On Exonerating Israel, And Demonising Iran
Now that the US and Israel have stopped bombing Iran, Israel can re-focus on its core business of starving children in Gaza, and killing their parents, medical staff, journalists and anyone else who strays across their line of fire.
Since Israel shut the UN out of aid delivery, it has given the job of handing out a trickle of food to a private US entity called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, or GHF. The GHF aid sites have functioned as effective killing grounds. Reportedly, top UNRWA officials have described the GHF aid centres as a 'death trap.'
Parents desperate for food to feed their starving children have been drawn to these GHF sites, where they continue to be killed in large numbers by the IDF. Since the GHF set up shop on May 27th, over 400 Palestinians have reportedly been killed at these aid sites. Here's Tuesday's death toll:
Israeli forces and drones have killed at least 86 Palestinians since dawn, including 56 near aid distribution centres, in the latest attacks on desperate people seeking aid in the besieged Gaza Strip, according to medical sources in hospitals. In Rafah alone, in the south of the enclave, 27 aid seekers were gunned down by the Israeli military on Tuesday.
This use of food to lure desperately hungry people into locations where they can be killed in large numbers is functioning as a cost effective feature of Israel's machinery of genocide.
At least 92 people have been killed in Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip as desperate Palestinians continue to seek food amid an ongoing hunger crisis...Starving Palestinians have gathered in the area daily to receive packages from the United States- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which the United Nations has condemned for its 'weaponisation' of aid.
And again :
At least 82 Palestinians were killed across Gaza by the Israeli army on Friday, sources said, including several in an attack where jets bombed a house west of Deir el-Balah.
At least 37 people were killed in central Gaza, including 23 who were seeking aid, according to hospital sources. In Gaza City, another 23 people lost their lives, while 22 were killed in southern Gaza – 11 of whom were also aid seekers.
Not only food distribution points are being used to target groups of Palestinians. Reportedly, so are the electricity charging points, essential if the poor quality food being distributed is to be cooked. None of this butchery got much media coverage last week beyond Al Jazeera, because world attention was so distracted by the Israel/Iran conflict.
Gangster politics
We've seen this movie before. The boss sends his chief goon in to take down some sap who's been getting too big for his britches. The goon, gets so into it that the boss has to swear at him to stop. Do they finish the sap off, or do they leave him to linger on, as a stark warning about the real power players are in the Middle East?
That last bit seems to be the reasoning behind the current 'ceasefire.' To be clear: this conflict was never really about a a supposed threat posed by Iran's nuclear programme. No more than the 2003 invasion of Iraq was ever about finding those non-existent weapons of mass destruction. In both cases, the war was waged to remove rivals, and to establish just which neo-colonial power rules the roost in the region.
In sorting out truth from fiction in what is largely an exercise of naked power, the tut-tutting by the US and Israel about the need to keep the region safe from nuclear weapons is pretty shameless. Both countries have long opposed UN moves to turn the Middle East into a nuclear weapons free zone.
The US and Israel are both nuclear armed to the teeth. Israel is estimated to possess some 90 nuclear warheads, and the US is the only military power ever to use its nuclear weapons on other human beings. It did so twice. So...when it comes to issuing warnings about nuclear weapons, neither Israel nor the US are reliable narrators.
However, they have been extremely successful at setting the boundaries of this debate :
Myth One: Iran was building nuclear weapons and had to be stopped. Not true. Instead, it is entirely legal for member states of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons Treaty (NPT) to pursue the peaceful enrichment of uranium. (Iran is a signatory of the NPT, Israel is not.)
In their latest report, IAEA inspectors found that Iran had not enriched its U-235 above 60 %. and there had been no indication of nuclear weaponisation, for which enrichment to 90% would be required. In March, US intelligence chief Tulsi Gabbard testified to Congress that US intelligence sources had indicated Iran was not engaged in building a nuclear weapon.
In other words, Iran's non-existent nuclear weapons capability posed no 'imminent threat' to anyone – which is the necessary pre-condition needed under international law in order to justify the attacks made on its territory by Israel and the US.
