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NATO-backed network of Syria dirty war propagandists identified

Defaming journalism on the OPCW’s Syria cover-up scandal, The Guardian and its NATO-funded sources out themselves as the real “network of conspiracy theorists.”
By Aaron Maté | August 1, 2022

On June 10th, The Guardian’s Mark Townsend published an article headlined “Russia-backed network of Syria conspiracy theorists identified.” (“Russia-backed” has since been removed).

The article is based on what Townsend calls a “new analysis” that “reveals” a “network more than two dozen conspiracy theorists, frequently backed by a coordinated Russian campaign.” This network, Townsend claims, is “focused on the denial or distortion of facts about the Syrian regime’s use of chemical weapons and on attacking the findings of the world’s foremost chemical weapons watchdog,” the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). According to Townsend, I am named “as the most prolific spreader of disinformation” among the nefarious bunch.

In hawking this purported exposé of “disinformation”, Townsend violated every basic standard of journalism. He did not contact me before publishing his allegations; fails to offer a shred of evidence for them; and does not cite a single example of my alleged “prolific” disinformation. Instead, Townsend bases his claims entirely on a think-tank report  that also provides no evidence, nor even assert that I have said anything false. In the process, Townsend failed to disclose that the report’s authors — the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD) and the Syria Campaign — are groups funded by the US government and other belligerents in the Syria proxy war. To top it off, Townsend fabricates additional allegations that his state-funded sources do not even make.

As a result, Townsend and the Guardian have engaged in the exact sort of conduct that they falsely impute to me and others: spreading Syria-related disinformation with coordinated support from state-funded actors. The aim of this propaganda network is transparent: defaming journalism that exposes the OPCW’s ongoing Syria cover-up scandal and the dirty war waged by Western powers on Syria.

The OPCW cover-up is arguably the most copiously documented pro-war deception since the US-led drive to invade Iraq. In Western media, as The Guardian’s behavior newly demonstrates, it is also without question the most suppressed.

At the center of the story are two veteran OPCW scientists, Dr. Brendan Whelan and Ian Henderson. The pair were among a team that deployed to Syria in April 2018 to investigate an alleged chemical attack in the town of Douma. They have since accused senior OPCW officials of manipulating the Douma probe to reach a conclusion that baselessly implicated the Syrian government in a chlorine gas attack. Their claims are backed up by a trove of leaked documents and emails that show extensive doctoring and censoring of the Douma team’s findings.

The Douma cover-up extends far beyond the OPCW’s executive suite. It also implicates NATO governments led by the US, which bombed Syria over the Douma chemical weapons allegation, and then, weeks later, privately pressured the OPCW to validate it. Since the OPCW scandal became public, the US and its allies have thwarted efforts to address it.

At the most criminal level, the scandal implicates sectarian death squads armed and funded by the US and allies during their decade-long campaign for regime change in Syria.

At the time of the incident, Douma was occupied by the Saudi-backed jihadi militia Jaysh-al-Islam and under bombardment from Syrian army forces attempting to retake control. Shortly before their surrender, local allies of Jaysh-al-Islam accused Syrian forces of using chemical weapons. They released gruesome footage of an apartment building filled with slain civilians. A gas cylinder was filmed positioned above a crater on the roof. Concurrently, the White Helmets, a NATO and Gulf state-funded, insurgent-adjacent organization, released footage of what it claimed were gas attack victims in a Douma field hospital. Several journalists, including Riam Dalati of the BBC, Robert Fisk of the Independent, and James Harkin of the Intercept, found evidence that the hospital scene was staged. (In February 2019, Dalati claimed that he can “prove without a doubt that the Douma Hospital scene was staged.” Oddly, more than three years later, he has not released his findings).

The White Helmets’ alleged fakery of a chemical attack aftermath, coupled with the censored OPCW findings showing no evidence that a chemical attack occurred, suggest the inescapable conclusion that insurgents in Douma carried out a deception to frame the Syrian government. And given the unexplained deaths of the more than 40 victims filmed in the Douma apartment building, that deception may have entailed a murderous war crime.

Unlike the Iraq WMD hoax, the very existence of the OPCW’s Douma scandal is unknown to much of the Western world. With few exceptions, establishment media outlets have refused to acknowledge the OPCW whistleblowers and the leaks that brought their story to light.

After largely ignoring the OPCW cover-up since it first surfaced in May 2019, the Guardian has now published defamatory claims about journalists, myself included, who have dared to report on the censored facts.

When I wrote The Guardian about the Townsend article’s journalistic lapses, I did not get a response. One week later, I phoned Townsend, who was now back in the office but had yet to reply. In our conservation, which I recorded and recently published, I repeatedly asked Townsend to substantiate his claims about me and identify even a single example of my alleged disinformation.

Townsend did not attempt to defend his article’s assertions, beyond claiming that they were based on what was “in a report.” When I pressed further, he claimed that he had to “dash for a meeting” and promised that I would soon hear from the paper’s reader’s editor. (Before I published our phone call, and this article, I emailed Townsend a detailed list of questions and invited him to offer any additional comment. He did not respond).

“Deadly Disinformation”

Townsend could not provide any evidence for his assertions because the report that he parroted offers none as well.

The report, titled “Deadly Disinformation” and authored by The Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD) and the Syria Campaign, contains bare references to my reporting and makes no effort to refute it. Nowhere does the report even claim that I have said anything false. It simply claims to have “identified 28 individuals, outlets and organisations who have spread disinformation about the Syrian conflict,” and that I am “the most prolific spreader of disinformation” among them.

