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racism
Sen. Graham's Legacy: He Helped Israel Get Away With Genocide
Lindsey Graham is part of the answer to the question of how a genocide could be pursued in plain sight with impunity.
Jul 15, 2026
The sudden death of South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, 71, has been greeted with the full spectrum of reactions. Many of them were personal in character. I never met or testified before Sen. Graham, and I’m not under the illusion that the persona politicians project on television gives much insight into them as persons. This maxim is especially true for a politician, who typically tacks with the wind, as Graham often did. Nor is my interest here personal. People depict him as a nice guy to colleagues who was capable of praising rivals such as Joe Biden. That sort of senatorial bonhomie is irrelevant to the issue I want to address.
Genocides in the past 50 years have not always been easy to recognize in real time. The Khmer Rouge polished off a fifth of Cambodia’s population, but isolated journalistic reports of what was going on were dismissed in Washington. Likewise, the Clinton administration was slow to understand the mass killings in Rwanda.
It was not until April 23, 2005, that the first video was successfully posted to the World Wide Web. It was that breakthrough that made the Gaza genocide that began in October 2023 the first televised such mass atrocity. The Israeli policy of systematic killing of innocent noncombatants was live-streamed on smartphones on a daily basis throughout the world. There was no doubt about what we were seeing.
And yet, the Israeli leadership has suffered almost no repercussions for having disregarded the value of civilian life, adopting a monstrous Rules of Engagement allowing for as many as a hundred women, children, and noncombatant men to be killed for each militant targeted. NATO has ceased joint military exercises with Israel because its army violated its RoE so egregiously.
We have to revise the old saying. If you have neither the law nor the facts on your side, pound racist superiority and inherent lack of accountability.
Lindsey Graham is part of the answer to the question of how a genocide could be pursued in plain sight with impunity.
When the prosecutor for the International Criminal Court, Karim Khan, prepared in April 2024 to apply for arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity, former Prime Minister David Cameron shouted angrily at him that Britain would withdraw from and defund the ICC if the indictment went forward. Cameron was not in office at that time, and may have been used by the Tory government to express its displeasure without intervening officially. Labour promised to do better when it came back to power. It didn’t.
There is an old adage among lawyers: “If you have the facts on your side, pound the facts. If you have the law on your side, pound the law. If you have neither, pound the table.”
Israel’s lawyers, like Cameron and the Conservative Party in general, had neither the facts nor the law on their side, so they pounded the table. In fact, they threatened to dismantle the judge’s bench, strip his clothing off, and shoot him in the head.
Sen. Graham then joined a conference call with Khan in April, 2024, in which he lambasted the prosecutor, saying that ICC indictments are for “Africa and thugs like Putin,” not for the United States and its allies such as Israel.
If Khan’s report of this conversation is correct, it casts the late senator in an extremely poor light. It is hard to see the reference to Africa as anything but racism.
South Carolina had for centuries had one law for white people and another one for African Americans, who were kidnapped in Africa and brought to the lowcountry. Until 1863 they were held as chattel, property rather than persons. After a brief period of emancipation, they were gradually denied the right to vote or hold office, until the mid-1960s Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act. The point of the Trump administration, of which Graham became a pillar, is to repeal those laws and to again disenfranchise African Americans, with outrageous racial gerrymanders and measures such as limiting the number of polling stations in heavily African American districts.
While it is controversial whether Graham was personally a racist, what he said about the ICC being for Africans was certainly a racist comment, and it unfortunately replicated the long history of white sentiment in South Carolina that some laws do not pertain to white people, which is a way of saying that whites have impunity. He clearly coded Israelis as “white.” Such categorizations are worthless and arbitrary, however. Whiteness has no stable meaning. Most Israelis couldn’t have gotten served at a diner in South Carolina in the 1950s, though. What is important is that Graham so categorized them, and the significance he attached to that categorization.
That he threw Putin (and who could be more pasty?) into the mix might tell against this analysis. Yet obviously even under slavery and Jim Crow there were white criminals who harmed propertied white gentry and who did not share in impunity as a result. An example was Ian Gale, the cat burglar who robbed a hundred homes of valuables totaling as much as half a million dollars. Putin became a “thug” by attacking other white people in Ukraine, and so deserves to be dealt with as though he were an African.
