EU Contributes €4M to UNESCO’s Expanding Online Content Regulation and Digital ID Goals
By Didi Rankovic | Reclaim The Net | February 26, 2025
The EU is spending another €4 million (just under $4.2 million) on a project it runs together with the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), known as Social Media 4 Peace (SM4P).
Those targeted by this latest contribution from Brussels are Iraq, Kyrgyzstan, and South Africa as newly included countries, whereas what’s already been achieved in Indonesia and Kenya will be “reinforced,” the UN said.
Others that have been a part of the scheme, which critics consider a censorship initiative, are Bosnia and Herzegovina and Colombia. The EU has already given €4 million to SM4P in 2021, when it launched.
According to the EU’s SM4P page, the project’s purpose is to deal with “potentially harmful online content – in particular hate speech.” Now UNESCO announced the latest contribution saying that will help SM4P’s mission to address harmful content in “conflict-prone and polarized” societies.
And the UN agency promises to protect free speech and rights – “of the most vulnerable and marginalized communities.”
Other than the dystopian-sounding declaration of being there to counter “potentially harmful content,” SM4P raises eyebrows for activities such as contributing to the “shaping” of the Global Forum of Networks.
The burgeoning EU-UN partnership to tackle “disinformation and hate speech globally” has also contributed to what is referred to as global policy discussions on digital platform governance.
In the UN’s system of “nesting dolls of censorship projects,” the Global Forum of Networks is set up to allow international regulators to collaborate and implement UNESCO’s Guidelines for the Governance of Digital Platforms – the result of the said “discussions” – and what SM4P will be focused on until 2027.
The Guidelines’ About page states that this initiative’s aim is to “deal with the problems of dis- and misinformation and hate speech online.”
Then there’s the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 goals – including Sustainable Development Goal Target 16.9 (“legal identity for all, including birth registration, by 2030”), which pushes for digital ID as a way to participate in the digital economy.
That is another goal that SM4P will contribute to, according to the EU page about the project.
In announcing EU’s latest €4 million contribution, UNESCO said that SM4P already has more than 80 partners in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Colombia, Indonesia, and Kenya – but that its influence in “fostering multistakeholder collaboration and strengthening resilience against online harm” extends “beyond target countries.”
Florida Judge Rules Brazilian Censorship Orders Unenforceable Against Rumble and Trump Media
By Didi Rankovic | Reclaim The Net | February 25, 2025
A federal judge in Florida has denied a request from Trump Media and video platform Rumble to block enforcement of orders issued by Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, ruling that the case is not yet ripe for judicial review.
We obtained a copy of the order for you here.
However – that’s not because Rumble and Trump Media have no grounds – it’s because both companies “were not served upon Plaintiffs in compliance with the Hague Convention, to which the United States and Brazil are both signatories nor were they served pursuant to the Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty between the United States and Brazil.”
The two platforms have been at the forefront in the fight against censorship. In a win for free speech, the court ruled that the direct demands of Rumble and Truth are not through “established protocols” and so Plaintiffs [Rumble and Truth] are not obligated to comply with the directives and pronouncements, and no one is authorized or obligated to assist in their enforcement against Plaintiffs or their interests here in the United States.”
The immediate dispute revolves around a conservative Brazilian commentator living in the US, referred to in the lawsuit as Political Dissident A. This commentator, a vocal critic of the Brazilian Supreme Court, has been accused of “anti-democratic” speech—a charge that US courts would almost certainly dismiss as constitutionally protected under the First Amendment.
US District Judge Mary S. Scriven effectively stated that the two platforms do not need a temporary restraining order against Moraes because Morae’s orders to Rumble have no grounds.
In a statement, a Rumble spokesperson stated: “The court explicitly ruled that Moraes’s directives were never properly served under US or international law…” and that “The court further made clear that if anyone attempts to enforce these illegal orders on US soil, it stands ready to intervene to protect American companies and free speech. The ruling sends a strong message to foreign governments that they cannot bypass US law to impose censorship on American platforms.”
“This is a major victory for free speech and free expression online,” said Trump Media CEO Devin Nunes. “The ruling confirms that would-be dictators in any country can’t force Trump Media or Rumble to censor their opponents. We congratulate our partner Rumble on its principled stand for freedom.”
‘Inhumane, Reckless’: Critics Weigh in on Europe’s Approval of Self-amplifying COVID mRNA Vaccines
By Suzanne Burdick, Ph.D. | The Defender |February 24, 2025
Europe has approved a self-amplifying mRNA COVID-19 vaccine for ages 18 and up. The move drew criticism from scientists, who cited several concerns, including high rates of serious side effects among clinical trial participants and no long-term safety data.
The European Commission, the European Union’s primary executive body, on Feb. 14, granted marketing authorization for ARCT-154 — marketed as KOSTAIVE — a vaccine manufactured by CSL and Arcturus Therapeutics.
Japanese regulators were the first to approve the ARCT-154 shot, which the country made available for the 2024-25 season to people 65 and over, and 60- to 64-year-olds with severe underlying conditions.
Self-amplifying mRNA vaccines are similar to synthetic mRNA vaccines in that they both contain foreign mRNA that the body’s cells translate into a protein. However, unlike synthetic mRNA vaccines, self-amplifying vaccines also contain an enzyme that instructs the body on how to make more mRNA.
“What makes self-amplifying mRNA technology so worrisome, is that the mRNA will perpetuate indefinitely,” said Karl Jablonowski, Ph.D., senior research scientist at Children’s Health Defense (CHD).
