Friday, May 15, 2026

‘Death to Arabs’: Settler mobs storm Jerusalem’s Muslim, Christian quarters for ‘Flag March’

 Israelis organize the Jewish supremacist march each year to celebrate the conquest of Jerusalem in 1967

News Desk, The Cradle, MAY 14, 2026

 

(Photo credit: Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)

Tens of thousands of Jewish settlers descended on occupied Jerusalem on 14 May to celebrate the so-called ‘Flag March,’ beating Palestinian residents in the Muslim Quarter of the city, damaging storefronts, and shouting anti-Arab slogans.

The event, also known as the Flag Dance, commemorates the Israeli conquest of East Jerusalem during the Six-Day War in 1967.

Even before the parade began, Zionist youths pushed and cursed Palestinian residents and activists from “Standing Together,” an Israeli-Palestinian group established to protect Palestinians during the parade.

“When we put our bodies on the line, it oftentimes reduces the violence because settlers are less willing to attack when there are Jews there or when we document what’s going on,” stated Ori Shaham, the group’s international spokesperson.

The parade has long been marked by violence, extreme racism, and hate songs directed against the Palestinian residents of the Old City.

On Wednesday, the Knesset’s Aliyah, Absorption, and Diaspora Committee held a discussion on the violence directed against Christians during the annual parade.

The committee’s chairman, MK Gilad Kariv, stated that “there is nothing more ugly and offensive to the status of Jerusalem than the ugly behavior on the sidelines of the Flag Parade.”

“Every year we know what will happen … Muslim and Christian residents will close their shops, close their homes and schools, and lock themselves in their homes so as not to be exposed to violence? Is this the way of Judaism and the Torah of Israel?”

Last month, Haaretz reported that the Authority for Jewish National Identity in the Prime Minister’s Office provided nearly $200,000 in funding to organize the parade.

The remainder of the $400,000 budget was provided by the Foundation for the Renewal of Communities in Israel, an umbrella organization for several Torah groups.

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir used the Flag Day march to make a provocative raid on the Temple Mount, home to the Al-Aqsa Mosque, the third-holiest site in Islam.

Thucydides’ Trap: Peace and rivalry between the United States and China

 Professor Graham Allison’s concept has influenced the way scholars and leaders think about competition between global powers.

By Nora Delaney

Fall 2025

HOW SHOULD LEADERS AND POLICYMAKERS THINK about relative shifts in power between countries? Are there principles from history that countries can look back to that help understand geopolitical tensions when countries increase their political and economic power? These are the questions that help us navigate conflicts and understand prospects for peace.   

Graham AllisonGraham Allison, the Douglas Dillon Professor of Government and former Kennedy School dean, has argued that we can take a lesson from the ancient Greek historian Thucydides. Thucydides chronicled the Peloponnesian War in the 5th century BCE when the rising city-state of Athens challenged the dominant existing power of Sparta. Thucydides wrote, “It was the rise of Athens and the fear that this instilled in Sparta that made war inevitable.” 

Allison has looked to Thucydides and his exploration of the tensions between a rising and established world power to understand the relationship between China and the United States. In his 2017 book “Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides’ Trap?,” Allison argues that history shows many instances where rising powers challenge established ones, and often these situations end in war—though not always. Allison’s Thucydides’ Trap has since become an influential metaphor in international relations as experts think about the friction between China and the United States—and ways that they might avoid devastating conflict. The Institute for National Strategic Studies and the National Defense University Press, for example, published analyses interpreting the Thucydides Trap in the context of U.S.–China dynamics. Allison’s analysis has also generated attention in China. President Xi Jinping frequently uses it to identify the challenge today’s two great powers face; for example, in his meeting with Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer in October 2023, he said “The ‘Thucydides Trap’ is not inevitable, and Planet Earth is vast enough to accommodate the respective development and common prosperity of China and the United States.” Indeed, during Allison’s quarterly visits to China, Xi and key members of his team have engaged him directly to explore opportunities for escaping the Thucydides Trap.

Allison chairs the Harvard China Working Group that includes faculty from across the university and is pursuing ongoing work at the Kennedy School that grapples with the nature and future of U.S.-China competition. The rivalry between the United States and China, Allison has argued, encompasses four key areas that he and his colleagues at the Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs have researched and reported on: rivalry in economics, technology, military power, and diplomacy. These reports were originally prepared as part of a package of transition memos for the Trump-Biden transition after the November 2020 election. 

