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US Supreme Court limits EPA’s power to regulate carbon emissions

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Ohio
A coal-fired power plant on the Ohio River west of Cincinnati. One Democratic senator warned the right-wing majority’s ruling “could unleash a new era of reckless deregulation that will gut protections for all Americans and the environment.” Photo © 2013 Robert S. Donovan Licensable under the Creative Commons license.

US Supreme Court drops carbon bomb on the planet

by Jake Johnson — Common Dreams

The US Supreme Court’s right-wing majority handed down a decision Thursday that will severely limit the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority to regulate planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions from power plants, undermining the federal government’s ability to combat the climate emergency.

In its 6-3 ruling in West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency, the court’s conservative justices—led by Chief Justice John Roberts—sided with the coal industry and Republican attorneys general who sought to curb the EPA’s rulemaking powers under the Clean Air Act.

Amy Coney Barrett, one of the right-wing justices who voted to limit the EPA’s authority, has family ties to the fossil fuel industry.

Liberal Justice Elena Kagan warned in her dissent that “today, the court strips the Environmental Protection Agency of the power Congress gave it to respond to ‘the most pressing environmental challenge of our time.'”

Environmentalists echoed that assessment in response to the majority’s decision, the latest in a series of hugely consequential rulings over the past week. According to EPA data, the power sector represents the United States’ second-largest source of greenhouse gas emissions.

“A Supreme Court that sides with the fossil fuel industry over the health and safety of its people is anti-life and beyond broken,” said John Paul Mejia, national spokesperson for the youth-led Sunrise Movement. “We cannot and will not let our Democratic leaders stand by while an illegitimate court and the GOP goes on the offense.”

Wenonah Hauter, executive director of Food & Water Watch, said in a statement that the court’s ruling is “part of a broad-based assault on the ability of regulators to protect our air, water, and climate.”

“Long-sought by corporate polluters, industry-backed think tanks, and politicians who serve monied fossil fuel interests, this decision strikes at the heart of federal experts’ ability to do their jobs,” added Hauter, who stressed that “while this ruling intends to hamstring the federal government’s ability to regulate dangerous emissions, it does not signal the end of climate action.”

“The climate movement must and will continue to pressure agencies and elected officials at the local, state, and federal levels to enact policies that ensure a swift reduction in climate pollution and an end to the fossil fuel era,” Hauter said. “The Supreme Court will not stand in the way of the fight for a livable planet.”

The court’s ruling spells serious issues for President Joe Biden’s vow to put the United States on a path to 100% clean electricity by 2035. Meanwhile, the administration is moving ahead with oil and gas leasing on public lands, drawing backlash and legal action from climate groups.

The People vs. Fossil Fuels coalition, made up of more than 1,000 -based environmental groups, called on Biden to use his still-existing authority to “declare a climate emergency and stop new fossil fuel leases, exports, pipelines, and other infrastructure today.”

“Using authorities under the National Emergencies Act and the Defense Production Act,” the coalition noted, “the president could also halt crude oil exports, stop offshore oil and gas drilling, restrict international fossil fuel investment, and rapidly manufacture and distribute clean and renewable energy systems.”

 

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Editorials: Panama’s unfolding crisis; and The Truth

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Chiriqui
Partial roadblock at the bridge over the Chiriqui River. From a video on the Palabra Pública Twitter feed.

Something of a social explosion

Strikes, disruptive roadblocks, weighty political questions up in the air, the country swirling down into a sinkhole of debt, a widespread crime wave and mutual disrespect the growing norm – Panama is in trouble. Were there some program of action, some confidence building move, it would likely fail because there are too many interests in conflict and people have been betrayed too many times.

A jobs program? Reasonable enough. For those with PRD connections only? We see that already and it does not impress.

A rollback in fuel prices? We see that announced, but it’s little, it’s late and global forces are at work to prevent all that much relief on that front. The same applies to the prices of foods that are based on imports, or locally grown using imported materials.

Let’s not go looking for super-villains, nor sly conspiracies. Yes, we have both villains and plots but we have structural and cultural faults that are widespread within Panama, and some folks with good or bad intention applying their pressures from without.

This “everyone for themselves” attitude has to go. So does the “what’s in it for me?” mindset. So does the search for scapegoats who are different from ourselves. So does the search for some foreign savior.

We need to govern ourselves differently, at all levels. Easier said than done, but nobody else is going to save Panama.

 

An email exchange with Melania on January 6, 2021 – a bit of circumstantial evidence that also suggests the thinking in the Trump entourage that day.

