Independent British MP Jeremy Corbyn addresses demonstrators outside Downing Street protesting against the US military attack on Venezuela in London on January 5, 2026. (Photo by Wiktor Szymanowicz/Anadolu via Getty Images)
“He is choosing to desecrate the meaning of international law to avoid upsetting Donald Trump.”
Independent British Member of Parliament Jeremy Corbyn on Tuesday accused United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer of “cowardice” for refusing to condemn the US bombing of Venezuela and abduction of its president, acts that experts agree were flagrant violations of international law.
Hours after the US attack—as leaders in the region and worldwide voiced horror and outrage—Starmer issued a statement welcoming Nicolás Maduro’s ouster, declaring that “we regarded Maduro as an illegitimate president and we shed no tears about the end of his regime.”
Starmer later insisted, as the Trump administration laid out plans to control the Venezuelan government indefinitely, that the situation was “complicated,” adding that it was “for the U.S. to justify the action that it has taken.”
Corbyn, the former leader of the Labour Party now helmed by Starmer, countered in Tribune magazine that “it’s really not that complicated: Bombing a sovereign nation and abducting its head of state is illegal.”
“It is absolutely staggering that a prime minister with a background in law cannot bring himself to say something so obvious,” Corbyn wrote. “It’s not that he doesn’t understand. He understands full well. That is the true abomination: He is choosing to desecrate the meaning of international law to avoid upsetting Donald Trump. This is the true meaning of the so-called ‘special relationship’ that government ministers are so desperate to protect: one where the United States tells us to jump, and we ask how high.”
“Twenty-three years later, another Labour prime minister is doing his best to cement the UK’s status as a vassal of the United States.”
The UK, according to the government’s foreign secretary, has been in close contact with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on the role it can play in Venezuela, citing the “work we have done over many years to build up relationships and dialogue with Venezuelan opposition parties and with the current authorities in the regime and of course our relationship with the US.”
Corbyn argued that the government’s approach is in some ways reminiscent of its conduct in the lead-up to the disastrous and illegal US invasion of Iraq more than two decades ago.
“Twenty-three years later, another Labour prime minister is doing his best to cement the UK’s status as a vassal of the United States,” Corbyn wrote. “Unlike Iraq, the UK says it is not involved in the bombing of Venezuela. Like Iraq, however, the UK is proving once again that it has no interest in standing up for international law.”
A woman carries a child as Palestinians whose homes were destroyed by Israeli attacks try to continue their lives in heavily damaged and unusable buildings in the Hamad al-Shihri area of Khan Younis, Gaza, on January 5, 2026. (Photo by Abed Rahim Khatib/Anadolu via Getty Images)
Israeli forces reported blew up a 5-year-old girl and wounded two other children a day after fatally shooting a 15-year-old boy in Gaza.
With the world captivated by and concerned over the Trump administration’s weekend abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, Israel bombed the Gaza Strip and Lebanon, continuing its devastating US-backed response to the Hamas-led October 2023 attack.
In Gaza, where Israel faces widespread accusations of genocide, an Israeli strike on Monday “hit a tent housing displaced people, killing a 5-year-old girl and her uncle and wounding two other children,” the Associated Pressreported, citing officials at Nasser Hospital. “Family members wept over the bodies as they were brought to the hospital.”
The Israel Defense Forces used one of its common claims for when it kills civilians. According to the AP, the IDF said that it struck a Hamas militant who planned an imminent attack on Israeli troops in Gaza, the strike complied with the ceasefire agreement, and it was conducted in a targeted way to limit civilian harm.
The tent strike in the Muwasi area northwest of Khan Younis came a day after Israeli forces shot and killed at least three Palestinians in that city on Sunday. According toReuters, “Medics reported that the dead included a 15‑year‑old boy, a fisherman killed outside areas still occupied by Israel in the enclave, and a third man who was shot and killed east of the city in areas under Israeli control.”
Gutting the most basic norms of #InternationalLaw to facilitate a genocide in #Gaza has made possible the kidnapping of a sitting head of state & the commandeering of a sovereign state & describing it as “self-defense”The atrocities committed in Gaza cannot b contained #Venezuela
Israel has killed at least 422 Palestinians in Gaza and wounded 1,189 since reaching the ceasefire deal with Hamas three months ago. The overall death toll in the strip has climbed to at least 71,388, with another 171,269 people injured, according to local health officials. Global experts warn the true counts are likely far higher.
