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War & Peace
'Wow': Observers Surprised After Dem Moderate Rejects AIPAC Cash
"AIPAC's brand is increasingly, perhaps irredeemably toxic," wrote one observer.
Oct 16, 2025
A centrist Democratic lawmaker on Thursday surprised many political observers when he announced he would be returning donations he'd received from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.
Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.), who is running a primary challenge against Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), said that he was rejecting donations from AIPAC because it had aligned itself too closely with the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who last year was accused of committing crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court.
"I'm a friend of Israel, but not of its current government, and AIPAC's mission is to back that government," Moulton said in a social media post. "I don't support that direction."
As flagged by New York Times reporter Annie Karni, Moulton is now the fourth Democratic lawmaker who once received heavy support from AIPAC to reject their donations, following Reps. Morgan McGarvey (D-Ky.), Deborah Ross (D-NC), and Valerie Foushee (D-NC).
Hamid Bendaas, communications director for the Institute for Middle East Understanding Policy Project, observed in a post on X that Moulton appeared to be ignoring advice given by a prominent Democratic consultant over the summer to not focus on the Israel-Palestine conflict because polls showed it wasn't important to voters.
Dylan Williams, the vice president for government affairs at the Center for International Policy, argued that Moulton's rejection of AIPAC cash showed how far the organization's reputation with the electorate has fallen over the past several years.
"AIPAC is now so toxic to Democratic voters that support from it is widely seen as a political liability," he wrote. "The NRA-ization of AIPAC is nearly complete."
Ishaan Tharoor, a Washington Post global affairs columnist, also reflected on how much AIPAC's brand has been damaged over the last two years of war in Gaza, which has resulted in the deaths of at least 68,000 Palestinians.
"There was a time when people would refer to AIPAC as the gold standard in lobbying," he wrote. "So many in India and the Indian diaspora have talked about a future 'Indian AIPAC' one day influencing US politics in similar fashion. But AIPAC's brand is increasingly, perhaps irredeemably toxic."
Journalist Ryan Grim had a one-word reaction to Moulton's rejection of AIPAC cash: "Wow."
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Trump Admin Reportedly OKs CIA Action in Venezuela Amid Growing Alarm Over Bombed Boats
The reporting came as rights groups sought the legal memo on the president's deadly strikes on alleged drug-running boats in the Caribbean.
Oct 15, 2025
As outrage over US President Donald Trump's deadly boat bombings mounts, The New York Times reported Wednesday that his administration secretly authorized the Central Intelligence Agency "to carry out lethal operations in Venezuela and conduct a range of operations in the Caribbean," with the ultimate aim of ousting the country's leader, Nicolás Maduro.
"The agency would be able to take covert action against Mr. Maduro or his government either unilaterally or in conjunction with a larger military operation," according to the Times, which cited unnamed US officials. "It is not known whether the CIA is planning any operations in Venezuela or if the authorities are meant as a contingency."
"But the development comes as the US military is planning its own possible escalation, drawing up options for President Trump to consider, including strikes inside Venezuela," the newspaper noted. The administration's Venezuela strategy was "developed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, with help from John Ratcliffe, the CIA director."
The White House and CIA declined to comment on record, though some observers speculated it was "an authorized leak." The reporting comes as Democrats in Congress, human rights groups, and legal scholars sound the alarm of Trump's five known strikes on boats he claims were smuggling drugs, which have killed at least 27 people.
Critics highlighted the United States' long history of covert action in Latin America, as well as how the reported CIA authorization contrasts with Trump's so-called "America First" claims.
"This is absolutely insane," said Tommy Vietor, a former Obama administration official who went on to co-found Crooked Media. "America First was not sold as CIA regime change operations in Venezuela."
Critics also noted Trump's mission to secure the Nobel Peace Prize; this year, it went to María Corina Machado, a right-wing Venezuelan who dedicated the award to not only the people in her country, but also the US president.
"Now that Trump has delegated his preposterous politicking for a Nobel Peace Prize to sycophants, he can finally get around to declaring unilateral war on Venezuela, a war crime, as he murders Colombian civilians at sea, another war crime, and endorses collective punishment in Gaza, another war crime," journalist Seth Abramson said Wednesday.
As Senate Democrats last week unsuccessfully fought to stop Trump's boat strikes of the Venezuelan coast, Colombian President Gustavo Petro said on social media that one of the bombed vessels appeared to be carrying citizens of his country.
