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Another Week in Washington to Remember

Or perhaps to forget

By Philip Giraldi • Unz Review • July 12, 2025

If one thinks that arming Ukraine against Russia or having Israeli soldiers and also American contractors slaughter Gazan civilians are not supportive of any United States actual interests, last week could easily be written off as yet another descent into Hell on the part of the United States. Americans and others should have the right to criticize how the Israelis wage war without being denounced and criminalized by governments that have been corrupted from the inside, most often by money, but that is exactly what is going on in the US and in select countries in Europe. Watching children being targeted for killing and complaining about it does not make one an anti-Semite even though the Israeli government exploits that issue precisely as a tool to avoid any consequences for its horrific behavior. Here in America, it’s past time for the White House and Congress to rid themselves of their obscene and unseemly obsession with judging overseas developments using the optics of Israel loyalty tests. There is an appreciable difference between hating Israel reflexively based on its religion and acting like a member of a cheering gallery on steroids every time Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu comes to town.

There were three major developments during the week. The first was the passage through Congress and the signing by President Donald Trump of the “big, beautiful budget bill” which establishes by law the national government’s spending projections for 2026. The fiscal year begins on October 1st. The government has long exploited alleged foreign threats to national security to boost spending to enhance America’s military power. This tendency has been largely unchallenged since 9/11, when President George W Bush announced that he and the US now represented “a new sheriff in town” and would be waging war against terrorists worldwide. In 2025 Pentagon costs were budgeted at the $895 billion level. Now, however, President Donald Trump has topped even that with his bill, adding $150 billion to the military budget for 2026, which will exceed in theory for the first time more than $1 trillion.

Interestingly, however, the reality is that the US has for some time exceeded $1 trillion due to the way the government handles its war costs through unfunded material transfers and extra expenses that are approved outside the budget process itself, combined with the fact that the Pentagon’s several components and poor money management make it impossible to be successfully audited. Based on the $895 billion National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), US national security spending for 2025 is, for example, expected to actually reach about $1.77 trillion. The difference partly derives from military-related spending from other government agencies not funded by the NDAA, such as the Department of Veterans Affairs and Homeland Security as well as from the national security share of the interest accrued on the US debt.

In September 2024 the Government Accounting Office reported that the Defense Department “remains the only major federal agency that has never been able to achieve a clean audit opinion.” And the numbers are astonishing. In fiscal year 2024, which ran from October 1st, 2023 to September 30th, 2024, the Pentagon could not account for at least 44% of its assets, nor for at least 68% of the money allocated by Congress.

The biggest addition to actual defense spending is the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, with a new front recently opened in Iran, that the US is supporting off-budget, meaning that they are being paid for “out of pocket” and the money is printed up by the Federal Reserve and is added to the government debt, where it increases through the accumulation of interest to bill and bond holders. The Federal debt is now $37 trillion and Trump’s bill is expected to add at least $3 trillion more to it. Foreign nations that have invested in the debt by buying Treasury Bills might soon figure out that it is a bad investment and will stop doing so and the dollar will plummet.

And then there is the visit to Washington, the third by Benjamin Netanyahu since Trump became president six months ago, which was memorable in its own way. Netanyahu was in America again due to the fact that he wanted something. The larger issue is to get US direct support to renew an attack on Iran and the second objective being to speed up the resupply of weapons as Israel had de facto lost the conflict with the Iranians having run through its defensive weapons. What arrangements have been made vis-à-vis Iran have not yet been completely revealed, but it has been reported that multiple transport plane loads have been making their way filled with weapons drawn from US reserve stocks that are on their way to Tel Aviv as a gift from the US to Israel. And then there was the comedy routine provided by Netanyahu proposing Trump as recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, possibly the first time when a head of a state that is openly carrying out a genocide plus mass deportations and is about to create concentration camps endorses the country leader who enables the mass murder taking place. While in Washington Netanyahu also carried out the usual sucking up to Congress and vice versa as well as the closed-door meeting with the Jewish billionaires that have so effectively corrupted the US government.

The third performance of comic opera took place over Ukraine. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth apparently halted the shipment of new weapons to Kiev as a means of disengaging from the conflict with Russia. While it is clear that the US has no interest to be fighting a proxy war with Moscow, Trump had proven unable to end the fighting on his first day in office, which he had promised pre-election. To everyone’s actual surprise, Trump did not appear to know about the decision and reversed it, exhibiting some actual confusion during a press conference over what had happened. It was reminiscent of last week’s bizarre development over the disappearance of Israeli spy Jeffrey Epstein’s “client list” possibly to avoid embarrassing Israel and also, it has been suggested, to eliminate any speculation regarding Donald Trump’s relationship with Epstein in Florida back prior to 2019. It might be reasonable to assume that the whole episode amounts to one more big lie and cover-up coming out of the clownish ensemble that constitutes the Trump cabinet.

Finally, there is one other story that I consider a pure product of the ignorance and downright stupidity that characterizes the Trump regime. The United Nations Human Rights Council has what they refer to as a Special Rapporteur and investigator over developments in Israel and Palestine, to include the Israeli occupied territories on the West Bank. Francesca Albanese, an Italian, is an experienced bureaucrat of demonstrated integrity who has focused on human rights issues. She has been under intense pressure from both the United States and Israel to forego on reporting Israel’s atrocities, particularly in Gaza, but those who have actually interacted with her claim that she has recorded developments honestly and accurately. This past week, coinciding with the Netanyahu visit, Washington decided to move against her with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announcing sanctions against her.

This is how Rubio described the case to be made to justify the sanctions: “Today I am imposing sanctions on UN Human Rights Council Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese for her illegitimate and shameful efforts to prompt [International Criminal Court] action against US and Israeli officials, companies, and executives… Albanese’s campaign of political and economic warfare against the United States and Israel will no longer be tolerated. We will always stand by our partners in their right to self-defense.”

