Rahmeh Aladwan is a British-Palestinian doctor in the NHS. She has been “withstanding a two-year long coordinated assault campaign by the UK ‘Israel’ lobby for standing against the Holocaust in Palestine”. And on 13 October, she said:
The death threats are worse than ever. I have had to call the police for the second time this year to protect my family.
She added that the lobby’s campaign, which pro-Israel health secretary Wes Streeting has backed, “is political violence”. And she stressed:
You have painted a target on an innocent NHS doctor’s back.
The death threats are worse than ever. I have had to call the police for the second time this year to protect my family.
This is not a coincidence. This is a coordinated assault, manufactured by the UK 'israel' lobby (CAA, UKLFI, JMA, GJ), rubber-stamped by the GMC, amplified by…
Aladwan has also insisted that her harassment represents something much bigger – the state’s crackdown on free speech and the idea of “innocent until proven guilty”:
Britain is in serious trouble. They're not just coming for me. They're coming for our free speech. They're coming for a fundamental British value: 'innocent until proven guilty'.
We don’t need to agree with all the opinions someone holds, or the way they express them, to support their right to free speech. Rahmeh Aladwan, for example, has been very outspoken in ways that some supporters of Palestinian liberation may disagree with. But as her crowdfunder says, Palestinian people have just experienced two years:
of genocide, of heartbreak, of constantly losing loved ones
Anyone who is not full of indignation at this point has not been paying attention.
But for Aladwan, these two years have also been a period of:
doxxing, smears, defamation, threats, and harassment from the UK ‘israel’ lobby and jewish supremacists (zionists).
She has defended herself against the claims of the lobbyists targeting her livelihood by stressing that the main issue is her opposition to:
genocide caused by jewish supremacy, extremism, and unadulterated terrorism.
The complaint filed by the malicious and unhinged UK 'israeli' jewish lobby (445 pages) with my medical regulator targeted five main topics. My response was as follows:
1. On 'Terrorism' I support the Palestinian right to resistance, including armed struggle—a right enshrined in… pic.twitter.com/Axp7z2Jynl
And it’s true that Hamas is not the organisation behind a brutal, decades-long colonial occupation. Nor has it murdered over 20,000 children in the last two years. Palestinian people, meanwhile, very much have the legal right to resist occupation, but Israel does not have the legal right to decimate a territory it occupies. For these reasons and more, the UK’s illogical stance on Israel’s colonial regime in Palestine has sparkedchallenges to the UK’s proscription of Hamas.
Pointing this out, however, doesn’t mean Hamas is a progressive champion. Becauseit’snot. But its crimes pale in comparison to those of the genocidalapartheid state it’s resisting. And the groups going after Aladwan are attacking free speech in Britain because of their support for that state.
On Wednesday 15 October, there will be a protest in London against British state censorship on behalf of Israeli war criminals. And anyone who truly cares about free speech should support it.
In 2006, George W. Bush infamously embarrassed Tony Blair by yelling “Yo, Blair” at him. It wasn’t the informality which made this incident humiliating; it was the fact it perfectly encapsulated the so-called ‘special relationship’ between the UK and US. This wasn’t a relationship of equals, and it hadn’t been for some time. When America hollered, the UK came running. Donald Trump and Keir Starmer have had ‘Yo Blair’ moments of their own, with the latest being this:
WATCH: Trump asked, “Where is the UK?”
Starmer raised his hand. Trump called him to the stage, making him think he was going to speak.
Starmer approached the podium. “It’s nice that you’re here,” Trump said, then sent him back, offending Starmer. pic.twitter.com/Y67s4JGmEM
For good measure, Trump also humiliated Tony Blair in a separate incident.
Yo, Starmer
In the video above, Trump asks:
Where’s United Kingdom?
Starmer responds as if he’s in a pantomime, chirping:
I’m behind you.
He was literally right there too. It’s unclear if this is further evidence that Trump has dementia or an instance of Starmer’s forgettableness; either way, Trump sounds incredibly tired as he says “come here”, before asking “everything going good?” Starmer responds “very good”, with Trump telling him “it’s very nice that you’re here”.
While this exchange sounds pleasant enough, Trump proceeds to drop a hydrogen bomb of awkwardness by turning away from Starmer and continuing his train of thought, leaving Starmer just standing there like a lemon.
What does he do next?
He slowly shuffles around and limply walk backs into position while Giorgia Meloni and Mark Carney strain to look neutral.
This is what the scene looks like after he returns to his position – Starmer seemingly crestfallen while his peers looks like they’re trying not to laugh:
This is how things looked beforehand:
Of course, you can definitely read too much into these things.
Regardless of the truth, it’s definitely a ‘Yo, Blair’ moment in that it perfectly encapsulates the special relationship in 2025. The US barely remembers that we’re there even when we’re obviously and painfully right there.
In response to these harrowing scenes, people noted the following:
Imagine going from the world’s most powerful empire to whatever this is in just a few decades.
The way Sir Kier happily and eagerly jumps up when called, then slinks back once quickly dismissed, all by someone who doesn’t know his name….pic.twitter.com/1IYirFC3ph
As promised, Trump also managed to embarrass Blair after embarrassing Starmer with the following exchange:
Donald Trump has cast doubt on the appointment of former UK prime minister Tony Blair to a Gaza ‘Board of Peace’ by telling reporters on Air Force One that he wants to find out if ‘Tony would be popular with all’ in the Middle East.
This was at least less embarrassing than what he subjected Starmer to, but only because Blair wasn’t lurking in the background when he said it.
Trump, Starmer, and repetition
The saying goes that ‘history repeats itself, first as tragedy and second as farce’. We were well into the farce stage with Bush and Blair; as such, it makes sense that what we’re seeing now is so far beyond farcical.
Schadenfreude aside, it’s important to remember that the bufoonish actions of these grotesque clowns have real-life consequences. The ceasefire is a welcome end to the genocide, but it’s also just the beginning:
Exactly this. This is what we need to continue fighting for until a free Palestine https://t.co/1enqDRZlDw
Former government minister and permanent sociopath Priti Patel has been on the BBCrepeating standard Zionist fictions about Palestine marches.
Priti Patel: shilling for Zionism
Speaking to a sympathetic audience in the form of Laura Kuenssberg, Priti Patel’s claims of hate marches went unchallenged by the programme’s host. The former home secretary fulminated:
You would think after two years of these apparent hate orgies riddled with antisemitism, there might be extensive footage of the bile in question. Yet, in an era where everyone walks around with a recording device in their pocket, there is a mysterious lack of evidence to support the outlandish claims of Patel and others.
As pointed out by Dilly Hussain on X, Patel’s view on the matter should carry very little weight, given her historic associationwith the Zionist pseudo-state:
Priti Patel had a secret meeting with Netanyahu without the knowledge of the UK government.
She had 13 secret meetings with Israeli officials, and was then forced to resign.
Breaching MP rules used to get you sacked, now you can assist a genocide scot-free
Priti Patel resigned from her role as Secretary of State for International Development in 2017 after she was caught having secret meetings with Israeli officials while on holiday on the soil stolen from Palestinians. She even travelled to some of its most stolen-est land, visiting the Golan Heights robbed from Syria in 1967, and then went so far as to suggest international aid money should end up there. She had failed to inform anyone in government about what she had been up to while in the apartheid regime. That, along with the mixing of her private affairs on holiday and public duties as a minister, constituted a breach of the ministerial code.
Oh for the good old days of 2017, when you could get sacked for such comparatively minor transgressions with Zionists. These days, you can have your entire government enthusiastically participate in a genocide with them, and it’s anyone who stands against you that gets punished. The resignation didn’t stop Patel taking the standard trajectory of the British ruling class, however, as she failed upwards to become Home Secretary in 2019.
Others pointed out the contradiction between Patel’s confection about copies of the Torah being burnt on Palestine marches (again, zero evidence of this), while failing to condemn the actual burning of a Quran.
The woman who was sacked due to her illegal meetings with ISRAEL, lies about Torahs being burned in the STREET, when Qurans are deemed OK to burn in the UK as freedom of speech. https://t.co/YJKQYiHlny
Interestingly, this was the extent of the pushback from Kuenssberg, who made vague references to a “holy book” being torched. This follows the national broadcaster’s standard hierarchy of racism, where fictional antisemitism at Palestine marches must be tackled head-on and incessantly, but real, blatant Islamophobia can only be referred to in veiled terms. Another X user asked why Patel is the person brought on by the BBC in the first place:
Priti Patel sacked for having unauthorised meetings with Israeli officials is who the BBC bring on to slate the half a million Brits who are against genocide. https://t.co/tjkftGOQYQ
Priti Patel’s support for mass murderers isn’t anything new – she previously worked as a lobbyist for the killers at British American Tobacco, who were having issues due to working with another pack of thugs in the form of the Burmese dictatorship. Fiona in Hamilton provided perhaps the most succinct description of Patel, so we’ll give her the final word:
The 1800s-style land theft project often referred to as ‘Israel’ has received a reprieve on potential banishment from the annual Eurovision song contest. Organisers the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) have called off a November vote that was due to take place on the continued involvement of the fake state. In a statement, the craven body said:
In the light of recent developments in the Middle East, the EBU’s executive board (meeting on October 13) agreed there was a clear need to organise an open and in-person discussion among its members on the issue of participation in the Eurovision Song Contest 2026.
Consequently, the board agreed to put the issue on the agenda of its ordinary winter general assembly, which will be taking place in December, rather than organising an extraordinary session in advance.
So, vague pledges to “put the issue on the agenda” replace a specifically arranged vote that could have seen the Zionist entity expelled. Due to it being an apartheid, ethnic cleansing, occupying, genocidal terror project, the entity is heavily dependent on events like Eurovision to whitewash its horrifying crimes. It is therefore extremely concerning that the EBU seems keen to quietly sweep the issue under the carpet now that the most acute phase of Zionist genocide in Palestine may (may) have passed.
Eurovision organiser EBU passing the buck and dodging the question
The Eurovision coordinator has already tiptoed around the issue, holding a consultation process on the matter that started in July. It said:
We understand the concerns and deeply held views around the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. It is up to each member to decide if they want to take part in the contest, and we would respect any decision broadcasters make.
Then, rather than make a decision itself, it passed the buck by organising a vote. This would have been a simple majority, meaning that 35 of the 68 EBU members would have needed to signal their approval to trigger ejection of ‘Israel’. Member states include countries from West Asia and North Africa such as Algeria, Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon, at least some of whom would have likely voted for removal. Now even the ballot has been abandoned. The shitshow mirrors the feeble FIFA’s failure to kick the settler-colony out of the World Cup, another crucial reputation laundering point for Zionism.
The EBU had been pressured into the potential vote by a number of countries threatening to withdraw if the pseudo-state squatting on Palestine was granted continued participation. RTÉ, Ireland’s national broadcaster, had said:
RTÉ feels that Ireland’s participation would be unconscionable given the ongoing and appalling loss of lives in Gaza. RTÉ is also deeply concerned by the targeted killing of journalists in Gaza, and the denial of access to international journalists to the territory, and the plight of the remaining hostages.
