahu and ensure he does not quietly restart hostilities.

Their presence keeps pressure alive, but it cannot be permanent. Netanyahu, long known for exploiting ambiguities in past agreements, will test every margin.

Public trust in him is weak — among Israelis, world leaders, and his own ministers. If he obstructs the deal, he risks splitting from Washington’s agenda and losing what remains of Israel’s legitimacy.

Trump’s broader aim is to rehabilitate Israel’s global image. He believes halting the war helps Israel recover its reputation while giving Netanyahu a way to maintain power. But his gamble is that Netanyahu will accept limits; if he goes rogue, Trump may face the dilemma of confronting the ally he once defended.

The absent West Bank and the end of the two-state illusion
The West Bank was conspicuously absent from Trump’s discourse. The United States no longer recognises the two-state solution — the very framework established under the Oslo Accords of the 1990s, which Washington itself once sponsored to guarantee Palestinians the right to self-determination and statehood.

By omitting any reference to it, Trump effectively buried what little remained of that diplomatic vision.

This omission ensures that the conflict in Palestine will not end; it will only be renewed, sooner or later, and wherever resistance resurfaces.

In the two years of war, Israel has constructed 22 new settlements on occupied Palestinian land in the West Bank, further erasing the territorial basis for a viable Palestinian state and dismantling the last vestiges of Oslo.

What now remains is not peace but a state of permanent instability — a no-peace condition that guarantees the cycle of violence will continue.

The unresolved core
Trump’s ceasefire is a political theatre of control. It publicly enshrined a truce, placed Netanyahu under scrutiny, and allowed Trump to claim a diplomatic victory. But it did not resolve the Palestinian question.

The ceasefire applies to Gaza, not to the broader occupation, the blockade, or the issue of self-determination. The two sides now operate within a precarious arrangement: Israel controls roughly half of Gaza, the Palestinian resistance remains armed in the other half, and both test the boundaries daily.

Trump cannot hold his envoys indefinitely, and Netanyahu cannot be trusted to restrain himself. The US–Israeli alliance remains solid, but Trump’s personal intervention underscored a fundamental shift: unconditional support has limits when the costs to America’s reputation become too high.

Trump’s strategy was to save Netanyahu and Israel from total isolation — to stop a war that had already killed more than 76,000 people, 82 percent of them civilians, including more than 20,000 children. He halted the destruction at the price of ambiguity: a ceasefire without a settlement, peace without reconciliation.

The world leaders who gathered in Sharm el-Sheikh signed the end of a war, not the beginning of a solution.

Elijah J Magnier is a veteran war zone correspondent and political analyst with over 35 years of experience covering the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). He specialises in real-time reporting of politics, strategic and military planning, terrorism and counter-terrorism; his strong analytical skills complement his reporting. His in-depth experience, extensive contacts and thorough political knowledge of complex political situations in Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Sudan and Syria provide his writings with insights balancing the routine misreporting and propaganda in the Western press. He also comments on Al Jazeera.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The global peak journalism body has condemned the targeting, harassment, and censorship by lobby groups of Australian journalists for reporting critically on Israel’s war on Gaza.

The Brussels-based International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and its Australian affiliate, the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance (MEAA), said in a statement they were attempts to silence journalists and called on media outlets and regulatory bodies to ensure the fundamental rights to freedom of expression and access to information were upheld.

In a high-profile case, Australia’s Federal Court found on June 25 that Lebanese-Australian journalist Antoinette Lattouf was unlawfully dismissed by the national public broadcaster, Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), for sharing a social media post by Human Rights Watch relating to violations by Israel in Gaza, reports IFJ.

Lattouf was removed from a five-day radio presenting contract in Sydney in December 2023, with the judgment confirming her dismissal was made to appease pro-Israel lobbyists.

On Seotember 24, the ABC was ordered to pay an additional $A150,000 in compensation on top of A$70,000 already awarded.

In a separate incident, Australian cricket reporter Peter Lalor was dropped from radio coverage of Australia’s Sri Lanka tour by broadcaster SEN in February after he reposted several posts on X regarding Israeli attacks in Gaza and the release of Palestinian prisoners in Israel.

“I was told in one call there were serious organisations making complaints; in another I was told that this was not the case,” said Lalor in a statement.

Kostakidis faces harassment
Prominent journalist and former SBS World News Australia presenter Mary Kostakidis has also faced ongoing harassment by the Zionist Federation of Australia, with a legal action filed in the Federal Court under Australia’s Racial Discrimination Act for sharing two allegedly “antisemitic” posts on X.

