Eight items of major concern regarding the proposed WHO treaty and IHR amendments
By Meryl Nass, MD | November 13, 2023
1. Biological warfare agent proliferation.
The treaty and the proposed amendments instruct nations that they must perform surveillance for potential pandemic pathogens, build or maintain sequencing labs, and both share actual specimens with the WHO (where a BioHub has been created for this purpose) and also share the sequences online. This demands the proliferation of biological weapons agents — which I believe is a crime (based on my interpretation of Security Council Resolution 1540 and the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention).
1 a. The June 2, 2023 “Bureau text” version of the treaty also called for nations performing Gain-of-Function research to reduce “administrative impediments” to the work. In other words, restrictions on the research should be relaxed, which would make lab leaks more likely to occur. This paragraph was removed from the October 30, 2023 version of the treaty.
2. Giving the WHO a blank check to create new rules in the future
The treaty calls for a Conference of Parties and a new WHO Secretariat to be created in the future that will make rules for how the pandemic prevention and response apparatus will work—which provides essentially a blank, signed contract to the WHO to create whatever rules it wants.
3. Liability-free vaccines developed at warp speed will be produced
The treaty calls for rapid vaccine development /production and shaving time off all aspects of vaccine development, testing and manufacture. This requires vaccines to be used without licenses, and the treaty calls for nations to have laws in place to issue Emergency Use Authorizations for this purpose, and to “manage” liability issues. See “The WHO’s Proposed Treaty will Increase Man-Made Pandemics” for more information about this. The US, EU and others have specifically called for 100-day vaccine development and an additional 30 days for production of pandemic vaccines. This would allow for no meaningful human testing.
4. Human rights guarantees have been removed in the new amendments
The amendments removed “human rights, dignity and freedom of persons” from the existing IHR language. Following complaints, this phrase was later inserted into the Treaty–but the treaty may not be accepted in 2024. Meanwhile, the amendments require only a simple majority to pass, are being written in secret, and so it is likely that the most problematic issues will be found in the amendments.
5. Social media surveillance and censorship of citizens is required
Both the amendments and the treaty call for nation states to perform surveillance of their citizens’ social media, and to censor and prevent the spread of information that does not conform to the WHO’s public health narratives. Yet the treaty also calls for citizens to be free to access information, while they are to be protected from “infodemics,” which are defined as too much information. Citizens must also be stopped from spreading mis- and disinformation.
6. We may not learn what is in the amendments until after they are passed
The amendments have been negotiated entirely in secret for the past nine months, while there have been multiple consecutive drafts of the pandemic treaty released to the public during that time. And while the negotiated amendments were to be tabled for public review in January, the WHO’s principal legal officer has provided a legal fig leaf to avoid the obligation of making them public 4 months ahead of the vote. Will the public even see the amendments before a vote on them occurs?
Why is there such secrecy regarding the proposed amendments?
7. The WHO Director-General could become your personal physician
According to the proposed amendments, the WHO D-G would be able to commandeer and move medical supplies from one country to another, decide what treatments can be used, and restrict the use of other treatments.
8. When will the WHO be able to use its newly minted powers?
The amendments will come into force after a declaration of a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) is made. However, a declaration of a potential PHEIC will also trigger these powers. The powers can be extended even after a PHEIC is over, as we have seen with COVID and monkeypox (MPOX) declarations by the D-G.
The treaty will be in force continuously, requiring no declaration or pandemic to confer new powers to the WHO.
See detailed report:
EU tells Moldova to sanction Russia
RT | November 14, 2023
The European Union expects Moldova to fully implement sanctions against Russia in order to demonstrate “European values,” the bloc’s ambassador in the former Soviet republic said on Tuesday.
If Chisinau truly wants to join the EU some day, it needs to implement all of the bloc’s laws, rules and regulations – as well as foreign policy, Ambassador Janis Mazeiks said in an interview for the Moldovan channel TV8.
“Sanctions are not introduced just like that. For each of them, there was a reason why it was introduced,” the Latvian diplomat who represents Brussels told host Anatoly Golya in the Russian-language broadcast. “Therefore, we expect those countries that want to join the EU to gradually increase their adherence to sanctions.”
Mazeiks was addressing Golya’s claim that Moldova was already 78% in compliance with the bloc’s embargo on Russia, introduced to support Kiev in the Ukraine conflict.
“I hope this percentage will increase, as we look at the Republic of Moldova as a future EU member,” the diplomat said, adding that it was important for Brussels to see the implementation of all EU laws and regulations, “including joining the EU sanctions, since this is also a manifestation of our values.”
