I was born in Poonch (Kashmir) and now I live in Norway. I oppose war and violence and am a firm believer in the peaceful co-existence of all nations and peoples. In my academic work I have tried to espouse the cause of the weak and the oppressed in a world dominated by power politics, misleading propaganda and violations of basic human rights. I also believe that all conscious members of society have a moral duty to stand for and further the cause of peace and human rights throughout the world.
Without law enforcement, Palestinians’
lives, homes and property are left vulnerable, and they soon realize the
only way they can protect themselves and their possessions is to leave
The war in Gaza, the public attention that is focused on the hostages
and their abandonment, the stormy debates for and against population
transfer and deliberate starvation as well as the question of how many
tens of thousands – including children – must die for Israel to be
shocked out of its actions: All these, plus the roiling domestic
politics, create ideal conditions for settlers’ quiet and systematic
expulsion of Palestinians from Area C of the West Bank, which is under
exclusive Israeli control.
Haaretz Podcast
‘We have to find ways to live here together’: Why this Israeli author wrote an ‘unheroic war diary’
00:00 / 28:38
After the war began, the settlers developed
a new method for displacing Palestinian communities: They establish
settlement outposts adjacent to them and immediately begin to assault
their residents, steal their livestock and restrict their movements.
In the absence of law enforcement, the Palestinians’ lives, homes and
property are left vulnerable. They quickly realize that the only way
they can protect themselves and their possessions is to leave.
According to the data of Kerem Navot, an Israeli nonprofit that
monitors land-use policy in the West Bank, since the war began around 60
Palestinian communities have been expelled from Area C (Hagar Shezaf,
Hebrew Haaretz, Friday).
The latest victim of this method is the Ramallah-area Bedouin village
al-Mughayyir. Its residents have lived there for some 40 years, but it
took settlers less than a week to expel them.
They have been subjected to harassment for two years, but the outpost
established last week set off a dramatic escalation that led to its
displacement.
In this case, there was no need for a violent attack: A threat
sufficed, since residents knew well what had happened to other villages
that failed to heed the threats.
The new outpost is less than 100 meters
(yards) from one of the village homes. The IDF and Civil Administration
did not act to remove it or to protect the Palestinian residents, who
fled from their homes in fear. This is quiet expulsion, under the
watchful but silent eyes of the state and the military.
The “hilltop youth” do not act alone. The settlement enterprise is a
terrifying apparatus with the power not only to build outposts and expel
communities but also to elect representatives to the Knesset and place
them in the cabinet.
MK Tzvi Succot has already been spotted in the new outpost. A
petition submitted to the High Court of Justice demanded temporary
relief: moving the outpost 3 kilometers (almost 2 miles) from the
village and conducting regular patrols.
The state was asked to explain its failure to take action against the
expulsion attempt. Justice Yosef Elron ruled against the requested
temporary measures and gave the state until May 29 to respond. The
court, then, is a party to the Palestinians’ abandonment.
The occupying power is responsible for protecting the people living
under occupation. The army and the Civil Administration must act
immediately to remove the settlers, protect the Palestinians and prevent
the next expulsion.
In the absence of such action, it is clear that the Israeli
establishment is a party to the expulsion. Israel cannot continue to
ignore its obligations under international law and agreements to which
it is a signatory.
The above article is Haaretz’s lead editorial, as published in the Hebrew and English newspapers in Israel.
Palestinians
inspect a house destroyed by an Israeli airstrike in Deir al-Balah,
Gaza, on Wednesday, May 21, 2025. [AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana]
On Sunday, the Israeli military announced a plan to occupy
three-quarters of the Gaza Strip. The entire remaining Palestinian
population, estimated at around 2 million people, would be forced into
an area of just 35 square miles.
The plan is the practical implementation of “Operation Gideon’s
Chariots,” which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has described
as the “concluding moves” of the onslaught in Gaza.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) stated that it currently controls 44
percent of the Gaza Strip and plans to expand that control to 75 percent
within two months.
The IDF announced plans to establish three “humanitarian zones”—i.e.,
concentration camps—located along the southern coast, in Gaza City in
the north and near Nuseirat in central Gaza.
The IDF stated that its operational focus will shift from targeting
individual Hamas fighters to seizing territory and forcibly displacing
the Palestinian population.
In a statement on the mass displacement plan, the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor wrote:
Israeli forces have issued at least 35 evacuation orders in the Gaza
Strip since January of this year, affecting over one million people.
These orders compound the harm caused by those issued prior to January,
which had already resulted in much of the population being displaced.
Israel is now intensifying efforts to confine residents to a narrow area
along the southern coast—an apparent prelude to expulsion from the
Strip, in line with the “Trump Plan” recently adopted by Netanyahu as a
condition for ending military operations in the enclave.
This weekend’s announcement by the IDF coincides with the launch of
the US-Israeli “Gaza Humanitarian Foundation,” which is set to begin
distributing food and humanitarian supplies on Monday.
International humanitarian aid agencies have condemned the
organization, which the US and Israel aim to use to replace the existing
humanitarian network by distributing starvation rations to pre-vetted
individuals using facial recognition technology.
The total occupation of Gaza, the transfer of the population to
concentration camps and the monopolization of food distribution by the
US and Israeli militaries is the essential prelude to their plan for the
forcible displacement of the remaining Palestinian population.
