Democracy gone Astray: Thursday, September 05, 2024

Democracy Gone Astray

Democracy, being a human construct, needs to be thought of as directionality rather than an object. As such, to understand it requires not so much a description of existing structures and/or other related phenomena but a declaration of intentionality.

This blog aims at creating labeled lists of published infringements of such intentionality, of points in time where democracy strays from its intended directionality. In addition to outright infringements, this blog also collects important contemporary information and/or discussions that impact our socio-political landscape.

All the posts here were published in the electronic media – main-stream as well as fringe, and maintain links to the original texts.

[NOTE: Due to changes I haven't caught on time in the blogging software, all of the 'Original Article' links were nullified between September 11, 2012 and December 11, 2012. My apologies.]

Thursday, September 05, 2024

Palestinian teacher determined to stay in Gaza, whatever the cost

Abdallah al-Naami cannot stop wondering what will come next as the Israel-Hamas war approaches the end of its second week.

“What kind of life will be left in Gaza after all this? It’s day 13. Around half of Gaza is wiped out,” the 23-year-old journalist, photographer and teacher told Al Jazeera. “Even if we survive the bombs, we survive starvation, what will be left?”

Al-Naami lives in Gaza, a narrow band of Palestinian territory pressed against the Mediterranean Sea.

As the death toll in Gaza nears 3,800 from two weeks of Israeli aerial bombardment, we go to the occupied West Bank to speak with Dr. Mustafa Barghouti. “With the passage of each minute, more Palestinians are killed,” says Barghouti, general secretary of the Palestinian National Initiative. Barghouti has been a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council since 2006 and is also a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization Central Council. He discusses Biden’s visit to Israel, the “clearly Israeli” strike on Al-Ahli Arab Hospital, Israel’s plans to annex Gaza, and the collapsed civilian society there, where residents have no access to clean water, no hospital beds for critical medical care and no safe haven. “The game is clear: They want to ethnically cleanse, completely, the Gaza Strip.”

Horrifying racial and class injustices lie at the heart of contemporary child welfare policies in the United States, as Alan J. Dettlaff demonstrates in his recently released book, Confronting the Racist Legacy of the American Child Welfare System: The Case for Abolition.

Among the most shocking is this: Half of all Black children will be subject to a Child Protective Services (CPS) investigation by their 18th birthday.

“Today’s separations occur under a facade of benevolence,” Dettlaff writes, “a myth that has been perpetuated over decades by those in power, that family separations are necessary to save the most vulnerable children” from abuse and neglect.

“Judge imposes gag order on Donald Trump” is a perfect headline for Trump’s campaign fundraising machine, which is bleeding mounds of cash to pay for the former president’s mounting legal bills. It’s a snappy statement, free of any context, and has the power to immediately rile up both fans and foes on social media.

The Trump campaign kicked into high gear after a federal judge hit the former president with a protective order on Monday, a common occurrence in legal cases under intense media scrutiny. The partial gag order is limited in scope, but Trump and his campaign quickly framed it as an attack on Trump’s “free speech” and his effort to “save America” from “Third World Marxist Tyranny,” as one message in a flurry of emails to supporters put it on Tuesday. The email adds that MAGA fans who donate $47 to the campaign will receive a t-shirt with a picture of Trump.

Tomer Eliaz, a 17-year-old boy in the kibbutz of Nahal Oz, was forced to go door-to-door by Hamas and tell neighbors to come out, saying he would be killed if they didn’t.

Several opened up and were murdered, while others were hauled off as hostages to Gaza. After using the teenage boy as bait, the Islamist militants shot him dead too.

Just 800 meters from the Gaza border, Nahal Oz was one of the first Hamas targets on October 7, and the events of that morning are now painfully seared into the minds of residents Elad Poterman and Addi Cherry.

A Pentagon report on China’s military power says Beijing is exceeding previous projections of how quickly it is building up its nuclear weapons arsenal and is “almost certainly” learning lessons from Russia’s war in Ukraine about what a conflict over Taiwan might look like.

The report released on Thursday also warns that China may be pursuing a new intercontinental missile system using conventional arms that, if fielded, would allow Beijing “to threaten conventional strikes against targets in the continental United States, Hawaii and Alaska.”

The leaderless House was plunged deeper into chaos on Thursday after Republicans refused to coalesce around a speaker and a plan to empower an interim speaker collapsed.

The party’s embattled candidate for speaker, congressman Jim Jordan of Ohio, vowed to press ahead, scheduling a long-delayed third vote on his nomination for Friday morning.

But angry and exhausted, the House Republican conference ended the day of fiery closed-door sessions no closer to breaking the impasse that has immobilized the chamber for a 17th day.

Israel security officials have signalled their readiness to embark on a ground offensive into Gaza that they say will be far more comprehensive and ferocious than any previous conflict with Hamas.

