Bret Stephens is a political commentator who works for The New York Times and NBC News. Stephens was editor-in-chief of The Jerusalem Post between 2002 and 2004.
His Jewish identity is mentioned hand-in-hand with his political orientation by The Times of Israel : “In criticizing Trump even after his electoral victory, Stephens joins other leading Jewish conservative voices, including Brooks, Jennifer Rubin and William Kristol.” His Jewish identity is pertinent because he is known as a neocon and a strong supporter of Israel. The one seems to reinforce the other. Furthermore, his position on Iraq was criminal and disastrous and now he’s advocating a position on Syria that would also be criminal and disastrous. We should be extremely skeptical of the objectivity of someone like him who comes across as a shill for Israel and the Empire all-in-one.
Strong criticism of his position on Syria appears in an article by Robert Rabil dated yesterday that quotes him as follows: “U.S. should target Assad and his senior lieutenants directly in a decapitation strike, just as the U.S. attempted in Iraq in 2003, and against Osama bin Laden in 2011… if we [Americans] are serious about confronting Iran, Syria remains the most important battlefield.” What may result from such an aggression and war crime as decapitating Syria? I quote the article:
“It is mind boggling that someone as astute as Stephens would call for the decapitation of the regime in the same way U.S. had done in Iraq without providing an alternative to the regime. No less significant, does ‘our’ seriousness about confronting Iran require decapitating the Syrian regime? Is punishing the Syrian regime a pretext to confront Iran? This is a dangerous and flawed logic divorced from the harsh reality of the Levant. How could anyone invoke what the U.S. attempted in Iraq without admitting and internalizing the staggering human and financial cost the U.S. has paid? Has the notion of what may happen the day after the decapitation strike and confronting Iran crossed Stephens’ mind, or of those echoing him?
“Undoubtedly, Syria will further descend into anarchy and wretchedness, leading up to regional and international strife. A decapitating strike against the Syrian regime and/or an open confrontation with Iran in Syria would most likely put Moscow and Washington on a path of armed conflict. Russia made its position clear that it will respond to any game changing attack on Syria…
“Most importantly, is it in the national interest of Washington to risk a war over Syria, and by extension Iran, with Moscow after what United States has gone through in Iraq and Afghanistan with little to show for the enormous sacrifices Americans have made?”
Stephens was born in New York City in 1973. Stephens is said to be “brilliant”. He has several awards, indicating he’s a smart fellow, but being smart doesn’t make you wise, right or someone whose ideas should be followed. He strongly endorsed the war on Iraq:
“Stephens was a ‘prominent voice’ among the media advocates for the start of the 2003 Iraq War, for instance writing in a 2002 column that, unless checked, Iraq was likely to become the first nuclear power in the Arab world. Although the weapons of mass destruction used as a casus belli were never shown to exist, Stephens continued to insist as late as 2013 that the Bush administration had ‘solid evidence’ for going to war. Stephens has also argued strongly against the Iran nuclear deal and its preliminary agreements, arguing that they were a worse bargain even than the 1938 Munich Agreement with Nazi Germany.”
Stephens’ advice on Syria is easily as criminal as his advice on Iraq. Keeping the covenant with Iran is productive of peace. Breaking it is productive of war.
The neocon world view fails to recognize the the tremendous injuries the U.S. is inflicting on peoples in other lands. It fails to recognize either their property rights or rights to self-determination. The neocons fail to recognize the long-term ill-will and retaliation that the U.S. is producing. The neocons naively and wrongly think that democracy is a wonderful institution, that the U.S. has a right to overthrow regimes and set up democratic governments. They wrongly think that they are capable of building states when they are not. The neocons fail to recognize the military capabilities, including the nuclear weapons, of other powers. The neocons overestimate the efficacy of the U.S. military. The Jewish neocons are influenced strongly by Israeli right-wingers, and they are not of a mind to devise peaceful solutions to the nagging problems associated with Israel. The neocons do not comprehend that the world can progress peacefully and without a dominant superpower attempting to impose its standards and form of government. The neocons fail to recognize the faults of the U.S. government. The neocons ignore the inflation of the domestic police state as a feature of the Empire, just as they ignore the mounting U.S. debt. The neocons fail to see or appreciate other peoples as persons, instead viewing them as pieces they can move on a world chess board.
Michael S. Rozeff [send him mail] is a retired Professor of Finance living in East Amherst, New York. He is the author of the free e-book Essays on American Empire: Liberty vs. Domination and the free e-book The U.S. Constitution and Money: Corruption and Decline.
May 1, 2018
Posted by aletho |
Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes, Wars for Israel | Israel, Middle East, NBC News, New York Times, Syria, United States, Zionism |
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The recent Facebook and Cambridge Analytica fiasco deepened public concern about the political power and allegiances of Big Tech corporations. Soon after the story went viral, 3,100 Google employees submitted a petition to Google CEO Sundar Pichai protesting Google’s involvement in a Pentagon program called “Project Maven”.
Last week, the Tech Worker’s Coalition launched a petition protesting tech industry participation in development for war, urging Google to break its contract with the Department of Defense (DoD). Will Pichai respond?
