This was a week which crystallized a number of things. When you add them all together, however, the key thing is that it demonstrated just how important the USA has become, through the Trump administration, in aiding the Russian war effort. This might have been hidden in all the distracting stardust being thrown in the air about the Graham Tariff Bill, or the recently announced (extremely weird) possible sale of some motley air defense capabilities to Ukraine (arrival uncertain and unknown). However, behind the stardust which the press seems too out of its depth to properly interrogate the reality is that the war has entered into a fascinating contrast.
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On the land, where the Ukrainians were less reliant on the USA, it is the Ukrainians who are showing the initiative and dealing some substantial blows to Russian military strength. If what we are hearing about Operation Vivaldi is only partially true, the Ukrainians are continuing to advance in the combined operations of infantry and UAVs.
In the ranged war, relying on Ukrainian sources, the Ukrainians are also showing some important strengths—when they concentrate on the right targets. However it is in their ranged campaign against the Ukrainians, aided enormously by the USA starving Ukraine of air defense (a great example of why relying on the weapons of another power is always so dangerous) that the Russians are being their most effective—and almost certainly will continue to be so for the upcoming winter.
Add it up, and what we see is that Russia’s area of initiative in the war has been enormously abetted by the USA and Donald Trump.
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“In addition to the advance itself, we can say that during this operation a fairly large number of enemy officers were also destroyed and a fairly significant number of enemy personnel were taken prisoner. Perhaps, in recent years, this is the largest replenishment of the exchange fund that came from the Ukrainian side,”
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The Ukrainian General Staff claimed 11,090 Russian personnel losses in the seven daily reports from 14 to 20 September 2026, an average of about 1,584 a day. Here is a breakdown.
Russia Batters Ukraine At Range
The last week was actually a lighter week than the one before when it came to Russian ranged attacks on Ukraine. They launched attacks every night, but with a smaller number of systems than the seven days previously. Here is a table of the number of units attacking—mostly drones (which means Geran/Shaheds) from Sept 14-19. We do not have last night’s figures yet.
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The reality of the ranged war, even with these reduced attacks, remains the same however. Ukraine can do little to intercept Russian ballistic missiles. The attack on 17 September, for instance, the only example of the Russians making a large ballistic missile assault last week, saw the Ukrainians claiming that they could not intercept one of them. The Ukrainian Air Force listed only Shahed/Gerans and Banderols as being neutralized that night.
Indeed, this slower week could be a sign of the Russians stocking up for larger attacks in the fall and winter. They have a track record of doing that.
This is the reality. Ukraine, because of the US depriving it of Patriots. Even in the announcement yesterday that the US might be selling some air defense capability to Europe to pass on to Ukraine, there was no mention of Patriots. What was announced was some “possible” sale of deficient systems. Indeed, the press did not even know how to report what happened—as in this CBS report.
Trump, Diesel And Ukrainian Energy Strikes
Another area where the Ukrainians confirmed that they can be effective when not impeded in the USA, is their ongoing campaign against Russian fuel production. We have confirmation of that this week because Donald Trump came out and pleaded with the Ukrainians to do Putin a favor and stop attacking Russian refineries.
Things were so bad, that Trump begged once and lied twice—before the Ukrainians made it clear exactly what their position is. It was a fascinating “exchange” that started last Sunday (13 September). Then Trump said this to the press:
“Mr. Zelenskyy has to do one thing. He has to stop knocking out diesel fuel in Russia…We spoke to Mr. Zelenskyy about it. There are plenty of other targets. Don’t hit diesel fuel, because that’s hurting, that’s hurting the world.”
However, Trump decided to blame the Ukrainians and help Putin when discussing the issue publicly. And this was not all. On September 14, Trump doubled-down on his claim that the rise in diesel prices was Ukraine’s fault but, miraculously, claimed that he had gotten the Ukrainians and the Russians to agree to stop all energy attacks. He tweeted:
“Ukraine has agreed not to hit Russian Energy targets. Russia has agreed to do, likewise!…The World’s Diesel price rise is mostly caused by the Russia/Ukraine War, not Iran.”
It is still shocking how the President of the USA can just make up nonsense, spew it out, and some people will believe him.
Zelensky even openly contradicted Trump, in denying any deal had been reached. He said Ukraine might consider a deal, but as of now“Russia hasn’t stopped striking our energy sector… And our responses to them for this are tangible.”
It was a revealing exchange. As always for Trump, Ukraine is the baddies and Russia is to be protected. That will never change.
The more interesting thing is the confirmation of the seriousness of the Ukrainian campaign on Russian oil production. It is why this must be the key target of the Ukrainian ranged campaign. If the Ukrainians have no ability to defend themselves against Russian ballistic missiles because of the USA, the least they can do is not listen to the USA when the American president pleads with them to stop their most effective strategic campaign.
