Top Democrat-linked PR firm tapped by pro-Israel groups to control Gaza war narrative
By Kit Klarenberg | MintPress News | December 29, 2023
On December 6, it was announced with much fanfare that the 10/7 Project, a new “centralized communications operation to promote continued US bipartisan support for Israel; push for accurate, complete coverage of the Israel-Hamas war,” and achieve a “stronger” media “focus” on the victims of October 7’s Al-Aqsa Flood would be launched, by a quintet of the largest Israeli lobby groups on U.S. soil.
Who and what is funding the 10/7 Project isn’t at all clear. Publicity material spoke vaguely of an unnamed “coterie of philanthropists” and the organization’s interest in sourcing “more philanthropic support” moving forward. Future formal financial disclosures may make for fascinating reading, but its founders offer some clues.
The five comprise the American Jewish Committee (AJC), the Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA), the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), and the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. This is quite the rogue’s gallery of Zionist entities, several of which have deplorable track records of actively whitewashing, if not outright facilitating, Israeli apartheid propaganda activities that have become turbocharged since October 7.
As such, the 10/7 Project’s professed mission of countering “disinformation” about October 7 and “Israel’s response” to the events can only be considered highly disquieting, especially given its target audience is “key media and government influencers.” In reality, of course, the organization is just the latest salvo in the Zionist state’s long-running information war against Palestinians and the Western world. This pitched battle has recently become ever more treacherous, specifically due to Tel Aviv’s genocidal “response” to Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.
One could be forgiven for thinking the 10/7 Project had already floundered in its objectives. After an initial ripple of mainstream interest, primarily from Israeli outlets and Zionist news platforms, the organization has seemingly vanished without a trace from the media landscape – or at least, its name has. As we shall see, though, it’s evident that in the manner of an iceberg, the 10/7 Project’s public footprint represents but the visible tip of something far larger and considerably more destructive.
‘STRANGLEHOLD ON CONGRESS’
While the 10/7 Project may not be directly making headlines daily, its parent organizations certainly are. The ADL has since October 7 published a steady stream of reports, lapped up by the media largely without question, testifying to an explosion of “anti-Semitic incidents” across the Western world in the wake of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.
Shocking stuff, one might think. Yet, as an investigation by MintPress News Senior Staff Writer Alan MacLeod revealed, the ADL is producing such staggering figures by categorizing anti-Israel and pro-Palestine rallies and corresponding chants at both as individual “anti-Semitic incidents.” Despite the exposure of its embarrassing, Enron-style accounting, the League continues to pump out the same bogus “research” at regular intervals. On December 12, it claimed “anti-Semitism” in the US was now up 337% in the wake of October 7, “an all-time record.”
It is far from the first time ADL definitions of anti-Semitism have failed to pass muster. For example, in December 2022, The Grayzone’s Alex Rubinstein revealed that the League did not categorize Ukraine’s openly Neo-Nazi paramilitary Azov Battalion to be the “far right group it once was.” This, despite the fact that Azov’s mission to “lead the white races of the world in a final crusade… against Semite-led Untermenschen,” as articulated by founder Andriy Biletsky, remains unchanged.
Meanwhile, the infamous AIPAC – accurately described by U.S. political scientist John Mearsheimer as “a de facto agent for a foreign government, [with] a stranglehold on Congress” – has made clear its significantly intensified mission to rid Washington DC of any elected official possessed of even vaguely anti-war, pro-Palestinian views, by declaring war on lawmakers such as Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar.
When AIPAC moves against, or in favor, of particular politicians, they mean business – and depressingly, the organization usually wins. Annually, the organization publishes a report on its “policy and political achievements” that year. Its 2022 installment boasts, among other things, of bagging $3.3 billion “for security assistance to Israel, with no added conditions” and having gifted $17.5 million – the most of any U.S. PAC – to “pro-Israel candidates,” 98% of whom won their elections, in the process defeating 13 anti-Israel challengers.
CONFLICTS OF INTEREST
The official website of the 10/7 Project is spartan in the extreme. Visitors are offered a “contact us” form, a link to subscribe to its regular newsletter, and a “what we do” section listing purported activities. This includes informing the public “with credible, real-time information about events in Israel and Gaza,” highlighting “excellent reporting,” calling out “biased coverage,” holding “biased media accountable,” and offering “expert spokespeople for press and broadcast outlets.”
Unmentioned anywhere is that the 10/7 Project is represented by a trio of notorious PR and political consultancies – CKR Solutions, OnMessage Public Strategies, and SKDK. Together, they move in the shadows to advance the organization’s interests and messaging publicly and on Capitol Hill. SKDK’s contribution will inevitably be the most insidious and impactful.
