Israeli airstrikes vs Palestinian rockets: Facts & stats on air attacks

Chart of Israelis killed by rockets from Gaza and Palestinians in Gaza killed by Israeli airstrike | If Americans Knew (Click on to enlarge)

Canadian and US media news reports on Israel-Palestine virtually always mention ‘thousands of rockets have been fired from Gaza.’ However, the media rarely report how many people these rockets have killed, when they began, and what they look like. Canadian and US media reports also fail to compare these Palestinian weapons to the weapons Israel uses in its airstrikes.

Media struggle to defend Washington’s cruelty toward Venezuela and Iran as coronavirus spreads

By JOE EMERSBERGER, FAIR

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro wears a facemask, Marcch 23 | Venezuelanalysis

An Associated Press article (New York Times, 3/17/20) headlined “IMF Rejects Maduro’s Bid for Emergency Loan to Fight Virus” declared:

The request is an about-face for Maduro, who for years refused to share economic data with the Washington-based lender and just last month condemned it as a tool of US imperialism. In the past he has called the IMF a blood-sucking “assassin” responsible for plunging millions of people into poverty across Latin America.

China bolsters global effort to combat coronavirus

International Cooperation to Help Countries Cope

Chinese and Cuban doctors arrive in Italy to help treat COVID-19 pandemic.

Assistance to Italy and Other EU Countries

On March 12, a group of nine Chinese aid professionals arrived in Rome with tons of medical supplies, including 700 ventilators, monitors and defibrillators, as part of China’s efforts to help Italy contain the novel coronavirus outbreak.

IMF refuses aid to Venezuela (Excerpts)

– Ana Maldonado, Paola Estrada, Vijay Prashad, Zoe PC –

Venezuela receives aid from China, March 19, 2020, to combat the COVID-19 pandemic.

On March 16, 2020, the chief of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Kristalina Georgieva wrote a blog post on the Fund’s website; it represents the kind of generosity necessary in the midst of a global pandemic. “The IMF stands ready to mobilize its $1 trillion lending capacity to help our membership,” she wrote. Countries with “urgent balance-of-payments needs” could be helped by the IMF’s “flexible and rapid-disbursing emergency response toolkit.” Through these mechanisms, the IMF said that it could provide $50 billion to developing countries and $10 billion to low-income countries at a zero-interest rate.

US imperialists’ utter contempt for human life; new sanctions imposed on Iran

On March 17, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced further sanctions on Iran amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. The sanctions are ostensibly in response to March 12 rocket attacks in Taji, Iraq, that killed two members of the U.S. occupation forces, for which it claims Iran is responsible. According to a statement by Pompeo, the sanctions target entities and individuals mostly related to Iran’s petrochemical industry that “provide revenue to the regime that it may use to fund terror and other destabilizing activities.” These include five companies based in the United Arab Emirates, three companies in China, three in Hong Kong and one in South Africa.

Cuba a beacon of international solidarity and medical excellence in the fight against COVID-19

International Cooperation to Help Countries Cope

Cuban medical team of 50 arrives in Suriname March 20, 2020, to assist with COVID-19 pandemic.

On March 21, 53 physicians and nurses from Cuba’s celebrated Henry Reeve International Medical Brigade of health professionals, trained in disaster medicine and infectious disease containment, arrived in Italy’s northern Lombardy region at the request of its health authorities. They will join a dozen Chinese doctors to work in a new field hospital being built in Bergamo in Italy’s hardest hit area, where over 63 per cent of the country’s deaths due to COVID-19 and 42 per cent of its active cases are concentrated, with over 1,000 patients undergoing intensive treatment. It is the sixth contingent of the specialized brigade to go abroad to fight the COVID-19 pandemic and the first sent to Europe.

Cuba’s timely assistance to British cruise ship

International Cooperation to Help Countries Cope

Shortly before dawn on March 18, the British passenger ship MS Braemar of the Fred. Olsen Cruise Lines, with over 1,000 passengers and crew aboard, docked in the port of Mariel, Cuba. Since March 12, the ship had been denied permission to dock in several of its scheduled ports of call around the Caribbean or in the U.S. by authorities of those countries, due to the fact that one of its passengers and four crew members had confirmed cases of COVID-19, with a further 28 passengers and 27 crew members, including a doctor, in isolation after displaying symptoms.