EU joins IMF, Gulf states funneling billions into Egypt as Gaza refugee crisis looms
The Cradle | March 14, 2024
The EU is preparing a €7.4 billion ($8 billion) aid package for Egypt, citing “concerns” that the Israeli genocide in Gaza and the ballooning crisis in Sudan could “risk exacerbating financial troubles in the North African nation and raising immigration pressure on Europe,” according to a report by the Financial Times (FT).
European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen is set to visit Cairo on 17 March alongside the Greek, Italian, and Belgian prime ministers to “finalize and announce the agreement.”
Completion of the deal accelerated following the start of Israel’s campaign of genocide in the Gaza Strip. The terms of the agreement reportedly include support for Egypt’s energy sector, assistance to deal with the rising number of refugees entering the country, and help to fortify the country’s border with Libya.
An estimated €1bn in emergency financial assistance could be paid immediately to Cairo, while another €4 billion in “macro-financial assistance” hinges on implementing reforms under an expanded loan program with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Officials told FT the rest of the funds would be drawn from various EU funding streams.
The funds from Brussels is the latest in a recent string of investment packages coming from the west and Gulf states for cash-strapped Egypt.
“With respect to the question on the potential impact pressures from refugees from Gaza, what we do see in Egypt is that there is a need to have a very comprehensive support package for Egypt. And we’re working … to ensure that Egypt does not have any residual financing needs,” IMF spokesperson Julie Kozack said on 22 February.
The IMF agreed just days later to expand its financial rescue program for Egypt to $8 billion after the Egyptian central bank let loose its currency to help stabilize the economy. Egypt is the second most indebted country to the IMF, behind only Argentina, with an international debt that grew from $37 billion in 2010 to $164 billion in 2023.
In late February, UK oil giant BP announced plans to develop gas projects and drilling in Egypt over the next three to four years at a cost of $1.5 billion. This came just after the North African nation sealed a massive $35 billion real estate development deal with the UAE, which will see Emirati investment vehicle ADQ build a 170 km tourism and financial center in the Ras al-Hekma area.
In recent weeks, Cairo has also been in discussions to sell prime Red Sea coastal land near Sharm al-Sheikh to Saudi investors.
The unprecedented windfall comes as Egypt is putting the finishing touches on a kilometers-wide buffer zone and wall along its border with southern Gaza, allegedly in preparation to take in hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians once the Israeli ground invasion of Gaza’s southernmost city begins.
Amnesty International and other NGOs have also accused Cairo of “harassing” the director of the UK-based Sinai Foundation for Human Rights, which revealed the construction of the buffer zone last month.
Geopolitical analysts, including The Cradle’s Mohamad Hassan Sweidan, have speculated that Egypt may be willing to accept refugees from Gaza in exchange for a significant offset of its staggering debt.
Israel attacking historical, cultural Palestinian sites in Gaza, West Bank, Jerusalem
MEMO | March 14, 2024
The ongoing Israeli aggression on the besieged Gaza Strip has targeted historic sites and cultural centres destroying them either completely or partially while the indiscriminate killing has led to the death of many of the enclave’s writers, artists and activists, a joint report issued by the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) and the Ministry of Culture has revealed.
The report issued yesterday on the Palestinian National Culture Day said Israel has destroyed 32 cultural centres and institutions as well as 12 museums while more than 2,100 pieces of heritage dresses and embroidered items had been lost. As many as 45 writers, artists and activists have been killed by Israel since it started its war in October.
The Israeli aggression has led to the destruction of about 27 murals, and the bombing of more than eight publishing houses and printing presses, three media and art production companies and studios, nine public libraries as well as four religious shrines.
The Israeli bombing has completely destroyed 219 mosques and partially destroyed 287 mosques and three churches, 195 historical buildings, nine archaeological sites and 19 universities and colleges.
In the occupied West Bank, the Israeli army’s restriction on movement, repeated invasions and various massacres have caused the halting of many cultural activities including the soap festival in the city of Nablus, which was scheduled in April as part of the Ministry of Culture’s preparations to register the soap on the World Heritage List.
The statement said that Palestinian institutions and associations in the occupied city of Jerusalem “were subjected to attempts to dismantle them… as happened with the Al-Hakawati Theatre,” adding that “the [Israeli] occupation authorities are working to put in place everything that would keep these associations ineffective and completely stop their activity, through stifling administrative and legal processes.”
