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I’ve lost all trust in medical research – the financial muscle of Big Pharma has been busy distorting science during the pandemic

By Malcolm Kendrick | RT | July 4, 2020

Evidence that a cheap, over-the-counter anti-malarial drug costing £7 combats Covid-19 gets trashed. Why? Because the pharmaceutical giants want to sell you a treatment costing nearly £2,000. It’s criminal.

A few years ago, I wrote a book called ‘Doctoring Data’. This was an attempt to help people understand the background to the tidal wave of medical information that crashes over us each and every day. Information that is often completely contradictory, viz ‘Coffee is good for you… no, wait it’s bad for you… no, wait, it’s good for you again,’ repeated ad nauseam.

I also pointed out some of the tricks, games and manipulations that are used to make medications seem far more effective than they truly are, or vice versa. This, I have to say, can be a very dispiriting world to enter. When I give talks on this subject, I often start with a few quotes.

For example, here is Dr Marcia Angell, who edited the New England Journal of Medicine for over 20 years, writing in 2009:

“It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgement of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as editor.”

Have things got better? No, I believe they’ve got worse – if that were, indeed, possible. I was recently sent the following email about a closed-door, no-recording-allowed discussion, held in May of this year under no-disclosure Chatham House rules:

“A secretly recorded meeting between the editors-in-chief of The Lancet and the New England Journal of Medicine reveal both men bemoaning the ‘criminal’ influence big pharma has on scientific research. According to Philippe Douste-Blazy, France’s former health minister and 2017 candidate for WHO director, the leaked 2020 Chatham House closed-door discussion was between the [editor-in-chiefs], whose publications both retracted papers favorable to big pharma over fraudulent data.

The email continued with a quote from that recording: ‘Now we are not going to be able to … publish any more clinical research data because the pharmaceutical companies are so financially powerful today, and are able to use such methodologies, as to have us accept papers which are apparently methodologically perfect, but which, in reality, manage to conclude what they want them to conclude,’ said The Lancet’s editor-in-chief, Richard Horton.”

A YouTube video where this issue is discussed can be found here. It’s in French, but there are English subtitles.

The New England Journal of Medicine and The Lancet are the two most influential, most highly resourced medical journals in the world. If they no longer have the ability to detect what is essentially fraudulent research, then… Then what? Then what, indeed?

In fact, things have generally taken a sharp turn for the worse since the Covid-19 pandemic struck. New studies, new data, new information is arriving at breakneck speed, often with little or no effective review. What can you believe? Who can you believe? Almost nothing would be the safest course of action.

One issue has played out over the past few months, stripping away any remaining vestiges of my trust in medical research. It concerns the anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine. You may well be aware that Donald Trump endorsed it – which presents a whole series of problems for many people.

However, before the pandemic hit, I was recommending to my local NHS trust that we should look to stock up on hydroxychloroquine. There had been a great deal of research over the years strongly suggesting it could inhibit the entry of viruses into cells, and that it also interfered with viral replication once inside the cell.

This mechanism of action explains why it can help stop the malaria parasite from gaining entry into red blood cells. The science is complex, but many researchers felt there was good reason for thinking hydroxychloroquine may have some real, if not earth-shattering, benefits in Covid-19.

This idea was further reinforced by the knowledge that it has some effects on reducing the so-called ‘cytokine storm’ that is considered deadly with Covid-19. It’s prescribed in rheumatoid arthritis to reduce the immune attack on joints.

The other reason for recommending hydroxychloroquine is that it’s extremely safe. It is, for example, the most widely prescribed drug in India. Billions upon billions of doses have been prescribed. It is available over the counter in most countries. So, I felt pretty comfortable in recommending that it could be tried. At worst, no harm would be done.

Then hydroxychloroquine became the center of a worldwide storm. On one side, wearing the white hats, were the researchers who’d used it early on, where it seemed to show some significant benefits. For example, Professor Didier Raoult, of the Institut Hospitalo-universitaire Méditerranée Infection, in France:

“A renowned research professor in France has reported successful results from a new treatment for Covid-19, with early tests suggesting it can stop the virus from being contagious in just six days.”

Then came this research from a Moroccan scientist at the University of Lille:

“Jaouad Zemmouri … believes that 78 percent of Europe’s Covid-19 deaths could have been prevented if Europe had used hydroxychloroquine… Morocco, with a population of 36 million [roughly one tenth that of the US], has only 10,079 confirmed cases of Covid-19 and only 214 deaths.

“Professor Zemmouri believes that Morocco’s use of hydroxychloroquine has resulted in an 82.5 percent recovery rate from Covid-19 and only a 2.1 percent fatality rate, in those admitted to hospital.”

Just prior to this, on May 22, a study was published in The Lancet, stating that hydroxychloroquine actually increased deaths. It then turned out that the data used could not be verified and was most likely made up. The authors had major conflicts of interest with pharmaceutical companies making anti-viral drugs. In early June, the entire article was retracted by Horton.

Then a UK study came out suggesting that hydroxychloroquine did not work at all. Discussing the results, Professor Martin Landray, an Oxford University professor who is co-leading the Randomised Evaluation of Covid-19 Therapy (RECOVERY) trial, stated:

“This is not a treatment for Covid-19. It doesn’t work. This result should change medical practice worldwide. We can now stop using a drug that is useless.”

The study has since been heavily criticized by other researchers, who state that the dose of hydroxychloroquine used was potentially toxic. It was also given far too late to have any positive effect. Many of the patients were already on ventilators.

This week, I was sent a pre-proof copy of an article about a study that will be published in the International Journal of Infectious Diseases. Its author has found that hydroxychloroquine “significantly” decreased the death rate of patients involved in the analysis. The study analyzed 2,541 patients hospitalized in six hospitals between March 10 and May 2 2020, and found 13 percent of those treated with hydroxychloroquine died and 26 percent of those who did not receive the drug died.

When things get this messed up, I tend to look for the potential conflicts of interest. By which I mean, who stands to make money from slamming the use of hydroxychloroquine, which is a generic drug that’s been around since 1934 and costs about £7 for a bottle of 60 tablets?

In this case, first, it’s those companies who make the hugely expensive antiviral drugs such as Gilead Sciences’ remdesivir, which, in the US, costs $2,340 for a typical five-day course. Second, it’s the companies that are striving to get a vaccine to market. There are billions and billions of dollars at stake here.

In this world, cheap drugs such as hydroxychloroquine don’t stand much chance. Neither do cheap vitamins, such as vitamin C and vitamin D. Do they have benefits for Covid-19 sufferers? I’m sure they do. Will such benefits be dismissed in studies that have been carefully manipulated to ensure they don’t work? Of course. Remember these words: “Pharmaceutical companies are so financially powerful today, and are able to use such methodologies, as to have us accept papers which are apparently methodologically perfect, but which, in reality, manage to conclude what they want them to conclude.” 

Unless and until governments and medical bodies act decisively to permanently sever the financial ties between researchers and Big Pharma, these distortions and manipulations in the pursuit of Big Profit will continue. Just please  don’t hold your breath in anticipation.

Malcolm Kendrick is a doctor and author who works as a GP in the National Health Service in England. His blog can be read here and his book, ‘Doctoring Data – How to Sort Out Medical Advice from Medical Nonsense,’ is available here.

September 26, 2020 Posted by | Book Review, Corruption, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | | Leave a comment

Remembering Israel’s botched attempt to assassinate Khaled Meshaal

MEMO | September 25, 2020

What: On 25 September, 1997, Israelis from the Mossad spy agency attempted to assassinate Palestinian political leader Khaled Meshaal in Amman, the capital of Jordan. The brazen attempt on the life of the then 41-year-old head of the Hamas Political Bureau sparked a diplomatic row which threatened to wreck the newly-signed peace deal between Jordan and Israel. The crisis ended with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu making a number of humiliating concessions.

Where: Amman, Jordan.

When: 25 September, 1997.

What happened?

