Tuesday, October 17, 2023

Slow-Cooker Beef Stroganoff in the Kitchen

Riley notes Betty Crocker's Slow-Cooker Beef Stroganoff:


Ingredients

  • 1/4 cup butter
  • 2 lb boneless beef sirloin steak, cut into 3x1/2x1/4-inch strips
  • 1 cup chopped onion
  • 2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
  • 1 can (10.5 oz) condensed golden mushroom or cream of mushroom soup
  • 1 carton (8 oz) sliced fresh mushrooms
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon pepper
  • 4 oz cream cheese, cubed (from 8-oz package)
  • 1 container (8 oz) sour cream
  • 6 cups hot cooked noodles or rice                

Steps

  • 1
    In 12-inch skillet, melt butter over medium-high heat. Add beef strips, onion and garlic; cook 7 to 9 minutes or until beef is browned.
  • 2
    In 3 1/2- to 4 1/2-quart slow cooker, mix beef mixture, soup, mushrooms, salt and pepper.
  • 3
    Cover; cook on low heat setting 5 to 6 hours or until beef is tender.
  • 4
    Stir cream cheese into beef mixture until melted. Stir in sour cream until well blended. Serve over noodles.                          


That's a pretty simple recipe -- and a slow cooker one since it's that time of year. 


Now for some news.  Sandy English (WSWS) reports:


Earlier this week, the right-wing media began a campaign of slander and censorship against a New York City Palestinian teacher who called out the pro-Zionist advice emailed to all teachers by Chancellor David Banks, an appointee of Democratic Mayor Eric Adams. 

Math teacher Mohammad Jehad Ahmad wrote on X/Twitter: “So-called ‘Israel’ has continually indiscriminately killed civilians, children, the elderly, the press, and medical workers and targeted schools, places of worship, and medical facilities … Now [Banks] has the time to send us Zionist propaganda to our official work emails.”

The New York Post, without contacting Ahmad, wrote a scurrilous and lying  piece identifying him with antisemitism. The gutter organ of the Murdoch family published the name of Ahmad’s school. The witch-hunt was inflamed on X/Twitter by various Zionist and fascist forces and then further exacerbated by an article on Fox News, as described below. Ahmed and his family have received death threats. 

When he was contacted by Fox News, Ahmad said, in a statement published on social media: “For the last 75 years so-called Israel has continued to exist though continued dispossession, ethnic cleansing and incremental genocide. As is supported by the UNGA resolution 37/43 (1982), the oppressed people of Palestine have a right to armed resistance against their oppressor.”

The World Socialist Web Site spoke to Mohammad Ahmad on Monday. 

Sandy English: Can you describe what happened?

Mohammad Ahmad: Earlier this week all teachers received an email from the [New York City Schools] chancellor [David Banks] with one-sided  Zionist resources, ignoring the Palestinian side of the conversation. 

I felt that he was echoing the mayor’s view which was basically normalizing extermination of Palestinians in Gaza and equating people at rallies to terrorists. I felt that the chancellor was approaching me at work and echoing this sentiment so I condemned him on Twitter. I took a screenshot of the email that all teachers received with the Zionist resources, and I condemned him for this and how he was approaching this conversation. 

And then Saturday morning I received a text message from a friend that the New York Post wrote an article about me. The Post had not reached out to me for comment, and they just published this one tweet of mine and found an image of my face from my personal Facebook profile. They had trawled through my Twitter, and then they compiled an article with me at the center. They misconstrued what I said in a very anti-Jewish light, which is not at all what I'm saying.

Then came the simple Twitter harassment, and then Fox News picked it up and reached out to me for comment. I’m not a public figure, so I didn’t know how to approach this. I thought, well, this is a good opportunity because the New York Post didn't reach out to me for comment. This is a chance for me to kind of explain myself. And so, I sent Fox News a lengthy response. They literally clipped three words from it and wrote a whole article. And that’s when it became national, and it started getting desperate. 


That really is awful, the way they keep demonizing people. 

This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot" for Tuesday:

Tuesday, October 17, 2023.  Gaza remains under assault.


Starting in the United States where a wack job tried to carry out the corporate media endorsed collective punishment.  NBC NEWS' Samira Puskar and Marlene Lenthang and Corky Siemaszko report:


The suburban Chicago landlord accused of stabbing a 6-year-old Palestinian American boy to death and badly wounding his mother was ordered held behind bars Monday while federal authorities opened a hate crimes investigation into what they say was a deadly anti-Muslim attack.

