October 17, 2024

MASTER LIST of Articles for DWF NEWS 10/17/24

Nazi Germany Used Gas Ovens, Zionist Israel Uses Starvation and Bombing

Roger Kotila, PhD      DWF NEWS

Extermination Works. At First.

Chris Hedges       SheerPost

'Intolerable': Global Outrage as Israeli Forces Fire on UN Peacekeepers in Lebanon

Jake Johnson    Common Dreams

200+ Protesters at NY Stock Exchange Say 'Stop Arming Israel'    

Jessica Corbett   Common Dreams

 Genocide, Nuclear War, & AI Weapons Aren't Normal. Let's Shut It Down.

Ray Acheson   Reaching Critical Will

DEBT BOMB

Mark Thompson   Project On Government Oversight

Nazi Germany Used Gas Ovens, Zionist Israel Uses Killing by Starvation and Bombing

Roger Kotila, PhD      DWF NEWS

 If Zionist Israel's scorched earth policy against Gaza's Palestinians (bomb, bomb, bomb) isn't enough, I learn from investigative reporter Helena Cobban that the Zionists are also starving the civilian population to death. 

Much like during WWII as the Jews were being taken to the gas chambers and the U.S. government failed to take action to save them, the U.S. government is once again failing to take action, this time refusing to rescue the Palestinians, victims of genocide. Worse yet, the U.S. is actually providing money and military support for the Zionists despite knowing that Israel is openly committing world crimes against largely defenseless Palestinians.  

I asked AI Co-pilot about WWII, genocide, and America's role back then. AI's response: 

"The U.S. officially entered WWII in December 1941 after the attack on Pearl Harbor 3. However, the primary focus of the Allied forces, including the U.S., was on defeating Nazi Germany rather than specifically rescuing Jews 4. It wasn’t until the Allied forces began liberating concentration camps in 1945 that the full extent of the Holocaust became widely known 5, 6.

The U.S. did take some steps to help, such as establishing the War Refugee Board in 1944, which helped save thousands of Jews 5. However, many historians argue that more could have been done earlier to save lives." -- from AI Co-pilot

Genocide by starvation is underway according to Helena Cobban. Herein are excerpts from Cobban's letter. Her new book "Understanding Hamas, and Why That Matters" becomes an important resource for those of us seeking solutions to end the genocide which the UN is unable to stop. -- Roger Kotila, PhD, DWF NEWS

From the desk of Helena Cobban

Pres., Just World Educational

Dear friends [Excerpts, Cobban's letter to her readers]:

The latest stats from UN-OCHA on Israel's deliberate blocking of the passage of food and other vitally needed humanitarian goods into Gaza are shocking. As the above graphic from OCHA's latest report (PDF) shows, the number of trucks of aid Israel is allowing into Gaza per day has declined steadily from April until this week.

The daily average in September was just one-third the number in April-- and barely over 10% of the daily average of trucks that Israel allowed into Gaza in September 2023.

This is, as Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant called for on October 8 or 9 of last year, the killing by starvation of Gaza's remaining (and already much weakened) population.

Quite possibly, by the end of winter, Israel will have succeeded in killing more than half of Gaza's people through its maintenance of its genocide-by-starving policies.

• However, as we know, the intense political crisis in and over Gaza continues. Speedy global action is needed to:

• End the Genocide;
• Win the lasting Ceasefire;
• Roll Back the Military Occupation in which Israel has held Gaza for 57 years now; and
• Allow the Palestinian People finally to exercise their Right of Self Determination.

The right of self-determination, by the way, obviously includes the Palestinians' right to choose their own leaders. And thus far, all the opinion polling conducted in Palestine over recent years shows that their preference is for a political leadership that includes the Islamic Resistance Movement-- Hamas.

Which of course makes our book "Understanding Hamas And Why That Matters"extremely timely. Another reason is that the only negotiations for a ceasefire that have ever been conducted (and that last November won a solid 7-day ceasefire during which many Israeli hostages were freed) were negotiations with Hamas.

-- [Above Excerpts from Helena Cobban]

Extermination Works. At First.

