Stop This War, Mahmoud Khalil and Gaza

Since World War II the United States has “failed up” into the 47th President

Lawrence Bentley

Jun 23, 2025

Operation Midnight Hammer

War is never a good thing. Sometimes it is necessary when a nation is attacked, but never a good thing.

What makes it worse is when:

International law has been broken and no one does anything about it;
The leaders plus their media mouth pieces create lies/propaganda to escalate, justify and deceive;

Someone needs to “reel in” the leaders of all these wars, the world body was set up for that purpose after World War II, but countries are picking and choosing when to comply with the United Nations, the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Court, the Geneva Conventions and the Non-Proliferation Treaty. It is not just about the particular leaders today, since the end of World War II racism, money, power & sex have overridden compassion, justice, equality & freedom. Yes, sex: you think if the world leaders were in loving relationships they would be out murdering and destroying the world?

I went through the online newspapers of the New York Times, Washington Post and Wall Street Journal. Presenting the facts is not the lead story. The lead story is writing what the power structure wants them to write and what will bring the most subscriptions. I don’t even bother turning the TV News, but I did not see one CNN video clip on Twitter (X) of Van Jones 1000% supporting Operation Midnight Hammer to the nodding “approval” of Scott Jennings.

Here is some of the reporting at the instruction of the powerful:

Washington Post:

"A weakened Iran could turn to assassination and terrorism to strike back"
"U.S. authorities uncovered and disrupted a series of assassination plots. The targets, according to U.S. officials and court filings, included former national security adviser John Bolton, former secretary of state Mike Pompeo and Donald Trump, at the time the former president"
“Trump removed the federal security details for John Bolton and Mike Pompeo if these threats are so serious why are they being exposed?”
“Their standoff capabilities and nascent nuclear program have been badly hit” - Matthew Levitt, director of the counterterrorism program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

Wall Street Journal:

“U.N. atomic agency chief says 'very significant damage' likely at Fordow”
“Trump Meets the Moment on Iran - The President bombs three nuclear sites to spare the world from an intolerable risk.”

New York Times:

“Iran’s Nuclear Dreams May Survive Even a Devastating American Blow”
“President Trump declared a “spectacular military success,” saying that American bombs had knocked out key pillars of Iran’s nuclear program.”

How come when Israel (with US backing) turns to pagers and assassination in Lebanon it is celebrated in the Global North Corporate media?

How come when Israel (with US backing) turns to assassination, car bombs, drones in Iran it is celebrated in the Global North Corporate media?

How come when Trump and Netanyahu threaten Ayatollah Ali Khamenei with assassination it is celebrated in the Global North Corporate media?

How come when Trump assassinates Major General Qasem Soleimani it is celebrated in the Global North Corporate media?

Washington Post Quote:

“In the hours after Israel launched its first wave of strikes against Iran on June 13, killing top military leaders and nuclear scientists, Israeli intelligence operatives launched a covert campaign to intimidate senior officials with the apparent aim of dividing and destabilizing Tehran’s theocratic regime, according to three people familiar with the operation. People working for Israel’s security services who speak Persian, Iran’s primary language, called senior Iranian officials on their cellphones and warned them that they, too, would die unless they ceased supporting the regime of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, according to the three people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss clandestine operations. One of them estimated that more than 20 Iranians in positions of power were contacted.”

Israel is “weakened” - carrying out extrajudicial assassinations that are illegal under international law, and it is written as sound strategy. How is murdering an entire family and possibly neighbors in a drone strike sound strategy?

In order to justify expanding the US war on Iran, the Global North Corporate Media is suddenly concerned about a "weakened" Iran using "assassination and terrorism" - where was that concern as soon as Trump said he was "considering" an attack on Iran or the assassination of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei? Is U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) now going to switch to running around in Masks picking up Iranians (or people who look like Iranians) off the street and putting them in concentration camps like the Japanese in 1942?

I read Mike Mihajlovic on Twitter (X) on the damage from Saturday June 21, 2025 to the Iranian nuclear sites at Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan. I also read Dmitry Medvedev on Telegram.

Mihajlovic had a lot scientific detail on the satellite images to analyze the impact of the airstrikes. One video showed 16 Iranian trucks leaving the Fordo site on Friday. From the satellite images critical infrastructure of the nuclear fuel cycles were either unaffected, or sustained only minor damage. Could the facility have been empty or only contain non-relevant supplies? Did Iran have warning from other countries, its own intelligence or the US?

