Podcasts about middle east monitor

Ralph and team spend the entire hour with Israeli reporter, Gideon Levy, a singular voice in an otherwise compliant domestic press to discuss his book “The Killing of Gaza: Reports on a Catastrophe” a series of columns written before and after the October 7th, 2023 attacks that put this ongoing tragedy in historical context.Gideon Levy is a Haaretz columnist and a member of the newspaper's editorial board. He is the author of the weekly “Twilight Zone” feature, which covers the Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza over the last 25 years, as well as the writer of political editorials for the newspaper. He is the author of The Punishment of Gaza, and his latest book is The Killing of Gaza: Reports on a Catastrophe.If you talk with me about a very broad scheme—not ending this war now in Gaza, but really for a long range, a real vision—the vision is only the choice between an apartheid state between the river and the sea, or a democracy between the river and the sea. There is no third way anymore, unfortunately. And we have to choose, and the world has to choose: Is the world ready to accept a second apartheid state, or is the world ready to act for having an equal democracy for Palestinians and Israelis living between the river and the sea?Gideon LevyWe have to stick to global, universal values: occupation is illegal, apartheid is immoral, and war is always cruel.Gideon LevyAfter the 7th of October, an iron curtain fell between Israel and any kind of human sentiments toward Gaza— the people of Gaza, the victims of Gaza, we don't want to hear, we don't want to know, we are not bothered, and we have the right to do whatever we want.Gideon LevyWe hear about the hundred hostages held by Hamas underground a great deal in the US media, but we don't hear much about the torture and the other mistreatment of thousands of Palestinians—some of them women and children—who were arrested, just arbitrarily kidnapped, and sent to Israeli jails.Ralph NaderNews 12/18/241. Our top story this week comes from Public Citizen Corporate Crime expert Rick Claypool, who reports that the Biden Department of Justice has opted to not prosecute McKinsey, the consulting firm that advised Purdue Pharma to “turbocharge” OxyContin sales even as the opioid crisis reached its peak. Instead, the DOJ announced they would enter into a Deferred Prosecution Agreement with the firm; in other words, the Biden administration is giving McKinsey a get out of jail free card for their role in perhaps the most expansive, destructive, and clear case of corporate crime this century. Claypool rightly calls this deal “Pathetic” and “A slap in the face to everyone who lost a loved one to the crisis.”2. On December 10th, a federal judge blocked Kroger's proposed $20 billion acquisition of Albertsons supermarkets, per the Wall Street Journal. According to the Journal, U.S. District Judge Adrienne Nelson sided with the Federal Trade Commission, which had sued to stop the merger, agreeing that this consolidation in the grocery store sector would “erode competition and raise prices for consumers.” This argument was particularly poignant given the soaring cost of groceries since the COVID-19 pandemic. In the aftermath of this decision, Albertsons has filed suit against Kroger alleging that the larger supermarket chain had resisted calls to “divest itself of a larger number of stores,” in order to stave off the inevitable antitrust actions federal regulators would bring against this merger. Albertsons filed this lawsuit, which seeks at least $6 billion in damages less than 24 hours after the ruling, per the Journal.3. On December 14th, the BBC reported 26-year-old OpenAI whistleblower Suchir Balaji was found dead in his San Francisco apartment. In October, Balaji exposed that OpenAI had flagrantly violated US copyright laws while developing its flagship AI program ChatGPT. Balaji's revelations form the underpinnings of lawsuits against OpenAI by news publishers, including the New York Times, as well as best-selling authors who allege their work was unlawfully used to train the company's AI models. The BBC reports that Balaji's death was ruled a suicide by the San Francisco medical examiner's office and that his body was discovered by police when they were called in to “check on his wellbeing.” This report does not include who called in the wellness check.4. According to intrepid independent journalist Ken Klippenstein, the New York Times has issued internal guidance directing staff to “dial back” its use of photos of Luigi Mangione's face. The reasons for withholding images of Mangione's face – bizarre in its own right given the inherent newsworthiness of such photos – is however just the tip of the iceberg. The Times has also directed its reporters to refrain from publishing Mangione's manifesto, despite having copies in their possession. As Mr. Klippenstein puts it “This is media paternalism at its worst, the idea that seeing the shooter's face too much, or reading his 262-word statement, will necessarily inspire copy-cat assassinations and should therefore be withheld from the public.” To his immense credit, Mr. Klippenstein has published the manifesto in full, which is available on his Substack – as are photos of Mangione's face.5. Turning to the Middle East, the diplomatic tension between Israel and Ireland continues to deepen. On December 11th, the Middle East Monitor reported that Ireland will “formally join South Africa's genocide case against Israel,” at the International Court of Justice, following formal approval by the Irish government. Ireland will reportedly ask the Court to “broaden its interpretation” of what constitutes genocide, according to the nation's Foreign Minister Micheal Martin. Martin went on to say that Ireland is “concerned that a very narrow interpretation of what constitutes genocide leads to a culture of impunity in which the protection of civilians is minimised,” and that the government has also approved joining the Gambia's genocide case against Myanmar. Just days later, Israel announced that the country would shutter its embassy in Dublin, accusing Ireland of “extreme anti-Israel policies,” including joining the genocide lawsuit and recognizing the state of Palestine, per CNN. Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris, facing harsh criticism from Israeli politicians, wrote “I utterly reject the assertion that Ireland is anti-Israel. Ireland is pro-peace, pro-human rights and pro-International law.”6. In more Palestine news, the Hill has published a heartrending op-ed by Hamid Ali, widower to Aysenur Eygi, the American citizen murdered in cold blood by the IDF during a protest in the West Bank in September of this year. This piece begins “What do you do with the clothes your wife was wearing when she was killed, now stained with her blood? How do you preserve them as evidence for an investigation that may never happen? What else can you do when your government has given no indication that it will hold her killer — a soldier in the army of a close ally — accountable[?]” Ali goes on to tell the story of how he met Aysenur, how they fell in love, and eventually got married – and recounts the eyewitness testimony that she was shot after “20 minutes of calm, sheltering behind an olive tree.” Ali also expresses his anger and frustration – both at the Israeli military's flimsy attempt to cover up the murder by falsely claiming she was “shot accidentally during a violent protest,” an assertion that, he notes, was swiftly debunked by major news outlets – and at the United States government, which has refused to hold the Israeli military accountable. Ali ends this piece by laying out how he and his family will meet with the State Department and members of Congress next week to “plead with them to do something about Aysenur's senseless killing…support our family's call for an independent U.S. investigation into her death and accountability for the soldier that killed her…[and] urge President Biden to prioritize this case in the last days of his administration and uphold justice for our family.”7. Last week, we reported on the so-called “mutiny” of younger Democrats against the old-guard poised to take the ranking member committee seats in the new Congress. Chief among these was AOC's bid to seize the ranking member slot on the Oversight Committee from Congressman Gerry Connolly, who is 74 years old and suffering from cancer. At first, it seemed like the young Congresswoman from Queens had successfully outmaneuvered Connolly – even going so far as to pledge that she would no longer back primary challenges against incumbent Democrats, a cornerstone of her outsider brand and appeal, POLITICO reports. Yet, with help from the Democratic power brokers including Nancy Pelsoi, Connolly was able to beat back this challenge at the Democratic Steering Committee. The final vote was a lopsided 131-84, per Axios.8. Our last three stories this week concern the legacy of the Biden Administration. First, progressives are calling on the president to pardon environmental lawyer Steven Donziger, who has faced persecution as a “corporate political prisoner” per American University's Center for Environment Community & Equity for his role in suing Chevron over that company's environmental devastation in Ecuador. In a letter signed by 34 congressional Democrats, led by Congressman Jim McGovern and including Senators Bernie Sanders and Sheldon Whitehouse, along with Representatives Rashida Tlaib, Pramila Jayapal, and Jamie Raskin among others, the progressives write “Mr. Donziger is the only lawyer in U.S. history to be subject to any period of detention on a misdemeanor contempt of court charge…the legal case against Mr. Donziger, as well as the excessively harsh nature of the punishment against him, are directly tied to his prior work against Chevron.” This letter continues “Pardoning Mr. Donziger”…[would send] “a powerful message to the world that billion-dollar corporations cannot act with impunity against lawyers and their clients who defend the public interest.” We echo this call to pardon Donziger, particularly since President Biden's recent, highly-publicized pardons have consisted of corrupt public officials and his own troubled son Hunter.9. Next, Reuters reports that on December 11th, the Senate opted not to back President Biden's renomination of Lauren McFerran to the National Labor Relations Board. The upper chamber voted 50-49 against holding a confirmation vote, with the usual suspects – Senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema – defeating the move. Had the Senate reconfirmed McFerran, the balance of the labor board would have remained tilted in favor of Democrats and their allies in organized labor. Now, incoming President Trump will be able to stack the board with his own nominees, expected to be much friendlier to business. Trump is also expected to sack NLRB General Counsel Jennifer Abruzzo, who has been instrumental in leveraging the power of the NLRB in favor of workers.10. Finally, on a lighter note, Deadline reports the NLRB has ruled that contests on the Netflix dating show Love Is Blind are in fact employees under the law. This reclassification opens the door to widespread unionization throughout the unscripted television sector, which has long skirted the heavily-unionized Hollywood system. The fallout from this decision will have to be observed over time and the Trump NLRB could certainly seek to hold the line against unionization in that industry – of which Trump himself was a longtime fixture – but this decision could mean an almost unprecedented expansion of the Screen Actors Guild. We will be watching.This has been Francesco DeSantis, with In Case You Haven't Heard. Get full access to Ralph Nader Radio Hour at www.ralphnaderradiohour.com/subscribe