Jablonowski explained that with the traditional COVID-19 mRNA vaccines, “at least there is some solace in knowing the original mRNA will break down and stop production of the spike proteins.”
Nicolas Hulscher, an epidemiologist with the McCullough Foundation who writes on Substack, called Europe’s approval of ARCT-154 a “grave mistake.”
“These products behave like a synthetic virus,” Hulscher said. “The replicon mRNA is designed to encode not only the target antigen but also viral replicase, enabling the mRNA to replicate itself within the target cells. This replication machinery allows for an unknown period of toxic antigen production.”
The antigen is the “active ingredient in all vaccines … that causes the immune system to begin producing antibodies,” according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Jablonowski said that being chronically exposed to an antigen — “especially one as toxic as the COVID-19 spike protein” is “like being vaccinated every day for the rest of your life.”
Plus, the product may not effectively target emerging COVID-19 variants, Jablonowski said:
“When a new variant emerges, as coronaviruses change constantly, would the strategy be another self-amplifying mRNA vaccine? Another factory that may never turn off? And so on? There will be a breaking point.
“The tragic short-sightedness of this strategy is that eventually the vaccinated will be creating spike protein to assault their own body to teach their immune system how to combat a virus that doesn’t exist anymore.”
Hulscher said long-term safety data on ARCT-154 is “non-existent.” He also reported that 90% of clinical trial participants experienced adverse events after the first dose, with 74.5% reporting systemic reactions and 15.2% requiring medical attention.
Arcturus Therapeutics is one of at least nine vaccine developers working on self-amplifying mRNA products, according to a November 2024 analysis by Hulscher.
So far, none of the clinical trials for the product have “addressed the major concern of product shedding,” Hulscher said.
Jablonowski also pointed out that the mRNA lipid nanoparticle technology has been shown to cross the placental barrier, making it “unconscionable that the European Commission would allow these products anywhere near a person who may become pregnant.”
FDA approved clinical trial for self-amplifying bird flu vaccine
Although the U.S. has yet to approve a self-amplifying mRNA COVID-19 vaccine, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration last November gave the green light for Arcturus Therapeutics to launch clinical trials for a self-amplifying mRNA vaccine targeting the H5N1 virus, commonly known as bird flu.
The trials are funded by the U.S. government and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. “The United States must REJECT this dangerous technology,” Hulscher said.
Cardiologist Dr. Peter McCullough agreed.
“Vaccinologists have made a critical error in the design of genetic vaccines,” McCullough said. “Injection of the genetic code for any foreign protein including parts of viruses causes the body to respond with an immune attack against its own cells.”
“This leads to intense vaccine injury syndromes all through the human body,” he said.
McCullough added, “Giving the vaccines their own ‘life’ with the ability to reproduce themselves is inhumane, reckless, and from the outset, should be flagged as dangerous and potentially lethal to the recipient.”
Related articles in The Defender
- Japan Approves World’s First ‘Self-amplifying’ mRNA COVID Shot — Is the U.S. Next?
- ‘Disaster Waiting to Happen’: FDA Approves Phase 1 Trial of Gates-funded Self-amplifying Bird Flu Vaccine
- Rogan Rips Mainstream Media for Failure to Cover ‘Real Numbers’ of People Injured, Killed by COVID Shots
- U.S. Pumps $667 Million Into World Bank’s Pandemic Fund
This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.
Erasing 1,700-year history: Israel’s property grab threatens Armenian Christians in al-Quds
By Ivan Kesic | Press TV | February 26, 2025
Armenian Christians, the smallest recognized community in occupied al-Quds, are reeling under pressure from Israeli settler-colonial policies aimed at imposing exorbitant taxes, seizing their properties, displacing them, and ultimately Judaizing the historic city center.
On February 18, the Armenian Patriarchate in the holy city issued an urgent communiqué, warning that the local Zionist municipality is attempting to confiscate and auction off properties it owns there.
The Patriarchate is situated in the Armenian Quarter, one of the four sections of the walled Old City, alongside the Christian, Muslim, and Jewish Quarters.
This small Armenian community, located in the southwestern corner of the 12.6-hectare Old City, numbers only a few hundred people. As the oldest Armenian diaspora, it has maintained a presence in the neighborhood for nearly 1,700 years, as per historical accounts.
For years, the Armenian community has resisted the expansion of Jewish-only settlements in occupied Jerusalem al-Quds. However, their enduring heritage is now at risk of being erased.
The Israeli regime claims that the Patriarchate has unpaid taxes dating back to 1994—an accusation the Patriarchate denounces as unjust, crippling, and only recently imposed.
It warns that this move could set a dangerous precedent for all Christian communities in the city.
In an effort to halt the foreclosure process on its centuries-old properties, the Patriarchate has filed a petition. The hearing was initially scheduled for February 24 but has since been postponed.
Unjustified tax apartheid
After issuing a desperate appeal and urging supporters to share it on social media platforms, the Armenian Patriarchate came under vicious attack from Zionist hate-mongers, who falsely accused it of evading taxes for 31 years.
In reality, as a Press TV website investigation revealed, Christian church-owned properties were exempt from property taxes for two centuries until a 2018 decision by the Zionist municipality, approved by Benjamin Netanyahu’s regime, overturned this longstanding policy.
