Democracy Now!

Donald Trump Has Been Found Guilty on 34 Felony Charges in New York Criminal Trial, Israeli Strikes in Bureij and Nuseirat Camps in Central Gaza Kill Entire Families, Israeli Forces Withdraw from Jabaliya After Decimating the City, Destroying 1,000 Homes, Israel Burns Down Ramallah Veggie Market as Smotrich Says Israel Will Turn West Bank into Ruined Cities", MSF: Israeli Bid to Label UNRWA as Terror Group An Outrageous Attack on Humanitarian Assistance", Houthi Movement Says U.S.-U.K. Strikes Killed 16 in Yemen's Hodeidah, Slovenian Government Recognizes Palestinian Statehood, Silence Is Complicity": Nurse Starts Hunger Strike Outside White House, U.S. Quietly Reverses Position, Allows Ukraine to Use U.S. Weapons in Russia, According to Reports, 24 Deaths Reported in One Day in India Amid Protracted Heat Wave, CBS: Biden Admin Planning to Send Some Migrants to Greece and Italy for Resettlement, SCOTUS Sides with NRA in First Amendment Challenge Against New York Official

As public concern grows about the health and environmental impacts of so-called forever chemicals, a new investigation by ProPublica and The New Yorker reveals that 3M, the American manufacturing giant, discovered and concealed the risks of these toxic substances for decades. PFAS are used in everyday products, from nonstick cookware to food packaging, but take decades or longer to break down in the body and environment. They have been found in the blood of almost every person in the United States and are linked to serious health effects. Investigative reporter Sharon Lerner says 3M knew as early as the 1970s that forever chemicals were dangerous even in small amounts, but kept those findings secret and gaslit" one of its own scientists, Kris Hansen, who later raised concerns about forever chemicals in human blood samples. Her direct bosses had been aware of the presence of this chemical in blood, even though they ... appeared to act surprised when she brought her findings," says Lerner. They knew all along that what she was finding was true."

A judge in Canada this week ruled that a student protest encampment could remain standing at the University of Toronto until at least mid-June, when a top court will decide on an injunction filed by the school requesting the police to clear the pro-Palestinian protesters off campus. Students and faculty launched the encampment on May 2 to protest Israel's war on Gaza. It quickly became one of the largest encampments in North America with 175 tents, hundreds of campers, and a sacred fire led by Indigenous elders. Administrators at the University of Toronto, Canada's largest university, had wanted to clear the encampment before graduation ceremonies begin in early June. We know what we're doing is just. And all of us are willing to stand our ground no matter what happens," says Mohammad Yassin, a graduating senior, spokesperson for Occupy University of Toronto and a member of the student negotiating team. Yassin is Palestinian with family members currently in Gaza. We also speak with geography professor Deb Cowen, part of the Jewish Faculty Network, who says the encampment is a precious learning space" bringing students together. We have maybe never seen our campus be so alive with the spirit of debate, of creative thought, of rigorous conversation and dialogue," Cowen says.

We speak with Kenneth Roth, international affairs scholar and former head of Human Rights Watch, about revelations that Israel waged a nearly decadelong campaign to intimidate the International Criminal Court in order to stop possible war crimes prosecutions of Israeli officials. A joint investigation by The Guardian and the Israeli +972 Magazine revealed that Israel surveilled, hacked, smeared and threatened top ICC officials, including chief prosecutor Karim Khan and his predecessor, Fatou Bensouda. The former head of the Mossad, Yossi Cohen, is said to have personally threatened Bensouda. The revelations come just a week after Khan announced he is seeking arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and three top leaders of Hamas. This is a crime," Roth says of the Israeli campaign against the ICC. He says the revelations also undermine U.S. claims that Israel can hold itself accountable. There is no good-faith Israeli investigation. There is a concerted, high-level effort to undermine justice to protect Netanyahu, Gallant and others from war crime charges."

Israel Seizes Entire Gaza-Egypt Border, Continues Deadly Invasion of Rafah, Palestinian Journalist Motasem Dalloul Loses Two Young Sons in Israeli Strikes, Send the Whole World to Gaza": Families Beg the World to Help End Israeli Border Blockade, Spain Hosts Palestinian PM as European Countries Extend Diplomatic Relationship with Palestine, Brazil Withdraws Tel Aviv Ambassador; China Calls for Int'l Peace Conference, Stop Fueling Genocide": Activists Block Entrance to Chevron Headquarters, Celebrated NYC Nurse Fired After Highlighting Gaza Genocide in Speech, Meta Removes Hundreds of Fake Accounts Set Up by Israeli Firm, NATO Members Meet Amid Debate over Allowing Ukraine to Use Western Weapons in Russia, Another Candidate for Mayor Killed in Mexico Days Ahead of Nationwide Election, Hong Kong Convicts 14 Pro-Democracy Activists in National Security Trial as Authorities Expand Arrests, Thousands of Rohingya Displaced Along Burma's Border as Fighting Intensifies, Jurors Deliberate for Second Day in Trump's NYC Criminal Trial, Samuel Alito Rejects Calls to Recuse Himself from Supreme Court Cases Related to Jan. 6 and Trump

A major New York Times investigation explores the history of one of America's most important allies in the war against the Taliban: Abdul Raziq. While fighting in Afghanistan, Raziq was frequently praised by American generals and oversaw soldiers trained, armed and paid by the United States and its allies." But to civilians in the area, Raziq became known as America's monster" after coming to power through years of torture, extrajudicial killing and abduction. Raziq, who was assassinated in 2018, was responsible for the largest known campaign of forced disappearances during America's 20-year war in Afghanistan. Raziq was basically the poster child for brutality by the U.S.-backed government," says New York Times journalist Matthieu Aikins. Despite knowing about the abuses, the U.S. continued to work with Raziq side by side because he was just so effective in the war." Aikins argues U.S. wishful thinking and self-delusion" about the atrocities committed by U.S. troops and allies is part of the reason why the U.S. failed in Afghanistan despite spending 20 years there and so many hundreds of billions of dollars."

