The Third Estate Sunday Review focuses on politics and culture. We're an online magazine. We don't play nice and we don't kiss butt. In the words of Tuesday Weld: "I do not ever want to be a huge star. Do you think I want a success? I refused "Bonnie and Clyde" because I was nursing at the time but also because deep down I knew that it was going to be a huge success. The same was true of "Bob and Carol and Fred and Sue" or whatever it was called. It reeked of success."
The Americans knew. The Americans helped. Did the CIA or Pentagon
help with the targeting? It hardly matters. The Americans provided the
bombs, the helicopters, the fighter jets, the bullets and the tank
shells. The Americans watched the attack unfold. They watched from
Biden’s pier. They watched from drones. They watched as the streets
filled with blood, bodies and limbs. Afterward, the Americans praised
the rescue operation and said nothing about the dead Palestinian
children and women. Nothing about the amputees and the eviscerated.
Nothing about the three hostages who were also apparently killed in the
Israeli attack, including an American citizen.
The Biden administration’s complicity in the Nuseirat mass slaughter
shatters the last pretense of American diplomacy in the Middle East.
It’s a sinister calculus that justifies killing and wounding 1000 people
to rescue four–four people who could have been released through a
ceasefire, a ceasefire the Biden administration claims it wanted to
broker.
The massacre at Nuseirat made clear once more that some lives are
worth more than others. And to the Israelis and their American allies,
at least, Palestinian lives don’t seem to be worth anything at all.
Friday, June 14, 2024. Crooked Clarence Thomas lies again, a lifeguard
backed by right-wing nuts is trying to further erode LGBTQ+ rights,
Jeffrey St. Clair reflects on the recent slaughter in Gaza and much
more.
Starting in the US where confidence in the Supreme Court remains at an all time low. As Mike noted earlier this morning "Crooked Clarence Thomas can't stop lying."
Now lying would be a problem for anyone -- even a young child.
However, Crooked Clarence isn't a young child. He is a justice on the
Supreme Court who has now served (poorly) for over thirty years. And
when he can't follow the rules, who is he to offer judgment on anyone?
The hypocrisy leaves the mind reeling.
So
there are three more trips that his billionaire sugar daddy paid for
that, oops!, Crooked Clarence forgot to disclose. This is not the
behavior of an ethical judge. This is the behavior of a crook and
crooks are not supposed to be judges. They're certainly supposed to
appear before judges but they are not supposed to sit on the bench.
It
is past time for Crooked Clarence and Offending Alito to be pulled from
the Court. But we also desperately need term limits on the Supreme
Court. That is long overdue.
Stephen Johnson Field sat on the Supreme Court from 1863 to 1897. From WIKIPEDIA:
Field insisted on breaking John Marshall's
record of 34 years on the court, even when he was no longer able to
handle the workload. His colleagues asked him to resign due to his being
intermittently senile,[14] but he refused, at one point John Marshall Harlan urged
Field to retire. Finding him dozing in the robing room. Harlan later
related what happened next: “The old man listened, gradually became
alert, and finally, with his eyes blazing with the fire of youth, he
burst out, ‘Yes, and a dirtier day’s work I never did in my life.'”[15]
In
March 1896, he wrote what would be his final opinion on behalf of the
Court, but remained on the bench for another twenty months, finally
retiring on December 1, 1897.[16] Field would become the last veteran of both the Taney Court and the Chase Court to remain on the bench. He would remain the longest serving member of the Court until his record was surpassed by William O. Douglas, who served from 1939 to 1975.
We
need laws changing this from a life time appointment because for the
American people this is now becoming a lifetime sentence -- where we
have to wait for these corrupt bastards to die in order to get justice.
When
Crooked Clarence refuses to properly disclose, he stains his own image
and he stains the Court's image. This should not be allowed to happen.
MEDIAS TOUCH is a good outlet and produced good content.
But we cringed over one this week where a woman wanted to talk about the
assault on women's rights.
We don't think the assault exists?
We
know it does. And it's a good topic for a commentary -- for many
commentaries. But the woman seemed to doubt that or to feel that she
needed to shore up the case by citing an attack on Civil Rights.
