Joe Biden

In my latest article about Israel’s still-ongoing genocide in Gaza, I reflect on the latest death toll of 41,496 Palestinians, compiled by Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, which also indicates that 90% of those killed were civilians, and discuss the latest investigation by +972 Magazine, exposing the existence of an AI program, codenamed “Lavender,” which auto-generated bombing targets with little or no human oversight, contributing immensely to the devastating civilian death toll. I note, however, that the existence of the AI program shouldn’t distract us from the reality that Israel’s aim has always been genocide, as evidenced by bombing raids in which no military target is discernible, through the complete destruction of Gaza’s entire infrastructure, its war on hospitals, its summary executions and enforced disappearances, its incessant use of snipers and quadcopters (often deliberately targeting children), and its use of starvation. I end by noting that unconditional western support for Israel finally seems to be waning, particularly as a result of outrage generated by the killing of six western aid workers (and a Palestinian), which, of course, only demonstrates a fundamental racism in the west. Despite the hypocrisy, however, I conclude that it is worth exerting as much pressure as possible on western politicians and the media to permanently shift their positions and to begin the necessary moves towards finally ending Israel’s 76-year impunity, and, by whatever means, ending its current, and unprecedented genocidal slaughter.

My latest article about Israel’s genocide in Gaza follows the most recent report, by the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor, that over 40,000 people (mostly civilians) have now been killed by Israel over the last five months. I discuss the latest horrors to be inflicted on the trapped Palestinians of Gaza — deliberate starvation — and assess how, despite so much unconditional support for Israel in the west, an untold number of people are waking up to the fact that Israel is the last European colonial settler project, and that the brutality of the Israelis, their belief in themselves as the “chosen people”, and their horrendous dehumanization of the Palestinians, is all part of the same colonial template that western countries undertook for many centuries, and which in some cases (including the UK and France) involved their engagement in unspeakable brutality as recently as the 1950s, and into the 1960s. With western countries still engaged in desperate attempts to stifle all criticism of Israel, I conclude with a hope that an end to this horrific situation is in sight, that Gaza will be rebuilt and Palestinians given autonomy, that Israel will collapse, and that everyone who has supported this genocide in any way will be permanently ostracized.

Two weeks into Israel’s relentless bombing of Gaza, as the death toll reaches 5,926, including 2,450 children, I discuss ongoing western complicity, focusing on President Biden’s visit to Israel last week, his hypocrisy, his rambling and often contradictory speech, and his absurd claim that Hamas’s attacks on October 17 were not only Israel’s equivalent of the 9/11 attacks, but, “for a nation the size of Israel, it was like 15 9/11s.” Making a comparable assessment, I explain how, for the people of Gaza, their deaths to date are equivalent to 285 9/11s. I also discuss “administrative detention” in Israel, comparable to indefinite imprisonment without charge or trial at Guantánamo, and also reflect on how a Guantánamo analogy can be made regarding the 2.3 million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip, which is an open air prison, and where those held are all regarded as guilty of Hamas’s crimes, according to Israel’s President, Isaac Herzog. Finally, I look at the growing body of evidence that Israel’s attacks on Gaza constitute genocide, with particular reference to a UN report last week, in which nine Special Rapporteurs stated “There is an ongoing campaign by Israel resulting in crimes against humanity in Gaza”, and adding that “there is also a risk of genocide against the Palestinian People.”

My detailed report about, and the video of ‘Close Guantánamo!’, an extraordinary and hugely powerful three-hour event held at the EU Parliament on September 28, 2023, featuring nine speakers, including Mansoor Adayfi (on what was only his second trip to freedom since he finally got a passport earlier this year) and two other former prisoners, two lawyers, a UN Rapporteur, myself and others, hosted by the inspiring independent Irish MEPs Clare Daly and Mick Wallace. As the event highlighted, the priorities for anyone concerned with justice, and with bringing to an end Guantánamo’s vile existence, are to resettle 16 men still held who have been approved for release (for which the countries of EU can help), providing adequate medical care for everyone still held at the prison, reminding the US government that it continues to have an obligation to ensure the welfare of former prisoners, even after their release, and, eventually, seeking accountability for the crimes that the US government has committed, and still continues to commit at Guantánamo.

My analysis of the significance of a DoD Sanity Board’s assessment that Ramzi bin al-Shibh, one of five men accused of involvement in the 9/11 attacks, who are caught up in seemingly endless pre-trial hearings in Guantánamo’s broken military commissions, is unfit to stand trial because he suffers from PTSD and psychosis. That assessment has been accepted by the military judge in the 9/11 case, but meanwhile President Biden has refused to accept conditions requested by the 9/11 co-accused in plea deals that have been ongoing for the last 18 months, since prosecutors finally recognized that the use of torture had made a successful trial untenable. The conditions include the lifelong provision of adequate physical and mental health care, which has not been provided at Guantánamo, and which, ironically, has contributed significantly to bin al-Shibh’s inability to stand trial.

My reflections on how, 21 years after Guantánamo opened, the men still held, and those who have been released, are still deprived of fundamental rights as human beings, just as they were when they were first sent to Guantánamo in the first place, to be held as “enemy combatants.”

The video – with my introduction – of ‘Guantánamo: 21 Years On’, the very first episode of a new English language show, ‘The London Circle’, broadcast by the Arabic news channel Al Hiwar TV, featuring Moazzam Begg and I in discussion with Anas Altikriti.

A letter from over 150 rights groups, including Close Guantánamo, which was sent to President Biden on the 21st anniversary of the opening of the prison at Guantánamo Bay, on Jan. 11, 2023, identifying it as “the iconic example of the abandonment of the rule of law”, and urging him to close it without any further delay.

Events marking the 21st anniversary of the opening of Guantánamo, on Jan. 11, including online events that I’m taking part in in the US and the UK, and a march and rally in London. A particular focus this year is the shameful situation faced by the 20 men (out of 35 in total) who have been approved for release but are still held.

Linking to, and discussing my recent interview with Chris Cook of Gorilla Radio in Canada, about the collapse of Liz Truss’s government, after just 44 days, the baleful influence of the Tufton Street ‘think-tanks’, and the unending agony of Brexit, plus discussion of the plight of Julian Assange and the current situation at Guantánamo. Chris also played the Four Fathers’ anti-Brexit anthem, ‘I Want My Country Back (From The People Who Wanted Their Country Back)’, and my article also includes some post-interview reflections on Rishi Sunak as the new Prime Minister, and the many challenges he faces, not least on Brexit.