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150 EU officials expected to monitor Elon Musk conversation with Alice Weidel, possible ban on the table

Remix News | January 9, 2025

The European Union’s outrage is only growing over a planned interview hosted by Elon Musk later today with Alternative for Germany (AfD) party co-chair Alice Weidel. Now, Politico is reporting that 150 EU officials are expected to attend the conversation between Musk and Weidel for the purpose of learning whether X is complying with EU rules. In addition, French politicians are already talking about an EU-wide ban.

The claim is that there are fears that Musk’s team will manipulate the algorithm to provide the interview more attention. However, Musk has over 200 million followers and nearly all of his posts receive millions and often tens of millions of views, which makes it certain that the interview, which has also been widely advertised, will receive significant attention.

Weidel has also taken to X about the surveillance of the upcoming interview.

“Big Brother is watching you: 150 EU officials are supposed to monitor my conversation with @elonmusk. An EU that uses its bureaucracy to exercise censorship on social media is instilling the spirit of unfreedom. The #dsa threatens democracy!” she wrote

The officials overseeing the interview are “given relatively extensive power,” according to Politico. They will be able to use, among other things, the Digital Services Act (DSA) to monitor how the algorithm works and how content is being displayed to users.

Politico writes that Musk allegedly pushed certain posts in the past, including one about the Super Bowl in the past. The alleged reason was that Musk was mad that one of President Biden’s posts were getting more attention.

The EU officials are working with experts from the European Center for Algorithmic Transparency” in Seville to determine if such an action will occur once again. However, they will not release this information immediately. Instead, it will like be added to a general procedure against X.

A wide range of EU leaders fear losing power due to shifting public sentiment, and Musk’s X represents their top threat. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot, on Wednesday, called for a decisive stand against political influence. When asked whether a ban on X, in the same style as Brazil, was possible, he responded: “That is possible under our laws.”

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez also claimed Musk was pushing “hate” and warned against the rise of fascism in Europe.

SPD General-Secretary Matthias Miersch said that Musk’s influence on Germany’s elections now “call into question the foundations of democracy.”

However, Musk is unlikely to manipulate the algorithm in favor of Weidel especially when enough people are already likely to watch the interview without any interference. Absent some overt manipulation, it is unclear what could possibly be illegal about such an interview. Musk is allowed to interview Weidel. That is his right and her right. The bigger problem would be if he censored anyone who criticized such an interview or manipulated the algorithm to suppress this criticism, which is undoubtedly what the old Twitter regime did before his purchase — all of which the EU actively supported

The head of Germany’s Federal Network Agency, Klaus Müller, appeared to take a more measured approach to the issue.

“Not everything that you get upset about is also illegal,” said Müller on Thursday morning on Deutschlandfunk. “In election campaigns, you also have to put up with things that you personally find inappropriate, indecent or unacceptable.” Freedom of expression always means “the freedom of those whose opinion you do not share.”

He said that the excitement over the Musk interview was “understandable” but it must first be observed whether any laws are actually broken during the process. He noted, however, that people could choose simply not to listen to the interview.

January 9, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Progressive Hypocrite | , | Leave a comment

Pro-Western Georgian ex-president appointed to US fellowship

RT | January 9, 2025

Former Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili has become a fellow at the McCain Institute at Arizona State University, the US academic institution has said. Georgia’s parliament speaker has slammed the appointment, asserting she is going back to “the entity that employed her.”

Zourabichvili, who was born in France and maintained a pro-Western stance during her term, has been chosen for the 2025 Kissinger Fellowship, named after former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, the McCain Institute announced in a statement on Monday.

Commenting on the offer earlier this week, the speaker of the Georgian Parliament, Shalva Papuashvili, drew parallels between Zourabichvili’s appointment and former President Mikhail Saakashvili’s past academic tenure abroad.

“Almost 12 years ago, a similar gesture was extended to … Saakashvili, at Tufts University,” he wrote on X on Tuesday. “Despite having pledged allegiance to Georgia alone, Saakashvili later became a Ukrainian citizen and Zourabishvili too, eventually, is likely to return to her native France.”

Papuashvili concluded that neither had truly served Georgia, returning instead “to the entity that employed them.”

In December, Georgian MPs elected as president former Manchester City football player Mikhail Kavelashvili from the People’s Party, which together with the Georgian Dream form the ruling coalition.

However, Zourabichvili refused to recognize Kavelashvili as her successor, claiming that the parliamentary election in October that brought a convincing victory for Georgian Dream had been rigged.

Despite failing to provide any proof of fraud, the pro-Western opposition protested for weeks after the vote, demanding a rerun of the election. They were fully backed by Zourabichvili, who herself appeared among the demonstrators. The 72-year-old also threatened to not leave the presidential palace in Tbilisi, but eventually departed in late December.

Georgia is a parliamentary republic in which the prime minister and government wield executive power, while the president’s position is ceremonial.

