Joshua Frank
Recall those
feverish days leading up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq when Colin Powell
presented his dubious evidence to the United Nations Security Council, claiming
Saddam Hussein possessed WMDs. The result of those bogus lies was The Iraq
Resolution, which authorized the use of force against the sovereign state, and
passed the Senate by a decisive 77-23 margin, with only 23 dissenting votes.
Support crossed party lines as Hillary Clinton and many other prominent
Democrats consistently reached into George W. Bush’s basket of lies, repeating
the neocons’ WMD propaganda. The New York Times, fulfilling its usual
perfunctory role, ran Judith Miller’s series of bogus articles parroting the
same falsehoods. Outrage grew, and we took to the streets as the U.S. invasion
loomed.
Today, I have
the same sense of helplessness each time Israel is engulfed in yet another
murderous deception, which warmakers spread through a compliant mainstream
press. Much like their selling of the Iraq war, The New York Times relentlessly
publishes pieces reiterating Israel’s rationale for bombing hospitals and
promoting the (now thoroughly debunked) allegations of mass sexual assault,
which have been used to depict all Palestinians as savages deserving of
execution. The New York Times often qualifies its errors with caveats but
rarely admits fault. Democrats still vote against halting arms shipments to war
criminal Benjamin Netanyahu, knowing it will likely harm innocent children in
Gaza. History repeats, and mothers weep.
In March 2003,
during the U.S. invasion of Iraq, we were still adapting to the emerging
digital media landscape. There were no smartphones, TikTok, Twitter, or
Instagram. While information was accessible, distribution was limited to email
lists and message boards. Independent outlets like CounterPunch, TomDispatch,
and Antiwar.com were trailblazing radical journalism, countering the tide of
pro-war disinformation from mainstream sources.
Consider
YellowTimes.org, a prominent alternative to The New York Times before the Iraq
War. Shortly after the U.S. military arrived in Iraq, their server was
suspended for posting screenshots from Al Jazeera of dead U.S. soldiers and
Iraqi civilians. The outrage stemmed not from dead Iraqis but from the sight of
lifeless troops, victims of the Bush administration’s deceit.
“No TV station
in the US is allowing dead US soldiers of POWs to be displayed and we will not
either. We understand free press and all that but we don’t want someone’s
family member to see them on some site. It is disrespectful, tacky and
disgusting,” read an email to Yellow Times editor Erich Marquardt from the
site’s Florida-based server provider, VortechHosting.
YellowTimes was
finished, never to return. While their decision to publish graphic war photos
might have smacked of poor taste, there was nothing illegal about publishing
gruesome war photos. The blatant suppression of the YellowTimes, along with the
mainstream media’s unwillingness to question the government’s WMD narrative,
would have disastrous consequences. Over the next eight years, nearly 500,000
excess deaths would be attributed to the U.S. invasion of Iraq, including 4,419
U.S. service members, and mainstream media outlets would be disseminating the
majority of the reporting.
First They Came
for the Students
In March,
nearly 22 years to the day since YellowTimes was taken down, a video captured
six plainclothes ICE agents apprehending Tufts graduate student Rümeysa Öztürk
on the streets near her home in Somerville, Massachusetts. As widely reported,
Öztürk, a Fulbright scholar, was in the country on a student visa, concluding a
PhD program in Child Study and Human Development. The disturbing video footage
provides a bird’s eye view of the authoritarian overreach we are experiencing,
highlighting the intensification of Trump’s efforts to suppress pro-Palestine
activism and a broader assault on press freedom.
Like Mahmoud
Khalil of Columbia University, and others who’ve been arrested in recent weeks,
Öztürk had not been accused of breaking any laws; she had merely co-written an
op-ed for the student newspaper urging Tufts’ President Sunil Kumar to
recognize resolutions passed by the student senate, which included a call for
the university to disclose and divest from companies with ties to Israel.
“These
resolutions were the product of meaningful debate by the Senate and represent a
sincere effort to hold Israel accountable for clear violations of international
law,” Öztürk and her co-authors wrote. “Credible accusations against Israel
include accounts of deliberate starvation and indiscriminate slaughter of
Palestinian civilians and plausible genocide.”
