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Francesca Albanese, public intellectuals and the industry of pro-Palestine defamation

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Francesca Albanese’s refusal to placate those who seek to police the boundaries of acceptable discourse on Palestine
Francesca Albanese’s refusal to placate those who seek to police the boundaries of acceptable discourse on Palestine is precisely what makes her a target. Image: X/@maariaris/screenshot APR

COMMENTARY: By Layth Malhis

You, the reader, are the public intellectual. Unfortunately, this message carries immense weight: those who engage with Palestine bear a collective responsibility to confront and end the carnage, the bloodshed, and the ever-mounting rubble.

Yet, in doing so, you will find yourself in the crossfire of a relentless defamation machine — one that thrives, operates, and feeds off the energy of Palestinian blood.

During her tour across college campuses in the United States, United Kingdom, and Canada, Francesca Albanese, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories, was the target of egregious criticism and mischaracterisations.

The Wall Street Journal is among the many media outlets that have taken part in this defaming effort. On October 30, its own editorial board brandished her as a “Hamas apologist” who has a “long record of trivialising the Holocaust”.

This concerted effort by the WSJ and other established media outlets in the US and UK to attack the Special Rapporteur was yet another reminder that to publically stand up for Palestine is to endure a process of vilification where character and integrity are defamed and systematically undermined — all to dismantle any semblance of credibility of the message and more importantly its orator.

In 1993, the Palestinian American literary critic Edward Said delivered a series of thought-provoking lectures for the BBC’s Reith Lecture series, exploring the role of the public intellectual through the lens of literature, his personal experiences, and his critical insights.

These lectures were later compiled into a book where Said defined the intellectual as an “individual with a specific public role in society that cannot be reduced simply to being a faceless professional… endowed with a faculty to representing, embodying, articulating a message, a view, an attitude, philosophy or opinion to, as well as for, a public.”

Said emphasises that the intellectual bears a profound responsibility: to “raise embarrassing questions, to confront orthodoxy and dogma (rather than to produce them), to be someone who cannot easily be co-opted by governments or corporations, and whose raison d’être is to represent all those people and issues that are routinely forgotten or swept under the rug.”

The intellectual as a dissenter and advocate
His framing of the intellectual as a dissenter and advocate for the marginalised challenges individuals to embody courage and integrity in the face of power and complacency.

This article explores the dual roles of public intellectuals: those forced into the role amidst genocide and those who choose to engage from the outside, both vital in resisting erasure.

Since October 7, 2023, two distinct types of public intellectuals have emerged:

The first type of public intellectual is the everyday individual in Gaza — the teachers, doctors, photographers, journalists, nurses, grocery clerks, and all who carry the will to document, report, and speak truth to power. Ordinary people thrust into extraordinary circumstances, where life itself has been reduced to a desperate game of survival.

Over the past year, Israel’s systematic decimation of Gaza’s medical, educational, and sanitation infrastructure has severed Palestinians from the most basic metrics of life.

Yet, those with the skill and capacity to provide care, knowledge, and dignity have been forced into a cruel and precarious existence. Their resilience has made them public intellectuals by necessity, embodying both survival and resistance in the face of erasure.

These intellectuals serve the people of Palestine not only by merely providing essential services to ensure survival but also by resisting the occupation’s disinformation war.

Breaking through the fog of Israeli propaganda
They have achieved this through the dissemination of pictures, videos, and oral testimonies from the victims of Israel’s genocidal campaign, breaking through the fog of propaganda to communicate the truth to the outside world.

Among those who have assumed this role are Bisan Owda, Dr Ghassan Abu Sitta, Refaat Alareer, Dr Husam Abu Safia, Anas al-Sharif, Wael Al-Dahdouh, and many others, some still alive, countless now martyred.

Public intellectuals in Gaza have been systematically targeted by the Israeli war machine. Just this week, we learned of the agonising and distressing circumstances surrounding the death of Dr Adnan Al Bursh.

Revered as a leader and a hero for his unyielding presence during crises in the besieged strip, Dr Al Bursh took it upon himself to document and disseminate footage of life inside Al-Shifa Hospital during the early weeks of the genocide. His courageous efforts to expose the deliberate destruction of Gaza’s medical sector by the Israeli army have been instrumental in bringing attention to the mounting war crimes.

Dr Al Bursh’s work flagged the systematic targeting of healthcare infrastructure, a grim pattern that has been substantiated by the World Health Organisation, which reports 516 Israeli attacks on Gaza’s healthcare sector.

His detainment and life-ending brutalisation were yet another harrowing reminder of Israel’s relentless campaign against those who dare to heal, resist, and speak out.

His life and death exemplify the extraordinary sacrifices made by Gaza’s public intellectuals in the face of Israel’s genocidal and urbicidal project, where the destruction of human life and urban fabric are employed as tools of erasure and domination.

Rebelling and agitating against normalisation
The second type of public intellectual — you, me, and those whose love and passion, borrowing from James Baldwin, holds the world intact — are the ones who possess absolute choice and freedom to address Palestine and its profound injustices.

This group exists on the outside, rebelling and agitating against the normalisation of Palestinian blood. It wakes to videos filled with carnage and despair, and it sleeps to the haunting pleas of those trapped in the besieged land.

The primary condition of the public intellectual during genocide is to transform into a state of agitation, to ensure that fatigue does not set in and that the endless cycle of destruction and outrage does not dull the sharpness of the convictions held by those who stand in solidarity with Palestinians.

Their task is monumental: to end the suffering, to give those screaming for help a moment to breathe, to grieve, and to mourn what little remains amidst the rubble.

I remind those who hold Palestine close to their hearts — the ones who see, who know, who have the faces and screams of Sidra Hassouna, Hind Rajab, and countless other children, mothers, and fathers etched into their memory — that you must shoulder the burden of responsibility required to end this once and for all. You must tear apart the veil of normalisation, where moral apathy supersedes humanity.

The role of the public intellectual on the outside is to persistently challenge the system working in overdrive to normalise the mass death and territorial expropriation unfolding in real-time on our social media feeds.

This role is not without risks; it inevitably marks the orator, the fighter for justice, as an enemy of the established order and its orthodoxy. It will take a piece of their heart and box it into a state of discomfort, where the feeling of contempt is replaced by melancholy.

The risks of speaking truth about Palestine
In an illuminating episode of the Makdisi Street Podcast featuring Saree, Osama, and Karim Makdisi — each embodying the role of the public intellectual on Palestine — the acclaimed writer and activist Ta-Nehisi Coates reflected on the risks of speaking truth about Palestine.

He argued that when your work authentically captures the reality of Palestinian suffering and successfully communicates this pain to the world, it provokes a backlash.

Racism and efforts to silence you will emerge, calibrated to inflict just enough harm to deter you from continuing on your path. Yet, Coates emphasised, the path of amplifying the Palestinian struggle for freedom must be walked, regardless of the obstacles.

When addressing Palestine, the public intellectual must embody an unyielding commitment to dismantling the narratives and mechanisms designed to erase and dehumanise the oppressed.

A striking example of this is Francesca Albanese’s masterful intervention during a press briefing on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on November 5, where she effectively dismantled the concept of a state’s “right to exist.”

Recognising the bad faith in which the question was posed, Albanese redirected the discussion to the framework of international law, emphasising its role in safeguarding the rights of people, not states.

She underscored the absurdity of such narratives by drawing a parallel to her native Italy, illustrating how inconceivable such a question would be if applied to any other country.

Unwavering clarity is essential
This unwavering clarity is essential; any quivering or half-measure approach risks greater harm to Palestinians, as it inadvertently feeds into the machinery of normalisation.

