Aletho News

ΑΛΗΘΩΣ

Dr. Mercola Files Lawsuit Against US Sen. Elizabeth Warren

By Dr. Joseph Mercola | November 8, 2021

In early September 2021, U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren sent a letter1 to Andy Jassy, chief executive officer of Amazon.com, demanding an “immediate review” of Amazon’s algorithms to weed out books peddling “COVID misinformation,” stressing that Amazon’s sale of such books was “potentially unlawful.”2,3,4

Warren specifically singled out my book, “The Truth About COVID-19,” co-written with Ronnie Cummins, founder and director of the Organic Consumers Association (OCA), as a prime example of “highly-ranked and favorably-tagged books based on falsehoods about COVID-19 vaccines and cures” that she wanted banned.

“Dr. Mercola has been described as ‘the most influential spreader of coronavirus misinformation online,” Warren wrote,5 adding: “Not only was this book the top result when searching either ‘COVID-19’ or ‘vaccine’ in the categories of ‘All Departments’ and ‘Books’; it was tagged as a ‘Best Seller’ by Amazon and the ‘#1 Best Seller’ in the ‘Political Freedom’ category.

The book perpetuates dangerous conspiracies about COVID-19 and false and misleading information about vaccines. It asserts that vitamin C, vitamin D and quercetin … can prevent COVID-19 infection … And the book contends that vaccines cannot be trusted …”

Warren Fancies Herself Above the Law

Warren should know that as a government official, it is illegal for her violate the U.S. Constitution, and pressuring private businesses to do it for her is not a legal workaround.

Since she willfully ignores the law, Cummins and I, along with our publisher, Chelsea Green Publishing, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who wrote our foreword, are suing Warren, both in her official and personal capacities, for violating our First Amendment rights. The federal lawsuit, in which Warren is listed as the sole defendant, was filed in the state of Washington. As noted in our complaint:

“Once upon a time, the First Amendment was understood to guarantee that books challenging governmental orthodoxy could be sold without fear of governmental intimidation or reprisal.

Almost sixty years ago, in Bantam Books v. Sullivan, 372 U.S. 58 (1963), the Supreme Court held that state officials violated the First Amendment by sending letters to booksellers warning that the sale of certain named books was potentially unlawful.

The ‘vice’ in such letters and in the ‘veiled threat’ of legal repercussions they communicated, explained the Court, is that they allow government to achieve censorship while doing an end-run around the judiciary, ‘provid[ing] no safeguards whatever against the suppression of … constitutionally protected’ speech, thus effecting an unconstitutional ‘prior restraint.’

It made no difference that the officials who sent the letter lacked the ‘power to apply formal legal sanctions’ — i.e., that the officials did not themselves have the power to sanction or prosecute the booksellers in any way. Indeed this fact made the unconstitutionality more apparent.

The officials ‘are not law enforcement officers; they do not pretend that they are qualified to give or that they attempt to give distributors only fair legal advice … [T]hey acted … not to advise but to suppress.’

It also made no difference, the Court expressly found, that the letters were framed as mere ‘exhort[ation]’ or that the booksellers were in theory ‘free’ to ignore the letters, because the officials had ‘deliberately set about to achieve the suppression of publications deemed ‘objectionable’,’ and ‘people do not lightly disregard public officers’ veiled threats.’

Today, certain members of the United States Congress have apparently forgotten, or think they are above, the law set forth in Bantam Books.”

Warren’s Attack on Constitutionally Protected Speech

There’s no doubt our book, “The Truth About COVID-19,” is constitutionally protected speech, and that Warren’s letter is calling on Amazon to suppress protected speech.

In our book, we share viewpoints, ideas, opinions, verifiable facts and factual hypotheses that our federal government just so happens to disfavor, as it counters their chosen narrative that SARS-CoV-2 emerged naturally, cannot be prevented by any means other than experimental gene therapy, and cannot be treated by any other means than certain experimental and exorbitantly costly drugs.

Since the start of the pandemic, government has systematically sought to suppress the kind of information shared in our book, using the same tactic as Warren used against us here — warning Internet-based companies that if they don’t censor these views, the full weight of the government’s wrath will be turned against them. As explained in our complaint:

“The term ‘vaccine misinformation’ as Warren uses it is propagandistic and false. As she uses it, ‘vaccine misinformation’ refers to any speech challenging the safety and efficacy of the COVID vaccines, even when that speech consists of factually accurate information or protected opinion …

On September 10, 2021, as a direct result of Warren’s letter, a major national bookseller chain, Barnes and Noble, notified the publisher of The Truth About COVID-19 by email that it would no longer sell the work as an e-book. Barnes and Noble has — for now — reversed that decision.

It is impossible for Plaintiffs to know with certainty whether, as a result of Warren’s letter, Amazon is now covertly demoting, downgrading, or otherwise suppressing The Truth About COVID-19 in numerous ways that would be hidden from view, but Plaintiffs believe that Amazon is in fact covertly taking such action.

Even if no bookseller in the country had yielded to Warren’s threats, her letter would still be actionable as a clear violation of the First Amendment.

In Backpage.com, LLC v. Dart, 807 F.3d 229 (7th Cir. 2015) (Posner, J.), relying on Bantam Books, the Court held that a governmental official ‘violates a plaintiff’s First Amendment rights’ if by ‘threat’ or ‘intimidation’ the official attempts to induce ‘a third party’ to stop ‘publishing or otherwise disseminating the plaintiff’s message,’ and emphasized that ‘such a threat is actionable and thus can be enjoined even if it turns out to be empty — the victim ignores it, and the threatener folds his tent.’

Such threats go ‘by the name of ‘prior restraint,’ and a prior restraint is the quintessential first-amendment violation.’ Accordingly, Plaintiffs ask this Court to vindicate clearly established law, to vindicate Plaintiffs’ constitutional rights, to vindicate the First Amendment itself, by declaring Warren’s conduct unconstitutional and by enjoining her from repeating such conduct in future.”

Warren Calls Out ‘Misinformation’ With Misinformation

In our complaint, we also emphasize the fact that Warren’s claims of misinformation are themselves misinformation. For example, Warren claims our book falsely “asserts that … vitamin D … can prevent COVID-19 infection.” According to Warren, this claim has no scientific basis. This is clearly and verifiably false as there are many studies, published in 2020 and 2021, supporting this claim.

For example, in May 2021, the National Institutes of Health’s website, PubMed.gov, published a Journal of Medical Virology article titled “Vitamin D Deficiency Is Associated With COVID-19 Positivity and Severity of the Disease.”6 Many other scientific articles have also linked vitamin D deficiency with a higher risk of COVID infection, more severe outcomes and increased rates of death.

Indeed, a recent systematic review7 of the literature, posted on the U.S. National Library of Medicine, which is another National Institutes of Health website, concluded that “blood vitamin D status can determine the risk of being infected with COVID-19, seriousness of COVID-19, and mortality from COVID-19.

