Daily Archives: 25 July 2024

Ben-Gvir Endorses Trump, Says He’s More Likely to Back War on Iran

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Original article by BRETT WILKINS republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Far-right Israeli lawmaker Itamar Ben-Gvir delivers a speech following the exit polls of the 2022 Israeli general election on November 2, 2022.
 (Photo: Ilia Yefimovich/Picture Alliance via Getty Images)

The Israeli security minister, who leads the far-right Jewish Power party, accused the Biden administration of thwarting Israel’s victory against Hamas.

Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir endorsed former U.S. President Donald Trump—the 2024 Republican nominee—for the White House in an interview published Wednesday in which he accused the Biden administration of preventing Israel from winning its war on Gaza.

“I believe that with Trump, Israel will receive the backing to act against Iran,” Ben-Gvir, who heads the far-right Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power) party, toldBloomberg. “With Trump, it will be clearer that enemies must be defeated.”

“A cabinet minister is supposed to maintain neutrality,” the 48-year-old minister conceded, “but that’s impossible to do after [U.S. President Joe] Biden.”

“The U.S. has always stood behind Israel in terms of armaments and weapons, yet this time the sense was that we were being reckoned with—that we were trying to be prevented from winning. That happened on Biden’s watch and fed Hamas with lots of energy,” added Ben-Gvir, who was convicted in 2007 of incitement to racism after he advocated the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.

While Biden, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and other administration officials have decried Israel’s indiscriminate bombing of Gaza and high civilian casualties—at least 140,000 Palestinians killed, injured, or missing, according to local and international agencies—the U.S. has approved billions of dollars in new military aid and more than 100 arms sales to Israel since October.

During his White House tenure, Trump—who boasted that he “fought for Israel like no president ever before”—moved the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and brokered the Abraham Accords between Israel and Arab nations Bahrain, Morocco, Sudan, and the United Arab Emirates.

Trump has said that Israel should “get the job done” in Gaza, while criticizing the Israel Defense Forces for posting videos showing its obliteration of the embattled Palestinian enclave.

“I don’t know why they released wartime shots like that. I guess it makes them look tough. But to me, it doesn’t make them look tough,” Trump said in April. “They’re losing the PR war. They’re losing it big. But they’ve got to finish what they started, and they’ve got to finish it fast, and we have to get on with life.”

While Trump says he wants a deal with Iran to prevent it from developing nuclear weapons, as president he unilaterally withdrew the U.S. from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action—also known as the Iran nuclear deal—and oversaw a “maximum pressure” campaign against Tehran featuring deadly economic sanctions.

On the advice of Iran hawks in his administration including then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Trump also ordered the January 2020 assassination of Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Gen. Qasem Soleimani in Iraq.

Ben-Gvir’s interview was published as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was set to address a joint meeting of U.S. Congress Wednesday in Washington, D.C. A growing number of Democratic lawmakers have called for not only a cease-fire in Gaza but also a suspension of U.S. military aid to Israel, whose conduct in the war is on trial for genocide at the International Court of Justice.

Dozens of Democratic lawmakers and Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont have signaled they will skip Netanyahu’s speech. Vice President Kamala Harris, who is also the Senate president, said she will not preside over Wednesday’s session. Harris, who is the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee in the wake of Biden’s withdrawal from the race on Sunday, said she will meet privately with Netanyahu on Thursday.

Echoing calls from groups including CodePink and the Council on American Islamic Relations, Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) said this week that the prime minister should be arrested for war crimes and genocide.

Karim Khan, the International Criminal Court prosecutor, has applied for arrest warrants for Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and three Hamas leaders for alleged war crimes including extermination committed on and after October 7.

Original article by BRETT WILKINS republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

Continue ReadingBen-Gvir Endorses Trump, Says He’s More Likely to Back War on Iran

Venezuela’s electoral authority debunks “vote rigging” narrative ahead of Sunday’s presidential elections

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Original article republished from peoples dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.

The National Electoral Council’s headquarters in Caracas, 2024. Photo: teleSUR

In the week ahead of Venezuela’s presidential elections, the National Electoral Council met with international electoral observers and representatives from all political parties

The Venezuelan National Electoral Council (CNE) announced on Monday July 22 that all the electoral machines that will be used in the elections on Sunday, July 28 have been distributed. With this, the president of the CNE, Elvis Amoroso assured that the machines that will be used in Sunday’s elections have been reviewed by representatives of the political organizations.

“Witnesses from political organizations were present at the event to verify the operation of each of the telecommunications devices involved in the process of transmitting results and ensuring the network used by the CNE,” said Amoroso, at a press conference.

Amoroso also said that the representatives of the political parties that will participate in the elections were able to verify the security codes as well as the functioning of the software to be used by the machines. The CNE thus seeks to guarantee the integrity of the elections and to safeguard the decision of the voters of the Caribbean country.

On the other hand, in its eagerness to cover the election with greater international confidence, the CNE accredited several international observers such as the Carter Center of the United States, the Council of Electoral Experts of Latin America, and the UN Panel of Experts, among others.

