Kiev’s Alleged Proof That Russia Blew Up The Kakhovka Dam Doesn’t Stand Up To Scrutiny
BY ANDREW KORYBKO | JUNE 9, 2023
The Ukrainian secret police claimed on Friday to have intercepted a call between two Russian soldiers where one of them allegedly admitted that their side blew up the Kakhovka Dam. That person explicitly denied that Kiev was responsible and instead said that it was a false flag attack by Russia’s own troops that supposedly went awry, which would explain their losses downstream. They also said that the flooding killed thousands of animals in a nearby safari park.
Nobody should believe the account that was shared in this recording since it doesn’t stand up to scrutiny. For starters, it’s already suspicious enough that the three talking points made in the recording – that Ukraine wasn’t responsible, Russia staged a false flag that didn’t go according to plan, and thousands of animals also died – perfectly align with Kiev’s official narrative. The chances that one of their opponents echoed all three points in a single secretly recorded conversation is highly unlikely.
The second reason why this is dubious is because it was shared a day after Foreign Minister Kuleba angrily rejected Turkiye’s pragmatic proposal to form a multilateral committee for investigating the Kakhovka Dam’s destruction. Kiev would have certainly known that refusing to participate in a truly neutral investigation into this war crime would make their side look guilty, which explains why they fabricated this recording in order to desperately divert attention towards Russia instead.
And finally, the global media attention that this recording just generated serves to drown out the discussion that Tucker Carlson sparked in the first episode of his new show on Twitter where he informed the 110 million people who watched it about a damning Washington Post report from December. Ukrainian Major General Andrey Kovalchuk not only admitted to plotting the exact same terrorist attack that happened half a year later, but even to testing its viability with US-supplied HIMARS missiles.
The content, timing, and context within which the Ukrainian secret police just shared their alleged proof that Russia blew up the Kakhovka Dam are all questionable in and of themselves, let alone when taken together. No honest observer would extend credence to this recording, which is arguably fabricated for the reasons that were explained. Those who sincerely want to know the truth about what happened should pressure Ukraine to join Turkiye’s proposed UN-led multilateral investigation committee.
Kuleba’s innuendo that the deck would be stacked against Kiev in the event that it participates in a UN-led investigation is discredited by the fact that this global body has consistently taken its side in every one of its disputes against Russia since the start of the special operation. Unlike UNGA votes where countries can be bribed or pressured to influence the political outcome of this process, however, no such trickery can take place in an evidence-driven investigation where Russia participates as an equal party.
Ukraine knows that Turkiye’s proposal would prove that it blew up the Kakhovka Dam exactly as Kovalchuk admitted to the Washington Post that Kiev had been plotting to do since late last year, which is why it refuses to join and instead fabricated this “evidence” as its excuse. Nevertheless, Russia, Turkiye, and other UN members can still proceed with this investigation even without Ukraine if they have the will to do so, but the West might claim that it’s “illegitimate” so long as Kiev isn’t involved.
In the court of public opinion, however, Ukraine comes off as guilty by refusing to participate in a truly neutral investigation into this war crime. Having its infamously corrupt secret police share a suspicious recording that coincidentally echoes all three of Kiev’s talking points and then claiming that the case is closed on this issue isn’t something that someone who’s innocent would do. Anyone who claims otherwise has an agenda in gaslighting others in order to cover up for Kiev’s culpability in this war crime.
Bipartisan opposition to US government spying grows – poll
RT | June 8, 2023
For the first time in over a decade, less than half of Americans – 48% – believe it is sometimes necessary to relinquish freedom to the government in exchange for protection from terrorism, according to an AP-NORC poll published on Thursday.
Half of the poll’s 1,081 respondents countered that sacrificing one’s rights was never necessary for security. When the pollster asked the same questions in 2011, nearly two thirds (64%) had accepted the possibility they might have to jettison their liberty to fight terrorism, with one third disagreeing.
Declining trust in US intelligence agencies and their leadership appeared to play a significant role in the shift. Just 18% of poll respondents said they had “a great deal of confidence” in the leaders of the intelligence community, and while 49% had “some” confidence, nearly a third (31%) had hardly any.
The sharpest decline was among Republicans, only 44% of whom supported sacrificing liberty for security – in comparison with 55% of Democrats and 42% of independents. In 2011, 69% of Republicans had prioritized protection over freedom.
Accompanying the decline in trust has been a growing awareness that Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), while explicitly intended to spy on foreign targets, is also used to surveil millions of Americans. The infamous loophole makes any American contacted by a foreign target fair game for warrantless wiretapping by US intelligence. This deeply unpopular scheme has united even some Republicans and some Democrats in Congress against it.
That FISA warrants illegally obtained by the FBI were used to spy on former president Donald Trump during his 2016 campaign has only strengthened some Republicans’ rejection of that system.
Asked about different types of warrantless wiretapping, poll respondents found eavesdropping on domestic phone calls to be the most objectionable tactic, with 67% of respondents opposing it. While 62% found reading domestic emails equally beyond the pale, three out of five responses opposed monitoring domestic text messages as well.
A plurality even opposed government eavesdropping in situations involving reading emails of foreign origin and listening to phone calls from outside the US, with just 28% thinking warrantless wiretapping was acceptable in either case. Monitoring internet searches for “suspicious activity” attracted more approval, with 30% favoring it, and more disapproval, with 48% being against it at the same time.
The Biden administration has urged Congress to renew Section 702, which will otherwise expire at the end of the year. Claiming it is critical to fighting terrorism overseas, intelligence officials nevertheless declined to share specifics on how they use the controversial program earlier this year, instead merely informing lawmakers that every court that has examined the FISA provision has “found it to be constitutional.”
Billionaire Biden Donor Bankrolled 2020 Election Social Media Censorship Effort
BY LEE FANG | JUNE 8, 2023
The Department of Homeland Security’s controversial social media censorship effort during the 2020 election was propped up by a partisan billionaire.
Newly obtained documents, acquired through a public records request, confirm that Pierre Omidyar, the billionaire founder of eBay, financed a specialized portal maintained by the Center for Internet Security (CIS). This portal was used to facilitate the swift removal of predominantly conservative messages on Twitter and Facebook during the previous presidential election.
Omidyar, previously identified as one of the largest donors to campaign groups supporting Joe Biden’s presidential bid, donated $45 million to the “Sixteen Thirty Fund” in 2020. This dark money group mobilized Democratic voters and financed pro-Biden Super PACs. However, Omidyar’s direct involvement in the DHS partnership, which is now facing increased scrutiny, remained undisclosed until now.
The funding provided by Omidyar to CIS was used to establish a Misinformation Reporting Portal (MiRP). A team from CIS continuously monitored this portal 24/7 from September 28 to November 6, 2020, as revealed in a post-election report, “Election Infrastructure Misinformation Reporting.” The Democracy Fund, Omidyar’s foundation, supported the creation of the MiRP through a direct grant, according to the report.
The misinformation reporting portal served to rapidly identify and remove instances of alleged misinformation. CIS’s report acknowledged that the flagged content ranged from “intentional misinformation to honest mistakes.” Of the content reported by CIS, 61% “resulted in positive action,” which the group defined as content takedowns or labeling.