Therefore, maintaining appropriate levels of Vitamin D through supplementation or natural methods … is recommended for the public to be able to cope with the pandemic.” As noted in our complaint:

“Thus while Warren professes to champion true COVID information to save lives, she is purveying false information that could lead to COVID deaths. Warren is telling people that vitamin D levels don’t matter for COVID, when in fact — as readers would learn from The Truth About COVID-19 — correcting vitamin D deficiencies could save their lives.

By her own logic and according to her own demands, every major social media platform should have banned Warren’s letter as ‘COVID misinformation.’ But officials like Warren only denounce ‘COVID misinformation,’ demand its censorship, and threaten legal repercussions when the statements in question challenge the COVID narrative they support — not when they themselves are misrepresenting the truth about COVID-19.

Warren’s letter further accuses The Truth About COVID-19 of disseminating ‘false and misleading information about vaccines,’ including by (in Warren’s words) ‘contend[ing] that vaccines cannot be trusted.’

The book’s stated thesis about the COVID vaccines is that their effectiveness ‘has been wildly exaggerated and major safety questions have gone unanswered.’ This statement is accurate and well within the bounds of constitutionally protected opinion …

Warren’s letter further cites a June, 2021, review of The Truth About COVID-19 that purports to list examples of the book’s ‘misinformation,’ the first of which is the following: ‘the authors argue that the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus was engineered in a laboratory in Wuhan, China.’ It is true that The Truth About COVID-19 argues that that ‘the preponderance of evidence’ supports the lab-leak theory of the origins of the COVID virus.

But the claim that this position is ‘misinformation’ is, once again, itself misinformation. The lab-leak theory — long denounced as a ‘conspiracy theory’ by federal actors and suppressed on social media — is in fact supported by substantial and growing evidence. See, e.g., Wall St. Journal, ‘Science Closes In on Covid’s Origins: Four studies — including two from WHO — provide powerful evidence favoring the lab-leak theory,’ Oct. 5, 2021.8

The review’s next example of the supposed ‘misinformation’ in the The Truth About COVID-19 is this: the book ‘insists multiple times that the public health measures and restrictions will be permanent. Not true.

The CDC announced that fully vaccinated Americans could resume activities without wearing masks or physically distancing, resume domestic travel, and refrain from quarantine even when following a known exposure to the virus if they remain symptom-free.’

This CDC announcement obviously proved to be false, while the prediction made in The Truth About COVID-19 that health restrictions would continue after vaccination has proved more accurate.

Moreover, it is not the case that the Truth About COVID-19 ‘insists’ that these restrictions will be permanent — it says that certain restrictions on our liberty, beginning in the pandemic, will ‘probably’ be permanent, reflecting a humility about the certainty of one’s assertions that Warren might have profited from.”

This Is Only the Beginning

As noted in a press release by Cummins, this lawsuit is just the beginning. OCA and I are launching a campaign to fight back against the censorship that is taking root. This includes unraveling the threads that lead back to the fake fact checkers and disinformation agents in the media, but all of this will take time, so be patient.

As explained by Cummins:

“OCA’s federal lawsuit, filed jointly with Dr. Mercola, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Chelsea Green books is not just directed against Elizabeth Warren, but is intended to establish a legal precedent against the increasing censorship, slander, and intimidation coming from a wide variety of government, corporate, and media sources.

This Big Pharma/Big Media/Big Government Inquisition is fueled by disinformation and dark money coming from powerful international public relations firms such as the Publicis Groupe and front groups such as the so-called Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH).

We are under attack, not because we are purveyors of dangerous disinformation and hate, as Warren and her Establishment cohorts allege, but rather because, in the midst of an international health, economic, and political crisis, we are trying to expose the truth about the lab origins of this catastrophe, and explain how preventive and natural medicine and health, healthy organic food, natural supplements, low-cost generic drugs, strong immune systems, and a healthy environment are our best defenses against chronic disease and engineered pathogens.

We are not anti-vaccine, but rather pro-vaccine safety. We are not purveyors of disinformation, but rather firm defenders of free speech, unobstructed scientific inquiry, and freedom of choice …

We are castigated as ‘conspiracy theorists’ for publicizing the behind-the- scenes machinations of billionaires like Bill Gates, the World Economic Forum, and their ‘Hall of Shame’ collaborators9 in the military-industrial complex.

We are under siege for exposing the existential risks of genetic engineering and lab manipulation, a mad science not only contaminating our food, seeds and animals, but essentially weaponizing pathogenic viruses, bacteria, and insects, part of a catastrophic biological and medical arms race that threatens us all.

We are saddened and alarmed by the now routine attacks on free speech, free association, and medical freedom of choice. We are troubled by the extreme polarization and anger poisoning the body politic, and the debilitating impact of fear-mongering and shaming on our children and the public at large.

We are alarmed by the collateral damage to our health, our psyches, and the entire social fabric by government authoritarianism, virologists and gene engineers playing God, and Big Pharma greed …

America, and the once-hoped-for community of nations, are accelerating toward self-destruction. The body politic is sick, frightened, angry, and divided. People have apparently forgotten how to talk to one another when we disagree on politics, COVID responses, vaccine safety, and a range of other polarizing government dictates.

Former friends and co-workers have become enemies. Meanwhile the forests are burning. Water resources are diminishing … Our children and the most vulnerable are forced to struggle harder than ever, just to survive and preserve their sanity, making it harder and harder maintain a positive outlook, enjoy every day life, much less achieve true happiness.

If COVID-19, the product of mad science and insatiable greed, has taught us anything, it’s that we must transform our food and farming systems and take control of our health.

We must acknowledge, prevent, and resolve the dietary, environmental, and public health-related comorbidities of our ailing population, strengthen our immune systems to fight off chronic disease and pathogens, and provide special protection for the most vulnerable.

We must bring profit-at-any-cost corporations, captured media and regulatory agencies, indentured politicians, Silicon Valley surveillance capitalists, out-of-control genetic engineers, virologists, and bioweapons profiteers to heel.”

Stop the Madness

To this end, OCA has launched a Stop the Mad Science campaign. This global grassroots campaign aims to ban the engineering of viruses, bacteria and all potential pandemic pathogens (PPPs). Mounting evidence suggests COVID-19 was indeed the result of gain-of-function (GOF) research, paid for in part by U.S. taxpayers and carried out by U.S. and Chinese researchers.

Unless we put an end to this kind of dangerous research (and it goes on worldwide, not just in the U.S. and China), COVID won’t be the last manmade pandemic we’ll have to face. More than 65,000 people have already signed the petition in support of this effort. Please add your signature here if you haven’t done so already. As noted by Cummins:

“Current ongoing experiments, routinely funded with our tax dollars, that need to be stopped immediately include genetically engineering SARS-CoV-2 so that it can overcome or bypass natural immunity; combining the SARS-CoV-2 virus with deadly anthrax bacteria; engineering the bird flu and Ebola to be more transmissible; and other criminally insane experiments — hiding behind the excuse that lab and genetic engineering of pathogens are necessary for ‘biodefense’ and ‘biomedicine.’