Google has a lot to answer for. In March 2016, then US Secretary of Defense, Ash Carter, tapped then Alphabet CEO Eric Schmidt to chair the DoD’s new Innovation Advisory Board. The Board would give the Pentagon access to “the brightest technical minds focused on innovation” – culled from Silicon Valley.
More recently, details about Project Maven emerged. The project uses machine learning and deep learning to develop an AI-based computer vision solution for military drone targeting. This innovative system turns reams of visual data – obtained from surveillance drones – into “actionable intelligence at insight speed.”
Because there are many more hours of surveillance footage than a team of humans can view, most of the footage cannot be evaluated by Pentagon workers. Using AI, Project Maven steps in to make sure no footage goes unwatched. The AI performs analytics of drone footage to categorize, sift and identify the items the DoD is looking for – cars, people, objects and so on – and flag the sought-after items for a human to review. The project has been successful, and the Pentagon is now looking to make a “Project Maven factory”.
Reports of Google’s participation in Project Maven comes amidst news they are bidding alongside Amazon, IBM and Microsoft for a $10 billion “one big cloud” servicing contract with the Pentagon. Eric Schmidt, who is no longer CEO of Google or Alphabet, but who remains a technical advisor and board member at Google’s parent company Alphabet, claims to recuse himself of all information about Google AI projects for the Pentagon, because he also chairs the DoD’s Innovation Advisory Board.
Schmidt’s central role in this story underscores controversy about Google’s close relationship to the US military. In 2013, Julian Assange penned an essay highlighting Google’s sympathy for the US military empire in his essay, The Banality of ‘Don’t Be Evil’– a criticism of Schmidt and Jared Cohen’s co-authored book, The New Digital Age.
In 2015, Schmidt hosted Henry Kissinger for a fireside chat at Google. He introduced Kissinger as a “foremost expert on the future of the physical world, how the world really works” and stated Kissinger’s “contributions to America and the world are without question.”
For many, Henry Kissinger’s “contributions” are drenched in the blood of the Global South. Declassified documents show that during the Vietnam/Indochina War, Kissinger, then a national security advisor, transmitted Nixon’s orders to General Alexander Haig: use “anything that flies on anything that moves” in Cambodia. According to a study by Taylor Owen and Ben Kiernan (Director of Genocide Studies at Yale University), the United States dropped more tons of bombs on Cambodia than all of the Allies during World War II combined. Cambodia, they conclude, may be the most bombed country in history. By all reason, Kissinger should be tried for genocide.
Carpet bombing Cambodia is just one of many crimes carried out by Dr. Kissinger. During his time in government, he bolstered “moderate” white settler-colonial forces in Southern Africa to subvert the black liberation struggle for independence and self-determination. The US deemed Nelson Mandela, the African National Congress and other, less-recognized black liberation groups as “terrorist” and “communist” threats to US interests. The apartheid regime subjugated the black majority not only inside South Africa, but in brutal wars across the border in countries like Angola and Mozambique. More than 500,000 Africans died in Angola alone.
US corporations profited from business in the region, and provided white supremacists the arms, vehicles, energy resources, financial support and computer technology used to systematically oppress black people. IBM was a primary culprit, supplying the apartheid state with the bulk of computers used to denationalize the black African population and administer the state, banks, police, intelligence and military forces.
On April 6, 2018, Kissinger welcomed one of today’s new tech leaders, Eric Schmidt, to keynote the annual Kissinger Conference at Yale University. This year’s theme was Understanding Cyberwarfare and Artificial Intelligence. After praising the ROTC and Ash Carter (both in attendance), Schmidt told the audience it is a “tremendous honor to be on the same stage as Dr. Kissinger, and we all admire him for all the reasons we all know.” In his speech, he spoke of how the US must develop AI to defend against today’s familiar adversaries: the “nasty” North Koreans, the Russians, the Chinese. A couple of Yale students were kicked out for protesting.
In decades past, human rights advocates famously challenged the development of technology for racial capitalism. Activists, including students and workers, pressured IBM, General Motors and other corporations to stop aiding and abetting apartheid and war.
Today, a new wave of technology is being tapped by military and police forces. IBM has partnered with the City of Johannesburg for early efforts at “smart” policing, while Africa and the Middle East are targets of the US drone empire. Activists advocating democracy and equality inside Africa and the Middle East are staunchly opposed to these developments.
The bi-partisan effort to police Trump-designated “shithole” countries with advanced weaponry has Big Tech on its side. Google’s involvement with Project Maven constitutes active collaboration in this endeavor.
An activist campaign about Silicon Valley’s collaboration with the US military could be unfolding. However, it’s going to take grassroots pressure across the world to make technology work for humanity.
Michael Kwet is a Visiting Fellow of the Information Society Project at Yale Law School.