Allison and others at the Belfer Center and the Kennedy School continue to lead in our understanding of the ways the United States and China compete and cooperate as world powers.

Israel increasing use of solitary confinement for Palestinians, including for minors

 Data obtained from Israel Prison Service shows children and women among detainees increasingly being held in isolation

A member of the Israeli security forces walks outside the Kziot prison in the Negev desert on 25 January 2025 (AFP/Gil Cohen Magen)

Kziot prison in the Negev desert in Israel, on 25 January 2025 (AFP/Gil Cohen Magen)

By MEE staff

Published date: 14 May 2026 12:01 BST | Last update:21 hours 32 mins ago

There has been a marked increase in Palestinian prisoners, particularly minors, being held in solitary confinement since Israel‘s genocide in Gaza began, according to recently published data. 

The data was published this week by Physicians for Human Rights, who obtained it through a freedom of information request to the Israel Prison Service. 

It showed that the number of minors transferred to solitary confinement rose from one in 2022 to 50 in 2023, before spiking significantly to 290 in 2024. 

Meanwhile, the number of adult detainees held in solitary confinement nearly tripled year-on-year in 2024, reaching 4,493. 

Female detainees in solitary confinement rose too, from two in 2022 to 25 two years later. 

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The Israel Prison Service has two types of solitary confinement: punitive and deterrent isolation. The former lasts 14 days, while the latter can last for six months, and Israeli authorities are able to renew it. 

According to rights groups, most cases involve Palestinians being held in short-term punitive isolation.

Rights organisations have long been critical of solitary confinement, considering it to be an extreme form of punishment. 

Research suggests that it can lead to mental health problems, memory loss, hallucinations and physical illnesses. 

‘Returned from hell’: Press monitor exposes torture of Palestinian journalists by Israel

Read More »

Conditions for Palestinian prisoners have worsened since Israel’s genocide in Gaza began in October 2023. 

Prisoners and detainees have reported food shortages, as well as the spread of diseases within jails and violence committed by prison guards. 

“What was once an exceptional measure has become routine – including for minors and women,” said Oneg Ben-Dror of Physicians for Human Rights. 

She added that the sharp increase of using isolation had raised serious concerns about prisoners’ human rights, as well as their physical and mental health. 

The Israel Prison Service told Haaretz that there had been a “dramatic increase” in the number of security detainees in recent years, including minors. 

It said that comparisons of conditions before and after October 2023 “distort reality” and said that it operated under a policy of “custodial governance” in which it handles any breach of order or discipline in accordance with the law. 

Huge spike in arrests

As of last month, more than 9,600 Palestinians were being held in Israeli jails. 

At least 3,532 of them were held in administrative detention, an Israeli policy which allows the military to detain Palestinians without charge or trial for periods of six months, a period which can be renewed indefinitely.

At least 342 prisoners were children, 84 were women, and 119 were serving life sentences. 

There has been a huge spike in arrests since the Israeli genocide in Gaza began. Before October 2023, around 5,250 Palestinians were held in Israeli prisons.

In March, Israel’s Knesset approved a bill allowing the execution of prisoners, by 62 votes to 48, despite international calls to abandon it.

Under the law, anyone who “intentionally causes the death of another person with the intent to harm an Israeli citizen or resident, or to threaten the existence of the State of Israel” could face the death penalty or life imprisonment.

The wording effectively targets Palestinians, while Jewish Israelis who kill Palestinians would face, at most, a prison sentence.

Thursday, May 14, 2026

Microsoft Ousts Head of Israeli Branch Over Use of Tech to Spy on Palestinians

Microsoft continues “to supply cloud and AI arms to the Israeli military,” activists pointed out.

By Shireen Akram-Boshar , Truthout Published May 13, 2026

 

Pro-Palestinian demonstrators hold banners and signs as they protest outside the Microsoft Build conference at the Seattle Convention Center in Seattle, Washington on May 19, 2025.
Pro-Palestinian demonstrators hold banners and signs as they protest outside the Microsoft Build conference at the Seattle Convention Center in Seattle, Washington on May 19, 2025.

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Microsoft’s Israel subsidiary has announced that its general manager, Alon Haimovich, will be stepping down from his position on May 31, after an investigation into the subsidiary’s collaboration with the Israeli military.

