The Chris Hedges Report with reporter Max Blumenthal on how the Israeli military launched a series of attacks on Oct. 7 designed to kill Hamas gunmen along with their Israeli hostages.
The Chris Hedges Report with reporter Max Blumenthal on how the Israeli military launched a series of attacks on Oct. 7 designed to kill Hamas gunmen along with their Israeli hostages.
Thank you. The GrayZone has been very focused and clear. Every day since I read your post The Horror The Horror I have sent an excerpt from it to the President, the two Senators from my state and my Congressional representative. Murder by my government in my name has been taking place my entire life. Surely there must be a way to stop. Max makes it clear that at least in this case, it is unlikely.
Thank you for another excellent interview. Max is a walking encyclopedia on current events. I could listen to you both discuss world events all day.
Quite upsetting so many Americans have been lied to by our government controlled media. If it weren’t for independent news we’d all be as gullible at the hands of our war department.
Thank you, for always letting your guests talk through all the pertinent points they need to make instead of like other interviewers constantly interrupting them and trying to redirect them to the questions they want to have answered. This is the type of reporting that is important to me thanks again.
Blumenthal has done excellent work reporting on this. He is to be commended. Also, as always, Chris Hedges is simply the greatest journalist/author of his (my) generation.
It distresses me that a reporter as thorough, honest, and eloquent as Max Blumenthal would smear one of the greatest historians of Israel/Palestine vis-a-vis the role played by the United States in the "Jewish State's" bloody founding, Alison Weir, author of "Against Our Better Judgment: How the United States Was Used to Create Israel" and founder of "If Americans Knew". I cannot find it within my heart to forgive Max for his smear against my friend and fellow activist, Alison Weir, one of the finest, most righteous and humane Americans that has ever lived but, credit where credit is due, his reporting on Oct. 7th, 2023, is indeed, admirable.
It seems to me the only way to end the slaughter is if the billionaire American jews put pressure on Israel to stop. They are the only ones with the money, power and influence to do so. As far as I know none of them have. Which indicates that they are fine with genocide. If we the people can put pressure on them, such as boycott, perhaps we have a chance.
this is US/Israeli genocide - bizness as usual for the hegemon in it's Imperial March to Nowhere. Israel of course exists to help fulfill that and is happy to be it's profit making proxy. ah yes. Perhaps I'm more cynical than most. I think it's extremely likely that the Israeli's knew the attack was going to happen and simply let it happen. It advances the end that has always been the goal since the formation of Israel. Throwing a couple of thousand citizens under the bus seems like an easy leap for a gov that is coming down hard on any citizen or person that criticizes. The US owners do.
Perhaps what happened is otherwise, as Max says, but I think not. It's all a continuing disaster for everyone.
Yes, Chris, the essential aspect of understanding the now fast accelerating ‘death knell’ of America, Israel, and the integrated combination of the unholy AIPAC is that “The Quiet American” EMPIRE [Apologies to Graham Greene] of this combined fascist Empire has been shrouded in deceit, lying, War-ginning, and camouflaged backing of the GLOBAL “Masters of the Universe” — of which I have written about for several decades:
AIPAC Defined
By Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine
11-5-9
For me, AIPAC should stand for American-style Imperialism Political Action Committee:
I still believe that the number one reason that AIPAC should not have undue influence on this matter is, as I wrote to “The Nation” in 2007, that "AIPAC (the American Israel Political Action Committee) and others, which are together termed “the lobby,” are not really speaking for the majority of Israeli nor American Jews–but are actually speaking nearly the opposite. I have long believed and written that the acronym AIPAC should rightly stand for American-style Imperialism Political Action Committee, since it does not reflect the honest desires and needs of the vast majority of the people of Israel but the aims of a global corporate Empire, which reduces the people of both Israel and America to living in its twin facades of “Vichy America” and “Vichy Israel.”
