Arusha, Tanzania – The East African Court of Justice (EACJ) Appellate Division has upheld a decision regarding the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP). In November 2023, the First Instance Division of the EACJ dismissed a case that four East African civil society organisations filed in November 2020.
This has disappointed the East African Crude Oil Pipeline-Project Affected Persons, who view the court as having shut the door of justice on them.
“A heavy blow to justice”
The Court ruled that the case filed by Natural Justice (Kenya), Africa Institute for Energy Governance Uganda, Center for Food and Adequate Living Uganda, and the Center for Strategic Litigation (Tanzania) fell outside the required filing period.
The StopEACOP Coalition believes the judges have chosen to treat a profound question of people’s rights, environmental survival, and climate justice as a mere procedural file.
In doing so, they have delivered a heavy blow to the promise of regional justice and cast a deep shadow over the Court’s own credibility as the body tasked with ensuring adherence to the East African Community Treaty.
We strongly condemn the ruling made by the East African Court of Justice, which has told millions of people across the region that technicalities matter more than their lives, their land, and their future. That is not neutrality nor objectivity. It is a choice in favour of oil companies and the governments that serve them.
The StopEACOP Coalition maintains that the decision to dismiss the case on procedural grounds
prevents examination of the substantive issues.
These include land compensation disputes, transboundary impacts, and environmental impacts including impacts on water sources and protected areas.
It also concerns the project’s overall alignment with the East African Community Treaty on its commitments to sustainable development, the protection of human rights, and the responsible and ethical management of transboundary resources.
Mamdoo continued:
In refusing to hear the harms of EACOP on a technical pretext the legitimacy of this Court now hangs by a thread, and history will have to decide whether it was a forum for justice or simply an office providing cover for corporate plunder.
Negative impacts of the East African Crude Oil Pipeline
Independent bodies and local and international civil society organisations have documented the negative impacts of the controversial East African Crude Oil Pipeline project.
Problems include irregular land acquisition processes, potential risks to the Lake Victoria basin that over 40million people depend on, and human rights violations.
Similar concerns have just been raised by civil society groups in the Democratic Republic of Congo following disastrous pollution recently observed by local communities. This was subsequently corroborated by a scientific report published by Environmental Law Alliance Worldwide, pertaining to cross-border oil developments in the region.
To that end, civil society groups in DRC under the banner “Our Land Without Oil” have taken their government, the government of Uganda, and the Secretary General of the East African Community to the EACJ over an ecological disaster, disrupting the livelihoods of fisher communities in Lake Albert and Lake Edward as a result of lake asphyxiation and chemical contamination linked to oil activity in the region.
While the StopEACOP Coalition holds out hope for this legal effort, the dismissal of yesterday’s case sends a chilling message to all those seeking regional remedies for regional harms: that even the highest court in the Community may refuse to hear evidence when powerful interests are at stake represents a gravely concerning injustice.
Recheal Tugume, an East African Crude Oil Pipeline-impacted community member from Hoima, said:
We must insist that the Court, and all regional institutions, do better. We will continue to demand that they live up to their mandates. But this ruling also shows us that we cannot afford the illusion that these institutions will save us.
Our survival depends on continuing the struggle on every front and with every tool available to us, organising in our communities, confronting financiers and insurers, challenging governments, and building a renewable energy future for our communities.
The StopEACOP Coalition is an alliance of local groups, communities, and African and global
organisations.
It has been calling for a stop to the proposed pipeline and associated oil fields at Tilenga and Kingfisher.
The campaign is gathering momentum, building pressure on the remaining supporters and financiers of the East African Crude Oil Pipeline.
To date, 43 banks and 30 (re) insurers have already ruled out support for EACOP.
Vinzons is a quiet coastal town in the eastern Philippines province of Camarines Norte in Bicol. With a spread out population of about 45,000. it is known for its rice production, crabs and surfing beaches in the Calaguas Islands.
But the town is really famous for one of its sons — Wenceslao “Bintao” Vinzons, the youngest lawmaker in the Philippines before the Japanese invasion during the Second World War who then took up armed resistance.
He was captured and executed along with his family in 1942.
One of the most interesting assets of the municipality of Vinzons — named after the hero in 1946, the town previously being known as Indan — is his traditional family home, which has recently been refurbished as a local museum to tell his story of courage and inspiration.
“He is something of a forgotten hero, student leader, resistance fighter, former journalist — a true hero,” says acting curator Roniel Espina.
As well as a war hero, Vinzons is revered for his progressive politics and was known as the “father of student activism” in the Philippines. His political career began at the University of Philippines in the capital Manila where he co-founded the Young Philippines Party.
The Vinzons Hall at UP-Diliman was named after him to honour his student leadership exploits.
Student newspaper editor
He was the editor-in-chief of the Philippine Collegian, the student newspaper founded in 1922.
At 24, Vinzons became the youngest delegate to the 1935 Constitutional Convention and six years later at the age of 30 he was elected Governor of Camarine Norte in 1941 — the same year that Japan invaded.
In fact, the invasion of the Philippines began on 8 December 1941 just 10 hours after the bombing of Pearl Harbour in Hawai’i.
The invading forces tried to pressure Governor Vinzons in his provincial capital of Daet to collaborate. He absolutely refused. Instead, he took to the countryside and led one of the first Filipino guerilla resistance forces to rise up against the Japanese.
His initial resistance was successful with the guerrilla forces carrying out sudden raids before liberating Daet. He was eventually captured and executed by the Japanese.
The bust of “Bintao” outside the Vinzons Town Hall. Image: Asia Pacific Report
The exact circumstances are still uncertain as his body was never recovered, but the museum does an incredible job in piecing together his life along with his family and their tragic sacrifice for the country.
One plaque shows an image of Vinzons along with his father Gabino, wife Liwayway, sister Milagros, daughter Aurora and son Alexander (no photo of him was actually recovered).
A family of Second World War martyrs . . . their bodies were never recovered. Image: Asia Pacific Report
According to the legend on the plaque:
“Wenceslao Vinzons with his father disappeared mysteriously – and were never see again. The Japanese sent out posters in Camarines Norte expressing regret that on the way to Siain, Quezon, Vinzons was shot while attempting to escape. ‘So sorry please.’
“The remains of the body of Vinzons, his father, wife, two chidren and sister have never been found.”
The Japanese Empire as portrayed in the Vinzons Museum. Video: APR
Imperial Japan showcase
One room of the museum is dedicated as a showcase to Imperial Japan and its brutal invasion across a great swathe of Southeast Asia and the brave Filipino resistance in response.
A special feature of the museum is how well it portrays typical Filipino lifestyle and social mores in a home of the political class in the 1930s.
The tourist author, Dr David Robie (red t-shirt) with acting curator Roniel Espina (left), Tourism Officer Florence G Mago (second from right) and two museum guides. Image: Asia Pacific Report
When I visited the museum and talked to staff and watched documentaries about “Bintao” Vinzons’ life, one question in particular intrigued me: “Why was he thought of as a ‘forgotten hero’?”
According to acting curator Espina, “It’s partly because Camarines Norte is not as popular and well known as some other provinces. So some of the notable achievements of Vinzons do not have a high profile around in other parts of the country.”
Based at the museum is the town’s principal Tourism Officer Florence G Mago. She is optimistic about how the Vinzons Museum can attract more visitors to the town.
“We have put a lot of effort into developing this museum and we are proud of it. It is a jewel in the town.”
The Vinzons family home . . . now refurbished as the town museum under the National Historical Institute umbrella. Image: Asia Pacific Report
As activist groups around the world observe December 1 — flag-raising “independence” day for West Papua today marking when the Morning Star flag was flown in 1961 for the first time — Kristo Langker reports from the Highlands about how the Indonesian military is raising the stakes.
SPECIAL REPORT:By Kristo Langker in Kiwirok, West Papua
While DropSite News usually reports on, and from, parts of the world where the US war machine operates, in this story, the weaponry in question is made by a multinational French weapons manufacturer and Chinese manufacturer.
However, you will see the structure is the same — the Indonesian government using drones and helicopters to terrorise and displace the people of West Papua, while the historical reason imperial interests loom over the region stems from a US mining project in the 1960s.
The videos in this story are well worth watching — exclusive interviews with the guerilla group fighting off the drones and airplanes with bows and arrows.
A still from a video of Embraer EMB 314 Super Tucano bombing and strafing the mountains of Kiwirok on October 6, 2025. Video: Lamek Taplo and Ngalum Kupel, TPNPB
On 25 September 2025, Lamek Taplo, the guerilla leader of a wing of the West Papua National Liberation Army (Tentara Pembebasan Nasional Papua Barat, or TPNPB), left the jungle with his command to launch a series of raids on Indonesian military posts.
Indonesia had established three new military posts in the Star Mountains region in the past year, according to NGO Human Rights Monitor, with sources on the ground telling Drop Site News that nearby civilian houses and facilities — including a church, schools, and a health clinic — had been forcibly occupied in support of the military build-up.
5 Indonesian soldiers shot
Despite being severely outgunned, the command shot five Indonesian soldiers, killing one, while suffering no casualties themselves, according to Taplo and other members of his group.
The raids continued for three more days. The command shot the fuselage of a helicopter and burned five buildings that Taplo’s group claimed were occupied by Indonesian security forces.
Taplo was killed less than three weeks later by an apparent drone strike. During an October 13 interview a week before his death, Taplo, a former teacher himself, told Drop Site why TPNPB targeted a school:
“It’s because they (Indonesian military) used it as their base. There’s no teacher — only Indonesians. I know, because I was the teacher there, too . . . Indonesia sent ‘teachers’. However, they’re actually military intelligence.”
School building set on fire by the TPNPB on September 27, 2025. Image: Ngalum Kupel/TPNPB
Indonesia has laid claim to the western half of New Guinea island since the 1960s with the backing of the US. For the past year, the Indonesian military has ramped up its indiscriminate attacks on subsistence farming villages, especially those that deny Indonesian rule.
The military presence has been growing exponentially after the October 2024 inauguration of President Prabowo Subianto, who is implicated in historic massacres in Papua from his time as commander of Indonesia’s special forces — called Komando Pasukan Khusus or “Kopassus”.
According to witnesses interviewed in Kiwirok and its surrounding hamlets, and documented in videos, there are now snipers stationed along walking tracks, and civilians have been shot and killed attempting to retrieve their pigs.
Indonesian retaliated
Indonesia immediately retaliated against TPNPB’s September attacks by sending two consumer-grade DJI Mavic drones, rigged with servo motors, to drop Pindad-manufactured hand grenades.
One drone targeted a hut that Taplo claimed did not house TPNPB but belonged to civilians.
No one was killed as the grenade bounced off the sheet metal roof and exploded a few meters away. The other drone flew over a group of TPNPB raising the Morning Star flag of West Papua but was taken down by the guerrillas before a grenade could be dropped.
Ngalum Kupel TPNPB celebrating the capture of a drone. September 28, 2025.
Holding the downed drone and grenade, Taplo likened the ordeal to Moses parting the Red Sea for the escaping Israelites: “It’s like Firaun and Moses . . . It was a miracle.”
Then joking: “The bomb (grenade) was caught since it’s like the cucumber we eat.”
Lamek Taplo holding a downed DJI Mavic drone and Pindad grenade on 28 September 2025. Image: Ngalum Kupel/TPNPB
Over the next few weeks, a series of heavier aerial bombardments followed.
Video evidence
Videos taken by Taplo show two Embraer EMB 314 Super Tucano turboprop aircraft darting through the air, followed by the thunderous sound of ordnance hitting the mountains.
Despite the fact that thousands of West Papuans have been killed in bombings like these since the 1970s, Taplo’s videos are the first to ever capture an aerial bombardment from the ground in West Papua, owing to the extreme isolation of the interior.
In fact, many highland West Papuans’ first contact with the outside world was with Indonesian military campaigns.
Ostensibly a counter-insurgency operation against a guerrilla independence movement, these bombings are primarily hitting civilians — tribal communities of subsistence farmers.
The few fighters Indonesia is targeting are poorly armed lacking bullets, let alone bombs — and live on ancestral land with their families. The most ubiquitous weapon among these groups remains the bow and arrow.
Taplo told Drop Site the bombings began on Monday, October 6.
“Firstly they (Indonesia) did an unorganised attack: they dropped the bomb randomly . . . they just dropped it everywhere. You can see where the smoke was coming from.
“Even though it was an Indonesian military house, they just dropped it on there anyway. That was the first one; then they came back. The first place bombed after was a civilian house; the second was our base.”
Embraer EMB 314 Super Tucano bombing and strafing the mountains. October 6, 2025
Former Dutch colony
West Papua was a Dutch colony until 1962, when Indonesia, after a bitter dispute with the Netherlands, secured Washington’s backing to take over the territory.
Just three years after Washington tipped the scales in favour of Indonesia in their dispute with the Netherlands, the nationalist Indonesian President Sukarno was ousted in a US-backed military coup in 1965.
Hundreds of thousands of Indonesian leftists (or suspected leftists) were killed in just a few months by the new regime led by General Suharto.
Indonesia’s acquisition of West Papua is often treated as an event peripheral to this coup, yet both events held a symbiotic relationship that would become the impetus for many of the mass killings perpetrated by Indonesia in West Papua.
Forbes Wilson, the former vice-president of US mining giant Freeport, visited Indonesia in June 1966, and in his book, The Conquest of Copper Mountain, he boasts that he and several other Freeport executives were among the first foreigners to visit Indonesia after the events of 1965.
Wilson was there to negotiate with the new business friendly Suharto regime, particularly regarding the terms of Freeport’s Ertsberg mine, which was set to be located under Puncak Jaya — the tallest mountain in Oceania.
This mine eventually became the world’s largest gold and copper mine and Indonesia’s largest single taxpayer. The mine’s existence was one of the primary reasons Indonesia gained international backing to launch a vicious Malanesian frontier war against the native and then-largely uncontacted Papuan highlanders.
The “war” continues to this day, though it is largely unlike other modern conflicts.
Like frontier ‘wars’
Instead, the concerted Indonesian attacks are most comparable to the US and Australian frontier wars. Indonesia, one of the world’s largest and most well-armed militaries, is steadily wiping out some of the world’s last pre-industrial indigenous cultures and people.