Over the next six months we will begin to organize protests and picket lines outside the GoF labs and institutions where these dangerous experiments are being carried out. These street protests will be amplified by public education, petition gathering, litigation, and grassroots lobbying.”

Sources and References

November 9, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , , | Leave a comment

When in doubt, fiddle with the vaccine figures

By Tom Penn | TCW Defending Freedom | November 9, 2021

DR Mary Ramsay, Head of Immunisation at the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) and joint ‘chief editor’ of their vaccine database, penned a recent blog post for gov.uk in which she makes a most ludicrous claim.

She states that the dramatic rise in cases in the vaccinated cohort compared with the unjabbed should be interpreted not as evidence of the vaccine’s inefficacy, but rather as consequence of behavioural traits in the vaccinated, whom she alleges are ‘more health conscious and therefore more likely to get tested’, and who ‘behave differently, particularly with regard to social interactions and therefore may have differing levels of exposure to Covid-19’.

According to Ramsay, then, the epidemic of reinfection is the fault not of the vaccine itself but its recipients, who if only they would just stop testing themselves and socialising with each other might just conveniently knock the issue of inefficacy on the head.

It appears that the UKHSA have found themselves between a rock and a hard place vis-a-vis the rollout. Without mass testing there exists no casedemic, and without a casedemic there in turn exists no pandemic. Without an engineered pandemic there exists not the vehicle by which to crush self-determination. However, maintain hypochondriacal mass testing and current levels of faux-freedom, and the casedemic ends up inconveniently betraying the inefficacy of the product, vehicle for the introduction of a universal, health-based identification system; critical in turn to the instalment of a single, global government.

Two recent announcements lead me to speculate that once the majority of children have been vaccinated, the death season is over, and we can supposedly make our way out of the Covid Stadium, ‘Van-Tam Cup’ in hand after a winter playing out the longest tournament of public health intervention-football ever known, the UKHSA’s muddying of data will only accelerate.

The MHRA’s approval of Merck’s molnupiravir antiviral drug to treat symptomatic Covid-19 (Pfizer’s Paxlovid offering is yet to be approved), and the likelihood that vaccine smart patches could begin human trials by the middle of 2022, introduce two more elements to an already obscenely corrupt so-called crisis which may end up prolonging the use of damaging public health controls for many winters to come, as the data harvested from how these various Covid-19 ‘treatments’ interact with each other could provide limitless scope for misinterpretation or outright censure, and thus the basis for manufacturing further interventions.

It is the running theme of this counterfeit emergency that data has been modelled, muzzled, meddled with and misconstrued with a view to help obfuscate an ulterior geopolitical agenda. Dr Mary Ramsay, for example, has solved the matter of vaccine inefficacy by simply defecting from pharmaceutical to behavioural science unchallenged.

What might happen when government agencies begin playing off booster-shot data against molnupiravir efficacy against vaccine smart-patch glitches against case rates against hospital figures, and then measuring it all up against what appears to be a state-decreed behavioural and mental health index? The answer: the end of the current Anthropocene epoch as we know it, and the beginning proper of its successor: the Propagandacene.

Molnupiravir is already being trumpeted as the world’s ‘first’ at-home treatment designed to reduce drastically the chance of hospitalisation from Covid-19, yet we already know that to be a false claim, and so right from the off Merck’s offering is fishy; the words of Dr June Raine from the mostly mute MHRA ringing equally hollow: ‘With no compromises on quality, safety and effectiveness, the public can trust that the MHRA has conducted a robust and thorough assessment of the data.’

Some of us have been knocking on the door of the MHRA’s appalling Covid-19 vaccine Yellow Card Reporting System figures for quite some time now, and yet they still refuse to open. Will it be the same with molnupiravir, vaccine smart patches and Lord knows what else the druids of the post-Covid International Order have in store for us?

Introduce alongside all of the aforementioned the incoming attack on the nation’s constitution by the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities, the consumer healthcare association’s vision of a decade of self care, and the Nudge Unit’s new Net Zero/Zero Covid psyops campaign, and we shall, if we haven’t already, enter an era of human evolution wherein the blame for every single problem in society, no matter how far removed from the common man’s sphere of influence, will be laid squarely at his feet nonetheless. He will doubtless obediently hang his head in shame whilst the hooded executioner readies yet more killing apparatus.

November 9, 2021 Posted by | Deception, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , | Leave a comment

Test results for steel used in US Navy subs ‘falsified’ for decades

RT | November 9, 2021

A former metallurgist at a Washington state foundry that produced steel used in US Navy submarines has admitted to taking “shortcuts” and doctoring the results of strength and toughness tests on the metal for over three decades.

Elaine Marie Thomas, 67, pleaded guilty to the fraud at a Tacoma court on Monday. Thomas was the director of metallurgy at a foundry in the city that provided steel castings used by Navy contractors Electric Boat and Newport News Shipbuilding to manufacture submarine hulls.

According to the Justice Department, the tests were to prove that the steel would hold up in a collision or during certain “wartime scenarios.” While there was no information on whether any submarine hulls had failed, authorities said the Navy had incurred additional costs and maintenance-related expenses to ensure the vessels were seaworthy.

Although the government did not reveal which subs were affected, the contractors have jointly built Virginia class submarines for about two decades. In a statement to the court, Thomas’ attorney noted that the “government’s testing does not suggest that the structural integrity of any submarine was in fact compromised.”

In her plea agreement, Thomas told the court that she faked test results for at least 240 steel productions between 1985 and 2017 – roughly half the steel the foundry supplied to the Navy. Her attorney said Thomas “took shortcuts,” but “never intended to compromise the integrity of any material.”

In 2017, a metallurgist being groomed to replace Thomas noticed the suspicious test results and alerted the foundry’s parent company, Bradken Inc. The Kansas City-based firm fired her and disclosed the falsified data to the Navy, but suggested that the discrepancies were not the result of fraud. Prosecutors said this affected the Navy’s efforts to investigate the scope of the problem and address potential risks to personnel.

The Justice Department said that when investigators confronted Thomas with the fraudulent results, she admitted that it “looks bad” and revealed that she had given passing grades in some tests because she thought the Navy’s temperature-testing requirements were “stupid.”

Thomas, who faces up to 10 years in prison and a $1 million fine when she is sentenced in February, was apparently not “motivated by greed nor any desire for personal enrichment,” her attorney said, adding that she “regretted failing to follow her moral compass.”

