John McRae🐭

simply attempting to make sense of things

[Doug Gerstner @DougGerstn22736]

They arrested Donald J. Trump
They arrested Steve Bannon
They arrested Peter Navarro
They arrested Walt Nauta
They arrested Carlos De Oliveira
They arrested Tom Barrack
They arrested Rudy Giuliani
They arrested Mark Meadows
They arrested John Eastman
They arrested Jenna Ellis
They arrested Michael Roman
They arrested Kenneth Chesebro
They arrested Jeffrey Clark
They arrested Sidney Powell
They arrested Robert Cheeley
They arrested David Shafer
They arrested Shawn Still
They arrested Stephen Cliffgard Lee
They arrested Harrison William Prescott Floyd
They arrested Trevian C. Kutti
They arrested Scott Graham Hall
They arrested Misty Hampton
They arrested Cathleen Alston Latham
They arrested Ray Stallings Smith III
They arrested Boris Epshteyn
They arrested Christina Bobb
They arrested Kelli Ward
They arrested Tyler Bowyer
They arrested Nancy Cottle
They arrested Jacob Hoffman
They arrested Anthony Kern
They arrested James Lamon
They arrested Robert Montgomery
They arrested Samuel Moorhead
They arrested Lorraine Pellegrino
They arrested Gregory Safsten
They arrested Michael Ward
They arrested Allen Weisselberg

Now they're saying we're "weaponizing justice".

And by “they”, I mean “you” and “your ilk.”

[John McRae🐭 @citronal]

@5rHxIhQGQnnRSOe @canceledmouse Gaza notifications

[John McRae🐭 @citronal]

@caitoz Exactly

[Caitlin Johnstone @caitoz]

Been thinking about this meme ever since I saw it a few days ago. It tells the whole story.

[Jurassic Carl 🦖🐭 @carl_jurassic]

@Jikkyleaks @kent4jmj @AGHuff @Melchizedek1972 @SenGaryPeters @RandPaul @RepJackBergman @COVIDSelect @RepThomasMassie @ClareCraigPath Might be worth reposting this.

[Caitlin Johnstone @caitoz]

They're Calling Ethnic Cleansing "Voluntary Migration" Now

Israeli officials are now openly admitting that they’re working on “encouraging” the migration of Palestinians from Gaza, ridiculously claiming that this migration would be “voluntary” despite their having deliberately made the enclave uninhabitable over the last three months.

The Times of Israel reports:

“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s two senior far-right partners endorsed the rebuilding of settlements in the Gaza Strip and the encouraging of “voluntary emigration” of Palestinians on Monday, while hawkish opposition MK Avigdor Liberman called for Israel to reoccupy southern Lebanon.

“Speaking during their parties’ respective faction meetings in the Knesset, National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich presented the migration of Palestinian civilians as a solution to the long-running conflict and as a prerequisite for securing the stability necessary to allow residents of southern Israel to return to their homes.

“The war presents an ‘opportunity to concentrate on encouraging the migration of the residents of Gaza,’ Ben Gvir told reporters and members of his far-right Otzma Yehudit party, calling such a policy ‘a correct, just, moral and humane solution.’

“‘We cannot withdraw from any territory we are in in the Gaza Strip. Not only do I not rule out Jewish settlement there, I believe it is also an important thing,’ he said.

“The ‘correct solution’ to the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict is ‘to encourage the voluntary migration of Gaza’s residents to countries that will agree to take in the refugees,’ Smotrich told members of his Religious Zionism party, predicting that ‘Israel will permanently control the territory of the Gaza Strip,’ including through the establishment of settlements.”

The repeated use of the word “encourage” stands out in these remarks, given that encouraging Gaza’s inhabitants to flee their homeland is exactly what Israel’s actions since October have been doing. Once you’ve made 90 percent of Gaza’s inhabitants homeless with internal displacement, forced half the population into starvation via siege warfare, destroyed the enclave’s entire healthcare system to the point where disease is now running rampant, all while raining death and destruction from above in a wildly unpredictable manner with airstrikes routinely hitting designated safe zones, you’re offering the population some very strong “encouragement” indeed to vacate the region as soon as possible.

