Inside the Trump Administration’s Venezeula Disagreements
By Ted Snider | The Libertarian Institute | October 28, 2025
In the waters of the Caribbean, a surprisingly large U.S. fleet sits with Venezuela in its sights. It includes over 10,000 troops, Aegis guided-missile destroyers, a nuclear-powered fast attack submarine, F-35B jet fighters, MQ-9 Reaper drones, P-8 Poseidon spy planes, assault ships, and a secretive special-operations ship.
The fleet is built for war on Venezuela or its drug cartels, but it is engineered to put enough pressure on Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro to push him from power. The justification for the war is stopping the flow of drugs into the United States by Venezuelan drug cartels; the justification for the coup is that Maduro is the head of those cartels.
But U.S. officials—often those in the best place to know—have disagreed with all three aspects of the military action: the significance of Venezuela’s drug cartels in the flow of drugs, and especially fentanyl, into United States; the role of Maduro in those cartels; and the use of the military to fight them. For their disagreement, many of those officials have left or been forced from their jobs.
U.S. President Donald Trump has insisted that military force is necessary to stop “narco-terrorists” who are smuggling a “deadly weapon poisoning Americans.” He has claimed that “every boat” the U.S. military strikes off the coast of Venezuela is “stacked up with bags of white powder that’s mostly fentanyl” and “kills 25,000 on average—some people say more.”
But current and former U.S. officials disagree. While most of the boats the U.S. military has sunk have been in the passageway between Venezuela and Trinidad and Tobago, U.S. officials say that that passage is neither used to transport fentanyl nor is it used to transport drugs to the United States. 80% of the drugs that flow through that passage is marijuana, and most of the rest is cocaine. And those drugs are headed, not to the United States, but to West Africa and Europe. Most of the fentanyl that finds its way into the U.S. comes from Mexico.
The military strikes on Venezuelan boats cannot be justified by the war on drugs and “are unlikely…to cut overdose deaths in the United States,” according to officials. “When I saw [an internal document on the strikes],” a senior U.S. national security official said, “I immediately thought, ‘This isn’t about terrorists. This is about Venezuela and regime change.’”
According to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, 90% of the cocaine that transits into the United States enters through Mexico, not Venezuela. And Venezuela is not a source of fentanyl. The dissenting American officials are in agreement with international bodies. The 2025 UNODC World Drug Report assesses that Venezuela “has consolidated its status as a territory free from the cultivation of coca leaves, cannabis and similar crops.” The report says that “[o]nly 5% of Colombian drugs transit through Venezuela.” The European Union’s European Drug Report 2025 corroborates the United Nations report: it “does not mention Venezuela even once as a corridor for the international drug trade.”
U.S. intelligence also disagrees on the Trump administration’s claim that Maduro is at the head of the Venezuelan drug cartels. The Trump administration has insisted that “Maduro is the leader of the designated narco-terrorist organization Cartel de Los Soles.”
Again, though, U.S. officials disagree. A “sense of the community” memorandum dated April 7, 2025 that puts together the findings of the eighteen agencies in the U.S. intelligence community released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence directly contradicts the Trump administration’s claim that Maduro is the leader of Tren de Aragua (TDA) drug cartel.
The memorandum clearly states that “the Maduro regime probably does not have a policy of cooperating with TDA and is not directing TDA movement to and operations in the United States.” It states that the intelligence community “has not observed the regime directing TDA.”
Making the American case against the Maduro government even less credible, the memorandum finds that “Venezuelan intelligence, military, and police services view TDA as a security threat and operate against it in ways that make it highly unlikely the two sides would cooperate in a strategic or consistent way.” The Venezuelan National Guard has arrested TDA members and “Venezuelan security forces have periodically engaged in armed confrontations with TDA.”
The contradiction was seen as a problem. Days after the memorandum’s release, Joe Kent, then acting chief of staff for Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, told a senior intelligence analyst to do a “rethink” of the analysis and offer a new assessment. “We need to do some rewriting so this document is not used against the DNI [Director of National Intelligence] or POTUS [President of the United States],” Kent told intelligence officers.
The rewritten memo still contradicted the Trump administration’s claims about Maduro. One week later, Michael Collins, the acting chair of the National Intelligence Council, and Maria Langan-Riekhof, his deputy, were fired by Gabbard. Gabbard claims the firings were part of a campaign to stop leaks by “deep-state criminals” who are politicizing the intelligence community.
U.S. officials have objected not just to the White House’s claims about Venezuela as a narco-state and about Maduro’s role as head of the cartels, but also to the White House’s militarized answer to the problem. And the objection has come from the highest level of the U.S. military.
