Massacre
Starmer’s guest Herzog signs shells to fire on Gaza
Genocide-mongering Israeli president warmly welcomed and presented with gifts by right-wing Starmer and Labour Friends of Apartheid
Israeli president Isaac Herzog has been photographed signing shells to be fired upon Gazan civilians. Herzog, like other Israeli government figures, has said that there are no innocents being killed in Israel’s wanton slaughter of Palestinian civilians:
It’s an entire nation that is out there that’s responsible. It’s not true, this rhetoric about civilians not aware, not involved. It’s absolutely not true.
So closely identified is Herzog with Israel’s war crimes that his comments were cited byexpert Raz Segal, the program director of genocide studies at Stockton University, as an example of the Israeli regime’s expression of intent to commit that and other war crimes.
According to Euromed Monitor, Israel has so far killed 30,000 people in Gaza, well over half of them women and children. Approaching 60,000 more have been injured, many of them severely.
As Declassified‘s John McEvoy has pointed out, Herzog recently received a fawning welcome from ‘Labour’ ‘leader’ Keir Starmer – who left him a signed note in a copy of a book presented to him by Steve McCabe, the parliamentary chair of the so-called ‘Labour Friends of Israel’ (LFI).
Starmer and LFI are no friends of working-class people – but they can’t get enough of those eager for war crimes against the Palestinians.
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Huge victories for humanity as German courts rule Gaza chants protected speech
‘From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free’ and other chants for freedom and against genocide are freedom of expression, despite government efforts to criminalise pro-Palestinian protest
Image: Die Linke
In a huge victory for human rights, for humanity and for the Palestinian people, the Münster Administrative Court in north-west Germany has ruled that chants and slogans frequently used in pro-Palestinian, anti-genocide rallies and marches are not illegal.
“From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” and “Child murderer Israel” are not only legal but are protected by freedom of expression laws. “Stop the genocide in Gaza” has already been ruled legal by the Cologne Administrative Court.
The German state, which has some of the most extreme laws protecting Israel from criticism of its actions, has used riot police and draconian action to try to quell the protests.
Palestinian legal advocacy group the European Legal Support Center, which has been fighting the cases on behalf of the movement, noted that:
In both decisions, the judge reiterated that criticism of the Israeli state is protected by freedom of expression, stressing that the slogans are directed against Israel & not against the Jewish population of Germany, thus rejecting any inflammatory allegations of antisemitism.
Both court decisions followed protest bans issued by the Police. We congratulate the activists and their lawyers who refused to be silenced and boldly challenged the bans!
The decisions come as the UK government continues to try to demonise protesters and to use anti-terror laws to persecute activists working for human rights and justice in Palestine and to stop Israel’s mass slaughter and ethnic cleansing of civilians, which has taken approaching 30,000 innocent lives so far, around half of them children. Many more have been hideously wounded and more than seven out of ten of Gaza’s 2.2 million people are reported to be in severe hunger.
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US trying to persuade Switzerland to waive Geneva Conventions for Israel in Gaza
Rules of war banning inhumane treatment of POWs and civilians should not be invoked, say US diplomats behind scenes as US complicity in Israeli war crimes becomes explicit
Image: Red Crescent Society
US diplomats are trying to persuade Switzerland – the custodians of the Geneva Conventions governing the rules of conduct during war, with the ability to decide when meetings are held to discuss non-compliance – to set aside the application of the Conventions to Israel’s genocidal campaign against Palestinians in Gaza, according to documents seen by the HuffPost US.
The Geneva Conventions are a set of treaties and protocols known particularly for the strictures of the third and fourth conventions on how nations can treat civilians and prisoners of war:
- The First Geneva Convention “for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armed Forces in the Field” (first adopted in 1864, revised in 1906, 1929 and finally 1949);
- The Second Geneva Convention “for the Amelioration of the Condition of Wounded, Sick and Shipwrecked Members of Armed Forces at Sea” (first adopted in 1949, successor of the Hague Convention (X) 1907);
- The Third Geneva Convention “relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War” (first adopted in 1929,[35] last revision in 1949);
- The Fourth Geneva Convention “relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War” (first adopted in 1949, based on parts of the Hague Convention (II) of 1899 and Hague Convention (IV) 1907).