Armenian Quarter in al-Quds, the place of 1,700 years of Armenian history
The Zionist settler-colonial authorities then imposed the so-called Arnona, an annual municipal property tax levied on local residents in the occupied al-Quds.
Without any legal basis, the municipality arbitrarily ruled that the historic 200-year exemption applied only to places of worship, while all other church-owned properties would be subject to retroactive taxation from 1994.
This date was chosen because it marked the signing of an agreement between the Zionist regime and Jordan, recognizing Amman’s custodianship over Muslim holy sites in the Old City—while Tel Aviv remained the occupying power.
Overnight, the municipality’s decision saddled the small Armenian community with a 24-year debt. Under Zionist regime laws, properties weighed down with such heavy debts can be seized and auctioned to cover the outstanding amount.
This aggressive campaign was spearheaded by Nir Barkat, a Likud politician, and then-mayor, who sought to tax so-called “non-religious” church properties for a total of $200 million, even ordering the freezing of their bank accounts.
The Armenian Patriarchate was not alone in its resistance. Other Christian leaders also vehemently opposed the move, going so far as to close the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in protest.
The dispute further strained relations between the Israeli regime and the Holy See, which cited local tax disputes as a key reason for delaying ongoing bilateral negotiations on property and economic matters.
Armenian Christians as the primary target
As the smallest and most vulnerable Christian community in the city, Armenians have been the primary target of the Zionist regime’s apartheid policies. The Armenian Patriarchate emphasizes that no other Christian community has faced such unprecedented and irreversible measures.
Following the municipality’s issuance of a seizure order, the Armenian Patriarch sent a letter to Netanyahu, urging him to intervene and halt the municipality’s actions regarding the tax dispute.
The Patriarchate has challenged the legality of these measures, asserting that no judicial ruling has ever subjected it to such obligations.
The petition asserted that the municipality disregarded the statute of limitations for the period between 1994 and 2018, demanding an exorbitant sum without clearly defining the presumed tax base.
The municipality’s actions have been described as aggressive and particularly unjustified; given that it itself owes the Patriarchate millions of shekels in overdue rental fees.
Armenian Quarter numbers only a few hundred people due to Zionist apartheid policies
Despite this, the Patriarchate has refrained from legal action to recover the debt, instead opting for prolonged negotiations to reach an amicable resolution.
In its statement, the Patriarchate also noted that it has repeatedly attempted to present these arguments to municipal authorities, who have refused to reassess the validity of the debt, despite clear violations of legal deadlines and procedures.
The official responsible for rejecting the review of the debt—because the deadline for objections had passed—is the same individual who originally determined the astronomical debt.
“In other words, the municipal employee is acting as the claimant, judge, and executor of the administrative order, serving the interests of his employer—the municipality,” the statement declared.
The petition is therefore directed against both the municipality and the official in question. A hearing was scheduled for February 24; however, just four days before the date, it was announced that the session had been postponed indefinitely due to weather conditions.
If the petition is rejected, the municipality will be authorized to immediately resume the seizure of properties in order to erase the long history of Armenian Christians in the occupied holy city.
Christian communities’ condemnation
Church representatives in the occupied al-Quds, along with the World Council of Churches (WCC), have expressed their solidarity with the Armenian Patriarchate through an official statement.
On February 21, the Patriarchs and Heads of Churches in Jerusalem issued a declaration condemning the municipality’s “unjust foreclosure order” and calling for “immediate intervention.”
Christian leaders in occupied al-Quds voiced their “great concern” and “steadfast solidarity” with the Orthodox Armenian Patriarchate in its fight for justice against what they described as an “unverified and exorbitant” tax debt, denouncing it as “dubious and morally unacceptable.”
“It is inconceivable that Christian institutions, which for centuries have safeguarded the faith, served communities, and preserved the sacred heritage of the Holy Land, should now face the threat of property seizure under Israeli administrative measures that disregard due process,” they stated.
Particularly alarming, they noted, is the municipality’s attempt to enforce the debt determination without judicial review, in open defiance of the committee formed to handle such negotiations.
This “reckless move,” they warned, threatens the Orthodox Armenian Patriarchate, sets a dangerous precedent for other Christian institutions, and undermines religious freedom.
They further explained that seizing these assets would strip both the Armenian Patriarchate and its community of essential economic resources, jeopardizing their ability to sustain their presence and fulfill their pastoral mission.
The statement concluded with a powerful declaration: “The targeting of one Church is an assault on all.” The leaders urged Israeli occupation to immediately intervene, halt all foreclosure proceedings, and ensure the resumption of negotiations.
The WCC, a global Christian inter-church organization representing 352 member churches, echoed this condemnation in a separate statement, denouncing the Israeli actions as “a blatant attack on religious freedom” and “an alarming violation of the historic status quo” governing the Holy Sites of al-Quds.
Other hostile moves against Christians
The imposition of a fictitious tax debt is just one example of Zionist attempts to appropriate Armenian property and intimidate the Armenian community.
Another significant case is the ongoing multi-year effort to seize the Cows’ Garden, an undeveloped one-hectare section of the Armenian Quarter.
The controversy erupted in 2020 when the Armenian Patriarchate signed a ten-year contract with the local municipality to convert the vacant land into a parking lot for Jewish settlers in the Old City and pilgrims visiting the Western Wall.
Both Armenians and Palestinians staged protests against the lease agreement, voicing concerns over Armenian land ownership. The Patriarchate maintained that the deal was strictly a financial arrangement, not a sale deed.
