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Desperate for collusion proof, FBI ‘tried & failed to recruit Russian oligarchs’ – report

RT | September 2, 2018

FBI agents tried to turn Russia’s once-richest man into a US mole, according to an explosive NYT report. It claims that Oleg Deripaska was one of six oligarchs targeted for information in a Russiagate-related intelligence flop.

According to reports by the New York Times, the US government pushed oligarchs with perceived links to President Vladimir Putin for information. Deripaska was allegedly nudged to give up information on Russian organized crime and “possible Russian aid to President Trump’s 2016 campaign.”

Determined to get something on the Kremlin’s unproven involvement in the 2016 election, FBI agents reportedly turned up unannounced at Deripaska’s New York home to quiz him about his ex-business partner Paul Manafort – who went on to lead Trump’s election campaign – and Manafort’s links to Russia.

Despite the US government’s repeated attempts to gather intelligence from him, Deripaska told the US Department of Justice that he had no information to provide. Sources told the NYT that Deripaska disagreed with the agents’ opinion that Russia had colluded with the US in Trump’s election campaign. He also slammed theories about Manafort’s alleged role as “preposterous,” even though the two men were involved in a “bitter business dispute.” He is also said to have notified the Kremlin about the US government’s failed efforts to recruit him.

It is understood that Justice Department official Bruce Ohr and former British spy Christopher Steele – who was responsible for the infamous Trump-Russia ‘dirty dossier’ – were involved in the attempt to turn Russian oligarchs into US informants. The report said that the US government tried to entice Deripaska with promises to relieve him of previous visa issues stemming from past legal problems, but their attempts to win over the aluminum magnate and other Russian oligarchs appear to have failed.

In April, Deripaska and his company were hit by sweeping US sanctions, with Washington accusing him of links to crime, various abuses and even of ordering a murder.

The report comes as Trump took to Twitter to accuse the Department of Justice and FBI of “corruption” over the “Russia hoax.” The president also accused the DOJ and FBI of being “completely out to lunch” in a series of tweets, in which he insisted that “no information was ever given by the Trump Team to Russia”.

September 2, 2018 Posted by | Russophobia | , | 2 Comments

Evo Morales: US is The Real Global Threat, Not Venezuela

teleSUR | September 1, 2018

Bolivian President Evo Morales said Friday, on Twitter, that “the U.S. is the real threat to humankind,” responding to Senator Marco Rubio’s talk of using the U.S. Armed Forces against the Venezuelan Government as it “has become a threat for the region and even for the United States.”

Morales said “Senator Marco Rubio, warns of using the Empire’s army against the people of Venezuela because he assumes a “threat” against the security of the U.S.” The Bolivian president remarked that is the U.S. is the real threat to the world’s people, citing “its history of interventionism and military coups d’état in the world.”

The Florida Republican senator made the comments after meeting with national security advisor for the Donald Trump Administration, John Bolton, at the White House Wednesday.

“I believe that the United States Armed Forces are only used in case of a threat to national security. I think there is an argument, very strong, that can be used at this moment that Venezuela has become a threat to the region and even to the United States.”

Earlier this year, in February, Rubio made a similar statement, encouraging the Venezuelan Army to overthrow the Nicolas Maduro-led Bolivarian government.

“The world would support the Armed Forces in #Venezuela if they decide to protect the people & restore democracy by removing a dictator,” Rubio said, in a tweet, on Feb. 9.

On Saturday, Jun. 16, Bolivian President Evo Morales forcefully stated that Latin America “is no longer the United States’ backyard,” while denouncing the United States’ attempt to convince its South American allies to help orchestrate a military intervention or coup in Venezuela.

September 2, 2018 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , , | 4 Comments

Supporters of Apartheid Israel Abuse Sydney Anti-War Student

By Tim Anderson | American Herald Tribune | September 2, 2018

Media, parliamentary, academic and other supporters of apartheid Israel have abused University of Sydney doctoral student Jay Tharappel for his outspoken support of Yemen, opposition to Israel and his consistent stance against the long wars 0n Syria and Korea.

Much of the western media falsely pretend that the massively internationalized war on Syria is a “civil war”. Most also refuse to recognize the simple fact that, over the past 65 years, the USA has never agreed to a peace agreement with North Korea.

The personal attacks on Jay reveal a shallow recognition of free speech in Australia. It is extraordinary that so much abuse has been heaped on one dissident voice. Demands for censorship of his political comments have come from various sources, but many of them supporters of the apartheid state of Israel.