Since its founding in 2004, the company has careened from damaging scandal to damaging scandal yet consistently secures major, big-ticket clients. The reason for this is clear. SKDK was founded by and employs a retinue of high-ranking, well-connected Democratic operatives. Among them is Anita Dunn, Barack Obama’s White House Communications Director, credited as the “mastermind” of Joe Biden’s 2020 election win and widely regarded as a key member of the President’s “inner circle.”
Joe Biden speaks with SKDK’s Anita Dunn ahead of his State of the Union address in February 2023. Adam Schultz | White House
Ever since Obama’s 2008 election win, SKDK has been plausibly accused of selling privileged access to the White House to clients despite failing to register as a lobbying firm. This means major corporations have a direct means of encouraging – and bribing – the Oval Office to offer tax breaks, shred regulations, dump legislation, smash unions, and generally harm the U.S. public interest with total impunity and in absolute secrecy.
SKDK’s expansive Rolodex also helps politicians get out of serious trouble. In 2018-2019, Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan paid the company $200,000 for “crisis communications” assistance after one of his campaign workers sued him for harming her professionally when she complained of sexual harassment by one of his top aides. Meanwhile, in August 2021, it was revealed a senior SKDK staffer personally intervened to suppress negative media coverage of sexual harassment allegations against New York Governor Andrew Cuomo.
Even more perversely, it’s since been revealed that at the same time, SKDK was advising Madigan on how to navigate his public controversy, the company was also helping his former campaign worker bring a lawsuit against the aide who’d sexually harassed her. A more perfect demonstration of the DC blob’s incestuous nature and SKDK’s total lack of ethical and professional scruples one would be hard-pressed to find. And both are highly competitive categories.
SKDK played a pivotal role in Biden’s 2020 presidential bid, decisively reversing his fortunes after abysmal performances in various caucuses. While the mainstream media primarily praised the miraculous work of the company and Dunn – his de facto campaign director – there has also been fierce controversy surrounding its electioneering activities. For example, SKDK fired off daily “Misinformation Briefings” to major tech and social media firms, including Google, Meta and Twitter, requesting that specific content be suppressed or removed.
In most cases, the recipients complied, meaning SKDK exerted extraordinary influence over what voters did and did not know and could and could not see during the controversial 2020 Presidential election. Which surely at least partially accounts for Biden’s victory. To make matters even worse, the company was simultaneously. reaping a $35 million windfall from the government of California by running the state’s supposedly bipartisan “get-out-the-vote” campaign. The contract, originally to be financed by local taxpayers, was mysteriously awarded to SKDK on a “no-bid” basis.
‘DICTATE TERMS’
Clearly, the 10/7 Project was intended to be a very public affair. In an early promotional interview, executive director Josh Isay – perhaps unsurprisingly, until August 2022 SKDK’s longtime CEO – boasted about the “widespread enthusiasm” with which the organization’s “efforts to set the record straight and combat misinformation spouted by Hamas terrorists and their anti-Israel allies” had so far been received:
We look forward to continuing to do the critically important work of providing policymakers and the American public with reliable information about Israel and Hamas, and uplifting the stories of the innocent victims of the October 7th massacre.”
Yet, there is no obvious sign of those ambitions bearing fruit to date. A partial explanation for this failure may lie in the 10/7 Project’s wish to transform the “innocent victims” of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood into human interest stories and atrocity propaganda while elevating the organization’s eponymous date to the position of 9/11 in the American public’s mind.
In the weeks since the 10/7 Project’s inception, it has become ever-increasingly clear the Zionist narrative of what unfolded when Hamas breached Gaza’s armored concentration camp walls – unquestioningly regurgitated over and again for weeks after that by the Western media – is completely and grotesquely fraudulent.
For example, on December 15, it was reported based on social security data that Tel Aviv’s claim that 1,200 civilians died in the initial assault was greatly exaggerated. In reality, just 695 lost their lives. The previous figure was itself a revision from an initial civilian casualty “estimate” of 1,400.
Every civilian death in a warzone is an extremely grave crime. It is surely for this reason that Tel Aviv on December 12 desperately argued “it would not be morally sound” to investigate “friendly fire” incidents in “kibbutzim and southern Israeli communities” during Operation Al Aqsa Flood – civilians killed by Israeli Occupation Forces. Nonetheless, the numbers involved are avowedly “immense.”