In Mexico, millions of voters are poised to elect the first woman president in the country's history when they cast their ballots on Sunday. Voters will be choosing between front-runners Claudia Sheinbaum, the former mayor of Mexico City, and Xochitl Galvez, a former senator; and a third candidate, Jorge Alvarez Maynez, who is trailing further behind in the polls. The landmark moment has filled many with hope as Mexico has one of the highest rates of gender violence and femicides in Latin America. This is the primary contradiction for Mexico. You're going to elect a woman, but you still haven't resolved the fact that women are being murdered at the rate of about 10 to 11 every single day," says Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Maria Hinojosa, who interviewed both Sheinbaum and Galvez. Hinojosa says the two front-runners are the result of decadeslong work by feminists in Mexico, along with feminists all over Latin America, pushing for equality."

Jury deliberations begin today in Donald Trump's hush money and election interference trial. Trump has been charged with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in relation to a $130,000 hush money payment that his former lawyer, Michael Cohen, made to adult film actress Stormy Daniels. In a marathon day of closing arguments, prosecutor Joshua Steinglass argued that the payment scheme amounted to an effort by Trump to manipulate and defraud the voters" before the 2016 presidential election by preventing Daniels from going public with her claim that she had a sexual encounter with Trump. It was an amazing summation in which every piece of evidence was explained as a part of the entire narrative of Trump criminality," says Ron Kuby, a criminal defense lawyer. On the other hand, Trump's defense lawyer Todd Blanche branded Cohen, the prosecution's star witness, as the greatest liar of all time" and dismissed the trial as a politicized attack. If Trump is found guilty, it will likely be weeks or months until he is eventually sentenced. The charges carry a maximum of four years in prison, and Trump is expected to appeal any conviction.

White House: Israeli Attack on Rafah Tent Camp Does Not Violate Biden's Red Line", Algeria Proposes New U.N. Resolution on Gaza as Mexico Seeks to Join ICJ Genocide Case, New U.S.-Made Pier Breaks Apart Off Coast of Gaza, Halting Aid Shipments, From Hacking to Surveillance, Israel Waged War" on ICC Prosecutors, State Dept. Official Resigns After U.S. Claims Israel Is Not Obstructing Aid to Gaza, Pro-Palestinian Protests Continue Across Globe, Jury Deliberations to Begin in Donald Trump Criminal Trial, India Issues Red Alert Amid Record Heat as Int'l Court Holds Climate Hearing in Flood-Ravaged Brazil, Papua New Guinea Links Deadly Landslide to Climate Crisis, Transitional Council in Haiti Picks New Prime Minister, Replacing Official Picked Weeks Ago, Georgia Lawmakers Override Veto to Pass New Foreign Agents Law, South Africa Holds Election as ANC Risks Losing Majority, Texas House Speaker Wins GOP Primary Runoff Against Trump-Backed Challenger, 2024 Race: Jill Stein Secures Enough Support for Green Nomination; Libertarians Pick Chase Oliver

As we mark Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander Heritage Month in the United States, we're joined by Mae Ngai to discuss the life and work of legendary Chinese American photographer Corky Lee, who documented the Asian American community in a career that spanned five decades before his death from the COVID-19 pandemic in 2021. Ngai is the co-editor of the new book Corky Lee's Asian America: Fifty Years of Photographic Justice. We also play excerpts of the new documentary Dear Corky by filmmaker Curtis Chin, which features Lee himself discussing his activism and career. Lee often said his aim in life was to break stereotypes of Asian Americans one photograph at a time. He wanted to make Asian Americans visible when we had been invisible, erased from American history," says Ngai.

Two days after the International Court of Justice ordered Israel to immediately stop its assault on Rafah, Israeli warplanes began to drop bombs on refugee tent camps in what had previously been declared a safe zone." At least 45 people, including children and infants, were killed in the bombing. We discuss the ruling and the massacre in Rafah with Ahmed Abofoul, a legal researcher and advocacy officer at the Palestinian human rights organization Al-Haq who was born and raised in Gaza. Abofoul is now based in The Hague, where the International Court of Justice recently ordered Israel to halt its assault on Rafah in a genocide case brought by South Africa. Abofoul notes the significance of the World Court ruling but decries Israel's complete disregard for international orders, including previous ICJ rulings this year. Israel is lying," while its allies are parroting whatever Israel is saying." Without a direct enforcement mechanism, attempts to rein in Israeli attacks are likely to continue to fail. Will complicit" Western states continue business as usual, or will we see sanctions on Israel?" Abofoul asks. Everything I know in Gaza has been destroyed," he adds. This is a genocide. This is about the erasure of the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip and as a whole, and this is the essence of Zionism as a settler-colonial ideology."

We go to Rafah for an update after an Israeli attack on refugee tent camps in what had previously been declared a safe zone" killed at least 45 people, including women and children. Basically, the situation is totally catastrophic," reports Palestinian journalist Shrouq Aila, from Rafah. She explains the bombs set tents made largely of nylon on fire, igniting a deadly blaze, and that Israel's relentless assault has made three hospitals in the city inoperable. People are in a total mess and desperate because of this," she says. Aila has been displaced since the start of the war from Jabaliya, where she had been studying English at the now-destroyed Islamic University of Gaza.

