“I Am Open”: 50,000 Italian Restaurant Owners Plan to Ignore Lockdown
Huge act of civil disobedience plans to conduct business as usual inspite of “anti-Covid” measures
OffGuardian | January 15, 2021
Today – Friday 15th January – over 50,000 restaurants are planning to open, an act of mass civil disobedience against “anti-Covid” lockdown measures which have massively hurt the restaurant business, especially small family-owned businesses.
Spreading through social media under the hashtag #IoOpro (“I am opening”), the movement is largest country-wide act of civil disobedience since lockdowns began.
Italain opposition MP Vittorio Sgarbi has backed the movement, saying in an interview:
Open up, & don’t worry, in the end we will make them eat their fines”.
Italy’s government is already facing internal conflict and crisis, an early election is a possibility.
A similar movement already started in Mexico on January 12th, when hundreds of restaurant owners gathered to protest the lockdowns.
The “I am Open” protest is spreading across Europe as well, with variants already taking hold in German-speaking Switzerland (#Wirmachenauf) and Poland (#OtwieraMY).
It’s good to be reminded that, no matter how much it looks like the new normal is spreading unopposed, it’s not. People all over the world are resisting where they can. That’s what “Covid Positive” is all about.
To follow the progress of this movement we recommended following Robin Monotti and the It’s Time to Rise accounts on twitter and other platforms.
2020: Annus Horribilis, The Worst Is Yet to Come? Poverty, Unemployment, Despair
By Stephen Lendman | January 1, 2021
For most Americans, 2020 was disastrous for their safety, well-being and future.
Unprecedented numbers of people lost jobs — a greater percent of working-age Americans than in the 1930s Great Depression.
Millions more became way underemployed earning poverty wages with few or no benefits — struggling daily to survive.
Well over 100,000 small businesses went bankrupt or otherwise shut down permanently because of draconian lockdowns, quarantines and related policies.
According to Gallup survey data, “Americans’ mental health ratings s(ank) to a new low” in 2020 — with no end to mass-misery in prospect.
Chicago’s Water Tower Place is the city’s preeminent downtown shopping mall along its Magnificent Mile.
Its survival is threatened by lack of enough retail traffic.
A city news report said there’s “real anxiety that Chicago’s main shopping districts — the Magnificent Mile and Gold Coast — are (at risk) of falling apart” for lack of enough revenue to keep operating.
The Illinois Retail Merchants Association said “economic fallout” from what’s going on “made it difficult for businesses to keep up with high downtown rents.”
What’s true about Chicago’s retail environment applies to the US nationwide — with no end of it in prospect looking ahead.
According to the National Restaurant Association, up to half of the nation’s restaurants may close permanently if the current environment continues or worsens — millions of jobs to be lost with them.
Looking ahead in the new year, is unprecedented food insecurity, hunger, malnutrition, untreated illnesses, and homelessness coming in the weeks and months ahead?
While Congress and the Wall Street owned and controlled Fed throw trillions of dollars of free money at the nation’s privileged class, most US households never endured harder than ever hard times than now.
They’re worsening, not improving, because of indifference in high places toward the nation’s most disadvantaged that are exploding in numbers of affected millions of people — the US middle class disappearing in plain sight.
Everything going on — the Greatest Main Street Depression in US history — was planned by US dark forces in cahoots with monied interests.
It’s all about benefitting them exclusively by exploiting most others.
It includes creating an unprecedented in size permanent underclass.
Longer-term, the diabolical scheme aims to create a ruler-serf society, harming the vast majority of Americans.
Seasonal flu/influenza — disguised as covid — has been and continues to be the phony pretext for getting Americans to go along with what no one should tolerate.
Their fundamental freedoms may be permanently lost so privileged interests can more greatly benefit from their misery.
Providing $600 stimulus checks to qualified households pales in comparison to open-checkbook handouts to Wall Street, other corporate favorites, and the already super-rich.
The paltry amount mocks growing poverty and deprivation that’s highly likely to worsen in the new year.
The US is not only unsafe and unfit to live in, it’s permanently thirdworldized.
