Skip Navigation
Remote View
news @hexbear.net
SeventyTwoTrillion [he/him] @hexbear.net

Bulletins and News Discussion for December 11th to December 17th, 2023 - What's Yours is Mine - COTW: Canada

Image is of the Cobre Panama open-pit copper mine, located 120 kilometers west of Panama City.

Canada is a prolific mining country, hosting many of the world's top mining corporations. Some of its extraction is local - for example, Saskatchewan is the world's largest producer of potash, a critical agricultural nutrient. Much of the extraction is abroad. Naturally, this means that Canada has cut a bloody, but often ignored, path through the global periphery, extracting minerals and causing environmental degradation.

A notable recent example is that of the Cobre Panama copper mine, which is owned by First Quantum Minerals, one of the largest mining companies in Canada. The company earned $10 billion in revenue in 2022, of which the Cobre Panama mine generated $1 billion. Protests in Panama about this mine have gone on for over a decade, urging for a greater share of the profits, protection of indigenous people, and stronger environmental protections. Canada has maintained a stoney silence (pun somewhat intended) on these movements.

On October 20th, the president of Panama, Cortizo, renewed the company's mining concession for 20 years, after a halt in production since the end of 2022 due to negotiations and reform. Everybody hated this. In October, protestors took to the streets in sufficient numbers that Cortizo was forced to halt new mining approvals, and announced a public referendum on whether the contract with First Quantum should be repealed. This was immediately cut down, but the government decided to invalidate the new concession anyway in late November, calling it unconstitutional, and closing down the mine.

First Quantum Minerals has lost about half its market value since October. Various international banks have said that Panama could lose its investment-grade credit rating next year due to the income hit - the mine generated 5% of its GDP. The international arbitration process which First Quantum has initiated against Panama could last years.

The book Canada in the World: Settler Capitalism and the Colonial Imagination handles Canada's role as an imperialist, anti-indigenous, extractive state throughout its history, and is on our geopolitical reading list.

The weekly update is here on the website.
Your Tuesday Briefing is here in the comments and here on the website.
Your Thursday Briefing is here in the comments and here on the website.
Your Friday Briefing is here in the comments and here on the website.
Your Saturday Briefing is here in the comments and here on the website.

The Country of the Week is Canada! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.

The bulletins site is here!
The RSS feed is here.
Last week's thread is here.

You're viewing a single thread.

1.3K comments

  • This thread is about the forced conscription of a Gazan civilian to act as a suicide bomber on behalf of the IDF. I edited it to improve the layout.

    Thread by @MouinRabbani on Thread Reader App

    THREAD: The following translation of a witness statement from the Gaza Strip was produced by a volunteer with the Palestinian Journalist Syndicate. It is provided here because it is an account that according to the translator "we find to be highly credible". I am not in a position to verify it, but would suggest that doing so is an urgent task for those who claim to oppose human shields and suicide bombings, and demonstrate they are acting in support of a principle rather than of a state.

    Translation [Brackets indicate the translator's clarifications, I have made no corrections]

    Prior to our apprehension within Majda Wasila School, located near Palestine Mosque in the western sector of Gaza City. [When this incident occurred, the civilian was in Majda Wasila School along with his family members and others, near Palestine Mosque in the western part of Gaza City.] I was approached by an [Israeli] officer who asked my name, occupation, and age.

    He also sought information regarding my relatives and family. He then directed me to accompany him. When I asked about our destination, he said: "I am going to present you to your Lord akin to a bride." Clarifying if he meant a groom, he elucidated, "a bride adorned in white attire and makeup."

    [In this dialogue, the Israeli soldier is making light of the possibility of killing the civilian.] I was escorted to a location next to a tunnel that belongs to the resistance. There, the Israeli officer outfitted me with a belt containing explosives and a GoPro camera affixed to my head. He secured a rope around my waist, with the directive, "When I tug the rope, you are to return to me." I was held at gunpoint near the tunnel entrance and threatened with harm against my family.

    While I was resisting compliance with his commands, he suddenly thrust me into the tunnel opening, where I landed and remained for approximately 3 minutes. Then he started yelling [at me to move] and fired shots to force me to move forward in the tunnel. I walked a distance of about 40 meters. He then pulled me from the tunnel using the rope, and said: "your Lord still does not desire your presence."

    I was handed over to the soldiers, who received instructions to find another individual of younger age. When I got back outside the tunnel, I discovered my family members still near the tunnel, and a child (15 years old) was taken from the group. Fortunately, he returned unharmed, and I saw him upon my release from detention.

    The [Israeli military's] objective underlying these actions is to avoid entering the tunnel. If the camera affixed to my head had detected the presence of resistance fighters within the tunnel, [the Israeli officer] would have detonated [the explosives on my belt], killing me and others. Further details will come out in the coming days.

    End of Translation.

    An Israeli acquaintance adds: What is described here is not "use of human shields", but rather a much more severe crime: forced conscription of a civilian to act as a suicide bomber on behalf of the IDF.

    That being said, there is ample evidence that the IDF is also using human shields in recent weeks, both in Gaza and in the West Bank (including one instance in which after using a Palestinian as a human shield the IDF apparently attempted to execute him: at the time reports indicated he survived the shooting).

    I would also note that in [Operation] Cast Lead [in 2008-2009] there was a somewhat similar case, which in Israel is dubbed the "Child Procedure" incident, in which a 9-year-old Palestinian child was forced to open bags which the IDF suspected were wired to explode. "Child Procedure" is a paraphrase of "Neighbor Procedure", the IDF-speak for using Palestinians as human shields (a practice notably used by newly popular "leftist" Yair Golan, who called it "very humane".

    It is widely assumed Golan will lead the leftist-Zionist camp in the upcoming elections).

    End of comment by acquaintance and END OF THREAD

1345 comments