As Surgeons, We Have Never Seen Cruelty Like Israel’s Genocide in Gaza
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- Written by FEROZE SIDHWA and MARK PERLMUTTER FEROZE SIDHWA and MARK PERLMUTTER
- Published: 12 April 2024 12 April 2024
We urge anyone who reads this to publicly oppose sending weapons to Israel as long as this onslaught continues.
"As humanitarian trauma surgeons we have both seen incredible suffering. Collectively, we were present at Ground Zero on 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, the Boston Marathon bombing, and the 2010 earthquake in Haiti on the first day of these disasters. We have worked in the deprivation of southern Zimbabwe and the horrors of the war in Ukraine. Together we have worked on more than 40 surgical missions in developing countries on three continents in our combined 57 years of volunteering. This long experience taught us that there was no greater pain as a humanitarian surgeon than being unable to provide needed care to a patient.
But that was before coming to Gaza. Now we know the pain of being unable to treat a child who will slowly die, but also alone, because she is the only surviving member of an entire extended family. We have not had the heart to tell these children how their families died: burned until they resembled blistered hotdogs more than human beings, shredded to pieces such that they can only be buried in mass graves, or simply entombed in their former apartment buildings to die slowly of asphyxia and sepsis."
Read more at Common Dreams
After six months of war, I fear we may lose Palestine completely | Raja Shehadeh
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- Written by Raja Shehadeh Raja Shehadeh
- Published: 09 April 2024 09 April 2024
By now several things have become clear. The first is the re-emergence in Israel of the Jewish ultra right; settlers and Jewish supremacists with their uncompromising expansionist agenda. It was as though this recalcitrant group was waiting for the opportunity to accelerate the pursuit of its colonial objectives. Already, not only is the Gaza Strip transformed but so is the West Bank, fragmented as it is by roadblocks and locked iron gates restricting access to villages, and settlers continuing to expel Palestinians from their land. As for Gaza, plans are already being prepared for settling the north by Israeli Jews.
‘Lavender’: The AI machine directing Israel’s bombing spree in Gaza
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- Written by Peter Miller Peter Miller
- Published: 05 April 2024 05 April 2024
The Israeli army has marked tens of thousands of Gazans as suspects for assassination, using an AI targeting system with little human oversight and a permissive policy for casualties, +972 and Local Call reveal.
A new investigation by +972 Magazine and Local Call reveals that the Israeli army has developed an artificial intelligence-based program known as “Lavender,” unveiled here for the first time. According to six Israeli intelligence officers, who have all served in the army during the current war on the Gaza Strip and had first-hand involvement with the use of AI to generate targets for assassination, Lavender has played a central role in the unprecedented bombing of Palestinians, especially during the early stages of the war. In fact, according to the sources, its influence on the military’s operations was such that they essentially treated the outputs of the AI machine “as if it were a human decision.”
Formally, the Lavender system is designed to mark all suspected operatives in the military wings of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), including low-ranking ones, as potential bombing targets. The sources told +972 and Local Call that, during the first weeks of the war, the army almost completely relied on Lavender, which clocked as many as 37,000 Palestinians as suspected militants — and their homes — for possible air strikes.
Write-in "Uncommitted" for Oregon's Democratic Presidential Primary
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- Written by Peter Miller Peter Miller
- Published: 05 April 2024 05 April 2024
Uncommitted Oregon has just launch its campaign to get voters concerned about the genocide in Gaza to vote their conscience. See UncommittedOregon.org for more information.
Write in Uncommitted
We are a diverse coalition of voters in Oregon, spanning different faiths, ethnicities, and generations. We call upon all Democrats and people of conscience to refrain from endorsing candidate Biden until his administration ceases its support of, and stands firmly against, the genocide in Gaza. We believe the horrible events of October 7th cannot justify Israel’s actions and the Biden administration’s support.
Join us by writing in Uncommitted on or before May 21 in Oregon’s Democratic Presidential Primary. Let us hold the Biden administration accountable, as their actions contradict their call for a ceasefire.
Gaza: The Death of an American Airman
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- Written by Gilbert Schramm Gilbert Schramm
- Published: 31 March 2024 31 March 2024
On Feb. 26 Senior Airman Aaron Bushnell, 25, a cyber defense operations specialist with the 531st Intelligence Support Squadron reportedly died from injuries sustained in a brutal and unusual way. Most Americans mourn the death of any service member. I hope he is mourned as well. He made a tragic sacrifice for a higher ideal. Bushnell set himself on fire in front of the Israeli embassy in Washington DC to protest the continuing atrocious assault of Israeli forces on Gaza. As an experienced airman and defense expert, he probably had a pretty clear insight into what the current Israeli bombing would do on the ground. Reuters reports him as saying in a final statement, "I will no longer be complicit in genocide."
In 1963, Buddhist monks in Vietnam chose to sacrifice themselves in the same way. Their self immolations helped focus the world on the tragedy then occurring in Vietnam. Their acts helped change the trajectory of that conflict. I sincerely hope that the death of Aaron Bushnell will do the same for the ongoing carnage in Gaza.