107 Comments

Biden picks a war with Russia and loses, killing more than a half million. To compensate and get a "win," Biden enables the slaughter of defenseless men, women and children, leaving premature babies to suffocate.

Biden to The Hague.

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@David Eason

Trial at the Hague is for those leaders who LOSE to the West's ownership, not for their own blunted tools.

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Thanks Chris for your dedication and courage to report some semblance of truth. But after reading this latest piece, I need to take a small break and contemplate a world of peace. But I shall return hopefully holding onto whatever sanity I can as the world seemingly implodes in endless violence and hatred. My partner and I used to hold a peace vigil with a few others and my sign said: Imagine Peace Every Day. It seemed like a meaningless gesture but bearing witness to the possibility of peace is about all I have left to offer. I am powerless to stop the madness of those who have access to weapons of mass destruction and the willingness and eagerness to use them.

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Please consider signing my petition. I believe we have to do what we can to change this narrative that locks us farther and deeper into the war mentality and machine.

I will post this link and more comments about it separately.

I want those who believe in finding a peaceful solution, to call on Pope Francis to go to Gaza, to the Rafah Crossing and enter into Gaza with the Gazans. I believe this would change the dynamics as soon as such a visit was announced. I made a petition on change.org

If you think this might work, and would like to support it , please sign and share:

https://chng.it/tfYb2DjFDy

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Thank you!

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Thank you for this initiative which I have signed and contributed to

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Thank you so much! We do what we can, yes.

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As you say and recommend SC, "Imagine Peace Every Day" --- which is a certainly valid and effective message regarding the inexorable turn toward even more war.

However, I am buoyed, in these awful times, and "these 'TIMES' they aren't a-changing" regarding NYT and "The Quiet American" global EMPIRE to prosecute more War, as long as it can remain fully camouflaged, deceitful, and faithfully under the control of the arrogantly self-appointed "Masters of the Universe".

I greatly appreciate your reference to "Imagine Peace Every Day" --- however, I am trying 'like hell' to change the first line, and particularly the last word of John Lennon's (and perhaps Lenin's) most enlightened song to:

Imagine there's no EMPIRE

it's easy if you try

No hell below us

above us only sky

I will put my every effort into employing "Imagine there's no EMPIRE" for the simple reason that our only promising 'Road Not Taken' being to metaphorically propose a world which does not cave into the reality of what Chris packs into "They Knew What They Were Doing"

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Thanks Schrodinger

I live less than hour from where Chris grew up. When I first revisited Mark Twain's War Prayer on Nebraska Educational television I thought immediately of St Johnsbury.,

The American Society of thought Criminals

The War Prayer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVYIRbmxHpc

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November 13, 2023
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I agree, a separate subject & yet not.

I have been wanting a general strike labor wise for years, but there is no reason the strike has to be limited to pay & benefit issues, it most certainly could include we won't work until we stop funding war vs healthcare housing & education. These 3 things Americans deserve(everyone deserves), and as long as we can afford to fund endless war like everywhere, we can afford to provide those 3 vital things to all!

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November 14, 2023
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What he said!!!

Straight up

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During WW11, if resistance fighters killed any German soldiers, the Germans killed 10 villagers for every German soldier killed. Israels' reprisal, on current numbers is more like 1,000 to 1.

Please tell me again, who are the Nazis here.

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November 13, 2023Edited
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Most people of the Jewish faith are not Nazis, even in Israel. I've known many who weren't, living honourably and happily in Sydney among others of all different faiths, but we do have Nazis here in Australia as does the US, the UK Ukraine and many other countries. The commonality is racism and bigotry - Fascism. Not nationality or faith.

What you say of Dueteronomy may well be true, but I don't read religious texts, I'll stick with Richard Dawkins thanks.

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November 13, 2023
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Dave's not home man.

