Ukrainian security services snatch Russian journalist from street to deport her
RT | August 30, 2017
Russian television correspondent Anna Kurbatova has been detained by the Ukrainian security services in Kiev. The journalist, who works for Russia’s Channel 1, will be deported for “smearing” Ukraine, according to a security services spokesperson.
The incident occurred in the city center of the Ukrainian capital on Wednesday. Kurbatova was “grabbed by unknown assailants, forced into a car and driven away,” according to Channel 1.
The Russian authorities are closely monitoring the situation to learn more about the fate of the journalist.
“At the moment we don’t have information, but, undoubtedly, we’ll do our best to clarify the situation,” Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry is also trying to clarify the situation around the correspondent’s detention.
“The Russian Foreign Ministry and Russian diplomatic institutions abroad are looking into the disappearance of a Channel 1 journalist in Ukraine,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told TASS.
The Russian embassy in Kiev has sent requests to the Ukrainian security services as well as a note to Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry, urging them to clarify the incident and immediately release the journalist, RIA Novosti reported.
A spokesperson for the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) confirmed that the journalist was detained by the organization’s operatives. Kurbatova will be deported from Ukraine to Russia and the SBU is currently preparing the paperwork, according to the spokesperson.
“Russian propagandist Anna Kurbatova will be forcibly returned to the Russian Federation. Ukraine is a constitutional state, its security services operate strictly within the legal framework. All necessary documents for her deportation are being prepared at the moment. It will happen to everyone who dares to smear Ukraine,” the spokesperson said in a Facebook post.
Russian Commissioner for Human Rights Tatyana Moskalkova has contacted her Ukrainian counterpart following the incident to determine whether the security services are following legal procedures.
“I’ve just sent a request to my colleague Valeria Lukyanova asking her about the location [of the journalist], her health condition and the consular visit, i.e. whether all the conventions are being observed if she has been detained by law enforcement,” Moskalkova told Interfax.
“I’m outraged and deeply worried about the treatment of journalists. Freedom of speech is protected not only by states’ constitutions, but also by international legal acts, journalists worldwide are independent and have immunity.”
Ahead of the incident, the journalist received threats in connection with her reporting on Ukraine’s Independence Day, according to Channel 1. Following her report, Kurbatova was placed on the list of “enemies of Ukraine” on the notorious Mirotvorets (Peacemaker) website. The website accuses the journalist of “anti-Ukrainian propaganda” and “manipulating socially-important information.”
Just before the incident, Kurbatova had prepared a new report on the ill-treatment of journalists in Ukraine, which has not yet been aired.
It’s not the first time a Russian journalist has become a target for the Ukrainian security services. Earlier in August, a journalist for the All-Russia State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company (VGTRK), Tamara Neresyan, was deported following an apparently similar incident.
“I was detained in the street and promptly brought to the main SBU office, where I was questioned for three hours. They confiscated my phone, it was done very roughly, nearly breaking my arms. Following the questioning they read me a resolution of the SBU that I would be deported and barred from re-entry for three years,” Neresyan told Rossiya 24 TV channel.
Tillerson Caves, Will Appoint Special Anti-Semitism Envoy Who Monitors Criticism of Israel
Anti-Semitism Envoy Hannah Rosenthal adopted a new Israel-centric definition of anti-Semitism and used it to train American diplomats.
By Alison Weir | If Americans Knew | August 29, 2017
After continuing pressure, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has announced that he will name a special envoy and maintain an office to monitor alleged anti-Semitism.
All three previous anti-semitism envoys have been fervent Israel partisans, two of them working for AIPAC. The first envoy endorsed a new definition of the word “anti-Semitism” to include criticism of Israel; the second adopted the new, Israel-centric definition; and the third helped to disseminate the definition world-wide.
This was part of an international campaign to expand the definition of anti-Semitism and embed this in governments and law enforcement agencies, potentially criminalizing support for Palestinian rights.
When it appeared in June that Trump might eliminate the office in a cost-cutting measure, he and Tillerson came under immediate attack by Jewish organizations and some others, including the Southern Poverty Law Center.
According to a letter from Tillerson to the Senate released yesterday, a number of similar special envoys and ambassadorships will be maintained, including the Special Envoy for Israeli-Palestinian Negotiations (currently filled by Frank Lowenstein), the Special Envoy as well as the Special Advisor for Holocaust Issues (which, among other things, works with Israel and supports the anti-Semitism envoy; currently the Special Advisor is Stuart E. Eizenstat), and the Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom; Kansas Governor Sam Brownback, a strong supporter of Israel despite its record of religious discrimination, has been nominated for the position.
