American film star celebrity John Cusack, who describes himself on his x-page bio as an “apocalyptic shit-disturber”, has posted an open letter to the world denouncing the Israeli “mass murder” in Gaza and calling for “your outrage”.
While warning the public to “don’t stop talking about Palestine/Gaza”, he says that the “hollow ‘both sides’ rhetoric is complicity with power”.
“This is not a debate with two sides that can be normalised — and all the hired bullshit in print and on tv will never change the narrative,” he said.
Palestinian freelance photojournalist Fatma Hassouna . . . murdered in an Israeli air strike on after it was announced about her film on Gaza being screened at the Cannes Film Festival. Image: Fatma Hassouna
His statement comes as hundreds of directors, writers, actors have denounced Israeli genocide in Gaza and the film industry’s “silence,” “indifference” and “passivity” coinciding with the Cannes Film Festival.
More than 350 prominent directors, writers and actors signed an open letter condemning the genocide and the “official inaction” of the film industry in regard to the mass suffering.
The industry open letter was published on the first day of the Cannes festival. It began by calling attention to the fate of 25-year-old Fatma Hassouna, a Palestinian freelance photojournalist, who was murdered in an Israeli air strike on April 16.
She was assassinated after it was announced that Iranian director Sepideh Farsi’s film Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk, in which she Hassouna was the star, had been selected in the ACID parallel, independent film section of the festival.
“There is a genocide unfolding before our eyes in Gaza. Not a metaphor, not a tragedy in the abstract — a genocide. Carried out in real time, in front of satellites, smartphones, and sanitized press conferences. And what has the so-called “land of the free” done? Applauded. Armed. Rationalised. Looked away.
London protest: ‘No to another Nakba” Video: Al Jazeera
“The blood in Gaza does not just stain the hands of those launching the missiles. It stains every hand that signs off on the bombs, every hand that wrings itself in liberal anguish but does nothing, and every hand that beats its chest in right-wing bloodlust cheering it all on.
“The American far right sees in this mass killing a projection of its own fantasies — walls, camps, and the unrelenting dehumanisation of the “other.” No surprise there. And where are the liberals? Their silence is violence. Their hollow “both sides” rhetoric is complicity with power. And mass murder. And the machine of empire—greased with our taxes, shielded by our media, and excused by our moral debauchery . How’s everybody at the Met gala doing tonight ?
American actor John Cusack . . . “If you claim to care about justice – if you ever marched, ever lit a candle for any cause – then your voice should be raised now.” Image: Wikipedia
“If you claim to care about justice — if you ever marched, ever lit a candle for any cause — then your voice should be raised now. Or it means nothing. The children of Gaza do not need your sorrow. They need your outrage. Your pressure. Your courage.
“End the siege. End the weapons shipments. End the lies. Call this what it is: a genocide.
“And if your politics cannot confront that—then your politics are worthless.
“In furious solidarity
“John Cusack”
Here’s a template –
To Whom It May Still Concern,
There is a genocide unfolding before our eyes in Gaza. Not a metaphor, not a tragedy in the abstract—a genocide. Carried out in real time, in front of satellites, smartphones, and sanitized press conferences. And what has the…
Seven European nations have called on Israel to “immediately reverse” its military operations against Gaza and lift the food and water blockade on the besieged enclave.
They have also called on all parties to immediately engage with “renewed urgency and good faith” for a ceasefire and release of all hostages.
The seven countries are Iceland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, Norway, Slovenia, and Spain.
They declared that they would be silent in the face of the man-made humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza that has so far killed more than 50,000 men, women and children.
Israeli forces continue bombarding Gaza yesterday, killing at least 125 Palestinians, including 36 in the so-called “safe zone” of al-Mawasi.
The intensified Israeli attacks have rendered all the public hospitals in northern Gaza out of service, said the Health Ministry.
The joint statement
The joint statement signed by the leaders of all seven countries said:
“We will not be silent in front of the man-made humanitarian catastrophe that is taking place before our eyes in Gaza. More than 50.000 men, women, and children have lost their lives. Many more could starve to death in the coming days and weeks unless immediate action is taken.
“We call upon the government of Israel to immediately reverse its current policy, refrain from further military operations and fully lift the blockade, ensuring safe, rapid and unimpeded humanitarian aid to be distributed throughout the Gaza strip by international humanitarian actors and according to humanitarian principles. United Nations and humanitarian organisations, including UNRWA, must be supported and granted safe and unimpeded access.
“We call upon all parties to immediately engage with renewed urgency and good faith in negotiations on a ceasefire and the release of all hostages, and acknowledge the important role played by the United States, Egypt and Qatar in this regard.
“This is the basis upon which we can build a sustainable, just and comprehensive peace, based on the implementation of the two-State solution. We will continue to support the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination, and work in the framework of the United Nations and with other actors, like the Arab League and Arab and Islamic States, to move forward to achieve a peaceful and sustainable solution. Only peace can bring security for Palestinians, Israelis and the region, and only respect for international law can secure lasting peace.
“We also condemn the further escalation in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, with increased settler violence, the expansion of illegal settlements and intensified Israel military operations. Forced displacement or the expulsion of the Palestinian people, by any means, is unacceptable and would constitute a breach of international law. We reject any such plans or attempts at demographic change.
“We must assume the responsibility to stop this devastation.”
The letter was signed by Kristrún Frostadóttir, Prime Minister of Iceland; Micheál Martin, Taoiseach of Ireland; Luc Frieden, Prime Minister of Luxembourg; Robert Abela, Prime Minister of Malta; Jonas Gahr Støre, Prime Minister of Norway; Robert Golob, Prime Minister of Slovenia; and Pedro Sánchez, President of Spain.
Gaza proves global system ‘incapable of solving issues’
Meanwhile, the Iranian Foreign Minister, Abbas Araghchi, says the crisis in Gaza has once again demonstrated that “the pillars of the international system are incapable of resolving such issues”, reports Al Jazeera.
It also showed “that the fate of the [Middle East] region cannot and should not remain at the mercy of extra-regional powers”, he said during a speech at the Tehran Dialogue Forum.
“What is currently presented by these powers as the ‘regional reality’ is, in fact, a reflection of deeply constructed narratives and interpretations, shaped solely based on their own interests,” Iran’s top diplomat said.
He said these narratives must be redefined and corrected from within the region itself.
“West Asia is in dire need of a fundamental reassessment of how it views itself,” Araghchi said.
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.
About 2000 New Zealand protesters marched through the heart of Auckland city today chanting “no justice, no peace” and many other calls as they demanded an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and an end to the Israeli atrocities in its brutal war on the besieged Palestinian enclave.
For more than 73 days, Israel has blocked all food, water, and medicine from entering Gaza, creating a man-made crisis with the Strip on the brink of a devastating famine.
Israel’s attacks killed more than 150 and wounded 450 in a day in a new barrage of attacks that aid workers described as “Gaza is bleeding before our eyes”.
in Auckland, several Palestinian and other speakers spoke of the anguish and distress of the global Gaza community in the face of Western indifference to the suffering in a rally before the march marking the 77th anniversary of the Nakba — the “Palestinian catastrophe”.
“There are cracks opening up all around the world that haven’t been there for 77 years,” said Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) co-chair John Minto in an inspired speech to the protesters.
“We’ve got politicians in Britain speaking out for the first time. Some conservative politician got standing up the other day saying, ‘I supported Israel right or wrong for 20 years, and I was wrong.’
‘The world is coming right’
“Yet a lot of the world has been wrong for 77 years, but the world is coming right. We are on the right side of history, give us a big round of applause.”
Minto was highly critical of the public broadcasters, Television New Zealand and Radio New Zealand, saying they relied too heavily on a narrow range of Western sources whose credibility had been challenged and eroded over the past 19 months.
PSNA co-chair John Minto . . . .capturing an image of the march up Auckland’s Queen Street in protest over the Israeli genocide in Gaza. Image: APR
He also condemned their “proximity” news value, blaming it for news editors’ lapse of judgment on news values because Israelis “spoke English”.
Minto told the crowd that that they should be monitoring Al Jazeera for a more balanced and nuanced coverage of the war on Palestine.
His comments echoed a similar theme of a speech at the Fickling Centre in Three Kings on Thursday night and protesters followed up by picketing the NZ Voyager Media Awards last night with a light show of killed Gazan journalists beamed on the hotel venue.
Protesters at the NZ Voyager Media Awards protesting last night against unbalanced media coverage of Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Image: Achmat Eesau/PSNA
About 230 Gazan journalists have been killed in the war so far, many of them allegedly targeted by the Israeli forces.
Minto said he could not remember a previous time when a New Zealand government had remained silent in the face of industrial-scale killing of civilians anywhere in the world.
“We have livestreamed genocide happening and we have our government refusing to condemn any of Israel’s war crimes,” he said.
NZ ‘refusing to condemn war crimes’
“Yet we’ve got everybody in the leadership of this government having condemned every act of Palestinian resistance yet refused to condemn the war crimes, refused to condemn the bombing of civilians, and refused to condemn the mass starvation of 2.3 million people.
“What a bunch of depraved bastards run this country. Shame on all of them.”
Palestinian speaker Samer Almalalha . . . “Everything we were told about international law and human rights is bullshit.” A golden key symbolising the right of return for Palestinians is in the background. Image: APR
Palestinian speaker Samer Almalalha spoke of the 1948 Nakba and the injustices against his people.
“Everything we were told about international law and human rights is bullshit. The only rights you have are the ones you take,” he said.
“So today we won’t stand here to plead, we are here to remind you of what happened to us. We are here to take what is ours. Today, and every day, we fight for a free Palestine.”
Nakba survivor Ghazi Dassouki . . . a harrowing story about a massacre village. Image: Bruce King survivor
and he told a harrowing story from his homeland. As a 14-year-old boy, he and his family were driven out of Palestine during the Nakba.
He described “waking up to to the smell of gunpowder” — his home was close to the Deir Yassin massacre on April 9, 1948, when Zionist militias attacked the village killing 107 people, including women and children.
‘Palestine will be free – and so will we’
Green Party co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick said: “What we stand for is truth, justice, peace and love.
“Palestine will be free and, in turn, so will we.”
Israel has blocked all food, water, and medicine from entering Gaza, creating a man-made crisis, with the integrated food security agency IPC warning that famine could be declared any time between now and September, reports Al Jazeera.
The head of the UN Children’s Fund, Catherine Russell, said the world should be shocked by the killing of 45 children in Israeli air strikes in just two days.
Instead, the slaughter of children in Gaza is “largely met with indifference”.
“More than 1 million children in Gaza are at risk of starvation. They are deprived of food, water and medicine,” Russell wrote in a post on social media.
“Nowhere is safe for children in Gaza,” she said.
“This horror must stop.”
“The coloniser lied” . . . a placard in today’s Palestine rally in Auckland. Image: APR
Famine worst level of hunger
Famine is the worst level of hunger, where people face severe food shortages, widespread malnutrition, and high levels of death due to starvation.
According to the UN’s criteria, famine is declared when:
At least 20 percent (one-fifth) of households face extreme food shortages;
More than 30 percent of children suffer from acute malnutrition; and
At least two out of every 10,000 people or four out of every 10,000 children die each day from starvation or hunger-related causes.
Famine is not just about hunger; it is the worst humanitarian emergency, indicating a complete collapse of access to food, water and the systems necessary for survival.
According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), since Israel’s complete blockade began on March 2, at least 57 children have died from the effects of malnutrition.
“Stop Genocide in Gaza” . . . the start of the rally with PSNA co-chair Maher Nazzal on the right. Image: APR
Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka and Fiji’s coalition government are “detached from the values that Fijians hold dear”, says the NGO Coalition on Human Rights in Fiji (NGOCHR).
The rights coalition has expressed deep concern over Rabuka’s ongoing engagements with Indonesia.
“History will judge how we respond as Fijians to this moment. We must not stay silent when Pacific people are being occupied and killed,” said NGOCHR chair Shamima Ali.
“Is Fiji’s continuing silence on West Papua yet another example of being muzzled by purse strings?”
“As members of the Melanesian and Pacific family, bound by shared ancestry and identity, the acceptance of financial and any other benefit from Indonesia—while remaining silent on the plight of West Papua—is a betrayal of our family member and of regional solidarity.”
“True leadership must be rooted in solidarity, justice, and accountability,” Ali said.
“It is imperative that Pacific leaders not only advocate for peace and cooperation in the region but also continue to hold Indonesia to account on ongoing human rights violations in West Papua.”
Sadly, this highlights RNZ’s failure to report the genocide from the perspective of the very real victims — more journalists killed in Gaza than the whole of World War Two, aid workers murdered and buried, 17,000 children, including babies, who will never ever grow.
I respect so many RNZ journalists and have always supported this important national broadcaster but it is time for it to pull up its pants, ditch the propaganda and report from the field of truth.
I carry my Jewish ancestors in standing against genocide and calling for reports that show the truth of the travesty.
For reporting on protests I have been pepper sprayed by thugged-up police donning US-style gloves and glasses (illegally carrying pepper spray and tasers).
I was banned from my own town hall when I tried — with my E Tu press card — to attend the deputy leader Winston Peters’ media conference.
This government does not want the truth reported, it seems.
I have reported from the fields of invasion and conflict. I’ve taught journalism and communications. Good journalists remember journalism ethics. Reports from the point of view of the oppressor support the oppressor.
Humanitarianism means not reporting from the perspective of a mercenary army — an army that has been enforcing apartheid for decades, and which is invoking a policy of extermination for expansion.
Please read this media review and think of how you would feel if someone demanded that you leave your home. Palestinians have faced oppression and apartheid and “unhoming” for decades.
Think of the intolerable weight of grief you would carry if a sniper put a bullet between the eyes of a child you love and know.
Report on the victims. And stop subscribing to propaganda.
Saige England is a journalist and author, and a member of the Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA). She is a frequent contributor to Asia Pacific Report. This was first published as a social media post.
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by Pacific Media Watch.
West Papuans in Merauke claim the Indonesian government is stealing land to build its global “food barn” and feed its population of 280 million.
Indonesia denies this and says all transactions are lawful.
President Prabowo Subianto’s administration wants Indonesia to be able to feed its population without imports as early as 2028, with the greater goal of exporting food.
To get there, Indonesia plans to convert millions of hectares into farmland.
Wensi Fatubun, from Merauke in Indonesian-occupied Papua close to Papua New Guinea’s border, said forests where he grew up were being cleared.
“[The] Indonesian government took the land for the [food] security project, it was not consulted with or consented to by Indigenous Papuans,” Fatubun said.
Prabowo’s goal is a continuation of his predecessors.
National food estate project
In 2020, President Joko Widodo announced the establishment of a national food estate project which aimed at opening up new areas of farmland outside the Java main island,
It is similar to the failed Merauke Integrated Food and Energy Estate, spearheaded by President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono in 2010.
About 1.3 million hectares were set aside in Merauke for it — half for food crops, 30 percent sugar cane, and 20 percent for palm.
A report from the US Department of Agriculture said it encountered resistance from locals and legal challenges.
“Approximately 90 percent of the targeted areas were forest, which provided a source of livelihood for many locals. Accordingly, the development plans became a flashpoint for local activists concerned about environmental and biodiversity impacts,” the report said.
Probowo’s government has a more ambitious goal of opening up 3 million ha of agricultural land in Merauke — two million for rice and one million for sugarcane.
Human Rights Watch Indonesia researcher Andreas Harsono said President Prabowo had elevated the “so-called food security issue”.
“[The President] wants Merauke in West Papua to be the so-called national food barn. This deforestation land grabbing is much more deeper in Merauke than in the past.”
Conflict has escalated
Harsono said conflict had escalated in West Papua and was now on par with some of the most violent periods in the past 60 years, but he was not sure if it was connected to the President’s focus on food security.
BenarNews reported that about 2000 troops had been deployed late last year in Merauke to provide security at a 2 million ha food plantation.
Rosa Moiwend, from Merauke, said the soldiers worked alongside farmers.
“They are expected to teach local farmers how to use mechanical agriculture equipment,” Moiwend said.
“But as West Papuan people, the presence of the military in the middle of the community, watching communities activities, people’s movement when they travel from one place to another, actually creates fear among the people in Merauke.”
Like Harsono and Fatubun, Moiwend said “land grabs” were happening.
However, she said it still involved a land broker, which created a facade of a fair procedure.
‘We do not sell land’
“Indigenous Merauke, indigenous Marind people like myself and my people, we do not sell land because land belongs to the community. It is communal land.”
However, a spokesperson for Indonesia’s Embassy in Wellington said all processes and steps involving land sales had been lawful, “always respecting the inclinations of local tribes”.
“Its development always involving local authorities, especially chief tribes for the consent of their ulayat (traditional land),” they said.
“There is no land grab without consent, and the government also working on the biodiversity conservation and forestry production to create space harmonisation model with Conservation International, Medco Group, and couple of other independent organisations.”
Former Green Party MP now West Papuan campaigner Catherine Delahunty . . . New Zealand and Australia are failing the citizens of West Papua. Image: Johnny Blades/VNP
‘They are stripping communities’ – campaigner West Papua Action Aotearoa spokesperson Catherine Delahunty, formerly a Green Party MP, said the region was part of the lungs of the Pacific, which was now being destroyed.
“The plan has been around for a long time but it seems to have escalated under Prabowo,” Delahunty said.
“They are stripping those lands and stripping those communities who live there from their traditional foods such as the sago palm to turn the whole of Merauke into sugar cane, rice and palm plantations.
“The effects have been massive and they’re just getting worse.”
She said New Zealand and Australia — the two “most powerful” governments in the South Pacific — were failing in their obligations to the citizens of West Papua.
“You could almost justify, because it’s a long way away from other parts of the world, that Europe and the northern hemisphere don’t really understand West Papua but there’s no excuse for us.
“These people are in our region but they’re not white people. I think there’s a huge element of racism towards Papuans and towards Pacific nations who aren’t perceived as important in the Western worldview.”
She said there was willingness to trade with Indonesia as a regional powerhouse, and New Zealand did not want to rock the boat.