Above: The war of June 1967 began with a pre-emptive air strike by Israel in which it destroyed the air force fleets, while they were on the ground, of three neighboring nations, Jordan, Syria and Egypt. Without air capability these nations had little ability to defend their territories and this war ended quickly: it is known as the Six Day War. At the end of this war, Israeli forces had occupied all the areas in pink on this map: the West Bank, Gaza, the Golan Heights which belonged to Syria (at the northeast/upper right corner of Israel) and the Sinai Peninsula which belonged to Egypt (large area to the left/southwest of Israel).
The Camp David Accords, mediated by U.S. President Jimmy Carter, were fulfilled in 1982, at which time all of the Sinai Peninsula was again under Egyptian control.
Above: This map shows in green the areas that Israel has had under military occupation since 1967. As noted in the previous map, the Sinai Peninsula was returned to Egyptian control by 1982.
In November 1967, the same year as the Six Day War, the UN Security Council unanimously adopted UN SC Resolution 242, which required the “withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict.” As of 2017, Israel has refused to comply with this UN Security Council resolution for fifty years.
Spike in red diesel prices as Middle East conflict continues
Jenni Green 09 September 2026
Red diesel prices have soared into three-figure territory again, putting extra cost pressure on farmers and growers looking to run their machinery during the busy autumn period.
Two weeks ago, red diesel was ticking along at about 95-97p/litre – a level it has been at for much of the summer.
But last week it jumped to 105p/litre according to the Farmers Weekly average collected from farm suppliers across the country, and this week it was quoted at more than 107p/litre – up almost 70% on last year’s price.
This is despite the fact that in June, following pressure from the NFU, the Treasury cut duty on red diesel from 10.18p to 6.48p/litre, its lowest rate in 20 years.
The upturn reflects developments in the Middle East, with signs of the US-Iran conflict widening, including a recent attack by Houthi rebels based in Yemen on Saudi Arabian oilfields.
Brent crude oil prices soared to nearly $100/barrel (£74) this week, a level not seen since May.
With the Ukraine/Russia war also rumbling on and oil vessels being targeted in the Black Sea, the outlook remains volatile.
above 4pc, driving up prices on supermarket shelves and forcing the Bank of England to raise interest rates.
The crunch is already inflicting fresh pain on motorists. Diesel prices at British pumps are averaging almost 192p a litre, back to the highs of early April.
The diesel squeeze has been exacerbated by Ukrainian drone attacks on Russian refineries. Reuters reported on Tuesday that half of Russia’s top six diesel producers had significantly cut back or halted output in September.
Moscow recently extended its own diesel export ban until Sept 30.
Saudi Aramco will halt all crude deliveries to European refiners next month after a pipeline attack.
The East-West pipeline has been shut since September 10 and could take up to six weeks to repair.
Brent crude has swung between $104 and $108 a barrel this week on the disruption.
Saudi Aramco has informed at least two European oil refining customers that they will receive no crude deliveries next month, after an attack on the kingdom’s key pipeline to the Red Sea, Bloomberg reported citing people familiar with the matter.
European customers normally receive Saudi crude through term contracts, guaranteeing steady monthly supply.
The report said those deliveries under long-term contracts will not happen in October.
The decision applies to all European buyers, the people cited in the report said.
The pipeline at the center of the crisis
Saudi Arabia’s East-West pipeline, a 1,200-kilometer route carrying up to 7 million barrels a day from the kingdom’s eastern oil fields to the Red Sea port of Yanbu, has been shut since a September 10 drone attack damaged at least one pumping station.
Reuters reported on September 17, citing satellite imagery and industry sources, that three pumping stations were actually damaged, one more than initially assessed.
The pipeline had become Saudi Arabia’s critical alternative export route after Iranian attacks brought tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz to a near standstill.
Repair estimates range from a partial restart within days to full recovery taking five to six weeks, the report said.
Europe scrambles for alternatives
European refineries typically receive Saudi crude via Egypt’s Mediterranean port of Sidi Kerir, linked to the Red Sea by pipeline.
With that route now cut, refiners are racing to secure replacement barrels from the North Sea and elsewhere.
Poland’s Orlen, which relies on Saudi Arabia for roughly 40% of the crude feedstock across its three refineries, has issued more than ten tenders since last Friday to secure alternative supplies.
At least three European refiners have already had September cargoes canceled or delayed as far out as November, according to market sources cited by Argus, with two more expected to receive similar notices.
European OECD countries imported 577,000 barrels a day of crude from Saudi Arabia in June, according to the International Energy Agency’s monthly Oil Market Report.