UN probe finds Israel deliberately targeted journalists
Late Reuters visuals journalist Issam Abdallah
Press TV – March 14, 2024
A United Nations investigation singles out the preventability of an October 13 Israeli attack on a group of journalists in southern Lebanon that led to the death of a Reuters reporter.
The attack consisted of two tank strikes that claimed the life of the agency’s 37-year-old visuals journalist Issam Abdallah, and wounded six other journalists, including Agence France-Presse (AFP) photographer Christina Assi, 28, near the Lebanese village of Alma al-Chaab. Assi later had a leg amputated.
The investigation by the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) found out that the attack targeted “civilians, in this instance clearly identifiable journalists.”
The attack, it said, “constitutes a violation of UNSCR 1701 and international law,” the UNIFIL report said, referring to United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended a 33-day-long Israeli military onslaught on the country in the summer of 2006.
The seven-page report dated February 27 said further, “It is assessed that there was no exchange of fire across the Blue Line at the time of the incident,” referring to a temporary line that was drawn after the withdrawal of the Israeli regime from Lebanon during an earlier war in 2000.
“The reason for the strikes on the journalists is not known,” the probe added.
At least 133 journalists and media workers have been killed since October 7, when the Israeli regime launched a genocidal war against the Gaza Strip that has so far claimed the lives of 31,300 Gazans, most of them women, children, and adolescents.
Culture Warriors Spread Disinfo on ‘Haitian Cannibals’
By Patrick Macfarlane | The Libertarian Institute | March 14, 2024
In the first few years of the 2020s, the world witnessed a revolution in the dissemination of atrocity propaganda. Thanks to the proliferation of social media, smartphone ownership, and artificial intelligence, atrocity claims can now be manufactured, disseminated, and, thankfully, debunked in real time.
Although technology may be evolving, lies do not change much.
During World War I, the British claimed Germans boiled the corpses of their war dead to make fat and glycerin for munitions. More recently, we’ve seen accusations of industrial organ harvesting in Xinjiang, China and claims that Hamas “beheaded babies” in Israel. A key element of these atrocity stories, and many like them, is their over-the-top cartoonization of violence.
Amidst violent political upheaval in Haiti, a narrative has emerged that Haitian society is devolving into widespread cannibalism. A video even emerged purporting to show popular opposition figure, Jimmy “Barbeque” Cherizier, cutting the flesh off a burning corpse and eating it.
This propagandistic narrative comes at a crucial juncture where Western powers have for three years failed to drum up yet another foreign military intervention in this ill-fated nation.
After the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moise in 2021, Haiti was ruled by U.S.-installed President Ariel Henry. Many Haitians viewed Henry as an American puppet leader. Because Henry was unable to stabilize the country, the United States pushed the United Nations to deploy a peace keeping force to his nation.
Two weeks ago, Henry left Haiti for Kenya, attempting to secure Joe Biden’s long-desired UN security deployment. In his absence, Haiti’s organized opposition united under the leadership of Jimmy “Barbeque” Cherizier. The united opposition launched an armed revolution that dragged Haiti further into discord, albeit with the goal of creating a truly independent and prosperous country. Unable to safely return to Port-au-Prince, Henry resigned on Tuesday.
Last Saturday, reports began to circulate that Haiti was under siege by cannibal gangs. However, the claims were not reported by mainstream outlets. Instead, they were made on X (formerly Twitter) by popular culture war influencers. These influencers used these reports to sow fear that the unrest will spread to the United States through immigration. With 10.4 million views as of this writing, Malaysian national Ian Miles Cheong circulated the first and most viewed Haiti cannibalism report. The report was furthered, among others, by Dom Lucre, Jake Shields, Tim Pool, and Libs of Tiktok.
Given his position as the wealthiest man in the world and the owner of X, Elon Musk has an effect, intended or not, of legitimizing the information he interacts with on the platform. As is the case with Cheong’s cannibalism report, the information might not be reliable. Nevertheless, Musk drove a number of his 176.3 million followers to Cheong’s post by replying to it.
So, just what was the problem with Cheong’s report? He doesn’t have a source.