That coupled with a media blackout made it easy for Indonesia to act with impunity, Delahunty said.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Nakba Day today marks 15 May 1948 — the day after the declaration of the State of Israel — when the Palestinian society and homeland was destroyed and more than 750,000 people forced to leave and become refugees. The day is known as the “Palestinian Catastrophe”.
By Soumaya Ghannoushi
US President Donald Trump’s tour of Riyadh, Abu Dhabi and Doha is not diplomacy. It is theatre — staged in gold, fuelled by greed, and underwritten by betrayal.
A US president openly arming a genocide is welcomed with red carpets, handshakes and blank cheques. Trillions are pledged; personal gifts are exchanged. And Gaza continues to burn.
Gulf regimes have power and wealth. They have Trump’s ear. Yet they use none of it — not to halt the slaughter, ease the siege or demand dignity.
In return for their riches and deference, Trump grants Israel bombs and sets it loose upon the region.
This is the real story. At the heart of Trump’s return lies a project he initiated during his first presidency: the erasure of Palestine, the elevation of autocracy, and the redrawing of the Middle East in Israel’s image.
“See this pen? This wonderful pen on my desk is the Middle East, and the top of the pen — that’s Israel. That’s not good,” he once told reporters, lamenting Israel’s size compared to its neighbours.
To Trump, the Middle East is not a region of history or humanity. It is a marketplace, a weapons depot, a geopolitical ATM.
His worldview is forged in evangelical zeal and transactional instinct. In his rhetoric, Arabs are chaos incarnate: irrational, violent, in need of control. Israel alone is framed as civilised, democratic, divinely chosen. That binary is not accidental. It is ideology.
Obedience for survival Trump calls the region “a rough neighbourhood” — code for endless militarism that casts the people of the Middle East not as lives to protect, but as threats to contain.
His $110 billion arms deal with Saudi Arabia in 2017 was marketed as peace through prosperity. Now, he wants trillions more in Gulf capital. As reported by The New York Times, Trump is demanding that Saudi Arabia invest its entire annual GDP — $1 trillion — into the US economy.
Riyadh has already offered $600 billion. Trump wants it all. Economists call it absurd; Trump calls it a deal.
This is not realpolitik. It is a grotesque spectacle of decadence, delusion and disgrace
Across the Gulf, a race is underway — not to end the genocide in Gaza, but to outspend one another for Trump’s favour, showering him with wealth in return for nothing.
The Gulf is no longer treated as a region. It is a vault. Sovereign wealth funds are the new ballot boxes. Sovereignty — just another asset to be traded.
Trump’s offer is blunt: obedience for survival. For regimes still haunted by the Arab Spring, Western blessing is their last shield. And they will pay any price: wealth, independence, even dignity.
To them, the true threat is not Israel, nor even Iran. It is their own people, restless, yearning, ungovernable.
Democracy is danger; self-determination, the ticking bomb. So they make a pact with the devil.
Doctrine of immunity That devil brings flags, frameworks, photo ops and deals. The new order demands normalisation with Israel, submission to its supremacy, and silence on Palestine.
Once-defiant slogans are replaced by fintech expos and staged smiles beside Israeli ministers.
In return, Trump offers impunity: political cover and arms. It is a doctrine of immunity, bought with gold and soaked in Arab blood.
They bend. They hand him deals, honours, trillions. They believe submission buys respect. But Trump respects only power — and he makes that clear.
He praises Russian President Vladimir Putin: “Is Putin smart? Yes . . . that’s a hell of a way to negotiate.” He calls Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan “a guy I like [and] respect”. Like them or not, they defend their nations. And Trump, ever the transactional mind, respects power.
Arab rulers offer no such strength. They offer deference, not defiance. They don’t push; they pay.
And Trump mocks them openly. King Salman “might not be there for two weeks without us”, he brags. They give him billions; he demands trillions.
It is not just the US Treasury profiting. Gulf billions do not merely fuel policy; they enrich a family empire. Since returning to office, Trump and his sons have chased deals across the Gulf, cashing in on the loyalty they have cultivated.
The message was clear: access to the Trumps has a price, and Gulf rulers are eager to pay.
Now, Trump is receiving a private jet from Qatar’s ruling family — a palace in the sky worth $400 million.
This is not diplomacy. It is plunder.
And how does Trump respond? With insult: “It was a great gesture,” he said of the jet, before adding: “We keep them safe. If it wasn’t for us, they probably wouldn’t exist right now.”
That was his thank you to Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar; lavish gifts answered with debasement.
And what are they rewarding him for? For genocide. For 100,000 tonnes of bombs dropped on Gaza. For backing ethnic cleansing in plain sight. For empowering far-right Israeli politicians, including Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as they call for Gaza’s depopulation.
For presiding over the most fanatically Zionist, most unapologetically Islamophobic administration in US history.
Still, they ask nothing, while offering everything. They could have used their leverage. They did not.
The Yemen precedent proves they can act. Trump halted the bombing under Saudi pressure, to Netanyahu’s visible dismay. When they wanted a deal, they struck one with the Houthis.
And when they sought to bring Syria in from the cold, Trump complied. He agreed to meet former rebel leader turned President Ahmed al-Sharaa — a last-minute addition to his Riyadh schedule — and even spoke of lifting sanctions, once again at Saudi Arabia’s request, to “give them a chance of greatness”.
No US president is beyond pressure. But for Gaza? Silence.
Price of silence While Trump was being feted in Riyadh, Israel rained American-made bombs on two hospitals in Gaza. In Khan Younis, the European Hospital was reportedly struck by nine bunker-busting bombs, killing more than two dozen people and injuring scores more.
Earlier that day, an air strike on Nasser Hospital killed journalist Hassan Islih as he lay wounded in treatment.
As Trump basked in applause, Israel massacred children in Jabalia, where around 50 Palestinians were killed in just a few hours.
This is the bloody price of Arab silence, buried beneath the roar of applause and the glitter of tributes.
This week marks the anniversary of the Nakba — and here it is again, replayed not through tanks alone, but through Arab complicity.
With every cheque signed, Arab rulers do not secure history’s respect. They seal their place in its sordid footnotes of shame
The bombs fall. The Gaza Strip turns to dust. Two million people endure starvation. UN food is gone.
Hospitals overflow with skeletal infants. Mothers collapse from hunger. Tens of thousands of children are severely malnourished, with more than 3500 on the edge of death.
Meanwhile, Smotrich speaks of “third countries” for Gaza’s people. Netanyahu promises their removal.
And Trump — the man enabling the annihilation? He is not condemned, but celebrated by Arab rulers. They eagerly kiss the hand that sends the bombs, grovel before the architect of their undoing, and drape him in splendour and finery.
While much of the world stands firm — China, Europe, Canada, Mexico, even Greenland – refusing to bow to Trump’s bullying, Arab rulers kneel. They open wallets, bend spines, empty hands — still mistaking humiliation for diplomacy.
They still believe that if they bow low enough, Trump might toss them a bone. Instead, he tosses them a bill.
This is not realpolitik. It is a grotesque spectacle of decadence, delusion and disgrace.
With every cheque signed, every jet offered, every photo op beside the butcher of a people, Arab rulers do not secure history’s respect. They seal their place in its sordid footnotes of shame.
Soumaya Ghannoushi is a British Tunisian writer and expert in Middle East politics. Her journalistic work has appeared in The Guardian, The Independent, Corriere della Sera, aljazeera.net and Al Quds. This article was first published by the Middle East Eye. A selection of her writings may be found at: soumayaghannoushi.com and she tweets @SMGhannoushi.
Israel’s military has admitted attacking the Nasser Medical Complex in the city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, killing Palestinian journalist Hassan Eslaih and another person while claiming it was a “targeted attack”.
Gaza’s Government Media Office confirmed the killing of Eslaih yesterday and described it as an “assassination”.
The Gaza Health Ministry condemned the “heinous” attack on Nasser hospital.
Esaih who receiving treatment at the hospital’s burn unit for severe injuries sustained during an April 7 Israeli strike on a media tent located next to the hospital.
He had survived that attack, but suffered severe injuries, including burns, and lost two fingers.
Esaih was the director of the Alam24 News Agency and a freelancer who contributed to international news organisations, including photos of the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, reports Al Jazeera.
Israel claims Eslaih was a Hamas fighter who participated in the October 7 attack, an allegation he vehemently denied.
‘False claims’ about journalists
At the time, he told Mondoweiss, a US-based news outlet, that Israel was “trying to obliterate the image of Palestinian journalists with these false claims that they belong to Hamas and other factions”.
He added that he did not belong to any party in Gaza.
Latest Israeli killing takes death toll among Gaza journalists to 215
The Government Media Office in Gaza said the killing of Eslaih took the death toll of Gaza journalists to 2015. It condemned “in the strongest terms the systematic targeting, killing and assassination of Palestinian journalists” by Israeli forces.
It said that Eslaih was “assassinated” while receiving treatment at the Nasser Medical Complex.
“We hold the Israeli occupation, the US administration, and the countries participating in the crime of genocide — such as the United Kingdom, Germany, and France — fully responsible for committing this heinous, brutal crime,” it added.
According to the US-based Committee to Protect Journalists, at least 178 journalists and media workers have been killed in Palestine, Israel, and Lebanon since the war began. Media freedom watchdogs in Europe and the US have often under counted the journalist death toll.
Israel’s military claimed in a post on Telegram that the strike targeted a Hamas “command and control complex” at the hospital — the largest in southern Gaza — without providing further evidence.
Repeated targeting of hospitals
The Health Ministry said the Israeli attack targeted the surgical building at Nasser Medical complex, killing at least two people and wounding patients and medical staff.
“The repeated targeting of hospitals and the pursuit and killing of wounded patients inside treatment rooms confirms the occupation forces’ deliberate intent to inflict greater damage to the health care system and threaten the treatment of the wounded and sick, even on hospital beds,” it added.
According to officials in Gaza, Israel has bombed and burned at least 35 hospitals across the Strip.
This is despite the fact that attacks on health facilities, medical personnel and patients are considered a war crime under the 1949 Geneva Convention.
Here are some of the worst attacks:
Al-Ahli Hospital: Hundreds of people sheltering in the car park of al-Ahli Hospital were killed in an explosion in October 2023. In the days leading up to the incident, the hospital director reportedly received warnings from Israel.
Al-Awda Hospital: An Israeli air raid in November 2023 killed Dr Mahmoud Abu Nujaila and Dr Ahmad al-Sahar of Doctors Without Borders (MSF), and another doctor, Ziad al-Tatari. Israeli forces raided the hospital the following month and detained Dr Adnan Al Bursh, who died in Israeli custody later.
Al-Shifa Medical Complex: Israeli forces raided the hospital in November 2023, killing at least 25 Palestinians, including three medical workers, and leaving it non-functional. They stormed the hospital a second time in March of last year, killing at least 22 people. After they withdrew, three mass graves were found and at least 80 corpses were retrieved.
Kamal Adwan Hospital: The Israeli military arrested Dr Hussam Abu Safia, the director of Kamal Adwan Hospital, in December of last year after he refused to follow orders to abandon one of the last functioning hospitals in northern Gaza. His arrest came a day after the military killed approximately 20 Palestinians and detained about 240 in a raid inside the hospital, which was one of the “largest operations” conducted in the territory until that time.
Israeli claim rejected
Hamas has rejected the Israeli prime minister’s claim that military pressure helped secure the release of a captured US-Israeli soldier, 21-year-old Edan Alexander, from Gaza.
“The return of Edan Alexander is the result of serious communications with the US administration and the efforts of mediators, not a consequence of Israeli aggression or the illusion of military pressure,” Hamas said in a statement.
The group added that Netanyahu was “misleading his people”, Al Jazeera reports. Hamas said earlier it was a goodwill gesture to US President Donald Trump on the eve of his Middle East visit.
Officers call for war’s end
Meanwhile, a group of former Israeli military commanders have urged Trump to end Israel’s war on Gaza.
The group representing more than 550 former senior officers in the Israeli military and intelligence agencies has written to Trump, asking him to use his visit to the Middle East, which began today, to “bring all our hostages back” and “end the war” in Gaza.
The Commanders for Israel Security also urged the US leader to “end the death and suffering of innocents, launch a Hamas-free ‘morning after’ for the Strip, and pave the way for a regional security coalition that includes Israel”.
By all accounts, “our approach to you represents the view of the vast majority of Israelis”, the group wrote.
The letter also said the war in Gaza “no longer serves Israel’s national objectives”, and that to most Israelis, Israel’s “justified objectives” to “end Hamas brutality” after October 7 “have long been achieved”.
The letter added, “If continued, the war, as well as the aggressive annexation policy on the West Bank, challenges regional stability. Most important, as you have correctly noted, it risks the lives of our hostages.”
An Australian solidarity group for West Papuan self-determination has called on Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to raise the human rights crisis in the Melanesian region with the Indonesian president this week.
Albanese is visiting Indonesia for two days from tomorrow.
AWPA has written a letter to Albanese making the appeal for him to raise the issue with President Prabowo Subianto.
“The Australian people care about human rights and, in light of the ongoing abuses in West Papua, we are urging Prime Minister Albanese to raise the human rights situation in West Papua with the Indonesian President during his visit to Jakarta,” said Joe Collins of AWPA.
He said the solidarity group was urging Albanese to support the West Papuan people by encouraging the Indonesian government to allow the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to visit West Papua to investigate the human rights situation in the territory.
The West Papuan people have been calling for such a visit for years.
Concerned over military ties
“We are also concerned about the close ties between the ADF [Australian Defence Force] and the Indonesian military,” Collins said.
“We believe that the ADF should be distancing itself from the Indonesian military while there are ongoing human rights abuses in West Papua, not increasing ties with the Indonesian security forces as is the case at present.”
Collins said that the group understood that it was in the interest of the Australian government to have good relations with Indonesia, “but good relations should not be at the expense of the West Papuan people”.
“The West Papuan people are not going to give up their struggle for self-determination. It’s an issue that is not going away,” Collins added.
A group of New Zealand academics at Otago University have drawn up a “Declaration on Palestine” against genocide, apartheid and scholasticide of Palestinians by Israel that has illegally occupied their indigenous lands for more than seven decades.
The document, which had already drawn more than 300 signatures from staff, students and alumni by the weekend, will be formally adopted at a congress of the Otago Staff for Justice in Palestine (OSJP) group on Thursday.
“At a time when our universities, our public institutions and our political leaders are silent in the face of the daily horrors we are shown from illegally-occupied Palestine, this declaration is an act of solidarity with our Palestinian whānau,” declared Professor Richard Jackson from Te Ao O Rongomaraeroa — The National Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies.
“It expresses the brutal truth of what is currently taking place in Palestine, as well as our commitment to international law and human rights, and our social responsibilities as academics.
“We hope the declaration will be an inspiration to others and a call to action at a moment when the genocide and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians is accelerating at an alarming rate.”
Scholars and students at the university had expressed concern that they did not want to be teaching or learning about the Palestinian genocide in future courses on the history of the Palestinian people, Professor Jackson said.
Nor did they want to feel ashamed when they were asked what they did while the genocide was taking place.
‘Collective moral courage’
“Signing up to the declaration represents an act of individual and collective moral courage, and a public commitment to working to end the genocide.”
The declaration commits its signatories to an academic boycott as part of the wider Boycott, Disinvestment and Sanction (BDS) campaign “until such time as Palestinians enjoy freedom from genocide, apartheid and scholasticide”, they had national self-determination and full and complete enjoyment of human rights, as codified in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The declaration says that given the International Court of Justice (ICJ) has ruled there is a “plausible” case that Israel has been committing genocide, and that all states that are signatory to the Genocide Convention must take all necessary measures to prevent acts of genocide, the signatories commit themselves to an academic boycott.
BDS is a campaign, begun in 2005, to promote economic, social and cultural boycotts of the Israeli government, Israeli companies and companies that support Israel, in an effort to end the occupation of Palestinian territories and win equal rights for Palestinian citizens within Israel.
It draws inspiration from South African anti-apartheid campaigns and the United States civil rights movement.
The full text of the declaration:
The Otago Declaration on the Situation in Palestine
We, the staff, students and graduates, being members of the University of Otago, make the following declaration.
We fully and completely recognise that: – The Palestinian people have a right under international law to national self-determination; – The Palestinians have the right to security and the full enjoyment of all human and social rights as laid out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights;
And furthermore that: – Israel is committing a genocide against the Palestinian nation, according to experts, official bodies, international lawyers and human rights organisations; – Israel operates a system of apartheid in the territories it controls, and denies the full expression and enjoyment of human rights to Palestinians, according to international courts, human rights organisations, legal and academic experts; – Israel is committing scholasticide, thereby denying Palestinians their right to education;
We recognise that: – Given the International Court of Justice has ruled that there is a plausible case that Israel has been committing genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza, that all states that are signatory to the Genocide Convention, which includes Aotearoa New Zealand, have a responsibility to take all necessary measures to prevent acts of genocide;
We also acknowledge that as members of a public institution with educational responsibilities: – We hold a legal and ethical responsibility to act as critic and conscience of society, both individually as members of the University and collectively as a social institution; – We have a responsibility to follow international law and norms and to act in an ethical manner in our personal and professional endeavours; – We hold an ethical responsibility to act in solidarity with oppressed and disadvantaged people, including those who struggle against settler colonial regimes or discriminatory apartheid systems and the harmful long-term effects of colonisation; – We owe a responsibility to fellow educators who are victimised by apartheid and scholasticide;
Therefore, we, the under-signed, do solemnly commit ourselves to: – Uphold the practices, standards and ethics of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign in terms of investment and procurement as called for by Palestinian civil society and international legal bodies; until such time as Palestinians enjoy freedom from genocide, apartheid and scholasticide, national self-determination and full and complete enjoyment of human rights, as codified in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. – Adopt as part of the BDS campaign an Academic Boycott, as called for by Palestinian civil society and international legal bodies; until such time as Palestinians enjoy freedom from genocide, apartheid and scholasticide, national self-determination and full and complete enjoyment of human rights, as codified in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The Otago Declaration congress meeting will be held on Thursday, May 15, 2025, at 12 noon at the Museum Lawn, Dunedin.
A decision by the Broadcasting Standards Authority to uphold a complaint against a 1News broadcast last November is a warning to news media, says the Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa.
