Palestinians sit at a large table surrounded by the rubble of destroyed homes and buildings as they gather for iftar, the fast-breaking meal, on the first day of Ramadan in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, March 1, 2025
THE ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas was hanging by a thread today after Israel blockaded all goods and supplies reaching Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.
Israeli representatives also warned of “additional consequences” if Hamas doesn’t accept a new proposal to extend the fragile ceasefire.
Hamas has accused Israel of trying to derail the existing ceasefire agreement and said its decision to cut off aid was “cheap extortion, a war crime and a blatant attack” on the truce, which began in January after more than a year of negotiations.
Both sides stopped short of saying the ceasefire had ended.
The first phase of the ceasefire, which included a surge in humanitarian assistance, expired on Saturday. The two sides have yet to negotiate the second phase, in which Hamas was to release dozens of remaining hostages in return for an Israeli withdrawal and a lasting ceasefire.
An Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the decision to suspend aid was made in co-ordination with the United States.
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/O74hZCKKdpAUK Foreign Minister David Lammy confirms that UK government and military are active participants in Israel’s genocides and that the F-35 parts that they suspended from supplying to Israel are instead simply diverted via the United States. He says see https://youtu.be/QILgUHrdWRE
General Zachary Stenning is leading a UK military delegation to Israel. (Photo: Tim Ireland / Alamy)
Exclusive: UK military accused of giving a “fig leaf” to Israeli forces as another trip to Tel Aviv is uncovered.
A senior British soldier is heading to Israel for a briefing from the country’s military, despite it being under investigation for genocide and war crimes, Declassified has found.
The trip will be led by major general Zachary Stenning, a former commandant of Sandhurst officer academy.
He is now a director of Strategic Command, part of the Ministry of Defence (MoD). Known as StratCom, it describes its role as “learning and adapting to make Defence more lethal…We are the capabilities you don’t usually see. Or those you can’t.”
The trip is taking place just weeks after the Israeli military’s head of operations, General Oded Basyuk, had to be given immunity from prosecution to visit the MoD in London.
Israeli generals are afraid of being detained abroad after the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former defence minister Yoav Gallant over the siege of Gaza.
Business as usual
Although the UK government has banned the export of certain weapons to Israel, Declassified understands that the MoD is routinely conducting bilateral military engagement with the Israel Defence Forces (IDF).
John Deverell, a retired brigadier who was director of defence diplomacy at the MoD, told Declassified that British soldiers should not be visiting Israel at this time.
He said: “Our MoD should not have anything to do with their Israeli opposite numbers – and nor should British armed forces as a whole.
“Any relationship between the two militaries is useful to the IDF because an onlooker can infer that the British Army agrees with how the IDF conducts operations. In effect, it gives a sort of fig leaf to the IDF.
“But the danger to the British of the series of meetings that are apparently taking place is significant. At the least we are perceived as non-critical of the IDF. And at worst we may be seen as complicit in war crimes.
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/O74hZCKKdpAUK Foreign Minister David Lammy confirms that UK government and military are active participants in Israel’s genocides and that the F-35 parts that they suspended from supplying to Israel are instead simply diverted via the United States. He says see https://youtu.be/QILgUHrdWRE
Palestinians examine shrapnel from a rocket allegedly used by Israel in the attack to displaced Palestinian tents in Deir al-Balah, Gaza on November 9, 2024. (Photo: Ashraf Amra/Anadolu via Getty Images)
The decision tells the international community that “you can ignore American law with respect to the provision of humanitarian aid and the use of weapons provided by American taxpayers.”
A memorandum aimed at restricting arms sales to protect human rights, issued by former U.S. President Joe Biden last year amid intensifying outcry over his administration’s support for Israel’s bombardment of Gaza, ultimately did little to stop the U.S. from continuing to back a military operation in which there is abundant evidence of war crimes.
But advocates decried President Donald Trump’s decision Monday to repeal the document, National Security Memorandum-20 (NSM-20) as “shameful,” warning that it sends the message that “anything goes,” as Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) said.
Van Hollen proposed legislation last year that pushed Biden to introduce NSM-20, which required countries that receive military aid from the U.S. to provide assurances that the weapons will not be used to violate international humanitarian law.
When the memo was introduced last February, rights advocates had been warning for months that continued U.S. support for Israel violated laws that were already in place, including the Foreign Assistance Act and the Arms Export Control Act, which restrict arms sales to countries that block humanitarian aid or otherwise break human rights laws.
The U.S. is the largest international funder of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), which began bombarding Gaza in October 2023 in retaliation for a Hamas-led attack. Numerous reports have shown that the Israeli military has attacked Palestinian civilians indiscriminately in Gaza, with U.S. weapons used in some assaults.
At least 48,346 people have been killed in Gaza since the bombardment began. A temporary cease-fire was established in January.
Trump quietly repealed NSM-20 after approving the sale of more than $7.4 billion in arms sales to Israel earlier this month and lifting sanctions on Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank.
The president also released one shipment of 2,000-pound bombs that had been frozen by the Biden administration after NSM-20 was issued last year.
Last May, Biden paused the shipment as Israel’s incursion in the southern Gaza city of Rafah garnered international outcry over the danger the expanded attacks posed to the 1.5 million Palestinians who were sheltering in the city.
But that same month, the Democratic administration issued a report that was required by NSM-20 claiming that there was not enough evidence that Israel had violated international humanitarian law to end overall U.S. support for the IDF.
That assessment came days after World Food Program executive director Cindy McCain warned that Israel’s blocking of humanitarian aid into Gaza had led to a “full-blown famine” in the northern part of the enclave.