When the report bothers to mention of anything that I have actually said, it engages in distortion. In its first mention, the report states that I wrote an article that “attacks Bellingcat for its contributions to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).” Here, they not only fail to assert that I said anything false, but offer a false portrayal of what happened.

As for “attacking” Bellingcat — a website that, like the report’s authors, is funded by NATO states that were belligerents in the Syria dirty war – what I really did was expose its disinformation.

In this case, Bellingcat fraudulently attacked Whelan (the key OPCW whistleblower), along with several journalists (myself included) by falsely accusing us of concealing an OPCW letter that, I quickly revealed, did not in fact exist. Bellingcat was forced to add a correction, delete embarrassing tweets, and apologize to one of the article’s targets, the journalist Peter Hitchens (who resides in the UK, home to strict libel laws). I later exposed that Bellingcat copied a hidden, external author for some of their false material.

In short, the ISD/Syria Campaign’s first purported example of my alleged “disinformation” is an easily verifiable case where I’ve exposed state-backed lies.

The report’s only other substantive example comes when it notes that I have argued that the OPCW probe’s Douma probe “was flawed.” This far understates my case: the OPCW’s Douma investigation wasn’t “flawed”; it’s a scandalous cover-up worthy of global attention. Regardless, yet again, the report does not even assert that my argument is false, let alone try to explain why.

In a July 13th email, I asked the ISD to substantiate their claim that I have spread disinformation, and provide even one example of it. On its website, the ISD claims to “take complaints seriously,” and promises a response “within ten working days.” As of this writing, after 13 working days, I have not heard back.

At The Guardian, OPCW leaks are “problematic”

When I emailed a complaint about Townsend’s reporting, The Guardian admitted fault only on failing to contact me before publishing his evidence-free allegations. This was the result, they claimed, of a “breakdown of communication internally.” I was then offered the chance to respond to the article in 200 words.

A key point in my reply (which can be read here) was that The Guardian and its state-funded source is unable to identify any falsehoods in anything I’ve written “because my reporting on the OPCW’s Douma cover-up scandal is based on damning OPCW leaks.” These leaks, I added, “reveal that veteran inspectors found no evidence of a chemical attack in Douma, and that expert toxicologists ruled out chlorine gas as the victims’ cause of death. But these findings were doctored and censored by senior OPCW officials.”

At The Guardian, this passage set off an apparent alarm. After disparaging my reporting on the OPCW leaks, The Guardian informed me that they would now prevent me from even mentioning them. In a July 8 email, a Guardian editor wrote that the “the part about the OPCW” in my reply “continues to be problematic.” My reference to the OPCW leaks, the editor claimed, “makes an assertion that has been rebutted by an independent inquiry.”

I responded by asking the editor to specify exactly which “assertion” of mine has been rebutted. I also proposed that, if they believe that I have said anything “problematic,” they publish their own rebuttal.

In multiple follow-up emails, the editor failed to identify any “rebutted” assertion of mine. Despite that, the Guardian proceeded to publish my reply without its reference to the OPCW leaks. But this raised a new problem: in censoring my statement, they misquoted me. When I pointed out that error, they updated my reply to finally allow a (minimal) mention of the OPCW leaks.

The Guardian also took me up on my proposal that they publish their own rebuttal:

Editor’s note: Both the ISD and the Syria Campaign list a diverse range of funders and describe themselves as “fiercely independent”. In 2020 the OPCW rebutted claims about its investigation into the Douma incident (Inquiry strikes blow to Russian denials of Syria chemical attack).

As for the “inquiry” that The Guardian claims “rebutted claims about its investigation into the Douma incident,” the inquiry was not independent, and did not rebut anything.

The “inquiry” was appointed by the OPCW’s Director General’s office, the very body that presided over the cover-up. It was also staffed by two “investigators” from the US and UK. These happen to be the two states that bombed Syria based on the Douma allegations that the OPCW fraudulently validated, and that have since tried to bury the scandal at every stage.

Accordingly, the OPCW “inquiry” avoided the allegations of censorship in the Douma probe and instead disingenuously minimized the whistleblowers’ role. The whistleblowers themselves have rebutted the inquiry’s claims about them, as have I in subsequent reporting.

A network of NATO disinformation

As for what the Guardian calls the ISD and Syria Campaign’s “diverse range of funders,” both groups indeed enjoy a diverse range of funders: everyone from NATO governments to NATO government-funded organizations. They also receive support from billionaire-funded foundations that often work in concert with these same NATO governments’ foreign policy objectives.

The Institute for Strategic Dialogue’s “diverse range of funders,” according to The Guardian.

The ISD’s “diverse” funders include the US State Department, the US Department of Homeland Security, three other US state-funded organizations, and more than two dozen other NATO government agencies. On the private side, the ISD’s funders include the foundations of three of the world’s richest oligarchs: Pierre Omidyar’s Omidyar Group, George Soros’ Open Society Foundations, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

In using the ISD as a source, The Guardian has a conflict of interest that its article did not disclose. The latter two ISD donors have also given sizeable grants to The Guardian: at least $625,000 from Open Society Foundations since 2019, and at least $12.9 million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation since 2011.

Omidyar’s foundation has a direct role in the ISD/Syria Campaign report. The Omidyar Group’s Luminate Strategic Initiatives is listed alongside the German government-funded Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung foundation as the report’s fiscal sponsor.

Omidyar’s sponsorship of an attack on journalism about the OPCW scandal is highly fitting. The Intercept, the self-described “fearless and adversarial” outlet that Omidyar also funds with his vast fortune, has never once acknowledged the OPCW leaks or whistleblowers’ existence. While ignoring the OPCW scandal for more than three years, The Intercept has published multiple articles promoting the allegation that Syria committed a chemical attack in Douma.

