Gaza Poet, Writer, Refaat Alareer Killed In Targeted Strike With 6 Family Members; Had Angered Bari Weiss, Max Blumenthal Accuses Weiss Of "Inspiring" Death Threats And IDF Targeting
Gaza Poet, Writer, Refaat Alareer Killed In Targeted Strike With 6 Family Members; Had Angered Bari Weiss, Max Blumenthal Accuses Weiss Of "Inspiring" Death Threats And IDF Targeting
Dec 9, 2023·edited Dec 15, 2023Liked by Celia Farber
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What's next (not UNlikely at all), the assassination of American poets on U.S. soil like myself who defend the Palestinians and stand up against Zionist fascism? It wouldn't surprise me; because, with the increasing crackdowns on the First Amendment and Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and of freedom of speech, in the U.S., this is the totalitarian repression that we are headed for [if it's not already occurring and being made to look like "something else" ("accident", "murder by someone else" {victim of "unrelated" crime{s}}, "natural death", "suicide", etc.]. I personally believe that there are likely Israeli assassins in the U.S. that are specifically here for the purpose of destroying selected critics of the Zionist, fascist regime, and/or critics of the global(ist) totalitarian-fascist regime also being run by (the) Zionists, both in Israel and globally (and will their families be targeted next as well, if they too aren't already the victims of same also?).
My friend Mosab Abu Toha posted this on Friday morning:
The day before yesterday, Refaat received a phone call from the Israeli intelligence about locating him in the school where he took refuge. They informed him that they were going to kill him. He left the school not wanting to endanger the others, and at 6 p.m. his sister's apartment was bombed, where he was killed, his sister and her four children.
There was a big vigil for him in New York on Friday night...
Thank you, Celia for posting this with links, as a fellow poet, new to me.
Here is a beautifully and justly vicious article on the BBC’s coverage (typical MSM deceitful shroud Laura rips apart to let the light in) of Refaat to add to your brief mention:
BBC DEHUMANISES MURDERED WRITER IN NAME OF IMPARTIALITY
They refused to even name his killers LAURA K 9 DEC 2023
The BBC has taken great care to dehumanise a Palestinian writer who was murdered by Israel by calling him “controversial”. The BBC takes its obligation to report in a neutral manner (that doesn’t upset the Israeli government or its supporters in the British government) very seriously.
“Love and death of the great gifts that are given to us; mostly they are passed on unopen.” Rainer Maria Rilke
along with my Lessons of Loss, let us permit the gift of his going to open us to our Voluntary Humanity where we choose the Innocent Individual always over the Criminal Collective.
Finally, this song and video version, may add to our Opening towards doing no harm to self or others:
I looked up his name + BBC and didn't see anything really biased pro-Israel-wise, and as you read the article, it rather humanizes him. See my substack note for screenshots
Did you read the article by Laura K on the BBC article?
BBC DEHUMANISES MURDERED WRITER IN NAME OF IMPARTIALITY by LAURA K 9 DEC 2023
“They refused to even name his killers. The BBC has taken great care to dehumanise a Palestinian writer who was murdered by Israel by calling him “controversial”.”
“Update: An earlier version of this article described Refaat Alareer as controversial and has been amended to make clear that it was his comments about the 7 October attacks which were controversial and caused huge offence.”
I disagree with your opinion that the article “humanizes” him.
DID YOU NOT NOTICE ALL THE NEGATIVE COMMENTS ABOUT HIM? FOR EXAMPLE:
1.“Alareer had declined to leave northern Gaza following the start of Israeli operations in the area.”
SO HE CHOSE TO STAY AND BE BOMBED. AFTER ALL HE WAS WARNED, YES? Read Laura K’s article as bitter sarcasm as she eviscerates the BBC article and more importantly shakes in our face what she felt should have been in it.
2. “In an interview with the BBC in the hours after Hamas's 7 October attack on Israel, Alareer caused widespread offence by calling it "legitimate and moral". He said it was "exactly like the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising".
Following the outcry over Alareer's interview in October, a BBC spokesperson said: We reported the Hamas attacks and the response by Israel in line with the BBC's Editorial Guidelines.
We have included contributors who have condemned the attackers as terrorists and we have reported that Hamas is designated as a terrorist group by many Western governments, including the UK.
While an interviewee who made comments on the Warsaw Ghetto was robustly challenged on air, we agree his comments were offensive and we don't intend to use him again."
NO NEED TO READ BETWEEN THE LINES OF THE BBC ARTICLE TO NOTE THIS IS NOT A EULOGY BUT A PILLORY DISGUISED AS ONE.
Compare this more balanced article by the UK Guardian
The Guardian piece describes his Warsaw Ghetto remarks -- which by the way is the only negative thing both papers cite about him -- "caused outrage" while the BBC says they "caused widespread offence ". So one could argue the BBC was softening it, and the Guardian was attacking him.
Again, I disagree with your reading. How you can interpret the BBC was “softening it” when they wrote so much on this Warsaw Ghetto remark on a piece that was supposed to be a eulogy; the Guardian did not emphasis this as BBC did.
Partly agree, these are to varying degrees, subjective matters; however, I consider it possible and desirable to be more objective, and in the case of the propaganda wars going on between the Collective Israel Zionist government murderers and the Individual Palestinians being murdered, I know what side I am on and how the MSM manipulates “facts” to always back the Criminal Collective. I stand with the Individual Palestinians and criticise MSM—and I hope you do too.