Questions:

How much does it cost for 125 U.S. aircraft to undertake this mission?
What is the cost of 14 GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrators and More than 75 precision-guided weapons?

Seems to me Iran’s political regime has survived and the people are rallying around the country’s leadership. The person who has an Israeli-American “target” on his head, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has continued to pick replacements in the chain of military command in case they are murdered in Israeli strikes. Additionally, the Supreme Leader has named three senior clerics as candidates to succeed him to the Assembly of Experts (the clerical body responsible for appointing the supreme leader) should he be murdered by Israel or the United States.

The Supreme Leader is hidden away underground, speaks through a trusted aide (who hopefully wasn’t been paid off) and suspending all electronic communications. Ayatollah Khamenei, is 86 years old and views assassination as martyrdom.

"It was not an attack on Iran, it was not an attack on the Iranian people, this wasn't a regime change move, this was designed to degrade and/or destroy three nuclear sites related to their nuclear weaponization ambitions." - Secretary of State Marco Rubio

“It’s not politically correct to use the term, ‘Regime Change’. But if the current Iranian Regime is unable to MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN, why wouldn’t there be a Regime change???” - Donald Trump

Those two quotes are proof of incompetence and evil within the Presidential Administration.

Narges Mohammadi

Narges Mohammadi of the Iranian Defenders of Human Rights Center, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2023. Narges Mohammadi spent more than 20 years fighting for women’s rights. She was arrested 13 times and sentenced to 31 years in prison and 154 lashes, but was released in December 2024. Yet she is not calling for “regime change” but for peace. Ms. Mohammadi was forced to say this you think? In over 20 years they never got her to follow the authoritarian talking points, why would you assume she is doing it now?

“…to use all your individual, collective, and institutional capacities to amplify the call of ‘No to War’ and support our urgent plea for a ceasefire and an end to this war.” - Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi

“Democracy cannot come through violence and war.” - Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi

Mahmoud Khalil

Mahmoud Khalil - Columbia University graduate and American green card holder was released from the Jena, Louisiana immigrant detention center on June 20, 2025. U.S. District Judge Michael Farbiarz of Newark, New Jersey, ordered the release by the Department of Homeland (in)Security after 104 days in detention. Mahmoud Khalil was kidnapped by plainclothes (m)ICE agents in the lobby of his university residence in Manhattan March 8, 2025 and never charged with a crime. Donald Trump and Marco Rubio just decided they didn’t like what he said about Palestinian rights and tried to revoke his green card and deport him back to Syria. Brother Mahmoud was a lead negotiator during the pro-Palestinian campus protests at Columbia in 2024.

Mahmoud Khalil, born in Syria - returned to New York to his wife, Dr Noor Abdalla, and son, Deen who was born while his father was in detention. Mahmoud Khalil obtained his master’s degree in public administration at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs. Brother Mahmoud’s family was forced to flee for their lives in 1948 from the Village of Tiberias during “The Nakba” when Israeli terrorists murdered or displaced over 750,000 Palestinians from their homes. Stole their land.

Brother Mahmoud had to surrender his passport and green card to (m)ICE, has limited travel privileges within the United States and must notify the Department of Homeland (in)Security of his address within 48 hours of arriving in New York.

Three other students kidnapped – Rümeysa Öztürk, Badar Khan Suri, and Mohsen Mahdawi – were released while their immigration cases are pending. Yunseo Chungis went into in hiding while her case is being fought.

“Mahmoud’s release reignites our determination to continue fighting until all our prisoners are released – whether in Palestine or the United States, until we see the end of the genocide and the siege on Gaza, and until we enforce an arms embargo on the Israel” - Miriam Osman of the Palestinian Youth Movement

"Although justice prevailed it's long, very long overdue. And this shouldn't have taken three months." - Mahmoud Khalil

Israel is Still Killing in Gaza

It barely makes the news any longer, but Gaza is still a slaughter pen and I wish it would be stopped.

On June 23, 2025 Israeli attacks murdered a known 48 Palestinians and wounded 104 over the previous 24-hour period. Additionally, three Palestinians murdered by previous Israeli attacks were also recovered from the rubble.

Since Israel resumed its attacks with the full backing of President Trump to break HIS ceasefire on March 18, 2025. Since October 7, 2023 the death toll has reached 55,959 and the number of wounded 131,242.