First on today's show, Ralph welcomes back Dr. Bandy Lee to discuss her recent conference, "The More Dangerous State of the World and the Need for Fit Leadership—The Much More Dangerous Case of Donald Trump". Then, Ralph is joined by Professor Ted Postol to talk about the missiles and rockets (and other weapons) being used in the expanding war(s) in the Middle East. [Nadia Milleron] went down to Springfield, the state capitol, and met with every assembly member, saying—for future wrongful death, you should give people in Illinois the opportunity to file for punitive damages against these corporate defendants, or other similarly-positioned defendants. And she got it through—it was considered impossible to beat Boeing, and she got it through and the governor signed it. That's the determination of a parent who loses a child to corporate crimeRalph NaderDr. Bandy Lee is a medical doctor, a forensic psychiatrist, and a world expert on violence who taught at Yale School of Medicine and Yale Law School for 17 years before joining the Harvard Program in Psychiatry and the Law. She is currently president of the World Mental Health Coalition, an educational organization that assembles mental health experts to collaborate with other disciplines for the betterment of public mental health and public safety. She is the editor of The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump: 37 Psychiatrists and Mental Health Experts Assess a President and Profile of a Nation: Trump's Mind, America's Soul.Let me clarify that there's a distinction among the evaluations that mental health experts do—one is diagnostic, the other is functional. And the diagnostic exam is the one that mental health professionals have no business doing on a public figure because that's what you do in private therapy sessions, and you diagnose someone in order to outline their course of treatment. But a functional assessment is something you do for the public—and that includes unfitness or dangerousness—and these kinds of comments are not only permitted, they are part of our societal responsibility because we are responsible not just for private individual patients, but for the public, for society.Dr. Bandy LeeDonald Trump is not an isolated phenomenon. He is a product of the system that has come before him and he is an accelerator of the dangers that succeed him. I do not believe that a Biden presidency would have been this dangerous without a Trump presidency preceding him. Dr. Bandy LeeTed Postol is Professor of Science, Technology and National Security Policy Emeritus in the Program in Science, Technology, and Society at MIT. His expertise is in nuclear weapon systems, including submarine warfare, applications of nuclear weapons, ballistic missile defense, and ballistic missiles more generally. He previously worked as an analyst at the Office of Technology Assessment and as a science and policy adviser to the chief of naval operations. In 2016, he received the Garwin Prize from the Federation of American Scientists for his work in assessing and critiquing the government's claims about missile defenses.I do not want to appear like I don't think it matters, but at the same time, it's been provoked to the point that it's amazing that the Iranians have restrained themselves to this point. But the Iranians know that they're going to suffer heavy damage from Israel. They have not wanted to go to war. They have shown great wisdom and restraint in spite of the situation.Ted PostolWhat the Israelis want—this guy Netanyahu in particular, who I think is delusional besides being psychopath—what Netanyahu wants, he wants a decisive victory. Again, let me underscore that—a decisive victory against Iran and also Hezbollah and Gaza, these poor victims of his genocide in Gaza. He can't do that. He's going to kill God knows how many more people in his effort—which is already a crime against humanity that's beginning to look like the Holocaust—but he's not going to defeat Hezbollah in a decisive way. Ted PostolIn Case You Haven't Heard with Francesco DeSantisNews 10/2/241. ProPublica reports “The U.S. government's two foremost authorities on humanitarian assistance [USAID and the State Department's Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration] concluded this spring that Israel had deliberately blocked deliveries of food and medicine into Gaza.” Yet just days later, instead of acting upon this information, Secretary of State Antony Blinken misled Congress telling lawmakers “We do not currently assess that the Israeli government is prohibiting or otherwise restricting the transport or delivery of U.S. humanitarian assistance [to Gaza].” In USAID's report, the agency laid out specific examples of Israeli interference, including “killing aid workers, razing agricultural structures, bombing ambulances and hospitals, sitting on supply depots and routinely turning away trucks full of food and medicine.” The State Department Refugee bureau separately concluded that “the Foreign Assistance Act should be triggered to freeze almost $830 million in taxpayer dollars earmarked for weapons and bombs to Israel, according to emails obtained by ProPublica.” Yet because Blinken refused to accept these facts and instead opted to lie to Congress, the weapons pipeline to Israel continues to flow unimpeded. Some, including Nihad Awad, national executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, have called on Blinken to resign, per the Middle East Monitor.2. On September 27th, Israel assassinated Hezbollah Secretary-general Hassan Nasrallah. According to NBC, the Israelis made this decision “after concluding [Nasrallah] would not accept any diplomatic solution to end the fighting on the Israel-Lebanon border that was not tied to an end to the war in Gaza.” Through this assassination, and the assassination of Hamas Political Bureau chairman Ismail Haniyeh earlier this year, Israel has made clear that they would rather resort to extrajudicial killings than negotiate an end to the ongoing genocide in Gaza. Israel now plans to invade Southern Lebanon, further escalating this conflict into a regional war, with the full backing of the United States.3. Following the pager and walkie-talkie attacks in Lebanon, the office of Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib issued a statement decrying that “The Biden-Harris administration continues to allow Netanyahu and the Israeli government to operate with impunity as they carry out war crimes. After facing no red line in Gaza…Netanyahu is now expanding his genocidal campaign to Lebanon…Deploying more U.S. troops and sending more U.S. bombs will only lead to more suffering and carnage. The...administration is capable of stopping the bloodshed. President Biden must implement an immediate arms embargo to end the slaughter and de-escalate the risk of a wider regional war.” Yet, far from de-escalating, the Biden administration has stood by while Netanyahu has escalated further, with increasing signs that the situation will tip over into a full-scale regional war between Israel and Iran. Dark days indeed could be ahead.4. This week, Hurricane Helene cleaved a “500-mile path of destruction” stretching from Florida to the Southern Appalachians, per CNN. So far, the casualties include at least 128 dead and whole communities wiped off the map. Yet, this devastation is not limited merely to peoples' homes and communities. In a darkly ironic twist, “Hurricane Helene's severe flooding [in Asheville, North Carolina] knocked offline the top tracker of U.S. and global climate data, including of extreme weather…The National Centers for Environmental Information,” or NCEI. According to the NCEI, “Even those who are physically safe are generally without power, water or connectivity,” per Axios. And just outside Atlanta, Vox reports “Amid the devastation and mass flooding…A chemical fire [at BioLab] released a massive plume of potentially toxic gasses into the air.” Officials issued a shelter-in-place order Sunday evening covering Rockdale County, home to around 90,000 people. EPA testing detected signs of chlorine gas in the air. Fulton County, which includes parts of Atlanta, has reported “a haze and strong chemical smell.”5. Last week, the International Trade Union Confederation published a report accusing “Some of the world's largest companies of undermining democracy across the world by financially backing far-right political movements, funding and exacerbating the climate crisis, and violating trade union rights and human rights.” This report specifically names Amazon, Tesla, Meta, ExxonMobil, Blackstone, Vanguard and Glencore. This report cites a litany of damning acts by these corporations – ranging from union busting and environmental degradation to funding of far-right and anti-indigenous movements around the globe – but makes the fundamental point that “This is about power, who has it, and who sets the agenda. …They're playing the long game, and it's a game about shifting power away from democracy at every level into one where they're not concerned about the effects on workers – they're concerned about maximizing their influence and their extractive power and their profit…Now is the time for international and multi-sectoral strategies, because these are, in many cases, multinational corporations that are more powerful than states, and they have no democratic accountability whatsoever, except for workers organized.” Per the Guardian, “the ITUC includes labor group affiliates from 169 nations…representing 191 million workers…the federation is pushing for an international binding treaty…to hold transnational corporations accountable under international human rights laws.”6. Yet, although these corporations are being called out for their role in undermining democracy, the Biden administration is granting many of them large sums of money via the newly announced “Partnership for Global Inclusivity on AI.” According to the State Department, this partnership will bring together the Department of State, Amazon, Anthropic, Google, IBM, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia, and OpenAI to “promote inclusivity, respect for human rights, digital solidarity, and equitable access to the benefits of AI globally.” As the American Prospect's Luke Goldstein notes, every single one of the companies listed are currently facing lawsuits or are under investigation by either the Department of Justice or the Federal Trade Commission, and two of these corporations were clients of Secretary of State Antony Blinken's during his time as a consultant at WestExec Advisors. And in California, Variety reports Governor Gavin Newsom has vetoed SB 1047, a bill that “sought to ward off catastrophic risks of highly advanced [AI] models…[that] could be used to develop chemical or nuclear weapons.” This bill was strongly supported by SAG-AFTRA.7. A new article in the Atlantic makes the case that “Legalizing Sports Gambling Was a Huge Mistake.” On a previous program we discussed how the “widespread legalization of sports gambling over the past five years has [led to a] roughly 28% increase in bankruptcies and an 8% increase in debt transferred to debt collectors,” along with substantial increases in auto loan delinquencies and use of debt consolidation loans. Beyond the financial damages however, this piece cites a new University of Oregon study that found in places where sports gambling is legalized, a loss by the home NFL team increases intimate partner violence by approximately 10%. As Deseret News put the question, “If, after six years, a law was discovered to be encouraging domestic violence while causing people, especially the poor, to lose what little money they could put toward savings, what would be the correct next step?”8. On September 24th, the Federal Trade Commission took action against Invitation Homes, the country's largest landlord of single-family homes, for “an array of unlawful actions against consumers, including deceiving renters about lease costs, charging undisclosed junk fees, failing to inspect homes before residents moved in, and unfairly withholding tenants' security deposits when they moved out.” The FTC complaint cites a 2019 email from Invitation Homes' CEO “calling on the senior vice president responsible for overseeing the company's fee program to ‘juice this hog'” by making additional fees mandatory for renters. This action comes as “Democrats Are Torn Between Donors and Their Base,” over the high-profile FTC Chair Lina Khan, Wired reports. While many billionaire Democratic donors have publicly called for Khan's ouster, polling shows around “80 percent of Democrats feel that the government should be doing more to take on corporate monopolies, compared to only 3 percent who say it should be doing less...[and] Nearly 90 percent of Democrats…feel that lobbyists and corporate executives hold too much power over the government.” To his credit, powerful House Democrat Jim Clyburn recently defended Khan when asked whether she should be fired, saying “… fired for what? For doing [her] job?…I suspect that people who represent Invitation Homes may want her to be replaced by somebody who would not do their [job],” per the Huffington Post.9. POLITICO Europe has published a shocking exposé documenting “the atrocities carried out during the summer of 2021 by a [Mozambican] commando unit led by an officer who said his mission was to protect ‘the project of Total.'” The “Total” in question being TotalEnergies, the French energy titan operating an enormous liquid natural gas plant in the Southeast African country. According to this report, “villagers had been caught in the crossfire between the Mozambican army and ISIS-affiliated militants. Having fled their homes, they had gone to seek the protection of government soldiers. Instead…[t]he soldiers accused the villagers of being members of the insurgency. They separated the men — a group of between 180 and 250 — from the women and children. Then they crammed their prisoners into… shipping containers…hitting, kicking and striking them with rifle butts. The soldiers held the men in the containers for three months. They beat, suffocated, starved, tortured and finally killed their detainees. Ultimately, only 26 prisoners survived.” Beyond this horrific massacre, this piece investigates the complex relationship between the Mozambican government, the Islamist insurgency, and French energy interests operating in Mozambique.10. Finally, on the eve of the inauguration of Claudia Sheinbaum, Mexico's incoming president and the first ever Jewish head of state in North America, tensions are mounting between the country and its northern neighbor, the United States. On his way out, popular left-wing president Andrés Manuel López Obrador, or AMLO, has declared a Yucatán port owned by Alabama-based Vulcan Materials a nature reserve in a move that the company is calling “expropriation.” According to Reuters, the company has quarried limestone in Mexico for over three decades and AMLO has long criticized their activities as environmentally damaging. AMLO also offered offered up to 7 billion pesos or $362 million for the land, but Vulcan rejected the offer. In response to AMLO's move, Republican Senators Katie Britt of Alabama and John Cornyn of Texas sent a letter “threatening Mexico with ‘crushing consequences' if the incoming Administration of Claudia Sheinbaum,” doesn't reverse this decision, per José Díaz Briseño of Reforma. This vague saber rattling raises the question, voiced by decorated journalist Ryan Grim, “Are Senate Republicans threatening some kind of coup”?This has been Francesco DeSantis, with In Case You Haven't Heard. Get full access to Ralph Nader Radio Hour at www.ralphnaderradiohour.com/subscribe