On Tuesday, Cheong posted a screenshot of an email he ostensibly received from NBC Reporter David Ingram asking where he got his information.
In the email, Ingram asks Cheong if his cannibalism claim originates from the “unnamed source” referred to by a Daily Express U.S. article. Cheong ridiculed the question, saying, “I just received a request for comment from NBC News asking me to prove cannibalism exists in Haiti. I wish I was making this up.”
Despite Cheong’s mockery, Ingram’s question was legitimate. Cheong made a specific claim in his post. He did not claim “cannibalism exists in Haiti.” He claimed “cannibal gangs are besieging the national palace in Port-au-Prince.”
While Ingram did not link to the article in his email, he was likely referring to this March 5 piece, which states:
… a journalist on the ground told Daily Express US that cannibalism has been witnessed on the streets as the violence reaches “unprecedented” levels… Speaking anonymously, they said: “Haiti is living in a total chaotic situation right now. It is total chaos everywhere, especially in the capital where I am right now”… Following the interview, the journalist said via message: “Cannibalism is not widespread, but definitely an indication of the worsening situation. It definitely happens on a few occasions.”
If Cheong did indeed source his report from the Daily Express U.S. piece, the original claim is dubious. The source is hearsay; the anonymous reporter was told by alleged witnesses that they observed cannibalism. The reporter then told the Daily Express U.S. that cannibalism “definitely happens on a few occasions.” He did not say that he had personally witnessed cannibalism, neither did he allege a specific incident where cannibalism took place.
Furthermore, Cheong mischaracterized the Daily Express report. Cheong’s initial tweet claimed “Cannibal gangs are besieging the national palace in Port-au-Prince.” Cheong transformed the report from “cannibalism definitely happens on a few occasions,” to “cannibal gangs are besieging the national palace[.]”
Another popular culture war influencer, Dom Lucore, subsequently circulated a video of a Haitian gangster eating burnt flesh from a charred human corpse. Lucore claimed the man in the video was opposition leader Jimmy “Barbeque” Cherizier.
Despite being corrected by Dan Cohen, a journalist who personally filmed a documentary featuring Cherizier, Lucore doubled down on the claim.
Although the video probably does depict a Haitian gangster eating human flesh, it is clearly not Jimmy Cherizier. Further, the video is several years old and not connected in any way to what is occurring on the ground in Haiti right now. There is no evidence to suggest that Hatians are eating each other en masse or that criminal gangs are using cannibalism as a weapon of terror.
Does cannibalism exist in Haiti? Apparently, in isolated incidents, yes. But cannibalism has existed there for hundreds of years.
Americans are understandably concerned about illegal immigration. However, they fail to appreciate that this false story supports the case for U.S.-led intervention in Haiti, something the Biden administration has desired for years. A foreign invasion of Haiti would further traumatize the Haitian people and certainly increase the amount of refugees seeking asylum in the United States. As with our prior interventions in Haiti, American taxpayers would be forced to foot the bill.
Canadian, Irish, French Government-Attempted Speech Regulations Appear Like Desperate Censorship Power Plays
BY JEFFEREY JAXEN | MARCH 12, 2024
Following in the footsteps of UKs highly controversial Online Safety Act, now law, Canadian and Irish government officials are proposing legislation that would push the boundaries to further stifle online debate.
During the COVID response, the American government chose to erect a massive, top-down censorship industrial complex pulling in key White House officials, CDC heads, and the Department of Homeland Security.
In the UK, it was all-out military psychological operations using the British Army unit’s 77th Brigade and Specialist Group Military Intelligence. Both countries turned their security apparatuses, once used against foreign enemy combatants, to target its own public domestically in an aggressive move to shape public thought and neutralize independent voices.
Now, humanity is at an inflection point. A non-stop blitzkrieg of contentious issues are affecting the lives of many. The failed COVID response taught us that open conversation and investigation is critical to unwind industry talking points, government propaganda, and scientific falsehoods.
Perhaps more important, the new public square, that is the digital age of social media, serves as a steam valve to debate valid concerns surrounding charged issues like climate change and the net zero push, open migration, vaccine safety, reckless government monetary policy, election meddling, the surgical and pharmaceutical fast track of gender-affirming care for minors, intelligence agency run ‘disclosure,’ and so much more.
