Law, Power, and Justice

WEEKEND NEWS NOTES

 SATURDAY/SUNDAY 4, 5 MAY 2024

BBC News Newshour (5/4/24)

Israel/Hamas

•        We’ve been here before, but reports are that a cease fire is imminent.

•        Protests in Israel by hostage families continue.

•        (Note: Haaretz publishes piece arguing that Netanyahu is purposefully standing in the way of a peace agreement.)

•        Netanyahu’s partners in the coalition say that without a ground offensive in Rafah, they will leave the government and bring it down.

•        Finance Minister Smotrich says a deal without an offensive in Rafah would be a “disaster.”

Interview with Amir Avivi, retired military now with a defense think tank in Israel.  Israel insists that even with a cease-fire (of about 40 days) the ground invasion in Rafah will begin once this is over.

•        It is felt that a complete cease-fire will mean that Israel will lose the war and the past six months will “be for nothing.”

•        Hamas is not going to release all the hostages.  We need to free them with military action.

•        Sinwar is in Rafah.  Rafah is the last stronghold.  This is going to be  the decisive battle where Hamas will be destroyed.

Assassination of Sikh Indian activist

•        Hardeep Singh Nijar’s death in Canada.  (Note: This followed an attempted assassination of another Sikh activist in the US).

•        Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has alleged that the Indian authorities could have been involved.

•        Nijar worked with groups who wanted to carve out part of India as a separate Sikh state. 

•        It is described by a reporter, Stephen Chase, Globe and Mail in Ottawa, as a gangland-killing.

•        The Indian government regards the Sikh movement to establish a separate state, seditious, and they want Canada to arrest these people and ship them back home.

•        The government claims that these groups are sending arms back to India.  They have provided no evidence of this to Canada.

•        In the United States, there was a separate attempted assassination of another Sikh activist.

THE NATION PODCAST: The Time of Monsters, Yousef Munayyer, Palestinian Writer

•        The campus violence is not something Americans have seen in the recent past.

•        The scale of what’s taking place is impressive.  What took so long?  How widespread this is…the diversity of the students involved…students willing to sacrifice…expulsions, evictions…people are willing to “pay a price.”

•        “It’s been seven months and seventy-five years.”

•        “Palestinian dispossession…”

•        There was a “lot of planning and a lot of organizing.”  (Note: Get podcast of reporter going to Columbia.)

•        “Joe Biden is undermining his own coalition.”

•        The cost of our relationship with Israel is getting too high.

•        Biden’s approach may well cost him the election.

•        Biden’s national security people completely misread the region. 

•        25 min.

SUNDAY

News Notes

Israel/Hamas

•        Netanyahu has turned down a ceasefire proposal which would have involved releasing hostages. 

•        The US has “paused” some funding for Israel (CNN, 7:54).

MSNBC (Ayman)

•        Tim Scott was asked six times if the 2020 election was legitimate.  He evaded an answer.

•        House pressure to stop the ground invasion of Rafah.  They are urging him to withhold some offensive military aid to Israel.

•        There is a national security deadline over military aid in three days.

•        Netanyahu has blocked Al Jazeera broadcasts in Israel.  An Al Jazeera office was raided today.

•        This is the first time Israel has shuttered a news outlet. 

•        Foreign Press Association: This is a dark day for democracy.

•        Foreign journalists are barred from Gaza unless they are embedded with Israeli troops.

•        Israel has been accused of targeting journalists.  Israel denies this.

•        Israel has a disturbing history of jailing journalists.

•        Managing Editor, Al Jazeera, Mohamed Moawad: Al Jazeera has provided the primary coverage of Gaza.  The ban covers Israel proper, not the “occupied regions.”  The ban is ambiguous and Al Jazeera (AJ) is not certain exactly how it will be implemented.  AJ is accused of being a threat to national security.  AJ has been criticized by the Arab world for having Israeli officials on the network.