US cracking down on $10 billion Israeli scam that steals life savings
Employees of Israeli binary options firm Yukom Communications receive cars for achieving high sales quotas in 2015. The company is believed to have defrauded tens of thousands of victims out of more than $100 million.
Israel-based binary options companies have been cheating Americans out of millions of dollars, causing ruin and misery. Finally, when Israel failed to rein them in, the FBI took action, and so far,15 Israelis have been indicted in the U.S. for the scams.
Two dual citizen Americans working for an Israeli company have just been sentenced in Maryland for cheating senior citizens and veterans out of their live savings.
Israeli law enforcement has ‘proven unable or unwilling to effectively tackle the country’s internet scams, despite the fact that they have operated at an industrial scale…’
By Alison Weir | If Americans Knew | September 26, 2019
Israel-based financial scammers have been cheating Americans and others out of billions of dollars, causing ruin to individuals and families and resulting in at least one suicide. Recently, 15 Israelis have been indicted in the U.S. for binary options scams, and two have just been sentenced.
While Israel has been aware of the practice for years and made it illegal in Israel, its parliament did nothing about stopping the companies’ fraudulent actions abroad until 2017. Legislation now on the books contains loopholes that enable the practice to continue unabated.
An Israeli attorney summarized the situation: “We export financial fraud.”
Israel’s blind eye to scam that brings in billions
For over 10 years, the Israeli government, which gets over $10 million per day in aid from American taxpayers, turned a blind eye to the scam. The Israeli parliament made it illegal in Israel, but permitted the Israel-based companies to continue operating around the world.
The Times of Israel describes the operations: “They would dupe victims worldwide into believing that they were successfully investing and earning money, encouraging them to deposit more and more into their accounts, until the company eventually cut off contact with the investors and disappeared with all or almost all of their money.”
The Times of Israel reports that at its height, the “widely fraudulent Israeli binary options industry” was estimated to have generated up to $10 billion a year through hundreds of companies that employed thousands – perhaps tens of thousands – of Israelis.
The US government believes that the binary options scheme by one Israeli company alone has bilked more than $100 million from tens of thousands of victims across the United States and the rest of the world.
According to a Canadian securities official who helped blow the whistle on the binary options fraud, it’s “well known that the bulk of the boiler rooms – the places that are making the calls, are happening in Israel.”
After an outcry “among overseas law enforcement agencies, with the FBI at the forefront, that Israel was allowing this ‘monstrous’ fraud to flourish year after year,” the Times of Israel reports, Israel belatedly passed legislation against the international victimization in 2017. The bill contained a number of loopholes, and the Israeli government continues to do little to stop the multi-billion dollar industry.
The Times of Israel reported at the time that the 2017 law against binary options was watered down, “creating loopholes through which binary options and other rogues, simply by retooling what they do, will be able to continue to prosper.”
Doing the right thing for the wrong reasons
When Israel finally officially stopped permitting the scammers to operate internationally, its reason for acting was not about ethics. The change came because the scandal was hurting Israel’s image. Notes on behalf of the legislation warned that “Israeli binary option companies risked damaging the country’s reputation and ‘could foment anti-Semitism’.”
In introducing the bill, the Knesset member emphasized: “We worry about the BDS movement. This industry has a huge impact on how Israel is viewed throughout the world. Our government officials go to international conferences and their colleagues abroad raise their eyebrows because of this industry.”
The Times of Israel reports that in spite of the 2017 legislation, “Many binary options operatives continue to operate from Israel and abroad, some of them offering fraudulent forex, cryptocurrency or other financial products as opposed to binary options.”
According to TOI, “Perpetrators have enriched themselves at the expense of victims around the world while enjoying impunity and suffering little social stigma here. Israeli law enforcement has proven unable or unwilling to effectively tackle the country’s internet scams, despite the fact that for several years they have operated at an industrial scale.”
“The fraudulent firms ostensibly offer customers worldwide a potentially profitable short-term investment. But in reality — through rigged trading platforms, refusal to pay out, and all manner of other ruses — these companies fleece the vast majority of customers of most or all of their money. The fraudulent salespeople routinely conceal where they are located, misrepresent what they are selling and use false identities.”
Two dual citizen Americans have just been found guilty and sentenced for their roles in the fraud.
New York native Yair Hadar / aka ‘Steven Gold’
On September 23, Yair Hadar, a New York native and dual American and Israeli citizen, was sentenced to 8 months in prison for his role in a $145 million investment scam based out of Israel.
Hadar often went by the alias “Steven Gold” during his sales pitch. It appears that his full name is Israel Steven Hadar, and that he’s possibly a real estate agent with Doma Realty Group LLC. A phone call to Doma asking for information resulted in the phone being abruptly hung up.
U.S. District Judge Theodore D. Chuang noted that Hadar had cheated many people out of most of their savings, according to a report by Law360, a website focused on the legal profession.
“I wish you could have seen what this has done to the victims,” Judge Chuang told Hadar.
An affidavit by an FBI agent describing Hadar’s actions reported that he had brought in close to a million dollars from unsuspecting “investors.”
New York native Liora Welles / aka ‘Lindsay Cole,’ ‘Lindsay Wells,’ and ‘Lindsay Taylor’
On September 20, California native Liora Welles, a dual American and Israeli citizen, was sentenced to 14 months in prison for her role in a $145 million binary options scam based out of Israel.
In sentencing Welles, the judge pointed out that the scam “literally cheated senior citizens out of their savings.”
Judge Chuang emphasized that Welles was particularly effective at “coaxing money from the elderly, veterans and other vulnerable targets.”
The prosecution said Welles’ purpose had been “to obtain the maximum deposit from investors and to take steps to ensure that investors lost the money in their accounts – thereby making money for themselves and their brand in the process.”
Court filings showed that the Israelis specifically targeted retirees, Social Security recipients, pension holders and veterans.
Welles acknowledged that she was “directly responsible” for obtaining approximately $2.4 million from victims. Two of them were 82-year-old Eugene Timmons and his wife, of Kansas City, who dipped into their life savings to invest approximately $110,000. They lost everything.
Welles appears to be from Santa Monica, California.
The fraud continues
As TOI predicted in its discussion of the law’s loopholes, the fraudulent industry has continued to flourish.
Law360 reports that the US prosecutors’ investigation is ongoing: “U.S. Department of Justice attorney Rush Atkinson told Judge Chuang that while the name for the scam has changed, the same fraud is still being carried out by the same players on a global scale.
“The trading scheme has since been banned by the Israeli government and the European Securities and Markets Authority, but Atkinson told the judge Friday that it’s likely still going on in Israel and is definitely continuing in other countries, though he said he’s not ‘comfortable’ going into detail.”
While the Times of Israel is covering the story in detail, U.S. news media seem to have published only a few, scattered reports on the scam. Apart from specialized websites, US news media failed to report on the recent convictions. As a result, relatively few Americans are aware of the scam and the Israeli connection.
Meanwhile, despite the Israeli government’s slowness in making it illegal for scammers to operate abroad and its minimal enforcement of the anemic new law, the US Congress is poised to give Israel $38 billion over the next 10 years, approximately $23,000 per Jewish Israeli family of four.
Victims of the fraud can call the Victim Assistance Line toll-free at (888) 549-3945 or email the U.S. Department of Justice at victimassistance.fraud@usdoj.gov.
**Go here to sign a petition saying No more aid to Israel while it allows its companies to victimize Americans.
Alain Soral Sentenced to 2 Years Jail for Sharing “Gilets-Jaunes” Anti-Rothschild Rap Video
He Could Pay Over €170,000 in Fines and Compensation
A French writer and publisher will be jailed for sharing this meme
By Guillaume Durocher • Unz Review • September 26, 2019
The French civic-nationalist and anti-Zionist intellectual Alain Soral was sentenced to two years prison last week for sharing a rap video entitled “Gilets-Jaunes.”