The McCain Institute said that during her presidency between 2018 and 2024 Zourabichvili “forcefully defended Georgia’s path to EU and NATO integration and supported democratic reform, famously vetoing the Georgian Dream government’s Kremlin-modeled ‘foreign agent law’ and standing against the party’s autocratic turn.”

In her new role, the former Georgian president “will use her vast diplomatic, leadership, and policymaking experience to push for new elections and a democratic path forward in her country,” it said.

In May, the parliament in Tbilisi overturned Zourabichvili’s veto and adopted legislation that required NGOs, media outlets and individuals that get more than 20% of their funding from abroad to register as foreign agents and disclose their donors.

The Georgian political opposition strongly criticized the bill, labeling it a “Russian law” and accusing the ruling party of basing it on legislation enacted in Russia in 2012. The ruling party, meanwhile, maintained that the law was inspired by the US Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938, emphasizing that the Georgian version is actually far more lenient than its American counterpart.

Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze said last month that the law had helped to avert a coup that had been planned in Georgia with the use of “foreign funding.”

January 9, 2025 Posted by | Aletho News | , | Leave a comment

Ukraine offers to replace Hungary in EU

RT | January 9, 2025

Ukraine is ready to take Hungary’s place in the European Union, the Foreign Ministry in Kiev said on Wednesday. Budapest recently blasted Ukraine for blocking the transit of natural gas from Russia to the European Union.

Earlier this week, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto accused Kiev of creating “artificially reduced supply,” emphasizing that its unilateral decision to stop the transit of Russian gas, coupled with EU sanctions, had sent prices soaring.

“If the Hungarian side prioritizes strengthening of Russia instead of the EU and the US, it should openly admit it,” the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said in a statement. “Ukraine will be ready to fill any vacant seat in the EU and NATO, if Hungary decides to vacate it in favor of membership in the CIS or the CSTO.”

The CIS, short for the Commonwealth of Independent States, is a bloc uniting several post-Soviet countries. The CSTO, or Collective Security Treaty Organization, is a military alliance that currently includes Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

Ukraine chose not to prolong a five-year transit contract with Russia’s Gazprom at the end of 2024, cutting off several EU member states from Russian gas supplies, including Romania, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Austria, Italy, and Moldova. The halt immediately sent prices in the region soaring to more than €50 per megawatt hour, a level unseen since October 2023.

Hungary’s Szijjarto stated that the higher prices undermine the EU’s competitiveness and disproportionately burden citizens of the bloc. The minister further alleged that Ukraine had breached its EU Association Agreement by halting transit shipments.

Kiev’s decision has also been slammed by Slovakia, which relies on Russian pipelines for about 60% of its energy needs. Last week, Slovak Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok characterized the move as a “betrayal of trust” and a threat to energy stability in the region.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said earlier this month that the US was the only beneficiary of the situation, charging that Washington is the “main sponsor of the Ukrainian crisis.”

Moscow was willing to prolong the transit contract and maintain gas shipments through Ukrainian territory beyond 2024. President Vladimir Putin accused Kiev of “punishing” EU member states with its decision, predicting that it would result in higher energy prices. During his annual press conference on December 19, he said the halt would have minimal impact on Russia, however.

January 9, 2025 Posted by | Economics, Militarism, Russophobia | , , , | Leave a comment

Hungarian news portal calls Biden’s decision to sanction minister ‘a slap in the face’

Remix News | January 9, 2025

In the wake of the United States sanctioning Antal Rogán, the minister in charge of Prime Minister Orbán’s cabinet office, the Mandiner news portal assesses the case as highly unusual.

The official statement from the U.S. Treasury Department quotes Bradley T. Smith, the Treasury Department’s Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, as saying: “The United States will not hesitate to hold accountable individuals, like Rogan, who use the power of their office to illicitly enrich themselves and their cronies at the expense of their country and their fellow citizens.”

The justification does not contain specific cases, but writes about general corruption, referring to the 2023 Corruption Perceptions Index. This index was prepared by Transparency International (TI), which receives support from organizations affiliated with the United States Department of State and George Soros, among others.

The sanctions action taken by the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) was based on Presidential Executive Order 13818, which implements the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act.

The Magnitsky Act allows the United States to impose sanctions on individuals for either corruption or human rights abuses. As Human Rights First describes it, the U.S. Congress passed the original Magnitsky Act in 2012 in response to the death in custody of Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian tax consultant who exposed a massive tax fraud scheme. The Magnitsky Act authorized the United States to impose sanctions on Russians involved in Magnitsky’s brutal detention and other human rights abuses against activists. Interestingly, the law does not define exactly what corruption means.

Between 2017 and 2023, the United States sanctioned 650 foreign individuals citing the law.

Even the soon-to-be-departing Pressman admitted that Antal Rogán’s sanctioning was unprecedented: “It is not common for the United States to designate a sitting minister.  Even less common to do so in an Allied country.”

How unprecedented the case is, is well illustrated by the company in which the Biden administration placed the Hungarian minister.