November 9, 2021 Posted by | Corruption, Deception | | Leave a comment

Same Old Same Old: Youngkin seeks the Jewish stamp of approval

BY PHILIP GIRALDI • UNZ REVIEW • NOVEMBER 9, 2021

Every time one thinks that politicians in the United States might have actually have had a “come to Jesus” moment and will henceforth serve the people who pay to support them, something pops up to demonstrate that nothing has changed but the names of the folks who are selling most of us out. As a Loudoun County Virginia resident with children and grandchildren in the public school system who is active in the Fight for Schools movement, I was delighted when Glenn Youngkin defeated the truly despicable Terry McAuliffe to become the next governor of the state. McAuliffe not only engaged in constant race and class baiting in terms of how he couched his appeals to voters, confident that the fraud that he and his party-mates had engineered into the system disguised as “voting rights” would be enough to win the day in a state that has leaned Democratic in recent elections. So tone deaf to the voters was McAuliffe that he came out with “I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach.” and two days before election day went off the deep end by telling his audience at a rally that Virginia just has too many school teachers who are white.

So goodbye McAuliffe, a man born to be forgotten even by his patrons the Clintons but for his improvised victory dance on the stage during one of his last appearances, a performance so appalling that his daughters were embarrassed to watch. So now we have Glenn Youngkin as governor-elect and a new day is dawning… or is it? Hopefully the new administration will kill Critical Race Theory and the pursuit of “equity” in the public schools, thereby returning academic standards to what they once were. And parents might actually be listened to over their concerns rather than being sent to jail for protesting. But what else will be in the package?

Well, it should surprise no one that the usual pander to America’s wealthy and powerful Jewish community has been going on behind the scenes. Media reporting dated the very day after Youngkin was elected revealed that “Glenn Youngkin today announced a plan to combat anti-Semitism in Virginia… one area of particular concern to Youngkin is the increasing number of crimes targeting Jews. That is why as governor he will form a Virginia Holocaust, Genocide and Anti-Semitism Advisory Commission and push the Virginia General Assembly to pass a state law adopting the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of anti-Semitism. ‘Virginia must take clear and concrete action to stop all forms of anti-Semitism, and when I’m governor, we will,’ said Youngkin. ‘I will push the General Assembly to pass a law adopting the internationally recognized definition of anti-Semitism, and I will form a commission to examine and address anti-Semitic incidents in Virginia. Our Jewish friends and neighbors must know that we stand with them against the tide of hate and discrimination…’”

Presumably Youngkin, who clearly was coached on his statement, is aware that the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of anti-Semitism includes criticism of Israel as an indication that one is an anti-Semite. For those of us who have always believed that Israel is a foreign nation with interests that differ from those of the United States and that it can be criticized just as one would any other country in the world, the state of Virginia will clearly be embracing a contrary view. And one can only look forward to the sanctions against anyone who dares to support boycotting Israel products or services, referred to as BDS, to put pressure on Jerusalem to begin treating the Palestinians humanely.

Ironically, Youngkin was labeled an anti-Semite during the campaign against McAuliffe, which should have alerted him to the danger inherent in special commissions set up at the behest of agenda-driven racial or ethnic groups. In a campaign rally, he named George Soros, who is Jewish, as the source of the money that was planting political activists in Virginia local governments and school boards, which is demonstrably true. One Virginia Democrat leader claimed that Youngkin had been “spouting off antisemitic tropes, just to fire up his base.”

Youngkin might consider that far from being the perpetual victim, American Jews are the wealthiest, best educated and politically most powerful demographic in the US, something that is true all across the country and even more so in Virginia near the seat of power in Washington where Jews are way over-represented. Their power enables the brutality of Israel in its occupation of historic Palestine, which includes shooting and imprisoning children, blowing up hospitals and apartment buildings, and engaging in acts of war against its neighbors Syria and Iran. Recently the Jewish state has announced a new wave of illegal “settlement” building on the occupied West Bank, a decision that even provoked the gutless Biden Administration to object mildly, while also describing a group of Palestinian charities and civic organizations as terrorists. Who is the victim Glenn?

There are roughly 70,000 Jews living in Virginia out of a total population of 8,670,000 and one would be hard pressed to find any overt instances of actual anti-Semitism. Jews in Virginia are privileged, just like they are nearly everywhere in the United States, and the Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates is a Jewish woman, Eileen Filler-Corn. Of course, groups like the notoriously sensitive Anti-Defamation League (ADL) can always come up with what they claim to be anti-Semitic incidents when there are swastikas drawn on walls or doors or by citing the instances when a Jewish student feels uncomfortable at college because someone was holding up a sign saying “Free Palestine.” Sometimes the perpetrators of so-called anti-Semitic incidents have themselves been Jews.

Youngkin has apparently been briefed to believe that the state is overrunning with fanatical anti-Semites seeking to kill Jews and burn down synagogues so he is pledging “concrete action to stop all forms of anti-Semitism” which presumably will include restrictions on Freedom of Speech, for which appropriate “hate crime” laws will be drafted. This follows a pattern established in a number of other US states where local Jews are working hard to suppress any criticism of Israel.

Youngkin’s unneeded commission to support uniquely Jewish interests will, of course, cost the usual substantial dollop of unaccountable taxpayer money to support a demographic that is already rich and powerful. Israel and the Jewish community already get an enormous free ride from the state government. I have previously reported how Grant Smith, who heads the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRMEP), has detailed how one such board that he has identified in Virginia is a unique example of a state’s economic policies being manipulated by a dedicated Israeli fifth column in government. It is named the Virginia Israel Advisory Board (VIAB).

The VIAB uniquely is actually part of the Virginia state government. It is funded by the Commonwealth of Virginia and is able to access funds from other government agencies to support Israeli businesses. It is staffed by Israelis and American Jews drawn from what has been described as the “Israel advocacy ecosystem” and is self-administered, appointing its own members and officers. Only Virginia has such a group actually sitting within the government itself though other states have similar advisory or “trade” commissions. VIAB is able to make secret preferential agreements, to arrange special concessions on taxes and to establish start-up subsidies for Israeli businesses. Israeli business projects have been, as a result, regularly funded using Virginia state resources with little accountability. It has been estimated that the cash flow in favor of Israel from Virginia alone has exceeded $500 million annually.

Smith has reported how VIAB is not just an economic mechanism. Its charter states that it was “created to foster closer economic integration between the United States and Israel while supporting the Israeli government’s policy agenda.” Smith also has observed that “VIAB is a pilot for how Israel can quietly obtain taxpayer funding and official status for networked entities that advance Israel from within key state governments.” The board grew significantly under Democratic governor Terry McAuliffe’s administration (2014-2018). McAuliffe, regarded by many as the Clintons’ “bag man,” has received what are regarded as generous out-of-state campaign contributions from actively pro-Israeli billionaires Haim Saban and J.B. Pritzker, who are both affiliated with the Democratic Party.