Israeli Bombing of Rafah Camp Kills 45 People, Burns Children Alive, ICJ Orders Israel to Immediately Halt Its Military Offensive in Rafah", Spain, Norway and Ireland Formalize Recognition of Palestinian State, Gaza Solidarity Protests Continue Following Attack on Rafah Camp, UCLA Police Make First Arrest Weeks After Violent Mob Attacked Gaza Solidarity Encampment, University of Toronto Asks Court to Allow Campus Arrests After Protesters Defy Deadline to Disband, Reporters Without Borders Asks ICC to Investigate Israeli War Crimes Against Gaza Journalists, At Least 18 Killed in Russian Strike Amid Intensifying Kharkiv Offensive, Death Toll Estimate from Papua New Guinea Landslide Rises to 2,000, Temperatures Top 125 Degrees in South Asia; Brazilian Flood Survivors Face Threat of Disease, Mexico Faces Water Shortages as Another Heat Wave Sends Temperatures Soaring, 22 People Killed in Memorial Day Weekend Storms, South Korea, Japan and China Hold First Joint Summit in Years; Comfort Women Protest Japan in Seoul, WHO Members Fail to Reach Consensus on a Pandemic Treaty, Trump's NYC Criminal Trial to Head to Deliberations After Closing Arguments, Liberian Man Detained at Stewart Immigrant Prison Has Died, Uvalde Families Sue Meta, Microsoft and Gunmaker Daniel Defense, UAW Challenges Alabama Mercedes-Benz Loss at NLRB

We spend the rest of our Memorial Day special with Nathan Thrall and Abed Salama, the author and subject of a Pulitzer Prize-winning book detailing the many bureaucratic barriers and indignities that make the lives of Palestinians living under Israeli occupation even more difficult. A Day in the Life of Abed Salama: Anatomy of a Jerusalem Tragedy focuses on the 2012 death of Salama's son, 5-year-old Milad, who was killed in a fiery bus crash during a school field trip to a theme park. What followed was a desperate daylong search by Salama and his family to locate Milad's body across different cities and hospitals, encountering numerous barriers due to the Israeli occupation system, like different ID cards giving varying levels of access through military checkpoints, and lack of help from any Israeli authorities. I think and I hope the book will make some changes and help us as Palestinians to live our lives as other people around the world," says Salama. This interview first broadcast on October 5, 2023.

In Part 1 of our Memorial Day special broadcast, we speak with Jerusalem-based journalist and author Nathan Thrall, who was recently awarded the 2024 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction for his book, A Day in the Life of Abed Salama: Anatomy of a Jerusalem Tragedy. Thrall discusses Israel's ceasefire talks with Hamas and Israel's intensified crackdown in the West Bank. The restrictions on movement in the West Bank are the worst that they have ever been since the occupation began," Thrall says. He also responds to the cancellation of some of his book talks in Germany.

Israel's seizure of the Rafah border crossing with Egypt has sparked anger from the Egyptian government, which has warned that Israel is endangering the landmark 1978 Camp David Accords that normalized relations between the two countries. Despite the increasingly critical tone about Israel's war on Gaza, however, Egyptian authorities have closely coordinated with Israel in decisions around allowing humanitarian aid in through the Rafah crossing and allowing Palestinians out of Gaza. Egyptian security forces have also locked up over 120 people in Egypt, placing them in pretrial detention on terrorism charges for expressing solidarity with Palestine. There is a fear within the system that allowing people to voice support and solidarity with Palestinians' opposition to Israel will extend not just to criticism of the Egyptians' official position vis-a-vis the war ... but also extend to the domestic situation, the human rights situation, the unprecedented economic crisis the country is going through," says Egyptian journalist and human rights advocate Hossam Bahgat. He is executive director of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights and was banned from traveling outside of Egypt for the past eight years, with his assets frozen, as part of an Egyptian government crackdown on human rights NGOs. In March, Egyptian authorities finally closed the case against EIPR and other human rights groups and lifted the travel ban, allowing Bahgat to join us now in our New York studio.

More than a thousand Harvard students walked out of their commencement ceremony yesterday to support 13 undergraduates who were barred from graduating after they participated in the Gaza solidarity encampment in Harvard Yard. Asmer Safi, one of the 13 pro-Palestinian student protesters barred from graduating, says that while his future has been thrown into uncertainty while he is on probation, he has no regrets about standing up for Palestinian rights. This is an ethical stance that we're taking," Safi says. We also hear from history professor Alison Frank Johnson, one of over 100 faculty members who voted to confer degrees on the 13 seniors, who describes Harvard's punishment of them as an egregious departure from past precedent," as was the board's subsequent overruling of faculty. We hoped then that the Corporation, as it has always done in the past, would accept our recommendations for degree recipients and allow the 13 to graduate, which they chose not to do."

The presidents of UCLA, Northwestern and Rutgers universities were questioned Thursday on Capitol Hill about pro-Palestine protests on campus Thursday, the fourth time in six months that the Republican-led House Education Committee has summoned school leaders to Washington over accusations of antisemitism. Lawmakers reserved their heaviest questioning for the presidents of Northwestern and Rutgers, where Gaza solidarity encampments were voluntarily dismantled after students negotiated deals with university administrators. Northwestern journalism professor Steven Thrasher, who has been an outspoken supporter of the Gaza solidarity encampments at his school and elsewhere, was singled out during the hearing and described as a goon," but he tells Democracy Now! he is undeterred in both his pro-Palestine advocacy and defense of his students. It's supposed to scare everybody who supports Gaza. It's supposed to scare everybody who's against the genocide. It's supposed to scare students who are righteously standing up against the killing that's happening," says Thrasher.

