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On Witless Great Vengeance and Furious Anger
Seeking to rally the troops for his unholy war, Christian nationalist, TV-carnie and war fanboy Pete Kegseth just passed off some vengeful Gospel According to Tarantino as scripture at his (unconstitutional) Pentagon prayer service, and yes we have them now. Added to the "shameless blasphemy" of quoting - without credit - Samuel Jackson's homicidal hitman Jules as "prayer," Pete moronically misses the redemptive point: As he cites the "tyranny of evil men," he, unlike Jules, doesn't friggin' get that he is one.
With their calamitous illegal war continuing to spiral out of control, flailing regime officials are striking out in ever more erratic ways. Nursing his deranged feud with Pope Leo XIV, a vindictive Private Bonespurs - Suffer the little children to own the Pope - abruptly cancelled an $11 million contract with Catholic Charities in Miami to fund a vital, decades-long foster program for migrant children, aka small deadly illegals, who enter the U.S. alone. The result of "an incredibly psychologically harmful" move for already vulnerable kids: "They don't know who or where they are from day to day." Meanwhile, slimy, Bible-and-chest thumping braggadocio Pete is working hard to inflict his own fire-and-brimstone carnage.
Blithely pressing on with a serial slaughter based on evidently "entirely make-believe" grounds, Hegseth killed three more "narco-terrorists," likely fishermen, in the Eastern Pacific last week. It was the third boat bombing in three days - complete with giddy video - in the name of a "narco-trafficking" criminal conspiracy of which, experts say, there is "zero evidence"; they also say the murders have "no impact at all" on America's drug problems. Despite bogus legal theories scrounged up by the regime in an attempt to justify the deaths of at least 177 mostly innocent people, rights advocates note, “'Murder' is the general term for premeditated killings outside of armed conflict."
In the wake of those transgressions and many more, Democrats just filed six articles of impeachment against Hegseth; their lead sponsor, Iranian-American Arizona Rep. Yassamin Ansari, cited "high crimes and misdemeanors,” including war crimes, abuse of power, and other charges. The bill didn't mention Hegseth's clearly unconstitutional worship services (what separation of church and state?), part of a brazen Christian crusade that faces a lawsuit arguing, "The federal government’s role is to serve the public, not proselytize." Nor does it flag his bloody, unseemly prayers for U.S. troops to inflict “overwhelming violence against those who deserve no mercy."
The impeachment effort also fails to target the movie plagiarism and general dumbfuckery committed by cosplay Hegseth, one of a host of inept imposters in this awful Oceans 11 re-make, in his latest, lamest piece of performance art: Asking Pentagon officials and their families at last week's "Christian" service to bow their heads in prayer for a godless war as he recited scripture from the Book of Ezekiel, or maybe "Caesar" or Samuel or Snakes On A Plane, a prayer he claimed was delivered by the lead planner of the “Combat Search And Rescue” mission that earlier this month rescued two pilots downed in Iran."They call it 'CSAR 25:17,' which I think is meant to reflect Ezekiel 25:17," he blustered of "the Lord’s word about who we are and how we conduct ourselves...Pray with me please."
With his greasy smirk, he then launched into an almost word-for-word rip-off of the iconic speech by blood-stained hitman and aspiring philosopher Jules Winnfield, played indelibly by Samuel Jackson in Quentin Tarantino's 1994 black comic morality tale Pulp Fiction. Moments later, Jules point-blank executes hapless young Brett, not because he posed any threat or was allegedly developing nuclear weapons, but because Jules is just following orders. Because that's his job. Because each time he kills a stranger in cold blood, he likes to first recite that "prayer," which propitiously helps make him feel powerful, morally upright, cleansed of whatever guilt or grief or questions that might otherwise trouble his sleep.
"The path of the downed aviator is beset on all sides by the iniquities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men," Pete declaimed. "Blessed is he who, in the name of camaraderie and duty, shepherds the lost through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother’s keeper, and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to capture and destroy my brother. And you will know my call sign is Sandy One when I lay my vengeance upon thee, and Amen." Some in the audience, presumably moviegoers, chuckled at the source; others looked dutifully, cluelessly solemn as their kids squirmed in boredom. Blessed be the hitmen. Let us prey, indeed.
In reality, of the three passages in Ezekiel 25:17, only the shortest comes close to Pete's/Jules' harangue: "I will execute great vengeance on them with furious rebukes, and they shall know that I am the LORD when I lay My vengeance upon them." Tarantino, a fan of Kung Fu flicks, lifted his own fake version from a 1973 Japanese martial arts film, Karate Kiba, about a Kung Fu vigilante who vows to eliminate the crime-infested drug business in Japan. Hegseth, the guy with Nazi tattoos who lectures people about "Christian values," didn't mention or credit Tarantino, a theft and sacrilege first caught by Baptist minister Brian Kaylor. But no harm no foul: In today's idiocracy, notes Mary Trump, "Who among us has not mistaken the holy words of Tarantino's Pulp Fiction for Biblical scriptures?"
