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War & Peace
Two More Israeli Soldiers Kill Themselves Amid Crisis Driven by Horrors of Genocide
"As humans," explained one psychologist, "we can be both victims and perpetrators."
Jul 29, 2026
Two more Israeli soldiers killed themselves over the past two days, bringing renewed scrutiny to what experts say is a worsening mental health emergency inside the Israel Defense Forces during 33 months of genocidal war on Gaza and enduring stigma around seeking treatment.
According to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, two female IDF troops—a combat soldier and an intelligence officer—died by suicide this week. Israeli Military Police said they are investigating both deaths, which bring the number of active duty IDF troops who have killed themselves this year to at least 16. Haaretz said that at least nine former IDF soldiers have also committed suicide after completing their military service in 2026.
The latest deaths underscore what military officials, mental health professionals, and veterans have increasingly described as one of the most severe psychological crises the Israeli military has faced in decades.
Earlier this year, Haaretz reported that Israeli military suicides reached 21 in 2024 and 22 in 2025—the highest annual totals in roughly 15 years. Israel's oldest daily newspaper also found that the military had reduced the number of mental health officers available to soldiers despite unprecedented demand for psychological services.
The crisis has been exacerbated by repeated troop deployments since the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack—itself the cause of tremendous trauma and some suicides by survivors—and Israel's subsequent assault on Gaza, which has been characterized by what prosecutors at the International Criminal Court in The Hague say are crimes against humanity and war crimes, and what a United Nations panel of experts said is a genocide.
More than 250,000 Palestinians have been killed or wounded by Israeli forces in Gaza, some of them reportedly executed at close range.
IDF troops and Israeli and international medical workers have described the deliberate and indiscriminate shooting of Palestinian civilians, including women and children, some of whom were reportedly executed. Former Palestinian prisoners and Israeli troops and doctors have also reported torture and sexual abuse of detainees, and of civilians including children and even a toddler. Such carnage and abuse has taken a toll on the perpetrators as well as their victims.
A persistent stigma surrounding mental health treatment also discourages many soldiers from seeking the care they need. Some fear being viewed as weak or worry that treatment could adversely affect their military service or relationships, despite ongoing efforts to destigmatize the issue.
A senior IDF commander told the Israeli public broadcaster Kan last year that "most of the suicides resulted from the complex reality created by the war," adding, "War has consequences."
Earlier this year, Reuters reported that the IDF had recorded a nearly 40% increase in post-traumatic stress disorder among its troops since September 2023, with 60% of the 22,300 people being treated for war wounds experiencing PTSD. The news agency cited an Israeli parliamentary committee's finding that 279 soldiers had attempted to kill themselves in the period from January 2024 to July 2025, and that IDF combat soldiers comprised 78% of all suicides in Israel in 2024.
Some observers—especially Palestine defenders—have little sympathy for IDF soldiers who kill themselves, pointing to the widespread crimes being committed in Gaza and throughout illegally occupied Palestine, including apartheid, settler colonization, and ethnic cleansing.
Others, recognizing their humanity and the moral injury that experts say afflicts many participants in war, mourn these deaths while maintaining that compassion for soldiers must never eclipse accountability for crimes against Palestinians.
After Eliran Mizrahi, a 40-year-old Israeli father of four, killed himself in 2024, his sister told CNN, “He always said no one will understand what [he] saw."
Mizrahi's mother said that "he saw a lot of people die. Maybe he even killed someone. [But] we don’t teach our children to do things like this… so, when he did this, something like this, maybe it was a shock for him.”
US psychologist Rachel Kabasakalian-McKay coined the term “complex implication” to define how “history often implicates us in networks of harm, even as we carry our own traumas."
"As humans," she explained in a 2025 interview with Psychology Today, "we can be both victims and perpetrators.”
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'Only Getting Worse': Global Alarm Mounts Over Israel's Assault on Occupied West Bank
"Settler attacks are now the leading cause of Palestinian injuries in the West Bank," said the Carter Center.