One begins to wonder if Rubio is as totally ignorant and stupid as his boss. The US has previously called on the UN to replace Albanese and a week before the sanctions were issued a warning from Washington suggested that something was coming. “The United States once again expressed its grave concerns to UN Secretary-General António Guterres about the continued activities of Francesca Albanese … and again called upon the Secretary-General to condemn her activities and call for her removal,” the US UN mission said in a statement on July 1. The US has characteristically accused Albanese of “virulent antisemitism” for her criticism of Israel, a smear on Albanese also made by President Joe Biden’s administration after she last year produced a report accusing Israel of genocide. One might observe that in February the US also used the sanctions tool against the justices of the International Criminal Court (and their families) after the court issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and the Israel’s former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on charges of genocide.

Wish that were all, but there is one more story about what a fine place “America’s best friend and closest ally” Israel actually is. A twenty-year old Palestinian American from Tampa Florida, Seif al-Din Muslat, was visiting family in the town of Sinjil, north of Ramallah, on Friday. In town, he was confronted and beaten to death by rampaging Israeli settlers. Another Palestinian teen Mohammad Shalabi was shot dead in the same incident. The US Embassy apparently was informed of the killing by the boy’s family but as usual it will take no action and will defer to the so-called Israeli justice system to investigate. That means that the scum Settlers, largely expat Americans from places like Brooklyn, will in no way be punished and will walk free to kill more Palestinian children. There have been an increasing number of instances where Israeli settlers in the West Bank ransack Palestinian neighborhoods and towns, burning homes and vehicles and destroying crops and businesses in attacks. And they feel free to kill any Palestinian who crosses their paths or who tries to intervene. Thank you Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Trump for your loyalty to murderous Jews. It does you proud, or at least it demonstrates what you are made of!

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

July 12, 2025 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Militarism, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

EU could hand another €100bn to Ukraine – Bloomberg

RT | July 9, 2025

European Union officials are weighing a proposal to provide Ukraine with another €100 billion ($117 billion) in grants and low-interest loans, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday, citing sources familiar with the matter.

The plan involves establishing a dedicated fund within the bloc’s upcoming seven-year budget framework, the unnamed insiders told the outlet. Disbursement would begin in 2028 if the proposal is approved.

The move would further shift the financial burden onto Western European taxpayers of what Moscow has condemned as a US-triggered NATO proxy war. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in April that officials in Brussels “view possible suspension of Ukraine assistance as confirmation of the EU’s strategic inviability” and are pushing for continued funding to protect their reputation.

Ukraine’s military and defense institutions have faced a string of corruption scandals during the conflict with Russia, including overpayments for rations and shady arms procurement contracts. This week, Ukrainian outlets reported that anti-corruption investigators searched a property belonging to former Defense Minister Aleksey Reznikov. Reznikov resigned in 2023 following allegations of financial misconduct in his department.

The proposed fund is reportedly one of several avenues under consideration, with a final decision expected by July 16 or possibly later, according to Bloomberg. The report added that last month, the European Commission briefed EU finance ministers on Kiev’s intention to increase this year’s defense spending by $8.4 billion using domestic sources.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denis Shmigal said in June that defense expenditures had risen 34% year-on-year during the first five months of 2025. Meanwhile, Finance Minister Sergey Marchenko warned in May that Kiev’s national debt is nearing $171 billion, approximately equivalent to the country’s gross domestic product.

Ukraine continues to rely heavily on external financial aid to sustain its national budget. Earlier this year, the government failed to restructure a portion of its sovereign debt issued in 2015 and declined to honor a $665 million repayment to private investors in early June.

The country’s economy is also feeling the strain of a labor shortage, as millions have fled to Western nations offering them protection and social benefits. Many men of military age who remain in Ukraine have evaded conscription, which usually means avoiding formal employment and by extension, income taxes.

July 9, 2025 Posted by | Corruption, Militarism | , | Leave a comment

Russia declares Yale University ‘undesirable’

RT | July 9, 2025

Russia has banned Yale University from operating within its territory, accusing the Connecticut-based institution of meddling in domestic affairs and attempting to destabilize its economy.

The Prosecutor General’s Office added Yale to the list of “undesirable” organizations on Tuesday. “The university’s activities are aimed at violating the territorial integrity of the Russian Federation, enforcing an international blockade, undermining its economy, and destabilizing the country’s socio-economic and political situation,” the office said in a statement.

Prosecutors claim that the Maurice R. Greenberg World Fellows Program at the Yale Jackson School of Global Affairs has been used to “train opposition leaders from foreign countries.” Russian opposition figure Aleksey Navalny and his close associate Leonid Volkov participated in the program in 2010 and 2018, respectively.

Navalny died in prison in February 2024 while serving a lengthy sentence on extremism charges. In 2021, a Russian court banned Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) under extremism laws. Last month, Volkov, who lives outside Russia, was sentenced in absentia to 18 years in prison for his activities as an FBK leader.

Prosecutors alleged that FBK used “the knowledge and techniques” acquired at Yale to “escalate protest activities in Russia.” Prosecutors also claimed that Yale has worked to create a “legal framework” for using frozen Russian assets to fund the Ukrainian army. Moscow regards the freezing and seizure of its assets related to the Ukraine conflict as illegal and tantamount to theft.

Since 2022, Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, a professor at the Yale School of Management, and his team have campaigned to pressure foreign companies to cut ties with Moscow and advocated for tougher sanctions on Russia. In a 2024 Fortune article, Sonnenfeld and Steven Tian, research director of the Yale Chief Executive Leadership Institute, credited themselves with helping the US Treasury design sanctions targeting Russia’s oil trade.

July 9, 2025 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

Von der Leyen blames Russia for no-confidence motion

RT | July 8, 2025

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has dismissed efforts by members of the European Parliament to oust her, branding her critics “conspiracy theorists” and accusing them of acting on behalf of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Von der Leyen is facing a parliamentary motion of no-confidence in her presidency, which is scheduled for a vote on Thursday after being tabled by Romanian MEP Gheorghe Piperea. Addressing the parliament during a debate on Monday, von der Leyen said those backing the proposal were following “the oldest playbook of extremists” and were attempting to undermine public confidence in the EU with “false claims.”