Meanwhile, power centers are desperate to take all the above issues and funnel vocal detractors from the dominant narrative into one category – hate.
Over the years, governments have gleefully began attaching the ‘hate’ label onto any person, topic, or explanation that runs counter to the single, myopic version of events, ideas, information, or even historical events they deem fact – despite valid evidence proving otherwise.
Socially, the ‘it’s all hateful except for our viewpoint’ worked for corporations, governments, and legacy media operations when they enjoyed narrative control.
Those days are fleeting now and major cracks have formed upon once-settled topics. Now we see the grip tightening from the legislative angle to create more bureaucracy and new powers to punish.
Canada’s Bill C-63 enacts what’s called the Online Harms Act, amends the Criminal Code, and the Canadian Human Rights Act among other things. It also attempts to define and legislate a human emotion stating:
“hatred means the emotion that involves detestation or vilification and that is stronger than disdain or dislike”
Meanwhile, C-63 states that an “Offense motivated by hatred… under this Act or any other Act of Parliament”…carries with a penalty of “imprisonment for life.”
Other goodies written into the bill are the creation of an extrajudicial government tribunal to rule on complaints of threats, intimidation or discrimination from people who can remain anonymous. That’s right, no need to face your accuser says Canada.
If one is accused by the government’s newly-created, extrajudicial group to be “engaging or to have engaged in the discriminatory practice,” they can be ordered, as the bill states, “to pay compensation of not more than $20,000 to any victim identified” and “to pay a penalty of not more than $50,000 to the Receiver General.”
No room for abuse here. What could go wrong?
One would think this would be a one-off piece of speech-chilling legislation from a country that has lost its way under poor leadership. Yet Ireland is also attempting a similar move with mirrored legislative language.
Ireland’s Incitement to Violence or Hatred and Hate Offences Bill is currently before the upper house of the Irish legislature. The Critic writes the law, if enacted, “…would usher in a dangerous new standard for state-driven censorship. The expression or possession of content or even ideas deemed “hateful” would be illegal under the law, with serious implications for everyday people…”
An opinion piece published in The Hill writes:
“As per the tentative legislation, people with “protected characteristics” which includes, inter alia, race, color, and nationality are afforded new legal protections against psychical and mentally inflicted harms, in which offenders are motivated by “hatred.””
It continues by stating:
“As such, Ireland’s police force, An Garda Síochána, will have the authority under the bill to raid the home of the possessor of such material, demand their password and seize their devices. Failure to comply could result in a year-long prison sentence.”
The reason for the sudden Orwellian about face given by Irish prime minister Leo Varadkar was that Ireland needed to “… modernise our laws against incitement to hatred and hatred in general.”
Despite the weak cover stories governments are using to capture speech and attempt to regain narrative control, a clear pattern is being seen – open debate is dangerous to the dwindling control of power centers.
The fun doesn’t stop there.
Article 18 of the WHO’s Pandemic Treaty also stipulates that all countries signed on to the power-centralizing agreement are mandated to “… combat false, misleading, misinformation or disinformation” and “inform policies on factors that hinder adherence to public health and social measures in a pandemic and trust in science and public health institutions.”
Finally, a bill in the works in France appears to be a special gift for pharmaceutical companies. Article 4 of the bill specifically states:
Provocation, by means of repeated pressure or maneuvers, of any person suffering from a pathology to abandon or abstain from following medical treatment is punishable by one year of imprisonment and a fine of 30,000 euros. therapeutic or prophylactic, when this abandonment or abstention is presented as beneficial for the health of the person concerned whereas it is, in the state of medical knowledge, clearly likely to cause for them, taking into account the pathology of which they is affected, particularly serious consequences for their physical or psychological health.
As written, it appears that any criticism of vaccine products, SSRIs, statins, opioids, drugs and procedures used to transition children, or just about any other product or medical practice that has debatable concerns and unsettled science surrounding it – if currently accepted in ‘medical knowledge’ – is a protected class not to be spoken ill about.
“When the provocation provided for in the first two paragraphs has been followed by effects, the penalties are increased to three years of imprisonment and a fine of 45,000 euros.” states the proposed French law.