Iceland, the Netherlands, Slovenia and Spain had also expressed an intention to leave the 2026 Eurovision contest. Spain’s Culture Minister Ernest Urtasun stated:
What I can say is that if Israel takes part, and if we don’t manage to get it thrown out, then we’ll have to take steps [such as withdrawing]. I don’t think we can normalise Israel’s participation in international forums as if nothing’s happened.
Even if the genocide has slowed, the Zionist entity still must be boycotted
The last few words from Urtasun elucidate a key point that is even more relevant in the wake of the recent developments in Palestine. Simply because there’s now a ceasefire, ‘Israel’ cannot be allowed to escape without consequence for its recent crimes, which are perhaps unparalleled in cruelty. Furthermore, its system of apartheid persists, and it must be ostracised just as apartheid South Africa was.
Letting the Zionist abomination compete in events like Eurovision is a breach of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) anti-normalisation guidelines. The Palestinian Campaign For The Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) arm of the BDS movement calls for a “boycott of Israeli academic and cultural institutions” for their role in an:
…Israeli system of oppression that has denied Palestinians their basic rights guaranteed by international law, or has hampered their exercise of these rights, including freedom of movement and freedom of expression.
Whether or not it has ended its annihilation of Gaza, the above still applies. The EBU must either expel ‘Israel’ or let its members vote to do so.
Scott Ritter: “… what everybody’s forgetting is that the basic terms of this deal are the same terms that Hamas has been laying out since October 7th. And now these terms are being met. And uh, this is a Hamas victory.”
Depending on which source you consult, the twenty-point peace plan of President Donald Trump for securing peace in Gaza shows much exultance and extravagant omission. The exultance was initially focused on the return of the hostages. It then shifted to the broader strategic goals of the various parties. Commentary on this point, even as the living Israeli hostages convalescence after their exchange for Palestinian detainees, sidesteps the Palestinian people, those fly in the ointment irritants who never seem to exit the political scene.
The peace plan, in effect, is being executed to eliminate Hamas and any semblance of a Palestinian militant movement in favour of an Israel-Arab-US axis of preferment and normalisation. Doing so puts a firm lid on Palestinian sovereignty and statehood in favour of sounder relations between Israel and the Arab states.
Consider, for instance, the views from the American Jewish Committee in their October 10 assessment. “President Trump’s unconventional approach created new diplomatic realities and forced Israel and key Arab states to align in new ways.” The peace plan was “the most credible framework to date for advancing Israeli-Arab peace, creating new opportunities for regional engagement, and countering Hamas’ ideology through a united alliance of Israel and Arab nations committed to peace, security, and prosperity.” Clearly, Palestinians are, if not footnotes, then invisible ink lines in such arrangements.
This attitude is also echoed in remarks made by the US Vice President, J.D. Vance. Palestinian subservience is assumed in any new proposed arrangement which prioritises Israeli security and a collective of overseeing nation states that will guard against any mischief in the Strip. “The President convinced the entire Muslim world really, both the Gulf Arab states, but as far as South-East Asia as Indonesia, to really step up and provide ground troops so that Gaza could be secured in safety.”
Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty gave some sense of what is expected. “We are going to support and commit troops within specific parameters,” he told CBS. A UN Security Council mandate would be required, along with clear specifications for what the mission of the troops on the ground would be, “which will be peacekeeping and providing training to Palestinian police.”
Trump’s near cinematic appearance on October 13 in the compact, claustrophobic Knesset after the handover of the hostages set the scene for Israeli grandstanding, staged mawkishness and denial. Netanyahu was in typical form, accusing Israel’s friends of blood libel stupidity for recognising Palestine; in doing so, they had effectively committed acts of antisemitism, buying “into Hamas’s false propaganda.” Massacring and starving those in the Gaza Strip warranted no mention, but disarming Hamas and demilitarising the enclave did. With praise for both himself and Trump, Netanyahu spoke of jointly forging “a path to bring the remaining hostages home and end the war. End a war in a way that ensures the disarming of Hamas, the demilitarisation of Gaza, and that Gaza would never again pose a threat to Israel.”
He also thanked Trump for “fully” backing the decision to make the last murderous assault into Gaza City. This “military pressure” provided momentum that eventually saw Hamas capitulate. The US President then “succeeded in doing something that no one believed was possible. You brought most of the Arab world, you did, you brought most of the world behind your proposal to free the hostages and end the war.”
Opposition leader Yair Lapid, for his part, explicitly denied any genocide or “intentional starvation” of the Palestinians, then proceeded to overlook them in calling on “all the nations of the Islamic world” to engage Israel.
Trump’s own speech was meandering, personal and free of complex turns. He spoke about his envoy Steve Witkoff as a Henry Kissinger who did not leak, an emissary of singular genius. An interruption by Hadash lawmakers Ayman Odeh and Ofer Cassif, both demanding that Palestine be recognised, did not faze him. And then came mention of the Ukraine War, and Russian President Vladimir Putin and more adulatory remarks for the US delegates who have paid homage to the US God King. They were all part of “central casting”.
Not a sliver of reference to the Palestinian cause for sovereignty made an appearance, which continues to moan under the strategic expediency of it all, the residents of Gaza doomed to indefinite invigilation at the hands of Trump’s “Board of Peace”. More to the point, he was happy to admit providing weapons at the request of “Bibi” at a moment’s notice. The US made “the best weapons in the world, and we’ve given a lot to Israel, … and you used them well.” But the slaughter could not continue, and the Israeli PM would be remembered “far more” for accepting the peace agreement. “The timing for this is brilliant. I said, ‘Bibi you’re going to be remembered for this far more than if you kept this thing going, going, going, kill, kill, kill.’”
The Palestinians, granted brief respite from military violence, will be desperately wary. When Lapid mentioned that Trump had “saved far more than one life, and life is an entire world”, it can also be assumed that killing one life kills a world. Some 68,000 Palestinian worlds (a conservative estimate) were extinguished by the munitions and weapons of Israel and its backers. As humanitarian workers return to Gaza, they see the horrors of a lunarscape of devastation. If only Trump had considered paying a visit to that particular part of earth.
Counter-terror laws being ‘weaponised’ against pro-Palestine groups in UK, US, France and Germany, says FIDH
The right to protest has come under “sustained attack” across the west , according to a report highlighting the growing criminalisation of pro-Palestinian demonstrations.
The study by the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) pays particular attention to the UK, the US, France and Germany, where it says governments have “weaponised” counter-terrorism legislation as well as the fight against antisemitism to suppress dissent and support for Palestinian rights in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now! The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman.
As we’ve reported, the Gaza ceasefire deal is in effect. Phase one of the US.-backed 20-point plan is underway. Hamas has released all 20 living captives. Israel has released almost 2000 Palestinians in Ramallah and now in Khan Younis in Gaza.
Yesterday, President Trump addressed the Israeli Knesset and then co-chaired a so-called peace summit in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, with President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was not among the 20 or more world leaders who attend. He was invited but said he was not going.
For more, we’re joined by the Israeli historian, author and professor Ilan Pappé, professor of history and director of the European Centre for Palestine Studies at the University of Exeter and the chair of the Nakba Memorial Foundation. Among his books, The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, almost 20 years ago, and Gaza in Crisis, which he co-wrote with Noam Chomsky. His new book, Israel on the Brink: And the Eight Revolutions That Could Lead to Decolonization and Coexistence.
We thank you so much for being with us. Professor Pappé, if you could start off by responding to what has happened? We’re watching, in Khan Younis, prisoners being released, Palestinian prisoners, up to 2000, and in the occupied West Bank, though there families were told if they dare celebrate the release of their loved ones, they might be arrested.
And we saw the release of the 20 Israeli hostages as they returned to Israel. Hamas says they’re returning the dead hostages, the remains, over the next few days. Israel has not said they will return the dead prisoners, of which it’s believed there are nearly 200 in Israeli prisons.
Your response overall, and now to the summit in Egypt?
ILAN PAPPÉ: Yes. First of all, there is some joy in knowing that the bombing of the people in Gaza has stopped for a while. And there is joy knowing that Palestinian political prisoners have been reunited with their families, and, similarly, that Israeli hostages were reunited with their families.
But except from that, I don’t think we are in such an historical moment as President Trump claimed in his speech in the Knesset and beforehand. We are not at the end of the terrible chapter that we have been in for the last two years.
And that chapter is an Israeli attempt by a particularly fanatic, extremely rightwing Israeli government to try and use ethnic cleansing in the West Bank and genocide in Gaza to downsize the number of Palestinians in Palestine and impose Israel’s will in a way that they hope would be at least endorsed by some Arab governments and the world.
So far, they have an alliance of Trump and some extreme rightwing parties in Europe.
And now I hope that the world will not be misled that Israel is now ready to open a different kind of page in its relationship with the Palestinians. And what you told us about the way that the celebrations were dealt with in the West Bank and the incineration of the sanitation center shows you that nothing has changed in the dehumanisation and the attitude of this particular Israeli government and its belief that it has the power to wipe out Palestine as a nation, as a people and as a country.
I hope the world will not stand by, because up to now it did stand by when the genocide occurred in Palestine.
AMY GOODMAN: We have just heard President Trump’s address to the Israeli Knesset. He followed the Israeli Prime Minister, Netanyahu. I’m not sure, but in listening to Netanyahu, I don’t think he used the word “Palestinian.” President Trump has just called on the Israeli president to pardon Netanyahu.
Your thoughts on this, and also the possibility of why Netanyahu has not joined this summit that President Trump is co-chairing? Many are speculating for different reasons — didn’t want to anger the right, that’s further right than him. Others are saying the possibility of his arrest, not on corruption charges, but on crimes against humanity, the whole case before the International Criminal Court.
ILAN PAPPÉ: It could be a mixture of all of it, but I think at the center of it is the nature of the Israeli government that was elected in November 2022, this alliance between a very opportunistic politician, who’s only interested in surviving and keeping his position as a prime minister, alongside messianic, neo-Zionist politicians who really believe that God has given them the opportunity to create the Greater Israel, maybe even beyond the borders of Palestine, and, in the process, eliminate Palestinians.
I think that his consideration should all — are always about his chances of survival. So, whatever went in his mind, he came to the conclusion that going to Cairo is not going to help his chances of being reelected.
My great worry is not that he didn’t go to Cairo. My greatest worry is that he does believe that his only chance of being reelected is still to have a war going on, either in Gaza or in the West Bank or against Iran or in the north with Lebanon.
We are dealing here with a reckless, irresponsible politician, who is even willing to drown his own state in the process of saving his skin and his neck. And the victims will always be, from this adventurous policy, the Palestinians.