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I wish I could be as sanguine about this as you Mr Hedges but I fear that the fact Palestinians have released a piece on the rules their fighters should adopt kinda says it all. Palestinians have rules about what they do but as we have seen with the recent and entirely unsurprising revelations that the bulk of the so-called atrocities on zionist civilians were committed by the idf to prevent hostage taking says it all. the zionists have no rules, the nonsense pushed out by zionists as revealed in Israel Shahak's tell all Jewish History, Jewish Religion (see https://archive.org/details/jewish-history-jewish-religion-the-weight-of-three-thousand-years-by-israel-shahak-126pgs/mode/2up ) shows that as far as recreating 'greater israel' zionists have no rules. Any amount of killing, rape, desecration is A OK as long as the jew doing it is doing so to bring about the seizure of all lands zionists believe was 'gifted' to them by their particularly cruel & asinine god.

eg:

“…various rabbinical commentators in the past drew the logical conclusion that in wartime all Gentiles belonging to a hostile population may, or even should be killed. Since 1973 this doctrine is being publicly propagated for the guidance of religious Israeli soldiers. The first such official exhortation was included in a booklet published by the Central Region Command of the Israeli Army, whose area includes the West Bank. In this booklet the Command's Chief Chaplain writes:

When our forces come across civilians during a war or in hot pursuit or in a raid, so long as there is no certainty that those civilians are incapable of harming our forces, then according to the Halakhah they may and even should be killed ... Under no circumstances should an Arab be trusted, even if he makes an impression of being civilised ... In war, when our forces storm the enemy, they are allowed and even enjoined by the Halakhah to kill even good civilians, that is, civilians who are ostensibly good.’”

see https://archive.org/details/jewish-history-jewish-religion-the-weight-of-three-thousand-years-by-israel-shahak-126pgs/page/n7/mode/2up

No wonder these people seek to drag up hitler on any occasion, zionists' beliefs are even worse than anything that mob of nazi thugs ever dreamed up.

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November 13, 2023
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Which Jewish God are you referring to. He evolved as as nations evolved. There were synagogues in Crimea before there was a Jesus and I don't remember then slaughtering anyone. My ancestors were being slaughtered in the Basque as Columbus searched for new Jews to slaughter.

The truth is our Messiahs are never perfect they are human and badly flawed.

There is no eternity no Heaven no Hell just a place for the dead to repose.

The final solution began not in 1938 but in American Occupied Havana May 27 1939 when Roosevelt sent Jewish Refugees back to Germany aboard the SS St Louis to begin the final solution and Jews couldn't even get into Gaza.

I 'd like to call you all kinds of names but Banality just about says it all.

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November 13, 2023
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There is Judeo Christian and Judeo Christian and Abraham was a wandering Aramean as were his sons Ismael and Isaac. I went to Protestant School and I live less than an hour St Johnsbury Vermont. I am high functioning autistic. I had a PhD vocabulary and a genius in logic at seven and could not do school no matter how hard I tried. I discovered I didn't know how to write when wife said why don't you try going back to school. My wife had a PhD and was expert in cross cultural education. I can now write and I get great joy from writing and I live in a REAL democracy. In real democracies like Canada the government has a contract to protect the people not subjugate them.

Ismael and Isaac are Romulus and Remus.

The Holocaust (The final Solution was written in Havana Washington and London on May 27 1939 aboard the SS St Louis when almost a thousand Jewish Refugees were sent back to Germany when Beaverbrook, Roosevelt and Mackenzie King said One Jew is one too many and left the final solution up to Hitler. They couldn't even disembark in Gaza, Johannesburg , Chile , Brazil or Argentina because Gaza belonged to Lord Beaverbrook and the British Foreign Office and America and the English hate (I don't know maybe hated would sound more soothing) Jews. They had a Jew roast in Yorke to celebrate Richard's return from the Crusades and we weren't allowed to return until after the Civil War where both Charles and Cromwell lost both their minds and their heads.

https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/mark-twain-and-the-jews

Mark Twain was a Zionist and he hated religion and wanted a Jewish state he knew the Czar and wished him dead.

In 1896 Twain called for a Jewish State in Palestine.

We had no choice but become bankers we couldn't own land We lived in Crimea for over 2000 years but we never owned the land. Mark Twain understood Yiddish he write the The American Claimant translated from Yiddish. I remember Gaza in 1938 we called it the SS St Louis.

I read Voltaire's Bastards I didn't write the 20th Anniversary edition foreword without reading the book or The Dictionary of Aggressive common Sense or the dedication to Hannah Arendt and the Banality of Evil starring Robert McNamara as Don Quixote.

I went to Protestant school we had The Crucible as the Sr High School play and I was the only person in school who knew it was about the Harvard Divinity School.

