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dan maertens
  • BNP Paribas en Axa medeverantwoordelijk

     

    Het rapport noemt onder andere de bank BNP Paribas en verzekeraar AXA expliciet als instellingen die nog steeds investeren in bedrijven die betrokken zijn bij de bezetting en het geweld in Palestina en Gaza. BNP Paribas financierde de afgelopen jaren bijvoorbeeld Elbit Systems, een Israëlische wapenfabrikant die drones, munitie en bewapening levert die ingezet worden bij luchtaanvallen op Gaza en bij de bewaking van de muur en controleposten in bezet gebied.

     

    AXA, een van de grootste verzekerings- en investeringsgroepen in Europa, blijft investeren in ondernemingen zoals Caterpillar en Motorola. Caterpillar levert de bulldozers die gebruikt worden bij het vernietigen van Palestijnse huizen en landbouwgrond. Motorola levert communicatiesystemen en surveillance-technologie aan het Israëlische leger, technologie die ingezet wordt om Palestijnse burgers te controleren en te onderdrukken.

dan maertens

Why China's Inaction on Palestine and Iran Weakens its Global Standing

"No Cold War without Commitment !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Much of the Western media is eager to frame the U.S.–China rivalry as a “new Cold War.” But the comparison is misleading. During the original Cold War, the Soviet Union built a vast network of allied states and armed movements. It supported anti-colonial struggles, funded proxies, and directly challenged US influence in multiple regions. It was not merely a rival; it was an alternative. China, by contrast, avoids any such commitments. It has no proxies, no military alliances, and rarely takes a strong stand in ongoing conflicts. Its only real investments lie in infrastructure and trade—not security guarantees or political protection."

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  • Beijing wants the world to believe that a new multipolar is possible, one in which U.S. dominance is giving way to a more balanced international order. However, if China truly wishes to lead that new era, it must confront a hard truth: a concrete global influence cannot be built with pro forma denunciatory speeches and symbolism alone, it needs investment that goes beyond economic alliances to create a security partnership all around the world.

     

  • China’s foreign policy has long been defined by caution, non-interventionism, and a preference for quiet diplomacy over confrontation. But this posture, viewed as strategic patience, is fast becoming a liability. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the Middle East, where China’s passivity in the face of Israeli and U.S. aggression has exposed the limits of its global ambition.

     

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dan maertens
  • while the Bundis Sara Wagenknecht (BSW), which could have prevented the scandal with its no vote, abstained! With 348 yes votes and 344 no votes, the result was close." (at: https://mlrg.online/current-events/the-metamorphoses-of-would-be-cdu-chancellor-friederich-merz-and-the-2025-german-federal-elections/ )
  • "Mögliche Annäherung im Bund Sahra Wagenknecht spricht sich für Gespräche mit AfD aus at-> https://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/bsw-chefin-sahra-wagenknecht-zeigt-sich-offen-fuer-gespraeche-mit-afd-im-bund-a-f4ade7fd-169d-42a7-a56e-382ab5e4df39
     

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dan maertens
  • Poll: Overwhelming majority of Jewish Israelis share genocidal belief there are ‘no innocent people in Gaza’

         
  • 64% of Israelis agree with this statement, almost two out of three. But it is actually considerably higher among Jewish Israelis, because that number is heavily weighted by Palestinians with Israeli citizenship. Palestinians make up about 20% of the Israeli population and 92% of them oppose the statement, so that leaves Jewish Israelis with overwhelming support.1 

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dan maertens
  • devraient mettre le site d'exploitation d'eau minérale naturelle en conformité avec les exigences des autorités sanitaires.
  • L'entreprise avait jusqu'au 7 juillet 2025 pour retirer l'ancien système. Le 7 mai, le préfet du Gard avait donné deux mois au groupe pour retirer sa microfiltration à 0,2 micron, estimant, en se fondant sur l'avis des experts de l'Agence régionale de Santé (ARS) Occitanie, que ce dispositif "modifie le microbisme de l'eau produite, en contradiction avec la réglementation en vigueur" sur les eaux minérales naturelles.

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Michel Bauwens

Cheerleaders for Genocide - by Heather Brunskell-Evans

"The Israeli Ambassador to the UN recently claimed: “We are the most moral country in the world, and we are the guardians of civilisation.” In contrast, a UN member of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Territories, Chris Sidoti, says: “The death of this institution is actually a moderate demand […] The Israeli army is one of the most CRIMINAL armies in the world.”

Israel’s narrative of itself as an exemplary but beleaguered liberal democracy is now slipping out of hegemonic control. Kneecap and Bob Vylan have become influential contributors to this dismantling. The cat is out of the bag and will not be returned. The general public is increasingly aware of Israel’s crimes. Even the timid among us are refusing the injunction of Friends of Israel that human empathy for the Palestinians is Jew-hatred. Finally, the young are being politicised. They demand: “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!”"

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Michel Bauwens

Mithras the Syrian - by Hiram Crespo - The Twentiers

"In the seven centuries during which the ancient Epicurean Gardens were active, the Epicureans seem to have had both an oral and written tradition of lovingly and cheerfully narrating the pastimes and activities of Epicurean friends (past and present). In the days of Philodemus of Gadara, these stories were told by the Scholarch of his day (Zeno of Sidon) in a manner that stirred the emotions among the disciples.

In this essay I will discuss one of the friends of Metrodorus, Mithras the Syrian, and the ethical and educational value derived from storytelling and from the repetition and celebration of the story of love, loyalty, and friendship between them. "

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Michel Bauwens

The Imaginal Realm, the Otherworld, and Theurgy

"an imaginal realm is not simply “an invented world,” a work of fiction; and both Blake and Tolkien believed the worlds of their works to be as real as any other. On the other hand, every world, including that we take to be “reality,” is a product of invention. The question is: Who is doing the inventing? It is not a welcome realization, is it? As Rilke so wisely observes, “already the knowing animals are aware / that we are not really at home in / our interpreted world.”[1] My claim: the imaginal world is just as substantial as any world, including those we think we inhabit. Another name for the imaginal realm, or at least an aspect of it, is the Otherworld.

The great French scholar and philosopher of religion Henri Corbin explains the characteristics of the imaginal realm:

“Between the universe that can be apprehended by pure intellectual perception and the universe perceptible to the senses, there is an intermediate world, the world of idea-images, of archetypal figures, or subtle substances, of ‘immaterial’ matter. This world is as real and objective, as consistent and subsistent as the intelligible and sensibly worlds; it is an intermediate universe ‘where the spiritual takes body and the body becomes spiritual,’ a world consisting of real matter and real extension, though by comparison to sensible, corruptible matter these are subtle and immaterial. The organ of the universe is the active imagination; it is the place of theophanic visions, the scene on which visionary events and symbolic histories appear in their true reality.”"

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