Online, Pentagon shill Sean Parnell acknowledged the prayer was "obviously inspired by dialogue in Pulp Fiction"; of Pete's failure to note that, he argued, "Anyone saying the Secretary misquoted Ezekiel 25:17 is peddling fake news and ignorant of reality." The next day, at a briefing on the war, the thin-skinned Hegseth again went off and Biblical on the press, calling their accurate reports on an unpopular war "unpatriotic" and likening the media to the Pharisees: "They were there to witness (but) their hearts were hardened (in) pursuit of their agenda." The whining didn't go over well; America really seems to hate Pete. "The gospel according to St. Jack Daniels. What a dick," they griped, and, "Talibangicals' perverted take on Christianity - Hegseth is literally an anti-Christ. And a rapist."
Mostly, people were pissed at his ignorant appropriation of the much-loved Pulp Fiction for his own base and bloody purposes, declaring, "And you call yourself a white Christian nationalist?" and, "I'd take Samuel Jackson's character over Pete's any day." They wondered if, next time, Pete would add the famed Biblical parable, "You know what they call a quarter-pounder with cheese in Paris?” (Royale.) They argued Pete's "scriptures" should include more "Motherfucker"'s, they offered hilarious video of Jules meeting up with another quivering Brett, they marveled at the idiocy of Hegseth, a bellicose grandstander who didn't understand that, in Jules' bonkers, vengeful "prayer," the speaker is actually the bad guy.
In one of Pulp Fiction's two final scenes, in the diner where the film begins, Jules comes to a belated moral reckoning with himself. He has long justified his bloody past by telling himself (like Pete) he's taking righteous vengeance on the "bad." But earlier that day, after killing Brett, he's "miraculously" untouched by a barrage of gunshots - a survival he attributes to "divine intervention, a sign to re-evaluate his life. Of his ritual recitation, he tells the young thief, “I never gave much thought to what it meant...It was just some cold-blooded shit to say to a motherfucker before I popped a cap in his ass...The truth is, you’re the weak, and I’m the tyranny of evil men. But I'm tryin', Ringo, I'm tryin' real hard to be the shepherd." Drunken, unctuous, preening Pete, who keeps missing the point, should too.
"Woe to those who manipulate religion and the very name of God for their own military, economic, and political gain, dragging that which is sacred into darkness and filth - Pope Leo X1V
Apr 19, 2026
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'Time for Half Measures Is Over': Study Warns of Terrifying Atlantic Ocean Current Collapse
The global climate crisis is causing a critical Atlantic Ocean current system to weaken much sooner than previously predicted, according to a study published on Thursday. If it stops, scientists say it could pose catastrophic consequences for Europe, Africa, and the Americas.
The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) is one of the most important current systems in the world for maintaining the delicate balance of the global climate. It helps to keep colder regions like Europe and the Arctic mild by moving warm water northward and pushes large amounts of carbon deep into the ocean, keeping it out of the atmosphere.
Scientists have feared AMOC's decline for some time. Previous studies have shown it to be at its weakest point in 1,600 years. But research published this month suggests that a collapse may come much sooner than anticipated.
One study, published Thursday in the journal Science Advances, used climate models and current data to predict the decline in the coming decades.
Researchers found that the system is on course to slow by more than 50% by the end of the century and could pass a significant tipping point by mid-century, at which point its decline would become irreversible.
"We found that the AMOC is declining faster than predicted by the average of all climate models," said lead researcher Valentin Portmann, of the Inria Research Center of Bordeaux South-West. "This means we are closer to a tipping point than previously thought.”
A major driver of its slowdown has been the rapid melting of Greenland's freshwater ice sheet into the Atlantic, which has diluted denser saltwater, making it harder to transfer northward.
He explained: “The more rapidly Greenland melts, the more freshwater floods the North Atlantic. This disrupts the sinking process, effectively applying the brakes to the entire system.”
This research followed another study published last week by scientists at the University of Miami, which found that AMOC has been weakening at four latitudes in the Atlantic.
Professor Stefan Rahmstorf, a leading AMOC researcher at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, who was not involved in either study, called it "an important and deeply concerning result" that "confirms that the ‘pessimistic’ climate models—those projecting a severe weakening of the AMOC by 2100—are the most accurate."
"The most dramatic and drastic climate changes we see in the last 100,000 years of Earth history have been when the AMOC switched to a different state," Rahmstorf explained.
A shutdown of the current system poses what Canadian climate activist and marine conservationist Paul Watson described as a "domino effect of climatic upheavals."
Scientists have projected that temperatures in northern Europe could plummet dramatically, with winters in London sometimes reaching below -20°C (-4°F) and those in Norway reaching -48°C (-54°F). It also threatens to dramatically shorten growing seasons, putting food security in peril for hundreds of millions of people.