On Friday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly said
for the first time that the displacement of the Palestinian population
from Gaza is an official objective of Israel’s war effort.
Israel, Netanyahu declared in a press conference, “is ready to end
the war, under clear conditions that … we carry out the Trump plan. A
plan that is so correct and so revolutionary.”
In February, US President Trump declared, “The US will take over the
Gaza Strip. … We’ll own it.” He said the US will “level it out” and that
other countries will “build various domains that will ultimately be
occupied by the 1.8 million Palestinians living in Gaza.”
Last week, NBC News reported that the United States is in
negotiations with Syria and Libya, whose governments it helped to
overthrow in Islamist insurgencies, to accept the Palestinian people who
are being displaced from Gaza.
Earlier this month, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich spelled
out the government’s plan: Within a year, Gaza will be completely
destroyed, civilians will be pushed into a “humanitarian zone” in the
south, and from there, they will begin leaving en masse for third
countries.
In a report published Saturday, the Washington Post explained
that the so-called “Gaza Humanitarian Foundation” was created by a
“group of former US intelligence and defense officials and business
executives, working in close consultation with Israel.”
According to the Post, it will
hire armed private contractors to provide logistics and security for a
handful of aid distribution hubs to be built in southern Gaza. Under
the arrangement, which would replace existing aid distribution networks
coordinated by the United Nations, Palestinian civilians would have to
travel to the hubs and submit to identity checks to receive rations from
nongovernmental organizations.
The Post reported on internal planning documents by the
“Gaza Humanitarian Foundation” that anticipated its operations being
compared to “concentration camps with biometrics” or being similar to
“Blackwater, a former US mercenary firm implicated in violence against
civilians in Iraq.”
Gaza’s entire remaining population is on the brink of famine, after
Israel blocked nearly all food, fuel and electricity from entering the
enclave since March.
Israel is also continuing its daily massacres of civilians, including
journalists, doctors and humanitarian workers. On Friday, an Israeli
airstrike killed at least seven children of Alaa al-Najjar, a
pediatrician at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis.
On Sunday, Israeli airstrikes killed at least 30 Palestinians across
the Gaza Strip. Among the dead was journalist Hassan Majdi Abu Warda,
bringing the number of Palestinian journalists killed since October 2023
to 220.
Also Sunday, the International Committee of the Red Cross said in a
statement that two of its staff members, Ibrahim Eid and Ahmad Abu
Hilal, had been killed in an Israeli attack in Khan Younis.
Israeli attacks also killed Ashraf Abu Nar, the operations director
of Gaza’s civil defense, and his wife, in a strike on their home in
Nuseirat.
To date, 53,900 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed by Israeli
attacks since October 7, 2023, with hundreds of thousands wounded.
In a statement Sunday, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA,
said that 950 children have been killed by Israeli attacks over the
past two months. “Children in Gaza are enduring unimaginable suffering,”
UNRWA said in a post on X. “They are starving, displaced, and exposed
to indiscriminate attacks.”
People watch as smoke billows following an Israeli strike in Jabalia, Gaza on May 25, 2025.
(Photo: Bashar Taleb/AFP via Getty Images)
“These are not isolated accounts; they
point to a systemic failure and a horrifying moral collapse,” said the
executive director of Breaking the Silence.
Israeli soldiers have “systematically” used Palestinians as human shields during the 19-month assault on the Gaza Strip, The Associated Press reported Saturday, citing Palestinian civilians and members of the Israel Defense Forces who described engaging in the practice that is banned under international humanitarian law.
“Orders often came from the top, and at times nearly every platoon used a Palestinian to clear locations,” APreported, citing the account of an unnamed Israeli officer.
One Palestinian man, Ayman Abu Hamadan, said Israeli soldiers dressed
him in army fatigues, attached a camera to his forehead, and forced him
to enter homes to ensure they were clear of bombs and militants. Abu
Hamadan said he was passed from unit to unit for over two weeks.
“Soldiers stood behind him and, once it was clear, entered the buildings to damage or destroy them, he said,” AP reported. “He spent each night bound in a dark room, only to wake up and do it again.”
Nadav Weiman, executive director of Breaking the Silence—an anti-occupation group founded by former Israeli soldiers—told AP that “these are not isolated accounts; they point to a systemic failure and a horrifying moral collapse.”
Israeli officials frequently justify attacks on homes, hospitals, and
other civilian infrastructure by alleging that Hamas uses Gaza’s
civilian population as human shields. But Israeli forces have long been
accused of using detained Palestinians as human shields, both during and
prior to the current assault on Gaza.
According to the Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem,
“Over the years, the military practiced an official policy of using
Palestinians as human shields, ordering them to carry out military
activities that put their lives in jeopardy: Palestinians were forced to
remove suspicious objects from roads, tell other Palestinians to come
out and surrender themselves, physically shield soldiers while they
fired, and more.”
“In most cases, no one was held accountable,” the group said.
Earlier this year, an anonymous Israeli officer wrote in a column for Haaretz that “in Gaza, human shields are used by Israeli soldiers at least six times a day.”
“Today, almost every platoon keeps a ‘shawish,’ and no infantry force
enters a house before a ‘shawish’ clears it,” the officer wrote. “This
means there are four ‘shawishes’ in a company, twelve in a battalion,
and at least 36 in a brigade. We operate a sub-army of slaves.”
In response to AP‘s reporting, the IDF told the Jerusalem Post that it would only investigate the claims in the story “if further details are provided.”