#Australia🇦🇺: A number of Australian journalists have been targeted, harassed, and censored by lobby groups for reporting critical of Israel’s war on Gaza. @withMEAA @IFJGlobal https://t.co/KqMXmFC2n1

— IFJ Asia-Pacific (@ifjasiapacific) September 29, 2025

Kostakidis said the case failed to identify which race, ethnicity or nationality was offended by her posts, with a verdict currently awaited on a strikeout order filed by Kostakidis in July.

The MEAA said: “MEAA journalists are subject to the code of ethics, who in their professional capacity, often provide critical commentary on political warfare.

“These are the tenets of democracy. We stand with our colleagues in their workplaces, in the courtrooms, and in their deaths to raise our voices against the silence.”

The IFJ said: “Critical and independent journalism in the public interest is more crucial than ever in the face of incessant pressure from partisan lobby groups.

“IFJ stands in firm solidarity with journalists globally facing harassment and censorship for their reporting.”

Journalist killed in Gaza City

Meanwhile, gunmen believed to be part of Israeli-linked militia, have killed Palestinian journalist Saleh Aljafarawi, south of Gaza City, after the ceasefire, reports Al Jazeera.

Social media posts showed people bidding farewell to the 28-year-old who had been bringing news about the war over the last two years through his widely watched videos, the channel said.

Several people accused of attacking returnees to Gaza City by colluding with Israeli forces were killed during clashes in the area where Aljafarawi was shot dead, sources told Al Jazeera.

Al Jazeera said that more than 270 Palestinian journalists had been killed in Gaza since the war began in October 2023.

BREAKING: Prominent Palestinian journalist Saleh Aljafarawi has been killed by gunmen in Gaza City’s al-Sabra neighbourhood, making him one of more than 270 journalists killed since Israel’s war began in 2023.

🔴 LIVE updates: https://t.co/yOyLZarHaa pic.twitter.com/cXinQKS4WW

— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) October 12, 2025

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The grim facts should speak for themselves. Since 7 October 2023, Israel has deliberately killed an unprecedented number of Palestinian journalists in Gaza.

Those brave individuals are smeared as Hamas operatives and terrorists by Israel and its supporters.

But the real story behind this, beyond just Western racism and dehumanisation towards Arab reporters who don’t work for the corporate media in London or New York, is an Israeli military strategy to deliberately (and falsely) link Gazan journalists to Hamas.

The outlet +972 Magazine explains the plan:

“The Israeli military has operated a special unit called the ‘Legitimization Cell,’ tasked with gathering intelligence from Gaza that can bolster Israel’s image in the international media, according to three intelligence sources who spoke to +972 Magazine and Local Call and confirmed the unit’s existence.

“Established after October 7, the unit sought information on Hamas’ use of schools and hospitals for military purposes, and on failed rocket launches by armed Palestinian groups that harmed civilians in the enclave.

“It has also been assigned to identify Gaza-based journalists it could portray as undercover Hamas operatives, in an effort to blunt growing global outrage over Israel’s killing of reporters — the latest of whom was Al Jazeera journalist Anas Al-Sharif, killed in an Israeli airstrike this past week [august 10].

According to the sources, the Legitimisation Cell’s motivation was not security, but public relations. Driven by anger that Gaza-based reporters were “smearing [Israel’s] name in front of the world,” its members were eager to find a journalist they could link to Hamas and mark as a target, one source said.

As a journalist who has visited and reported in Gaza since 2009, here is a short film I made after my first trip, Palestinian journalists are some of the most heroic individuals on the planet. They have to navigate both Israeli attacks and threats and Western contempt for their craft.

I stand in solidarity with them. And so should you.

After the Israeli murder of Al Jazeera journalist Anas Al-Sharif on August 10, I spoke to Al Jazeera English about him and Israel’s deadly campaign:

Antony Loewenstein speaking on Al Jazeera English on 11 August 2025.   Video: AJ

Antony Loewenstein interviewed by Al Jazeera on 11 August 2025.  Video: AJ

Republished from the Substack of Antony Lowenstein, author of The Palestine Laboratory,  with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

When Iraqi troops attacked the Saudi border town of Khafji during the first Gulf War, Saudi soldiers fled in panic. Two French photographers and I watched frantic soldiers commandeering fire trucks and racing south. US Marines pushed the Iraqis back.