Tropical storms in the North Atlantic would also become more severe. As the current slows, sea levels are expected to rise, and the greater temperature difference between cooling Europe and the warming tropics can fuel more intense hurricanes and increase the risk of flooding in major coastal cities.
"We must avoid this collapse at all costs," Rahmstorf said. "The stakes are too high; this isn’t just about Europe’s climate, but the stability of the entire planet."
Such a dramatic change in the flow of global heat could scramble temperature and rainfall patterns worldwide, putting some areas at greater risk of drought and disrupting the monsoon season that fuels agriculture in many regions.
It also risks becoming self-perpetuating, as the large amounts of carbon released from the ocean could further accelerate AMOC's collapse. Research published last week found that carbon emissions from the Southern Ocean alone could increase global temperature by about 0.2°C.
"The science is clear: The AMOC is teetering on the edge of collapse, and the window to act is closing," Watson said. "Yet global leaders remain paralyzed by short-term politics and denial."
The conclusion of the most recent United Nations climate summit, COP30, has been described as woefully insufficient to address the mounting climate emergency. The roadmap for action released by the host nation, Brazil, excluded any mention of the phrase "fossil fuels" after the conference was overrun by industry lobbyists.
"The time for half-measures is over," Watson said. "The choices we make in the next decade will determine whether future generations inherit a manageable climate or a world plunged into chaos."
Apr 16, 2026
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'Taxing Billionaires Is Not Radical': Mamdani Joins Top Economists to Denounce 'Rigged' US Tax System
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani is using Tax Day to remind Americans that the nation's tax code is "rigged" to protect the superrich while making the case for a more equitable system.
In a Guardian op-ed co-written with Nobel laureate in economics Joseph Stiglitz and Paris School of Economics professor Gabriel Zucman, New York's democratic socialist mayor lamented that the world is living with greater wealth inequality than ever before, with just 0.0001% of the global population holding the equivalent of 16% of global wealth—more than the bottom half of humanity.
Mamdani and the economists attributed the global surge in inequality in large part to America's "regressive" tax system, which has grown dramatically more favorable to the wealthy over the past half-century.
As wealth concentrates, so does power — the power to influence elections, shape policy, tilt markets and define the terms of public debate.Taxing billionaires is not radical.What is radical is allowing a system where extreme wealth exists alongside widespread hardship.
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— Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani (@mayor.nyc.gov) April 15, 2026 at 11:05 AM
Compared to 1960, when the 400 richest Americans paid roughly half their incomes in taxes, they now pay about 24%—helped by a combination of lower marginal tax rates and loopholes that allow billionaires and corporations to shield their wealth and effectively pay a smaller share of their incomes than everyone else.
This inequality was further exacerbated by the massive GOP tax law signed by President Donald Trump last year, which a report by Americans for Tax Fairness found gave the wealthiest 1% of households an average tax break of $9,000.
While the Trump administration promised earlier this year that the average American family would receive a $1,000 tax refund from the legislation, Corey Husak, director of tax policy at the Center for American Progress, found that the average refund was just $346 higher than the previous year—and that even that figure was heavily inflated by the benefits accrued by the richest earners.
Meanwhile, those gains were more than wiped out by the added cost of Trump's tariffs and the dramatic cuts to the social safety net passed by Republicans, which have led to spiking health insurance costs and thrown millions off Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits.
"We can disagree about how progressive tax systems should be—the extent to which the rich should pay more tax, relative to their income, than the rest of us," Mamdani, Stiglitz, and Zucman wrote. "But there is no justification for a regressive system in which the superrich contribute less than the rest of us. This is how inequality is deepened and sustained."
The authors praised efforts in other countries to combat rising inequality. One initiative they highlighted was a 2% tax on the wealth of those with more than €100 million ($117 million), a proposal championed by Zucman. A version of the measure was passed last year by France's National Assembly but stalled in the Senate after being blocked by centrist and right-wing parties.
But the initiative still has momentum around the world. This weekend, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez and Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will meet with the leaders of several other nations, including Mexico, Colombia, and South Africa, to discuss adopting similar taxes.
Meanwhile, in the US, a proposed ballot initiative for a one-time 5% billionaire tax in California—aimed at recouping losses from Trump's Medicaid cuts—appears overwhelmingly popular, with around two-thirds support according to a poll last month, despite aggressive lobbying by billionaires to stop the measure.
Mamdani has pushed for a similar measure in New York City to help balance the city budget and fund universal childcare and affordable housing.
On Wednesday, Democratic New York Gov. Kathy Hochul announced that she was backing a so-called "pied-à-terre tax," which applies a surcharge to anyone with a second home valued over $5 million in New York City. Mamdani's office has estimated that it will raise $500 million annually.