Yes, AIPAC accomplishes precisely the inverse of the noble purpose it claims to serve–to protect the people of Israel–and is instead a great danger to the people of Israel through its singular focus on the unsustainable and inevitably sorrowful strategy of militarist Empire. But AIPAC is neither the only nor the worst deceiver and denier of the aspirations of peoples whom it claims to speak for. That title of champion guileful mis-guider and destroyer of people’s democratic purpose is the corporate global Empire, which has metastasized from an initial tumor in the United States itself (although it shows no nationalism nor patriotism) and which can best be described as the Empire behind the curtain of “Vichy America.”
Just as AIPAC disregards the real interests of the people of Israel in favor of its own agenda of militant imperialism, so the domestic-grown pathology of the US-centered corporate/financial Empire even more contemptuously and arrogantly disregards the democratic and peaceful interests of all Americans and displaces their dreams with its own sordid nightmare of global domination by force of arms and economic exploitation under the false flag of “Vichy America.”
At the end of the day, it needs to be understood that the global corporatist Empire which hides behind the facade of “Vichy America” is the heart of the destructive unitive Empire that “the lobby” lobbies."
Since my 2007 criticism of AIPAC’s undue and FALSE viewpoint in claiming to speak for any majority of Jews, I have further thought that from the humanist and empathetic ‘democracy thinking’ of the majority of Israeli and American working-class citizens, that "it’s hard to imagine, in this very modern 21st century, that we are still looking toward the end of the last of tribal ‘empire-thinking’.
We are a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, multi-racial, even post-racial, sectarian, mixing-pot-world of democracies on a small fragile planet — and yet, we are still not beyond the danger of existential death at the hands of ancient and irrelevant tribal ‘empire-thinking’.
As only Kurt Vonnegut’s sense of ironic black humor might envision, “It is as if the whole human race was about to sit down to a celebratory picnic for successfully reaching our 21st century, when we are all unexpectedly killed by one remaining giant dinosaur.”
The last people in the world who should want to stay in (or ever promote) a world of tribalism, are the Muslims and Jews ---- based on how they have been abused by various nationalist and other modern “-ism” Empires.
Fighter pilots have a saying that, “speed is life”. But, for all the rest of us, “inclusiveness is life” — and tribalism is death by the oldest lie of empire.
Racism is another deadly old lie of empire, as is aggressively fundamentalist religion.
Nationalism is a somewhat newer lie of empire, proving particularly deadly in the 20th century.
While, economic ideology is the newest, and current, lie of empire (which is causing our economic and environmental collapse).
But all the lies and deceptions of “empire-thinking” lead ineluctably to the very same grave — so choose your empire poison, stupidly. Or choose your inclusiveness, wisely.
Thank you Max Blumenthal for covering a story which msm is afraid to touch, the death of Israelis by friendly fire. It is possible that a large number of the Hamas victims were actually killed by the Israeli forces. Israel cares little about Hamas hostages, as indicated by how little is being done to get them released and the indiscriminate bombing that is killing the hostages as well as the Palestinians.
So, it is a genocide that is based on lies too?! I mean, 1200 people killed by who exactly? How many were killed by the Israeli army?! The lies about the horrific act of violence of the hamas terrorists galvanized the people of the world and gave an excuse for the Israeli army to pound on Gaza, at least for sometime. What can you do with this very important piece of news about the truth of what happened on Oct 7?!
And the scaring part is when these lunatics will decide to "Hanibalized" us with their nuclear bombs. They will not care if the majority of the Jewish people live here, they are crazy and blood thirsty.
Great work. Thank you. Such a sad note at the end. Agree, Zionist Israel will not stop until it clears and reoccupies Gaza ( and the West Bank which is already happening at this moment under cover of Gaza). This will be, if not already is, one of the darkest chapters in human history
I'm transcribing part of PHYLLIS BENNIS "Ending Cycles of Violence: Israel & Palestine "Interview by David Barsamian (Washington, DC 27 October 2023)
"D.B. -The term genocide was coined by a Polish Jew, a famous jurist, a lawyer, Raphael Lemkin, having seen what the Turks did to the Armenians in 1915, and then the Holocaust. Now there's an Israeli historian of genocide, his name is Raz Segal, and in the issue of Jewish Currents, he calls Israel's assault on Gaza “a textbook case of genocide.”