Al-Aqsa Hospital Loses Power as Health Facilities Inundated Amid Nonstop Israeli Attacks, U.N.: 900,000 Gazans Have Been Displaced Since Start of Rafah Invasion, House Panel Grills More University Heads Amid Ongoing Student Protests, Police Raid UCLA; Harvard Graduates Walk Out, Defend Protesters Who Were Denied Graduation, German Police Raid Palestinian Solidarity Protest at Humboldt University, Biden Welcomes President William Ruto to White House as Kenya Prepares to Deploy to Haiti, Over 100 Feared Dead After Papua New Guinea Landslide, U.N. Approves Srebrenica Genocide Resolution, Macron Visits New Caledonia, Insists Reform Will Take Place Against Will of Indigenous Population, SCOTUS Approves Racially Gerrymandered South Carolina Voting Map, Louisiana Moves to Classify Abortion Pills as Controlled Substances, NCAA Agrees to $2.8B Deal Which Would Allow Colleges to Start Paying Their Athletes, DOJ Announces Antitrust Lawsuit Against Live Nation, Norfolk Southern Will Pay $15 Million Clean Water Act Fine for East Palestine Disaster, George Floyd Justice in Policing Act Reintroduced Ahead of 4th Anniversary of His May 25 Murder

The new Netflix documentary Power examines the role of police in the United States. We speak to its Oscar-nominated director, Yance Ford, about how policing is used to suppress dissent and protect property in the U.S., its relationship to imperialism and occupation, and the significance of the film's release ahead of the fourth anniversary of the death of George Floyd, the Minneapolis man who was killed when police officers placed him in a deadly chokehold and who became a rallying point for protests against anti-Black racism and police brutality. The thing that police want to do more than anything else is contain and control threats to order," says Ford. What we still see in the U.S. and around the world today, from the Black Lives Matter movement to the campus Gaza solidarity movement, is the use of police as small militaries whose job is to suppress dissent."

When a group of volunteer doctors with the Palestinian American Medical Association traveled to Gaza last month, they were prepared to treat some of the most horrific injuries caused by Israel's relentless assault on civilians in Gaza. But they were not prepared to be stranded under the bombardment for over a week after the Israeli military seized and closed the border crossing into the southern end of the besieged region, preventing people and supplies from getting in or out. Dr. Adam Hamawy, a plastic surgeon and Army veteran from New Jersey, has now evacuated Gaza after he was trapped at European Hospital in Khan Younis with dwindling supplies. Hamawy, who previously treated Illinois Senator Tammy Duckworth for a life-threatening injury while both were in the Army, was offered evacuation along with another group of American doctors days earlier, but refused to leave without first securing the release of his entire volunteer medical team. He now emphasizes that he and his colleagues must be immediately replaced with additional humanitarian relief workers. It was never a condition for our exit to have other people come in - it was an expectation," he says. A hospital cannot run on just a few doctors alone. It also needs nurses, it needs staff."

Three European nations have announced plans to recognize the State of Palestine, joining 143 other countries around the world in formal recognition. Leaders in Ireland, Norway and Spain cited a desire to support a political solution to the ongoing conflict in Gaza as the driving force behind the announcements, while Israel responded by recalling its ambassadors from all three countries. Israel's Ambassador to Ireland Dana Erlich called the move a prize for terrorism." Catherine Connolly, an independent member of the Irish parliament, rejects Erlich's characterization, instead calling recognition a step for peace" and a direct result of people's outrage and upset" over Israeli brutality in Palestine. She connects the Palestinian national struggle with Ireland's own fight for recognition at the League of Nations just over a century ago and its history with famine and colonialism. Our solidarity is with people who suffer in any way, but particularly from famine," Connolly says. Next Tuesday will be historical, when we raise the Palestinian flag on the grounds of our parliament."

Israel Continues to Decimate Gaza's Hospitals, Storming Al-Awda and Bombing Kamal Adwan, Mike Johnson Pressures Schumer to Endorse Netanyahu Invitation to Congress Amid Democratic Objections, U.S., Israel Condemn Recognition of Palestinian State, as Colombia Announces Embassy in Ramallah, Two Progressive Dems Lose Oregon Primaries After AIPAC-Tied Group Funds Opponents, China Starts Major Military Drills Around Taiwan After Inauguration of New President, U.K. Prime Minister Calls Surprise July Election, Maritime Tribunal Issues Ruling Holding Governments Responsible for Ocean Pollution, Judge Blocks Part of Florida Anti-Immigrant Law; Arizona GOP Advances Anti-Immigrant Ballot Measure, Justice Alito Flew Another Right-Wing Flag Used by Trump Supporters Outside Holiday Home, Senate Confirms Biden's 201st Federal Judge, Uvalde Families Settle with City, Announce New Lawsuit Ahead of 2nd Anniversary of Massacre, Biden Cancels Another $7.7B in Student Debt; Debt Collective Protesters Arrested in D.C.

We speak with The New Republic's Kate Aronoff about how President Biden has unveiled steep tariff increases on various Chinese imports, including electric vehicles, which will quadruple from the current tariff rate of 25% to 100%. What you see ... is Biden really looking to lean into a really quite hawkish position on China," says Aronoff. She explains why Biden is caught between insulating the American auto industry from competition and allowing affordable EVs to enter U.S. markets for climate goals. Aronoff says experts say Biden should work with China on this industry and to not see this as zero-sum competition. We need to build a lot of clean technology. This is a very large pie, and there's no reason why the United States cannot also have a piece of it."

The Intercept columnist Natasha Lennard details how the combination of anti-Palestinian, Islamophobic repression and very few worker protections across the U.S. has created a very dangerous constellation" for academic laborers that is overwhelmingly only facing pro-Palestinian speakers, not speakers who are supporting Israel's genocide." She calls it the New McCarthyism" on college campuses. A lot of media attention has focused on the spectacle of encampments and the very, very brutal police response," says Lennard. What you also have going on behind the scenes is the targeting of individuals who work at universities."