West Papuans have fought back, forming the Free Papua Movement (Organisasi Papua Merdeka, or OPM) and its various splinter armed wings, whose most prominent one is the TPNPB.
Due to the impenetrable terrain of the mountain highlands, the Indonesian military has difficulty fighting the TPNPB on the ground, often instead resorting to indiscriminate aerial bombardments.
The TPNPB’s fight is as much about West Papuan independence as it is an effort by localised tribal communities and landowners using whatever means to prevent Indonesian massacres and land theft.
“No army has ever come to protect the people. I live with the people, because there’s no military to protect my people,” Taplo said in a video sent just before his death.
“From 2021 until this year 2025, I have not left my land; I have not left the land of my birth.”
In October 2021, the Indonesian military launched one of these bombing campaigns in the remote Kiwirok district and its surrounding hamlets in the Star Mountains — deep in the heart of the island of New Guinea.
Little information
Because of this isolation, very little information about these bombings trickled out of the mountains — save for a few images of unexploded mortars and burning huts.
Only a handful journalists, including the author of this article, have been able to visit the area, and it took years and multiple visits to the Star Mountains for the full scale of the 2021 attacks to be reported.
It was eventually revealed that the Indonesian assaults included the use of most likely Airbus helicopters that shoot FZ-68 2.75-inch rockets, designed by French multinational defence contractor Thales, and reinforced by Blowfish A3 drones manufactured by the Chinese company Ziyan.
These drones boast an artificial intelligence driven swarm function by which they litter villagers’ subsistence farms and huts with mortars improvised with proximity fuzes manufactured by the Serbian company Krušik.
A largely remote, open-source investigation by German NGO Human Rights Monitor revealed that hundreds of huts and buildings were destroyed in this attack. More than 2000 villagers were displaced, and they still hide in makeshift jungle camps.
“The systematic nature of these attacks prompts questions of crimes against humanity under the Rome Statute,” the report noted. Additionally, witnesses interviewed by this author gave the names of hundreds who died of starvation and illness after the bombings.
With little food, shelter, weapons, or even internet to connect them to the outside world, many of the thousands of Ngalum-Kupel people displaced since 2021 are displaced again — likely to die without anyone knowing — mirroring countless Indonesian campaigns to depopulate the mountains to make way for resource projects.
Long-term effects
The impact of the latest wave of attacks in October 2025 is likely to be felt for years, as the bombs destroyed food gardens and shelters and displaced people who were already living in nothing more than crowded tarpaulins held up by branches, while having already been forced to hide in the jungle after the 2021 bombings.
“It is the same situation with Palestine and Israel — people are now living without their home,” said Taplo.
Lamek Taplo (standing) in jungle camp on 15 October 2025. Image: Ngalum Kupel/TPNPB
On 6 October 2025, Indonesia retaliated further, deploying two aircraft that aviation sources confirmed to be Brazilian-made Embraer EMB 314 Super Tucano turboprops. These planes were filmed bombing and strafing the mountains.
Drop Site confirmed that some of the shrapnel collected after these attacks is from Thales’s FZ 2.75-inch rockets — the same rockets used in the 2021 attacks.
Shrapnel from Thales FZ rockets on 6 October 2025. Image: Ngalum Kupel/TPNPB
In January this year, Thales’s Belgium and state-owned defence company, Indonesian Aerospace, put out a press release titled: “Indonesian Aerospace and Thales Belgium Reactivate Rocket Production Partnership,” which boasted the integration of Thales designed FZ 2.75-inch rockets with the Embraer Supertucano aircraft.
Though these were not the only ordnance deployed, some of the impact zones measured over 20m, and the shrapnel found in these craters was far heavier and larger than that from the Thales rockets.
Shrapnel ‘no joke’
“It’s no joke. It was long and big. It could destroy a village . . . ” said Taplo before picking up a piece of shrapnel around 20cm long.
“This is five kilograms,” he said, weighing the remnants.
Inspecting Impact zone from bombings on 6 October 2025.
A former Australian Defence Force air-to-ground specialist told Drop Site that the large size of the shrapnel and nature of the scarring and cratering indicate that the bomb was not a modern style munition. It was most likely an MK-81 RI Live, a variant of the 110kg MK-81 developed and manufactured by Indonesian state-owned defence contractor Pindad.
“This weapon system is unguided, and given the steep terrain, it is unlikely that a dive attack could easily be used, providing the enhanced risk of collateral damage or indiscriminate targeting given the weapons envelope,” the specialist said. Pindad did not respond to Drop Site’s request for comment.
Shrapnel from MK-81 bombs on 12 October 2025. Image: Ngalum Kupel/TPNPB
Photos from a February Pindad press release about the development of the MK-81 RI Live show these bombs loaded on an Indonesian Embraer Supertucano.
An Indonesian Embraer EMB 314 Super Tucano loaded with the Pindad MK-81 RI Live in February, 2025. Image: PT Pindad Public Relations Doc
A week later, Indonesia hit again. At around 3am, on October 12, a reconnaissance aircraft flew over the camp where Taplo’s command and their families were sleeping, waking them just in time to evacuate before another round of bombs were dropped == again, most likely the MK-81 RI Live.
Bomb strike on video
Taplo captured the bomb’s strike and aftermath on video. Clearly shaken, he makes an appeal for help, saying “UN peacekeeping forces quickly come to Kiwirok to give us freedom, because our life is traumatic . . .
“Even the kids are traumatised; they live in the forest, and seek help from their parents, ‘Dad help me. Indonesia dropped the bomb on the place I lived in.’”
On the morning of October 19, a drone dropped a bomb on a hut near where Taplo was staying. Initially, the bomb didn’t detonate, leaving enough time for civilians to evacuate the area.
After the evacuation, Taplo and three men returned to remove the ordnance, which then detonated and instantly killed Lamek Taplo and three others — Nalson Uopmabin, 17; Benim Kalakmabin, 20; and Ike Taplo, 22.
The bodies of slain TPNPB members on October 19, 2025. Image: Ngalum Kupel/TPNPB
Speaking to Drop Site just hours after Taplo was killed, eyewitnesses say the drone was larger than the DJI Mavics deployed earlier and were similar in size to the Ziyan drones from 2021.
Photos taken of the remnants of the bomb show the tail of what was most likely an 81mm mortar.
“The presence of drones — similar to that of DJI quadcopters and [with] improvised fins for aerial guidance — have been employed [just as] ISIS used those weapons systems in Syria,” the former Australian Defence Force air-to-ground specialist told Drop Site.
The mortar piece that killed Commander Lamek Taplo and three others. October 20, 2025. Image: Ngalum Kupel/TPNPB
Plea to Pacific nations
On October 26, civilians in Kiwirok sent an appeal to the government of Papua New Guinea and other Pacific Island nations. So far, there has been no response, despite these bombings occurring on Papua New Guinea’s border.
The last communication Drop Site received from Kiwirok indicated that the bombings were continuing and the mountains still swarmed with drones — limiting any chance of escape.
Pictures posted on social media in November by members of Indonesian security forces, those stationed in Kiwirok, give some insight into the level of zeal with which Indonesia is fighting this campaign.
An Indonesian soldier can be seen wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with a skull wearing night vision goggles, a gun, and a lightning bolt forming a cross behind it. The caption reads “Black Zone Kiwirok.”
A “Black Zone Kiwirok” T-shirt on 19 November 2025. Souurce: Instagram post by Indonesian soldier
Another photo shows soldiers sitting in front of a banner which reads “Kompi Tempur Rajawali 431 Pemburu” — a reference to the elite “Eagle Hunter” units set up in the mid 1990s by then-General Prabowo Subianto to hunt down Falantil guerillas in Timor Leste.
As there has been no record of these units being deployed in Papua — nor of an “Eagle Hunter” unit made up of soldiers from the 431st Infantry Battalion — it is unclear whether these banners are just Suharto-era nationalism on display, or if they signify that these units have been revived.
A “Kompi Tempur Rajawali 431 Pemburu” regimental banner on 19 November 2025. Source: An Instagram post by Indonesian soldier
On his final phone call with the outside world, just before the signal cut out, Taplo vowed to continue the TPNPB’s fight: “We will fight for hundreds of days . . .
“We will fight . . . This war is by God. We have asked for power; we have prayed for nature’s power. This is our culture.”
Four Papuan political prisoners have been sentenced to seven months’ imprisonment on treason charges.
But a West Papua independence advocate says Indonesia is using its law to silence opposition.
In April this year, letters were delivered to government institutions in Sorong West Papua, asking for peaceful dialogue between Indonesia’s President Prabowo Subianto and a group seeking to make West Papua independent of Indonesia, the Federal Republic of West Papua.
Four people were arrested for delivering the letters, and this triggered protests, which became violent.
West Papua Action Aotearoa’s Catherine Delahunty said Indonesia claims the four, known as the Sorong Four, caused instability.
“What actually caused instability was arresting people for delivering letters, and the Indonesians refused to acknowledge that actually people have a right to deliver letters,” she said.
“They have a right to have opinions, and they will continue to protest when those rights are systematically denied.”
Category of ‘treason’
Indonesia’s Embassy based in Wellington said the central government had been involved in the legal process, but the letters fell into the category of “treason” under the national crime code.
Delahunty said the arrests were in line with previous action the Indonesian government had taken in response to West Papua independence protests.
“This is the kind of use of an abuse of law that happens all the time in order to shut down any form of dissent and leadership. In the 1930s we would call this fascism. It is a military occupation using all the law to actually suppress the people.”
Delahunty said the situation was an abuse of human rights and it was happening less than an hour away from Darwin in northern Australia.
The spokesperson for Indonesia’s embassy said the government had been closely monitoring the case at arm’s length to avoid accusations of overreach.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Oracle is the database and cloud computing company which is owned by Larry Ellison. Ellison wasn’t that well known in the UK until recently, but he became infamous after it was revealed he backs the Tony Blair Institute.
Larry Ellison, Oracle founder and Trump fan, gave £300m to the Tony Blair Institute. Oracle already holds £1 billion in existing UK government cloud contracts with the Home Office, Ministry of Justice, and DWP. In November 2025, the Home Office quietly extended Oracle’s deal by… pic.twitter.com/8RWaNfrLJc
There are many technologies which are labelled ‘AI’, but the most notable in recent years has been ‘generative AI’ — i.e. the tech which drives text, image, and music generators like ChatGPT, Sora 2, and Suno.
In simple terms, these systems are predictive engines, which means they generate content by predicting what happens next. While this technology is impressive, it suffers from ‘hallucinations’, which is the technical term for ‘making stuff up’. These hallucinations are an intrinsic part of the generative process, and as of right now there seems to be no way of stopping them.
One key problem with the generative AI boom is that the hallucination problem makes this technology impractical for many work places. It’s difficult to rely on software which works well sometimes but shits the bed when you’re not expecting it. The issue creates a situation in which users have to handhold their AI tools, and this means the time AI saves is lost in other ways. This is why one report found 95% of AI pilots failed, and another found 42% of companies abandoned their AI initiatives in 2025.
The other issue is AI companies like OpenAI have been attracting investment by claiming generative AI — a predictive technology — will one day turn into general artificial intelligence, a thinking technology. Some people believe this is possible; others do not:
This may bruise the egos of scaling believers like @sama and @DarioAmodei who’ve bet billions, but, no — AGI won’t magically “emerge” just by making LLMs bigger. No memory. No world model. Just pattern-matching. The problem is the *architecture* — not the size.
Regardless of who’s right, the current state of play is:
These companies are not making significant profit from AI products.
There are no signs that their tech will magically turn into AGI.
Or that was the state of play, anyway. A recent leak revealed by tech journalist Ed Zitron showed that:
Open AI’s services cost a lot more to run that we thought.
Open AI’s services make a lot less money that we thought.
Exclusive: Based on documents viewed by this newsletter, OpenAI spent over $12.4 billion on inference from 2024 to September 2025. As part of its Microsoft revenue share, it sent $493.8m in 2024/$865.8m Jan-Sep 2025, implying lower revenues than previously reported.
www.wheresyoured.at/oai_docs/
Hello @NintendoEurope@Nintendo@NintendoAmerica this video confuses me as a consumer and makes me think less of Pokémon and Nintendo as a brand. I will never be purchasing any Nintendo related merchandise or watching any Pokemon related media because of this video. https://t.co/MAQumaIk9c
These data centres cost billions and use significant amounts of electricity:
Data centres consume 5% of America’s electricity, up from 2% a decade ago. The International Energy Agency projects nearly 10% by 2030. More at today’s Chartbook Top Links: pic.twitter.com/5K4AiXOAo8
Additionally, it turns out the GPUs data centres are using are advancing so quickly that they need to be replaced every few years, as CITP blog reports:
One unnamed Google architect assessed that GPUs running at 60-70% utilization—standard for AI workloads—survive one to two years, with three years as a maximum. The reason: thermal and electrical stress is simply too high.
But physical failure isn’t the only concern. Technological obsolescence drives replacement cycles. Nvidia’s GB200 (“Blackwell”) chip provides 4-5x faster inference than the H100. When competitors deploy hardware with significantly better performance, three-year-old chips become economically obsolete even if they still function.
In other words, these unfathomably expensive data centres are somehow more expensive than we realised. Combine this with the fact that many of the newer ones exist solely to support a failing technology, and you can see why stock valuations are plummeting.
Oracle
We’ve no idea how long it will take for all this to come crashing down, but we can say this; do not invest in these companies right now.
We’ll add that with a company named ‘Oracle’, Larry Ellison really should have seen this coming.
The children’s names were Fadi Abu Assi and Goma Abu Assi.
Since killing the children, the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) have tried to claim it was actually the victims who violated the ceasefire:
CEASEFIRE VIOLATION: IDF troops identified two suspects who crossed the yellow line, carried out suspicious activities, and approached the troops in southern Gaza, posing an immediate threat. The IAF eliminated the suspects to remove the threat.
They are children…what did they do? They do not have missiles or bombs, they went to gather wood for their father so he can start a fire.
According to Gaza’s Health Ministry, Israel has killed 352 Palestinians since the October 10 ceasefire. Accordingly, Hamas are demanding mediators step in to stop Israel from killing them. The most consequential mediator is of course Donald Trump, but the president seems more focussed on other matters right now:
Trump “closes” Venezuela airspace over a fake drug war.
But he isn’t president of Venezuela.
Trump is pardoning former Honduran puppet Orlando Hernandez.