Moldova, which is located between Romania and Ukraine, became an independent state in 1991. Its government has been pushing for EU and NATO membership since 2020, going so far as to ban critics and ask Brussels to sanction those opposed.
The policies of President Maia Sandu defy the wishes of the Moldovan people, Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolay Patrushev warned last week, accusing the government in Chisinau of “Romanianization, rejection of sovereignty and national identity,” and making Moldova “a new victim of the Western colonialist policy.”
Sandu’s Party of Action and Solidarity (PAS) faced backlash in the local elections earlier this month, losing almost all major cities and Chisinau itself. The party’s deputy chairman insisted that the “pro-European choice has won confidently across the whole country,” however.
Hungary to introduce new ‘sovereignty’ law
RT | November 14, 2023
Hungary’s ruling Fidesz party is set to introduce a bill to the nation’s parliament which will create a special office to monitor activities that “threaten the sovereignty of the country.”
The new department would be tasked with overseeing the inflow of foreign funding to political parties, media, and public organizations thought to be targeted for influence or manipulation by hostile governments or financial interests, such as Hungarian-American billionaire and serial financier of liberal causes George Soros.
Gergely Gulyas, the chief of staff for Prime Minister Viktor Orban, declined to give specifics of the new office’s remit on Thursday, when he announced the impending submission of the draft legislation, merely stating that it “could probe all sorts of activities … that would violate the sovereignty of the country.”
When plans to create the new authority were made public in September, a Fidesz party member suggested the measure could apply to “left-wing journalists, quasi-civil organizations,” and political parties.
Orban had recently complained at a party meeting that foreign actors were manipulating the levers of Hungarian society through civil society groups and media “financed by Brussels or through the Soros network.”
“They have openly said that they want a change of government in Hungary,” he said in a speech earlier this year, accusing his enemies of using “every means of political corruption to finance the Hungarian opposition.”
Orban and other Fidesz lawmakers have specifically accused the EU of interfering in the country’s political process by withholding €28 billion ($30 billion) in funds until it fulfills a laundry list of 27 judicial, media, and economic reforms. While Brussels has long accused Hungary of failing to meet EU standards regarding the rule of law, Budapest has argued such accusations are politically motivated.
Hungary previously passed legislation in 2017 targeting NGOs receiving foreign funding, a law condemned by the EU Court of Justice for allegedly introducing “discriminatory and unjustified restrictions” on fundamental rights.
Critics, like the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union, have similarly argued the current legislation aims to “limit participation in public life and the operation of the free press.” Noting that political parties are already justifiably banned from accepting foreign funding, the group’s strategy director Stefania Kapronczay told The Guardian the new authority is likely to further the government’s narrative that any foreign funding runs contrary to Budapest’s interests.
Banning the AfD would be dangerous for democracy, says hard-left firebrand Wagenknecht
BY THOMAS BROOKE | REMIX NEWS | NOVEMBER 14, 2023
The right-wing populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party has found an unlikely defender in Sahra Wagenknecht, the hard-left firebrand nationalist who called moves by establishment politicians to ban the increasingly popular party “completely wrong” and dangerous for democracy.
In an interview published on Sunday with the ARD broadcaster, Wagenknecht insisted that attempts to suppress political adversaries with unconstitutional bans are contradictory to Germany’s democratic principles.
“I think the call for a ban on the AfD is completely wrong, and I find the discussion about it dangerous. Banning unpopular parties because they are becoming too strong is incompatible with a free society,” she told viewers.
The former Die Linke leader, who recently split from her old left-wing party to form a new political group, BSW — For Reason and Justice, called for unsavory parties to be beaten on the political battlefield and their ideas challenged, rather than martyring them and creating further civil unrest among an increasingly disillusioned electorate.
Wagenknecht added that she hoped her new party could win around voters thinking of supporting the AfD based on its policies, instead of simply eradicating the opposition.
“I will be happy if AfD voters choose us in the future because they find our offer more serious and convincing,” she told the broadcaster.
Wagenknecht’s new political outfit shares the same view as the AfD when it comes to uncontrolled mass migration and calls for greater restrictions on newcomers to the country. The left-wing politician even praised her political competition for bringing the issue of mass migration to the forefront of the political debate in Germany.
“Because (the AfD) has become stronger, the question of ‘How do we reduce uncontrolled migration’ has finally arrived in politics,” she said.
Wagenknecht revealed her belief that the longstanding pro-migration policies of her previous party, Die Linke, would struggle to resonate with an electorate becoming increasingly more socially conservative on the issue, and expressed her desire for the party to change course and “find itself” once more.