Terry McAuliffe as governor met regularly in off-the-record “no press allowed” sessions with Israel advocacy groups and spoke about “the Virginia Advisory Board and its successes.” That was, of course, a self-serving lie by one of the slimiest of the Clinton unindicted criminals. In short, the VIAB is little more than a mechanism set up to carry out licensed robbery of Virginia state resources being run by a cabal of local American Jews and Israelis to benefit their co-religionists in Israel. As a side benefit to us Virginians, its reckless activities have led to numerous zoning and environmental violations.

So Glenn Youngkin I wish you well. I sure as hell voted for you given that you were running against Terry McAuliffe supported by folks named Biden, Harris, Obama and Abrams, but hey, if you truly have any integrity, it is past time to get your mind right on Israel and its supporters re the con-job they have been pulling on the American people for the past seventy-plus years. You are smart enough to know that but perhaps so ambitious that you will bury your conscience and go along with the bullshit. Anti-Semitism, such as it is, does not threaten our Republic but the continuous pandering to a specific special interest that already has money and power and is tied with a foreign government that wants us to go to war on its behalf is both unacceptable and dangerous. Please take the papers relating your planned anti-Semitism Advisory Commission, which will no doubt be generously compensated and staffed by the Chosen, and shove them into a file somewhere where they will never be seen again. You have more important things to do, believe me.

Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.

November 9, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | , , | Leave a comment

One Brave ICU Physician Reporting Covid-19 Vaccine Injuries Leads to a Dozen More

11 sworn declarations from physicians across the country reflect the disregard public health agencies have for Covid-19 vaccine safety

By Aaron Siri | November 1, 2021

One act of bravery begins to snowball. Dr. Patricia Lee “risked it all” to step forward, after being ignored by public health officials, to reveal the serious series of harms she witnessed from Covid-19 vaccines in her intensive care unit.  With that one act, my firm has now been contacted by more than a dozen other physicians. Attached are 11 declarations from physicians across the country attesting to serious harms from Covid-19 vaccines.

These physicians, like Dr. Lee, reached out to public health authorities at the CDC, FDA, and NIH for over ten months only to have their concerns dismissed or ignored. These agencies typically respond by saying that VAERS is not showing a safety signal so there is nothing to worry about. If you don’t already know, VAERS is the system that the CDC and FDA say cannot show that a vaccine causes an injury, but yet can show a vaccine is safe. Meaning, heads they win, tails you lose.

Worse, many of these physicians were injured by a Covid-19 vaccine themselves and despite being physicians, the physicians from whom these injured physicians sought treatment also typically dismissed their injuries. And they are physicians seeking help from fellow physicians!

The story most of these physicians tell is like that of Maddie de Garay who, despite being in a wheelchair and needing a feeding tube through her nose, was told it was psychological. These physicians were, incredibly, almost all initially told the same. Only after seeking treatment from physicians that they knew from work or medical school, were many of them believed. If physicians are dismissed as “making it up,” imagine what the average individual without medical knowledge and access must deal with after a Covid-19 vaccine injury.

Public health authorities tell us to trust doctors. If individuals have concerns about the vaccine, they say: “speak with your doctor.” These very doctors are now telling health authorities there is a serious problem. They have been telling these health authorities for months in myriad correspondences. And the 11 declarations attached are likely a small sampling – after all, Dr. Patricia Lee’s letter was only released on this Substack when only had a few hundred subscribers. It nonetheless started a snowball of physicians reaching out with similar stories which is growing by the day.

It should not be that public health authorities listen to physicians only if they parrot their preferred messaging regarding Covid-19 vaccines. To the contrary, physicians should especially be listened to when their clinical experience directly opposes that messaging. But the experience of these physicians, and the many more who have contacted my firm, evidence precisely the opposite is true.

These doctors, like most doctors, are the last individuals that want to admit that a Covid-19 vaccine caused their patients or their own injuries. And they are the last to want to publicly make such an admission. Truly. But reality does not afford them these luxuries. The injuries they report are all too real and devastating. As detailed in the attached declarations (click image below), most of the injured physicians can no longer work or are severely restricted in their ability to work.

The lesson yet again is that civil and individual rights should never be contingent upon a medical procedure. Never. Requiring informed consent – which means giving every American the ability to give or withhold consent without coercion – is the last and final backstop to the dangers that result when we permit the government to decide what must be injected or placed into or onto our bodies. This is no hyperbole as the current state of affairs is that you cannot sue the manufacturers for Covid-19 vaccine injuries, cannot see the data underlying the licensure of the vaccine, cannot discuss Covid-19 vaccine injuries on social media, and cannot say no to the vaccine if you want to keep your job or attend many universities. Whatever your views are on the Covid-19 vaccine itself, every American should reject letting the government decide what medical procedures they must engage in to participate in civil society.

Letter with Physician Declarations to CDC, FDA and NIH

Response and Email Exchange with CDC, FDA and NIH Regarding the Letter

November 9, 2021 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

Iconic singer Van Morrison sued over Covid-19 comments

NO MORE LOCKDOWN, NO MORE FASCIST POLICE, NO MORE TAKING OF OUR FREEDOM AND OUR GOD GIVEN RIGHTS

AS I WALKED OUT

BORN TO BE FREE OF THE COVID SCAM

https://www.bitchute.com/video/4OPLfKgq9i3h/

RT | November 8, 2021

Northern Ireland’s health minister, Robin Swann, has filed a defamation lawsuit against Van Morrison after the rock and R&B legend labeled him “very dangerous” over Covid-19 restrictions during the pandemic.

Swan’s legal team believes Morrison’s repeated public statements harmed the minister’s reputation by implying he was unfit for his position during the health crisis. The statement of claim against the 76-year-old singer-songwriter was filed in September.

“Proceedings have been issued and are ongoing against Van Morrison. We are aiming for a trial in February,” Swann’s lawyer, Paul Tweed, told local media on Sunday.

Swann’s choice of legal representation signals his strong desire to win the case, as Tweed is known as a high-profile libel lawyer, who has previously represented the likes of Harrison Ford, Justin Timberlake, and Jennifer Lopez.

The fallout between the minister and musician occurred in June after Morrison’s gig in Belfast was canceled at the last moment due to coronavirus restrictions.

The singer still got on stage and told the audience: “Robin Swann has all the power. So I say Robin Swann is very dangerous.” He also tried to persuade the crowd to chant: “Robin Swann is very dangerous.” […]

Last year, Swann criticized Morrison over his songs about the coronavirus restrictions, including ‘Born to Be Free’, ‘As I Walked Out’, and ‘No More Lockdown’. … Full article

November 9, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties | , , | Leave a comment

How Sweden swerved Covid disaster

By Johan Anderberg | UnHerd | November 8, 2021

A hundred years ago, in New York City, 20,000 people marched down Fifth Avenue in protest against one of the greatest public health policy experiments in history. One of them was wearing a sign featuring an image of Leonardo da Vinci’s “The Last Supper,” beside the slogan, “Wine was served.” There were posters of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln. Another read: “Tyranny in the name of righteousness is the worst of all tyrannies.”

