US needs ‘Department of Offense, not Defense’ – presidential candidate
US presidential candidate Nikki Haley speaks at a campaign event on Saturday in Pella, Iowa. © Getty Images / Scott Olson
RT | October 22, 2023
Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley has called for instilling fear in Washington’s foreign enemies by transforming the US Department of Defense into the “Department of Offense.”
Speaking at a campaign event on Friday in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Haley demanded that the US respond to the Israel-Hamas war by providing the Israeli government and military with “whatever they need whenever they need it.” She added that Washington’s goal must be to “eliminate Hamas, not weaken them,” and she called for cutting off government funding to colleges whose students or employees hold protests in support of the Palestinians.
Haley, a former South Carolina governor who served as US ambassador to the UN under then-President Donald Trump, suggested that the administration of US President Joe Biden must not be fooled by Friday’s release of two American hostages by Hamas. “They are doing this to earn favor with America because they want to try and look good in the eyes of America,” she said. “Don’t fall for it.”
Having a stronger military and strong leadership in the White House could have prevented the war in Israel, as well as the Russia-Ukraine conflict, Haley argued. Biden’s botched withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan in 2021 and his administration’s recent prisoner-swap agreement with Iran emboldened America’s enemies, she claimed, adding that only a stronger military can restore US credibility.
“We’ve got to be smart, and we’ve got to be ready,” Haley said. “I’m tired of talking about a ‘department of defense’. I want a ‘department of offense’. Every enemy needs to fear us.”
Haley is calling for a bigger and apparently more aggressive military despite the fact that the Pentagon already boasts annual spending of nearly $832 billion – exceeding the world’s nine next largest defense budgets combined. The US has about 750 bases in 80 countries, and it has a long history of regime-change programs and military interventions around the world.
“This woman is a crazed warmonger,” US podcast host Joey Mannarino said in an X (formerly Twitter) post. “Don’t let the sweet Southern accent fool you. She’d have us in every war she could find.”
Haley has reportedly been enriched by the US military industrial complex since resigning as Trump’s UN ambassador in October 2018. She was hired as a board member with US defense contractor Boeing in 2019. Although she left the company the following year, she still owned as much as $250,000 in Boeing stock as of a financial disclosure filing in May.
Haley has earned six-figure fees for speaking engagements, including over $230,000 from the Center for Israel and Jewish Affairs, and she was paid $127,500 for her work as a consultant to an advocacy group called United Against a Nuclear Iran, which has lobbied for military strikes against Tehran. She also netted more than $708,000 in consulting fees from Prism Global Management LLC, an investment fund, and her husband holds stakes in two firms with ties to the defense industry.
Ukraine’s leaders are controlled by US – German ex-chancellor
Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder © Photo by Kay Nietfeld/dpa via Getty Images
RT | October 21, 2023
Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder has argued in a newspaper interview that the US government didn’t “allow” any compromises that could have brought an end to the Russia-Ukraine conflict just weeks after Moscow’s military offensive began in February 2022.
Speaking in an interview published by Germany’s Berliner Zeitung newspaper on Friday, Schroeder said he was asked to help mediate the March 2022 peace negotiations between Ukrainian and Russian officials in Istanbul. He said that although representatives of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky were open to making concessions on such key issues as renouncing efforts to join NATO, “the Ukrainians did not agree to peace because they were not allowed to. They first had to ask the Americans about everything they discussed.”
Russian officials have repeatedly claimed that the US and other Western backers of Ukraine discouraged Zelensky’s government from agreeing to a peace settlement. Schroeder, who has defended his continuing friendship with Russian President Vladimir Putin, essentially confirmed that allegation in the Berliner Zeitung interview. “My impression: Nothing could happen because everything else was decided in Washington,” he said.
The ex-chancellor described Washington’s strategy as “fatal,” saying it resulted in closer ties between Russia and China. “The Americans believe they can keep the Russians down,” Schroeder said. “Now, it is the case that two actors, China and Russia, who are limited by the USA, are joining forces. Americans believe they are strong enough to keep both sides in check. In my humble opinion, this is a mistake. Just look how torn the American side is now. Look at the chaos in Congress.”
