Anti-War

We are nine months into the Donald Trump presidency and the road ahead seems pretty clear. There is an unsustainable one trillion dollar Pentagon budget supporting a newly renamed Department of War and Washington is engaged in conflicts that could escalate in Europe, Asia, South America and Africa. If it were possible to stage a bellicose incident near or in Antarctica that would also no doubt become a target, just as the Arctic region is currently playing into fantasies involving Greenland and Canada. Trump has even stopped talking to friendly neighbor Canada about trade relations over an ad that he did not like and no doubt will be discussing invasion soon.

It is particularly difficult to pick out the most idiotic comments made by President Donald Trump over the past week as there is so much to choose from. There were the memorable doodle-headed speeches before the Israeli Knesset and the so-called Peace gathering in Sharm el-Sheikh Egypt and the threats against Hamas over the failure to come up with the bodies of Israeli hostages that were killed by American government provided bombs dropped by Israel and are now buried beneath piles of rubble. And then there is the Insurrection Act, cited nearly every day by Trump or one of his cabinet, which, if it is successfully called for and passes through judicial review, will truly turn the United States into a police state ruled by a leader that clearly is mentally incompetent as well as providing all the signs that he is a narcissistic psychopath whose goal in holding the presidency is to be surrounded by folks who tell him constantly how great he is! And let’s not forget the bloviation regarding the “Triumphal” Arch being planned for the Arlington National Cemetery end of Memorial Bridge leading to the Lincoln Memorial in Washington.

I sit here at my desk, looking out the window – and see someone walking through the parking lot. This is the most ordinary of moments. I shrug quietly. Life goes on.

My impulse is to stop writing the column here. That’s it. Nothing more to say. Life is totally fine and civilized and I’m here in the middle of it, growing old but giving no thought whatsoever to the darkness that lurks at humanity’s margins. Sure, the news covers that stuff, but what do I care? Things are fine where I live.

But the darkness tugs. I read the news. I know that hell consumes parts of the planet and certain lives have no safety – no value – whatsoever. Here’s a recent New York Times headline, as ordinary as the fact that someone was walking through the parking lot outside my window:

“U.S. Military Kills Another 6 People in 5th Caribbean Strike, Trump Says.”

Well, so what? They were transporting drugs. “The military has now killed 27 people as if they were enemy soldiers in a war zone and not criminal suspects. . . .”

If we are to speak of a Palestinian victory in Gaza, it is a resounding triumph for the Palestinian people, their indomitable spirit, and their deeply rooted resistance that transcends faction, ideology, and politics.

For decades, the prevailing notion was that the 'solution' to the Israeli occupation of Palestine lay in a strictly negotiated process. “Only dialogue can achieve peace” has been the relentlessly peddled mantra in political circles, academic platforms, media forums, and the like.

A colossal industry burgeoned around that idea, expanding dramatically in the lead-up to, and for years after, the signing of the Oslo Accords between Yasser Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and the Israeli government.

The Unmaking of 'Peace'

Another day, another Israeli massacre in South Lebanon. Hassan Atwi and his wife Zainab Raslan were killed in an Israeli drone strike in southern Lebanon on October 6, 2025. The strike targeted their car in the village of Zabdin, near Nabatiyeh, according to Dearborn.org-News & media website.

Hassan Atwi, who is an engineer, was reportedly blinded in a pager blast last year and his wife lost her right hand. The couple had two sons who were killed during the 2023-24 Israel air bombing campaign of Lebanon. 

The Lebanese health ministry also reported Monday's attack and confirmed, "two people were killed and one wounded when an Israeli drone strike targeted a car on the Zebdin road in the Nabatiyeh district" of southern Lebanon, reported the New Arab Staff and Agencies on October 6.

Over 4,000 people were killed in Israel's attacks in Lebanon since the November 27, 2024 ceasefire agreement was signed.

It is interesting how President Donald Trump keeps whining about the 20 alleged Israeli hostages that are reportedly still held by Hamas in Gaza, demanding that they be released immediately, while ignoring the hundreds of unarmed Palestinians that are being murdered daily by Israeli military and armed contractors as well as by deliberate starvation. Also, the thousands of Palestinians who had nothing to do with Hamas or Gaza and are nevertheless being held without charge in Israeli prisons under horrific conditions including torture are of no interest to the US president and his team. Trump is of course profoundly ignorant, demonstrated most recently during his 55 minute rambling speech to the United Nations General Assembly in which he attacked both the UN institutionally as well as nearly every delegate and nation represented in the room, minus the Palestinians, of course, for whom he had blocked the issuance of visas guaranteeing that they would have no voice or presence in New York.