On the night of February 28, the Israel-US airstrike killed his father, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, his wife, his brother-in-law and sister-in-law.

According to a recent report from Reuters, Ayatollah Seyyed Mojtaba Khamenei suffered life threatening injuries and apparently lost his leg and has a disfigured face.

The report said he communicated through written statements read by TV anchors and audio conferences with senior officials.

• READ MORE: US military says it will block all Iranian port traffic in Hormuz Strait
• US delegation ‘failed to gain the trust of the Iranian delegation’
• Protesters rally across Aotearoa in condemnation of Israel, US ‘warmongering’ and ‘shameful’ NZ​
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

I don’t want to believe Reuters or any puppet media from the West but I would like to believe that the new supreme leader is not in full capacity as expected.

Well, despite all that, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is still grounded, strong and with no signs of collapse.

They lost 40+ senior leaders but still fought two superpower countries to a ceasefire. They still control the Strait of Hormuz and have thousands of missiles and drones left.

This simply points out to the fact that IRGC is in control and guess who is the leader?

Led IRGC for decades
Mojtaba Khamenei, the 56-year-old son of the martyred Ali Khamenei, who led IRGC for decades with a hand injury over a bomb explosion in a tape recorder in 1981.

Imagine you were Mojtaba who has just lost all your family to a brutal attack that claimed even more lives in your country.

In one way or another you survived and you have people taking instructions from you.

At this point I don’t think death scares you anymore because you saw death in its true colours and even had a conversation with it.

Back to myself, what if I was Mojtaba Khamenei? First, no surrender. I would fight to the last microsecond and die fighting but surrendering is where I draw the line.

Second, the Strait of Hormuz is non-negotiable. It is our territorial waters and remains under our control. We do with it what we want. It’s ours, period.

After all, it was open and safe for all until someone decided to attack us and now we call the shots. It’s either you agree with our terms of gerrarahia!

Two options on missiles
On our missile programme, two options. It’s either we maintain our missile programme or develop nukes.

We won’t sit here and be at the mercies of aggressive enemies like Israel and US with no options to protect ourselves.

It’s either we can nuke you or we can missile you one or both options. Imagine just being there and being limited to defensive missiles capabilities yet those asking you to do that are the same people attacking you during negotiations!

Uranium enrichment. Let everyone enrich uranium and use it however they want. It’s either everyone can or no one can’t. No selective privileges.

Lastly, if I was Mojtaba Khamenei, those who murdered my family would definitely pay, not by dollars, not by Shekel and of course not by propaganda but by blood.

What would you do, if you were Mojtaba Khamenei?

Bonface Chisutia is a writer and academic based in Nairobi, Kenya. This commentary is republished from his Facebook account.

When news reports first indicated that US Vice-President JD Vance was going to lead the Americans in the negotiations with Iran, the country the US and Israel are waging a foolish war against, there was a sense that someone even as young him may have recognised the train wreck that Donald Trump was creating.

Former top negotiators real estate developer Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, had already proven to be self-enriching charlatans like Trump.

If someone understood a little — only a little — more about the state of affairs, they could be excellent replacements to Witkoff and Kushner and save America from a crisis of its own making.

• READ MORE: US military to block all Iran-bound ships from transiting the Hormuz Strait
• US delegation ‘failed to gain the trust of the Iranian delegation’
• Protesters rally across Aotearoa in condemnation of Israel, US ‘warmongering’ and ‘shameful’ NZ​
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

As it transpired, that person was not Vance.
​
In the negotiations with Iran in Islamabad, the US vice-president proved to be no more than a minion to Trump, not someone who can rise to the occasion and stop the stupid war that is taking down the American military and the global economy.
​
If you cannot see how disastrously America and Israel are conducting the war, here is Professor Timothy Snyder, an expert on European history, parsing it for you in plain language on March 18, just two weeks after the war started:
​

“[Trump] took the greatest military force in world history, lost the war to a middle power in a week, begged the world to save him, and demanded that the media lie about this and everything else.

I try, but at a simple human level I do not see how anyone can mistake this man’s almost supernatural weakness for strength.”
​

By now, it is an open secret that Trump is being blackmailed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who holds evidence of degenerate behavior by the US president from his devilish days on disgraced financier and convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein’s island.

But even in a moment of incompetence, incredible loss, and national humiliation for America like this, Vance had a chance to save his country.
​
Now we know for certain that everyone who has ever worked for Trump is diminished by it. Vance was an exception only for a second.
​
IRNA News Agency is state-controlled media.

Cyclone Maila has been downgraded to a tropical low but has caused widespread damage in Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea.

Ten people were reported dead in the autonomous Papua New Guinea region of Bougainville, including eight people killed in a landslide.

The incident happened at Asiko Village in Kongara constituency in Central Bougainville.

• READ MORE: Cyclone Vaianu: Damaging winds, heavy rain hit NZ’s North Island

Reports received by NBC News said the tragedy struck early Thursday evening, April 9.

A couple, their son and grandchild are among those killed in the landslide.

Their bodies have been recovered.

A government assessment is underway to determine the immediate extent of damage and destruction across the region.

A number of other people, including a pregnant mother, were injured and hospitalised at the local Kakusida Health Centre.

Roads have also been cut off due to flooding, and food gardens reportedly damaged as well.

Bougainville Copper has been delivering food supplies and other items to families of the deceased.

The Australian government has pledged A$2.5 million in aid for those affected by Maila.

Cyclone Vaianu
Cyclone Vaianu caused flooding in Fiji before bringing rain and strong winds to Aotearoa New Zealand.

Vaianu tracked away from mainland New Zealand overnight Sunday, after battering the country’s north-east over the weekend.

The cyclone is expected to affect the Chatham Islands on Monday.

The weather system brought 220mm of rain to Coromandel and wind gusts of 126 km/h were recorded at Māhia.

Evacuated Hawkes Bay residents will find out on Monday if they can return to their homes.

Bay of Plenty evacuees were allowed to return home on Sunday.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Iran’s ambassador has criticised New Zealand’s failure to condemn the US and Israeli strikes on Iran as damaging the relationship between the two nations, reports 1News.

Interviewed on TVNZ’s Q+A programme by Jack Tame, Ambassador Reza Nazar Ahari said New Zealand’s “silence” would be interpreted as tacit support for the attacks.

He said the relationship between the two nations had “shifted”.

• READ MORE: US military to block all Iran-bound ships from transiting the Hormuz Strait
• US delegation ‘failed to gain the trust of the Iranian delegation’
• Protesters rally across Aotearoa in condemnation of Israel, US ‘warmongering’ and ‘shameful’ NZ​
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

Ahari told Tame that New Zealand’s diplomatic “quietness” had damaged the relationship between the two nations, reports 1News.

He said the world had shifted from a “rule of law” to a “rule of the jungle”, where nations had given themselves the right to attack others without authorisation.

“A country like United States [has] made a military attack on Iran, and it is very clear that it is contrary to all international regulations, but New Zealand has not condemned that,” 1News quoted him as saying.

“Then that kind of quietness means that support. In Iranian culture, in many cases, quiet means positive reply,” he said.

US navy blockade
Peace talks at the weekend between the US and Iran in Islamabad, Pakistan, resulted in no new agreement, after six weeks of strikes on Iran and the Islamic Republic’s retaliatory attacks.

US President Donald Trump has declared a navy bockade on Iran after the failed talks and oil prices have surged again amid a fragile two-week ceasefire.

A Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) spokesperson told Q+A on Friday: “Just today, New Zealand has signed onto a joint leaders’ statement with Australia, the UK and other world leaders which calls on all sides to implement the ceasefire, including in Lebanon.”

Weather warnings in New Zealand’s North Island are starting to lift, as Tropical Cyclone Vaianu tracks away from the country.

Red and orange wind and rain warnings have been in place across much of the island since Friday.

All red warnings and most orange warnings have now expired or been lifted.

• READ MORE:  Cyclone Vaianu: First impacts could be felt Saturday amid severe NZ warnings
• Live RNZ weather updates

Orange wind warnings are in place in Hawkes Bay overnight and in Tararua from 10pm Sunday, while Bay of Plenty, Rotorua and Tairāwhiti have had overnight wind warnings downgraded to a yellow watch.

Metservice meteorologist John Law said the system was beginning to clear away.

“On the latest analysis, the central part of Cyclone Vaianu is now just off that eastern coast towards Hawkes Bay, with the winds now generally turning more southwesterly across New Zealand.

“We’ve still got some wet weather, particularly those areas east of Lake Taupō, but over the next few hours, we’ll start to find even that pulling away, as this whole system continues to move through.”

Far North mayor ‘grateful’
RNZ’s Peter de Graaf reports Far North Mayor Moko Tepania said he was breathing a huge sigh of relief after his district escaped serious damage from Cyclone Vaianu.

The district was the first to feel the effects of the cyclone on Saturday night, but the storm took a path further to the east than initially predicted, limiting its impact on Northland.

However, some areas, such as Whangārei’s central city, were lashed by more than 130mm of rain in a 24-hour period, and winds of 110km/h were recorded at Cape Reinga.

A buoy off the Bay of Islands recorded a maximum wave height of 10.8m on Saturday afternoon.

Tepania said the outcome was a huge relief.

“All of the reports that are coming in — and not just through our Emergency Operations Centre intelligence lines, but also the good old kūmara vine and our Kaitiaki Response Network on the ground — are showing us that the effects of Cyclone Vaianu have been very limited,” he said.

“Power outages, a few roofs that have blown off, but all in all, our roading networks made it through and rivers never breached warning levels. So I’m very grateful.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Thousands of protesters took part in the “Stop Wars Aotearoa” rallies across New Zealand today, calling for an end to the illegal war on Iran and the brutal onslaught on Lebanon this week breaching a fragile two-week truce.

While high-powered delegations from Iran and the United States were arriving in Islamabad for historic mediation talks being brokered by Pakistan, protesters in Auckland, Christchurch and other places across New Zealand were challenging the US and Israeli “warmongering” and criticising the New Zealand government’s “shameful” stance.

Led by US Vice-President JD Vance, the Americans arrived to take part in direct talks with their Iranian foes for the first time since the Islamic Revolution in 1979.

• READ MORE: Historic Iran-US talks to continue for a second day; Israel pounds Lebanon
• ‘Ten minutes of terror’ – Lebanon death toll tops 300 from Israel’s ‘Black Wednesday’
• Ending Israel’s war on peace – Iran’s 10-point proposal is serious
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

Ironically, Americans living in New Zealand were among those protesting in Auckland.

Kelby Dalton of Americans Abroad Against the War told the cheering crowd in Aotea Square that many of his compatriots condemned the US warmongering under President Donald Trump and were leaving the US in droves – not because they hated America, but because “we love America” and want the destructive political direction to change.

Stop Wars Aotearoa organiser Joe Carolan declared the protesters opposed all wars and championed freedom – “We’re going to stand up for the people of Iran, stand up for the people of Palestine, stand up for the people of Lebanon, stand up for the people of Venezuela, stand up for the people of Cuba, stand up for this fight against the American empire.”

Carolan said: “We will not be provoked by those who believe in violence down at the US Consulate, those who say that violence can bring freedom, those who think that Netanyahu can guarantee women’s rights in Iran.

“Are you joking?

Counter-protest
He was referring to a small counter-protest of Israel-supporting and monarchist Iranians outside the US Consulate in downtown Auckland who were calling for resumed bombing of Iran.

“These people are guilty of a genocide where 60,000 people have been killed [in Gaza].

“No liberation for women – or anyone in Iran – can come from the pedophile Donald Trump or the genocider Netanyahu.”

The protesters marched to the US Consulate at the Citygroup Building in Customs Street and staged a “die-in” to mark the targeted slaughter of 168 children at the Shajareh Tayyebeh girls’ elementary school in the southeastern Iranian city of Minab by US bombs.

This tragedy took place on February 28, the opening day of the illegal and unprovoked US-Israel war on the Islamic Republic.

Bill Bradford of the Workers First Union and Filipino community advocate Mikee Santos and a group of Filipino union activists spoke out about how the US military machine and imperialism had exploited migrant communities around the world, especially in the Middle East.

A wide range of speakers, politicians, civil society leaders and trade unionists earlier addressed the main rally, including Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa’s co-chair Maher Nazzal — “we cannot all be free until Palestine is free” — Labour Party’s Phil Twyford; Green Party’s Ricardo Menéndez-March, Alliance Party’s Victor Billot, Council of Trade Unions’ president Sandra Grey and the union choir.

‘Standing with peace and justice’
Two displaced Afghani women speakers thanked everybody for “standing up against American and Israeli imperialism — and for standing with justice and peace”.

Miriam Majud recited a 13th-century humanist poem “Bani Adam” (“Sons of Adam” or “Human Beings”) by Iranian Sufi poet Saadi Shirazi, in Farsi (Persian) and in English.

Bibi Amena gave a speech highlighting Iranian achievements for women in contrast to mainstream media reports.

“I am not from Iran, and I have never visited Iran. But I want to talk about what Iran has done for my people,” she said.

“In 1979, when the Soviets invaded Afghanistan, Iran opened its borders for us. In 2001, when American and NATO forces invaded and brutally occupied Afghanistan, Iran once again opened its borders.

“For 40 years, Iran hosted millions of Afghan refugees — not in camps, but in cities among their own citizens. They gave us homes, schools, hospitals. They gave us a life of dignity.

“Now the same America that destroyed my home Afghanistan attacks Iran. The same Israel that bombs Gaza bombs Iran.

Today I stand with Iran because yesterday Iran stood with my people — just as Iran has and continues to stand with Palestine, with Yemen, Cuba, Lebanon, Venezuela and with every other oppressed nation fighting for freedom from the chains of neocolonialism.”

She pointed out that while the regimes in Washington and Tel Aviv “love to pretend they care about women’s rights – it’s only while bombing them”.

“Today, Iran’s female literacy rate is 99 percent, one of the highest in the world. Over 60 percent of Iranian university students in science and engineering are women,” she said.

“Again, one of the highest statistics in the world. 49 percent of doctors in Iran are women.

“Iranian women are engineers, pilots, doctors, judges, parliamentarians, and professors. They lead pro-government rallies, they guard their bridges and power plants against US and Israeli bombs.

“They’re not waiting for permission from Tel Aviv or Washington.”

‘We can bring change’
In Otautahi Christchurch, Iranian-Kiwi columnist and writer Donna Miles told protesters that New Zealand and the world ought to leave Iran to sort out its own future free of global interference.

“We can bring change. We have brought change. And we can do so if Iranians are left alone — if sanctions are lifted, if the middle class in Iran are able to breathe. And if civil society is able to thrive.

“This is what we need. Leave us alone. America needs to get out of the Middle East.

“Peace in the Middle East is possible. It’s not unachievable. Israel needs to end its occupation of Palestine and America needs to end its imperialism.”

Miles also questioned the New Zealand government?

“How shameful it was to see [Foreign Minister] Winston Peters standing next to [Secretary of State] Marco Rubio soon after Trump made those tweets threatening extremist war crimes wiping out an entire civilisation, ending a country in one night, taking it back to the stone age — and we have a minister who stood there silent.”

Her critical comments came just days after her article in The Press warning that US President Trump “can’t kill off Iranians’ resilient spirit”.

AMY GOODMAN: As the US and Iran prepared to hold ceasefire talks in Pakistan today, Israel is continuing to bomb Lebanon.

The death toll from Israel’s massive attack on Wednesday topped 300. More than 1150 people were injured. In a span of 10 minutes, Israel struck 100 sites across Beirut, the Beqaa Valley and southern Lebanon.

The Financial Times described Israel’s attack on Lebanon as, “one of the deadliest single bombing campaigns in the history of a country wracked by decades of war and destruction”.

• READ MORE: Vance in Pakistan to lead US-Iran ceasefire talks; Israel bombs Lebanon
• Ending Israel’s war on peace – Iran’s 10-point proposal is serious
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

Israel and the US have claimed the Iran ceasefire deal does not include Lebanon, but numerous other nations disagree — and the ceasefire mediator Pakistan provided written evidence that Lebanon was included.

Foreign ministers of Pakistan and France condemned what they called “serious ceasefire violations made in Lebanon”. CBS News reports Trump initially agreed Lebanon was included in the ceasefire, but his position changed after a phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The US is expected to host talks between Israel and Lebanon on Tuesday. As Israel continues to attack Lebanon, Hezbollah has retaliated by firing missiles at Israel.

At the United Nations, a spokesperson for the secretary-general spoke.

STÉPHANE DUJARRIC: With the announcements of the ceasefire between Iran and the United States, the ongoing military activity in Lebanon poses a grave risk to the ceasefire and efforts towards a lasting and comprehensive peace in the region.

AMY GOODMAN: Since the war began in late February, Israel has killed more than 1530 people in Lebanon, including at least 130 children. In Beirut, grieving families gathered at hospitals to identify bodies after Israel’s attacks on Wednesday.

MOHAMMED: [translated] I had dropped off my sister. She went up into the house. I went on a little trip, and they hid. I came back and didn’t find the building.

I didn’t find my sister, and I didn’t find my family, any of them. I found my brother, and his son was in the rubble.

AMY GOODMAN: We go now to Beirut, where we’re joined by Rania Abouzeid. She’s an award-winning Lebanese Australian journalist and author based in Beirut. Her books include No Turning Back: Life, Loss, and Hope in Wartime Syria. Her latest piece in New York magazine, headlined “The Iran War Is Not Over: Scenes from a day of carnage in Beirut.”

Welcome back to Democracy Now!, Rania. Why don’t you describe those scenes of a day of carnage in Beirut? We have a four-second delay, so we will wait.

Lebanon death toll tops 300 from Israel’s Black Wednesday    Video: Democracy Now

RANIA ABOUZEID: It was 10 minutes of terror, a day that the Lebanese are calling Black Wednesday. It was hard to tell what was blowing up where, because those hundred or so attacks were all happening simultaneously, and not just in the capital Beirut, but also in other parts of the country.

They targeted very densely populated parts of the capital, neighbourhoods in the capital that were themselves hosting people who had been displaced from other parts of the country. In the Beqaa, mourners at a funeral in a cemetery were targeted. In Beirut, workers at a well-known roastery were removed by Civil Defence personnel as charred corpses.

So, it was a very, very ugly day. And as we speak, the — I can’t say “rescue,” because there’s — unfortunately, the people are dead, but search teams continue to try and locate and find and retrieve the remains of people who were killed in the rubble of their homes.

AMY GOODMAN: Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, said Israel will “continue to strike Hezbollah wherever required,” but later said he’s approved direct talks with Lebanon as soon as possible. Can you talk about what’s happening with these negotiations?

You had the Belgian foreign minister who had come to Beirut to meet with the Lebanese President Aoun, and the bombing hit very close to their quarters, as he was congratulating the Lebanese president on saying that he would directly negotiate with Israel, then condemned the attack and said Lebanon had to be included with the ceasefire.

Can you take it from there? What’s happening now? Where do you understand these talks will take place?

RANIA ABOUZEID: Well, the first thing is that the talks remove Lebanon from the wider ceasefire talks that are due to take place between Iran and America tomorrow. That has many Lebanese worried, because they wonder: What sort of leverage does Lebanon have? It doesn’t exactly have a Strait of Hormuz, whereas Iran seems to have a stronger negotiating position.

Yesterday, Lebanon’s Prime Minister Nawaf Salam made it quite clear. He said that Lebanon, the Lebanese government, will negotiate for Lebanon, and that nobody else will do so.

So he has very clearly drawn the line between whatever Iran negotiates and what he hopes his government will be able to negotiate with the Israelis. Now, the Iranian foreign minister has made a ceasefire in Lebanon a condition of tomorrow’s talks, so it’s unclear whether or not they are going to go ahead.

So, in addition to the question of what sort of leverage does Lebanon have, some Lebanese are also worried because there is a precedent. There is a 15-month so-called ceasefire, where the — this is the second war in less than two years — and there was a 15-month ceasefire between the two.

During that period, the Lebanese government was supposed to negotiate indirectly with Israel, through something called a “mechanism” — which was US and French-led — to ensure that each side fulfilled its requirements under the terms of that ceasefire. During those 15 months, Israel continued to occupy five hilltop positions that it had newly seized in the war.

It was supposed to withdraw from them under the ceasefire. It didn’t. It was supposed to withdraw its troops back across its border under the ceasefire. It didn’t. So the Lebanese government was unable to get Israel to adhere to any of the conditions of the ceasefire. So some Lebanese wonder what it will be able to achieve now.

In addition, I have to say that the — just the mere fact of direct talks not only breaks a taboo here in Lebanon, it also breaks a very longstanding law. Since the mid-1950s here, it is considered an act of treason to have any direct interaction with an Israeli.

But the Lebanese president himself, General Joseph Aoun, about a month ago, called for direct talks with Israel, breaking that massive, massive taboo. He had four conditions for these talks that were supposed to be followed sequentially. The first condition was an immediate and complete ceasefire.

Condition number two was that the Lebanese Army is strengthened. Third was that the Lebanese Army would continue its efforts to disarm Hezbollah.

And then fourth was the direct negotiation. So it looks like the Lebanese state has jumped over the president’s own — you know, three of his conditions to go straight to the fourth one.

So, Hezbollah, for its part, has said it does not think that Lebanon should be negotiating under fire, because it puts it in the weaker position. Some Lebanese fear that this is a ploy by Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to prolong the war under the pretext of, you know, having these talks under fire.

The proponents of the talks, I have to say, say that it is an issue of Lebanese sovereignty that Lebanon will negotiate any sort of deal with the Israelis. They also say that Lebanon is not a card for the Iranians to wield or to use in any negotiations. And they point out that, well, you don’t exactly talk to your friends to make deals; you talk to your enemies.

So, it’s a very, very divisive issue. The Hezbollah secretary-general is due to give a speech where he will, no doubt, address the issue of the talks. And there’s supposed to be a protest here in Lebanon, just behind me, actually, in front of the Grand Serail, which is where the prime minister’s office is, against the idea of these talks.

AMY GOODMAN: Let me turn to the questions you raise in your latest New York magazine piece, “The Iran War Is Not Over: Scenes from a day of carnage in Beirut.” First of all, “How much of Lebanon is Israel prepared to destroy while claiming to target Hezbollah and its infrastructure, and will the world just watch as it does so?”

And your second question: “Can Israel even defeat Hezbollah militarily or is it, as many Lebanese suspect, trying to exact so painful a price from fellow Lebanese that they turn on the group, plunging the country into civil strife?”

RANIA ABOUZEID: Well, the Israelis have made no secret of what they want to do in Lebanon. Officials, from the defence minister, Smotrich, the finance minister, they have all talked about Lebanon being part of their Greater Israel project. They have talked about seizing and occupying southern Lebanese territory up to the Litani River, which, at its deepest, is about 30 km away from the Israeli border.

Israel Katz, Israel’s defence minister, said that he wants to turn that area, that lush, verdant agricultural area, into a wasteland that resembles what the Israelis did in Gaza. He has threatened that the hundreds of thousands of Lebanese who have been displaced from there will not be allowed to return.

So, that’s what the Israelis have indicated that they want to do.

In terms of what they’re able to do, they have, according to Israeli media reports, had to scale back some of those ambitions because of the fierce resistance that they’re facing on the ground from Hezbollah fighters.

Let me give you the example of a town in southern Lebanon called Khiam, where there are Israeli forces in this town, but they have been fighting for weeks and weeks to try and take control of it, and they have been unable to.

So, according to the Israeli media reports, they now say that they want to occupy about a three-to-four-kilometre strip of territory. And Hezbollah will, no doubt, fight and try and prevent them from doing that, too. So, that’s what the Israelis want to do.

In terms of Lebanese turning on each other, Israeli officials called up — there are a couple of Christian villages down in the south. There are also Sunni. There are Druze, as well as the Shiite villages down south. It’s a mixed area.

And the Israeli officials called up some of those Christian towns, where the people refuse to leave their territory, and told them, “Listen, do not shelter your Shiite neighbours; otherwise, you will come under attack.”

So, that’s a very clear sort of indication of what the Israelis are sort of hoping to foment in terms of civil strife and turning, literally, neighbour against neighbour.

AMY GOODMAN: Let me play a clip from a Beirut resident. Naim Chebbo survived a bombing on Wednesday, said he’s now afraid to sleep. He said he wants the fighting to stop, and blamed Hezbollah.

NAIM CHEBBO: [translated] We want peace. We don’t want problems with anyone anymore. Eighty percent of Arab countries have peace with Israel. Why doesn’t Lebanon have peace, so that we can end all these problems?

As long as Hezbollah is in Lebanon, Israel will strike Lebanon. That’s it. Hezbollah is not defending Lebanon. It’s defending Iran’s agenda. That’s it.

AMY GOODMAN: Rania Abouzeid, how common or typical is this comment of a Lebanese who survived the bombing on Wednesday, Israel’s bombing?

RANIA ABOUZEID: The Lebanese are very divided over the issue of Hezbollah and its weapons, and they always have been, but more so now in this recent war, because it started on March 2, and Hezbollah lobbed about six rockets into Israel, claiming that it was in retaliation for the assassination of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, as well as, “in defense of Lebanon.”

So, many Lebanese saw it as a war of choice almost by Hezbollah.

Now, Hezbollah and its supporters say that after those 15 months of a ceasefire — that wasn’t really a ceasefire, because, according to the UN, Israel violated Lebanon’s sovereignty about 15,000 times during that period. There were thousands of attacks, resulting in the deaths of more than 350 Lebanese.

So, Hezbollah supporters say they were patient for those 15 months, and now they have chosen to respond.

But, certainly, there are Lebanese who are very angry with Hezbollah. They don’t want any war. I mean, no Lebanese wants war, even the hundreds of thousands of displaced, many of whom might be Hezbollah supporters. Everybody wants to go home.

You know, war is not the option for anybody. But it’s a question of: Under what circumstances, for example, will Lebanon negotiate with Israel? Will it be under the Iranian umbrella in these talks tomorrow, or will it try and forge another path? And which is better?

I mean, look, there are some Lebanese who don’t care if aliens will negotiate on behalf of Lebanon as long as it can secure a ceasefire.

AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to, finally, ask you about what’s happening on the ground. According to the World Health Organisation, some of Lebanon’s hospitals may run out of lifesaving medical supplies within days and attempt to treat patients wounded by the Israeli airstrikes. This is WHO representative in Lebanon, Dr Abdinasir Abubakar.

DR. ABDINASIR ABUBAKAR: There are some shortages, some of those essential chronic medications, the insulin, but also some of the, you know, dialysis supplies.