The reporting came as Israel continued with its large-scale ground
offensive and aerial assault in Gaza, where the entire population is
facing a dire hunger crisis due to Israel’s monthslong siege.
On Sunday, according toReuters,
“Israeli military strikes killed at least 23 Palestinians across the
Gaza Strip… including a local journalist and a senior rescue service
official.”
Hours earlier, an Israeli strike
on a home in Khan Younis killed nine children of a Nasser Hospital
pediatrician and badly injured her husband while she was at work.
“Targeting families in the still-standing buildings: distinguishable sadistic pattern of the new phase of the genocide,” Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, wrote in response to the deadly strike.
Apoorvanand teaches Hindi at the University of Delhi. He writes literary and cultural criticism.
Al-Jazeera, Published On 13 May 2025
People
wave Indian flags in support of the Indian Armed Forces, following the
ceasefire announcement between India and Pakistan, in Delhi on May 13,
2025 [Priyanshu Singh/Reuters]
On May 12, two days after the announcement of a ceasefire between
India and Pakistan, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi finally
addressed the nation. He stated that the Indian army had only “paused”
military action and Operation Sindoor, launched in the aftermath of the
April 22 massacre in Pahalgam to target “terrorist hideouts”, had not
ended.
“Now, Operation Sindoor is India’s policy against terrorism.
Operation Sindoor has carved out a new benchmark in our fight against
terrorism and has set up a new parameter and new normal,” he said.
Modi’s speech was clearly not meant
to reassure the Indian people that the government can guarantee their
safety or security and is seeking peace and stability. Instead, it was
meant to warn that the country is now in a permanent warlike situation.
This new state of affairs has been called not to secure the national
interest but to satisfy Modi’s nationalist support base, which was
bewildered and disappointed with the announcement of the ceasefire by
United States President Donald Trump. The detrimental impact that this
new militarised normal will have on Indian democracy is clearly a price
worth paying, according to the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
The truth is, the political establishment unwittingly put itself in a
difficult position when it decided to capitalise politically on the
aftermath of the Pahalgam attack in India-administered Kashmir and whip
up war fervour.
While victims of the attack like Himanshi Narwal, who survived but
lost her husband, navy officer Vinay Narwal, called for peace and warned
against the targeting of Muslims and Kashmiris, the BJP called for
revenge and embraced anti-Muslim rhetoric.
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As a ruling party, it did not feel the need to take responsibility
for failing to prevent the attack or explain the carelessness in
securing tourist destinations. It immediately converted this act of
killing into an act of war against India.
Actions followed the hate rhetoric swiftly. Muslims and Kashmiris
were attacked in several parts of India, and arrests were made of those
criticising the Indian government. In Kashmir, nine houses were blasted
immediately as punishment of those who had any link with “terrorists”,
and thousands were detained or arrested. People with Pakistani passports
were deported, and families were broken.
Then, Operation Sindoor was announced. The Indian army’s targeting of
Pakistani sites was accompanied by frenzied calls from the mainstream
media for the complete obliteration of Pakistan. Major TV platforms –
entirely falsely – declared the Karachi port had been destroyed and the
Indian army had breached the border.
The war cries and fake news emerging from the TV studios and the
frantic messaging from the IT cells of the BJP led its supporters to
believe that a decisive battle against Pakistan had been launched and
its fall was imminent.
In parallel, critical voices were swiftly silenced. The Indian
government requested the blocking of 8,000 accounts from the social
media platform X, including those of BBC Urdu, Outlook India, Maktoob
Media, veteran journalist Anuradha Bhasin and political content creator
Arpit Sharma.
Just when war fever had gripped the BJP’s support base, the sudden
announcement of a ceasefire by the US caught them by surprise. The truce
was seen as a retreat and an admission of weakness.
Some of the BJP’s online supporters turned on the foreign secretary,
Vikram Misri, who had declared the ceasefire as the representative of
the government of India. He was viciously attacked, and his timeline was
flooded with abusive and violent messages, calling him a traitor and
coward. His daughter also faced abuse.
The trolling was so severe that Misri had to lock his social media
accounts. Interestingly, but unsurprisingly, we did not hear about the
blocking of any social media accounts trolling him or any action by the
police against them. There was no action to protect Narwal either after
she faced abuse and humiliation by the same crowd for daring to call for
peace.
Meanwhile, the Association for Protection of Civil Rights, which
focuses on rights violations in marginalised communities, has released a
report saying 184 hate crimes against Muslims – including murder,
assault, vandalism, hate speech, threats, intimidation and harassment –
have been reported from different parts of India since April 22.
On Saturday, Misri claimed that India was a democracy that allowed
criticism of the government. But the experience of critics raising
questions about the objective and efficacy of Operation Sindoor has been
bitter.
Criticism of government requires parliamentary deliberation. But the
government has been ignoring calls by opposition parties to convene the
parliament, which means stalling democratic dialogue.
Now that the prime minister has announced the operation has not
ended, total loyalty from the Indian people will be demanded. Opposition
parties would feel compelled to suspend all questions to the
government. Muslims would feel a burden to prove their allegiance to the
nation. The government will happily blame a dire economic situation
that is of its doing on the war. There will be freedom of speech, but
only for those who speak in favour of the BJP.