To falter in conviction is to risk legitimising propaganda that perpetuates oppression, enabling the powerful to cloak their violence in a veneer of legitimacy. For the public intellectual, there is no room for compromise in confronting these narratives — their mission is to illuminate truth and uphold justice without equivocation.

One of the primary reasons Zionist interest groups have gone into overdrive to skew and tarnish Francesca Albanese’s reputation is her unapologetic stance, not only in support of the Palestinians but in defence of their right to resist oppression.

It is evident when one hears her speak that she does not hold back; she refuses to dilute her convictions or entertain any ambiguity about her stance. Her words leave no room for speculation or the comfort of moderation, forcing her audience, and her opponents, to confront the harsh realities of colonial violence and occupation on her terms, terms based exclusively on truth and humanist principles.

Albanese’s refusal to placate those who seek to police the boundaries of acceptable discourse on Palestine is precisely what makes her a target.

She exemplifies the essence of the public intellectual: a voice of resistance that remains unsilenced and unyielding, boldly challenging the orthodoxy of power and its enablers. Albanese, alongside others across various sectors and disciplines, provides a vital blueprint for embodying the role of the public intellectual in the context of Palestine.

While their methods and areas of influence may differ, they share an unabashed, unapologetic commitment to confronting the enablers of genocide with relentless determination. They recognise that what is at stake — the lives and futures of Palestinians in Gaza and the normalisation of systemic violence — demands untiring commitment, and it is precisely because of the significant personal cost involved that they persist in their fight.

No system that relies on defamation and character assassination as a form of policing speech that seeks to humanise the incarcerated and mutilated should continue.

Their sole adversary is that violent system
For the public intellectual, their sole adversary is that system, a system that is weaker today than it was yesterday, as the collective pursuit for truth is making serious ground to eroding its foundations.

Be that public intellectual who speaks and writes on Palestine with courage and conviction, unafraid to be unabashedly proud in their stance.

Approach Palestine not as an abstract cause but as part of your kin, allowing your sense of justice and humanity to guide your voice.

In a world desensitised to the pain and suffering it perpetuates, Palestine offers a rare, transformative opportunity — a “once in a generation” moment to mobilise and redefine the structures of power and ideals that shape our global reality.

Layth Malhis is at the Center of Contemporary Arab Studies at Georgetown University. He writes on settler colonialism and necropolitics in Palestine and the broader Arab world.This article was first published by The New Arab.

US officials talked about merits of removing $10m bounty on Syrian rebel leader

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Flashback:
Flashback: "Wanted" flyer for Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) leader Abu Mohammad al-Jolani . . . designated as a terrorist by the US since 2013 with the Trump administration in 2018 imposing a $10 million bounty on his head. Image: X/USEmbassySyria 2017

By Sean Mathews

American officials have discussed the merits of removing a $10m bounty on Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) leader Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, whose rebel group swept into Damascus and toppled the government of Bashar al-Assad on Sunday, a senior Arab official briefed by the Americans told Middle East Eye.

Ahmed al-Sharaa, commonly known as Jolani, has been designated as a terrorist by the United States since 2013, while his organisation, HTS, was proscribed by the Trump administration in 2018 when a $10 million bounty was placed on his head.

For years, HTS lobbied to be delisted, but its pleas largely fell on deaf years with the group relegated to governing just a sliver of northwest Syria.

Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) leader Abu Mohammad al-Jolani
Flashback: “Wanted” flyer for Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) leader Abu Mohammad al-Jolani . . . designated as a terrorist by the US since 2013 with the Trump administration in 2018 imposing a $10 million bounty on his head. Image: X/USEmbassySyria 2017

But the lightning blitz by the rebels, which saw Assad’s iron-grip rule end in spectacular fashion on Sunday, has since forced Washington to rethink how it engages with the former al-Qaeda affiliate.

The senior Arab official, who requested anonymity due to sensitivities surrounding the talks, told MEE that the discussions had divided officials in the Biden administration.

Meanwhile, when asked about the discussions, one Trump transition official disparaged the Biden administration.

Jolani, 42, gave a rousing victory speech in Damascus’ iconic Umayyad Mosque on Sunday and is widely expected to play a key role in Syria’s transition after 54 years of Assad family rule.

“Today, Syria is being purified,” Jolani told a crowd of supporters in Damascus, adding that “this victory is born from the people who have languished in prison, and the mujahideen (fighters) broke their chains”.

He said that under Assad, Syria had become a place for “Iranian ambitions, where sectarianism was rife,” in reference to Assad’s allies Iran and its Lebanese proxy Hezbollah.

‘Saying the right things now’
Speaking several hours after the fall of Damascus, US President Joe Biden called the rebel takeover a “fundamental act of justice,” but cautioned it was “a moment of risk and uncertainty” for the Middle East.

“We will remain vigilant,” Biden said. “Make no mistake, some of the rebel groups that took down Assad have their own grim record of terrorism and human rights abuses,” adding that the groups are “saying the right things now.”

“But as they take on greater responsibility, we will assess not just their words, but their actions,” Biden said.

Later, a senior Biden administration official, when asked about contact with HTS leaders, said Washington was in contact with Syrian groups of all kinds.

The official, who was not authorised to publicly discuss the situation and spoke on condition of anonymity, also said the US was focused on ensuring chemical weapons in Assad’s military arsenal were secured.

Meanwhile, The New York Times reported that US intelligence agencies were in the process of evaluating Jolani, who it said had launched a “charm offensive” aimed at allaying concerns over his past affiliations.

Jolani was born to a family originally from the occupied Golan Heights and fought in the Iraq insurgency and served five years in an American-run prison in Iraq, before returning to Syria as the emissary of Islamic State founder Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

‘Charm offensive can be misleading’
“A charm offensive might mean that people are turning over a new leaf and they think differently than they used to so you should hear them out. On the other hand, you should be cautious because charm offensives can sometimes be misleading,” the US official said.

“We have to think about it. We have to watch their behaviour and we need to do some indirect messaging and see what comes of that,” the official added.

But, US President-elect Donald Trump, who will be entering office in just five weeks, has left few doubts where he stood on the conflict, saying Washington “should have nothing to do with it [Syria].”

In a social media post on Saturday, Trump wrote that Assad “lost” because “Russia and Iran are in a weakened state right now, one because of Ukraine and a bad economy, the other because of Israel and its fighting success”.

Trump used Assad’s fall as an opportunity to call for an end to the war in Ukraine, without mentioning the Syrian opposition or the Syrian allies of the US.

Jordan lobbies for Syrian Free Army
Assad’s ousting has seen Nato-ally Turkey cement its status as the main outside power in Syria at the expense of a bruised and battered Iran and Russia.

But the US holds vast amounts of territory in Syria via its allies, who joined a race to replace the Assad regime as its soldiers abandoned villages and cities en masse.

The US backs rebels operating out of the al-Tanf desert outpost on the tri-border area of Jordan, Iraq and Syria.

The Syrian Free Army (SFA) went on the offensive as Assad’s regime collapsed taking control of the city of Palmyra.

The SFA works closely with the US and its financing is mainly run out of Jordan. The SFA also enjoys close ties to Jordanian intelligence.

A former Arab security official told MEE that Jordan’s King Abdullah II met with senior US officials in Washington DC last week and lobbied for continued support for the Syrian Free Army.

However, maintaining stability in post-Assad Syria will be key for Jordan as it looks to send back hundreds of thousands of refugees and ensure a power vacuum does not lead to more captagon crossing its border, the former official said.

900 US troops embedded with Kurds
In northeastern Syria, the US has roughly 900 troops embedded with the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

Arab tribes linked to the SDF swept across the Euphrates River on Friday to take a wide swath of strategic towns, including Deir Ezzor and al-Bukamal. The latter is Syria’s strategic border crossing with Iraq.