I get more the impression the BBC is trying to juggle two competing propaganda narratives -- which is significant in and of itself. Also, I'd wager most people don't read articles like this with a fine-toothed comb, but rather skim over them, and read that way, to me it seems like I said, tilting slightly his way. I'd also wager that pre-October 7, the BBC would be far more pro-Palestinian and critical of Israel.
Unfortunately, most people do not think for themselves and take their government and MSM reports as true, so skim or not, it does not matter…the authorities control their minds.
I do not view the BBC and Guardian much at all so I have no response to your comment on BBC being Pro-Palestine.
I do have a comment though on what I think is indeed YOUR “skimming over” the BBC article and not getting the points Laura K was making.
I would have hoped my pointers would have gotten you to read deeper into the article and hers but I do not seem to have succeeded.
Laura K's points were reflecting a minute analysis which a normal skimming reader doesn't fixate on -- that's the point. But that's only one part of my response. Ironically, I actually WANT the BBC to be pro-Israel, as it fits my theory about the Mainstream better, so my cursory analysis was actually undermining my own view -- i.e., I was looking at the data dispassionately. I still think the BBC piece overall conveys the impression of a poet and his family killed by bombing, and goes on to talk about his poetry and achievements. Just because it doesn't blazon its masthead with "POOR PALESTINIAN POET AND HIS PRECIOUS FAMILY MASSACRED BY THE EVIL ISRAELIS!!!" doesn't mean it is as horribly biased in this regard as you guys are making it out to be.
Hugh Fitzgerald of Jihad Watch (pro-Israel, anti-Mainstream) over the years would complain about the BBC in a thousand subtle ways giving preferential treatment in their coverage to the Palestinians rather than Israel. While Hugh is biased pro-Israel, he's a bright guy, and many times his arguments were cogent (irrelevant to whether one is pro or anti Israel), though the same caveats apply.
We still disagree about your reading of the BBC article, especially your “I was looking at the data dispassionately” claim. The OBJECTIVE FACT that the BBC spent so much space with its “controversial” claim on a eulogy piece and your refusal to recognize this tells me you are not objectively dispassionate but subjectively engaged in your conclusions.
This is heartbreaking. You know, I’ve tried to like Bari Weiss over the years, but I have to say, well, I just haven’t been able to muster it. She has now proven herself to be juvenile and deeply vindictive, among other less than stellar qualities. I’m so sorry this has happened to Refaat. No words.
I cannot speak to the targeting of this poet, and how accurate any bombing can be, but I do know that a baby was put in an oven. What I cannot comprehend is how so many on the left believe Hamas so readily, and never even question the fact that you would not have written this article at all if the terror group who is running a religious war to kill all jews, as written in the koran in the end times, the reason for the rapes as well, had not broken a ceasefire on the 7th of October with such barbaric attacks on 1200 peace activists and their families.
This story is not factually verified Linda. Let's all try to get to the truth. MANY LIES have been seeded. Many overturned. Even Netanyahu's office admitted they lied, for example about beheaded babies. AFTER CNN already reported it. CNN retracted.
I’m not sure but think the beheaded babies thing was grossly exaggerated. I do think they found a or perhaps more than one beheaded baby. Certainly not 40. The truth is always found somewhere in the middle
I'm more than happy to start talking about every detail we can be sure of, regarding the horrors of Oct. 7th.
I'm more than happy to look at everything. I need volunteer reporters, until I can catch up (pay off debt) and pay people. This is the plan. Investigative reportage has to be forensically validated, before it can be published or relied upon. One needs very trusted sources, who are right up close to the story.
While I am not "right up close to the story," I am happy to volunteer my time to assist you. I worked for many years as a fraud investigator (legal services); have some experience as a citizen journalist and did a stint as an Assistant Managing Editor at the L.A. Weekly. I am HAPPY to help!!!!
The trigger for the genocidal assault on Gaza has still not been investigated by proper authorities. Enough information is out there, however, to make it clear it was not a simple matter of something that just happened out of the blue. Netanyahu still has a lot of explaining to do about all the prior knowledge, including by a number of journalists, that something big had been planned for Oct. 7. Many of the Israelis killed on that day were killed by the IDF according to Max Blumenthal who has been paying close attention. Netanyahu's relationship with Hamas has been described as "symbiotic".. ie close.intimate, complex. He needs to keep the war going to stay out of jail. Netanyahu has built his career often exploiting the imagery of Islamic terrorism often created through the manipulation of Muslim patsies, assets, and mercenaries. The assignment of the Qassam Brigades was to capture Israeli people, but especially soldiers if possible, and then keep them alive in order to take them back to Gaza so they would have some bargaining chips otherwise denied to them. What happened to force them into those extremes? How can Israeli continue from here now that so many people in the world rightly perceive of that polity as the baby killing entity and worse?