People are usually put on the sanctions list for very serious reasons. Former Afghan parliamentarian Ajmal Rahmani, for example, was sanctioned in 2023 for allegedly mismanaging U.S. government aid intended for the reconstruction of his war-torn country and then building an extensive business and real estate empire in Germany and Dubai.

Under the Trump administration, a European politician was sanctioned as well. In December 2019, the U.S. government sanctioned Latvian politician Aivars Lembergs for money laundering, embezzlement, bribery, and abuse of office. Four entities owned or controlled by Lembergs were also designated, including the Ventspils Freeport Authority, which operated a major international port.

In 2021, the U.S. Treasury Department announced sanctions under the Global Magnitsky Act against three Bulgarian individuals: former parliamentarian Delyan Peevski, prominent businessman Vasil Bozhkov, and former national security official Ilko Zhelyazkov. In addition, 64 entities allegedly associated with them were also sanctioned, Radio Free Europe reported.

Each of the cases mentioned above clearly shows that usually when someone is put on a sanctions list for corruption, their accomplices are also sanctioned, as well as the companies involved.

The Biden administration has a history of using the Justice Department and Democratic prosecutors against its own political opponents, so it is not surprising that it is using sanctions against the Hungarian government. The timing of the sanctions is also telling, as Joe Biden’s government will leave in two weeks, so this decision can be interpreted as a diplomatic slap in the face.

January 9, 2025 Posted by | Progressive Hypocrite | , , , | Leave a comment

UK special forces had ‘golden pass’ to get away with murder – officer

RT | January 8, 2025

British SAS operatives were given a “golden pass allowing them to get away with murder” in Afghanistan, a former UK Special Forces officer has told a government inquest. Other witnesses described routine executions of unarmed civilians by British forces.

The officer’s statement was given behind closed doors to the UK’s Independent Inquiry Relating to Afghanistan earlier this year, and included in a trove of documents published by the inquiry on Tuesday.

The former officer raised concerns about the killing of unarmed civilians in 2011, claiming that the SAS was covering these crimes up. The officer said that higher-ups within UK Special Forces – which comprises the Special Air Service (SAS), the Special Boat Service (SBS), and four other clandestine branches of the British military – had no interest in investigating the killings, and that SAS operatives had essentially been handed a “golden pass allowing them to get away with murder.”

The Afghanistan Inquiry is probing night raids carried out by British special forces between 2010 and 2013, when the alleged killings took place.

A junior officer told the inquest that “all fighting age males” were killed in these raids, regardless of whether they were armed or not. SAS personnel sometimes carried weapons to drop beside dead bodies after the killings in order to make them appear as combatants.

Prisoners were sometimes executed after they had been restrained, the witness recounted. “In one case, it was mentioned a pillow was put over the head of an individual before being killed with a pistol,” the document noted.

The inquiry is investigating the killings of at least 80 prisoners.

”I suppose what shocked me most wasn’t the execution of potential members of the Taliban, which was of course wrong and illegal, but it was more the age and the methods and, you know, the details of things like pillows,” the officer said, noting that some of the victims were “100%” aged 16 or younger.

The officer said that he was afraid for his own safety after testifying.

”Basically, there appears to be a culture there of ‘shut up, don’t question’,” another officer told the inquiry.

Claims of war crimes committed by British special forces in Afghanistan have surfaced before, with BBC Panorama, the Sunday Times, and other outlets claiming that civilians were routinely killed on night raids. In one case, the American military reportedly had video footage of one massacre, but mysteriously lost the footage when pressed by a British court.

Late last year, the BBC reported that one of the UK’s most senior generals had withheld from the latest inquiry evidence of soldiers executing handcuffed detainees in Afghanistan.

January 9, 2025 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, War Crimes | , | Leave a comment

Jimmy Carter’s Hypocritical Olympic Boycott

By Jacob G. Hornberger | FFF | January 8, 2025

According to an article in the Washington Post, Gene Mills, a U.S. citizen who was one of the top amateur wrestlers in the world, stated, “He stole my life. That was my life. He took it away from me.”

Mills was referring to President Jimmy Carter, who recently passed away at the age of 100. It was Carter who ordered U.S. athletes to boycott the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow, Russia. The reason? Carter used the boycott to protest the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.

There were two at least two big problems with Carter’s order, however.

One problem is that in a genuinely free society, people have the right to travel wherever they want and interact with anyone they want. If people want to compete in sporting events in foreign lands or just be spectators, that’s part of living the life of a free person. It’s none of the government’s business.

That wasn’t Carter’s mindset. His order reflected the reality of the American condition in modern times. In the United States, citizens no longer have the God-given, natural right of freedom of travel or freedom to interact with people in foreign lands. American citizens are subject to the orders, dictates, and edicts of their political masters. Once the president issued his order prohibiting them from competing in the Olympics, American citizens were expected to obey. I’ve sometimes wondered what U.S. officials would have done to U.S. athletes who decided to disobey Carter’s edict. No doubt Carter and his federal henchmen would have figured out ways to smash them.