Öztürk’s arrest
by ICE and the threat of deportation represent an escalation. The ICE abduction
of Öztürk was a draconian strategy intended to dissuade others, especially
those on student visas, from expressing similar empathy for Palestinian
suffering. As of April 10, a total of 600 student visas have been revoked in
the United States, with most citing pro-Palestine activism.
Trump’s
crackdown on pro-Palestine protests at universities like Columbia—and the
threat to withhold $400 million in federal funding–is an escalation of a
bipartisan effort to silence pro-Palestinian voices. While President Biden
spoke against alleged anti-Semitism, he only weakly addressed the violence
directed at pro-Palestine encampments last year, which drew criticism.
“Rather than
addressing the sources of violence and heeding calls for immediate federal
action to protect student activists and uphold their rights to free expression
and assembly, President Biden has misplaced the blame on the peaceful student
activists,” wrote American Muslims for Palestine in a May 2024 statement.
“Doing so sets a dangerous precedent for students across the United States,
making them open targets for attacks by police, administrators, and extremist
Zionist groups.”
It was Biden’s
dangerous precedent that set the stage for Trump’s escalating attacks on those
speaking out against Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Students on visas in the
country have been an easy target, but these ICE arrests may only signal the
beginning of what’s to come. The press, especially media outlets that expose
Israel’s genocide, are likely to be next.
The Case of the
Alleged Hamas Freelancer
Ramzy Baroud,
one of CounterPunch’s popular contributors, was born in a Gaza refugee camp and
now resides in the U.S. His early life in the refugee camps gave him a profound
understanding of his people’s struggle for liberation. A prolific journalist
and author, Ramzy also serves as the editor of the Palestine Chronicle, one of
the first English-language Palestinian media sources on the internet, which has
been active since 1999.. Last October, his sister, Dr. Soma Baroud, was
assassinated by the Israeli Defense Forces when a missile struck her vehicle.
Her crime? Being a doctor in Gaza. At that time, she was one of over 1,000
healthcare workers killed by Israel.
Ramzy clearly
explains why his sister, like many others, was targeted. We recently had him
discuss it on our CounterPunch Radio podcast.
“ [Israel
knows] the importance of our women in our society. They know the significance
of doctors in our society, especially doctors who play more than the role of
just someone who heals wounds and helps people at hospitals,” Ramzy explained.
“Doctors who also serve the role of community leaders. And she really was a
[leader] … So it’s kind of layers of devastation. I think the family is still
unable to understand fully or to come to terms with the emotional loss just
because the loss is never really stopped and there is just no time to even
reflect in any profound or deep way about all of this.”
While Ramzy’s
sister was targeted in Gaza, the non-profit Palestine Chronicle has also faced
attacks. Last July, The New York Times published an article about a former
Israeli hostage in Gaza named Andrey Kozlov, who had been held captive by Hamas
fighters for six excruciating months after being kidnapped. Kozlov claimed that
one of his captors, Abdallah Aljamal, was moonlighting as a journalist for the
Palestine Chronicle. This accusation was repeated by Almog Meir Jan, who had
been abducted along with Kozlov and another Israeli named Shlomi Ziv at the
Nova music festival on October 7, 2023.
Aljamal was
killed in a massacre at the Nuseirat refugee camp in June 2024. He was 37 years
old. Israel has provided no evidence that Aljamal, a well-known Palestinian
journalist, was ever a member of Hamas, participated in the October 7 attacks,
or held Israeli hostages. However, as we know, Israel doesn’t require evidence
to commit war crimes, including the murder of journalists. Aljamal wasn’t the
only contributor to the Palestine Chronicle who Israel killed; notable
journalists Wafa Al-Udani and Yousef Dawas were also targeted, among the over
175 media workers killed by Israel during its onslaught on Gaza.
In July 2024,
Almond Meir Jan, one of the Israeli hostages, filed a lawsuit against the
Palestine Chronicle, claiming that, by publishing Aljama, they had provided
“material support” for a “designated foreign terrorist organization.” The suit
was later dismissed for lack of evidence that Baroud’s media project was in any
way connected to Hamas.