Oil prices swing on the outage
Brent crude climbed as high as $108 a barrel this week before easing to around $104.84 by Friday morning, as Saudi Arabia moved to reroute some exports through the Strait of Hormuz to offset the pipeline outage.
WTI crude traded near $103.
Physical crude cargoes in Europe told a starker story, with some prices reported above $130 a barrel and North Sea Forties crude reaching $136.75, a sign of how tight the actual deliverable market has become even as futures prices moved more modestly.
Consultancy Rapidan Energy expects Saudi crude exports to fall by 400,000 barrels a day this month because of the outage, partly offset by higher flows through Hormuz.
“Risk remains skewed toward a larger disruption if the pipeline outage extends past September or Iran, the Houthis, or other proxy groups escalate attacks,” the firm told clients in a note.
The disruption adds to a broader energy shock already unfolding this month, as elevated oil prices feed into inflation concerns that helped push the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates for the first time since 2023.
‘We make the world go ‘round. When we stop, it stops’: Truck drivers speak out as diesel prices reach record highs
Truck drivers say cost of diesel is having a negative impact on their work
Owner-operators say fuel costs cut into pay
Yahathan, a truck driver for 28 years, said diesel prices are having a negative impact on his work because he travels long distances, sometimes for months at a time.
“We’re going to automatically spend over $2,000 a week on fuel,” Yahathan said. “Because in order to make money, the truck has to keep moving, has to keep rolling. So that’s using up fuel every time you roll.”
Yahathan said speed affects how much fuel is used, but drivers who need to reach a destination quickly can spend $70,000 or more. He said he just finished a load and was waiting to hear from a broker about his next one, likely toward Chicago.
Yahathan, who is an owner-operator, said the rising prices are affecting his business.
“I feel that diesel for truck drivers, you know, it shouldn’t go up at a high rate because we make the world go ‘round,” Yahathan said. “Now, without us, no companies wouldn’t even exist.”
Yahathan said company drivers are not responsible for fuel costs, but owner-operators like himself have to manage fuel spending closely to sustain their business. He said the increase is causing him to cut down on loads because of the distances he has to travel. He said he pays for fuel out-of-pocket because he owns his truck.
September 18, 202610:13 PM GMT+1Updated 10 hours ago
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EXTENT OF AGREEMENT REMAINS UNCLEAR
The Danish prime minister’s office said on Friday that the agreement would strengthen North Atlantic and Arctic security.
Greenland’s prime minister, Jens-Frederik Nielsen, said in a statement that the agreement recognized Greenland’s interests and the Arctic island’s place in international cooperation. “This benefits us all,” he said.
Much was unclear as of Friday night, including whether any new US bases would be constructed as a result of the agreement. Trump’s Truth Social posts about negotiations or agreements often lack context or specifics.
Imran Bayoumi, a former Pentagon official now with the Atlantic Council think tank, said it would be new if the US can build bases without the approval of Greenland or Denmark but that largely “it seems that Washington could have achieved a lot of these objectives through diplomacy and dialogue without straining the broader US-NATO relationship.”
It was also unclear how the agreement would be received in Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark. The island’s residents aspire to independence and have bristled at US attempts to assert control.
In a separate statement, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that the deal “permanently and completely” addressed Washington’s national security concerns with respect to the island.
“Greenland will forever be part of the strategic defense area of North America and exclude any adversary from it and the surrounding area,” he wrote.
A State Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss specific terms, said the deal prohibits non-NATO countries from building a base in Greenland and will allow only the US and its allies to make unspecified “sensitive investments.” The official said the agreement grants the US permanent access, basing and overflight rights, and would continue to apply even if Greenland becomes independent.
September 19, 202611:09 AM GMT+1Updated 2 hours ago
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Denmark and Greenland expressed hope that a deal, which is expected to be signed during the UN General Assembly next week, would end months of uncertainty triggered by Trump’s threats to seize control of Greenland
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“The US should not control Greenland. I think it’s better if we have cooperation with NATO,” said Jakob Ludvigsen, 65.
“Trump should stay far, far, far away from Greenland,” Marianne Hansen, a 71-year-old retired chef, told Reuters in Nuuk. “He should not expect our children and grandchildren to become Americans in the future.”
There is no indication that the new agreement grants the U.S. any sovereignty over any part of Greenland, and does not transfer property or territory to the U.S.
Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and Greenlandic Prime Minister Jens-Frederik Nielsen confirmed the agreement in a joint statement.
Frederiksen said the agreement will strengthen the security of the Arctic and the North Atlantic, and recognizes “the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Kingdom and the Greenlandic people’s right to self-determination.”
Nielsen added that the deal reflects “Greenland’s interests and its place in the international cooperation. It is to the benefit of us all.”
