♥️Nick Cave ♥️ „Perhaps Wim is trying to save the Berlinale from succumbing to the fate of those festivals that have become little more than a narrowing of the cultural imagination, where the concept of an arts festival as a space for free-ranging and diverse ideas, a place of vitality and originality that encourages disagreement and good faith debate, is being sucked down the sinkhole of a single monolithic ideology — one voice, one cause, one dissent.“ theredhandfiles.com/film-fes…

BREAKING: U.N. chief António Guterres distances himself from Francesca Albanese. This follows her rejection now by foreign ministers of France, Germany, Austria, and Italy. 🇺🇳 Spokesman: “We don't agree with much of what she says.”

I survived the genocide. I lost loved ones. I lost a home. I lost a business. We are mentally, financially, and psychologically done. When we condemn Hamas, it’s our basic right. It’s none of your business. You don’t get to call us “traitors” and “collaborators” from afar, scum.

It’s October 7th. Two years ago, I would’ve described myself as progressive. That day showed me I was standing on the side of people that are truly evil. I really held two contradictory views from being in the movement. I’ve heard all these things about Israel abusing the Palestinians and I believed them. I also had seen antisemitism growing up in Mississippi and felt very strongly it was something decent people should fight. And so I did what almost no other progressive did in the aftermath of October 7th. I took time to really read and study the conflict before voicing opinions on it. And it turned out everything the progressive movement has been claiming the Israelis were doing was just frankly a lie. Six wars and six major conflicts since 1948, and Jews had started none of it. The constant barrage of rocket attacks on civilians truly shocked my conscience, something none of my friends seemed to care about. In the two years since that horrific day and progressives have been crystal clear. Jews don’t count. And since I decided to stand with them, they’ve made it clear that I don’t count either. It has been like setting my career and friendships on fire. I regret literally nothing because that inch of integrity is all we have in this world. But I do regret standing for so long with a movement fundamentally, incapable from telling good from evil.

It was still dark, November 20, 2013 when the ambulance left Gaza through the Erez Crossing. Inside was a baby girl, barely one year old, her chest rising in fragile rhythm under the oxygen mask. Her mother sat beside her, silent, clutching a small blanket. The driver said the destination softly, almost apologetically: Schneider Children’s Medical Center, Petach Tikva - inside Israel. The Israeli doctors didn’t ask who she was. They simply began to work - tubes, machines, monitors. The baby’s infection had spread too far. For a few days, they tried everything. Then she was sent back home, still breathing, but fading fast. She died not long after. Seven months later, June 3, 2014, another ambulance crossed that same checkpoint - this time carrying an elderly woman, weak and pale, headed for a Jerusalem oncology ward. Four months after that, October 19, 2014, yet another woman was taken in through Ichilov Hospital in Tel Aviv, rushed into intensive care after a surgical complication. Each case, quiet, discreet - handled by Israeli doctors, coordinated through Israeli channels, and permitted despite the risks. Three medical rescues. Three acts of mercy. And every one of those patients belonged to the same family: the family of Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of Hamas. Yes - the same man whose organization was firing rockets at those very cities while his loved ones were being treated in their hospitals. We all know stories like this in Gaza - whispered, denied, but never forgotten. The same people who condemn Israel in speeches will secretly call Israeli coordinators when their relatives fall sick. And the same society that depends on that help will mock anyone who admits gratitude. It’s not just hypocrisy. It’s identity confusion - a culture that fears honesty more than hunger. From childhood, we’re taught that aid from Israel is humiliation, and that violence redeems it. So when we receive medicine or electricity, we must repay it with anger to prove we haven’t betrayed “the cause.” Our leaders understand this perfectly: guilt keeps the people obedient. As long as we’re torn between needing Israel and hating it, they stay in power. The West calls these stories “exceptions.” They’re not. They are the rule - a system built on contradiction, where the same movement that sends its daughters to Tel Aviv for treatment sends rockets to destroy Tel Aviv the next day. We have normalized madness. Our freedom won’t begin with revenge. It will begin with truth. When we can finally say, without fear, that an Israeli doctor tried to save a Palestinian child, and that this does not make us weak or ashamed, we’ll start to heal. Because dignity is not found in death or denial - it’s in the courage to face our own reflection.

SHOCKING: During a ceremony awarding antisemite Francesca Albanese honorary citizenship in Reggio Emilia, Italy, the Free Palestine crowd booed the mayor when he called for the release of the hostages. Francesca herself — a UN Special Rapporteur — couldn’t help but roll her eyes. Why is this supposedly ‘peaceful crowd, claiming to want nothing more than a ceasefire’, so afraid of the hostages being freed? A true humanist would defend both Palestinians suffering in this war and the 48 hostages tortured in Gaza for two years. It’s not a choice of one or the other. Unless… you hate Jews.

It’s still a genocide, even if Palestinians refuse the ceasefire to end it.

Hamas's secret police (Sahm/arrow unit) is turning up the heat against starving civilians in Gaza. It arrested a group of men who received food boxes from a GHF site in Rafah, only to steal their food parcels, beat, and strip them naked. According to those who were arrested, members of Hamas's unit were asked why they're doing this, and the reply was "instructions from the leadership." It seems that Hamas will be fighting tooth and nail to stop GHF from functioning by punishing Gaza's civilians for obtaining food from distribution sites. If these incidents become common, it means the terror group is declaring total war on the mechanism in a desperate bid to restore the old aid distribution system, which was much easier for the group to exploit. Nevertheless, this is a continuation of Hamas’s long involvement in contributing to the hunger crisis throughout the war in the Strip.