Dozens of other special envoy positions are being eliminated or combined, including ones concerned with Tibet, disabilities rights, global food security, cyber issues, global youth issues, conflict diamonds, the closing of Guantanamo, and a number that focus on the environment.
Simonyan Slams Reporters Without Borders for Calling RT ‘Enemy of Journalism’
© Flickr/ Marieke Guy
Sputnik – August 28, 2017
RT Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan struck back at Reporters Without Borders, which called the channel “an enemy of journalism” allegedly exploiting the EU parliament resolution against Russian media outlets comparing them to Daesh terrorist group propaganda.
RT and Sputnik Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan said Monday that Reporters Without Borders (RSF) is discrediting the work of advocacy groups by calling the broadcaster “an enemy of journalism.”
“Following such horrific remarks Reporters Without Borders should quietly self-dissolve, so as not to disgrace true human rights defenders,” Simonyan told the RT commenting on Deloire’s remarks.
On August 26, RSF Secretary General Christophe Deloire in an interview with Telerama magazine cited Simonyan’s appeal for protection against the European parliament’s 2016 resolution on countering alleged Russian anti-EU propaganda and media, including RT and Sputnik, as an example of how “enemies of journalism are exploiting the principles adopted to protect it.”
In November 2016, the European Parliament passed a resolution where it described the two media outlets as a threat to Europe’s unity and drew a parallel between them and propaganda disseminated by Daesh terrorist group. The document calls for extra European Commission funding for counter-propaganda projects.
Sputnik responded by calling the move a direct violation of media freedom and human rights, while Russian President Vladimir Putin commented on the matter by pointing out that the document indicates a degradation of democracy in the West.
Sputnik contacted RSF for the organization’s comments on the resolution, only to be told that the organization had taken a decision to no longer give interviews to Rossiya Segodnya.
Looking for the Thought Police? Try looking in the mirror.
By T.P. Wilkinson | Dissident Voice | August 25, 2017
1984 is probably one of the worst books of the 20th century because of its mis-interpretation!
a) Although Orwell was writing about ENGLAND, in fact, and not as allegory, the exigencies of anti-Soviet propaganda required that the story be defined as a dystopia about the world under Soviet control. Whatever Orwell may have thought about Stalin, 1984 was a story directly attacking the Labour Party and the policies that would become enshrined in Labour governments dominated by graduates from Oxford and to a lesser extent Cambridge. Anyone outside of Britain might be forgiven at the time for missing this but today the oversight is simply rooted in ignorance — willful or unwitting.
b) Orwell, who served in the colonial police in Burma, was well acquainted with the methods of social control used in Britain’s colonies — including torture and surveillance. He had no reason to draw on reports from the Soviet Union, true or false. He also worked in the British government’s propaganda department. The BBC was created in 1922 as a radio monopoly in part to improve the government’s campaign against organised labour. There the fabrication of “news” was daily routine, as it is today.
c) Post-war Britain was — in comparison to the US esp. — a disaster area. After two world wars, Britain was bankrupt. The empire which had subsidised the metropolitan standard of living was collapsing. Indian independence alone would mean an initial massive balance of payments deficit to the Union, not to mention debt to the US. The economy was more or less in ruins. The standard of living had sunk drastically for all but the very rich. It did not take any imagination to invent “Victory Gin” — Britain was nominally on the side of the winners but had lost everything. For someone like Orwell this was very obvious.
d) Too little attention is paid to the actual structures that Orwell describes. The Party and the Thought Police are most frequently mentioned. This focus distorts Orwell’s depiction of a complex mechanism of social control. Ironically many people who have read Noam Chomsky’s essays do not grasp the point which Orwell makes and Chomsky reiterates — albeit avoiding too much attention to this embarrassing point.
Orwell distinguished between the “inner party”, the “outer party” and the “prols”. This classification is very important for comprehending the whole process. Propaganda — that is the constant manipulation of data in forms to create what counts on any one day as “true” — is directed primarily at the “outer party”. The “inner party” is not concerned with what is actually true, this virtually invisible group is interested only in power. The “outer party” is governed by rigorous ideas of truth and virtue which have to be policed — precisely because the very idea of “truth” is a policing tool — not unlike sexual purity. The “truth” is of no material importance to the mass — the “prols” in Orwell’s depiction. But the “outer party” — the intellectuals, the bureaucrats, middle managers, functionaries of all types whether in the state or private sector, in short those who claim citizenship based on supposed intelligence and virtue/merit — need constant policing.