For a year, beer, wine and spirits had been illegal throughout the United States. From a public health perspective, it seemed a reasonable enough measure. That alcohol was a dangerous substance was clear: disease, violence, poverty and crime were intimately bound up with it. Even now, despite its failure, it is known as the “noble experiment”. But was it right to prevent people from making drinks they not only enjoyed, but that also served important cultural and religious purposes? Not for the first time, Americans found themselves torn in a balance between freedom and security — nor for the last.

Until recently, prohibition remained the largest experiment in social engineering a democracy had ever undertaken. And then, in early 2020, a new virus began to spread from China. Faced with this threat, the world’s governments responded by closing schools, banning people from meeting, forcing entrepreneurs to shut their businesses and making ordinary people wear face masks. Like prohibition, this experiment provoked a debate. In all the democracies of the world, freedom was weighed against what was perceived as security; individual rights versus what was considered best for public health.

Few now remember that for most of 2020, the word “experiment” had negative connotations. That was what Swedes were accused of conducting when we — unlike the rest of the world — maintained some semblance of normality. The citizens of this country generally didn’t have to wear face masks; young children continued going to school; leisure activities were largely allowed to continue unhindered.

This experiment was judged early on as “a disaster” (Time magazine), a “the world’s cautionary tale” (New York Times), “deadly folly” (the Guardian). In Germany, Focus magazine described the policy as “sloppiness”; Italy’s La Repubblica concluded that the “Nordic model country” had made a dangerous mistake. But these countries — all countries — were also conducting an experiment, in that they were testing unprecedented measures to prevent the spread of a virus. Sweden simply chose one path, the rest of Europe another.

The hypothesis of the outside world was that Sweden’s freedom would be costly. The absence of restrictions, open schools, reliance on recommendations instead of mandates and police enforcement would result in higher deaths than other countries. Meanwhile, the lack of freedom endured by the citizens of other countries would “save lives.”

Many Swedes were persuaded by this hypothesis. “Shut down Sweden to protect the country,” wrote Peter Wolodarski, perhaps the country’s most powerful journalist. Renowned infectious diseases experts, microbiologists and epidemiologists from all over the country warned of the consequences of the government’s policy. Researchers from Uppsala University, the Karolinska Institute and the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm produced a model powered by supercomputers that predicted 96,000 Swedes would die before the summer of 2020.

At this stage, it was not unreasonable to conclude that Sweden would pay a high price for its freedom. Throughout the spring of 2020, Sweden’s death toll per capita was higher than most other countries.

But the experiment didn’t end there. During the year that followed, the virus continued to ravage the world and, one by one, the death tolls in countries that had locked down began to surpass Sweden’s. Britain, the US, France, Poland, Portugal, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Spain, Argentina, Belgium — countries that had variously shut down playgrounds, forced their children to wear facemasks, closed schools, fined citizens for hanging out on the beach and guarded parks with drones — have all been hit worse than Sweden. At the time of writing, more than 50 countries have a higher death rate. If you measure excess mortality for the whole of 2020, Sweden (according to Eurostat) will end up in 21st place out of 31 European countries. If Sweden was a part of the US, its death rate would rank number 43 of the 50 states.

This fact is shockingly underreported. Consider the sheer number of articles and TV segments devoted to Sweden’s foolishly liberal attitude to the pandemic last year — and the daily reference to figures that are forgotten today. Suddenly, it is as if Sweden doesn’t exist. When the Wall Street Journal recently published a report from Portugal, it described how the country “offered a glimpse” of what it would be like to live with the virus. This new normal involved, among other things, vaccine passports and face masks at large events like football matches. Nowhere in the report was it mentioned that in Sweden you can go to football matches without wearing a facemask, or that Sweden — with a smaller proportion of Covid deaths over the course of the pandemic — had ended virtually all restrictions. Sweden has been living with the virus for some time.

The WSJ is far from alone in its selective reporting. The New York Times, Guardian, BBC, The Times, all cheerleaders for lockdowns, can’t fathom casting doubt on their efficacy.

And those who’ve followed Sweden’s example have also come in for a lot of criticism. When the state of Florida — more than a year ago and strongly inspired by Sweden — removed most of its restrictions and allowed schools, restaurant and leisure parks to reopen, the judgement from the American media was swift. The state’s Republican governor was predicted to “lead his state to the morgue” (The New Republic). The media was outraged by images of Floridians swimming and sunbathing at the beach.

DeSantis’s counterpart in New York, the embattled Democrat Andrew Cuomo, on the other hand, was offered a book deal for his “Leadership lessons from the Covid-19 pandemic”. A few months ago, he was forced to resign after harassing a dozen women. But the result of his “leadership lesson” lives on: 0.29% of his state’s residents died of Covid-19. The equivalent figure for Florida — the state that not only allowed the most freedom, but also has the second highest proportion of pensioners in the country — is 0.27%.

Once again, an underreported fact.

From a human perspective, it is easy to understand the reluctance to face these numbers. It is hard to avoid the conclusion that millions of people have been deprived of their freedom, and millions of children have had their education gravely damaged, for little demonstrable gain. Who wants to admit that they were complicit in this? But what one American judge called the “laboratories of democracy” have conducted their experiment — and the result is increasingly clear.

Exactly why it turned out this way is harder to explain, but perhaps the “noble experiment” of the 1920s in the US can offer some clues. Prohibition didn’t end because the freedom argument prevailed. Nor was it because the substance itself had become any less harmful to people’s health. The reason for the eventual demise of the alcohol ban was that it simply didn’t work. No matter what the law said, Americans didn’t stop drinking alcohol. It simply moved from bars to “speakeasies”. People learned to brew their own spirits or smuggle it in from Canada. And the American mafia had a field day.

The mistake the American authorities made was to underestimate the complexity of society. Just because they banned alcohol did not mean that alcohol disappeared. People’s drives, desires and behaviours were impossible to predict or fit into a plan. A hundred years later, a new set of authorities made the same mistake. Closing schools didn’t stop children meeting in other settings; when life was extinguished in cities, many fled them, spreading the infection to new places; the authorities urged their citizens to buy food online, without thinking about who would transport the goods from home to home.

If the politicians had been honest with themselves, they might have foreseen what would happen. For just as American politicians were constantly caught drinking alcohol during the prohibition, their successors were caught 100 years later breaking precisely the restrictions they had imposed on everyone else. The mayors of New York and Chicago, the British government’s top advisor, the Dutch Minister of Justice, the EU Trade Commissioner, the Governor of California all broke their own rules.

It isn’t easy to control other people’s lives. It isn’t easy to dictate desirable behaviours in a population via centralised command. These are lessons that many dictators have learned. During the Covid pandemic, many democracies have learned it too. The lesson has perhaps not yet sunk in, but hopefully it will eventually. Then perhaps it will be another 100 years before we make the same mistake again.