Even though an international media campaign tried to popularize the idea that the presidential candidate and current president would not recognize the results, Maduro said in a political rally that “nobody is going to stain the name of Venezuela or the electoral process; rain, thunder or shine, on Sunday there will be free elections in Venezuela. And we will recognize and defend the results”.

Similarly, Jorge Rodríguez, deputy of the Venezuelan National Assembly and an important leader of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) said in an interview with El País, that “we will recognize the results of the National Electoral Council”, and that if the ruling party were to lose the elections, there would be a “peaceful transition”.

On the other hand, the political team of the right-wing candidacy of Edmundo González Urrutia has repeatedly refused to affirm that it will accept the result of the presidential elections if its candidate were to lose in the elections of Sunday, July 28. María Corina Machado, head of the Venezuelan opposition, said a few weeks ago to the newspaper La Opinión that “The only way for Nicolás Maduro to win is with a monumental fraud”.

This political uncertainty promoted by the right-wing keeps Venezuela on high alert in the face of possible allegations of electoral fraud that, according to Jorge Rodriguez, are already being planned from abroad: “The violent people are trying to deny reality, they have a center in Miami where they will chant fraud on the afternoon of July 28…On Sunday, we will take to the streets, to celebrate the triumph of President Nicolas Maduro!”.

Original article republished from peoples dispatch under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA) license.

Continue ReadingVenezuela’s electoral authority debunks “vote rigging” narrative ahead of Sunday’s presidential elections

‘Oil Kills’ protesters disrupt flights at airports across Europe in wave of action

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https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jul/24/oil-kills-protesters-disrupt-flights-at-airports-across-europe-in-wave-of-action

Police and Heathrow airport security were on high alert after Just Stop Oil protesters were arrested at the airport’s perimeter fence. Photograph: Kristian Buus/In Pictures/Getty Images

Ten activists arrested at Heathrow, over 30 flights cancelled at Cologne-Bonn, and planes delayed or diverted

Climate activists acting under the banner “oil kills” have glued themselves to the tarmac and grounded flights across Europe as holidaymakers attempt to make summer getaways.

In a wave of protests at airports from Oslo to Barcelona, activists disrupted flights and demanded that rich and polluting countries phase out fossil fuels by 2030. The protests, which the activists said had led to several arrests, came a day after climate scientists logged the world’s hottest day on record.

An activist taking part in the protest at Cologne-Bonn airport holds her hand glued to the runway. Photograph: Letzte Generation Handout/EPA

“Ordinary people are taking matters into their own hands today to do what our criminal governments have failed to do,” the campaign said in a statement. “We are putting our bodies on the wheels of the machine of the global fossil economy and saying ‘oil kills’.”

In Germany, protesters from the climate group Letzte Generation (Last Generation) briefly stopped flights on Wednesday morning after they cut a chain-linked fence and glued themselves to the tarmac at Cologne-Bonn airport. The airport said that 31 flights had been cancelled and six diverted.

In Austria, activists delayed a flight by refusing to sit down before takeoff while others spilled orange paint in the terminal at Vienna airport. In Switzerland, they blocked roads leading to Zürich and Geneva airports.

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https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jul/24/oil-kills-protesters-disrupt-flights-at-airports-across-europe-in-wave-of-action

Continue Reading‘Oil Kills’ protesters disrupt flights at airports across Europe in wave of action

Water temperatures near UK last year were hottest on record, say scientists

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https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/jul/25/water-temperatures-near-uk-last-year-were-hottest-on-record-say-scientists

Scientists compiling the annual State of the UK Climate report say they have have started to pay more attention to extremes. Photograph: Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

The water near the UK’s coasts was hotter in 2023 than scientists have ever before recorded, a report has found, with children today experiencing a hotter and wetter climate than that in which their parents and grandparents grew up.

The sea surface temperature near coasts was 0.9C hotter and winter rainfall across the country was 24% greater over the last decade than the average from 1961 to 1990, according to the State of the UK Climate 2023 report. It found the number of “hot” (28C) days has more than doubled over that period, and the number of “very hot” (30C) and “extremely hot” (32C) days has more than tripled.

Since the UK hit 40C heat for the first time in 2022 – “absolutely smashing records” – the scientists behind the annual report started to pay more attention to extremes, said Mike Kendon, a climate scientist at the Met Office who was the lead author of the report.

The scientists found the number of “very wet” days was 20% greater in the last decade than in the 1961-1990 period.

The mass burning of coal, oil and gas since the 1850s – together with the boom in livestock farming and heavy industry – has heated the planet by 1.3C and upended weather patterns that used to vary only naturally. The report found human activity had made the UK’s unusually high average temperature last year 150 times more likely.

Still, projections show that “2023 will be a fairly average year by the middle of the century and a fairly cool year by the end of the century,” said Kendon. “It’s a really dramatic indicator that our climate will be pushed out of the envelope of the historical range.”

The UK, which has pumped more planet-heating gas into the atmosphere than all but a handful of countries, according to an analysis from Carbon Brief – is already suffering from increasingly violent weather that scientists have traced back to the breakdown of a stable climate. An analysis in May found that a spell of “never-ending” rain in the UK and Ireland last autumn and winter was made 10 times more likely and 20% wetter by global heating.

