News Review: The Art of No Deals
The genocide, aid as a political weapon, rifts in US support for Israel, the Saudi role in the US ceasefire with Yemen, and Istanbul 2.0.
Published: 2025-05-13
More Confirmation of the Genocide
After 582 days of the military murder of Palestinian women, children, police, doctors, teachers and other civilians by Israel's armed forces in Gaza, its political leader Benjamin Netanyahu, added to the mountain of political statements submitted as evidence by the Republic of South Africa in its case against Israel at the United Nations International Court of Justice (ICJ) under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (Genocide Convention):
“We are destroying more and more homes, and Gazans have nowhere to return to. The only inevitable outcome will be the wish of Gazans to emigrate outside of the Gaza Strip,”
[Netanyahu via Antiwar]
South Africa has been joined in the case by Nicaragua, Colombia, Libya, Mexico, Spain, Türkiye, Chile, Maldives, Bolivia, Ireland, Cuba & Belize (in chronological order). The ICJ publishes the proceedings (oral, written) and judgments for case 192 at its website [https://icj-cij.org].
Some commentators have conflated the recent proceedings of the court hearing submissions on an advisory opinion (case 196) concerning Israel's obligations as an occupying power in Palestine with the case under the Genocide Convention. While related, these are distinct legal matters. One will produce a judgment (192), the other an opinion (196).
While courts can be tiresomely slow and their proceedings sometimes difficult to understand, they remain our solution to resolving differences other than with clubs or nuclear weapons.
From Denying Aid, to Politicizing it
The catastrophe (Nakbah) of the technicolor, Israeli genocide of Palestinians in Gaza not only exposes the immorality of Zionist Israel but has also seriously damaged the US Empire's international standing. In turn this is fracturing support for Israel within the US.
Two months after Israel re-implemented its collective punishment of Gazan civilians via its total blockade of food, medicines, fuel and other humanitarian aid on March 2nd 2025, the US announced that a non-governmental organisation to distribute humanitarian aid in Gaza is to be created. The NGO's name, "Gaza Humanitarian Foundation" was announced by the US State Department's spokesperson Tammy Bruce. In response to journalists' questions about the NGO she directed their attention to a yet to be released 'announcement' by the yet to exist NGO. It's wikipedia page has, interestingly, already been created.
Associated with the NGO will no doubt be a non-Israeli and non-US, and thus commercial, security service involved in the aid delivery. The creation of these entities, rather than the use of existing, professional organisations with decades of experience in delivering humanitarian aid (e.g the Red Cross/Red Crescent), speaks of the commercialization of aid delivery or the NGO's use as a political tool, or both.
Hadn't Trump gutted US-AID and the NED? Hadn't the time of using NGO's as tools for political destabilization come and gone? Is this not just another deliberate process of scoring interim political points by declaring an aid effort which is designed to fail?
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation NGO may well be washed away faster than the previous US theatre of aiding Palestinians, the Gaza pier.
[Watch a part of the $320 million waste washing ashore miles away.]
Arming Criminals after Murdering the Police
The war criminals who wear the IDF uniform and kill ambulance staff have no qualms murdering Gaza's police force. Both are members of Gaza's civilian administration under the direction of Gaza's elected authority, Hamas, and are thus, according to Zionist logic, terrorists.
Credible accusations have been issued of Israeli agents arming and coordinating local criminal gangs in Gaza, utilizing the lack of the civilian administration they murdered, to foment discord by facilitating theft and other crimes.
“These acts are not spontaneous,” Ismail Thawabta, the head of the Government Media Office in Gaza, told Mondoweiss in a statement on Sunday. “They are not the result of hunger or necessity, as is being said, but are backed by malicious intentions aiming to sow chaos and damage the social fabric.”
Thawabta added that some of the looting groups are “directly acting on the directives of Israeli forces.” They are armed and “semi-organized,” he said, and “some of the known names have been brought before the law and neutralized.”
Friedman's Rant
The diabolical actions of the state of Israel are, finally, having some affect within the pro-Israel political block in the US.
A potential division between the US and Israel, partially based on personal differences between their their political leaders, was reinforced in a New York Times opinion article by Jewish American, conservative warmonger Thomas Friedman. Friedman 'has characterized his high school years as "one big celebration of Israel's victory in the Six-Day War."' [Wikipedia] Friedman may be willfully ignorant of Israel's attack on, and attempt to sink with all hands, the USS Liberty during that war.
Friedman warned the current US regime:
[Netanyahu's] ultranationalist, messianic Israeli government is not America’s ally.
and pleaded that:
It is [also] vital to defend the U.S. security architecture your predecessors have built in the region.
