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War & Peace
Another Palestinian Infant Dies of Hypothermia in Storm-Battered Gaza
"Palestinian babies freeze to death as shelters and lifesaving humanitarian aid—located just a few miles away—for 1 million civilians is blocked by Israel," noted one journalist.
Dec 12, 2025
A second Palestinian infant and a young girl died of hypothermia in Gaza as heavy rains and flooding—whose effects are exacerbated by Israel's genocidal annihilation and ongoing siege of the coastal strip—raised the death toll from Storm Byron to at least 16.
Taim Al-Khawaja—who was several months old—died in the Shati refugee camp in northern Gaza, while 9-year-old Hadeel al-Masri died in a shelter west of Gaza City, according to local officials. Their deaths follow that of Rahaf Abu Jazar, an 8-month-old who died Thursday of exposure after floodwaters inundated her family’s tent in Khan Younis.
At least five other people were killed when a building in Beit Lahia collapsed amid the storm, and two others were killed when a wall collapsed onto tents housing displaced Palestinians in the Remal neighorhood of Gaza City. According to Gaza's Government Media Office (GMO), at least 13 buildings have collapsed and more than 27,000 tents have been destroyed or left uninhabitable by Byron's winds, rain, and floodwater.
While farmers in neighboring Israel welcomed the torrential rains, which delivered relief from drought conditions, the storm is devastating Palestinians already reeling and weakened from nearly 800 days of war and siege. Israel's US-backed onslaught has left more than 250,000 Gazans dead, maimed, or missing and 2 million more starved, sickened, or displaced. Roughly 1.5 million Palestinians are currently living in tents or other makeshift shelters.
The recent hypothermia deaths evoked horrific memories of the past two winters in Gaza, when more than a dozen Palestinians—most of them infants and children—died from hypothermia caused by exposure. While many Israelis and their supporters abroad point to the relatively mild Mediterranean winters in an effort to deny these deaths, experts note that hypothermia can be deadly at temperatures over 60°F (15°C) in overexposed conditions such as those in Gaza.
Reporting from Gaza, Al Jazeera's Ibrahim al-Khalili said Friday that genocide-ravaged Gazans are now enduring “an added layer of suffering."
“The tents are collapsing. The cold is unbearable. Basically, they don’t have anywhere to go. What is unfolding is devastating,” he said. “It’s not just a storm; it’s a new wave of displacement even after the war has stopped. Many people here told me that a new war has really begun after this flooding, and people are being forced to flee whatever fragile shelters they had.”
Hamas spokesperson Hazem Qassem on Friday called the recent exposure deaths a "continuation of the war of extermination."
“The successive collapses of homes bombed during the war of extermination on the Gaza Strip, caused by the storm, and the resulting deaths, reflect the unprecedented scale of the humanitarian disaster left by this criminal Zionist war,” he said.
Jonathan Crickx, chief of communications for the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), told Agence France-Presse Friday that Gazans are also enduring "absolutely appalling hygiene and sanitary conditions."
"There aren't enough toilets; there are places—I saw some in Gaza City—where large pools of water are essentially open sewers right next to the displacement camps," he added.
While the shaky two-month ceasefire between Israel and Hamas has somewhat eased the Israeli blockade on Gaza, the GMO said Friday that “the occupation continues to close crossings and prevent the entry of humanitarian aid and materials that could provide shelter."
“This includes blocking the entry of 300,000 tents, prefabricated mobile homes, and caravans," the agency added.
The #Gaza Strip has been left flooded by #StormByron, destroying already damaged buildings and causing additional loss of life.MSF is concerned about the upcoming winter and heavy rain.Caroline Seguin, Emergency Coordinator, updates:
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— Doctors Without Borders / Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) (@msf.ca) December 12, 2025 at 2:02 PM
In a statement Friday, Doctors Without Borders Gaza emergency coordinator Caroline Seguin said that the charity is "very, very worried about the next month with the winter coming and the heavy rain."
"Last year we saw a huge increase in respiratory infections for children, diarrhea as well, and of course all the wounded that are living inside the tents will have big difficulties to heal their wounds and will have probably an increase of infection for the wound of the wounded," Seguin noted. "It's near to be not possible to live in this conditions."
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Dem Senator Raises Alarm About Trump Bringing 'Illegal and Dangerous Misuse of Lethal Force' to Domestic Foes
"If Trump is using this justification to use military force on any individuals he chooses... what’s stopping him from designating anyone within our own borders in a similar fashion and conducting lethal, militarized attacks against them?"
Dec 12, 2025
A Democratic senator is raising concerns about President Donald Trump potentially relying on the same rationale he's used to justify military strikes on purported drug trafficking vessels to kill American citizens on US soil.
In an interview with the Intercept, Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) argued that Trump's boat strikes in the Caribbean and the Pacific Ocean have been flatly illegal under both domestic and international law.
Diving into specifics, Duckworth explained that the administration has been justifying its boat-bombing spree by arbitrarily declaring suspected drug traffickers as being part of "designated terrorist organizations," which the senator noted was "not grounded in US statute nor international law, but in solely what Trump says."