It’s a totalitarian/plutocratic banana republic in the Northern Hemisphere — the world’s largest and most threatening to everyone everywhere.
On New Year’s Day, establishment media maintained their mass deception drumbeat.
According to NYT fake news, “in 2021 things will start getting better (sic).”
“And there’s good reason to believe that once the good news starts, the improvement in our condition will be much faster and continue much longer than many people expect (sic).”
The Washington Post pretended that “the big story of 2021 could be a very hopeful one (sic).”
Like other establishment media, it’s pushing the myth of mass-vaxxing to the rescue — ignoring how experimental covid vaccines may cause irreparable harm to human health overall, along with risking the illness they’re supposed to protect against but won’t.
According to the Wall Street Journal, “(t)he great comeback of 2021 is surely coming (sic).”
“(I)t will begin to explode in late spring, with vaccines more available and a spreading sense that things are easing off, and be fully anarchic by summer (sic).”
The above disinformation ignores the reality of unprecedented/made-in-the USA misery that’s highly likely to worsen ahead and become permanent for most Americans.
I see nothing to be optimistic about in the new year and what follows.
The only solution is popular revolution. Nothing else can prevent state-sponsored dystopia that’s well underway.
It’ll worsen without mass outrage and rebellion against the diabolical system.
It’s our lives, our well-being, our future, and our choice to accept the unacceptable or rise up against it.
Yemen’s Houthis say Saudi pilots will only be exchanged for Palestinian prisoners
MEMO | December 31, 2020
An official in Yemen’s Houthi-led National Salvation Government (NSG) has reiterated that Saudi pilots currently being held captive will only be released in exchange for Palestinian prisoners in the kingdom.
In an interview yesterday with Al-Masirah TV, the head of the National Committee for Prisoners Affairs, Abdulqadir Al-Murtadha, stated: “We have assured the other party that the Saudi pilots will not be released from prison except in exchange for the Palestinian prisoners in Saudi Arabia.”
He added: “The negotiation rounds in the prisoners’ issue in 2020 were distinguished by the fact that they ended with implementation, unlike the previous rounds,” noting that 1,087 prisoners of the Houthi-allied Yemeni army and “popular committees” were freed earlier in the year; 670 prisoners through UN brokered agreements and 417 prisoners through local deals.
“The enemy thwarted 30 exchange deals during 2020, which were agreed upon through local parties to liberate more than 600 prisoners from both sides,” according to Al-Murtadha.
“We released 150 prisoners during 2020, including 64 children who were brought into the battles by the forces of aggression, while the rest were released for humanitarian reasons.”
Last year, Saudi Arabia incarcerated 68 Palestinians and Jordanians following a mass trial which has raised concerns by Human Rights Watch (HRW) over issues relating to due process. Some of the detainees had been held without charge for nearly two years.
Among the Palestinians detained is Mohammed Al-Khodari, who is over 80 years old and a high-ranking official from the Gaza-based resistance movement Hamas. Alike the other detainees he was charged on vague accusations relating to terrorism.
In March the leader of the Houthi movement known as the Ansarallah, Sayyid Abdulmalik Al-Houthi, extended an offer to the Saudis to release Hamas members held in Saudi in exchange for one of the captured Saudi coalition pilots held in Yemen along with four Saudi soldiers. The “much-appreciated initiative” was met with praise by Hamas who in a statement said it valued the “spirit of fraternity and sympathy” for the Palestinian people and their cause.
Calling on International Civil Society to Join Them: Palestinians, Israelis Call for a Single Democratic State
One Democratic State Campaign
The following statement was issued by the One Democratic State Campaign (ODSC) on November 15, 2020. The ODSC is one the largest initiatives of Palestinians and Israelis championing a one-state solution as an alternative to the Israeli military occupation and apartheid in Palestine.
(November 15, 2020) The Palestinian-led One Democratic State Campaign (ODSC), comprised of Palestinians from every major community (’48, the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the refugee camps and the Diaspora/Exile), together with their critical Israeli Jewish partners, has issued a call for the establishment of a single democratic state including everyone living between the River and the Sea, including Palestinian refugees who choose to return to their homeland.
