#forcibly stripped

[talesofmetalandmagic]

BadThingsHappenBingo – Episode I

@badthingshappenbingo

Fandom: League of Legends (Shurima)

Characters: Emperor Omah Azir, Xerath (+ extras)

Prompt: forcibly stripped

Synopsis: Azir is kidnapped and taken to the same sandstone cave where Xerath’s father was killed during his servitude. Xerath makes it clear once and for all that Azir isn’t worthy of being called a god by removing the visual symbol of his power: his golden armor. 

Take that helmet of his, thief girl, and run as fast as you can. When I'm done with him… there will be nothing left but that. Azir clings to the last words he's heard as if to a raft. He feels like he's truly submerged in the stormy sea – he can't see anything, with that fucking hood on his head – and at every curve of the dunes he walks on he sinks on a breakwater higher than the others. Up and down, without respite. If Xerath hadn't sealed his beak he would have vomited all over himself three days ago. The changing temperature is the only way to recognize the passage of time. During the day the sun weighs on him like a leaden cloak, and he has so much sweat on his feathers that when he ruffles it off he finds even more sweat on him just from the gesture. At night a chill falls to lose his mind, and Azir is almost grateful to have to walk again, and again, and again: the constant movement helps to keep warm. Perhaps this is the punishment Xerath has in mind. Dragging him in a procession of shame around his native territory, turning his golden armor into a humiliating cilice. No way, though. He is Omah Azir, emperor by right of that same land on which he sheds blood and sweat, and Shurima itself will take her revenge as soon as he's free from that torc. May he torment him, subjugate him, have fun playing tyrant: he shall have the last word, and he'll wear that armor with the pride of his house. The days of sweat pass, and so do the nights of trembling: and finally, while Azir's bleeding paws settle on a stony and dusty ground, two hands tear the hood from his head and a sun knife burns his eyes up to the nape of his neck .

Sivir isn't there, is the first thought that crosses his mind. She must have escaped, yes. Any alternative would hurt too much, and it is not possible that his descendant is naive. May Xerath face him: he's an adversary on his level. The same man holding his hood in his hand, a burly middle-aged fellow with ashen-white eyes, rips the clamps from his beak. Azir stands firm, he will not moan in pain for that worm Xerath. He won't admit that he would give anything for a glass of water, a bite of banana and honey, just to be able to sit down. That beautiful Ascended body is not born for humiliation. And Xerath is there, lifted into the air like a comet, the chains on his formless body quivering like endless lightning. He's so close that if he were untied he could slap him. -How are you feeling, Imperial Majesty?- He seems to taste the contempt dripping from her lipless face. He can't even hate him on the same level, not Xerath: he's made up his mind that he's in charge, that he's in a position of superiority over him. Azir would spit on his face if they were on the same level. "Fine," he replies. -Better than you will be when I reach you.- -Talk, always talk. I'd shut your mouth again if it weren't more right to teach you to shut up.- -You can't silence an emperor.- Xerath throbs, the chains tremble. He can't figure out what he's thinking, without a face to look at. Xerath had beautiful eyes once. They were so black, from pupil to iris, that they seemed to be getting bigger all the time. -I'll think about it when I have an emperor in front of me. Now take off his armor. Show me the feathers.- The hand of the man with the ashen eyes moves towards the buckles of his breastplate. Azir snaps: he reaches him under the chin, with both fists, and the bones of his chin crumble under the skin against his knuckles. The man falls on his back, stiff as a boulder. A pool of blood slides down his chin, and his white eyes remain open, empty, without light. -Don't touch me!- Azir widens his eyes, bares his teeth under his beak. They're all going to end up like that: may they try, may they try to despoil the Emperor of the Sands. -No one dare touch me!- Two other men grab his arms, tug at his cloak and the flaps of feathers at his wrists. Hands go up against his legs, squeeze his thighs until they tear the skin. They don't see me, they don't realize. Azir pecks the neck of the man to his right, but his hands are gripping the fabric. He feels the grip of the cloak loosening, the armor lightning. -LET ME GO!- Two slender hands cling to her wrist, tight like the coils of a snake: then a clink resounds against the sand, and a young woman with short hair kicks her gold cuff, making it disappear in the sand. Azir lunges, claws without seeing them, pecks left and right. -I will have you all crucified, leave me!- -Oh, Azir. You still don't get it.- Xerath towers over him like an obelisk, his eyes of light curling into a smile of pure joy. -You lost.- A moment later lightning strikes: Azir has time to close his eyes before squealing.