Johan Anderberg is a journalist and author of Flocken, a bestselling history of the Swedish experience during Covid-19.

This is an edited translation of an article that first appeared in Sydsvenskan.

November 8, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties | , | Leave a comment

Myocarditis ‘tends to be mild’? Tell that to this vaccine victim

By Sally Beck | TCW Defending Freedom | November 8, 2021

YOUNG men who develop the heart conditions myocarditis or pericarditis post Covid vaccination are ‘extremely rare’ according to the UK’s drugs watchdog. This is not true, says leading US cardiologist Dr Peter McCullough, and even if it was true, it is no comfort if you are one of the ‘rare’ cases to find yourself in hospital with heart inflammation like Amanda Hartnetty’s 21-year-old son.

‘The term “rare” is getting old now,’ she said. ‘My son was admitted to hospital in August two days after his second Moderna jab. He had been there for a week when a nurse told him: “Another one of you with myocarditis after the vaccine has just come in and he’s 29.” I wonder how rare it really is?’

According to Dr McCullough, heart inflammation cases in the US have increased by 21,000 per cent in four months, predominantly affecting young men. He said: ‘In June 2021, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said there were 200 cases of myocarditis. By October we had 10,304 cases. This number is shocking.’

Amanda’s youngest son, now 22, who does not want to be named, was admitted to Hillingdon Hospital, Uxbridge, on August 19 with excruciating chest pain.

Amanda, 57, from north London, who works in customer support, said: ‘He and his girlfriend had been to visit the university where he was just about to start, then stayed at a friend’s overnight. In the morning they were driving back and his arms were in incredible pain, he had tingling in his fingers and his chest felt really heavy. Then he felt sick and shivery and started vomiting. He said his chest felt like it was being ripped apart.

‘He had no idea what was wrong, and they thought he might have food poisoning. They got back to her place where she dialled 111. The call handler made an appointment for him at the hospital for an hour’s time and then they sat in A&E for hours.’

Crucially, hospital staff measured his troponin level and when they got the results, they were so startling they thought they were wrong. Troponin is a protein which regulates the heartbeat. The normal level for a 21-year-old is less than 14 ng/l (nanograms per litre), but his was sky high. ‘My son’s level was 7,000 and it rose to 25,000 at its worst,’ said Amanda.

This can indicate that the person is having a heart attack, but he was diagnosed with myocarditis which has similar symptoms of chest pain, shortness of breath and fatigue, because his electrocardiogram (ECG), which checks the heart’s rhythm, was fine. His discharge letter confirms that the vaccine was the cause, saying ‘myocarditis secondary to Covid-19 vaccination’.

Myocarditis is inflammation of the heart muscle, can cause a cardiac arrest and can be fatal. It is more serious than pericarditis (also linked to the vaccine) which is inflammation of the sac surrounding the heart. Myocarditis is caused either by a virus – so SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, could cause it – or it is autoimmune, when your body attacks itself. Vaccines are designed to provoke the immune system so it is entirely possible that an unexpected immune response could occur, but the NHS know little about vaccination as a cause of myocarditis and often pooh-pooh the connection.

Hillingdon is part of Harefield Hospital, which has a specialist heart unit, so thankfully Amanda’s son was in the best place to get the best care, but at first, hospital staff would not consider the possibility that Moderna’s Covid jab had caused his problems.

He spent a week in hospital but even after he was discharged last month, his GP was unaware of the connection. ‘He was trying to explain to the GP that his problems had been caused by the vaccination and she had never heard of it. That’s why I’m speaking out now because this is a side-effect that is just not known about. It was such a shock to take in. We didn’t know about it, and it was not discussed with him before he had his jab.

‘We are so lucky his girlfriend called 111. Who knows what might have happened if she hadn’t? A nurse told me they were really worried, and they didn’t want to tell him how worried they were.’

The youngest of four siblings, he was a fit, healthy young man who played drums in a rock band, held down jobs in a restaurant and a warehouse and before lockdown last March, was keen to join the RAF. He is now so debilitated he is unable to do any exercise and has been advised not to do anything more strenuous than a walk until at least January. Most days, he needs an afternoon nap. Three months on and an MRI scan shows that his heart is still inflamed, which contradicts the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) advice that ‘cases tend to be mild when they do occur’.

Jonathan Engler, a bio-medical entrepreneur who has studied law and medicine and developed a phase III clinical trial for a heart failure medicine, said: ‘If you’ve had myocarditis you have to be monitored permanently and are at risk of developing heart disease later in life.’

The British Heart Foundation, our premier heart health charity, say that if the damage is severe you may need a heart transplant.

Amanda said: ‘One question neither the hospital nor the GP could answer is what happens if he catches Covid? They said they don’t know because they don’t have the data. I also asked if there would be any lasting damage and the best answer they can give me is “hopefully not”.’

Meanwhile, her son is taking things easy and trying not to think about the future: ‘He has to take betablockers to stabilise his mood so that his heart rate isn’t raised,’ she said.

Amanda’s four children have all had their childhood vaccines, as have her three grandchildren. ‘I am not antivax,’ she said. But she was worried about the speed with which the Covid jabs were introduced and the lack of long-term data.

She received her first Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine on March 1 from the now-notorious batch number PV46671 and suffered a serious adverse reaction. There are now 11 people known to have had bad reactions to that batch, and seven spoke to TCW earlier this year.

Amanda, who does not use social media, was unaware that there was a problem with that particular batch until we spoke. She said: ‘I was so ill afterwards; I threw up before I got home from the surgery. It was like instant, proper flu, no build-up like you normally get of feeling under the weather for a couple of days. I had shivers and shakes and a terrible headache. I felt like my head was in a fog and I just wanted to sleep. I was like that for a week, and it took weeks for me to get better.’

She filled in a Yellow Card report for the MHRA about her son but not herself. She said: ‘They sent lots of questions back like “does he take drugs,” they listed everything apart from what was in the jab.

‘My message is that people do need to look out for these side-effects. They were not mentioned to us before we got our jabs, so I just wonder how many others know about them.’

November 8, 2021 Posted by | Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

Wanted US Capitol insurrectionist asks Belarus for asylum

RT | November 8, 2021

An American man wanted in the US on charges of violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds after taking part in the infamous January 6 riot in Washington is now in Belarus, and has asked Minsk to grant him asylum.

In an interview with Belarusian state media, Evan Neumann claimed that the accusations against him are “unfounded.”

Neumann is also charged with “assaulting, redirecting, or impeding” law enforcement officers and “knowingly entering or remaining in” a restricted building.

The American says he moved in March from California to Ukraine, where he stayed for four months. He claims that, after just two weeks, he saw Ukrainian Security Service officers following him, which eventually led to his decision to move to Belarus and seek asylum.

On his journey to Belarus, he trekked across swamps of northern Ukraine before reaching the border near Pinsk.

