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Four Gentlemen Tour the Bekaa Valley November 25, 2024: - On Thursday evening news came through that we had at long last gained the full list of approvals required to travel to report outside Beirut; we were cleared by the Ministry of Information, the Ministry of Defence, and the local authorities. Laith Marouf of Free Palestine TV called me and suggested we go down together on Friday to the southern capital of Nabatieh, which has been enduring heavy bombing. I asked Laith to give me half an hour, and did some quick research. Nabatieh is about 12 miles from the Israeli border and has been devastated by Israeli bombing attacks.… 
The Effects of Israeli Barbarity November 20, 2024: - I could not tell the easy, comforting lie. "No", I told the woman, her traumatised children clinging to her legs, "I can't say you are safe here; not one of us is safe. The Israelis are genocidal. But in Lebanon so far, I don't think they have bombed a school". I was with one of 67 families, with 215 children, living as refugees in a small school at Ain Rumaila in Southern Beirut. The area borders the evacuated suburb of Dahiya which the Israelis are systematically demolishing, and bombings rattle the windows of the school every day. This woman is… USA Tries to Pound Lebanon Into Submission November 17, 2024: - Israel has intensified its air strikes on Lebanon and in particular on Beirut, ahead of a visit on Tuesday or Wednesday by US envoy Hochstein, at which he will press Lebanon to accept a US/Israeli ceasefire plan. This plan is touted as being based on UNSCR 1701, but in fact represents its abnegation. You may have noted that neoliberal politicians and media pundits, who ignore and denigrate every other UN Resolution on the Middle East, are suddenly very enthusiastic about UNSCR 1701. This is because it mandates withdrawal of Hezbollah forces to the north of the river Litani. But it…
Two Weeks In Beirut November 13, 2024: - Apologies, in setting up Patreon as an alternative subscription method some had requested, I accidentally blocked non Patreon subscribers. Fixed now. I have also started a gofundme to cover costs of operating in Beirut. Flying from Rome on a bright Sunday morning, the MEA Airbus was configured for about 300 people. About 20 of us boarded to fly to Beirut. It is a very strange feeling to be on an almost empty commercial airliner, particularly as nearly all of the small number of passengers were in business class, leaving economy class barren. Two Christian priests travelling economy, with impressive beards… Online Media Banned in Lebanon November 10, 2024: - It is illegal to report from Lebanon without prior accreditation by the Ministry of Information. On the day Niels and I arrived in the country, a new rule was introduced by the Ministry specifically excluding online media from accreditation, which is now limited to print newspapers and broadcast TV stations only. All freelance journalists and independent TV production companies are also specifically excluded. The specific instruction from the Ministry of Information states: not: web or digital or online or production house The new policy is given in writing to journalists who apply, by the Press Bureau of the Ministry of…
Beirut Problems November 1, 2024: - On Wednesday we were arrested and held awhile by General Security in Lebanon and told not to report from here until we receive the proper permits. This is a frustrating delay but I hope will soon resolve.
Setting Up In Beirut October 30, 2024: - I apologise for the break, I have been setting up in Beirut to cover the Israeli assault from here. This has been quite a logistic challenge. I am accompanied by Niels Ladefoged, the cinematographer with Wikileaks who was with Julian Assange on his flight to Australia. Readers of this blog know Niels as the cinematographer of Ithaka who was my companion on the month-long tour of Germany I made with that film. We have needed to get to Beirut and then get safe accommodation, and organise internet access, a car and driver, interpreters, etc. I am lucky to have some…
Who Are the Terrorists? October 18, 2024: - I have a confession to make. When a journalist writes this it generally means they will proceed to reveal something they hope will actually show them in a good light or justified in some way. But I have a real confession to make, of something I did that was wrong. Somewhere in the UK, among the papers of a dead loved one which nobody has the heart to throw out, in cardboard boxes in dusty attics or deep in the filing cabinets of Jeremy Corbyn, exist still a few copies of thousands of letters bearing my authentic signature. These letters,… 
The Notional Health Service October 17, 2024: - Today is my 66th birthday, so I am hoping that you will forgive an article that is at core the anecdotal ramblings of an old man. It was inspired by horror at Wes Streeting (I could end the sentence there but I shall continue it) 's plan to give weight loss jabs to the unemployed. The unemployed are more likely to be underweight than the population average, and this attempt to portray the unemployed as lazy couch potatoes is vile in many ways. Its masking as an "investment" in the economy by Big Pharma is chilling. If it goes ahead,… 
The Salisbury Festival of Russophobia Opens Today October 14, 2024: - Today is the grand opening of the Salisbury Festival of Russophobia, otherwise known as the Public Inquiry into the death of Dawn Sturgess, an unfortunate victim of imperialist spy games. Do not be fooled. This is not in any sense a genuine public inquiry, supposed to get at the truth. This is an inquiry like the Hutton Inquiry into the death of Dr David Kelly, designed entirely to conceal the truth and further the official narrative. In the Kelly case, the official narrative was that one of the world's leading experts in chemical weapons, with access to instant-action neurotoxins, decided… 