Microsoft ordered an inquiry into its Israel subsidiary last year after a joint investigation by The Guardian, Israeli-Palestinian publication +972 Magazine, and Hebrew-language outlet Local Call revealed the Israeli military’s extensive use of Microsoft’s Azure platform for surveillance.

The Israeli military, it was found, used Microsoft’s Azure cloud-based system to store millions of daily phone calls made by Palestinians, enabling it to capture a much larger pool of everyday Palestinian communication than possible on military servers. According to +972 Magazine, this has created “what is likely one of the world’s largest and most intrusive collections of surveillance data over a single population group.” This has in turn shaped the Israeli military’s operations in both Gaza and the occupied West Bank.

Though Microsoft claimed its leadership was unaware of how the Azure cloud system would be used, leaked documents revealed that Israel’s military surveillance gave specific instructions for its vision of a project that would store “A million [Palestinian] calls an hour.”

The Israeli military’s Unit 8200 — an intelligence unit comparable to the U.S.’s National Security Agency — had approached Microsoft’s CEO in 2021 to work with Microsoft’s Azure to create a specific database for its mass surveillance of Palestinians.

Related Story

Pro-Palestinian demonstrators protest outside the Microsoft Build conference at the Seattle Convention Center in Seattle, Washington, on May 19, 2025.

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Human Rights

Microsoft Faces Reckoning for Assisting Israel’s Genocide in Gaza

The tech giant could face legal liability for aiding and abetting “atrocity crimes” in Palestine, legal groups say. By Mike Ludwig , Truthout

December 3, 2025

Israeli military sources said that intelligence from the phone calls was then used to identify bombing targets in Gaza, and that the military’s use of Azure had increased during the course of the genocide in Gaza. Initially, the Israeli military had focused its use of the Azure cloud platform on the West Bank, creating a network of surveillance used to assist in the Israeli occupation’s domination there.

Microsoft’s inquiry has concluded, according to The Guardian, and has resulted in Microsoft Israel’s general manager, Haimovich, leaving the company.

Several other managers of Microsoft Israel have also left their positions amidst the inquiry.

Though it has not laid out its full findings, Microsoft’s inquiry concluded that the Israeli military intelligence unit violated Microsoft’s terms of service, which prohibit the use of its technology to facilitate mass surveillance. Microsoft then ended Unit 8200’s ability to access its cloud services and AI used to support its surveillance project.

Beyond the Azure cloud system, Microsoft is used in all major infrastructure in the Israeli military system.

In a statement sent to Truthout upon the news that Microsoft Israel’s general manager would be departing, No Azure for Apartheid, an activist group that is part of a broader movement of tech organizers, said the decision “comes at the heels of relentless pressure from our campaign” as well as that of other activists.

“Microsoft has tried to quietly say goodbye to war criminal Alon Haimovich, who oversaw the development of Azure tools for the Israeli military which helped accelerate the first AI-powered genocide,” the group said.

Contrary to claims that Microsoft’s leadership did not know how the technology would be used, No Azure for Apartheid asserts that Haimovich worked closely with Microsoft’s CEO, Satya Nadella.

“Microsoft workers who continue to speak up about those war crimes are arrested, prosecuted, brutalized, fired and sanctioned,” the statement continues.

The statement also claims that Microsoft’s investigations have not stopped it from “continuing to supply cloud and AI arms to the Israeli military” and that the group “refuse[s] to allow Microsoft to scapegoat one or a handful of individuals to wipe its hands clean of its complicity in genocide.” Microsoft, they said, must “end this collusion and cut off all ties with the Israeli military and government immediately.”

Hossam Nasr, an organizer with No Azure for Apartheid and a former tech worker fired by Microsoft for speaking out against the company’s complicity with Israel’s military, told Truthout:

Over the course of the genocide, we’ve come to learn how deeply embedded Microsoft is within the Israeli military ecosystem. Microsoft supplies cloud, AI, computing, storage and advanced AI models to the Israeli military to be used not just by Unit 8200 but also Mamram, Ofek, and specific naval, air and ground units in the Israeli military. Microsoft has a footprint in all major military infrastructures in Israel.