Among the “stories of the innocent victims of the October 7th massacre” selected by the 10/7 Project for public “uplifting” in service of whitewashing and justifying the Gaza genocide will have been a great many individuals slaughtered in cold blood by indiscriminate, excessively violent IDF actions. This is all but inevitable. Urgently casting those victims into obscurity while ensuring the entire issue of Zionist “friendly fire” is not examined is now of paramount importance.
More significantly, though, the exposure – and occasional admission – of Tel Aviv’s brazen lies has fundamentally shifted mainstream narratives and sympathies away from Israel and towards the Palestinians. Audiences of every extraction globally can witness the monstrous reality of the genocide in Gaza and learn of Zionist abuse of the Palestinians even before the colonial entity’s founding in 1948 with their own eyes and ears.
Israeli deceit has been so relentless and so readily exposed that even typically subservient Western news networks and their featured pundits are treating official claims with enormous skepticism. Similarly, Zionist violence is so constantly unremitting and wantonly sadistic that graphic reports of carpet bombs maiming and slaughtering every generation of Palestinians are now commonplace.
Meanwhile, developments such as the revelation that IDF soldiers killed three shirtless Israelis waving a white flag, speaking Hebrew and seeking their assistance have traveled widely, in turn highlighting prior examples of identical “peacetime” atrocities inflicted upon Palestinians. By contrast, there has to date been no “misinformation spouted by Hamas terrorists and their anti-Israel allies” to combat at all.
A LOSING BATTLE
As a result, the 10/7 Project and its founders are placed in the invidious position of having to publicly defend the indefensible – namely, a modern-day genocide unfolding on television screens and front page headlines the world over. In such circumstances, overt and unashamed advocacy work is best conducted behind the scenes. Yet, it is precisely in this context that the 10/7 Project may be most dangerous and potent due to its open-door Oval Office access.
Tireless solidarity efforts by European activists, protesters, citizen journalists, and civil society organizations have produced significant results. Paris went from mulling legislation criminalizing anti-Zionism in November to now leading global pressure for a ceasefire. Multiple governments and opposition leaders are likewise changing their tune. Senior British officials openly warn Netanyahu to drastically rein in his unquenchable bloodlust if he wishes to retain any international support.
Stateside, however, while the crusading work of grassroots pro-Palestine voices and groups has been redoubtable, the Biden administration’s commitment to facilitating, encouraging, and exacerbating the Gaza genocide, however it can, remains undimmed. While the President has demanded Netanyahu’s slaughter be wrapped up by the new year, there is no indication material, financial, and diplomatic support upon which the new Nakba depends is being curtailed. On December 18, during an official visit to Tel Aviv, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin issued a bloodcurdling oath:
This is Israel’s operation, and I’m not here to dictate timelines or terms. Our support [for] Israel’s right to defend itself is ironclad, as you’ve heard me say a number of times, and that’s not going to change.”
One way greater pressure could be brought to bear against the Biden administration might be for citizens to demand their elected representatives in Washington to disclose what dealings they may have had with the 10/7 Project or its representatives since its launch.
To ascertain whether and how White House policy and public pronouncements are being directly informed, if not explicitly dictated, by the wishes and wills of a shadowy and unaccountable lobbying coalition with indeterminate but no doubt intimate political and financial connections to the perpetrators of a 21st century Holocaust.
Kit Klarenberg is an investigative journalist and MintPress News contributor exploring the role of intelligence services in shaping politics and perceptions. His work has previously appeared in The Cradle, Declassified UK, and Grayzone. Follow him on Twitter @KitKlarenberg.
Poland’s new government moves to crack down on ‘hate speech’
Karina Bosak and Dobromir Sośnierz from the Confederation party
BY GRZEGORZ ADAMCZYK | KRESY.PL | JANUARY 22, 2024
Poland’s new government is moving to limit freedom of speech and actively penalize so-called hate speech, a move that has been associated with stifling dissent and limiting opposition to issues surrounding mass immigration, religion, and LGBT issues in other European countries.
Poland’s Confederation party is now voicing its opposition to new proposals outlined in the left-liberal coalition government’s agreement, which will effectively destroy free speech.
“The ruling coalition, as part of its coalition agreement, has announced that they want to penalize so-called hate speech. The current left-wing Deputy Minister of Justice Krzysztof Śmiszek, from the New Left, has stated that his department is currently working on introducing these regulations, which limit freedom of speech and public debate in Poland. We, as the Confederation, strongly oppose this. The direct consequence of criminalizing certain words will, in fact, be the criminalization of conservative, religious, Christian views,” declared Confederation MP Karina Bosak on Friday.
Bosak added that public debate needs to be free, open, and unencumbered. She pointed out that her party “does not want there to be any sacred cows in Poland, that there are social groups whose ideas cannot be criticized at all in a healthy, free public debate.”