They must be told not only what is fashionable but what counts as true or as the acceptable/polite consensus. These people cannot be left in abject ignorance since they are needed to maintain the system. They are in short the “Gene Sharp factor” — the percentage of the population with which one moves the whole. (Ironically the first edition (1993) of Sharp’s From Dictatorship to Democracy was published in Burma — where Orwell began his police career.) They are too numerous in comparison to the “inner party” to be ignored but not as disorganized as the “prols” so that they cannot be beaten down physically as a mass.
Perhaps Noam Chomsky does not focus too much on his observation that it is the middle class intellectual/managerial class that is the target of most regime propaganda (most heavily propagandised) because he belongs precisely to that class. In fact, on some issues he might be confused with an asset of the Thought Police — coming too as he does from a central US Thought Police institution — MIT.
Orwell was an Old Etonian. Eton College is the pinnacle of the “outer party” cadre institutions in Britain. It is run for the “inner party” and many of the “inner party” are also Old Etonians but the English public school is notorious for enforcing class distinctions even among those of the same college. All Etonians are equal too, some are more equal than others.
e) Who is “Big Brother”? Big Brother is always supposed to be a kind of Stalin allegory. However, unlike the US, Britain has a constant figure who constitutes the focus of all loyalty and affection — the reigning monarch. The British royal family changed their name when war was declared against Germany in 1914. It became inappropriate to have a German king ordering illiterate British peasants and workers into war against another German king who was directly related for reasons that could not be admitted openly and still cannot. So the name “Windsor” was adopted. Edward VIII both before and after his abdication maintained a healthy relationship with blatant fascists of the old style.
This does not mean that the British royal family ever renounced its affinity for fascism (e.g. Franco and Salazar). Moreover it is almost impossible to criticise the monarchy substantively in the United Kingdom. The actions of its members, singularly or collectively, are beyond review or public reproach — except in matters trivial like taste or polite speech. The pretense that the most wealthy private individual in the country (and one of the world’s wealthiest), the reigning monarch, has no personal interest in the policies of the British government and has no practical influence over the government in defense of those interests is about as great a self-deception as one can demand of any person, let alone an entire country.
God save the King/Queen…
f) It is even arguable that Orwell was more concerned about the US because this was the country which switched sides and manipulated the war aims the most — without any cost to itself. During WWII it was clear that the Soviet Union was fighting a vicious war just to survive in the face of the Western onslaught. However, sober people also saw that the US stood to be the only beneficiary of the war. In 1945, this was obvious. No sooner had the war ended but the US proclaimed a war against the Soviet Union. Britain could not have afforded such a position — even if Churchill would have liked. He gave his deceptive “iron curtain” speech for Truman because of dependence on the US not because Britain could have afforded an anti-Soviet policy on its own.1 Orwell could certainly see the absurdity of an impoverished Britain having been on the side of the Soviet Union against Hitler now aligned with the US against the Soviet Union.
In fact, it could be argued that Orwell’s novel is very coherent with Roger Waters’ The Wall (and its sequel The Final Cut) in their specifically BRITISH views of mass culture and pseudo-democracy concealing party dictatorship. It has little, if anything, to do with Russian society, let alone politics. That is only natural. Orwell never lived in Russia and would not have been able to explain Russian society. For that one has to turn to Russians themselves; e.g., Tolstoy or Sholokhov or Pasternak. On the other hand many Americans believe that they understand British society — this is due largely to saturation with BBC programming. However similar Britain may appear to the US, it is actually a very different country and culture (except perhaps for the highest strata of the Anglo-American ruling class). The illusion that Britons are only more quaint Americans has done much to promote the mis-understanding of Orwell.
One of the great intellectual travesty’s of the 20th century is the ascendency of US liberal ideology — in its broadest sense.2
There is probably not a country in the world today with so much influence on intellectual and cultural activity from such a depraved and obscene level of general ignorance and stupidity. The capacity to saturate the world with this structural mendacity and almost genetic stupidity is probably worse than any other weapons system the country’s psychopaths have produced — because it is the basis for acceptance of all those weapons in the first place.
- Churchill, unlike Truman, had attended the meetings with Stalin and Roosevelt at Yalta where it was agreed that the Soviet Union would occupy the Eastern European territories that had been absorbed into the German Empire, in part as a basis for war reparations due to the enormous destruction suffered by the Soviet Union — almost all of the European part of the country was razed to the ground. He knew that the Soviet occupation had been agreed by all the Allies. He also knew that the Allies were attempting to deprive the Soviet Union of the reparations due from Germany. In short he knew that it was the West that was hanging an “iron curtain” in front of the Soviet Union in the hope that it would collapse after WWII. Britain could not have afforded such a policy. Among other things the collapse of the empire would deprive it of its cheap access to all sorts of raw materials making it vulnerable to world market fluctuations.