Following a relentless campaign waged by No Azure for Apartheid — which included a worker petition signed by over 2000 employees, disruptions at key events, and an encampment and sit-in at the president’s office last summer — Microsoft became the first U.S. tech company to end some of its contracts with the Israeli military in September 2025, Nasr said. But although the company stopped selling some of its cloud and AI services to Unit 8200, “the vast majority of their contracts with the Israeli military remain intact.”

Microsoft continues to be a partner in not only Israel’s genocide in Gaza, but in the war on Iran and Israel’s war on southern Lebanon, Nasr said.

“This gives us even more fuel and motivation to continue our organizing. We’re not going to stop until all our demands are met — until Microsoft ends all of its contracts with the Israeli military.”

Press freedom is under attack

As Trump cracks down on political speech, independent media is increasingly necessary.

Truthout produces reporting you won’t see in the mainstream: journalism from the frontlines of global conflict, interviews with grassroots movement leaders, high-quality legal analysis and more.

Our work is possible thanks to reader support. Help Truthout catalyze change and social justice — make a tax-deductible monthly or one-time donation today.

about:blank This article is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), and you are free to share and republish under the terms of the license.

Shireen Akram-Boshar

Shireen Akram-Boshar is a socialist writer, editor and Middle East/North Africa solidarity activist.

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Craig Murray: Zionism Poisons UK’s Central Nervous System

 Consortium News, Volume 31, Number 131 — Thursday, May 14, 2026

Not questioning Zionism has long been the entry ticket to the British political and media Establishment, but although public belief in the Zionist narrative is fatally damaged, prosecutions of pro-Palestinian activists continue.

 

Demonstration protesting Gaza genocide in Edinburgh outside the Scottish first minister’s office, July 19, 2025. (Photo from author’s website)

By Craig Murray
CraigMurray.org.uk

Unquestioning Zionism has for decades been the entry ticket to the British political and media Establishment.

Anybody who was not a fully certified and compliant Zionist would find their career limited – as Jeremy Corbyn, Alan Duncan, Robin Cook and David Mellor all found. Most others, of course, were never allowed to progress that far.

In the media there are any number of examples — Antoinette Lattouf, Emily Wilder, Katie Halper, Gabriele Nunziante and Sangita Myska — just from the top of my head. Lack of enthusiasm for Israel is career-destroying.

One consequence is that now, as the U.K. political system retches to try and vomit up a new prime minister, every single one of the contenders — Andy Burnham, Angela Rayner, Ed Miliband and Wes Streeting — has a long history of nailed-on, certified Zionism and relationship with both Israel and Labour Friends of Israel, and is a long-term recipient of Zionist lobby cash.

The media have spent the last several days since the local elections studiously ignoring the fact that support for genocide is a key factor in alienating the Labour Party’s traditional voting base — or when they do mention it, relating it only to Muslim voters. One thing we know for certain is that any probable new prime minister is not going to change Britain’s support for the genocidal zionist entity.

Zionism has long poisoned the central nervous system of the U.K. body politic.

For many years, due to its media control, this system worked seamlessly.

The media portrayed a benign image of Israel as a bastion of liberal democratic values under siege from corrupt and barbaric Arab peoples.

The genocide of Palestinians, which has been in progress almost 80 years, proceeded at a pace and by methods which rigorous media control made it possible to convince Western audiences was not really happening at all.

When a kickback against genocide came on Oct. 7, 2023, media gatekeeping made the declaration of condemnation of Hamas a ritual which had to be observed to ensure purity before you were permitted to express anything else at all.

The media united around false atrocity stories of the events of Oct. 7. Then they united around false Israeli narratives in which every Gazan hospital, clinic, school, public utility and eventually home was a secret Hamas missile base.

Zionist Narrative Fatally Damaged

At this point, something broke. There was a spectacular burst in public opinion. From being a lulling, soothing narrative of European civilisational superiority, the Zionist propaganda was revealed as obvious lies in the service of the very worst atrocities man could do to man (and child).

The media covered up the horrors and the Israeli government raced to stem the flow of images out of Gaza by murdering every journalist there, but public belief in the zionist narrative was fatally damaged.

The result of that was Western Zionist governments became scared of their own populations. In virtually every Western state, extreme authoritarian measures were adopted to limit free speech and punish pro-Palestinian protest.

This was followed by attempts to reinforce the exclusion from public life of non-Zionists by a new wave of accusations of anti-Semitism, reinforced by waves of false flag or agent provocateur organised “anti-Semitic incidents.”