In an attempt to cripple the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas, Netanyahu, then in his first term as prime minister, authorised the assassination of Meshaal. The little-known Palestinian leader was born in 1956 in Silwad, which was then in the Jordanian administered West Bank. In 1967, Meshaal’s family and 300,000 other Palestinians were expelled from their homes by Israeli occupation forces in a second wave of ethnic cleaning that came to be known as the Naksa (Setback). Netanyahu is said to have personally picked Meshaal from a number of Hamas operatives for Mossad agents to kill. The attempt on Meshaal’s life came in the wake of a series of suicide bombings in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

A six-member Mossad team arrived in Amman a week before the assassination using false Canadian passports. The plan was clear: kill the exiled Hamas leader using a lethal toxin without leaving any trace of the killers. The idea was that after the toxin had been administered covertly, Meshaal would go about the rest of his day as normal and then, when tiredness overcame him, he would take a nap, never to wake up again; he was expected to die within 48 hours.

On the morning of the assassination attempt, two of the six agents moved into position to deliver a lethal dose of toxin — identified later as fentanyl — as Meshaal entered his office. The other four Israeli agents are said to have been deployed around the block either as drivers or as lookouts.

The Mossad agents delivered the toxin using an aerosol device and fled from the scene. One of Meshaal’s bodyguards gave chase and managed to apprehend the assassins after some hand to hand combat. Their capture was to have major ramifications.

What happened next?

Hours after the arrest of the two agents by the Jordanian authorities, the Israelis hatched a plan to diffuse the situation. With the diplomatic consequence of his actions dawning on Netanyahu, he attempted to conceal the botched assassination attempt from the rest of the world. He dispatched Mossad head Danni Yatom to plead with King Hussain of Jordan for the agents’ release. Yatom’s pre-emptive disclosure and plea for help from the Jordanian monarch exploded in Israel’s face, sparking a diplomatic crisis with the Hashemite Kingdom, which had normalised relations with the Zionist state three years earlier.

While the Israelis tried frantically to keep a lid on the botched plot, Meshaal’s health deteriorated. The toxin had done its job and within 48 hours he would be dead. King Hussain warned Israel that if the Hamas leader died, the Mossad agents would be hanged as murderers. The King had gone out on a limb to sign a peace treaty with Israel against the wishes of his people, so he called US President Bill Clinton to enlist his support. It was said that US anger was such that no one within the normally pro-Israel White House was willing to make Netanyahu’s case for him. “This man is impossible,” Clinton is reported to have said upon hearing that the Israeli Prime Minister had authorised the assassination attempt with little regard for Jordanian sovereignty, and thus endangered the fragile peace treaty.

Having been stonewalled by Netanyahu for the antidote to the toxin at the first time of asking, an angry King Hussein relayed his message through Clinton, insisting that the Israelis must deliver a vial of the antidote, which was the only way to save Meshaal’s life. “If Meshaal dies, the peace treaty dies with him,” he insisted. With the US applying pressure, Israel had no choice but to comply. A light aircraft delivered the antidote.

The indignity for Netanyahu did not end there. The two Mossad agents were still under arrest facing a death sentence and the Israeli Embassy in Amman, in which the other four members of the six man Mossad team had taken refuge, was surrounded by Jordanian security forces. In exchange for allowing them to leave Jordan, King Hussain was determined to exact a heavy price. He demanded a prisoner exchange, which was agreed.

Under the deal, Israel released the ailing Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the quadriplegic founder and spiritual leader of Hamas who was one of the most notable Palestinians in its prisons, along with 70 other Palestinian prisoners.

Meshaal was saved with just hours to spare. His reputation grew within the Palestinian resistance movement as “the man who wouldn’t die”. He became the leader of Hamas when Israel assassinated Yassin in 2004.

Meanwhile, a chastened Netanyahu was forced to apologise. His act of contrition came two days later when he arrived in Amman to pledge that Israel would not make another attempt on Meshaal’s life. This was not the end for the humiliated Israeli Prime Minister. He lost his bid for re-election in 1999, after which he retired temporarily from politics.

September 25, 2020 Posted by | Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Israeli authorities destroy Palestinian family home in Silwan, East Jerusalem

Defence for Children Palestine | September 23, 2020

Manal A., 6, shares the story of Israeli authorities demolishing her family’s home in East Jerusalem. Israeli forces regularly demolish Palestinian homes that are built without permits, which are nearly impossible to obtain.

Demolition Under Occupation

Al-Haq | September 24, 2020

Dramatic increase in the average of Palestinian structures demolished by Israeli occupation authorities during 2019.

September 24, 2020 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular, Video | , , , , | Leave a comment

The False Flag Poisoning of Alexei Navalny

By Max Parry • Unz Review • September 24, 2020

On August 20th, Russian opposition figure and self-styled “anti-corruption” activist Alexei Navalny fell seriously ill while in mid-flight from Tomsk, Siberia to the Russian capital. The Moscow-bound plane was abruptly re-routed to make an emergency landing in the Siberian city of Omsk where the anti-Kremlin politician was subsequently hospitalized for suspected poisoning and placed in a medically-induced coma. Two days later, Navalny was airlifted to Germany in an evacuation arranged by a Berlin-based “human rights” NGO at the request of Pussy Riot spokesman Pyotr Verzilov. His transport on a medically-equipped plane with German specialists was permitted by the Russian authorities who now stand accused of culpability in the alleged attack, all in the midst of the ongoing pandemic.

While the Russian doctors in Omsk (who saved Navalny’s life) maintain they did not find any evidence of chemical weapons substances in his system, upon examination the German government quickly announced that its military lab had discovered “unequivocal evidence” Navalny was poisoned by a Soviet-era Novichok nerve agent and demanded an explanation from the Kremlin — without providing any of said evidence to Moscow or the public, of course. Despite being the supposed victim of an extremely deadly military-grade nerve agent, three weeks later Navalny came out his comatose state and off ventilation, defiantly vowing a return to Russia. Was he ever tested for COVID-19? At this point it seems more likely than this propaganda stunt we are expected to believe.

It is unconvincing precisely because it follows a pattern of improbable events questionably attributed to the Kremlin. As many have noted, the incident strikingly resembles the alleged March 2018 poisoning in Salisbury, England of disgraced former Russian intelligence officer Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, visiting from Moscow which caused a similar diplomatic row. Skripal, who had been a double agent for MI6 and served ten years imprisonment for high treason, was exiled to the UK after his sentence in a spy-swap between Russia and Britain in 2010. While residing in southern England, Skripal was reportedly in close contact with a security consultant who worked for the author of the salacious but fabricated dossier on U.S. President Donald Trump’s alleged ties to Russia, former British intelligence agent Christopher Steele — and may have even been the source of its unverified contents.

Skripal and his daughter were discovered unconscious on a park bench, but were said to have been initially contaminated hours earlier by the extremely fast-acting substance applied to the door handle of his residence. Similarly, Alexei Navalny is said to have been contaminated by a water bottle in his hotel room, not in the tea he drank at the Tomsk Bogashevo airport cafe before boarding his flight as originally believed. How is the elapsed time in both of these cases possible? The toxin in Navalny’s case was also not discovered until examination in Germany, meaning a bottle laced with a chemical warfare agent was transported all the way to Berlin? None of those who came to Navalny’s aid or treated him suffered any noxious effects, unlike the Skripals where multiple police officers at least showed minor symptoms. Still, both Navalny and the Skripals fully recovered from their supposed exposure to an extremely lethal toxin considered even more deadly than sarin or VX gas. After their release from the hospital, the Skripals immediately went into hiding which has left the enormous questions surrounding the incident still unresolved two years later. However, the damage was already done as the UK government immediately blamed Moscow and more than 100 Russian diplomats were expelled by Britain and its Western allies.

Months later in June 2018, two British nationals were the victims of an accidental poisoning (one fatally) after they discovered a discarded but unopened perfume bottle containing the same poisonous agent. Then that September, Scotland Yard released CCTV footage of two Russian men alleged to be GRU military intelligence agents in Salisbury at the time of the attack. However, no verifiable evidence was ever provided by the British government showing that the two were responsible, though it was conveniently claimed that the would-be culprits clumsily left vestiges of the fatal chemical agent in their hotel room. So, not only is Russian intelligence incapable of carrying out successful assassinations, but carelessly unable to cover their tracks? The premise was already absurd enough but made even more fanciful by Britain’s refusal to comply with the Chemical Weapons Convention in providing Moscow with requested samples of the toxin which purportedly poisoned the treasonous ex-spook and his daughter. Thus far in the Navalny case, Germany is following the same script.

