"Israeli leadership must realise that there is no military solution to its security concerns."
— King Abdullah of Jordan in Cairo
One minute into his speech at the Cairo Summit, King Abdullah switched from Arabic "for our friends in Europe and around the world, my message is for them."
Full video of his remarks and transcript below:
Peace, God’s mercy and blessings be upon you.
This is how Muslims and Arabs greet others: with a wish for the other to be blessed with peace and the mercy of God.
Our religion came with a message of peace. The Pact of Omar, issued at the gates of Jerusalem almost 15 centuries ago, more than a thousand years before the Geneva Conventions, ordered Muslim soldiers not to kill a child, a woman or an old person, not to destroy a tree, not to harm a priest, not to destroy a church.
Those are the rules of engagement that Muslims must accept and abide by, as should all those who believe in our common humanity. All civilian lives matter!
I am outraged and grieved by those acts of violence waged against innocent civilians in Gaza, in the West Bank, and Israel.
The relentless bombing campaign underway in Gaza as we speak is cruel and unconscionable—on every level.
It is collective punishment of a besieged and helpless people.
It is a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law.
It is a war crime.
Yet, the deeper the crisis cuts of cruelty, the less the world seems to care.
Anywhere else, attacking civilian infrastructure and deliberately starving an entire population of food, water, electricity, and basic necessities would be condemned. Accountability would be enforced, immediately, unequivocally.
And it has been done before—recently, in another conflict.
But not in Gaza. It’s been two weeks since Israel put in place the complete siege of the Gaza Strip. And still, for the most part, global silence.
Yet the message the Arab world is hearing is loud and clear: Palestinian lives matter less than Israeli ones. Our lives matter less than other lives. The application of international law is optional. And human rights have boundaries—they stop at borders, they stop at races, and they stop at religions.
That is a very, very dangerous message, as the consequences of continued international apathy and inaction will be catastrophic—on us all.
We cannot let raw emotions dictate the moment; our priorities today are clear and urgent:
First: An immediate end to the war on Gaza, the protection of civilians, and the adoption of a unified position that indiscriminately condemns the targeting of all civilians, in line with our shared values and international law, which loses all value if it is implemented selectively.
Second: The sustained and uninterrupted delivery of humanitarian aid, fuel, food, and medicines to the Gaza Strip.
Third: The unequivocal rejection of the forced displacement or internal displacement of the Palestinians. This is a war crime according to international law, and a red line for all of us.
This conflict, my friends, did not start two weeks ago, and it will not stop if we continue down this blood-soaked path. We know all too well that it will only lead to more of the same—a zero-sum game of death and destruction, of hatred and hopelessness played on repeat.
Today, Israel is literally starving civilians in Gaza, but for decades, Palestinians have been starved of hope, of freedom, and a future.
Because when the bombs stop falling, Israel is never held accountable, the injustices of occupation continue and the world walks away, until the next round of violence. The bloodshed we are witnessing today is the price of that, of failing to make tangible progress towards a political horizon that brings peace for Palestinians and Israelis alike.
Israeli leadership must realise that there is no military solution to its security concerns, that it cannot continue to sideline the five million Palestinians living under its occupation, denied of their legitimate rights, and that Palestinians lives are no less valuable than Israeli lives.
The Israeli leadership must realise, once and for all, that a state can never thrive if it is built on the foundations of injustice.
Over the past 15 years, we have seen how the dreams of a two-state solution and the hopes of an entire generation have turned into despair. This has been the policy of hardline Israeli leadership—to focus solely on security over peace and create new illegal realities on the ground that render an autonomous Palestinian state unviable. In the process, it has empowered extremists on both sides.
But we must not—we cannot—write off this conflict as too far gone, for the sake of both the Palestinians and the Israelis.
Our collective and unified message to the Israeli people should be: We want a future of peace and security for you and for the Palestinians, where your children and Palestinian children should no longer live in fear.
It is our duty as the international community to do whatever it takes to restart a meaningful political process that can take us to a just and sustainable peace on the basis of the two-state solution.
The only path to a safe and secure future for the people of the Middle East and the entire world—for the Jewish people, for Christians, for Muslims alike—starts with the belief that every human life is of equal value and it ends with two states, Palestine and Israel, sharing land and peace from the river to the sea.
The time to act is now.
Here’s what went down: we just won a clean 45 day gov extension, stripped GOP’s earlier 30% cuts to Social Security admin etc, staved off last minute anti-immigrant hijinks, and averted shutdown (for now).
People will get paychecks and MTG threw a tantrum on the way out. Win-win
53% of US adults now believe that routine vaccines administered to dogs are either unsafe, ineffective, or unnecessary.
Anyone who downplays the threat of the anti-vaccine movement is either not paying attention or has been bamboozled.
https://t.co/0UW18iOoHR
Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.
There’s been a massive cock up and as a result, there’s a very slim chance, some of our Hawkstone CIDER bottles might, there’s no easy way of saying this, explode. If the cap has the code L3160, open it underwater, pour it away and get in touch for a refund. [email protected]
Really sorry about this but on the upside, the beer is fine and still delicious. As is the cider, in bottles that are unaffected. Which is almost all of them.
Happy Fourth of July, everybody.
Today and every day, Michelle and I are grateful to our troops and their families for their sacrifice, courage, and strength.
@dpakman Yes sir, Ronald Mc’Donald Tr*mp said on Troath Central that he’s getting arrested.
This is good news, but it’s scary too because this may mean that Fascist Ron DeSantis may run for president in 2024.
@dpakman Would it be a net positive if we dismantled and disposed of the law that requires corporations to increase profits year on year? How do you think that would impact everyone? I feel like this law almost single handedly, props up late stage capitalism.
I’m proud that CT recently became the first state to require all high schools to offer courses on African American, Black, Puerto Rican, and Latino studies as an elective. Adding these courses benefits everyone and is critical to providing students with a quality education.
How awful, bacterial meningitis is still a terrible killer, but we see this much less frequently in children because of outstanding Hib, PCV, meningococcal vaccines, including Bexsero now for meningB. I’ve taken care of too many sick kids before these vaccines were in use
@nathaliejacoby1 When I studied Biotechnology and evolutionary biology. Also the concept of believing in all or nothing is how I was taught to believe in religion. I was taught that you can’t just follow some things and not others. I was raised a Muslim, I like the religion, but not those parts
“Anti-vaccine activism, which I actually call anti-science aggression, has now become a major killing force globally."
- @PeterHotez, Professor and Dean @BCM_TropMed, on the devastating impact of #misinformation and disinformation.
Trump just called for the suspension of the Constitution and it is the final straw for zero republicans, especially the ones who call themselves “constitutional conservatives.”
⚠️DISASTROUS **Influenza-Like Illness** this year—compared to the same week of 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021–notice how previous “mild” seasons didn’t lead to bullshit “immunity debt” surges? #Tripledemic likely worse due to immunocompromised by #LongCovid.
HT @KirvinQuamme