April 30, 2018
Posted by aletho |
Full Spectrum Dominance, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | Africa, Eric Schmidt, Google, Henry Kissinger, Human rights, United States |
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In 1879 began the disastrous ‘War of the Pacific’, the Chilean army invaded Bolivia’s ‘Litoral’ department, leaving the poorest nation in South America landlocked. It is thought up to 18,000 Bolivians died in the war. Chile’s war on Bolivia was at every step of the way backed and armed by the British Empire as English industrialists took control of the vast natural resources of the Bolivian coastal region. These included guano, sodium, nitrate, copper where British interests established a monopoly on the export of these primary resources. Bolivia has never given up its demand to return to the coast, it still maintains a navy in preparation, the only landlocked country in the world to do so. Today the Bolivian government, under left-indigenous president Evo Morales is taking the biggest steps yet in securing a sovereign access to the sea as he takes the case to the International Court of Justice at the Hague who have already ruled against Chile’s early objections to Bolivia’s claims, a preliminary ruling is expected on April 28th. This is more than a territorial dispute, this is a political battle to roll back the hidden legacy of British imperialist interference in Latin America. It is inconceivable that Bolivia’s previous neoliberal governments could have come this far, indeed they didn’t, Bolivia’s successes are precisely because Morales’ left government is nation building for the first time, bringing natural resources under public ownership and incorporating the social movements into the structures of popular power. Those who preceded him were more interested in short sighted frenzies of privatisation than any long term state projects like this.
The war began when the Bolivian government raised taxes on the Chilean and British companies operating in Bolivia’s Litoral department. Companies such as the “Antofagasta Nitrate & Railway Company” (CSFA) refused to pay so Bolivia moved to nationalise mining interests there. Chile then unleashed a brutal war that was to last 5 years and invade huge parts of Bolivia and even Peru. Territory they still hold to this day. Behind this was a vast network of British imperial interests that had built links to sections of the Chilean oligarchy. Ever since the fall of the Spanish Empire in the Americas, Britain was quick off the blocks in establishing informal control of Latin American natural resources. Chile’s Banco Edwards was a subsidiary of the Bank of England[1], and owned by the same family as Chile’s foremost newspaper El Mercuriothat became key in drumming up popular support for the invasion and framing it as a patriotic war rather than a war for British and Chilean mining capitalists. An English businessman with the CSFA articulated Britain’s colonial approach to the conflict, “The Bolivians are getting very cocky, but with this action they’ll realise that they can’t interfere with a subject of the crown, and also, the Chileans will realise that it is in their interests to have the English at their side”. From the start of the war began an aggressive media operation in London to portray Chile as advanced and civilised, and Bolivia as backward hordes, one newspaper labeled Bolivia a “Semi-barbarous country that doesn’t know civilization”[2]. This was a textbook divide and rule strategy that the British Empire was employing all over Africa. Britain was rigidly against Simon Bolívar’s vision of a united Latin America, (‘Gran Colombia’ as he called it), Eduardo Galeano summed it up thus, “For U.S. imperialism to be able to “integrate and rule” Latin America today, it was necessary for the British Empire to help divide and rule us yesterday. An archipelago of disconnected countries came into being as a result of the frustration of our national unity.”[3]. British economic interests penetrated deep into every port city of the Americas and played off the new republics against each other whenever its interests were threatened. Britain proceeded to play a vital role in urging and sponsoring Chile’s invasion, providing it with huge supplies of arms, financing, logistical support and the political support of its press. Bolivia’s meagre forces never stood a chance.
The British backed Chilean forces overwhelmed both Bolivia and Peru. Today it is estimated that lack of access to the sea deprives Bolivia of 1.5% in economic growth annually[4], a huge amount for the region’s poorest country. For British imperial interests the outcome was everything they hoped and more, Yorkshire industrialist John Thomas North established a monopoly over the vast nitrate fields and the British linked Edwards family reaped huge rewards from the captured natural resources. These oligarchs formed a caste that wielded huge political power and plunged Chile into civil war in 1891 when the progressive president Balmaceda tried push through competition laws to break up their monopolies, the war ended in victory for the oligarchy. In some ways even Chile did not benefit from the war, they were left indebted to Britain to the tune of millions for the support they received and the natural resources fell into the hands of a tiny number of families who exported these primary materials on the cheap to the global north. Peruvian historian Enrique Amayo, in his book on British involvement in the war perhaps summed it up best in his final heading titled “Imperialist Great Britain helped Chile, but in the end Chile too became the loser”[5].
This war nearly 140 years ago is still an open wound for Bolivians and an obstacle to Latin American integration and unity. The sense of loss for Bolivia, a small nation against the might of the British Empire and Chilean sub-imperialism. Add to this, Chile’s national chauvinism gained after the war, that they are the ‘advanced’ of the region compared with their ‘backward’ and more indigenous neighbours Bolivia and Peru, the xenophobia and discrimination is still a defining experience of Andean migrants in Santiago.