Thanks for the thoughtful reply Celia, however short and to the point. I starting reading your thoughts on Kary Mullis early in the WHO-authorized pandemic and I was far from alone in being dumbfounded by the manipulation of the PCR test to build up the fear and panic of our friends and neighbours. It sure worked. Your reflections on the career and meanings embedded in Kary Mullis' life, I found really intriguing and so much deeper and more nuanced than most of the whistle blowing stuff that was then starting to (thankfully) emerge. At the time I was doing a lot of back and forth corresponding with Mark Crispin Miller on the early stages of his career-transforming saga. Something about the overlap of the way the early commentaries were being published, suggested to me that you and Mark, both New Yorkers, might be friends or collaborators or something. Mark knows that I faced a major hit from the Lobby in Canada who planted a really ugly image by "Jonathan Goldberg" in my Facebook post and then smeared me quite ruthlessly as the "Holocaust Denying, Anti-Semitic, Conspiracy Professor at the University of Lethbridge in Alberta. B'nai Brith Canada somehow managed to take over the Board of Governors of my U, and in October of 2016 suspended me, a senior tenured Full Professor, without pay and without any due process at all. I had tried to enlist Mark to help me but that didn't happen. A year later a court ordered me to be returned to my academic position but I never got back into the classroom. I so want to spread the alarm about the anti-social behaviour of the Lobby, or the part I encountered anyway, and yet I really want to avoid generalizing ethnic slurs and such. Perhaps that's why your comment on "phrasing" touched me and emboldened me to introduce myself to you with some background. As they say in Ojibway Country, meegwetch (thanks)
After reading about how Israel created Hamas (https://swprs.org/why-israel-created-hamas/) and doing tons of research info Israel's LONG history of false flag terrorism (I'd say they are the masters of deception), I've wondered whether Hamas=Mossad, or at least if Mossad had infiltrated Hamas and was leading/directing Hamas.
WOW!! That Blue Shirts link is amazing. Everybody should have a look at that. It reveals a lot that I haven't seen anywhere else, and the conclusion's an eye-opener! Thanks, Sandra. Well done.
Thanks go to Michael--he's been doing great work and deserves more subscribers. He describes himself as a former Zionist and is even willing to look at the Israeli role in 9/11.
The Segev/Shipler info doesn't establish that Israel "created" Hamas, only at worst that they opportunistically assisted them (with money and maybe also otherwise).
Next, the info from "Israeli military intelligence whistleblower, Ari Ben-Menashe" only establishes again opportunistic assistance, not "creation".
Next, "former Mossad case officer and whistleblower Victor Ostrovsky revealed how the Mossad secretly supported Hamas" -- secret support is not "creation".
Next, "Guela Amir, mother of alleged Rabin assassin Yigal Amir " doesn't even adequately prove that Israel was grooming these extremist Israelis to assassinate Rabin -- let alone does it prove Israel "created" Hamas.
Next, "In a February 2001 article, American news agency UPI revealed how “Israel gave major aid to Hamas”, -- nothing that follows establishes that Israel "created" Hamas, only at worst that they opportunistically used them.
After that long list of failed attempts to establish the claim, the article then cites another article that quotes Yasser Arafat:
"To the Italian daily L'Espresso, Arafat laid out the reasons for this support. "Hamas was constituted with the support of Israel..."
That website that publishes that quote, "Executive Intelligence Review" and the author of that piece, Dean Andromidas, fail to link the Italian daily from which they get the Arafat quote. I took the time and trouble to see if I could find it. Of course, I found many sites simply repeating the claim, echo-chamber-wise, but not actually providing a link to the primary source, L'Espresso. Until I see that primary source, I remain skeptical.
Agree- Israel benefitted from 10/7- it's giving them pretext for doing what they always wanted to do: genocide the Palestinians and steal the rest of the land.
The name of the games in the upper echelons of power is to invent your enemy, invent its controlled opposition and such. It looks to me that what we are seeing in Palestine-Israel is a classic example. As I understand it, al-Qaeda, ISIL, Daesh is all about that. So was the Soviet Union for that matter. Netanyahu is one of the most skilled practitioners of inventing and manipulating the Islamic enemy He studied with the pros like Bernard Lewis. The trail of evidence in this kind of thing usually has to do with following the flow of money. From whence did the seed funding for Hamas come? You must have looked into that Hesperado.
"The story was debunked by journalist Ishay Coen from the Israeli news website Kikar HaShabbat:"There is a certain story that has been published on social networks in recent weeks. Oven. From checking with the IDF, Zakah, Shura camp and more - you don't know of such an event. Spreading incorrect stories will harm Israeli propaganda," Coen said on X (as translated by Google).
“Anyone who wants to thwart the establishment of a Palestinian state has to support bolstering Hamas and transferring money to Hamas.” – Benjamin Netanyahu (2019)
“In the visible dimension Hamas is an enemy, in the hidden dimension it is an ally.”
– IDF Major General Gershon Hacohen (2021)
“Israel started Hamas. It was a project of Shin Bet.”
– Charles Freeman, US diplomat and ambassador (2006)
And Israel running a religious war to kill all Palestinians, or a huge number of them, and mostly women and children, is "okay" because of that [and "two wrongs (supposedly) make one right"]?!
Most of the people here are either "conservatives" and/or constitutionalists, certainly NOT "liberals" [unless they are "liberally" for True Justice (but, believe me, I don't agree with everything they believe, except for the beliefs of all True Constitutionalists like myself)], and they definitely are NOT supportive of any real terrorism committed by Hamas. BUT THE PALESTINIANS HAVE JUST AS MUCH RIGHT(S) TO DEFEND THEMSELVES FROM THE APARTHEID FASCISM AND SEVENTY-FIVE YEAR LONG MASS-OPEN-AIR-IMPRISONMENT OF THEMSELVES BY THE ISRAELIS, AS WELL AS SEVENTY-FIVE YEARS OF MASS-GENOCIDE OF THEIR PEOPLE, WHICH ARE ENDLESS!!
the baby in the oven is one of several memes -- along with "40 beheaded babies", "targeting a hospital", "cutting off women's breasts and playing with them", "decapitating victims and playing with the heads", "raping women and parading them naked", "raping women, killing them, then raping their dead bodies" etc. -- evidently calculated to demonize Hamas beyond the pale. One thing all these memes share: there is inadequate evidence verifying them. All we have is the strange and unprecedented activity of Israel holding "private screenings" for select journalists who then go onto various parts of social media saying "I have seen the video evidence in the private screening, and I can tell you it's true." Well, that ain't good enough for something this momentously important of international significance.