The coincidental timing over the past few years of several pieces of legislation whose effect will be to essentially chill freedom of speech in the end equation must be taken seriously. The good news is that individuals at all levels of society are sounding the alarm to critically analyze and reject all attempts at overarching control over basic human rights – no matter how well packaged and intentioned they may initially seem.
UK’s National Health Service to stop prescribing puberty blockers to gender-confused children
LifeSiteNews | March 12, 2024
The British National Health Service (NHS) is formally ending the prescribing of puberty blockers to children with gender confusion, in a major policy shift representing a victory against transgender ideology.
The i Paper reports that the change follows the recommendation of a multi-year independent review led by consultant pediatrician Dr. Hilary Cass. The underage use of puberty blockers will now be limited to clinical research trials. The change does not apply to Scotland, whose government says blockers will only be considered for minors “after close psychological and endocrine assessment,” per the report.
“We have always been clear that children’s safety and wellbeing is paramount, so we welcome this landmark decision by the NHS,” said Health Minister Maria Caufield. “Ending the routine prescription of puberty blockers will help ensure that care is based on evidence, expert clinical opinion and is in the best interests of the child.”
Reconsideration of NHS’s standards for chemically “transitioning” young people was bolstered by years of concern over the lax standards at the scandal-ridden Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS), operated by the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust. In January, it was revealed that the facility had seen almost 400 children younger than six years old and more than 70 aged four or younger over the past decade.
The GIDS had long been a source of controversy, from its backing of a discredited study used to justify giving puberty blockers to 11-year-olds, to a case last August in which it approved a “sex-change” procedure for a 22-year-old suffering from over a dozen mental health disorders.
Cass’s report found that the GIDS had failed to consistently collect follow-up data on the long-term outcomes for children who received puberty blockers, “which means it is not possible to accurately track the outcomes and pathways that children and young people take through the service.”
Puberty blockers, which are used to chemically castrate sex offenders, have been shown to devastate bone density in children, putting them at risk of osteoporosis, fractures, and other injuries. Other side effects associated with the drugs include emotional disorders, pseudotumor cerebri, paralysis, renal impairment, sudden cardiac death, and stroke in men, as LifeSiteNews has reported.
The Tavistock clinic is closing at the end of the month, and on Cass’s recommendation, NHS will be opening a pair of regional clinics in April, which it says will employ a more “holistic approach to care,” including neurodiversity, pediatrics, and mental health.
A significant body of evidence shows that “affirming” gender confusion carries serious harms, especially when done with impressionable children who lack the mental development, emotional maturity, and life experience to consider the long-term ramifications of the decisions being pushed on them, or full knowledge about the long-term effects of life-altering, physically transformative, and often irreversible surgical and chemical procedures.
Studies find that more than 80% of children experiencing gender dysphoria outgrow it on their own by late adolescence, and that even full “reassignment” surgery often fails to resolve gender-confused individuals’ heightened tendency to engage in self-harm and suicide — and may even exacerbate it, including by reinforcing their confusion and neglecting the actual root causes of their mental strife.
Some physicians heavily involved in transitioning minors have been caught on video admitting to more old-fashioned motives for such procedures, as with an exposé last year about Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s Clinic for Transgender Health in the United States, where Dr. Shayne Sebold Taylor said outright that “these surgeries make a lot of money.”
Theft of Frozen Russian Assets May Lead to Financial Crisis in the West
By Ekaterina Blinova – Sputnik – 13.03.2024
While US policymakers are seeking to grab Russia’s sovereign assets altogether, EU officials are planning to find legal ways to seize the profits generated by the assets. Russia has signaled it will retaliate against any form of theft.
An EU official told Reuters that Russian assets frozen in the EU could generate up to €20 billion in after-tax profits through 2027, adding that only part of these profits, as well as a tax on the gross amount, could be sent to the Kiev regime. It was noted the remaining funds, however, would have to stay in the West to create a buffer against Moscow’s retaliation measures.
Of the roughly $282 billion in Russian assets immobilized in Japan and the West, around $207 billion (€191 billion) are held at Euroclear, a clearinghouse based in Belgium.
The official anticipates Euroclear may face a flurry of legal claims from Moscow if Russian money is transferred to Ukraine. The claims are due to come from the Russian Central Bank, which can seize €33 billion in Euroclear funds held in the national securities depository in Moscow as a tit-for-tat move, according to the official.