The following year, the parking lot was opened, and the Patriarchate signed a new contract with Israeli investors from the Dubai-registered Xana Gardens company to lease the land for 99 years and construct a luxury hotel.
This sparked even fiercer protests and led to the uncovering of an internal corruption scandal. By the end of 2023, the Patriarchate canceled the contract, stating that the investors had misled them regarding financial commitments and final development plans.
In response, the Israeli company escalated its efforts to forcibly acquire the land, resorting to lawsuits, threats, and physical intimidation of Armenians.
Since then, the Armenian Christian community has erected temporary guard stations and has been physically safeguarding the disputed land around the clock for months.
Jewish mobs have been recorded attacking Armenians on multiple occasions. Under the protection of Israeli occupation police, the company sent bulldozers to the site, and at one point, the owner arrived in person, openly calling for the expulsion of Armenians.
Zionist extremists frequently vandalize the Armenian Quarter with hate graffiti, including slogans such as “Death to Arabs and their Armenian Friends.” They have also targeted Armenian families with harassment and violence.
Meanwhile, investigations have revealed the company’s ties to the far-right settler movement, which aids Israeli settlers in seizing Muslim and Christian properties across occupied al-Quds.
Armenians and Palestinians fear the long-term consequences of these policies, warning that they will disrupt the demographic balance and further the ongoing Judaization of the Old City.
Trump’s Defense Budget Proposal to Russia & China Aims to Give US Military Edge
By Svetlana Ekimenko – Sputnik – 26.02.2025
President Donald Trump floated offering Russia and China to join the US in slashing their defence budgets in half when speaking to reporters at the White House on earlier in February, adding that he hoped to take this up with President Vladimir Putin and President Xi Jinping “when things calm down”.
Washington hopes to drag Moscow and Beijing into “deceptive” 50% military spending cuts, staking on their desire to “avoid appearing disinterested in peace overtures by the US,” geopolitical analyst Brian Berletic told Sputnik.
The proposal is a ruse by Donald Trump aimed at rectifying the “disparity between the bloated US military budget” and the “more efficient ones of Moscow and Beijing,” noted the former US Marine.
“A genuine agreement would not be based on a percentage cut, but an equal reduction in […] explicitly capabilities the US has used for decades to project power abroad, including its global-spanning network of military bases, its membership in aggressive blocs like NATO, its sea and airlift capabilities, and various types of missiles and drones (both naval and aerial) the US is right now developing to menace nations like Russia and China along, and within their own borders,” he said.
Even if the US, Russia, and China were to slash military spending by 50%, proportionately America would “still enjoy greater overall spending than both nations combined, speculated the pundit.
Despite this proposal sounding promising at face value, he added, without further details from the US government’s side, it “appears to be an attempt to provide the US an overwhelming military advantage all while appearing to pursue global peace.”
US President Donald Trump proposed that the United States, Russia, and potentially China each reduce their defense budgets by 50%, saying: “One of the first meetings I want to have is with President Xi of China, President Putin of Russia. And I want to say: ‘Let’s cut our military budget in half.’ And we can do that.”
Following this proposal, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin indicated Moscow’s openness to negotiations: “We are not against it. The idea is good: the US cuts by 50%, we cut by 50%, and if China wants, they can join later.”
China’s defense spending “is completely out of the need of safeguarding national sovereignty, security and development interests, and the need of maintaining world peace,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian stated at a press conference on February 25.
Orban blasts conviction of Bosnian Serb leader
RT | February 26, 2025
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has condemned the conviction of Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik by a court in Sarajevo, describing it as a “political witch hunt” and a misuse of the legal system against a democratically elected official. Such moves are detrimental to the stability of the Western Balkans, he warned.
A Bosnian court sentenced Dodik, the president of Republika Srpska, to one year in prison on Wednesday for obstructing decisions made by Bosnia’s constitutional court and defying the authority of international envoy Christian Schmidt, who oversees the implementation of the 1995 Dayton Peace Agreement that concluded the Bosnian war. The court also barred Dodik from holding political office for six years.
“The political witch hunt against President @MiloradDodik is a sad example of the weaponization of the legal system aimed at a democratically elected leader,” Orban wrote on X in response to the court’s ruling.
“If we want to safeguard stability in the Western Balkans, this is not the way forward!”
Dodik did not attend the sentencing but addressed supporters in Banja Luka afterward, denouncing the ruling as politically motivated and pledging to implement “radical measures.” He warned that the conviction could deal a “death blow to Bosnia and Herzegovina” and suggested the possibility of Republika Srpska’s secession.
In a post on his official X account, Dodik announced plans for the Republika Srpska National Assembly to reject the court’s decision and prohibit the enforcement of any rulings from Bosnia’s state judiciary within its territory. Republika Srpska would obstruct the operations of Bosnia’s central government and police within its jurisdiction, he declared.
Dodik has two weeks to appeal the verdict. Legal experts indicate that the sentence will become final once the appeals process is exhausted.
Following the verdict, Dodik communicated with Orban and Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, expressing gratitude for their support. Vucic has convened an emergency meeting of Serbia’s National Security Council to discuss the implications of Dodik’s sentence and is expected to visit Republika Srpska within the next 24 hours.
Dodik is known for his opposition to NATO and has resisted Bosnia’s accession to the US-led military bloc. He has also opposed Western sanctions against Russia related to the Ukraine conflict.
