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Did Israel Just Lie About a Car Ramming to Kill Two Palestinian Teens?

By Robert Inlakesh | 21st Century Wire | March 5, 2019

On Sunday, two Palestinian teenagers were shot dead by Israeli soldiers following, what the Israeli military called, an attempted car ramming ‘terrorist’ attack in the West Bank village of Kufr N’ima.

The Israeli, as well as Western press that covered it, framed the incident as if it was a closed case terrorist attack. The two soldiers injured during the collision of a civilian car and Israeli military vehicle, were described as heroes and their recovery was welcomed. Israeli PM, Benjamin Netanyahu, even weighed in on the incident, calling for the immediate demolitions of the homes of the “terrorists”.

But what really happened and was this a complete cover up, simply justifying the murder of innocent Palestinians?

Firstly we have to establish as clearly as possible what actually transpired, out of the details available.

The incident occurred late on Sunday night, during/following illegal Israeli military raids on civilian villages. The weather was reportedly bad and caused for dangerous driving conditions, especially on the underdeveloped roads of West Bank villages.Three boys, Amir Darraj, Yousef Anqawi and Haitham Alqam were driving and approached a quick corner turn, before colliding with the soldiers.

According to eyewitnesses, the Israeli jeep had no lights on and was not identifiable, a very typical thing for the soldiers to do during late night raids.

The corner was a slippery surface in the rain according to witnesses. I can also personally testify, as someone who has been in cars that have almost lost control at this very spot, to the validity of this claim. However we will never see an investigation as the Israeli occupation soldiers destroyed cameras, refuses to release its own videos and quickly took away the vehicles involved.

The Israeli claim is that they acted quickly and killed the “terrorists”, however, eye witnesses claim that there was a 5 minute gap between the crash and the shooting, this would mean that arrests could have been resorted to instead of executions. Israeli troops also refused to allow medical assistance to the teens they shot, firing tear gas at those that attempted to approach them.

A point made by a local journalist and photographer from the nearby village of Bil’in, Hamde Abu Rahmah, was that the three boys – two of which he knew very well – were not from Kufr N’ima and most likely would have had no idea that the soldiers were there. Hamde Abu Rahmah also verified in a Facebook post yesterday, that the two boys have no direct connection to any political groups or resistance factions.

Another point made by Hamde Abu Rahmah, was that car rammings almost never involve more than one operative, let alone three. Hamas and Islamic Jihad would normally announce instantly their involvement in these acts, but didn’t.

An article published in the Israeli newspaper ‘Haaretz’, repeated the Israeli claim of the boys possessing molotov cocktails, despite the fact that Israel has provided no evidence of this. Any journalist who covers the West Bank is familiar with Israel displaying all evidence it claims to have immediately, so why not in this case?

Let’s take a deeper look at this argument of the molotov cocktails. Would this be the rational weapon of choice following a car ramming? If they did have them in the car, as the Israeli military claims, but didn’t attempt to use them, does this justify the usage of live ammunition against the teens? The Israelis don’t claim the molotov cocktails were used against them following the car collision and couldn’t possibly have discovered them until after the incident occurred, so why does the media include the molotov cocktails in their accounts of what happened?

Then we have the other issue of international law and who was in the wrong. According to the 4th Geneva convention and more specifically UNGA Resolution 37/43, Palestinians have the full legal right, under international law, to armed resistance. The only legal right those Israeli soldiers had during this Sunday nights incident, was to pack up and leave.

Even if this was somehow a car ramming attack on Occupation Soldiers, the attack is not classed as terrorism under international law. If you are arguing that Israeli soldiers, illegally raiding villages, on illegally occupied territory are in the right for shooting dead two teenagers and believe this to be a terrorist attack, you are quite literally on the side of the Israelis over International Law.

The result of all this, is that Amir Darraj and Yousef Anqawi were both shot dead, their bodies have been taken by Israel’s soldiers and now the Israeli policy of collective punishment, demolishing “terrorist” homes, will now be enforced.

So not only will the families of these two dead teenagers mourn, but will mourn on the ruins of their demolished homes and will be seen all over the world as the family members of terrorists.

Author Robert Inlakesh is a special contributor to 21WIRE and European correspondent for Press TV. He has reported from on the ground in occupied Palestine. See more of his work here. 

March 5, 2019 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

From Qana to Gaza, Israel issues denials and smears investigations of its crimes

By Professor Kamel Hawwash | MEMO | March 5, 2019

I wrote recently about an EU report on the growth of illegal Israeli settlements and argued that the EU was diligent in documenting Israel’s-breaches of international law but that it has singularly failed to bring it to account, even when it has demolished EU-funded projects.

A more recent report commissioned by the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) investigated the actions of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) at the nominal border with Gaza since 30 March last year, which marked the beginning of the Great March of Return protests. For almost 50 weeks, Israeli snipers have gunned down, with deliberate, chilling precision, Palestinian men, women and children.

The “Report of the independent international commission of inquiry on the protests in the Occupied Palestinian Territory – A/HRC/40/74” acknowledges that the peaceful protests “were civilian in nature, with clearly stated political aims.” The protesters asked to be allowed to return to the homes from which they have been expelled from 1948 onwards, and for a lifting of the siege on Gaza. Instead of meeting their peaceful and legitimate demands from the outset, Israel has killed over 200 Palestinians, including journalists and medics, and maimed dozens of young men, who now have to face life as amputees, rather than sportsmen.

An injured Palestinian kid is carried away after Israeli forces' clashed with protestors during a "Great March of Return" demonstration near Israel-Gaza border, in Khan Yunis, Gaza on March 01, 2019 [Mustafa Hassona / Anadolu Agency]
Mohammad Jasser Barbakh, not yet 14 years old, was shot on 26 October by an Israeli sniper while taking part in the Great March of Return protests [File photo]

The irony here is that Israel complained about Malaysia’s decision to ban the Israeli Paralympics team from competing in the country, while the IDF was making its own sickening contribution to future Palestinian Paralympics teams.

The UNHRC’s report makes for gruesome reading. Israeli soldiers are accused of “intentionally firing on civilians, who were neither directly participating in hostilities, nor posing an imminent threat.” The report warns that, “These serious human rights and humanitarian law violations may constitute war crimes or crimes against humanity.”

Israel’s reaction was predictable and follows a long line of denial and smearing of any report which accuses it of wrongdoing. According to a Foreign Ministry spokesman, “This report was born in sin, in a politically biased, one-sided resolution that determined the outcome before the investigation even started.” He went on to lay the blame on Hamas: “[Hamas] has declared war on Israel and calls to kill Jews. Hamas is orchestrating the attacks and using civilians in Gaza as human weapons to assault Israel and Israeli civilians. Hamas exploits the civilians in Gaza as human shields for terrorists.” As usual when such allegations are made, no evidence is produced to back them up, nor is the legitimate right to resist military occupation ever mentioned.