Thus, the irony was that in issuing his boycott order to protest Russia’s invasion of Afghanistan, Carter was demonstrating that the United States was now founded on at least one of the principles of the communist Soviet Union — that freedom of travel is not a fundamental, God-given right here in the United States any more than it is in communist, totalitarian nations.

Of course, things haven’t changed a bit. If American citizens travel to Cuba, for example, and spend money there without the official permission of their U.S. masters, they are immediately indicted upon their return to the U.S., prosecuted, convicted, fined, and sentenced to prison.

Another big problem is that it was Carter and his national-security establishment who intentionally, knowingly, and deliberately provoked the Soviets into invading Afghanistan in the first place. Yes, you read that right. While Carter pontificated about the evil Soviet empire’s invasion of Afghanistan — and used American athletes as pawns in his protest against the invasion — the fact is that Carter himself, as well as the U.S. national-security establishment, wanted the Soviets to invade Afghanistan and, in fact, provoked them into doing so.

This evil little scheme was later confirmed by Carter’s national-security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski. The scheme called for supporting Afghanistan opponents of Russia in the hopes of provoking the Soviets into invading the country. The scheme worked brilliantly. And when Soviet forces invaded Afghanistan in 1979. Carter, Brezinski, and other U.S, officials were as exultant as U.S. officials would be many years later when they succeeded in provoking Russia into invading Ukraine.

Why such exultation? As Brezinski put it, they had now given the Soviets their “own Vietnam.” In other words, Russia would now be bogged down in a war that would entail the killing of tens of thousands of Russian soldiers, just like the 58,000 American soldiers that U.S. presidents, the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA sacrificed in Vietnam for nothing. What a warped and perverted thing to be excited about.

Thus, here you had Carter protesting against the invasion of Afghanistan by those evil Russians when it was Carter himself who desired the invasion, provoked it, and was exultant about it when it happened. He then had the audacity to use innocent U.S. athletes, who had nothing to do with any of these machinations, as pawns to protest against the invasion that Carter wanted, provoked, and got. Is it really difficult to understand why so many people around the world, including here in the United States, hate the hypocrisy of the U.S. government so much?

January 9, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Timeless or most popular | , , , , | Leave a comment

Operation Choke Point 2.0 (2023)

Corbett | January 7, 2025

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

WATCH ON: ARCHIVE / BITCHUTE / ODYSEE / RUMBLE / RUMBLE / SUBSTACK or download the MP3 AUDIO

From 2013: The specter of Operation Choke Point 2.0 has just been raised in a recent House Financial Services Committee meeting. But what was Operation Choke Point 1.0? And why should we be concerned about this latest attempt to debank “disfavoured individuals,” anyway? Find out all the details in this week’s edition of The Corbett Report podcast.

FLASHBACK SHOW NOTES:

FinTech CEOs Expose How Feds Colluded In ‘Debanking’ Schemes After Andreessen ‘Opened The Floodgates’ On Rogan

Operation Choke Point 2.0: How the Feds Are Seeking to ‘Debank’ Targeted Industries

What is Operation Choke Point 2.0? Trump vows to end it

“Operation Chokepoint 2.0”: De-Banking Policies and the Adverse Use of Reputational Risk in Bank Supervision

Proof of Operation Chokepoint 2.0

Choke Point: How the Government Will Control the Cashless Economy

Episode 440 – Operation Choke Point 2.0

PODCAST SHOW NOTES:

Watch: Federal Reserve head is questioned on controversial “debanking of disfavored individuals”

Choke Point: How the Government Will Control the Cashless Economy

Episode 394 – Solutions: Survival Currency

Become a Corbett Report member and help support this work

Banks have started to freeze accounts linked to the protests, Freeland says

Episode 413 – Give Send Gone

Operation Choke Point 2.0 Is Underway, And Crypto Is In Its Crosshairs

Federal Reserve Says Custodia’s Plans Would Endanger Itself and the Crypto Industry

Episode 394 – Solutions: Survival Currency

How to Win the War on Cash

Fight the Banksters with Cash Friday – #SolutionsWatch

Black Market Fridays – #SolutionsWatch

January 9, 2025 Posted by | Full Spectrum Dominance, Timeless or most popular, Video | | Leave a comment

Trump posts video slamming Netanyahu, US wars for Israel

By Kyle Anzalone | The Libertarian Institute | January 8, 2025

President-elect Donald Trump shared a video featuring Columbia professor Jeffery Sachs sharply criticizing US Middle East policy and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanahu’s role in leading the US into wars.

In the video, Sachs says Netanyahu is “a deep, dark son of a bitch” who led the US into multiple follies in the Middle East and now wants America to fight a war with Iran on Israel’s behalf. “Netanyahu had, from 1995 onward, the theory that the only way we’re going to get rid of Hamas and Hezbollah is by toppling the governments that support them. That’s Iraq, Iran and Syria. The guy is nothing if not obsessive.” The professor continued, “He’s gotten us into endless wars and because of the power of all of this in U.S. politics, he’s gotten his way.”