"A new war zone has opened: the Caribbean," he said at the time. "Evidence shows that the last boat bombed was Colombian, with Colombian citizens inside. I hope their families come forward and file complaints. There isn't a war against smuggling; it's a war for oil, and the world must stop it. The aggression is against all of Latin America and the Caribbean."
The Trump administration recently claimed in a confidential notice to Congress intended to justify the deadly bombings that the president decided drug cartels "are nonstate armed groups, designated them as terrorist organizations, and determined that their actions constitute an armed attack against the United States."
While that notice leaked to the press, the ACLU and Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) on Wednesday filed a Freedom of Information Act request seeking the Office of Legal Counsel's guidance and other related documents regarding the strikes.
"All available evidence suggests that President Trump's lethal strikes in the Caribbean constitute murder, pure and simple," said Jeffrey Stein, staff attorney with the ACLU's National Security Project. "The public deserves to know how our government is justifying these attacks as lawful, and, given the stakes, immediate public scrutiny of its apparently radical theories is imperative."
CCR legal director Baher Azmy stressed that "in a constitutional system, no president can arbitrarily choose to assassinate individuals from the sky based on his whim or say-so."
"The Trump administration is taking its indiscriminate pattern of lawlessness to a lethal level," Azmy added. "The public understanding of any rationale supporting such unprecedented and shocking conduct is essential for transparency and accountability."
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'These Are Murders': Trump Condemned After Bombing Yet Another Boat Off Venezuelan Coast
"That's 27 lives taken without even a semblance of a legal justification under domestic or international law," said one critic of the boat strikes.
Oct 14, 2025
President Donald Trump, who in recent days has been lobbying to receive a Nobel Peace Prize, announced on Tuesday afternoon that he had ordered a lethal US military strike against yet another boat off the coast of Venezuela.
In a post on his Truth Social network, Trump said that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Tuesday morning "ordered a lethal kinetic strike on a vessel affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization (DTO) conducting narcotrafficking."
Trump then claimed that "intelligence" had "confirmed" that the boat was engaged in illegal drug trafficking, although he provided no evidence to back up this claim.
Six passengers aboard the boat were killed in the attack, the president claimed.
Trump has now repeatedly ordered the American military to use deadly force against boats in international waters that are allegedly engaged in drug smuggling. Many legal scholars, including some right-wing experts who in the past have embraced expansive views of presidential powers, consider such strikes illegal.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) condemned Trump's attack, which she noted was the fifth time the president had ordered a strike on a purported drug-trafficking vessel.
"Using the military to execute alleged criminals with no due process or input from Congress is brazenly unconstitutional and damaging to our democracy," she wrote in a social media post.
Attorney George Conway, a former Republican who broke with the party over its support of Trump, said there was absolutely zero doubt that Trump's strikes on the boats were acts of murder.
"That's 27 flat-out murders," he wrote in a post on X, referring to the total body count resulting from the president's boat strikes. "That's 27 lives taken without even a semblance of a legal justification under domestic or international law."
Kenneth Roth, former director of Human Rights Watch, said that Trump could face criminal prosecution for attacking the boats.
"Trump keeps ordering the summary killing of people in boats off the coast of Venezuela," Roth wrote. "Whether drug traffickers or not (we have no idea), these are murders. If on Venezuelan territory, the International Criminal Court could prosecute."
Richard Painter, who was an ethics lawyer in former President George W. Bush's White House, similarly described the strikes as "murder" and "a violation of US as well as international law."
According to The Associated Press, the strikes against boats have unnerved the Venezuelan government, which believes the US is preparing to launch a regime-change war against it. Venezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino last week even went so far as to tell his citizens to be prepared for a potential invasion during a televised appearance.
"I want to warn the population: We have to prepare ourselves because the irrationality with which the US empire operates is not normal,” he said, according to the AP. “It’s anti-political, anti-human, warmongering, rude, and vulgar."
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Ceasefire Sparks Fresh Calls for Global Media Access to Gaza
Press groups are also demanding justice for the more than 200 journalists slaughtered in Palestinian territory over the past two years.
Oct 13, 2025
Since a fragile ceasefire in the Gaza Strip began on Friday, press freedom advocates and critics of Israel's genocidal assault have issued new calls for international media access to the decimated Palestinian territory, including the largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy group in the United States.