What a coincidence that the attack comes just as Nord Stream 2, the second line of the massive natural gas pipeline under construction from Russia to Germany opposed by the U.S. and several NATO allies, is near completion. Suddenly, the diplomatic fall-out has put the controversial project in limbo, with Chancellor Angela Merkel and the German government under pressure from Washington to withdraw from the project which would increase Russian influence on Europe’s energy infrastructure and rival the U.S.’s costlier exports. As pointed out by Die Linke’s Dietmar Bartsch, where were the calls to halt the purchase of Saudi oil imports after the grisly murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi? It is clear that the Anglo-Americans are simply desperate to halt the resurgence of Moscow on the international stage, threatening their German counterparts with sanctions as the final sections of the pipeline conveying Russian gas across the Baltic Sea is being constructed. The attack on Navalny could not occur at a more auspicious time for the Atlanticists and a worse time for Moscow.

The notion that Russian President Vladimir Putin would try to assassinate an opposition figure who holds a minuscule 2% support amongst the population, far behind other opponents nonexistent to Western media but the one who just so happens to be favored by Washington, is contrary to any reason or common sense. Not to mention, at the exact moment it would jeopardize a project essential to Russia’s economic growth and frugality, as the pipeline would link Moscow with Western Europe bypassing neighboring transit countries such as the Ukraine (also opposed to Nord Stream 2) which have costly transit fees. Is it really the Russian government who stands to massively benefit from this fiasco? The answer to “cui bono?” could not be more clear: U.S., Saudi and Emirati oil and gas interests, not the Kremlin. Russia was also recently the first nation to develop a COVID-19 vaccine candidate with its Sputnik V registered in August, an international competition that has been heavily politicized by Washington which is eager to cast aspersions on Moscow’s accomplishment. Meanwhile, Germany is also the one Western European country where Washington’s anti-Russian propaganda is falling flat, as recent polls consistently show that the vast majority of Germans don’t see Russia as a threat, likely a result of their high rate of media literacy.

Despite Navalny’s recovery, there are already calls to legislate a ‘Navalny Act’ as a follow-up to the Magnitsky Act, a bipartisan bill previously passed by the U.S. House of Representatives in 2012 under the Obama Administration which sanctioned Russian officials accused of being responsible for the 2009 death of Sergei Magnitsky, an unscrupulous Russian tax lawyer who helped dodgy international financiers like the US-born British tycoon William Browder commit massive tax evasion in Russia. Magnitsky died under mysterious circumstances while in custody awaiting trial for facilitating Browder’s skullduggery and suffering from poor health, with the Russian prison officials first accused of depriving him of medical treatment and then allegedly beating and torturing him to death. The fascinating 2016 documentary The Magnitsky Act: Behind the Scenes explores the case from the perspective of Westernized Putin critic and filmmaker Andrei Nekrasov, who through the course of his investigation unexpectedly discovers that the mainstream media narrative of Magnitsky’s death was a fiction concocted by Browder. Suddenly, Nekrasov’s entire perspective on Russia comes into question and the film takes on a metanarrative of the nature of propaganda itself.

What we are being told about Navalny is likely another fairy tale like the implausible story forged by Mr. Browder about the death of the auditor he hired to enrich himself exploiting Russia’s tax loopholes. Incredibly, the American-born investor is the grandson of Earl Browder, the leader of the Communist Party USA during its heyday until his expulsion at the end of World War II. When the wartime US-Soviet alliance fell apart and the Cold War began, the elder Browder proved more loyal to American imperialism than the communist movement and presided over the liquidation of the CPUSA until it was reestablished with his dismissal as General Secretary. Having grown up in a Russian-speaking family, decades later his grandson decided to cash in on the collapse of the former Soviet Union through various investment ventures as manager of the hedge fund Hermitage Capital Management. When Putin succeeded Boris Yeltsin and numerous oligarchs went into exile or landed themselves in prison, Bill Browder was forced to flee the country after defrauding the Russian government of millions with the help of the late Mr. Magnitsky.

One of those banished oligarchs, billionaire media tycoon Boris Berezovsky, also died under dubious circumstances in the UK when he was found hanging in his apartment bathroom in Berkshire, England in 2013. Like Magnitsky, Putin and the Russian government were suspected of involvement in Berezovsky’s death by the media without a shred of evidence, even though his suspicious purported “suicide” actually came shortly after expressing a written willingness to return to Russia and reconcile with Putin — which almost certainly would have been a stroke of good luck for Russian counter-intelligence and a threat to the West, not the Kremlin. Berezovsky had been close with a former agent of the Federal Security Service (FSB, the KGB’s successor), Alexander Litvinenko, a defector renowned for claiming he had been ordered by Putin to assassinate Berezovsky and subsequently lived in the UK as a consultant for British intelligence until his own polonium poisoning in 2006, the first of a series of episodes framing Moscow. Consistently, however, in every one of these cases it is never the Kremlin which stands to gain.

There is a reason Putin consistently polls over 70% in favorability with the Russian people and that is his directing the country away from Western domination under the ruinous neoliberal economic policies of his corrupt and inebriated predecessor Boris Yeltsin which auctioned off the former state-owned assets to foreign investors such as Browder and oligarchs like Berezovsky. Meanwhile, Navalny has a level of support well under 5%, with recent polls placing him behind the Communist Party’s Pavel Grudinin and the ultra-nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky. While Navalny’s own rhetoric has shifted over the years, he has controversially maintained his own cozy relationship with ethnic nationalists who make up a significant amount of his right-wing populist base, even co-organizing annual marches dominated by racist skinheads.

Navalny infamously coined the slogan “Stop Feeding the Caucasus!” advocated by xenophobic nationalists calling for the defunding and secession of the Muslim-majority North Caucasus from Russia, while making frequent Islamophobic statements and stoking anti-immigrant sentiments against Central Asians. You would never know this reading Western media who have completely sanitized Navalny’s politics (if they ever address them at all), while they remain obsessed with the perceived ingratiation between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin even though the former’s politics have far more in common with Navalny than the Russian President. Given the U.S. support for far right nationalists in the 2014 anti-Russian coup d’etat in Ukraine, Washington has no qualms about backing fascists to undermine Moscow.

In 1831, Russia’s most famous and revered poet, Alexander Pushkin, composed “To the Slanderers of Russia”, a patriotic ode in response to members of the French parliament who were advocating for a military intervention to assist the Polish uprising against the Russian Empire. Pushkin asserted that the Polish uprising was an inter-slavic “ancient, domestic dispute”, while the Poles considered it an issue of national independence which their European allies were eager to exploit against Moscow. For the great Russian writer, the Polish alliance with the tyrant and invader Napoleon was unforgivable. He also reportedly communicated to General Alexander von Benckendorff, the chief of the Tsarist secret police assigned to censor and surveil him, that the Europeans were still bitter over the failed French invasion of Russia in 1812 and had not yet attacked with weapons but were doing so with “daily mad slander.”

Fast forward nearly 200 years later and little has changed in Russia-West relations. The only thing that has arguably transformed is Russia’s standing on the world stage following the collapse of the Russian Empire in 1917 and the Soviet Union almost 75 years later, the latter of which was masterminded by a Polish-born National Security Advisor, Zbigniew Brzezinski, whose Russophobic worldview was a product of the deep-seated “ancient, domestic dispute” Pushkin wrote of a century earlier. Contrary to the Western portrayal of the resurgence of Moscow in the new millennia under Vladimir Putin as neo-tsarist expansionism, post-Soviet Russia is actually a relatively weak capitalist state that has found itself a target of regime change by the West which seeks the colonization and balkanization of Eastern Europe.

