John Taukave (left) from the Micronesian Center for Sustainable Transport and Miss Samoa Litara Ieremia-Allan (second from left) with Pacific youth delegates at COP29 this month. Image: John Taukave/MCST/BenarNews
By Sera Sefeti in Baku, Azerbaijan
As the curtain fell at the UN climate summit in Baku last Sunday, frustration and disappointment engulfed Pacific delegations after another meeting under-delivered.
Two weeks of intensive negotiations at COP29, hosted by Azerbaijan and attended by 55,000 delegates, resulted in a consensus decision among nearly 200 nations.
Climate finance was tripled to US $300 billion a year in grant and loan funding from developed nations, far short of the more than US $1 trillion sought by Least Developed Countries and Small Island Developing States.
“We travelled thousands of kilometres, it is a long way to travel back without good news,” Niue’s Minister of Natural Resources Mona Ainu’u told BenarNews.
Three-hundred Pacific delegates came to COP29 with the key demands to stay within the 1.5-degree C warming goal, make funds available and accessible for small island states, and cut ambiguous language from agreements.
Their aim was to make major emitters pay Pacific nations — who are facing the worst effects of climate change despite being the lowest contributors — to help with transition, adaptation and mitigation.
“If we lose out on the 1.5 degrees C, then it really means nothing for us being here, understanding the fact that we need money in order for us to respond to the climate crisis,” Tuvalu’s Minister for Climate Change Maina Talia told BenarNews at the start of talks.
PNG withdrew
Papua New Guinea withdrew from attending just days before COP29, with Prime Minister James Marape warning: “The pledges made by major polluters amount to nothing more than empty talk.”
Miss Kiribati 2024 Kimberly Tokanang Aromata gives the “1.5 to stay alive” gesture while attending COP29 as a youth delegate earlier this month. Image: SPC/BenarNews
Fiji’s lead negotiator Dr Sivendra Michael told BenarNews that climate finance cut across many of the committee negotiations running in parallel, with parties all trying to strategically position themselves.
“We had a really challenging time in the adaptation committee room, where groups of negotiators from the African region had done a complete block on any progress on (climate) tax,” said Dr Michael, adding the Fiji team was called to order on every intervention they made.
He said it’s the fourth consecutive year adaptation talks were left hanging, despite agreement among the majority of nations, because there was “no consensus among the like-minded developing countries, which includes China, as well as the African group.”
Pacific delegates told BenarNews at COP they battled misinformation, obstruction and subversion by developed and high-emitting nations, including again negotiating on commitments agreed at COP28 last year.
Pushback began early on with long sessions on the Global Stock Take, an assessment of what progress nations and stakeholders had made to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees C.
“If we cannot talk about 1.5, then we have a very weak language around mitigation,” Tuvalu’s Talia said. “Progress on finance was nothing more than ‘baby steps’.”
Pacific faced resistance
Pacific negotiators faced resistance to their call for U.S.$39 billion for Small Island Developing States and U.S.$220 billion for Least Developed Countries.
“We expected pushbacks, but the lack of ambition was deeply frustrating,” Talia said.
Fiji’s Assistant Minister of Foreign Affairs Lenora Qereqeretabua addresses the COP29 summit in Baku this month. Image: SPREP/BenarNews
Greenpeace Pacific lead Shiva Gounden accused developed countries of deliberately stalling talks — of which Australia co-chaired the finance discussions — including by padding texts with unnecessary wording.
“Hours passed without any substance out of it, and then when they got into the substance of the text, there simply was not enough time,” he told BenarNews.
In the final week of COP29, the intense days negotiating continued late into the nights, sometimes ending the next morning.
“Nothing is moving as it should, and climate finance is a black hole,” Pacific Climate Action Network senior adviser Sindra Sharma told BenarNews during talks.
“There are lots of rumours and misinformation floating around, people saying that SIDS are dropping things — this is a complete lie.”
Pacific delegates and negotiators meet in the final week of intensive talks at COP29 in Baku this month. Image: SPREP/BenarNews
COP29 presidency influence
Sharma said the significant influence of the COP presidency — held by Azerbaijan — came to bear as talks on the final outcome dragged past the Friday night deadline.
The Azeri presidency faced criticism for not pushing strongly enough for incorporation of the “transition away from fossil fuels” — agreed to at COP28 — in draft texts.
“What we got in the end on Saturday was a text that didn’t have the priorities that smaller island states and least developed countries had reflected,” Sharma said.
COP29’s outcome was finally announced on Sunday at 5.30am.
“For me it was heartbreaking, how developed countries just blocked their way to fulfilling their responsibilities, their historical responsibilities, and pretty much offloaded that to developing countries,” Gounden from Greenpeace Pacific said.
Some retained faith
Amid the Pacific delegates’ disappointment, some retained their faith in the summits and look forward to COP30 in Brazil next year.
“We are tired, but we are here to hold the line on hope; we have no choice but to,” 350.org Pacific managing director Joseph Zane Sikulu told BenarNews.
“We can very easily spend time talking about who is missing, who is not here, and the impact that it will have on negotiation, or we can focus on the ones who came, who won’t give up,” he said at the end of summit.
Fiji’s lead negotiator Dr Michael said the outcome was “very disappointing” but not a total loss.
“COP is a very diplomatic process, so when people come to me and say that COP has failed, I am in complete disagreement, because no COP is a failure,” he told BenarNews at the end of talks.
“If we don’t agree this year, then it goes to next year; the important thing is to ensure that Pacific voices are present,” he said.
Despite Australia’s draconian anti-protest laws, the world’s biggest coal port was closed for four hours at the weekend with 170 protesters being charged — but climate demonstrations will continue. Twenty further arrests were made at a protest at the Federal Parliament yesterday.
SPECIAL REPORT:By Wendy Bacon
Newcastle port, the world’s biggest coal port, was closed for four hours on Sunday when hundreds of Rising Tide protesters in kayaks refused to leave its shipping channel.
Over two days of protest at the Australian port, 170 protesters have been charged. Some others who entered the channel were arrested but released without charge. Hundreds more took to the water in support.
Thousands on the beach chanted, danced and created a huge human sign demanding “no new coal and gas” projects.
Rising Tide is campaigning for a 78 percent tax on fossil fuel profits to be used for a “just transition” for workers and communities, including in the Hunter Valley, where the Albanese government has approved three massive new coal mine extensions since 2022.
Protest size triples to 7000 The NSW Labor government made two court attempts to block the protest from going ahead. But the 10-day Rising Tide protest tripled in size from 2023 with 7000 people participating so far and more people arrested in civil disobedience actions than last year.
The “protestival” continued in Newcastle on Monday, and a new wave started in Canberra at the Australian Parliament yesterday with more than 20 arrests. Rising Tide staged an overnight occupation of the lawn outside Parliament House and a demonstration at which they demanded to meet with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.
News of the “protestival” has spread around the world, with campaigners in Rotterdam in The Netherlands blocking a coal train in solidarity with this year’s Rising Tide protest.
Of those arrested, 138 have been charged under S214A of the NSW Crimes Act for disrupting a major facility, which carries up to two years in prison and $22,000 maximum fines. This section is part of the NSW government regime of “anti-protest” laws designed to deter movements such as Rising Tide.
The rest of the protesters have been charged under the Marine Safety Act which police used against 109 protesters arrested last year.
Even if found guilty, these people are likely to only receive minor penalties.Those arrested in 2023 mostly received small fines, good behaviour bonds and had no conviction recorded.
On Sunday I was arrested for blockading the world’s largest coal port, and now I am here in Canberra, to voice the anger of my generation.
I wrote to @AlboMP weeks ago inviting him to stand here today, on these lawns, and explain himself to the young people of Australia. pic.twitter.com/QgxjTApS92
Executive gives the bird to judiciary The use of the Crimes Act will focus more attention on the anti-protest laws which the NSW government has been extending and strengthening in recent weeks. The NSW Supreme Court has already found the laws to be partly unconstitutional but despite huge opposition from civil society and human rights organisations, the NSW government has not reformed them.