Ralph welcomes former TV writer turned grass roots organizer, Jason Berlin, who explains how his group, Field Team 6, uses the latest data and analytics to identify and reach out to potential Democratic voters in order to register them to vote and how that could turn the tide in purple, flippable states.Jason Berlin is a former TV writer and co-founder of Field Team 6, a national voter-registration project that organizes voter drives to register Democrats in the most flippable states across the country.The fact is you can't get out the vote if those voters don't exist to begin with. It's like no one had a talk with people about where a voter comes from. So we concentrate on that first half of the equation—getting people over that biggest hurdle, getting them registered, generating this river of new Democrats and Independents who can then get into the system and be targeted by the massive get-out-the-vote machinery.Jason BerlinThe Democratic Party over the years has exhibited serious symptoms of masochism. It's like they've written off half the country, where they don't even compete.Ralph NaderIn Case You Haven't Heard with Francesco DeSantisNews 9/4/241. On August 28th, the Israeli Defense Forces targeted United Nations World Food Programme vehicles with “repeated gunfire,” per CNN. According to the agency, “Despite being clearly marked and receiving multiple clearances by Israeli authorities to approach, the vehicle was directly struck by gunfire as it was moving toward an…IDF…checkpoint.” Photos show at least ten bullet holes in the vehicle windows. As this piece highlights, “ongoing airstrikes and repeated evacuation orders by Israeli forces have forced many of the agency's food warehouses and community kitchens to shutter…The IDF-designated ‘humanitarian zone' in Gaza is also steadily shrinking; in the past month alone, the IDF has reduced this zone by 38%.” This incident is reminiscent of the Israeli strike on World Central Kitchen workers in April, when the IDF killed three Britons, a Palestinian, a US-Canadian dual citizen, an Australian, and a Pole via multiple airstrikes. Two days after the World Food Programme incident, CNN reported that the IDF killed four in a humanitarian aid vehicle affiliated with the American Near East Refugee Aid organization.2. On Monday, the Israeli labor federation, Histradrut, called a general strike in order to “pressure Netanyahu's government into changing its approach to cease-fire negotiations,” per NPR. This action was taken in response to the death of six hostages who would have been released had Israel agreed to the ceasefire proposed in early July. According to NPR, “Many schools and government buildings were shut…[and]…Ben Gurion airport…paused flights for several hours.” Yet, Israel's Labor Court quickly ordered the strike to end and the union obeyed; the action lasted less than one business day. This incident illustrates the deep discontent with the Netanyahu government's handling of the hostage negotiations, but also the impotence of Israeli civil society to change course.3. In more positive news related to labor and Israel, Democracy Now! reports Jimmy Williams Jr. president of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades, says his union is “directing its massive international pension fund to divest from the Gaza genocide.” According to left-wing British outlet Skwakbox, the Painter's Union receives $330 million dollars in new contributions from union members each year.4. The Middle East Monitor reports “Ray Youssef, CEO of the Bitcoin marketplace platform, Noonesapp…[alleges that cryptocurrency giant Binance] ‘has seized all funds from all Palestinians as per the request of the IDF. They refuse to return the funds. All appeals denied.'” Responding to this allegation, a Binance spokesperson claimed that this seizure of assets only covers a limited number of accounts linked to “illicut funds,” though “Binance did not specify the extent or value of the ‘illicit funds' involved.” Boosters of cryptocurrency, like Robert F. Kennedy Jr., have framed it in terms of “transactional freedom,” per Axios. Not so for the Palestinians, it seems.5. Jeremy Corbyn, former leader of the U.K. Labour Party, has united with four other independent, pro-Gaza MPs to form the Independent Alliance, per the BBC. This new parliamentary bloc will “use their…platform to campaign for scrapping the two-child benefit limit and against arms sales to Israel.” With five MPs in this alliance, it already outnumbers the Green Party and is equal to Reform UK, the far-right party formed by Brexit champion Nigel Farage. In their first move since forming the Independent Alliance, the MPs issued a statement in response to Foreign Minister David Lammy's announcement that the U.K. will suspend a small number of arms export licenses to Israel. This statement reads “For months, we have called for an immediate and full suspension of arms sales to Israel. The government has finally admitted there is a clear risk of weapons being used to commit violations of international law…This announcement must be the first step in ending all arms…used by the Israeli military to commit genocide in Gaza.”6. According to the ACLU of Indiana, “[Indiana University] has approved a new policy that prohibits all expressive activity if it takes place between 11 p.m. and 6 a.m., even if the activity is not at all disruptive, such as standing silently, holding a sign, wearing a t-shirt with a communicative message, or discussing current events with friends.” This policy, which “carries harsh punishments, including suspension or expulsion for students, and suspension or termination of staff,” was adopted in response to campus pro-Palestine demonstrations last year. The ACLU of Indiana has already filed a lawsuit to overturn this chilling policy. And at New York University, Palestine Legal reports “In a dangerous escalation of repression, [NYU] announced new student conduct policies last week that appear to prohibit criticism of Zionism. If implemented, these policies risk creating a hostile environment for Palestinian and anti-Zionist Jewish students and severely curtail…free expression.” This statement notes that NYU does not afford protected status to any other political ideology and that this decision “opens the door for other ethno-nationalist ideologies to claim protection from criticism. With Zionism enshrined as a protected class, there's no reason why Hindu nationalism, Christian nationalism, white nationalism or similar ideologies wouldn't be afforded the same.” Palestine Legal has vowed that it will “continue to monitor and combat institutional attempts to punish and censor students organizing for Palestinian rights.”7. In a major escalation of tensions, the United States seized Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro's plane in the Dominican Republic and transferred it to Florida, per the BBC. According to this report, “US officials said the plane was seized for suspected violations of US export control and sanctions laws,” while Venezuelan officials have denounced this move as an act of “piracy,” and “reserves the right to take any legal action to repair this damage to the nation.” Foreign Minister Yván Gil said the US had justified itself “with the coercive measures that they unilaterally and illegally impose around the world.” This is just the latest case of western governments seizing Venezuelan state assets; in 2018, the Bank of England seized nearly $2 billion worth of Venezuelan gold and has refused to return those assets despite urging from the United Nations special rapporteur on sanctions, per Declassified UK.8. The Miami Herald is out with a stunning new report on the dubious “Havana Syndrome” which finds that patients were “coerced” to join an NIH study on the supposed illness. According to this piece, “An internal review board at the National Institutes of Health…decided to shut down a long-term study of Havana Syndrome patients that found no signs of brain injuries, after several participants complained of mishandled medical data, bias and pressures to join the research. [Jennifer George] A spokeswoman for NIH said the internal review found that ‘informed consent' policies to join the study ‘were not met due to coercion.” Though George insists the coercion was not on the part of the NIH, she declined to identify who coerced the patients.9. Daniel Nichanian of Bolts Magazine reports “[Arizona Democratic Senate nominee Ruben] Gallego, fresh off of a police union endorsement, just penned a letter to the US [Department of Justice] asking them to stand down in its investigations against the Phoenix police and its effort to bring the department under a consent decree.” The proposed consent decree in question stems from a DOJ investigation that found “[Phoenix PD] uses excessive force, including unjustified deadly force… unlawfully detain, cite, and arrest people experiencing homelessness and unlawfully dispose of their belongings…discriminates against Black, Hispanic, and Native American people when enforcing the law…violates the rights of people engaged in protected speech and expression…[and] discriminate against people with behavioral health disabilities when dispatching calls for assistance and responding to people in crisis.”10. Finally, in more positive Senate-related news, a new Split Ticket poll shows populist Independent candidate Dan Osborn running neck-and-neck with incumbent Republican Senator Deb Fischer in Nebraska. While Donald Trump leads Kamala Harris 54 to 37, the same poll shows Senator Fischer leading by only 1 point – 39% to Osborn's 38%, with 23% undecided. Osborn, a union leader who organized the 2021 Kellogg strike, has been favorably profiled by the American Prospect. There is no Democrat running for this seat.This has been Francesco DeSantis, with In Case You Haven't Heard. Get full access to Ralph Nader Radio Hour at www.ralphnaderradiohour.com/subscribe

Ralph welcomes Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, an American trauma surgeon who worked at the European Hospital in Khan Younis. They'll discuss Dr. Sidhwa's experience on the ground in Gaza, as well as his letter (co-signed by 45 other American medical practitioners) to President Biden, VP Harris, and First Lady Dr. Jill Biden. Then, Ralph is joined by University of Chicago Booth School of Business Professor Luigi Zingales to look at why business schools are setting capitalism up to fail.Dr. Feroze Sidhwa is a trauma and critical care surgeon as well as a Northern California Veterans Affairs general surgeon, and he is Associate Professor of Surgery at the California Northstate University College of Medicine. Dr. Sidhwa served at the European Hospital in Khan Younis in March and April of this year, and he has done prior humanitarian work in Haiti, the West Bank, Ukraine, and Zimbabwe. Dr. Sidhwa and 45 other American doctors and nurses who have served in Gaza recently sent a letter exhorting President Biden, VP Harris, and First Lady Dr. Jill Biden to effect an immediate ceasefire. Gaza is definitely unique compared to anywhere else that I've been—the level of violence, the level of displacement, the level of deprivation of normal things that society provides.Dr. Feroze SidhwaThere's so much in this letter, listeners, that you need to know about because it's such heartfelt and professionally documented close observation. This short interview cannot do justice to the horrors that Dr. Sidhwa and others observed—and they were just there for a few weeks. Ralph NaderOne of the things that we tried to emphasize in the letter is that we don't have anything to say about the politics of the Israel-Palestine conflict…We, as physicians, that's not what we're talking about.  We're talking about our own participation in a massive unprecedented assault on a civilian population. By a military that we fund—we supply, literally every day. We provide the training. We provide all the diplomatic cover. The economic support. Everything is coming from the United States. And in the end, the Israelis have already decided what they're going to do. They have decided to destroy Gaza. If half the people there die, oh well, if all of the people there die, oh well. But we don't have to be involved in it.Dr. Feroze SidhwaI think the situation in Gaza has reached such a level, the political moment in the U.S. with Biden not running again, has reached a certain level, and then with Netanyahu's bonker address to Congress—when Nancy Pelosi is openly criticizing the Prime Minister of Israel, he's really screwed up.Dr. Feroze SidhwaLuigi Zingales is the Robert C. McCormack Distinguished Service Professor of Entrepreneurship and Finance at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. He co-developed the Financial Trust Index, which is designed to monitor the level of trust that Americans have toward their financial system. He is currently a faculty research fellow for the National Bureau of Economic Research, a research fellow for the Center for Economic Policy Research, a fellow of the European Governance Institute, and the director of Chicago Booth's Stigler Center for the Study of the Economy and the State. Professor Zingales is the co-host (with Bethany McLean) of the podcast Capitalisn't, and co-author (with Raghuram G. Rajan) of the book Saving Capitalism from Capitalists. These days, there is a lot of attention in business school about the environment, about so-called social responsibility, about all these aspects…but business schools like to keep separate the social aspects from the business aspects. So, in many places now there are classes on social entrepreneurship—which is something very interesting where people try to use their entrepreneurial skills to promote an initiative that is good for society at large, even if it's not necessarily profitable. But then if you are not a social enterprise, then you have to be the most capital, profit-maximizing firms on the face of the earth. There is nothing in between.Professor Luigi ZingalesOne year there was a management conference, and I organized a session on corporate fraud. And I expected a lot of people to show up and listen to the panel. In fact, it was a fiasco. Almost nobody showed up, because they don't want to confront their own limitations and problems. They want to see the more glitzy and shiny aspects of success. And that's what attracts them to business school, and that's what we end up selling to them. So I think that we are in part responsible because we cater too much to their own demand. Professor Luigi ZingalesIn Case You Haven't Heard with Francesco DeSantisNews 7/31/241. On Monday, nine Israeli soldiers were arrested on suspicion of raping a Palestinian prisoner at the Sde Teiman detention facility. In response, the Middle East Eye reports “Dozens of people…including members of parliament and Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu, gathered outside Sde Teiman and stormed the…facility…[and] Hours later, some 1,200 rioters gathered outside the Beit Lid base, where the nine suspects were taken for questioning.” This piece quotes military chief of staff Herzi Halevi who described the riots as “bordering on anarchy” and said the rioters harmed the military. Yet, “Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich described the suspects as as ‘heroic warriors'…[and] National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, who oversees the prisons where Palestinians are detained, called [the suspects] the ‘best heroes' and described the arrests as ‘shameful'.” One of these soldiers has now been released, according to the Middle East Monitor.2. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu addressed Congress last week amid mass protests in Washington D.C. During his speech, Axios reports six spectators were arrested for “disrupting” the address. All six of these demonstrators are family members of the Israeli hostages. Capitol Police spokesperson Brianna Burch is quoted saying “demonstrating in the Congressional Buildings is against the law.”3. In the U.K., the new Labour government is sending mixed messages on their Middle East policy. Late last week, the government announced that they would drop the United Kingdom's opposition to the International Criminal Court's arrest warrant against Netanyahu, per CNN. Yet this week, Foreign Secretary David Lammy announced that despite campaign promises, “Labour will…delay recognition [of a Palestinian state] indefinitely, making it conditional on Israel feeling ‘safe and secure,'” as reported by British blog Stats for Lefties. Labour continues to face pressure from independent MPs like Jeremy Corbyn on this issue.4. This week, President Nicolas Maduro was reelected in Venezuela. Elon Musk was caught spreading misinformation implying that Maduro engaged in election fraud – sharing a video that he claimed showed ballot boxes being stolen, when in fact the ballot boxes in question were actually air conditioning units, per Mediaite. The National Lawyer's Guild International Committee however, which sent a delegation to monitor the election, “observed a transparent, fair voting process with scrupulous attention to legitimacy, access to the polls and pluralism.” The NLG statement went on to decry “Despite the soundness of the electoral process, the U.S. backed opposition, with support from an anti-Maduro western press has refused to accept the results, undermining the stability of Venezuela's democracy.”5. Forbes reports that Disney has reached a deal with the unionized workers at Disneyland, ratifying a three-year contract that includes “a $24 hourly minimum wage…wage increases, seniority increases, more flexible attendance and sick leave policies, and other benefits.” This deal thus averts the first strike at the Anaheim park in four decades. Last week, More Perfect Union reported that the 14,000 unionized Disneyland workers “authorized a strike by 99%.”6. Jacobin reports “SpaceX [has won] a First Battle in Its Assault on the NLRB.” In this piece, People's Policy Project founder Matt Bruenig lays out how “SpaceX...[winning] a preliminary injunction in a Texas federal district court against the National Labor Relations Board… moves us closer to a potential Supreme Court decision declaring the NLRB unconstitutional.” This is the latest installment in the corporatist war on administrative law, which has already scored major victories in the SEC v. Jarkesy and Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo cases. Bruenig notes that “For now, the district court's decision simply prevents the NLRB from processing a fairly run-of-the-mill unfair labor practice charge against SpaceX. The real question is going to be what the Supreme Court does once this case makes it to their docket. But in the meantime…it is likely that other companies subject to NLRB proceedings will seek similar injunctions.”7. A storm is brewing within the Kamala Harris campaign over Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan. Democracy Now! Reports “some of the Democratic Party's biggest donors, including LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, are openly pushing Harris to fire…Khan, who has led Biden's antitrust efforts.” NBC notes that Hoffman is a billionaire megadonor and that other megadonors like Barry Diller are also calling for Khan's removal, and adds that “Khan's pro-consumer, pro-worker, anti-monopoly agenda has attracted no small amount of hate from powerful and monied interests.” On the other side, Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren and the Service Employees International Union – a close labor ally of Harris – have defended Khan. This battle illustrates the cross-cutting interests Harris will have to navigate as the Democratic nominee, and possibly, as president. We urge the Vice President to back Khan, not the billionaire donor class.8. The Washington Post is out with a heartbreaking new report on the increase of homelessness among “Working Americans with decent-paying jobs who simply can't afford a place to live.” This report cites data showing that homelessness, already at record highs, is only getting worse – growing by 61% in Southeast Texas over the past year, 35% in Rhode Island, and 20% in northeast Tennessee. Throughout the country, rents have risen by over 32% in four years and overall homelessness by 12%.9. In another disturbing economic trend, a new academic working paper out of UCLA and USC analyzes how the “widespread legalization of sports gambling over the past five years has impacted consumer financial health.” The most-discussed findings of this paper have to do with debt, with a “roughly 28% increase in bankruptcies and an 8% increase in debt transferred to debt collectors,” along with substantial increases in auto loan delinquencies and use of debt consolidation loans. As the researchers put it “these results indicate that the ease of access to sports gambling is harming consumer financial health by increasing their level of debt.”10. Finally, for some good news, the White House issued a statement Monday celebrating that “As of today, over 600,000 Teamster workers and retirees have pensions protected from devastating cuts,” as part of Biden's signature American Rescue Plan. This announcement came after the administration acted to protect 70,000 worker pensions in New England, building on similar actions in Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Missouri, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania. As the Boston Globe explains “The [American Rescue Plan] set up a special financial assistance program that allows struggling multi-employer pension plans to apply for assistance from the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, a federal agency that protects the retirement incomes of workers in defined benefit pension plans.” The administration is paying particular attention to the protection of Teamsters, as that union's leadership has been flirting with an embrace of the GOP. Not one Republican voted for the American Rescue Plan.This has been Francesco DeSantis, with In Case You Haven't Heard. Get full access to Ralph Nader Radio Hour at www.ralphnaderradiohour.com/subscribe