“We will defend Poles against such regulations and proposals that threaten freedom of speech and their values,” declared the Confederation MP.
Dobromir Sośnierz, another party member, highlighted concerns about the subjective nature of defining hate speech.
“What the left understands by so-called hate speech, in practice, will mean speech hated by Minister Śmiszek, not necessarily speech that expresses hatred towards someone, but something that leftists dislike,” he remarked.
Sośnierz also warned that such regulations would, in practice, limit public debate.
“This government is starting not by expanding our freedoms but by limiting them again, which will also lead to clogging up the courts,” he added.
In his view, the ministry’s work is “an act of sabotage, especially in this situation where a massive crisis in the judiciary is looming, as well as perhaps the exclusion of certain judges from ruling. Adding more cases for the judiciary to resolve, which are completely unnecessary, will be counterproductive.”
Deputy Minister Śmiszek announced this week legislative changes to introduce criminal responsibility for what his party considers hate speech against homosexuals.
“The time has come to ban disgusting, homophobic, discriminatory statements in the public sphere,” declared Śmiszek, who is openly homosexual.
Meanwhile, the European Parliament is calling on EU leaders to include incitement to hatred and hate crimes in the catalog of transnational crimes, which include terrorism or human trafficking.
Israelis opposing war receiving ‘death threats,’ says Knesset member Ofer Cassif
Lawmaker from the Arab-majority Hadas-Ta’al party and a Knesset member, Ofer Cassif in his office in West Jerusalem on January 12, 2024. [Arif Kayacan – Anadolu Agency]
MEMO | January 20, 2024
Firebrand Israeli lawmaker Ofer Cassif, who has been criticized for backing South Africa’s genocide case against Israel, says “there is an assault going on” against those who are opposing Tel Aviv’s military campaign in Gaza.
The vocal politician from the left-wing, Arab-majority Hadash-Ta’al party, was suspended from the Knesset for 45 days for criticizing the war that began after the Oct. 7 cross-border offensive by Hamas.
The Palestinian death toll from Israel’s more than 100-day bombardment of the Gaza Strip has crossed 24,000 people, most of them women and children.
The initial Hamas attack is said to have killed 1,200 people, and around 240 hostages were taken, some of whom were released during a week-long truce in November.
In a wide-ranging exclusive interview with Anadolu, Cassif said rejection of Israel’s military response has led to “an assault on freedom of speech,” including death threats.
“People are arrested for tweets and posts, not in support of Hamas, of course, but in supporting ending the war, or before even cease-fire. Students are suspended from the universities and colleges. People are fired from their workplaces. The police are brutally violent towards the demonstrators,” Cassif said.
“There is an assault on freedom of speech of those who raise voice against the war … there are death threats. Because it’s not only violence from above, from the government from the prime minister, legitimization of the violence against the protesters, of course by [Itamar] Ben Gvir (national security minister) and the police, which unfortunately mostly became a kind of a private militia of Ben Gvir. But it also penetrates the society as a whole. And you can see that within the society, a growing a part of the public supports, literally and explicitly, violence against those who oppose the war, including death threats.”
‘Region will explode’ if Netanyahu doesn’t go
Cassif said everyone will pay a “huge price” and the entire “region is going to explode” if Israel does not get rid of the “terrible government” headed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
According to him, the only way to stop the catastrophe from happening is by stopping the war, exchange of prisoners and release of all hostages, withdrawal of Israeli military from Gaza, and the beginning of serious peace process.
“This government should go home, if not to prison” as it has caused a lot of damage to both Israelis and Palestinians, he said. “The only way to live, to have a future, to prosper, is this. No war.”
Israeli contradictions
He also highlighted the contradiction in statements of Israeli authorities over the assault on the blockaded enclave, who on one hand say they never intentionally target civilians, but at the same argue there are no innocents in Gaza.
“A minister said ‘… dropping an atomic bomb on Gaza is an option.’ Another member of the Knesset, although a backbencher, said Gaza be eliminated. He used this term eliminated. Netanyahu himself, the prime minister, said Gaza is like Amalek. Amalek is like a codename, a biblical codename, of a group that deserves extermination.
“The president of Israel, who is supposed to be objective and beyond politics, signed a bomb, before it was sent to Gaza. And he also said that there aren’t any innocent people in Gaza. This is only the tip of the iceberg. So how can you say that you do not target civilians, innocent civilians, and at the same time, you say they aren’t innocent civilians. This contradiction shows exactly how this government behaves, what is the policy of this government, and I emphasize this is against Israel too.”
