News and Analysis 12/15/23

A “founder of The Intercept and a bestselling author … takes apart Israel’s propaganda, the devastating US role in Gaza atrocities, and why Palestine’s history matters”:

• ‘Biden Could END Gaza War with a Phone Call’: Jeremy Scahill Exposes US and Israeli Claims (Owen Jones / YouTube)

Why do the MSM and US government insist on repeating discredited stories about the October 7th attack?

• Israel-Palestine War: Why Is the Media Ignoring Evidence of Israel’s Own Actions on 7 October? (Middle East Eye)

Israel continues to target noncombatants, schools, houses of worship, journalists, artists, and the health system, and now send human shields into the Hamas controlled tunnels:

• Nonstop Israeli Airstrikes on Gaza Claim Dozens of Innocent Lives, as Israel’s Aggression Completes 70 Days (Wafa)
• Israeli Strike on UNRWA School Kills 33 as Gaza Invasion Continues (New Arab)
• Israeli Troops Kill 12 Palestinians, Desecrate West Bank Mosque (Reuters)
• Update: Israeli Drone Strike Wounds Al Jazeera’s al-Dahdouh (Middle East Eye)
• Ahmed Tobasi of the Freedom Theatre in Jenin & Bread and Puppet’s Peter Schumann on Art & Liberation (Democracy Now)
• Diseases Spread in Gaza amid Health System Collapse, Israeli Strikes (Aljazeera)
• Israel-Palestine War: Palestinian Says Soldiers Sent Him into Hamas Tunnel Strapped with Bombs (Middle East Eye)

A “core of ideologically driven US citizens were at the forefront of building religious settlements on land expropriated from Palestinians”:

• How American Citizens Are Leading Rise of ‘Settler Violence’ on Palestinian Lands (The Guardian)

“[I]t is most likely that Tunisians’ views shifted not in response to Hamas’s attack but to … the increasing cost to civilians of Israel’s military operation in Gaza”:

• How the Israel-Hamas War in Gaza Is Changing Arab Views (Foreign Affairs)

“She is a stupid motherf***er, and I will drag her by the back of my car and cut her f***ing head off for disrespecting my Jewish flag” …

• Middle School Teacher Arrested After Allegedly Threatening to Behead Muslim Student Who Said Israeli Flag Offended Her (CNN)

… while a Harvard professor’s wife “‘deeply’ regrets her racist tirade, in which she referred to the graduate student’s traditional Palestinian keffiyeh as a “terrorist scarf’”:

• Harvard Professor’s Wife Apologizes for Anti-Muslim Tirade Caught on Cam (Daily Beast)

“Iranian pilgrims will for the first time in eight years begin regular travel to Saudi Arabia from Dec. 19, Iranian media reported on Wednesday”:

• Iran Lifts Visa Rules for 33 Countries Including Gulf States -ISNA (Reuters)

Critics of the move also note the arrests of a Palestinian activist and a union general secretary who expressed solidarity with the Palestinians:

• Israel-Palestine War: French Publisher Stops Printing Ilan Pappe’s ‘Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine’ Despite Surge in Sales (Middle East Eye)

A closer look at the increasingly banned Students for Justice in Palestine:

• How a Student Group Is Politicizing a Generation on Palestine (New Yorker)

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