Dozens of Israeli army vehicles, bulldozers, and drones wreaked havoc to the occupied West Bank city of Jenin on 30 October during an early morning raid that saw Palestinian resistance fighters powerfully confront the invading forces.
Following the devastating incursion, the Jenin Brigades issued a statement confirming that their fighters drove off the Israeli army, damaging at least 30 Israeli armored vehicles and leaving an unknown number of Israeli soldiers dead.
For its part, the Palestinian Health Ministry said at least four Palestinians were killed during the clashes in Jenin. About 120 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank since 7 October, with nearly 2,000 injured.
The Israeli forces besieged the rebellious city from the early hours of Monday, attacking Jenin Governmental Hospital, dropping bombs on residential buildings, destroying streets leading up to the adjacent refugee camp, placing dirt mounds to separate the camp from the city, and bulldozing major landmarks.
Mass arrest campaigns also continued across the occupied West Bank on Sunday night, as Tel Aviv targeted the Dheisheh camp, Janata, Nahalin, and Beit Fajjar in the Bethlehem district, as well as Hebron, Ramallah, and Nablus.
At least 60 Palestinians were detained, according to the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club.
Over 1,500 Palestinians have been arrested since the start of the Gaza-Israel war on 7 October, as Israel has launched nightly arrest campaigns in the occupied West Bank. At least 4,000 laborers from Gaza have also been detained, pushing the number of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons past 10,000.
A leaked policy document compiled by Israel’s Ministry of Intelligence calls for the depopulation of Gaza and the forced displacement of its residents to Egyptian territory, according to a copy published by the Sicha Mekomit news site on Saturday.
The ten-page document, dated October 13, recommends that Israel establish tent cities in Egypt’s Sinai peninsula to accommodate the Gazan population. These tent cities should then be developed into permanent settlements, with a“sterile zone of several kilometers” separating them from the Israeli border.
Under the plan, Gaza’s 2.3 million residents would be told that “there is no longer any hope of returning to the territories that Israel will occupy in the near future,” and that “Allah made sure that you lost this land because of the leadership of Hamas.”
US support will be vital to the plan’s success, the document states. Washington could put “pressure on Egypt, Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the Emirates to contribute to the initiative either in resources or in accepting displaced persons,” it notes, adding that Spain, Greece, and Canada could also be convinced to accept refugees from the strip.
Sicha Mekomit stated that the plan “amounts to the ethnic cleansing of Gaza.” According to the Ministry of Intelligence, however, the policy would be portrayed to the rest of the world as causing “fewer casualties among the civilian population” than the current cycle of Hamas attacks and overwhelming Israeli reprisals.
Despite its name, the Ministry of Intelligence does not oversee the activities of Israel’s security and intelligence agencies. Instead it prepares studies and policy papers for review by the government, which ultimately decides whether or not to implement them.
The ministry is headed by Gila Gamliel, a member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party. Gamliel is the second Netanyahu ally in recent weeks to recommend the ethnic cleansing of Gaza, with the Meshgav Institute, a right-wing think tank, publishing a similar policy paper last week describing the war as “a rare opportunity” for the “relocation and final settlement of the entire Gaza population.”
The Meshgav Institute is led by Meir Ben Shabat, who served as Netanyahu’s national security adviser from 2017 until 2021. The paper was published online but deleted after it drew international condemnation.
Netanyahu’s office told the Israeli newspaper Haaretz that the ministry’s document represents “initial thoughts” on the future of Gaza, and will not be considered until the war is over.
Spanish Social Rights Minister Ione Belarra has urged European leaders to take immediate action against Israel, including severing diplomatic ties and imposing economic sanctions, amid the intensified bombing and expanded ground operations against Hamas militants in the besieged Palestinian enclave.
She also called for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to be prosecuted for the alleged war crimes committed against civilians in Gaza.
“After this hellish night in Gaza, I have a very simple but very important message for European leaders. Do not make us complicit in genocide. Act. Not in our name,” Belarra said in a passionate video message on X on Saturday.