- A more precise clarification of what might otherwise be called the ideology of the North Atlantic Establishment would exceed the scope of this brief note. Carroll Quigley’s The Anglo-American Establishment provides a fairly useful summary of its principles and the way it has been expressed through the 20th century. It should be noted that one of the key cadre institutions for academics according to Quigley is the All Souls College of Oxford University– where Gene Sharp also completed his doctorate.
Dr T.P. Wilkinson writes, teaches History and English, directs theatre and coaches cricket between the cradles of Heine and Saramago. He is also the author of Church Clothes, Land, Mission and the End of Apartheid in South Africa (Maisonneuve Press, 2003).
Israel prevents Palestinian students from entering school in Al-Aqsa Mosque
MEMO | August 25, 2017
Israeli police prevented 160 Palestinian secondary school students from entering the Shari’ah School in Al-Aqsa Mosque on Thursday, under the pretext that their school books are based on the Palestinian curriculum, Quds Press has reported. The police had already prevented the delivery of schoolbooks at the premises two days ago, citing the same pretext about the curriculum.
According to Raed Da’na, the Director of Preaching and Guidance at Al-Aqsa, the books were distributed outside the mosque because Israeli police object to the presence of “Palestinian flags and pictures of protests” alongside the text. The Israelis even said that book covers which have the Palestinian flag on them must be torn up if students want to enter the mosque to attend their school, he revealed.
Da’na added that Israeli security forces confiscated the ID documents of Najih Bukairat, the head of the Aqsa Academy for Sciences and Heritage, and Robain Muhaisin, a Palestinian teacher, before taking them to a police station in the Old City of occupied Jerusalem. The vehicle used to distribute the school textbooks was impounded.
In a related incident, Israeli police and border guards stormed into the Aytam [Orphans] Islamic School, located in the Old City, and arrested two students, according to the Quds Media Centre. A Quds Press correspondent said that this happened while dozens of Jewish settlers were storming around Al-Aqsa Mosque. Sixty-five settlers were accompanied and protected by Israeli security forces, she added. They ordered Al-Aqsa’s guards to stay away from the settlers as they entered the mosque.
Guards attached to the Noble Sanctuary usually accompany Jewish settlers once they enter the compound through the Magharbeh Gate and stay with them until they leave through the Silsela Gate, making sure that they do not do anything that would constitute a violation of the mosque’s sanctity. For this, the guards are subjected to threats and restrictions from Israeli police officers.
British universities should be more discerning about their choice of benefactors
By Alastair Sloan | MEMO | August 25, 2017
Just over eighteen months ago, environmental campaigners in Britain received some surprising news. They had been working for three years to get the Tate Gallery in London to reveal how much money oil giant BP had given it between 1990 and 2011. The figure turned out to be relatively small, ranging from £150,000 to £330,000 per year. Although this was a good chunk of the gallery’s income in the nineties, this soon equated to less than one per cent of the Tate group’s funding between 2000 and 2006. The sponsorship deal continued for another ten years, alongside similar BP sponsorships of the British Museum, the Royal Opera House and the National Portrait Gallery. Across all of these organisations, the oil company likewise contributed less than one per cent of funding to each one. The oft-heard argument that the struggling arts sector would go under were it not for this kind of funding from not-very-nice corporations was clearly bunkum. If anything, these institutions were willing collaborators in corporate whitewashing.
The same could be said of Gulf funds for British universities. Middle East Studies departments whisper about the necessity of funding from countries like the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, because budgets are falling. A close look at the finances of the University of Exeter reveals something else, though; the issue of donations from alumnus Sheikh Dr Sultan Bin Muhammad Al-Qasimi of Sharjah were raised recently by the International Campaign for Freedom in the United Arab Emirates.
According to the Telegraph, the ruler of Sharjah – one of the most conservative Emirates in the UAE — has given more than £8 million to Exeter University over two decades (roughly the same time period that the Tate was receiving money from BP). A breakdown of when these donations were made is not available, but government grants and tuition fees in 1999 (the earliest data that I have been able to find) amounted to £52 million. The equivalent figure today is £250 million, around three times the original government and student fees funding even when adjusted for inflation. Much of this has come from the introduction of hugely expensive tuition fees for students.
