Imperialism
Israel
Palestine
Fig. 1. The ruins of a terminal at the Gaza airport. Image by Said Khatib (Agence France-Presse) on September 9, 2018, via the Times of Israel,[1] fair use.
What’s also not changing is the growing global perception that Israel is at odds with the international system and reliant on the United States to shield it from further censure. Israeli officials were incensed by U.N. Secretary General António Guterres’s claim last year that the Hamas attack on Oct. 7 did not occur in a “vacuum” — an observation which Israel argued was justifying Hamas terrorism.
But this week’s proceedings in The Hague dig into what Guterres was invoking, reckoning with more than a half century of deeper, tragic context. The current drumbeat of extreme rhetoric from [Binyamin] Netanyahu’s political allies to the right — including rejections of any talk of Palestinian statehood or equal political rights, calls to carry out de facto ethnic cleansing in Gaza and even denials of the existence of the Palestinian people — offers a reminder of the parallel conversation taking place within Israel.[2]
Polina Ivanova, “Israel grapples with ‘Eichmann’ dilemma over Hamas attack trials,” Financial Times, February 21, 2024, https://www.ft.com/content/dbdc4ea2-d33f-43ce-b029-52a7cb8d2ae4
Ishaan Tharoor, “The world confronts Israel over its occupation of Palestinian lands,” Washington Post, February 21, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com//world/2024/02/21/israel-occupation-palestine-gaza-un-icj-hearing/
Neoliberalism
Academic repression
Student loans
Fig. 2. Unattributed and undated image via James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal,[3] fair use.
I’m afraid Megan Tomasic’s report isn’t terribly helpful in explaining who will benefit from Joe Biden’s latest round of student loan relief. Instead, she spends more space retreading Biden’s initial program, which was struck down by the Supreme Court. Look for an email, I guess.[4]
Megan Tomasic, “Biden administration to forgive $1.2 billion in student loan debt, impacting 153,000 borrowers,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, February 21, 2024, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-nation/2024/02/21/biden-administration-to-forgive-1-2-billion-in-student-loan-debt/stories/202402200105
- [1]Agence France-Presse and Times of Israel, “20 years after its opening, destroyed Gaza airport embodies grounded peace hopes,” Times of Israel, September 12, 2018, https://www.timesofisrael.com/20-years-after-its-opening-destroyed-gaza-airport-embodies-grounded-peace-hopes/↩
- [2]Ishaan Tharoor, “The world confronts Israel over its occupation of Palestinian lands,” Washington Post, February 21, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com//world/2024/02/21/israel-occupation-palestine-gaza-un-icj-hearing/↩
- [3]Richard K. Vedder, “Eliminate or Radically Restructure Federal Student Loans,” James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal, September 16, 2020, https://www.jamesgmartin.center/2020/09/eliminate-or-radically-restructure-federal-student-loans/↩
- [4]Megan Tomasic, “Biden administration to forgive $1.2 billion in student loan debt, impacting 153,000 borrowers,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, February 21, 2024, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-nation/2024/02/21/biden-administration-to-forgive-1-2-billion-in-student-loan-debt/stories/202402200105↩