Like the ISD, the Syria Campaign is also funded by governments and other belligerents in the Syria dirty war. As The Grayzone’s Max Blumenthal reported in 2017, the Syria Campaign was founded by Ayman Asfari, a Syrian-British billionaire oil tycoon and leading financial supporter of the Syrian National Coalition, the largest government-in-exile group established after the Syria conflict erupted in 2011. The Syria Campaign has also done extensive P.R. and fundraising for the White Helmets, the insurgent-adjacent, NATO state-funded organization implicated in the Douma incident.

That these two state-funded groups “describe themselves as ‘fiercely independent'” is apparently enough for The Guardian. I trust that the Guardian would feel differently if they were dealing with self-described “fiercely independent” groups funded by the Russian and Syrian governments.

Unsurprisingly, the vast majority of sources quoted in the ISD/Syria Campaign report are funded or employed by the same NATO state and private sponsors. This includes the White Helmets; the Global Public Policy Institute; Syrian American Medical Society (SAMS); self-described journalist Chloe Hadjimatheou of the BBC, who produced a podcast series that disparaged the OPCW whistleblowers and whitewashed the Douma cover-up; and James Jeffrey, the former US Special Envoy for Syria.

For a report that claims to be concerned with protecting Syrians from “real-world harm,” Jeffrey is a particularly interesting interview subject. Few US officials have been as candid about their willingness to immiserate Syrian civilians in pursuit of hegemonic US goals in their country.

Jeffrey has declared that al-Qaeda is a US “asset” in Syria, and has admitted to misleading the Trump White House to undermine an effort to withdraw the US military, whose illegal occupation deliberately deprives Syria of its own wheat and fuel. Jeffrey has openly bragged about his “effective strategy” to ensure “no reconstruction assistance” in Syria — even though the war-ravaged country is “desperate for it.” And he has also taken credit for helping to impose crippling US sanctions on Syria that have “crushed the country’s economy.”

Jeffrey’s proudly self-acknowledged real-world harms on millions of Syrians don’t seem to bother the study’s authors, presumably because their Western state sponsors implement them.

The report is so invested in its state funders’ aims in Syria that it approvingly airs frustration that other governments are failing to toe the NATO line. A “former Western diplomat” complains that “disinformation” on Syria is helping states “avoid making the decisions that we want them to make, say in the Security Council or elsewhere.” (emphasis added). From the point of view of Western officials, the anonymous diplomat is employing an accurate operative definition of what constitutes “disinformation”: any information that causes those deemed subordinate to “avoid making the decisions that we want them to make.”

Fittingly, another anonymous “senior diplomat” laments that supposed Syria disinformation is intended “ultimately to cast doubt upon the legitimacy and integrity of the people doing this kind of [policy] work.” Daring to question the “legitimacy and integrity” of Western policymakers who oversaw a multi-billion dollar CIA-led dirty war on Syria that knowingly empowered al-Qaeda and other sectarian death squads while leaving hundreds of thousands dead — another intolerable act that can only result from “disinformation.”

A member of the US-funded, insurgent-adjacent White Helmets is also given space to lament that alleged “disinformation” is hurting its donations. “We hear about billions of dollars for aid at conferences on Syria but most of that funding goes to the UN,” a White Helmets manager complains. Unmentioned is that European governments have cut funding to the group after their late founder, the lavishly paid UK military veteran James le Mesurier, admitted to pocketing donor funds and financial fraud right before he took his own life.

Having promoted the hegemonic agenda of its state sponsors, the report closes with a thinly veiled call to censor the dissenting voices it targets.

The ISD and Syria Campaign urge policymakers to “adopt a whole-of-government approach in tackling disinformation” and “ensure that loopholes or special privileges are not created for ‘media’ which would only exacerbate the spread of disinformation.” These “privileges” presumably refer to free speech. The report also notes favorably that platforms have addressed “thematic harms such as public health disinformation or foreign interference in elections.” As a result, the report calls on these platforms to “commit to applying similar levels of resourcing… in the context of the ongoing Syrian conflict.” Perhaps they have in mind the censorship of journalism about Hunter Biden’s laptop before the 2020 election, on the fake grounds that the story was “Russian disinformation.”

The fact that this network of state-funded actors is devoting energy to disparaging journalism about the OPCW’s Syria cover-up — and even advocating that it be censored – reflects their powerful sponsors’ desperation to bury a damning scandal.

In public, OPCW Director General Fernando Arias has provided misleading and outright false answers about the Douma probe, including why he refuses to meet with the dissenting inspectors and the rest of the original investigative team.

On top of the two known whistleblowers, Arias has ignored calls for accountability from his original predecessor, founding OPCW chief Jose Bustani, as well as four other former senior OPCW officials. Along with Bustani, former senior UN official Hans von Sponeck has spearheaded the Berlin Group 21, a global initiative to address the OPCW scandal. The US has responded to Bustani by blocking his testimony at the United Nations. Arias meanwhile refused to open a letter that he received from Sponeck’s group, returning it back to sender.

The response of Western media outlets like the Guardian to the stonewalling of these veteran diplomats and senior OPCW officials has simply been to ignore it.

In whitewashing the OPCW cover-up, the preponderance of state sources parroted by The Guardian reveals the ultimate irony in its allegations. While claiming to “identify” a fictional network of Russia-backed disinformation actors about Syria, The Guardian’s Townsend is himself spreading the disinformation of a NATO-funded network that defames voices who expose the dirty war on Syria.

