California Senator Says Calling for a Ceasefire in Gaza Is ‘Dehumanizing Language’
By Kyle Anzalone | The Libertarian Institute | January 18, 2024
In an interview with the LA Times, Sen. Laphonza Butler said that it was “dehumanizing” to call for a ceasefire in Gaza. The striking comments come as Gaza has been turned into a humanitarian nightmare by an Israeli military campaign that has relayed upon US support.
The Senator was asked, “Why haven’t you called for a ceasefire in Gaza? Do you think it’s meaningful for a senator to call for a ceasefire or not?” “I don’t want my voice to ever be utilized in dehumanizing any Californian or American,” she responded. “We can both acknowledge that the atrocities of Oct. 7 were horrible and that Israel has a right to defend itself while we honor the humanity of the innocent Palestinian lives that are being used as a political pawn by a terrorist organization [Hamas].”
She continued, “And so for me, I want to use my time, energy, and attention to ensure that we are advocating for a permanent solution. And I don’t want to continue the language that further divides our party, our communities, or our country.”
The LA Times followed up, “What language is the dehumanizing language?” Butler answered, “To some, that is the ceasefire language and to some [it] is other words and phrases that have been sort of utilized in this context.” California’s junior Senator added, “To me, I want to focus on what is the solution that we can implement now and in the future, to accomplish both goals.”
Since the Hamas attack on southern Israel, which took place just over three months ago, Israeli operations in Gaza have killed at least 25,000 Palestinians, including over 10,000 children. The Israeli attacks have destroyed Gaza’s medical infrastructure, leading to children undergoing amputations in unsanitary conditions and without anesthetics.
Israel has used massive 2,000-pound bombs provided by the US near hospitals and in dense civilian areas, leading to massive deaths among women and children. Tel Aviv has also destroyed other critical civilian infrastructure, such as the solar array for a water treatment facility or universities.
Tel Aviv has severely restricted aid to Gaza. The lack of food has left hundreds of thousands of Palestinians suffering in famine conditions, according to the UN. Butler did not explain how ending the fighting in Gaza would be “dehumanizing” while continuing the onslaught in Gaza would “honor the humanity of innocent Palestinians.”
It is unclear what “solution” Butler is referring to. The White House claims it wants the conflict in Gaza to end with a Palestinian state. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he told his partners in Washington that he would never allow the two-state solution to materialize.
The White House, like Butler, refuses to call for a ceasefire in Gaza. The Biden administration has vetoed several UN Security Council resolutions that called for Israel to end its military operations in Gaza. Washington has additionally refused to place any conditions on the military assistance Israel is being provided on a near-daily basis.
The unrestrained support for Israel has started to break Biden from his voters and Democratic politicians. Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen chastised Biden for allowing Tel Aviv to ignore Washington’s requests. “At every juncture, Netanyahu has given Biden the finger. They are pleading with the Netanyahu coalition, but getting slapped in the face over and over again,” he said. A recent USA Today poll found former President Donald Trump leading Biden among young voters, a demographic that also strongly opposes US support for Israel.
More than 390 educational institutes destroyed in Gaza
Press TV – January 18, 2024
The Palestinian resistance movement Hamas announced the destruction of more than 390 schools, universities, and educational institutions in over 100 days of brutal bombardment of the besieged strip by the Israeli regime.
In a press note issued on Thursday, the resistance movement said, “More than 390 schools, universities, and educational institutions have been destroyed in 100 days, the most recent of which was the bombing of Al-Isra University and the re-bombing of the Islamic University today.”
Hamas said that the destruction of school and university buildings in the Gaza Strip “is a war crime and criminal behavior aimed at destroying all components of human life…” The resistance group stated that Israel is deliberately targeting the education system to erode the national identity of Palestinians.
Calling on the United Nations and other human rights organizations to document and prosecute the regime for its crimes, Hamas said, “We affirm that our people, through their steadfastness, sacrifices, and resistance, will thwart these despicable plans to undermine the educational system and obliterate the deep-rooted national identity of our Palestinian people.”
Gaza’s Ministry of Education announced on Tuesday that 4,368 students have been killed while almost 8000 have been injured since the start of Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip on October 7.
The number of teachers killed is 231 teachers with 756 injured.
Israel’s relentless bombardment has also targeted 65 schools affiliated with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Refugees (UNRWA).
As per the figures given by the Palestinian Health Ministry on Wednesday, the death toll from Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip has surged to 24,448.