Ukraine: A Deep State Tool to Destroy Trump?
By Ekaterina Blinova – Sputnik – 26.02.2025
The Ukrainian political class is not just badmouthing US President Donald Trump – it has actively worked to undermine his presidency on behalf of the Democrats since his first term, Hans Mahncke, a US investigative journalist and lawyer, tells Sputnik.
Ukraine as a Deep State Tool
- In 2016, top Ukrainian officials publicly insulted then presidential candidate Trump as a “dangerous misfit.”
- Ukrainian operatives dug up dirt on Trump concerning his alleged ties to Russia and leaked a fabricated ledger to undermine his campaign manager, Paul Manafort.
- Former security chief Valentyn Nalyvaichenko admitted Kiev interfered in the 2016 US election.
- In 2019, Democrats weaponized Ukraine again to impeach Trump, with US officials of Ukrainian origin Eugene and Alexander Vindman playing a prominent role.
The Trump-Russia collusion hoax, “deflected attention from Ukraine’s 2016 election meddling…, Biden’s role in pressuring Ukraine to fire a prosecutor investigating Burisma, Biden’s role in the 2014 Maidan coup, and from broader US involvement in post-2014 Ukrainian politics,” Mahncke says.
“Russiagate also sabotaged Trump’s ability to reset relations with Russia… maintaining the rigid narrative of Ukraine as the virtuous ally and Russia as the ultimate villain,” the journalist underscores.
Two Birds With One Stone: Why Patel’s Ukraine Probe Could Bust the Deep State
“A real investigation into Ukraine wouldn’t just expose corruption there — it would strike at the heart of the Washington, DC, establishment,” Mahncke says, commenting on new FBI Director Kash Patel’s bid to scrutinize the Kiev regime.
Mahncke explains that Ukraine has long been a hub for money laundering, foreign influence, and off-the-books deals.
While many potential crimes linked to Ukraine may now fall outside the statute of limitations, fraudulent USAID payments and bribery schemes remain well within the window for prosecution, according to the lawyer.
“USAID funds, NGO cash flows, and military aid kickbacks have enriched the same elites who pushed the Maidan coup and later worked to destroy Trump. If Patel follows the money, it will lead straight back to Washington,” the journalist highlights.
What’s Behind Trump’s Dizzying Speed in Exposing Deep State Fraud?
“The deep state will strike back — no question. Right now, it seems to be in disarray, but there will be some kind of lashing out; we just don’t know what yet. What’s certain is that it’s coming. That’s why Trump must move fast — and he knows it,” Mahncke notes.
Team Trump’s remarkable speed in exposing the USAID scandal and other instances of internal fraud “comes from knowing exactly what they’re up against” and “where the bodies are buried” after years of deep state attacks against him, the journalist points out.
“A key ally in this fight is Elon Musk — a no-nonsense, brilliant businessman who cuts to the chase. From the Twitter Files to fighting censorship, he’s made it harder for the deep state to control the narrative,” Mahncke concludes.
US open to economic cooperation with Russia – Rubio
RT | February 26, 2025
The US and Russia could restore economic ties once the Ukraine conflict is resolved, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has suggested.
Speaking in an interview with Breitbart on Tuesday, Rubio noted that Moscow and Washington could discuss the economic and business domain, but only after they have ensured the smooth operations of each other’s diplomatic missions and have resolved the Ukraine crisis.
“We have to invite them and see, okay, if you guys are serious about ending this thing, let’s sit down and talk about it,” Rubio said. “I think step three is, if we can end this conflict, what does US-Russian relations look like in the 21st century? Are there things we can work on together geopolitically or maybe even economically?”
According to Rubio, Russia and the US have “opportunities to work together” to achieve a “reset” in relations which will “entail talking about not just Russian assets that have been seized by America, by the Europeans… but also American companies that have been hurt.”
He cautioned, however, that such negotiations remain distant. “We’re not at that step yet… We can’t even really talk about those things or fix those things until we bring this war at least to some sort of enduring ceasefire – hopefully permanent.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree in 2023 allowing for the temporary takeover of assets belonging to Russia-based foreign companies from “unfriendly” countries, with several Western companies affected. In October 2024, Russia temporarily nationalized the assets of Glavproduct, a major US-owned food producer.
However, while US-Russian relations sank to historic lows under the administration of US President Joe Biden, his successor Donald Trump has signaled interest in restoring ties. Earlier this month, the two sides held high-profile talks in Saudi Arabia that focused on paving the way for resolving the Ukraine conflict and restoring bilateral ties.
Trump has since indicated that Washington might explore joint ventures in Russia’s mineral sector and suggested that sanctions on Moscow could be lifted “at some point” as part of the broader Ukraine conflict settlement process.
Putin said on Monday that Russia and the US are in talks about “major” joint economic projects, adding that Moscow is open to cooperating with American private companies and government agencies to develop its rare-earth industry.
Zelensky now with only the dictatorship in London to support him
By Martin Jay | Strategic Culture Foundation | February 26, 2025
What is the definition of a ‘dictator’? In the days that followed Trump’s social media post calling President Zelensky one, British media seized upon the subject and ran with it for days. Various public figures were asked whether Trump was right to use the word and whether they believed Zelensky was actually one. Two figures from the right, Nigel Farage and Liz Truss both said they thought Trump was both wrong to call him one and that in fact he wasn’t one.