Washington’s allies in Western Europe “failed” to seize the opportunity to push for peace in March 2022, Schroeder said. At the time, he added, Zelensky was open to compromise on Crimea and breakaway territories in the Donbass region. Since that time, hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian troops have been killed as Western military aid prolongs the conflict. Putin estimated earlier this month that Kiev lost over 90,000 soldiers in the failed counteroffensive that began in June.
“The arms deliveries are not a solution for eternity, but no one wants to talk,” Schroeder said. “Everyone is sitting in trenches. How many more people have to die? It’s a bit like the Middle East. Who are the victims on one side and on the other? Poor people who lose their children.”
Schroeder argued that only French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz can revive peace talks in Eastern Europe. “Scholz and Macron should actually support a peace process in Ukraine because it’s not just an American matter, but above all a European matter.” He added, “Why did Scholz and Macron not combine the arms deliveries with an offer to talk? Macron and Scholz are the only ones who can talk to Putin.”
Russian leaders were threatened by the US push to bring NATO to Moscow’s western border by adding Ukraine to the Western military alliance, Schroeder said. However, he claimed that one of the justifications for arming Ukraine – alleged Russian expansionism – had no basis in reality.
“This fear of the Russians coming is absurd,” Schroeder said. “How are they supposed to defeat NATO, let alone occupy Western Europe?” He added, “That is why no one in Poland, the Baltics and certainly not in Germany – all NATO members, by the way – has to believe they are in danger.”
On the other hand, Schroeder insisted, Western leaders must understand that no matter who is in power in Moscow, Russia won’t allow either Ukraine or Georgia to be absorbed by NATO. “This threat analysis may be emotional, but it is real in Russia,” he said. “The West must understand this and accept compromises accordingly. Otherwise, peace will be difficult to achieve.”
Pentagon’s Crafty Plan: Ukraine to Receive ‘Frankenstein’ Air Defenses From US
By Andrey Kots – Sputnik – 21.10.2023
The Pentagon has greenlit a new air defense project custom-made for Kiev. According to US media reports, Ukraine will receive anti-aircraft missile systems produced in an unusual manner by the US defense industry. Sputnik examines what Washington has in mind.
The Ukrainian military is experiencing a serious shortage of anti-aircraft defenses. This is because of the Russian forces’ use of long-range Lancet kamikaze drones, and the Russian Aerospace Forces deployment of precision-guided glide bombs, which have greatly thinned the ranks of the Ukrainian Armed Forces’ frontline air defenses. To protect infantry and equipment, Kiev has been forced to move its air defense systems closer to the front, where they can fall prey to cheap Russian FPV drones.
Consequently, Kiev’s requests for advanced air defenses from its Western patrons have become increasingly urgent. The armed conflict that has broken out in the Middle East has exacerbated the problem. Israel asked for help from the US on the first day of hostilities. The Pentagon is on the horns of a dilemma – whether Israel or Ukraine is more deserving of its support. The latest rhetoric would suggest that Washington is more inclined to help Tel Aviv, with Ukraine left scrambling for whatever scraps are left.
Old ‘Monsters’ for the Frontline
Step forward the FrankenSAM (a portmanteau word of “Frankenstein” and “SAM” [surface-to-air missile]) program. The plan involves the development and production of improvised air defense systems using components and materials from Ukrainian, US and allied stockpiles. Old decommissioned anti-aircraft missiles will be repurposed as ammunition for these “chimeras”.
According to one major international news agency, the US Department of Defense believes this approach will quickly provide the Ukrainian Armed Forces with some much-needed air defense capabilities. This, in turn, will prepare the Ukrainian army for the winter campaign.
In this way, Washington hopes to achieve three goals at once: it will load its defense industry up with orders for “FrankenSAMs”, get rid of obsolete explosives, and demonstrate “support for its ally” to the world.
A Reagan-Era Veteran Missile
According to the media, the Pentagon is working on three projects as part of the FrankenSAM program. The first is almost finished: Ukraine will initially receive a ground-based short-range air defense system with AIM-9M Sidewinder missiles, according to the news agency’s source. Without going into detail, the source explained that the chassis, launchers, radar and other equipment for the system will be provided by the US and its allies. This, the media outlet noted, will help “meet Kiev’s vital air defense needs” and tackle related issues.