Israeli army blows up university in Gaza after 70 days of converting it into a military barracks
Palestine Information Center – January 18, 2024
GAZA – The Israeli occupation forces (IOF) blew up the building of Al-Isra University in Gaza after 70 days of occupying it and converting it into a military barracks and a detention center.
The university administration said in a statement on Thursday, “The IOF occupied the university building for seventy days, turning it into a military base and a center for sniping isolated civilians in the areas of Rashid Street, Al-Mughraqa, and Al-Zahra, as well as a temporary detention center for interrogating Palestinians, before detonating it.”
Israeli media outlets published a video documenting the moment the occupation forces detonated the main headquarters of Al-Isra University in the city of Al-Zahra, south of Gaza City, yesterday.
Gaza Testimony
Al-Haq | January 17, 2024
Journalist Dia Al Kahlout was arbitrarily arrested by the #Israeli Occupying Forces from his home in Beit Lahia & detained for 33 days.
Upon his release, family members of others arbitrarily detained desperately try to get information about their loved ones
mRNA vaccines lead to unwanted proteins – but what does it mean?
New research has experts angered by the “complete and utter regulatory failure” to ensure patient safety
BY MARYANNE DEMASI, PHD | JANUARY 16, 2024
After three years on the market and billions of doses later, the mRNA COVID-19 vaccines continue to throw up surprises.
A landmark study, published last December in Nature, has reignited concerns over the safety of the vaccines.
The study, by highly credentialled UK researchers, found that in addition to spike protein, Pfizer’s mRNA vaccine can instruct cells to produce other ‘off-target’ proteins, which are foreign to the immune system.
How does it happen?
The researchers say that ribosomes, which are responsible for decoding the mRNA in cells, can slip and misread the coded instructions about 8% of the time – known as “ribosomal frameshifting.”
They say the ‘glitch’ has to do with how the mRNA in the vaccine has been genetically modified.
Unlike naturally-occurring mRNA, the mRNA that exists in the vaccines has had a ‘uridine’ base replaced with a ‘N1-methyl pseudouridine’ (to stabilise it) and unfortunately, has made it prone to reading errors.
But are these ‘off-target’ proteins harmful?
At a press briefing, the study researchers insisted there were no safety concerns, and that their findings did not indicate the mRNA vaccines were unsafe.
The BBC characterised the glitch as a “harmless tiny slip” in mRNA gene translation.
Science said there was “nothing alarming” about the study, and interviewed experts who reiterated the absence of adverse events associated with these off-target proteins.
However, David Wiseman, a research scientist involved in medical product development, is not so convinced. He, and his co-authors, published their comments in Nature.
I spoke with Dr Wiseman about his concerns and what this research might mean for patient safety.
DEMASI: Thanks for speaking with me Dr Wiseman. How concerned are you about these latest findings?
WISEMAN: I’m very concerned. This raises more questions about the long-term safety of the mRNA vaccines.
DEMASI: Before we discuss what they found, can you explain the purpose of the study?
WISEMAN: Well, these researchers asked a simple question – are the instructions contained within the mRNA of the vaccines being faithfully carried out. Or put another way, does the body make the spike protein it’s supposed to make, as instructed by the mRNA’s code.
It’s like saying here’s a recipe with instructions on how to make a cake – it’s grandma’s cake recipe. These researchers wanted to know if the mRNA could accurately give instructions on how to make Grandma’s cake or whether it would produce a corrupted version of grandma’s cake.
These researchers obviously knew from the literature that modifying some of the bases in the vaccine’s RNA – as was the case for the mRNA COVID-19 vaccines – that it might cause misreads of different kinds. It’s known as ‘frameshifting.’
DEMASI: And what exactly did they find?
WISEMAN: They found the Pfizer vaccine can cause your cells to make proteins that they are not supposed to make – you end up with what I call “Pfrankenstein proteins.”
DEMASI: Because sometimes there are errors in the way the mRNA is read?
WISEMAN: Yes. Imagine the following three-letter English words ABE DAN TEA TON ERA TWO – the letters are like the code on the mRNA. Now instead of starting to read the sentence at the letter “A” of the first word, you frameshift to the next letter – the letter “B.”
That means that all the other letters are shifted to the left and it will give you a new sentence with three-letter words BED ANT EAT ONE RAT etcetera.
So, the new words have a completely different meaning from the original words. This is what happened in the body of some people vaccinated with Pfizer’s product.
New unwanted “off-target” proteins were produced, that actually led to an “off-target” immune response.
DEMASI: So, were these off-target proteins detected in the blood of people who’d been vaccinated?
No, they did not measure these proteins in the blood of people who’d been vaccinated.