It is still a racist comment.
Graham’s angry attack on Khan showed the Nixonian logic of genocide denial. It isn’t a crime if the United States or Israel does it.
Ironically, Graham was a law school graduate and served in the US Air Force Judge Advocate General’s (JAG) Corps for more than 30 years while in the Air National Guard and Reserves. He rose to hold the rank of colonel.
The JAG Corps of the Air Force admitted in 2020, “The statistics show that black male Airmen under the age of 25 and with less than 5 years of service receive NJP [nonjudicial punishment] and courts-martial actions at a higher rate than similarly situated white male Airmen.”
You give the white guy a break but throw the book at the Black guy. That was how Graham’s second institution often behaved during the decades he served in it. While for some JAG officers, this outcome may have resulted from an unconscious prejudice, Sen. Graham made his invidious view explicit in the conference call with Khan.
He also once said that it would be “terrible” if he took a DNA test and it showed he had Iranian ancestry. In retrospect I think he may have meant that such a bloodline might have made him partially brown and so would have denied him the benefits of being above the law enjoyed by white people. (Persian is an Indo-European language and Iran comes from the same root as “Aryan,” and a lot of Iranian Americans identify as white, but Graham was too incurious to have known all that.)
We have to revise the old saying. If you have neither the law nor the facts on your side, pound racist superiority and inherent lack of accountability.
And that is how Graham, in his guise as master prestidigitator, made the elephant of genocide disappear.
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Paraguayan Senator Refuses to Apologize as Government Condemns Racist Attack on France's Mbappé
"I will not apologize," said 62-year-old Sen. Celeste Amarilla. "I come from a generation when gays were beaten up and calling someone a little Black shit was common."
Jul 07, 2026
A Paraguayan senator on Tuesday partially retracted her racist rant against French soccer superstar Kylian Mbappé but refused to apologize as French prosecutors weigh hate crime charges and officials in both countries condemned her remarks.
Prosecutors in Paris are considering charges of incitement to hatred or violence, or aggravated public insult, against right-wing Paraguayan opposition Sen. Celeste Amarilla, after the French Football Federation filed a complaint calling the "racist remarks" of the lawmaker "totally abject and unacceptable."
France eliminated Paraguay from the FIFA World Cup on Saturday, beating the South American side 1-0 in the Round of 16 match in Philadelphia, with Mbappé scoring a game-winning penalty kick in the 70th minute.
Following the unusually physical match—some observers accused Paraguay of being sore losers and playing dirty—Mbappé refused to shake Paraguayan goalkeeper Orlando Gill's hand.
An incensed Amarilla then took to X to call Mbappé a "colonized Cameroonian, pretending hard to be French, resentful, newly rich, arrogant, and ugly."
In a second post, the senator said Mbappé "didn't even learn to write; instead of mother's milk, he suckled on coconuts, and the most educated things he heard were the chimpanzees."
Mbappé was born in Paris and grew up just outside the French capital in Bondy.
Amarilla also cheered racist posts by other X users and asked "permission" to use one comment asking, "What kind of 'dark' thing can you ask someone who ran from lions so as not to be eaten?"
While many Paraguayans rushed to Amarilla's defense in the name of their national, sporting, and even racial honor, the country's Foreign Ministry released a statement saying the nation's government "deplores and rejects" her remarks, which it said are "contrary to the values and principles that inspire peaceful coexistence and respect for the human dignity that our country promotes."
Paraguayan Vice President Pedro Alliana also weighed in, asserting Monday that "football is an expression of fraternity" that "should unite people," and "there is no room for any type of discrimination" in the sport.
Mbappé responded directly to Amarilla on social media, saying, "You are a despicable woman and unworthy of your position."
"You do not represent Paraguay, that country which has sweated passion and honor throughout the competition," the French captain and Real Madrid superstar wrote. "Through your recklessness and your brazen racism, the entire world has already forgotten the journey and the historic effort that your players accomplished during this World Cup, making way for an incompetent woman who gives the worst possible image of her country."