‘What’s going on in Gaza must be investigated by impartial body’
Cassif said he did not want to claim that the Israeli government is pursuing a genocidal policy in the Gaza Strip, arguing: “The legal definition of genocide is one that I leave experts to analyze.”
But, he added, there are two main reasons for him supporting the genocide case in The Hague: conducting an impartial investigation on Gaza bombing, and to save lives.
“What’s going on in Gaza must be investigated by an impartial body. I do not trust the government of Israel or any branch or proxy of the Israeli government to investigate itself … It’s like asking a thief to investigate oneself whether he or she stole something. It doesn’t make any sense,” he said.
“This terrible assault on Gaza is costing the lives of thousands of thousands of Palestinians, and hundreds of Israeli soldiers and Israeli hostages. They (Israeli hostages) are held in terrible conditions by Hamas in Gaza. I want the lives to be saved.”
But that cannot be done just through protests in Israel, he added.
“We cannot demonstrate, we cannot raise our voice. We are limited. There is a dictatorship now here, practically. What’s left is to look for a refuge in international organizations. So that’s the main reason why I think we should have supported the appeal of South Africa.”
Interests of Palestinians and Israelis ‘not contradictory’
“The interests of Israel, and the interests of Palestinians, as far as I see, are not contradictory. I think it’s in common interest of both the Palestinians and the Israelis to seek peace and to end the war,” Cassif said.
The Israeli government, he said, “totally neglected” the hostages. “The government doesn’t do anything to save the hostages. And everybody knows the only way to save the hostages, who are dying there, is by ending the war.”
The parliamentarian claimed 47% of the Israeli public, according to polls, supports ending the war in order to rescue the captives. “I agree with this specific point. I do hope the ICJ will ensure a decision that will end the war.”
Israeli press ‘betrayed’ profession
Asked why the Israeli army does not allow journalists to enter Gaza, Cassif said: “Perhaps they have something to hide … Normally when you don’t allow someone to get into somewhere. It’s because you don’t want someone to see something.”
About press freedom in Israel, Cassif said there have been situations where authorities “mobilize,” or force the media to “publish something and not to publish something else,” but now a vast majority of journalists are “voluntarily” supporting the policy of the government.
“You can say, there are not many limitations on freedom of the press, but the press itself, most of them, choose not to act freely … this is disgraceful, it’s unprofessional, and it will be remembered once this terrible era is ended and finished. It will be remembered that they betrayed the profession.”
‘They want to silence us’
Commenting over a lawmaker’s efforts to get him expelled from the 120-member Knesset, Cassif said “they want to silence” and “don’t want our voice to be heard … the voices against the war. This is the part of the persecution and silencing of the people who support peace and go against violence and war.”
The opposition lawmaker said he believed the efforts against him will succeed, but he will approach the Supreme Court to get relief as “there is no legal basis.”
“According to the law, a member of Knesset can be expelled only if one supports racism, terrorism, or armed struggle against Israel. Neither of those is relevant to me. I’m against racism, I’m against terrorism. I am against armed struggle against Israel.”
He said the claim is based on political reasons. “The world should understand that the assault on Gaza, and the silencing of peace lovers and the democrats in Israel are two sides of the same coin. They continue with a coup they began before Oct. 7 by other means.”
More than 390 educational institutes destroyed in Gaza
Press TV – January 18, 2024
The Palestinian resistance movement Hamas announced the destruction of more than 390 schools, universities, and educational institutions in over 100 days of brutal bombardment of the besieged strip by the Israeli regime.
In a press note issued on Thursday, the resistance movement said, “More than 390 schools, universities, and educational institutions have been destroyed in 100 days, the most recent of which was the bombing of Al-Isra University and the re-bombing of the Islamic University today.”
Hamas said that the destruction of school and university buildings in the Gaza Strip “is a war crime and criminal behavior aimed at destroying all components of human life…” The resistance group stated that Israel is deliberately targeting the education system to erode the national identity of Palestinians.
Calling on the United Nations and other human rights organizations to document and prosecute the regime for its crimes, Hamas said, “We affirm that our people, through their steadfastness, sacrifices, and resistance, will thwart these despicable plans to undermine the educational system and obliterate the deep-rooted national identity of our Palestinian people.”
Gaza’s Ministry of Education announced on Tuesday that 4,368 students have been killed while almost 8000 have been injured since the start of Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip on October 7.
The number of teachers killed is 231 teachers with 756 injured.
Israel’s relentless bombardment has also targeted 65 schools affiliated with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Refugees (UNRWA).
As per the figures given by the Palestinian Health Ministry on Wednesday, the death toll from Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip has surged to 24,448.