Two protesters were targeted for special treatment: Naomi Hodgson, a key Rising Tide organiser, and Andrew George, who has previous protest convictions.
George was led into court in handcuffs on Monday morning but was released on bail on condition that he not return to the port area. Hodgson also has a record of peaceful protest. She is one of the Rising Tide leaders who have always stressed the importance of safe and peaceful action.
The police prosecutor argued that she should remain in custody. The magistrate released her with the extraordinary requirement that she report to police daily and not go nearer than 2 km from the port.
Planning for this year’s protest has been underway for 12 months, with groups forming in Brisbane, Adelaide, Melbourne, Canberra Sydney and the Northern Rivers, as well as Newcastle. There was an intensive programme of meetings and briefings of potential participants on the motivation for protesting, principles of civil disobedience and the experience of being arrested.
Those who attended last year recruited a whole new cohort of protesters.
Newcastle climate protest. Video: Al Jazeera
Last year, the NSW police authorised a protest involved a 48-hour blockade which protesters extended by two hours. Earlier this year, a similar application was made by Rising Tide.
The first indication that the police would refuse to authorise a protest came earlier this month when the NSW police successfully applied to the NSW Supreme Court for the protest to be declared “an unauthorised protest.”
But Justice Desmond Fagan also made it clear that Rising Tide had a “responsible approach to on-water safety” and that he was not giving a direction that the protest should be terminated. Newcastle Council agreed that Rising Tide could camp at Horseshoe Bay.
People got the power! ✊ Eye witnesses say 24 protestors were arrested for protesting at parliament today, demanding the Albanese Government stop new coal. pic.twitter.com/ueNjHogzWZ
Minns’ bid to crush protest The Minns government showed that its goal was to crush the protest altogether when the Minister for Transport Jo Haylen declared a blanket 97-hour exclusion zone making it unlawful to enter the Hunter River mouth and beaches under the Marine Safety Act last week.
On Friday, Rising Tide organiser and 2020 Newcastle Young Citizen of the year Alexa Stuart took successful action in the Supreme Court to have the exclusion zone declared an invalid use of power.
An hour before the exclusion zone was due to come into effect at 5 pm, the Rising Tide flotilla had been launched off Horseshoe Bay. At 4 pm, Supreme Court Justice Sarah McNaughton quashed the exclusion zone notice, declaring that it was an invalid use of power under the Marine Safety Act because the object of the Act is to facilitate events, not to stop them from happening altogether.
When news of the judge’s decision reached the beach, a big cheer erupted. The drama-packed weekend was off to a good start.
Friday morning began with a First Nations welcome and speeches and a SchoolStrike4Climate protest. Kayakers held their position on the harbour with an overnight vigil on Friday night.
On Saturday, Midnight Oil front singer Peter Garrett, who served as Environment Minister in a previous Labor government, performed in support of Rising Tide protest. He expressed his concern about government overreach in policing protests, especially in the light of all the evidence of the impacts of climate change.
Ships continued to go through the channel, protected by the NSW police. When kayakers entered the channel while it was empty, nine were arrested.
84-year-old great-gran arrested, not charged By late Saturday, three had been charged, and the other six were towed back to the beach. This included June Norman, an 84-year-old great-grandmother from Queensland, who entered the shipping channel at least six times over the weekend in peaceful acts of civil disobedience.
The 84-year-old protester Jane Norman . . . entered the shipping channel at least six times over the weekend in peaceful acts of civil disobedience. Image: Wendy Bacon/MWM
She told MWM that she felt a duty to act to protect her own grandchildren and all other children due to a failure by the Albanese and other governments to take action on climate change. The police repeatedly declined to charge her.
On Sunday morning a decision was made for kayakers “to take the channel”. At about 10.15, a coal boat, turned away before entering the port.
Port closed, job done Although the period of stoppage was shorter than last year, civil disobedience had now achieved what the authorised protest achieved last year. The port was officially closed and remained so for four hours.
By now, 60 people had been charged and far more police resources expended than in 2023, including hours of police helicopters and drones.
On Sunday afternoon, hundreds of kayakers again occupied the channel. A ship was due. Now in a massive display of force involving scores of police in black rubber zodiacs, police on jet skis, and a huge police launch, kayakers were either arrested or herded back from the channel.
When the channel was clear, a huge ship then came through the channel, signalling the reopening of the port.
On Monday night, ABC National News reported that protesters were within metres of the ship. MWM closely observed the events. When the ship began to move towards the harbour, all kayaks were inside the buoys marking the channel. Police occupied the area between the protesters and the ship. No kayaker moved forward.
A powerful visual message had been sent that the forces of the NSW state would be used to defend the interests of the big coal companies such as Whitehaven and Glencore rather than the NSW public.
By now police on horses were on the beach and watched as small squads of police marched through the crowd grabbing paddles. A little later this reporter was carrying a paddle through a car park well off the beach when a constable roughly seized it without warning from my hand.
When asked, Constable Pacey explained that I had breached the peace by being on water. I had not entered the water over the weekend.
Kids arrested too, in mass civil disobedience Those charged included 14 people under 18. After being released, they marched chanting back into the camp. A 16-year-old Newcastle student, Niamh Cush, told a crowd of fellow protesters before her arrest that as a young person, she would rather not be arrested but that the betrayal of the Albanese government left her with no choice.
“I’m here to voice the anger of my generation. The Albanese government claims they’re taking climate change seriously but they are completely and utterly failing us by approving polluting new coal and gas mines. See you out on the water today to block the coal ships!”
Each of those who chose to get arrested has their own story. They include environmental scientists, engineers, TAFE teachers, students, nurses and doctors, hospitality and retail workers, designers and media workers, activists who have retired, unionists, a mediator and a coal miner.
They came from across Australia — more than 200 came from Adelaide alone — and from many different backgrounds.
Behind those arrested stand volunteer groups of legal observers, arrestee support, lawyers, community care workers and a media team. Beside them stand hundreds of other volunteers who have cleaned portaloos, prepared three meals a day, washed dishes, welcomed and registered participants, organised camping spots and acted as marshals at pedestrian crossings.
Each and every one of them is playing an essential role in this campaign of mass civil disobedience.
Many participants said this huge collaborative effort is what inspired them and gave them hope, as much as did the protest itself.
Threat to democracy Today, the president of NSW Civil Liberties, Tim Roberts, said, “Paddling a kayak in the Port of Newcastle is not an offence, people do it every day safely without hundreds of police officers.
“A decision was made to protect the safe passage of the vessels over the protection of people exercising their democratic rights to protest.
“We are living in extraordinary times. Our democracy will not irrevocably be damaged in one fell swoop — it will be a slow bleed, a death by a thousand tranches of repressive legislation, and by thousands of arrests of people standing up in defence of their civil liberties.”
Australian Institute research shows that most Australians agree with the Council for Civil Liberties — with 71 percent polled, including a majority of all parties, believing that the right to protest should be enshrined in Federal legislation. It also included a majority across all ages and political parties.
It is hard to avoid the conclusion that it is a fear of accelerating mass civil disobedience in the face of a climate crisis that frightens both the Federal and State governments and the police.
As temperatures rise Many of those protesting have already been directly affected by climbing temperatures in sweltering suburbs, raging bushfires and intense smoke, roaring floods and a loss of housing that has not been replaced, devastated forests, polluting coal mines and gas fields or rising seas in the Torres Strait in Northern Australia and Pacific Island countries.
Others have become profoundly concerned as they come to grips with climate science predictions and public health warnings.
In these circumstances, and as long as governments continue to enable the fossil fuel industry by approving more coal and gas projects that will add to the climate crisis, the number of people who decide they are morally obliged to take civil disobedience action will grow.
Rather than being impressed by politicians who cast them as disrupters, they will heed the call of Pacific leaders who this week declared the COP29 talks to be a “catastrophic failure” exposing their people to “escalating risks”.