The U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 caused a spike in oil prices that generated huge profits for Chevron and ExxonMobil, but also had the unintended consequence of benefiting Russia’s state-run oil industry just as Putin was re-nationalizing its energy assets and banishing financial criminals like Browder and Berezovsky. While its strength and influence has certainly been restored, its foreign investments remain low even in the Ukraine where Moscow has been accused of territorial expansion with the so-called “annexation” of Crimea, where the mostly Russian-speaking eastern Ukrainian population actually voted to join its neighbor in a referendum. Russia may no longer be an empire (or communist), but yet it remains in the crosshairs of Western imperialism, whose political leaders and subservient corporate media are still conducting the “mad slander” that Pushkin opined.

Max Parry is an independent journalist and geopolitical analyst. His writing has appeared widely in alternative media. Max may be reached at maxrparry@live.com

September 24, 2020 Posted by | Deception, False Flag Terrorism, Russophobia, Timeless or most popular | , , , | Leave a comment

The Pandemic is a Test Run – #PropagandaWatch

Corbett • 09/23/2020

Watch on Archive / BitChute / LBRY / Minds / YouTube

The death cult that wants to suppress humanity has issued their warning: the lockdown of the world in the name of the global scamdemic is not the end of this madness. It is only the beginning. Join James for this week’s edition of #PropagandaWatch as he dissects the latest attempt to leverage the climate scam on the back of the COVID scam, and how both of these distractions are being used to indoctrinate the public into the death cult.

SHOW NOTES:
Coronavirus and Climate Change – #PropagandaWatch

What would happen if the world reacted to climate change like it’s reacting to the coronavirus? (May Boeve and others)

Coronavirus can trigger a new industrial revolution

The pandemic didn’t solve climate change. This week’s disasters are proof

Weather Is Not Climate!

Innovating to zero! | Bill Gates

CNN: “The pandemic didn’t solve climate change. This week’s disasters are proof” (Eric Worrall)

September 23, 2020 Posted by | Deception, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, Video | , | Leave a comment

‘Serious Security Threat’: Beijing Claims US Spy Planes Posed as Airliners Over 100 Times in 2020

By Morgan Artyukhina – Sputnik – 22.09.2020

In light of increased attention being brought on the activities of US spy planes near China, Beijing has accused the US of disguising them as civilian airliners more than 100 times in 2020 alone, calling the practice a “serious security threat” and warning it poses a danger to actual civilian aircraft.

Several times over the last few weeks, observers have noticed US intelligence aircraft seeming to “disappear” in mid-flight on international flight-tracking programs, only to be replaced by what seems to be a civilian aircraft broadcasting what turns out to be a fake transponder code. These “civilian” aircraft then fly typical spy plane routes, patrolling intensively over an area for several hours, before mysteriously turning back into US spy planes on their return flights.

On September 16, a Chinese government official confirmed those suspicions, saying the US has made the practice routine over the last year.

“It is the old trick of the US military to use a transponder code to impersonate civil aircraft of other countries,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin told reporters last Wednesday.

“According to incomplete data, since the beginning of this year, the US reconnaissance aircraft have electronically impersonated civil aircraft of other countries in the South China Sea for more than a hundred times. This above-mentioned practice is egregious, which has severely violated international aviation rules, disrupted the aviation order and safety in relevant airspace, threatened the security of China and countries in the region. China firmly opposes that,” he said.

“We urge the US side to immediately stop such dangerous, provocative behaviors to avoid accidents in the air and at sea. China will continue work with regional countries to firmly safeguard the freedoms and safety of navigation and overflight in the South China Sea as well as the peace and stability in the region,” Wang added.

A September 18 report by the South China Sea Probing Initiative (SCSPI), a think tank connected to Peking University, further corroborated the claims by citing multiple, independently verified sources that arrived at the same conclusions.

The practice has continued since: on September 21, a US Air Force RC-135W Rivet Joint signals intelligence aircraft, built by Boeing and based on a modified version of its 707 passenger aircraft, was spotted using a fake transponder hex code to fly through the South China Sea near China’s Hainan Island and the Paracel Islands, China’s claims of control over which are disputed by Vietnam.

​Then on Tuesday, an RC-135S Cobra Ball, an aircraft specialized for observing ballistic missile launches, flew from the US Air Force’s Kadena Air Base on Okinawa, Japan, bound for the Yellow Sea, where it, too, adopted a bogus hex code, as multiple observers confirmed. Hilariously, a KC-135 Stratotanker was even spotted flying out to refuel this aircraft that was supposedly not a US spy plane. The refueler didn’t bother to disguise itself, however.​

The South China Morning Post reported on September 19 that an unnamed source had told the paper about a US Air Force E-8C spy plane doing the same thing near the coast of China’s Guangdong Province, which faces the South China Sea. The report did not say when the incident took place. The E-8 is also modified from a Boeing 707 airliner and resembles it closely.

Another observer recorded a US Air Force RC-135U Combat Sent, which collects information on radar arrays, broadcasting a fake hex code in the Black Sea off the coast of Russia’s constituent Republic of Crimea on September 21. It was one of several aircraft watching Russia’s Kavkaz-2020 drills.

As Sputnik reported, the US spy planes must be turning off their International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) transponders, which broadcast unique information about the aircraft to other planes as well as receivers on the ground in hexadecimal format. They then turn on another transponder, making it look like they’re really another plane in the sky. For many of the US’ intelligence-gathering aircraft, like the RC-135W Rivet Joint and E-8C Joint STARS, the masquerade is only helped by their exterior appearances, which closely resemble a civilian airliner.

When asked about the practice, US Air Force Gen. Kenneth Wilsbach, the commander of Pacific Air Forces, only said that “we follow the rules for international airspace, and we were following the rules that day.”

Technically this is true. Steffan Watkins, an open-source intelligence researcher based in Ontario, Canada, noted on Twitter that Wilsbach’s statement amounts to an admission, despite his attempts to dissimulate.

​“He’s confirming that yes, they do whatever they want in international airspace, because there is no law preventing them from changing their ICAO hex mid-flight,” Watkins wrote. “He’s also right, it wasn’t an isolated occurance; the #USAF has done so many times before. See, as a state aircraft they can do whatever they want. They’re not *breaking* any laws, because they’re above the law, essentially. See how that wordplay works?”

Indeed, the ICAO’s regulations specifically note that they “are not applicable to State aircraft (military, police or customs) in general,” and that “there are no requirements for State aircraft to comply with civil requirements in international airspace,” but also notes that it “requires States to ensure that military aircraft do not endanger civil aircraft.”

Since Malaysia seems to be the nation of choice for US spy planes to disguise themselves as being from, it’s possible Kuala Lumpur could claim the US is unreasonably endangering its civil aircraft by doing so. The southeast Asian nation has historically had close economic ties with China, but in recent years Washington has attempted to drive a wedge between them using their competing claims over parts of the South China Sea.

In May, the US delivered the first six of 12 ScanEagle unmanned surveillance aircraft to the Royal Malaysian Navy, which will be used for maritime patrols.

September 23, 2020 Posted by | Deception, Militarism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | | Leave a comment

Piracy in the Strait of Malacca: an Age-Old Problem Whose Future Is Unclear

By Dmitry Bokarev – New Eastern Outlook – 22.09.2020

The Strait of Malacca, which runs between the Malay Peninsula (Malacca) and Sumatra, is the most convenient maritime route to take between the Indian and Pacific oceans. From time immemorial, it has held tremendous significance for international trade. Even back in ancient times, ports sprang up on the shores of the strait that were visited by ships carrying goods from India and China. These ports turned into important regional centers of commerce. In the Middle Ages, the main port on the Strait of Malacca, and the central hub for regional trade, was the city of Malacca, located on the strait that bears its name and the capital of the Malacca Sultanate. In 1511, Malacca was captured by the Portuguese, who attempted to control all the shipping traffic that went through the strait. In 1641, Portuguese Malacca was taken by the Dutch, and in 1795 the British fended off the Dutch to take control. Together, the Netherlands and the British Empire ruled the Strait of Malacca for the following over 100 years. During that time, Malacca waned in importance as a transport hub and trading center, and the British colony of Singapore moved to the foreground. In 1945, Indonesia gained independence from the Netherlands, in 1957 Malaysia gained independence from Great Britain, and then in 1965 Singapore won independence from Malaysia. And now these three countries – Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore – all own the strait together, and earn profit from the stream of vessels that continuously runs through it. At present, virtually all the maritime trade between Europe, Africa, and East Asia runs through the Strait of Malacca: up to 25% of all maritime transport shipments (about 120,000 vessels per year) in the world pass through it.