In fact, one of Townsend’s central allegations goes well beyond his state-funded sources. Although Townsend’s article is premised on identifying a “network of conspiracy theorists,” Townsend’s sole source – the ISD/Syria Campaign report – never alleges that such a “network” exists. Nowhere in the report does the word “network” even appear.

Thus, Townsend has not only parroted state-funded sources, but concocted an additional allegation in the service of their narrative. This is not just an ordinary fabrication: in creating the fantasy of a “coordinated”, “Russia-backed”, “network of conspiracy theorists,” Townsend also reveals himself to be the very thing that he accuses his targets of being: a conspiracy theorist.

And given that Townsend not only parrots his state-backed sources but works for an outlet funded by some of the same sponsors, it is fair to say that The Guardian and these state-funded think tanks are a part of the same network.

Consequently, reading the article’s headline — “Network of Syria conspiracy theorists identified”—as a description of The Guardian and the NATO-funded sources that it relied on, the claim is no longer inaccurate.

August 2, 2022 Posted by | Deception, Fake News, False Flag Terrorism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia | , , , , | Leave a comment

Israel demands disbanding of UN committee investigating attacks on Gaza

MEMO | August 1, 2022

Israel demanded on Sunday the disbanding of the UN committee investigating crimes committed during the occupation state’s military offensive against Gaza in May last year. It is alleged that remarks made by one member of the committee were “anti-Semitic”.

Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid made the demand in a letter to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, in which he referred to the statements by Miloon Kothari, a member of the UN Human Rights Council’s Commission of Inquiry, in a media interview.

“We are very disheartened by the social media that is controlled largely by, whether it is the Jewish lobby or specific NGOs,” Kothari said on a Mondoweiss podcast on 25 July. “A lot of money is being thrown into trying to discredit us.”

Israel boycotted the investigation and prevented the commission’s investigators from entering the apartheid state. It claimed that the commission’s partial findings in June were “the latest in a series of biased reports.”

In his letter to Guterres, Lapid claimed that, “The fight against anti-Semitism cannot be waged with words alone, it requires action. This is the time for action; it is time to disband the Commission. This Commission does not just endorse antisemitism — it fuels it.”

The UN spokesman did not respond immediately to requests for comment, but Mondoweiss published a message from the committee’s chair, Navi Pillay, in which she said that Kothari’s comments were intentionally taken out of context.

The US and other Western countries, including Germany, Britain and Austria, denounced — very predictably — Kothari’s comments as “anti-Semitic”.

The US representative to the UN Human Rights Council, Ambassador Michele Taylor, tweeted, “We are outraged by recent anti-Semitic, anti-Israel comments made by a member of the Israel COI. These unacceptable remarks sadly exacerbate our deep concerns about the open-ended nature & overly broad scope of the COI and the HRC’s disproportionate & biased treatment of Israel.”

Although the commission was set up to investigate the Israeli attack on Gaza, which lasted 11 days in May last year, its mandate includes human rights violations before and after that, in addition to investigating the root causes of the tension.

At least 250 Palestinians as well as 13 people in Israel were killed during the Israeli aggression, which saw severe Israeli attacks and raids that exacerbated the destruction caused by the 2014 military offensive. Palestinian factions in the Gaza Strip fired several thousand rockets in response to Israel’s ongoing brutal military occupation and siege.

August 1, 2022 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

New Democratic Party lawmaker Brian Masse says Canada’s vaccine passport is about tracking, not health

By Ken Macon | Reclaim The Net | July 30, 2022

New Democratic Party member of parliament Brian Masse said that ArriveCAN, which is mandatory for entry into Canada, is not about safety, it is about tracking. Despite pushback from the opposition, the public, and industry experts, the Liberal Trudeau government insists on the continued use of the app.

“I always fight for safety 1st, ArriveCAN is not that. It’s being used as a back door to permanently track all border crossing,” Masse wrote on Twitter.

“MPs need to speak up now or it will destroy our tourism industry, frustrate & create longer line ups when the technology fails.”

Speaking to the Windsor Star, Masse said he had been urging the government to remove the requirement for about a month. He argued that the app delays traffic and does not improve public safety because testing results can be input 72 hours before arrival, which is enough time for someone to get infected.

He further argued that the app is outdated because it only covers the first two doses; it does not cover the boosters.

Masse also said that the app is harming Canada’s tourism.

“Branding is now becoming an issue,” said Masse. “All border MPs know this. We are basically watching the destruction of our tourism industry…People are just going to stay away.”

Despite all these concerns, the government insists on the continued use of the app, saying that the pandemic is not over.

The government also recently announced that the app can be used for customs and immigration declarations, leading to speculations that ArriveCAN might become permanent.

July 30, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , | Leave a comment

US judge throws out malicious anti-Semitism claim against university professor

MEMO | July 29, 2022

In a victory for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel, a US judge has thrown out bogus anti-Semitism claims against a professor at Pittsburgh university in a lawsuit based on the highly controversial International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of anti-Jewish racism.

Pro-Israel groups have been advocating IHRA’s adoption for several years saying that the non-binding definition will not stifle free speech on Israel. Critics, however, have consistently warned that not only will the IHRA have a chilling effect on free speech, but it will also give ammunition to radicalised Zionist groups to pursue malicious lawsuits against critics of the Apartheid State.

Robert Ross, who teaches literary arts and social justice studies at Point Park University appears to have been the victim of such spurious and malicious lawsuits which are designed to intimidate critics of Israel as much as to instil fear in anyone advocating for Palestinian rights.

The lawsuit against Ross was filed in 2019 by Channa Newman, a professor at the university. Newman claimed that she was a target of anti-Semitism due to her Zionist beliefs. According to the Electronic Intifada, Newman’s lawsuit alleged Ross used his position to foster “a militant version” of the BDS movement and “hateful views against Israel” that “are anti-Semitic.”