Israel’s defence minister, Yoav Gallant, visited troops on the Gaza border on Thursday, telling them: “You see Gaza now from a distance, you will soon see it from inside. The command will come.”

“I am tasked with leading us to victory,” Gallant told the soldiers. “We will be precise and forceful, and we will keep going until we fulfil our mission.”

As the mortifying destruction of the besieged and overpopulated Gaza Strip by Israel continues at full speed, with hundreds of Palestinians losing their lives in a single attack on the al-Ahli Arab Hospital on Tuesday evening alone, fears that the conflict may spill over and trigger another multi-front war in the region are also growing.

The Israeli missiles that already transformed much of Gaza into piles of rubble have also struck targets in Lebanon and Syria. In Syria, Israeli missile strikes left two major airports out of service. In Lebanon, Israeli shelling in the southern part of the country killed Reuters journalist Issam Abdallah, and injured several others. Egypt has also been directly affected by the escalation, with Israel repeatedly bombing the Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza.

On the morning of October 7, I woke up around 7:30am to find a message on our family WhatsApp group from my parents explaining that they heard sirens and moved into their safe room. As they often face threats and hear sirens where they live, I wasn’t immediately worried.

I made my morning coffee and turned on the news. This is when I learned that Hamas was intruding on Israeli villages and became worried. I immediately called my father. It was 7:35am. He picked up and told me, “Yes, Maoz we are in the safe room. We hear them shooting. That’s it.”

Canada has pulled 41 diplomats out of India in the latest escalation of a bitter dispute over the killing of a Sikh separatist in Vancouver.

The Canadian government made the decision to recall its diplomats after the Indian government said it would revoke their diplomatic immunity, Canadian Foreign Minister Melanie Joly said on Wednesday.

Joly said India’s threat to revoke their diplomatic immunity was “unprecedented” and violated international law.

BERLIN — A military ground offensive by the Israel Defense Forces in the Gaza Strip would last years and involve horrific fighting, David Petraeus, who served as a top U.S. general in both Iraq and Afghanistan, told POLITICO's Power Play podcast.

Speaking after the brutal attacks by Hamas militants on Israel which left 1,400 dead and thousands injured, the former director of the Central Intelligence Agency warned that pursuing the IDF's bombing campaign with a land invasion "could be Mogadishu on steroids very quickly."

In the classic film “Modern Times,” Charlie Chaplin tried to impress a woman by roller-skating while blindfolded. Again and again, the unwitting Chaplain skates perilously close to a cavernous hole. Only by happenstance does he avoid a fatal plunge.

Keep this image in mind if you’re tempted to send up a cheer or a sigh of relief that Jim Jordan has — for now — been denied the speakership of the House. If it’s a cause for celebration, it should be decidedly muted, because it’s another example of just how close America has repeatedly come to an all-out political catastrophe. It’s also a reminder that the more close calls there are, the more likely it is that at some point, the worst will indeed happen.

Jim Jordan’s improbable rise to the cusp of Capitol Hill’s top job has delighted many conservatives, who see an accomplished infighter bent on impeaching President Joe Biden.

He’s a model presence on Fox News during an era in which success for many Republicans is measured in cable news hits, instead of old-fashioned legislating. His installation as speaker would mark the first time the GOP’s top lawmaker hailed from the party’s growing hard-right contingent. He’s in good standing when it comes to one of the GOP’s most important yardsticks — his relationship with former President Donald Trump.

There’s a reason why House Republicans can’t settle on a speaker.

It’s the same reason there are effectively parallel GOP presidential primaries. One is between a series of candidates embarked on all the usual rituals vying for support from about half the party’s voters, while the other half has long ago made up its mind about who its preferred nominee is. His name may ring a bell.

There is no longer a cohesive Republican Party. There’s a pre-Trump GOP and a post-Trump GOP, living together uneasily. They may be roommates but they’re not married.

China has blown past previous projections for the size of its nuclear arsenal and is now producing even more weapons while expanding its navy, the Pentagon is warning in a new report released Thursday.

The Defense Department specifically believes China had more than 500 nuclear warheads in its arsenal as of May, roughly 100 more than last year, according to its annual China Military Power Report.

DOD also estimates China will likely double that to more than 1,000 nuclear warheads by 2030, and the number is expected to grow, the report says.

With the House effectively shut down, the Senate has the upper hand on Washington’s two biggest issues this fall — aiding Ukraine and Israel and keeping the government open.

Even if the House GOP selects a speaker or a caretaker leader to claw out of the current chaos, its Republicans will already be in a weakened state as the White House prepares a massive, potentially $100 billion request for national security aid. Instead, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s Senate GOP looks to have the Republican sway over both that foreign money debate and the fight to avoid a shutdown.

Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, has said Moscow’s relations with North Korea have reached a “new level”, as concern grows over deepening military ties between the two countries amid the war in Ukraine.

Speaking on Thursday in the North Korean capital, Pyongyang, Lavrov hailed last month’s summit in Russia’s far east between Vladimir Putin and the North’s leader, Kim Jong-un, as evidence that bilateral ties were at a “qualitatively new, strategic level”.

