China detonates non-nuclear hydrogen bomb — media
RT | April 20, 2025
Chinese researchers have successfully tested a non-nuclear hydrogen bomb that created a sustained fireball, far outperforming traditional explosives, the South China Morning Post has reported.
In an article on Sunday, the newspaper cited the researchers’ study published last month in the Chinese-language Journal of Projectiles, Rockets, Missiles and Guidance. According to the report, a team from the China State Shipbuilding Corporation’s (CSSC) 705 Research Institute — a key player in underwater weapon systems — developed a 2kg (4.4lbs) bomb primarily composed of magnesium hydride, with conventional explosives serving as the catalyst.
In a field test, the device reportedly generated a fireball with temperatures exceeding 1,000 degrees Celsius (1,832 degrees Fahrenheit) that lasted for more than two seconds, which is considerably longer than what an equivalent TNT blast is capable of producing.
In the reaction, magnesium hydride, a compound originally developed as an efficient fuel, rapidly releases stored hydrogen gas, resulting in a sustained inferno.
The novel explosive device’s destructive power thus is said to lie not in its blast pressure, but rather in the ability to generate extreme heat.
The South China Morning Post quoted CSSC research scientist Wang Xuefeng as explaining that its properties also allow for “precise control over blast intensity, easily achieving uniform destruction of targets across vast areas.”
If fully developed, the method could presumably yield a weapon similar to napalm or a thermobaric device – ideal for annihilating defensive structures and armored vehicles.
While the production of magnesium hydride used to be mostly small-scale and rather complicated, China has recently developed a cheaper and safer production method and built a plant capable of producing 150 tons of the compound per year.
Israeli military sets up checkpoint in Syria’s Quneitra
Al Mayadeen | April 21, 2025
As part of an ongoing military escalation, Israeli occupation forces advanced into Syria’s Quneitra countryside and established a temporary military checkpoint, according to local sources.
The sources reported that several Israeli military vehicles were mobilized west of the village of al-Asha in southern Quneitra, where they advanced toward Tel al-Ahmar al-Gharbi and set up a checkpoint.
Civilian areas targeted amid escalation
The Syrian province of Quneitra has witnessed a rapid increase in Israeli military activity, marked by swift incursions and expanded targeting zones. Local reports indicate that the occupation forces have widened their operations to include civilian areas, suggesting a strategy that may involve the displacement of the local population.
Earlier this week, Israeli occupation forces carried out a sudden military operation near the towns of Taranjeh and Koum Mheires, targeting Syrian army positions and destroying installations within minutes. The strikes also hit nearby residential zones, raising concerns about whether the targeting was deliberate or collateral.
Local voices, claims of forced displacement
Abu Marwan, a resident of Quneitra province, told Al Mayadeen he is seeking compensation after ongoing Israeli operations damaged property and farmland. He said that hundreds of farmers have been affected, with Israeli forces targeting abandoned posts, disabled vehicles, and civilian areas despite the lack of any apparent security threat.
“Israel’s” creation of so-called buffer zones has moved civilian homes into active military zones, increasing the risk to residents and reinforcing concerns about an intentional push toward forced displacement.
This latest Israeli military operation aligns with a broader pattern of rapid and forceful strikes, including similar raids near the town of Hadr. In those cases, military sites were destroyed swiftly, with effects extending beyond combat zones and into populated regions.
The frequency and scale of such operations in Quneitra and near the occupied Golan Heights reflect growing concerns over Israeli expansionism and its long-term impact on southern Syria.
Germany announces new military aid package to Ukraine
RT | April 20, 2025
Germany has announced a new package of military aid for Ukraine, which includes armored vehicles, air-defense rockets, and howitzers, among other weaponry. Earlier this month, incoming Chancellor Friedrich Merz indicated that he might break Berlin’s self-imposed taboo on providing Kiev with long-range rockets – a remark that drew a stern warning from Moscow.
On Thursday, the German government published an updated list of arms and military equipment it shipped to Ukraine. The latest batch encompasses a number of Mine Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicles (MRAP), ammunition for Leopard 2 tanks as well as Gepard self-propelled anti-aircraft guns and missiles for IRIS-T SLM air-defense systems. On top of that, Berlin supplied Kiev with several Zuzana 2 self-propelled howitzers, 155mm and 122mm artillery rounds, reconnaissance and strike drones, as well as man-portable anti-tank weapons and assault rifles.