But in Riyadh, the press was told of our gallant Saudi allies defending their homeland. Once fighting ended, the press bus stopped a few miles down the road from Khafji. The pool reporters clambered out, escorted by military minders. They did stand-ups with the distant sound of artillery and smoke as a backdrop and repeated the lies the Pentagon wanted to tell.

Meanwhile, the two photographers and I were detained and beaten by enraged Saudi military police, furious that we had documented the panicked flight of Saudi forces, as we tried to leave Khafji.

My refusal to abide by press restrictions in the first Gulf War saw the other New York Times reporters in Saudi Arabia write a letter to the foreign editor saying I was ruining the paper’s relationship with the military. If not for the intervention of R.W. “Johnny” Apple, who had covered Vietnam, I would have been sent back to New York.

I do not fault anyone for not wanting to go into a war zone. This is a sign of normality. It is rational. It is understandable. Those of us who volunteer to go into combat — my colleague Clyde Haberman at The New York Times once quipped “Hedges will parachute into a war with or without a parachute” — have obvious personality defects.

Pretend war correspondents
But I fault those who pretend to be war correspondents. They do tremendous damage. They peddle false narratives. They mask reality. They serve as witting — or unwitting — propagandists. They discredit the voices of the victims and exonerate the killers.

When I covered the war in El Salvador, before I worked for The New York Times, the paper’s correspondent dutifully regurgitated whatever the embassy fed her. This had the effect of making my editors — as well as editors of the other correspondents who did report the war– question our veracity and “impartiality.”

It made it harder for readers to understand what was happening. The false narrative neutered and often overpowered the real one.

The slander used to discredit my Palestinian colleagues — claiming they are members of Hamas — is sadly familiar. Many Palestinian reporters I know in Gaza are, in fact, quite critical of Hamas. But even if they have ties with Hamas, so what?

Israel’s attempt to justify targeting journalists from the Hamas-run al-Aqsa media network is also a violation of Article 79 of the Geneva Convention.

I worked with reporters and photographers who had a wide variety of beliefs, including Marxist-Leninists in Central America. This did not prevent them from being honest. I was in Bosnia and Kosovo with a Spanish cameraman, Miguel Gil Moreno, who was later killed with my friend Kurt Schork.

Miguel was a member of the right-wing Catholic group Opus Dei. He was also a journalist of tremendous courage, great compassion and moral probity, despite his opinions about Spain’s fascist ruler Francisco Franco. He did not lie.

Seeking to crush
In every war I covered, I was attacked as supporting or belonging to whatever group the government, including the US government, was seeking to crush. I was accused of being a tool of the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front in El Salvador, the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, the Guatemalan National Revolutionary Unity, the Sudanese People’s Liberation Army, Hamas, the Muslim-led government in Bosnia and the Kosovo Liberation Army.

John Simpson of the BBC, like many Western reporters, argues that the “world needs honest, unbiased eyewitness reporting to help people make up their minds about the major issues of our time. This has so far been impossible in Gaza.”

The assumption that if Western reporters were in Gaza the coverage would improve is risible. Trust me. It would not.

Israel bans the foreign press because there is a bias in Europe and the United States in favour of reporting by Western reporters. Israel is aware that the scale of the genocide is too vast for Western outlets to hide or obscure, despite all the ink and airtime they give to Israeli and US apologists.

Israel also cannot continue its systematic campaign of annihilation of journalists in Gaza if it has to contend with foreign media in its midst.

Israeli lies amplified by Western media outlets, including my former employer The New York Times, are worthy of Pravda. Beheaded babies. Babies cooked in ovens. Mass rape by Hamas. Errant Palestinian rockets that cause explosions at hospitals and massacre civilians. Secret command tunnels and command centers in schools and hospitals. Journalists who direct Hamas rocket units. Protesters of the genocide on college campuses who are antisemites and supporters of Hamas.

Israel ‘lies like it breathes’
I covered the conflict between the Palestinians and Israelis, much of that time in Gaza, for seven years. If there is one indisputable fact, it is that Israel lies like it breathes. The decision by Western reporters to give credibility to these lies, to give them the same weight as documented Israeli atrocities, is a cynical game.

The reporters know these lies are lies. But they, and the news outlets that employ them, prize access — in this case access to Israeli and US officials — above truth. The reporters, as well as their editors and publishers, fear becoming targets of Israel and the powerful Israel lobby.