Jul 29, 2026
United Nations Human Rights Office spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani on Wednesday issued a dire warning about violence being carried out in the occupied West Bank by both Israeli armed forces and Israeli settlers, which she said is "only getting worse."
Noting that eight Palestinians, including a boy, have been killed in the West Bank in just the last week, Shamdasani decried actions taken by the Israeli government to tighten control of the occupied territory and expand illegal settlements.
"Settlers and Israeli security forces, often acting together, have attacked local communities, assaulting families, destroying and confiscating property, and burning mosques," said Shamdasani. "Movement restrictions are now tighter, blocking Palestinians from reaching essential services."
The UN Human Rights spokesperson also expressed alarm at "open calls by Israeli leaders for revenge and collective punishment against Palestinian communities, accompanied by threats to turn the West Bank into another Gaza."
Shamdasani encouraged the international community to "act urgently and in unison to halt the continuing killing and dispossession of the Palestinian people, and to bring an end to the Israeli occupation."
In a Tuesday statement, the Carter Center similarly highlighted rising Israeli settler violence in the West Bank, pointing to a recent report from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs estimating an average of six settler attacks per day against Palestinians.
"Settler attacks are now the leading cause of Palestinian injuries in the West Bank," the center explained, "and more than 3,200 Palestinians have been displaced by settler attacks and home demolitions this year—double the daily rate of the previous three years."
The center likewise urged the international community to "take urgent diplomatic, legal, and economic action to pressure Israel to fulfill its obligations under international law to curb settler violence, ensure accountability, protect civilians, and end policies that enable settlement expansion and annexation."
According to the anti-occupation Israeli group Peace Now, officials on the Higher Planning Council on Wednesday were scheduled to discuss authorizing more than 1,200 housing units in four West Bank settlements, which would bring the cumulative number of housing units approved this year to over 8,000.
This comes on top of the nearly 28,000 housing units approved by the council last year, which Peace Now described as "an unprecedented record and the highest annual figure since the establishment of the settlement enterprise in the West Bank."
Peace Now added that the Israeli government has significantly sped up the process for approving new settlement construction in recent years after scrapping earlier rules requiring the Israeli defense minister to sign off on new building projects in the occupied territories.
"In recent weeks, we have witnessed a change where the Higher Planning Council meets every week and approves several hundred housing units in each meeting," explained Peace Now. "In this way, the government seeks to normalize planning in settlements and attract less public and international attention and criticism."
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Trump's Iran Quagmire Spirals as US Teams Up With Saudis to Bomb Iraq
"Without a fundamental shift in US objectives and acceptance of a new regional balance, this conflict could drag on with profound and lasting economic consequences," said one analyst.
Jul 29, 2026
US President Donald Trump's illegal war of choice against Iran further spiraled out of control on Wednesday as American forces teamed up with Saudi Arabia to bomb Iraq, strikes that came hours after the US military said it intercepted an Iranian ballistic missile attack on American forces in Jordan.
The US Central Command said its strikes in Iraq targeted "Iran-aligned terrorists that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) directed to attack US forces and Saudi energy infrastructure." The office of Iraqi President Nizar Amidi condemned the US-Saudi airstrikes as "an unacceptable attack and a blatant violation of Iraq's sovereignty." According to Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces, at least 20 of its members were killed by the US-Saudi attacks.
The exchange marked the first military escalation since the US and Iran paused strikes over the weekend, briefly hinting at the possibility of a return to diplomatic talks that have thus far not produced a lasting peace agreement.
Trump signaled Wednesday that the US onslaught—which is historically unpopular with the American public—was far from over.
"We're going to beat the fucking shit out of them," Trump told Fox News, according to reporter Trey Yingst. "We'll be hitting them hard."
"We're going to beat the fuc*ing sh*t out of them," President Trump told Fox News after Iran launched a surprise attack against U.S. forces. "We'll be hitting them hard."