There has been lots of atrocity propaganda--they always use stories about victimized babies and women (e.g. incubator babies for 1st war on Iraq, babies on German bayonets in WW1, and rape stories to justify NATO war on Libya) to justify the wars.
Here's another one with babies:
Israeli Journalist Retracts ‘Babies Hung on a Clothesline’ October 7 Atrocity Propaganda
Journalist Ishay Cohen published and erased a fake story provided to him by the Israeli military spokesperson, but a prominent Israeli propaganda account is still promoting it.
The Los Angeles Times retracts rape allegations against Palestinian group Hamas
The allegations, which had initially garnered widespread attention, raised concerns about the conduct of Palestinian fighters during ongoing conflicts. However, following a thorough investigation, The Los Angeles Times has concluded that the reports in question do not meet the necessary criteria for substantiation.
And Max Blumenthal caught them using a photo from 2022, as evidence of rape on 10/7:
Blumenthal continued digging, and was able to tell us that Elkayam-Levy had used photographs of rape victims and spoken in a shaky voice as if to prove the authenticity of the rape allegations. I admit that had it not been for Blumenthal’s investigative work I would have fallen for this Zionist-fuelled trickery. To her eternal shame, Elkayam-Levy, either knowingly or in ignorance, presented an old image of dead female Kurdish fighters as women sexually assaulted at the Nova music festival on 7 October.
The west has lost all moral authority to lecture third world countries on human rights. I worry for the rest of the the world and those current and future victims
Thank you for sharing, Celia. This is so heartbreaking. This must touch us all as writers, shaking us up, forcing deep questions to the surface: Why do I write? To whom/what am I giving my voice? Yesterday Refaat Alareer joined the writers and artists who have dedicated their work and given their lives calling for truth and freedom, Víctor Jara, Nâzım Hikmet, Erich Ohser, to name a few. Heroic Humans ~ free spirits defending the right to live for all ~ a request which would seem perfectly normal ~ which should go without saying! ~ in a humane world.
I was until October 7, working with an 'anti-woke' activist group that was the successor to an entity that had been heavily promoted by Bari Weiss. Within a 48 hour period, I watched group leaders morph from champions of free speech and a free press into blood thirsty zealots who are advocating the doxing/ruination of anyone who questions the narrative. Weiss and her IDW buddies are fanatics.
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What's next (not UNlikely at all), the assassination of American poets on U.S. soil like myself who defend the Palestinians and stand up against Zionist fascism? It wouldn't surprise me; because, with the increasing crackdowns on the First Amendment and Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and of freedom of speech, in the U.S., this is the totalitarian repression that we are headed for [if it's not already occurring and being made to look like "something else" ("accident", "murder by someone else" {victim of "unrelated" crime{s}}, "natural death", "suicide", etc.]. I personally believe that there are likely Israeli assassins in the U.S. that are specifically here for the purpose of destroying selected critics of the Zionist, fascist regime, and/or critics of the global(ist) totalitarian-fascist regime also being run by (the) Zionists, both in Israel and globally (and will their families be targeted next as well, if they too aren't already the victims of same also?).
For many years of my poetry:
https://www.wolfbritain.com/wolf-britain/start.html
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I am so sorry. Those are the ony words that come to me.
💔🙏🏻
The IDF really, really has a lot of computerized AI targeting information in their "Gospel" targeting system. ;-(
My friend Mosab Abu Toha posted this on Friday morning:
The day before yesterday, Refaat received a phone call from the Israeli intelligence about locating him in the school where he took refuge. They informed him that they were going to kill him. He left the school not wanting to endanger the others, and at 6 p.m. his sister's apartment was bombed, where he was killed, his sister and her four children.
There was a big vigil for him in New York on Friday night...
Thank you Ammiel. This is also what Max Blumenthal reported. Can one read your friend Mosab on social media?
Thank you, Celia for posting this with links, as a fellow poet, new to me.
Here is a beautifully and justly vicious article on the BBC’s coverage (typical MSM deceitful shroud Laura rips apart to let the light in) of Refaat to add to your brief mention:
BBC DEHUMANISES MURDERED WRITER IN NAME OF IMPARTIALITY
They refused to even name his killers LAURA K 9 DEC 2023
The BBC has taken great care to dehumanise a Palestinian writer who was murdered by Israel by calling him “controversial”. The BBC takes its obligation to report in a neutral manner (that doesn’t upset the Israeli government or its supporters in the British government) very seriously.
https://normalislandnews.substack.com/p/bbc-dehumanises-murdered-writer-in
Bringing Rilke's words to mind
“Love and death of the great gifts that are given to us; mostly they are passed on unopen.” Rainer Maria Rilke
along with my Lessons of Loss, let us permit the gift of his going to open us to our Voluntary Humanity where we choose the Innocent Individual always over the Criminal Collective.