1News described violence in the streets of Amsterdam on November 7 and 8 following a soccer match as “disturbing” and ‘antisemitic’ and stated the graphic video of beatings were Maccabi Tel Aviv fans under attack just for being Jewish.
Videographers who took the footage which 1News had used, complained to their news agencies that this description was wrong. The violence had been perpetrated by the Israeli Maccabi Tel Aviv fans against those they suspected of being Arab or supporters of Palestine.
The visiting Israelis were the attackers — not the victims, said the PSNA statement, as widely reported by global media correcting initial reports.
Before the match these same Maccabi fans had gathered in large groups to chant “Death to Arabs” — a racist genocidal chant which if used with the races reversed (“Arabs” replaced by Jews”) “would have been rightly condemned in purple prose by Western news media such as TVNZ”, said PSNA co-chair John Minto in the statement.
“But no such sympathy for Palestinians or Arabs,” he added.
Requested broadcast correction
PSNA said in its statement that it had immediately requested that TVNZ broadcast a correction. TVNZ refused, though admitting they had got the story wrong.
PSNA then referred a complaint to the BSA which upheld the complaint as failing to meet the accuracy standard.
Minto said in the statement that the BSA decision should be seen as a warning to news media to be aware that Israel was using “fabricated charges of antisemitism, to justify and divert attention from its genocide in Gaza and silence its critics”.
“Just because [Israeli Prime Minister] Benjamin Netanyahu and the then US President Joe Biden made statements turning Amsterdam attackers into victims, doesn’t mean TVNZ news should automatically parrot them,” Minto said.
“That’s effectively what the BSA concluded.”
Framing violence: How Israel shaped the narrative and the impact on Dutch politics Video: Al Jazeera
Minto also pointed to what he called a recent fabricated hysteria about antisemitism in Sydney, which the New South Wales police found to be completely based on hoaxes by a criminal gang.
“In the US, Trump is using the same charge as an excuse to close down university courses and expel anyone who protests against the Israeli genocide in Gaza,” Minto said.
“Of course, we strongly condemn the real antisemitism of anti-Jewish, Nazi-type Islamophobic groups,” Minto says.
Call for media ‘self education’
“It should be easy for professional reporters and editors to tell the difference between criticism of Israeli apartheid, ethnic cleansing and violence on one hand, and on the other hand Nazis and their fellow travellers who condemn Jews because they are Jews.
“The BSA is, in effect, demanding the news media educate themselves.”
In a half-hour report on 16 November 2024 headlined “Media bias, inaccuracy and the violence in Amsterdam”, Al Jazeera’s global mediawatch programme The Listening Post said “one night of violence revealed … Western media’s failings on Israel and Palestine”.
“In the wake of an ugly eruption of violence on the streets of Amsterdam, the media coverage of the story [was] put under the microscope with editors scrambling to revise headlines, rework narratives, and reframe video content.”
In an investigative documentary, The Full Report, on 22 January 2025, Al Jazeera’s Dutch correspondent Step Vaessen reported how Israel had framed the violence, shaped the narrative, manipulated the global media, and impacted on Dutch politics.
The escalation of violence in West Papua is on par with some of the most intense times of conflict over the past six decades, a human rights researcher says.
The United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) claims that Indonesia killed at least one civilian and severely injured another last Tuesday in Puncak Regency.
In a statement, ULMWP interim president Benny Wenda said Deris Kogoya, 18, was killed by a rocket attack from a helicopter while riding his motorbike near Kelanungin Village.
Jemi Waker, meanwhile, sustained severe violent injuries, including to both his legs.
The statement said Waker had refused to go to hospital, fearing he would be killed if he went.
Human Rights Watch researcher Andreas Harsono said that over the past month he had received an unusually high number of messages accompanied by gruesome photos showing either Indonesian soldiers or civilians being killed.
“The fighting is much more frequent now,” Harsono said.
More Indonesian soldiers
“There are more and more Indonesian soldiers sent to West Papua under President Pradowo.
“At the same time, indigenous Papuans are also gaining more and more men, unfortunately also boys, to join the fight in the jungle.”
He said the escalation could match similarly intense periods of conflict in 1977, 1984, and 2004.
A spokesperson for Indonesia’s Embassy in Wellington said they could not confirm if there had been a military attack in Puncak Regency on Tuesday.
However, they said all actions conducted by Indonesia’s military were in line with international law.
They said there were attacks in March and April of this year, instigated by an “armed criminal group” targeting Indonesian workers and civilians.
Harsono said if the attack was on civilians, it would be a clear breach of human rights.
Confirmation difficult
However, he said it was difficult to confirm due to the remoteness of the area. He said it was common for civilians to wear army camouflage because of surplus Indonesian uniforms.
Israel is in a weak position and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s extremism knows no bounds. The only other way around an eventual regional war is the ousting of the Israeli prime minister.
US President Donald Trump has closed his line of communication with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, according to various reports citing officials.
This comes amid alleged growing pressure on Israel regarding Gaza and the abrupt halt to American operations against Ansarallah in Yemen. So, is this all an act or is the US finally pressuring Israel?
On May 1, news broke that President Donald Trump had suddenly ousted his national security advisor Mike Waltz. According to a Washington Post article on the issue, the ouster was in part a response to Waltz’s undermining of the President, for having engaged in intense coordination with Israeli PM Netanyahu regarding the issue of attacking Iran prior to the Israeli Premier’s visit to the Oval Office.
Some analysts, considering that Waltz has been pushing for a war on Iran, argued that his ouster was a signal that the Trump administration’s pro-diplomacy voices were pushing back against the hawks.
This shift also came at a time when Iran-US talks had stalled, largely thanks to a pressure campaign from the Israel Lobby, leading US think tanks and Israeli officials like Ron Dermer.
Then, seemingly out of nowhere, Trump publicly announced the end to a campaign designed to destroy/degrade Yemen’s Ansarallah-led government in Sana’a on May 6.
Israeli leadership shocked
According to Israeli media, citing government sources, the leadership in Tel Aviv was shocked by the move to end operations against Yemen, essentially leaving the Israelis to deal with Ansarallah alone.
After this, more information began to leak, originating from the Israeli Hebrew-language media, claiming that the Trump administration was demanding Israel reach an agreement for aid to be delivered to Gaza, in addition to signing a ceasefire agreement.
The other major claim is that President Trump has grown so frustrated with Netanyahu that he has cut communication with him directly.
Although neither side has officially clarified details on the reported rift between the two sides, a few days ago the Israeli prime minister released a social media video claiming that he would act alone to defend Israel.
On Friday morning, another update came in that American Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth would be cancelling his planned visit to Tel Aviv.
Can Trump and Netanyahu remake the Middle East? Video: Palestine Chronicle
Is the US finally standing up to Israel? In order to assess this issue correctly, we have to place all of the above-mentioned developments into their proper context.
The issue must also be prefaced on the fact that every member of the Trump government is pro-Israeli to the hilt and has received significant backing from the Israel Lobby.
Mike Waltz was indeed fired and according to leaked AIPAC audio revealed by The Grayzone, he was somewhat groomed for a role in government by the pro-Israel Lobby for a long time.
Another revelation regarding Waltz, aside from him allegedly coordinating with Netanyahu behind Trump’s back and adding journalist Jeffrey Goldberg to a private Signal group chat, was that he was storing his chats on an Israeli-owned app.
Yet, Waltz was not booted out of the government like John Bolton was during Trump’s first term in office, he has instead been designated as UN ambassador to the United Nations.
The UN ambassador position was supposed to be handed to Elise Stefanik, a radically vocal supporter of Israel who helped lead the charge in cracking down on pro-Palestine free speech on university campuses. Stefanik’s nomination was withdrawn in order to maintain the Republican majority in the Congress.
If Trump was truly seeking to push back against the Israel Lobby’s push to collapse negotiations with Iran, then why did Trump signal around a week ago that new sanctions packages were on the way?
He announced on Friday that a third independent Chinese refiner would be hit with secondary sanctions for receiving Iranian oil.
Israeli demands in Trump’s rhetoric
The sanctions, on top of the fact that his negotiating team have continuously attempted to add conditions the the talks, viewed in Tehran as non-starters, indicates that precisely what pro-Israel think tanks like WINEP and FDD have been demanding is working its way into not only the negotiating team, but coming out in Trump’s own rhetoric.
There is certainly an argument to make here, that there is a significant split within the pro-Israel Lobby in the US, which is now working its way into the Trump administration, yet it is important to note that the Trump campaign itself was bankrolled by Zionist billionaires and tech moguls.
Miriam Adelson, Israel’s richest billionaire, was his largest donor. Adelson also happens to own Israel Hayom, the most widely distributed newspaper in Israel that has historically been pro-Netanyahu, it is now also reporting on the Trump-Netanyahu split and feeding into the speculations.
As for the US operations against Yemen, the US has used the attack on Ansarallah as the perfect excuse to move a large number of military assets to the region.
This has included air defence systems to the Gulf States and most importantly to Israel.
After claiming back in March to have already “decimated” Ansarallah, the Trump administration spent way in excess of US$1 billion dollars (more accurately over US$2 billion) and understood that the only way forward was a ground operation.
Meanwhile, the US has also moved military assets to the Mediterranean and is directly involved in intensive reconnaissance over Lebanese airspace, attempting to collect information on Hezbollah.
An Iran attack imminent? While it is almost impossible to know whether the media theatrics regarding the reported Trump-Netanyahu split are entirely true, or if it is simply a good-cop bad-cop strategy, it appears that some kind of assault on Iran could be imminent.
Whether Benjamin Netanyahu is going to order an attack on Iran out of desperation or as part of a carefully choreographed plan, the US will certainly involve itself in any such assault on one level or another.
The Israeli prime minister has painted himself into a corner. In order to save his political coalition, he collapsed the Gaza ceasefire during March and managed to bring back his Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir to his coalition.
This enabled him to successfully take on his own Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar, in an ongoing purge of his opposition.
However, due to a lack of manpower and inability to launch any major ground operation against Gaza, without severely undermining Israeli security on other fronts, Netanyahu decided to adopt a strategy of starving the people of Gaza instead.
He now threatens a major ground offensive, yet it is hard to see what impact it would have beyond an accelerated mass murder of civilians.
The Israeli prime minister’s mistake was choosing the blocking of all aid into Gaza as the rightwing hill to die on, which has been deeply internalised by his extreme Religious Zionism coalition partners, who now threaten his government’s stability if any aid enters the besieged territory.
Netanyahu in a difficult position
This has put Netanyahu in a very difficult position, as the European Union, UK and US are all fearing the backlash that mass famine will bring and are now pushing Tel Aviv to allow in some aid.
Amidst this, Netanyahu made another commitment to the Druze community that he would intervene on their behalf in Syria.
While Syria’s leadership are signaling their intent to normalise ties and according to a recent report by Yedioth Ahronoth, participated in “direct” negotiations with Israel regarding “security issues”, there is no current threat from Damascus.
However, if tensions escalate in Syria with the Druze minority in the south, failure to fulfill pledges could cause major issues with Israeli Druze, who perform crucial roles in the Israeli military.
Internally, Israel is deeply divided, economically under great pressure and the overall instability could quickly translate to a larger range of issues.
Then we have the Lebanon front, where Hezbollah sits poised to pounce on an opportunity to land a blow in order to expel Israel from their country and avenge the killing of its Secretary General Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah.
Trigger a ‘doomsday option’?
Meanwhile in Gaza, if Israel is going to try and starve everyone to death, this could easily trigger what can only be called the “doomsday option” from Hamas and other groups there. Nobody is about to sit around and watch their people starve to death.
As for Yemen’s Ansarallah, it is clear that there was no way without a massive ground offensive that the movement was going to stop firing missiles and drones at Israel.
What we have here is a situation in which Israel finds itself incapable of defeating any of its enemies, as all of them have now been radicalised due to the mass murder inflicted upon their populations.
In other words, Israel is not capable of victory on any front and needs a way out.
The leader of the opposition to Israel in the region is perceived to be Iran, as it is the most powerful, which is why a conflict with it is so desired. Yet, Tehran is incredibly powerful and the US is incapable of defeating it with conventional weapons, therefore, a full-scale war is the equivalent to committing regional suicide.
Robert Inlakesh is a journalist, writer, and documentary filmmaker. He focuses on the Middle East, specialising in Palestine. He contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle and it is republished with permission.
On April 24, 2025, Indonesia made a masterful geopolitical move. Jakarta granted Fiji US$6 million in financial aid and offered to cooperate with them on military training — a seemingly benign act of diplomacy that conceals a darker purpose.
“There’s no need to be burdened by debt,” declared Fiji Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka during the bilateral meeting at Jakarta’s Merdeka Palace (Rabuka, 2025).
More significantly, he pledged Fiji’s respect for Indonesian sovereignty — diplomatic code for abandoning West Papua’s struggle for self-determination.
This aligns perfectly with Indonesia’s Law No. 2 of 2023, which established frameworks for defence cooperation, including joint research, technology transfer, and military education, between the two nations.
This is not merely a partnership — it is ideological assimilation.
Indonesia’s financial generosity comes with unwritten expectations. By integrating Fijian forces into Indonesian military training programmes, Jakarta aims to export its “anti-separatist” doctrine, which frames Papuan resistance as a “criminal insurgency” rather than legitimate political expression.
The US $6 million is not aid — it’s a strategic investment in regional complicity.
Geopolitical chess in a fractured world
Indonesia’s manoeuvres must be understood in the context of escalating global tensions.
The rivalry between the US and China has transformed the Indo-Pacific into a strategic battleground, leaving Pacific Island nations caught between competing spheres of influence.
Although Jakarta is officially “non-aligned,” it is playing both sides to secure its territorial ambitions.
Its aid to Fiji is one move in a comprehensive regional strategy to diplomatically isolate West Papua.
Flashback to West Papuan leader Benny Wenda (left) meeting Fiji Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka in Suva in February 2023 . . . At the time, Rabuka declared: “We will support them [ULMWP] because they are Melanesians.” Image: Fiji govtBy strengthening economic and military ties with strategically positioned nations, Indonesia is systematically undermining Papuan representation in important forums such as the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF), the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG), and the United Nations.
While the world focuses on superpower competition, Indonesia is quietly strengthening its position on what it considers an internal matter — effectively removing West Papua from international discourse.
The Russian connection: Shadow alliances
Another significant yet less examined relationship is Indonesia’s growing partnership with Russia, particularly in defence technology, intelligence sharing, and energy cooperation
This relationship provides Jakarta with advanced military capabilities and reduces its dependence on Western powers and China.
Russia’s unwavering support for territorial integrity, as evidenced by its position on Crimea and Ukraine, makes it an ideal partner for Indonesia’s West Papua policy.
Moscow’s diplomatic support strengthens Jakarta’s argument that “separatist” movements are internal security issues rather than legitimate independence struggles.
This strategic triangulation — balancing relations with Washington, Beijing, and Moscow– allows Indonesia to pursue regional dominance with minimal international backlash. Each superpower, focused on countering the others’ influence, overlooks Indonesia’s systematic suppression of Papuan self-determination.
Institutionalising silence: Beyond diplomacy
The practical consequence of Indonesia’s multidimensional strategy is the diplomatic isolation of West Papua. Historically positioned to advocate for Melanesian solidarity, Fiji now faces economic incentives to remain silent on Indonesian human rights abuses.
A similar pattern emerges across the Pacific as Jakarta extends these types of arrangements to other regional players.
It is not just about temporary diplomatic alignment; it is about the structural transformation of regional politics.
When Pacific nations integrate their security apparatuses with Indonesia’s, they inevitably adopt Jakarta’s security narratives. Resistance movements are labelled “terrorist threats,” independence advocates are branded “destabilising elements,” and human rights concerns are dismissed as “foreign interference”.
Most alarmingly, military cooperation provides Indonesia with channels to export its counterinsurgency techniques, which are frequently criticised by human rights organisations for their brutality.
Security forces in the Pacific trained in these approaches may eventually use them against their own Papuan advocacy groups.
The price of strategic loyalty
For just US$6 million — a fraction of Indonesia’s defence budget — Jakarta purchases Fiji’s diplomatic loyalty, military alignment, and ideological compliance. This transaction exemplifies how economic incentives increasingly override moral considerations such as human rights, indigenous sovereignty, and decolonisation principles that once defined Pacific regionalism.
Indonesia’s approach represents a sophisticated evolution in its foreign policy. No longer defensive about West Papua, Jakarta is now aggressively consolidating regional support, methodically closing avenues for international intervention, and systematically delegitimising Papuan voices on the global stage.
Will the Pacific remember its soul?
The path ahead for West Papua is becoming increasingly treacherous. Beyond domestic repression, the movement now faces waning international support as economic pragmatism supplants moral principle throughout the Pacific region.
Unless Pacific nations reconnect with their anti-colonial heritage and the values that secured their independence, West Papua’s struggle risks fading into obscurity, overwhelmed by geopolitical calculations and economic incentives.
The question facing the Pacific region is not simply about West Papua, but about regional identity itself. Will Pacific nations remain true to their foundational values of indigenous solidarity and decolonisation? Or will they sacrifice these principles on the altar of transactional diplomacy?
The date April 24, 2025, may one day be remembered not only as the day Indonesia gave Fiji US$6 million but also as the day the Pacific began trading its moral authority for economic expediency, abandoning West Papua to perpetual colonisation in exchange for short-term gains.
The Pacific is at a crossroads — it can either reclaim its voice or resign itself to becoming a theatre where greater powers dictate the fate of indigenous peoples. For West Papua, everything depends on which path is chosen.
Ali Mirin is a West Papuan from the Kimyal tribe of the highlands that share a border with the Star Mountain region of Papua New Guinea. He graduated with a Master of Arts in international relations from Flinders University, Adelaide, Australia.
The Aotearoa Philippines Solidarity national assembly has condemned the National Party-led Coalition government in New Zealand over signing a “deplorable” visiting forces agreement with the Philippine government
“Given the Armed Forces of the Philippines’ appalling human rights record and continuing attacks on activists in the Philippines, it is deplorable for the New Zealand government to even consider forging such an agreement,” the APS said in a statement today.