This obviously makes the argument for the “voluntary migration” of Gazans completely nonsensical, since violently coercing someone into doing something and ensuring that they’ll die if they don’t do it is the exact opposite of what the word “voluntary” means.

But that’s the slogan we’re seeing pop up again and again as Israel draws closer to its final solution to the Palestinian problem in Gaza. Netanyahu and his cohorts have been repeatedly uttering phrases like “voluntary resettlement” and “voluntary migration” to describe the plan for Gaza’s Palestinian inhabitants to either move to refugee camps set up in the adjacent Sinai Peninsula in Egypt or to be taken in by other nations around the world.

Netanyahu has said that a team must be established to “ensure that those who want to leave Gaza to a third country can do so.” Iraq invader Tony Blair was reportedly being eyed as a potential leader of such a team by Israeli officials, though Blair has denied this.

Mitchell Plitnick wrote the following on the absurdity of the “voluntary migration” talking point in an article for Mondoweiss last month:

“The term ‘voluntary emigration’ is likely to be heard quite a lot in the coming weeks and months, and it is one of the most cynical, dishonest terms one can imagine. There is, of course, nothing voluntary about people leaving Gaza. Israel has made the place unlivable, and that was before the current bombardment.

“Now, they are essentially being forced to leave under the threat of imminent death. The people of Gaza did not suddenly lose their attachment to Palestine. They will die if they stay, as will their children. If you cut off water, electricity, food, and medical care, destroy all the shelter, and then ask a person, ‘Would you still like to stay?’ their decision to leave is obviously not voluntary.”

But that’s the narrative they’re going with apparently.

And it’s nothing new; Israel has been falsely claiming for generations that its violent forced expulsion of Palestinians known as the Nakba was voluntary as well. In 2000 Palestinian academic Ghada Karmi wrote that “The Israeli version of history — that the Palestinians left voluntarily or under orders from their leaders and that Israelis had no responsibility, material or moral, for their plight — has been successfully marketed to the world community for decades.”

The plot to relocate Palestinians from territories desired by Israel is also far from new. In a 2002 article for The Guardian titled “A new exodus for the Middle East?”, Israeli historian Benny Morris writes that the agenda to “transfer” Palestinians to other countries has existed for as long as modern Zionism:

“The idea of transfer is as old as modern Zionism and has accompanied its evolution and praxis during the past century. And driving it was an iron logic: There could be no viable Jewish state in all or part of Palestine unless there was a mass displacement of Arab inhabitants, who opposed its emergence and would constitute an active or potential fifth column in its midst. This logic was understood, and enunciated, before and during 1948, by Zionist, Arab and British leaders and officials.

“As early as 1895, Theodor Herzl, the prophet and founder of Zionism, wrote in his diary in anticipation of the establishment of the Jewish state: ‘We shall try to spirit the penniless [Arab] population across the border by procuring employment for it in the transit countries, while denying it any employment in our country … The removal of the poor must be carried out discreetly and circumspectly.’”

This is a very, very old agenda, being presented as something brand new that is only just occurring to Israeli officials just now. They didn’t just come up with this. It’s been fantasized about for as long as Israel was a twinkle in its founding fathers’ eyes.

This is the real objective in Gaza. Not the “elimination of Hamas” (whatever the hell you want to pretend that would look like in practice), but the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip.

Hamas is not the target in Gaza. Hamas is just the excuse.

[Caitlin Johnstone @caitoz]

I used to think it was wrong for Israel to be killing tens of thousands of Gazans with airstrikes and starving hundreds of thousands with siege warfare, but then Israel apologists informed me that some Palestinians did mean things to Israelis in the past, so now I support it.