According to the statement, “in total, the Federal Republic of Germany has so far provided or committed for future years military assistance with a value of approximately 28 billion euro,” with around €5.2 billion ($5.9 billion) worth of supplies coming from the German military’s own stocks.
Additionally, “more than 10,000 Ukrainian soldiers have received military training in Germany” since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in February 2022, Berlin estimated.
At a meeting of the Ukraine Contact Group in Brussels, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius announced plans to donate military equipment to Ukraine in 2025. The donation will include four IRIS-T air defense systems, 300 guided missiles, 100 ground surveillance radars, 100,000 artillery rounds, 300 reconnaissance drones, 25 Marder infantry fighting vehicles, 15 Leopard 1A5 tanks, and 120 portable anti-aircraft missile systems.
Speaking to outlet ARD last Sunday, Merz, who is expected to be officially named chancellor on May 6, hinted that he could deliver Taurus missiles to Ukraine. The Taurus has a range of 500km.
Current Chancellor Olaf Scholz has repeatedly turned down Kiev’s requests for the rockets, arguing that they could lead to a dangerous escalation of the conflict.
Matthias Miersch, the leader of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), which is currently in the process of forming a coalition government with Merz’s Christian Democrats, expressed hope on Wednesday that the incoming chancellor, “once fully informed by [intelligence] agencies, will reassess the issue clearly.”
In response to Merz’s remark, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova stated that any cruise missile attack on Russian facilities or critical transport infrastructure requiring Bundeswehr assistance would be seen as direct German involvement in military operations.
Facing Prison Time in Germany for Criticizing an Israeli Journalist: The Case of Hüseyin Dogru
By Alan MacLeod – MintPressNews – April 20, 2025
Amid a crackdown on pro-Palestine voices in Germany, a journalist regularly attacked as a Russian operative is facing up to three years in prison for defamation of an Israel-based journalist. Hüseyin Dogru, founder of red. media, has been charged with defamation for actions relating to a spat with Nicholas Potter, a German state-funded reporter working for the Israeli outlet, The Jerusalem Post.
In December, Potter, a self-styled counter-extremism expert, published a lengthy exposé in The Jerusalem Post, claiming that red. media, MintPress News, and The Grayzone were part of a network of far-left outlets promoting extremism and anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.
Worse still, he strongly insinuated that all three were promoted and funded by the governments of Russia, Syria, and Iran.
The charges are false (see MintPress’ rebuttal here), and are particularly ironic, coming as they do from a journalist who is funded by the German Foreign Office. One who, amid a genocide, moved to Israel to work for an outlet headed by a former Israeli Defense Forces spokesperson.
Moreover, Potter himself arguably holds extreme views on the subject. Just weeks after attacking us for our journalism, he penned an article titled “Can Journalists Be Terrorists,” which attempted to justify many of Israel’s killings of Palestinian media workers.
Both red. and MintPress immediately highlighted much of this important context, and our content went viral.
From Viral Criticism to Criminal Charges
A sticker about Potter, based on a red. media graphic, was spotted in Berlin. The sticker took the outlet’s criticism of him, and plastered the phrase, “The German Hurensohn” — “The German Son of a Bitch” — over the top. That sticker is the centerpiece of the prosecution’s allegation of a coordinated “hate campaign” against Potter led by red. media. Potter claims that he has suffered harassment and threats to his life, and some have tried to link this back to red. media’s graphic.
The accusations provoked a storm of articles in German media, all supportive of Potter. Many echoed U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s claims that red. media is a Russian government-controlled influence operation.
A red. media post criticizing journalist Nicholas Potter, left, appears as a modified sticker in Germany, right. Photo provided to MintPress
Dogru denies these allegations, although he was previously a key part of Red Fish, a platform financed by Ruptly, a Germany-based outlet partially funded by the Russian state-controlled network, RT. After the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Dogru closed Red Fish and started his own independent outlet. He insists it has no connection to Russia and is dedicated to making revolutionary and educational content. He also denies having any information or involvement in producing anti-Potter stickers.