The President says U.S. strikes overnight against Iran-backed militias in Iraq were coordinated with the… pic.twitter.com/AeLbEGFCFi
— Trey Yingst (@TreyYingst) July 29, 2026
Iran's Foreign Ministry said in a statement Wednesday that the US-Saudi bombing of Iraq was aimed at expanding "the scope of the war and conflict in the West Asia region."
"The warmongering US regime and its accomplices in the region [are] responsible for the dangerous consequences of these criminal, inhumane, and provocative acts," the foreign ministry added.
Shortly after the flurry of attacks, CNN published a survey showing that 67% of Americans believe that Trump's military actions in Iran have "hurt the US" as oil prices surged once again. Nearly three-quarters of Americans believe Trump does not "have a clear plan for handling the situation in Iran," according to the poll.
"It remains remarkable that Trump won two elections criticizing America’s Middle East wars, attacking the Bush era, and disavowing the regime change business," Sina Toossi, a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy, wrote on social media. "Yet with each passing day, his presidency and legacy are becoming consumed with a Middle East quagmire of his own making."
"Investors should stop assuming this war is nearing its end," Toossi added. "The conditions for a durable settlement do not yet exist. Without a fundamental shift in US objectives and acceptance of a new regional balance, this conflict could drag on with profound and lasting economic consequences."
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By 22-Point Margin, Americans Think Netanyahu Should Be Arrested on US Soil
"Prime Minister Netanyahu has a warrant out for his arrest for committing war crimes," said one Democratic senator. "He should be nowhere close to the Oval Office of the president of the United States."
Jul 28, 2026
As with his proposals for government-run grocery stores and a tax on the second homes owned by rich New Yorkers, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani's recent call for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, an accused war criminal, to be arrested on US soil sparked outrage among Trump administration officials and others on the right.
And just like his other proposals, despite the claims that the mayor's comments displayed "extreme views" and were dangerous and divisive, Mamdani's demand that the US execute the International Criminal Court's (ICC) arrest warrant for Netanyahu is broadly supported by the public.
A poll taken by The Economist/YouGov between July 25-27 found that 49% of Americans believe the US should arrest Netanyahu, who arrived in Washington, DC on Monday to meet with President Donald Trump and attend the late Sen. Lindsey Graham's (R-SC) funeral.
Just 27% of respondents said the US should not execute the warrant, while 23% were unsure, according to the poll released Tuesday.
Nearly a quarter of people who voted for Trump in 2024 agreed with Mamdani, as well as 21% of people who identified themselves as supporters of Trump's MAGA political movement. The view was also held by 68% of Democrats and 55% of Independents, as well as 24% of Republican voters.
Forty-seven percent of respondents also said they believed Netanyahu was guilty of war crimes.
With Americans increasingly disapproving of Israel and the powerful pro-Israel lobby, sympathizing with Palestinians, and now backing the arrest of Netanyahu by an "overwhelming margin," said the Institute for Middle East Understanding, Trump is nevertheless "welcoming him back into the White House to lobby for more impunity, more war, and more of our tax dollars going to Israel."
Columbia University professor Anthony Zenkus wrote that while nearly half of Americans believe the US should execute the ICC warrant, "we've got prominent Democrats and Republicans and their online supporters calling Mamdani a terrorist for wanting to do that very thing."
Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) and Trump's ambassador to the United Nations, Mike Waltz, are among those who have condemned Mamdani's demand for Netanyahu's arrest. Waltz said the US would not execute the warrant because the country, like Israel, is not party to the Rome Statute, which established the ICC, and does not recognize the court's authority. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has threatened to "dismantle" the court.
On Tuesday, Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) denounced the White House for hosting the Israeli prime minister while Israel is "wrongfully detaining an American citizen," 20-year-old student Sama Safi, who was detained in the West Bank on June 2.
"As I speak, we've not been able to get justice for American citizens killed by violent Israeli settlers or by the IDF," Van Hollen continued, referring to the Israel Defense Forces. "As I speak, Palestinians in the West Bank are under violent assault by Israeli terrorists who are terrorizing Palestinian villages, lighting mosques on fire, torching cars, pushing Palestinians off their lands, killing innocent Palestinians."