Finally, this song and video version, may add to our Opening towards doing no harm to self or others:
Pat Metheny “From This Place”
“Trust in Love, Truth Be my Lead
From Here I Will Stand with Thee
Till Hearts are Truly Free”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJZ--WNq_II
I looked up his name + BBC and didn't see anything really biased pro-Israel-wise, and as you read the article, it rather humanizes him. See my substack note for screenshots
https://substack.com/profile/25949243-hesperado/note/c-45070158
That's not the headline I saw. They changed their tune.
Did you read the article by Laura K on the BBC article?
BBC DEHUMANISES MURDERED WRITER IN NAME OF IMPARTIALITY by LAURA K 9 DEC 2023
“They refused to even name his killers. The BBC has taken great care to dehumanise a Palestinian writer who was murdered by Israel by calling him “controversial”.”
https://normalislandnews.substack.com/p/bbc-dehumanises-murdered-writer-in
When you read the BBC AMENDED [my emphasis] article
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-67656787.amp
did you notice at the bottom:
“Update: An earlier version of this article described Refaat Alareer as controversial and has been amended to make clear that it was his comments about the 7 October attacks which were controversial and caused huge offence.”
I disagree with your opinion that the article “humanizes” him.
DID YOU NOT NOTICE ALL THE NEGATIVE COMMENTS ABOUT HIM? FOR EXAMPLE:
1.“Alareer had declined to leave northern Gaza following the start of Israeli operations in the area.”
SO HE CHOSE TO STAY AND BE BOMBED. AFTER ALL HE WAS WARNED, YES? Read Laura K’s article as bitter sarcasm as she eviscerates the BBC article and more importantly shakes in our face what she felt should have been in it.
2. “In an interview with the BBC in the hours after Hamas's 7 October attack on Israel, Alareer caused widespread offence by calling it "legitimate and moral". He said it was "exactly like the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising".
Following the outcry over Alareer's interview in October, a BBC spokesperson said: We reported the Hamas attacks and the response by Israel in line with the BBC's Editorial Guidelines.
We have included contributors who have condemned the attackers as terrorists and we have reported that Hamas is designated as a terrorist group by many Western governments, including the UK.
While an interviewee who made comments on the Warsaw Ghetto was robustly challenged on air, we agree his comments were offensive and we don't intend to use him again."
NO NEED TO READ BETWEEN THE LINES OF THE BBC ARTICLE TO NOTE THIS IS NOT A EULOGY BUT A PILLORY DISGUISED AS ONE.
Compare this more balanced article by the UK Guardian
Palestinian poet Refaat Alareer killed in Gaza
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/08/palestinian-poet-refaat-alareer-killed-in-gaza
Get free, stay free.
The Guardian piece describes his Warsaw Ghetto remarks -- which by the way is the only negative thing both papers cite about him -- "caused outrage" while the BBC says they "caused widespread offence ". So one could argue the BBC was softening it, and the Guardian was attacking him.
Again, I disagree with your reading. How you can interpret the BBC was “softening it” when they wrote so much on this Warsaw Ghetto remark on a piece that was supposed to be a eulogy; the Guardian did not emphasis this as BBC did.
These are relative subjective matters, difficult to pin down with certainty as objective fact.
Partly agree, these are to varying degrees, subjective matters; however, I consider it possible and desirable to be more objective, and in the case of the propaganda wars going on between the Collective Israel Zionist government murderers and the Individual Palestinians being murdered, I know what side I am on and how the MSM manipulates “facts” to always back the Criminal Collective. I stand with the Individual Palestinians and criticise MSM—and I hope you do too.
I get more the impression the BBC is trying to juggle two competing propaganda narratives -- which is significant in and of itself. Also, I'd wager most people don't read articles like this with a fine-toothed comb, but rather skim over them, and read that way, to me it seems like I said, tilting slightly his way. I'd also wager that pre-October 7, the BBC would be far more pro-Palestinian and critical of Israel.
Unfortunately, most people do not think for themselves and take their government and MSM reports as true, so skim or not, it does not matter…the authorities control their minds.
I do not view the BBC and Guardian much at all so I have no response to your comment on BBC being Pro-Palestine.
I do have a comment though on what I think is indeed YOUR “skimming over” the BBC article and not getting the points Laura K was making.
I would have hoped my pointers would have gotten you to read deeper into the article and hers but I do not seem to have succeeded.
Laura K's points were reflecting a minute analysis which a normal skimming reader doesn't fixate on -- that's the point. But that's only one part of my response. Ironically, I actually WANT the BBC to be pro-Israel, as it fits my theory about the Mainstream better, so my cursory analysis was actually undermining my own view -- i.e., I was looking at the data dispassionately. I still think the BBC piece overall conveys the impression of a poet and his family killed by bombing, and goes on to talk about his poetry and achievements. Just because it doesn't blazon its masthead with "POOR PALESTINIAN POET AND HIS PRECIOUS FAMILY MASSACRED BY THE EVIL ISRAELIS!!!" doesn't mean it is as horribly biased in this regard as you guys are making it out to be.
Hugh Fitzgerald of Jihad Watch (pro-Israel, anti-Mainstream) over the years would complain about the BBC in a thousand subtle ways giving preferential treatment in their coverage to the Palestinians rather than Israel. While Hugh is biased pro-Israel, he's a bright guy, and many times his arguments were cogent (irrelevant to whether one is pro or anti Israel), though the same caveats apply.