“There is no proof that they have any answers, but there is ample proof that many are supported by our enemies and by their puppet masters in Russia or elsewhere.”

“These are movements fueled by conspiracies, from anti-vaxxers to Putin apologists. And you only have to look at some of the signatories of this motion to understand what I mean.”

In his remarks to parliament, Piperea accused the Commission of centralizing decision-making in a non-democratic fashion and of interfering in the internal affairs of member states.

Russian officials have claimed that EU leaders are using fear tactics to shield themselves from criticism. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov dubbed von der Leyen, who is German, a “fuhrer” for her efforts to push a multi-billion euro militarization program on member states. Russia maintains that unlike Western states it does not interfere with other nations’ domestic affairs.

Von der Leyen urged “all the pro-Europeans, pro-democracy forces” in the chamber to support her agenda, arguing that unity was essential to uphold the EU’s foreign policy strength.

Criticism of von der Leyen’s leadership has centered on her handling of the EU’s Covid-19 response during her first term, particularly the lack of transparency in finalizing a 2021 vaccine procurement deal with Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla. Earlier this year, the European Court of Justice found her office at fault for failing to retain text messages exchanged with Bourla and for refusing to release them to journalists with adequate justification.

Piperea is a member of Romania’s AUR party, led by George Simion, who narrowly lost a presidential runoff this year to a pro-EU candidate. The election followed a scrapped first-round vote earlier in 2024, in which outsider Calin Georgescu emerged as the frontrunner. The country’s Constitutional Court annulled the results, citing government allegations of Russian interference. Critics of the EU claim the episode reflects a broader anti-democratic trend allegedly enabled by Brussels.

July 8, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Corruption, Deception, Russophobia | , , , | Leave a comment

500 organizations funded by Brussels are operating in Hungary to counter Orbán’s government: report

Remix News | July 8, 2025

Hungary’s Office for the Protection of Sovereignty has identified 1,479 Hungarian beneficiaries that participated in projects directly funded by the European Commission.

Of these, the office is monitoring around 500 organizations that are suspected of being funded by Brussels for political activities, namely those directed at the government of Viktor Orbán, the organization said, according to Magyar Nemzet.

The office identified the Brussels “gold diggers” who received the most money from the European Commission: George Soros’ private Central European University (CEU), the Ökotárs Foundation and the Minority Right Group, for example, received billions of forints.

Meanwhile, other organizations received received hundreds of millions of forints: the Power of Humanity, the Hungarian Helsinki Committee, the Background Company, and the Hungarian Jeti Co., Ltd., which publishes 444, Political Capital, the Republikon Institute and the Menedék – Migrants Support Association

The Hungarin office began its investigation into the political lobbying network funded by the European Commission in the spring. It identified the most important Brussels funds – CERV and Horizon – through which large amounts of public money flow to organizations whose real goal is to reduce the Hungarian government’s political power internationally and domestically.

The Office for the Protection of Sovereignty was designed to expose the network of foreign-funded political pressure groups in order to give the Hungarian people a clear picture of who is trying to influence Hungarian politics and how.

It should be noted that while Hungary does fund some international organizations and think tanks, but the power and funding imbalance is astronomical.

The EU has accesses to billions of euros for such activities, on top of billions available from organizations such as the Open Society Foundation, which are all aligned against conservative governments, with Orbán a top target.

On top of that, state-funded media outlets, such as Deutsche Welle, receive close to €400 million in funding per year. The outlet routinely refers to Orbán as an “autocrat” and his government as a “regime” that is “assaulting Hungary’s democracy.”

July 8, 2025 Posted by | Corruption | , | Leave a comment

Germany’s AfD to soften stance on migrants – Bild

 RT | July 6, 2025

The Alternative for Germany (AfD) party has softened its anti-immigration rhetoric in a bid to appeal to moderate voters and prove itself capable of forming a government down the road, Bild has claimed.

Founded in 2013, the right-wing party has steadily gained in popularity amid the continuing migrant crisis in Germany. It finished second in the federal elections in February, winning 152 seats in the 630-seat Bundestag. In April, a survey by the pollster Forsa indicated that it enjoyed the support of 26% of respondents, ahead of all the other parties in Germany.

In an article on Saturday, Bild claimed to have seen a new seven-point policy paper that the AfD’s parliamentary group was expected to adopt that same day.

Conspicuously absent from the document are calls for the “remigration” of German residents with a migrant background, as well as an insistence on the “German guiding culture,” according to the outlet.

Bild claimed that the terms had specifically been axed from the party program in order to “reach more moderate voters,” and “appear capable of governing by the next federal election” in 2029. Aside from these purported changes, the AfD also reportedly intends to adopt a code of conduct for its lawmakers in the Bundestag.

The party’s interim goal is to gain ground in next year’s regional elections, Bild reported.

The media outlet claimed that the updated program calls for an end to asylum-granting to refugees at the border, tougher naturalization requirements and less social welfare for migrants.

The party also reportedly seeks to slash taxes, lift a self-imposed ban on the use of nuclear power plants, and restore the Nord Stream pipelines. The conduits, which used to carry Russian natural gas, were destroyed by a targeted underwater explosion in 2022. Berlin has since ruled out restoring them to operation.

According to Bild, the right-wingers want Germany’s foreign policy to be guided by the motto “Germany first,” which would presumably entail an end to weapons deliveries to Ukraine and the lifting of sanctions on Russia.

In a post on X on Sunday, the AfD Bundestag group revealed that its members had convened for a “closed meeting” over the weekend to set “political goals for the coming period.”

The party was declared a “confirmed right-wing extremist entity” by Germany’s domestic intelligence agency in May, only for the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) to suspend the label shortly thereafter.

July 7, 2025 Posted by | Corruption, Militarism | , | Leave a comment

HHS to ‘Revolutionize’ Vaccine Injury Compensation, RFK Jr. Tells Tucker Carlson

By Suzanne Burdick, Ph.D. | The Defender | July 1, 2025

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. sat down yesterday with Tucker Carlson to share an update on his mission to end the skyrocketing rate of autism in U.S. kids.