"We encourage American and international media outlets to demand direct, unsupervised access to Gaza in the wake of the ceasefire agreement," the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said in a statement on Monday, as Hamas returned 20 hostages taken on October 7, 2023 and Israel released over 1,900 imprisoned Palestinians, most of whom were taken captive by Israeli forces over the past two years.
CAIR urged reporters to demand access to "the 1,700 Palestinian men, women, and children going free after Israel occupation forces abducted them from Gaza, held them without charge, and reportedly subjected them to torture in prisons run by Itamar Ben-Gvir," the country's far-right minister of national security.
As Drop Site News' Ryan Grim noted on social media, some Palestinians are already speaking out about the torture they endured:
“Although many media outlets will understandably cover the release of Israeli hostages, it is important to also cover the stories of Palestinian civilians who were kidnapped and other Palestinian hostages who may not go free, such as Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya," said CAIR. "Ignoring Palestinian suffering would give the appearance of bias and create a warped, one-sided image for the public."
"It is particularly critical for American journalists to overcome the Israeli government's attempts to hide the aftermath of the US-funded devastation in Gaza," CAIR added. "Reporters must immediately receive access to Gaza so they can see and report on the consequences of the genocide for themselves."
Unsuccessfully pursuing a Nobel Peace Prize, US President Donald Trump announced last Wednesday night that Israel and Hamas had agreed to the first phase of his proposed plan for Gaza. On Monday, Trump addressed Israeli lawmakers. He also signed a peace deal document, as did Egyptian, Qatari, and Turkish leaders.
A report published last week by the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft and the Costs of War Project at Brown University found that the Trump and Biden administrations provided at least $21.7 billion in military aid to Israel since October 2023. The two-year Israeli assault—widely decried as genocide—has killed at least 67,869 Palestinians and wounded 170,105, the Gaza Health Ministry said Monday. Thousands of people remain missing, and experts believe the true toll is far higher.
Among those dead are hundreds of Palestinian journalists, who have worked to not only survive Gaza but also share stories from there over the past two years, as Israel has largely prevented any international reporters from entering the territory.
The various tallies of journalists slaughtered in Gaza go up to at least 271, which includes Saleh al-Jafarawi, a Palestinian reporter and content creator killed on Sunday. According to The New Arab:
Reports in Arabic media state that the armed militia was affiliated with Israel, and members of the group had been killing displaced Palestinians who were making their way back to their homes in the aftermath of the truce.
When he was found, after being announced as missing early on Sunday, he was wearing a press jacket.
The reporter had amassed a large following on social media for his fearless dispatches from on the ground, despite himself being displaced, starved, and his home bombed.
As Middle East Eye reported Monday, the slain journalist "was buried the same day as his brother Naji al-Jafarawi was released from an Israeli prison as part of an exchange of captives."
After Saleh al-Jafarawi's death, multiple social media users shared a video of him welcoming the ceasefire that started on Friday.
Jonathan Dagher, head of the Middle East Desk at Reporters Without Borders, or Reporters Sans Frontières (RSF), said in a Friday statement that "the relief of a ceasefire in Gaza must not distract from the absolute urgency of the catastrophic situation facing journalists in the territory."
Over 200 journalists have been killed by Israeli forces, "and the reporters still alive in Gaza need immediate care, equipment, and support," he noted. "They also need justice—more than ever. If the impunity for the crimes committed against them continues, they will be repeated in Gaza, Palestine, and elsewhere in the world. To bring justice to Gaza's reporters and to protect the right to information around the world, we demand arrest warrants for the perpetrators of crimes against our fellow journalists in Gaza."
"RSF is counting on the International Criminal Court (ICC) to act on the complaints we filed for war crimes committed against these journalists," added Dagher, whose group has filed five complaints with the tribunal since October 2023. "It's high time that the international community's response matched the courage shown by Palestinian reporters over the past two years."
The board of the Foreign Press Association in Jerusalem also released a statement on Friday. It said that "the FPA welcomes the agreement between the warring parties on a ceasefire in Gaza. With the halt in fighting, we renew our urgent call for Israel to open the borders immediately and allow international media free and independent access to the Gaza Strip."
"For the last two years, the FPA and its members have asked, through all channels, to be let into Gaza to report on the reality of the war. These demands have been repeatedly ignored, while our Palestinian colleagues have risked their lives to provide tireless and brave reporting from Gaza," the group continued.
Israel's Supreme Court is set to hear arguments in a related case next week, "but there is no reason to wait that long," the group added. "Enough with the excuses and delay tactics. The restrictions on press freedom must come to an end."
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