There is no political desire for a party that advocates “open borders, the right to stay for everyone, and radical climate activism,” she claimed.
On this point, the former communist reserved unlikely praise for Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who she claimed was right to stand up for the interests of his own citizens, even if she disagrees with him politically.
“I don’t have to like Orbán to say that what he’s doing is wiser in terms of the interests of his country,” she said.
Orbán has been a staunch opponent of Brussels’ proposed migration pact, which would see EU member states obliged to receive migrant quotas or face financial penalties for non-compliance. He has remained opposed to the continuous funding of the Ukraine war and is a long-standing advocate for peace in the region.
His administration has continued to import Russian gas and oil despite protestations from Brussels and recently became the first EU leader to shake hands with Russian President Vladimir Putin since Moscow’s invasion of eastern Ukraine in February last year as he attempts to navigate a peaceful solution to the ongoing conflict.
China’s Territorial Disputes Don’t Add Up to Rampant Expansionism
By Joseph Solis-Mullen | The Libertarian Institute | November 14, 2023
Having covered China’s ongoing territorial dispute with the Philippines last week, further details of China’s existing, and settled, territorial disputes seemed in order. For not only has Washington explicitly committed Americans to fight and die over several of these disputes, as in the cases of the Philippines and Japan, but understanding their wider context does much to inform and dispel the fake China threat narrative of a red wave poised to wash mercilessly over its weaker neighbors.
We’ll start with Japan. Like the dispute between China and the Philippines over the Spratly Islands or Scarborough Shoal, the origins of China’s dispute with Japan over the Senkaku or Diaoyu Islands stretch back over a century, and their claims are rooted in differing interpretations of vaguely worded treaties and conflicting historical accounts. Really, though, as then-Premier Zhou Enlai bluntly stated, it was the question of potential undersea oil reserves that made sovereignty over the islands worth disputing. And once the United States, which had been administering the territories in question since the end of World War II, gave up its administrative role, both Tokyo and Beijing got back to disputing possession between them.
For decades Washington took no part. From 2012 to 2014, however, as part of its pivot to Asia, the Barack Obama administration worked with the government of the late Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to clarify that the United States’ 1960 mutual defense treaty obligations pertained to Japan’s claimed maritime possessions. As in the Philippines, then, Washington has deliberately expanded the possibility of direct conflict between the United States and China.
Meanwhile, while New Delhi and Beijing have several areas of overlapping territorial claims along their 2,000 mile border, the most contentious of these is in Ladakh, in the mountains and on the Depsang Plains. A short, ferocious war between India and China in 1962 established the present status quo, but things have been far from quiet. In 2020-2021 a series of melees resulted in deaths on both sides. Despite this, the most recent statements from both sides consist of pledges to maintain “peace and tranquility” along their shared border. This is well, because while Washington has no mutual defense treaty with India, it has formed an increasingly close security partnership. And the more adversarial relations between Beijing and New Delhi are perceived to be the more empowered to pursue its containment strategy Washington will feel.
Lastly, the complicated case of Vietnam. Like Japan and the Philippines, Hanoi’s disputes with Beijing are entirely maritime in nature. Like India, however, Vietnam shares a land border with its larger neighbor and has fought a relatively recent war against China, that in 1979. But then, like several of China’s smaller and less developed neighbors, Vietnam’s concern for the preservation of its sovereignty and autonomy have to be carefully balanced with its critical economic relations with Beijing. Indeed, the crux of the dispute between the two has to do almost exclusively with the economic benefits to be derived from sovereignty over the disputed islands in question; the Paracels and Spratly among them. While Hanoi is unlikely ever to be in Washington’s pocket, its apprehension over Beijing’s assertion of its privileges under the so-called “nine-dash line” means it will welcome Washington’s conduct of so-called “freedom of navigation” exercises in these disputed waters. Sailing U.S. warships into waters claimed by China and near its shores in the name of securing oil and fishing rights for Vietnam may not sound like it’s in the interest of America or Americans—but hey, that’s why you’re not in Washington making these decisions.
Despite its almost uniformly cartoonish depiction in the western corporate media as aggressively seeking to bestride the globe, and for all its outstanding border disputes, Beijing has already peacefully settled several such similar long-standing disputes with Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Russia, Mongolia, the two Koreas, Laos, Myanmar, and Pakistan. In many of these cases, such as the Koreas, Tajikistan, and Kazakhstan, China accepted a far smaller portion of the territory for itself in the final settlement. In several others, such as the smaller states along its south and southwest, Beijing was equally generous in the terms it accepted.