We still disagree about your reading of the BBC article, especially your “I was looking at the data dispassionately” claim. The OBJECTIVE FACT that the BBC spent so much space with its “controversial” claim on a eulogy piece and your refusal to recognize this tells me you are not objectively dispassionate but subjectively engaged in your conclusions.
Heartbreaking
This is heartbreaking. You know, I’ve tried to like Bari Weiss over the years, but I have to say, well, I just haven’t been able to muster it. She has now proven herself to be juvenile and deeply vindictive, among other less than stellar qualities. I’m so sorry this has happened to Refaat. No words.
I cannot speak to the targeting of this poet, and how accurate any bombing can be, but I do know that a baby was put in an oven. What I cannot comprehend is how so many on the left believe Hamas so readily, and never even question the fact that you would not have written this article at all if the terror group who is running a religious war to kill all jews, as written in the koran in the end times, the reason for the rapes as well, had not broken a ceasefire on the 7th of October with such barbaric attacks on 1200 peace activists and their families.
This story is not factually verified Linda. Let's all try to get to the truth. MANY LIES have been seeded. Many overturned. Even Netanyahu's office admitted they lied, for example about beheaded babies. AFTER CNN already reported it. CNN retracted.
Linda you tell me—what is going on here?
THEY LIED ABOUT THE BEHEADED BABIES.
Who does that?
Is it Israel ..the actual baby killers?
I’m not sure but think the beheaded babies thing was grossly exaggerated. I do think they found a or perhaps more than one beheaded baby. Certainly not 40. The truth is always found somewhere in the middle
I'm more than happy to start talking about every detail we can be sure of, regarding the horrors of Oct. 7th.
I'm more than happy to look at everything. I need volunteer reporters, until I can catch up (pay off debt) and pay people. This is the plan. Investigative reportage has to be forensically validated, before it can be published or relied upon. One needs very trusted sources, who are right up close to the story.
While I am not "right up close to the story," I am happy to volunteer my time to assist you. I worked for many years as a fraud investigator (legal services); have some experience as a citizen journalist and did a stint as an Assistant Managing Editor at the L.A. Weekly. I am HAPPY to help!!!!
Serendipity and you still can't see it.
https://middleeastobserver.org/2023/10/29/new-evidence-that-idf-shelled-israeli-citizens-on-oct-7-killing-over-a-hundred/
Are you aware of the Hannibal Directive? If not, check out Haaretz on it.
The trigger for the genocidal assault on Gaza has still not been investigated by proper authorities. Enough information is out there, however, to make it clear it was not a simple matter of something that just happened out of the blue. Netanyahu still has a lot of explaining to do about all the prior knowledge, including by a number of journalists, that something big had been planned for Oct. 7. Many of the Israelis killed on that day were killed by the IDF according to Max Blumenthal who has been paying close attention. Netanyahu's relationship with Hamas has been described as "symbiotic".. ie close.intimate, complex. He needs to keep the war going to stay out of jail. Netanyahu has built his career often exploiting the imagery of Islamic terrorism often created through the manipulation of Muslim patsies, assets, and mercenaries. The assignment of the Qassam Brigades was to capture Israeli people, but especially soldiers if possible, and then keep them alive in order to take them back to Gaza so they would have some bargaining chips otherwise denied to them. What happened to force them into those extremes? How can Israeli continue from here now that so many people in the world rightly perceive of that polity as the baby killing entity and worse?
Anthony, I really appreciate how you phrased and wrote this.
Thanks for the thoughtful reply Celia, however short and to the point. I starting reading your thoughts on Kary Mullis early in the WHO-authorized pandemic and I was far from alone in being dumbfounded by the manipulation of the PCR test to build up the fear and panic of our friends and neighbours. It sure worked. Your reflections on the career and meanings embedded in Kary Mullis' life, I found really intriguing and so much deeper and more nuanced than most of the whistle blowing stuff that was then starting to (thankfully) emerge. At the time I was doing a lot of back and forth corresponding with Mark Crispin Miller on the early stages of his career-transforming saga. Something about the overlap of the way the early commentaries were being published, suggested to me that you and Mark, both New Yorkers, might be friends or collaborators or something. Mark knows that I faced a major hit from the Lobby in Canada who planted a really ugly image by "Jonathan Goldberg" in my Facebook post and then smeared me quite ruthlessly as the "Holocaust Denying, Anti-Semitic, Conspiracy Professor at the University of Lethbridge in Alberta. B'nai Brith Canada somehow managed to take over the Board of Governors of my U, and in October of 2016 suspended me, a senior tenured Full Professor, without pay and without any due process at all. I had tried to enlist Mark to help me but that didn't happen. A year later a court ordered me to be returned to my academic position but I never got back into the classroom. I so want to spread the alarm about the anti-social behaviour of the Lobby, or the part I encountered anyway, and yet I really want to avoid generalizing ethnic slurs and such. Perhaps that's why your comment on "phrasing" touched me and emboldened me to introduce myself to you with some background. As they say in Ojibway Country, meegwetch (thanks)
fwiw- Looks like some very interesting info here about 10/7:
The 'Blue Shirts' of October 7
Some of the Hamas field Commanders on the day of the attack were NOT Palestinians or even Arabs & at least one was almost certainly Israeli!
MICHAEL GINSBURG
https://actionabletruth.substack.com/p/blue-shirts-october-7
(Michael is a former Israeli)
*****
After reading about how Israel created Hamas (https://swprs.org/why-israel-created-hamas/) and doing tons of research info Israel's LONG history of false flag terrorism (I'd say they are the masters of deception), I've wondered whether Hamas=Mossad, or at least if Mossad had infiltrated Hamas and was leading/directing Hamas.