There is no cost for betraying the Palestinians. They are powerless.

Call those lies out and you will swiftly find your requests for briefings and interviews with officials rebuffed. You won’t be invited by press officers to participate in staged visits to Israeli military units. You and your news organisation will be viciously attacked.

You will be left out in the cold. Your editors will terminate your assignment or your employment. This is not good for careers. And so, the lies are dutifully repeated, no matter how absurd.

It is pathetic watching these reporters and their news outlets, as Fisk writes, fight “like tigers to join these ‘pools’ in which they would be censored, restrained and deprived of all freedom of movement on the battlefield”.

When Middle East Eye journalists Mohamed Salama and Ahmed Abu Aziz, along with Reuters photojournalist Hussam al-Masri, and freelancers Moaz Abu Taha, and Mariam Dagga — who had worked with several media outlets, including the Associated Press — were killed in a “double tap” strike — designed to kill first responders arriving to treat casualties from initial strikes — at Nasser Medical Complex, how did Western news agencies respond?

‘Hamas camera’
“Israeli military says strikes on Gaza hospital targeted what it says was a Hamas camera,” the Associated Press reported.

“IDF claims hospital strike was aimed at Hamas camera,” announced CNN.

“Israel army says six ‘terrorists’ killed in Monday strikes on Gaza hospital,” the AFP headline read.

“Initial inquiry says Hamas camera was target of Israeli strike that killed journalists,” Reuters said.

“Israel claims troops saw Hamas camera before deadly hospital attack,” Sky News explained.

Just for the record, the camera belonged to Reuters, which said Israel was “fully aware” the news agency was filming from the hospital.

When Al Jazeera correspondent Anas al-Sharif and three other journalists were killed on August 10 in their media tent near al-Shifa Hospital, how was it reported in the Western press?

Pulitzer prize-winner
“Israel Kills Al Jazeera Journalist It Says Was Hamas Leader,” Reuters titled its story, despite the fact al-Sharif was part of a Reuters team that won a 2024 Pulitzer Prize.

The German newspaper Bild, published a front page story headlined: “Terrorist disguised as a journalist killed in Gaza.”

The barrage of Israeli lies amplified and given credibility by the Western press violates a fundamental tenet of journalism, the duty to transmit the truth to the viewer or reader.

It legitimizes mass slaughter. It refuses to hold Israel to account. It betrays Palestinian journalists, those reporting and being killed in Gaza. And it exposes the bankruptcy of Western journalists, whose primary attributes are careerism and cowardice.

Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist who was a foreign correspondent for 15 years for The New York Times, where he served as the Middle East bureau chief and Balkan bureau chief for the paper. He is the host of show “The Chris Hedges Report”. This article is republished from his X account.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

COMMENTARY: By Walden Bello

When the Flores and Velasco articles and posts whitewashing Israel’s genocidal policies in Gaza first came out a few days ago, I was waiting for people in the Philippine media to criticise and denounce them since they were so obviously hack pieces that did not meet the minimal standards of decent journalism.

I waited and waited, until I realised that there were no media people or organisations that were going to speak up.

Where were the progressive and liberal voices, apart from those of Richard Heydarian and Inday Espina Varona?

This was the reason I felt compelled to issue the statement condemning the sordid reporting of Flores and Velasco.

I was not out to do an expose, but that’s what it effectively became. In my subsequent posts, I raised the question of what was the reason just two journalists were willing to challenge the stories.

Was it a case of circling the wagons to protect errant colleagues? Was it fear of ties with the Israeli state being exposed by the Israelis in retaliation? Was it fear of physical or political reprisals by the Israelis?

These may have played a part, but the deafening silence meant there was something bigger at work.

This morning I received a long text from a prominent media practitioner that provided the answer. It’s not fear. It’s actually worse: agreement with Zionist ideology and policies, including genocide.

That the person asked me not to divulge his name for fear of suffering retribution from his colleagues stunned me. OMG, is this how deep the rot is with our media? ? Here is his disconcerting revelation to me:

‘Most are prejudiced’
“Yes some are scared, but honestly most of them actually are prejudiced against Muslims and side with the Zionists anytime.

“Most believe in the US religious fascist Zionist narrative, and also cannot accept that the world has changed — that the US is no longer the unipower it was decades ago, and that Russia, China, India and BRICS are on the rise.

“And also, you should hear them talk about how Filipino Muslims should be wiped off the face of the earth.