A Russian-American journalist has been detained in Russia on charges of violating its foreign agents law, reportedly due to her coverage of Russia’s military mobilisation for its invasion of Ukraine.

Alsu Kurmasheva, an editor with Radio Free Europe-Radio Liberty’s (RFE-RL) Tatar-Bashkir service, was detained on Wednesday by masked Russian law enforcement agents.

RFE-RL confirmed her detention in a statement on Thursday and said Kurmasheva had been charged with failure to register as a foreign agent and faced up to five years in prison.

Leftwing Jewish activists campaigned against Israel’s bombardment and blockade of Gaza this week in Washington, culminating in protests that have seen hundreds arrested for civil disobedience outside the White House and Congress.

But groups like the Anti-Defamation League have dismissed the actions as unrepresentative of fellow Jews, signalling a growing rift in the community as the war in the Middle East continues to claim thousands of lives.

Police detained about 400 demonstrators on Wednesday after they staged a sit-down protest on Capitol Hill inside the Cannon Building, the oldest congressional office building, demanding an immediate ceasefire in the latest hostilities between Israelis and Palestinians.

Authoritarianism expert Ruth Ben-Ghiat on Wednesday addressed the chilling threats that some House Republicans have received for not backing Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) to replace ousted Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) as House speaker.

Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-Iowa) has received what she described as “credible death threats and a barrage of threatening calls,” Rep. Don Bacon’s (R-Neb.) wife has received threatening text messages and Rep. Nick LaLota (R-N.Y.) has been told to: “Go fuck yourself and die.”

Former Donald Trump lawyer Sidney Powell has pleaded guilty to six charges in the Georgia election interference case.

Powell, who was charged alongside the former president, reached a deal with prosecutors and will now testify at future trials.

There are 19 defendants in the case, most of whom have pleaded not guilty.

Powell faced charges of conspiracy to commit intentional interference of election duties.

Pfizer told pharmacies and clinics this week it will soon price a five-day course of COVID-19 treatment Paxlovid at almost $1,400, more than two-and-a-half times what the federal government has paid for the antiviral pills.

The Wall Street Journal first reported Wednesday that Pfizer plans to price a course of the oral antiviral at $1,390, far higher than the U.S. had paid at $529. The drug was authorized in the U.S. in 2021 and quickly became a key tool to help treat those at risk of developing severe infections from COVID-19.

The Party of God

Hezbollah, or the Party of God, is one of the most important Islamist movements in the Middle East. Based in Lebanon, it has a powerful military wing, which is the focus of current concern, but it also runs a political party that wields decisive influence, TV stations and an extensive network of welfare services including clinics and schools. Its sprawling business interests, both licit and illicit, bring in hundreds of millions of dollars.

The leaderless House was plunged deeper into chaos on Thursday after Republicans refused to coalesce around a speaker and a plan to empower an interim speaker collapsed.

The party’s embattled candidate for speaker, congressman Jim Jordan of Ohio, vowed to press ahead, scheduling a long-delayed third vote on his nomination for Friday morning.

But angry and exhausted, the House Republican conference ended the day of fiery closed-door sessions no closer to breaking the impasse that has immobilized the chamber for a 17th day.

Noy Katsman knew the eulogy for their murdered brother would anger some who came to mourn, but did not want the violence of Hayim Katsman’s death to eclipse his life as a peace activist.

Grief and loss at Hayim’s slaughter was magnified by watching Israel launch a war in his name, said Noy, who is non-binary. So at the funeral, relying on a Jewish tradition of respect for the bereaved, Noy called for it to stop.

Moscow has pledged its "complete support" for North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, says Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

Mr Lavrov, who is on an official trip to North Korea, also thanked the country for its support in Ukraine.

His ongoing trip sets the stage for a possible visit to the country by President Vladimir Putin.

Last week, the US said North Korea had begun sending large shipments of arms to Russia for use in Ukraine.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping has told Russian President Vladimir Putin the “political mutual trust” between their countries was “continuously deepening” as the two men met for bilateral talks in Beijing.

State news agency Xinhua reported on Wednesday that Xi also called for joint efforts by China and Russia to “safeguard international fairness” and “justice” as he hailed “close and effective strategic coordination” between their two countries.

Xi noted that he and Putin had met “42 times in the past 10 years and [had] developed a good working relationship and a deep friendship”.

Israel’s police chief, Kobi Shabtai, has said there will be “zero tolerance” for protests in support of Gaza in Israel, threatening to send anti-war demonstrators to the besieged Palestinian enclave that Israel has been bombarding daily for nearly two weeks.

Shabtai’s comments came in a video posted on the TikTok channel of the Israeli police on Tuesday. Israeli media picked it up on Wednesday after police broke up a rally in Haifa in support of Gaza, arresting six people.

Democracy gone Astray