In early 2026, consumer prices and housing costs have soared far faster than wages can match. A January poll from KFF found that 82% of adults said their overall cost of living had increased over the past year, with around two-thirds saying they worried about affording healthcare for themselves and their families, and nearly a quarter saying they were worried about affording food and rent.
In response to this economic precarity, more than 62% of Americans said in a January YouGov survey that they felt billionaires are taxed too little, and more than half said that wealth inequality is a problem.
"The idea that billionaires should pay higher tax rates than working people is not radical," the authors of the Guardian op-ed said. "What is radical is allowing a system where extreme wealth exists alongside widespread hardship—and where those billionaires can in effect opt out of contributing to the society that made their success possible."
Apr 15, 2026
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Platner Thanks Small-Dollar Donors After Reporting $4 Million Fundraising Haul in First Quarter
For the second consecutive quarter, US Senate candidate Graham Platner's campaign reported Wednesday, he's out-raised both his top Democratic primary opponent, Gov. Janet Mills, and Republican Sen. Susan Collins, and the political newcomer emphasized in a video posted online that his fundraising haul has largely been powered by "working people" who "are willing to send what they can to support this campaign."
Platner, a combat veteran and oyster farmer who is running on proposals including Medicare for All and a billionaire minimum tax, read part of a letter from one of the 88,000 supporters who were able to send donations to his campaign in the first quarter of 2026—amounting to a total of $4.1 million.
"My wife and I have very little reserved assets, living now largely on our combined Social Security checks," Platner read. "But I want to make this small gesture of my support for your candidacy. My check for $35 is enclosed. Thank you so much for what you're doing. Keep up the good work. Respectfully, Jim Bishop."
Platner said in the video that his campaign is not taking money from large corporations or super political action committees (PACs), which are able to raise unlimited amounts of money for candidates.
"These are people who are going to miss the money they sent to us," said Platner. "When you spend your time sinking it into just trying to make ends meet, every dollar counts... It actually makes me feel a deep responsibility to not let you down."
Platner has $2.7 million on hand, while Mills brought in $2.6 million and has just over $1 million in the bank.
Collins' seat, the only one held by a Republican in a state won by former Vice President Kamala Harris in 2024, is a top target for the Democratic Party as it tries to win back control of the Senate. The senator, whom Platner has attacked over her donations from Wall Street, raised just over $3 million this quarter and has over $10 million on hand. A super PAC that is supporting her, Pine Tree Results, also has more than $11 million, according to Politico.
Platner also led in fundraising in the last quarter of 2025, bringing in $4.6 million in a haul that he said was also powered by donors who gave less than $200. More than $3 million of those funds came from small-dollar contributors—about three times the amount Mills and Collins collected from small donors combined.
The first-time candidate has led by wide margins in several recent polls as Mills' campaign has attacked him over controversies that broke last fall regarding a tattoo he got that resembled a skull and crossbones that appeared on the uniforms of Nazi guards during World War II, and posts he wrote years ago on the message board site Reddit.
After Mills released an ad regarding comments he made in 2013 about sexual assault, 55% of respondents to an Emerson College poll said they supported Platner, while 28% backed Mills.
Mills' campaign said last week it would drop the attack ads on Platner's Reddit posts, while Platner has begun shifting his attention to Collins in some of his advertising. The primary is set for June 9.
Apr 16, 2026
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Report on State of US Libraries Exposes Trump Attacks and Record-Breaking Book Ban Efforts
"The State of America's Libraries" report "is in a very real way a report on the state of our nation," American Library Association executive director Dan Montgomery wrote in the introduction of the annual publication, released Monday.
"Unsurprisingly, then, there is much to be deeply concerned about in these pages, and much to bring hope," the ALA leader acknowledged. "Ultimately, this report can serve as a clarion call to those who love libraries and our republic."
Published at the beginning of National Library Week, the report explores a range of topics, including threats to intellectual freedom. ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF) found that last year at least 4,235 unique titles were challenged—the association's term for an attempt to have a resource removed or restricted—the second-highest ever documented, just short of 2023's record.
OIF also found that at least 5,668 books were banned from libraries—66% of those challenged—and 920 books faced restrictions such as relocation or a parental permission requirement. The ALA noted that "this is both the highest number of titles censored in one year and the highest rate of challenges resulting in censorship" dating back to 1990.
"In 2025, book bans were not sparked by concerned parents, and they were not the result of local grassroots efforts," explained Sarah Lamdan, executive director of the OIF, in a statement. "They were part of a well-funded, politically driven campaign to suppress the stories and lived experiences of LGBTQIA+ and BIPOC individuals and communities."
Specifically, OIF found that 92% of all book censorship efforts were initiated by "pressure groups, government officials, and decision-makers," and fewer than 3% came from individual parents. Additionally, 40% of the unique titles challenged last year—1,671 works—were about the experiences of LGBTQIA+ people and people of color.