New Zealand for all of its loud claims to be an honest broker that supports the norms of international law has chosen not to defend international law in this instance. Russia's actions in Ukraine? Terrible, we said, right from the outset. But Team Israel's actions in Iran? Different story. According to acting PM David Seymour in his best impersonation of a moral vacuum, we don't have enough information ( about what?) and besides, no one cares what we think anyway. Truly, a leader for our time.
Channelling Diplomacy
There's more. Through diplomatic channels, Iran had repeatedly signalled its willingness to forego nuclear weaponry in return for trade sanctions being lifted, and for gaining access to Western markets. A deal to that end was signed between the Obama administration and Iran in 2015.
In that deal, Iran agreed not to commission its Arak nuclear reactor, significantly reduced its enrichment programme and submitted to regular IAEA inspections to ensure its compliance. Even though the US never followed through on its side of the bargain, Iran also suspended its enrichment programme for two more years in the hope that the Biden administration might honour the US commitments. Biden didn't.
Even after this track record of treachery by the US, Iran was still willing this year to negotiate an acceptable level of nuclear enrichment with the West. It was still in the middle of those talks – with more talks scheduled in Oman on June 22nd – when Benjamin Netanyahu started bombing Iran. Here's how the former head of the IAEA Mohamed ElBaradei, has summed up the situation :
'For Israel to attack #Iran including its nuclear facilities (prohibited by international law) and for #Trump to ask Iran for 'total surrender' and forego a treaty right (uranium enrichment) in a clear act of national humiliation, on suspicion that it is developing nuclear weapons (possessed by both #Israel and #US), suspicion that does not constitute an 'imminent threat' as confirmed by all western intelligence agencies and was dealt with through negotiations in #JCPOA agreement of 2015 which the US withdrew from in 2018. To rely on force and not negotiations is a sure way to destroy the #NPT and the nuclear non-proliferation regime (imperfect as it is) and sends a clear message to many countries that their 'ultimate security' is to develop nuclear weapons !!!'
Footnote: If Iran has shifted enrichment tools out of its official sites, it may soon (or already) have enough material to construct a 'dirty bomb.'
Myth Two: Iran funds terrorism throughout the Middle East. To be sure, Iran has lent support in recent years to both Hamas in Gaza, and to Hezbollah n Lebanon. In response to the active Saudi/UAE involvement in the civil war in Yemen – which included Saudi blockades of food and essential medical supplies during an epidemic - Iran has also lent a limited amount of support to the Houthis.
Commonly, the Houthis get described by Western media as 'rebels' and Iranian 'proxies' – even though they control some 70-% of Yemen, provide the nearest thing to an effective central government, and make their own foreign policy decisions (notably in support of the people of Gaza) regardless of what Tehran advises them to do. Evidently, only the bad guys have proxies. We have alliances.
Look at the map of the Middle East. Iran has few friends (Qatar, Iraq, Lebanon at best) and many, many far more powerful enemies – Israel, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Syria, Egypt, Turkey, and all of North Africa. When it comes to funding 'terrorism' abroad, Iran's exported terrorism is largely limited to its murderous attacks upon its own Iranian dissidents.
To everyone else, Iran is not the main terrorist problem. Over the past decade or more, the terrorism threat in cities across Europe has come from either right wing hate groups, or from Islamic State and other Sunni extremist groups. It has not come from the Shia clerics in Iran.
No doubt, Iran is ruled by a stupidly brutal, religiously bigoted regime that executes its dissidents. But then, that description also fits Saudi Arabia just as neatly. Yet no-one is bombing Riyadh in order to weaken or eliminate the House of Saud.
Footnote : Which country repeatedly carries most of the acts of terrorism committed across the Middle East? That would be Israel, by a long shot. Israel has not only invaded and continues to illegally occupy territory that belongs to its neighbours. According to this Washington Post count in February, over 23,000 US citizens currently serve in the IDF, in aid of Israel's military expansionism.
On a regular basis across the Middle East, Israel kills foreign political and religious leaders, journalists, aid workers, medical staff, and scientists. Assassination has become a common tool of Israeli foreign policy. There is no equivalent elsewhere in the Middle East to Israel's scale of state-sponsored terrorism.