Wendy Bacon is an investigative journalist who was the professor of journalism at University of Technology Sydney (UTS). She worked for Fairfax, Channel Nine and SBS and has published in The Guardian, New Matilda, City Hub and Overland. She has a long history in promoting independent and alternative journalism. She is a Rising Tide supporter, and is a long-term supporter of a peaceful BDS and the Greens.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu holds a map of "The New Middle East" -- without Palestine -- during his September 22, 2023 address to the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
Image: Common Dreams
ANALYSIS: By Jeffrey D. Sachs
It’s official now. America’s closest ally, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the one accorded more than 50 standing ovations in Congress just months ago, is under indictment by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for crimes against humanity and war crimes.
America must take note: the US government is complicit in Netanyahu’s war crimes and has fully partnered in Netanyahu’s violent rampage across the Middle East.
For 30 years the Israel Lobby has induced the US to fight wars on Israel’s behalf designed to prevent the emergence of a Palestinian State.
Netanyahu, who first came to power in 1996, and has been prime minister for 17 years since then, has been the main cheerleader for US-backed wars in the Middle East. The result has been a disaster for the US and a bloody catastrophe not only for the Palestinian people but for the entire Middle East.
Israel’s intransigence, and its brutal suppression of the Palestinian people, has given rise to several militant resistance movements since the beginning of the occupation. These movements are backed by several countries in the region.
The obvious solution to the Israel-Palestine crisis is to implement the two-state solution and to demilitarise the militant groups as part of the implementation process.
Overthrow foreign governments
Israel’s approach, especially under Netanyahu, is to overthrow foreign governments that oppose Israel’s domination, and recreate the map of a “New Middle East” without a Palestinian State. Rather than making peace, Netanyahu makes endless war.
What is shocking is that Washington has turned the US military and federal budget over to Netanyahu for his disastrous wars. The history of the Israel lobby’s complete takeover of Washington can be found in the remarkable new book by Ilan Pappé, Lobbying for Zionism on Both Sides of the Atlantic (2024).
“Rather than making peace, Netanyahu makes endless war.”
Netanyahu repeatedly told the American people that they would be the beneficiaries of his policies. In fact, Netanyahu has been an unmitigated disaster for the American people, bleeding the US Treasury of trillions of dollars, squandering America’s standing in the world, making the US complicit in his genocidal policies, and bringing the world closer to World War III.
If Trump wants to make America great again, the first thing he should do is to make America sovereign again, by ending Washington’s subservience to the Israel Lobby.
The Israel Lobby not only controls the votes in Congress but places hardline backers of Israel into key national security posts.
These have included Madeleine Albright (Secretary of State for Clinton), Lewis Libby (Chief of Staff of Vice President Cheney), Victoria Nuland (Deputy National Security Adviser of Cheney, NATO Ambassador of Bush Jr., Assistant Secretary of State for Obama, Under-Secretary of State for Biden), Paul Wolfowitz (Under-Secretary of Defence for Bush Sr., Deputy Secretary of Defense for Bush Jr.), Douglas Feith (Under-Secretary of Defence for Bush Jr.), Abram Shulsky (Director of the Office of Special Plans, Department of Defence for Bush Jr.), Elliott Abrams (Deputy National Security Adviser for Bush Jr.), Richard Perle (Chairman of the Defense National Policy Board for Bush Jr.), Amos Hochstein (Senior Advisor to the Secretary of State for Biden), and Antony Blinken (Secretary of State for Biden).
“Netanyahu has been an unmitigated disaster for the American people, bleeding the U.S. Treasury of trillions of dollars, squandering America’s standing in the world, making the U.S. complicit in his genocidal policies, and bringing the world closer to World War III.”
Plan in Fighting Terrorism book
In 1995, Netanyahu described his plan of action in his book Fighting Terrorism. To control terrorists (Netanyahu’s characterisation of militant groups fighting Israel’s illegal rule over the Palestinians), it’s not enough to fight the terrorists.
Instead, it’s necessary to fight the “terrorist regimes” that support such groups. And the US must be the one to lead:
“The cessation of terrorism must therefore be a clear-cut demand, backed up by sanctions and with no prizes attached. As with all international efforts, the vigorous application of sanctions to terrorist states must be led by the United States, whose leaders must choose the correct sequence, timing, and circumstances for these actions.”
As Netanyahu told the American people in 2001 (reprinted as the 2001 foreword to Fighting Terrorism):
“The first and most crucial thing to understand is this: There is no international terrorism without the support of sovereign states.
“International terrorism simply cannot be sustained for long without the regimes that aid and abet it… Take away all this state support, and the entire scaffolding of international terrorism will collapse into dust.
“The international terrorist network is thus based on regimes—Iran, Iraq, Syria, Taliban Afghanistan, Yasir Arafat’s Palestinian Authority, and several other Arab regimes, such as the Sudan.”
Music to neocon ears
All of this was music to the ears of the neocons in Washington, who similarly subscribed to US-led regime change operations (through wars, covert subversion, US-led colour revolutions, violent coups, etc.) as the main way to deal with perceived US adversaries.
After 9/11, the Bush Jr. neocons (led by Cheney and Rumsfeld) and the Bush Jr. insiders of the Israel Lobby (led by Wolfowitz and Feith), teamed up to remake the Middle East through a series of US-led wars on Netanyahu’s targets in the Middle East (Lebanon, Iran, Iraq, Syria) and Islamic East Africa (Libya, Somalia, and Sudan). The role of the Israel Lobby in stoking these wars of choice is described in detail in Pappe’s new book.
The neocon-Israel Lobby war plan was shown to General Wesley Clark on a visit to the Pentagon soon after 9/11. An officer pulled a paper from his desk and told Clark: “I just got this memo from the Secretary of Defence’s office.
“It says we’re going to attack and destroy the governments in 7 countries in five years — we’re going to start with Iraq, and then we’re going to move to Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Iran.”
In 2002, Netanyahu pitched the war with Iraq to the American people and Congress by promising them that “If you take out Saddam, Saddam’s regime, I guarantee you that it will have enormous positive reverberations on the region [. . .] People sitting right next door in Iran, young people, and many others, will say the time of such regimes, of such despots, is gone.”
A remarkable new insider account of Netanyahu’s role in spearheading the Iraq War also comes from retired Marine Command Chief Master Sargent Dennis Fritz, in his book Deadly Betrayal (2024). When Fritz was called to deploy to Iraq in early 2002, he asked senior military officials why the US was deploying to Iraq, but he got no clear answer. Rather than lead soldiers into a battle he could not explain or justify, he left the service.
The neocon-Israel Lobby teamwork has marked one of the greatest global calamities of the 21st century.
In 2005, Fritz was invited back to the Pentagon, now as a civilian, to assist Under-Secretary Douglas Feith in the declassification of documents about the war, so that Feith could use them to write a book about the war.
Spurred by Netanyahu
Fritz discovered in the process that the Iraq War had been spurred by Netanyahu in close coordination with Wolfowitz and Feith. He learned that the purported US war aim, to counter Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction, was a cynical public relations gimmick led by an Israel Lobby insider, Abram Shulsky, to garner US public support for the war.
Iraq was to be the first of the seven wars in five years, but as Fritz explains, that follow-up wars were delayed by the anti-US Iraqi insurgency. Nonetheless, the US eventually went to war or backed wars against Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Lebanon. In other words, the US carried out Netanyahu’s plans — except for Iran.
To this day, indeed to this hour, Netanyahu works to stoke a US war on Iran, one that could open World War III, either by Iran making the breakthrough to nuclear weapons, or by Iran’s ally, Russia, joining such a war on Iran’s side.
The neocon-Israel Lobby teamwork has marked one of the greatest global calamities of the 21st century. All of the countries attacked by the US or its proxies — Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Syria — now lie in ruins.
Meanwhile, Netanyahu’s genocide in Gaza continues apace, and yet again the US has opposed the unanimous will of the world (other than Israel) this month by vetoing a UN Security Council ceasefire resolution that was backed by the other 14 members of the UN Security Council.
