W. Niederhut

William Saletan has long been one of my favorite op-ed journalists in the U.S. Republicans Are Rationalizing Cruelty Toward Gaza November 1, 2023 at 11:00 am EDT By Taegan Goddard William Saletan: “I’m Jewish. I believe in Israel, and I’m aghast at what Hamas did to so many innocent people on October 7. I strongly support the use of force against the killers.” “But as thousands of innocent people die in Gaza—not as targets, but as victims of relentless bombardment in a war they didn’t choose—I can’t accept the bigotry, zealotry, and callousness these candidates are espousing. They aren’t standing up against ruthless religious violence. They’re promoting it.”

I'm re-printing this for non-subscribers. Thanks to the CIA, we might never know the full truth behind JFK’s assassination By Jefferson Morley October 31, 2023 Jefferson Morley is vice president of the Mary Ferrell Foundation and editor of the JFK Facts newsletter on Substack. What does the Central Intelligence Agency know about the reasons for the assassination of President John F. Kennedy that it won’t tell the American public? As the 60th anniversary of JFK’s assassination approaches, the CIA has gained control of the historical record. As a result, the most important Kennedy files might never be seen, leaving unanswered the question of the exact nature of the agency’s interest in Lee Harvey Oswald. Was the CIA merely incompetent in dealing with the itinerant Marxist Marine, or did it use him for some still-classified purpose? Or is there another explanation for its unwillingness to share all it knows? The clandestine service is no longer under any obligation to answer such questions. When it comes to the Kennedy assassination files, the CIA has won the battle over full disclosure. The 1992 JFK Records Act was supposed to lay ongoing questions to rest by mandating the release of all government files related to the shooting of the president in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963. The law, passed by a unanimous Congress (including then-Sen. Joe Biden), created an independent civilian review panel that declassified almost 320,000 documents starting in the 1990s. Although these documents did not yield proof of an assassination conspiracy, they detailed the CIA’s monitoring of Oswald between 1959 and 1963. They revealed that the CIA station in Miami did not believe Oswald acted alone. And they generated sworn testimony about Kennedy’s autopsy, all of which undermined the official story that a “lone gunman” killed the president for reasons known only to himself. The released records showed that former CIA director Allen Dulles compromised the Warren Commission’s investigation by shielding the agency’s operations around Oswald from scrutiny. Counterintelligence chief James Angleton sought to “wait out” the commission by denying it key cables about the alleged assassin. And then-Deputy Director Richard Helms testified, falsely, that the agency had only “minimal information” about Oswald before Kennedy was killed. In fact, the pre-assassination Oswald file, partially released in the 1990s — but not fully declassified until this past April — confirmed that the CIA’s information on him was extensive, detailed and up to date. The agency opened a file on Oswald in November 1959 after he traveled to Moscow and declared his allegiance to communism. Counterintelligence officers intercepted and read his mail. When he moved to Minsk, in present-day Belarus, and married a Russian woman, they collected reports on his movements from the FBI, the State Department and the Office of Naval Intelligence. Upon Oswald’s return to the United States in June 1962, the CIA’s interest deepened. The agency funded his enemies among anti-Castro Cuban student exiles. In September 1963, top officials at the agency’s headquarters in Langley were notified of Oswald’s arrest for fighting with CIA-sponsored students in New Orleans who had generated propaganda about the ex-defector’s pro-Castro activities. CIA surveillance teams in Mexico City took pictures of the Soviet Embassy, which Oswald visited in October 1963. By the time Kennedy left for Texas on Nov. 21, all this information was known to a small group of senior officers at Langley. The agency has acknowledged that it engaged in a Kennedy coverup. In a partially declassified 2013 journal article, in-house historian David Robarge conceded that the CIA had concealed relevant information from the Warren Commission. Robarge insisted, however, that the deception should not call into question the “lone gunman” theory. In his Orwellian formulation, the CIA had merely engaged in a “benign coverup.” In 2017, President Donald Trump let the JFK Records Act’s 25-year deadline for full disclosure slip. While proclaiming that the Kennedy files had been released, Trump acquiesced to the agency’s demand to keep portions of more than 11,000 documents secret. In 2021, President Biden did the same, while giving the CIA another year to release additional information. The National Archives now says that all Kennedy assassination files have been released — with the exception of no fewer than 3,648 documents that still contain redactions. No one knows when the American people will see these records, if ever. A CIA-authored Transparency Plan, approved by Biden in June, effectively guts the records act by eliminating presidential oversight, the only lever that has ever compelled the agency to obey the law. The CIA has repeatedly concealed aspects of the Kennedy story. For example, in a June 1961 memo, presidential adviser Arthur Schlesinger made the case for reorganizing the clandestine service. Sixty-two years later, the agency asserts that this ancient policy proposal is a threat to national security today. The CIA has redacted more than a page of Schlesinger’s memo — and Republican and Democratic presidents have approved the censorship. That’s real power. The agency has dodged accountability and fortified its position in the capital’s constellation of power. But this has come at a cost. As the plausibility of the “lone gunman” theory has deteriorated, suspicions of the CIA have increased. We don’t know whether the agency is maneuvering simply to prevent revelations of its own incompetence, or whether it’s concealing an undisclosed psychological warfare program to manipulate Oswald and discredit pro-Castro forces, or whether it’s merely acting out of some bureaucratic instinct for secrecy that is its own justification. But as long as it fails to practice full disclosure on this story, public suspicion will endure. As former president Harry S. Truman wrote in The Post one month after Kennedy’s assassination, the agency’s actions have turned it into “a symbol of sinister and mysterious foreign intrigue.” And they contribute to a broader mistrust of the federal government, which has grown steadily since the Warren Commission report was published in 1964. Doubts about the “lone gunman” theory have mutated into distrust of all aspects of government activity, including public health, voting and elections. After 60 years, nothing does more to encourage the notion that a domestic “deep state” operates beyond the reach of democratic institutions than the CIA’s continuing stonewalling on the Kennedy assassination. Its “victory” on the full release of the assassination files is a loss for democratic self-government.