Students and faculty at The New School, home to the first faculty Gaza solidarity encampment, have announced they reached a deal with the university to hold a vote on divesting from Israel by June 14. The agreement comes after months of campus protests, encampments and the occupation of a university building to demand The New School divest its endowment from companies arming and supporting Israeli forces in Gaza and the West Bank. The school's Students for Justice in Palestine chapter has said the university currently has ties to several companies that are actively involved in, and benefiting from, the genocide in Palestine," including Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, Google and Caterpillar. What this is not is an end to war or famine or occupation, and so we're keeping our eyes on the bigger picture, which is Palestine," says Alexandra Chasin, a professor at The New School and member of the faculty encampment negotiating team. We hope to be a model, or at least to help organizers at other universities, as well."

We speak with Palestinian American University of Michigan student Salma Hamamy, who was pepper-sprayed and beaten at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor when the Gaza solidarity encampment there became the latest to be violently dismantled Tuesday morning in the nationwide crackdown on student-led protests in solidarity with Palestine. Student protesters set up the encampment about a month ago to demand the University of Michigan's endowment divest from companies with ties to Israel, but school President Santa Ono claimed the peaceful action had become a threat to public safety. Dozens of officers raided the encampment before dawn, arresting and hospitalizing students after pepper-spraying and pushing them to the ground. I repeatedly said that my family has been killed, and that is why I am here. And as I was saying that through the megaphone, police officers snatched the megaphone out from my hand," says Hamamy. She explains the university has refused to discuss divestment with protesters. Instead of meeting with us at the table and meeting with us at the encampment, they decided to meet us with violent force and chemical attacks." University of Michigan President Santa Ono is slated to appear before Congress Thursday alongside the presidents of UCLA and Yale.

In the occupied West Bank, Israeli forces raided the northern city of Jenin early Tuesday morning, killing at least eight Palestinians, including a doctor shot dead on his way to work and a teenager riding his bicycle. About a dozen others were injured, including a journalist. Motasem Abu Hasan, an actor at The Freedom Theatre in the Jenin refugee camp who escaped the invasion, describes the ongoing attack on the camp. They are shooting everything," says Abu Hasan. The Freedom Theatre was about to premiere their first play since October 7 as part of their wider effort to share the Palestinian narrative and reveal the truth about the Israeli occupation." The raid began just as Spain, Ireland and Norway became the latest European states to recognize the Palestinian state. It's a result of the cultural intifada," says Abu Hasan. That's why we really believe in the power of narrative, especially in The Freedom Theatre, in Palestine, in Jenin camp."

Ireland, Norway & Spain Announce Recognition of Palestinian State, U.N. Suspends Food Aid in Rafah; U.S. Admits No Aid from New Pier Has Reached Gazans, Protesters Disrupt Blinken Testimony, Calling Him The Butcher of Gaza", Police Raid Univ. of Michigan Encampment; UC Santa Cruz Academic Workers Go on Strike, Israel Seizes AP Broadcasting Equipment & Then, Under Pressure, Reverses Course, Trump Trial: Defense Rests Case as Former President Declines to Take Stand, Trump Removes Campaign Video Referencing The Creation of a Unified Reich", Trump Suggests He May Back Birth Control Restrictions, Fani Willis and Judge Scott McAfee Win Races in Georgia, Iran's Supreme Leader Khamenei Speaks at Funeral for Ebrahim Raisi, U.N. Warns Genocide May Be Occurring in Sudan, Greek Judge Dismisses Charges in Migrant Smuggling Shipwreck Case, Mexico: 14 Killed in Political Violence in Chiapas Ahead of June 2 Election, H. Bruce Franklin, Historian & Fierce Critic of Vietnam War, Dies at 90

We speak with renowned Israeli historian Ilan Pappe about his recent trip to the United States, when he was interrogated for two hours by federal agents upon arrival at Detroit airport about his political views on Gaza, Hamas and Israel, as well as demanding to know whom he knew in U.S. Muslim, Arab and Palestinian communities. Pappe was only allowed to enter the country after agents copied the contents of his phone. They refused to tell me why they stopped me," he says. Pappe, author of The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, also discusses the Nakba, growing support for Palestinian rights, and why he believes the collapse of the Zionist project" is imminent.

Israel and the United States have both strongly condemned the International Criminal Court's decision to pursue arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on war crimes charges, calling it outrageous" and seeking support from other allies in opposing the court's moves. On Monday, ICC chief prosecutor Karim Khan outlined specific charges against Netanyahu and Gallant, including starvation of civilians as a method of warfare" and extermination." The ICC also sought arrest warrants for three leaders of Hamas - Yahya Sinwar, Ismail Haniyeh and Mohammed Deif - for war crimes including extermination and murder, the taking of captives, torture, rape and other acts of sexual violence. The warrants for Israel's top leaders, which must still be approved by a panel of ICC judges, are a watershed event in the history of international justice," says war crimes prosecutor Reed Brody. This is the first time that a Western or pro-Western leader is [the] subject of an indictment request."We also speak with Israeli historian Ilan Pappe, author of The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, who says Israel's strident response to the ICC prosecutor is no surprise. This is the kind of Israel we have in 2024. It doesn't care about international law. It doesn't care about international opinion," says Pappe.

We speak with Lily Greenberg Call, the first known Jewish appointee to resign from the Biden administration over the war in Gaza. Greenberg Call was a special assistant to the chief of staff at the Interior Department after being named to the post by President Joe Biden in early 2023, but she quit on May 15 in a four-page letter that slammed Biden's disastrous, continued support for Israel's genocide in Gaza." Greenberg Call is at least the fifth high-profile resignation from the Biden administration since October 7. She says her resignation was motivated by her Jewish values. I feel that I am really living in my Jewishness, in the essence of what I was raised with, by standing up for Palestinians and by demanding their freedom," Greenberg Call tells Democracy Now!, criticizing Biden and others for pitting Jewish safety against Palestinian rights. I am so angry at the president that he is using my community as justification for this slaughter, making us the face of the American war machine."