You can help to exert pressure by writing to your MP and demanding our government stand up to Israel’s violations. You can also support agencies which are helping Palestinians on the ground.
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) announced that it recorded approximately 9,300 cases of severe malnutrition among children under the age of five in the Gaza Strip during the month of October 2025.
In its statement, the organisation warned that high levels of malnutrition continue to seriously threaten children’s lives and health. And with the onset of winter, weather conditions are exacerbating the crisis through the spread of disease and falling temperatures. As a result, increasing mortality rates are soaring among the most vulnerable groups.
Gaza’s starving population
UNICEF explained that tests conducted by its teams and partners in Gaza last month revealed these large numbers of children suffering from acute malnutrition. And, the organisation confirmed that large shipments of winter supplies remain stuck at the border. They have called, once again, for humanitarian aid to be delivered safely and without hindrance.
In this context, Catherine Russell, Executive Director of UNICEF, said:
Despite progress, thousands of children under the age of five remain acutely malnourished in Gaza, while many more lack proper shelter, sanitation and protection against winter.
And, Russell also stressed the urgency of the situation:
Too many children in Gaza are still facing hunger, illness and exposure to cold temperatures, conditions that are putting their lives at risk. Every minute counts to protect these children.
It is estimated that the Gaza Strip needs around 300,000 tents and prefabricated housing units to provide minimum shelter for the population, following the widespread destruction caused by Israel’s war of extermination over the past two years.
Arab Cup coach Ihab Abu Jazar is a native of Palestine with a storied football career as both player and coach. Hailing from Rafah in the southernmost part of Gaza, he knows exactly what it means to play football under war and grow up under siege.
And, he spent many years on the pitches of the Gaza Strip as a player and coach before becoming the technical director of the Palestinian national team. Undoubtedly, he is now carrying with him the memory of a city ravaged by conflict and a people waiting for any moment of joy in which to celebrate life.
From Gaza to the Arab Cup
Abu Jazar did not come to the national team from a traditional career path, but rather burdened with memories of war, the loss of friends, and the sound of rockets that were closer to the pitches than the goalposts. This background made his speech at half time in the qualifying match between Palestine and Libya a pivotal moment unlike any other familiar sporting speech.
Abu Jazar’s speech between halves of the Palestine-Libya match was not merely technical guidance. It was an explicit reference to the pain of Gaza, when he entered the dressing room and stood in front of his players, saying in his Gazan dialect, familiar to every Palestinian:
Don’t forget who we are playing for. We are excellent in the match, but there are people in tents, there is an entire people, there are people in Jerusalem, there are people who cannot find food because of hunger, siege and war. You are the ones who want to make them happy temporarily. They must be happy so they can forget death, destruction and war. We are about to die, but God willing, we will win.
The speech was not just meant to boost morale, but was a reminder of the pain of a nation living under fire. It was a reminder to the players, were it needed, that their performance was no longer just a game, but the only source of joy for millions who had lost the meaning of normal life.
Joy for Palestine
While the original 90 minutes ended in a goalless draw, the Palestinian players took their coach’s words to heart and won the penalty shootout 4–3. In doing so, they secured a place in the Arab Cup alongside Qatar, Tunisia, and Syria. Their qualification was not just a sporting achievement, but a crowning glory for a people trying to steal a moment of victory from the rubble of war.
Today, Abu Jazar is seen as more than just a coach. He is a living witness to a war that continues to ravage his city and a symbol of Gaza’s unbreakable spirit. Every time he stands on the sideline, he carries with him Rafah, with all its tears, salt, and renewed hope that football can still work miracles when the world is unable to stop the tragedy.
Qualifying was not just a sporting achievement, but a small window of hope for the people of Gaza, who today live in tents and under the rubble of war. Abu Jazar, whose home and city remain under fire, has taught us that sport is not an escape from reality, but sometimes a vital space for resistance.
With this qualification, Ihab Abu Jazar has become a symbol of a coach who came from the heart of suffering, leading his players with the spirit of a city that continues to resist, and with words that created an unforgettable moment in the history of the Palestinian national team.
The Israeli occupation forces (IOF) claim it has killed more than 30 Palestinian resistance fighters in Eastern Rafah who have attempted to exit their tunnels, as of November 28. An estimated 60-80 fighters from Hamas’ military wing, al-Qassam Brigades, remain beneath eastern Rafah. According to a prominent Hamas official, the fighters are “under siege” .
ELIMINATED: 9 additional terrorists were located in underground terror infrastructure in eastern Rafah
The terrorists were most likely eliminated during the IDF’s ongoing efforts to dismantle the underground infrastructure sites through aerial strikes & engineering measures.…
This line does not only allow the IOF to remain in control of more than half of the Gaza Strip. It also means Hamas tunnel shafts, which are behind the yellow line, are now in areas controlled by the occupation. These areas are supposed to be no go areas for Palestinians. So resistance fighters operating underground, who were active at the moment the ‘ceasefire’ took effect, are now isolated. They are also vulnerable to attack by ‘Israel’.
Hamas publicly acknowledged this situation for the first time, on November 26, when it released a statement. It said the occupation had committed a brutal crime “through the pursuit, elimination, and arrest of the besieged mujahideen (fighters) in the tunnels of Rafah”. Hamas claims that by killing and arresting them, while they are leaving the tunnels, ‘Israel’s’ actions “constitute a flagrant violation of the Gaza ceasefire agreement, and is compelling evidence of the ongoing attempts to undermine the agreement”.
Hamas says it holds the occupation “fully responsible” for the fighters’ safety. It also criticises ‘Israel’ for “undermining the efforts of mediators”. Hamas says they have been working towards ending the suffering of its fighters and facilitating their return home.
‘Israel’ refused safe passage for fighters from Rafah tunnels back to liberated areas of Gaza
The US has reportedly been pressuring the Israeli regime to allow safe passage for Hamas fighters trapped in the Rafah tunnels. But Netanyahu’s Office has refused this idea, stating it “is not allowing safe passage for 200 Hamas terrorists”.
In its statement, Hamas is calling on mediators to continue pressuring the occupation to allow the safe return of its fighters. It notes that the Qassam Brigade fighters stuck in the tunnels are a “unique model of sacrifice, heroism, and patience”. It calls them “a symbol of the dignity and freedom of the Palestinian people”. Dignity, patience, sacrifice and heroism are all virtues the Israeli occupying forces will never ever embody.
The Israeli regime has reportedly sent a proposal to senior Hamas officials. It claims it would permit Palestinian resistance fighters to emerge from the tunnels if they surrender. These Palestinians must also agree to be detained in the occupation’s prisons. They would then supposedly be eligible for release if they agreed to disarm.
The enemy should know that in our dictionary, surrendering and handing oneself over to the occupier has no meaning.
Defense Minister Israel Katz posted on X that he would “prioritise the destruction of the tunnels as the central task in the yellow zone”. Yet after more than two years of relentless attacks in Gaza, the Zionist regime has been unable to destroy the majority of Hamas tunnels. Katz himself claims that 60 percent still remain.
Tunnels — A vital tool for resistance
Tunnels in Gaza date back decades. Early uses were by groups like the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine to evade capture and resist incursions. Hamas expanded its tunnel network post-1987. This was mainly due to the outbreak of the First Intifada, a grassroots uprising against ‘Israel’s’ then 20 year military occupation. It began in December 1987, and resulted in 1100 Palestinians killed and more than 100,000 injured.
Hamas was founded that same year as an Islamist resistance group for the liberation of Palestine. It began developing underground infrastructure for smuggling weapons, evading Israeli forces, and sustaining operations amid intensified crackdowns. Tunnels then shifted from sporadic use to systematic expansion. They enabled the resistance to bypass military patrols and import essentials under blockade pressures.
The Israeli occupation’s frequent lockdowns and destruction of Gaza’s infrastructure like its airport and seaport by 2001, fuelled tunnel growth. These were a “safety valve” for goods and arms. Hamas, alongside other factions, oversaw deeper, longer tunnels to fund operations and counter Israeli superiority. These tunnels were viewed as tools of defiance during the First Intifada. This era laid the groundwork for tunnels to become integral to resistance logistics by the 1990s.
Armed resistance against occupation is legal, ethnic cleansing and genocide are not
These structures symbolise immense ingenuity against superior military power. The resistance may not match the Israeli occupation’s strength, advanced technology or firepower, but it demonstrates resourcefulness and adaptability. The criminal Israeli regime relies on its cutting edge equipment and well funded forces. Al-Qassam and other resistance groups rely only on their intimate knowledge of guerrilla tactics and the terrain. And their extensive network of underground tunnels to challenge the occupying power.
Palestinians remain subject to an occupying power that alters borders, terms and obligations with impunity. What was sold as a pause in violence has instead left these Palestinian freedom fighters isolated. They are cut off from their communities and are being denied protections that should be guaranteed under international law. The entrapment of these men makes clear no ceasefire can hold when one side can systematically violate it, and not be held accountable. While this injustice continues, Palestinians remain at the mercy of an occupation that aims to ethnically cleanse the entire Gaza Strip, through a genocide if it can get away with it.
As we’ve said before, vessel strikes on narco-terrorists will continue until their the poisoning of the American people stops.
Today, at the direction of President Trump, the Department of War carried out a lethal kinetic strike on a vessel operated by a Designated Terrorist… pic.twitter.com/gQF9LpSjqD
Importantly, whether the people on these boats were drug runners or not, it’s illegal to just blow them up. One person who seemingly doesn’t care about this reality, however, is the US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth:
The technical term for what America is doing is an act of ‘extra-judicial killings’, which means they’re murdering people outside the confines of the law. While any sort of killing is bad, the problem with normalising unauthorised murder is simply this: where does it end?
You might agree with blowing up drug runners, but you probably wouldn’t like being blown up yourself. But once the cat’s out of the murder bag, nothing is off the table.
“These are criminals, not soldiers. Criminals are civilians,” said Mr Moreno Ocampo of the US allegations against the boat crews. “They are criminals, and we should do better at investigating them, prosecuting them and controlling them, but not killing people,” he told the BBC.
It’s actually a degree worse than this too, we don’t even know that the slain individuals were even drug runners. This is the problem with blowing people up before asking them questions. And again, you might think you agree with this, but what you’re agreeing to is a future in which you’re one false accusation away from being drone struck.
Hegseth’s latest statements have drawn criticism from figures including congressman Ted Lieu:
Dear @SecWar: I read the classified legal memo. Nothing in the memo, or military law, authorizes a second kinetic strike against defenseless survivors. If the reports are true, then a war crime was committed.
The above was in response to the accusation that Hegseth is personally ordering murders:
Exclusive: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave an order to “kill everybody” in the first strike on suspected drug boats in the Caribbean. After two men survived, the mission commander ordered a second strike to comply with Hegseth’s instructions, according to two sources.…
The fact that he’s reportedly been busted doing war crimes could suggest why Hegseth is lashing out and doubling down. As people are pointing out, however, the future is looking very bleak for Hegseth given that his boss Donald Trump is clearly too self-involved to push through the Fourth Reich they were relying on:
Based on the Commander’s Legal Handbook issued by the Judge Advocate General, Pete Hegseth’s orders for a second strike to execute survivors were illegal and constitute a war crime.
Note to Pete Hegseth:
Banking on a Trump pardon to shield you from accountability for ordering extrajudicial killings in the Caribbean Sea – won’t work in countries under ICC jurisdiction who will send you to The Hague. Tick fucking tock. pic.twitter.com/7f7wbccpNS
In Trump’s first term, his main obstacle to getting his own way was the fact that his underlings were constantly working against him. In his second term, he attempted to rectify this problem by only hiring loyalists. The problem is that Trump loyalists range from ‘stupid’ to ‘unhinged’ to ‘intoxicated’, with Hegseth reportedly being all three.
Of course, while the stupidity of these people will likely prevent them from instigating 1,000 years of Trumpism, that doesn’t mean they won’t do tremendous damage between now and 2028.
At a time when death has been stealing Gaza’s breath for two years of unrelenting war, the Palestinian national football team stands ready to compete in the Arab Cup with heavy hearts and shoulders carrying more than just their team jerseys. They hold an entire homeland, living under fire and seeking respite and a glimmer of hope in football.
Amidst the tents of displacement and the rubble of destroyed homes, and from the silence of Palestinian stadiums that have been shut down by war, the team emerges to remind the world that Palestine is not just breaking news, but a people who want to live and play.
Abu Jazar: ‘we are playing the opening match against Qatar with the pain of Gaza in our hearts’
During the press conference ahead of the Arab Cup opening match against Qatar, the team’s technical director, Ihab Abu Jazar, spoke not only as a coach but as a Palestinian who has experienced the most painful details. He says sincerely, reflecting the sentiments of the Gazans:
We are happy to be in the Arab Cup. This is an important milestone for our people, even more so than for the football team. We will play until our last breath. This is our people’s right.
Although the road was paved with difficulties, the team managed to overcome Libya in the play-offs to secure its place in the tournament, before finding itself in a ‘world-class’ group, which includes two teams that qualified for the World Cup It begins its Arab Cup journey with an opening match against the Asian champions, Qatar.
Abu Jazar said:
The task is difficult, yes, but we are holding on to our chances and we trust our players. We have some significant absences, but we have a spirit that never fades.
Palestine has no league, but its spirit is bigger than the pitch
Since the start of Israel’s genocide, the Palestinian league has been suspended and players have been scattered between the inside and outside, but the technical staff has found a way to fight on another front: expanding the roster and bringing in 18 new players to compensate for the absence of influential players, foremost among them Wissam Abu Ali.
Abu Jazar explained at the Arab Cup press conference:
Expanding the roster is a necessity. We don’t have a local league, so we are looking to quickly build chemistry. We have young players, but they have the spirit of Palestine.
He pointed out that the short training periods for the new players are not ideal, but they are sufficient to establish a new team formation:
We reached our peak performance in the qualifiers, and we want to continue. Despite everything, the team will look different.
The Arab Cup awaits
The Palestinian coach praised the supportive Arab position, particularly in allowing Palestinian players to be registered as ‘local players’ in the leagues, which has preserved the careers of a number of players during the suspension of activity in their homeland.
He says:
We thank all the Arab federations that helped our players. In the shadow of war, these positions were a real support.