If the current situation and the current demand actually continue and the current escalation continue, probably the country may be facing a very real risk of critical shortage, including trauma supplies, surgical materials, blood products, chronic medications.

And any other further disruption could seriously hinder the ability of providing timely, adequate care for both emergency and ongoing health needs.

AMY GOODMAN: Rania Abouzeid, your final comments on what you think is about to happen? And do you think Iran will insist on including this in the ceasefire, joined by many countries around the world who are saying Lebanon has to be included, or, as you write in your column, “many Lebanese are wondering whether Iran will forsake Hezbollah and allow Lebanon to be pounded”?

RANIA ABOUZEID: Very difficult to tell, Amy. That’s the honest truth. But, you know, Iran also has its considerations. If it does forsake Hezbollah and goes it alone, well, then, you know, Hezbollah is part of Iran’s Axis of Resistance. There are other allies in the region who will see this and wonder if Iran might forsake it, too.

So it’s a question of its broader network. There are the Houthis in Yemen. There are various militia groups in Iraq who will be watching very carefully to see what Iran does, if it stands by its ally, Hezbollah, or if it doesn’t.

There are also — it also has domestic considerations. You know, Iranians have been pounded now for weeks and weeks. They want a reprieve. They don’t want to return to war.

So, the Iranians will be juggling those, their own sort of conditions, as well, in terms of what their ultimate stance is with regard to heading to the negotiations with or without a ceasefire in Lebanon.

AMY GOODMAN: Finally, Rania, I mean, you are there in Beirut. Israel struck central Beirut, southern Beirut, gone beyond the Litani River to the Zahrani River, some are wondering if they’ll take over that whole land, about a fifth of Lebanon. But you, yourself, are you afraid to walk in the streets?

RANIA ABOUZEID: It depends on what streets, Amy. It depends on where, what part of Lebanon, because that’s the thing about Wednesday’s attack, is that it shattered the sense that any place is safe, because you just don’t know.

The neighbourhoods that were targeted were very far, for example, from the southern suburbs of Beirut where Hezbollah has some institutions — not that that justifies striking a very densely, you know, populated area. The southern suburbs are home to hundreds of thousands of people.

But it was anybody’s guess. Like, why target a street with a roastery? Why target during rush hour when children were leaving school and civil servants were heading home? So, that’s the thing. The sense of safety anywhere has been shattered.

Republished from Democracy Now! under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States Licence.

ANALYSIS: By Jeffrey D. Sachs and Sybil Fares

A two-week ceasefire has partially halted the Israel-US war on Iran. The war accomplished precisely nothing that a competent diplomat could not have achieved in an afternoon.

The Strait of Hormuz was open before the war and it is open again now, but with more Iranian control.

Meanwhile, the chaos continues. Israel is intent on blowing up the ceasefire, as this was Israel’s war from the start.

• READ MORE: This illegal US-Israeli attack on Iran is also an assault on the United Nations
• Israel says no ceasefire with Lebanon, US-Iran talks due
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

Israel dazzled Trump with the prospect of a one-day decapitation strike that would put Trump in charge of Iran’s oil. Israel, in turn, was out for bigger prey: to bring down the Iranian regime and thereby become the regional hegemon of Western Asia.

The foundation of the ceasefire is Iran’s 10-point plan, which Trump (perhaps unwittingly) called a “workable basis on which to negotiate.” The plan makes sense, but it is a major climbdown for the US, and probably a redline for Israel.

Among other points, the plan calls for an end to the wars raging in the Middle East, almost all of which have Israel at their root cause. The plan would also resolve the nuclear issue, essentially by going back to the JCPOA that Trump ripped up in 2018.

The Iran War, and the other wars raging across the Middle East, trace back to one core Israeli idea, that Israel will permanently and steadfastly oppose a sovereign Palestinian state and will topple any government in the Middle East that supports armed struggle for national sovereignty.

It is crucial to note that the UN General Assembly has passed multiple resolutions, such as Resolution 37/43 (1982), affirming that political self-determination is so vital, that armed struggle in the quest for self-determination is legitimate.

The UN was born, in part, out of the determination to end the centuries of European imperial domination over Africa and Asia. Of course, there would be no cause for armed struggle if Israel would accept a political solution, notably the two-state solution that has overwhelming support throughout the world.

The peace is within reach, if the US grasps it.
Netanyahu’s core goal may be summarised as Greater Israel. This means no Palestinian sovereignty, and no clear boundaries for Israel even beyond the boundary of historical Palestine under British rule after the First World War.

Zionist extremists like Netanyahu’s political allies, Ben-Gvir and Smotrich favour Israeli control over parts of Lebanon and Syria, as well as permanent control over all of what was British Palestine.

America’s Christian Zionists, exemplified by the US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, and a strong voter base of Trump, speak of God’s promise to Israel of the lands between the Nile and the Euphrates. Crazy stuff, but these are real beliefs, nonetheless, and they are conveyed in the White House.

Israel’s strategy is therefore regime change in every country that resists Greater Israel, a plan already foreshadowed in the famous political document “A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm,” written by US Zionist neocons as a platform for Netanyahu’s new government in 1996.

We’ve had constant wars in the Middle East since then to implement the Clean Break vision. This has included the war in Libya to overthrow Moammar Qaddafi, the wars in Lebanon, the war to overthrow Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, the war to overthrow Iraq’s Saddam Hussein, and now the war to topple the Iranian regime.

This is not to say that the US lacks its own grandiose ideas. Israel wants regional hegemony, this is not a secret. Netanyahu confirmed these ambitions in his recent remarks about Israel becoming “a regional power, and in certain fields a global power.”

On the other hand, American officials dream of global hegemony. And Trump dreams of money. He craves the Iranian oil and repeatedly said so.

In any event, it’s clear that this war was Netanyahu’s creation. He and the Mossad chief came to Washington to sell Trump a bill of goods. It’s not hard. Trump was suckered, while everybody else had their doubts about Netanyahu’s claims of an easy one-day decapitation strike — essentially a replay of the US operation in Venezuela.

It’s pathetic to “listen in” on the White House discussion, as revealed by the New York Times. Netanyahu, a con man, presented rosy scenarios of regime change that US intelligence contradicted, yet Trump foolishly accepted.

Trump and Netanyahu were cheered on by Christian Zionists (Hegseth), Jewish Zionists and real-estate developers (Kushner and Witkoff), a faith healer (Franklin Graham), and high-level sycophants (Rubio and Ratcliffe).

Trump himself who was begging for a ceasefire
Until Tuesday evening, it looked like Trump might lead the world blindly to the Third World War. The vulgarity and brutality of his public rhetoric was unmatched in US presidential history.

Now we know that he was desperately seeking an off-ramp and using Pakistan for that purpose. While Trump was telling the world that Iran was begging for a ceasefire, it was Trump himself who was begging for a ceasefire. The Pakistani leader delivered it.

The ceasefire is good, and the 10-point plan is good, even if perhaps Trump didn’t know what was in it when he said that it was a good basis for negotiation. Israel will, in any event, work overtime to break it, and has already started to do so, with carpet bombing of Beirut that is killing hundreds of civilians, and with other strikes.

A permanent US-Iran agreement is the last thing that Netanyahu wants. That would end his dream of Greater Israel.

Yet there is a way to peace and that is for the US to face reality. Israel is the real “terror state,” waging perpetual war throughout the Middle East for a wholly indefensible reason — to have unchecked freedom to terrorise and rule over the Palestinian people and to expand its borders as Israel’s zealots see fit.

To make lasting peace in the Middle East, the US must end its blank check to Israel’s perpetual wars and join with the rest of the world to force Israel to live within its internationally recognised borders of June 4, 1967.

Iran’s 10-point plan can be the basis of a comprehensive regional peace — if the US accepts the reality of a state of Palestine. In that case, Iran would likely agree to stop funding non-state belligerents, and Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, and the entire region could live in mutual security and peace.

That outcome should be the basis of a negotiated agreement of the US and Iran in the next two weeks.

American views clear
The American people have made their views clear. A 2025 Pew survey finds most Jewish Americans lack confidence in Netanyahu and back the two-state solution. Most Americans now view Israel unfavourably, the highest unfavourability in history. Sympathy for Israel has hit a 25-year low. Now the political class must catch up with the public.

The peace is within reach, if the US grasps it. Iran’s proposal is serious and the ceasefire is a fragile opening for a comprehensive settlement.

The question is whether the US will, once again, allow Israel to destroy the peace, or rather this time stand up for America’s interests and the world’s interests in a lasting peace.

Jeffrey D. Sachs is a university professor and director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, where he directed the Earth Institute from 2002 until 2016. He is also president of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network and a commissioner of the UN Broadband Commission for Development. Sybil Fares is a specialist and adviser in Middle East policy and sustainable development at SDSN.

Republished under Creative Commons.

Severe weather warnings are set to come into place this weekend as Cyclone Vaianu bears down on New Zealand.

Coromandel and parts of the Bay of Plenty are expected to be the worst-affected, though no part of the North Island will escape unscathed, forecasters warn.

A state of emergency has been declared for Northland as at 5pm, for an initial period of seven days, as part of the regional response.

• READ MORE: Tropical Storm Sinlaku strengthens, could hit CNMI as typhoon by Monday
• Other Pacific wild weather reports

The first warnings will be in effect from late Saturday night in Northland, before Vaianu makes its way south.

Most of the rain and winds will hit on Sunday, reaching the upper South Island by early afternoon.

An hour before Trump said he’d cause the death of a “whole civilisation” if Iran didn’t open the strait of Hormuz, an Iranian official said the shipping channel would be reopened for two weeks if the United States stopped bombing Iran.

The US has now stopped bombing Iran.

So we’re back to the status quo before Trump began his war.

• READ MORE: Israel’s Lebanon attacks threaten US-Iran ceasefire as negotiations near
• Trump claims ‘success’ in Iran in just 32 days compared to lengthy US wars
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

Only now, Iran can credibly threaten to close the strait if it doesn’t get what it wants from Trump — thereby causing havoc to the US and world economies. Trump’s only remaining bargaining chip is his threat of committing war crimes.

In other words, Tuesday’s showdown was a clear victory for Iran and a clear defeat for Trump (although he framed it as a victory).

The Iran fiasco is only the latest in a host of examples revealing how to defeat Trump.

In addition to Iran, similar strategies have been used by China, Russia, Canada, Mexico and Greenland.

Inside the US
Inside the United States, the people of Minneapolis have used them, as have Harvard University, comedian Jimmy Kimmel, writer E Jean Carroll and the law firms Perkins Coie, Jenner & Block, Susman Godfrey, and WilmerHale.

What’s the strategy that connects them all? All refused to cave to Trump, despite his superior military or economic power.

Instead, they’ve engaged in a kind of jiujitsu in which they use Trump’s power against him, while allowing Trump to save face by claiming he’s won. Consider:

Iran knew it was no match for the superior might of the US (and Israel). So it used cheap drones and missiles to close the Strait of Hormuz and incapacitate other Gulf oil installations, thereby driving up the prices of oil and gas at the pump in the US, which has put growing political pressure on Trump, months before a midterm election. Hence, Trump has been forced to pause his war.

China knew what to do when Trump imposed a giant tariff on Chinese exports to the US: it put restrictions on seven types of heavy rare earth metals and magnets, crucial to US defense and tech industries. Beijing continues to use these rare earth restrictions as tactical levers in ongoing negotiations over trade, rather than demand complete surrender by Trump on his trade policies.

Russia has leveraged its vast deposits of oil and natural gas in gaining leverage over US allies. It has also demonstrated its potential ability to intrude into US elections (the Mueller report detailed a “sweeping and systematic” campaign by Russia to interfere in the 2016 US presidential election, primarily favouring Trump).

Canada and Mexico have won tariff showdowns with Trump by leveraging the US’s substantial economic dependence on them for components and raw materials, but without crowing about their victories.

Greenland has leveraged public opinion globally and in the United States — overwhelmingly against an American invasion or occupation — to curb Trump’s ambitions there.

Minneapolis resistance
Now, as to what’s happened inside the United States:

The citizens of Minneapolis and St Paul have leveraged their asymmetric power against Trump’s ICE and border patrol agents by carefully organising themselves into a force of non-violent resistance to protect immigrants there.

Harvard University’s strategy for resisting Trump’s interference in Harvard’s academic freedom has been to leverage its influence with the federal courts in Boston and the Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, to get rulings that stopped Trump (although he’s still trying).

The comedian Jimmy Kimmel turned a political crisis into a ratings victory by using the public backlash against his suspension from ABC, which Disney owns. Since ABC reinstated him, Kimmel has continued to target Trump, and secured his contract through 2027.

The writer E Jean Carroll defeated Donald Trump in two civil cases over sexual abuse and defamation, ultimately securing over $88 million in damages from him — verdicts that have been upheld by federal appeals courts.

Carroll’s lawyers used a civil lawsuit, requiring a lower burden of proof than proving a crime beyond a reasonable doubt. They presented the jury with Trump’s Access Hollywood tape and testimony from other Trump accusers. His depositions, where he called her a “whack job”, were played for the jury.

The law firms Perkins Coie, Jenner & Block, Susman Godfrey, and WilmerHale refused to follow Trump’s executive orders targeting law firms that had represented causes or clients that Trump opposed.

First Amendment rights infringed
The firms leveraged constitutional arguments with the federal courts — arguing that the orders infringed on their First Amendment rights to advocate whatever causes they wished, violated the constitution’s separation of powers because the orders would prevent the judiciary from considering challenges to executive authority, and violated their clients’ rights under the constitution to be represented.

The Justice Department ultimately dropped its fight against these firms in March 2026 after federal appellate judges also found Trump’s orders unconstitutional.

What’s happened to the countries and organisations that have caved to Trump?

All have strengthened Trump’s leverage over them. Europe seems incapacitated, fearing Trump will leave Nato (despite a US law prohibiting it), but unable to decide where to draw the line with him.

The media network ABC continues to lose viewers, while being subject to Trump’s next whims. CBS was purchased by the Trump allies Larry Ellison and his son, David, and is hemorrhaging talent.

Columbia University has been racked by dissent from both students and faculty. The Trump regime continues to make demands of it.

The law firms that caved in to Trump’s executive orders have seen lawyers exit who felt the deals betrayed the firms’ values and principles.

Microsoft dropped Simpson Thacher to work with Jenner & Block — a firm that fought Trump. Students at elite law schools have also reportedly begun to shun firms that struck deals with the Trump regime.

Bottom line: there’s now a clear blueprint for how to defeat Trump. It’s available to any country, organisation or person on which he seeks to impose his will: reject his demands and then use your own asymmetric power — a form of jiujitsu — to turn Trump’s power against him.

Robert Reich, a former US Secretary of Labour, is a professor of public policy emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Guardian US columnist and he blogs at robertreich.substack.com. His new book, Coming Up Short: A Memoir of My America, is out now in the US and in the UK. This article is republished from his Facebook page — other Robert Reich articles at Asia Pacific Report.

Papua New Guinea’s Defence Minister Dr Billy Joseph has stepped aside to allow investigations into allegations he interfered with army recruitment.

Prime Minister James Marape said he would assume the defence portfolio while an independent probe into PNG Defence Force recruitment irregularities proceeded.

A media release from Marape said preliminary reports pointed to possible vested interests interfering in recruitment processes, including favouritism and improper influence.

• READ MORE: Other PNG military reports

The resignation comes after the circulation of video on social media suggesting Dr Joseph favoured people from his district of Nipa-Kutubu for recruitment.

Opposition MPs on Wednesday called for Dr Joseph’s resignation over the allegations, also claiming he had effectively been using soldiers as personal security.

Dr Joseph said he stepped aside to preserve the integrity of the defence sector.

The Prime Minister said he wanted Australia to help with the probe, adding that it was a matter of national security.

Landmark pact
PNG last year signed a landmark pact with Australia to closely integrate the countries’ military forces, and to allow Australia to recruit PNG citizens into the Australian Defence Force.

“Recruitment into our Defence Force must be beyond reproach. It must be transparent, merit-based, and free from any form of influence or conflict of interest,” Marape said.

“This is not the first time issues have surfaced in recruitment at Murray Barracks. Similar concerns were raised five years ago, 10 years ago, and now again.”

The prime minister said the investigation would be completed within a fortnight, with findings to be made public.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Al Jazeera journalist Mohammed Wishah has been killed in an Israeli drone strike in the Gaza Strip, the Qatari television news channel reports.

The air strike caused the car to burst into flames, sources told Al Jazeera.

Israel has been targeting journalists in the Gaza Strip since the beginning of its genocidal war against Palestinians in Gaza in October 2023.

• READ MORE: Gaza journalist deaths reach 262 as Al Jazeera correspondent killed during ceasefire
• Trump threatens action if Iran fails to comply with ‘real’ ceasefire deal
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

The Gaza Government Media Office said at least 262 journalists had been killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza since then.

In a statement, Al Jazeera Media Network said it “strongly condemns the heinous crime of targeting and killing Al Jazeera Mubasher correspondent, Mohammed Wishah”.

“This constitutes a new and flagrant violation of all international laws and norms, and reflects a continued systematic policy of targeting journalists and silencing the voice of truth,” it said.

“As Al Jazeera mourns its correspondent Mohammed Wishah, who joined the network in 2018, it affirms that his killing was not a random act but a deliberate and targeted crime intended to intimidate journalists and prevent them from carrying out their professional duties,” the statement continued.

Israeli ‘ceasefire’ violations
Al Jazeera’s Ibrahim al-Khalili, reporting from Gaza City, says the fact that Wishah was killed while travelling on the main road in Gaza City shows “the situation is getting much more dire in light of the ongoing Israeli military’s ‘ceasefire’ violations”.
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“It’s nearly six months since the US-brokered ‘ceasefire’ came into effect, and the Israeli violations continue – targeting journalists like Wishah, who has been covering the genocidal war since day one,” he said.

Attacks on Gaza – Al Jazeera reporter killed                     Video: Al Jazeera

The Gaza Government Media Office says the Israeli military has committed about 2,000 violations since the “ceasefire” took effect.
‘Systematic targeting’

The office also said the killing of Wishah was an example of the “systematic targeting and assassination of Palestinian journalists” by Israel.

It called on the International Federation of Journalists, the Arab Journalists Union and media bodies worldwide to “condemn these systematic crimes against Palestinian journalists and media workers in the Gaza Strip.”

The office appealed to the international community and relevant organisations to “stop these repeated attacks,” prosecute those responsible in international courts, and “exercise serious and effective pressure to stop the crime of genocide” and protect journalists in Gaza.

More than 72,000 people have been killed and over 171,000 others injured in the Strip since October 2023. The assault was halted under a US-backed ceasefire that took effect last October.

According to Gaza’s Health Ministry, at least 733 Palestinians have been killed and 2034 injured in Israeli attacks since the ceasefire.

Yesterday began with Donald Trump issuing genocidal threats against Iran on social media and ended — just ten hours later — with the announcement of a 14-day ceasefire, on Iran’s terms.

Even by the volatile standards of Trump’s presidency, the whiplash is extraordinary. What, then, have the two sides actually agreed to — and what might it mean?

In a subsequent post, Trump asserted that Iran had agreed to keep the Strait of Hormuz open during the two-week pause in hostilities. Negotiations, he added, will proceed over that period on the basis of Iran’s 10-point plan, which he described as a “workable” foundation for talks.

• READ MORE: ‘Killing machine’: Lebanon mourns as Israeli raids shake US-Iran
• Iranians breathe a ‘ceasefire’ sigh of relief as all sides claim victory
• Ignoring genocide – the bill for Australia’s silence has arrived
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

Those 10 points are:

1. The US must fundamentally commit to guaranteeing non-aggression.
2. Continuation of Iran’s control over the Strait of Hormuz.
3. Acceptance that Iran can enrich uranium for its nuclear programme.
4. Removal of all primary sanctions on Iran.
5. Removal of all secondary sanctions against foreign entities that do business with Iranian institutions.
6. End of all United Nations Security Council resolutions targeting Iran.
7. End of all International Atomic Energy Agency resolutions on Iran’s nuclear programme.
8. Compensation payment to Iran for war damage.
9. Withdrawal of US combat forces from the region.
10. Ceasefire on all fronts, including Israel’s conflict with Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The United States has not, of course, signed on to all 10 points. But the mere fact that Iran’s framework will anchor the negotiations amounts to a significant diplomatic victory for Tehran.

More striking still, according to the Associated Press, Iran will retain control of the Strait during the ceasefire and continue — alongside Oman — to collect transit fees from passing vessels. In effect, Washington appears to have conceded that reopening the waterway comes with tacit recognition of Iran’s authority over it.

The geopolitical consequences could be profound. As Mohammad Eslami and Zeynab Malakouti note in Responsible Statecraft, Tehran is likely to leverage this position to rebuild economic ties with Asian and European partners — countries that once traded extensively with Iran but were driven out of its market over the past 15 years by US sanctions.

Also strategic
Iran’s calculus is not driven solely by solidarity with Palestinians and Lebanese. It is also strategic. Continued Israeli bombardment risks reigniting direct confrontation between Israel and Iran — a cycle that has already flared twice since October 7.

From Tehran’s perspective, a durable halt to its conflict with Israel is inseparable from ending Israel’s wars in Gaza and Lebanon. This is not an aspirational add-on; it is a prerequisite.

The forthcoming talks in Islamabad between Washington and Tehran may yet falter. But the terrain has shifted. Trump’s failed use of force has blunted the credibility of American military threats, introducing a new dynamic into US-Iran diplomacy.

Washington can still rattle its sabre. But after a failed war, such threats ring hollow.

The United States is no longer in a position to dictate terms; any agreement will have to rest on genuine compromise. That, in turn, demands real diplomacy — patience, discipline, and a tolerance for ambiguity — qualities not typically associated with Trump.

It may also require the participation of other major powers, particularly China, to help anchor the process and reduce the risk of a relapse into conflict.

Above all, the ceasefire’s durability will hinge on whether Trump can restrain Israel from undermining the diplomatic track.

No illusions
On this point, there should be no illusions. Senior Israeli officials have already denounced the agreement as the greatest “political disaster” in the country’s history — a signal, if any were needed, of how fragile this moment may prove to be.

Even if the talks collapse — and even if Israel resumes its bombardment of Iran — it does not necessarily follow that the United States will return to war. There is little reason to believe a second round would produce a different outcome, or that it would not once again leave Iran in a position to hold the global economy hostage.

In that sense, Tehran has, at least for now, restored a measure of deterrence.

One final point bears emphasis: this elective war was not only a strategic blunder. Rather than precipitating regime change, it has likely granted Iran’s theocracy a renewed lease on life — much as Saddam Hussein did in 1980, when his invasion enabled Ayatollah Khomeini to consolidate power at home.

The magnitude of this miscalculation may well puzzle historians for decades to come.

Dr Trita Parsi is the executive VP of the Quincy Institute and an award-winning author. Washingtonian Magazine has named him one of the 25 most influential voices on foreign policy. Noam Chomsky calls him “one of the most distinguished scholars on Iran”.

Having launched an illegal, destructive war that brutally struck the entire planet’s economy (and confirmed once again Europe’s combination of irrelevance and hypocrisy), and after threatening Iran with genocide and “civilisational annihilation,” President Trump ultimately backed down on everything.

Like a Roman Emperor during the Empire’s declining years would declare victory and stage triumphs in Rome following massive defeats of his legions at the hands of Gothic warriors, so now does this modern American Nero struggle to convince us that he “won”.

In reality, Iran now decides which vessels pass through the Strait of Hormuz and, for the first time, charge them tolls for so doing.

• READ MORE: US, Iran announce two-week ceasefire; Israel claims truce excludes Lebanon
• Pope Leo XIV hails ceasefire between US and Iran as “sign of real hope”
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

The demands of the White House, which Trump had set as prerequisites for stopping the bombings, have bitten the dust.

The surrender of Iran’s enriched uranium, the demand for the destruction of Iran’s missiles, the vain hopes for regime change, the designs on Iranian oil — all of these goals were forgotten.

What has not been forgotten, and will not be forgotten, are the 180 schoolgirls that the US murdered on the first day of their attack by striking their school — along with the thousands of other killed and maimed civilians.

False sense of relief
Lest the world be overtaken by a false sense of relief, it is crucial to brace ourselves for the long-lasting economic repercussions of Trump’s idiotic war.

Make no mistake: the shockwaves of economic hardship caused by the US attack on Iran may wane but it will not be averted.

The wave of soaring prices, the blow to employment, the increase in interest rates and foreclosures will not disappear with this ceasefire.

On the contrary, because of the oligarchic cartels that also see this crisis as an opportunity, it will take political pressure by the many on the very few to reverse the negative consequences of this criminal war, as well as all the various crises that preceded it.

Republished from Yanis Varoufakis’ X feed.

There is a bitter truth that must be spoken before we can talk honestly about what is happening to us now. Michael West Media reports on Australia’s quiet complicity in the illegal US-Israeli war on Iran.

COMMENTARY: By Andrew Brown

When the bombs fell on Gaza, Australia was quiet.

When the hospitals were destroyed, when the aid was blocked, when children were pulled from rubble in pieces, when the United Nations, the International Criminal Court, and humanitarian organisations with decades of credibility in conflict zones used words like genocide, ethnic cleansing and collective punishment, Australia was quiet.

Not uniformly. Not entirely. There were protests in every major city, sustained over months, of a size and seriousness this country has not seen since the Iraq War.

• READ MORE: Iran accepts ceasefire after Trump says it will pause bombing for two weeks
• Synagogue in Tehran ‘completely destroyed’ in US-Israeli attack
• Top university says US-Israel attack targeted Iran’s progress, AI learning
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

There were independent senators who stood in Parliament and said what needed to be said, in plain language, without diplomatic hedging. There were journalists, academics, former diplomats, and hundreds of thousands of ordinary Australians who signed petitions, marched in the streets, and wrote letters that went largely unanswered.

Palestinian-Australian, Muslim-Australian, Arab-Australian communities, and many others with no personal connection to the conflict beyond a functioning conscience, screamed into a political void and were told, in effect, to calm down.

Or apprehended for wearing a t-shirt.

“I’m offended by crocs,” says man apprehended by many police & special ops for wearing “F… Israel” t-shirt

The footage #andrewbrown #legend #auspol pic.twitter.com/fc1p3f911d

— Michael West (@MichaelWestBiz) April 6, 2026

The country, as a political entity, its government, its major institutions, its official voice to the world, was quiet.