I hope the world understands that, really, the urgent need of — and I’m talking about world leaders rather than societies. You already discussed what is the level of solidarity among civil societies. But I do hope that political elites will understand — especially in the West — their role now is not to mediate between Israelis and Palestinians.
Their role now is to protect the Palestinians from destruction, elimination, genocide and ethnic cleansing. And nothing of that duty, especially of Europe, that is complicit with what happened, and the United States, that are complicit with what happened in the last two years — nothing that we heard in the speeches so far in the — in preparation for the summit in Egypt, and I have a feeling that we won’t hear anything about it also later on.
There is a different way in which our civil societies refer to Palestine as a place that has to be saved and protected, and still this irrelevant conversation among our political elites about a peace deal, a two-state solution, all of that, that has nothing to do with what we are experiencing in the way that the Israeli government thinks it has an historical moment to totally de-Arabise Palestine and eliminate and expunge the Palestinians from history and the area.
AMY GOODMAN: Ilan Pappé, I want to thank you for being with us, Israeli historian, professor of history, director of the European Centre for Palestine Studies at the University of Exeter, chair of the Nakba Memorial Foundation. His new book, Israel on the Brink: And the Eight Revolutions That Could Lead to Decolonization and Coexistence.
Scenes of Palestinian emergency workers, journalists, displaced refugees, and children in Gaza celebrating on the streets widely circulated following the announcement of a ceasefire deal. In the United States, Israel’s most powerful ally, people involved in the Palestine solidarity movement met the moment with a similar sense of both mourning and cautious optimism.
The Palestinian Youth Movement, a Palestinian diaspora organization that has played a key role in organizing mass demonstrations in the United States since the beginning of Israel’s war on Gaza, joins “our people in welcoming the prospect of a durable ceasefire agreement,” according to a statement released October 9.
All living Israeli captives were released by Hamas on 13 October and have returned to Israel as part of the ceasefire agreement’s exchange formula.
The 20 living captives were handed over to the Red Cross before being returned to Israel by the Israeli military.
The Israeli army confirmed the final 13 captives were handed over, after initially receiving seven. The captives have been taken to hospitals for checkups and to meet their family members.
The coming hours will also see the resistance release the bodies of deceased Israeli captives.
Meanwhile, Israel is releasing a total of 1,966 Palestinian prisoners. Buses carrying prisoners have already begun departing from Israel’s Ofer prison in the occupied West Bank, with some having arrived in Ramallah – one of the drop-off points.
Canary journalist Alaa Shamali is trying to get his family – of five children – safely out of Gaza, but needs your help to make it happen.
Palestinian journalist Alaa Shamali has written unflinchingly on the countless heinous atrocities Israel has perpetrated in Gaza. A little more than a week before the colonial settler state broke the first 2025 supposed ceasefire in March, Alaa started penning his heart-rending prose for the Canary. Now, seven months on, and at the fragile precipice of another so-called ceasefire, his haunting words continue to echo out in the vacuum of a Western mainstream media still clamouring to cover for genocidal war criminals.
Everything he writes, he does with the harrowing clarity and poignancy that can only come from experience and truly knowing the gut-wrenching reality of life under Israeli bombardment and occupation. Because as he has recounted the horrifying details of Israel’s “strangling siege” leaving three-quarters of children in Gaza malnourished, eating sand and drinking contaminated water, and living displaced in “torn tents”, he has told these stories as a record too of his own family’s devastating reality.
Canary journalist Alaa Shamali: an urgent fundraiser for his family in Gaza
It compels readers to try to imagine the utter heartbreak and struggle of:
spending every day, every night, and every moment in such cramped conditions. They need urgent support to rebuild their home and regain a sense of normalcy.
However, it also caveats this with the unfaltering fact that what Alaa’s family has lived through amounts to “unimaginable hardship and loss”.
Because, as for many families in Gaza, this current genocide was not the first time Israel destructively uprooted their lives. The GoFundMe relays how Israel has demolished their home, not once, not twice, but three times in little over the last decade:
Their home in Gaza has been destroyed three times by the wars on Gaza in 2014, 2021, and now again in 2024. Each time they have painstakingly rebuilt their lives and their home, but this time, they have lost not only their home but also any source of income. The compensation for their 2021 home destruction is still pending, and now they face the devastating reality of losing their home once more.
deprived of the most basic right of fatherhood: to see his five children walk to school in Gaza with peace of mind.
He has recounted the hopes and dreams of his five children – currently living in a displacement camp in Gaza. There’s 15-year-old Dima, his eldest who waits in the displacement tent wondering if she will get the chance to return to school. Alaa penned a particularly painful exchange, where Dima has asked her father:
Dad… will I be able to continue my studies?
And he wrote with palpable grief:
I hear her question echoing inside me at night like an absent school bell. I try to smile and tell her, “You will continue,” but my voice betrays me. How can I reassure her when all I have is my pen, while all the roads to school are blocked by rubble?
The crowdfunder adds another tinge of utter anguish over Dima’s desire for the most basic things a young teenager might hope for, simply:
decorating her room with the best furniture and devices, to build a future alongside her four younger siblings.
Israel has forced next eldest 13-year-old Ibada to grow up “before his time”, stealing his childhood so:
His voice, which used to be full of enthusiasm, has become hoarse with waiting.
Alaa wrote that it’s as if he carries:
the burdens of adults while still a child.
Salah, Abdullah, and Lina: playing in the corridors of displacement
Alaa’s 12-year-old son Salah has a “deep love for football” and he:
admires stars like Messi, Ronaldo, and Mohamed Salah.
When the fundraiser started in June 2024, Salah hadn’t watched “a match in nine months”. He had already missed an entire school year. Well over a year on, Alaa wrote how Salah and ten-year-old son Abdullah:
were the mirror of childhood in my home. Their laughter on the way to school and their running on the way back gave me the feeling that life was still possible despite the war.
Today, he says:
that innocence has been stolen from them, and they play in the corridors of displacement instead of schoolyards.
However, what “breaks” Alaa’s heart “the most” is his “little girl”, his youngest, 6-year-old Lina:
When I look at her, I feel that her entire childhood is being silently assassinated. She is growing up outside of school, like a flower without water, and her pain alone is enough to fill a thousand news reports. But all I can do is carry her silence and broadcast it to the world.
In her own words, Lina has captured the plaintive tragedy of a child growing up under constant genocidal siege:
Bombing over our heads and such. Nothing but missiles above us. We get hit a lot. Leave behind our childhood. I’m still a little girl.
And Lina has expressed the most simple hope of all children in Gaza:
End the war – we are children – we want to live.
Support Alaa’s family to seek safety and rebuild their lives
Now, Gaza has entered another ceasefire – but Lina’s wish still goes unanswered. Predictably, and as last time, Israel continues to violate it with impunity. It’s still bombing, still murdering, and still maiming Palestinians in refugee camps.
And all the while, it is maintaining the key ingredients of its engineered famine, namely, its blockades severing access to sorely-needed aid. The UNRWA has detailed that 6,000 trucks loaded with food, tents, and medicines enough for the entire population of Gaza for three months:
remain stuck at the Gaza border, waiting to be allowed in.
It’s why Alaa’s family needs your help to move to Egypt, where:
they can find safety and begin to rebuild their lives. Every donation, no matter the amount, can make a significant difference. Please donate to help this family escape the horrors of war and start anew.
As Alaa himself has written, Gaza:
does not ask for pity, but for justice. It does not ask only for aid, but for the right to live like others. It asks to sleep without fear, to open a school, or to light a small lamp at night without it being considered a luxury.
For his family and others from Gaza to live safe, secure, fulfilling lives once more, is a powerful act of resistance after two years of genocide. In the spirit of mutual aid and solidarity, the Canary implores readers, wherever they can, to continue supporting Palestinians’ crowdfunders.
Alaa has been supporting his family as he writes full-time for the Canary. But amid the immense costs of essentials in Gaza, and the enormous expenses of them leaving the Strip for a new life, his wages can only go so far. You can donate to Alaa’s family’s fundraiser here.
Gaza will be rebuilt according to the whims of global arms firms that helped destroy, it seems. UK PM Keir Starmer, whose government has actively supported the genocide, announced plans for the future of the ruined enclave Sunday.
Starmer said that the UK would contribute £20mn. He claims this will:
ensure water, sanitation and hygiene services reach tens of thousands of civilians across Gaza.
The UK government press release said:
reconstruction will be Palestinian-led, with absolutely no role for Hamas in its future governance.
So who will have a role?
Starmer’s rogues gallery for Gaza
Starmer also announced a three-day summit was underway in the UK. It includes a real rogue’s gallery of who WILL be involved.
And that list doesn’t look all that Palestinian. Excepting the Israeli-backed Palestinian Authority (PA) which functions as a sort of prison guard service on behalf of Israel.
The government said:
The UK Wilton Park summit will bring together a coalition of representatives from businesses, civil society and governments, to convene crucial planning and coordination efforts for postwar Gaza.
Discussions will also cover efforts to support the Palestinian Authority’s own transformation and reform programme to ensure it can support Gaza’s recovery.
But what kind of businesses?
Wilton Park summit
The Wilton Park organisation describes itself as:
an Executive Agency of the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office.
A deeper look reveals Wilton park is deeply entangled with the same global arms firms which helped destroy Gaza.
Wilton Park has what it called a Global Impact Group which it describes as a:
…unique, cross-sector, membership initiative designed to provide opportunities for input into international policy discussions.
The Impact Group brings “together policy leads” from across sectors “to share best practice, explore common approaches and to make policy recommendations”.
Among the Impact Group membership you’ll find friendly local arms firms like Lockheed, BAE Systems, Airbus and Rolls Royce. It also includes Meta (formerly Facebook) and British Petroleum (BP). Adam Smith International, the global wing of the neoliberal Adam Smith Institute, is also a member.
Genocide complicity
There are numerous examples of the ways in which these firms support the Israeli military.
In 2024, Palestinians launched a legal action against BP for supplying oil to Israel. The International Centre for Justice for Palestinians (ICJP) said that BP had demonstrated:
…a clear failure to adhere to its own human rights policies and international law.
By facilitating the transport of oil that fuels military operations in Gaza, BP has contributed to the humanitarian catastrophe unfolding in the region. Our clients seek justice for the profound suffering and loss they have endured and call on BP to act responsibly by immediately halting its involvement.
The truth is Gaza lays in ruins as a result of Israeli military violence. But that level of violence which was only politically and materially possible because of the UK and others.
There have to be serious questions about whether arms firms, an oil giant, a big tech firm and a neoliberal thinktank should get a say in what comes next.
In another age, this kind of activity would be captured in a single word: colonialism.
Israeli hidden explosives continue to kill Palestinian children in Gaza, despite the supposed ‘ceasefire’. In one incident this morning, a ‘suspicious device’ went off, killing one child and wounding several:
They called it a ceasefire, yet death still hides beneath the rubble. Before withdrawing, Israeli forces planted explosives and mines across Gaza silent killers waiting for innocent hands to touch. Today, another child paid the price. Even in “peace,” Israel’s war on Gaza’s children never ends.