It goes without saying that such an important section of the seas, which constantly has vessels with valuable cargo running through it, cannot escape the threat of pirate attacks. For many centuries, the Strait of Malacca and the coastal waters of countries in Southeast Asia adjacent to it were swarming with sea raiders. For some tribes that lived in the territory now occupied by modern-day Indonesia, Malaysia, and Cambodia, piracy was often the only source of income.

Nowadays, this phenomenon has become much less frequent, but there are still some areas around the World Ocean where it persists, and the Strait of Malacca is one of those international hotbeds of piracy that have survived. In the 2000’s, up to 40% of all pirate attacks in the world took place in this strait.

Aware of the seriousness of this threat, law enforcement agencies started to patrol the Strait of Malacca not only from those countries located on its shores – Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore – but also from India and Thailand. Thanks to the actions taken by law enforcement, in early 2010s the number of attacks dropped sharply.

Nonetheless, the number of people willing to become involved in piracy, as is often the case, exceeds the number of people available to go on patrols. In addition, every object or manifestation that has a center also has fringes. In keeping with this rule, piracy in Southeast Asia, with the Strait of Malacca as its center, also has the waters of other countries in the region that belong to its fringes. Thanks to the Strait of Malacca, the territorial waters throughout all of Southeast Asia are teeming with merchant ships, so pirate attacks in these waters should be seen as part of the piracy that occurs in the Strait of Malacca. For example, piracy nowadays takes place in Thailand’s coastal waters. In the Gulf of Siam, which laps the shores of that country, each year there are dozens of pirate attacks on vessels, many of which are either traveling toward the Strait of Malacca or leaving it. According to available data, the many raiders that operate in Thai waters include people from Vietnam, Indonesia, Cambodia, China, and even Bangladesh. After committing attacks in Thai territorial waters, they quickly leave them and take cover in the waters belonging to the other countries that share maritime areas in the Gulf of Siam with Thailand: Cambodia, Vietnam, and Malaysia. Some people believe that the main base for the pirates that ply the waters of the Gulf of Siam is Langkawi, an archipelago located right on the Strait of Malacca near the border that runs between Thailand and Malaysia. These islands are also known for being a center for local contraband. Also, besides the countries along the Strait of Malacca, nowadays pirates actively make their living in the waters of Cambodia and the Banda Sea, located between Indonesia and East Timor.

The pirates that operate in the Strait of Malacca nowadays are both equipped and behave in different ways. For example, villagers along the Indonesian shores of the Strait of Malacca who engage in piracy are chiefly fishermen and boaters with low incomes. They use regular boats, can only afford household machetes in terms of weapons, and their targets are small, weakly protected vessels that do not carry cargo that has any particular value. When capturing those, they basically confine themselves to robbing the crew and stealing any valuable equipment from the ships, and do everything possible to avoid human casualties.

But these are destitute people, and their ambitions are not that high. There are other, more “advanced”, pirates in both Indonesia and other neighboring countries. For example, teams of raiders that rob ships in the Gulf of Siam are equipped with the latest technology: they have large, rigid-hull inflatable boats with powerful engines that would not shy away from commando units from the most advanced countries’ navies, with machine guns installed on the boats, and ordinary soldiers armed with modern firearms. These high-velocity boats can easily overtake slow-moving cargo ships that carry millions of dollars in goods.

And it stands to reason that even in the territorial waters of countries that do not access the Strait of Malacca it is safer for pirates to strike now, and many attacks by pirates equipped with the latest technology continue to take place in the Strait of Malacca itself, since it has the places where they can score the biggest jackpots. The Singapore Strait is one example – it is the narrowest area along the Strait of Malacca, where merchant ships often conglomerate in a peculiar kind of “maritime traffic jam”. Unfortunately, being well-equipped and well-armed, and feeling their substantial superiority in terms of force, these “professional pirates” act much more cruelly than their counterparts from impoverished coastal regions. There are reports that some of the crews on the vessels subjected to attack have been completely slaughtered.

In 2019, there were 53 pirate attacks registered in Southeast Asia. The main platform for piracy remains Indonesia, and it is easy for criminals familiar with the local terrain to take cover in its jungles, and along its winding rivers. However, there is a new, alarming trend involving increased piracy activity in the Philippines.

Piracy in the Strait of Malacca and the waters that lie around its outskirts is a problem that is hundreds of years old. It is apparent that there is no quick fix for it. A large-scale military campaign that covers almost all of Southeast Asia could bring quick results. However, that kind of campaign would also result in much more harm than good. Local countries in the area are unlikely to be able to execute that kind of campaign, each one operating in its own territory, and if foreign military personnel were brought in and conducted a large-scale international military operation, then it is not clear which participating country would end up in a dominant position, and therefore it is also not clear who would gain control over the Strait of Malacca, a strategically important transport artery that all countries worldwide depend upon to some extent. That is why, at least for now, piracy in the Strait of Malacca should be viewed as the lesser of the two evils, and one that the owners of vessels traveling through the strait can reduce to a minimum on their own by setting up individual security systems for each of their vessels.

September 22, 2020 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular | Leave a comment

FAUCI TOUTS VITAMINS FOR COVID?!

 

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September 22, 2020 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, Video | Leave a comment

Pro-Women’s Rights Supreme Court Judge Ruth Ginsburg Utterly Ignored Palestinian Genocide

By Gideon Polya | Dissident Voice | September 20, 2020

On the occasion of the death of the remarkable, pro-women’s rights US Supreme Court judge but fervent supporter of genocidally racist Zionism, Ruth Bader Ginsburg (RBG), one notes that in her outstanding over 60 year career she was utterly silent about the human rights of Palestinians, and that  women and children are 75% of the 14 million sorely oppressed Palestinians, the 7 million Exiled Palestinians, the 8 million Palestinian refugees, the 5 million Occupied Palestinians with zero human rights in the military-guarded Gaza Concentration Camp (2 million) and West Bank ghettoes (3 million), and the 2 million Palestinian Israelis living as Third Class citizens of Apartheid Israel under over 60 race-based laws.

Genocidally racist American and British Zionists played a key role in the Balfour Declaration and the defeat of Germany in WW1 that had the dreadful consequences of Nazi German anti-Jewish anti-Semitism, WW2, the WW2 Jewish Holocaust (5-6 million Jews killed through violence or deprivation) and the ongoing Palestinian Genocide (2.2 million Palestinian  deaths from violence, 0.1 million, or from imposed deprivation, 2.1 million, since the Australia-assisted British invasion of the oil-rich Middle East in 1914).1

Silence is complicity. Kathryn Shihadah has written about these horrendous historical realities and has described Judge Ginsburg’s Palestinian Genocide-complicit silence as “Progressive Except Palestine” (PEP) (2017): “Ginsburg [first Jewish woman on the US Supreme Court] has pursued justice wholeheartedly all her life, and has throughout her career advocated for progressive causes. In 1972, she co-founded the Women’s Rights Project at the ACLU, and fought more than 300 gender discrimination cases between 1973 and 1974. But these admirable convictions we see in Ginsburg that are common among many Americans – empathy toward the marginalized, advocacy for defenseless – suddenly evaporate in certain situations. Perhaps it’s subconscious, but there lurks another loyalty ready to override the cause of true justice and compassion. Ruth Bader Ginsburg is among the many influential members of the P.E.P. Club: Progressive Except Palestine. For someone dedicated to liberty and justice for all, she is resoundingly silent on the issue of Palestine. Nowhere in her recently published collection of writings, My Own Works , do the words ‘Palestine’ or ‘Palestinian’ appear. Even ‘Arab’ is nowhere to be found, although she discusses the Holocaust, Zionism, and Israel.”