Make no mistake: this was not because China or its leaders are “generous.” Rather, the logic of China’s position dictated its policies. Relations with Mongolia, for example, need be nothing but normal, for as things stand Mongolia is effectively an economic colony of China. In the cases of Laos and Myanmar, failure to pursue peaceful settlements on terms acceptable to its neighbors could have caused headaches for Beijing among its many potentially resistive minorities along its long, jungled frontier.
Finally, it is worth pointing out that the government in Taipei, Taiwan, also lays claim to many of the above disputed territories—including several that Beijing has already negotiated away. Further, that it was Chiang’s Republic of China that first produced the modern “nine dash line” map laying claim to sovereignty over the South and East China Seas—so the idea that a democratically transformed China would have been some peaceful, pliant good neighbor is oh so much more of Washington’s predictable balderdash.
As Joe Biden prepares to meet with Xi Jinping this week, we can only hope that more sensible heads will prevail when it comes to relations with China. The relationship need not be that of best friends, but that does not and should not mean that China is cast in the role of foe instead. Azerbaijan faces no consequences for its recent conquest, nor Egypt for its long and paltry human rights record. Washington needs some grownups at the wheel, ones who will deal pragmatically with the world as it is, not as they envision forcing it to be.
Eyewitness Reveals How Family of Four Died During Israeli Strike in Southern Lebanon
Samira Ayoub with her daughter Huda, granddaughters Rimas, Talin and Lian; her elder brother Samir Ayoub with his son before the tragedy
By Christina Malyk – Sputnik – 14.11.2023
Samir Ayoub, a Russian-Lebanese journalist, lost four of his family members – younger sister Samira (60) and her granddaughters Rimas (14), Talin (12) and Lian (10) – during an Israeli drone strike on the village of Aitarun near the Lebanese-Israeli border. The tragedy occurred right before his eyes.
Samir highlighted that he did not expect that an Israeli drone would attack the civilians who “have nothing to do with the military.” That tragic day, his sister Samira, her daughter Huda, and granddaughters Rimas, Talin, and Lian were packing their things and moving to Beirut, while schools were closed near the Israeli border, and asked Samir for help.
“We, who live near the border, already know that the drone sees everyone and everything that is on earth, even animals. Therefore, I asked the children to play near the car. I thought they would see the children and definitely not touch us. The youngest of the girls even jumped on the hood of the car. Therefore, I am absolutely sure they saw that only children and women got into the car,” he added.
Then, when the family started driving to Beirut, the tragedy suddenly occured. Samir Ayoub described the moment:
“We left Aitarun for Beirut in two cars. I was driving in front. Suddenly, I heard a sound as if pyrotechnics had gone off. The car received a direct hit, and it burned to the ground. My sister was sitting in the passenger seat, she died on the spot. The girls, my niece’s daughters, were burned alive in the back seat. Only my niece survived – she was driving.”
According to him, Huda, mother of the murdered girls and his niece, is still in hospital with serious injuries, but her life is not in danger now. She remembers what happened to her car that day.
“Huda remembers the tragedy every day. Although she is recovering physically, it is extremely difficult for her mentally. We all try to support her as best we can. Her husband also holds on despite such a terrible loss. He and I constantly come to the hospital to visit her,” Samir noted.
Samir wants to remember the murdered girls as “wonderful children,” who had their own dreams about the future. He revealed:
“The eldest, Rimas, was 14, she wanted to become a doctor. The middle one, Talin, was 12 and dreamed of becoming a designer. The youngest, Lian, was 10, and she dreamed of becoming an artist. But, alas, due to the actions of the Israeli army, their dreams will no longer be able to come true.”
The Lebanese government condemned the actions of the Israeli military and filed a formal complaint to the UN for committing a war crime.
“The Israelis reported they had eliminated three terrorists in the south of Lebanon. But what kind of terrorists? These were my sister, a pensioner, and her schoolgirl granddaughters. All we want now is truth and justice,” he concluded.
Report: Israel killed 3,100 school students, 130 teachers in Gaza
MEMO | November 14, 2023
The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) said as many as 3,141 Palestinian students have been killed by Israel in the besieged Gaza Strip and occupied West Bank since 7 October, along with 130 teachers and administrators.
In a statement, the PCBS said 3,117 Palestinian students were killed in the Gaza Strip between 7 October and 11 November while 24 students were killed in the West Bank. A further 4,863 have been injured during this period; 4,613 of them in the Gaza Strip and 250 in the occupied West Bank.
