‘Where Do We Go from Here’? From Slave Revolts to Palestinian Resistance

February 7, 2026

Children in Gaza demanding an end to the Israeli siege. (Photo: Mahmoud Ajjour, The Palestine Chronicle)

By Benay Blend

Until the Empire falls, the pattern remains the same. In order for entities like the US and Israel to plunder targets for land and natural resources, they must render the resistance either barbaric and/or invisible.

On August 16, 1967, Dr. Martin Luther King delivered a speech before the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) in which he honored the group’s achievements on the 10th anniversary of its founding.

In order to address his theme, “Where Do We Go from Here?” King spoke to the value of recognizing the current situation, a time in which there were many problems left to solve, some of which still exist today.

Despite these odds, King maintained that “first, we must massively assert our dignity and worth. We must stand up amid a system that still oppresses us and develop an unassailable and majestic sense of values. We must no longer be ashamed of being black.”

“As long as the mind is enslaved,” he concluded, “the body can never be free.” King’s words are relevant today not only for the colonized but also for those who refuse to acknowledge the agency of such people to bring about their own liberation.

In a two-part documentary for PBS, Looking for Lincoln, historian Henry Louis Gates Jr. hosted an exploration of the myths surrounding Abraham Lincoln, the president credited with freeing the slaves at the close of the Civil War.

While Gates delved into his own ambivalence about the man who many consider to be racist yet progressive in his thinking over time, he seldom mentioned the role of enslaved men and women in freeing themselves from slavery.

Even before the onset of the war, black men and women revolted against their owners in a variety of ways—work stoppage, running away, buying their own freedom, and in some cases, armed revolt. During the conflict, black men served in the Union army while women worked as cooks for the military and sometimes as spies against the South.

“The issue is not Black people’s capacity to survive and succeed,” writes Prof. Kellie Carter Jackson. “It is White people’s ability to accept Black humanity and forfeit the myth of their supremacy.”

Throughout his odyssey, Gates argued that what is forgotten is just as important as what is remembered, particularly within the context of the Black experience. His admonition holds true for all historical journeys in which mainstream actors are privileged with a starring role.

After the Vietnam War, for example, commentators credited a variety of sources that brought the war to a close—student protests, working class opposition, peace movements within the military, and Henry Kissinger, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1973 for his role, along with Vietnamese diplomat Le Duc Tho, in bringing about a ceasefire in Vietnam.

In “Lessons from the Vietnam War,” John Marciano analyzes several aspects of the conflict, including US war crimes, those who did and did not condemn it, and specific segments of the population who participated in the anti-war movement.

Significantly, Marciano rarely mentions North Vietnamese resistance as an important aspect of their victory. He concedes that the Vietnamese understood that their country was unified in their aspiration for independence and believed in their right to self-determination, but that information was contained in only one paragraph in his essay.

Until the Empire falls, the pattern remains the same. In order for entities like the United States and Israel to plunder targets for land and natural resources, they must render the resistance either barbaric and/or invisible.

Since October 7, “Palestinians have managed to reassert Palestinian agency,” claims journalist Ramzy Baroud, “including the legitimacy of all forms of resistance, as a winning strategy against Israeli colonialism and US-Western imperialism in the region.”

Nevertheless, numerous official statements tend to begin with an obligatory denunciation of Hamas before moving on to an admittedly overdue admission of Israel’s genocide.

In a statement issued on Oct. 7, 2024, Senator Bernie Sanders (Democrat-Vermont) noted that this date marked one year since the “horrific Hamas attack on Israel,” an event, he says, that murdered 1200 “innocent” men, women, and children.

“Yahya Sinwar and his Hamas accomplices are responsible for mass murder, the taking of hostages, and sexual violence,” continued Sanders. “They are war criminals. Nobody should forgive or forget those atrocities, which began this war.”

Not long after, Human Rights Watch repeated the same misinformation: Hamas had committed war crimes against an innocent population.

By February 7, 2025, there appeared clear documentation that Israel had issued through its Hannibal Directive an order to shoot and kill Israeli captives on Oct. 7th rather than have them taken by Hamas.

“Roughly 1,100 Israelis were killed,” explained Asa Winstanley. It remained unclear how many deaths were due to Israel’s order and how many were killed by Palestinians.

By February 2024, reports by the New York Times that Hamas had raped Israeli women and girls on Oct. 7 had also been debunked. Further information would follow as to the questionable sources that initiated the charge.

“From beheaded babies to a systematic mass rape campaign and everything in between,” Robert Inlakesh explains, “the lies espoused by genocide apologists have been numerous. What is even more shameless is that new lies continue to be created,” all within the service of “hoaxes” that are “inherently racist and play on orientalist myths” long used to justify “genocide and ethnic cleansing against the people of Gaza.”

When anti-colonial resistance is not ignored altogether, it is maligned in such a way as to warrant the displacement and erasure of indigenous people around the world.

Thus, while Senator Sanders finally admitted that “it is genocide” in a statement on December 17, 2025, he prefaced it with the obligatory description of Hamas as a “terrorist” organization, followed by a plea that Israel has a right to defend itself.

Under international law, a state cannot occupy a territory, then attack it on the assumption that it is a “foreign body” which presents a national security threat.

“Sanders chose to start his op-ed by essentially suggesting that ‘Hamas started it,’” writes Ahmad Ibsais. “This not only amounts to victim-blaming but also erases eight decades of pillage, plunder, and ethnic cleansing.”

In his speech quoted above, Martin Luther King asserted that “self-affirmation is the black man’s need, made compelling by the white man’s crimes against him.”

In “The Defeat of Israel and the Rebirth of Palestinian Agency,” journalist Ramzy Baroud affirms a similar refrain: “Palestinians have managed to reassert Palestinian agency, including the legitimacy of all forms of resistance, as a winning strategy against Israeli colonialism and US-Western imperialism in the region.”

Despite the machinations of official spokesmen and women, Palestinians in Gaza have won a significant victory, one that Baroud confirms “is a resounding triumph for the Palestinian people, their indomitable spirit, and their deeply rooted resistance that transcends faction, ideology, and politics.”

Self-affirmation enables self-determination. The former is a prerequisite for those who seek “human justice,” an attainment that requires the “determination of those who fight for it and aspire to achieve it”; the latter involves ignoring negotiations that seldom lead to peace in favor of employing all forms of resistance that ensure agency in the ongoing struggle for liberation.

Indonesia Prepares 8,000 Troops for Proposed Gaza ‘Stabilization Force’

February 10, 2026

President Prabowo Subianto of Indonesia is conditioning his country's participation in Trump's Board of Peace on Palestinian independence. (Photos: Anadolu, QNN. Design: Palestine Chronicle)

By Palestine Chronicle Staff  

Indonesia is preparing thousands of troops for a potential deployment to Gaza as part of a proposed international post-war security arrangement, linking Jakarta’s humanitarian-framed initiative to broader political negotiations surrounding US President Donald Trump’s Gaza plan and the emerging multinational “stabilization force.”

Key Developments

Indonesia is preparing between 5,000 and 8,000 troops for Gaza deployment.

Units expected to focus on engineering, medical, and reconstruction roles.

Plan linked to Trump’s international stabilization force proposal.

Israeli media reported preparations to host Indonesian troops in southern Gaza.

Indonesia conditions normalization with Israel on recognition of Palestinian statehood.

Indonesia Prepares Gaza Deployment

Indonesia’s army began preparations for a possible deployment of up to 8,000 personnel following a leadership meeting chaired by President Prabowo Subianto in Jakarta.

Army Chief of Staff Maruli Simanjuntak said the numbers and timeline remain under review pending coordination within the military command structure, according to an official Indonesian military statement released Monday.

Officials indicated the force would consist mainly of engineering and medical units, emphasizing humanitarian work and reconstruction rather than combat operations.

The British newspaper The Guardian reported that the deployment would support ceasefire implementation and post-war stabilization arrangements in Gaza.

‘International Stabilization Force’

The proposal is reportedly connected to a broader plan advanced by Washington to establish a temporary multinational force inside Gaza.

The framework envisions foreign troops assisting in training Palestinian police and supporting a transitional administration while Israel withdraws to agreed positions.

US-based news outlet Politico previously reported that Indonesia, Azerbaijan, and Pakistan were leading candidates to contribute troops to the force. US troops would not be deployed inside the enclave, with regional and Muslim-majority countries expected to provide personnel instead.

Israeli Media Reports and Disputes

Israeli public broadcaster Kan and Channel 12 reported that Israeli security officials had begun preliminary planning for the arrival of Indonesian forces in southern Gaza, particularly in areas between Rafah and Khan Yunis, as part of a proposed multinational stabilization deployment following the war.