Chris Hedges       SheerPost

Extermination works. At first. This is the terrible lesson of history. If Israel is not stopped — and no outside power appears willing to halt the genocide in Gaza or the destruction of Lebanon — it will achieve its goals of depopulating and annexing northern Gaza and turning southern Gaza into a charnel house where Palestinians are burned alive, decimated by bombs and die from starvation and infectious diseases, until they are driven out. It will achieve its goal of destroying Lebanon — 2,255 people have been killed and over one million Lebanese have been displaced — in an attempt to turn it into a failed state. And, it may soon realize its long cherished dream of forcing the United States into war with Iran. Israeli leaders are publicly salivating over proposals to assassinate Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Hosseini Khamenei and carry out airstrikes on Iran’s nuclear installations and oil facilities.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his cabinet, like those driving Middle East policy in the White House — Antony Blinken, raised in a staunch Zionist family, Brett McGurk, Amos Hochstein, who was born in Israel and served in the Israeli military, and Jake Sullivan — are true believers in the doctrine that violence can mold the world to fit their demented vision. That this doctrine has been a spectacular failure in Israel’s occupied territories, and did not work in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Libya, and a generation earlier in Vietnam, does not deter them. This time, they assure us, it will succeed. READ MORE

https://scheerpost.com/2024/10/14/chris-hedges-extermination-works-at-first/

'Intolerable': Global Outrage as Israeli Forces Fire on UN Peacekeepers in Lebanon

Jake Johnson    Common Dreams

EXCERPTS      

 United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres on Friday joined human rights organizations and the foreign ministers of major countries in condemning the Israeli military’s targeting of U.N. peacekeeping forces stationed in Lebanon, where Israel has killed more than 2,000 people in bombings and ground attacks in recent weeks.

“This incident is intolerable and cannot be repeated,” said Guterres after the U.N. Interim Peacekeeping Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL)—an international body of more than 10,000 military and civilian personnel from dozens of countries—issued a statement accusing Israel of “deliberately” targeting the operation’s positions. UNIFIL has been present in southern Lebanon since 1978.

Global outrage soon followed, with the top diplomats of Spain, France, Italy, China, Turkey, and other nations issuing statements forcefully condemning the attack. READ MORE

https://scheerpost.com/2024/10/11/intolerable-global-outrage-as-israeli-forces-fire-on-un-peacekeepers-in-lebanon/

200+ Protesters at NY Stock Exchange Say 'Stop Arming Israel'    

Jessica Corbett   Common Dreams

EXCERPTS

As the Israeli assault of the Gaza Strip and Lebanon continued on Monday, over 200 Jewish-led protesters, including descendants of Holocaust survivors, were arrested at the New York Stock Exchange while demanding that the United States “stop arming Israel and profiting from genocide.”

Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP)—which has led several anti-genocide protests across the country over the past year of war—said that hundreds of people joined the action in New York City. The advocacy group shared photos and videos on social media of participants in red T-shirts with messages including “Not in Our Name” and “Stop Arming Israel.”

“As Gaza is bombed, Wall Street booms,” the group said. “The stock prices of weapons manufacturers have skyrocketed this year. The U.S. war economy is profiting from genocide. The 50+ members of Congress who invest in arms companies get richer every day.”

As Common Dreams has reported, stocks of American war profiteers—including Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and RTX, formerly known as Raytheon—soared in response to Israel launching its assault on Gaza after the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack as well as earlier this month, after Israeli forces began a ground invasion of Lebanon and Iran fired off ballistic missiles.

“Remember that members of Congress are permitted to own stock in war manufacturing, so when they vote to send more bombs or send our loved ones to war, they profit personally,” U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) said in early October. READ MORE

https://scheerpost.com/2024/10/15/200-jewish-led-protesters-arrested-at-ny-stock-exchange-say-stop-arming-israel/Jewish-Led

Genocide, Nuclear War, & AI Weapons Aren't Normal. Let's Shut It Down.