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https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/jul/25/water-temperatures-near-uk-last-year-were-hottest-on-record-say-scientists

Continue ReadingWater temperatures near UK last year were hottest on record, say scientists

Starmer suspends MPs who voted to scrap the two-child benefit cap

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Image of Keir Starmer and a poor child.
Zionist Keir ‘Kid Starver’ Starmer. Image thanks to The Skwawkbox.

https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/starmer-suspends-mps-who-voted-to-scrap-the-two-child-benefit-cap

Union leaders condemn the Prime Minister’s ‘disgraceful’ decision

SIR KEIR STARMER has been condemned by union leaders for suspending seven Labour MPs for voting to scrap the two-child benefit cap, as independents including Jeremy Corbyn vowed to work with them to offer a “real alternative.”

Leaders of fire, education, civil service, bakeries and mail unions hit out at the Prime Minister’s “disgraceful” and “completely wrong” decision as they joined thousands backing a grassroots petition calling for their reinstatement.

Former shadow chancellor John McDonnell, ex-shadow business secretary Rebecca Long Bailey, Apsana Begum, Richard Burgon, Ian Byrne, Zarah Sultana and Imran Hussain were kicked out of the Parliamentary Labour Party for six months for backing an SNP amendment calling for the cap to be scrapped on Tuesday night.

Ms Sultana, MP for Coventry South, suggested she was the victim of a “macho virility test” today.

“This isn’t a game … this is about people’s lives,” she added.

“I slept well knowing that I took a stand against child poverty that is affecting 4.3 million people in this country and it is the right thing to do and I am glad I did it.”

MP for Poplar and Limehouse Ms Begum said: “Labour’s own 11 affiliated unions support the scrapping of the two-child benefit cap; there’s popular support among the Labour Party membership to see the cap lifted.”

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By disciplining MPs for voting to pull children out of poverty, Keir Starmer has shown us who he really is Owen Jones

Labour will say this is just a matter of party discipline, but it is a clear demonstration of the government’s priorities

The Labour leadership has told you who it is, over and over again: it is time to believe it. Keir Starmer has suspended seven Labour MPs because they voted to overturn a Tory policy which imposes poverty on children. Sure, another tale will be spun: that by voting for the Scottish National party’s amendment to abolish the two-child benefit cap, the seven undermined the unity of the parliamentary Labour party and were duly disciplined. But that is nonsense.

Such parliamentary rebellions are scattered through our democratic history, and are accepted almost as a convention of government. Boris Johnson suspended multiple Brexit rebels in 2019 and it was rightly seen as an aberration. He did not, for example, exact the same punishment when five Tory MPs backed a Labour motion extending free school meals in 2020. When it comes to Labour history, even Tony Blair never resorted to such petty authoritarianism. Forty-seven Labour MPs rebelled over a cut to the lone parent benefit in 1997 – none had the whip removed.

This episode tells us many things. Firstly, it completely undermines Starmer’s slogan of choice: “country before party”. Starmer knows a policy devised by George Osborne to prevent parents from claiming benefits for a third or fourth child is cruel and fails on its own terms. When Starmer stood for leader, he promised to scrap the limit. After all, it imposes poverty on 300,000 kids, and drives another 700,000 further into hardship. Fifty-nine per cent of families affected have at least one parent in work – like the care workers, supermarket workers and cleaners applauded by politicians on porches and balconies during the pandemic. Research has found that it does not increase employment levels, and may actually make it harder to find work, while having no impact on family size. Charities have identified it as one of the single biggest generators of poverty in Britain.

It is hard to imagine Starmer is unaware of the fact that Osborne devised the policy to stoke public hostility towards and create a Victorian caricature of the undeserving, overbreeding poor. No decent society punishes children for choices they have not made and parents should not be punished for having more children. In Britain in 2024, kids turn up to schools with bowed legs and heart murmurs because of malnourishment, but a vast cost is also imposed on society as the scarring effect of poverty produces lasting lower productivity and employment levels.

Starmer knew this when he told the BBC almost exactly a year ago that he would retain this wicked Tory policy. He made the commitment to sound tough. Contrast with how he genuflects before powerful interests such as the Murdoch empire. By endorsing the two-child benefit cap, Starmer decided to gain partisan advantage, rather than fix an injustice afflicting his country. Party first, country second. Or rather, to be specific: playing politics with the lives of our most vulnerable children.

There isn’t the money available, we are told. The price tag is £1.7bn, a pittance given annual government expenditure is £1.2tr. According to the Sunday Times rich list, the 350 wealthiest British households have a combined fortune of £795bn: is leaving their taxes at the same level more important than parents skipping hot meals to feed their little ones? When Starmer told Volodymyr Zelenskiy that the UK would give Ukraine £3bn a year “for as long as it takes”, he acknowledged there is money available for what the government considers a priority. This Labour government simply does not regard child poverty as a priority.

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Continue ReadingStarmer suspends MPs who voted to scrap the two-child benefit cap