This MiRP system was used by a coalition of liberal-leaning research groups and overseen by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (CISA), a sub-agency of the DHS that has led the government’s push to censor social media. Despite government backing for the project, the effort was partisan – the Democratic National Committee was part of the consortium, but not the Republican National Committee, indicating a partisan bias.
“In addition to sharing all reports with CISA, some reports were shared with the Federal Bureau of Investigation,” the CIS report noted. The effort focused on “election narratives” deemed conspiratorial or inaccurate.
Tax records appear to confirm the Omidyar funding. The Democracy Fund’s 990 disclosure shows that it donated $130,000 to CIS in 2020. The grant, however, is listed as support for “election security best practices,” a vague description that belied the true function of the MiRP portal.
CIS did not respond to a request for comment. The Omidyar Network discussed this inquiry with me but stopped responding before publication.
Evidence of this MiRP system first emerged in emails I obtained from a visit to Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters in December. In an email thread dated October 1, 2020, Twitter attorney Stacia Cardille mentioned receiving outreach from DHS, forwarding a censorship demand from CISA, CIS official Aaron Wilson, and a representative from the Election Integrity Partnership, a coalition monitoring misinformation.
The alleged misinformation mentioned in the October 1 thread revolved around conservative warnings regarding potential risks associated with mail-in voting—a concern voiced by partisans from both sides. Twitter, however, took action against conservative accounts but did not similarly act against Democrats who warned against mail-in ballots, as I’ve previously reported. For instance, former D.N.C. chairman Howard Dean tweeted during the election: “Do not vote by mail. Ok to vote now early and drop your ballot off in person at the proper office. Too late to trust trumps postmaster thug.”
The Dean tweet was noted by Twitter’s content moderation team but no action was taken, while similar messages warning against mail-in voting from conservative accounts were censored.
The CIS report provides a comprehensive explanation of the public-private apparatus employed to influence content on social media. In doing so, the report also debunks recent myths. In April, MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan made a false claim that journalist Matt Taibbi deliberately misrepresented his case under oath during his congressional testimony on CISA’s role in shaping social media decisions. Hasan suggested that Taibbi had willfully conflated CISA with CIS during his testimony. This claim led Representative Stacey Plaskett (D-V.I) to accuse Taibbi of perjury in a letter.
The CIS report I obtained contradicts Hasan and Plaskett, clarifying that “CIS and CISA worked together to ensure the reports were sent to the social media platform within an hour of their receipt.” CIS also played a pivotal role in triaging the material while maintaining the government partnership with disinformation research think tanks.
In essence, CIS and CISA worked in close collaboration to exert pressure on platforms like Twitter, aiming to remove conservative political expression deemed untrustworthy. The project was a public-private venture, overseen by government agencies, and supported by a system financed entirely by a Democratic donor.
The report makes recommendations for future elections. It notes that misinformation reporting may require dedicated government funding, with a “transition to the operational side of CIS” under the CISA umbrella, as well as better operational support from social media platforms.
The CIS report is part of a batch of documents recently received from Kate Starbird, an advisory board member of CISA at the University of Washington, via a records request. As I reported on Tuesday, the Justice Department intervened last year to impede the release of records from Starbird’s team. Starbird has also accused journalists seeking these records of “harassment,” likening it to a cyber attack.
Nevertheless, these inquiries are part of a broader public examination of government-backed censorship. As previously reported, Starbird’s advisory panel advocated for an expanded role for CISA, calling for an extension of its monitoring to include various platforms such as social media, mainstream media, cable news, hyper-partisan media, talk radio, and other online resources.
To support their argument for such a broad mandate, CISA advisors highlighted the detrimental effects of alleged misinformation on key democratic institutions like the courts, as well as other sectors such as the financial system and public health measures, suggesting that virtually any major public interest concern may be used as justification for broad censorship.
Clinton Foundation Whistleblowers Have Chance to Bust IRS & Expose Hillary’s ‘Pay-to-Play’
By Ekaterina Blinova – Sputnik – 08.06.2023
Clinton Foundation whistleblowers are due to provide new information to the US Tax Court concerning the IRS’ apparent unwillingness to investigate Bill and Hillary Clinton’s charity. The IRS, FBI, and DoJ have already been under the spotlight over their apparent “preferential treatment” of Joe Biden’s son Hunter.
The Hunter Biden IRS whistleblower case has largely eclipsed another Tax Court development that could have serious consequences for US dynastic political families. Late last month, US Tax Court Judge David Gustafson reinvigorated a years-long whistleblower case concerning the Clinton Foundation, a charity run by Bill and Hillary Clinton.
Two forensic investigators-turned-whistleblowers, John Moynihan and Larry Doyle, filed a lawsuit over the IRS’ apparent unwillingness to look into the charity’s alleged misdeeds.
Despite the IRS commissioner repeatedly trying to trash the case, the judge rejected the agency’s latest motion to dismiss and asked for new arguments by June 30, 2023.
What’s in the Clinton Foundation Whistleblower Case?
The story of the years-long case goes back to August 2017, when Doyle and Moynihan first submitted a whistleblower complaint with the IRS accusing the Clinton Foundation of tax crimes. However, in November 2018 they received a preliminary denial from the revenue service.
Nonetheless, the whistleblowers did not give up. On December 13, 2018, Doyle and Moynihan testified before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, suggesting that the Clinton Foundation owes the US government between $400 million and $2.5 billion in taxes. According to the forensic investigators, the charity does not operate as a tax-exempt 501(c)(3) organization, but acts as nothing short of a foreign agent.
“As such, the foundation should’ve registered under FARA (Foreign Agents Registration Act). Ultimately, the foundation and its auditors conceded in formal submissions that it did operate as a (foreign) agent, therefore the foundation is not entitled to its 501c3 tax-exempt privileges as outlined in IRS 170 (c)2,” Moynihan stated at the time.
The two whistleblowers told US lawmakers that they had collected approximately 100 exhibits in excess of 6,000 pages, expressing bewilderment at the IRS’ hesitation to investigate the Clinton Foundation case.
Tax Court Judge Busted IRS
Having received the final denial from the IRS to look into the issue in February 2019, Doyle and Moynihan filed a lawsuit with the US Tax Court.
On October 8, 2020 they scored their first victory: Tax Court Judge Gustafson ruled that the IRS’ Whistleblower Office (WBO) had “abused its discretion” in trying to dismiss “specific credible documentation” put forward by Doyle and Moynihan, thereby allowing the case against the Clintons’ charities to proceed.
The judge also raised concerns over the IRS’ handling of the case and detailed mistakes in the filing of specific forms by the IRS Criminal Investigation (CI) division and omissions in its conclusions concerning the Clinton Foundation whistleblowers’ complaint. Judging from the division’s documentation, it remained unclear whether the IRS had used the information provided by the whistleblowers in any investigation into the charity. The judge noted, however, that he had reasons to believe that the IRS had engaged in some investigative activity concerning the Clinton charity in coordination with the FBI.
“Prompted by petitioners’ [Doyle and Moynihan] allegations – explicit and detailed, with names, dates, and locations – the WBO’s email put a single direct question to CI: ‘Can you please confirm that IRS CI is not working with these [whistleblowers] on any investigation with these [target] entities?’ CI’s reply was a non-answer that looks like it may have been a deliberate evasion: ‘The claim was appropriately declined by criminal investigation.’ But was CI ‘working with’ petitioners or not? CI did not say,” Gustafson wrote at the time.