In 2002, Netanyahu gave an address to Congress to help sell Americans on going to war in Iraq. “If you take out Saddam, Saddam’s regime, I guarantee you that it will have enormous positive reverberations on the region,” the Israeli Prime Minister said. “And I think that people sitting right next door in Iran, young people, and many others, will say the time of such regimes, of such despots is gone.”

The Iraq War would result in hundreds of thousands of murdered Iraqi civilians, thousands of dead Americans, trillions of dollars spent, and a government in Baghdad more aligned with Tehran. Additionally, the power vacuum created by the fall of Saddam’s government led to the rise of al-Qaeda in Iraq and the Islamic State.

As of 2019, a majority of Americans believed the war in Iraq was not worth fighting and a mistake.

After the US disposed of Saddam, the Iraqi people elected a Shi’ite-led government that favored strong ties with Tehran. Washington and its Middle East allies then became concerned that there now existed a “Shi’ite Crescent” in the region stretching from Iran to Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.

Professor Sachs explains that President Barack Obama then ordered the CIA to launch an operation that supported Sunni militant groups in Syria attempting to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad. At the time, the Defense Intelligence Agency warned that the CIA’s support for Sunni groups could result in the creation of an Islamic Caliphate.

Sach’s criticisms of US foreign policy and Israel’s influence in Washington’s politics have resulted in attacks from high-ranking Israeli officials. Diaspora Affairs Minister Amichai Chikli said Sachs was in a group of “fringe Holocaust deniers, conspiracy theorists, and blood libel enthusiasts who oppose the State of Israel.”

In the video, a two-minute compilation of a longer interview posted by Wall Steet Apes, Sachs slams the US media for failing to cover the CIA’s support for the opposition to Assad, noting the New York Times only mentioned the operation, dubbed Timber Sycamore, three times.

Trump has labeled himself as the “best friend” of Israel and has promised to increase support for the Jewish State after he returns to the White House.

January 8, 2025 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Video, Wars for Israel | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Germany: Green-led agency warns Facebook of potential sanctions after Zuckerberg says he will end censorship regime

Remix News | January 8, 2025

Germany and the European Union are in an uproar after Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said he was going to take efforts to end censorship on Facebook and Instagram, including the termination of Meta’s relationship with fact-checkers who Zuckerberg accused of political bias.

Given that much of the EU power runs on political censorship, Brussels and member states like Germany are worried they might lose control of the political narrative, especially when left-liberal leaders are falling from power across the Western world.

The Federal Network Agency in Germany, which reports to German Economic Minister Robert Habeck, is threatening that Facebook could more likely face sanctions if it does not continue its “fact checking” relationship with controversial organizations like Correctiv, known for its hit pieces on the Alternative for Germany (AfD).

The Green Federal Network Agency boss is threatening Facebook with sanctions if it does not resume working with “fact checkers” such as “Correctiv”. This has led to censorship on a large scale, as Zuckerberg admitted.

Klaus Müller, of the Greens and who runs the Federal Network Agency, wrote on X on Wednesday morning according to the Digital Service Act (DSA), “the cooperation of very large online platforms with fact-checking organizations is not mandatory, but their risk of sanctions is reduced if they do so in the EU.” EU election guidelines also note that the presence of fact checkers is considered “a risk-minimizing measure in elections” with regard to “systemic risks.”

“If a (Very Large Online Provider) VLOP does not work with fact checkers, it must prove that it is taking other, equally effective risk-minimizing measures,” he further wrote.

Zuckerberg admits that these fact-checkers have helped drive a regime of censorship on his platform. He notes that these organizations have exerted pressure to “censor more and more.”

However, German media reports that Facebook is still currently working with Correctiv. It is unclear when that relationship will end — if ever.

Zuckerberg says he now wants to switch to a community notes system like the one deployed by Elon Musk on X. Notably, he wants to lift restrictions on certain issues, such as immigration and gender issues, and adjust filters to allow free expression on the platform.

As Remix News reported, our own news site has come under attack from Facebook censors in the past, reducing our reach from millions of views a week to a few thousand a week as of now.

January 8, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , | Leave a comment

Telegram supported freedom of speech when it was less ‘safe’ – Durov

RT | January 8, 2025

It’s easy to support freedom of speech when one doesn’t have to face any risks for doing so, Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov wrote on Wednesday, in a post on his messenger platform. The entrepreneur was apparently commenting on recent announcements by Meta – the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Threads – which has announced some major policy changes.

On Tuesday, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that his company would ditch its controversial third-party fact-checking program in the US. He admitted that such services did more harm than good, as they “shut out people with different ideas.” He also said that Donald Trump’s victory in the November presidential elections was one of the developments that prompted the policy change.

Zuckerberg called the recent US elections a “tipping point” towards prioritizing freedom of speech, and vowed to reduce censorship.