The US support for the SDF is a sore point in its ties to Turkey, which views the SDF as an extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

The PKK has waged a decades-long guerrilla war in southern Turkey and is labelled a terrorist organisation by the US and the European Union.

Turkey’s concerns about the PKK led it to launch an invasion of Syria in 2016, with the aim of depriving Kurdish fighters of a quasi-state along its border. Two more military forays followed in 2018 and 2019.

The SDF is already being squeezed in the north with Turkish-backed rebels called the Syrian National Army entering the strategic city of Manbij.

During Syria’s more than decade long war, the US slapped sanctions on Assad’s government, enabled Israel to launch strikes on Iran inside Syria, and backed opposition groups that hold sway over around one-third of the country.

Sean Mathews is a journalist for Middle East Eye writing about business, security and politics. His coverage spans from across the Middle East, North Africa and the Balkans.  Republished from Middle East Eye under Creative Commons.

Caitlin Johnstone: Assad is out, woke Al-Qaeda is in

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CNN just released a coddling softball interview with Abu Mohammed al-Jolani
CNN just released a coddling softball interview with Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, the former ISIS and al-Qaeda member who leads the Syrian opposition group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which is itself a rebranded offshoot of al-Qaeda in Syria. Image: caitlinjohnstone.com.au

COMMENTARY: By Caitlin Johnstone

Well, the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is out, likely to be replaced by one or more US puppet regimes depending on whether the nation maintains its current borders or is carved up into separate states. The empire notches another win.

I am not a military analyst, but analysts who are normally supportive and optimistic in favour of Assad like Elijah Magnier and Pepe Escobar are saying this is the end.

Assad’s whereabouts are unknown as Turkish-backed fighters and al-Qaeda-linked forces with a history of Western backing have swept through the country with alarming speed, and now Russia and Iran have joined with the governments of US-aligned nations like Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and Turkey in calling for an end to the fighting in favour of a political solution.

CNN reports that opposition forces have captured Damascus , Assad has reportedly fled the country with his whereabouts unknown, and footage reportedly shows Assad forces retreating from the area where the president’s main residence is located.

The US proxy warfare in Lebanon and Ukraine makes a lot more strategic sense now; by tying up Hezbollah and Russia in other conflicts, the path was opened up for another run on Damascus and a chance to further cut off Hezbollah from supplies.

Many pundits on my end of the commentary spectrum had been calling those proxy wars self-defeating and framing them as the desperate flailings of a dying empire which will only accelerate its demise, but now here we are watching the empire score a victory it’s been chasing for years, with the Western/Israeli stranglehold on the Middle East growing tighter than ever.

An al-Qaeda is woke now narrative
Meanwhile, the press is falling all over itself to support this regime change by promoting the narrative that al-Qaeda is woke now.

CNN just released a coddling softball interview with Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, the former ISIS and al-Qaeda member who leads the Syrian opposition group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which is itself a rebranded offshoot of al-Qaeda in Syria.

Jolani told CNN that he has reformed from his radical ways of the past, saying, “Sometimes it’s essential to adjust to reality,” adding, “someone who rigidly clings to certain ideas and principles without flexibility cannot effectively lead societies or navigate complex conflicts like the one happening in Syria.”

Now the imperial press are full of headlines like “How Syria’s rebel leader went from radical jihadist to a blazer-wearing ‘revolutionary’” from CNN, “Syria’s rebel leader Golani: From radical jihadist to ostensible pragmatist” from The Times of Israel, and “How Syria’s ‘diversity-friendly’ jihadists plan on building a state” from The Telegraph.

Only a matter of time before we start seeing former ISIS and al-Qaeda members chatting it up on liberal Western talk shows with their preferred gender pronouns listed next to their names.

As luck would have it, these “diversity-friendly jihadists” have been telling the Israeli press that they “love Israel” and won’t do anything to harm its interests, so it’s safe to say that this “revolution” has been about as organically grown as a sheet of crystal meth.

One of the many perks of being the world’s dominant superpower is that it gives you the luxury of time. If one regime change operation fails, don’t worry, you can just move some chess pieces around and take another shot at it.

If a coup attempt fails in Latin America, relax, there will be other coup attempts. If your efforts to grab Syria fail, you can just smash it with sanctions and occupy its oil fields to impoverish it while overextending its military allies in proxy conflicts elsewhere and grab it later.

A good kickboxer throws many combinations with the understanding that most strikes will miss or be blocked or cause minimal damage, trusting that eventually the one knockout blow will get through.

No empire lasts forever, but there’s no evidence that this one is going away any time in the immediate future. This ugliness could conceivably drag itself out for generations.

Caitlin Johnstone is an Australian independent journalist and poet. Her articles include The UN Torture Report On Assange Is An Indictment Of Our Entire Society. She publishes a website and Caitlin’s Newsletter. This article is republished with permission.

PNG’s Parkop tells exiled Papuans ‘don’t lose hope – keep up the freedom struggle’

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West Papuans in Port Moresby proudly display their Morning Star flag of independence
West Papuans in Port Moresby proudly display their Morning Star flag of independence — banned by Indonesia. Image: Inside PNG

Asia Pacific Report

Governor Powes Parkop of Papua New Guinea’s capital Port Moresby has appealed to West Papuans living in his country to carry on the self-determination struggle for future generations and to not lose hope.

Parkop, a staunch supporter of the West Papua cause, reminded Papuans at their Independence Day last Sunday of the struggles of their ancestors, reports Inside PNG.

“PNG will celebrate 50 years of Independence next year but this is only so for half of the island — the other half is still missing, we are losing our land, we are losing our resources.

NCD Governor Powes Parkop
NCD Governor Powes Parkop . . . message of hope and cultural pride on West Papua’s Independence Day in Port Moresby. Image: Inside PNG

“If we are not careful, we are going to lose our future too.”

The National Capital District governor was guest speaker for the celebration among Port Moresby residents of West Papuan descent with the theme “Celebrating and preserving our culture through food and the arts”.

About 12,000 West Papuan refugees and exiles live in PNG and Parkop has West Papuan ancestry through his grandparents.

The Independence Day celebration began with everyone participating in the national anthem — “Hai Tanaku Papua” (“My Land, Papua”).

Song and dance
Other activities included song and dance, and a dialogue with the young and older generations to share ideas on a way forward.

Some stalls were also set up selling West Papuan cuisine, arts and crafts.

West Papuan children dancers.
West Papuan children ready to dance with the Morning Star flag of West Papuan independence – banned in Indonesia. Image: Inside PNG

Governor Parkop said: “We must be proud of our identity, our culture, our land, our heritage and most importantly we have to challenge ourselves, redefine our journey and our future.

“That’s the most important responsibility we have.”’

West Papua was a Dutch colony in the 9th century and by the 1950s the Netherlands began to prepare for withdrawal.

On 1 December 1961, West Papuans held a congress to discuss independence.

The national flag, the Morning Star, was raised for the first time on that day.

Encouraged to keep culture
Governor Parkop described the West Papua cause as “a tragedy”.

This is due to the fact that following the declaration of Independence in 1961, Indonesia laid claim over the island a year later in 1962.

This led to the United Nations-sponsored treaty known as the New York Agreement.

Indonesia was appointed temporary administrator without consultation or the consent of West Papuans.

In 1969 the so-called Act of Free Choice enabled West Papuans to decide their destiny but again only 1026 West Papuans had to make that choice under the barrel of the gun.

To this day, Melanesian West Papua remains under Indonesian rule.

Governor Parkop encouraged the West Papuan people to preserve their culture and heritage and to breakaway from the colonial mindset, colonial laws and ideas that hindered progress to freedom for West Papua.