Hidden explosives
Local journalists and civil defence have accused Israel of leaving cans of ‘food’ and even toys packed with explosives, with numerous reports of children killed or maimed after picking them up. In what appears to have been a concerted counter-information campaign, Western media and US government-funded ‘fact checkers’ quoted US military experts dismissing the idea and claiming that the food cans are mine detonators, without questioning why ‘mine detonators’ were being left behind in bombed civilian homes for families to find.
Even without the toys and food cans, the United Nations says that Israel’s genocidal campaign has left a ‘dark legacy’ of thousands of tons of unexploded ordnance that continues to endanger Palestinian civilians, even more so as they begin to return to the rubble of their homes.
As families on Monday celebrated the return of about 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and 20 living Israeli hostages after the two-year Israeli bombardment that has killed more than 67,000 people and left rubble across Gaza, advocates demanded the return of Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya, who was captured nearly a year ago and has reportedly been imprisoned in a detention center known for torturing detainees.
The case of death is not at all the cause of the dead, it’s the cause of the living.
— Ghassan Kanafani, from the novel Men Under the Sun
My people are fearless and the gallows to each person among us is the instance that precedes the dawn of a new day for all of us … Prosecutor! Understand that when one of us enters the nation’s battle of destiny, he takes into consideration all possible results. But above all, he places his confidence in the determination of the people to win victory.
— Ghassan Kanafani, from the story “A Heroine from My Country”
They tell you this is a “conflict.” A “complex issue.” A tragedy happening “over there.”
They are lying.
What is happening in Gaza, in Palestine, is the logical, bloody conclusion of a global system of exploitation—a system sustained not by monsters, but by the convenient, daily complicity of those who benefit from it most: the citizen-consumers of the West.
This complicity is masked by a grand, soothing lie: the lie of democratic citizenship.
The state and its subjects have entered a symbiotic pact of bad faith. The theory goes like this: in a democracy, the citizen is sovereign. The government’s actions are an expression of the popular will. Therefore, the citizens are responsible. This is the idealistic shell. Let us crack it open and examine the actual, pathetic reality inside.
The state, functioning as the capitalist class’s executive committee, depends on this lie as its foundational fiction. It is the democratic alibi that launders imperial violence into policy. The weapons shipped to fuel genocide are stamped with the seal of “democratic principles,” their bloody purpose blessed by the hollow ritual of the ballot. This is the dictatorship of the elite, a regime of class power wearing the convincing mask of popular consent—a specific apparatus designed to vaporize the accountability of the capitalist and imperialist classes, dispersing it as a fine mist of collective guilt over the populace.
But why do the masses accept this lie?
Because it is an anesthetic.
Having already swallowed the primordial myth of capitalist democracy—that freedom is consumption and power is a ballot—this smaller lie of passive citizenship is the necessary sedative that numbs the pain of their own powerlessness and the horror conducted in their name.
Here we must be Kanafanian in our clarity. To be a “citizen” of the metropole is, in practice, to be a consumer. And the consumer’s paradise is built on the graveyards of the Global South. Your stability, your cheap energy, your endless stream of goods, is subsidized by the control and immiseration of others. To truly confront this would shatter the consumer’s world. The cognitive dissonance would be unbearable.
And so, the lie administers the necessary anesthetic. The recited alibis of impotence (“What power do I have?”) are the superstructure of a material bargain. This is the highest stage of false consciousness: the willed surrender of agency for the comforts of the labor aristocracy. It is a transaction: the consumer trades their revolutionary potential for moral oblivion, outsourcing conscience to the state and NGOs—the very managers of the crisis—who, in return, guarantee the sanctity of the shopping aisle.
This is the “citizenshipness” we are sold: a hollowed-out identity, a safety valve for dissent. Protest, write your representative, cast your vote—then return to your consumption. The system allows you to perform concerns without ever threatening the foundations of your comfort. It is a brilliant, cynical management of dissent.
Thus, the genocide and the ongoing Nakba in Palestine are not an aberration. It is the system working as intended. The bombs falling on Rafah, Occupied Palestine, are funded by the taxes of the Western citizenry. The diplomatic cover is provided in their name. Their silence—or more accurately, their fragmented, ineffective noise—is the permission slip.
The connection is not metaphorical; it is material. The luxury lifestyle and the genocide are two outputs of the same machine. One is the direct, concentrated violence of imperialism. The other is the diffuse, structural violence of an exploitative global order. They require each other.
To the real socialists among us, the conclusion is clear: Spontaneous protest is not enough. Moral outrage is not enough. The working classes of the imperial core have been bought off with crumbs from the colonial plunder. They will not achieve revolutionary consciousness on their own. The task falls to an organized political party—those who see through the lie—to break the hypnotic spell of consumer citizenship. To organize, not to plead. To expose the comfort, to make the machinery of complicity grind to a halt.
And to the Palestinians, the path is one of steadfast, rooted resistance. The Palestinian struggle is not a plea for Western sympathy. It is an anti-colonial/imperial war. It is the absolute negation of the lie. Every act of resistance, from the stone to the slogan, is a truth-telling, exposing the brutal reality that the capitalist West so desperately masks with its talk of “complexity” and “citizenship.”
The question is not whether the Western citizen is complicit. The question is whether they will continue to choose the convenience of the lie over the difficult truth of their own justice—a justice that is inextricably linked to the justice and liberation of Palestine. To end the genocide there, they must first kill the complacent consumer within themselves.
There is no other way.
Israeli-backed Palestinian looting gangs have lived in luxury while Gaza burned. A Sky News investigation shows how local militia leader Yasser Abu Shabab has positioned himself and his allies to rule Gaza after the ceasefire. Abu Shabab’s forces have benefited massively from Israeli support and aid passed through the the deeply dodgy Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).
Sky News mapped the areas under the militias control, saying one:
…small neighbourhood is the headquarters of the Popular Forces, Yasser Abu Shabab’s former looting gang which now, with Israel’s backing, hopes to wrest control of the Gaza Strip from Hamas.
Palestinian militia product of their environment
Sources inside the Popular Forces and IDF told the Murdoch-owned channel details of the plans.
Hassan Abu Shabab, an ally and relative if the militia leader, told Sky recent recruitment had “swelled the group’s forces across Gaza to around 3,000”.
One senior aid worker said cigarettes were one way the militia cashed in:
Abu Shabab was empowered by cigarette smuggling.
In that kind of curtailed environment, you’re going to get Abu Shababs.
Images and video published by Sky Newsshow bags of cash in the hands of the militia. The leader admits his gang has targeted truck going into Gaza, but said they had hit specific commercial targets and not aid trucks:
Hamas accused us of stealing the shipments, while in reality, we were bringing them for our families and distributing them.
Yes, there were some breaches, with a few people who sold things off – fine. But things escalated. Hamas’s men came in and they killed my cousins. […] Fifty-four people were lost in that massacre.
Israeli-backed forces
After the clashes with Hamas, which Sky News could not verify, Israel:
began coordinating with Yasser Abu Shabab to smuggle in cash, food, guns and vehicles for use in his battles against Hamas.
The equipment is brought in in coordination with the Palestinian Authority (PA), Israeli military, and neighbouring countries like Egypt. Reportedly the food comes directly from GHF, whose armed aid distribution points proved to be deadly for many Palestinians.
The Norwegian Refugee Council told Sky News that having militias in the aid supply chain broke with core humanitarian principles:
Once channelled through an armed group, aid no longer meets that definition.
It becomes indistinguishable from support to one side in the fighting and may expose agencies to accusations of complicity or liability under counter-terrorism and sanctions frameworks.
IDF links
Sky News also spoke to a serving IDF soldier who confirmed Israeli is directly backing the Popular Forces:
The cooperation [with Yasser Abu Shabab] mainly goes through [Israel’s security service] Shin Bet, or some official state mechanism.
We just bring in the food, make sure it arrives in Gaza.
The soldier, who is a Bedouin serving in the Israeli military, said:
Israel helps him, it gives him grenades, it gives him money, it gives him vehicles, it gives him food, it gives him all types of things.
A new political battle is being waged to see who administrates Gaza after the latest ceasefire. It seems Israel is positioning its well-fed, well-funded collaborators for the job. Their support, along with the Palestinian Authority’s, of rogue racketeers is a strategic choice to further entrench unrest and instability for Palestinians surviving genocidal horror after genocidal horror.
Hamas announced on Monday the release of 20 living Israeli prisoners as part of the first phase of the prisoner exchange deal reached with Israel, dubbed the “Al-Aqsa Flood Deal.”
The movement said in an official statement monitored by the Canary:
As part of the Al-Aqsa Flood prisoner exchange deal, we have decided to release 20 living Israeli prisoners.
This comes within the context of the temporary ceasefire agreement between the two sides, which includes a prisoner exchange and a humanitarian truce. According to Israel’s Channel 12, the International Red Cross has so far received seven Israeli prisoners held in the Gaza Strip. They are: Matan Angrist, Gali Berman, Zeev Berman, Alon Ohl, Eitan Horn, Guy Gilboa Dalal, and Omri Miran.
Reuters reported that the majority of the Israeli prisoners to be released by the Qassam Brigades were captured during the October 7, 2023, attack, while attending a Nova concert near the settlement of Re’im in southern Israel. Meanwhile, the newspaper Israel Hayom reported, citing a security source, that the Israeli army began preparations this morning to transfer Palestinian prisoners from the northern Gaza Strip. Channel 24 reported that the Israeli Prison Service had completed final preparations for the release of the prisoners, in accordance with the agreement.
Israeli prisoners make calls to families
And, in a remarkable and unprecedented development in the history of prisoner exchanges between the Palestinians and Israel, the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth reported that the Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, allowed Israeli prisoners held in the Gaza Strip to make direct phone calls to their families prior to their release.
The newspaper reported that a number of families received phone calls from their captive relatives, in coordination with the Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s military wing, which oversaw the handover process.
These phone calls represent an unprecedented humanitarian step in such deals, which are usually carried out in complete secrecy and without any direct contact between the prisoners and their families until the moment of handover.
Commenting on this move, Israeli military analyst Yaron Avraham said:
Hamas had detailed maps of Israeli army bases and positions, so what’s so strange about it also having the phone numbers of soldiers’ families?
He added that this reflects:
the advanced intelligence capabilities possessed by the resistance inside Gaza.
List for Palestinian prisoners set for release expanded
In a notable development, the Israeli government approved, during an emergency telephone vote, an amendment to the list of Palestinian prisoners to be included in the release. The official Kan Broadcasting Corporation reported that the amendment included the addition of five Palestinian prisoners to the list, to be released if there is any shortage in the number of released Gazan prisoners. Among the prominent names on the reserve list is Dr. Hussam Abu Safia, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, who was arrested by Israeli forces from inside the hospital last December.