Israeli Airstrikes Kill Dozens Across Gaza as Genocide Continues in Wake of ICC Arrest Warrant News, Israel Kills 7 Palestinians in Jenin Raid, Incl. a Student, Teacher and Doctor, AOC Lends Her Clout to New York Bill Which Would Sanction Charities Funding Israel, Yale Students Walk Out of Graduation; The New School and Bard Make Progress in Their Demands, Funeral Proceedings Begin in Iran for Pres. Ebrahim Raisi, Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, Pres. Macron Heads to New Caledonia as Death Toll from Unrest Increases to 6, Pylos Shipwreck Trial Opens in Athens, Raising Concerns over Criminalization of Migrants, Prosecution Rests in Trump's NYC Trial; Defense Starts Off with Admonishment of Witness, Judge and DA in Georgia's Trump Election Subversion Case Up for Reelection, Larry Bensky, Veteran KPFA Broadcaster Who Reported on Iran-Contra, Dies at 87

At Morehouse College, students and faculty were divided over inviting President Joe Biden to receive an honorary degree and give a speech at the school's commencement ceremony. Morehouse valedictorian DeAngelo Fletcher, who had a Palestinian flag affixed to his graduation cap, called for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza during his speech, and assistant professor of sociology Taura Taylor stood with her fist raised, facing away from Biden as he addressed the crowd. I wanted to take it upon myself to, one, stand up for my principles, and then also kind of stand in solidarity for my students as well as my other fellow faculty members who felt that we were caught in this moment where it seemed like we, as a community, selected Biden, when we all did not," says Taylor. We also speak with Samuel Livingston, an associate professor of Africana studies, who held a flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo behind Biden as he spoke. We held up the flag because the people of the Congo do not get enough media attention in terms of the active genocide that the United States is supporting through its support of Rwanda," says Livingston. Congo deserves justice, reparations from the United States for the assassination of Patrice Lumumba, conspiring in that assassination, and the people today deserve a country that is built on peace and justice."

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on Monday won the right to appeal his extradition to the United States. Assange's lawyers argued before the British High Court that the U.S. government provided blatantly inadequate" assurances that Assange would have the same free speech protections as an American citizen if extradited from Britain. Assange has spent more than a decade facing the threat of extradition to the U.S., where he faces up to 175 years in prison for publishing classified documents exposing U.S. war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is a victory for Julian Assange in that he lives on to fight another day, his case lives on to fight another day. But he's not out of Belmarsh [Prison] yet, and he's not in the clear yet," says Chip Gibbons, policy director of Defending Rights & Dissent. This could still end in him being sent to the U.S. And the person who can stop this is Joe Biden and Merrick Garland."

The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court has announced he is seeking arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and three leaders of Hamas: Yahya Sinwar, Ismail Haniyeh and Mohammed Deif. The charges against Netanyahu and Gallant include starvation of civilians, extermination, intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population, among other crimes. The charges against the Hamas leaders include extermination, murder, taking hostages, rape, among other crimes. It places Israel's leaders of this genocidal onslaught on the Gaza Strip in the dock," says Middle East analyst Mouin Rabbani, who explains why this will be very significant" for Israel's allies and signatories to the ICC. They now have to make a choice between Israeli impunity and obligations under the Rome Statute."

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian were killed on Sunday in a helicopter crash along with several other officials and crew. Wreckage of the helicopter was found early Monday in a mountainous region of the country's northwest following an overnight search in blizzard conditions. Raisi was returning from inaugurating a new dam built jointly with Azerbaijan along the two countries' border. Raisi, 63, was elected in 2021 in a vote that saw the lowest-percentage turnout in the Islamic Republic's history after major opposition candidates were disqualified from taking part. Analyst Trita Parsi says the president's death will have little impact on the Islamic Republic's policies, including barring dissident candidates from running for office. Now the regime is going to have to try to whip up and mobilize voters and excitement for an election within 50 days," he says. And it has to make a decision: Is it actually going to allow other candidates to stand, or is it going to continue on the path that it has set out for itself in which these elections increasingly become rather meaningless in terms of actual democratic value?"

Iran in Mourning After Helicopter Crash Kills President and Foreign Minister, ICC Chief Seeks Arrest Warrants for Netanyahu, Gallant and Hamas Leaders, Israel Expands Deadly Attacks in Gaza, Occupies Al-Awda Hospital Amid Dire Fuel and Water Shortages, Netanyahu Facing Internal Opposition in His Coalition and on the Streets, Biden Is Met with Protest as He Delivers Morehouse Graduation Speech, U.K. High Court Rules Julian Assange Can Appeal U.S. Extradition, Congolese Military Says It Thwarted Coup Attempt Led by Opposition Leader Malanga, Pres. William Lai Inaugurated in Taiwan, Tells China to Stop Its Intimidation, Pres. Luis Abinader Wins Reelection in Dominican Republic, Russian Attacks in Kharkiv Kill 11 as Ukraine Asks NATO, U.S. for Help Training Its Army, Mercedes-Benz Workers Vote Against Unionizing with UAW, Man Who Broke Into Nancy Pelosi's House and Attacked Her Husband Sentenced to 30 Years, Houston Storm Death Toll Climbs to 7