A 1951 agreement between the U.S. and Denmark already gave Washington wide latitude to expand military bases and deploy troops to the island, something that NATO diplomats have pointed out with some frustration since the start of the Trump administration. It is not clear how this new agreement changes that agreement which already gave Washington much of what Trump has been demanding.
While the U.S. military footprint in Greenland is small, it has fluctuated in size depending on the threat picture throughout the Cold War and after. American warships can dock at a deepwater port there and radar systems feed data back to the Pentagon.
US military nearly intercepted a Chinese ship this spring after an AI chatbot fabricated an intelligence report claiming it was carrying nuclear weapons components: According to four sources familiar with the episode that spoke to CNN, the false report, generated with AI help by a special operations command analyst, set off alarm bells across the military during the ongoing Iran war, with armed personnel preparing to board the vessel and military planes already in the air. Officials only discovered the report was “entirely false” just before the operation was set to launch, tracing it back to a chatbot that had inaccurately identified the ship’s cargo. One source said the incident “almost started a war,” since any US action against a Chinese vessel risked spiraling into armed conflict between the two countries. The chatbot had fused open-source intelligence with classified signals intelligence to reach its false conclusion, and the analyst then used AI again to package the findings into a standard, trusted-format intelligence report before disseminating it. US Special Operations Command Pacific and the Pentagon did not respond to CNN’s request for comment.
Chen Yixin, head of China’s Ministry of State Security, called for tighter government oversight of AI, warning that rapidly advancing technology could be exploited for disinformation, cyberattacks, espionage and military competition. His assessment puts political security at the centre of Beijing’s AI concerns, rather than focusing solely on the broader question of whether advanced AI could eventually escape human control.
A new Wall Street Journal report claims the Pentagon is reassessing its military posture after Iranian missile and drone attacks reportedly damaged key U.S. facilities during the recent conflict. The report says the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain—one of Washington’s most important military hubs in the Gulf—was among the sites hit, raising fresh questions about the vulnerability of American bases near Iran. The report also says U.S. officials are considering relocating some military functions, moving command facilities underground, and reducing America’s footprint in parts of the Gulf.
August 2026:
The Pentagon is considering reducing its military footprint in the Persian Gulf following the scale of destruction caused during Operation Epic Fury reported Washington Post. The consideration remains in the initial phase between the Pentagon’s policy wing, alongside the joint staff and the US Central Command. They are considering a potential configuration of the US military, once the hostilities cease, whether to repair and reconstruct these severely compromised bases in their current form. The deliberations are yet to reach US Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth.
US military positions in the Persian Gulf
The US maintains over 40,000 personnel in the region across nearly 20 installations, from Jordan to Oman. Roughly 20 major sites are spread across the region.
Bahrain is the Naval centrepiece, as the official headquarters for the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet and US Naval Forces Central Command (NAVCENT). It coordinates all the maritime corridors from the Persian Gulf and Arabian Sea to the Red Sea. Other US Army and Air Force assets are stationed across Kuwait, Qatar, and neighbouring Gulf nations. Situated in Doha, Qatar, is the Al Udeid Air Base, the largest US military base in the Middle East, and it acts as the forward headquarters for US Central Command (CENTCOM).
The recent “special military operation” in the Gulf has exposed the vulnerabilities of these US facilities, with incoming Iranian missiles targeting a total of 200 US military installations, and six American service members killed in March. The Pentagon has expended over 1,000 advanced air-defence interceptors, severely straining global stockpiles of Patriot and THAAD systems. The Pentagon projects that the Iran war will tally approximately $37.5 billion by late September, excluding the cost required to reconstruct heavily compromised complexes
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The scale of damage has made the Pentagon official reconsider the deployment and positioning of the assets. A section of the Pentagon is considering repositioning military personnel and hardware further westward towards Jordan, Israel or Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea coast. Some discussions centre on the closure of bases in Kuwait, while transferring forces from the UAE, Jordan, and Bahrain to safer zones outside the range of Iranian missiles and drones. A separate recommendation envisions relocating additional US military capabilities to Israel’s Ovda Airbase, though there are concerns about Israeli espionage and exposure to counterintelligence.
What does it mean for Tehran?
The Gulf nations have been substantially dependent on the US capability to provide security. Some of them are unorthodox cities with no domestic capabilities and possess no traditional source of food and water. They depend heavily on the trade routes to maintain the illusion of being safe financial hubs in the desert. Now, a US reduction of troops will not explicitly strain the relationship, but pragmatically they would turn towards the next bigger power in the region, Iran, for security. So the war might allow Iran to emerge as one pole of power in the Gulf, while Israel might absorb the US military capability, entangle itself within the US military-industrial network and emerge as another pole.
