SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
To donate by check, phone, or other method, see our More Ways to Give page.
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
Democratic Congresswoman-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York joined climate activists occupying the office of Nancy Pelosi, who is expected to serve as the next speaker of the House. (Photo: Waleed Shahid/Twitter)
News related to climate change is rarely good. More often than not, it engenders a sense of doom and helplessness among the public. But lately there has been a glimmer of hope on the horizon for climate justice, and it bears the name Sunrise Movement.
Even before the midterm elections took place, activists in the youth-based climate justice organization had planned a sit-in at the Washington, D.C., offices of California representative and longtime Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi. A week after the election, the approximately 200 people that crowded into Pelosi's office were visited by newly elected New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Addressing the climate activists, Ocasio-Cortez said, "My journey here started at Standing Rock," referring to the powerful indigenous-led rebellion to stop the Dakota Access pipeline project in 2017. Immediately afterward, Ocasio-Cortez pledged to introduce legislation to create a "Select Committee on a Green New Deal," as one of her first actions in Congress.
William Lawrence, a co-founder of the Sunrise Movement, explained to me in an interview that the movement is motivated by the existential threat of the climate crisis. "We have hundreds of millions of lives worldwide that are at stake because of the threat of runaway climate change," he said. The solutions out of this crisis are known and achievable: "We need to overhaul our energy system, our food system and our transit system," Lawrence explained. In his opinion, "The only way to do that in time is for the government to take an active role in the economy to shape and guide the transition. That's exactly how we got ourselves out of the Great Depression."
"Establishment Democrats now have two powerful forces working to push them in the right direction on climate: a strong grassroots movement intent on holding politicians' feet to the fire, and a bold new crop of aggressive young democratic socialists like Ocasio-Cortez."
But lawmakers are still undecided on a plan of action. Pelosi, feeling the pressure from grassroots activists and new colleagues like Ocasio-Cortez, made the call for reviving a defunct committee called the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, which was established the last time Democrats controlled the House.
While that committee's mandate would not go nearly as far as the one Ocasio-Cortez has proposed, other Democrats, like New Jersey Rep. Frank Pallone, the ranking Democrat on the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, dismissed Pelosi's position, saying a select committee was "not necessary." His opposition highlights a strongly regressive streak within the Democratic Party that feels compelled to maintain the status quo in the face of the climate devastation that is already happening all around us.
Establishment Democrats now have two powerful forces working to push them in the right direction on climate: a strong grassroots movement intent on holding politicians' feet to the fire, and a bold new crop of aggressive young democratic socialists like Ocasio-Cortez, who have been elected to office. It is the perfect storm of forces needed now more than ever to push a strong climate agenda.
Coming off a violent hurricane season on the U.S. East Coast, this fall brought record-breaking fires to the nation's West Coast, underscoring the urgency of climate catastrophe. The death toll from the worst fire in California's recorded history--the Camp Fire in Butte County--has now reached 83, with more than 600 still missing. Meanwhile, rain is expected this week in the northern part of the state, which could bring relief to the dry areas but could also trigger dangerous mudslides and flash flooding in areas stripped bare of brush and vegetation. Scientists are in clear agreement that climate change is behind this unprecedented fire season.
But President Trump barely acknowledged climate change during his weekend visit to the impacted areas. In addition to (embarrassingly) forgetting the name of the devastated town of Paradise--he referred to it as "Pleasure" before being corrected--Trump lectured state officials about the importance of raking and cleaning forest vegetation. His interior secretary, Ryan Zinke, went even further, saying in an interview with the extremist right-wing outlet Breitbart that the fires were the fault of "environmental radicals."
Rather than confront Republicans like Trump and Zinke (Lawrence dismissed the GOP as "An organized alliance between fossil-fuel billionaires and white supremacists"), the Northern California chapter of the Sunrise Movement showed up outside the offices of Democratic Rep. Barbara Lee, a strong progressive figure and veteran lawmaker. They wore masks to protect their lungs from the toxic air that blanketed the areas surrounding the Camp Fire, and they called upon Lee to support the resolution that Ocasio-Cortez plans to introduce. So far, Lee has not responded.
