The ‘F’ word is in play as Trump’s former generals turn on him and election nears
Is Donald Trump a fascist? The ‘F’ word is in play in the final few days of this US election campaign.
Trump’s opponent Kamala Harris was asked whether she thought Donald Trump is a fascist during a CNN townhall in Pennsylvania this week and replied “Yes. I do. Yes. I do.”
She has shifted her campaign from smilingly spreading “joy”, to concentrating on bread-and-butter issues and warnings about a Trump victory.
People “care about bringing down the cost of groceries”, she explained. “They also care about our democracy and not having a president of the United States who admires dictators and is a fascist.”
The spectre of fascism is in the news because of alarming threats from Trump himself, along with on the record responses to them by two top generals who served in the White House during Trump’s presidency.
His planned rally in Madison Square Garden this weekend is also being compared in some quarters to a notorious Nazi rally held at the same venue in 1939.
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US Marine Corps General John F Kelly served under President Trump as homeland security secretary and then as his longest chief of staff, from 2017 to 2019.
Talking to the New York Times this week, Kelly first defined fascism: “It’s a far-right, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement characterised by a dictatorial leader, centralised autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy.”
Then drawing on his extensive personal and private experience of Trump he concluded: “He’s certainly an authoritarian, admires people who are dictators – he has said that. So he certainly falls into the general definition of fascist, for sure.”
Donald Trump and his chief of staff John Kelly in 2018. Pic: Reuters
Kelly had vowed not to intervene during the election unless he felt the US Constitution – to which Americans swear allegiance – was under threat.
Trump’s increasingly violent outbursts changed his mind. This month Trump said he plans to turn the “National Guard, or … the military” on “sick people, radical left lunatics” and others he called the “enemy within”. He has also threatened to shut down major media organisations.
In her Fox News interview, the Democratic nominee Kamala Harris denounced her Republican opponent, saying: “You and I both know that he has talked about turning the American military on the American people.
“He has talked about going after people who are engaged in peaceful protest. He has talked about locking people up because they disagree with him.”
Harris denounced Trump at a rally in Georgia this week. Pic: AP
Trump has gone still further, accusing America’s highest military officer Mark Milley, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, of a “treasonous act… so egregious that, in times gone by, the punishment would have been DEATH!”.
General Milley’s offence, in Trump’s eyes, was calling his Chinese counterpart after the January 6 insurrection to assure him that the US and its international relations remained stable. “My intention was to de-escalate,” he said.
Retired US Army General Mark Milley. File pic: Reuters
‘Gates of hell will be unleashed’
Another ex-military leader, retired General Mike Flynn, who has stayed loyal to Trump and who was pardoned by him for failing to register as a foreign agent, was asked if he would preside over military tribunals in a second Trump term “not only to drain the swamp, but imprison the swamp, and on a few occasions, execute the swamp”.
“Believe me,” Flynn replied, “the gates of hell – my hell – will be unleashed.”
Milley warned the Watergate reporter Bob Woodward that Trump is “fascist to the core” and “the most dangerous person to this country”.
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Trump denies Hitler comment claims
While in office Trump routinely referred to his senior officers as “my generals” and was bewildered that their loyalty was to uphold the Constitution rather than to obey his commands without question.
Independently both the generals, Milley and Kelly, recall President Trump repeatedly expressing admiration for Hitler, “you know Hitler did some good things” and expressing contempt for American soldiers killed or wounded fighting for their country as “losers” and “suckers”.
On a visit to Arlington Cemetery, near where Kelly’s son, a fallen marine, is buried, Trump mused “what’s in it for them?”
“I thought he was asking one of these rhetorical questions,” Kelly recalls, “but I didn’t realise he was serious – he just didn’t see what the point was… selflessness is something he just didn’t understand”.
Trump cannot bear to be in the company of the disabled and has flirted with the idea of eugenics, exerting control over which humans are allowed to breed.
Trump ’employs racist slurs and tropes’
He employs racist slurs and tropes, ranging from attacking Harris as lazy, dumb and sleepy to outright attacks on Mexicans as “murderers and rapists”.
When a 20-year-old Latina army private was murdered by a fellow soldier at Fort Hood, the then president Trump met her grieving family and offered to pay funeral costs personally, The Atlantic magazine reports.
But when a bill came in he told his chief of staff “don’t pay it” adding “It doesn’t cost 60,000 bucks to bury a f*****g Mexican… f*****g people trying to rip me off!”
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Donald Trump has always wanted to play Madison Square Garden, like big showbiz and sports celebrities.
He was advised against wasting his time in previous campaigns because New York is a blue wall Democratic state. This year he is indulging himself by making a big noise in his home town – what matters most to him.
His rally will not have the jack-booted polish of the Nazis in 1939. Trump embracing and kissing the stars and stripes is more his style.
The alt-right TV presenter Tucker Carlson has been booked as the warm-up man for the big show.