Key House Democrat refuses to clear $2.8 billion bomb sale to Israel
Top Foreign Affairs Democrat Gregory Meeks has “questions” about how these munitions could be used in densely populated areas of Gaza and Lebanon.
U.S. Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY) speaks to members of the media at the U.S. Capitol Building on May 21, 2026 in Washington. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
All of us who are white skinned know of historical abuses committed during colonisation of non-white nations. But we continue to abuse non-white people who live within our communities, even though the majority contribute massive benefits to our way of life as our fellow human beings.
I just learned of historic atrocities committed within the United States as a white supremacy backlash against the growing success and prosperity of black communities.
Drowned Towns: The Black Communities Erased by Water
Mar 27, 2025
Throughout history, Black communities in America have built thriving towns—only to have them stolen, destroyed, and erased. In five such cases—Oscarville, GA; Ferguson, SC; Little Egypt, NC; Vanport, OR; and Kowaliga, AL—entire Black towns were forcibly emptied and submerged under water, often under the guise of “progress” or public works projects. What were once bustling communities filled with homes, businesses, schools, and churches now lie buried beneath lakes, their histories nearly forgotten.
These were not accidents. Whether through violent racial expulsions, unfair eminent domain seizures, or deliberate neglect, the residents of these towns were forced from their land with little to no compensation. Their loss meant more than just the destruction of homes—it was the theft of generational wealth and culture.
Today, these lakes serve as recreational spots, their dark past hidden beneath the surface. But the stories of the families who lived, worked, and built their lives in these places must not be lost. This is their history.
Oscarville, GA → Lake Lanier
Oscarville, Georgia, was a thriving Black community in Forsyth County, home to farmers, shopkeepers, and skilled laborers. However, in 1912, white mobs terrorized the town after a white woman named Mae Crow was allegedly assaulted. Two Black men, Ernest Knox and Oscar Daniel, were lynched, and white residents launched a campaign of racial violence.
The Black residents were driven out at gunpoint, their homes burned, and their land stolen. Many were forced to flee in the middle of the night, leaving behind farms, churches, and schools.
Decades later, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers flooded the land in the 1950s to create Lake Lanier, erasing the remnants of Oscarville. Families who had owned property for generations received little or no compensation, and the descendants of those displaced still struggle to reclaim their stolen land.
Survivor Account:
One survivor’s descendant, George Rucker, recounted the fear his grandmother felt as a child when her family had to leave Oscarville. “She remembered the night the men came to their home, torches in hand, telling them they had to go or they’d be killed. They left with just the clothes on their backs.”
Lake Lanier has a notorious reputation for unexplained drownings and accidents, which some believe are tied to the violent history of Oscarville.
All of the human race originated in Africa. We are one people – each has equal value. Our ancient ancestors did not strive to survive in order to destroy one another over artificially created belief systems, motivated by greed and desire for power over one another.
There’s a city buried under Lake Lanier (Georgia’s biggest lake), and submerged with it is a secret: An American horror story filled with terror, death, genocide, and ghosts.
If you spend any time in or around Atlanta, you’ve heard tales of Lake Lanier. There are eerie accounts of fishermen seeing ghostly kayaks floating on the water, or women with no hands roaming the Jerry D. Jackson Bridge. Every so often, someone loses their life at the lake and leaves behind stories of good swimmers being snatched under the water, unexplainable boating accidents, or vehicles crashing into the lake without cause.
Many folks who live close by will tell you straight up, “Don’t go to Lake Lanier.” And its death toll certainly validates their point. There have been well over 500 deaths since the lake’s inception and more than 200 since 1994. Whether the lake is cursed or not is entirely up to you. But, one thing’s for certain, its horrifying past adds a much-needed perspective to understanding its haunting present.
Long before Central Park became New York City’s most iconic green space, its land was home to a thriving, self-sufficient settlement known as Seneca Village. Founded in 1825 by free African Americans, the community represented one of the first significant concentrations of Black property ownership in Manhattan. At its height, it was home to about 225 residents, multiple churches, schools, and cemeteries. But by 1857, the entire village was destroyed through eminent domain to make way for Central Park. For more than a century, Seneca Village was all but erased from history.
Seneca Village was established on land purchased from John Whitehead, a white farmer who began selling off lots in 1825. The first recorded African American buyer was Andrew Williams, a 25-year-old shoeshiner who purchased three lots for $125. That same week, trustee Epiphany Davis of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church acquired twelve lots, and soon after, the church itself purchased additional land. These early acquisitions laid the foundation for a settlement where Black New Yorkers could own property, vote, and escape the intense racial hostility of downtown Manhattan.