Lawrence said the activists were sending a message to Lee, saying, "We love you, we respect you, you have been a progressive champion for many years on so many issues, but that doesn't mean you get a pass on this."
"Trump and the GOP's deregulatory agenda is exacerbating these problems through actions like last year's tax-reform bonanza for the wealthy and ending the Paris Agreement. Our elected officials are literally erasing our children's future."
What activists with the Sunrise Movement are cleverly doing is demanding that their elected representatives, including Pelosi, Pallone and Lee, answer the question: "What Is Your Plan?" "Not only do they not have a plan," said Lawrence, "but they don't have a plan to make a plan."
Angry about Pallone's recent stance that no action is needed to establish any sort of select committee to address climate change, Sunrise Movement activists paid him a visit, too. According to Lawrence, Pallone attempted to cast himself as their ally, citing his statements in support of climate action and his 2009 vote for a "cap and trade program." But Lawrence pointed out that Pallone "has taken hundreds of thousands of dollars from fossil fuel companies."
Lawrence and his fellow activists are demanding that Democrats back a "Green New Deal"--a proposal whose very name invokes the important government jobs program that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed into law to help end the Great Depression. The idea is one whose time has come. Rampant poverty and climate change are arguably the two most important challenges facing the U.S. today. A Green New Deal would address both crises together. At this moment, Congress has no plan to solve either income inequality or global warming. Indeed, Trump and the GOP's deregulatory agenda is exacerbating these problems through actions like last year's tax-reform bonanza for the wealthy and ending the Paris Agreement. Our elected officials are literally erasing our children's future.
This is not a pie-in-the-sky movement. Lawrence said he is realistic: "We know that we are not going to pass anything until 2021 when we have Trump out of office, and hopefully we have a more favorable breakdown in the Senate." With regard to recent developments, he insisted, "But now that the Democrats hold the House, it is absolutely imperative that they make a plan that will be ready to go in 2021." The climate--and our species--depend on it.
This article was originally published at Truthdig.
Trump and Musk are on an unconstitutional rampage, aiming for virtually every corner of the federal government. These two right-wing billionaires are targeting nurses, scientists, teachers, daycare providers, judges, veterans, air traffic controllers, and nuclear safety inspectors. No one is safe. The food stamps program, Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid are next. It’s an unprecedented disaster and a five-alarm fire, but there will be a reckoning. The people did not vote for this. The American people do not want this dystopian hellscape that hides behind claims of “efficiency.” Still, in reality, it is all a giveaway to corporate interests and the libertarian dreams of far-right oligarchs like Musk. Common Dreams is playing a vital role by reporting day and night on this orgy of corruption and greed, as well as what everyday people can do to organize and fight back. As a people-powered nonprofit news outlet, we cover issues the corporate media never will, but we can only continue with our readers’ support. |
News related to climate change is rarely good. More often than not, it engenders a sense of doom and helplessness among the public. But lately there has been a glimmer of hope on the horizon for climate justice, and it bears the name Sunrise Movement.
Even before the midterm elections took place, activists in the youth-based climate justice organization had planned a sit-in at the Washington, D.C., offices of California representative and longtime Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi. A week after the election, the approximately 200 people that crowded into Pelosi's office were visited by newly elected New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Addressing the climate activists, Ocasio-Cortez said, "My journey here started at Standing Rock," referring to the powerful indigenous-led rebellion to stop the Dakota Access pipeline project in 2017. Immediately afterward, Ocasio-Cortez pledged to introduce legislation to create a "Select Committee on a Green New Deal," as one of her first actions in Congress.
William Lawrence, a co-founder of the Sunrise Movement, explained to me in an interview that the movement is motivated by the existential threat of the climate crisis. "We have hundreds of millions of lives worldwide that are at stake because of the threat of runaway climate change," he said. The solutions out of this crisis are known and achievable: "We need to overhaul our energy system, our food system and our transit system," Lawrence explained. In his opinion, "The only way to do that in time is for the government to take an active role in the economy to shape and guide the transition. That's exactly how we got ourselves out of the Great Depression."