Reuters reported, citing an official source, that 1,966 Palestinian prisoners included in the agreement had boarded buses in preparation for their release. They are distributed as follows:
1,716 prisoners from the Gaza Strip will be released at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Yunis.
250 prisoners from the West Bank and Jerusalem, including several who were serving life sentences, will be transported to their destinations, either within the Palestinian territories or abroad.
Future of the deal
The deal is viewed as a political and moral victory for the Palestinian resistance, following the failure of Israel’s military attempts to recover its prisoners through months of intensive ground and air operations, which claimed the lives of thousands of Palestinians, including a large number of civilians.
Meanwhile, international efforts continue to complete the next phases of the truce agreement, which includes additional field and humanitarian arrangements, amid warnings of the agreement’s collapse if Israel does not adhere to all of its terms, most notably halting its aggression against the Gaza Strip and improving the humanitarian conditions of its residents.
The Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor has called for international journalists and media outlets, along with fact-finding committees and international investigators, to be granted unrestricted access to the Gaza Strip. The organisation have called for the urgent need to document what it described as ‘crimes of genocide’ committed by Israel and to ensure accountability and legal responsibility for serious violations against civilians.
There is an urgent need to open Gaza to international journalists and media teams for unrestricted field access to cover the humanitarian catastrophe left by this genocide. Israel has systematically sought to erase truth by targeting Palestinian press, killing at least 254 journalists, destroying most media institutions, and continuing to bar international journalists from entering the enclave.
Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor calls on International media outlets to immediately dispatch their teams to Gaza to document the scale of destruction, the extent of civilian suffering, and to monitor compliance with the ceasefire. Covering developments in Gaza is not merely a professional mission but a moral and humanitarian duty toward victims of one of the most brutal crimes of modern times.
They emphasised:
Any restriction on press freedom or denial of entry to media and international investigation mechanisms perpetuates efforts to conceal facts and withhold evidence from the global public, obstructing independent documentation of genocide and widespread destruction inflicted upon civilians and infrastructure.
Human rights group says Gaza must be opened to observers
The group also explained that the success of the ceasefire agreement that came into effect on Friday under the auspices of Egypt, Qatar, Turkey and the United States depends on respect for international humanitarian law, an end to the ongoing violations against Palestinians, and addressing the root causes of the conflict, namely the occupation and the blockade imposed on the Strip for years.
The statement noted that Israel has prevented foreign journalists from entering Gaza, while systematically targeting the Palestinian press, killing more than 250 journalists and destroying most media institutions in an attempt to obscure the facts and prevent the documentation of crimes.
The group also stressed that opening Gaza to the international media is an urgent necessity to cover the catastrophic humanitarian situation and ensure that the true picture is conveyed to the world. It also emphasised that preventing the press and international commissions from working reinforces a policy of impunity and undermines the chances of justice.
They concluded their call by urging the international community to take immediate action to ensure that journalists and investigators have access to Gaza, stressing that freedom of the press is a prerequisite for achieving justice and uncovering the truth:
Ignoring human rights or the ongoing occupation in any political initiative perpetuates impunity and enables Israel to repeatedly commit atrocities without accountability. Rigorous monitoring of Israeli practices in Gaza is vital to prevent the recurrence of genocide. Preventing genocide is not a political choice or negotiable matter but an absolute legal and moral duty requiring decisive international action.
Mahmoud Basal, spokesperson for the Civil Defence in the Gaza Strip, warned that Palestinians returning to their neighbourhoods and homes in Gaza City face a double security and humanitarian disaster. He explained that remnants of war, in the form of unexploded ordnance, are scattered among the rubble and crumbling homes are thus turned into death traps.
Palestinians are not returning to their homes, but to ruins, to enormous rubble, and to areas unfit for habitation or life.
On Friday, the ceasefire agreement in Gaza came into effect and the occupation forces began a gradual withdrawal from some residential areas. That has allowed hundreds of thousands of displaced people in the centre of the Gaza Strip to return to their neighbourhoods, more than 80% of which have been destroyed.
Urgent demands for Gaza
The Civil Defence spokesperson also confirmed that field teams had found quantities of rockets, shells, and explosive materials that had not exploded during the attacks. This is especially the case in densely populated residential areas. He pointed out that these materials posed an imminent danger to the lives of residents, especially children and families who had been forced to return to the remains of their homes due to lack of shelter.
He said:
Residential neighbourhoods have been turned into abandoned battlefields, and every stone in them may conceal a deadly danger. These materials are still active and could explode at any moment.
Basal called for the international community to intervene and exert immediate pressure on the occupying authorities to hand over maps and accurate information on the locations of unexploded ordnance used in the bombing. He pointed out that civil defence teams are working with very limited resources, without specialised tools or adequate technical support, which increases the difficulty and danger of the task for the crews.
Basal described the scene in Gaza City as ‘unprecedented in terms of the scale of destruction,’ noting that hundreds of residential buildings had been reduced to rubble and the entire infrastructure had been damaged, including water and electricity networks, roads and health facilities. He said that civil defence faces a double burden, not limited to recovering bodies or extinguishing fires, but extending to securing areas, dealing with explosive materials, and providing a minimum level of safety for residents who are forcibly returning to their destroyed homes.
Two leftwing opposition members of the Knesset protested in the middle of US President Donald Trump’s historic and rambling speech praising the Gaza ceasefire and his administration in West Jerusalem today.
MK Ayman Odeh, a lawyer and chair of the mainly Arab Hadash-Ta’al party, was escorted out of the Knesset plenum after holding up a protest sign calling on Trump to “recognise Palestine”.
It was a day filled with emotion as Hamas released the 20 last living Israeli captives and the Israeli military began freeing 2000 Palestinian prisoners, many of them held without charge.
Lawmaker Odeh is a strong advocate for Palestinian statehood, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyaho’s government opposes.
Ofer Cassif, the party’s only Jewish MK, also tried to hold up a protest sign and was removed from the chamber.
After the interruption, President Trump quipped: “That was very efficient” — and then carried on with his speech.
Previously, Odeh posted on his X account: “The amount of hypocrisy in the plenum is unbearable.
‘Crimes against humanity’
“To crown Netanyahu through flattery the likes of which has never been seen, through an orchestrated group, does not absolve him and his government of the crimes against humanity committed in Gaza, nor of the responsibility for the blood of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian victims and thousands of Israeli victims.
“But only because of the ceasefire and the overall deal am I here.
“Only ending the occupation, and only recognising the State of Palestine alongside Israel, will bring justice, peace, and security to all.”
The brief interruption did not deflect from Trump’s speech that was effusive in its praise for Israel, the country’s leadership, the hostages and their families, and its military and so-called “victory” in Gaza.
הוציאו אותי מהמליאה רק כי העליתי את הדרישה הפשוטה ביותר, דרישה שכל הקהילה הבינלאומית מסכימה עליה:
“The choice for Palestinians could not be more clear,” the US president argued.
“This is their chance to turn forever from the path of terror and violence — it’s been extreme — to exile the wicked forces of hate that are in their midst, and I think that’s going to happen,” Trump said.
Palestinians welcome the release of prisoners. Image: AJ screenshot APR
Tear gas fired An Israeli armoured vehicle fired tear gas and rubber bullets at Palestinians gathered near Ofer Prison in the occupied West Bank, where hundreds had assembled to await the release of prisoners,
Earlier, the Israeli military, in a post on X, reported that the International Red Cross had transferred the final 13 captives held by Hamas to Shin Bet forces in the Gaza Strip, after an earlier group of seven had been released.
Al Jazeera Arabic, citing Palestinian sources, also reported that the handover of all 20 living captives had now been completed.
Al Jazeera’s Nour Adeh reported from Amman, Jordan, because Al Jazeera is banned from reporting from Israel and the Occupied West Bank, that the Israeli Broadcasting Authority had confirmed that the Red Cross had received the remaining 13 living Israeli captives.
“They will soon be handed over to the custody of the Israeli military, which, of course, is still present in 53 percent of Gaza,” she said.
“That means that we are in the process of concluding the release of all living Israeli captives, and that is all happening as US President Trump arrived in Israel.
“These are important developments, and the choreography is not coincidental.”
Remaining in Gaza were the bodies of 28 Israeli captives, and it was not clear how many of them will be released today.
As part of the ceasefire, the Israeli military were releasing almost 2000 Palestinian prisoners — including 1700 who had been kidnapped from Gaza, and 250 Palestinians serving life or long sentences.
President Trump was due to fly to the Sharm el-Sheikh respirt in Egypt later today for a summit aimed at advancing Washington’s plans for Gaza and the region.
Palestinians being held in Israeli prisons in harsh conditions. Graphic: Al Jazeera/Creative Commons
AMY GOODMAN:Israel’s government has approved the first phase of the Gaza ceasefire deal, that includes a pause in Israeli attacks and the release of the remaining hostages held by Hamas in exchange for Palestinians detained in Israeli prisons — 20 living hostages were freed today coinciding with President Trump’s visit to Israel and Egypt.
According to the deal, 250 Palestinian prisoners serving life sentences and another 1700 people from Gaza detained in the last two years — and described as “forcibly disappeared” by the UN — would be released.
Hamas has demanded the release of prominent Palestinian political prisoner Marwan Barghouti, but his name was reportedly secretly removed from the prisoner exchange list by Israel.
Meanwhile, the US is sending about 200 troops to Israel to monitor the ceasefire deal.
The Israeli military on Friday confirmed the ceasefire had come into effect as soldiers retreated from parts of Gaza. Tens of thousands of Palestinians, including families that had been forced to the south, began their trek back to northern Gaza after news that Israeli forces were withdrawing.
Returning Gaza City residents made their way through mounds of rubble and destroyed neighborhoods, searching for any sign of their homes and belongings. Among them, Fidaa Haraz.
FIDAA HARAZ: [translated] I came since the morning, when they said there was a withdrawal, to find my home. I’m walking in the street, but I do not know where to go, due to the extent of the destruction.
I swear I don’t know where the crossroads is or where my home is. I know that my home was leveled, but where is it? Where is it? I cannot find it.
What is this? What do we do with our lives? Where should we live? Where should we stay? A house of multiple floors, but nothing was left?
AMY GOODMAN: Al Jazeera reports Israel’s army said it would allow 600 humanitarian aid trucks carrying food, medical supplies, fuel and other necessities daily into Gaza, through coordination with the United Nations and other international groups.
On Thursday, the exiled Hamas Gaza chief Khalil al-Hayya declared an end to the war.
KHALIL AL-HAYYA: [translated] Today, we announced that we have reached an agreement to end the war and aggression against our people and to begin implementing a permanent ceasefire, the withdrawal of the occupation forces, the entry of aid, the opening of the Rafah crossing in both directions and the exchange of prisoners.
AMY GOODMAN: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke today in Israel.