Following the abolition of slavery in New York State in 1827, more African Americans moved to Seneca Village. By the 1830s, displaced residents from nearby areas, also joined the community. Later, waves of Irish and German immigrants, many fleeing famine and economic hardship, settled alongside Black residents, creating a rare example of a racially and ethnically mixed community in the mid-19th century.
By 1855, Seneca Village had 52 houses, with some built on stone foundations. Archaeological evidence suggests that the homes were well-built and stable, contradicting claims that the area was a “shantytown.” Many residents grew vegetables in gardens, raised livestock, and relied on natural resources like Tanner’s Spring for fresh water and the Hudson River for fishing.
Artificial intelligence has advanced rapidly in recent years, but the technology’s potential long-term risks are also drawing fresh warnings from some of its pioneers.
Geoffrey Hinton, referred to as the Godfather of AI, has said it is ‘not unreasonable’ to predict that it could wipe out humanity within the next decade.
Speaking to the BBC’s Newsnight, the Nobel Prize-winning computer scientist put the probability at around 10%, while stressing that there was no reliable method for calculating such a risk.
In September 2026, four acts gave up their spots on Ed Sheeran’s stadium tour after Sheeran dropped Macklemore for saying two words from the stage: Free Palestine. Finneas, Aaron Rowe, the Irish band Beoga, and the Danish band Lukas Graham have all walked. Macklemore had introduced his song Hind’s Hall, named for Hind Rajab, a six-year-old killed in Gaza waiting for rescue in a car with her dead relatives. Robert Kraft, who owns Gillette Stadium, had barred him from performing there, and Macklemore says Sheeran told him Kraft rallied other stadium owners into an ultimatum: keep Macklemore and lose the venues.
Ed Sheeran apparently doesn’t want to take sides on the whole “is genocide bad” conversation.
It feels obvious to me that what’s happening to the people of Gaza is a genocide. There is more suffering in the world than any one person can take on, and the ways to actually reduce it are not all within reach. Some levers are easy to pull, some are almost impossible to move even when the choice in front of you is between people dying and someone’s profit, and no one can fix it all. What I try to do, as a person and as the founder of this publication, is find the ones I can actually reach that reduce the most suffering while being achievable, and put my attention there.
I’ve posted several pieces on divestment campaigns to move government and union funds away from the companies currently committing war crimes. I’ll make sure to cover that again soon and am working behind the scenes to create a legislative push in all 50 states and with every major union to have mass divestment and contract discontinuation from the companies attacking democracy and murdering innocents en masse.
Thankfully, there have been people doing incredible work on this subject. Qasim Rashid, a human rights lawyer, and the journalist Wajahat Ali have both written about Gaza with a steadiness I admire and have been open about what saying so has cost them. Rashida Tlaib kept at it through a House censure. Naomi Klein has investigated and weighed in from inside the Jewish community. They are more qualified than I am and they have done this work better than I can, and at a moment when it matters this much, watching them do that so well has been a genuine relief. It’s part of why I felt I could finally write this. The ground didn’t need me to break it, only to add what I can, which is what follows.
Here’s how I want to do that. I have beliefs about Gaza that I think are true, and I want to know whether they are. The way to find out is to look at the evidence and rate it: who produced it, by what method, how independent they are from the various sides, and how well it survives the other side’s best objection. That’s also the way I try to get closer to the truth on any subject, and I’ve never shown the whole process before. This piece does.
Before the evidence, a word on how this article is built. In 2016, four Cornell researchers studied about 18,000 arguments across a million replies on the Reddit forum r/ChangeMyView, where people invite strangers to change their minds, to see which comments actually worked. The finding: what changes a mind is calm, sourced, and built from information the reader didn’t already have, rather than the reader’s own frame handed back to them. Calm mattered literally, on a scale where “librarian” rated low and “terrorism” high, the winning comments sat at the calm end. I’ve written this piece to match it.
So let’s begin.
Genocide has a legal definition. It was written in 1948, in the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
The first part is a list of five acts: killing members of a group; causing them serious bodily or mental harm; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births; and forcibly transferring the group’s children to another group.
The second part is intent. The acts have to be committed with intent to destroy a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group, in whole or in part, as such.
Nearly every serious argument about Gaza is about the second part. The number of dead is contested only at the margins. The question is whether the killing was done to destroy Palestinians in Gaza as a group or was the result of a war against Hamas fought without restraint and in a crowded place.
The fact is, a government committing genocide rarely writes down that destroying an entire ethnic group is the plan, so courts let you infer intent from the pattern of conduct.
In its March 12, 2026 filing defending Israel, the United States asked the court to throw out that inference and demand something close to an intentional confession: that civilian deaths in urban combat can’t show intent on their own, and that only conduct explainable by nothing but genocide counts.