Newman, who made her case using the US State Department’s definition of anti-Semitism which has very similar wording to the IHRA, further alleged that the political views of Ross, and those of his students, led to a hostile work environment for her. As is the case with the IHRA, the State Department definition includes claims that it is anti-Semitic to say Israel’s foundation was a “racist endeavour” or to apply “double standards” to Israel by requiring from it “behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.”

In his ruling, the judge asserted that if the court accepted Newman’s allegations, it would “invalidate” on its face and on civil rights grounds “an entire academic and public debate” and that it would give Newman “a veto over others engaging in that same debate.” The judge further added that Newman was effectively seeking to “compel” the speech and views of others to be consistent with hers.

“I am relieved and thrilled,” Ross told the Electronic Intifada. “The judge took the time to articulate why he’s not granting this work environment claim and that there’s nothing inherently hostile with [advocating for] BDS. In these times, we’ll take what we can get. I think it’s a victory,” he explained.

“The judge, to me, made it clear that there’s nothing legally wrong with teaching BDS, participating in BDS, or advocating for it,” Ross added. The dismissal of the hostile work environment claims, Ross added, “should be empowering, it should be a green light for other folks to engage in this movement.”

July 29, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , , , | Leave a comment

EU goes from ‘Je suis Charlie’ to upholding ban on Russian state media

By Ramin Mazaheri | Press TV | July 29, 2022

Paris – The censorship of Russian media outlet, Russia Today, in Europe has been widely denounced as hypocritical. Despite that, the European Union’s General Court has denied an appeal by Russia’s RT France to uphold liberty of the press for all nations. Ramin Mazaheri reports from Paris.

In a major blow to freedom of the press, European Union’s second highest court has upheld the ban on Russian media outlet RT France for alleged “disinformation”.

Launched in 2017 with a €20 million budget and well over 100 employees, RT France burst on the scene with reporting that the billionaire-dominated French mainstream media refused to touch. Their coverage of the Yellow Vest social revolt won widespread praise, and – like PressTV – they rejected the total Western media blackout on the movement which began in June 2019.

It was no surprise that President Emmanuel Macron was the first leader to call for a Europe-wide ban on Russian state media. The French government then orchestrated the rapid implementation of the ban – less than a week after Russia started its military operation in Ukraine.

The fact that freedom of the press is granted to far-right media such as the Islamophobic Charlie Hebdo magazine but denied to the Russian people has already left its impression: the citizens of France and Europe have not been allowed to hear both sides of the long-running conflict in Ukraine.

This one-sided media domination has allowed European elite to whip up Russophobia and war hysteria unopposed, and provided them with the opportunity to impose unprecedented economic and diplomatic pressure on Moscow.

Upon relinquishing the EU’s rotating presidency in June, Macron was criticized for saying that the Ukraine war ‘accelerated’ the bloc’s collective agenda. Many said the EU was, once again, not relying on democratic means to achieve political ends.

A final appeal by RT France to the European Court of Justice is expected to fail as well.

In 2012, on the orders of the European Commission, Press TV was removed by top European satellite provider Eutelsat. Last year the Presstv.com domain was seized and shut down by the United States federal government.

July 29, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

Twitter accounts suspended for “COVID-19 misinformation” have increased over 70%

By Tom Parker | Reclaim The Net | July 28, 2022

Twitter suspended a record 4,466 accounts for violating its “COVID-19 misinformation” rules in H1 2022, according to the latest stats in its COVID-19 Misinformation Transparency Report. This represents a more than 70% increase from its previous record of suspending 2,614 accounts for violating the COVID-19 misinformation rules in H2 2021.

The report also revealed that Twitter removed 13,803 pieces of content and challenged (forced the account owner to verify their account with an email or phone number) 7,025 accounts for violating its COVID-19 misinformation rules in H2 2021.

One of the most controversial aspects of Twitter’s far-reaching COVID-19 misinformation rules is that users who repeatedly claim that vaccinated people can spread COVID-19 can be banned from the platform.

When Twitter introduced this rule, even the CDC was admitting that vaccinated people can become infected and “have the potential to spread the virus to others.” More recently, former White House COVID response coordinator Dr. Deborah Birx admitted during congressional testimony that the US government’s claim that the vaccinated can’t spread the virus was based on “hope” and acknowledged during a recent interview that she “knew” the vaccines do not protect against infection and that the US government “overplayed them.”

Despite these admissions and acknowledgments, this rule that bans users from saying vaccinated people can spread the virus is still in place.

Other claims that are banned under Twitter’s COVID-19 misinformation rules include “claims contrary to health authorities” that Twitter deems to “misrepresent research or statistical findings pertaining to the severity of the disease, prevalence of the virus, or effectiveness of widely accepted preventative measures, treatments, or vaccines” and claims that the vaccines are part of a “global surveillance” effort.

Twitter hasn’t published its censorship stats for July but several high-profile COVID commentators, including British consultant surgeon Tony Hinton and epidemiologist Andrew Bostom, have already been banned from the platform this month.

July 28, 2022 Posted by | Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , | Leave a comment

US Should Not Fund Ukrainian ‘Blacklist’

Consortium News | July 27, 2022

Scott Ritter was among those blacklisted by a Ukrainian government agency that appears to be funded by the United States. Ritter has written the following letter to his representatives in Congress.