Activists from Filipino communities and concerned New Zealanders gathered in Auckland yesterday to discuss the current human rights crisis in the Philippines and resolved to organise solidarity actions in Aotearoa New Zealand.
The visiting forces agreement (VFA), signed in Manila last month, allows closer military relations between the two countries, including granting allowing each other’s militaries to enter the country to participate in joint exercises.
“By entering into a VFA with the Philippines, the coalition government is being complicit in crimes against humanity being perpetrated by the AFP and the regime of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. against the Filipino people,” the statement said.
Having such an agreement in place with the Philippine military tarnished New Zealand’s global reputation of respecting human rights and having an independent foreign policy.
“The APS reiterates its call to the New Zealand government to junk the VFA with the Philippines and to end all ties with the Philippine military,” the statement said.
Mid-term general election tomorrow
“Assembly participants also discussed the mid-term general election campaign in the Philippines “and the violence borne out of it”.
“Elections are typically a bloody affair in the country, but the vote set to occur on Monday [May 12] is especially volatile given the high stakes,” the statement said.
“The country’s two dominant political factions, the Marcos and Duterte camps, are vying for control of the country’s political arena and there is no telling how far they would go to obtain power.”
The statement said there were reports of campaigners going missing, being extrajudicially killed and also being detained without due process.
“We expect electoral fraud and violence will again be committed by the biggest political dynasties especially against the progressive candidates representing the most marginalised sectors.
“The Philippine government must do everything it can to avoid further bloodshed and violent skirmishes that aim to preserve power for the competing political dynasties.”
The statement said that the APS called for the immediate and unconditional freedom for Bayan Muna campaigner Pauline Joy Panjawan.
“Her abduction, torture and continuing detention on trumped up charges speak volumes about the reality of the ongoing human rights crisis in the Philippines.
With yesterday’sassembly, the APS renewed its commitment to raise awareness over the human rights crisis in the Philippines and to do everything it could to raise solidarity with the Filipino people struggling to “achieve a truly just and democratic society”.
NERMEEN SHAIKH:We begin today’s show looking at Israel’s ongoing targeting of Palestinian journalists. A recent report by the Costs of War Project at Brown University described the war in Gaza as the “worst ever conflict for reporters” in history.
By one count, Israel has killed 214 Palestinian journalists in Gaza over the past 18 months, including two journalists killed on Wednesday — Yahya Subaih and Nour El-Din Abdo. Yahya Subaih died just hours after his wife gave birth to their first child.
Meanwhile, new details have emerged about the killing of Shireen Abu Akleh, the renowned Palestinian American Al Jazeera journalist who was fatally shot by an Israeli soldier three years ago on 11 May 2022.
She was killed while covering an Israeli army assault on the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank. Shireen and another reporter were against a stone wall, wearing blue helmets and blue flak jackets clearly emblazoned with the word “Press”.
Shireen was shot in the head. She was known throughout the Arab world for her decades of tireless reporting on Palestine.
AMY GOODMAN: Israel initially claimed she had been shot by Palestinian militants, but later acknowledged she was most likely shot by an Israeli soldier. But Israel has never identified the soldier who fired the fatal shot, or allowed the soldier to be questioned by US investigators.
But a new documentary just released by Zeteo has identified and named the Israeli soldier for the first time. This is the trailer to the documentary Who Killed Shireen?
DION NISSENBAUM: That soldier looked down his scope and could see the blue vest and that it said “press.”
ISRAELI SOLDIER: That’s what I think, yes.
SEN. CHRIS VAN HOLLEN: US personnel have never had access to those who are believed to have committed those shootings.
DION NISSENBAUM: No one has been held to account. Justice has not been served.
FATIMA ABDULKARIM: She is the first American Palestinian journalist who has been killed by Israeli forces.
DION NISSENBAUM: I want to know: Who killed Shireen?
CONOR POWELL: Are we going to find the shooter?
DION NISSENBAUM: He’s got a phone call set up with this Israeli soldier that was there that day.
CONOR POWELL: We just have to go over to Israel.
DION NISSENBAUM: Did you ever talk to the guy who fired those shots?
ISRAELI SOLDIER: Of course. I know him personally. The US should have actually come forward and actually pressed the fact that an American citizen was killed intentionally by IDF.
FATIMA ABDULKARIM: The drones are still ongoing, the explosions going off.
CONOR POWELL: Holy [bleep]! We’ve got a name.
DION NISSENBAUM: But here’s the twist.
NERMEEN SHAIKH:The trailer for the new Zeteo documentary Who Killed Shireen? The film identifies the Israeli soldier who allegedly killed Shireen Abu Akleh as Alon Scagio, who would later be killed during an Israeli military operation last June in Jenin, the same city where Shireen was fatally shot.
AMY GOODMAN:We’re joined right now by four guests, including two members of Shireen Abu Akleh’s family: her brother Anton, or Tony, and her niece Lina. They’re both in North Bergen, New Jersey. We’re also joined by Mehdi Hasan, the founder and editor-in-chief of Zeteo, and by Dion Nissenbaum, the executive producer of Who Killed Shireen?, the correspondent on the documentary, longtime Wall Street Journal foreign correspondent based in Jerusalem and other cities, a former foreign correspondent. He was twice nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.
We welcome you all to Democracy Now! Dion, we’re going to begin with you. This is the third anniversary, May 11th exactly, of the death of Shireen Abu Akleh. Talk about your revelation, what you exposed in this documentary.
DION NISSENBAUM: Well, there were two things that were very important for the documentary. The first thing was we wanted to find the soldier who killed Shireen. It had been one of the most closely guarded secrets in Israel. US officials said that if they wanted to determine if there was a crime here, if there was a human rights violation, they needed to talk to this soldier to find out what he was thinking when he shot her.
And we set out to find him. And we did. We did what the US government never did. And it turned out he had been killed, so we were never able to answer that question — what he was thinking.
But the other revelation that I think is as significant in this documentary is that the initial US assessment of her shooting was that that soldier intentionally shot her and that he could tell that she was wearing a blue flak jacket with “Press” across it.
That assessment was essentially overruled by the Biden administration, which came out and said exactly the opposite. That’s a fairly startling revelation, that the Biden administration and the Israeli government essentially were doing everything they could to cover up what happened that day to Shireen Abu Akleh.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Well, let’s go to a clip from the documentary Who Killed Shireen?, in which Dion Nissenbaum, our guest, speaks with former State Department official Andrew Miller. He was Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Israeli-Palestinian Affairs in 2022 when Shireen was killed.
ANDREW MILLER: It’s nearly 100 percent certain that an Israeli soldier, likely a sniper, fired the shot that killed or the shots that killed Shireen Abu Akleh. Based on all the information we have, it is not credible to suggest that there were targets either in front of or behind Shireen Abu Akleh.
The fact that the official Israeli position remains that this was a case of crossfire, the entire episode was a mistake, as opposed to potentially a mistaken identification or the deliberate targeting of this individual, points to, I think, a broader policy of seeking to manage the narrative.
DION NISSENBAUM: And did the Israelis ever make the soldier available to the US to talk about it?
ANDREW MILLER: No. And the Israelis were not willing to present the person for even informal questioning.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: That was State Department official — former State Department official Andrew Miller, speaking in the Zeteo documentary Who Killed Shireen? He was Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Israeli-Palestinian Affairs in 2022 when Shireen was killed.
I want to go to Shireen’s family, whom we have as guests, Anton Abu Akleh and Lina, who are joining us from New Jersey. You both watched the film for the first time last night when it premiered here in New York City. Lina, if you could begin by responding to the revelations in the film?
LINA ABU AKLEH: Hi, Amy. Hi. Thank you for having us.
Honestly, we always welcome and we appreciate journalists who try to uncover the killing of Shireen, but also who shed light on her legacy. And the documentary that was released by Zeteo and by Dion, it really revealed findings that we didn’t know before, but we’ve always known that it was an Israeli soldier who killed Shireen. And we know how the US administration failed our family, failed a US citizen and failed a journalist, really.
And that should be a scandal in and of itself.
But most importantly, for us as a family, it’s not just about one soldier. It’s about the entire chain of command. It’s not just the person who pulled the trigger, but who ordered the killing, and the military commanders, the elected officials.
So, really, it’s the entire chain of command that needs to be held to account for the killing of a journalist who was in a clear press vest, press gear, marked as a journalist.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: And, Anton, if you could respond? Shireen, of course, was your younger sister. What was your response watching the documentary last night?
ANTON ABU AKLEH: It’s very painful to look at all these scenes again, but I really extend my appreciation to Zeteo and all those who supported and worked on this documentary, which was very revealing, many things we didn’t know. The cover-up by the Biden administration, this thing was new to us.
He promised. First statements came out from the White House and from the State Department stressed on the importance of holding those responsible accountable. And apparently, in one of the interviews heard in this documentary, he never raised — President Biden never raised this issue with Bennett, at that time the prime minister.
So, that’s shocking to us to know it was a total cover-up, contradictory to what they promised us. And that’s — like Lina just said, it’s a betrayal, not only to the family, not only to Shireen, but the whole American nation.
AMY GOODMAN: Mehdi Hasan, you’ve backed this documentary. It’s the first big documentary Zeteo is putting out. It’s also the first anniversary of the founding of Zeteo. Can you talk about the proof that you feel is here in the documentary that Alon Scagio, this — and explain who he is and the unit he was a part of? Dion, it’s quite something when you go to his grave. But how you can absolutely be sure this is the man?
MEHDI HASAN:So, Amy, Nermeen, thanks for having us here. I’ve been on this show many times. I just want to say, great to be here on set with both of you. Thank you for what you do.
This is actually our second documentary, but it is our biggest so far, because the revelations in this film that Dion and the team put out are huge in many ways — identifying the soldier, as you mentioned, Alon Scagio, identifying the Biden cover-up, which we just heard Tony Abu Akleh point out. People didn’t realise just how big that cover-up was.
Remember, Joe Biden was the man who said, “If you harm an American, we will respond.” And what is very clear in the case of Shireen Abu Akleh, an American citizen who spent a lot of her life in New Jersey, they did not respond.
In terms of the soldier itself, when Dion came to me and said, “We want to make this film. It’ll be almost like a true crime documentary. We’re going to go out and find out who did it” — because we all — everyone followed the story. You guys covered it in 2022. It was a huge story in the world.
But three years later, to not even know the name of the shooter — and I was, “Well, will we be able to find this out? It’s one of Israel’s most closely guarded secrets.” And yet, Dion and his team were able to do the reporting that got inside of Duvdevan, this elite special forces unit in Israel.
It literally means “the cherry on top.” That’s how proud they are of their eliteness. And yet, no matter how elite you are, Israel’s way of fighting wars means you kill innocent people.
And what comes out in the film from interviews, not just with a soldier, an Israeli soldier, who speaks in the film and talks about how, “Hey, if you see a camera, you take the shot,” but also speaking to Chris Van Hollen, United States Senator from Maryland, who’s been one of the few Democratic voices critical of Biden in the Senate, who says there’s been no change in Israel’s rules of engagement over the years.
And therefore, it was so important on multiple levels to do this film, to identify the shooter, because, of course, as you pointed out in your news headlines, Amy, they just killed a hundred Palestinians yesterday.
So this is not some old story from history where this happened in 2022 and we’re going back. Everything that happened since, you could argue, flows from that — the Americans who have been killed, the journalists who have been killed in Gaza, Palestinians, the sense of impunity that Israel has and Israel’s soldiers have.
There are reports that Israeli soldiers are saying to Palestinians, “Hey, Trump has our back. Hey, the US government has our back.” And it wasn’t just Trump. It was Joe Biden, too.
And that was why it was so important to make this film, to identify the shooter, to call out Israel’s practices when it comes to journalists, and to call out the US role.
AMY GOODMAN: I just want to go to Dion, for people who aren’t familiar with the progression of what the Biden administration said, the serious cover-up not only by Israel, but of its main military weapons supplier and supporter of its war on Gaza, and that is Joe Biden, from the beginning.
First Israel said it was a Palestinian militant. At that point, what did President Biden say?
DION NISSENBAUM: So, at the very beginning, they said that they wanted the shooter to be prosecuted. They used that word at the State Department and said, “This person who killed an American journalist should be prosecuted.” But when it started to become clear that it was probably an Israeli soldier, their tone shifted, and it became talking about vague calls for accountability or changes to the rules of engagement, which never actually happened.
So, you got to a point where the Israeli government admitted it was likely them, the US government called for them to change the rules of engagement, and the Israeli government said no. And we have this interview in the film with Senator Chris Van Hollen, who says that, essentially, Israel was giving the middle finger to the US government on this.
And we have seen, since that time, more Americans being killed in the West Bank, dozens and dozens and dozens of journalists being killed, with no accountability. And we would like to see that change.
This is a trajectory that you’re seeing. You know, the blue vest no longer provides any protection for journalists in Israel. The Israeli military itself has said that wearing a blue vest with “Press” on it does not necessarily mean that you are a journalist.
They are saying that terrorists wear blue vests, too. So, if you are a journalist operating in the West Bank now, you have to assume that the Israeli military could target you.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Well, let’s go to another clip from the film Who Killed Shireen?, which features Ali Samoudi, Shireen Abu Akleh’s producer, who was with Shireen when she was killed, and was himself shot and injured. In the clip, he speaks to the journalist Fatima AbdulKarim.
FATIMA ABDULKARIM: We are set up here now, even though we were supposed to meet at the location where you got injured and Shireen got killed.
ALI SAMOUDI: [translated] We are five minutes from the location in Maidan al-Awdah. But you could lose your soul in the five minutes it would take us to reach it. You could be hit by army bullets. They could arrest you.
So it is essentially impossible to get there. I believe the big disaster which prevented the occupation from being punished and repeating these crimes is the neglect and indifference by many of the institutions, especially American ones, which continue to defend the occupation.
FATIMA ABDULKARIM: [translated] We’re now approaching the third anniversary of Shireen’s death. How did that affect you?
ALI SAMOUDI: [translated] During that period, the occupation was making preparations for a dangerous scenario in the Jenin refugee camp. And for this reason, they didn’t want witnesses.
They opened fire on us in order to terroriSe us enough that we wouldn’t go back to the camp. And in that sense, they partially succeeded.
Since then, we have been overcome by fear. From the moment Shireen was killed, I said and continue to say and will continue to say that this bullet was meant to prevent the Palestinian media from the documentation and exposure of the occupation’s crimes.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: That was Ali Samoudi, Shireen Abu Akleh’s producer, who was with Shireen when she was killed, and was himself shot and injured.
We should note, Ali Samoudi was just detained by Israeli forces in late April. The Palestinian journalist Mariam Barghouti recently wrote, “Ali Samoudi was beaten so bad by Israeli soldiers he was immediately hospitalised. This man has been one of the few journalists that continues reporting on Israeli military abuses north of the West Bank despite the continued risk on his life,” Mariam Barghouti wrote.
The Committee to Protect Journalists spoke to the journalist’s son, Mohammed Al Samoudi, who told CPJ, quote, “My father suffers from several illnesses, including diabetes, high blood pressure, and a stomach ulcer . . . He needs a diabetes injection every two days and a specific diet. It appears he was subjected to assault and medical neglect at the interrogation center . . .
“Our lawyer told us he was transferred to an Israeli hospital after a major setback in his health. We don’t know where he is being held, interrogated, or even the hospital to which he was taken. My father has been forcibly disappeared,” he said.
So, Dion Nissenbaum, if you could give us the latest? You spoke to Ali Samoudi for the documentary, and now he’s been detained.
DION NISSENBAUM: Yeah. His words were prophetic, right? He talks about this was an attempt to silence journalists. And my colleague Fatima says the same thing, that these are ongoing, progressive efforts to silence Palestinian journalists.
And we don’t know where Ali is. He has not actually been charged with anything yet. He is one of the most respected journalists in the West Bank. And we are just seeing this progression going on.
AMY GOODMAN: So, the latest we know is he was supposed to have a hearing, and that hearing has now been delayed to May 13th, Ali Samoudi?
DION NISSENBAUM: That’s right. And he has yet to be charged, so . . .
AMY GOODMAN:I want to go back to Lina Abu Akleh, who’s in New Jersey, where Shireen grew up. Lina, you were listed on Time magazine’s 100 emerging leaders for publicly demanding scrutiny of Israel’s treatment of Palestinians, the horror.
And again, our condolences on the death of your aunt, on the killing of your aunt, and also to Anton, Shireen’s brother. Lina, you’ve also, of course, spoken to Ali Samoudi. This continues now. He’s in detention — his son says, “just disappeared”.
What are you demanding right now? We have a new administration. We’ve moved from the Biden administration to the Trump administration. And are you in touch with them? Are they speaking to you?
LINA ABU AKLEH: Well, our demands haven’t changed. From day one, we’re calling for the US administration to complete its investigation, or for the FBI to continue its investigation, and to finally release — to finally hold someone to account.
And we have enough evidence that could have been — that the administration could have used to expedite this case. But, unfortunately, this new administration, as well, no one has spoken to us. We haven’t been in touch with anyone, and it’s just been radio silence since.
For us, as I said, our demands have never changed. It’s been always to hold the entire system to account, the entire chain of command, the military, for the killing of an American citizen, a journalist, a Palestinian, Palestinian American journalist.
As we’ve been talking, targeting journalists isn’t happening just by shooting at them or killing them. There’s so many different forms of targeting journalists, especially in Gaza and the West Bank and Jerusalem.
So, for us, it’s really important as a family that we don’t see other families experience what we are going through, for this — for impunity, for Israel’s impunity, to end, because, at the end of the day, accountability is the only way to put an end to this impunity.
AMY GOODMAN: I am horrified to ask this question to Shireen’s family members, to Lina, to Tony, Shireen’s brother, but the revelation in the film — we were all there last night at its premiere in New York — that the Israeli soldiers are using a photograph of Shireen’s face for target practice. Tony Abu Akleh, if you could respond?
ANTON ABU AKLEH: You know, there is no words to describe our sorrow and pain hearing this. But, you know, I would just want to know why. Why would they do this thing? What did Shireen do to them for them to use her as a target practice? You know, this is absolutely barbaric act, unjustified. Unjustified.
