News Briefs for December 12, 2024
HAVANA TIMES – Here are the top international news stories compiled by Democracy Now on Thursday, December 12, 2024.
Israel Bombs Syria’s Ports; Turkish-Backed Rebels Seize Territory Held by Kurdish Militias
Dec 12, 2024
Israeli forces are continuing a large-scale bombing campaign of Syrian targets following the ouster of Bashar al-Assad, attacking the Port of Latakia and a weapons storehouse in Tartus. Israeli troops have pushed deeper into the occupied Golan Heights and a demilitarized buffer zone established by the United Nations a half-century ago.
In northern Syria, fighters with the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army have seized more areas, including the city of Deir ez-Zor, amid clashes with U.S.-backed, Kurdish-led militias. Elsewhere, Turkey’s intelligence agency bombed a convoy of trucks driven by Kurdish fighters who had seized heavy weapons and ammunition abandoned by Syria’s military. Fighting in northern Syria has displaced more than 100,000 people.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has arrived in Jordan for emergency talks on Syria. He heads to Turkey next.
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Families of Syria’s Disappeared Search for Loved Ones in Sednaya Prison
Dec 12, 2024
In northern Syria’s Latakia region, opposition fighters set fire to the tomb of Hafez al-Assad, Syria’s longtime authoritarian leader and father of ousted President Bashar al-Assad.
Tens of thousands of Syrians are gathering in Damascus today to attend the funeral of opposition activist Mazen al-Hamada, whose body was discovered in a morgue of the notorious Sednaya prison, showing signs of torture. On Tuesday, families of disappeared prisoners continued searching Sednaya for signs of their long-lost loved ones who were locked up under Assad’s brutal regime.
Hayat al-Turki: “I will show you the photo of my missing brother. It’s been 14 years. This is his photo. I don’t know what he looks like, if I find him. I don’t know what he looks like, because I am seeing the photos of prisoners getting out. They are like skeletons. But this is his photo, if anyone has seen him, can know anything about him or can help us. He is one of thousands of prisoners who are missing. I am asking for everyone, not only my brother, uncle, cousin and relatives.”
In Damascus, the leader of the armed group HTS, Abu Mohammad al-Julani, has vowed to shut down Assad’s notorious prisons, including Sednaya, and to dissolve Assad’s security forces. After headlines, we’ll get the latest on Syria.
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Israel Kills Dozens of Palestinians in Strikes Across Gaza Strip, Incl. Humanitarian Workers
Dec 12, 2024
In Gaza, an Israeli drone strike on a humanitarian aid convoy west of Khan Younis has killed at least 13 people and injured dozens of others. It’s the latest Israeli attack on relief workers, after the U.N. reported last month that Israel has killed at least 333 humanitarian personnel since October 7, 2023.
The Palestinian news agency Wafa reports other Israeli attacks over the past 24 hours killed seven people, including children, in a bombing of a residential building in Gaza City; another 15 Palestinians were killed when Israel bombed a home west of the Nuseirat refugee camp.
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Israeli Sniper Kills Kamal Adwan Surgeon Dr. Saeed Jouda
Dec 12, 2024
Palestinian orthopedic surgeon Dr. Saeed Jouda has died after he was shot by an Israeli sniper in northern Gaza. Dr. Jouda had left retirement to treat patients at the besieged Kamal Adwan Hospital, which has endured weeks of bombings and direct attacks on its staff.
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UNGA Overwhelmingly Votes for Gaza Ceasefire; WSJ: Hamas Agrees to 2 Key Israeli Ceasefire Demands
Dec 12, 2024
On Wednesday, the United Nations General Assembly voted overwhelmingly in favor of a resolution calling for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire in Gaza. Just seven countries joined the United States and Israel in voting against the resolution.
Meanwhile, The Wall Street Journal reports that Hamas has agreed to two of Israel’s key demands for a ceasefire in Gaza. For the first time, Hamas has revealed a list of hostages it holds in Gaza, and Hamas has reportedly agreed to a deal that would allow Israeli forces to remain in Gaza temporarily when the fighting stops.
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Israeli Forces Withdraw from Southern Lebanese Town as Israel’s Violations of Truce Continue
Dec 12, 2024
The U.S. military said Israeli forces completed their first withdrawal from Al-Khiyam in southern Lebanon as part of a ceasefire agreement reached at the end of November. Israel has continuously violated the truce, including on Wednesday, when its forces struck several southern Lebanese towns, killing at least five people, according to Lebanon’s Health Ministry.
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U.N. Experts Urge World to Hold Israel Accountable, Call on U.S. and Germany to Halt Arms Supplies
Dec 12, 2024
At the Geneva U.N. headquarters, a panel of experts held a news conference and called for a halt to direct arms transfers to Israel, and a review of Israel’s U.N. membership over its genocide in Gaza. This is U.N. special rapporteur Ben Saul.
Ben Saul: “If lawlessness on this scale and of this extremity has no consequences, then it sends a signal to everybody else that you can behave in the same way, and the whole system begins to break down. … Germany and the United States supply 99% of the weapons exported to Israel. They could stop this conflict overnight if they stopped the weapons that kill the Palestinians.”
