Albanese awarded Spain’s highest civilian honour for ‘documenting and denouncing violations of international law in Gaza’

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/albanese-awarded-spains-highest-civilian-honour-documenting-and-denouncing-violations

 UN Special Rapporteur for the occupied Palestinian territories Francesca Albanese gives a press conference at the UN City in Copenhagen, February 5, 2025

FRANCESCA ALBANESE has been awarded Spain’s highest civilian honour for her work “documenting and denouncing violations of international law in Gaza.”

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez presented the Order of Civil Merit to the UN’s special rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territory at a ceremony in Madrid on Thursday.

In a post on social media Mr Sanchez said: “Public responsibility also entails the moral obligation not to look the other way.

“It is an honour to award the Order of Civil Merit to a voice that upholds the conscience of the world.”

Ms Albanese said: “Thank you, Mr President, for this recognition, for championing a Europe that belongs to its peoples, in accordance with international law — not above it or in defiance of it — and for solidarity, the lifeblood of the human family.

Original article continues at https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/albanese-awarded-spains-highest-civilian-honour-documenting-and-denouncing-violations

Keir Starmer objects to criticism of the IDF. He asks how could anyone object to them starving people to death, forced marches like the Nazis did, bombing Gaza's hospitals and universities, mass-murdering journalists, healthworkers and starving people queuing for food, killing and raping prisoners and murdering children. He calls for people to stop obstructing his genocide for Israel.
Keir Starmer objects to criticism of the IDF. He asks how could anyone object to them starving people to death, forced marches like the Nazis did, bombing Gaza’s hospitals and universities, mass-murdering journalists, healthworkers and starving people queuing for food, killing and raping prisoners and murdering children. He calls for people to stop obstructing his genocide for Israel.
Keir Starmer explains that UK is actively supporting Israel's genocidal expansion and repeats his previous quotation that he supports Zionism "without qualification". Keir Starmer said “I said it loud and clear – and meant it – that I support Zionism without qualification.” here: https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/keir-starmer-interview-i-will-work-to-eradicate-antisemitism-from-day-one/
Keir Starmer explains that UK is actively supporting Israel’s genocidal expansion and repeats his previous quotation that he supports Zionism “without qualification”. Keir Starmer said “I said it loud and clear – and meant it – that I support Zionism without qualification.” here: https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/keir-starmer-interview-i-will-work-to-eradicate-antisemitism-from-day-one/
Donald Trump sings and dances, says that it's fun to kill everyone ...
Donald Trump sings and dances, says that it’s fun to kill everyone …

Continue ReadingAlbanese awarded Spain’s highest civilian honour for ‘documenting and denouncing violations of international law in Gaza’

Britain quietly approves $11.85m arms licence to Israel despite Gaza ban

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This work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License

Israeli forces carrying weapons, raid Nablus city of West Bank, Palestine on April 23, 2026. [Nedal Eshtayah – Anadolu Agency]

The UK Department for Business and Trade (DBT) has granted two new licences for the export of military equipment to Israel, including an £8.7 ($11.85) million licence covering “components and technology for targeting equipment”, the Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) has revealed.

The licences were issued despite the British government’s September 2024 suspension of such exports over fears they would be used in Israel’s genocide in Gaza. CAAT’s analysis of UK export licensing statistics for the fourth quarter of 2025, published on 30 April, found that the UK issued export licences worth £20.5 ($27.9) million in total for transfers to Israel during the quarter.

The most significant of the new approvals was an Open Individual Export Licence for “components and technology for targeting equipment” — a category of export the UK government had publicly suspended eight months earlier, citing the risk of use in Israel’s genocide in Gaza. When questioned about the licence, DBT replied that it “covers items for re-export from Israel, and the Government of Israel is not an end-user or ultimate end-user. This is consistent with our suspension”.

CAAT said the defence rested on a legal fiction. The watchdog warned of the risk of “auto-diversion”: a process by which Israel can fail to retransfer military equipment to its declared destination and instead assign it to an unauthorised end-user, such as the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), for use in Gaza. 

Such a move would constitute a breach of the export licence and a potential criminal offence under UK law. British ministers have previously said they would revoke any licence should “any evidence” emerge that exported equipment had not reached its declared destination, but CAAT noted that the UK government makes no known efforts to verify what happens to its military exports after they leave Britain.

The watchdog’s concerns are not theoretical. In March, an investigation revealed that an Elbit-owned subsidiary in the UK had shipped dozens of drone components, including Watchkeeper engines, to Israel over an 18-month period. 