Russia may also take legal action to seize Euroclear assets held in Hong Kong and Dubai.
Western banks that have lost investment funds in Russia could also sue the clearinghouse, potentially leading to Euroclear’s bankruptcy and triggering a domino effect, given Euroclear’s key role in global financial transactions. The EU official warned that, ultimately, the trail of counterclaims could lead to nothing short of an economic crisis.
Speaking to the Financial Times in mid-February, Lieve Mostrey, chief executive of Euroclear, warned that a G7 plan to use Russia’s frozen assets as a backstop to issue debt for Ukraine, or seize the immobilized assets altogether, could pose serious financial risks to Europe.
“When we come to a logic of seizing of assets (…) then you see the trust in the Euroclear system, the trust in the European capital markets, the trust in euro as a currency substantially affected,” she told FT.
Mostrey remarked that “the risk is a bit lower” if the West grabs profits generated by the frozen sovereign assets.
Russia has underscored it will take retaliatory measures in response to any manipulations with its financial resources illegally immobilized by the West, and that it would perceive any form of grab as “theft”. Euroclear is already facing between 50 and 100 lawsuits in Russian courts over the sanctioned assets.
Any actions with Russian frozen assets will trigger a symmetrical response, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov told Sputnik in late February, adding that a similar quantity of foreign assets have been frozen in Russia.
The Russian finance minister suggested last December that in the event of confiscation of Russian assets in Europe, Russia may tap foreign funds frozen in so-called Type “C” accounts, a special type of accounts for non-residents introduced by Russia in March 2022. One cannot withdraw money from these accounts as funds can only be used for a limited range of purposes, such as paying taxes or purchasing federal loan bonds.
According to some estimates, by mid-March 2023, up to 1 trillion rubles (€10 billion) could have been accumulated in type “C” accounts in the form of dividends and coupons paid to investors from unfriendly countries at Russia’s National Settlement Depository (NSD).
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov made it clear in early February that Russia is prepared for a decade-long legal battle over the potential seizure of its assets.
“If such decisions are made, they will be deeply illegal. They will have decades-long judicial consequences for those who make these decisions and for those who implement these decisions,” Peskov emphasized.
Russia says no to Switzerland ‘peace conference’
RT | March 13, 2024
Moscow has no intention of participating in a proposed Swiss-hosted peace conference on the Ukraine conflict, even if it is officially invited, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has stated.
The official response follows recent media reports that China and Switzerland have been pushing to get Russia invited to the talks. Last month, Switzerland announced plans to organize a peace summit “by the summer.” No specific date has been named as of yet. The list of participants has also not been revealed. However, Ukraine has indicated that Russia can only be invited if it agrees in advance to a litany of preconditions.
“This forum will be dedicated to promoting the ultimatum ‘Zelensky peace formula,’ although its Swiss organizers pretend that they are looking for a common denominator in the peace initiatives of different countries,” Zakharova said, according to a press release issued on Wednesday on the ministry’s website.
She explained that Zelensky’s plan includes a number of unrealistic terms, including the withdrawal of Russian troops to Ukraine’s 1991 borders, holding Moscow accountable and paying reparations, as well as provisions on food, nuclear safety, energy, ecology, and humanitarian problems. Kiev’s basic demands remain the same, while legitimate Russian interests are being ignored, Zakharova said.
“So, the upcoming conference is a continuation of meetings in the Copenhagen format, which initially discredited themselves, and now have reached a dead end.”
Moscow is convinced that “Switzerland can hardly serve as a platform for various peacekeeping efforts, since this presupposes a neutral status, which Bern has lost,” the spokeswoman claimed.
“All this makes Russia’s participation in the aforementioned ‘peace conference’ pointless as it doesn’t matter whether it will be held in one, two or five stages – its ultimatum essence, promoted by Kiev and its masters, does not change from this,” Zakharova concluded.
Ukraine’s Western backers insist that a peace settlement can only be achieved on Kiev’s terms and have vowed to continue weapons deliveries for “as long as it takes.” Russia, meanwhile, has stressed that no amount of foreign aid will change the course of the conflict.
Peace negotiations between Moscow and Kiev were held in the spring of 2022, but broke down with both sides accusing each other of making unrealistic demands.