And we really hope that this US administration will be able to put an end to all this impunity they are enjoying. If they didn’t enjoy all this impunity, they wouldn’t have been doing this. Practising on a journalist? Why? You know, you can practice on anything, but on a journalist?
This shows that this targeting of more journalists, whether in Gaza, in Palestine, it’s systematic. It’s been planned for. And they’ve been targeting and shutting off those voices, those reports, from reaching anywhere in the world.
NERMEEN SHAIKH:And, Anton, if you could say — you know, you mentioned last night, as well, Shireen was, in fact, extremely cautious as a journalist. If you could elaborate on that? What precisely —
ANTON ABU AKLEH: Absolutely. Absolutely. Shireen was very careful. Every time she’s in the field, she would take her time to put on the gear, the required helmet, the vest with “press” written on it, before going there. She also tried to identify herself as a journalist, whether to the Israelis or to the Palestinians, so she’s not attacked.
And she always went by the book, followed the rules, how to act, how to be careful, how to speak to those people involved, so she can protect herself. But, unfortunately, he was — this soldier, as stated in the documentary, targeted Shireen just because she’s Shireen and she’s a journalist. That’s it. There is no other explanation.
Sixteen bullets were fired on Shireen. Not even her helmet, nor the vest she was wearing, were able to protect her, unfortunately.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Mehdi Hasan, you wanted to respond.
MEHDI HASAN: So, Tony asks, “Why? Why would you do this? Why would you target not just a journalist in the field, but then use her face for target practice?” — as Dion and his team reveal in the film. And there is, unfortunately, a very simple answer to that question, which is that the Israeli military — and not just the Israeli military, but many people in our world today — have dehumanised Palestinians.
There is the removal of humanity from the people you are oppressing, occupying, subjugating and killing. It doesn’t matter if you’re an American citizen. It doesn’t matter if you have a press jacket on. It only matters that you are Palestinian in the sniper’s sights.
And that is how they have managed to pull of the killing of so many journalists, so many children. The first documentary we commissioned last year was called Israel’s Real Extremism, and it was about the Israeli soldiers who go into Gaza and make TikTok videos wearing Palestinian women’s underwear, playing with Palestinian children’s toys. It is the ultimate form of dehumanisation, the idea that these people don’t count, their lives have no value.
And what’s so tragic and shocking — and the film exposes this — is that Joe Biden — forget the Israeli military — Joe Biden also joined in that dehumanisation. Do you remember at the start of this conflict when he comes out and he says, “Well, I’m not sure I believe the Palestinian death toll numbers,” when he puts out a statement at the hundred days after October 7th and doesn’t mention Palestinian casualties.
And that has been the fundamental problem. This was the great comforter-in-chief. Joe Biden was supposed to be the empath. And yet, as Tony points out, what was so shocking in the film is he didn’t even raise Shireen’s case with Naftali Bennett, the prime minister of Israel at the time.
Again, would he have done that if it was an American journalist in Moscow? We know that’s not the case. We know when American journalists, especially white American journalists, are taken elsewhere in the world, the government gives a damn. And yet, in the case of Shireen, the only explanation is because she was a Palestinian American journalist.
AMY GOODMAN:You know, in the United States, the US government is responsible for American citizens, which Biden pointed out at the beginning, when he thought it was a Palestinian militant who had killed her. But, Lina, you yourself are a journalist. And I’m thinking I want to hear your response to using her face, because, of course, that is not just the face of Shireen, but I think it’s the face of journalism.
And it’s not just American journalism, of course. I mean, in fact, she’s known to hundreds of millions of people around world as the face and voice of Al Jazeera Arabic. She spoke in Arabic. She was known as that to the rest of the world. But to see that and that revealed in this documentary?
LINA ABU AKLEH: Yeah, it was horrifying, actually. And it just goes on to show how the Israeli military is built. It’s barbarism. It’s the character of revenge, of hate. And that is part of the entire system. And as Mehdi and as my father just mentioned, this is all about dehumanizing Palestinians, regardless if they’re journalists, if they’re doctors, they’re officials. For them, they simply don’t care about Palestinian lives.
And for us, Shireen will always be the voice of Palestine. And she continues to be remembered for the legacy that she left behind. And she continues to live through so many, so many journalists, who have picked up the microphone, who have picked up the camera, just because of Shireen.
So, regardless of how the Israeli military continues to dehumanise journalists and how the US fails to protect Palestinian American journalists, we will continue to push forward to continue to highlight the life and the legacy that Shireen left behind.
NERMEEN SHAIKH:Well, let’s turn to Shireen Abu Akleh in her own words. This is an excerpt from the Al Jazeera English documentary The Killing of Shireen Abu Akleh.
SHIREEN ABU AKLEH: [translated] Sometimes the Israeli army doesn’t want you there, so they target you, even if they later say it was an accident. They might say, “We saw some young men around you.” So they target you on purpose, as a way of scaring you off because they don’t want you there.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: So, that was Shireen in her own words in an Al Jazeera documentary. So, Lina, I know you have to go soon, but if you could just tell us: What do you want people to know about Shireen, as an aunt, a sister and a journalist?
LINA ABU AKLEH: Yes, so, we know Shireen as the journalist, but behind the camera, she was one of the most empathetic people. She was very sincere. And something not a lot of people know, but she was a very funny person. She had a very unique sense of humor, that she lit up every room she entered. She cared about everyone and anyone. She enjoyed life.
Shireen, at the end of the day, loved life. She had plans. She had dreams that she still wanted to achieve. But her life was cut short by that small bullet, which would change our lives entirely.
But at the end of the day, Shireen was a professional journalist who always advocated for truth, for justice. And at the end of the day, all she wanted to do was humanise Palestinians and talk about the struggles of living under occupation. But at the same time, she wanted to celebrate their achievements.
She shed light on all the happy moments, all the accomplishments of the Palestinian people. And this is something that really touched millions of Palestinians, of Arabs around the world. She was able to enter the hearts of the people through the small camera lens. And until this day, she continues to be remembered for that.
AMY GOODMAN: Before we go, we’re going to keep you on, Mehdi, to talk about other issues during the Trump administration, but how can people access Who Killed Shireen?
MEHDI HASAN: So, it’s available online at WhoKilledShireen.com, is where you can go to watch it. We are releasing the film right now only to paid subscribers. We hope to change that in the forthcoming days.
People often say to me, “How can you put it behind a paywall?” Journalism — a free press isn’t free, sadly. We have to fund films like this. Dion came to us because a lot of other people didn’t want to fund a topic like this, didn’t want to fund an investigation like this.
So, we’re proud to be able to fund such documentaries, but we also need support from our contributors, our subscribers and the viewers. But it’s an important film, and I hope as many people will watch it as possible, WhoKilledShireen.com.
AMY GOODMAN:We want to thank Lina, the niece of Shireen Abu Akleh, and Anton, Tony, the older brother of Shireen Abu Akleh, for joining us from New Jersey. Together, we saw the documentary last night, Who Killed Shireen? And we want to thank Dion Nissenbaum, who is the filmmaker, the correspondent on this film, formerly a correspondent with The Wall Street Journal. The founder of Zeteo, on this first anniversary of Zeteo, is Mehdi Hasan.
IMO, this sounds like an expression of sorrow and regret about the conflict, and about the evils it is feeding and fostering. Regardless, the institute has described that comment by Davis as antisemitic.
“‘You cannot claim to champion social cohesion while minimising or rationalising antisemitic hate,’ the institute said. ‘Social trust depends on moral consistency, especially from those in leadership. Peter Davis’s actions erode that trust.’”
For the record, Davis wasn’t rationalising or minimising antisemitic hate. His comments look far more like a legitimate observation that the longer the need for a political-diplomatic solution is violently resisted, the worse things will be for everyone — including Jewish citizens, via the stoking of antisemitism.
The basic point at issue here is that criticisms of the actions of the Israeli government do not equate to a racist hostility to the Jewish people. (Similarly, the criticisms of Donald Trump’s actions cannot be minimised or rationalised as due to anti-Americanism.)
Appalled by Netanyahu actions
Many Jewish people in fact, also feel appalled by the actions of the Netanyahu government, which repeatedly violate international law.
In the light of the extreme acts of violence being inflicted daily by the IDF on the people of Gaza, the upsurge in hateful graffiti by neo-Nazi opportunists while still being vile, is hardly surprising.
Around the world, the security of innocent Israeli citizens is being recklessly endangered by the ultra-violent actions of their own government.
If you want to protect your citizens from an existing fire, it’s best not to toss gasoline on the flames.
To repeat: the vast majority of the current criticisms of the Israeli state have nothing whatsoever to do with antisemitism. At a time when Israel is killing scores of innocent Palestinians on a nightly basis with systematic air strikes and the shelling of civilian neighbourhoods, when it is weaponising access to humanitarian aid as an apparent tool of ethnic cleansing, when it is executing medical staff and assassinating journalists, when it is killing thousands of children and starving the survivors . . . antisemitism is not the reason why most people oppose these evils. Common humanity demands it.
Ironically, the press release by the NZ Israel Institute concludes with these words: “There must be zero tolerance for hate in any form.” Too bad the institute seems to have such a limited capacity for self-reflection.
Footnote One: For the best part of 80 years, the world has felt sympathy to Jews in recognition of the Holocaust. The genocide now being committed in Gaza by the Netanyahu government cannot help but reduce public support for Israel.
It also cannot help but erode the status of the Holocaust as a unique expression of human evil.
One would have hoped the NZ Israel Institute might acknowledge the self-defeating nature of the Netanyahu government policies — if only because, on a daily basis, the state of Israel is abetting its enemies, and alienating its friends.
Footnote Two: As yet, the so-called Free Speech Union has not come out to support the free speech rights of Peter Davis, and to rebuke the NZ Israel Institute for trying to muzzle them.
This is a section of Gordon Campbell’s Scoop column published yesterday under the subheading “Pot Calls Out Kettle”; the main portion of the column about the new Pope is here. Republished by Asia Pacific Report with permission.
This article was initially set out to focus onThe Encampments, Kei Pritsker and Michael T Workman’s impassioned documentary that chronicles the Columbia University student movement that shook the United States and captured imaginations the world over.
But then it came to my attention that a sparring film has been released around the same time, offering a staunchly pro-Israeli counter-narrative that vehemently attempts to discredit the account offered by The Encampments.
October 8 charts the alleged rise of antisemitism in the US in the wake of the October 7 attacks on southern Israel by Hamas-led Palestinian fighters.
A balanced record though, it is not. Wendy Sachs’s solo debut feature, which has the subhead, “The Fight for the Soul of America”, is essentially an unabashed defence of the silencing of pro-Palestinian voices.
Its omissions are predictable; its moral logic is fascinatingly disturbing; its manipulative arguments are the stuff of Steven Bannon.
It’s easily the most abhorrent piece of mainstream Israeli propaganda this writer has come across .
Ignoring October 8 would be injudicious, however. Selected only by a number of Jewish film festivals in the US, the film was released in mid-March by indie distribution outfit Briarcliff Entertainment in more than 125 theatres.
The film has amassed more than $1.3 million so far at the US box office, making it the second-highest grossing documentary of the year, ironically behind the self-distributed and Oscar-winning No Other Land about Palestine at $2.4 million.
October 8 has sold more than 90,000 tickets, an impressive achievement given the fact that at least 73 percent of the 7.5 million Jewish Americans still hold a favourable view of Israel.
“It would be great if we were getting a lot of crossover, but I don’t know that we are,” Sachs admitted to the Hollywood Reporter.
Zionist films have been largely absent from most local and international film festivals — curation, after all, is an ethical occupation — while Palestinian stories, by contrast, have seen an enormous rise in popularity since October 7.
The phenomenon culminated with the Oscar win for No Other Land.
October 8 . . . “easily the most abhorrent piece of mainstream Israeli propaganda this writer has come across.” Image: Briarcliff Entertainment
But the release of October 8 and the selection of several Israeli hostage dramas in February’s Berlin Film Festival indicates that the war has officially reached the big screen.
With the aforementioned hostage dramas due to be shown stateside later this year, and no less than four major Palestinian pictures set for theatrical release over the next 12 months, this Israeli-Palestinian film feud is just getting started.
Working for change The Encampments, which raked in a highly impressive $423,000 in 50 theatres after a month of release, has been garnering more headlines, not only due to the fact that the recently detained Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil happens to be one of its protagonists, but because it is clearly the better film.
Pritsker and Workman, who were on the ground with the students for most of the six-week duration of the set-in, provide a keenly observed, intimate view of the action, capturing the inspiring highs and dispiriting lows of the passionate demonstrations and wayward negotiations with Columbia’s administrations.
The narrative is anchored from the point of views of four students: Grant Miner, a Jewish PhD student who was expelled in March for his involvement in the protests; Sueda Polat, a protest negotiator and spokesperson for the encampments; Naye Idriss, a Palestinian organiser and Columbia alumni; and the soft-spoken Khalil, the Palestinian student elected to lead the negotiations.
A desire for justice, for holding Israel accountable for its crimes in Gaza, permeated the group’s calling for divesting Columbia’s $13.6 billion endowment funds from weapons manufacturers and tech companies with business links to the Netanyahu’s administration.
Each of the four shares similar background stories, but Miner and Khalil stand out. As a Jew, Miner is an example of a young Jewish American generation that regard their Jewishness as a moral imperative for defending the Palestinian cause.
Khalil, meanwhile, carries the familiar burden of being a child of the camps: a descendant of a family that was forcibly displaced from their Tiberias home in 1948.
The personal histories provide ample opportunities for reflections around questions of identity, trauma, and the youthful desire for tangible change.
Each protester stresses that the encampment was a last and only resort after the Columbia hierarchy casually brushed aside their concerns.
These concerns transformed into demands when it became clear that only more strident action like sit-ins could push the Columbia administration to engage with them.
In an age when most people are content to sit idly behind their computers waiting for something to happen, these students took it upon themselves to actively work for change in a country where change, especially in the face of powerful lobbies, is arduous.
Only through protests, the viewers begin to realise, can these four lucidly deal with the senseless, numbing bloodshed and brutality in Gaza.
Crackdown on free speech Through skilled placement of archival footage, Pritsker and Workman aptly link the encampments with other student movements in Columbia, including the earlier occupation of Hamilton Hall in 1968 that demonstrated the university’s historic ties with bodies that supported America’s involvement in the Vietnam War.
Both anti-war movements were countered by an identical measure: the university’s summoning of the New York City Police Department (NYPD) to violently dismantle the protests.
Neither the Columbia administration, represented by the disgraced ex-president Minouche Shafik, nor the NYPD are portrayed in a flattering fashion.
Shafik comes off as a wishy-washy figure, too protective of her position to take a concrete stance for or against the pro-Palestinian protesters.
The NYPD were a regular fixture outside universities in New York during the encampments during 2024 Image: MEE/Azad Essa
The NYPD’s employment of violence against the peaceful protests that they declared to have “devolved into antisemitic and anti-Israel rhetoric” is an admission that violence against words can be justified, undermining the First Amendment of the US constitution, which protects free speech.
The Encampments is not without flaws. By strictly adhering to the testimonials of its subjects, Pritsker and Workman leave out several imperative details.
These include the identity of the companies behind endowment allocations, the fact that several Congress senators who most prominently criticised the encampments “received over $100,000 more on average from pro-Israel donors during their last election” according to a Guardianfinding, and the revelations that US police forces have received analysis of the Israel-Palestine conflict directly from the Israeli army and Israeli think tanks.
The suggested link between the 1968 protests and the present situation is not entirely accurate either.
The endowments industry was nowhere as big as it is now, and there’s an argument to be made about the deprioritisation of education by universities vis-a-vis their endowments.
A bias towards Israel or a determination to assert the management’s authority is not the real motive behind their position — it’s the money.
Lastly, avoiding October 7 and the moral and political issues ingrained within the attack, while refraining from confronting the pro-Israel voices that accused the protesters of aggression and antisemitism, is a major blind spot that allows conservatives and pro-Israel pundits to accuse the filmmakers of bias.
One could be asking too much from a film directed by first-time filmmakers that was rushed into theatres to enhance awareness about Mahmoud Khalil’s political persecution, but The Encampments, which was co-produced by rapper Macklemore, remains an important, urgent, and honest document of an event that has been repeatedly tarnished by the media and self-serving politicians.
The politics of victimhood The imperfections of The Encampments are partially derived from lack of experience on its creators’ part.
Any accusations of malice are unfounded, especially since the directors do not waste time in arguing against Zionism or paint its subjects as victims. The same cannot be said of October 8.
Executive produced by actress Debra Messing of Will & Grace fame, who also appears in the film, October 8 adopts a shabby, scattershot structure vastly comprised of interviews with nearly every high-profile pro-Israel person in America.
The talking heads are interjected with dubious graphs and craftily edited footage culled from social media of alleged pro-Palestinian protesters in college campuses verbally attacking Jewish students and allegedly advocating the ideology of Hamas.
Needless to say, no context is given to these videos whose dates and locations are never identified.
The chief aim of October 8 is to retrieve the victimisation card by using the same language that informed the pro-Palestine discourse
Every imaginable falsification and shaky allegation regarding the righteousness of Zionism is paraded: anti-Zionism is the new form of antisemitism; pro-Palestinian protesters harassed pro-Israel Jewish students; the media is flooded with pro-Palestinian bias.
Other tropes include the claim that Hamas is conspiring to destabilise American democracy and unleash hell on the Western world.
Mosab Hassan Yousef, the son of a Hamas co-founder who defected to Israel in 1997, stresses that “my definition of Intifada is chaos”.
There is also the suggestion that the protests, if not contained, could spiral into Nazi era-like fascism.
Sachs goes as far as showing historical footage of the Third Reich to demonstrate her point.
The chief aim of October 8 is to retrieve Israel’s victimhood by using the same language that informs pro-Palestine discourse. “Gaza hijacked all underdog stories in the world,” one interviewee laments.
At one point, the attacks of October 7 are described as a “genocide”, while Zionism is referred to as a “civil rights movement”.
One interviewee explains that the framing of the Gaza war as David and Goliath is erroneous when considering that Hamas is backed by almighty Iran and that Israel is surrounded by numerous hostile countries, such as Lebanon and Syria.