The moral decline involved has been tragic to witness, given the WWII circumstances that gave birth to the state of Israel. Yet by choosing to fixate solely on their own needs and interests - the hostages! – the citizens of Israel seem to be wilfully blind to the daily round of crimes against humanity that are being committed in their name, by the Netanyahu government.
Once seen as a victim, the state of Israel now acts more like a psychotic, impervious to the suffering it is causing to others. Apart from a few notable exceptions like Ireland, Spain and South Africa, the West prefers to look the other way. For its part, New Zealand pretends not to see what is happening in Gaza.
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Why Asia-Pacific Should Be Rooting For Iran
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One would have to say that the project, pursued by successive Presidents, both Democrat and Republican, has been a great success – if you discount the fact that a couple of million human beings, most of them civilians, many of them women and children, nearly all of them innocents, were slaughtered, starved to death or otherwise disposed of. With the exception of Iran, those countries have endured chaos and civil strife for long painful years. A triumph of American bomb-based statecraft. Now – with Muammar Gaddafi raped and murdered ('We came, we saw, he died', Hillary Clinton chuckled on camera the same day), Saddam Hussein hanged, Hezbollah decapitated, Assad in Moscow, the genocide in full swing in Palestine – the US and Israel were finally able to turn their guns – or, rather, bombs – on the great prize: Iran. Iran's missiles have checked U.S.-Israel for the time being Things did not go to plan. 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13 hours ago
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Why most Pacific governments stand with Israel
A supporter of Israel holds an Israeli flag in front of the Israeli Embassy in Washington, DC, on 8 October. Photo: JULIA NIKHINSON / AFP Amid uncertainty in the Middle East, one thing remains clear: most Pacific governments continue to align themselves with Israel. Steven Ratuva, distinguished professor of Pacific Studies at Canterbury University, told RNZ that island leaders are likely to try and keep their distance, but only officially speaking. "They'd probably feel safer that way, rather than publicly taking sides. But I think quite a few of them would probably be siding with Israel." With Iran and Israel trading blows last week, Ratuva said that is translating into deeper divisions along religious and political lines in Pacific nations. "People may not want to admit it, but it's manifesting itself in different ways." Photo: 123RF The United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution on 13 June calling for "an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire in the war in Gaza", passing with 142 votes, or a 73 percent majority. Among the 12 nations that voted against the resolution , alongside Israel and the United States, were Fiji, Micronesia, Nauru, Palau, Papua New Guinea and Tuvalu. Among the regional community, only Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands voted for the resolution, while others abstained or were absent. Last week, Fijian Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka, in an interview with The Australian , defended Israel's actions in Iran as an act of survival. "They cannot survive if there is a big threat capability within range of Israel. Whatever [Israel] are doing now can be seen as pre-emptive, knocking it out before it's fired on you." 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This sparked outrage from civil society leaders throughout the region, including the head of the Pacific Conference of Churches, Reverend James Bhagwan. "This use of Pacific airspace and territory for military strikes violates the spirit of the Treaty of Rarotonga, our region's declaration for being a nuclear, free peace committed zone." "Our region has a memory of nuclear testing, occupation and trauma... we don't forget that when we talk about these issues." Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Photo: GPO / AFP Bhagwan told RNZ that there is no popular support for Israel's most recent actions in the Pacific. "This is because we have international law... this includes, of course, the US strikes on Iran and perhaps, also, Israel's actions in Gaza." "It is not about religion, it is about people." 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Scoop
13 hours ago
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'New Middle East': This Is Netanyahu's Real Goal In The Region