These researchers did something similar to what I did with the six English words – they “predicted” what some of these off-target proteins would look like, had there been a problem with frameshifting.
They made these frameshift proteins in the lab – about 30 or 40 of them – pooled them together in a test tube and then exposed them to blood lymphocytes (white blood cells that mount the immune response) taken from people who’d been vaccinated.
What they found in about 25 to 33% of people who’d received Pfizer’s product, was that their lymphocytes, responded immunologically when exposed to these frameshift proteins in a test tube.
It means their lymphocytes had seen the proteins before – their immune system had already been primed from a prior exposure, presumably after that person had received the mRNA vaccine.
DEMASI: They also tested samples from people who’d received the AstraZeneca vaccine and saw no immune reaction – can you explain why?
WISEMAN: The AstraZeneca vaccine is a different technology. It is a DNA vaccine and does not have the uridine modification that is causing the frameshifting in the mRNA vaccine.
So, it’s not surprising that the lymphocytes from people given the AstraZeneca vaccine did not react to these frameshift proteins, because they’d never seen them before.
DEMASI: They didn’t study people vaccinated with Moderna, but would you say the problem is likely to happen with Moderna’s vaccine too?
WISEMAN: Yes, I would because it’s also an mRNA vaccine and contains the same sort of uridine modification as the Pfizer vaccine.
DEMASI: OK, so making proteins you’re not supposed to make sounds bad, but the media coverage seemed to suggest there wasn’t a problem….
WISEMAN: What you have to realise is that your body is being hijacked, not just to produce spike protein, but also to produce other, what I call, “Pfrankenstein” proteins that are completely uncharacterised.
We don’t know what they are, what they do, for how long they’re made or how long they last in the body, and we have no idea what their toxicity is. From the Nature paper however, we do know that these unwanted proteins elicit immune reactions in the body.
DEMASI: What could these immune reactions lead to? You were concerned about autoimmune conditions?
WISEMAN: Yes. These researchers showed that frameshifting could create chimeric proteins. Basically, as the ribosome reads the code for the spike protein, it may slip in the middle of reading the code. So, the first half is spike protein, and the second half is a Pfrankenstein protein.
Now, just imagine one half can still attach to the ACE2 receptor on cells but on the other end, you’ve got this Pfrankenstein protein dangling outside of the cells. Your immune system is going to destroy the cell because it looks foreign, and now you’ve got something that looks like an autoimmune condition.
Or you could have a protein that turns out to be not necessarily identical, but sufficiently similar to another protein in our body like a hormone and it ends up mimicking the hormone’s activity and disturbing your endocrine system.
DEMASI: But the study authors said there were “no adverse events” associated with these frameshift proteins.
WISEMAN: The authors wrote, “…there is no evidence that frameshifted products in humans generated from BNT162b2 vaccination are associated with adverse outcomes.”
But they only looked at 21 people who received Pfizer’s vaccine, so you cannot call that a serious safety study by any stretch of the imagination.
And how did they select these people? The volunteers were part of another government funded study and had not reported undue effects from vaccination. Since they did not study subjects who had reported adverse vaccine effects, the selection of participants was probably biased.
DEMASI: The authors of the study said that with some tweaks they could identify potential slips and reduce reading errors…..
WISEMAN: Right, and this work should’ve been done by the vaccine manufacturers and by the regulators before the product was authorised and given to billions of people. They’ve asked people to take a vaccine, and put it into children and they have no clue what is happening inside the body.
What they’re trying to say now is that there have been no problems identified in 21 people, but in the future there may be problems, so we should just keep studying it.
Are you kidding me? What they’re saying is that ‘we will inject you first and ask safety questions later.’ It’s not good enough.
It’s just like the retired Pfizer executive admitted in a Nature article, “We flew the aeroplane while we were still building it.”
DEMASI: Shouldn’t the drug regulators be all over this?
WISEMAN: This has been a complete and utter regulatory failure. The 2021 WHO guidelines say that for mRNA vaccines the manufacturers have to disclose all the sequences and unexpected reading frames. They were required to have done this work already… The FDA should have been looking at it.
The mRNA vaccines are causing our bodies to produce uncharacterised proteins, with unknown toxicology, that produce an immune response of unknown clinical significance. The dereliction of duty by regulators shows how they’ve sunken to an all-time low.
US health agency hushed Covid vax myocarditis warning – media
RT | January 17, 2024
The US Centers for Disease Control never sent an urgent health alert it had drafted in May 2021 regarding a potentially fatal side-effect linked to the Covid-19 vaccinations it was promoting, and continued to push the shots without warning the public, according to a document obtained by Epoch Times on Wednesday.