Let me guess. Will our forum's favorite, Orwellian propagandist, Michael Griffith, also claim that the CIA and their mainstream media propagandists didn't work to systematically smear Jim Garrison and Oliver Stone? Geez... It's all about the CIA and the military-industrial complex "controlling the past"-- the false historical narrative. Michael Griffith reminds me of those government-employed propagandists in the novel, 1984, who spent their work days writing false copy about historical and current events in order to manipulate the masses. This isn't rocket science. If the American public learned the truth about history-- e.g., about JFK's murder, and PNAC's 9/11 "New Pearl Harbor" op-- would the military-industrial complex still be able to control the present and future? Doubtful. As GHWB said, toward the end of his life, "If the American people knew what we Bushes had done, they'd lynch us in the streets." And the Leo Straussian Neocons (Wolfowitz, Feith, et.al.) always believed that the ignorant American masses had to be manipulated to support PNAC's expensive military objectives. The same thing was true in the case of killing JFK in order to escalate the U.S. wars against communism in Vietnam, Indonesia, and throughout the Third World. Griffith is working as a verbose salesman for U.S. military-industrial mythology.

Netanyahu declares a Holy War of Annihilation on Civilians of Gaza, Citing the Bible (juancole.com)

Ron, My wife's cousin from Dallas was so sick of the heat wave in Texas this year that he and some friends came up to Estes Park, Colorado on Thursday, to spend a few days at my father-in-law's cabin. Then it snowed last night, and it will get down to 14 F tonight, with a high of 23 F today. Life isn't fair.

Addendum: It looks like my response (above) to Sandy's question got buried at the bottom of the page within one minute of my post. So, I want to remind people that we have a tree and a forest here. Griffith's Tehran conference claim is his latest tree. The forest is the 30 year U.S. government defamation campaign to create a false impression that Prouty was not an honest, credible witness of U.S. Deep State history.