Besides this, in 2018 the CI “had to be asked three times to complete its Form 11369 for this case, giving ‘unacceptable’ responses to the WBO and grousing that it’s ‘somebody else’s job,'” the judge pointed out.
In April 2021, Tax Court Judge Gustafson suggested in his new ruling that the IRS Whistleblower Office had been withholding important information concerning the case: “The [IRS] Whistleblower Office must further investigate to determine whether CI proceeded with an investigation based on petitioners’ information and collected proceeds… It seems clear we should remand the case to the WO so that it can explore this gap,” the judge stated.
Durham Report Sheds New Light on Clinton Foundation Probes
Meanwhile, on October 26, 2021, Moynihan and Doyle announced that they had been approached and interviewed by Special Counsel John Durham, who at the time was investigating the origins and handling of the Trump-Russia probe.
Earlier, on September 24, 2021, The New York Times broke a story that the special counsel had sought information about the FBI’s Clinton Foundation inquiry within the framework of his probe, which was launched in 2019.
Later, in May 2023, Special Counsel Durham revealed in his 306-page final report that the FBI’s Washington, New York, and Little Rock, Ark., field offices had at least four ongoing probes into the Bill and Hillary Clinton charity’s apparent “pay-to-play” schemes during the 2016 election cycle. Still, all four investigations were abruptly closed prior to the 2016 Election Day, with Hillary running as the Democratic presidential nominee.
Durham particularly pointed out that senior FBI and Justice Department officials engaged in slowing down and closing the aforementioned investigations. “Both senior FBI and department officials placed restrictions on how those matters were to be handled such that essentially no investigative activities occurred for months,” the special counsel emphasized.
Durham Report and Hunter Biden IRS Whistleblower Case May Help
Judge Gustafson’s May 30 ruling gives an opportunity to Doyle and Moynihan to incorporate Durham’s allegations in their forthcoming court filings, which they should submit no later than June 30, as per Just the News, a US independent media outlet founded by award-winning investigative journalist John Solomon.
In addition, a specific recent ruling in a Tax Court case titled Berenblatt vs. IRS Commission could also come in handy for the Clinton Foundation whistleblowers, the media outlet noted.
“Whistleblowers may be granted limited discovery if they make a significant showing that there is material in the IRS’s possession indicative of bad faith on the IRS’s part in connection with the case or of an incomplete administrative record compiled by the IRS,” the ruling stated concerning the Berenblatt vs. IRS Commission.
The IRS’ lax handling of the Doyle and Moynihan complaint, as well as the agency’s ambiguous conduct and apparent unwillingness to look into the Clinton Foundation appear especially suspicious in light of the FBI’s closure of a whopping four probes into the charity.
Previously, similarly controversial behavior by IRS, FBI, and DoJ officials was exposed by Hunter Biden IRS whistleblowers.
On May 26, 2023, IRS supervisory criminal investigator Gary Shapley appeared before the US House Ways and Means Committee and provided seven bombshell documents totaling 23 pages to confirm his claims regarding the apparent “preferential treatment” of Hunter Biden, the son of President Joe Biden. The documents presented by the agent indicated that starting from at least 2020, DoJ officials made repeated attempts to thwart his investigation.
Shapley blew the whistle in April. After that, the IRS veteran and his 12 subordinates were expelled from the probe at the request of the DoJ. What’s more, one of Shapley’s subordinates, who asked his seniors about the rationale behind booting the team out, was threatened and silenced by IRS officials.
What Will Happen to Clinton Foundation if Doyle and Moynihan Win?
Wall Street analyst and investigative journalist Charles Ortel has been conducting a separate private investigation into the Clinton Foundation for the last several years. Ortel is an old hand in exposing potential financial fraud: he was the first to raise a red flag about General Electric (GE) shortly before the company’s stock crashed in 2008.
In an interviews with Sputnik, the Wall Street analyst repeatedly drew attention to the FBI, DoJ, and IRS’ failures to see obvious discrepancies in the Clinton Foundation’s operations and financial documentation. Per Ortel, the charity’s case remains the largest unprosecuted fraud ever.
Separately, the analyst referred to the US mainstream media’s unwillingness to touch upon the matter, too. The US mainstream press either silences or ridicules attempts to investigate the Clinton Foundation’s apparent “pay-to-play” schemes much in the same vein as it tried to trash the Hunter Biden “laptop from hell” story.
“The judge [Gustafson] and his staff likely have extensive evidence indicating that the entity originally known as ‘The William J. Clinton Presidential Foundation’ and subsequently operating under many other names is not validly authorized by the IRS or by any other government to conduct charitable activities as a nonprofit organization,” Ortel told Sputnik.
“Nonetheless, Bill Clinton and his associates have solicited more than $2 billion in the guise of charity but have failed to account for its financial results in the manner required by applicable laws and regulations.”
“Because Bill Clinton also is active politically and pursuing personal profit, there is great suspicion that the Clinton Foundation Charity Network is the core of an illegal conspiracy where donors seeking political favors from Clinton and his globalist allies exchange contributions for favors inside America and around the world. The Clinton approach and past failures by many governments to purge charity fraud and political corruption from the system likely inspired the Biden family to follow the Clinton script. Who knows how many other politicians will milk supposed charities for personal and political gain?” the Wall Street analyst pointed out.
If Doyle and Moynihan win their case in the US Tax Court and subsequent IRS/FBI investigations into the Clinton Foundation are conducted in good faith, it is likely that the alleged fraud and pay-to-play schemes would be proven, according to the analyst.
He believes that the Clinton Foundation should be placed in conservatorship and run by a nonpartisan group of Trustees, who would then be charged with constructing accurate records from October 23, 1997 to present.
“This course may not be possible because there are major defects in the known public record calling into question whether ‘The William J. Clinton Presidential Foundation’ actually existed after April 25, 2005 when Articles of Incorporation and Bylaws were defectively amended,” Ortel continued. “In a worst case scenario for the Clinton family and for ‘Trustees,’ all ‘revenues’ of ‘The Clinton Foundation’ would become taxable personal income to the co-conspirators while some expenses might be tax deductible. On top of this financial burden, fines and penalties and interest might also be assessed.”
“Not only should the FBI investigate the Clinton Foundation fraud conspiracy, but appropriate government authorities must investigate why current and former presidents who illegally abuse public charities are insulated and protected from prosecution and then discipline all bad actors involved forcefully and publicly,” the Wall Street analyst concluded.
DeSantis Says ‘Weaponization’ of Federal Law Enforcement ‘Mortal Threat to Free Society’
Sputnik – 09.06.2023
The “weaponization of federal law enforcement” in the United States is a “mortal threat to a free society,” Florida Governor and Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis said Thursday, following the news about the indictment of former US President Donald Trump.
“The weaponization of federal law enforcement represents a mortal threat to a free society. We have for years witnessed an uneven application of the law depending upon political affiliation. Why so zealous in pursuing Trump yet so passive about Hillary [Clinton] or Hunter [Biden]?” DeSantis tweeted, adding that “the DeSantis administration will bring accountability to the DOJ [Department of Justice], excise political bias and end weaponization once and for all.”