In 2008, the nephew of the late King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia gave £8 million to Cambridge University to build its “Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Centre of Islamic Studies”. The same year, Cambridge University’s annual report shows that income from government grants and tuition fees had risen from £251 million to £279 million. Cambridge made £174 million from its publishing house, more than £20 million more than in 2007. Even its “examination and assessment services” had seen income go up from £193 million to £216 million. All these increases led to the university almost doubling its surplus for the year, to £42 million. Yet that same year, it also accepted £8 million from a state known for its appalling human rights record, all the while knowing full well that the university coffers were overflowing.
After 2008, of course, there was the recession, so perhaps last year’s £3 million donation from the Qatar Development Fund towards Somerville College, Oxford, was justified? Think again. Somerville College itself was certainly on track to suffer a £3 million reduction in donations had the Qatar money not arrived, and had just borrowed huge amounts to extend its buildings, but Oxford University generally was doing well. In 2010, its income had risen since the previous year by nearly five per cent, to £920 million. By 2015, that figure was up to £1.3 billion, with surpluses of nearly £400 million sat in university bank accounts. Oxford doesn’t include in its numbers, as Cambridge does, its significantly profitable publishing business, which was on hand to top up coffers when they are running low.
In the UAE, we only have to go back to March to find that a prominent academic was jailed for ten years. His crime? He used Twitter. The country has imposed travel restrictions on visiting academics from Georgetown University, the London School of Economics and New York University, as well as prosecuting other university professionals. In January, the UAE government detained Abdulkhaleq Abdulla for ten days without charge after the prominent Emirati academic and vocal supporter, not critic, of the government posted a tweet that praised the UAE as the “Emirates of tolerance” but bemoaned the authorities’ lack of respect for freedom of expression and political liberties. Abdulla was an adviser to Mohammed Bin Zayed, the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, and a retired professor of political science at the University of the UAE. Similar situations abound in Saudi Arabia, and academic freedoms are only marginally better in Qatar.
So British universities are well off. They don’t need money from abroad, but they are opting to take it in any case, and who they are choosing to take it from isn’t encouraging. This devalues British academia and spits in the face of academics and others calling for change who are imprisoned in those donor countries for their pains. Universities should be campaigning to have tuition fees removed, be more inventive about how they make money, and stop plastering the names of Middle East dictators across their walls. They need to be much more discerning in their choice of benefactors. It’s too late to do this today, but tomorrow will do very nicely.
Israel charges Palestinian cleric Sheikh Salah with incitement of terror
Press TV – August 24, 2017
The Tel Aviv regime has indicted Sheikh Raed Salah, a cleric who supported Palestinian protests over Israel’s controversial security measures imposed last month at a holy site in occupied Jerusalem al-Quds.
The Israeli court formally charged Salah on Thursday with incitement of terror over speeches he delivered encouraging Palestinians to protest for the right of holding prayers inside the Haram al-Sharif compound, which is home to the revered al-Aqsa Mosque, the third holiest site in Islam.
Israel had earlier in the week extended Salah’s detention, nearly a week after he was arrested. Prosecutors had demanded the renewed detention, saying they intended to bring charges against the 58-year-old cleric.
Israel’s security measures, which came after the July 14 deadly shooting and killing of two Israeli policemen, sparked some unprecedented protests and sit-in gatherings in occupied East Jerusalem al-Quds as Palestinians refused to accept the restrictions for nearly two weeks.
Israel was later forced to remove metal detectors and cameras installed at the gates and Palestinians ended sit-ins and prayers outside the mosque.
Salah had served for nine months in Israeli jails before he was released in January. He was previously charged with “incitement of violence” and “incitement of racism.” His latest arrest sparked condemnations in the occupied territories as his supporters said it was part of a political witch hunt aimed to silence dissent.
Israelis have also banned Salah’s group, the Islamic Movement in Israel, in 2015 for allegedly stoking violence.
Kuwait Files Cases Against Web Users Criticizing Qatar Blockade
Sputnik – 23.08.2017
The Kuwaiti Attorney General’s office filed criminal cases against several social media users who have been criticizing Arab states and their leadership for the decision to cut ties with Qatar and impose a blockade, Kuwaiti Information Minister Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah Al Sabah said Tuesday.
“We do not tolerate offensive remarks regarding any friendly Arab country, made by both licensed Kuwaiti media and social media users. The Attorney General’s office will deal with all those who offended Persian Gulf states,” Al Sabah said in an interview to Saudi Arabian Okaz newspaper.
He also noted that the names of those users had been already submitted to the Attorney General’s office.