Sandy, What evidence has Michael Griffith presented to support his claim that Chiang Kai-shek and/or his delegates did not meet, secretly, with Stalin in Tehran? On the contrary, Prouty, himself, flew the delegates to Tehran in a VIP Lockheed Lodestar. Griffith's timeline has been debunked, in which he claimed that Chiang and his delegates could not have met with Stalin en route to Karachi from Cairo. Meanwhile, the larger picture in this Tehran debate is that Griffith has posted a redundant series of false, defamatory claims about Prouty on the forum during the past year-- apparently, for the purpose of promoting the false impression that Prouty was not an honest, rational witness of CIA and U.S. military ops. This 30 year-old Prouty defamation campaign is similar to the well known U.S. government defamation campaigns attacking the credibility of Prouty's associates, Jim Garrison and Oliver Stone.

So, Dubya strutted out to the mound, smiling, tonight and threw the first pitch into the dirt in front of the catcher. Then it hit me. Things have been so bad in the Trump era that, despite all of Dubya'sserious policy mistakes-- tax cuts, Afghanistan, and Iraq-- he's an affable model of mental stability compared to Donald Trump. I read somewhere that, after listening to Trump's Inaugural Address in 2016, Dubya turned to someone sitting next to him and said, "That was some weird sh*t right there."

Thanks, Don, Jr. I needed a laugh today. It all makes sense now... 🤥 Tucker Carlson and Fox were fluffing RFK, Jr. as a "Democratic plant" to undermine Trump. Don Jr. Says RFK Jr. Is a ‘Democrat Plant’ October 27, 2023 at 11:09 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 91 Comments Donald Trump Jr. told Iowans while volunteering for his father’s 2024 presidential campaign that Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s candidacy is just a Democrat ploy, The Messenger reports. Said Trump Jr.: “It legitimately always felt like it was a Democrat plant to hurt the Trump thing. He wouldn’t be there if the Democrats didn’t want him.”

77 year-old George W. Bush will be throwing the first pitch in Game One of the World Series tomorrow in Arlington. Dubya sold his share in the Texas Rangers franchise prior to the 2000 Presidential primaries. Rangers pick historic figure to throw out first pitch in Game 1 of World Series (msn.com)

I posted the archived NYT cable indicating that Chiang Kai-shek had been officially invited, in Cairo, to meet with Stalin in Tehran. I also debunked your timeline claiming that Chiang and his delegates could not have conferred with Stalin in Tehran, en route to Karachi. Your other defamatory claims about Prouty have been repeatedly debunked during the past year, after you joined this forum. But at least Greg Kooyman is cheering for your bunk, while dodging Paul Brancato's question.

Question for the mods. If a guy like Michael Griffith keeps repeating debunked claims, ad infinitum, is there a point where the Education Forum finally says, "No mas?" Griffith has now posted pages and pages of redundant, defamatory McAdams-type disinformazia about Col. L. Fletcher Prouty and JFK's 1963 Vietnam policy decisions. Whenever the subject, or honest questions, arise, Griffith simply re-posts the same debunked McAdams talking points. It's not a debate. It's like trying to converse with a television broadcasting the same Swift Boat Vet ads.

Geez...what a pathetic choice for Speaker-- hardly less objectionable than Jim Jordan and the other Trump J6 co-conspirators. Perhaps even worse. As for his theology, does this MAGA yahoo think that God put Hitler and Mussolini in office?