Tucker Carlson referred to Trump as ‘Dad’ at a campaign rally in Georgia earlier this week. Pic: Reuters
Carlson: VP deserves a ‘spanking’
Carlson had the same job at another rally in Georgia this week and gave a taste of the sexist patriarchal, and vulgar, attack which the 20,000 MAGA fans in New York City can expect “Dad” to make against Kamala Harris.
“Dad is pissed. And when Dad gets home, you know what he says?” Carlson told the cheering crowd with Trump on the platform behind him, “‘You’ve been a bad girl. You’ve been a bad little girl, and you’re getting a vigorous spanking right now'”.
Trump would like to be a fascist dad, trampling on the rules and decencies of American democracy. Fortunately, should he be re-elected to the White House, he will likely be too ridiculous, ignorant and weak to pull it off, so long as there are still enough people like General Kelly to defend the Constitution.
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Analysis: US election on a knife edge
Harris: Trump ‘increasingly unhinged and unstable’
Now after Trump’s threats, Kamala Harris’ rhetoric has darkened.
Donald Trump is increasingly unhinged and unstable, and in a second term, people like John Kelly would not be there to be the guardrails against his propensities and his actions. Those who once tried to stop him from pursuing his worst impulses would no longer be there and no longer be there to rein him in.
“He wants a military who will be loyal to him, personally, one that will obey his orders, even when he tells them to break the law or abandon their oath to the Constitution of the United States,” she said.
Posing the question as a stark choice for US voters going to the polls for the presidential election on 5 November, she added: “We know what Donald Trump wants. He wants unchecked power.
“The question in 13 days will be: What do the American people want?”
The man convicted of the murder of British student Meredith Kercher has been charged with sexual assault against an ex-girlfriend.
Rudy Guede, 38, was the only person who was definitively convicted of the murder of 21-year-old Ms Kercher in Perugia, Italy, back in 2007.
He will be standing trial again in November after an ex-girlfriend filed a police report in the summer of 2023 accusing Guede of mistreatment, personal injury and sexual violence.
Guede, from the Ivory Coast, was released from prison for the murder of Leeds University student Ms Kercher in 2021, after having served about 13 years of a 16-year sentence.
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Since last year – when this investigation was still ongoing – Guede has been under a “special surveillance” regime, Sky News understands, meaning he was banned from having any contact with the woman behind the sexual assault allegations, including via social media, and had to inform police any time he left his city of residence, Viterbo, as ruled by a Rome court.
Guede has been serving a restraining order and fitted with an electronic ankle tag.
The Kercher murder case, in the university city of Perugia, was the subject of international attention.
Ms Kercher, a 21-year-old British exchange student, was found murdered in the flat she shared with her American roommate, Amanda Knox.
The Briton’s throat had been cut and she had been stabbed 47 times.
(L-R) Raffaele Sollecito, Meredith Kercher and Amanda Knox. File pic: AP
Ms Knox and her then-boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, were placed under suspicion.
Both were initially convicted of murder, but Italy’s highest court overturned their convictions, acquitting them in 2015.
World
IDF blames ‘technical error’ after Gaza officials say children collecting water killed in strike
The Israeli military says it missed its intended target after Gaza officials said 10 Palestinians – including six children – were killed in a strike at a water collection point.
Another 17 people were wounded in the strike on a water distribution point in Nuseirat refugee camp, said Ahmed Abu Saifan, an emergency physician at Al Awda Hospital.
The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said it had intended to hit an Islamic Jihad militant but a “technical error with the munition” had caused the missile to fall “dozens of metres from the target”.
The IDF said the incident is under review, adding that it “works to mitigate harm to uninvolved civilians as much as possible” and “regrets any harm to uninvolved civilians”.
A wounded child is treated after the strike on the water collection point. Pic: Reuters
Officials at Al Awda Hospital said it received 10 bodies after the Israeli strike on the water collection point and six children were among the dead.
Ramadan Nassar, who lives in the area, said around 20 children and 14 adults were lined up Sunday morning to fill up water.
When the strike occurred, everyone ran and some, including those who were severely injured, fell to the ground, he said.
Blood stains are seen on containers at the water collection point. Pic: Reuters
In total, 19 people were killed in Israeli strikes in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, local health officials said.
Two women and three children were among nine killed after an Israeli strike on a home in the central town of Zawaida, officials at Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital said.
Israel has claimed it hit more than 150 targets in the besieged enclave in the past day.
The latest strikes come after the Israel military opened fire near an aid centre in Rafah on Saturday. The Red Cross said 31 people were killed.
The IDF has said it fired “warning shots” near the aid distribution site but it was “not aware of injured individuals” as a result.
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Palestinians shot while seeking aid, says paramedic
The war in Gaza started in response to Hamas’s attack on Israel on 7 October 2023, which killed 1,200 people and saw about 250 taken hostage.
More than 58,000 Palestinians have since been killed, with more than half being women and children, according to Gaza’s health ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its count.
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US President Donald Trump has said he is closing in on another ceasefire agreement that would see more hostages released and potentially wind down the war.
But after two days of talks this week with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, there were no signs of a breakthrough, as a new sticking point emerged over the deployment of Israeli troops during the truce.