The real issue facing the Trump Administration is not defending Israel from its neighbors, who call repeatedly, almost daily, for peace based on the two-state solution. The real issue is defending the US from the Israel Lobby.
Jeffrey D. Sachs is a university professor and director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, where he directed The Earth Institute from 2002 until 2016. He is also president of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network and a commissioner of the UN Broadband Commission for Development. He currently serves as an SDG Advocate under Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. Dr Sachs is the author, most recently, of A New Foreign Policy: Beyond American Exceptionalism (2020). This article was first published by Common Dreams and is republished under a Creative Commons licence.
Over in a flash. A volley of missiles hit Dnipro at 12,000 km/h. A sobering warning to the West. Did they pay attention? Image: www.solidarity.co.nz
COMMENTARY: By Eugene Doyle
In the space of a couple of days last week two completely unprecedented attacks occurred that have the potential to rewrite world history. The US and UK directly attacked Russia and, for the first time ever in war, an Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile was fired — by Russia.
Naturally, most people in the West paid little attention.
Within moments of the silo opening at the Kapustin Yar rocket base in Russia on Thursday, American eyeballs were on it.
They had received a warning from the Russians a few minutes before, through the joint nuclear risk-reduction channels, but no one on the Western side could actually guarantee what payload the rocket carried, what the destinations of its multiple warheads really were, or what would happen when those warheads struck their targets travelling at 12,000 km/h.
If nuclear-armed, one such missile has the ability to destroy several of the major cities of Europe. Thankfully, the warheads were conventional and all were concentrated on a military-industrial complex in Dnipro, Ukraine, 800 km away.
They struck about 5 minutes later.
Stephen Clark, writing on the US tech site Ars Technica says the attack portends a new era of warfare.
Hot on the heels Wednesday: The strike came hot on the heels of another major and historic escalation, this one undertaken by the US and UK, using their long-range ATACMS and Storm Shadow missiles, to hit inside Russia for the first time, reportedly targeting sites that included the headquarters of Russia’s Army Group North.
Le Monde reported that 12 British Storm Shadow missiles were fired. Pause and think about that: the British military using their own targeting experts, inputting proprietary coding data, top-secret weapon initiation sequences, real-time satellite coordination, etc, fired missiles into Russia.
A bit like cutting a ribbon, some Ukrainian might have been allowed to push a bright red button to get things moving. Not even at the height of the Cold War was either side reckless and brainless enough to do such a thing.
President Putin says the war has now been “globalised”. The Russians lost no time in counter-striking.
Thursday’s attack on the Yuzhmash military-industrial complex was the first use of a new generation of missile, the Oreshnik, which the Russians say is now in serial production. They travel 6000 km/h faster than US Patriot missile interceptors and are almost certainly unstoppable.
The footage is staggering: the sky lights up and a volley of warheads strikes at Mach 10 (12,000km/h). Nima Alkhorshid from Dialogue Works asked a very sensible question about the Russian strike on Dnipro and Putin’s speech that followed: “Did the West receive the message?”
Typically, Western leaders say any Russian warning is bluffing and sabre-rattling but I hope they are sitting up and paying attention. Unfortunately, that does not appear to be the case.
Jean-Noël Barrot, the French Foreign Minister, said France had no “red lines” in terms of escalation and reiterated that the project was still on for Ukraine to be part of NATO.
Time to ‘kick the Chihuahua’ Russian-American military analyst Andrei Martyanov says it may be time to “kick the Chihuahua”. If the West fires more missiles into Russia, the next targets for the Russians is likely to be military installations on NATO territory, possibly in Poland or Romania, but equally likely British naval vessels or bases either in the UK or places like Cyprus.
Martyanov says the British seem to want to experience real war first hand.
“What was demonstrated to the United States, as well as to those Chihuahuas like Britain and France, was that they have no means of intercepting anything like this and they can be dealt with when Russia decides to.”
Bellicose language but Russians are furious at being attacked by the UK and US.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov spoke of a “qualitative shift” in the war. “We will be taking this as a qualitatively new phase of the Western war against Russia and we will react accordingly.”
With US strategy in Ukraine increasingly incoherent, US officials admit the “permission” to use long-range missiles “is not a game-changer”; yet it represents the kind of escalation President Biden had previously said could lead to WWIII. Is he just trying to hand a poisoned chalice to Trump?
The war’s tempo is clearly quickening. Also this month, President Putin outlined a change in the country’s policy for employing nuclear weapons in conflict, lowering the threshold.
Shattered dream
In military terms this week’s dramatic events are about “moving up the escalation ladder”. Leopard and Abrams tanks were first kept off the battlefield, then included. Cluster munitions were suddenly used, including on civilian targets; F16s were considered too dangerous a signal to Russia, then they were permitted.
This and more all took a couple of years, one rung at a time. Now we are moving up the escalation ladder in leaps and bounds. Where will it end?
“Russia holds overwhelming conventional escalation dominance,” Martyanov said. “But if they [the West] want to go nuclear, we’re all pretty much done.”
But here’s the crazy thing: the hope of defeating Russia, taking back all Ukrainian territory, dealing a deadly blow to the Russian economy, placing NATO missiles in Ukraine, and achieving regime change is all-but-certainly a shattered dream. Russia has won the war in Ukraine; the West must accept this and negotiate or drive us all to the precipice.
The winds of disappointment are blowing through the capitals of the West. In a piece, “Ukraine Morale Falls”, Deutsche Welle reported this week that 30,000 Ukrainians have deserted this year; the judicial system is so clogged that the Rada (Parliament) passed a bill saying deserters who returned would be forgiven.
The long suffering of the Ukrainian people, the deaths and mutilations, their shattered economy, blasted infrastructure and all the misery that comes with defeat in war will not be alleviated by escalation, it will only be made worse.
Anatol Lieven, visiting professor at King’s College London and senior fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, wrote an excellent article last week calling on the Democrats to fundamentally reorient their foreign policy — to summon the courage to break free of the “Blob”, the permanent state within the US state, that has disastrously misguided US foreign policy.
Lieven says, I think wisely, “The US needs to abandon its messianic strategy of spreading ‘democracy’ through US power, which has become in practice little more than a means of trying to undermine rival states.”
He goes on to recommend, as many of us have for years, that peace with Russia must be pursued, that the NATO expansion project must be abandoned, and that the US must get out of the planetary hegemon game.
Ukraine is simply the latest in a string of national projects that were fatally captured by a great power in pursuit of its own ends. The US has as little concern for Ukrainians as it does for Iraqis, Libyans, Palestinians, Syrians, Afghans or Vietnamese. So many of those who drank the US Kool Aid and shackled their national projects to the US geopolitical juggernaut eventually got crushed and left in the dust of their own countries as the Americans moved on to their next project.
Back in 1618 Europe started to tear itself to pieces in the geostrategic contest known as the Thirty Years War. Once the continent was devastated, its leaders signed the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648 ushering in an era of diplomacy and recognition of the importance of balancing the security interests of all parties.
They had cannons, swords, pikes and muskets. We have nuclear weapons. We all need to evolve our psychology and think more like statesmen and stateswomen — and less like nutters.
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
Wanted for war crimes . . . Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (left) and former defence minister Yoav Gallant. Image: Palestine Online
ANALYSIS: By Belén Fernández
The International Criminal Court (ICC) last week issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defence minister, Yoav Gallant, “for crimes against humanity and war crimes committed from at least 8 October 2023 until at least 20 May 2024”, as per the ICC press release.
An arrest warrant was also issued for Hamas military commander Mohammed Deif, although this particular detail will continue to be entirely ignored by the Israeli establishment, which prefers to remain up in arms over its allegedly singular victimisation.
In the eyes of Israel, the ICC decision constitutes a horrifying display of anti-Semitism and even support for “terror”.