"Libraries exist to make space for every story and every lived experience," stressed ALA president Sam Helmick. "As we celebrate National Library Week, we reaffirm that libraries are places for knowledge, for access, and for all."
The most-targeted titles in 2025 were:
1. Sold by Patricia McCormick
2. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
3. Gender Queer: A Memoir by Maia Kobabe
4. Empire of Storms by Sarah J. Maas
5. (tie) Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo
5. (tie) Tricks by Ellen Hopkins
7. A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas
8. (tie) A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
8. (tie) Identical by Ellen Hopkins
8. (tie) Looking for Alaska by John Green
8. (tie) Storm and Fury by Jennifer L. Armentrout
The ALA publication also features sections on library services for people who are incarcerated or in reentry, how libraries can "approach literacy in a community-driven, responsive way to meet today's rapidly evolving and growing literacy needs," and "intensified debates over access to information and shifting fiscal priorities."
The report highlights ALA's Show Up For Our Libraries campaign, launched in the face of attacks from Republican President Donald Trump—who has issued executive orders targeting diversity, equity, and inclusion, and to effectively dismantle the Institute of Museum and Library Services. He also fired the librarian of Congress, Carla Hayden, and the register of copyrights, Shira Perlmutter.
From threats to (and victories for) intellectual freedom, to increasing services for incarcerated people, to a whirlwind of legislative and legal battles, 2025 proved pivotal for our nation's libraries.Read more in our State of America's Libraries Report: A Snapshot of 2025: https://bit.ly/3ORpvpE
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— American Library Association (@amlibraryassoc.bsky.social) April 20, 2026 at 9:00 AM
While the report sounds the alarm on the state of US libraries—and the nation more broadly—it also emphasizes, as Lamdan wrote in one section, that "the story of library censorship in 2025 is... not only about the challenges libraries faced, but also about the resilience of the people who stood up for them."
"Legal victories and new state-level protections emerged in several regions, reinforcing longstanding principles of intellectual freedom and reaffirming libraries' role as institutions that serve all members of their communities," she noted. "Coalitions of library workers, authors, educators, and community members successfully advocated for right to read laws in Connecticut, Delaware, and Rhode Island that protect intellectual freedom, libraries, and library workers."
"Courts across the nation held that censorship legislation was unconstitutional," Lamdan continued. "Judges declared that laws including Florida's HB 1069 and Iowa's SF 496, which provide for the removal of books containing certain viewpoints, were unconstitutionally vague and overbroad. Courts also affirmed the First Amendment right to read in libraries. Voters in states including Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Texas rejected censorship-focused school and library board candidates, electing board members who promised to protect people’s right to read and learn."
She added that "2025 was also a year of coalition-building. Grassroots activists, advocacy organizations, writers, authors, publishers, teachers, parents, and library workers came together to celebrate libraries and the joy of reading."
The report was released less than three months ahead of the 250th anniversary of the US Declaration of Independence.
"As we look toward the next 250 years, the choice is ours," said Helmick. "We can let our libraries fade, viewed as charming relics of a bygone era. Or, we can choose to invest in them as a bedrock of our future. Let us decide, right now, that they are not optional. They are the very breath of a free society, and they are worth fighting for."
Apr 20, 2026
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Trump Invokes Wartime Law to Fulfill 'Wish List for Oil, Gas, and Coal Industries'
US President Donald Trump on Monday invoked wartime authority in an effort to boost domestic fossil fuel production—with the help of taxpayer funding—as his administration faces growing political backlash over gas price spikes, driven by the illegal assault on Iran.
The five presidential memos Trump signed cite his executive powers under the Cold War-era Defense Production Act, which gives the president the ability to expand and accelerate production of key supplies. Critics accused Trump of abusing his emergency authority, once again, to give handouts to an industry profiting massively from the Iran war, which the president launched without congressional authorization.
"President Trump is abusing emergency authorities and wasting taxpayer resources through unprecedented abuse of the Defense Production Act to promote his politically favored fossil fuel projects at the expense of energy affordability and common sense," said Tyson Slocum, energy director at the consumer watchdog Public Citizen. "Today’s unjustified suite of executive orders is a wish list for the oil, gas, and coal industries, who are already enjoying record profits under Trump’s Energy Unaffordability Agenda."
“America is already—far and away—the world’s largest oil and gas producer, and the world’s largest petroleum and gas exporter," Slocum added. "Promoting more fossil fuel exports at a time when Trump has failed to deliver affordable, sustainable energy for American communities is just another example of the president’s incompetent, failed energy policies."
Trump's memos aim to bolster petroleum, coal, and liquefied natural gas production, asserting that the nation's "current inadequate and intermittent energy supply leaves us vulnerable to hostile foreign actors and poses an imminent and growing threat to the United States’ prosperity and national security."
"Action to expand the domestic petroleum production, refining, and logistics capacity is necessary to avert an industrial resource or critical technology item shortfall that would severely impair national defense capability," the memos state.