Incidentally the Hasbara invented “Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiyya” so-called terrorist group – actually an Israeli-operated Telegram account – was first “revealed” to the Western public by Joe Truzman of Israeli Washington-front organisation the Foundation for Defending Democracy (F.D.D.).

Nick Stewart of the F.D.D. has subsequently been added to the Witkoff-Kushner negotiating team with Iran and flew to Islamabad with them.

The Iranians have entirely sensibly refused to engage with this group as simply representing Israel.

That is where we are now, with extraordinary developments like the effort to jail and debar Rajiv Menon KC for contempt of court for what I had called the greatest legal speech I ever read, and the charging of thousands of peaceful citizens under terrorism laws for supporting Palestine Action.

[On Tuesday, human rights barrister Menon won his appeal against contempt of court proceedings leveled at him for a closing speech in the trial of Palestine Action activists.

On the same day, however, news outlets reported that a “terrorism connection” was added to the case, which the jury did not know about and which means four of the anti-genocide defendants found guilty in a retrial can be sentenced as terrorists.]

Those are but horrible symptoms of a wider malaise — and the fundamental shift is that the majority of the population, and above all of younger people, now realise that they are governed by a political and media class which acts in service of a Zionist project which is truly evil.

The billionaire class was already allied with the far right. As the appalling fall in living standards of ordinary people since the 2008 banking crisis has been caused by the massive and artificially wrought concentration of wealth which followed, the efforts to divert attention from the hoarders of wealth instead to scapegoat immigrants have entailed massive financial and corporate media backing for racist politicians.

Racism & Zionism Ally

This now syncs neatly with their need for support for Zionism. Zionism has found support through an easy alliance with the rampant Islamophobia that underpins much of the anti-migrant sentiment in the U.K. and rest of the Western world.

Israel’s core support now does not feel the need to hide the fact that Israel was always a deeply racist project.

Israel’s core supporters now glory in racist genocide, as the Tommy Robinson march this weekend will demonstrate and as the Israeli flags at Reform rallies show. 

On last week’s election coverage on all U.K. television channels, every single time a Green representative came on they were immediately pushed to criticise Zack Polanski’s comments on the Golders Green incident — where a certified lunatic stabbed two Jewish men after stabbing a Muslim man.

I was sad — and somewhat shocked — to hear every single Green Party representative head immediately for the Jeremy Corbyn tactic of abject apology and condemnation of “anti-Semitism.”

Only Jenny Jones then pushed back against the conflation of criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism.

Jenny Jones, The Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb, member of the House of Lords. (Official Portrait, Wikipedia)

The exclusion of non-Zionists is still in force within the political and media class. It will remain in force until we change the political and media class.

Personally, the disconnect between the revulsion of the large majority of people of the Western world at the genocide in Gaza, and the people’s complete lack of political power to stop their uni-party political leaderships from supporting genocide, has fundamentally changed my view of politics.

I now fully accept that the change the Western world needs is revolutionary, not incremental.

The problem is those of the exploited classes who have reached breaking point, have so far been easily diverted down the track of racism and away from their true enemies. I fear that is a tactic not likely to fail soon.

We continue to fight with what weapons we have to hand. On May 27 at the Court of Session in Edinburgh we will continue our legal battle against the proscription of Palestine Action.

The May 27 hearing will be on our motion to suspend the proscription in Scotland pending the Scottish judicial review. Decent, caring people are still being dragged through the Scottish courts on potentially life-changing terrorism charges merely for expressing their support for Palestine Action’s attempts to stop genocide.

Many have been dragged to court again and again as their cases are continually put off, while the legal establishment havers over the proscription.

The Crown Office refuses to drop prosecutions and Police Scotland refuses to say it will not arrest people. Nobody has any certainty as to whether the law is being enforced or not.

Arrests and prosecutions appear entirely at executive whim – the very definition of arbitrary government. We seek to end this uncertainty.

The U.K. government is bringing a counter motion to sist (suspend) the judicial review pending the conclusion of the English proceedings — a straight Unionist argument that these things should be decided in London for the whole of the U.K.

I do hope you will come to the court in Edinburgh on May 27, both to witness the proceedings and to demonstrate outside and show that public revulsion at genocide is not going away, and is only increased by Israel’s illegal attacks on Iran and Lebanon.