Washington announced the delivery of Sidewinder missiles in August, after the release of what was then its latest military aid package. This raised many questions, as the missile is of the air-to-air variety. Ukrainian fighter jets still in service are not capable of firing it without significant modifications to their on-board electronic systems, and the first F-16s for the Ukrainian armed forces are not expected until next spring at the earliest.
In addition, the Sidewinder is only effective at short range, whereas Russian pilots prefer long-range engagements. The news about the modification of these missiles for ground use clarifies the situation.
The AIM-9 Sidewinder is the grandfather of a weapons system that entered production in 1956 and has undergone several upgrades over the years. The forthcoming short-range air defense version of the system will be equipped with the 9M variant, introduced in 1983 and actively used during Operation Desert Storm. The period of most extensive production coincided with the years of this conflict.
In the early 2000s, this modification was replaced by the more advanced AIM-9X, with the Reagan-era AIM-9M variants stored away. It’s unknown how effective these 30-year-old missiles will be against modern Russian aircraft, but the fact is that the US has enough of these munitions to supply Ukraine for months.
Americanized ‘Buk’
The second offspring of the FrankenSAM project will be an air defense system based on early versions of the Soviet Buk missile system. The Americans plan to modernize Ukraine’s remaining inventory of these systems to accommodate outdated AIM-7 Sparrow air-to-air missiles, which were also introduced in 1956.
Unlike the AIM-9, the AIM-7 Sparrow is a medium-range air defense missile capable of engaging targets up to 20 to 25 kilometers away. The original Buk missiles have a much longer range, but it appears that Ukraine has almost none left.
It’s known that the “Buks” will be modified to use the RIM-7 Sea Sparrow ship-based variant of the missile. It seems to be easier to adapt a naval version for land-based launches than an airborne one. Also, similar adaptations have been made before. In the early 1990s, the Pentagon provided Taiwan with 500 RIM-7 missiles modified for ground-based launch. But during exercises in 2012, three of Taiwan’s Sea Sparrows malfunctioned and crashed into the sea, prompting Taipei to stop using the missiles.
It’s unlikely that the American Sparrow arsenal has miraculously become more reliable over the past 11 years. It’s also unclear whether these missiles will pose a greater threat to Russian aviation or to the Ukrainians themselves in the area where Ukrainian air defenses are deployed.
The same question applies to the third known component of the FrankenSAM project. The Pentagon is working on the modernization of the HAWK medium-range surface-to-air defense system, which was introduced in 1959. Ukraine already operates several of these systems, but no reports on their success have been published by Ukrainian command.
However, improvised air defenses can be effective. The Yugoslav experience in 1999 demonstrated this when an outdated Serbian S-125 system successfully shot down a state-of-the-art American stealth fighter, the F-117.
Furthermore, the FrankenSAM project is unlikely to be an attempt to move away from the Ukrainian issue and gradually cut off military supplies.
Rather, “the US and the European Union have a consolidated position whereby – at least for the next three years – the volume of arms and military equipment supplies to Ukraine will be maintained and will tend to increase,” said Igor Korotchenko, a military analyst and editor-in-chief of National Defense magazine. “We must not delude ourselves with false hopes and illusions that the support will stop, especially in light of recent reports of contradictions in the West.”
The FrankenSAM project is likely to be a temporary fix. The US is at present actively reviving its defense production to replenish depleted stockpiles – its own, Ukraine’s, and those of NATO allies. The purpose of these makeshift anti-aircraft missile “monsters” is to buy the Ukrainian military time until factories are operating at full capacity.
Biden Speech on Aid to Israel, Ukraine Embodied ‘America Last’ Policy, Says Ex-US Diplomat
Sputnik – 21.10.2023
WASHINGTON – The president made a rare address to the nation on Thursday in which he argued that funding Israel and Ukraine was a matter of US security.
President Joe Biden’s nationally broadcast speech seeking broad support for stepping up already huge levels of US aid to Ukraine and Israel was another unthinking, reflexive expression of the globalist mindset that has been destroying the US economy and society over the past several decades in pursuit of crazed international goals, former State Department diplomat James Carden said.
“The speech will be remembered, if at all, as a perfect encapsulation of the ‘America Last’ mindset of our ruling class, which privileges foreign countries over middle and working class Americans,” Carden said.