Trump signed the directives hours after he publicly disagreed with his own energy secretary's assessment of when Americans can expect to see relief at the gas pump, where they're paying over $4 per gallon on average nationwide. US Energy Secretary Chris Wright said Americans might not see significantly lower gas prices until next year; Trump claimed that assessment was "totally wrong,” even as economists warned of lasting impacts to US and global energy markets stemming from the Iran war.
The world's largest oil and gas giants have profited massively from war-induced price spikes, with the biggest beneficiaries—including US-based Chevron and ExxonMobil—banking over $30 million an hour in windfall gains during the first month of the conflict.
Trump's memos came days after a group of Republican lawmakers in the House and Senate introduced legislation aimed at shielding fossil fuel companies from legal action to hold them accountable for their central role in the climate emergency.
“Big Oil companies have raked in massive profits at the pump while lying to the American people about the catastrophic harm of their products, and now they want to deny Americans their rightful day in court and stick taxpayers with the bill for the mess they made," Richard Wiles, president of the Center for Climate Integrity, said in response to the bill. "If fossil fuel companies have done nothing wrong, why do they need immunity?"
Apr 21, 2026
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'Day of Ordinary Terror': Israeli Attack on West Bank School Kills Man, Child
"It does feel like if a group of Palestinians with machine guns broke into an Israeli school and shot a bunch of children, it would be breaking news in every outlet on Earth," said one reporter.
Apr 21, 2026
Israeli soldiers and settlers opened fire on a school in a West Bank village Tuesday, killing a Palestinian man and child and wounding at least four other people amid their escalating ethnic cleansing efforts in the illegally occupied territory.
The Palestinian Ministry of Health and Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) said settlers attacked a school in the village of al-Mughayyir, east of Ramallah, on Tuesday morning.
Amin Abu Ulaya, head of the local council, told Reuters that settlers and Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers entered the village and then shot at students at the school and other Palestinians who rushed to the scene.
PRCS said that 14-year-old Aws Hamdi Al-Naasan and 32-year-old Marzouq Abu Naim were shot and killed by the attackers.
An IDF spokesperson claimed that troops were deployed to the area following reports of stones being thrown at a military vehicle, and that a reservist then opened fire at "suspects."
The IDF also said the reservist, who has not been identified, has been suspended pending an investigation. Most Israelis who harm Palestinians are never punished. Meanwhile, Israel last month passed legislation legalizing the hanging of terrorists convicted killing of Israelis—a law critics contend will not apply to Israelis who commit similar crimes against Palestinians.
Kathem Al-Haj-Ahmed, a 57-year-old al-Mughayyir resident, told Reuters on Tuesday that settlers arrived first and began attacking the school. Parents and others who came to pick up their children came under fire. Al-Haj-Ahmed said that's when the man and child were killed.
Drop Site News reported:
A paramedic at the scene said at least three settlers deliberately fired at children attempting to escape from classrooms from a position approximately 50 meters away, with a level of accuracy he described as close to sniping. An eyewitness said shooting was directed at classroom windows and balconies still full of children as residents attempted to evacuate the school by crawling.
Israeli forces arrived during the attack and, according to witnesses, provided protection to the settlers rather than stopping them. A 63-year-old man, Attallah Abu Aliya, said he was shot in the leg by an Israeli soldier without warning as he walked toward the school after hearing it was under attack.
IDF troops often protect, and sometimes join, settlers attacking Palestinians.
Another 14-year-old, Mohammed Naasan, was killed by IDF troops in al-Mughayyir in January. The slain boy's father was also killed by settlers in 2019.
Tuesday's shooting occurred about 15 miles from where a Palestinian family—a mother, father, and two young children—were massacred by Israeli troops while traveling in their car in Tammum in March. The two children, ages 7 and 5, were shot in the head; two of their siblings were wounded but survived.
Two other West Bank Palestinians died Tuesday as a result of encounters with Israelis. Sixteen-year-old Mohammad Majdi al-Jaabir of Hebron was struck and killed by a vehicle in a convoy sent to secure Israeli Settlement Minister Orit Strock, while a woman, 49-year-old Raja' Fadl Bitawi, succumbed to injuries sustained from Israeli army gunfire in Jenin nearly two years ago, according to local media reports.
"This is our reality in al-Mughayyir village; they aim to displace us, and both the army and the settlers are exchanging roles among them," Al-Haj-Ahmed said.
Both Israel’s occupation of Palestine and the colonization of Palestinian lands by Jewish settlers are illegal under international law. Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention states that an “occupying power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.”
In July 2024, the International Court of Justice—where Israel is currently facing a genocide case related to the Gaza war, which has left more than 250,000 Palestinians dead or wounded—found the occupation of Palestine to be an illegal form of apartheid that must be ended as soon as possible. The ICJ also ruled that Israeli settler colonization of the West Bank amounts to annexation, also a crime under international law.