I am afraid these proceedings are horribly expensive to keep the legal battle going. Again, please contribute if you can, but do not contribute if it causes you difficulty. If you know people who are able to afford to help and likely to be sympathetic, please do contact them and ask their assistance. We are trying to keep a lot of very good people out of prison.

You can donate here via Crowd Justice, which goes straight to the lawyers, or through CraigMurray.org.uk.

Craig Murray is an author, broadcaster and human rights activist. He was British ambassador to Uzbekistan from August 2002 to October 2004 and rector of the University of Dundee from 2007 to 2010. His coverage is entirely dependent on reader support. Subscriptions to keep this blog going are gratefully received.

Subscriptions to keep Craig Murray’s blog going are gratefully received. Because some people wish an alternative to PayPal, Murray has set up new methods of payment including a GoFundMe appeal and a Patreon account.

This article is from CraigMurray.org.uk.

Views expressed in this article may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.

Tags: Anti-Semitism Craig Murray Gaza Genocide Green Party Iran Israel Jenny Jones Palestine Action’ Tommy Robinson Zionism

Wednesday, May 13, 2026

We Can’t Curb Nuclear Proliferation If We Don’t Acknowledge Israel’s Nukes

No credible nonproliferation policy begins by pretending not to see the bombs your ally already has.

By Etan Mabourakh , Truthout Published May 12, 2026

 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu points to a red line he drew on a graphic of a bomb while addressing the United Nations General Assembly on September 27, 2012, in New York City.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu points to a red line he drew on a graphic of a bomb while addressing the United Nations General Assembly on September 27, 2012, in New York City.

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Thirty House Democrats, led by Rep. Joaquin Castro, publicly asked Secretary of State Marco Rubio on May 4 to end the long-standing U.S. policy of ambiguity around Israel’s nuclear capabilities. In a letter, the group asked for answers on detailed questions about Israel’s warheads, delivery systems, fissile material production, and nuclear doctrine. They argue that Congress has a constitutional responsibility to understand the nuclear balance in the Middle East and warn that official silence makes coherent nonproliferation policy impossible.

Lawmakers tied their demand for transparency directly to the current U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, warning that fighting alongside a state whose nuclear posture remains officially unacknowledged heightens the risks of miscalculation and escalation. It also makes the United States out to be hypocritical — citing the nonexistent threat of an Iranian nuclear weapon yet to be built, which Iran had forsworn, while simultaneously ignoring Israel’s secret, unmonitored, undiscussed nuclear weapons arsenal.

If the United States claims to be deeply concerned about nuclear proliferation in the region, the government has a responsibility to stop ignoring facts that make the entirety of U.S. foreign policy on proliferation look completely disingenuous. The U.S. cannot keep sending billions in weapons unconditionally to a nuclear-armed state while treating open discussion of that reality as impermissible.

This letter is a rare and important challenge to one of the most entrenched taboos in U.S. foreign policy: acknowledging that Israel has an undeclared nuclear arsenal for decades and that Washington has largely complied with Israel’s desire to maintain silence around it. That posture goes all the way back to a secret 1969 understanding that allowed the issue to remain publicly unspoken even as it has shaped regional calculations. For decades, Washington would not acknowledge Israel’s nuclear capability, and Israel would not confirm it. But declassified National Security Archive material suggests that by 1969, U.S. agencies had already accumulated enough sensitive evidence to treat the issue as a serious intelligence matter, while also deciding that political and foreign policy costs outweighed the benefits of pressing it openly. The result was an unofficial understanding that helped lock the subject inside a veil of deniability, even as internal investigations, wiretaps, and intelligence briefings continued behind the scenes.

If the formal public stance of the U.S. is to not support the existence of nuclear weapons in the Middle East — whether in Iran or Israel — then the foreign policy objective should be to advocate for a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction. This would require acknowledging that war has utterly failed as a strategy to prevent that goal, especially when the fake threat of an active nuclear weapons program is used to justify military action — as has been the case in costly, useless U.S. wars in Iraq and now in Iran.

Related Story

Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) speaks during a press conference in the U.S. Capitol on January 23, 2025 in Washington, D.C.