The US president said he was requesting that Congress fund renewed supplies of weapons and other aid to President Volodymyr Zelensky’s regime in Ukraine and he was linking that goal with pushing through a parallel enormous increased aid package to Israel as it prepares to invade Gaza to eliminate Hamas.
However, Carden pointed out that Biden paid no attention to the out of control crime, security, economic, social and drug crises now sweeping the United States.
Biden spent no time at all addressing the sufferings of the domestic communities that have been destroyed over the past three decades by free trade agreements, endless wars and an open border policy that has flooded the country with fentanyl and opioids which are killing what little remains of their communities, Carden said.
The almost-81-year-old president gave no hint of new thinking, moderation, compromise or flexibility in his address, Carden added.
“Biden’s speech signals that there will be no rethinking US policy toward Ukraine or the Middle East,” he said, adding that instead, the “strategic assumptions in the speech were absurd and obsolete”.
Biden’s comments “validated George Kennan’s view that the United States is similar to one of those prehistoric monsters with a body as long as this room and a brain the size of a pin,” Carden added.
The Biden administration is requesting from Congress funds in the amount of $106 billion, primarily for the defense needs of Ukraine and Israel, but also for strengthening the United States’ position in the Indo-Pacific and for operations on the southern US border. Of the total sum, the administration is requesting more than $60 billion for Ukraine.
Israeli economy plunges into recession
The Cradle | October 20, 2023
Israeli economists have reported a major recession due to the ongoing war against the Palestinian resistance factions.
“Israel has entered the war, and it is in a recession, and trade is currently zero,” Israeli daily business paper, The Marker, noted.
The Israeli economy has taken a serious hit at the hands of Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, losing $3 billion in damages on the first day of the war alone, a state that some economists say is worse than it was during their 2006 war with Hezbollah.
The Marker report went on to say, “the second week of the war is about to end, a week when there is almost no trade in Israel, and many are trying to stay with their heads above the water, afraid of the future – and they still don’t know who will compensate them and when?”
US economic risk analysis firm Moody’s has put the Israeli A1 rating, a high rating attractive to any investor, on hold, given the current crisis.
Fitch Ratings had also negatively reviewed Israeli economic status, placing their credit score on a negative watch earlier this week.
“While not our base case, such large-scale escalation, in addition to human loss, could result in significant additional military spending, destruction of infrastructure, sustained change in consumer and investment sentiment and thus lead to a large deterioration of Israel’s credit metrics,” Fitch Ratings wrote in a statement.
No previous war or global economic crisis has downgraded Israel’s rating by any of the major economic rating companies. These downgrades can make future trade more difficult for Israel.
Interest rates are at the highest they have been since the 2006 war with Lebanon.
According to a Bloomberg report, the shekel is among the world’s worst-performing currencies this month despite a $45 billion package of emergency measures.
Two days after the start of the current war, on 9 October, the Bank of Israel sold off $30 billion in foreign reserves in an attempt to prevent the currency from further falling under the dollar.
This increasing economic decline is an addition to the already faulty economy.
US conducts underground explosion at nuclear test site
RT | October 20, 2023
The US has conducted an underground explosion at a nuclear testing range in Nevada, just after Russian lawmakers approved the withdrawal from an international treaty that bans all nuclear tests.
The experiment at the Nevada National Security Site (NNSS) on Wednesday involved “chemical high-explosives and radiotracers,” a statement by the US Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) said.
“These experiments advance our efforts to develop new technology in support of US nuclear nonproliferation goals,” Corey Hinderstein, the NNSA’s deputy administrator for defense nuclear nonproliferation, stated. “They will help reduce global nuclear threats by improving the detection of underground nuclear explosive tests.”
Several US laboratories collected data using various types of sensors, which will “help validate new predictive explosion models and detection algorithms,” the press release added.
The US experiment took place just hours after the Russian State Duma, the lower chamber of the parliament, passed a bill on withdrawing the ratification of the 1996 Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT). The move is meant to achieve parity with the US, which did not ratify the international agreement.
Mikhail Ulyanov, the Russian envoy to the UN in Vienna, reiterated Moscow’s commitment to maintaining an unofficial moratorium on testing once the withdrawal from the CTBT is finalized, unless its hand is forced.