The reports suggested the troops could be tasked with securing humanitarian corridors and assisting in civil administration arrangements in evacuated zones after Israeli troop redeployments.

Jakarta rejected the claims, saying no geographic deployment areas had been agreed upon and that Indonesia would only participate under a clear international legal mandate and guarantees for civilian protection.

The Australian newspaper, citing Indonesian defense sources, reported that officials in Jakarta were concerned about being drawn into an occupation-adjacent security role and emphasized the country would only join a mission formally approved through international mechanisms and acceptable to the Palestinians.

Prabowo’s Expanding Diplomatic Role

President Prabowo Subianto has increasingly sought a larger international security role for Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim-majority country.

He previously stated Indonesia was ready to send up to 20,000 peacekeepers to Gaza or other conflict zones and participated in international talks on the enclave’s future.

Reuters news agency reported that Indonesia also joined Trump’s “Board of Peace,” reinforcing its diplomatic involvement in post-war planning.

Despite this engagement, Jakarta does not maintain diplomatic relations with Israel and has reiterated that normalization would only occur if Palestinian statehood is recognized.

Jenin and Tulkarm Refugees Fear Permanent Displacement – Again

Zena Al Tahhan 

The Electronic Intifada 

5 February 2026

A bulldozer demolishing homes with men watching

An Israeli military bulldozer demolishes a building in the Nur Shams refugee camp, east of Tulkarm in the occupied West Bank, on 31 December 2025.  Nidal EshtayehXinhua

Tens of thousands of Palestinians in the northern occupied West Bank are marking one year since their forcible expulsion from their homes in the refugee camps of Tulkarm, Nur Shams and Jenin.

The camps remain under military siege, and Israeli forces are still stationed inside.

When the assault on Jenin and Tulkarm began in January 2025, Israel Katz, the Israeli defense minister, said his troops would remain in the camps until the end of the year. Within weeks, some 40,000 people were driven from their homes, many at gunpoint – described as the largest mass expulsion since 1967.

As residents enter their second year of displacement – with no end to the operation in sight – grave legal, political and moral questions are being posed.

At the heart of this crisis is the severe and direct threat to the protected legal status of Palestine refugees, who, under United Nations Resolution 194, have a right to return to their original lands from which they were violently expelled during the creation of Israel as a settler-colonial state in 1948.

The Palestine refugee issue, the longest unresolved refugee crisis in the world, has now entered a new and dangerous phase, as the same families undergo displacement for a second time in 77 years in the West Bank as in Gaza.

The assault, which rights groups say constitutes war crimes and crimes against humanity, has gone far beyond displacement. Thousands of homes have been systematically demolished, entire neighborhoods flattened and civilian infrastructure destroyed.

Israeli occupation authorities have said that the rebuilding of demolished residential buildings will not be permitted, according to the Haifa-based Adalah rights group, which has represented residents in appeals against the demolition of their homes. This suggests a deliberate effort to permanently erase refugee camps as political and physical spaces and ensures that many refugees will have nothing to return to, even if the military assault were to end.

Alongside the military operations, the Israeli government is taking concrete steps to restrict and end the role of the UN agency for Palestine refugees, UNRWA, an organization that was created in the aftermath of Israel’s establishment and consequent refugee crisis.

“What’s happening in the northern part of the West Bank is nothing but destruction of the three refugee camps in an Israeli effort to destroy not only UNRWA, but the whole right of Palestinian refugees to return to their original lands based on UN resolutions,” Palestinian political leader Mustafa Barghouti told The Electronic Intifada.

“Israel thinks that if they destroy a camp, they will destroy the right of return,” he continued. “Palestinian refugees, however, will never give up their right of return, no matter what happens.”

Over the past year, these refugee camps have been turned into ghost towns, devoid of life. Expelled residents stand on the surrounding hilltops, as close as they are allowed to get, watching Israeli soldiers occupy their camps, sleep in their homes and tear down their memories right before their eyes.

As displacement deepens and the world looks away, the question is no longer whether this crisis is temporary but whether the world will allow the permanent erasure of the protected status of Palestinian refugeehood by force.

“Existential issue”

Israel has taken a series of legal, administrative and operational steps that have significantly restricted UNRWA’s ability to operate over the past several years. These include legislation passed in late 2024 by the Israeli parliament, prohibiting UNRWA from operating inside Israel.

In January 2026, Israeli forces demolished part of UNRWA’s offices and facilities in occupied East Jerusalem. They also cut electricity to the agency’s facilities in the Qalandia refugee camp in Kufr Aqab and are threatening to shut down the camp’s training center, which offers vocational training to hundreds of young Palestinian students.

While the ban on UNRWA may not formally ban the agency’s activity in the West Bank and Gaza, it forbids any Israeli official contact with the agency and annuls agreements and arrangements that previously facilitated its work – including issuing visas to foreign employees. These measures have disrupted service delivery in education, healthcare and humanitarian assistance both in occupied Gaza and the West Bank.

For over a decade, UNRWA has functioned despite chronic underfunding. With the United States – historically the agency’s largest single donor – having intermittently suspended funding to UNRWA in recent years, the agency has reported budget shortfalls and service reductions affecting millions of registered Palestinian refugees.

“Palestinian refugee camps fall under the direct administrative responsibility of UNRWA,” Bashir Mataheen, the spokesperson for the Jenin city municipality, told The Electronic Intifada. “Today, UNRWA stands at a very dangerous crossroads, with clear service reductions and the threat of complete closure.”

This, he said, pointing to the besieged Jenin refugee camp behind him, is an “existential issue” for camp residents.

“The people of Jenin camp were displaced in 1948, and this is the second displacement, repeated in 2025. This is extremely dangerous and threatens their entire future.”

And, Mataheen warned, forcing UNRWA out or closed would have implications beyond the humanitarian dimension.

“It calls into question the political standing of these families and the future of their right of return. Once the international body that formally protects their refugee status is gone, that right is left without a clear framework or guarantee. There will be a serious political vacuum and crisis.”

On 21 December 2025, Philippe Lazzarini, the UNRWA commissioner-general said on his official X account that the “coordinated campaign to dismantle UNRWA has reached unseen levels” over the past two years.

“One major myth is that UNRWA maintains Palestine Refugees in a refugee limbo. The truth is that, wherever they are, refugees remain refugees in the absence of just and lasting political solutions to their plight,” he wrote.

“Dismantling UNRWA will not end the refugee status of Palestinians in the absence of a political solution.”

Political status

Israel launched its assault on the northern occupied West Bank on 21 January 2025, just two days after a second, ultimately doomed, ceasefire was announced in the still ongoing genocide in the occupied Gaza Strip. The timing underscored a shift in military focus rather than a de-escalation, and Israeli forces rapidly escalated its assaults across the West Bank.

The offensive, which started almost exactly a year ago, concentrated on the cities of Jenin and Tulkarm, where occupation forces carried out sustained raids, airstrikes and ground incursions, killing dozens of Palestinians and wounding many others. The assault involved the deployment of hundreds of ground troops, including special forces and snipers, alongside armed drones, surveillance aircraft, armored vehicles and tanks.

Residential neighborhoods and refugee camps were placed under siege, with widespread destruction of homes, roads and civilian infrastructure, marking the longest military assault in the area since the second intifada in the 2000s.

According to satellite images obtained by the UN, by May 2025 – less than six months after the start of the assault – some 43 percent of Jenin refugee camp was destroyed, as well as 35 percent of Nur Shams camp and 14 percent of Tulkarm camp.

“Not a single building in the Jenin refugee camp escaped damage. Preliminary statistics indicate that over 1,500 homes in the camp were fully destroyed,” Mataheen said.

“The losses to infrastructure, including electricity, water, sewage systems and road networks in the camp alone – has exceeded $320 million,” he continued.

“For residents, this is not merely a humanitarian and refugee crisis,” said Mataheen. “It is about the possible erasure of the political status they have maintained for close to eight decades.”

Zena Al Tahhan is an independent writer and TV reporter based in occupied Jerusalem.

Morgan McSweeney: Was the Man Running Britain and His Ties to Israel

Jody McIntyre 

The Electronic Intifada 

5 February 2026

Article written prior to the resignation of McSweeney over the weekend.

Keir Starmer’s chief of staff Morgan McSweeney is widely considered to be the power behind the British prime minister’s throne. But who are the powers behind McSweeney? Ben CawthraZUMA Press

Morgan McSweeney, the secretive Labour Party operative effectively running the British government, has been thrust into the spotlight in recent months.

As Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s chief of staff, McSweeney is said to hold immense influence over the direction of the country. Recent book The Fraud by investigative journalist Paul Holden, exposed many of McSweeney’s backroom dealings. The book has already led to two resignations at Number 10 Downing Street, the prime minister’s official residence and headquarters.