After this hellish night in Gaza I have a very simple but very important message for European leaders. Do not make us complicit in genocide. Act. Not in our name. pic.twitter.com/6YxdxaLDW9
More than 8,000 Palestinians, including 3,342 children, have been killed in Gaza since Israel’s air campaign began, according to the latest figures from the Gaza Health Ministry. The unprecedented Hamas raid into Israel, as well as hundreds of rocket strikes on Israeli territory earlier this month, left around 1,400 people dead, while 230 Israelis and foreigners were taken hostage, according to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
Addressing the severity of the current situation in Gaza and Israel’s disproportionate retaliation, the minister highlighted the termination of internet and telephone services in the strip, claiming that the move “has a very clear objective” of guaranteeing that “Israel commits crimes against humanity without consequences.”
“Our inaction is turning us into accomplices,” the minister stressed, arguing that “Israel believes that its international alliances guarantee its impunity.”
“We have to act now, tomorrow will be too late,” she continued, voicing her message to the EU leaders: “Cut diplomatic relations with the State of Israel. Carry out exemplary economic sanctions against those responsible for this genocide. And without a doubt, let’s take Netanyahu before the International Criminal Court, so that he can be tried for what he is, a war criminal.”
She also appealed to EU citizens to take to the streets and raise their voice so that “this genocide” comes to an end.
The IDF escalated air and ground attack on Gaza on Friday, causing a near-total communication blackout. Connectivity was partially restored over the weekend, but the Israeli blockade of Gaza continues; Netanyahu announced the “second stage” of the war against Hamas on Saturday.
An investigation by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has found out that an artillery shelling that killed a Reuters journalist and injured six others in southern Lebanon earlier this month was deliberate and came from Israel.
Video journalist Issam Abdallah, who worked for Reuters, died and six other journalists were wounded — including two from AFP, one of them seriously — in the Israeli shelling of the village of Alma al-Shaab in southern Lebanon on October 13.
Qatar-based Al Jazeera said the network’s cameraperson Elie Brakhia and reporter Carmen Joukhadar were also among those wounded in the attack.
“The initial findings of the investigation show that the reporters were not collateral victims of the shooting,” the RSF said on Sunday, adding, “One of their vehicles, marked ‘press’, was targeted, and it was also clear that the group stationed next to it was [comprised of] journalists.”
Although the RSF did not explicitly name Israel, it added that according to ballistic analysis the shots came from the east of where the journalists were standing; that is, from the direction of Lebanon’s border with the 1948 Israeli-occupied territories.
The journalists themselves have been quoted as saying that they believe they were hit by fire coming from the direction of Israel.
Offering more details, the investigation revealed that the journalists had occupied the spot, which was hit by two strikes 37 to 38 seconds apart. The first strike killed Abdallah, while the second and more powerful one ignited the vehicle used by Al-Jazeera TV crew and injured several journalists.
“Two strikes in the same place in such a short space of time, from the same direction, clearly indicate precise targeting,” the RSF report said.
It added, “It is unlikely that the journalists were mistaken for combatants, especially as they were not hiding: in order to have a clear field of vision, they had been in the open for more than an hour, on the top of a hill.”
Meanwhile, the report noted, the journalists’ bullet-proof vests and the nearby vehicle were marked ‘press’.
According to two journalists interviewed by the RSF, an Israeli helicopter had flown over the scene a few seconds before the strikes.
Lebanon’s Press Editors’ Syndicate condemned what it called the “targeting” of journalists and described the killing of a Reuters video journalist as a “deliberate crime.”
One day after the incident, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kan’ani condemned the attack. He condoled with and expressed sympathy towards the survivors as well as the international community of journalists.
The Lebanese Hezbollah resistance movement also strongly condemned the fatal Israeli attack against journalists in southern Lebanon, stating that the regime’s killing of civilians and threats to Lebanon’s security will not go unanswered.
“We vehemently denounce the occupying Israeli regime’s new crime against a journalist team of seven people covering news… near the Israeli enemy’s al-Abad site, outside the town of Hula, which resulted in the martyrdom of a civilian,” Hezbollah said in its statement.
“This act of aggression comes in line with the occupiers’ assaults on members of the press in Lebanon and Palestine, and is meant to prevent exposition of truth to the international community,” it added.