The cost of silence
That silence had a cost. Not just a moral cost, though the moral cost is staggering and will take generations to fully reckon with.

A strategic cost. The cost of allowing a logic of unchecked military impunity to establish itself as the operating principle of the US-Israeli alliance. A logic that, once normalised in Gaza, did not stay in Gaza.

It never does.

More than 72,000 people killed so far. More than 171,000 injured. An entire civilian population, in one of the most densely populated places on earth, was systematically starved, displaced, and destroyed.

Journalists were killed in numbers that constitute, by any honest accounting, a deliberate campaign to eliminate witnesses. Paramedics were bombed. UN peacekeepers were struck.

Aid workers from Australia’s own partner organisations were killed in strikes so precise they could not have been accidental.

Australia expressed concern.

Calibrated, diplomatically worded, operationally meaningless concern.

And then, when the same alliance, emboldened by 18 months of zero meaningful consequence, turned its weapons on a sovereign nation-state, on Iran, on February 28 of this year, Australia expressed support. Called it constructive. Offered the American justification back to its own people as sovereign Australian policy.

Warnings ignored
The people warning loudest about Gaza were not merely warning about Palestinians. They were warning about a system. A system in which American military power and Israeli strategic ambition, freed from the constraints of international law and serious allied pushback, would expand. Would find new targets. Would come, eventually, for the stability of every country caught in its orbit.

They were right. And they were called antisemitic for saying so.

Iran did not come from nowhere. The assault on Iran is the direct and logical extension of the impunity normalised in Gaza. If you can destroy a civilian population with no meaningful consequence, you can bomb a sovereign nation.

If the ICC arrest warrant for Netanyahu means nothing, then international law means nothing. And if international law means nothing, then the only operating principle is force.

And the consequences of force are distributed not just to the combatants but to every country whose government chose alignment over principle.

Australia chose alignment over the people of Gaza. It chose it again over Iran. And now it is discovering, at the bowser and the checkout and the business bank account, exactly what that choice costs.

The war came home
Here is what makes this moment different from every protest march and every unanswered letter that came before.

The pain is no longer abstract.

When Gaza burned, the average Australian, cocooned by geographic distance, insulated by a media that kept the most confronting images off prime time, reassured by politicians who described it as heartbreaking while doing nothing, could maintain the fiction that this was someone else’s tragedy.

Terrible, certainly. Distant. Manageable. Something that happened over there, to people over there, in a conflict that had been going on forever and would presumably continue

without any particular bearing on the school fees or the mortgage or the quarterly business figures.

That fiction is now dead.

The fuel price spike is not over there. The supply chain disruption is not over there. The investment uncertainty showing up in superannuation statements, in business loans that just got harder to service, in the job that exists today and may not exist in three months.

None of that is over there.

The war came home. Not in body bags. Not in the specific grief of a military family. It came home in the way that imperial adventurism always eventually comes home to the countries that enable it.

Through the economy. Through the slow, grinding, distributed punishment of a population that was never consulted, never warned, and never honestly told what their government’s choices would cost them.

Australia’s complicity
Australia was a participant in Gaza’s destruction. Not with weapons. Not with soldiers. With silence. With diplomatic cover. With the specific, material legitimacy that flows from a liberal democracy declining to formally object. And with the arms adjacent, intelligence and security cooperation that flows through Five Eyes and has never been seriously interrogated in the Australian public domain.

Complicity is not passive.

When you have the power to intervene, to sanction, to condemn, to withdraw diplomatic cover, and you choose not to, you are not a bystander. You are a participant. And participants, eventually, share in the consequences.

The Palestinian people could not make Australia listen with their suffering alone.

Not because Australians are cruel. They are not. But because the suffering was made distant. The media made it complex. The politicians made it delicate. The lobby groups made it professionally dangerous to say in plain language what was plainly happening.

The whole architecture of managed consent did its job with brutal efficiency for 18 months.

But a 40 percent fuel price increase cuts through managed consent, as does a wave of small business closures. And young Australians told to absorb the economic consequences of a war their government endorsed without their knowledge or consent. That cuts through everything.

The people who protested over Gaza, who were dismissed and belittled and accused of antisemitism and told they were being naive about geopolitical complexity, understood something that the political class is only now beginning to grasp: That the world does not offer permanent non-involvement. That the wars you enable reach you. That the impunity you excuse comes back denominated in currencies you understand personally.

Fuel. Food. Jobs. Mortgages. Businesses. Futures.
This is that reckoning. The genocide in Gaza did not wake Australia up, the bill for enabling it will.

And when Australia wakes, fully, clearly, with the focused fury of people who now understand exactly what was done to them, the politicians who called it constructive and the media that told them to blame the Energy Minister are going to find that managed consent has a shelf life.

That shelf life has expired.

Vietnam survived Nixon’s madman theory and the world survived the era of mutually assured destruction. Now we face the moment of two super-empowered shitheads. There is nothing nicer to call them.

Who will stop two self-obsessed, very old men, already dedicated to tearing down humanity? Today Trump openly declares his intention to destroy a civilisation. They are apparently only able to see war personally, Netanyahu as the climax of 40 years of dreaming, and Trump as his arbitrary prerogative.

In lockstep they destroyed Gaza’s homes, places of learning and culture, health and modernity. They murdered civilians with abandon and drew pictures of capitalist castles on the beach — and still they failed, just as their over-armed predecessors have failed from Vietnam to Afghanistan.

• READ MORE: Iran accepts ceasefire after Trump says it will pause bombing for two weeks
• Synagogue in Tehran ‘completely destroyed’ in US-Israeli attack
• Top university says US-Israel attack targeted Iran’s progress, AI learning
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

People still live, in great need of our action.

The scorched-earth vision of Trump and Netanyahu rolls onward. Now in Iran and again in Lebanon, they make war on civilian homes and infrastructure. They destroy families and livelihoods, places of beauty and culture, the bridges that connect us, the industries that rebuild and the energy that lights the darkness.

They desecrate all of our religions. The list of their crimes grows daily.

These two evil despots are content to erode the world’s supplies of power, fertiliser, manufacturing components. They are oblivious to the lives they imperil in Iran, Lebanon and Palestine — and countless other people who they will kill around the world by hunger and hardship.

Anything to rule, even over a landscape of bones and dust. They will fail but they must not be allowed to play this out.

We are beyond disgust. We are witnessing the end of an order indeed: America’s empire is flailing in its death throes. How many people will Trump take down with it?

Weighed down with dread, we have no words but these: someone, everyone, stop them!

Republished from Sh’ma Koleinu — Alternative Jewish Voices.

Trump may have backed down for now, but he’s shown how unhinged he is by threatening the death of a “whole civilization.”

I’m heading back to DC to try and get answers for the American people. Congress needs to return to the Capitol immediately and vote to end this war. https://t.co/vZLXb0anhq

— Senator Andy Kim (@SenatorAndyKim) April 8, 2026

COMMENTARY: By Andrew Brown

Here is a reliable indicator that you are being managed rather than informed.

When the story gets complicated, when the real cause of your pain points uncomfortably toward power, toward allies, toward the architecture of foreign policy that cannot be questioned, the Murdoch press reaches for a scapegoat.

And so, as Australians watch fuel prices surge by approximately 40 percent, a direct consequence of the US-Israeli strikes on Iran closing the Strait of Hormuz, as ABC News has itself reported, the editors and columnists of News Corp’s Australian outlets have a different culprit in mind.

• READ MORE: Monsters of war – the men who have put the world at risk
• ‘Complete demolition’: Trump repeats Iran ultimatum as deal deadline looms
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

Not Netanyahu. Not Trump. Not the war that has sent energy markets into convulsions and supply chains into chaos. Not the illegal military campaign that blocked one of the world’s most critical shipping arteries and sent insurance premiums for tankers into the stratosphere.

No, their preferred villain is Chris Bowen.

Australia’s Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen, who did not bomb Iran. Chris Bowen, who does not set the global price of oil. Chris Bowen, whose energy policies, right or wrong, are entirely debatable on their merits, has precisely nothing to do with a US-Israeli military campaign that closed the Strait of Hormuz and triggered the worst fuel price shock in years.

The Bowen beat-up is not journalism. It is misdirection of the most deliberate and dishonest kind. It is the Murdoch press doing what it does most reliably and most effectively — running cover for power, redirecting the public’s legitimate anger toward a safe domestic target, and keeping the real architecture of the crisis, the geopolitical decisions, the alliance commitments, the illegal war, safely out of frame.

Because here is what the Murdoch press will not tell you, and what the mainstream media in general has failed to say with anything like the clarity the situation demands.

Australians are paying more for fuel because a war closed the Strait of Hormuz.

Doh!

That war was launched on February 28 of this year by the United States and Israel against Iran.

It was not sanctioned by the United Nations Security Council. It was not authorised by any provision of international law that serious legal scholars recognise as applicable. It was not preceded by any meaningful consultation with allies, including Australia, whose economies would absorb its consequences.

It was a unilateral act of military aggression by the most powerful country on earth and its primary regional client, conducted because they had the weapons to do it and had calculated, correctly, that nobody with the power to stop them would try.

Puppet on a string
And when it happened, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese went on the ABC’s 7:30 programme and told Sarah Ferguson that what Australia supported was the American decision to stop Iran getting nuclear weapons and to address Iran’s role in destabilising the region.

Read that answer carefully. It is not an answer about Australian interests. It contains no reference to Australian sovereignty, Australian economic security, or the fuel price increase already beginning when those words were spoken.

It is a recitation, clean, fluent, almost word for word, of the American and Israeli justification for the strikes, delivered in the Prime Minister’s voice, on Australian public television, as though it represented Australia’s own sovereign and independently arrived at conclusion, which it didn’t.

He later described Australia’s contribution to the conflict as “constructive”. He has since said he wants more certainty about the war’s objectives and acknowledged there needs to be an end point.

This is the man who endorsed the war before its objectives had been defined, now asking what they are.

Managed complicity and Murdoch
This is what managed complicity looks like up close. You sign on. You use the ally’s language. You call it constructive. And then, when the consequences arrive in the form of 40 percent fuel price increases and small businesses collapsing under freight surcharge pressure, you allow the media ecosystem you have never seriously challenged to redirect the public’s fury at your own Energy Minister.

The Murdoch press is doing its job. That job is not to inform Australians.

That job, in this specific context, on this specific story, is to protect the US-Israeli alliance from the accountability it deserves and to ensure that the legitimate rage of a population being economically punished for decisions made in Washington and Jerusalem never finds its proper target.

The proprietor of that press empire has spent decades cultivating proximity to exactly the power centres that prosecuted this war.

Murdoch newspapers in the United States were among the most consistent cheerleaders for the military adventurism that set the conditions for what is now unfolding. His Australian mastheads take their foreign policy cues from a worldview that treats American and Israeli strategic interests as essentially synonymous with the interests of the English-speaking world.

That worldview is not Australia’s sovereign foreign policy. It is an ideology dressed as common sense, distributed at scale through the country’s most-read newspapers, and deployed most aggressively when the connection between geopolitical decisions and domestic pain threatens to become too obvious to ignore.

Chris Bowen did not block the Strait of Hormuz. A war did.

An illegal war. Conducted without Australian consent. Endorsed by an Australian Prime Minister on national television, using the language of the people who started it.

And the newspapers owned by a man whose commercial and ideological interests align entirely with the people who started it are telling you it is the Energy Minister’s fault.

That is not a coincidence; it is the system working exactly as designed.

The question is whether Australians are going to keep letting it work.

Minister,

You are about to meet US Secretary of State Marco Rubio at a time of real global tension.

Moments like this define countries.

My great-grandfather fought fascism.

• READ MORE: ‘Complete demolition’: Trump repeats Iran ultimatum as deal deadline looms
• Monsters of war – the men who have put the world at risk
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

In 1935, when fascist Italy invaded my country of birth, Ethiopia, then Abyssinia, Emperor Haile Selassie warned the world at the League of Nations. Many countries hesitated. New Zealand didn’t.

Under Prime Minister Michael Joseph Savage, we called for sanctions. We chose principle over power.

We used to be clear about our principles in international politics. We stood against apartheid. We stood against nuclear testing in the Pacific.

In the 2010s, New Zealand went across Africa, the Middle East, Latin America and Asia asking for support to sit on the UN Security Council — not as a powerful country, but as a voice for the powerless.

Many countries trusted us and backed us. And for a time, we honoured that trust.

On 23 December 2016, under [then Foreign Minister] Murray McCully, we backed a UN resolution declaring Israeli settlements illegal under international law. There was pressure. We stood firm.

On 25 March 2026, the UN voted to recognise slavery and the transatlantic slave trade as among the gravest crimes against humanity. Most countries supported it. New Zealand stepped back.

And as of 2026, we still refuse to recognise the State of Palestine while genocide unfolds in Gaza.

Minister, the current global tensions make this even more important. New Zealand is clear on international law when it comes to Iran. We must be just as clear when it comes to the United States and Israel.

As a small trading nation, our economic, diplomatic and security interests depend on international law being applied consistently. If we pick and choose, we weaken that system and we weaken ourselves.

Our reputation was built by standing up and punching above our weight, even when it was uncomfortable.

That is where our soft power came from. We have the potential to be a superpower in soft power.

Right now, we risk losing that by moving closer to powerful countries, even when they are in the wrong.

Minister, take that history with you into that meeting. Be clear. Be consistent. Stand for international law everywhere, not just where it is easy.

People in New Zealand and around the world are watching. And history has a long memory.

Nureddin Abdurahman is a Tangata Tiriti from Addis Ababa 17 years ago and a Wellington City Councillor. He first won a seat as a Paekawakawa/Southern Ward councillor in 2022 and was re-elected in 2025.

If the US-Israelis escalate, the Saudis should fear for the future of the Yanbu pipeline.

So should we — even if you don’t know it by name. If Trump and Netanyahu make good on their genocidal threats against Iran and escalate, “Yanbu” may soon be as familiar to you as “Hormuz”.

Yanbu alone is delivering about 7 percent of global seaborne crude. Iran is fully aware that, by bypassing the Strait of Hormuz, it provides the West with access to millions of barrels of oil per day needed to keep industries and lives moving forward and oil prices from skyrocketing.

• READ MORE: ‘Complete demolition’: Trump repeats Iran ultimatum as deal deadline looms
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

Why, Iran might reasonably ask, should this continue while the US-Israeli war machine pursues its mission to drive Iran back to the Stone Age?

Yanbu bears resemblance to another famous pipeline — Nord Stream — that, as forewarned by President Biden, was destroyed after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

“If Russia invades — that means tanks or troops crossing the border of Ukraine — then there will no longer be a Nord Stream 2. We will bring it to an end,” the President said at a press conference in February 2022.

It wasn’t a smoking gun but rather watching someone load the gun.

Easily invite emulation
Today, in a different US war, Nord Stream’s destruction could easily invite emulation by the Iranians who are slowly learning to better the instruction provided by the US and Israel.

Sitting out on the Red Sea, seemingly far from the trouble and strife playing out in the Persian Gulf, is Yanbu, the port that receives up to 5 million barrels of Saudi oil per day.

It is a lifeline for Saudi Arabia’s oil industry, an escape route for oil that would otherwise be trapped. If the Strait of Hormuz is the jugular vein of Gulf oil, Yanbu is a bypass valve allowing the Saudi energy heart to keep beating.

Built during the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s, this 1200 km pipeline connects the massive Abqaiq oil fields in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia with the Red Sea. It was built with the express purpose of bypassing the Strait of Hormuz.

Known as the East-West Pipeline or simply The Petroline, it travels 1200km across the Kingdom over some of the harshest deserts in the world, a glistening steel thread that even traverses the jagged Hijaz Mountains, to reach its terminus at the Red Sea port of Yanbu.

Yanbu isn’t just a port, it is a sprawling facility with the complex engineering needed to receive, store and shuttle the black gold.

Huge storage farms glistening with steel tanks, each holding tens of millions of barrels, connect with dozens of specialised berths for the giant tankers.

Biggest tankers
The biggest tankers can swallow 270,000 tonnes of oil that must then work its way either north through the Suez Canal or south through the chokepoint at Bab el-Mandeb, which both Ansar Allah (the Houthis) and Iran have threatened to close this week.

Bab-el-Mandeb means — most aptly today — “Gate of Tears” or “Gate of Grief” in Arabic.

Saudi Arabia, UK, US and to a lesser extent New Zealand, Australia and many Western countries, have been part of a campaign to crush Houthi control of this 20km chokepoint.

The Saudi-led war and starvation siege imposed on Yemen with the assistance of these countries killed, according to the United Nations, more than 400,000 Yemeni civilians. This depraved violence against one of the poorest populations on earth was largely ignored by the Western media.

It features heavily in the calculations of Iran and Yemen: they know the moral values of their enemies.

So far the Houthis have only participated in a limited way with a few, largely symbolic, missiles fired at Israel. They have good reason to hesitate.

The Saudis, battered by Houthi drone strikes on their infrastructure and out-generalled by Ansar Allah, have signalled a willingness to permanently settle the Yemen war, providing territorial concessions and huge funds for reconstruction. Blocking the Bab-el-Mandeb could wreck this strategic progress and invite another genocidal onslaught from the Saudis, Americans and their allies.

Confronting ‘Axis of Genocide’
Nonetheless despite being massively out-gunned, Ansar Allah and the Yemeni people in their millions have shown a willingness to confront what they see as the Axis of Genocide (US-Israel and their allies).

Just a few days ago Houthi Deputy Information Minister Mohammed Mansour told Al Monitor, “The option of closing the Bab el-Mandeb Strait is a Yemeni option that can be implemented should the aggression against Iran and Lebanon escalate savagely, or if any Gulf state becomes directly involved in military operations in support of the [Zionist] entity or the United States.”

For its part, Iran has a menu of options to choose from to bring the flow into or out of Yanbu to a halt. Something as simple as destroying the specialised loading arms or the pumping stations at the terminal would halt the whole system.

Striking a handful of tankers (some with $200 million of oil onboard) would instantly make the Red Sea uninsurable. The pipeline itself could be targeted. This is the fire and mayhem that the US and Israel are inviting if they continue to target Iran’s civilians and vital infrastructure.

As geopolitical experts like Professor John Mearsheimer have warned for decades: when faced with an existential threat (as Iran obviously is) a state will do anything to ensure survival. Were Iran to successfully see off the massive attack by the US and Israel and successfully retain control of the Strait of Hormuz, it will seek to establish an entirely new security architecture for the region, one that no longer involves US bases.

Iran will want peace, stability and good commerce, but will seek reparations from the Gulf States for having provided bases for the US-Israeli war machine.

Another pipeline will also likely be on Iran’s list of potential targets. Israel’s close ally Abu Dhabi, has played an important role in the war. It is the richest of the emirates that comprise the UAE. Its Habshan–Fujairah pipeline also bypasses Hormuz by taking a 360km land route from Abu Dhabi’s Habshan oil wells to Fujairah, a port on the Gulf of Oman.

Outside Iranian control
This adds about 1.8 million barrels a day to global trade and currently sits outside Iranian control.

With Iran in the process of establishing a toll booth — a system of transit charges — for vessels passing through the Strait of Hormuz, both Habshan–Fujairah and Yanbu represent strategic threats to its control of energy coming out of the Gulf and, most importantly, the taxation revenue scheme it will need to recoup the hundreds of billions of dollars in damages to the country inflicted by the US and Israel.

I discuss this topic in my article “Who will pay billions in reparations to Iran? We will.”

I hope this violence ends. I hope the Americans and Israelis cease their illegal war. I doubt either will pay reparations to the Iranians, including the families of the hundreds of school children they have slaughtered.

For those reasons and more, I hope the Iranians survive and thrive thanks, in part, to the transit fees they now have every right to charge the nations that did nothing to stop this crime of crimes.

Eugene Doyle is a writer based in Wellington, New Zealand. He has written extensively on the Middle East, as well as peace and security issues in the Asia Pacific region, and contributes to Asia Pacific Report. He hosts solidarity.co.nz

Greenpeace International has announced that the MY Arctic Sunrise — one of its largest vessels — will be taking part in the upcoming Global Sumud Flotilla relaunch in order “to directly challenge Israel’s ongoing blockade of aid to Gaza”.

The green group said the Arctic Sunrise, an icebreaker that’s been part of Greenpeace’s fleet since 1995, will be “sailing alongside more than 70 vessels and over 1000 participants” in the second Global Sumud Flotilla, which is scheduled to set sail from Barcelona on April 12, with subsequent stops in Syracuse, Italy, and Lerapetra, Greece en route to Gaza.

Greenpeace said the Arctic Sunrise “is providing operational and technical support” for the flotilla.

• READ MORE: Other Global Sumud Flotilla reports
• Kia Ora Gaza website

“The devastation inflicted on Gaza has become a dangerous doctrine of impunity, now spreading to Lebanon through relentless destruction and deepening human suffering,” Greenpeace Middle East and North Africa executive director Ghiwa Nakat said in a statement.

“The Greenpeace ship is joining this people-led mission to demand safe, unhindered humanitarian access to Gaza and to challenge the illegal blockade that continues to devastate civilian life.

“We stand firmly against war crimes, deliberate starvation, ethnic cleansing, genocide, and ecocide,” Nakat added.

“This flotilla is a call to governments around the world to end their silence, protect humanitarian action, and act with urgency and principle to uphold international law, human dignity, and justice.”

Specialised medical care
Global Sumud Flotilla organisers said the 2026 mission will focus on specialised medical care, with more than 1000 healthcare professionals aiming to deliver lifesaving medicines and equipment to Gaza, where 29 months of Israeli war and siege have left the Palestinian exclave’s medical infrastructure in ruins.

Last year, dozens of boats carrying hundreds of activists from over 40 nations took part in the last Global Sumud Flotilla — sumud means “perseverance” in Arabic — as it attempted to break Israel’s naval blockade and deliver desperately needed humanitarian aid including food, medicines, and baby formula to starving Gazans amid a growing famine.

Israeli forces intercepted and seized the flotilla vessels in international waters in early October, arresting all aboard the boats and temporarily jailing them in Israel, where some — including Swedish climate campaigner Greta Thunberg — said they were physically and psychologically abused by their captors.

The Freedom Flotilla Coalition has made numerous attempts to break Israel’s blockade by sea, all of which ended in more or less the same way.

In 2010, Israeli forces raided one of the first convoys carrying humanitarian aid to Gaza by sea. The Israeli attackers killed nine volunteers aboard the MV Mavi Marmara, including Turkish-American teenager Furkan Doğan and a 10th died later.

Numerous experts and the entire United Nations Security Council — except the United States — have called the starvation of Gaza deliberately created by Israel, whose Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and former Defence Minister, Yoav Gallant, are wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes, including murder and forced starvation.

Israel — whose assault and siege of Gaza have left more than 250,000 Palestinians dead or wounded — is also facing a genocide case in the International Court of Justice filed by South Africa and formally supported by nearly 20 countries, including Spain, the mission’s country of departure.

Cycle of destruction
“At this time of escalating war, triggered by US and Israeli militaries and cascading into a cycle of destruction and pain across the Middle East, we are honoured to answer the call to join the Sumud Flotilla,” Greenpeace Spain executive director Eva Saldaña said yesterday.

“While world governments have lacked the courage and conviction to uphold international law and their obligation to prevent genocide in Gaza, the Sumud Flotilla has been a shining light of humanitarian solidarity and a symbol of hope in action.”

Global Sumud Flotilla leaders applauded Greenpeace’s decision to participate in its 2026 mission.

“Greenpeace’s history of defending the seas, confronting injustice, and taking action in defence of life makes them a powerful addition to our 2026 spring mission,” said Global Sumud Flotilla steering committee member Susan Abdullah.

“We sail together in the same direction, with a shared determination to help break Israel’s illegal siege of Gaza.”

Republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons.

New Zealand’s Finance Minister says she has “never felt so dependent on the actions and feelings of one administration and its leaders”, as concerns grow about the fuel shock triggered by the US-Israel war on Iran.

And the Prime Minister has called the US President’s foul-mouthed threats to Iran “unhelpful” and the US’ goals and objectives in Iran “unclear”.

Few ships carrying stock have been allowed to pass through the Strait of Hormuz since Iran effectively closed it just over a month ago, in retaliation for the attacks.

• READ MORE: Monsters of war – the men who have put the world at risk
• Iran’s ceasefire proposal response significant but ‘not good enough’: Trump
• NZ’s Peters called on to stress Palestine ‘open wound’ with Rubio
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

That has triggered a global spike in prices at the pump, and New Zealand — wholly dependent on importing refined fuels — has not been spared.

At the weekend, US President Donald Trump issued an expletive-laden threat at Iran, telling it to “open the F*****’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell” or its civilian infrastructure would be attacked.

He followed that up on Monday (US time) with a claim the “entire country can be taken out in one night”.

The comments come as Foreign Minister Winston Peters heads to the US to meet US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

Asked about Trump’s comments today, Finance Minister Nicola Willis first was diplomatic.

‘Acting with restraint’
“We actually want to see all parties acting with restraint, moving toward a negotiated solution so the crisis can end,” she told RNZ Morning Report.

“And it’s simply the fact that the longer the conflict goes on, the more severe the impact. And once again, we call on the US, Iran, all actors in this conflict to uphold international law.”

Asked again, she replied: “Well, I have reflected that never have I felt so dependent on the actions and feelings of one administration and its leaders as New Zealand is right now.

“And I see the pain that so many New Zealanders are experiencing as a result of this fuel shock, and I wish for it to end.

“And the sad reality is that it’s not in New Zealand’s hands, that lies in the hands of countries very far away.”

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon, appearing on Morning Report shortly after Willis, said Trump’s rhetoric was “unhelpful”.

“I think the bottom line is that the focus needs to be on not seeing this conflict expand any further. It is critical that the US and Iran find a way to de-escalate. Absolutely critical for the world and certainly for us in New Zealand.

“But, you know, yeah, I mean, unhelpful — because more military action is not necessary.”

‘Comply with international law’
He said he expected “all parties to comply with international law, as you’d expect, and international humanitarian law”.

‘Totally unacceptable’
On Trump’s social media comments, Labour leader Chris Hipkins told Morning Report, the threats he made were “totally unacceptable” and there was no justification for it.

“It would be an attack on innocent civilians and not something New Zealand should in any way condone.

“Threatening to blow up innocent civilians is not the sort of thing you would expect to see the president of the United States engaging in — it’s totally unacceptable and New Zealand should condemn it.”