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11-Year-Old Girl from Sierra Leone Appears to Be Lone Survivor of Refugee Shipwreck That Killed 40+
Dec 12, 2024
Image Credit: Compass Collective
In Italy, rescue workers pulled an 11-year-old girl out of the Mediterranean after she survived three days at sea clinging to a pair of inner tubes following a shipwreck. The child, who is from Sierra Leone, is believed to be the only survivor from the ship, which had been carrying some 44 asylum seekers to Europe.
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Christopher Wray Resigns as Trump Hopes to Confirm Conspiracy Theorist Kash Patel as Head of FBI
Dec 12, 2024
FBI Director Christopher Wray announced he will resign at the end of President Biden’s term. Wray was appointed by then-President Trump in 2017, but Trump turned on Wray over the FBI’s investigations into Russian election interference, the January 6 Capitol insurrection and Trump’s mishandling of classified documents. Trump has nominated far-right conspiracy theorist Kash Patel to lead the FBI, who has called for the FBI’s D.C. office to be closed and turned into a “museum of the deep state.”
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Trump Taps Kari Lake to Lead VOA, Kimbery Guilfoyle as U.S Amb. to Greece, Tom Barrack as Turkey Amb.
Dec 12, 2024
On Wednesday, Trump tapped Kari Lake, prominent election denier and failed candidate for Arizona senator and governor, to helm Voice of America, the federally funded international media broadcaster.
Meanwhile, Trump selected Kimberly Guilfoyle, fiancée to Donald Trump Jr., to be the U.S. ambassador to Greece. The announcement came just hours after a British tabloid published photos of Trump Jr. holding hands with Palm Beach socialite Bettina Anderson.
Trump also appointed longtime associate and billionaire investor Tom Barrack as ambassador to Turkey. Barrack was charged, and later acquitted, with acting as an unregistered foreign agent for the United Arab Emirates, conspiracy, obstruction of justice and making false statements to the FBI when he worked as an adviser to Trump from 2016 to 2019.
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Sens. Manchin, Sinema Join GOP to Sink Democratic Control of National Labor Relations Board
Dec 12, 2024
Image Credit: Geraldshields11/Wikimedia
In a blow to organized labor, outgoing Senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema have voted against President Biden’s renomination of Lauren McFerran for another five-year term as chair of the National Labor Relations Board, preventing Democrats from locking in their current 3-2 majority on the federal board through 2026. Sinema and Manchin’s “no” votes, along with the opposition of Republican senators, means the NLRB will almost certainly come under control of Republicans after Trump takes office. The NLRB is charged with protecting workers’ right to organize, and settling disputes between unions and employers, including anti-labor megacorporations like Amazon and Starbucks.
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House Votes 281-140 in Favor of $895 Billion Military Spending Bill
Dec 12, 2024
The House of Representatives on Wednesday passed a $895 billion Pentagon bill which includes a ban on gender-affirming care for children of military personnel. Vermont Democrat Becca Balint, one of the 140 House members — mostly Democrats — to vote against the National Defense Authorization Act, said, “We cannot continue to bankroll a nearly $1 trillion military budget, while we underfund schools, housing, and more. It’s long past time we put the urgent needs of working families before giving a blank check to the military industrial complex.”
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Older Student Loan Borrowers Rally at Education Department Demanding Biden Cancel Crushing Debts
Dec 12, 2024
Image Credit: The Debt Collective
Student loan borrowers in their fifties, sixties and seventies rallied in front of the Education Department in Washington, D.C., Wednesday to demand the Biden administration cancel their crushing debts before leaving office. People sixty and above are the fastest-growing demographic of student debtors and risk having their Social Security checks garnished for unpaid debt. This follows another protest last week by loan recipients who were defrauded by predatory, for-profit schools.
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Dozens of Democrats Join Activists in Demanding Biden Certify Equal Rights Amendment
Dec 12, 2024
Image Credit: Elizabeth Wight
U.S. Capitol Police arrested several activists Tuesday as they blocked Constitution Avenue as part of a protest demanding President Biden publish the Equal Rights Amendment before leaving office. Dozens of Democrats are also calling on Biden to quickly move to codify the ERA, which has been approved by 38 states but was never ratified. Among them is Congressmember Cori Bush, who spoke at a press conference on Tuesday, the 101st anniversary of the ERA’s introduction in Congress.
Rep. Cori Bush: “For months, President Biden and Democrats warned of the threat posed by Donald Trump on our bodily autonomy and on our democracy, a threat that is about to become reality very soon. President Biden has the power to do something about this. He has the ERA. The ERA is one sentence that has the power to protect our future: ‘Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.’”
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Biden Commutes Sentences of 1,500 Nonviolent Offenders in Largest-Ever Presidential Clemency
Dec 12, 2024
President Biden announced he is commuting the sentences of some 1,500 people and pardoning another 39, in what the White House says is the largest single-day act of presidential clemency. The commutations will affect people who were transferred from prison to home confinement during the pandemic. The pardons involve nonviolent crimes, including drug offenses. Advocates are pressing Biden to commute federal death sentences before leaving office, as well as pardon or grant clemency to high-profile figures facing political persecution, including human rights lawyer Steven Donziger, Assata Shakur, Leonard Peltier and Edward Snowden.