Al Mayadeen – October 19, 2024
US-Israeli intelligence outmatched by Sinwar's defiance: Reports
Sinwar’s martyrdom underscores the failure of the US and Israeli intelligence to fully grasp his unwavering ideology and fortifies his reputation as a legendary figure in the struggle.
International media remain stunned by the revelation that Sinwar was killed in battle, actively fighting despite the yearlong, intense efforts by US and Israeli intelligence to assassinate him.
His death not only highlights the failure of these agencies to fully comprehend his ideology but also cements his status as a legendary figure, whose determination and resistance persisted to the very end. Sinwar's legacy now resonates even more powerfully, symbolizing the resolve of a man who defied immense pressure and became a martyr in his struggle.
CNN said that Sinwar's death concludes a "yearlong manhunt" that engaged both Israeli and US intelligence services. The CIA had even established a dedicated task force to track Sinwar, and after the events of October 7, the US increased its intelligence resources in the region to focus on Hamas and its leadership, as per the report.
However, several US officials said, as quoted by CNN, that his death came as an unexpected event.
For months, both Israeli and US intelligence had a rough idea of Sinwar's general location, it added.
Still, the Hamas leader's constant movement made it extremely challenging to precisely track him down.
Until the end, US intelligence officials believed as cited by the report that Sinwar was indifferent to his own survival and resolutely committed to continuing the fight.
Sinwar’s final moments: Defiant Resistance fighter
The operation to capture Sinwar, as per The New York Times, included Israeli commandos and intelligence agents, along with a dedicated unit set up within Shin Bet's headquarters and the CIA. The effort employed advanced electronic surveillance tools and ground-penetrating radar technology supplied by the United States.
In a related context, Daniel Byman, a professor at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, has recently said that the killing of Yahya Sinwar, the recently elected head of Hamas' political bureau, may turn out to be less impactful than anticipated in the current war on Gaza.
While Sinwar's death only means one less leader in the Palestinian Resistance, Hamas is far from rescinded as "Israel" faces the more complex challenge of the day after in Gaza.
Byman wrote in Foreign Policy that despite Hamas suffering the loss of many of its leaders like Ismail Haniyeh and [allegedly] Mohammed Deif, the Resistance will still have new less-experienced members ready to take over.
Sinwar's death might increase the likelihood of a ceasefire, Byman argues, since he was more aggressive toward "Israel" and his strategy was to allow the occupation to continuously harm its worldwide reputation and its relationship with the US.
According to Byman, the savage Israeli assault on Gaza is a cautionary tale for future leaders in the Resistance about the dangers of confronting a ruthless adversary, noting that Hamas may find it advantageous to regroup and rebuild, despite the occupation claiming it killed a third of its fighters as it killed 42,000 Palestinians.
On the other hand, new leaders may also choose to intensify their resistance efforts. Under Sinwar, Hamas significantly harmed "Israel", revitalized the Palestinian cause, and tarnished "Israel’s" global image.
Following the loss of numerous leaders, fighters, and countless Palestinian lives, there is also a strong desire for revenge among the Resistance and its members.
Despite Israeli bloodthirst, Byman asserts that "Hamas endures" as a Resistance movement and has recovered from the assassination of its leaders in the past, while Benjamin Netanyahu continues to ignore the pleas of Israelis for a captive agreement.
Al Mayadeen – October 19, 2024
Hamas built underground war machine for survival: WashPo
Hamas’s vast underground tunnel system, often referred to as the "Gaza metro," enabled the movement of weapons and fighters out of sight of Israeli surveillance.
The Washington Post reported on Saturday that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar had been preparing for a large-scale attack against Israel for months before the October 7 operation, also known as Operation al-Aqsa Flood.
According to sources who met with Sinwar in early 2023, he hinted at a significant plan, although no specific details were provided at the time.
The WashPo report reveals fresh insights into how Hamas, under Sinwar's leadership, meticulously organized the operation, amassing weapons and constructing an intricate network of underground tunnels within Gaza.
Despite years of isolation in the densely populated strip, Hamas developed a sophisticated arsenal of homemade rockets and improvised explosive devices.