Earlier on Thursday, Trump said on Telegram that “the corrupt Biden administration” had informed his lawyers that he had been indicted in a federal investigation over alleged mishandling of classified documents at his Florida residency and summoned to appear in court on Tuesday. The ex-president expressed despair over the indictment, pointing out that he is being prosecuted as polls show he is by far the leading candidate among both Republicans and Democrats.
American media, citing sources, reported on Thursday that Trump was facing seven counts, including willful retention of national defense information, corruptly concealing docs, conspiracy to obstruct justice, and false statements.
US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said later in the day that it was “unconscionable” for US President Joe Biden to indict “the leading candidate opposing him,” adding that Biden “kept classified documents for decades” and calling the situation “a dark day for the United States of America.” McCarthy said House Republicans “will hold this brazen weaponization of power accountable.”
Trump has denied any wrongdoing in the classified documents case and the other three criminal probes he is involved in, including charges of falsifying business records and the former president’s alleged involvement in the events on Capitol Hill on January 6, 2021.
Biden Regime Censors Disclosure Of 2020 Election Censorship Documents
By Didi Rankovic | Reclaim The Net | June 7, 2023
Censoring proof of censorship – that would be a new low for the current US administration, but that is what newly released documents – emails – are now revealing as the inner workings of the Biden White House related to online speech, and what they say they consider to be “misinformation.”
The new documents refer to the time last September when some journalists and civil rights advocates wanted to probe the role of the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in censorship on social sites – a part of what is now widely considered collusion between various government agencies, and privately-owned tech giants.
But, it would appear that instead of being forthcoming about this information – in the spirit of democracy, and also, since the cat was already out of the bag anyway – the government, via the Department of Justice (DoJ) got busy trying to effectively sabotage these efforts, Lee Fang reported.
The method was to “at least” slow down the rate at which public records having to do with the authorities’ behavior were released to the public.
These latest revelations have to do with DHS’ Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (CISA), University of Washington (UW) professor and a CISA advisory panel member Kate Starbird, who also heads a “disinformation” outfit at the university (funded by the government), and requests from the Daily Caller News Foundation, Tech Inquiry, journalist Lee Fang, and the Government Accountability Project, all separately asking for records from the UW.
Requests varied, but all had to do with Starbird – her job was to assist CISA in “moderating” -i.e., censoring – some types of Twitter and Facebook content.
Instead of providing this information, Western District of Washington Assistant US Attorney Annalisa Cravens emailed Starbird saying that CISA informed them about the requests – and, “(…) We would ask to have an extension of time before the records are produced so that we can have time to review them and assess whether we’ll have to file suit to protect them from disclosure,” the email reads.
This is an example not only of how the power the government has given itself to be the arbiter of what content, particularly political, or construed as political, people have access to online – but also of how it goes about trying to minimize the perception of its involvement.
“It is not clear which documents may have ultimately been delayed, withheld, or redacted because of the Biden administration’s interference in the public records request,” Lee Fang writes.
The FBI, Ukraine’s Censorship Assistant
By Adam Dick | Ron Paul Institute | June 7, 2023
Aaron Maté has been among a handful of reporters to whom Elon Musk granted access to Twitter records to uncover efforts by the United States government along with Twitter to censor communication on the social media platform in the time before Musk gained control over it. The newest revelations from Maté concern the US government, via the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), having acted as an assistant to the Ukraine government’s main intelligence agency, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), to seek censorship of 163 targeted Twitter accounts — Maté’s included — as well as personal information related to those Twitter accounts.
Maté’s chilling revelations here.
It is bad enough that the US government has been seeking to censor social media communication to advance the goals of power-hungry politicians, businessmen, and bureaucrats here in America. Now, comes revelations that, on top of that, the US government has been seeking to advance the censorship goals of, and hand over personal information of individuals using social media to, the government of Ukraine. Keep in mind that Ukraine is an intensely corrupt government, is overrun with nazis, and is apparently comfortable with targeting for assassination foreign individuals merely because those individuals have expressed views judged intolerable regarding Ukraine or its war with Russia.
The Ukraine government has also been relentless in suppressing free speech, opposition political parties, and the free exercise of religion within its borders.
Of course, the US assistance to Ukraine’s censorship effort has extended beyond Twitter. Maté notes in the concluding paragraph of his article:
News of the FBI’s work with Ukrainian intelligence to censor Twitter users also follows reporting from journalist Lee Fang that the FBI has pressured Facebook to remove accounts and posts deemed by the SBU to be Russian ‘disinformation.’ According to Fang, a senior Ukrainian official in regular contact with the FBI defined ‘disinformation’ in such broad terms that it could mean viewpoints that ‘simply contradict the Ukrainian government’s narrative.’
How about the US starts respecting the First Amendment, and stops assisting Ukraine in pursuing its authoritarian objectives?
Copyright © 2023 by RonPaul Institute
Querying the existence of a covid ‘pandemic’
Health Advisory & Recovery Team | June 6, 2023
Covid-19 has been described as a global pandemic but does this title give it a severity and indeed fear factor way beyond its actual impact?
The word pandemic used to have a very specific meaning. It was used to describe a scenario where there was extensive incapacitation of key workers and large numbers of deaths, including young people. A genuine pandemic is not something that would have needed billions of dollars in advertising for people to even notice and fear. Using this long-established definition of the word, we conclude that there was in fact no global pandemic in 2020. The word was deliberately misapplied and weaponised against an unsuspecting public. Let us be clear, this article is not questioning the existence of a virus SARS-CoV-2 or an illness named Covid-19, but even the choice of ‘SARS’ (Severe Acquired Respiratory Syndrome) as the name for this coronavirus was already setting the scene for systematic fear-mongering.
The notion of a ‘pandemic’ was relentlessly promulgated through mainstream media to ramp up fear in the population, to help enforce unprecedented lockdowns and other extremely harmful policies (e.g school closures and universal mask wearing) and to push through Emergency Use Authorisations of novel technology mRNA and viral vector DNA products.
This would not have been possible were it not for three false premises that covid was:
- novel;
- extremely lethal; and
- unprecedented.
It was none of these things. It was no more novel than numerous other viruses which emerge each year in terms of the ability to be recognised by our immune systems. It was no more lethal than bad influenza viruses of the past and was less lethal than seasonal influenza for the young. Intensive care stays were longer than have been observed with flu, though whether that was due to a virus directly or caused by our changed response to how we treated respiratory infections is unclear. Overall it was a treatable, seasonal respiratory virus mostly affecting the old and infirm.
HART has written previously on how similar the mortality was to the bad influenza winter of the year 2000. The mortality data for 2020 is unremarkable globally when compared to previous influenza seasons except perhaps in New York City and Northern Italy. In both of these outliers, the data emerging is raising uncomfortable questions about the relative contribution of the virus versus the impact of policy-related responses when considering the extraordinary number of deaths reported. In spite of these outliers, global mortality data shows no evidence of a global pandemic. It could be argued that a once in every 20 year event should not be minimised, but nor does it justify an all of society emergency response or the institution of a permanent biosecurity surveillance state.