Democracy in India thus remains in suspended animation as the country now faces a permanent enemy and a permanent war.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
ApoorvanandApoorvanand
teaches Hindi at the University of Delhi. He writes literary and
cultural criticism.Apoorvanand teaches Hindi at the University of Delhi.
He writes literary and cultural criticism.
The Israeli leader said the ‘main problem’ preventing ’emigration’ was the lack of countries willing to take in Palestinian refugees
by Dave DeCamp, Antiwar. com, May 12, 2025
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that the forced removal of Palestinians from Gaza was “inevitable.”
“We are destroying more and more homes, and Gazans have nowhere to return to. The only inevitable outcome will be the wish of Gazans to emigrate outside of the Gaza Strip,” Netanyahu said at the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, according to The Jerusalem Post.
Israeli officials have made clear that the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian population of Gaza is their ultimate goal, but it remains unclear where the Palestinians would go. Netanyahu told the committee that the “main problem” preventing “emigration” is the lack of countries willing to take in the Palestinians.
Israel has maintained a total blockade on Gaza since March 2 and has developed plans to start bringing in aid using private US security contractors to use food to lure starving Palestinians into a tiny part of southern Gaza. Netanyahu said that the aid would be conditional on the Palestinians not returning to where they came from.
Netanyahu also said Israel was currently not planning to establish Jewish settlements in Gaza at the moment because President Trump is interested in having the US take over the territory.
Limor Son Har-Melech, an Israeli MK and member of the Jewish Power Party, suggested American Jews could move to Gaza. “Bring the Jews from the United States, this way we’ll hit two birds with one stone,” he said.
The task shouldn’t be falling to university activists and
obscure antiwar bloggers. Every news outlet in the world should be
making this their entire focus.
It can make you feel like you’re going mad. How
phony and superficial it all is. How we’re a year and a half into
history’s first live-streamed genocide and our whole society is acting
like everything’s peachy.
We’re murdering kids. We’re starving them. We’re dropping high tech
military explosives on them. Blowing their limbs off. Ripping their guts
out. Shooting them in the head. This isn’t just being done by “Israel”.
It’s being done by the entire western empire which backs these
atrocities.
And yet if you turn on a TV you’ll see famous people laughing and
joking about nonsense, expressing political opinions of no more depth
and significance than whether or not there should have been a female
Ghostbusters movie. Go read the news and it’s dominated by empty fluff
about celebrities and politicians and the latest brain fart to come out
of Donald Trump’s mouth. Go to a party and everyone’s nattering about
vapid gibberish, yelling “No politics!” if you try to say anything about
the holocaust-shaped elephant in the room.
I used to have a lot more fun on my platform. Lots of humor. But ever
since the Gaza holocaust began, that kind of writing has often felt
like it would be irreverent and frivolous. Almost sacrilegious. I would
feel like I’m joining in with the madness of mainstream culture by
turning my back on all those emaciated bodies and mutilated children.
So for the last year and a half I’ve mostly just been doing what I
feel everyone on earth ought to be doing: pointing to the genocide and
saying it needs to stop.
I used to be more creative in my ways of pointing to the criminality
of the empire, because its depravity was often difficult for people to
really grasp, so I was always seeking out new ways to help people see
its monstrosity with fresh eyes. Now that they’re just butchering
children right in front of us, that’s not really what’s called for
anymore. What’s called for is to keep drawing everyone’s attention to
the terrible thing that’s staring us all right in the face.
This task shouldn’t be falling to university activists and obscure
antiwar bloggers. Every news outlet in the world should be making this
their entire focus.
If we had a sane and ethical news media, this is what they would be
doing. All the leading stories every single day would be about the
latest evil thing Israel and its western backers have done in Gaza,
clearly stating in every headline our own government’s role in making
this possible. Every press conference would be completely dominated with
questions asking every western official why we are participating in an
active genocide and demanding answers about when it is going to stop.
Instead we get “Palestinians perish in explosion” passive-language
headlines, usually coupled with “…says Hamas-run health ministry” in
order to let readers disbelieve the entire story. And that’s on those
rare occasions that Israel’s atrocities get reported on at all; normally
Gaza is seen as a third or fourth-tier issue of far less importance
than some infinitely less egregious grievance in our own country.
Palestinian lives are given vastly less weight than western lives,
with our own feelings and comforts emphasized far more heavily than the
issue of the Palestinian people living or dying.
And it can just make you feel like you’re going crazy. It’s like if
we were all going around physically drenched in human blood, with blood
flooding our living rooms and severed limbs strewn about our bedrooms
and kitchens?—?but nobody was talking about it. You try to say “What’s
up with all this blood and gore?” and they shush you and tell you it’s
impolite to talk about politics. A dark red deluge pours out of your
minivan door when you open it to pick up your kid from soccer practice,
and everyone looks away.
This is happening. We know it’s happening. It’s happening right in
front of us and we’re acting like it’s not. It’s so maddening and
frustrating, and it can make you feel so powerless.
But we keep pointing at Gaza, because what the hell else are we going
to do? The alternative is to join the lunatics acting like it isn’t
happening.
At the very least, it’s a way of preserving our sanity. Preserving
our humanity. Even if they do succeed in purging Gaza of all Palestinian
life, at the very least we will have prevented the bastards from
warping and twisting us into psychopathic freaks like them. Even if we
can’t stop them from destroying Gaza, we can at least stop them from
destroying our hearts.