U.S. District
Court Judge Tiffany Cartwright stated in her ruling, “Many of the positions
taken by the Chronicle, such as highlighting the deaths of Palestinian
civilians and criticizing Israeli airstrikes, have been echoed by countless
news organizations, protesters, and political leaders around the world … These
articles do not cross the line from protected speech to inciting or preparing
for unlawful activity. Nothing in the complaint alleges that Defendants
advocated for, incited, or planned specific human rights violations.”
For its part,
the Palestine Chronicle denied having knowledge of any ties between Aljama and
Hamas, noting that he was an unpaid freelancer and not a staff writer.
Additionally, they stated in their response to Jan’s lawsuit that “Defendants
do not contest that the underlying torts committed against Jan by Aljamal and
Hamas—the kidnapping and imprisonment of a civilian hostage—are international
human rights violations.”
Following the
death of Ramzy’s sister last October, Almond Meir Jan and Shlomi Ziv filed
another lawsuit against the Palestine Chronicle, submitting a similar complaint
that by publishing Abdallah Aljamal, they were providing “material support” for
terrorism. This suit is supported by the National Jewish Advocacy Center, led
by Mark Goldfeder, who argues that he perceives anti-Zionist activism as
inherently antisemitic. The organization has filed similar lawsuits against
other media outlets, including the Associated Press, for their reporting on the
October 7 attacks.
“ [Trump] wants
to silence dissent in the United States, and there’s been a major war on
Palestinian voices and pro-Palestinian voices, [anyone] who dares stand up for
the Palestinian people,” Ramzy Baroud told CounterPunch Radio. “For many
Americans, what is happening [to] Mahmoud Khalil … [is] not igniting the kind
of attention that it really should be igniting … [Next we] are going to see
attacks on American citizens under various guises. The Espionage Act of this
and that. The Israelis have done it … I feel like the Americans are following
that trajectory.”
The lawsuits
targeting the Palestine Chronicle are not standalone incidents; they form part
of a larger strategy involving widespread visa cancellations and, illustrated
by Rümeysa Öztürk’s case, a repression of student journalism aimed at silencing
those seen as threatening U.S. interests. Consider the fate of YellowTimes
during the Iraq War, now intensified many times over. A fresh wave of
McCarthyism is resurfacing, energized by Donald Trump.
The Media as
Terrorist Enablers
Palestine
supporters have faced various forms of censorship since October 7, including
significant collaboration between Israel and Meta to eliminate anti-genocide
content from their Facebook and Instagram platforms. Additionally, Meta has
radically adjusted its algorithms to shadow ban posts criticizing Israel. In a
2023 report, Human Rights Watch described Meta’s assault on free speech as
“systemic and global.”
In June 2024,
former Meta engineer Ferras Hamad filed a lawsuit against Meta, claiming he was
wrongfully terminated for attempting to undo a program used to suppress content
related to Palestine.
These
well-documented actions have affected not only personal accounts but also media
outlets. And it’s not just Meta. The New York Times, seemingly acting on behalf
of the State Department, has done its best to discredit journalists like Vijay
Prashad, peace organizations like CODEPINK, and others, suggesting they are
pawns of the Chinese Communist Party (a claim they openly deny). The Times’
questionable reporting has led conservative lawmakers to urge Attorney General
Pamela Bondi to investigate the situation in hopes of shutting them down. Our
own podcast, CounterPunch Radio, had an episode discussing the October 7
attacks with investigative journalist Arun Gupta removed twice, without notice,
by our hosting service Blubrry. While these various attempts at censorship
might seem disparate, collectively they signify a deliberate assault on media
free speech.
The U.S.
government has stepped up its legislative efforts against non-profit media,
viewing it as detrimental to its foreign policy goals. In November 2024, HR
9495, referred to as the Stop Terror-Financing and Tax Penalties on American
Hostages Act, was approved with a vote of 219-184. This legislation allows the
Treasury Department to strip the tax-exempt status of any non-profit
organization it classifies as a “terrorist-supporting organization.” Full
authority would be granted to Treasury officials, bypassing due process. While
the bill has stalled in the Senate, it could be brought back at any moment and,
with considerable Democratic support, might find an easier route to the
President’s desk. The act would first target organizations that oppose Israel’s
genocide in Gaza.