P.B. -And he's not the only one. There is a petition that has been signed, I don't know how many, I think it's over 100 scholars around the world, scholars of genocide. That's an academic discipline. Hard to imagine, but it is. And they are the ones who understand better than anyone what international law actually says and doesn't say about defining genocide, holding accountable those accused of acts of genocide, and crucially, the obligations of, in this case, the member states who have signed the convention against genocide, which include of course the United States and Israel. Any outside third party who is a signatory to that convention has an international obligation to act to stop it. So, what is our government doing? We are not only sending Israel $3.8 billion every year as a starting amount. It's
already, this year, up way over $4 billion, but we are now just announcing $14 billion that the Biden administration wants to send for this war. So, we are paying for this war. Israel's entire military budget is $23 billion. When this $14 billion goes through, and there's little doubt that it will, it will mean that the
United States taxpayers are paying more than 75% of Israel's entire military budget this year. That's shocking. For a government that is carrying out acts that are at best war crimes, and may well be crimes against humanity, and acts of genocide. We are culpable. Our government is accountable and we as taxpayers have to do even more to say, "Not in our name. We need a ceasefire now." This is the necessity to stop the killing. Will a ceasefire solve all the problems? Of course not. We also need humanitarian aid. We need accountability for all of the crimes, including the crimes of October 7th.
We need all of that. We need the hostages to be freed. It's now over 10,000 Palestinians being held illegally in Israeli jails, we need them to be freed. 160 of them are children. Twelve of those children are being held under administrative detention. It's shocking. Israeli military detention laws apply to children as young as 12. It's the only country in the world who has a military juvenile justice system. So, it's a shocking reality and we need to keep up the pressure."
Chris! I love that you work for/with the Real News Network.
For 2 reasons
1)they are great!
2) I just learned the word "Bumfuzzled" from them
It went "Biden Bumfuzzled by loses he is taking with young voters..." and it was accompanied by a photo where he clearly looks like he just smelled one of his own dusty old farts! I was thoroughly amused, I'll read the article at some point likely as well.
But anyone seeking a laugh seek out this photo & download there app(I did not get paid to say this, or anything else... Clearly)
Thank you. The GrayZone has been very focused and clear. Every day since I read your post The Horror The Horror I have sent an excerpt from it to the President, the two Senators from my state and my Congressional representative. Murder by my government in my name has been taking place my entire life. Surely there must be a way to stop. Max makes it clear that at least in this case, it is unlikely.
Thank you for another excellent interview. Max is a walking encyclopedia on current events. I could listen to you both discuss world events all day.
Quite upsetting so many Americans have been lied to by our government controlled media. If it weren’t for independent news we’d all be as gullible at the hands of our war department.
Thank you, for always letting your guests talk through all the pertinent points they need to make instead of like other interviewers constantly interrupting them and trying to redirect them to the questions they want to have answered. This is the type of reporting that is important to me thanks again.
Blumenthal has done excellent work reporting on this. He is to be commended. Also, as always, Chris Hedges is simply the greatest journalist/author of his (my) generation.
It distresses me that a reporter as thorough, honest, and eloquent as Max Blumenthal would smear one of the greatest historians of Israel/Palestine vis-a-vis the role played by the United States in the "Jewish State's" bloody founding, Alison Weir, author of "Against Our Better Judgment: How the United States Was Used to Create Israel" and founder of "If Americans Knew". I cannot find it within my heart to forgive Max for his smear against my friend and fellow activist, Alison Weir, one of the finest, most righteous and humane Americans that has ever lived but, credit where credit is due, his reporting on Oct. 7th, 2023, is indeed, admirable.
It seems to me the only way to end the slaughter is if the billionaire American jews put pressure on Israel to stop. They are the only ones with the money, power and influence to do so. As far as I know none of them have. Which indicates that they are fine with genocide. If we the people can put pressure on them, such as boycott, perhaps we have a chance.
this is US/Israeli genocide - bizness as usual for the hegemon in it's Imperial March to Nowhere. Israel of course exists to help fulfill that and is happy to be it's profit making proxy. ah yes. Perhaps I'm more cynical than most. I think it's extremely likely that the Israeli's knew the attack was going to happen and simply let it happen. It advances the end that has always been the goal since the formation of Israel. Throwing a couple of thousand citizens under the bus seems like an easy leap for a gov that is coming down hard on any citizen or person that criticizes. The US owners do.