Senator Charles Schumer

Leo W. O’Brien Federal Office Building

11A Clinton Avenue, Room 827

Albany, NY 12207

Senator Christine Gillibrand

Leo W. O’Brien Federal Office Building

11A Clinton Avenue, Room 821

Albany, NY 12207

Representative Paul Tonko

19 Dove Street, Unit 302

Albany, NY 12210

July 27, 2022

Dear Senators Schumer and Gillibrand, and Congressman Tonko,

My name is Scott Ritter. I am a New York State resident, currently residing in the Town of Bethlehem, in Albany County. My family and I have lived at our current address since July 2000.

I am writing to you in your collective role as my elected representatives in the United States Congress, specifically regarding H.R. 7691, the Additional Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2022, which became Public Law 117-128 on May 21, 2022, which each of you voted in favor of.

I draw your attention to the First Amendment of the United States Constitution, specifically the following language: “Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.”

By enacting Public Law 117-128, you appear to have abrogated your Constitutional responsibilities in so far as you may have, in fact, made a law which both abridges the freedom of speech and a free press by enabling the Government of Ukraine, through the use of US taxpayer dollars appropriated under Public Law 117-128, to publish a “blacklist” singling out US citizens as “Russian propagandists” for exercising their Constitutional rights pertaining to free speech and a free press.

The “blacklist” in question was published on July 14, 2022, by the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation, and consists of a list of politicians, academics, and activists who the Center claims promote “Russian propaganda.” Many on this list are citizens of the United States, some of whom, like me, have taken an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States.

While the specific criterion used by the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation for selecting persons for inclusion on this “blacklist” is not known, in my case the Ukrainian government appears to have taken umbrage against my articulation of Ukraine as a NATO base of operations, my analysis of the Bucha Massacre in early March which assigns responsibility to Ukrainian security services, and my description of the current Ukraine-Russian conflict as a “proxy conflict” being waged on behalf of the United States.

Whether one agrees with my positions on these and other matters pertaining to Ukraine is not the point; by articulating my views, I am exercising my rights under the Constitution of the United States. While the Government of Ukraine is free to express its opinions regarding my viewpoints as it sees fit, the Government of the United States, by using funds appropriated by the United States Congress, should not facilitate the actions of the Government of Ukraine in this regard.

I draw your attention to Section 507(a) of Public Law 117-128, which directs that “[f]unds made available by this title under the heading Economic Support Fund may be made available for direct financial support for the Government of Ukraine.”

Public Law 117-128 makes available $8,766,000,000 for assistance for Ukraine under the heading “Economic Support Fund.”

On July 12, 2022, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) issued a press release in which it announced that $1.7 billion in direct budgetary aid was provided to Ukraine under Public Law 117-128, which allowed the Government of Ukraine, among other things, to pay the salaries of Ukrainian civil servants. This would logically include the salaries of the employees of the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation.

As a constituent whose name has appeared on a so-called “blacklist” published by the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation, my personal and professional life has been, and continues to be, detrimentally impacted by the chilling effect of being labeled a “Russian propagandist” for simply exercising the right to free speech guaranteed by the United States Constitution. Moreover, Ukraine has a history of converting “blacklists” of this nature into “kill lists”, where those who speak out against the policies of the Ukrainian government are being murdered or threatened with violence. I am certain you agree with me that Congress cannot be in a position where, through its actions, foreign governments are provided the means to intimidate citizens of the United States from exercising their Constitutionally protected rights regarding free speech.

As such, I respectfully request that each of you investigate what role, if any, funds authorized by you under Public Law 117-128, have been used to underwrite the actions of the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation, and more specifically, if any funds appropriated under Public Law 117-128 have been used to pay the salaries of Ukrainian civil servants employed by the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation involved in the preparation and dissemination of this so-called “blacklist”.

Under Section 507(d) of Public Law 117-128, Congress directs that “[t]he Secretary of State or the Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development, as appropriate, shall report to the appropriate congressional committees on the uses of any funds provided for direct financial support to the Government of Ukraine pursuant to subsection (a) and the results achieved, not later than 90 days after the date of enactment of this Act and every 90 days thereafter until September 30, 2025,” and that such a report “shall also include the metrics established to measure such results.”

I request that each of you become personally involved in preparing the appropriate questions to be asked of either the Secretary of State or the Administrator of USAID when they next appear before Congress to carry out their mandated reports regarding the use of funds provided for the direct financial support of the Government of Ukraine. The specific metric of interest here is whether any of these funds were used to pay the salaries of civil servants employed by the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation involved in the preparation and dissemination of the aforementioned “blacklist”.

If funds were, in fact, used in this manner, I would respectfully request that you, in your status as my elected representatives to the United States Congress, take the appropriate action necessary to ensure that funds appropriated by the United States Congress are not used to suppress the free speech rights afforded to citizens of the United States, including myself, by the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. Moreover, I would insist that you take the appropriate action to guarantee that the Government of Ukraine immediately cease and desist in all activity designed to threaten and intimidate citizens of the United States. You are duty bound to protect the interests of the United States and its citizens rather than facilitate the actions of a foreign power that are, by design, intended to accomplish just the opposite.

Congress cannot be allowed to bypass Constitutionally imposed constraints on its actions by allowing a foreign government to do that which would not be permitted here in the United States. By paying the salaries of the civil servants employed by the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation, who have prepared and disseminated the so-called “blacklist”, you and your fellow Senators and Representatives appear to be doing just that—allowing the Government of Ukraine to suppress the right of free speech guaranteed to United States citizens under the Constitution.

I look forward to hearing back from each of you as to how you propose to proceed in this matter.

Sincerely,

Scott Ritter

July 28, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , | Leave a comment

US Wants to Increase RT, Sputnik Moderation Due to Their Objectivity – Russian Embassy

Samizdat – 28.07.2022

US senators are calling for increased moderation of Spanish-language RT and Sputnik, as they are dissatisfied with the interest of Latin Americans in objective coverage of events, the Russian Embassy in the United States said in a statement.