By the end of their nearly 90-minute conversation, the two had covered a slew of topics, including pharmaceutical ads on TV, increasing compensation for the vaccine-injured, and the need for a “truth commission” to uncover who and what caused the COVID-19 pandemic.

Carlson, who last year left FOX News after being the network’s “most popular host,” now runs “The Tucker Carlson Show.” He broke his interview with Kennedy into five “chapters”:

  1. Uncovering the Reason for Skyrocketing Rates of Autism
  2. Is It Possible to End the Corrupt Relationship Between Big Pharma and Corporate Media?
  3. Will There Be Compensation for the Vaccine-Injured?
  4. RFK’s Firing of So-Called “Experts”
  5. The Real Reason Fauci Got a Pardon

Below are highlights from each.

HHS will do honest, open research on autism and vaccines

In the past, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) failed to honestly and adequately research the possible link between vaccines and autism, Kennedy said.

The CDC ignored recommendations from the Institute of Medicine to do a “litany” of studies to get at the issue, Kennedy said, including animal models, observational studies, bench studies and epidemiological studies.

“But what we’re going to do now,” he said, “is we’re going to do all the kinds of studies that the Institute of Medicine originally recommended.”

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) in April announced a new research program to study what causes autism and why autism diagnoses are on the rise.

NIH will make data from Medicare and Medicaid available to independent scientists for analysis. Data from the Vaccine Safety Datalink — a huge repository for health records — will also be used, Kennedy said.

Raw data will be made available to the public whenever possible, Kennedy said.

“Something new that we’re bringing in is that every study will be replicated,” he added.

Big Pharma ads fail to benefit patients and doctors

Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Angus King (I-Maine) last month introduced federal legislation to end direct-to-consumer prescription drug advertising.

Kennedy didn’t reference the bill or say he supported a ban on such ads. However, he outlined several reasons why pharmaceutical marketing on mainstream media is bad for public health.

Many ads are misleading, he told Carlson. “Even the music and the video, the photos that they show … it’s sending a message that if you take this drug, you’re going to be riding jet skis and playing volleyball and water skiing and have a great-looking spouse.”

Meanwhile, the ads feature the most expensive version of the drug rather than the generic version.

“They’re not going to advertise the generics because they’re not making any money,” Kennedy said. “So they’re advertising the ones that are the highest profit margins for them.”

Plus, the U.S. taxpayer bears the brunt of the cost while the drug company profits. Kennedy explained:

“Normally, if you see an advertisement on TV like for Coca-Cola, you then have a choice to go get that and you’re paying out of your pocket for it.

“When somebody buys a pharmaceutical drug, it’s Medicaid and Medicare that are paying for it … it’s the taxpayer. … And we’re paying for the ads because they’re tax-deductible.”

When a patient sees the ad and asks a doctor for the drug, the doctor — who is told by a “corporate bean counter” to limit time with a patient to only 11 minutes — has to choose whether to use the time trying to talk the patient out of the drug, Kennedy said. But if the doctor does that, the patient likely goes away unsatisfied.

Or the doctor could just say, “All right, you want this prescription? I’ll write it for you.” Then the patient will be satisfied and come back, Kennedy said. “The doctors hate it. … And nobody thinks that this is good for public health. It is hurting us.”

Kennedy said the censorship of vaccine-related information on social media is also a problem.

The U.S. Supreme Court yesterday denied Children’s Health Defense’s (CHD) petition to hear its censorship case against Meta, the parent company of Facebook.

CHD sued Meta in August 2020 and filed an amended complaint in November 2020, alleging that government actors partnered with Facebook to censor CHD’s speech — particularly speech related to vaccines and COVID-19 — that should have been protected under the First Amendment. The company deplatformed CHD from Facebook and Instagram in August 2022 and has not reinstated the accounts.

Censorship of scientific results that are critical of vaccines is also a problem, Kennedy added.

Kennedy’s plans to expand vaccine injury compensation program

The National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986, which granted legal immunity to vaccine makers and created the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, also made it difficult for anyone injured by a vaccine to obtain compensation.

“We just brought a guy in this week who is going to be revolutionizing the [National] Vaccine Injury Compensation program,” Kennedy said.

“We’re looking at ways to enlarge the program so that COVID vaccine-injured people can be compensated … we’re looking at ways to enlarge the statute of limitations,” Kennedy told Carlson.

It’s currently limited to three years. “A lot of people don’t discover their injuries till after that,” Kennedy said.

The program has other flaws, including that it has no discovery process, no rules of evidence and historically had corrupt leadership.

“We’re going to change all that,” Kennedy said. “I’ve brought in a team this week that is starting to work on that.”

Kennedy also said HHS will use AI (artificial intelligence) to track vaccine injuries more effectively. The agency plans to use AI in other ways, too, such as speeding up drug approval processes and detecting fraud.

Why CDC vaccine advisory committee needed a clean sweep

Kennedy defended his recent move to fire all members of the CDC’s vaccine advisory panel, saying the board had become “a sock puppet for the industry that it was supposed to regulate.”

On June 11, Kennedy named eight researchers and physicians to the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), two days after removing all 17 of the previous ACIP members.

“This was a long time coming, Tucker,” Kennedy said. He gave an example to illustrate the kind of financial conflict of interest that had plagued the board for years.

Years ago, the committee approved adding a rotavirus vaccine to the childhood immunization schedule, he said.

Four of the five committee members had “direct financial interest in the rotavirus vaccine,” Kennedy said. “They were working for the companies that made the vaccine, or they were receiving grants to do clinical trials on that vaccine.”

Within a year, that specific rotavirus vaccine was linked to “disastrous” disease in kids and pulled from the market. It was replaced by a different rotavirus vaccine that then-committee member Dr. Paul Offit had helped develop.

“Then [Offit] and his business partners, Dr. Stanley Plotkin, and a couple of other people, sold that vaccine to Merck for $186 million,” Kennedy recalled.

