When will Middle East conflict end?

Posted on 8th March 2024 by Simon Reed

From a social media post:

“Hamas and the Israeli forces have sowed the seeds of another century of hatred and conflict…”

Not sowed the seeds. It is already a well-established and ancient forest of hatred and conflict. It has been fed and watered frequently with bitterness and blood since before records began.

They like it this way. It is embedded into people’s culture and lore, into their tradition and values.

It can be changed, but not until:

they want it to change;
the rest of the world stops interfering to make it worse;
the privatised arms industry is dismantled or otherwise not allowed to profit from provoking war; the women say “enough!” (which is hard when the cultures suppress women’s voices);
they recognise that people with different value and beliefs are equal;
they accept compromise and forgiveness over vengeance;
they accept mistakes and harm are caused on all sides;
they convince one another that getting along without bloodshed is what they want;
they recognise that everybody has to live somewhere;
they accept we are not entitled to anything when we are born other than what we are given by other people and that means someone else has to go without so we must share.
In the above ‘they’ means ‘everyone’ and anyone who says otherwise is part of the problem and not ready for change.

It can be done, and has been done many times around the world. But this one is particularly tricky.

It is International Women’s Day today. I wonder how many will be killed in conflict today. Probably about 10 to 20 in Gaza, some more in Yemen, some more elsewhere. Does anyone keep count? Perhaps someone should. How’s that for a global metric?

10,000 dead children in Gaza? Really?

Posted on 6th February 2024 by Simon Reed

From someone in a social media discussion:

85,000 children dead in Yemen due to their civil war. More than 10,000 dead in Gaza since October.

Which got the reply:

The 10,000 number for Gaza is an exaggeration. Hamas is a terrorist organization that pulls numbers out of a hat. The only way the 10,000 could be accurate is if they are counting their teenage soldiers as children.

My response:

1) HOW MANY DEAD CHILDREN?

It is so unusual to have precise numbers in a conflict it made me doubt the figures too. So I did some light research. Checking with non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in the medical, reporting and conflict resolution sectors, plus the UN and independent aid agencies gives some insight.

These figures are validated, verified and the records independently checked. Trusted news organisations have looked into how they come about and are content.

The US government challenged the numbers because israel’s were one tenth of the Palestinians’ numbers. Israel was wrong and released much bigger numbers nearly the same as the Palestinians were giving out.

The numbers you see online of total deaths and child deaths and confirmed and trustworthy.

The IDF claims they are killing just two civilians for each combatant. They give no more details at all than that. The US says the IDF has killed between 5000 and 9000 Hamas combatants, meaning a ratio of between 1:2 and 1:4. Let’s assume the IDF figure is accurate, and not as flawed as their previous numbers.

Let us also pretend that ratio applies to the use of child soldiers, regardless of how young so including babies.

That means there are at least 6,600 confirmed civilian child deaths. Is that an acceptable number?

By the way, teenage soldiers are still children. Child soldiers are victims too.

2) ACCURACY OF THE NUMBERS

The principal source is the Gaza’s Ministry of Health (MoH). On the face of it, probably the least reliable of sources since it is run by Hamas. However…

In December, when the MoH reported 15,899 dead, the Times of Israel reported the IDF confirmed 5,000 combatants + 10,000 civilian = 15,000 deaths. So the IDF is giving similar numbers. This is far higher than the Israeli government had been claiming in November; it is the Israeli government that has had to revise its reporting, upwards by a factor of ten! It later said this was because they were providing numbers of confirmed terrorists, not Palestinians. This discrepancy was used by Joe Biden to erroneously say the MoH figures were wrong.

MoH uses a centralised computer system with each hospital providing details of each casualty and corpse. They release figures every few hours. When the US queried the details in October, the MoH provided the raw data including names, ID numbers and so on. At that time it was 6,747 named dead and 281 unidentified.

The data is shared with the totally separate health ministry in the West Bank. It confirms the numbers itself and says it trusts the figures provided. The ID numbers for Gaza, West Bank and Israel are held by the Israeli Population Registry Office and so can be validated.