On October 16, Admiral Alvin Holsey, head of the U.S. Southern Command, the group that oversees all operations in Central and South America, including the current and any future military actions taken against Venezuela, announced that he was stepping down. The New York Times has reported that there were “real policy tensions concerning Venezuela” between the admiral and Pete Hegseth, the secretary of War. Current and former U.S. officials say that Holsey “had raised concerns about the mission and the attacks on the alleged drug boats.”
But there are also reports that there were questions about whether Holsey would be fired in the days before he announced his resignation. “Hegseth did not believe Holsey was moving quickly or aggressively enough to combat drug traffickers in the Caribbean.” The Washington Post reports that “Hegseth had grown disenchanted with Holsey and wanted him to step aside.” The disenchantment, according to “people familiar with the matter,” started “around the time that the Trump administration began ordering deadly strikes on alleged drug boats off the coast of Venezuela.”
At every level, Venezuela as a significant source of drug deaths in America, Maduro’s role as leader of Venezuela’s drug cartels, and the United State’s militarized solution to the problem, U.S. officials have disagreed with the Trump administration. Some of those officials have paid for doing their jobs with their jobs.
China will act if its interests are harmed by Iran sanctions: Envoy
Press TV – October 27, 2025
China will act to respond to the sanctions imposed against Iran if they harm its interests, the country’s ambassador to Iran has said.
Cong Peiwu said on Monday during a press conference in Tehran that China will not hesitate to act if its economic interests are affected by restrictions imposed on trade with Iran.
Cong made the remarks in response to questions about China’s way of dealing with recent United Nations sanctions on Iran, which were re-imposed in late September after European parties to a 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and world powers accused Tehran of failing to observe its obligations under the agreement.
Along with Russia and Iran, China believes that the move by Britain, France, and Germany to return UN sanctions on Iran was illegal, signaling that it would not necessarily abide by the UN sanctions.
The Chinese ambassador said that Beijing seeks closer cooperation with Tehran as he reiterated that Iran and China share a common stance opposing unilateralism in the world.
China is Iran’s largest trading partner, as it buys 29% of Iran’s total non-oil exports while being responsible for 25% of imports into the country.
Estimates suggest that more than 92% of Iran’s oil exports also end up in China, despite a harsh regime of US sanctions that imposes heavy penalties on buyers of Iranian oil.
Those estimates show that China’s total trade with Iran, including its oil purchases, amount to $65-70 billion per year.
Experts believe China counts on the smooth and affordable supply of oil from Iran for maintaining growth in its industrial sector.
Figures published in late August showed that China had relied on Iran for 13.6% of its total oil imports in the first half of 2025 as shipments reached an average of 1.38 million barrels per day (bpd) over the period.
Privately-owned refiners receive the bulk of Iranian oil shipments arriving in China as they enjoy discounts of up to 8% per barrel offered by Iran to circumvent US sanctions.
Recent data by international tanker tracking services suggest Iran’s oil exports to China reached records of more than 1.8 million bpd in September.
Sen. Rand Paul Slams Strikes on Boats in Caribbean as ‘Extrajudicial Killings’
By Kyle Anzalone | The Libertarian Institute | October 27, 2025
Senator Rand Paul blasted President Donald Trump’s strikes on alleged drug traffickers as unconstitutional and illegal.
“A briefing is not enough to overcome the Constitution. The Constitution says that when you go to war, Congress has to vote on it. … The drug war, or the crime war, has typically been dealt with through law enforcement,” Paul said on Fox News Sunday. “And so far they have alleged that these people are drug dealers … and we’ve had no evidence presented. So at this point we would call them extrajudicial killings.”
So far, the Department of War has bombed ten boats it claims are smuggling narcotics into the US. Nine of the strikes have been on vessels in the Caribbean, against alleged cartels linked to Venezuela. The White House has not provided evidence that the ships were carrying drugs.
“So far, they have alleged that these people are drug dealers. No one said their name. No one said what evidence. No one said whether they’re armed. And we’ve had no evidence presented,” Paul said.
One survivor of a strike was released by Ecuador, finding he was not engaged in wrongdoing when the boat was attacked. One family member said a victim of a US strike was a fisherman, and not working for a cartel.
Trump has discussed expanding the strikes into Venezuela and has given the CIA approval to conduct lethal operations against cartels. Secretary of State Marco Rubio claims that Venezuelan President Maduro is the leader of a cartel designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization.
If Trump elects to expand the war, he told reporters that he will brief Congress on the plans. He went on to say he did not have to discuss the matter with the Legislator and has not sought a Declaration of War.