Over the past three years, the ODSC, founded in Haifa but with working relations throughout the worldwide Palestinian community, has formulated a 10-point political program setting out the vision and framework of a shared democracy in which all the inhabitants of historic Palestine would enjoy common citizenship and equality under the law in a new and pluralistic political community. After decades in which the justice of the Palestinian struggle against Zionist colonization has been recognized by the international community, after decades of chasing after the chimera of a “two-state solution,” and after decades of asserting Palestinian rights with no viable political expression, the time for an effective campaign of decolonization and liberation is now, and it is urgent. Every day the Israeli government, aided by the international community, imposes draconian and irreversible “facts on the ground,” locking the country’s majority population, the Palestinians, into tiny, impoverished enclaves, perpetuating as well the exile of half the Palestinian population. A democratic state in historic Palestine is no utopia if we organize around a just political program, organize, strategize and effectively mobilize our forces, the global grassroots, the international civil society — you. We call on you to join our One Democratic State Campaign and help us build it into an effective anti-colonial, liberation movement.
For further information, contact us at contact@onestatecampaign.org. Much work still needs to be done to flesh out our program. We understand that we all will not agree on every issue, but our task in this historic moment is clear: armed with a clear and compelling political program, we need to fully enter the political arena. We call on the entire international community, and especially civil society, to support our Call for a democratic state in historic Palestine. The time has come.
It is in this spirit of solidarity, as part of a process of liberation, that we are reaching out to you to join us, beginning by endorsing our program. The struggle goes on.
In solidarity,
Awad Abdel Fattah, Galilee
Nadia Naser Najab, Ramallah, UK
Livnat Konopni, Tel Aviv
Haidar Eid, Gaza
Jeff Halper, Jerusalem
Leila Farsakh, USA
Diana Buttu, Haifa, Canada
Samah Sabawi, Australia
Mohamed Kabha, Galilee
Mohammad Al Helu, Ramallah
Rula Hurdal, Galilee
Jonathan Cook, Nazareth
Ilan Pappe, Haifa
Sami Miaari, Sakhnin
Saleh Hijazi, Ramallah
Nur Masalha, UK
Ramzy Baroud, USA
Jowan Safadi, Haifa
Rafah Anabtawi, Shefa-ʻAmr
Hamada Jaber, Ramallah
Naji al-Khatib, France
Sari Bashi, Ramallah
Bassem Tamimi, Nabi Salah
Johnny Mansour, Haifa
Jamil Hilal, Ramallah
Susan Abulhawa, USA
Haim Bresheeth, UK
Areen Hawari, Nazareth
Abdallah Grifat, Galilee, South Africa
Amir Kaadan, Galilee
Munir Nuseibah, Jerusalem
Ronnen Ben-Arie, Haifa
Eitan Bronstein, Brussels
Umar al-Ghubari, Triangle
Raja Deeb, Yarmouk Camp, Netherlands
Bilal Yousef, Galilee
Areej Sabbagh, Nazareth
Yoav Haifawi, Haifa
Mohamed Noman, Jordan
Mazin Qumsiyeh, Bethlehem
Majd Nasrallah, Triangle
Wehbi Badarni, Nazareth
Ghada Karmi, UK
Bana Shaghri, Kufr Yaseef
Miko Peled, USA
George Bisharat, USA
Issa Debi, Haifa, Switzerland
Ramez Eid, Eilabun
Radi Jarai, Ramallah
Hatem Kanaaneh, ‘Arrabat al-Battuf
Nidal Rafa, Haifa
Issam Odwan, Gaza
Asaad Abu Sharkh, Gaza, Ireland
Shir Hever, Germany
Bolivians Face Major Post-Coup Struggles As Luis Arce Seeks Justice, Economic Reforms, Activist Says
By Demond Cureton – Sputnik – 17.11.2020
Bolivians are tasked with numerous challenges after successfully voting out the former Jeanine Anez coup government, who seized control last year in elections contested by opposition forces. The nation has entered a period of restructuring and healing following major political crises in recent months.
Miriam Amancay Colque, spokeswoman for the Bartolina Sisa Resistance movement in London, spoke to Sputnik about events in Bolivia following President Luis Arce and Vice-president David Choquehuanca’s victory in national elections.