Steady as she goes
Willis was resisting the temptation to cut fuel taxes and road user charges (RUC) as prices spiked — particularly for diesel — saying it would make no sense to encourage fuel consumption at the same time as calling for restraint.

According to the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment’s (MBIE) latest data national fuel stocks are stable, with sufficient stock levels — for now.

Diesel levels have dipped slightly since the last report, while jet fuel and petrol levels have risen slightly. There is now just 17.5 days’ worth of diesel in the country, with more on ships headed this way — 12 outside our exclusive economic zone and four inside.

“We haven’t had any reports of any issues with those shipments that are in international waters,” Willis told Morning Report. “We would expect to get reporting from fuel importing companies if they were seeing any issues with those. They seem to be safely on their way.”

Gaspy figures show diesel is now more expensive than 91 at more than $3.70 a litre, while its users also have to pay RUC.

“That price is really, really tough on many, many businesses in our economy, and also individuals and families who use diesel,” Wilis said. “We’re used to seeing diesel at the pump cheaper than 91.

Prime Minister Luxon said he was “gravely concerned” that the longer the conflict went on, the “harder it gets for Kiwis here at home”. Just how long it would take to get back to normal was “unknown”, he said, but no restrictions on use were yet planned.

Supply challenges
“Even if we’ve got a ceasefire miraculously and a quality one tomorrow, there clearly will be supply challenges as production has ramped back up again, as storage is always put in storage and it’s transported out through the Hormuz out into the refineries around the world.”

Luxon said Peters would be making it clear to Rubio the conflict was impacting New Zealand and “pushing them to deescalate”.

“I think the goals and the objectives from the US administration have been somewhat unclear. For us, that’s why the world is suffering, everybody around the world. I’ve spoken to a number of world leaders.

“Some of those developing economies are doing it incredibly tough. I know it’s difficult for our New Zealand folk here at home as well, dealing with higher prices at the pump.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

COMMENTARY: By Andrew Brown

Two men are mainly responsible for the war on Iran. And then there are those — such as Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese — who wilfully acquiesce to their murderous whims.

It’s the men. Not their press releases. Not their carefully managed public personas. Not the language their communications teams have stress tested for maximum palatability.

It’s the men themselves.

• READ MORE: Tehran says response to ceasefire proposals formulated, no direct talks
• NZ’s Peters called on to stress Palestine ‘open wound’ with Rubio
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

Their records. Their legal jeopardy. And the extraordinary, historically unprecedented fact that the two primary architects of a war now costing ordinary Australians their livelihoods are both, in their own ways, running from accountability while simultaneously running the world.

Benjamin Netanyahu
Netanyahu is not merely a controversial leader prosecuting a controversial war. He is a criminal defendant. An accused man.

A person who, under the laws of his own country, not the laws of his enemies, not the laws of international tribunals, he can dismiss as biased, stands charged with fraud, breach of trust, and bribery.

His trial has been grinding through Israel’s courts since 2020. It has not concluded. And critics, serious critics, within Israel’s own legal and political establishment, have made the case, with mounting evidence, that the prolongation of this war serves Netanyahu’s personal legal interests at least as much as it serves Israel’s security ones.

Think about what that means.

A man facing prison. A man whose political survival depends on remaining in power. A man for whom a ceasefire, a negotiated peace, a return to normalcy could mean the resumption of court proceedings that his wartime emergency has conveniently disrupted. A man whose far-right coalition partners have made clear they will collapse the government the moment the guns fall silent.

This man, this specific man, in this specific legal and political predicament, has been handed a blank cheque by Washington. Unlimited weapons. Diplomatic cover.

A US veto at the Security Council every time the international community tries to intervene.

And Anthony Albanese calls the objectives of his war appropriate.

ICC arrest warrant
The International Criminal Court did not call them appropriate. It issued an arrest warrant.

A warrant that sits unrequited and unenforced as Western governments, including Australia’s, conduct business as usual with a man the court has found reasonable grounds to prosecute for war crimes. This is not a technicality. This is not a diplomatic inconvenience. It is the most fundamental possible test of whether the rules-based international order that Australia constantly invokes as a guiding principle means anything whatsoever.

And Australia is failing that test, quietly, daily,

with a smile and a press release about shared values.

This is the casus belli we are never allowed to examine. Not the security rationale. Not the stated military objectives. The actual human being in whose name and for whose benefit this catastrophe is being prosecuted. And what that human being is running from.

Donald Trump
Donald Trump returned to the White House in January 2025 carrying more legal and personal baggage than any president in American history.

A convicted felon. Civil judgments in the hundreds of millions of dollars. And something else, something the mainstream press, particularly in America and Australia, has handled with a caution so extraordinary it constitutes institutional cowardice — the Epstein files.

Jeffrey Epstein was not a lone predator. He was the centre of a network. A procurement and blackmail operation, almost certainly intelligence connected, that ran for decades across the highest levels of American, British, and Israeli power.

The files released in dribs and drabs, fought over in courts, partially suppressed and heavily redacted, point toward a system of leverage that compromised some of the most powerful men on earth.

Trump’s name appears in those files thousands of times. His association with Epstein was long, documented, and by his own prior admission, enthusiastic. In a 2002 interview, he described Epstein as terrific fun, noting approvingly that he liked beautiful women, many of them on the younger side.

That statement was made publicly. It has not been retracted.

It has simply been absorbed into the general noise of a political culture that has lost the capacity for appropriate disgust.

But the Epstein connection is not merely a personal scandal. It is a geopolitical one.

Epstein’s operation did not exist in a vacuum. Ghislaine Maxwell, his co-conspirator, convicted and imprisoned, was the daughter of Robert Maxwell, the media baron confirmed after his death to have been a Mossad asset.

The intelligence dimensions of the Epstein network have been reported by journalists of unimpeachable seriousness across multiple continents. The suggestion that a blackmail operation of this scale, running through the power centres of American political and financial life for decades, had no connection to the intelligence services that specialise precisely in this kind of leverage is not a serious position.

It is wilful blindness.

The Mossad connection
Mossad is Israel’s foreign intelligence service and one of the most operationally aggressive intelligence agencies on the planet. It has assassinated scientists in foreign countries. It has conducted sabotage operations across the Middle East. It has run networks of influence, surveillance, and covert pressure in Western capitals for decades.

This is not conspiracy. This is its known, partially acknowledged, historically documented record.

What the Epstein network, the Mossad connection, the Maxwell lineage, and the drip feed of suppressed files collectively describe, if you follow the thread honestly and without flinching, is a Western political order in which deference to Israeli policy is not entirely or even primarily explained by shared democratic values and strategic alignment.

Some of it is explained by fear.

Some of it is explained by leverage.

Some of it is explained by the quiet, unspoken, never to be uttered in polite company reality that powerful men in Washington, London, and Canberra have made themselves vulnerable. To networks of kompromat, to relationships they cannot fully disclose, to the specific kind of coercive power that intelligence operations specialising in the exploitation of human weakness have deployed for as long as intelligence operations have existed.

This is why the charge of antisemitism is deployed so rapidly against anyone who raises these questions.

Not because the questions are antisemitic.

They manifestly are not, being questions about the conduct of specific governments, specific intelligence agencies, and specific individuals, not about Jewish people as a whole.

But because the charge works. It silences. It ends careers. It redirects the conversation. And the people with the most to lose from honest answers have every incentive to ensure the conversation never reaches those answers.

The International Criminal Court has issued its warrant. The Epstein files are dripping into the public domain. The Maxwell Mossad connection is confirmed historical record.

The leverage that may explain a generation of Western politicians who cannot bring themselves to say a single word of meaningful criticism of Israeli state conduct is no longer the province of conspiracy forums. It is the subject of serious investigative journalism on three continents.

And Australia’s answer, apparently, is to look away.

Anthony Albanese will not be the one to look squarely at any of this. He has already told us where he stands. On national television, he endorsed the war. He called it constructive. He offered the American justification back to an Australian audience as though it were Australia’s own sovereign conclusion.

It was not. It was obedience dressed as policy. And the men who benefit most from that obedience, a defendant in Tel Aviv and a felon in Washington, are laughing all the way to the next airstrike while ordinary Australians pay the bill, while journalists are prosecuted.

• Tomorrow: How the Murdoch press is running cover for a war and pointing your anger at the wrong man entirely.

Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa has appealed to Foreign Minister Winston Peters to stress to the Palestine genocide “open wound” in his meeting with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Washington this week.

Co-chair Maher Nazzal of PSNA said in a statement the international crisis in West Asia “must be reined in” and New Zealand pressure should be part of this.

He blamed the US-Israel war on Iran on resistance to the genocide in Gaza in which almost 73,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have been killed.

• READ MORE: Foreign Minister Winston Peters off to meet US Secretary of State Marco Rubio
• Tehran slams Trump threats over Strait of Hormuz closure
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

Nazzal also warned in the letter to Peters against New Zealand being “recruited” for the US war effort.

“The US will want to recruit New Zealand into the US and Israel war on Iran, and try to get Peters to offer something crazy, like dispatching the New Zealand frigates Te Kaha and Te Mana to help force the Straits of Hormuz,” he said.

‘But the open wound of Palestine remains the single greatest threat to peace and stability across the entire world.”

Nazzal said PSNA was urging Peters to press the US to demand equal rights for everyone living “between the river and the sea”.

“This means confronting the apartheid state of Israel head-on. The world can no longer tolerate a genocidal and racist state in West Asia, which is armed to the teeth by the US and hell-bent on attacking its neighbours to capture territory.

Stoking ‘the flames of hatred’
“Israel continues to stoke the flames of hatred and eternal war by last week passing legislation to execute Palestinians convicted of what Israel calls ‘terrorism’.”

Nazzal said the racist apartheid law did not apply to Jewish Israeli settlers who were killing Palestinians daily.

It exclusively applied in the military courts, which were only used to try Palestinians.

“They have a conviction rate of over 96 percent,” Nazzal said.

“Racist Israeli ministers and Knesset members celebrated the inflammatory racist law with champagne. There was barely a peep from Peters.

“New Zealand has played an important role in helping resolve international conflicts in the past — we can be part of the solution now,” Nazzal added.

A rift within French Polynesia’s ruling party Tavini Huiraatira deepened during Easter weekend with a mass resignation from a group of 14 members.

The resignation was tendered by a group of young members of the local Territorial Assembly.

In their resignation letter, the members of the local parliament, writing to Tavini’s historic 81-year-old leader Oscar Temaru, insist that their decision was “carefully considered” and “does not question the respect we have [towards Temaru].”

• READ MORE: Other French Polynesia reports

The mass resignation reduces Tavini’s majority to 22 within the Territorial Assembly (out of a total of 57 MPs).

This also means Tavini no longer has an absolute majority within the House.

The Assembly is scheduled to convene at its next sitting this week on 9 April 2026.

Crucial Assembly meeting on Thursday
Any motion of no confidence requires the approval of at least 35 MPs.

The other components of the Assembly include 16 from the opposition pro-France (autonomists) and 5 others who are independents.

The 14 resigning MPs belong to a group of “moderate” members of the Tavini, who were mostly elected at French Polynesia’s last territorial elections in May 2023.

Tensions have since surfaced between the newly-elected members of the “new generation” and the founding members of the Tavini, including party president Oscar Temaru and the party’s number two, Antony Géros (who is also the Speaker of the Territorial Assembly).

At the recently-held municipal elections, Géros lost his position of Mayor of the small city of Paea and in the capital city of Pape’ete, pro-autonomy figure Rémy Brillant won — well ahead of two pro-independence figures, Tavini-backed Tauhiti Nena (who secured 11.03 percent of the votes) and 25-year-old Tematai Le Gayic, 25 (who scored much better with 23.3 percent).

In the wake of the municipal elections, Le Gayic was the first to signal the split with his party.

The next territorial elections are scheduled to be held in 2028.

The group of dissident MPs is perceived as close to Brotherson, 56, who became French Polynesia’s President in May 2023.

Géros was not chosen at the time.

Less confrontational approach
Brotherson has since embodied a less confrontational approach, especially with regards to his perceived good relationship with the French government, as opposed to a more confrontational approach from his party’s historic leadership.

Among the most often cited causes of the rift between Tavini’s old guard and the younger group of MPs are such issues as French Polynesia’s undersea mineral resources exploitation (which Temaru favours, as a key to the French Pacific territory’s independence).

The younger Tavini MPs, as well as French Polynesia’s Tavini President Moetai Brotherson (who is also Temaru’s son-in-law), are opposed to this exploitation of resources.

This anti-deep sea mining exploitation is also the official stance of the French government, which is warning of potential environmental damage from such operations.

Brotherson’s general stance over independence is also more nuanced and contrasts with the party’s support for a short timeline and process.

Since the resignation, Tavini has held several “emergency” meetings in a bid to reconcile the two opposing factions.

But none of those have been conclusive.

Some of the views expressed by militants support a resignation from Brotherson, which he is opposed to.

Others recommend a one-on-one meeting between Temaru and Brotherson to try and iron out their differences.

“If nothing comes out of this meeting, then Tavini Huiraatira will take action on April 9,” the party wrote on social networks at the weekend.

“If we start entertaining diverging views of the party’s objectives, we’re in trouble”, an irate Géros told local media.

Biblical references
Temaru and his son-in-law have separately commented on the Easter weekend crisis.

On Good Friday, they both used biblical, religious metaphors and direct references to Easter.

“Forgive them, for they know not what they are doing” said Temaru, quoting crucified Jesus Christ during his Easter martyrdom.

But he also admitted there were “reasons to be worried”.

Meanwhile, Brotherson posted on social networks: “While some are meeting in tribunal mode, on this Good Friday, I prefer to leave it to God.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Reports from West Papua say as many as five people have been shot dead in Dogiyai regency in an alleged retaliatory attack after a policeman was killed.

A joint police and military operation was launched in the regency in Indonesia’s Central Papua province to respond to the killing, by apparent stabbing, of a police officer — a Papuan — in Kamu District’s Moanemani town on Tuesday.

According to Papuan news media outlet Suara Papua and the Human Rights Monitor group, security forces are alleged to have indiscriminately opened fire in a series of villages in Moanemani.

• READ MORE:  West Papuans massacred by Indonesian police in Dogiyai
• At least six Papuan civilians killed and two injured by bullets in Dogiyai
• Other West Papua reports

The Papua-based human rights and peace NGO Solidaritas Rakyat Papua, cited by Suara Papua, reported that four Papuan civilians including a 12-year-old boy, were shot dead by the security forces, and another four were injured, adding that one police officer was earlier killed and another injured.

However, Human Rights Monitor reported that at least six Papuans were shot dead in the alleged retaliatory operation, while at least two others sustained gunshot injuries.

The Indonesian Embassy in New Zealand confirmed the officer’s death, attributing it to an “armed criminal group”, the government’s label for West Papuan independence fighters.

But it said it was not yet able to confirm further casualties as the incident was still being investigated.

The United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) statement claimed on Thursday that at least five Papuans had been killed in the unrest in Dogiyai. The dead Papuans were named in the statement.

The embassy accuses the ULMWP of often claiming its members as civilian casualties.

Human Rights Monitor said the violent crackdowns occurred amid escalating tensions and heavy deployment of security forces across Dogiyai Regency in the past month.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

An Easter message. There’s no mystery about why wars start. They happen because someone, somewhere, decides that negotiation is more dangerous to them than to the people being bombed.

Look at what was happening this “Good” Friday. Iran. Gaza. The West Bank. Lebanon.

Thirty-six days of missiles and a Strait of Hormuz sealed shut while oil companies post record profits and defence contractors book forward orders through 2031. No one in those boardrooms is losing sleep over a negotiated settlement.

• READ MORE: Iran slams Trump’s Strait of Hormuz threats as ‘incitement to war crimes’
• Eugene Doyle: Who will pay billions in reparations to Iran? We will
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

That would be the one outcome they cannot monetise.

The choice of war over negotiation is always deliberate. It’s what happens when the institutions built to make negotiation workable — the United Nations, the International Criminal Court, and the mechanisms of international law — are systematically defunded, vetoed into paralysis, or simply disregarded by those states powerful enough to ignore them without consequence.

When accountability is optional, war is always cheaper than compromise. For the people making the decision, not for the people paying for it in blood.

And here is what makes this moment different from others: we’re not even pretending anymore. Israeli ministers speak of erasure openly. American officials wave away civilian casualties with the language of collateral necessity.

Actions become shameless
The international community issues statements of concern and then approves the next arms shipment. The gap between what is said and what is done has closed — not because the words have become honest, but because the actions have become shameless.

Negotiation requires recognising the humanity of the other party. That’s precisely why it’s rebuffed. You can’t negotiate with someone you have spent 20 years or more dehumanising. Make them monstrous enough and war stops requiring justification. It becomes necessary.

But nothing about this is inevitable. Wars end when the people with the power to end them decide the cost of continuing exceeds the cost of stopping.

That calculation is being made right now, every day, by people who are not dying. The question is not when they will choose peace. It’s when the rest of us will make their continuing refusal untenable.

Richard David Hames is an Australian philosopher-activist, strategic adviser, entrepreneur and futurist, and he publishes The Hames Report on Substack. This article is republished with the author’s permission.

In the coming years, if Iran survives as a sovereign state and retains control over the Strait of Hormuz, countries like Australia, New Zealand, the UK, South Korea and Japan will be made to pay hundreds of billions of dollars in reparations for the US-Israeli war on Iran.

For this to come to pass, Iran must fight the aggressors to a standstill and ensure they can impose, if necessary, a chokehold on the oil, gas and fertilisers vital to the global economy.

• READ MORE: Protesters condemn Luxon govt for failing to condemn illegal war on Iran
• President Trump, don’t listen to your sycophants on Iran, this isn’t reality TV
• US bombing targets bridges and Pasteur Institute – ‘symbols of Iran’s scientific strength’, says spokeswoman
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

So, when next you see an image of spectacular US-Israeli violence, think this: “I might have to pay for that”.

There is no doubt that US-Israel has succeeded in setting fire to Iran, inflicting a heavy death toll, and hundreds of billions of dollars in damages to the civilian infrastructure of the country.

As the Leader of the so-called “Free World” said this week: the aim is to bomb Iran back to the Stone Age.

The US and Israel have dropped well over 15,000 huge bombs and missiles on Iran. According to the United Nations, by March 17 the US and Israel had already destroyed 54,000 civilian homes.

Destruction now far worse
The destruction is now far worse, approaching 100,000 structures. By the end of March hundreds of schools, dozens of universities, much of the civilian infrastructure including major bridges, energy systems and cultural sites had been attacked by the Americans and Israelis. Does anyone still believe they have come to Iran to free the people?

Who should pay for reconstruction? The Iranian government is clear: we should — because this immense crime was, from their perspective, aided and abetted by Australia, the UK, EU, New Zealand and others, who, as with the genocide in Gaza, did nothing meaningful to stop it.

According to Lloyds, Iran has now set up a toll booth at the Strait of Hormuz — referred to by some as “The Aya-Toll-a Booth” — to tax ships that pass through the strait. It may be questionable under the Law of the Sea but this would be to quibble after the US-Israelis blitzkrieg.

The Majlis (Iranian Parliament) is finalising a law declaring Iranian “sovereignty, control and oversight” of the Strait, something it had never asserted before. The bill introduces a system of transit fees for commercial vessels passing the Hormuz Strait, effectively imposing a tax of up to $2 million per vessel that wishes to pass.

A large oil tanker has a cargo worth about $200 million so the fee is not excessive. Multiply that by more than 100 ship movements per day under peacetime conditions and Iran could be in receipt of tens of billions of dollars per year.

Given the rogue states who launched this war will never submit to international law or reparations it seems an elegant solution.

Under the system, ships must now provide their International Maritime Organisation (IMO) number, cargo manifest, crew names, ownership details and destination before Iran will issue a safe passage clearance. The law bans vessels from the US, Israel, and their allies, while granting safe transit to China, Russia, India, Pakistan, Iraq, Bangladesh and other friendly nations.

Iran needs to win
For this to fully come to fruition, Iran needs to win.

Professor Robert Pape, a top US expert on warfare, based at the University of Chicago, says Iran will likely emerge from this terrible war as a super-power.  Many analysts, such as Colonel Daniel Davis, Mark Sleboda, Annelle Sheline, and Professor John Mearsheimer, now see an Iranian victory as likely.

Professor Pape himself has run simulations of US-Iran wars for decades and is clear: “Trump made a huge mistake.”

Professor Pape, who was one of the prime architects of the US Air Force’s war curriculum, told journalist Mahmoud Ansari that Trump and others are currently confusing tactical success with strategic outcomes. For the moment, the Americans and Israelis are enjoying success after success: killing leaders and school girls, blowing stuff up and so on.

“That can be mesmerising, and cause this illusion of precision control but it is not the same thing as a strategic victory. Iran before the war controlled 4 percent of the world’s oil. Twenty-six days later they control 20 percent of the world’s oil.”

As Trita Parsi of the Quincy Institute pointed out this week, Denmark charged transit fees for 400 years for vessels to pass through the Øresund Strait into and out of the Baltic. Panama, Egypt and Turkey all charge transit fees.

The countries who played the starring supporting roles in the genocide in Gaza — Germany, UK, Australia — and supported Israel and America in their rampages across the Middle East for decades may — if they are lucky — get access to the Gulf again but may have to pay a heavy price for their role in the destruction of the lives of tens of millions of people.

NZ awaits eventual negotiations
The energy security of a minor henchman like New Zealand will have to await eventual negotiations between its major suppliers — South Korea and Singapore — and Iran.

Bloodied but as yet unbowed, Iran knows it can — and must — rise like the Phoenix from the ashes.

In the Iranian version of the Phoenix tradition — reaching back thousands of years —  the Phoenix (Simurgh in Farsi) must face death and destruction before being reborn and revitalised.

The Simurgh is so ancient it possesses the wisdom of the ages: in other words it knows how to survive calamities that would consume others. This is called civilisational resilience and it is baked into the DNA of the Iranian people.

Eugene Doyle is a writer based in Wellington, New Zealand. He has written extensively on the Middle East, as well as peace and security issues in the Asia Pacific region, and is a contributor to Asia Pacific Report. This article was first published on his Solidarity blog.

As tensions rose ahead of Easter, US President Donald Trump publicly criticised Pope Leo XIV, accusing the pontiff of “interfering in political matters he does not fully understand”.

During a rally, Trump reportedly said: “The Vatican should focus on religion, not tell strong nations how they should defend themselves. America will always put its security first.”

The remarks quickly drew global attention and prompted a calm but firm response from the Pope.

• READ MORE: Pope: Easter drives out hatred and brings down the mighty
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

Speaking at the Vatican, Pope Leo XIV responded: “The Church cannot remain silent when power is used without moral responsibility. Faith must guide humanity toward peace, not justify conflict.”

Following the exchange of statements, many Catholic faithful around the world also began voicing their opinions.

Many believers expressed support for the message of peace and moral responsibility emphasised by Pope Leo XIV, arguing that faith should be used to bring people together and promote peace, rather than to justify conflict.

Across religious forums and social media platforms, Catholics called on political leaders to respect the spiritual role of the Church, while also encouraging dialogue between politics and religion to be conducted with humility, reconciliation, and mutual respect.

Many also expressed hope that the Pope’s message would continue to inspire efforts toward peace around the world.

New Zealand’s government was taken to task today for its lack of a principled stand against Israel’s Gaza genocide and the illegal and unprovoked US-Israel war on Iran.

Several speakers at a rally in the heart of Auckland expressed disappointment and anger at Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s failure to condemn the war of aggression against Iran, one of the major supporters of Palestinian self-determination and justice.

The speakers from several cultures were scathing about New Zealand’s weak stance in the rally at Te Komititanga Square with a theme of “Welfare not warfare”.

• READ MORE: US-Israel attacks hit petrochemical, nuclear sites in Iran
• President Trump, don’t listen to your sycophants on Iran, this isn’t reality TV
• US bombing targets bridges and Pasteur Institute – ‘symbols of Iran’s scientific strength’, says spokeswoman
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

The criticism comes as US President Donald Trump is reportedly seeking a record $1.5 trillion in “defence” spending for the coming year along with massive social cutbacks, according to a White House details released yesterday, while New Zealand’s budget allows for an unprecedented NZ$12 billion four-year plan to overhaul the country’s military.

Bibi Amena, a twice-displaced refugee from Afghanistan who has experienced the devastation of war and lost family members while resisting the Soviet invasion and occupation of Afghanistan, said the illegal assassination of a high profile head of state and respected figure among Shia Muslims around the world should have been condemned.

“At the very least our government should have condemned America and Israel in the strongest words possible,” she said.

New Zealand should have distanced itself from America and Israel “and their crumbling empire”.

Helen Clark quoted
She quoted former prime minister Helen Clark who at the beginning of this war described New Zealand’s response as “a disgrace” and that it was in the country’s best interests to keep advocating for international law.

“New Zealand is not a mighty country, and if we trample international law and forego an independent foreign policy, we are left at the mercy of countries far bigger and far stronger than us,” Amena said.

“Let’s be loud and clear when we say that Israel and America’s war on Iran is illegal — it’s illegitimate, unprovoked and immoral.”

A Tehran-born psychology student, Ali Reza, who migrated to New Zealand in 2013, was also strongly critical of the government’s weak stance over the war.

“Some politicians seem to have trouble with their spines. Iran has many excellent spinal surgeons who could help them with that.”

He praised the Palestinian resistance in the face of the 76th years “brutality, occupation, mass murder and mass displacement” by Israel.

“Meanwhile, the Sudanese people were suffering through a devastating civil war caused by the UAE (United Arab Emirates) and its master Israel. The enemy’s lies set records displaying psychotic levels of manipulation and exploitation,” he said.

“The enemy renewed their specialisation in the discipline of evil wrongdoings, pioneering in numerous fields, followed by their murderous campaign in Lebanon, Yemen, Iraq and Iran, all funded by the United States.”

Choice for Aotearoa
Leeann Wahanui-Peters of the Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) called for a choice for Aotearoa — one between “the security of our whānau and the lies and profits of warmongers and their masters in Wall Street, the City of London, and the shadow bankers of Black Rock and company”.

“A choice between a home, a warm home and weapons,” she said. “A choice between a future of justice, peace and prosperity for all and a past of war and exploitation for the few.

“For decades, we have been told that the world is dangerous and that the only way to be safe is to spend more on the military.”

“This is a lie,” Wahanui-Peters said.

“The greatest threat to the safety of a child in Aotearoa isn’t a missile from a distant land. It is the coldness of a house their parents can’t afford to heat, or living in a car.