“These are college graduates from UP [University of the Philippines], UST [University of Santo Tomas], Ateneo who studied media.

“Whenever I would voice empathy for the Muslim minority here, or Palestinians, I’d be called stupid. Same also because I refused to join in the corruption.

“Oh, and also they have the same prejudice against China and the Chinese and mistake the Japanese imperial army atrocities as something China did to us!

“Also this is not limited to media. I have batchmates from UP Diliman, medical doctors, lawyers, engineers who also have the same prejudices.”

He added: “Some of these journalists have won awards abroad.”

Walden Bello is a Filipino academic and analyst of Global South issues who was awarded Amnesty International Philippines’ Most Distinguished Defender of Human Rights Award in 2023. He has also served as a member of the House of Representatives of the Philippines.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

I am alarmed by reports that Filipino journalists were flown in by the Israeli government to participate in what is essentially a whitewashing campaign for the ongoing genocide in Gaza.

At least two articles, atrocious excuses for journalism, have come out of this trip.One is a piece by Wilson Lee Flores for The Philippine Star, entitled “Israel beyond the headlines: Where ancient stones speak.”

By attempting to divert attention from the massacre of Palestinian civilians to “the Old City’s labyrinthine alleys,” Flores acts as an apologist for war crimes, akin to writing a travel blog about Nazi Germany.

In a Facebook post, Flores further parrots Israel’s propaganda by highlighting how the brutal IDF employs both men and women to carry out atrocities, a cynical weaponisation of “feminism.”

Even more repulsive is the piece from the Daily Tribune about “Gaza’s Fake Famine” from Vernon Velasco. It is a parody of a story, overly simplifying the famine of Gaza to a matter of food truck logistics, and uncritically quoting an IDF Officer.

Fittingly, the article contains three photos of shipping containers but not a single photo of a human being.

This runs counter to facts laid out by UN officials, including Joyce Msuya, the UN’s Assistant Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, who points out how half a million people face “starvation, destitution, and death”.

‘Moral failure’ over Gaza
A study published in the prestigious medical journal Lancet points to the “moral failure” as 1-2 million people live in the most extreme food insecurity level (phase 5 or catastrophe famine) according to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC).

This famine unfolds as shameless journalists make food vlogs kilometres away.

The facts are clear. At least 63,000 people have been killed and 150,000 injured, with women and children making up a significant portion of the casualties. The UN has also reported that nearly 90 percent of Gaza’s population (around 1.9 million people) has been displaced.

Widespread destruction has left over 70 percent of Gaza’s infrastructure destroyed, including more than 94 percent of hospitals either damaged or destroyed. No amount of narrative spin or “complexity” can sanitise this genocide.

As we celebrate National Press Freedom Day, I implore friends in the press to not fall for the lies of the murderous Zionist regime.

It would be tragic for journalists to provide cover for a regime that has murdered at least 240 of their peers.

Filipino journalists must shed the unhealthy culture of silence and non-intervention, and not hesitate to criticise errant colleagues.

They must make it clear that these recipients of Zionist gold are a disgrace to Philippine journalism. The Philippine government must look into the activities of the Israeli Embassy and their manipulation of local media narratives to sanitise their genocide.

Filipino journalists must stand in solidarity with their slain colleagues abroad, not with their killers.

Walden Bello is a Filipino academic and analyst of Global South issues who was awarded Amnesty International Philippines’ Most Distinguished Defender of Human Rights Award in 2023. He has also served as a member of the House of Representatives of the Philippines.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The grim facts should speak for themselves. Since 7 October 2023, Israel has deliberately killed an unprecedented number of Palestinian journalists in Gaza.

Those brave individuals are smeared as Hamas operatives and terrorists by Israel and its supporters.

But the real story behind this, beyond just Western racism and dehumanisation towards Arab reporters who don’t work for the corporate media in London or New York, is an Israeli military strategy to deliberately (and falsely) link Gazan journalists to Hamas.

The outlet +972 Magazine explains the plan:

“The Israeli military has operated a special unit called the ‘Legitimization Cell,’ tasked with gathering intelligence from Gaza that can bolster Israel’s image in the international media, according to three intelligence sources who spoke to +972 Magazine and Local Call and confirmed the unit’s existence.

“Established after October 7, the unit sought information on Hamas’ use of schools and hospitals for military purposes, and on failed rocket launches by armed Palestinian groups that harmed civilians in the enclave.