The report, however, alleges that the Resistance relied on external financial support and training from Iran, though these claims have yet to be fully verified due to a lack of substantial evidence.
It also suggests that a significant portion of Hamas' resources were reportedly siphoned from aid funds, charitable donations, and local tax revenues.
Hamas’s vast underground tunnel system, often referred to as the "Gaza metro," enabled the movement of weapons and fighters out of sight of Israeli surveillance.
Israeli occupation forces (IOF) officials were reportedly shocked by the tunnel network’s scale, which spanned hundreds of miles with bunkers and passages reaching up to 120 feet below ground.
The tunnel system not only facilitated the October 7 operation but has also allowed Hamas to continue fighting despite "Israel’s" intense military response and the heavy losses incurred.
The WashPo investigation, based on interviews with military and intelligence analysts as well as Palestinian officials, shows how Hamas became largely self-sufficient, producing up to 80 percent of its weapons locally.
Sinwar's strategic shift focused on ensuring Hamas could function without substantial external aid, allowing it to sustain its resistance throughout a prolonged war.
Even after losing thousands of fighters and several key commanders, Hamas remains active.
The tunnel network has been essential to the group’s survival, but cash reserves and resources are reportedly dwindling, and humanitarian conditions in Gaza have deteriorated drastically, with thousands of civilians dead and much of the territory in ruins.
Despite these setbacks, Hamas’s recruitment efforts remain strong, driven by revenge and anger among young Palestinians.
The report highlights growing concerns among Israeli and international officials that Hamas, though weakened, could rebuild and continue posing a serious threat.
Its survival strategy, which includesﾠlocally produced weaponsand an extensive tunnel network, has prompted a reassessment of how "Israel" and its allies approach the ongoing conflict.
As the war enters a new phase, experts warn that Hamas may shift to insurgency-style tactics, including the use of IEDs and guerrilla warfare, potentially posing a long-term challenge for Israeli forces invading Gaza.
The World Socialist Web Site – October 19, 2024
US used Australian bases in bombing Houthi facilities in Yemen
Mike Head
The Australian Department of Defence confirmed yesterday that Australian air bases were used for long-range US attacks by B-2 stealth bombers on Yemen on the night of October 16‒17. This included “access and overflight for US aircraft in northern Australia,” a spokesperson told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC).
Many questions remain unanswered by the Albanese Labor government about the involvement of Australian bases in what amounts to an escalation by the Biden-Harris administration of its military aggression to back Israel’s intensifying genocide in Gaza and plans for attacks on Iran.
It is not clear whether the B-2s landed in Australia before or after their strikes on alleged Houthi weapons bunkers in Yemen, or whether US air force tankers used the bases to refuel the giant bombers.
The ABC initially reported that “A remote Northern Territory air base has been used as a staging post for this week’s major US airstrike on underground Houthi weapons stores in Yemen.”
Later, the ABC added a strange note to the story. It said the Defence Department refused to confirm or deny whether US aircraft involved in the strikes took off from Australian air force base RAAF Tindal, in the Northern Territory. The spokesperson claimed the need to protect “operational security.”
Regardless of the precise extent of the involvement, this development marks another intensification of the Labor government’s transformation of northern Australia into a strategic platform for US wars, both in the Middle East and against China.
It also demonstrates Australia’s active participation in the US-backed Israeli onslaught in Palestine and Lebanon, and its support for an imminent Israeli assault on Iran, which could provoke a wider catastrophic war for US-Israeli control over the Middle East.
The Iranian-linked Houthi regime was targeted because of its military strikes in the Red Sea and Israel, attempting to oppose the genocide in Gaza.
While not explicitly naming Iran or China, the US administration said the B-2 strikes in Yemen were intended to send a message to any other enemy of the US capacity to strike anywhere in the world.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said President Joe Biden ordered the strikes to “further degrade the Houthis’ capability” to destabilise the region and protect US forces.”
“Today, US military forces, including US Air Force B-2 bombers, conducted precision strikes against five hardened underground weapons storage locations in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen,” Austin said.
“This was a unique demonstration of the United States’ ability to target facilities that our adversaries seek to keep out of reach, no matter how deeply buried underground, hardened or fortified.