This remarkable endearment for Zelensky is really the core of the problem in the west in particular the UK, where its leader Sir Keir Starmer declared that he would be ready to send British troops to Ukraine – a suggestion which was quickly shot down by the elites of Germany and France as preposterous.
It’s rare that the giants of the EU put the British government in its place on world affairs but we are living in unprecedented times of sensational stupidity and perhaps ignorance from politicians which we have never seen before.
Farage’s views on the Middle East tell us he is both ignorant of what is happening there and doesn’t have any advisors covering the region. But his views on Ukraine are even more shockingly deranged. Zelensky is a leader who has shut down anything which resembles an ‘opposition’ both politically and media, he has conglomerated all TV stations into one state-owned entity so as to shut down even the slightest criticism or accountability of his own actions, he has had the few dissident voices arrested and thrown into prison, with some predicting that there are thousands of journalists and media workers. Add to that it is rapidly emerging that the level of corruption and embezzlement linked directly to Zelensky is on a scale that even hard line critics in the West could not have even imagined.
In my own investigation in October 2023, where a very angry Ben Wallace insulted me in a WhatsApp interview before blocking me, I outline how the original, more sensational claim that only about a third of all military equipment sent to Ukraine was actually making it to the battlefield was in fact realistic. This analogy was bandied about for some time and was dismissed by Wallace and others like Alecia Kearns MP as nonsense and yet turned out to be more than just realistic but likely. That is to say that 66 percent of what was being sent to Ukraine was being sold on the black market in Libya making Zelensky and his close circle billionaires.
In recent weeks now mainstream journalists and politicians are talking about the arms scandal and it is only a matter of time before we shall see the realities of this. The British government have always turned a blind eye to it, both in Ukraine and further afield. It would cost them nothing to do a study in the Sahel to evaluate how much of the equipment there funding terrorism is coming from the arms bazaars of Tripoli where all of this kit is ending up. I suggested to Wallace that his own government at the time should send some investigators there (Libya) to look at what’s available. I was more or less told to go there myself and do the job for them.
But Zelenksy support structure for so long has been that of a dictator, in particular media. The hundreds of media outlets in Ukraine which were receiving USAID funding is extensive, not to mention the hundreds of civil servants which support him being on the same payroll. If that doesn’t shock Farage and Truss, then consider the same slush fund which paid out around a 100 million dollars to movie stars to go and visit him and fake their adulation, all for the purposes of cheating the humble U.S. taxpayer by raising his profile.
Who could forget Sean Penn giving him his own Oscar, or Ben Stiller chilling with the Ukrainian leader and making small talk? Angelina Jolie is even reported to have been paid 20 million dollars to meet with him but didn’t even manage that and simply mooched about a bit in the country before jetting back to the U.S. Of course, the celebrities all dismiss these claims, through the same left-wing woke press which is part of their extended political family. But the question we should be asking ourselves is simply this: if they were not paid, then why won’t they show up now and show support at the precise moment when Zelensky needs it the most? Given that these celebrities supported Biden and are Democrats, this would be the most logical thing for them to do. In reality, the wall of silence is what we see.
Dictators don’t stand over their hired killers and watch their victims in their final moments like Idi Amin did. In reality, they only indicate and hint to the thugs on their payroll what she should do to fix problems. Do Farage and Truss actually believe that dissidents are not rounded up and thrown into jail where they are tortured and in some cases murdered? Now that the vultures are circling over Zelensky and many are wondering how many days in office he has left, more reports are emerging with details of such cases. The story of Gonzalo Lira, the American Chilean blogger whose vlogs were often well-informed and threw a very poor spotlight on Zelensky is a very sad one as he was brutally tortured while in prison and finally died. If the Zelensky cabal can do this to an American citizen, perhaps Farage and Truss will not be too surprised when in the coming weeks we will have the same Damascus prison media moment where it transpires that there are certainly hundreds, possibly thousands of journalists, commentators and political rivals in Ukraine’s prisons.
The debate, if we can call it that in the UK, over whether Zelensky is a dictator or not is a remedial one at best as it misses the point. In Britain, during the same period a man was imprisoned for posting a social media comment about a Labour official while a granny was visited by two plain clothes cops about her mere criticism of a Labour councilor’s conduct. Plain clothed detectives!
Britain has descended rapidly into a police state with Starmer as its dictator. The high ground we once had where we scolded China for arresting protestors has now been kicked away from under our feet. We have become China. Britain’s police now cannot deal with crime but prefer being the ‘Thought Police’ and threatening old biddies.
And so the talk about what is a dictator is rather fatuous if not incongruent given that those doing it are part of an elite which only claim to cherish free speech but in fact loath it. Farage cannot be taken seriously on Ukraine but his comments do steer the bumble hack towards darker questions. Who is funding him? And is his own dream of being a PM in the UK going to merely continue the present dictatorship which silences anyone who questions him? His reputation of being thin-skinned and kicking out of his party anyone who questions his ideas is already established. His own repugnance of British media also is well known. Previously in Brussels, his decision led to the closure of the only free speech, anti corruption magazine going, which he was always fearful of exposing his own infidelity while an MEP. And as for Truss, the most inept prime minister Britain has ever had in its long history, whose dictator-like style while in office crashed the economy? How should we interpret her support for Zelenksy? Do both Farage and Truss admire this dictator? The problem is not with the word ‘dictator’, it is more about the people who use it for their own purposes. It is not important whether Zelensky is one or not, rather than he is not a dictator who is servile to Trump and his cabal. Unlike Farage, Zelensky is not our kind of dictator.
