Antinuclear

World may have crossed solar power ‘tipping point’.

 The world may have crossed a “tipping point” that will inevitably make
solar power our main source of energy, new research suggests. The study,
based on a data-driven model of technology and economics, finds that solar
PV (photovoltaics) is likely to become the dominant power source before
2050 – even without support from more ambitious climate policies.

However, it warns four “barriers” could hamper this: creation of stable
power grids, financing solar in developing economies, capacity of supply
chains, and political resistance from regions that lose jobs.

The researchers say policies resolving these barriers may be more effective
than price instruments such as carbon taxes in accelerating the clean
energy transition. The study, led by the University of Exeter and
University College London, is part of the Economics of Energy Innovation
and System Transition (EEIST) project, funded by the UK Government’s
Department for Energy Security and Net Zero and the Children’s Investment
Fund Foundation (CIFF).

“The recent progress of renewables means that
fossil fuel-dominated projections are no longer realistic,” Dr Femke
Nijsse, from Exeter’s Global Systems Institute.

 Exeter University 17th Oct 2023 #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

October 19, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Israeli Politician Says “Children of Gaza Have Brought This Upon Themselves”

When children are explicitly framed as “not innocent,” all-out genocidal warfare is possible.

TruthOut, By Jonathan Ofir , MONDOWEISS, October 18, 2023

t really is hard to imagine a more malicious statement than “the children of Gaza have brought this upon themselves” when children in Gaza are now being massacred by the hundreds. But this was actually said in a recent Knesset session. And it wasn’t someone considered an extreme right-winger, but a liberal centrist – Meirav Ben-Ari from Yair Lapid’s opposition party Yesh Atid.

The full, over-three-hour session from Monday can be seen here. Ben-Ari is evidently getting worked up as Palestinian lawmaker Aida Touma-Sliman (around two hours into the session) bemoans the loss of civilian lives “both in the area surrounding Gaza and in Gaza,” imploring to make an effort to release hostages and to “get the civilians out of the circle of blood.” “Jews as well as Arabs, Israelis as well as Palestinians.” “A child is a child,” Touma-Sliman reminds everyone, pointing out that at that point, over 900 children had been killed from Israel’s bombing of Gaza (a day later, that number swelled to well over a thousand).

All this humanity was just too much for Ben-Ari. She started shouting and heckling Touma-Sliman, saying, “There is not symmetry, there is no symmetry!”

“Between children there is symmetry,” she said.

Ben Ari went livid: “There is no symmetry!!”

Touma-Sliman emphasized: “A child is a child is a child.”

Twenty-five minutes after this unbearable episode, Ben-Ari came up to speak, admittedly unplanned. This is precisely 2.5 hours into the session video:

“I did not plan to speak, of course, but I have to say one thing that should be clear: There is no symmetry. There is no symmetry. Me, my friends, ok, were on the way to the synagogue on the day of Simchat Torah, and they were shot at, only because they were Jews in this state. That’s it. And friends of mine – their children went to the party, to celebrate – seculars, religious, doesn’t matter who, only because they were Jewish, they were murdered. So there is no symmetry! And the children in Gaza – the children in Gaza have brought this upon themselves! We are a peace-seeking nation, a life-loving nation. There is no symmetry – our children are kidnapped over there!” (My emphasis)……………………………………………………………………..

Ben-Ari’s genocidal rhetoric was actually echoing a comment just made by Israeli President Isaac Herzog, who is also known as a liberal, even from further left. At a recent press conference on October 13, Herzog answered a question by Rageh Omar from ITV, who asked him what Israel can do to alleviate the impact on the over two million civilians in Gaza, many of whom have nothing to do with Hamas. Herzog answered:

“We are working, operating militarily in terms according to rules of international law, period. Unequivocally. It is an entire nation out there that is responsible. …………………………………..

This is really unmistakable – Herzog is really implying that an “entire nation is responsible,” and the implication is that they are legitimate targets. However, he later denied that this is what he meant.

This rhetoric has a long history among Israeli politicians. In 2018, when Avigdor Lieberman was Defense Minister, he declared that “there are no innocent people in the Gaza Strip” because “everyone has a connection to Hamas.” This was in April 2018, when Israel was beginning to turkey-shoot unarmed Palestinian protesters in the Great March of Return. When a video filmed by Israeli snipers, where they celebrate their shooting of a motionless, unarmed Palestinian, surfaced on social media around that same time, Lieberman commented that they deserved a medal for their shots. I could just as well mention that Lieberman has advocateddecapitating “disloyal” Palestinian citizens with an axe and the drowning of Palestinian prisoners in the Dead Sea. Lieberman is now regarded as a Netanyahu critic who is considering joining the “unity government” so as to “join the war cabinet in order to bring about the fastest possible victory.”

You may say this is just rhetoric, but these words also lead to actions. Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant’s comments referred to Palestinians as “human animals” as Israel closed all the water taps to Gaza, making the already unlivable living conditions there a genocidal nightmare. The relationship between words to actions is obvious. ……. more https://truthout.org/articles/israeli-politician-says-children-of-gaza-have-brought-this-upon-themselves/?utm_source=Truthout&utm_campaign=431d0bc2ba-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_3_20_2023_13_41_COPY_05&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_bbb541a1db-431d0bc2ba-650192793&mc_cid=431d0bc2ba&mc_eid=73e1cd43d0 #Israel #Palestine

October 19, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

The Mainstream Press Keep Slamming Israel’s Hospital Bombing Story

CAITLIN JOHNSTONE, OCT 19, 2023  https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/the-mainstream-press-keep-slamming?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=138092278&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&utm_medium=email

A new report from the UK’s Channel 4 News adds to the surprising amount of opposition we’re seeing in the mainstream press to Israel’s narrative about the deadly explosion at the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza this past Tuesday.