What Israel is doing in Gaza would only be unethical if everyone in Gaza were a perfect little cherub who’d never committed any violence or done anything wrong ever. I could see getting upset if the IDF was raining military explosives upon a giant concentration camp full of squishy marshmallow-like beings made of pure love and conceived without original sin who do nothing but coo and sing lullabies all day, but in reality the concentration camp is populated by beings who are not nearly that perfect.

I hear people calling this a genocide, but that’s ridiculous. What’s been explained to me is that the assault on Gaza is completely different from all the genocidal massacres you’ve read about in history, because the Israelis believe what they are doing is right. See, this time the ones who are carrying out the mass-scale extermination programs and ethnic cleansing plans have reasons for doing so.

As we all know, in a proper genocide the perpetrators have no reasons for carrying out their mass extermination programs and ethnic cleansing plans; they do it solely because they are evil and like doing evil things. In a proper genocide the perpetrators historically spend most of their time cackling like cartoon supervillains and talking about how delightfully evil their genocidal actions are.

This isn’t like that at all. You see, the Israelis sincerely feel that the population they are eliminating is very bad, and they believe removing that population will make the land a much better and safer place to live. They see the Palestinians as a major problem, and, unlike a proper genocide, they are simply trying to find a solution to that problem which will be permanent and final.

So when you see Israel apologists defending Israel’s actions in Gaza, please try to keep in mind that they’re just helpfully explaining that the Israeli government has reasons and motives for doing what it’s doing, and that it believes what it is doing is correct. If this were a proper genocide, that wouldn’t be the case.

You’ve seen what genocide looks like. It looks like Nazis rounding up Jews and killing them. Are the Israelis wearing swastikas? Are the Palestinians Jewish? No? Okay then. That proves this cannot possibly be a genocide, because if it was, it would look exactly the same as a previous historical instance of genocide in every conceivable way. It’s not even the early 1940s right now, it’s a completely different time period. Like, duh.

So relax. Everything is fine. This isn’t a genocide, and if it is, we can read about it in our history books later on and be sure to get it right next time.

[Ash @AshPolitik]

"Mummy blogger" brilliant takedown of Maiden

@Lauren_Dubois

[John McRae🐭 @citronal]

@caitoz Thank you so much for your courage, clear logical vision, humanity and continued messaging.

[John McRae🐭 @citronal]

@Jonathan_K_Cook 🎯

[John McRae🐭 @citronal]

@SenatorWong @dfat @AustraliaUN Finally!

[Caitlin Johnstone @caitoz]

“Stop murdering thousands of children,” said the evil, crazy Nazi.

“It’s bad to murder children,” the monster added. “Children should not be slaughtered at mass scale with powerful military explosives, they should be allowed to remain alive and happy and healthy.”

What would lead someone to say something so hateful and depraved? What disgusting conspiratorial anti-semitic online rabbit holes must this freak have slithered down in his path toward radicalization to say something so profoundly evil? One can only guess.

“We should not incinerate children and blow their guts out of their bodies with bombs,” the world’s worst person continued. “Zero children should die by incineration, and their guts belong on the inside of their bodies.”

I’m just as shocked and dismayed as you are. I thought we were beyond this. I thought we as a civilization had left this kind of genocidal rhetoric behind us with the end of Nazi Germany. But, apparently, Adolf Hitler still lives on.

This fiendish enemy of all things good and righteous went on to say that all Palestinians are human beings just like everyone else, and they should accordingly be given human rights instead of exterminated like insects with some of the most sophisticated weaponry ever devised.

“I just don’t think someone having a certain ethnicity makes it acceptable to butcher them in massive numbers with modern war machinery and drive them off the land they wish to live on,” said the ghoul, adding, “I kind of think we ought to treat others how we ourselves would wish to be treated.”

Now, I’m as liberal as the next person and I absolutely support free speech, but this kind of repugnant blood libel is exactly why we need to be having some serious conversations about how far the right to free speech ought to go. We can’t have deranged fascists running around our society fomenting genocidal violence by spouting extremist rhetoric like “Don’t drop bombs on babies” and “It’s wrong to intentionally assassinate journalists.”

