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May 11th, 2021
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Almost 1,600 children were killed or wounded in airstrikes in Afghanistan over the past five years, according to a report from Action on Armed Violence (AOAV).
The report analyses data released earlier this year by the UN and found that between 2016 and 2020, there were 3,977 civilian casualties from airstrikes in Afghanistan, 1,598 of which were children. Out of that number, 785 were killed, and 813 were wounded.
About 50 percent of the civilian casualties were caused by the US and its NATO coalition partners. The rest were at the hands of the Afghan Air Force, which is entirely propped up by the US.
By Dave DeCamp
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At least 20 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli airstrikes that were launched across Gaza on Monday, including nine children. Another 60 Palestinians were wounded in the bombing.
Eyewitnesses said the strikes targeted crowded civilian neighborhoods. Among the slain were two siblings, eleven-year-old Ibrahim al-Masri and seven-year-old Marwan, from the city of Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza, who were killed while playing in the street.
"My children were martyred. I cannot find any justification whatsoever for targeting someone passing through overcrowded civilian neighborhoods where dozens of children usually play," Youssef al-Masri, the father of the children, told Middle East Eye.
By Dave DeCamp
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The Mideast is aflame as usual. Even Israel is suffering through a seemingly unending election crisis, with a continuing electoral majority for the right but against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
In a normal world Washington wouldn't worry about the result, but the U.S. government has offered a near-blank check for the Israeli state for years, driven by religion rather than security - though, oddly, evangelical Christianity much more than any form of Judaism. The ascendancy of an Israeli government comfortable with a permanent subject Palestinian population, ala Sparta's infamous Helots, creates a dangerous source of instability for and hostility to America.
The ongoing attempt to form a government illustrates how even Arab citizens are second class, kept at the margins of Israeli society. Palestinians are treated much worse.
By Doug Bandow
Twice last week, the federal government's unconstitutional spying on ordinary Americans was exposed. One of these revelations was made by a federal judge in Washington, D.C., who wrote that the FBI is still using warrantless spying in criminal cases, notwithstanding the Constitution and federal laws. The other revelation was a surprise even to those of us who monitor these things - the United States Postal Service acknowledged that it has been spying on Americans.
Here is the backstory.
The modern American security state - the parts of the federal government that spy on Americans and do not change on account of elections - received an enormous shot in the arm in 1978 when Congress enacted the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. That naively misguided and profoundly unconstitutional law was sold to Congress as a way to control the security state's spying in the aftermath of Watergate.
By Andrew P. Napolitano
A piece was published in Turkey's Hrriyet on May 5 by its editor-in-chief Sedat Ergin analyzing the prospects of the Biden administration removing American nuclear bombs from Turkey.
It has been estimated that the Pentagon maintains 50 B61 tactical nuclear weapons at the Incirlik Air Base in the country among an estimated 350 of those kept in Europe under the auspices of a NATO nuclear sharing or burden sharing arrangement. Both expressions are used. The other 300 bombs are reputed to be in Belgium, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands.
By Rick Rozoff
Most Americans likely assume that the mission of the U.S. Coast Guard is to protect the coasts of the United State from maritime threats. Increasingly, though, that is no longer true, as Coast Guard vessels and personnel now routinely operate thousands of miles from the US homeland. Moreover, they frequently are not engaged in "defensive" missions, but are instead part and parcel of Washington's arrogant force projection around the world.
The traditional missions were not always sensible or achievable ones, to be sure. During the 1920s and early 1930s, Coast Guard cutters were tasked with trying to intercept shipments of liquor trying to reach thirsty consumers in the United States. Not surprisingly, that mission proved to be utterly futile and frustrating.
By Ted Galen Carpenter
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