On today's program, Ralph welcomes two guests who have worked as civic advocates for more than fifty years—chemical engineer and environmentalist Barry Castleman, and solar energy advocate Ken Bossong. How do they maintain their civic stamina over more than five decades? That's what Ralph wants to know. Then, Ralph is joined by our resident international law expert Bruce Fein, to discuss breaking news from the International Criminal Court. Barry Castleman is a chemical engineer, environmentalist and researcher specializing in health issues. He is the author of Asbestos: Medical and Legal Aspects and has worked with public interest groups around the world over the past 50 years on the control of asbestos and chemical hazards. Mr. Castleman has been involved in rule-making on asbestos by numerous federal agencies as a consultant to the agencies and to environmental groups. He has testified as an expert witness in civil litigation in the US on the history of asbestos as a public health problem, and the reasons for failure to properly control asbestos hazards.I remember speaking to students at Johns Hopkins about 30 years ago about careers in international public health, and talking to them about how they should try and listen into themselves and think about what it is they'd really like to do, what they're really interested in, and try to follow that. Rather than following the money or auctioning themselves off to the highest bidder when they graduate from Hopkins.Barry CastlemanYou lose your innocence reading these corporate documents. They're unbelievable in terms of showing that all of these decisions about health and safety and environment are business decisions to the people who make them. And the wanton, reckless, willful disregard of public health is clear. So making these documents publicly available is an extraordinary public service.Barry CastlemanKen Bossong is the Executive Director of the Sun Day Campaign, a non-profit research and educational organization he founded in 1992 to aggressively promote sustainable energy technologies as cost-effective alternatives to nuclear power and fossil fuels. Mr. Bossong has advocated for solar energy and other renewable energy for more than 50 years, and he previously served as Director of the Critical Mass Energy Project at Public Citizen. Nearly 100% of all the new generating capacity in the United States in the month of March—which is the most recent month for which there are statistics—came from solar alone. There was none from coal. There was only one megawatt from natural gas. There was, I think, three megawatts from oil. And there was zero from nuclear. So the only resource that's growing and scaling up rapidly is solar. Coming in second place is wind. The fossil fuel technologies and nuclear power combined are producing very little.Ken BossongWhat keeps me going? Basically the bad guys. I am always ginned up by the challenge of confronting people who are doing things which I consider to be socially, environmentally irresponsible. And as you pointed out with the example of the oil companies, there's never been a shortage of people who are trying to do things that I think are damaging. Ken BossongBruce Fein is a Constitutional scholar and an expert on international law.  Mr. Fein was Associate Deputy Attorney General under Ronald Reagan and he is the author of Constitutional Peril: The Life and Death Struggle for Our Constitution and Democracy, and American Empire: Before the Fall.Although it doesn't really change a whole lot on the legal chessboard, the more countries that recognize a Palestinian statehood, the more pressure there will be on the United States to do something that acknowledges their right…The one other element that comes into play, however, is that there are various tribunals, jurisdictions that can be employed only by a state... So the more that we have international recognition of a Palestinian state, it then would have standing instead of South Africa to go to the International Court of Justice and say—we want a declaration that genocide is being committed against us by Israel. So there are small ways in which I think the greater the recognition, the greater the legal standing Palestine has as in at least some international body.Bruce FeinIn Case You Haven't Heard with Francesco DeSantisNews 5/22/241.  On May 20th, the International Criminal Court announced it would seek arrest warrants related to the ongoing atrocities in Gaza. Bucking pressure from western governments, the ICC will pursue arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on charges including “Starvation of civilians as a method of warfare…[and] Extermination…as a crime against humanity.” The Court also announced it would seek arrest warrants for Hamas leaders, including Yahya Sinwar, Ismail Haniyeh, and Mohammed Diab Ibrahim Al-Masri for their alleged international offenses. The ICC's decision was met with indignation by Israel and its western allies, including President Joe Biden, who said “What's happening is not genocide,” per the Guardian. Mousa Abu Marzouk – the first chief of Hamas' politburo, and the head of Hamas' international relations – writes in Media Review Network “Hamas stands ready to appear before the ICC with witnesses and live testimony and bear the burden of any judicial finding against it or its members after a full and fair trial with rules of evidence; with examination and cross examination into [what] we have done or not over the many years of our leadership as a national liberation movement. Is Israel?”2. On May 19th, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi was killed when his helicopter was forced to make a “hard landing” near the Iranian/Azerbaijan border. Many suspect Israeli involvement in this crash, largely due to Israel's history of assassinating Iranian officials. Israel however denies any involvement. The Middle East Monitor, relaying what Israeli officials told Channel 13, reports “The message Israel is sending to the countries of the world is that Tel Aviv has nothing to do with the incident.”3. Israeli ambassador Michael Herzog has sent a letter to dozens of congressional Democrats “accus[ing] lawmakers of aiding…Hamas…misrepresenting Israeli policy and…inappropriately trying to influence President…Biden,” per the Huffington Post. This letter – a response to moderate Democrats Jason Crow and Chris Deluzio's May 3rd letter alleging that Israel is breaking U.S. law – has rankled Democrats in Congress. One staffer told the Huffington Post that multiple parts of the letter “verg[ed] on offensive,” and another said “the tone of this letter is not reflective of the fact that the U.S. is the primary guarantor of Israel's security. An unaware reader would assume that Israel is the superpower in this relationship and the U.S. the recipient of aid.” Yet another aid put it this way, “Never before have we received such a harsh letter from the Israeli government. But then again, never before have we been so critical of their actions.”4. Independent investigative journalist Ken Klippenstein reports “The National Counterterrorism Center, created in the wake of 9/11 to combat al Qaeda, is now working overtime to find evidence of foreign funding of pro-Palestinian student protesters.” Klippenstein continues “The effort follows repeated calls by Congress for the federal government to investigate university protesters' purported links to Hamas, and coincides with a push by the FBI and homeland security bureaucracies to link the campus demonstrations to foreign actors. Tempting as it might be to laugh off the specter of foreign powers directing undergraduate protesters, evidence of this would provide the legal basis for the intelligence community to spy on Americans. Absent a foreign connection, the protests are constitutionally-protected speech.” Civil liberties advocates have long warned of the American anti-terrorism apparatus being weaponized against internal dissent. During the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020, the Trump administration infamously worked feverishly to cook up some connection between foreign governments and supposed domestic “antifa” leaders. The fact that the Biden administration is seeking to do the same speaks to just how enticing it is for the federal government to use trumped up terrorism accusations to silence legitimate protests.5. In a chilling new installment of the campus crackdown on pro-Palestine activity, POLITICO reports the California State University system has “placed Sonoma State campus President Mike Lee on leave… after he agreed to protesters' demands to involve them in university decision-making and pursue divestment from Israel.” In a statement, CSU Chancellor Mildred García derided president Lee for his “insubordination and the consequences it has brought upon the system.” The message is clear: any degree of violence in confronting the student protesters is acceptable, engaging with their demands is not.6. In more higher education news, the Harvard Graduate Student's Union – organized under the UAW – has filed an unfair labor practice charge against the university over their response to campus pro-Palestine protests, per Bloomberg labor reporter Josh Eidelson. “[The union is] claiming the school's retaliation violated students' right as employees to protest over workplace issues.” This charge will test the limits of workplace speech protections and we will be watching closely to see where the board lands.7. Last week, workers at two Alabama Mercedes-Benz plants voted against joining the United Autoworkers by a margin if 2,045 to 2,642, per 1819 News. UAW President Shawn Fain blamed the loss on union busting by the corporation, stating “Mercedes engaged in egregious illegal behavior. The federal government as well as the German government are currently investigating Mercedes for the intimidation and harassment they inflicted on their own workers. We intend to follow that process through…This is a David and Goliath fight. Sometimes Goliath wins a battle. But David wins the war.” Fain went on to say “Justice isn't about one vote or one campaign. It's about getting a voice, getting your fair share. And let's be clear: workers won serious gains in this campaign. They raised their wages, with the 'UAW bump.' They killed wage tiers. They got rid of a CEO who had no interest in improving conditions in the workplace. Mercedes is a better place to work thanks to this campaign, and thanks to these courageous workers.” Finally, Fain noted the similarities between this campaign and the previous attempts to unionize Volkswagen plants, stating “[Mercedes] told the workers to give the new CEO a chance. That's exactly what Volkswagen told its workers in 2019. And in 2024, Volkswagen workers realized it's not about a CEO. It's about a voice on the job, it's about getting our lives back, and getting our time back. The only path to do that is through a union contract.”8. CNN reports that on Tuesday May 14th, the Justice Department  “notified Boeing that it [had] breached [the] terms of its 2021 [deferred prosecution] agreement in which the company avoided criminal charges for two fatal 737 Max crashes.” This report goes on to say “Families of victims and lawyers representing them met with the Justice Department late last month to persuade the Biden administration to end the agreement in light of multiple safety lapses at Boeing this year and in past years after the 2021 agreement was reached.”  Following this meeting, attorney Paul Cassell said the deferred prosecution agreement was “rigged” and “pledged to hold Boeing accountable for its ‘fraud and misconduct.'” 9. On Monday May 20th, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange won the right to appeal his extradition to the United States. Per Democracy Now! “Assange's lawyers argued before the British High Court that the U.S. government provided ‘blatantly inadequate' assurances that Assange would have the same free speech protections as an American citizen if extradited from Britain. Assange…faces up to 175 years in prison for publishing classified documents exposing U.S. war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan.” This is a major victory for Assange. Yet, as Chip Gibbons, policy director of Defending Rights & Dissent puts it “[Assange is] not out of Belmarsh [Prison] yet…This could still end in him being sent to the U.S. And the person who can stop this is Joe Biden.”10. Finally, according to Washington Post labor reporter Lauren Kaori Gurley, “[Over 400] physicians have filed to unionize with SEIU, in what they say would be the first doctor's union in Delaware and the Mid-Atlantic.” These physicians – employed by ChristianaCare, Delaware's largest private employer – have laid out a list of grievances they hope to address by organizing, including “patient safety concerns due to understaffing and inadequate resources…the erosion of the physician-led model of care...[and] the moral injury caused by the pressure to prioritize...profit over patient needs.” Gurley further highlighted that a key priority of this doctor's union is “combating excessive corporatization,” in healthcare.This has been Francesco DeSantis, with In Case You Haven't Heard.  Get full access to Ralph Nader Radio Hour at www.ralphnaderradiohour.com/subscribe

MEET THE AUTHOR Podcast: LIVE - Episode 142 - PETER F. CROWLEYOriginally Aired Wednesday February 7,2024 Featuring Author/Poet PETER F. CROWLEYABOUT PETER: As a prolific author from the Boston area, Peter F. Crowley writes in various forms, including short fiction, op-eds, poetry and academic essays. In 2020, his poetry book Those Who Hold Up the Earth was published by Kelsay Books and received impressive reviews by Kirkus Review, the New Age and two local Boston-area newspapers. His writing can be found in Middle East Monitor, Znet, 34th Parallel, Pif Magazine, Galway Review, Digging the Fat, Adelaide's Short Story and Poetry Award anthologies (finalist in both) and The Opiate. His books That Night and Other Stories (CAAB Publishing) and Empire's End (Alien Buddha Press) were released during the week of Friday the 13th in October 2023.Watch or listen to all episodes here: www.IndieBookSource.com

Çinli muhalif sanatçı Ai Weiwei'in Filistin konusunda gösterdiği tepkiden dolayı dört farklı sergisinin iptal edildiğini daha önce bu köşede yazmıştım. Ai Weiwei geçtiğimiz günlerde verdiği bir röportajda Avrupa'daki durumu tüm çıplaklığıyla bir kez daha gözler önüne serdi. Ai Weiwei verdiği röportajda birçok yabancı basın organının da ön plana çıkarttığı gibi şunu söylüyor: Batı'daki sansür kimi zaman Mao Çin'inden daha kötü. Bugün pek çok insanın basit fikirlerini dile getirerek kovulduklarını, sansürlendiklerini görüyorum. Batı dünyası gerçek yüzünü hiç saklamadı, sadece şimdi daha görünür oldu. Ve bütün bunların sadece başlangıç olduğunu düşünüyorum. Ama bu başlangıç sadece kötülerin güçlenmesi değil aynı zamanda iyilerin, haksızlık karşısında sesini yükseltenlerin de görünür olmasına, birlikteliğine yol açıyor. Middle East Monitor web sitesinden Naima Morelli Palestine Museum US'in direktörü Faisal Saleh'le bir görüşme gerçekleştirmiş. Saleh bu görüşmede Venedik Bienali'nin yetkililerinin sanat ve politikanın birbirinden ayrı olduğunu bu sebeple sergiye yer veremeyeceklerini belirttiğinde hiç çekinmeden şu sözlerle cevap verdiğini aktarıyor: “Evet, sanat konusunda sizin kadar uzman olmayabilirim ama siyasetle sanatın iç içe olduğunu biliyorum. Gerçekten birini diğerinden ayıramazsınız.” Venedik Bienali, Rusya, Ukrayna'ya saldırdığında hem Rusya'ya karşı çıktı hem de Ukrayna'ya özel ihtimam gösterdi. Bu yıl da İsrail'e Venedik Bienali'nde yer verirken Filistin'e yer vermiyor. Çağdaş sanat söz konusu olduğunda politika ve sanatın iç içe geçtiğini, sanatın artık büyük çoğunlukla hisler değil düşünceler üzerinden ilerlediğini biliyoruz. Venedik Bienali'nin bu yaklaşımı Batı'nın “kendisinden” olmayana karşı olan tavrını bir kez daha gözler önüne sermesi bakımından son derece önemli. İnşallah Filistinli sanatçılar bir yolunu bulup Venedik'te yerlerini alabilirler, böylece mücadelelerine devam edebilirler.