The Palestinian team is not playing for points in the Arab Cup, nor is it just looking for a second place or a sporting achievement. It is entering the Arab Cup to tell the world:
We are here… despite the destruction, despite the siege, despite the war.
The players carry images of Gaza in their hearts, scenes of children in camps, the faces of mothers waiting for good news, not bad news.
Abu Jazar concluded by saying:
Palestine has a great legacy of struggle… and we are on a national mission. We want to make our people happy, and we feel proud to carry our country’s flag.
Its players run on the pitch as if they were running on the land of a stolen homeland, raising their heads as if they were raising the flag of a country trying to triumph for life, and facing every team with a style that resembles the resilience of their people:
Every ball is resistance, every pass is steadfastness, and every match is a whole nation fighting to survive.
The origin of the expression “tuckered out” goes back to the east of the United States around the 1830s.
After New Englanders began to compare the wrinkled and drawn appearance of overworked and undernourished horses and dogs to the appearance of tucked cloth, it became associated with people being exhausted.
Expressions such as this can be adapted, sometimes with a little generosity, to apply to other circumstances.
This adaptation includes when a prominent far right propagandist and activist who, in a level of frustration that resembles mental exhaustion, lashes out against far right leaders and governments that he has been strongly supportive of.
Tariq Ali . . . reposts revealing far right lament. Image: politicalbytes.blog
This came to my attention when reading a frustrated far right lament reposted on Facebook (27 November) by British-Pakistani socialist Tariq Ali.
If anything meets the threshold for a passionate expression of grief or sorrow, this one did.
The lament was from Tucker Carlson, an American far right political commentator who hosted a nightly political talk show on Fox News from 2016 to 2023 when his contract was terminated.
Since then he has hosted his own show under his name on fellow extremist Elon Musk’s X (formerly Twitter). Arguably Carlson is the most influential far right host in the United States (perhaps also more influential than the mainstream rightwing).
He is someone who the far right government of Israel considered to be an unshakable ally.
Carlson’s lament
The lament is brief but cuts to the chase:
There is no such thing as “God’s chosen people”.
God does not choose child-killers.
This is heresy — these are criminals and thieves.
350 million Americans are struggling to survive,
and we send $26 billion to a country most Americans can’t even name the capital of.
His lament doubled as a “declaration of war” on the entire narrative Israel uses to justify its genocide in Gaza. But Carlson didn’t stop there. He went on to expose the anger boiling inside the United States.
President Donald Trump . . . also the target of Carlson’s lament. Image: politicalbytes.blog
The clip hit the US media big time including 48 million views in the first nine hours. Subsequently a CNN poll showed that 62 percent of Americans agree with Carlson and that support for Israel among Americans is collapsing.
But Carlson went much further directly focussing on fellow far right Donald Trump who he had “supported”.
By focussing the US’s money, energy, and foreign policy on Israel, Trump was betraying his promises to Americans.
This signifies a major falling out including a massive public shift against Israel (which is also losing its media shield), the far right breaking ranks, and panic within the political establishment.
Marjorie Taylor Greene . . . another prominent far right leader who has fallen out with Trump. Image: politicalbytes.blog
It should also be seen in the context of the extraordinary public falling out with President Trump of another leading far right extremist (and conspiracy theorist) Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. In addition to the issues raised by Carlson she also focussed on Trump’s handling of the Epstein files controversy.
Far right in New Zealand politics
The far right publicly fighting among itself over its core issues is very significant for the US given its powerful influence.
This influence includes not just the presidency but also both Congress and the Senate, one of the two dominant political parties, and the Supreme Court (and a fair chunk of the rest of the judiciary).
Does this development offer insights for politics in New Zealand? To begin with the far right here has nowhere near the same influence as in the United States.
The parties that make up the coalition government are hard right rather than far right (that is, hardline but still largely respectful of the formal democratic institutions).
It is arguably the most hard right government since the early 1950s at least. But this doesn’t make it far right. I discussed this difference in an earlier Political Bytes post (November 3): Distinguishing far right from hard right.
Specifically:
…”hard right” for me means being very firm (immoderate) near the extremity of rightwing politics but still respect the functional institutions that make formal democracy work.
In contrast the “far right” are at the extremity of rightwing politics and don’t respect these functional institutions. There is an overlapping blur between the “hard right” and “far right”.
Both the NZ First and ACT parties certainly have far right influences. The former’s deputy leader Shane Jones does a copy-cat imitation of Trumpian bravado.
Far right Brian Tamaki has some influence but is a small bit player compared to Tucker Carlson and Marjorie Taylor Greene. Image: politicalbytes.blog
Meanwhile, there is an uncomfortable rapport between ACT (particularly its leader and Deputy Prime Minister David Seymour) and the far right Destiny Church (particularly its leader Brian Tamaki).
But this doesn’t come close to meeting the far right threshold for both NZ First and ACT.
The far right itself also has its internal conflicts. The most prominent group within this relatively small extremist group is the Destiny Church. However, its relationship with other sects can be adversarial.
Insights for New Zealand politics nevertheless Nevertheless, the internal far right fallout in the United States does provide some insights for public fall-outs within the hard right in New Zealand.
This is already becoming evident in the three rightwing parties making up the coalition government.
NZ Prime Minister Christopher Luxon . . . coalition arrangement starting to get tuckered out and heading towards lamenting? Image: politicalbytes.blog
For example:
NZ First has said that it would support repealing ACT’s recent parliamentary success with the Regulatory Standards Act, which was part of the coalition agreement, should it be part of the next government following the 2026 election;
National subsequently suggested that they might do likewise;
ACT has lashed out against NZ First for its above-mentioned position;
NZ First leader Winston Peters has declined to express public confidence in Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s leadership;
NZ First has publicly criticised the Government’s economic management performance; and
while National and ACT support the sale of public assets, NZ First is publicly opposed.
These tensions are well short of the magnitude of Tucker Carlson’s public attack on Israel over Gaza and President Trump’s leadership.
However, there are signs with the hard right in New Zealand of at least starting to feel “tuckered out” of collaborating collegially in their coalition government arrangement and showing signs of pending laments.
Too early to tell yet but we shall see.
Ian Powell is a progressive health, labour market and political “no-frills” forensic commentator in New Zealand. A former senior doctors union leader for more than 30 years, he blogs at Second Opinion and Political Bytes, where this article was first published. Republished with the author’s permission.
Forty years after the bombing of the Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior in Auckland Harbour, award-winning journalist and author David Robie has revisited the ship’s fateful last mission — a journey that became a defining chapter in New Zealand’s identity as a nuclear-free nation.
It captures the courage of those who stood up to nuclear colonialism in the Pacific and draws striking parallels with the existential challenges the region now faces — from climate change to renewed geopolitical tensions.
“The new edition has a completely new 40-page section covering the last decade and the transition in global emphasis from ‘nuclear to climate crisis survivors’, plus new exposés about the French spy ‘blunderwatergate’. Ironically, the nuclear risks have also returned to the fore again,” Robie told The Australia Today.
“The book deals with a lot of critical issues impacting on the Pacific, and is expanded a lot and quite different from the last edition in 2015.”
In May 1985, the Rainbow Warrior embarked on a humanitarian mission unlike any before it. The crew helped 320 Rongelap Islanders relocate to a safer island after decades of radioactive contamination from US nuclear testing at Bikini and Enewetak atolls.
Robie, who joined the ship in Hawai’i as a journalist, recalls the deep humanity of that voyage.
Back in 1985: Journalist David Robie (centre) pictured with two Rainbow Warrior crew members, Henk Haazen (left) and the late Davey Edward, the chief engineer. Robie spent 11 weeks on the ship, covering the evacuation of the Rongelap Islanders. Image: Inner City News
Humanitarian voyage
“The fact that this was a humanitarian voyage . . . helping the people of Rongelap in the Marshall Islands, it was going to be quite momentous,” he told Pacific Media Network News.
“It’s incredible for an island community where the land is so much part of their existence, their spirituality and their ethos.”
The Rainbow Warrior sailing in the Marshall Islands in May 1985 before the Rongelap relocation mission. Image: David Robie/Café Pacific Media
The relocation was both heartbreaking and historic. Islanders dismantled their homes over three days, leaving behind everything except their white-stone church.
“I remember one older woman sitting on the deck among the remnants of their homes,” Robie recalls.
Their ship’s banner, Nuclear Free Pacific, fluttered as both a declaration and a demand. The Rainbow Warrior became a symbol of Pacific solidarity, linking environmentalism with human rights in a region scarred by the atomic age.
On 10 July 1985, the Rainbow Warrior was docked at Auckland’s Marsden Wharf when two underwater bombs tore through its hull. The explosions, planted by French secret agents, sank the vessel and killed Portuguese-Dutch photographer Fernando Pereira.
The front page of The New Zealand Herald on 12 July 1985 — two days after the bombing. Image: NZH screenshot
Bombing shockwaves The bombing sent shockwaves through New Zealand and the world. When French Prime Minister Laurent Fabius finally admitted that his country’s intelligence service had carried out the attack, outrage turned to defiance. New Zealand’s resolve to remain nuclear-free only strengthened.
Former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark. Image: Kate Flanagan /www.helenclarknz.com
Former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark contributes a new prologue to the 40th anniversary edition, reflecting on the meaning of the bombing and the enduring relevance of the country’s nuclear-free stance.
“The bombing of the Rainbow Warrior and the death of Fernando Pereira was both a tragic and a seminal moment in the long campaign for a nuclear-free Pacific,” she writes.
“It was so startling that many of us still remember where we were when the news came through.”
Clark warns that history’s lessons are being forgotten. “Australia’s decision to enter a nuclear submarine purchase programme with the United States is one of those storm clouds gathering,” she writes.
“New Zealand should be a voice for de-escalation, not for enthusiastic expansion of nuclear submarine fleets in the Pacific.”
Clark’s message in the prologue is clear: the values that shaped New Zealand’s independent foreign policy in the 1980s — diplomacy, peace and disarmament — must not be abandoned in the face of modern power politics.
Author David Robie and the Rainbow Warrior III. Image: Facebook/David Robie
Geopolitical threats
Robie adds that the book also explores “the geopolitical threats to the region with unresolved independence issues, such as the West Papuan self-determination struggle in Melanesia.”
Clark’s call to action, Robie told The Australia Today, resonates with the Pacific’s broader fight for justice.
“She warns against AUKUS and calls for the country to ‘link with the many small and middle powers across regions who have a vision for a world characterised by solidarity and peace, which can rise to the occasion to combat the existential challenges it faces — including of nuclear weapons, climate change, and artificial intelligence.’”
Author David Robie with a copy of Eyes of Fire during a recent interview with RNZ Pacific. Image: Facebook/David Robie
When Eyes of Fire was first published, it instantly became a rallying point for young activists and journalists across the Pacific. Robie’s reporting — which earned him New Zealand’s Media Peace Prize 40 years ago — revealed the human toll of nuclear testing and state-sponsored secrecy.
Today, his new edition reframes that struggle within the context of climate change, which he describes as “the new existential crisis for Pacific peoples.” He sees the same forces of denial, delay, and power imbalance at play.
“This whole renewal of climate denialism, refusal by major states to realise that the solutions are incredibly urgent, and the United States up until recently was an important part of that whole process about facing up to the climate crisis,” Robie says.
“It’s even more important now for activism, and also for the smaller countries that are reasonably progressive, to take the lead.”
For Robie, Eyes of Fire is not just a history book — it’s a call to conscience.
“I hope it helps to inspire others, especially younger people, to get out there and really take action,” he says.
“The future is in your hands.”
“You can’t sink a rainbow” slogan on board the Rainbow Warrior III. Image: David Robie 2025
The Rainbow Warrior returned to Aotearoa in July to mark the 40th anniversary of the bombing. Forty years on, the story of the Rainbow Warrior continues to burn — not as a relic of the past, but as a beacon for the Pacific’s future through Robie’s Eyes of Fire.
A petition to launch an inquiry into “Russian influence on UK politics & democracy” has hit a critical milestone. Having tipped over 100,000 signatures, it will now be considered for a debate in Parliament. This could prove to be particularly awkward for Nigel Farage and his Reform Party, given the proof of Russian interference and recent conviction of their former head of Wales:
“Allowing money to corrupt your moral compass constitutes a grave betrayal of the trust vested in you by the electorate”
Ex-leader of Reform UK in Wales Nathan Gill sentenced for taking bribes as part of a pro-Russia influence campaign
We are concerned about reported efforts from Russia to influence democracy in the US, UK, Europe and elsewhere. We believe we must establish the depth and breadth of possible Russian influence campaigns in the UK.
We believe recent events underscore the urgency of this issue.
The “recent events” in this instance are no doubt the conviction of Nathan Gill. As we reported earlier this month, Labour responded by demanding that Reform investigate themselves:
It’s now 24 hours since Nigel Farage’s man in Wales was sent down for 10+ years for taking pro-Russian bribes.
Why won’t Farage allow an independent investigation to root out any pro-Russian links in Reform? What has he got to hide? pic.twitter.com/lOgiGDCexu
If nothing else, this petition could force Labour to shit or get off the pot.
Russia-gate
Over the past decade, there has definitely been a tendency for establishment centrists to paint Russia as the sole reason for our problems. This manifested most in the aftermath of Trump’s first election and the EU Referendum.
In the case of the US election, Hillary Clinton suffered because she was the living embodiment of the establishment at a moment when voters turned against the failing status quo. In the case of Brexit, we had a situation in which Brexiteers successfully managed to pin the failings of neoliberal Britain on the EU (it’s also worth noting the campaign to leave the EU had been growing as a movement for decades; the campaign to remain didn’t get serious until the week after the referendum).
We’re not suggesting Russia had no influence on these pivotal world events, but suggesting Vladimir Putin is solely responsible for our ills prevents us from identifying and solving the many other issues which are driving political extremism — chief among them spiralling inequality.
Solidarity
While we may not always agree with the centrists about the best way of addressing these topics, we can all agree it would be fun to watch Farage squirm in a debate on Russian interference. That is if he turns up, of course. As we all know, the guy would seemingly rather be anywhere but at work.
Jamaica’s bobsled team has won gold in the North American cup, fulfilling the promise of the 1988 Olympic team who inspired the movie Cool Runnings:
Historic WIN for Jamaica’s Bobsled Team in Whistler, Canada!