“The employment of US Air Force B-2 Spirit long-range stealth bombers demonstrate US global strike capabilities to take action against these targets when necessary, anytime, anywhere.”
While the Pentagon did not mention Iran, American media noted that the B-2 is the only plane capable of hitting allegedly deeply buried Iranian nuclear facilities.
RAAF Tindal, near Katherine, south of Darwin, is undergoing a multi-billion-dollar upgrade, due to be completed in 2026, to accommodate US bomber deployments, under access agreements with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s government.
According to the Warzone, a specialist military website: “Available low-resolution satellite imagery for the dates in question doesn’t show any B-2s at Tindal—which is not conclusive in itself—but there are other possible operating locations in northern Australia, including some auxiliary installations.”
The website said the official US line appeared to point to a roundtrip to Yemen from Whiteman Air Force Base, Missouri, the main operating base for the B-2s, “although it may be the case that one or more Australian bases were made available as an alternative landing site, after the mission. If the flight was direct, it would have literally flown around the world.”
Warzone reported that it was “more or less certain” that US Air Force aerial refueling tankers used Australian air bases to support the raids. “Photos—backed up by some satellite imagery—show KC-135 Stratotankers and KC-46 Pegasus tankers at Cairns Airport in Queensland and more KC-135s at RAAF Amberley [near Brisbane], soon after the strikes.”
So far, the US air force has not confirmed what weapons were used, possibly the 30,000-pound GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP), which can only be carried by B-2s, or 2,000-pound BLU-109-equipped GBU-31 Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAM).
Neither Albanese nor Defence Minister Richard Marles have yet commented, but others were quick to broadcast the government’s closer integration into US military operations.
An Australian official told the ABC that the support Australia provided was “consistent with our long-standing alliance commitment and close cooperation, demonstrating the interoperability of our militaries.”
Darwin Labor MP Luke Gosling, who is the Albanese government’s special envoy for defence, told the ABC that Australia works “incredibly closely with the US Air Force” in the country’s north.
Gosling said there were “no deliberate messages being sent from Australia, other than we are in lock-step with our allies in order to uphold a rules-based order upon which Australia’s security and prosperity is so dependent.”
This “rules-based order” is in fact a US regime, whereby it and its allies, such as Israel, increasingly flout international law, in order to seek to reassert US global hegemony, particularly over its designated targets of Russia, China and Iran.
Justin Bassi, executive director of the government-financed Australian Strategic Policy Institute, said the operation in Yemen was unprecedented in scale, means and what it targeted. Alongside the Israeli killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, the raid was “possibly the major international story” of the day. He said it “took a B-2 to be able to destroy these underground facilities in Yemen containing sophisticated weaponry supplied by Iran.”
Under Labor’s agreements with Washington, exercises and visits involving US bombers have accelerated. B-2s have become regular visitors, with four having deployed to RAAF Base Amberley in 2022, and another two in August this year, for a Bomber Task Force mission.
The upgrade work at Tindal includes an expanded apron with space for up to six B-52 strategic bombers, squadron operations facilities, maintenance infrastructure, fuel and munitions storage, and mission planning buildings.
This will make Tindal and other Australian bases forward operating locations for US bombers across the Indo-Pacific—in addition to Japan, Hawaii, Guam and Diego Garcia—capable of striking China as well as the Middle East.
The Yemen operation underscores the analysis made by the Socialist Equality Party in the resolution adopted at its Seventh National Congress on October 3‒6. It warned:
Australia’s acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines under the AUKUS pact, as well as hypersonic missiles and other advanced weaponry, is only one expression of the transformation of the country into a launching pad for war. Bases across the country, especially in the north and west, are being expanded, with the US given access across all military domains. US nuclear-capable strike assets, including nuclear submarines and B-52 bombers, are being “rotated” through Australia, with preparations for their semi-permanent basing. Over the past four years, Pine Gap has grown by a third, with analysts describing it as one of the key US bases in the world for planning nuclear war with China.