Meanwhile, according toAl Jazeera, journalists on the ground in the illegally occupied Palestinian territory observed that the IDF “has spent the past 24 hours expanding the so-called ‘yellow line’ in eastern Gaza,” or the boundary behind which Israeli forces officially withdrew as part of the October deal.
Al Jazeera‘s Hani Mahmoud reported from Gaza City:
The ongoing Israeli attacks on the ground, the expansion of the “yellow line,” are meant to eat up more of the territory across the eastern part, really shrinking the total area where people are sheltering.
Everyone is cramped here. The population here not just doubled but tripled in many of the neighborhoods, given the fact that none of these people is able to go back to their neighborhoods. We’re talking about Zeitoun, Shujayea, as well as Tuffah.
It was not until the past few minutes that the sounds of hums, the drones buzzing, faded away, but it had been going on for the past night and all of yesterday. Ongoing explosions that could be heard clearly from here.
Mahmoud also reported that “there’s nothing on the ground other than the headlines we’ve been reading over the past couple of days, the expectation now that within days the Rafah crossing is going to open and allow for movement in and out of Gaza. So far, we know the Israeli military is pushing for Rafah to be just a one-way exit.”
Throughout the Israeli assault, far-right officials in Israel have ramped up calls to ethnically cleanse Gaza of its Palestinian population and recolonize the territory. There has also been a surge in violence from Israeli settlers and soldiers against Palestinians in the illegally occupied West Bank over the past two years, as well as renewed settlement-building efforts there.
Laila Al-Arian, an American journalist and executive producer for Al Jazeera‘s documentary series “Fault Lines,” said on social media Sunday, “With eyes on Venezuela, Israel is bombing Gaza and escalating its assault on the West Bank.”
In November 2024, nearly a year before the ceasefire agreement in Hamas, Israel struck a deal with the Lebanese political and paramilitary group Hezbollah—and, since then, as with Gaza, has repeatedly violated it.
Israel launched strikes on eastern and southern Lebanon on Monday after an IDF spokesperson said the military would target alleged Hezbollah sites in Kfar Hatta and Ain el-Tineh, and Hamas sites in Annan and al-Manara.
Al Jazeerareported that “Lebanon’s Health Ministry said a drone strike on a car in the southern village of Braikeh earlier Monday wounded two people. The Israeli military said the strike targeted two Hezbollah members.”
Genocide denier and Current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is quoted that he supports Zionism without qualification. He also confirms that UK air force support has been essential in Israel’s mass-murdering genocide. Includes URLs https://www.declassifieduk.org/keir-starmers-100-spy-flights-over-gaza-in-support-of-israel/ and https://youtu.be/O74hZCKKdpAKeir 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.Orcas discuss Genocide-supporting and complicit Zionists. Donald Trump, Keith Starmer, David Lammy, Rachel Reeves, Angela Rayner and Wes Streeting are acknowledged as evil genocide-complicit and supporting cnuts.
President Donald Trump listens as he was speaking with reporters while in flight on Air Force One, Sunday, Jan. 4, 2026, as returning to Joint Base Andrews, Md
THIS doesn’t end here. Unless the United States faces consequences for what it is doing in Venezuela it will do it, or try to, again and again.
It says so itself — one reason Keir Starmer, Friedrich Merz, Emmanuel Macron and other Trump appeasers appear so ridiculous.
When Trump in his first term blurted out that US forces were in Syria “only for the oil,” his allies’ embarrassment could be glossed over by a media unwilling to expose years of its own propaganda about humanitarian interventions and counter-terror operations.
Not now. Trump kidnaps a head of state and then announces Washington will “run” his country.
What does that mean? Well, what remains of the Venezuelan government must grant Washington “total access. We need access to the oil and to other things in their country.” What if Venezuela’s Vice-President Delcy Rodriguez won’t do as she’s told? She’ll face “a situation worse than Maduro.” Maybe killed in the kidnapping operation, like the 32 brave Cuban soldiers who died defending her boss.