The Constitution explicitly grants Congress the authority to Declare War. However, the principle of preventing the President from unilaterally declaring war has been eroded over time. Congress has not declared war since World War 2 II. The last Authorization for Use of Military Force was passed in 2002 for the Iraq War.
Senator Paul has teamed up with Democratic Senator Tim Kaine to push a War Powers Resolution that would stop Trump from launching a war with Venezuela.
Israeli military company establishes first branch in UAE
MEMO | October 27, 2025
The Hebrew newspaper Maariv reported on Sunday that the Israeli government has approved the establishment of a branch of Controp Precision Technologies Ltd in the United Arab Emirates. The move has been described as an “unprecedented security and economic step” since the signing of the normalisation agreements in 2020.
Controp Precision Technologies Ltd specialises in designing and manufacturing EO/IR systems used for intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and targeting missions across air, land, and maritime domains. The company provides its solutions to the defence, homeland security, and other related sectors.
According to the newspaper, the new company, named Controp Emirates Ltd, will operate within Abu Dhabi’s free trade zone (ADGM). It will be fully owned by the Israeli parent company and will operate under strict security supervision from Israel’s Ministry of Defence.
The purpose of the new branch is to enable the company to manufacture and market its advanced electro-optical systems locally in the UAE, as well as to provide maintenance and technical support services.
The total investment in the first phase is estimated at around 30 million US dollars, funded through Controp shares and owner loans. The branch will be managed by an Israeli chief executive, while full control will remain with the parent company.
How Israel-First Jewish Americans plan to re-monopolise the narratives on Palestine
By Jamal Kanj | MEMO | October 27, 2025
The nature of the United States’ relationship with Israel defies logic and reason. It is a parasitic one-sided benefit, entangled in the tentacles of organised influence, manipulation, financial power, and media control. Israel contributes next to nothing of tangible benefit to America’s security, strategic value, or economy, yet Washington continues to design its foreign policy and moral compass around Israel. It is so absurd it borders on sorcery.
A relationship driven by an Israel-first agenda that extends beyond the halls of Congress into the very architecture of the disinformation system. It reshapes how Americans think and how they view the world: through Congress, through newsrooms, through algorithms, and through paid “influencers,” one at a time. To that end, American media and entertainment industries serve as essential tools for molding the nation’s political landscape and American culture. Oracle’s CEO, Safra Catz, captured this intent candidly in a 2015 email to former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, writing, “We believe that we have to embed the love and respect for Israel in the American culture.”
A decade later, that vision is maturing. Israel-first Oracle founder Larry Ellison is now poised to acquire major show business studios and news outlets. His son, David Ellison, has become the head of Paramount and CBS through the Skydance–Paramount merger. This is while Ellison senior is in talks to purchase Warner Bros., its film studios, and CNN.
As a major media owner and influential figure in political campaigns, Ellison has a well-documented history of coordinating with Israeli government officials. Evidence of this surfaced recently in hacked emails published by Drop Site News and Responsible Statecraft. In 2015, in an email exchange, Israel’s then–ambassador to the United Nations, Ron Prosor, asked Ellison if Senator Marco Rubio had “passed his scrutiny.” Ellison assured him that Rubio “will be a great friend for Israel,” later donating $5 million for Rubio’s presidential primary campaign. Rubio didn’t pass Ellison’s scrutiny as an American patriot; he passed it for Israel.
Under the ownership of Israel-first billionaires, American media outlets have become revolving doors for “embedded” Zionist shaping public perception. Case in point is Bari Weiss, founder of The Free Press, and the new editor-in-chief of CBS News. Weiss is described as “ardent supporter of Israel” who has used her platform to whitewash the Israeli genocide and starvation campaign in Gaza. She is now bringing those talking points from a fringe outlet straight into one of the nation’s major news organizations.
Ellison and other Israel-first donors like Miriam Adelson, who gave Trump’s campaign $100 million, have one single focus: who is best to represent Israel’s interests in Washington. Even Trump, who brands himself as an “America First” president, admits as much telling the Israeli Knesset that his major donor, Adelson, loves Israel more than America.
In addition to traditional media, social media has become the latest arena for influence by Israel-first power brokers. TikTok stands out as the first major platform not owned or controlled by Israel-first investors. For this reason, Tik Tok was possibly the only major social media outlet that escaped the Israeli managed algorithm. It is no coincidence that Israeli officials, along with Israel-first Jewish American politicians and media pundits, have amplified claims of “data security risks” to justify efforts to either shut TikTok down or take control of its messaging.