Gaza Fights Back is a MintPress News original documentary, directed by Dan Cohen. It tells the story of how Gaza’s armed resistance intervened in occupied Jerusalem as Israeli settlers expelled Palestinians from their homes and created provocations at the al-Aqsa compound. Featuring rare interviews with the Palestinian armed resistance and innocent victims of Israeli aggression, Gaza Fights Back offers a unique look at how Hamas’ armed wing outwitted the region’s most powerful military, and the toll exacted against the civilian population.
Dr Keith Berkowitz is a founding member, with Dr Pierre Kory, of the Front Line Covid-19 Critical Care Alliance (FLCCC). He is treating a lot of vaccine-injured patients at his practice in midtown Manhattan. Dr Berkowitz was kind enough to answer a few questions on the Covid vaccine and the vaccine injured.
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Who is most at risk for vaccine injury?
One thought is that if someone had Covid first, and then got the vaccine after being sick, the rates of vaccine injury were higher because they already had an antibody response, their immune system was already revved up, and then they got an injection of another antigen. Another group I see is people with autoimmune disease, they seem to be more triggered. I have several cases of people who had dormant autoimmune disease, such as ulcerative colitis and rheumatoid arthritis, and post vaccine it got retriggered. What people forget about vaccines is that they have an immunosuppressive effect. So in that two- to three-week period, the immune system takes a hit, which makes the body vulnerable to other illnesses. The third group I see that are most at risk of vaccine injury are people with high histamine levels.
What are the most common symptoms of vaccine injury?
Mildest is probably loss of taste and smell, mild digestive issues, or a cough. More severe are the autoimmune responses, the neurological symptoms, like brain fog, and tinnitus (which is one of the toughest to treat), myocarditis and pericarditis (inflammation of the heart), cancer, which I would call the most severe.
Is that new cancers, or cancers that have returned?
I’m seeing both.
Which autoimmune diseases are you seeing?
First, autoimmune disease is what I’m seeing most in vaccine injury. Specifically thyroid disease, more than anything else. What’s interesting is that I’m seeing normal thyroid function, and positive thyroid antibodies. So typically we wouldn’t check for thyroid antibodies if thyroid function was normal. So that group is often missed for that reason.
Would you say any vaccine was worse than the others?
It seems to be batch-related. That’s the question. There’s a theory that 10 per cent of the batches, roughly, caused 90 per cent of the issues. If you look at the original technology, the mRNA was created at a 70 per cent purity. There’s speculation that, because of manufacturing issues, they weren’t able to create that level of purity, and achieved only 50-55 per cent purity. So does one really know if that level of purity works? Especially being that it was never tested.
Why is there so much denial around vaccine injury?
I think there was a blind trust of the government and the pharmaceutical companies, coupled with a fear aspect of Covid (remember people thought that 50 per cent of hospitalised Covid patients died, when it was more like less than 1 per cent). Fear made people not think any more, and now they’re in denial about the choice they made. Another thing I can’t figure out: If you’re vaccinated, how does an unvaccinated person put you at risk? Also, why did doctors not do their own research? It was blind faith. Medications all have side effects – why was this one different?
How do you respond to the proponents of the vaccine who say, regarding vaccine injury, correlation is not causation?
That’s true, but why are they not even looking into it? If they are so confident, then just study it. What do they have to lose? Why not disprove it? Why is disproving it a major issue for them? If you don’t agree with me, prove me wrong.
Traditionally, vaccines take 10-15 years to get approval, because all that time they are studying long-term effects. The Covid vaccine, which was administered as soon as it was created, is still only about three years old. Therefore, have we yet to see the potential damage it can cause?
Absolutely. Do you know what percentage of drugs approved by the US Food and Drug Administration are withdrawn within five years? 31 per cent. One out of three drugs are taken off the market within five years. That’s incredibly high. That tells me we’re not checking properly. Now with this vaccine, one of my biggest questions is why did we decide to use new technology? Is a pandemic the right time to test new technology? I would argue probably not. And why did some countries around the world, like China and Russia, not use this technology? And at the end of the day we have to ask, was the treatment worse than the problem? And should medical products be tied to financial incentives? That creates a huge conflict. There were incentives to use the vaccine. If a drug or a treatment was really that good, would you need to push it like that?
Any final comments?