It makes me feel unsafe when people say such things, because I do not agree with the things they are saying. And, as we all know, the universe revolves around me and how my feelings feel. I therefore fear we have reached an unfortunate juncture in our society where we’ve no choice but to censor the internet, prohibit pro-Palestine demonstrations, ban TikTok, and make it illegal to be a Zoomer. The only alternative is to allow horrifying radicalization like what we just witnessed here to continue.

[Caitlin Johnstone @caitoz]

The Independent has an article out titled “Inside a southern Gaza hospital: Screaming orphaned children, amputee toddlers and the stench of rotting flesh,” which begins as follows:

“A badly burned toddler screaming for the mother he doesn’t know is dead — and screaming because doctors do not have enough painkillers to relieve his suffering. An eight-year-old boy whose brain is exposed as bombing damaged parts of his skull. A teenage girl, her eye surgically removed, because every bone in her face is smashed. A three-year-old double amputee, whose severed limbs are laid out in a pink box beside him.

“And in the background is the stench of rotting flesh as maggots ‘creep out of untreated wounds’.”

These horrors are all caused by a genocidal onslaught that is being backed to the hilt by the US government, who just single-handedly blocked a UN resolution demanding a ceasefire to end this nightmare. Instead of focusing on the unfathomable depravity of all this, Americans are being propagandized into worrying about a completely fictional epidemic of university demonstrators chanting for the genocide of Jews.

But for all the efforts to spin, justify and distract from the mass atrocity Israel and its allies are perpetrating in Gaza, more and more people are opening their eyes to what’s happening, and are ceasing to fall for the propaganda any longer.

This is largely because for the last two months the horrific images described in text by The Independent have been cascading down our social media feeds in jarringly graphic photos and videos. Those who’ve only been peripherally aware of Israel’s actions in Gaza may find those descriptions astonishing, but for anyone who’s been following the Gaza massacre it’s just a verbal description of what we’ve been looking at since October.

It’s much, much harder to propagandize the public into accepting military atrocities when they have decent visibility into how those atrocities are actually manifesting as they inflict themselves on human flesh. In an age where photos and videos of events can go viral within minutes of their occurrence, and in an area where it’s still possible to upload some footage onto social media, it’s far more difficult to persuade people to believe this is anything other than what it is.

If everyone on earth could really truly see what’s happening in Gaza, and actually viscerally grasp and appreciate what they were seeing, the killing would end tomorrow. It would end tomorrow because the entire world would force an end to it by any means necessary. These atrocities would no longer be tolerable by humanity’s collective consciousness once they had been fully seen.

And really all of humanity’s problems are like this. If everyone could really see and deeply comprehend how horrific war is, war and militarism would end immediately. If everyone could really see and deeply comprehend how insane and self-destructive ecocide is, ecocide would end immediately. If everyone could really see and deeply comprehend the horrors of poverty, abusive prison systems, police brutality and institutional injustice, these things would no longer be permitted to exist in our society.

Seeing is all that’s required for humanity to begin moving out of dysfunctionality and towards health. That’s true regardless of what scale of humanity you’re talking about, from the largest problems of global civilization right down to the subtlest dysfunctionality in the inner processes of the individual. Once enough seeing has happened, the dysfunctionality cannot continue.

Corruption and malfeasance doesn’t stop until it has been exposed to the public. Abuse doesn’t stop until the abusiveness has been clearly seen for what it is and brought to an end. Addiction and other self-destructive behavior patterns don’t abate until the inner dynamics which drive them have been brought into consciousness and seen clearly. Self-realization only occurs when there’s been a clear seeing into the nature of awareness and perception.

Seeing is crucial to ending dysfunction at every scale of human life. That’s why Julian Assange figured that the best way to help the world would be to find a way to make it easier for the public to see what’s going on behind the veils of secrecy that the powerful enshroud themselves with, and that’s why Assange is now currently in prison. Those who want more health and harmony are always trying to find ways to make things more seen, while those who want to preserve the status quo of domination and dysfunction are always trying to keep things hidden.