Leading the push to acquire TikTok are none other than Israel-first Ellison and Murdoch families. The same Israel-first billionaires whose influence extends across media, technology, and politics. The TikTok debate has little to do with data security and everything to do with Israeli narrative security. The concern was never Chinese access to American data, but rather the inability of the Israel-first actors to manipulate TikTok’s algorithm and content flow. Ironically, even Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu applauded the planned takeover of TikTok, calling it “the most important purchase going on right now.” “Weapons change over time,” he told a group of Israeli “digital warriors.” “The most important ones are on social media.”
The consequences reach far beyond the newsroom. A Responsible Statecraft investigation revealed that Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has been quietly paying American social media influencers up to $7,000 per post to push pro-Israel content without any disclosure. In other words, US information space is being systematically infiltrated by undisclosed foreign propaganda.
What we are witnessing is not just the manufacturing of consent, but a corporate and money colonization of truth. With Ellison’s empire controlling these platforms, Weiss’s like controlling the newsroom, and Israel’s ministries funding the feeds, the American mind is a victim of engineered illusion. This is not a mere media bias. It is institutionalised propaganda disguised as “mainstream journalism.”
Voltaire once wrote, “Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.” For decades, Israel and its enablers have convinced Americans of the absurd: that religion grants Europeans ancestral rights to the Middle East, a nuclear-armed occupier is a victim, and genocide is “self-defence.”
America’s real test of democracy is not on the battlefields, but in confronting AIPAC and Israel-first influence over our executive and legislative branches, the curated news, and most dangerously, the creeping effort to stifle academic freedom in our universities, sealing the colonisation of the American mind.
The intersection of political influence and media ownership raises concerns not only about the extent of its reach, but in how seamlessly it blends into the cultural and political mainstream, making foreign interests appear as domestic consensus. The merging of political power and Israel-first money has reduced US media to an instrument of ideological conformity. Now with Israel-first Fox News, combined with Ellison’s expanding media empire monopolising the narrative, America will finally have its version of the Israel-Pravda.
US detains British commentator Sami Hamdi amid pro-‘Israel’ pressure

Al Mayadeen | October 27, 2025
British journalist and political commentator Sami Hamdi was detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at San Francisco International Airport on Sunday.
The detention occurred during his ongoing speaking tour organized by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), raising alarms over the influence of pro-Israeli lobbying groups.
Hamdi had entered the US legally on October 19 to participate in events addressing US foreign policy and the Israeli war on Gaza. He had recently spoken at CAIR’s annual gala in Sacramento and was scheduled to speak at another event in Florida. On October 24, he was informed that his visa had been revoked, and ICE agents detained him upon his arrival at San Francisco International Airport.
DHS says Hamdi is a national security threat
US Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin confirmed Hamdi’s detention, stating that he posed a national security threat.
“This individual’s visa was revoked, and he is in ICE custody pending removal,” McLaughlin wrote on X.
Reactions from Civil Rights Groups
Friends of Hamdi and civil rights organizations have condemned the detention as an infringement on free speech. A statement from his supporters described the arrest as “a deeply troubling precedent for freedom of expression and the safety of British citizens abroad.”
They called for the United Kingdom Foreign Office to demand urgent clarification from US authorities regarding the grounds for Hamdi’s detention.
CAIR criticized pro-Israeli lobbying groups’ influence on US authorities that led to Hamdi’s arrest. In a statement, CAIR accused “unhinged Israel First bigots” of pressuring the US government to detain Hamdi, labeling the action as an “Israel First policy, not an America First policy.”
Hamdi’s father, Mohamed El-Hachmi Hamdi, expressed concern over his son’s detention, stating that Sami “has no affiliation with any political or religious group.” He emphasized that his son’s stance on Palestine is centered on the people’s right to security, peace, freedom, and dignity, describing him as “one of the young dreamers of this generation, yearning for a world with more compassion, justice, and solidarity.”
Israel blocks winter essentials for Palestinian prisoners for third year

Palestinian Information Center – October 27, 2025
GAZA – Lina al-Tawil, director of the Palestinian Center for Prisoners’ Advocacy, said that Israeli prison service (IPS) prevents the entry of blankets and winter clothing to thousands of Palestinian detainees for the third consecutive year.
“Prisoners from Gaza are the most affected by this policy, especially those arrested after October 7, 2023,” Tawil said in a statement on Sunday, noting that those detainees from Gaza had received only one set of prison clothes, a shirt and trousers, since they were kidnaped from the Strip.
Tawil also pointed out that most of the Israeli prisons are located in desert areas, which makes winter harsher and worsens the humanitarian situation inside them, particularly for sick prisoners who suffer from the cold and face serious complications due to the lack of protective and heating means.
Tawil highlighted the spread of infectious diseases among Palestinian prisoners during the winter, attributing it to overcrowded cells and the sharing of personal items, describing such harsh incarceration conditions as a “formula used by the Israeli authorities to increase the number of sick detainees.”