Germany Criminalized Palestinian Solidarity
Potter’s support for Israeli policies has certainly drawn the ire of many in the pro-Palestine movement in Germany. Yet he is far from alone. The German government has offered its full support to Israel and has gone so far as to ban pro-Palestine demonstrations and lock up countless activists, including Jewish people. The phrase “From the River to the Sea” has effectively been criminalized, with Berlin announcing that it would deny citizenship to anyone using it. New German citizenship laws require all applicants to sign what is, in effect, a loyalty oath to the State of Israel, declaring that it has a “right to exist.”
Berlin is currently deporting foreign residents for their participation in lawful protests supporting Palestinian rights. Dogru’s legal team has advised him that his wife and son could be deported as well.
Commentators have warned that, with these actions, Germany is lurching towards the authoritarian right. With the far-right AfD Party surging in the polls (a recent survey found they are now the most popular party in Germany), many inside the country are ringing the alarm bells.
“For decades, Germany has stuck with Israel and its narratives in the Middle East,” Dogru told MintPress, adding: “Since October 7, we see that the German government is violently repressing activists to make sure there are no voices in Germany critical of Israel. Activists here have paid a high price to make sure that they can protest.”
According to Dogru, this is a test case. Ultimately, the suppression of speech is not about Israel, but an attack on its own society.
Germany is preparing to assert itself as a leading military and political force in NATO and the EU. To do that, it must eliminate resistance — not just abroad, but at home. This isn’t driven by historical guilt or solidarity. It’s about silencing dissent and disciplining society. By targeting the most marginalized, the German state is disciplining its population — silencing opposition before it grows.”
The message from the German government is clear, Dogru claims: “fall in line, or be crushed.”
Atmosphere of talks with Washington is ‘constructive’: Iran
Al Mayadeen | April 20, 2025
The Iranian government’s spokesperson, Fatemeh Mohajerani, stated on Sunday that the atmosphere of the recent round of indirect talks with the United States was “constructive,” signaling a potential easing of tensions between the two countries.
She confirmed that practical steps to reduce tensions will be discussed in the upcoming sessions.
Speaking to the state-run IRNA news agency, Mohajerani emphasized that Iran is acting in its national interests and values, adding that “Iran is moving forward based on its national interests and preserving the dignity of its people.”
“It will welcome any initiative to lift sanctions that serve the interests of the Iranian people,” noting that the expert-level talks are expected to resume in Muscat, Oman, in the coming days.
Araghchi confirms forward momentum
The statement came a day after Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi described the second round of indirect discussions, held in Rome, as “good.”
He said the talks, which lasted approximately four hours, led to an understanding on several key frameworks and objectives.
“We reached an understanding on some of the main frameworks and objectives, and we agreed to continue the talks,” Araghchi told Iranian state television.
Araghchi confirmed that technical-level discussions will begin on Wednesday in the Sultanate of Oman. These expert meetings aim to work out the specifics of a potential agreement. A follow-up political meeting is scheduled for Saturday, also in Oman, to evaluate the results of the technical talks.
This second round of diplomacy comes just one week after the first round, also held in Oman, which both sides had described as constructive.
Over 1,300 Easter truce violations by Ukraine – MOD
RT | April 20, 2025
The Russian military has been targeted more than 1,300 times by Ukrainian forces in the less than 24 hours since the declaration of an Easter truce by both sides, the Defense Ministry in Moscow has said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said earlier that the pause in hostilities would be in effect from 6:00pm Moscow time on Saturday, and last until midnight on Monday. He instructed the country’s military to stay on high alert and be ready “to respond to any violations or provocations.” Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky answered a few hours later that Kiev’s forces “will act in a reciprocal way.”
The Defense Ministry said in a statement on Sunday that “despite the announcement of the Easter truce,” Ukrainian forces attempted to assault the positions of the Russian military in the areas of the settlements of Sukhaya Balka and Bogatyr in Russia’s Donetsk People’s Republic overnight. The attacks were repelled, it added.
Kiev’s troops also used 48 plane-type UAVs against the Russian military, including one in Crimea, the statement read.