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War & Peace

Democrats Demand Answers From Rubio on Number of Nuclear Bombs Owned by Israel

It’s widely known that Israel has covert nuclear warheads, but the US has never officially acknowledged their existence. By Sharon Zhang , Truthout

May 6, 2026

The goal of nonproliferation cannot be credible if it is selective. Israel is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, while Iran is. Simply acknowledging that fact does not require putting full trust in Tehran to abide by the treaty — indeed, that’s why Iran has been subjected to countless inspection regimes; it simply means that any honest regional nonproliferation framework has to begin with the facts as they are, not as Washington prefers to describe them.

The U.S. cannot keep sending billions in weapons unconditionally to a nuclear-armed state while treating open discussion of that reality as impermissible.

Those facts and suspicions have been a matter of public record for decades, even if U.S. officials have often refused to address them publicly. As far back as 1965, the U.S. government knew that over 200 pounds of highly enriched, weapons-grade uranium had gone missing from the Nuclear Materials and Equipment Corporation (NUMEC) plant in Pennsylvania — triggering enduring investigations and allegations by the CIA and other agencies that the material was clandestinely diverted to the Israeli nuclear program. Decades later, in 1986, former Dimona technician Mordechai Vanunu leaked photographs and data to the Sunday Times that exposed the full scale of Israel’s covert weapons program. These facts have long been known and reported on by countless media outlets and scholars, even if they were officially evaded by the U.S. government.

That is why the Castro letter deserves attention beyond the news cycle. The lawmakers wrote that ambiguity about Israel’s program makes coherent nonproliferation policy impossible not only for Iran, but for Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and every other state making decisions based on the capabilities of its neighbors. These 30 Democrats are right to express this concern, and the principle involved is larger than one conflict: There’s no such thing as a rules-based order built on exceptions for allies and punishment for adversaries.

We will not be able to resolve complex issues of nuclear proliferation if we cannot even share a basic reality. The Orwellian “ceasefires” in Gaza, Lebanon, and Iran illustrate this clearly. The U.S. government and its allies lie, and then expect the other side to not just accept their terms, but also their version of the truth — a recipe for perpetual conflict.

Ironically, tragic and repeated U.S. failures of diplomacy have strengthened the most conservative forces inside Iran, who benefit most from isolation, siege, and perpetual confrontation. If U.S. officials profess to care about the Iranian people, regional peace, and genuine nonproliferation, they should be building diplomatic pathways that reduce incentives for weaponization, not destroying the possibility of trust altogether.

The United States should state openly what it knows, demand transparency from all regional actors, and return to the hard work of diplomacy. The rest of Congress should insist on answers to the questions raised in the Castro letter, not bury them. And anyone serious about preventing nuclear catastrophe should be willing to say a simple thing out loud: There is no credible nonproliferation policy that begins by pretending not to see the bombs your ally already has.

Press freedom is under attack

As Trump cracks down on political speech, independent media is increasingly necessary.

Truthout produces reporting you won’t see in the mainstream: journalism from the frontlines of global conflict, interviews with grassroots movement leaders, high-quality legal analysis and more.

Our work is possible thanks to reader support. Help Truthout catalyze change and social justice — make a tax-deductible monthly or one-time donation today.

about:blank This article is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), and you are free to share and republish under the terms of the license.

Etan Mabourakh

Etan Mabourakh

Etan Mabourakh is the national organizing manager at the National Iranian American Council, where he organizes grassroots volunteers through a nationwide chapter network and coalitions across the United States. A Jewish Iranian American based in New York, Etan has consulted on campaigns at every level of government, speaks frequently on U.S.–Iran policy, as well as civil rights and antiwar advocacy.

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Trump threatens Iran will be “decimated” if it does not accept US dictated deal

 

Kevin Reed, WSWS.org, 13 May 2026

With the US ceasefire announced on April 8 all but over, the conflict with Iran is intensifying with President Trump escalating threats of renewed military attacks against Tehran.

On Monday, Trump dismissed Iran’s latest reply to the US proposal as “totally unacceptable,” called it a “piece of garbage,” and said he “didn’t even finish reading it.” He said the ceasefire—which effectively ended last week when the US fired on Iranian military targets—was on “massive life support.”

On Tuesday, before departing for China, the president continued with the posture that the US is dictating terms to Iran. When asked if he was going to discuss the war with Beijing, Trump said he would talk to President Xi about the war but mostly about trade and added that Iran was not really one of the topics because the US had it “very much under control.”