The administration’s continued support for Israel led some to dismiss NSM-20 as a “PR stunt” and a “gimmick.”
American law still forbids sending military aid to countries that commit human-rights abuses. The Biden directive was just a PR stunt for an administration that wanted to ignore the law but pretend it wasn't https://t.co/H50x2uZa4f
Although NSM-20 did not stop the Biden administration from putting human rights at risk, critics warned that countries such as Israel will be even more emboldened following Trump’s repeal of the memo.
The decision tells the international community that “you can ignore American law with respect to the provision of humanitarian aid and the use of weapons provided by American taxpayers,” Van Hollen told The Washington Post.
Christopher Le Mon, a former State Department official under Biden, told the outlet that “the only thing the Trump administration does by eliminating NSM-20 is signal to U.S. partners that the administration simply doesn’t care how these governments use U.S. arms, no matter how immoral or illegal their conduct.”
Sarah Yager, Washington director of Human Rights Watch, told the Post that with NSM-20 rescinded but other laws like the Foreign Assistance Act still in place, the Trump administration must now “show the American people that [it] will abide by U.S. laws when sending weapons to allies.”
Former President of the United States Joe Biden addressing to the nation in the Rose Garden at the White House in Washington DC, United States on November 7, 2024 [Celal Güneş – Anadolu Agency]
The International Criminal Court (ICC) should investigate former US officials President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin for their accessorial roles in aiding and abetting, as well as intentionally contributing to, Israeli war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza, US civil society organisation Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN) has said.
The NGO submitted a 172-page communication to the ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan on 19 January, 2025. Prepared with the support of ICC-registered lawyers and other war crimes experts, the submission details a pattern of deliberate and purposeful decisions by these officials to provide military, political, and public support to facilitate Israeli crimes in Gaza; this support included at least $17.9 billion of weapons transfers, intelligence sharing, targeting assistance, diplomatic protection and official endorsement of Israeli crimes, despite knowledge of how such support had and would substantially enable grave abuses.
“There are solid grounds to investigate Joe Biden, Antony Blinken and Lloyd Austin for complicity in Israel’s crimes,” said Reed Brody, DAWN board member and veteran war crimes lawyer. “The bombs dropped on Palestinian hospitals, schools and homes are American bombs, the campaign of murder and persecution has been carried out with American support. US officials have been aware of exactly what Israel is doing, and yet their support never stopped.”
DAWN’s communication lays out the legal and factual basis for investigating Biden, Blinken, and Austin for violating Articles 25(3)(c) and (d) of the Rome Statute, both aiding and abetting and intentionally contributing to crimes committed by Israeli officials in Gaza. These crimes include those identified in the arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, including the war crimes of starvation and intentionally directing attacks against the civilian population, and crimes against humanity, including murder, inhumane acts, and persecution, under the Rome Statute. It also includes their role in the war crime of intentionally directing attacks against civilian objects under Article 8(2)(b)(ii) and the crime of genocide under Article 6.
“Not only did Biden, Blinken and Austin ignore and justify the overwhelming evidence of Israel’s grotesque and deliberate crimes, overruling their own staff recommendations to halt weapons transfers to Israel, they doubled down by providing Israel with unconditional military and political support to ensure it could carry out its atrocities,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Executive Director of DAWN. “They provided Israel with not only essential military support but equally essential political support by vetoing multiple ceasefire resolutions at the UN Security Council to ensure Israel could continue its crimes.”
This work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. I
Minister of Justice and Correctional Services of South Africa Ronald Lamola answers the questions of press members related to the public hearings of South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague, Netherlands on January 11, 2024 [Dursun Aydemir – Anadolu Agency]
South Africa has vowed not to withdraw its genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), despite the Trump administration’s threats and aid cut.
There is “no chance” South Africa could withdraw the case it filed in December 2023, Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola told the Financial Times.
“Standing by our principles sometimes has consequences, but we remain firm that this is important for the world, and the rule of law,” he added.
South Africa was the first nation to drag Israel to the ICJ over its genocidal war on Gaza that has claimed more than 48,000 lives and reduced the enclave to rubble. A ceasefire that took hold on 19 January is currently in place.
Last week, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order halting financial aid to South Africa in retaliation for a new land appropriation law it claims seizes property from the country’s White minority, as well as the ICJ case against Israel.
The US also alleges that South Africa is working with Iran to “develop commercial, military and nuclear arrangements.”
“The United States cannot support the government of South Africa’s commission of rights violations in its country or its ‘undermining United States foreign policy, which poses national security threats to our Nation, our allies, our African partners, and our interests,” the order read.
“While we do have a good relationship with Iran, we don’t have any nuclear programmes with them, nor any trade to speak of,” Lamola said.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa recently signed the expropriation bill into law, which will allow the state to expropriate land without compensation if it is “just, equitable and in the public interest.”
The government says the law aims to address apartheid’s past injustices, and that Trump’s accusations are lies, distortions and misinformation.
According to Ramaphosa, the country was only receiving HIV/AIDS prevention funding from the US.
After South Africa instituted proceedings against Israel alleging violations of the 1948 Genocide Convention in the Gaza Strip, several countries joined the case including Nicaragua, Colombia, Cuba, Libya, Mexico, Spain, Belize and Turkiye.
The International Criminal Court has separately issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza. Trump has also sanctioned the ICC for investing Israeli officials.
This work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. I
Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.Climate Science Denier Donald Trump says Burn, Baby, Burn.