“It is their hunger in their stomach because their school lunch has been cut. It is the despair of a future with no jobs and no hope.”

And yet, said Wahanui-Peters, New Zealand’s “coalition regime” chose to be “fiscally irresponsible” and chose military assets ahead of the best interests of the country’s people.

‘Gateway for hell’
Bibi Amena said New Zealand’s silence over Israeli crimes in Palestine “opened the gateway for hell” in Iran.

“In the past 30 days of aggression, Israeli and American bombs have slaughtered over 3000 innocent Iranian children, women and men.

“They have attacked and destroyed energy and water supplies, civilian infrastructure, oil facilities, schools and hospitals. All of these attacks are illegal under international law.

“So why has our government remained silent? Why do we allow America and Israel to commit war crime after war crime with impunity?”

Amena referenced the first day of the illegal war on Iran, an American Tomahawk missile targeting a girls’ elementary school in the city of Minab, killing more than 160 girls aged between 7 and 12.

She ended her speech with a short quote “which went viral on social media” by Professor Foad Izadi from the University of Tehran: “Iran is fighting the Epstein class of the world, that either rapes little girls, or bombs little girls.”

Organisers of the Stop Wars Aotearoa coalition said there would be a major rally with the theme “No More Wars” in Auckland’s Aotea Square and a protest march to the US Consulate next Saturday, April 11, at 2pm.

A Constitutional Reform Bill dedicated to New Caledonia was rejected on Thursday by the French National Assembly (Lower House) without debate, by a gathering of opposition parties by a score of 190 to 107.

The rejection came in the form of the endorsement of a preliminary Bill filed by a left wing opposition, Emmanuel Tjibaou, on behalf of the GDR group (Gauche démocrate et républicaine).

The “prior rejection motion” means that if the rejection motion is adopted, then it closes the current sitting on the matter and the Bill would then have to come back to the other House of Parliament, the Senate, following the “shuttle” rule.

• READ MORE: Thousands take to Nouméa streets ahead of French Parliament debate on New Caledonia
• Other Kanaky New Caledonia reports

Tjibaou, who is an indigenous Kanak pro-independence leader, is one of the two MPs representing New Caledonia in the Assembly.

The text was originally tabled for a vote to be held on 1 April 2026, but this was later delayed by one day, following an announcement by Speaker Yaël Braun-Pivet.

However, on Thursday, during a sitting that only debated motives from the government and its Minister for Overseas Naïma Moutchou, the rapporteur Philippe Gosselin and representatives from all parties present, it quickly became clear that most of the opposition parties were going to support the rejection motion, and vote against the text without further debate.

The sitting only lasted 01 hour 40 minutes.

Tjibaou, speaking in support of his rejection motion, stressed that the Constitutional Bill, in his view, was “not consensual”, because his party, the FLNKS (Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front) was opposed to the text and that the Bill “did not seek to reach a compromise” between all stakeholders.

Tjibaou said this was in contradiction to the previous Matignon-Oudinot (1988) and Nouméa Accord (1998), which initiated a decolonisation process for New Caledonia.

The present Constitutional Bill derives from talks held in July 2025 and January 2026 between New Caledonia political stakeholders and the French government. This was on two occasions — in the small city of Bougival in July 2025 and later in January 2026 in Paris, at the French Presidential palace of Élysée, and the French ministry of Overseas territories in Rue Oudinot.

Hence the name of Bougival-Élysée-Oudinot (BEO) for a text and an expanded project.

The project also envisions the creation of a “State of New Caledonia”, with a correlated “New Caledonia Nationality” available to people who are already French citizens.

Other participating parties pro-France and pro-independence (two pro-independence members of FLNKS) have since split to create their own “UNI” (Union Nationale pour l’Indépendance).

They have maintained their commitment to the BEO process, including their legislative adaptation (in the form of a Constitutional Amendment and an “organic Law”, which would de facto become New Caledonia’s constitution).

Tjibaou: ‘a logic of assimilation’
But the BEO text, in August 2025, was unequivocally opposed by the FLNKS, one of the main components of the pro-independence movement.

The FLNKS later explained it saw these, as well as a planned process of transfer of more powers from Paris to Nouméa, was, in their view, just a “lure” of independence.

Tjibaou said on Thursday the text was at best “symbolic”.

“To us, this amounts to a perennial status within France… It’s a logic of assimilation… It cannot be compared to a decolonisation in accordance with the UN resolutions and the international law”, he told MPs.

He called on local elections to be held sooner than later, currently no later than 28 June 2026.

Tjibaou said it was ironic that “a pro-independence” should tell the Minister that “when our Kanak country is damaged, it is also France that is damaged”… Because “when you make decisions that are leading us to chaos, you are also jeopardising France’s place in the Pacific”, he said at the tribune.

Moutchou: ‘There is no other agreement’
Moutchou, in her reply, said the rejection of the Bill would have repercussions on New Caledonians’ everyday life.

She stressed what New Caledonians needed, after the riots of May 2024 and a severe economic downfall since, was “visibility”, especially on the part of economic stakeholders who needed stability in order to restore confidence and investment.

“There is no other agreement. The Bougival process was approved by 5 of the 6 political parties of New Caledonia.

“Some are mentioning the absence of FLNKS. I’ve always maintained the principles of transparency, dialogue information for all. And the door was never closed”, she said.

“And the politics of the empty chair cannot dictate the future of a territory.

“So what do we do? How much longer do we have to wait… To be responsible, we move on with those who are here… Consensus does not mean unanimity, consensus is not perfection, it’s a point of equilibrium”, she replied to Tjibaou.

“And while we have this text that is not perfect, but opens a way, those who say, ‘we will wait and see later’ risk bringing us back to a confrontational situation”.

Metzdorf’s disappointment
The other MP for New Caledonia, pro-France Nicolas Metzdorf, also took to the tribune to express disappointment.

“I don’t know what more we should do. After the 2024 riots, you asked us to find a political agreement. We did this and we made big concessions, we, the non-independentists. We did this for the good of New Caledonia.

“Then you said we had to meet again to further clarify… On Kanak identity and the self-determination process. So now we are back with two political agreements.”

“And now you are sending us back home without a debate… You know, New Caledonia may be far from Paris, but tonight, many are watching this debate on TV and they’re thinking ‘What will happen to us?”

“Many have lost their home, their work, but even worse, they have lost hope to live in peace in New Caledonia”.

“What I am asking (MPs) today is just to have the common decency to debate on this (Bill)… These agreements are being supported by the majority of New Caledonia’s political class (including the moderate pro-independence parties within the Union Nationale pour l’Indépendance), but also by the economic and business sector.”

“I’m asking for a vote on these accords and I’m asking to organise a consultation of New Caledonia’s people, because at the end of the day, we are the only legitimate ones to decide on our future.”

What now?
Following the rejection vote on Thursday, French Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu said all parties that had signed the Bougival-Elysée-Oudinot Accord would meet “next week”, because this is what was agreed in case of a deadlock.

Commenting on future options, Metzdorf told French media in Paris that “all options are now on the table”.

After the National Assembly’s rejection, another possibility was to bring the text back to the Upper House (the Senate).

Another option (that was almost implemented a few months ago, but later abandoned) would be to bring back a process of “consultation” directly in New Caledonia in the form of a de facto referendum for or against the Bougival process.

But the sensitive issue of who is eligible to vote at local elections remains for the looming provincial elections (which would now have to be held no later than 28 June 2026).

Pro-France parties are still determined to have those restrictions changed to allow the “frozen” electoral roll to be more open, if not fully “unfrozen”.

This could be the subject of separate negotiations between New Caledonia’s opposing parties in the coming days.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Mr Trump, may I have a word?

Bad enough for you to insist — in the face of all evidence to the contrary — that you “won” the 2020 election.

But it’s another thing for you to pretend — in the face of mounting deaths and injuries, ballooning expenses, and rising prices — that you won, or are winning, the war with Iran you began on February 28.

“Let me say, we’ve won,” you told a rally in Kentucky on March 11.

• READ MORE: US ‘hasn’t even started’ attacks on Iran’s infrastructure, Trump warns
• US bombing targets bridges and Pasteur Institute – ‘symbols of Iran’s scientific strength’, says spokeswoman
• ‘No kings’: What Americans can learn from other nonviolent civil activism movements
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

“I think we’ve won,” you said on the White House South Lawn on March 20.

“We’ve won this war. The war has been won,” you said in the Oval Office on March 24.

“We are winning so big,” you told a fundraising dinner on March 25.

“We’ve had regime change,” you told reporters just a few days ago. “The one regime was decimated, destroyed, they’re all dead. The next regime is mostly dead.” Iran has now moved onto its “third regime,” and American negotiators are now speaking to “a whole different group of people” who have “been very reasonable,” you said.

You’re making this up
You’re making all this up. In fact, you’re losing your war. And so is America and much of the rest of the world.

After a month, your war has already cost 13 American lives, cost American taxpayers more than US$30 billion, cost American consumers at least a dollar more per gallon of gas than they paid a month ago, pushed up food prices and mortgage rates, and pushed down the value of 401(k) retirement plans.

It’s mangled supply chains for industries that rely on items such as fertiliser to grow food or helium to make computer chips. It’s also wreaked havoc across the Middle East with at least 1574 civilians killed in Iran, including 236 children, and at least 50 killed in Iran’s attacks on other Gulf nations.

You assumed Iran would give up its nuclear programme. Wrong. After more than a month of bombing by the United States and Israel, you’ve most likely stiffened the regime’s resolve to produce a nuclear weapon.

In this respect, too, America is worse off — more endangered than we were in 2018 before you withdrew the United States from the Iran nuclear deal negotiated by former President Barack Obama. In that deal, Iran agreed to restrict its nuclear programme — reducing uranium stockpiles by 98 percent and capping enrichment at 3.67 percent, and allowing inspections — in exchange for relief from UN, EU, and US nuclear-related sanctions.

Iran now holds a stockpile of approximately 970 pounds of uranium enriched up to 60 percent purity, according to the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation. That’s close to weapons-grade. No one knows where it’s stored.

You thought winning this war would be as easy as abducting Nicolás Maduro from Venezuela and setting up a puppet regime there. Wrong again. The old ayatollah is gone, but the new one and his regime are even more radical and hard line.

Embraced asymmetric warfare
You assumed America’s military might would weaken Iran’s military capacity. Wrong. They’ve embraced asymmetric warfare — using cheap drones and missiles and blocking the Strait of Hormuz — rather than take on America’s and Israel’s superior forces directly.

You thought the regime would soon cave. Wrong. It’s been over a month and they’re the ones playing the waiting game. They think they can withstand the mounting political and economic pressures better and longer than you and America can. They may be correct.

Reportedly, you’ve told aides you’re now willing to end the war even if Iran continues to block the Strait of Hormuz. Maybe this is your best option at this point. But it will allow Iran to decide in the future how much oil gets through and for whom, and could cause the economic damage to the US to grow exponentially worse.

Mr Trump, do you really believe you won this war? Do you really believe America is better off than it was when you began the war?

Maybe the people around you are telling you that you’ve won the war and we’re better off because you punish the bearers of bad news and reward those who tell you what you want to hear. Presumably you’re hearing the same fictionalised good news from Republicans in Congress, from sycophantic leaders abroad, from other assorted lackeys and suck-ups.

Or maybe you think that if you can convince enough people that you won and we’re better off, you will have won and America will be better off. Because for you it’s always about public perceptions of reality rather than reality itself.

No truth, only belief
Everything depends on hype, spin, exaggeration, and outright lies. For you there’s no truth, only belief.

Or maybe you think that if you keep saying you won or are winning, and America has come out on top, your magical thinking will in fact come true.

But this isn’t a game, and you’re not a magician.

This is real blood and guts. Real pain. Real deaths and injuries. Real price increases at the gas pump. Real hardships for real people — in America, in the Middle East, and elsewhere.

You can’t pretend, sir. This isn’t reality television. This is for real. And the reality is Americans are worse off now and less secure than we were when you started this.

Robert Reich is an American professor, writer, former Secretary of Labour, and author of The System, The Common Good, Saving Capitalism, Aftershock, Supercapitalism, The Work of Nations. He is also co-founder of Inequality Media. This commentary was originally published on his Facebook page and is republished under Creative Commons.

An Iranian government spokesperson, Fatemeh Mohajerani, has declared that the attacked “bridges and the Pasteur Institute are symbols of Iran’s scientific strength” in response to the latest US onslaught.

She added that they were “the product of a civilisation that spans thousands of years” and that “its depth is hard to grasp for those who speak the language of the ‘Stone Age.’”

“For a land that has lit the lamps of knowledge for centuries, these threats carry only one meaning: you can strike the infrastructure, but you will not touch the roots of a nation . . .

• READ MORE: Steel plants, bridge hit as US-Israel attacks expand — Iran vows retaliation
• Iran’s president urges global health bodies to act after US-Israeli strike on Pasteur Institute in Tehran
• Iranian president calls on American public to challenge US war motives
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

“Iran will rebuild and continue moving forward,” Mohajerani said.

This comes as the United States and Israel have escalated their attacks on civilian infrastructure in Iran, destroying a historical medical research facility, as well as a vital bridge connecting the capital to other regions in the country.

The illegal and unprovoked US-Israeli war of aggression on Iran has targeted and destroyed the Pasteur Institute of Iran, one of the country’s leading public health and research institutions, in a direct attack on civilian and scientific infrastructure in the country.

JUST IN:

US and Israel have targeted Iran’s B1 Bridge in Karaj again, the tallest bridge in the Middle East.

The renewed strike occurred while rescue and relief teams were assisting victims from the initial attack… See more pic.twitter.com/EojvvsPp9V

— Ayatollah Alireza Arafi (@Realarafi) April 2, 2026

In numbers — human cost of the war on Iran:

• Iran: 1937 killed; 24,800 wounded
• Lebanon: 1345 killed, including 125 children; more than 4040 wounded
• Israel: 28 killed (all but one were civilians), including 10 Israeli soldiers killed in Lebanon, 3223 injuries hospitalised
• US: 13 killed in combat and two of non-combat causes, more than 200 injured
• Occupied West Bank: Four people killed
• UAE: 12 killed, 169 injured
• Bahrain: 3 killed
• Saudi Arabia: 2 killed, 20 injured
• Kuwait: 6 killed
• Oman: 3 killed
• Qatar: 16 injured
• Jordan: 20 injured
• Syria: 4 killed
• Iraq: More than 107 killed

New Zealand has joined Australia, France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom in expressing “deep concern” about an Israeli bill expanding the death penalty for Palestinians.

Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters posted on social media last night, indicating New Zealand had joined the other nations, and emphasising the country’s opposition “for decades” to the death penalty “in all circumstances”.

It comes as the Green Party tried yesterday to move a motion in Parliament on the issue, but failed to get the support of all parties.

• READ MORE: Israel passes extreme death penalty law targeting only Palestinians
• ‘Dangerous escalation’: World reacts to Israel passing death penalty law
• Other Palestine genocide reports

The ACT party told RNZ it did not support the motion being put without notice, and noted the Minister of Foreign Affairs was responsible for expressing New Zealand’s position on international issues.

Earlier this week, the Israeli Parliament finalised a controversial bill that would effectively expand the death penalty for Palestinians convicted of terrorism and nationalistic murders.

The bill stipulated that residents in the West Bank who killed an Israeli “with the intent to negate the existence of the State of Israel” would be sentenced to death.

The Foreign Ministers of Australia, France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom released a joint statement expressing their “deep concern” about the bill, saying it would “significantly expand the possibilities to impose the death penalty in Israel”.

‘Discriminatory character’
“We are particularly worried about the de facto discriminatory character of the bill. The adoption of this bill would risk undermining Israel’s commitments with regards to democratic principles.

“The death penalty is an inhumane and degrading form of punishment without any deterring effect. This is why we oppose the death penalty, whatever the circumstances around the world. The rejection of the death penalty is a fundamental value that unites us.”

The statement also urged the Israeli decision makers to “abandon these plans”.

The Green Party wanted to highlight the issue in Parliament, and sought support from across the House to move a motion without notice.

Co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick told reporters yesterday afternoon convention stipulated motions without notice needed prior agreement from all parties.

“This stops spurious motions going up and clogging the time of our Parliament.”

The motion read that the “New Zealand House of Representatives expresses deep concern about Israel’s new legislation which extends the use of the death penalty against Palestinians living under unlawful occupation; shares the concerns of Australia, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and Italy about the “de facto discriminatory character’ of the legislation; and calls on the Israeli Government to reverse this legislation”.

Labour, Te Pati Māori supported motion
Opposition Labour and Te Pāti Māori parties both told RNZ they supported the motion.

Labour leader Chris Hipkins said his party would firmly support a motion in the House to condemn Israel’s use of the death penalty against Palestianians.

“It clearly discriminates against Palestinians — a point underscored by the fact that the law does not apply to Israeli extremists who commit similar crimes. There are major issues with the process including that it removes the right to an appeal. By condemning Israel, we would stand alongside the United Nations, EU and the UK.”

Te Pāti Māori told RNZ it supported the motion, and queried why other parties had not.

“This law further embeds discrimination into Israel’s justice system by allowing Palestinians to be sentenced to death while others are not subject to the same punishment for similar acts,” a spokesperson for the party said.

“It sits within the context of the ongoing genocide against the Palestinian people, and the backdrop of Israel and the United States’ illegal invasion of Iran and Lebanon.”

National and New Zealand First did not respond to queries but the ACT party told RNZ it did not support the motion being put without notice.

‘Symbolic motions’
A spokesperson for the party said it noted the Minister of Foreign Affairs was responsible for expressing New Zealand’s position on international issues, and “ACT supports that approach over symbolic motions in the House”.

“If the House passed a motion every time a country passed a law of concern, we would spend more time talking about other countries’ legislation than our own.

“All MPs have the right to put a motion on notice under Standing Orders.”

In response, Swarbrick said it was “deeply disappointing” and acknowledged the point was “symbolism”.

“I can point to many different examples when the ACT Party, for example, has put forward very similar motions, evidently for the very purpose of that same symbolism, which in turn means something on the international stage.

“It felt particularly pertinent for our country to take a stand against the perpetuation of abuse of human rights with the Israeli Parliament passing the ability to effectively murder, to slaughter Palestinian hostages and prisoners.”

She said a motion on notice did not have the status of being read out in Parliament and having the backing of every single parliamentary party.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

This is a war of narratives with the United States administration trying to push forward its narrative of “victory” while the Iranian administration or establishment is trying to push its narrative of being suppressed and under attack.

The Iranian President, Masoud Pezeshkian, has clearly said in an open letter to the American people that Iran has never started a war, and that Iran has no hostility towards American citizens.

He invited the people of America to look beyond politics and rhetoric and reconsider the realities of the past and present.

• READ MORE: ‘Which interests being served by war?’ Iran’s Pezeshkian asks US public
• Is Iran war really ‘America First’, Iranian president asks in letter to US public
• Trump vows to bring back Iran to the ‘stone age’
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

He said that as the Iranian people harboured no enmity towards other nations, including the people of America, Europe, and neighboring countries, attacks on Iran’s infrastructure and the targeting of our people would have consequences beyond the country’s border.

“What we do in response is based on the legitimate right of self-defence, not an act of aggression,” he said.

So, given the fact that the Iranians have already denied that they’ve asked for a ceasefire, now we see the president is trying to present a narrative, a complete different narrative, and at the end, showing and preserving Iran’s right to defend itself.

President Pezeshkian urged a shift away from confrontation with Tehran, questioning both US policy priorities and the “machinery of misinformation” about his country.

“Is ‘America First’ truly among the priorities of the US government today?” Pezeshkian asked.

Judge Iran on experience
He also called on Americans to judge Iran by the experiences of those who had visited the nation of some 90 million people and the achievements of Iranian immigrants.

“Observe the many accomplished Iranian immigrants — educated in Iran — who now teach and conduct research at the world’s most prestigious universities, or contribute to the most advanced technology firms in the West.

“Do these realities align with the distortions you are being told about Iran and its people?,” he asked.

President Pezeshkian said “the world stands at crossroads”, and argued that continuing on a path of hostility toward Iran was “more costly and futile than ever before”.

He described the choice between confrontation and engagement as “both real and consequential,” warning that its outcome will “shape the future for generations to come”.

The Iranian president questioned whose interests were being served by US military action against Iran, framing it as costly for both Iranians and Americans.

“Was there any objective threat from Iran to justify such behaviour?” he asked.

Iran President’s open letter to the American people          Video: Al Jazeera

“Does the massacre of innocent children, the destruction of cancer-treatment pharmaceutical facilities, or boasting about bombing a country ‘back to the Stone Age’ serve any purpose other than further damaging the United States’ global standing?”

President Pezeshkian also questioned the role of Israel in the war, asking, “Is it not also the case that America has entered this aggression as a proxy for Israel, influenced and manipulated by that regime?”

“Is it not evident that Israel now aims to fight Iran to the last American soldier and the last American taxpayer dollar — shifting the burden of its delusions onto Iran, the region, and the United States itself in pursuit of illegitimate interests?”

Ali Hashem reports for Al Jazeera.

The full open letter by Iran’s President Pezeshkian to the American people:
To the people of the United States of America, and to all those who, amid a flood of distortions and manufactured narratives, continue to seek the truth and aspire to a better life:

Iran — by this very name, character, and identity — is one of the oldest continuous civilisations in human history. Despite its historical and geographical advantages at various times, Iran has never, in its modern history, chosen the path of aggression, expansion, colonialism, or domination.

Even after enduring occupation, invasion, and sustained pressure from global powers — and despite possessing military superiority over many of its neighbors — Iran has never initiated a war.

Yet it has resolutely and bravely repelled those who have attacked it.

The Iranian people harbour no enmity toward other nations, including the people of America, Europe, or neighboring countries. Even in the face of repeated foreign interventions and pressures throughout their proud history, Iranians have consistently drawn a clear distinction between governments and the peoples they govern. This is a deeply rooted principle in Iranian culture and collective consciousness — not a temporary political stance.

For this reason, portraying Iran as a threat is neither consistent with historical reality nor with present-day observable facts. Such a perception is the product of political and economic whims of the powerful — the need to manufacture an enemy in order to justify pressure, maintain military dominance, sustain the arms industry, and control strategic markets. In such an environment, if a threat does not exist, it is invented.

Within this same framework, the United States has concentrated the largest number of its forces, bases, and military capabilities around Iran — a country that, at least since the founding of the United States, has never initiated a war. Recent American aggressions launched from these very bases have demonstrated how threatening such a military presence truly is. Naturally, no country confronted with such conditions would forgo strengthening its defensive capabilities. What Iran has done — and continues to do — is a measured response grounded in legitimate self-defence, and by no means an initiation of war or aggression.

Relations between Iran and the United States were not originally hostile, and early interactions between the Iranian and American people were not marred with hostility or tension. The turning point, however, was the 1953 coup d’état — an illegal American intervention aimed at preventing the nationalisation of Iran’s own resources. That coup disrupted Iran’s democratic process, reinstated dictatorship, and sowed deep distrust among Iranians toward US policies.

This distrust deepened further with America’s support for the Shah’s regime, its backing of Saddam Hussein during the imposed war of the 1980s, the imposition of the longest and most comprehensive sanctions in modern history, and ultimately, unprovoked military aggression — twice, in the midst of negotiations — against Iran.

Yet all these pressures have failed to weaken Iran. On the contrary, the country has grown stronger in many areas: literacy rates have tripled — from roughly 30 percent before the Islamic Revolution to over 90 percent today; higher education has expanded dramatically; significant advances have been achieved in modern technology; healthcare services have improved; and infrastructure has developed at a pace and scale incomparable to the past.

These are measurable, observable realities that stand independent of fabricated narratives.

At the same time, the destructive and inhumane impact of sanctions, war, and aggression on the lives of the resilient Iranian people must not be underestimated. The continuation of military aggression and recent bombings profoundly affect people’s lives, attitudes, and perspectives. This reflects a fundamental human truth: when war inflicts irreparable harm on lives, homes, cities, and futures, people will not remain indifferent toward those responsible.

This raises a fundamental question: Exactly which of the American people’s interests are truly being served by this war? Was there any objective threat from Iran to justify such behaviour? Does the massacre of innocent children, the destruction of cancer-treatment pharmaceutical facilities, or boasting about bombing a country “back to the stone ages” serve any purpose other than further damaging the United States’ global standing?

Iran pursued negotiations, reached an agreement, and fulfilled all its commitments. The decision to withdraw from that agreement, escalate toward confrontation, and launch two acts of aggression in the midst of negotiations were destructive choices made by the US government — choices that served the delusions of a foreign aggressor.

Attacking Iran’s vital infrastructure — including energy and industrial facilities — directly targets the Iranian people. Beyond constituting a war crime, such actions carry consequences that extend far beyond Iran’s borders. They generate instability, increase human and economic costs, and perpetuate cycles of tension, planting seeds of resentment that will endure for years. This is not a demonstration of strength; it is a sign of strategic bewilderment and an inability to achieve a sustainable solution.

Is it not also the case that America has entered this aggression as a proxy for Israel, influenced and manipulated by that regime? Is it not true that Israel, by manufacturing an Iranian threat, seeks to divert global attention away from its crimes toward the Palestinians?

Is it not evident that Israel now aims to fight Iran to the last American soldier and the last American taxpayer dollar — shifting the burden of its delusions onto Iran, the region, and the United States itself in pursuit of illegitimate interests?

Is “America First” truly among the priorities of the US government today?

I invite you to look beyond the machinery of misinformation — an integral part of this aggression — and instead speak with those who have visited Iran. Observe the many accomplished Iranian immigrants — educated in Iran — who now teach and conduct research at the world’s most prestigious universities, or contribute to the most advanced technology firms in the West. Do these realities align with the distortions you are being told about Iran and its people?

Today, the world stands at a crossroads. Continuing along the path of confrontation is more costly and futile than ever before. The choice between confrontation and engagement is both real and consequential; its outcome will shape the future for generations to come.

Throughout its millennia of proud history, Iran has outlasted many aggressors. All that remains of them are tarnished names in history, while Iran endures — resilient, dignified, and proud.

Thousands took to the streets of the capital Nouméa on Tuesday — hours ahead of a scheduled French Parliament debate in the National Assembly in Paris to discuss the French Pacific territory’s political future.

An estimated 2500 came in support of local Association Un Coeur, une Voix (UCUV–One Heart, One Voice) to oppose the prospect of the next local elections (to elect New Caledonia’s three provinces) being held under the current “frozen” electoral roll, which excludes people who have not resided in New Caledonia before 1998 or their direct descendents.

