9 February 2025

British Complicity in Genocide in Palestine Demands Repression at Home & an Attack on Democratic Rights

 Opposition to Zionist War Crimes & Support for Palestinian Resistance is ‘Terrorism’ in the Eyes of The Establishment – 

Tony Greenstein & Richard Medhurst Explain What is at Stake


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https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86445763038

Tony Greenstein's Speech at the Old Bailey

Journalist Richard Medhurst Raided and Detained 

Does anyone remember Starmer’s 10 Pledges on which he was elected in April 202 as Labour Party leader?  Let me remind you.

Pledge No. 4 promised to ‘Promote Peace & Human Rights’. He promised “no more illegal wars” which has already been broken by British participation in Israel’s genocide. We have heard nothing about his promise of a Prevention of Military Intervention Act and as for his promise to “put human rights at the heart of foreign policy” well that is a sick joke.

And as for Starmer’s promise to ‘review all arms sales and make us a force for international peace and justice’ the least said the better. Just 8% of all arms contracts to Israel have been frozen.

Last week the home of journalist Richard Medhurst was raided and 19 pages of his electronic devices and equipment were seized by the Austrian police almost certainly in co-ordination with the British anti-terror police. This follows on from the arrest and detention for 3 days of Ali Abunimah of the Electronic Intifada in Switzerland. It is clear that the repression of activists and journalists in Britain is being duplicated across Europe.



The Process is the Punishmment

On 4 December four UN Special Rapporteurs  - independent human rights experts who advise the United Nations on human rights issues – wrote to the British government demanding an explanation for its persecution of journalists and political activists under the Terrorism Acts. They stated that those persecuted ‘appear to have no credible connection to “terrorist” or “hostile” activity.’ They demanded an explanation for the government’s abuse of the Terrorism Act to raid, harass, intimidate and criminalise journalists and political activists who expose and resist Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

The government had 60 days to respond but it has not bothered to do so, hence why the letter has been made public. In it, the Rapporteurs state that those the government is targeting ‘appear to have no credible connection to “terrorist” or “hostile” activity’.

The Two Zionist Law Officers Behind the Prosecution and Persecution of Journalists - in Israel they shoot or ban journalists - now they are trying out the same in the UK

You might think that the whole purpose of anti-terrorism legislation is to prevent terrorism. Apparently not so.  Terrorist acts seem to be the excuse to clamp down on liberties that otherwise the government would be too afraid to touch. The exercise of free speech and the ability to speak one’s mind seem to particularly distress government minister. ‘Human rights’ lawyer Starmer and his Zionist Attorney General Hermer and Sarah Sackman, Vice-President of the genocide supporting Jewish Labour Movement have other ideas. Supporting the Palestinian resistance against Israel’s genocide in Gaza, which obviously includes Hamas, is a form of terrorism.

I am charged with ‘inviting support for Hamas’.  I’m not quite sure what that means since nothing I or others say or do is going to have the slightest effect on Hamas’s ability to pursue a guerrilla war against Israel’s murderous army.

I haven’t invited anyone to join Hamas, indeed I don’t even know whether someone in Britain is eligible to join. I certainly don’t know how to apply and I’ve never had the slightest interest in joining myself. Quite why a Jewish atheist should want to join an Islamist organisation is a mystery that only those whose expertise is in twisting words and meanings out all recognition could answer.

An Israeli War Criminal Alon Misrahi Who Later Committed Suicide

If there was ever a just war then the fight against Israel’s army is just that.  As Israel bombs and destroys every single hospital, school and university in Gaza, the Palestinian resistance wages a courageous fight against a murderous army that takes thousands of civilians prisoners in order to incarcerate them  in Israel’s torture camps.

The fight of the Palestinian resistance is as just as the fight of the French and Czech resistance against the Nazis. As the old saying goes ‘one man’s freedom fighter is another man’s terrorist’.

The official casualty rate in Gaza is now 62,000 but that is almost certainly a vast underestimate. In December 2024 The Lancet projected a death toll of 186,000. The total today could be 300,000, over 10% of Gaza’s population.