READ MORE:
Among the war crimes charges against Netanyahu and Gallant are that “both individuals intentionally and knowingly deprived the civilian population in Gaza of objects indispensable to their survival, including food, water, and medicine and medical supplies, as well as fuel and electricity, from at least 8 October 2023 to 20 May 2024”.
The latter date refers to the day that the ICC prosecutor filed the applications for the arrest warrants and is not, obviously, an indication that Israeli war crimes in the Gaza Strip have abated over the past six months.
Officially, the Israeli military has killed nearly 45,000 Palestinians in Gaza since October 2023, although the true death toll is undoubtedly many times higher. And while a United Nations committee recently found Israel’s methods of warfare in the Gaza Strip to be “consistent with genocide”, the ICC has stopped short of calling Israel out on this front, instead specifying that the court “could not determine that all elements of the crime against humanity of extermination were met”.
Of course, any and all international recognition of Israel’s criminal behaviour is morally significant given the country’s modus operandi, according to which international law is made to be broken – but only by Israel itself. It’s no accident that neither Israel nor the United States, Israel’s primary backer and current accomplice to genocide, are not parties to the ICC.
US would have its own war crimes to answer
Were international “justice” not completely selective and governed by an egregious double standards, the US would have its own plethora of war crimes to answer for — like the wanton slaughter of civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq under the guise of the so-called “war on terror”.
Meanwhile, it’s not quite clear why the ICC has stopped short of detecting “all elements of the crime of against humanity of extermination” on the part of Netanyahu and Gallant. After all, knowingly depriving a civilian population of everything “indispensable to their survival” would seem to be a pretty surefire way of ensuring, well, extermination.
It’s also kind of “indispensable to survival” to not be bombed to death while having your entire territory pulverised.
And to that end, perhaps, the ICC has “found reasonable grounds to believe” that both Netanyahu and Gallant “each bear criminal responsibility as civilian superiors for the war crime of intentionally directing an attack against the civilian population”.
But assigning such individual guilt is a mere drop in the bucket of “justice”. At the end of the day, the state of Israel as a whole bears “criminal responsibility” for usurping Palestinian land and engaging in 76.5 years (and counting) of ethnic cleansing, displacement and massacres.
All of this while driving a sector of the Palestinian population to armed resistance and thereby converting them into targets for continued Israeli criminality.
Given Israel’s lengthy history of flouting United Nations resolutions, the country’s presumption that it should also be immune from ICC rulings comes as no surprise.
While Israel does not recognise ICC jurisdiction domestically, Netanyahu and Gallant could in theory be arrested if they travel to any of the court’s 124 member states. Needless to say, this is not an eventuality that will be encouraged by the world’s reigning superpower.
Not Israel’s first ICC run-in
And yet this is not Israel’s first run-in with the ICC. Back in 2019, after nearly five years of “preliminary investigation”, the court announced that then-prosecutor Fatou Bensouda was “satisfied” that there was a “reasonable basis to initiate an investigation into the situation in Palestine”.
This did not mean, of course, that said investigation was set to commence – eternal bureaucracy and foot-dragging being the hallmark of international criminal law.
Rather, it had simply been established that there was a “reasonable basis to believe that war crimes have been or are being committed in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip”.
Well, yeah. And that “reasonable basis” had already been around for, oh, seven decades or so.
Anyway, Bensouda’s ruminations were still more than the Israelis could handle. The Jerusalem Post, for example, ran a dispatch by Israeli attorney Nitsana Darshan-Leitner — titled “Refusing to Play the Palestinians’ ICC game” — in which the author accused the court of serving as a “concealed weapon” against Israel.
Contending that there was “nothing sexier for Bensouda than the Israeli-Palestinian conflict”, Darshan-Leitner concluded: “We knew that Bensouda was tired of pursuing African dictators and brutal tribal leaders, and wanted to show that the ICC was a court with a truly international reach”.
Speaking of sexy, Al Jazeera has noted that, as a result of Bensouda’s ongoing perceived insolence, Israeli spy chief Yossi Cohen “intensified the covert war on the court that Israel has been waging since Palestine joined the ICC in 2015”.
The Mossad went about intercepting Bensouda’s communications, and she reported being “personally threatened”. She stepped down as prosecutor in 2021, the same year the “investigation into the situation in Palestine” finally got under way.
Now, it remains to be seen just what the Israelis have up their sleeves in this latest international legal showdown. But as the “situation in Palestine” proceeds apace and genocide rages, there’s a reasonable basis to believe justice is not ultimately an option.
Belén Fernández is the author of Inside Siglo XXI: Locked Up in Mexico’s Largest Immigration Center (OR Books, 2022), Checkpoint Zipolite: Quarantine in a Small Place (OR Books, 2021), Exile: Rejecting America and Finding the World (OR Books, 2019), and other books. She is a columnist for Al Jazeera, contributing editor at Jacobin Magazine, and has written for The New York Times, Middle East Eye, among numerous other publications.
For almost six decades photographer John Miller (Ngāpuhi) has been a protest photographer in Aotearoa New Zealand.
From his first photographs of an anti-Vietnam War protest on Auckland’s Albert Street as a high school student in 1967, to Hīkoi mō te Tiriti last week, Miller has focused much of his work on the faces of dissent.
He spoke of his experiences over the years in an interview broadcast today on RNZ’s Culture 101 programme with presenter Susana Lei’ataua.
John Miller at the RNZ studio with his Hīkoi camera. Image: Susana Lei’ataua/RNZ
Miller joined Hīkoi mō te Tiriti at Waitangi Park in Pōneke Wellington last Tuesday, November 19, ahead of its final walk to Parliament’s grounds.
“It was quite an incredible occasion, so many people,” 74-year-old Miller says.
“Many more than 1975 and 2004. Also social media has a much more influential part to play in these sorts of events these days, and also drone technology . . .
“I had to avoid one on the corner of Manners and Willis Streets flying around us as the Hīkoi was passing by.
“We ended up running up Wakefield Street which is parallel to Courtenay Place to get ahead of the march and we joined the march at the Taranaki Street Manners Street intersection and we managed to get in front of it.”
Comparing Hīkoi mō te Tiriti with his experience of the 1975 Māori Land March led by Dame Whina Cooper, Miller noted there were a lot more people involved.
“During the 1975 Hīkoi the only flag that was in that march was the actual white land march flag — the Pou Whenua — no other flags at all. And there were no placards, no, nothing like that.”
Miller tried to replicate photos he took in 1975 and 2004: “However this particular time I actually was under a technical disadvantage because one of my lenses stopped working and I had to shoot this whole event in Wellington using just a wide angle lens so that forced me to change my approach.”
Miller and his daughter, Rere, were with the Hīkoi in front of the Beehive.
“I had no idea that there were so many people sort of outside who couldn’t get in and I only realised afterwards when we saw the drone footage.”
The International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, his former Defence Minister, Yoav Gallant, and Hamas leader, Mohammed Deif.
The judges also “found reasonable grounds to believe that they bear criminal responsibility” … “for the war crime of intentionally directing an attack against the civilian population”. Image: Amnesty International poster
If they were ever to be judged at the ICC, a conviction is conceivable.
The charges of the court against Netanyahu are severe. The three-judge panel unanimously said that he and Gallant are “co-perpetrators for committing the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare, and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts”.
The judges also “found reasonable grounds to believe that they bear criminal responsibility” . . . “for the war crime of intentionally directing an attack against the civilian population”.
The charges are also backed by the work of the International Court of Justice, which has found that it is “plausible” that Israel has committed acts in Gaza that violate the Genocide Convention.
If arrested, Netanyahu would go through a trial, and he could then be acquitted, or convicted.
In the latter case, Netanyahu would join the ranks of leaders considered perpetrators of crimes against humanity, such as Charles Taylor of Liberia, Hissène Habré of Chad, Saddam Hussein of Iraq, Augusto Pinochet of Chile, Slobodan Milosevic of Serbia, Radovan Karadžić of Serbia, Idi Amin of Uganda, Pol Pot of Cambodia, Joseph Stalin of the former Soviet Union, Mao Zedong of China, and Adolf Hitler of Germany.