First came the bully and smear media, from Murdoch’s Daily Telegraph, and from Channel Seven. The Murdoch tabloid, in a torrent of personal abuse, attacked Jay for rejecting the false chemical weapons claims against Syria, in April 2017. It then falsely claimed that Jay’s criticism of Murdoch journalist Kylar Loussikian was a racist attack.

In August 2018 Channel Seven manufactured another scandal about Jay, falsely claiming that a Yemeni badge he wore in China was ‘anti-semitic’. One part of that badge, seen on Jay’s shirt in one of my social media posts, said ‘death to Israel’.

The photo was simply one of the friends at lunch. Channel Seven, using the false translation “death to Israeli”, claiming it was a racist incitement. I posted in response that the Channel Seven piece ‘promotes ignorance, apartheid, and war’.

In fact ‘death to Israel’ is a political statement by the Yemeni group Ansarallah, which calls for an end to apartheid Israel, the regime that is reported to have killed a Palestinian child every three days for the past 18 years. The Australian government sells arms to the Saudis to bomb Yemen, as they ignore that terrible war and try to suppress any news about Yemen.

Later, the University of Sydney told the Sydney Morning Herald that I was “under investigation” for refusing to take down that photo of Jay and friends at lunch. After a Sydney Morning Herald [allegation] against me, I made a social media statement explaining my position.

For Channel Seven’s principal sources journalist, Bryan Seymour used two people (to represent “many in the Jewish and Muslim community”). First was a well-known supporter of Israel, Vic Alhadeff. Vic was previously a chair of the NSW Community Relations Commission but resigned in 2014 after posting in support of Israel’s bloody reign of terror in Gaza.

The other was Jordanian-Australian Jamal Daoud, who claimed to represent a Palestinian group but is best known for his repeated attacks on those who support Syria. He has abused many supporters of Syria as ‘spies’ and ‘prostitutes’. In 2017 he took an Israeli propagandist to Syria, and since then has been wanted for questioning in Syria. Earlier, in 2015, he began an online petition to challenge a security ban on him entering Lebanon.

The corporate media came back to abuse Jay after he wrote a thoughtful piece on his visit to North Korea (DPRK) in the student newspaper Honi Soit. The article defended independent Korea while it described in some detail what he had seen there. On social media pages, many appreciated the unusual article, while others responded with censorial outrage.

The Daily Telegraph added another abusive piece, which copied much of Jay’s article while adding invective. Even the state-owned ABC wrote in support of the demand that the article be taken down, simply because it was seen as too favorable to North Korea.

Why the hysteria over criticism of Israel? Well, both the Murdoch media and Channel Seven have deep business links with Israel’s occupation forces, including those who regularly demolish Palestinian homes in their ethnic cleansing purges.

Pro-Israel figures and some Jewish media in Australia predictably and falsely tried to conflate Jay’s and my opposition to Israel with anti-Jewish racism. I have made my position on Israel and racism very clear on many occasions, most recently in an article called The Future of Palestine.

A selection of pro-Israel types jumped on the bandwagon. They included federal Labor MP Tim Watts, who attacked Jay’s article and Honi Soit, saying ‘everyone associated with this article ought to be ashamed’.

When he was criticized for picking on a student newspaper he said, by way of justification, that he was trying to get at me (‘the professor’).

In fact, Tim Watts is yet another supporter of apartheid Israel. In late 2015 he went on an Israeli-government paid junket to Israel, in a group led by conservative minister Christopher Pyne. The group seemed to toe the Israeli line because Palestinian minister Dr. Sabri Saidam described them as “rude” and “not well educated” on Palestine.

Subsequently, Tim Watts took his Israel connection seriously. He strongly recommended the book ‘My Promised Land’ by Ari Shavit, which explains how Israel created “something unique and quite endearing” in a tough neighborhood.

This “unique and quite endearing” creation was described by an authoritative 2017 report to the United Nations as an ‘apartheid state’ and therefore ‘a crime against humanity’. US academic lawyers Richard Falk and Virginia Tilley wrote that “the situation in Israel-Palestine constitutes an unmet obligation of the organized international community to resolve a conflict, partially generated by its own actions”.

Professor Ariadne Vromen, a professor in Government at the University of Sydney, and opponent of the BDS campaign against Israel, jumped in, inexplicably, attacking the former Syrian Ambassador to Australia Tammam Sulayman. Ambassador Sulayman is now Syria’s envoy to North Korea, and it was he who invited us to visit that country.

Ariadne claimed that Ambassador Tammam had failed her research design course, 15 years ago. “He didn’t pass first year”, she said. After some criticism, she removed her post.