Figure 1 showing ONS crude mortality rates since 1840
Without the highly flawed PCR case data and draconian global restrictions on doctors’ freedom to treat their patients as they saw fit, there would be nothing particularly notable about this year. Outside of PCR driven data, a small rise in the number of calls to ambulances for breathing difficulties was observed, though it is possible that hysteria and fear may be responsible for at least part of this. We might have noticed an unusually late spike in influenza-like illness but not much more. Mortality-wise, it would appear as a mid-range ‘bad flu’ year. It is worth reading the work of Professor Denis Rancourt on mortality data, who has been pointing out this inconvenient truth since early 2021.1,2
Interestingly, the WHO quietly altered the accepted definition of ‘pandemic’ in 2009, just before the so-called H1N1 ‘pandemic’. The rushed-to-market Pandemrix vaccine which was pushed hard in the face of the imaginary ‘pandemic’ was subsequently pulled from the market due to life-changing side effects (often in children), a signal picked first up in Finland but later found elsewhere.
In essence, they used exactly the same playbook in 2020, but seemed to have ironed out some of the ‘problems’ encountered the first time round. Vicious behavioural psychology tactics were the main tools used to ‘correct’ these ‘problems’. Shaming people into believing they may ‘kill granny’ was a master-stroke. They used guilt, shame and the threat of ostracism, these being some of the most powerful drivers of human behaviour. There was even an identical cast of characters; Fauci, Drosten and Gates, all reporting for duty, aided and abetted by the bought and paid for media machine working on 24 hour overdrive.
In 2003, an influenza pandemic was defined as follows:
“An influenza pandemic occurs when a new influenza virus appears against which the human population has no immunity, resulting in several simultaneous epidemics worldwide with enormous numbers of deaths and illness.”
In 2009, the WHO decided, in their infinite wisdom, to get rid of the words “enormous numbers of deaths and illness.” from the definition. You would think deaths and serious illness were the only meaningful characteristics of a ‘deadly pandemic’.
To successfully fight against the globalist mission creep of tyrannical public health measures, we must collectively stop stoking the ‘deadly pandemic’ fire. If we continue to allow this falsehood to embed in public consciousness, all of the unethical horrors enacted will simply be repeated for the next non-pandemic-pandemic.
Without the requirement for excess deaths and widespread serious illness, malevolent profit-driven interests can simply will a ‘pandemic’ into existence on finding any new mutation amongst the global virus population. A strategy to force countries to invest heavily in searching for genetic anomalies will fuel the pandemic creation industry. Once one is found, the response can be fuelled by using fraudulent test data and media advertising, as they did very successfully in 2020. We cannot allow this to happen again and must therefore reclaim the word ‘pandemic’ to ensure it is only applied in the correct way.
We expect a reflexive objection to this article from some quarters on the basis that the case has not been adequately argued that covid had minimal impact on overall mortality in 2020. This fact is irrelevant when challenging the terrifyingly inappropriate global response. The world’s population was sold a serious lethal deadly pandemic which – we were told – necessitated the reordering of society. The ‘new normal‘ as it was affectionately called by so many perfectly in-sync global leaders. In the event, we did not have a serious lethal deadly pandemic, and what has happened (and continues to happen) is based on a lie. Arguing about whether or not some bits of the lie might have a modicum of truth in them is a distraction from much bigger questions which need addressing.
Footnotes
Missouri v. Biden might be most important legal case in U.S. history
From what I’ve read, proof our federal government wants to kill free speech is overwhelming.
BY BILL RICE, JR. | JUNE 7, 2023
Until yesterday, I’d not read any documents in the lawsuit brought by the states of Missouri, Louisiana et al vs. President Biden. Because of this, I didn’t fully grasp the stunning claims made by the plaintiffs, nor realize how overwhelming the evidence is that supports this case.
Yesterday, I read the first 54 pages of a 354-page legal document that was filed with a federal district court in Louisiana on March 3, 2023.
I now better understand why some people believe this might be the most important legal case in U.S. history.
In a nutshell, attorneys for the plaintiffs are compiling and presenting a mountain of evidence that shows actors for the U.S. government have conspired to nullify the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
This Amendment was first for an important reason.
It states that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
The core issue at stake is should American citizens be allowed to have genuine “freedom of speech.”
In my view, the evidence already presented in this legal case proves beyond a reasonable doubt that a cadre of officials in government (and organizations working “in partnership” with government agencies) despise, fear and want to end “free speech.” In fact, they’ve already effectively blocked the free speech of millions of Americans.
In a democracy, free speech is vitally important as it makes dissent from prevailing narratives possible and thus protects the “natural rights” of citizens who may hold minority views. That is, without “free speech,” only the views of those who embrace “authorized” opinions would be allowed to participate in any meaningful way in democratic debates.
One can parse this lengthy document a thousand ways, but the bottom-line conclusion is that the U.S. government believes only its views should be allowed to be widely disseminated.
Even more terrifying, virtually all the important institutions in contemporary society defend and seemingly support the efforts of the federal government to censor any speech labeled “mis-“ or “disinformation.”
A few of my main take-aways from my (partial) reading of this must-read legal document:
All Hope is Not Lost
The fact that attorneys general from at least two U.S. states have filed such a lawsuit provides hope that the entire country has not yet become disciples and enforcers of Big Brother.
It is also significant that the push-back to mass censorship comes from the state level of our “republic” and not from the federal government itself. That is, the Attorney General of the United States should have brought this case. Instead, representatives of the U.S. government are vigorously defending mass censorship, and the effort to “abridge the freedom of speech.”
The Legal System Can Work
This document is 354 pages because it’s replete with transcripts from legal depositions and exhibits that the public would have not seen absent the commencement of this legal proceeding.
The document also proves the power of legal “discovery” wherein defendants have to turn over all relevant evidence such as emails, meeting records, etc. (although plaintiffs argue that the defendants have still not turned over every piece of “discovery” requested).
A healthy democracy hinges on “fact-finding” and a “search for the truth.” This lawsuit has made it possible for the people who are following this case (not enough people) to learn more about the activities of the most powerful individuals who work for the most powerful government on the planet.
A quick aside ….
In reading this summary of evidence, I was struck by how easy it was for plaintiffs’ attorneys to build their case.
The attorneys, investigators and staffers bringing this case are clearly intelligent professionals who’ve been very thorough in developing their evidence and trying to prove their case. That is, if they get a fair hearing (which I’m not sure they will), they should win this case with ease.
However, this example made me think of all the lawsuits and “fact-finding” exercises that have NOT occurred with any of the litany of crimes and scandals of our Covid times (and even before Covid).
One strongly suspects that if other teams of competent litigators and investigators had employed the same tools of discovery and depositions, every scandal of our times would also be just-as-easily exposed.
Just like I think about all of the mainstream news articles that are off limits to alleged “watchdog” journalists, I also think about all the lawsuits and prosecutions that are apparently off limits to the people and organizations who could bring such cases.
What’s the core issue in this case?
The first paragraph of the “motion for the injunction” describes what the plaintiffs are trying to prove (and have already proven as far as I am concerned).