The rules

The basic rule is that the majority rules in a democracy, and the minority carries on as the opposition to make itself the majority the next time around.

Yes, in the USA there are distortions of that, the biggest one the Electoral College, and then at state and local levels there are all sorts of gerrymandering and vote suppression tactics, some of which reach into the makeup of the federal Congress and the overall popular vote for all offices.

But the rule of thumb is about who got the most votes, and those who didn’t need to adjust their activity to change it the next time, if they can. That was the big rule that Donald Trump violated.

Now the MAGAs cry foul that a congressional committee that lacks the power to fine or imprison anybody is, through witnesses and documents, unfolding the story of an attempt to thwart both the 2020 popular and Electoral College vote. They demand an adversarial procedure, with all sorts of disruptions, to keep the American people from following the story. They intimidate and vilify witnesses. They cherry-pick little incongruities to deny elephant-in-the-room truths.

It’s time to defend the United States of America and its constitutional order against all enemies foreign and domestic. Against Donald Trump and his thugs.

Some of them already have been to trial, but let those who have not get the full panoply of defendants’ guarantees – the exclusion of hearsay from the evidence, the right for to have lawyers who pester with objections, the right to a disinterested jury. But the congressional investigation isn’t one of those. It’s a truthful explanation to the American people and to the world, and the committee has been giving us that.

 

If you miss a shot, you missed it. You can’t go back. You can only try to not make the same mistake twice. I’ve won a lot in my career, and I’ve lost a lot. You take the good with the bad. Also, it’s not only about winning. It’s about the process and the journey, the people you’re with, continuing to grow and learn, and getting better every day.

Megan Rapinoe

 

Bear in mind…

 

The pleasure of all reading is doubled when one lives with another who shares the same books.

Katherine Mansfield

 

Fame and wealth without wisdom are unsafe possessions.

Democritus

 

The closer the collapse of the Empire, the crazier its laws are.

Marcus Tullius Cicero

 

 

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Convergencia Sindical, La vaina de MedicSol

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labor on another privatization
 

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Economy: Again, the non-scientific view from Coronado survey

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C1
Off in the distance, you might barely be able to pick them up, there are more empty billboards than there are outdoor ads promoting this or that good or service. It’s a sign of a weak economy, imprecise but very real. The signs in front of stores, for beer and for telecom services tend to be exceptions.

Signs of the times — still HARD times

photos and captions by Eric Jackson

Look around you. See which business premises are vacant, are smashed up by maleantes, are under construction, seem to be working fewer hours. Taken along with other indicators as a visual whole on this day late in June, these add up to signs of a weak economy.

Go into a store where you regularly shop, and see how much space is devoted to alcohol as compared to other things, and the balance of cheap versus expensive food products.

And then pay attention to the advertising business, even as you rationally take all advertising to be lies. Empty billboards? Online hype for crypto investments or other forms of gambling? The few industries that are doing well duking it out for market share, but otherwise a lot of empty advertising space?

The food court upstairs from the Super 99 — itself deserted except for the Bamboo Express — whose hsiu mai dumplings the editor endorses as a cheap and good lunch deal — is a good observation point. Especially when coupled with the bus rides between Coronado and rural Anton district.

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The telecom industry is going through a concentration under the monopoly-friendly Cortizo administration and the typical gouging is well underway. But notice the cell tower atop empty billboards.

The gym is open. The church is still there. Nothing happening at the playground and only one business running in the food court. And nobody wants to buy these ad spaces from the Martinellis.
 

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Castro-Rodríguez, Miami Spanish broadcast blackout on damning testimony

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PBs
Proud Boys marching in Washington on January 6, 2021, prior to the assault on the US Capitol. Wikimedia photo by Elvert Barnes. Since then they have marched into leadership positions within the Republican Party in Miami.

In Miami no Spanish-language radio or TV coverage of Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony

by Manuel Castro-Rodríguez

The congressional committee investigating the January 6, 2021, has established that it thinks at least some of the attackers, such as leaders of the far-right Proud Boys and Oath Keeper groups, premeditated the attack on the Capitol, but:

• 1- Mr. René García, who is the chairman of the Miami-Dade Republican Party, Miami-Dade County Commissioner and former state senator, refuses to denounce seven Proud Boys that are on Miami-Dade GOP exec committee.
• 2- Senator Marco Rubio refuses to denounce seven Proud Boys that are on Miami-Dade GOP exec committee.
• 3- No radio or television station in Spanish in Miami has broadcast this news about Senator Marco Rubio and the chairman of the Miami-Dade Republican Party, René García.