During a one-hour peaceful march in downtown Nouméa, the participants were brandishing tricolour blue-white-red flags and other placards denouncing what they described as “second-class citizens” treatment and their perceived condition of self-styled “victims of history”.

• READ MORE: Other Kanaky New Caledonia reports

The march was designed to send a clear message to French MPs ahead of debates on New Caledonia later this week.

“I’m sorry for using harsh words, but it’s like we’re being robbed [of our rights],” UCUV president Raphaël Romano told local Radio Rythme Bleu.

“And now we have those MPs who are going to decide for us. They’re going to use New Caledonia for their own national political gains . . .  and make a mess”.

“If [MPs] can’t find an agreement, then they should let New Caledonians choose.

“It’s a shame for democracy, it happens nowhere else in the world”, Romano told local media.

His movement is strongly supported by several prominent pro-France parties, including Le Rassemblement and Les Loyalistes.

He said the situation affected all ethnic communities in New Caledonia.

“Those who can’t vote are men and women from all walks of life, all ethnic groups who live together in peace, every day,” he said.

“It’s hard enough to try and recover from the May 2024 riots, where people have lost their businesses and their job.”

The 2024 riots caused 14 deaths and more than 2 billion euros (almost NZ$4 billion) in material damage.

They were also initially triggered by peaceful protests against a plan to have the French constitution modified, especially regarding the electoral restrictions.

The protests turned violent and out of control in Nouméa on the very day debates started in Paris.

The “freeze” was enforced in 2009, as part of the Nouméa Accord, signed in 1998.

Originally designed as a temporary measure, the restriction currently excludes up to 40,000 people, many of them born in New Caledonia.

‘Counter demonstrations’
Meanwhile, pro-independence movements have called for other “counter-demonstrations” outside of Nouméa.

One gathering took place on Tuesday, including in the outer Loyalty Islands of Lifou, while another demonstration is scheduled on Wednesday, in Koné (North of the main island, Grande Terre).

The voting restriction measure was originally included in the 1998 Nouméa Accord as a measure to prevent any erosion of New Caledonia’s indigenous Kanak population’s voice.

The proposed text derives from talks held between New Caledonia political stakeholders and the French government.

This was on two occasions: in the small city of Bougival in July 2025 and later in January 2026 in Paris, at the French Presidential Élysée Palace and the French Ministry of Overseas Territories, Rue Oudinot.

Hence the name of Bougival-Élysée-Oudinot (BEO) for a text and an expanded project.

But the BEO text, in August 2025, was unequivocally opposed by the FLNKS (Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front), the main component of the pro-independence movement.

Other participating parties — pro-France and pro-independence (two pro-independence members of FLNKS have since split to create their own “UNI” [Union Nationale pour l’Indépendance]) — have since maintained their commitment to the BEO process, including their legislative adaptation (in the form of a Constitutional Amendment and an “organic Law, which would de facto become New Caledonia’s constitution).

The project also envisions the creation of a “State of New Caledonia”, with a correlated “New Caledonia nationality” available to people who are already French citizens.

The FLNKS later explained it saw these, as well as a planned process of transfer of more powers from Paris to Nouméa, as just a “lure” of independence.

Reacting to the UCUV march, FLNKS said the “freeze” was ruled constitutional by France’s Constitutional Council in September 2025 and could only be changed if a “consensual” agreement was found.

But FLNKS considers the BEO-derived text “is not a logical continuation of the Nouméa Accord”.

The BEO-derived Bill, if adopted, could eventually replace the Nouméa Accord.

But it is now still undergoing legislative process.

The French Senate endorsed it on February 24, with a comfortable right-wing majority.

But this week, the same text is to be debated in the Lower House of Parliament, the National Assembly, which has been divided since the July 2024 French national snap election following President Macron’s decision to dissolve Parliament.

Current predictions are that since there is no clear majority within the Lower House, the Bill, which comes in the form of a Constitutional Amendment (with the capacity to replace the Nouméa Accord) is likely to be rejected.

The opposition to the current right-wing group comes from the left (far-left La France Insoumise -LFI-, the Socialists (who say the Bill is “heavy with threats and dangers”), the Communists, the Greens) and Marine Le Pen’s far-right Rassemblement National (RN).

Last week, the Constitutional Bill came before the National Assembly’s Law Committee and suffered an initial rejection.

Parliamentary debates in the National Assembly are scheduled to begin on Wednesday (1 April 2026, Paris time) and could last for the next three days.

‘Barrage’ of three thousand amendments
Some opposition parties, especially the democratic and republican left (GDR, Gauche démocrate et républicaine, to which the pro-independence New Caledonian Kanak MP Emmanuel Tjibaou belongs) have already filed on the agenda a “prior rejection motion” to withdraw the Bill.

Some of those expressed strong reservations because the process and ensuing Bill was opposed by FLNKS and that, therefore, there was no unanimity.

Meanwhile, since last week, in a previously used barrage tactic, LFI has also filed over 3000 amendments.

Restrictions still apply under Nouméa Accord — French Constitutional Council
UCUV has been fighting for years to defend their rights, in front of what they term a “denial of democracy”.

Last year, they took their case to the French Constitutional Council, which ruled that in the present situation, the electoral roll “freeze” for local elections was part of the Nouméa Accord which was part of the French Constitution.

UCUV president Raphaël Romano said they now have no other option but to take their case before the European Court of Human Rights, even though they admit their hopes are “very weak”.

He said the deadline was 4 April 2026.

If the Constitutional Bill is rejected by Parliament, a new proposed calendar for implementation will automatically become obsolete.

And local provincial elections that have already been delayed three times since May 2024 will have to be held not later than 28 June 2026, instead of the proposed December this year.

If the BEO-derived text is rejected, then the Nouméa Accord applies again and the planned provincial elections will have to be held under the restricted — “frozen” — electoral roll system.

“The provincial elections will not be held under a frozen electoral roll. It’s just not possible”, Romano said.

Deadlock, imbroglio: what now?
Other possible alternative scenarios could include re-submitting a new, revised Bill, dedicated to the electoral roll, or organising a “consultation”, a de facto referendum with eligible New Caledonians.

Under the French parliamentary principle of the “shuttle”, the text could be sent back to the Senate.

Under the BEO text, people eligible for voting at local provincial elections can either be born in New Caledonia or having resided there for an uninterrupted 15 years (for the first five years of enforcement, then the minimum residence period would be reduced to 10 uninterrupted years).

From the French government’s point of view, an agreement on New Caledonia’s institutional future is the only solution to bring back stability and economic “visibility” for local and foreign investors.

“Everything is on the table to get things moving”, French Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu told French media last week.

Overseas Minister Naïma Moutchou is still advocating for the benefits a parliamentary approval would bring to New Caledonia in terms of a “framework” for economic recovery.

France has earmarked some 2 billion euros in a “refoundation” pact, structured to put the economy, social services and the crucial nickel mining industry back on track, provided necessary reforms are carried out.

“Let’s give a chance to this process, because in New Caledonia, the alternative to an open political process is never quiet: it’s uncertainty and, over there, it always ends up weakening civil peace,” she told Parliament last week.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

One day in October 2023 I was walking down the supermarket aisle when I saw greenwashing in plain sight.

Fonterra’s Anchor butter was sitting in the chiller with a prominent claim on the packaging that it was Grass Fed.

I knew that Fonterra cows were fed on millions of tonnes of palm kernel. So I decided to do something about it. And today we finally won that battle.

• READ MORE: Fonterra settles activists’ misleading packaging lawsuit for ‘100 percent NZ grass-fed’ claims

Today, after Greenpeace sued Fonterra under the Fair Trading Act, Fonterra has published a statement admitting its “100% New Zealand Grass Fed” claim breached section 9 of the Act.

Section 9 makes it illegal to “engage in conduct that is misleading or deceptive or is likely to mislead or deceive.” Fonterra has undertaken to not use this label again.

Thus Fonterra, New Zealand’s largest company, a multinational with $26 billion a year in turnover, was today forced to admit it has been deceiving its customers about a key claim it makes about its products — “100% New Zealand Grass Fed”.

Fonterra’s deception
While Fonterra was telling its customers that its Anchor brand butter was “100% New Zealand Grass Fed”, they were telling their milk suppliers that they could feed their dairy cows up to 3kg of palm kernel every day.

That works out at around 20 percent of all the food that a dairy cow eats. In practice dairy producers are probably on average providing about 6 percent to 8 percent of a New Zealand dairy cow’s diet from palm kernel, though it could be up to 20 percent in individual cases.

Palm kernel is one of the products of the palm industry in Malaysia and Indonesia — yes, the same palm industry that is destroying the last of the Southeast Asian tropical rainforests.

A million tonne deception
So on the one hand Fonterra was telling New Zealanders that they should buy Fonterra products because they are natural, 100 percent from New Zealand grass, while at the same time it was giving the green light to its milk suppliers to feed dairy cattle palm kernel from offshore.

And not just a little bit, I mean millions of tonnes of palm kernel.

In fact, Fonterra’s milk suppliers are using so much palm kernel that New Zealand is the world’s largest importer of palm kernel, at around two million tonnes per year, most of which is fed to dairy cattle.

During the period when Fonterra used the “100% New Zealand Grass Fed” label (they state from December 2023 to April 2025), New Zealand imported around three million tonnes of palm kernel, at a cost of around $800 million. Of this, around two and a quarter million tonnes went to Fonterra suppliers.

So not only was Fonterra deceiving their customers that their butter was “100% New Zealand Grass Fed”, but they were doing it on a massive scale. 

It looked like a huge lie in plain sight by New Zealand’s largest company. Someone had to do something.

Off to the Commerce Commission
So standing in the chiller aisle of the supermarket I had an idea — I should complain to the Commerce Commission, as it was a breach of the Fair Trading Act. It was deceptive and misleading advertising.

The Commerce Commission is responsible for the Fair Trading Act so surely they would care that New Zealand’s largest company was misleading millions of New Zealanders about a key claim of their products.

So I sent off my complaint in November 2023, received an automated acknowledgement, and then I waited. And waited.

Finally in June 2024 I chased them up and in July 2024 managed to get a zoom meeting with the relevant Commission investigator. The investigator explained that they had done some kind of investigation and had connected with Fonterra but they were planning to take zero enforcement action. Nothing.

So eight months after my original complaint, with zero effort by the Commerce Commission to contact me, I discovered they planned to do nothing about it.

I was pretty annoyed so I decided to make an Official Information Act (OIA) request to the Commerce Commission to find out what they had done.

Commission wrote Fonterra a letter, Fonterra carried on
And this is where it starts to get pretty interesting. The OIA showed that Commerce Commission investigators had actually done some investigating. Moreover, they had concluded that the label was likely to mislead consumers.

The Commerce Commission wrote to Fonterra in March 2024 stating that the label “may lead consumers to form an overall impression that the cow’s diet comprises of [sic] 100% grass… A reasonable consumer… may not … be aware that up to 8% of a cow’s diet may consist of supplemental non-grass feed… the use of PKE may not be clear to a reasonable consumer.”

If the Commerce Commission found the label was misleading, hence in breach of the Fair Trading Act, what would they do?

The Commission letter to Fonterra stated that “we do not intend to further investigate the complaint made against you at this time”.

So… the Commission wrote them the letter, and nothing else.

Fonterra received the Commerce Commission letter in March 2024 giving the commission’s opinion that the label was likely to be misleading but stating that the commission would take no further action.

And what did Fonterra do? Fonterra just kept using the label.

Greenpeace takes legal action against Fonterra
In late September 2024, we had had enough of the greenwashing by Fonterra and the failure of the Commerce Commission to take action and we initiated legal action ourselves.

Aside from the deceptive advertising issue, Greenpeace has campaigned on palm kernel for years. Palm kernel is driving tropical rainforest destruction in Southeast Asia as well as providing the feed for intensive dairy agribusiness in New Zealand, which is polluting fresh water and producing climate emissions.

We want the dairy industry to cut out palm kernel, and we want New Zealand consumers to know that Fonterra’s dairy products are driving rainforest destruction.

We sued them under the Fair Trading Act, doing the work that the Commerce Commission had failed to do.

This is no small matter for a New Zealand NGO to take on a $26 billion a year multinational corporation. Fonterra employed the law firm Chapman Tripp against us, the biggest law firm in the country.

If we were to lose the case and have costs awarded against us, it could have been disastrous, as both sides knew.

Fonterra stops using the deceptive label
And guess what? In April 2025, six months after we lodged our legal action, Fonterra quietly stopped using the deceptive and misleading “100% New Zealand Grass Fed” label.

And then finally in March 2026, as the court hearing date approached, Fonterra agreed to an out of court settlement in which they admitted they had breached section 9 of the Fair Trading Act by engaging in deceptive and misleading advertising. And they agreed not to use the label again.

We finally made Fonterra admit that they were using tonnes of palm kernel and that their milk is most certainly not 100 percent New Zealand Grass Fed.

Fonterra has a choice about how its milk is produced. It chooses to accept milk produced with palm kernel, chooses to accept destroying rainforests, killing orangutans and birds of paradise.

Multinational corporations are just machines for making money – we need to regulate them
Fonterra deliberately chose to use that misleading label back in December 2023. Presumably they did this to sell more of their products, to maximise profits.

Fonterra chose to keep using the label even after the Commerce Commission told them they thought it was likely to mislead consumers. It was only when Greenpeace took legal action against them that they were forced to change.

Fonterra spouts a lot of nonsense about how it cares for the environment or New Zealanders or whatever. But they are just a machine for making money for their shareholders. The practical benefit of all the corporate talk about “caring” is to avoid proper government regulation.

If we want to align the activities of multinational corporations with society’s values then we have to regulate them, as they will not do it themselves. By design, large corporations do not have “values”. They are just machines for making money, and whether they make money by destroying nature, or not, only depends on the laws under which they operate and whether those laws are enforced.

The Commerce Commission let the biggest corporation in the country get away with deceiving consumers – a deception that was millions of tonnes in size and repeated weekly to every New Zealander who walked down a supermarket aisle. And so that corporation just carried on doing it.

Greenpeace stood up and we won. But it shouldn’t have been up to us.

The role of the government is to act in our collective interest by regulating corporations, not only to make sure they don’t deceive consumers, but to protect a stable climate, to protect the biodiversity of our planet, and indeed to protect life on Earth.

Dr Russel Norman is executive director of Greenpeace Aotearoa. Republished from Greenpeace Aotearoa with permission.

• Petition: Stop Fonterra using Palm Kernel

US President Donald Trump has been obsessed with seizing Iran’s Kharg Island for more than 35 years — way before he became a politician. In 1990, he wrote in an American newspaper that the United States should seize Kharg.

Trump thinks that by seizing Kharg, he would get hold of Iranian oil, which he has admitted he wants badly. Either he is deliberately misleading the world or he is not well informed.

Kharg is nothing more than a loading terminal. It is a small island, only about 90 sq km in size, some 28 km from the Iranian mainland.

• READ MORE: Trump says war could end in ‘two to three weeks’ — Iran’s Araghchi confirms no negotiations
• Will China join Pakistan-led efforts to mediate US-Iran peace?
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

It’s main advantage is that it is surrounded by very deep waters which allows what are known as Very Large Crude Carriers (VLCCs) to come alongside and load huge quantities of crude oil. A VLCC can easily load up to 2 million barrels of crude.

At today’s price of US$116 per barrel, the value of the cargo would exceed $232 million.

Kharg itself is not an oilfield. It does not produce crude. Every drop of oil which is stored in its many storage tanks are piped there from the mainland through underwater pipes.

All the Iranian oil fields are on the mainland. Now that the Iranians have known well in advance that Trump might seize the island, do you know what they will do? They will turn off the spigot.

No more oil flow
No more oil will flow from the mainland to the island. What oil there is stored in the tanks on the island would have been loaded onto vessels which would have departed Kharg.

I am willing to put a wager that if the Americans seize the island, they will not find any oil. Maybe there will be some residue left in the tanks but the amounts would be so miniscule that in law it would be known as de minimis.

Trump can seize the island and I am sure the Iranians will allow him to do so. But what will happen after that?

The marines and the paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division will be slaughtered by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). I pity the American mothers and wives who will be receiving the bodies of their sons and husbands.

Iranian missiles and drones will descend on the American troops like fire and brimstone. There is absolutely no way the Americans can hold the island. The Iranians know this and have dared the Americans to come because they know that it is an invitation to hell for the enemy.

The trouble with the Americans is hubris. They think the rest of the world can easily be walked over by their unbeatable marines and other elite troops.

Napoleon too thought that his Old Guards or Imperial Guards were invincible until they came up against the British Grenadier, Coldstream and Scots Guards at Waterloo. And for the first time ever in the Napoleonic Wars, the agonising cry from the French generals of “En arriere!“ meaning “backward” or “retreat” was heard in the ranks of this legendary unit.

Best trained, fanatical
When the Americans face the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, whether at Kharg or Hormuz, they will be coming up against some of the best trained and fanatical soldiers in the world, who are equipped to the hilt with modern weaponry.

All their generals are veterans of the bloody 8 year Iran-Iraq war. If there are soldiers who know what war is, it is the IRGC.

And to me it is the height of absurdity for the Americans to think that they can accomplish their missions with only about 17,000 ground troops.

I think the scale of the slaughter is going to be gut-wrenching and awful. It will be the modern day equivalent of the battle of Cannae where Hannibal destroyed the entire Roman army, killing 80,000 enemy soldiers in a single day and taking another 10,000 as prisoners.

In 1980, America was humiliated when their military helicopters floundered in the failed Operation Eagle Claw rescue mission to extract the embassy hostages. Nearly half a century later, I fear America will again be humiliated in Iran.

Lim Tean is a Singaporean lawyer, politician and commentator. He is the founder of the political party People’s Voice and a co-founder of the political alliance People’s Alliance for Reform.

Museums around the world present the story of war in different ways. The Imperial War Museum in London includes military history, the Holocaust, women’s roles in the two world wars, wartime artwork and the political issues of the time.

This museum records both civilian and military experiences, looking at the impact of war on people’s lives. Its Crimes Against Humanity section has a continuous film about genocide and ethnic violence in our time.

The Dutch Resistance Museum in Amsterdam focuses on the Dutch experience during the occupation of the Netherlands by Nazi Germany during World War Two, and features personal stories of those who lived during that period.

• READ MORE: Up close and friendly with Vietnam’s war resistance Củ Chi tunnels and museum
• Scars on the Heart exhibition at Auckland Museum
• Museum’s attempt to show ‘both sides’ of the Second World War
• Nuclear-Free Pacific exhibition opened – calls for inspired peace and regionalism

National museums in India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh musealise the memory of the 1947 Partition in different, selective ways, with oral history, survivor testimonies, and personal artefacts to document the displacement and trauma of the subcontinent’s division.

How does our own war museum remember war?

Visitors to Auckland’s War Memorial Museum find that the top floor is dedicated to the memory of New Zealand soldiers killed in World Wars One and Two.

The WWI Hall of Memories contains a sanctuary, used for commemoration. In this space are medals and badges of units in which men and women from the Auckland Province served, and British badges that acknowledge those who joined British units.

Roll of honour
In the WWII Hall of Memories, carved into marble is the permanent roll of honour of men and women from the Auckland Province who died in both World Wars, and in Korea, Malaya, Borneo and Vietnam.

The Scars on the Heart exhibition covers New Zealand’s civil wars of the 1840s and 1860s, the Anglo-Boer War, the First and Second World Wars, the Asian wars and New Zealand’s involvement in United Nations peacekeeping missions. Items on display include letters, diaries, photos, clothing and firearms.

There is a recreation of a bivouac shelter at Gallipoli and a Western Front trench from WWI.

This year, the greatest number of active armed conflicts since the end of the Second World War is taking place. The Doomsday Clock was set at 85 seconds to midnight on January 27 — the closest it has ever been to midnight.

Funding for nuclear weapons programmes is increasing and the New START treaty, the nuclear arms reduction treaty between the United States and Russia has expired, with US President Donald Trump having no interest in renewing arms limitation agreements.

Remembering the destructive and tragic consequences of war should be central to the role of museums in their telling of stories about war. However, unfortunately, around the same time as the recent removal of asbestos from the museum, some of these vital stories have been removed.

They include evidence of civilian war trauma installed in the 1990s by then head curator Lieutenant-Colonel Chris Pugsley to show impacts of war on civilians. Another removal has been the 1968 “Letter from a Vietnam Hospital” by the New Zealand surgeon and surgical team leader in Vietnam, Dr Peter Eccles-Smith, and a photo of a woman and a child who were victims of the Nagasaki atomic bomb in 1945.

No record of NZ nuclear protests
There is also no longer any text or photos showing New Zealand’s official protests against French nuclear testing at Moruroa Atoll in the South Pacific.

In addition to the reinstatement of these particular items, a more encompassing telling of stories about war at Auckland Museum than at present could include the portrayal of New Zealand’s resistance to international wars, the work of civilian and army medical personnel, photos of injured soldiers and civilians, photos and placards of anti-war demonstrators, stories of conscientious objectors, portrayals of victims of the atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and photos and stories about the nuclear-free movement in NZ and the Pacific, including the fateful journey of Greenpeace’s Rainbow Warrior across Oceania into Auckland Harbour.

Auckland Museum’s 2025 plan included “Enabling commemoration opportunities to reflect the community while exploring themes of conflict and peace; and commitment to broadening our commemorative narrative to be inclusive of diverse experiences and events relevant to our communities.”

This year is 30 years since the International Court of Justice declared that the threat or use of nuclear weapons would generally contradict international law. Next year, 2027, will be the 40th anniversary of NZ’s nuclear-free legislation, a fitting time for Auckland Museum to launch an exhibition that could include NZ’s official and civil society opposition to nuclear weapons.

Veteran peace activists hope to forge a constructive working relationship with Auckland Museum to help portray people’s experience of war more fully, and create a peace gallery to tell the story of NZ’s peace history.

Audrey van Ryn is a peace activist and writer. In 2009, she created the Auckland Peace Heritage Walk on behalf of the United Nations Association of NZ. She is currently secretary of Community Groups Feeding the Homeless.

• If interested, please contact Dr David Robie of the Asia Pacific Media Network

New Zealand’s national Māori radio network, Te Whakaruruhau o Ngā Reo Irirangi Māori o Aotearoa, is considering litigation over a potential loss of government funding which it says threatens the survivability of iwi radio stations.

Chairperson Peter-Lucas Jones (Ngāti Kahu, Te Rārawa, Ngāi Takoto, Te Aupōuri) — who was also chief executive of Far North iwi broadcaster Te Hiku Media — told current affairs series RUKU Māori radio was a right under Te Tiriti o Waitangi, not a government handout.

Recent and proposed actions targeting iwi stations, implemented primarily through Te Māngai Pāho (TMP), disregarded the treaty and exposed the Crown to credible legal risk, he said.

• READ MORE: Other Māori broadcasting reports

“This issue is not about resisting change, iwi radio stations have themselves funded transitions to digital platforms and new media without Crown support.

“The issue is whether the Crown can, through an intermediary, dismantle a treaty remedy without Māori consent.”

There are more than 20 iwi radio stations across New Zealand, from Te Hiku in the North to Tahu FM in the South.

Stations receive funding through Te Māngai Pāho to promote Māori language and culture.

Time-limited funding
TMP currently has $16 million of time-limited funding, equal to almost 25 percent of their total annual funding, which is due to expire on June 30.

Te Māngai Pāho said that while 2026/27 appropriations would not be confirmed until the Budget announcement in late May, the impact of this funding loss would be felt across the whole Māori media sector.

“Te Māngai Pāho is consulting with the Māori media sector, including iwi radio, on the future of our funding allocations. We have requested feedback to understand how any reduction of funding will be felt across the sector.

“Feedback will inform the board’s final decisions around funding allocations. We understand that the stability of iwi radio stations and content creators is threatened by this funding cut.”

Jones said iwi stations unanimously agreed at a special general meeting they would not accept any decrease in funding and would consider legal action in response to any cutbacks.

“Decisions taken by TMP that materially affect iwi radio funding, structure or autonomy remain Crown actions for treaty purposes.

“The Crown cannot discharge its Treaty obligations by delegation and then rely on that delegation to insulate itself from responsibility.”

Rapidly changing audience
The iwi radio network said it had been grappling with a wide range of issues including, rapidly changing audience expectation and emerging technologies, numerous siloed media outlets and an inadequate investment in workforce development affecting the ability to grow and retain a skilled workforce.

Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka said Māori media, including iwi radio, played a critical role in supporting te reo Māori revitalisation and connecting whānau and communities across Aotearoa, shaping public understanding by sharing Māori stories and te reo directly with whānau.

He said no final decisions had been made through the consultation between TMP and the Māori media sector and it was premature to confirm impacts on funding levels, services, or jobs, including claims about specific percentage reductions.

“Earlier financial support of $16 million in time-limited funding was put in place under the previous government and is now coming to an end. The current consultation process is focused on how best to manage that transition within existing funding,” he said.

“As Minister, I do not direct or intervene in Te Māngai Pāho’s operational funding decisions. Those are matters for the board.”

Potaka said the Crown’s role was to ensure a strong and sustainable system for te reo Māori revitalisation.

High quality content
“I expect the consultation process to reflect the importance of Iwi radio and the role it plays in communities across the country, while ensuring funding is used effectively to deliver high-quality content on platforms that meet audience preferences.

“Māori media entities continue to adapt to changes in funding and audience behaviour, and I expect decisions to prioritise value for money while supporting strong te reo Māori outcomes.

“Any organisation is entitled to raise concerns or seek legal advice. However, there is an established independent process underway, and it is important that process is allowed to run its course.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Fiji’s Health Minister Dr Ratu Antonio Lalabalavu has defended the government’s handling of the country’s HIV crisis.

HIV is surging in Fiji with at least 9000 people — or nearly one percent of the population — reported to be now infected.

There are concerns that the real figure could be significantly higher, with global health experts saying HIV is historically under-reported.

• READ MORE: Other HIV in Fiji reports

The World Health Organisation (WHO) believes the country has been gripped by an “escalating HIV outbreak”.

The island nation declared an HIV outbreak in January last year, with the government calling it “a national crisis” and regional health experts warning that it could spread across the region.

Dr Lalabalavu told Pacific Waves that despite the rising tide of infection the government’s response to the crisis had been “responsible”.