Republished with permission from Inside PNG.

West Papuans in Port Moresby proudly display their Morning Star flag of independence — banned by Indonesia. Image: Inside PNG

Amnesty International doubles down on Israeli Gaza ‘genocide, atrocities’ report at NZ rally

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David Robie
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By David Robie

Amnesty International officials at a rally in Auckland today doubled down on their global report this week accusing Israel of genocide and called on Aotearoa New Zealand to take more action over the atrocities in the besieged enclave of Gaza.

The global human rights movement’s 296-page fully documented report says Israel has “unleashed hell and destruction on Palestinians in Gaza brazenly, continuously and with total impunity”.

The allegations have enraged the Tel Aviv government and stirred the unaffiliated Israeli chapter of Amnesty International to distance itself from the “genocide” allegation while admitting “serious crimes are being committed in Gaza, that must be investigated”.

Speaking at the weekly rally in Te Komititanga Square in the heart of Auckland today, Amnesty International Aotearoa’s people power manager Margaret Taylor said the report was “irrefutable”.

“Israel has committed and is — this very minute — committing genocide against Palestinians in the occupied Gaza Strip,” she said and was supported with loud shouts of “shame, shame!”

Al Jazeera reports that 50 people were killed in the latest Israeli attacks on central Gaza’s Nuseirat refugee camp — in which the death toll included six children and five women — and the Indonesian Hospital in northern Gaza’s Beit Lahiya district.

The report examines in detail Israel’s violations in Gaza over nine months between 7 October 2023 and early July 2024.


Israel’s genocide against Palestinians.    Video: Amnesty International

‘Firsthand accounts, satellite photography’
“Amnesty International interviewed hundreds of people with firsthand accounts. We analysed photos and video footage of the devastation, the remains of weaponry, corroborated with satellite photography, and we reviewed a huge range of data sets, repirts and statements by UN agencies, humanitarian organisations, human rights groups, and senior Israeli government officials and military leaders,” said Taylor.

“As I said before, this is irrefutable.

“This is genocide. And it must stop now,” she said.

The Amnesty International delegation at today's justice and ceasefire rally for Palestine
The Amnesty International delegation at today’s justice and ceasefire rally for Palestine in downtown Auckland. Image: David Robie/Asia Pacific Report

“With this evidence we are demanding that all those accused of genocide be brought to justice. Decades of impunity must stop.

“We have to use all the tools at our disposal – the International Criminal Court, the International Court of Justice, extraterritorial jurisdiction – to ensure that those accused of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes are brought to justice.

“We must ensure that perpetrators have nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.”

The Amnesty International report said that the “atrocity crimes” against Israelis by Hamas on 7 October 2023, which triggered the current war — although brutal repression against the Palestinians has been extensively reported since the Nakba in 1948 — “do not justify genocide”.

The publication of the report has been welcomed around the world by many humanitarian and human rights groups but condemned by Israel and criticised by its main backer, the United States.

In a statement, the Israeli Foreign Minister claimed: “The deplorable and fanatical organisation Amnesty International has produced a fabricated report that is entirely false and based on lies.”

A "thousands of children are dying" placard
A “thousands of children are dying” placard at today’s Palestine rally in Auckland. Image: David Robie/Asia Pacific Report

Last month, the international Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Foreign Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Margaret Taylor said: “The wheels of international justice have finally caught up with those who are alleged to be responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity. This is an historic breakthrough for justice . . .

“That’s a start. Prime Minister Netanyahu is now officially a wanted man.”

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) is also investigating Israel over “plausible genocide” in a case brought by South Africa and supported by at least 18 other countries.


Israel’s actions had brought Gaza’s population to the “brink of collapse”, said the Amnesty International report.

“Its brutal military offensive had killed more than 42,000 Palestinians [now more than 44,000], including over 13,300 children, and injured over 97,000 more, by 7 October 2024, many of them in direct or deliberately indiscriminate attacks, often wiping out entire multigenerational families.

“It has caused unprecedented destruction, which experts say occurred at a level and speed not seen in any other conflict in the 21st century, levelling entire cities and destroying critical infrastructure, agricultural land and cultural and religious sites.

“It thereby rendered large swathes of Gaza uninhabitable.”

A "flag-masked" child at today's Palestine rally in Auckland
A “flag-masked” child at today’s Palestine rally in Auckland. Image: David Robie/Asia Pacific Report

NZ needs to take action
Taylor told the rally that New Zealand needed to take more action over the genocide, such as:

  • Publicly recognise that Israeli authorities are committing the crime of genocide and commit to strong and sustained international action;
  • Ban imports from illegal settlements as well as investment in companies connected to maintaining the occupation; and
  • Do everything possible to facilitate Palestinian people seeking refuge to come to Aotearoa New Zealand and receive support.

In RNZ’s Checkpoint programme on Thursday, Amnesty International Aotearoa’s advocacy and movement building director Lisa Woods said the organisation had worked to establish the intent behind Israel’s acts in Gaza, adding that they meet the definition of genocide.

The series of air strikes analysed in the report had hit civilian homes in densely populated urban areas.

“No evidence was found that any of these strikes were directed at a military objective,” she said.

“The report found that the way these attacks were conducted is that they were conducted in ways that were designed to cause a very high number of fatalities and injuries among the civilian population.”

Today’s Palestine rally also devoted part of its activities to preparing a series of on-the-spot submissions to the Treaty Principles Bill amid many “Kill the bill” tee-shirts, banners and placards.

Dr David Robie is editor of Asia Pacific Report and Café Pacific. This report was first published at Asia Pacific Report.

A "Kill the Bill" tee-shirt
A “Kill the Bill” tee-shirt referring to the controversial Treaty Principles Bill widely regarded as a fundamental attack on Aotearoa New Zealand’s foundational 1840 Treaty of Waitangi at today’s Palestine rally in Auckland. Image: David Robie/Asia Pacific Report

Eugene Doyle: The demon in the mirror. Trump exposes who we are

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"They died in line waiting for food . . . Three women were stampeded and suffocated in a giant desperate crowd that was begging for bread in Deir Al Balah. No more words." . . . The caption on this photograph by Palestinian journalist Nahed Hajjaj in response to the Isareli genocide in Gaza. Image: X/nahed_hajjaj99

COMMENTARY: By Eugene Doyle

They “will be hit harder than anybody has been hit in the long and storied History of the United States of America”.

— Donald J Trump about the people of Gaza and their defenders.

“Western justifications for their barbarism is well-established — after all, genocide is a Western liberal value.”

— Professor Joseph Massad

New Zealand, Australia and the rest “are aiding a regime that is starving people, they are aiding a regime that is preventing children from having anaesthetics in an operating theatre.”

— Professor Mohammad Marandi

What is the response from our leaders to this genocidal menace to Palestine by Trump? What does it mean for us as people of the West?

What would it say about us if he made good on the threat and we did nothing? Below are some harsh assessments from the frontlines about us that we should pay careful attention to.

First, weigh Trump’s words in your mind. Israeli leaders were thrilled when Trump pledged that there would be “hell to pay” unless the 100 hostages held in the Gaza Strip were released ahead of his January 20 inauguration. There was no mention of the thousands of Palestinian political prisoners and hostages, including children, held in captivity by Israel.

Writing on Truth Social, Trump said the Israeli hostages had to be freed by the time he was sworn in or “Those responsible will be hit harder than anybody has been hit in the long and storied History of the United States of America.”

Harder than the US genocide of native Americans? Harder than the unspeakable horrors of American slavery? Hit harder than the victims of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima? Harder than the three million civilians killed by the US terror bombing of North Korea?