The congressional committee investigating the January 6, 2021, insurrection held a surprise hearing Tuesday that featured a key witness: Cassidy Hutchinson, who was a top aide to President Donald Trump’s last chief of staff, Mark Meadows.

Hutchinson is not a household name, but she’s become central to the committee investigation — she sat for four recorded interviews and was the only live witness at the Tuesday hearing. In her live testimony, Hutchinson provided an intimate and detailed look inside the West Wing — and at the president, specifically — on the day of the attack:

• 1. Trump knew some of his supporters had weapons — and encouraged them to march on the Capitol. And he tried to go, too.
• 2. Trump wrestled with his Secret Security agent as he sought to go to the Capitol
• 3. Trump didn’t want to call off the rioters
• 4. Trump threw dishes

No radio or television station in Spanish in Miami has broadcast this news about the testimony of Cassidy Hutchinson, who was a top aide to President Donald Trump’s last chief of staff, Mark Meadows. Miss Hutchinson said, among other things:

I just had an interesting conversation with Rudy, Mark. Sounds like we’re going to go to the Capitol,” she told Meadows. “He didn’t look up from his phone and said something to the effect of, ‘There’s a lot going on, Cass, but I don’t know, things might get real, real bad on January 6th.

Me? Every day I comply with the naturalization oath of allegiance to the United States of America that I made: “I promise that I will protect the Constitution and all laws from all enemies, from other countries, or from inside the United States,” even if the enemies are Senator Marco Rubio and the chairman of the Miami-Dade Republican Party, Miami-Dade County Commissioner and former state senator René García.

 

 

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Trump hit hard by January 6 witnesses

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Bennie
January 6 committee chair Bennie Thompson meets with labor leaders several years ago. AFGE photo.

‘Bombshell after bombshell’ dropped as testimony homes in on Trump guilt

by Brett Wilkins – Common Dreams

Democracy defenders responded to Tuesday’s testimony by a former Trump administration aide before the January 6 committee by demanding that the former president and his co-conspirators be held to account in the face of increasingly incriminating evidence of their culpability for the 2021 insurrection.

Cassidy Hutchinson, who served as a special assistant to Mark Meadows, former President Donald Trump’s last chief of staff, revealed what the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen described as “bombshell after bombshell” during her in-person testimony to members of the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol.

Lisa Gilbert, executive vice president of Public Citizen and co-chair of the Not Above the Law Coalition, said in a statement that “in the reams of evidence against Trump and his allies, Hutchinson’s testimony of the deeply detailed plans of January 6 and the inaction of those in the White House in response to the violence show just how close we came to a coup.”

“Her testimony comes at a critical point in the hearings, showing the conspirators knew what they were doing was illegal, and knew it could result in violence, yet they proceeded anyway,” she added. “And that once the violence was ongoing, the president refused to act.”

Among other things, Hutchinson testified that:

• Trump knew that heavily armed supporters were in Washington, DC to attend the “Stop the Steal” rally that preceded the January 6 attack and was infuriated that Secret Service agents were trying to bar them from the event;
• When Secret Service agents told Trump they would not take him to the Capitol, he became physically aggressive with one of them, telling him “I’m the fucking president” and grabbing the steering wheel of the presidential limousine;
• Despite pleas from top aides—including White House counsel Pat Cipollone’s warning that “people are going to die, and blood is going to be on your fucking hands”—Trump refused to act as the Capitol was overrun; and
• Meadows and attorney Rudy Giuliani sought preemptive presidential pardons for their roles in Trump’s effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

“Trump and his chief of staff Mark Meadows were warned repeatedly of anticipated violence on January 6th yet did nothing,” Common Cause president Karen Hobert Flynn said in response to Hutchinson’s testimony. “They were informed of semi-automatic rifles and pistols—AR-15s and Glocks—being carried by members of the audience on the Ellipse, hours before his speech, yet Trump incited the crowd and called on his heavily armed audience to march on the Capitol and ‘fight like hell.'”

Hobert Flynn continued:

The armed and vicious mob he sent to the Capitol on January 6th was the final desperate act in a months long, multi-layered criminal conspiracy by former President Trump and his henchmen to ignore the will of the American people and overturn the legitimate results of the 2020 election by any means.

His actions and inaction as the insurrection unfolded, outlined in sworn testimony to the January 6 select committee, [are] jaw-dropping, un-American, and yet another warning to us all. Just when we think accounts of the actions of the former president and his inner circle can get no worse, we learn that in fact it can.