Russian President Vladimir Putin subsequently said the Ukrainian delegation had initially agreed with some of Russia’s terms during the talks in Istanbul that March, but then abruptly reneged on the deal.
The Kremlin has repeatedly stressed that it remains open to meaningful discussions and has blamed the lack of a diplomatic breakthrough on the Ukrainian authorities.
Israel killed more children in Gaza in 5 months than all global conflicts for last 4 years: UN rapporteur
MEMO | March 13, 2024
In just five months, Israel has killed more children in a strip of land the size of the US city of Philadelphia than all conflicts worldwide did in the past four years combined, said a UN special rapporteur today.
In a scathing report presented to the United Nations, Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, decried the ongoing crisis in Gaza, describing it as a systematic process tantamount to genocide.
Albanese’s report underscores the harrowing reality faced by Palestinian children under Israeli occupation, highlighting the devastating toll of the conflict.
“Destroying a population from its roots. Genocide is a process, not an act, and what is happening in Gaza is a tragedy foretold. See my report on the treatment of Palestinian children under Israeli occupation,” she wrote on X.
The report details the relentless assault on Gaza’s civilian population, particularly its children, who have borne the brunt of the violence. Albanese’s findings paint a disturbing picture of systematic targeting, indiscriminate bombings and the destruction of essential infrastructure, leaving countless families displaced and communities in ruins.
Israel has waged a deadly military offensive on the Gaza Strip since October. Over 31,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have since been killed in Gaza, and over 73,000 others injured amid mass destruction and shortages of necessities.
American-Israeli Professor: US & Allies Will Help Israel Ethnically Cleanse Palestine
By Ian DeMartino – Sputnik – 13.03.2024
There has been a growing public rift between US President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over Israel’s plan to invade the southern Gaza city of Rafah, the last designated safe area in the region.
Despite the growing public rift, Israel has nothing to fear from Biden and the United States will ultimately assist Israel in ethnically cleansing Palestine in more ways than just supplying weapons, professor, activist and anthropologist Jeff Halper told Sputnik’s Fault Lines on Tuesday.
“[Israel] is a settler colonial movement. Therefore, in order to transform Palestine into Israel, an Arab country to a Jewish country, you have to displace the population and you have to take its land. This isn’t only happening in Gaza. This is certainly happening in the West Bank as well,” Halper explained. “By destroying Gaza… it makes it impossible for the Gazans to come back. Now, Israel would like Egypt to take them and put them in the Sanai [desert], [but] Egypt says no.”
Instead, the United States and other Western countries will take the Gazans into their country. “The United States will say ‘Alright, we’ll take 50,000,’ Canada will say – Canada already said this – ‘we’ll take 30,40,50,000.’ Each European country will take a few thousand or tens of thousands, Australia, New Zealand and so on. Israel could get rid of a million or more Palestinians, with the help – the complicity – of European and North American countries, under the guise of humanitarian aid for refugees… That’s what Israel is calling ‘voluntary transfer.’”
Earlier, Co-host Jamarl Thomas asked about Egypt’s intentions, noting that satellite imagery has shown that infrastructure is being built in the Sinai desert, presumably meant to house potential Palestinian refugees.
“They’re building a camp, but not as [part of] a plan,” Halper explained. “They built the camp because they’re afraid… that if in fact, Israel does invade Rafah in the south, there isn’t really a good plan of where those people go. The combination of military pressure plus starvation is simply going to drive a million Palestinians through the border… If there [is] a massive break out of Gaza in the direction of Egypt, then Egypt is prepared for that… It isn’t for any kind of voluntary plan, it’s for that possibility.”
Israel’s ultimate plan, Halper argues, is to greatly lower the number of Palestinians in the region and then create an apartheid for the remainder.
“[Israel will] lock them into small little islands with the help of Biden, we’ll call those Bantustans a state, and now we have a two-state solution. Israel is on 85% of the country, it controls everything [and] it’s a Jewish country, but there’s a Palestinian state on a few little islands that will be recognized by the international community and now we’re done with the Palestinians and we can move on,” Halper explained. “In other words, Israel thinks it can get away with apartheid in a way South Africa couldn’t, and there’s good reason to believe that might be true.”