When Azir opens his eyes, his mouth full of bile, he is floating somewhere above the men of Xerath, a foot away from the scorching sun. He opens his beak to breathe: pain pops in his ribs, neck, up and down his arms and legs. Let me go: he moves his lips, but his voice does not come out; his throat burns as if he's been screaming for a whole day. He coughs, blinks, turns his head this way and that as if he were hooded again. Ten, twenty, a hundred hands hold him up as if to carry it in triumph. His dewclaws are swollen with flesh, a drop of blood runs down his neck. He cannot see him anymore: but he's watching him, he knows it, he wants it. A gust of wind caresses Azir's face and chest, moving the feathers. The feathers… no, no. The hands that hold him slip away from under his back: Azir tenses in anticipation of the blow. His back scrapes against the sand, his head tilts back. When he touches his forehead she realizes that one wrist is bare and one cuff is undone. -How dare you…- The sand seems to slip away from under him. He gets on all fours, pulls himself to his feet without resting his knees on the ground. When he stands, claws planted so as not to fall again – an emperor on his knees, that would be all that's missing – he sees the men who dared to touch him, a perfect circle on all sides, some bleeding from their bellies, some from their limbs, a woman even from the mouth. Only the first to touch him, the one with the white eyes, lies motionless in the pool of his blood. Azir, as bad as it is, draws relief. I can still fight. Then the two before him move away from each other, and Azir sees behind them the heap of gold beside Xerath, and on its top the spread wings of his breastplate. And under the shin guards and leg loops, two hanging rags that had once been his cloak. To preserve him from nudity remain the purple under-tunic, now smeared with a disgusting paste of sweat and damp sand, and the only cuff. Azir clenches the fist he's attached to. He will fight to the last jewel, and if he loses it will be a hard-earned defeat. If they didn't have that traitor's magic on their side, he would have killed them all already, and without breaking a sweat. -I am Emperor Omah Azir, and I will fight to the last for my dignity.- -You will give that to me instead, Azir. Even that. You no longer deserve any jewels.- The wretches step aside as Xerath passes, as if he were already the emperor. Come come. You will see what awaits you. Xerath is all armor, but there is a core in the middle of the chains. He's not as smart as he thinks if he's got a weak point left. Azir hides the cuff behind his back and raises his bare hand into a dry punch. And something clicks inside Xerath.

The light burns like fire against Azir's face. He sees sky, sand, sky and sand again; and even the sand burns, scrapes against the flesh like the sharpest of knives, while he rolls against the dune and lies back with his face immersed in the dust. Get up. You can fight. Pull yourself up. The sun beats down on the feathers, but Azir feels chilled. Xerath is upon him, his chains creak, the energy where his heart used to be keeps popping in that same way. It can not be. Get up, pusillanimous wretch. Azir raises his feathered head, shakes the dust from his feathers and eyes, rubs his face with his hands – two bare hands, feathers and feathers and nothing else. It's over. The white-eyed men and women arrive shortly after, like a swarm of ants. Two of them take his limp hands like rags and lock them behind his back with heavy iron handcuffs. Others gird his ankles with a chain an arm's length, to the end of which is attached a stone the size of a watermelon. Azir drags himself into a sitting position and yanks, to the last drop. He can only tilt his head and see the tear in the undertunic, from which a few feathers dangle. My armour. He had never looked at his body without it. He looks like a hawk, but he doesn't feel like a bird of prey: he's thin, small, ragged. Wrong. -Xerath, you..- -Shh, shh. Let me look at you… - It almost seems to him that those engraved eyes widen, joyful, scrutinizing his sanded and tattered feathers as if there was nothing more beautiful in the world. -Humiliated, dirty, clad in rags. I could make statue of this, to look at you for eternity.- -That armor belongs to me.- he hates how the sand runs through his feathers, rough as a curry comb. He feels like scratching himself, but he'll hold back. He's not a flea-ridden mutt, he's an emperor. -That body doesn't even belong to you. But we've only just begun, Azir. You will have to suffer much more than a striptease in the sunlight.- Azir drags himself to his feet again. He broke a spur nail, leaning his foot on it hurts, his right arm pulls the cuff against him, and the sprout of a lump is growing at the back of his neck, but he stands upright like a worthy Emperor of Shurima and looks up at that shapeless face with all the hatred of his nakedness. -You will pay for it, Xerath. Look me in the face. I am the glory of Shurima, don't mess with me. You will pay dearly.- -I've been paying all my life, Azir. Now stop.- Xerath glows like a nova, but Azir doesn't look away. This is the last time he humiliates him like this.