The ICC has issued arrest warrants over Gaza. Video: DW
Next steps The arrest warrants rely on ICC member states carrying them out. And this is by no means a foregone conclusion.
Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, has been wanted by the court since 2023 for his role in directing attacks at civilians in Ukraine and illegal deportation of Ukrainian children.
But Putin was not arrested on a recent visit to Mongolia, a state that is party to the ICC, after the Mongolian authorities had assured him he would be safe. That said, he was unable to travel to South Africa when leaders from the Brics economic bloc of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa met in Johannesburg in 2023.
This was due to the experience in South Africa of former Sudanese president, Omar Al-Bashir. Bashir, for whom the ICC granted arrest warrants in 2009 and 2010 for allegedly directing a campaign of mass killing, rape and pillage against civilians in Darfur, travelled to South Africa in 2015 to attend an African Union summit. But he had to leave abruptly for fear of arrest.
South Africa’s Supreme Court of Appeal ruled in 2016 that the government’s failure to arrest him was unlawful. And the ICC ruled against South Africa on its “shameful failure” to arrest Bashir the following year.
He was also able to travel freely to other ICC member states, including Chad, Kenya and Jordan.
Bashir was overthrown in a military coup in 2019 and placed under arrest. He is now persona non grata in Sudan where he was convicted of corruption, sentenced to two years in prison, and is being investigated for his role in the coup that brought him to power.
Not arresting criminals inflicts damage on the ICC, which already has a weak record of prosecutions. For example, after former president of Ivory Coast, Laurent Gbagb, was charged then acquitted.
But it also takes away a major opportunity to achieve justice for victims of serious crimes.
Dramatic political implications The likelihood of Netanyahu, who has become the first ever leader of a Western country to be charged by the ICC, appearing at The Hague is low. But the political implications of the arrest warrants for Netanyahu are, at any rate, dramatic.
Netanyahu knew the ICC would be able to hold him to account for his political decisions, and this is exactly why he disapproved of Palestine joining the ICC in 2015.
In practice, Netanyahu might lose even more legitimacy in his own country than he has done already with some groups. Civil society groups in Israel are following the work of the ICC very closely.
B’Tselem, a Jerusalem-based non-profit organisation that documents human rights violations in the occupied Palestinian territories, has said that the ICC intervention and ICJ rulings “are a chance for us, Israelis, to realise that . . . upholding a regime of supremacy, violence and oppression necessarily involves crimes and severe violation of human rights”.
Netanyahu will also be limited in his travels, and viewed as a pariah in many of the 124 states that are party to the ICC. This is a view that would be shared by most leaders of European states.
The EU is, for the moment, unlikely to be able to use its global human rights’ sanctions regime against Netanyahu, which allows targeted measures against foreign nationals who are deemed responsible for gross violations of human rights.
This is because unanimity across the bloc is necessary, and some states such as Austria, Czechia, Hungary and Germany could be reluctant to agree to this. Even the French Foreign Ministry spokesperson said: “It’s a point that is legally complex.”
But the EU is a strong supporter of the ICC, so there will be pressure in governments of all EU states to act against Netanyahu.
The political implications of this decision are not isolated to Netanyahu. Pro-Palestinian protest activity has taken place at over 500 US colleges since October 7. And the UK has now joined most EU states in supporting Netanyahu’s arrest.
The US is now very much isolated among Western countries in its lack of support for international law. The ICC, on the other hand, is becoming increasingly visible in its quest for international justice for victims.
No real argument in Netanyahu's defence . . . We saw this illustrated in a statement from Senator Tom Cotton, who proclaimed that the US would invade The Hague if the ICC tries to enforce its arrest warrants. Image: caitlinjohnstone.com.au
COMMENTARY:By Caitlin Johnstone
The International Criminal Court has formally issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
No such arrest warrants were issued for President Biden or any of the other Western officials who have been backing Israel’s genocidal atrocities, which is a bit like a judge issuing a warrant for a mass murderer but not for the guy who gave him the gun and stood next to him handing him ammunition and drove the getaway car and lied to the police to cover up the crime.
Nothing will come of this new development because it is completely unenforcible and international law is only as real as the US empire agrees to pretend it is, but it is a significant step in the deterioration of international consensus on Israel as the entire world watches the Zionist regime commit atrocity after atrocity right out in the open.
The antisemitic decision of the International Criminal Court is a modern Dreyfus trial – and will end the same way.
Israel utterly rejects the false and absurd charges of the International Criminal Court, a biased and discriminatory political body.https://t.co/slCeoZ4fbX
Predictably, Benjamin Netanyahu has responded to this decision by shrieking about antisemitism and calling the ICC’s move “a modern Dreyfus trial”. He is doing this because he does not have anything resembling a real argument in his defense, and neither does anyone else.
We saw this illustrated in a statement from Senator Tom Cotton, who proclaimed that the US would invade The Hague if the ICC tries to enforce its arrest warrants.
“The ICC is a kangaroo court and Karim Khan is a deranged fanatic,” Cotton said. “Woe to him and anyone who tries to enforce these outlaw warrants. Let me give them all a friendly reminder: the American law on the ICC is known as The Hague Invasion Act for a reason. Think about it.”
The ICC is a kangaroo court and Karim Khan is a deranged fanatic. Woe to him and anyone who tries to enforce these outlaw warrants. Let me give them all a friendly reminder: the American law on the ICC is known as The Hague Invasion Act for a reason. Think about it.
This is as psychotic a public statement as anything you’ll see from the most far-right extremists in the Knesset. The United States is run by demented zealots with nukes, just like Israel.
Warmongering frenzy
The “Hague Invasion Act”, formally known as the American Service-Members’ Protection Act, is a US federal law passed during the warmongering frenzy of the early Bush administration which authorizes the president to use “all means necessary and appropriate to bring about the release of any US or allied personnel being detained or imprisoned by, on behalf of, or at the request of the International Criminal Court.”
That “or allied personnel” bit is why Cotton is able to cite this law in reference to an arrest warrant for Israelis.
Speaking of Israel and US senators, a bill by Bernie Sanders to block a shipment of tank shells to Israel was just killed in the Senate by a vote of 18 to 79.
Sanders framed the bill as an effort to restrict “the sale of offensive arms to Israel”, making a distinction from “defensive” arms like the Iron Dome, which is absurd and obfuscatory to begin with. All arms to Israel are offensive rather than defensive in nature, in that they are all used to help Israel murder people without experiencing the deterrence they would receive from a retaliatory response.
There is a reason body armour is regulated in a way that is similar to firearms; it’s because someone who wants to commit a violent crime can wear a bulletproof vest while doing so to ensure that they can perpetrate the crime without being stopped by police.
That is exactly how Israel uses its so-called “defensive” weaponry.
And speaking of progressive US lawmakers taking feeble stands on Israel, congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has come under fire for voting to support House Resolution 1449, a bill which purports to simply denounce antisemitism but in reality promotes the false conflation of antisemitic hate speech with speech that is critical of Israel.
‘Harmful definition’
Progressive congresswoman Ilhan Omar, who voted against the bill, said in a statement that she did so because “the bill endorses the harmful definition of IHRA that dangerously conflates legitimate criticism of Israel to antisemitism and further harms our ability to address antisemitism.”
Everywhere you look it is powerful criminals getting away with far too much while the people who are supposed to be resisting them do far too little.
This happens as Russia hits Ukraine with a new type of hypersonic missile, which Putin went out of his way to mention could easily have been equipped with a nuclear warhead.
This attack was a warning to Ukraine for using long-range missiles supplied by the US and UK to strike targets inside Russia, and occurs as Moscow revises its nuclear doctrine lowering the threshold for when nuclear weapons may be used.
This is unsustainable. It cannot continue. One way or the other, all this madness is going to come to an end.