French President Emmanuel Macron posted on social media: "Another goal for Kylian Mbappé. Against racism this time. All my support. When words defile, our values respond—dignity, respect, fraternity."
Amarilla subsequently posted a screed attacking what she called Mbappé's "arrogance" and "contempt."
"My posts were written in the heat of the moment," she claimed. "That mixed-race blood—a beautiful blend of Indigenous and Spanish blood flowing through my veins—was boiling while you mocked those great Paraguayan players who fought as equals until the very end of the match, and that's why I wrote those messages."
During Amarilla's youth, Paraguay committed genocide against the Aché, Ayoreo, Guaraní, and other Indigenous peoples under the US-backed dictatorship of Gen. Alfredo Stroessner.
"Soon afterward, however, I regretted responding with the same insults that I myself receive," Amarilla continued in a conciliatory twist. "I, too am looked down upon for being brown-skinned and Latina; they call us 'sudacas.' I regretted it and deleted the post. I realized I was repeating patterns that I hate. I understand that it may have hurt you, because it is humiliating."
"Now I demand that you also retract your words and apologize to me," she added.
Speaking at a Tuesday morning press conference, Amarilla again defended her actions, which she said were rooted in her Generation X upbringing, declaring, "I will not apologize."
🗣️ Celeste Amarilla: “I come from a generation where calling someone a “little Black sh*t” was common.
Watch out for Paraguayans. We put Dinho behind bars for corruption.
Don't underestimate me, I can file charges against you.”
She’s disgusting, bro. 🤮 pic.twitter.com/yAw55G0hSP
— 10 (@Kylian) July 7, 2026
"I'm nearly 62 years old and grew up in a society where gays were beaten and where calling someone a little Black shit was the most common thing," the senator said. "I come from that generation, so now I'm trying to build a different Celeste Amarilla, that's capable of co-existing with others."
"Have patience," she added. "I'm trying."
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What Is There to Celebrate on the 250th Anniversary of the United States of America?
If we must, what we need to celebrate is the basic principles and ideas behind the Declaration of Independence, while being fully cognizant of the fact that we still have a long way to go to achieve equality in this country.
Jun 30, 2026
On July 4, 2026, the United States of America turns 250 years old. Should the Left celebrate the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States with the signing of the Declaration of Independence? After all, this is a nation with a very dark and ugly past—with racism, genocide, and imperialism deeply embedded in its psyche.
Surely Native Americans have no reason to celebrate. The history of the United States government’s treatment of Native Americans is one of cruelty, oppression, and extermination. Leaving aside the 56 million Indigenous people that were killed by European settlers across the Americas by 1600, since its independence in 1776, the US government has launched more than 1,500 attacks against various Indigenous people, slaughtering them, and taking their lands. Native Americans in the US continue to face oppression, poverty, and discrimination, and rank near the bottom of all other groups in terms of health, education, and employment.
What about Black Americans? Do they have a reason to celebrate a nation that denied them their humanity for much of those 250 years, while they continue to experience racial discrimination to this day? Racism against Black people remains very much widespread in the Good Ol’ USA.
Should American women have a reason to celebrate the nation’s 250th birthday? They have been treated as second-class citizens until fairly recently, and while many countries around the world have or had female leaders, it is a widely shared belief that the US is still not ready for a woman president.
The Declaration of Independence should serve as a stark reminder of the need for a call to action when a government, like the one represented by Donald Trump, acts illegally and unconstitutionally to weaken democratic institutions.
If anything, a major milestone like the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence should be an opportunity to confront the nation’s dark and ugly past and reflect on what has gone wrong with US democracy and what we can do about it. After all, isn’t it a tragic irony that the celebration of America’s 250th birthday, which is supposed to honor the principles of liberty and equality upon which the nation was allegedly founded, will take place with an administration in power whose own beliefs and actions embody the very tyrannical rule that the Declaration of Independence sought to overthrow?
What manner of national progress is this?