Jim Jordan Demands Answers After Biden Admin Caught Flagging “MAGA” And “Trump” To Track Political Opponents’ Financial Transactions
By Tyler Durden | Zero Hedge | January 18, 2024
Jim Jordan, Chairman of the House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government on Wednesday, announced that it had obtained documents revealing that federal agencies have flagged financial transactions for financial institutions for people using politically sensitive words such as “MAGA” and Trump.”
In a letter to Noah Bishoff – who was a former FinCEN Director (Financial Crimes Enforcement Network) – and now an Anti Money Laundering (AML) officer at fintech company Plaid, Inc. Jordan described situations in which Americans buying bibles or shopping at sporting good stores might find their transactions flagged.
New documents obtained by the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government reveal that the federal government flagged terms like “MAGA” and “TRUMP” for financial institutions if Americans used those phrases when completing transactions. Individuals who shopped at stores like Cabela’s or Dick’s Sporting Goods, or purchased religious texts like a bible, may also have had their transactions flagged. This kind of pervasive financial surveillance, carried out in coordination with and at the request of federal law enforcement, into Americans’ private transactions is alarming and raises serious concerns about the FBI’s respect for fundamental civil liberties. – Judiciary.house.gov
“The Committee and Select Subcommittee have obtained documents indicating that following January 6, 2021, FinCEN distributed materials to financial institutions that, among other things, outline the ‘typologies’ of various persons of interest and provide financial institutions with suggested search terms and Merchant Category Codes (MCCs) for identifying transactions on behalf of federal law enforcement,” reads the letter.
“These materials included a document recommending the use of generic terms like ‘TRUMP’ and ‘MAGA’ to ‘search Zelle payment messages’ as well as a ‘prior FinCEN analysis’ of ‘Lone Actor/Homegrown Violent Extremism Indicators,” the letter continues. “According to this analysis, FinCEN warned financial institutions of ‘extremism’ indicators that include ‘transportation charges, such as bus tickets, rental cars, or plane tickets, for travel to areas with no apparent purpose,’ or ‘the purchase of books (including religious texts) and subscriptions to other media containing extremist views.’ In other words, FinCEN urged large financial institutions to comb through the private transactions of their customers for suspicious charges on the basis of protected political and religious expression.”
The Committee announced that it’s seeking interviews with senior intelligence officials, including Bishoff.
EC Chief Ursula von der Leyen calls for public-private collaboration to fight 2024 election “disinformation”
By Cindy Harper | Reclaim The Net | January 17, 2024
The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, delivered an alarming pro-censorship proclamation at the annual Davos World Economic Forum. She expressed her concern that “misinformation” and polarization in societies pose a serious threat to the international business community.
“For the global business community, the top concern for the next two years is not conflict or climate,” she said in her speech to elites. She argued that the bigger problem is “disinformation and misinformation, followed closely by polarization within our societies.”
In her exhortation, Leyen said that there needs to be partnerships formed between governments and the private sector to curb “disinformation.”
“Many of the solutions lie not only in countries working together but, crucially, on businesses and governments, businesses and democracies working together,” she said.
Leyen suggested that it was especially important as 2024 will be “the biggest electoral year in history.”
She added: “Even as the insidious spread of misinformation and disinformation threatens the cohesion of societies, there is a risk that some governments will act too slowly, facing a trade-off between preventing misinformation and protecting free speech, while repressive governments could use enhanced regulatory control to erode human rights.”
Australia: ABC staff threaten strike after Arab journalist sacked
Award-winning journalist and author Antoinette Lattouf
MEMO | January 17, 2024
ABC journalists in the broadcaster’s Sydney offices yesterday threatened to strike unless management addresses concerns over the unlawful dismissal of radio host Antoinette Lattouf, Anadolu news agency reported.
The award-winning journalist and author, who is of Lebanese heritage, was sacked by ABC last month for sharing on Instagram a report by Human Rights Watch (HRW) on the besieged Gaza Strip.
The internationally-recognised rights watchdog released a report on how starvation was being used as “a weapon of war” by the Israeli government in Gaza. ABC also published a news item on the report.
On Tuesday, the Sydney Morning Herald revealed a leaked chain of WhatsApp messages from a group called Lawyers for Israel who had lobbied for Lattouf to be sacked.
“The ABC sacked broadcaster Antoinette Lattouf after a high-level and coordinated letter-writing campaign from pro-Israel lobbyists that directly targeted the corporation’s chair, Ita Buttrose, and managing director David Anderson,” the news daily said.