"Establishment Democrats now have two powerful forces working to push them in the right direction on climate: a strong grassroots movement intent on holding politicians' feet to the fire, and a bold new crop of aggressive young democratic socialists like Ocasio-Cortez."
But lawmakers are still undecided on a plan of action. Pelosi, feeling the pressure from grassroots activists and new colleagues like Ocasio-Cortez, made the call for reviving a defunct committee called the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, which was established the last time Democrats controlled the House.
While that committee's mandate would not go nearly as far as the one Ocasio-Cortez has proposed, other Democrats, like New Jersey Rep. Frank Pallone, the ranking Democrat on the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, dismissed Pelosi's position, saying a select committee was "not necessary." His opposition highlights a strongly regressive streak within the Democratic Party that feels compelled to maintain the status quo in the face of the climate devastation that is already happening all around us.
Establishment Democrats now have two powerful forces working to push them in the right direction on climate: a strong grassroots movement intent on holding politicians' feet to the fire, and a bold new crop of aggressive young democratic socialists like Ocasio-Cortez, who have been elected to office. It is the perfect storm of forces needed now more than ever to push a strong climate agenda.
Coming off a violent hurricane season on the U.S. East Coast, this fall brought record-breaking fires to the nation's West Coast, underscoring the urgency of climate catastrophe. The death toll from the worst fire in California's recorded history--the Camp Fire in Butte County--has now reached 83, with more than 600 still missing. Meanwhile, rain is expected this week in the northern part of the state, which could bring relief to the dry areas but could also trigger dangerous mudslides and flash flooding in areas stripped bare of brush and vegetation. Scientists are in clear agreement that climate change is behind this unprecedented fire season.
But President Trump barely acknowledged climate change during his weekend visit to the impacted areas. In addition to (embarrassingly) forgetting the name of the devastated town of Paradise--he referred to it as "Pleasure" before being corrected--Trump lectured state officials about the importance of raking and cleaning forest vegetation. His interior secretary, Ryan Zinke, went even further, saying in an interview with the extremist right-wing outlet Breitbart that the fires were the fault of "environmental radicals."
Rather than confront Republicans like Trump and Zinke (Lawrence dismissed the GOP as "An organized alliance between fossil-fuel billionaires and white supremacists"), the Northern California chapter of the Sunrise Movement showed up outside the offices of Democratic Rep. Barbara Lee, a strong progressive figure and veteran lawmaker. They wore masks to protect their lungs from the toxic air that blanketed the areas surrounding the Camp Fire, and they called upon Lee to support the resolution that Ocasio-Cortez plans to introduce. So far, Lee has not responded.
Lawrence said the activists were sending a message to Lee, saying, "We love you, we respect you, you have been a progressive champion for many years on so many issues, but that doesn't mean you get a pass on this."
"Trump and the GOP's deregulatory agenda is exacerbating these problems through actions like last year's tax-reform bonanza for the wealthy and ending the Paris Agreement. Our elected officials are literally erasing our children's future."
What activists with the Sunrise Movement are cleverly doing is demanding that their elected representatives, including Pelosi, Pallone and Lee, answer the question: "What Is Your Plan?" "Not only do they not have a plan," said Lawrence, "but they don't have a plan to make a plan."
Angry about Pallone's recent stance that no action is needed to establish any sort of select committee to address climate change, Sunrise Movement activists paid him a visit, too. According to Lawrence, Pallone attempted to cast himself as their ally, citing his statements in support of climate action and his 2009 vote for a "cap and trade program." But Lawrence pointed out that Pallone "has taken hundreds of thousands of dollars from fossil fuel companies."
Lawrence and his fellow activists are demanding that Democrats back a "Green New Deal"--a proposal whose very name invokes the important government jobs program that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed into law to help end the Great Depression. The idea is one whose time has come. Rampant poverty and climate change are arguably the two most important challenges facing the U.S. today. A Green New Deal would address both crises together. At this moment, Congress has no plan to solve either income inequality or global warming. Indeed, Trump and the GOP's deregulatory agenda is exacerbating these problems through actions like last year's tax-reform bonanza for the wealthy and ending the Paris Agreement. Our elected officials are literally erasing our children's future.