Citing? A whispered aside, at best. And why do that?
There's
more than enough reason to make a commentary on the assault on Civil
Rights -- many commentaries (and Roland S. Martin regularly does a great
job with those commentaries on his own podcasts). The way the woman
utilized this was confusing and weakened her presentation.
If
she was attempting to note the reality that the fright-wing wishes to
strip all of us of our rights (which is, in fact, true), she left out
the LGBTQ+ community and that's a huge omission because that community
is and has been the test case for the fright-wing in their efforts to
destroy rights and to create a climate of hate.
And it
has been with those efforts that the hate mongers have shown their hand;
however, too few want to see reality -- or maybe their own latent
homophobia prevents them from seeing reality.
The
Supreme Court is a dishonest and crooked body that has handed down
outrageous rulings over the last four years. And, yes, DOBBS is one of
those outrageous rulings. So were the rulings in ALEXANDER V SOUTH
CAROLINE NAACP and SFFA V HARVARD/UNC. They are disgusting rulings that
ignored precedent and trashed settled law.
But the worst attack on Americans came in 303 CREATIVE LLC V ELENIS.
And
this is where Turley comes in. He had already begun his flirtation
with The Federalist Society. Within a few years, his exposure had led
to full blown hate. He began offering pro bono help behind the scenes
to many offensive and disgusting cases. On CREATIVE LLC, he began
insisting that Lori Smith -- the homophobe -- was being denied her
religious right to practice homophobia. He worded differently but
that's the reality.
Lori was a known liar who had no
standing to sue and her case was a joke that only became more outrageous
after the verdict when it was learned that the person she cited in
court papers as having requested she make a same-sex wedding site for
him (a) never made that request, (b) was straight and (c) was married to
a woman and had been for over 15 years. She's just a cheap little liar
and you have to wonder how she justifies that in her so-called faith?
The
verdict in that case created two sets of citizenship. Straight people
are entitled to all rights but gay men and lesbians only have rights if
those rights do not offend the homophobia of some religious nutcase.
That's what the verdict was.
Turley went all in on
that case and you can read his Tweets and his columns -- even if he kept
hidden his interactions with Lori Smith's attorneys. With DOBBS and
the other cases?
He was less vocal and had to keep
things hidden. In our society, sadly, you can fully attack the LGBTQ+
community and get away with it. Turley and the fright-wing know that
they have to step more lightly when it comes to attacking others. So
with attacks in other areas, these are steps to eliminating rights.
Steps. Affirmative action has largely been struck down in college
admissions due to the Crooked Court. DOBBS? It, as Turley repeatedly
insisted, turned the issue over to the states. Many of these
states,Turley failed to note, had already prepared for this day and had
laws in place to destroy reproductive rights.
They chip
away at a specific right. But with Lori Smith's case, they went back
to overturning equality and all the decisions that involved equality
over the Court's history to argue that gays and lesbians only have
rights if 100% of America agrees they should have them.
That's
what they want to do with reproductive rights and with Civil Rights but
they know they have to move slowly there. And part of the slow move is
to lie and attack the rights of women and people of color in an attempt
to soften public reaction to the coming onslaught.
The fakery is part of the process and the plotting and scheming start long before we're aware of it.
And
again, we're seeing how destructive that case was. They've got a new on teed up thanks to a
priss pot named Jeffrey Little who's an appalling piece of work and
whose 'delicately' aged face would have gotten him cast in a late 80s TV
movie as an AIDS patient. Sadly, Little wants to do his acting in
court. Piece of garbage is a lifeguard in California and by golly he
can't be expected to raise flags because he's a delicate flower so nutso
is suing. Robin Abcarian (LOS ANGELES TIMES) reports:
Little claims in his lawsuit that the Progress Pride flag in
question symbolizes and advances “a range of controversial religious
and moral views, including about the family, the nature of marriage and
human sexuality including the promotion of certain sexual practices, and
the identity, nature and purpose of the human person.”