Gilbert of Public Citizen said that “Hutchinson’s testimony blows any notion of plausible deniability surrounding January 6 out of the water. She said Trump knew his rally crowd was armed, but said they weren’t there to hurt him. He encouraged an armed crowd to go to the Capitol, and told them that he would be with them.”

Progressives said Tuesday’s testimony underscored the imperative for accountability for Trump and members of his inner circle.

Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI) tweeted that Trump “knew dangerous weapons were headed to the Capitol. He knew Congress was the target. He said the VP deserved to be hung for upholding the Constitution. He attacked a member of his Secret Service. He incited an insurrection.”

Common Cause’s Hobert Flynn asserted that “the former president and his co-conspirators must be held accountable by the Justice Department and any other authority with jurisdiction, including by state or local officials where parts of this scheme were plotted and carried out.”

Echoing Hobert Flynn, Gilbert said that Hutchinson’s testimony “makes it absolutely clear that Donald Trump remains a danger to our democracy and to our nation.”

She added, “There must be accountability for the criminal conspiracy to steal our votes that ultimately led to the violence on January 6 that we now know the administration anticipated, and that Trump encouraged.”

 

 

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Las científicas de STRI: Sol Parra y sus mariposas

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La joven entomóloga Sol Parra utiliza tecnología de edición genética para comprender cómo el mimetismo de patrones de color evoluciona en mariposas. Patrones dentro de patrones: la investigadora Sol Parra ha estado trabajando en este proyecto desde enero 2022, editando la genética de mariposas Heliconius y analizando los patrones de color resultantes en sus alas, buscando patrones que puedan indicar cómo exactamente estos genes determinan cómo lucen estas mariposas. Foto por Jorge Alemán — STRI.

¿Cómo los genes de las mariposas hacen posible
que imiten los patrones de color de alas de otras?

por STRI

Especies diferentes de las deslumbrantes y coloridas mariposas Heliconius son conocidas por su habilidad de desarrollar patrones de color de alas casi idénticos, una defensa evolutiva contra aves insectívoras, las cuales reconocen que mariposas con ciertos patrones de alas tienen mal sabor. Mientras más parecidas las mariposas, más rápidamente las aves aprenden a evitar comer cualquiera de ellas.

Particularmente intrigados por dos especies, Heliconius erato y Heliconius melpomene, los investigadores quieren saber por qué cada especie tiene tantas subespecies que imitan los patrones de alas de su contraparte en la otra especie.

Los científicos que trabajan en el Laboratorio Heliconius de Gamboa del Instituto Smithsonian de Investigaciones Tropicales descubrieron qué determina el fenotipo (características observables) en las mariposas, causando los patrones de color de alas casi idénticos: un gen en la secuencia de ADN de las Heliconius llamado WntA.

Utilizando la tecnología CRISPR de edición genética, los investigadores inyectaron huevos frescos de mariposas con una proteína llamada CRISPR-Cas9, la cual se adhiere al gene WntA y lo saca de la secuencia de ADN, cortando la cadena. Las células rellenan el espacio y reparan la cadena, pero sin la plantilla que trae el gen WntA, las mariposas adultas frecuentemente desarrollan patrones de alas asimétricos aparentemente aleatorios, lo cual prueba que el gen contiene la información que determina los patrones de color.

Pero ¿por qué este gen siempre es expresado con los mismos resultados? ¿Por qué los pares miméticos aún lucen casi idénticos, a pesar de ser diferentes especies, viviendo en diferentes regiones y condiciones?

Sol Parra, graduada de biología de la Universidad Nacional de Colombia y pasante de investigación en el laboratorio, comenzó un proyecto a principios de 2022 para estudio la región en la secuencia del ADN que precede el gen WntA, la cual puede ser la reguladora de la actividad de este gen.

“Las zonas reguladoras son áreas en la secuencia del ADN a las cuales otras proteínas se pueden adherir, y estas proteínas promueven o inhiben la expresión del gen,” explica Parra. En otras palabras, sin estas redes que regulan al gen WntA, las alas de una mariposa pueden no lucir como se espera.

Cada mañana, Parra y el equipo recolectan huevos recién puestos por las mariposas en las plantas hospederas. Cuidadosamente pegan los minúsculos huevos a una lámina de vidrio, y los colocan bajo un microinyectador; una aguja microscópica de cuarzo inyecta los huevos con una guía de ARN, una molécula parecida al ADN, la cual lleva a la proteína CRISPR-Cas9 directo al gen WntA y lo remueve.