Israeli occupation forces have also arrested 67 students, all of them from the West Bank, during that period.
As many as 403 teachers and administrators were wounded by the Israeli raids on the besieged Gaza Strip while more than 40 teachers and administrators were arrested in the occupied West Bank.
The Israeli warplanes have purposefully targeted 239 government schools in the Gaza Strip with air strikes, causing severe destruction to 45 schools while 50 schools run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Refugees (UNRWA) have been attacked. In the occupied West Bank, the Israeli army has attacked 27 government schools, the PCBS report found.
Racist and genocidal: Zionist leaders and cheerleaders in their own words
By David Miller | Press TV | November 14, 2023
Although they spend a lot of time and resources pretending that they are “democrats” and not racists, Zionists are often, especially in a crisis situation, very clear about what they believe.
We see settlers regularly on the streets of occupied Palestine chanting provocative slogans such as “may your village burn”, and “death to Arabs” and also calling for a second Nakba.
But the racist and genocidal nature of Zionism goes right to the top.
What follows is a series of inflammatory and deeply racist statements by Zionists, all uttered after 7 October 2023 and the launch of the Al Aqsa Storm (also known as Al Aqsa Flood) operation by the Hamas-led Palestinian resistance.
“I have ordered a complete siege on the Gaza Strip. There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed. We are fighting human animals.”
Yoav Gallant, Israeli military affairs minister, 9 October 2023
“Israel needs to increase the humanitarian pressure on the Gaza Strip so that eventually hundreds of thousands of hungry and thirsty Gazans will break through the Rafah crossing.”
Tzachi Levi, Israel National News, 20 October 2023
“I am very puzzled by the constant concern which the world, … is showing for the Palestinian people and is actually showing for these horrible inhuman animals who have done the worst atrocities that this century has seen.”
Dan Gillerman, Israel’s former ambassador to the United Nations, 25 October 2023
“We are sons of light, they are sons of darkness. And light will prevail over darkness.
Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli Prime Minister, 25 October 2023
“Do not leave a stone upon a stone in Gaza. Gaza needs to turn to Dresden, Yes! Complete incineration, No more hope…. Annihilate Gaza Now! Now!”
Moshe Feiglin, leader of the libertarian Zionist party Zehut, former Knesset member, 26 October 2023
“If we were dealing with humans, we’d send humanitarian aid, but we’re dealing with animals.”
Rabbi Meir Mazuz, October 2023
“It is an entire nation out there that is responsible. It is not true this rhetoric about civilians not being aware, not involved. It’s absolutely not true.”
Israeli President Isaac Herzog, 12 October 2023.
“You have to be very careful. Let me tell you we are going to finish this war, we are going to win, because we are stronger. After this Russia will pay the price. Russia will pay the price. Russia is supporting the enemies of Israel. Russia is supporting Nazi people who want to commit genocide on us. And Russia will pay the price.”
Amir Weitmann, a senior member of Likud party, on RT, 19 October 2023
“This is not Auschwitz – This is Hamas! We are not fighting against humans – we are fighting monsters! Israel will not stop until Hamas is destroyed! This is what I said at the General Assembly podium when I showed footage of Israeli civilians burnt alive by Hamas and of Hamas savages.”
Gilad Erdan, Israel ambassador to the United Nations, 26 October 2023
“Are you serious asking about Palestinian civilians? What’s wrong with you?”
Former Israeli PM Naftali Bennett on Sky News after being asked – “What about the babies in incubators in Gaza whose life support has been turned off because the Israelis have cut off the power”, 12 October 2023
“Right now, one goal: Nakba! A Nakba that will overshadow the Nakba of 48. Nakba in Gaza and Nakba to anyone who dares to join!”
Ariel Kallner, Likud party, member of the Knesset
“Be triumphant and finish them off and don’t leave any behind. Erase the memory of them Erase them, their families, their mothers and their children. These animals can no longer live.”
Ezra Yachin, 95, former Stern Gang terrorist, now back in the occupation forces. October 2023
These are only a sample of the many genocidal statements issued by Zionist leaders and cheerleaders from the past month alone.
Many more can be found online in various useful threads, compilations and videos.
The epidemic of genocidal statements in the period after October 7 has shocked the world and rightly so. But, of course, Zionism has always been an ideology and a practical movement that is intrinsically racist and inherently genocidal.
To establish a “Jewish state” in historic Palestine, Zionists deemed it necessary to find a way to eliminate the natives either by killing them or forcing them to leave.