Our guest is the Haaretz correspondent Amira Hass, the only Israeli Jewish journalist to have spent 30 years living in and reporting from Gaza and the West Bank. She is the recipient of the 2024 Columbia Journalism Award, and on Wednesday she addressed the graduating class of the Columbia Journalism School in New York City. Hass discusses the ongoing Israeli war on Gaza, why journalists should resist the normalization of evil and injustice," Israel's recent censorship of Al Jazeera, its maintenance of a strict apartheid system, its complete rejection of the prospect of Palestinian statehood and more. Israel took Palestinian life, liberty and freedom as hostage for the past 75 years," says Hass. You go to Tel Aviv, you think you are in New York or you are in London - and 40, 50 kilometers away, Palestinians live in cages."We also play an excerpt from the student and faculty-led People's Graduation" held Thursday at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City in response to Columbia University's crackdown on student protest, which culminated in the administration's cancellation of university-wide commencement. Centering Palestinian solidarity, the People's Graduation featured speakers including the Pulitzer Prize-winning data journalist and illustrator Mona Chalabi, who praised the work of student journalists. While our institutions have failed us these past seven months, ... we listened to your radio stations if we wanted the truth," she said.

We Don't Want Ships. We Want Safety": Displaced Gazans Reject U.S. Pier; U.N. Calls for Land Access, Spain Bars Ships with Weapons For Israel; 13 Foreign Ministers Warn Against Israel's Rafah Assault, Israel's Genocide Has Reached New and Horrific Stage": South Africa Requests Urgent ICJ Intervention, Police Raid and Arrest Students at Gaza Solidarity Encampments at UC Berkeley, DePaul University, WaPo: Billionaires and Execs Urged Eric Adams to Send Police to Columbia's Gaza Encampment, SCOTUS Overrules Challenge to Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, NYT: Upside-Down Flag Seen Outside Alito's Home in Jan. 2021, a Symbol Used by Election Deniers, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott Pardons Known Racist Who Murdered BLM Protester in 2020, Texas Storms Kill 4, Cut Power to a Million Customers, Biden Admin to End New Leases in U.S.'s Largest Coal-Producing Region, Ron DeSantis Eliminates Climate Change as Priority in Florida's Energy Policy, Congolese Mourners Call Out Rwanda and Western Supporters for Genocide" on Its People, HRW Says Rwanda Denied Entry to Its Researcher, Another Deportation Flight Leaves the U.S. for Haiti Despite Grave Dangers", DOJ Moves to Reclassify Marijuana

Human Rights Watch has documented ethnic cleansing in the West Darfur region of Sudan by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces and allied militias against the Masalit people and other non-Arab communities. These allied militia and the RSF then, from April until June, conducted a rampage of killings, of lootings, of torture, of rape," says Belkis Wille, associate director with the Crisis, Conflict, and Arms Division at Human Rights Watch. She says international actors must cut off the flow of arms to all warring parties, but adds there is little political will" to enforce an arms embargo in Sudan.

Ukrainian forces are withdrawing from some areas in the northeastern region of Kharkiv as Russian forces continue a new offensive that has displaced thousands. This latest setback for Ukraine comes more than two years after Russia invaded the country. Human Rights Watch has documented several incidents of Russian soldiers summarily executing surrendering Ukrainian soldiers, with drone footage showing the killings in clear detail," says Belkis Wille, associate director with the Crisis, Conflict, and Arms Division at Human Rights Watch. They take off their vests, they put down their helmets, they lie on the ground and put their hands up. And then we see them being executed by Russian soldiers in cold blood."

A new Human Rights Watch Report finds Israeli forces have attacked humanitarian aid convoys and facilities at least eight times since October 7 despite being given their coordinates. Israeli authorities did not issue advance warnings to any of the aid organizations before the attacks, which killed at least 15 people, including two children, and injured at least 16 others. More than 250 aid workers have been killed in Gaza over the past seven months, according to the United Nations. Aid workers, unfortunately, die in conflict zones," says HRW researcher Belkis Wille. What's really unique in the context of Gaza is the high number in such a short period of time."Wille also discusses a recent U.S. government report that found Israel has likely violated international law in its assault on Gaza but that it could not make that conclusion definitively - a shocking" finding, she says. The United States absolutely has to start doing more to limit military assistance to Israel. ... And it needs to do far more to protect civilians more broadly."

Aid agencies are running out of food in southern Gaza amid Israel's ongoing offensive in Rafah and the shutdown of the two main border crossings in the south. Some 1.1 million Palestinians are on the brink of starvation, according to the United Nations, while a full-blown famine" is taking place in the north. Meanwhile, some Israelis have been blocking aid from reaching the Gaza border, including a violent attack on trucks carrying humanitarian relief through the occupied West Bank earlier this week, when settlers threw food packages on the ground and set fire to the vehicles at the Tarqumiyah checkpoint near Hebron. They did whatever they want," says Israeli lawyer and peace activist Sapir Sluzker Amran, who documented the attack on the aid convoy. She says Israeli soldiers appeared to be working with the settlers, refusing to intervene. They were just standing aside like there is nothing that they can do, like it's normal, what's happening."