In this sense we actually are kind of looking at a struggle between light and darkness, because there is an ongoing battle between the impulses within our species to make things seen and the impulses to make things unseen. On one side you have real journalism, true education, authentic activism and dedicated inner work trying to bring the unseen into the light of awareness, and on the other side you have government secrecy, censorship, propaganda, Silicon Valley algorithm manipulation and the war on journalism trying to obstruct and obfuscate the truth from the public eye. Those who desire peace, health and harmony will always find themselves on the former side, while those who desire domination, destruction and exploitation always find themselves on the latter.

That’s why Israel has been systematically exterminating journalists, artists and academics in Gaza, and why it tries to restrict internet access and communications as much as it can get away with. It’s why the US empire is imprisoning Julian Assange and continually working to control what information the public sees online while hiding a tremendous amount of its activities behind government classification. It’s why the abusive husband works to isolate his wife from her friends and family and tells anyone who says anything about his abusiveness that it’s none of their business. It’s why when we sit in meditation there are forces within us which squirm and flail around rather than allow stillness and inner clarity to set in. Humanity is in a constant struggle with itself — between staying hidden and becoming a truly conscious species.

But we can’t hide from ourselves forever. Already more and more cracks in the walls are appearing, and the light is streaming in through them. The aspects of our species which want to remain hidden are leaving fingernail marks on the floor as the aspects of ourselves which want to be seen are dragging them kicking and screaming into the light of consciousness.

There can only be one winner in this fight. We’ll either become a conscious species that is guided by truth and lucid understanding or we’ll kill ourselves by nuclear war or climate catastrophe in our frantic efforts to remain hidden. Either way, the tower of lies and secrets is coming tumbling down eventually.

[John McRae🐭 @citronal]

@caitoz Thank you💔

[Caitlin Johnstone @caitoz]

For Refaat Alareer

They killed a poet in Gaza on Wednesday.

Well, as much as you can kill a poet, anyway.
Kill a poet and his poems fight on.
That poet is still throwing his marker at the bastards.

A poet may have hands like velveteen mittens,
but he can fight on even if he has no hands at all.

A poet may have a home made of zip-ties and tarps,
but he can fight on even if he sleeps on rubble.

A poet can fight on even if he’s got no legs.
A poet can fight on even if he’s got no arms.
A poet can fight on even if he’s got no teeth.
A poet can fight on even if he’s got no eyes.
A poet can fight on even if he’s got no hope.
A poet can fight on even if he’s got no life.
A poet can fight on even after he has drawn his last breath,
even after they’ve returned him to earth’s womb,
even after his possessions have been divided among his loved ones,
even after the flesh has gone from his bones,
even after there’s no memory of him besides the poems he left behind.

Poets can midwife a new world into being.
Poets can give people a vision to fight for.
Poets can change reality.
Poets are powerful.
That’s why people kill them.

I saw a video of two young boys strolling through Gaza
nursing some tea in a paper cup,
gossiping like the two old men
they might never get to be.

And there’s a bee burrowing a hole in my door
and a siren going off in my head,
because the drones never stop in Gaza,
and because there are bodies popped open by girders,
buried under ruins rained down on by hellfire,
near where mothers lie awake weighing
whether it would be better to live without her children
or for her kids to live without her,
and we know this alarm won’t stop
until the explosions stop,
until the screams stop,
until the bleeding stops,
until healing begins,
until justice is served,
until the bastards are beaten,
until a healthy world has been born.

Refaat, until there is justice,
I will throw my marker at them too.

[Caitlin Johnstone @caitoz]

Legislators in the world's most powerful government just passed a resolution saying that Judaism is synonymous with a colonialist ideology which routinely murders children.

[John McRae🐭 @citronal]

@caitoz @REuler8 🤣🤣🤣

[John McRae🐭 @citronal]

🎯🎯🎯

[Caitlin Johnstone @caitoz]

If I Were Going To Commit A Genocide

If I were going to commit a genocide, I’d make sure to kill as many women and children as possible to eliminate the future generations of the people I was trying to wipe out. Come to think of it, I guess I’d do what Israel is doing in Gaza.