The music clip (watch it while you still can) is typical of the Yellow Vests in denouncing French media, political, and financial elites, and making a plea for direct democracy, notably the famous proposed Citizen’s Initiative Referendum (Référendum d’Initiative Populaire or RIC).
The video also argues for the abrogation of the banking law of June 1973 – known as the “Pompidou-Rothschild Act,” after the then French president and the investment bank he used to work for. Critics claim the law has reduced France to debt slavery by making her dependent on financial markets for loans rather than self-finance through the national bank.
The video also features a pyre where various figures are symbolically burned: President Emmanuel Macron, various media (TF1, Le Monde, BFMTV . . .), the Rothschild bank, and, most problematically, powerful elite Jews (Jacques Attali, Bernard-Henri Lévy, Patrick Drahi).
The rapper points out: “And if we talk about the media and Macron, we’ll have to talk about Drahi. His bank account is in Israel and he pays no taxes here.” Drahi, a Franco-Israeli-Portuguese oligarch born in Morocco and residing in Switzerland, has bought up large swathes of French media in recent years.
In case the denunciation of Jewish-globalist and Jewish-Zionist power elites in the financial and media spheres were not explicit enough, the video also states: “We’re not talking about a so-called oppressed minority. We’re talking about the deliberately neglected majority [of workers, farmers, and pensioners] . . . France has decided to free itself from the Rothschilds.”
President Macron speaking before the powerless lobby you will be destroyed for criticizing
As the words “so-called oppressed minority” are uttered, images are flashed of the annual dinner of the CRIF – the influential official French Jewish lobbying organization – an event where the crème de la crème of the French politico-media elite regularly come to genuflect.
The rapper lauds the “prolo patriotes” (patriotic workers) who are rising up and denounces the oligarchic “parasites” who are enriching themselves all the while demanding austerity from the masses. The song concludes: “The French are fed up with these parasites. The French are fed up, it ain’t racist. National uprising!” The author is a certain “Rude Goy.”
There are various pro-Arab and pro-Muslim symbols included. Drahi is mentioned while a pro-Palestine hoody is flashed. The rapper wears a fashionable keffiyeh. As a mainstream journalist anxiously warns that the French State is bordering on collapse in the face of the protesters, the rapper answers: “Inshallah” (God willing in Arabic).
The video then artfully interweaves mainstream yellow-vest concerns about French democracy’s subversion by high finance with a denunciation of the specific role of Jewish elite power in this process. There is no blanket anti-Semitism or attack on day-to-day Jews.
The images of Jewish oligarchs and intellectuals being symbolically burned – along side mainstream media and the French president, mind you – angered a certain number of Jewish activist and (mostly Jewish-run) “anti-racist” organizations. I imagine these images felt downright Auschwitzian to them.
The groups sued Soral for “granting enormous visibility to this video by publishing it on his website” and thus promoting the anti-Semitic theory of a “Jewish conspiracy.”
Note Soral did not create the video: he merely shared it on his website, as he did innumerable other yellow-vest videos. One wonders if linking to the video is also considered a criminal act. Probably not, or only if your name is Alain Soral. This tells you something about the legal arbitrariness of these censorious laws and liberticidal ethnic lobbies.
Soral will also be required to pay a 45,000-euro fine and tens of thousands of euros in “compensation” to the various aggrieved Jewish and/or professional “anti-racist” activist organizations. That’s called good business.
Coincidentally, or not, the bank BNP Paribas simply closed the bank account of Égalité & Réconciliation, Alain Soral’s influential counter-cultural organization.
Presumably the court decision will be appealed. However, the noose is apparently tightening around Soral. Earlier this year, he was also sentenced to a year in jail for sharing a cartoon highlighting various holocaust hoaxes (lampshades, soap, etc).
Soral has always said that true intellectuals must inevitably come up against the authorities sooner or later. An intellectual who really stands up for his ideals “passera par la case prison” (will go to jail, do not pass-go), as Pierre-Joseph Proudhon and Charles Maurras did.
Whatever happens, more people than ever are being sensitized to a certain ethnic group’s considerable power and privilege by the very fact of jailing a French intellectual on their lobbying organizations’ behalf.
Risking Women’s Health, While Widening the Door to Techno-Eugenics
By Tina Stevens and Stuart A. Newman | CounterPunch | September 26, 2019
In September, California’s legislature passed AB 922, a bill legalizing the payment to women for their eggs for research purposes. Additionally, next year, the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) is expected to return to the voters to secure passage of an initiative that will supply billions of dollars to fund entrepreneurial bioresearch. If Governor Newsom does not veto AB 922, CIRM will have a green light to fund research that will not only jeopardize women’s health through egg extraction but will enable the controversial genetic manipulation of human embryos. (Already, there are bioentrepreneurs who have created genetically engineered human embryos for implantation.)
This human genetic engineering would be massively amplified by vastly expanding the market in women’s eggs, the raw material necessary for the industrialization of human production. (see Stuart A. Newman: “Our Assembly-Line Future? CounterPunch, July 28, 2018 ). AB 922 and the expected repeat funding of CIRM constitute the leading edge of a juggernaut roaring down the road to techno-eugenics.
When instituted in 2004, CIRM was specifically prohibited from funding research that paid women for eggs. Only reimbursement for expenses directly associated with donation was allowed. Federal guidelines similarly reflected caution and continue to do so. According to the National Academy of Sciences 2010, “no payments, cash or in kind, should be provided for donating oocytes [i.e., egg cells] for research purposes.” AB 922 constitutes an end-run around these well-justified provisions.
The Center for Genetics and Society (CGS), Friends of the Earth, Alliance for Humane Biotechnology, many women’s advocacy groups, including Our Bodies Ourselves, and reproductive justice groups, including Black Women for Wellness and California Latinas for Reproductive Justice, came out in opposition to AB 922. But this bill is only the most recent attempt of bio-entrepreneurial interests and well-funded lobbying over the course of more than a decade, to expand access to women’s eggs. The physically invasive egg retrieval process has resulted in serious complications for many women who have donated eggs and its short-term and long-term health risks have not been adequately studied. Moreover, these risks are shouldered inequitably. As a CGS and Pro-Choice Alliance for Responsible Research fact sheet on the bill underscores:
“Paying women for their eggs for research creates an “undue incentive” for women of limited financial means to participate in a procedure that has not been shown to be safe. Since low-income women are disproportionately women of color and immigrants, they are likely to be the most affected. They may also have limited access to medical care should they experience adverse health effects beyond the current standard of care for egg providers, and less likely to benefit from any scientific advances that may result from the research.”
Finally, the push to commercialize eggs has been accompanied by claims that research in human reparative medicine will be thwarted without it. But such claims should not be accepted uncritically. While ethical considerations may see some lines of investigation foreclosed, the historical record shows that scientists resourcefully find other avenues to reach desired goals. Consider, for example, the once prevailing scientific imperative that brought CIRM into existence in 2004: that human embryos, not funded as research materials by the Federal government, were the only source of stem cells that could turn into a wide variety of reparative cell types. But just two years later Dr. Shinya Yamanaka introduced the scientific community to induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells. These cells have much the same properties as embryonic stem cells but were made from mature tissues. Importantly, they do not require the harvesting of women’s eggs. Yamanaka won the Nobel Prize for his work in 2012. Virtually all stem cell biologists now use iPS cells instead of the embryonic ones. This includes recipients of CIRM funds as well, notwithstanding the fact that the raison d’etre of CIRM, the fact that the federal government would not fund research on the most versatile stem cells (at the time those derived from embryos), no longer exists in the era of iPCs. Why then, is the demand for women’s eggs for bioresearch growing?