But Israel – whose advocates frequently complain that they want Israel to be treated like any other country – and its US backers want Israel to be exempted from these universal rules of war.
This is unsurprising, given the mass slaughter of civilians, especially children, the targeting of schools and hospitals, the alleged execution of women and children and the mass graves of victims – but it is surprising to hear this homicidal exceptionalism being so bluntly stated.
Yet according to the article:
U.S. diplomats are finalizing a démarche ― a diplomatic initiative ― to their Swiss counterparts that Washington hopes will scuttle plans for a meeting to discuss violations of the Geneva Conventions in the current war between Israel and Hamas, the Gaza-based militant group, according to State Department documents seen by HuffPost.
The revelation comes as the U.S. is simultaneously slow-rolling the most high-profile international attempt to ease suffering in Gaza: a United Nations Security Council resolution that would drastically increase the flow of humanitarian aid into the besieged strip…
Palestinian diplomats and a significant group of U.N. member states, including some European nations allied with the U.S., are preparing a call for Switzerland to launch such a conference focused on the fighting on Israel-Palestine that would cover Geneva Conventions violations by all parties, according to the State Department documents and a person familiar with the Palestinian effort.
Despite global public opinion abhorring Israel’s constant war crimes against Palestinian civilians in Gaza and the West Bank, the US is determined to keep Israel unaccountable for its actions.
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Outrage builds over Unite’s use of Israel-linked firms as protesters occupy Axa Dublin office
Union management’s choice of firms is ‘huge embarrassment’, say insiders
A row has broken out in Unite over the union’s choice of insurer and hotel chain, after a group linked to the union occupied the European HQ of Axa insurance in Dublin.
Community Action Tenants’ Union (CATU) and the Dublin for Gaza group took over Axa’s offices and called for boycott of the company, according to Irish paper The Journal, because of the business being one of “725 European financial institutions that have subsidised apartheid Israel’s colonial settlements“. Axa told the paper that it “has no proprietary investments in any of the banks cited in recent calls for boycott”.
The action prompted growing anger among supporters of Palestinian human rights in Unite Ireland that the UK and Irish union’s official, democratic position is firm support of Palestinian freedom and right of return to lands taken from them by the Israeli settler-colonial project – and opposition to Israeli occupation, apartheid and oppression.
In fact, at its annual conference earlier this year, Unite delegates voted to formally support the ‘Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions’ (BDS) movement that represents Palestinians’ peaceful resistance to the occupation by encouraging businesses to refuse to buy from or do business with illegally-occupied territories, in a resolution saying that Unite:
[recognises that] Israel is practicing the crime of apartheid, calls for an end to the UK Government’s proposed free trade agreement with Israel, and for support for BDS campaigns against companies complicit in supporting Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian land.
Yet according to union insiders, Axa is Unite’s insurer in Ireland – and Unite’s designated provider of hotel accommodation is the Leonardo hotel group, which is part-owned by the Israeli Fattal group. One outraged insider told Skwawkbox:
It’s a huge embarrassment to Unite and one that is causing a lot of anger – even more so as our Irish exec meeting next month is taking place in the Belfast Leonardo’s.
What’s worse is that this has been going on for months and the union still hasn’t done anything to change it. Businesses linked to Israel should never have been selected in the first place, let alone still be used now with everything that’s going on in Gaza.
Unite general secretary Sharon Graham has already infuriated supporters of Palestinian rights by remaining silent for many weeks at the start of Israel’s latest genocidal assault on Gaza – then making a grossly asymmetrical statement appearing to treat Israeli deaths more seriously than Palestinian; and ultimately allegedly having the exec railroaded into accepting only her preferred wording when a statement was eventually issued.