According to Kennedy, Offit told Newsweek that he won the lottery. “It’s been said of him that he voted himself rich, so that kind of conflict was typical on that committee.”

Could a ‘truth commission’ hold Fauci accountable?

Carlson and Kennedy discussed the origins of COVID-19 and the possible reasons for Dr. Anthony Fauci’s presidential pardon.

Just before leaving office, former President Joe Biden preemptively pardoned Fauci. The pardon, retroactive to Jan. 1, 2014, addresses “any offenses” Fauci committed during this period, including in his former capacities as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, member of the White House COVID-19 Response Team and chief medical adviser to Biden.

When Carlson pressed Kennedy to comment on Fauci’s motivations for funding coronavirus research in China, Kennedy said he tried to avoid speculation.

That’s why in his book, “The Real Anthony Fauci,” he reports only what Fauci did, not Fauci’s possible motivations, he said.

Carlson said, “It sounds like Fauci is beyond the reach of the law at this point.”

Kennedy responded, “Yeah, I think generally, unless there was a truth commission, you know, which they did in South Africa. They did it in Central America after the 1980s wars there, and they were very, very helpful to those societies. I think we should probably do something like that now.”

Kennedy explained how a truth commission works:

“You have a commission that hears testimony on what exactly happened. Anybody who comes and volunteers to testify truthfully is then given immunity from prosecution. But so that at least the public knows who did what. …

“People who are called and don’t take that deal and perjure themselves, they then can be prosecuted criminally.”

This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.

July 3, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Corruption, Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science | | Leave a comment

Agent of Chaos: Lindsey Graham’s Power Depends on War

By Ekaterina Blinova – Sputnik – 30.06.2025

Hawkish Senator Lindsey Graham got President Donald Trump to strike Iran, according to the Wall Street Journal. What’s he gaining from the Middle East war?

Darling of Jewish Lobby

  • The Republican Jewish Coalition was Graham’s top donor in his 2020 re-election, giving $111,000 (OpenSecrets).
  • Over $1 million more came via RJC, according to RJC’s executive director Matt Brooks.
  • Brooks: “There is nobody more important in the US Senate” for the US-Israel partnership.
  • He raised $109 million in total.

RJC: Longtime Supporter of Graham

  • RJC leaders Larry Mizel and Sam Fox backed Graham’s 2014 re-election.
  • Fox gave $50,000 and Mizel $100,000 to his super PAC, West Main Street Values.
  • RJC board member Sheldon Adelson co-hosted a fundraiser for Graham’s 2016 presidential bid.

AIPAC is Another Backer

  • Graham major backer, billionaire Mizel, also sits on AIPAC’s board — the top pro-Israel lobby in the US.
  • Haaretz calls Mizel a key booster of pro-Israel Republicans who opens doors in Israel’s power circles for GOP politicians.

More Wars – More Defense Contractors Backing

  • Lockheed Martin gave Graham $102,000 in 2020, according to OpenSecrets
  • Boeing added $80,700 in 2024.
  • The Intercept notes most cash comes from defense-linked individual donors — like Humvee mogul Ron Perelman, who gave $500,000 to Graham’s 2016 run.

Graham’s 2026 Senate Bid at Stake

  • Graham’s hawkish Iran stance apparently ties to his 2026 ambitions – he needs big donor cash.
  • RJC backs him as “one of the strongest advocates for the US Jewish community.”
  • Defense firms will pay too—if he keeps the bombs dropping.

June 30, 2025 Posted by | Corruption, Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

Vaccine Makers Signal Fear Over Removal of Neurotoxic Injected Aluminum Ingredient

By Jefferey Jaxen | June 27, 2025

Former FDA commissioner Dr. Scott Gottlieb made his ceremonial appearance on CNBC to titrate the public well with Big Pharma talking points in the wake of this week’s ACIP meeting.

After speaking for less than one minute and forty seconds, Gottlieb used the tired, inaccurate slur ‘anti-vaxxer’ four times in a failed attempt to frame an us verse them narrative like it was 2015 again.

With the newly appointed ACIP committee vote to remove the mercury-based preservative thimerosal from the few remaining flu shots, Gottlieb wasted no time circling the wagons to protect the widespread, problematic aluminum adjuvant in several vaccines on the CDC’s childhood schedule.

His concern was that would be ACIP’s next target. And he’s probably right.

“This is a very safe ingredient” stated Gottlieb regarding the regular injection of aluminum nanoparticles into infants, children and adolescents at scale.

Zero pushback or questions from the interviewer to challenge him per usual.

How settled is the safety science of injecting aluminum in children?

The Informed Consent Action Network sent a legal letter to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in 2019 demanding any human or animal studies relied upon by these agencies to establish the safety of injected aluminum.

The agencies produced no documents nor could they located a single study showing the safety of aluminum in childhood vaccines.

Meanwhile, a 2021 study published in the Journal of Trace Elements in Medicine and Biology found that six childhood vaccines contain a statistically significant greater quantity of aluminum adjuvant than is provided for on these products’ labeling. This study promped ICAN to demand the FDA assure that vaccine manufacturers are disclosing accurate information regarding the amount of aluminum adjuvant in their childhood vaccines. The agency has since stonewalled the request.

Here’s the embarrassing, anti-scientific part Gottlieb forgets to mention.

The rationale for injecting aluminum adjuvant nanoparticles into newborns was allowed and justified by a single 2011 study, by a single FDA scientist named Dr. Robert Mitkus.

Author J.B. Handley in his book How to End the Autism Epidemic writes the following about Mitkus’ study:

What would be lost on the average layperson is that the only biological science Dr. Mitkus considered in making his safety assessment was a single study that infused (rather than injected) aluminum citrate (rather than aluminum hydroxide) into adults (rather than babies). It’s hard to put this seemingly minor detail in proper context. In no other drug on the planet (except for vaccines) would safety standards ever be determined without using the actual product (aluminum hydroxide) administered in the proper way (intramuscular injection), into the proper patient population (infants).