“Never say never. Tests may resume under certain circumstances. I believe that such a development would be negative for the modern world, for maintaining stability,” he said in an interview with Russian media. “We have enough turbulence in international relations and wouldn’t want another powerful factor added.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that if the US resumes nuclear testing, which he believes it may do as part of the modernization of its arsenal, Moscow will follow suit. Neither nation has conducted live nuclear tests since the early 1990s. Moscow’s last test was in 1990, before the USSR collapsed.
Russia’s Questions on US Military Biological Program in Ukraine Remain Unanswered
Sputnik – 18.10.2023
UNITED NATIONS – The questions posed by Russia to the United States and Ukraine about their military biological program remain unanswered and need to be addressed, Russian Foreign Ministry Non-Proliferation and Arms Control Department Deputy Director Kosntantin Vorontsov stated on Wednesday.
“Our well-founded questions to the US and Ukraine have yet to receive a proper response. They remain open and need to be addressed,” Vorontsov stressed during a meeting of the UN General Assembly First Committee.
Vorontsov pointed out that Russia has provided a “mass of evidence” regarding the US military biological program and emphasized that the facts regarding its implementation in Ukraine with the support of the Defense Department and affiliated entities requires close attention.
“The projects carried out in Ukrainian laboratories lead to the conclusion that biological weapons components were being developed in close proximity to Russian territory,” Vorontsov emphasized.
Since March 2022, Russia has repeatedly accused the United States of conducting in Ukraine biological research for military purposes. Russia has pointed out that up to 30 biological laboratories in Ukraine were likely involved in biological weapons production. The United States has denied the allegation.
Russian jets armed with Kinzhal missiles to patrol Black Sea – Putin
RT | October 18, 2023
Russian President Vladimir Putin told journalists on Wednesday that he has ordered warplanes to conduct regular patrols of the neutral airspace over the Black Sea.
“Our MiG-31 planes are armed with Kinzhal missile systems. It is known that they have a range of over 1,000 km and a Mach-9 speed,” he said at a press conference in Beijing.
The announcement was not meant as a threat, Putin stressed, but rather a reaction to escalating instability, particularly in the Middle East. He mentioned the US’ deployment of two aircraft carrier strike groups to the Mediterranean Sea in support of Israel as a factor.
As stipulated by Putin, the range of the hypersonic weapons potentially puts the eastern part of the sea within striking distance of Russian patrols.
Putin reported the development after commenting on the confirmation by the US that it had supplied several ATACMS ground-launched ballistic missiles to Ukraine, providing a new military capability for Kiev’s forces fighting Russia. The president called it a mistake for several reasons, such as dragging the US deeper into the conflict.
“Let no one say they have nothing to do with it. We believe they do,” he stressed.
He also described as “laughable” the notion that Russia has “already lost” in Ukraine. US President Joe Biden voiced it on several occasions during the conflict in the sense that Moscow supposedly wanted to conquer the entire country and failed to do that. The Russian government denied ever having such aspirations.
“If Russia has lost the war, why supply ATACMS? Let him take back the ATACMS and the rest of the weapons, get some pancakes, and come to us for a tea party,” Putin mused.
In an interview with CBS News last Sunday, Biden urged the audience to imagine a future in which “we, in fact, unite all of Europe and Putin is finally put down,” claiming it was achievable.
War with Hamas deals ‘severe economic blow’ to Israel
The Cradle | October 17, 2023
Eleven days into its war with the Hamas-led Palestinian resistance, Israel is paying a heavy economic toll, Maariv reported on 17 October.
The Israeli newspaper reported that “the Israeli economy appears to have already begun to pay a heavy price for the war,” which began on 7 October with the start of Hamas’ Al-Aqsa Flood Operation.
The newspaper explained in a report published Tuesday that “4.6 billion shekels [$1.1 billion] is the price paid by the Israeli economy as a result of workers not coming to work and low productivity in Israeli institutions.”
According to the analysis of the economic department of Israel’s Manufacturers Union, the closure of the education system, blocking of traffic routes, and the extensive mobilization of the army reserves has also hurt economic productivity.
In total, it is estimated that about 1.3 million Israeli workers did not go to work this week.