The UN rapporteurs made their views clear as to what the clear purpose of the persecution of activists and journalists was. 

the potential misapplication of counter-terrorism laws against journalists and activists who were critical of the policies and practices of certain governments, which may unjustifiably interfere with the rights to freedom of expression and opinion and participation in public life, lead to self-censorship and have a serious chilling effect on the media, civil society and legitimate political and public discourse.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mn2PKOrqmfI&t=24s

Craig Murray Addresses the UN in Geneva on Western government attacks on civil liberty

Section 12 of the Terrorism Act 2000 has been used to charge journalists and activists, including Richard Barnard and Richard Medhurst, for allegedly expressing support for a “proscribed organisation” in the course of activism and media reporting…

…we raise concern about an alleged pattern of over use, or other misuse, of counter-terrorism legislation to target legitimate freedom of expression and opinion, including public interest media reporting, and related freedoms of peaceful assembly and association, and political dissent or activism.

The UN Rapporteurs singled out the notorious section 12(1A) of the Terrorism Act 2000, which criminalizes expressing an opinion or belief that is supportive of a proscribed organisation and being reckless as to whether it encouraged support for that organisation. This is what I was originally arrested. The Rapporteurs wrote:

The term “support” is undefined in the Act and in our view is vague and overbroad and may unjustifiably criminalize legitimate expression.

We note that there is no requirement that the expression of support relate to the commission of violent terrorist acts by the organization. As such, the offence may unjustifiably criminalize the expression of opinion or belief that is not rationally, proximately or causally related to actual terrorist violence or harms. The offence further does not require any likelihood that the support will assist the organization in any way. It goes well beyond the accepted restrictions on freedom of expression under

international law concerning the prohibition of incitement to violence or hate speech…

As the UK Joint Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights observed

‘the meaning of expressing support for a proscribed organization is ambiguous and could capture speech that is neither necessary nor proportionate to criminalize, including legitimate debates about the de-proscription of an organization and disagreement with a government’s decision to proscribe.’

However the Court of Appeal has put the most restrictive and oppressive interpretation on the legislation.

The Court of Appeal further indicated that it could include “encouragement, emotional help, mental comfort and the act of writing or speaking in favour of something”. The Court reasoned that “[the] organisation as a body, and the individual members or adherents of it, will derive encouragement from the fact that they have the support of others, even if it may not in every instance be active or tangible support”.

In other words the charges against activists have nothing whatsoever to do with terrorism but everything to do with opposition to Britain’s support for Israel’s war crimes. There is an International Criminal Court Act 2001, s.51 of which makes it

an offence against the law of England and Wales for a person to commit genocide, a crime against humanity or a war crime.

The section ‘applies to acts committed—

(a)    in England or Wales, or

      (b)   outside the United Kingdom by a United Kingdom national, a United Kingdom resident or a person subject to UK service jurisdiction.

Section 52 makes it ‘an offence against the law of England and Wales for a person to engage in conduct ancillary to an act to which this section applies.’ Sub-section 2 makes it clear that not only does this apply to behaviour in England Wales but that it also applies to conduct ‘which, being committed (or intended to be committed) outside England and Wales, does not constitute such an offence.’

The UN Rapporteurs note that

some proscribed organizations are de facto authorities performing a diversity of civilian functions, including governance, humanitarian and

medical activities, and provision of social services, public utilities and education. Expressing support for any of these ordinary civilian activities by the organization could constitute expressing support for it, no matter how remote such expression is from support for any violent terrorist acts by the group’.

When the British government under Priti Patel proscribed, not only the military but the political wing of Hamas, they were effectively saying that a doctor who was a member of Hamas’s political wing was also a terrorist. This proscription is an invitation to genocide and is thus unlawful, not only under domestic legislation but the Geneva Convention on Genocide. As Genocide is the ultimate crime, the proscription simply falls by the way. Except that Britain’s Police, being institutionally racist, believe that the lives of Palestinians counts for nothing.

Tony Greenstein at the Old Bailey

The UN Rapporteurs also wrote of their concern that

the absence of legal certainty may have a chilling effect on the media, public debate, activism, and the activities of civil society, in a context where there is a heightened public interest in discussion of the conflict in the Middle East, including the conduct of the parties and the underlying conditions conducive to violence in the region. We are further concerned that a person could be prosecuted for isolated remarks or sentences that mischaracterize the overall position of the individual, or despite the individual’s intentions or continued and express disavowal of terrorist violence, given the subjectivity and contested meanings of certain expressions in relation to sensitive or controversial political conflicts…

The recommendation of the UN Rapporteurs is that the government should

repeal section 12(1A), or otherwise to amend it to protect freedom of expression, and to develop prosecutorial guidelines for its appropriate use to avoid the unnecessary or disproportionate incrimination of political dissent.