- “Federal officials, including Defendants, have made a long series of public statements since at least 2018 demanding that social-media platforms increase their censorship of speech and speakers disfavored by these officials, and threatening adverse consequences – such as repeal or reform of Section 230 immunity under the Communications Decency Act (CDA), antitrust scrutiny or enforcement, increased regulation, and other measures – if the platforms do not increase censorship …. “ (emphasis added).”
Note: For more excerpts from the document, see Reader Comments (under “most recent.”)
Comments:
Laymen and legal scholars alike agree that the First Amendment does not compel any publisher to print any and all speech. For example, a private company like The New York Times can publish, or not publish, whatever speech it wants for whatever reason it wants.
The issue in this case is whether citizens living in the “town square” can use Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc. to share their opinions or facts.
Or, more specifically, can the government use its immense power to compel private companies to censor speech the government doesn’t like (speech labeled by the government as dangerous, extremist, false or basically “misinformation” or “disinformation” as the government defines these terms).
Plaintiffs argue that the federal government is using its power to abridge free speech. The federal government is doing this by threatening to effectively shut down social media companies who don’t comply with the government’s wishes.
The federal government could harpoon these companies by “reforming” or “amending” Section 230 of the CDA. This section grants legal immunity to such companies, meaning social media companies can’t be sued or criminally tried because of the speech of citizens who make posts on their platforms.
Paragraph 3 of the document explains the power of this “threat.”
“3. The threat of antitrust scrutiny or enforcement is also a major motivator to social-media platforms. For example, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has stated that the threat of antitrust enforcement is “an ‘existential’ threat” to his platform.”
The evidence – presented on scores of pages – clearly reveals this “threat” was made explicitly, implicitly, publicly and privately over and over and over by myriad employees of the U.S. government, including the President of the United States.
This makes one (almost) feel empathy for these social media companies, which have had a symbolic bazooka pointed at their heads by the U.S. government dating to the day “Joe Biden” allegedly won the presidential election over Donald Trump.
I write that I “almost” feel empathy for these companies because if anyone skims this document, he will quickly see that virtually every employee and key executive of these companies was eager and happy to accede to the demands of their pro-censorship rulers.
Those who read this document will see never-ending examples of government officials brow-beating and intimidating social media companies for NOT censoring MORE.
To me, these companies appear almost masochistic – as in they seemingly enjoyed their incessant scoldings. For example, social media employees often thanked their government minders for pointing out their transgressions, which they seem overly-eager to correct. (Here, the Stockholm Syndrome comes to mind).
The “stick” of repealing Section 230 is not the only motivation social media companies have for complying with Big Brother.
Numerous “carrots” also exist as almost every one of these companies also profits from big contracts with the federal government and/or receives large sums of money (such as vaccine advertising spends) for supporting the authorized narratives (or, more precisely, silencing the non-authorized narratives).
The Virality Project
The document makes many references to the Virality Project, an influential project commissioned by academics at Stanford University.
As I’ve written previously, the most important goal of the world’s real rulers in Covid times was/is the effort to fight “vaccine hesitancy.”
If people were hesitant about getting their Covid vaccines, the mRNA project would be a bust. Big Pharma and all the many entities that receives massive amounts of money from Big Pharma would not be pleased.
One thing that might make half the world skeptical of the “safe and effective” non-vaccines would be if the views of vaccine skeptics actually “went viral.”
This, very possibly, could have happened … absent mass censorship.
In my last article, I discussed several of the key “chess moves” our rulers have made to make sure they win this “game.”
Arguably, the most important move was making sure dissenting views did NOT go viral, a result which didn’t happen by chance … but by a coordinated effort to censor hundreds of millions of potential skeptics and critics.
Since the government doesn’t own Facebook (where two billion people share speech), the government had to “persuade” Facebook (Meta) to do their censoring for them.
This was a conspiracy, a massive one …
In reading this document, I was also stunned when I thought about all the employees and organizations that were involved in the effort to defeat the threat of “vaccine hesitancy” (and protect all the other many untrue Covid narratives).
I stopped reading after 54 pages, but this was enough to see that the actors in this conspiracy (a cover-up of the truth) included the President of the United States, all his key White House employees, the CDC, the Census Bureau, The Surgeon General and his staff, officials in the NIH (such as Anthony Fauci), many of the key members of Congress, all the new “fact checkers” and probably the White House chef.
Time and again, plaintiff’s attorneys present examples where government officials cite articles written by “journalists” at The New York Times or Washington Post that were used as a weapon to demand even more censorship among social media companies.
Surreally, this means our “free press” has been one of government’s key allies in suppressing free speech.
Government contractors, non-profits and think tanks were also brought in to help with the vital censorship chess moves.
Another hallmark of a conspiracy would be any evidence proving a coordinated initiative. The plaintiff’s attorneys have done an excellent job proving this happened. For example, the authors of the legal brief repeatedly show how the words “accountable” and “transparency,” were used ad nauseam by all the censorship conspirators.
When government actors told social media companies they would be “held accountable,” this was a not-too-subtle threat that they better do as told … Which, sadly and not surprisingly, they did.
The conspirators also incessantly demand “transparency” from social media companies.
The government didn’t just ask social media companies to do a little more censorship for the good of the country, they demanded access to all the algorithms, data bases, search queries, content-moderation policies, etc. that would prove companies were censoring the content the government said must be censored.
Amazingly, companies like Meta complied …. so, apparently, officials at the CDC and The Census Bureau (which for some reason took a lead role in enforcing censorship) and key White House staffers were looking at the same tools Meta used to see what Covid topics were trending on their platform.
The government would then tell the companies to ban such speech on their platforms.
Not only did government actors hold a gun to the social media companies’ heads, they wanted to see (and even use) the very tools that allow these companies to know what their users were posting.
As we’ve learned from the “Twitter files,” government officials also repeatedly zeroed in on key “disinformation super-spreaders” and made sure they were banned and punished.
Victims/targets of these censorship efforts include high-profile Covid skeptic like Alex Berenson, Steve Kirsch and Robert Kennedy, Jr., but they might as well have included Bill Rice, Jr, whose Facebook account has also been suspended (for no known or stated reason) multiple times.
Per the copious evidence in this legal brief, every time Meta banned someone or said some topic was now taboo, government officials were rarely placated, and demanded even more censorship. And, again, government officials kept demanding “transparency” to see that thy’s will was being done.
The irony of course is that the U.S. government is the least transparent entity on the face of the earth.
To be clear and to state what should be perfectly obvious by now, the multi-faceted censorship and “disinformation” programs (which pre-date Covid) were created and enforced to make sure no real government “transparency” is/was possible.
For our government officials, transparency is like sunlight or a silver crucifix to a vampire.
What will be the result of this lawsuit?
I actually don’t know what the plaintiffs are demanding except for the government to cease and desist with its efforts to compel censorship.
Speaking for myself, I’ve already seen enough evidence where this U.S. citizen won’t be mollified unless we have criminal prosecutions, the impeachment of President Biden and the censure of all the members of Congress who bullied these social media executives.
Also, the companies that went along with this need to be boycotted by every citizen that still cares about the First Amendment.
I’d also note that while Twitter has (largely) turned over a new leaf under the ownership of Elon Musk, the rest of the social media companies are censoring left and right just like they’ve been doing since “Joe Biden” was sworn into office. (This tells me these companies are betting on “Biden” prevailing in this lawsuit).