El equipo cuida los huevos inyectados mientras comienza el ciclo de vida de las mariposas Heliconius: dentro de tres a cuatro días una larva (oruga) sale del huevo y crece por dos a tres semanas, alimentándose de las espirales de la planta Passiflora y sintetizando alcaloides, los químicos que le dan a las mariposas su mal sabor cuando son adultas. La larva forma entonces una crisálida (pupa), donde pasa una semana hasta que una mariposa completamente desarrollada emerge; los adultos viven entre 4 a 6 meses.

Una vez que tienen una mariposa adulta, el equipo analiza cambios en los patrones de las alas y los comparan con los patrones en mariposas silvestres. “A veces se nota a simple vista,” dice Parra. “Cuando las diferencias no son tan cuantitativas, utilizamos fotografía de alta calidad para comparar, o un programa computacional que analiza patrones de color.”

Parra continuará este estudio hasta Julio, inyectando huevos y estudiando los resultados, con la esperanza de comprender cómo exactamente las regiones reguladoras en el ADN de las mariposas trabajan sobre este gen.

“He trabajado con insectos desde el principio, y me interesa cómo el mimetismo ha evolucionado en las Lepidópteras (polillas y mariposas), y los fenómenos que explican el mimetismo desde la genética,” Parra declara. Debido a que las mariposas son organismos modelos para estudios evolutivos, los resultados de esta investigación podrían revelar mucho sobre cómo se adaptan en un mundo altamente cambiante.

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“Cuando las diferencias no son tan cuantitativas, utilizamos fotografía de alta calidad para comparar, o un programa computacional que analiza patrones de color.” Foto por Jorge Alemán — STRI.

 

 

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There’s prejudice here, but take conventional wisdom with a boulder of salt

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Gaby at Pride 2022
Some 6,000 people catch what entertainer Gaby Gnazzo had to say at the Pride celebration in Parque Urraca, which took place on the evening of a rainy Saturday. Photo from the World Pride Panama Twitter feed.

…Then there were detractors — perhaps

by Eric Jackson

Earlier in the week the SPI presidential guards disrupted the Pride Week picnic in Parque Omar. The park administration, a part of the First Lady’s office, quickly apologized but the homophobe groups continue to claim that park rules were violated. Some of these arguments twist the regulations against putting signs and banners and so on on the park’s fence or other fixtures into a ban on carrying the rainbow flag. Some of them invent things about lewd conduct or other things they might have imagined about a picnic. In any case the religious far right and the neofascists in this country ALWAYS approve of police hassling gay people, so they put out the call for their followers to show up dressed in white at Parque Omar on the Sunday after Pride Saturday to support a more repressive Institutional Protection Service (SPI):

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The groups that were posting this on social media?

No photos, not a word. Well, not about the gathering they called. A Twitter storm about Sodom and Gomorrah and all sorts of insulting comments about Saturday’s pride marchers, but silence about their own gathering. We may presume that it did not happen and that they are not in a position to claim a gay plot without being laughed at.

Yes, Panama has this heavy streak of homophobia, wherein people hesitate to vote for anyone LGBT nor any sort of Q, for starters. But we also have a strong privacy culture, which makes discussions about anyone else’s sexuality, let alone inquiries to a questioned person, beyond the pale gauche. Dignity and equality for homosexuality are unlikely to get through this current legislature, where a handful of deputies regularly rail against the queers. But if they call a rally, few people will show for the homophobe cause.

 

 

 

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Ben-Meir, The Abraham Accords and the Occupation

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The assassination of Al Jazeera reporter Shireen Abu Akleh, a Palestinian-American dual citizen who worked for a Qatar-based multilingual international news medium, and then the subsequent police attack on her funeral in East Jerusalem, might be shrugged off by cynical politicians looking at some “big picture.” But especially in the Arab world, at such politicians’ peril. The Abraham Accords have been in the making for several years — what has ultimately brought them to fruition is the Arab states’ national security interests. By no means though have the Arab states abandoned the Palestinian cause, which will continue to haunt them and Israel until an independent Palestinian state is established.

The Abraham Accords’ implications
for the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

by Alon Ben-Meir

There is a prevailing sense among Israelis that the Abraham Accords suggest that the Arab states have, for all intents and purposes, abandoned the Palestinian cause. To the Israelis, those Arab states have presumably concluded that they can benefit greatly on a number of spheres from normalization of relations with Israel, which override their concerns over the Palestinians’ fate. This is just another fallacy that Israelis like to embrace. It suits their baseless contention that the occupation no longer presents an obstacle to normalizing relations with the Arab states, and Israel’s long-standing resistance to the establishment of a Palestinian state is now accepted as a fait accompli.