Every time I read Chris Hedges I must watch this twice it looks just like St Johnsbury. I need the tears to wash my eyes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVYIRbmxHpc

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Er, Mohammed descended from Abraham's son, Ishmael, who was called a wild donkey of a man, who didn't get along well with other people. In Genesis, God told Abraham that Ishmael's seed would become a great nation and would cause Isaac's seed trouble. Looks like islam took that to heart.

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BDS, BDS, BDS! Palestinians will prevail.

let's not vote for bribed politicians!

their deception must be finished.

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This my favourite comedian with English Subtitles it is two hours of truth telling and bloodletting.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_Co3gjQS8M

"Life's a comedy for those that think."

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVYIRbmxHpc

We are all Palestinians we killed off Neanderthals and we still carry their genes.

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Very powerful stuff, Chris. As Will Rodgers said:

If you teach a person or an animal a lesson in meanness, don't be surprised if they learn it.

and our mystery source:

The great strength of the totalitarian state is that it forces those who fear it to imitate it.

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This essay offers a rare look at how Palestinian fighters see their struggle against a mightier, much better-equipped enemy (armed with all the latest weapons & by the world's biggest military power!). It shows these fighters have guts galore--& suggests plausibly that Israel underestimated them. I agree that the fight will be long & bloody until Israel admits to its long-time wronging of the Palestinian people. So many lives could be spared--& their own peace secured-- if they would do so sooner rather than later.

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It is not only their "guts galore" After 75 years of holocaust the Palestinians have no other choice than dying murdered in their homes or dying fighting for their freedom.

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Bless you Chris for your powerful commitment to speaking the truth and educating the people so we can know what we are fighting for and what we are up against.

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I am not worried about Israel prevailing. They will. They will destroy Hamas which is their goal. They have to because their survival depends on it. I am worried about all the leftist antisemites when this dies down and what their position will do to their ongoing lives, careers, etc. I support free speech, but there are consequences for such demonstrated hate. Maybe we can deport all of them to what remains of Palestine so they can make it better.

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You use the term “Anti Semites” in an odd way. In my opinion he most effective anti-semites are the Zionists. Many in the Hassidic community agree.

The actions of the settlers, the supporters and the government, their programs, propagate hatred, distrust, and prejudice towards Jews everywhere. The great traditions of intelligence, learning, and courage is carried on by others: Chomsky, Finklestein, Peled, and all who understand that only injustice can come from injustice. So those who call for the end to the genocide in Gaza, those who call for regime change in Jerusalem, are not anti-Semitic, and they’re not anti-Israel or anti-Jewish, but they are in fact, is self loving Jews.

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The religious fanatics who propagate the most vile teachings are not representative of world Jewry. To suggest that they are is, indeed, antisemitic and will give succor to genuine Jew-haters everywhere.

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November 13, 2023
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In defence of Rob, look at how many Jewish organisations are active in the protests and the Hasidic Jews in Israel - We need to differentiate between the Zionists and Jews. I have seen so many young Jewish people on Social Media speaking out against the atrocities in Gaza. I consider myself a Christian - as does Christ Hedges - buy I don't buy into Evangelical Christianity or that the Bible is the word of God. Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.

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November 13, 2023
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And study your Bible and the writings of Mohamed and any other ancient text. That's just the point - They are from another time and should not be considered a relevant instruction pamphlet for how to conduct our spiritual lives today.

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And how many Christian religious wars have been fought in the name of god? And were those wars especially vicious? Indeed they were. Read up on the Thirty Years War for starters, and you will learn that today’s Gaza War is no worse.

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November 14, 2023
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More to the point of your last few words, they are decent, compassionate caring human beings regardless of how they may or may not identify with any one group.

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How does one kill an idea Mr. Lee? How does one kill an ideology that won’t countenance oppression and dispossession? If Hamas disappears tomorrow a stronger resistance will emerge in its place. There is no military solution for the “peace” that the Zionists seek in Palestine. The only lasting alternative is either a real commitment to the long US/Israeli sabotaged “two-state solution” or One State that recognizes the rights of all the citizens of this country be they Jew or Palestinian. One man, one woman, one vote. In other words, an actual democratic state must emerge.