"When Donald Trump meets with Bibi Netanyahu, things don't go well for the United States of America," said the senator, noting that five months after Israel convinced the administration to launch an "illegal war against Iran," American soldiers are being killed and injured in the region.
"On top of all that," said Van Hollen, "Prime Minister Netanyahu has a warrant out for his arrest for committing war crimes. He should be nowhere close to the Oval Office of the president of the United States."
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'This Is Not a Ceasefire,' Doctors Without Borders Says of Gaza, 'It Is a Continuation of the Genocide'
"A ceasefire should ensure that hostilities are paused, weapons are silenced, and that people are safe from strikes across the strip."
Jul 28, 2026
Nearly 10 months into a "ceasefire" in the Gaza Strip, as Israel on Tuesday killed at least one Palestinian man with an airstrike on the Nuseirat refugee camp, Doctors Without Borders declared that "the wounds of war are not only unhealed—they are still being inflicted."
"This is not a ceasefire," said the medical charity, also known as Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), in a statement. "It is a continuation of the genocide, calibrated to be violent enough to keep Palestinians suffering every day, yet silent enough to avoid stirring international outrage."
Israeli forces have killed more than 73,300 Palestinians in Gaza and wounded over 174,009 since the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack on Israel—with global experts warning the true toll is likely far higher. Local authorities have documented at least 1,200 deaths and 3,900 injuries since the ceasefire was agreed to over nine months ago.
Experts with the United Nations and others around the world have denounced the Israeli assault and blockade as a genocide, and South Africa is leading a related case at the International Court of Justice. The International Criminal Court has also issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister, Yoav Gallant, over the mass slaughter.
Nearly all of Gaza's roughly 2 million survivors have been forcibly displaced, starved, or sickened. MSF said that "the destruction of homes has not stopped with the announcement of the ceasefire. Sudden and arbitrary orders for people to flee their homes and shelters continue to be used as a tool of psychological warfare by Israeli forces."
Rajaa Jendiya, who was widowed in the "flour massacres," is living in a tent at a school-turned-displacement camp with her children. She told Middle East Eye that she often takes them to the hospital because of illnesses.
"Inside and around the school, you often see sewage water overflowing, while rubbish accumulates, attracting flies and insects," Jendiya said. "These conditions become even worse with the heat, and many times my children have developed skin diseases."
In such makeshift shelters across Gaza, "scabies, respiratory infections, rat bites, and other diseases are rife," according to MSF.
Accessing healthcare has also become difficult in the coastal strip, as Israel has killed and detained Palestinian medical providers, and bombed civilian infrastructure such as hospitals, including in the months since the ceasefire deal was reached.
As MSF detailed Tuesday:
On July 16, an Israeli strike near an MSF clinic in Al-Mawasi sent four injured people to our teams. The following day, two apartment buildings housing our staff in Gaza City were struck without warning, trapping families inside as explosions shattered windows. In one building, rubble and bodies crashed into the lower-floor apartment of an MSF staff member.
The same day, MSF teams in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza, treated 12 people—seven of whom were children—who were injured after Israeli forces struck a funeral in Al-Nuseirat. In total, this strike killed eight people and injured 20. Among those killed was the 21-year-old son of an MSF staff member. Our colleague got the news while working in another emergency room.
"These were not isolated incidents," the organization stressed, "but merely a snapshot of 48 hours in Gaza."
Israel has also limited the flow of food and medicine into the war-torn territory. Calling out the country for using humanitarian assistance "as an instrument of oppression," MSF emphasized that "the Israeli state has an obligation under international law to ensure Palestinians in Gaza have access to aid, regardless of political negotiations, military agreements, or conduct of hostilities."
Since October, when the Israel Defense Forces controlled about half of Gaza, the "yellow line" indicating IDF occupation has kept shifting, to push Palestinians into "an ever-shrinking area," MSF explained. "Today, almost 2 million Palestinians are confined to approximately 30% of the strip."