She urged international organizations, especially the International Committee of the Red Cross, to take swift action to address what she called “this critical crisis” in Israeli jails and to pressure the Israeli authorities to end the suffering it deliberately inflicts on Palestinian prisoners.
USS Nimitz loses 2 aircraft in South China Sea in 30 minutes
Al Mayadeen | October 27, 2025
Two US Navy aircraft operating from the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz were lost to the sea within roughly 30 minutes of each other: an MH-60R Sea Hawk and an F/A-18F Super Hornet.
On Sunday, search-and-rescue forces recovered all five personnel from the two incidents; troops were reported in stable condition. The US Pacific Fleet has characterized the events as separate incidents and opened formal investigations.
Timeline and immediate facts
The first incident involved an MH-60R Sea Hawk assigned to Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron HSM-73; it went into the sea in the mid-afternoon while conducting routine carrier operations.
Approximately 30 minutes later, an F/A-18F Super Hornet from VFA-22 crashed into the South China Sea; both aviators ejected and were recovered. Official statements and reporting indicate both events occurred while the Nimitz was operating in the South China Sea during what has been described as routine deployment activity.
Peacetime losses in a contested theater
A single deck-oriented aviation mishap is an accepted operational risk; two losses from the same carrier within a short span are not. Carrier flight decks are among the most hazardous workplaces in peacetime precisely because routine activity concentrates high-energy operations in a confined, moving environment.
The coincidence of two different airframes, a rotary-wing anti-submarine warfare (ASW) platform and a strike fighter, being lost in quick succession raises immediate questions about whether the events are independent mishaps or symptoms of a common underlying problem, including maintenance, human factors, deck operations, or environmental conditions.
A series of US Navy ‘mishaps’
During extended US operations in the Red Sea, including an all-out aerial and naval aggression against the Yemeni Armed Forces, the Navy recorded several high-profile aviation and deck incidents.
Aircraft were lost overboard, and friendly fire shot down a US fighter that the Navy later admitted to.
Those combat-adjacent mishaps, driven in large part by Yemeni missile and unmanned threats and by an unusually high operational tempo, differ in proximate cause from a routine-operations crash, but together they form a cluster that points to systemic pressure on American naval aviation readiness and risk margins.
How aircraft go overboard
On a carrier, parked and stowed aircraft are secured by brakes, chocks, and multiple tiedowns attached to deck padeyes; moving aircraft are handled with tractors, elevators, and carefully choreographed deck evolutions governed by standardized procedures.
An aircraft can go overboard when one or more protective layers fail: tiedown chains can part under extreme roll/heave or wind, fastening points can be improperly rigged or removed prematurely, tow vehicles or handling errors can permit an uncontrolled move, or a sudden ship maneuver, for example an emergency turn or severe roll in heavy sea state, can create loads that exceed restraints.
Active flight operations introduce other vectors. Bolters, arrested-landing failures, catapult or engine malfunctions, or deck strikes can send an aircraft into the water.
Material costs
The material loss is non-trivial. Modern Super Hornets and missionized Sea Hawks represent tens of millions of dollars apiece in direct replacement and far higher sums over lifecycle accounting; public reporting commonly places a unit-replacement estimate for a Super Hornet at around $70 million and the MH-60R at around $37 million, though precise figures vary by accounting method.
F/A-18 losses
- One F/A-18F Super Hornet was lost after an arresting cable failed during landing on the USS Harry S. Truman in May 2025.
- Another F/A-18E Super Hornet was lost in April 2025 when the crew lost control of the aircraft while it was being towed in the hangar bay, causing it and the tow tractor to fall overboard.
- A third F/A-18 Super Hornet was lost after it was accidentally shot down by the guided-missile cruiser USS Gettysburg.
USS Nimitz on its final deployment
The Nimitz is one of the US Navy’s older nuclear-powered carriers and was reported to be on its final deployment before decommissioning in May 2026. Aging platforms are not inherently unsafe, but prolonged deployments, deferred maintenance, and supply-chain friction raise the probability of mechanical or human-process failures.
Geostrategic implications
Tactically, losing two aircraft is a direct hit to the USS Nimitz strike group’s operational strength in the region. But politically, the impact could be even greater.
The South China Sea remains one of the world’s most contested waters, where US naval presence serves as both a coercive measure against China and a reassurance to Washington’s allies. Incidents like these tend to draw sharp attention. They give rivals an opportunity to point to underlying problems related to US readiness and reliability while allies quietly watch how Washington manages the situation.
When seen alongside earlier mishaps in the Red Sea, including crashes, handling errors, and a friendly-fire shootdown, the Nimitz losses suggest a Navy stretched thin. High operational tempo, aging ships and aircraft, and pressure to sustain global deployments may be eroding safety margins.