Dressed in an orange prison-issued jumpsuit, his hair disheveled, 71-year-old Joseph Czuba answered "yes sir" to the judge but otherwise sat quietly in a Will County courtroom where he was formally charged with three counts of murder, one count of attempted murder, two counts of aggravated battery and two counts of committing a hate crime.

Investigators said the deadly attack that resulted in the death of Wadea Al-Fayoume was linked to the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas in the Middle East.


As Trina observed last night, "The consequences of rhetoric.  You cannot demonize a people non-stop on the media over and over and then act surprised when some deranged nut case absorbs the message and acts upon it."  Patrick Martin (WSWS) notes:


In the wake of this killing, there were the usual professions of horror and outrage by the US capitalist politicians who have been spreading the pro-Israel propaganda depicting the Palestinians as devils in human face. Illinois’s billionaire governor, J. B. Pritzker, called the murder “nothing short of evil,” an empty label that covers up the real causes of the attack, which lie not in Czuba’s psyche, but in the society that produced and directed him.

The White House issued a few paragraphs claiming that President Biden and his wife Jill were “shocked and sickened” by the news. “This horrific act of hate has no place in America, and stands against our fundamental values,” the US president claimed.

Last week, Biden gave a speech in which he described the actions of the Palestinians who broke through the gates of the open-air prison they inhabit as “pure, unadulterated evil.” In using this dehumanizing language to describe the Palestinians, Biden echoed the language of Gallant and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

In his speech, Biden gave Israel carte blanche for its attacks on the civilian population of Gaza, declaring, “Like every nation in the world, Israel has the right to respond—and indeed has a duty to respond—to these vicious attacks.” Already, Israel has killed over 2,000 Palestinians in the present conflict. With all food, water and energy cut off, and with a full invasion likely, the death toll will only soar.

In an interview on “60 Minutes” over the weekend, Biden said that Hamas’ October 7 raid “is as consequential as the Holocaust.” Between 1939 and 1945, the Nazis’ “Final Solution” exterminated 6 million Jews, approximately 40 percent of the total world Jewish population at the time.

The Hamas raid of October 7, which resulted in approximately 1,000 Israeli deaths, was the action of oppressed people who had broken out of a open air prison camp. To compare this to the Holocaust is a grotesque anti-Palestinian slander that could not but encourage the type of violent actions that took place in Illinois.


Brett Wilkins (COMMON DREAMS) adds:


At a Sunday news conference, Illinois State Assemblyman Abdelnasser Rashid (D-21)—who is Palestinian American—said: "Let's be clear. This was directly connected to the dehumanizing of Palestinians that has been allowed over the last week by our media, by our elected officials who have lacked the moral compass and lacked the courage to call for something as simple as de-escalation and peace."

  "Let's not sugar-coat it," Rashid wrote on X, formerly Twitter, "this hate crime is a result of the dehumanizing, one-sided media coverage of Palestinians and irresponsible statements from elected officials."

"Israeli spokespeople have been using genocidal language about Palestinians on news channels every day for the past week," he added. "The Israeli military has killed over 2,600 Palestinians in the last week, including more than 700 children, and the numbers increase by the hour." 


Now to yesterday's DEMOCRACY NOW!




AMY GOODMAN: We begin today’s show in Gaza, where the death from Israel’s 10-day bombardment has topped 2,750. The dead include over a thousand Palestinian children. Over 50 Palestinians have also been killed in the occupied West Bank. Over 1 million residents of Gaza have been displaced, including many who fled their homes after Israel ordered the entire northern Gaza Strip to be vacated. More than a thousand people are believed to be trapped under rubble following Israeli airstrikes.

And the humanitarian catastrophe is growing as hospitals are running out of electricity and water due to the Israeli siege. Water has already run out at U.N. shelters across the Gaza Strip. This is Dr. Mohammed Abu Mughaiseeb, deputy medical coordinator in Gaza for Doctors Without Borders.