In southern Israel, some 85 percent of workers were absent from their jobs, along with about 20 percent of workers in the rest of Israel.
The head of the Manufacturers’ Union and the head of the Employers and Companies Association, Ron Tomer, said after the harsh assessments that “there is no doubt that the war constitutes a severe economic blow to the economy.”
According to Maariv, this estimate does not take into account “additional and very significant financial damage, which will only be assessed economically at the end of the fighting, such as direct damage to factories and damage to profitability.”
In addition to decreased productivity, Israel will see indirect damage, such as the damage to the reputation of Israeli companies with customers abroad, cancelled transactions, failure to adhere to schedules, and the depreciation of the shekel.
Should the conflict widen to include not just Hamas but also Iran, a key backer of the Palestinians, Bloomberg estimates oil prices could climb to $150 a barrel and cause a global recession that takes about $1 trillion off world output.
Iranian involvement on the Palestinian side could lead to a cut in Iranian oil output and a tightening of western sanctions hindering Iranian oil sales.
Bloomberg notes further that an oil shock of this size would also derail the worldwide effort to rein in inflation. In the US, the Federal Reserve’s 2 percent inflation target would not be met, and costly gasoline would be a hurdle for President Joe Biden’s re-election campaign.
Another possibility is that Iran could close the Strait of Hormuz, the world’s single-most important energy corridor. Globally, over one-sixth of oil and one-third of liquefied natural gas passes through the narrow strait
“The gas market is calm but tense,” Henning Gloystein, director for energy, climate and resources at the Eurasia Group think tank said.
“It doesn’t take much to go into a fever pitch. We had the Ukraine war, Russian gas supply cuts, oil cap sanctions and now you have war in the Middle East as well — that’s a problem,” he said.
West ‘stomps’ on Russian-drafted resolution for Gaza ceasefire
The Cradle | October 17, 2023
A Russian-drafted resolution for a humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza failed to pass at the UN Security Council (UNSC) on 16 October.
China, Russia, Gabon, Mozambique, and the UAE voted in favor of the resolution, while the US, UK, France, and Japan voted against it. Albania, Brazil, Ecuador, Ghana, Malta, and Switzerland all abstained from voting.
The text of the resolution called for an immediate humanitarian truce, the release of prisoners, access to aid, and the safe evacuation of civilians.
Vassily Nebenzia, Russia’s Permanent Representative to the UN, condemned the UNSC failure to pass the resolution and slammed the “selfish intention of the western bloc,” which he said “basically stomped” on international calls for de-escalation and an end to violence.
He added that the resolution was needed to respond to the “unprecedented exacerbation” of the calamity inside the Gaza Strip, where Israel has continued to bomb 2.2 million Palestinians trapped inside and prevent the entry of humanitarian aid.
Washington’s representative, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, denounced the resolution for failing to condemn “Hamas terrorism.”
“By failing to condemn Hamas, Russia is giving cover to a terrorist group that brutalizes innocent civilians. It is outrageous, hypocritical, and indefensible. We cannot allow this Council to unfairly shift the blame to Israel and excuse Hamas for its decades of cruelty,” she said.
The failed resolution came the same day Russian President Vladimir Putin held phone calls with the presidents of Iran, Syria, Egypt, and the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“The Israeli side was in particular informed of the essential points of telephone correspondences that took place today with the leaders of Palestine, Egypt, Iran, and Syria,” the Kremlin said in a statement.
Close to 3,000 Palestinians have been killed and about 10,000 wounded due to Israel’s indiscriminate bombing of civilian infrastructure in the Gaza Strip.
The Rafah crossing with Egypt, the only entry for humanitarian aid to Gaza, has remained shut despite multiple reports of an agreement between Egypt and Israel, which Tel Aviv has denied.
“The process of opening the crossing is a joint Palestinian-Egyptian process, subject to clear working mechanisms, and requires prior coordination, which has not happened until now [due to] lack of coordination, in addition to the intense bombing to which the crossing was subjected by the Israeli occupation forces,” Salama Marouf, director of the media office of the Hamas-led government in Gaza, said on Tuesday.
Israel has bombed the aid route several times over the past few days, including on 16 August.
Any talk of truce “comes in the context of the psychological warfare waged by the Israeli occupation,” Marouf added.