Preserving this "security architecture" could have been achieved, implied Friedman, if Netanyahu:
agree[d] to open a dialogue with the Palestinian Authority about a two-state solution one day with a reformed authority — in return for Saudi Arabia normalizing relations with Israel
But, continued Friedman:
Netanyahu put his personal interests ahead of Israel’s and America’s .. because the Jewish supremacists in his cabinet said if he did so they would topple his government.
[NYT]
Friedman, and perhaps the NYT, have caught up with reality.
Within the article, Friedman quoted Reuters:
“the United States is no longer demanding Saudi Arabia normalize ties with Israel as a condition for progress on civil nuclear cooperation talks.”
[Reuters]
Which brings us to Trump's upcoming trip to southwest Asia.
Nuclear Power to the Kingdom But Not the Islamic Republic
For over a decade the House of Saud have been attempting to re-orienting their economy away from oil. It will become more expensive to extract and process as the easier to tap fields are emptied. A replacement energy source for the Kingdom is required and one candidate is nuclear power.
US involvement in the business of constructing nuclear power facilities for Saudi Arabia is, as Friedman hinted, a primary topic for Trump's upcoming visit to the Kingdom. The US does not hold a monopoly over the technology of nuclear power. To allow the US into the potentially lucrative business, and to minimize embarrassment to itself the kingdom made some demands of the US regime before Trump's visit.
The Middle East Eye reported, based on anonymous US officials, that the Kingdom was a party demanding a ceasefire with Yemen:
“Trump appears to be meeting a Saudi ‘ask’ to stop strikes ahead of his visit,” one of the US officials told MEE.
“The pressure from the Saudis to end this has intensified since last week. They told us that attacks on Yemen while POTUS is there would be playing with fire,” the official added, using an acronym for the US President.
Since the Russian initiated and Chinese facilitated rapprochement between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Kingdom has reaffirmed its position that it refuses to normalize relations with Israel until an equivalent is achieved for Palestine. Yemen's Ansar Allah have gained significant respect for their principled economic blockade of Israel in compliance with the Genocide Convention. It would not have looked good for the House of Saud to host the infidels in Riyadh while they were murdering the principled Yemenis.
The Kingdom's shift from running a war against Yemen to demanding that the US stop its is a stunning change. It demonstrates the political power which Yemen has generated from its unwavering opposition to Israel's genocide of Palestinians in Palestine.
Trump has acquiesced. He stopped wasting billions of dollars making the US look a fool running an illegal, pointless and ineffective war against Ansar Allah to potentially obtain business providing nuclear power to the Saudis.
It is glaringly obvious that the Trump administration will need to manufacture quite a narrative to involve itself in the process of supplying nuclear power capabilities to Kingdom while negotiating with Iran to prevent it having the same. Complicating matters further is that Iran has offered its services to the Kingdom for the same purpose.
Russia is waiting in the wings. It is likely to throw its hat in the ring during President Vladimir Putin's upcoming regional visit.
Putin Floats Istanbul 2.0
Trump's most successful foreign policy initiative may yet be his threat to remove the US from playing the fake role of mediator to end a conflict which it provoked and which it continues to arm.
Putin re-issued Russia's statement that it is willing to negotiate "without pre-conditions" when he offered, assuming Turkiye will again host the discussions, direct negotiations with Ukraine on May 15th. Those negotiations, if Ukraine participates, will work from the Istanbul agreement refused by Zelensky. That refusal was based on the worst advice Boris Johnson every gave anybody, 5 weeks into the war, before a million further casualties.
The Art of No Deals
Trump demanded that Ukraine accept Russia's offer of direct negotiations "IMMEDIATELY".
President Trump said that he wanted Ukraine to accept Putin’s offer for direct talks without a ceasefire. “President Putin of Russia doesn’t want to have a Cease Fire Agreement with Ukraine, but rather wants to meet on Thursday, in Turkey, to negotiate a possible end to the BLOODBATH. Ukraine should agree to this, IMMEDIATELY,” he wrote on Truth Social.
[Antiwar]
Scatterbrained Trump then wafted the idea that he would walk in on the negotiations uninvited. He, it seems, needs the limelight, irrespective of the fact that staying away may actually help to settle a conflict, a primary plank of his election campaign. (*)
Whether the US withdraws from its fake facilitation of peace is anybody's guess. Uncertainty has become situation normal for the empire.
Trump may believe that diplomatic ambiguity is a strategy. It is not. It demonstrates that Trump is an incompetent statesman.