On Wednesday, US Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Robert Menendez, Senators Bill Cassidy and Tim Kaine called on the CEOs of Meta (banned as an extremist organization in Russia), Twitter and Telegram to better moderate content distributed by Spanish-language versions of RT and Sputnik. The senators said they were concerned by reports that the reach of such media outlets has increased amid the situation in Ukraine.

“Parliamentarians, in the typical manner, once again turn everything upside down, seeing in the work of our news agencies attempts to “spread disinformation”, “undermine democracy” and “sow chaos” in the Western Hemisphere. The reason for such accusations is dissatisfaction with the interest of the Latin American public in objective coverage of events in Russia and the world,” the Russian Embassy said on Telegram.

“Washington’s ruling circles are clearly annoyed that, thanks to high-quality and timely news content, citizens of the countries of the region make a choice in favor of Russia Today and Sputnik, and not US-controlled media,” it said.

July 28, 2022 Posted by | Full Spectrum Dominance | , , | Leave a comment

New Normal Newspeak #5: “Recession”

Don’t worry, the economy is fine, we’re definitely not in a recession…according to the new definition

OffGuardian | July 27, 2022

Our new series of micro-articles deals with the newly everyday occurrence of the modern media simply changing what a word means. Today’s word is “recession”.

The United States is not in a recession. The government want to be very clear about that.

Yes, it’s true that a “recession” is generally defined as…

a period of temporary economic decline during which trade and industrial activity are reduced, generally identified by a fall in GDP in two successive quarters.

And yes, it’s true that the US has likely seen a “fall in GDP in two successive quarters”…but that doesn’t mean there’s a recession.

OK, it might technically be a recession but, apparently, there’s a difference between a “technical recession” and a “real recession”. The Whitehouse posted a blog about it a few days ago (as this reddit user pointed out):

What is a recession? While some maintain that two consecutive quarters of falling real GDP constitute a recession, that is neither the official definition nor the way economists evaluate the state of the business cycle.

There you have it – the US isn’t in a recession (not a real one, anyway), by this different definition of “recession”.

This does not constitute the Whitehouse changing the definition. They want to be very clear about that, too. And, as usual, the official “fact-checkers” have their back.

Newsweek headlines: Fact Check: Did The White House ‘Change Definition of Recession’?, which does a lot of prevarication and double-talking around the subject.

CNBC is both more forthright and more patronising, defending the Whitehouse position under the headline “Here’s how to know if we’re in a recession, and it’s not what you think”

Business Insider are even less subtle about it: “No, the White House isn’t changing the definition of a recession”

The point many of them are clinging to is that we can’t be in a recession because of all the “new jobs”. A startling piece of intellectual dishonesty, since the “new jobs” are not new at all, they’re all the old jobs everyone lost due to lockdown.

At the end of the day the price of energy is skyrocketing, inflation is hitting record highs all over the world, there’s a food crisis and a fuel crisis and a housing crisis and a general cost of living crisis.

… who cares what we call that? Does changing the name change the thing? A recession by any other name is still as deep.

The people in charge believe that as long as they keep changing the names of things it doesn’t matter that everyone is starving. They are wrong.

July 27, 2022 Posted by | Deception, Economics, Fake News, Full Spectrum Dominance, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | | Leave a comment

WHO calls for global censorship to combat monkeypox “misinformation”

TCS WIRE | July 27, 2022

WHO Director-general Tedros Adhanom has requested that social media companies around the world combat all “misinformation” regarding monkeypox.

“As we have seen with COVID-19, misinformation and disinformation can spread rapidly online. So, we call on all social media platforms, tech companies, and news organizations to work with us to prevent and counter harmful information,” Adhanom said earlier today.

This news comes only four days after the WHO chief Adhanom declared monkeypox an international health emergency, overruling a majority of panel members that voted against making such a declaration.

Now, it looks like the WHO is taking the next step: censoring anyone who isn’t on board with their monkeypox madness.

This is the same step the World Health Organization took in 2020 and 2021 when the WHO claimed that all information that went against the narrative was part of a broader “infodemic.”

“Soon after the world started getting used to the terms coronavirus and COVID-19, WHO coined another word: “infodemic” — an overabundance of information and the rapid spread of misleading or fabricated news, images, and videos. Like the virus, it is highly contagious and grows exponentially. It also complicates COVID-19 pandemic response efforts,” reads a 2020 article entitled “Immunizing the public against misinformation.”

Over the course of the pandemic, the WHO began partnering with countries to combat the “infodemic,” which, more often than not, meant censoring people online who had genuine concerns or were trying to proliferate the truth of adverse reactions following mRNA jabs.

Such adverse reactions are now known to be a fact, and health officials worldwide have begun warning people of the risk from things like post-vaccine myocarditis, which the WHO has consistently waved away as a conspiracy theory.

July 27, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science | | Leave a comment

Jacinda’s duplicity as pupils are told to mask up again or be punished

By Guy Hatchard | TCW Defending Freedom | July 27, 2022

LAST week the New Zealand government called for mask wearing to be enforced in schools – and many schools have apparently decided to punish students who do not comply.

Asked whether she was happy with that situation, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern ducked the question, denied the mandate, passed the buck, and still managed to appear happy for students to be punished.

She said: ‘We are really open-minded on this issue. We in fact went back multiple times to education and health and said, “Look, if you believe we should bring that mask mandate back we are happy to do that. Whatever you think is going to be in the best interest of our learners, our schools, and our health outcomes.”