SPUTNIK: Can you tell us about the current mood in Bolivia? How are people feeling after Luis Arce’s electoral victory?
Miriam Amancay Colque: The Bolivian people have regained their hope or, as we call it, their Ajayu, or their ‘soul’.
The victories of President Arce and Vice-president Choquehuanca mark those of the Bolivian people that, despite intimidation, persecution and massacres, defended democracy against racist, genocidal Jeanine Anez dictatorship.
Bolivians, in particular indigenous people, feel that their dignity and identity has been restored and are now placing faith in their new leadership.
Former president Evo Morales has also returned from exile in Argentina, back to his roots in Bolivia. Nearly 1m people welcomed him in El Chapare, and we are sure he will work positively with the new government.
SPUTNIK: How was the swearing in ceremony and how did people react?
Miriam Amancay Colque: The swearing-in ceremony for the President and Vice-President was inspiring. It took place on 8 November and was attended by global delegates and Bolivians. Social movements from across the country joined the parade to show support for the two officials, and the event was celebrated with music and dances for over eight hours.
There was widespread jubilation, with several thousands taking part in the event. A small opposition group protested the event but failed to dampen the celebrations.
Bolivians have shown the world that a humble but dignified and courageous people were able to break the chains of the former Anez dictatorship to reclaim their democracy.
SPUTNIK: What has become of the previous coup administration?
Miriam Amancay Colque: The former regime strongman who launched massacres across the country, Arturo Murillo Prijic, was the first to flee the country. Jeanine Anez is also believed to have fled Bolivia, and her collaborators have either renounced or left their posts.
Most of them will face justice for numerous crimes, including massacres, torture, imprisonment, corruption and others.
SPUTNIK: Have they accepted defeat or do you think they will attempt further coups in the country?
Miriam Amancay Colque: The opposition will always be on the lookout, but as long as Bolivians remain united and mobilised, it will be very difficult for them to violate the rule of law and its institutions again.
Those most affected by the attacks from the right-wing groups were always indigenous people who, after over 500 years, continue to struggle against oppressors and will continue to defend their rights.
Dignified and sovereign people rebelled and empowered themselves by speaking out against the Anez regime and emerged victorious.
But it should be known that the opposition never works alone. US organisations such as the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) funded the right-wing opposition with millions to destabilise left-wing governments.
Groups such as Rios de Pie (Standing Rivers) were camouflaged as an environmental non-governmental organisation (NGO) lead by Jhanisse Vaca Daza, a US-backed operative with experience in toppling progressive governments.
Daza also holds racist views and is now campaigning against President Arce in an attempt to divide Bolivians again.
SPUTNIK: How will the incoming administration deal with those responsible for crimes against humanity?
Miriam Amancay Colque: To bring peace we need justice, and all people involved in crimes against humanity must be tried and punished. Massacres took place against mostly indigenous people, leading to over 30 people killed and hundreds injured, and cannot go unpunished.
Judicial authorities in Bolivia will need to investigate and restore justice and peace to affected families, and President Arce has met with families in Senkata to listen to their testimonies.
We remembered the victims killed and injured in Ovejuyo, Pedregal, Rosales and Chasquipampa in southern La Paz City on 11 November, and victims of the Huayllani, Sabaca massacre last year were remembered on the 15th.
Many of them have been unable to seek justice, and our organisation sends our heartfelt solidarity to all those affected.
Despite the pain and trauma, it is important to seek justice for all victims and their relatives subjected to threats and mistreatment by security forces, including police and paramilitary groups as well as health professionals refusing to provide medical care to victims because they ‘looked like Masistas’, or indigenous people.
SPUTNIK: According to Reuters, Arce promises “moderate” Socialism for the Bolivian people. What precisely does he mean by this and how would it work compared to socialism under Evo Morales?
Miriam Amancay Colque: Neoliberal policies have been imposed on Bolivia, leading to major poverty, unemployment and inequality, among others.
Capitalism is not the answer for these people there is a need to move to a system that works for the people rather than exploiting them, and that supports the majority rather than a few by redistributing wealth to the poorest and marginalised.