This is not a pie-in-the-sky movement. Lawrence said he is realistic: "We know that we are not going to pass anything until 2021 when we have Trump out of office, and hopefully we have a more favorable breakdown in the Senate." With regard to recent developments, he insisted, "But now that the Democrats hold the House, it is absolutely imperative that they make a plan that will be ready to go in 2021." The climate--and our species--depend on it.
This article was originally published at Truthdig.
News related to climate change is rarely good. More often than not, it engenders a sense of doom and helplessness among the public. But lately there has been a glimmer of hope on the horizon for climate justice, and it bears the name Sunrise Movement.
Even before the midterm elections took place, activists in the youth-based climate justice organization had planned a sit-in at the Washington, D.C., offices of California representative and longtime Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi. A week after the election, the approximately 200 people that crowded into Pelosi's office were visited by newly elected New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Addressing the climate activists, Ocasio-Cortez said, "My journey here started at Standing Rock," referring to the powerful indigenous-led rebellion to stop the Dakota Access pipeline project in 2017. Immediately afterward, Ocasio-Cortez pledged to introduce legislation to create a "Select Committee on a Green New Deal," as one of her first actions in Congress.
William Lawrence, a co-founder of the Sunrise Movement, explained to me in an interview that the movement is motivated by the existential threat of the climate crisis. "We have hundreds of millions of lives worldwide that are at stake because of the threat of runaway climate change," he said. The solutions out of this crisis are known and achievable: "We need to overhaul our energy system, our food system and our transit system," Lawrence explained. In his opinion, "The only way to do that in time is for the government to take an active role in the economy to shape and guide the transition. That's exactly how we got ourselves out of the Great Depression."
"Establishment Democrats now have two powerful forces working to push them in the right direction on climate: a strong grassroots movement intent on holding politicians' feet to the fire, and a bold new crop of aggressive young democratic socialists like Ocasio-Cortez."
But lawmakers are still undecided on a plan of action. Pelosi, feeling the pressure from grassroots activists and new colleagues like Ocasio-Cortez, made the call for reviving a defunct committee called the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, which was established the last time Democrats controlled the House.
While that committee's mandate would not go nearly as far as the one Ocasio-Cortez has proposed, other Democrats, like New Jersey Rep. Frank Pallone, the ranking Democrat on the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, dismissed Pelosi's position, saying a select committee was "not necessary." His opposition highlights a strongly regressive streak within the Democratic Party that feels compelled to maintain the status quo in the face of the climate devastation that is already happening all around us.
Establishment Democrats now have two powerful forces working to push them in the right direction on climate: a strong grassroots movement intent on holding politicians' feet to the fire, and a bold new crop of aggressive young democratic socialists like Ocasio-Cortez, who have been elected to office. It is the perfect storm of forces needed now more than ever to push a strong climate agenda.
Coming off a violent hurricane season on the U.S. East Coast, this fall brought record-breaking fires to the nation's West Coast, underscoring the urgency of climate catastrophe. The death toll from the worst fire in California's recorded history--the Camp Fire in Butte County--has now reached 83, with more than 600 still missing. Meanwhile, rain is expected this week in the northern part of the state, which could bring relief to the dry areas but could also trigger dangerous mudslides and flash flooding in areas stripped bare of brush and vegetation. Scientists are in clear agreement that climate change is behind this unprecedented fire season.
But President Trump barely acknowledged climate change during his weekend visit to the impacted areas. In addition to (embarrassingly) forgetting the name of the devastated town of Paradise--he referred to it as "Pleasure" before being corrected--Trump lectured state officials about the importance of raking and cleaning forest vegetation. His interior secretary, Ryan Zinke, went even further, saying in an interview with the extremist right-wing outlet Breitbart that the fires were the fault of "environmental radicals."
Rather than confront Republicans like Trump and Zinke (Lawrence dismissed the GOP as "An organized alliance between fossil-fuel billionaires and white supremacists"), the Northern California chapter of the Sunrise Movement showed up outside the offices of Democratic Rep. Barbara Lee, a strong progressive figure and veteran lawmaker. They wore masks to protect their lungs from the toxic air that blanketed the areas surrounding the Camp Fire, and they called upon Lee to support the resolution that Ocasio-Cortez plans to introduce. So far, Lee has not responded.