“It’s easy to say you support something when you risk nothing,” Durov wrote in his Telegram post the next day, adding that some “platforms are announcing they’ll now have less censorship.” He did not cite Meta by name in his post, though.

Those making such changes only now would face a “real test of their newly discovered values” when “the political winds change again,” the Telegram CEO predicted, adding that his company’s values “don’t depend on US electoral cycles.”

“I’m proud that Telegram has supported freedom of speech, long before it became politically safe to do so,” Durov said.

His words came just a week after the Telegram CEO himself said that his platform was facing certain restrictions in the EU due to anti-Russia sanctions. At that time, Durov stated that Russians had more media freedom than Europeans did, given that all Western media outlets were “freely accessible” on Telegram in Russia while “certain Russian media has been restricted in the EU under DSA/sanctions laws.”

Durov also faced major legal challenges in the EU last year. The Russian entrepreneur, who is also a citizen of France, the UAE, and Saint Kitts and Nevis, was detained in France and faced 12 criminal charges, including complicity in distributing child pornography, drug dealing, and money laundering. French authorities claimed that Telegram’s supposedly lax moderation rules had allowed criminals to flourish on the platform.

The businessman was released on bail but barred from leaving France. In September 2024, he announced an update to Telegram’s Terms of Service and Privacy Policy, which would make it clear that that IP addresses and phone numbers of those who violate the messenger’s rules “can be disclosed to relevant authorities in response to valid legal requests.” In October of the same year, he also admitted that the platform had already been sharing such information with relevant authorities, as it had been possible to do so since 2018.

January 8, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Russophobia | , , | Leave a comment

Keir Starmer’s Censorship Playbook

By Christina Maas | Reclaim The Net | January 8, 2025

At a time when public trust already teeters on a knife’s edge, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has decided that what we really need is a lecture on “misinformation.” Yes, the same Starmer who spent years navigating political quagmires with the dexterity of a politician reading polling data, and someone accused of lying to the public in the manifesto that got him elected, now fancies himself the arbiter of “truth” and “decency.” And what better way to assert moral authority than by weaponizing one of Britain’s darkest scandals—the rape gang crises—and reframing criticism of government failures as the “poison of the far-Right”?

Criticism: The New Extremism

During his January 6 press conference, Starmer ditched accountability in favor of a moral crusade against critics. He accused them of peddling “lies,” “misinformation,” and—brace yourself—aligning with the “far-right.” “We’ve seen this playbook many times,” Starmer said, oozing conviction.

But the public has seen his playbook too.

If you express concern about how successive governments ignored victims, allowed systemic failures to fester, and dragged their feet on justice, you’re basically a neo-Nazi. Starmer’s rhetorical sleight-of-hand here is stunning—turning widespread outrage into something inherently sinister.

By lumping legitimate grievances in with the ravings of extremists, he effectively tars everyone with the same brush. Victims and their advocates? Extremists. Grassroots activists demanding reforms? Extremists. It’s a brilliant move if your goal is to shut down meaningful conversation while appearing noble.

Blaming Musk: A Modern-Day Scapegoat

But Starmer wasn’t done. Enter the obligatory bogeyman of modern discourse: Elon Musk. When the X owner criticized MP Jess Phillips for refusing to support a public inquiry into the grooming gang scandals, Starmer leaped at the opportunity to accuse him of endangering her safety. Musk, Starmer implied, had crossed some vague and undefinable “dangerous threshold” by calling out a politician’s inaction.

There’s no denying threats against MPs are a serious matter, especially in today’s climate, but let’s not pretend Musk was personally drafting hate mail. Criticism of public officials, even harsh criticism, isn’t equivalent to endorsing violence. Yet, Starmer’s play here is clear: frame dissent as inherently harmful and wrap it in the protective cloak of “safety.” It’s a chillingly effective tactic that sets the stage for conflating free speech with hate speech—a distinction that seems increasingly inconvenient for those in power.

The New Gatekeepers of “Decency”

Starmer’s framing of these issues points to a larger, more insidious trend: the slow, deliberate erosion of public discourse under the guise of safeguarding “truth” and “decency.” Dissenting voices are no longer just misguided or even wrong—they’re now dangerous, toxic, and unworthy of a platform.

What makes this particularly egregious is the context. The grooming gang scandals are a grotesque example of institutional failure. Victims were ignored for years as authorities feared accusations of racism, prioritizing optics over justice.

What Starmer presents as a defense of democracy is, in fact, a calculated effort to consolidate narrative control. If criticism can be dismissed as “far-Right poison,” then any dissenting voice—no matter how valid—can be silenced without debate.

Sliding Toward Silence

Starmer’s approach represents the classic slippery slope of censorship. First, the extremists are silenced (fair enough, many argue). Then, the vaguely problematic voices are muted. Finally, anyone who veers too far from the approved script is deemed an enemy of “truth.”