In an inter-agency email titled “draft alert on myocarditis and mRNA vaccines” obtained by the Times, CDC official Dr. Demetre Daskalakis informed two high-ranking colleagues that he had attached “the most recent draft of an alert as discussed.”
The agency disseminates what it describes as “vital health information” to doctors and public health officials at federal, state and local levels through a system called the Health Alert Network. The warning was reportedly prepared for release via this network; Daskalakis’ email was dated May 21, 2021, but never saw publication.
While the exact text of the warning has not been made public, the CDC had been tracking cases of myocarditis – a potentially deadly heart condition – in individuals vaccinated with Pfizer and Moderna’s mRNA-based Covid-19 vaccines for months, witnessing what it internally acknowledged was an alarming spike in cases, even as it continued to urge all Americans to get vaccinated against the novel coronavirus.
Two days before the email was sent, the CDC told state officials it was “closely monitoring” post-vaccination cases of myocarditis and pericarditis, a similar condition, and acknowledged that such cases “can be serious.” However, the public was not notified until weeks later – and the CDC continued to promote the jabs to all Americans, even after the risk was made public.
Instead of the never-released draft alert, the CDC later chose to inform healthcare providers about the danger in a document headed “clinical considerations” that lacked the forceful language or widespread distribution a Health Alert Network bulletin would have received. While it acknowledged the increased risk of myocarditis, it placed equivalent emphasis on the need to vaccinate everyone over age 11.
Last year, it emerged that both the CDC and the Food and Drug Administration had been made aware of a myocarditis “safety signal” triggered by an unusually large number of adverse event reports as far back as February 2021 – just two months after the mRNA-based vaccines received regulatory approval [emergency use authorizion].
Despite international news reports that vaccination with Pfizer and Moderna’s shots was associated with an elevated risk of myocarditis, the US regulatory agencies did not inform the public about the risk until after the jabs had been approved for patients between 12 and 15 years old – one of the age groups most susceptible to their deadly side effects.
Australia: ABC staff threaten strike after Arab journalist sacked
Award-winning journalist and author Antoinette Lattouf
MEMO | January 17, 2024
ABC journalists in the broadcaster’s Sydney offices yesterday threatened to strike unless management addresses concerns over the unlawful dismissal of radio host Antoinette Lattouf, Anadolu news agency reported.
The award-winning journalist and author, who is of Lebanese heritage, was sacked by ABC last month for sharing on Instagram a report by Human Rights Watch (HRW) on the besieged Gaza Strip.
The internationally-recognised rights watchdog released a report on how starvation was being used as “a weapon of war” by the Israeli government in Gaza. ABC also published a news item on the report.
On Tuesday, the Sydney Morning Herald revealed a leaked chain of WhatsApp messages from a group called Lawyers for Israel who had lobbied for Lattouf to be sacked.
“The ABC sacked broadcaster Antoinette Lattouf after a high-level and coordinated letter-writing campaign from pro-Israel lobbyists that directly targeted the corporation’s chair, Ita Buttrose, and managing director David Anderson,” the news daily said.
The report reveals that the Israeli lobby “repeatedly wrote to the ABC demanding Lattouf be sacked, and threatened legal action if she was not.”
Yesterday, about 80 ABC staff members demanded a meeting with Anderson, who is currently on leave.
They threatened to stage a walkout if their concerns were not addressed.
Lattouf has legally challenged her termination, saying she was sacked on the grounds of “political opinion or a reason that included political opinion” and later expanded the claim to include race, due to her Lebanese heritage.
While ABC has denied Anderson was behind Lattouf’s sacking, the broadcaster has told a court that the journalist was removed “because she ignored a direction from managers and shared a controversial social media post from Human Rights Watch.”
Lattouf demands a clear public apology, financial compensation and the offer of a proportionate position.
Hearings are scheduled to begin later this week.
In a statement to the Sydney Morning Herald, Lattouf’s lawyer, Josh Bornstein, said that after “October 7 and the ensuing conflict in the Middle East, it has become common knowledge in the media industry that Arab and Muslim journalists are being subjected to intimidation, censorship and expulsion.”
Republicans threaten to fire US federal workers if they oppose Israel genocide
MEMO | January 17, 2024
Germany considers delivery of tank ammunition to Israel amid genocidal Gaza war
Press TV – January 17, 2024
Germany’s government is considering the delivery of tank ammunition to Israel amid genocidal war against Gaza, the German magazine Der Spiegel has reported, as Western governments keep on backing the Tel Aviv regime for its ongoing massacre.