Lawrence said the activists were sending a message to Lee, saying, "We love you, we respect you, you have been a progressive champion for many years on so many issues, but that doesn't mean you get a pass on this."
"Trump and the GOP's deregulatory agenda is exacerbating these problems through actions like last year's tax-reform bonanza for the wealthy and ending the Paris Agreement. Our elected officials are literally erasing our children's future."
What activists with the Sunrise Movement are cleverly doing is demanding that their elected representatives, including Pelosi, Pallone and Lee, answer the question: "What Is Your Plan?" "Not only do they not have a plan," said Lawrence, "but they don't have a plan to make a plan."
Angry about Pallone's recent stance that no action is needed to establish any sort of select committee to address climate change, Sunrise Movement activists paid him a visit, too. According to Lawrence, Pallone attempted to cast himself as their ally, citing his statements in support of climate action and his 2009 vote for a "cap and trade program." But Lawrence pointed out that Pallone "has taken hundreds of thousands of dollars from fossil fuel companies."
Lawrence and his fellow activists are demanding that Democrats back a "Green New Deal"--a proposal whose very name invokes the important government jobs program that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed into law to help end the Great Depression. The idea is one whose time has come. Rampant poverty and climate change are arguably the two most important challenges facing the U.S. today. A Green New Deal would address both crises together. At this moment, Congress has no plan to solve either income inequality or global warming. Indeed, Trump and the GOP's deregulatory agenda is exacerbating these problems through actions like last year's tax-reform bonanza for the wealthy and ending the Paris Agreement. Our elected officials are literally erasing our children's future.
This is not a pie-in-the-sky movement. Lawrence said he is realistic: "We know that we are not going to pass anything until 2021 when we have Trump out of office, and hopefully we have a more favorable breakdown in the Senate." With regard to recent developments, he insisted, "But now that the Democrats hold the House, it is absolutely imperative that they make a plan that will be ready to go in 2021." The climate--and our species--depend on it.
This article was originally published at Truthdig.
The new Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services administrator joins "a team of snake oil salesmen and anti-science flunkies that have already shown disdain for the American people and their health," said one critic.
Echoing a party-line vote by the U.S. Senate Finance Committee last week, the chamber's Republicans on Thursday confirmed President Donald Trump's nominee to head the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, former televison host Dr. Mehmet Oz.
Since Trump nominated Oz—who previously ran as a Republican for a U.S. Senate seat in Pennsylvania—a wide range of critics have argued that the celebrity cardiothoracic surgeon "is profoundly unqualified to lead any part of our healthcare system, let alone an agency as important as CMS," in the words of Robert Weissman, co-president of the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen.
After Thursday's 53-45 vote to confirm Oz, Weissman declared that "Republicans in the Senate continued to just be a rubber stamp for a dangerous agenda that threatens to turn back the clock on healthcare in America."
Weissman warned that "in addition to having significant conflicts of interest, Oz is now poised to help enact the Trump administration's dangerous agenda, which seeks to strip crucial healthcare services through Medicare, Medicaid, and the Affordable Care Act from hundreds of millions of Americans and to use that money to give tax breaks to billionaires."
"As he showed in his confirmation hearing, Oz will also seek to further privatize Medicare, increasing the risk that seniors will receive inferior care and further threatening the long-term health of the Medicare program. We already know that privatized Medicare costs taxpayers nearly $100 billion annually in excess costs," he continued, referring to Medicare Advantage plans.
CMS is part of the Department of Health and Human Services, now led by Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.—who, like Oz, came under fire for his record of dubious claims during the confirmation process. Weissman said that "Dr. Oz is joining a team of snake oil salesmen and anti-science flunkies that have already shown disdain for the American people and their health. This is yet another dark day for healthcare in America under Trump."
In the middle of Trump's tariff disaster, the Senate is voting to confirm quack grifter Dr. Oz to lead the Centers for Medicaid & Medicare Services.
[image or embed]
— Jen Bendery (@jbendery.bsky.social) April 3, 2025 at 12:29 PM
Oz's confirmation came a day after Trump announced globally disruptive tariffs and Senate Republicans unveiled a budget plan that would give the wealthy trillions of dollars in tax cuts at the expense of federal food assistance and healthcare programs.