As the world’s attention focused on Gaza after the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack and, later, the US-Israeli war on Iran and Israel's assault on Lebanon, Israeli soldiers and settlers have killed at least 1,079 Palestinians—at least 235 of them children—in the West Bank, according to the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees.
Numerous US citizens—most but not all of them Palestinians—have been killed by Israeli soldiers and settlers in recent years.
Settler pogroms have been compared to the Nakba, during which more than 750,000 Palestinians were ethnically cleansed to make way for the modern state of Israel.
On Monday, the West Bank Protection Consortium—which is led by the Norwegian Refugee Council and funded by donors including 13 European nations—published a report detailing sexual violence committed by Israeli soldiers and settlers in the West Bank. Crimes including sexual assaults have facilitated Israel's ongoing ethnic cleansing of Palestine.
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Campaign's Augmented Reality Tool Allows Students to Explore True Cost of Nuclear Weapons
"We can't put a nuclear warhead on a teacher's desk in real life, but with AR we can make you see it there. It puts the cost of these decisions in the room where your kids learn, at the scale where you can actually feel it."
Apr 21, 2026
A new educational campaign is using augmented reality technology to help American students understand the true costs of possessing and maintaining a massive stockpile of nuclear weapons.
Up in Arms, a campaign started by Ben & Jerry's co-founder Ben Cohen to increase support for slashing the bloated US defense spending budget, has teamed with nonprofit media lab Amplifier to create Class Dismissed, a new initiative that gives students in K-12 classrooms a jarring visual representation of nuclear weapons.
"This is a campaign about tradeoffs," Classed Dismissed states on its website. "By placing full-scale representations of nuclear weapons into classrooms, gyms, libraries, and schoolyards, the project makes national spending priorities visible at human scale. As federal military budgets expand, domestic programs are squeezed year after year. While hundreds of billions flow into Cold War–era weapons, schools are left with overcrowded classrooms, aging buildings, and fewer teachers and support staff."
The campaign emphasizes that the weapons students will see depicted on their devices through augmented reality are "not hypothetical," but instead reflect "real weapons programs and real costs, translated through comparisons drawn from public reporting and nonpartisan budget analysis."
Aaron Huey, founder of Amplifier and creative director for Class Dismissed, said the campaign decided to use augmented reality technology to accomplish "things that are physically impossible but politically necessary."
"We can't put a nuclear warhead on a teacher's desk in real life, but with AR we can make you see it there," said Huey. "It puts the cost of these decisions in the room where your kids learn, at the scale where you can actually feel it."
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) in 2025 projected that plans by the US Department of Defense and Department of Energy to "operate, sustain, and modernize current nuclear forces and purchase new forces" will cost $946 billion through 2034, an average of $95 billion per year.
"That total includes $357 billion to operate and sustain current and future nuclear forces and other supporting activities," CBO explained. "$309 billion to modernize strategic and tactical nuclear delivery systems and the weapons they carry; $72 billion to modernize facilities and equipment for the nuclear weapons laboratory complex; $79 billion to modernize command, control, communications, and early-warning systems; and $129 billion to cover potential additional costs in excess of projected budgeted amounts estimated using historical cost growth."
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Report Details Israeli Use of Sexual Violence to Force Palestinians From West Bank Homes
"Sexual violence is not incidental to this crisis. It is one of the mechanisms driving people from their land," said one contributor to the new report.
Apr 21, 2026
A report published Tuesday by an international human rights consortium details how Israeli soldiers and settlers are weaponizing sexual violence to facilitate the forced expulsion of Palestinians from the illegally occupied West Bank.
The report, published by the West Bank Protection Consortium (WBPC)—which is led by the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) and funded by donors including 13 European nations—found that "more than 70% of displaced households interviewed identified threats to women and children, particularly sexualized violence, as the decisive reason for leaving" their homes in the West Bank of Palestine.
The West Bank, which includes East Jerusalem, has been occupied by Israel since 1967 and is the site of an accelerating campaign of US-backed deadly ethnic cleansing dating back to 1947.
Palestinians interviewed for the report described "escalating patterns of sexual harassment in Area C"—the roughly 60% of the West Bank that, under the 1995 Oslo II Accord, is under full Israeli control—"including sexualized insults and gestures, indecent exposure, intimidation, threats of sexual violence, and surveillance of intimate spaces such as bedrooms."
"Participants in multiple locations described settlers exposing themselves, making threats of rape, and stalking women as they walked to latrines," the report continued.
"Men and boys also experience sexualized humiliation, forced nudity, and sexualized threats," the publication notes. "In Wadi al-Seeq, after the community was forcibly displaced, three men reported that settlers detained them and attempted to sexually assault one man with a broomstick while he was blindfolded. They described forced stripping, beatings, burning and being urinated on, and said perpetrators circulated images of the abuse."