However, despite calls to step down, McSweeney himself seems invulnerable to pressure.

It is impossible to understand the slavish pro-Israeli stance adopted by Keir Starmer and the Labour Party in recent years without understanding McSweeney.

In November, Health Secretary Wes Streeting – a stalwart in the pressure group Labour Friends of Israel – said that “there wouldn’t be a Labour government without him.” Journalist George Eaton wrote that the current Labour cabinet “more than ever, is made in McSweeney’s image.”

But the man who preferred to operate in the shadows for many years has now had his cover blown.

The mainstream media’s focus has been how he illegally hid donations to Labour Together, while he was director of that organization, the one that was credited with propelling Keir Starmer into leadership of the party.

Yet most journalists have missed – either deliberately or negligently – a key thread of the McSweeney story: his historic relationship with pro-Israeli lobbyists, politicians and financiers.

This story starts before McSweeney even joined Labour.

Photo shows the entrance to a kibbutz

McSweeney spent a brief but formative period of his youth volunteering on an Israeli settlement, Kibbutz Sarid. (Facebook)

As a teenager in 1994, he dropped out of university and went to stay in Sarid, a kibbutz (Jewish colony) originally established on stolen Palestinian land in 1926. It seems apparent that this was a formative experience for the young McSweeney, but little is written about his time in the north of occupied historic Palestine.

One exception to that rule is Patrick Maguire and Gabriel Pogrund’s account of Starmer’s rise to power, Get In. In that book, the journalists from London paper The Times report that “in a factory built by Czech Jews at Sarid, nine miles from Nazareth, the lazy teenager learned to work. He built saw-cutters and grinding wheels. He returned to London not just with a tan but a work ethic.”

According to The Jerusalem Post, in that kibbutz and the surrounding Jezreel Valley, McSweeney would have become “closely acquainted with the Hashomer Hatzair,” a Zionist settler organization founded in Austria-Hungary in 1913.

According to Israeli general Moshe Dayan, in his infamous 1969 speech about depopulated Palestinian villages no longer existing due to Jewish colonization, “Sarid [arose] in the place of Haneifs … There is not one place built in this country that did not have a former Arab population.”

Who did McSweeney stay with during his Israeli sojourn? Who did he meet?

While researching this article, a former Labour volunteer, “Simon,” contacted me and spoke on condition of anonymity. Simon claimed that McSweeney was deliberately inserted into the party and later became Keir Starmer’s “handler,” presenting compromising material to keep him “in line.”

Starmer has arguably gone further than any previous Labour leader in pushing an extreme pro-Israeli narrative in the British political sphere, once announcing that he supports “Zionism without qualification.”

Undated photo released by the US Department of Justice in December 2025 shows Morgan McSweeney’s mentor Peter Mandelson celebrating the birthday of convicted pedophile and Israeli intelligence asset Jeffrey Epstein.

To understand the danger of Starmer, we need to understand McSweeney.

He joined the Labour Party in 1997, and in 2001 was set to work on “Excalibur,” a database established by influential Labour planner Peter Mandelson, who was in many ways the architect of Tony Blair’s infamous “New Labour” project to remodel the party in the neoliberal image.

According to a contemporary BBC News report, the Excalibur database “rivalled MI5” – Britain’s domestic spy agency – “in the information it held on anybody and everybody, friend or foe,” and Mandelson’s headquarters “became synonymous with spin-doctory and control-freakery.”

McSweeney’s relationship with his mentor would endure. He was reportedly “very insistent” on Mandelson’s appointment as British ambassador to the US in 2024.

McSweeney then tried to delay Mandelson’s ultimate sacking in September 2025.

Mandelson was eventually fired after revelations about his close friendship with convicted pedophile and suspected Israeli intelligence asset Jeffrey Epstein. Emails released by the US Congress show that Mandelson called Epstein “my best pal” and that Epstein referred to Mandelson fondly as “Petie.”

John McTernan, an adviser to Tony Blair when he was Britain’s prime minister, once praised McSweeney as “the new Peter Mandelson.”

In a seemingly inexplicable move that embarrassed even his staunchest supporters, Starmer is alleged to have effectively overruled British security services in promoting Mandelson, despite overwhelming evidence of his close friendship with Epstein.

Was Starmer acting on the orders of McSweeney in appointing Mandelson?

Is the subordinate actually the handler, as my whistleblower claims? And if so, who is McSweeney managing the prime minister on behalf of?

Israel lobbyists

McSweeney cut his political teeth campaigning for Steve Reed in the Lambeth local authority elections of 2006.

Reed, now Starmer’s housing minister, is a veteran supporter of Labour Friends of Israel, an opaque lobby group which refuses to reveal its funders and has close links to the Israeli embassy in London. As previously reported by The Electronic Intifada, in 2020 Reed secretly met influential Israel lobby financier Trevor Chinn and five other Israel lobbyists, giving the group a series of pledges and setting up “a regular channel of communication.”

McSweeney’s next political challenge came in East London in between 2008 and 2010, when he worked on public relations for right-wing, pro-Israel lawmaker Margaret Hodge, helping her to retain the parliamentary seat for Barking, against a challenge from the insurgent far-right British National Party.

This campaign was bolstered by Hope Not Hate, a supposedly anti-racist group which in fact aids Zionism – Israel’s state ideology – and has shadowy ties to Britain’s intelligence agencies. Previous employees at Hope Not Hate include Ruth Smeeth a former lawmaker who has been active in Labour Friends of Israel, Jemma Levene, a blogger for The Times of Israel, and Liron Velleman a pro-Israeli activist and former policy officer for the Jewish Labour Movement, another lobby group. (In 2024, Velleman was forced to resign as a North London councillor under mysterious circumstances. Then last year he pleaded guilty to a series of sex offences against a 13-year-old girl.)

A group of people posing for the camera

McSweeney led an election campaign for “committed Zionist” Margaret Hodge (center, in light blue) who later took part in this January 2024 ”solidarity” visit to Israel — at the height of its genocide in Gaza. (LFI/X)

McSweeney’s former team in Barking and Dagenham gave an early indication of his political philosophy. Among them was David Evans, future Labour general secretary under Starmer.

Evans is reportedly a “fierce critic of anti-Zionism” and was later responsible for booting former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn out of the party.

Evans was subsequently rewarded by Starmer with a lifetime appointment to the House of Lords, Britain’s unelected upper chamber.

Hodge, a self-described “committed Zionist,” is also known for her role in allegedly covering up a child sexual abuse ring which had infiltrated care homes in Islington, a London neighborhood, between the 1960s and 1990s. Under her leadership, the local authority in Islington was found to have ignored the complaints of victims.

Hodge herself in 2003 attempted to discredit one survivor who spoke out, but was soon forced to apologize for her smear campaign against him under threat of a libel suit. As recently as 2024, Hodge claimed her failings were the result of being badly advised – yet she still refuses to name those who allegedly advised her to ignore the complaints.

During the Gaza genocide, in January 2024, Hodge took part in a propaganda trip paid for by Labour Friends of Israel. She met Israeli president Isaac Herzog, who infamously claimed that there are no innocent civilians in Gaza, a statement cited by South Africa in its case against Israel in the International Court of Justice for the crime of genocide.

As with Evans, Starmer rewarded Hodge for her services with a life peerage nomination.

“Protect Trevor Chinn”

McSweeney’s next outing was in 2015, when he reportedly “masterminded” Liz Kendall’s doomed Labour leadership campaign. Evidently, even McSweeney’s political genius has its limits: in a stunning victory, Jeremy Corbyn won the leadership and Kendall came last with 4.5 percent of the membership vote.

In November 2023, as the Gaza genocide unfolded, Labour Friends of Israel supporter Kendall was asked whether the Labour Party would condemn Israeli use of white phosphorus, an incendiary weapon, the use of which is heavily restricted by international law.

“I think it would be unwise when we are not on the ground to comment,” she replied.

But the reason McSweeney has been ejected from his self-imposed cocoon and propelled into infamy in recent months stems from 2017, when he became director of a company called “Labour Together Ltd.”

As has now been widely reported, McSweeney failed to report almost a million dollars’ worth of donations to Labour Together, who were later fined for breaking UK electoral law more than 20 times. A regulator accepted McSweeney’s questionable explanation that this failure was an accidental oversight, meaning the fine was relatively low – just over $19,000.

However, many journalists reporting on the scandal have failed to examine who was funding Labour Together.

McSweeney is reported to have concealed the donations, at least partially, “to protect Trevor Chinn, Labour Together’s great benefactor.”

Arguably the British pro-Israel lobby’s most important financial backer, Chinn has personally bankrolled both Conservative and Labour Friends of Israel.

In 2024, he was awarded for “service to the state of Israel” by génocidaire Isaac Herzog. Indeed in 2013 Chinn stated that he had “spent my entire life working for Israel,” so his loyalties are no secret.