We are concerned that police powers at UK border areas and ports under

schedule 7 may be unjustifiably used against journalists and activists who are critical of Western foreign policy. ... We are concerned that such powers carry a risk of intimidating, deterring, and disrupting the ability of journalists to report on topics of public importance without self-censorship…

Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000, and schedule 3 of the Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Act 2019, have been used to examine and obtain data from journalists and activists, including Johanna Ross (Ganyukova), John Laughland, Kit Klarenberg, Craig Murray and Richard Medhurst in circumstances where they appear to have no credible connection to “terrorist” or “hostile” activity.

This of course is exactly what has happened.  Academics such as Professor Ilan Pappe have been stopped as have a series of radical and dissident journalists. All with the blessing of a Prime Minister who still lays claim to being a human rights lawyer. The Rapporteurs write that they are particular concerned at

the growing number of instances where schedule 7 may have been inappropriately directed towards journalists and activists, and to consider addressing this through amendments to the legislation, guidance for relevant officials, and training of border security officers. We further encourage your Excellency’s Government to address the judiciary’s concerns regarding the retention of electronic data

Not surprisingly Starmer has not only ignored it but decided to prosecute both myself and Natalie Strecker under the anti-terror legislation despite neither of us posing any threat of terrorism. Journalist Richard Medhurst has been charged under the Terrorism Act for doing his job and refusing to hand over passwords that would allow the state to rifle through contacts, sources and confidential communications.

The UN letter also details some of their criticisms concerning the badly-written Terrorism Act 2000, which is (deliberately) so broad that it can be abused in the way that the Starmer regime is now doing:

We are concerned at the vagueness and overbreadth of the offence in section 12(1A) of the Terrorism Act 2000, which criminalizes expressing an opinion or belief that is supportive of a proscribed organisation and being reckless as to whether it encouraged support for that organisation. We reiterate the many concerns about this offence identified by the UK Joint Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights in its report on the bill that introduced the offence.

The UN Rapporteurs note that

The suggestion by the Court of Appeal that any support will somehow encourage the organization is nebulous and tenuous, and over-extends liability to capture speech that may have a very remote and speculative relationship to terrorist violence.

We note further that view of the United Nations Human Rights Committee that the predicate definition of terrorism in section 1 of the Terrorism Act 2000 is itself over-broad and “unduly restrictive of political expression”, and has been criticized also by the two Independent Reviewers of Terrorism Legislation and the UK Supreme Court in R v. Gul (2013)

Further, the section 12(1A) offence does not require the person to intend to encourage others to support the organization. The lower mental element of “recklessness” is sufficient, namely where the person had some subjective foresight that their conduct will result in the proscribed outcome and nonetheless engages in it in circumstances where a reasonable person would not.

The UK Joint Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights has warned that a mental element of recklessness when applied to acts of speech alone is dangerous; and that this is aggravated by the lack of clarity as to what speech constitutes an expression of support.

The principle of legality under article 15(1) of the ICCPR requires that criminal laws are sufficiently precise so that it is clear what conduct constitutes an offence and the legal consequences of committing an offence. This principle seeks to prevent ill-defined and/or overly broad laws which are open to arbitrary application and abuse, including to target civil society on political or other unjustified grounds (A/70/371, para. 46(b)). We are concerned that section 12(1A) does not meet this standard because of its vagueness and overbreadth.

The Human Rights Committee has stipulated that these restrictions must be “the least intrusive instrument” among those which might achieve the desired result and must be “proportionate to the interest to be protected (general comment No. 27, para. 14). In this respect we emphasize that the section 12(1A) offence is unnecessary since there is already an offence of “encouragement of terrorism” under section 1 of the Terrorism Act 2006, which is a more calibrated and proportionate offence targeting encouragement of terrorist crimes.

The UN Rapporteurs also criticize Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000, pointing out its similar unfitness and scope for abuse and miscarriages of justice. They say that

We are further concerned that the extensive powers authorised under section 2 do not require any degree of suspicion that a person falls within the meaning of “terrorist” at section 40(1)(b).

The extreme breadth of such power enables unnecessary, disproportionate, arbitrary or discriminatory interference with an individual’s rights, including freedom from arbitrary detention, freedom of movement under article 12(1) of the ICCPR, and the rights to leave and

enter one’s own country under article 12(2) and (4) of the ICCPR.

There is no material on which to form a rational judgement as to whether the use of the powers

are necessary or proportionate in the individual case. Even a “hunch” or the “professional intuition” of the officer concerned could be the basis on which the powers will be exercised.

The arbitrary potential of the power is compounded by the low threshold of determining whether a person merely “appears” to fall within section 40(1)(b). The safeguards around the power, such as restrictions on the location, duration, type of questioning and search, and the supervision of the Independent Reviewer of terrorism legislation, are insufficient to prevent the misuse of the power and the potential harm caused to the rights of the individuals examined.