In early June, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Egypt and a number of other countries broke off diplomatic relations with Qatar in early June, accusing it of supporting terrorism and interfering in their internal affairs. The move has been strongly condemned by a number of Kuwaiti journalists and analysts, who have a large number of followers on social media.
Kuwait, acting as a mediator in the crisis, handed over the four Arab states’ ultimatum containing several demands to Doha. The list included requests to sever relations with Iran, close Turkey’s military base on Qatar’s territory, shut down Al Jazeera TV channel and end support for the Muslim Brotherhood, a terrorist organization banned in Russia. Doha has refused to comply with the demands.
Palestinian Authority shows its ‘authoritarian’ face through Cyber Crimes Law
Ma’an – August 22, 2017
BETHLEHEM – Palestinian prisoners’ rights group Addameer has joined a growing chorus opposition to the Palestinian Authority (PA) — which the NGO described as “an ever increasingly authoritarian regime” — for a new far-reaching law that effectively criminalizes “any form of digital dissent.”
The decree, issued by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on June 24, has been described by rights groups as “draconian” and “the worst law in the PA’s history,” for imposing jail time, hard labor, and fines for creating, publishing, and sharing information deemed dangerous by the PA.
In a statement last last week, the leftist PLO faction the Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestinian (PFLP) called the law “a repressive tool” against all who disagree, oppose, and “confront the misdeeds” of the PA.
The PFLP said the law’s passage came as “the (Israeli) occupation is waging a frantic campaign against journalists, including prosecutions, arrests and attacks, sometimes amounting to direct physical targeting leading to the death and injury of dozens of journalists,” and that that PA “is seeking to prosecute and arrest the same journalists.”
In detailed breakdown of the new law published Sunday, Addameer, which provides legal support to Palestinian political prisoners held by Israel and the PA, explained that the vague and far-reaching law could mean prison time, hard labor, and/or hundreds of dollars in fines for journalists, leakers, meme-sharers, and someone “watching Game of Thrones using a VPN.”
“The most troubling aspects of this document are its vague definitions of what constitutes a punishable offence, its extension of punishment to any individual who assists or agrees with what the decree considers a felony, and the clear attacks on dissenters, journalists, and leakers,” the prisoners’ rights group explained.
Addameer slammed the law for using quasi-legitimate restrictions on hacking and internet fraud as legal camouflage for serious curtailments of privacy and freedom of expression.
While the rights group said there was a “kernel of truth” that such a decree was needed to combat hackers and fraudsters, “it by no means represents a ‘necessity’ as stipulated in the Basic Law.”
Palestinian Basic Law says that presidential decrees may only be issued in a “time of necessity, if the situation is urgent enough as to not be able to wait until the next sitting of the Palestinian Legislative Council,” according to Addameer.
Since Hamas won parliamentary elections in 2006, the Palestinian Legislative Council has not convened in Ramallah, meaning that Abbas, who extended his presidency indefinitely in 2009, has been ruling solely by decree for a decade.
Prison time, fines, or both
The law mandates that “any person who…has abused any information technology” can face imprisonment, a fine 200 to 3,000 Jordanian dinars, or both. If the alleged offence affects government data, a minimum sentence of five years of hard labor and a minimum fine of 5,000 Jordanian dinars ($7,070) is called for, Addameer said.
This clause, according to Addameer, is clearly directed at journalists and leakers, though such “abuse” is undefined and open to interpretation.
A person who threatens to commit a felony or an undefined “immoral act” on the internet also faces temporary hard labor.
Anyone who creates or shares content that “infringes on public morals” faces a minimum one-year sentence or a minimum fine of 1,000 Jordanian dinars capped at 5,000 dinars ($7,070), or both.
The greatest threat to press freedoms in the law, Addameer said, is an article that punishes “anyone who creates or manages a website or an information technology platform that aims to publish news that would endanger the integrity of the Palestinian state, the public order or the internal or external security of the State” with a fine between $1,414 and $7,070 or at least a year of jail time, or both.
Anyone who shares such content would also be punished with a maximum one-year prison sentence or fine of between 200 Jordanian dinars ($283) and 1,000 dinars ($1414), or both.
“Something as simple as a share on Facebook could result in a fine, jail time, or both. The decree even goes as far as to criminalize the use of any means to bypass the blocking of certain websites, such as a VPN,” Addameer said.
The decree also demands website providers comply with the PA to block certain websites, enshrines the right for the PA to seize equipment allegedly used in cyber crime felonies, and allows the PA to monitor anyone’s communications and data for a renewable period of 15 days with magistrate’s court approval. Violators of these clauses can expect hard labor or temporary hard labor.
