Feed aggregator

In der Silvesternacht geht eine Rakete zu früh los, Plewig steht noch zu nah dran. Jetzt setzt sich die Moderatorin für ein Böller-Verbot ein. Ausserdem kritisiert sie Kommentare, in denen ihr nun die Schuld an ihrer Verletzung zugeschoben wird.

By Melek Zahine
BORDEAUX, France, Jan 12 2026 (IPS)

Before military aid is appropriated, troops deployed, or bombs dropped, the United States lays the groundwork for its political violence by first stripping adversaries of their humanity. Diplomacy is sidelined, legal restraints are treated as inconveniences, and profit is valued over human life. This machinery of dehumanization, imposed around the world for decades and honed in Gaza the past three years, has now returned home, turned inward against Americans by the elected officials and systems meant to protect them.

Melek Zahine

The human and financial costs of America’s addiction to war were a constant presence in my childhood. For my generation, war was relentlessly pursued by the political establishment, laundered through media narratives, and imposed on the working class and the poor in taxes and blood. I was not yet two when my family immigrated to the United States in April 1970, as the Vietnam War raged and Nixon ordered the invasion of Cambodia. By the time those wars ended, new interventions, proxy wars, coups, and “wars on terror” followed, with the language of dehumanization used to sell and sustain each conflict. Vietnamese civilians were reduced to “free-fire targets,” and indigenous farmers in Cold War Latin America were labeled “peasants and subversives” to justify massacres. After 9/11, Iraqis were written off as “collateral damage,” and during America’s longest war, Afghan “military-age males” were presumed “terrorists” and “guilty by default.” In every instance, dehumanization preceded and justified the violence.

The Laboratory for Dehumanization

And always, decade after decade, lingered U.S. patronage for Israel’s own wars, especially towards Palestinian self-determination. Israeli human rights abuses in the occupied Palestinian territories—excessive force, collective punishment, illegal settlement expansion, and arbitrary detention—have been documented in U.S. State Department reports since the 1970s. Yet Washington continued to expand military aid, making Israel the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. foreign assistance in history. After October 7, despite warnings from multiple U.S. government officials that Israel’s response to Hamas amounted to the collective punishment of Gaza’s 2.1 million population, nearly half of which is children, both the Biden and Trump administrations approved tens of billions of dollars in emergency arms transfers. These transfers proceeded despite evidence that U.S.-supplied arms, including chemical weapons and 2,000-pound bombs, were being used by Israel on Gaza’s densely populated civilian neighborhoods—violating both international law and domestic laws, namely the U.S. Arms Export Control Act and the Leahy Law. Over decades of support, but especially the past three years, U.S. support to Israel helped refine its own language of dehumanization towards Palestinians by consistently framing the killing of civilians as nameless and “unavoidable” incidents of Israel’s right to self-defense and laying the rhetorical foundation for the genocide in Gaza.

The Empire Comes Home

The militarized ICE raids now taking place across the United States rely on tactics, equipment, and doctrines supplied by the very military industrial complex that has profited from Gaza. The same officials who reduced Palestinians to “terrorists” or those shielding them now use that language at home, casting Americans protecting their communities as “threats to be neutralized” rather than citizens with inalienable rights. President Trump’s reluctance to say Renée Good’s name after a federal ICE agent fatally shot her in Minneapolis last week—framing the encounter as “self-defense”—echoes how Palestinians killed in Gaza by U.S.-supplied weapons and political cover are discussed as abstract, unnamed casualties. Naming the powerful while rendering the vulnerable nameless shields perpetrators and exposes the persistent logic of dehumanization that now bridges U.S. foreign policy and domestic policing.

Reclaiming Our Humanity

In his 1961 Farewell Address, Dwight D. Eisenhower warned that an unchecked military-industrial complex could distort democratic governance at home. Yet even as he spoke, he oversaw the very coups and interventions that entrenched permanent militarization. We are now living in the reality he feared. Washington’s ongoing complicity in Gaza, its increasingly aggressive posture toward Venezuela and Greenland, and its authoritarian behavior at home are a stark reminder: when dehumanization goes unchecked in U.S. foreign policy, it is only a matter of time before it goes unchecked domestically.

If Gaza and America’s long history of dehumanization have taught us anything, it’s that Americans cannot depend on their political elites to restrain their appetite for abusive authority. Average citizens must move beyond mere condemnation and toward sustained civic action. This means voting out officials beholden to war-profiteering lobbies, reasserting congressional power over the executive branch, and demanding the enforcement of laws designed to prevent U.S. complicity in human rights abuses overseas and the rule of law at home. The challenge ahead is truly immense—but ending the machinery of dehumanization is not inevitable and remains within the reach of those Americans determined to reclaim their shared humanity for one another and the world.