That is a reading of the law built to benefit Israel, and it’s close to unmeetable, because almost no genocide in history came with the perpetrator announcing it as such.
The Netherlands and Iceland, filing in response and within the same week, asked the court for the opposite, a reading that lets intent be inferred from conduct as it usually is.
Now the evidence, from the most independent and rigorous to the least, with the objection you’ll hear at each rung, answered.
The first rung is the count of the dead.
The Gaza Health Ministry’s count reached 73,789 killed as of September 15, 2026, and the Associated Press describes the ministry’s records as detailed and generally viewed as reliable by UN agencies. The ministry is part of the Hamas-run government. That’s the first objection you’ll hear, and independent methods have tested it.
A team led by Zeina Jamaluddine at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine used capture-recapture, a statistical method that estimates a total from the overlap between separate lists, and put deaths from traumatic injury between October 7, 2023 and June 30, 2024 at 64,260 against the ministry’s 37,877, an undercount the authors put at about 41 percent. The study appeared in The Lancet in January 2025.
In February 2026, a team led by Michael Spagat of Royal Holloway, University of London, with fieldwork by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, published the war’s first population survey in The Lancet Global Health, covering 2,000 households and 9,729 people.
The UN Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, chaired by Navi Pillay, who presided over the international tribunal for Rwanda and later served as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, reported on September 16, 2025 that Israel had committed four of the five acts in the Convention and that statements by senior officials together with the pattern of conduct established intent to commit genocide. The commission asked the International Criminal Court to add genocide to the arrest warrants issued in November 2024 for Netanyahu and Gallant.
The third rung is human rights organizations.
Amnesty International published a 296-page report on December 5, 2024 and concluded there was sufficient basis to find that Israel had committed and was continuing to commit genocide, with three of the five acts and the specific intent to destroy Palestinians in Gaza.
Human Rights Watch published a 179-page report on December 19, 2024 and found that Israel had deliberately deprived Gaza of water, which HRW called the crime against humanity of extermination and an act of genocide.
B’Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights Israel are both Israeli organizations, and both published their findings on July 28, 2025. B’Tselem concluded that Israel’s policy toward Palestinians in Gaza had shifted from repression and control to destruction and annihilation; PHRI’s legal and medical analysis found three of the acts, including conditions of life calculated to destroy the group. Guy Shalev, PHRI’s director and the grandson of a Holocaust survivor, called the conclusion painful.
The fourth rung is scholars.
The International Association of Genocide Scholars, a body of about 500 academics that includes Holocaust specialists, announced on September 1, 2025 that a resolution stating that Israel’s policies and actions in Gaza meet the legal definition of genocide had passed with 86 percent of those voting in favor.
Omer Bartov is a professor of Holocaust and genocide studies at Brown University, he was born in Israel, and he served in its army. He wrote in the New York Times in November 2023 that what he was seeing did not yet rise to genocide. He changed his mind in stages over the following year, in the Guardian in August 2024, on CNN that December, then again in the New York Times on July 15, 2025, where he wrote that by May 2024, after the army ordered about a million people sheltering in Rafah to the beach at Mawasi and then destroyed much of the city, his conclusion had become that Israel was in fact committing genocide. A man who studies the crime for a living, who resisted the word against his own background and his own earlier judgment, followed the evidence to it anyway.
The last rung we will explore is governments and the officials who lead them, the least independent sources on either side. Their words appear in the UN commission’s report and in Amnesty’s as evidence of intent.
On October 13, 2023, President Isaac Herzog said at a press conference that “it is an entire nation out there that is responsible” and that civilians could have risen up against Hamas. When a reporter asked whether that made civilians legitimate targets, he said no, and in the same answer he said there were many innocent Palestinians and that Israel operates under international law. Israel’s defenders say he was describing Hamas-run Gaza as a state. The UN commission counted the statement as incitement.
On October 28, 2023, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in a televised address about the soldiers entering Gaza, quoted the Bible: “Remember what Amalek did to you.” In the Book of Samuel, God orders King Saul to kill every Amalekite, including women, children, infants, and animals. Israel’s answer is that the sentence before the quotation named the murderers of October 7 as the enemy.
On the other side of the ledger sit Israel’s denials and the United States’ filing. Israel says it fights an existential war under international law, that Hamas hides among civilians, that Hamas diverts aid, and that the accusation itself is antisemitic. The United States told the court the genocide allegations are false.
A war against Hamas explains strikes on buildings where Hamas operated. It doesn’t explain a siege on the entire population ordered on October 9, 2023, a famine confirmed in August 2025 while food waited at the border, two million people pushed into less than half their land, or a finance minister saying starvation might be moral. The bodies that applied the legal test to that record found intent: the UN commission, Amnesty, B’Tselem, Physicians for Human Rights Israel, and 108 genocide scholars. Human Rights Watch found the acts and stopped at intent. The people who say no are the Israeli government, and the United States government defending it. The best legal point on their side asks the world to withhold the label of genocide unless the Israeli government says so explicitly.