“The Ukrainian units fired 444 times from cannons and mortars at the positions of our troops, [and] carried out 900 strikes with quadcopter drones,” the ministry said.
There were 12 artillery attacks, 33 UAV strikes, and seven munition drops in the border areas of Bryansk, Kursk, and Belgorod regions in western Russia, which resulted in “civilian casualties and injuries, as well as damage to civilian facilities,” according to the statement.
“In accordance with the order of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Armed Forces [President Vladimir Putin], all [Russian military] groupings in the area of the special military operation strictly observed the ceasefire regime… and remained at previously occupied lines and positions,” the ministry said.
The Russian Foreign Ministry’s ambassador-at-large overseeing investigations of war crimes by Kiev, Rodion Miroshnik, said earlier in the day that Ukraine used artillery and drones to attack residential areas in several cities and towns in Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republic as well as in Kherson Region. More reports of violations of the Easter ceasefire by Ukraine have been coming in, he added.
During their phone call on March 18, Putin accepted his US counterpart Donald Trump’s proposal to introduce a 30-day pause on targeting energy facilities. Zelensky also said at the time that his country would abide by the truce. However, the Russian Defense Ministry reported daily violations by Ukraine of the partial ceasefire, which expired last week.
The breaches of the Easter truce suggest that Kiev is unable to stick to any pause in the fighting, Miroshnik said during appearances on Soloviev LIVE TV on Sunday.
“I do not remember a single ceasefire that would be successful and long-term, so I do not yet see any serious grounds to say that Ukraine is capable of doing this [abide by a truce],” the diplomat stressed.
NATO’s War Narratives Collapse
Aaron Maté & Glenn Diesen
Glenn Diesen | April 18, 2025
Investigative journalist Aaron Maté discusses how NATO’s war narratives are falling apart. Maté is renowned for debunking the Russiagate hoax, yet the lessons about the dangers of embracing false stories have not yet been appreciated.
Wrong, ABC News, Climate Change Didn’t Cause 2025’s Severe Tornado Outbreak
By Linnea Lueken | ClimateREALISM | April 14, 2025
A recent story by ABC News, “Climate and environment updates: Tornado activity doubled March average: NOAA,” classifies recent severe tornado outbreaks under their “climate crisis” category, implying that these storms were caused by global warming. This is false. Climate change is not causing an increase in the number or severity of tornados, nor can it be connected to such a limited event.
ABC warns:
The climate crisis is not a distant threat; it’s happening right now and affecting what matters most to us.
According to a new report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, U.S. tornado activity in March was more than twice the monthly average, with over 200 tornadoes recorded.
Although ABC doesn’t explicitly state that this tornado season has been caused by climate change, the story strongly implies it, and as such it cannot be left unchallenged, because it is wrong.
The United States did experience a destructive and violent tornado season in March 2025, but it was not a record breaker in terms of numbers or strength, nor does it reflect a long-term trend that would be necessary to prove the climate connection.
The National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) disagree strongly with ABC’s claims. They report that tornado records in the past are spotty, because they are very short lived and aren’t always reported, especially as one moves further back into the past. NCEI reports “[m]any significant tornadoes may not make it into the historical record since Tornado Alley was very sparsely populated during the 20th century.”
Doppler weather radar did not become widespread until the 1990s. Because of the low coverage of weather radar before then, and much higher coverage in recent years, NCEI explains that “observation practices have led to an increase in the number of reported weaker tornadoes, and in recent years EF-0 tornadoes have become more prevalent in the total number of reported tornadoes.”
NCEI continues:
With increased National Doppler radar coverage, increasing population, and greater attention to tornado reporting, there has been an increase in the number of tornado reports over the past several decades. This can create a misleading appearance of an increasing trend in tornado frequency. To better understand the variability and trend in tornado frequency in the United States, the total number of EF-1 and stronger, as well as strong to violent tornadoes (EF-3 to EF-5 category on the Enhanced Fujita scale) can be analyzed. These tornadoes would have likely been reported even during the decades before Doppler radar use became widespread and practices resulted in increasing tornado reports. The bar charts below indicate there has been little trend in the frequency of the stronger tornadoes over the past 55 years.
