Tag: perpetual war

US and Its Corporate Interests Won’t Leave Iraq Anytime Soon – Analyst

Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani indicated in January that he was committed to speeding up negotiations with the US-led international coalition on the final withdrawal of its forces from the country. He confirmed Baghdad’s “steadfast and principled” position that the coalition had already fulfilled its mission.

Don’t expect the US to suddenly leave Iraq “while corporate interests steer American foreign policy,” Isa Blumi, an associate professor at the Department of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at Stockholm University, told Sputnik.

“I don’t see this happening […] unless there is a serious revolution in Iraq itself or in the larger region that sees the US leave permanently from these strategic and very lucrative arenas for American corporations to make money,” Blumi said, commenting on the ambiguous announcement of a partial drawdown of US forces in Iraq.

The US footprint “remains omnipresent, hegemonic, willing to use enormous violence,” he noted.

The military presence “will be modified” due to the “vulnerability of explicit American presence” to aerial attacks, which might chip away at the dimming aura of US invincibility, the expert underscored.

Since the beginning of the escalation of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the bases of the US-led international coalition in Iraq, as well as US troops in Syria, have come under regular attacks, with armed Shiite groups claiming responsibility in Iraq.

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US Likely ‘Had a Hand’ in Israel’s Operation to Eliminate Hezbollah’s Leader Nasrallah – Analyst

Iran has condemned the Israeli attack that killed Hezbollah’s Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah, with President Masoud Pezeshkian claiming that the US greenlit the attack and bears partial responsibility for the “war crime.”

It is very likely that the US “had a hand” in Israel’s operation in Beirut that killed Hezbollah’s Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah, Nikolas Kosmatopoulos, assistant professor of public policy and international affairs at the American University of Beirut, told Sputnik.

“Certainly, there is good reason to believe that there has been diplomatic approval… military, most probably, and intelligence cooperation,” he said.

US interest in an operation targeting Nasrallah “might have to do with the protection of the role and power that Israel projects in the region,” the pundit speculated.

“It is no secret that Israel enjoys bipartisan support in the US Senate and Congress. It is also an important US ally, and carries out its dirty job in the region. It helps the US maintain economic, diplomatic, and political hegemony […] keeps the region in turmoil… It doesn’t allow for the unification of the region, doesn’t allow for the region to cooperate with each other… become a regional power that could endanger the interests of the US and the EU,” he underscored.

Kosmatopoulos pointed out that the military-industrial complexes of the US and Israel “are almost organically entwined, are an extension of each other.”

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IDF Reveals Special Operations Activity In Lebanon

More than 700 special operations in which IDF forces spent more than 200 nights in enemy territory in southern Lebanon.

Some of the promotions even lasted 2-3 consecutive days of staying in southern Lebanon.

Many special units of the IDF engaged in these operations.

As part of the operations, the forces entered the Hezbollah tunnels, destroyed weapons in the territory itself, captured and placed explosives, and also removed weapons and intelligence documents to Israeli territory.

In two of the operations over the past few months, our forces were injured – one as a result of exploding traps of our forces, and one as a result of the explosion of an old bomb that was left in the field. Hezbollah did not recognize these operations and there were no encounters or battles with terrorists at all.

The operations were carried out at a distance of up to 2-3 km from the border with Israel in the nearest strip of villages.

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Israel bombs Palestinian journalist’s home in latest Gaza massacre

Palestinian journalist Wafa Aludaini was killed alongside her family on 30 September in an Israeli airstrike targeting their home in central Gaza. 

Aludaini’s family home was bombed by Israel on Monday, killing her with her husband and two children, according to several Palestinian media reports. 

Gaza’s Government Media Office identified her as the 174th Palestinian journalist to be killed by Israel since the start of the war in Gaza on 7 October.

She worked “with several English-speaking media outlets,” the media office said, urging the international community to hold Israel accountable for its “crimes against journalists.”

“Through her words and actions, she stood as both a storyteller and a symbol of the Palestinian struggle for freedom,” wrote the Palestine Chronicle, with who Aludaini worked as a contributor, on 30 September. 

Israeli airstrikes continue to pound the entirety of the Gaza Strip on a daily basis. 

A woman and her child were killed in Deir al-Balah on Monday after an Israeli airstrike targeted a home in the Hakr al-Jami area of the city.

“Israeli occupation forces committed two massacres against families in the Gaza Strip over the last 24 hours, resulting in the killing of at least 20 Palestinians and the injury of 108 others,” WAFA news agency reported.

Since 7 October, at least 41,615 people have been reported killed and another 96,359 injured. 

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Violating the Law To Provide War Aid to Israel

In March, I wrote about eight United States Senate members sending a letter to President Joe Biden declaring that Section 6201 of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 requires the termination of offensive military aid to the Israel government because the Israel government “prohibits or otherwise restricts, directly or indirectly, the transport or delivery of United States humanitarian assistance.” This declaration seemed then and continues to seem now true to observers of the situation where Gazans suffer from the deprivation of daily needs including food and medical supplies as they also suffer from bombs and bullets. Still, the US military aid flow to Israel has continued at a high rate.

To overcome the legal objection presented by these senators and others, the US Department of State asserted in a May 10 report that “We do not currently assess that the Israeli government is prohibiting or otherwise restricting the transport or delivery of U.S. humanitarian assistance.” Ta-da: legality.

That dishonest State Department assertion enabled the Biden administration to take action prohibited under US law. And, because of the die-hard pro-Israel bent of congressional leadership, the ruse was sure not to be met with effective legislative answer.

