by Stephen Lendman

Israel is waging premeditated, unprovoked war on Palestine. The shocking toll on defenseless people mounts daily, ignored by deplorable Western and Israeli media - portraying naked aggression as self-defense against “knife-wielding terrorists,” mindless of a new generation of Palestinian youths demanding freedom they deserve.

As America commemorates its rogue warrior tradition on Veterans Day, honoring young men and women sent to wage wars of aggression globally against invented enemies, Palestinians count their dead, wounded and imprisoned heroes, victims of Israeli ruthlessness. As of November 11, soldiers and police murdered 82 Palestinians in cold blood, including 18 children and four women - 72-year-old widow Tharwat al-Sharawi lethally gunned down in her car en route to have lunch with her sister.

She threatened no one. Claims otherwise were vicious lies. Israeli forces killed her husband, Fuad, 25 years ago during the first Intifada. Seven children lost both parents. IDF shoot to kill policy claimed another life.

More than 8,500 Palestinians were injured since October 1, a shocking total with likely many more to follow - by live fire, potentially lethal rubber/plastic-coated steel bullets, stun grenades, toxic tear gas and vicious beatings.

The Palestinian Health Ministry said Israeli forces most often use live fire against defenseless Palestinians, including peaceful protesters.

Most wounded victims were shot in their upper bodies, many in serious condition, showing shoot to kill is official Israeli policy, gunning down defenseless civilians in cold blood.

Every day is bloody in Palestine, the world community ignoring the horrific ordeal endured by millions of long-suffering people, now under siege, attacked daily by rampaging Israeli forces.

Ahead of Netanyahu’s meeting with Obama on Monday, he approved another 2,200 illegal settlement units on stolen Palestinian land, as well as plans to build two new settlement outposts east of Ramallah, an affront ignored during discussions in Washington.

Palestine’s Foreign Ministry called the move “part of the overall Israeli escalation policy and aggression against the Palestinian people and constitute a flagrant challenge to the international community’s will and the international legitimacy resolutions.”

Palestinian Prisoner Society attorney Fawaz Alshalodi said children abducted by Israeli forces suffer horrifically in detention - 62 in Jafon prison.

On Tuesday, he visited the facility. Most incarcerated children are being tortured and severely beaten, he said. Guards storm prison areas aggressively, commit horrific abuses freely, conduct humiliating searches.

Medical care is denied. Food served is unfit to eat, warm clothes and hot water not provided, sanitation nonexistent, isolation frequently imposed, family visits and communications with relatives by phone not allowed - how a brutal occupier operates always, intensified now.

Soldiers and police terrorize Palestinians daily. Fear of death, injury or imprisonment haunts an entire population, victims of Israeli viciousness - its killing machine generously funded by Washington, billions of US taxpayer dollars annually for endless wars without mercy.

A Final Comment

Separately, on November 10, with no public announcement or media reports, the White House continued a national emergency “with respect to Iran,” first imposed by executive order on November 14, 1979 by Jimmy Carter - “pursuant to the International Emergency Economic Powers Act…”

Obama claimed US “relations with Iran have not returned to normal” - showing Washington’s hostile intentions toward the Islamic Republic remain unchanged. The nuclear deal changed nothing.

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Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

His new book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks World War III".

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

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