READ: UK Labour approved more weapons to Israel in three months than Tories did in four years

Israel had failed to retransfer the equipment to Romania as required by the licence, citing force majeure arising from its assault on Gaza. The contract with Romania has still not been fulfilled. Elbit announced it would start delivering the drones only two days after Romania threatened to cancel the contract.

A second new licence covers components for military training aircraft, and related technology, for transfer to France, Greece, Israel and Italy — likely supplied by the US aerospace firm Moog for the M-346 Lead-In Fighter Trainer produced by Italy’s Leonardo. 

The M-346 is used in every phase of advanced and pre-operational training for Israeli pilots before they fly combat missions in Gaza, Iran and Lebanon using F-16 and F-35 jets. Israel has caused massive devastation with F-35 jets across Gaza, Iran and Lebanon. Similar components shipped by Moog from the UK were recently seized by authorities in Belgium, who have since opened a criminal investigation.

CAAT’s Research Coordinator Sam Perlo-Freeman said the new licences exposed the limits of the British government’s stated policy.

“These new export licenses show just how willing the UK is to continue enabling Israel’s genocidal assaults, while staying within the technical rule of a vastly insufficient and ineffective policy towards IDF war crimes,” he said.

“The targeting equipment for which DBT granted a license, for transfer to and re-export by Israel, could easily be used in Gaza. Given Israel’s history of weapons diversion and illicit transfers, and outstanding questions about Elbit drone components failing to arrive in Romania, there remains a grave risk that Israel will auto-divert the targeting equipment to the IDF for use in Palestine.”

Perlo-Freeman explained that the British government was leaning on a system of declarations it has no power to enforce. “DBT is relying on end-user undertakings that hold no legal force in Israel, which the UK government does not check up on and cannot enforce. The exporter is technically in-the-clear, so long as it can’t be shown they knew the end-user undertaking was false.”

READ: ‘Cowardly’ UK court ruling permits F-35 arms exports to Israel despite genocide in Gaza

Keir Starmer explains that UK is actively supporting Israel's genocidal expansion and repeats his previous quotation that he supports Zionism "without qualification". Keir Starmer said “I said it loud and clear – and meant it – that I support Zionism without qualification.” here: https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/keir-starmer-interview-i-will-work-to-eradicate-antisemitism-from-day-one/
Keir Starmer explains that UK is actively supporting Israel’s genocidal expansion and repeats his previous quotation that he supports Zionism “without qualification”. Keir Starmer said “I said it loud and clear – and meant it – that I support Zionism without qualification.” here: https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/keir-starmer-interview-i-will-work-to-eradicate-antisemitism-from-day-one/

Continue ReadingBritain quietly approves $11.85m arms licence to Israel despite Gaza ban

Our Oceans Are Tipped To Collapse: Can we still act?

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Climate Adam discusses the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC).

Donald Trump urges you to be a Climate Science denier like him. He says that he makes millions and millions for destroying the planet, Burn, Baby, Burn and Flood, Baby, Flood.
Donald Trump urges you to be a Climate Science denier like him. He says that he makes millions and millions for destroying the planet, Burn, Baby, Burn and Flood, Baby, Flood.
Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.
Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.
Orcas discuss how Trump was re-elected and him being an obviously insane, xenophobic Fascist.
Orcas discuss how Trump was re-elected and him being an obviously insane, xenophobic Fascist.

Continue ReadingOur Oceans Are Tipped To Collapse: Can we still act?

Trump Counterterrorism Strategy Puts ‘Anti-Fascists’ on Par With ISIS, Al-Qaeda

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Article by Brad Reed republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

Hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers took to the streets during a “No Kings” protest in New York City on March 28, 2026. (Photo by Erik McGregor/LightRocket via Getty Images)

“The global War on Terror has come home.”

The Trump administration on Wednesday released an official counterterrorism strategy that puts “anti-fascist” organizations on par with terrorist organizations such as Islamic State and al-Qaeda.

In outlining its strategy, the document argues that the US faces three “major type” of terrorist threats: “Legacy Islamiast Terrorists,” such as al-Qaeda and ISIS; “Narcoterrorists” that sell illegal drugs; and “Violent Left-Wing Extremists, including Anarchists and Anti-Fascists.”

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When it comes to the purported domestic left-wing threats, the document says the administration will “prioritize the rapid identification and neutralization of violent secular political groups whose ideology is anti-American, radically pro-transgender, and anarchist.”