Israel requested Germany in November to approve the delivery of around 10,000 rounds of 120-millimeter precision ammunition manufactured by Rheinmetall, the report said.
The departments involved have already fundamentally agreed behind the scenes to fulfill a request from the Israeli government.
The Israeli ambassador to Germany, Ron Prosor thanked the German government for its unrelenting support it has shown.
“Since October 7, Germany has unmistakably stood by Israel and expressed its unreserved support,” Prosor told Der Spiegel. “Israel thanks Germany for this,” he added.
The German Chancellor Olaf Scholz emphasized that arms deliveries were also possible.
According to the report, in order to promptly address the request, there is consideration being given to releasing ammunition from the stocks of the German army as the industry is unable to provide the desired precision ammunition immediately.
In November apart from Germany, Israel had also asked other partners for military aid because of its heavy use of ammunition against the Gazans.
US President Joe Biden approved the delivery of 14,000 rounds of tank ammunition for almost $106 million at the beginning of December, after he bypassed Congress.
The Western-backed Israeli genocide in Gaza has been escalating because of the continuous support of Western governments, as they have been persistently arming Israel and supporting the regime with large amounts of funds.
Israeli war on Gaza was a high-risk gamble that proved a failure: Analyst
By Alireza Hashemi | Press TV | January 16, 2024
The Israeli genocidal war on Gaza was a high-risk gamble that eventually proved a failure, and the rising direct and indirect costs of the war make it difficult for the regime to sustain it, says an analyst.
Mohammad Sadeq Koushki, a Tehran-based political and foreign affairs commentator, in a conversation with the Press TV website, said the Israeli regime has encountered staggering losses with its onslaught on Gaza, which makes it hard for Israeli officials to keep fanning its flames.
“This war is unequal in many aspects. The biggest difference is that the Palestinian side has nothing to lose, and nowhere to go. They have no option but to defend themselves and to continue the war for as long as it takes,” he said, referring to the Palestinian resistance’s upper hand over the occupation.
“But on the other hand, the Zionists have a lot to lose. Those still living in the Israeli-occupied territories went there in the hope that they would have a better life there. Now that doesn’t exist and people are losing their motivation to remain in the occupied lands and have decided to leave.”
Koushki said the indirect costs of the war are also taking a heavy toll on the regime’s economy.
“It’s not just ordinary people leaving. Investors are also leaving. The skilled workforce who went there from Europe and the US are also leaving. Tourists are also afraid of visiting the region,” he noted.
“Reservists, who were summoned by the regime, have also left their jobs. For the first time, a huge population has been displaced, and the regime has to pay for their living expenses.”
Staggering cost of war
He said the Benjamin Netanyahu-led regime has been spending 200 to 250 million dollars per day on the war while continuing to lose their troops and tanks and military vehicles.
“It was a high-risk gamble from the beginning and it has failed. It’s the Zionist settlers who have to pay for this failure. Netanyahu is doing this at their expense. And the costs are rising fast,” Koushki said.
This week, the genocidal war launched by the Israeli regime on Gaza on October 7 completed 100 days, leaving almost 24,000 Palestinians dead, the majority of them children and women.
Despite the high casualty toll in Gaza, the Palestinian resistance groups backed by the people of Palestine have refused to retreat or surrender, or even leave the besieged territory.
According to political pundits, the regime failed to achieve any of its stated objectives of the war.
Of late, the Israeli military claimed that it has shifted to “a new phase” of the war, which it says is focused on the southern part of the blockaded territory.
There have also been reports of Israeli military regiments abandoning northern Gaza without managing to eliminate the Hamas resistance group or destroy its infrastructure.
Israel can’t crush resistance
Israeli premier Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly rejected international calls for a humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza, vowing that “no one will stop us” from eliminating the Hamas movement.
Israeli officials say the regime will keep going for months or even years until it achieves its stated goals.
Koushki said Hamas is a manifestation of Palestinian resistance and Israel has never been able to eliminate this resistance throughout the past 75 years of its occupation.
“Hamas is nothing to be destroyed. From the 1990s onwards, hundreds of Hamas commanders were assassinated. The most important leaders. What happened to Hamas,” he asked.
“Even if Israel gets all of Hamas members in Palestine and executes every single one of them, the next generation of Palestinians will be the new Hamas. They can’t eliminate the resistance.”
On calls by various Israeli regime officials for Gazans to be “encouraged” to leave the region, Koushki asserted that Israel’s forced displacement plan is not feasible.