"While Dr. Oz would rather play coy, this is no hypothetical. Harmful cuts to Medicaid or Medicare are unavoidable in the Trump-Republican budget plan that prioritizes another giant tax break for the president's billionaire and corporate donors," Tony Carrk, executive director of the watchdog group Accountable.US, said ahead of the vote.
"None of Dr. Oz's 'miracle' cures that he's peddled over the years will help seniors when their fundamental health security is ripped away to make the rich richer," Carrk continued. "And while privatizing Medicare may enrich Dr. Oz's family and big insurance friends, it will cost taxpayers far more and leave millions of patients vulnerable to denials of care and higher out-of-pocket costs."
Lee Saunders, president of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), was similarly critical, saying after the vote that "at a time when our population is growing older and the need for access to home care, nursing homes, affordable prescription drugs, and quality medical care has never been greater, Americans deserve better than a snake oil salesman leading the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services."
"Dr. Mehmet Oz has been shilling pseudoscience to line his own pockets. He can't be trusted to defend Medicare and Medicaid from billionaires who want to dismantle and privatize the foundation of affordable healthcare in this country," the union leader added. "AFSCME members—including nurses, home care and childcare providers, social workers and more—will be watching and fighting back against any effort to weaken Medicare and Medicaid. The 147 million seniors, children, Americans with disabilities, and low-income workers who rely on these programs for affordable access to healthcare deserve nothing less."
"While your kids are getting ready for school, kids in Gaza were once against just massacred in one," said one observer.
Israeli airstrikes targeted at least three more school shelters in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, killing dozens of Palestinians and wounding scores of others on a day when local officials said that more than 100 people were slain by occupation forces.
Gaza's Government Media Office said that at least 29 people—including 14 children and five women—were killed and over 100 others were wounded when at least four missiles struck the Dar al-Arqam school complex in the Tuffah neighborhood of eastern Gaza City, where hundreds of Palestinians were sheltering after being forcibly displaced from other parts of the embattled coastal enclave by Israel's 535-day assault.
Al Jazeera reported that "when terrified men, women, and children fled from one school building to another, the bombs followed them," and "when bystanders rushed to help, they too became victims."
A first responder from the Palestine Red Crescent Society—which is reeling from this week's discovery of a mass grave containing the bodies of eight of its members, some of whom had allegedly been bound and executed by Israel Defense Forces (IDF) troops—told Al Jazeera that "we were absolutely shocked by the scale of this massacre," whose victims were "mostly women and children."
Warning: Video contains graphic images of death.
Horrifying scenes following the Dar Al-Arqam School Massacre!#Gaza pic.twitter.com/xOvuq3Zztx
— Dr. Zain Al-Abbadi (@ZainAbbadi11) April 3, 2025
An official from Gaza's Civil Defense, five of whose members were also found in the mass grave on Sunday, said: "What's going on here is a wake-up call to the entire world. This war and these massacres against women and children must stop immediately. The children are being killed in cold blood here in Gaza. Our teams cannot perform their duties properly.
Gaza Health Ministry spokesperson Zaher al-Wahidi said that the death toll was likely to rise, as some survivors were critically injured.
Dozens of victims were reportedly trapped beneath rubble of Thursday's airstrikes, but they could not be rescued due to a lack of equipment.
The IDF claimed that "key Hamas terrorists" were targeted in a strike on what it called a "command center." Israeli officials routinely claim—often with little or no evidence—that Palestinian civilians it kills are members of Hamas or other militant resistance groups.
Israel also bombed the nearby al-Sabah school, killing four people, as well as the Fahd School in Gaza City, with three reported fatalities.
Some of the deadliest bombings in the war have been carried out against refugees sheltering in schools, many of them run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA)—at least 280 of whose staff members have been killed by Israeli forces during the war.
The United Nations Children's Fund has called Gaza "the world's most dangerous place to be a child." Last year, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres for the first time added Israel to his so-called "List of Shame" of countries that kill and injure children during wars and other armed conflicts. More than 17,500 Palestinian children have been killed in Gaza since October 2023, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
Thursday's school bombings sparked worldwide outrage and calls to hold Israel accountable.