If I were going to commit a genocide, I’d deliberately target civilians and civilian infrastructure to make it harder and harder for the undesirable population to survive. Actually, one good example of this would be what Israel is reportedly doing in Gaza today.

If I were going to commit a genocide, I’d make sure to target cultural centers to destroy the history and culture of the population I wished to remove, taking out their museums and ancient religious buildings. You know what? I suppose I’d do pretty much exactly what Israel is currently doing in Gaza.

Another thing I’d do if I were going to commit a genocide is make sure to kill all the best and brightest members of the population I was trying to exterminate — their doctors, lawyers, academics, journalists and thought leaders — in order to prevent any reconstruction of the civilization I was trying to stomp out. In other words I’d do what Israel is presently doing in Gaza.

If I were going to commit a genocide, obviously I’d have to make sure all my main underlings were on board for the operation, so you’d probably see them spouting genocidal rhetoric all the time in support of those plans. Kind of like the way Israeli officials have been talking for the last two months when discussing their operations in Gaza.

If I were going to commit a genocide, I’d also want to have a plan to drive the undesirables who couldn’t be eliminated by mass murder off the land I wanted them removed from. You’d see people in my government frequently discussing plans for ethnic cleansing, in very much the same way you’re seeing such discussions over and over again among Israeli officials and thought leaders.

If I were going to commit a genocide, I’d keep attacking the undesirable population with extreme aggression while pushing them further and further toward a foreign border, eventually forcing other nations to either take them in or keep allowing them to be slaughtered as I rain military explosives upon their continually shrinking living space.

Either way I get rid of the population I was trying to get rid of, and I can repopulate the land I seized with a more desirable sort of people. In other words I’d do exactly what Israel is clearly doing, in plain view of the entire world.

[Caitlin Johnstone @caitoz]

If I Were Going To Commit A Genocide

If I were going to commit a genocide, I’d make sure to kill as many women and children as possible to eliminate the future generations of the people I was trying to wipe out. Come to think of it, I guess I’d do what Israel is doing in Gaza.

If I were going to commit a genocide, I’d deliberately target civilians and civilian infrastructure to make it harder and harder for the undesirable population to survive. Actually, one good example of this would be what Israel is reportedly doing in Gaza today.

If I were going to commit a genocide, I’d make sure to target cultural centers to destroy the history and culture of the population I wished to remove, taking out their museums and ancient religious buildings. You know what? I suppose I’d do pretty much exactly what Israel is currently doing in Gaza.

Another thing I’d do if I were going to commit a genocide is make sure to kill all the best and brightest members of the population I was trying to exterminate — their doctors, lawyers, academics, journalists and thought leaders — in order to prevent any reconstruction of the civilization I was trying to stomp out. In other words I’d do what Israel is presently doing in Gaza.

If I were going to commit a genocide, obviously I’d have to make sure all my main underlings were on board for the operation, so you’d probably see them spouting genocidal rhetoric all the time in support of those plans. Kind of like the way Israeli officials have been talking for the last two months when discussing their operations in Gaza.

If I were going to commit a genocide, I’d also want to have a plan to drive the undesirables who couldn’t be eliminated by mass murder off the land I wanted them removed from. You’d see people in my government frequently discussing plans for ethnic cleansing, in very much the same way you’re seeing such discussions over and over again among Israeli officials and thought leaders.

If I were going to commit a genocide, I’d keep attacking the undesirable population with extreme aggression while pushing them further and further toward a foreign border, eventually forcing other nations to either take them in or keep allowing them to be slaughtered as I rain military explosives upon their continually shrinking living space.

Either way I get rid of the population I was trying to get rid of, and I can repopulate the land I seized with a more desirable sort of people. In other words I’d do exactly what Israel is clearly doing, in plain view of the entire world.