Many other legal experts have called the administration's strikes illegal, with some going so far as to call them acts of murder.
Duckworth, a military veteran, also said it was not a stretch to imagine Trump placing terrorist designations on US citizens as well, which would open up the opportunity to carry out lethal strikes against them.
"If Trump is using this justification to use military force on any individuals he chooses—without verified evidence or legal authorization—what’s stopping him from designating anyone within our own borders in a similar fashion and conducting lethal, militarized attacks against them?" Duckworth asked. "This illegal and dangerous misuse of lethal force should worry all Americans, and it can’t be accepted as normal."
Independent journalist Ken Klippenstein reported last week that Attorney General Pam Bondi recently wrote a memo that directed the Department of Justice (DOJ) to compile a list of potential “domestic terrorism” organizations that espouse “extreme viewpoints on immigration, radical gender ideology, and anti-American sentiment.”
The memo expanded upon National Security Presidential Memorandum-7 (NSPM-7), a directive signed by Trump in late September that demanded a “national strategy to investigate and disrupt networks, entities, and organizations that foment political violence so that law enforcement can intervene in criminal conspiracies before they result in violent political acts."
The Intercept revealed that it reached out to the White House, the DOJ, and the US Department of Defense and asked whether the tactics used on purported Caribbean drug traffickers could be deployed on the US citizens that wind up on Bondi's list of extremists. All three entities, reported the Intercept, "have, for more than a month, failed to answer this question."
The DOJ, for instance, responded the Intercept's question about using lethal force against US citizens by saying that "political violence has no place in this country, and this Department of Justice will investigate, identify, and root out any individual or violent extremist group attempting to commit or promote this heinous activity."
Rebecca Ingber, a former State Department lawyer and current professor at Cardozo Law School, told the Intercept that the administration's designation of alleged cartel members as terrorists shows that there appears to be little limit to its conception of the president's power to deploy deadly force at will.
“This is one of the many reasons it is so important that Congress push back on the president’s claim that he can simply label transporting drugs an armed attack on the United States and then claim the authority to summarily execute people on that basis," Ingber explained.
The Intercept noted that the US government "has been killing people—including American citizens, on occasion—around the world with drone strikes" for the past two-and-a-half decades, although the strikes on purported drug boats represent a significant expansion of the use of deadly force.
Nicholas Slayton, contributing editor at Task and Purpose, pointed the finger at former President Barack Obama for pushing the boundaries of drone warfare during his eight years in office.
"Really sucks that Obama administration set a legal precedent for assassinating Americans," he commented on Bluesky.
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'Stop Arming Israel,' Jewish-Led Groups Tell DNC Leaders at Party Summit
"The American public is demanding decisive action to end US complicity in the Israeli government’s war crimes by stopping the flow of weapons to Israel."
Dec 12, 2025
Jewish Voice for Peace Action on Friday led a coalition of groups demanding that the Democratic Party stop providing arms to the Israeli government.
Speaking outside the Democratic National Committee’s Winter Meeting in Los Angeles, Jewish Voice for Peace Action (JVP Action) held a press conference calling on Democrats to oppose all future weapons shipments to Israel, whose years-long assault on Gaza has, according to one estimate, killed more than 100,000 Palestinian people.
While carrying banners that read, "Stop Arming Israel," speakers at the press conference also called on Democrats to reject money from the American Israeli Political Action Committee (AIPAC), which has consistently funded primary challenges against left-wing critics of Israel.
JVP Action was joined at the press conference by representatives from Health Care 4 US (HC4US), Progressive Democrats of America, the Council on American-Islamic Relations Action (CAIR Action), and the United Teachers of Los Angeles (UTLA) Board of Directors.
Estee Chandler, founder of the Los Angeles chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace, warned Democrats at the press conference that they risked falling out of touch with public opinion if they continued to support giving weapons to Israel.
"The polls are clear,” Chandler said. "The American public is demanding decisive action to end US complicity in the Israeli government’s war crimes by stopping the flow of weapons to Israel, and the Democratic Party refusing to heed that call will continue to come at their own peril."
The press conference came a day after the progressive advocacy group RootsAction and journalist Christopher D. Cook released an "autopsy" report of the Democratic Party's crushing 2024 losses, finding that the party's support for Israel's assault on Gaza contributed to last year's election results.
Chandler also called on Democrats to get behind the Block the Bombs Act, which currently has 58 sponsors, and which she said "would block the transfer of the worst offensive weapons from being sent to Israel, including bombs, tank rounds, and artillery shells that are US-supplied and have been involved in the mass killing of Palestinian civilians and the grossest violations of international law in Gaza."
Although there has technically been a ceasefire in place in Gaza since October, Israeli forces have continued to conduct deadly military operations in the enclave that have killed hundreds of civilians, including dozens of children.
Ricardo Pires, a spokesperson for the United Nations Children’s Fund, said last month that the number of deaths in Gaza in recent weeks has been "staggering" given that they've happened "during an agreed ceasefire."