Hamas still holds 50 hostages, with fewer than half of them believed to be alive, after most of the rest were released in ceasefire agreements or other deals.
World
‘At least 59 killed’ in Gaza after Israeli military opens fire near aid centre and carries out strikes
At least 59 Palestinians have reportedly been killed after the Israeli military opened fire near an aid centre in Gaza and carried out strikes across the territory.
The Red Cross, which operates a field hospital in Rafah, said 25 people were “declared dead upon arrival” and “six more died after admittance” following gunfire near an aid distribution centre in the southern Gazan city.
The humanitarian organisation added that it also received 132 patients “suffering from weapon-related injuries” after the incident.
The Red Cross said: “The overwhelming majority of these patients sustained gunshot wounds, and all responsive individuals reported they were attempting to access food distribution sites.”
The organisation said the number of deaths marks the hospital’s “largest influx of fatalities” since it began operations in May last year.
The IDF has said it fired “warning shots” near the aid distribution site but it was “not aware of injured individuals” as a result.
It said in a statement: “Earlier today, several suspects were identified approaching IDF troops operating in the Rafah area, posing a threat to the troops, hundreds of metres from the aid distribution site.
“IDF troops operated in order to prevent the suspects from approaching them and fired warning shots.”
Palestinians mourn a loved one following the incident near the aid centre. Pic: Reuters
Mother’s despair over shooting
Somia Alshaar told Sky News her 17-year-old son Nasir was shot dead while visiting the aid centre after she told him not to go.
She said: “He went to get us tahini so we could eat.
“He went to get flour. He told me ‘mama, we don’t have tahini. Today I’ll bring you flour. Even if it kills me, I will get you flour’.
“He left the house and didn’t return. They told me at the hospital: your son…’Oh God, oh Lord’.”
Asked where her son was shot, she replied: “In the chest. Yes, in the chest.”
Somia Alshaar, pictured with her daughter, says her son was shot dead. Pic: Reuters
‘A policy of mass murder’
Hassan Omran, a paramedic with Gaza’s ministry of health, told Sky News after the incident that humanitarian aid centres in Gaza are now “centres of mass death”.
Speaking in Khan Younis, he said: “Today, there were more than 150 injuries and more than 20 martyrs at the aid distribution centres… the Israeli occupation deliberately kills and commits genocide. The Israeli occupation is carrying out a policy of mass murder.
“They call people to come get their daily food, and then, when citizens arrive at these centres, they are killed in cold blood.
“All the victims have gunshot wounds to the head and chest, meaning the enemy is committing these crimes deliberately.”
Israel has rejected genocide accusations and denies targeting civilians.
Two boys mourn their brother at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis. Pic: Reuters
‘Lies being peddled’
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), the controversial US and Israeli-backed group which operates the distribution centre near Rafah, said: “Hamas is claiming there was violence at our aid distribution sites today. False.
“Once again, there were no incidents at or in the immediate vicinity of our sites.
“But that’s not stopping some from spreading the lies being peddled by ‘officials’ at the Hamas-controlled Nasser Hospital.”
The Red Cross said its field hospital in Rafah has recorded more than 250 fatalities and treated more than 3,400 “weapon-wounded patients” since new food distribution sites were set up in Gaza on 27 May.
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Palestinians inspect the wreckage after an Israeli airstrike in Deir al Balah. Pic: AP
It comes after four children and two women were among at least 13 people who died in Deir al Balah, in central Gaza, after Israeli strikes pounded the area starting late on Friday, officials in Al Aqsa Martyrs hospital in the territory said.
Fifteen others died in Israeli airstrikes in Khan Younis, in southern Gaza, according to Nasser Hospital.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has not responded to a request for comment on the reported deaths.
Listen to The World with Richard Engel and Yalda Hakim every Wednesday
Israeli has been carrying out attacks in Gaza since Hamas-led militants killed some 1,200 people and took 251 hostages on 7 October 2023.
Hamas still holds 50 hostages, with fewer than half of them believed to be alive, after most of the rest were released in ceasefire agreements or other deals.
Israel’s offensive in Gaza has killed more than 57,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, according to Gaza’s health ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its count.
US President Donald Trump has said he is closing in on another ceasefire agreement that would see more hostages released and potentially wind down the war.
But after two days of talks this week with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, there were no signs of a breakthrough.
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The latest fatalities in Gaza comes as a 20-year-old Palestinian-American man was beaten to death by settlers in the Israeli-occupied West Bank on Friday, the Palestinian Health ministry said.
Sayafollah Musallet, also known as Saif, was killed during a confrontation between Palestinians and settlers in Sinjil, north of Ramallah, the ministry said.
A second man, Hussein Al-Shalabi, 23, died after being shot in the chest.
Mr Musallet’s family, from Tampa Florida, has called on the US State Department to lead an “immediate investigation”.
A State Department spokesperson said it was aware of the incident but it had no further comment “out of respect for the privacy of the family and loved ones” of the reported victim.
The Israeli military said the confrontation broke out after Palestinians threw rocks at Israelis, lightly injuring them.
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