Civilian casualties in Gaza since October 7th now exceed 5,000-- about half of them children. Jordan’s Queen: Double standard in treatment of Palestinians | Watch (msn.com) Kristof: We Must Not Kill Gazan Children to Try to Protect Israel's Children October 21, 2023 The crisis in the Middle East is a knotty test of our humanity, asking how to respond to a grotesque provocation for which there is no good remedy. And in this test, we in the West are not doing well. The acceptance of large-scale bombing of Gaza and of a ground invasion likely to begin soon suggests that Palestinian children are lesser victims, devalued by their association with Hamas and its history of terrorism. Consider that more than 1,500 children in Gaza have been killed, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health, and around one-third of Gaza homes have been destroyed or damaged in just two weeks — and this is merely the softening-up before what is expected to be a much bloodier ground invasion. …The United States speaks a good deal about principles, but I fear that President Biden has embedded a hierarchy of human life in official American policy. He expressed outrage at the massacres of Jews by Hamas, as he should have, but he has struggled to be equally clear about valuing Gazan lives. And it’s not always evident whether he is standing four-square with Israel as a country or with its failed prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, a longtime obstacle to peace. …In his speech on Thursday, Biden called for America to stand firmly behind Ukraine and Israel, two nations attacked by forces aiming to destroy them. Fair enough. But suppose Ukraine responded to Russian war crimes by laying siege to a Russian city, bombing it into dust and cutting off water and electricity while killing thousands and obliging doctors to operate on patients without anesthetic. I doubt we Americans would shrug and say: Well, Putin started it. Too bad about those Russian children, but they should have chosen somewhere else to be born. …The best answer to this test is to try even in the face of provocation to cling to our values. That means that despite our biases, we try to uphold all lives as having equal value. If your ethics see some children as invaluable and others as disposable, that’s not moral clarity but moral myopia. We must not kill Gazan children to try to protect Israeli children. More at www.nytimes.com/2023/10/21/opinion/israel-gaza-palestine-children.html?unlocked_article_code=1.40w.v7UG.4WZQwsV6xF_9&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

Pathetic. Paul Brancato asked the disingenuous Prouty bashers an honest question last Saturday, and-- as I predicted-- the response from Michael Griffith is to simply repeat his same old debunked John McAdams defamation tropes. Mcadams - Laughing stock of the internet (blackopradio.com)

Obama is not quite ready to give Joe Biden a Ph.D. in diplomacy for supporting Operation Bomb-a-Baby-for-Bibi. Instead, Obama seems to agree with Bernie Sanders' and Ralph Nader's take on halting the genocide in Gaza (with less strident rhetoric than Nader.) Obama: Israeli military strategy ignoring human costs will 'backfire' Former president Barack Obama posted his thoughts on the conflict to Medium. He acknowledged that Palestinians are continuing to be displaced by a settler movement backed by Israeli policies, but he added that antisemitism and hate toward Palestinians and/or Arabs and Muslims cannot be tolerated. “The world is watching closely as events in the region unfold, and any Israeli military strategy that ignores the human costs could ultimately backfire,” he wrote. He said the Israeli government’s decision to cut off food, water and electricity to a captive civilian population could worsen a growing humanitarian crisis but also “further harden Palestinian attitudes for generations, erode global support for Israel, play into the hands of Israel’s enemies, and undermine long term efforts to achieve peace and stability in the region.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/10/23/israel-gaza-war-news-hamas/#link-7FLQEVS4E5BJFIE7GN3DBBW27A

Nonsense, Matt. It's an epic foreign policy disaster for the U.S.-- with global ramifications. Perhaps you haven't been reading the international news this week-- about Iraqi attacks on U.S. troops, and a mob setting fire to the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. There was also the cancellation by officials in Jordan and Egypt of a scheduled meeting with Biden. This past week also witnessed the resignation of a senior U.S. State Department official, in response to Biden's misguided kowtowing to Netanyahu's war on the besieged civilian population of Gaza. Opinion | The Spectacular Failure of Biden's Middle East Policy | Common Dreams