Sexual practices? I think he’s reading an awful lot into a swatch of brightly colored fabric.
Little
also claims that he is opposed to the flag because it has been
“featured prominently during Gay Pride parades around the world,
including those in which adults wear little to no clothing while in the
presence of children.”
Excuse me, Los Angeles lifeguard says what?
Has
the good captain not noticed how many people are running around L.A.
beaches nearly naked on your average sunny day? I mean, you’d be hard
pressed to tell the difference between a bikini and dental floss these
days. In fact, it’s sometimes hard to tell who is wearing a thong and
who is actually naked.
But
hey, as long as they don't ask for your sexual orientation while you
are caught in a rip tide, even lifeguards are allowed to be bigots, at
least in private.
Imposing their religion on the rest of us is where I draw the line, though. Same-sex marriage was legalized in 2015. Gender is not binary. Trans people exist and deserve respect. Flying the Pride flag is a symbolic way of saying, "You belong too."
There
is so much wrong with this nonsense and garbage and the Crooked and
Corrupt Supreme Court brought us here. In a functioning legal world,
even with that disaster opinion from 303 CREATIVE LLC V ELENIS on the books, Little wold have no right to hide behind his so-called religious beliefs to refuse to do his job duites.
Raising flags? That's part of the job. And whatever the flag is? That's also part of the job.
B-b-b-but my religion!!!!
Your religion may tell you that you can't work on the Sabbath.
Your religion does not tell you that you can't raise a flag.
In addition, you raising flags for your job?
If
we work, we have job duties. And the whole world knows that our job
duties do not necessarily reflect our own personal beliefs no matter how
deeply felt.
Little
Jeffrey Little was big enough to express his distaste for LGBTQ+
people. He can do that anytime he wants. Doing so on the clock might
get him fired -- probably should. But raising a series of flags is not
an endorsement of anything other than what the state says should be
displayed.
If he doesn't want to do what the state says, he is free to quit.
His bigotry does not get rewarded in a functioning legal system.
Pamela Manson (UPI) notes
that he is pressing this court case (with right wing backing, I'm sure)
despite the fact that the state attempted to work with him:
The
Fire Department issued assurances last week that Little will not be
personally responsible for the raising or lowering of the Progress Pride
flag as part of his job for the remainder of June, according to
attorney Paul Jonna, special counsel for the Thomas More Society, a public interest law firm that represents the lifeguard captain.
However,
the department insisted that Little must still ensure his subordinates
comply with the requirement and that he will need to renew his request
for a religious accommodation every year, Jonna said Monday.
Nothing's good enough for these freaks.
And
I get some of the homophobia, it is understandable. Ava and my piece
that we pulled from above, that piece was re-written three
different times over three different days before it was published and
the original draft included some reality: Little boys are horny.
Meaning?
They
play with themselves, they play with animals, they play with each
other, they will stick their erect penises in a vaccume extension, in
spout water pours out of into tub, they will stick it anywhere. .
Then they grow up and some are in such a panic that they go
overboard like little Little's doing.
As children, they did circle jerks and mutual masturbation and what have you.
And they do that because they're horny. And then some of them start to mess around with females.
You do get how that f**ks with their minds?
These
same-sex experiences that they don't want anyone to know about -- but
that many of had in childhood -- are left behind. Their shame over what
they did as horny boys is replaced with the lie of what happened and
they then lie to themselves that they are so big and strong that they
overcame The Big
Gay and so others can as well!
That's
the lie that's always been behind
conversion 'therapy.' So when you find yourself talking to man who
believes in conversion' therapy' or wants to insist that it's a matter
of
choice, you need to grasp that this idiot believes that because they've
confused humping, handly, squeezing and mouthing whatever was handy when
they were horny with actually being gay and so they think they fought
off being gay and if they did it then everyone can.
These idiots were not gay, they were horny.
And
if we would grasp that basic fact about these homophobes, if we would
grasp and discuss it, it
would cut down on some of the homophobia -- mainly because these
homophobes would stop expressing his homophobia as they grasped what
their words revealed to the rest of us and how every time they went off
on this topic, we were all looking them in the face trying to figure out
whether they just gave each other hands jobs, went down on each other
or maybe went all the way to cornholing -- a term so well known by so
many males for a reason.