World-renowned researchers called out this fact in their 2018 study by stating:

“To date, aluminum adjuvants per se have, perhaps surprisingly, not been the subject of any official experimental investigation, and this being in spite of the well-established neurotoxicity of aluminum.”

Will aluminum adjuvants be ACIP’s next target? Are studies being commissioned by Jay Bhattacharya’s NIH to look at these ingredients and their well-established role in creating chronic disease in American Children? All open questions at the time of this writing.

As for Scott and his industry pals, shots across the bow appear to be signaling that it’s no longer business as usual.

Gottlieb left his position as FDA commissioner only to accept a position on the board of Pfizer in less than three months.

Gottlieb is Big Pharma’s jack-in-the-box who seems to pop up and make noise at key moments when public pressure is applied which threatens bottom line profit margins of their liability-free injectable product lines.

His corporate media residency at CNBC allows for rapid response industry talkings points to roll from his mouth at a moment’s notice whenever his handlers decide to make him dance.

Prior to the pandemic, as questions swirled about a connection between vaccines and autism, Gottleib was there. When asked by the CNBC reporter why parents claim that their children developed autism or “something on the spectrum” right around the time they received their shots, Gottlieb blamed coincidence by saying:

“Children who are gonna display symptoms of autism and other developmental disorders, those start to manifest and become self-evident right around the time kids are getting vaccinated.”

Magic. Like Fauci, Gottleib is his own version of The Science™. What he says is ordained, never questioned during interviews. A continuous appeal to authority. Why? Because Pfizer man said so.

With a little luck, revolving door riders like Gottlieb will be artifacts of a shameful past era. Where U.S. regulatory agencies continually launched their leaders into the waiting arms of the industries they regulated.

June 27, 2025 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Science and Pseudo-Science | | 1 Comment

NATO’s credibility eroding amid organized crime corruption scandals and internal fractures

By Uriel Araujo | June 20, 2025

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), heralded as the bulwark of Western security, faces a credibility crisis that mirrors the decline of the West. Corruption scandals, internal divisions, and an insatiable appetite for expansion despite unmet commitments have eroded its legitimacy, with the Ukraine crisis as a stark backdrop. As a matter of fact, NATO’s troubles reflect a faltering Western order struggling to maintain global dominance.

Since last month, a sprawling investigation into the NATO Support and Procurement Agency (NSPA) has revealed that officials sold confidential information to defense contractors, rigging multimillion-dollar arms contracts, including drones critical to Ukraine’s military efforts. The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) exposed a sophisticated network of insiders leaking sensitive data for personal gain, undermining NATO’s procurement integrity. Arrests in Belgium, the Netherlands, and Spain, with investigations in Luxembourg, Italy, and the United States, highlight the probe’s scope, which is expected to widen the more the EU agencies look at NATO’s contracts. This organized crime angle, involving illicit financial flows, remains underreported, which makes one wonder just how deep the rot goes.

The Ukraine crisis certainly amplifies these scandals’ impact. NATO’s support for Kyiv, including massive arms shipments, is tainted by corrupt practices that may have inflated costs or misdirected resources. One may recall that Ukrainian Brigadier General Volodymyr Karpenko admitted in 2022 that nearly 50% of received weaponry was lost, potentially smuggled. Europol’s Catherine De Bolle warned that same year of arms flooding Europe’s black markets. In 2024, Washington admitted failing to track $1 billion in small arms, but claimed it was due to inadequate inventories. This could be just the tip of the iceberg, as the Atlantic organization is increasingly looking like a racketeering ring.

The fact that this scandal remains underreported speaks volumes. That the CIA admittedly infiltrated media outlets, funded journalists and so on to shape narratives during the Cold War is no secret, Operation Mockingbird being just the most famous case. The late Udo Ulfkotte claimed in his 2014 book “Gekaufte Journalisten” that Western intelligence, including the CIA, would often pay journalists to push pro-NATO narratives. Suffice it to say that there’s no reason to assume such practices ceased, especially as narrative wars have intensified – not to mention that in the post-Soviet world NATO just kept on expanding. In any case, The National Endowment for Democracy and, until recently, the USAID are also known to support media globally, typically with a pro-NATO spin. Corruption and propaganda often go hand in hand. But here I digress.

Historically speaking, NATO has been no stranger to organized crime ties. Up until the nineties, Operation Gladio, a NATO clandestine program, collaborated with the Sicilian Mafia and neo-fascist terrorist groups in Europe, as confirmed by parliamentary inquiries. In post-Maidan Ukraine, NATO’s support for groups like the Azov regiment, with neo-Nazi ties, echoes this pattern. Plus, one may recall that Vladimir Zelensky has claimed that Western officials misappropriated $88.5 billion of aid sent to Kyiv. When it comes to the Western alliance, corruption schemes often go hand in hand with far-right paramilitary groups and organized crime.

Corruption is not NATO’s only problem. Many member states fail to meet the 2% GDP defense spending target; in 2024, only 23 of 32 complied, revealing a chronic lack of commitment. In fact, Trump’s rhetoric pertaining to the Alliance largely stems from this fact alone. Internal divisions further weaken the Alliance. The Greek-Turkish rivalry in the Aegean, for one thing, with territorial disputes, threatens NATO’s southeastern flank. These fissures reveal an alliance struggling to maintain unity amid divergent agendas.

NATO’s relentless expansion, despite these challenges, is its most provocative misstep. Its post-Cold War push eastward, absorbing former Soviet states, fueled tensions with Russia, culminating in the Ukraine crisis. Thus, NATO has become a destabilizing force, which provokes rather than deterrs conflict. Fueling conflicts might be good for the defence industry but it certainly does not do much for trans-Atlantic security. Moreover, the 2022 accession of Finland and Sweden, while touted as a triumph, has stretched NATO’s resources and exposed its inability to integrate new members seamlessly (not to mention the way Turkey leveraged it). It has made Europe a less safe place, for one thing.