Russia’s new cruise missile a ‘game-changer’ – former US Army officer
RT | October 26, 2025
Russia’s newly tested unlimited-range nuclear-powered missile, the Burevestnik, is a game-changing weapon that is bound to significantly affect US President Donald Trump’s plan to build the ‘Golden Dome’ anti-missile system, former US Army officer Stanislav Krapivnik believes.
Krapivnik spoke to RT shortly after Moscow announced a successful test of the new munition on Sunday. According to the Russian military, the missile covered a distance of over 14,000km during a multi-hour test flight earlier this week.
“The Burevestnik is a game changer… the missile can go around anti-aircraft zones around radar zones… it stayed in the air for 16 hours. Possibly can stay in the air longer. What this means is it’s a second-strike weapon, which means that if Russia is struck, it will strike back,” Krapivnik said.
The development is bound to affect the US plans to build its ‘Golden Dome’ anti-missile system, which is already supposed to be “up and going” but is unlikely to become operational at least before 2030, he added.
“Right now, radar systems and anti-aircraft systems, normally for ballistic missiles like this, are set up on likely ballistic trajectories from nations that may fire on the US: North Korea, China, and Russia. So they don’t have to cover the entire US. With this missile, they would have to cover the entire United States, which makes everything much, much more difficult and much more expensive,” Krapivnik stated.
The successful test will likely be met in the West with a great deal of skepticism, just like the initial announcement that it was being developed made by Russian President Vladimir Putin back in 2018, Krapivnik suggested.
“The further society walks away from being able to recognize truth, the more it comes to the point where it’s going to collapse. And the West is at the brink of collapse; they don’t recognize the truth no matter what,” Krapivnik said, adding that the expected “continuous denial of reality” is “the same thing that we saw with hypersonic missiles.”
Lithium-Ion Batteries in Cars: Explosion Destroys Apartments
StacheD Training | October 22, 2025
A plug-in hybrid exploded inside a garage in Izegem, Belgium, destroying multiple apartments and displacing several families. Investigators say the blast originated from the vehicle’s lithium-ion battery system. In this video, I break down what happened, why lithium-ion batteries can cause powerful explosions in enclosed spaces, and what this means for first responders and building safety.
Training & Consulting: https://www.stachedtraining.com
Bowing to Zionist lobby pressure, UK medical regulator hounds British-Palestinian medic

By Maryam Qarehgozlou | Press TV | October 26, 2025
Yielding to pressure from pro-Israel lobbying groups, the UK’s General Medical Council (GMC) has reopened a politically motivated case against British-Palestinian doctor Rahmeh Aladwan over her outspoken criticism of UK-backed Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza.
The renewed proceedings aim to suspend the 31-year-old medic from the UK medical register over social media posts condemning the genocide in Gaza and the complicity of the British government.
The move comes less than a month after the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS) ruled that the complaints against her were not “sufficient to establish that there may be a real risk to patients” and refused to impose any restrictions on her licence.
That September 25 decision had appeared to close the case.
However, under pressure from Zionist lobbying groups — led by the so-called Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) and the Jewish Medical Association (UK) — the GMC has now reversed course.
Both groups, backed by Labour Health Secretary Wes Streeting, have spearheaded a smear campaign to punish Dr. Aladwan for her vocal and strong pro-Palestine stance.
For nearly two years, she has been the target of online smears and defamation for exposing Israel’s slaughter of more than 68,000 Palestinians and the near-total destruction of Gaza.
Earlier this month, the CAA escalated its rhetoric, claiming that Aladwan was conducting a “campaign of hatred against British Jews” and threatened to legally challenge the MPTS for clearing her name.
Streeting — who has publicly vowed to overhaul the way medical regulators handle so-called “anti-Semitism” cases — has openly pushed for harsher measures against critics of Israel.
In practice, his proposal would mean prosecuting anyone who denounces the Zionist regime’s genocidal actions.
Investigations by Declassified UK revealed that Streeting received almost £30,000 from Britain’s pro-Israel lobby, and in 2022, he became the first member of Keir Starmer’s shadow cabinet to visit the Israeli-occupied territories — in a move designed to signal a break with former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn’s pro-Palestine position.
Under this political pressure, a GMC case examiner compiled a new dossier of Aladwan’s social-media posts from late September to early October and referred her again to the Interim Orders Tribunal (IOT).
The CAA quickly boasted that its legal threat had forced the regulator to act.
At Thursday’s hearing, the MPTS agreed to convene a second tribunal — a move that could ultimately strip Dr. Aladwan, a National Health Service (NHS) doctor with seven years of service, of her right to practice medicine in the country where she grew up.