"While your kids are getting ready for school, kids in Gaza were once against just massacred in one," Australian journalist, activist, and progressive politician Sophie McNeill wrote on social media. "We must sanction Israel now!"
There were other IDF massacres on Thursday, with local officials reporting that more than 100 people were killed in Israeli attacks since dawn. Al-Wahidi said more than 30 people were killed in strikes on homes in Gaza City's Shejaya neighborhood, citing records at al-Ahli Arab Baptist Hospital in Gaza.
Al Jazeera reported that al-Ahli's emergency room "is overwhelmed with casualties and, as is so often the case over the past 18 months, the victims are Gaza's youngest."
Thursday's intensified airstrikes came as Israeli forces pushed into the ruins of the southern city of Rafah. Local and international media reported that hundreds of thousands of Palestinian families fled from the area, which Israel said it will seize as part of a new "security zone."
Human rights defenders around the world condemned U.S.-backed killing and mass displacement, with U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.)—whose bid to block some sAmerican arms sales to Israel was rejected by the Senate on Thursday—saying: "There is a name and a term for forcibly expelling people from where they live. It is called ethnic cleansing. It is illegal. It is a war crime."
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, his former defense minister, are fugitives from the International Criminal Court, which last year issued arrest warrants for the pair over alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity. Israel is also facing a genocide case at the International Court of Justice.
According to Gaza officials, Israeli forces have killed or wounded at least 175,000 Palestinians in Gaza, including upward of 14,000 people who are missing and presumed dead and buried beneath rubble. Almost everyone in Gaza has been forcibly displaced at least once, and the "complete siege" imposed by Israel has fueled widespread and sometimes deadly starvation and disease.
"Working-class candidate v. billionaire political race. I'm here for it," wrote one longtime progressive strategist.
Dan Osborn, an Independent U.S. Senate candidate who struck a chord with working-class voters in Nebraska and came within striking distance of unseating his Republican opponent last year, announced Thursday that he's considering another run, this time challenging GOP Sen. Pete GOP Ricketts, who is up for election in 2026.
"We could replace a billionaire with a mechanic," Osborn wrote in a thread on X on Thursday. "I'll run against Pete Ricketts—if the support is there." Osborn said that he's launching an exploratory committee and would run as Independent, as he did in 2024.
Ricketts has served as a senator since 2023, and prior to that was the governor of Nebraska from 2015-2023. By one estimate, Ricketts has a net worth of over $165 million—though the wealth of his father, brokerage founder Joe Ricketts, and family is estimated to be worth $4.1 billion, according to Forbes.
A mechanic and unionist who helped lead a strike against Kellogg's cereal company, Osborn lost to Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.) by less than 7 points in November 2024 in what became an unexpectedly close race.
Although he didn't win, he overperformed the national Democratic ticket by a higher percentage than other candidates running against Republicans in competitive Senate races, according to The Nation.
"Billionaires have bought up the country and are carving it up day by day," said Osborn Thursday. "The economy they've built is good for them, bad for us. Good for huge multinationals and multibillionaires. Bad for workers. Bad for small businesses, bad for family farmers. Bad for anyone who wants Social Security to survive. Bad for your PAYCHECK."
Osborn cast the potential race as between "someone who's spent his life working for a living and will never take an order from a corporation or a party boss" and "someone who's never worked a day in his life and is entirely beholden to corporations and party."
"We could take on this illness, the billionaire class, directly," he said.
Osborn, who campaigned on issues like Right to Repair and lowering taxes on overtime payments, earned praise from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who told The Nation in late November that Osborn's bid should be viewed as a "model for the future."
Osborn "took on both political parties. He took on the corporate world. He ran as a strong trade unionist. Without party support, getting heavily outspent, he got through to working-class people all over Nebraska. It was an extraordinary campaign," Sanders said.
In reaction to the news that Osborn is exploring a second run, a former Sanders campaign manager and longtime progressive Democratic strategist Faiz Shakir, wrote: "working-class candidate v. billionaire political race. I'm here for it."