“Shane Pitter drove Jamaica into history, piloting the 4-man bobsled to a groundbreaking gold medal after an electrifying 4.91-second start with brakemen Junior Harris, Andrae Dacres, and Tyquendo Tracey” @JBSFedpic.twitter.com/Uo0FA2P2IH
Jamaica achieved their historic win at this year’s North American Cup (NAC), which took place in Whistler, Canada. According to the Caribbean National Weekly (CNW), the team achieved a time of 1 minute and 45.88 seconds. The next two fastest teams were Canada and… Canada.
We suspected this was a typo at first, but the International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation (IBSF) have confirmed the existence of two different Canadian teams:
We’re not sure why Canada got two teams, but Australia did too. If anything, this makes the situation even more impressive. Jamaica didn’t just win; they did so against two separate teams with a home side advantage.
Jamaica has once again showcased the power of determination, discipline, and raw athletic talent on the global stage. In a historic performance, the Jamaican 4-man bobsled team captured gold at the North America Cup (NAC) in Whistler, Canada, marking the country’s first gold medal at any international bobsleigh race.
#CANADA: Nearly 40 years after the Jamaica bobsleigh team’s first Winter Olympics inspired the film Cool Runnings, it made history again last weekend by capturing its first ever gold medal at an international bobsleigh competition. pic.twitter.com/nv0w5HM3Eh
Researching this article, we found that the Jamaican women’s team did actually win gold at the World Push Championships. While the World Push events do involve a bobsled, the activity focusses solely on the starting push, as you can see in this video:
Responding to the NAC victory, the Jamaican team’s brakeman Tyquendo Tracey said:
It’s been a long time coming where we just need to put things together the right way and show the world that regardless of the sport, regardless of climate, we can always put forward our best foot
The pilot Shane Pitter, meanwhile, said the victory was ‘especially poignant’ coming after Jamaica was recently rocked by Hurricane Melissa, which was the first Category 5 storm to hit Jamaica in recorded history. He added that he hoped the victory will give the ‘people back home something to cheer for’.
It’s also worth noting Israel finished 6th in the North American Cup — reaffirming its status as the only ‘democracy’ in the Middle East, Europe, and now the Americas.
In October this year, theCanary editor Steve Topple reported on the activity of Telegraph journalist Patrick Sawer. Sawer was doorstepping pro-Palestine activists to ask questions which were raised by the Zionist lobby group Stop the Hate.
Now, news site TRT World has reported more on the people behind Stop the Hate:
Doorstep the hate
When Sawer turned up at the doorstep of independent journalist Ibrahim Abul-Essad, the latter noted it was a very “direct” way for the Telegraph journalist to make first contact. In response, Sawer said he wanted to give Abul-Essad the opportunity to respond to Stop the Hate UK, who were arguing that Abul-Essad should be prosecuted for “antisemitic hate crimes”.
This type of targeted harassment is nothing new from Stop The Hate UK. As the Canary previously reported, Stop The Hate took a central role in the proscription of Palestine Action. The group bill themselves as the “largest Jewish-led direct action campaign group in the UK.” However, that ‘direct action’ regularly involves doxxing activists to the police. It has specifically run a targeted campaign against Dr Rahmeh Aladwan – to the point where its racism was revealed as it made cops arrest another brown doctor, thinking it was Aladwan.
Meanwhile, Labour Against Antisemitism’s Alex Hearn has a history of weaponising antisemitism on behalf of Israeli politicians against anti-Zionist Jews.
Moreover, Labour Against Antisemitism has a history of targeting innocent people with accusations of antisemitism for its own political agenda. Or rather, it targeted people for the political agendas of Keir Starmer and his now-chief of staff Morgan McSweeney.
It would be unimaginable if criticism of Russia or North Korea led to journalists doorstepping a person, and yet here we are.
In the video at the top, TRT World report:
Research shared with TRT World by an independent Palestinian researcher points to two main figures behind the group: Itai Galmudi and Yochy Davis. They organized counter protests against Palestine solidarity events in the UK. Galmoudi is reportedly an Israeli army veteran. Davis met Israeli President Isaac Herzog last year and both were recently photographed at a reception inside Israel’s London embassy.
Davis previously drew attention to himself at a Roger Waters gig:
Yochy Davis attempted to pull out an Israeli flag at the Roger Waters show in London this week.
Davis is reported to be a member of the Board of Deputies and previously worked for My Truth, a propaganda organization for the Israeli military. pic.twitter.com/xjcHS1jHbu
Stop the Hate UK, which was publicly praised by former Israeli Ambassador Tzipi Hotovely, joined other pro-Israel organisations in demanding the UK government designate the direct action group Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation.
Hotovely is the smirking genocidaire who was Israel’s ambassador to the UK until recently:
“Every school, every mosque, every second house” needs to be destroyed in Gaza..”
If you heard someone saying this you’d condemn it right? It’s not self defence. It’s genocidal. It’s extremist. Right?
The below video clearly demonstrates the Zionist propaganda playbook, which is to cry ‘antisemitism’ whenever somebody accurately describes what Israel is doing:
Piers Morgan told the Israeli Ambassador to the UK, Tzipi Hotovely, that Israel is killing children.
While it turns out you can cry ‘wolf’ many times and still get away with, Israel’s defenders have now thoroughly maxed out their bullshit allowance.
Stop the Hate—Foreign influence
The TRT World video goes on to say:
Critics ask: why are two individuals, foreign citizens, linked to a foreign state accused of genocide, helping shape which British activists get labelled ‘extremists’ or ‘terrorists’ on UK soil?
Stop the Hate is just one piece of a larger pro-Israel ecosystem in the UK. However, Galmudi also runs Enough is Enough. Another group that mobilizes against pro-Palestine activism. Together, the groups form part of a wider network of policy outfits, doxing illegal pressure groups and pro-Israel think tanks.
So the real question is this: who gets to decide what counts as extremism in the UK? British citizens or foreign-aligned pressure groups with an agenda?
And if they can influence who gets labelled a terrorist, then whose interests is Britain really defending?
Historically, there has been tremendous hostility from the establishment whenever anyone asked these questions. We’re at a point now, though, where too many people are asking, and they can’t silence us all.
Protesters in Fiji and Aotearoa New Zealand kicked off the UN Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People today as Israel faced global condemnation over more “war crimes” against Palestine, Lebanon and Syria.
At least 13 people, including two children, were killed and 25 were wounded as Israel launched another incursion into Syrian territory in the Damascus countryside, according to state media.
The Syrian Foreign Ministry condemned “the criminal attack carried out by an Israeli occupation army patrol in Beit Jinn”.
At Albert Park in Fiji’s capital Suva today, members of Fijians for Palestine Solidarity Network (F4PSN) defied police repression and gathered to celebrate Solidarity Day.
They issued a statement declaring:
“On the 48th anniversary of this day, we must be clear: Fiji cannot claim to stand for human rights while aligning itself with GENOCIDE, APARTHEID and OCCUPATION.
“We refuse to let our government speak in our name while supporting systems of colonial oppression.”
Fiji ‘not on side of Palestine justice’
The statement went on to state that in 1977, the UN General Assembly had called for the annual observance of November 29 as the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People.
But now, Palestinians faced dispossession, military occupation, forced displacement, and the systematic destruction of their homes and lives.
“The world is watching genocide unfold in Gaza — entire families wiped out, children buried under rubble, hospitals bombed, and civilians starved — while governments continue to fund Israel’s genocidal campaign and shield it from accountability,” the network said.
Fiji was not on the side of justice and humanity, added the network. These were some of the reasons why:
Fiji has repeatedly abstained or voted against resolutions protecting Palestinian rights at the United Nations, including resolutions calling for humanitarian ceasefires;
Fiji voted against renewing support for Palestinian refugees under UNRWA;
Fiji abstained on a resolution supporting a two-state solution;
Fiji was the only country to publicly support Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine and land annexation at the International Court of Justice; and
Fiji has opened an embassy in Jerusalem, in Occupied Palestine.
“This is not foreign policy — this is complicity,” said the network.
Fiji pro-Palestinian protesters in Albert Park, Suva, today marking UN Solidarity Day. Image: Fijians for Palestine Solidarity Network
“And we say loudly from Fiji: End occupation. End apartheid. End genocide. Free Palestine — from the River to the Sea.”
Powerful speeches in NZ
In New Zealand’s Te Komititanga Square beside Auckland city’s main transport hub, protesters heard several powerful speakers before marching up the Queen Street shopping precinct to Aotea Square and raised the Palestinian flag.
Journalist and videographer Cole Martin, of Aotearoa Christians for Peace in Palestine who recently returned from six months bearing witness in the occupied West Bank, gave a harrowing account of the brutality and cruelty of daily life under Israeli military control.
Describing the illegal destruction of Palestinian homes by Israeli military bulldozers in one village, Martin said: “They [villagers] put up tents. And they Israeli military returned because the tents, they say, didn’t have the correct permits, just like their homes.
“And so they demolished them.
“But when Palestinians apply for permits, they are pretty much never granted them. It is an impossible system.”
Journalist Cole Martin speaking at the UN Solidarity Day rally in Auckland today about his recent experiences bearing witness in the occupied West Bank. Image: Asia Pacific Report
Speaking for Amnesty International Aotearoa, people power manager Margaret Taylor described the US President Trump-brokered “ceasefire” in Gaza as “dangerous” because it gave the illusion that life in Gaza was returning to normal.
“We here today are aware that the ‘normal’ for the people of Gaza is the ongoing genocide perpetrated against them by Israel.
“Earlier this week Amnesty international again came out saying, ‘yes, it is still genocide’.
“‘It is still genocide. It is still genocide.” It continues unabated.
“We had to do that because world leaders have denied that it is genocide and are using this alleged ceasefire.”
“Boycott Israel” declares a banner at today’s UN Solidarity Day rally in Auckland. Image: Asia Pacific Report
Gaza flotilla plans
Gaza Sumud Flotilla activist Youssef Sammour, who was also rally MC, brought the crow up-to-date with plans for another flotilla to attempt to break the Israeli siege around the Gaza enclave.
About 30 other protests are happening across New Zealand this weekend over the Gaza genocide.
Global news media reports described Israel’s brutal attacks on Gaza, West Bank, Lebanon and Syria, although little was reported in New Zealand media.
Several Israeli soldiers were also reported wounded in clashes at the town of Beit Jinn.
The Syrian Foreign Ministry condemned “the criminal attack carried out by an Israeli occupation army patrol in Beit Jinn”.
Al Jazeera reports that Israeli military incursions have become more brazen, more frequent and more violent since Israel expanded its occupation of southern Syria.
Several Israeli soldiers were also reported wounded in clashes at the town of Beit Jinn when local people fought back against the Israeli incursion.
Meanwhile, the UN has condemned an incident in Jenin in the occupied West Bank as another “apparent summary execution” and warned that killings in the Occupied West Bank were surging “without accountability”.
Footage from Jenin showed Israeli forces shooting two Palestinian men in the back after they had raised their hands to surrender. They were unarmed.
“The beast must be stopped” says a placard held aloft by protest artist Craig Tynan among the Christmas decorations in downtown Auckland today. Image: Asia Pacific Report
Farah Abu Ayyash, a Palestinian journalist working for Tasnim News Agency, has been detained by the zionist regime since August 5, and held without trial or charge. She was arrested during a night-time raid on her home near Hebron in the West Bank. A reality echoed across the testimonies of Palestinian prisoners.
Abu Ayyash abused and humiliated by Israeli occupation forces
Abu Ayyash’s lawyer, Hassan Abbadi tells the Canary about the night of her arrest:
When they came to her home, it was after midnight. She was very afraid, and didn’t expect them to be coming to arrest her. About a dozen cars, with around 50 soldiers, two female, turned up.
Abu Ayyash experienced physical abuse and humiliation at the hands of the occupation, after her arrest.
She told Abbadi:
They took me to Karmei Tzur (an illegal colonial settlement, north of Hebron), tied me to a chair outside, next to a pipe dripping filthy water onto me… The female soldiers tightened the white plastic restraints on my wrist so hard that my artery swelled. An officer eventually cut them off with pliers. Dogs tore at my pants.
Then they put me in solitary— just a room filled with electrical boxes. They pretended not to know I was a journalist. They forced me to unlock my phone… I work with complete transparency.
Palestinian prisoners: Israeli detention ‘like a horror film’
Abu Ayyash described to her lawyer her transfer to “Maskubiah”— the Russian Compound — an Israeli occupation detention centre in occupied Jerusalem:
It was like a horror film. They shoved me inside with handcuffs, leg shackles, and a heavy chain on my shoulders. Nahshon officers (colonial Israeli prisons guards) beat me. A female soldier grabbed my hair, slammed my head into the wall, and ordered me to kiss the Israeli flag. I refused. She kicked me. I was sick.
……In Ramla prison, they put me in an abandoned room and turned off the light. I screamed. Then they placed me in an underground cell infested with cockroaches, insects, and bedbugs. I cried all night. Cockroaches covered my face and body. The marks are still there.
She explains that she was later taken back to the Russian Compound, and fainted multiple times from the cold.
‘For 90 days Farah was completely alone, without even a lawyer’
According to Abbadi, Abu Ayyash has also been blindfolded and strip searched 12 times since being arrested. After 55 days she was moved to Damon women’s prison, where she remains today.
He says:
I am so angry. I met her in prison, 90 days after she was arrested. Until then, she was completely alone, and did not even have a lawyer. No journalists, not even in Palestine, wrote about her. She told me people only talk about prisoners when they have died or have been released. Everyone forgets the prisoners who are surviving there. Farah does not want people to wait until she is killed before they talk about her, but to speak now, while she is alive.
Abbadi last visited Abu Ayyash on November 26 in Damon women’s prison, where she was moved 55 days after being arrested, and remains today. Of the 52 women of all ages in Damon — children and grandmothers alike — more than 40 are held under administrative detention, with no charge or trial. No family visits are allowed, and the conditions are dire.
Abbadi says:
These women have their hijabs taken away. They do not go outside at all, and see no sun. In Farah’s cell there are seven prisoners but only six beds, so one of them always must sleep on the ground.
There are no menstrual supplies, and they only have one set of clothes and underwear. Some of them don’t get to change their clothes for seven months, and because of all this, they become sick with scabies.