Arce’s socialist views were formed when he was a member of the Socialist Party 1 (PS1) in the 80s. His party leader, Marcelo Quiroga Santa Cruz, was tortured, killed and disappeared by military dictator Luis Garcia Mesa in July 1980.
We also recognise that Morales is an undisputed and charismatic indigenous leader with a major place in history, and Arce is, after all, the architect of the miraculous economic policies that transformed Bolivia under Morales.
Arce’s policies halved extreme poverty from 38 percent to 17 percent, reduced national debt and increased wealth by 5 percent each year. It is thanks to Arce that Bolivia has made such progress prior to the US backed coup. He is also a more pragmatic person and is well-qualified to rescue the nation from economic collapse and bring people together.
SPUTNIK: What are the most important challenges for the Arce administration?
Miriam Amancay Colque: President Arce has inherited a real challenge after the coup government left the country economically destroyed with state companies privatised and bankrupt, along with a -11 percent recession rate and unemployment tripled.
Jeanine Anez took power only to embezzle public funds with her collaborators, who never offered support to Bolivians left to their own devices in the COVID-19 pandemic.
Dead victims were found in the streets, in houses and other places, without medical assistance and abandoned by the state.
President Arce’s top priority will be to tackle COVID-19 by providing full assistance to Bolivians. He recently stated he would rebuild the economy, boost domestic consumption and pledge financial support, and announced on 12 November a further Bonus Against Hunger to be paid in December to unemployed people over 18 years old.
The most pressing problems in the country will be economic and health issues. President Arce has said he would need to implement measures to boost the economy.
Personally, I think there should be no payments of foreign debt to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) until the economy is back on track and COVID-19 is suppressed.
The government should also continue industrialising national gas, lithium and other resources, and further advancements in social services should be implemented to inspire young, new leaders in the future.
SPUTNIK: What issues will they need to reverse from the former Anez coup government?
Miriam Amancay Colque: Measures will need to be implemented to reverse the damage of the Anez coup government, including boosting internal demand, renationalising strategic companies from foreign companies and backing state firms.
Education will need to be restored after the coup government shuttered schools for the year, leaving thousands of children without access to education.
The Arce government has reestablished the Culture and Decolonisation Ministry to continue to support the Bolivian people.
The Bolivian people are beginning to decide their own future for themselves.
Iran ready to play leading role in Syria reconstruction/ Shalamcheh-Basra-Latakia railway; The most important economic joint project
Mideast Discourse | November 6, 2020
Steven Sahiounie, a Syrian-American journalist, believes that while Western and European sanctions prevent the import of replacement parts needed by Syria in infrastructure projects, the ability of Iranian industrial engineers to build what is needed could be a vital path around and behind Western sanctions.
Sahiounie tells the Bazaar in an exclusive interview that the prospects for continuing bilateral relations between Iran and Syria are good.
“They both share the same dedication to peaceful relations with countries in the Middle East region while holding firmly to the ideal of resistance to the occupation of Palestine, and demanding that the rights of the Palestinian people be restored without delay”, he said.
Steven Sahiounie is an award-winning journalist, and chief editor of MidEastDiscourse. He has appeared on RT, PressTV, Syrian News, as well as international TV and radio programs. As a Syrian-American journalist and political commentator, he is often sought out concerning currents events facing Syria and the region.
Following is the text of the interview:
Bazaar: How do you predict the prospects for bilateral relations between Iran and Syria?
Sahiounie: The prospects for continuing bilateral relations between Iran and Syria are good. They both share the same dedication to peaceful relations with countries in the Middle East region while holding firmly to the ideal of resistance to the occupation of Palestine, and demanding that the rights of the Palestinian people be restored without delay.
Bazaar: What are the current economic relations and volume of trade between Iran and Syria?
Sahiounie: The trade officials of both Syria and Iran have worked toward establishing industrial and economic free trade zones jointly, with an emphasis on the private sector.
Iran and Syria are slated to boost bilateral trade volume from $500 million to $1 billion within the next year.
Bazaar: What is the major part of Syrian exports?