Ariadne Vromen 19a3b

Of course, it is inappropriate for academics to abuse students or former students, or to humiliate them for their grades or results. In this case, Ariadne’s comments were also false. When I enquired, Ambassador Sulayman spelled out to me the reason why he had left Ariadne’s class and his doctoral studies at the University:

“Of course I didn’t complete at that time with Ariadne because [his supervisor, another academic] started the war on me and I complained against her to the university. So I stopped everything … in my [thesis] preface I stated there is no linkage between the secular Baath party and al Qaeda … but she said ‘that does not exclude links between Saddam and al Qaeda’, and I said but we are talking about the Baath party … Then she started returning every paper I sent her … she is a clear Zionist … It is silly for [Ariadne] to say that I didn’t finish even one year without mentioning the reason.”

Professor Vromen’s abuse of a former student and ambassador is strange. Why would an academic jump in to abuse a former student, in the context of an abusive media campaign against another student? What is wrong with honest discussion?

Unfortunately, this is not an isolated incident. The University of Sydney is well known for harboring pro-apartheid-Israel academics. It hosts a research project backed by US Government-funded agencies, called ‘The Electoral Integrity Project’. That project rates the electoral democracy of many countries. As it happens, they rate Israel’s ‘democracy’ very highly (17/127), even though the Jewish state is notorious for its institutionalized racism.

In 2007-08 the University of Sydney accepted a large grant from the American Australian Association, to establish a ‘United States Studies Centre’. This was mostly Australian Government money but came at the suggestion of media mogul Rupert Murdoch. The idea of the Centre came from a desire to repair the damage done to the image of the USA in the wake of its 2003 invasion of Iraq. I wrote an article about this scandal, back in 2010.

Washington remains the major funder and arms provider to apartheid Israel, providing the racist state with more than three billion dollars every year, mostly in military subsidies.

September 2, 2018 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Corbyn Summoned by MI5 for ‘Facts of Life’ Briefing on Terrorism – Reports

Sputnik – 02.09.2018

The head of the MI5, Andrew Parker, has reportedly invited Corbyn to a “facts of life” briefing on the real terrorist threats facing the country.

But Corbyn has postponed the meeting, which was scheduled for Tuesday, as he is expected to spend all day attending a meeting of Labour’s National Executive Committee as he battles to quell a storm over anti-Semitism that has engulfed his leadership.

“The subjects of the briefing would have included issues relating to the domestic security threat, counterterrorism, counter-espionage, Russia and returning foreign fighters,” The Sunday Times wrote, quoting intelligence sources.

This would have been the first time the Labour leader would have been briefed by the head of Britain’s domestic intelligence service, the newspaper wrote.

Jeremy Corbyn had been told he could bring along his chief advisor Seumas Milne and Labour’s shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott to the briefing.

Another source told the newspaper that Britain’s security services have been “troubled” by some of Jeremy Corbyn’s statements on terrorism.

When speaking after last year’s bombing in Manchester, Corbyn suggested that it was London’s foreign policy, rather than jihadist ideology, that bears the blame for terrorist atrocities.

Corbyn and Milne have also questioned the veracity of the security services’ conclusion about Russia’s alleged involvement in the Skripals’ poisoning in March, with Milne saying that she found it “problematic” to trust the security services after the Blair government lied about the strength of the intelligence about alleged Iraqi weapons of mass destruction in the run-up to the US-led invasion of the Arab country in 2003.

September 2, 2018 Posted by | False Flag Terrorism | , , | 6 Comments

Back to the Future

A fictional story

By Gilad Atzmon | September 2, 2018

Neither Britain nor the rest of the world was surprised by last week’s election results. For the last six months Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party have led in the polls and during that time no one doubted that Corbyn would become Britain’s new prime minister, the only question was when. And yet, Corbyn’s increasing popularity wasn’t a smooth shift in British politics, it resulted instead from a gradual increase in British unity in opposition to an obnoxious foreign lobby. The nastier Corbyn’s enemies were, the more Brits sided with him. At a certain stage it became clear that it was the Zionist Lobby, rather than Corbyn himself, that united the Brits behind Corbyn.

The more the Jewish self-appointed ‘leadership’ pushed: the more they equated Corbyn with Enoch Powel and even Hitler, the more the Brits responded by siding with the old anti racist. In the months leading up to the election the picture became clear, a wide spectrum of Brits were expressing fatigue with the manner in which a foreign lobby was crudely intervening in their national politics.