‘Zionists feel cornered’
On recent Israeli attacks inside Syria and Lebanon, which led to the martyrdom of several commanders of the resistance front, including Iran’s Sayyed Razi Mousavi, Koushki said it won’t help the regime.
“Even if Israelis attack Syria or Lebanon 10 times a day, or assassinate five resistance commanders each day, it doesn’t change anything on the ground in Gaza and doesn’t make up for Israel’s huge losses.”
When asked about the effectiveness of attacks by Lebanese, Iraqi, and Yemeni resistance groups against Israeli interests, Koushki highlighted the significant psychological impact of these strikes.
“Those living in the occupied territories feel they’re cornered and this places a huge pressure on them. They feel they’re being attacked from all directions. This is the first time that all occupied territories are insecure. From Eilat in the south to Galilee in the north to even central regions. People feel they don’t belong to this region,” the Iranian analyst told the Press TV website.
Asked whether the US and its allies can deter further anti-Israel operations by the Yemeni military, the analyst said the recent attacks on Yemen have not degraded their capability to attack Israel.
“The point is that Yemenis have imposed a semi-blockade on Israel. Did these attacks stop Yemen from targeting Israel-linked ships? Yemenis have conducted attacks against those ships even after the recent US-UK attacks. So they couldn’t stop Yemen and it’s very hard to believe they can do that shortly.”
South Africa’s genocide case
On South Africa’s genocide case against Israel, he said the regime is unlikely to abide by any ICJ verdict but it would significantly boost the pro-Palestine movement worldwide.
“Israel defied numerous UN resolutions and disregarded the 2004 ICJ ruling on the separation wall. This genocide case would be no exception. But Israel’s flouting of laws will only solidify its status as a pariah in the eyes of its backers in the West and further mobilize global public opinion against the regime.”
How far will complicity reach in Israel’s genocidal offensive in Gaza?
By Ramona Wadi | MEMO | January 16, 2024
If we were to listen to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the definition of genocide would be altered, because Israel’s definition of its genocidal intent and actions were summed up by him as “a moral and just war” waged by the settler-colonial enterprise and the Israeli military. “This international defamation campaign will not weaken our hands or weaken our determination to fight to the end,” Netanyahu asserted. Until what end? The complete ethnic cleansing of Gaza?
At the International Court of Justice (ICJ) last week, Israel played its fabricated security narrative to the full, and unsurprisingly blamed Hamas for the thousands of Palestinians injured and killed by Israeli air strikes. The apartheid state also played the humanitarian card, despite starvation being one of the tactics used to annihilate the Palestinian population. Humanitarian corridors have been bombed, food aid has been prevented from entering Gaza and, on occasions where delivery was possible, the provisions were meagre in comparison with the scale of deprivation as a result of Israel’s dealing of death and destruction. Not to mention Israeli soldiers firing upon Palestinian civilians as they crowded around to get aid. Or children collecting flour that had been spilled on the ground. Genocide is not a fabrication — or a “defamation campaign” as Netanyahu would have us believe – and Israel, of course, has perfected its methods.
However, not even Israel believes its own lies, let alone the rest of the international community.
Alliances and complicity are what Israel relies on, though. It is allowed to retain control over its security narrative because ties run deep and dependence upon Israel’s military technology is the major weakness of too many governments. So much so, in fact, that the Jerusalem Post is marketing Israel’s weaponry which it has used in Gaza. As if to inaugurate the “100 days of the Israel-Hamas war” – Israel’s euphemism for genocide – a recent article lists Israel’s new weaponry and medical supplies for the military. With emphasis on precision targeting and mortars with “improved accuracy… for use against terrorists in crowded areas”, perhaps Israel can explain why precision targeting increases the death toll of Palestinian civilians, unless Israel is precisely targeting civilians. This is beside Israel’s assertion that it also used unguided bombs, “the goal being more attacks in fewer flights”. The Jerusalem Post notes that, “Israel is the first country to use them in operational activity.” Whatever Israel uses, precision strikes or unguided bombs, civilians have been targeted in a strip of land in which nowhere is safe and the only way out is forced transfer, a preference which Israeli leaders only stopped touting as the ICJ hearing loomed closer.
There is no defamation campaign against Israel. The settler-colonial state has boasted of its intent to annihilate Palestinians in Gaza and carried out genocidal actions that prove the intent. What is more, it has already boasted of its own impunity at the ICJ when it stated that a court order granting the requested provisional measures to stop the genocide would “ensure that Israel will be in breach of it as soon as it is made.” The underlying tone is that Israel will not be stopped from committing genocide because Israel deems itself above international laws and conventions. If the international community fails to stop this rogue state, a new level will be ushered in with regard to impunity and complicity in genocide.