One highly controversial reason is to fund research seeking to create gene edited embryos. This is something that CIRM has considered, as recounted in Biotech Juggernaut: Hope, Hype, and Hidden Agendas of Entrepreneurial BioScience. Surely the public, which pays for CIRM funded research, has the right to steer it away from techno-eugenicist uses. Blocking AB 922 would be a start.
Time is running out. The governor has until October 13 to veto or sign bills. It is not known when he might get to AB 922. Please contact Governor Newsom’s office to call for a veto of AB 922.
Visit: https://govapps.gov.ca.gov/gov40mail/ or tweet @GavinNewsom to veto AB 922.
For more information about AB 922, visit:
https://www.geneticsandsociety.org/article/california-shouldnt-expand-market-womens-eggs
For more information about the risks and consequences of egg harvesting, visit:
http://www.humanebiotech.org/egg-donors-project
Tina Stevens and Stuart Newman are the authors of Biotech Juggernaut: Hope, Hype, and Hidden Agendas of Entrepreneurial BioScience (Routledge, 2019.)
Schiff’s ‘re-telling’ of Trump phone call with Ukraine head mocked as ‘unhinged Orange-Man-Bad fan fiction’
RT | September 26, 2019
With impeachment efforts against President Donald Trump resting on the content of a single phone call, who could blame Congressman Adam Schiff for embellishing the truth a little, all to sell his “Orange Man Bad” narrative.
Though Trump released a transcript of the call in question on Wednesday, the Democrat-controlled House Intelligence Committee pressed ahead with questioning Acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire on Thursday, about his handling of the whistleblower complaint that first thrust the phone call into the spotlight.
His thunder stolen by the release of the transcript – which failed to reveal the quid-pro-quo arrangement between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that Democrats had alleged – Schiff added some dramatic flourishes to his summary of the call as Maguire’s hearing opened, describing “the essence of what the president communicates.”
“We’ve been very good to your country. Very good. No other country has done as much as we have. But you know what? I don’t see much reciprocity here. I hear what you want. I have a favor I want from you, though. And I’m gonna say this only seven times, so you better listen good.”
“I want you to make up dirt on my political opponent, understand, lots of it. On this and on that. I’m going to put you in touch with people… and by the way don’t call me again. I’ll call you when you’ve done what I asked.”
Sounds dramatic, but the only problem? Trump didn’t say any of this. Not a word. Schiff was mocked by Republican lawmakers and pundits for being so “desperate” that he resorted to rewriting the call into “unhinged ‘Orange Man Bad’ fan fiction.”
Chastised by Republicans on the committee, Schiff admitted that his mad-libbed re-telling of the call was “parody,” a stand-up routine of sorts from the California congressman. “It’s a shame that we started off this hearing with fictional remarks,” Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio) said. “Unfortunately today, many innocent Americans are going to turn on their TV and the media is only going to show that section of what the chairman had to say.”
From his wooden delivery to his poor imitation of Trump, Schiff will unlikely be leaving Washington DC for Hollywood any time soon. However, the California Democrat is well versed in grandiose storytelling. Schiff branded the idea of probing Joe Biden’s son Hunter over his role at a Ukrainian gas holding as “making up dirt” – this from the same Schiff who kept audiences on edge for the last two years by promising to reveal “direct evidence” of “Russian collusion” hiding “in plain sight.”
Schiff’s promises never amounted to anything beyond the contents of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s final report and, perhaps with Russia seeming a dead end, the congressman is now looking to Ukraine to satisfy his appetite for investigation.
The actual Trump quote on Biden in the conversation with Zelensky goes as follows: “The other thing, there’s a lot of talk about Biden’s son, that Biden stopped the prosecution [of the Burisma Holding where Hunter Biden was on board of directors] and a lot of people want to find out about that so whatever you can do with the attorney general [William Barr] would be great.”
From the Anti-Russia Brouhaha to the Ukraine Brouhaha
By Jacob G. Hornberger | FFF | September 26, 2019
Since he became president, Donald Trump has killed thousands of people in Afghanistan and the Middle East in wars that are illegal under our form of government, given that he has never secured the constitutionally required congressional declaration of war to wage such wars.
Operating through his military-intelligence forces, he has also assassinated countless people in different parts of the world, notwithstanding the fact that the Constitution expressly prohibits him and his cohorts from killing anyone without due process of law.
He has also maintained a prison camp, torture center, and “judicial” system in Cuba that has denied people the right of speedy trial, trial by jury, due process of law, effective assistance of counsel, the right to confront adverse witnesses, and protection from cruel and unusual punishment, all in contravention to the guarantees provided in the Bill of Rights.
So let me see if I have this clear: Trump’s enemies oppose impeaching him for those things but instead want him removed from office for a telephone call in which Trump requested the Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky to undertake an investigation into possible corruption in Ukraine by Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden.
That’s rich!
What’s wrong with impeaching Trump for the right reasons — wreaking death, injury, suffering, and destruction in illegal actions abroad? Wouldn’t his removal from office for those things have more significance than if it’s done because of a telephone conversation?
Bribery charge
Of course, there is the possible bribery element to Trump’s request to Zelensky. A few weeks before the telephone conversation, Trump ordered that a scheduled $250 million aid package to Ukraine be held up. Even though Trump did not mention the aid suspension in his telephone conversation with Zelensky, the allegation would be that Trump was sending Zelensky an implied message: “Grant my request to conduct an investigation into Biden and you’ll get your $250 million in U.S. taxpayer money.”
The problem that Trump’s enemies have, however, is a problem of proof. “Knowing” that that was what Trump was doing is different from proving it, especially since Trump states that he held up the money for the purpose of encouraging European countries to contribute more money to the effort. While Trump’s alternative explanation certainly appears strained, there is still the problem of proving that he is lying. In an impeachment trial, Trump’s enemies are going to have to prove that he is lying, which could be prove to be problematic, especially given the virtual certainty that Republicans in the Senate will immediately fall into line and vote for acquittal, knowing full what will happen to them if they don’t.
There is another problem that Trump’s enemies face: the fact that U.S. foreign aid, which both Republicans and Democrats have long supported, is itself a bribe. Does anyone really think that U.S. foreign aid is for the purpose of helping the “poor, needy, and disadvantaged?” Forcing or “encouraging” foreign regimes to do what U.S. officials want them to do is the whole purpose of foreign aid. If they vote the right way in the UN, for example, the aid will continue. If they don’t, it will stop.
Back in the George H.W. Bush regime, President Bush was trying to get the UN to support his resolution to go to war against Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. Yemen voted no. U.S. Secretary of State James Baker is reported to have said, “That will be the most expensive vote they ever cast.” U.S. foreign aid to Yemen was cut off.
Moreover, consider the fact that when Third World nations are appointed to the UN Security Council, U.S. officials increase the amount of foreign aid they receive. When they get off the Security Council, the amount is reduced. What is that if not a bribe being paid to ensure they vote the right way while they are serving on the Security Council?
It’s probably also worth mentioning the political bribery that both Trump and his Democratic presidential opponents will be engaging in during the impeachment proceedings as part of their campaigns for president. They are already offering all sorts of “free” programs and “free” money to American voters with the aim of garnering their votes. Why is that type of bribery considered okay?
Campaign-finance laws
Some Trump critics are saying that the mere fact that Trump asked Zelensky to conduct the investigation into Biden and his son constitutes an impeachable offense, independently of whether the aid package was meant to be a bribe or not. Their argument turns on federal campaign-finance laws, which make it illegal for presidential candidates to seek a contribution from foreign governments.