The Trump White House narrative is in our faces every day. Who can take seriously Merz’s call for an explanation on how US actions are justified in international law, when Secretary for War Pete Hegseth vows to pursue “maximum lethality not tepid legality?” The politicians of the old Washington Consensus merely look pathetic through their “hear no evil, see no evil” approach to the new one.
Hence the backlash against Starmer’s feeble fence-sitting, involving MPs well beyond the socialist left (such as Emily Thornberry), the TUC and the rapidly growing Greens.
There are half-hearted efforts to depict Venezuela as a special case. But again the Trump White House’s loudmouth assertions undermine the pretence.
Attacking Colombia and removing its elected president “sounds good to me,” says Trump. Cuba’s government is “going down.” The US “has to do something with Mexico,” “needs Greenland, absolutely.”
Donald Fuhrump says that Amerikkka doesn’t bother with crimes or charges anymore, not being 100% Amerikkkan and opposing his real estate intentions is enough.Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.Orcas discuss how Trump was re-elected and him being an obviously insane, xenophobic Fascist.
Demonstrators gathered outside the US consulate in Amsterdam, Netherlands to protest the US attack on Venezuela on January 4, 2026. (Photo by Mouneb Taim/Anadolu via Getty Images)
“International law is not ‘dead’ just because the most powerful no longer respect it,” one expert stressed. “To preserve the rules-based international order, all states need to call out breaches of the law when they occur.”
Protests have erupted in the US and around the world following President Donald Trump’s attack on Venezuela and abduction of President Nicolás Maduro, and international law experts on Monday joined in rebuking the deadly military operation, with several outlining exactly how Trump’s actions were unlawful.
At Just Security, University of Reading professor of international law Michael Schmitt, New York University law professor Ryan Goodman, and NYU Reiss Center on Law and Security senior fellow Tess Bridgeman explained that the US military’s bombing of Venezuela and kidnapping of Maduro differs legally from the dozens of boat strikes the US has carried out in the past four months.
The attacks in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific have killed more than 100 people and have also been violations of international law, according to numerous legal experts—but they “have occurred in international waters against stateless vessels,” wrote Schmitt, Goodman, and Bridgeman.
In contrast, the operation in the early morning hours on Saturday took place within Venezuelan borders and “is clearly a violation of the prohibition on the use of force in Article 2(4) of the UN Charter,” they wrote. “That prohibition is the bedrock rule of the international system that separates the rule of law from anarchy, safeguards small states from their more powerful neighbors, and protects civilians from the devastation of war.”
Article 2(4) of the UN Charter, to which both the US and Venezuela are parties, states:
All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.
The scholars vehemently rejected the narrative the Trump administration has put forward for months about its escalation in the Caribbean and Venezuela: that the White House simply aims to protect Americans from drug trafficking, a claim that officials have repeated despite the fact that US and international law enforcement agencies have not identified the South American country as a significant player in the drug trade.
For Trump’s assertions that drug cartels in Venezuela pose an imminent threat to Americans “to make any sense,” wrote the authors, “the drug activity must be characterized as an ‘armed attack’ against the United States… Drug trafficking simply does not qualify as, and has never been considered, an ‘armed attack.’ In brief, the relationship between drug trafficking and the deaths that eventually result from drugs being purchased and used in the United States is far too attenuated to qualify as an armed attack.”
“It is indisputable that drug trafficking is condemnable criminal activity, but it is not the type of activity that triggers the right of self-defense in international law,” they continued, adding that any possible involvement by Maduro’s government in the drug trade also does not rise “to the level of an armed attack against the United States.”
Schmitt, Goodman, and Bridgeman wrote that “Operation Absolute Resolve,” as the administration has termed the Saturday attack that killed more than 80 people, “amounts to an unlawful intervention into Venezuela’s internal affairs,” and that while officials including Secretary of State Marco Rubio have claimed the kidnapping of Maduro was simply a law enforcement operation and not an act of war, the US does not have jurisdiction to carry out such an action in Venezuela without the government’s consent.
“The United States has engaged in governmental activity in Venezuela—law enforcement—that is exclusively the domain of the Venezuelan government,” wrote the authors. “Even though the United States does not recognize the Maduro government as legitimate, international law provides that the relevant officials to grant consent are those of the government that exercises ‘effective control’ over the territory; in this case, officials in the Maduro administration.”