We are further concerned that the retention of electronic data under section 11A(3)(a) “for so long as is necessary for the purpose of determining whether a person falls within section 40(1)(b)” is disproportionate, particularly if it were used to justify retention indefinitely so as to provide a bank of data for future use in connection with subsequent investigations or the collection or receipt of additional information.

We consider that the retention of data for a long period should require an objectively established ground for the suspicion and be strictly necessary and proportionate to that law enforcement objective. In this regard, we refer your Excellency’s government to article 17 of the ICCPR which requires that “[n]o one shall be subjected to arbitrary or unlawful interference with [their] privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to unlawful attacks on [their] honour and reputation”.

We note that several journalists detained under schedule 7 have had their electronic devices confiscated for a significant period of time and have not been updated on the use, retention or destruction of their data, or advised in relation to their personal data protection rights.

The term “hostile act” is defined at section 1(6) as an act which: “(a) threatens national security; (b) threatens the economic well-being of the United Kingdom in a way relevant to the interests of national security; or (c) is an act of serious crime”.

What is ‘threatening the economic well-being of the UK’?  It could be argued that a general strike or even a strike in important areas of the economy such as docks constitute such a threat.

We raise similar concerns regarding the vague and over-broad definition of “hostile activity”, which includes the sweeping terms “national security” and “economic well-being”. The ambiguity within these concepts reposes an extraordinary discretion in the police when exercising the relevant powers, increasing the risk of unnecessary, disproportionate or otherwise arbitrary interferences in the rights to liberty and privacy, and having a chilling effect on freedoms of thought, conscience, opinion and expression, including in relation to journalists and activists.

The letter is signed by:

·         Ben Saul, Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protectiSpecial Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism

·         Irene Khan, Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression

·         Gina Romero, Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association

·         Ana Brian Nougrères, Special Rapporteur on the right to privacy

The letter effectively accuses the Starmer regime of the deliberate abuse of anti-terrorism legislation to criminalise free speech on Palestine to protect Israel, because of Starmer’s absolute commitment to Zionism and the ‘right’ of Israel to murder whoever it wants..

Tony Greenstein

See full letter from the UN Rapporteurs

Craig Murray’s United Nations Censures UK Over Abuse of Terrorism Act Against Journalists and Activists

UN Special Rapporteurs: the UK is suppressing free speech on Palestine

Skwawkbox UN slams UK for Starmer’s war on pro-Gaza journalism and activism

8 February 2025

The Zionist Plan for ‘Cleansing’ Gaza of its Palestinians is Not New – Like Many Such Ideas It Originated with their Nazi friends

 There is a German word for what is being proposed – Judenrein or today Arabrein


There is nothing new in Donald Trump and Netanyahu’s plans for the ‘evacuation’ of the Palestinians from Gaza. The Nazis’ devoted much time and energy to a similar ‘problem’.

From 1939 onwards hundreds of thousands  of Jews, Poles and Gypsies, were preventing the Warthegau, that part of Poland which was conquered and incorporated into Greater Germany, being settled with German colonists. Most of them were expelled to the Generalgouvernment, that part of Poland into which they intended to pour all the racial ‘mush’ (Himmler).

Volksdeutsche of Łódź greeting German cavalry in 1939

The Nazis managed, with difficulty, to resettle half a million Volksdeutsche in their place just as Israel hopes to settle Jews in Gaza. 

Hans Frank

Many were the conflicts within the Nazi bureaucracy between the Gauleiter Arthur Greiser and the Governor-General of the Generalgouvernment, Hans Frank. For those who are interested in Nazi resettlement policies you can read Christopher Browning’s article on Nazi resettlement policies.

Arthur Greiser

It was only when the Nazi plans for the resettlement of the Jews to the East were thwarted that they turned to extermination. So it is with Gaza, except that the Zionists reversed the process, first they began the extermination process and only then turned to expulsion.

Palestinian journalists demonstrate outside the Palestinian Authority against the banning of media

Yet despite this that pathetic poodle of US imperialism, Keir Starmer and his contemptible fool of a Foreign Secretary, David Lammy, could not bring themselves to criticise Trump. As the Guardian’s Peter Walker put it, ‘Prime minister and colleagues use political code to push back at proposal without directly criticising US president.’

Even Ed Davey of the Lib Dems criticised the loathsome Trump whilst pushing for the resurrection of that old lame duck, the two-state solution. Starmer has built his career on slavish loyalty to the American Empire and Trump is not going to stop him.