On the same day as the Yemen bombing, the Labor government also escalated its commitment to the US-NATO war against Russia. The government announced it would donate 49 M1A1 Abrams tanks to Ukraine, the largest such tank donation yet by any US ally, taking Australia’s military contribution to $1.3 billion.
As these developments demonstrate, the Labor government is fully committed to what is a three-front global war by US imperialism against Russia, China and Iran. Every previous “red line” is being crossed, threatening humanity with a potential nuclear conflagration unless stopped by the international working class, guided by a socialist strategy to overturn the capitalist profit system, the root cause of the lurch into war.
Al Mayadeen – October 19, 2024
By day 379 of Israeli genocide in Gaza, 42,519 killed, 99,637 injured
Families and survivors are imploring the Gaza Civil Defense teams to come to their rescue, but the constant Israeli bombardment and siege render all operations nearly impossible.
The Ministry of Health in Gaza has released its daily report, marking the 379th day of ongoing Israeli aggression in the strip.
In the past 24 hours alone, the Israeli occupation has carried out three massacres against families in Gaza, killing 19 and injuring 91.
Many victims remain trapped under the rubble as Israeli forces continue to bombard affected areas, preventing ambulances and Civil Defense teams from reaching them.
Since the war began over a year ago, the total number of martyrs has now reached 42,519, with injuries totaling 99,637.
As the Israeli siege continues clamping down on Palestinians in northern Gaza, particularly the Jabalia refugee camp, Gaza's Civil Defense revealed that at least 400 Palestinians have been killed, while many others were injured, as a result of the 15-day blockade.
Children, women, and the elderly make up the majority of the martyrs and injuries, while families trapped in the camp have been imploring the Civil Defense to come to their rescue, however, its crews are unable to reach them due to the ceaseless bombardment.
The excruciating scenes from Jabalia show tens of bodies scattered on the camp's streets as "Israel" continues targeting anyone and everyone.
According to the Civil Defense, Palestinians that have survived so far go to sleep starving and parched, with no food or water, due to the tightening siege the occupation has enforced.
At noon today, five Palestinians were killed, including a child, and several others were injured in the Israeli bombardment of a civilian home near the Halabia junction in Jabalia.
The Civil Defense also announced that the Israeli occupation continues to neglect the request for coordination with the Red Cross and the United Nations to rescue those trapped and besieged beneath the rubble.
Israeli army bombs Indonesian Hospital
Israeli occupation forces have not spared hospitals either, as part of their systematic destruction of the healthcare system in Gaza.
Health Minister Majed Abu Ramadan revealed that two patients were martyred in the Indonesian Hospital in Beit Lahia, as a direct result of the siege, the prohibition of medical supplies, survival essentials, medical necessities, and power outages, which disrupt operations.
The risk of death is looming and could hit at any moment, the Minister said, adding that medical teams and wounded patients are facing the most critical and dire conditions.
Since early Saturday morning, Israeli occupation forces besieged the hospital, targeting anyone moving in its vicinity.
Marwan Sultan, the director of the Indonesian Hospital, confirmed that the facility is currently non-operational and that all individuals within its premises are surrounded by the IOF.
Concurrently, the Gaza Ministry of Health reported that the Israeli artillery bombed the upper floors of the hospital, which houses over 40 patients, along with medical staff. The Ministry confirmed a complete power outage at the facility.
It also mentioned that a group of forcibly displaced people was targeted in front of the hospital's entrance, with heavy gunfire directed at the building and its grounds, causing widespread fear among patients and medical personnel.
Refugee camps and schools, children and women under IOF fire
In the al-Shati refugee camp, west Gaza City, the Israeli occupation committed yet another massacre after directly targeting the Asmaa school, where hundreds of civilians are seeking shelter. Seven Palestinians were brutally murdered and several more were injured in the Israeli airstrikes.
Across several schools turned into makeshift shelters for displaced families in Tal al-Zaatar, the IOF carried out a massive arrest campaign, detaining tens of displaced Palestinians while rounding the women and children, forcing them to go to Gaza City, in northern Gaza.
The Abu Hussein School in the Jabalia camp has also come under bombardment again, with fires breaking out after the Israeli occupation opened fire on its grounds and buildings. Two days ago, the IOF bombed the Abu Hussein school, murdering at least 28 and injuring another 160, according to Gaza's Government Media Office.