“It has also been assigned to identify Gaza-based journalists it could portray as undercover Hamas operatives, in an effort to blunt growing global outrage over Israel’s killing of reporters — the latest of whom was Al Jazeera journalist Anas Al-Sharif, killed in an Israeli airstrike this past week [august 10].

According to the sources, the Legitimisation Cell’s motivation was not security, but public relations. Driven by anger that Gaza-based reporters were “smearing [Israel’s] name in front of the world,” its members were eager to find a journalist they could link to Hamas and mark as a target, one source said.

As a journalist who’s visited and reported in Gaza since 2009, here’s a short film I made after my first trip, Palestinian journalists are some of the most heroic individuals on the planet. They have to navigate both Israeli attacks and threats and Western contempt for their craft.

I stand in solidarity with them. And so should you.

After the Israeli murder of Al Jazeera journalist Anas Al-Sharif on August 10, I spoke to Al Jazeera English about him and Israel’s deadly campaign:

Antony Loewenstein speaking on Al Jazeera English on 11 August 2025.   Video: AJ

Antony Loewenstein interviewed by Al Jazeera on 11 August 2025.  Video: AJ

Republished from the Substack of Antony Lowenstein, author of The Palestine Laboratory,  with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

An Al Jazeera journalist who has documented Israel’s trail of atrocities for almost the past two years has condemned Western news agencies covering the war on Gaza as treating Palestinian reporters like “robots”.

“You see how Palestinian journalists are treated. There’s no protection when they are alive,” Hind Khoudary told Al Jazeera from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza.

“And after they are killed, no one even mentions them.”

She said today was a “very, very angry morning” after five journalists were killed yesterday among at least 21 people, including medical workers, at al-Nasser Medical Centre in a “double tap” strike by the Israeli military.

The slain news professionals have been named as Hossam al-Masri, a freelance photographer for the Reuters news agency; Mariam Abu Daqqa, freelance journalist for The Independent and the Associated Press (AP); Moaz Abu Taha, correspondent for the American broadcasting network NBC; Mohamad Salama, press photographer for Al Jazeera; and Ahmed Abu Aziz, freelance journalist working for Middle East Eye and the Tunisian radio station Diwan FM, who died later from his injuries.

“Palestinian journalists do not know how to mourn their five colleagues and there’s a wave of anger at the international news agencies.

“Many news outlets [that the killed journalists worked for] did not even mention their contributors. The Reuters news agency did not mention in their headline their cameraman who had been working for them for months.

“In their article, they simply described him as a Reuters ‘contractor’.

‘Not mentioned’
As for Moaz Abu Taha [another journalist killed in the Nasser medical centre attack], not a single news organisation that he was working for said he was working for them,” she said.

“Palestinian journalists have been risking their lives for 23 months now, and after they are killed, they are not even mentioned in headlines.

“In the end, they are mentioned as ‘contractors’, as ‘freelancers’ – while, when they were alive, they were working 24/7 to produce, fix and document for these news outlets.

“This is how most Palestinian journalists feel — that we’re just being used as robots to report on what’s going on because there are no foreign journalists.

“We get killed and then everyone forgets about us.”

Gaza’s silenced voices.     Video: Al Jazeera

RSF ‘fiercely condemns’ killings
The Paris-based media freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) “fiercely condemned” the latest killings, saying they came after the murder of Khaled al-Madhoun on Saturday, 23 August 23.

This was a toll of six journalists killed in two days. It follows the killing of six other journalists two weeks ago on August 10.

According to RSF information, all were deliberately targeted. RSF again called for an emergency UN Security Council meeting to “end this massacre of journalists”.

Thibaut Bruttin, director-general of RSF, said: How far will the Israeli armed forces go in their gradual effort to eliminate information coming from Gaza? How long will they continue to defy international humanitarian law?

“The protection of journalists is guaranteed by international law, yet more than 200 of them have been killed by Israeli forces in Gaza over the past two years.

“Ten years after the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 2222, which protects journalists in times of conflict, the Israeli army is flouting its application.

“RSF calls for an emergency UN Security Council meeting to ensure this resolution is finally respected, and that concrete measures are taken to end impunity for crimes against journalists, protect Palestinian journalists, and open access to the Gaza Strip to all reporters.”

‘Suicide drone’
According to Al Jazeera, the first strike on the live broadcast post that killed Hossam al-Masri was carried out using a loitering munition — also known as a “suicide drone” — typically equipped with a camera and an explosive charge.