After speaking with residents in Deir al-Balah, Khan Younis, Rafah, and Gaza City's Zeitoun, Tuffah, and Shejaia neighborhoods, Reuters reported Tuesday that "Israeli forces have advanced the yellow block markers during the past 10 days, triggering new waves of displacement in areas already devastated by months of conflict."
While loading bags and mattresses onto a truck in Zeitoun, Assem Dawla told the news agency: "The whole war is displacement, displacement. You can't stay anywhere without [Israel] telling you, 'Get out of here, we want to come in.'"
Staying near the yellow line comes with risks. MSF said that "just this week, one mother told our teams that her 14-year-old son, who has Down syndrome, was shot five times by Israeli snipers near the yellow line while he was playing near his home."
"A ceasefire should ensure that hostilities are paused, weapons are silenced, and that people are safe from strikes across the strip," the group asserted. "Using it as a weapon of war and reinforcing the confinement to a fraction of Gaza cannot be justified."
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'Lindsey Liked War': Trump Laughs Off Graham's Giddiness Over Iran Onslaught
"He's never seen a war that he didn't like."
Jul 28, 2026
US President Donald Trump on Tuesday recalled Lindsey Graham's warmongering ways ahead of the late Republican senator's funeral, while once again threatening to commit more atrocities in Iran if an agreement to stop the war he and Israel started there is not reached soon.
Trump phoned in to Fox News' "Fox and Friends" morning show to laud his "great friendship" with the senator from South Carolina, who died on July 11 at the age of 71. Previously unreleased video published over the weekend shows Graham jubilant over Trump's decision to attack Iran in February and saying the president "loves blowing stuff up."
The president told "Fox and Friends" hosts: "He was very much a hawk, as you would say, on Iran. Lindsey liked war, to be honest with you."
"I said, you're a nice guy, how can you like war so much?" the president added. "He was a guy that liked war. I jokingly say—and there's nothing funny about it—but he's never seen a war that he didn't like."
Trump on Lindsey Graham: "He's never seen a war that he didn't like. He was very much into that -- you know, for good reason. He felt that way, some other people feel that way." pic.twitter.com/YbAttT8h8s
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 28, 2026
Graham had pushed for attacking Iran since at least 2010, both for strategic and financial reasons; in March, he boasted that the United States was "gonna make a ton of money" from the war.
While Graham isn't the only Republican in Congress to make inflammatory comments about Iran—just over the weekend, Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana opined that "sometimes you have to kill a few chickens to scare the monkeys"—he was the most consistent cheerleader for continuing attacks on the Mideast nation.
Trump also discussed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's visit to Washington, DC to attend Graham's funeral and make the case for continued war on Iran. Netanyahu is Trump's partner in the illegal war of choice, and is additionally wanted by the International Criminal Court in The Hague for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Graham was accused of incitement to genocide for advocating the total destruction of Gaza.
Moving on during Tuesday's interview, Trump said that if the Iranian government does not agree to a deal to end the 150-day war, "then I go back and I finish the job."
Trump and Netanyahu have both been accused of sabotaging negotiations with Iran when agreements seemed nearly at hand.
The president again said he would destroy Iranian bridges and power plants if a deal is not reached soon, his latest in a string of war crime threats that has included an earlier genocidal vow to wipe out the "whole civilization" of Iran.
"I could take out most of their bridges in less than an hour," Trump claimed on Tuesday. "I could knock out the power plants within one day."
"I think of 91 million people without power, without the bridges," he said. "And there's always the desalination plants. And who am I hurting there? I'm hurting the people. So I'm not looking to do that, [but Iran] cannot have a nuclear weapon."
US and Israeli intelligence have said for decades—including during both Trump administrations—that Iran is not trying to develop nuclear weapons.
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House Democrat Unveils Bill to Cut Off Funding for Trump's Iran War
"As more of our servicemembers are killed in Iran, and energy prices continue to skyrocket here at home, Congress cannot sit on its hands."
Jul 28, 2026
A Democratic lawmaker in the US House of Representatives on Tuesday introduced legislation that would cut off funding for President Donald Trump's illegal war with Iran.