PRIME MINISTER BENJAMIN NETANYAHU: [translated] Today, we mark one of the greatest achievements in the war of revival: the return of all of our hostages, the living and the dead as one. …
This way, we grapple Hamas. We grapple it all around, ahead of the next stages of the plan, in which Hamas is disarmed and Gaza is demilitarised.
If this can be achieved the easy way, very well. If not, it will be achieved the hard way.
AMY GOODMAN: In the United States, President Trump hailed his administration’s ceasefire plan during a Cabinet meeting on Thursday as concerns mount regarding potential US and foreign intervention in the rebuilding of Gaza.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Gaza is going to be slowly redone. You have tremendous wealth in that part of the world by certain countries, and just a small part of that, what they — what they make, will do wonders for — for Gaza.
AMY GOODMAN: For more, we’re joined by two guests. Diana Buttu, Palestinian human rights attorney and a former adviser to the negotiating team of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO). She has just recently written a piece for The Guardian. It is headlined “A ‘magic pill’ made Israeli violence invisible. We need to stop swallowing it.” And Amjad Iraqi is a senior Israel-Palestine analyst at the International Crisis Group, joining us from London.
We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Diana Buttu, let’s begin with you. First, your response to the ceasefire-hostage deal that’s just been approved by the Israeli government and Hamas?
DIANA BUTTU: Well, first, Amy, it’s really quite repulsive that Palestinians have had to negotiate an end to their genocide. It should have been that the world put sanctions on Israel to stop the genocide, rather than forcing Palestinians to negotiate an end to it. At the same time, we’re also negotiating an end to the famine, a famine that Israel, again, created.
Who are we negotiating with? The very people who created that famine. And so, it’s really repugnant that this is the position that Palestinians have been forced to be in.
And so, while people here are elated, happy that the bombs have stopped, we’re also at the same time worried, because we’ve seen that the international community, time and again, has abandoned us.
Everybody is happy that the Israelis are going home, but nobody’s talking about the more than 11,000 Palestinians who are currently languishing in Israeli prisons, being starved, being tortured, being raped. Many of them are hostages picked up after October 2023, being held without charge, without trial, and nobody at all is talking about them.
So, while people are happy that the bombs have stopped, we know that Israel’s control has not at all stopped. And Israel has made it clear that it’s going to continue to control every morsel of food that comes into Gaza. It’s going to control every single construction item that comes into Gaza.
And it’s going to continue to maintain a military occupation over Gaza.
This is not a peace agreement. This is not an end to the occupation. And I think it’s so important for us that we keep our eyes on Gaza and start demanding that Israel be held to account, not only for the genocide, but for all of these decades of occupation that led to this in the first place.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about the exchange of hostages, Israeli hostages, dead and alive, and Palestinian prisoners? According to the Hamas Gaza chief, I believe they’re saying all women and children, Palestinian women and children, picked up over these last two years — or is it beyond? — are going to be released. And then, of course, there are the well over 1000 prisoners who are going to be released.
DIANA BUTTU: No, not quite. So, there are 250 who are political prisoners who are going to be released, and that list just came out about a little over an hour ago.
But there are also 1700 Palestinians, solely from Gaza, who are going to be released. And these were people — these are doctors, these are nurses, these are journalists and so on, who were — who Israel picked up after 7 October, 2023, and has been holding as hostages.
These are the people that are going to be released. There are still thousands more, Amy, that are from the West Bank, that we do not know what is going to happen to them.
And so, while the focus is just on the people in Gaza — and again, there is no path for freeing all of those thousands of Palestinians who are languishing in Israeli prisons, being starved, being tortured, being raped.
What’s going to happen to them? Who’s going to be focusing on them? I don’t think that it’s going to be this US administration.
AMY GOODMAN:I want to talk about the West Bank in a minute. More than a thousand Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank just over the last two years. But I first want to get Amjad Iraqi’s response to this deal that has now been signed off on.
I mean, watching the images of tens of thousands, this sea of humanity, of Palestinians going south to north, to see what they can find of their homes in places like Gaza City, not to mention who’s trapped in the rubble. We say something — well over 60,000 Palestinians have been killed, but we don’t know the real number. It could be hundreds of thousands?
AMJAD IRAQI: Indeed, Amy. And to kind of continue off of Diana’s points, this is a deal that really should have been made long, long time ago. We’ve known that the parameters of this truce have been on the table for well over a year, if not since the very beginning of the war, what they used to define as an all-for-all deal, the idea that Hamas would release all hostages in exchange for a permanent ceasefire.
And the reasons for the constant foiling of it are quite evident. And it’s important to recognise this not for the sake of just lamenting the lives, the many lives, that have been lost and the massive destruction that could have been averted, but it needs to really inform the next steps going forward.
The biggest takeaway of what’s happening right now is that in order for a ceasefire to be sustained, in order for Gaza to be saved from further military assault, you need massive political pressure.
And we’ve seen this really build up in the past weeks and months. You saw this, for example, from European governments, which, even through the symbolic recognition of Palestinian statehood, was very much venting their frustration with the Israeli conduct in the war, the fact that the EU was actually starting to contemplate more punitive measures against Israel, such as partial trade suspensions, potential sanctions against Israel.
We saw this building up over the past few weeks. Arab states have started to use much of their leverage, especially after Israel’s strike on Doha or on Hamas’s offices in Doha. We started seeing Gulf and other Arab and Muslim states come forward to President Trump at the UN saying that Israel aggression cannot continue like this.
And most crucially is, of course, President Trump himself and Washington finally saying that it needs to put its foot down to stop this war, which we’ve heard repeatedly from Trump himself.
But this is really the first time since the January ceasefire agreement where Trump has really insisted that this come to an end.
Now, this — now there’s much to be sort of debated about the Trump plan itself, but this aspect of the truce cannot continue, and certainly cannot save Palestinian lives, unless that pressure is maintained.
The concern now is that that pressure will recede or alleviate, because there’s now a deal that’s signed. But, actually, in order to enforce it, that pressure really needs to be maintained.
AMY GOODMAN: What do you think was the turning point, Amjad? The bombing of Qatar?
Now, I mean, The New York Times had an exposé that Trump knew before, not just in the midst of the bombing, that Israel was bombing their ally to try to kill the Hamas leadership. But do you think that was the turning point?
AMJAD IRAQI: It certainly might have expedited, I think, a lot of factors that were already building up. As I said, pressure had been mounting against Israel for quite a while.
There was really outrage, not just at the continuance of the military assaults, but the policy of starvation, which was very evident on the ground, and Israel’s complete refusal to let in aid, its failed project with the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.
So, this had all been building, but I do think the strike on Doha really pushed Arab states to say that enough is enough. To see them really meet all together with President Trump and create a bit more of a united position to insist that this really couldn’t go on, I think, has really signalled that Israel really crossed a certain line geopolitically.
Now, of course, that line should have been recognised as being crossed well before because of the facts on the ground in Gaza, but I do think that this has helped to kind of push things over the edge a bit more assertively.
There are also speculations about Trump, of course, trying to have his name in for the Nobel Peace Prize, and potentially other factors. But I do think that the timing of this, again, regardless of what ended up pushing it over the line, it is unfortunate that it has really taken this long.
And it’s really up to global powers and foreign governments to recognise that in order to make sure that this stays, that they really need to keep that pressure up.
AMY GOODMAN: And, Amjad Iraqi, the core demand of the ceasefire is that Hamas disarm and end its rule. What security guarantees is Hamas seeking for its own members to lay down their arms and not face a wave of arrests or assassinations?
How is this going to work? And talk about who you see running Gaza.
AMJAD IRAQI: So, these things are still a bit unclear. So, throughout the ceasefire talks, Hamas has kept insisting about the idea of US guarantees that Israel will not end the war.
But there’s never really any clear, concrete way to prove this. And as we’ve seen before, like in the January ceasefire deal and in much of the ceasefire talks, even if President Trump expresses his desire to see an end to the war, oftentimes he would still hand the steering wheel to Prime Minister Netanyahu.
And if Netanyahu decided that he wanted to thwart the ceasefire talks, if he wanted to relaunch military assaults, and the Israeli military and the government would back it, then Trump and Washington would fall into line and amplify those calls, and even President Trump himself would sort of cheer on the military assaults.
And so, this factor has certainly weighed a lot on Hamas, but I do think there’s a culmination of pressure, the fact that Arab states have insisted on Hamas to try to show, at least signal, certain flexibility, even though many of its demands have been quite consistent throughout the war.
But the fact that I think Hamas is now feeling that there’s also a bit more pressure on Israel to actually ensure that they at least try to take the gamble that they will not return to war.
And in regards to decommissioning and disarmament, publicly Hamas has placed a red line around this right to bear arms. But historically, and even recently, they do say that they are willing to have conversations about decommissioning, as long as it’s tied to a political framework, especially one that’s tied to the establishment of a Palestinian state.
Now, one can really debate how much this process is actually quite feasible, and obviously the Israeli government and much of the Israeli public is quite adamant in its opposition against Palestinian statehood, but Hamas may at least offer some space for those conversations to be had.
There are discussions about it potentially giving up what it might describe as its larger or more offensive weaponry, like rockets or anti-tank missiles. And there’s bigger questions around firearms.
But I think it’s important to put this question not as a black-and-white issue, as something that has to come first in the political process, as Israel is demanding, but one that requires trust building and confidence building in the rubric of a process of Palestinian self-determination.
This is important not just in the case of Palestine, but across many conflicts around the world where the question of decommissioning, about establishing one rule, one gun, one government for a society, requires that kind of process. So, it shouldn’t just be a policy of destroying and military assaults and so on. You do need to engage in these questions in good faith.
AMY GOODMAN: There are so many questions, Diana Buttu, in this first stage of the ceasefire-hostage deal, is really the only one that Netanyahu addressed in his speech.
You’re usually in Ramallah. You spend a lot of time in the West Bank. Where does this leave the Palestinian Authority? I don’t think the West Bank is talked about in this deal.
And what about the fact that we’re looking at pictures of Netanyahu surrounded by Steve Witkoff on one side and Jared Kushner, who has talked about — as we know — famously referred to Gaza as “very valuable” waterfront property?
DIANA BUTTU: Well, I think that this plan was really an Israeli plan, and it was repackaged and branded as a Trump plan. And you can see just in the text of it and the way that all of the guarantees were given to the Israelis, and none given to the Palestinians, it’s really an Israeli plan.
But beyond that, it’s important to keep in mind that when Trump was going around and talking about this plan, that he consulted with everybody but Palestinians. He didn’t talk to Mahmoud Abbas. He didn’t even let Mahmoud Abbas go to the UN to deliver his speech before the UN.
I’m pretty certain he didn’t speak to the UN representative, Palestine’s representative to the UN. And so, this is — once again, we’ve got a plan in which people are talking about Palestinians, but never talking to Palestinians. So, again, this is very much an Israeli plan repackaged as a Trump plan and branded as a Trump plan.