A Reuters article also confirmed the death of its contractor, Hussam al-Masri.

The second strike 8 minutes later targeted the hospital yet again after rescue teams and journalists had arrived.

The Al-Nasser complex is a well-known gathering place for displaced journalists in Gaza who, since October 2023, have been living in tents around the hospital to access information on injured and deceased patients, as well as available facilities.

Targeted Murder. This is what israeli nazis do.. pic.twitter.com/RL8mc1YCMW

— Ali (@MerruX) August 25, 2025

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

More than 200,000 people took the streets across Australia on Saturday in a national day of action demanding that the Labor government sanctions Israel and stops the two-way arms trade.

It comes after 300,000 people marched, in driving rain, across Sydney Harbour Bridge on August 3 to demand the same.

Palestine solidarity groups across the country are coordinating their plans as Israel’s illegal deliberate starvation policy is delivering its expected results.

Protests were organised in more than 40 cities and towns– a first in nearly two years since the genocidal war began.

At least 50,000 rallied on Gadigal Country/Sydney, 10,000 in Nipaluna/Hobart, 50,000 in Magan-djin/Brisbane, 100,000 in Naarm/Melbourne, 10,000 in Kaurna Yerta/Adelaide, 15,000 in Boorloo/Perth, 600 in the Blue Mountains, 500 in Bathurst, 5000 in Muloobinba/Newcastle, 1600 in Gimuy/Cairns and 700 in Djilang/Geelong.

Sydney’s turnout for Australia’s nationwide protests against Israeli genocide. Video: GreenLeft

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

So here we are, 2025, and Israel has finally achieved what no terrorist group, no hostile neighbour, no antisemitic tyrant ever could: it has become the most dangerous country on earth — for its own people.

Not because of rockets or boycotts, but because its government has decided that the only way to secure the future is to annihilate everyone else’s.

The Zionist project — once sold as a miraculous refuge for a persecuted people — now stands revealed as a 70‑year experiment in ethnic cleansing, wrapped in biblical entitlement and armed with American money.

The current phase? Bulldozers in the West Bank, tanks in Gaza, and a prime minister whose personal survival depends on keeping his citizens permanently terrified and morally anesthetised.

Netanyahu and his coalition of zealots have at last clarified Israel’s mission statement: kill or expel two million Palestinians, and call it “security.”

Reduce Gaza to rubble, herd the survivors into tents, and then — here’s the punchline — offer them “resettlement packages” in Libya or South Sudan, as though genocide could be rebranded as humanitarian outsourcing.

And the world? Still dithering over whether to call this behaviour “problematic.” As if sanctions and isolation are reserved only for the unlucky states without lobbyists in Washington or friends in European parliaments.

Israel is begging to be treated as a pariah, but we keep dressing it up as a partner.

The most awkward truth of all: Jews in the diaspora now face a choice. Condemn this grotesque betrayal of Jewish history, or keep defending the indefensible until Israel itself becomes the nightmare prophecy it was meant to escape.

Richard David Hames is an American philosopher-activist, strategic adviser, entrepreneur and mentor and he publishes The Hames Report on Substack.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Three media spokespeople addressed the 98th week of New Zealand solidarity rallies for Palestine in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland today, criticising the quality of news reporting about the world’s biggest genocide crisis this century.

Speakers at other locations around the country also condemned what they said was biased media coverage.

The critics said they were affirming their humanity in solidarity with the people of Palestine as the United Nations this week officially declared a man-made famine in Gaza because of Israel’s weaponisation of starvation against the besieged enclave with 2 million population.

More than 62,000 Palestinians have been killed in the 22 months of conflict – mostly women and children.

One of the major criticisms was that the New Zealand media has consistently framed the series of massacres as a “war” between Israel and Hamas instead of a military land grab based on ethnic cleansing and genocide.

The first speaker, Mick Hall, a former news agency journalist who is currently an independent political columnist, said the way news media had covered these crimes had “undoubtedly affected public opinion”.

“As Israel’s ethnic cleansing of Gaza devolved into a full-blown genocide, our media continued to frame Israel’s attack on Gaza as a war against Hamas, while they uncritically recorded Western leaders’ claims that Israel was exercising a ‘right of self-defence’,” he said.

NZ media lacking context
New Zealand news outlets continued to “present an ahistorical account of what has transpired since October 7, shorn of context, ignoring Israel’s history of occupation, of colonial violence against the Palestinian people”.