The report, led by Channel 4 chief correspondent Alex Thomson, spotlights glaring plot holes in Israel’s claim that a failed rocket by Palestinian Islamic Jihad was responsible for the blast, and in the supposed audio clip Israel published which it claims is an intercepted conversation between two Hamas fighters saying Israel was not responsible. It also presents an argument that will be inconvenient for Israel apologists who’ve been claiming photos of the damage to the hospital rule out the possibility of an Israeli airstrike.

“So what of Israel’s explanation?” says Thomson. “Sensing a major problem they worked through the night to get their version out. Press conference first thing. Conclusion: an Islamic Jihad rocked caused it all.”

“They present what they say is two Hamas operatives talking about the attack,” Thomson reports. “Hamas call this an obvious fabrication. Two independent Arab journalists told us the same thing, because of the language, accent, dialect, syntax and tone. None of which is, they say, credible.”

“Equally, Israel claims the Islamic Jihad failed missile was fired from here: a cemetery very close to the hospital,” Thomson continues. “But look again at the video of the event — the trajectory of the missile doesn’t line up with that location. Too high. Too horizontal. Confusingly, the Israelis’ presentation also says the missile was fired from a location down in the southwest; it can’t be both.”

Thomson also reports that while the photos of the blast site do appear to rule out a ground-detonating Israeli munition, they’re entirely in keeping with other munitions used by Israel which could easily have taken such a toll on human life.

“This is what you see at the hospital today — small craters you’d expect to see from a mortar strike or artillery round, not a missile,” says Thomson. “Surrounding buildings have only superficial damage, not structural collapse. Some of the windows of an adjoining church remain intact. This makes a ground-detonating Israeli missile strike unlikely, but it doesn’t rule out an airburst munition, which could cause major loss of life, but would produce far less structural damage.”

Thomson also notes that “Israel has form when it comes to war propaganda”, citing its false denials of the IDF killings of British filmmaker James Miller and Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh.

On Twitter (or whatever we’re calling it now), Thomson’s remarks on the Israeli audio file were even more pointed.

“Several experts confirm Hamas’ view to Channel 4 News that the audio tape of ‘Hamas’ operatives talking about the missile malfunction is a fake,” tweeted Thomson. “They say the tone, syntax, accent and idiom are absurd.”

This is a still developing story with much still to be revealed, but this to me might be the most damning evidence against Israel yet. If Israel didn’t bomb that hospital, then why is it publishing fake audio clips of people posing as Hamas fighters agreeing with each other that Israel definitely didn’t bomb that hospital?

I mean, if people were saying I bombed a hospital, and I knew I didn’t, the last thing I’d do is publish an audio file of me pretending to be two guys talking about how Caitlin definitely didn’t bomb the hospital.

Picture a recording of me doing two blokey-sounding voices going,

“Hello my evil friend!”

“Hello!”

“Did you hear that Caitlin definitely did not bomb that hospital?”

“She didn’t?”

“No! It turns out it was we, the Evil Bad Guys!”

“We did it?”

“Yes, it was us!”

That would look pretty silly, right?

If Israel is making itself look this ridiculous, then it’s no wonder the western press are not lining up to help it cover up this particular misdeed. They’ve got to maintain at least some credibility if they’re going to keep manufacturing consent for other wars, after all.

October 19, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Seventy years on, Indigenous victims of UK’s nuclear tests in South Australia still await justice

Rudi Maxwell Oct 14 2023  https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/indigenous-news/2023/10/14/indigenous-victims-sa-nuke-tests/

Seventy years ago Yami Lester was playing outside with his friends at Wallatinna Station in remote South Australia when the ground shook beneath their little feet.

Then a strange black mist quietly rolled in.

On that day, October 15, 1953, the British government conducted its first nuclear test on the Australian mainland, at Emu Field, 170km from Wallatinna.

Mr Lester, a Yankunytjatjara man, was blinded by the fallout.

Before he died in 2017, he shared his memories of the explosion with ICAN, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear weapons.

“It wasn’t long after that a black smoke came through, a strange black smoke, it was shiny and oily,” he said.

“A few hours later we all got crook, every one of us.

“We were all vomiting; we had diarrhoea, skin rashes and sore eyes. I had really sore eyes, they were so sore I couldn’t open them for two or three weeks.

“Some of the older people, they died.”

Between 1952 and 1963, the British government, with the active participation of the Australian government, conducted 12 major nuclear test explosions and up to 600 ‘minor’ trials in remote South Australia and off the coast of Western Australia.

The ‘minor trials’ dispersed 24.4 kg of plutonium in 50,000 fragments, 101kg of beryllium and 8 tonnes of uranium.

Radioactive contamination from the tests was detected across much of the continent. For decades the authorities denied, ignored and covered up the consequences.

Legacy of trauma

Australia held a royal commission into the tests, which handed down its final report in 1985. In the UK, former service personnel are still fighting with the government for access to records.
Karina Lester says little was done to protect Aboriginal communities during nuclear tests, the ones at Emu Field were known as Totem 1 and Totem 2.

Little was done to protect the 16,000-or-so test-site workers, and even less to protect nearby Aboriginal communities, as Karina Lester, Yami’s daughter, explained.

“The country is still wearing the scars and the people are still wearing those scars as well,” Ms Lester told AAP.

“One of the things I’ve been concerned about as a second generation survivor is that there has been no clean-up at Emu Field in 70 years, so we still don’t know if it’s safe for us to hunt and gather and collect food on or to even visit.

