Tag: ethnic cleansing

Israel Defense Minister Unveils Plan For ‘Concentration Camp’ In Gaza

With Gaza ceasefire negotiations under way and President Trump raising hopes of a deal being reached by week’s end, Defense Minister Israel Katz on Monday revealed that the IDF will create what it calls a “humanitarian city” in the wasteland that is Rafah, and then forcibly concentrate Gaza’s entire population of nearly 2 million people inside it. 

Though the Israeli government and its advocates will likely to condemn already-widespread usage of the term “concentration camp” to describe this undertaking — likely claiming it’s somehow antisemitic given the parallels to Nazi Germany — it’s unambiguously applicable under the Merriam-Webster definition of the term: 

concentration camp (noun) a place where large numbers of people (such as prisoners of war, political prisoners, refugees, or the members of an ethnic or religious minority) are detained or confined under armed guard  

In the first phase, the IDF plans to round up 600,000 displaced Palestinians who are living in the coastal Mawasi area and move them to Rafah, a city in southernmost Gaza that borders Egypt and Israel. Eventually, every Gaza resident will be moved. After security screening, Palestinians will be ushered inside the camp, with IDF guards ensuring that none are able to leave, Katz said. 

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New footage exposes ragtag US mercenaries firing toward Gaza aid seekers

Following an AP investigation accusing a US mercenary firm of firing on desperate Gaza aid seekers, the company has released extensive new footage in an attempt at damage control. But the video only further implicates the scandal-plagued operation.

On July 2, the Associated Press released an exposé containing short videos which appeared to show American mercenaries associated with the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) opening fire on aid-seekers in Gaza during an incident in southern Gaza this May. The footage was supplied by a former employee of UG Solutions, a firm charged with securing GHF distribution sites.

“I think you hit one,” one soldier of fortune says to another following a loud burst of gunfire.

“Hell yeah, boy!” another exclaims.

In an apparent attempt to control the damage from the AP investigation, UG Solutions has distributed a pair of videos comprising over seven minutes of footage to the press. 

The newly released footage offers an unprecedented glimpse of the disturbing interactions between the starving population of Gaza and well-armed, clearly unprepared Americans hired to provide security for GHF’s chaotic aid operations.

Filmed by one of its own employee, the recordings were seemingly distributed in an effort to show UG Solutions’ agents have not fired live bullets on unarmed crowds of Palestinians. According to a UG Solutions statement, the videos “not only clarify what happened, but provide critical context, which contradicts that [sic] AP’s reporting and shows that the accusations are unfounded.”

However, a closer examination by The Grayzone demonstrates that the video was anything but exculpatory. 

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Netanyahu Visits White House: Genocide Made Invisible

Whatever the outcomes of Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to the White House on Monday and the latest scenario for a ceasefire in Gaza, a bilateral policy of genocide has united the Israeli and U.S. governments in a pact of literally breath-taking cruelty. That pact and its horrific consequences for Palestinian people either continue to shock Americans or gradually normalize indifference toward ongoing atrocities on a massive scale.

Recent news reporting that President Trump has pushed for a ceasefire in Gaza is an echo of a familiar refrain about peace-seeking efforts from the Biden and Trump administrations. The spin remained in sync with the killing – not only with American bombs and bullets but also with Israel’s refusal to allow more than a pittance of food and other essentials into Gaza.

Last year began with a United Nations statement that “Gazans now make up 80 per cent of all people facing famine or catastrophic hunger worldwide, marking an unparalleled humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip amid Israel’s continued bombardment and siege.” The UN quoted experts who said: “Currently every single person in Gaza is hungry, a quarter of the population are starving and struggling to find food and drinkable water, and famine is imminent.”

In late February 2024, President Biden talked to journalists about prospects for a “ceasefire” (which did not take place) while holding a vanilla ice cream cone. “My national security adviser tells me that we’re close, we’re close, we’re not done yet,” Biden said, before sauntering off. He spoke during a photo op at an ice cream parlor in Manhattan, while the UN was sounding an alarm that “very little humanitarian aid has entered besieged Gaza this month.”

During the 16 months since then, variants of facile verbiage from top U.S. government officials have repeated endlessly, while normalizing genocide with a steep race to the ethical bottom, so that – in Orwellian terms, much like “war is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength” – genocide is not genocide.

Refusal to acknowledge the complicity and impunity is most of all maintained by avoidance and silence. The process makes a terrible truth inadmissible rather than admittable.

All the doublethink and newspeak must detour around the reality that the U.S.-supported Israeli siege of Gaza is genocide, which the international Genocide Convention defines as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group” – with such actions as “deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.”

Israel’s actions in Gaza clearly meet that definition, as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have unequivocally concluded with exhaustive reports.

But under the cloaks of the Israeli and American flags, the official stories insist that the unconscionable should be invisible.

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ISIS-Linked Palestinian Group Admits to Coordinating With Israel

A Palestinian group opposed to Hamas and tied to ISIS has received support from Israel, its leader now admits. 