Caitlin Johnstone’s work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, following her on Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud, YouTube, or throwing some money into her tip jar on Ko-fi, Patreon or Paypal. If you want to read more you can buy her books. The best way to make sure you see the stuff she publishes is to subscribe to the mailing list at her website or on Substack,
which will get you an email notification for everything she
publishes. For more info on who she is, where she stands and what she’s
trying to do with her platform, click here. All works are co-authored with her American husband Tim Foley.
The views expressed are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
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As Israel’s global isolation grows, Berlin deepens its alliance with
Tel Aviv – criminalising dissent, rewarding lobby groups, and eroding
rights in the name of fighting antisemitism
A pro-Palestine activist is led away by police officers during a
demonstration against Israel’s war on Gaza at the Free University of
Berlin, Germany, on 7 May 2024 (Tobias Schwarz/AFP)
On 28 March, the Zionist German Jewish weekly Judische Allgemeine Zeitung happily announced that Tel Aviv would become Berlin’s newest twin city, with all factions of the Berlin House of Representatives agreeing to the decision.
A few days later, Der Tagesspiegel, one of Berlin’s so-called “quality newspapers,” declared that “the two metropolises have a lot in common”.
What an abysmal disgrace: the representatives of the self-proclaimed
parties of the “democratic centre” in the Berlin House of
Representatives – Christian Democrats, Social Democrats, and Greens –
have decided, together with the “Left” and the fascist Alternative für
Deutschland (AfD), to move even closer to the genocidal butchers in Tel
Aviv.
They do so even as large parts of the world are gradually distancing themselves from this regime.
Choosing a twin city is far more than a symbolic act, especially when that city is the capital of a state ruled by war criminals responsible for an ongoing genocide.
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Such a decision reflects common interests and values that supposedly bind the cities and their populations together.
And the ones on display in this partnership are telling: while one
side commits genocide, the other supports, promotes, and finances it;
while one carries out ethnic cleansing, the other feigns ignorance;
while one deliberately targets children, journalists, and medical
personnel, the other looks away and prattles on about human rights;
while one starves a people to death, the other merely shrugs.
This list is far from complete, but it is already one of the most
repulsive imaginable. Berlin and Tel Aviv, as the German press rightly
points out, do indeed have a lot in common.
Historical amnesia
The decision by Berlin’s representatives sends a clear message to the
world about what the German capital now stands for – and marks an
unprecedented act of historical amnesia.
The government of a city that was under siege decades ago, and
continues to invoke that experience as central to its collective memory,
has now switched sides.
A city that remembers its own siege should have named Gaza City as its twin – not the capital of those enforcing one
Berlin is aligning itself with the capital of a country that has not only besieged the Gaza Strip for 17 years and created the largest prison on earth and put Palestinians “on a diet” – but has also been committing genocide for more than 18 months – a campaign fully supported by the people of Tel Aviv.
If the experience of siege were truly as significant and defining for
Berlin as its politicians so often claim, with great solemnity, then
there would have been only one natural and fitting twin city: Gaza City.
Unlike Gaza, however, Berlin found help when it was besieged after the Second World War. Western countries sent “raisin bombers”
and supplied the trapped enclave with food, and they were not prevented
from doing so by the Soviet Union – in stark contrast to the criminal starvation of Gaza’s civilian population by the settler-colonial regime in Tel Aviv.
In order to live up to their historical experience and
responsibility, Berlin’s representatives should have sent “raisin
bombers” to Gaza on 8 October 2023, instead of making themselves
accomplices to genocide. They should not have wasted a single thought on
becoming partners with the perpetrator capital.
Zionist influence
Berlin’s choice of Israel’s
capital city underscores how deeply German politicians have, in recent
years, allowed the Zionist lobby to shape the city’s political agenda.
In a manner incompatible with the rule of law, it now takes only the
suspicion that an event or statement might be deemed antisemitic,
according to the Zionist-driven IHRA definition, for the machinery of state repression to lurch into action.
From smear campaigns and police raids to the prosecution of activists
and the criminalisation of humanitarian solidarity, every demonstration
in support of Palestinian rights is met with brutal suppression by Berlin’s militarised riot police.
The Zionist lobby, as in other countries, does not seek to address the root causes of antisemitism. Instead, it weaponises the charge in order to pressure the German state into punishing anti-Zionist speech.
Following its electoral victory, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU)
and its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU),
submitted a “minor interpellation” to the federal government titled
“Political Neutrality of State-funded Organisations”.
It consisted of over 500 questions targeting civil society
organisations critical of Israel’s genocide, with the aim of stripping
them of funding and charitable status if they do not conform to what the
Christian Democrats define as “political neutrality.”
Unsurprisingly, the Christian parties did not include a single
Zionist lobby organisation in their interpellation, even though these
groups are anything but “politically neutral”.
On the contrary, they operate as propaganda arms for the Zionist
cause and Israel’s genocide against the Palestinian people in ways that
are openly hostile to democratic principles and the defence of
universalist ideals.
But perhaps more revealing is the fact that, two years ago, taxpayer
funding for one of the Zionist lobby groups was almost doubled, reaching
an annual total of 23 million euros ($25m).
Another openly Zionist organisation is
also financially supported by the Ministry of the Interior – even
though, once again, an organisation that openly represents and defends a
racist ideology can hardly be considered “politically neutral.”
So what, exactly, is its public benefit?