In his 1896 book The Jewish State, a foundational text for the Zionist racist movement, Theodor Herzl explained that the Zionist movement should appeal to European imperial powers to support the creation of a “Jewish state” in Palestine.
To help bolster support for Zionism among European imperialists, Herzl presented Zionism as a civilising mission, saying, “To Europe, we would represent a part of the barrier against Asia; we would serve as the outpost of civilization against barbarism.”
During his trip to Palestine in 1898, Herzl said that “large-scale drainage operations and the elimination of swamps … could make [Palestine] habitable [for Europeans]” and that, “Such Arabs, as are immune to the fever, might be used for the work”.
He went on to say “If we move into a region where there are wild animals to which the Jews are not accustomed – big snakes, etc. – I shall use the natives, prior to giving them employment in their transit countries [i.e. before they are deported], for the extermination of these animals.”
In April 1905, at a talk in Manchester, England, leading Zionist ideologue Israel Zangwill said, “[We] must be prepared …. to drive out by the sword the [Arab] tribes in possession … or to grapple with the problem of a large alien population, mostly Mohammedan”.(Masalha, The Politics of Denial: Israel and the Palestinian Refugee Problem, Pluto Press 2003: 15)
The Council of the Jewish Agency responded to the 1938 Peel Commission by constituting a Population Transfer Committee, to plan the compulsory removal of Palestinians, to take place, as they put it, not “by preaching ‘sermons on the mount’ but by machine-guns”.(Porter et al. (eds), Faith in the Millennium Sheffield Academic Press 2001: 79)
Later, in 1941, Ben-Gurion, the Labour Zionist leader and first Prime Minister of the Zionist entity said, “It is impossible to imagine general evacuation [of Palestinians from the land] without compulsion and brutal compulsion”. (Masalha: 19)
Today the ‘brutal compulsion’ continues as the Zionists try and finish the job of eliminating the natives either by killing them or by forcing them out into the Sinai or Jordan.
It’s not just the “far right”, it’s not just the revisionists, it’s not just the centrists, it’s not just the labour Zionist tradition, it’s not just the “socialist” Zionists.
Zionism at its root is a racist and genocidal ideology. It must be eradicated.
David Miller is the producer and co-host of Press TV’s weekly Palestine Declassified show. He was sacked from Bristol University in October 2021 over his Palestine advocacy.
EU retail giant explains ‘mislabelling’ Israeli products
RT | November 14, 2023
Lidl supermarkets have come under fire in France for allegedly trying to disguise the origin of products from Israel, local media reported over the weekend.
According to the reports, French netizens have spotted Lidl labeling Israeli avocados and pomegranates as being of African or even Spanish origin. A number of users posted photos featuring the products and their labels, both the original and those added by the store, on X (former Twitter) as proof of the misrepresentation, calling the situation “a scandal at Lidl.”
“The item is supposed to come from Morocco according to its label, but after examining it, it turns out that the real origin is Israel,” wrote one user.
“Same thing [happened to me] this morning at the Lidl in Vallauris – avocados from Morocco on the store label, and on the avocado, an Israeli label… I think there are plenty of stores doing this to sell their stocks,” another X user recounted. Similar discrepancies have also reportedly been sighted in Auchan and Carrefour stores.
Commenting on the reports, Schwarz Group, which owns Lidl stores, said that the supposedly intentional mislabeling was nothing more than “a display error, due to the fact that we regularly have avocados and pomegranates from different sources on the shelves.”
While some alleged instances of mislabeling predated the Israel-Hamas conflict, their number reportedly surged when the hostilities began in early October and calls from pro-Palestinian activists to boycott Israel-linked goods became more frequent. Some users believe that these calls prompted the stores to intentionally misrepresent products of Israeli origin so that customers would continue to buy them.
“In view of the recent events in the Middle East, we are dismayed by what is hap-pening [in our stores] and are observing the situation with great concern. Schwarz Group companies reject all forms of violence. Our thoughts are with the victims of the conflict,” the company’s press service told the news outlet.
According to the news outlet Actu Strasbourg, France’s Directorate General for Competition Policy, Consumer Affairs and Fraud Control (DGCCRF) has been aware of the complaints and is currently investigating the situation.
“These incidents were the subject of a small number of reports to our services, spread over several months. These, like any consumer report, are taken into account by DGCCRF investigators,” the organization told the news outlet.
The media’s Nord Stream lies just keep coming
Why do billionaires and governments scramble to control the media? Because the power over our minds is the greatest power there is.