In the most fanciful segment of the film, the interviewees claim that the Students for Justice in Palestine is affiliated and under the command of Hamas, while haphazardly linking random terrorist attacks, such as 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting to Hamas and by extension the Palestinian cause.
A simmering racist charge delineate the film’s pro-Israel discourse in its instance on pigeonholing all Palestinians as radical Muslim Hamas supporters.
There isn’t a single mention of the occupied West Bank or Palestinian religious minorities or even anti-Hamas sentiment in Gaza.
Depicting all Palestinians as a rigid monolith profoundly contrasts Pritsker and Workman’s nuanced treatment of their Jewish subjects.
The best means to counter films like October 8 is facts and good journalism
There’s a difference between subtraction and omission: the former affects logical form, while the latter affects logical content.
October 8 is built on a series of deliberate omissions and fear mongering, an unscrupulous if familiar tactic that betrays the subjects’ indignation and their weak conviction.
It is thus not surprising that there is no mention of the Nakba or the fact that the so-called “civil rights movement” is linked to a state founded on looted lands or the grand open prison Israel has turned Gaza into, or the endless humiliation of Palestinians in the West Bank.
There is also no mention of the racist and inciting statements by far-right ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich.
Nor is there mention of the Palestinians who have been abducted and tortured and raped in Israeli prisons.
And definitely not of the more than 52,000 Palestinians killed in Gaza to date.
Sachs’ subjects naturally are too enveloped in their own conspiracies, in the tightly knotted narrative they concocted for themselves, to be aware of their privilege.
The problem is, these subjects want to have their cake and eat it. Throughout, they constantly complain of being silenced; that most institutions, be it the media or college hierarchies or human rights organisations, have not recognised the colossal loss of 7 October 7 and have focused instead on Palestinian suffering.
They theorise that the refusal of the authorities in taking firm and direct action against pro-Palestinian voices has fostered antisemitism.
At the same time, they have no qualms in flaunting their contribution to New York Times op-eds or the testimonies they were invited to present at the Congress.
All the while, Khalil and other Palestinian activists are arrested, deported and stripped of their residencies.
The value of good journalism October 8, which portrays the IDF as a brave, truth-seeking institution, is not merely a pro-Israel propaganda, it’s a far-right propaganda.
The subjects adopt Trump rhetoric in similarly blaming the diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies for the rise of antisemitism, while dismissing intersectionality and anti-colonialism for giving legitimacy to the Palestinian cause.
As repugnant as October 8 is, it is crucial to engage with work of its ilk and confront its hyperboles.
Last month, the Hollywood Reporter set up an unanticipated discussion between Pritsker, who is in fact Jewish, and pro-Israel influencer Hen Mazzig.
The heated exchange that followed demonstrated the difficulty of communication with the pro-Israeli lobby, yet nonetheless underlines the necessity of communication, at least in film.
Mazzig spends the larger part of the discussion spewing unfounded accusations that he provides no validations for: “Mahmoud Khalil has links to Hamas,” he says at one point.
When asked about the Palestinian prisoners, he confidently attests that “the 10,000 Palestinian prisoners” — hostages, as Pritsker calls them — they have committed crimes and are held in Israeli prisons, right?
“In fact, in the latest hostage release eight Palestinian prisoners refused to go back to Gaza because they’ve enjoyed their treatment in these prisons.”
Mazzig dismisses pro-Palestinian groups like Jewish Voice for Peace and the pro-Palestinian Jewish students who participated in the encampments.
“No one would make this argument but here we are able to tokenise a minority, a fringe community, and weaponise it against us,” he says.
“It’s not because they care about Jews and want Jews to be represented. It’s that they hate us so much that they’re doing this and gaslighting us.”
At this stage, attempting for the umpteenth time to stress that anti-Zionism and antisemitism are not one and the same — a reality that the far-right rejects — is frankly pointless.
Attempting, like Khalil, to continually emphasise our unequivocal rejection of antisemitism, to underscore that our Jewish colleagues and friends are partners in our struggle for equality and justice, is frankly demeaning.
For Mazzig and Messing and the October 8 subjects, every Arab, every pro-Palestinian, is automatically an antisemite until proven otherwise.
The best means to counter films like October 8 is facts and good journalism.
Emotionality has no place in this increasingly hostile landscape. The reason why The Bibi Files and Louis Theroux’s The Settlers work so well is due to their flawless journalism.
People may believe what they want to believe, but for the undecided and the uninformed, factuality and journalistic integrity — values that go over Sachs’ head — could prove to be the most potent weapon of all.
Joseph Fahim is an Egyptian film critic and programmer. He is the Arab delegate of the Karlovy Vary Film Festival, a former member of Berlin Critics’ Week and the ex director of programming of the Cairo International Film Festival. This article was first published by Middle East Eye.
Auckland film maker Paula Whetu Jones has spent nearly two decades working pro bono on a feature film about the Auckland cardiac surgeon Alan Kerr, which is finally now in cinemas.
She is best known for co-writing and directing Whina, the feature film about Dame Whina Cooper.
She filmed Dr Kerr and his wife Hazel in 2007, when he led a Kiwi team to Gaza and the West Bank to operate on children with heart disease.
What started as a two-week visit became a 20 year commitment, involving 40 medical missions to Gaza and the West Bank and hundreds of operations.
Paula Whetu Jones self-funded six trips to document the work and the result is the feature film The Doctor’s Wife, now being screened free in communities around the country.
I met Alan and Hazel Kerr in 2006 and became inspired by their selflessness and dedication. I wanted to learn more about them and shine a light on their achievements.
I’ve been trying to highlight social issues through documentary film making for 25 years. I have always struggled to obtain funding and this project was no different. We provided most of the funding but it wouldn’t have been possible to complete it without the generosity of a small number of donors.
Others gave of their time and expertise.
Film maker Paula Whetu Jones . . . “Our documentary shows the humanity of everyday Palestinians, pre 2022, as told through the eyes of a retired NZ heart surgeon, his wife and two committed female film makers.” Image: NZ On Film
Our initial intention was to follow Dr Alan in his work in the West Bank and Gaza but we also developed a very special relationship with Hazel.
While Dr Alan was operating, Hazel took herself all over the West Bank and Gaza, volunteering to help in refugee camps, schools and community centres. We tagged along and realised that Dr Alan and his work was the heart of the film but Hazel was the soul. Hence, the title became The Doctor’s Wife.
I was due to return to Palestine in 2010 when on the eve of my departure I was struck down by a rare auto immune condition which left me paralysed. It wasn’t until 2012 that I was able to return to Palestine.
Wheelchair made things hard
However, being in a wheelchair made everything near on impossible, not to mention my mental state which was not conducive to being creative. In 2013, tragedy struck again when my 22-year-old son died, and I shut down for a year.
Again, the project seemed so far away, destined for the shelf. Which is where it sat for the next few years while I tried to figure out how to live in a wheelchair and support myself and my daughter.
The project was re-energised when I made two arts documentaries in Palestine, making sure we filmed Alan while we were there and connecting with a NZ trauma nurse who was also filming.
By 2022, we knew we needed to complete the doco. We started sorting through many years of footage in different formats, getting the interviews transcribed and edited. The last big push was in 2023. We raised funds and got a few people to help with the logistics.
I spent six months with three editors and then we used the rough cut to do one last fundraiser that helped us over the line, finally finishing it in March of 2025.
Our documentary shows the humanity of everyday Palestinians, pre-2022, as told through the eyes of a retired NZ heart surgeon, his wife and two committed female film makers who were told in 2006 that no one cares about old people, sick Palestinian children or Palestine.
They were wrong. We cared and maybe you do, too.
What is happening in 2025 means it’s even more important now for people to see the ordinary people of Palestine
Dr Alan and his wife, Hazel are now 90 and 85 years old respectively. They are the most wonderfully humble humans. Their work over 20 years is nothing short of inspiring.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
The New Zealand Māori Council and Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa made a high profile appeal to Foreign Minister Winston Peters over Gaza today, calling for urgent action over humanitarian supplies for the besieged Palestinian enclave.
“Starving a civilian population is a clear breach of international humanitarian law and a war crime under the Rome Statute to the International Criminal Court,” said the open letter published by the two organisations as full page advertisements in three leading daily newspapers.
Noting that New Zealand has not joined the International Court of Justice for standing up to “condemn the use of starvation as a weapon of war”, the groups still called on the government to use its “internationally respected voice” to express solidarity for humanitarian aid.
The plea comes amid Israel’s increased attacks on Gaza which have killed at least 61 people since dawn, targeting civilians in crowded places and a Gaza City market.
The more than two-month blockade by the the enclave by Israel has caused acute food shortages, accelerating the starvation of the Palestinian population.
Israel has blocked all aid into Gaza — food, water, fuel and medical supplies — while more than 3000 trucks laden with supplies are stranded on the Egyptian border blocked from entry into Gaza.
At least 57 Palestinians have starved to death in Gaza as a result of Israel’s punishing blockade. The overall death toll, revised in view of bodies buried under the rubble, stands at 62,614 Palestinians and 1139 people killed in Israel.
The open letter, publlshed by three Stuff-owned titles — Waikato Times in Hamilton, The Post in the capital Wellington, and The Press in Christchurch, said:
Rt Hon Winston Peters Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston.Peters@parliament.govt.nz
Open letter requesting government action on the future of Gaza
Kia ora Mr Peters,
The situation in Occupied Gaza has reached another crisis point.
We urge our country to speak out and join other nations demanding humanitarian supplies into Gaza.
For more than two months, Israel has blocked all aid into Gaza — food, water, fuel and medical supplies. The World Food Programme says food stocks in Gaza are fully depleted. UNICEF says children face “growing risk of starvation, illness and death”. The International Committee of the Red Cross says “the humanitarian response in Gaza is on the verge of total collapse”.
Meanwhile, 3000 trucks laden with desperately needed aid are lined up at the Occupied Gaza border. Israeli occupation forces are refusing to allow them in.
Starving a civilian population is a clear breach of International Humanitarian Law and a War Crime under the Rome Statute to the International Criminal Court.
At the International Court of Justice many countries have stood up to condemn the use of starvation as a weapon of war and to demand accountability for Israel to end its industrial-scale killing of Palestinians in Gaza.
New Zealand has not joined that group. Our government has been silent to date.
After 18 months facing what the International Court of Justice has described as a “plausible genocide”, it is grievous that New Zealand does not speak out and act clearly against this ongoing humanitarian outrage.
Minister Peters, as Minister of Foreign Affairs you are in a position of leadership to carry New Zealand’s collective voice in support of humanitarian aid to Gaza to the world. We are asking you to speak on behalf of New Zealand to support the urgent international plea for humanitarian aid to be allowed into Gaza and to initiate calls for a no-fly zone to be established over the region to prevent further mass killing of civilians.
We believe the way forward for peace and security for everyone in the region is for all parties to follow international law and United Nations resolutions, going back to UNGA 194 in 1948, so that a lasting peace can be established based on justice and equal rights for everyone.
New Zealand has an internationally respected voice — please use it to express solidarity for humanitarian aid to Gaza, today.
Nā
Ann Kendall QSM, Co-chair Tā Taihākurei Durie, Pou [cultural leader] NZ Māori Council
Maher Nazzal and John Minto, National Co-chairs Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA)
The NZ Māori Council and Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa advertisement in New Zealand media today. Image: PSNA
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.
After 19 months of conflict that has killed tens of thousands of Palestinians and drawn accusations of war crimes against Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu is once more preparing to escalate Israel’s offensive in Gaza.
The latest plan puts Israel on course for full occupation of the Palestinian territory and would drive Gazans into ever-narrowing pockets of the shattered strip.
It would lead to more intensive bombing and Israeli forces clearing and holding territory, while destroying what few structures remain in Gaza.
This would be a disaster for 2.2 million Gazans who have already endured unfathomable suffering.
Each new offensive makes it harder not to suspect that the ultimate goal of Netanyahu’s far-right coalition is to ensure Gaza is uninhabitable and drive Palestinians from their land. For two months, Israel has blocked delivery of all aid into the strip.
Child malnutrition rates are rising, the few functioning hospitals are running out of medicine, and warnings of starvation and disease are growing louder. Yet the US and European countries that tout Israel as an ally that shares their values have issued barely a word of condemnation.
They should be ashamed of their silence, and stop enabling Netanyahu to act with impunity.
In brief remarks on Sunday, US President Donald Trump acknowledged Gazans were “starving”, and suggested Washington would help get food into the strip.
But, so far, the US president has only emboldened Netanyahu. Trump returned to the White House promising to end the war in Gaza after his team helped broker a January ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.
Under the deal, Hamas agreed to free hostages in phases, while Israel was to withdraw from Gaza and the foes were to reach a permanent ceasefire.
But within weeks of the truce taking hold, Trump announced an outlandish plan for Gaza to be emptied of Palestinians and taken over by the US.
In March, Israel collapsed the ceasefire as it sought to change the terms of the deal, with Washington’s backing. Senior Israeli officials have since said they are implementing Trump’s plan to transfer Palestinians out of Gaza.
On Monday, far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said: “We are finally going to occupy the Gaza Strip.”
Netanyahu insists an expanded offensive is necessary to destroy Hamas and free the 59 remaining hostages. The reality is that the prime minister has never articulated a clear plan since Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack killed 1200 people and triggered the war.
Instead, he repeats his maximalist mantra of “total victory” while seeking to placate his extremist allies to ensure the survival of his governing coalition.
But Israel is also paying a price for his actions. The expanded offensive would imperil the lives of the hostages, further undermine Israel’s tarnished standing and deepen domestic divisions.
Israel has briefed that the expanded operation would not begin until after Trump’s visit to the Gulf next week, saying there is a “window” for Hamas to release hostages in return for a temporary truce.
Arab leaders are infuriated by Netanyahu’s relentless pursuit of conflict in Gaza yet they will fete Trump at lavish ceremonies with promises of multibillion-dollar investments and arms deals.
Trump will put the onus on Hamas when speaking to his Gulf hosts. The group’s murderous October 7 attack is what triggered the Israeli offensive.
Gulf states agree that its continued stranglehold on Gaza is a factor prolonging the war. But they must stand up to Trump and convince him to pressure Netanyahu to end the killing, lift the siege and return to talks.
The global tumult triggered by Trump has already distracted attention from the catastrophe in Gaza. Yet the longer it goes on, the more those who remain silent or cowed from speaking out will be complicit.
To mark the release of the 2025 World Press Freedom Index, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) partnered with the agency The Good Company to launch a new awareness campaign that puts an ironic twist on the glossy advertising of the tourism industry.
Three out of six countries featured in the exposé are from the Asia Pacific region — but none from the Pacific Islands.
The campaign shines a stark light on the press freedom violations in countries that seem perfect on postcards but are highly dangerous for journalists, says RSF.
Disguised as attractive travel guides, the campaign’s visuals use a cynical, impactful rhetoric to highlight the harsh realities journalists face in destinations renowned for their tourist appeal.
Along with Indonesia, Greece (89th), Cambodia (115), Egypt (170), Mexico (124) and the Philippines (116) are all visited by millions of tourists, yet they rank poorly in the 2025 World Press Freedom Index, reports RSF.
‘Chilling narrative’
“The attention-grabbing visuals juxtapose polished, enticing aesthetics with a chilling narrative of intimidation, censorship, violence, and even death.
“This deliberately unsettling approach by RSF aims to shift the viewer’s perspective, showing what the dreamlike imagery conceals: journalists imprisoned, attacked, or murdered behind idyllic landscapes.”
The RSF Index 2025 teaser. Video: RSF
Indonesia is in the Pacific spotlight because of its Melanesian Papuan provinces bordering Pacific Islands Forum member country Papua New Guinea.
Despite outgoing President Joko Widodo’s 10 years in office and a reformist programme, his era has been marked by a series of broken promises, reports RSF.
“The media oligarchy linked to political interests has grown stronger, leading to increased control over critical media and manipulation of information through online trolls, paid influencers, and partisan outlets,” says the Index report.
“This climate has intensified self-censorship within media organisations and among journalists.
“Since October 2024, Indonesia has been led by a new president, former general Prabowo Subianto — implicated in several human rights violation allegations — and by Joko Widodo’s eldest son, Gibran Rakabuming Raka, as vice-president.
“Under this new administration, whose track record on press freedom offers little reassurance, concerns are mounting over the future of independent journalism.”
Fiji leads in Pacific
In the Pacific, Fiji has led the pack among island states by rising four places to 40th overall, making it the leading country in Oceania in 2025 in terms of press freedom.
A quick summary of Oceania rankings in the 2025 RSF World Press Freedom Index. Image: RSF/PMW
Both Timor-Leste, which dropped 19 places to 39th after heading the region last year, and Samoa, which plunged 22 places to 44th, lost their impressive track record.
Of the only other two countries in Oceania surveyed by RSF, Tonga rose one place to 46th and Papua New Guinea jumped 13 places to 78th, a surprising result given the controversy over its plans to regulate the media.
RSF reports that the Fiji Media Association (FMA), which was often critical of the harassment of the media by the previous FijiFirst government, has since the repeal of the Media Act in 2023 “worked hard to restore independent journalism and public trust in the media”.
In March 2024, research published in Journalism Practice journal found that sexual harassment of women journalists was widespread and needed to be addressed to protect media freedom and quality journalism.
In Timor-Leste, “politicians regard the media with some mistrust, which has been evidenced in several proposed laws hostile to press freedom, including one in 2020 under which defaming representatives of the state or Catholic Church would have been punishable by up to three years in prison.
“Journalists’ associations and the Press Council often criticise politicisation of the public broadcaster and news agency.”
On the night of September 4, 2024, Timorese police arrested Antonieta Kartono Martins, a reporter for the news site Diligente Online, while covering a police operation to remove street vendors from a market in Dili, the capital. She was detained for several hours before being released.
Samoan harassment
Previously enjoying a good media freedom reputation, journalists and their families in Samoa were the target of online death threats, prompting the Samoan Alliance of Media Professionals for Development (SAMPOD) to condemn the harassment as “attacks on the fourth estate and democracy”.
In Tonga, RSF reports that journalists are not worried about being in any physical danger when on the job, and they are relatively unaffected by the possibility of prosecution.
“Nevertheless, self-censorship continues beneath the surface in a tight national community.”