This isn’t only about online discourse or high-profile figures like Musk. It’s about ordinary people—victims, activists, and concerned citizens—who now risk being labeled as agitators simply for demanding accountability.

The Real Threat: Manufactured Consensus

Starmer’s insistence on equating criticism with extremism creates a vacuum where only the government’s narrative is allowed to thrive. And when the only voices left are the ones singing praises of the status quo, we’re no longer talking about democracy; we’re talking about a PR campaign with parliamentary decorum.

James Cleverly, former Home Secretary, didn’t mince words when he weighed in on the fiasco, summing up what many in Britain are quietly, or not-so-quietly, thinking. “Accusing those who disagree with him, or who seek legitimate answers about repeated failures of child protection, as ‘far-Right’ is deeply insulting and counterproductive,” Cleverly said, in a rare moment of plain speaking from a political figure.

As Cleverly pointed out, branding dissent as extremism doesn’t bridge divisions; it widens them, pouring accelerant on an already polarized public square.

Maggie Oliver, the whistleblower who exposed the Rochdale scandal, spoke for many when she called Starmer’s remarks “insulting in the extreme.” Oliver, who resigned from Greater Manchester Police in protest over their inaction, knows better than most how hard it is to get the system to listen. To see campaigners lumped in with extremists, she argued, “sets a terrifying precedent.”

The “Misinformation” Blueprint: Starmer’s New Censorship Arsenal

If Prime Minister Starmer’s handling of criticism over the UK’s rape gang scandal feels less like leadership and more like a prelude to mass censorship, that’s because it likely is. With the newly minted Online Safety Act and provisions under the National Security Act 2023, Starmer’s buzzword-heavy rhetoric about “misinformation” starts looking less like clumsy damage control and more like the calculated groundwork for a chilling clampdown on dissent.

For years, “misinformation” has been a convenient scapegoat for governments worldwide to suppress inconvenient truths. Now, in the UK, the term threatens to become a legal cudgel, ready to pummel any narrative that strays too far from the government-approved script.

Weaponizing the Online Safety Act

Starmer doesn’t need to introduce sweeping new legislation to suppress dissent—his government already has a powerful set of tools at its disposal. The Online Safety Act, sold to the public as a safeguard against harm, contains provisions that are broad enough to suppress not only malicious lies but also legitimate criticism under the guise of protecting the public. Here’s how it could play out:

1. Section 179: False Communications Offense

This is where Starmer’s “misinformation” rhetoric gets teeth. Section 179 criminalizes knowingly false communications intended to cause “non-trivial psychological or physical harm.” The wording here is as vague as it is dangerous. What qualifies as “non-trivial psychological harm”? If the government decides that criticisms of its handling of the grooming gang scandal cause emotional distress to MPs—or, conveniently, to the public—it could label them as harmful misinformation.

Imagine this: a social media user accuses Starmer’s government of ignoring systemic abuse in grooming gang cases. Even if the criticism is grounded in fact, the government could argue that the way it’s framed constitutes psychological harm. Once flagged, tech platforms—obligated under the Online Safety Act to prevent such offenses—could preemptively remove posts or ban users entirely.

The chilling effect is immediate. Knowing the penalties—up to 51 weeks in prison and unlimited fines—citizens may think twice before questioning the government on sensitive issues. And that’s the goal: silence through fear.

2. Schedule 7, Section 37: Foreign Interference

The National Security Act 2023 adds another weapon to Starmer’s arsenal: the foreign interference clause. This provision criminalizes any “misrepresentation” on behalf of a foreign power, even if the information shared is true. While the law ostensibly targets foreign espionage, its scope is alarmingly wide.

Starmer could use this to neutralize high-profile international critics like Elon Musk. If Musk’s tweets about UK safeguarding policies are deemed to influence British political discourse, Starmer’s government could accuse him of “foreign interference.” The penalties? Up to 14 years in prison for violators and mandatory platform censorship of related content.

Any UK citizen amplifying criticism that the government ties to a foreign agenda—whether real or imagined—could face scrutiny under this Orwellian provision.

3. Section 152: Advisory Committee on Disinformation and Misinformation

Perhaps the most insidious element of the Online Safety Act is the creation of a disinformation advisory committee under Ofcom. This unelected body will have the power to define what counts as “misinformation,” aligning platforms’ moderation policies with government narratives.

Given Starmer’s framing of dissent as extremist “poison,” it’s easy to imagine how this committee could become a government lapdog. If dissenting views about rape gang scandals—or any politically sensitive issue—are labeled misinformation, platforms would have little choice but to silence those voices.

4. Section 165: Media Literacy

Ofcom’s mandate to promote media literacy sounds harmless enough, but in practice, it’s a PR goldmine for governments looking to control narratives. Imagine a state-backed campaign equating criticism of the grooming gang scandal to conspiracy theories, painting dissenters as dangerous purveyors of hate. This would prime the public to distrust any view that deviates from the official line, effectively preempting free debate.