This is going to take years to figure out. It isn’t going away any time soon. I feel bad for the people who took something which they thought they were doing for the right reason, and now they are suffering. And they’re not being helped. Why does the government create a long Covid initiative, but not a vaccine-injured initiative? Why are we ignoring these patients? And why are we [in the US] approving a product for over six-month-olds when other countries are saying over 65 years? Another thing that doesn’t make sense is a study on teenagers showed that we have to vaccinate a million young men to prevent one hospitalisation. And the potential in a million doses is 1,000 with side effects. So the hospital to side effect rate is one to a thousand. It doesn’t make any sense! My worry is the trust in the medical system may never come back. And I’m not sure that it’s not deserved.
Renewed calls for mask mandates are on the rise, as reports of scary Covid variants are making their way through the news. My perception is that most people will not accept this. It’s fairly well known among the public that masks do not work to halt the transmission of respiratory diseases.
There is even less support for vaccine mandates. There are more successful lawsuits against vaccine mandates each month, and greater numbers of doctors are speaking against forced medicines. Many of them seem to be rediscovering informed consent.
There is one other area where mandates may still have a foothold: that is in the test for disease, particularly Covid. Take a test before you enter a public space; take a test before you go to work; take a test merely because the authorities say so, because they want to track where the virus is going. There are many authorities saying that testing should be mandated, and many ordinary citizens are going along with the idea, thinking, “What’s the harm in taking a test?”
Should you be required to take a test for Covid or any other disease in order to participate in society?
This question seems slightly different from the questions of the other two mandates that have been presented in the past few years. The attack on vaccine mandates has been straightforward: Covid is not dangerous to large cohorts of the population; the vaccines do not prevent transmission; the mRNA jab has been known to cause harm. Likewise, with masks, the arguments are centered around the idea that they don’t really work, and they might also cause harm. We have heard about respiratory problems from microparticles and learning disabilities in children, from their stunted growth in communication skills.
To combat mandated testing, these arguments do not hold as much sway. It’s difficult to argue that testing for Covid might harm the person being tested, and therefore, it’s difficult to attack on the grounds that the tests don’t work perfectly well.
Even the arguments I have heard againstmandatory testing usually have a qualifier in them about the relative danger of the disease in question: “I would understand mandated testing if this was a highly virulent and deadly virus.”
There have been many times we have heard from public health officials about the need for centralized control of people’s behavior in the response to disease. Indeed, even Jay Bhattacharya, who has been fiercely against lockdowns and who has promoted focused protective measures, has said that a scenario could arise where such coordination may be necessary. In discussing the rising lack of trust in public health, he says:
In theory, there is a risk to restricting public health action: It will make coordinated nationwide action more difficult in the next pandemic. What if next time, we have a disease outbreak that requires every part of the country to shut down everywhere, all at once, for a long time?
My issue is with the word requires. Required by whom and to what end? A disease is not an agent. Whatever it may do to us, diseases don’t require action. Humans in charge require action.
So let’s ignore for the moment whether tests work or not, but instead focus on what it means for someone to have the authority to say that you must take a harmless test.
Does someone, anyone, an individual or a government authority, have the right to require you to do something, just because it won’t hurt you?
And on top of the claim that you are not being hurt, there is the more insidious charge: you are being selfish. The authorities and society have decided that the needs of the group rise above the needs of the individual. Certainly this seems to be the case if the test causes no harm. But who is being selfish here? Is it you or the selfish collective?
Regardless of whether you are not being hurt, and whether you are being selfish, here is the essential point of requiring you to take the test.
The point is that the outcome of the test will influence or dictate your subsequent behavior.
Based on the test, it is implied that you will have to do something about it, or that someone will make you. If you test positive, will that mean you cannot go out? Will it mean that you will be locked in a room and can’t see your family and friends? Will it open the door to other bodily controls, like mandated medicine?
If there is no understanding that your behavior will be dictated by the result of the test, what’s the point of the test?
This question can be stated more precisely by saying: the act of forcing you to take a test for disease removes your agency. The idea of agency, as introduced in the Enlightenment, is that each individual carries a moral responsibility for their actions, and that each individual should have that responsibility. The responsibility to act in a way that respects the life and liberty of others should not be taken or assumed by another person or authority.
I have heard the argument that authorities test not in order to control our behavior and thus remove our agency, but instead only to understand how the virus may be spreading in a particular area. They can then understand how to best focus resources to help where outbreaks occur. This is indeed the path that Bhattacharya is on in his article: mandatory testing is justified for the public good when there is no infringement of individual rights, and that a uniform nationwide response is never the correct answer.