Disillusionment with ‘human rights’
After spending years working as a lawyer and legal adviser with various human rights organisations, Hassan Abbadi says he has now “divorced all of them,” and works only with “God, my wife and myself”.
He tells us last year on Human Rights Day, December 10, his seven year old granddaughter was crying.
She asked me if I knew there were children killed in Gaza. It made me think about the double standards all over the world, when it comes to human rights. From that day, I have said I don’t believe any more in these human rights organisations. Not at all!
Abbadi spends his days as a volunteer lawyer, visiting Palestinian political prisoners, who are detained by the Israeli occupation. Every week he visits three prisons, and spends time with the inmates. He says he has met up with around 700 prisoners, often travelling around four hours each way to meet them.
“But I’m glad I’m doing this. I believe in what I am doing. I know it’s good for them, and also for me, to talk about all of this”.
Many thousands of Palestinian prisoners suffer in silence
Abbadi is quick to point out that he “knows a lot of Farah’s”, and emphasises her situation is in no way unique.
He said:
There are more than 11,000 Palestinian prisoners who are in the same position as her, and many cannot afford a lawyer. I have met around 20 Palestinian journalists, and some have been imprisoned for 25 years — no one talks about them.
Abu Ayyash has struggled with her difficult situation, but talking with her lawyer has made things easier. Abbadi speaks out to shed light on her story, warning that silence can be as harmful as the Israeli occupation’s prison walls that conceal the truth.
Video footage has captured Israel’s occupation forces (IOF) executing two unarmed Palestinians at point blank range, after they had surrendered and lifted up their shirts, proving they are not a threat.
‘Israel’ believes labelling Palestinians as “terrorists” allows it to violate international law
Yesterday, November 27, the colonial Israeli army brutally beat the two men, Muntaser Abdullah and Yusuf Ali Asasa. They were then fatally shot, in cold blood. The men were in the Jabal Abu Dhahr area of Jenin, in the Northern occupied West Bank. The IOF is withholding both bodies.
The IOF and the occupation’s police released a joint statement about the murder of the two men.
They said:
the wanted individuals were affiliated with a terror network in the area of Jenin.
This familiar excuse is used by the Israeli regime, to carry out every war crime against unarmed Palestinian civilians, whether in Gaza or the West Bank. The accusations always come with no evidence whatsoever.
The murder was caught on camera this time, but ‘Israel’ commits crimes like this against Palestinians every day in occupied Palestine. The only difference is that many go unheard and unseen by the public.
Ben Gvir: occupation ‘acted exactly as expected of them’
The Government Communication Centre in the West Bank called it:
an outright extrajudicial killing in blatant violation of international humanitarian law
Far-right extremist National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir has taken to social media. He has praised the military, saying he “provides full backing to the Border Guard fighters and IDF soldiers” who directly fired at the two Palestinians who emerged from a building in Jenin. According to Ben Gvir, the Israeli occupation troops “acted exactly as expected of them”.
Abdullah Al-Zighari, head of the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society said the two men were former prisoners who had previously been arrested by the IOF. Muntaser was the brother of Khaled Abdullah, from Jenin refugee camp, who died in ‘Israel’s’ Megiddo Prison in February. Khaled had been held under administrative detention, without trial or charge, for more than 15 months. He was in good health when first detained.
Al-Zighari described the execution as a war crime and a crime against humanity.
He said:
This crime is part of a systematic and escalating policy of executions carried out by the occupation forces, which coincides with legislative efforts in the occupying state to pass a law allowing the implementation of the death penalty against Palestinian prisoners.
‘Israel’ has systematically committed these crimes for decades
Al-Zighari stressed that these practices confirm Israeli occupation authorities do not need any additional legislative framework to carry out killings. Assassinations, field executions, and slow death inside prisons are violations that have been systematically committed for decades. But since October 2023, they have become even more common.
Military aggression by the zionist regime is ongoing in Jenin and the surrounding area. Operation Iron Wall was launched in January and completely emptied the Jenin, Tulkarm and Nur Shams refugee camps, forcibly displacing 32,000 residents. Even though the destruction was immense, the Israeli occupation continues to order demolitions. According to the IOF, it is preparing to demolish 24 buildings in the Jenin refugee camp on November 28. The demolitions, it says, are “required in accordance with a clear and necessary operational need“.
In February there was a controlled demolition of more than 20 buildings in Jenin Camp. More than 190 buildings were also issued with demolition orders there in March and June. The real reason behind these actions is nothing more than ethnic cleansing and collective punishment.
Roland Friedrich, Director of UNRWA Affairs for the West Bank and East Jerusalem, posted on X about the demolitions:
This systematic destruction goes against the basic principles of international law, and only serves to tighten the control of Israeli security forces over the camps in the long term. The camps need to be rebuilt – not further destroyed – and their residents allowed to return and restore their lives.
They must not be trapped in interminable displacement.
Also in Jenin yesterday: IOF shot two children
In Jenin yesterday, the Palestinian Red Crescent Society treated two children shot in the thigh by the IOF. Medical crews also transported to hospital a 23 year old man from Jenin who was badly beaten by the IOF.
Under international humanitarian law the killing of any fighter, including a resistance fighter is strictly prohibited if they are not in combat. If they are no longer participating in hostilities, have laid down their arms, or surrendered, the killing becomes a crime.
These violations of international law are carried out on a daily basis by ‘Israel’. It acts with impunity, knowing governments around the world have chosen not to act. Today there is global outrage over this video, but tomorrow it will sadly be forgotten.
Last Sunday, 23 November, a Bedouin couple were found murdered in the city of Homs, in Syria. The two were part of the Sunni Bani Khaled tribe. Behind them, sectarian slogans had been daubed on a wall.
The killings threatened to ignite a new wave of sectarian violence in Syria’s third-largest city, which is known for its diverse religious makeup.
Syria—Widespread protests
Individuals reportedly began shooting at houses in Alawite (a Shia offshoot) neighbourhoods. Then, on 25 November, Alawite leaders of the Supreme Alawite Islamic Council called protests in Latakia and Tartous, often considered strongholds of the religious minority. Officially, no casualties were reported. However, monitoring groups stated that dozens were injured.
The blood of Druze isn’t cheap!
The blood of Shi’a isn’t cheap!
The blood of Christians isn’t cheap!
The blood of Kurds isn’t cheap!
BTNewsRoom reported that the demonstrators denounced the continued sectarian disappearances and killings, and called for the release of Alawite prisoners detained by the new government. Some also demanded a federalised system, in the belief that this would protect minority communities.
Outside Homs, cities in the Latakia and Tartous regions — including Safita, Dreikish, Jableh, Qardaha, and Sheikh Badr — saw protests and sit-ins. They called for an end to the “killing of Alawites” and “the human right to live in safety and dignity.”
Al Jazeera explained that:
During the Syrian uprising that eventually brought down al-Assad, Homs was described by some activists as the heart of the revolution. Members of its Sunni Muslim community in particular had long complained about oppression from the al-Assad regime, which was led by Alawite.
Homs is still a multifaith and multiethnic city, with Sunni, Alawite and Christian communities.
Since the ouster of al-Assad in December 2024, Alawite in Homs have reported cases of discrimination, violence, and eviction from their homes. After the coastal violence in March, some Alawite fled Syria for villages in Lebanon’s Akkar region.
Fragile peace
This week, security forces working alongside a handful of tribal leaders reportedly helped to avert widespread bloodshed. Reuters reported that officers used gunfire to break up rival protesters. However, the officials did arrest some 120 individuals involved in violence, and imposed a curfew. This included both Alawite-majority areas and nearby Sunni-majority and mixed areas.
Thus far, Syria seems to have avoided all-out sectarian fighting after the week’s tensions. However, the peace has been exceptionally fragile since the fall of ex-President Bashar al-Assad last year. Sectarian conflict has since broken out in the coastal region in March and Suwayda in July.
Syria is currently led by president Ahmed al-Sharaa, AKA nom de guerre Abu Mohammad Al-Jolani, a former Al Qaeda fighter. His transitional government has faced criticism from the international community for its failure to quell these earlier outbreaks of violence. As such, the more immediate reaction to the threat of sectarian conflict in this instance will likely boost al-Sharaa’s international legitimacy.
‘The root cause is not controlled’
The government — drawn from Syria’s Sunni Muslim majority — has also tried to downplay the sectarian angle of the Bedouin murders. Brigadier general Marhaf al-Naasan, Homs’ Internal Security Commander, posted a Facebook statement claiming that the government:
strongly condemns this heinous crime and affirms that its objective is clearly to ignite sectarian rhetoric and sow discord within our community.
Whilst the threat of continued sectarian conflict is far from over, reports currently indicate that the peace is holding in Syria — at least for now.
Syrian researcher and human rights specialist Lina Ghoutouk told Al Jazeera that the government must do more to disarm the tribal factions:
The communication from the government side was good. It was clear that this violence, aggression, or sectarianism is completely unacceptable. […]
The problem is that the root cause is not controlled.
Uncontrolled weapons on the loose mean [such incidents] could happen again.
Sitiveni Rabuka, the instigator of Fiji’s coup culture, took to the witness stand for the first time today — fronting the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) in Suva.
The TRC was set up by Rabuka’s coalition government with the aim of promoting truth-telling and reconciliation regarding political upheavals dating back to 1987.
The five-member TRC began its work earlier this year. It was led by Dr Marcus Brand, who was appointed in January, and has reportedly already finished his role.
Rabuka had stated earlier this year he would “voluntarily appear” before the commission and disclose names of individuals involved in his two racist coups almost four decades ago.
The man, often referred to as “Rambo” for his military past, has been a permanent fixture in the Fijian political landscape since first overthrowing a democratically elected government as a 38-year-old lieutenant-colonel.
But now, at 77, he has a weatherbeaten face yet still carries the resolute confidence of a young soldier. He faced the TRC commissioners, wearing a tie in the colours of the Fiji Army, to give a much-anticipated testimony by Fijians locally and in the diaspora.
He began by revisiting his childhood and the influences in his life that shaped his worldview. He fundamentally accepted the actions of 1987 were rooted in his racial worldview.
Protecting Indigenous Fijians
He acknowledged those actions were a result of his background, being raised in an “insulated” environment (i.e. village, boarding school, military), and it is his view that he was acting to protect Indigenous Fijians.
Asked if the coups had served their purpose, Rabuka said: “The coups have brought out more of a self-realisation of who we are, what we’re doing, where we need to be.”
“If that is a positive outcome of the coup, I encourage all of us to do that. Let us be aware of the sensitivity of numbers, the sensitivity of a perceived imbalance in the distribution of assets, or whatever.”
But perhaps the most important response from him came toward the end of the almost 1hr 50min submission to a question from the facilitator and veteran journalist Netani Rika, who asked Rabuka: “Do you see the removal of immunity for coup perpetrators from the [2013] Constitution as a way towards preventing a repeat of these incidents [coups]?”
“There should be [a] very objective assessment of what can be done,” Rabuka replied.
“There are certain things that we cannot do unless we all agree [to] leave the amendment to the [2013] Constitution open to the people. If that is the will of the people, let it be.
“At the moment our hands are tied,” confirming indirectly that the removal of immunity for coup perpetrators is off the table as it stands.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
“Israel appears set on destroying the framework created to ensure compliance with international law . . . ”, the International Court of Justice heard in April 2025.
To a similar effect, Norway’s Development Minister said in May that Israel was setting a dangerous precedent for international human rights law violations in Gaza.
Both accounts stem from the belief that Israel’s crimes in Gaza are so extreme that they have broadened the scope of impunity under international law. That would make future conflicts more fluid and the world more dangerous, possibly precipitating the emergence of a New World Order.
The First World Order emerged in 1920 with the creation of the League of Nations, the first intergovernmental organisation. The goal was to prevent conflicts and wars from ever happening again. But because of, inter alia, structural weaknesses and the unresolved injustice of the defeated parties, the Second World War erupted in 1939 and the world order crumbled.
The horrors of the Second World War thus paved the way to the emergence of the Second World Order. It rallied universalism with the establishment of the United Nations and the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This was reinforced by numerous bodies and treaties to maximise compliance with international law.
While International law was never perfect, let alone fully implementable, it has had an indirect, normative influence on shaping domestic politics, academia, civil society, and journalism. It set in motion the emergence of a global rights-based consciousness, setting a frame of reference against which states are morally and legally judged, even if lacked enforcement.
‘Self-defence’ claim Israel is the product of the Second World Order. It was initially legitimised by the UN Partition Plan of Palestine in November 1947, and was admitted as a full UN member state in May 1949.
It is today a signatory of multiple UN treaties and engages with international law in various domains. Yet for years it has employed quasi-legal concepts hoping to inject dangerous exceptions in the law tailored to its own image.
It dealt with international law based more on self-perceived legitimacy (via historical victimhood or Biblical ties to the land of Palestine) than objective legality. That resulted in the production of Israeli societal beliefs regarding the country’s boundless right to, say, “self-defence”, that only few in the international community shared.
This exclusive outlook was helped, ironically, by international law’s own lingua franca, its rhetorical nature. It equipped Tel Aviv, like several other states, with the linguistic tools to justify themselves.
Think of how Israelis defend their military occupation of Palestinians by quoting legal arguments regarding self-defence. Or by re-interpreting the UN Resolution 242, which calls for the “withdrawal from territories occupied in 1967”, to mean not “all” territories.
They also argue that the Gaza Strip was not occupied since 2005. But ignore Israel’s continued “effective control” over it, which makes it an occupation as per the Fourth Hague Convention.
And while Israel isn’t a party to the Convention, it is customary international law, and therefore binding.
Dahiya Doctrine In the same vein, Tel Aviv’s ratification in 1995 of the convention on certain conventional weapons, did not stop it deploying cluster bombs against civilians in Beirut’s southern Dahiya’s district in 2006.
The Israeli army readily denied it was in violation of international law, because “they warned the area’s population”.
It is in Dahiya that a new legal threshold was crossed, or rather twisted. One that would define Israel’s next military campaigns, namely “The Dahiya Doctrine”. It permits the unleashing of extraordinary force against the civilian population and infrastructure.
While a clear violation of international law’s “principle of proportionality”, Israeli officials often justified the attacks as lawful for they target the civilian bedding of “terrorists”.
Needless to say, the Israeli definition of terrorism encapsulates almost every act of dissidence directed at the state, or Jews. Regardless of the legitimacy of that act, and irrespective of its form — violent or passive.