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Palestinians only oppress themselves. There is plenty of Arab money that should have flooded into their country in investment to help them advance. Why not? Well, behind the virtue signaling wall of stupid life-meaning-strangled liberal elites that own the media, leading Arabs are saying Israel needs to wipe Hamas off off the face of the earth, and the Palestinian people are too corrupt and violent to welcome any investment... and oh by the way, keep them the hell out of our Arab countries as they are nothing but trouble. Those more advanced Arab counties know better. Stupid Western liberals do not. But we can see that trouble in the UK and New York where they congregate as immigrants.

People are only as good as is their culture. And Palestinian culture sucks. So does western coastal and big city liberal-leftist culture... why ya'll tend to like Palestinians... you have that in common.

A two-state solution would be fine except those Palestinians are committed to killing Jews. So that will not work. A one-state solution isn't feasible and you know it... so stop with the intellectual dishonesty suggesting it.

What you really want is Israel to be wiped off the map and most of the Israeli Jews dead. Then you will feel better for some reason that only your type of people and those 1930s Germans can explain.

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Were Palestinians “sabotaging themselves” when Israel built illegal settlements on land designated for a Palestinian state? Were Palestinians “sabotaging themselves” when Israel brazenly violated the ceasefire agreement that led to the savage Operation Cast Lead assault in 2008? Were Palestinians “sabotaging themselves” when Israel encouraged the rise of Hamas, even funding them, as a counterweight to the secular PLO which was prepared to recognize Israel in exchange for a two state solution? Your threadbare excuses for the unconscionable atrocities of the vicious settler/colonialist state of Israel don’t hold water. Israel will either be a democracy or a pariah apartheid state, but what it will not be is both.

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Your post if full of the lies of a terrorist.

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No significant sized group “wants the Jews dead”. That’s a provocation by Israelis. My own uncle (by marriage), used to try that on me. He was a well known artist in Jerusalem. One day I brought a Palestinian family to visit him, but he was not really open to them. I was very sorry, because their sincere desire was for peace and understanding.

As for wiping “Israel” of the map, I”m for it. Then grab a sharpie and write in “Palestine”, a fitting name for the home of Jews, Muslims, and Christians alike, as it was for millennia.

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Sera: Note to self: Stop feeding the trolls.

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LOL. Sure. So if Israel boots all the Palestinians from Gaza when they have no place else to call home, you will of course say that Israel does not want them dead. What a bunch of intellectual dishonest hogwash.

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Might want to get a mirror and take a long look, bub.

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You have lost, and miserably. Save your "worries" for yourself.

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@Frank Lee

You don't have to be a leftist or an antisemite to abhor fascists commiting genocides. Your lightly veiled threat against the lives and careers of those who speak up against your personal agenda of ethnic cleansing is noted.

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Frank contends that Israels survival depends on the destruction of Hamas ideology. I imagine that Hamas feels that the survival of Palestinians depends on the destruction of Zionist ideology.

Both are logical positions given the atrocities and war crimes committed by both adversaries. You can argue which ideology is valid (or which is not) 'til the cows come home. Either way, the result is a zero sum game as all the cows will sooner, rather than later, be dead.

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All the cows will die EXCEPT the Holy Cash Cows- Lockheed-Martin, General Dynamics, Northrop-Grumman, Boeing, BAE Systems, L3Harris Technologies, Raytheon et alia. Those cows will fatten like unto the first 7 kine of Pharaoh's dream. And yea, verily, what seven may come after?

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Don’t suggest that you are going to support someone like me to what remains of Palestine. That is insulting and disgusting.

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You are disgusting. Please shut up!

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You first unless you have something intelligent or interesting to contribute. You usually do not... just personal attacks. Weak.

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The veiled threat to violence. First, second and last resource of the mujaihideen

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Three days ago I got this crazy idea that the one thing that could stop the bombing immediately, would be for Pope Francis to go to Gaza, to the Rafah Crossing and enter into Gaza with the Gazans. I believe this would change the dynamics as soon as such a visit was announced. I made a petition on change.org

If anyone thinks this might work, and would like to support it , please sign and share widely:

https://chng.it/tfYb2DjFDy

This is not instead of but in addition to anything else you may be doing. Given the craven behavior of the western governments, we have to look in new and more creative directions. I recognize obstacles, but although it might not work, maybe it's worth trying. Please sign and share if you can.

And forgive me if you've seen this before, and/or will again.