“And so it’s a difficult time for the family but also a time for us to remember and remind our fellow Australians of exactly what happened 70 years ago at Totem 1 and Totem 2 at Emu Field.”

October 17, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

This Way for the Genocide, Ladies and Gentlemen

This is not a war. It is the obliteration of civilians trapped for 16 years in the world’s largest concentration camp. Gaza is being leveled, flattened, destroyed, reduced to rubble. Hundreds of thousands of its impoverished residents will be killed, wounded or left homeless without food, fuel, water and medical help. Nearly 600 children are already dead.

Israel, as it has in the past, will block the dissemination of independent reporting and images once some 360,000 soldiers launch a ground assault. It cut internet service in Gaza on Saturday. The brief glimpses of Israeli atrocities that make it out will be dismissed by Israeli leaders as anomalies or blamed on Hamas. 

By Chris Hedges / Original to ScheerPost, October 15, 2023  https://scheerpost.com/2023/10/15/this-way-for-the-genocide-ladies-and-gentlemen/

Washington and European governments are cheerleading Israel’s genocidal campaign in Gaza. The failure to intervene to halt the carnage threatens to ignite violence throughout the region.

I have been in urban warfare in El Salvador, Iraq, Gaza, Bosnia and Kosovo. Once you fight street by street, apartment block by apartment block, there is only one rule — kill anything that moves. The talk of safe zones, the reassurances of protecting civilians, the promises of “surgical” and “targeted” air strikes, the establishment of “safe” evacuation routes, the fatuous explanation that civilian dead were “caught in the crossfire,” the claim that the homes and apartment buildings bombed into rubble were the abode of terrorists or that errant Hamas rockets were responsible for the destruction of schools and medical clinics, is part of the rhetorical cover to carry out indiscriminate slaughter.

Gaza is such a small area — 25 miles in length and about 5 miles wide — and so densely populated that the only outcome of an Israeli ground and air assault is the mass death of those Israel’s Defense Minister Yoav Gallant calls “human animals” and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu calls “human beasts.” Israeli Knesset member Tally Gotliv suggested dropping “doomsday weapons” on Gaza, widely seen as a call for a nuclear strike. Israeli President Isaac Herzog on Friday dismissed calls to protect Palestinian civilians. “It is an entire nation out there that is responsible … this rhetoric about civilians not aware, not involved, it’s absolutely not true,” Herzog said. “They could’ve risen up, they could’ve fought against that evil regime that took over Gaza in a coup d’etat.” He added, “We will break their backbone.”

The demand by Israel that 1.1 million Palestinians — nearly half of Gaza’s population — evacuate northern Gaza, which will become a free fire zone, within 24 hours, ignores the fact that given the overcrowding and sealed borders there is no place for the displaced to go. The north includes Gaza City, the most densely populated part of the strip, with 750,000 residents. It also includes Gaza’s main hospital and the Jabalia and al-Shati refugee camps.

Israel, by employing its military machine against an occupied population that does not have mechanized units, an air force, navy, missiles, heavy artillery and command-and-control, not to mention a U.S. commitment to provide a $38 billion military aid package for Israel over the next decade, is not exercising “the right to defend itself.” This is not a war. It is the obliteration of civilians trapped for 16 years in the world’s largest concentration camp. Gaza is being leveled, flattened, destroyed, reduced to rubble. Hundreds of thousands of its impoverished residents will be killed, wounded or left homeless without food, fuel, water and medical help. Nearly 600 children are already dead.

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) has been forced to close 14 food distribution centers leaving half a million people without food relief. Gaza’s only power plant has run out of fuel. The United Nations says 12 of its staff have been killed by Israeli air strikes, 21 out of 22 UNRWA health facilities in Gaza have been damaged and hospitals lack basic medicines and supplies.

Israel, as it has in the past, will block the dissemination of independent reporting and images once some 360,000 soldiers launch a ground assault. It cut internet service in Gaza on Saturday. The brief glimpses of Israeli atrocities that make it out will be dismissed by Israeli leaders as anomalies or blamed on Hamas. 

The West refuses to intervene, as 2.3 million people, including 1 million children, are deprived of food, fuel, electricity and water, see their schools and hospitals bombed and are butchered and rendered homeless by one of the most advanced military machines on the planet.

The gruesome images of Israelis gunned down by Hamas is the currency of death. It trades carnage for carnage, a macabre dance that Israel initiated with the massacres and ethnic cleansing that allowed for the creation of the Jewish state, followed by decades of dispossession and violence meted out to the Palestinians. The Israeli army, before the current assault, had killed 7,779 Palestinians in Gaza since 2000 including 1,741 children and 572 women, according to the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem. This figure does not include Gazans who died due to drinking contaminated water or being denied access to medical treatment. Nor does it include the rising number of Gazan youth who, having lost all hope and struggling with deep depression, have committed suicide.

I spent seven years reporting on the conflict, four of them as the Middle East Bureau Chief of The New York Times. I stood over the bodies of Israeli victims of bus bombings in Jerusalem by Palestinian suicide-bombers. I saw rows of corpses, including children, in the corridors in Dar Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. I watched Israeli soldiers taunt small boys who in response threw rocks and were then callously shot in the Khan Younis refugee camp. I sheltered from bombs dropped by Israeli warplanes. I climbed over the rubble of demolished Palestinian homes and apartment blocks along the border with Egypt. I interviewed the bloodied and dazed survivors. I heard the soul crushing wails of mothers keening over the corpses of their children.