Israel would upscale the Dahiya Doctrine in its consecutive onslaughts on Gaza since 2008, while continuing to pay lip service to international law.
After 7 October 2023, even the words of justification had been abandoned. Calls by Israeli officials and some journalists to commit war crimes in Gaza, including genocide, were mostly unapologetic.
Save for the gas chambers, the Israeli army committed every atrocity imaginable against Gaza’s civilians. Gaza became the world’s largest graveyard of children. Most hospitals, schools, and universities were destroyed, alongside nearly 80 percent of the Strip’s infrastructure and homes.
More journalists were targeted and killed in Gaza than both world wars, the Vietnam War, wars in Yugoslavia, and the war in Afghanistan combined. And unknown to modern conflict, Israel systematically went after aid workers, including UN-associated ones.
Enemies and allies The gun barrels were then turned against the very representative of international law, the UN. In October 2024, the Knesset banned the UNRWA — going even further by labelling it a “terrorist organisation”.
Sure, Israel has long looked at the UN as biased, and saw the UNRWA as detrimental to Tel Aviv’s wishes to erase the Palestinian refugee problem from existence. But after October 7, not only did Israel unleash a genocidal war against Palestinians, it used quasi-legal instrument and military prowess to neutralise the legal bodies that may limit its scope.
This is unprecedented in the United Nation’s history.
Yet, despite its unbridled brutality, Israel could have been kept at bay had it not been for the US support.
Indeed, the White House helped Israel normalise its violations of international law in two ways. Firstly, by emphasising the “reason of the state” doctrine over international law. The White House under Biden and Trump, almost fully embraced the Israeli narrative of self-defence after October 7, even when it was evident that the Israelis went too far in Gaza.
Secondly, the US was already waging its own lateral war on international law. In February 2025, Donald Trump issued an Executive Order authorising sanctions on the ICC and its Chief Prosecutor.
It expanded the sanctions on four ICC officials in August, saying they had been pivotal in efforts to prosecute Americans and Israelis.
Trump had withdrawn from the UN Human Rights Council in 2018, allegedly over anti-Israel bias. The Biden administration re-joined in 2021 despite being critical of the council’s “disproportionate attention on Israel”. But in 2025 Trump re-withdrew from the organisation.
Ultimately, whether Israel is being driven by a sense of doom post-October 7, one that has overshadowed rationality, or it is rationally using whatever necessary militarily capacity it has to achieve its war objectives, matters little.
Whatever the explanation, what stands is that Israel’s unprecedented crimes set a trajectory in the international system. There is now a possibility that under the increasing normalisation of such crimes, the system will ultimately break.
But if the trajectory follows the same pattern as in the past 100 years, then the crisis may usher in a third world order. A rectifying phase. But that remains speculative, for the path of history is not linear.
Dr Emad Moussa is a Palestinian-British researcher and writer specialising in the political psychology of intergroup and conflict dynamics, focusing on MENA with a special interest in Israel/Palestine. He has a background in human rights and journalism. Follow him on Twitter: @emadmoussa
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has succeeded in reversing a human rights-based ruling that allowed a family of Palestinian refugees fleeing Israel’s genocide in Gaza, to remain in the UK.
The Court of Appeal backed Mahmood’s bid to prevent refugees using a scheme designed for (almost all white) Ukrainians to remain in Britain under the provisions of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) to protect family life. This overturns the decision of an immigration tribunal ruling that horrified the Israel lobby and the far-right because it said that a Palestinian family qualified for the scheme’s protection.
The appeal court instead ruled that family links between siblings are not strong enough to justify them remaining in the UK under Article 8 of the ECHR.
Human Home Secretary’s rights
The appeal court judges also decided that immigration tribunals must take account of the Home Secretary’s right to act in the interests of “the economic well-being of the country or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.” The ruling completely ignores the Home Office’s own evidence that immigrants are net contributors to the UK’s economic health rather than detracting from it.
The Appeal Court’s ruling is deeply dangerous because government lawyers will use it as a precedent to persuade immigration tribunals to rule against desperate refugees with UK family in future cases.
Mahmood is preparing new legislation to further limit the scope for immigration courts to consider Article 8 human rights in asylum applications and appeals against deportation, requiring judges to prioritise supposed ‘public safety’ over individual rights.
Shabana Mahmood was not always a dog-whistling xenophobe who would rather pander to racists than respect human rights — and the international law that underpins them. In 2015 — before Keir Starmer got his claws into Labour and imposed his fanatical support for Israel and his thirst for the approval of racists — she wrote that helping refugees whether in their own regions or in Europe was a “moral duty”:
we have a moral duty to act. When the refugees make it to the shores of Lesvos they are not just on Greece’s doorstep but our doorstep too.
I welcome the government’s policy proposals to help refugees directly from the camps, who have not made the dangerous journey to Europe. But we cannot simply ignore the crisis in Europe, either.
It is not an either/or situation – we must have a strategy and a willingness to help both refugees in the region and those who have made it to Europe…
…Their desperation is not lessened because they have a degree or because they had a good job before war and chaos descended.
Fear of death doesn’t diminish because of the money you used to have or the standard of the house you used to live in.
It is a false distinction and we mustn’t fall for it.
We have to work with our European partners and create new, safe, and legal routes for refugees to get to Europe. We cannot abandon them to their fate, left as prey for smugglers whilst risking death on the seas… the push factor [for people fleeing to Europe and the UK] is either death or the slow torture of a temporary life in a camp which amounts to no kind of life at all. If that is what they face then they are going to run. We cannot kid ourselves that they have choices; we have to act.
Shabana Mahmood of 2015 would hate this one
Shabana Mahmood was also once enough of an advocate of Palestinian rights to argue publicly in favour of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign against the Israeli occupation. Her own website still boasts that:
I am, and always have been, a passionate and determined supporter of Palestinian rights and my parliamentary record on this issue speaks for itself. My support extends fully to citizens in the Occupied Palestinian Territories who have had themselves or their families displaced or injured by Israel’s military action in the region.
Not any more, you’re not, Ms Mahmood. Now you are a shill for your racist boss and his twin Islamophobic obsessions with Israel and with pandering to the racist right from whom he is functionally indistinguishable. You are helping him make sure that Palestinians and others guilty of fleeing-while-brown are rejected or made to live in fear that they will be, while ‘schemes for Ukrainians’ are only available for those pale folk.
Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides signed the agreement in Lebanon:
This is a historical agreement, concluding an issue pending for many years and now look forward to what our countries can jointly create.
A preliminary deal was signed in 2007, but was severely delayed. All in all, Cyprus is a key node for the EU to extract resources from the Middle East. This includes as part of a genocide economy.
Cyprus and the genocide economy
As the Canary reported on 5 November, the British are deeply involved.
The genocide economy is set to get a big boost, with British-based energy firm Energean preparing to construct a pipeline that would see gas pumped to Cyprus from an offshore rig in stolen maritime territory in Palestine.
The move would be the first time gas was imported from the settler state into Europe:
Cyprus will be the first European nation to import natural gas from the apartheid settler-colony, a disgraceful breach of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign and international law, as it funds a genocide.
Cyprus has served as a conduit and base for British collusion in Israel’s genocide. British spy planes gathered intelligence over Gaza for the Israelis throughout the genocide.
All the British spy flights have taken off from RAF Akrotiri, the UK’s sprawling air base on Cyprus, and have been in the air for around six hours.
Gaza sits around 30 minutes flight time from the base so it is likely the RAF has gathered around 1,000 hours of surveillance footage over Gaza.
The UK has backed Israel to the hilt since 7 October 2023. It has trained Israeli personnel, and given various forms of direct support to the regime. Meanwhile, Cyprus has major defence contracts with Israel. It’s no surprise that the UK, Cyprus and the EU have their eyes on resources in the region.
Every year, the right wing get more and more het up about the idea that ‘the left have cancelled Christmas‘. This has never happened of course, and what it usually boils down to is that a single product didn’t have the word ‘Christmas’ on it, ignoring the fact it’s in the middle of a massive Christmas display with the word ‘Christmas’ all over it.
What you won’t hear from the likes of GB News is that the real anti-Christmas freak is none other than American vice president JD Vance:
Vance: Who really likes — be honest with yourself, who really likes Turkey? You are all full of shit. Everybody who raised your hands… Turkey doesn’t actually taste that good. Chicken is good all the time. pic.twitter.com/4TDDHAihUv
That sound you can hear is Jesus turning in his grave.
JD Vance—Freak behaviour
In his speech, Vance said the following:
Think about Turkey. Who really likes, be honest with yourselves, who really likes Turkey? You’re all full of shit. Everybody who raised your hand, I know, think about it. And here’s how I know that every single one of you who raised your hand is lying to me.
This is sicko behaviour, and the next time he comes to the UK, the British right needs to call it out.
Vance continued:
How many times do you roast an 18-pound turkey just randomly?
Good point; it is odd that people don’t have a meal which costs a small fortune and takes days to prepare on a whim — well noticed — we can see why you’re the second most powerful man in the world.
Later in the same speech, Vance said:
We cook this gigantic American bird, and we do all kinds of crazy things to make it taste good.
Another good point — you do have to do ‘crazy things’ to make food taste good, don’t you. In the UK, we call this ‘cooking’.
Vance added:
I’m actually going to deep fry a turkey myself tomorrow. And look, here’s the thing. If you’ve got to deep fry something to make it taste good, it probably isn’t that good.
This comment probably won’t go down well in the White House given that Trump makes a big deal of his Scottish heritage.
Reasons to be thankful
We should note that Vance was talking about Thanksgiving, which is the day when Americans have their Christmas dinner (they’re not very bright, bless them).
While this article is obviously tongue in cheek, the point is this; if you look for reasons to say ‘Christmas has been cancelled’, you can find them. The purpose of Christmas isn’t to force yourself into a tizzy over Tesco, though, it’s to eat too much food and be merry.
At the same time, if you do want to get mad at Tesco, there are plenty of places to start:
FUN FACT: Supermarket giants like Tesco and Asda increased their operating profits last year by 66%.
We’re not in a ‘cost of living crisis’ – we’re in a ‘cost of GREED crisis’.
Piers Morgan is one of the worst and most annoying people in public life. At the same time, he’s a person who has the ability to be crushingly correct, and when that happens he’s a force to behold:
Piers Morgan was in conversation with Dave Rubin — a man who started off on the left, pivoted to the centre, and then admitted he was right wing. Given his turn, many have described Rubin as a ‘grifter’. Even worse than being a shill, however, the guy has zero personality. At least when Alex Jones bullshits you it’s entertaining; listening to Rubin speak is like being drowned in porridge.
On to the interview, the dead eyed Zionist Rubin said to Morgan:
You acknowledge that there’s been no starvation, correct?
Morgan didnot acknowledge this, and when Rubin asked him where the videos are, he answered:
Well, I’ve seen a lot, but you would dismiss them all as fakes. The UN says there was starvation, but you guys don’t believe a word the UN says. The other official bodies say there was starvation. You don’t want to hear a word they say. Israel denies everything.
You can say that no Gazan has starved at all. The reports by almost every official body say the opposite, but you don’t believe them.
However, the best way to get to the truth is let journalists who are used to covering in war zones; let them go in and do their job. Particularly now we have the ceasefire.
There is a reason the Israeli government is not letting the media in. They are terrified about what the world will uncover.
The wretched worm Rubin sputtered in response, clearly not knowing how to respond.
A lot of them look fat. They have fresh clothes and fresh haircuts.
Gaza is a big place, so it’s not surprising the problems would be inconsistent across the entire strip. This is what Gaza looks like since Israel went in by the way:
You can criticise October 7th all you like, but if you think that event justifies committing an equal atrocity every day for two years, then you’re a monster. Morgan made similar points later in the interview:
Show me another moment in the 75-year conflict where the response has been to kill 60 times as many people and where you have a government with people like Smotrich and Ben-Gvir who begin publicly, openly talking about ethnically cleansing all the Palestinians from Gaza; about annexing the West Bank, about taking complete control of all of it, to the point that Donald Trump had to step in and say, that is not happening.
Rubin tried to dismiss these men as ‘random ministers’, but Morgan hit back:
They’re not the two of the most senior people in the government.
Rubin replied.
No, no, no, but them talking about things is different.
He didn’t expand on this point; presumably because he realised it made no sense. They’re not just ‘talking about things’ are they, Dave; they’re describing their intentions — genocidal intentions which the Israeli government has carried out.
I hear that a lot. Well, my point is this. You have a unique population in Gaza where half of them are under 18. There is a unique proportion of kids in this part of the world, right? So at what point do you try and find a different way to resolve this?
The only solution that seemed to be being offered by Netanyahu, Ben-Gvir, Smotrich and the others was to raze Gaza to the floor and expel all Palestinians.
Rent-a-gob
There’s more to the interview than we quoted, but you get the idea.
Rubin isn’t a charismatic or intelligent man, but he will argue the point no matter how stupid or heartless he looks, and that’s the sort of sorry excuse for a man that America and Israel need.
To be clear, we suspect Piers Morgan probably doesn’t give a shit about Palestine either. The guy loves controversy and attention, and the best way of bringing new people into his orbit is to periodically upset everyone. Besides all that, Morgan is smart enough to see which way the wind is blowing. As they say, one day everyone will have always been against this.
Donald Trump is the oldest man to have ever been US president. The fact that he occupies a high-pressure position while being so old may explain why he keeps having temper tantrums. One case in point is:
Trump responds to a detailed report about his waning energy and propensity to sleep through on-camera events by calling the New York Times’s Katie Rogers ugly pic.twitter.com/DReu5zVmOX
It could — on the other hand — just be his rancid personality.
Old man Trump
His history of childish outbursts fits into a broader pattern of reactivity to any ounce of criticism or challenge. The latest incident seems to be more of the same.
nearly a year into his second term, Americans see Mr. Trump less than they used to, according to a New York Times analysis of his schedule. Mr. Trump has fewer public events on his schedule and is traveling domestically much less than he did by this point during his first year in office, in 2017, although he is taking more foreign trips.
He also keeps a shorter public schedule than he used to. Most of his public appearances fall between noon and 5 p.m., on average.
And when he is in public, occasionally, his battery shows signs of wear. During an Oval Office event that began around noon on Nov. 6, Mr. Trump sat behind his desk for about 20 minutes as executives standing around him talked about weight-loss drugs.