Speaking before the hearing, Dr. Aladwan told reporters she had been “summoned by what is now more accurately called the Genocide Medical Council.”
“It is only four weeks since I was summoned here for exactly these allegations, it is my social media postings, it is my support for the Palestinians to resist under international law,” she said.
“Mostly really, it’s the GMC buckling to the pressure of the Israeli lobby and the MPs such as Wesley Streeting who are funded by them and who are making comments.”
She described the ordeal as a coordinated effort to silence voices of dissent.
“There’s been a huge media smear campaign, corruption, and collusions between all these institutions that have been subverted by the Israeli lobby to just take my license away or silence me.”
Inside the tribunal, Aladwan was even denied the right to address the panel directly. Representing the GMC, Emma Gilsenan said that only her legal representative could pose questions — a privilege she had been granted in the earlier hearing.
Her counsel, Kevin Saunders, instructed by Zillur Rahman of Rahman Lowe Solicitors, denounced the proceedings as a response to “external pressure.”
He highlighted Streeting’s public condemnation of the previous tribunal’s ruling, calling it “an attempt to undermine the rule of law and the determination of an independent body.”
Saunders pointed out that the 12-page dossier presented by the GMC contained nothing new to justify reopening the case.
He stressed that Aladwan’s social media posts were separate from her clinical practice, which has been exemplary, noting that she was expressing solidarity with her own people under siege.
No evidence has ever shown that her posts affected patient safety or her duties as a doctor, he said.
When Saunders requested a stay of proceedings on grounds of “abuse of process,” the tribunal rejected the motion.
‘Surrender to political pressure’
On Friday, after the second tribunal, Dr. Aladwan took to X (formerly Twitter) to condemn what she described as the MPTS’s “surrender to political pressure.”
“They chose to trample on their own ruling from the 25th of September and allow the GMC to resubmit the same evidence—effectively perverting our British legal system on behalf of the ‘Israeli’ Jewish lobby and their funded MP Streeting,” she wrote.
“If a foreign lobby can force our panels to backtrack on a ruling, the finality of British justice is dead.”
She called it “a dark day for Britain,” vowing to continue her fight.
“They picked the wrong British Palestinian. I will fight this — not just for me, but for our sovereignty and fundamental rights in Britain. If the process is the punishment, then bring it on.”
Ahead of the hearing, she had warned that the GMC was determined to destroy her livelihood “to please its masters in the Israeli lobby.”
“Let’s be clear,” she posted. “A British Jewish or ‘Israeli’ doctor could … bomb hospitals and kill patients in Palestine — and keep their license and freely treat British patients. I’m being persecuted for speech. They would be protected for murder. This is Jewish supremacy.”
By Tuesday, Aladwan revealed that the GMC was now seeking her suspension for being “unrepentant.”
“The first tribunal found no need for any order. Now, the GMC demands suspension because I refused to ‘moderate’ speech that was already deemed acceptable,” she said.
“This is not about safety. It’s about punishment. They are explicitly seeking what the ‘Israeli’ lobby demanded: my removal from practice for my political views. This is the weaponisation of medical regulation. This is political persecution.”
Arrest before tribunal: A ‘political theatre’
Only two days before facing her second tribunal, Aladwan was arrested by British police — a move many saw as part of a broader campaign to silence and intimidate her.
In a video posted on social media, the British-Palestinian doctor could be seen confronting police officers as they informed her she was under arrest for “three malicious communications and one offence of inciting racial hatred.”
According to the officer, the charges stem from Aladwan’s posts on October 7 — marking the second anniversary of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, the Hamas-led operation launched in response to over seven decades of Israeli apartheid — and from a July 21 speech at a pro-Palestine rally outside the Foreign Office, where police claimed she had called for “the eradication of Israel.”
Aladwan, who in her posts described the historic resistance operation as the day Israel was “humiliated,” immediately challenged the officer’s motives.
“You are doing this for the Israeli Jewish lobby so you can get an arrest on me before my tribunal on Thursday,” she said in the video. “This is what the UK does to its doctors.”
After her release, Aladwan denounced the arrest as “political theatre, not policing.”
In a detailed social media post, she described harsh and degrading conditions during her detention — denied water for six hours, refused essential medication, left in a freezing cell without a blanket, and isolated with a broken intercom.
“These are not standard procedures. They are punitive measures,” she wrote.
Aladwan also revealed the political motive behind the arrest.
“An officer explicitly informed me the police would be ‘reporting the arrest to the GMC.’ This is a non-reportable event. This admission reveals the direct channel of communication between the police and my regulator,” she said.