Graham was also exposed using proxies to order the cancellation of showings of the film ‘Oh Jeremy Corbyn/The Big Lie’, which exposes the political abuse of antisemitism accusations against left-wingers in the Labour party, and discussion of Asa Winstanley’s forensic book Weaponising Antisemitism: How the Israel Lobby Brought Down Jeremy Corbyn. Proxies were similarly despatched to try, unsuccessfully, to cancel a Unite ‘fringe’ event at Labour’s conference earlier this month in support of Palestinians.
Her popularity in Ireland is already low. Irish union legend Brendan Ogle is also suing her, her ally Tony Woodhouse and the union for defamation; he also alleges that he was abused by the union after his return from treatment for serious cancer – and after he made ‘protected disclosures’ to the union about its failures to adhere to covid protocols during the pandemic. Graham and her representatives have been accused of ‘disgusting’ behaviour toward Ogle – and anger in Ireland at the situation became so great that an entire sector branch threatened to disaffiliate entirely from Unite, the well-known ‘Right2Water’ campaign said it will no longer work with Unite, Unite’s Community section in Ireland condemned the ‘injustice inflicted’ on him and members picketed general secretary Sharon Graham’s long-delayed visit to Dublin.
Ms Graham is using Denton’s one of the world’s most profitable law firms to defend the defamation suit and Ogle’s the tribunal case. Denton’s was lambasted after its initial social media statement on Israel/Gaza failed even to mention the many Palestinian deaths. The statement was subsequently deleted and replaced.
Her tenure as Unite boss has been marked by a string of other allegations – which neither she nor the union has denied – including alleged destruction of evidence against her husband in misogyny and bullying complaints.
The Euro Med Monitor group reports that some 24,000 civilians in Gaza have been killed so far in just nine weeks by Israel’s bombing, shelling and invasion, around half of them children. Israel is also continuing to kill Palestinians in the occupied West Bank. Politicians around the world have called on the International Criminal Court to investigate and prosecute Israeli government ministers for genocide and other war crimes.
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Hastings council leadership quits Labour to form Independent Group
Resignation statement damning of lack of policies and vision
Hastings council cabinet (including two Green then-members) in May 2022
The leadership of Hastings Council has announced its resignation from the Labour Party to form a Hastings Independents group. A statement from the group summarising their reasons reads:
After long and careful consideration, we have made the difficult decision today to leave the Labour Party and become independent councillors.
There are many reasons, but our view is that standing up for Hastings, and especially for our residents, will be much easier as independents.
The national Labour Party no longer provides us with the policies, the support or the focus on local government that we need given the many local issues we are committed to tackling.
We will now concentrate on standing up for Hastings, to work in partnership with all those who are passionate to drive our town forward, and our work in our communities, which is why we all became councillors.
As a group, we will not be making any further comment until the New Year.
Cllr Paul Barnett Leader of the Council
Cllr Maya Evans Deputy Leader of the Council
Cllr Andy Batsford Cabinet member
Cllr John Cannan Cabinet member
Cllr Ali Roark Cabinet member
Cllr Simon Willis Cabinet member
HASTINGS INDEPENDENTS
The Hastings cabinet consisted last year of six Labour and two Green councillors, but the coalition fell apart with the Greens ‘booted out’. Labour was already a minority on the council, but the largest party with fifteen out of thirty-two councillors. Now the party has less than a third of Hastings councillors, having already lost Norwich, Oxford and Burnley councils over outrage at Keir Starmer’s support for Israeli war crimes. It remains to be seen in the new year whether the genocide in Gaza is among the Hastings group’s ‘many reasons’.
Update: Statements by two of the councillors include Gaza among the reasons for their resignation:
Statement Cllr John Cannan, Wishing Tree Ward, Hastings Borough Council
Cabinet Member and Chair of the Charity Committee
14th December 2023
In May 2022 I was extremely proud to be elected as Labour Councillor for Wishing Tree Ward. I worked hard to get elected and received great support from the Labour Group. That same group of Labour comrades provided me with so much encouragement as I found my feet as a new Councillor. Since that time I have worked hard for the residents of Wishing Tree advocating for them across a broad range of issues.