Lebanese and Palestinian flags at a recent solidarity rally in Auckland's Te Komititanga Square calling for an immediate ceasefire and an end to genocide. Image: David Robie/Café Pacific
The United States has vetoed a UN Security Council ceasefire resolution — for the fourth time — in Israel’s brutal war on Gaza, while Hezbollah demands a complete ceasefire and “protection of Lebanon’s sovereignty” in any deal with Israel. Amid the death and devastation, Joe Hendren reflects on his time in Lebanon and examines what the crisis means for a small country with a population size similar to Aotearoa New Zealand.
SPECIAL REPORT: By Joe Hendren
Since the Israeli invasion of Lebanon I can’t help but think of a friend I met in Beirut.
He worked at the Regis Hotel, where I stayed in February 2015.
At one point, he offered to make me a Syrian dish popular in his hometown of Aleppo. I have long remembered his kindness; I only wish I remembered his name.
The author, Joe Hendren, stands in Martyr’s Square, Beruit . . . “Kia kaha Lebanon – stand strong – I look forward to the day I can visit you again.” Image: Joe Hendren
At the time, his home city was being destroyed. A flashpoint of the Syrian Civil War, the Battle of Aleppo lasted four long years. He didn’t mention this of course.
I was lucky to visit Lebanon when I did. So much has happened since then.
Economic crisis and a tragic port explosion Mass protests took over Lebanese streets in October 2019 in response to government plans to tax WhatsApp calls. The scope of the protests soon widened, as Lebanese people voiced their frustrations with ongoing economic turmoil and corruption.
A few months later, the covid-19 pandemic arrived, deepening the economic crisis and claiming 10,000 lives.
On 4 August 2020, the centre of Beirut was rocked by one of the largest non nuclear explosions in history when a large amount of ammonium nitrate stored at the Port of Beirut detonated. The explosion killed 218 people and left an estimated 300,000 homeless. The government of Hassin Diab resigned but continued in a “caretaker” capacity.
Tens of thousands of protesters returned to the streets demanding accountability and the downfall of Lebanon’s political ruling class. While some protesters threw stones and other projectiles, an Al Jazeera investigation found that security forces violated international standards on the use of force. The political elite were protected.
“The Lebanon financial and economic crisis is likely to rank in the top 10, possibly top three, most severe crises episodes globally since the mid-nineteenth century. This is a conclusion of the Spring 2021 Lebanon Economic Monitor (LEM) in which the Lebanon crisis is contrasted with the most severe global crises episodes as observed by Reinhart and Rogoff (2014) over the 1857–2013 period.
“In fact, Lebanon’s GDP plummeted from close to US$ 55 billion in 2018 to an estimated US$ 33 billion in 2020, with US$ GDP/capita falling by around 40 percent. Such a brutal and rapid contraction is usually associated with conflicts or wars.”
The Lebanon Poverty and Equity Assessment, produced by the World Bank in 2024, found the share of individuals in Lebanon living under the poverty line more than tripled, rising from 12 percent to 44 percent. The depth and severity of poverty also increased over the decade between 2012 and 2022.
To make matters worse, the port explosion destroyed Lebanon’s strategic wheat reserves at a time when the war in Ukraine drove significant increases in global food prices. Annual food inflation in Lebanon skyrocketed from 7.67 percent in January 2019 to a whopping 483.15 percent for the year ending in January 2022. While food inflation has since declined, it remains high, sitting just below 20 percent for the year ending September 2024. The World Bank said:
“The sharp deterioration of the Lebanese pound, which lost 98 percent of its pre-crisis value by December 2023, propelled inflation to new heights. With imports constituting about 60 percent of the consumption basket (World Bank, 2022), the plunging currency led to triple-digit inflation which rose steeply from an annual average of 3 percent between 2011 and 2018, to 85 percent in 2019, 155 percent in 2020, and 221 percent in 2023 . . .
“Faced with falling foreign exchange reserves, the government withdrew subsidies on medication, fuel, and wheat further fuelling rising costs of healthcare and transport (Figure 1.2). Rapid inflation acted effectively as a highly regressive tax, striking hardest at the poor and those with fixed, lira-denominated incomes.”
The ongoing crisis of the Lebanese economy has amplified the power of Hezbollah, a paramilitary group formed in 1982 in response to Israel’s invasion and occupation of Lebanon.
“Hezbollah is famous for entrenching its power in an elaborate social infrastructure of Islamic welfare. The social grip of those structures and services is increased by the ongoing crisis of the Lebanese economy. When the medical service fails, desperate families turn to the Hezbollah-run health service,” says Adam Tooze
As banks imposed capital controls, many Lebanese lost confidence in the financial system. The financial arm of Hezbollah, the al-Quad al-Hassan Association (AQAH), experienced a significant increase in clients, despite being subject to US Treasury sanctions since 2007.
The US accuses Hezbollah of using AQAH as a front to manage its financial activities. When a 28-year-old engineer, Hassan Shoumar, was locked out of his dollar accounts in late 2019, he redirected his money into his account at AQAH: “What I care about is that when I want my money, I can get it.”
While Hezbollah portrays itself as “the resistance”, as a member of the governing coalition in Lebanon, it also forms an influential part of the political elite. Adam Tooze gives an example of how the political elite is still looking after itself:
“[T]he Lebanese Parliament in a grotesque act of self-dealing in January 2024 passed a budget that promised to close the budget deficit of 12.8 of GDP by raising regressive value-added tax while decreasing the progressive taxes levied on capital gains, real estate and investments.
“For lack of reforms, the IMF [International Monetary Fund] is refusing to disburse any of the $3bn package that are allocated to Lebanon.”
While the protest movement called for a “technocratic” government in Lebanon, the experiences of Greece and other countries facing financial difficulties suggest such governments can pose their own risks, especially when they involve unelected “experts” in prominent positions.
One example is the political reaction to the counterproductive austerity programme imposed on Greece by the European Commission, European Central Bank and IMF in the aftermath of the 2007-2008 financial crisis. This demonstrates how the demands of international investors can conflict with the needs of the local population.
Lebanon carries more than its fair share of refugees Lebanon currently hosts the largest number of refugees per capita in the world, despite its scarce resources. This began as an overflow from the Syrian conflict in 2011, with nearly 1.2 million ‘displaced’ Syrians in Lebanon registered with UNHCR by May 2015.
When I visited Lebanon in 2015, I tried to grasp the scale of the refugee issue. In terms of population, Lebanon is comparable to New Zealand, with both countries having just over 5 million people.
I imagined what New Zealand would be like if it attempted to host a million refugees in addition to its general population. Yet in terms of land area Lebanon is only 10,400 square kilometres — about the size of New Zealand’s Marlborough region at the top of the South Island.
Now, imagine accommodating a population of over 5 million in such a small space, with more than a fifth of them being refugees.
While it was encouraging to see New Zealand increase its refugee quota to 1500 places in July 2020, we could afford to do much more in the current situation. This includes creating additional visa pathways for those fleeing Gaza and Lebanon.
#BREAKING
United States VETOES Security Council draft resolution that would have demanded an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, and the release of all hostages
On top of all that – Israeli attacks and illegal booby traps Since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and the ongoing Israeli invasion of Gaza, Israel and Hezbollah have exchanged fire across Lebanon’s southern border.
Israel makes much of the threat of rocket attacks on Israel from Hezbollah. However, data from US based non-profit organisation Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED) shows Israel carried out 81 percent of the 10,214 attacks between between the two parties from October 7, 2023, and September 20, 2024.
These attacks resulted in 752 deaths in Lebanon, including 50 children. In contrast, Hezbollah’s attacks, largely centred on military targets, killed at least 33 Israelis.
Hezbollah continues to offer an immediate ceasefire, so long as a ceasefire also applies to Gaza, but Israel has refused these terms.
While the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) disputed these figures as an “oversimplification”, the IDF do not appear to dispute the reported number of Lebanese casualties. Hezbollah continues to offer an immediate ceasefire, so long as a ceasefire also applies to Gaza, but Israel has refused these terms.