Starmer told us  how he was ‘moved’ by the image of Emily Damari, the Israeli hostage who was reunited with her family. The images of Palestinian hostages, who had been starved, beaten and tortured, did not make any impression on this apology for a human being. However it is doubtful that anything could move Starmer apart from a subsidy from one of his millionaire friends towards his wardrobe.

When Israel was established as a ‘Jewish’ State it fabricated a narrative that the Palestinian refugees had run away, on orders from the Arab regimes, despite pleas from the Zionists to stay. This was comprehensively debunked, first by Erskine Childers and Rashid Khalidi and then Israeli historians Benny Morris and Ilan Pappe.

I was brought up to believe this nonsense.  Israel had closed its archives and even reclassified documents that had been released in order to hide the truth. [see Burying the Nakba: How Israel Systematically Hides Evidence of 1948 Expulsion of Arabs].

Benny Morris explained thatDefense Ministry officials apparently hope their actions will raise doubts about the conclusions and credibility of various scholars.’ This enabled people like Israel’s vile Ambassador, Tzipi Hotoveli, to proclaim that stories of the Nakba were an ‘Arab lie’.


Only 3% Of Jewish Israelis Think Trump's Ethnic Cleansing Plan For Gaza Is Immoral

Today there is no pretence. Israelis in their overwhelming majority want the Palestinians of Gaza (and the West Bank) either expelled or  exterminated. Some 82% of Israeli Jews support Trump’s plan and just 3% consider the proposals immoral. The rest think it impractical. This is what memory of the Holocaust has become in Zionist hands.

It is worth bearing in mind that Israelis are far more racist towards the Palestinians than Germans were to Jews. Anti-Semitism in Germany was never respectable. The Nazis had to work hard to persuade Germans and they never succeeded. Anti-Semitism was confined to the core of the Nazi party itself. Between 1930 and 1933 Hitler downplayed anti-Semitism to the point of non-existence.

Of course people will find this difficult to accept given the way the media portrays the reasons why Hitler came to power. However all serious historians agree. For example Ian Kershaw wrote in Popular Opinion and Dissent in the Third Reich that the more than five million extra votes that the Nazis obtained in the 1930 elections were in no sense anti-Semites’. David Cesarani suggested in The Final Solution  that  Hitler’s attacks on Jews ‘diminished to vanishing point’. Even Zionist historian Yehuda Bauer accepted this. 

In 1939 Hitler began to fulfil his desire to create ‘living space’ lebensraum for the German people by conquering first Poland, then Western Europe and finally Russia. That is precisely what Israel is doing. Achieving its Arab-free living space.

For 15 months they carpet bombed Gaza under the pretence that they were seeking to destroy Hamas when it was obvious to anyone, bar Jews for Genocide and that inveterate liar Starmer, that Hamas was the one thing they hadn’t destroyed.

Hospitals, schools, clinics, universities, journalists, residential homes and agricultural land – all were subject to the an intensity of bombing that made the destruction of Nuremberg, Dresden and Hamburg seem like a picnic.

All the while Butcher Biden supplied the 2,000 lb bombs that enabled the devastation. Now Trump comes along and says that of course Palestinians can’t live in the rubble whilst still continuing to supply the 2000 lb bombs. The hypocrisy and mendacity of our rulers knows no bounds.

We have a weak and shaky ceasefire, which hasn’t stopped Israel killing Palestinians in Gaza although the bombing has (temporarily) stopped. There isn’t an agreement that Israel has made that hasn’t been broken and they are still killing people in Lebanon. Netanyahu and much of his coalition would like to restart the slaughter because to the Zionists not enough Palestinians have yet died.

Yet whatever Israel does, as far as Starmer, Trump and our own Jews for Genocide in the form of the Board of Deputies, are concerned it is acting in self-defence. It is an interesting legal concept as to whether an occupying power has the right of self-defence. Perhaps Russia has such a right in Ukraine! Maybe we should consult our favourite ‘human rights lawyer’ Sir Kid Starver.

I fear that Israel will find a pretext to restart the war against Gaza. What Trump has done is to provide Israel with a pretext to break the ceasefire, as Netanyahu has promised, after the first phase, in which case we will see a continuation of the genocide. This is a very real danger. Of course it will be difficult politically to restart the slaughter but that will depend on the American administration. One thing is for certain. The Arab regimes could stop it in a day if they stopped the oil.  And the Arab masses could stop it if they overthrew those regimes.