What has changed since then is a transformation in Bolivian state and society since the left came to power in 2006. Bolivia’s recent diplomatic success has its roots in the fact that the left has for the first time since the 1952 revolution, begun popular nation building, so therefore it has the capacity for long term projects of state such as this. Since Morales was swept to power in 2006 by the wave of social movements that overthrew two neoliberal governments within two years, Bolivia has ‘reclaimed’ natural resources like Gas and some mining, as well as other industries that were privatised in the neoliberal period such as the national airline, telecommunications, airports and numerous manufacturing initiatives. Alongside this, the reconfiguring of the state as the ‘Plurinational State’ with a new popular constitution and the incorporation of indigenous movements and trade unions into decision making. All of this has created a cultural confidence and given Bolivia the growth and stability necessary to push on towards historic state projects like reclaiming the sea, which Morales has mobilised the social movements behind too[6]. Morales’ anti-imperialist politics also means there is real political will for the first time. Under the neoliberal administrations preceding Morales the maritime demands were mostly rhetoric, in reality attempts were made to privatise Bolivia’s natural gas reserves to foreign multinationals and export them through the Chilean ports that were conquered by force. The neoliberal period was also one of economic and political chaos that gave Bolivia hyperinflation, mass unemployment and repression, the country was nowhere near strong enough to mobilise behind a historic demand like this. To take on, in a concerted manner, the historic legacy of British Imperialism and Chilean militarism, and against Chile’s right wing billionaire president Sebastian Piñera takes political commitment that only the current government has been able to deliver. The prospects for Bolivia look their strongest ever since Salvador Allende openly supported Bolivia’s right to return, though the coup put an end to Allende’s vision, laid out in 1970, “In this plan of reparation for injustices, I’ve also resolved that our brother country Bolivia return to the sea. Ending the confinement they have faced since 1879 due to the interference of English imperialism. We cannot condemn a people to a life sentence… a people that enslave another is not free”[7]. The historical baton has been passed from Allende to Evo to finally find a solution, the Plurinational State has a fighting chance for the first time.
Notes.
[1]François Schollaert Paz, “La Guerra del Pacífico fue concebida en Londres”
[2]Ibid.
[3]Galeano, ‘Open Veins of Latin America’(1997), p. 259.
[4]‘¿Cómo afecta a Bolivia no tener salida al mar?’ Telesur.
[5]Enrique Amayo, ‘La Política Británica en la Guerra del Pacífico’,
[6]‘COB retoma el control de Conalcam y se suma al ‘banderazo’ por el mar’, La Razón, 06.03.18
[7]‘Allende ofreció mar para Bolivia’, Página Siete
April 29, 2018
Posted by aletho |
Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | Bolivia, Chile, Latin America, United States |
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Israeli forces have kidnapped a Lebanese woman in the Tel Aviv-occupied Lebanese territory, the Lebanese army says.
The incident happened in Lebanon’s Shebaa Farms on Saturday and the abductee was identified as Nohad Dali.
“On April 28 at 8.30 p.m., an Israeli enemy patrol carried out the abduction of Nohad Dali from the town of Shebaa and took her into occupied Palestinian territory,” said an army statement.
Lebanon has raised the seizure of Dali with the United Nations peacekeeping force, which is stationed on Lebanon’s border with the occupied territories. The Israeli military said it briefly held the Lebanese woman before releasing her.
Tel Aviv has been occupying Shebaa Farms since 1967, when it seized the territory from Lebanon during a full-scale war against Arab nations. Lebanon and Israel are technically at war as a result of the continued occupation.
Israel launched two wars on Lebanon in 2000 and 2006, in both of which the Lebanese resistance movement of Hezbollah inflicted heavy losses on the regime’s military.
In January, Lebanon’s Prime Minister Saad Hariri called Israel the greatest threat to Lebanon’s stability. “The only threat I see is Israel taking some kind of action against Lebanon, out of a miscalculation,” Hariri told an audience at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Israel also takes great exception to Hezbollah’s assisting the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in its battle against Takfiri terrorism and militancy.
The Israeli air force has repeatedly violated Lebanon’s airspace to strike Syria-based targets belonging to Hezbollah since the group started helping out the Syrian army.
April 29, 2018
Posted by aletho |
Illegal Occupation, War Crimes | Hezbollah, Israel, Lebanon, Zionism |
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OCCUPIED JERUSALEM – Israel Hayom newspaper on Sunday said that the Paraguayan president Horacio Cartes has pledged to transfer his country’s embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
Cartes said that he would like the move to take place before he leaves office in June.
Cartes said during a ceremony held in the Paraguayan capital of Asunción to mark the 70th anniversary of the establishment of Israel that his decision stems from both political and personal commitment.
Paraguay is the fourth country to decide to move its embassy to Occupied Jerusalem joining the Czech Republic, Guatemala and Honduras who followed the lead of the US.
Both the US and Guatemala have decided to transfer their embassies to Jerusalem in mid-May, while Honduras and the Czech Republic have not set a date yet.
On 6th December 2017 the US president Donald Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and announced his intention to move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to the holy city stirring worldwide condemnation.
April 29, 2018
Posted by aletho |
Illegal Occupation, War Crimes | Israel, Jerusalem, Latin America, Palestine, United States, Zionism |
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GAZA – Hamas strongly condemned the German Bundestag’s call for the German government to support recognizing the Israeli occupation as a Jewish state over the land of historic Palestine.