I said at the top that it feels obvious to me. Having walked the evidence, I’ll say it as a finding. The two sides are not equal in the evidence they can show.
It’s a genocide.
This article exists because orienting ourselves, even when we are certain, is critical to repairing this world. For my own writing, the value I can offer is clarity, even when the clarity is nothing more than credible sources assembled in a logical order. That’s what this piece is.
There’s a second reason. The work I’ve done professionally brought me close to murder, child abuse, domestic violence, and the people who committed those crimes, as well as their victims. I’ve spent my adult life studying human nature, from military law enforcement, to empathy disorders in incarcerated populations, to education and even behavioral rehabilitation in youth with conduct disorder. I’m also one of the people who lies awake at night thinking about the horrors in the world that we might not be able to stop. Sometimes sleep doesn’t arrive so easily.
Writing is part of how I handle that. It’s how I look for the piece of human suffering I can actually do something about, and then do something about it.
So much has changed over the last few years, as people have continued to discuss the genocide. More people can see this now. A stadium tour lost four acts in a week. A Holocaust scholar reversed himself in the New York Times. Two Israeli human rights organizations applied the genocide label about their own country. A man who calls it genocide was elected mayor of New York. Fewer people are on the fence than were a year ago, and that shift came from education and from the activists and writers who refused to stop explaining it, often against the platforms themselves: Human Rights Watch documented more than 1,000 removals or suppressions of peaceful pro-Palestine posts on Instagram and Facebook, and creators widely report their reach collapsing the moment they name it.
What hasn’t changed is the policy. The United States filed in March 2026 to defend Israel at the world court, and the weapons still ship. Opinion has moved faster than power has, and closing that gap is the work still in front of all of us.
We’re here to fight for freedom and justice, and I’m grateful to everyone doing that.
Robert Kraft said he barred Macklemore from Gillette Stadium over material shown from the stage in New Jersey and what Kraft called a history of “antisemitic rhetoric and imagery.” Macklemore says Sheeran told him that people Sheeran had spoken with found the words Free Palestine and the Palestinian flag hurtful. Kraft kept his stadium and Sheeran kept his tour. Finneas, Aaron Rowe, Beoga, and Lukas Graham gave up their tour dates because this moment demands those of us not under fire to be willing to accept consequences as free speech and human rights continue to be suppressed.
To borrow the spirit of poet and activist Tupac Shakur, whose music I admittedly enjoy far more than Macklemore’s:
Fuck Robert Kraft, fuck Ed Sheeran, fuck genocide denial, and fuck fascists too.
‘Purge Palantir!’: Union nurses warn Big Tech and Big Brother are invading our healthcare system
“Palantir has no place in our hospitals, no place in our community… Nurses are advocates first. We’re trained to advocate and to speak up when something is wrong, and that’s what we’re doing.”
Sept 14 (Reuters) – Large technology companies, including Palantir Technologies, Nvidia and Booz Allen Hamilton, could restrict or cease to use advanced AI models unless Anthropic and OpenAI guarantee not misusing their intellectual property, the Information reported on Monday.
Microsoft, meanwhile, is capitalizing on such concerns by pitching isolated cloud environments and its own AI offerings to draw clients, according to the report that cited people familiar with the matter.
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei on Saturday called for AI companies to slow the pace of frontier model development, warning that capabilities are advancing faster than researchers can understand or control — a position quickly endorsed by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Elon Musk.
But a number of former Palantir employees tell WIRED they believe the public still largely misunderstands what the company actually does and how its software works. Some people think it’s a data broker that buys information from private companies and resells it to the government. Others think it’s a data miner, constantly scanning the internet for unique insights it can collect and market to customers. Still others think it maintains a giant, centralized database of information collected from all of its clients. In reality, Palantir does none of these things, but the misconceptions continue to persist.
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A version of this logic pervades the internal culture at Palantir. When asked what distinguishes it from other tech companies, former employees consistently mentioned its “flat” staffing structure. Engineers can laterally move to more prestigious or challenging projects if they prove worthy based on their skills and connections. One former staffer tells WIRED that this made the company feel like a meritocracy where the best people, and the best ideas, naturally rise to the top.
Some former employees say that Palantir’s meritocratic culture helped cultivate a sense of loyalty among staff. But they also believe that this can make it difficult to speak out against the company or its business decisions. (Gordon said that Palantir “prides itself on a culture of fierce internal dialog and disagreement on difficult issues related to our work.”)
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