BY JONATHAN COOK | NOVEMBER 14, 2023
Want to understand why the media we consume is either owned by billionaires or under the thumb of government? The latest developments in the story about who was behind the explosions that destroyed the Nord Stream pipelines that brought Russian gas to Europe provide the answer.
Although largely forgotten now, the blasts in the Baltic Sea in September 2022 had huge and lasting repercussions. The explosion was an act both of unprecedented industrial sabotage and of unparalleled environmental terrorism, releasing untold quantities of the most potent of the greenhouse gases, methane, into the atmosphere.
The blowing up of the pipelines plunged Europe into a prolonged energy crisis, tipping its economies deeper into a recession from which they are yet to recover. Europe was forced to turn to the United States and buy much more expensive liquified gas. And one of the long-term effects will be to accelerate the de-industrialisation of Europe, especially Germany.
There can be almost no one in Europe who did not suffer personal financial harm, in most cases significant harm, from the explosions.
The question that needed urgently answering at the time of the blasts was one no media organisation was in a hurry to investigate: Who did it?
In unison, the media simply recited the White House’s extraordinary claim that Russia had sabotaged its own pipelines.
That required an unprecedented suspension of disbelief. It meant that Moscow had chosen to strip itself both of the lucrative income stream the gas pipelines generated, and of the political and diplomatic leverage it enjoyed over European states from its control of their energy supplies. This was at a time, remember, when the Kremlin, embattled in its war in Ukraine, needed all the diplomatic influence it could muster.
The need to breathe credibility into the laughably improbable “Russia did it” story was so urgent at the time because there was was only one other serious culprit in the frame. No media outlet, of course, mentioned it.
The United States had both the motive and the means.
US officials from Biden down had repeatedly threatened that Washington would intervene to make sure the Nord Stream pipelines could not operate. The administration was expressly against European energy dependency on Russia. Another gain from the pipelines’ destruction was that a more economically vulnerable Europe would be forced to lean even more heavily on the US as a guarantor of its security, a useful chokehold on Europe when Washington was preparing for prolonged confrontations with both Russia and China.
As for the means, only a handful of states had the divers and technical resources enabling them to pull off the extremely difficult feat of successfully planting and detonating explosives on the sea floor undetected.
Had we known then what is gradually becoming clear now, even from establishment media reporting – that the US was, at the very least, intimately involved – there would have been uproar.
It would have been clear that the US was a rogue, terrorist state, that it was willing to burn its allies for geostrategic gain, and that there was no limit to the crimes it was prepared to commit.
Every time Europeans had to pay substantially more for their heating bills, or filling up their car, or paying for the weekly shop, they would have known that the cause was gangster-like criminality by the Biden administration.
Which is precisely why the establishment media were so very careful for the first months after the explosions not to implicate the Biden administration in any way, even if it meant ignoring the mass of evidence staring them in the face.
It is why they ignored the incendiary report by legendary investigative journalist Seymour Hersh – who has broken some of the most important stories of the last half century – detailing exactly how the US carried out the operation. When his account was occasionally referenced by the media, it was solely to ridicule it.
It is why, when it became obvious that the “Russia did it” claim was unsupportable, the media literally jumped ship: credulously reporting that a small group of “maverick” Ukrainians – unknown to President Volodymyr Zelensky, of course – had rented a yacht and carried off one of the most daring and difficult deep-sea stunts ever recorded.
It is why, later, the media treated it as entirely unremarkable – and certainly not worthy of comment – that new evidence suggested the Biden administration was warned of this maverick Ukrainian operation against the whole of Europe. It apparently knew what was about to happen but did precisely nothing to stop it.
And it is why the latest reporting from the Washington Post changes the impossible-to-believe “maverick” Ukrainian operation into one that implicates the very top of the Ukrainian military. Still, the paper and the rest of the media steadfastly refuse to join the dots and follow the implications contained in their own reporting.
The central character in the new drama, Roman Chervinsky, belongs to Ukraine’s special operations forces. He supposedly oversaw the small, six-man team that rented a yacht and then carried out the James Bond-style attack.
The ingenuous Post claims that his training and operational experience meant he was “well suited to help carry out a covert mission meant to obscure Ukraine’s responsibility”. It lists his resistance activities against Russia. None indicate that he had the slightest experience allowing him to mastermind a highly challenging, extremely dangerous, technically complex attack deep in the waters of the Baltic Sea.
If the Ukrainian military really was behind the explosions – rather than the US – all the indications are that the Biden administration and Pentagon must have been intimately involved in the planning and execution.
Not least, it is extremely unlikely that the Ukrainian military had the technical capability to carry out by itself such an operation successfully and undiscovered.