Sahiounie: The top exports of Syria are Pure Olive Oil, Spice Seeds, Other Nuts, Apples, Pears, and Calcium Phosphates.
Syria shipped an estimated $462 million worth of goods around the globe in 2019. That amount reflects a -46% decrease since 2015 and a -36.2% drop from 2018 to 2019.
The US-NATO attack on Syria beginning in 2011 has devastated lives, the infrastructure, and the economy. The continuing sanctions by the US and EU are designed to keep the war against the Syrian people going, even though the battlefields are silent, except for Idlib, which is under the military occupation of Al Qaeda.
The data from 2010 shows that 81.1% of products exported from Syria were bought by importers in Iraq, Italy, Germany, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, France, Lebanon, Jordan, United States, Netherlands, Egypt, and Spain. Due to the US-EU sanctions against Syria and the Arab monarchies of the Persian Gulf region boycotts, the markets for Syrian goods were closed due to political ideology. Iraq, Lebanon, and Jordan have maintained some trade with Syria in defiance of the western bullies.
The Syrian government is working with a comprehensive plan for agricultural development and expansion of agricultural and food industries to enhance the Syrian economy in the face of the sanctions and the unfair siege on the livelihood of the Syrian people.
Bazaar: What is the most important economic project of the two countries at this present?
Sahiounie: The project to build a railroad connecting Iran’s Shalamcheh border crossing, to the Iraqi port of Basra, and finally to reach Syria’s Mediterranean port city of Latakia is the most important economic project between Syria and Iran.
The project has been on the drawing board for years and is now in the beginning stages. The mammoth railroad line will be linked to the New Silk Road, also known as China’s Belt and Road Initiative, which in turn is also linked to the Russian railroad system. Once completed, western sanctions on Syria and Iran will be thwarted.
Bazaar: What is the most important tool to protect the continuation of bilateral economic relations?
Sahiounie: The most important tool for Iran and Syria to use to protect their continuing bilateral economic relations is in supporting the two countries’ private sectors, both in trade and industry, for the benefit of investment opportunities in the free zones. The bartering system of exchanging goods and services without the use of currency is another tool that can be effective.
Bazaar: The trade between the two countries is set to reach $ 1 billion by next year. What are the plans for expanding bilateral trade? What ?is your opinion?
Sahiounie: Plans to expand bilateral trade include mechanisms to enhance commercial exchange and develop cooperation in the field of research laboratories and medical equipment and infrastructure projects, development, and investment.
The agreement is known as “long-term strategic economic cooperation”, which includes industrial, trade, and agricultural cooperation. Education, housing, public works, railroads, and investments are covered in other agreements.
An important banking agreement between Iran and Syria has been reached, which sends a message to the international community about the depth of Syrian-Iranian cooperation and will benefit Iranian companies wishing to invest in Syria and participate in reconstruction.
Syria and Iran signed several agreements worth $142.5 million, involving Iranian companies involved in the restoration of more than 2,000 MegaWatts of power production capacity, and additional projects by the dozens in the oil and agricultural sectors.
Bazaar: What is your opinion about the impact of Caesar’s law and resulting US sanctions on Iran-Syria trade?
Sahiounie: The impact of Caesar’s sanctions is psychological. To instill fear into the minds of all Syrian people, as well as all countries which would conduct business with Syria.
Layer, after layer of sanctions, has been applied to Syria, to destroy the Syrian government, and installing a US puppet to be the ultimate ‘yes-man’ to Washington.
As Syria and the entire world grapple with the COVID-19 pandemic, the imposition of such inhumane sanctions has increased the suffering of the Syrian people. Instead of coming to the aid of people inside Syria with medical supplies to cope with the pandemic, the sanctions prevent medical companies abroad from doing business with merchants in Syria in the medical supplies industry, for fear of being tracked down and fined by the US Treasury Department.
Horror stories have been heard of companies in Europe who sent medicines and supplies to Syria, only to be tracked down in their own offices in Europe by US authorities enforcing the sanctions against anyone who would dare to throw a lifeline to anyone in Syria.
Bazaar: What is your assessment about Iran’s role in Syria`s reconstruction?