These scandals and structural issues are emblematic of the West’s decline. The narrative of Western moral superiority is untenable when NATO, its premier security institution, is plagued by shady deals and disunity. NATO’s failure to adapt to a multipolar world, where players such as China, Russia, and even Turkey assert autonomy, further alienates the Global South. The West’s decline is not merely military or economic but a matter of legitimacy, as its institutions falter under their contradictions.

In conclusion, NATO’s corruption scandals are symptoms of a deeper malaise. They expose an alliance that, despite its grandiose ambitions, is fractured by internal divisions, weakened by unmet commitments, and compromised by systemic failures. Turkey’s ambivalence, the Greek-Turkish rivalry, and the Ukraine crisis highlight NATO’s inability to cohere, while its expansionist zeal deepens global tensions. To put it simply, NATO’s troubles reflect the West’s waning influence in a world no longer willing to accept its dominance.

Uriel Araujo, Anthropology PhD, is a social scientist specializing in ethnic and religious conflicts, with extensive research on geopolitical dynamics and cultural interactions.

June 20, 2025 Posted by | Corruption, Deception | , | Leave a comment

The rise of Abu Shabab: Mapping the Gaza militia armed by Israel

By Muhammad Shehada | The New Arab | June 10, 2025

A political earthquake hit Israel last week when former Defence Minister Avigdor Liberman revealed that “the Israeli government is giving weapons to a group of criminals and felons, identified with Islamic State [in Gaza], at the direction of the prime minister”.

Netanyahu has since admitted that Israel had been “running” proxy militias in Gaza, but tried to put a positive spin on it, claiming that such a move aims to challenge Hamas’s rule.

But branding these gangs as potential rivals to Hamas masks the very goal of why Israel created them in the first place. Around 300 untrained thieves, drug dealers, criminals, and convicted murderers cannot overpower Hamas’s estimated 30,000 militants.

Their actual role has more to do with advancing Israel’s genocide, starvation, and ethnic cleansing in Gaza while creating plausible deniability.

Furthermore, recent evidence indicates that Israel may have been collaborating with some of these Islamic State-linked elements even before 7 October.

Abu Shabab: A front for an Israeli proxy?

The most prominent gang leader in Gaza is Yasser Abu Shabab. His name first appeared in August 2024 on Hamas-linked social media groups as the figure responsible for looting the vast majority of humanitarian aid and reselling it on the black market for astronomical prices.

A senior security source told The New Arab that Abu Shabab’s gang had been active for months before then.

Local authorities knew Abu Shabab well. He was serving a long sentence in prison for the possession of large quantities of drugs, according to three knowledgeable sources. He was one of many inmates who escaped under the cover of Israel’s war on Gaza in October 2023.

Some other inmates were released on parole when Israel began bombing government facilities. Israeli newspapers like Maariv and Yediot Ahronot confirmed Abu Shabab’s criminal history through people close to him, and even added that he had links to the Islamic State (IS) through smuggling drugs from Sinai into Gaza.

Police in Gaza were perplexed when he emerged as a top gang leader. The security source told The New Arab that Abu Shabab is 35 years old, thin, weak, short (around 150cm in height), uncharismatic, illiterate, has strabismus in one eye, and has never received military training.

To them, he didn’t seem like someone with the leadership skills necessary to form a group of 300 armed militants, steal truckloads of aid, and store it under the radar.

Local authorities quickly decided that Abu Shabab was merely a front for an Israeli astroturfing campaign to maintain its policy of starvation in Gaza after the international community pressured Netanyahu to ease his total siege and allow a trickle of aid into the enclave.

What made this clear, according to them, is how Israeli drones bombed emergency committee volunteers or police officers every time they came close to thwarting a looting attempt by that gang in particular.

By late September 2024, Abu Shabab was talked about in Gaza as an Israeli-backed collaborator, not just a gang leader. That is when Hamas militants attempted to ambush him, firing around 90 bullets at a vehicle they thought belonged to Abu Shabab.

The vehicle, however, was identical to the one used by Islam Hijazi, the program officer of a US charity called Heal Palestine. She was tragically killed in the incident.

Two months later, Abu Shabab received widespread media attention after he burned a fuel truck and completely shut down the route used by aid convoys to retaliate against another Hamas ambush that killed his brother Fathi and 21 other members of his gang.

Soon after, the Washington Post revealed that the UN had named Abu Shabab in an internal memo as the main figure behind aid looting under “passive or active IDF protection”. This left little room for doubt that Abu Shabab’s gang was a tool for Israel to maintain starvation while externalising blame.

Mapping gang leaders: IS, ex-PA intel officers, and murderers

Abu Shabab’s deputy is thought to be Ghassan al-Dahini, 38, reportedly a former lieutenant in the Palestinian Authority (PA). Dahini is the one running the gang’s operations on the ground and actively trying to recruit new members, along with Saddam Abu Zakkar, per local authorities. His Facebook profile displays Israeli hostage emojis.

Another senior Palestinian security source told The New Arab that Dahini was a member of the “Army of Islam”, the extremist group responsible for kidnapping journalist Alan Johnston in 2007.

The group pledged allegiance to IS in 2015. Ghassan’s brother, Mohammed, died in prison after he was detained on drug-related offences, and Ghassan himself was imprisoned twice in March 2020 and November 2022, per the source. He added that “the Army of Islam relied on Dahini for the Sinai smuggling routes”.

On Sunday, Dahini posted a video of himself in military gear in Eastern Rafah close to Israel’s perimeter fence. He was standing next to a white pickup truck with a UAE license plate from Sharjah and firing a brand-new Serbian Zastava rifle.

Another prominent gang leader in Rafah is Shadi Soufi, a convicted murderer who was awaiting a death sentence before 7 October for killing a Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) leader. Like Yasser, he also escaped prison during the war and was named by humanitarian organisations as responsible for looting aid under Israeli protection in Rafah.

Soufi, al-Dahini, and Abu Shabab are from the same Bedouin Tarabin clan that stretches across Rafah, Israel’s Negev desert, Egypt’s Sinai, and Jordan. Abu Shabab’s family recently disowned him for collaborating with Israel and said they will go after him to hold him accountable.