Jeffrey Little does not belong working for the state.
If
his so-called 'religious' beliefs are so firm that he can't raise a
flag? He needs to quit. Because other people have religious rights as
well.
Me? As a cancer
survivor a few times over, it's my deeply held belief that no God would
want us to harm any group of people. No God would preach or teach
intolerance.
Guess what? A lot of people hold religious beliefs in this country that incorporate that attitude.
If
his religious view is intolerant, he needs to find another job and not
work with the public. Maybe he could become a minister. I'm sure he'd
love to be around young kids.
But whatever he does, he shouldn't be allowed to work in his current job.
If
he's given the right not to raise the flag because of his passionate
fantasies -- sorry, 'beliefs,' -- about gay people, he doesn't need to
be employed.
And if you don't live in California and you disagree with me? SHUT THE F**K UP.
That's where I live. And you're telling me that a lifeguard is going to be given a pass to be homophobic.
Let's travel this slippery slope.
Where does it end?
I do not feel safe having my tax money paying his salary. He's not a real life guard.
He's a loon who won't raise a flag.
So
if someone's drowning in the ocean, is he going to try to save them?
Even if he thinks they might be gay? Or knows that they are?
My concern is that he's just going to watch them drown and again say, “as I was under the impression that I would not have to deal with working in these conditions.”
He is a danger to himself in others and cannot work public safety.
Today,
his religious views say no to the Pride flag. Tomorrow? His religious
views say he can't give Mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to certain
people.
He is not fit and he is not qualified for a public safety job.
Public
safety is a social contract in which we are all equal and we are all
deserving. Jeffrey Little doesn't believe that. His ass needs to be
fired and fired immediately. Him on the beach is a big question mark
for public safety and questioning whether or not a lifeguard will rescue
someone in need is the first indication that they are not qualified for
their job.
And
the hate group backing him up is the Thomas More Society. They're a
group of Catholic freaks who are okay with priests molesting children
but not okay with women having rights or with public safety measures
(see their cases during COVID) and they're part of the crazy liars who tried to overturn the election:
The Thomas More Society has been aligned with the presidential administration of Donald Trump.[37] Trump appointed Sarah Pitlyk, a special counsel to the society, to a federal district judgeship.[38]
In 2020, after Trump was defeated by Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election, the Thomas More Society established the Amistad Project as part of an attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.[6] Trump repeatedly and falsely claimed that the election was marred by voter fraud.[6] The project was led by former Kansas Attorney General (and later Liberty University professor) Phillip Kline,[6][39] although his law license was suspended.[39] The effort was tied to Jenna Ellis, a senior legal adviser to the Trump campaign who was also special counsel to the Thomas More Society.[6] The
Amistad Projects filed lawsuits on behalf of supposed "grassroots"
groups (with titles such as the "Pennsylvania Voters Alliance" and
"Wisconsin Voters Alliance") in the swing states won by Biden (Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin). All the suits were rejected or dismissed by the courts.[6] Ellis's
tie to the society and the project suggested "a coordinated effort to
flood the nation's courts with repetitive litigation" allowing Trump to
continue to claim that the election results remain contested.[6]
On December 14, 2020, ahead of the electoral college vote, Amistad Project attorney Ian Northon accompanied a group of self-described "Republican electors" in Lansing who
were attempting to cast Michigan electoral votes for Trump, despite
Biden winning Michigan and being previously certified as the winner.