“We will use all the tools constitutionally available to us to map them at home,” the document adds, “identify their membership, map their ties to international organizations like Antifa, and use law enforcement tools to cripple them operationally before they can maim or kill the innocent.”

The document makes no mention of the threat posed by members of right-wing groups such as the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, many of whom received pardons from President Donald Trump in 2025 for their role in violently storming the US Capitol building on January 6, 2021.

report published last year by the Center for Strategic and International Studies found that, while left-wing political violence has grown since Trump’s first election in 2016, it “remains much lower than historical levels of violence carried out by right-wing and jihadist attackers.”

Journalist Ken Klippenstein reported on Wednesday that the strategy “is the brainchild of White House counterterrorism czar Sebastian Gorka, an eccentric figure I have reported on, who last year hinted at terrorism charges being levied for political opponents of the administration.”

Digging into the details of the document, Klippenstein said it was essentially a strategy for prosecuting “pre-crime,” which he noted “aims to build cases against people for what they might do, most ominously based on speech or beliefs.”

At the end of his analysis, Klippenstein warned that the document makes clear “the global War on Terror has come home.”

The counterterrorism strategy document builds on the framework established by National Security Presidential Memorandum-7 (NSPM-7), a directive signed by Trump in September that demanded a “national strategy to investigate and disrupt networks, entities, and organizations that foment political violence so that law enforcement can intervene in criminal conspiracies before they result in violent political acts.”

Rights groups have for months been sounding the alarm about the implications of NSPM-7, which they said could be used to initiative a widespread crackdown against the Trump administration’s critics.

Article by Brad Reed republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

Donald Trump decrees forbidden terms denying sexual diversity
Donald Trump decrees forbidden terms denying sexual diversity
Donald Trump warns against following the https://onaquietday.org blog, says that it's easy atm, she only needs to report war crimes supporting Israel's genocidal expansion.
Donald Trump warns against following the https://onaquietday.org blog, says that it’s easy atm, she only needs to report war crimes supporting Israel’s genocidal expansion.

Continue ReadingTrump Counterterrorism Strategy Puts ‘Anti-Fascists’ on Par With ISIS, Al-Qaeda

Labour facing election doomsday

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/labour-facing-election-doomsday

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer helps out in the call centre at Labour Party headquarters in London, on the last day of campaigning ahead of the elections, May 6, 2026

Meanwhile, far-right Reform UK projected to gain around 1,550 representatives

LABOUR is facing electoral annihilation across the country on Thursday in elections that could bring the hard-right Reform UK a major step closer to power.

Much of Britain is set to deliver a damning verdict on Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer’s two years in power in one of the most consequential sets of local elections ever.

Voting for the Scottish and Welsh Parliaments and local authorities across England, including every London borough, could mark a landmark in the breakdown of the long-standing two-party system.

Reform boss Nigel Farage claimed that “we will emerge over the course of the next couple of days as the only true national party.”

Last-minute polling suggests Labour could lose up to 1,850 of the 2,550 seats it is defending and crash to defeat in Wales for the first time in more than a century, with Reform projected to gain around 1,550 representatives.

If these predictions are borne out as results emerge on Friday, pressure will grow still further on Sir Keir to quit, given his epic-level personal unpopularity is clearly a deadweight on Labour’s vote.

Article continues at https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/labour-facing-election-doomsday

Keir Starmer says that the Labour Party under his leadership is intensely relaxed about assaulting those least able to defend themselves - the very poorest and most vulnerable.
Keir Starmer says that the Labour Party under his leadership is intensely relaxed about assaulting those least able to defend themselves – the very poorest and most vulnerable.
Keir Starmer explains that UK is actively supporting Israel's genocidal expansion and repeats his previous quotation that he supports Zionism "without qualification". Keir Starmer said “I said it loud and clear – and meant it – that I support Zionism without qualification.” here: https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/keir-starmer-interview-i-will-work-to-eradicate-antisemitism-from-day-one/
Keir Starmer explains that UK is actively supporting Israel’s genocidal expansion and repeats his previous quotation that he supports Zionism “without qualification”. Keir Starmer said “I said it loud and clear – and meant it – that I support Zionism without qualification.” here: https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/keir-starmer-interview-i-will-work-to-eradicate-antisemitism-from-day-one/
Keir Starmer says that he's banning words and phrases now as well as placards.
Keir Starmer says that he’s banning words and phrases now as well as placards.
Continue ReadingLabour facing election doomsday