But I ask you this: how many times in the past three years has mandated testing led merely to expanded awareness of where the virus is headed and not to control individuals? I have heard many stories personally of individuals who tested positive and were immediately quarantined, and then subsequently tracked by authorities through their phones. I have also read more horrible stories, of arrests and inhumane conditions. In fact, the language around these enforced behaviors gets even more dire than that.
On March 22, 2020, Trump said, “In a true sense, we’re at war. And we’re fighting an invisible enemy.” Trump along with many others compared fighting a virus to fighting a war. In fact, that is how the whole pandemic response was run, as a national security operation.
But what is war? War occurs when two groups of people attempt to kill each other. That is, when individuals and their governments use their agency to seek out and destroy others or to defend themselves. When individuals claim not to use their agency, as when they say, “I was just following orders,” or “We all have to do what the authorities are saying is correct,” they are merely abdicating their own agency, but not relieving their own responsibility.
Robin Koerner describes this connection in his recent article, “The Complicity of Compliance.” He points out that in such situations, people merely subordinate their agency to an agenda. They do not alleviate the burden of their responsibility, although they think they might, they are only going along with the immoral action of the state.
How does this compare to a “war” against a virus? A virus has no agency, and more importantly, an individual carrying a virus has no agency. Any individual, sick or not, cannot decide to infect another person. You may argue that a person can use their agency to attempt to make another person sick. You could cough in someone’s face intentionally, for example. But this is about the extent to which you could go to use your agency to attempt to infect others. It is your moral decision not to cough in someone’s face.
Now let’s get back to mandatory testing. What happens to your agency when someone or an authority requires that you be tested for a particular virus? As I’ve described, the test comes with an implicit assumption that your behavior will be controlled if that test is positive. Will you be quarantined? Will you not be permitted to enter a public space? Will your movements be tracked?
The deadliness of the virus is irrelevant.
The accuracy of the test is irrelevant.
The motivation of the authority is irrelevant.
What matters is that by requiring a test, the authority has removed your agency.
You can no longer act in a way in accordance with your morality and conscience, and the door is open for your liberties to be removed.
So really, how harmless is it to allow any authority or state actor to require that you take a test for disease? This is a trick. By going along, you are thus agreeing to subordinate your own agency to that of the state.
This situation throws us back to before the Enlightenment, before the 17th century, to a time of feudal control of the lives of individuals. If the state says you do it, you do it, whatever it is. The comparison of virus control to feudalism has been made many times.
Is that how you want to live your life?
Or has freedom been good to you?
Take a test voluntarily if you like, if you think it will help to protect your family, friends, and all of your compatriots, or possibly if you think it will help authorities to understand the spread of disease. Respect others and do not try to infect them, as unrealistic as that notion may be.
But do not submit to mandatory testing for disease. Maintain your independence, your morality, and your conscience; do not be tricked into relinquishing your agency to the state. It is a trick to obtain control over your life that you will have willingly surrendered.
Your moral responsibilities are yours alone. Keep them that way.
Alan Lash is a software developer from Northern California, with a Masters degree Physics and a PhD in Mathematics.
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) accused federal public health agencies of displaying an “appalling” lack of transparency with the American public during the pandemic, depriving them of “the benefit of informed consent.”
In a letter sent Oct. 25 to the heads of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the National Institutes of Health, Johnson said that even now, “As new and alarming information continues to come to light, federal health agencies continue to stonewall and gaslight Congress and the public.”
The lawmaker pointed to an FDA-funded study published this month that identified a potential safety signal linking mRNA COVID-19 vaccines to seizures in children ages 2-5.
Johnson questioned whether the CDC was aware of these findings last month when it recommended everyone 6 months of age and older be vaccinated to protect against COVID-19 this fall and winter.
As a result, they “have not even come close to ensuring that doctors can provide informed consent on a new gene therapy masquerading as a ‘vaccine’ that was rushed to market without adequate safety or efficacy testing,” he said.
In his letter, the lawmaker wrote that the agencies’ refusal to respond to the “vast majority” of his questions and information requests “only heightens [his] level of suspicion.”