State repression
On 19 February 2025, Berlin’s mayor Kai Wegner (CDU) deliberately
pressured the president of Freie Universität (FU), Gunter M Ziegler, on
behalf of the Zionist lobby to cancel an event with Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
As Forschung & Lehre reported, it was not only the mayor who exerted pressure on university’s president.
Two Zionist groups – that are anything but “politically neutral”
– were also involved. Ziegler ultimately bowed to this illegitimate
encroachment on the university’s autonomy and cancelled the event.
On 4 April, the right-wing Die Welt newspaper launched another smear campaign against Albanese, echoing official Israeli propaganda in advance of a UN vote on her reappointment.
The paper quoted German politicians, including Jurgen Hardt of the
CDU – a staunch Zionist advocate – who parroted Israeli military lies
with shameless disregard for truth or decency.
As if that were not enough, Berlin crossed a new threshold on 1 April with a Trump-like move: announcing the deportation of three EU citizens and one US citizen simply for participating in pro-Gaza demonstrations.
These individuals had committed no crime. But in Berlin, freedom of
expression is already too much to tolerate, especially when exercised to
defend Palestinian rights.
This sends an unambiguous warning: anyone who demands justice for Palestinians is now a target of state repression.
If the courts fail to halt this descent into authoritarianism, German
citizens could soon face prison for criticising Israeli war crimes,
while non-citizens will simply be deported. All will be punished not for
violence or incitement, but for defending the wrong people in the eyes
of the political establishment.
Institutional assault
After German parliamentarians unanimously adopted
the IHRA definition of antisemitism in 2017, the real consequences of
this move for German democracy became clear in light of the ongoing
Zionist genocide of the Palestinian people.
Two decisive resolutions
passed in November 2024 and January 2025 dramatically changed German
society and paved the way for even greater Zionist influence.
Germany’s support for Israel’s far-right alliance shatters its ‘denazified’ facade
The first Zionist-led attack on German democracy came in November with the adoption of the resolution “Never again is now: Protecting, preserving and strengthening Jewish life in Germany”.
Its passage enables the German government to intervene in social life
as a matter of principle – to defame anyone, Jew or non-Jew, as an
antisemite and to punish those who raise their voices against the
Zionist settler-colonial-apartheid regime and its war crimes.
The second attack followed on 28 January with the resolution
“Antisemitism and hostility towards Israel in schools and
universities”. It was passed hastily, largely unnoticed by the public,
after the end of the government and during the election campaign.
The resolution amounts to a brazen assault on the autonomy of
universities and the freedom of research and teaching. Under the guise
of concern over a purported rise in antisemitism at schools and
universities, the charge is being weaponised to silence critical
academics and students.
At a federal press conference following its adoption, German
professors expressed outrage that the resolution had been drafted
without the usual consultation of antisemitism experts or academic
bodies.
They also criticised the fact that the drafters had ignored the
objections of the German Rectors’ Conference (HRK), which had already
rejected a similar proposal in autumn 2024 over legal concerns.
According to one professor, it was not even clear who had authored the
resolution.
The resolution is a brazen assault on academic freedom, weaponising
antisemitism to silence critical voices in schools and universities
Presumably, however, the driving force is not difficult to identify.
Given the resolution’s explicitly Zionist agenda – threatening students
and academics who take a stand against the regime and its genocide – one
need only look to current and former parliamentarians who are behind
the resolution.
Volker Beck, a former Green MP, is president of the German-Israeli Society.
Mathias Stein, a former MP from the Social Democratic Party of Germany
(SPD) and a member of the parliamentary group behind the resolution, is
one of its vice presidents.
Other current and former Bundestag members, including Marcus Faber
(FDP), Lisa Badum (Greens) and Jurgen Hardt (CDU/CSU), also serve as
vice presidents of the German-Israeli Society.
It is hardly surprising that academic expertise and historical
accuracy were of no interest when this resolution was drafted. German
parliamentarians have proven either unable or unwilling to recognise its
true intent.
Rather than defending democratic rights or resisting Zionist encroachment, they have become willing accomplices to its sweeping “land grab” – one that dismantles Germany’s institutions and democracy itself.
New fascism
Once hailed as “poor but sexy,” Berlin attracted young people from
around the world, along with the global cultural elite and influential
scientists. That era is over.
For Germany’s political class, supporting Israel’s genocide is naked self-interest
Today, Berlin has turned to the democracy-destroying weaponisation of
antisemitism, laying an axe to freedom of opinion, thought, research
and teaching.
The right to criticise Israel for what it is – a genocidal, white
supremacist settler colony carrying out ethnic cleansing in the West
Bank, threatening Palestinians with Israeli citizenship, and endangering
civilian populations across the region – is under active assault.
Through its partnership with Tel Aviv, Berlin is becoming a safe
haven for Zionist supremacists and racists, for Israeli soldiers who
have committed war crimes in Gaza, and for wanted officials from the
Israeli government – all under the pretext of protecting Jewish life.
Instead of upholding international law or defending civil liberties,
Berlin’s so-called “democratic centre” is paving the way for an emerging
new fascism.
Welcome to Berlin, the capital of Zionist repression.
The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye.
Jurgen Mackert is Professor of Sociology at the University of
Potsdam, Germany. He was a temporary Professor for the Structure of
modern societies at the University of Erfurt, Germany and a visiting
professor for Political Sociology at Humboldt University Berlin. His
latest books include On Social Closure. Theorizing Exclusion,
Exploitation, and Elimination (Oxford University Press 2024).