Perhaps what happened is otherwise, as Max says, but I think not. It's all a continuing disaster for everyone.
Yes, Chris, the essential aspect of understanding the now fast accelerating ‘death knell’ of America, Israel, and the integrated combination of the unholy AIPAC is that “The Quiet American” EMPIRE [Apologies to Graham Greene] of this combined fascist Empire has been shrouded in deceit, lying, War-ginning, and camouflaged backing of the GLOBAL “Masters of the Universe” — of which I have written about for several decades:
AIPAC Defined
By Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine
11-5-9
For me, AIPAC should stand for American-style Imperialism Political Action Committee:
I still believe that the number one reason that AIPAC should not have undue influence on this matter is, as I wrote to “The Nation” in 2007, that "AIPAC (the American Israel Political Action Committee) and others, which are together termed “the lobby,” are not really speaking for the majority of Israeli nor American Jews–but are actually speaking nearly the opposite. I have long believed and written that the acronym AIPAC should rightly stand for American-style Imperialism Political Action Committee, since it does not reflect the honest desires and needs of the vast majority of the people of Israel but the aims of a global corporate Empire, which reduces the people of both Israel and America to living in its twin facades of “Vichy America” and “Vichy Israel.”
Yes, AIPAC accomplishes precisely the inverse of the noble purpose it claims to serve–to protect the people of Israel–and is instead a great danger to the people of Israel through its singular focus on the unsustainable and inevitably sorrowful strategy of militarist Empire. But AIPAC is neither the only nor the worst deceiver and denier of the aspirations of peoples whom it claims to speak for. That title of champion guileful mis-guider and destroyer of people’s democratic purpose is the corporate global Empire, which has metastasized from an initial tumor in the United States itself (although it shows no nationalism nor patriotism) and which can best be described as the Empire behind the curtain of “Vichy America.”
Just as AIPAC disregards the real interests of the people of Israel in favor of its own agenda of militant imperialism, so the domestic-grown pathology of the US-centered corporate/financial Empire even more contemptuously and arrogantly disregards the democratic and peaceful interests of all Americans and displaces their dreams with its own sordid nightmare of global domination by force of arms and economic exploitation under the false flag of “Vichy America.”
At the end of the day, it needs to be understood that the global corporatist Empire which hides behind the facade of “Vichy America” is the heart of the destructive unitive Empire that “the lobby” lobbies."
Since my 2007 criticism of AIPAC’s undue and FALSE viewpoint in claiming to speak for any majority of Jews, I have further thought that from the humanist and empathetic ‘democracy thinking’ of the majority of Israeli and American working-class citizens, that "it’s hard to imagine, in this very modern 21st century, that we are still looking toward the end of the last of tribal ‘empire-thinking’.
We are a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, multi-racial, even post-racial, sectarian, mixing-pot-world of democracies on a small fragile planet — and yet, we are still not beyond the danger of existential death at the hands of ancient and irrelevant tribal ‘empire-thinking’.
As only Kurt Vonnegut’s sense of ironic black humor might envision, “It is as if the whole human race was about to sit down to a celebratory picnic for successfully reaching our 21st century, when we are all unexpectedly killed by one remaining giant dinosaur.”
The last people in the world who should want to stay in (or ever promote) a world of tribalism, are the Muslims and Jews ---- based on how they have been abused by various nationalist and other modern “-ism” Empires.
Fighter pilots have a saying that, “speed is life”. But, for all the rest of us, “inclusiveness is life” — and tribalism is death by the oldest lie of empire.
Racism is another deadly old lie of empire, as is aggressively fundamentalist religion.
Nationalism is a somewhat newer lie of empire, proving particularly deadly in the 20th century.
While, economic ideology is the newest, and current, lie of empire (which is causing our economic and environmental collapse).