DR. MOHAMMED ABU MUGHAISEEB: The situation is very difficult. I mean, today we were for two hours searching for drinkable water. Even drinkable water is not available anymore. It’s very difficult. Food, still there is food. No electricity, no pumping of normal water, as well. The hospitals are barely working. I mean, there’s a lot of medical staff who left the hospital with their families because you cannot — I mean, they are not safe, so they need to stay with their families to evacuate, as well. Medication is really decreasing in the private pharmacies, as well. So, I mean, it’s very dangerous. I mean, they are bombing all the day, so, I mean, there is no humanitarian corridor. Today I am in contact with some hospitals, mainly Shifa. Burn unit, there is only one surgeon, one anesthesiologist, no nurses at all in the hospital, in this burn unit especially. They have a lot of shortage or — I mean, we don’t know what will be tomorrow and where we are going.

AMY GOODMAN: Oxfam’s Omar Ghrieb recorded this audio message from Gaza after fleeing the northern Gaza Strip after Israel ordered the area fully evacuated. He described the mass exodus as “Nakba 2.0.”

OMAR GHRIEB: Perhaps yesterday was one of the worst days of my life. We spent years hearing from our grandparents about Nakba and what that was and how they felt. And I think yesterday we had the chance to actually see it with our own eyes when we were all pushed into mass expulsion, to go from north and center Gaza into southern Gaza. And it was really horrible. People spent over 14 hours in an influx of a sea made of people, just walking with their belongings, holding children, holding sick people, holding people with disability, just walking and walking and walking under the sun, begging any passing car to take them, but most cars were full to the brim. It was Nakba 2.0 happening right in front of our eyes, and we are actually a part of it.

I don’t know how and when we reached the south, but people kept coming. The streets were frantically busy. And I saw so many people just taking the streets, like putting their children and their belongings in the street and just sitting there, because most really left aimlessly with nowhere to go and no one to seek refuge to. And on top of that, they talked about a safe humanitarian route, and then they bombed two trucks filled with people. Tens were dead. I saw the bombing place. I don’t know what’s going to happen next.

AMY GOODMAN: That was Oxfam’s Omar Ghrieb speaking from Gaza. Many Palestinians say there’s no place for them to go. This is Um Muhammad Al-Laham, a grandmother, speaking from a hospital in Khan Younis next to her 4-year-old granddaughter, who was the only member of her family to survive after Israel bombed their home.

UM MUHAMMAD AL-LAHAM: [translated] They were sitting inside the house. My sons and his sons and one of their mothers-in-law were at his house. Suddenly, without warning, they bombed the house. Fourteen people were killed. Only this girl, my granddaughter Fulla, survived. I hope she’ll get better and stay safe and heal. May their souls rest in peace. God is the one who gives patience to people. … May God keep me alive to take care of her, and she will be a good person. She is the only person alive from her father’s family, who is martyred, also her brother, sister, mother, grandmother from her mother’s side, her uncles — all of them, 14 people all at once.

AMY GOODMAN: In Israel, family members who have loved ones kidnapped by Hamas held protests over the weekend demanding their safe return. Israel now believes Hamas is holding 199 hostages, a figure that’s higher than previous estimates. This is Avichai Brodetz, a farmer from kibbutz Kfar Aza. His wife and three children were taken captive in Gaza — to Gaza.

AVICHAI BRODETZ: And my kids are over there, along with my wife, I hope in good health. And I want them to come back home in good health. And I came here. This is where decisions are being made in Israel. If I could go to the center of Gaza and do the same thing, I would. And I wish I could go there some day. … We have to stop. I think we got this right now as a sign from God just to stop the bloodshed. And I ask Hamas, which is holding my family — I hope, again, in good health — please stop, and the Israeli government to please stop and just bring the women and children back.

AMY GOODMAN: We’re joined now by Omar Shakir, Israel and Palestine director at Human Rights Watch. He’s joining us from Chicago.

Omar, tell us the latest — it’s so difficult to make contact with people in Gaza right now — what you understand is happening, Israel demanding that the entire population of northern Gaza, which is the main population center, including Gaza City, must move south of Khan Younis, then, though, that we heard that they were bombing Khan Younis. Talk about the situation now.