What would be the contribution that Trump would have been seeking? Dirt! That’s their argument — that by asking Zelensky to undertake an investigation into possible corruption by Biden and his son, Trump was effectively asking Zelensky to provide him with political dirt that he could use in his campaign against Biden. Of course, nobody knows how much that speculative dirt would be worth, and so it’s not really clear how much that supposed illegal campaign contribution would be.
But let’s face it: If asking a foreign regime to conduct an investigation into possible political corruption is really a crime under U.S. law, then it only goes to show how ludicrous federal campaign-finance laws are.
First of all, let’s look at the words of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech.” Now, it seems to me that if anything constitutes speech, it’s a telephone conversation. How in the world does a campaign-finance law enacted by Congress trump the express prohibition on Congress enunciated in the First Amendment? Isn’t the Constitution supposed to be the supreme law of the land?
Second, why does a request for an investigation necessarily translate into a request for dirt? Isn’t it possible that a request for an investigation is just that — a request for an investigation?
Consider for a moment that Biden wasn’t running for president. Would Trump’s request for an investigation into possible corruption still be considered a crime? I don’t see how, given that he wouldn’t be running afoul of federal-finance campaign laws by supposedly seeking dirt against a political opponent.
Given such, how can a request for an investigation be a crime when applied against a candidate for office but not against someone who isn’t a candidate for office? Indeed, let’s assume, for a moment, that Biden and his son really did engage in political corruption in Ukraine. Would that mean that they could silence Trump from requesting an investigation simply by running for office? If that’s the case, maybe it’s time to reevaluate and terminate America’s ridiculous campaign-finance laws.
Impeachment: A nightmare for the Bidens?
One of the most amusing aspects of the upcoming impeachment circus is that it is likely to result in a living nightmare for Joe Biden and his son. The matter that Trump wanted Zelensky to investigate was Hunter Biden’s appointment to the board of a private gas company in Ukraine while his father Joe Biden was vice-president. The position turned out to be an extremely lucrative one, reportedly paying Hunter Biden up to $50,000 a month.
Meanwhile, while Hunter Biden was receiving that handsome stipend, this father Joe was playing an active role in Ukrainian affairs. In fact, part of that active role included Vice-President Biden’s request to Ukrainian officials to fire the nation’s top prosecutor, who had jurisdiction over the private gas company where his son Hunter had been appointed. Joe Biden maintains that he wanted the prosecutor fired not because he was investigating his son’s gas company but because the prosecutor wasn’t do enough to ferret out corruption in Ukraine.
The impeachment inquiry is likely to give Trump and the Republicans the opportunity to subpoena Joe and Hunter Biden and require them to testify as to all the details of Hunter’s relationship with that gas company, what his services for it were, how much he actually got paid, and the exact nature of Joe Biden’s efforts to get that Ukraine prosecutor fired. That part of the impeachment proceedings cannot be something that the Bidens are looking forward to, and it might still be prove to be a reason for Democrats to abandon their impeachment efforts.
Two big points
There are two overriding points to all this new brouhaha.
First, what are President Trump and Vice President Biden doing meddling in Ukraine’s affairs in the first place, and why isn’t anyone complaining about that? We have just gone through more than two years of laments about Russia’s supposed meddling in America’s system. What business do U.S. officials have meddling in Ukraine’s affairs?
Second, the entire Ukraine brouhaha shows the lack of importance that both major political parties place on ethical principles. Even if Trump’s request for an investigation into Biden and his son was entirely legal and even if Biden’s request to fire the Ukrainian prosecutor was entirely legal, both actions violate the fundamental ethical principles against conflicts of interest and avoiding even the appearance of impropriety.
Major Climate Paper Withdrawn By Nature
Retraction exposes lack of statistical expertise in climate science
Global Warming Policy Forum – 26/09/19
A major scientific paper, which claimed to have found rapid warming in the oceans as a result of manmade global warming, has been withdrawn after an amateur climate scientist found major errors in its statistical methodology.
The paper, from a team led by Laure Resplandy of Princeton University, had received widespread uncritical publicity in the mainstream media when it was published because of its apparently alarming implications for the planet. However, within days of its publication in October 2018, independent scientist Nic Lewis found several serious flaws.
Yesterday, after nearly a year’s delay, the paper was officially withdrawn.
Nic Lewis said
This is just the latest example of climate scientists letting themselves down by using incorrect statistics. The climate field needs to get professional statisticians involved up front if it is going to avoid this kind of embarrassment in future”.
Dr Benny Peiser, director of the Global Warming Policy Forum, said
Climatology is littered with examples of bad statistics, going back to the infamous Hockey Stick graph and beyond. Peer review is failing and it is falling to amateurs to find the errors. Scientists in the field should be embarrassed”.
No Evidence That Climate Change Is Accelerating Sea Level Rise
By Ralph B. Alexander | Science Under Attack | September 23, 2019
By far the most publicized phenomenon cited as evidence for human-induced climate change is rising sea levels, with the media regularly trumpeting the latest prediction of the oceans flooding or submerging cities in the decades to come. Nothing instills as much fear in low-lying coastal communities as the prospect of losing one’s dwelling to a hurricane storm surge or even slowly encroaching seawater. Island nations such as the Maldives in the Indian Ocean and Tuvalu in the Pacific are convinced their tropical paradises are about to disappear beneath the waves.
There’s no doubt that the average global sea level has been increasing ever since the world started to warm after the Little Ice Age ended around 1850. But there’s no reliable scientific evidence that the rate of rise is accelerating, or that the rise is associated with any human contribution to global warming.
A comprehensive 2018 report on sea level and climate change by Judith Curry, a respected climate scientist and global warming skeptic, emphasizes the complexity of both measuring and trying to understand recent sea level rise. Because of the switch in 1993 from tide gauges to satellite altimetry as the principal method of measurement, the precise magnitude of sea level rise as well as projections for the future are uncertain.
According to both Curry and the UN’s IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), the global rate of sea level rise from 1901 to 2010 was about 1.7 mm (about 1/16th of an inch) per year, increasing after 1993 to 3.2 mm per year, almost double the previous rate – though this estimate is considered too high by some experts. But, while the sudden jump may seem surprising and indicative of acceleration, the fact is that the globally averaged sea level fluctuates considerably over time. This is illustrated in the IPCC’s figure below, which shows estimates from tide gauge data of the rate of rise from 1900 to 1993.
It’s clear that the rate of rise was much higher than its 20th century average during the 30 years from 1920 to 1950, and much lower than the average from 1910 to 1920 and again from 1955 to 1980. Strong regional differences exist too. Actual rates of sea level rise range from negative in Stockholm, corresponding to a falling sea level, as that region continues to rebound after melting of the last ice age’s heavy ice sheet, to positive rates three times higher than average in the western Pacific Ocean.
The regional variation is evident in the next figure, showing the average rate of sea level rise across the globe, measured by satellite, between 1993 and 2014.
You can see that during this period sea levels increased fastest in the western Pacific as just noted, and in the southern Indian and Atlantic Oceans. At the same time, the sea level fell near the west coast of North America and in the Southern Ocean near Antarctica.
The reasons for such a jumbled picture are several. Because water expands and occupies more volume as it gets warmer, higher ocean temperatures raise sea levels. Yet the seafloor is not static and can sink under the weight of the extra water in the ocean basin that comes from melting glaciers and ice caps, and can be altered by underwater volcanic eruptions. Land surfaces can also sink (as well as rebound), as a result of groundwater depletion in arid regions or landfilling in coastal wetlands. For example, about 50% of the much hyped worsening of tidal flooding in Miami Beach, Florida is due to sinking of reclaimed swampland.
Historically, sea levels have been both lower and higher in the past than at present. Since the end of the last ice age, the average level has risen about 120 meters (400 feet), as depicted in the following figure. After it reached a peak in at least some regions about 6,000 years ago, however, the sea level has changed relatively little, even when industrialization began boosting atmospheric CO2. Over the 20th century, the worldwide average rise was about 15-18 cm (6-7 inches).