Kathryn Shihadah has further commented on the malignant impact of Zionist US Supreme Court judges on WW1, WW2, the Jewish Holocaust and the Zionist invasion of Palestine (2017): “Ruth Bader Ginsburg is [was] a big fan of the Supreme Court’s first Jewish justice, Louis Dembitz Brandeis. Brandeis is revered today as a great judge, but at the time of his appointment – 1916 – he was recognized by some as ‘unscrupulous’ in his methods and at times ‘unethical’ in his behaviour… In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson named Brandeis to the Supreme Court. As required, Brandeis officially resigned from his formal affiliations, including stepping down from his leadership role in Zionism. However, he zealously continued his work on a more informal basis, even from his Supreme Court chambers. Later, he would persuade the next 2 Jewish justices – Cardozo and Frankfurter – to join the ranks of the Zionist Organization of America, assuring a continued, subtle partiality toward the Jewish project… Samuel Landman, secretary of the World Zionist Organization, claimed in a 1936 article in World Jewry, that it was ‘Jewish help that brought USA into the war on the side of the Allies.’ The goal was not victory for the Allies, but real estate in Palestine, so Brandeis and associate Felix Frankfurter reportedly worked to ensure the war would last until Palestine was in the bag. They even reportedly sabotaged a potential opportunity to end the war in May 1917 (18 months early), which would have saved much destruction and many lives, including Brandeis’ fellow Americans. Eventually, of course, Germany was defeated. According to historian Henry Wickham Steed, one of Germany’s top generals considered the Balfour Declaration to be ‘the cleverest thing done by the Allies in the way of propaganda,’ and wished Germany had thought of it first. Landman further stated that Germany was aware of the Jewish connection, and, chillingly, this ‘contributed in no small measure to the prominence which anti-Semitism occupie[d] in the Nazi program’ only a few decades later. This horrific irony can not be overstated.”2

Seen in the light of this appalling history, at a personal level for me another ultimate consequence of malignant racist Zionism was the extermination of all but a dozen of my family in the ethnic cleansing of Jews from Hungary in 1944-1945. It is now too late to tell the famed human rights advocate but shamefully pro-Zionist and Palestinian human rights-ignoring Ruth Bader Ginsburg that silence is complicity.

Below is a 50-item  summary of a century of horrors inflicted upon the Palestinians but utterly ignored by famed, pro-human rights, Jewish American Supreme Court judge, Ruth Bader Ginsburg:

(1). The ongoing Palestinian Genocide  has been associated with 2.2 million Palestinian deaths from violence, 0.1 million, or from imposed deprivation, 2.1 million, since the British invasion of the Middle East in WW1.

(2). Eminent International law expert Professor Francis Boyle (University of Illinois) has stated: “The Palestinians have been the victims of genocide as defined by the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, under which a government can be guilty of genocide even if it intends to destroy a mere “part” of the group”.

(3). Of 14 million Palestinians (75% women and children),  7 million are Exiled from Palestine, 5 million are Occupied Palestinians highly abusively confined under military rule to the Gaza Concentration Camp (2 million)  or to West Bank ghettoes (3 million), and nearly 2 million are Palestinian Israelis living as Third Class citizens  under over 60 Nazi-style, race-based laws.

(4). In  1880 there were 25,000 Jews (mostly immigrants) and  500,000 Indigenous Arab Palestinians living in Palestine.

(5). The Palestinian Genocide commenced with the famine deaths of 100,000 Palestinians associated with conquest of Palestine in WW1 by the British and the Australian  and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC).

(6). Palestine became disposable British ”property” with the 1916 Sykes Picot Agreement that divided the oil-rich Middle East between the UK and France.

(7). The notorious Balfour Declaration from racist Lord Balfour to Zionist Lord Rothschild (2 November 1917) was sent only 2 days after the Australian cavalry charge victory over the Turks at Beersheba, Palestine  (31 October 1917).

(8). The draft of the Balfour Declaration was strongly opposed by anti-racist Jewish British Government Minister Sir Edwin Montagu (only the second British Jew to enter the British Cabinet) as a grave injustice  to the Indigenous Palestinians, and as “anti-Semitic and in result will prove a rallying ground for Anti-Semites in every country in the world”. Australia’s anti-racist Jewish Governor General Sir Isaac Isaacs, the first Australian-born Governor General,  was also resolutely anti-Zionist.

(9).  Orthodox Jewish rabbis, most notably the outstanding German rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch (after whom my great grandfather was named), were resolutely opposed to Zionism.

(10). Fervently pro-Zionist Jewish British historian Professor Sir Martin Gilbert in a book on WW1 stated that the Balfour Declaration was offered as an inducement for Zionist Communists to keep Russia in WW1. Professor Martin Gilbert has documented about 20 suggested locations around the world for a Jewish state, and indeed genocidal racist Theodor Herzl (the founder of Zionism) suggested Argentina as an alternative to Palestine.

(11). The violent killing of Indigenous Palestinians commenced with the 10 December 1918 Surafend Massacre by Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) soldiers in which about 100 Palestinian villagers were massacred.

(12). Genocidally racist American and British Zionists played a key role in the Balfour Declaration and the defeat of Germany in WW1 that had the dreadful consequences of Nazi German anti-Jewish anti-Semitism, the horrors of WW2, the WW2 Jewish Holocaust (5-6 million Jews killed through violence or deprivation), the ongoing Palestinian Genocide and the ongoing, US-imposed Muslim Holocaust and Muslim Genocide.

(13). Zionists contributed to the WW2 Jewish Holocaust by collaborating with the Nazis before and during WW2,  and opposing Jewish refugees finding sanctuary anywhere except Palestine.

(14). In 2020 there are 13.9 million Israeli subjects, these   comprising 6.6 million Jewish Israelis, 1.9 million Indigenous Palestinian Israelis, 5 million Occupied Palestinians, and 0.4 million non-Jewish and non-Arab  Israeli subjects. Jewish Israelis are a 47% minority of the subjects of Apartheid Israel, and Indigenous Palestinians are  50% of Apartheid Israeli subjects.

(15). UN General Assembly Resolution 3246 (29 November 1974) states in part: “7.  Strongly condemns all Governments which do not recognize the right to self-determination and independence of peoples under colonial and foreign domination and alien subjugation, notably the peoples of Africa and the Palestinian people”.

(16). 90% of Palestine has now been ethnically cleansed of Indigenous Palestinian  inhabitants in an ongoing war criminal ethnic cleansing that has been repeatedly condemned by the UN and most recently by UN Security Council Resolution 2334 that was unanimously supported except for a remarkable Obama US abstention.

(17). Apartheid Israel has also annexed and ethnically cleansed a small part of Lebanon and a large part of  Syria.

(18). There are 8 million Palestinian refugees, 7 million Exiled Palestinians, 5 million Occupied Palestinians, and 1.9 million Israeli Palestinians, with  all of these 14 million Palestinians variously excluded from all or part of Palestine, a land known as such for about 2,500 years after the Philistine coastal inhabitants of circa 1,000 BCE.

(19). 5 million Occupied Palestinians have zero (0) of the human rights set out in the 30 Articles of the Universal Charter of Human Rights.

(20). Nearly 2 million Palestinian Israelis live as Third Class citizens  under over 60 Nazi-style race-based discriminatory laws and under threat of further genocidal mass expulsion.

(21). Despite massive and deadly imposed deprivation and  repeated episodes of genocidal mass expulsion (800,000 in the 1948 Nakba or catstrophe and 400,000 in the 1967 Naksa or setback), Indigenous Palestinians today  represent 50% of the subjects of Apartheid Israel  (the ruling Jewish Israelis  represent a 47% minority).

(22). 73% of the Indigenous Palestinian subjects of Apartheid Israel cannot vote for the government ruling them i.e. they are subject to egregious Apartheid that has been described by anti-racist Jewish and non-Jewish South African anti-Apartheid heroes as worse than Apartheid in South Africa.

(23).  Dr  H. F. Verwoerd (Prime Minister of South Africa from 1958 until his assassination in 1966 and  the “Architect of Apartheid” in South Africa) at the UN (1961): “Israel is not consistent in its new anti-apartheid attitude… they took Israel away from the Arabs after the Arabs lived there for a thousand years. In that, I agree with them. Israel, like South Africa, is an apartheid state.”

(24). The “GDP per capita” is  US$42,000 for Apartheid Israel but a deadly $3,000 for Occupied Palestinians.