‘They came back to us and said we should strongly encourage their use, but we should still allow schools to implement the policies themselves. That’s where we have landed. We have not said mask wearing is compulsory, but we are strongly encouraging it.’

You can watch the full interview here. There is plenty of spin, but not a lot of ambiguity. Head teachers have been given a green light to dust off the detention book.

Some schools are giving students detention either during lunchtime or after school (the modern equivalent of writing out ‘I will wear my mask’ a thousand times), which translates into loss of opportunities to participate in extracurricular activities and sports. This should be unacceptable and is certainly deleterious to a student at any age and may result in them becoming alienated or adversely affected emotionally or socially. Students go to school to learn and understand the process of verifying knowledge, to engage socially, and to develop skills in communication; whereby they may debate and agree or disagree with one another, without the fear of being punished or discriminated against.

There is a considerable body of scientific evidence pointing to the ineffectiveness of masks to stop transmission. Long-term mask use also poses health risks and causes significant learning deficits.

Some parents, and hence their children, will be well aware of this. A policy of punishment for non-mask wearers is the antithesis of a constructive learning environment and teaches: ‘Comply without question or face a penalty.’

School attendance in New Zealand is already at an all-time low. As a result of this move, it is going to fall further. The opportunities for constructive debate are fast disappearing in education, and we can understand why many parents are turning their thoughts to home-schooling.

The problem here is that the public is being deliberately kept in the dark about the ineffectiveness of masks and the dangers of prolonged mask-wearing. Most are following government advice, thinking that they are protecting themselves and others from Covid. They are ending the day with a headache and a sore face, but sure that they have thereby saved the world.

So far, the NZ government has kept a tight hold on the Covid narrative by warning people that alternative news sources and social media conversations are full of misinformation, whilst government announcements are closely following ‘the science’. They also give cash grants to the mainstream media and advertise to the point of saturation.

That is all set to ramp up from today. The government has concluded a formal binding agreement with Meta (Facebook and Instagram), TikTok, Google (Gmail and YouTube), Amazon (Spark) and Twitter to limit the availability of harmful content including ‘misinformation and disinformation’ in New Zealand.

In a world first, the code is described as ‘voluntary’, but it includes a ‘commitment’ to being held ‘accountable’ which allows its provisions to be ‘enforced’. How is that for doublespeak? And who is deciding what is harmful?

The mask mandate rules and the information censorship have something in common. The government is asking others to do its dirty work, then asking us to believe it has nothing to do with those others. We are not naive: we already know how this works.

The agreement cleverly conflates things that we all feel should be controlled, such as child sexual exploitation and incitement to violence, with rational discussions about drug safety and effectiveness.

YouTube has previously withdrawn Covid content from view at the private request of the Ministry of Health. Apparently this can happen if any content causes the NZ government embarrassment.

I don’t suppose it has escaped your notice that internet censorship is a tool of oppressive governments. The dangers are becoming all too obvious here, where the majority of the public, subjected to blanket government advertising, still believe that regular mRNA boosters and flu shots offer protection for life that is stronger than natural immunity.

This is all taking on a macabre aspect, because official Covid data here and in the EU is showing that boosted individuals are increasingly more likely to die with Covid than are the unvaccinated. The apparent reluctance on the part of the government to engage with the implications of this official Covid data is seriously worrying. Governments traditionally have a general duty of care when it comes to policing public health measures.

This year has been one of the wettest on record in NZ. As a result, ants are coming into homes in record numbers and you may have been struck with how expendable ant populations are.

Ant colonies appear to have a centralised administrative policy whereby any number of workers can be put at risk in the search for homes and food for queens. This is a sort of groupthink which starkly contrasts with human ethics, wherein the individual is highly valued.

Here in New Zealand, we are 90 per cent mRNA vaccinated and we currently have the highest rate of all-cause mortality in the world. Even the Ministry of Health has admitted this is not because of Covid. Yet if you follow the government advertising and press statements, you will probably be unaware of this and happily sure that ‘the science’ is being followed.

I don’t need to draw conclusions for you here. If you are following the current Covid science journal publishing, you will be well aware of mathematical arguments entirely based on collected data which are taking place within a rational framework. Ignoring or hiding these is dangerous.

The author is in New Zealand 

This blog is co-authored with Narayani Hatchard. 

July 26, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , , | Leave a comment

AP instructs news media to avoid certain words when referring to transgender issues

By Cindy Harper | Reclaim The Net | July 26, 2022

The Associated Press Stylebook, used as a style manual by most media outlets, has been updated to include a “Topical Guide” for transgender coverage.

The guide says writers should use “unbiased language” when referring to trans people. It also says writers should “avoid false balance” by “giving [a] platform to unqualified claims or sources in the guise of balancing a story by including all views.”

“A person’s sex and gender are usually assigned at birth by parents or attendants and can turn out to be inaccurate. Experts say gender is a spectrum, not a binary structure consisting of only men and women, that can vary among societies and can change over time,” the guide further states.

The guide adds: “Avoid terms like biological male, which opponents of transgender rights sometimes use to oversimplify sex and gender, is often misleading shorthand for assigned male at birth, and is redundant because sex is inherently biological.”

It tells writers to describe the amputation of genitals and breasts as “gender-confirmation procedures” or “gender affirming care” because these treatments “can improve psychological well-being and reduce suicidal behavior.”

Other rules include: “Don’t refer in interviews or stories to ‘preferred’ or ‘chosen’ pronouns. Instead, write ‘the pronouns they use,’ ‘whose pronouns are,’ ‘who uses the pronouns,’ etc.”

July 26, 2022 Posted by | Full Spectrum Dominance | | Leave a comment

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