Siedlerkolonialismus. Grundlagentexte und aktuelle Analysen (edited with
Ilan Pappe; Nomos 2024).
Columbia University has suspended more than 65 students for their
role in a pro-Palestinian demonstration that forced the shutdown of the
main campus library, a school official said on Friday.
Placed on interim suspension, the students will be prohibited from
taking their final exams or entering campus except to access their
dormitories, the university official said.
Columbia also barred 33 other people from campus, including students
from other colleges and alumni who took part in the protest, according
to the official.
“When rules are violated and when our academic community is
purposefully disrupted, that is a considered choice one with real
consequences,” the Columbia official said.
Scores of students were arrested after seizing part of the school’s
main library on Wednesday in one of the biggest pro-Palestinian
demonstrations on campus since last year’s wave of protests against
Israel’s war in Gaza.
Officers of the New York Police Department were called to campus to quell the protest at the request of university officials.
The demonstration came amid negotiations between Columbia’s board of
trustees and the Trump administration, which announced in March it was
penalizing the university over previous pro-Palestinian protests by
cancelling hundreds of millions of dollars in research grants.
There was no immediate reaction to news of the suspensions from student activists representing the protesters.
Organisers of Wednesday’s demonstration repeated their long-standing
demands that the university cease investing any of its $14.8 billion
endowment in weapons makers and other companies that support Israel’s
military occupation of Palestinian territories.
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United Nations aid officials have rejected a U.S. and Israel-backed plan for aid delivery in Gaza
that reportedly involves the use of a private foundation and U.S.
military security contractors to deliver far less humanitarian
assistance than the besieged enclave needs.
Jens Laerke, a spokesperson for the U.N.’s Office for the
Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), warned Friday that the
agency “will not participate.”
“There is no reason to put in place a system that is at odds with the DNA of any principled humanitarian organization,” Laerke told the BBC.
Since early March, Israel has blocked aid
from entering Gaza, compounding widespread misery and hunger in the
besieged enclave as Israel continues to mount a deadly military campaign
there. U.N. officials have decried the fact that aid is close at hand but is not being allowed in.
Speaking in Jerusalem on Friday, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike
Huckabee said that the plan involves a private U.S.-backed foundation,
which will distribute aid from a set number of distribution sites,
according to CNN. Huckabee said the idea is to create a system that prevents Hamas from obtaining the aid.
The private entity, called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, would administer those distribution sites using private U.S. military contractors and aid workers, according to CNN.
The plan reportedlyentails
only allowing 60 aid trucks a day, a sliver of what was allowed to
enter the enclave during the two-month cease-fire that Israel ended in
March. A document
from the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation states that there will initially
be four distribution sites aimed at providing 1.2 million Palestinians
in its first phase, or 60% of Gaza’s population.
According to the The New YorkTimes, under the current aid distribution system, the U.N. says there are 400 distribution points.
Huckabee said
that Israel would not be involved in delivering aid, but that Israeli
forces would handle security around the distribution sites.
The Times of Israel, citing
officials familiar with the plan, reported that the Israeli government
and military have been involved in putting the plan together, even if
the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation is the entity that is slated to
distribute the aid.
Reporting from The Washington Postpublished
Monday, which cited unnamed Israeli officials and aid workers, framed
the emerging plan as an Israeli initiative to take control of aid
distribution in Gaza. The Post‘s reporting also stated that the distribution centers would be all be located in the south of Gaza.
The Post spoke with officials from a dozen international aid groups working in Gaza, who expressed concerns that restricting aid to a few locations would force more displacement and be discriminatory.
James Elder, spokesperson for the U.N.’s children’s agency UNICEF, echoed this, according to the BBC,
saying on Friday that the proposed plan would lead to more children
suffering and that the decision to locate all the distribution centers
in the south appeared designed to weaponize aid as “bait” to force
Palestinians to be displaced once again.
The plan “contravenes basic humanitarian principles” and appears
designed to “reinforce control over life-sustaining items as a pressure
tactic,” Elder said, according to U.N. News.
Trump
and Musk are on an unconstitutional rampage, aiming for virtually every
corner of the federal government. These two right-wing billionaires are
targeting nurses, scientists, teachers, daycare providers, judges,
veterans, air traffic controllers, and nuclear safety inspectors. No one
is safe. The food stamps program, Social Security, Medicare, and
Medicaid are next.
It’s an unprecedented disaster and a
five-alarm fire, but there will be a reckoning. The people did not vote
for this. The American people do not want this dystopian hellscape that
hides behind claims of “efficiency.” Still, in reality, it is all a
giveaway to corporate interests and the libertarian dreams of far-right
oligarchs like Musk.
Common Dreams is playing a vital role by
reporting day and night on this orgy of corruption and greed, as well as
what everyday people can do to organize and fight back. As a
people-powered nonprofit news outlet, we cover issues the corporate
media never will, but we can only continue with our readers’ support.
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Published date: 31 October 2023 11:41 GMT | Last update:1 year 6 months ago
Governments have failed to condemn Israel’s disproportionate
retaliation and the collective punishment of Gaza’s civilian population
Protesters hold up a sign condemning French President Emmanuel Macron at a rally in Paris on 22 October 2023 (AFP)
The latest stage of the Israel-Palestine conflict
in Gaza has revealed an unexpected moral bankruptcy on the part of the
European Union’s institutions and almost all of its member states.