Alex Salmond. Always My Hero. October 13, 2024: - Before Alex Salmond, Scottish Independence was an impossible dream, a romantic aspiration, outside the realm of practical politics. After Alex Salmond, it is the dominant question in Scottish politics and by far the biggest threat to the UK state. I would argue that, with every poll for a decade showing overwhelming support for Independence among the under 30s and support for the UK only in a majority in the over 55s, Alex made Independence inevitable. In Scotland's national story, he deserves a place alongside William Wallace and Robert Bruce. (In my last conversation with Alex, about two weeks ago, he… Simply No Red Lines At All October 11, 2024: - There is literally no act so vile that the UK, US and Germany will not support if perpetrated by the terrorist state of Israel. Yesterday Israel: deliberately attacked UN peacekeepers in three separate bases; bombed residential central Beirut killing and maiming hundreds; abducted, beat up and held an American journalist; slaughtered 30 Palestinian refugees in an UNRWA school; was found by an official UN Commission Report to be guilty of the crime against humanity of "extermination" in Gaza. Any single one of these outrages would be roundly condemned if committed by any country at all except Israel, and would lead…
In Praise of Civil Disobedience October 9, 2024: - Western governments are deeply involved, strongly against the will of the majority of their population, in committing a colonial genocide of indigenous people. This happens because the political class have been bought by the Zionist lobby. The causes may run deeper, but that is the mechanism. Democracy has therefore failed, having been fatally corrupted. In these circumstances, civil disobedience is not just ethically justified, it is the duty of the good citizen. Palestine Action continue their highly effective actions to disrupt the chain of supply of the Israeli weapons industry. On Friday morning I was at the Old Bailey with… 
A Very Peculiar Triumph October 5, 2024: - At the end of Julian Assange's testimony before the Judicial Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, 95% of the entire room of 220 people rose in a standing ovation. The audience consisted of members of the Parliamentary Assembly, who are delegated members of their national parliaments, from all over Europe. Furthermore they included members of the full European political spectrum, including the dominant national parties. The audience also included Council of Europe staff and experts, and worldwide media. Note this well - and I have never witnessed anything remotely like this - the 100 or so… 
Netanyahu Plays Chicken September 21, 2024: - Netanyahu is desperate to keep war simmering along and to draw the USA closer and closer to him. At the same time he cannot send ground forces into South Lebanon where they will take massive casualties. Israel can assassinate, it can employ indiscriminate terrorism and it can bombard from the air, and it has done all these things against Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Iran. But Israel cannot destroy Hamas nor Hezbollah, cannot get back its hostages from Gaza and cannot make Northern Israel safe for its colonialists. Nothing Israel is doing in any way advances those declared objectives and in… 
A New Left Wing Party in the UK? September 18, 2024: - Keir Starmer has left about 70% of the landscape of historic western political and economic thought vacant to his left. It is unsurprising that a new party will arrive to claim the unoccupied ground. A meeting at the weekend discussed a new party provisionally called The Collective, which may be led by Jeremy Corbyn, who addressed the meeting. That was strangely secretive but seems to have been an adjunct of Corbyn's Peace and Justice Movement international conference, which occurred simultaneously and featured many of the same cast. The Collective is not new. This name was used for a loose coalition… 
Some Truth Bombs At the UN September 16, 2024: - Alongside Richard Medhurst I had the chance to state rather more truth than is generally heard inside the United Nations in Geneva: "Not only is the West complicit in the Genocide in Palestine, the ruling class of the West is so scared of its own citizens that it is now prepared to persecute its own citizens in support of a genocide". Richard Medhurst followed up on the same theme: Our appearance at the UN was organised by Justice for All International, an admirable Geneva based NGO with which I am proud to be associated. If you can donate to their… 
That Harris/Trump Debate September 11, 2024: - I just sat through a recording of the Trump/Harris debate. Ignoring the merits of their political stances, I agree with the general consensus that Kamala Harris "won" in performance terms, but only because Trump was awful. Both were of course terrible on Palestine. While I appreciate that that is of most interest to perhaps a majority of my readers, and that it is a key issue for a significant slice of US voters, it is not what this post is about. I am considering more broadly the prospects for who becomes US President. Trump's ability to make a coherent argument… Scotland and The Devolution Trap September 9, 2024: - As Starmer and Reeves subject the UK economy to yet more austerity and deregulation, the Scottish Government takes the blame for cutbacks caused by an economic policy in which they have zero say. That has always been the problem with devolution: it is responsibility without power – an invidious position to be in. That is not to say the Scottish government does not make plenty of mistakes of its own - the absurdly large sums of money thrown at the "third sector", often to further pet causes, is one example. Angus Robertson has just imposed cuts on Creative Scotland programmes,… 
The End of Western Pluralist Democracy September 1, 2024: - No major western leader is ever again going to be able to speak about human rights or ethical values, without attracting howls of derision. They are turning on their own people in order to prevent protest at a genocide they actively support. Keir Starmer stepped up the pressure on opponents of Zionist genocide on Thursday with the arrest of journalist Sarah Wilkinson and the charging of activist Richard Barnard, both under the draconian Section 12 of the Terrorism Act which carries a sentence of up to 14 years in prison. The UK MSM has of course ignored these, but is… More News
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