In a statement on Sunday, Hamas said “At the time the Palestinians expected a strong support from the Federal Republic of Germany on the 70th anniversary of the Nakba, the Bundestag did not mention the seven-decade long aggression of the Israeli occupation on our people, and it did not denounce the Israeli racist and fascist policies”.
Today, the Israeli occupation as an occupying power, continues usurping Palestinian land in favor of illegal settlements, arrests thousands without trial, many of them are children, women and patients, Judaizes Jerusalem and forcefully deports Jerusalemites from their homes and imposes an unjust siege on more than two million Palestinians in Gaza.
The siege on Gaza is considered by all international institutions and international laws as a collective punishment that amounts to a crime against humanity.
You, the Bundestag, described the Israeli occupation as a “state that embraces western European values.” Do these values accept, for example, the killing of dozens and wounding of thousands of peaceful demonstrators, most of them children, who demand their right to a decent life and return to their homes?
This decision destabilizes the region and the world, as well as it gives the occupation a green light to continue its aggression against our people, violation of international law and encourages the displacement of the rest of our people.
Hamas is wondering whether accepting a Jewish state is in line with the democratic values on which Germany was founded after WWII, which basically do not consider differences between citizens on the basis of race, color or religion.
Therefore, we demand that the Bundestag cancel this decision and take positions that achieve justice for our people after decades of suffering, which Europe, and foremost Germany, is a major cause of it.
April 29, 2018
Posted by aletho |
Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | Germany, Hamas, Human rights, Israel, Palestine, Zionism |
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The Saudi Foreign Minister had announced that Riyadh was willing to send troops to Syria as part of a wider international coalition if it receives an invitation to do so. He also expressed his opinion that Qatar must do the same.
Hamad bin Abdullah Al-Thani has branded Saudi Arabia’s demands for Qatar to pay for US troops to remain in Syria and the sending of its troops before the US withdraws an attempt to influence public opinion in the Arab world, according to France 24 TV channel.
“This statement [by the Saudi Foreign Ministry] is not worthy of an answer. Qatar refutes the brainwashing of the public opinion in the Arab world in such a way,” Qatar’s Foreign and Prime Minister said.
He also admitted that Qatar’s delegation was informed during its visit to the US about the idea of sending troops to Syria. Al-Thani believes that any decisions on Syria must be made as a part of the comprehensive solution to the Syrian problem.
“[Qatar insists] on developing a political solution to the Syrian problem, which would embed the political transition of power, punishment of war criminals and return stability to Syria,” Al-Thani said.
Saudi Foreign Minister Adel Jubeir stated on April 25 that Qatar must send its troops to Syria prior to the US withdrawal from its base in the country. Earlier US President Donald Trump claimed that Middle Eastern countries must pay for everything that happens in their region as well as deploy their soldiers on the ground, possibly referring to the situations in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. He also added that without US protection, “wealthy” Arab states “wouldn’t last a week.”
The Saudi Foreign Minister said on April 23 that Riyadh is ready to send its troops to Syria, but is waiting for an official invitation.
The Iranian Foreign Minister’s advisor Hussein Sheikholeslam has expressed his opinion in an interview with Sputnik that the deployment any additional troops to Syria will not bring about peace, but instead will only complicate the crisis.
April 27, 2018
Posted by aletho |
Illegal Occupation, War Crimes | Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria |
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This week saw an horrendous massacre of up to 50 women and children at a wedding party in Yemen, carried out by the US, British and French-backed Saudi air force.
Two wedding halls in Hajjah Province were obliterated in the air strikes. Body parts were strewn among the debris in a hellish scene.
Among the carnage, a little boy was found by civilian rescuers clinging desperately to the body of his dead father. He refused to let go of his father’s bloodied corpse, clinging to the hope that his parent was still alive.
There was hardly any coverage of the slaughter in Western news media.
Yet the incident was nothing other than a massacre of civilians by Saudi warplanes, armed and fueled by the US, Britain and France. A war crime.
Abominably, the Hajjah bombing was just one of many such war crimes committed by the Western-backed Saudi regime on Yemen over the past three years.
Contrast that Western media indifference to Yemen’s suffering with the saturated coverage given to an unverifiable, and as it turns out, fabricated incident in Syria over an alleged chemical-weapons attack in Douma on April 7.
Videos of dubious provenance were played over and over on Western media purporting to show children suffering from chemical exposure in Syria. Strangely, the pitiful scene of the Yemeni wedding hall massacre and the little boy among the carnage gained negligible Western media coverage.
A week after the Douma incident, on April 14, after much hysterical condemnation of the Syrian government and its Russia ally, US President Donald Trump and his British and French counterparts ordered a barrage of missile strikes on Syria in what was supposed to be revenge for the alleged atrocity in Douma.
Trump, Theresa May and Emmanuel Macron made anguished statements about “human suffering” in Syria. On Yemen, they say nothing.
This week, Russian authorities facilitated testimonies by families from Douma at the Hague headquarters of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. British and American officials decried it as Russian “theatrics” without even bothering to listen to the testimonies.