In terms of them looking at Gaza as being prime real estate, this is not at all different from the way that they’ve done it in the past, and this is not at all the way that Israel has looked at Palestine.
And this is because this is the way that colonisers look at land that isn’t theirs. They ignore the history of the place.
Gaza has an old history. It has some of the oldest churches, I think the second-oldest church in the world. It has some of the oldest mosques. It has an old civilization.
We want Gaza to be Gaza. We don’t want it to be Dubai or any other place. We want it to be Gaza. And so, the idea of somehow turning it into prime real estate, this is the mentality of somebody who’s coming from outside.
This is the way that colonisers think. This isn’t the way that the Indigenous think. And so, you can see in this plan that it’s not only the idea of the outside coming in, but they certainly didn’t consult Palestinians at all.
As for what’s going to happen to the Palestinian Authority, it’s clear that they don’t want the Palestinian Authority in the Gaza Strip, and it’s clear that they do want to have a foreign authority in the Gaza Strip.
But once again, Amy, when is it that Palestinians get to decide our own future? Are we really going back to the era of colonialism, when other people get to decide our future? And that’s what this plan is really all about.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, we’re going to be continuing to cover this story. President Trump is going to be there for the signing of the ceasefire in Sharm El-Sheikh in Egypt on Monday, and the hostages and prisoners are expected to be released on Monday or Tuesday.
Diana Buttu, I want to thank you for being with us, Palestinian human rights attorney, former adviser to the negotiating team of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, and Amjad Iraqi, Israel-Palestine analyst at the International Crisis Group.
On 11 October, BBC News said that according to ‘local sources’:
Hamas has recalled about 7,000 members of its security forces to reassert control over areas of Gaza recently vacated by Israeli troops.
BBC gives ‘deliberate misinformation and false narratives’
The BBC continued:
The mobilisation order was reportedly issued via phone calls and text messages which said the aim was to “cleanse Gaza of outlaws and collaborators with Israel” and told fighters to report within 24 hours. Reports from Gaza suggest that armed Hamas units have already deployed across several districts, some wearing civilian clothes and others in the blue uniforms of the Gaza police.
In a statement released on 12 October, Gaza’s Government Media Office has called these claims ‘false and baseless’.
It said:
These claims reflect deliberate misinformation and false narratives intended to mislead the public. We strongly condemn the fact that international media outlets resort to publishing such unverified allegations without referring to official authorities in Gaza, which clearly undermines their professionalism and serves the propaganda promoted by the Israeli occupation.
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), as a public service broadcaster is meant to hold the government in this country to account, but this genocide has shown that when it comes to Israel and Palestine this is not the case. Multiple recent reports, open letters, and analyses have accused the BBC of bias towards the Israeli regime in its coverage of this genocide.
Systematic bias against Palestinians
In a report titled BBC on Gaza–Israel: One Story, Double Standards published in June 2024, which critiqued the BBC’s coverage of the Gaza genocide between October 2023 and October 2024, the Centre for Media Monitoring (CfMM) accused the BBC of operating under a framework of ‘double standards’ when covering the Gaza genocide, of systemic bias against Palestinians, and of applying inconsistent editorial standards when covering Israeli and Palestinian experiences of war.
It argued that Palestinians are consistently underrepresented, under-humanised, and under-protected by the BBC’s editorial policies, and called on the broadcaster to undertake a major internal review of its editorial processes, to apply its guidelines of impartiality and fairness more rigorously, and to ensure more balanced representation of voices, language, and context in its reporting.
Over the course of 12 months, the CfMM analysed nearly 3,900 online BBC articles and over 32,000 broadcast segments across BBC television and radio, looking at how language, framing, airtime, interview subjects, and emotional cues differed when reporting on Israeli and Palestinian casualties.
Prioritisation of Israeli narratives
To highlight differences in its reporting, the report also examined the BBC coverage of Ukraine, and looked at the differences in tone and framing when reporting on civilian suffering. It found that the broadcaster was much more willing to use humanising language, discuss war crimes, and highlight the deaths of journalists and civilians when covering Ukraine.
In contrast, the suffering of Palestinian civilians was often framed in more abstract or clinical terms, and accusations of Israeli wrongdoing were treated with more caution or scepticism.
According to CfMM, the BBC prioritised Israeli narratives, voices, and suffering, while downplaying or marginalising the Palestinian experience.
One of the main differences was in the amount of coverage given per fatality. According to the report, while approximately 42,000 Palestinians were killed (at the time of writing) compared to about 1,250 Israelis during the covered period, Israeli deaths received approximately 33 times more coverage per death in BBC online articles and 19 times more coverage in broadcast output.
The report argues that this suggests an editorial decision-making process that privileges certain narratives over others, rather than one based purely on journalistic impartiality.
BBC has ‘double standards’ on how it portrays violence against civilians, depending on victim’s identity
Another key finding involved the emotional framing of victims.
The BBC was found to have used emotive language, such as terms like ‘massacre’, ‘murder’, and ‘slaughter’ far more frequently when referring to Israeli casualties than to Palestinian ones. The word ‘murder’ was used over 220 times in reference to Israeli victims, but just once in reference to Palestinians, while the term ‘massacre’ appeared 18 times more often in relation to Israeli deaths. The CfMM interprets this discrepancy as a ‘double standard’ in how violence against civilians is characterised depending on the identity of the victim.
The report also details that during the year-long period, the BBC conducted over 2,300 interviews with Israeli voices, compared to just over 1,000 with Palestinians. The presenters themselves, the report claims, also echoed or affirmed Israeli occupation perspectives much more frequently – over 2,300 times-compared to just 217 instances where they reflected Palestinian perspectives.
In addition, CfMM claims that on more than 100 occasions BBC presenters shut down or dismissed attempts by guests to raise concerns about genocide being committed against Palestinians. At the same time, the BBC allegedly failed to report or contextualise numerous statements made by Israeli officials that human rights experts and UN figures have cited as evidence of incitement or genocidal intent.
Failure by BBC to report on UK weapons exports to the Israeli occupation, and legal implications
In December 2024, Guardian columnist Owen Jones also published a report about BBC bias towards Israel. It was titled The BBC’s Civil War Over Gaza, and was based on interviews with about a dozen anonymous BBC staff who spoke to Jones about their concerns. Overall, they said:
As an organisation we have not offered any significant analysis of the UK government’s involvement in the war on Palestinians. We have failed to report on weapons sales or their legal implications. These stories have instead been broken by the BBC’s competitors.
His investigation revealed that over 100 BBC employees and 300 other journalists and media professionals had signed a letter to the Director‑General Tim Davie expressing concerns about editorial suppression, lack of impartiality, and opaque decision‑making – claiming the corporation has become ‘a mouthpiece for Israel.’
The letter alleged that reports and documentaries favorable to Palestinian perspectives had been blocked or delayed even after passing standard editorial checks, that staff felt constrained by fear of being accused of having agendas or being biased, and that decisions we not transparent.
Several staffers also told Jones that they had resigned in recent months, not just from dissatisfaction, but because they believe the BBC’s reporting was not honest or balanced. One of these, was newsreader Karishma Patel.
The BBC is complicit in genocide, by its selective storytelling, by remaining silent, and by distorting the truth. The corporation is funded by the public in this country, and has a duty to serve the public interest – not the interests of the powerful.
If it is not fulfilling its mandate, it should be held accountable.
Within hours of being named the Nobel Peace laureate for 2025, María Corina Machado called on President Trump to step up his military and economic campaign against her own country — Venezuela.
The curriculum vitae of the opposition leader hardly lines up with what one would typically associate with a Peace Maker. Nor would those who nominated her, including US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and recent US national security advisor Mike Waltz, both drivers of violent policies towards Venezuela.
“The Nobel Peace Prize for 2025 goes to a brave and committed champion of peace, to a woman who keeps the flame of democracy burning amidst a growing darkness,” said the Nobel Committee statement.
Let’s see if María Corina Machado passes that litmus test and is worthy to stand alongside last year’s winners, Nihon Hidankyo, representing the Japanese hibakusha, the survivors of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, “honoured for their decades-long commitment to nuclear disarmament and their tireless witness against the horrors of nuclear war”.
Machado supports Israel, would move embassy Machado is a passionate Zionist and supporter of both the State of Israel and Benjamin Netanyahu personally. She has not been silent on the genocide; indeed she has actively called for Israel to press ahead, saying Hamas “must be defeated at all costs, whatever form it takes”.
>If Machado achieves power in Venezuela, among her first long-promised acts will be the ending of Venezuela’s support for Palestine and the transfer of the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
The smiling face of Washington regime change The Council on American-Islamic Relations, US’s largest Muslim civil rights organisation, called Machado a supporter of anti-Muslim fascism and decried the award as “insulting and unacceptable”.
2025 Nobel Peace Prize laureate María Corina Machado . . . “It is really a disaster. It’s laying the groundwork and justifying greater military escalation,” warns a history professor. Image: Cristian Hernandez/ Anadolu Agency
Venezuelan activist Michelle Ellner wrote in the US progressive outlet Code Pink:
“She’s the smiling face of Washington’s regime-change machine, the polished spokesperson for sanctions, privatisation, and foreign intervention dressed up as democracy.
“Machado’s politics are steeped in violence. She has called for foreign intervention, even appealing directly to Benjamin Netanyahu, the architect of Gaza’s annihilation, to help ‘liberate’ Venezuela with bombs under the banner of ‘freedom.’
She has demanded sanctions, that silent form of warfare whose effects – as studies in The Lancet and other journals have shown – have killed more people than war, cutting off medicine, food, and energy to entire populations.”
Legitimising US escalation against Venezuela Ellner said she almost laughed at the absurdity of the choice, which I must admit was my own reaction. Yale professor of history Greg Grandin was similarly shocked.
“It is really a disaster. It’s laying the groundwork and justifying greater military escalation.”
What Grandin is referring to is the prize being used by Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the Trump administration to legitimise escalating violence against Venezuela — an odd outcome for a peace prize.
Grandin, author of America, América: A New History of the New World says Machado “has consistently represented a more hardline in terms of economics, in terms of US relations. That intransigence has led her to rely on outside powers, notably the United States.
“They didn’t give it to Donald Trump, but they have given it to the next best thing as far as Marco Rubio is concerned — if he needs justification to escalate military operations against Venezuela.”
The Iron Lady wins a peace prize? Rubio has repeatedly referred to Machado as the “Venezuelan Iron Lady” — fair enough, as she bears greater resemblance to Margaret Thatcher than she does to Mother Teresa.
This illogicality brought back graffiti I read on a wall in the 1970s: “Fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity”. Yet someone at the Nobel Committee had a brain explosion (fitting as Alfred Nobel invented dynamite) when they settled on Machado as the embodiment of Alfred Nobel’s ideal recipient — “the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.”
Machado, a recipient of generous US State Department funding and grants, including from the National Endowment for Democracy (the US’s prime soft power instrument of regime change) is praised for her courage in opposing the Maduro government, and in calling out a slide towards authoritarianism.