In a further escalation, thousands of handheld pagers and walkie-talkies used in both civilian and military contexts in Lebanon and Syria suddenly exploded on September 17 and 18.
Israel attempted to deny responsibility, with Israeli President Isaac Herzog claiming he “rejects out of hand any connection” to the attack. However, 12 defence and intelligence officials, briefed on the attack, anonymously confirmed to The New York Times that Israel was behind the operation.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later boasted during a cabinet meeting that he had personally approved the pager attack. The New York Times described the aftermath:
“Powered by just a few ounces of an explosive compound concealed within the devices, the blasts sent grown men flying off motorcycles and slamming into walls, according to witnesses and video footage. People out shopping fell to the ground, writhing in agony, smoke snaking from their pockets.”
The exploding devices killed 42 people and injured more than 3500, with many victims losing one or both of their hands or eyes. At least four of the dead were children.
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikatri called the explosions “a serious violation of Lebanese sovereignty and a crime by all standards”.
While around eight Hezbollah fighters were among the dead, most of those killed worked in administration roles and did not take partin hostilities. Under international humanitarian law targeting non-combatants is illegal.
Additionally, the UN Protocol on Mines, Booby-Traps and Other Devices also prohibits the use of “booby-traps or other devices in the form of apparently harmless portable objects which are specifically designed and constructed to contain explosive material”. Israel is a signatory to this UN Protocol.
Israel’s decision to turn ordinary consumer devices into illegal booby traps could backfire. While Israel frequently stresses the importance of its technology sector to its economy, who is going to buy technology associated with Israel now that the IDF have demonstrated its ability to indiscriminately weaponise consumer devices at any time?
International industry buyers will source elsewhere. Such a “silent boycott” could give greater momentum to the call from Palestinian civil society for boycotts, divestments and economic sanctions against Israel.
The booby trap pagers are also likely to affect the decisions of foreign airlines to service Israel on the grounds of safety. Since the war began in October 2023, the number of foreign airlines calling on Ben Gurion Airport in Israel has fallen significantly. Consequently, the cost of a round-trip ticket from the United States to Tel Aviv has risen sharply, from approximately $900 to $2500.
Israel targets civilian infrastructure in Lebanon Israel has also targeted civilian organisations linked to Hezbollah, such emergency services, hospitals and medical centres operated by the Islamic Health Society (IHS). Israel claims Hezbollah is “using the IHS as a cover for terrorist activities”. This apparently includes digging people out of buildings, as search and rescue teams have also been targeted and killed.
Israel accuses the microloan charity AQAH of funding “Hezbollah’s terror activities”, including purchasing weapons and making payments to Hezbollah fighters. On October 20, Israel attacked 30 branches of AQAH across Lebanon, drawing condemnation from both Amnesty International and the United Nations.
Ben Saul, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Counter-terrorism maintains AQAH is not a lawful military target: “International humanitarian law does not permit attacks on the economic or financial infrastructure of an adversary, even if they indirectly sustain its military activities.”
Where the author ate his Za’atar man’ousheh – Pigeon’s Rock, Corniche, Beiruit. Image: Joe Hendren
On top of all that — an Israeli invasion In 1982, Israel attempted to use war to alter the political situation in Lebanon, with counterproductive results, including the creation of Hezbollah. In 2006, Hezbollah used the hilly terrain of southern Lebanon to beat Israel to a stalemate. Israel risks similar counterproductive outcomes again, at the cost of many more lives.
Yet on 1 October 2024, Israel launched a ground invasion of Lebanon, alongside strikes on Beirut, Sidon and border villages. The IDF confirmed the action on Twitter/X, promising a “limited, localised and targeted” operation against “Hezbollah terrorist targets” in southern Lebanon. One US official noted that Israel had framed its 1982 invasion as a limited incursion, which eventually turned into an 18-year occupation.
Israeli strikes have since expanded all over the country. According to figures provided by the Lebanese Ministry of Public Heath on November 13, Israel is responsible for the deaths of at least 3365 people in Lebanon, including 216 children and 192 health workers. More than 14,000 people have been wounded, and more than one million have been displaced from their homes.
Since September 30, 47 Israeli troops have been killed in combat in Southern Lebanon. Around 45 civilians in northern Israel have died due to rocket fire from Lebanon.
So, on top of an economic crisis, runaway inflation, unaffordable food, increasing poverty, the port explosion and covid-19, the Lebanese people now face a war that shows little signs of stopping.
Analysts suggest there is little chance of a ceasefire while Israel retains its “maximalist” demands, which include a full surrender of Hezbollah and allowing Israel to continue to attack targets in southern Lebanon.
A senior fellow at the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut, Mohanad Hage Ali, believes Israel is feigning diplomacy to push the blame on Hezbollah. The best chance may come alongside a ceasefire in Gaza, but Israel shows little signs of negotiating meaningfully on that front either.
On September 26, the Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah BouHabib summarised the mood of the country in the wake of the pager attack:
“[N]obody expected the war to be taken in that direction. We Lebanese—we’ve had enough war. We’ve had fifteen years of war. . . .We’d like to live without war—happily, as a tourist country, a beautiful country, good food—and we are not able to do it. And so there is a lot of depression, especially with the latest escalation.”
In Aotearoa New Zealand, the Māori phrase “Kia kaha” means “stand strong”. If I could send a message from halfway across the world, it would be: “Kia kaha Lebanon. I look forward to the day I can visit you again, and munch on a yummy Za’atar man’ousheh while admiring the view from the beautiful Corniche Beirut.”
Joe Hendren holds a PhD in international business from the University of Auckland. He has more than 20 years of experience as a researcher, including work in the New Zealand Parliament, for trade unions and on various research projects. This is his first article for Asia Pacific Report. His blog can be found at http://joehendren.substack.com
Police estimate 42,000 people participated in the Wellington leg of the hīkoi - but other estimates put it at well over 50,000. Image: Layla Bailey-McDowell/RNZ
International media coverage of Aotearoa New Zealand’s national Hīkoi to Parliament has largely focused on the historic size of the turnout in Wellington yesterday and the wider contention between Māori and the Crown.
Some, including The New York Times, have also pointed out the recent swing right with the election of the coalition government as part of the reason for the unrest.
The Times article said New Zealand had veered “sharply right”, likening it to Donald Trump’s re-election.
“New Zealand bears little resemblance to the country recently led by Jacinda Ardern, whose brand of compassionate, progressive politics made her a global symbol of anti-Trump liberalism.”
The challenging of the rights of Māori was “driving a wedge into New Zealand society”, the article said.
“However, it has prompted widespread anger among the public, academics, lawyers and Māori rights groups who believe it is creating division, undermining the treaty, and damaging the relationship between Māori and ruling authorities,” it said.
‘Critical moment’
Turkey’s public broadcaster TRT World said New Zealand “faces a critical moment in its journey toward reconciling with its Indigenous population”.
🇳🇿 New Zealand MP Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke performed a haka in a powerful speech during her first appearance in parliament.
Maipi-Clarke is Aotearoa’s youngest MP since 1853 and is seen as representing the ‘kohanga reo’ generation of young Māori. pic.twitter.com/sWwbS1FsBI
While Al Jazeera agreed it was “a contentious bill redefining the country’s founding agreement between the British and the Indigenous Māori people”.
The Washington Post pointed out that the “bill is deeply unpopular, even among members of the ruling conservative coalition”.
“While the bill would not rewrite the treaty itself, it would essentially extend it equally to all New Zealanders, which critics say would effectively render the treaty worthless,” the article said.
The Hīkoi, and particularly the culmination of more than 42,000 people at Parliament, was covered in most of the mainstream international media outlets including Britain’s BBC and CNN in the United States, as well as wire agencies, including AFP, AP and Reuters.
Across the Ditch, the ABC headline called it a “flashpoint” on race relations. While the article went on to say it was “a critical moment in the fraught 180-year-old conversation about how New Zealand should honour the promises made to First Nations people when the country was colonised”.