Rather than push for a two-state solution that is looking increasingly less likely, Halper argued that Israel should be converted “into one democratic state of equal rights for all its citizens.”
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Book Review
New paperback: Butchered by “Healthcare”
Lies are Unbekoming | October 20, 2026
Butchered by “Healthcare” is Robert Yoho’s plain-spoken account of how American medicine stopped being a profession and became an industry. 341 pages. Over a thousand references. Thirty-eight chapters.
“Screening Tests Are Useless”, on tests that find diseases that would never have hurt you. “The FDA Protects the Big Drug Companies”, on an agency funded by the companies it regulates. “The Journals’ Sins Are the Editors’ Sins”, on ghostwritten studies and captured peer review. “Opioids and ‘Pain Management’”, on how a generation was prescribed its way into addiction. “Prozac and Relatives” and “Antipsychotics Are Disastrous”, on what psychiatry does to adults and children. “Surgery: Money Before Patients”. “Failed Cancer Treatments”. “Futile CPR and Overprescribing”. “Billing Scams & Specialty Warfare”. “Hospitals Are Sharks”. Each with a Patient Tips section at the end on how to survive it.
If you have ever walked out of a doctor’s office with a prescription you didn’t ask for, or watched a parent put through a treatment that made them worse, this is the book you want on your shelf before the next appointment. … Full review
Butchered by “Healthcare” is available on Lulu now.
Blog Roll
Aletho News- Undersea Internet cables could be targeted in retaliation for attacks on Iran: IRGC deputy chief
- EU sending ‘biased’ observers to interfere in Serbian election – president
- White House envoy declares kinetic action against Yemen ‘fruitless’
- Ukraine deployed thousands of microdrones in Iraqi Kurdistan: Tasnim
- Iran calls for emergency UNSC meeting over Trump’s ‘brazen’ bomb talk, Israeli threats
- Iranian sources reveal details of Russia-China Hormuz proposal
- Plan for more US-Israel integration puts our military tech at risk
- Another Round Against Iran Will Break What Is Left of the Gulf
- SVR Report on Ukraine’s Mexican Drug Gang Links Could Pressure Zelensky, Won’t Change US Policy
- British Government Employees Were Fact-Checking the News at the BBC. Nobody Told You.
- If Americans Knew
- Israel Denies Entry to French Journalist, U.S. Researcher Amid Rise in Entry Denials
- Gaza’s hospitals are running out of life-saving fuel – Daily Update
- Mysterious bot accounts reportedly spread fake ‘man on the street’ videos for Michigan Senate candidate
- Israeli Defense Minister Katz Says Over 60 Lebanon Villages Have Been Destroyed
- Why Is Israel Running TV Ads in Iowa Ahead of the Midterms?
- Hind Rajab’s Alleged Killer Is in the United States. HRF Demands His Arrest.
- US Officials Face Fresh Pressure After Another American ‘Brutalized’ by Israeli Settlers in West Bank
- Israel-Backed Palestinian Militias Terrorize Displaced Families in Gaza
- FBI subpoenas pro-Palestine activists over Israeli weapons plant disruption
- Fourth winter arrives in wartorn Gaza, too early – Daily Update
- No Tricks Zone
- Predictions Made By Renowned Climate Proifessor Over Past Decades Have Been Proven To Be Poor
- New Study Suggests Large Regions Of The Pacific Ocean Have Been Cooling For The Last 80 Years
- Germany’s Green Energy Debacle: High Energy Costs Force Kahla Porzellan to Close After 182 Years!
- New Study: 50 Years Of The Most Aggressive ‘Net Zero’ Policies Can Only Affect The Global Climate By 0.03°C
- US September “Heat” Was No Record…Many Records Set Decades Ago
- Latest European Green Energy Debacle; Portugal’s Largest Flagship Solar Park Insolvent!
- Green Energy Debacle: German Expert Professor Fritz Vahrenholt Warns Of Severe Economic And Social Consequences
- Two More Paleo Reconstructions Affirm Meters-Higher Sea Levels Across Ireland, Brazil 7000-6000 Years Ago
- New Study: Earth And Venus Surface Warmth Largely Explained By Convection And Lapse Rate, Not CO2 Or Radiation
- 2025 Nature Paper Claiming Worsening Global Drought Gets RETRACTED …Heavily Flawed