But all the lies and deceptions of “empire-thinking” lead ineluctably to the very same grave — so choose your empire poison, stupidly. Or choose your inclusiveness, wisely.
Oh shit I haven't even had a chance to hear this one but these are 2 of my favorites no doubt!!!
And briahna joy Gray
Hope there’s bonus material on this one
Thank you Max Blumenthal for covering a story which msm is afraid to touch, the death of Israelis by friendly fire. It is possible that a large number of the Hamas victims were actually killed by the Israeli forces. Israel cares little about Hamas hostages, as indicated by how little is being done to get them released and the indiscriminate bombing that is killing the hostages as well as the Palestinians.
So, it is a genocide that is based on lies too?! I mean, 1200 people killed by who exactly? How many were killed by the Israeli army?! The lies about the horrific act of violence of the hamas terrorists galvanized the people of the world and gave an excuse for the Israeli army to pound on Gaza, at least for sometime. What can you do with this very important piece of news about the truth of what happened on Oct 7?!
And the scaring part is when these lunatics will decide to "Hanibalized" us with their nuclear bombs. They will not care if the majority of the Jewish people live here, they are crazy and blood thirsty.
Great work. Thank you. Such a sad note at the end. Agree, Zionist Israel will not stop until it clears and reoccupies Gaza ( and the West Bank which is already happening at this moment under cover of Gaza). This will be, if not already is, one of the darkest chapters in human history
I'm transcribing part of PHYLLIS BENNIS "Ending Cycles of Violence: Israel & Palestine "Interview by David Barsamian (Washington, DC 27 October 2023)
"D.B. -The term genocide was coined by a Polish Jew, a famous jurist, a lawyer, Raphael Lemkin, having seen what the Turks did to the Armenians in 1915, and then the Holocaust. Now there's an Israeli historian of genocide, his name is Raz Segal, and in the issue of Jewish Currents, he calls Israel's assault on Gaza “a textbook case of genocide.”
P.B. -And he's not the only one. There is a petition that has been signed, I don't know how many, I think it's over 100 scholars around the world, scholars of genocide. That's an academic discipline. Hard to imagine, but it is. And they are the ones who understand better than anyone what international law actually says and doesn't say about defining genocide, holding accountable those accused of acts of genocide, and crucially, the obligations of, in this case, the member states who have signed the convention against genocide, which include of course the United States and Israel. Any outside third party who is a signatory to that convention has an international obligation to act to stop it. So, what is our government doing? We are not only sending Israel $3.8 billion every year as a starting amount. It's
already, this year, up way over $4 billion, but we are now just announcing $14 billion that the Biden administration wants to send for this war. So, we are paying for this war. Israel's entire military budget is $23 billion. When this $14 billion goes through, and there's little doubt that it will, it will mean that the
United States taxpayers are paying more than 75% of Israel's entire military budget this year. That's shocking. For a government that is carrying out acts that are at best war crimes, and may well be crimes against humanity, and acts of genocide. We are culpable. Our government is accountable and we as taxpayers have to do even more to say, "Not in our name. We need a ceasefire now." This is the necessity to stop the killing. Will a ceasefire solve all the problems? Of course not. We also need humanitarian aid. We need accountability for all of the crimes, including the crimes of October 7th.
We need all of that. We need the hostages to be freed. It's now over 10,000 Palestinians being held illegally in Israeli jails, we need them to be freed. 160 of them are children. Twelve of those children are being held under administrative detention. It's shocking. Israeli military detention laws apply to children as young as 12. It's the only country in the world who has a military juvenile justice system. So, it's a shocking reality and we need to keep up the pressure."
shared on fb
Chris! I love that you work for/with the Real News Network.
For 2 reasons
1)they are great!
2) I just learned the word "Bumfuzzled" from them
It went "Biden Bumfuzzled by loses he is taking with young voters..." and it was accompanied by a photo where he clearly looks like he just smelled one of his own dusty old farts! I was thoroughly amused, I'll read the article at some point likely as well.
But anyone seeking a laugh seek out this photo & download there app(I did not get paid to say this, or anything else... Clearly)