It’s not just Covid issues subject to mass censorship ….
For those who think the censorship regime only deals with Covid topics, I say you better think again … as this document also proves.
Plenty of sections of this document provide evidence showing that “disinformation” about Climate Change, election fraud and woke issues like “gender identification” will also continue to be subject to the whims of the government’s arbiters of truth.
For my part, I’m now convinced that what shouldn’t happen … will probably happen. This means, “Joe Biden” will probably win re-election and this case will probably be thrown out or the Supreme Court led by (captured?) John Roberts will ultimately side with the defendants.
If this happens, perhaps more Americans will belatedly understand the new legal precedent that has been set.
In the future, any speech that’s deemed “misinformation” by unelected bureaucrats (at say the CDC or EPA) can indeed be censored and banned.
It will be perfectly fine for presidents, Congressmen and surgeon generals to demand that social media companies censor unauthorized or “dangerous” speech. Furthermore, the government will be granted that “transparency” that tells them Meta or Google are following their orders.
Strangely, Substack wasn’t mentioned …
In reading this document, I was struck by the fact Substack (as far as we know) has yet to be targeted by the Censorship Czars.
My guess is that if this case is decided in favor of the defendants, this will no longer be the case. The “dangerous misinformation” I’ve been posting (and my readers in the Reader Comments) will suddenly be fair game for censorship as well.
Substack is replete with writers challenging the false Covid narratives, but this speech platform is also full of skeptics of Climate Change, writers who might not support the Ukraine War or central bank digital currencies … authors who think election fraud is real and correspondents who don’t like the “woke” transgender and pronoun malarky.
For the past 240 years, Americans thought the First Amendment gave them the “freedom” to share their views on controversial topics. If Biden and the U.S. government win this case, I suspect we’ll soon learn otherwise.
Taliban successfully eradicates poppy cultivation: Report
Toor Khan (right) razing a poppy field to the ground along with fellow Taliban members. (Photo Credit BBC)
The Cradle | June 8, 2023
The Taliban government of Afghanistan has carried out “truly unprecedented reductions in poppy cultivation” in 2023, according to a new analysis published by Alcis, a UK-based geographic information services firm specializing in geospatial data collection, statistical analysis and visualization.
The poppy reduction followed a ban on drugs in Afghanistan issued in April 2022 by Taliban leader Mullah Haibatullah, only seven months after the Islamic movement took power following the August 2021 US military withdrawal from the country.
Alcis reports that an effective ban on poppy cultivation is in place and that opium production in 2023 will be negligible compared to 2022. High resolution imagery analyzed by the firm shows that in the province of Helmand, poppy cultivation was reduced from 120,000 hectares in 2022 to less than 1,000 hectares in 2023. This amounts to the largest reduction in poppy cultivation ever recorded in the country, including after the Taliban banned poppy production in 2000, one year before losing power following the 2001 US invasion.
As a result, wheat cultivation now dominates provinces in the south and southwest, where some 80% of Afghanistan’s total poppy crop had previously been grown.
The Taliban announced the ban on poppy cultivation in April 2022, but allowed the harvest of the poppy crop planted in the fall of 2021, fearing that banning or destroying it so close to the harvest season and after farmers had invested considerable time and resources in their poppy fields would provoke widespread unrest.
The Taliban then banned the planting of new poppy crops moving forward and destroyed any poppy fields planted after that time in violation of the ban.
Over the course of the summer of 2022, the Taliban also targeted the methamphetamine industry by destroying the ephedra crop and ephedrine labs across the country.
These findings were confirmed by journalists from the BBC, who traveled to Afghanistan this month while embedded with Taliban members destroying remaining poppy fields with sticks.
The BBC noted that the loss of supply of Afghan heroin may lead to increases in the “synthetic drugs, which can be far more nasty than opium,” among US and European drug users.
The BBC noted further that “opium was also grown freely in areas controlled by the US-backed former Afghan regime, something the BBC witnessed prior to the Taliban takeover in 2021.”
Indeed, the heroin trade has played a role in the conflicts plaguing the war-torn country since the 1970s.
In the late 1970s and in the 1980s, the CIA relied on Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence Agency (ISI) and its Afghan mujahideen clients to wage war against the Soviet-backed Afghan government, and against Soviet forces which occupied the country in support of the government.
According to historian Alfred McCoy, the ISI, and mujahideen soon became key players in the burgeoning cross-border opium traffic.
McCoy writes that “The CIA looked the other way while Afghanistan’s opium production grew from about 100 tonnes annually in the 1970s to 2,000 tonnes by 1991. In 1979 and 1980, just as the CIA effort was beginning to ramp up, a network of heroin laboratories opened along the Afghan-Pakistan frontier. That region soon became the world’s largest heroin producer. By 1984, it supplied a staggering 60% of the US market and 80% of the European.”
McCoy writes further that, “Caravans carrying CIA arms into that region for the resistance often returned to Pakistan loaded down with opium – sometimes, reported the New York Times, ‘with the assent of Pakistani or American intelligence officers who supported the resistance.’”
As reporting from journalist Gary Webb showed, the CIA was transporting weapons by plane to its proxy army in Nicaragua, the Contras, while the planes returned to the US loaded with cocaine, during this same period. Declassified US government documents later acknowledged that US officials relied on the drug trade to fund arms purchases for the Contras.
The Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989 was followed by years of chaos as warlords competed for control of the country. In 1996, the Taliban came to power and imposed a measure of order on the country. In 2000, the Islamic movement banned poppy production.
However, US forces invaded Afghanistan in October 2001 and quickly toppled the Taliban. Poppy cultivation and the heroin trade flourished.
In 2004, Antonio Maria Costa, Executive Director United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, reported that opium cultivation increased by two-thirds that year and had spread to all 32 provinces, “making narcotics the main engine of economic growth” in the country.
In 2010, a growing Taliban insurgency prompted President Obama to launch his Afghan surge, which sent an additional 17,000 US troops to the country. The surge was launched at Marja, a remote market town in Helmand province.
Alfred McCoy writes that, “As waves of helicopters descended on its outskirts spitting up clouds of dust, hundreds of marines sprinted through fields of sprouting opium poppies toward the village’s mud-walled compounds. Though their targets were the local Taliban guerrillas, the marines were, in fact, occupying one of the capitals of the global heroin trade.”
McCoy noted further that the US-backed “Afghan army seemed to be losing a war that was now driven – in ways that eluded most observers – by a battle for control of the country’s opium profits. In Helmand province, both Taliban rebels and provincial officials are locked in a struggle for control of the lucrative drug traffic.”
As Simon Spedding of the University of South Australia observed, “The simple facts are that opium production was high under the US-influenced government of Afghanistan of the 1970s, decreased 10-fold by 2001 under the Taliban, and then increased 30-fold and more under the US to the same level as in the 1970s … These are facts, whereas the idea that the CIA runs opium from Afghanistan would be a conspiracy theory—unless, you thought about the United Nations statistics or happened to have been to Afghanistan.”
Saudis snub US push on Tel Aviv ties, oil prices, Syria during Blinken’s high-profile visit
Press TV – June 8, 2023
Saudi officials have snubbed US Secretary of State’s latest push for the Kingdom’s normalization of relations with the Israeli regime and his bid to win further concessions on oil prices and Riyadh’s recent resumption of ties with Syria and Iran during his high-profile visit to Saudi Arabia.