Bronvermelding onder tekst. . . . . Het conflict tussen Israëliërs en Palestijnen lijkt eindeloos. En steeds weer wordt de wereld er in meegezogen. Waar komt dit conflict vandaan? Waarom ging het mis? En wat betekent die geschiedenis voor de situatie van nu? Deze aflevering gaat over het verhaal van Israëliers en Palestijnen. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Belangrijkste bronnen - A history of the modern middle east. William L. Cleveland, Martin Bunton. Fifth edition (2012). - The Population of Palestine: Population History and Statistics of the Late Ottoman Period and the Mandate (1990). Columbia university press. New York. - Report of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967. United Nations general assembly special rapporteur (2022). - Mensenrechten organisaties: Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, B'tselem, Yesh Din, Breaking the Silence. - Historisch verhaal: Kenniscentrum Israel Palestina, MidEast Web en Historisch nieuwsblad - Uiteenlopende perspectieven: Middle East Monitor, Christenen voor Israel, the Rights forum, Centrum Informatie en Documentatie Israel. - Andere aanraders zijn de online explainers van universiteit van Nederland, Crash Course en de NOS.

Welcome to The Daily Wrap Up, a concise show dedicated to bringing you the most relevant independent news, as we see it, from the last 24 hours (11/29/23). As always, take the information discussed in the video below and research it for yourself, and come to your own conclusions. Anyone telling you what the truth is, or claiming they have the answer, is likely leading you astray, for one reason or another. Stay Vigilant. !function(r,u,m,b,l,e){r._Rumble=b,r[b]||(r[b]=function(){(r[b]._=r[b]._||[]).push(arguments);if(r[b]._.length==1){l=u.createElement(m),e=u.getElementsByTagName(m)[0],l.async=1,l.src="https://rumble.com/embedJS/u2q643"+(arguments[1].video?'.'+arguments[1].video:'')+"/?url="+encodeURIComponent(location.href)+"&args="+encodeURIComponent(JSON.stringify([].slice.apply(arguments))),e.parentNode.insertBefore(l,e)}})}(window, document, "script", "Rumble");   Rumble("play", {"video":"v3w2i0a","div":"rumble_v3w2i0a"}); Video Source Links (In Chronological Order): signal-2023-11-29-080822_002.jpeg (738×1600) (74) DD Denslow

In the wake of Hamas's attacks on 7 October, which involved atrocities against civilians, Israel has declared war on Gaza. The country's military—one of the most powerful in the world—is attacking hospitals, schools, mosques, markets, infrastructure and residential areas. Civilians are being slaughtered and a total siege has been imposed, preventing vital supplies and aid from entering the besieged territory and worsening the already dire situation of residents. On the program today, we hear an interview between Anjuman Rahman and Aseel Safi.  Anjuman is a reporter for Middle East Monitor, and Aseel is a student based in Gaza.

Négy év után először látták – felismerhetetlen az egykor sármos színész hirado.hu     2023-05-23 05:07:00     Bulvár A háromszoros Oscar-díjas színész az utóbbi években szó szerint felszívódott, vagy csak egyszerűen senki nem ismert rá. Scorsese 80 évesen ismét mesteri filmet csinált 24.hu     2023-05-22 18:12:13     Film Cannes Martin Scorsese Martin Scorsese A megfojtott virágokkal ismét mesteri filmet csinált. Helyszíni tudósítás Cannes-ból. Közel 30 év után újra összeáll a Hungária Igényesférfi.hu     2023-05-23 08:17:47     Zene Koncert Stadion Puskás Aréna A 29 évvel ezelőtt, az akkori Népstadionban mintegy százezer néző előtt megtartott Hungária koncertet követően újra összeáll és feltehetően utoljára lép fel minden idők egyik legsikeresebb magyar zenekara a nemzeti stadionban, a Puskás Arénában. Tudja mi az Unesco világörökség részét képező afládzs-rendszer? – Az legrangosabb arab irodalmi díj győztesét ez ihlette Tudás.hu     2023-05-22 18:08:40     Könyv Világörökség Omán A szélsőséges időjárási jelenségekkel, a súlyos szárazsággal és az áradásokkal foglalkozó művével nyerte el idén a legjelentősebb arab irodalmi díjat (IPAF) Zahrán el-Kászimi ománi regényíró és költő – adta hírül hétfőn a Middle East Monitor hírportál. A Vízkereső a 49 éves Kászimi negyedik regénye, melyet először 2021-ben adtak ki. A Nemzetközi Dí Mit nézzek? Schwarzenegger Netflix-sorozata mellett 4 másik premierről sem érdemes lemaradnod Mafab     2023-05-23 07:43:02     Film USA Kína Netflix Arnold Schwarzenegger Öt izgalmas új sorozat is indul ezen a héten a különböző streaming platformokon. Ott van köztük Arnold Schwarzenegger régóta várt újdonsága, karrierje első sorozatszerepével. De megérkezik egy nagyszerű őslényes doku-sorozat második évada is. Bepillantást nyerhetünk a hivatásos sellők életébe és képet kapunk arról is, milyenek egy amerikai-kínai hé Obi-Wan Kenobi-sorozat: most akkor végül lesz második évad, vagy sem?! Kathleen Kennedy, a Lucasfilm főnőke, végre előállt a farbával! theGeek     2023-05-23 07:02:34     Film Mozi Disney Star Wars Ewan McGregor Mozi Hírek – A Lucasfilm elnöke végre színt vallott, hogy egyáltalán tervben van-e véve az Obi-Wan Kenobi második évada, és hogy mi vár a legendás Jedi karakterre a jövőben. Az Obi-Wan Kenobi című sorozat az egyik legnagyobb siker volt a Disney+ kínálatában, hiszen visszahozta Ewan McGregor-t a legendás Jedi szerepében. A sorozat első évada 2022 de Csak a dzsungel van Závada Péter új verseskötetében Könyves Magazin     2023-05-22 18:23:46     Könyv Színház Drog Chat Chat Gpt, a murénák ingamozgása, a kokain, az illúzió és a valóság gyarmatosítása is témái Závada Péter új, A muréna mozgása című verseskötetének. Meg a jelenlét szerepe, a társadalom és én viszonya, a tekintet politikája vagy a színház. A hét könyve okos és játékos verseskötet egy világról, amely a pánikra koncentrál.  Meghalt Ray Stevenson hollywoodi színész Telex     2023-05-22 20:18:12     Film Hollywood Star Wars A főleg akciófilmekben ismert északír színész 58 éves volt. Volt már Megtorló, muskétás és Thor cimborája is, illetve fontos szerepet kapott a következő Star Wars-sorozatban. Sandra Hüller két filmben is nagyot alakított Cannes-ban – Sikere ellenére idén is díj nélkül távozik? Librarius     2023-05-23 07:59:19     Film Mozi Cannes Sandra Hüller 2016-ban, a Toni Erdmann című filmmel robbant be a cannes-i közönség, majd az egész mozivilág tudatába.   Kurt Cobain gitárja még összezúzva és használhatatlanul is elég szép summáért talált gazdára refresher.hu     2023-05-23 09:47:00     Zene Kurt Cobain Kurt Cobain gitárja közel hatszázezer dollárért talált gazdára, vagyis a becsült érték kábé tízszereséért kelt el. Még 9 alulértékelt, de valójában piszok jó film a Netflixen port.hu     2023-05-23 06:00:00     Film Netflix Robert Downey Jr. Martin Freeman Martin Freeman posztapokaliptikus drámája, Richard Linklater rotoszkóp technológiás animációs filmje és Robert Downey Jr. saját apjáról forgatott dokuja is bekerült a válogatásunkba.

Négy év után először látták – felismerhetetlen az egykor sármos színész hirado.hu     2023-05-23 05:07:00     Bulvár A háromszoros Oscar-díjas színész az utóbbi években szó szerint felszívódott, vagy csak egyszerűen senki nem ismert rá. Scorsese 80 évesen ismét mesteri filmet csinált 24.hu     2023-05-22 18:12:13     Film Cannes Martin Scorsese Martin Scorsese A megfojtott virágokkal ismét mesteri filmet csinált. Helyszíni tudósítás Cannes-ból. Közel 30 év után újra összeáll a Hungária Igényesférfi.hu     2023-05-23 08:17:47     Zene Koncert Stadion Puskás Aréna A 29 évvel ezelőtt, az akkori Népstadionban mintegy százezer néző előtt megtartott Hungária koncertet követően újra összeáll és feltehetően utoljára lép fel minden idők egyik legsikeresebb magyar zenekara a nemzeti stadionban, a Puskás Arénában. Tudja mi az Unesco világörökség részét képező afládzs-rendszer? – Az legrangosabb arab irodalmi díj győztesét ez ihlette Tudás.hu     2023-05-22 18:08:40     Könyv Világörökség Omán A szélsőséges időjárási jelenségekkel, a súlyos szárazsággal és az áradásokkal foglalkozó művével nyerte el idén a legjelentősebb arab irodalmi díjat (IPAF) Zahrán el-Kászimi ománi regényíró és költő – adta hírül hétfőn a Middle East Monitor hírportál. A Vízkereső a 49 éves Kászimi negyedik regénye, melyet először 2021-ben adtak ki. A Nemzetközi Dí Mit nézzek? Schwarzenegger Netflix-sorozata mellett 4 másik premierről sem érdemes lemaradnod Mafab     2023-05-23 07:43:02     Film USA Kína Netflix Arnold Schwarzenegger Öt izgalmas új sorozat is indul ezen a héten a különböző streaming platformokon. Ott van köztük Arnold Schwarzenegger régóta várt újdonsága, karrierje első sorozatszerepével. De megérkezik egy nagyszerű őslényes doku-sorozat második évada is. Bepillantást nyerhetünk a hivatásos sellők életébe és képet kapunk arról is, milyenek egy amerikai-kínai hé Obi-Wan Kenobi-sorozat: most akkor végül lesz második évad, vagy sem?! Kathleen Kennedy, a Lucasfilm főnőke, végre előállt a farbával! theGeek     2023-05-23 07:02:34     Film Mozi Disney Star Wars Ewan McGregor Mozi Hírek – A Lucasfilm elnöke végre színt vallott, hogy egyáltalán tervben van-e véve az Obi-Wan Kenobi második évada, és hogy mi vár a legendás Jedi karakterre a jövőben. Az Obi-Wan Kenobi című sorozat az egyik legnagyobb siker volt a Disney+ kínálatában, hiszen visszahozta Ewan McGregor-t a legendás Jedi szerepében. A sorozat első évada 2022 de Csak a dzsungel van Závada Péter új verseskötetében Könyves Magazin     2023-05-22 18:23:46     Könyv Színház Drog Chat Chat Gpt, a murénák ingamozgása, a kokain, az illúzió és a valóság gyarmatosítása is témái Závada Péter új, A muréna mozgása című verseskötetének. Meg a jelenlét szerepe, a társadalom és én viszonya, a tekintet politikája vagy a színház. A hét könyve okos és játékos verseskötet egy világról, amely a pánikra koncentrál.  Meghalt Ray Stevenson hollywoodi színész Telex     2023-05-22 20:18:12     Film Hollywood Star Wars A főleg akciófilmekben ismert északír színész 58 éves volt. Volt már Megtorló, muskétás és Thor cimborája is, illetve fontos szerepet kapott a következő Star Wars-sorozatban. Sandra Hüller két filmben is nagyot alakított Cannes-ban – Sikere ellenére idén is díj nélkül távozik? Librarius     2023-05-23 07:59:19     Film Mozi Cannes Sandra Hüller 2016-ban, a Toni Erdmann című filmmel robbant be a cannes-i közönség, majd az egész mozivilág tudatába.   Kurt Cobain gitárja még összezúzva és használhatatlanul is elég szép summáért talált gazdára refresher.hu     2023-05-23 09:47:00     Zene Kurt Cobain Kurt Cobain gitárja közel hatszázezer dollárért talált gazdára, vagyis a becsült érték kábé tízszereséért kelt el. Még 9 alulértékelt, de valójában piszok jó film a Netflixen port.hu     2023-05-23 06:00:00     Film Netflix Robert Downey Jr. Martin Freeman Martin Freeman posztapokaliptikus drámája, Richard Linklater rotoszkóp technológiás animációs filmje és Robert Downey Jr. saját apjáról forgatott dokuja is bekerült a válogatásunkba.