OMAR SHAKIR: We’re witnessing a situation that’s simply not fathomable for any of us on the outside. We’re talking about a population that has now for days been without electricity, that has been without water, that has been without — for large parts of it, without internet, that’s been without food, that’s been without aid. Hundreds of thousands have left northern Gaza. You know, if they’re lucky, they’ve been able to get to relatives and family homes south of Wadi Gaza, as many do not have that privilege and, you know, are making temporary accommodations. They’re under constant bombardment. We’ve seen some of the more intense bombing of Gaza take place over the last 24 to 48 hours. There have been reports of people killed as they were taking a safe route out of Gaza. The hospitals are operating on generators, which are running out of fuel. People are now resorting to water that’s unfit for human consumption. There are people that have not been able to leave northern Gaza, because you have there Gaza’s main hospital. You have people with disabilities. You have older people. And they’re terrified of what might come ahead. You have Israeli officials who are signaling their intent to commit large-scale atrocities.

So we really have a terrifying situation where people in Gaza are saying their goodbyes to the world. They’re not sure, you know, whether or not they’ll make it to the evening, to tomorrow morning. The humanitarian situation, despite reports, people are not being allowed — have not been allowed to leave via Rafah as of the time we’re speaking. Aid is still not getting in. Electricity is still not getting in. There’s no confirmed reports of even water having come back in. So it’s a really desperate situation.

AMY GOODMAN: Heard that the Secretary of State Antony Blinken had pushed them to turn the water back on, but because the electricity isn’t on, it couldn’t be pumped.

OMAR SHAKIR: Exactly. I mean, in order for water to be provided, you obviously need the electricity to allow the water to be pumped. You also need — you know, the ability for the desalinizational plant to operate, you need electricity. Water infrastructure has been damaged in the airstrikes. And again, the water was only being provided to a certain part of southern Gaza, which is clearly part of the Israeli government’s strategy of trying to empty northern Gaza of its population. There are obviously many other areas in Gaza. So, right now people have no choice but to turn to water which is unfit for human consumption and which carries the risk, for those who drink it, of waterborne illnesses. So, amid everything else, not having water — as the U.N. has said, water is life. And Gaza is running out of life.

AMY GOODMAN: Omar Shakir, in a long Twitter thread you posted on Saturday, you warned Israeli authorities are signaling their intent to commit mass atrocities. You cite a number of Israeli officials making statements suggesting precisely that. Can you document what you’re saying and what they’ve been saying?

OMAR SHAKIR: Absolutely. I mean, we have seen rhetoric from the Israeli government that signals that they hold the entire 2.2 million people of Gaza responsible for the heinous attacks that took place on October 7th. You have the president of Israel, Isaac Herzog, who has said very clearly that the entire nation of Gaza is responsible. He notes that the people there could have risen up to topple the Hamas government. You have statements from Israel’s energy minister, who was responsible for cutting the water, the fuel, the electricity, who has similarly talked about, you know, cutting off the last drop of water and the last battery until they’re defeated. Again, he’s referring — it’s a statement that refers both to Hamas authorities but also to evacuating the entire population. You have statements, of course, from Israel’s defense minister, that’s gotten much attention, about fighting “human animals,” declaring an entire siege on Gaza. You have Israel’s U.N. ambassador that was on CNN a couple of days ago and spoke about how, you know, “Let’s remember that Hamas — you know, that the population of Gaza elected Hamas.” Of course, he neglects to mention that nearly half of Gaza’s population are children who weren’t even alive to vote at the last time there were elections.

All these statements should worry the international community, because they’re not happening in a vacuum. They’re happening as the Israeli government reduces entire neighborhoods and blocks to rubble, as hundreds of children and civilians have been killed in relentless bombardments, 6,000 bombs dropped in a 25-by-7-mile area, I mean, an open-air prison. So these statements aren’t happening in a vacuum. They’re happening amid the most intense bombardment of Gaza we’ve maybe ever seen, in a situation where more than a million people, according to reports, have been displaced from their homes. So, the international community must act to stop this. There is a moment that we can try and stop this, and we must do so before it’s too late.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to play for our audience Israeli President Isaac Herzog claiming no one is innocent in the Gaza Strip, including civilians.

PRESIDENT ISAAC HERZOG: We are working, operating militarily, according to rules of international law, period, unequivocally. It’s an entire nation out there that is responsible. It’s not true, this rhetoric about civilians were not aware, not involved. It’s absolutely not true. They could have risen up. They could have fought against that evil regime which took over Gaza in a coup d’état. But we are at war. We are at war. We are at war with the other. We are defending our homes. We are protecting our homes. That’s the truth. And then, when a nation protects its home, it fights. And we will fight until we break their backbone.

