Category: 2. World

JAKARTA:

Thousands rallied across Indonesia Monday as the military was deployed in the capital after six people were killed in nationwide protests sparked by anger over lavish perks for lawmakers.

At least 500 protesters gathered outside the nation’s parliament in Jakarta, watched by soldiers and police throughout the day, before dissipating after President Prabowo Subianto warned protests should end by sundown.

But elsewhere protests were more volatile. In Gorontalo city on Sulawesi island protesters clashed with police, who responded with tear gas and water cannon, according to an AFP journalist. In Bandung on the main island Java, protesters hurled Molotov cocktails and firecrackers at the provincial council building.

Thousands more rallied in Palembang on Sumatra island and hundreds gathered separately in Banjarmasin on Borneo island, Yogyakarta on the main island of Java and Makassar on Sulawesi, according to AFP journalists around the country.

“Our main goal is to reform the parliament,” protester and university student Nafta Keisya Kemalia, 20, told AFP outside parliament before the protest ended. AFP

A plan circulating in the White House to develop the “Gaza Riviera” as a string of high-tech megacities has been dismissed as an “insane” attempt to provide cover for the large-scale ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian territory’s population.

On Sunday the Washington Post published a leaked prospectus for the plan, which would involve the forced displacement of Gaza’s entire population of 2 million people and put the territory into a US trusteeship for at least a decade.

Named the Gaza Reconstitution, Economic Acceleration and Transformation Trust – or Great – the proposal was reportedly developed by some of the same Israelis who created and set in motion the US- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation with financial planning contributed by Boston Consulting Group.

Most controversially, the 38-page plan suggests what it calls “temporary relocation of all of Gaza’s more than 2 million population” – a proposal that would amount to ethnic cleansing, potentially a genocidal act.

Palestinians would be encouraged into “voluntary” departure to another country or into restricted, secure zones during reconstruction. Those who own land would be offered “a digital token” by the trust in exchange for rights to redevelop their property, to be used to finance a new life elsewhere.

Those who stay would be housed in properties with a tiny footprint of 323 sq ft – minuscule even by the standards of many non-refugee camp homes in Gaza.

It was not clear if the plan reflects US policy, and neither the White House nor the State Department responded to the Washington Post’s request for comment. But the prospectus seem to reflect Donald Trump’s previously stated ambition to “clean out” Gaza and redevelop it.

Among critics of the leaked prospectus was Philip Grant, the executive director of Trial International, a human rights group based in Switzerland, who called the plan “a blueprint for mass deportation, marketed as development”.

“This is a blueprint for mass deportation, marketed as development. The outcome? A textbook case of international crimes on an unimaginable scale: forcible population transfer, demographic engineering, and collective punishment,” Grant said.

Trial is one of fifteen groups that have previously warned that private contractors operating in Gaza in collaboration with the Israeli government risk “aiding and abetting or otherwise being complicit in crimes under international law, including war crimes, crimes against humanity, or genocide”, and that they may be liable under several jurisdictions.

“Those involved in the planning and execution of such a plan – including corporate actors – could face legal liability for decades to come,” Grant said.

Even in the Israeli media the proposal invited incredulity, with a column in the left-leaning Haaretz describing it as “a Trumpian get-rich-quick scheme reliant on war crimes, AI and tourism”.

The highly fanciful prospectus – subtitled “From a Demolished Iranian Proxy to a Prosperous Abrahamic Ally”– appears to have been drawn up by people with no physical knowledge of Gaza, the politics of the Middle East or the likely challenges in attempting to rebuild the territory as a multibillion-dollar tourism and technology hub that would inevitably compete with Israel.

The scheme, described as requiring no US funding and intended to be funded by investors to the tune of $100bn, envisages a bustling port city bisected by a watercourse and bordered by up to eight leafy AI-powered high-tech megacities, apparently modelled after Saudi Arabia’s troubled Neom project.

It also envisages an “Elon Musk” manufacturing park located – without irony – on the ruins of the Erez industrial zone, which was built with Israeli investment to exploit cheap labour in the Palestinian territory and subsequently closed and destroyed by Israeli forces.

Examination of the map appears to suggest the plan would also involve the expropriation for an Israeli security buffer zone of much of Gaza’s agricultural land, which tends to be located at Gaza’s periphery close to the border with Israel.

The small print is most damning, however, making no distinction in terms of sovereignty between Gaza, Israel and Egypt, suggesting no consideration has been made for Palestinian self determination. Under the plan, Israel would maintain vaguely defined “overarching rights” over Gaza “to meet its security needs”. There would be no Palestinian state but a “Palestinian polity” which would join Trump’s Abraham Accords.