“In essence, besides the infringement on freedom of the press, the PA can now imprison and fine individuals for a Facebook share, watching Game of Thrones using a VPN, making an ‘offensive’ meme, posting a tweet against certain policies, or asserting political allegiances,” Addameer said.
2 known instances of law being used so far
Addameer said that the PA has already used the law to curtail press freedoms and freedom of expression at least twice.
Most recently, five journalists were arrested and accused of “leaking information to hostile entities,” and four others were also questioned. Initial claims said the arrests were not related to the decree, but the prosecutor later cited the law as the reason for their arrest.
The journalists were held for five days and were made to agree to a 1,000 dinar bond, the amount stipulated in the decree. “It is unclear if charges will be further pursued but, at this point, none have been officially issued,” according to Addameer.
The journalists, barring one freelancer, all worked for news outlets that were blocked by the PA in mid-August. The majority of the 30 affected sites were affiliated to PA rivals Hamas and discharged Fatah member Muhammad Dahlan, with a few others being associated with so-called Islamic State.
“The fact that these websites are run by political rivals to the current ruling faction of the PA indicates that that these laws are being and, will continue to be used, to stifle free speech, legitimate decent (sic), and discussions regarding the state of politics in Palestine,” Addameer said.
Despite not being detained under the decree, Addameer also cited the arrest of Palestinian Today journalist Jihad Barakat, as a violation of press freedoms since the law was enacted. He was detained for filming Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah being searched by Israeli soldiers at a checkpoint.
Barakat was charged for a range of offenses, including panhandling, for which he will stand trial in the PA court system in September.
Addameer reminded the PA of its obligations under a number of human rights conventions the decree violates regarding freedom of expression, to which the Ramallah-based government has committed.
“Despite the ‘Electronic Crimes Law’ using the language of ‘national security,’ the decree itself is clearly contrary to the spirit of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The fact that the limits on free speech have been applied to opposition voices, and critical journalists, is more than enough to conclude that the PA is currently in violation of their international commitments,” the prisoners’ rights group affirmed.
“Furthermore, Addameer urges that the Palestinian Authority must abide by the conventions to which it is a party, especially considering the ongoing deteriorating human rights situation in the occupied Palestinian territories.”
TSA facial biometric body scanners and government watchlists being used in train stations
MassPrivatel | August 22, 2017
The TSA is winning the war on Americans minds as commuters are being tricked into giving away their rights without a fight.
The above video warns that facial recognition body scanners are coming to a train station near you…
“Soon you might have to pass through one of these to get to your train or subway.”
Last week, the TSA Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority ‘voluntarily’ asked commuters to walk through facial recognition body scanners before being allowed to board a train.
If you watched the video you might have noticed that the mass media (CBS) did not interview a single person who was concerned about their privacy. Instead, they quoted passengers who think body scanners are a good thing.
Nothing suspicious about that, right?
CBS warned that if the LA Metro installs the body scanners next year, commuters won’t be able to opt-out.
According to an article in the LA Times, the LA Metro has begun piloting biometric body scanners that send short-wave radio frequencies through commuters bodies to search for bombs and weapons.
A ‘pilot program’ is really a government euphemism for gauging the public’s response to another intrusive police search.
Bill Gates bankrolled high speed body scanners
According to an article in ‘The Guardian’, the start-up company Evolv Technology is pilot testing high speed body scanners at the Los Angeles’s Union Station, Union Station in D.C., and the Denver international airport.
Evolv has taken a page right out of the TSA playbook citing safety concerns and fear of terror to justify their usage.
Corporations are using Americans fears of terror to make huge profits.
Evolv stands to make hundreds of millions of dollars if commuter train stations install their body scanners. A single scanner will cost taxpayers $60,000, while Bill Gates who helped fund Evolv Technoloy makes a nice profit.
Police use our fears of terror to justify losing of our rights
An LA Times article served as a mouthpiece to justify more government spying.
Mr. Wiggins isn’t done scaring the public just yet…
Curiously, the LA Times devoted only one sentence to privacy concerns.
Three months ago, I warned everyone that California Transit Authorities have a history of using corporate spy gear to spy on commuters.
A class action lawsuit in California revealed that Transit Police are using a ‘Bart Watch’ app and Stingray surveillance to allegedly spy on commuters texts and emails.
Let’s make one thing perfectly clear, the war on terror is a for-profit business being led by private corporations and DHS. (The TSA is part of DHS.)