Who wants the next pandemic and why?
By Drago Bosnic | January 16, 2024
It’s been nearly two years since Russia uncovered the extremely disturbing truth about American involvement in bioweapons testing in Ukraine. However, the institutions of the so-called “rules-based world order” (posing as the “international community”) have completely ignored these findings, while the mainstream propaganda machine has done everything in its power to present them as supposed “conspiracy theories”. Still, the world has been demanding answers from the US-led political West. This includes non-aligned countries, often dubbed the “fence sitters” by the United States, although there have been far worse descriptions used by the European Union. American diplomacy (if one could even call it that) is too busy meddling in the internal affairs of other countries, so it usually refuses to comment on allegations regarding the Pentagon-run “biological research facilities” in Ukraine.
Luckily for the world, the Russian military never stopped investigating this issue, despite constant attempts to prevent, sabotage and/or discredit these efforts. On January 15, TASS reported that the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) identified over 50 participants in America’s bioweapons program in Ukraine last year alone. During a briefing held on the same day, Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, Head of the Russian Armed Forces’ Nuclear, Biological and Chemical (NBC) Protection Troops, warned about the dangers of these US-sponsored illicit activities. Kirillov revealed that an event that can only be described as a false flag training exercise was held in Lvov back in August 2023. The goal was to accuse Russia of supposed bioweapons usage in Ukraine, likely as a way for the US/NATO to both incriminate Moscow and divert attention away from itself and its illegal biological warfare activities in the war-torn country.
“I would like to note the work carried out in 2023 to identify the organizers and participants of military-biological activities on the territory of Ukraine. As a result of the analysis of the documentation obtained, more than 50 people were identified, including officials of US and Ukrainian government agencies, and employees of intermediary organizations and private companies,” Kirillov said at the briefing.
Among others, he named Kenneth Myers, Robert Pope and Joanna Wintrol, employees of the US DoD’s Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, as well as representatives of the companies Battelle and EcoHealth Alliance, Kevin Olival, Karen Saylors and Lewis von Thaer.
“The [false flag] event [in Lvov] was attended by Filippa Lentzos; Gemma Bowsher; and Irina Demchyshyna, Head of the Reference Laboratories of the Public Health Center of the Ukrainian Health Ministry; as well as Darya Ponomarenko, Head of the Department of Biological Safety and Biological Protection of the Public Health Center of the Ukrainian Health Ministry,” Kirillov said.
He added that R&D on pathogens that could cause massive economic damage was extensively conducted in these biolabs, including research on mechanisms for their more efficient distribution and spreading. The program was conducted under the leadership of Denis Muziyka. In addition, Viktor Gavrilenko and Alexander Mezinov were involved in the collection and shipment of materials. It can be argued the report essentially shows that the endgame was to cause long-term damage to the Russian economy (particularly its massive agricultural potential). In turn, this was supposed to cause instability in the country, possibly even a famine that could destabilize the Russian government. Needless to say, such activities are tantamount to a declaration of war. And yet, those conducting them are completely unmoved by the possibility of a direct confrontation between nuclear-armed superpowers.
In further reports published later that day, TASS revealed additional goals of these US-run biolabs. General Kirillov touched upon the US strategy of (ab)using its publicly stated goals of supposedly “monitoring infectious diseases and providing assistance to developing countries” to further expand its biological warfare capabilities.
“Over the past year, the Pentagon has developed and adopted a number of conceptual documents that involve expanding the foreign network of US-controlled biological laboratories and continuing military biological research beyond national jurisdiction. <…> While the stated goals are monitoring infectious diseases and providing assistance to developing countries, using the example of Ukraine, it became clear how the military-biological potential of the United States is being built up,” he stated.
Kirillov also recalled that Washington DC created new administrative and technical agencies last year – the Office of Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policy, and the Bureau of Global Health Security and Diplomacy. These two agencies are supposed to serve as fronts for further bioweapons programs, not only in Ukraine, but around the world. Kirillov also reiterated previous findings uncovered after the start of the special military operation (SMO). He specifically mentioned the Pentagon’s two major projects in Ukraine, aimed at studying the causative agents of particularly dangerous pathogens and diseases such as tularemia, anthrax and hantavirus infections.
“The research was carried out in three main areas. These are monitoring the biological situation, collecting endemic strains, and studying the susceptibility of the local population,” Kirillov said.
