Link Blog
- Brian Tokar – _The Green Alternative_
- Murray Bookchin – “Listen, Marxist!”
- Murray Bookchin – “Ecology and Revolutionary Thought”
- _Pluriverse: A Post-Development Dictionary_
Democrats Question U.S. Claims That Israel Isn’t Violating International Law Using American Weapons
More than two dozen House Democrats sent a letter to the Biden administration on Tuesday questioning its assertions that the Israeli government is using American weapons in full compliance with U.S. and international law, as required by a memo President Joe Biden issued in February.
Texas Democratic Reps. Veronica Escobar and Joaquin Castro led the congressional letter to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines. The 26 Democrats note that for months, “elected representatives, intergovernmental bodies, international courts, Israeli and global human rights observers — along with government officials themselves — have persistently expressed grave concerns regarding the actions of the Netanyahu government.”
Documenting Six Months of Israeli War Crimes in Gaza
Over the last six months, Israel has repeatedly massacred Palestinians in Gaza, resulting in the deaths of well over thirty thousand Palestinians, some 70 percent of whom are women and children. Tens of thousands more have been injured. These numbers are probably an undercount considering Israel’s deliberate destruction of Gaza’s health care system, which is the sole independent source of these numbers (which are also used by Israel, including its prime minister and the military)
Breaking it down by the numbers. Damning but not surprising.
“One of the reasons I am hosting this new weekly show for Zeteo, is that I am fed up with media organizations failing to challenge the racism and bigotry of our leaders, and I am also fed up with media organizations themselves pushing racist, bigoted, dehumanizing coverage of minorities across the board - but especially, especially, of the Palestinians. I think the world deserves better.”
UN Report Describes Abuse and Dire Conditions in Israeli Detention - The New York Times
Gazans released from Israeli detention described graphic scenes of physical abuse in testimonies gathered by United Nations workers, according to a report released on Tuesday by UNRWA, the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees.
Palestinian detainees described being made to sit on their knees for hours on end with their hands tied while blindfolded, being deprived of food and water and being urinated on, among other humiliations, the report said. Others described being badly beaten with metal bars…
The big idea: are we about to discover a new force of nature? | Physics | The Guardian
Such a new force could help unlock a deeper structure at the base of reality
Hints that physicists may be on the brink of making such a breakthrough have been accumulating over the past decade. The first tranche of evidence comes from particle physics experiments here on Earth, the results of which appear to conflict with our current best theory of fundamental particles, the standard model.
Our rapidly heating planet is regularly shattering records these days. December through February was so warm — in fact, the hottest winter on record in the U.S. — it’s been described by some climate experts as a “lost winter.” Last year also set new records for global surface temperature, hottest summer and ocean heat content. Perhaps most ominously, the world averaged temperatures 1.4º C higher than pre-industrial levels during those 12 months.
Protestors Against Gaza Genocide Block Roads, Commerce in 50 Cities Across the World | Truthout
Demonstrators across every inhabited continent took to the streets to block major corridors and spots of economic activity on Monday, April 15, in a coordinated economic disruption to protest Israel’s genocide in Gaza.
The “A15” protests were planned across 50 cities, including 21 in the U.S., encompassing 17 countries in total. Protesters blocked shipping ports and railroads, targeted funders of arms manufacturers like Israel’s Elbit Systems, blocked factories for arms manufacturers directly, and linked arms across major roads, including highways and airport entrances.
Meanwhile, in Gaza, the genocide continues, famine grows.
As the world focuses on Iran’s attack on Israel, bloodshed continues in Gaza - YouTube
As the world waits to see how Israel will respond to Iran’s attack, in Gaza, the bloodshed continues. Four were killed in overnight airstrikes in the southern city of Rafah, and 11 were killed - including children - in central Gaza. Israeli tanks have re-entered the north of the strip, surrounding schools housing displaced families.
As technology develops, sound has become an increasingly important way of measuring the health and biodiversity of ecosystems: our forests, soils and oceans all produce their own acoustic signatures. Scientists who use ecoacoustics to measure habitats and species say that quiet is falling across thousands of habitats, as the planet witnesses extraordinary losses in the density and variety of species.
Something to be aware of.
Bird flu spread: The dairy and meat industries don’t want you to think cows have bird flu - Vox
The current, highly virulent strain of avian flu had already been ripping through chicken and turkey farms over the past two years. Since it jumped to US dairy cows for the first time last month, it’s infected more than 20 dairy herds across eight states, raising alarms among public health authorities about possible spread to humans and potential impacts on the food supply.