Data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) tornado count show no trend in the number of tornadoes since the introduction of widespread Doppler radar. (See figures below)
Figure 1: Trend of all tornadoes counted since 1950. Note that the trend stops increasing once the widespread coverage of Doppler weather radar is achieved in the 1990s. Red are preliminary estimates for this year.
When it comes to the strongest tornadoes, EF-3 and above, there appears to be a downwards trend. (see figure below)
Climate at a Glance: Tornadoes points out that as recently as 2017 through 2018, the United States set records for the longest period in history without a tornado death and the longest period in history without an F3 or stronger tornado. In fact, the two record-low years for number of tornadoes both occurred this past dozen years, in 2014 and 2018.
Moreover, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change finds that “[t]here is low confidence in observed trends in small spatial-scale phenomena such as tornadoes.”
ABC’s alarming coverage of the 2025 tornado season is at odds with the data. There is no dangerous climate signal in the tornado data, there may even be evidence that the modest warming of the past century is related to the decline in severe tornado outbreaks in the United States. A single severe tornado season, or concentrated outbreak, is not evidence of catastrophic climate change, only a long-term sustained trend would suggest climate change might be a factor, and there is no such trend.
How Might The US’ Relations With Ukraine & Russia Change If It Abandons Its Peace Efforts?
By Andrew Korybko | April 18, 2025
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Friday that the US might stop mediating an end to the Ukrainian Conflict if it concludes within “a matter of days” that no peace deal is doable. That coincided with the Wall Street Journal reporting that Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff told them that “Putin had been fixated on Ukrainian land in their discussions. He said that Russia might get some of the regions, but not all.” This analysis here explained why it’s so important for Russia to obtain full control over the disputed lands.
If no breakthrough is achieved, such as the US coercing Ukraine into withdrawing from those regions or Russia agreeing to freeze this dimension of the conflict, then the US might indeed abandon its peace efforts. The question therefore arises of how that could change its relations with Ukraine and Russia. Beginning with the first, Trump and his team’s explicitly expressed exhaustion with this conflict bodes ill for the scenario of the US continuing military support for Ukraine, which would please Russia.
The Europeans would try to replace some of this lost aid in order to keep the conflict going in alignment with Zelensky’s vision, but they’d be unable to replace all of it and he might ultimately be forced into agreeing to worse terms than the US’ if Russia successfully expands its ground offensive. At the same time, however, the US might also suspend its talks with Russia on the strategic resource deals that were supposed to serve as the centerpiece of their planned “New Détente” as long as the conflict continues.
This balanced approach would be predicated on pressuring Ukraine and Russia into committing to compromises aimed at restoring the US-led peace talks since the first doesn’t want to lose territory in other regions while the second is interested in shaping the post-conflict era in partnership with the US. These evidently aren’t their top priorities, however, otherwise the land issue would have already been resolved one way or another and there wouldn’t be any talk of the US abandoning its peace efforts.
Other than the unlikely scenario of the US “escalating to de-escalate” on better terms for Ukraine, another comparatively more probable one exists but which is still less likely than the aforesaid, and that’s the US discontinuing military support for Ukraine but continuing resource talks with Russia. These negotiations are connected to Ukraine since the US is seeking privileged terms from Russia in exchange for coercing Kiev into Moscow’s demanded concessions but can still proceed even if that doesn’t occur.
The reason why this scenario is considered less likely than the balanced one described above is because some of the US’ sanctions that impede the clinching of resource deals with Russia can’t easily be lifted without first bringing about an end to the Ukrainian Conflict. Moreover, sanctions relief and the prospect of jointly shaping the post-conflict era are the only carrots that the US can dangle for incentivizing Russia to compromise on ending the conflict, which Trump wants it to do for solidifying his global legacy.
He’s therefore expected to at least temporarily suspend such talks with Russia for that reason in that scenario but might resume them if the conflict remains protracted with no clear diplomatic or military solution. That would make the most sense since he wouldn’t prematurely give up the only means that the US has for incentivizing Russia to compromise for peace but he also wouldn’t lose the objective economic and strategic benefits that a resource deal would bring.