The spokesman went on to smear the UNHRC and the report’s three authors: “The HRC becomes an accomplice of a terrorist organisation, supporting Hamas’s aggression against Israel and the oppression of the people of Gaza.” The three individuals, he alleged, lack any understanding in security matters, without a relevant professional background.

Israel’s apologists came out in force to condemn the report, including US President Donald Trump’s Special Envoy Jason Greenblatt. “This COI report is another manifestation of the UNHRC’s clear bias against Israel,” he tweeted, “which remains the only country that the Council dedicates an entire standing agenda item to targeting.”

Such condemnation of investigations into Israel’s crimes and smearing of investigation teams and the bodies that form them is not new. The UNHRC set up an investigation into Israel’s 2014 military offensive against the Gaza Strip which lasted for 50 days, resulting in over 2,000 Palestinians being killed and causing extensive destruction.

The Report of the Independent Commission of Inquiry on the 2014 Gaza Conflict – A/HRC/29/52 accused both Hamas and Israel of committing war crimes. “Israel does not commit war crimes,” claimed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as he rejected the report. “Israel defends itself against a terrorist organisation that calls for its destruction and carries out many war crimes.” He accused the commission of being “notoriously biased” against Israel.

Following an escalation of violence in November 2012, a UN report criticised armed Palestinian groups and the IDF. The latter, it insisted, “did not consistently uphold the basic principles of conduct of hostilities, namely, the principles of distinction, proportionality and precautions.” The report documented a number of cases, including one which took place on 18 November, in which an Israeli air strike targeted without prior warning a three-storey house belonging to the Al-Dalou family in Al-Nasser neighbourhood, in central Gaza City. The strike killed 12 people, including five children and four women. Again, Israel brushed aside criticism and no individual Israeli was held accountable.

Following the 2008/9 Israeli military offensive on Gaza, the UN published the Goldstone Report on the devastating events which took place between 27 December 2008 and 17 January 2009 and which resulted in over 1,300 Palestinians being killed. The report accused both Israel and Palestinian armed groups of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Israel’s reaction was predictable. The Foreign Ministry said that, “Israel rejects the one-sided resolution adopted in Geneva by the UN human rights council and calls upon all responsible states to reject it as well… [The resolution] provides encouragement for terrorist organisations worldwide and undermines global peace.” It also accused the UNHRC of anti-Israel bias.

Israel’s siege and attack on the Jenin refugee camp in April 2002, which lasted for 10 days and killed dozens if not hundreds of Palestinians (the figures are disputed) again brought accusations of war crimes against Israel. The Israeli government refused to allow a UN team to carry out a field investigation, resulting in the UN producing a report based on available evidence. “In sum, the Israeli occupying forces have, without a doubt, committed serious violations of international humanitarian law,” the report concluded. “Also, without a doubt, war crimes, including grave breaches of the Fourth Geneva Convention, have been committed by Israel, the occupying Power, in several Palestinian cities, including in the Jenin refugee camp.” However, the report disputed the Palestinian claim of a massacre, a decision which was welcomed by the Israeli government. Furthermore, the report was judged as “seriously flawed” by human rights organisations and Britain’s Independent newspaper, which were able to corroborate many of the allegations against the occupation state. No Israeli has ever been held accountable for any violations.

It is possible to go back further in time to another Israeli atrocity to demonstrate the lack of accountability for crimes committed by the IDF. On 18 April 1996, Israeli forces shelled a UN compound in Qana, in Southern Lebanon, where 800 Lebanese civilians had taken refuge; 106 people were killed in the attack. Israel claimed that this was due to technical issues rather than deliberate targeting of a UN facility. However, the subsequent UN investigation concluded, “While the possibility cannot be ruled out completely, it is unlikely that the shelling of the United Nations compound was the result of gross technical and/or procedural errors.” The UN also found that “Contrary to repeated denials, two Israeli helicopters and a remotely piloted vehicle were present in the Qana area at the time of the shelling.” Amnesty International called for an independent investigation arguing, “It is not enough that the Israeli army investigates themselves. Israel has a history of either not investigating civilian deaths, or conducting similarly flawed inquiries.”

Now here we are, 23 years on and the UN’s most recent report again calls on Israel to investigate its own crimes, even though everyone knows that Israel never finds its own people guilty; always dismisses reports carried out by independent investigators as biased and one-sided; denies entry to the investigation teams; and refuses to cooperate. It claims to apply the highest standards of self-regulation but no one has ever been held fully accountable for any crimes, despite the thousands of deaths, the tens of thousands of injuries and the tens of thousands of homes that have been destroyed by Israelis since Qana, never mind the other massacres which have occurred since 1948.

It is time for Israel to be held to account for its actions, for the sake of those who have suffered at its hands. If international law is to have any credibility at all, we need to ensure that all UN member states pay due respect to human rights and the quest for justice through due legal process.

March 5, 2019 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Four Young Palestinian Lives Snuffed Out Every Month for The Past Year at The Hands of Israeli Soldiers

By CJ Werleman | American Herald Tribune | February 28, 2019

Last Friday, Yousef a-Dava, a 15-year old Palestinian boy was shot and killed by Israeli snipers, becoming the 48th child slain in Gaza by Israeli security forces since the Great Return March began nearly 12 months ago.

“He was peacefully protesting for a better future, raising the Palestinian flag, is the Palestinian flag a weapon?” asked his grief-stricken sister, Nariman al-Daya, in an interview with Middle East Eye.

His death was every bit as gruesome as it was unjustifiably atrocious, with eyewitnesses explaining how he “tried to stand up, walk a couple more steps” before falling to the ground again, after the bullet fired by an Israeli sniper “entered Yousef’s body, exploded hear his heart, exited from his back” and injured another man who was standing behind him.

Less than one hour later he was pronounced dead at al-Shifa Hospital after an emergency operation failed to revive him.

What other democratic ally do we allow 48 unarmed children to be shot and killed for flying a flag or kite in an open field, one that is ring-fenced by high-voltage electric currents, spot-and-strike machine gun posts, armored tanks and dozens of the world’s most lethal military marksmen?

If this were happening in Poland, Spain, or Portugal, both the United States and United Nations would’ve moved quickly to impose economic sanctions, while calls to invade and bomb would be heard far louder than a mere whisper, but this is Israel, the “Middle East’s only democracy,” so the entirely erroneous propaganda tagline goes.

48 murdered children equates to four young lives snuffed out every month for the past year at the hands of Israeli soldiers, who in no way felt threatened by these now slain youngsters. Unless, of course, you think children throwing rocks from inside a cage at armored vehicles positioned hundreds of meters away on the other side fortified fences and barricades is a threat to anyone or anything, which it clearly it isn’t!

Thus these deaths are to be identified for what they truly are: the cold-blooded murder of innocent and non-threatening children.