At one point, Mr. Trump’s eyelids drooped until his eyes were almost closed, and he appeared to doze on and off for several seconds. At another point, he opened his eyes and looked toward a line of journalists watching him. He stood up only after a guest who was standing near him fainted and collapsed.
To add insult to injury, the piece included a close up video of Trump falling asleep in the Oval Office. It also drew attention to his health:
Many of the facts that concerned critics about Mr. Trump’s physical health during his first term are present now. He does not get regular exercise, in part because he has a long-held theory that people are born with a finite amount of energy and that vigorous activity can deplete that reserve, like a battery. He enjoys red meat and is known to eat McDonald’s by the sackful.
Notably, this is a lot more polite than much of the online speculation about what’s going on with Trump:
Don’t let discourse about a dead Nazi distract you from the fact that Donald Trump shows visible signs of having had a stroke, explaining his recent disappearance from public view and corresponding visits to the hospital, and is using an AI filter in official videos to hide it pic.twitter.com/DqZSxWoMEM
— James | Meta Comics (FREE PALESTINE, FREE CONGO) (@ComicsMeta) September 11, 2025
Trump wasn’t even able to salute with his right arm at the Veteran’s Day Celebration and it’s obvious that he has some extreme and serious health conditions that this Country hasn’t been told about! He’s had a stroke and most likely has Alzheimers too! Watch how his mouth droops. pic.twitter.com/ID8kflXlu9
What the hell is wrong with Trump? Did he have a stroke or some other type of medical condition??? Notice the way he’s dragging his legs! He can barely keep his balance!pic.twitter.com/Bc4utfyBuk
We should note that Rogers wasn’t the only author of this piece, but is the only female journalist attached to it. As such, people have labelled it as another example of the president’s sexism:
The president calls a New York Times reporter “ugly,” the third insult toward a female reporter in recent weeks. https://t.co/5bayXE5oKZ
While we can’t conclusively blame Trump’s outbursts on his age, the US could avoid the speculation entirely by implementing a mandatory retirement age for politicians.
Indonesia is preparing one of the largest peacekeeping deployments in its history — a 20,000-strong force of soldiers, engineers, medics and logistics personnel — to enter the shattered and starving Gaza Strip.
Three brigades, three hospital ships, Hercules aircraft, a three-star general, a reconnaissance team, battalions for health services, construction and logistics — Jakarta is moving with remarkable speed and confidence.
But the moral clarity that Indonesia prides itself on in its support for Palestine is now in danger of being muddied by geopolitical calculation.
And that calculation, in this case, is deeply entangled with a plan conceived and promoted by US President Donald Trump — a plan that critics argue would freeze, not resolve, the structures of domination and blockade that have long suffocated Gaza.
Indonesia must ask itself a hard question: Is it stepping into Gaza to help Palestinians — or to help enforce a fragile order designed to protect the status quo?
For years, Indonesian leaders have proudly stated that their support for Palestine is grounded not in expediency but in principle.
President Prabowo Subianto has reiterated that Jakarta stands “ready at any moment” to help end the suffering in Gaza. But readiness is not the same as reflection. And reflection is urgently needed.
Tilted towards Israel
Trump’s so-called stabilisation plan envisions an International Stabilisation Force tasked with training select Palestinian police officers and preventing weapons smuggling — a mission framed as neutral but structurally tilted toward Israel’s long-standing security demands.
The plan does little to address the root political causes of Gaza’s devastation. It does not confront Israel’s decades-long military occupation.
It does not propose a just political horizon. And it does not establish meaningful accountability for continued violations, even as reports persist that ceasefire terms are repeatedly breached.
A peacekeeping force that does not address the underlying conditions of injustice is not peacekeeping. It is de facto enforcement of a deeply unequal arrangement.
Indonesia’s deployment risks becoming just that.
Former deputy foreign minister Dino Patti Djalal has urged caution, warning that Indonesian troops could easily be drawn into clashes simply because the territory remains saturated with weaponry, competing authorities and unresolved political tensions.
He argues that Indonesia must insist on crystal-clear rules of engagement. With volatility always a possibility, a mission built on ambiguity is a mission built on quicksand.
Impossible peacekeeper position
His warning deserves attention. A peacekeeper who does not know whether they are expected to intervene, withdraw or hold ground in moments of confrontation is placed in an impossible position.
And should Indonesian forces — admired worldwide for their professionalism — be forced to navigate chaos without a political framework, Jakarta will face unpredictable political and humanitarian consequences at home and abroad.
More troubling is the lack of political strategy behind Indonesia’s enthusiasm. Prabowo’s government frames this mission as a humanitarian and stabilising operation, but it has not clarified how it fits within the long-term political resolution that Indonesia claims to champion.
For decades, Jakarta has stood consistently behind a two-state solution. Yet today, after the destruction of Gaza and the collapse of any credible peace process, many Palestinians and international observers argue that the two-state paradigm has become a diplomatic mirage — repeatedly invoked, never realised, and often used to justify inaction.
If Indonesia truly wants to stand for justice rather than merely stability, it must be willing to articulate alternatives. One of those alternatives — controversial but increasingly discussed in academic, political and human rights circles — is a rights-based one-state solution that guarantees equal citizenship and security for all who live between the river and the sea.
Such a political horizon would require courage from Jakarta. Supporting a single state would mean breaking sharply from US policy preferences and acknowledging that decades of partition proposals have failed to deliver anything resembling peace.
But Indonesia has taken courageous positions before. It has spoken against apartheid in South Africa and, most recently, called out the global community’s double standards in the treatment of Ukraine and Palestine.
Jakarta must be moral voice
If Jakarta wants to be a moral voice, it cannot outsource its vision to a proposal drafted by an American administration whose approach to the conflict was widely criticised as one-sided.
Indonesia’s soldiers are being told they are going to Gaza to help. That is noble. But noble intentions do not excuse political naivety.
Before Jakarta sends even a single battalion forward — before the hospital ships are launched, before the Hercules engines warm, before the three-star commander takes his post — Indonesia must ask whether this mission will move Palestinians closer to genuine freedom or merely enforce a temporary calm that leaves the underlying injustices untouched.
A peacekeeping force that sustains the structures of oppression is not peacekeeping at all. It is maintenance.
Indonesia can — and must — do better.
Dr Muhammad Zulfikar Rakhmat is the director of the Indonesia-MENA Desk at the Centre for Economic and Law Studies (CELIOS) in Jakarta and a research affiliate at the Middle East Institute, National University of Singapore. He spent more than a decade living and traveling across the Middle East, earning a BA in international affairs from Qatar University. He later completed his MA in International Politics and PhD in politics at the University of Manchester. This article was first published by Middle East Monitor.
Indonesia is preparing one of the largest peacekeeping deployments in its history — a 20,000-strong force of soldiers, engineers, medics and logistics personnel — to enter the shattered and starving Gaza Strip.
Three brigades, three hospital ships, Hercules aircraft, a three-star general, a reconnaissance team, battalions for health services, construction and logistics — Jakarta is moving with remarkable speed and confidence.
But the moral clarity that Indonesia prides itself on in its support for Palestine is now in danger of being muddied by geopolitical calculation.
And that calculation, in this case, is deeply entangled with a plan conceived and promoted by US President Donald Trump — a plan that critics argue would freeze, not resolve, the structures of domination and blockade that have long suffocated Gaza.
Indonesia must ask itself a hard question: Is it stepping into Gaza to help Palestinians — or to help enforce a fragile order designed to protect the status quo?
For years, Indonesian leaders have proudly stated that their support for Palestine is grounded not in expediency but in principle.
President Prabowo Subianto has reiterated that Jakarta stands “ready at any moment” to help end the suffering in Gaza. But readiness is not the same as reflection. And reflection is urgently needed.
Tilted towards Israel
Trump’s so-called stabilisation plan envisions an International Stabilisation Force tasked with training select Palestinian police officers and preventing weapons smuggling — a mission framed as neutral but structurally tilted toward Israel’s long-standing security demands.
The plan does little to address the root political causes of Gaza’s devastation. It does not confront Israel’s decades-long military occupation.
It does not propose a just political horizon. And it does not establish meaningful accountability for continued violations, even as reports persist that ceasefire terms are repeatedly breached.
A peacekeeping force that does not address the underlying conditions of injustice is not peacekeeping. It is de facto enforcement of a deeply unequal arrangement.
Indonesia’s deployment risks becoming just that.
Former deputy foreign minister Dino Patti Djalal has urged caution, warning that Indonesian troops could easily be drawn into clashes simply because the territory remains saturated with weaponry, competing authorities and unresolved political tensions.
He argues that Indonesia must insist on crystal-clear rules of engagement. With volatility always a possibility, a mission built on ambiguity is a mission built on quicksand.
Impossible peacekeeper position
His warning deserves attention. A peacekeeper who does not know whether they are expected to intervene, withdraw or hold ground in moments of confrontation is placed in an impossible position.
And should Indonesian forces — admired worldwide for their professionalism — be forced to navigate chaos without a political framework, Jakarta will face unpredictable political and humanitarian consequences at home and abroad.
More troubling is the lack of political strategy behind Indonesia’s enthusiasm. Prabowo’s government frames this mission as a humanitarian and stabilising operation, but it has not clarified how it fits within the long-term political resolution that Indonesia claims to champion.
For decades, Jakarta has stood consistently behind a two-state solution. Yet today, after the destruction of Gaza and the collapse of any credible peace process, many Palestinians and international observers argue that the two-state paradigm has become a diplomatic mirage — repeatedly invoked, never realised, and often used to justify inaction.
If Indonesia truly wants to stand for justice rather than merely stability, it must be willing to articulate alternatives. One of those alternatives — controversial but increasingly discussed in academic, political and human rights circles — is a rights-based one-state solution that guarantees equal citizenship and security for all who live between the river and the sea.
Such a political horizon would require courage from Jakarta. Supporting a single state would mean breaking sharply from US policy preferences and acknowledging that decades of partition proposals have failed to deliver anything resembling peace.
But Indonesia has taken courageous positions before. It has spoken against apartheid in South Africa and, most recently, called out the global community’s double standards in the treatment of Ukraine and Palestine.
Jakarta must be moral voice
If Jakarta wants to be a moral voice, it cannot outsource its vision to a proposal drafted by an American administration whose approach to the conflict was widely criticised as one-sided.
Indonesia’s soldiers are being told they are going to Gaza to help. That is noble. But noble intentions do not excuse political naivety.
Before Jakarta sends even a single battalion forward — before the hospital ships are launched, before the Hercules engines warm, before the three-star commander takes his post — Indonesia must ask whether this mission will move Palestinians closer to genuine freedom or merely enforce a temporary calm that leaves the underlying injustices untouched.
A peacekeeping force that sustains the structures of oppression is not peacekeeping at all. It is maintenance.
Indonesia can — and must — do better.
Dr Muhammad Zulfikar Rakhmat is the director of the Indonesia-MENA Desk at the Centre for Economic and Law Studies (CELIOS) in Jakarta and a research affiliate at the Middle East Institute, National University of Singapore. He spent more than a decade living and traveling across the Middle East, earning a BA in international affairs from Qatar University. He later completed his MA in International Politics and PhD in politics at the University of Manchester. This article was first published by Middle East Monitor.
Donald Trump has once again shown us exactly why he is not fit to lead one of the most powerful countries in the world.
An unknown source leaked the recordings of two telephone conversations. One appears to show Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, advising Yuri Ushakov, Putin’s most senior foreign policy aide, on how to appeal to the president.
And of course, Trump has defended him. He said it was the “standard thing”.
According to the BBC, Trump told reporters on Wednesday that he hadn’t heard the audio, but he was “doing what a dealmaker does” to sell his peace plan to both Russia and Ukraine.
The leak emerged after the US presented its 28-point draft peace plan.
The other leaked recording is a phone call between Mr Ushakov and Kirill Dmitriev, Mr Putin’s economic adviser. It seems to suggest that the Kremlin created the 28-point plan, which Trump then presented as his own.
Trump’s big 28 point surrender plan for Ukraine was drafted and written by Russia.
Treason pedo Trump was assigned with delivering it in another failed attempt to backstab Ukraine and Europe and prevent the release of the blackmail Russia has on the US “president”. pic.twitter.com/9nwVzKe9DV
As the Telegraph reported, Mr Dmitriev allegedly said during the call:
I think we’ll just make this paper from our position, and I’ll informally pass it along, making it clear that it’s all informal
And let them do like their own. But, I don’t think they’ll take exactly our version, but at least it’ll be as close to it as possible.
The Telegraph then added that he suggested “talking to Steve about this paper” — which is an apparent reference to Witkoff.
Mr Dmitriev claimed the transcript was fake.
Trump—Quick to defend
Republicans called for Trump to remove Witkoff from the Ukraine-Russia peace negotiations. However, Trump was quick to defend him.
Russia has, of course, denied leaking the recording.
Russia has denied leaking a phone call between Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and Vladimir Putin’s senior adviser.
The leak, first reported by Bloomberg News, revealed details of a conversation that took place on Oct 14 in which Mr Witkoff advised Yuri Ushakov on how…
An unknown source leaked the US-backed peace plan last week. It included giving Russia some Ukrainian-controlled territory in eastern Ukraine. It has been widely criticised for being too Russian-focused and has now been heavily edited. However, Zelensky still wants to negotiate with Trump on the territorial concessions. He has asked the president for a meeting “as soon as possible”
The US is arguing that the current trajectory of the war means that, eventually, Russia will take that land anyway.
From Trump’s refusal to criticise Putin during his 2016 election campaign, to surrounding himself with people known to be friends and business associates of Russia — it is clear that Trump’s relationship with Russia has always been a little too special. And now, it seems that Ukraine is going to pay the price of that friendship.
(@ahri_rose_elmac) 
CEASEFIRE VIOLATION: IDF troops identified two suspects who crossed the yellow line, carried out suspicious activities, and approached the troops in southern Gaza, posing an immediate threat. The IAF eliminated the suspects to remove the threat.
(@Tpopularfront) 
ELIMINATED: 9 additional terrorists were located in underground terror infrastructure in eastern Rafah
for Jamaica’s Bobsled Team in Whistler, Canada!
Ambassador to the 
(@Simo7809957085) 