The entire language in the prospectus, and labelling of several features, appears aimed at appealing to the vanity of Trump, Musk, and Saudi Arabia’s crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, for whom the security ring around Gaza is named.

According to the Boston Consulting Group, quoted by the Post, work on the document was not approved and two senior partners who led the financial planning had been fired.

That criticism was echoed by HA Hellyer, a senior associate at the Royal United Services Institute who suggested that the details of the plan were so clearly ludicrous that the proposal should not be taken seriously at face value.

“It’s insane. What is important is what the plan points to, and that is not a new idea: the Israel determination that there should be no Palestinian sovereignty or self determination in Gaza.

“The US has made clear since February [when details of plans for a Trump Riviera in Gaza first emerged] that they are OK with the idea of ethnic cleansing in Gaza.

“The notion that this would be about ‘voluntary departure’ when Palestinians in Gaza have no choice but to be shot or starved.”

Katherine Gallagher, a senior lawyer at the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York, said that “any company that aligns itself with Israel – and seemingly, Trump – in a plan to forcibly transfer Palestinians from their homes in Gaza is opening itself up to significant legal liability at home and under universal jurisdiction”.

The CCR recently sued the Trump administration for records of its funding of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, the private outfit overseeing aid distribution in Gaza and at whose sites hundreds of Palestinians have been killed while queuing for food.

The prospectus was leaked days after Trump held a White House meeting to discuss day-after planning for Gaza attended by the former British prime minister Tony Blair, who has contributed views on Gaza’s future to the Trump administration and Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.

The leaked plan was also rejected by senior Hamas official Basem Naim who said: “Gaza is not for sale.

“Gaza is part of the greater Palestinian homeland.”

The world’s leading association of genocide scholars has declared that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.

A resolution passed by the International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS) states that Israel’s conduct meets the legal definition as laid out in the UN convention on genocide.

Across a three-page resolution, the IAGS presents a litany of actions undertaken by Israel throughout the 22-month-long war that it recognises as constituting genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The IAGS is the world’s largest professional association of genocide scholars and includes a number of Holocaust experts. Out of its 500 members, 28% took part in the vote and 86% of those who voted supported the resolution.

In a summary of Israeli policies and actions, the declaration notes the widespread attacks on both the personnel and facilities needed for survival, including in the healthcare, aid, and educational sectors.

Among many other elements, it notes the 50,000 children killed or injured by Israel, as highlighted by UN aid organisation Unicef, which impacts the ability of Palestinians in Gaza to survive as a group and regenerate.

The resolution also highlights the support among Israeli leaders for the forced expulsion of all Palestinians from Gaza, alongside Israel’s near-total demolition of housing in the territory.

The IAGS notes the statements by Israeli leaders dehumanising Palestinians in Gaza, characterising them all as the enemy, alongside promises to “flatten Gaza” and turn it into “hell”.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry said the report was based on “Hamas lies” and poor research, calling it an “embarrassment to the legal profession”. A spokesperson added that it was Israel itself which is the victim of genocide.

Israel has regularly denied that its actions in Gaza amount to genocide and says they are justified as a means of self-defence.

The IAGS scholars state that while the 7 October 2023 Hamas attack – in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others taken hostage – was itself a crime, Israel’s response has not only been directed against Hamas but has targeted Gaza’s entire population.

The 1948 UN Genocide Convention, which was adopted following the mass murder of Jews by Nazi Germany, defines genocide as crimes committed “with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group”.

A number of leading rights organisations, including two Israeli organisations, have also declared they believe Israel is committing genocide.

The UN and a number of Western nations have said that they will only consider a ruling by a court that genocide is taking place as authoritative.

The UN’s top court, the International Court of Justice, is currently considering a case brought by South Africa in 2023 that argues that Israel is committing genocide. The ICJ has not yet made a determination on the subject and has granted Israel an extension until January 2026 to present its defence.

Israel has accused the case of having antisemitic motivations, calling it a “blood libel”, in reference to historic allegations that Jewish communities ritually murder Christian children.

The IAGS say their resolution has no bearing on any case put forward to an international court.

On Monday, the Hamas-run Ministry of Health said that 63,557 people had been killed and 160,660 injured during the war so far. The ministry’s numbers are widely considered reliable yet they do not distinguish between civilians and fighters.

In August, the UN-backed food monitor, the IPC, confirmed that famine was taking place in parts of Gaza. Israel is accused of causing the famine through ongoing restrictions on food and medical aid entering Gaza.

Israel controls all border crossings into the Gaza Strip, and as the occupying power bears responsibility for protecting civilian life under international law, which includes the prevention of starvation.