Sahiounie: Since 2017, Iranian companies have participated in rebuilding expos in Syria, and in 2019, the Syrian–Iranian Joint Chamber of Commerce held its first meeting. Iran is poised to play a leading role in the reconstruction of Syria. Projects include residential buildings, power stations, agriculture, telecommunications, oil, and mining.
In 2018, Iran signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Syria to construct 200,000 housing units near Damascus alongside other large projects. Iranian companies are participating in several major projects in Syria’s energy industry, including a gas-fired power plant project in Aleppo. Iran’s largest energy construction company, MAPNA Group, is engaged in the construction of the 540-MegaWatt combined-cycle power plant in Latakia.
Over 95 percent of the power plant equipment and much of the equipment in the Iranian electricity and water industry are domestically manufactured and can repair steam, natural gas, combined-cycle, incineration, and turbines of generators, as well as make strategic parts for power plants.
While the US-EU sanctions prevent Syria from importing much-needed replacement parts for infrastructure projects, the ability of the Iranian industrial engineers to manufacture what is needed can be a vital path around and behind the back of the western sanctions.
Time to Stand Up and Be Counted
By Craig Murray | October 29, 2020
Today, nothing is more important than to say that we will not be silent on the dreadful oppression of the Palestinian people; the daily beatings, killings, humiliations, demolitions, expropriations and destruction of groves that are the concomitant of Israeli illegal occupation.
We will never be browbeaten into silence on the slow genocide of the Palestinian people.
Nobody with any grasp on the location of their right mind believes Jeremy Corbyn to be an anti-Semite. Nobody with any grasp on their right mind believes the Labour Party is now anything but the substitutes’ bench for the Neoconservative team. Under Keir Starmer, the Labour Party has failed to oppose the granting of legal powers to the security services to kill, torture, entrap, forge and fake with impunity. It has failed to oppose the limitation of prosecution of British soldiers for war crimes. The Labour Party now seeks to erase all trace that it might once have been a party that offered an alternative to the right wing security state.
As Director of Public Prosecutions, Keir Starmer pressurised Swedish prosecutors who wished to drop the case against Julian Assange, to persist in order that he might be rendered to the USA. He further persuaded them not to interview Julian here, which is standard practice when he was never charged but only wanted for questioning, and which would have reduced Julian’s ordeal by four years.
Starmer received £50,000 in personal donations from lobbyist Sir Trevor Chinn to fund his leadership bid.
It is perfectly plain that Starmer’s aim in suspending Corbyn is to drive the mass membership that Corbyn attracted out of the Labour Party, and make it a reliable arm of the right wing security state. He wants the Labour Party to be financially dependent not on its members, who have annoying principles, but on donors like Chinn.
The media and political elite have attained their aim; there is no longer any point in voting in Westminster elections. A right wing government supporting the neo-con status quo and the ever tightening security state is now firmly guaranteed and cannot be influenced by a Westminster election.
Anti-normalization Protests Erupt in Bahrain despite Security Restrictions
MEMO | October 24, 2020
Anti-normalisation protests erupted in the streets of the Bahraini capital of Manama after Friday prayer yesterday.
Protesters held up banners denouncing normalisation, with the unified slogan “Anti-normalisation Friday”, along with a photo of a masked Palestinian militant.
Bahrain’s normalisation agreement with Israel was met with widespread anger, despite tight security restrictions, as well as the summoning of the demonstration organisers and participants, forcing them to sign an order to stay off the streets and not to engage in disruptive activities.
The protesters expressed their rejection of normalisation by carrying banners with the slogans: “Normalisation is treason”, “We reject submission, humiliation and surrender to the instructions of the US and Britain” and “Israel is a cancer that must be eradicated, and we will”. Other slogans stated: “We will never surrender” and “Normalisation is shameful, it is a betrayal”.
After Bahrain announced normalising relations with Israel, the hashtag “Bahrainis against normalisation” was widely circulated by Bahraini activists on Twitter.
The Emirati and Bahraini normalisation agreements with Israel were categorically rejected by the Palestinian authorities and factions, who considered the decision as a betrayal of Al-Aqsa mosque, Jerusalem and the Palestinian cause.