Meanwhile, in the Nuseirat refugee camp, four Palestinians were killed and several more sustained injuries, including a child, as Israeli warplanes raided the central and western areas of the camp.
Al Mayadeen – October 19, 2024
Hezbollah barrages Israeli positions, Haifa, unveils M-80 rockets
Hezbollah fighters destroyed a Merkava tank and fired barrages of rockets at Israeli occupation forces across the frontlines on Saturday.
The Islamic Resistance in Lebanon - Hezbollah remains unwavering in its commitment to support the Palestinian people and protect Lebanon from Israeli aggression.
On Saturday, Resistance fighters executed a series of operations, including long-range rocket attacks, successful defense against Israeli armor in South Lebanon, and the shelling of Israeli occupation forces positioned near the Lebanese-Palestinian border.
Another Merkava tank destroyed
On Thursday afternoon, Hezbollah fighters destroyed the 22nd Israeli Merkava tank in only a few weeks, as the Israeli regime still attempts to take control of the border area.
At 1:00 pm, Hezbollah's anti-armor units fired an anti-tank guided missile at an Israeli Merkava tank, positioned in the Zar'it settlement near the Lebanese-Palestinian border, destroying it and killing and injuring those inside it.
Hezbollah shells Israeli military assembly points, positions
As for Hezbollah's indirect fire support, the group has been firing multiple salvos of rockets at Israeli occupation forces since 1:00 am Saturday.
Israeli occupation forces in al-Malikiyah, al-Malikiyah military site, Shlomi, al-Bassa, al-Marj military site, and Zar'it were targeted with salvos of rockets at seperate occassions, as well as in Avivim, which was shelled on twice on Saturday.
- At 1:00 am, Hezbollah fighters fired a salvo of rocket artillery shells at Israeli occupation troops in al-Malikiyah.
- Resistance fighters then launched a salvo of rockets at a grouping of Israeli troops in Avivim, at 2:45 am.
- Following a period of relative calm, Hezbollah fighters fired two large barrages of rockets at Israeli occupation forces in Shlomi and al-Bassa, at 10:50 am.
- At 11:10 am, Hezbollah fighters shelled a grouping of Israeli occupation soldiers in the al-Marj military site.
- 10 minutes past noon, Israeli occupation soldiers in the Zar'it settlement came under a rocket attack.
- Troops in the Malikiyah military site were also the target of a rocket attack at 1:05 pm.
- Five minutes later, Hezbollah fighters fired yet another salvo of rockets at the Avivim settlement.
- Hezbollah fighters also fired a salvo of rockets at the Kiryat Shmona city settlement, located near the Palestinian-Lebanese border.
Long-range rocket attacks
As for Hezbollah's series of "Khaibar operations", which come in support to the Palestinian people, in defense of Lebanon, and in response to Israeli massacres and civilians in Lebanon, Hezbollah fighters fired a large barrage of precision-guided rocket artillery at an Israeli base located to the east of occupied Haifa.
Usually, these guided projectiles have been launched in small amounts at a time, and were only recently deployed on the battlefield. Today's operation marks a first in confontations that have lasted for more than a year.
Hezbollah also launched multiple rocket attacks including:
- A large barrage of rockets fired at the Krayot cluster of settlements in northern Haifa, which came under attack at 10:30 am.
- A rocket attack on the occupied city of Safad, which was executed at 12:50 pm.
- A rocket attack on the Rosh Pina settlement, located to the east of Safad, which was conducted at 1:00 pm.
- Impacts were recorded in Kiryat Ata, in the Krayot, and in occupied Akka, were one settler was killed while several other injuries were reported.
Unvieling the M-80 anti-personnel rocket MLR
Hezbollah's Military Media Unit has unveiled the locally-produced multiple rocket launcher (MLR), the M-80 MLR. This homegrown MLR is available in both mobile and stationary configurations, featuring 24 launch slots.
