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We speak with the secretary general of Amnesty International about the human rights group's new report on the "global political economy enabling Israel's genocide, occupation and apartheid" against Palestinians. Agnès Callamard says Israel's "24 months of genocide" since October 2023 would not be possible without international support and the continued supplying of Israel's war machine by major arms makers, technology firms and other companies. The report names the U.S. military contractors Boeing and Lockheed Martin, the Israeli arms companies Elbit Systems, Rafael Advanced Defense Systems and Israel Aerospace Industries, the South Korean conglomerate Hyundai and the U.S. tech company Palantir Technologies, among others. While Israel faces growing international condemnation over its actions in Gaza, Callamard says other states must push for an immediate ceasefire and impose consequences, including an arms embargo on Israel.
"You can denounce as much as you want. If you do not take actions, including economic actions, then your words are empty," says Callamard.
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Just days after President Trump threatened to wage war on the city of Chicago, ICE launched what it called "Operation Midway Blitz," and President Trump claimed the city was "about to find out why it's called the Department of WAR" — a reference to his order to rename the Department of Defense. On Monday, the Supreme Court allowed the Trump administration to resume indiscriminate immigration raids in Los Angeles. "Donald Trump is targeting Los Angeles and California because this is a city and a state in which multiculturalism and ethnic diversity have worked," says Viet Thanh Nguyen, Pulitzer Prize-winning author. He also discusses Trump's use of the term "Chipocalypse Now," a reference to the epic Vietnam War film Apocalypse Now, and discusses how his Vietnamese heritage led him to support Palestinian liberation. "I identified strongly with the plight of Palestinians, because one of the first things that one of the Israeli ministers said after October 7 was that they were fighting human animals — by which he meant Palestinians — and that idea of reducing other people to being less than human is one of the key narrative acts that justifies genocide," he says.
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