“The liberation of the Palestinian people and the Jewish people are intertwined and go hand-by-hand, and you cannot achieve one without the other.” - Mahmoud Khalil

Dr Ezzideen Shehab

Dr Ezzideen is a 28-year-old doctor at the Nasser Medical Complex (what is left of it) in northern Gaza. The doctor was born and raised in the Jabaliya refugee camp. Here are his own words from the Gaza hellscape:

“Yesterday, the last warning came from Nasser Hospital: In 24 hours, there will be no formula left for premature infants. Not a metaphor. Not exaggeration. A clinical fact. And the response? Silence. Not one truck. Not one crate. Just the silence of steel-hearted men, satisfied with the mathematics of infant death. That evening, a mother was brought to the clinic. Thirty-three years old. Unconscious. Skin cold. Breath shallow. A body so thin I could see the outline of her bones as I placed the IV. Her baby still clung to her, unaware that the breast it suckled had nothing left to give but the scent of death. Diagnosis? Dehydration. Acute malnutrition. But in truth, she suffers from something medicine cannot cure: abandonment. We administered fluids, stabilized her vitals. On paper, it will look like we helped her. We did not. We postponed the inevitable. She will return, again and again, until she dies or the world wakes up. And I am not sure which will come first. My colleague, still untouched by this hell, whispered that she should stop breastfeeding. “She must regain her strength,” he said. I did not answer. What could I say? That formula is no longer a product here, but a dream? That a can of powdered milk now costs more than a month's worth of food, if there were food? She cannot buy bread. She cannot buy air. And yet we speak to her as if she had choices. This is the cruelty of war: not just the bombs, but the absurdity of giving advice to the damned. When she left, I saw her husband standing outside. He looked at me with the eyes of a man who has already buried too much. I gave him the money in my pocket. It will not save her. It might buy two loaves of bread. It might buy her three more days of life. But she will return. And when she does, we will treat her again with our empty hands, with our useless medicine, and our unbearable guilt. This is not medicine. This is triage in a mass grave that has not been dug yet. Do not mistake this for a humanitarian emergency. This is not a famine. It is a siege; It is not collapse. It is calculation; It is not neglect. It is intent.”

“And intent, cold and deliberate, makes it a crime. The women who collapse in my arms are not statistics. They are executions carried out in slow motion. And what is the world’s role? It does not pull the trigger. It simply watches the gun fire, again and again, and calls it complicated.”

“But I will tell you what is simple: Hunger kills. Thirst kills. Silence kills. And here, in Gaza, all three work together with perfect efficiency.”

Well over 1400 Medical and First Responder personnel have been murdered in Gaza.

If You Cannot Act, Speak

I signed a Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib petition to demand the United States Congress and Senate each vote to stop Trump from going to war with Iran. Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib Palestinian-American is now a co-sponsor of the bipartisan War Powers Resolution, House Congressional Resolution 38―introduced by Ro Khanna and Thomas Massie.

“If they threaten me with detention, even if they would kill me, I would still speak up for Palestine,” he said at a brief press conference after landing. I just want to go back and continue the work I was already doing, advocating for Palestinian rights, a speech that should actually be celebrated rather than punished.” - Mahmoud Khalil

“I will never stop striving for the realization of democracy, freedom and equality.” - Narges Mohammadi

They are coming for all of us.

https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2023/mohammadi/facts/

https://www.npr.org/2025/06/22/nx-s1-5441731/iran-strike-congress-reaction-vance-rubio

https://www.thenation.com/article/world/the-north-of-gaza-is-an-open-graveyard/

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/21/world/middleeast/iran-ayatollah-israel-war.html

https://www.newsweek.com/doald-trump-nobel-peace-prize-rwanda-2088736

https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-judge-orders-release-pro-palestinian-activist-khalil-2025-06-20/

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jun/21/mahmoud-khalil-released-family

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2025/06/23/exclusive-israel-intelligence-iran-call-audio/?utm_campaign=wp_post_most&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&carta-url=https%3A%2F%2Fs2.washingtonpost.com%2Fcar-ln-tr%2F4340d36%2F68597b21c2bee70ac1eb01f9%2F5d1360a2ade4e25d4b1bf753%2F14%2F66%2F68597b21c2bee70ac1eb01f9

https://x.com/MihajlovicMike/status/1936599306942771255

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/06/23/iran-retaliation-terrorism-assassination/