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ICC Judges 'Wiped Out Economically and Socially' by US Sanctions—But Remain Resolute
“In my country, I prosecuted terrorists and drug lords," said Judge Luz Ibáñez Carranza of Peru. "I will continue my work."
Dec 12, 2025
International Criminal Court judges remain steadfast in their pursuit of justice—including for victims of Israel's genocidal war on Gaza—even as they suffer from devastating US sanctions, some of the affected jurists said in recent interviews.
Nine ICC officials are under sanctions imposed in two waves earlier this year by the Trump administration following the Hague-based tribunal's issuance of arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza, including murder and forced starvation. The tribunal also issued warrants for the arrest of three Hamas officials, all of whom have been killed by Israel during the course of the war.
The sanctioned jurists are: Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan (United Kingdom), Deputy Prosecutor Nazhat Shameem Khan (Fiji), Deputy Prosecutor Mame Mandiaye Niang (Senegal), Judge Solomy Balungi Bossa (Uganda), Judge Luz del Carmen Ibáñez Carranza (Peru), Judge Reine Adelaide Sophie Alapini-Gansou (Benin), Judge Beti Hohler (Slovenia), Judge Nicolas Yann Guillou (France), and Judge Kimberly Prost (Canada).
The sanctions followed a February executive order from US President Donald Trump sanctioning Khan and accusing the ICC of “baseless actions targeting America and our close ally Israel.”
The sanctions—which experts have called an act of criminal obstruction—prevent the targeted ICC officials and their relatives from entering the United States; cut off their access to financial services including banking and credit cards; and prohibit the use of online services like email, shopping, and booking sites.
Fearing steep fines and other punitive measures including possible imprisonment for running afoul of US sanctions by providing “financial, material, or technological support" to targeted individuals, businesses and other entities strictly blacklist sanctioned people—who are typically terrorists, organized crime leaders, and political or military leaders accused of serious human rights crimes.
“Your whole world is restricted,” Prost—who was part of an ICC appellate chamber's unanimous 2020 decision to investigate alleged US war crimes and crimes against humanity in Afghanistan—told the Associated Press on Thursday. “I’ve worked all my life in criminal justice, and now I’m on a list with those implicated in terrorism and organized crime."
Ibáñez Carranza said the US sanctions are not deterring her, telling the AP: “In my country, I prosecuted terrorists and drug lords. I will continue my work."
Guillou told Le Monde last week that the sanctions mean he is banned from almost all digital services—including Amazon and PayPal—in a world dominated by US tech giants. This has led to some absurd scenarios, including having a hotel reservation he booked via Expedia in his own country canceled.
"To be under sanctions is like being transported back to the 1990s," he said.
The Trump administration's objective, said Guillou, is "intimidation... permanent fear, and powerlessness."
"European citizens under US sanctions will be wiped out economically and socially within the [European Union]," he added.
Guillou remains defiant in the face of sweeping hardship caused by the sanctions, contending that he is part of a larger struggle for justice as, "empires are hitting back" in response to "three decades of progress in multilateralism."
The US—which, like Israel, is not party to the Rome Statute that governs the ICC—has been at odds with the court for decades. In 2002, Congress passed, and then-President George W. Bush signed, the American Service Members’ Protection Act—also known as the Hague Invasion Act—which authorizes the president to use “all means necessary and appropriate” including military intervention to secure the release of American or allied personnel held by or on behalf of the ICC.
During his first term, Trump sanctioned then-ICC Chief Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda and Prosecution Jurisdiction Division Director Phakiso Mochochoko over the Afghan war crimes probe.
The nine jurists sanctioned this year by the US are seeking relief and are calling on European governments to invoke the EU's so-called "Blocking Statute," which is meant to shield officials of the 27-nation bloc from the extraterritorial application of third country laws.
"States parties [to the Rome Statute] face a choice: Continue to capitulate to the bullying of the US, or meet the challenge posed by the sanctions, past and future, and respond appropriately," Jens Iverson, an assistant professor of international law at Leiden University in the Netherlands, wrote last month for OpinioJuris. "Which choice they make will reveal the actual values of the states who as a matter of law are pledged to combat atrocity and impunity."
Ibáñez Carranza told Middle East Eye in a recent interview: "What we are asking are practical measures. What we are asking is action. We need the support of the entire world. But we are in Europe now, and Europe is a powerful structure. The European Union is a powerful structure. They should react as such. They cannot be subordinated to the American policies."
International Criminal Court (ICC) judge Luz del Carmen Ibanez Carranza has called on the international community to stand with ICC judges following US-imposed sanctions over the court’s arrest warrants for Israeli officials pic.twitter.com/otJfwHgzdw
— Middle East Eye (@MiddleEastEye) December 6, 2025
Ibáñez Carranza said that said measures should be taken "to support the court, not only to support the judges, but to support the system... of Rome."
"It's not only the judges" who are affected by the US sanctions, she asserted. "They want to affect the system of Rome, the system of the court, where we deliver justice for... the most defenseless and vulnerable victims... They are the affected ones with this."
"The work of the International Criminal Court is for humanity," Ibáñez Carranza added. "And this is why we are resilient, and this is why we need not only to stand together as judges, but the entire international community."
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