That said, Israeli leaders still view the Abraham Accords as a historic breakthrough that will have major regional and national positive implications. They forget the fact that these Accords will remain hostage to the geopolitical winds that sweep the region as well as what the Palestinians might or might not do in the months and years to come.

A brief historical background

Since the introduction of the Arab Peace Initiative (API) in 2002, the Arab states, led by Saudi Arabia, have de facto recognized Israel’s right to exist but conditioned normalization of relations with Israel upon “the acceptance of the establishment of a sovereign independent Palestinian state on the Palestinian territories occupied since June 4, 1967 in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, with East Jerusalem as its capital.” Once these conditions are met by Israel, the API notes that the Arab states will “enter into a peace agreement with Israel, and provide security for all the states of the region….and establish normal relations with Israel in the context of this comprehensive peace.”

From the time the API was introduced 20 years ago, however, the geopolitical environment in the Middle East has dramatically changed.

On the Israeli side, the eruption of the Second Intifada in 2002 on the heels of the API destroyed what was left of Israel’s trust of the Palestinians, and the peace negotiations between the two sides in 2008-2009 and 2013-2014 ended in failure. In the interim, Israel has vastly expanded its settlements enterprise and annexed more Palestinian land, while the Israeli public was steadily moving to the right-of-center, making the prospect of establishing a Palestinian state ever more remote.

On the Palestinian side, extremism was on the rise, especially by Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The Palestinian Authority (PA) was plagued by internal rivalry, corruption, and stark polarization, especially between Hamas and the PA. Israel’s harsh occupation further intensified the Palestinians’ resistance, and violence between the two sides became more frequent. The PA’s negotiating stance further hardened, afraid of being seen as betraying the Palestinian cause. Thus, little room was left for meaningful concessions to reach any agreement with Israel, especially under former PM Netanyahu’s 13 consecutive years in power, who vowed not to allow the establishment of a Palestinian state under his watch.

Recognizing Israel’s prowess

The growing Iranian threat against Israel and the Arab states, and Tehran’s ambition to become the region’s hegemon, provided a common national security cause between Israel and especially the Arab Gulf states to rally against Iran’s threats and to disabuse Tehran from its regional ambitions. To that end, going back nearly two decades, Israel began to share intelligence and provide military-related advanced technology with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Saudi Arabia in particular, who felt directly threatened by Iran.

Hence, the Gulf states began to view Israel as a strategic partner due to four critical factors: a) Israel’s military prowess is second to none in the region and rivals even both Shiite Iran and Sunni Turkey; b) Israel’s unmatched intelligence capability which the Gulf states have and continue to eagerly seek; c) Israel’s world-renowned advanced technology which they badly needed to enhance their military machine and fighting capabilities among many other civilian uses; and finally, d) Israel is a nuclear power on which the Gulf states can rely, even more so than the US because Israel itself is existentially threatened by and is in the forefront to deter Iran.

The above four factors provided Israel with huge political leverage, and even though Israel continues to occupy Palestinian land, the regional geopolitical conditions and the Gulf states’ desire to collaborate with Israel presented them with a challenge and a choice: to normalize relations with Israel now or stick to the API, which conditioned normalization with Israel upon settling the conflict with the Palestinians. The signatories to the Abraham Accords opted for the first option because what Israel has and continues to provide them is critically important and urgently needed to serve their national security. Moreover, the Abraham Accords put Iran on notice that the region was growing more united in its opposition to Tehran.

The Arab states’ evolving position

Making that choice however, does not translate, as many Israelis believe, to the Arab states abandoning the Palestinian cause. To the contrary, they view the Abraham Accords as a means by which to serve their national interest on one hand, while changing the dynamic of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on the other, and in so doing break the impasse between them that prevailed especially under Netanyahu’s tenure.

It should be noted that the Abraham Accords clearly stipulates that the parties will “…[commit] to continuing their efforts to achieve a just, comprehensive, realistic and enduring solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.” In an interview, UAE Ambassador to the United States Yousef Al Otaiba reinforced that specific provision, stating that the normalization agreement was a result of the Emirates’ efforts to stop further Israeli annexation of the West Bank. In fact, since the Accords were signed, Israel has not annexed another inch of Palestinian territory, albeit it continues planning for the future expansion of existing settlements.

This is not merely lip-service. The Arab states, just like Israel, are stuck with the Palestinians. They may disagree with them on a host of issues, especially with Hamas’s extremism, but they cannot and will not indefinitely accept or tolerate the brutal Israeli occupation. The recent conflagration between Israeli soldiers and police and Palestinian youth at the Temple Mount should serve as a reminder to the Israelis as to where the Arab world really stands.