That the concerns of islanders are unwarranted despite rising seas is borne out by recent studies revealing that low-lying coral reef islands in the Pacific are actually growing in size by as much as 30% per century, and not shrinking. The growth is due to a combination of coral debris buildup, land reclamation and sedimentation. Another study found that the Maldives — the world’s lowest country — formed when sea levels were even higher than they are today. Studies such as these belie the popular claim that islanders will become “climate refugees,” forced to leave their homes as sea levels rise.
Heated Climate Change Debates rage on after Climate Action Summit at UNGA
By Sarah Abed | September 26, 2019
The 74th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) is in full swing in New York this week with discussions and debates ranging from climate change to trade deals and the growing tensions in the Middle East.
A few days prior to the UNGA however, there was a climate strike on September 20th. Participation took place in dozens of cities around the world with the largest being in New York and led by Greta Thunberg a Swedish youth climate activist who began the “Fridays for the Future” movement last year.
On Monday, the UNGA was mostly focused on the Climate Action Summit and for the first time high-level meetings and discussions about Universal Health Care (UHC) were covered in what is considered to be the most significant political meeting on UHC thus far.
The Climate Action Summit was hosted by Secretary General of the United Nations Antonio Guterres who started his speech by saying that nature is angry and we fool ourselves if we think we can fool nature because nature always strikes back and around the world nature is striking back with fury. Young adults and children demanded a response for climate change. A few took the stage including Greta Thunberg who started her first climate strike a year ago. When asked her message to world leaders she passionately began with “my message is we’ll be watching you”… she said we are in the beginning of mass extinction, and all you can talk about is money and economic growth, how dare you”.
Mr. Guterres gave a sense of urgency that we are in a race against time and must do everything in our power to stop the climate from warming before it stops us.
After the Climate Action Summit scientists and researchers have new data to study from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The United Nations Environmental Program delegation was in NY for the UNGA and highlighted how governments, citizens, and civil society can take productive action when it comes to the environment, climate and sustainable development goals. UNEP highlights and updates are outlined on their site.
Philipino representatives delivered a statement on behalf of their country on Monday, during a meeting on Universal Health Coverage (UHC) stating that President Rodrigo Duterte passed a UHC law earlier this year that provides free basic services to all.
The Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi said that his nation will be spending $50 billion on water conservation in the new few years, signaling the high importance of water management and he also pledged to more than double India’s non-fossil fuel target to 400 gigawatts.
President Trump stated on Tuesday, that he is “ready, willing and able” to mediate the “complex” Kashmir issue if both Pakistan and India wanted him to get involved.
On Tuesday and Wednesday, a Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF) took place.
Also on Tuesday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke about global injustice and highlighted a number of problems which threaten global peace and security saying, “The international community is losing the ability to find lasting solutions to challenges such as terrorism, hunger, misery, climate change” he criticized world powers for failing to take appropriate action to deal with crises around the globe. He also called for world leaders to support his plan for a safe zone to be established in Syria, he said that if the “peace corridor” is extended to the Deir El-Zor-Raqqa area that 3 million Syrian refuges can safely return home.
During his speech President Erdogan held up four maps illustrating Israel’s disregard for borders and its gradual occupation of Palestinian land. He also held up a map showing the safezone he wants to establish in Syria on his southern border. Erdogan likened the suffering of the people of Gaza to that of the holocaust.
President Erdogan also called on UN members to help support Turkey’s efforts to ensure security in Syria’s Idlib. He has mentioned previously that with or without the US’s support he will establish a safe zone on his southern borders to push back US-sponsored and backed Kurdish militias and help Syrian refugees currently living in Turkey return home.
US President Donald Trump led the Global Call to Protect Religious Freedom and introduced initiatives to end religious persecution on Tuesday, as well. During his press conference on Wednesday he proudly proclaimed that he is the first to lead a global call on this matter.
The launch of Hello Global Goals Collaboration took place on Tuesday with Japanese character Hello Kitty in the SDG Media Zone which has been a main feature of the UNGA high-level week conference since 2016. The SDG Media Zone brings together UN Member states, content creators, activists, influencers, media partners and highlights actions and solutions in support of Sustainable Development Goals. The SDG Media Zone offers impactful in-depth interviews, Ted-style talks, panel discussion and advances the 2030 Agenda, using impactful, dynamic, and in-depth conversations with decision makers, etc. Its events are live streamed on UN WebTV and focused on the main themes of the week including climate change, universal healthcare, financing for development and small island developing states.
On Thursday, a dialogue on Financing for Development (FFD) and a meeting on the elimination of nuclear weapons is taking place.
On Friday, the UNGA is holding a meeting to review progress made in addressing the priorities of Small Island Developing States (SIDS) through the implementation of the SIDS Accelerated Modalities of Action (SAMOA) Pathway.
All of this relates to the 2030 UN Agenda, which is a plan of action for people, the planet, and prosperity and is supposedly meant to strength universal peace in larger freedom, however some think this plan has a sinister underlying agenda and should be looked into further.
Sarah Abed is a political analyst with BRICS.
From Russiagate to Ukrainegate
By Finian Cunningham | Strategic Culture Foundation | September 26, 2019
With the “Russiagate” hoax proving to be the “most fraudulent political scandal in American history,” as Princeton Professor Stephen Cohen puts it, now we have emerging an alternative – “Ukrainegate”.
President Donald Trump is being accused of abusing his White House office to put pressure on Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky to dig into alleged corrupt dealings by Joe Biden, the top Democratic candidate for the forthcoming presidential elections in 2020.
To make matters worse for Trump, he is also accused of threatening to withhold $250 million of military aid as a way to pressure the Kiev authorities to investigate Biden’s past relations with Ukraine, when he was serving as Vice President in the Obama administration. That could amount to extortion by Trump, if proven.
Democratic political opponents and the anti-Trump liberal media are renewing demands for his impeachment. They are adamant that he has now crossed a clear red line of criminality by seeking a foreign power to interfere in US elections by damaging a presidential rival.
For his part, Trump denies his conversations with the Ukrainian president were improper. He said he phoned Zelensky back in July to mainly congratulate him on his recent election. Trump does however admit that he mentioned Biden’s name to Zelensky in the context of Ukraine’s notorious culture of business corruption. The American leader maintains that Joe Biden should be investigated for possible conflict of interest and abusing the office of vice president back in 2016 in order to enhance the business affairs of his son, Hunter.
Trump’s phone call to Ukraine hit the news last week when a US intelligence officer turned whistleblower to allege that the president was overheard in a conversation inappropriately making “a promise to a foreign leader”. The identity of the foreign leader was not disclosed. But immediately, the anti-Trump US media began speculating that it was Russian President Vladimir Putin. The keenness to point fingers at Putin showed that the Russiagate fever is still virulent in the US political establishment, even though the long-running narrative alleging Russian interference or collusion collapsed earlier this year when the two-year Robert Mueller “Russia investigation” floundered into oblivion for lack of evidence.
Turns out now that Trump’s telephone liaison was not with Putin, but rather Ukraine’s Zelensky. And the anti-Trump politicos and media are getting all fired up with “Ukrainegate” – as a replacement for the non-entity Russiagate.
Trouble is that this alternative conspiracy could backfire badly for Trump’s enemies. Because, despite the obsession with trying to impeach Trump, the renewed focus on Ukraine raises legitimate and serious questions about the past dealings of Joe Biden.
In March 2014, Biden’s son Hunter was slung out of the Navy Reserve for his cocaine habit. Then a month later, the younger Biden ends up on the executive board of Ukrainian natural gas firm Burisma Holdings. This was all only weeks after the Obama administration and European allies had backed an illegal coup in Kiev against the elected Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych.