Israeli military operation in Jenin: Palestinian homes attacked with simultaneous blasts

Instead Israel’s war on the Palestinians has spread to the West Bank. For the past 5 years I have raised funds for the Al Tafawk Children’s Centre in Jenin refugee camp. Three times the Israeli military has deliberately wrecked the interior of the Centre.

Today I have no idea if Al Tafawk is even standing because much of Jenin’s refugee camp has been blown up and numerous people, including children have been killed. Yet still Western leaders have the audacity to about Israel’s ‘self-defence’. If only Goebbels had had such good propagandists as the BBC provide he could have achieved far more without the opprobrium.

Israeli Soldiers Celebrate Destruction in Jenin

Israel’s attack on Jenin we should not forget was preceded by 25 days of violence by the Quisling Palestine Authority. Yet even now organisations like Britain’s Palestine Solidarity Campaign are afraid of calling these Quislings by their name. First Israel banned Al Jazeera and then the PA banned it.

See Two Days after Speaking to the Palestine Chronicle – Jenin Journalist Killed by Palestinian Authority

See The PA and Israel are allies in silencing the truth

Trump’s plan though is unlikely to be carried out. The last thing the Egyptian and Jordanian states want is hundreds of thousands of Palestinians determined to seek their revenge. Despite their role as collaborators, neither regime has a death wish.

If the Zionists cannot achieve an empty Gaza by ethnic cleansing then mass murder and genocide is the alternative and the only thing standing in the way are Hamas and the Palestinian resistance.

This of course is where Britain’s political police come in. They will do their utmost to arrest and persecute anyone who supports resistance to Israel’s genocide. All in the name of ‘the fight against terrorism’. This is the state of British ‘democracy’ today and we can rely on Britain’s compliant judiciary to do their best to help.

There has been one of those absurd ‘debates’ about whether Israel is committing genocide. As if not using the word changes the reality. I suggest people read Yuval Abraham’s article in +972 Magazine, Bomb the area, gas the tunnels: Israel’s unbridled war on Gaza’s underground as to what Israel’s tactics were. Abraham writes that:

The Israeli army intensively bombarded residential areas in Gaza when it lacked intelligence on the exact location of Hamas commanders hiding underground, and intentionally weaponized toxic byproducts of bombs to suffocate militants in their tunnels…

The investigation, based on conversations with 15 Israeli Military Intelligence and Shin Bet officers who have been involved in tunnel-targeting operations since October 7, exposes how this strategy aimed to compensate for the army’s inability to pinpoint targets in Hamas’ subterranean tunnel network. When targeting senior commanders in the group, the Israeli military authorized the killing of “triple-digit numbers” of Palestinian civilians as “collateral damage,” and maintained close real-time coordination with U.S. officials regarding the expected casualty figures.

 So there we have it. Israel was prepared to kill hundreds of Palestinian civilians on the off chance that they might kill a member of Hamas.  And then creatures like Lammy & Starmer dare to call Hamas ‘terrorist’.

In the process three Israeli hostages — Nik Beizer, Ron Sherman, and Elia Toledano — were killed by asphyxiation as a result of a Nov. 10, 2023, bombing that targeted Ahmed Ghandour, a Hamas brigade commander in northern Gaza. Even if the bombs didn’t kill them then the carbon monoxide they produced did.

Israel soldiers were not willing to fight in the tunnels but thought that carpet bombing would do the trick. Fortunately it didn’t and at the end of the war Hamas and the Resistance was killing more of Israel’s war criminal military than it was at the beginning.

Imagine if Hamas exploded a bomb in the middle of Tel Aviv because they believed a senior officer of the Israeli army was passing by?  Or Russia bombed a market place because it believed a Ukrainian general was doing his shopping there. The pages of the tabloids would be filled with blood curdling rhetoric.

Israel’s figures of Hamas fighters killed were always phony. Every male civilian they killed was a Hamas ‘terrorist’ but at the end of the day the Zionists ended up fooling themselves, which was why, when the ceasefire came into effect, Israelis were stunned to see hundreds of Hamas fighters in their distinctive olive green uniforms handing over the healthy and well-fed Israeli captives, unlike the emaciated and tortured bodies of the Palestinian captives that Israel had seized.

Israel’s 2,000 lb bombs were supplied by the United States despite knowing how they would be used but ‘bloody’ Blinken stymied any declaration that human rights violations were being carried out. Why?

Because under the Leahy law if the US State Department declared that Israel was committing war crimes then the U.S. Government would have been barred from using funds to assist in those crimes. Instead investigations into Israel’s war crimes never progressed beyond an initial stage.