The MoH has a long track record of being reliable, according to the World Health Organization and the UN. In conflicts in 2008, 2014 and 2021, the MoH’s figures at the time matched the UN’s own subsequent investigation figures to within 4%. Israel’s own figures for the 2014 war were 2125 killed, UN said 2251 and MoH said 2310 – so within 9% of Israel’s estimate. When Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem tallied up deaths in 2014, it made it 2185 (9% fewer) but said such differences were “fairly normal” and down to different ways of counting.

3) WHO TRUSTS THE NUMBERS?

Médecins Sans Frontières confirm the numbers (plus detail attacks and airstrikes on medical facilities and staff).

Airwars – a charity that investigates civilian deaths in conflicts – has done a specific analysis of scores of these records to check them and confirmed them. They have now checked and independently confirmed the details of over 900 of the bodies.

The charity Every Casualty Counts studies death tolls in wars and they say all they found was one person recorded twice in the data.

The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine analysed the data statistically, such as correlating ID numbers and age, and could find no evidence of falsification.

Human Rights Watch’s Israel and Palestine director: “These figures are professionally done and have proven to be reliable”.

The Guardian newspaper, generally considered a very reliable source for such information, are content the numbers are realistic. The BBC has also investigated and reported on the numbers with the same conclusion. Ditto for Reuters.

Note that these numbers are only the known deaths. They do not include people missing or bodies still buried under rubble and not reported. The Palestinian Red Crescent and US government’s assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs say the numbers must be higher than those published.

It is also only confirmed dead. Tens of thousands have had hospital treatment, many with life-changing wounds. That will include children, and have created orphans.

Airstrikes kill civilians

Posted on 18th September 2021 by Simon Reed

We are told that drone strikes have surgical precision.

We are told that intelligence is always checked before targeting people.

Afghanistan: US admits Kabul drone strike killed civilians

We are told lies.

These are extra-judiciary (i.e. sentence delivered without trial) executions (i.e. killings). We usually call that murder.

Why is nobody held accountable?

Oh, I forgot. We are. By the families, friends and sympathisers of the victims, who hold us responsible for the actions of our military and governments.

Are you happy, being party to mass murder of innocent civilians, including children?

If not on the military, then what?

Posted on 5th January 2020 by Simon Reed

With regard to withholding military taxation such that it is spent on something else, a common challenge is “On what?”

On the Beeb news it says “Australia bushfires: Fundraiser reaches A$20m in 48 hours“. The Australian government spends that much on their military every 8½ hours.

That story also says “Prime Minister Scott Morrison has called up 3,000 reserve troops to help“. That is 3.7% of their armed forces. 15% of their reserves (i.e. civilians being called away from their day jobs) and 0% of their active personnel.

If 3.7% of the Australian military budget was permanently re-allocated to fire prevention (as opposed to ‘Oh shit, the whole country is on fire, maybe we ought to act now‘), it would provide AUS$765,000,000 annually. Nearly 40 times what has been raised from charitable giving to help save the country.

Australia spends just over AUS$1,000 per capita on militarisation. The fundraiser is equivalent to 20,000 people’s military expenditure, about 0.078% of the population. Military expenditure is 1.9% of GDP and 5.1% of government spending.

Perhaps Australia should spend a bit less on battle tanks and a bit more on the land they drive around on. The Leopard tanks they had from 1976 to 2007 were never used. They currently have 59 M1A1 Abrams tanks; these have also never been used. They would like to increase that to 90. Each one costs about AUS$13m. Just ⅔rds of a fund-raiser each.

Export Processing Zones and ‘economic wellbeing’

Posted on 27th December 2019 by Simon Reed

In Open University module DD301 Critical Criminology we learned about Export Processing Zones or EPZs. These are where a government sets aside a piece of land near an airport or other transfer terminal and designates it outside the normal employment legislation. This means manufacturers can set up in that region to process goods more cheaply than they otherwise would. It attracts business to the country and so is seen as a good thing. Governments charge lower tax rates and sometimes pay for the building of factories.

The downside is that the legislation that is set aside is health and safety, minimum wage, working hours, rights to union membership and strike and other protections of employment rights. Also, environmental legislation and tax collection can be set aside. The companies can operate more cheaply because they are not competing on a level playing field; they can treat the workers there differently.