Harder than the years of napalm, B52 bombers, mass rapes and other large-scale US war crimes that stole millions of lives in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos? Harder than the US death squads in Central America, Afghanistan and Iraq? Yes, it is a long and storied history.

When governments fail to clear the lowest bars of moral conduct
When governments fail to clear the lowest bars of moral conduct, history demands that populations take action – that citizens don’t look away but step up and do everything it takes to force fundamental change, respect for human rights and international law. Image: X/@WearThePeaceCo

Something worse than genocide?
And now Republican Trump threatens something worse than the genocide that Democrat America and Israel are already inflicting on the Palestinian people. Who else will be targeted is unclear.

When Trump tweeted those threats, not a single political leader in a Western country uttered a syllable of censure.

Ali Abunimah of electronic intifada asked a very pertinent question when interviewing Columbia University professor Joseph Massad this week, “Were you surprised by the scale of the atrocities Israel was willing to commit or by the seemingly limitless Western support?”

“I was surprised by the scale of the genocide but not by the Western support it has received,” Massad replied.

Then Ali Abunimah said something really interesting: “If I think about my own reaction, I was not surprised by what Israel was capable of but I must have naively thought there was a limit to what the West would tolerate. It turns out there is no limit to what they will tolerate.”

The words should strike our eardrums like thunder claps. They are, I believe,
both shocking and undeniable. Trump will simply force us to face the demon in the mirror.

Professor Massad: “Western justifications for their barbarism is well-established — after all, genocide is a Western liberal value. I believe Israel is sincere when it says it abides by Western liberal values: one of which is genocide, one of which is settler colonialism, one of which is racism and contempt for its racial inferiors.”

Arrest warrants ‘a huge moment’
Another voice of judgment on the conduct of our Western governments, our Western culture, is professor Mohammad Seyed Marandi of Tehran University: Marandi says the issuing of arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant was a huge moment, especially
for anyone who took the time to read them.

According to the International Criminal Court they bear criminal responsibility for “the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare; and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts”.

“This is the sort of barbarism that Canada and New Zealand are supporting,” Marandi says. “They are aiding a regime that is starving people, they are aiding a regime that is preventing children from having anaesthetics in an operating theatre. That is the reality of New Zealand. That is the reality of Australia. That is the reality of Canada, Norway and Sweden.

“It’s why ‘Western values’, ‘Western civilisation’ all become meaningless in the eyes of the international community.”

Many Western governments supply weapons and bombs to support the genocide.

Others like New Zealand and Australia send troops to attack Yemen to relieve the Houthi blockade of Israel, share intelligence, including targeting data, welcome Israeli diplomats but refuse to recognize Palestine, provide political cover at the UN and elsewhere,
refuse to boycott, divest or inflict sanctions on Israel, train with their army and deny the truth of what is happening.

On November 22, New Zealand designated Hezbollah as a “terrorist entity”; this after the terror bombing of Lebanon by Israel that has killed over 3000 civilians, maimed tens of thousands and destroyed the homes of hundreds of thousands. Prime Minister Christopher Luxon is confused as to who should be labelled terrorists.

The repudiation of the ICC warrants for Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant by Germany, France, the US and other Western governments was really just putting yet another bullet into the rotten carcass of Western credibility; the rest of the world knows international law was designed to go after Muslims, Africans and Slavs, not the white rulers of the West.

Immoral and disproportionate
The Pope said last month’s Israeli attacks on Gaza and Lebanon have been immoral
and disproportionate and that its military has gone beyond the rules of war.

Amnesty International has just released a 300-page report stating that its research has found sufficient basis to conclude that Israel has committed and is continuing to commit genocide against Palestinians in the occupied Gaza Strip.

The UN’s report “Genocide as colonial erasure” documents the vastness of the inhumanity being meted out to the Palestinian people by our friends and allies.

When governments fail to clear the lowest bars of moral conduct, history demands that populations take action – that citizens don’t look away but step up and do everything it takes to force fundamental change, respect for human rights and international law. This is a time for activism not indifference or “tuning out”.

Professor Marandi lays down the gauntlet to citizens of the West, saying what in our hearts we know about our own governments:

“They will allow the extermination of the people of Gaza. And then if the Israelis go after the West Bank, they will allow for that to happen as well. Under no circumstances do I see the West blocking extermination,” Marandi says.

How will you personally respond?

I will give the last word to Aaron Bushnell, the young US serviceman who
self-immolated in front of the Israeli Embassy in Washington in February to protest at the US and Israel’s genocidal actions in Gaza. His last words on this Earth, as the fire consumed him, were: “Free Palestine!”

Earlier that day, Aaron posted this on X as he set up the livestream:

“Many of us like to ask ourselves, ‘What would I do if I was alive during slavery? Or the Jim Crow South? Or Apartheid? What would I do if my country was committing genocide?’ The answer is, you’re doing it. Right now.”

Eugene Doyle is a writer based in Wellington. He has written extensively on the Middle East, as well as peace and security issues in the Asia Pacific region. He hosts the public policy platform solidarity.co.nz

How Jeton Anjain planned the Rongelap evacuation – new Rainbow Warrior podcast series

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The ABC/RNZ podcast takes the listener into a room in Seattle, Washington, in 1984, where Greenpeace International leader Steve Sawyer (right) met Jeton Anjain
The ABC/RNZ podcast takes the listener into a room in Seattle, Washington, in 1984, where Greenpeace International leader Steve Sawyer (right) met for the first time with Jeton Anjain and heard his plea for help to relocate Rongelap people using the Rainbow Warrior. Image: © 1985 David Robie/Eyes Of Fire

REVIEW: By Giff Johnson in Majuro

As a prelude to the 40th anniversary of the evacuation of Rongelap Islanders to Mejatto Island in Kwajalein in 1985, Radio New Zealand and ABC Radio Australia have produced a six-part podcast series that details the Rongelap story — in the context of The Last Voyage of the Rainbow Warrior, the name of the series.

It is narrated by journalist James Nokise, and includes story telling from Rongelap Islanders as well as those who know about what became the last voyage of Greenpeace’s flagship.

It features a good deal of narrative around the late Rongelap Nitijela Member Jeton Anjain, the architect of the evacuation in 1985. For those who know the story of the 1954 Bravo hydrogen bomb test at Bikini, some of the narrative will be repetitive.

The Last Voyage of the Rainbow Warrior podcast series logo
The Last Voyage of the Rainbow Warrior podcast series logo. Image: ABC/RNZ

But the podcast offers some insight that may well be unknown to many. For example, the podcast lays to rest the unfounded US government criticism at the time that Greenpeace engineered the evacuation, manipulating unsuspecting islanders to leave Rongelap.

Through commentary of those in the room when the idea was hatched, this was Jeton’s vision and plan — the Rainbow Warrior was a vehicle that could assist in making it happen.

The narrator describes Jeton’s ongoing disbelief over repeated US government assurances of Rongelap’s safety. Indeed, though not a focus of the RNZ/ABC podcast, it was Rongelap’s self-evacuation that forced the US Congress to fund independent radiological studies of Rongelap Atoll that showed — surprise, surprise — that living on the atoll posed health risks and led to the US Congress establishing a $45 million Rongelap Resettlement Trust Fund.

Questions about the safety of the entirety of Rongelap Atoll linger today, bolstered by non-US government studies that have, over the past several years, pointed out a range of ongoing radiation contamination concerns.

The RNZ/ABC podcast dives into the 1954 Bravo hydrogen bomb test fallout exposure on Rongelap, their subsequent evacuation to Kwajalein, and later to Ejit Island for three years. It details their US-sponsored return in 1957 to Rongelap, one of the most radioactive locations in the world — by US government scientists’ own admission.