Children who had previously appeared in dubious videos released by the militants in Douma, testified that they were orchestrated unwittingly for a propaganda video on April 7 purporting to show chemical weapons had been used. It turns out that no chemical weapons were used. Medics in Douma confirmed that too.
The Douma incident was undoubtedly a false flag. There was no chemical-weapons attack. It was a brazen fiction amplified by Western media.
Shamefully, Western media this week have blatantly dropped the Douma “story” probably in light of the evidence emerging about the false flag.
But based on that stunt, the US, France and Britain launched over 100 missiles on Syria. The US-led air strikes were based on a lie. The strikes were therefore a grave violation of international law. A war crime.
The Western media in their reckless, hysterical coverage of the Douma incident alleging a chemical-weapon attack thus stand accused of complicity in the subsequent criminal US-led air strikes.
But where is the Western media coverage and outcry over a real atrocity which happened this week in Yemen? Like many other real atrocities that have occurred in Yemen from Western-backed Saudi air strikes, the Western media act as conduits for covering up the crimes by omitting to report on the horror.
Another distorted priority in Western media was the massive coverage given to an incident this week in Toronto where some deranged individual killed 10 pedestrians with a van. A terrible crime in Toronto no doubt. But nothing on the scale of dozens of women and children being butchered in Yemen by US, British and French-backed Saudi warplanes.
The near-complete absence of reporting on the barbarity inflicted in Yemen with the support of Western governments is an example of how Western media operate like propaganda services.
No wonder that Western governments get away with such crimes in Yemen and elsewhere when the news media in those countries are shamefully derelict in reporting on the crimes of Western governments, and holding the latter to account.
To accuse Western media of being derelict is perhaps too generous a criticism. They are in fact complicit in war crimes by their deliberate distortion and omission.
Their complicity is compounded by their arrogance in proclaiming to be “independent, professional journalism”. It is sickening when Western media outlets continually boast about their “excellence in journalism”. Celebrity self-inflated journalists like Christiane Amanpour at CNN or Stephen Sackur at the BBC talk about “digging for truth and understanding” and “hard talking”.
Why isn’t Amanpour digging for “truth and understanding” in the blood-soaked rubble of Yemen; why isn’t Sackur hard-talking to Western foreign ministers about their crimes in Yemen and Syria, like he rudely tried to do recently with Russia’s Sergei Lavrov? They don’t because they are vastly overpaid propaganda artists in the service of imperial power.
These people, like the news organizations they work for, are vile charlatans. The Western media are propaganda cleaners for their criminal governments. This week’s distortion about a false flag in Syria and the horror in Yemen is the proof.
April 27, 2018
Posted by aletho |
Corruption, Deception, Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | France, Saudi Arabia, Syria, UK, United States, Yemen |
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On April 14th, shortly after the United Kingdom, United States and France bombed the sovereign country of Syria, on the basis of unproven allegations of the use of chemical weapons in Douma on 7th April, the British Prime Minister, Theresa May made the following comment in her official statement:
“Together we have hit a specific and limited set of targets. They were a chemical weapons storage and production facility, a key chemical weapons research centre and a military bunker involved in chemical weapons attacks. Hitting these targets with the force that we have deployed will significantly degrade the Syrian Regime’s ability to research, develop and deploy chemical weapons” [my emphasis].
It seemed to me when I heard these words – and the passage of time has not altered this impression – that Mrs May was admitting to one of two actions, either of which ought to see her removed from office.
If we take her statement at face value, then it appears that she authorised a cruise missile strike on a number of depots that she believed contained chemical weapons, thus risking the dispersion of toxic chemicals into the atmosphere. It hardly needs to be spelled out what this could have led to, especially as some of these sites were close to residential areas.
On the other hand, if she authorised the bombing of these facilities knowing full well that they did not contain chemical weapons, then her public statement made after the bombing was false.
There really are no other options. Either she believed that these facilities contained chemical weapons, in which case her authorisation of the bombing of them was a deeply reckless and irresponsible act, which could have had horrendous consequences for the people near those locations. Or she knew that they did not in fact contain chemical weapons, in which case her statement was deliberately misleading.
According to the Russian Ministry of Defence, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) has been investigating one of the bombed sites, Barzah, and has so far found no evidence of chemical weapons.
But let’s say that you don’t take their word for this. Fine, but you are then faced with two problems:
Firstly, the OPCW, in a report published on 23rd March, just three weeks before the US, UK and French strikes on Syria, stated that their inspectors had found no evidence of chemical weapons at the Barzah site when they last inspected it back in late November:
“In accordance with paragraph 11 of Council decision EC-83/DEC.5, the second round of inspections at the Barzah and Jamrayah facilities of the SSRC was concluded on 22 November 2017. The results of the inspections were reported as an addendum (EC-87/DG.15/Add.1, dated 28 February 2018) to the report entitled “Status of Implementation of Executive Council Decision EC-83/DEC.5 (dated 11 November 2016)” (EC-87/DG.15, dated 23 February 2018). The analysis of samples taken during the inspections did not indicate the presence of scheduled chemicals in the samples, and the inspection team did not observe any activities inconsistent with obligations under the Convention [Chemical Weapons Convention] during the second round of inspections at the Barzah and Jamrayah facilities.”