In Papua New Guinea, RSF reports journalists are faced with intimidation, direct threats, censorship, lawsuits and bribery attempts, “making it a dangerous profession”.
“And direct interference often threatens the editorial freedom at leading media outlets. This was seen yet again at EMTV in February 2022, when the entire newsroom was fired after walking out” in protest over a management staffing decison.
“There has been ongoing controversy since February 2023 concerning a draft law on media development backed by Communications Minister Timothy Masiu. In January 2024, a 14-day state of emergency was declared in the capital, Port Moresby, following unprecedented protests by police forces and prison wardens.”
This impacted on government and media relations.
Australia and New Zealand
In Australia (29), the media market’s heavy concentration limits the diversity of voices represented in the news, while independent outlets struggle to find a sustainable economic model.
While New Zealand (16) leads in the Asia Pacific region, it is also facing a similar situation to Australia with a narrowing of media plurality, closure or merging of many newspaper titles, and a major retrenchment of journalists in the country raising concerns about democracy.
Pacific Media Watch collaborates with Reporters Without Borders.
An international NGO seeking to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza by sea says it has been in talks with Malta’s government about allowing a ship to enter Maltese waters to repair damage caused by a drone attack.
The ship named Conscience, operated by the Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC), suffered damage to its front section including a loss of power when it was hit by two drones just outside Maltese territorial waters in the central Mediterranean early on Friday, the NGO said yesterday.
The coalition, an international non-governmental group, blamed Israel — which has blockaded, bombarded and starved Gaza — for the attack, reports Al Jazeera.
The Conscience, which set off from Tunisia, had been waiting to take on board some 30 peace and humanitarian activists from around the world before trying to sail to Gaza in the eastern Mediterranean.
The ship had been trying to deliver aid, including food and medicines, to the besieged enclave, where aid groups warn people are struggling to survive following a two-month total blockade by Israel.
Swedish activist Greta Thunberg said she was in Malta and had been planning to board the ship as part of the flotilla.
Prime Minister Robert Abela said yesterday that Malta was prepared to assist the ship with necessary repairs so that it could continue on its journey, once it was satisfied that the vessel held only humanitarian aid.
Ensuring safety
Coalition officials said yesterday that the ship was in no danger of sinking, but that they wanted to ensure it would be safe from further attacks while undergoing repairs, and able to sail out again.
Earlier yesterday, the coalition accused Malta of impeding access to its ship. Malta denied the claim, saying the crew had refused assistance and even refused to allow a surveyor on board to assess the damage.
Maltese authorities must permit the ‘Conscience’ immediate safe passage into Maltese waters, and provide all needed assistance as well as protection for the ship and all those on board. #BreakTheSiegehttps://t.co/4da8t80adJ
— Freedom Flotilla Coalition (@GazaFFlotilla) May 4, 2025
“The FFC would like to clarify our commitment to engagement with [Maltese] authorities to expedite the temporary docking of our ship for repairs and surveyors, so we can continue on the urgent humanitarian mission to Gaza,” the coalition said in a statement later in the day.
A Malta government spokesman said its offer was to assist in repairs out at sea once the boat’s cargo was verified to be aid.
Coalition officials said the surveyor was welcome to board as part of a deal being negotiated with Malta.
Israel blocked humitarian aid
Israel halted humanitarian aid to Gaza two months ago, shortly before it broke a ceasefire and restarted its war against Hamas, which has devastated the Palestinian enclave and killed more than 62,000 people.
Another NGO ship on a similar mission to Gaza in 2010 was stopped and boarded by Israeli troops, and nine activists were killed with a wounded 10th victim dying later. Other such ships have similarly been stopped and boarded, with activists arrested.
The New Zealand humanitarian charity Kia Ora Gaza is affiliated with the Freedom Flotilla Coalition and a number of New Zealanders have participated in the FFC efforts to break the siege over the past decade.
Hamas issued a statement about the attack off Malta, accusing Israel of “piracy” and “state terrorism”.
Australia (ranked 29th) and New Zealand (ranked 16th) are cited as positive examples by Reporters Without Borders in the 2025 World Press Freedom Index of commitment to public media development aid, showing support through regional media development such as in the Pacific Islands.
The 2025 World Press Freedom Index by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has revealed the dire state of the news economy and how it severely threatens newsrooms’ editorial independence and media pluralism.
In light of this alarming situation, RSF has called on public authorities, private actors and regional institutions to commit to a “New Deal for Journalism” by following 11 key recommendations.
The media’s economic fragility has emerged as one of the foremost threats to press freedom.
According to the findings of the 2025 World Press Freedom Index, the overall conditions for practising journalism are poor (categorised as “difficult” or “very serious”) in half of the world’s countries.
When looking at the economic conditions alone, that figure becomes three-quarters.
Concrete commitments are urgently needed to preserve press freedom, uphold the right to reliable information, and lift the media out of the destructive economic spiral endangering their independence and survival.
That is where a New Deal for Journalism comes in.
The 11 RSF recommendations for a New Deal for Journalism:
1. Protect media pluralism through economic regulation Media outlets are not like other businesses and journalism does not provide services like other industries.
Although most news outlets are private entities, they serve the public interest by ensuring citizens’ access to reliable information, a fundamental pillar of democracy.
Media pluralism must therefore be guaranteed, both at market level and by ensuring individual newsrooms reflect a variety of ideas and viewpoints, regardless of who owns them.
In France (25th), debates around media ownership consolidation — particularly involving the Bolloré Group — have highlighted the risks to media pluralism.
In South Africa (27th), the Competition Commission is considering solutions to mitigate the threats posed by giant online platforms to the pluralism of the digital information space.
RSF 2025 World Press Freedom Index summary. Video: RSF
2. Adopt the JTI as a common standard News outlets, tech giants, and governments should embrace the Journalism Trust Initiative (JTI), an international standard for journalism.
More than 2000 media outlets in 119 countries are already engaged in the JTI certification process. Launched by RSF, the JTI acts as a common professional reference that does not judge an outlet’s content but evaluates the processes in its production of information, improving transparency around media ownership and editorial procedures, and promoting trustworthy outlets.
This certification provides a foundation to guide public funding, inform indexing and ranking policies, and enable online platforms and search engines to highlight reliable information while protecting themselves against disinformation campaigns.
3. Establish advertisers’ democratic responsibility Governments should introduce the principle that companies have a responsibility to help uphold democracy, similar to corporate social responsibility (CSR). Advertisers should be the first to adopt this concept as a priority, as their decision to shift their budgets to online platforms — or, worse, websites that fuel disinformation — makes them partially responsible for the economic decline of journalism.
Advertisers should be encouraged to link their advertising investments to criteria on reliability and journalistic ethics. Aligning advertising strategies with the public interest is vital for fostering a healthy media ecosystem and maintaining democracies.
This notion of a democratic responsibility for companies has notably been promoted by the steering committee of the French General Assembly of Information (États généraux de l’information) and may be included in the bill that will be examined in 2025 by the French National Assembly.
4. Regulate the gatekeepers of online information Democratic states must require digital platforms to ensure that reliable sources of information are visible to the public and remunerated.
The European Union’s Copyright Directive and Australia’s (29th) News Media Bargaining Code in — the first legislation regulating Google and Facebook — are two examples of legally requiring major platforms to pay for online journalistic content.
Canada (ranked 21st) has undertaken similar reforms but has faced strong resistance, particularly from Meta, which has retaliated by removing news content from its platforms.
To ensure the economic value generated by online journalistic content is fairly distributed, these types of laws must be broadly adopted and their effective implementation must be guaranteed.
Public authorities must also ensure fair negotiations so that media outlets are not crushed by the current imbalance of power between economically fragile news companies and global tech giants.
Lastly, the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) has made the need for fair remuneration for content creators all the more urgent, as their work is now used to train or feed AI models. This is simply the latest example of why regulation is necessary to protect journalistic content from new forms of technological exploitation.
To mark World Press Freedom Day, 3 May, Europeans Without Borders (ESF), Cartooning for Peace and Reporters Without Borders (RSF) have joined forces for Caricartoons, a campaign celebrating press freedom. Image: RSF screenshot PMW
5. Introduce a tax on tech giants to fund quality information The goal of introducing such a tax should be to redistribute all or part of the revenue unfairly captured by digital giants to the detriment of the media. The proceeds would be redirected to news media outlets and would finance the production of reliable information.
Several countries have already committed to reforms that tax major digital platforms, but almost none are specifically aimed at supporting the production of quality information from independent sources.
Indonesia (127th) implemented a tax on foreign digital services, while also requiring platforms to remunerate media outlets for the use of their content starting in 2024. France also established a specific tax on digital companies’ revenues in 2019.
6. Use public development aid to combat news deserts and strengthen reliable information from independent sources As crises, conflicts and authoritarian regimes multiply, supporting reliable information from independent sources and countering emerging news deserts has never been more important.
Official Development Assistance (ODA) must incorporate support for independent journalism, recognising that it is indispensable not only for economic development but also for strengthening democratic governance and promoting peace.
At least 1 percent of ODA should be allocated to financing independent media outlets in order to guarantee their sustainability.
At a time when certain support mechanisms — such as the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) — are under threat, commitments from donor states are more crucial than ever.
Australia (ranked 29th) and New Zealand (ranked 16th) are positive examples of this commitment, showing support through regional media development programmes, notably in the Pacific Islands.
7. Encourage the development of hybrid and other innovative funding models It is essential to develop support mechanisms that combine public funding with private contributions (donations, investments, and loans), such as the IFRUM, a fund proposed by RSF to reconstruct the media in Ukraine (62nd).
To diversify funding sources, states could strengthen tax incentives for investors and broaden the call for donors beyond their own residents and taxpayers.
8. Guarantee transparency and independence in the allocation of media aid Granting public or private subsidies to the media must be based on objective and transparent criteria that are subject to oversight by civil society. Only clear, equitable aid distribution can safeguard editorial independence and protect media outlets from political interference.
One such legislative solution is the European Media Freedom Act (EMFA), which will come into force in 2025 across all European Union member states. It includes transparency requirements for aid distribution, obliges member states to guarantee the editorial independence of newsrooms, and mandates safeguards against political pressure.
Other countries have also established exemplary frameworks, such as Canada (21st), which has implemented a transparent system combining tax credits and subsidies while ensuring editorial independence.
9. Combat the erosion of public service media Public service media are not state media: they are independent actors, funded by citizens to fulfil a public interest mission. Their role is to guarantee universal access to reliable, diverse information from independent sources, serving social cohesion and democracy.
Financial and political attacks against these outlets — seen in many countries — threaten the public’s access to trustworthy information.
10. Strengthen media literacy and journalism training Supporting reliable information means that everyone should be trained from an early age to recognise trustworthy information and be involved in media education initiatives. University and higher education programmes in journalism must also be supported, on the condition that they are independent.
Finland (5th) is recognised worldwide for its media education, with media literacy programmes starting in primary school, contributing to greater resilience against disinformation.
11. Encourage nations to join and implement international initiatives, such as the Partnership for Information and Democracy The International Partnership for Information and Democracy, which promotes a global communication and information space that is free, pluralistic and reliable, already counts more than fifty signatory countries.
RSF stresses that journalism is a vital common good at a time when democracies are faltering.
This New Deal is a call to collectively rebuild the foundations of a free, trustworthy, and pluralistic public space.
Republished by Pacific Media Watch in collaboration with Reporters Without Borders.
World Media Freedom Day reflections of a protester
Yesterday, World Media Freedom Day, we marched to Television New Zealand in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland to deliver a letter asking them to do better.
Their coverage [of Palestine] has been biased at its best, silent at its worst.
I truly believe that if our media outlets reported fairly, factually and consistently on the reality in Gaza and in all of Palestine that tens of thousands of peoples lives would have been saved and the [Israeli] occupation would have ended already.
Instead, I open my Instagram to a new massacre, a new lifeless child.
I often wonder how we get locked into jobs where we leave our values at the door to keep our own life how (I hope) we wish all lives to be. How we all collectively agree to turn away, to accept absolute substandard and often horrific conditions for others in exchange for our own comforts.
Yesterday I carried my son for half of this [1km] march. He’s too big to be carried but I also know I ask a lot from him to join me in this fight so I meet him in the middle as I can.
Near the end of the march he fell asleep and the saying “dead weight” came to mind as his body became heavier and more difficult to carry.
I thought about the endless images I’ve seen of parents in Gaza carrying their lifeless child and I thought how lucky I am, that my child will wake up.
How small of an effort it is to carry him a few blocks in the hopes that something might change, that one parent might be spared that terrible feeling — dead weight.
Republished from an Instagram post by a Philippine Solidarity Network Aotearoa supporter.
About 1000 pro-Palestinian protesters marked World Press Freedom Day — May 3 — today by marching on the public broadcaster Television New Zealand in Auckland, accusing it of 18 months of “biased coverage” on the genocidal Israeli war against Gaza.
They delivered a letter to the management board of TVNZ from Palestine Solidarity Network (PSNA) co-chair John Minto declaring: “The damage [done] to human rights, justice and freedom in the Middle East by Western media such as TVNZ is incalculable.”
The protesters marched on the television headquarters near Sky Tower about 4pm after an hour-long rally in the heart of the city at a precinct dubbed “Palestine Square” in the Britomart transport hub’s Te Komititanga Square.
Several opposition politicians spoke at the rally, calling for a ceasefire in the brutal war on Gaza that has killed more than 62,000 Palestinians with no sign of a let-up.
Labour Party’s disarmament and arms control spokesperson Phil Twyford was among the speakers that included Green Party co-leader Marama Davidson and Ricardo Menéndez March.
All three spoke strongly in support of Greens co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick’s Member’s Bill to sanction Israel for its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.
Davidson said the opposition parties were united behind the bill and all they needed were six MPs in the coalition government to “follow their conscience” to support it.
Appeals for pressure
They appealed to the protesters to put pressure on their local MPs to support the humanitarian initiative.
Protesters outside the Television New Zealand headquarters in Auckland today. Image: Asia Pacific Report
In The Hague this week, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) heard evidence from more than 40 countries and global organisations condemning Israel over its actions in deliberately starving the more than 2 million Palestinians by blockading the besieged enclave for more than the past two months.
Only the United States and Hungary spoke in support of Israel.
Mutlaq al-Qahtani, Qatari Ambassador to The Netherlands, also said there were “new trails of tears in the West Bank mirroring Gaza’s fate”.
Israel executing ‘genocidal war’ against Gaza, Qatar tells ICJ. Video: Al Jazeera
Among the speakers in the Auckland rally, one of about 30 similar protests for Palestine across New Zealand this weekend, was coordinator Roger Fowler of the Auckland-based Kia Ora Gaza humanitarian aid organisation, who denounced the overnight drone attack on the Gaza-bound Freedom Flotilla aid ship Conscience in international waters after leaving Malta.
The ship was crippled by the suspected Israel attack, endangering the lives of some 30 human rights activists on board. Fowler said: “That’s 2000 km away from Israel, that’s how desperate they are now to stop the Freedom Flotilla.”
A protester placard declaring “TVNZ, you’re biased reporting is shameful. Where is your integrity?” Image: Asia Pacific Report
He reminded protesters that Marama Davidson and retired trade unionist Mike Treen had been on previous aid protest voyages in past years trying to break the Israeli blockade, but there was no New Zealander on board in the current mission.
Media ‘credibility challenge’
Journalist and Pacific Media Watch convenor Dr David Robie spoke about World Media Freedom Day. He paid a tribute to the sacrifices of 211 Palestinian journalists killed by Israel — many of them targeted — saying Israel’s war on Gaza had become the “greatest credibility challenge for journalists and media of our times”.
Many protesters carried placards declaring slogans such as “TVNZ your biased reporting is shameful. Where is your integrity?”, “Journalists are not targets” and “Caring for the children of Palestine is what it’s about.”
After marching about 1km between Te Komititanga Square and the TVNZ headquarters, the protesters gathered outside the entrance chanting for fairness and balance in the reporting.
“TVNZ lies. For the past 18 months they have been nothing but complicit,” said one Palestinian speaker to a chorus of: “Shame!”
He said: “Every time TVNZ lies, a little boy in Gaza dies.”
Another Palestinian speaker, Nadine, said: “Every time the media lies, a little girl in Gaza dies.”
The Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) letter to Television New Zealand’s board. Image: Asia Pacific Report
Deputation delivers TVNZ letter
A deputation from the protesters delivered the letter from PSNA’s John Minto addressed to the TVNZ board chair Alastair Carruthers but found the main foyer main entrance closed so the message was left.
Minto’s two-page letter calling for an independent review of TVNZ’s reporting on Palestine and Israel said in part:
“Over the past 18 months of industrial scale killing of Palestinians by the Israeli military in Gaza we have been regularly appalled at the blatantly-biased reporting on the Middle East by Television New Zealand.
“TVNZ’s reporting has been relentlessly and virulently pro-Israel. TVNZ has centred Israeli narratives, Israeli explanations, Israeli justifications and Israeli propaganda points on a daily basis while Palestinian viewpoints are all but absent.
“When they are presented they are given rudimentary coverage at best. More often than not Palestinians are presented as the incoherent victims of Israeli brutality rather than as an occupied people fighting for liberation in a situation described by the International Court of Justice as a “plausible genocide”.
“This pattern of systemic bias and unbalanced reporting is not revealed by TVNZ’s complaints system which focuses on individual stories rather than ingrained patterns of pro-Israel bias.
“Every complaint we have made to TVNZ has, with one minor exception, been rejected by your corporation with the typical refrain that it’s not possible to cover every aspect of an issue in a single story but that over time the balance is made up.
“Our issue is that the bias continues throughout TVNZ’s reporting on a story-by-story, day-by-day basis — the balance is never achieved. The reporting goes ahead just the way the pro-Israel lobby is happy with.”
The rest of the letter detailed many examples of the alleged systematic bias, such as failing to describe Gaza, West Bank and East Jerusalem and as “Occupied” territory as they are designated under international law, and failing to state the illegality of Israel’s military occupation.
Minto concluded by stating: “It is prolonging Israel’s illegal occupation, its apartheid policies, its ethnic cleansing and theft of Palestinian land. TVNZ is part of the problem – a key part of the problem.”