Gazans Flee Israeli Attacks Across the Territory as Chaos Reigns in Besieged Territory, University Human Rights Network Concludes Israel Is Committing Genocide in Gaza, Israel's Far-Right Leaders Dispute Future of Gaza, Biden Is Making Jews the Face of the War Machine": First Jewish Biden Appointee Resigns over Gaza, Israeli Historian Ilan Pappe Interrogated by U.S. Agents at Detroit Airport, Germany Lifts European Ban on British Palestinian Surgeon Ghassan Abu-Sittah, Refuse to Accept Hell as Normal": Amira Hass Delivers Graduation Speech as Students Keep Up Protests, Sonoma State President Placed on Leave After School Agrees to Academic Boycott of Israel, Unions Representing UC and Harvard Student Workers Challenge Violent Crackdown on Gaza Protests, Prime Minister of Slovakia in Stable Condition After Assassination Attempt, Far-Right Populist Geert Wilders Forms Dutch Coalition But Agrees Not to Become Prime Minister, Putin Backs Beijing Peace Plan for Ukraine as He Meets with Xi Jinping in China, France Declares State of Emergency in New Caledonia After 4 Killed in Clashes with Police, Activists Say Javier Milei's Rhetoric and Policies Led to Deadly Attack on Lesbians, Ex-Gambian Interior Minister Ousmane Sonko Convicted for Crimes Against Humanity, SCOTUS Restores Louisiana Voting Map with Additional Black-Majority District, Biden and Trump Agree to 2 Network Debates, Eschewing Debate Commission

Students and workers at the City University of New York held a peaceful occupation Tuesday of the school's Graduate Center in solidarity with Palestine and renamed its library The Al Aqsa University Library," after Gaza's oldest public university, which was destroyed by Israel's bombardment. This comes as over 500 faculty and staff at CUNY have signed a letter demanding the charges be dropped against at least 173 people arrested in April when NYPD violently raided a peaceful Gaza solidarity encampment on the City College campus. This is really the most egregious example we've seen of violent repression of pro-Palestinian organizing," says pro-Palestine activist and CUNY alumni Musabika Nabiha, who says the crackdown wasn't in response to the tents, rallies or free food, but because the encampment's demands themselves proved a threat to the constant accumulation of profit and profiting off of genocide that CUNY is engaged in." Alex Vitale, coordinator of the Policing and Social Justice Project at CUNY's Brooklyn College, criticizes the school administration for being relatively harsh on student activists. "CUNY is spending millions of dollars for a security apparatus that fails to address the real security needs of students and is really there in moments like this to be a tool, a kind of private army, for the administration to suppress student dissent."

Palestinians across the globe are marking the 76th anniversary of the Nakba - which means catastrophe" in Arabic - when those establishing the state of Israel violently expelled over 700,000 Palestinians. Palestinian historian Abdel Razzaq Takriti says closer to 900,000 Palestinians were forced out or massacred during Israel's founding, which is being celebrated inside Israel with calls to ethnically cleanse and settle the Gaza Strip and the occupied West Bank. The Nakba is continuing. This is a colonial continuum," says Takriti. It's not enough to commemorate. It's not enough to talk about it. We have to stop it right now. ... The first step to doing that is to stop the genocide in Gaza." Takriti lays out four principles for Nakba education: refuting Nakba denialism, recognizing the Nakba is part of an ongoing process of settler colonialism, stopping that process, and then reversing it by restoring Palestinian national rights.

Democracy Now! speaks with Dr. Adam Hamawy, one of around 20 American medical workers trapped in Gaza after Israel closed the Rafah border crossing into Egypt. A plastic surgeon and Army veteran, Hamawy is on a volunteer mission with the Palestinian American Medical Association at the European Hospital in Khan Younis. Like many Gazans, the U.S. medical workers are now facing dehydration and other deadly health conditions. We're continuing to do our job. ... It's tiring, but this is exactly what we need to be doing," says Hamawy, who calls on President Biden to stop supporting Israel's assault on Gaza. If my best friend is a serial killer, I'm going to stop being his friend." Hamaway describes treating massive" injuries to civilians in Khan Younis, where much of the city has been destroyed and vandalized in Hebrew. It's going to haunt all of us. ... I'm here. I see it with my own eyes. At some point in time, everyone is going to see it."

In the historic criminal hush money election fraud trial of former President Donald Trump, New York prosecutors are wrapping up their case charging Trump with falsifying business records in an illegal effort to influence the 2016 presidential election. On Tuesday, Trump's former fixer Michael Cohen admitted he misled the Federal Election Commission about hush money payments made to adult film star Stormy Daniels. In cross-examination, defense attorneys tried to suggest Cohen was motivated by vengeance against Trump. He's the one who has firsthand knowledge of the actual deal that he and Donald Trump struck in order to pay the hush money, create a phony retainer, and ultimately falsify the business records," says criminal defense lawyer Ron Kuby. The boss betrayed him. And now he, indeed, is out for revenge." Kuby says Trump and his right-wing allies are using the trial as a backdrop for politics, and discusses the possibility of Trump serving prison time. Kuby is also representing climate crisis activists arrested at Citibank headquarters in New York City during Earth Week last month and pro-Palestinian activists arrested at recent protests at Fordham University and SUNY Purchase. I tend to view these struggles ... as perennial struggles with each generation kind of rising up to do their part," Kuby says. I just have mad respect for the young people who are literally risking their education, their careers and their futures to stand up for the planet, to stand up against the slaughter in Gaza."

Biden to Send Another $1 Billion in Arms to Israel as Palestinians Mark 76th Nakba Anniversary, Palestinian Truck Drivers Face New Risks After Settlers Attacked Aid Convoy in West Bank, Israel's National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir Joins March Calling for Resettlement of Gaza, Pro-Palestinian Protesters Disrupt Google Conference over Israel Contract, Harvard Students End Encampment as Officials Agree to Discuss Divestment Demand, House Speaker Mike Johnson Visits Trump Trial & Bashes Prosecution, Maryland, Nebraska and West Virginia Hold Primaries, Ukrainian Forces Withdraw from Areas of Kharkiv Amid New Russian Offensive, Protests in Georgia After Passage of Foreign Influence" Bill, Biden Places 100% Tariff on Chinese Electric Cars, DOJ Says Boeing Violated Settlement, Could Face Criminal Prosecution, Eight Migrant Farmworkers Die in Bus Accident Heading to Watermelon Farm