But the second problem you have is this: If the Russian MoD is wrong, or spreading false information, and the OPCW has now found evidence of chemical weapons at Barzah, this would only go to show that Theresa May, along with her US and French counterparts, recklessly bombed a chemical weapons facility, without any certainty that it would not result in catastrophic consequences for people in the neighbourhood.
Unless of course someone can come up with a scenario whereby cruise missiles can be dropped “safely” on a chemical weapons depot with a guarantee that the toxic substances held there would not become a danger to people in the surrounding neighbourhoods.
So its as simple as this: If the OPCW report of 23rd March, and the Russian MoD claims made on 25th April are true, then Theresa May misled the public when she claimed that the missiles she authorised had targeted and hit chemical weapons facilities. If the OPCW report of 23rd March, and the Russian MoD claims made on 25th April are false, then Theresa May knowingly authorised the targeting of chemical weapons storage facilities, which could have had catastrophic consequences for innocent people.
Here’s the question that someone in Parliament needs to ask her:
“Prime Minister, on April 14th you authorised the bombing of three sites in Syria, which you claimed were developing and storing chemical weapons. Had this action caused the release of toxic substances into the atmosphere, would you have taken full responsibility for any resulting fatalities in the area?”
April 27, 2018
Posted by aletho |
Deception, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | Syria, UK |
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Syria’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Bashar al-Jaafari has once again reiterated Damascus’ adherence to the pre-June 1967 line, re-establishing borders from before the Six Day War, stressing that the country’s sovereign right on the occupied Golan Heights is non-negotiable, and the territory captured by the Zionist entity should be completely restored.
During a UN Security Council meeting on the Middle East situation, the UN envoy said some UNSC member-states have opted for a selective approach and the double standards policy, indulging in empty talk about international law, human rights, and the inalienable principles of the UN Charter.
At the same time, these member states turn a blind eye to the Israeli occupation of the Syrian Golan Heights, al-Jaafari said.
“Where have those states and their talk about counterterrorism and the international humanitarian law been when Syrian citizens were arrested and arbitrarily taken to Israeli jails, just as what happened to Sudqi al-Maqt, who was re-arrested because of his audio and video documentation of the close cooperation between the Israeli occupation forces and the Daesh and Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist organizations,” al-Jaafari said during the meeting.
He proceeded to say that the United States has always protected the Zionist entity, granting it immunity, despite the fact that Tel Aviv has consistently violated UNSC resolutions, demanding that the pre-June 1967 status quo be restored.
The Syrian official also denounced Israeli policies towards the Palestinians, recalling the recent developments in Gaza and the West Bank.
Concluding his speech, the UN representative called on the UNSC to take urgent measures against the occupation regime, demand that it stop its aggression and force Tel Aviv to abide by resolutions 242, 338, and 497, stipulating the liberation of Arab territories from its occupation, including the Golan Heights, withdrawing to the pre-June 1967 line.
April 27, 2018
Posted by aletho |
Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | Human rights, Israel, Syria, United Nations, United States, Zionism |
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Iran’s envoy to the United Nations says the Israeli regime has proven its “rogue” nature by adopting “expansionist, aggressive and apartheid” policies that are the root cause of all conflicts in the Middle East region.
“Indeed, Israel is a rogue regime, by definition – this is an undeniable fact for the international community, except for those who believe illegal occupation, illegal settlements, apartheid, siege, and regular attacks of mass murder are the legitimate actions of a regime that proclaims itself as the only democracy in the Middle East,” Gholamali Khoshroo said in a statement addressed to the UN Security Council on Thursday.
Khoshroo criticized the United States and other members of the council for granting Israel a sense of “exceptionalism” that has allowed Tel Aviv to constantly undermine peace in the region without ever having to worry about the consequences.
“The impunity this regime has enjoyed for so long wouldn’t have been possible without the help it receives from the US and certain interest groups,” he added.
The statement followed a series of military threats by Israeli officials against various countries in the region– including Iran and Syria– which have gone unnoticed by the UN Security Council.
Earlier on Thursday, Israeli minister of military affairs Avigdor Liberman hurled an unprovoked threat towards Iran, telling Arabic-language, Saudi-owned news website Elaph that “if Iran attacks Tel Aviv, we will hit Tehran.”
On April 9, Israeli leaders proudly announced that they had conducted a missile attack against the T-4 airbase in Syria’s Homs province, where Iranian and Russian military advisors were stationed on a mission to assist Syrian military forces in the war against Daesh and other foreign-backed militants.
The attack killed more than a dozen people, including seven Iranian military advisors. Israeli officials have made it clear that they would not refrain from orchestrating similar attacks in future.
“Every outpost in which we see Iran positioning militarily in Syria, we will destroy, and we will not allow this no matter what the price,” Lieberman told Elaph.