(25). 50% of the egregiously mal-treated  Occupied Palestinians are children and 75%  are women and children.

(26). In the 21st century each year an average of about 550 Occupied Palestinians have been killed violently by Apartheid Israel, and a further average of about 4,200 have died annually from imposed deprivation.

(27). In the 21st century there have been 1,615 non-terrorism Israeli deaths from homicide by Israelis, 164 Israeli deaths from terrorism in Israel (excluding Jerusalem), 1,183 further Israeli deaths from terrorism elsewhere in Zionist-ruled Palestine, 9,505 Occupied Palestinian deaths by Israelis, and 72,000 Occupied Palestinian avoidable deaths from imposed deprivation (2017 estimates).

(28). In the period 1920 – February 2017 there were 3,847 Israeli/Zionist  deaths from Palestinian violence as compared to about 100,000 Palestinians violently killed by Zionists and about 2 million Palestinians dying from imposed deprivation.

(29). In the 21st century each year an average of 70 Zionists are killed by Palestinians versus 550 Palestinians violently killed by Apartheid Israel,  and  through imposed deprivation, each year Apartheid Israel passively  murders about 2,700 under-5 year old Palestinian  infants and passively murders 4,200 Occupied Palestinians in general who die avoidably from deprivation each year. under Israeli Apartheid.

(30). There is a circa 10 year life expectancy gap between Occupied Palestinians and Israelis, this grossly violating Articles 55 and 56 of the Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War that demand that an Occupier must provide life-sustaining food and medical services to the Occupied subjects “to the fullest extent of the means available to it”.

(31). UN experts have recently described conditions in the illegally blockaded and regularly shelled and bombed Gaza Concentration Camp as verging on the  “unliveable”.

(32). Apartheid Israel has attacked 13 countries and  occupied 5, whereas Iran that Apartheid Israel threatens with nuclear destruction has not invaded another country for 1,300 years (i.e. from the time of the Sassanian Empire).

(33). Arabic has been the main language of Palestine for 1,400 years, and Indigenous Palestinians are 50% of the subjects of Apartheid Israel. However Arabic was relegated to merely a “special language” in the recent Nazi-style Apartheid Israeli “Jewish Nation State Legislation”.

(34). In its genocidal treatment of the Palestinians, US-, UK-, Canada-, France- , EU- and Australia-backed Apartheid Israel ignores numerous UN General Assembly Resolutions and UN Security Council Resolutions, the UN Genocide Convention, the Geneva Convention, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Rights of the Child Convention, the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the UN Refugee Convention, the UN Convention on Apartheid,  and many other aspects of International Law.

(35). Apartheid Israel has violently invaded the territory of 13 countries (this including planes and ships, to whit Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Jordan, Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Uganda, Tunisia, and the US (the attack on the USS Liberty in 1967 that killed 34 and wounded 171), and has occupied the territory of 5 other countries, namely  Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, and Jordan.

(36). The 1950-2005  avoidable deaths (excess deaths) from deprivation in 5 countries variously occupied by Apartheid Israeli total 24 million.

(37). Of  5 million Occupied Palestinians (half of them children), many are routinely blackmailed through imprisonment, torture or denial of life-saving medical care to spy on fellow Palestinians for Apartheid Israel.

(38). 5 million Occupied Palestinians (half of them children) are excluded by armed military check points from Jews-only areas and Jews-only roads.

(39). 50% of Israeli children are physically, psychologically or sexually abused each year,  but 100% of Occupied Palestinian children are subject to traumatizing human rights abuse by the serial war criminal Israel Defence Force (IDF) through actual or threatened deadly violence.

(40). With continuing deadly blockade and after repeated, large-scale  destruction of homes, schools, hospitals and infrastructure, conditions in the Gaza Concentration Camp are appalling. Only about 30 Israelis gave ever been killed by home-made Gaza rockets but the grossly disproportionate Israeli bombing and shelling reprisals have devastated densely populated  Gaza, and killed 4,600 and wounded about 20,000, most disastrously  in 2008-2009 and in 2014.

(41). Since March 2018 the Israelis have  killed about 200 unarmed Palestinians  and wounded about 20,000  more  out of scores of thousands of unarmed Occupied Palestinians protesting the Occupation weekly in Gaza (in  the 1960 Sharpeville Massacre in Apartheid South Africa police killed 69 demonstrators  and wounded 220 more).

(42). Apartheid Israel backed Apartheid South Africa and was variously complicit in the Guatemalan Mayan Genocide, the Sri Lanka Tamil Genocide, the Myanmar Rohingya Genocide, the Iraqi Genocide and the US-backed neo-Nazi Ukrainian Revolution.

(43). In repeated recent elections  6.6 million Jewish Israelis have overwhelmingly supported  Apartheid, Occupation and the ongoing Palestinian Genocide.

(44). Apartheid Israel reportedly has up to 400 nuclear weapons, has 6 German-supplied submarine launch platforms, and helped Apartheid South Africa acquire nuclear weapons.

(45). Jewish Israelis overwhelmingly derive from Yemeni, Berber and Khazar converts to Judaism whereas it is actually the Indigenous Palestinians who are the descendants  of the Jewish and non-Jewish inhabitants of Palestine at the time of that wonderful, Aramaic-speaking, Palestinian humanitarian, Jesus.

(46). Molecular biological and linguistic studies variously reveal that the Ashkenazim (the minority ruling Apartheid Israel) derive from Khazar converts to Judaism in the first millennium CE, and that there is a  substantial prehistoric European ancestry amongst Ashkenazi maternal lineages.

(47). Zionist leaders from genocidal racists Theodor Herzl (Palestinian Genocide) and Winston Churchill (WW2 Bengali Holocaust) to genocidally racist Israeli prime ministers from David  Ben Gurion to Benjamin Netanyahu have uttered deeply racist and indeed genocidal comments about Palestinians that would be totally unacceptable in the “politically correct Western democracies  that back Apartheid Israel.3

(48). President John  F. Kennedy and his brother Robert Kennedy unsuccessfully sought registration of Zionists as agents of a foreign power. Successive  US administrations became beholden to the Zionists after Apartheid Israel acquired nuclear weapons by 1967 with French and US help.

(49). Successive US administrations have committed $6 trillion to Zionist-backed wars in which 32 million Muslims have died from violence (5 million) or deprivation (27 million) in 20 countries invaded by the US Alliance since the US government’s 9-11 false flag atrocity that killed 3,000 people.

(50). Over 30 million Americans have died preventably since 9-11 from “lifestyle  choice” and “political choice” reasons. Thus successive US administrations have committed $6 trillion to killing over 30 million Muslims abroad instead of trying to keep 30 million Americans alive at home.

  1. For a detailed and documented analysis of the horrendous death toll in a century of Zionist-promoted wars and attendant holocausts and genocides see Gideon Polya, US-Imposed Post-9/11 Muslim Holocaust & Muslim Genocide, 400 pages, Korsgaard Publishing, Germany, 4 June 2020; and Gideon Polya, “Racist Mainstream ignores US-Imposed Post-9/11 Muslim Holocaust & Muslim Genocide,” Countercurrents, 17 July 2020. [↩]
  2. See Kathryn  Shihadah, “Ruth Bader Ginsburg: at 84, where does she get her PEP (Progressive Except Palestine)?”, Israel-Palestine News, 20 December  2017. [↩]
  3. See “Zionist quotes re racism and Palestinian Genocide,” Palestinian Genocide. [↩]

Gideon Polya is a biochemist, writer, humanitarian activist, and artist. His latest book is US-Imposed Post-9/11 Muslim Holocaust & Muslim Genocide (2020).

September 21, 2020 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Progressive Hypocrite, Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | , | Leave a comment

American Mass Bombings of Chinese Cities in World War II

Tales of the American Empire | May 12, 2019

The United States Army Air Forces destroyed most Japanese cities during World War II, and a few cities in China as well. These were not precision airstrikes but mass bombings designed to destroy the city and kill residents.