As a head of state, Maduro is also subject to protections from enforcement jurisdiction by another state, they wrote, under “customary international law.”
“The United States has engaged in governmental activity in Venezuela—law enforcement—that is exclusively the domain of the Venezuelan government.”
The authors wrote that, as Maduro said in a statement Monday, the president may be considered a prisoner of war and be “entitled to the extensive protections of the Third Geneva Convention,” given his status as commander-in-chief of Venezuela’s armed forces. His wife is also “entitled to a robust set of protections afforded to captured civilians” under the Fourth Geneva Convention, they wrote.
The explanation by Schmitt, Goodman, and Bridgeman bolstered remarks by other international law experts including Ben Saul, the UN special rapporteur on human rights and counterterrorism.
Saul on Saturday condemned Trump’s “illegal aggression against Venezuela and the illegal abduction of its leader and his wife,” and said the president “should be impeached and investigated for the alleged killings,” of dozens of Venezuelans in the attack.
“Every Venezuelan life lost is a violation of the right to life,” he said.
At the Conversation, Australian National University international law professor Sarah Heathcote emphasized that the UN Security Council, which held an emergency meeting Monday in response to the US strike, had not authorized the attack. Such an authorization, along with consent by Venezuela’s government or a credible claim that the US was acting in self-defense, would have made the Trump administration’s actions lawful.
Instead, she wrote, “the US intervention in Venezuela was as brazen and unlawful as its military strike on Iran in June last year.”
“But international law is not ‘dead’ just because the most powerful no longer respect it,” she said. “To preserve the rules-based international order, all states need to call out breaches of the law when they occur, including in the current instance.”
At the Security Council meeting, UN Secretary-General António Guterres emphasized “the imperative of full respect, by all, for international law, including the Charter of the United Nations, which provides the foundation for the maintenance of international peace and security.”
“Venezuela has experienced decades of internal instability and social and economic turmoil. Democracy has been undermined. Millions of its people have fled the country,” he said. “In situations as confused and complex as the one we now face, it is important to stick to principles. Respect for the UN Charter and all other applicable legal frameworks to safeguard peace and security.”
“International law contains tools to address issues such as illicit traffic in narcotics, disputes about resources, and human rights concerns,” he added. “This is the route we need to take.”
Donald Fuhrump says that Amerikkka doesn’t bother with crimes or charges anymore, not being 100% Amerikkkan and opposing his real estate intentions is enough.Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.Orcas discuss how Trump was re-elected and him being an obviously insane, xenophobic Fascist.
A supporter holds a poster of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in Caracas, Venezuela, January 3, 2026, after U.S. President Donald Trump announced that Maduro had been captured and flown out of the country
VENEZUELA’S new interim president Delcy Rodriguez must provide the United States with “total access” to its oil reserves, US President Donald Trump said on Sunday evening.
Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One on Sunday night, Mr Trump was asked what his government wants from Ms Rodriguez following its kidnapping of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores at the weekend.
“Total access,” Mr Trump said. “We need total access to the oil and other things in their country that allow us to rebuild [it].”
Former vice-president Ms Rodriguez was officially sworn in as interim president today, while maintaining that Mr Maduro remains the legitimate president and must be released.
…
Mr Trump also took aim at Colombia and President Gustavo Petro.
“Colombia’s very sick too,” he said. “Run by a sick man who likes making cocaine and selling it to the United States. And he’s not going to be doing it very long.”
Asked if that might mean another attack on a peaceful Latin American country, Trump said: “Sounds good to me.”
Mr Petro took to social media today to say: “The US is the first country in the world to bomb a South American capital in all of human history.”
He called on Latin American countries to unite or risk being “treated as a servant and slave.”
Donald Fuhrump says that Amerikkka doesn’t bother with crimes or charges anymore, not being 100% Amerikkkan and opposing his real estate intentions is enough.Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.Orcas discuss how Trump was re-elected and him being an obviously insane, xenophobic Fascist.
President Donald Trump listens as he was speaking with reporters while in flight on Air Force One, Sunday, Jan. 4, 2026, as returning to Joint Base Andrews, Md