He listed over a dozen letters he sent requesting information on the COVID-19 vaccines that the agencies “have failed to adequately address.”
These included requests for data about vaccine lots linked to high rates of adverse events, information suppression on social media and the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program.
Johnson listed 11 other outstanding requests he made regarding the other aspects of the pandemic.
But these make up only a partial list of over 60 public letters Johnson said he has sent to government agencies concerning various aspects of the pandemic.
“It is well past time for U.S public health agencies to be transparent,” he said.
Johnson requested the agencies respond by Nov. 8 to questions about what they knew about the risks COVID-19 vaccines posed to children, when they knew it and how they plan to address those issues.
Brenda Baletti Ph.D. is a reporter for The Defender. She wrote and taught about capitalism and politics for 10 years in the writing program at Duke University. She holds a Ph.D. in human geography from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a master’s from the University of Texas at Austin.
Dr. Kulvinder Kaur Gill is a pediatric allergist in Toronto. She condemned COVID rules as irrational, political, harmful, and inconsistent with scientific data. In the eyes of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (CPSO), Gill was dangerous.
In 2021, the CPSO issued three “cautions” (formal warnings) against her. In 2022 it began disciplinary proceedings. The College alleged that she was undermining confidence in public health measures. Its senior counsel wrote that her communications were unprofessional and unbalanced. In its persecution of Gill, the CPSO has made the case for its own demise. Self-regulated monopolies do not work. The CPSO and other professional regulators need competition.
Gill’s inquisition was not an isolated case. Like other medical regulators in North America, the CPSO forbade its doctors from publicly contradicting COVID orders and recommendations. Its Discipline Tribunal revoked the licence of Patrick Phillips, one of several Ontario doctors pursued for their COVID dissent.
The Nova Scotia medical college investigated Dr. Chris Milburn for writing an op-ed on the death of personal responsibility in the criminal justice system. The Ontario College of Psychologists ordered Jordan Peterson to undergo re-education on the use of social media for tweeting about politics. The BC College of Nurses seeks to discipline Amy Hamm for believing in the biology of two sexes.
The Law Society of Ontario compelled its members to state their concurrence with the ideology of “equity, diversity, and inclusion” until a group of rebel lawyers (of whom I was one) managed to repeal it, although the agenda remains. In British Columbia and Alberta, law societies are instituting politically laden “cultural competency” requirements. Teachers, occupational therapists, engineers, and accountants cannot safely voice doubts about transgenderism or “anti-racist” agendas.
This regulatory bullying is occurring within self-regulated professions. Like “ordinary” regulation, self-regulation is coercive. The state delegates authority to their governing bodies. Some doctors rule over other doctors. A licence from the CPSO is voluntary only in the sense that a driver’s licence is voluntary. You don’t get fines or prison time if you don’t get one, but then you can’t drive or practice medicine. Gill’s livelihood was on the line.
Civil servants do not run self-governing professional bodies, but they are part of the executive branch of government nonetheless. Legislation creates them and they are subject to the constitution. Self-regulation exists only for as long as the legislature says that it does.
Legislatures delegate authority, the theory goes, because professionals have the expertise to ensure competence and ethical practice in the public interest. Your surgeon should know how to cut. Your corporate lawyer should be able to draft articles of incorporation and not skim funds off your trust account. But focusing on technical competence and honest conduct no longer satisfies professional regulatory bodies.
We live in a managerial age. As C.S. Lewis wrote:
“The greatest evil is not now done in those sordid ‘dens of crime’ that Dickens loved to paint. It is not done even in concentration camps and labour camps. In those we see its final result. But it is conceived and ordered (moved, seconded, carried, and minuted) in clean, carpeted, warmed, and well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do not need to raise their voices.”
Professions have become managerial cartels. Governing bodies are their godfathers, permitting only proper people and perspectives. Their purpose is not to ensure public access to a variety of professional opinions. Instead, they seek to herd people into “correct” attitudes and behaviors. Propaganda is not evil, but merely a tool to facilitate right results.
Ironically, managerial cartels turn out to be terrible managers. They excel at exercising control but not at producing good outcomes. During COVID, even propaganda was patently incoherent. Yet Gill was one of a scant few doctors and scientists to decry the public health debacle unfolding in front of them. As her lawyer Lisa Bildy wrote in response to the College’s accusations, Gill provided the public with substantiated facts on lockdowns, masking, and COVID vaccines, relying on credible and respected scientific sources and opinions.