Not only did Chinn fund McSweeney’s Labour Together operation, but when McSweeney became a director of the organization in 2017, Chinn was already on the board himself.

As well as bankrolling the think tank, Chinn also personally bankrolled Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner, Rachel Reeves, Bridget Phillipson, Lisa Nandy, Wes Streeting and David Lammy – who would all go on to take leading roles in the Labour government elected in July 2024.

Pro-Israel funders

While McSweeney was ensuring his influence over Labour’s candidate selection, Chinn was gaining the ear of the future prime minister and cabinet.

Another funder of Labour Together was Gary Lubner, who has also donated more than $8 million to the central party since 2022 and financed many of their new batch of MPs, including Labour Friends of Israel vice-chairs Damian Egan and Mike Tapp, as well as Justice Secretary David Lammy. But Lubner also funded the election campaign of Morgan McSweeney’s wife, Imogen Walker, who was conveniently selected for a safe seat in Scotland and elected in 2024.

Epstein’s friend Peter Mandelson also helped fundraise for Walker.

McSweeney’s influence is also widely credited with the candidacy of veteran Israel lobbyist Luke Akehurst in Durham, a city with which he had no apparent connection prior to the general election in 2024. Once described by Israeli embassy spy Shai Masot as “one of the best” in Labour, Akehurst was chosen for the seat “after a secretive selection process excluding members of the North Durham constituency party.”

Incredibly, Akehurst was himself a member of the Labour National Executive Committee that was in charge of vetting candidates.

A 2024 prospective parliamentary candidate for Labour in London, Sara (not her real name) contacted me with her own experience of being dragged before a three-person panel consisting of Akehurst, Sharma Tatler and Anu Prashar.

“I was given five minutes notice and then told I wasn’t suitable, with no right to appeal,” she told me.

Who specifically gave the undeclared donations Labour Together was fined for has not been made public. But leaked emails revealed that McSweeney was advised to explain the hidden donations as an “admin error” by the long-standing Labour Party lawyer Gerald Shamash.

Shamash previously threatened to sue anti-Zionist writer Tony Greenstein on behalf of both the Labour Party and Scott Horner, a Labour official who got a local branch discussion on sanctions against Israel banned in 2021.

Once again rewarding his loyalists, Starmer made Shamash a life peer.

McSweeney’s Labour Together board also included Lisa Nandy, today Britain’s culture secretary. Nandy reportedly “demanded to know why no one at the BBC has lost their job” after the broadcast of Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone, a documentary to which the Israel lobby objected, claiming it was too sympathetic to Palestinians.

The BBC subsequently pulled the program.

Nandy has also received tens of thousands of pounds from Israel lobbyists Stuart Roden and Trevor Chinn.

Ideological Zionists

McSweeney’s supporters are also a reflection of his ideology. Proud Zionist and Conservative peer Michael Gove, who recently wrote that the genocidal Israeli military should receive the Nobel Peace Prize, has praised McSweeney as “a fighter ruthless in identifying the real enemy.”

Last year, McSweeney successfully lobbied for Australian press baron Rupert Murdoch, a close friend of war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu, to be invited to the state banquet being put on for Donald Trump’s UK visit. McSweeney and Murdoch sat next to each other at the dinner.

Starmer’s “recognition” of Palestine as a state is a smokescreen – McSweeney is running the government.

Recent polls have rated Starmer as the most unpopular British prime minister in history. An enduring image of this serial failure will be his infamous radio interview when, in a response to a question about the cutting off of electricity and water to the entire population of Gaza, he said that “Israel has that right.”

But as always, McSweeney was operating behind the scenes. As the Gaza genocide commenced, and some dared to express disagreement with Starmer’s horrific comments, he messaged colleagues: “We can be stronger … We need to make it more about [Hamas].”

McSweeney may have been lionized by party insiders in the past as “the savior of the Labour Party” who “pulled us out of the mire.” But neither his career-long devotion to the Zionist cause nor his Mandelson-inspired political dark arts seem sufficient in saving Starmer from the political scrapheap.

Starmer’s downfall is now a matter of when, rather than if. But perhaps the real question is: how long can McSweeney remain ensconced in Number 10?

Jody McIntyre is an investigative journalist whose work can be found at jodymcintyre.substack.com. He stood at the 2024 UK general election, receiving over 10,000 votes.

German Media Ignores Allegations that Israel Raped German Journalist

Jara Nassar 

The Electronic Intifada 

6 February 2026

Two women hug in a crowd

An activist with the Freedom Flotilla is embraced on her arrival in Berlin on 7 October 2025. Activists have alleged that they were sexually assaulted and subject to humiliating and abusive treatment while in Israeli detention.  Michael UkasDPA

In late December, German journalist and activist Anna Liedtke publicly alleged that she was raped by female Israeli prison guards while in Israeli imprisonment.

Liedtke, a member of the women’s organization Zora, which has faced German state repression due to statements supporting the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, was speaking at a conference in solidarity with political prisoners in Paris on 21 December.

In late September, she had set sail for Gaza with the Freedom Flotilla Coalition vessel Conscience. The Conscience carried about 100 journalists and medical staff. The passengers belonged to two of the professions most under attack by the Israeli military in Gaza.

Just like the other several dozen boats aiming to break the nearly two-decades-long Israeli siege on the Gaza Strip, the Conscience was intercepted in international waters by the Israeli navy – which sources much of its material from German weapons manufacturers — and the crew was forcibly brought to Israel, in violation of international law.

Once in Ashdod port, the members were subjected to humiliating treatment by Israeli forces as well as physical and psychological abuse. Liedtke, 25, was brought to Ketziot prison, named a “torture camp” in the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem’s 2024 report “Welcome to Hell.”

Liedtke reports severe mistreatment at the hands of Israeli forces.

She and her fellow crew members had hands and feet shackled, were blindfolded, verbally abused when trying to communicate with each other, and held for five days without access to clean drinking water, she recalled in a podcast from late October. She also witnessed violent physical abuse of other prisoners from her prison cell: “I heard the barking of a dog and then his screams.”

While in prison, the crew members were subjected to repeated strip searches, clearly intended to humiliate prisoners.

“Prisoners were dragged by the hair and laughed at during strip searches,” Liedtke said.

While female flotilla members were nominally searched by female prison guards, male prison guards had every opportunity to watch. Liedtke recalls a female crew member screaming that they were “touching my breasts!”

Systemic pattern of abuse

It was during one of these strip searches that Liedtke reports having been raped by female prison guards.

On 10 October 2025, the crew members were transferred from Ketziot prison to the Givon deportation prison. According to Liedtke, the rape happened during the transfer and because she resisted yet another strip search.

Since Liedtke’s statements in late December, two further Freedom Flotilla members have come forward with allegations of sexualized violence by Israeli prison guards.

Italian journalist Vincenzo Fullone is quoted in a press release by the Freedom Flotilla Coalition saying that “on three separate occasions, I was ordered to enter a small, specially arranged room where I was completely stripped and subjected to invasive and painful anal searches… During the third search, the pain became unbearable and was compounded by mockery, verbal abuse – including the words, ‘Don’t you like it, Hamas whore?’ – and the photographing of my body.”

Surya McEwen, an activist from Australia, states that he “was stripped naked and sexually assaulted by Israeli officers while being held hostage. One held a gun to my head, angrily threatening that he would kill me, while the other yanked and pulled on my genitals, perversely and almost gleefully.”

McEwen had previously alleged that Israeli soldiers had dislocated his arm and that he had been forced to kneel with other flotilla members while Itamar Ben-Gvir, the Israeli national security minister, verbally abused them.

Israel has employed sexualized violence against Palestinians for decades. This includes “organized and systematic practice of sexual torture, including rape, forced stripping, forced filming, sexual assault using objects and dogs, in addition to deliberate psychological humiliation aimed at crushing human dignity and erasing individual identity entirely,” according to a recent report by the Gaza-based Palestinian Center for Human Rights.

Humiliation appears to be a deliberate goal throughout the reports, going back to the Orientalist trope that Arab men are particularly vulnerable to sexual humiliation and “only understand force.”

This trope was also at play in the widespread propagation of claims that Hamas systematically raped Israeli women on 7 October. Despite many of these claims – along with the atrocity propaganda of beheaded babies – being thoroughly debunked, Western mainstream media outlets have yet to reckon with their role in instrumentalizing sexualized violence to justify the genocide in Gaza.

Just the first victim

The German government and German media have remained silent on the alleged rape of a German citizen. Not a single state media outlet has reported on Liedtke’s case, and Zora confirms that no press representatives other than this reporter have reached out.