AMY GOODMAN: “We will fight until we break their backbone.” I want to turn to your post on Saturday, where you wrote, “History teaches us that, when there are clear calls to commit large-scale atrocities by a party capable of doing so & actions taken consistent with those words, they need to be taken seriously & stopped. That’s where we are today in Israel & Palestine. A descent into darkness.” Omar Shakir, if you can take it from there?

OMAR SHAKIR: Yeah, I mean, Present Herzog talked about breaking their back. They have broken the back of the people of Gaza in a way that’s simply unprecedented. The statement that the Israeli government is complying with international law is pure fiction. I mean, we know they’ve cut vital necessities, as we’ve discussed, to the entire civilian population. They have sealed the crossings. We know that they have bombed in a way that, again, has reduced — as has been proudly boasted by the Israeli Air Force on Twitter, of reducing entire neighborhoods and blocks to rubble.

You know, we really need to take note of these statements, because the Israeli government — and again, what’s striking here is that it’s not meeting the sort of pushback that one would expect in a situation like this. I mean, it took days for Europe and the United States even to reiterate basic platitudes about the need to comply with international humanitarian law. You’re not seeing sufficient effort taken to warn of the risks to Gaza’s population. It is a situation that, as we speak, is deteriorating, and not enough is being done to stop it.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to ask you about white phosphorus. You tweeted — Human Rights Watch tweeted October 12th, “Israel has used white phosphorus in military operations in Gaza and Lebanon, putting civilians at risk of serious and long-term injuries. White phosphorus causes excruciating burns and can set homes afire. Its use in populated areas is unlawful.” Israel has denied this. What proof do you have of this, Omar Shakir?

OMAR SHAKIR: I mean, Israel also denied it in 2009, when Human Rights Watch documented it, and that turned out to be false, as was disproven by numerous other voices. Human Rights Watch verified this evidence. It’s confirmed. We were able to take video footage that took place both in Lebanon and Gaza, verified that it was recorded when it was taken. We ran these by weapons and munitions experts, who confirmed that it was — you know, that what was shown was white phosphorus. And then we interviewed people who live in the communities where the white phosphorus was dropped in Gaza, near the port area, and their description of what it looked like and smelled like was consistent with the use of white phosphorus.

Amnesty International followed up with their own reporting, where they were able to verify additional areas in which white phosphorus was used. They were able to look at footage that was provided by the Israeli government of some of the weapon systems being used in Gaza, again being able to source that it was white phosphorus that was being carried by those planes.

And, of course, we’re talking about a weapon that is, when dropped in civilian areas, unlawful, because it can burn homes and other structures. It can cause lifelong suffering for the communities that live there. The fact that the Israeli government is using it — and let’s note that they have — even when not used as a weapon, even when white phosphorus is used for signaling or obscuring the army, it can cause harm to civilians. And the Israel army has readily available alternatives that have much of the same effect in terms of signaling or obscuring, without the harm it causes to civilian populations. Its use is [inaudible] —

AMY GOODMAN: Well, Omar Shakir, I want to thank you very much for being with us, Israel and Palestine director at Human Rights Watch, also authored the landmark 2021 Human Rights Watch report titled “A Threshold Crossed: Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution.”

Coming up, Israeli historian, Holocaust scholar Raz Segal. He says Israel’s assault on Gaza is “a textbook case of genocide.” Back in 30 seconds.


Jake Johnson (COMMON DREAMS) reports:


  Israel's relentless bombing campaign in the occupied Gaza Strip has killed more than 1,000 Palestinian children—roughly one every 15 minutes—since it began on October 7, according to the latest tally from Defense for Children International–Palestine.

Children have faced some of the most horrific impacts of Israel's ongoing assault on Gaza, where roughly half of the population is under the age of 18. Israel has dropped more than 6,000 bombs on Gaza—home to 2.3 million people—in the wake of Hamas' deadly attack.

Mohammad Abu Rukbeh, senior Gaza field researcher at DCIP, said in a statement Tuesday that "the repercussions of this war will not only affect the victims we have lost, some of which are still trapped under the rubble of their homes, and not only the residential areas that have been completely destroyed, including our own homes, but the psychological impact on us civilians and our children will be catastrophic."

Research released before Israel's latest bombardment of Gaza found that four out of five children in the Gaza Strip reported living with depression, grief, and fear amid a yearslong Israeli blockade and frequent outbreaks of deadly violence.