Starmer’s Record: A Preview of What’s to Come

Starmer’s embrace of censorship isn’t theoretical—it’s historical. When riots broke out in the summer of 2023, his government oversaw the arrest of individuals for inflammatory social media posts. While some cases involved genuine incitement, others targeted people simply expressing anger at systemic failures or “misinformation.” The precedent was clear: if your post made the government uncomfortable, you were a target.

Fast forward to today, and Starmer’s buzzword-laden rhetoric—“misinformation,” “extremism,” “poison”—looks suspiciously like a blueprint for round two. His invocation of these terms isn’t casual; it’s calculated. Each one is a trigger for the machinery of censorship already baked into British law.

January 8, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , | Leave a comment

EU funding for Israeli tech raises fresh concerns about complicity in genocide

By Melike Pala | MEMO | January 8, 2025

Israel’s use of artificial intelligence (AI) funded by European Union research programmes to target civilians is attracting a lot of criticism. Since the Israeli attacks on Gaza began on 7 October, 2023, the EU has provided over €238 million ($246m) to Israeli institutions for research and innovation. The funds are believed to have supported the development of AI-driven “location and killing” technology used by Israel against Palestinian civilians in Gaza.

Nozomi Takahashi, a member of the board of directors of the European Coordination of Committees and Associations for Palestine (ECCAP), told Anadolu that they are aware of allegations about EU funds aiding AI technologies targeting civilians. Takahashi said that they had addressed the issue in letters to high-level EU officials, including former EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell.

She pointed to AI-based systems used by the Israeli army called “Habsora” (The Gospel), “Lavender” and “Where is Daddy?” She said that these systems are used “to identify, locate and kill the targets in the current genocide in Gaza.”

Emphasising that these systems are used indiscriminately against civilians, Takahashi noted that, “Such extrajudicial killing is prohibited by international law. The scale and frequency of civilians killed in Gaza using such AI systems are devastating.”

The ECCAP official highlighted the EU’s particular focus on AI development, and said that Israeli research institutions are also involved in various EU-funded projects in this field. However, identifying which EU-funded project underpins those used by the Israeli army is impossible due to confidentiality and secrecy. “The potential high risk associated with such technology in the hands of a government that has a record of human rights violations should raise the alarm.”

Only civilian projects, added Takahashi, are eligible for funding through the Horizon Europe programme. “The development of such AI technology further blurs the border between civil and military applications.” She criticised the EU for its “narrow focus” when evaluating the goals of the projects that it funds, with insufficient monitoring and overlooking the potential for their use in the military.

Takahashi highlighted that Horizon Europe’s ethical principles require funded projects to uphold “respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and human rights, including the rights of minorities.” However, the research entity’s history with military activities or human rights violations is “neither questioned nor required” during ethics reviews, she claimed.

According to Eman Abboud, a lecturer at Trinity College Dublin, it has been demonstrated that EU funds have financed arms companies under the guise of civil security and tech research. She said that the EU is “culpable” by supporting the military industry in Israel — the state is currently facing genocide charges at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) — through its funding programmes.

“Israeli companies such as Elbit Systems Ltd. and Israel Aerospace Industries, which profit from and are deeply complicit in Israel’s long-term violent oppression and apartheid, as well as the current genocide of the Palestinian people, have received funding for security research from European funding programmes,” explained Abboud.

Criticising the ability of organisations contributing to human rights violations and the undermining of international humanitarian law to benefit from EU funds, she said, “The EU has refused to sever its trade links with Israel or ban them from Horizon Europe,” despite the ongoing ICJ case against the occupation state.

She referenced EU-GLOCTER, a “counter-terrorism” project involving Israeli institutions, noting the links to Israel’s military and intelligence, including Reichman University’s International Institute for Counter-Terrorism (ICT), which was co-founded by a former intelligence chief. “We must understand that institutions like these provide the means to create the intelligence apparatus that is used to target specific civilians in Gaza and in Lebanon. We cannot separate them, given the strategic dual use of academic research funding and military research funding.”

The AI technology developed within the Israeli military named Habsora, generating automated and real-time targets, frequently strikes civilian infrastructure and residential areas, with the number of civilian casualties always being known in advance.

The Lavender technology analyses data collected on approximately 2.3 million people in Gaza using ambiguous criteria to assess the likelihood of an individual’s connection to the Palestinian resistance group Hamas.

Sources told Tel Aviv-based +972 and Local Call that, early in the Gaza attacks, the military was “completely reliant” on Lavender, automatically targeting males it flagged, without oversight or specific criteria. Lavender has marked approximately 37,000 Palestinians as “suspects”.

Using the AI-based system called “Where is Daddy?” Israel simultaneously tracks thousands of individuals and when they enter their homes targeted individuals are bombed, with no regard for the presence of civilians, including women and children.

These AI technologies are known to make computational errors frequently and disregard the principle of “proportionality”. They have played a significant role in the killing of over 45,850 Palestinians since 7 October, 2023.

January 8, 2025 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

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