But in spite of the many signs that Britain had had enough, the British Jewish so-called ‘leadership’ didn’t stop pushing. Not a day passed without a rabbi using the BBC to spread the message of Jews’ right to live in ‘peace’ on someone else’s land. Every day we read a Guardian interview with an influential Jew who threatened to make Aliya and take his or her shekels with him. The Brits weren’t impressed, on social media some offered departing Zionists piggy back rides to Heathrow.

Commentators agreed that the escalation in British Jews’ troubled relationship with the rest of the nation was a very dangerous development. Corbyn, for his part, repeatedly stated that Labour would fight all forms of racism including antisemitsm. But the Jewish leaders’ concerns didn’t abate. “We didn’t ask him to fight racism, we want him to fight antisemitism.” Corbyns’ assurances were totally dismissed by the Jewish bodies. His motto, ‘For the Many not the Few,’ that excited so many Brits was interpreted by Zionist Jews as “for the Many not the Jew.” It became clear that no one within the Jewish community knew how to calm things down. On the contrary, the self-appointed Jewish ‘representative’ bodies, seemed to compete amongst themselves to see who could drip more oil into the blaze.

Two weeks before the election, when it was widely accepted that Corbyn was about to become a PM and there was no force that could stop him, not even the Jewish Lobby, violence was employed. In early January, MI5 was tipped off about a possible plot to physically attack the Labour leader. According to Israeli media a few arrests were made in North West London. The British press was restricted from passing that story on to the citizens of the kingdom.

In a desperate move two weeks before the election, AIPAC, CRIF and other overseas Jewish pressure groups joined local Zionist bodies in stating that a Labour win would lead to an immediate international call by Jews for a boycott of Britain. The Guardian was quick to publish an extended commentary by George Soros, its favorite ‘currency analyst,’ who lectured the Brits on what would happen to their pound if they were stupid enough to allow Corbyn into 10 Downing Street.

AIPAC and CRIF delivered. Less than 24 hours after the election, the two influential Jewish lobbies called for immediate and severe financial measures against Britain. Wealthy Jews were urged to withdraw their funds and investments from the City. The US administration was implored to stop trade with Britain immediately. President Trump, hanging on a thread and battling likely impeachment, promised to seriously consider the demands of the Lobby that has dominated American foreign policy for more than three decades.

The situation in Britain did indeed deteriorate immediately as Soros predicted. Within a day, the pound lost 45% of its value against the dollar and this after the dollar lost 20% of its value against the Iranian Rial a week earlier (due to an EU-Chinese-Russian deal with Iran).

Brits weren’t happy at all. In fact, many of them were devastated. Corbyn, now a PM in the process of forming his government, was put in an untenable situation. It was just a question of time before nasty scenes of violence erupted. I guess that we have seen it all before…

September 2, 2018 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , | 2 Comments

US Threats to Strike Syria Won’t Stop Damascus From Idlib Op – Syrian FM

Sputnik – 02.09.2018

Following the liberation of Daraa in the south, Idlib remains the “world’s largest open prison” for some three million people and the last terrorist stronghold in Syria.

“Anything that is actively promoted by the US will not affect the determination of the Syrian people and Syrian army’s plans to clear Idlib and finally put an end to terrorism in Syria,” Syrian Foreign minister Walid Muallem said in an interview.

According to him, the US accusations about alleged plans regarding chemical attacks have become questionable in the eyes of public opinion and are just an excuse for a possible attack on Syria.

“We, the people and leadership of Syria, would like to end the conflict today, but the intervention of Western countries headed by the US makes it difficult,” Muallem said.

Muallem emphasized that the US presence in Syria is illegal and Washington can in no way justify it.

“The US presence has claimed the lives of thousands of Syrian and every time terrorists were besieged by the Syrian Arab Army, Washington provided them with protection. It became clear that Washington’s main objective was to prolong the crisis in Syria in the interests of Israel,” the minister said.

On August 22, US National Security Adviser John Bolton stated that Washington and its partners would respond in a “swift and appropriate manner” to any verified chemical weapons use in Idlib or elsewhere in Syria.

Separately, US State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said that the United States “will respond to any verified chemical weapons use in Idlib or elsewhere in Syria… in a swift and appropriate manner.”

The Russian Defense Ministry, when commenting on the situation, accused the US and its allies of attempting to use a chemical weapons provocation planned by militants in Idlib as a pretext to launch an attack on Syrian government forces.

In August, Russian officials warned of a conspiracy by terrorists to launch an alleged chemical attack in order to provoke Western retaliation against the Syrian government.