That was my thought from minute 1.
Same here!!!
WOW!! That Blue Shirts link is amazing. Everybody should have a look at that. It reveals a lot that I haven't seen anywhere else, and the conclusion's an eye-opener! Thanks, Sandra. Well done.
Thanks go to Michael--he's been doing great work and deserves more subscribers. He describes himself as a former Zionist and is even willing to look at the Israeli role in 9/11.
The Segev/Shipler info doesn't establish that Israel "created" Hamas, only at worst that they opportunistically assisted them (with money and maybe also otherwise).
Next, the info from "Israeli military intelligence whistleblower, Ari Ben-Menashe" only establishes again opportunistic assistance, not "creation".
Next, "former Mossad case officer and whistleblower Victor Ostrovsky revealed how the Mossad secretly supported Hamas" -- secret support is not "creation".
Next, "Guela Amir, mother of alleged Rabin assassin Yigal Amir " doesn't even adequately prove that Israel was grooming these extremist Israelis to assassinate Rabin -- let alone does it prove Israel "created" Hamas.
Next, "In a February 2001 article, American news agency UPI revealed how “Israel gave major aid to Hamas”, -- nothing that follows establishes that Israel "created" Hamas, only at worst that they opportunistically used them.
After that long list of failed attempts to establish the claim, the article then cites another article that quotes Yasser Arafat:
"To the Italian daily L'Espresso, Arafat laid out the reasons for this support. "Hamas was constituted with the support of Israel..."
That website that publishes that quote, "Executive Intelligence Review" and the author of that piece, Dean Andromidas, fail to link the Italian daily from which they get the Arafat quote. I took the time and trouble to see if I could find it. Of course, I found many sites simply repeating the claim, echo-chamber-wise, but not actually providing a link to the primary source, L'Espresso. Until I see that primary source, I remain skeptical.
Quo bono? Why would anyone in their right mind actually carry out that Oct 7 charade in reality?
Knowing that in reality, it would let Israel bring deadly, disproportioned death and destruction on Gaza?
Who benefits? The smiling Netenyahu and the terrorist state Israel that's who.
Who is in cahoots with and in denial of these realities?
Supporters of Israel ....both willing and ignorant.
Minor correction: That's Cui Bono.
Congratulations! I knew it would cui someone. ;-p
Cui bono
Agree- Israel benefitted from 10/7- it's giving them pretext for doing what they always wanted to do: genocide the Palestinians and steal the rest of the land.
Section Commander of the Gaza Fence: “The obstacle is built so that even a fox cannot pass it”. They Let It Happen. The Hamas Attack Was Allowed to Close the Book on Palestine. https://www.globalresearch.ca/speculation-mark-hamas-attack-allowed-close-book-palestine/5836029
But I think it's more than "they let it happen" - I think they had a hand in orchestrating it:
The 'Blue Shirts' of October 7
Some of the Hamas field Commanders on the day of the attack were NOT Palestinians or even Arabs & at least one was almost certainly Israeli!
MICHAEL GINSBURG
https://actionabletruth.substack.com/p/blue-shirts-october-7
More here:
Israel's Second 9/11 https://thegoodcitizen.live/p/october-7-2023
https://geopoliticsandempire.com/2023/12/06/was-al-aqsa-flood-false-flag/
https://vigilantcitizen.com/vigilantreport/the-october-7th-attacks-on-israel-were-allowed-to-happen-heres-why/
"Aye!"
More on the obvious false flag for genocide:
Israel’s Oct. 7 Footage MYSTERIOUSLY DISAPPEARS!
https://rumble.com/v3zvbre-israels-oct.-7-footage-mysteriously-disappears.html?mref=6zof&mrefc=4
The name of the games in the upper echelons of power is to invent your enemy, invent its controlled opposition and such. It looks to me that what we are seeing in Palestine-Israel is a classic example. As I understand it, al-Qaeda, ISIL, Daesh is all about that. So was the Soviet Union for that matter. Netanyahu is one of the most skilled practitioners of inventing and manipulating the Islamic enemy He studied with the pros like Bernard Lewis. The trail of evidence in this kind of thing usually has to do with following the flow of money. From whence did the seed funding for Hamas come? You must have looked into that Hesperado.
Bibi fiddled while Gaza burned. Obviously believing he is too smart to end up like Ariel Sharon.
But I'm not sure about Hesperado.
Someone might just be having troubles additional to sounding their consonants.
And I know circumcision is a sore point for some people, but it's not something I'm about to go off half-cocked over.
Baby baked in an oven is just more atrocity propaganda, just like the 40 beheaded babies:
Hamas Did Not 'Bake a Baby in an Oven,' Israeli Journalists Report
https://www.informationliberation.com/?id=64093
"The story was debunked by journalist Ishay Coen from the Israeli news website Kikar HaShabbat:"There is a certain story that has been published on social networks in recent weeks. Oven. From checking with the IDF, Zakah, Shura camp and more - you don't know of such an event. Spreading incorrect stories will harm Israeli propaganda," Coen said on X (as translated by Google).
As for Hamas:
https://swprs.org/why-israel-created-hamas/
“Anyone who wants to thwart the establishment of a Palestinian state has to support bolstering Hamas and transferring money to Hamas.” – Benjamin Netanyahu (2019)
“In the visible dimension Hamas is an enemy, in the hidden dimension it is an ally.”