In the past, Europe used to make efforts to mitigate Washington’s blind pro-Israel stance and to advance the Palestinian cause, such as during the drafting of the 2003 Road Map to Peace. Two decades later, the EU and its top shareholders are barely recognisable.
The last 20 years of the Israel-Palestine conflict have included the Second Intifada,
Israel’s destructive wars on Gaza with massive Palestinian civilian
casualties, thousands of home demolitions, and creeping annexation
through settlement growth in the occupied West Bank and East
Jerusalem. Gaza has also been subject to a harsh blockade since 2007.
Under these circumstances, logic would dictate that European support
for Palestinians should have increased. Instead, Europe has become
increasingly pro-Israel, or in the best case, indifferent to the
Palestinian cause.
It speaks volumes that in the last two decades, the only significant EU measure has been – brace yourselves – to request a change in the labelling
of Israeli products, ensuring that goods produced in illegal
settlements are labelled as such. This was less than a slap on the
wrist, but it still sparked Israeli indignation.
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The EU’s political discourse on Palestinian rights has slowly
adjusted to Israel’s increasingly far-right narrative, with dissent and
different opinions silenced or strongly criticised by mainstream media.
The mere use of the word “occupation”, or any objection to Israeli violence, is equated with antisemitism.
This charge is systematically used for character assassinations of
pro-Palestinian politicians and activists through complacent media. Jeremy Corbyn, the former British Labour leader, is a prime example.
Today, the Labour leadership’s stance on Israel-Palestine is barely distinguishable from Likud’s, and Muslim voters are fleeing the party in droves.
One-sided solidarity
Other European parties across the political spectrum have followed
the same path. A complete metamorphosis has taken place. Many
explanations could be provided, but ultimately, European politicians
stand with Israel because they seem to get in less trouble that way.
Still, no one could have imagined what European leaders would do
after the events of 7 October. This is not to criticise their strong condemnations of the 7 October attacks by Palestinian fighters, nor the support they extended to Israel.
Rather, my criticism is addressed towards the past two decades of
European passivity towards the roots of the Israel-Palestine conflict,
and their continuing reluctance to deal with the issue of the Israeli
occupation.
This conflict did not begin on 7 October.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had to shake the Europeans from their guilty torpor by reminding them
this week that “the attacks by Hamas did not happen in a vacuum”. He
said: “The Palestinian people have been subjected to 56 years of
suffocating occupation. They have seen their land steadily devoured by
settlements and plagued by violence; their economy stifled; their people
displaced and their homes demolished. Their hopes for a political
solution to their plight have been vanishing.”
On the European moral scale, Israeli pain is rated higher than Palestinian pain
For these common-sense words, Israel demanded Guterres’s resignation.
Meanwhile, a procession of European leaders have rightly travelled to Israel to express their solidarity, including the presidents of the European Commission and European Parliament, the German chancellor, the French president, the British prime minister, and the Italian prime minister. But we have not seen a similar procession of visits to Ramallah as Israeli bombs continue to rain down on Gaza.
On the European moral scale, Israeli pain is rated higher than
Palestinian pain – and it appears nothing is going to change that. The
European position is that Hamas committed an unprovoked act of
terrorism, while Israel is just exercising its legitimate right to
self-defence.
Bland exhortations
However, Israel’s right to self-defence must be contextualised within
its role as an occupying power for more than five decades, during which
it has harassed, humiliated and killed countless Palestinians. This is
the point Guterres was attempting to convey in his heavily criticised
remark, especially to western democracies, those champions of the
rules-based world order.
It is worth remembering that when Palestinians last held a mass peaceful protest, the 2018 Great March of Return, which followed the provocative US decision to move its embassy to Jerusalem, the Israeli army fired upon thousands of Palestinians gathered at the Gaza fence. Israeli snipers killed more than 200 Palestinians, including medics and journalists, and wounded thousands more.
Israel-Palestine war: Will the West choose genocide or peace?
This was a despicable act, a crime – but no condemnation came from western democracies.
Today, European leaders have remained silent amid Israel’s
disproportionate bombardment of Gaza, while implicitly condoning the
murderous language being used by Israeli officials – including President
Isaac Herzog, who has said
there are no innocent civilians in Gaza. “It is an entire nation out
there that is responsible,” he said, tacitly justifying their collective
punishment.
This is an especially outrageous statement coming from a descendant
of the same people who suffered the most horrific collective
victimisation of the 20th century: the Holocaust. It is equally
outrageous for European leaders to have remained silent at Herzog’s
words.
After 1,400 Israelis were killed in the 7 October attack, the Israeli
flag was projected on European building facades as a legitimate show of
solidarity. But despite the ongoing slaughter of Palestinians, with more than 8,000 already killed, we have seen no similar official gestures.
Of course, thousands of Palestinian flags are being hoisted by
European citizens, largely unreported by mainstream media, across
European capitals. People are doing what their governments will not:
condemning Israel’s disproportionate retaliation and the collective
punishment of Gaza’s Palestinian population through indiscriminate
bombing and the cutting off of water, electricity, fuel and food
deliveries.
All European institutions have been able to utter, amid heavy public
pressure, are bland exhortations for Israel to abide by international
law. This is too little, too late – and too hypocritical.
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