According to Russian Defense Ministry’s spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov, a group of militants, who had been prepared by the Olive Group, had conspired to stage the rescue of victims of a chemical weapons attack in Idlib.

After media reports alleging a chemical attack had been carried out in the Syrian city of Douma in April, Western countries immediately accused the Syrian government of being behind the attack.

Following the accusations, the US, the UK, and France launched over 100 missiles on multiple targets in the country in response to the alleged use of chemical weapons.

Damascus denied the accusations and said that the Jaish al-Islam terror group had staged the attack to encourage foreign intervention in Syria.

September 2, 2018 Posted by | False Flag Terrorism, Illegal Occupation, Wars for Israel | , | 1 Comment

Declassified docs reveal how Pentagon aimed to nuke USSR and China into oblivion

RT | September 2, 2018

Plans for a nuclear war devised by the US Army in the 1960s considered decimating the Soviet Union and China by destroying their industrial potential and wiping out the bulk of their populations, newly declassified documents show.

A review of the US general nuclear war plan by the Joint Staff in 1964, which was recently published by George Washington University’s National Security Archive project, shows how the Pentagon studied options “to destroy the USSR and China as viable societies.”

The review, conducted two years after the Cuban Missile Crisis, devises the destruction of the Soviet Union “as a viable society” by annihilating 70 percent of its industrial floor space during pre-emptive and retaliatory nuclear strikes.

A similar goal is tweaked for China, given its more agrarian-based economy at the time. According to the plan, the US would wipe out 30 major Chinese cities, killing off 30 percent of the nation’s urban population and halving its industrial capabilities. The successful execution of the large-scale nuclear assault would ensure that China “would no longer be a viable nation,” the review reads.

The Joint Staff had proposed to use the “population loss as the primary yardstick for effectiveness in destroying the enemy society with only collateral attention to industrial damage.” This “alarming” idea meant that, as long as urban workers and managers were killed, the actual damage to industrial targets “might not be as important,” the George Washington University researchers said.

The 1964 plan doesn’t specify the anticipated enemy casualty levels, but – as the researchers note – an earlier estimate from 1961 projected that a US attack would kill 71 percent of the residents in major Soviet urban centers and 53 percent of residents in Chinese ones. Likewise, the 1962 estimate predicted the death of 70 million Soviet citizens during a “no-warning US strike” on military and urban-industrial targets.

The Pentagon continues to rely heavily on nuclear deterrence, and – just like in the 1960s – the US nuclear strategy still regards Russian and Chinese military capabilities as main “challenges” faced by Washington. The latest Nuclear Posture Review, adopted in February, outlined “an unprecedented range and mix of threats” emanating from Beijing and Moscow. The document, which mentions Russia 127 times, cites the modernization of the Russian nuclear arsenal as “troubling” for the US.

The existing nuclear strategy also allows the US to conduct nuclear strikes not only in response to enemies’ nuclear attacks, but also in response to “significant non-nuclear strategic attacks” on the US, its allies and partners.

The newest US Nuclear Posture Review was heavily criticized by Russia and China. Moscow denounced the strategy as “confrontational,” while Beijing described the Pentagon’s approach as an example of “Cold-War mentality.”

September 2, 2018 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , | 1 Comment

Egypt president approves law restraining social media

Press TV – September 2, 2018

Egypt seems to be intensifying its crackdown on opponents with a new law. President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has approved the legislation, authorizing officials to monitor social media users.

As reported by the official gazette on Saturday, the new law gives state authorities the right to monitor the activities of social media users on the internet.

The legislation, it said, places social media accounts with over 5,000 followers under the supervision of the Supreme Council for the Administration of the Media.

That means any popular blog, website or even account on Facebook, Twitter or other platforms, could be considered a media outlet and subject to the supervision of the media regulator which could block them for spreading fake news.

The controversial law was passed in the parliament back in July.

Critics argue that it increase state power to crack down on opposition activists.

Human rights groups have on numerous occasions criticized Egypt for its tough approach towards opponents.

The Sisi government has silenced most critics in the media, rolled back social freedoms, and placed draconian restrictions on demonstrations and the work of rights groups.

Tens of thousands of people have been detained since 2013, when the military, led by Sisi, overthrew Mohamed Morsi.

Morsi, Egypt’s first democratically-elected president, came to power after the 2011 uprising toppled long-time autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

Read more:
Egypt arrests prominent blogger amid crackdown on dissent
Egypt subjecting prisoners to horrendous abuse, torture

September 2, 2018 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , | 2 Comments