Matt, Your misleading AP propaganda article is predicated on a semantic sleight-of-hand-- denying that the St. Porphyrios Church compound was hit by an Israeli missile. Go back and read WaPo's detailed, on-the-ground, descriptions of the attack on the St. Porphyrios Church compound (above) and the deaths caused by that Israeli missile attack on the church compound-- similar to the attacks by 6,000+ other Israeli missiles launched into residential neighborhoods in Gaza since October 7th. You should also read this article (below) by the Pulitzer Prize winning former New York Times Middle East correspondent, Chris Hedges, about Israel's history of systematically lying about their crimes against Palestinian civilians. As a long-time Middle East correspondent, Hedges' opinions are based on direct observation. Israel's Culture of Deceit, by Chris Hedges - The Unz Review October 18, 2023

“Peace, War, and 9/11” A Cinematic Portrait of Graeme MacQueen, A Warrior for Peace EDWARD CURTIN • OCTOBER 19, 2023 “Peace, War, and 9/11”, by Edward Curtin - The Unz Review It is one thing to read a review of this important and compelling film – a tour de force – and another to watch it. The former fades into insignificance when one takes an hour-and-a-half to immerse oneself in its tragic yet revelatory story. For in it we see and hear a dying man speak eloquently of how he accepted the role that life brought him – a 9/11 truthteller and peace apostle – and now, as he departs the stage, hopes this last effort will ease his exit and help fulfill his mission as a man of peace. Because Graeme MacQueen was my close friend for the last ten years of his life, I found it very hard to watch this film since his death on April 25th is still raw and painful. For more than three years he suffered greatly and yet found the strength to cooperate with his colleague Ted Walter in the making of this important film. Walter’s direction admirably portrays MacQueen’s nobility by having Graeme narrate his life’s work interspersed with documentary footage that illuminates the truth about many issues, most notably the attacks of September 11, 2001 and the subsequent anthrax attacks. The result is a very powerful and important lesson in personal courage and historical truth. From the opening scenes we see Graeme tell it bluntly and hopefully: that the official story of 9/11 is a fraud, and that because his life’s work has been to oppose war, he hopes he has fulfilled his “mission.” Humble as he was, it is inspiring to hear him speak of his mission, which is another word for vocation or calling, a mystery beyond analysis. “Peace, War, and 9/11” can be viewed here and here. Or you can watch it below. A long-time professor of religious studies at McMaster University in Ontario, Canada where he was the Founding Director of the Center for Peace Studies and a Buddhist scholar, he was also a peace activist, who traveled to El Salvador and worked with peace groups to learn for himself the truth about other conflicts and help resolve them. His writing and research were meticulously logical and evidence based to a fault, and it would be impossible to accuse him of ever reaching rash conclusions based on speculation. While there are powerful documentaries that focus exclusively on facts and are narrated by omniscient and objective narrators, Peace, War, and 9/11, while also based on proven facts, is doubly powerful because it is told by a man whose personal story is a moving example of one who, from a young age, was inspired by a reverence for life and the embrace of non-violence, and whose vocation long preceded his scholarly and anti-war pursuits. The documentary footage begins with a clip from President John Kennedy’s indispensable American University speech of June 10, 1963 where he appeals for an end to the Cold War, the abolishment of nuclear weapons, the end of a Pax Americana, and the establishment of a genuine peace: “. . . the kind of peace that makes life on earth worth living – the kind that enables men and women to grow and to hope and to build a better life for their children – not merely peace for Americans but peace for all men and women – not merely peace in our time but peace in all time.” This clip sets the stage for all that follows, for it is implied that this speech, among his other anti-war actions, led to JFK’s assassination by the CIA. The film makes similar points about the assassinations of Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Robert Kennedy. The point is clear: Peacemaking is a dangerous activity, but it is necessary if we are to reverence life and live by conscience. To listen to MacQueen give his analysis of war as a system, at times cold and others hot, not one event but a series of events – a tumor on human society as he describes it (echoing the tumors that are killing him) – is to receive a concise lesson on war and peace. The film illustrates his words with powerful footage from Vietnam, the Tonkin Gulf, Pearl Harbor, the words of the warmaking class, etc. all leading to the attacks of September 11, 2001. He explains how his suspicions about those events gradually grew until in 2005 he read an article by David