The College had scheduled a two-week disciplinary hearing for early 2024. But in September 2023, it abruptly cancelled the hearing with no explanation. Gill’s disciplinary ordeal had come to an end, although her formal warnings remain. Bildy will challenge their validity by judicial review in spring 2024.
Self-regulation protects professions from government interference. That is ironic, given the CPSO’s insistence that their members toe the government line. But self-regulation does not protect individual professionals from the oppression of their peers. A different model beckons: multiple, private regulators competing for members, credibility, and public trust.
Professional cartels benefit the bullies who run them. There’s no reason to grant them the power of monopoly.
Bruce Pardy is executive director of Rights Probe and professor of law at Queen’s University.
Dr. Malik writes:
My name is Ahmad Malik and I am an honest surgeon passionate about free speech and medical ethics.
I have been suspended without pay and cancelled because I dare to challenge the Government narrative, defend informed consent, oppose mandates and lockdowns, question experimental jabs and insist that there are only two biological sexes.
I am raising funds to take legal action against the hospital to lift my suspension and stop the attempts by organisations to censor me.
It will set a precedent that organisations cannot bully, harass and censor those that speak up for medical ethics, and encourage others to speak out.
I am up against large organisations and my case is complex. Legal costs will easily run into the thousands. I need a decent fighting fund which will give me the best chance of being successful.
Hezbollah Deputy Secretary General Sheikh Naim Qassem has lauded the steadfastness of the resistance front in the face of the Israeli occupation.
Sheikh Qassem warned certain Arab states in the region that they will not be spared from Israeli brutality if they do not throw their weight behind the Palestinians in Gaza.
The high-ranking official with the Lebanese resistance movement made the remarks in a statement on his X social media account on Sunday, the 23 day of Israel’s constant bombardment of Gaza.
“Let the Arab rulers know the resistance is strong, steadfast and victorious, God Almighty willing, and the days will prove that,” Sheikh Qassem said.
“You should know that Israel’s plan is to crush you and your people. What is happening in Gaza is a model for you and your role after it unless you are slaves and subject to it. And remember that the Israeli slogan is ‘From the Euphrates to the Nile.”
“Get together and threaten, do what will deter them, boycott, make way for your people to express freely, declare your support for Palestine and al-Quds; this is an opportunity to break the brutality,” Sheikh Qassem said.
“The Palestinian people and their resistance are paying the price for the pride of the nation and future generations, so be with them so that you can be with yourselves and your peoples, and victory comes only from God.”
Sheikh Qassem also censured the unflinching support the United States and Western governments provided to the Israeli onslaught.
“The brutality of the US, France, Britain and Germany in their absolute support of Israeli criminality and genocide against civilians in Gaza has exceeded the lowest levels of humanity.”
Israel has been waging a barbaric war on Gaza since October 7, when Hamas-led Palestinian resistance groups launched their biggest operation against Israel in years. The sneak Operation Al-Aqsa Storm came in response to the regime’s intensified crimes against the Palestinian people.
The Israeli war has so far claimed the lives of over 8,000 innocent Palestinians, including more than 3,000 children, and left upwards of 20,500 others wounded.
The United Nations General Assembly overwhelmingly passed a resolution on Friday, calling for the implementation of an immediate “humanitarian truce” in Gaza. The vote came after the United Nations Security Council failed four times in the past two weeks to take action due to Washington’s veto against relevant resolutions.
The assembly stressed the “importance of preventing further destabilization and escalation of violence in the region,” urging “all parties to exercise maximum restraint and upon all those with influence on them to work toward this objective.”
Israel has rejected all calls for a ceasefire, claiming it would benefit Hamas.
A senior Biden administration representative was recently questioned in a congressional hearing by the Republican members over allegations about the federal government funding an organization that allegedly deprives conservative media platforms of advertising revenue under the guise of purging disinformation. The organization, called the Global Disinformation Index (GDI), is a UK-based think tank that flags suspected sources of disinformation, compelling advertisers to blacklist these sources, thereby threatening their financial sustainability.