Trump Administration Targets $1.4B in Federal “Misinformation” Grants
NIH and State Dept. Order Crackdown on Speech-Policing Programs Funded Under Biden
By Christina Maas | Reclaim The Net | April 19, 2025
It started, as so many federal science fair projects do, with a grant and a vague idea. The University of California, Irvine secured a $683,000 pot of taxpayer gold to study how social media “misinformation” affects vaccine acceptance among black and latino communities. Their plan was to track the followers of so-called “vaccine-hesitant influencers” and feed the data into a visualization tool.
That grant is now dead. Not because it failed, but because the broader disinformation-industrial complex is starting to crack under the weight of its own contradictions.
The UC Irvine project was just one tile in a mosaic of more than 800 federally funded efforts, totaling over $1.4 billion since 2017. All of it was earmarked to combat misinformation, disinformation, and whatever the marketing department decided to call lies [and unapproved views] this week. More than 600 of these contracts were approved during the Biden administration, and it turns out people started noticing that the government was quietly inserting itself into the content moderation business.
Enter Donald J. Trump, stage right, with his first-day executive order accusing the federal government of turning buzzwords like “malinformation” into permission slips for clamping down on speech. The Department of Justice was assigned to dig through the records and figure out just how far the thought policing went.
The public got a good look after The Free Press decided to play matchmaker between obscure federal records and actual journalism. That triggered a glorious round of internal audits, panicked reviews, and in some cases, the rapid self-destruction of programs that suddenly couldn’t remember what they were for.
NIH: From Health Science to Thought Control
The National Institutes of Health got caught mid-sprint. In response to press inquiries, the NIH not only canceled the UC Irvine grant but also torched a $22.4 million payout to UnidosUS, a group whose mission had somehow morphed from Latino advocacy into online speech policing. NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya hit the panic button, sending out an “URGENT” internal email ordering a review of all research touching the sacred trinity of mis-dis-mal information.
An NIH spokesperson said the agency is now “taking action to terminate research funding that is not aligned” with updated policy priorities. In plain English, they finally read the Constitution and realized they might be setting it on fire.
The State Department’s Digital Hall Monitor Gets Benched
Meanwhile, the State Department has been busy putting its own houseplants on leave. Secretary Marco Rubio, now running Foggy Bottom like it’s a Senate hearing, has suspended dozens of staffers from the Global Engagement Center. He says the agency crossed the line into censorship, which is a bold claim until you look at the receipts. The Center has spent years telling Americans what is or isn’t true, always with the urgency of a substitute teacher discovering TikTok.
The department has begun attaching “no-cost amendments” to existing grants. That’s bureaucrat-speak for telling award recipients to sign a bunch of legal paperwork and swear they aren’t doing anything unconstitutional. A little late for that, but sure.
The Pentagon: Same Game, New Label
At the Pentagon, they’ve decided that the problem is just a branding issue. So the term “disinformation” has been retired in favor of the more patriotic-sounding “countering adversary propaganda and information operations.” A senior Defense Department official explained that the shift brings the program into alignment with the new White House directive. Which is the kind of sentence that usually ends with somebody testifying in front of Congress about data collection gone wrong.
None of this seems to affect Peraton, a defense contractor that holds a $979 million contract to identify threats in coordination with US Central Command. Peraton did not respond to The Free Press’ requests for comment, possibly because they were too busy deciding whether your aunt’s Facebook post counts as hostile influence activity.
Microsoft Broadens Always-Watching AI-Powered Recall Tool That Logs and Indexes User Activity
A built-in memory machine disguised as convenience, Recall quietly turns every moment at your keyboard into searchable history.
By Ken Macon | Reclaim The Net | April 19, 2025
Microsoft’s renewed push to roll out Recall, an AI-powered feature in Windows 11 that automatically logs user activity every few seconds, is reigniting deep concerns among those focused on digital privacy and personal security.
Initially paused following a storm of backlash last year, Recall has quietly returned in a preview version of Windows 11 (Build 26100.3902), now available to select testers. The tool takes snapshots of a user’s screen at regular intervals and creates a searchable timeline of everything from app usage to websites visited and documents accessed. While Microsoft pitches this as a convenience tool, privacy advocates see a surveillance mechanism in disguise.