“Israel may torture Palestinians daily and now has a free pass to abuse our activists as well,” a spokesperson for the Freedom Flotilla’s German delegation told The Electronic Intifada.

The world has allowed Israel to utilize brutal violence against Palestinians for decades. October 2023 only served to spike this violence.

The deliberate murder of internationals such as Rachel Corrie or Ayşenur Ezgi Eygi, while drawing a modicum of protest from Western governments, has not led to any substantial changes in the West’s continued support for Israeli apartheid and genocide.

It is therefore no surprise that Israeli impunity for sexualized violence and rape extends to international solidarity activists as well.

“What happened to us is only the tip of the iceberg,” Liedtke said.

Vincenzo Fullone said he is “still unable to find peace because if they were willing to do this to me, I can’t imagine what they’ve done – and continue to do – to the Palestinians under their complete control.”

Whose dignity and whose pain matters? The silence of Western governments provides a clear answer: not Palestinians, and increasingly, not anyone in solidarity with them.

In her first public disclosure of her experience, the video of which has since gone viral online while being ignored by German media, Liedtke speaks with a clear and steady voice. It only breaks towards the end.

“I will not stop fighting for justice and the end of violence until every woman is free and has received justice.”

What does justice mean for her?

“Justice is the end of Zionism,” she said.

Jara Nassar is a Lebanese-German journalist, artist and community organizer based in Berlin.

The Toxic Legacy of Genocide

Islam Elhabil 

The Electronic Intifada 

8 February 2026

Palestinian adults and children sort through garbage at a landfill north of Khan Younis with tents in the background

Displaced Palestinians at a landfill north of Khan Younis looking for plastic or paper to light a fire for cooking, 13 December 2025. Abed Rahim KhatibDPA via ZUMA Press

Before the genocidal war, daily life in Gaza included an informal but functional plastic collection system. A waste collector moved through neighborhoods using a donkey-drawn cart, calling for residents to sell plastic and scrap materials.

This activity was not only a source of income, but also an integral part of local solid waste management practices.

Households commonly separated plastic waste at the source, sorting larger plastic items such as cups, plates, toys and plastic appliances. These materials were stored and later collected by the waste collector, who transported them from one street to another.

The process provided livelihood support while simultaneously contributing to environmental protection by reducing plastic accumulation in public spaces. It created income-generating opportunities by reducing plastic accumulation in streets and directing part of the waste into limited recycling pathways, depending on available facilities and technical capacity, thereby supporting basic environmental protection and public health under blockade conditions.

Following the genocide that began in October 2023, this system collapsed, leaving plastic waste uncollected and accumulating in the environment, where it increasingly releases pollutants into air, water and human bodies.

The destruction caused by Israel extends beyond physical infrastructure. It disrupts established material management systems and reshapes the relationship between society and waste, resulting in a highly polluted environment with limited or no alternatives for mitigation, generating global consequences that extend beyond Gaza and pose broader environmental risks to the surrounding region.

After Israel cut off fuel and electricity supplies on 9 October 2023, fuel has become largely inaccessible, forcing thousands of Palestinians to confront an urgent and ongoing energy shortage.

Burning plastic to survive

As the destruction continued over months and available firewood – including salvaged doors and household materials – was progressively depleted, displaced families increasingly resorted to emergency alternatives, the most hazardous of which was burning plastic for cooking and heating.

The conversion of plastic into fuel – as is sporadically and dangerously done in Gaza under the duress of the Israeli blockade and genocide – involves a sequential process that begins with collecting plastic from different locations and sorting it by type, a task made extremely difficult under conditions of war and severe resource scarcity.

The plastic is then cut into small pieces and fed into a specialized iron furnace heated to high temperatures ranging from 400 to 600 degrees Celsius in a process commonly referred to as plastic pyrolysis, during which the material melts, vaporizes and passes through pipes as gas into a water-based cooling system, where it condenses back into a liquid. This liquid is then extracted as diesel-like fuel, while heavy residues remain and are repeatedly reprocessed in the same furnace through additional thermal cycles until a purity level of approximately 80 percent is achieved.

The entire process typically requires between eight and 10 hours, depending on the quantity and type of plastic used.

Alarmingly, and far more commonly, plastic burning occurs both in improvised clay ovens in poorly ventilated, confined spaces and as direct open burning inside displacement camps, where residents are forced to burn plastic, paper and similar waste. In both cases, the plastic can provide fuel for cooking and warmth.

This forced practice poses significant health risks, particularly to women and children, as women are typically responsible for cooking near these ovens while children remain in close proximity. Burning plastic releases dense smoke and toxic emissions inside tents, contributing to a rise in respiratory diseases, most notably asthma and pulmonary infections, especially among children, elderly people and women.

These emissions constitute a direct public health threat, effectively turning displacement tents from temporary shelters into concentrated sources of air pollution, where populations are exposed simultaneously to disease, hunger and ongoing military violence.

Burning plastic in open areas is a highly toxic process that does not merely generate smoke, but fundamentally alters ambient air quality through the release of hazardous pollutants. In enclosed settings such as displacement tents, where ventilation is extremely limited, smoke accumulates rapidly and is inhaled by people who are particularly vulnerable in these conditions.

Exposure in these conditions does not typically result in acute, isolated health events, but rather in cumulative and long-term respiratory and systemic health effects.

Environmental studies have repeatedly indicated that open residential burning of plastic waste is a major source of air pollution.

The resulting fine particulate matter is well known for its ability to penetrate deep into the respiratory system. In contexts where formal waste collection is absent, as in Gaza, open plastic burning becomes a diffuse yet significant source of air pollution, substantially increasing health risks and transforming displacement shelters into poorly ventilated environments with chronic exposure to harmful emissions.

Microplastic maelstrom

Beyond gaseous pollutants and visible smoke, plastic burning accelerates the physical and chemical breakdown of plastic materials into microplastic and nanoplastic particles. During combustion, plastic melts and partially burns, then deposits on surrounding surfaces. Upon cooling and mechanical fragmentation, it disintegrates into microscopic particles that are not visible to the naked eye.

Microscopic and spectroscopic analyses have shown that these particles retain the chemical signatures of the original plastic polymers, indicating environmental persistence and biological toxicity.

Microplastics can remain suspended in the air, damaging plants, or settle on bedding, clothing and food, leading to their repeated inhalation and ingestion. As a result, displacement tents become chronic accumulation sites for airborne microplastics, introducing an additional, largely invisible layer of pollution that poses long-term risks to respiratory health through inhalation and persistent exposure.

Military bombardment plays a central role in transforming plastic into a large-scale environmental hazard. The destruction of homes, shops, factories and warehouses generates not only concrete debris, but also substantial quantities of damaged and partially burned plastic materials, including pipes, cables, insulation, furniture and electrical equipment.

Under exposure to heat, sunlight, mechanical abrasion and repeated burning, these materials progressively degrade into microplastic particles and toxic combustion by-products that infiltrate soil, water resources and food systems.

With the collapse of formal waste management systems, plastic waste accumulates in streets, around displacement shelters and in agricultural lands due to the absence of regular collection or safe disposal sites. At the same time, severe fuel shortages and the lack of access to conventional cooking and heating sources all force residents to seek alternative energy options.

Numerous informal dumping and burning areas have consequently emerged near displaced populations.

Humanitarian aid, while essential for survival, inadvertently feeds this cycle, as plastic-packaged food and water rapidly become unmanaged waste or fuel for burning, creating a structural contradiction in which immediate survival practices intensify long-term environmental contamination and health risks.

Children represent the most vulnerable group within this exposure pathway. They grow up in environments saturated with burned plastic residues, play near plastic waste and consume food and water stored in containers reused repeatedly under unsafe conditions.

Their developing bodies are subjected to chronic exposure to pollutants at a time when laboratory facilities, environmental monitoring systems and medical treatment capacities have been severely damaged or rendered inaccessible.

In this context, plastic pollution becomes biologically embedded through prolonged exposure. Genocide, then, effectively functions as an uncontrolled system for the production and accumulation of plastic-related contamination.

Even after the cessation of hostilities, plastic-derived pollutants are expected to persist in soil, groundwater and the food chain, continuing to affect human health long after physical reconstruction begins.

Discussing the reconstruction of Gaza without addressing plastic contamination therefore neglects a critical environmental and public health dimension. Debris management is not solely an engineering challenge, but a chemical and environmental one that requires structured strategies for plastic waste treatment and remediation.

Without such interventions, reconstruction efforts risk reestablishing communities on contaminated land, embedding the toxic legacy of war into the rebuilt environment.

Islam Elhabil is an engineer from Gaza and a Malaysia-based microplastics specialist.