Another prominent leader of the Abu Shabab gang is Essam Soliman Nabahin, 35, a convicted murderer and IS member. He was implicated in a series of bombings against Hamas in 2015 by extremist Salafist groups and escaped to Sinai to formally join IS’s ranks. He caught the attention of Egyptian media in 2017 after taking part in attacks against the Egyptian army.

Nabahin’s name resurfaced in June 2023 when the police raided a house in central Gaza where he was hiding. He killed a police officer and was convicted in a military court before his escape in the early days of the war.

Israel says Nabahin was previously “recorded launching rockets into Israel without coordination with Hamas”.

Local authorities in Gaza have long suspected that IS-linked individuals like Nabahin were being pushed by Israel’s Shin Bet to fire one or two primitive projectiles sporadically to give Israel a pretext to strike Gaza and bomb specific targets. Hence, the police detained those militants repeatedly.

A senior Palestinian security source told The New Arab that authorities in Gaza caught a collaborator in 2018 who directed such occasional rocket attacks to give Israel cover for military action in Gaza.

Other members of the gang include multiple known drug dealers and convicted murderers.

How is Israel helping them?

Israel’s government has admitted it provided weapons to these gangs, mostly rifles and other light weaponry, in addition to money and equipment. Footage posted by Abu Shabab’s gang showed them driving in white pickup trucks with machineguns on top that looked virtually identical to those of Hamas.

In addition, Israel provides these gangs with safe refuge in areas fully depopulated by the Israeli military, like Rafah, and declared “extermination zones”, where any Palestinian entering would be killed on the spot. They are also provided with logistical support, protection, and even access to Israeli territory.

A Palestinian journalist documented one case of a gang member crossing into Israel, which could explain how those gangs disappeared completely during the ceasefire last January.

On the ground, the Abu Shabab gang has established warehouses operated with forklifts where they store looted aid. They have also established a military complex, according to the UN, which said the Israeli army would force aid convoys to drive through the areas where the gangs had positioned their militants and put up checkpoints to loot trucks.

And where the Israeli military goes, so do the gangs. After Israel issued forcible expulsion orders for Khan Younis and raided the European hospital and its surrounding area, Abu Shabab moved into the ‘Jarghoun’ villa in that very same area, per security sources.

On Tuesday, Israeli news channel i24 reported that Israel had launched airstrikes to protect the gang after it was attacked by Hamas militants in southern Gaza. The strikes killed four Hamas members.

What role do the gangs play on Israel’s behalf?

The Israeli-backed gangs in Gaza have become an unofficial arm of the Israeli military. For instance, whenever Israel gets pressured to allow food into Gaza, it immediately unleashes the gangs to maintain their use of starvation as a weapon of war, while blaming it on Hamas.

Experts believe Israel is using starvation as a tool for genocide by imposing conditions on a group “calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part”. Prolonged starvation inflicts permanent mental and physical damage, particularly on children.

Israel has also been using these gangs to orchestrate chaos and engineer societal collapse through attacks on markets, shops, private businesses, homes, warehouses, soup kitchens, and other places vital to maintaining the population’s survival.

For instance, in early May 2025, a gang attacked a communal kitchen in Gaza. As soon as volunteers arrived to stop the looting, Israel bombed it and killed six volunteers, which implies it was a coordinated attack.

The Israeli army also sends the gangs on reconnaissance and surveillance missions in dangerous areas. Last month, Hamas released footage of an ambush it carried out against armed men in Rafah whom it thought were undercover Israeli troops. They turned out to be Abu Shabab militants.

Israel also uses the gangs to infiltrate Palestinian society and gather intelligence, as well as to kidnap and interrogate Palestinians by luring them with the promise of food, as documented by Palestinian journalist Younis Tirawi.

Israel is using proxy gangs for the final phase of the war

The most concerning use of these gangs, however, is Israel’s recently announced plan to push Gazans into camps in Rafah on Egypt’s borders to depopulate and destroy “everything that remains” of the rest of the enclave. This is a precursor to Israel’s declared goal of the mass expulsion of Palestinians into Egypt and other countries.

The Abu Shabab gang recently announced establishing an encampment area in eastern Rafah near the Egyptian borders and is using the very aid they have been systematically looting to lure starved Gazans into moving there.

This announcement was preceded by a clear rebranding psyop, where the same gang responsible for looting aid suddenly and shamelessly declared itself as a new “security force” that aims to “protect aid from looting”. They have since emerged in brand-new military and police uniforms in the Israeli-designated buffer zone in Rafah, where no Palestinians are allowed to enter.

Remarkably, Israel has allowed these gang members to wear Palestinian flags and insignia on their uniforms, while at the same time refusing to let the Palestinian Authority’s staff at the Rafah border crossing wear any such symbols.

In other words, Israel is using these gangs as a front. The Israeli army knows that if it orders Gazans to come to camps in eastern Rafah, people will immediately know it’s a trap for mass expulsion. But if a uniformed Palestinian force with good PR on social media makes such a demand, some people might fall for the trap.

Israel has used this same proxy tactic in Lebanon against Palestinians in 1982, where the Israeli military bolstered the South Lebanon Army (SLA) and used it and other militias to commit the Sabra and Shatila massacre, which saw 3,500 Palestinians killed.

Those collaborators collapsed after the Israeli army’s withdrawal from Southern Lebanon, as their leaders surrendered or fled to Israel. The same fate awaits these new Israeli-backed gangs once the Gaza genocide comes to an end.

Muhammad Shehada is a Palestinian writer and analyst from Gaza and the EU Affairs Manager at Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor.

Follow him on Twitter: @muhammadshehad2

June 17, 2025 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Ritter’s Rant Ep. 5: Grossi’s got to go

The IAEA’s incestuous relationship with Israel has destroyed its credibility

Scott Ritter | June 16, 2025

June 17, 2025 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Video | , , , | Leave a comment

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