[candaru]

no no. you don't get it. the reason I injure my blorbos until they can't walk is because that's the only way they'll ever let someone else carry them. the reason I curse them to be sick and feverish is so that they'll finally open up about their emotions while delirious. the reason I force them to overexert themselves to the point of exhaustion is so that when they pass out they can finally rest.

I'm doing this for their own good.

[charles-leclerc-official]

I am in tears LEWIS???!!!!! Sir????

Source

[twentyfivemiceinatrenchcoat]

❗️FOOD FOR THOUGHT!!! ❗️

Hypothetically speaking, if curses suddenly ceased to exist in the jujutsu world, would gojo be happy?

It was mentioned/implied that gojo enjoyed being a sorcerer or exorcising curses in the afterlife chapter so I’m soooo lost 😭😭😭

BITING MY FIST…… this is a heartbreaking question anon……… my brain is spinning though so let’s see.

WELL…. first of all, like you said, gojo sincerely enjoys fighting!!! i think he had the most fun he’s Ever had (aside from his time with suguru) during the sukugo fight for…. many reasons but one of them is just that he likes the thrill <333 being able to go all out when you have that much power must feel really nice, right?

BUT BUT BUT… i also think it’s important to remember that gojo was literally raised as a weapon 😭 of course he’d like fighting, it’s his purpose as a human being as far as the world is concerned. i think you Could make an argument that his fondness for fighting is a defense mechanism…. idk if i believe that entirely because i do think he’s a bit of a freak all on his own. but it’s there. i don’t think satoru would enjoy violence much at all if he had been born as a non-sorcerer, though, so there’s that.

buuuut to answer your question!! no, i don’t think he’d be happy. i think he’d be unhappy, actually 😭 at least at first!! mostly because gojo’s lived his abnormal life far too long to be able to adjust to a ”normal” one. if curses stopped existing, his strength would stop having a purpose, so we’d end up with the same dilemma that’s been plaguing gojo for over a decade: is his strength all that defines him? maybe if he lives that way for a long time he’ll eventually find his answer and end up happy, but at least at first, i think the sudden change would be more like a curse for him. it’d take a WHILE for him to adjust, let alone accept it and start to heal.

….. if he had been REborn into a world without curses then i think he’d be happy though :3 and i think gojo’s happy in canon too!! he’s isolated and lonely but he’s also a really positive guy. even if his life is busy, tough, and awful, he’ll keep on smiling, and i don’t think it’s fake. one must imagine gojo satoru happy, or something. you know?

[moltensmusings]

Mashima's biggest hindrance in fairy tail is his need to put pervy content in. Now I don't mean this as a "pervy=bad". I enjoy one piece. I can handle it to a certain extent.

But his need to make all his women scantily clad at the very least and naked at worst throughout the series, purposefully have them in embarrassing situations that humiliate them, and include older men leering at young girls will always give me the ick.

Macao and wakaba could've been cool characters, or at least interesting. I'd have loved to see what their specific dynamics with gildarts and the other older mages are and maybe even their history together. And yet Mashima can't go a single arc that includes them without them making weird comments about the girls they either watched grow up, or girls who are still underage.

And beyond just the in universe guys, his desperation to have his women be "sexy" means a lot of the unique, interesting clothing he used to draw for them gets often tossed aside in favor of showing as much skin on them as he can without outright making them naked. Now there are female characters who this can work for. Fem fatales being the best example, flirtatious women who are comfortable in their bodies being another, heck even mages that use water or solar power I could excuse it on. But it's every female character regardless of how little it makes sense for them.

And this isn't even getting into the weird stuff he does with Wendy and Chelia and the arc that aged down the characters leading to some incredibly icky panels.

Fairy tail can be so much fun. There are solid ideas and some really great twists. But so often it devolves into creepy territory that rereading later arcs feels like a chore.

[yearningfortheend]

"You never used to seem to care."

-🌒 (basically it was that this one got stabbed and the other drowned. Havent yet figured out how itd work tjo)

Well, it's either I'm in a state of psychosis and hallucinating sticky notes with writing on them whilst having delusions that it's someone I know who's doing it, or this is actually real.