Ray Griffin that startled him. It was about the testimony of New York City firefighters who heard explosions in the Twin Towers. This prompted him to pursue what his scholarship had prepared him for: the careful pursuit of textual analysis in pursuit of evidence, and so he read the 12,000 pages of the World Trade Center task force report only to discover that 118 NY firefighters talked about explosions throughout the towers and 10 did not. The more he studied, the more he found additional eyewitness, such as police officers, to bring the number to 156. Such eye witness testimony, reinforced by the first reports from television announcers kept adding up, as thermite was found in the dust of the towers. The evidence for controlled demolition of the buildings kept increasing; he concludes that “the evidence is overwhelming.” His words are supported by confirmatory video from many of the people he mentions. This video testimony makes this film so powerful. From there he dissects the same day emergence of the official narrative which blamed Osama bin Laden for 9/11 without any evidence to support it. It became the propaganda narrative of good versus evil. Evidence for the alleged 19 hijackers was not produced, then or ever. War was simply declared against the bad guys, who were declared guilty by fiat. Finally, Graeme analyzes the anthrax letters that were sent in the weeks following September 11. Only five people died but the effects were profound. He leads the viewer through his important research as presented in The 2001 Anthrax Deception. His book shows conclusively that the anthrax attacks were an inside job coming from a U.S. government lab, not an Al-Qaeda operation. Nevertheless, this led to the Patriot Act, the invasion of Afghanistan, and in 2003 the invasion of Iraq, although all were based on lies. And significantly, if the anthrax attacks were an inside job which he conclusively proves, so too were those of September 11th, as some of the alleged hijackers, particularly the leader Mohamed Atta, were involved in the anthrax deceptions. He concludes by saying many people don’t get the deep state because they can’t imagine treachery of this kind and scope. He accuses many traditional leftists of falling down on the job of showing how 9/11 was a propaganda coup based on “mendacity and deception.” Many such leftists who have often been critics of U.S. domestic and foreign policy – and we are shown pictures of Noam Chomsky, Chris Hedges, Amy Goodman, Glen Greenwald, et al. – have also refused to even discuss the matter. This Graeme says “is probably from fears of looking ridiculous and admitting you were wrong for years and years on a really important topic.” Here I must disagree with my dear friend, for this seems to me false, for these same people could have examined the evidence as Graeme did when he jumped into his research starting in 2005. They adamantly refused then and now and so have given cover for the justification of the endless U.S. wars on terror that are ongoing. I do not believe this was because of “looking ridiculous.” It is more insidious than that. We see an interview with General Wesley Clarke who says he was shown a paper in the Pentagon in late September 2001 where he was informed that the U.S. was not going to just invade Afghanistan but Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and finally Iran. Graeme makes clear that any country that dares to resist the U.S. “and our Israeli companions” will be attacked and destroyed. This is the war system at work. It is, as he says, all about collective punishment; the warfare states will attack you and kill you in large numbers even if you individually have had nothing to do with any of this. Systemic killing is at the heart of this state terrorism, as the Israeli massacres of Palestinians has long shown, even as I write. To cap off his analysis, we are shown video of the collapse of Building 7 at the World Trade Center. It was not hit by a plane and came down in free-fall speed at 5:20 P.M. It was clearly taken down by controlled demolition and its fall was predicted by 60 firefighters in advance. It was the final crime committed that day, one that it has taken many people years to discover, if they have. “We haven’t tried very hard to abolish war,” Graeme says at the end. It is “this mutually reinforcing tumor on societies” that many don’t understand because of its systemic nature and because they don’t take the time to read and study closely all the official narratives that explain it as unavoidable. These are lies. Yet just as 19th century crusaders for justice finally abolished slavery and started a gradual process to try to stop wars – to no avail – the fight goes on. As JFK said at American University, “We all cherish our children’s future. And we are all mortal.” This deeply moving film will elucidate and edify those who care for the world’s children. While one man’s story, it is universal. Graeme MacQueen has departed this earth, but he has fulfilled his mission as a man of peace. “You do your best,” he tells us. What more can we ask of him, and ourselves as well. “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God.”