The M-80 shell itself is an 80 mm caliber rocket, measuring 95 cm in length and weighing 10 kg. While the warhead may be relatively small, it packs a significant punch. Each shell is primed with 4,750 individual steel balls, creating a highly lethal fragmentation effect with a kill radius of 35 meters.
Designed for maximum devastation against enemy personnel, the M-80 rocket can effectively target enemy troops located up to 3.3 kilometers from the launch point, ensuring another layer of fire support.
Countercurrent – October 19, 2024
In the Time of Heroes
by Dr Salim Nazzal
In the time of heroes, history records names that never die with their bodies, but remain alive with every step toward freedom. In Fairouz’s play Jibal Al-Sawan, the hero dies at the city gate while fighting, and his daughter cries out to the occupier, (My father has died, but the idea of liberation remains.) That same idea, the idea of undying freedom, echoed amidst the deep sorrow that spread across Palestine when the leader Yahya Sinwar was martyred.
Sinwar died as heroes do, with his rifle in hand, defending his people in the face of a massacre that stands among the greatest in modern history. Despite being wounded in the shoulder, he bandaged his injury and continued the fight. When the drones came to finish the battle, he attacked them with a stick, refusing to surrender. He died like the heroes of ancient legends, but his death was not the end.
History may not write about a single bullet, but it records the moments that ignite the fire of resistance and push events toward significant change. History is the accumulation of events, and in the end, it must lead to a happy conclusion, even if that conclusion is not visible now in a world dominated by international injustice, where America blocks every step toward justice in Palestine.
As for the Zionists, they deluded themselves into believing they had won, speaking of reshaping the Middle East and about the (day after,) without realizing that this day has not yet ended, and that the day of resistance is long and ongoing.
Yahya Sinwar, like the story of Palestine itself, was born to a family expelled from its land in 1948, and he spent half of his life in Israeli prisons, with the other half fighting the occupation. America labeled him a terrorist, just as they had once labeled Nelson Mandela. But history does not follow the desires of the great powers; if it did, the occupiers would rule the world.
Sinwar, like others before him, such as Ismail Haniyeh and dozens of other leaders assassinated by Israel, passed away. Yet, each time a leader is killed, another rises to continue the journey. This is the unchanging truth: the flame of freedom does not extinguish with the death of one person, no matter how significant they are.
Sinwar, like Hassan Nasrallah, is a hero who belongs to the (time of heroes in miserly days,) as Fairouz described them. These are truly miserly days, overwhelmingly dark. But as the saying goes: (The darker the night, the closer the dawn.)
Salim Nazzal is a Palestinian Norwegian researcher, lecturer playwright and poet, wrote more than 17 books such as Perspectives on thought, culture and political sociology, in thought, culture and ideology, the road to Baghdad
https://countercurrents.org/2024/10/in-the-time-of-heroes/
The World Socialist Web Site – October 19, 2024
Praising murder of Yahya Sinwar, imperialist powers endorse Netanyahu’s mass extermination plan in Gaza
By Andre Damon
On Thursday, Israeli forces killed Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas, during a firefight in Rafah. The killing of Sinwar prompted statements of unrestrained support for the Netanyahu government by the leaders of the United States, France, Germany and the UK, who used the occasion to openly endorse Netanyahu’s campaign of extermination and ethnic cleansing against a population of 2.2 million people.
Sinwar died while resisting his killers, but the fact that he resisted does not make his death any less a murder. His killing is part of an illegal imperialist-backed war whose aim is the extermination of the population of Gaza and the annexation of the territory illegally occupied by Israel since 1967.
Sinwar’s murder follows a campaign of illegal assassinations targeting all of the leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah, as well as leading Iranian figures, as the US and Israel expand their military onslaught throughout the region. Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed by more than 80 2,000-pound bombs in Lebanon last month, and Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh was assassinated in Tehran in July.
Sinwar was born on October 29, 1962 in the Khan Yunis refugee camp in Gaza. His family had been expelled from Majdal Asqalan, also known as Ashkelon, in southern Israel, during the 1948 imperialist-backed ethnic cleansing of Arabs from what became Israel. When Sinwar was just five years old, Gaza was illegally occupied by Israel as part of the occupation of all of the Palestinian territories. For virtually his entire life, Israel subjected the population of Gaza to a total blockade, turning it into the world’s largest concentration camp and denying its residents every fundamental human right. Israel kidnapped, killed and tortured Gazans with impunity.