I arrived in Jerusalem in 1988. Israel was busy discrediting and marginalizing the secular, aristocratic Palestinian leadership of Faisel al-Husseini and driving Jordanian administrators from the occupied West Bank. This secular and moderate leadership was replaced by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and Yasser Arafat. But Arafat, very likely poisoned by Israel, and the PLO were also ruthlessly pushed aside by Israel. The PLO was replaced by Hamas, which Israel openly fostered as a counterweight to the PLO. 

The escalating savagery of Israel against the Palestinians is reflected in the escalating savagery of the Palestinians. The resistance groups are Israel’s doppelgängers. Israel believes that with the eradication of Hamas the Palestinians will become docile.  But history has shown that once one Palestinian resistance movement is destroyed, a more virulent and radical one takes its place.

The killers feed off each other. I saw this in the ethnic wars in Bosnia. When religion and nationalism are used to sanctify murder there are no rules. It is a battle between light and dark, good and evil, God and Satan. Rational discourse is banished. 

“The sleep of reason,” as Francisco Goya said, “brings forth monsters.” 

The Jewish extremists, fanatic Zionists and religious bigots in the current Israeli government need Hamas. Revenge is the psychological engine of war. Those targeted for slaughter are rendered inhuman. They are not worthy of empathy or justice. Pity and grief are felt exclusively for one’s own. Israel vows to eradicate a dehumanized mass that embodies absolute evil. The maimed and dead in Gaza, and the maimed and dead in Israeli towns and kibbutzim, are victims of the same dark lusts.  

“From violence only violence is born,” Primo Levi writes, “following a pendular action that, as time goes by, rather than dying down, becomes more frenzied.”

The Biden administration has promised unconditional Israeli support and weapons shipments. 

The USS Gerald R. Ford Carrier Strike Group has been deployed to the eastern Mediterranean Sea to “deter any actor” who might widen the conflict between Israel and Hamas. The carrier group includes the U.S. Navy aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford; its eight squadrons of attack and support aircraft; the Ticonderoga-class guided missile cruiser USS Normandy; and the Arleigh-Burke class guided missile destroyers USS Thomas Hudner, USS Ramage, USS Carney and USS Roosevelt, according to a Pentagon statement.

The U.S., as in the past, ignores the far greater death and destruction, as well as the illegal occupation, meted out by Israel to the Palestinians or the periodic military campaigns — this is the fifth major military assault by Israel on Gaza in 15 years — against civilians. 

Israel says it recovered 1,500 bodies of Hamas fighters after the incursion. This is a number greater than the 1,300 Israeli victims. Nearly all the dead Hamas fighters, I suspect, were young men born inside the Gaza concentration camp who had never seen the outside of the open-air prison until they burst through the security barriers erected by Israel. If Hamas fighters possessed Israel’s technological arsenal of death, they would be able to do their killing more efficiently. But they do not. Their tactics are cruder versions of those Israel has used against them for decades. 

I know this disease, the exaltation of race, religion and nation, the deification of the warrior, the martyr and violence, the celebration of victimhood. Holy warriors believe they alone possess virtue and courage, while their enemy is perfidious, cowardly and evil. They believe they alone have the right to revenge. Pain for pain. Blood for blood. Horror for horror. There is a fearsome symmetry to the madness, the abandonment of what it means to be humane and just. 

T.E. Lawrence calls this cycle of violence “the rings of sorrow.”

Once these fires are lit they can easily become a conflagration.

Israeli tanks and soldiers, to thwart an attack by Hezbollah in support of the Palestinians, have been deployed to the border with Lebanon. The Israeli forces killed fighters from Hezbollah, as well as a Reuters journalist, which saw Hezbollah fire a salvo of rockets in retaliation. Israel’s National Security Minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir announced he would distribute 10,000 assault rifles to Israeli settlers, who have carried out murderous rampages in Palestinian villages in the West Bank. Israel has killed at least 51 Palestinians in the occupied West Bank since Hamas launched its attack on October 7.

Psychologist Rollo May writes:

At the outset of every war…we hastily transform our enemy into the image of the daimonic; and then, since it is the devil we are fighting, we can shift onto a war footing without asking ourselves all the troublesome and spiritual questions that the war arouses. We no longer have to face the realization that those we are killing are persons like ourselves.

The killing and torture, the more they endure, contaminate the perpetrators and the society that condones their actions. They sever the professional inquisitors and killers from the capacity to feel. They feed the death instinct. They expand the moral injury of war. 

Israel taught the Palestinians to communicate in the primitive howl of hatred, war, death and annihilation. But it is not Israel’s assault on Gaza I fear most. It is the complicity of an international community that licenses Israel’s genocidal slaughter and accelerates a cycle of violence it may not be able to control. #Israel #Palestine

October 17, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

“Collateral damage” is unintentional, but Israel’s bombing of Gaza kids IS INTENTIONAL.

2 Bombing Kids And Blaming It On Hamas

CAITLIN JOHNSTONE, OCT 16, 2023

There’s no “collateral damage” in Gaza. Collateral damage is when you unintentionally kill civilians. You can’t drop military explosives on places you know are densely packed with children and then call their deaths unintentional. It’s like calling the death and destruction caused by Hiroshima and Nagasaki unintentional.

The “human shields” narrative is just Israel bombing civilians and blaming it on someone else. That’s all it’s ever been.

The “human shields” argument is like if London had responded to an IRA attack by dropping thousands of bombs on Belfast, killing thousands of Irish civilians and hundreds of children, and justifying its bombing campaign by calling it an unfortunate but necessary measure to take out the IRA’s Belfast Brigade because they’re located in the same places as civilians.

It’s like if the western political/media class defended and supported the carpet bombing of Belfast, saying “All those thousands of deaths are the fault of the IRA, because they’re in Belfast where the civilians are. England has a right to defend itself, after all.”