Northon claimed the "electors" were "fulfilling their constitutional
duty."[40] The fake "votes" cast by the pro-Trump "alternate electors" have no legal standing.[41][42]
On December 22, 2020, after the electors had cast their votes, the Amistad Project sued in D.C. federal court on
behalf of a variety of plaintiffs: ten voters, five organizations, and
eight state legislators. The two Michigan legislators listed as
plaintiffs later requested to be dropped from the suit, feeling that the
suit that was filed differed too strongly from what they had agreed to.[43] The project sued, among others, Vice PresidentMike Pence,
governors, election officials, and legislative officials in the
battleground states; the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate,
and the electoral college itself.[44] The group asked the court to (as the district court later described in denying the request) "declare unconstitutional several decades-old federal statutes governing the appointment of electors and the counting of electoral votes for
President of the United States; to invalidate multiple state statutes
regulating the certification of Presidential votes; to ignore certain
Supreme Court decisions; and, the coup de grace, to enjoin the U.S.
Congress from counting the electoral votes on January 6, 2021, and declaring Joseph R. Biden the next President."[45] The
suit was derided by legal community for the substance of its arguments,
the broadness of its goals, and for naming the Electoral College as a
defendant, with notes that the Electoral College is not something that
exists, but a process that happens.[46]
On January 4, 2021, U.S. District Judge James E. Boasberg denied
the society's motion for a preliminary injunction, noting that
plaintiffs lacked standing, the case was filed in the wrong court, and
that plaintiffs made no effort to serve the
other side. Boasberg wrote that in addition to those procedural
problems, "the suit rests on a fundamental and obvious misreading of the
Constitution. It would be risible were its target not so grave: the
undermining of a democratic election for President of the United
States."[47]
By
the way, does Jeffrey Little's religious beliefs allow Paul Jonna --
Jeffrey Little's attorney -- to wear lipstick? There are hardly any public photos of him where he's not wearing lipstick
and that's not just my opinion, I've got a photo shoot later today and
an artist is already here to do her magic. I checked with her -- you
know my eyes -- and she's an expert and, yes, Paul Jonna is wearing
lipstick in photo after photo.
I
can't imagine that if your religious beliefs tells you that you can hate LGBTQ+
people these same beliefs also tell you it's okay to hang out with men who wear
cosmetics. So maybe Jeffrey Little needs to start praying and maybe
Thomas More needs to stop being so desperate for attorneys that they
take in men who wear make up.
We've
got so much to cover but we have stop for a moment for Barbra
Streisand. Some people are e-mailing the public account insisting that
I'm not calling her out when I should be. If you missed it, this week
Barbra made a statement about the mythical rapes of October 7th. I
really have more important things to do -- as should you -- then get
caught up in that. It was a stupid comment from an uniformed woman. If
you've missed it -- and maybe this isn't in the media? -- James Brolin
and his woman-beating son Josh have been all in on go-go-go Israel. So
she's surrounded by that. THE NEW YORK TIMES -- her gospel (because
she's an idiot) has repeatedly pimped the lie of rapes. (Again, no
woman has come forward. There is no proof. The allegations made were
just more lies from a corrupt government.)
Barbra
is an idiot. She reads NYT, she praises it. She even praised Frank
Rich when Bully Boy Bush occupied the White House. If you're not
familiar with Rich's body of work, before politics he did movie
reviews. And no one, not even John Simon, trashed her more than Frank
Rich. But there was idiot Babs praising him and linking to him because
he said what she wanted to hear about Bully Boy Bush. Despite the huge
and preening ego -- or maybe because of -- Barbra praised a man she
should hve ignored.
This
is a woman, please note, who has bragged for years about her lack of
education and laughing about how she was close to 30 before she knew who
won The Civil War. And not just bragged about to those of us who know
her, you can find her bragging and laughing about it to the press.
So,
no, the fact that Barbra has hopped onto the lie about the mythical
rapes does not surprise me. Nor should it surprise anyone.
The bodies of children and women, the old and young, shredded by
shrapnel, riven with bullets, some with severed limbs and others with
perforated eyes.
“There were children everywhere, there were women, there were men,”
said Karin Huster, who was working at Al-Aqsa with Médecins Sans
Frontières. “We had the gamut of war wounds, trauma wounds, from
amputations to eviscerations to trauma, to TBIs, traumatic brain
injuries. Fractures, obviously, big burns. Kids completely grey or white
from the shock, burnt, screaming for their parents — many of them not
screaming because they are in shock.”