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You may be right Joy. But not in the way you hope. A martyred Pope by IDF Judeo-fascists will set the world on fire! They have already bombed and destroyed the oldest Christian church in the ME. Maybe he should go to Jerusalem instead at least their he will only be spit on by Kahane zealots! Then the world could see the ugly side of Zionism and the Pope could turn the other cheek, and prove his LOVE for peace. Although the Israeli G-d of war may assassinate him anyway. That said you show hope in the midst of all this hopelessness!

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I appreciate your comments and analysis. There are real problems this petition doesn’t address, for sure, but let’s all keep trying to shift the dominant narrative. Thanks!

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@Joy in HK:

The Popes have stated more charitable views many times over the years. Many famous songs have been written in search of peace. Few to none have influenced these global warmongers to make peace. They do influence we ordinary peoples' views. It's quite sad and true.

Your idea is nice, but I highly doubt that the exceedingly wealthy, sinful, exploitive Vatican will heed the call. I was raised Catholic. The false teachings are legion. Popes are NOT infallible. No longer in any religion. Thanks for trying.

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Thanks Chris, I must admit my knowledge of Algeria is completely lacking, imagine a million and a half murdered and virtually no one knows. It shows the power of propaganda and censorship that Chomsky and Orwell have tried to reveal to the ignorant sheep. The best of the best from the west, who put their lives on the line carrying out their work is the late Robert Fisk and yourself Chris. Dodging bombs and bullets in some respects is easier than dodging propaganda, smears and media black lists! Stay safe, we all love you!

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>>[Israel] will pay an even higher price in Gaza.<< Good.

In 1991, with Operation Desert Storm(trooper), I was left hoping that the Iraqis could kill many times over the number of U.S. soldiers as they did. If the didn't (and they didn't), the u.s. would be emboldened. And look at the ensuing 30 + years. I did not want to see soldiers die, but I knew that without a steep price paid for our war of choice, the u.s. would continue. Now they use proxies to get out their blood thirst for imperial dominance. Israel, one of the proxies the u.s. uses to kill people darker than Casper (the ghost and Weinberger). Not that it matters as much, but, besides killing massive amounts of civilians, it also brings down the nation. I don't care so much about the u.s., we deserve this fate. The Jewish people world-wide do not deserve to have their symbol of the past into the future made into a hollow, soulless failed nation, but they will. That seems to be what is left of the amerikkkan way.

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In this article I realized that how powerful a deceptive the narrative can be.

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Fantastic image - Blood Meal - beautifully appallingly powerful! Thank you!

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So many times I have heard commentators try to force Palestinian supporters into denouncing in their words "brutal bloody unimaginable slaughter" on Oct 7. I hear the same hasbara from people in Canada in my discussions/arguments with blind supporters of Judeo-fascism with absolutely no historical context. My response goes something like this " Yes I denounce the "unfortunate" death of the 800 innocent civilians ( 400 of the 1200 were IDF soldiers, police and border guards) and I refuse to call them "Human Shields". You can hear them gulp, pause and sputter. Then I quickly ask do you denounce the slaughter of 4500 Palestinian children, 3500 women and the siege that denies them food , water , medicine and reduce them to merely "human shields" yourself? Do you denounce Judeo-fascism and the ongoing Genocide verging on a Holocaust. Most are only armed with hasbara talking points and defenseless in defending themselves. Nothing puts off a rhetoric machine more than throwing a wrench in the unknowing thought process of stupid brain washed victims of infantile catechisms!

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Agreed. Organized religion is the villain. Once someone has sowed the seeds of believing absurd things, then it is very easy for them to harvest the fruits of hatred and made anyone to commit genocide of believers of another faith who don't believe the absurdities they were taught when children.

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Help me out here. It is my impression that Hamas is something like Isis or Boko Haram.

Utter savages who are inspired by their Salafi interpretation of the Koran where all infidels should be killed. Is that not right? If my impression is correct, then Hamas is not a resistance with an aim of merit. It is a killer of all not aligned with their view. This is an irredeemable position and should be presented as such. I also think of the Netenyahu, Likud, and their militarists as savages.

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HAMAS won a legitimate election who was supervised by Jimmy Carter. They represent and fight for their people that have been sadistically treated by Israel. I don't know if this makes it different from Isis or Boko Haram. They have no power in the West Bank which accepted the right of Israel to exist and chose the way of peace and nevertheless its population has been methodically disposed, terrorized and murdered by Israel. I don't know if this makes Israel like Isis or Boko Haram.

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