In October 2022 I was delighted to be invited to join Cabinet as Chair of The Charity Committee. It’s been a real pleasure to work with a cabinet group of such talented, energetic, creative, and hardworking people. I have thoroughly enjoyed the journey described above which is why it has been such a difficult decision for me to make to resign from the Labour party with immediate effect.
Unfortunately, during the time I describe above the Labour Party Leadership and officials have moved the party away from the core values that I hold dear; protecting the most vulnerable, fairness, co-operatively working for the common good, protecting the interests of workers, cherishing the NHS, green policies to fight climate change, international co-operation to name a few. This has been evidenced by a failure to support striking workers and their unions, rowing back on green investment, support for the continued privatisation of the NHS and an appalling response to the tragedy currently taking place in Gaza.
At a local level unelected party officials have undermined Hastings Borough Council leadership over and over again. They vetoed a popular co-operation agreement with the Green Party. They have prevented popular local politicians from applying to stand as the local MP and have ‘parachuted in’ their favoured candidate. What does all this say about local democracy? They have blocked the deputy leader of the Council from standing as a councillor in the forthcoming local election. Where once there was a broad church receptive to ideas from all perceived wings of the party, there is now a narrow-minded vindictiveness directed at those on the left.
I wouldn’t join the Labour Party as it presents and operates today, hence this decision.
I look forward to working with the very talented group of newly independent Councillors who, I know, will put what is best for Hastings at the very core of everything they do.
Statement by Cllr. Maya Evans, Hollington Ward, Hastings Borough Council
Deputy Leader of the Council, Cabinet member for Regeneration & Climate Change
14th December 2023
I would like to announce my resignation of the Labour whip.
I was proudly elected councillor for Hollington ward in 2018 and have taken great pride and honour in serving my residents. Hollington has proven to me the importance of community solidarity and how people who have been given the least in life, often give the most when it comes to helping others. I have been both humbled and inspired by residents who have twice elected me to represent them on the council, and to be the change they want to see.
Over the last few years, it has become increasingly apparent that the Labour Party has moved away from many of its core values and principles. To woo the Tory vote the Labour Party has lost its way, leaning into right wing policies and rhetoric which has become increasingly difficult to publicly justify and support.
I understand that Labour’s current election strategy is to mirror the Tories, and although I want rid of the current abhorrent Government, I cannot continue to volunteer hundreds of hours to an organisation which no longer represents working people, no longer stands up for the persecuted and oppressed, and no longer has a vision to radically improve life for a huge portion of society who are on low incomes, marginalised and vulnerable. I know lots of Labour supporters will feel confusion and maybe even anger at my decision, however it has now become impossible to continue with integrity.
Locally we have been micromanaged by Westminster centric unelected Labour Party officials who have barely visited Hastings let alone understand the town and its residents. The national Labour Party has denied Hastings’ members the right to select their own parliamentary candidate and selection of councillors; and there is now a well-established national pattern of the Labour Party blocking people of colour from leadership positions. It appears unelected Labour officials now have a very fixed idea around who is electable, sadly this tends not to favour people of colour, working class people, or local people from the community. I have personally been blocked by the Labour Party from standing as an MP and also to re-stand as a councillor, reasons given were spurious.
Labour’s policy position on Gaza has been completely unforgiveable, from not supporting a ceasefire, to silencing politicians from speaking out, expelling an MP, unofficially instructing councillors not to attend peace marches, and enforcing a three-line whip which led to the resignation of 10 Labour MP shadow ministers. To date 18,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, 7,000 of which were children. To stay silent is to not support humanity.