But history is not a linear progression. Nor is it guided by the realization of freedom and rationality, as Hegel thought. Human history moves in a spiral, and irrationality makes up a great part of human life and history. Moreover, not only does the value of ideals vary greatly (Nazism and imperialism were as potent ideals as those of democracy and self-determination), but there is usually a disconnect between ideals and political reality. Some of the lofty principles in the Declaration of Independence, such as “all men are created equal,” collided with the facts on the ground and, in fact, had a very narrow interpretation when they were written, as they applied only to white, propertied men.
Indeed, in 2026, we have a president who likes to govern like a king, or a dictator. As a matter of fact, the Supreme Court has given Donald J. Trump king-like powers. Thus, it is hardly surprising that Trump 2.0 has demolished democracy by initiating a new age of authoritarian rule with civil- and human-rights rollbacks, weaponizing the federal government against the president’s political rivals, and unleashing a paramilitary squad of fascist thugs into communities across the nation. It is also hardly surprising that Trump has become the most corrupt president in US history. He is exploiting shamelessly the highest office in the land to enrich himself and his family.
Trump’s enablers extend beyond today’s Supreme Court, which has moved so far rightward that it qualifies as the most reactionary in the nation’s modern history. It includes the plutocrats, media conglomerates, evangelical Christians, and pro-Israel political networks. Retail corporations, major law firms, and academic institutions capitulated with such ease to Trump’s bullying tactics that they made a mockery of liberal ideals.
All that being said, it is difficult not to appreciate the importance of the Declaration of Independence. It is indeed one of the most important documents in the history of politics and ideas for the simple but radical fact that, by articulating the intention of the American colonies to separate from British rule, it established the principles of self-government and individual rights while connecting equality and freedom.
Being profoundly influenced by the philosophical thinking of John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau (unlike contemporary US leaders, the likes of Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and John Adams were deeply learned men and had extensive knowledge of history and philosophy), the Declaration of Independence solidified the claims of social contract theory—that is, the idea that governments receive their just powers from the consent of the governed—and justified rebellion against tyranny. Within just a couple of decades, the Declaration of Independence inspired revolts across the globe. It had great impact on political and philosophical debates leading up to the French Revolution (1789) and served as a reference point behind the slave revolt against French colonial rule in Haiti in 1791 and the Irish rebellion against British rule in May 1798.
When Ho Chi Minh declared Vietnam an independent nation on September 2, 1945, he paraphrased the US Declaration of Independence. He opened his declaration of independence with the statement from the 1776 Declaration: “All men are created equal. They are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” But then he updated those words by saying, “In a broader sense, this means: All the peoples on the Earth are equal from birth, all the peoples have the right to live, to be happy and free.”
Indeed, the Declaration of Independence served as a “universal blueprint” for the anti-colonial struggles that occurred after World War II. It is indeed a radical document. One of its foundational principles is that “it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish” governments that become destructive to their fundamental rights. This principle is a cornerstone of democratic theory and should never be forgotten.
Ironically enough, all US administrations have largely abandoned the fundamental principles underpinning the Declaration of Independence—and none more so than President Donald Trump’s administration. The country is on a very slippery path under Donald Trump’s imperial proto-fascism. Democracy is dying before our very own eyes, and Trump’s desire to reshape the world order not only creates more uncertainty and instability but risks opening a Pandora’s box.
It is in this context that the Declaration of Independence should serve as a stark reminder of the need for a call to action when a government, like the one represented by Donald Trump, acts illegally and unconstitutionally to weaken democratic institutions and engages purely in self-dealing while endangering our communities. We have a monstrous, tyrannical government in power that the People must stand up to with all their might before it ruins everything.
If we must, what we need to celebrate on the 250th anniversary since the signing of the Declaration of Independence is nothing more and nothing less than the basic principles and ideas behind this document, in an updated manner, of course, à la Ho Chi Minh, while being fully cognizant of the fact that we still have a long way to go to achieve equality in this country. That was not the intention of those who drafted and signed the Declaration of Independence; nonetheless, they gave the world a political and philosophical document for the ages.
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