The footage of the Nazi youth camps along the east coast is chilling as is the footage of the fairly large events. Fast forward to 2020 and Trump getting nearly 47% of the popular vote. How many millions are ready to support fascism in 2024?
Nazi Town, USA | Full Documentary | PBS - YouTube
In February 1939, more than 20,000 Americans filled Madison Square Garden for an event billed as a “Pro-American Rally.” Images of George Washington hung alongside swastikas, underlining the organizers' belief that Nazism was entirely consistent with American ideals.
‘The doom sits on your shoulders’: Farmers share how weeks of wet weather have hit them hard
Rainfall was above average in most parts of Ireland last month. The EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service’s latest monthly report also identified that March was wetter than average across western Europe more broadly. It was also the 10th month in-a-row to see record-breaking average global temperatures as climate change escalates.
The first episode is very well done. Another chapter in the violence perpetrated in the US by the state against Black Power activists.
The Africas VS. America | CBC Listen
In 1985, police dropped a bomb in a Philadelphia neighborhood. Their target? A family of Black radicals known as ‘MOVE,’ who found themselves ensnared in a city — and nation’s — domestic war on Black Liberation. Over seven episodes, host Matthew Amha investigates the events that culminated in the MOVE bombing, and the long afterlife of a forgotten American tragedy.
An excellent episode of Solarpunk Now! podcast:
Episode 18 – Ecology is Radical: A People’s History of Environmentalism
This Earth Month, we’re looking back on the history of environmental radicalism. Brian Tokar is a teacher, activist, and writer who’s been involved in the movements he writes and teaches about since the 70s. We discuss how leftism and environmentalism came together, why ecology matters for the left, and what lessons we can learn from these traditions and put into practice today.
References:
A state execution just 40 minutes north of me.
Dispatch From a Missouri Execution: A Microcosm of the US Death Penalty Fight | Truthout
The state-sponsored execution of 52-year-old Brian Dorsey on Tuesday evening in Bonne Terre, Missouri, marked the fifth such execution to take place in the U.S. this year, as right-wing activists across the nation push hard to expand the use of the death penalty.
Two more executions are already scheduled to take place in Missouri this year, despite a multipronged anti-death-penalty campaign, including prisoner support; focused bipartisan legislative initiatives starting with repeal; exoneration and clemency campaigns; and pressuring officials to reopen problematic cases tried by known racially biased prosecutors.
Just another day in the climate emergency as the reservoir that supplies most of the water to Colombian capital city Bogotá hits a record low of 16%. A city that usually receives twice as much rainfall as London, is now rationing water.
Another result of the drought, some neighborhoods are choking in smoke as wildfires burn in the forests surrounding the city.
Meanwhile Mexico City is also rationing water and Guatemala declared a wildfire emergency on Wednesday.
Continuing genocide.
Aid ‘still not reaching Gaza’, as top US official warns famine has started | The Guardian
A promised surge in aid into that Benjamin Netanyahu promised Joe Biden a week ago has so far failed to materialise, aid workers say, as the US aid chief confirmed that famine is beginning to take hold in parts of the besieged coastal strip.
We speak with two doctors who’ve just returned after two weeks at the European Hospital in Gaza. Dr. Feroze Sidhwa and Dr. Mark Perlmutter are co-authors of a new piece for Common Dreams titled “As Surgeons, We Have Never Seen Cruelty Like Israel’s Genocide in Gaza.” They describe a hospital “hanging on by a thread,” with the majority of patients being young children, and bombing targeted at Muslim Palestinians “concentrated at the time of evening prayer.” “Genocide was the overwhelming impression that I got,” says Perlmutter.
The climate emergency is the long emergency that will have no end in our lifetimes, each future year worse than the last.
Canada risks more ‘catastrophic’ wildfires with hot weather forecast | The Guardian
Last year, Canada endured its worst-ever fire season, with more than 6,600 blazes burning 15m hectares (37m acres), an area roughly seven times the annual average. Eight firefighters died and 230,000 people were evacuated from their homes.
This winter the country experienced warmer-than-normal temperatures and widespread drought, setting the stage for another punishing summer.
Gaza Is Unlike Anything I’ve Ever Seen, Says NGO Head/Ex-CNN Journalist Arwa Damon - YouTube
Award-winning journalist Arwa Damon has just returned from a humanitarian trip to Gaza in her capacity as the founder of INARA, the International Network for Aid Relief and Assistance, a nonprofit currently providing medical and mental healthcare to children. Damon describes the overwhelming need for aid under Israel’s siege of the territory. "