Pat, Indeed. And it's a train wreck that could escalate into WWIII. The planet's 1+ billion Muslims are enraged by the bombing of besieged civilians in Gaza. U.S. troops have been attacked in Iraq, and a mob tried to burn our embassy in Beirut. Israel is threatening to bomb Iran, and China is, reportedly, sending war ships to the Middle East.

Matt, I'm surprised that you would condone Bibi's current blockade and massacre of women and children in Gaza-- allegedly, in "retaliation" for the recent terrorist attacks by Hamas. The civilian casualties and infrastructure demolition in Gaza has been massive. It's, basically, ethnic cleansing. Do you also condone Chivington's massacre of Native American women and children at Sand Creek in 1864-- in "retaliation for the Cheyenne "Dog Soldier" attacks on white settlers in Colorado? Whites and indigenous Native Americans at war... Anything goes? If JFK were POTUS, at present, I believe he would have endeavored to prevent Netanyahu's war crimes in Gaza. P.S. Your AP "fact check" about the St. Porphyrios Church bombing is dubious. Who owns AP nowadays? The last time I researched that subject, several years ago, AP was being managed by a right wing propagandist named William Dean Singleton who used to own the Denver Post. Church of England joins Catholic, Orthodox churches in calls for ceasefire after Israel kills Christian Palestinians (msn.com)

The U.S. is Israel's main international ally and supplier of funding and armaments, Sandy. Our U.S. military aid to Israel during the past 60 years has been astronomic. Are you suggesting that we have no meaningful role to play in mitigating the Israeli/Palestinian conflict-- including the prevention of war crimes? The bombing of civilian non-combatants-- including Gaza's one million children-- is a war crime. Israel has already destroyed more than 25% of Gaza's residential housing, while blocking food, water, and medicine supplies to its 2.3 million besieged citizens. There was a time in modern history-- especially during JFK's administration-- when the U.S. endeavored to function as a just, neutral mediator there. Now the tiny Gaza Strip is one of the last remaining Palestinian territories occupied by indigenous Palestinians, and Joe Biden has, essentially turned his back on the massacre of Palestinian women and children in Gaza. Have you studied maps of Palestine during the past century?

These "both siderism" tropes about Israel's current bombing of Gaza's civilian population is a real head scratcher. What are people thinking? War crimes are war crimes. It's like claiming that Chivington's 1864 Sand Creek Massacre of Native American women and children was justified because Native Americans and white settlers had been killing each other for years on the Great Plains. Ralph Nader is spot on today, as usual. Opinion | Biden Will Not Escape History's Judgement for Failure to Stop Gaza Assault | Common Dreams

Addendum: Greek Orthodox church struck in deadly Gaza City blast - The Washington Post Maher Ayyad, 72, a member of the community, said the strike hit a two-story building in the church compound, killing 18 people and injuring at least 20. About 100 people were in the bombed building at the time of the strike, he said, and about 400 displaced civilians, mainly Christians, were taking shelter in the entire complex. Among those reported killed were relatives of former U.S. representative Justin Amash, a Libertarian who once represented Michigan’s 3rd Congressional District. Amash tweeted Friday afternoon that several relatives who had been sheltering in the church, including two women he identified as Viola and Yara, were killed in the strike. I was really worried about this. 😔 With great sadness, I have now confirmed that several of my relatives (including Viola and Yara pictured here) were killed at Saint Porphyrius Orthodox Church in Gaza, where they had been sheltering, when part of the complex was destroyed as… pic.twitter.com/w5k1xEeTgF — Justin Amash (@justinamash) October 20, 2023 There are about 1,000 Palestinian Christians remaining in Gaza, and the loss was “huge” for the community, Ayyad said. About 500 Christians, including Ayyad, have relocated to the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate School in Gaza City.

