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For the last month, I could not get the image of 6-year-old Lebanese girl Amal Dorr off my mind. Amal was killed in an Israeli airstrike on February 21 in South Lebanon along with another victim Khadija Suleiman, 40, whose child was seriously injured. Zaineb was on her was to visit her uncle's house nearby in the city of Majda Zion. This precious little girl is the same age as my granddaughter Zaineb.

Thousands of mourners came from all over Lebanese to attend Zaineb and Khadija's funeral in order to pay respect. Zaineb and Khadija's lives were tragically cut short by savage Israeli airstrikes on that day. Zaineb is the eighth star to light the sky over Lebanon since the start of Al-Aqsa Flood Operation. The other 7 Lebanese martyred children were: Taline and Layan Shour from the village of Ainata, killed on November 5, 2023. Also, Hussein and Amir Mohsen from Sawaneh village, killed on Feb. 14, 2024, and Ghadeer Tarhini and Mahmoud Amer from the town of Nabatieh who were killed on Feb. 13, 2024, according to Mayadeen English, Feb. 2022.

A couple of years ago, the iconic gate to the infamous World War II-era extermination camp at Auschwitz was stolen. As far as I know, the “crime” has not been solved. At the top of that gate was this classic bit of Nazi propaganda, proclaimed to the millions of doomed incoming victims: “Arbeit Macht Frei” (Work Makes One Free).

 “Arbeit Macht Frei” is a pretty good summary of what is otherwise known as “the Protestant work ethic” that started in Europe during the Protestant Reformation. Right-wing nationalists, anti-communist, pro-capitalist, pro-war, anti-Semitic, racist and religious reformers such as John Calvin and Martin Luther would have agreed that “Arbeit Macht Frei” supported their dogmatic teachings about fulfilling one’s patriotic duty to the state, the church or the industry that employed the people. 

If we condemn Hamas for its October 7 attacks in Israel, we’re not accused of anti-Arab bigotry. Nor should we be. Nothing could possibly justify the atrocities that Hamas committed against hundreds of civilians, who were the majority of the 1,200 people killed as a result of the attacks by Hamas forces. And nothing can justify the taking of civilian hostages.

When the foreign policy of a country as large and significant as the United States is governed by a case of cognitive dissonance, terrible things happen. 

 These terrible things are, in fact, already taking place in the Gaza Strip, where well over 100,000 people have been killed, wounded or are missing, and an outright famine is currently ravaging the displaced population. 

Probably fewer ideas are treated with more contempt in today’s world than . . . ahem: a one-state solution for Palestine and Israel, with, good God, every resident equally valued, equally free.

“Snort! No one wants this! It’s not possible — it’s not true!”

My reply to the cynics is this: We will not enter the future with closed minds. We will not find security — we will not evolve — if we choose to remain subservient to linear, us-vs.-them thinking. We will not become our fullest selves or have access to our own collective human consciousness if we choose to stay caged in our own righteous certainty. Our god is better than your god!

I acknowledge from the start: This is not a simple process, any more than America’s reluctant embrace of the civil rights movement was, or is, simple. But armed dehumanization — which is to say war, hatred, ethnic cleansing, cultural erasure, endless slaughter, the murder of children, genocide — is neither “simple” nor the least bit effective in creating a world that is safe for anyone. War and hatred perpetuate nothing but themselves. You know that, right?

GREEP #170 begins with QUASIM RASHID, candidate for Congress in Illinois, who offers a glimpse of a progressive new generation coming to power.

NANCY LARSON fills us in on the latest insanity from the Buckeye State.

SANDY BOLZENIUS, MARY STONEWALL, KARLA SANDS, WENDI LEDERMAN, LYNNE FEINERMAN and others chime in.

RAY MCCLENDON clarifies the latest developments in Trump’s Georgia election theft case and offers a harsh warning on the likelihood of election theft throughout the United States.

PAUL NEWMAN correctly attacks the spineless, listless Merrick Garland.

We then explore the dying nuke power industry alongside the rise of the booming wind industry in New York and elsewhere.

The great PAUL GUNTER, RON LEONARD, TATANKA BRICCA and others then explore the insanity of pro-nuke/anti-solar policies in DC and CA.

MARY OLSON also takes us deep into the realities of the deeply denied death toll at Three Mile Island.

JOHN LAFORGE of NukeWatch updates us on the killing power of tritium and other atomic fallout.

ROSEDANIE CADET delivers as astonishing report of chaos and hardship in HAITI that defies description.