Hungary PM Orbán meets with Putin in Beijing
BY THOMAS BROOKE | REMIX NEWS | OCTOBER 17, 2023
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Beijing on Tuesday to discuss ongoing bilateral agreements between the two nations.
The pair were snapped shaking hands in the Chinese capital — the first photographed handshake between Putin and an EU leader since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February last year.
Orbán told the Russian president that “Hungary has never sought to confront Russia” and has always and will continue to “pursue the goal of building and expanding the best communication,” reported Russia’s state-run news agency TASS.
“In Europe today, one question is on everyone’s mind: Will there be a ceasefire in Ukraine? For us Hungarians, too, the most important thing is that the flood of refugees, the sanctions, and the fighting in our neighboring country should end,” Orbán posted on X following the meeting.
Budapest has maintained relatively close relations with Moscow and faced the wrath of the European Union for steering its own course through the conflict in Ukraine and refusing to present a united front with other EU leaders.
Orbán’s administration has long opposed the provision of arms to Kyiv, which it claims is prolonging the conflict and increasing the death toll, and has advocated for an immediate ceasefire and peace talks.
The rendezvous exerts further pressure on Brussels, which requires Hungary’s approval for proposed budget reforms in order to unlock further funding for Ukraine.
“Given the fact that in today’s geopolitical conditions the opportunities for maintaining contacts and developing relations are very limited, it can only cause satisfaction that our relations with many European countries are maintained and developed. One of these countries is Hungary,” Putin told Orban.
The meeting was criticized by U.S. Ambassador to Hungary David Pressman who accused Orbán of “pleading for business deals” while Russia continues its aggression in Ukraine.
“Hungary’s leader chooses to stand with a man whose forces are responsible for crimes against humanity in Ukraine, and alone among our Allies,” he posted on X.
This interpretation of the meeting was questioned by the Hungarian prime minister’s political director, Balázs Orbán, who claimed that Budapest was “fed up” with Pressman’s “hypocrisy.”
“If the question is who’s doing business with the Russians, the Americans should turn down the volume. They are buying more than twice as much nuclear fuel alone as they used to, and we have a whole list of them,” he added.
“Since your president refuses to talk about ending this war, someone has to,” quipped Koskovics Zoltán, a geopolitical analyst at the Budapest-based Center for Fundamental Rights.
Both leaders arrived in Beijing at the invitation of Chinese President Xi ahead of an international forum on China’s Belt and Road Initiative.
Earlier on Tuesday, Orbán met with the Chinese leader to discuss the strengthening of Hungarian-Chinese relations.
“Connectivity instead of decoupling: This is the Hungarian model. Our aim is to strengthen Hungarian-Chinese relations. This is good for Hungary and good for the European economy,” he said in a statement.
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Woolsey Fire started at Santa Susana Field Lab — where “radioactive materials released were never accurately measured”
By John Laforge | CounterPunch | November 30, 2018
In my Nov. 16 column, I reported on potential radiation risks posed by California’s Woolsey wildfire having burned over parts or all of the Santa Susana Field Laboratory—south of Simi Valley, Calif., 30 miles outside Los Angeles—site of at least four partial or total nuclear reactor meltdowns.
The field laboratory operated 10 experimental reactors and conducted rocket engine tests. In his 2014 book Atomic Accidents, researcher James Mahaffey writes, “The cores in four experimental reactors on site … melted.” Reactor core melts always result in the release of large amounts of radioactive gases and particles. Clean up of the deeply contaminated site has not been conducted in spite of a 2010 agreement.
Los Angeles’s KABC-7 TV reported Nov. 13 that the Santa Susana lab site “appears to be the origin of the Woolsey Fire” which has torched over 96,000 acres. Southern Calif. Public Radio said, “According to Cal Fire, the Woolsey Fire started on the afternoon of Thursday, Nov. 8 … on the Santa Susana site.” … continue
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- Devastating Assessment Of Comirnaty Vaccine By Former Senior Pfizer Europe Toxicologist
- New Study: CO2 Is ‘Effectively Negligible’ As An Explanatory Climate Change Factor Since 2000
- Former Pfizer Toxicologist Dr. Helmut Sterz Tells Bundestag Hearing Pfizer Vaccine Should Have Never Been Approved
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