Israel’s ‘grave mistake’
The blatant threat drew a response from Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Major General Mohammad Baqeri, who said Friday morning that the attack on T-4 was nothing but small “fireworks” that were never going to stop Iran’s influence in the region.
Baqeri also downplayed reports that some regional countries were joining forces with Israel to form a front against Iran.
“If they (Israelis) think that these childish actions and coalitions will help them continue their disgraceful lives, they are gravely mistaken,” he said, noting that the future was looking “bright and clear” although there were a few bumps on the road as well.
Israel’s ‘mass murder’ in Gaza
In his statement, Khoshroo also pointed to Israel’s deadly crackdown on anti-occupation protests in the Gaza Strip and said Iran ” reaffirms its solidarity with the Palestinian people.”
Protests along the Gaza fence since March 30 have led to clashes with Israeli forces, who have killed at least 38 Palestinians and injured hundreds of others.
The rally, dubbed the “Great March of Return,” will last until May 15, which coincides with the 70th anniversary of Nakba Day (Day of Catastrophe) on which Israel was created.
Calling the violence “planned and deliberate,” the Iranian envoy said, “Those who support and enable the Israeli regime to commit these types of crimes have also the Palestinians’ blood on their hands.”
April 27, 2018
Posted by aletho |
Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | Iran, Israel, Middle East, Syria, United States, Zionism |
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Russia’s envoy to the OPCW said it was crucial to avoid new false-flag attacks in Syria and that Moscow “won’t allow” US military action there, as he described details of Russian findings on the site of the alleged Douma incident.
New false-flag operations against Damascus are “possible, since our American partners are once again threatening to take military action against Syria, but we will not allow that,” Russia’s permanent representative to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), Aleksandr Shulgin, said during a press conference in The Hague on Thursday.
The meeting was called by Russia’s OPCW mission and featured witnesses of the April 7 alleged chemical incident in the city of Douma. It highlighted the findings of Russian military experts, who were among the first to reach the site of the purported attack and locate the “munitions” that supposedly hit the residential buildings.
“Russian experts performed a detailed analysis of the information on the ground,” Major-General Igor Kirillov, the head of Russia’s Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Protection (RKhBZ) Troops, said. “Two gas cylinders, allegedly dropped by the government forces from helicopters, were found in two apartments.”
The cylinders and the damage they supposedly caused did not fit the tale of an airstrike entirely, Kirillov said. One of the cylinders lacked any makeshift upgrades, such as fins, to make it usable as an aerial munition, and, surprisingly, it was not even deformed.
“An empty gas cylinder found at the top floor. The apartment was partially destroyed earlier by an aerial bomb explosion, parts of roof and outer wall were missing,” Kirillov stated. “Other walls were sprayed with shrapnel. It’s quite peculiar that the cylinder was not deformed, which doesn’t fit its purported fall from a big altitude on concrete floor.”
The other cylinder, while fitted with some crude fins, also remained in nearly pristine condition despite its “fall.” The device miraculously did little to no damage to the room it supposedly hit, besides a large hole in the ceiling, which, however, was unlikely made by the object, according to military specialists.
“The cylinder has partially retained impermeability and is almost undamaged, which is impossible after a fall from some 2,000 meters, the usual altitude used by the Syrian army helicopters,” Kirillov said. “A tail part of an unguided rocket has been uncovered on the roof near the gap in the ceiling. The munition was likely to make the hole, but we cannot rule out an artificial nature of the damage made to the roof, since we discovered a pinch bar at the stairwell of the building.”
The cylinder was likely hauled by the “authors of the staged video” from outside, the official stated, as “multiple chips and dragging marks at the stairwell” indicated. An apartment below was being used by its owner to breed chickens, and all the livestock miraculously “made through the so-called chemical attack alive,” according to Kirillov.
“Moreover, the RKhBZ troops have uncovered a booby-trapped chemical laboratory and chemical stockpile in the city of Douma, which was liberated from the militants. They’ve been presumably used by the terrorists to manufacture toxic substances,” the official said, adding that a chlorine-filled canister that was very similar to the purported munitions used during the Douma incident was recovered from the militant-run warehouse. OPCW-controlled substances, which can be used to produce mustard gas, have been also found there.
The Douma incident was featured in videos released by the controversial White Helmets group and spread through militant-linked social media accounts. It was seemingly taken at face value by the US and its allies, who promptly pinned the blame on Damascus and launched a massive missile strike on the country in “retaliation” on April 14. The attack came hours before the OPCW experts were set to embark on their fact-finding mission in Douma.
The experts have already visited the site of the purported incident. Shulgin, meanwhile, called on the OPCW to visit the chemical laboratories left behind by the militants to see for themselves who is actually behind the use of chemical arms in Syria.
“We urge the OPCW technical secretariat and experts to make use of their time in Syria and examine the undercover underground chemical laboratories of the militants, the terrorists, who used them, as we believe, to produce chemical munitions, including those used for all kinds of false flag attacks,” Shulgin stressed.
April 26, 2018
Posted by aletho |
False Flag Terrorism, War Crimes | France, Russia, Syria, UK, United States |
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