Israel's current military campaign in Gaza is its deadliest to date, and the unlawful total blockade it has imposed on the strip has further deprived children and the rest of the civilian population of food, fuel, electricity, and clean water. Some Gazans have resorted to drinking seawater and water contaminated by sewage, and hospital staff have reportedly had to drink from IV solution bags.

"Israeli authorities cut water supply to Gaza on October 9, and since then, all three water desalination plants in Gaza have been forced to cease operations," DCIP noted Tuesday, citing the United Nations. "Even though Israeli authorities claimed to resume water supply to southern Gaza yesterday, there is no electricity to operate water pumps, Israeli airstrikes have damaged many water lines, and very little water in Gaza is drinkable in the first place."


Around the world, people protest the assault on the Palestinians.  ARAB NEWS reports:


Iraqi activists have called for demonstrations on Friday across Baghdad to support “besieged” Palestinians in the Gaza Strip amid the ongoing Israeli war and occupation.

“The Preparatory Committee announced the organization of massive popular demonstrations in Baghdad and the rest of the country’s governorates, in support of the brothers in Palestine and in solidarity with the besieged Gaza Strip, and the Palestinian resistance factions in the face of the usurping Israeli occupation,” according to a statement received by the Iraqi News Agency.

The statement added that one demonstration will be held at 4 p.m. near the Suspension Bridge in Baghdad.

It called on Iraqis from other governorates to hold similar actions in their cities.

“We call on all social and popular (activists), unions and federations to actively participate in this mass mobilization in support for the brothers and (resistance fighters) in the occupied Palestine,” the statement added.

The same youth activists called for demonstrations in Baghdad last Friday and the turnout was huge and overwhelming -- as it was in Kirkuk and other areas of Iraq.  In the US, Brett Wilkins (COMMON DREAMS) reports:


  Dozens of Jewish Americans and allies were arrested Monday outside the White House in Washington, D.C. as thousands of protesters urged the Biden administration to press for an end to Israel's massive bombardment of Gaza—which, after just 10 days has already killed more Palestinians than any previous Israeli war on the besieged coastal enclave.

Event organizers said more than 50 people were arrested by Capitol Police and uniformed Secret Service agents after blocking multiple entrances to the White House during a demonstration organized by the Jewish-led peace groups IfNotNow and Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP). Protesters chanted "cease-fire now" and sang songs in Hebrew after being arrested and made to sit on the ground with their hands cuffed behind their backs. 


COUNTERPUNCH carries the 10 point statement from The Cornell Collective for Justice in Palestine.  The Cornell Collective make their public statement at a time when, in the US, threats are made against bodies speaking out.  At THE NATION, Rebecca Cadenhead reports:

 

Days earlier, on October 7, the Harvard Palestine Solidarity Committee published a letter in response to Hamas’s massacre of Israeli civilians and the retaliatory Israeli attacks on Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. It was cosigned by 33 student organizations. 

“We, the undersigned student organizations, hold the Israeli regime entirely responsible for all unfolding violence,” the letter began.

Today’s events did not occur in a vacuum. For the last two decades, millions of Palestinians in Gaza have been forced to live in an open-air prison. Israeli officials promise to “open the gates of hell,” and the massacres in Gaza have already commenced. Palestinians in Gaza have no shelters for refuge and nowhere to escape. In the coming days, Palestinians will be forced to bear the full brunt of Israel’s violence.


The letter was immediately criticized for its timing, its assertion that the Israeli government was “entirely responsible for all unfolding violence,” and its lack of sympathy for Israeli deaths. But that weekend, discussion was mostly confined to the university. “Initially, I saw it being passed around on social media,” says Phoebe Barr, a senior involved in a few Harvard activist groups. Barr noticed that it was being discussed on Sidechat, an anonymous social media platform popular at the university. “People started posting things like, ‘Oh, my God, PSC released this statement, isn’t it so horrible?’ And then some people were defending it, saying [the PSC] weren’t condoning violence and that it was just a statement about the origins of conflict in the region and the way that governments can provoke violent attacks.”

By October 9, discussion of the letter left the university entirely. That afternoon, Larry Summers, a former Harvard president, issued a condemnation of the letter on Twitter, now known as X, which he said it was “morally unconscionable” and displayed a “lack of clarity regarding terrorism.” “In nearly 50 years of @Harvard affiliation, I have never been as disillusioned and alienated as I am today,” he wrote.

By the end of the day, Summers was joined by a litany of Harvard professors, students, business leaders, and politicians, including Senator Ted Cruz and Representatives Ritchie Torres and Elise Stefanik. Most argued that the letter implicitly or explicitly condoned terrorism; Stefanik wrote that the letter excused the “slaughter of innocent women and children.”

In a statement to The Harvard Crimson, a representative from the PSC wrote that the organization rejects “the accusation that our previous statement could be read as supportive of civilian deaths.” Instead, “the statement aims to contextualize the apartheid and colonial system while explicitly lamenting ‘the devastating and rising civilian toll.’”

By the morning of October 10, the letter was an international news story. Billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman tweeted that Harvard should release the names of students involved in organizations who signed the letter; he and several other business leaders vowed that they would not hire students who had membership in the signing organizations. University President Claudine Gay told the Crimson that the letter did not speak for “Harvard University or its leadership.” Five organizations that originally signed the letter—Amnesty International at Harvard, Harvard College Act on a Dream, the Harvard Undergraduate Nepali Student Association, the Harvard Islamic Society, and Harvard Ghungroo—removed their signatures. By that evening, a counter-letter penned by Harvard Hillel’s president condemning the original letter had accumulated 3,000 signatures from Harvard affiliates.

Opponents of the letter began to post the personal information of students in the Palestine Solidarity Committee and other signatories. Currently, at least four websites list such personal information, and students have reported that hundreds of strangers have tried to contact their employers and families, targeted their social media accounts, and sent them intimidating messages, including death threats. As a result, a list of the co-signing organizations was removed from the letter on the afternoon of October 10.

n Tuesday, Amy, a member of the Palestine Solidarity Committee realized they had been doxxed. (Amy is a pseudonym; they spoke to me under the condition of anonymity.) Friends and family members started sending them links to websites and social media posts that shared their full name, picture, and other identifying information. Then, strangers—who have no connection to Harvard and appear to have found Amy’s information through these websites—began sending Amy threatening direct messages on their social media accounts.

Amy began to worry that they would be targeted when they left their dorm room. “I have not slept, I’ve barely eaten, I have not completed my schoolwork.” Amy says. “I have not been able to focus in class. This is one of the worst weeks at Harvard I’ve ever experienced.”

Of particular concern to Amy and other members of the Palestine Solidarity Committee is the truck displaying students’ faces and names, which has been colloquially dubbed “the doxxing truck.” The truck, which circled Harvard’s campus for two days, is owned by Accuracy in Media (AIM), a right-wing organization based in Washington, D.C. “The discourse about Harvard is drawing media attention away from the actual conflict,” one told me. “I also think it’s terrible to identify activists as terrorists.”

 

Those cheering on the attacks on Palestinians are in the wrong and they can't win any logical argument so they attack the people who speak out against the assault and geocide in an attempt to silence the voices pointing out reality.   Ray Acheson (COUNTERPUNCH) observes, "Consistency is the condition of credibility. When one says nothing justifies the killing of Israelis and in the same breath condones the killing of Palestinians, that is morally reprehensible, legally unacceptable, and politically and humanly catastrophic. Palestinian civilians are not less deserving of protection. Palestinian lives are not less worthy of respect. The families of hundreds of Palestinians killed, overwhelmingly civilians … deserve solidarity and compassion…. If you abandon them, you abandon your humanity, you undermine our international law-based order, you serve neither the cause of justice nor the cause of peace."



Turning to the US and the race for president, more struggles as the GOP tries to determine their party's presidential nominee.  Dasha Burns (NBC NEWS) reports minor candidate Tim Scott continues to struggle: 



The super PAC backing Sen. Tim Scott’s presidential campaign is pulling the TV ad reservations it had made for the fall, the group announced in a memo to donors obtained by NBC News.

“Starting today, we are going to release all of our Fall media inventory,” Trust in the Mission PAC co-chair Rob Collins wrote in the memo. “We will continue to fully fund our grassroots door knocking, conduit fundraising, event hosting, and earned media efforts.”


Natalie Allison (POLITICO) adds, "The retreat from TV is the latest sign of how dire the primary has become for a candidate who once anticipated outside help from big donors — but who is now polling in low single digits and hasn’t yet qualified for the third debate."  Also struggling is former Vice President Mike Pence.  Alex Bollinger (LGBTQ NATION) reports:


An unknown man heckled 2024 GOP presidential candidate Mike Pence at a campaign event in New Hampshire by claiming that the two have a sexual relationship.

“Mike Pence, are you going to tell them? Tell them! You promised today was our coming out day,” the person yelled as Pence talked with gathered reporters as he officially registered as a candidate in the New Hampshire GOP primary at the state secretary of state’s office. “Mike Pence and I are gay. We’re gay! Here’s the proof! Here’s the proof!”

[. . .]


As vice president, he has given a keynote address at an anti-LGBTQ+ hate group conference, refused to mention LGBTQ+ people during his World AIDS Day addresses, gave a speech at a conference about “how gender ideology harms children,” and is rumored to be one of the chief architects behind the transgender military ban.


Did Pence just get outed?  Also experiencing townhall problems?  Vivek Ramaswamy.  Isaac Schorr (MEDIAITE) reports:


Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy was confronted by a critical town hall attendee in New Hampshire who excoriated him as a “scam artist” and “showman” in New Hampshire on Saturday.

“Mr. Ramaswamy, thank you. You’ve expressed some illogical and dangerous positions just about everything under the sun. But I will only bring up a few points today,” began the voter, who was instructed by Ramaswamy to “be respectful” of other attendees and pick her “favorite” critiques.

“A few years ago, we all saw firsthand the disastrous results when a ruthless capitalist, a scam artist, a showman, and a liar with no public service experience became the president of the United States, and yet we are here again. My fellow New Hampshire residents are being manipulated by showmen and Trump wannabes to win our votes,” declared the Granite Stater, drawing a parallel between Ramaswamy and former President Donald Trump.

She continued:

Mr. Ramaswamy, you may be a millionaire and you may know how to avoid paying taxes by incorporating companies in Bermuda. But let’s talk about your lack of job qualifications. You’re not qualified to become the principal of my children’s school of only 1000 students. You’re not qualified to be the selectboard of my town with a population of 16,000 people. And you’re definitely not qualified to run for the highest office of our nation to govern 330 million Americans. Spewing nonsensical, fast talking, empty words interspersed with name dropping, Thomas Jefferson and George Washington should not be misconstrued as knowledgeable. We Americans should stop thinking that rich men who fund their campaigns and manipulate us into thinking that they’re smart or savvy, are qualified for the presidency to receive the codes to launch nuclear weapons and to become the commander-in-chief of our military forces.

“If we American voters keep supporting self-promoting showmen who treat the U.S. presidency or vice presidency as an entry level position, then we, the American people, are to blame for the destruction of our democratic institutions. Please your thoughts about that?” she concluded. 


As Mike noted last night, Ronald DeSantis avoids his won townhall issues by ejecting a 15-year-old  boy. Remember, America, if they're fourteen or younger, Ronald will step up to them and defend America but 15 and over, you're on your own.  Bess Levin (VANITY FAIR) explains:


In 2023, hating the media and viewing it as a sworn enemy is basically an official plank of the Republican Party, as it has been for several years now. To hear Republicans tell it, the media is out to get them and is not to be trusted. Usually, this stance is directed at legacy publications like The New York Times or The Washington Post, which have the audacity to ask questions like, “Who do you think won the 2020 election?” Apparently, though, the Times and the Post aren’t the only ones to have gotten under the GOP’s skin. It also has a 15-year-old aspiring reporter to reckon with.

On Friday, Quinn Mitchell, a New Hampshire teen who has been following politicians on both sides of the aisle since he was barely in the double digits, was thrown out of a GOP event where almost every Republican candidate for the 2024 nomination was expected to speak. Mitchell first came to prominence while attending a town hall in June, where he asked Ron DeSantis if he believed that Donald Trump “violated the peaceful transfer of power, a key principle of American democracy that we must uphold.” DeSantis responded by asking, “Are you in high school?” and then failed to actually answer the question.



DeSantis, stuffed into lockers throughout his schooling, still suffers PTS from an especially savage atomic wedgie he endured freshman year at Dunedin High School while Beck's "Loser" played over the p.a. system.  In fact, you only have to whisper "In the time of chimpanzees I was a monkey" into his ear to make him wet his shorts today. 


The following sites updated: 


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