The occupation humiliates not only the Palestinians but the Arab states as well. They can swallow only so much of Israel’s gross human right abuses, settlers’ unprovoked violence against innocent Palestinians, and the killings of hundreds of Palestinians each year, often without any justification. And if there were to be a major violent eruption between Israel and the Palestinians, which is only a question of time, the Arab states with no exception, will side with the Palestinians regardless of who instigated the violence.

Israel’s lost perspective

Every Israeli who does not seek to end the Israel-Palestinian conflict should ask themselves where Israel will be 15-20 years down the line. Do they really believe that the Arab states will gradually forget about the Palestinians? Do they think that Israel’s founders envisioned a Jewish state that would permanently occupy Palestinian land in the West Bank, maintain an indefinite blockade on Gaza in the east, and systematically and openly discriminate against Israeli Arab citizens? How many more generations of warriors does Israel want to raise and train, only to rain havoc on the Palestinians? What damage has this already done and will do to the Jewish Israeli character? The one and only Jewish state will become a pariah state and hit a new moral bottom, constantly threatened and living by the gun.

The promise of the Abraham Accords

The recent free trade agreement between Israel and the UAE and the extent of their bilateral trade is extremely significant, as such an agreement would further cement their relations. Moreover, the UAE along with Bahrain and other Gulf states are discussing the prospect of a security alliance, which the Biden administration fully supports. To be sure, the ties in many spheres between Israel and the Gulf states will continue to grow as long as no major violent Israeli-Palestinian conflagration erupts.

However, regardless of how desperate the Gulf states may be for Israeli technology, intelligence, trade, and knowhow, for them the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with its capital in East Jerusalem remains sine qua non to a comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace. To be sure, as long as there is no Israeli-Palestinian peace based on a two-state solution, the current normalization process will remain fragile at best, subject to the changing geopolitical environment as well as to the intensity and the pitfalls of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Now that new elections are scheduled to be held in October, every Israeli should remember that Israel’s ultimate national security rests on peace with Palestinians. To that end, they should elect leaders who commit to ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Abraham Accords should be viewed then as the building block on which to erect a comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace that includes the Palestinians, and not as Accords that expunge the Palestinians’ rightful demand for an independent state of their own.

The Abraham Accords offers Israel the unique opportunity to move in that direction, and any Israeli leader who does not realize that is forfeiting the promise of Israel’s founders and the premise on which the state was created.

Dr. Alon Ben-Meir is a retired professor of international relations at the Center for Global Affairs at NYU. He taught courses on international negotiation and Middle Eastern studies for over 20 years.

 

 

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10 key US Senate races

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In 10 key US Senate races, here’s how top candidates responded to Roe ruling

by Brett Wilkins — Common Dreams

With the fate of reproductive rights for tens of millions of Americans now dependent upon federal and state lawmakers in the wake of the Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v. Wade, Common Dreams takes a look at how Democratic and Republican candidates in 10 key US Senate races responded to Friday’s ruling.

Calling Friday “a sad day for the court and for the country,” President Joe Biden urged Americans to elect congressional candidates who will vote to codify reproductive freedom and state lawmakers who will defend abortion rights.

“Voters need to make their voices heard,” the president asserted. “This fall Roe is on the ballot. Personal freedoms are on the ballot. The right to privacy, liberty, equality; they’re all on the ballot.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), who has faced criticism for backing anti-choice Democrats over progressive candidates and for downplaying the growing threat to reproductive rights, warned: “Be aware of this—the Republicans are plotting a nationwide abortion ban. They cannot be allowed to have a majority in the Congress to do that, but that’s their goal.”

Reproductive rights advocates have stressed the need for the Senate to pass the House-approved Women’s Health Protection Act in order to codify the protections afforded by Roe into federal law. However, without a majority large enough to overcome or reform the filibuster, there remains no hope for the bill’s passage.

With an eye on November’s midterm elections, here’s how leading Democratic and Republican candidates in 10 key Senate races responded to Friday’s Supreme Court decision.

Pennsylvania

Democratic Senate nominee and Lt. Gov. John Fetterman called the ruling “unjust” and “wrong,” vowing to “fight it with everything I’ve got,” while Dr. Mehmet Oz, the Republican nominee, welcomed the decision, which he said can be the “greatest gift of all” to mothers and children.

Nevada

Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto tweeted that “today is a devastating day for women in America,” and that she is “standing with the majority of Nevadans and Americans more determined than ever to fight for a woman’s right to choose.”