James Cavallaro and Lara Sheehi join the show to talk about being canceled over their criticism of Israel. James Cavallaro is a prominent Human Right expert who was blocked by Biden from his nomination to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) over his criticism of Israeli apartheid. Lara Sheehi is Assistant Professor of Clinical Psychology at George Washington University who is the subject of a Title VI complaint launched by the Right Wing organization Stand With Us. Then Tara Alami, a Palestinian writer and organiser from occupied Jerusalem and occupied Yafa, talks about the latest settler violence against Palestinians. James Cavallaro is a visiting professor at Columbia, UCLA and Yale and a professor of the practice at Wesleyan University. He is also the Executive Director of the University Network for Human Rights. He has taught human rights law and practice for nearly a quarter century, most recently at Yale Law School (Spring 2020), Stanford Law School (2011-2019), and Harvard Law School (2002-2011). At both Harvard and Stanford, he established and directed human rights clinics and ran human rights centers. Cavallaro has overseen dozens of projects with scores of students in over twenty countries. In June 2013, Cavallaro was elected to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. He served as President of that body from 2016-2017. Lara Sheehi, PsyD is an Assistant Professor of Clinical Psychology at the George Washington University's Professional Psychology Program where she is the founding faculty director of the Psychoanalysis and the Arab World Lab. Lara's work takes up decolonial and anti-oppressive approaches to psychoanalysis, with a focus on liberation struggles in the Global South. She is co-author with Stephen Sheehi of Psychoanalysis Under Occupation: Practicing Resistance in Palestine (Routledge, 2022) which won the Middle East Monitor's 2022 Palestine Book Award for Best Academic Book. ***Please support The Katie Halper Show *** For bonus content, exclusive interviews, to support independent media and to help make this program possible, please join us on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/thekatiehalpershow Follow Katie on Twitter: https://twitter.com/kthalps

Once again, two rival Prime Ministers are jostling for power in Libya and triggering fighting in the capital Tripoli. Elections are delayed, and peace talks have made little progress. So, could this be the return of civil war? Join host Hashem Ahelbarra. Guests: Salah Elbakkoush - Political Analyst and Former Senior Adviser to Negotiating Team of the High Council of States in Libya. Mustafa Fetouri - Journalist and Contributor, Middle East Monitor. Silvia Colombo – Associate Fellow, International Affairs Institute in Italy.    

This week Lowkey is joined by Asa Winstanley, an investigative journalist living in London, who writes about Palestine and the Middle East. He hails from the south of Wales and has been visiting Palestine since 2004. He writes for the groundbreaking Palestinian news site The Electronic Intifada, where he is an associate editor, and also writes a weekly column for the Middle East Monitor.Winstanley explores the post-WW2 period of European history and reveals examples of Nazis being rehabilitated, subsumed into the U.S. machinery of empire, and dispatched as Cold Warriors.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/MintPressNews)

When the Libyan revolution brought down Muammar Gaddafi 10 years ago, many thought his name was consigned to history. Now his son, Saif Al Islam Gaddafi, is running for president. What are his chances? And what will the vote mean for Libya?  Join host Nastasya Tay. With guests: Youcef Bouandel - Professor of Political Science and International Relations at Qatar University. Anas El Gomati - Director of the Sadeq Institute. Mustafa Fetouri - Journalist and Contributor to Middle East Monitor.

When the Libyan revolution brought down Muammar Gaddafi 10 years so, many thought his name was consigned to history. Now his son, Saif Al Islam Gaddafi, is running for president. What are his chances? And what will the vote mean for Libya?  Join host Nastasya Tay. With guests: Youcef Bouandel - Professor of Political Science and International Relations at Qatar University. Anas El Gomati - Director of the Sadeq Institute. Mustafa Fetouri - Journalist and Contributor to Middle East Monitor.

Shocking almost everybody in positions of power, life-long socialist and anti-war activist Jeremy Corbyn was elected leader of the British Labour Party in 2015. There was no honeymoon period for the Londoner, however, as right away the media, the government and even senior members of his own party began attempting to oust him.Defying the critics, Corbyn held on and took Labour to arguably its greatest-ever electoral success in 2017. However, his poor handling of Brexit and an unprecedented phoney anti-Semitism smear campaign sank his chances of becoming prime minister of the United Kingdom.Our guest today on Mintcast saw the entire situation unfold from up close. Asa Winstanley is a London-based investigative journalist at The Electronic Intifada. A former member of the Labour Party, like Corbyn, he was suspended from the party, in his case after he called the Jewish Labour Movement an "Israel embassy proxy."Corbyn -- a veteran anti-imperialist who opposed nuclear weapons, proposed the United Kingdom leave NATO and supported a targeted boycott of Israel over their annexation of much of Palestine -- was immediately attacked by sources of entrenched power. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo even stated that his government was “doing its best” to prevent Corbyn from being elected.Despite a near-hysterical campaign against him, Corbyn's popularity grew and grew. His 2017 manifesto -- which included making college free for all and proposed a huge expansion of social housing, an end to government austerity measures, nationalizing key industries like railways, and providing everyone in the country with free high-speed internet access -- was immensely popular.However, by the 2019 general election, years of attacks from the media, the military and even most of the elected officials within his own party had taken their toll, and Labour lost the contest to Boris Johnson's Conservative Party. In the three months prior to the vote, there were 1,450 articles in national British newspapers linking Corbyn to anti-Semitism.Asa Winstanley joined Mintcast host Mnar Adley today to discuss his work covering this case, and also talks about the wider implications of the affair. Originally from South Wales, Winstanley focuses his work primarily on the Middle East and British politics. Apart from being an associate editor at The Electronic Intifada, he also writes at Substack and The Middle East Monitor.Subscribe to MintCast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and SoundCloud.Also, be sure to check out the new Behind the Headlines channel on YouTube and subscribe to rapper Lowkey's new video interview/podcast series, The Watchdog.Support the show (https://www.mintpressnews.com/donations/)

Are you interested in getting your research published in a leading peer-reviewed journal focused on the Middle East? Join us for a conversation with the editors of four prominent international journals who share their perspectives and advice on how to get your research published. Our panellists share their insights on the publishing process and provide tips for what they are looking for in their submissions. We are joined by Joel Gordon, Editor of the International Journal of Middle East Studies; Noha Mellor, Associate Editor of the British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies; and Salim Tamari, Editor of Jerusalem Quarterly. The event will be chaired by Sarah Irving, Editor of CBRL’s journal Contemporary Levant. https://cbrl.ac.uk/event/how-to-get-published-in-a-middle-east-journal/ About the speakers: Joel Gordon is Editor of the International Journal of Middle East Studies and a Professor of History at the University of Arkansas-Fayetteville. He is a political and cultural historian of modern Egypt and the Middle East/Islamic world. He teaches and writes about political change, the intersections of public and popular culture, historical memory and nostalgia, and religious and secular crosscurrents, with emphases on cinema, music and mass media. He is the author of three books on the era of Gamal Abdel Nasser and numerous articles, book and film reviews. Noha Mellor is a Professor at the University of Bedfordshire and an Adjunct Professor at Stockholm University. She is the author of several books about Arab media including The Making of Arab News (2005), Modern Arab Journalism (2007), Arab Media (2011), Reporting the MENA Region (2015), and Voice of the Muslim Brotherhood (2017). She has recently co-edited the first comprehensive Handbook on Arab Media (2020). She is Associate Editor of the British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies and a member of the editorial board of Arab Media & Society, International Journal of Press/Politics, Journal of Arab & Muslim Media Research, and Journalism Studies. Salim Tamari is Professor of Sociology (Emeritus) at Birzeit University; Research Associate at the Institute for Palestine Studies; and Editor of The Jerusalem Quarterly. He has previously been the Editor of the Heritage and Society Journal, the Birzeit Social Science Review and Afaq Falastiniyya. Salim is the author of a number of publications including: Mountain Against the Sea: A Conflicted Modernity; The Storyteller of Jerusalem: The Life and Times of Wasif Jawhariyyeh (with Issam Nassar); and Year of the Locust: Erasure of the Ottoman Era in Palestine. He was the winner of the 2018 Middle East Monitor prize for his book Great War and the Remaking of Palestine and won the 2017 State of Palestine Prize for Lifetime Achievements in the social sciences and humanities. About the chair: Sarah Irving is Editor of the CBRL journal Contemporary Levant and a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at Edge Hill University in Lancashire, researching a social history of the 1927 earthquake in Mandate Palestine. She has worked in and on the Levant region, particularly Palestine, since 2001 and has written and edited a number of academic and trade books on its culture and history. Most recently these include Cultural Entanglement in the Pre-Independence Arab World, edited with Tony Gorman of Edinburgh University and published by IB Tauris, and articles in Jerusalem Quarterly, Contemporary Levant and Revue d’histoire culturelle on aspects of the intellectual and social history of Mandatory Palestine.

Join Marc Lamont Hill, Mitchell Plitnick, & Noura Erakat for a launch event and discussion of the important new book, Except for Palestine. ———————————————— “For too long, many have championed the rights and liberties of oppressed peoples here and abroad, but remained silent on Palestinian freedom, or even worse, supported U.S. policies that render Palestinian humanity and suffering invisible. This clear and courageous book is a clarion call for moral integrity and political consistency.” —Cornel West In their major new work of daring criticism and analysis, Except for Palestine, scholar and political commentator Marc Lamont Hill and Israel-Palestine expert Mitchell Plitnick spotlight how holding fast to one-sided and unwaveringly pro-Israel policies reflects the truth-bending grip of authoritarianism on both Israel and the United States. The co-authors will be joined by Jadaliyya co-founder and editor Noura Erakat for a conversation on why progressives who oppose regressive policies on immigration, racial justice, gender equality, LGBTQ rights, and other issues must extend these core principles to the oppression of Palestinians. Order Except for Palestine: The Limits of Progressive Politics here: https://bookshop.org/a/1039/9781620975923 ———————————————— Speakers: Marc Lamont Hill is one of the leading intellectual voices in the country. He is currently the host of BET News. An award-winning journalist, Dr. Hill has received numerous prestigious awards from the National Association of Black Journalists, GLAAD, and the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences. Dr. Hill is the Steve Charles Professor of Media, Cities, and Solutions at Temple University. Prior to that, he held positions at Columbia University and Morehouse College. He is the author of Nobody: Casualties of America's War on the Vulnerable, from Ferguson to Flint and Beyond, and We Still Here: Pandemic, Policing, Protest, and Possibility, and with Mitchell Plitnick, Except Palestine: The Limits of Progressive Politics. He is the owner of Uncle Bobbie's Bookstore in Philadelphia, PA. Mitchell Plitnick is a political analyst and writer. He is the author, with Marc Lamont Hill, of Except for Palestine: The Limits of Progressive Politics. Mitchell's previous positions include vice president at the Foundation for Middle East Peace, Director of the US Office of B'Tselem: The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, and Co-Director of Jewish Voice for Peace. Plitnick graduated with honors from UC Berkeley in Middle Eastern Studies and wrote his thesis on Israeli and Jewish historiography. He earned his Masters Degree from the University of Maryland, College Park's School of Public Policy.You can find him on Twitter @MJPlitnick. Noura Erakat is a human rights attorney and an Assistant Professor at Rutgers University, New Brunswick. Noura is a Co-Founding Editor of Jadaliyya, an electronic magazine on the Middle East that combines scholarly expertise and local knowledge. She is the author of Justice for Some: Law and in the Question of Palestine, winner of the 2019 Palestine Book Awards sponsored by the Middle East Monitor and winner of the Independent Publishers Book Award's Bronze Medial in Current Events/Foreign Affairs. She is currently a Non-Resident Visiting Fellow in the Religion, Conflict, and Peace Initiative at the Religious Literacy Project at the Harvard Divinity School. ————————————————————— This event is co-sponsored by Haymarket Books and The New Press. Watch the live event recording: https://youtu.be/k-8QjEGV3oU Buy books from Haymarket: www.haymarketbooks.org Follow us on Soundcloud: soundcloud.com/haymarketbooks