The narrative, that includes multiple interviews with people in the Marshall Islands, takes the listener through the experience Rongelap people have had since Bravo, including health problems and life in exile. It narrates possibly the first detailed piece of history about Jeton Anjain, the Rongelap leader who died of cancer in 1993, eight years after Rongelap people left their home atoll.

The podcast takes the listener into a room in Seattle, Washington, in 1984, where Greenpeace International leader Steve Sawyer met for the first time with Jeton and heard his plea for help to relocate Rongelap people using the Rainbow Warrior. The actual move from Rongelap to Mejatto in May 1985 — described in David Robie’s 1986 book Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage of the Rainbow Warrior — is narrated through interviews and historical research.

Rongelap Islanders on board the Rainbow Warrior bound for Mejatto in May 1985. Image: © 1985 David Robie/Eyes Of Fire

The final episode of the podcast is heavily focused on the final leg of the Rainbow Warrior’s Pacific tour — a voyage cut short by French secret agents who bombed the Warrior while it was tied to the wharf in Auckland harbor, killing one crew member, Fernando Pereira.

It was Fernando’s photographs of the Rongelap evacuation that brought that chapter in the history of the Marshall Islands to life.

The Warrior was stopping to refuel and re-provision in Auckland prior to heading to the French nuclear testing zone in Moruroa Atoll. But that plan was quite literally bombed by the French government in one of the darkest moments of Pacific colonial history.

The six-part series is on YouTube and can be found by searching The Last Voyage of the Rainbow Warrior.

Scientists conduct radiological surveys of nuclear test fallout
A related story in this week’s edition of the Marshall Islands Journal.

Columbia University scientists have conducted a series of radiological surveys of nuclear test fallout in the northern Marshall Islands over the past nearly 10 years.

“Considerable contamination remains,” wrote scientists Hart Rapaport and Ivana Nikolić Hughes in the Scientific American in 2022. “On islands such as Bikini, the average background gamma radiation is double the maximum value stipulated by an agreement between the governments of the Marshall Islands and the US, even without taking into account other exposure pathways.

“Our findings, based on gathered data, run contrary to the Department of Energy’s. One conclusion is clear: absent a renewed effort to clean radiation from Bikini, families forced from their homes may not be able to safely return until the radiation naturally diminishes over decades and centuries.”

They also raised concern about the level of strontium-90 present in various islands from which they have taken soil and other samples. They point out that US government studies do not address strontium-90.

This radionuclide “can cause leukemia and bone and bone marrow cancer and has long been a source of health concerns at nuclear disasters such as Chernobyl and Fukushima,” Rapaport and Hughes said.

“Despite this, the US government’s published data don’t speak to the presence of this dangerous nuclear isotope.”

Their studies have found “consistently high values” of strontium-90 in northern atolls.

“Although detecting this radioisotope in sediment does not neatly translate into contamination in soil or food, the finding suggests the possibility of danger to ecosystems and people,” they state. “More than that, cleaning up strontium 90 and other contaminants in the Marshall Islands is possible.”

The Columbia scientists’ recommendations for action are straightforward: “Congress should appropriate funds, and a research agency, such as the National Science Foundation, should initiate a call for proposals to fund independent research with three aims.

“We must first further understand the current radiological conditions across the Marshall Islands; second, explore new technologies and methods already in use for future cleanup activity; and, third, train Marshallese scientists, such as those working with the nation’s National Nuclear Commission, to rebuild trust on this issue.”

Giff Johnson is editor of the Marshall Islands Journal. His review of the Rainbow Warrior podcast series was first published by the Journal and is republished here with permission.

Israel has ‘unleashed hell and destruction’ in Gaza genocide, says Amnesty investigation

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This screenshot from a video broadcast on Israeli channel Now 14 shows an officer and four soldiers of Israel’s Givati Brigade standing next to Palestinian detainees
This screenshot from a video broadcast on Israeli channel Now 14 shows an officer and four soldiers of Israel’s Givati Brigade standing next to Palestinian detainees, who are blindfolded, forced to kneel and bow down, with their hands tied behind their backs. In another part of the video, the officer said there were no “innocent” civilians in Gaza, seemingly to justify ill-treatment of the detainees. Image: Amnesty International screenshot APR

Asia Pacific Report

Amnesty International’s research has found sufficient basis to conclude that Israel has committed and is continuing to commit genocide against Palestinians in the occupied Gaza Strip, the organisation has revealed in a landmark new investigative report.

The 294-page report documents how, during its military offensive launched in the wake of the deadly Hamas-led attacks in southern Israel on 7 October 2023, Israel has “unleashed hell and destruction on Palestinians in Gaza brazenly, continuously and with total impunity”.

This 14-month military offensive was launched in the wake of the deadly Hamas-led attacks in southern Israel on 7 October 2023.

An Amnesty International statement made along with releasing the investigation says that the Aotearoa New Zealand government “can and should take action”, for example:

  • Publicly recognise that Israeli authorities are committing the crime of genocide and commit to strong and sustained international action;
  • Ban imports from illegal settlements as well as investment in companies connected to maintaining the occupation; and
  • Do everything possible to facilitate Palestinian people seeking refuge to come to Aotearoa New Zealand and receive support.

Lisa Woods, advocacy and movement building director at Amnesty International Aotearoa New Zealand, said: “This research and report demonstrate that Israel has carried out acts prohibited under the Genocide Convention, with the specific intent to destroy Palestinians in Gaza.

“It’s not enough to say ‘never again’. The New Zealand government has to publicly call this what it is — genocide.

“We’re asking the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister to show leadership. New Zealand has a responsibility to act.”

Ban illegal settlement products
Woods said that in addition to acknowledging that this was genocide, the New Zealand government must ban products from the illegal Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory — “and open the doors to Palestinians who are desperately seeking refuge.”

Agnès Callamard, secretary-general of Amnesty International, said about the new report:

"You feel like you are subhuman" - the Amnesty International genocide report
“You feel like you are subhuman” – the Amnesty International genocide report. Image: AI screenshot APR

“These acts include killings, causing serious bodily or mental harm and deliberately inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza conditions of life calculated to bring about their physical destruction.

“Month after month, Israel has treated Palestinians in Gaza as a subhuman group unworthy of human rights and dignity, demonstrating its intent to physically destroy them.

“Our damning findings must serve as a wake-up call to the international community: this is genocide. It must stop now.”

Callamard said that states that continued to transfer arms to Israel at this time must know they are “violating their obligation to prevent genocide and are at risk of becoming complicit in genocide”.

She said that all states with influence over Israel, particularly key arms suppliers like the US and Germany — but also other EU member states, the UK and others — must act now to bring Israel’s atrocities against Palestinians in Gaza to an immediate end.

Population facing starvation
Over the past two months the crisis has grown particularly acute in the North Gaza governorate, where a besieged population is facing starvation, displacement and annihilation amid relentless bombardment and suffocating restrictions on life-saving humanitarian aid, Callamard said.

“Our research reveals that, for months, Israel has persisted in committing genocidal acts, fully aware of the irreparable harm it was inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza,” she said.

“It continued to do so in defiance of countless warnings about the catastrophic humanitarian situation and of legally binding decisions from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ordering Israel to take immediate measures to enable the provision of humanitarian assistance to civilians in Gaza.

“Israel has repeatedly argued that its actions in Gaza are lawful and can be justified by its military goal to eradicate Hamas. But genocidal intent can co-exist alongside military goals and does not need to be Israel’s sole intent.”

Amnesty International said in its statement that it had examined Israel’s acts in Gaza closely and in their totality, taking into account their recurrence and simultaneous occurrence, and both their immediate impact and their cumulative and mutually reinforcing consequences.

The organisation considered the scale and severity of the casualties and destruction over time. It also analysed public statements by officials, finding that prohibited acts were often announced or called for in the first place by high-level officials in charge of the war efforts.