The company claims the tool is safe. It requires users to opt in and enroll in Windows Hello to access stored snapshots. Microsoft describes the feature as a way to “quickly find and get back to any app, website, image, or document just by describing its content.” Users, the company says, can pause recording and choose what is saved.
But these assurances fall flat for those warning about the broader consequences. The fact that Recall is opt-in does not prevent the exposure of data from people who never enabled it. If someone with Recall turned on receives a private photo, message, or sensitive document, it will be silently captured, analyzed, and indexed by the tool, regardless of the sender’s intent or privacy tools used.
The feature’s ability to store and catalog data so comprehensively opens up a host of legal, security, and ethical issues. Lawyers, governments, and spyware operators would gain an unprecedented level of access to a user’s digital life; not through brute force or phishing, but through a built-in tool that essentially creates a time-lapse of computer activity.
For those wary of the increasing creep of AI into daily computing, Recall has become a textbook case. Critics have framed it as part of a larger trend where companies inject AI features into existing platforms not to serve users, but to drive engagement, data collection, or lock-in.
From Ms. Rachel To Anti-War College Students: The End Of American Free Speech
By Robert Inlakesh | Palestine Chronicle | April 19, 2025
Working together with the most powerful government in the world, Zionist organizations are smearing and persecuting anyone who expresses sympathy with Palestinians, subjected to a genocide subsidized with their own tax dollars. From the media to academia, American free speech rights are being stripped.
Fulfilling an agenda laid out in a 33-page document named “Project Esther”, published in October of last year by the Heritage Foundation, the US government is teaming up with extremist elements of the Zionist Lobby to crush criticism of Israel.
From its recommendations to form a federal task force to combat alleged antisemitism, which is really just criticism of the Israeli government, to its strategy to tear down leading academic institutions, the plan is being followed.
The Heritage Foundation, most well-known for its “Project 2025”, is known to possess considerable influence on the Trump White House. Yet, despite its obvious influence and policy recommendations that are being followed, almost down to the letter, there has been little connection drawn between these think-tank documents and Donald Trump’s anti-free speech crusade.
It is evident, however, that the Democratic Party also presided over the greatest assault on academic freedom in American history, placing itself in line with the Zionist Lobby, which is why it makes sense that there is no incentive from Democrat-aligned media to give light to this topic. Although the situation has only grown more dire for free speech rights, particularly on college campuses, since the departure of former President Joe Biden.
Uncharted Waters
Under the Trump administration, it started to become clear with the detention of Mahmoud Khalil that we were entering uncharted waters. The mere fact that a Green-Card holder, accused of no crime, and who is married to an American citizen, was snatched in the night by plain-clothed ICE officers, who ferried him off from New York to Louisiana, was a tell-tale sign of things to come.
Thereafter, things only grew worse. Zionist student groups and racist extremist organizations have worked to put together lists of completely peaceful, law-abiding individuals who are set to be targeted by federal security agencies.
Claiming persecution themselves, these groups hide behind the cloak of being offended by anti-war protests, in order to work with the state to see their political opposition suppressed by force.
Yet, the crackdown has not been limited to students/former students. Instead, this campaign that aims to trample on the First Amendment rights as they are laid out in the US Constitution is beginning to empower pro-Israel extremists.
Weaponizing the claims of antisemitism and claiming that their targets are “Hamas supporters”, these organizations no longer are required to even present evidence for their allegations.
The Case of Ms. Rachel
This lack of any proof for the claims being made was no more evident than in the case of Ms. Rachel, a popular children’s entertainer.
A pro-Israel organization known as “Stopantisemitism” decided to accuse Ms. Rachel of spreading Hamas propaganda and requested the US government investigate whether she is receiving foreign funding.
Ms. Rachel has not commented on any of the political dynamics concerning the genocide in Gaza, yet has long expressed her sympathies for Palestinian children suffering in the Gaza Strip, as well as the Israeli Bibas family. There is nothing even remotely antisemitic about her posts on the topic, nor do they have anything to do with Hamas.
Yet, the US government appears to have reached the same point Israel has, where an accusation that someone is affiliated with Hamas needs no evidence to corroborate it before action is taken.