Victory for Palestine Action as “Filton 6” Acquitted

Asa Winstanley 

Rights and Accountability 

4 February 2026

Six activists pose for the camera

Palestine Action activists Jordan Devlin, Charlotte Head, Zoe Rogers, Samuel Corner, Leona Kamio and Fatema Zainab Rajwani pose for the camera the night before they smashed up an Elbit arms factory in August 2024. Filton 24 Defence Committee

Six Palestine Action activists who broke into an Israeli arms factory in the UK have been acquitted or not convicted of all charges against them.

Campaigners told The Electronic Intifada on Wednesday that the result was a “monumental” and “total” victory.

After eight days of deliberation in January and February, the jury either acquitted or refused to convict Charlotte Head, Samuel Corner, Leona Kamio, Fatema Zainab Rajwani, Zoe Rogers and Jordan Devlin of all charges.

Five out of the six were released on bail Wednesday evening.

All six were found not guilty of aggravated burglary, the most serious charge which could have led to life sentences.

The six activists were arrested on site in August 2024 and held on remand for 17 months.

They were the first of a total of 24 defendants to face trials relating to the invasion and smashing of a factory in Filton, near Bristol in the west of England, owned by a subsidiary of Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest weapons manufacturer.

The group of 24 includes some of the prisoners who recently went on a hunger strike.

Once inside, the group destroyed Israeli quadcopter drones, which have been used frequently to massacre Palestinians in Gaza.

During the trial, acquitted defendant Fatema Zainab Rajwani (a third-year film student at the time of the action) was open that, “I damaged drones which is what I went in to do.” She commented on video footage shown to the court, saying, “That is me dismantling a quadcopter drone with a crowbar,” and explaining that the group wanted to “document the presence of quadcopters and [Elbit’s] crimes.”

Fourteen other defendants were rounded up by Britain’s feared Counter Terrorism Police, in a series of violent pre-dawn raids in November 2024 and July last year.

A Palestine Action source told The Electronic Intifada on Wednesday that the remaining Filton 24 prisoners will now appeal to be released on bail.

Such prisoners can usually be held on remand before trial for up to six months. But the politicization and fallacious government “terrorism” campaign against the group – in connivance with Israel – meant that the campaigners have been held on remand for as long as 17 months.

Not guilty

In addition to beating the most serious charge, the jury acquitted Fatema Zainab Rajwani, Zoe Rogers and Jordan Devlin of violent disorder. It refused to convict Charlotte Head, Samuel Corner and Leona Kamio of the same charge.

Samuel Corner was also not convicted of “grievous bodily harm with intent” for allegedly striking a police officer.

Crucially, the jury refused to convict any of the defendants of criminal damage.

Yet five of the group had admitted in court to destroying Israeli weapons and equipment belonging to Elbit at the factory.

That the jury could not reach a majority verdict on some of the lesser charges means in theory that there could be retrials in some cases – though that is not expected to have a realistic chance of success.

That is why the sixth defendant, Samuel Corner, was not immediately bailed on Wednesday. Government prosecutors asked the court for more time to decide if they wanted to pursue a retrial in relation to the grievous bodily harm charge.

The Palestine Action source also said that certain issues relating to matters under reporting restrictions imposed by the judge in this trial meant that the verdict was the best possible outcome for the group.

The source said that the verdict represented a “total victory” for the six Palestine Action campaigners.

Most of the remaining “Filton 24” group have been held on draconian remand for months – for more than a year in some cases.

But one, Sean Middlebrough, escaped during a short-term release in November last year. In an exclusive statement, he told The Electronic Intifada that he was not on the run, and was instead “refusing to be held as a prisoner of war of Israel in a British prison.”

Government ministers such as former Home Secretary Yvette Cooper attempted to portray the Filton activists as violent criminals who assaulted a police officer. The British press for the most part obediently parroted such claims and insinuations.

But during this “Filton 6” trial, body-cam footage released to the jury – some of which can be viewed in the video above – showed the exact opposite: Elbit security guards apparently assaulting the activists with sledgehammers.

In a statement released on Wednesday the Filton 24 Defence Committee said the result was a “monumental victory.”

The committee detailed how the trial unfolded.

According to the committee, the verdicts demonstrated that “the jury did not accept the prosecution case that the defendants entered the Elbit weapons factory with the intention of using the items they carried as weapons.”

They said that instead the “jury agreed with the defense argument, that the defendants’ sole intention was to use the items, including sledgehammers, as tools to disarm Israeli weapons … The jury understood that it is not those who destroy Israeli weapons which are guilty, rather the guilty party is the one that deploys such weapons to commit genocide in Gaza.”

The trial also revealed that footage went missing from a number of Elbit’s internal CCTV cameras covering key angles, the committee said. The security guards’ body-worn videos had also been repeatedly turned off and on, as well as edited by Elbit.

Twenty-first century suffragettes

Defense lawyer Rajiv Menon compared the six to the suffragettes – women who demanded the right to vote. In the early 20th century, the suffragettes were routinely denounced as “terrorists and extremists,” although “the reality of course is very different,” Menon said.

The lawyer also said that Judge Jeremy Johnson tried to exclude evidence on Elbit Systems, and interrupted when counsel for the defense asked questions about the Israeli weapons manufacturer.

Menon said that the judge “has restricted what the defendants have been allowed to tell you … what they knew about Elbit’s role in the Israeli attack on Gaza. The consequence of that is that you do not know everything that the defendants knew about Elbit before” they took action against the factory.

The lawyer told the jury that Elbit is a “massive weapons company that has played a critical role in the killing of tens of thousands of Palestinians.”

At the end of the evidence, the judge told the jury that the “situation in the Middle East” and Elbit’s operations are “not relevant” to the case and directed the jury to “follow the legal directions I’ve given you and not anything else.”

The judge also issued a series of reporting restrictions on the case. As a result, I am still prevented from reporting certain details here.

Nonetheless, because the case was heard in open court, I am able to report the following.

During the trial, a juror asked whether they were allowed to acquit because the defendants genuinely believed that they were destroying weapons to prevent their use in genocide.

The judge’s response was “no.”

Trials of the remaining Filton 24 prisoners are still due to happen at some point in the future.

Blow to UK and Israel

Clare Rogers, the mother of defendant Zoe Rogers and a relentless campaigner in her own right said in the committee’s statement that “these are six young people of conscience … They had tried everything else – marches, petitions, writing to MPs, encampments … They felt they had no option but to take action themselves, to try to save as many lives as they could.”

The verdicts are a severe blow to the UK government’s attempt to smear Palestine campaigners as violent criminals and “terrorists.”

In a controversial move last July the home secretary banned Palestine Action as a “terrorist” group, marking the first time ever a non-violent protest group had been outlawed under Britain’s draconian Terrorism Act of 2000.

Activist lisa minerva luxx, from the Filton 24 Defence Committee, criticized the government for prejudicing the trial: “This was a trial by media. Yvette Cooper and [Prime Minister] Keir Starmer took evidence in this case out of context and broadcast it on televisions and tabloids across the country in order to justify proscribing Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation.”

With the result of a legal challenge to that ban expected any week now, the verdict also represents a serious blow to the credibility of that proscription.

This is despite the government – and even the legal system – going to the greatest lengths to try and stitch up this case.

There are also serious implications for the continuing right to trial by jury in the UK.

The fact that a jury of their peers acquitted or refused to convict the first six of the Filton 24 shows the importance and the democratic potential of jury trials.

It is exactly for those reasons that the UK government is seeking to abolish, or seriously erode, the right to trial by jury in the UK. In large part, these so-called “reforms” seem to be targeted precisely at supporting Israel and preventing juries from acquitting according to their conscience.

Israeli Minister Calls West Bank Measures ‘De Facto Sovereignty,’ Says No Future Palestinian State

 By SAM METZ

8:30 AM EST, February 10, 2026

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — A top Israeli official said Tuesday that measures adopted by the government that deepen Israeli control in the occupied West Bank amounted to implementing “de facto sovereignty,” using language that mirrors critics’ warnings about the intent behind the moves.

The steps “actually establish a fact on the ground that there will not be a Palestinian state,” Energy Minister Eli Cohen told Israel’s Army Radio.

Palestinians, Arab countries and human rights groups have called the moves announced Sunday an annexation of the territory, home to roughly 3.4 million Palestinians who seek it for a future state.

Cohen’s comments followed similar remarks by other members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, including Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and Defense Minister Israel Katz.

The moves — and Israeli officials’ own descriptions of them — put the country at odds with both regional allies and previous statements from U.S. President Donald Trump. Netanyahu has traveled to Washington to meet with him later this week.

Last year, Trump said he wouldn’t allow Israel to annex the West Bank. The U.S.-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Hamas that aimed to stop the war in Gaza also acknowledged Palestinian aspirations for statehood.

Widespread condemnation

The measures further erode the Palestinian Authority’s limited powers, and it’s unclear the extent to which it can oppose them.