Speaking in a news conference alongside Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud in Riyadh on Thursday, the visiting Antony Blinken reiterated that Washington will continue to play an integral role in expanding normalization between the Tel Aviv regime and Saudi Arabia.
Blinken, who was in the kingdom as part of a US push to defuse rows that have touched on oil prices, and Riyadh’s opening to Iran, further insisted that normalizing relations between Israeli regime and its neighbors was a priority for Washington.
The Saudi foreign minister, however, rebuffed his American counterpart, saying that the kingdom believes “normalization of ties with Israel will have limited benefit without a pathway to peace for the Palestinians.”
“The Palestinian issue was and remains the central issue for Arab countries, and it is at the top of the kingdom’s priorities,” Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had also underlined during the Arab League summit in Jeddah on May 19.
“We will not delay in providing assistance to the Palestinian people in recovering their lands, restoring their legitimate rights and establishing an independent state on the 1967 borders with East al-Quds as its capital,” he further noted at the time.
Blinken also reiterated on Thursday that Washington will not normalize relations with Syria and does not support other nation’s normalization of ties with the government of President Bashar al-Assad.
For his part, Prince Faisal defended the landmark decision to lift Syria’s Arab League suspension, which came shortly after the start of the country’s foreign-sponsored conflict 12 years ago.
“Syria made very clear commitments to address concerns of the international community,” the chief Saudi diplomat said.
“We have differences of opinion but we’re working on finding a mechanism for us to be able to work together,” the Saudi foreign minister also pointed out during the press conference with the US secretary of state.
The Saudi foreign minister also highlighted that China and Saudi Arabia are close and strategic allies and have been increasing cooperation in the energy and financial sectors, and that “cooperation is likely to grow.”
Saudi ties with US, China not a ‘Zero-sum game’
He said Saudi Arabia’s ties with the United States and China were not a “zero-sum game.”
“I don’t ascribe to this zero-sum game,” Prince Faisal said in Riyadh. “We are all capable of having multiple partnerships and multiple engagements and the US does the same in many instances.
“So I’m not caught up in this really negative view of this. I think we can actually build a partnership that crosses these borders,” the top Saudi diplomat said.
Riyadh’s strengthening its commercial and security ties with Beijing comes as US influence wanes in the Middle East region.
Blinken was the second top US official to visit Saudi Arabia in less than a month, following a May 7 trip by White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan.
However, Blinken’s meetings with bin Salman and Persian Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) foreign ministers were relegated to the inside pages of Al-Watan and Okaz, the two major newspapers in Saudi Arabia.
Blinken and the crown prince had “open, candid” talks for an hour and 40 minutes, a US official said, covering topics including the conflict in neighboring Yemen, the war in Sudan, Israel, and human rights.
Riyadh has also leveraged its growing relationships with Russia and China as the Biden administration has pushed back against some Saudi demands including lifting restrictions on arms sales and help with sensitive high-tech industries.
Riyadh has clashed repeatedly with US President Joe Biden on its supply of crude oil to global markets, its willingness to partner with Russia in OPEC+ and its decision to restore full diplomatic relations with Iran in a deal brokered by China.
Featured Video
Marandi: Threat of Seizing Kharg Island & the Use of Nuclear Weapons
or go to
Aletho News Archives – Video-Images
Frlom the Archives
Iran War: United States Military Versus Israel Firsters
By James Petras | November 27, 2007
Why must Jewish organizations be and be seen as the loudest drum-beaters of all? Why can we not bring ourselves to say that military intervention is not on the table at all? Why not stash it under the table, out of sight and mount instead a diplomatic assault? – Leonard Fein, Forward
Introduction
As the White House and Congress escalate their economic sanctions and military threats against Iran, top military commanders and Pentagon officials have launched a counter-offensive, opposing a new Middle East War. While some commentators and journalists, like Chris Hedges (Truthdig, November 13, 2007), privy to this high stakes inter-elite conflict, attribute this to a White House cabal led by Vice President Cheney, a more stringent and accurate assessment puts the Zionist Power Configuration (ZPC) in the center of the Iran war debate.
There is a great deal riding in this conflict – the future of the American empire as well as the balance of power in the Middle East. Equally important is the future of the US military and our already heavily constrained democratic freedoms. The outcome of the continuous and deepening confrontation between top US military officials and the Israel Firsters over US foreign policy in the Middle East has raised fundamental questions over self-determination, colonization, civilian primacy and military political intervention, empire or republic. These and related issues are far from being of academic interest only; they concern the future of the United States. … continue
Blog Roll
Aletho News- How Zionist Control Is Hurting US Interests
- Iran warns it may target US missile launch sites in UAE cities
- American Military Failure in Afghanistan
- Friendly Skies of Georgia: Are Israeli-Linked Drones Launching False Flags from Georgian Territory?
- The Three Big Lies about Mammography Screening
- Ukrainian Embassy in Beirut sheltering top Mossad agent
- Palestinian family displaced after settlers violently attack them in Humsa, Jordan Valley
- The EU never learns – except for the wrong lessons
- Iran attacks on UAE leaves RSF militia high and dry
- Hosting Washington’s war: Bahrain faces the consequences
- If Americans Knew
- No let-up in attacks on Gaza as Israel takes on Iran, Lebanon – Not a ceasefire Day 155
- ‘Of Course’: IDF Drops Case Against Soldiers Accused of Raping Palestinian Prisoner
- Don’t Fall for the Regime Change Talk. Israel Is ‘Mowing the Lawn’ in Iran
- Will Israel and the US wreck the Gulf States along with Iran?
- US so far burned through ‘years’ of munitions in Iran war: Report
- How the Israeli Tail Wags the American Dog
- Outdated intel likely led to deadly U.S. strike on Iranian elementary school, sources say
- Pentagon insider says high U.S official Douglas Feith reported to Netanyahu
- In fond memory of Walid Khalidi, the historian of Palestine
- 6 more Americans killed, as Israel ‘mows the lawn’ in Iran – Not a ceasefire Day 154
- No Tricks Zone
- Storing Green Energy To Last Germany 10 Days Would Require A 60-Million Tonne Battery
- New Studies: UK Sea Levels Were 4 Meters Higher Than Today During The Mid-Holocene
- Destructive Green New Deal: German Energy And Metal Group Warns Of Drastic Crisis
- New Study Documents A 20-Year Pause In Arctic Sea Ice Decline – Driven By Internal Variability
- Wake-up Call: Survey Shows Majority Of Germans Now Favor Postponing Climate Targets!
- Televised! Leading German Political Candidate Tells Schoolchildren CO2 Makes Sun Hotter!
- New Study: A Century Warming Of 1.1°C Is ‘Commonplace’ And ‘Not Unusual’ During This Interglacial
- New Study: ‘Internal Noise’ And Volcanic Forcing Can Trigger 10-15°C Warming Within Decades
- Glaciers Worldwide Are Suddendly Surging, Experts Blame Warming!
- Surprising Discovery: Sahara Is Greening…Billions Of Trees Where Once Thought To Be Barren
Aletho News 