This
legislation is not an isolated act but a continuation of the government’s
crackdown on voices it finds uncomfortable–a ruthless campaign that dates back
to the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, which laid the
foundation for the PATRIOT Act, enacted after the 9/11 attacks. What we are
experiencing now is an extension of these policies. The plan is to expand the
government’s authority to curtail free speech. Under the Heritage Foundation’s
Project 2025, journalists and whistleblowers could face prosecution.
Additionally, Project Esther—developed by the same goons behind Project
2025—outlines a strategy to categorize all pro-Palestine protests as
anti-Semitic and supportive of Hamas. This sinister initiative, as exposed by
Mondoweiss last year, also advocates for the removal of pro-Palestine students
and professors from universities.
“As the more
notorious U.S. policies of the post-9/11 era … fade from public memory, these
older antiterrorism laws have been normalized as a comparatively liberal
baseline, their structurally anti-Palestinian character having been obscured in
the meantime,” writes Palestine Legal and the Center for Constitutional Rights
in a 2024 report. “The most important of these has been the statute
criminalizing ‘material support’ for terrorist organizations, the most commonly
charged federal antiterrorism offense … As in prior moments of crisis, the same
Zionist organizations that pushed for expanded antiterrorism laws – most no-
tably the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) – now brazenly tar all advocacy of
Palestinian liberation as support for terrorism.”
Frederick
Douglass once stated, “Liberty is meaningless where the right to utter one’s
thoughts and opinions has ceased to exist. That, of all rights, is the dread of
tyrants.”
Douglass
recognized that it’s our responsibility to resist censorship in all its forms.
This begins by speaking out and supporting radical, independent media. Because,
no matter how hard the tyrants try, they’ll never silence us all.
The militant group says it
wants a comprehensive peace deal and will not accept any “partial” agreements
Hamas is seeking a
comprehensive agreement to end the war in Gaza and exchange all Israeli
hostages for Palestinians imprisoned in Israel, a senior official of the
organization has said, rejecting West Jerusalem’s proposal for another
temporary truce.
Khalil Al-Hayya, Hamas’
Gaza chief negotiator, said in a video statement on Friday that the Palestinian
group would no longer accept interim agreements. Israel’s latest proposal
involved a 45-day ceasefire and the release of ten hostages held by Hamas. In
return, Israel would release 120 Palestinian prisoners serving life sentences
and over 1,000 detainees held since October 7, 2023. The offer would require
Hamas to disarm as a condition for a complete end to the war – a demand the
group firmly rejects.
“The partial agreements are
exploited by “[Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu and his government as
a cover for their political agenda, which is founded on perpetuating the
genocidal war and siege; even if the price is sacrificing all of their own
prisoners [hostages],” Hayya said.
He stated that Hamas was
“ready to immediately negotiate a deal to swap all hostages” in exchange for an
end to the Gaza war, the release of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons, and
the reconstruction of Gaza.
The Israeli authorities
have reported that 59 hostages remain in the enclave, with 24 believed to be
alive. Dozens of others were previously released through ceasefire agreements
or separate deals.
Israeli forces have taken
control of more than half of Gaza in a renewed offensive following the collapse
of a ceasefire and the stalling of hostage negotiations last month. The IDF has
resumed air strikes in Gaza to increase pressure on Hamas to release the
remaining captives.
The latest round of talks
on Monday in Cairo to revive the January ceasefire and free Israeli hostages
ended with no apparent breakthrough, Reuters said, citing Palestinian and
Egyptian sources.
Israel has declared that
its primary goal is the total disarmament and elimination of Hamas.
Meanwhile, air strikes
continue to claim dozens of lives in Gaza. According to the enclave’s Hamas-run
civil defense agency, on Thursday, Israeli strikes killed at least 37 people,
most of whom were displaced civilians sheltering in a tent camp.
The Israeli military stated
it had carried out strikes on more than 100 “terror targets” over the past two
days, including what it described as “terrorist cells, military structures, and
infrastructure sites.”
While West Jerusalem
claimed there was no shortage of aid and defended the blockade imposed on the
enclave in March, the UN warned on Monday that Gaza is facing its most severe
humanitarian crisis since the outbreak of the hostilities.
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