The letter called for an independent investigation.
Palestinian protesters at TVNZ headquarters while demonstrating against the public broadcaster’s coverage of the Israeli war against Gaza on World Press Freedom Day. Image: Asia Pacific Report
A human rights agency has called for an investigation into the drone attacks on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla aid ship Conscience with Israel suspected of being responsible.
The Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor said in a statement that the deliberate targeting of a civilian aid ship in international waters was a “flagrant violation” of the United Nations Charter, the Law of the Sea, and the Rome Statute, which prohibits the targeting of humanitarian objects.
It added: “This attack falls within a recurring and documented pattern of force being used to prevent ships from reaching the Gaza Strip, even before they approach its shores.”
The monitor is calling for an “independent and transparent investigation under Maltese jurisdiction, with the participation of the United Nations”.
It is also demanding “guarantees for safe sea passage for humanitarian aid bound for Gaza”.
“Any failure to act today will only encourage further attacks on humanitarian missions and deepen the catastrophe unfolding in Gaza,” said the monitor.
A spokesperson for the Gaza Freedom Flotilla said the group blamed Israel or one of its allies for the attack, adding it currently did not have proof of this claim.
Israeli TV confirms attack
However, Israel’s channel 12 television reported that Israeli forces were responsible for the attack.
The Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC) is a grassroots people-to-people solidarity movement composed of campaigns and initiatives from different parts of the world, working together to end the illegal Israeli blockade of Gaza.
The organisation said its goals included:
breaking Israel’s more than 17-year illegal and inhumane blockade of the Gaza Strip;
educating people around the world about the blockade of Gaza;
condemning and publicising the complicity of other governments and global actors in enabling the blockade; and
responding to the cry from Palestinians and Palestinian organisations in Gaza for solidarity to break the blockade.
The MV Conscience — with about 30 human rights and aid activists on board — came under direct attack in international waters off the coast of Malta at 00:23 local time.
An 11th-hour blitzkrieg for the Australian election 2025 tomorrow claims the Greens are enabling extremists who “will do anything in their power to establish a worldwide Islamic Caliphate”. Wendy Bacon and Yaakov Aharon investigate the Dark Money election.
SPECIAL REPORT: By Wendy Bacon and Yaakov Aharon
Minority Impact Coalition is a shadowy organisation which appeared on Australia’s political landscape in February of this year.
According to its constitution, its object is to promote “mutual respect and tolerance between groups of people in Australia by actively countering racism and bringing widespread understanding and tolerance amongst all sectors of the community”.
However, it is spreading ignorance, fear and Islamophobia to millions of mostly male Australians living in the outer suburbs and the regions.
Advance is ‘transparent … easy to deal with’ Speaking to an Australian Jewish Association webinar, Roslyn Mendelle, who is of Israeli-American origin and a director of Minority Impact Coalition (MIC), said the rightwing Advance introduced her to the concept of a third party.
“Advance has been nothing but absolutely honest, transparent, direct, and easy to deal with,” Mendelle said.
The electoral laws, which many say are “broken by design”, mean that it will be several months before MIC’s major donors are revealed. Donors making repeated donations below $15,900 are unlisted “dark money”. (This threshold will change to $5000 in 2026).
Who’s paying to undermine Australian democracy? Scam of the week Video: MWM
Coming in second place, are the returns from the Australian Taxation Office.
In NSW, it is targeting Greens candidates everywhere and is also focussed on the Labor-held seat of Gilmore, challenged by Liberal Party candidate Andrew Constance.
Independent journalist Alex McKinnon reported that MIC spokesperson and midwife, Sharon Stoliar, wrote in an open letter:
“When you chant ‘from the river to the sea Palestine will be free’ . . . while wearing NSW Health uniforms, you are representing NSW Health in a call for genocide of Jews. YOU. ARE. SUPPORTING. TERRORISM… I. WILL. REPORT. YOU.”
Its campaign material is authorised by Joshu Turier, a retired boxer and right-wing extremist.
According to Facebook library, MIC’s ads are targeted at men, particularly between ages 35 and 54 in Queensland, Victoria and New South Wales.
In mid-April, the group paid for an ad so extreme that Instagram pulled it, leading to Turier reposting on his own Facebook page again this week. He complained that “It’s beyond troubling when our media platforms remove simple, factual material.”
They are ‘coming for us’ {Editor … oh no!} By Wednesday, the video was back on MIC’s Facebook account. The video says that the Greens are deliberately enabling pro-Palestine student protesters, who
“Don’t actually believe in the concept of a nation. They don’t believe in borders. They don’t believe there is a national identity. They believe in the Islamic brotherhood.”
“. . . It is just the beginning. When antisemitism starts, it’s not going to stop. They are going to come for Christians, for Atheists, for Agnostics.”
MIC is spending big on billboards, campaign trucks, and professional videos targeting at least five electorates. But despite their big spending, they cannot be found on the Australian Electoral Commission transparency register.
According to the transparency advocacy group WhoTargets.Me, MIC has spent more than $50,000 on Google and Meta ads in the last month alone. This doesn’t account for billboards, trucks, labour, or the 200,000 addresses letterboxed in late March.
More investigation shows their donations will all flow through the QJ Collective Ltd (QJC), which also “powers” the Minority Impact Coalition website. QJC is registered as a significant third party with the Australian Electoral Commission.
Clones with ghost offices
Advance director Sandra Bourke and Roslyn Mendelle. Image: QJ Collective, Instagram
MIC and Queensland Jewish Collective are virtually identical. They have always had the same directors — with Azin Naghibi replacing Roslyn’s partner, Hava Mendelle, as both QJC and MIC director in March 2025.
When QJC first came to MWM’snotice last year, it was running a relatively well-funded campaign — although limited to several seats — to “Put the Greens Last” in the Queensland state election.
In September 2024, the group’s website stated that it was “non-partisan and not left or right-wing”, and that its “goal was to support Queenslanders in making informed decisions when voting for our leaders”. MIC is the vehicle for this campaign.
Today, neither the QJC nor MIC makes any such claim. The Collective’s website lists its leading “campaign’” as “exposing the two-faced nature of the Labor party”.
The alarming detail While the two “grassroots” groups share several of their total five different associated addresses, mostly consisting of shared offices, it is not a perfect match.
For both groups, directors Mendelle and Turier list their address as 470 St Pauls Terrace, Fortitude Valley, Queensland. There was no name or company, just an address, however, shared offices run by Jubilee Place are available at that location.
QJC and MIC director Naghibi lists her address on both extracts as 740 St Pauls Terrace, a non-commercial building.
Either Mendelle and Turier are living out of a shared office, or Naghibi is unable to remember the address of the shared office she has little real connection to.
Last year, MWM contacted the owners of QJC’s listed office address at Insolvency Company Accountants in Tewantin, Queensland. At first, the firm said that no one had heard of them. Following that, the firm said that the Collective is a client of the firm, however denied any further connection.
A fresh search this year showed an additional contact address listed by the grassroots Collective — this time 1700 km away — at 1250 Malvern Road, Malvern, Victoria. Again there was no name or company, just an address.
Located at that address is boutique accounting firm Greenberg & Co, which specialises in serving clients who are “high net worth individuals”. MWM contacted senior partner Jay Greenberg who said his role was only one of ‘financial compliance’. He said that he did have personal views on the election but these were not relevant. He declined to discuss further details.
Attack of the clones Better Australia is a third party campaigner that, like QJ Collective in 2024, claims to be bipartisan.
Its communications are authorised by Sophie Calland, an active member of NSW Labor’s Alexandria Branch. Her husband Ofir Birenbaum — from the nearby Rosebery Branch — is also a member of the third party Better Australia.
Co-convenor of Labor Friends of Israel, Eric Roozendaal, and former Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s secretary, Yaron Finkelstein, provided further campaign advice at a members meeting.
Patron of Labor Friends of Israel and former Senator Nova Peris teamed up with Better Australia for a campaign video last week.
“When Greens leader Adam Bandt refuses to stand in front of the Australian flag,” Peris said, “I ask, how can you possibly stand for our country?”
Better Australia’s stated goal is to campaign for a major government “regardless of which major party is in office”.
The group urges voters to “put the Greens and Teals last”, warning that a Labor minority government would be chaos. The “non-partisan” third party has made no statements on the Liberal-National Coalition, nor on a minority government with One Nation.
Some Better Australia workers — who wear bright yellow jackets labelled “community advisor” — are paid, and others volunteer.
“Isabella” told MWM that her enlistment as a volunteer for the third party campaigner is “not political” — rather it is all “about Israel”.
Previously Isabella had protested in support of the Israeli hostages and prisoners of war held in Gaza.
Better Australia’s “community advisor” “Isabella” at a Bondi Junction polling booth. Image: Wendy Bacon/MWM
Another campaigner told us he was paid by Better Australia. He spoke little English and declined to say more.
Two schoolgirls campaigning at Rose Bay told MWM that they were paid by their father who had chaired a Better Australia meeting the previous evening. They declined to disclose his name.
Calland addressing her Israeli volunteers. Image: Better Australia/Instagram/MWM
MWM later interviewed this woman who is an Israeli on a working holiday visa. She was supporting the campaign because it fits her political “vision”: the Greens and independent MPs like Allegra Spender must be removed from office because they are “against Israel” and for a “Free Palestine” which would mean the end of “my country”.
Allegra Spender denies these assertions.
Greens leader Adam Bandt remained determinedly optimistic, telling MWM that organisations such as Better Australia and MIC,
“are able to run their disinformation campaigns because Australia has no truth in political advertising laws, which enables them to lie about the priorities of the Greens and crossbench without consequence, as well as huge corporate money flowing into politics.
“In this term of Parliament, Labor failed to progress truth in political advertising laws, and instead did a dirty deal with the Liberals on electoral reforms to try and shut out third parties and independents.”
Labor’s candidate for Wentworth, Savannah Peake, told MWM on Tuesday that she had known Calland for 18 months.
Peake said that while she knew Calland had previously founded Better Council, she had only discovered Calland was authorising Better Australia when she arrived at the booth that morning.
Peake told MWM that she had contacted the NSW Labor Head Office to voice her objections and was confident the issue would be “dealt with swiftly”.
The third party campaign runs contrary to Peake’s preferences, which tells supporters in Wentworth to vote #1 Labor and #2 Allegra Spender. MWM repeatedly tried to follow up with Peake throughout the week to find out what action NSW Labor had taken but received no reply.
Liberal candidate for Wentworth, Ro Knox, complies with Better Australia’s call to put Greens last on her voting preferences.
Many people in NSW Labor know about their fellow members’ involvement in Better Australia. The Minister for Environment and MP for Sydney Tanya Plibersek, state member Ron Hoenig and NSW Labor have all previously refused to answer questions.
A Labor volunteer at a Wentworth pre-poll booth told MWM that he disapproved if a fellow party member was involved with the third party. Two older Labor volunteers were in disbelief, having incorrectly assumed that the anti-Teal posters were authorised by the Trumpet of Patriots party.
Another said he was aware of Calland’s activities but had decided “not to investigate” further.
Better Australia focuses on Richmond By the end of the week, Better Australia had left a trail of “Put the Greens last’ placards across Sydney’s Inner West, one of them outside the Cairo Takeaway cafe where the third party’s organiser Ofir Birenbaum was first exposed.
The third party have extended their polling campaign to the seat of Richmond, on the North coast of NSW where campaign sources are expecting more volunteers on election day.
As parties dash to the finishing line, they are calling for more donations to counter the astroturfers. According to website TheyTargetYou, the major parties alone have spent $11.5 million on Meta and Google ads over the last month.
Better Australia splurged $200,000 on ads targeting digital TV, social media, and the Australian Financial Review. Digital ads will continue in the final three days of the election, exploiting loopholes in the mandated political advertising blackout.
The Australian public has made little progress towards transparency in the current term of government.
Until reforms are made, Silicon Valley tech giants will continue to profit from dodgy ads and astroturfing groups sowing division with each Australian election cycle.
Wendy Bacon is an investigative journalist who was the Professor of Journalism at UTS. She worked for Fairfax, Channel Nine and SBS and has published in The Guardian, New Matilda, City Hub and Overland. She has a long history in promoting independent and alternative journalism. She is a long-term supporter of a peaceful BDS and the Greens.
Yaakov Aharon is a Jewish-Australian living in Wollongong. He enjoys long walks on Wollongong Beach, unimpeded by Port Kembla smoke fumes and AUKUS submarines. The article was first published by Michael West Media and is republished with permission.
While Aotearoa New Zealand improved three places in the latest RSF World Press Freedom Index — up to 16th — and most other Pacific countries surveyed did well, it was a bad year generally for the Asia-Pacific region.
Fiji (40th — up four places) has done best out of island nations to edge Samoa (44 — slumping 22 places) out of its traditional perch.
In the region overall, press freedom and access to reliable news sources have been “severely compromised” by the predominance of regimes — often authoritarian — that strictly control information, often through economic means, reports RSF.
In many countries, the government has a tight grip on media ownership, allowing them to interfere in outlets’ editorial choices, says the regional report.
“It is highly telling that 20 of the region’s 32 countries and territories saw their economic indicators drop in the 2025 World Press Freedom Index,” said the RSF editors.
Authoritarian regimes’ systematic control
The region harbours some of the most advanced states in terms of media control.
In North Korea (179), the media are nothing more than propaganda tools entirely subordinate to the country’s totalitarian regime.
In China (178) and Vietnam (173), outlets are either state-owned or controlled by groups closely tied to the countries’ respective Communist parties, and the only independent reporting comes from freelance journalists who mainly operate underground.
The independent journalists “work under constant threat and with no financial stability”.
RSF’s World Press Freedom Index commentary. Video: RSF
Meanwhile, foreign outlets can find themselves blacklisted at any given moment.
Growing repression, increasing uncertainty
The crackdown on press freedom is spreading across the region and is increasingly inspired
by the Chinese method of controlling information, reports RSF.
Spotlight on the Asia-Pacific region for media freedom. Image: RSF
Since the 2021 military coup in Myanmar (169), many of the country’s independent outlets have been dismantled. The few that remain are forced to work underground or from exile and can barely continue operations due to the lack of sustainable revenue.
Similarly, crackdowns on press freedom in Cambodia (161) and Hong Kong (140), where the press freedom situation has become “very serious,” have led to newsroom closures, journalists fleeing into exile — often with fragile finances — and pro-government outlets absorbing most media funding.
In Afghanistan (175), at least 12 new media outlets were forced to close in 2024 due to new directives imposed by the Taliban.
In the United States, the decision made in March by President Donald Trump led to the
suspension of Radio Free Asia’s (RFA) shortwave radio programmes in Mandarin, Tibetan
and Lao, and its affiliated BenarNews service, which had been building up Pacific news coverage.
Most US-based staff, including at-risk visa holders, along with staff in Australia, were axed with the budget cuts, potentially turning entire regions into “information blackouts”.
Media concentration and political collusion
In several countries, the concentration of media ownership in the hands of political magnates threatened media plurality, the RSF Asia-Pacific editors said.
In India (151), Indonesia (127) and Malaysia (88 ), a handful of politically connected conglomerates control most media groups.
In Thailand (85), the major media groups maintain close ties with the military or royal elite, who directly influence their content.
Similarly, in Mongolia (102), influential individuals from the business world, who are
often close to those in power, own a dominant share of the media landscape and use it to
promote their political and economic interests.
In Pakistan (158), the authorities threaten independant outlets with the cancellation of government advertising contracts.
Economic pressure even in democracies
Independent outlets in established democracies have also fallen prey to economic pressure.
In Taiwan (24), a rare case of government pressure affected the English-speaking public
broadcaster TaiwanPlus, whose funding was also significantly reduced by Parliament, which
is controlled by opposition parties.
In Australia (29), the media market’s heavy concentration limits the diversity of voices represented in the news, while independent outlets struggle to find a sustainable economic model.
While New Zealand (16) leads in the Asia Pacific region, it is also facing a similar situation to Australia with a narrowing of media plurality, closure or merging of many newspaper titles, and a major retrenchment of journalists in the country raising concerns about democracy.
The closure of Newshub cited by RSF as one of the threats to media freedom in Aotearoa New Zealand. Image: RSF webinar screenshot PMW
Until four years ago, New Zealand had been regularly listed among the top 10 leading countries for press freedom — along with the Scandinavian countries — but last year dropped as far as 19th.
The RSF regional analyses are updated every year and shed light on the trends observed in each year’s Index and provide additional information.
The ranking and press freedom situation of each of the Index’s 180 countries are detailed in the country profiles, which can be consulted on the RSF website.
World Press Freedom is celebrated globally tomorrow – May 3 each year.
Pacific Media Watch collaborates with Reporters Without Borders.
Authoritarian regimes’ systematic control . . . RSF Asia-Pacific bureau advocacy manager Aleksandra Bielakowska presenting the regional report at a webinar in Taipei today. Image: RSF webinar screenshot PMW
After a year and a half of war, nearly 200 Palestinian journalists have been killed by the Israeli army — including at least 43 slain on the job.
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has brought multiple complaints before the International Criminal Court (ICC) and continues to tirelessly support Gazan journalists, working to halt the extraordinary bloodshed and the media blackout imposed on the strip.
“Journalists are being targeted and then slandered after their deaths,” RSF director-general Thibaut Bruttin said during a recent RSF demonstration in Paris in solidarity with Gazan journalists.
“I have never before seen a war in which, when a journalist is killed, you are told they are really a ‘terrorist’.”
The journalists gathered together with the main organisations defending French media workers and press freedom on April 16 in front of the steps of the Opéra-Bastille to condemn the news blackout and the fate of Palestinian journalists.
The slaughter of journalists is one of the largest media massacres this century being carried out as part of the Israeli genocide in Gaza.
RSF said there was “every reason to believe that the Israeli army is seeking to establish a total silence about what is happening in Gaza”.
This was being done by preventing the international press from entering the territory freely and by targeting those who, on the ground, continue to bear witness despite the risks.
Mobilisation of journalists in Paris, France, in solidarity with their Gazan colleagues. Video: RSF
Last year, Palestinian journalists covering Gaza were named as laureates of the 2024 UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize, following the recommendation of an International Jury of media professionals.