NATO-skeptic Romanian presidential candidate arrested
RT | February 26, 2025
Romanian police have arrested Calin Georgescu, the front-runner in last year’s annulled presidential election, and conducted dozens of raids on his supporters and people tied to his campaign, local media reported on Wednesday.
A critic of NATO and the EU and an opponent of sending aid to Ukraine, Georgescu made headlines in November last year when he unexpectedly garnered 23% of the vote in the first round of the presidential election in Romania. However, the Constitutional Court annulled the results shortly before the second round, citing intelligence documents alleging ‘irregularities’ in his campaign.
Georgescu’s communications team has said on Facebook that he was arrested just as he was about to submit his new candidacy for the presidency.
”The system stopped him in traffic and he was pulled over for questioning at the Prosecutor General’s Office! Where is democracy, where are the partners who must defend democracy,” his team wrote.
Prior to his arrest, Georgescu condemned the raids on his supporters in a post on Facebook.
“The communist-Bolshevik system continues its odious abuses,” he wrote, accusing the Romanian authorities of trying to “invent evidence to justify the theft of the elections and to do anything to block my new candidacy for the presidency.”
The Romanian Prosecutor General’s Office is reportedly investigating Georgescu over allegations of involvement “in a fascist organization and the promotion of controversial ideologies and historical figures in the public space,” G4Media outlet reported, citing sources close to the investigation.
According to media reports, police found “weapons, live ammunition, and more than a million dollars hidden in a safe” during the raids.
America as Republic, not as Empire – Europe’s “sound and fury” after jaw-dropping pivots in U.S. policy
By Alastair Crooke | Strategic Culture Foundation | February 26, 2025
The bits are falling into a distinct pattern – a pre-prepared pattern.
Defence Secretary Hegseth at the Munich Security Conference gave us four ‘noes’: No to Ukraine in NATO; No to a return to pre-2014 borders; No to ‘Article 5’ peacekeeper backstops, and ‘No’ to U.S. troops in Ukraine. And in a final flourish, he added that U.S. troops in Europe are not ‘forever’ – and even placed a question mark over the continuity of NATO.
Pretty plain speaking! The U.S. clearly is cutting away from Ukraine. And they intend to normalise relations with Russia.
Then, Vice-President Vance threw his fire cracker amongst the gathered Euro-élites. He said that the élites had retreated from “shared” democratic values; they were overly reliant on repressing and censoring their peoples (prone to locking them up); and, above all, he excoriated the European Cordon Sanitaire (‘firewall’) by which European parties outside the Centre-Left are deemed non-grata politically: It’s a fake ‘threat’, he suggested. Of what are you really so frightened? Have you so little confidence in your ‘democracy’?
The U.S., he implied, will no longer support Europe if it continues to suppress political constituencies, arrest citizens for speech offenses, and particularly cancel elections as was done recently in Romania. “If you’re running in fear of your own voters”, Vance said, “there is nothing America can do for you”.
Ouch! Vance had hit them where it hurts.
It is difficult to say what specifically most triggered the catatonic European breakdown: Was it the fear of the U.S. and Russia joining together as a major power nexus – thus stripping Europe from ever again being able glide along on the back of American power, through the specious notion that any European state must have exceptional access to the Washington ‘ear’?
Or was it the ending of the Ukraine/Zelensky cult which was so prized amongst the Euro-élite as the ‘glue’ around which a faux European unity and identity could be enforced? Both probably contributed to the fury.
That the U.S. would in essence leave Europe to their own delusions would be a calamitous event for the Brussels technocracy.
Many may lazily assume that the U.S. double act at Munich was just another example of the well-known Trumpian fondness for dropping ‘wacky’ initiatives intended to both shock and kickover frozen paradigms. The Munich speeches did exactly that all right! Yet that does not make them accidental; but rather parts that fit into a bigger picture.
It is clear now that the Trump blitzkrieg across the American Administrative State could not have been mounted unless carefully pre-planned and prepared over the last four years.
Trump’s flurry of Presidential Executive Orders at the outset of his Presidency were not whimsical. Leading U.S. constitutional lawyer, Johnathan Turley, and other lawyers say that the Orders were well drafted legally and with the clear understanding that legal challenges would ensue. What’s more, that Trump Team welcome those challenges.
What is going on? The newly confirmed head of the Office of Budget Management (OBM), Russ Vought, says his Office will become the “on/off switch” for all Executive expenditure under the new Executive Orders. Vought calls the resulting whirlpool, the application of Constitutional radicalism. And Trump has now issued the Executive Order that reinstates the primacy of the Executive as the controlling mechanism of government.
Vaught, who was in OBM in Trump 01, is carefully selecting the ground for all-out financial war on the Deep State. It will be fought out firstly at the Supreme Court – which the Trump Team expect confidently to win (Trump has the 6-3 conservative majority). The new régime will then be applied across all agencies and departments of state. Expect shrieks of pain.
The point here is that the Administrative State – aloof from executive control – has taken to itself prerogatives such as immunity to dismissal and the self-awarded authority to shape policy – creating a dual state system, run by unelected technocrats, which, when implanted in departments such as Justice and the Pentagon, have evolved into the American Deep State.