“Taking into account  the pre-existing context of dispossession, apartheid and unlawful military occupation in which these acts have been committed, we could find only one reasonable conclusion: Israel’s intent is the physical destruction of Palestinians in Gaza, whether in parallel with, or as a means to achieve, its military goal of destroying Hamas,” Callamard said.

Atrocities ‘can never justify Israel’s genocide’
“The atrocity crimes committed on 7 October 2023 by Hamas and other armed groups against Israelis and victims of other nationalities, including deliberate mass killings and hostage-taking, can never justify Israel’s genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.”

According to the statement, international jurisprudence recognises that the perpetrator does not need to succeed in their attempts to destroy the protected group, either in whole or in part, for genocide to have been committed.

The commission of prohibited acts with the intent to destroy the group, as such, was sufficient.

The report examines in detail Israel’s violations in Gaza over nine months between 7 October 2023 and early July 2024.

Amnesty International interviewed 212 people, including Palestinian victims and witnesses, local authorities in Gaza, healthcare workers, conducted fieldwork and analysed an extensive range of visual and digital evidence, including satellite imagery.

It also analysed statements by senior Israeli government and military officials, and official Israeli bodies.

On multiple occasions, the organisation shared its findings with the Israeli authorities but had received no substantive response at the time of publication.

Unprecedented scale and magnitude
The organisation said Israel’s actions following Hamas’s deadly attacks on 7 October 2023 had brought Gaza’s population to the brink of collapse.

Its brutal military offensive had killed more than [44,000] Palestinians, including more than 13,300 children, and wounded or injured more than 97,000 others by 7 October 2024, many of them in direct or deliberately indiscriminate attacks, often wiping out entire multigenerational families.

Israel had caused unprecedented destruction, which experts say occurred at a level and speed not seen in any other conflict in the 21st century, levelling entire cities and destroying critical infrastructure, agricultural land and cultural and religious sites, Amnesty International said.

It thereby rendered large swathes of Gaza uninhabitable.

Tjibaou’s party unveils plan for New Caledonia’s future ‘independence’

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Union Calédonienne’s new president Emmanuel Tjibaou (centre) and executive bureau hold a press conference last Thursday 30 Nov 2024
Union Calédonienne’s new president Emmanuel Tjibaou (centre) and executive bureau hold a press conference last Thursday . . . "now is the time to build the road to full sovereignty." Image: RRB/RNZ

By Patrick Decloitre

New Caledonia’s largest pro-independence party, the Union Calédonienne (UC), has unveiled the main outcome of its congress last month, including its plans for the French Pacific territory’s political future.

Speaking at a news conference last Thursday in Nouméa, the party’s newly-elected executive bureau, now headed by Emmanuel Tjibaou, debriefed the media about the main resolutions made during its congress.

One of the motions was specifically concerning a timetable for New Caledonia’s road to independence.

Tjibaou said UC now envisaged that one of the milestones on this road to sovereignty would be the signing of a “Kanaky Agreement”, at the latest on 24 September 2025 — a highly symbolic date as this was the day of France’s annexation of New Caledonia in 1853.

‘Kanaky Agreement’ by 24 September 2025?
This, he said, would mark the beginning of a five-year “transition period” from “2025 to 2030” that would be concluded by New Caledonia becoming fully sovereign under a status yet to be defined.

Several wordings have recently been advanced by stakeholders from around the political spectrum.

Depending on the pro-independence and pro-France sympathies, these have varied from “shared sovereignty”, “independence in partnership”, “independence-association” and, more recently, from the also divided pro-France loyalists camp, an “internal federalism” (Le Rassemblement-LR party) or a “territorial federation” (Les Loyalistes).

Charismatic pro-independence leader Jean-Marie Tjibaou, Emmanuel’s father who was assassinated in 1989, was known for being an advocate of a relativist approach to the term “independence”, to which he usually preferred to adjunct the pragmatic term “inter-dependence”.

Jean Marie Tjibaou
Founding FLNKS leader Jean Marie Tjibaou in Kanaky New Caledonia in 1985 . . . assassinated four years later. Image: David Robie/Café Pacific

Negotiations between all political parties and the French State are expected to begin in the next few weeks.

The talks (between pro-independence, anti-independence parties and the French State) are scheduled in such a way that all parties manage to reach a comprehensive and inclusive political agreement no later than March 2025.

The talks had completely stalled after the pro-indeoendence riots broke out on 13 May 2024.

Over the past three years, following three referendums (2018, 2020, 2021, the latter being strongly challenged by the pro-independence side) on the question of independence (all yielding a majority in favour of New Caledonia remaining part of France), there had been several attempts to hold inclusive talks in order to discuss New Caledonia’s political future.

But UC and other parties (including pro-France and pro-independence) did not manage to sit at the same table.

Speaking to journalists, Emmanuel Tjibaou confirmed that under its new leadership, UC was now willing to return to the negotiating table.

He said “May 13 has stopped our advances in those exchanges” but “now is the time to build the road to full sovereignty”.

Back to the negotiating table
In the footsteps of those expected negotiations, heavy campaigning will follow to prepare for crucial provincial elections to be held no later than November 2025.

The five years of “transition” (2025-2030), would be used to transfer the remaining “regal” powers from France as well as putting in place “a political, financial and international” framework, accompanied by the French State, Tjibaou elaborated.

And after the transitional period, UC’s president said a new phase of talks could start to put in place what he terms “interdependence conventions on some of the ‘regal’ — main — powers” (defence, law and order, foreign affairs, currency).

Tjibaou said this project could resemble a sort of independence in partnership, a “shared sovereignty”, a concept that was strongly suggested early November 2024 by visiting French Senate President Gérard Larcher.

But Tjibaou said there was a difference in the sense that those discussions on sharing would only take place once all the powers have been transferred from France.

“You can only share sovereignty if you have obtained it first”, he told local media.

One of the other resolutions from its congress held last weekend in the small village of Mia (Canala) was to reiterate its call to liberate Christian Téin, appointed president of the FLNKS (Kanak Socialist National Liberation Front) in absentia late August, even though he is currently imprisoned in Mulhouse (north-east of France) pending his trial.

Allegations over May riots
He is alleged to have been involved in the organisation of the demonstrations that degenerated into the May 13 riots, arson, looting and a deadly toll of 13 people, several hundred injured and material damage estimated at some 2.2 billion euros (NZ$3.9 billion).

Tjibaou also said that within a currently divided pro-independence movement, he hoped that a reunification process and “clarification” would be possible with other components of FLNKS, namely the Progressist Union in Melanesia (UPM) and the Kanak Liberation Party (PALIKA).

Since August 2024, both UPM and PALIKA have de facto withdrawn with FLNKS’s political bureau, saying they no longer recognised themselves in the way the movement had radicalised.

In 1988, after half a decade of a quasi civil war, Jean-Marie Tjibaou signed the Matignon-Oudinot agreements with New Caledonia’s pro-France and anti-independence leader Jacques Lafleur.

The third signatory was the French State.

One year later, in 1989, Tjibaou was shot dead by a hard-line pro-independence militant.

His son Emmanuel was aged 13 at the time.

‘Common destiny’
In 1998, a new agreement, the Nouméa Accord, was signed, with a focus on increased autonomy, the notions of “common destiny” and a local “citizenship” and a gradual transfer of powers from France.

After the three referendums held between 2018 and 2021, the Nouméa Accord prescribed that if there had been three referendums rejecting independence, then political stakeholders should “meet to examine the situation thus generated”.

On Thursday, Union Calédonienne also stressed that the Nouméa Accord remained the founding document of all future political discussions.