In a statement on Tuesday, President Mahmoud Abbas’ cabinet “instructed all public and private Palestinian institutions not to engage with these Israeli measures and to strictly adhere to Palestinian laws and regulations in force.”

A group of eight Arab and Muslim-majority countries expressed their “absolute rejection” of the measures, calling them in a joint statement Monday illegal and warning they would “fuel violence and conflict in the region.”

Israel’s pledge not to annex the West Bank is embedded in its diplomatic agreements with some of those countries and renewed warnings that it was a “red line” for the Emirates led Israel to shelve some high-level discussions on the matter last year.

United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres said he was “gravely concerned” by the measures.

“They are driving us further and further away from a two-State solution and from the ability of the Palestinian authority and the Palestinian people to control their own destiny,” his spokesperson, Stephane Dujarric, said on Monday.

What the measures mean

The measures, approved by Netanyahu’s Security Cabinet on Sunday, expand Israel’s enforcement authority over land use and planning in areas run by the Palestinian Authority, making it easier for Jewish settlers to force Palestinians to give up land.

Smotrich and Katz on Sunday said they would lift long-standing restrictions on land sales to Israeli Jews in the West Bank, shift some control over sensitive holy sites — including Hebron’s Ibrahimi Mosque, also known as the Tomb of the Patriarchs — and declassify land registry records to ease property acquisitions.

They also revive a government committee empowered to make what officials described as “proactive” land purchases in the territory, a step intended to reserve land for future settlement expansion.

Taken together, the moves add an official stamp to Israel’s accelerating expansion and would override parts of decades-old agreements that split the West Bank between areas under Israeli control and areas where the Palestinian Authority exercises limited autonomy.

Israel has increasingly legalized settler outposts built on land Palestinians say documents show they have long owned, evicted Palestinian communities from areas declared state land, firing zones or nature reserves.

More than 700,000 Israelis live in the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem, territories captured by Israel in 1967 and sought by the Palestinians for an independent state along with the Gaza Strip.

Palestinians are not permitted to sell land privately to Israelis. Settlers can buy homes on land controlled by Israel’s government.

The international community overwhelmingly considers Israeli settlement construction to be illegal and an obstacle to peace.

“These decisions constitute a direct violation of the international agreements to which Israel is committed and are steps toward the annexation of Areas A and B,” anti-settlement watchdog group Peace Now said on Sunday, referring to parts of the West Bank where the Palestinian Authority exercised some autonomy.

__ Natalie Melzer contributed reporting from Nahariya, Israel.

UN is Waiting to See How Much the US Intends to Pay of the Nearly $4 Billion it Owes

UN Secretary General António Guterres is welcomed by Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer to 10 Downing Street, London, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (Henry Nicholls/Pool Photo via AP)

By EDITH M. LEDERER

7:06 PM EST, February 9, 2026

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United Nations said Monday it’s waiting to find out how much of the nearly $4 billion the United States owes the world organization the Trump administration intends to pay and when the money will arrive.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned last week that the world body faces “imminent financial collapse” unless its financial rules are overhauled or all 193 member nations pay their dues, a message clearly directed at the United States.

The U.S. owes $2.196 billion to the U.N.’s regular operating budget, including $767 million for this year, according to a U.N. official. The U.S. also owes $1.8 billion for the separate budget for the U.N.’s far-flung peacekeeping operations, and that also will rise.

The U.S. Mission to the United Nations confirmed that U.S. Ambassador Mike Waltz said the Trump administration planned to make a significant down payment on its arrears in a matter of weeks, with the final amount still to be determined. His comments were first reported by Reuters.

U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters Monday that Guterres has been in touch with Waltz “for quite some time,” and the U.N.’s controller also has been in touch with U.S. officials.

”We’re waiting to see exactly when payments will be made and in what amount,” Dujarric said.

Guterres said in a letter to all member nations last week that cash for the U.N.'s regular operating budget could run out by July, which could dramatically affect its operations.

President Donald Trump has said the United Nations has not lived up to its potential. His administration did not pay anything to the United Nations in 2025, and it has withdrawn from U.N. organizations, including the World Health Organization and the cultural agency UNESCO, while pulling funding from dozens of others.

U.N. officials have said 95% of the arrears to the U.N.’s regular budget is from the United States.

The country second on the list for not paying its mandatory regular dues is Venezuela, which owes $38 million, the U.N. official said. The South American nation, whose economy was struggling before the U.S. military raid in January that deposed then-President Nicolás Maduro, has lost its right to vote in the General Assembly for being two years in arrears.

Nearly 60 countries paid their annual dues by the Feb. 8 due date.

British PM Starmer Vows to Fight for His Job After Furor About Former Ambassador’s Epstein Ties

By JILL LAWLESS

4:35 PM EST, February 9, 2026

LONDON (AP) — British Prime Minister Keir Starmer vowed Monday to fight for his job as revelations about the relationship between the former U.K. ambassador to Washington and Jeffrey Epstein spiraled into a full-blown crisis for his 19-month-old government.

The prime minister’s authority over his own Labour Party has been battered by fallout from the publication of files related to Epstein — a man he never met and whose sexual misconduct has not implicated Starmer.

Some lawmakers in Starmer’s center-left party have called on him to resign for his judgment in appointing Peter Mandelson to the high-profile diplomatic post in 2024 despite his ties to the convicted sex offender. The leader of the Labour Party in Scotland, Anas Sarwar, joined those calls Monday, saying “there have been too many mistakes” and “the leadership in Downing Street has to change.”

Starmer’s chief of staff and his communications director have also quit in quick succession. But Starmer insisted he will not step down.

AP correspondent Laurence Brooks reports on British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s attempt to fight for his job as revelations about Jeffrey Epstein’s ties to a former ambassador spark a leadership crisis.

“Every fight I have ever been in, I’ve won,” he told Labour lawmakers at a meeting in Parliament.

“I’m not prepared to walk away from my mandate and my responsibility to my country,” he added.

After Sarwar spoke, senior colleagues — including those tipped as potential challengers — rallied to support Starmer. Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy wrote on X: “We should let nothing distract us from our mission to change Britain and we support the Prime Minister in doing that.”

Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper posted: “At this crucial time for the world, we need his leadership not just at home but on the global stage.” Former Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, a potential successor, said Starmer “has my full support.”

Supportive lawmakers said Starmer won over a restive crowd when he addressed scores of Labour members of Parliament Monday evening behind closed doors.

“Of course, there were tough moments,” legislator Chris Curtis said. “But he really brought the room round.”

Starmer has apologized

Starmer fired Mandelson last September after emails were published showing that he maintained a friendship with Epstein after the financier’s 2008 conviction for sex offenses involving a minor. Critics say Starmer should have known better than to appoint Mandelson in the first place. The 72-year-old Labour politician is a contentious figure whose career has been tarnished with scandals over money or ethics.

A new trove of Epstein files released by authorities in the United States on Jan. 30 revealed more details about the relationship and put new pressure on Starmer.

Starmer apologized last week to Epstein’s victims and said he was sorry for “having believed Mandelson’s lies.”

He promised to release documentation related to Mandelson’s appointment, which the government says will show that Mandelson misled officials about his ties to Epstein. But publication of the documents could be weeks away. They must be vetted on national security grounds and for potential conflicts with a police investigation.

Police are investigating Mandelson for potential misconduct in public office over documents suggesting he passed sensitive government information to Epstein a decade and a half ago. The offense carries a maximum sentence of life in prison.

Mandelson has not been arrested or charged, and he does not face any allegations of sexual misconduct.

Chief of staff took the fall

Starmer’s chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, took the fall for the decision to give Mandelson the job by quitting on Sunday. He said he “advised the prime minister to make that appointment, and I take full responsibility for that advice.”

McSweeney has been Starmer’s most important aide since he became Labour leader in 2020 and is considered a key architect of Labour’s landslide July 2024 election victory. But some in the party blame him for a series of missteps since then.

Some Labour officials hope that his departure will buy the prime minister time to rebuild trust with the party and the country.

Senior lawmaker Emily Thornberry said McSweeney had become a “divisive figure” and his departure brought the opportunity for a reset.

She said Starmer is “a good leader in that he is strong and clear. I think that he needs to step up a bit more than he has.”

Others say McSweeney’s departure leaves Starmer weak and isolated.

Opposition calls to resign

Opposition Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch said Starmer “has made bad decision after bad decision” and “his position now is untenable.”

Since winning office, Starmer has struggled to deliver promised economic growth, repair tattered public services and ease the cost of living. He pledged a return to honest government after 14 years of scandal-tarred Conservative rule, but has been beset by missteps and U-turns over welfare cuts and other unpopular policies.