According to the FBI, Neumann was a part of the mob of supporters of then-President Donald Trump that stormed the United States Capitol in Washington on January 6 this year. The attack, known commonly as ‘the insurrection’, sought to disrupt and delay the Electoral College vote count that would confirm Joe Biden’s election as the 46th US president. The rioting led directly to five deaths and has since been blamed for four police officers committing suicide.

Speaking to Belarusian TV, Neumann claimed that he was innocent.

“I’m charged, I believe, with six cases. And I think all of them are felonies. A felony is a very serious charge. It means you hurt somebody or something,” he explained. “I don’t think I committed any crime. One of the charges was very serious. The allegation is that I hit a police officer. It is completely unfounded.”

Neumann doesn’t deny that he was at the riot.

In the words of TV channel Belarus 1, Neumann “sought justice” and “asked uncomfortable questions,” and is now “being persecuted by the US government.”

According to Belarus’ Ministry of Internal Affairs, three US citizens have applied for refugee status, protection, or asylum in Belarus in 2021.

Neumann’s trek through Ukraine’s swampy forests wasn’t his first trip to the country. According to the FBI, he took part in the Western-backed Orange Revolution in 2004 and 2005, which led to a pro-NATO/anti-Russian government in Kiev.

November 8, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties | , , , | Leave a comment

Pakistan reaches ‘complete ceasefire’ with local Taliban faction

RT | November 8, 2021

Pakistan’s government has agreed a total ceasefire with the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) group, Information Fawad Chaudhry has announced, noting that talks leading to the move were facilitated by authorities in Kabul.

Speaking on Monday, Chaudhry told reporters that “a complete ceasefire” agreement has been reached and further talks were taking place to ensure a lasting peace. “The talks will focus on state sovereignty, national security, peace, social and economic stability in the areas concerned,” he said, according to local media.

The minister described the move as a “positive development” and said that it would help achieve peace after a long period of conflict, adding that the Taliban, which now rules over Afghanistan, facilitated the talks.

In October, Prime Minister Imran Khan told Turkey’s TRT World that some factions of the TTP were looking for reconciliation and were speaking with the government. “There are different groups that form the TTP and some of them want to talk to our government for peace. So, we are in talks with them. It’s a reconciliation process,” Khan stated.

It had previously been suggested by Pakistan’s President Arif Alvi that a conditional amnesty for TTP members could be granted if they surrendered their weapons, accepted the state constitution, and refrained from any criminal activity.

Reuters, citing sources, reported on Saturday that the TTP had requested certain prisoners be released as a prerequisite for peace talks.

Despite being weakened by a 2014 Pakistani military campaign which drove the TTP out of its stronghold in North Waziristan, the group still has an estimated 4,000-5,000 fighters, many based across the border in Afghanistan, and has been continually involved in bloody incidents.

The TTP is an ideological twin to the Afghan Taliban and wishes to establish its interpretation of Sharia – a hard-line form of Islamic governance – in Pakistan.

November 8, 2021 Posted by | Aletho News | , | Leave a comment

Israeli soldiers given ‘prizes’ for helping compile database of Palestinians’ pictures – reports

Israeli forces detain a man during a protest in Hebron. September 9, 2021. © Reuters / Mussa Qawasma
RT | November 8, 2021

The Israeli military has reportedly compiled a digital surveillance database to monitor Palestinians in Hebron in the West Bank using invasive facial recognition tech integrated into a network of cameras and soldiers’ phones.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) even incentivized soldiers to compete against each other to take photos of residents “with prizes for the most pictures collected by each unit,” according to the Washington Post. Soldiers were reportedly offered rewards such as a night off if they managed to take the most pictures.

The surveillance dragnet is apparently based in part on smartphone technology called ‘Blue Wolf’ that captures the photos and cross-references the faces to find matches on the database. The application then signals to the soldier through a “traffic light” of colors which individuals to detain, arrest or leave alone.

Noting that the IDF has admitted to the initiative’s existence in an online brochure, the report also features interviews with former soldiers who had previously spoken to Breaking the Silence – a group of veterans that highlights human rights violations by the IDF.

One former soldier reportedly described the program as the IDF’s secret “Facebook for Palestinians.” Another veteran told the paper a network of facial recognition cameras had been installed at various checkpoints in the flashpoint town – as well as a broader network of CCTV cameras known as ‘Hebron Smart City’ that sometimes even allows the IDF to see inside people’s homes.

The network also apparently makes use of ‘White Wolf’, an app employed by security volunteers in the West Bank to provide ID information about Palestinians before they enter settlements to work.

“I wouldn’t feel comfortable if they used it in the mall in [my hometown], let’s put it that way,” said one recently discharged soldier who reportedly served in an intelligence unit. She called the Hebron surveillance system a “total violation of privacy of an entire people.”

People worry about fingerprinting, but this is that several times over.

In response, the IDF issued a statement that noted how “routine security operations” were “part of the fight against terrorism and the efforts to improve the quality of life for the Palestinian population in [the West Bank].” It would not comment on the IDF’s “operational capabilities in this context.”

November 8, 2021 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , , | Leave a comment

The EU is proposing blatant mass surveillance of email and chat messages

By Didi Rankovic | Reclaim The Net | November 8, 2021

A German member of the European Parliament is warning against EU plans to adopt new, wide-ranging mass surveillance rules that he says would seriously jeopardize citizens’ right to privacy by forcing tech companies to give access to encrypted messages to the authorities.

And that is what the laws now in the works in Brussels – that are supposed to replace temporary rules adopted in July – are designed to do, by ordering messaging and video chat providers like WhatsApp and Skype to put tech in place that would provide access to people’s private communications and, thanks to an automated system, monitor chats in real time and report suspicious content.

In a statement, MEP Patrick Breyer said that the EU commission must understand that it cannot give itself the right to intrusive surveillance of digital communication of every citizen, and do it without “specific suspicion.” He also believes EU’s policy on this issue is not only illegal and irresponsible – but also [in]effective.

As is often the case, the new intrusive regulation is being sold to the public as a way to combat sexual abuse of children, but the ramifications are much broader, while the idea of suspecting everyone in advance – making citizens “guilty until proven innocent” – doesn’t sit at all well with privacy advocates like Breyer.

Dutch MEP Sophie in ‘t Veld shed light on how dissenters on this issue are treated, revealing that they are made to feel like they are not committed to combating child abuse because they have questions critical of the proposed laws.

A number of other MEPs are opposed to the idea and speak about that openly, with some comparing the EU’s model of mass online surveillance to what is happening in China.

On his website, Breyer explained that what he refers to as “chatcontrol” is allowing the EU to have access to chats, messages and emails the providers scan in a way that is “general and indiscriminate.” He also said that building on the July regulation, the EU planned to already have expanded rules in place this fall, but that the date had to be postponed because of pushback from citizens and stakeholders.

November 8, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , | Leave a comment

« Previous Entries     Next Entries »