Netanyahu and his far-right partner Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s Finance Minister,  ‘proud homophobe’ and fascist are itching to get back into the bombing on the grounds that if you haven’t succeeded yet try, try and try again. But what is clear is that Hamas and the Palestinian Resistance has not been defeated and is unlikely to be defeated. 

At the moment Israel’s genocidal lust and desire for more living space is now translating into war on the people of the West Bank.

Even Trump cannot simply declare that he wants Palestinians to leave Gaza because he wants the gas fields in the sea off Gaza. Instead he dresses it up as concern for the Palestinians. He wrote that the Palestinians in Gaza would have "far safer and more beautiful communities, with new and modern homes, in the region."

There is nothing new in this duplicity. As Abdaljawad Omarwrote

the same language has been used before. In 1830, President Andrew Jackson justified the Indian Removal Act as a necessary measure for the “happiness” of Native Americans, ethnically cleansing them under the guise of protecting their way of life....

The logic remains unchanged — displacement framed as pragmatism, ethnic cleansing cloaked in the language of order and progress, and for Trump: Palestinians as an obstacle to a beautiful beachfront where everyone could live, including “some Palestinians.”  

In Trump’s impossible Gaza plan can still do a great deal of harm Michelle Plitnick wrote that ‘in one of the cruelest, most repulsive twists of the Trump argument, he actually argued that his plan for ethnic cleansing was intended to benefit the Palestinians.’

This could be so magnificent. But more importantly than that is the people that have been absolutely destroyed that live there now can live in peace in a much better situation because they are living in hell. And those people will now be able to live in peace. We’ll make sure that it’s done world class.

It is noticeable that German leaders have said next to nothing. But why should Germany’s leaders say anything? The worse it gets for Palestinians the more they can come to terms with their own holocausts. After all, if even the Jews perpetrate a holocaust then it can’t be that bad.

Today Gaza is unliveable in because Israel deliberately made it so. For the Palestinians to be removed would be to reward the war criminals. That Trump can suggest it and the media can actually debate it seriously demonstrates how low moral standards have sunk in the western world.

One wonders what Western leaders would say if Putin had carpet bombed Ukraine and then said he was removing the population to save them further trauma and he expected Britain, Germany and France to take them in and foot the bill! All in order that they could have ‘beautiful’ lives free from Russian bombs! Yet this is what Trump is saying and our leaders cannot even spell out the implications for fear of offending his fragile ego.

We are entering a period of great uncertainty. The Palestine solidarity movement has a responsibility to step up its protests and begin to make life uncomfortable for those in power. Instead of allowing the Metropolitan Police to disrupt our protests we should be disrupting the rhythms of London. The first thing we should be doing is to hold the demonstration which was initially planned for the BBC – with or without the agreement of Britain’s political police.

Tony Greenstein

See also 

The Gaza 'war' was a lie, as is the ceasefire. Trump just told you

Jonathan Cook

The PA and Israel are allies in silencing the truth

The PA and Israel are allies in silencing the truth

I witnessed firsthand the PA’s brutality against journalists in Gaza. Its possible return does not bode well for us.

Published On 1 Feb 2025 

A group of Palestinian journalists protest in front of the Palestinian Legislative Council headquarters against the decision of the Palestinian Authority to close Bethlehem-based private TV channel, Al-Roah, in Gaza City on October 17 1999 [File: Mohammad Saber/AFP]

On December 28, 21-year-old journalism student Shatha Al-Sabbagh was assassinated near her home in Jenin. Her family accused snipers from the Palestinian Authority (PA) deployed in the camp of shooting her in the head. Al-Sabbagh had been active on social media, documenting the suffering of Jenin residents during the raids by Israel and the PA.

Just a few days after Al-Sabbagh’s assassination, the authorities in Ramallah banned Al Jazeera from reporting from the occupied West Bank. Three weeks later, PA forces arrested Al Jazeera correspondent Mohamad Atrash.

These developments come as the Israeli occupation has killed more than 200 media workers in Gaza and arrested dozens across the occupied Palestinian territories. It has also banned Al Jazeera and refused to allow foreign journalists to enter Gaza. The fact that the PA’s actions mirror Israel’s reveals a shared agenda to suppress independent journalism and control public opinion.

To Palestinian journalists, that is hardly news. The PA has never been our protector. It has always been a complicit partner in our brutalisation. That is true in the West Bank and it was true in Gaza when the PA was in power there. I witnessed it myself.