Article Two of the Constitution however, says very bluntly: Executive power shall be vested in the U.S. President (with no ifs or buts at all.) Trump intends for his Administration to recover that lost Executive power. It was, in fact, lost long ago. Trump is re-claiming too, the Executive’s right to dismiss ‘servants of the State’, and to ‘switch off’ wasteful expenditure at his discretion, as part of a unitary executive prerequisite.
Of course, the Administrative State is fighting back. Turley’s article is headlined: They Are Taking Away Everything We Have: Democrats and Unions Launch Existential Fight. Their aim has been to cripple the Trump initiative through using politicised judges to issue restraint orders. Many mainstream lawyers believe Trump’s Unitary Executive claim to be illegal. The question is whether Congress can stand up Agencies designed to act independently of the President; and how does that square with the separation of powers and Article Two that vests unqualified executive power with one sole elected official – the U.S. President.
How did the Democrats not see this coming? Lawyer Robert Barnes essentially says that the ‘blitzkrieg’ was “exceptionally well-planned” and had been discussed in Trump circles since late 2020. The latter team had emerged from within a generational and cultural shift in the U.S.. This latter had given rise to a Libertarian/Populist wing with working class roots who often had served in the military, yet had come to despise the Neo-con lies (especially those of 9/11) that brought endless wars. They were animated more by the old John Adams adage that ‘America should not go abroad in search of monsters to slay’.
In short, they were not part of the WASP ‘Anglo’ world; they came from a different Culture that harked back to the theme of America as Republic, not as Empire. This is what you see with Vance and Hegseth – a reversion to the Republican precept that the U.S. should not become involved in European wars. Ukraine is not America’s war.
The Deep State, it seems, were not paying attention to what a posse of ‘populist’ outliers, tucked away from the rarefied Beltway talking shop, were up to: They (the outliers) were planning a concerted attack on the Federal expenditure spigot – identified as the weak spot about which a Constitutional challenge could be mounted that would derail – in its entirety – the expenditures of the Deep State.
It seems that one aspect to the surprise has been the Trump Team’s discipline: ‘no leaks’. And secondly, that those involved in the planning are not drawn from the preeminent Anglo-sphere, but rather from a strand of society that was offended by the Iraq war and which blames the ‘Anglo-sphere’ for ‘ruining’ America.
So Vance’s speech at Munich was not disruptive – merely for the sake of being disruptive; he was, in fact, encouraging the audience to recall early Republican Values. This was what is meant by his complaint that Europe had turned away from “our shared values” – i.e. the values that animated Americans seeking escape from the tyranny, prejudices and corruption of the Old World. Vance was (quite politely) chiding the Euro-élites for backsliding to old European vices.
Vance implicitly was hinting too, that European conservative libertarians should emulate Trump and act to slough-off their ‘Administrative States’, and recover control over executive power. Tear down the firewalls, he advised.
Why? Because he likely views the ‘Brussels’ Technocratic State as nothing other than a pure offshoot to the American Deep State – and therefore very likely to try to torpedo and sink Trump’s initiative to normalise relations with Moscow.
If these were Vance’s instincts, he was right. Macron almost immediately summoned an ‘emergency meeting’ of ‘the war party’ in Paris to consider how to frustrate the American initiative. It failed however, descending reportedly into quarrelling and acrimony.
It transpired that Europe could not gather a ‘sharp-end’ military force greater than 20,-000-30,000 men. Scholtz objected in principle to their involvement; Poland demurred as a close neighbour of Ukraine; and Italy stayed silent. Starmer, however, after Munich, immediately rang Zelensky to say that Britain saw Ukraine to be on an irrevocable path to NATO membership – thus directly contradicting U.S. policy and with no support from other states. Trump will not forget this, nor will he forget Britain’s former role in supporting the Russiagate slur during his first term in office.
The meeting did however, underline Europe’s divisions and impotence. Europe has been sidelined and their self-esteem is badly bruised. The U.S. would in essence leave Europe to their own delusions, which would be calamitous for the Brussels autocracy.
Yet, far more consequential than most of the happenings of the past few days was when Trump, speaking with Fox News, after attending Daytona, dismissed Zelensky’s canard of Russia wanting to invade NATO countries. “I don’t agree with that; not even a little bit”, Trump retorted.
Trump does not buy into the primary lie intended as the glue which holds this entire EU geo-political structure together. For, without the ‘Russia threat’; without the U.S. believing in the globalist linchpin lie, there can be no pretence of Europe needing to prepare for war with Russia. Europe ultimately will have to come to reconcile its future as a periphery in Eurasia.
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The lies about the 1967 war are still more powerful than the truth
By Alan Hart | June 4, 2012
In retrospect it can be seen that the 1967 war, the Six Days War, was the turning point in the relationship between the Zionist state of Israel and the Jews of the world (the majority of Jews who prefer to live not in Israel but as citizens of many other nations). Until the 1967 war, and with the exception of a minority of who were politically active, most non-Israeli Jews did not have – how can I put it? – a great empathy with Zionism’s child. Israel was there and, in the sub-consciousness, a refuge of last resort; but the Jewish nationalism it represented had not generated the overtly enthusiastic support of the Jews of the world. The Jews of Israel were in their chosen place and the Jews of the world were in their chosen places. There was not, so to speak, a great feeling of togetherness. At a point David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s founding father and first prime minister, was so disillusioned by the indifference of world Jewry that he went public with his criticism – not enough Jews were coming to live in Israel.
So how and why did the 1967 war transform the relationship between the Jews of the world and Israel? … continue
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