Important new information concerning the State Department’s assertion is provided in a Tuesday ProPublica article by Brett Murphy. Looking at internal communications in the State Department, Murphy recounted how the State Department’s assertion not only flew in the face of what people could readily observe in regard to Israel’s actions to suppress aid reaching Gazans, it also was outright contradicted by two State Department organizations that were charged with assessing the situation.

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Top 10 Human Rights Violations by Netanyahu Against Palestinian People

Israel’s complex and often controversial political landscape has made human rights a central issue in the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a figurehead in Israeli politics for decades, has been overwhelmingly condemned for his policies regarding the Palestinian people.

Throughout his tenure, numerous incidents and policies under his administration have drawn widespread criticism from human rights organizations, who rightly accuse him of violating international human rights law and the rights of Palestinians.

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The Militarization of Higher Education

The divestment campaigns launched last spring by students protesting Israel’s mass slaughter in Gaza brought the issue of the militarization of American higher education back into the spotlight.

Of course, financial ties between the Pentagon and American universities are nothing new. As Stuart Leslie has pointed out in his seminal book on the topic, “The Cold War and American Science,” “In the decade following World War II, the Department of Defense (DOD) became the biggest patron of American science.” Admittedly, as civilian institutions like the National Institutes of Health grew larger, the Pentagon’s share of federal research and development did decline, but it remained a source of billions of dollars in funding for university research.

And now, Pentagon-funded research is once again on the rise, driven by the DOD’s recent focus on developing new technologies like weapons driven by artificial intelligence. Combine that with an intensifying drive to recruit engineering graduates and the forging of partnerships between professors and weapons firms and you have a situation in which many talented technical types could spend their entire careers serving the needs of the warfare state. The only way to head off such a Brave New World would be greater public pushback against the military conquest (so to speak) of America’s research and security agendas, in part through resistance by scientists and engineers whose skills are so essential to building the next generation of high-tech weaponry.

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Meet the First Tenured Professor to Be Fired for Pro-Palestine Speech

Maura Finkelstein never hid her support for Palestinian liberation during her nine years working as a professor of anthropology at Muhlenberg College, a small liberal arts school in Allentown, Pennsylvania.

“I have always had an ethical practice of making sure that I include Palestine in my teaching,” Finkelstein told me. “It was never outside the bounds of what I do.”

For Finkelstein, who is Jewish, this was not always easy. More than 30 percent of Muhlenberg’s 2,200 students are Jewish, many of them vocal supporters of Israel.

Neither her longtime public support of Palestinians, however, nor the courses on Palestine she taught in her early years at the school prevented Finkelstein from earning tenure in 2021. Following the arduous tenure process, professors are supposed to enjoy lifetime job security and robust safeguards of academic freedom. The bar for dismissal from a tenured academic position is by design meant to be extremely high, requiring justifiable cause.

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US Bolsters Forces in Middle East, Issues Warning to Iran

The Pentagon on Sunday announced steps to bolster its forces in the Middle East amid Israel’s non-stop bombardment of Lebanon.

Pentagon spokesman Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder said the US will reinforce its “air-support capabilities” in the coming days and said Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin “increased the readiness of additional US forces to deploy, elevating our preparedness to respond to various contingencies.”

Ryder said Austin also ordered the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and its strike group to stay in the region. The USS Wasp Amphibious Ready Group / Marine Expeditionary Unit will also continue to operate in the Eastern Mediterranean.

Ryder also issued a warning to Iran in the statement. “Secretary Austin stressed that the United States is determined to prevent Iran and Iranian-backed partners and proxies from exploiting the situation or expanding the conflict,” he said.

“Secretary Austin made clear that should Iran, its partners, or its proxies use this moment to target American personnel or interests in the region, the United States will take every necessary measure to defend our people,” Ryder added.

The US has been vowing to defend Israel from any potential Iranian attack, and the Pentagon said last week that was one purpose of maintaining an increased force posture in the region.

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Famine in Europe: the real goal of anti-Russian policies

The controversy over Ukrainian agricultural products continues. Ukrainian food products have simply invaded the European market and are driving thousands of farmers out of business. Despite the protests and political pressure, no EU decision-maker seems interested in changing this tragic scenario. However, the crisis seems to have even deeper dimensions and could be a real time bomb for the entire European society.

The Bulgarian government recently asked the European Commission to pass a resolution banning the import of Ukrainian chicken eggs. According to the Bulgarian authorities, the large amount of cheap Ukrainian eggs on the European market is hurting Bulgarian producers, who rely on egg sales as a vital part of their business. Thousands of Bulgarian farmers are going bankrupt, and the crisis is only expected to get worse in the near future.

The problem is not limited to eggs or Bulgaria. Selling grain, meat, dairy products and everything that is produced in the countryside seems to be no longer an attractive business in Europe. Since 2022, protests for change have been taking place in all parts of the European continent. From Poland to France, no European farmer is happy to see his products being replaced on the market by massive quantities of cheap Ukrainian agricultural items.

This is due to the irrational decision of European decision-makers to ban all import tariffs on Ukrainian food products. The measure is allegedly intended to boost the Ukrainian economy during the crisis caused by the conflict with Russia – which ironically is sponsored by the West itself. In the current European market, it is cheaper to import Ukrainian food than to resell the native products, which is obviously causing thousands of farmers to abandon their businesses.

As well known, most of Europe does not have a very strong agricultural sector, with local farmers relying on government aid to stay active in the market. Without this aid and with the invasion of Ukrainian products, it is simply no longer profitable to be part of European agribusiness, which is why thousands of people are likely to stop working in the rural areas and join the growing class of the European “precariat”.

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