Labour consistently lags behind the hard-right Reform UK party in opinion polls, and its failure to improve had sparked talk of a leadership challenge, even before the Mandelson revelations.

Starmer said Monday that Reform UK’s politics would “tear this beautiful country apart,” calling the campaign to defeat them “the fight of our times.”

“As long as I have breath in my body, I’ll be in that fight,” he said.

Under Britain’s parliamentary system, prime ministers can change without the need for a national election. If Starmer is challenged or resigns, it will trigger an election for the Labour leadership. The winner would become prime minister.

The Conservatives went through three prime ministers between national elections in 2019 and 2024, including Liz Truss, who lasted just 49 days in office.

Starmer was elected on a promise to end the political chaos that roiled the Conservatives’ final years in power.

Labour lawmaker Clive Efford said Starmer’s critics should “be careful what you wish for.”

“I don’t think people took to the changes in prime minister when the Tories were in power,” he told the BBC. “It didn’t do them any good.”

Somalia Welcomes Its First Bowling Alley as the Middle Class and Diaspora Returnees Grow

By OMAR FARUK

10:58 PM EST, February 8, 2026

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — In a city long defined by conflict, Somalia ’s capital of Mogadishu now echoes with the crash of pins at the country’s first modern bowling alley.

It’s the latest sign of revival in the once-thriving Indian Ocean port shaped by 35 years of civil war and militant bombings. Millions of people were forced to flee what became one of the world’s most dangerous cities. Those who remained avoided public spaces as the al-Qaida-linked group al-Shabab waged an insurgency against the Somali state.

In recent years, improved security measures against al-Shabab, an expanded government presence and growing private investment have allowed daily life to re-emerge. Cafes line newly reopened streets, beaches draw evening crowds and traffic congestion, once unimaginable, now clogs key intersections.

The Feynuus Bowling Center opened last year and draws many locals and Somalis returning from the diaspora, who bring investment and business ideas after years of sending billions of dollars in remittances from abroad.

On a recent evening, young Somalis gathered in groups, laughing and filming each other on their phones while music played. Many from the diaspora are visiting Mogadishu for the first time in years, or the first time ever.

“I couldn’t believe Mogadishu has this place,” said Hudoon Abdi, a Somali-Canadian on holiday, as she prepared to take her turn to bowl.

“I’m enjoying it. Mogadishu is actually safe,” she said, urging others to visit.

Mogadishu remains vulnerable to militant attacks, however, with security measures like checkpoints and heavily guarded zones part of daily life. Non-Somalis remain largely confined to a compound at the international airport.

But residents say the ability to gather for recreation signals an important psychological shift. Such venues provide a welcoming environment for a younger generation eager for safe spaces to socialize.

Abukar Hajji returned from the United Kingdom on holiday after many years away and found the difference between what he imagined and what he experienced eye-opening.

“When I was flying from the U.K., I believed it was a scary place, like a war-torn country,” he said. “Everyone told me, ‘Good luck,’ but when I came and saw it with my own eyes, I didn’t want to leave.”

Sadaq Abdurahman, the manager of the bowling center, said the idea for the business emerged from a growing demand among young people for recreational facilities.

“It has created employment opportunities for at least 40 youths,” he said.

According to the Somali National Bureau of Statistics, Somalia’s unemployment rate stands at 21.4%.

The bowling alley has private security guards, bag checks and surveillance cameras, reflecting the precautions common at public venues in Mogadishu.

Urban planners and economists say businesses like the bowling alley signal a broader shift in Mogadishu’s recovery, as private sector growth increasingly complements international aid and government-led rebuilding efforts.

Ahmed Khadar Abdi Jama, a lecturer in economics at the University of Somalia, said innovative businesses are responding to the needs of diaspora returnees and the growing middle class, “which in turn adds to the expected increase in Somalia’s GDP.”

Outside the bowling alley, traffic hummed and neon signs flickered, other reminders of Mogadishu’s fragile transformation.

Storm Marta Kills at Least 4 in Morocco as the Country Battles Floods

3:04 PM EST, February 8, 2026

RABAT, Morocco (AP) — Flash floods caused by a storm in northern Morocco killed at least four people as the country struggled with days of heavy rain and water releases from overfilled dams that forced mass evacuations, local authorities said Sunday.

Three children — a girl and two boys aged 2 to 14 — and a man in his 30s died in a car that was swept away in a village near Tétouan, about 270 kilometers (168 miles) north of the capital Rabat, according to a statement from the Interior Ministry citing local authorities. Another person remains missing.

Local authorities said they will open an investigation into what happened.

The flash floods were caused by a storm system known as Marta, which moved into Morocco over the weekend and dumped up to 92 millimeters (3.6 inches) of rain on some northern cities, Houssine Youabed of Morocco’s General Directorate of Meteorology told The Associated Press. Storm Marta also reached neighboring Spain and Portugal.

Days earlier, another storm, Leonardo, hit northern Africa and the Iberian peninsula. In Morocco, it overfilled dams and rivers, damaging homes and crops, triggering minor landslides and forcing more than 150,000 people to evacuate.

The turbulent weather has also secured at least a year’s supply of drinking water for Morocco and boosted resources for the country’s critical agricultural sector, officials said, providing relief after a yearslong drought.

Haiti's Presidential Council Steps Down With No Succession Plan

Presidential Council Chair Laurent Saint-Cyr at a ceremony marking the end of the transitional council's rule, Port-au-Prince, Haiti, 7 February 2026 

Africa News

Haiti’s Transitional Presidential Council stepped down amid heavy security at the government office in Port-au-Prince on Saturday.

The tumultuous governance by the nine-member body, intended to curb the bloody gang conflict and bring about long-delayed elections, came to an end with no succession plan in place.

It ruled alongside a US-backed Prime Minister Alix Didier Fils-Aimé who was expected to remain in power and will now be solely in charge of the country.

Negotiations to decide what, if anything, would replace the council are ongoing.

The transitional council’s term was marked by a deterioration in security, corruption accusations, and political infighting.

In January, Fils-Aimé, survived an attempt by the council to remove him, with members backing down as Washington threatened serious consequences if this were to take place.

The council's plan to oust the prime minister for reasons not made public appeared to fall to the wayside as it stepped down in an official ceremony on Saturday.

“We need to put our personal interests to the side and continue progress for security,” said the council's outgoing president, Laurent Saint-Cyr, who rejected a push to dismiss the prime minister.

Fils-Aimé now faces the daunting task of organising the country’s first general elections in a decade on his own.

Haiti last held polls in 2016 and has been without an elected president since the 2021 assassination of Jovenel Moise.

Tentative dates were announced for August and December, but many experts believe it is unlikely an election and a run-off could be held this year.

The United Nations says gangs killed nearly 6,000 people in Haiti last year. About 1.4 million people, or 10 per cent of the population, have been displaced by the violence.

South Africa to Withdraw Troops from UN Mission in DR Congo

Africa News

South Africa has announced the withdrawal of its troops from a United Nations mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

President Cyril Ramaphosa’s office said on Saturday that he had informed the UN Secretary‑General, Antonio Guterres, of the decision.

South Africa has supported the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the DRC for 27 years and has more than 700 soldiers deployed there.

The Presidency said Pretoria will work jointly with the UN to finalise the timelines and other modalities of the withdrawal, which will be completed before the end of this year.

It said the decision to leave MONUSCO was influenced by the need to consolidate and realign the resources of the national defence force.

Pretoria said, however, it will maintain close ties with Kinshasa and continue to support regional, continental, and UN efforts to bring lasting peace to the the DRC.

MONUSCO’s mandate is to counter the many rebel groups who have been fighting for decades in eastern Congo, a region that has recently seen an escalation in fighting.

When its mandate was extended in December, it had a total of nearly 11,000 troops and police deployed in the country.

Organization Promoting Central African Economic Integration Suspends Activities

An organisation promoting regional economic integration among six Central African nations has suspended its activities amid a severe financial crisis.

The Commission of the Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa said almost all projects and missions will pause pending an improvement in the collection of the Community Integration Tax.

CEMAC groups together Cameroon, Gabon, Chad, the Republic of the Congo, Central African Republic, and Equatorial Guinea.

It said that, faced with a financial downturn, member states are retaining the tax levied on imports – its main source of revenue - instead of transferring it to the Commission.

CEMAC has urged member states to establish an independent mechanism for collecting this tax as a dedicated resource separate from national budgets.

Estimates suggest that the Commission collected less than half of the integration tax due last year.

The suspension aims to urgently reduce expenditures, including halting administrative meetings, and non-essential official missions planned under the 2026 budget.

Commission President, Baltazar Engonga said, however, that those activities and missions deemed strategically important will still be allowed to proceed.

Experts say the suspension will delay regional infrastructure projects, hinder the free movement of people, and slow the pace of economic integration in Central Africa.