Vice President Joe Biden was the White House’s point man to Ukraine, supporting the new regime in Kiev by organizing financial and military aid. Biden even boasted how he personally warned Yanukovych that the game was up and that he better step down during the tumultuous CIA-backed street violence in Kiev during February 2014. “He was a dollar short and a day late,” quipped Biden about the ill-fated president.
The appointment of Biden’s washed-up son to a plum job in Ukraine should have merited intense US media scrutiny and investigation. But it didn’t. One can only imagine their reaction if, say, it had been Trump and one of his sons involved.
Moreover, in 2016, when Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin was conducting a probe into allegations of corruption and sleaze at the gas company Burisma, among other businesses, it was Vice President Joe Biden who intervened in May 2016 to call for the state lawyer to be sacked. Biden threatened to withhold a $1 billion financial loan from Washington if the prosecutor was not axed. He duly was in short order and the probe into Burisma was dropped.
Potentially, Joe Biden, the current top Democratic candidate for the 2020 presidency, could see his chances unraveling if “Ukrainegate” is pushed further. The dilemma for his supporters among the political establishment is that the more they try to beat up on Trump over his alleged horse-trading with Ukraine, the more the heat can be turned by him on Biden over allegations of graft and abuse of office to further his family’s business interests.
Senator Lindsey Graham, who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, is this week calling for an investigation into Biden’s conduct in Ukraine.
“Joe Biden said everybody’s looked at this and found nothing. Who is everybody? Nobody has looked at the Ukraine and the Bidens,” Mr. Graham told Fox News.
“There is enough smoke here,” Graham added. “Was there a relationship between the vice president’s family and the Ukraine business world that was inappropriate? I don’t know. Somebody other than me needs to look at it and I don’t trust the media to get to the bottom of it.”
Ukrainegate could turn out to be even far more damaging to the Democrats. Because there is evidence that it was the US-backed Kiev regime which helped seed political dirt on Paul Manafort, the former Trump campaign manager. Manafort is facing jail time for fraud and tax offenses unearthed by the Mueller probe. Mueller did not find any link between Manafort and a “Kremlin influence campaign”, as was speculated. However, because Manafort did work previously as a political manager for the ousted Ukrainian President Yanukovcyh, he was seen as a liability for Trump. Was Russiagate always Ukrainegate all along?
Apart from Biden’s potential personal conflict of interests in Ukraine, the country may turn out to be the key to where the whole Russiagate fiasco was first dreamt up by Democrats, Kiev regime operatives and US intelligence enemies of Trump.
Ukrainegate has a lot more political skeletons to tumble from the wardrobe. Those skeletons may bury Democrats and their liberal media-intelligence backers, rather than Trump.
House Intelligence Committee releases whistleblower report on Trump-Zelensky call
RT | September 26, 2019
The whistleblower complaint that led to the impeachment inquiry against US President Donald Trump has been released. In it, the leaker admits he did not actually hear the phone call at the center of the scandal.
Released by the House Intelligence Committee on Thursday, the complaint details the circumstances surrounding Trump’s July phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Democrats argue that Trump attempted to pressure Zelensky into reopening a corruption investigation into 2020 candidate Joe Biden’s son Hunter, and his business dealings in the country.
The complaint reveals little new about the call itself. In it, the whistleblower – believed to be a member of the intelligence community – admitted that they had not actually been privy to the call, but went on secondhand accounts from those who were. They also detailed a series of contacts between US and Ukrainian officials, some pertaining to the investigation into Hunter Biden’s business dealings.
Though Trump himself released a transcript of the call on Wednesday – which did not reveal a quid-pro-quo arrangement as Democrats alleged – the party has still pressed ahead with an impeachment inquiry. As the complaint was released, the committee prepared to interview Acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire about his handling of the complaint.
According to the whistleblower, Trump’s mention of the investigation in the phone call amounted to soliciting “interference from a foreign country in the 2020 US election.”
Accompanying the report was a letter from Maguire, who said the complaint “appears credible” and determined it to be an “urgent concern.”
President Trump responded angrily to the release, accusing Democrats of “trying to destroy the Republican party and all that it stands for.”
The complaint adds little of value to the Democrats’ case against Trump. Much of it is built on the concerns of anonymous officials who viewed the call as a “flagrant” abuse of office. The whistleblower also expressed concern that the White House apparently attempted to block the release of the call transcript. However, Trump’s release of the record on Wednesday rendered this concern moot.
Much of the whistleblower’s story surrounding the call is built on media reports. According to one of these reports, Ukrainian officials close to Zelensky claimed to have “evidence” that other officials in Kiev had “interfered” with the 2016 US election on behalf of the Democratic Party. Another report alleged that Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, planned to travel to Kiev to pressure Zelensky to investigate this supposed “evidence.”
Giuliani’s trip never happened, and these reports, alongside the whistleblower’s “general understanding of the state of affairs” make up the bulk of the complaint.
Also cited as evidence against Trump is his statement to ABC’s George Stephanopoulos earlier this summer, in which he said that he would “listen” to dirt on his political rivals from a foreign country. The president later said: “They all do it, they always have, and that’s the way it is.”
Whether the transcript will be enough to sustain an impeachment inquiry against Trump remains to be seen. Unless House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-California) can solicit more damaging information from the whistleblower in a committee hearing, the call transcript itself remains the only piece of hard evidence against Trump, but doesn’t detail the level of abuse the whistleblower alleged.
Furthermore, while a majority of House members back impeaching Trump, the American public does not share their opinion. A Quinnipiac University poll released on Wednesday shows that only 37 percent of voters support impeachment, the vast majority of them Democrats.
Though many Democrats long to see Trump impeached and removed from office, more fear that impeachment would strengthen the president’s chances come 2020, and would give credence to his argument that the effort to remove him is “the single greatest witch hunt in American history.”
Trump Frees Himself From Bolton – but Robert O’Brien Will Be Just as Bad
By Philip Giraldi | Strategic Culture Foundation | September 26, 2019
After months of rumors, John Bolton was finally fired from the White House but the post mortem on why it took so long to remove him continues, with the punditry and media trying to understand exactly what happened and why. Perhaps the most complete explanation for what occurred came from President Donald Trump himself shortly after the fact. He said, in some impromptu comments, that his national security advisor had “… made some very big mistakes when he talked about the Libyan model for Kim Jong Un. That was not a good statement to make. You just take a look at what happened with Gadhafi. That was not a good statement to make. And it set us back.”
Trump has a point in that Bolton was clearly suggesting that North Korea get rid of its nuclear weapons in exchange for economic benefits, but it was the wrong example to pick as Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi gave up his weapons and was then ousted and brutally killed in a rebel uprising that was supported by Washington. The Bolton analogy, which may have been deliberate attempt to sabotage any rapprochement, made impossible any agreement between Kim and Trump as Kim received the message loud and clear that he might suffer the same fate.
More recently, Bolton might have been behind media leaks that scuttled Trump’s plan to meet with Taliban representatives and that also, acting on behalf of Israel, undercut a presidential suggestion that he might meet with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. Trump summed up his disagreements with Bolton by saying that the National Security Advisor “wasn’t getting along” with other administration officials, adding that “Frankly he wanted to do things — not necessarily tougher than me. John’s known as a tough guy. He’s so tough he got us into Iraq. That’s tough. But he’s somebody that I actually had a very good relationship with, but he wasn’t getting along with people in the administration who I consider very important. And you know John wasn’t in line with what we were doing. And actually in some cases he thought it was too tough, what we were doing. Mr. Tough Guy.”