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu persistently declares his ambition to "change the face of the Middle East". Yet, his repeated assertions seem to clash with the unfolding reality on the ground. Netanyahu's opportunistic relationship with language is now proving detrimental to his country. The Israeli leader undoubtedly grasps fundamental marketing principles, particularly the power of strong branding and consistent messaging. However, for any product to succeed over time, clever branding alone is insufficient; the product itself must live up to at least a minimum degree of expectation. Netanyahu's "product," however, has proven utterly defective, yet the 75-year-old Israeli Prime Minister stubbornly refuses to abandon his outdated marketing techniques. But what exactly is Netanyahu selling? Long before assuming Israel's leadership, Netanyahu mastered the art of repetition – a technique often employed by politicians to inundate public discourse with specific slogans. Over time, these slogans are intended to become "common sense". As a member of the Knesset in 1992, Netanyahu delivered what appeared to be a bombshell: Iran was "within three to five years" from obtaining a nuclear bomb. In 1996, he urged the US Congress to act, declaring that "time is running out." While the US pivoted its attention toward Iraq, following the September 2001 attacks, Netanyahu evidently hoped to eliminate two regional foes in one stroke. Following the fall of the Iraqi government in 2003, Netanyahu channeled all his energy into a new discourse: Iran as an existential threat. Between then and now, Iran has remained his primary focus, even as regional alliances began to form around a discourse of stabilization and renewed diplomatic ties. However, the Obama administration, especially during its second term, was clearly uninterested in another regional war. As soon as Obama left office, Netanyahu reverted to his old marketing strategy. It was during Trump's first term that Netanyahu brought all his marketing techniques to the forefront. He utilized what is known as comparative advertising, where his enemies' "product" is denigrated with basic terms like 'barbarism', ' dark age ', and so forth, while his own is promoted as representing ' civilization ', ' enlightenment ', and 'progress'. He also invested heavily in the FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt) marketing technique. This entailed spreading negative or misleading information about others while promoting his own as a far superior alternative. This brings us to "solution framing." For instance, the so-called "existential threats" faced by Israel can supposedly be resolved through the establishment of a "New Middle East." For this new reality to materialize, the US, he argues, would have to take action, not only to save Israel but also the "civilized world" as well. It must be noted that Netanyahu's "New Middle East" is not his original framing. This notion can be traced to a paper published by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in March 2004. It followed the US war and invasion of Iraq and was part of the intellectual euphoria among US and other Western intellectuals seeking to reshape the Middle East in a way that suited US geopolitical needs. The Carnegie article sought to expand the definition of the Middle East beyond the traditional Middle East and North Africa, reaching as far as the Caucasus and Central Asia. American politicians adopted this new concept, tailoring it to suit US interests at the time. It was US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice who largely rebranded"greater" to "new," thus coining the "New Middle East," which she announced in June 2006. Though Netanyahu embraced the term, he improvised it in recent years. Instead of speaking of it as a distant objective, he declared that he was actively in the process of making it a reality. "We are changing the face of the Middle East. We are changing the face of the world," he triumphantly declared in June 2021. Even following the events of October 7, 2023, and the Israeli war and genocide that ensued, Netanyahu never ceased using the term. This time, however, his emphasis on "change" rotated between a future possibility and an active reality. "I ask that you stand steadfast because we are going to change the Middle East," he stated on October 9 of that same year. And again in September 2024, he proclaimed that Israel was "pursuing" a plan to "assassinate Hezbollah leaders" with the aim of "changing the strategic reality of the Middle East." And again, in October, December, and January of this year. In every single instance, he contextualized the "change of the Middle East" with bombs and rockets, and nothing else. In May, coinciding with a major Israeli bombing of Yemen, he declared that Israel's "mission" exceeds that of "defeating Hamas," extending to "changing the face of the Middle East." And finally, on June 16, he assigned the same language to the war with Iran, this time remaining committed to the new tweak of adding the word "face" to his new, envisaged Middle East. Of course, old branding tactics aside, Netanyahu's Middle East, much like the US' old "greater Middle East," remains a pipe dream aimed at dominating the resource-rich region, with Israel serving the role of regional hegemon. That said, the events of the last two years have demonstrated that, although the Middle East is indeed changing, this transformation is not happening because of Israel. Consequently, the outcome will most likely not be to its liking. Therefore, Netanyahu may continue repeating, like a broken record, old colonial slogans, but genuine change will only happen because of the peoples of the region and their many capable political players. - Dr. Ramzy Baroud is a journalist, author and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of six books. His latest book, co-edited with Ilan Pappé, is ' Our Vision for Liberation: Engaged Palestinian Leaders and Intellectuals Speak Out'. His other books include 'My Father was a Freedom Fighter' and 'The Last Earth'. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA). His website is