Matt, Indeed. Propaganda abounds during military ops. Oddly, your AP article (above) is the only thing I've seen denying the Israeli bomb hitting the church compound. On the flip side, multiple news sources-- including Reuters, WaPo, Newsweek, and Al Jazeera-- reported that the St. Porphyrios Orthodox Church was damaged by an Israeli missile, killing at least 16 people in the church compound. I first read about this in the Washington Post yesterday. (Article below re-printed for non-subscribers) Historic Orthodox church sheltering civilians struck in deadly Gaza City blast www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/10/20/gaza-church-strike-saint-porphyrius/ The Greek Orthodox St. Porphyrius Church, where Palestinians had been taking shelter, was damaged by an airstrike in Gaza City on Thursday. (Reuters) October 20, 2023 JERUSALEM — The historic Church of St. Porphyrius, Gaza’s oldest active church, was struck Thursday as it sheltered hundreds of Palestinians displaced by the war, according to religious officials. At least 16 Christians were killed in the bombing and unknown number injured, the Gaza-based Palestinian Ministry of Health said Friday. The Washington Post geolocated the strike and confirmed the location of the church based on a video that shows people searching through rubble of a destroyed building in Gaza City. The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem blamed Israel for the strike. The Israel Defense Forces said in an emailed statement that a strike targeting a Hamas control center “damaged the wall of a church in the area” and that it is “aware of reports on casualties” and is reviewing the incident. In footage geolocated by The Washington Post, people searched through rubble after the Church of Saint Porphyrius in Gaza City was struck Oct. 20. (Video: X) The Church of St. Porphyrius’s original structure dates to the 5th century, and the current structure was built in the 12th century. Located in a historic quarter of the city, it is named after a former bishop of Gaza, Saint Porphyrius, and placed where he is believed to have died in A.D. 420. Characterized by thick walls and a richly decorated interior, the church has long been a place of refuge and community for its members, who are a religious minority in the Gaza Strip. Ibrahim Jahshan, a deacon at the church, told The Post that several hundred displaced Christians had taken refuge on the grounds. Rescuers were still digging through the rubble early Friday, but Jahshan said the strike killed nine people and wounded more than a dozen. The Order of St. George, an associated order of the church, issued a statement confirming the strike. “Archbishop Alexios appears to have been located and is alive, but we don’t know if he is injured,” the Order of St. George stated. The blast hit “two church halls where the refugees, including children and babies, were sleeping.” A Palestinian American woman who moved from Gaza to the United States in the early 2000s said in an interview that she had relatives and friends sheltering in the church at the time of the strike, some of whom were injured. “They’re terrified. They’re shaken. They don’t know what to do, and they don’t know where else to go,” said the woman, whom The Post is not identifying because of concern for her family’s safety. She expressed outrage at the idea that more than a million civilians could evacuate from a place as densely populated and heavily bombed as Gaza City — a mass movement called for by Israel last week. “It’s impossible,” she said. She said she grew up going to St. Porphyrius before moving to the United States, and her family has deep ties to the church, dating back to when they became refugees during the 1948 founding of Israel and mass displacement of Palestinians. Describing the congregation as close-knit and family-like, she said she’s not just worried about her relatives. “I’m concerned for everyone because we’re a small community.” Christians make up about 1 percent of Gaza’s population and have faced restrictions and discrimination by Hamas and Gaza’s Islamist government, according to human rights groups. During the 2014 Gaza war, about 1,000 Palestinian Muslims fled Israeli shelling for the Church of St. Porphyrius, where graves were damaged by shrapnel from a nearby strike, Reuters reported. Gaza hospital where hundreds were killed is owned by Anglican Communion branch In a statement early Friday local time, the Patriarchate of Jerusalem said targeting churches sheltering innocent citizens “cannot be ignored.” “The Patriarchate stresses that it will not abandon its religious and humanitarian duty, rooted in its Christian values, to provide all that is necessary in times of war and peace alike.”