UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves has today announced the expansion of Heathrow airport. The climate cannot tolerate that. We have a Burn, baby Burn pyromaniac in the States and seriously intellectually challenged politicians worldwide.
10.20pm GMT Correction: Rachel Reeves announced that the government would support the expansion of Heathrow and other airports.
https://www.declassifieduk.org/israels-genocide-general-welcomed-in-london-and-the-media-yawns/
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Last week, Declassified UK carried out one of the fundamental duties of journalism. Its reporter Alex Morris sought to hold accountable a war crimes suspect evading justice. And not just any suspect.
Morris doorstepped Major General Oded Basyuk as he led an Israeli military delegation through the streets of London in meetings with the Ministry of Defence and the Royal United Services Institute, a UK “security think-tank” with close ties to the British government.
Basyuk, sometimes spelt Basiuk, heads the Israeli military’s operations directorate, whose responsibilities have included the development of the military strategy that guided Israel’s brutal 15-month assault on Gaza.
The International Court of Justice ruled a year ago that a “plausible” case had been made that Israel was committing a genocide in Gaza. Israel has effectively been on trial ever since.
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Further, Britain’s universal jurisdiction laws mean serious crimes can be prosecuted in the UK wherever they occurred, and separately from the ICC. A private application for his arrest could have been issued while he was here.
The only plausible answer is that the government of Keir Starmer gave him a gold-plated assurance that he would not be arrested under any circumstances during his visit.
That is precisely what happened back in November when Israel’s now-outgoing military chief of staff, Lieutenant General Herzi Halevi, visited Britain to meet officials from the Ministry of Defence and Foreign Office.
Starmer’s government issued Halevi with diplomatic immunity – a so-called “special mission certificate” – that blocked any possibility of legal redress against him.
As a signatory to the Rome Statute, it should be noted, Britain is legally obliged to enforce an arrest warrant issued by the ICC, though it has equivocated about whether in practice it would carry out an arrest of either Netanyahu or Gallant, if put to the test.
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See the original article at https://www.declassifieduk.org/israels-genocide-general-welcomed-in-london-and-the-media-yawns/
The UK has been an active participant in Israel’s genocidal campaign in Gaza for the last 15 months, a new report published by the British Palestinian Committee (BPC) reveals today.
The 22-page document entitled ‘British military collaboration with Israel’ says: “The UK has not simply failed to meet its third-party responsibilities to uphold international law, including its duty to prevent genocide, but has been an active participant in Israel’s genocidal campaign in Gaza for the last 15 months.”
Cataloguing evidence of the “many layers of collaboration between the UK and Israel in this genocidal project”, the report details the UK’s active involvement in the Israeli arms industry, British provisions of logistical support and weapons transfers to the Israeli military, British protection of Israel’s military infrastructure, direct military intervention from the UK in Yemen to support Israel’s goals and repeated, ongoing intelligence provision from the UK to Israel via surveillance flights.
BPC Director, Dr Sara Husseini, said: “This report shows that UK complicity in Israel’s crimes goes far beyond arms sales.”
Highlighting the International Court of Justice (ICJ)’s ruling that Israel’s actions in Gaza amount to “plausible genocide”, Husseini added: “As the world looked on in horror, Israel continued its genocidal aggression in Gaza for a further 12 months. The UK has provided active military assistance to Israel throughout.”
This, she continued, implicates “its institutions and officials in the gravest breaches of international law.”
READ: Israel transfers military equipment to Syrian demilitarised zone
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Commenting ahead of the Chancellor’s speech on growth when she is expected to signal government backing for airport expansion in the South East, including a third runway at Heathrow, Greenpeace UK’s chief scientist Dr Doug Parr said:
“The third runway at Heathrow is bad economics. There’s little evidence that airport expansion in the southeast will boost the economy – the only things that will grow for sure are noise, air pollution and climate emissions. The last thing our economy needs is more billions in damage from storms and floods.
“Fewer and fewer business people choose air travel – the vast majority of flights are taken by a wealthy elite of frequent leisure flyers. Most of the benefits of airport expansion will go to jet-setters, airlines and airport bosses, leaving taxpayers and holidaymakers to pay billions for new infrastructure and transport links.
“Chasing growth for growth’s sake is not an economic strategy. Instead of picking up any old polluting project from the discard pile, the Chancellor should focus on green industries that can attract investment and bring economic and social benefits for years to come, like secure jobs, affordable energy bills and cheaper, better transport.”
PEACE campaigners vowed to “break the climate of fear” fed by intensified police repression in a weekend rally to defend protest rights.
Hundreds gathered in Bethnal Green’s Atrium to discuss the Metropolitan Police’s mass detentions of marchers, including the violent arrest of chief steward Chris Nineham, at a Palestine solidarity demonstration on January 18, and the subsequent decision to charge Mr Nineham, Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) director Ben Jamal and others with public order offences.
Mr Jamal said the policing that day was “an escalation of repression by the state against our movement.
“Very clearly in my view, the police sought to provoke scenes of disorder on the streets. They began arresting people very early for the crime of standing in the wrong bit of Whitehall at the wrong moment. They brought empty coaches to transport to police stations those they intended to arrest… despite the fact that every single one of our protests has been peaceful and has had a low rate of arrest.”
The PSC leader said police intended to create “a scene of chaos and disorder that would create the political climate to enable [Home Secretary] Yvette Cooper to go into Parliament and announce she was banning all future marches.
“They did not succeed… [because] this is a peaceful and disciplined movement.”
The Metropolitan Police deny having tried to provoke disorder and referred the Morning Star to a previous statement accusing marchers of “a deliberate effort, involving organisers of the demonstration,” to breach the conditions they had imposed on the march, which included blocking a protest outside the BBC.
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Article continues at https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/we-will-break-your-climate-fear-peace-activists-warn-police-and-politicians