Conservatives could run a sound argument in terms of Machado as an anti-regime figure but it is ludicrous to suggest her hard-ball politics and close alliances with Trump would in any way qualify her for the peace prize. Others see her as an agent of the CIA, an agent of the Monroe Doctrine, and as a mouthpiece for a corrupt elite that wants to drive a violent antidemocratic regime change.
She has promised the US that she would privatise the country’s oil industry and open the door to US business.
“We’re grateful for what Trump is doing for peace,” the Nobel winner told the BBC. Trump’s recent actions include bombing boatloads of Venezuelans and Colombians — a violation of international law — as part of a pressure campaign on the Maduro government.
Machado says she told Trump “how grateful the Venezuelan people are for what he’s doing, not only in the Americas, but around the world for peace, for freedom, for democracy”. The dead and starving of Gaza bear witness to a counter narrative.
Rigged elections or rigged narratives? Peacemakers aren’t normally associated with coup d’etats but Machado most certainly was in 2002 when democratically elected President Hugo Chavez was briefly overthrown. Machado was banned from running for President in 2024 because of her calls for US intervention in overthrowing the government.
Central to both Machado’s prize and the US government’s regime change operation is the argument that the Maduro government won a “rigged election” in 2024 and is running a narco-trafficking government; charges accepted as virtually gospel in the mainstream media and dismissed as rubbish by some scholars and experts on the country.
Alfred de Zayas, a law professor at the Geneva School of Diplomacy who served as a UN Independent Expert on International Order, cautions against the standard Western narrative that the Venezuelan elections “were rigged”.
The reality is that the Maduro government, like the Chavez government before it, enjoys popularity with the poor majority of the country. Delegitimising any elected government opposed to Washington is standard operating procedure by the great power.
Professor Zayas led a UN mission to Venezuela in 2017 and has visited the country a number of times since. He has spoken with NGOs, such as Fundalatin, Grupo Sures, Red Nacional de Derechos Humanos, as well as people from all walks of life, including professors, church leaders and election officials.
“I gradually understood that the media mood in the West was only aiming for regime change and was deliberately distorting the situation in the country,” he said in an article in 2024.
I provide those thoughts not as proof definitive of the legitimacy of the elections but as stimulant to look beyond our tightly curated mainstream media. María Machado is Washington’s “guy” and that alone should set off alarm bells.
Michelle Ellner: “Anyone who knows what she stands for knows there’s nothing remotely peaceful about her politics.”
“Beati pacifici quoniam filii Dei vocabuntur. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God”. Matthew 5:9.
Amen to that.
Eugene Doyle is a writer based in Wellington. He has written extensively on the Middle East, as well as peace and security issues in the Asia Pacific region. He contributes to Asia Pacific Report and Café Pacific, and hosts the public policy platform solidarity.co.nz
There is no shortage of failed peace plans in occupied Palestine, all of them incorporating detailed phases and timelines, going back to the presidency of Jimmy Carter. They end the same way. Israel gets what it wants initially — in the latest case the release of the remaining Israeli hostages — while it ignores and violates every other phase until it resumes its attacks on the Palestinian people.
It is a sadistic game. A merry-go-round of death. This ceasefire, like those of the past, is a commercial break. A moment when the condemned man is allowed to smoke a cigarette before being gunned down in a fusillade of bullets.
Once Israeli hostages are released, the genocide will continue. I do not know how soon.
It was the moment everyone in southern Gaza had been waiting for: the chance to return to their homes, or what remained of them, in Gaza City and northern Gaza. On October 10, as part of the first phase of the ceasefire agreement reached between Israel and Hamas, throngs of people began the march back north, moving up the coastal al-Rashid road in a sight reminiscent of Gazans’ historic return march during the January-March ceasefire earlier this year.
On Saturday morning, a statement from the Gaza Civil Defense said that over 300,000 people had made the trek to Gaza City over the past two days.
“No tents or mobile homes are available to house the returnees from the south,” the statement said.
While Arab states condemned Israel’s war on Palestinians in Gaza as a genocide, they were simultaneously secretly expanding military cooperation with the US and Israel to help defend against a war with Iran, leaked documents revealed by the Washington Post on 11 October show.
The documents, written between 2022 and 2025, show that officials from six Arab countries joined their Israeli and US counterparts for a series of meetings in Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, and Qatar over the past three years.
The documents described efforts by the US military to create the “Regional Security Construct,” which would include Israel, Qatar, Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE.
The documents refer to Kuwait and Oman as “potential partners” in the project.
The participants met to prepare to protect Israel during a possible war with Iran by integrating their forces with US air defense systems.
The legal landscape around UK citizens serving in the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) has shifted, lawyers say. Palestinian statehood means that Brits who served in Israel’s genocide can be tried and jailed. Technically, the Foreign Enlistment Act of 1870 means Brits who served in foreign armies can be jailed or fined. But the act is very old and poorly enforced. Heron said may not serve as a basis for prosecution.
In April 2010, Public Law Interest Centre and the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights submitted evidence to British police regarding ten individuals who’d served in the Israeli military:
Our 240-page submission to the Metropolitan police highlights that the UK cannot turn a blind eye.
The police have the power, the resources and the responsibility to investigate British nationals alleged to have taken part in war crimes, wherever they occur.
How Many Serve?
In March 2024, Declassified UK reported that 80 Brits were serving in the Israeli military on 7 October 2023. However, we only know this as Declassified submitted Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to the government.
The global peak journalism body has condemned the targeting, harassment, and censorship by lobby groups of Australian journalists for reporting critically on Israel’s war on Gaza.
The Brussels-based International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and its Australian affiliate, the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance (MEAA), said in a statement they were attempts to silence journalists and called on media outlets and regulatory bodies to ensure the fundamental rights to freedom of expression and access to information were upheld.
In a high-profile case, Australia’s Federal Court found on June 25 that Lebanese-Australian journalist Antoinette Lattouf was unlawfully dismissed by the national public broadcaster, Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), for sharing a social media post by Human Rights Watch relating to violations by Israel in Gaza, reports IFJ.
Lattouf was removed from a five-day radio presenting contract in Sydney in December 2023, with the judgment confirming her dismissal was made to appease pro-Israel lobbyists.
On Seotember 24, the ABC was ordered to pay an additional $A150,000 in compensation on top of A$70,000 already awarded.
In a separate incident, Australian cricket reporter Peter Lalor was dropped from radio coverage of Australia’s Sri Lanka tour by broadcaster SEN in February after he reposted several posts on X regarding Israeli attacks in Gaza and the release of Palestinian prisoners in Israel.
“I was told in one call there were serious organisations making complaints; in another I was told that this was not the case,” said Lalor in a statement.
Kostakidis faces harassment
Prominent journalist and former SBS World News Australia presenter Mary Kostakidis has also faced ongoing harassment by the Zionist Federation of Australia, with a legal action filed in the Federal Court under Australia’s Racial Discrimination Act for sharing two allegedly “antisemitic” posts on X.
Kostakidis said the case failed to identify which race, ethnicity or nationality was offended by her posts, with a verdict currently awaited on a strikeout order filed by Kostakidis in July.
The MEAA said: “MEAA journalists are subject to the code of ethics, who in their professional capacity, often provide critical commentary on political warfare.
“These are the tenets of democracy. We stand with our colleagues in their workplaces, in the courtrooms, and in their deaths to raise our voices against the silence.”
The IFJ said: “Critical and independent journalism in the public interest is more crucial than ever in the face of incessant pressure from partisan lobby groups.
“IFJ stands in firm solidarity with journalists globally facing harassment and censorship for their reporting.”
Journalist killed in Gaza City
Killed Palestinian journalist Saleh Aljafarawi . . . gained prominence for his videos covering Israel’s two-year war on Gaza Image: Abdelhakim Abu Riash/AJ file
Meanwhile, gunmen believed to be part of Israeli-linked militia, have killed Palestinian journalist Saleh Aljafarawi, south of Gaza City, after the ceasefire, reports Al Jazeera.
Social media posts showed people bidding farewell to the 28-year-old who had been bringing news about the war over the last two years through his widely watched videos, the channel said.
Several people accused of attacking returnees to Gaza City by colluding with Israeli forces were killed during clashes in the area where Aljafarawi was shot dead, sources told Al Jazeera.
Al Jazeera said that more than 270 Palestinian journalists had been killed in Gaza since the war began in October 2023.
BREAKING: Prominent Palestinian journalist Saleh Aljafarawi has been killed by gunmen in Gaza City’s al-Sabra neighbourhood, making him one of more than 270 journalists killed since Israel’s war began in 2023.
Saleh Al-Jafarawi: killed by Israel-collaborating faction
His colleague Ibrahim Nazmii published an update within the last hour that:
Our colleague Saleh Al-Jafarawi has been missing for hours while covering a media event in Gaza City. There is no reliable information about his fate. Please pray for him and we ask God to keep him safe.
However, about the same time reports broke that Saleh Al-Jafarawi had been shot dead by the clan’s gunmen in Tel Al-Hawa neighbourhood of Gaza City.
Featured image supplied
Update: al-Jafarawi’s murder has been confirmed. The article has been amended to reflect his death.
All the volunteers participating in the Thousands Madleens and the Freedom Flotilla Coalition’s Conscience Mission humanitarian flotilla have been released from detention after their abduction by Israel last week and subsequent abuse and ritual humiliation by Israeli forces.
Freedom Flotilla and Madleens volunteers released
The two flotillas were carrying aid to Gaza in attempt to break Israel’s criminal blockade that put hundreds of thousands of Palestinian civilians into the most serious phase of starvation. They were criminally intercepted in international waters on 8 October around 120 nautical miles from Gaza’s coast. Israel intercepted the much larger Global Sumud Flotilla (GSF) earlier this month and abducted its volunteer crews of almost five hundred people.
Israel deported dozens of Freedom Flotilla Coalition/Thousands Madleens participants earlier on Sunday 12 October. With them were Huwaida Arraf and Zohar Regev, both dual nationals holding Israeli citizenship, the last to be released. Earlier this week Palestinian legal support group Adalah represented one hundred and forty-five volunteers from the two flotillas in court, along with some of those who had been aboard the GSF.
Adalah received dozens of testimonies from participants describing degrading and often violent abuse inflicted by Israeli forces during the attack on their fleet and subsequent detention.
Israeli abuse rife
The abuse included physical and verbal assaults, being forced to remain in the sun for prolonged periods, the confiscation of personal belongings and harsh detention conditions in Ketziot prison, including denial of adequate food and drinking water, denial of access to legal counsel, hearings conducted without prior notice or proper legal representation and in one case a Muslim woman doctor being paraded naked while guards mocked her mastectomy scars, whose abuse has been ignored by western so-called ‘mainstream’ media.
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: A number of Australian journalists have been targeted, harassed, and censored by lobby groups for reporting critical of Israel’s war on Gaza. 
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