Yasser Abu Shabab, head of the ISIS-linked Popular Forces, discussed coordinating with Tel Aviv in an interview with Makan, Israel’s Arabic-language public radio broadcaster. “We keep them [Israel] informed, but we carry out the military actions on our own,” he said. 

Abu Shabab did not directly state that the Popular Forces receive direct support from Israel. He explained that his organization is supported by a number of parties, and “There are things we can’t talk about publicly.”

Last month, the ties between Abu Shabab and Tel Aviv were exposed by Israeli opposition leader and former Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman. “The Israeli government is giving weapons to a group of criminals and felons, identified with the Islamic State, at the direction of the prime minister,” Liberman said. “To my knowledge, this did not go through approval by the cabinet.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later confirmed Liberman’s accusation, saying the policy saves the lives of Israeli soldiers. 

Abu Shabab and his gang have been backed by Israel against Hamas. He said in the interview, adding that he was seeking to eradicate Hamas’s “injustice” and “corruption.” “We will continue to fight, no matter the bloodshed,” Abu Shabab added. “Right now, Hamas is dying. They know their end is near.”

An IDF officer explained to Haaretz, “There are many groups that oppose Hamas – Abu Shabab went several steps further. They control territory that Hamas doesn’t enter, and the IDF encourages that.”

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Roger Waters reported to counter-terror police after declaring support for Palestine Action

Former Pink Floyd member Roger Waters has been reported to counter-terror police after sharing a Facebook post declaring his unwavering support of Palestine Action – a day after it was officially proscribed as a terrorist organisation.

In the three-minute clip, posted to Waters’ Facebook page just hours after the ban came into effect, the 81-year-old stated: “I support Palestine Action. And I always will because that is the right thing to do.”

He also shared a hand-written sign he’d made, which read: “Roger Waters supports Palestine Action 5th July 2025. Parliament has been corrupted by agents of a genocidal foreign power. Stand up and be counted its now.”

The proscription came into force at midnight on the morning of July 5.

Speaking to the camera, Waters declared: “I am Spartacus. OK, this is Independence Day, July 5th 2025. I declare my independence from the government of the UK who have just designated Palestine Action a terrorist – a proscribed terrorist organisation.

“For the record I support Palestine Action. It’s a great organisation. They are non-violent. They are absolutely not terrorist in any way.

“They are a non-violent protesting organization, protesting the presence in the UK of Elbit Systems who are an Israeli arms manufacturing organization. Alright so that’s that. I support Palestine Action. And I always will because that is the right thing to do.”

Caroline Turner, director of UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI), which reported Waters to counter-terrorism police, commented: “Palestine Action have been anything but a non-violent organisation, using sledgehammers to smash windows and machinery, and causing millions of pounds of damage over the past few years in order to intimidate the public and certain companies, and to advance their own ideological cause.

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Palestinian Sheikhs in Hebron Ask Israel for Separate Emirates, Not State

A group of Palestinian sheikhs in the holy city of Hebron has written to the Israeli government formally asking to be given sovereignty over the area as an emirate, and not as part of a larger Palestinian state.

The new emirate, they say, would join the Abraham Accords, the regional agreement establishing peace between Israel and participating Arab and Muslim states. Abraham himself is said by tradition to be buried in Hebron, in the Tomb of the Patriarch, holy to Muslims and Jews.

The initiative places a new option on the table for the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and an alternative to the corrupt and antisemitic Palestinian Authority, which currently administers the area.

The Wall Street Journal reported Saturday:

“We want cooperation with Israel,” says Sheikh Wadee’ al-Jaabari, also known as Abu Sanad, from his ceremonial tent in Hebron, the West Bank’s largest city located south of Jerusalem. “We want coexistence.” The leader of Hebron’s most influential clan has said such things before, as did his father. But this time is different. Sheikh Jaabari and four other leading Hebron sheikhs have signed a letter pledging peace and full recognition of Israel as a Jewish state. Their plan is for Hebron to break out of the Palestinian Authority, establish an emirate of its own, and join the Abraham Accords.

The letter is addressed to Israeli Economy Minister Nir Barkat, a former mayor of Jerusalem, who has brought Mr. Jaabari and other sheikhs to his home and met with them more than a dozen times since February. They ask him to present it to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and await his reply.

“The Emirate of Hebron shall recognize the State of Israel as the nation state of the Jewish people,” the sheikhs write, “and the State of Israel shall recognize the Emirate of Hebron as the Representative of the Arab residents in the Hebron District.” Accepting Israel as a Jewish state goes further than the Palestinian Authority ever has, and sweeps aside decades of rejectionism.

The suggestion is timely: the U.S. and Israel are said to be preparing a formal peace plan that encompasses the region. The plan must make room for Palestinian aspirations in some form to win the support of Arab leaders.

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Report: European Union to Sanction Israel Next Week Over Gaza War

The European Union is planning to sanction Israel next week over the Gaza conflict.

The European elitists found violations of human rights obligations by Israel in Gaza.

Israel has been at war with Hamas since the terror group stormed southern Israel on October 7, 2023. The terror group slaughtered families in their homes, targeted a rave party with hundreds of young adults, gunned down the young party-goers, and kidnapped hundreds of Jews on their way back to Gaza.