[thecoolertails]

sega has no idea that sonic the hedgehog is about colonization

[girl-kisisser]

i have such a peculiar relationship with my femininity idek if i can call myself trans

[gardenstateofmind]

ALSO please at least make an attempt to respect patients privacy, a good 75% of the time they will say that at this point modesty has gone out the window and to just go ahead and do whatever needs to be done, and now you can continue on knowing you have permission

and for the times when a patient does care? you've made a huge difference. it is deeply traumatizing to have no bodily autonomy, and people in those situations often don't feel comfortable voicing/don't even realize they have the right to voice their complaints when they feel their privacy has been violated.

like most of the time my coworkers don't even bother fully closing the door when doing care, wtf is that!! i've had patients complain to me afterward bc they didn't feel comfortable saying something in the moment or to that person, like that is such a basic thing. and if you need to have them exposed for an extended period of time, get a warm blanket and drape it over whatever part of them doesn't need to be exposed. even the people who don't care about privacy still get cold.

[anthromimicry]

where do you carry your pain?

your arms.

you have tried to hold onto what is dear to you, only for it to be wrenched from your hands...

tagged by: @divingdownthehole!

tagging: @frostise, @redvived, @dispatched, @twcfaces, @vulpesse, and anyone else who might like to do this quiz!

[officiallralsei]

you've mentioned that you've been thinking about a specific au lately on the blog 👀 whats the deal there

well me and @gasterofficial were talking about what would happen if gaster's version of ralsei WASN'T successfully made to be able to handle eldritch knowledge. I've discussed it before on the blog, but I have the headcanon that the light can literally burn darkners who aren't prepared for it. (this comes from spamton having quite a bit of dialogue implying that he was burned/changed in some way by the knowledge he gained.) in blogverse canon, ralsei's got very sensitive eyes because he's still recovering from his initial exposure to that knowledge.

so if he wasn't successfully built to handle more Light Exposure than your average darkner... the logical conclusion is that gaining too much knowledge would blind him. after researching, i don't think it would be full blindness as that's kind of rare, but it would impair him badly enough that he would have trouble navigating on his own.

this is a problem for gaster. he needs to have a darkner guide, and now he's got EIGHT busted little guys. ralsei's certainly clever and adaptable, but he is NOT used to functioning blind just yet and there's not much time left before the game absolutely needs to start. a functional guide is a critical necessity to save the world of deltarune. and gaster just does not have the resources to try again.

so, out of luck and out of options, gaster becomes the worlds worst Ghost Guide to assist ralsei in his Actual Guide duties. guy who tells ralsei about his surroundings and also never shuts the fuck up. and is also his ghost dad who can't be perceived by others unless they're in a truly liminal space.

so what arises is a truly dysfunctional and codependent parent-child dynamic between these two. gaster likes ralsei but like... never really gives him room to make decisions on his own since hes constantly telling him what to do. ultimately he believes ralsei just kind of has to be a means to an end, no matter how much personal affection gaster has for him, due to the nature of ralsei being Born To Save The World, and that makes their relationship deeply unhealthy. meanwhile ralsei, who is a bit traumatized from being Literally Scorched By Horrible Knowledge in the first minute of his existence, is pretty happy to just let himself be directed constantly by someone who is kind to him and appears to have his best interests at heart. he ends up being quite sheltered due to all this. plus gaster also keeps telling him constantly Not To Think Too Much About The Fucked Up Things so he's gotten good at that.

thematically, the entire thing, at least for me, is another lens through which to look at deltarune's themes of agency and personhood. children, particularly disabled children, frequently have their personhood and agency denied to them because of the idea that they aren't capable of handling themselves. that's not to say that children and disabled people don't need SUPPORT, of course, but that support should be enabling them to make decisions for themselves when possible and appropriate, rather than denying them opportunities for agency. adding those particular lenses onto ralsei's canonical status as a darkner (which is a category of Unperson within the narrative) provides a lot of interesting ground with which to explore his emerging independence and self-actualization. also I just think its rad to think about weird Fucked Up Ghost Dad shenanigans

tldr:

[rx-05-29]

Listening to the persona 5 soundtrack, and half of me is complaining about the game and how it contradicts its own revolutionary message time and time again and the other half wants to overthrow the government

[isabel3710]

“Forcibly Stripper” for the Bad Things Happen Bingo

Sorry if this one makes anyone uncomfortable.