In an additional report by South Front, the Russian military revealed that the US Department of Defense conducted a series of experiments with smallpox viruses, which is prohibited by the World Health Assembly. This also includes research on the use of the monkeypox virus as a bioweapon, as well as R&D on the usage of agent-based simulators of smallpox viruses. Two strains of this pathogen are used in the course of aerobic studies. The World Health Assembly allows only two organizations to conduct such research – the Vector State Scientific Center in Russia and the Center for Disease Control in the US. However, these experiments were conducted by the employees of the Institute of Infectious Diseases, which is subordinate to the Pentagon. The US DoD was also engaged in studying other orthopoxviruses that are deadly and pose great danger to human life and health.
Interestingly (or perhaps “terrifyingly” would be a much more fitting term), concurrently with the Russian military’s briefings, the infamous World Economic Forum announced it would discuss the new unspecified deadly pathogen that causes what they call the “Disease X”, which the WEF claims is “10 times deadlier than the COVID-19”. Considering the fact that the WEF is deeply intertwined with the political West and its vaunted “rules-based world order”, the timing is rather peculiar. Why are the WEF and the so-called “international community” so “worried” about an unknown disease, but they keep ignoring clear-cut evidence of America’s massive (and rapidly expanding) bioweapons program? Why is the US military conducting this sort of research (on a global scale, at that), although any official civilian public health institution could easily do so on its own and without such deadly biohazard risks?
Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst.
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From the Archives
Politicians lie
By Mazin Qumsiyeh | Popular Resistance | August 18, 2013
There is no way to say this truth nicely: Politicians lie. That includes Japanese, American, Egyptian, Israeli, and Palestinian politicians! Is there something more common sense than that? Yet, so many citizens around the world believe their own politicians or wistfully acknowledge lies but think it is part of the job needed to run things. They believe even when politicians contradict themselves blatantly. This phenomenon is rather remarkable. It is a dissonance and disconnect from reality that many seem oblivious to. It is very dangerous because it can lead to accepting rationales for going to war. These can be deadly wars that lead to millions of lives lost as happened in what was called World War 1 and WW2. Even when incredible and declassified evidence abound, politicians continue to lie and old mythologies refuse to die. Here are just a few of the countless lies told to us over the past few decades… continue
Blog Roll
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- Global Tipping Points Lead the World Into a State of Entropy
- The day-after at the White House: USA and Xi Jinping
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- Iraqi resistance group vows to stage airport sit-ins over Iran aerial blockade
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- Deconstructing Netanyahu’s pants-on-fire UN rant – Daily Update
- Trump betrayed voters with his campaign lies and prioritized a foreign country once he took office
- Netanyahu calls Israel’s war in Gaza ‘opposite of genocide’ in UN speech to near-empty hall
- Settler Kidnappings: Torture, Sexual Abuse and Terrorisation of Palestinian Abductees as Israel Deepens Annexation of West Bank
- Gaza winter nears as 162,000 tents become unusable, raising fears of humanitarian crisis
- Netanyahu says, “It’s the opposite of genocide”; UN says Gaza economy is world’s ‘most severe crisis on record’ – Daily Update
- Israel’s US-Backed Assault on Gaza Has Created the ‘World’s Most Severe Economic Crisis on Record’: UN
- ‘Protecting U.S. Citizens’… From Israel
- ‘This is where I live now, the back of a truck’: a day in the life of a grandmother in Gaza
- In UN Speech, Iran’s President Displays Pictures of Children Killed by US, Brings Attention to Israel’s Nuclear Arsenal
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- New Study: Earth And Venus Surface Warmth Largely Explained By Convection And Lapse Rate, Not CO2 Or Radiation
- 2025 Nature Paper Claiming Worsening Global Drought Gets RETRACTED …Heavily Flawed
- New Study: ‘Global Drought Shows No Detectable Recent Acceleration Under Climate Warming’
- Economic Masterminds: German Socialists Suggest Taxing Productivity Gains Stemming From Using AI
- The South China Sea Has Not Been Cooperating With The Climate Change Narrative
- Energy Crisis: Germany Enters Heating Season With Historically Low Gas Reserve Fill Levels
- New Study: The Antarctic Ice Sheet Gained Mass From 2020-2024 Due To Staggering Snow And Ice Accumulation
- Study: Ocean Heating Rates From Thousands Of Years Ago ‘Dwarf’ Modern Ocean Heating Rates
- Climate Extremists Target, Attack Large-Scale Power Grid Infrastructure In Germany!
- New Study: Antarctic Ice Melt Has Contributed Less Than 1 Centimeter To Sea Level Rise In The Last 30 Years