It’s like if Belfast was walled in with nowhere for civilians to escape to, and London carpet bombed it targeting schools, churches and hospitals, and the western press framed this relentless assault on civilian buildings as “the UK-IRA war” in which London is exclusively bombing “IRA targets in Belfast”.

It’s like if the British spent a week dropping military explosives on locations it knew were packed with Irish children, and anyone who criticized this was accused of anti-Britishism and blood libel.

And to be clear this is not something I’d put past the British actually doing during the Troubles… if the Irish were Muslim and their skin was a little darker……………………….

Step 1: Abuse and kill Muslims

Step 2: Wait for Muslims to respond to those abuses with violence

Step 3: Cite that violence as justification for more killing and abuse to fight “radical Islamic terrorism”.

Works for the US empire’s bogus “war on terror”, and it works for Israel………………………………………..

Israel apologist translation guide:

“You’re an anti-semite” = “I cannot defend Israel’s actions using facts and logic.”

“You hate Jews” = “I cannot defend Israel’s actions using facts and logic.”

“You want Jews to die” = “I cannot defend Israel’s actions using facts and logic.”

“You love Hamas” = “I cannot defend Israel’s actions using facts and logic.”

“You side with the terrorists” = “I cannot defend Israel’s actions using facts and logic.”

Not that it really matters but for the record I personally have a great love for Jews and Jewish culture. Always have, since I was a kid. Most of my anti-war heroes are Jewish, and Jewish artists and thinkers have played a tremendous role in shaping my worldview. My criticisms are directed solely at the apartheid state which cannot exist in the way it exists without nonstop violence and war, which is falsely framed by the western empire as the monolithic source and stronghold of all things Jewish.

Conflating the abuses of that state with Jewishness and Judaism is profoundly anti-semitic. Jews are not anything remotely close to a monolith on the issue of Israel and Zionism. Most of what I’ve learned about Israel over the years I’ve learned from the brilliant Jewish people I follow who oppose it.  https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/bombing-kids-and-blaming-it-on-hamas?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=137999931&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&utm_medium=emailit. #Israel #Palestine

October 17, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Referendum failure only increases ICAN’s determination for justice for the nuclear-affected Aboriginal people of Australia.

Jemila Rushton., Campaigner, on behalf of all of us at ICAN Australia, 16 Oct 23

On this morning after the failed Voice referendum, let us cement our commitment to work for First Nations justice on this stolen land of Australia.

Let us remember that 70 years ago today, the first nuclear bomb on the mainland of this continent was detonated, on Aboriginal land, without consent, adequate warning or regard for the consequences that began unfolding from that day onwards.

The ‘Black Mist and the Ban’ statement marks this sombre anniversary with a direct call to action from survivors and their supporters in civil society. Read it here. 

The legacy of radioactive contamination has been borne disproportionately by First Nations bodies and land, in Australia, across the Pacific and beyond.

This fact is recognised by the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which also compels states parties to assist victims of nuclear weapons use and testing, remediate impacted environments, and cooperate internationally to fulfil these goals.

We are delighted to launch today this statement endorsed by 132 civil society organisations, representing millions of Australians. They are health, humanitarian, youth, First Nations, union, environmental, peace, legal and faith-based organisations. They call for:

“Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to sign the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons without delay and initiate the process of Australia ratifying it and adhering to its obligations, including to seek universalisation and assist nuclear victims and impacted environments.”

From today until 27 October, the 70th anniversary of the second nuclear test at Emu Field, SA, please take a moment to share this statement. Everyone can help to highlight this history, remember the victims and survivors, and honour the courage of impacted communities fighting for justice and nuclear abolition.

The statement has been signed by more than 130 civil society organisations, including the Australian Red Cross, Public Health Association of Australia, Health Services Union, Oxfam and Catholic Religious Australia, and outlines the escalating threat of nuclear weapons use, and calls on Australia to demonstrate its commitment to nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament by joining the TPNW.

A few days ago we co-hosted a webinar to mark this significant anniversary with second generation nuclear test survivor and Yankunytjatjara-Anangu woman Karina Lester, who said “these are stories of survival, and courage, and just hard work. It’s not an easy story to talk about. Tears in the eyes, lump in the throat, these stories are difficult, but these stories are important.”

June Lennon, Yankunytjatjara, Antikarinya and Pitjantjatjara woman and nuclear test survivor said “Nobody thought about the effects those bombs would have on our family. But I can tell you that our family is not a well family. We’ve had cancers, miscarriages, birth deformities… We were not considered to be people, human, to have the right to know what was happening in their own country.”

We also heard about the legacy of nuclear testing in the Pacific from Bedi Racule of the Pacific Conference of Churches, the impact on British nuclear veterans from Alan Owen, of LABRAS, research on the Emu Field testing program from author Elizabeth Tynan and the wise words of ICAN Ambassador Scott Ludlam

On this day and every day, we stand firm in our commitment to creating a future without nuclear weapons and seeking justice for all survivors

October 15, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

An Israeli lawmaker is urging her government to use ‘everything in its arsenal,’ including ‘doomsday’ weapons, against Hamas

Kwan Wei Kevin Tan , Oct 11, 2023

• An Israeli lawmaker says Israel should use nuclear weapons against Hamas.
• Revital “Tally” Gotliv wrote on X that she thinks it is time to fire “powerful missiles without limit.”
• Benjamin Netanyahu previously said Hamas “will pay a price it has never known before” for its attacks.

An Israeli lawmaker has urged her government to consider using nuclear weapons in their war against Hamas.