I will continue to work hard for my residents as a Hastings Independent councillor, I will continue to uphold the values and principles I was elected upon, moreover I will continue to put Hastings first, prioritising everything I do for the furtherment of the town and its residents.
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Urgent call goes out for support at picket of Royal Society of Arts Israel fundraiser
Staff walk out in protest but need support
An urgent call has gone out from staff and activists for supporters to join them outside the Royal Society Of Arts (RSA) building at 8 John Adam Street, next to Charing Cross station.
According to sources at the demo, the RSA organised a fundraiser for Israel, without notifying staff, with Israeli president Isaac Herzog and far-right Israeli ambassador Tzipi Hotovely, who this week dismissed the idea of Palestinian statehood. Staff walked out in protest to mount a picket but need support to bolster their numbers.
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Video: IDF ‘executes’ Palestinian women, children, babies in school
CONTENT WARNING: harrowing Al Jazeera video exposes horrific scene of slaughter
A video released by Al Jazeera shows the bodies of women and children ‘piled up’ in a school near Jabalia in northern Gaza, where they had been shot at point blank range by Israeli soldiers who witnesses say had already executed the men sheltering with them.
Human rights watchdog Euro Med Monitor has also reported ‘executions’ by occupation troops:
Well over 66,000 parliamentarians, civil society figures and others from around the world have today called on the International Criminal Court to launch a formal war crimes prosecution against Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu, his cabinet and others responsible for the growing list of murders and atrocities in Gaza.
In case the Al Jazeera YouTube video is deleted, it is accessible here.
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Video: Webbe ‘I will not be accomplice’ to war crimes, signs call for ICC Gaza investigation
Leicester East MP issues no-holds-barred speech; over 66,000 sign letter to International Criminal Court
Leicester East MP Claudia Webbe MP has signed a formal call to the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigate and prosecute Israeli war crimes in Gaza.
And in a no-holds-barred Westminster Hall speech to MPs explaining her decision to put her name to the formal letter of complaint, she said that she ‘will not be an accomplice’ to the daily atrocities against Palestinian civilians:
Webbe was one of the first of more than 66,000 international lawmakers, civil society representatives and civilians to sign the official complaint asking on the ICC to investigate, prosecute and arrest Israeli government figures, including Israel’s PM Benjamin Netanyahu, Defence Minister Yoav Gallant and Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, for war crimes against the people of Gaza including genocide and crimes against humanity.
“‘Never again’ must mean never again for anyone”
In a statement today, Ms Webbe MP said:
I have signed a formal complaint to the International Criminal Court for Justice calling on them to investigate and prosecute the Israeli government for war crimes against the people of Palestine, including genocide and crimes against humanity.
Israel’s bombardment of Gaza has destroyed or severely damaged 60-70% of homes and public buildings – some estimates say 80-90% – and has killed more than 20,000 civilians, including at least 10,000 children, as well as maiming countless others, who are now forced to undergo amputations and other serious surgery without anaesthetic, in impossible conditions.
The death toll from bombs and missiles is horrifying, but the toll from starvation and disease is set to be even worse, with Israel only allowing a fraction of the aid into Gaza that its people need and the UN unable to distribute it effectively because so many of their trucks have been destroyed. More than 150 UN personnel have been killed.
Yet the Israeli government is blaming the UN for the situation and is using humanitarian aid as a weapon of war, while Israel’s ministers have even suggested dropping a nuclear bomb on Gaza and talk openly of ‘Nakba 2023’ – a repeat of the violent mass expulsion of Palestinians in 1948 – and Israeli troops have planted flags in the centre of flattened residential districts to stake their claim.
I have received well over 6,000 letters and emails from constituents calling for an immediate ceasefire and I am comforting too many who have lost family under the rubble and others desperately worried about their loved ones and friends in Gaza and I will not be silent. Collective punishment is a war crime, forcible transfer of the population is a war crime, indiscriminate bombing and the use of white phosphorus on civilians – now confirmed by Amnesty International – is a war crime. I will not be an accomplice.