Of course, nowhere in the Western media is this reality framed in this accurate way. Instead we are fed headlines, or rather footnotes from the likes of The New York Times that read, “15-year-old boy killed in Gaza today,” without identifying the benign circumstances that led to his death, with newspaper editors doing their very best to falsely portray flag waving and rock-throwing protesters to be on equal footing to the most sophisticated military force in the Middle East.

It goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway, that if a population of 2 million predominately Jews or Christians were held in an open-air prison, which is precisely what Gaza is, and then bombed, strafed, droned, and shelled periodically, with children shot dead by snipers wearing the flag of a Muslim majority country, then there’d be no other issue the Western media would be talking about.

On Thursday, the United Nations published a report concluding, “Israeli soldiers committed violations of international human rights and humanitarian law,” adding that “some of those violations may constitute war crimes of crimes against humanity.”

“Many young person’s lives have been altered forever,” contends the United Nations Human Rights Council. “122 people have had a limb amputated since March 30 last year. Twenty of these amputees are children.”

Moreover, these deaths scratch only the surface of Israel’s savage war on Palestinian children. When Israel invaded Gaza in the summer of 2014, Palestinian children represented 25% of all civilians killed, with human rights groups documenting the deaths of 504 are under the age of 18.

Then there are the 500-700 Palestinian children who are detained each year in the Israeli military court system, some indefinitely, with most held and prosecuted on the charge of stone throwing.

It is in these Israeli military detention centers where some of the most egregious crimes against Palestinian children take place, with two-thirds reporting Israeli soldiers subjected them to violence and physical abuse.

Several years ago, UNICEF published a report that documented Israel’s systematic and systemic abuse of detained Palestinian children, concluding that “the ill-treatment of children who come in contact with the military detention system appears to be widespread, systematic and institutionalized throughout the process, from the moment of arrest to indictment of the child, the conviction and issuing of the verdict.”

The authors of the report also observed how child detainees were often arrested in the middle of the night, denied access to a lawyer or parents prior or during interrogation, denied right to remain silent, alongside credible claims Palestinian children were raped or threatened with rape or execution.

Ultimately Israel gets away with these atrocities because its violence and crimes against the Palestinian people takes place inside a media vacuum, with mainstream networks and publications giving a head glance towards the occupation and conflict only in moments where Palestinians, who are denied the right to resist Israel’s violence and illegalities peacefully, respond with violence of their own.

Until such time the world’s media and international community holds Israel accountable for its violations of international law and denial of human rights to the Palestinian people, it’ll continue to murder children as young as 2 years of age with total and complete impunity.

February 28, 2019 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Belfast Collusion: Supreme Court Rules Finucane Murder Inquiry Failed Miserably

Sputnik – 27.02.2019

The official investigation into the 1989 murder of Belfast solicitor Patrick Finucane, one of the most notorious killings of the Troubles, was ineffective and failed to meet human rights standards, the UK Supreme Court has ruled.

In a unanimous judgment, five justices said the investigation carried out by Sir Desmond de Silva in 2011 was frustrated by his inability to compel witnesses to testify about the killing. However, the court did not order a public inquiry, and left it to Whitehall to decide whether a new investigation should be conducted.

Under Article Two of the European convention on human rights, states have a duty not to kill, and an obligation to carry out an effective investigation into deaths.

“If [de Silva] had been able to compel witnesses; if he had been able to probe their accounts; if he had been given the chance to press those whose testimony might have led to identification of those involved in targeting Mr. Finucane… [then] one might have concluded all means possible to identify those involved had been deployed. Absent those vital steps, the conclusion an Article Two-compliant inquiry into Mr. Finucane’s death has not yet taken place is inescapable. It is for the state to decide… what form of investigation, if indeed any is now feasible, is required in order to meet that requirement,” Kerr ruled.

Collusion

Finucane was shot dead at his home in north Belfast 12 February 1989 by Ken Barrett and another masked man, after the pair battered down his front door with a sledgehammer and entered the kitchen, where Finucane’s family were eating a Sunday meal. They immediately opened fire and shot him twice, knocking him to the floor, before firing 12 further bullets into his face at close range. Finucane’s wife Geraldine was slightly wounded in the attack — Finucane’s three children were unharmed, having hidden underneath the kitchen table.

The Ulster Defence Association/Ulster Freedom Fighters (UDA/UFF) claimed responsibility, saying Finucane had been a high-ranking officer in the Irish Republican Army — no evidence has ever emerged to support this claim, and Finucane had represented both republicans and loyalists in high profile cases.

The Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) launched an investigation — Detective Superintendent Alan Simpson, who led the probe, stated a notable lack of intelligence on the murder flowed from other agencies regarding the killing. Activists and human rights groups long-suspected the RUC, or other elements of the British security state, had played a role in the attack, and in 2003, the British Government Stevens Report concluded the killing was indeed carried out with the assistance of police in Northern Ireland.

Moreover, it has emerged the loyalist paramilitary responsible for directing UDA attacks, Brian Nelson, was an agent of the British army’s notorious Force Research Unit, which provably colluded with loyalist paramilitaries in the murder of civilians. The Unit is also alleged to have carried out an arson attack on the offices of the Stevens Inquiry — the official investigation into British state collusion with paramilitary groups — in order to destroy incriminating evidence on its operational activities collected by Lord Stevens’ team.

In 2001, the UK and Irish governments agreed an international judge would investigate Finucane’s killing, among others, under the auspices of an official inquiry — but the decision was reversed in 2010 by then-Prime Minister David Cameron. In explaining his decision to Finucane’s family, he said “people in buildings all around here [Westminster] won’t let it happen”.

Nonetheless, in a public statement, Cameron acknowledged there’d been “shocking levels of collusion” between loyalist elements and the British state during the Troubles.

See Also:

UK Intel Planned Massacre at Catholic School – Former Ulster Paramilitary

February 27, 2019 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

Samidoun calls for the freedom of political prisoners in Egyptian jails

Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network – February 22, 2019

Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network condemned the executions carried out by the Egyptian regime against 9 Egyptian youths, calling for an end to the “systematic and continuous repression and killings by the fascist regime of General Abdel-Fattah Sisi.”

“What is happening in Egyptian prisons is systematic and documented torture. While this is widely known, it does not receive sufficient attention from international human rights bodies and legal institutions,” said Mohammed Khatib, the Europe coordinator of Samidoun. He referred to the “disgraceful collaboration between the so-called international community and the generals in Cairo.”

Khatib launched a scathing attack on the Egyptian regime and what he called “the silence of the Egyptian and Arab parties who describe themselves as standing with the people. They say with words that they oppose the Camp David regime, but remain silent on the daily violations of the rights of tens of thousands of Egyptian prisoners in Egyptian jails by that same Camp David regime.”

He pointed out “the perpetrators of torture and killings that took place in the prison known as ‘Scorpio’ (the Tora prison complex) and other jails and prisons have not been held accountable for their crimes. As a result, this only encouraged further repression and organized state terror on the part of the generals.”