President Joe Biden called Netanyahu on Thursday “to congratulate him on the mission,” the White House said in a statement. The statement declared that “Hamas [will] never again [be] able to control Gaza.”
On Thursday, Biden issued a statement saying that “With our intelligence help, the IDF relentlessly pursued Hamas’s leaders, flushing them out of their hiding places and forcing them onto the run… Today, however, proves once again that no terrorists anywhere in the world can escape justice, no matter how long it takes.”
The president continued, “Israel has every right to eliminate the leadership and military structure of Hamas.”
Biden’s remarks hailing the killing of Sinwar could have been made by a fascist leader. They exemplify the repudiation of democratic principles at the highest levels of the American state. Assassinations and genocide are being embraced by the leaders of “democratic” countries as legitimate policies in a disintegration of democratic forms of government and international law and a descent into ever deeper levels of criminality.
In subsequent statements in Berlin, Biden said the killing of Sinwar provided “an opportunity to seek a path to peace.” But his earlier statement made clear that what he meant by “peace” was ensuring that Hamas would “never again [be] able to control Gaza,” i.e., peace on the terms dictated by the genocidal Netanyahu government.
Biden’s statements were echoed by the leaders of France, Germany, the UK, and Italy, as well as the entire political spectrum in the United States, including Senator Bernie Sanders, who declared Sinwar a “war criminal who masterminded the brutal October 7th terrorist attack.”
The statements of support for Israel by the imperialist powers constitute an endorsement of the Gaza genocide as it moves to a critical new phase, in which Israel is making clear that the mass starvation and ethnic cleansing of the population of Gaza is its explicit aim.
Israel is implementing what has become known as the “generals’ plan,” coined by Giora Eiland, the former head of Israel’s National Security Council.
Since November, Eiland has publicly argued for the adoption of starvation as a method of war, not just in practice, as Israel has in fact done, but as a matter of official doctrine.
Last year, Eiland wrote:
Who are the “poor” women of Gaza? They are all the mothers, sisters, or wives of Hamas murderers… The international community warns us of a humanitarian disaster in Gaza and of severe epidemics. We must not shy away from this, as difficult as that may be. After all, severe epidemics in the south of the Gaza Strip will bring victory closer and reduce casualties among IDF soldiers.
Now, major US media publications are admitting that Israel is putting this plan into effect. An article published Friday in the Washington Post cited a statement by Israeli political scientist Gayil Talshir, who declared, “Part of what is happening in north Gaza now was a trial of the Eiland plan.”
The article reported, “For the first two weeks of October, no food reached the 400,000 people in war-battered northern Gaza.”
It continued:
What has played out in this stretch of the enclave mirrors, at least in part, a controversial siege plan conceived by a former Israeli general to gain full control of northern Gaza and then larger swaths of the enclave. It envisions systematically emptying areas of civilians and starving out—or shooting down—anyone who stays.
The implementation of Eiland’s plan to starve the population of Gaza and kill or displace every Palestinian man, woman, and child in northern Gaza forms the background to the deployment of 100 US ground troops to Israel to support a planned massive Israeli strike against Iran.
The escalation of war throughout the world is the essential content of the open embrace of assassination, terrorism and genocide by the imperialist powers.
This week, Washington Post columnist George Will declared that ﾓWorld War III is already underway.” The target of this war is “today’s axis: China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea,” and it is being waged by the imperialist powers. Under conditions of global war, the imperialist states are declaring that all measures are permitted, including murder and genocide, to achieve their geopolitical aims.
A warning must be made. The methods of assassination and the extermination of civilian populations being legitimized amid this global war will be used against domestic political opposition, including against resistance by the working class to the measures demanded as part of the “war effort.”
The rampage of genocide, terrorism and military violence being unleashed by the imperialist powers throughout the Middle East points to the urgent need to build a mass movement against war, based on the working class and aimed at overthrowing the capitalist system, which gives rise to imperialist violence all over the world.