I have signed the formal complaint to the International Criminal Court because there must be accountability for those responsible, and I have urged my colleagues in Parliament to do the same.
Never again must mean never again for anyone.
The formal letter of complaint to the ICC, which has been signed by hundreds of politicians globally as well as more than 66,000 others, is still open for readers to add their names here. Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, Podemos Social Rights minister Ione Belarra Urteaga and a host of other global lawmakers have signed. Details of signatories can be found here.
Despite the huge number of signatures, the UK media appear determined to ignore the war crime prosecution call.
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As Gaza burns, Labour organises ‘Keir-aoke’ to raise party funds
Starmer’s party isn’t satisfied with making us cringe through billionaire donations, support for war crimes and contempt for Palestinian suffering
With more than 20,000 slaughtered in Gaza by Israel – around half of them children – and many more maimed, Keir Starmer is rightly facing jeers and heckling everywhere he goes, because of his support for Israel’s ‘right’ to ‘defend itself’ by the mass murder of civilians and the razing of schools, hospitals and homes.
Labour’s response? A fundraiser titled ‘Keir-aoke’ – not to raise funds for oppressed Palestinians facing an illegal occupation and an apartheid system that treats them as lower than animals, but for whatever purposes the party thinks fit:
Despite donations from billionaires and corporations, Labour is still telling its members that it depends on their donations to survive – but clearly the regime’s numerous begging letters aren’t getting a good response and the party machine is somehow deluded enough to think mutilating language to name an event after Starmer is going to be more, not less appealing.
The lowest price for a ticket to this cringe-fest is £16.96 (but only for ‘concessions’), though people can save money by not going and instead buying – seriously – a ‘solidarity’ ticket for a mere £15:
Labour has already had to cancel one event because of protests by human rights supporters outraged by Starmer’s and local MP Steve Reed’s enthusiastic support for genocide, but the party is clearly not inclined to think, let alone learn, and its delusion runs deep.
Meanwhile, people with actual human feeling will be marching in their hundreds of thousands, in London and around the country, for justice, a ceasefire and an end to the illegal occupation of Palestine:
Check here for the actions near you – but be aware that at the time of writing, the PSC event page appears to be under an attack that is suspiciously affecting only that page on the PSC’s website.
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Video: Jewish Elders chain themselves to White House fence demanding ceasefire
At the same time, US Capitol police arrest dozens of Jewish peace protesters in Washington
Image: Jewish Voice for Peace Twitter account
A group of elderly Jewish people who want to see an end to Israel’s slaughter of Palestinian civilians have chained themselves to the fence of the White House, demanding immediate action from US president Joe Biden to secure a ceasefire and chanting, “Biden, Biden, pick a side, Ceasefire not genocide”:
On Twitter, the group said:
We are Jewish elders, bubbies, tetas, and grandmothers chaining ourselves to the White House, demanding the US stop funding and arming genocide against Palestinians. This is not complicated. Never again means never again for anyone.
As the elders chanted outside Biden’s residence, US police arrested dozens of Jewish and Palestinian peace protesters, who had mounted a sit-in at the Senate to call for a ceasefire and the abandonment of a Biden plan to send billions more in military aid to Israel.
A spokeswoman for one of the groups involved in the protest said:
Funding more death and destruction of human life.. makes no one secure and instead fuels hatred and continued war.
The Senate must heed our urgent demand to stop funding militarism and instead invest in life.
The action by Jewish protesters to condemn Israel’s actions and demand a ceasefire undermines the false narrative pushed by the UK media and Establishment that all Jewish people intrinsically support Israel and its aims and that anti-zionist Jewish groups are somehow ‘fringe’ elements who should not be allowed a voice. In the US, despite moves by Congress to equate anti-zionism automatically with antisemitism, very many Jews are non- or anti-zionist and are fully supportive of Palestinian freedom, self-determination and right of return. Jewish groups have also been prominent in pro-Palestinian marches here, though the UK media often tries to avoid showing them.
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