The steadfastness of political prisoners in the jails of the Arab reactionary, dictatorial regimes stems from the deep and absolute conviction and reality in the interdependence and linking of the struggle of the national and social movements in the Arab world with the struggle of the Palestinian people and the Palestinian prisoners, which is the spearhead of the liberation cause,” said Khatib. “The crimes perpetrated by the Camp David regime against the poor and the oppressed in Egypt cannot be separated from the crimes of the Zionist enemy and imperialist powers in the world, because of the Egyptian state’s dependence on these same imperialist forces. These powers see these regimes as a tool to destroy popular movements in order to further plunder and steal the resources of the Arab peoples.”

He called on activists and friends of the Samidoun Network internationally to stand with political prisoners in Egyptian jails and advocate and organize against the executions while working for the release of all Egyptian prisoners.

February 22, 2019 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture | , , | Leave a comment

In Hebron, Israel Removes the Last Restraint on Its Settlers’ Reign of Terror

By Jonathan Cook | The National | February 13, 2019

You might imagine that a report by a multinational observer force documenting a 20-year reign of terror by Israeli soldiers and Jewish settlers against Palestinians, in a city under occupation, would provoke condemnation from European and US politicians.

But you would be wrong. The leaking in December of the report on conditions in the city of Hebron, home to 200,000 Palestinians, barely caused a ripple.

About 40,000 separate cases of abuse had been quietly recorded since 1997 by dozens of monitors from Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Italy and Turkey. Some incidents constituted war crimes.

Exposure of the confidential report has now provided the pretext for Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to expel the international observers. He shuttered their mission in Hebron this month, in apparent violation of Israel’s obligations under the 25-year-old Oslo peace accords.

Israel hopes once again to draw a veil over its violent colonisation of the heart of the West Bank’s largest Palestinian city. The process of clearing tens of thousands of inhabitants from central Hebron is already well advanced.

Any chance of rousing the international community into even minimal protest was stamped out by the US last week. It blocked a draft resolution at the United Nations Security Council expressing “regret” at Israel’s decision, and on Friday added that ending the mandate of the Temporary International Presence in Hebron (TIPH) was an “internal matter” for Israel.

The TIPH was established in 1997 after a diplomatic protocol split the city into two zones, controlled separately by Israel and a Palestinian Authority created by the Oslo accords.

The “temporary” in its name was a reference to the expected five-year duration of the Oslo process. The need for TIPH, most assumed, would vanish when Israel ended the occupation and a Palestinian state was built in its place.

While Oslo put the PA formally in charge of densely populated regions of the occupied territories, Israel was effectively given a free hand in Hebron to entrench its belligerent hold on Palestinian life.

Several hundred extremist Jewish settlers have gradually expanded their illegal enclave in the city centre, backed by more than 1,000 Israeli soldiers. Many Palestinian residents have been forced out while the rest are all but imprisoned in their homes.

TIPH faced an impossible task from the outset: to “maintain normal life” for Hebron’s Palestinians in the face of Israel’s structural violence.

Until the report was leaked, its documentation of Israel’s takeover of Hebron and the settlers’ violent attacks had remained private, shared only among the states participating in the task force.

However, the presence of observers did curb the settlers’ worst excesses, helping Palestinian children get to school unharmed and allowing their parents to venture out to work and shop. That assistance is now at an end.

Hebron has been a magnet for extremist settlers because it includes a site revered in Judaism: the reputed burial plot of Abraham, father to the three main monotheistic religions.

But to the settlers’ disgruntlement, Hebron became central to Muslim worship centuries ago, with the Ibrahimi mosque established at the site.

Israel’s policy has been gradually to prise away the Palestinians’ hold on the mosque, as well the urban space around it. Half of the building has been restricted to Jewish prayer, but in practice the entire site is under Israeli military control.

As the TIPH report notes, Palestinian Muslims must now pass through several checkpoints to reach the mosque and are subjected to invasive body searches. The muezzin’s call to prayer is regularly silenced to avoid disturbing Jews.

Faced with these pressures, according to TIPH, the number of Palestinians praying there has dropped by half over the past 15 years.

In Hebron, as at Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, a Muslim holy site is treated solely as an obstacle – one that must be removed so that Israel can assert exclusive sovereignty over all of the Palestinians’ former homeland.

A forerunner of TIPH was set up in 1994, shortly after Baruch Goldstein, an Israeli army doctor, entered the Ibrahimi mosque and shot more than 150 Muslims at prayer, killing 29. Israeli soldiers aided Goldstein, inadvertently or otherwise, by barring the worshippers’ escape while they were being sprayed with bullets.

The massacre should have provided the opportunity for Yitzhak Rabin, Israel’s prime minister of the time, to banish Hebron’s settlers and ensure the Oslo process remained on track. Instead he put the Palestinian population under prolonged curfew.

That curfew never really ended. It became the basis of an apartheid policy that has endlessly indulged Jewish settlers as they harass and abuse their Palestinian neighbours.

Israel’s hope is that most will get the message and leave.

With Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in power for a decade, more settlers are moving in, driving out Palestinians. Today Hebron’s old market, once the commercial hub of the southern West Bank, is a ghost town, and Palestinians are too terrified to enter large sections of their own city.

TIPH’s report concluded that, far from guaranteeing “normal life”, Israel had made Hebron more divided and dangerous for Palestinians than ever before.

In 2016 another army medic, Elor Azaria, used his rifle to shoot in the head a prone and badly wounded Palestinian youth. Unlike Goldstein’s massacre, the incident was caught on video.

Israelis barely cared until Azaria was arrested. Then large sections of the public, joined by politicians, rallied to his cause, hailing him a hero.

Despite doing very little publicly, TIPH’s presence in Hebron had served as some kind of restraint on the settlers and soldiers. Now the fear is that there will be more Azarias.

Palestinians rightly suspect that the expulsion of the observer force is the latest move in efforts by Israel and the US to weaken mechanisms for protecting Palestinian human rights.

Mr Netanyahu has incited against local and international human rights organisations constantly, accusing them of being foreign agents and making it ever harder for them to operate effectively.

And last year US President Donald Trump cut all aid to UNRWA, the United Nations’ refugee agency, which plays a vital role in caring for Palestinians and upholding their right to return to their former lands.

Not only are the institutions Palestinians rely on for support being dismembered but so now are the organisations that record the crimes Israel has been committing.

That, Israel hopes, will ensure that an international observer post which has long had no teeth will soon will soon lose its sight too as Israel begins a process of annexing the most prized areas of the West Bank – with Hebron top of the list.

February 13, 2019 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

15 Years in Prison for Clicking on Terrorist Propaganda Even Once – New UK Law

Sputnik – February 13, 2019

Upon the adoption of a new legislation, Home Secretary Sajid Javid said that the Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Act “gives the police the powers they need to disrupt plots and punish those who seek to do us harm.”

The Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Act 2019 has received Royal Assent on 12 February, making the bill an Act of Parliament.

The act makes provision in relation to terrorism, enabling persons at ports and borders to be questioned for national security and updating the offence of obtaining information likely to be useful to a terrorist to cover material that is only viewed or streamed, rather than downloaded to form a permanent record.

The act sees to an increase to the maximum penalty for certain preparatory terrorism offences to 15 years’ imprisonment.

The UK government has been criticized by the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to privacy, Joe Cannataci, back in 2018. The inspector argued following his visit in the UK, that it was concerning that accessing propaganda “on three or more different ccasions” was viewed as an offence. Cannataci called the approach straying towards “thought crime.”

The three-click benchmark has been removed in the new bill and now even a single tap on ‘terrorist material’ could lead to years in prison. Exemption is provided for journalists, academic researchers or people who had “no reason to believe” they were accessing terrorist propaganda.

The Bill has also provided for a launch of an independent review of Prevent, the much criticized government’s strategy that aims to support persons vulnerable to radicalisation.

British intelligence services were condemned in 2018 for failing to properly monitor individuals of interest — later to be involved in terrorist activity — not under active investigation at the moment but in the peripheries of more than one investigation.

In 2017, the United Kingdom suffered five terrorist attacks in Westminster, the Manchester Arena, London Bridge, Finsbury Park and Parsons Green, with 36 people losing their lives and dozens injured.

February 13, 2019 Posted by | Civil Liberties, False Flag Terrorism, Full Spectrum Dominance, Subjugation - Torture | , | Leave a comment

Israeli Army Admits the Palestinian Motorcyclist They Killed Had No Explosives

IMEMC News – February 11, 2019

Following an investigation by the Israeli military into the killing of a Palestinian motorcycle rider on February 5th, and the severe wounding of his passenger, the military was forced to admit that their initial claim that the young man had explosives was a false claim.

Abdullah Faisal Omar Tawalba, 19, was shot and killed by Israeli forces on February 5th, 2019, at an Israeli military checkpoint in Jenin, in the northern part of the West Bank.

His passenger, Omar Ahmad Hanana, 15, was also shot by the Israeli military and badly injured, but is in stable condition at the Jenin Governmental Hospital run by the Palestinian Authority.

Initially, the Israeli military reported to the media that the young men had approached the checkpoint and “tried to plant explosives”.

An investigation by Israeli military police found no evidence whatsoever of any explosives of any kind.

The soldiers claimed that they “heard an explosion,” and were sure “an explosive was thrown at the roadblock, before they opened fire.”

The checkpoint where Abdullah was killed by the soldiers is located near the entrance of the al-Jalama village, northeast of Jenin in northern West Bank. The army’s initial statement claimed that Palestinians were riding a motor cycle and “hurled an explosive at the soldiers”.

There were no injuries of any soldiers.

Mahmoud Sa’adi, the director of the Emergency Department of the Palestinian Red Crescent in Jenin, said the slain Palestinian has been identified as Abdullah Faisal Omar Tawalba, 19, from the al-Jalama village, and added that Omar Ahmad Hanana, 15, was injured but is in a stable condition.

Palestinian medical sources said the medics moved the slain Palestinian, and the wounded teen, to Jenin Governmental Hospital.

They added that Tawalba was shot with several live rounds in the head and legs.

February 11, 2019 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture | , , , , | Leave a comment

Man’s testicles tasered during horrific police arrest

RT | February 10, 2019

Disturbing bodycam video shows Arizona cops tasering a man 11 times, including on the testicles, as his horrified family scream for them to stop. The police are now being sued for “excessive force and torture.”

The nightmare tasering began when Glendale police officers approached a vehicle for a signal turn violation in July 2017. Johnny Wheatcroft was in the front passenger seat, while his wife Anya Chapman and their 11 and six-year-old sons sat in the back. A friend of the family was driving.

Officers Matt Schneider and Mark Lindsey asked Wheatcroft for his ID and he inquired why he had to show it, as he was not driving the vehicle. Police allege he went to stuff something in his backpack, and, after pressing the taser against his arm and telling him to “relax,” Schneider twisted Wheatcroft’s arm behind his back and pulled him from the car while still restrained by his seat belt.

The officer began tasering him when he was half out of the vehicle, before they pulled him to the ground and continued to tase him. Even after Wheatcroft was dragged on the ground towards the back of the car, his feet remained entangled in the seat belt. His older son leaned into the front seat to open the belt to free his father, prompting Schneider to shout at him, causing the boy to burst into tears.

Glendale police said in a statement that Wheatcroft “exhibited verbal non-compliance by refusing to identify himself and failed to obey the officer’s instructions.” Chapman reportedly swung a bag of bottles at Lindsey’s head during the incident, although this can’t be seen clearly in the video.

Horrifyingly, Schneider is next seen pulling Wheatcroft’s shorts down and placing the taser on the handcuffed man’s testicles. The lawsuit filed by the couple reports Schneider tased his testicles and perineum. He then placed the taser on his penis and said, “You want it again? Shut your mouth. I’m done f*cking around with you.”

Another officer held a handgun to his head and Wheatcroft was kicked in the groin.

According to the suit and the police’s own admission, the officers used a “drive stun” method, in which the taser is pressed against a person before being fired. Glendale police also released a 30 second CCTV video of the incident taken from a distance.

The pair were arrested and charged with aggravated assault and physically resisting arrest. They were both in jail for months as they couldn’t afford bail before Chapman pled guilty to a lesser charge so she could be released to look after her children.

Wheatcroft’s charges were dismissed by the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office after prosecutors saw the bodycam video, which his lawyers released to media outlets.

Schneider was suspended for three days after the incident, Glendale police said.

February 10, 2019 Posted by | Subjugation - Torture | , , | Leave a comment

Venezuelan Oil Exports Plunge On ‘Harsher’ Sanctions

By Nick Cunningham | Oilprice.com | February 4, 2019

Venezuela’s oil production could be disrupted to a greater degree than most analysts first thought, as the U.S. government seeks essentially shut in the country’s oil sector.

When the Trump administration first announced sanctions on Venezuela’s oil sector a little over a week ago, it sounded as if they would simply bar U.S. companies from buying oil. That would still mean that Venezuela could ship the oil elsewhere, albeit at a painful discount.

However, the U.S. Treasury issued some more details on February 1, sketching out a harsher sanctions regime. The sanctions on Venezuela will actually resemble the measures targeting Iran in that it will bar companies from using the U.S. financial system to do business with PDVSA. As such, the reach of the sanctions will extend well beyond the shores of the United States.

Reuters reported that even prior to last Friday’s clarification from the U.S. Treasury, European buyers were already slashing purchases because of concerns over payments. Reuters reported that two of the world’s largest oil traders, Vitol and Trafigura, said that they would comply with all U.S. sanctions.