Constant inconsistency in international diplomacy is the art of no deals.
(*) There is more going on here. See the Helmer interview below. This will be covered in the … Extended podcast.
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Sources
The Genocide
Netanyahu Says the Ethnic Cleansing of Gaza Is 'Inevitable'; Dave DeCamp; Antiwar; 2025-05-12
ICJ:
case 192 (RSA v Israel under the Genocide Convention)
case 196 (opinion on Israel’s obligations)
Aid as a political weapon
Israel Is Creating a Power Vacuum in Gaza by Backing Armed Looters — and Killing Anyone Who Tries to Stop Them; Faris Giacaman and Tareq S. Hajjaj; Scheerpost; 2025-05-11
US establishes fund for Gaza aid distribution, no Israeli involvement; Al Mayadeen English; Al Mayadeen English; 2025-05-09
New Fund Established to Lead Gaza Aid Distribution Without IDF Involvement, U.S. Announces - Israel News - Haaretz.com; Haaretz; Archive.today; 2025-05-09
$320 million US pier collapses in Gaza, drifts to Ashdod (Video); Al Mayadeen English; Al Mayadeen English; 2024-05-25
BBC Mystifies Starvation in Gaza; Jonathan Cook; Consortium News; 2025-05-12
Rifts in US support for Israel
The Establishment Slowly Wearies of Netanyahu and Israel ; Simplicius; Simplicius' Garden of Knowledge; 2025-05-11
Multiple Western Press Outlets Have Suddenly Pivoted Hard Against Israel; Caitlin Johnston; Caitlin's Newsletter; 2025-05-12
Opinion - What Trump Should Keep in Mind on His Big Middle East Trip [Friedman]; NYT; Archive.today; 2025-05-09
Saudi nuclear power & a peace with Yemen
Exclusive: Under Trump, Saudi civil nuclear talks delinked from Israel recognition, sources say; Reuters; Archive.today; 2025-05-10
Trump Eyes 'Deal of the Century' With Saudis, Leaving Israel Little Room to Maneuver; Haaretz; Archive.today; 2025-05-10
Exclusive: Saudi Arabia pressed Trump to stop attacks on Yemen ahead of visit; Sean Mathews; Middle East Eye; 2025-05-06
Syria is a nightmare
This topic didn’t make the cut of the text
At Least 11 Alawites Killed in Syria as Sectarian Violence Continues to Rage; Jason Ditz; Antiwar; 2025-05-11
Trump Says He's Considering Lifting Sanctions on Syria; Dave DeCamp; Antiwar; 2025-05-12
Exclusive: Israel lobbies US to keep Russian bases in a 'weak' Syria, sources say; Reuters; Archive.today; 2025-03-10
Turkey talks with Israel about deconfliction in Syria when needed, foreign minister says; Reuters; Archive.today; 2025-04-09
Ukraine war: Putin calls for direct negotiations with Z
Putin Proposes Direct Talks With Ukraine, Zelensky Says Ceasefire Must Happen First; Dave DeCamp; Antiwar; 2025-05-11
Trump Says He's 'Thinking' About Joining Ukraine-Russia Talks in Turkey; Dave DeCamp; Antiwar; 2025-05-12
USS Liberty
Interesting Articles: mid February 2024; YesXorNo; 2024-02-14
Videos
Trump's Bold Move: Is Israel No Longer a Priority?; Alkhorshid interviews Larry C. Johnson; Dialogue Works; 2025-05-12
Johnson, on topic after topic, is eye openingly direct. Recommended.
My Week in Tehran.; Judge Napolitano interviews Alastair Crooke; Judging Freedom; 2025-05-12
Seyed Marandi & Alastair Crooke: Trump's Negotiations Fail; Glenn Diesen interviews Marandi & Crooke; Glenn Diesen (in Tehran); 2025-05-10
Ray McGovern and John Helmer: Enemies or Frenemies? The U.S. Position on Russia, Iran & China; Alkhorshid interviews McGovern & Helmer; Dialogue Works; 2025-05-12
Will Trump Dump Netanyahu?; Judge Napolitano interviews Prof. Jeffrey Sachs; Judging Freedom; 2025-05-12
Thunder⚡️Russia Rejects Ultimatums💥Kotliarivka Has Fallen⚠️ Military Summary And Analysis 2025.05.12; Dima; Military Summary; 2025-05-12
“Control of Bahatyr is melting before our eyes”, Ukrainian commander.
[Note for non-Russian speakers: Russia uses the letter ‘h’ for a swallowed version of the sound ‘g’. You may see Bahatyt spelled ‘Bagatyr’.]
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