“We are sticking to the Nouméa Accord because it is this document that brings us to the elements of accession to sovereignty”.

Patrick Decloitre is RNZ Pacific correspondent French Pacific desk. This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Israel and the ICC: A legal scholar’s response to The Washington Post

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The Washington Post editorial about the International Criminal Court's arrest warrants for Israeli officials published on 24 November 2024
The Washington Post editorial about the International Criminal Court's arrest warrants for Israeli officials published on 24 November 2024 . . . "full of misinformation and misrepresentation of facts," says a legal scholar. Image: WP screenshot APR

ANALYSIS: By Abdelghany Sayed

On November 24, The Washington Post’s editorial board published an editorial in which it laid out its views on the arrest warrants for Israeli officials recently issued by the Pre-Trial Chamber of the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Reading it as a legal scholar, I found it full of misinformation and misrepresentation of facts. It is unclear whether the editorial was an attempt to mislead the readers or reflected the board’s significant lack of knowledge and research abilities on ICC-related matters — or both.

In any case, the article merits a response that lays out the facts and points out the misrepresentation.

Did the ICC ignore other grave situations?
At the outset, the article suggests that the ICC has failed to address international crimes in Syria, Myanmar and Sudan. This is manifestly nonfactual.

The default grounds for the ICC to exercise jurisdiction is the commission of international crimes on the territory or by the nationals of either a state party to the ICC or a non-state party that has accepted the jurisdiction of the court.

The three states referred to neither joined the ICC nor accepted its jurisdiction.

The court exercises jurisdiction in Sudan based on a United Nations Security Council resolution that referred the case to the court in 2005 — as is its right under the Rome Statute, the treaty that established the ICC. Since then, the ICC has actively engaged with the situation in Sudan, issuing seven arrest warrants and pursuing six cases.

The Post is concerned with the conduct of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces but mentions nowhere in its editorial that Ali Muhammed Ali Abd-Al-Rahman, one of the leaders of its constituent militia, the Janjaweed, is already in ICC custody and standing trial. It also omits ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan’s assertion that his office is still investigating ongoing crimes.

On Myanmar, the Office of the Prosecutor opened preliminary examinations in 2018. After only one year, the Pre-Trial Chamber authorised it to open an investigation. On November 27, the Office of the Prosecutor applied for an arrest warrant against the head of Myanmar’s military government, Min Aung Hlaing.

To do this, both Khan’s office and the Pre-Trial Chamber pushed the limits of the legal text to adopt unorthodox, precedent-setting interpretations of the law with a view to overcoming the jurisdictional challenge in the absence of a UN Security Council referral.

Both ICC organs concurred that although the crimes of “deportation” and “persecution” were perpetrated by nationals of a non-state party and on the territory of a non-state party (Myanmar), the “conduct” constituting the crimes forced the victims into the territory of a state party (Bangladesh); consequently, the ICC should have jurisdiction because the crimes have been committed “in part” on a territory of a state party.

Despite the lack of grounds to exercise jurisdiction in Syria, former Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda indeed strived to address these crimes. Her office came up with a creative approach to examine acts committed by nationals of states parties but ended up with a very narrow scope of perpetrators and crimes.

There is no ICC “failure” to address crimes committed in Syria; rather, there is a Security Council failure to refer the Syria case to the ICC, as it did with Libya and Sudan. It is appropriate then to criticise the Security Council system, including the decades-long US abuse of its veto powers, for instance, to shield Israel.

Should the Israeli system be entrusted with prosecution?
The Post uncritically reproduces a regular Israeli and US talking point: that Israel as “a democratic country that is committed to human rights” is capable of investigating its own security forces. The ICC should not put “elected leaders of a democratic country with its own independent judiciary in the same category as dictators and authoritarians who kill with impunity”, it argues.

This argument misrepresents the law of the ICC and conceals substantive facts.

Even if Israel and its institutions could be deemed “democratic” and “independent”, international law requires a lot more than that.

The principle of complementarity means that the ICC complements, rather than replaces, national jurisdictions. Thus, the ICC prosecutor may intervene only when the state that has jurisdiction is “inactive” in investigating the crimes.

Complementarity in no way means that the elected officials and independent judiciary of a democratic state shall enjoy immunity from ICC prosecution. Instead, it means that Israel needs to show it has active investigations.

The fact of Israel’s inactivity in relation to war crimes and crimes against humanity by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant in and of itself already means that the complementarity assessment has been exhausted and the court may proceed.

And even if it were active, Israel would need to demonstrate the willingness and ability to genuinely prosecute the perpetrator and conduct. The law of the ICC allows it to intervene if the “investigative activities undertaken by the domestic authorities are not tangible, concrete and progressive”, as laid out in a decision in the case of Ivory Coast first lady Simone Gbagbo, accused of crimes against humanity.

Proceedings designated to shield the perpetrators or crimes in question warrant an ICC intervention. This, for instance, requires Israel to investigate the same person for substantially the same conduct.

The Post conceals that for decades, Israel has failed to hold to account its officials and members of its armed forces for crimes. These failures have been repeatedly documented by the UN and human rights organisations.

The 2014 UN Commission of Inquiry, for example, addressed the “procedural, structural and substantive shortcomings, which continue to compromise Israel’s ability to adequately fulfil its duty to investigate”. Palestinian and Israeli NGOs have repeatedly scrutinised Israel’s tendency to whitewash its own crimes, and Amnesty International considered “an ICC investigation [to be] the only way” to uphold international law.

These reports are in no way unknown or recent. Human Rights Watch, for example, has documented Israel’s failure to prosecute war crimes as far back as the 2014 war on Gaza, the second Intifada, the first Intifada and even the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, after which the Israeli government created the Kahan Commission to cover up then-Defence Minister Ariel Sharon’s responsibility for the Sabra and Shatila massacre.

The Post’s omission of these facts does not seem to be mere negligence.

Do the arrest warrants give credence to accusations against the ICC?
The editorial also claims that the arrest warrants “undermine the ICC’s credibility and give credence to accusations of hypocrisy and selective prosecution”. This maliciously misrepresents the facts to intentionally deceive the readers.

There are indeed longstanding, well substantiated and almost undisputed accusations but not of a bias against countries like Israel. During the first 20 years of its operation, the court sought to prosecute people solely from the African continent. As a result, it was criticised for having an “Africa problem” and channelling the “assertion of neocolonial domination”.

The ICC’s negligence regarding Western armies’ atrocities was consistently brought up, especially in relation to Palestine, Iraq and Afghanistan. As Valentina Azarova and Triestino Mariniello and I have previously argued in two articles, the court’s action on crimes committed against Palestinians could help it redress its problems with effectiveness and legitimacy.

As a legal scholar, I have not come across any rigorously justified accusation against the court that it is biased against “elected leaders” of “democratic states”, as The Post suggests. US attacks on the ICC — starting with the 2002 Hague Invasion Act, which threatens US invasion of any state complying with an ICC arrest warrant for US citizens — have been crude expressions of US hegemony and unpolished thuggery.

Israel itself has engaged in similar activities, as an investigation by +972 Magazine, the Local Call and The Guardian revealed in May. According to these publications, Israel ran a nine-year, state-orchestrated espionage and intimidation campaign against the ICC to shield its nationals from prosecution.

In the end, even in its decision to proceed with prosecution in the Palestine file, the ICC is doing the bare minimum of what it should be. And it is not its “bias” — as The Washington Post argues – that compels it to act, but rather the Israeli conduct — its magnitude, degree of cruelty and unprecedented availability of conclusive evidence.

Abdelghany Sayed is a researcher in international law at Kent Law School. He previously worked as an assistant legal analyst at the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court. This article was first published by Al Jazeera.

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