As a result, PDVSA and Maduro’s government could have a much harder time finding destinations for Venezuelan oil than first thought. The Wall Street Journal reported oil storage is “filling up” in Venezuela because of a lack of buyers.

Moreover, not only are the effects of the sanctions more far-reaching, but also more immediate than first thought. At first, the U.S. seemed to exempt shipments that were underway, outlining a sort of phased approach that would allow a handful of American refiners to gradually unwind their oil purchase from Venezuela. The phased approach, which was supposed to be extended into April, would help “to minimize any immediate disruptions,” U.S. Secretary of Treasury Steven Mnuchin said in late January.

But that now does not appear to be what is unfolding. PDVSA has demanded upfront payment, likely because it fears not being paid at all or having the revenues steered to the opposition. Indeed, the U.S. effort to steer PDVSA and its revenues into the hands of the U.S.-backed opposition leader Juan Gauidó appears to be a decisive turning point.

Oil tankers linked to Chevron, Lukoil and Respsol are delayed, redirected or sitting offshore because of lack of payment. The WSJ says that several of those tankers had recently sent oil to Corpus Christi, Texas, but are now anchored off the coast of Maracaibo sitting idle. “This is an absolute disaster,” Luis Hernández, a Venezuelan oil union leader, told the WSJ. “There’s almost no way to move the oil.”

Unable to sell any oil, Maduro’s regime could quickly run out of cash. The result could be a humanitarian catastrophe, a merciless and destructive objective that the Trump administration seems to have in mind. The U.S. government is essentially betting that by driving the country into the ground, the military and the people will turn on Maduro. It could yet turn out that way, but it could also deepen the misery and exact an unspeakable toll on the Venezuelan population, the very people the Trump administration says it is trying to help.

In the meantime, oil exports are likely heading into a freefall. The WSJ says that labor problems, including “mass defections of workers” are accelerating declines. PDVSA could soon run out of refined fuel.

Officials with knowledge of the situation told the WSJ that Venezuela’s oil production has likely already fallen well below 1 million barrels per day (mb/d), down more than 10 percent – at least – from December levels.

Wood Mackenzie estimates that production probably stands a little bit higher at about 1.1 mb/d, but that it could soon fall to 900,000 bpd.

It’s hard to imagine how Maduro can hang on if oil exports fall precipitously from here. But even if he does manage to stay in power, the U.S. may escalate the situation. Last month, U.S. national security adviser John Bolton had “5,000 troops to Colombia” written on his legal pad. President Trump himself said that a military intervention is an option.

For the oil market, the crisis presents a series of problems. If Maduro hangs on and the U.S. continues to heap more pressure on his government, Venezuelan oil production and exports will continue to fall. Alternatively, the U.S. is hoping for a quick regime change, after which it would lift sanctions, which it believes will lead to a reversal in output losses.

The next round of Iran sanctions is nearing, with U.S. sanctions waivers expiring in May. As such, the window of opportunity for the Trump administration “is open only a crack, necessitating a quick political change,” Barclays wrote in a note. By the third quarter, the loss of Venezuelan output, Iran sanctions, and the looming regulations from the International Maritime Organization will put an increasing premium on medium and heavy oils.

That would push up oil prices significantly. But the U.S. government has blown past the point of no return, leaving it with no other options except to escalate. That means that Venezuela is set to lose a lot more oil than analysts thought only two weeks ago.

February 5, 2019 Posted by | Economics, Subjugation - Torture | , | Leave a comment

US: Tasers Claimed 49 Lives in 2018 Through Police Violence

teleSUR | February 4, 2019

Taser death is a form of police violence that is claiming lives in the United States despite being called non-lethal, a recent Reuters report revealed.

Warren Ragudo died after two Taser shocks by police intervening in a family altercation. Ramzi Saad died after a Taser shock by police during a dispute between Saad and his mother. Chinedu Okobi died after police used a Taser to subdue him in a confrontation they blamed on his refusal to stop walking in traffic.

All three were unarmed. All three had histories of mental illness. And all three died last year in a single northern California county, San Mateo.

They were among at least 49 people who died in 2018 after being shocked by police with a Taser, a similar number as in the previous two years, according to a Reuters review of police records, news reports, and court documents.

The deaths typically draw little public scrutiny – no government agency tracks how often Tasers are used or how many of those deployments prove fatal, and coroners and medical examiners use varying standards to assess a Taser’s role in the death. But some communities now are considering more restrictive Taser policies following allegations that the weapons were used excessively or deployed against people with physical or mental conditions that put them at higher risk of death or injury.

Among 14 police departments, five are reviewing their Taser policies; three had conducted reviews and made no changes, and five declined to comment because investigations into the incidents were still ongoing.

A total of at least 1,081 U.S. deaths following the use of Tasers, almost all since the weapons began coming into widespread use in the early 2000s have been documented. In many of those cases, the Taser, which fires a pair of barbed darts that deliver a paralyzing electrical charge, was combined with other force, such as hand strikes or restraint holds.

The California county board of supervisors and the district attorney launched ongoing reviews of the use and safety of Tasers, which were touted by police and the weapon’s manufacturer as a near-perfect, “non-lethal” weapon when they began coming into widespread use more than a decade ago.

There is a need to reevaluate “the proper role for Tasers and how and when they are engaged,” Dave Pine, a member of the Board of Supervisors said. Until then, “I personally think it would be appropriate to have a moratorium on their use.”

Most independent researchers who have studied Tasers say deaths are rare when they are used properly, but in a series of reports in 2017, it was found that many police officers are not trained properly on the risks and weapons are often misused.

Axon Enterprise Inc., the Taser’s manufacturer argues that most cause-of-death rulings implicating its weapons are misinformed and said that Tasers, while “not risk-free,” are “the most safe and effective less-lethal use of force tool available to law enforcement.”

Many cases involved high-risk subjects, such as people agitated by drugs or mental illness, people with heart problems, people who are very young or very old or very frail.

At least half those who died after Taser shocks last year fell into one or more of those categories. As in previous years, about 90 percent were unarmed and nearly a quarter had a history of mental illness.

As police departments have become more aware of Tasers’ risks and limitations, a growing number have restricted their use, said Chuck Wexler, executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF) think tank. Still, many officers remain unaware of the hazards when they encounter those vulnerable to a Taser’s shock, Wexler warns.

February 4, 2019 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture | , | Leave a comment

The TSA (and other experiments in evil)

corbettreport | February 1, 2019

In 1961, a psychologist conducted an experiment demonstrating how ordinary men and women could be induced to inflict torture on complete strangers merely because an authority figure had ordered them to do so. In 2001, the United States government formed the Transportation Security Administration to subject hundreds of millions of air travelers to increasingly humiliating and invasive searches and pat downs. These two phenomena are not as disconnected as they may seem. Join us today on The Corbett Report as we explore The TSA (and other experiments in evil).