– IDF Major General Gershon Hacohen (2021)
“Israel started Hamas. It was a project of Shin Bet.”
– Charles Freeman, US diplomat and ambassador (2006)
....
And Israel running a religious war to kill all Palestinians, or a huge number of them, and mostly women and children, is "okay" because of that [and "two wrongs (supposedly) make one right"]?!
Most of the people here are either "conservatives" and/or constitutionalists, certainly NOT "liberals" [unless they are "liberally" for True Justice (but, believe me, I don't agree with everything they believe, except for the beliefs of all True Constitutionalists like myself)], and they definitely are NOT supportive of any real terrorism committed by Hamas. BUT THE PALESTINIANS HAVE JUST AS MUCH RIGHT(S) TO DEFEND THEMSELVES FROM THE APARTHEID FASCISM AND SEVENTY-FIVE YEAR LONG MASS-OPEN-AIR-IMPRISONMENT OF THEMSELVES BY THE ISRAELIS, AS WELL AS SEVENTY-FIVE YEARS OF MASS-GENOCIDE OF THEIR PEOPLE, WHICH ARE ENDLESS!!
So, stop defending Israeli fascism!!
....
https://www.winterwatch.net/2023/12/idf-strips-civilians-and-displays-them-on-the-street/
Just as Banderite Ukrainians did to the Jews when the Wehrmacht had come in. Babi Yar, Palestine, next. Shoah for me but not for thee?
Who's defending Israeli fascism??
Supporters of Isreals' Lebensraum.
"Linda Pavelka", above.
the baby in the oven is one of several memes -- along with "40 beheaded babies", "targeting a hospital", "cutting off women's breasts and playing with them", "decapitating victims and playing with the heads", "raping women and parading them naked", "raping women, killing them, then raping their dead bodies" etc. -- evidently calculated to demonize Hamas beyond the pale. One thing all these memes share: there is inadequate evidence verifying them. All we have is the strange and unprecedented activity of Israel holding "private screenings" for select journalists who then go onto various parts of social media saying "I have seen the video evidence in the private screening, and I can tell you it's true." Well, that ain't good enough for something this momentously important of international significance.
There has been lots of atrocity propaganda--they always use stories about victimized babies and women (e.g. incubator babies for 1st war on Iraq, babies on German bayonets in WW1, and rape stories to justify NATO war on Libya) to justify the wars.
Here's another one with babies:
Israeli Journalist Retracts ‘Babies Hung on a Clothesline’ October 7 Atrocity Propaganda
Journalist Ishay Cohen published and erased a fake story provided to him by the Israeli military spokesperson, but a prominent Israeli propaganda account is still promoting it.
https://www.uncaptured.media/p/israeli-journalist-retracts-babies
DEBUNKED: Israel Claims That Hamas Marked Children By Burning Their Legs With Motorcycle Exhaust
Uncaptured Media traces the origin of a viral lie that was spread by everyone from ex-Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett to Ha’aretz.
https://www.uncaptured.media/p/debunked-israel-claims-that-hamas
And the LA Times retracted the rape story:
https://www.anews.com.tr/world/2023/10/12/the-los-angeles-times-retracts-rape-allegations-against-palestinian-group-hamas
The Los Angeles Times retracts rape allegations against Palestinian group Hamas
The allegations, which had initially garnered widespread attention, raised concerns about the conduct of Palestinian fighters during ongoing conflicts. However, following a thorough investigation, The Los Angeles Times has concluded that the reports in question do not meet the necessary criteria for substantiation.
And Max Blumenthal caught them using a photo from 2022, as evidence of rape on 10/7:
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20231205-israels-fake-news-factory-implodes-over-7-october-rape-story/
Blumenthal continued digging, and was able to tell us that Elkayam-Levy had used photographs of rape victims and spoken in a shaky voice as if to prove the authenticity of the rape allegations. I admit that had it not been for Blumenthal’s investigative work I would have fallen for this Zionist-fuelled trickery. To her eternal shame, Elkayam-Levy, either knowingly or in ignorance, presented an old image of dead female Kurdish fighters as women sexually assaulted at the Nova music festival on 7 October.
We live in the most depraved country on the planet, or so it seems at times, now. Who'da thought that could happen?
The west has lost all moral authority to lecture third world countries on human rights. I worry for the rest of the the world and those current and future victims
Thank you for sharing, Celia. This is so heartbreaking. This must touch us all as writers, shaking us up, forcing deep questions to the surface: Why do I write? To whom/what am I giving my voice? Yesterday Refaat Alareer joined the writers and artists who have dedicated their work and given their lives calling for truth and freedom, Víctor Jara, Nâzım Hikmet, Erich Ohser, to name a few. Heroic Humans ~ free spirits defending the right to live for all ~ a request which would seem perfectly normal ~ which should go without saying! ~ in a humane world.
Devastating.
Absolutely heartbreaking. 😥
Hamas war crime
https://t.me/hamaswarcrimes2023
I was until October 7, working with an 'anti-woke' activist group that was the successor to an entity that had been heavily promoted by Bari Weiss. Within a 48 hour period, I watched group leaders morph from champions of free speech and a free press into blood thirsty zealots who are advocating the doxing/ruination of anyone who questions the narrative. Weiss and her IDW buddies are fanatics.
Celia, thanks so much for your post, which inspired my own about Refaat and John Lennon -https://ezprine.substack.com/p/in-memory-of-john-lennon-and-refaat