“Look at the [HIV] trend and how it started, it goes way back to 2017, 2018. We are the government that recognised it and now we are doing something about it.”

Budget allocation
The government allocated FJ$10 million (US$4.4 million) in last year’s Budget towards initiatives designed to tackle the problem, he said.

“From last year there have been government initiatives put in place to ensure that we do try and get this under control.”

Alarming stats
The Health Minister revealed some alarming HIV statistics in Parliament earlier this month.

“In 2025, Fiji recorded 2003 new diagnoses, up from 1583 in 2024, with the national rate diagnosis rising to 226 per 100,000, up from 13 per 100,000 in 2019 — a 17-fold increase,” he said.

“Men remain more affected, but the gap is narrowing, showing that infection is increasingly affecting women and families.”

On top of that, a new trend has emerged showing that the number of HIV-positive newborns is on the rise, according to the head of Fiji’s National HIV Outbreak and Cluster Response team, Dr Jason Mitchell.

Sixty babies were born with HIV last year, up from 31 cases in 2024 and more than 3 percent of women attending antenatal care in Fiji were testing positive for HIV, with the number slightly higher in the capital, Suva, Dr Mitchell said.

One baby is being diagnosed with HIV every week due to mother-to-child transmission, and one child is dying every month from advanced HIV disease.

Mother-to-child transmission
Mother-to-baby transmission is a growing concern, according to treatment support worker Dashika Balak.

“They (the mothers) test negatively initially but over the course of the pregnancy they acquire HIV,” Balak said.

“This is a new trend that we are seeing, because these women may not have risky behaviours but most of the partners are injecting drug users and in pregnancy people do have sex.”

Testing during pregnancy is now underway to reduce the risk of transmission to babies, she said.

Dr Lalabalavu has admitted that sexual promiscuity and drug use among youth in particular are huge contributing factors in the HIV epidemic.

Asked exactly how the government planned to address this, he said “a behavioural change programme” was needed to ensure that happens.

“It is part of the plan, you need good planning and a programme to ensure that is implemented across the board,” he said.

“It is not just something for the Ministry of Health, it’s for the various ministries, important stakeholders, the vanua, the church and the family in general.”

Conservative beliefs
Although there were plans to introduce a vital needle and syringe exchange programme, its rollout would take time, Dr Lalabalavu said.

“We will have to tread carefully in terms of how it is accepted within the community, and also we need to look into the legal aspect of it. So we are in the final stages of ensuring that the programme is endorsed.”

Cultural and religious beliefs played a part in the sensitivity around the issue in Fiji, he said.

“First of all, you need to create awareness that by doing this we are not advocating for drug use. That is the challenge and the narrative that we need the general public are aware of,” he said.

“Right now we are looking at avenues to ensure that we get the message to important stakeholders such as the community, the vanua, and religious-based organisations that are here.”

“We want to tap into their capabilities so they can, together with the ministry, pass this message along to their congregations and to the public at large,” he said.

Echoing this, Mitchell told Fiji’s state broadcaster that introducing the programme would not be easy, given the negative reactions in the past when condom use and family planning were phased in.

He said health officials were accused of promoting promiscuity among youth, when they were responding to public health needs.

However, he stressed that the needle and syringe programme was crucial to reducing HIV and Hepatitis C infections in the country.

Needle sharing is described as widespread in group settings, leading to infection clusters within families and communities.

The Health Minister said he expected that by the time the programme went public, it would be well accepted by the people.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Israel’s Parliament has approved a one-sided death penalty measure to execute Palestinians.

It is one of the most extreme laws in the nation’s history, and will exacerbate the far-right government’s illegal system of apartheid.

Some members of the Knesset, including ultranationalist National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, were seen wearing noose pins in the Knesset yesterday, and celebrating with champagne on live TV after the bill passed.

• READ MORE: ‘Dangerous escalation’: World reacts to Israel passing death penalty law
• Other Palestine genocide reports

Ben-Gvir said hanging is “one of the options,” as is execution by the electric chair or euthanasia.

The law was passed with 62 votes to 48 in its final reading.

The bill drew international condemnation ahead of its passage, including from the European Union, UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese, and Amnesty International. Human rights groups have vowed to challenge the bill in Israel’s Supreme Court.

The legislation, which has garnered broad public support in Israel, authorises executions for “terrorists” who kill “with the intent to deny the existence of the State of Israel,” according to Haaretz — effectively ensuring it won’t apply to any of the settlers who routinely murder Palestinians.

‘Confessions’ by torture
In military courts in the occupied West Bank, execution by hanging will now be the default punishment for terrorism. Only Palestinians are tried in these courts, and 96 percent of people are convicted, though cases are largely built on “confessions” extracted through torture.

The International Centre of Justice for Palestinians condemned the bill yesterday ahead of the vote as an “extreme escalation in Israel’s genocidal policies against Palestinians”.

“The progression of the legislation marks not just a profoundly unjust and illegal act of discrimination under international law, but a far more sinister escalation of Israel’s apartheid legal systems,” the center wrote.

Israeli Knesset death penalty for Palestinians.       Video: Al Jazeera

Israel is currently imprisoning about 9500 Palestinians, according to the human rights group B’Tselem, and about half of them are held under administrative detention.

According to the group, the Israel Prison Service has already started to prepare designated execution facilities.

B’Tselem on Sunday called the bill “another official killing mechanism” that will further normalise the slaughter of Palestinians, as Israel continues its genocide in Gaza and intensifies attacks in the occupied West Bank.

Human rights violation
“The death penalty is a total violation of the most basic human rights, primarily, the right to life,” B’Tselem wrote.

“Israel enforces a comprehensive policy of killing and oppression against the Palestinian people in all the territories it controls. The Death Penalty Law gives Israel’s apartheid regime yet another tool for advancing that policy.”

On top of Monday’s bill, the Knesset is also considering another death penalty measure to impose on alleged October 7, 2023, attackers.

According to Amnesty International, that bill would effectively expand the unilateral powers of military judges and eliminate judicial safeguards.

The skies over Tehran and Natanz may still carry the lingering haze of joint US-Israeli bombing operations.

Yet the world, filtered through the dominant lens of Western media, continues to be fed a singular narrative: the latent danger of Iran’s uranium enrichment, perpetually described as being “one step away” from a nuclear warhead.

Amid economic sanctions, UN Security Council resolutions and preemptive military strikes that have devastated Iran’s civilian and military infrastructure, there exists a deafening silence surrounding the Middle East’s most tangible arsenal of weapons of mass destruction: Israel’s nuclear stockpile.

• READ MORE: Al Jazeera’s defence editor Alex Gatopoulos explains how things stand in the war on Iran
• Trump says wants to take Iran’s oil — Kuwait power site hit
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

In reality, the region’s security architecture is not threatened by a nuclear capability that might exist in the future, but by one that has existed for more than six decades.

In Israel’s Negev desert stands the Dimona complex — a black box untouched by International Atomic Energy Agency inspections, immune to sanctions and maintained as one of the international community’s most tightly guarded open secrets.

This contradiction represents perhaps the most blatant manifestation of global double standards, preserving Israel’s nuclear privilege above international law.

History shows that Israel’s nuclear ambitions were not merely a reaction to external threats but part of a broader geostrategic design to secure regional hegemony. Since David Ben-Gurion articulated the post-Holocaust doctrine of “Never Again,” nuclear capability has been framed as the Samson Option — a last-resort deterrent ensuring Israel can devastate the region if its existence is threatened.

 

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Bombshell deception
Yet this privilege did not emerge organically. It was constructed through deception, clandestine procurement networks and sustained diplomatic protection from great powers — the same powers that now present themselves as global guardians of nuclear non-proliferation.

Israel’s success in maintaining its status as the Middle East’s sole nuclear power rests on its policy of amimut, or nuclear opacity. Through this doctrine, Israel enjoys the strategic advantages of nuclear deterrence without incurring the political or economic costs.

This has fundamentally distorted regional discourse. The world is compelled to treat with alarm a state that formally adheres to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, albeit under scrutiny, while tolerating another that refuses to sign the treaty and is widely believed to possess hundreds of nuclear warheads.

The turning point that legitimised this international hypocrisy came in 1969. In a secret White House meeting, US President Richard Nixon and Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir forged an understanding that would shape US foreign policy for decades.

Washington would cease pressuring Israel to sign the NPT or allow inspections of Dimona, provided Israel maintained a low profile and refrained from overt nuclear testing.

In effect, the US became a diplomatic shield for Israel’s undeclared nuclear weapons programme — an irony for a country that has repeatedly invoked nuclear concerns to justify interventions elsewhere.

This marked a stark departure from the era of John F Kennedy, the only US president willing to confront Israel’s nuclear ambitions directly. For Kennedy, nuclear proliferation was a personal nightmare threatening global stability.

He warned Ben-Gurion that US support could be seriously jeopardised if independent inspections of Dimona were not permitted. Following Kennedy’s assassination in 1963, such pressure evaporated under the Johnson and Nixon administrations, replaced by a pragmatic accommodation that allowed Israel’s “bomb in the basement” to quietly expand.

This privilege has enabled Israel to develop an advanced nuclear triad:

• Jericho ballistic missiles;
• modified F-15I fighter jets; and
• Dolphin-class submarines capable of launching nuclear-armed cruise missiles.

With estimates ranging between 90 and 400 warheads, Israel possesses not only a deterrent but a potent instrument of diplomatic coercion.

When Arab states, led by Egypt, have consistently called for a weapons of mass destruction-free zone in the Middle East, the US and its allies have routinely blocked such initiatives to preserve Israel’s exceptional status.

This nuclear privilege has also created what many non-Western diplomats describe as a compliance trap. States like Iran, signatories to the NPT, face intense scrutiny and economic punishment for procedural deviations.

Meanwhile, Israel — operating outside the framework of international law — enjoys access to the most advanced military technologies from the West. This systemic inequity fuels instability, signaling that the most effective path to avoiding international pressure is not compliance but power.

Architecture of sabotage
To maintain its nuclear monopoly, Israel has pursued an aggressive geostrategic doctrine that routinely violates the sovereignty of other states. Known as the Begin Doctrine and formalised in 1981, it asserts that Israel will not allow any Middle Eastern country to acquire weapons of mass destruction.

This is an extraordinary claim of authority: a state with undeclared nuclear weapons asserting the right to destroy the nuclear capabilities of others, even those intended for peaceful purposes, under the banner of “self-defence”.

Its first manifestation came with Operation Opera on June 7, 1981, when Israeli fighter jets destroyed Iraq’s Osirak nuclear reactor. Despite UN condemnation, the precedent was set: Israel effectively assumed the role of the region’s unilateral nuclear enforcer.

This pattern was repeated in 2007 with Operation Outside the Box, which destroyed Syria’s Al-Kibar facility. These preemptive strikes were driven by a clear calculation that major global powers would continue to grant Israel impunity, regardless of overt violations of international law.

Against Iran, this architecture of sabotage has reached unprecedented levels of sophistication and lethality. Over the past two decades, Israel has waged a shadow war involving the assassination of nuclear scientists in Tehran — sometimes using remotely operated weapons — as well as cyberattacks such as Stuxnet, which crippled thousands of centrifuges at Natanz.

These operations have often been conducted in close coordination with US intelligence, underscoring how Western non-proliferation policy has frequently functioned as an instrument to preserve Israel’s military dominance.

The escalation culminated in the Rising Lion campaign in 2025 and Operation Epic Fury in 2026. Backed by the Trump administration, Iran’s nuclear infrastructure has been targeted through large-scale airstrikes that largely disregarded the risks of radiation exposure to civilians.

Israel justified these actions by claiming that diplomacy had failed.

Yet this narrative omits a critical reality: Israel has consistently undermined diplomatic efforts, including by seizing Iran’s nuclear archives in 2018 to help justify the US withdrawal from the JCPOA.

The objective has never been merely to prevent an Iranian bomb but to preserve Israel’s monopoly on power.

Shadow alliance
The portrayal of Israel as a small, self-reliant state under constant siege is a carefully constructed myth. The history of its nuclear programme is one of covert international collaboration involving countries that now lead global anti-nuclear campaigns.

Without technological assistance from France, heavy water supplied by Norway via the United Kingdom and uranium sourced from Argentina, the Dimona facility would never have materialised.

France, now a vocal critic of Iran, played a central role by supplying a reactor and a plutonium reprocessing plant in 1957, partly as repayment for Israel’s support during the Suez Crisis.

Even more striking was Israel’s nuclear collaboration with apartheid South Africa in the 1970s. As two internationally isolated regimes, they developed deep military ties. Declassified documents suggest that Israel’s Shimon Peres once offered to sell nuclear warheads to Pretoria.

This partnership likely culminated in the 1979 Vela Incident, when a suspected atmospheric nuclear test was detected in the Indian Ocean. Despite strong evidence pointing to a joint Israeli-South African test, the Carter administration chose to obscure the findings to protect its ally.

Such collaborations demonstrate that, for Israel, international norms are secondary to strategic imperatives. While aiding a racially segregated regime’s nuclear ambitions, Israel simultaneously leveraged its diplomatic influence to block cooperation between its adversaries and other states.

This pattern persists today in the form of cyber and surveillance technologies exported to authoritarian regimes in exchange for diplomatic support.

Western backing has also extended to high-level intelligence operations to secure nuclear materials. In the 1968 Plumbat Affair, Israeli intelligence reportedly hijacked 200 tons of yellowcake uranium through a front-company scheme involving a cargo ship in Antwerp.

Rather than triggering sanctions or legal consequences, the operation was widely regarded as a remarkable intelligence success. Over time, the international community normalised such state-level misconduct, creating a skewed moral framework in which the security of one nation is deemed more important than the integrity of international law.

Deep double standard
Today, when the international community speaks of nuclear threats in the Middle East, the subject is invariably Iran. Yet the most immediate and substantial threat — Israel’s nuclear arsenal — remains untouchable.

This double standard has evolved into a kind of doctrine in global diplomacy, in which allegiance to Israel’s security necessitates the suspension of logic and justice. How can a state with hundreds of unmonitored nuclear warheads be framed as a stabilising force while another under strict IAEA oversight is cast as an existential threat?

This hypocrisy is especially evident in the NPT’s application. Intended as a universal instrument, it has instead functioned in the Middle East as a mechanism to constrain Arab states and Iran while allowing Israel to expand its nuclear capabilities unchecked.

The US has consistently used its veto power in the UN Security Council to block resolutions targeting Israel’s nuclear programme. Such policies not only undermine Washington’s credibility but also erode the very foundations of international law. When laws apply only to the weak, they become instruments of domination rather than justice.

Middle Eastern security will not be achieved through bombing Natanz or assassinating scientists in Tehran. As long as Israel is permitted to maintain its nuclear monopoly under the protection of Western double standards, the region will remain locked in a cycle of proliferation pressures.

Saudi Arabia, Turkey and others will inevitably seek their own nuclear capabilities to counterbalance Israeli dominance. Israel’s strategy of “mowing the grass” may delay conflict, but cannot resolve it.

The time has come for the world to stop feigning ignorance about Dimona. Any serious conversation about peace in the Middle East must begin with dismantling Israel’s nuclear privilege and demanding universal transparency.

Without equal pressure on Israel to join the NPT and place its facilities under IAEA safeguards, the rhetoric of non-proliferation is little more than diplomatic theatre. Regional security can only be built on a foundation of equality, not under the shadow of a nuclear monopoly sustained by global hypocrisy.

Ronny P. Sasmita is a senior international analyst at the Indonesia Strategic and Economic Action Institution, a Jakarta-based think tank.

From time to time, I post transcripts I’ve come across of particularly insightful conversations. Here’s one that’s particularly relevant to the US “No Kings” Day protests at the weekend.

Recently, The Conversation hosted a webinar in which executive editor and general manager Beth Daley interviewed John Shattuck, professor of practice at The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, and Oliver Kaplan, associate professor at Josef Korbel School of Global and Public Affairs at the University of Denver and a visiting scholar at Stanford University.

Shattuck is the former president of Central European University in Hungary, where he defended academic freedom against a rising authoritarian government. Kaplan is the author of Resisting War: How Communities Protect Themselves. This interview has been condensed and edited for print.

• READ MORE: ‘No Kings’ protests erupt across the US, with a Minnesota focus

BETH DALEY: What is an authoritarian regime, and what are their characteristics?

JOHN SHATTUCK: The authoritarian, often referred to as a “king,” is the ideal role from the point of view of the king, but certainly not from the point of view of the people. Authoritarian characteristics include centralised unlimited power, the opposite of democracy; no accountability and no rule of law; no independent courts; no checks and balances on how the king operates; rule by fear and coercion, and when necessary, in order to carry out the king’s orders, rule by by force.

There are no individual rights or civil liberties except those the king decides to allow those who are loyal to him to have, at least until he decides to take them away.

That’s a nutshell informal description of an authoritarian regime. A special threat today is that an authoritarian can emerge from a democratic election, and, indeed, a democratic election can be used to turn a weak democracy into an authoritarian regime.

But when this happens, it opens the door to challenge the authoritarian in a subsequent election if civic activism can defend the electoral process by which the authoritarian was elected.

BD: What are we seeing and not seeing in the US that other countries have gone through in terms of authoritarian government?

OLIVER KAPLAN: I think we are heading toward an autocracy, if not there already. In their 2026 report, the Varieties of Democracy Project writes that the US is no longer a liberal democracy and is moving into “competitive authoritarianism,” marked by executive overreach and erosion of judicial and legislative checks. The report notes that US democracy is being dismantled at a speed that is “unprecedented in modern history”.

We are seeing shifts in terms of concentration of power to the executive branch and a disregard of the rule of law, things like ignoring court orders and difficulty with holding the executive branch accountable. We are also seeing the militariSation of law enforcement, monitoring of US citizens, and what some refer to as the dual state — that the state is working for some people while causing more challenges for or oppressing other people.

One of the things we’re not seeing at full force yet is a complete shutdown of civic space. We’re able to hold this kind of conversation, and people are still able to dialogue and go out on the street.

There are some efforts at curtailing free speech, and I think there’s some self-censorship possibly happening. But there’s still this open space and a powerful mass movement growing in this country.

USA today:

7 million Americans in the streets today protesting for freedom.
3,000 cities and towns. Every single state. “No Kings” protests against the authoritarianism of the Trump. This is one of the largest demonstrations in American history.

pic.twitter.com/cLAwlXK69f

— James Melville (@JamesMelville) March 28, 2026

BD: John, you were on the front lines, particularly in Hungary as the head of Central European University. What did you see there that has parallels today to the US?

JOHN SHATTUCK: There’s certainly a parallel between Hungary and the US, even though the countries are very different in size, history and background. What I saw in Hungary when I became president of Central European University in 2009 was a weak, new democracy that was only established in 1990 after 70 years of fascism and communism.

I was in Hungary from 2009 to 2016 and, despite the differences, I could begin to see some parallels. Many people had grievances in Hungary about how their economy was operating, particularly after the global financial crisis that affected Hungary more than any other Eastern European country.

Then there was an urban-rural divide, the urban elite versus the rural majority in the country.

Along came a cynical populist-nationalist politician, Viktor Orbán. Orbán started manipulating these grievances, and did so to significantly divide Hungarian society. He attacked many of the institutions of democracy, which were increasingly unpopular because of people’s grievances.

He went after elites, and foreigners, and migrants, and the media. And he blamed all of them for the country’s problems. He then was able to ride these grievances into office.

Once in office, Orbán amended the constitution and laws relating to the Parliament. He undermined the independence of the media and the judiciary so as to centralise power. All of this happened while I was running an international university in Budapest, which remained independent because it received no funding from the Hungarian government.

We were able to resist the increasingly authoritarian regime over issues of academic freedom. The government tried to shut down our programmes of migration studies and gender studies, and tried to censor aspects of our history department.

These authoritarian attacks are similar to what we’ve seen happening in the US, and in fact, Viktor Orbán was greatly admired by Donald Trump, and a lot of the playbook that Orban has followed was mirrored in Project 2025 in the US under Trump.

BD: How do communities respond in different ways to authoritarian regimes?

OLIVER KAPLAN: Pro-democracy movements and protection types of movements at the local level often co-occur. For example, in Colombia there have been various leftist movements and political parties that have pushed for greater democratic opening while communities mobilise to keep people safe and help them cope with repressive conditions.

In places like Chile, El Salvador and Guatemala, communities built trust and support networks to provide aid, such as for people who needed food assistance. This provides space to independently operate and preserve the community.

The US has parallels, such as innovating early warning networks to get advance notice of risks and threats, by communicating using the Signal app. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, villages set up radio networks, and in Ukraine they have sophisticated early warning networks to get word of airstrikes and drone attacks.

Fact-finding and countering stigma are important, and in the US we’re seeing that in the form of the video recording and publicising of harmful actions. This has played out similarly in Syria with fact-finding to protect nongovernment organisations.

There’s also accompaniment where outside actors come in to provide support to communities. Around the world, church organisations play important accompaniment roles. We’re seeing clergy in the US step up and visit places that are at risk.

And then, there are protests, the most visible kind of action. In Minnesota, we’ve seen communities actually setting up community barricades, which has also happened in Mexico, Colombia and Northern Ireland. Communicating the nonviolent nature of these movements is important to avoid any pretext for additional crackdowns.

I think Americans have been taking similar actions to other places around the world in part because there are some similar background conditions: repression and strong social capital networks. Those two things come together to produce these strategies.

BD: Could you speak more about the need to build a clear narrative and a positive one?

JOHN SHATTUCK: There are two basic rules for how to resist authoritarianism that I’ve learned from experience: Build a diverse coalition and develop a unifying theme. You need a diverse coalition in order to appeal to a broad range of the public, and in order to do that, you need agreement on the goal and values of what you’re trying to accomplish.

You need a clear and unifying narrative. The narrative often involves economic issues and issues of corruption, since there’s often a great deal of corruption in authoritarian regimes.

Hungary will have its next parliamentary election in April in which Orbán will seek his fifth term as prime minister. The opposition has developed a broad coalition and a unifying theme, while Orbán is using the centralised instruments of government and media that he controls to try to manipulate public opinion.

The opposition coalition is headed by Peter Magyar, who was once a major supporter of Orbán’s government. Magyar’s name can be magical in Hungary — sort of like a “Joe America” in the US.

With Magyar as its head, the opposition is aiming to peel off supporters of the regime. It’s campaigning on economic grounds, with a positive message and on moderate terms. And most importantly, it includes parties from the left, right and center.

Poland has succeeded in doing what the Hungarian opposition is attempting. It managed to vote out an authoritarian government by putting together a broad coalition to defend the independence of the Polish judiciary. That became a coalition to elect parliamentarians in 2023, and that succeeded in changing the government.

BD: How important is the preexisting social fabric of a community to the success of a protest movement?

JOHN SHATTUCK: It’s important, but complicated. Hungary had a very weak civil society after 70 years of totalitarian fascism and communism. When I was there, the very word to “volunteer,” which we think of as the essence of community action and service, was seen to be a bad word in Hungarian because it was closely associated with collaborating with the regime.

In the US, we’re the opposite in a sense, although the US is now slipping on this. We have a long history of volunteerism, we have all these civil society organisations, we have a tradition of barn raising, people getting together with their neighbours and doing things in their communities. This is very much a part of the American spirit and a core value.

But today, I would say a combination of consumerism and economic individualism coming out of decades of economic deregulation has caused our civil society to fray. But the authoritarian challenge that we face now, and the way in which we are beginning to respond to it, is in fact bringing communities back together again.

I think what happened in Minneapolis is an example of that. And this may reflect a growing capacity to resist an authoritarian regime.

Republished from Robert Reich’s Substack, originally published by The Conversation. Republished under Creative Commons.

Robert Reich is an American professor, writer, former Secretary of Labour, and author of The System, The Common Good, Saving Capitalism, Aftershock, Supercapitalism, The Work of Nations. He is also co-founder of Inequality Media.

Public trust in Fiji’s mainstream media has significantly declined, a journalism academic has told the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, citing decades of political upheaval, censorship and institutional pressure.

At its third expert hearing in Suva, the commission heard from University of the South Pacific’s associate professor of journalism Shailendra Singh, who detailed how censorship, intimidation and political pressure had weakened the media landscape over decades.

Dr Singh, who is contributing to the commission’s media chapter, told the TRC that repeated disruptions — including the 1987, 2000 and 2006 coups — had lasting consequences on press freedom and public discourse.

• READ MORE: Other Fiji media reports

Drawing on more than 30 years of experience, he outlined how newsrooms faced closures, financial strain and the loss of skilled journalists, contributing to declining editorial independence and professional standards.

He said journalists were often forced into difficult ethical positions, navigating threats and highly polarised environments, which led to self-censorship, and, at times, uncritical reporting aligned with dominant political narratives.

He described the 2000 and 2006 coups as defining moments for the industry.

The 2006 period, he noted, brought the most stringent controls, including the introduction of the Media Industry Development Act 2010, which entrenched censorship and self-censorship in newsrooms.

Steady decline in public confidence
The long-term impact, he said, had been a steady decline in public confidence.

Dr Singh told the commission that perceptions of bias and compliance had contributed to the erosion of trust, with some members of the public even supporting tighter media control.

At the same time, restrictions on traditional media created space for alternative platforms such as blogs, social media and diaspora outlets — opening new avenues for expression but also raising concerns around misinformation and accountability.

Despite the repeal of the MIDA legislation in 2023, Dr Singh said the sector continued to grapple with its legacy, including financial instability, skills shortages and the risk of renewed political interference.

He recommended stronger legal protections for press freedom, improved training to lift professional standards, greater media literacy and independent regulatory mechanisms.

Republished from The Fiji Times with permission.

New Caledonia’s domestic airline Air Calédonie filed for bankruptcy on Friday, following almost a month of blockades by customers in the French Pacific territory’s outer islands.

The protest movement had been initiated by groups of angry outer islands customers who intended to oppose the company’s decision to move Air Calédonie’s operations from the Nouméa Magenta airport to New Caledonia’s international La Tontouta base, more than 50 km away from Nouméa city.

The smaller airport of Magenta, until now dedicated to domestic traffic, is located closer to Nouméa.

• READ MORE: Other Kanaky New Caledonia reports

The beginning of the protest movement, which effectively grounded all Air Calédonie aircraft, dates back to 2 March 2026.

The protesters are gathered under the name of “collective of users” and, on each participating island, are headed by local chiefs who are invoking custom rights.

In terms of law and order, and in defence of the principle of freedom of movement and “territorial continuity”, on the part of French State representatives, there have been no attempts to disrupt the movement by force.