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In 1961, a psychologist conducted an experiment demonstrating how ordinary men and women could be induced to inflict torture on complete strangers merely because an authority figure had ordered them to do so.

In 2001, the United States government formed the Transportation Security Administration to subject hundreds of millions of air travelers to increasingly humiliating and invasive searches and pat downs.

These two phenomena are not as disconnected as they may seem.

Today we explore The TSA (and other experiments in evil).

This is The Corbett Report.

In the midst of this year’s government shutdown, a story began to emerge: the safety of the skies was being threatened by the effect that the shutdown was having on workers of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA).

VICTOR OQUENDO: Good morning Robin, this place is a ghost town. For the second day in a row the security checkpoint here at Terminal B inside of Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport is shut down. Those are the ticket counters right there behind me, they are empty as well.

SOURCE: Airport security checkpoints close amid shutdown

JAKE TAPPER: Hundreds of TSA employees, who are working without pay right now, have called out from work this week. At Dallas-Fort Worth alone sick calls are up almost 300%.

SOURCE: Hundreds of TSA employees are calling out sick amid shutdown

DAGEN MCDOWELL: Also, the busiest airport in the world by passenger traffic, the Atlanta Heartsfield Jackson Airport, reported delays of more than an hour at checkpoints at times on Monday.

SOURCE: TSA staffing shortages hit airports amid partial government shutdown

ADRIENNE BAILON: “I was in JFK at 6:30am the other day and they were playing that poopty scoop Kanye song and I felt like I was in the Twilight Zone.” So ladies, what do you think about these agents going from TSA to TS-heeeey? I feel like whistle while you work. OK, you know what I’m saying? You’re working without getting paid, at least have a good time doing it but as long as it doesn’t get in the way of a very significant and important job, which is the safety of our air.

SOURCE: Government Shutdown: TSA Turns to… Explicit Rap Music?

While the TSA has been sold to the public as a valiant squad of dedicated operatives working diligently to protect “the safety of the air,” this public image could not be further from the truth.

The Transportation Security Administration was formally established in November 2001 under the pretext of “fixing” the system that had “somehow” allowed 19 men with box cutters to supposedly commit the most egregious violation of American airspace in history (aided in no small part by the simultaneous “failure” of the entire American intelligence establishment and the most sophisticated air defense in the world). Originally placed under the Department of Transportation, it was just a matter of months before the administration was transitioned into the newly-created Department of Homeland Security and began turning the relatively benign airport security procedures into an ordeal that traumatizes and humiliates virtually everyone who has to endure it.

FATHER: Rocco, they just gotta check you, OK? It’s no big deal.

ROCCO: But I want to go with Mom.

FATHER: Yeah we’re going to go there and eat in a minute. I know. It’s kinda weird, but it’s no big deal.

SOURCE: TSA Nabs Suspected Al Queda Terrorist At Chicago Airport, A toddler in a wheelchair

GIO BENITEZ: Listen as little Lucy says something it’s hard to imagine any 3 year old saying.

LUCY FORCK: I don’t want to go to Disney World.

BENITEZ: What made the toddler so distraught her parents say, was this:

TSA AGENT: It is illegal to do that.

BENITEZ: A run in with TSA screeners at Missouri’s Lambert St. Louis International Airport.

SOURCE: Girl in Wheelchair, 3, Detained by TSA: Caught on Tape

TSA AGENT: I’m also going to be doing a groin check, which means that I’m going to place my hand on your hip and one on your inner thigh, slowly go up and slide down.

JOHN TYNER: OK.

TSA AGENT: I’m going to do that two times in the front and two times in the back.

TYNER: We can do that out here, but if you touch my junk I’m going to have you arrested.

SOURCE: If You Touch My Junk, I’ll Have You Arrested – US Airport security

MELISSA DYKES: I mean, I’m sitting here right now, I’m staring out the window and there’s an American flag flying on this entry border thing for the airplane and it’s just such a joke. It’s just . . . what exactly are we? What has America become?

SOURCE: Why I Hate Flying in America…

If we are to take the establishment of the sprawling TSA bureaucracy and the invasive, degrading airport security procedures it has implemented at face value—that is, even if we accept that the administration was set up to “fix” the holes in airport security—then the entire experiment can be written off as a colossal failure.

Reports of TSA failures to find knives, massive shipments of narcotics, loaded guns, and even the very types of box cutters we are told were used on 9/11 have been so numerous over the years that it would be impossible to enumerate them all. Even just this past month, a passenger was able to sneak a gun onto a Delta flight bound for Tokyo, but the TSA insisted that the security failure had nothing to do with the shutdown; it was just standard TSA incompetence.

Even the government’s own testing of TSA procedures has confirmed time and again that the agency fails in providing even the most basic level of security for airline passengers.

In 2006, government investigators found that they were able to slip 75 percent of their fake bombs through checkpoints at LAX, one of the busiest airports in America, and 60% through Chicago O’Hare, one of the busiest airports in the world. A 2008 report from the Government Accountability Office blasted a government program to test for “gaps” in airport security because it failed to follow up on why these failures were occurring. In November of 2011 Congressional investigators issued their own blistering report on the agency, calling it an “enormous, inflexible and distracted bureaucracy” and pointing out that Americans “are no safer today than they were before 9/11” despite the 60 billion dollars that had been wasted on the administration up to that point.

But if we attack the TSA on grounds of incompetence, we risk falling into a carefully-laid trap. Proponents of this governmental monstrosity will argue that what is needed is more money to help the valiant guardians of the sky do their job properly. They will point to the shutdown and the resulting mess at the airports as an example of how vital the administration really is, and how important it is to continue increasing its budget so it can add ever more expensive weaponry to its arsenal of harassment.

No, it is not because of “incompetence” that we must condemn the Orwellian nightmare unfolding at the airports every single day. It is because this security theatre was never meant to keep us safe in the first place. The TSA is not a well-intentioned agency in need of better management or more funding or more highly-trained agents. On the contrary. It is doing precisely what it was created to do. The problem is that most people do not know what it was created to do.

In order to understand the real purpose of this spectacularly successful government agency, we need to revisit the Milgram experiment.

In 1961, psychologist Stanley Milgram conducted a now-famous experiment into the public’s propensity to obey perceived authority figures. In the experiment, ordinary men and women were tricked into administering what they believed to be painful and even fatal electric shocks to complete strangers on the pretense that they were helping a scientist conducting research into memory and learning.

RESEARCHER: We want to find out just what effect different people have on each other as teachers and learners and also what effects punishment will have on learning in this situation.

SOURCE: Obedience (Dr. Stanley Milgram, 1962)

But that “memory research” was just a cover story. In fact, both the scientist and the strangers were actors. The only one not in on the sham was the one delivering the shocks. The real experiment was designed to see how far those ordinary men and women would go in inflicting torture on others when commanded by a perceived authority figure.