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Fandom: Gravity Falls

Prompt: Forcibly Stripped

Trigger Warnings: creepy/possessive behavior

Masterlist

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Dipper scrambled to his feet and stared at the women, she had dyed blond hair and looked to be in her late 40s and wore a lot of makeup. Probably to make herself seem younger. She wore a slimming body suit and had long, manicured nails. 

Dipper got an uneasy feeling. 

The woman smirked, “Well, aren’t you a good looking boy.”

“Who are you?” Dipper wrapped his arms around his torso. 

“I’m Missy, but you can call me Mistress.” Missy stepped towards him and Dipper took a step back. 

“Um yeah… I’m not doing that.”

“Oooh. Playing hard to get” Missy kept walking towards him and whispered “I like it.” 

Somehow the women managed to corral him into the center of the room near the chair and Dipper pressed himself against the back. Missy looked him up and down like he was a piece of meat and walked right up to him. 

Dipper tried to hosit himself over the back of the chair and escape but she placed her hands on his shoulders and pushed him down. She ran her hands down his chest. 

“Please don’t touch me.” Dipper said “who are you anyways?”

Missy smirked, “I’m here to get you ready.”

“For what?”

“Oh don’t you worry about that.” Missy winked and taped his nose. Dipper pushed her away and she laughed.“Feisty, I like that. You’re going to be a fun one.”

Dipper’s heart pounded in his ears; he wanted to leave, to get away but he was stuck. “Look… I don’t want any trouble… This was a mistake. I shouldn’t be here.”

“Oh sweetheart” the way Missy said the pet name made a shiver run down his spine. “You are exactly where you are supposed to be.” 

Dipper’s mind raced, trying to think of a way out of the situation. He scanned the room for any escape routes but the door was blocked by two large men. He was trapped.

Missy smiled like a predator who had caught their prey. “Strip for me.”

“W-what?”

“You heard me. Now strip.” She ordered. 

“I’m not going to do that!” He protested. 

Missy gave a nod to the guards and they walked right up to him, one of them grabbed him around the weist from behind and lifted him into the air. Dipper kicked and struggled but the other guard grabbed one of his legs and pulled off his shoe and sock before repeating the action with his other foot. 

“Put me down!” 

“I have to get those clothes off of you somehow” Missy said “I want to get a good look at you.”

“I-I’ll do it.” Dipper stammered, not wanting to be humiliated more than he already was. 

“You promise?”

“Yes.”

Missy waved a hand and the guard set him back on his feet and went back to their post, the women looked at him expectantly and with shaking hands Dipper pulled off his shirt. He avoided eye contact and he undressed, but could feel Missy’s hungry gaze on him. 

Soon he stood in front of her, eyes downcast, in nothing but his boxers. “When I said strip.” Missy said “I meant strip.” 

Dipper’s eyes widdened when he realized what she wanted but obeyed nonetheless. Missy circled him, looking him over, and he squeezed his eyes shut. He could feel her hands on him. 

“I was right,” she stroked his back, “you are very pretty.” 

“What are you going to do to me?” Dipper asked, his voice a bit faint. 

Missy laughed, “don’t worry dear, I’m not going to do anything.” 

Dipper opened his eyes to see her leave the room, one of the guards gathered up his clothes and then they left too. Locking the door behind them. Dipper wrapped his arms around himself and walked around the room, trying to find a way out. 

There was nothing, there were no windows or vents and the door was locked. The chair was bolted to the floor. Dipper crouched in the corner and shivered, trying to cover as much of himself as he could.

It wasn’t long before the door opened and Missy returned with the guards. She held what looked like some folded black cloth. “Here you are, doll” she handed him the cloth. “Put this on.”

Dipper unfolded it, worried about what it was. It was a black jumpsuit. He didn’t hesitate to pull it on, not wanting to be exposed any longer. Missy watched as he dressed, grinning. As soon as he was done the guards grabbed him and forced him down into the chair and used the leather straps to bind his wrists to the arms of the chair.

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Author's Note:

I have never written a character like Missy before and I think I did well but harder than I originally intended. Though I really wanted to show what kind of character she is.