The report reveals that the Israeli lobby “repeatedly wrote to the ABC demanding Lattouf be sacked, and threatened legal action if she was not.”
Yesterday, about 80 ABC staff members demanded a meeting with Anderson, who is currently on leave.
They threatened to stage a walkout if their concerns were not addressed.
Lattouf has legally challenged her termination, saying she was sacked on the grounds of “political opinion or a reason that included political opinion” and later expanded the claim to include race, due to her Lebanese heritage.
While ABC has denied Anderson was behind Lattouf’s sacking, the broadcaster has told a court that the journalist was removed “because she ignored a direction from managers and shared a controversial social media post from Human Rights Watch.”
Lattouf demands a clear public apology, financial compensation and the offer of a proportionate position.
Hearings are scheduled to begin later this week.
In a statement to the Sydney Morning Herald, Lattouf’s lawyer, Josh Bornstein, said that after “October 7 and the ensuing conflict in the Middle East, it has become common knowledge in the media industry that Arab and Muslim journalists are being subjected to intimidation, censorship and expulsion.”
FBI Director Says Public-Private Sector Partnerships Are Important for Guarding Against “Misinformation”
By Tom Parker | Reclaim The Net | January 14, 2024
During an interview with CNBC, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Christopher Wray lauded his agency’s partnerships with the private sector to target “misinformation” and “disinformation,” despite growing scrutiny over the way these types of partnerships have been used to censor the speech of Americans.
Wray complained that social media has escalated misinformation and disinformation and that AI is “taking it to the next level.” He then lauded private sector partnerships as a way to defend against the proliferation of AI misinformation and disinformation.
“I come back to the importance of partnerships to guard against it,” Wray said. “Not just our partnerships, but there’s an important role for the private sector. For example, AI companies, which many of which are very actively engaged in this fight to help detect deepfakes. You know, in some ways, AI is quite good at detecting AI, and so seeing the private sector invest its own time and money into trying to help detect some of the things that you’re describing I think is an important piece of it. Obviously, government partners, research community, etc., is another piece of it.”
After praising these private sector partnerships that target misinformation and disinformation, Wray attempted to downplay censorship concerns and insisted that these efforts only target foreign actors.
“To be clear, our role at the FBI is focused on the role of the foreign actors, as in the source of the information, not the content,” Wray said. “We’re not the truth police. We don’t aspire to be.”
While Wray asserted that these efforts target foreign actors, lawmakers have previously challenged this assertion and pointed to a federal court ruling that stated the FBI had flagged domestic speech as potential misinformation. This federal court ruling is part of a legal case that’s headed to the Supreme Court and alleges several federal agencies, including the FBI, violated the First Amendment by pressuring Big Tech companies to censor the speech of Americans.
Numerous reports have also detailed how the FBI has flagged the speech of Americans to Big Tech companies for censorship.
‘Witch hunts in Israel’: Teacher placed in solitary confinement for criticizing Gaza killings
Press TV – January 14, 2024
The Israeli regime has held a history teacher in solitary confinement and fired him for raising concerns on social media about the Zionist forces killing of Palestinians in the besieged Gaza Strip and criticizing the military.
Meir Baruchin was kept in solitary confinement in a high-security jail in early November, over a series of Facebook posts he’d made, mourning the civilians killed in Gaza, criticizing the Israeli military, and warning against wars of revenge.
“Horrific images are pouring in from Gaza. Entire families were wiped out. I don’t usually upload pictures like this, but look what we do in revenge,” said his message on 8 October, a day after the Israeli regime started a genocidal war in Gaza in response to Hamas’ October 7 Operation Al-Aqsa Strom.
“Anyone who thinks this is justified because of what happened yesterday should unfriend themselves. I ask everyone else to do everything possible to stop this madness. Stop it now. Not later, Now!!!” he wrote below a picture of the family of Abu Daqqa, killed in one of the first airstrikes on Gaza.
Ten days after that Facebook message, he was fired from his teaching job in Petach Tikvah municipality. Less than a month later he was in the solitary confinement wing of al-Qud’s notorious “Russian Compound” prison, detained to give police more time to investigate critical views he had never tried to hide.
Baruchin was initially told to come to a police station for questioning over charges of sedition. When he pointed out to police that they needed a warrant from the attorney general to charge an Israeli citizen with that offense, treason charges were duly drawn up.
When he arrived at the police station, his arms and ankles were cuffed, and he was shown a warrant to search his home. Five detectives escorted him there, turned his apartment upside down, and eventually confiscated two laptops and six hard drives. The police then asked for more time to investigate, and a judge ordered that he be detained.