In announcing the "No Funds for Illegal Wars Act," Rep. John Larson (D-Conn.) said that it was time for the legislature to take the next steps to end the unlawful conflict Trump started in February without congressional authorization.
"As more of our servicemembers are killed in Iran, and energy prices continue to skyrocket here at home, Congress cannot sit on its hands. We have voted to end this illegal war not once, but twice—and we need to enforce the law."
Larson emphasized that his bill would not merely end funding for the illegal Iran war, which has cost tens of billions of dollars and thousands of lives. The legislation, the Connecticut Democrat said, would also “block Donald Trump or any future president from waging war without explicit approval from Congress, as both the Constitution and War Powers Act require.”
Larson last week joined Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY) in filing a resolution that would require House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) to “initiate or intervene in litigation” to enforce the war powers resolution that passed in both chambers of Congress last month and compel the president to end the conflict.
Trump predicted that the Iran war would only last a few weeks when it began, but the conflict is now in its sixth month and the president last week said he was considering authorizing what he described as a "massive attack" on Iran that he vowed would be "bigger than ever before."
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UN Human Rights Official Says Israeli Strikes in Lebanon Could Amount to 'War Crimes'
“The trauma, frustration, and despair are palpable—but so too is the demand for justice, which I heard resoundingly," said Volker Türk after visiting Lebanon.
Jul 28, 2026
Pointing to the mass forced displacement of at least 1 million Lebanese people, the denial of returns, and the widespread destruction of homes and civilian infrastructure since the Israel Defense Forces began attacking the armed group Hezbollah in the regional conflict stemming from the Israeli-US war on Iran, the United Nations' top human rights official reported Monday that the assault on Lebanon could amount to "war crimes."
Volker Türk, the UN high commissioner for human rights, spoke after a trip to Lebanon where he met with government representatives, local and international civil society groups, and people who have been forced to flee their homes due to the conflict, in which Israel is continuing to occupy parts of southern Lebanon and to attack residential neighborhoods despite a ceasefire that was brokered on June 26.
"The Israeli military continues to kill and injure people in Lebanon, with continued airstrikes and ground operations," said Türk. "My office has recorded large-scale violations of international humanitarian law, some possibly amounting to war crimes. Under certain circumstances, they may also constitute crimes under international law."
When Israel began retaliating against Hezbollah on March 2 for the group's attacks that had been in response to the war on Iran, the IDF issued "evacuation warnings to residents of more than 53 villages and densely populated areas in Lebanon and intensified airstrikes forced families across Lebanon to flee within minutes," according to the UN Refugee Agency.
Israeli officials have said they aim to model their operations in Lebanon on the destruction of Gaza over the past 32 months. The IDF has also established a self-declared "security zone," advancing six miles into Lebanon and taking control of about one-fifth of the country's territory, first ordering people in southern Lebanon to move north of the Litani River and then pushing past that point.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz recently boasted about the IDF's demolishing of 24 villages "that had existed for hundreds of years," saying: "The army systematically flattened the villages with bulldozers and explosives. 90% of the houses are gone. Between 15,000 and 20,000 homes have been destroyed.”
On Sunday the Lebanese military said Israeli forces were continuing shelling in the southern part of the country, preventing the military from taking control of the villages there as the agreement reached last month had stipulated.
Al Jazeera reported that residents of the town of Zawtar al-Gharbiya "had returned to homes of rubble" after having been displaced.
More than 4,300 people in Lebanon have been killed in Israeli attacks and more than 12,000 have been injured. More than 135 healthcare workers are among those who have been killed, Türk emphasized on Monday, as well as a number of journalists and media workers.
“I am struck by the widespread damage and compounded suffering that I have seen," Türk said. “The trauma, frustration, and despair are palpable—but so too is the demand for justice, which I heard resoundingly.”
The human rights official spoke about a victim he met during his visit to a school that had been repurposed as a shelter for about 1,000 people who'd fled violence. The man had lost his mother and brother in Israeli strikes on their residential building in Beirut, and was determined to seek justice and accountability.