SUBJECT A: Incorrect. You will now get a shock of 75 volts. [Applies shock] Soft hair, he kinda did some yelling in there.

RESEARCHER: Continue please.

SOURCE: Obedience (Dr. Stanley Milgram, 1962)

The study is famous in the annals of psychology because the results were so completely unexpected. Most psychologists predicted that only a very small percentage of the participants in the study would continue delivering shocks past the point where those shocks could be fatal. Instead, a staggering 65% of the test participants proceeded all the way to the maximum (supposedly lethal) voltage.

SUBJECT B: That is incorrect. This will be 195 volts. [Applies shock] The correct one was…

VICTIM: Let me out of here!

SUBJECT B: Slow dance.

VICTIM: Let me out of here my hearts bothering me. Let me out of here, you have no right to keep me here. Let me out. Let me out of here. Let me out my hearts bothering me!

RESEARCHER: Continue, please. Go on.

SUBJECT B: [Inaudible]

SOURCE: Obedience (Dr. Stanley Milgram, 1962)

Let’s repeat that. 65% of participants—ordinary men and women who thought they were volunteering for a simple experiment about memory and learning—were willing to deliver what they sincerely believed to be potentially fatal doses of electricity to random strangers simply because an authority figure assured them that it was necessary to continue with the experiment.

VICTIM: You have no right to hold me here!

SUBJECT B: The next phrase is ‘Fast’ …

VICTIM: Let me out, let me out, let me out of here!

SUBJECT B: Bird. Car. Train. Plane.

[Silence]

RESEARCHER: Continue, teacher.

SUBJECT B: That is incorrect. This will be 345 [volts]. The correct answer is ‘Fast Bird.’

SOURCE: Obedience (Dr. Stanley Milgram, 1962)

So now let’s look at the TSA’s real role. No, they are not there to keep us safe from the scary, turban-wearing Al-CIA-da goblins. But they are running a giant, society-wide, real-world Milgram experiment in obedience training. In this case, though, there are no actors. Real people are really being tortured, molested, degraded and subjected to the most demeaning public humiliation at the hands of badge-wearing authority figures. And this time the subjects of the experiment (the general public) are not being asked to deliver a shock. They are not being asked to participate in the torture, aid in the pat-downs, or help run the body scanners.

Instead, they are being asked not to participate. To sit. To watch. To learn. This is what happens to those who resist. This is what happens to random people who do not resist. This is what happens to 96-year-old WWII veterans. This is what happens to 4-year-olds. This is what happens to pregnant mothers. One day it will probably happen to you. And you, the ordinary men and women who are made to watch these torture sessions from the lengthy line up at the security gate, are expected to do nothing. There is nothing you can do. Nothing you will do.

If the TSA is not an attempt to “keep the skies safe” after all, but a nearly two-decade-long experiment in obedience training, then it cannot be denied that that experiment has been remarkably successful.

REPORTER: The YouTube user who posted this wrote that the agent subjected his kids to the pat downs because he had been selected as usual for a security check because of his name. We shared the video with TSA, the agency offering no comment but directed me to the section of its pat-down policy that says ‘officers will work with parents to resolve any alarms at the checkpoint.’ TSA has modified screening procedures for children 12 and under that reduces the likelihood of a pat-down.

PASSENGER: Well I mean you got to follow the rules but in the same regard I think that I’d probably have some apprehension. I’d be a little bit upset about it.

ETHAN ROSENBERG: I have to do what they’re doing.

REPORTER: What you see in this video is familiar for 10 year old Ethan Rosenberg.

ETHAN’S FATHER: Yes, he has to have a manual pat-down. He has a cochlear implant, a medically implanted device.

REPORTER: Ethan’s dad describes his son’s pat-down every time they fly as not a problem. Though Ethan clues us in on what these kids could be feeling.
ETHAN: Well, sometimes it’s uncomfortable.

People watch passively as the molestation and humiliation of strangers unfolds mere steps away from them. No outcry. No protest. No boycotts. No mass movements to stop these scenes from playing out again.

Yes, there was a mass campaign to “Opt Out” of the TSA’s invasive body scanners. A day was set, people were organized, a wave of Thanksgiving flyers were readying themselves to opt out of the procedure and overwhelm the agents with a never-ending stream of people to be patted down. But the TSA, knowing they would have been defeated had such a movement gained ground, chose to turn off the scanners and wave people through on the planned Opt Out Day, and the public, quickly distracted by the next story in the 24/7 news cycle, moved on.

The next time they have to take a flight, those same people who once protested these procedures will step dutifully into line, take off their belt and shoes, and pray that it won’t be them next. And unless and until people stop doing nothing and start doing something in the face of these obvious injustices, absolutely none of this will change. And, if people continue doing nothing, within a generation no one will even understand that these scenes are objectionable. That they don’t have to happen.

But you see, this is the most surprising part of the Milgram experiment. The one that everyone forgets. The experiment wasn’t run once or twice. It was run dozens of times, under all types of circumstances, and a remarkable fact was discovered: The way the experiment was set up determined the extent to which the participants obeyed their instructions. Sometimes the experiment was run so that one subject could watch other subjects participate in the study before they did. And in cases where the first subjects obeyed the psychologist and delivered the shocks, the later subjects would, too.

Yet—and here we get to the real lesson of the Milgram experiment—if the teacher saw other teachers disobey the psychologist and refuse to deliver the shocks, they would disobey, too.

PHILIP ZIMBARDO: Now I said he [Milgram] tested 1,000 subjects. In any one study, it’s only 50 or 60. But let’s look at the other 16 studies.

In each study, he varies one aspect of the social situation. We call that “experimental variations.” So in study 16, the percentage of people going to 450 volts is 91%. Nine out of 10 people go all the way. Why? In study 16, you come in and they say, “We’re running a little late. Why don’t you sit and wait until the other person finishes?” And you see a confederate looking like you go all the way to the end. In study number 5, only 10 percent go all the way. In study 5, you come in and you see people like you rebel.

That says we are powerful social models for other people. If you model evil behavior, it’s gonna spread to others. If you model good behavior, caring behavior, compassionate behavior, it’s gonna spread in a positive way.

SOURCE: The Lucifer Effect in Action: My Journey from Evil to Heroism

This is the surprising conclusion that has been scrubbed from most accounts of the Milgram experiment: Disobedience, once modeled, becomes an option in the mind of the public.

Remember this the next time you are at the security checkpoint: When you are asked to step into the body scanner, those behind you will be watching. Your choice will make a difference. When someone is being molested at a TSA pat-down and you are a witnessing it, those around you will be taking note of your reaction. Your behavior will affect theirs.

So, what choice will you make? Will you pass or fail this real-world Milgram experiment?

February 1, 2019 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular, Video | , | Leave a comment

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