___________________________________

 The Fog of War – Lesson #5; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOCYc…

US Army Air Forces in World War II; https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/AAF/…

September 20, 2020 Posted by | Timeless or most popular, Video, War Crimes | , | Leave a comment

Scientific American Goes Full Anti-Science

By Francis Menton | Manhattan Contrarian | September 12, 2020

Back at the beginning of the Trump administration in January 2017, it was all the rage for media on the left to accuse Trump and his people of being “anti-science.” I compiled a collection of such accusations in a post on January 27 of that year, using the title “Who Again Is ‘Anti-Science’?” Among those I cited as making the accusation was the venerable magazine Scientific American, which had published a piece on January 18, 2017 with the title “Trump’s 5 Most Anti-Science Moves.”

If you look at that 2017 Scientific American piece, or the other articles that I cited in my post, you will see that those commenters are conceiving of “science” not as a special methodology, but rather as something more like: “science is what people who call themselves scientists do.” The basic complaint of the commenters was that Trump was “anti-science” because he was listening to or appointing people who disagreed with — or worse, sought to de-fund — functionaries in the government who called themselves scientists.

I have a different definition of the term “science.” Here’s my definition: “Science is a process for understanding reality through using experiment or data to attempt to falsify falsifiable hypotheses.” Those are my words, but I have tried there to capture the gist of the classic conception of the scientific method articulated by philosopher Karl Popper. For a somewhat longer articulation of the same thing, here is an excerpt discussing Popper’s principles from the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

Popper’s falsificationist methodology holds that scientific theories are characterized by entailing predictions that future observations might reveal to be false. When theories are falsified by such observations, scientists can respond by revising the theory, or by rejecting the theory in favor of a rival . . . In either case, however, this process must aim at the production of new, falsifiable predictions. . . . [Popper] holds that scientific practice is characterized by its continual effort to test theories against experience and make revisions based on the outcomes of these tests.  By contrast, theories that are permanently immunized from falsification by the introduction of untestable ad hoc hypotheses can no longer be classified as scientific.

Astute readers of this passage will immediately recognize that today’s political environment is full of theories that claim the mantle of science — indeed, claim to be scientifically-established truth — but at the same time are “permanently immunized from falsification.” Exhibit A is the religion going under the name of “climate science.” Or consider Exhibit B, in the field of social science, the hypothesis that “systemic racism” is the cause of all economic underperformance by African Americans. There are plenty more such examples.

In recent years Scientific American has somehow gotten itself into the position of defending the truth of many such non-falsifiable claims, but most notably in its strenuous advocacy of climate change alarmism. How to reconcile such advocacy with the use of the term “Scientific” in its title? If you are wondering how that could even be attempted, check out the piece in the current issue by a guy named Mano Singham, with the title and sub-title, “The Idea That a Scientific Theory Can Be ‘Falsified’ Is a Myth; It’s time we abandoned the notion.” Singham is identified as a member of the American Physical Society, and is apparently a retired professor from Case Western Reserve University.

Singham begins by acknowledging that “[E]ver since the seminal work of philosopher of science Karl Popper, for a scientific theory to be worthy of its name, it has to be falsifiable by experiments or observations.” However, Singham now understands that that whole approach has become passé. Apparently, there is a new field, going by the name “science studies,” that “compris[es] the history, philosophy and sociology of science.” People in this new field have now demonstrated that “falsification cannot work even in principle.” Here’s the explanation:

[A] theoretical prediction is never the product of a single theory but also requires using many other theories. When a “theoretical” prediction disagrees with “experimental” data, what this tells us is that that there is a disagreement between two sets of theories, so we cannot say that any particular theory is falsified.

Got that? And now that we’ve deep-sixed falsifiability as having anything to do with science, what’s the replacement?

Science studies . . . show[] that the strength of scientific conclusions arises because credible experts use comprehensive bodies of evidence to arrive at consensus judgments about whether a theory should be retained or rejected in favor of a new one. . . . It is the preponderance of evidence that is relevant in making such judgments, not one or even a few results.

Well, Mano, let’s consider my hypothesis that the thing that causes the sun to come up every morning is my going to sleep the night before. I formulated this hypothesis a year ago based on some ten thousand consecutive nights where I had gone to sleep and the sun therefore arose the next morning. I then tested the hypothesis for a full year of going to sleep every night and observing that sure enough, the sun arose every succeeding morning, 365 consecutive times. Surely my hypothesis has been established as true.

A friend points out that one time back in college I pulled an all-nighter, and the sun still came up. So what? Under Singham’s “science studies” principles, that’s just putting “one result” up against “the preponderance of the evidence.” That one conflicting observation does not tell us that my hypothesis has been falsified, but rather only that “there is a disagreement between two sets of theories.” (Another thing that it might be telling us is that Singham is not very bright.)

Anyway, there is an obvious purpose for Singham’s piece appearing at this time in Scientific American, which is to attempt to defend the climate “science” scam against attacks that it is not real science because it lacks falsifiable hypotheses. Singham:

[The] knowledge [of science studies] equips people to better argue against anti-science forces that use the same strategy over and over again, whether it is about the dangers of tobacco, climate change, vaccinations or evolution. Their goal is to exploit the slivers of doubt and discrepant results that always exist in science in order to challenge the consensus views of scientific experts.

I don’t know how Singham chose his examples of arguments used by what he calls “anti-science forces,” but a look at those examples demonstrates what his exercise is really about, which is exempting climate “science” from the requirement of falsifiable hypotheses. The hypothesis that cigarette smoking is a significant factor in causing lung cancer could definitely be falsified by a study of thousands of randomly-selected non-smokers who developed lung cancer at the same rates as smokers. The hypothesis that life forms change over time through a process of evolution could be falsified by discovery of “fossil rabbits in the Precambrian,” in a famous formulation of J.B.S. Haldane that is actually quoted by Singham in his piece. And vaccinations are subjected to double-blind clinical trials, which are explicit attempts to falsify the hypothesis that they are effective. So the only one of the four examples selected by Singham that actually lacks falsifiable hypotheses, and that seeks to be “permanently immunized from falsification,” is climate change.

Overall, this is a thoroughly embarrassing performance, not just by Dr. Singham, but by Scientific American. It is beyond explanation how the editors of this once-prestigious publication, with the term “Scientific” in its name, could have so completely lost track of what makes science science. And then to top it off, they call the people who actually understand what science is “anti-science.”

My message to the editors is this: The proponents of climate change alarmism, if they want to make any kind of legitimate claim to the mantle of “science,” need to specify the falsifiable hypothesis that they claim has been established, and also the evidence which, if it emerged, they would agree had falsified the hypothesis. Until they do that, their assertions have no more claim to the label of “established science” than does my hypothesis that my going to bed is what causes the sun to come up the next morning. Those of us who understand what the scientific method is are onto the climate scammers. As for Scientific American, your reputation at this point is beyond rehabilitation.

September 19, 2020 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | | Leave a comment

The Library of Alexandria is on Fire

Corbett • 09/18/2020

We all know the story of the Library of Alexandria, the vast repository of ancient texts that was burnt to the ground by Caesar in 48 B.C. While the story itself isn’t accurate, it speaks to us today as we face the digital book burnings that are threatening the modern-day Library of Alexandria: the internet. In this speech delivered at the Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth’s Justice Rising conference on September 13, 2020, James Corbett connects the dots from that ancient story to the internet censorship of today, and outlines what we can do to fight the fire that is threatening our most important information.

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SHOW NOTES:
Justice Rising conference

9/11 Trillions: Follow the Money

Why Aren’t Insurers 9/11 Truthers? – Questions For Corbett #067

9/11: Decade of Deception

Operation Northwoods

Press For Truth BANNED On YouTube!

The Library of Babel – FLNWO #27

Century of Enslavement: The History of The Federal Reserve

YouTube Blacklists Federal Reserve Information. It’s Up To YOU To Spread It!

Continuing our work to improve recommendations on YouTube

Twitter shadowbans content

Former Twitter software engineer Abhinav Vadrevu explains shadowbanning

Who Will Fact Check the Fact Checkers?

Gordon Crovitz Newsguard co-founder

Newsguard advisors

Agamben book burning quotation

Fahrenheit 451

Aeschylus Meets the Mummy: 2,500-Year-Old, Lost Greek Trilogy Found Under Wraps

September 18, 2020 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Timeless or most popular, Video | Leave a comment