“Even from this darkness, there is an opportunity. We are mobilizing in a way that we have not done before, through documenting [violations]," the man told Türk.
Türk also heard about how "ongoing demolitions have flattened homes, schools, healthcare facilities, water distribution networks, electricity infrastructure, places of worship, and agricultural land."
The official gave his assessment of Israel's destruction of Lebanon days after Israel and its top military funder, the US, attempted unsuccessfully to sink his nomination to serve a second term as the UN's human rights commissioner.
Türk has condemned Israel's US-backed destruction of Gaza, the war on Iran, and President Donald Trump's “abuse and denigration of migrants and refugees” in the US.
Despite the powerful countries' objections and attempts to delay the vote, UN member states on Friday voted 144-10, with 13 abstentions, to give Türk another four-year term.
“Human rights are the antidote to today’s turbulence and defeatism," said Türk after the vote. "I will give my all for the rights of everyone, everywhere."
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Five Months After US Bombing of Iranian Elementary School, Pentagon Still Hasn't Released Its Findings
"The White House and Pentagon have so far refused any accountability or transparency," said CNN host Jake Tapper.
Jul 28, 2026
Tuesday marks five months since the US carried out a deadly attack on the Shajareh Tayyebeh Elementary School in the city of Minab, Iran, which killed more than 150 schoolchildren along with over a dozen teachers.
The US Department of Defense (DOD), however, has yet to release the results of the investigation it said it was conducting on the strike.
In a Tuesday social media post, CNN host Jake Tapper highlighted the DOD's silence about the school attack, noting that "the White House and Pentagon have so far refused any accountability or transparency."
Tapper then posted a timeline of accumulated evidence that the US was responsible for the deadly strike, while also including a quote from Rachel VanLandingham, a retired official from the Judge Advocate General's Corps (JAG), who said "it's atrocious that we haven't had an acknowledgement, an explanation, and an apology yet" from the Pentagon.
Earlier this month, CNN reported that the investigation into the school bombing was essentially complete, and it found that US military commanders "bypassed warnings" indicating that their database of strike targets inside Iran was badly out of date shortly before authorizing the attack on the building.
Two of CNN’s sources said senior commanders ignored the warnings out of “expediency,” as they did not want to significantly delay providing target lists during the outset of the war, which Trump illegally launched in February without authorization from the US Congress.
A group of experts at the United Nations last week renewed calls for the US to release the findings of its probe into the school bombing, noting that the US has "obligations under international humanitarian law and international human rights law."
“Five months following the school bombing in Minab, the US and Israel have not made any findings public, raising valid questions regarding the impartiality, effectiveness and transparency of any investigation that may be underway,” they said. “Justice delayed is justice denied.”
Two weeks ago, a group of 25 Democratic US senators sent a letter to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth pressing him to release the results of the Pentagon investigation and to submit to Congress a "prevention and remediation plan that identifies the specific corrective actions the Department will take to ensure this does not happen again."
"The United States military has a legal and moral obligation to take all feasible precautions to prevent civilian harm," the senators wrote. "When a U.S. strike kills civilians, the Department owes Congress, the American people, and the victims’ families a clear accounting of what happened and a credible plan to prevent future failures."
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'Stop All Military Aid': Sanders Condemns US Complicity in Israel's Decimation of Gaza
"We have funneled tens of billions of dollars in military aid to an Israeli government that has consistently violated international law and whose leader is a war criminal."
Jul 27, 2026
US Sen. Bernie Sanders on Sunday decried the ceaseless and horrific suffering that the Israeli military has inflicted on the population of the Gaza Strip with the assistance of American weapons, complicity that the Vermont senator called "shameful" and illegal under international law.
"We have funneled tens of billions of dollars in military aid to an Israeli government that has consistently violated international law and whose leader is a war criminal," wrote Sanders (I-Vt.), referring to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a fugitive from the International Criminal Court who is expected to travel to the US this week. "Enough is enough! Congress must listen to the American people. NO MORE US MILITARY AID TO ISRAEL."