He told reporters, “We’re only going to make a good deal,” and then said, “We’re either going to make a deal or they’re going to be decimated. One way or the other, we win.”

Trump continued to insist that the US has already “won” and that a deal with Iran has little significance. Along with the threat to “decimate” Iran, Trump warned on May 7 that the US would soon have to “look at one big glow coming out of Iran”—a comment widely understood as a threat to use nuclear weapons.

Iran’s latest confirmed position, as reported by state broadcaster and other outlets, is that any settlement must include war reparations, sanctions relief, release of frozen assets and recognition of Iranian sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei said Tehran was “not asking for anything unusual” and that the country was demanding only its “legitimate rights.”

The Iranian proposal also reportedly included a willingness to dilute part of its enriched uranium and transfer the rest abroad, but not under terms that would amount to a complete capitulation to Washington.

The key political point is that Iran is refusing to accept the framework dictated by US imperialism which, with the support of Israel, has carried out the illegal war including targeting 13,000 sites with missiles strikes and murdering the entire political leadership of the country.

While the White House has portrayed Iran’s position as obstructive, Tehran has consistently and explicitly linked any peace agreement to compensation for damage done and an acknowledgment of its sovereign rights over the strategic waterway.

Over the past 48 hours, there has been no publicly confirmed report of an Iranian or US strike sinking boats in the Strait of Hormuz itself, but the waterway remains the central strategic flashpoint of the war. The US has maintained naval pressure and claimed it is working to reopen the strait, while Tehran has insisted it retains sovereign rights there.

In practical terms, the strait is not under “absolute control” by Washington despite the claim by US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on May 4. The ongoing disruption, militarized patrols and negotiations show the strait to be a contested chokepoint which is not under US control.

The fact that Washington is publicly appealing to China to help “open” the strait is an open admission that the US cannot simply command passage through the strait by fiat. Reports on Tuesday that the UAE carried out a covert strike on Iran’s Lavan Island refinery demonstrates that the conflict over the strait involves multiple regional actors operating as proxies for US imperialism.

Although Abu Dhabi has not publicly acknowledged involvement, the reported strike caused a major fire and is expected to disrupt refinery production for months. A report by Reuters also stated, based on accounts from anonymous sources, that Saudi Arabia has been involved in covert anti-Iran operations. These reports confirm that the war is being conducted by a network of state actors, proxies and covert actions across the Gulf, all managed by the US government.

On Tuesday, Jules “Jay” Hurst, the Pentagon’s top budget official, told lawmakers that the cost of the war had increased to approximately $29 billion due to “updated repair and replacement of equipment costs and also just general operational costs.”Available from Mehring BooksThe struggle against imperialism and for workers’ power in IranA pamphlet by Keith Jones

Hurst’s testimony exposed Secretary of War Pete Hegseth’s effort to cover up the escalating cost of the war in testimony before both House and Senate appropriations committees by refusing to answer any questions about the total cost of the ten-week war. Hegseth’s appearance before Congress came amid a White House request for a 2027 military budget of roughly $1.5 trillion.

The Iranian Ministry of Health has reported 3,468 people killed in Iran, including more than 1,700 civilians, and over 26,500 injured. US casualties include roughly 200 wounded service members and 13 dead.

In a Truth Social post on Tuesday, Trump denounced media criticism of the war writing, “When the Fake News says that the Iranian enemy is doing well, Militarily, against us, it’s virtual TREASON in that it is such a false, and even preposterous, statement.” The administration’s attacks on public criticism are being paired with Pentagon restrictions that limit press access including credentials being revoked on “security” grounds.

Department of War policies have also targeted Pentagon reporters and, in the case of military publications, imposed tighter control over content and access. The aim is to silence criticism while expanding censorship and threats of legal action under wartime conditions.

Trump’s insistence that the US does not need any help from China clashes sharply with the fact that top US officials have been publicly urging Beijing to use its influence on Iran to help reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Secretary Bessent called on China to “step up” diplomatically, making clear that Washington is seeking Chinese assistance even while pretending otherwise.

In Lebanon, Israeli strikes continued, resulting in the killing of two paramedics in southern Lebanon on Sunday in strikes on health committee sites. The killing of medical workers—a strategic aim by the Zionist regime throughout the Gaza genocide—exposes the criminal character of the Lebanon campaign.