“An implicit understanding that violence and ethnic cleansing forms part of the organisational DNA of Zionism should have shaped how news stories were framed and presented over the past 22 months.

“Instead, newsroom leaders took their lead from our politicians, from the foreign policy positions from those in Washington and other aligned centres of power.”

Hall said newsrooms had not taken a “neutral position” — “nor are they attempting to keep us informed in any meaningful sense”.

“They failed to robustly document the type of evidence of genocide now before the International Court of Justice.

“By wilfully declining to adjudicate between contested claims of Israel and its victims, they failed to meet the informational needs of democratic citizenship in a most profound way.

“They lowered the standard of news, instead of upholding it, as they so sanctimoniously tell us.”

Evans slams media ‘apologists’
Award-winning New Zealand cartoonist Malcolm Evans congratulated the crowd of about 300 protesters for “being on the right side of history”.

“As we remember more than 240 journalists, camera and media people, murdered, assassinated, by Zionist Israel — who they were and the principles they stood for we should not forget our own media,” he said.

“The media which, contrary to the principles they claim to stand for, tried to tell us Zionist Israeli genocide was justified.”

“Whatever your understanding of the conflict in Palestine, which has brought you here today and for these past many months, it won’t have come first from the mainstream media.

“It wasn’t our reporters living in a tent in Gaza whose lives, hopes and dreams were blasted into oblivion because they exposed Zionist Israel’s evil intent.

“The reporters whose witness to Zionist Israel’s war crimes sparked your outrage were not from the ranks of Western media apologists.”

Describing the mainstream media as “pimps for propaganda”, Evans said that in any “decent world” he would not be standing there — instead the New Zealand journalists organisation would be, “expressing solidarity with their murdered Middle Eastern colleagues”.

Palestinian journalists owed debt
David Robie, author and editor of Asia Pacific Report, said the world owed a huge debt to the Palestinian journalists in Gaza.

“Although global media freedom groups have conflicting death toll numbers, it is generally accepted that more than 270 journalists and media workers have been killed — many of them deliberately targeted by the IDF [Israeli Defence Force], even killing their families as well.”

Dr Robie stressed that the Palestinian journalist death toll had eclipsed that of the combined media deaths of the American Civil War, First and Second World Wars, Korean War, Vietnam War, Cambodian War, Yugoslavia Wars, Afghan War, and the ongoing Ukraine War.

“The Palestinian death toll of journalists is greater than the combined death toll of all these other wars,” he said. “This is shocking and shameful.”

He pointed out that when Palestinian reporter Anas al-Sharif was assassinated on August 10, his entire television crew was also wiped out ahead of the Israeli invasion of Gaza City — “eliminating the witnesses, that’s what Israel does”.

Six journalists died that day in an air strike, four of them from Al Jazeera, which is banned in Israel.

Dr Robie also referred to “disturbing reports” about the existence of an IDF military unit — the so-called “legitimisation cell” — tasked with smearing and targeting journalists in Gaza with fake information.

He condemned the New Zealand media for republishing some of these “counter-narratives” without question.

“This is shameful because news editors know that they are dealing with an Israeli government with a history of lying and disinformation; a government that is on trial with the International Court of Justice for ‘plausible genocide’; and a prime minister wanted on an International Criminal Court arrest warrant to answer charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity,” he said.

“Why would you treat this government as a credible source without scrutiny?”

Mock media cemetery
The protest included a mock pavement cemetery with about 20 “bodies” of murdered journalists and blue “press” protective vests, and placards declaring “Killing journalists is killing the truth”, “Genocide: Zionism’s final solution” and “Zionism shames Jewish tradition”.

The demonstrators marched around Te Komititanga Square, pausing at strategic moments as Palestinians read out the names of the hundreds of killed Gazan journalists to pay tribute to their courage and sacrifice.

Last year, the Gazan journalists were collectively awarded the UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize for their “courage and commitment to freedom of expression”.

In Ōtautahi Christchurch today, one of the speakers at the Palestine solidarity rally there was author and journalist Saige England, who called on journalists to “speak the truth on Gaza”.

“The truth of a genocide carried out by bombs and snipers, and now there is another weapon — slow starvation, mutilation by hunger,” she said.

“The truth is a statement by Israel that journalists are ‘the enemy’. Israel says journalists are the enemy, what does that tell you?

“Why? Because it has carried out invasions, apartheid and genocide for decades.”

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz