On the same day that the International Court of Justice ordered the apartheid state of Israel to prevent any further acts of genocide in Gaza, the health ministry in the besieged territory reported that 174 Palestinians were killed and 310 wounded in the past 24 hours. By now the death toll in Gaza has eclipsed 26,000+ Palestinians killed and nearly 65,000 wounded since the start of Israel’s attacks.
Of course the US and UK are rushing to discredit the court’s findings, doubling down on their previous claims that Israel isn’t actually committing genocide, because ‘what even is a genocide really?’ And if it wasn’t enough to ignore the genocide or fund the weapons of war being used, the US, along with Australia, Canada, and Italy is suspending their financing of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA). This remarkably inhumane decision comes after several members of the UNRWA team were baselessly accused of being involved in the Hamas attacks on Israel back in early October. So the US is actively choosing to collectively punish all displaced Palestinians, or anyone who relies on UNRWA to survive, based on ridiculous Israeli allegations against ~0.0004% of UNRWA's staff.
In the bigger picture, it’s clear that yesterday’s decision from the ICJ was about as much as could be hoped for. The court ruled that the accusations of genocide being thrown at the apartheid state of Israel are, in fact, credible. The court ruled that Palestinians face an urgent and catastrophic situation and, perhaps most critically, that Israeli leaders have expressed genocidal intent. The ICJ ordered that Israel immediately stop killing Palestinians and all other prohibited acts under various genocide conventions, which again, is as much as they can do. They’re not going to send in troops to stop Israel’s rampage, and they’re not going to tell the US what to do with its taxpayer dollars.
With all due respect, the ICJ was never going to save Palestine, just like how a ceasefire is not and will never be the actual endgame. It’s a historic and necessary step in recognizing the crimes of an apartheid state and the plight of an oppressed people. But make no mistake, the goal here is for the complete liberation of a besieged people, by any means necessary, including the courts and the international tribunals.
Side Items
Trump Paying Up…Again: A Manhattan jury awarded $83.3 million to writer E. Jean Carroll yesterday in a costly counter to the former president’s continued social media attacks against the advice columnist. Carroll has made continued claims for years that the orange predator raped her in a department store years ago, and yet somehow this court ruling and its addition to the disgusting Trump legacy will do nothing to prevent him from being the next American president
Bobby B in Puerto Rico: In the latest edition of “Celebrities kinda just do whatever they want”, Jennifer Lopez is reportedly planning to take the classic kid’s TV show Bob the Builder down to Puerto Rico as "Roberto", a film that the singer and actress will co-produce. You may be asking yourself, “Who is the target audience here?” or “Who asked for this?” The obvious answer is no one, but that certainly won’t stop J-Lo from teaching the world that Roberto si se puede!
Murderous Pigs: Cops in the California city of Vallejo have been quietly working on a little public relations campaign that would update their department name and patches among other things. The department shift will also see them change the shape of their badges from a star to a shield to make it harder for police to mark them when an officer kills a civilian…wait what’s up? Apparently the Vallejo police previously had a tradition of bending the corners of their star-shaped badges anytime the officers murdered someone. This is the state of policing in this country