What tends to happen is that companies play one government off another to get better and better conditions for themselves and so there results a ‘race to the bottom‘ as governments compete to give the most favourable terms. The flip side to this is that it results in the work going to those countries most willing to remove employment rights and environmental protection. And when something goes wrong, the parent companies are rarely held accountable. From my DD301 essay TMA02:

Collaborations occur between corporations and states for economic reasons that cause social harms, such as in the Export Processing Zones (EPZs) where developing countries are obliged to lower regulatory standards to compete for businesses to move there, resulting in people working there having fewer human rights than they would otherwise have had (Tombs and Whyte, 2010, p. 161) showing corporations have negotiating power over supranationally recognised human rights. In 2011 the International Labour Organisation described Nigeria’s eleven EPZs as “veritable theatres of abysmal disrespect for workers’ rights” (ACTRAV, 2012). One Chinese iron-foundry was found to be using slave labour but the company threatened to pull out if the information was disclosed. Slave labour was found in other EPZs and they received reports of violence by management against staff. They concluded the working practices were contrary to Nigerian Labour Law but Nigeria’s Decent Work Country Programme—set up to improve employment rights and counter human rights abuses such as human trafficking and child labour—disregards what happens in the Nigerian EPZs.

The International Labour Organisation points out EPZs often do not meet ILO required standards. The International Labour Rights Forum highlights many instances of human rights abuses in EPZs; . According to The Balance these include low wages, high work intensity, unsafe working conditions, suppression of labour rights, long hours, excessive noise and heat, unsafe manufacturing equipment, un-inspected buildings and no access to union representation.

When people die in large numbers in these environments, it is then seen it is high profile Western brands being produced in these conditions. People are working in the worst conditions to maximise profits for what can be premium brands.

As the UK is in in Europe, we are protected by legislation from these conditions. Or we were.

BBC News: “Treasury ‘to rewrite rules to favour the North’”

The Treasury is reportedly planning to rewrite rules governing public spending… It could help boost investment in infrastructure, business development projects and schemes like free ports.

A free port is a form of EPZ. and the government intends to convert ten UK ports to free ports. Note there are no free ports in the EU because they are legally not possible.

According to The Times:

The Treasury is planning to rip up decades-old public spending rules in an effort to boost economic wellbeing in the north and the Midlands. Under proposals being drawn up before the spring budget, ministers will reassess how officials calculate the value for money of government investments in transport infrastructure, business development and initiatives such as free ports.

‘Economic wellbeing‘ – what a charmingly contradictory oxymoron. They mean ‘profitability’. They offer ‘unnecessary checks and paperwork‘ (there go the H&S and employment checks) and ‘customs and tax benefits‘ (because we don’t have enough corporates not paying tax) and ‘liberalised planning laws‘ (such as intended to allow fracking to re-start). The example they give of a successful free port is Miami. How many other cities in the developed world need their own Human Rights Watch division to fight for the rights of workers in the city?

It hasn’t taken long for the government to shaft the North. Those in the North who voted for Boris can look forward to working 6 days a week of 12 hours a day in dangerous conditions that are detrimental to the environment and contrary to EU-upheld human rights and no right to complain.

TMA02 essay references:

ACTRAV (2012) The State of Trade Unionism and Industrial Relations practice in Nigeria’s Export Processing Zones [Online], Geneva, International Labour Organisation. Available at http://www.ilo.org/actrav/info/fs/WCMS_183546/lang–en/index.htm (Accessed 10 January 2018).

Tombs, S. and Whyte, D. (2010) ‘Chapter 5: Crime, harm and corporate power’, in Muncie, J., Talbot, D. and Walters, R. (eds) Crime: Local and Global, Milton Keynes, The Open University, pp. 137-72.

Global spending on…

Posted on 8th September 2018 by Simon Reed

Annual global cost of removing all extreme poverty in the world (link): US$ 243 billion.

Annual global spending on ice cream in 2017 (link) US$ 54 billion.

Annual global cost of oceanic marine parks (link): US$ 12-14 billion.

Annual global military spending (link): US$ 1,700 billion.

“We need to maintain defence spending to protect jobs”

Posted on 9th August 2018 by Simon Reed