Israel retaliated with the promise to destroy Hamas in Gaza. The international community believes Israel has committed human rights violations in the process.

Now, EU officials are finalizing plans to sanction Israel this coming week.

Via Reuters.

However, deep divisions among member states suggest that only a few of the proposed measures—if any—are likely to be implemented.

According to an internal EU report on its trade agreement with Israel, seen by Euractiv last month, the bloc found “indications of violations” of human rights obligations.

In response, the European External Action Service (EEAS) is drafting a document outlining possible measures. EU ambassadors are expected to review it on July 10.

In 2024 the International Criminal Court called for the arrest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the Gaza War.

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Police Arrest ‘Palestine Action’ Protesters Following Ban as Terrorist Group by British Government

Dozens of protesters supporting Palestine Action were arrested in London on Sunday as they demonstrated in defiance of the British government’s move to classify the group as a proscribed terrorist organisation.

Following failures to legally challenge the terrorist classification, which prohibits people in the UK from supporting the group in any regard, supporters of Palestine Action gathered in London’s Parliament Square outside the House of Commons.

Protesters were seen waving placards with the message: “I oppose genocide, I support Palestine Action”.

The demonstration prompted at least 20 arrests from the Metropolitan Police, which said in a statement per Sky News: “The group is now proscribed and expressing support for them is a criminal offence… Arrests are being made.”

Earlier this week, Members of Parliament backed the government’s call for a ban on the group by a margin of 385 votes in favour to just 26 against.

Thus, Palestine Action is now on the same legal level as other banned Islamist terror groups like al Qaeda, ISIS, and Hezbollah. Those found to be members or supporters of the group now face up to 14 years in prison. Even wearing t-shirts or other symbols of the group can be punishable with up to six months behind bars.

While the group attempted to launch legal challenges at the High Court and the Court of Appeals, they were ultimately shot down, paving the way for the ban to come into effect at midnight on Saturday.

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Israel vs Germany: Who Killed More?

People who defend Israel like to play a numbers game. They like to talk about how insulting and absurd it is for people to make comparisons with the Nazi genocide of us Jews. They bring up the six million number and talk about how nothing compares with it. They talk about how what’s happening in Gaza is a drop in the bucket when taken in context. You can hear this argument made all the time by all sorts of defenders of the Israeli-American siege of Gaza. Here’s a quote from something someone wrote on Substack that got some traction:

“…people have no concept of the scale of the Holocaust. The Holocaust was a killing machine. Over 10,000 Jews were murdered in a single day, on many days. In one 100 day period 1.5 million Jews were murdered. Jews were lined up and shot into pits or crammed into rooms and gassed. The lucky ones got a shelf to sleep on, a piece of bread and a few months of labor until their bodies gave out. Don’t compare anything to the Holocaust.”

My initial reaction to reading something like this is to think, well…Israel is killing hundreds of people a day, every day, and also horribly disfiguring and crippling as many or more. Lots of people are also dying from disease, infections, malnutrition, and ultimately succumbing to horrible injuries from the constant carpet bombing that Israel is carrying out. Is that nothing? Is this a morality contest for racking up bodies? Does this person think that unless Israel surpasses 10,000 a day or whatever arbitrary figure they come up with, Israel (and they themselves) are in the clear? That unless it is 10,000 a day, they’re not like the Nazis — that they’re moral and right?

But today a secondary thought appeared in my mind. If you are doing comparative accounting of mass slaughter and using the Holocaust as the gold standard for evil, six million doesn’t mean much when talking about the number of people Israel has killed in Gaza. That’s because the sizes of the two political entities being compared — Israel vs Germany — are vastly different. During its genocide, Germany had at least ten times the population that Israel has today. For this numbers morality game to have any meaning, you need to readjust your figures — instead of absolute sums, you need to work with something that gets closer to a per-capita genocide rate.

In our hyper-information age, people are obsessed with numbers. Numbers are everything. Without numbers, things don’t have meaning for many of us. It’s a bit of an unhealthy obsession I think. But since it’s so vital to people, I want work with the numbers a bit to see if we can put things into perspective.

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West Bank town becomes ‘big prison’ as Israel fences it in

A five-metre-high metal fence slices across the eastern edge of Sinjil, a Palestinian town in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Heavy steel gates and roadblocks seal off all but a single route in and out of the town, watched over by Israeli soldiers at guard posts.

“Sinjil is now a big prison,” said Mousa Shabaneh, 52, a father of seven, watching on in resignation as workers erected the fence through the middle of the nursery on the edge of the town where he planted trees for sale, his sole source of income.

“Of course, we’re now forbidden from going to the nursery. All the trees I had were burned and lost,” he said. “In the end, they cut off our livelihood.”

Walls and checkpoints erected by Israeli forces have long been a part of day-to-day life for the nearly 3 million Palestinian residents of the West Bank. But many now say that a dramatic increase in such barriers since the start of the war in Gaza has put towns and villages in a state of permanent siege.

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