To learn more I recommend checking out Gary Jacobucci’s article that asked if, ‘DHS is a private offshore corporation.‘ Here are two companies that appear to be fronts for DHS: Homeland Security Solutions and Homeland Security Corporation. (Click here & here to find out more.)
Body scanners use government watchlists
Evolve uses ‘Known Wolves’, watchlist software that can identify people of interest or anyone on a government watchlist.
Getting the public to accept facial recognition body scanners at airports and Disney World is only part of a much greater privacy nightmare.
Evolv’s facial recognition body scanners are being used at public area screenings, sporting events, and employee screenings.
Retail stores and conference centers are also using facial biometric cameras and scanners.
Imagine a future where the police use government watchlists, facial biometric scanners, Stingray cellphone surveillance, Bluetooth, and license plate readers to spy on our every movement.
This is our future unless we fight for our privacy rights.
image credit: CryHavok
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Book Review
Alarmist climate science as a textbook example of groupthink
By Paul MacRae | May 1, 2012
… Groupthink was extensively studied by Yale psychologist Irving L. Janis and described in his 1982 book Groupthink: Psychological Studies of Policy Decisions and Fiascoes.
Janis was curious about how teams of highly intelligent and motivated people—the “best and the brightest” as David Halberstam called them in his 1972 book of the same name—could have come up with political policy disasters like the Vietnam War, Watergate, Pearl Harbor and the Bay of Pigs. Similarly, in 2008 and 2009, we saw the best and brightest in the world’s financial sphere crash thanks to some incredibly stupid decisions, such as allowing sub-prime mortgages to people on the verge of bankruptcy.
In other words, Janis studied why and how groups of highly intelligent professional bureaucrats and, yes, even scientists, screw up, sometimes disastrously and almost always unnecessarily. The reason, Janis believed, was “groupthink.” He quotes Nietzsche’s observation that “madness is the exception in individuals but the rule in groups,” and notes that groupthink occurs when “subtle constraints … prevent a [group] member from fully exercising his critical powers and from openly expressing doubts when most others in the group appear to have reached a consensus.”[2]
Janis found that even if the group leader expresses an openness to new ideas, group members value consensus more than critical thinking; groups are thus led astray by excessive “concurrence-seeking behavior.”[3] Therefore, Janis wrote, groupthink is “a model of thinking that people engage in when they are deeply involved in a cohesive in-group, when the members’ strivings for unanimity override their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action.”[4]
The groupthink syndrome
The result is what Janis calls “the groupthink syndrome.” This consists of three main categories of symptoms:
1. Overestimate of the group’s power and morality, including “an unquestioned belief in the group’s inherent morality, inclining the members to ignore the ethical or moral consequences of their actions.” [emphasis added]
2. Closed-mindedness, including a refusal to consider alternative explanations and stereotyped negative views of those who aren’t part of the group’s consensus. The group takes on a “win-lose fighting stance” toward alternative views.[5]
3. Pressure toward uniformity, including “a shared illusion of unanimity concerning judgments conforming to the majority view”; “direct pressure on any member who expresses strong arguments against any of the group’s stereotypes”; and “the emergence of self-appointed mind-guards … who protect the group from adverse information that might shatter their shared complacency about the effectiveness and morality of their decisions.”[6]
It’s obvious that alarmist climate science—as explicitly and extensively revealed in the Climatic Research Unit’s “Climategate” emails—shares all of these defects of groupthink, including a huge emphasis on maintaining consensus, a sense that because they are saving the world, alarmist climate scientists are beyond the normal moral constraints of scientific honesty (“overestimation of the group’s power and morality”), and vilification of those (“deniers”) who don’t share the consensus. … Read full article
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- New Study: Extreme Heat Records, Heatwaves, Extreme Cold Records Declining Across US Since 1899
- It’s The Cold, Stupid! Cold 20 Times More Lethal Than Heat, Multiple Studies Show
- European Institute For Climate And Energy: “Climate Debate is Seldom About Science”
- New Study: The Climate May Be 5 Times More Sensitive To Solar Forcing Than Commonly Assumed
- EV Industry Reached $70 Billion In Losses In 2024 Due To Delusional Green Ideologies
- Reality Check: Maldives Have Actually Grown In Size Or Remained Stable Over Recent Decades
- Abrupt Climate Change Also Occurred NATURALLY In The Past …25 Times During Last Ice Age
- Cave Discovery Reveals Today’s Desert Climates Were Recently Far Warmer, Wetter, Teeming With Life
- German Expert: Heat Dome Led To Record Temps In Western USA…Warmer In 1934, 1936
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