Trump’s final comment on Bolton was that “I’m sure he’ll do whatever he can do to spin it his way,” a throw-away line that could well set the stage for what comes next. Bolton has many supporters among hardliners in the GOP and the media and will no doubt be inclined to respond to the president in kind, but once the back and forth starts many other factors and relationships will come into play.
After the firing, it was widely believed that Donald Trump might have actually gotten rid of Bolton for all the right reasons, namely that as president he is disinclined to start any new wars and seeks negotiated solutions to existing conflicts, both of which concepts were no doubt regarded as anathema by the National Security Advisor. Unfortunately, that argument runs into problems where rhetoric and deeds disconnect if one considers actual actions undertaken by the president, to include the man that Trump has now named as Bolton’s replacement, Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs Robert O’Brien.
O’Brien might well have been ranked among the worst possible choices among the names floated in the media for the National Security Advisor position, mostly because he is almost completely lacking in actual experience related to the job. To be sure, he looks more presentable than the wild-eyed and walrus mustachioed Bolton, but Trump has repeatedly been overly deferential towards the bona fides of hardliners like O’Brien who boast of American Exceptionalism. The president will also likely appreciate that the sycophantic O’Brien’s lack of experience will mean that he will be completely deferential to the Chief Executive’s point of view at all times.
Trump’s cabinet choices have been so bad that they have led to musical chairs in nearly all senior positions. The president is to blame for having appointed Bolton, a man he disliked, though admittedly under orders from Israeli-American casino billionaire Sheldon Adelson, and he also did not have to elevate Mike Pompeo first as CIA Director and then as Secretary of State. There is no one around who outdoes Pompeo when it comes to avoiding diplomacy and negotiations while also threatening dire consequences for America’s “enemies.” O’Brien’s hardline credentials are largely indistinguishable from those of Pompeo and Bolton and it is widely believed that his appointment was due to advocacy by the Secretary of State, who is reportedly assembling his national security team.
And it should be observed that Trump’s claimed avoidance of war credentials are pretty thin. Far from fulfilling campaign promises to end the wars he inherited, Donald Trump has continued and even escalated those conflicts. He has withdrawn from agreements with Russia and Iran that enhanced US national security. Drone strikes under Trump have increased dramatically and have exceeded the number occurring during both of Obama’s terms, while new rules of engagement have led to a major increase in civilian casualties from US bombing directed against ISIS and the Taliban. Most recently in Afghanistan, 30 farm workers were killed in a drone strike. Trump is also doubling down on his support for the Saudi genocide against Yemen.
And the president has demonstrated that he is willing to attack countries that do not threaten the US and with which Washington is not at war. He has twice illegally bombed Syria based on phony intelligence and even when he decided at the last minute not to use force, as he did earlier this year with Iran, there was no serious evidence that he was truly seeking dialogue. He is waging “maximum pressure” economic warfare against both Iran and Venezuela, in both of which countries he has called for regime change. He has threatened Russia over Crimea and Ukraine and is in a trade war with China. Transparent regime change policies coupled with willy-nilly imposing of sanctions are destructive, hostile steps that kill people in the targeted countries and make enemies where none previously existed.
America’s new National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien recently featured in a taxpayer funded trip to Stockholm to obtain the release of rapper ASAP Rocky, who had been arrested after getting involved in a fist fight. O’Brien had orders to threaten unspecified retaliation against the Swedish government if it did not accede to White House demands. That exercise in international bullying means that O’Brien is quintessentially Trump’s kind of guy. He has written a book entitled While America Slept: Restoring American Leadership to a World in Crisis, calling on the United States to end any “appeasement and retreat,” and has described the nuclear agreement with Iran, in predictable neocon fashion, as a repeat of 1938, Hitler and Munich. He was Mitt Romney’s foreign policy adviser and is a Mormon, which means he basically lines up alongside the Christian Zionists when it comes to Israel.
The Israel Lobby has predictably welcomed O’Brien. Sandra Parker or Christians United for Israel (CUFI), enthused how “CUFI enjoys a close working relationship with many officials throughout the Trump Administration, and we look forward to working with Ambassador O’Brien on strengthening the US-Israel relationship, confronting the Iranian menace, and curtailing the threat posed by terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah.”
Mort Klein President of the Zionist Organization of America observed how “Mr. O’Brien is a great friend of Israel, and is now the top-ranking Mormon in the pro-Israel Trump administration. He is also best friends with ardent Zionist US Ambassador to Germany [Richard] Grenell … And you can’t be a great friend of evangelical Christian Grenell unless you support Israel.”
So, does the firing of John Bolton and replacement by Robert O’Brien mean that there will be a change of direction in US foreign policy? The answer has to be no. Trump might well be maneuvering to avoid a new war as he will be in full 2020 campaign mode and wants to avoid falling into a quagmire, but the basic belligerency of the administration and its strong tilt towards supporting feckless allies like Israel and Saudi Arabia is certain to continue.
Iranian President’s multifaceted UNGA speech, directed at President Trump, falls on deaf ears
By Sarah Abed | September 26, 2019
All eyes this week are on the events taking place at the 74th annual UN General Assembly (UNGA) which kicked off on Monday at UN Headquarters in New York. Hundreds of meetings, speeches, and events are planned to take place with representatives and world leaders from around the world.
In an entirely predictable move to appease the US, a joint statement was issued on Monday, by France, Germany, and the U.K, parroting Washington’s position of blaming Iran for the September 14th missile and drone strikes on Saudi Oil infrastructure.
In the joint statement they wrote, “it is clear for us that Iran bears responsibility for this attack. There is no other plausible explanation.” They reiterated their commitment to the JCPOA but called for new talks on a more comprehensive long-term agreement that deals with nuclear, regional, and missile activities.
In response to the statement, Iran’s Foreign Minister Javad Zarif said that the three nations should muster the will to forge their own path rather than parroting absurd US claims and making requests which are inconsistent with established JCPOA terms. He also stated that there will be no new deal without compliance with the current one.
In reviewing a lot of the side conversations that have been taking place between President Rouhani and other world leaders from France, Germany, the U.K., Switzerland, Sweden, Pakistan, etc. it appears that in the US’s absence these nations seem supportive of Iran’s efforts to keep the JCPOA deal alive. However, threats from Washington to sanction countries that do business with Iran like China, are worrisome and causing them to peddle back.
In a speech given on Wednesday, Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani said, “The Middle East is burning in the flames of war, bloodshed, aggression, occupation and religious and sectarian fanaticism and extremism.” President Rouhani spoke about Iran’s desire to solve and not create problems. He stated the United States was openly violating its responsibilities under the JCPOA and invited the US to come back to the negotiating table if they are willing to end sanctions and threats which violate principles of ethics and international law.
President Rouhani stressed that his proposal is clear they are not interested in war, in threats, in bullying, and want everyone involved to act according to the law and fulfill their obligations. President Rouhani spoke about Iran’s decades-long fight against terrorism and how on the contrary the US has been supporting and arming terrorist groups for decades. He spoke about the US’s involvement in Syria, Yemen, and Israel’s crimes against Palestinians.
Iranian President spoke about the need for the US to pull its troops out of the Middle Eastern region, saying that the ultimate way to achieve peace, security and independence is for the neighboring countries to work things out without foreign interference, which is fueling insecurity rather than bringing peace.
President Rouhani spoke about his new initiative the Coalition of Hope or Hormuz Peace Endeavor (HOPE) which he is proposing at the UNGA and encouraging cooperation in providing collective energy security, freedom of navigations and free flow of oil and other energy resources from and to the countries off the Strait of Hormuz and beyond.
President Rouhani said that this initiative is based on a commitment to UN principles, objectives, mutual respect, mutual interests, dialog, understanding, respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity, peaceful resolution of conflicts and most importantly non-aggression and non-interference in the domestic affairs of each other.