The tempo of the attack increased. The bombings and the gunfire and
the tanks and the helicopters. The frenzied sounds of a war machine at
full-throttle. For thirty minutes it went on. For an hour. For an hour
and a half. It seemed interminable for those seeking shelter on the
ground, cowering in buildings and the hospital. And then it was over,
finally. And there were only the cries for help from the shattered
streets and collapsed buildings. The cries of parents carrying dead
children in their arms, the cries of children looking at the gutted
bodies of their parents.
What had just happened? Why had this refugee camp at Nusierat, home
of so many homeless people, so many Palestinian families who had been
displaced by bombs time and time again, come under such a savage
sustained attack from the air and the ground, an attack that destroyed
90 homes and apartment buildings? An attack of such fury that it left
the streets scattered with severed arms and legs, the bodies of children
and their mothers and grandfathers left to bleed out in the marketplace
that seemed to be a target of the attack. What could possibly justify
this slaughter, this killing, this destruction that one Palestinian
refugee in Nuseirat said felt like “Doomsday”?
When the Israelis finally left, they took four people with them, four
hostages who had been rescued by Israeli commandos and evacuated in
helicopters that were stationed at or near Biden’s hapless
“humanitarian” pier that had, coincidentally or not, just been
reassembled and re-moored to the beach in central Gaza, after breaking
apart in high seas last month.
When the Israelis finally left with the four rescued hostages, who’d
been captured by Hamas on October 7 while attending the Nova rave just
outside the Israeli security fence that pens in and isolates northern
Gaza, they left behind 274 dead Palestinians, including 64 children and
57 women. They left behind 700 wounded, many in critical condition, many
of whom seem likely to die in the coming days and weeks.
The great rescue mission turned into the worst massacre to date in
Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, leaving the streets of Nuseirat, in the
words of Abu Asi, “halls of blood.”
Medical
sources have told Al Jazeera that 20 Palestinians have been killed in
Israeli raids on different areas in the Gaza Strip since dawn today.
Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary reports that Israeli forces targeted a
house in Deir el-Balah, and killed at least two Palestinians. Four
others were critically injured, among them children.
“Talking to the parents, they said they were playing in the courtyard when the air strike took place,” Khoudary said.
“There has been a couple of targets in Nuseirat and Bureij. The air
strikes are ongoing from north to the south, despite the ceasefire
negotiations.”
THE NATIONAL notes, "Three women were killed in an attack on a home near Hedar roundabout, in
western Gaza city, and a child was killed in bombardment on the city,
sources said." And THE GUARDIAN notes:
In the north of the Gaza Strip where Palestinians
have been hit hardest by hunger, residents say they are surviving on
bread alone due to acute shortages of vegetables, fruit and meat.
Reuters
reports that food that can be found in markets is being sold at
exorbitant prices: a kilo of green peppers, which cost about a dollar
before the war, was priced at 320 shekels or nearly $90. Traders
demanded $70 for just a kilo of onions.
Um Mohammed, a mother of six in Gaza City, told the news agency:
We are being starved, the world has forgotten about us.
Except for the flour, bread, we have nothing else, we don’t have anything to eat it with, so we eat bread only.
Gaza remains under assault. Day 252 of the assault in the wave that began in October. Binoy Kampmark (DISSIDENT VOICE) points out, "Bloodletting as form; murder as fashion. The ongoing campaign in Gaza
by Israel’s Defence Forces continues without stalling and restriction.
But the burgeoning number of corpses is starting to become a challenge
for the propaganda outlets: How to justify it? Fortunately for Israel,
the United States, its unqualified defender, is happy to provide cover
for murder covered in the sheath of self-defence." CNN has explained, "The Gaza Strip is 'the most dangerous place' in the world to be a child, according to the executive director of the United Nations Children's Fund." ABC NEWS quotes UNICEF's December 9th statement, ""The Gaza Strip is the most dangerous place in the world to be a child.
Scores of children are reportedly being killed and injured on a daily
basis. Entire neighborhoods, where children used to play and go to
school have been turned into stacks of rubble, with no life in them." NBC NEWS notes, "Strong majorities of all voters in the U.S. disapprove of President Joe
Biden’s handling of foreign policy and the Israel-Hamas war, according to the latest national NBC News poll.
The erosion is most pronounced among Democrats, a majority of whom
believe Israel has gone too far in its military action in Gaza." The
slaughter continues. It has displaced over 1 million people per the US
Congressional Research Service. Jessica Corbett (COMMON DREAMS) points out, "Academics and legal experts around the world, including Holocaust scholars, have condemned
the six-week Israeli assault of Gaza as genocide." The death toll of
Palestinians in Gaza is grows higher and higher. United Nations Women noted,
"More than
1.9 million people -- 85 per cent of the total population of Gaza --
have
been displaced, including what UN Women estimates to be nearly 1 million
women and girls. The entire population of Gaza -- roughly 2.2 million
people -- are in crisis levels of acute food insecurity or worse." THE NATIONAL notes, "Gaza death toll reaches 37,232 with 85,037 injured." Months ago, AP noted, "About 4,000 people are reported missing." February 7th, Jeremy Scahill explained
on DEMOCRACY NOW! that "there’s an estimated 7,000 or 8,000
Palestinians missing, many of them in graves that are the rubble of
their former home." February 5th, the United Nations' Phillipe
Lazzarini Tweeted:
April 11th, Sharon Zhang (TRUTHOUT) reported, "In addition to the over 34,000 Palestinians who have been counted as
killed in Israel’s genocidal assault so far, there are 13,000
Palestinians in Gaza who are missing, a humanitarian aid group has
estimated, either buried in rubble or mass graves or disappeared into
Israeli prisons. In a report released Thursday, Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor said that the estimate is based on initial reports and that the actual number of people missing is likely even higher."
As for the area itself? Isabele Debre (AP) reveals, "Israel’s military offensive
has turned much of northern Gaza into an uninhabitable moonscape. Whole
neighborhoods have been erased. Homes, schools and hospitals have been
blasted by airstrikes and scorched by tank fire. Some buildings are
still standing, but most are battered shells." Kieron Monks (I NEWS) reports, "More than 40 per cent of the buildings in northern Gaza have been damaged or destroyed, according to a new study of satellite imagery
by US researchers Jamon Van Den Hoek from Oregon State University and
Corey Scher at the City University of New York. The UN gave a figure of 45 per cent of housing
destroyed or damaged across the strip in less than six weeks. The rate
of destruction is among the highest of any conflict since the Second
World War."
On June 4, a coalition of active-duty service members, veterans and G.I. rights groups launched a campaign called Appeal for Redress V2
to encourage military personnel to tell Congress to stop funding
genocide in Gaza. Israel’s genocidal operation, now in its ninth month,
has killed more than 37,000 Palestinians and wounded nearly 85,000.
The campaign is sponsored by Veterans For Peace (VFP), the Military
Law Task Force of the National Lawyers Guild, About Face: Veterans
Against the War and the Center on Conscience & War. It is modeled
after the 2006 Appeal for Redress
issued during the occupation of Iraq. During that campaign, almost
3,000 active-duty, Reserve and Guard personnel sent protected
communications to their members of Congress urging an end to the wars
and occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Appeal for Redress V2 was formulated to help G.I.s directly tell their representatives that they oppose U.S. support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza.
“We will not stand by silently while genocide unfolds,” Senior Airman
Juan Bettancourt, an active-duty member of the U.S. Air Force, stated at
a June 4 press conference
announcing the campaign. “We refuse to be complicit” in the
“unspeakable carnage,” said Bettancourt, who is seeking separation from
the U.S. military as a conscientious objector.
Kathleen Gilberd, executive director of the Military Law Task Force of the National Lawyers Guild and my coauthor for Rules of Disengagement: The Politics and Honor of Military Dissent, told Truthout
there has been an increase in the number of applications for
conscientious objection (CO) and other types of honorable discharge from
the military. “Many military personnel have serious objections to the
U.S. support for Israel’s genocide against the Palestinians,” Gilberd
said.