"Similar abuses have also been reported elsewhere," WBPC continued. "In the Bethlehem governorate, testimony collected during a key informant interview described two 15-year-old boys herding cattle whom settlers attacked, beat, blindfolded, and stripped. The account said one boy was urinated on and the other sustained a leg fracture."
"In another Palestinian Bedouin community in the Jordan Valley... a violent settler raid was reported in which witnesses state that a Palestinian man was subjected to severe sexual assault in front of his family," the report states. "Testimonies further indicate that women and girls were beaten, children were threatened with death, and threats of rape were made."
Allegra Pacheco, WBPC's chief of party, said in a statement Monday that “this is how communities are emptied: not in a single moment, but through repeated attacks, fear inside the home, and pressure that makes ordinary life impossible."
In Khirbet Wadi al-Rakhim, one Palestinian reported that "an identified settler sexually harassed them and threatened them with reference to the Sde Teiman detention facility," the notorious prison in the Negev Desert where former Palestinian prisoners, Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers, and Israeli medical professionals have said they witnessed torture and other abuse of detainees ranging in age from children to the elderly.
These abuses include severe injuries caused by 24-hour shackling of hands and feet that sometimes required amputations, alleged rape and sexual assault by male and female soldiers, electrocution, mauling by dogs, denial of food and water, sleep deprivation, and other torture. The IDF is investigating the deaths of dozens of Palestinians at Sde Teiman, including one man who died after allegedly being sodomized with an electric baton.
NRC said Monday that in the West Bank, "displacement reshapes every aspect of life."
"Households reported the impact of prolonged exposure to settler violence, including the sexualized abuse documented in the report," the group noted, adding that "92% of affected households interviewed lost access to land, 88% lost their homes, and 84% lost essential assets."
"More than half lost livelihoods, while 40% of children lost access to education," NRC added. "Women report severe psychological distress at striking rates, alongside ongoing fear, instability, and exposure to further violence after relocation."
Pacheco said that "sexual violence is not incidental to this crisis. It is one of the mechanisms driving people from their land."
“The report documents how perpetrators target women, men, and children in ways that fracture families and deprive communities of the ability to remain," she added. "When coercive conditions leave people with no genuine choice but to leave, this amounts to forcible transfer under international law.”
The WBPC report also highlights that "these abuses occur within a broader environment shaped by systematic discrimination and persistent impunity," an observation underscored by the lack of punishment or slaps on the wrist for Israeli soldiers and settlers who harm Palestinians.
Israel must be held to account for its barbaric crimes. The horrifying reports of the IDF's sexual violence against women & girls in the West Bank demand immediate action. Today, I raised this with the Foreign Secretary - we must punish perpetrators and ensure justice.
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— Dr Rosena Allin-Khan MP (@drrosena.bsky.social) April 21, 2026 at 5:50 AM
Previous reports by groups including United Nations agencies have detailed Israeli sexual violence against Palestinians, including a March 2025 UN publication that found "sexual and gender-based violence—which has risen in frequency and severity—is being perpetrated across the occupied Palestinian territory as a strategy of war for Israel to dominate and destroy the Palestinian people."
An August 2025 investigation by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation featured Palestinian boys kidnapped by Israeli occupation forces in Gaza who said they suffered or witnessed sexual torture committed by their jailers.
Last year, Israel blocked a request from UN sex crimes experts to probe alleged sexual violence perpetrated by Hamas fighters during the October 7, 2023 attack, reportedly to avoid attendant scrutiny of rapes and other abuses allegedly committed by Israeli forces against imprisoned Palestinians.
Sexual violence committed by Israelis against Palestinians is as old as the modern state of Israel itself.
Israeli filmmaker Alon Schwarz's 2022 documentary Tantura—which concerns the 1948 massacre and ethnic cleansing of Palestinian residents from the village after which the film is named—features interviews with Israeli veterans who described the rape of Palestinian women and children. One of the Israelis gleefully recounted the rape of a child.
A former Israeli soldier recounts the 1948 Tantura events
He refers to serious abuses against civilians, including an assault on a minor
He admits to killings without knowing the exact number of victims pic.twitter.com/ub5LHIdYAY
— ADI ALARDAH (@alardah91) April 9, 2026
When IDF reservists were arrested on suspicion of gang-raping of a Palestinian prisoner at Sde Teiman after video footage of the alleged assault went viral, a mob of right-wing Israelis whose members included senior government officials stormed the prison in a failed bid to free the suspects.
Others, including Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, demanded a probe—not to seek justice for the victim, but rather to find and punish whoever leaked the video. Meanwhile, Israelis advocating legalized torture and rape of Palestinian prisoners were given nationwide platforms to air their views during the Sde Teiman scandal.
The IDF later dismissed the indictments of the accused Sde Teiman rapists.
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