But negotiations have been taking place with leaders in order to find a concerted way out of the blockades.

Economic stakeholders have also alerted authorities of the negative repercussions of the inter-island crisis, especially on tourism and hospitality-related businesses.

On some islands, views expressed range from an outright rejection of any aircraft landing, while others would accept the landing of aircraft from other airlines, but not from Air Calédonie.

Outer islands airports blockaded
Following weeks of blockade that have caused heavy losses for the company — dubbed “AirCal” — its board of directors, at a meeting on Friday in the capital Nouméa, decided to file for bankruptcy.

It said the current situation was no longer sustainable.

The blockade affected all of AirCal’s outer islands destinations, including the Loyalty Islands (Maré, Lifou, Ouvéa and Tiga) and the Isle of Pines (south of the main island of Grande Terre).

One of the options, if approved by a court, could allow a resumption of operations, if the process is deemed sustainable.

The company said under the proposed process, all debts would be frozen and provided it was allowed to resume inter-island flights, Air Calédonie could continue operating.

But if the plan is not approved by the judges, this could also mean an order for the company to go into receivership.

AirCal said the situation currently affected “almost 200 families”.

Vanuatu connection
Air Calédonie, in its embryonic form, started operations in the mid-1950s.

It currently operates a fleet of four turbo-prop ATR-72 aircraft.

Due to previous hardships faced recently (including the covid crisis, which also badly affected inter-islands operations), Air Calédonie had also entered into agreements with Air Vanuatu in October 2025  to lease one of its aircraft for the neighbouring archipelago’s domestic airlinks, including to and from the capital Port Vila and Vanuatu’s other main islands of Espiritu Santo (North) and Tanna (South).

In September 2024, a Nouméa-Port Vila bi-weekly link was also established under a codeshare agreement between Air Calédonie and Air Calédonie international aboard an ATR-72 aircraft.

At the time, the agreement was perceived as one step towards a possible merger of the two entities’ domestic and international operations, in a bid to save costs in the face of recent crises.

The recent crisis situation was also compounded by the riots that broke out in New Caledonia — mainly in the capital Nouméa and its surrounding area — in May 2024.

The unrest caused about 14 dead and material damage of over 2 billion euros (about NZ$ 4 billion) due to arson and looting.

But it also affected the capacity to operate domestic and international flights out of the airports of Nouméa La Tontouta and New Caledonia’s outer islands.

The plan to relocate Air Cal’s operations from Magenta to La Tontouta had been mooted by previous governments of New Caledonia, on the basis that if the move was not effected, then the company would not survive.

‘It looks as if someone wants the death of AirCal — Alcide Ponga
Commenting on the blockade, New Caledonia local government President Alcide Ponga was blunt. He told local media earlier this week: “It looks as if someone wants the death of AirCal.”

However, one of the blockaded small airports, on the Isle of Pines (South of Nouméa), announced earlier this week its intention to re-allow traffic, on the condition that Air Calédonie lands again at the small and nearby airport of Nouméa-Magenta and not at the main La Tontouta base.

The main shareholders of Air Calédonie are the government of New Caledonia and its three provinces (North, South and the Loyalty Islands group).

During heated debates on Thursday at New Caledonia’s Congress, politicians and board members from across the political chessboard called on the company to re-engage in negotiations to attempt an agreement to re-open all of the blockaded outer islands airfields and thus bring in fresh cash.

Another cash-generating option also envisaged by the company would be to persuade the board and stakeholders to set aside a financial package so that the company can go on operating.

Earlier this month, Air Calédonie was forced to put half of its staff into temporary unemployment mode, because the company’s financial situation (a cash flow estimated at only 3 million euros) did not allow any salary payment beyond April 2026.

Air Calédonie said it remained “mobilised to save a vital company for New Caledonia and design a viable recovery plan”.

A similar plan was already implemented in 2024 in the wake of the post-riots crisis.

Humanitarian special flights for patients
In recent days, New Caledonia’s government introduced the notion of humanitarian “sanitary corridors” in the form of special flights to transport selected patients in dire need of care to and from the outer islands and the capital Nouméa, at an estimated cost of some 13,500 euros (about NZ$27,000) per trip.

In the Loyalty Islands, several tourism and hospitality facilities have also suffered the brunt of the disruption of inter-island traffic.

Some of those have already been forced to either close down or enter into receivership.

No maritime alternative
The situation is further compounded by serious technical problems faced by the alternative means of inter-island transport — the ferry Betico has also been unable to operate, on a regular basis, over the past few months.

The ship is currently undergoing repairs to one of its engines and it announced tentative resumption of operations next week on April 3, the operating company said.

Until then, all trips to and from Nouméa have been cancelled.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

A French senator walked into the Luxembourg Palace, opened his mouth, and basically set the whole room on fire. Politely. In a suit.

Claude Malhuret didn’t yell nor wave his arms. He just listed things… calmly, methodically, like a doctor reading a very long and very depressing diagnosis.

And by the time he was done, the entire Trump administration had been reduced to a punchline that wasn’t even trying to be funny.

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He started with an apology. Why? Because a year ago, he said, he had compared Trump’s presidency to Nero’s Court. He was wrong.

“It’s the miracle court,” he corrected himself on Friday.

And then he started naming names.

A former heroin addict running the Ministry of Health. A climate skeptic in charge of the economy. A TV host with a drinking problem commanding the armed forces. A lobbyist who used to work for Qatar now sitting as Attorney General. A woman who openly admires Putin in charge of national intelligence.

‘Clown in a palace’
Malhuret quoted a Turkish proverb for the occasion… “When a clown settles in a palace, he does not become king — it is the palace that becomes a circus.”

Nobody needed to ask who or what he meant. They just smiled.

And you know what? He wasn’t even being cruel. He was just being truthful and very accurate. Which, somehow, made it worse.

Then came the part that made people’s jaws drop a little.

Every time the Epstein files resurface, he said, bombs go off somewhere in the world. A new military strike. A fresh crisis.

Convenient timing. Every single time.

Malhuret didn’t call it a conspiracy. He just pointed at the pattern and let everyone draw their own conclusions.

Gulf investments
The US$400 million Boeing jet from Qatar got a mention. The Gulf investments. The stock market moves that only a small circle of insiders seemed to profit from.

Any one of these, Malhuret said, would have triggered impeachment proceedings in France.

“But we are not here,” he added. “We are in MAGA’s America.”

Here’s what makes this 5 minute speech different from the usual political noise. Malhuret didn’t just wave his hands and say “America bad.” He went person by person, scandal by scandal, conflict by conflict — and built a picture so complete that by the end of it, you couldn’t really argue with any individual piece without defending the whole rotten structure.

It’s the kind of speech American senators could give. If they wanted to. If they weren’t so busy trying not to offend anyone.

The world is watching. While Americans debate whether the speech was fair or too harsh or whatever, the rest of the planet has already formed its opinion.

One man. One very powerful seat. And a world that keeps catching fire while everyone argues about the Epstein files — which, funny enough, never quite get released fully, do they?

“Trump, the Mar-a-Lago golfer, is the only bull in the world who walks around with his own china shop. When a clown takes over the Palace, he doesn’t become King. It’s the Palace that becomes a circus”

French senator Claude Malhuret once again nails it. You won’t hear a better… pic.twitter.com/q2mpL7XFtK

— Alex Taylor (@AlexTaylorNews) March 27, 2026

Who is in charge of this war: Israel or the United States?

One side believes Israel lured Trump into a trap from which he cannot extricate himself. The tail is wagging the dog.

• READ MORE: US-Israeli war on Iran widens with first attack from Yemen
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The other believes that the US, as the world’s sole military super-power, is the one that writes the geo-strategic script. If Israel acts, it is only because it serves Washington’s interests as well. The dog is wagging the tail.

Certainly, the idea that the tail, the client state of Israel, could be wagging the dog, the military juggernaut that is the US, seems, at best, counter-intuitive.

But then again, there is plenty of evidence that suggests advocates for the tail wagging the dog scenario may have a case.

They can point to the fact that Trump launched this war of choice on Iran despite winning the presidency on an “America First” platform in which he promised: “I’m not going to start a war. I’m going to stop wars.”

Rushed into war
His secretary of state, Marco Rubio, openly stated that the administration was rushed into war, finding itself apparently unable to restrain Israel from attacking Iran.

Joe Kent, Trump’s top counter-terrorism official, noted in his resignation letter that the administration “started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby”.

Addressing the Israeli Parliament last October, Trump appeared to confess to being under the thumb of the Israel lobby. As he praised himself for moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to the illegally occupied city of Jerusalem, he repeatedly pointed to his most influential donor, the Israeli-American billionaire Miriam Adelson, before observing: “I actually asked her once, I said, ‘So, Miriam, I know you love Israel. What do you love more, the United States or Israel?’ She refused to answer. That means, that might mean, Israel, I must say.”

A video from 2001 shows Benjamin Netanyahu, now Israel’s Prime Minister, caught secretly on camera, telling a group of settlers: “I know what America is. America is a thing you can move very easily, move it in the right direction. They won’t get in the way.”

Former US president Barack Obama, who ran up against Netanyahu repeatedly as Obama tried and failed to limit the expansion of Israel’s illegal settlements, thought the same.

In his 2020 autobiography, he wrote that the Israel lobby insisted that “there should be ‘no daylight’ between the US and Israeli governments, even when Israel took actions that were contrary to US policy.”

Any politician who disobeyed “risked being tagged as ‘anti-Israel’ (and possibly anti-Semitic) and confronted with a well-funded opponent in the next election”.

Obscuring the relationship
But any rigid, binary way of framing the relationship between the US and Israel obscures more than it illuminates.

I addressed this issue in my 2008 book on Israeli foreign policy, titled Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iran, Iraq and the Plan to Remake the Middle East. My conclusion then, as now, was that the relationship between Washington and Tel Aviv was better understood in different terms: as the dog and the tail wagging each other.

What does that mean?

Israel is Washington’s most favoured client state. It must, therefore, operate within the “security” parameters for the Middle East laid down by the US.

In fact, part of Israel’s job — the reason it is such an important client state — is because it has, until now, been able to enforce those parameters on others in the region.

But the story is more complicated than that.

At the same time, Israel seeks to maximise its ability to influence those parameters in its own interests, chiefly by shaping military, political and cultural discourse in the United States, through the many levers available to it.

Mobilised by Zionist lobbies
Zionist lobbies, both Jewish and Christian, mobilise large numbers of ordinary people to support whatever Israel claims to be in both its and US interests.

Mega-donors like Adelson use their wealth to cajole and intimidate US politicians.

Think-tanks with murky funding write legislation on Israel’s behalf that US politicians wave through.

Legal organisations, again with opaque funding, weaponise the law to silence and bankrupt.

And media owners, all too often in Israel’s camp, mould the public mood to stigmatise as “antisemitism” anything that opposes Israeli excesses.

This makes for a very messy arrangement.

The trouble with the idea that the US simply dictates to Israel — rather than that the two are constantly bargaining over what constitutes their shared interests — becomes apparent the moment we consider the two-and-a-half-year genocide in Gaza.

Desire to ‘disappear’ Palestinians
Israel has long had a fervent desire to disappear the Palestinians, whether through ethnic cleansing or genocide.

It wants the whole of historic Palestine, and the Palestinians are an obstacle to the realisation of that goal. Should the opportunity arise, Israel is also keen to secure a Greater Israel that requires grabbing and annexing substantial territory from neighbours, particularly Lebanon and Syria — as it is doing again right now.

After the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023, Israel seized on the chance to renew in earnest the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians it began in 1948, at the state’s founding.

It carpet-bombed Gaza, creating a “humanitarian crisis”, to force Egypt to open the floodgates into Sinai, where it hoped to drive the enclave’s population. Cairo refused.

As a result, Israel tried to increase the pressure by slaughtering and starving the people of Gaza. In legal terms, that constituted genocide.

But the idea that the US was deeply invested in Israel carrying out a genocide in Gaza, or directed that genocide, or had any particular interest in the genocide taking place, is hard to sustain.

Washington — first under Biden, then under Trump — gave Israel cover to carry out the mass slaughter of the Palestinian population, and armed and financed the genocide. But that is very different from it having a geostrategic interest in the mass slaughter.

Indifferent to Palestinians’ fate
Rather, the US is and always has been largely indifferent as to the fate of the Palestinians, so long as they are contained. They can be locked up permanently in occupation prisons.

Or ethnically cleansed to Sinai and Jordan. Or given a pretend statelet under a compliant dictator like Mahmoud Abbas. Or exterminated.

The US will bankroll whichever option Israel believes best serves its interests — so long as that “solution” can be sold by pro-Israel lobbies to western publics as a legitimate “response” to Palestinian “terrorism”.

What Israel could get away with changed on 7 October 2023. The US was prepared to approve Israel shifting from a policy of intermittently “mowing the lawn” in Gaza — short wrecking sprees — to the incremental levelling of the whole of Gaza.

In other words, Israel worked all its levers to persuade Washington that it was the right time for it to get away with genocide. It sold to the US the plan that Gaza could now be destroyed.

To present that as Washington’s plan is simply perverse. It was decisively Israel’s plan.

That doesn’t diminish in any way US responsibility for the genocide. It is fully complicit. It paid for the genocide. It armed the genocide. It must own it too.

Similar Iran war analysis
A similar analysis can be applied to the Iran war.

The US and Israel share the same larger policy towards Iran: they want it contained, weak, unable to exert influence. But they do so for slightly different reasons.

Israel demands to be regional hegemon in the Middle East, an invaluable client state with privileged access to Washington policymakers. Its supremacy and impunity, therefore, depend on Iran — its only plausible rival in the region — being as weak as possible and incapable of forging effective alliances with armed resistance groups such as Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Equally, Washington wants Israel unthreatened, leaving its ally free to project US imperial power into the Middle East.

But it has a more complex set of interests to consider. It needs to ensure that the Arab monarchies remain compliant, and it does so by both wielding a stick — threatening to unleash the attack dog of Israel on them should they disobey — and proffering a carrot — promising to shield them under its security umbrella against Iran so long as they stay loyal.

The ultimate goal is to guarantee unchallenged US control over the flow of oil and thereby the global economy.

In other words, the US has to weigh far more interests in how it deals with Iran than Israel does.

Effects on the global economy
Unlike Israel, Washington has to consider the effects of an attack on Iran on the global economy, to assess any impact on the dollar as the world’s reserve currency, and protect against rival powers like China and Russia exploiting strategic missteps.

For those reasons, Washington has traditionally preferred maintaining a degree of stability in the region. Instability is very bad for business, as is being demonstrated only too clearly right now.

Israel, by contrast, regards its struggle against Iran in existential terms. Many in the Israeli cabinet view it as a religious war. They are not interested in simply containing Iran – a decades-old policy they believe has failed. They want Iran and its allies on their knees, or at least in so much chaos that they cannot pose any kind of challenge to Israeli regional hegemony.

That point was highlighted by Jake Sullivan, Joe Biden’s former national security adviser, this week in an interview with Jon Stewart. He cited recent comments to him by Israel’s former military intelligence lead on Iran, Danny Cintrinowicz, that Netanyahu’s aim is to “just break Iran, cause chaos”.

Why? “Because,” says Sullivan, “as far as they’re concerned, a broken Iran is less of a threat to Israel.”

In other words, Israel wants to engineer instability in Iran, which is sure to spread instability across the region.

Those two agendas, as should be clear by now, are not easily compatible. Which is why Netanyahu has spent decades working every lever at his disposal in Washington to create an appetite for war.

Had war been self-evidently in US interests, his efforts would have been superfluous.

Israel deployed its lobbies
Instead, Israel has had to deploy its lobbies, marshal its donors and recruit sympathetic columnists to slowly shift the public mood to the point where a war was conceivable rather than patently dangerous.

And most importantly of all, Israel nurtured an intimate, ideological alliance with the neocons — hawkish, zealously pro-Israel US officials — who long ago gained a foothold in the inner sanctums of Washington.

Each recent administration has been a cat-fight over whether the neocons or more “moderate” voices would win out. Under George W Bush, the neocons dominated, leading to the invasion of Iraq in 2003, Israel’s short war on Lebanon in 2006, and a failed plan to expand the war to Syria and then Iran.

I documented all of this in Israel and the Clash of Civilisations.

Under Obama, the neocons were forced to take more of a back seat, which is why his administration was able to sign a nuclear deal with Iran that held until Trump ripped it up in 2018, during his first term as president. Biden, as with so much else, dithered.

In Trump’s second term, the neocons seem to be firmly back in charge, again weaving their mischief. The result — an illegal war on Iran — is likely to be a strategic catastrophe for the US, and a potential, if short-lived, victory for Israel.

So isn’t this the same as saying the tail wags the dog?

Sole repositories of power
No, not least because that assumes the visible realm of US politics — the President, the Congress, the two main political parties — are the sole repositories of power in the system.

Even in this visible sphere, support for Israel has dramatically waned since the Gaza genocide. As the illegal war on Iran grows ever more costly, both in treasure and lives, support for Israel among US voters is going to fall off a cliff.

Israel is for the first time a deeply partisan issue, dividing Democrats and Republicans, as well as a generational divide between the young and old. It is even splitting the MAGA base Trump depends on.

This political polarisation will continue to get much worse, ultimately freeing braver figures in US politics to start speaking out in franker terms about Israel’s nefarious role.

But power in the US isn’t just wielded at the formal, visible level. There is a permanent bureaucracy, with an institutional memory, that operates out of sight. We have gained brief glimpses of its covert operations from the work of Wikileaks, Julian Assange’s publishing platform for whistleblowers, and from Edward Snowden, the whistleblower who revealed illegal mass surveillance by the US state of its own citizens.

Both suffered serious consequences for their efforts to bring a little transparency to a profoundly corrupt system of secret power. Assange was locked away in a London high-security prison for many years as the US sought to extradite him on trumped-up “espionage” charges, while Snowden was forced into exile in Russia to evade arrest and long-term incarceration.

That bureaucracy — sometimes referred to as the Deep State, or the military-industrial complex — doesn’t play or fight fair. It doesn’t need to. It operates in the shadows.

Curtailing Israel’s influence
Were it to so choose, it could undermine the Israel lobby, and thereby curtail Israel’s influence over the visible realm of US politics.

It could effectively do to the leaders of the lobby — AIPAC, the Anti-Defamation League, the Zionist Organisation of America, the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organisations, Christians United for Israel, and others — what it did to Assange and Snowden.

It could, for example, influence public discourse to begin questioning whether these groups are really serving US interests or acting as foreign agents. That would, in turn, free up space for the media and legislators to call for tighter restrictions on these groups’ activities, requiring them to register as such.

The permanent bureaucracy is doubtless capable of doing much darker, underhand things too.

The fact that it hasn’t chosen to do any of this yet suggests Israel’s goals are not seen so far to be significantly in conflict with US goals.

But that could be about to change. In fact, the current, all-too-public debates about Israel driving the US into a war against Iran — an idea already seeping into popular consciousness — may be the first salvoes in the battle to come.

If the war on Iran turns out to be a catastrophic misstep, as it gives every appearance of being, there will be a price to pay — and leading US politicians are likely to scramble to shift the blame on to Israel. It may be that they are already getting in their excuses.

The all-too-visible freedom Israel has enjoyed in Washington to buy, bully and silence could soon become a central liability. It will not be hard to argue that a system so clearly open to manipulation that the US could be bounced into a self-sabotaging war needs to be remade, to prevent any repeat of such a disaster.

This may be the biggest lesson Washington learns from the war on Iran. That it is time to stop the tail wagging so vigorously.

Jonathan Cook is a writer, journalist and self-appointed media critic and author of many books about Palestine. Winner of the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. This article was first published on the author’s Substack and reepublished with permission.

Cuba’s Ambassador to New Zealand, Luis Morejón Rodríguez, last night made a passionate plea for his country’s sovereignty in defiance of the illegal US-led fuel blockade of the Caribbean nation.

Speaking at a packed Auckland Trades Hall, he warned that the three-month oil blockade and energy blackouts threatened the country’s public health system with dire consequences for many patients.

“In Cuba today, approximately 16,000 patients undergoing radiotherapy and more than 2800 patients receiving hemodialysis depend every day on a stable electricity supply in hospitals across the country,” he said.

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“These are life-sustaining treatments that cannot simply be postponed without risk.”

He said Cuba would continue to oppose Washington’s escalating military threats and economic pressure on his country.

Speaking alongside Ambassador Rodríguez was Dr Josephine Varghese, a Canterbury University lecturer who shared an eyewitness account of her recent trip to Havana.

She praised Cuba and “our collective fight against the global imperialism system”.

Military assault openly discussed
A military assault on Cuba has been openly discussed by US President Donald Trump and other White House officials since the illegal January 2 strike against Venezuela and kidnapping of President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, and also during the current war on Iran.

Last week, Trump declared in an offhand manner that he could just “take” Cuba.

International humanitarian convoys are bringing aid to Cuba to protest against the US fuel blockade, as Cuba continues to fend off US threats of a takeover.

However, two Mexican sailboats on the Nuestra America Convoy that has just arrived in Cuba this week were reportedly missing at sea and coast guard authorities from Cuba and Mexico are looking for them.

Ambassador Rodríguez said solidarity aid flotillas were really important for Cubans as they demonstrated global support.

During his speech last night, Ambassador Rodríguez said that when energy availability became uncertain, hospitals needed to prioritise essential services, and non-urgent procedures often needed to be delayed, preserving electricity and fuel resources.

“In other words, restrictions on fuel do not only affect economic indicators. They directly affect operating rooms, diagnostic equipment, medical treatments, and ultimately the health and well-being of patients,” he said.

‘Coercion and collective punishment’
“That is why Cuba has described these measures as economic coercion and collective punishment.”

On January 29, the White House issued an executive order blocking oil exports to Cuba, which imports around 60 percent of its fuel.

Ambassador Rodríguez said the world was living in a moment when the international system was being tested.

“Increasingly, we see the logic of power challenging the logic of law.

“For countries like Cuba — small countries — international law is not an abstract concept. It is our main protection.”

He criticised President Trump’s claim in January that Cuba represented an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to US national security.

“Let us pause for a moment and reflect on that statement. Cuba is a Caribbean island of 10 million people,” he said.

‘We do not project power’
“We do not possess nuclear weapons. We do not have military bases abroad. We do not project military power internationally.

“And yet we are described as an extraordinary threat.

“But this declaration is not merely rhetorical. It has very concrete consequences.”

With Cubans continuing to live under prolonged blackouts and the government preparing for military confrontation, the audience last night celebrated Cuba’s courageous resistance, saying it was an inspiration to the world.

The fuel blockade, enforced by the US naval armada in the Caribbean, piles pressure on top of Washington’s economic embargo that has been in place since the early 1960s.

Discussing the impact of the blockade on Cubans that she witnessed on her travel to Cuba in January, Dr Varghese said the unjust US measures “denied working people access to the most basic necessities, from medicines to electricity and transportation”.

She linked the Cuban crisis to the Palestinian, Iranian and Venezuelan struggles for peace and justice.

The Cuba Friendship Society, which sponsoring last night’s meeting chaired by retired trade unionist Robert Reid, noted that the only crime of Cuba and its people was that of overthrowing a US-backed dictator in 1959, and then defending their sovereignty and other conquests of their revolution in the six decades since.

The ambassador is also speaking at public meetings in Christchurch (March 17) and Wellington.

The Middle East is in flames. Britain is being dragged into an illegal war, the aims of which are entirely unclear, reports Richard Sanders of Double Down News.

“It’s a war of choice, and the man who chose it is Benjamin Netanyahu. Why, yet again, is the West dancing to Israel’s tune?

“I’ve made a number of videos exposing Israeli crimes. This one is different. It’s directed at conservatives and people generally who support the state of Israel.

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“I believe our indulgence of Israel is not just morally wrong. It’s against the interests of the US and the UK and ultimately against the interests of Israel itself.

“It is leading us all to disaster. Palestine is the place you come thundering, crashing into the buffers, the limits of the Western liberal moral imagination.

“The tragedy and complexity of Israel is that it’s both a product of the most unspeakable racism and a cause of it. Zionism was born from the suffering of Jewish people in Europe, culminating in the Holocaust, from a desire for a safe haven, a territory where Jews would for once be the hosts and not the eternal guests.

“It was framed as a return to a historic biblical homeland. and for its supporters. These two factors give it an entirely different complexion morally from other enterprises where predominantly European populations have settled far-flung parts of the world.

Dispossession and subjugation
“There’s no doubt that the Zionist dream has enormous emotional power. The problem, of course, is the other side of the equation, the people. It was inflicted upon the Palestinians whose experience of dispossession and subjugation was no different from that of countless other peoples subjected to European colonialism.

“In fact, arguably, it’s been considerably worse than many, precisely because of the licence and indulgence granted to the Israeli state.

“Let’s lay out the bold, indisputable facts. In 1948, more than 80 percent of the Palestinian population of what became Israel fled their homes. Now, if you want to believe this was not an act of deliberate ethnic cleansing, fine.

“What’s undeniable is that they were never allowed to return. In 1947, they were there. In 1949, they were not. The granting of the vote to that small fragment of the Palestinian population that remained provided a democratic fig leaf for the new state, one that was blown away once the Israelis occupied Gaza and the West Bank in 1967.

The End of Israel                                     Documentary: Double Down News

“There Palestinians have no right to vote for the political entity, the state of Israel that controls their lives. Jewish settlers, on the other hand, occupying the same territory do.

“Even in East Jerusalem, which as far as the Israeli government is concerned has been formally annexed to Israel, Palestinians cannot vote. Political rights depend upon ethnicity. That is not democracy.

“Israel is and has always been a state whose defining feature is that it’s structured to ensure the domination of one ethnicity over another. What else does the term a Jewish state mean?

‘Elephant in the room’
“This is the elephant in the room. the simple, blindingly obvious, undeniable fact that the Western political media class has decided that we must never mention or acknowledge, despite the fact that all of the world’s leading human rights organisations, including the Israeli NGO B’Tselem, have denounced Israel as an apartheid state.

“Now scour the history of the modern world. No people has ever resigned itself to being second class citizens in their own country. Spend just 10 minutes at a checkpoint in the West Bank and you get it.

“The disfiguring dehumanisation, the humiliation of elderly men and women forced to stand in the sun for hours waiting for 18-year-olds to search them.

“The brutalisation of young men in particular, the daily control of rage that is the lot of every Palestinian. It is simply emotionally, psychologically intolerable.”

• Watch the full Double Down News video