And given that, even before the war, the Ukrainian military had fallen almost completely under US military operational control, the idea that Ukraine’s senior command would have been able to, or dared, execute this complex and risky venture without involving the US beggars belief.
Politically, it would have been quite extraordinary for Ukrainian leaders to imagine they could unilaterally decide to shut down energy supplies to Europe without consulting first with the US, especially when Ukraine’s entire war effort was being paid for and overseen by Washington and Europe.
And of course, Ukrainian leaders would have been only too aware that the US was bound to quickly work out who was behind the attack.
It would be telling indeed that, in such circumstances, the Biden administration would apparently choose to reward Ukraine with more money and arms for its act of industrial sabotage against Europe rather than punish it in any way.
It would be equally astonishing that the three states supposedly investigating the attack – Germany, Sweden and Denmark – would not also soon figure out for themselves that Ukraine was culpable. Why would they decide to cover up Ukraine’s attack on Europe’s economy rather than expose it – unless they were worried about upsetting the US?
And of course, there is the elephant in the room: the Washington Post’s earlier reporting indicated that the US had prior knowledge that Ukraine was planning the attack. That is even more likely if the pipeline blast was signed off by Ukrainian military commanders rather than a group of Ukrainian “mavericks”.
The Washington Post’s new story repeats the line that the Biden administration was forewarned of the attack. Now, however, the Post casually reports that, after expressing opposition, “US officials believed the attack had been called off. But it turned out only to have been postponed to three months later, using a different point of departure than originally planned”.
The Washington Post simply accepts the word of US officials that the most powerful country on the planet fell asleep at the wheel. The CIA and Biden administration apparently knew the Ukrainian military was keen to blow up the Nord Stream pipelines and plunge Europe into an energy crisis and economic recession. But US officials were blindsided when the same small Ukrainian operational team changed locations and timings.
On this account, US intelligence fell for the simplest of bait and switches when the stakes were about as high as could be imagined. And the Washington Post and other media outlets report all of this with a faux-seriousness.
Either way, the US is deeply implicated in the attack on Europe’s energy infrastructure and the undermining of its economy.
Even if the establishment media reporting is right and Ukraine blew up Nord Stream, the Biden administration must have given the green light, overseen the operational planning and assisted in the implementation and subsequent cover-up.
Then again, if as seems far more likely, Hersh is right, then there was no middle man – the US carried out the attack on its own. It needed a fall guy. When Russia no longer fitted the bill, Ukraine became the sacrificial offering.
A year on, these muffled implications from the media’s own reporting barely raise an eyebrow.
The establishment media has played precisely the role expected of it: neutering public outrage. Its regimented acceptance of the initial, preposterous claim of Russian responsibility. Its drip-feed, uncritical reporting of other, equally improbable possibilities. Its studious refusal to join the all-too-visible dots. Its continuing incuriousness about its own story and what Ukraine’s involvement would entail.
The media has failed by every yardstick of what journalism is supposed to be there for, what it is supposed to do. And that is because the establishment media is not there to dig out the truth, it is not there to hold power to account. Ultimately, when the stakes are high – and they get no higher than the Nord Stream attack – it is there to spin narratives convenient to those in power, because the media itself is embedded in those same networks of power.
Why do billionaires rush to own media corporations, even when the outlets are loss-making? Why are governments so keen to let billionaires take charge of the chief means by which we gain information and communicate between ourselves. Because the power to tell stories, the power over our minds is the greatest power there is.
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Can the WHO and the United Nations impose sanctions on your sovereign country for non-compliance?
The UN is a far bigger threat than the WHO, which, although deserving of attention, cannot consume our entire focus.
BY SHABNAM PALESA MOHAMED | JUNE 18, 2024
This updated analysis was written in 2023 (read in full here at CHD Africa)
Sanctions are a powerful instrument of political control and economic profit. One of the rare but critical topics relevant to the international campaign to #ExitTheWHO is whether the World Health Organisation and the United Nations can impose, influence or recommend specific sanctions. The sanctions could be implemented against countries that choose to not comply or cannot comply with International Health Regulations, the proposed new pandemic treaty, or other legislative attempts that curtail rights, freedom and sovereignty.
The accelerating and profitable globalist march towards unprecedented levels of ‘1984’ style totalitarianism – using censorship, vaccine passports, 15 minute cities, and CBDC’s continues. It is plausible that the WHO and the UN will move to impose, influence or recommend sanctions against countries that do not want to or cannot comply with its centralised health agenda and undemocratic legislative attempts. … continue
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