The questioning unfolded in the backdrop of a hearing held by the House Foreign Affairs Committee led by the GOP. They contend that the government-funded Global Engagement Center (GEC) of the State Department, handed over a grant of $100,000 to the GDI in 2021.
The GDI has become a point of contention for congressional members due to its censorship measures. The organization has flagged several media outlets, including the New York Post, as disseminators of “disinformation.”
The accountability hearing had Republicans like Representative Darrell Issa question GEC’s Acting Coordinator Daniel Kimmage on whether these popular outlets, targeted by the GDI, were really spreading disinformation. Kimmage responded by stating that the GEC does not get involved in matters concerning US media outlets or domestic affairs.
However, when confronted with the question of GEC funding the London-based GDI, Kimmage admitted to the funding but clarified it was only for specific works targeted at Russian and People’s Republic of China narratives in languages other than English. Yet, the GOP lawmakers have continued to argue that the taxpayer funds are indirectly supporting the GDI’s blacklisting activities in the US.
In a period where concerns over free speech and censorship have become increasingly prevalent, the funding extended to entities like the GDI, which tiptoe the line between fact-checking and ideological bias, raises valid queries eerily resonating with the ongoing debate on censorship versus free speech. Notably, at the heart of the controversy is the question of third-party bias and transparency, and whether the act of flagging media outlets as dispensers of “disinformation” contributes to the suppression of certain types of content or perspectives.
The various EU institutions’ “entanglement” with the bloc’s own idea to try to substantially and dangerously undermine online encryption via a legislative effort known colloquially as “chat control” seems to be nearing a (positive for the internet) resolution – but the bureaucrats who support it appear to be unwilling to go down without a fight.
On Wednesday, European Parliament member (MEP) from Germany Patrick Breyer posted on his blog about EU Home Affairs Commissioner Ylva Johansson laboring to downplay concerns that lobbyists were reportedly part and parcel of drafting the regulation, supposedly there to protect children (stop the proliferation of CSAM content) – but in the process, thanks to its aggressive anti-encryption provisions, destroy the privacy of everyone on the web – including children!)
A day later, Breyer announced that the EP (European Parliament) negotiators had a majority to push through not what the EU Commission wanted – said to be indiscriminate bulk scanning of private communications – but to instead allow “only for a targeted surveillance of specific individuals and groups reasonably suspicious of being linked to child sexual abuse material, with a judicial warrant.”
Even with this development, it’s well worth taking a look at what the likes of Johansson had in mind just a day earlier (which they still could find some of the many EU loopholes to push through, mind you) – and how they justified it.
So, on Wednesday, the LIBE (European Parliament’s Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs) grilled Johansson on the issue of the alleged lobbying, in the context of “chat control.”
Reports about this first emerged in the press in September, and implied that the EU Commission was basically in cahoots with what’s described as “a foreign network” while coming up with what the critics dismiss as at once dangerous, and not even a smart scheme.
However, Johansson, as Breyer put it – “insisted no mistakes had been made.” (And here you see what it apparently takes to become a high-ranked EU official – the ability not to even wince when faced with overwhelming facts).
But for every bureaucrat speaking in circles, there are representatives of the public unwilling to mince their words.
“It was only to be expected that Johansson would respond to the revelations with her usual propaganda, such as citing a biased and suggestive Eurobarometer survey that violates the rules of good public opinion research,” Breyer spelled it out on Wednesday.
“In order to really hold Johansson accountable for her foreign-influenced bill and her lobbying in office, my committee, on our initiative, has demanded full access to all correspondence of her office with lobbying organizations – such as the secret letters of the dubious US foundation Thorn. Only then can we see the full extent of the entanglement with our own eyes” – he added at the time.
CARACAS, VENEZUELA — As the political crisis in Venezuela has unfolded, much has been said about the Trump administration’s clear interest in the privatization and exploitation of Venezuela’s oil reserves, the largest in the world, by American oil giants like Chevron and ExxonMobil.
Yet the influence of another notorious American company, Monsanto — now a subsidiary of Bayer — has gone largely unmentioned.
While numerous other Latin American nations have become a “free for all” for the biotech company and its affiliates, Venezuela has been one of the few countries to fight Monsanto and other international agrochemical giants and win. However, since that victory — which was won under Chavista rule — the U.S.-backed Venezuelan opposition has been working to undo it. … continue
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