Melek Zahine is a writer and advocate focusing on the intersection of humanitarian assistance and U.S. foreign policy.

IPS UN Bureau

 

Follow @IPSNewsUNBureau
!function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)\[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)?'http':'https';if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=p+'://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js';fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document, 'script', 'twitter-wjs');\ \ 

Afin de garantir la stabilité des prix et l’approvisionnement du marché durant le mois sacré de Ramadan, le groupe public Agrolog, en collaboration avec des […]

L’article « La viande ovine ne dépassera pas les 1 860 DA/kg durant le Ramadan », assure le PDG d’Agrolog est apparu en premier sur .

La star de Marty Supreme figure parmi les grands gagnants des Golden Globes et voit ses chances de remporter un Oscar renforcées.

Das Zürcher Stadtspital vermeldet einen neuen historischen Höchststand an Geburten. Waren es 2024 noch rund 2600 Babys, sind es im letzten Jahr schon 2932 Neugeborene.

Ce lundi 12 janvier 2026 revêt une portée toute particulière en Algérie. Il coïncide avec la célébration de Yennayer 2976, le Nouvel An amazigh, une […]

L’article Nouvel An amazigh – Yennayer 2976 : quelles sont les prévisions météo de ce lundi 12 janvier ? est apparu en premier sur .

Angelica De Riggi (34) verlor ihr Büsi an eine Krankheit. Jetzt sorgt die Solothurnerin in Las Vegas für Aufsehen: Ihre Erfindung scannt Gesichter und warnt Katzenhalter, bevor es zu spät ist.

Angelica De Riggi verlor ihr Büsi an eine Krankheit – jetzt sorgt die Solothurnerin für Aufsehen. Ihre Erfindung scannt Gesichter und warnt Katzenhalter, bevor es zu spät ist.

Ab Februar bietet das Luzerner Kantonsspital am Standort Sursee erstmals urologische Behandlungen für ambulante, stationäre und Notfallpatientinnen und -patienten an. Die Versorgung übernehmen Spezialisten der Klinik für Urologie des Luzerner Kantonsspitals (Luks).

Unser Reise-Redaktor Christian Bauer geht für vier Wochen nach Mérida in Mexiko, um Spanisch zu lernen. Tags paukt er in der Sprachschule – nachts entdeckt er eine Stadt voller Lebensenergie, Cantinas und Salsa-Rhythmen. Und einen (faulen) Studenten.

Das Budget 2026 der Gemeinde Schwyz hat trotz hängiger Beschwerde in Kraft treten können. Sie habe vor dem Verwaltungsgericht einen Teilerfolg erzielt, teilte die Gemeinde am Montag mit.

Die bitterkalten Tage setzen vielen Autos in der Schweiz zu und bringen die TCS-Patrouilleure ins Schwitzen. Allein am 5. Januar waren über 2200 Pannenhilfe-Einsätze nötig – viele wegen schwacher oder defekter Starterbatterien.

Ein Lastwagen ist am Montagmorgen auf der Autobahn A2 bei Pratteln in Brand geraten. Bei diesem Unfall wurde niemand verletzt, wie die Kantonspolizei Basel-Landschaft gegenüber der Nachrichtenagentur Keystone-SDA sagte.

Budapest’s decision comes one year after Hungary granted political asylum to former PiS deputy justice minister Marcin Romanowski

Die Waadtländer Staatsrätin Valérie Dittli wird in einem Bericht des Grossen Rates kritisiert. Dieser deckt «mangelhaftes Management, Misstrauen gegenüber der Verwaltung und unzureichend begründete Entscheidungen» auf.

Nach dem Aus im EFL Cup muss Manchester United auch im FA Cup früh die Segel streichen – das gab es zuletzt vor über 40 Jahren. Derweil sucht die Klubführung noch immer nach einem neuen Trainer.

Golden Globes 2026 in Beverly Hills: Stars setzen auf Eleganz in Schwarz, Weiss und Silber. Styling-Expertin Tatjana Kotoric analysiert, warum Zurückhaltung statt Pomp dieses Jahr den roten Teppich prägte.

Les demi-finales de la Coupe d’Afrique des Nations 2025, disputée au Maroc, offriront deux affiches de prestige. Le Sénégal et l’Égypte rejouent un duel devenu mythique, tandis que le Nigeria et le Maroc s’affrontent dans un choc entre un géant continental et le pays hôte.

In Crans-Montana kam es in der Neujahrsnacht zu einem verheerenden Brand, der 40 Todesopfer forderte. Im Ticker halten wir dich über die neusten Entwicklungen auf dem Laufenden.

Autofahrende müssen beim Kauf einer E-Vignette wachsam sein: Der Bund warnt vor Betrügern. Vorsicht ist beim Googeln sowie im Mailpostfach geboten.