Episode 111: Non-State Actors and State-Building in Libya after 2011 In this podcast, Professor Amal El-Obeidi discusses power struggles in Libya, as well as the country's instability since 2011. In the absence of a central state after the fall of Qaddafi's regime, processes of national reconciliation and transitional justice have been ineffective. Additionally, the increased number of municipalities after 2014 has led to new political divisions. El-Obeidi argues that local-level governing coalitions have often filled the void of state sovereignty and worked to reduce marginalization, as well as ensure equal access to resources. She focuses specifically on the increasing role of non-state actors in national reconciliation. In this context, tribes played a significant role in Libya's political and social life through ‘urf, or customary law. El-Obeidi highlights the position of women in local reconciliation dialogs within male-dominated councils. In addition to her research, El-Obeidi also speaks of the ways in which academic life has changed significantly for Libya scholars since 2011. The conflict in Libya has not only impacted academic facilities, but has made field research difficult, if not impossible.    Amal El-Obeidi is Professor of Comparative Politics in the Department of Political Science at the University of Benghazi, Libya. Currently she is a fellow researcher at the Institute for African Studies at Bayreuth University, Germany. She is a founding member and vice president of the Libyan Experts Forum for Development since 2017. Author of Political Culture in Libya, her work has appeared in Open Democracy and Middle East Monitor. Prof. El-Obeidi's research interests include gender issue, local reconciliation, governance and security issues, migration, conflict resolution, and peace building. Her current research addresses tribalism in Libya from a gender perspective.    Jacob Mundy, Associate Professor of Peace and Conflict Studies at Colgate University, conducted this interview on November 23, 2020. This podcast is part of the "Supporting Critical Research and Strengthening Scholarly Capacity in Algeria, Libya, and Tunisia" project organized by the Centre d'Études Maghrébines à Tunis (CEMAT) and the Centre d'Études Maghrébines en Algérie (CEMA), and funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York. Prof. Mundy heads the contemporary Libya studies research unit, of which Prof. El-Obeidi is a member.   Posted by: Hayet Lansari, Librarian, Outreach Coordinator, Content Curator (CEMA).

 The civil war in Libya has become a proxy war, dominated by weapons and support from outside the country.  Award-winning Libyan journalist Mustafa Fetouri of Middle East Monitor wonder how adding a third governing force to the 2 already stalemated will make things any better. He explains why Russia, Turkey, Egypt, the UAE and Qatar have all become active kibitzers in this murderous conflict.

Oggi il ministro degli Esteri Luigi Di Maio è stato a Tripoli per discutere con il primo ministro Al-Sarraj di relazioni italo libiche. I patti di investimento con l'Italia servono a mantenere il legame con la guardia costiera libica che controlla i centri di detenzione in cui i migranti vengono spesso incarcerati in condizioni disumane? I rapporti economici tra Italia e Libia possono rafforzare un governo in bilico? E cosa è successo esattamente in quella strada di Tripoli dove stamattina un attentatore suicida si è fatto esplodere, fortunatamente senza provocare vittime? Ne abbiamo parlato con Arturo Varvelli, direttore della sede di Roma dello European Council on Foreign Relations ECFR, con Mustafa Fetouri, editorialista libico del Middle East Monitor, con Zainab Sharrada, giornalista freelance che ha seguito l'attentato di Tripoli, e con Murat Aslan, ex militare e analista del think-tank turco SETA Foundation.

Oggi il ministro degli Esteri Luigi Di Maio è stato a Tripoli per discutere con il primo ministro Al-Sarraj di relazioni italo libiche. I patti di investimento con l'Italia servono a mantenere il legame con la guardia costiera libica che controlla i centri di detenzione in cui i migranti vengono spesso incarcerati in condizioni disumane? I rapporti economici tra Italia e Libia possono rafforzare un governo in bilico? E cosa è successo esattamente in quella strada di Tripoli dove stamattina un attentatore suicida si è fatto esplodere, fortunatamente senza provocare vittime? Ne abbiamo parlato con Arturo Varvelli, direttore della sede di Roma dello European Council on Foreign Relations ECFR, con Mustafa Fetouri, editorialista libico del Middle East Monitor, con Zainab Sharrada, giornalista freelance che ha seguito l'attentato di Tripoli, e con Murat Aslan, ex militare e analista del think-tank turco SETA Foundation.

The Palestine Podcast showcases a selection of lectures, talks and interviews featuring leading experts and social justice activists active on the Palestine-Israel issue. Brought to you by the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Click here to view all podcasts. Subscribe on your favourite platform! Apple PodcastsGoogle PodcastsSpotifyStitcherAcastYouTubeDeezerTuneInPlayer.fmPocketCastsCastroRadio PublicBreakerBlubrryPodcast AddictPodbeanPodcast RepubliciHeartRadio jQuery(document).ready(function($) { 'use strict'; $('#podcast-subscribe-button-11212 .podcast-subscribe-button.modal-632417ae7cd54').on("click", function() { $("#secondline-psb-subs-modal.modal-632417ae7cd54.modal.secondline-modal-632417ae7cd54").modal({ fadeDuration: 250, closeText: '', }); return false; }); }); ===== PP#33 - Ilan Pappe on 'The Biggest Prison on Earth: A History of the Occupied Territories [2019-10-12] - (Download here) INFO: The Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign was honoured to launch the paperback of Ilan Pappe's new book, The Biggest Prison on Earth: A History of the Occupied Territories (Oneworld, 2019) on 12th October 2019 in Dublin. This podcast is a recording of the talk by the acclaimed Israeli historian where he discussed a book which has been called “critical for understanding the present situation and looking forward to possible solutions”. About the Book Shortlisted for the Palestine Book Awards 2017 From the author of the bestselling The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine – the seminal study of the 1948 Nakba and the violent creation of the State of Israel – comes an incisive look at the Occupied Palestinian Territories, picking up the story where that book left off. In this comprehensive exploration of one of the world's most prolonged and tragic conflicts, Pappe uses recently declassified archival material to analyse the motivations and strategies of the generals and politicians – and the decision-making process itself – that laid the foundation of Israel's occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. From a survey of the legal and bureaucratic infrastructures that were put in place to control the population of over one million Palestinians, to the security mechanisms that vigorously enforced that control, Pappe paints a picture of what is to all intents and purposes the world's largest ‘open prison'. About the Author Ilan Pappe is Professor of History at the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies at the College of Social Sciences and International Studies and Director of the European Centre for Palestine Studies at the University of Exeter, and the author of over a dozen books including the bestselling The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, A History of Modern Palestine, The Idea of Israel, Ten Myths About Israel and The Forgotten Palestinians: A History of the Palestinians in Israel. In 2017, Pappe was awarded the Middle East Monitor's Lifetime Achievement Award at the Palestine Book Awards. Hosted by the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign. Disclaimer: The views expressed in this podcast reflect the opinions of the speaker(s) only and do not reflect the views of the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign unless otherwise explicitly stated. Apple PodcastsGoogle PodcastsSpotifyStitcherAcastYouTubeDeezerTuneInPlayer.fmPocketCastsCastroRadio PublicBreakerBlubrryPodcast AddictPodbeanPodcast RepubliciHeartRadio

The full recording of an interview I did recently with the Middle East Monitor. Article interview can be read at link below. Short surprise at the very end after the outro music! https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20190711-were-trying-to-find-a-gap-in-israels-walls/  

The Hate Show with Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert May 9, 2019 Season 1, Episode 12 It used to be that after working real hard to take care of our families, we could come home at night and relax in front of the TV set and watch Late Night talk show hosts entertain us with humor and fun. We had Johnny Carson and the Jay Leno and David Lettermen. They were phenomenal. But today, all that talent is gone from late night television. It has been replaced by vicious, politically-driven, selfish hatred against President Donald Trump Late night talk show hosts Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert spew some of the most obnoxious and vicious garbage that is pawned off as humor but it's just ugly hate. It's not even funny. The Late Show with Stephen Colbert should be called The Hate Show with Stephen Colbert. Now President Trump is like anypresident. There is some good and there is some bad. Sure he should be criticized but criticized with the intent of being constructive, fair and funny. Instead, Kimmel and Colbert are engaged in a vicious assault that is dragging this country down. But worse, their unfunny hate is actually helping to empower President Trump and their late night hate shows are going to guarantee that Trump will be re-elected in 2020. Here's my perspective on the "Ray Hanania on Politics" podcast. Check out more of my writings on AMerican politics and also on Middle East politics by visiting my personal website, my archive at www.Hanania.com. You can get links to all my writing at the Arab News Newspaper and Middle East Monitor, and in the Des Plaines Valley News and Southwest News Newspaper Chain as well as SuburbanChicagoland.com and the South Suburban News newspaper from Lyons and Bridgeview all the way south to Chicago heights. Listen to more of the "Ray Hanania on Politics" podcast by visiting www.RayHananiaOnPolitics.com. It's that simple.

Game of Thrones has been a "Thrilling Disappointment" May 9, 2019 Season 1, Episode 13 I have been watching Game of Thrones on HBO for more than 8 years. This is Season 8 and there are only 2 episodes left as it comes to a crashing end. I love the series so much I would watch any level of quality and I have an excitement about this final season that is unmatched with many other season finales. But despite my thrill, the fact is the producers and writers of this last season 8 of Game of Thrones have really been disappointing. They just haven't made it what it could have been, a spectacular ending. They didn't put the real effort into it. It is almost as if they just shrugged their shoulders and said ok let's end it. They are ending it but not at the level it could be ended at. This final season could have been the most spectacular ending ever for any series but it has been a level of disappointment. It's far less than it can be. I discuss some aspects of why I feel that way and I hope you enjoy this. Check out more of my writings on American politics and also on Middle East politics by visiting my personal website, my archive at www.Hanania.com. You can get links to all my writing at the Arab News Newspaper and Middle East Monitor, and in the Des Plaines Valley News and Southwest News Newspaper Chain as well as SuburbanChicagoland.com and the South Suburban News newspaper from Lyons and Bridgeview all the way south to Chicago heights. Listen to more of the "Ray Hanania on Politics" podcast by visiting www.RayHananiaOnPolitics.com.

S1 Ep9: How Uber and Lift are destroying an immigrant driven industry This is the Ray Hanania Podcasta weekly overview of all my opinion columns, my radio interviews, and my reports on Middle East topics and on Mainstream American politics. This episode of Ray Hanania on Politics looks at impact that Uber and Lyft are having on the Taxi Cab industry. The Taxi Cab industry is an immigrant driven industry and for the life of me, I don’t understand why the liberals who claim to care about immigrants are not standing up to defend the rights of the taxi can drivers who are being decimated and pushed out of business into homelessness by Uber and Lyft. Taxi cabs are a heavily regulated industry. It costs a major investment to drive a cab or start your own company. The medallion was a huge investment at one time and was like a stock rising in value from $30,000 to $700,000 or more in recent years. But the rise of Uber and Lyft have pulled the rug out from the Taxi cab industry and medallion costs have fallen dramatically. Owners have lost fortunes invested in hard work and money over the past 30 to 40 years. The real concern though is safety, the lack of adequate insurance. A Taxi Cab driver has thousands of dollars in insurance on their car. The Uber and Lyft drivers have cheap insurance. Who monitors them? We need to do something. Maybe require Uber and Lyft drivers to purchase a medallion the same way we forced taxi cab drivers to buy medallions. Put them through rigorous background checks. My mainstream columns are published at SuburbanChicagoland.com and in seven newspapers in the Southwest region of Chicagoland including The Regional News, The Reporter, the Des Plaines Valley News, and the Southwest News-Herald. My Middle East columns are published in the Arab News Newspaper, the Middle East Monitor online, and the Arab Daily News online. I hope you enjoy this episode of Ray Hanania on Politics. Go to RayHananiaOnPolitics.com for the latest episodes, or check us out on iTunes and my personal website www.Hanania.com end

Remembering the 1979 election that changed everything in Chicago -- April 2, 2019 This is the "Ray Hanania on Politics" Podcast, a look at Chicagoland politics past and present ... This episode of Ray Hanania on Politics looks at the 1978 campaign and 1979 Chicago Mayoral Election. We talk about the first African American mayor being either Lori Lightfoot or Toni Preckwinkle, but we can’t forget the action-paced newsmaking four year term of Chicago’s first woman Mayor Jane M. Byrne and how she defeated the Chicago Machine, and ended up taking it over … That was my first real election that I covered as a City Hall reporter and it was one of the most exciting elections Chicago had seen in a long time … Jane Byrne’s rise, her feud with the Cabal of Evil Men who were Ed Fast Eddie Vrdolyak, Ed Burke and First Ward Outfit alderman Fred Roti …her election challenge of Mike Bilandic, who took the office from Wilson Frost who was the President Pro Tempore when Richard J. Daley died on Dec. 20, 1976 … This is a look back at the rollercoaster first City Hall political earthquake that brought the Chicago Machine to its knees and changed Chicago politics forever … Jane Byrne’s rise opened the door to the changes that we continue to see today in Chicago politics. My mainstream columns are published at SuburbanChicagoland.com and in seven newspapers in the Southwest region of Chicagoland including The Regional News, The Reporter, the Des Plaines Valley News, and the Southwest News-Herald. My Middle East columns are published in the Arab News Newspaper, the Middle East Monitor online, and the Arab Daily News online. I hope you enjoy this episode of Ray Hanania on Politics. Go to RayHananiaOnPolitics.com for the latest episodes, or check us out on iTunes and my personal website www.Hanania.com.