PKRFN FROODU

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Tag List:

@badthingshappenbingo

[berryblu-arts]

have i posted this one before?

idk honestly, its kinda unfinished but eh, gonna leave yall with my sparkly son ig haha (also pffft the image split is so cursed sorry yall; i work in webtoon format for these asdjhsd)

[dailybotany]

So there's this crazy way you can manifest this! It's called voting!

Over the past four years, tribal comanagement initiatives have been a high priority across the entire Dept. of the Interior, resulting in many arrangements like this one across different federal lands. Policy like this is directly due to the Secretary of the Interior, who is appointed by the President. In 2020, Biden appointed Deb Haaland (the first Indigenous member of the President's Cabinet) as Secretary of the Interior. This means she oversees policy for all federal land management across agencies (except for the Forest Service). If you want to see progress continue and co-management become more widespread, vote blue in November!!

"The Yurok will be the first Tribal nation to co-manage land with the National Park Service under a historic memorandum of understanding signed on Tuesday [March 19, 2024] by the tribe, Redwood national and state parks, and the non-profit Save the Redwoods League, according to news reports.

The Yurok tribe has seen a wave of successes in recent years, successfully campaigning for the removal of a series of dams on the Klamath River, where salmon once ran up to their territory, and with the signing of a new memorandum of understanding, the Yurok are set to reclaim more of what was theirs.

Save the Redwoods League bought a property containing these remarkable trees in 2013, and began working with the tribe to restore it, planting 50,000 native plants in the process. The location was within lands the Yurok once owned but were taken during the Gold Rush period.

Centuries passed, and by the time it was purchased it had been used as a lumber operation for 50 years, and the nearby Prairie Creek where the Yurok once harvested salmon had been buried.

Currently located on the fringe of Redwoods National and State Parks which receive over 1 million visitors every year and is a UNESCO Natural Heritage Site, the property has been renamed ‘O Rew, a Yurok word for the area.

“Today we acknowledge and celebrate the opportunity to return Indigenous guardianship to ‘O Rew and reimagine how millions of visitors from around the world experience the redwoods,” said Sam Hodder, president and CEO of Save the Redwoods League.

Having restored Prarie Creek and filled it with chinook and coho salmon, red-legged frogs, northwestern salamanders, waterfowl, and other species, the tribe has said they will build a traditional village site to showcase their culture, including redwood-plank huts, a sweat house, and a museum to contain many of the tribal artifacts they’ve recovered from museum collections.

Believing the giant trees sacred, they only use fallen trees to build their lodges.

“As the original stewards of this land, we look forward to working together with the Redwood national and state parks to manage it,” said Rosie Clayburn, the tribe’s cultural resources director.

It will add an additional mile of trails to the park system, and connect them with popular redwood groves as well as new interactive exhibits.

“This is a first-of-its-kind arrangement, where Tribal land is co-stewarded with a national park as its gateway to millions of visitors. This action will deepen the relationship between Tribes and the National Park Service,” said Redwoods National Park Superintendent Steve Mietz, adding that it would “heal the land while healing the relationships among all the people who inhabit this magnificent forest.”"

-via Good News Network, March 25, 2024

[sayruq]

Israel is setting up a complex system of checkpoints that will prevent men of “military age” from fleeing Rafah in preparation for its offensive on the southern Gaza border city, a senior western official familiar with Israel’s plans has told Middle East Eye on condition of anonymity. The checkpoints are designed to allow some women and children to leave Rafah ahead of an expected Israeli offensive, but unarmed, civilian Palestinian men will likely be separated from their families and remain trapped in Rafah during an expected Israeli assault. The previously unreported disclosure of Israel’s construction of a ring of checkpoints around Rafah underscores how Israel is pushing ahead with plans to attack the city where over one million displaced Palestinians are sheltering in tents and makeshift camps. The creation of gender-based checkpoints around Rafah would put a spotlight back on Israel’s practice of stripping and forcibly detaining male Palestinian men and children, as it faces rising scrutiny in the West of its conduct in the war. The rounding up of Palestinian males in Gaza and photographing them stripped to their underwear drew condemnation in December, with the US calling the images “deeply disturbing”. Relatives of many of the men photographed recognised them and said they had nothing to do with Hamas. Israel's military was later accused of staging footage of men surrounding weapons. “Israel considers every male a Hamas fighter until proven otherwise,” Abbas Dahouk, a former senior military advisor at the State Department and military attache in the Middle East told Middle East Eye. “It’s not a sound move. Cordoning Rafah is a daunting task and good luck separating fathers and sons from their families.”