Growing up in Gaza, I watched how my people were oppressed by Israeli forces and by the PA. In 1994, the Israeli occupation formally handed over the Strip to the PA to administer under the provisions of the Oslo Accords. The PA remained in power until 2007. During these 13 years, we saw more collaboration with the Israeli occupation than any meaningful attempt at liberation. For journalists, the PA’s presence was not just oppressive, it was life-threatening, as its forces actively stifled voices to maintain its fragile grip on power.

As a journalism student in Gaza, I experienced this suppression firsthand. I walked the streets, witnessing PA security officers looting shops, their arrogance apparent in the brazen act of theft. One day, when I attempted to document this, a Palestinian officer violently grabbed me, ripped my camera from my hands, and smashed it to the ground. This wasn’t just an assault, it was an attack on my right to bear witness. The officer’s aggression only ceased when a group of women intervened, forcing him to retreat in a rare moment of restraint.

I knew the risks of being a journalist in Gaza and like other media workers, I learned to navigate them. But the fear I felt near the PA forces’ ambush points was unlike anything else. That was because there was never logic to their aggressive actions and no way to anticipate when they might turn on you.

Walking near the PA forces felt like stepping into a minefield. One moment, there was the illusion of safety, and the next, you faced the brutality of those who were supposedly there to protect you. This uncertainty and tension made their presence more terrifying than being on a battlefield.

Years later, I would cover the training sessions of Qassam Brigades under the constant hum of Israeli drones and the ever-looming threat of air strikes. It was dangerous but predictable – much more so than the actions of the PA.

Under the PA, we learned to speak in code. Journalists self-censored out of fear of retribution. The PA was often referred to as “cousins of Israeli occupation” – a grim acknowledgement of its complicity.

As the PA was fighting to stay in power in Gaza after losing the 2006 elections to Hamas, its brutality escalated. In May 2007, gunmen in presidential guard uniforms killed journalist Suleiman Abdul-Rahim al-Ashi and media worker Mohammad Matar Abdo. It was an execution meant to send a clear message to those who witnessed it.

When Hamas took over, its government also imposed restrictions on press freedoms, but its censorship was inconsistent. Once, while documenting the new policewomen’s division, I was ordered to show my photos to a Hamas officer so he could censor any image he deemed immodest. I often managed to bypass these restrictions by swapping my memory cards preemptively.

The officers weren’t fond of anyone overriding their orders, but instead of outright punishment, they resorted to petty power plays—investigations, revoked access, or unnecessary provocations. Unlike the PA, Hamas did not operate within a system of coordination with Israeli forces to suppress journalism, but the restrictions journalists faced still created an environment of uncertainty and self-censorship. Any violation on their part, however, was met with swift international condemnation—something the PA rarely faced, despite its far more systematic repression.

After losing control of Gaza, the PA shifted its focus to the West Bank, intensifying its campaign of media suppression. Detentions, violent crackdowns, and the silencing of critical voices became commonplace. Their collaboration with Israel was not passive; it was active. From surveillance to campaigns of violence, they play a crucial role in maintaining the status quo, stifling any dissent that challenges their power and the occupation.

In 2016, the PA’s collusion became even more apparent when they coordinated with Israeli authorities in the arrest of prominent journalist and press freedom advocate Omar Nazzal, who had criticised Ramallah for how it handled the suspected murder of Palestinian citizen Omar al-Naif at its embassy in Bulgaria.

In 2017, the PA launched a campaign of intimidation, arresting five journalists from different outlets.

In 2019, the Palestinian Authority blocked the website of Quds News Network, a youth-led media outlet that has gained immense popularity. This was part of a wider ban imposed by the Ramallah Magistrate’s Court that blocked access to 24 other news websites and social media pages.

In 2021, after the violent death of activist Nizar Banat in the PA’s custody sparked protests, its forces sought to crack down on journalists and media outlets covering them.

In this context, the prospect of the PA returning to Gaza following the ceasefire agreement raises serious concerns for journalists who have already endured the horrors of genocide. For those who survived, this could mean a new chapter of repression that reflects the PA’s history of censorship, arrests and stifling of press freedoms.

Despite the grave threats that Palestinian journalists face from Israel and from those who pretend to represent the Palestinian people, they persevere. Their work transcends borders, reflecting a shared struggle against tyranny. Their resilience speaks not only to the Palestinian cause but to the broader fight for liberation, justice and dignity.


Eman Mohammed is an award-winning Palestinian-American photojournalist and Senior TED fellow currently based in Washington, DC.