She further noted that the arrest was part of a coordinated campaign of intimidation aimed at influencing the medical tribunal and shaping public perception.
“It reveals a seamless network: lobby groups, politicians (Streeting), police, regulator (GMC),” she wrote. “They are not following due process. They are executing a strategy. Our British institutions have become enforcement tools for a foreign, hostile agenda—for the Israeli Jewish lobby—and the entire world can see it.”
Her post ended with a defiant declaration: “Free Britain and Palestine from Jewish supremacy (Zionism).”
Later, Aladwan published her bail conditions, which she said were a form of “house arrest.”
She is banned from attending any public event or protest related to Palestine or the Israeli regime in London, placed under curfew at a specified address, and required to notify police if she leaves home for more than 48 hours.
‘Losing grip over the narrative’
The arrest sparked outrage among pro-Palestine activists and supporters online, who harshly criticized British authorities for weaponizing law enforcement to suppress dissent.
A social media activist, Thomas Keith, wrote that the state’s reaction only exposes its weakness.
“The irony is that every time they try to silence a Rahmeh Aladwan, they just spotlight the hollowness of their so-called freedoms,” he said. “The more aggressive and coordinated the repression, the more obvious it is that the state is panicking, losing its grip over the narrative as more and more people refuse to look away from Gaza.”
“What you’re seeing is Britain showing the world it’s still an empire at heart, propping up colonialism abroad and silencing dissent at home. The cost of speaking the truth has never been higher, but the mask is off, and more people than ever see exactly who benefits from the machinery of state repression.”
Ellen Kriesels, another user on X, highlighted the hypocrisy of reopening a cleared case under lobby pressure and condemned the GMC’s renewed action as a blatant act of political persecution.
“This doctor was cleared by a tribunal three weeks ago. Now she is going back there on Thursday after intense media and political pressure at the behest of pro-Israel lobby groups. No new material. Political persecution is what this is. Shame on the GMC,” she wrote.
Aladwan herself has long maintained that silence is complicity. After her first tribunal in September, she posted a message urging others to resist fear and speak truth.
“We must operate without fear. We must name the root cause and identify the criminals. Palestinians are bravely resisting with their lives. The least we can do is resist with our words, uphold the principles of liberation (thawabet), and speak the full truth.”
She condemned Zionist supremacist structures behind the ongoing genocide in Gaza and the extermination of Palestinians across the occupied territories.
“The Jewish lobby and Jewish supremacists need to have some shame,” she wrote. “While Palestinians are being kidnapped, tortured, murdered, starved, raped, and burned alive by Israeli Jews, they continue to play victim and cry over our words and activism that are rooted in justice, morality, and humanity.”
In her message, she made clear what this struggle is really about.
“This is not about Jewish feelings or tears. This is about genocide caused by Jewish supremacy, extremism, and unadulterated terrorism.”
Netanyahu: Israel Does Not Need US Approval to Strike Gaza
By Kyle Anzalone | The Libertarian Institute | October 26, 2025
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed that he can order strikes in Israel at his discretion and that he is not controlled by the US.
Haaretz reports that the Israeli leader said Sunday that Israel “does not seek anyone’s approval” for strikes in Gaza. The remarks follow a report on Thursday that top US officials told Netanyahu that Washington expects to be informed before Tel Aviv attacks Gaza.
He says the US approves of Tel Aviv having full decision-making over striking Gaza. “Israel will decide which forces are unacceptable. The US agrees to this,” he said.
Last week, Israel bombed Gaza dozens of times, claiming it was reacting to a Hamas attack in Rafah. However, the White House knew there was no Hamas attack. When Washington informed Tel Aviv, it was aware that the explosion was caused by an Israeli bulldozer hitting an unexploded munition.
While the reporting said that Washington’s expectations did not amount to Netanyahu needing Trump’s permission to bomb Gaza, the President has sent a number of high-level officials to Israel to keep the Prime Minister from breaking the ceasefire. Trump’s policy has been dubbed “Bibi-sitting.”
Some Israeli officials said that Israel is struggling to dictate policy to the US. Israeli officials told Haaretz that they “have the impression that American scrutiny of Israel has reached a point that usurps Israel’s military and diplomatic power.” They added, “Netanyahu continues to deny this new reality because it contradicts his attempts to create a narrative of victory in the war, at least in the eyes of his political supporters.”
In his remarks, Netanyahu argued he has been able to violate the ceasefire agreement with Hezbollah and Hamas at his discretion. “I want to make one thing clear – our security policy is in our own hands. We are not willing to tolerate attacks against us, we respond at our discretion against attacks, as we saw in Lebanon and recently in Gaza,” he said.