In Israel’s case, the action taken is the detention, torture, and/or murder of that individual, whereas in the United States, it can come in the form of detention or legal battles for now.
This assault on free speech is being carried out against media outlets also, using similar tactics of providing baseless claims regarding collaboration with Hamas, and even on behalf of Israeli citizens filing their cases in US courts to take down registered not-for-profit organizations.
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Does Kevin Barrett Seek to “Absolve Islam of a Terrible Crime”?
The Kevin Barrett-Chomsky Dispute in Historical Perspective – Last part of the series titled “9/11 and the Zionist Question”
By Prof. Tony Hall | American Herald Tribune | August 28, 2016
Amidst his litany of condemnations, Jonathan Kay reserves some of his most vicious and vitriolic attacks for Kevin Barrett. For instance Kay harshly criticizes Dr. Barrett’s published E-Mail exchange in 2008 with Prof. Chomsky. In that exchange Barrett castigates Chomsky for not going to the roots of the event that “doubled the military budget overnight, stripped Americans of their liberties and destroyed their Constitution.” The original misrepresentations of 9/11, argues Barrett, led to further “false flag attacks to trigger wars, authoritarianism and genocide.”
In Among The Truthers Kay tries to defend Chomsky against Barrett’s alleged “personal obsession” with “vilifying” the MIT academic. Kay objects particularly to Barrett’s “final salvo” in the published exchange where the Wisconsin public intellectual accuses Prof. Chomsky of having “done more to keep the 9/11 blood libel alive, and cause the murder of more than a million Muslims than any other single person.” … continue
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Aletho News- Knesset advances bill mandating death by hanging for Palestinian prisoners
- Eilat port faces worst crisis as Red Sea shipping collapses
- Iran protest-riots can only achieve US-Israeli intervention, ‘shadow CIA’ concludes
- The Coming War on Iran: What Has Really Been Happening?
- US Cargo Planes Have Flooded the Persian Gulf Since the First of December
- Deep-state forces from abroad instigated violence in Nepal – former foreign minister
- Rare Earths—or Arctic Control? Greenland’s Riches May Just Be Excuse
- Kiev awards major mining project to Trump-linked investors
- US makes money from weapons, not from Ukrainian minerals
- Drone hits Kazakh tanker en route to Russian port
- If Americans Knew
- The New Neoconservatives
- As more Gaza children freeze to death, Trump eyes Gaza as starting point for world domination – Not a ceasefire Day 95
- More death: in Gaza, West Bank, Israeli prison – Not a ceasefire Day 94
- The Israeli Influence Operation Aiming to Install Reza Pahlavi as Shah of Iran
- Avoidable tragedy: another infant dies from cold – Not a ceasefire Day 93
- Israel is quietly erasing Palestinian refugee camps from existence in the West Bank
- The “Zionist tint” to the Maduro abduction, if not operational, then normative
- Press association condemns Israel’s continued ban on media access to Gaza
- Israeli Indifference to Palestinian Suffering Is Fertile Ground for the Growth of Sadism
- Surge in premature births, congenital defects, cancer deaths in Gaza – Not a ceasefire Day 92
- No Tricks Zone
- Denmark Places Climate Protection Above Animal Welfare, Poisoning And Culling Cows
- New Study: Greenland Was 3-7°C Warmer And Far Less Glaciated Than Today 6000-8000 Years Ago
- German Media Report That Current Frigid Weather Can Be Explained By Arctic Warming!
- Berlin Blackout Shows Germany’s $5 Trillion Green Scheme Is “Left-Green Ideological Pipe Dream”
- Modeling Error In Estimating How Clouds Affect Climate Is 8700% Larger Than Alleged CO2 Forcing
- Berlin’s Terror-Blackout Enters 4th Day As Tens Of Thousands Suffer In Cold Without Heat!
- Expect Soon Another PIK Paper Claiming Warming Leads To Cold Snaps Over Europe
- New Study: Human CO2 Emissions Responsible For 1.57% Of Global Temperature Change Since 1750
- Welcome To 2026: Europe Laying Groundwork For Climate Science Censorship!
- New Study Finds A Higher Rate Of Global Warming From 1899-1940 Than From 1983-2024
Aletho News 