Sanders, who has repeatedly tried to block Trump administration arms sales to Israel, noted that the Israeli military's genocidal assault on Gaza has continued during the so-called ceasefire agreement enacted last year, with Israeli forces aggressively extending their reach into the occupied Palestinian territory.
The Associated Press reported last week that "the Israeli military is quietly but quickly building a giant earthen barrier separating the over 50% of the Gaza Strip it controls from the rest of the territory, according to satellite imagery, further entrenching the division of the tiny Palestinian enclave."
"More than 23 kilometers (14 miles) have been constructed in recent months, running through Palestinian communities demolished by the military," AP observed. "That is equivalent to more than half the length of the coastal strip, which is some 40 kilometers (25 miles) long and 11 kilometers (7 miles) wide, and home to over 2 million Palestinians."
Sanders noted in his statement on Sunday that Israel "now controls an estimated 70% of Gaza, well beyond what they agreed to, and has built dozens of military outposts inside Gaza since the 'ceasefire' began."
"In the nine months since the 'ceasefire' was announced, Israel has killed at least 1,150 Palestinians, including a family of six last week," the senator wrote. "Now, as if to remove any doubt about their intentions, senior leaders of the Netanyahu government are moving to make the occupation permanent."
"The good news is that the American people are catching on," Sanders added. "More and more Americans—Democrats, Republicans and independents—are demanding that we stop all military aid to Israel and use our considerable leverage to end the suffering of the Palestinian people."
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Trump and Hegseth's Boat Strike Murder Spree Hasn't Slowed Cocaine Trafficking: DEA Analysis
"'Bombing boats' to stop drugs isn't just cruel and illegal—it's futile," said one expert.
Jul 27, 2026
An internal government analysis has revealed that President Donald Trump's campaign of strikes against alleged drug boats off the coasts of Latin America hasn't achieved its purported goal of diminishing the amount of cocaine being trafficked into the US.
The Washington Post reported on Monday that a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) analysis has concluded that the boat-bombing campaign, which many legal experts and human rights groups consider acts of murder, has not "reduced the amount of cocaine entering" the country.
"DEA analysts found the strikes had failed to affect the supply or price of cocaine in the United States," reported the Post, "and had led traffickers to diversify beyond go-fast boats and to avoid international waters, opting instead for larger boats and hemming close to coastlines, where US forces are less likely to open fire."
The Post added that US Department of Defense (DOD) officials last month gave a closed-door briefing toe members of Congress where they acknowledged the strikes had not reduced the purity of cocaine entering the US from Latin America.
In an interview with the Post, a DEA official said that drug cartels had several options in addition to smuggling contraband by boats and simply switched tactics to avoid being hit by US strikes, which so far have killed at least 221 people.
"When you squeeze the balloon on one side, it always expands on the other side," the official said. "They always find the weak spots and exploit them."
Journalist Alex Horton, one of the authors of the Post report, described the boat-bombing campaign as what happens "when you merge the failures of the war on terror and the failures of the war on drugs."
The Post's report on the effectiveness of boat strikes came days after the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) released a lengthy report that similarly found that the boat strikes' "impact on the trafficking of cocaine, the main drug flowing from South America, has been slight to non-existent."
Adam Isaacson, director of the Defense Oversight program at WOLA, explained the pointlessness of the boat-bombing spree in a Saturday social media post.
"All cocaine produced in a year could fit on just over 1% of a single container ship," Isaacson wrote. "Imagine that scattered worldwide across innumerable boats, planes, vehicles, and people. 'Bombing boats' to stop drugs isn't just cruel and illegal—it's futile."
Georgetown University Law School professor Marty Lederman noted in a Monday social media post that the boat-bombing spree would be unjustified even if it were successful at reducing the flow of cocaine into the US.
"Another reminder, since no one in Congress appears to care," wrote Lederman. "These strikes are a campaign of unlawful murders, and the administration hasn't offered any plausible argument to the contrary."
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