US officials have further restricted visitor visas for Palestinians, by denying them to almost all applicants who use a Palestinian passport, media reports say.

The development comes days after 80 Palestinian officials were denied visas ahead of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.

Earlier in August, visitor visas were paused for people hoping to travel from the Palestinian territory of Gaza. This newly-reported decree would affect a wider group – including people living in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

The Department of State did not explicitly confirm the move but said it was “taking concrete steps in compliance with US law and our national security”.

The decision was issued in a diplomatic cable dated 18 August, the New York Times and CNN reported.

US consular officers were told to refuse non-immigrant visas to “all otherwise eligible Palestinian Authority passport holders”, the communication was quoted as saying.

That would apply to Palestinians hoping to come to the US for a range of purposes, including for business, study or medical treatment.

The move meant that officials would be required to perform a further review of each applicant, which amounted to a blanket ban on issuing visas to Palestinians, the New York Times added in its report.

Palestinians who are able to make visa applications using other passports were said to be unaffected.

It is not clear what prompted the reported move, though the Trump administration has been steadfast in its support for Israel’s military campaign against Hamas in Gaza.

The news also follows last month’s announcements by a number of other US allies – including the UK, Canada and France – that they would recognise a Palestinian state on certain conditions. US Vice-President JD Vance has said Washington has “no plans” to follow suit.

The Trump administration has also cracked down on pro-Palestinian protests on university campuses.

The move represents a further toughening of the president’s stance on visas, following two earlier measures.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was among a group of dozens of Palestinian officials who were recently blocked from attending the UN General Assembly session in New York later this month, after US officials revoked his visa and accused the Palestinian Authority and Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), both of which Abbas leads, of undermining peace efforts.

And the Department of State said on 16 August it had paused approvals of visitor visas for Palestinians from Gaza specifically, so that a review could take place.

Hamas, which is designated as a terrorist group by the US, governed Gaza when hundreds of its armed fighters attacked Israel on 7 October 2023, killing about 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages. The attack triggered a massive and ongoing Israeli military offensive, in which at least 63,459 Palestinians have been killed, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.

The US visa policy has effectively been extended now to include people from the West Bank and wider Palestinian diaspora.

Asked about the latest move, a Department of State spokesperson’s statement said: “The Trump administration is taking concrete steps in compliance with US law and our national security in regards to announced visa restrictions and revocations for PA (Palestinian Authority) passport holders. We refer you to those public announcements for more information on those restrictions and revocations.

“Every visa decision is a national security decision, and the State Department is vetting and adjudicating visa decisions for PA passport holders accordingly.”

Key Facts

Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi met Monday in Tianjin, China. (Photo by Sergey Bobylev/Kremlin Press S./Anadolu via Getty Images)

Anadolu via Getty Images

What Happened At The China-Russia-India Summit?

Xi, Putin and Modi met in Tianjin, China, on Monday as China hosted the leaders of more than two dozen countries, putting on what looked like a unified front in a move some analysts called was a pointed message to the United States, particularly by India, which has been frustrated by tariff negotiations with the U.S. The leaders were seen shaking hands, embracing and laughing with one another, and Putin, who took a backseat limo ride with Modi, referred to the Indian leader as his “dear friend.” Modi posted a picture of his limo ride with Putin on his social media accounts, stating “conversations with him are always insightful.” Xi, in a speech at the summit, urged leaders to oppose “Cold War mentality, bloc confrontation and bullying” in likely shots at the United States, the New York Times reported. Putin, in a speech, said “understandings” reached with the United States at their Alaska summit in August could pave a way for peace between Russia and Ukraine, but blamed the West for the war over its “constant attempts to drag Ukraine into NATO.” The summit was Modi’s first trip to China in seven years, and the leaders of Asia’s largest countries agreed they are development partners, not rivals, and to not let their disputed border in the Himalayas “define the overall China-India relationship.”

How Have Analysts Interpreted The China-Russia-India Summit?

Keir Giles, a senior fellow at London think tank Chatham House, told NBC News the summit showed the “close relationship that Trump sought with Putin is now on display between Putin and others,” noting the United States gave India “a real cause to look for friendship and partnership elsewhere.” Manoj Kewalramani, who heads Indo-Pacific studies at Bangalore, India’s Takshashila Institution, told the New York Times optics are a key part of the summit and that U.S. policies “will result in other countries looking for alternatives to meet their interests.”

Further Reading

Smiles and Clasped Hands as Xi, Putin and Modi Try to Signal Unity (New York Times)

Trump Doubles India Tariffs To 50% In Retaliation For Russian Oil Purchases (Forbes)