“I wasn’t allowed to take anything with me to the cell,” he told the Observer. “I walked in with my clothes on and stayed with the same clothes for four days. There were cold-water showers, a tiny piece of soap, two blankets stinking from cigarette smoke, and a tiny towel,” he said.
He was interrogated again before a second judge ordered his release.
But he is living on savings while he waits for the verdict and even if he wins the treason charges have not been dropped: he could live in their shadow for five years, the limit for the police to prosecute.
He is not the only teacher to be targeted. Authorities also summoned Yael Ayalon, head of a Tel Aviv high school, after she shared a Haaretz article warning that Israeli media was hiding the suffering of Gaza’s civilians. “Israeli citizens need to be aware of this reality,” the piece said.
“This story is much bigger than my personal story, or Yael’s personal story. It is a time of witch hunts in Israel, of political persecution,” he said. “I became a ‘Hamas supporter’ because I expressed my opposition to targeting innocent civilians.”
He said he’d received hundreds of private messages of support from fellow teachers and students who were too frightened to go public, and showed several to the Observer.
“The message is crystal clear: keep silent, watch out,” he says, adding that they strengthened his conviction about speaking out. “I thought to myself, when I retire, I might conclude this is the most significant lesson I ever gave in civics.”
He still follows what is happening in Gaza closely, and flicks on his phone through images of the recent dead, a journalist, a violinist, a baby.
His latest post before the interview with the Observer was an image of an improvised grave marker, that looks like part of a broken piece of furniture. “Unknown martyr, green jacket and trainers,” the inscription reads.
“The whole story in one picture,” he says. “The Israeli mainstream media don’t broadcast this picture. They don’t get this picture, and don’t want to get this picture.”
Australia’s eSafety Commissioner Complains About X Reinstating Censored Accounts
By Didi Rankovic | Reclaim The Net | January 12, 2024
Without considering the possibility that there were perhaps too many of them to begin with – Australia’s eSafety Commissioner is complaining in a new report that X, since the Musk takeover, has fired too many “safety and public policy personnel.”
Another complaint from the commissioner’s “transparency report” is about previously censored accounts getting reinstated on the platform.
The sum of the new policy, according to this Australian office – a government agency that’s “independent (but) supported by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA)” – is that X is now less capable of “tackling online hate.”
It is no wonder that these accusations are made by eSafety, considering that it has been given powers to deal with what’s described as “cyberbullying, image-based abuse, and illegal and harmful online content.”
Basing the report on information obtained from X, eSafety writes that 80 percent of “safety engineers” have been let go since October 2022 (the same figure applies to global public policy staff). Moderators working for X have fared somewhat better – still, over 50 percent of them have been fired.
Considering that these employees were doing more than simply moderating – there have been many confirmed and very controversial cases on clear censorship against content and accounts – free speech supporters are likely fine to learn these precise numbers for the first time.
However, the Australian eSafety is not, taking a negative stance toward the developments and warning that they have “implications for Australian users.”
Commissioner Julie Inman Grant is quoted in the report as saying that, “It’s almost inevitable that any social media platform will become more toxic and less safe for users if you combine significant reductions to safety and local public policy personnel with thousands of account reinstatements of previously banned users.”
About that last point – we now know that the number of banned accounts that have been allowed back on X is at this point in excess of 6,100. But, the Australian office is not even sure if these figures concern X’s operations globally or just in Australia – although eSafety “understands” the latter to be the case, and draws this understanding from media saying earlier that a total of more than 62,000 accounts have been reinstated.
The commissioner is also displeased with the fact that X did not find it necessary to place “additional scrutiny” on these accounts – banned under previous ownership, and its policies.
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Precedents for Pizzagate
Marc Dutroux, Belgian pedophile, sadist, and serial killer with friends in high places
By Aedon Cassiel | Counter – Currents | December 23, 2016
To reiterate a point that should be clear to the more astute reader, my goal in this series (part 1, part 2) has not been to defend “Pizzagate” as such. My goal has been to defend the people who want to investigate it against specific accusations levied against them by people who think Pizzagate has revealed no intriguing information at all—for a specific reason, which I will be honing in and focusing on much more directly in this closing entry.
Whereas the mainstream critics of Pizzagate would have you believe that the dividing line is between paranoid conspiracy theorist followers of “fake news” and level-headed people who follow trustworthy news sources and rely on cold, hard reason to determine the truth, my goal has been to show that—whatever is or is not happening with Pizzagate itself—this framing of the issue is arrogant, insulting, and the product of extremely narrow tunnel vision. … continue
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- Climate Scientist Who Predicted End Of “Heavy Frost And Snow” Now Refuses Media Inquiries
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