Republican challenger Adam Laxalt—the former state attorney general who promotes the “Big Lie” that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from former President Donald Trump—called the ruling “a historic victory for the sanctity of life and the principles of democratic self-determination.”

Georgia

Democratic incumbent Raphael Warnock said he was “outraged” by the decision, pledging that “as a pro-choice pastor, I’ll never back down from this fight.”

Warnock’s GOP opponent, former NFL player Herschel Walker, said he “won’t apologize for erring on the side of life,” while praising the court for sending the issue of abortion “back to the states, which is where it belongs.”

Arizona

Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) tweeted that “today’s decision is a giant step backward for our country,” and that “it’s just wrong that my granddaughter will have fewer freedoms than my grandmother did.”

Arizona voters won’t elect a Republican Senate candidate until August. Among the contenders, state Attorney General Mark Brnovich said the justices upheld their responsibility “to defend the most vulnerable among us,” while Trump-endorsed venture capitalist Blake Masters hailed what he called “a huge victory for children across this country.”

Wisconsin

Sen. Ron Johnson (R) cheered the ruling as “a victory for life and for those who have fought for decades to protect the unborn.”

Meanwhile, the crowded Democratic primary field condemned the decision. Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes warned that “thousands of women will suffer and die” as a result, while state Treasurer Sarah Godlewski said she was “outraged and absolutely devastated.” Outgamie County Executive Tom Nelson stressed the need to “expand our majority to abolish the filibuster [and] codify Roe v. Wade,” and Milwaukee Bucks executive Alex Lasry asserted that Republicans “are not going to stop at Roe.”

“We’ve got to get out and vote Ron Johnson and Republicans up and down the ballot out of office,” Lasry said. “There is too much at stake.”

New Hampshire

Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-NH) lamented that “the court just took away a woman’s most fundamental freedom,” and that “for the first time in our country’s history, our daughters will grow up with fewer rights than their mothers had.”

Republicans seeking to oust Hassan include former Londonderry Town Manager, who supports “returning this matter to the state legislatures;” retired army Gen. Don Bolduc, who said the justices “made the right decision;” and state Senate President Chuck Morse, who said the decision “has no impact on New Hampshire.”

North Carolina

Democratic nominee and former state Supreme Court Chief Justice Cheri Beasley argued the high court set “a dangerous precedent for our personal freedoms,” while her GOP opponent, Trump-backed US Rep. Ted Budd, called the ruling “a historic victory for the millions of Americans who believe that every life is precious and deserves protection.”

Ohio

Venture capitalist and “Big Lie” purveyor J.D. Vance called Friday “a great day,” while quoting from the Old Testament. In stark contrast, US Rep. Tim Ryan, the Democratic nominee, tweeted that “we should be about expanding rights, but this Supreme Court is taking them away.”

“In overturning Roe v. Wade, today’s decision gives the green light to extreme politicians back home in Ohio to go all in on denying women the freedom to access lifesaving care,” he added.

Florida

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) tweeted that “today’s decision means that the laws regarding abortion in your state will now be decided by elected legislators in your state,” while Democratic challenger and US Rep. Val Demings said she is “mad as hell” but “not giving up.”

Missouri

Republican primary frontrunner and disgraced former Gov. Eric Greitens applauded what he called “a huge victory for the life movement.”

Among the crowded Democratic primary field in the race to replace retiring Republican Sen. Roy Blunt, nurse and brewery heiress Trudy Busch Valentine vowed to “work relentlessly for my constituents to be able to make their own healthcare decisions.” Meanwhile, Lucas Kunce, an attorney and Iraq and Afghanistan war veteran, tweeted that “a lot of the same politicians who demanded we keep up an endless war in Afghanistan so we could ‘protect women and girls’ are now criminalizing abortion across the country.”

“Missourians can’t just wait for another election,” he asserted. “Senate Democrats need to end the filibuster and codify Roe NOW.”

Addressing the midterm elections, Planned Parenthood Votes executive director Jenny Lawson said in a statement that “the shock waves from today’s devastating decision will ripple through to November, when our choices this election cycle could not be clearer.”

“One side worked for years to overturn Roe v. Wade and now wants a nationwide abortion ban. The other is fighting to leave personal health care decisions up to a patient and their doctor,” she continued. “Voters see this court ruling, they see states already banning abortion, they see their freedoms being handed over to politicians, and they are outraged.”

“This November, Planned Parenthood Votes will ensure that outrage translates to massive voter turnout and victories for candidates who unapologetically support abortion rights,” Lawson added.

 

 

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