Chicago Mayoral Election, Lightfoot vs Preckwinkle Opinion Commentary April 1, 2019 This is the Ray Hanania Podcasta weekly overview of all my opinion columns, my radio interviews, and my reports on Middle East topics and on Mainstream American politics. This episode of Ray Hanania on Politics looks at the race for Chicago mayor between Lori Lightfoot and Toni Preckwinkle. Although the polls and many media pundits have already called this election for Lightfoot, I don’t believe you can rule Preckwinkle out and I believe she has a shot at winning. A good shot. Although I have been a longtime critic of some of Preckwinkle’s policies, I feel Preckwinkle is the better candidate of the two and I have endorsed her, reflecting the sentiments of the Southwest Side and Northwest Side voters, most of who voted for other candidates. Both Lightfoot and Preckwinkle are Machine candidates of sorts, Preckwinkle a traditional Machine candidate but Lightfoot as an untraditional Machine candidate running to push the far left, the extremists of politics. You also have to consider that although many of the 12 candidates who lost to Lightfoot and Preckwinkle in the Feb. 26, 2019 open primary election have endorsed candidates, with Lightfoot receiving most of the endorsements, and Bill Daley not endorsing, you can’t assume that they control the votes their received. It’s a new ballgame folks. This election does not have the same dynamics of the 14-candidate open primary. I think Preckwinkle will win. My Middle East columns are published in the Arab News Newspaper, the Middle East Monitor online, and the Arab Daily News online. My mainstream columns are published at SuburbanChicagoland.com and in seven newspapers in the Southwest region of Chicagoland including The Regional News, The Reporter, the Des Plaines Valley News, and the Southwest News-Herald. Ihope you enjoy this episode of Ray Hanania on Politics. Go to RayHananiaOnPolitics.com for the latest episodes, or check us out on iTunes and my personal website www.Hanania.com end

Illinois Taxes, Mosque Massacres, Israeli election chicanery Podcast Illinois Taxation, Mosque Massacre in New Zealand and Israel, and Israel's election chicanery, March 24, 2019 This is Ray Hanania's Podcast, The Middle East & Mainstream Podcast, which explores every issue under the sun, from mainstream to the Middle East, politics, everyday life, society and more with hard-hitting opinions and insight and even humor. In this episode of Ray Hanania's Podcast, Ray explains talks about his columns published this week in the three main syndication carriers. First is his mainstream column published in the Southwest News Newspaper Group of eight newspapers in Chicagoland. This column focuses on how Illinois is the 49thworst state when it comes to taxation, and how Gov. J.B. Pritzker is making a serious mistake by trying to address the state’s financial troubles by increasing taxes. The cause of Illinois’ problems are the excessive pensions given to reward political patronage, not hard-earned career work. The way to address the pension problem is through pension reform, not through increasing taxes. The Middle East portion of the podcast addresses two topics, the first in Middle East Monitor online, the London website, Hanania writes about how the New Zealand massacre of 50 Muslims at two mosques in Christchurch reminds us of the very first terrorist attack against a mosque that took place by an American in Hebron on Feb. 25, 1994, just over 25 years ago. The terrorist, Dr. Baruch Goldstein, was from Chicago and had dual citizenship both Israeli and American. Goldstein was serving in the Israeli military, not in the American military, an issue of “dual loyalty” that Minnesota Congresswoman Ihlan Omar raised in her criticism of biased pro-Israel support. Goldstein killed 50 Muslims who were praying in the Ibrahimi Mosque and injured more than 125 others. The second Middle East column is published in the esteemed Arab News in Saudi Arabia and speaks to the efforts b Israel’s rightwing Apartheid government to undermine the voting rights on non-Jews in Israel. It speaks to Israel’s parliamentary system and how it is constructed to undermine the rights of Christian and Muslim voters in Israel. Ray Hanania has two podcasts now, one called Ray Hanania’s Middle East & Mainstream podcast, and my new one called “Ray Hanania on Politics” … both podcasts are available for download from iTunes and many other podcast systems. I’ll be shifting from Podbean to do exclusive podcasting for the “Ray Hanania on Politics” podcast. The new websites you can check are RayHananiaOnPolitics.comand also OnDeadlinePodcast.com. But remember, you can go to Hanania.com to view links to all of Ray Hanania’s mainstream, Middle East columns, and all of Ray Hanania’s podcasts and videos, too. Hanania has covered politics since 1976, including City Hall from 1977 through 1992 for the Daily Southtown and the Chicago Sun-Times. For more information on Ray Hanania's Podcasts, writings and syndicated columns visit his website at www.Hanania.com

On today's episode of Loud & Clear, Brian Becker is joined by Jacqueline Luqman, the co-editor-in-chief of Luqman Nation, which livestreams every Thursday night at 9:00 p.m. on Facebook, and Sputnik News analyst and producer Walter Smolarek.Friday is Loud & Clear’s weekly hour-long segment The Week in Review, about the week in politics, policy, and international affairs. The White House announced today that the second summit between Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un will take place in late February at a yet-to-be-determined location. This dramatic announcement comes after North Korean lead negotiator Kim Yong Chol visited Washington to meet with Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Brian speaks with Simone Chun, a fellow at the Korea Policy Institute and a member of the Korean Peace Network. A new story published by Buzzfeed is being called a bombshell that will lead to Donald Trump either resigning or being impeached. The story is based on anonymous sources. It asserts that Donald Trump directed his then personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, to lie to Congress about the nature and timing of negotiations between the Trump Organization and individuals in Moscow who are trying to broker a deal to set up a Trump Tower in Moscow. We’ll take a look at the story and its authors. Daniel Lazare, a journalist and author of three books—“The Frozen Republic,” “The Velvet Coup,” and “America's Undeclared War”, joins the show. Four activists with the humanitarian organization No More Deaths are on trial in Tucson, Arizona, facing charges from an arrest in 2017 related to their efforts to place life-saving supplies like water in a stretch of desert near the U.S.-Mexico border to prevent migrants from dying of thirst and starvation. The outcome of the case will have wide-reaching implications for humanitarians and immigrant rights activists. Justine Schnitzler, a volunteer and staff member with No More Deaths, joins Brian. As Jeremy Corbyn comes closer and closer to becoming the Prime Minister of the UK, attacks against him are ramping up. One line of attack has been the allegation that Corbyn, a long time supporter of Palestinian rights and opponent of intervention in the Middle East, is anti-semitic. Now, a new report shows that bot accounts on social media are being used to provide false evidence for these claims. Asa Winstanley. He is an investigative journalist with The Electronic Intifada and a columnist at Middle East Monitor whose article “Fake Labour accounts fueling ‘anti-Semitism crisis’” broke the story, joins the show.It’s Friday! So it’s time for the week’s worst and most misleading headlines. Brian speaks with Steve Patt, an independent journalist whose critiques of the mainstream media have been a feature of his site Left I on the News and on twitter @leftiblog, and Sputnik producer Nicole Roussell.

Your hosts, Lynn, Levon, Marie-Claude, and Marc (show video at bottom) Birth tourism in Canada, a much bigger issue than thought The issue of birth tourism is back once again in Canada. This photo of a Chinese baby holding a Canadian passport was posted by Baoma Inn, of Richmond B.C., one of several so-called birth houses or maternity hotels designed to enable women to have their babies here while ostensibly coming as tourists. New research shows the number of such "passport baby" births is at least five times higher than previously thought. (via CBC) Birth tourism, passport babies, or the related anchor baby, are used to describe the concept of foreign women coming to a country with "birthright citizenship" in order to have their baby declared as a citizen of that country. Canada is one of several countries which continues this concept, while the majority of countries around the world do not. A Canadian passport would give access to a wide variety of social benefits, and much lower university costs for the child. Thought to be an issue of very small concern, the federal government had felt it would be too costly to change the system to become more selective about given citizenship rights. This new information shows there are at least five times more "passport babies" being born than previously thought, and that the numbers are increasing every year Marc spoke to Andrew Griffith who discovered the new figures. He is an author and former senior official at Citizenship and Immigration Canada. Canada sanctions 17 Saudis linked to Khashoggi murder Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi speaks at an event hosted by Middle East Monitor in London, Britain, September 29, 2018. (Middle East Monitor/Handout via REUTERS) Canada has reacted to the murder of Saudi journalist and dissident Jamal Khashoggi, by putting sanctions of 17 Saudi officials believed to have had involvement in the man's murder. While the CIA and and Turkish investigators believe the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, M-B-S. ordered the killing, his name is not on the Canadian list. Canada's Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland made the announcement of the sanctions. In store, or online- How shopping affects your carbon footprint Consumers can bundle purchases and not choose fast shipping to reduce the emissions generated by their online shopping. (iStock) This past weekend saw a flurry of shopping in N. America, first was the American "Black Friday" sales, a concept which for better or worse has spread to Canada, and then Monday was called "cyber Monday" for online shopping bargains. Canadians are indeed big online shoppers , but what leaves a bigger carbon footprint- going to the store, or buying online? Lynn spoke to Anika Kozlowski, an assistant professor of fashion design, ethics and sustainability at Ryerson University in Toronto about the carbon emissions we leave depending on how we shop. Video of show Images of the week window.jQuery || document.write('

Iran fired half-a-dozen ballistic missiles from domestic bases that hit Islamic State targets deep in Syria.  The reason given was to avenge the Islamic State's recent suicide attacks on the Iranian Parliament. Israel is right next door to Syria.  And for decades, Teheran's ruling mullahs have been saying they intend to exterminate the Jews.  So Tel Aviv is feeling the heat. Lest anyone miss the point, Iran's foreign ministry issued a statement saying these launches were a message to Israel, America, and the Saudis. To our knowledge, this was the first-ever battlefield test of an intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) in the Mideast. These missiles take just minutes to hit their targets.  So it's hard to over-estimate how alarming a development this truly is. The global media practically goes into paroxysms of alarm over North Korea's IRBM tests -- none of which have actually ever hit a target. Some of them blew up on the launchpad, so nobody knows how close Kim's IRBMs are from actually being operational. Not so for Iran -- which has now successfully demonstrated its ability to annihilate military targets in Israel and Saudi Arabia with missiles fired from inside its territory. Make no mistake, Iran can now devastate Saudi Arabia's oil fields and all of Israel's cities with the push of a button. Look at the following timeline from the past three months and realize that in the previous six years of the Syrian civil war, there was not one instance of direct fighting between the U.S. and Iranian proxies. Now, they clash almost daily. April 4: Syrian President Bashar Assad launched a devastating chemical attack against his own people. April 6: U.S. President Donald Trump responded by firing 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles from the Mediterranean against the Syrian airfield, which marked the first time the U.S. had directly targeted the Assad regime in the Syrian civil war. May 18: A group from the Sayyid al-Shuhada Brigade, an Iranian-supported militia, approached the American al-Tanf military base on the border between Syria, Iraq and Jordan and, subsequently, was destroyed by aircraft. May 29: Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Units, a massive fighting force of mainly Iranian-backed militias, reached the Syrian border from Iraqi territory for the first time. Pictures were widely circulated in Iranian and Syrian media. June 6: An Iranian-backed militia advanced on the “deconfliction” zone in southern Syria. After repeated warnings to halt, U.S. aircraft destroyed the column of vehicles, including two artillery pieces, an antiaircraft weapon and a tank. June 8: An Iranian drone dropped a munition on U.S. coalition forces near al-Tanf, but it failed to detonate. The U.S. shot down the drone. June 12: Iranian state media released photographs of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force Cmdr. Qassem Suleimani standing on the Iraqi-Syrian border alongside an Iranian-backed militia, culminating a lightning offensive across eastern Syria to reach the border. June 14: The U.S. moved its mobile artillery rocket launchers into southern Syria for the first time in order to provide a 300-kilometer (186-mile) security umbrella for its troops along the border. June 18: The U.S. shot down a Syrian jet for bombing its allies in the most significant ratcheting up of tensions to date. June 18: Iran’s revolutionary guard launched six ballistic missiles toward Syria, travelling 370 miles and receiving permission to fly over Iraqi territory. Gen. Ramazan Sharif told state media that “the Saudis and Americans are especially receivers of the message.” Obviously, this situation in Syria is highly combustible, especially considering that each side does not want to back down. As Mahan Abedin correctly noted in Middle East Monitor on June 6, a clash is “inevitable.” He wrote:

Khalil Charles discusses the latest news on the Muslim brotherhood. Khalil is a researcher and journalist. He is currently an editor for The Middle East Monitor. You can find him at @khalilcharles