“Jericho missile! Jericho missile! A strategic alert, before we consider introducing our forces. A doomsday weapon!” Revital “Tally” Gotliv, a member of the Israeli parliament, wrote in a post on X on Monday. “This is my opinion. May God preserve all our strength.” 

Gotliv’s post — which had been viewed over 2.1 million times at press time — referenced Israel’s Jericho ballistic missiles. Israel’s government has neither confirmed nor denied the existence of its nuclear arsenal.

The lawmaker said in a subsequent post on Tuesday that Israel needs to be merciless when dealing with the Palestinian militant group.

“Only an explosion that shakes the Middle East will restore this country’s dignity, strength, and security! It’s time to kiss doomsday,” Gotliv wrote in her post on X. 

“Shooting powerful missiles without limit. Not flattening a neighborhood. Crushing and flattening Gaza,” she continued. “Otherwise, we would have done nothing. Not with passwords, with penetrating bombs. Without mercy! Without mercy!”

Gotliv’s follow-up post received over 250,000 views as of press time. The post was, at press time, tagged with a disclaimer from X, stating that its visibility had been limited because it “may violate X’s rules against Violent Speech.” ……………………………

Netanyahu said on Saturday that Hamas “will pay a price it has never known before” for its attacks. And yesterday, the Israel Defense Forces launched over 200 airstrikes on Gaza.  more https://www.businessinsider.com/israeli-lawmaker-urged-government-to-use-nuclear-weapons-against-hamas-2023-10?r=US&IR=T&fbclid=IwAR23dypzT9Ijw99QoAJpr2-WwBSNj-zfJzbivYSy4UnyF2tfwnVR1XX_hpw #Israel #nuclear #antinuclear #NuclearFree #NoNukes #NuclearPlants

October 15, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Fukushima Up Close, 13 Years Later

After thirteen years, the declaration of a State of Emergency for Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant still cannot be lifted because of many unknowns, as well as ubiquitous deadly radiation levels.

The spent fuel rods at the Fukushima nuclear reactor site are stored in pools of water on the top floor of compromised reactor buildings 100 feet above ground level………  “Continual storage in spent fuel pools is the most unsafe thing you could do.”

Fukushima Daichi Nuclear Power Plant will remain a high-risk explosive scenario for decades ahead. 

CounterPunch BY ROBERT HUNZIKER 13 Oct 23

The world is turning to nuclear power as a solution to global warming, but it is postulated herein that it is a huge mistake that endangers society. One nuclear meltdown causes as much damage over the long-term as a major war. Moreover, according to Dr. Paul Dorfman, chair of the Nuclear Consulting Group, former secretary to the UK Scientific Advisory Committee on Internal Radiation: “It’s important to understand that nuclear is very likely to be a significant climate casualty.”

Also, of interest: France’s Global Warming Predicament discusses nuclear energy’s vulnerability in a global warming world.

Beyond Nuclear International recently published an article about the status of Fukushima as well as an exposé of how the nuclear industry gets away with responsibility for radiation-caused (1) deaths (2) chronic conditions like cancer (3) genetic deformities: A Strategy of Concealment, September 24, 2023, by Kolin Kobayashi, who is a Tokyo-born France-based anti-nuclear activist journalist also serving as president of Echo-Exchange. Kobayashi’s work was posted by CounterPunch under the title: How Agencies That Promote Nuclear Power Are Quietly Managing Its Disaster Narrative.

The following synopsis, including editorial license that adds important death details which defy the nuclear industry’s bogus claims about nuclear safety, opens closed pathways to what’s really going on.

After thirteen years, the declaration of a State of Emergency for Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant still cannot be lifted because of many unknowns, as well as ubiquitous deadly radiation levels. The destroyed reactors are tinderboxes of highly radioactive spent fuel rods that contain more cesium-137 than eighty-five (85) Chernobyls. Cesium-137 in or near a human body erupts into a series of maladies, one after another in short order, depending upon level of exposure: (1) nausea (2) vomiting (3) diarrhea (4) bleeding (5) coma leading to death.

The spent fuel rods at the Fukushima nuclear reactor site are stored in pools of water on the top floor of compromised reactor buildings 100 feet above ground level, except for Unit 3 which completed removal of its spent fuel rods in 2019, an extremely slow, laborious process that’s highly dangerous.

Stored spent fuel rods in open pools of water are the epitome of high-risk. “If the 440 tonne vessel collapses, it could hit the storage pool next to it. If this pool is damaged, even partially, another major disaster could occur.” (Kobayashi) In that regard, there’s significant risk of collapse in the event of a strong earthquake. And Japan is one of the most earthquake prone countries in the world. “The city (Tokyo) government’s experts reckon there is a 70% chance of a magnitude 7, or higher, quake hitting the capital within the next 30 years.” (Source: Japan is Preparing for a Massive Earthquake, The Economist, August 31, 2023)

If exposed to open air, spent fuel rods erupt into a sizzling zirconium fire followed by massive radiation bursts of the most toxic material on the planet. It can upend an entire countryside and force evacuation of major cities. According to the widely recognized nuclear expert Paul Blanch: “Continual storage in spent fuel pools is the most unsafe thing you could do.” Paul Blanch, registered professional engineer, US Navy Reactor Operator & Instructor with 55 years of experience with nuclear engineering and regulatory agencies, is widely recognized as one of America’s leading experts on nuclear power.

Fukushima Daichi Nuclear Power Plant will remain a high-risk explosive scenario for decades ahead. After all, a program for future decommissioning is unclear and overall radiation guesstimates are formidable. All the structures where decommissioning will take place are highly radioactive and as such nearly impossible for the dangers to worker exposure.