“The issues of the region are too big and important for the United States to deal with. A country that has failed to resolve the issues of Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, and has been the spearhead of extremism, Talibanism and Daeshism will never be able to resolve more sophisticated issues,” stated Iranian President Rouhani.
On Wednesday, a meeting chaired by the European Union’s top diplomat, Federica Mogherini took place with representatives of those same three European countries along with Russian and Chinese representatives and Iran’s Foreign Minister Mr. Zarif. It was agreed upon that all participants wanted to see the deal fully implemented and that they were determined to continue all efforts to preserve the agreement. Participants were reminded that the agreement was endorsed by the U.N. Security council and that the pact “remains a key element of the global nuclear nonproliferation architecture, and a significant achievement of multilateral diplomacy.”
President Trump’s decision last year to not only unilaterally withdrawal from the JCPOA but also enforce a “maximum pressure campaign” is seen by the Iranian government as “economic terrorism”. Harsh sanctions not only target financial establishments and government officials but the most vulnerable Iranian civilians who as a result are having trouble accessing food and medicine.
Underneath all the grandstanding both nations are not genuinely interested in war. Iran understands Trump’s distaste with the JCPOA being that it was negotiated by former president Barak Obama’s regime. They are willing to make some modifications and give him his own deal even though the previous one took a decade of negotiations, but for that to happen they need relief from crippling sanctions. They need the United States to show a genuine interest in coming back to the negotiating table. We’ve all seen how in the course of a day or a tweet tensions can suddenly flare up.
President Rouhani’s speech was an invitation to President Trump to come to the negotiating table. He outlined what needs to be done and Iran’s willingness and desire to choose peace over war. Washington has expressed similar sentiments at times but has then quickly reverted to rebuking and enforcing stricter sanctions rather than alleviating them. It’s in everyone’s best interest that all parties involved keep a cool head and come to agreeable terms, for the sake of humanity.
Sarah Abed is a political analyst with BRICS.
Featured Video
The 17th Amendment Allowed Empire
or go to
Aletho News Archives – Video-Images
Book Excerpt
World War Two Was Not a Just War
By David Swanson | September 20, 2016
Excerpted from the just released book War Is Never Just.
World War II is often called “the good war,” and has been since the U.S. war on Vietnam to which it was then contrasted. World War II so dominates U.S. and therefore Western entertainment and education, that “good” often comes to mean something more than “just.” The winner of the “Miss Italy” beauty pageant earlier this year got herself into a bit of a scandal by declaring that she would have liked to live through World War II. While she was mocked, she was clearly not alone. Many would like to be part of something widely depicted as noble, heroic, and exciting. Should they actually find a time machine, I recommend they read the statements of some actual WWII veterans and survivors before they head back to join the fun.[i] For purposes of this book, however, I am going to look only at the claim that WWII was morally just. … continue
Blog Roll
Recent Comments
Unome on How hawks in US are trying to… Unome on Pentagon orders withdrawal of… Unome on 15 nations have made their pos… Kayleen on UK has flown 200 spy missions… poisonedwater on Hamas slams Biden for linking… poisonedwater on 15 nations have made their pos… Bill Francis on Britain At War-The Final … roberthstiver on Pro-Palestinian protests grow… roberthstiver on UK has flown 200 spy missions… Bill Francis on Pro-Palestinian protests grow… nancy hollander on How Britain Sabotaged Ukraine… 5 dancing shlomos on ‘We Get Paid to Vaccinate Your…
Aletho News- Dr. Peter McCullough Reveals How Much Doctors Were BRIBED to Push COVID Shots
- Green Blob Tells Government to Spend £30 Billion on Machine to Remove CO2 From the Air
- Western Media Ignites War on China in Sports
- 15 nations have made their position on the WHO sovereignty grab public before the WHA meeting commences
- Pentagon orders withdrawal of all US combat troops from Niger
- Hamas slams Biden for linking Gaza cease-fire to hostage release
- Gideon Falter, Campaign Against Antisemitism instruments of the Zionist entity
- How hawks in US are trying to demonize students protesting Israeli genocide
- Calling out UK for its brazen protection of pro-occupation forces
- Israel carpet bombs Gaza with no goal in sight
- If Americans Knew
- Israeli airstrikes in southern Gaza, invasion in central Gaza, carpet bombing in north – Day 217
- Strapped down, blindfolded, held in diapers: Israeli whistleblowers detail abuse of Palestinians in shadowy detention center
- Fighter jets, attack drones hammer Rafah; catastrophe looms – Day 217
- What it’s like to be used as a human shield by the Israeli army
- Detailed study finds 99% of pro-Palestine protests at US universities are peaceful
- VIDEO: Armenian Christians under siege by Israel
- Ex-Israeli special forces agent says he went ‘undercover’ at UCLA protest encampment
- The mainstream media distorted our anti-Vietnam War protests 50 years ago. They’re following the same strategy today
- Pete McCloskey, longtime supporter of Palestinians and USS Liberty veterans, has passed away
- Israel will kill Palestinians just fine without US heavy payload weapons; humanitarian crisis spirals – Day 216
- International Solidarity Movement
- The Right to Resist Genocide by Land and By Sea
- Women Support Center in Nablus empowers women and girls, resists gendered violence and the Occupation
- Palestinian Family at Um Darit Harassed and Isolated
- Occupation Forces Targeted Series of Strikes Kills 7 Aid Workers in Gaza
- Israeli army and police escalate repression of human rights volunteers following Knesset hearing.
- Illegal Israeli Settlers Continue Attacks on Shepherds in Masafer Yatta
- Second Friday of Ramadan at Qalandia Checkpoint
- Deceptively “quiet” first week of Ramadan in Jerusalem: a result of restrictions at Qalandia checkpoint
- Masafer Yatta: Israeli Settlers Burn a Family Car in Um Dhorit
- Violent arrest of Palestinian women in Susiya, Masafer Yatta
- Richie Allen
- The Richie Allen Show Returns Tomorrow Wednesday April 24th
- Call Richie Today Monday March 11th From 4.30pm
- Connect To The Richie Allen Show WhatsApp Today
- NHS Asks Patients To Choose From 12 Genders, 10 sexual Preferences & 159 Religions
- The Richie Allen Show Moves To A New Time Slot From Monday Nov 20th
- Starmer Will Sack Shadow Ministers Who Vote For Gaza Ceasefire
- AI Tool Can Predict Heart Attacks Years In Advance
- Nepal Bans TikTok To Preserve Social Harmony
- Bloke Appointed Boss Of Womb Health Charity
- WHO – “Gaza’s Biggest Hospital Becoming A Cemetery”
- No Tricks Zone
- New Paper: Global Warming Leading To HIMALAYAN COOLING, Preventing Glacial Melt!
- DNA Evidence Reveals Domestic Cats, Dogs, African Wildcats, Frogs Lived In The Arctic 9000 Years Ago
- -80°C: Antarctic Vostok Station Records “Extreme Winter Cold”…Not Even Winter Yet!
- The German E-Vehicle Nightmare, 2024 Q1 Sales Plummet 14%… “Graveyard” For Unsold Cars
- Newly Discovered 90,000-Year-Old Human Footprints Reveal How Much Higher Sea Levels Used To Be
- Germany’s Economic Bloodbath Worsens As Green Revolution Causes Economy To Bleed To Death
- Water Vapor Absorbs 84 Times More Radiation Than CO2 … Clouds Drove 89% Of 1982-2018 Warming
- The 97% Consensus Claim Is In Fact 97% Bogus
- Post-1980s Increases In Shortwave Radiation Explains Europe’s Warming Trends Far Better Than CO2
- “A Thing Where Every Part Of Your Life Just Confirms What It Is That You Want To Believe”
Aletho News 