Ray Acheson   Reaching Critical Will - UN First Committee Monitor 

EXCERPTS

 ... UN member states have not been able to effectively address these challenges. Part of this is because of the problematic institutional structure of the UN. Most of the core threats to international peace and security stem from the violent behaviour of the five permanent, nuclear-armed members of the UN Security Council and the other nuclear-armed states.

During the first week of general debate at the First Committee, many delegations—to varying degrees—criticised Israel’s actions against Palestinians and/or against Lebanon, including the Arab Group, the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf, the European Union, the Non-Aligned Movement, Brazil, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Liechtenstein, Mauritania, the Netherlands, Palestine, Peru, South Africa, Sweden, and Yemen.

As an evasive manoever around these facts, Israel tries to claim that it is the victim, not the aggressor. In the fields of psychology and domestic violence, there is an acronym for this: Deny, Attack, and Reverse Victim and Offender (DARVO). It describes a manipulative tactic often used by abusers to avoid taking responsibility for their actions and to shift the blame onto their victims. Israel’s denial of war crimes (i.e. claiming it has not bombed hospitals or targeted journalists or killed children), its rhetoric against those condemning its actions ... is arguably classic DARVO.

... emotion in such forums is often ridiculed in a gendered way. We have seen this time and again with nuclear weapons in particular, where nuclear-armed states describe those who want to ban these weapon or talk about their horrific impacts on human beings as being “emotional”. These same states promote nuclear weapons and deterrence doctrines as being essential for security, and insist that “real men” need to make these hard choices to “defend” their countries. This speaks precisely to why, as Liechtenstein said, “we need leaders who understand the risks and consequences of militarization and armed conflict” and “leaders who challenge the patriarchal system of weapons as expressions of masculinity and dominance,” ...  READ MORE

https://reachingcriticalwill.org/disarmament-fora/unga/2024/fcm/17242-first-committee-monitor-vol-22-no-2

DEBT BOMB

Mark Thompson -The Bunker, from Project On Government Oversight (POGO)

ULTIMATE WASTE, FRAUD, AND ABUSE

Spending like a drunken sailor threatens national security  

Oct. 16, 2024 -- Washington, DC

There it was October 8, buried discreetly on page 5 (PDF) of yet another eye-glazer from the Congressional Budget Office. In 2023, the nation spent $776 billion on its military — which buys something — and $710 billion in net interest on the public debt — which buys nothing. But in fiscal 2024, which ended September 30, those numbers flipped for the first time in U.S. history: the nation spent more money buying nothing ($950 billion in interest) than it did on its military ($826 billion).

The Bunker has been decrying waste, fraud, and abuse in the U.S. military for nearly a half-century. But everyone’s three favorite whipping boys when it comes to Pentagon spending pale alongside the nearly trillion dollars we spent on interest last year. That’s money we paid to borrowers, so we didn’t have to make the tough decisions required to live within our means.

We have simply opted to kick this annual binge-spending, now approaching $36 trillion, down a generation or two so our kids and grandkids can foot the bill. When The Bunker arrived in D.C. to cover the Pentagon in 1979, the national debt was $805 billion. That’s just over 2% of what it is today. OK, Boomers. Good job! According to CBO, interest paid on the national debt grew by a stunning 34% ($240 billion) from 2023 to 2024 (PDF). Those are numbers that would make an F-35 blush.

Congress approves all government spending, but more than half of the annual budget goes to mandatory programs like Social Security and Medicare locked (for now) into law. The rest — so-called discretionary spending, appropriated annually — is basically split between the Pentagon and everything else the federal government does (education, transportation, justice, the environment, etc.). But as that mandatory spending — and interest on the national debt — grows, there’s less left over for the Pentagon and all that other stuff. Both categories need deep cuts to avert financial disaster.

Neither presidential candidate is riding to the rescue. Vice President Harris’s economic proposals could add as much as $8 trillion to the national debt over the coming decade, according to an October 7 assessment by the non-partisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. Former President Trump’s fiscal blueprints, the group projected, could add $15 trillion.

Such profligacy eventually will do more harm to U.S. national security than any foreign foe ever could. “We spend,” to paraphrase a recent president. “We spend like hell. And if you spend like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.”