TEPCO (Tokyo Electric Power Company) does not yet know the true extent of damage nor the complete dispersion of corium (molten magma from melted nuclear fuel rods in the core of the reactors). ……………………………………………………………………………..

Radiation Risks to Society

According to the World Nuclear Association, there were no fatalities due to radiation exposure at Fukushima. And as recently as 2021, Forbes magazine reported No one Died From Radiation At Fukushima: IAEA Boss. It is believed this is a lie and part of a massive coverup.

a lie and part of a massive coverup.

According to Green Cross (founded in 1993 by Mikhail Gorbachev, who repeatedly spoke out about interrelated threats humanity and our Earth confront from nuclear arms, chemical weapons, unsustainable development, and the human-induced decimation of the planet’s ecology): “Approximately 32 million people in Japan are affected by the radioactive fallout from the nuclear disaster in Fukushima… This includes people who were exposed to radiation and other stress factors resulting from the accident and who are consequently at potential risk from both long and short-term consequences… As with the Chernobyl nuclear accident, which impacted 10 million people, Japan is expected to see increased cancer risk and neuropsychological long-term health consequences.”

With nuclear radiation, the damage to humans shows up years later as cancer and/or deformity of newborns second/third generation. For example, only recently, the truth has come to surface about Chernobyl-related deaths, child deformities, and cancer 30+ years after the event. ………………………………………………………………

According to an article in USA Today d/d February 24, 2022, What Happened at Chernobyl? What to Know About Nuclear Disaster: “At least 28 people were killed by the disaster, but thousands more have died from cancer as a result of radiation that spread after the explosion and fire. The effects of radiation on the environment and humans is still being studied.”

According to Chernobyl Children International, 6,000 newborns are born every year in Ukraine with congenital heart defects called “Chernobyl Heart.”

…………………………………. The Fukushima Report was prepared under the direction of Prof. Jonathan M. Samet, Director of the Institute for Global Health at the University of Southern California (USC), as a Green Cross initiative. Green Cross International: GCI is an independent non-profit and nongovernmental organization founded in 1993 by Nobel Peace Laureate Mikhail Gorbachev.

Over time, Japan is expected to see increased cancer risks and neuropsychological long-term health consequences. “The lives of approximately 42 million people have been permanently affected by radioactive contamination caused by the accidents in the Chernobyl and Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plants. Continued exposure to low-level radiation, entering the human body on a daily basis through food intake, is of particular consequence,”

Fukushima Deaths

The cocksure pro-nuclear crowd has trumpeted Fukushima as an example of Mother Nature taking lives because of an earthquake and tsunami; whereas the power plant accident proves nuclear power can withstand the worst without unnecessary death and illness. According to nuclear industry reports, all the deaths (16,000) were the fault of Mother Nature, not radiation.

But people in the streets and on the ground in Japan tell a different story about the risks of radiation. They talk about illnesses and death.  TEPCO itself has reported few radiation illnesses and no radiation-caused deaths but what if it’s not their responsibility in the first instance, as layers of contractors and subcontractors employ workers to cleanup the toxic mess. If “subcontractor workers die” from radiation exposure, so what? It’s not TEPCO’s responsibility to report worker deaths of subcontractors, and the subcontractors are not motivated to report deaths, which are not reported.

According to credible sources in Japan, death is in the air, to wit: “The ashes of half a dozen unidentified laborers ended up at a Buddhist temple in this town just north of the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant. Some of the dead men had no papers, others left no emergency contacts. Their names could not be confirmed, and no family members had been tracked down to claim their remains. They were simply labeled ‘decontamination troops’ — unknown soldiers in Japan’s massive cleanup campaign to make Fukushima livable again five years after radiation poisoned the fertile countryside… Hideaki Kinoshita, a Buddhist monk… keeps the unidentified laborers’ ashes at his temple, in wooden boxes and wrapped in white cloth.” (Source: Mari Yamaguchi, Fukushima ‘Decontamination Troops’ Often Exploited, Shunned, AP & ABC News, Minamisoma, Japan, Mar 10, 2016)

……………………………………………………………………………………….Alas, two hundred U.S. sailors of the USS Ronald Reagan filed a lawsuit against TEPCO, claiming that they experienced leukemia, ulcers, gall bladder removals, brain cancer, brain tumors, testicular cancer, dysfunctional uterine bleeding, thyroid illness, stomach ailments and other complaints extremely unusual in such young adults. One sailor died from radiation complications. Among the plaintiffs was a sailor who was pregnant during the mission. Her baby was born with multiple genetic mutations.

The sailors that filed the suit participated in “Operation Tomodachi,” providing humanitarian relief after the March 11th, 2011 Fukushima disaster based upon assurances that radiation levels were okay. But that was a lie.

Ultimately, and unsurprisingly, the 9^th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the sailors’ appeal.

In summation, the final word is left to Kolin Kobaryashi: “The international nuclear lobby, which represents only a minority, has the influence and money to dominate the world’s population with immense power and has now united the world’s minority nuclear community into one big galaxy.

Many of the citizens who have experienced the world’s three most serious civil nuclear accidents have clearly realized that nuclear energy is too dangerous. These citizens are so divided and conflicted that they feel like a helpless minority.”…………………….

“Five former Japanese prime ministers issued declarations that Japan should break with nuclear power generation on March 11, the 10th anniversary of the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami that triggered a nuclear disaster in Fukushima Prefecture  (Source: Ex-Prime Ministers Koizumi and Kan Demand EU Choose Zero Nuclear Power Path, The Japan Times, Jan. 27, 2022)………………………………………..more https://www.counterpunch.org/2023/10/13/fukushima-up-close-13-years-later/

October 15, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

France uses teargas on banned pro-Palestinian rally

By Layli Foroudi and Michel Rose, October 13, 20233

PARIS, Oct 12 (Reuters) – French police used teargas and water cannon to break up a banned rally in support of the Palestinian people in Paris on Thursday, as President Emmanuel Macron urged the French to remain united and refrain from bringing the Israel-Hamas conflict home.

Macron’s interior minister had earlier banned pro-Palestinian protests, saying they were “likely to generate disturbances to public order”.

France is home to Europe’s largest Muslim and Jewish communities. The Middle East conflict has often stoked domestic tensions in the past.

“This event is an earthquake for Israel, the Middle East and beyond,” Macron said in a solemn TV address. “Let’s not pursue at home ideological adventures by imitating or projecting.”

“Let’s not add, through illusions or calculations, domestic divides to international divides,” he said. “The shield of unity will protect us from hatred and excesses.”

Macron said the government had acted to boost police protection of Jewish sites, including schools and synagogues, and that there could be no justification for atrocities……………..

BANNED RALLY

Despite the ban, several hundred pro-Palestinian demonstrators gathered in central Paris in separate groups that police forces sought to keep from merging……….

“We live in a country of civil law, a country where we have the right to take a stand and to demonstrate. (It is unfair) to forbid for one side and to authorise for the other,” said Charlotte Vautier, 29, an employee at a non-profit who took part in the rally…………….

Two pro-Palestinian demonstrations in Paris had already been banned on Thursday for fear of outbursts when interior minister Gerald Darmanin told prefects to ban all pro-Palestinian demonstrations across the country…………more https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/france-bans-pro-palestinian-protests-citing-risk-disturbances-public-order-2023-10-12/

October 15, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

The US Is Just As Culpable As Israel For The Atrocities Committed In Gaza

The primary job of Israel apologists in the coming days will be producing and circulating narratives explaining why this self-evidently terrible thing is actually perfectly fine and acceptable.

And top-down commands are being issued within the US government to support this massacre unconditionally. 

So be perfectly clear, the US government is fully behind this massacre, and is just as culpable for everything that happens in Gaza as the Israeli government.

These abuses are being perpetrated using US weapons, US funding and US consent.

Washington could end this mass atrocity with a word, and instead they’re fully aligning themselves behind it. Israel’s crimes in Gaza are not meaningfully separate from the crimes of the US war machine.

Caitlin’s newsletter CAITLIN JOHNSTONE, , OCT 14, 2023

The Israeli government dropped thousands of leaflets on Gaza telling everyone who lives in the northern part of the strip that they have 24 hours to evacuate to the southern part, and then bombed the people who were trying to evacuate.

United Nations spokesman Stephane Dujarric denounced the evacuation order, saying the UN “considers it impossible for such a movement to take place without devastating humanitarian consequences.” Many Palestinians have said they’re going to stay where they are because they have nowhere safe to go, despite being told by Israel they must leave if they want to “save their lives”.

We’re about to see the death and destruction get much, much worse in Gaza, and it’s already very, very bad. As of this writing the official death toll from Israeli airstrikes in Gaza is speeding past 1,900, a number which includes 614 children. The primary job of Israel apologists in the coming days will be producing and circulating narratives explaining why this self-evidently terrible thing is actually perfectly fine and acceptable.

It’s so incredibly obvious what we’re looking at here. The only thing putting a wobble on people’s perception is the immense amount of propaganda distortion the media is churning out on this issue, plus the fact that the demographics look a bit different from what history has conditioned people to watch out for. If there were two million Jewish people trapped by Christians in a giant concentration camp and placed under total siege, being told that half of them had 24 hours to relocate into the other half or be killed, nobody would have any confusion about what they were witnessing.

And top-down commands are being issued within the US government to support this massacre unconditionally. 

The Huffington Post reports that the State Department has been circulating internal emails telling staff to avoid calls for peace, instructing them to refrain from using phrases like “de-escalation/ceasefire,” “end to violence/bloodshed” and “restoring calm.”

Asked about progressive congressional members calling for a ceasefire, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said, “we believe they are wrong, we believe they’re repugnant, and we believe they’re disgraceful.”

On the question of whether there are any potential Israeli actions that the White House would not tolerate, US national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters “I’m not here to draw red lines or issue warnings or give lectures to anybody.”

So be perfectly clear, the US government is fully behind this massacre, and is just as culpable for everything that happens in Gaza as the Israeli government. These abuses are being perpetrated using US weapons, US funding and US consent. Washington could end this mass atrocity with a word, and instead they’re fully aligning themselves behind it. Israel’s crimes in Gaza are not meaningfully separate from the crimes of the US war machine.

This is just a continuation and extension of the violence and bloodshed the US government has been inflicting around the world for generations. There’s a clip of George W Bush going around from a California event on Tuesday in which, for some bizarre, unfathomable reason, the former president was asked to provide his opinion on what Israel should do in response to the Hamas attack on October 7.

Bush said pretty much what you’d expect him to say: “You’re dealing with cold-blooded killers,” “negotiating with killers is not an option,” “one side is guilty.” The same book he’s been reciting from since September 11, 2001. What I find much more interesting is, why is anyone asking the absolute worst person you could possibly ask about what should be done in response to such an attack………………………………..

 the United States never learned any moral lessons from its warmongering after 9/11 — if it had, George W Bush would be sitting in a prison cell, and the US wouldn’t be backing a mass atrocity in Gaza………. https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/the-us-is-just-as-culpable-as-israel?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=137943417&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&utm_medium=email #Israel

October 15, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment