‘Dismantle the disastrous deal’: Trump tells AIPAC Iran deal is ‘number one priority’
RT | March 22, 2016
Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump told attendees at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee conference that he didn’t come to pander, saying “that’s what politicians do,” but he did make a promise related to the Iran nuclear deal.
“My number one priority is to dismantle the disastrous deal with Iran,” Trump said, speaking before AIPAC in Washington, DC on Monday evening. “I have been in business a long time… this deal is catastrophic for Israel – for America, for the whole of the Middle East… We have rewarded the world’s leading state sponsor of terror with $ 150 billion and we received absolutely nothing in return.”
Trump criticized the deal for not requiring Iran to dismantle its military nuclear capability and only limiting its nuclear program for a certain number of years. He chastised Iran for contributing to problems in Gaza, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen, and Saudi Arabia by providing weapons and money.
“Iran is financing military forces throughout the Middle East and it is absolutely indefensible that we handed them over $150 billion to facilitate even more acts of terror,” added Trump. “During the last five years, Iran has perpetrated terror attacks in 25 different countries on five continents. They’ve got terror cells everywhere, including in the western hemisphere very close to home. Iran is the biggest sponsor of terrorism around the world and we will work to dismantle that reach.”
He then slammed the United Nations, decrying it for its utter weakness and incompetence and arguing that it was “not a friend” of democracy, freedom, the United States, or Israel, while also vowing to veto any attempt by the UN to impose its will on the Jewish state.
“With President Obama in his final year, discussions have been swirling about an attempt to bring a Security Council resolution on the terms of an eventual agreement between Israel and Palestine,” Trump said. “Let me be clear: An agreement imposed by the UN would be a total and complete disaster. The United States must oppose this resolution and use the power of our veto. Why? Because that’s now how you make a deal. Deals are made when parties come to the table and negotiate.”
Other Republican presidential candidates spoke before and after Trump at AIPAC.
Ohio Governor John Kasich stressed his experience in foreign policy.
“I don’t need on the job training,” Kasich told the audience on Monday, explaining he already knows about the dangers facing the US and its allies. He stressed his “firm and unwavering” support for Israel and vowed to work to stamp out intolerance, racism, and anti-Semitism.
Kasich called for the suspension of the Iran nuclear deal in response to recent ballistic missile tests, which he said were a violation.
“We are Americans before we are Republicans and Democrats,” he said, adding, “I will not take the low road to the highest office in the land.”
Texas Senator Ted Cruz also spoke at AIPAC after Trump. He attacked the billionaire businessman for promising to be “neutral” in brokering a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians.
“As president, I will not be neutral,” said Cruz. He added, “America will stand unapologetically with the nation of Israel.”
Anti-Trump protesters gathered outside the venue to voice their anger over Trump’s brash political rhetoric and his attendance at the conference.
The leader of one of Washington’s most prominent synagogues said that he felt compelled to denounce Trump as he spoke at a conference of Israeli activists.
Rabbi Shmuel Herzfeld of the Ohev Sholom congregation wept as he described to reporters the importance of standing up to what he viewed as Trump’s hatred, describing him as “wicked.”
“This man is inspiring violence,” Herzfeld said, according to the Associated Press. “He is an existential threat to our country.”
“This man is wicked,” Herzfeld added, referring to Trump. “He inspires racists and bigots. He encourages violence. Do not listen to him.”
Trump Makes Same Promise on Jerusalem We’ve Been Hearing Since 1972
By Nima Shirazi | Wide Asleep In America | March 21, 2016
Breaking news!
The news media is abuzz today with reports that, speaking before the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) conference, an annual gathering of rabid right-wing Israel supporters, a presidential candidate vowed to move the U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
So who was it this time? Donald Trump.
So why is this news? It’s not.
Promising to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s undivided capital and to move the American embassy there is part of Pandering 101 for Oval Office hopefuls. Every candidate in the past few decades knows this. It’s an easy vow to make, and no one ever pays any political price for inevitably breaking it (since half of Jerusalem remains occupied territory and actually moving the embassy there would be a clear violation of international law, which doesn’t recognize Israel’s claim over the historic city). Making such an absurd promise plays well to the writhing masses at AIPAC confabs, establishes one’s Zionist bona fides, and is a quick and easy way to offend indigenous Palestinians living under occupation, apartheid and blockade without actually flipping them the bird.
Nevertheless, the press continues to report on this blustery promise, no matter who utters it, as if it actually merits attention.
While he repeated the promise today for AIPAC, Trump had already said it back in January. And Ted Cruz has too:
And Jeb Bush before him:
So did Mitt Romney in 2012:
And Ron Paul and Rick Santorum the same year before they dropped out of the race:
And Newt Gingrich and Michelle Bachmann (and Herman Cain) before them:
Both John McCain and running mate Sarah Palin made the promise back in 2008:
Four years earlier, John Kerry did the same, while also touting his record of making similar demands during his tenure in the Senate:
Before that was Al Gore and George W. Bush in 2000. As reported by The New York Times in May 2000:
(Supporters of moving the embassy were subsequently disappointed in Bush’s failure to act on his promise.)
The year before, while beginning her campaign for New York’s Senatorial seat, the then-First Lady Hillary Clinton weighed in on the matter herself:
In the mid-1990s, Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole and House Speaker Newt Gingrich similarly pandered like pros:
Before that, in 1992, the Clinton/Gore campaign hit the incumbent Bush administration for balking at the official recognition of “Israel’s sovereignty over a united Jerusalem.” Their campaign promised voters that “Bill Clinton and Al Gore will… support Jerusalem as the capital of the state of Israel.”
Even Mike Dukakis tacked to the right of both the outgoing Reagan administration and George H.W. Bush campaign in 1988:
Al Gore, who tried to win the Democratic nomination for president that year, reportedly said in September 1987 that “he would consider moving the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.”
In April 1984, during a heated Democratic primary season, Walter Mondale and Gary Hart bent over backwards to assure voters in New York City that they too supported moving the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
The New York Times reported at the time:
Walter F. Mondale said he had supported such a move for 20 years, and he asserted that Senator Gary Hart had changed his position on the issue five days ago. In the past two weeks, Mr. Hart has denied that he suddenly changed his position, but has said his position has ”evolved.” He has said firmly that if he became President, he would move the embassy to Jerusalem.
The Rev. Jesse Jackson is the only one of the three candidates who opposes moving the embassy. The Reagan Administration also opposes such a move because the status of Jerusalem has long been disputed and the United States does not support Israeli sovereignty over the city.
Despite efforts by New York Senator Daniel Moynihan and California Congressman Tom Lantos to introduce a bill mandating the move, Reagan was adamant about not moving the embassy, as such a divisive policy would, according to his Secretary of State George P. Shultz, “be very bad for the United States” and “damage our ability to be effective in the peace process.”
The pandering was so thick, however, that a month later the Reagan administration had to pretend to consider supporting the move in order to stave off losing votes in the upcoming election.
Though the bill eventually stalled, Los Angeles Times syndicated columnist Nick Thimmesch, who called the proposal “one of the dumbest ideas to be advanced in Congress this session,” lamented that “some of the election-year pandering in the Republic verges on the obscene” and credited the ill-conceived gambit to the lawmakers’ “blind obedience to the Israel lobby (American Israeli Public Affairs Committee).” That was October 3, 1984.
By 1986, another bill was introduced to move the embassy, this time brought to the Senate floor by Republican Jesse Helms.
But even in the mid-1980s, though, this was an old political ploy. The New York Times pointed out that the 1976 Democratic Party platform – on which Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale ran for office – declared:
We recognize and support the established status of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, with free access to all its holy places provided to all faiths. As a symbol of this stand, the U.S. Embassy should be moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
Before that, on March 17, 1972, Michigan Congressman Gerald Ford, then the Republican Minority Leader, told a Zionist Organization of America regional meeting in Cleveland that the Nixon Administration should transfer the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem.
Two years later, after first replacing Spiro Agnew as Vice President and then becoming President himself following Nixon’s resignation, Ford backtracked on his previous position. “Under the current circumstances and the importance of getting a just and lasting peace in the Middle East, that particular proposal ought to stand aside,” Ford said at his very first presidential press conference on August 9, 1974.
It’s been nearly 42 years since then and, sadly, while Palestine remains under brutal occupation, Israeli colonies continue to expand with impunity, and Palestinians are subject to ongoing oppression and violence, election-year pandering in the United States has become more obscene than ever.
The trillion dollar question
By Lawrence Wittner | Peace & Health Blog | March 16, 2016
Isn’t it rather odd that America’s largest single public expenditure scheduled for the coming decades has received no attention in the 2015-2016 presidential debates?
The expenditure is for a thirty-year program to “modernize” the US nuclear arsenal and production facilities. Although President Obama began his administration with a dramatic public commitment to build a nuclear weapons-free world, that commitment has long ago dwindled and died. It has been replaced by an administration plan to build a new generation of US nuclear weapons and nuclear production facilities to last the nation well into the second half of the twenty-first century. This plan, which has received almost no attention by the mass media, includes redesigned nuclear warheads, as well as new nuclear bombers, submarines, land-based missiles, weapons labs, and production plants. The estimated cost? $1,000,000,000,000.00—or, for those readers unfamiliar with such lofty figures, $1 trillion.
Critics charge that the expenditure of this staggering sum will either bankrupt the country or, at the least, require massive cutbacks in funding for other federal government programs. “We’re . . . wondering how the heck we’re going to pay for it,” admitted Brian McKeon, an undersecretary of defense. And we’re “probably thanking our stars we won’t be here to have to have to answer the question,” he added with a chuckle.
Of course, this nuclear “modernization” plan violates the terms of the 1968 nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which requires the nuclear powers to engage in nuclear disarmament. The plan is also moving forward despite the fact that the US government already possesses roughly 7,000 nuclear weapons that can easily destroy the world. Although climate change might end up accomplishing much the same thing, a nuclear war does have the advantage of terminating life on Earth more rapidly.
This trillion dollar nuclear weapons buildup has yet to inspire any questions about it by the moderators during the numerous presidential debates. Even so, in the course of the campaign, the presidential candidates have begun to reveal their attitudes toward it.
On the Republican side, the candidates—despite their professed distaste for federal expenditures and “big government”—have been enthusiastic supporters of this great leap forward in the nuclear arms race. Donald Trump, the frontrunner, contended in his presidential announcement speech that “our nuclear arsenal doesn’t work,” insisting that it is out of date. Although he didn’t mention the $1 trillion price tag for “modernization,” the program is clearly something he favors, especially given his campaign’s focus on building a US military machine “so big, powerful, and strong that no one will mess with us.”
His Republican rivals have adopted a similar approach. Marco Rubio, asked while campaigning in Iowa about whether he supported the trillion dollar investment in new nuclear weapons, replied that “we have to have them. No country in the world faces the threats America faces.” When a peace activist questioned Ted Cruz on the campaign trail about whether he agreed with Ronald Reagan on the need to eliminate nuclear weapons, the Texas senator replied: “I think we’re a long way from that and, in the meantime, we need to be prepared to defend ourselves. The best way to avoid war is to be strong enough that no one wants to mess with the United States.” Apparently, Republican candidates are particularly worried about being “messed with.”
On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton has been more ambiguous about her stance toward a dramatic expansion of the US nuclear arsenal. Asked by a peace activist about the trillion dollar nuclear plan, she replied that she would “look into that,” adding: “It doesn’t make sense to me.” Even so, like other issues that the former Secretary of State has promised to “look into,” this one remains unresolved. Moreover, the “National Security” section of her campaign website promises that she will maintain the “strongest military the world has ever known”—not a propitious sign for critics of nuclear weapons.
Only Bernie Sanders has adopted a position of outright rejection. In May 2015, shortly after declaring his candidacy, Sanders was asked at a public meeting about the trillion dollar nuclear weapons program. He replied: “What all of this is about is our national priorities. Who are we as a people? Does Congress listen to the military-industrial complex” that “has never seen a war that they didn’t like? Or do we listen to the people of this country who are hurting?” In fact, Sanders is one of only three US Senators who support the SANE Act, legislation that would significantly reduce US government spending on nuclear weapons. In addition, on the campaign trail, Sanders has not only called for cuts in spending on nuclear weapons, but has affirmed his support for their total abolition.
Nevertheless, given the failure of the presidential debate moderators to raise the issue of nuclear weapons “modernization,” the American people have been left largely uninformed about the candidates’ opinions on this subject. So, if Americans would like more light shed on their future president’s response to this enormously expensive surge in the nuclear arms race, it looks like they are the ones who are going to have to ask the candidates the trillion dollar question.
[Dr. Lawrence Wittner (http://lawrenceswittner.com) is Professor of History emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press). He is a regular contributor to the Peace and Health Blog.]
Trump’s Troubling Choice of Sessions
By Gilbert Doctorow | Consortium News | March 17, 2016
I imagine many anti-war colleagues will choke over Donald Trump’s selection of the junior senator from Alabama Jeff Sessions to head his foreign policy team. Sessions’s past strong support for the 2003 invasion of Iraq and the prosecution of the war that followed features prominently in his Wikipedia entry.
Surely, it is not heart-warming to read about Sessions’s rally in 2005 to protest an anti-Iraq War rally the day before. There he described the other side as committing the sin first highlighted by President Ronald Reagan’s neoconservative United Nations Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick in 1984 – “to blame America first.”
Then there are the other, non-foreign policy positions of Sessions that will be galling to all progressives. Ranked as one of the most conservative members of Congress, his positions on civil rights, gay marriage, race relations, immigration and abortion rights follow conservative orthodoxy. The list of his domestic policy red flags goes on and on.
In any case, Sessions is not widely regarded as a foreign policy expert. Despite his membership on the Senate Armed Services Committee, national security policy is not his strong suit. He is known more for his experience as a former state attorney general and a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee,
By itself, the choice of Sessions is a seemingly sad commentary on Trump’s campaign. And yet it clearly fit within Trump’s political calculations of getting elected to the presidency. Picking Sessions came not long after Sessions issued his endorsement of Trump, one of the first major figures in the Republican establishment to do so. With his solid standing within the more conservative wing of the party, Sessions is a valuable asset to protect Trump against charges that he is not a real Republican, nor a real conservative.
Whether Trump really intends to take counsel from this new chief adviser on foreign policy is another matter, a question of strategy and not electoral tactics. In this sense, Trump may have been too clever by half.
As he draws together a foreign policy and security team, Trump’s choice of Sessions – a lockstep Republican on national security as illustrated by his staunch support of President George W. Bush’s Iraq War – may push aside “realist” and “anti-interventionist” military and civilian experts who have been left on the curb these past 20 years as the American foreign policy establishment purged its ranks of heterogeneous opinions to become dominated by a monolithic assemblage of warmongers.
A person who regularly communicates with me summarized the challenges facing Trump in formulating foreign policy as follows:
“The key is fleshing out for Trump what his elliptical statements, not only about [Russian President Vladimir] Putin and Russia, mean, and translating his deal-making into a new non-militarist diplomacy — making big diplomatic deals that will end the cold war and open other prospects, e.g., on nukes, etc. I sense he is ready for this, but the military people Sessions will recruit have contrary instincts and no regional knowledge. Trump does best tapping into the real conservatives who are closer to Rand Paul and worship the Reagan of 1985-88. Even the retired Gen. [Martin] Dempsey [former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff], based on what [investigative reporter Seymour] Hersh wrote, might advise Trump.” (Hersh described Dempsey as resisting interventionist pressure to engage in “regime change” in Syria and instead worked behind the scenes with Russia to thwart gains by jihadist terror groups.)
The first task for a President Trump would be to take us back from the brink of nuclear war with Russia. In the context of needless confrontations with Moscow, which have produced a feverish atmosphere of mutual distrust, preemptive nuclear strikes have become all too thinkable.
A potential Trump administration in January 2017 should arrive in office with well-defined plans for resuming arms control talks that address directly American concerns over Russian tactical nuclear weapons and Russian concerns over America’s global missile defense system. Trump and his team should be ready to discuss and to act on a desperate need for a new security architecture in Europe that brings Russia in from the cold.
Only after these debts in arrears are resolved can we proceed in positive territory to revising the rules of global governance and replacing rancor and discord with concerted actions by all the big global players. This is the foreign policy which the American public has backed in opinion poll after opinion poll over the past 30 years. It is the policy which the establishment elites have denied us for too long.
Gilbert Doctorow is the European Coordinator, American Committee for East West Accord, Ltd. His latest book Does Russia Have a Future? (August 2015) is available in paperback and e-book from Amazon.com and affiliated websites. For donations to support the European activities of ACEWA, write to eastwestaccord@gmail.com. © Gilbert Doctorow, 2016
AIPAC Is Coming to Town
The annual grovel begins next week
By Philip Giraldi • Unz Review • March 15, 2016
I am reluctant to write two weeks in a row about Israel’s malignant influence over the United States but as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) is meeting in Washington for its annual Summit beginning next Sunday some commentary would seem desirable. AIPAC’s website claims that its “… mission is to strengthen, protect and promote the U.S.-Israel relationship in ways that enhance the security of Israel and the United States. Our staff and citizen activists educate decision makers about the bonds that unite the United States and Israel and how it is in America’s best interest to help ensure that Israel is safe, strong and secure.”
That is, of course, a self-serving bit of nonsense. U.S. national security would be best enhanced by telling Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to take a hike and never come back. AIPAC is a political pressure group, not an educational foundation, which is purely a pretext exploited to secure it tax exemption. It uses every means, fair and foul, to influence and even intimidate the U.S. government and media to maintain the fiction that Israel is somehow America’s “best friend” and “closest ally” even though it is neither. Its objective is to maintain the flow of U.S. dollars from the U.S. Treasury while keeping the firewall of political protection in place to insulate Israeli politicians from the consequences of their own actions.
This year AIPAC, which has an annual budget of $70 million and more than 200 employees, is expecting 16,000 supporters and two thirds of Congress. It will be featuring a keynote speech by Hillary Clinton, which should be fascinating. As Hillary and her husband Bill already constitute a fully owned subsidiary of the Israel Lobby and New York financial services interests, which often amount to the same thing, her attendance might be regarded as de rigueur. And she has already pledged to invite Netanyahu to the White House during her first month in office while also promising to move the Israeli relationship to a “new level,” a concept that is both difficult to imagine and positively frightening in terms of what it might portend. Will she move the entire U.S. government to Jerusalem? Or only the Treasury Department?
Donald Trump will also be speaking at AIPAC, for the first time. Trump has rattled Israel’s friends in the U.S. by calling for an even handed role by Washington in Middle East peace negotiations and through his insistence that he does not need the money from Jewish mega-donors to run his campaign and “can’t be bought.” But he has also said “First of all, there’s nobody… that’s more pro-Israel than I am. OK. There’s nobody. I am pro-Israel. I was the Grand Marshall, not so long ago, of the Israeli Day Parade down 5th avenue. I’ve made massive contributions to Israel. I have a lot of — I have tremendous love for Israel. I happen to have a son-in-law and a daughter that are Jewish, OK? And two grandchildren that are Jewish.” So one should assume that he will talk fulsomely about his love of Israel but at the same time it has to be hoped that he will assert his independence when it comes to policy affecting the United States.
Netanyahu also regularly appears at AIPAC. Last year he used the platform provided to harangue the American public and the inside the beltway chattering class about the dangers posed by Iran while also exploiting the opportunity to do some serious fundraising in New York. The visits also frequently provide an opportunity to meet with and scold the President of the United States or to address Congress on how the U.S. should conduct its foreign policy. It is a given in Washington that Netanyahu will show up in the nation’s capital personally to kick some butt at least twice a year but it is also understood that Bibi will not fail to dish out some harsh criticism the rest of the time by way of the media, his own patented form of international extortion.
Nothing illustrates the unbridgeable abyss between the media/talking head vision of Israel promoted by the Israel Lobby and folks like Hillary and the real thing more than the recent embarrassments and indignities being delivered by the Netanyahu government, which AIPAC really represents. Benjamin Netanyahu is, to everyone’s surprise, not coming to AIPAC this year but will instead address the conference by video link. The visit was planned but canceled at the last moment and, per Netanyahu, the fault is that of the president of the United States who had reportedly said that he would not be available for a meeting due to the upcoming trip to Cuba.
The Obama Administration was genuinely puzzled, partly due to the fact that it first learned of the cancellation through a newspaper story rather than from the Israeli Embassy or Foreign Ministry. It was also astonished by the explanation given as it had indeed set up a presidential meeting at Netanyahu’s request in spite of a very tight schedule. The White House did not complain openly about the deliberate snub, but it was clear to everyone involved that Netanyahu was yet again sending a message to the Administration regarding who was in charge.
Netanyahu benefits from the fact that his tendency to ridicule critics makes many in the media reluctant to challenge his behavior, but when it became embarrassingly clear that he had been fibbing about why he was not coming to Washington he immediately resorted to Plan B, stating that he did not want to interfere in the presidential primaries currently underway. No one believed that argument either as Netanyahu has not hesitated to interfere in American politics in the past, notably when he made clear that he would prefer a Republican president in 2012 and appeared in ads in Florida endorsing Mitt Romney.
The White House meanwhile resorted to its own Plan B when confronted by a truculent Netanyahu. It first groveled a bit about how much it loves Israel and then expressed hope that Vice President Joe Biden, who was in the air on his way to Tel Aviv, would be able to calm the situation. Indeed, the original objective of the Biden trip turned out to be the real reason for the contretemps with Netanyahu. Netanyahu was miffed because the United States has hesitated to provide him with a no-strings-attached long term agreement to give Israel at least $5 billion dollars per year in military assistance, up from the current $3 billion.
To be fair to Netanyahu, the demand for more “assistance” was no secret. The Israelis had made it clear since they failed to stop the Iran nuclear deal that they would feel a whole lot better if Washington were to give them a lot more money. And it would have to be guaranteed cash, tied to a security package that would run for at least ten years.
Biden had been sent to help negotiate an agreement over the assistance, which had been stalled due in part to Israeli expectations that they might do better with a GOP Administration or Hillary if they wait a few months. Obama’s insistence that any deal would require the Israeli government to forego lobbying directly to congress for more cash also was a stumbling block. The President of the United States has thereby found himself in a situation engineered by Netanyahu in which he has to beg Israel to take more money with the only condition being that it not make trouble with the nation’s legislature. In return for the largesse, Israel would not be committed to do anything that would directly benefit the United States.
In the event, Biden’s role as a negotiating intermediary was unsuccessful and he wound up looking foolish so he too has decided to speak at AIPAC where he will undoubtedly say many unctuous things that no one will believe.
There are several things that can be done to address the wildly asymmetrical situation with Benjamin Netanyahu and AIPAC. First, it must be recognized that the United States and Israel are actually two separate countries with very little in the way of common interests. The notion that they have many mutual concerns is largely a myth. AIPAC, the principal purveyor of the myth, is an agent of Israel and should be compelled to register with the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938, which would require it to maintain transparency in terms of who funds it. It should also be stripped of its tax exemption as it is demonstrably not an educational foundation. Taking those two steps would enable the American public to understand just exactly what AIPAC represents.
Second, President Obama should cut off aid to Israel completely since it is uninterested in there being any quid pro quo for the billions that it receives. If Obama wants to be gracious, he can consider renewing the subsidy if and when Israel rolls back its illegal settlements in Jerusalem and on the Palestinian West Bank. If Israel is not interested in peace and not willing to reverse policies that many believe constitute war crimes then it will not receive any support of any kind from the United States.
The annual reappearance of AIPAC in Washington should remind everyone that there are those among us who regard any allegiance to the common interests that should bind together all Americans as secondary at best. In the case of Israel, billions in taxpayer money should not be regarded as a convenient mechanism to bribe a foreign state to behave. It is past time to cut the ties that bind to despicable rogues like Benjamin Netanyahu and to make clear to Americans politicians that dual loyalty to a state that has been nothing but trouble for the past twenty years will no longer be considered acceptable.
Are Agent Provocateurs Disrupting Trump Rallies?
‘Soros seeks to destroy Trump’s challenge to New World Order’
Press TV – March 13, 2016
An American political analyst says Jewish billionaire George Soros is attempting to destroy the candidacy of Donald Trump, because he is not part of the Zionist controlled Satanic New World Order.
Steven D Kelley, a former CIA/NSA contractor, made the comments in an interview with Press TV on Saturday when asked to comment on the recent protests against Republican front-runner Trump.
On Friday night, a large number of protesters — many of them African Americans and Latinos angered by Trump’s anti-immigrant stance — clashed with Trump’s supporters in Chicago, Illinois, forcing the billionaire to cancel a rally there.
The cancellation, which came amid large demonstrations both inside and outside the event at the University of Illinois at Chicago, follows heightened concerns about violence in general at Trump’s rallies across the United States.
Trump, who has never held elected office, is leading the race, and has already won contests in 15 states — Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Hawaii, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Nevada, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, and Vermont.
“The ability of international power brokers to control and influence marginalized or simple minds continues to be used to defeat democratic processes and human rights,” Kelley said.
“We saw the destruction of the Ukraine when the money of demons like George Soros was used to fund fascist mobs. We see the same tactics being used in the American presidential election with George Soros once again funding violent opposition mobs to disrupt the legal free speech of a candidate who is not part of the Zionist controlled Satanic New World Order (NWO),” he added.
“The one candidate that is not a career politician, who does not pledge allegiance to Zionism, who will actually stop our suicidal plummet into world war with Russia, is also the one that every other bought and paid for puppet of Israel is attacking,” he continued.
“All of the racial tension being used to upset this one candidate, is contrived, and stoked by the very same corrosive elements that created the problems that were intended to divide, polarize, and destroy our community. These enemies of our country depend on division in order to distract us from their criminal activity,” the analyst stated.
“The fact that we see the most obvious servants of Israel leading the attack against this one man should be a major clue that the political parties are a farce, and that the true enemy of civilization, Zionism, are in extreme fear of what will happen should Trump win,” he observed.
“Washington works with the assumption that every member is corrupt, and can be exposed to prosecution if they get out of line. Bringing a non-politician who does not belong to a Satanic secret society, or who has not been compromised so as to be controlled by extortion, defeats the entire control system,” he noted.
“The only hope for this country and the rest of the world is to remove the Satanic Zionist puppets from all places of power. We all should understand that the enemy of our enemies is our friend,” Kelley concluded.
Are Agent Provocateurs Disrupting Trump Rallies?
By Stephen Lendman | March 12, 2016
Disrupting popular movements in America (and elsewhere) using agent provocateurs is longstanding practice.
The FBI notoriously targets groups out of step with accepted establishment practices – infiltrating, disrupting, sabotaging and destroying their activism for ethnic justice, racial emancipation, as well as economic, social and political equality across gender and color lines.
Occupy Wall Street protests were systematically disrupted nationwide, undermining the campaign altogether. Efforts to re-jump-start it never gained traction.
Former Louisiana Governor Huey Long outspokenly proposed wealth distribution to curb poverty and homelessness. His advocacy and planned 1936 presidential run cost him his life.
A month after announcing his candidacy, he was fatally shot at the Louisiana State Capitol. Jack Kennedy’s transformation from warrior to peacemaker got him assassinated.
Donald Trump is no Kennedy or Huey Long. He’s a boastful, demagogic, super-rich, racist, predatory capitalist con man, coming off in campaign speeches as anti-establishment, a figure party bosses aren’t sure they can control.
All sorts of dirty tricks are being used to undermine his run for the White House – perhaps including paid provocateurs to disrupt his political rallies.
Late last year, protesters disrupted a Virginia rally – clashing with supporters, chanting “Dump Trump. Campaign events in Miami, Dallas, Massachusetts, Ohio, Alabama and elsewhere were turbulent.
Chicago was the latest venue for disruption. A planned Friday event was cancelled shortly before Trump was scheduled to speak at the University of Illinois Chicago Pavilion.
Thousands of supporters awaited his arrival inside. Crowds outside protested his appearance. Disruption caused the rally to be cancelled, an announcement, saying:
“Mr. Trump just arrived in Chicago and after meeting with law enforcement has determined that for the safety of all the tens of thousands of people that have gathered in and around the arena, tonight’s rally will be postponed until another date. Thank you very much for you attendance and please go in peace.”
Protesters cheered. Supporters chanted “We want Trump!” Scuffles were reported inside and outside the pavilion.
Were paid provocateurs involved? Interviewed on Friday, Trump said he doesn’t incite or condone violence.
Illinois is one of five states holding key March 15 primaries. Their results could be decisive in deciding who’ll be the Republican presidential nominee.
Party bosses are going all out for anyone but Trump – even strongly supporting native born Canadian/naturalized US citizen Ted Cruz’s illegitimate candidacy.
Despite everything done so far to undermine him, Trump looks unstoppable. Supporters thinking he’ll change things for the better if elected in November are hopelessly out of touch with reality.
He’s like all the rest – in his case, old wine in new bottles, supporting the longstanding system too corrupted to fix.
Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.
His new book as editor and contributor is titled Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III
What is really at stake in the oddest American election season of a lifetime
By John Chuckman | Aletho News | March 8, 2016
I keep reading stuff in British papers about what America’s Left must do in an election where Donald Trump “has thrown caution to the wind.” Each time I read anything along that line, invariably, I ask myself, “What Left are they talking about?” As perhaps few in Europe understand, there is no Left in the United States.
Bernie Sanders comes closest to being Left, but he is not only from one of the very smallest states in the Union, it is a state known for its liberal bent, something which exists in very few corners of that huge “pounding fist” of a country.
It would be refreshing if Sanders could win, but he cannot. The odds are completely stacked against him. I believe the unexpected force of his campaign, this man whose name was widely unknown west of New England in a campaign against someone whose name and face are, by contrast, as well known as Hershey bars, is a quiet wave of public recognition of just how repulsive a person Hillary Clinton is. It seems a miracle that he has run so well against her, sometimes beating or virtually tying her.
But remember, this is America we’re talking about, a plutocratic imperial power, not a democracy, and one engaged in vast military and secret state security operations. There is simply no room for a self-declared “democratic socialist.” America has no truck with socialists, even rather nice and soft ones.
Money counts hugely in politics, as it does in every nook and cranny of American life. An accurate motto for America might well be, “If it can’t be bought, it ain’t worth having.” Hillary is exceptionally well connected with, and financed by, the people who really count in shaping American government. Short of a tidal wave of support, any primary lead by Sanders would be stripped of delegates or would be defeated by “super-delegates” at the convention by party insiders.
As for Hillary being elected, nothing in my view could be a greater disaster. She has a murderous record, and I doubt she has told the truth twice in her entire life.
There is simply no question about her tendency to brutal violence. She pushed husband Bill on the needless war in Serbia. She advocated inside the administration for what became the Waco horror. She voted for the illegal invasion of Iraq. She ran at least part of what went on in Libya, a black operation to gather weapons and men to send to Turkey for terrorizing Syria. And we have her brutal idea of humor, complete with sneering laughter, about Gadhafi, a man who on the whole did a decent job of governing in a difficult part of the world: “We came, we saw, he died.” She supports Israel’s worst bloody excesses with a smile and regularly takes money from some of the people who work strenuously to keep them going.
Trump carries a great deal of heavy baggage, and has said many things with which I totally disagree, but he does not have Hillary’s record of death and destruction on a grand scale. He may often be quite unpleasant, but Hillary is almost certainly a psychopath whose narcissistic personality feels driven and entitled to be President so she can continue toying with human beings. I reject 90% of what Trump says, but I reject just about 100% of what Hillary has actually done.
There is one area, and a very important one, where possibly Trump can do something good for the world, and that is foreign affairs. Some of his views there are sound, sounder by far than Hillary’s. His views on matters like Syria and Russia are entirely rational and not weighed down by America’s malicious policies of the last quarter century, policies which Hillary not only supports but helped to establish and execute.
A vote for Hillary is a vote for more American bullying and terror in the world, and that is not in the least an exaggeration. Terror is the right word for what America has done in the Middle East: it has crashed and raged through the region, leaving it in blazes. Hillary has served as a “willing executioner” in that hellish effort.
If you look at the groups and individuals who are key Hillary supporters, it is a pretty grim picture. It includes many corrupt and brutal foreign governments such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, and Israel, and a vast collection of gigantic international corporate special interests, even financial terrorists like the firm of Goldman Sachs who played a key role in the collapse of 2008 and who have never really been called to account for bringing so many to ruin. There is not a glimmer of genuine liberalism or democratic ideals in the people paying and easing her way, although she likes to put on her best clownishly little-girl face and claim how interested she is in the welfare of ordinary Americans at campaign stops.
If we could only gain some sense and rationality in America’s foreign affairs, it would be a genuine advance for the entire world. Almost certainly you have to pay a price for doing that in a place like the United States. Nothing comes free in a throbbing plutocratic power. That price may be living with Trump’s many unpleasant aspects.
The neocons especially see that possibility in Trump, which is why they hate him beyond telling. Already many have said really ugly things in public. And, remarkably, the word “assassination” keeps popping up in those circles. That fact alone should tell us how destructive the impact of the neocons has been upon America’s own society.
It would have been unthinkable fifty years ago for prominent Americans to talk or joke of assassinating a political candidate. That is how low American society has sunk during its long march with neocons, bombing, invading, promoting terrorism through proxies, and assassinating in the Middle East and in places like Ukraine – virtually all of which derives from the special influence of the neocons.
The political poverty of America was embarrassingly displayed in the original field of Republican candidates which resembled nothing so much as Madame Tussaud’s Chamber of Horrors. Fortunately, most of them are gone. As for Ted Cruz, the neocons’ possible “go to” man for stopping Trump, he is, just for a start, a right-wing religious wacko. There is a video of him on-line sitting at breakfast holding hands with his perfect little suburban family praying over the Sugar Pops. Staff working for Cruz include neo-con and CIA-types, and his wife is associated with Goldman Sachs. He is intellectually gifted, but many of his old associates in government say he is an extremely unpleasant man with which to work, extremely arrogant, and one not to be trusted, being given to treacherous turns. His former roommate at Princeton tells of getting e-mails from other students asking why he didn’t suffocate Cruz with a pillow while he had the chance. At least one person has commented on his resemblance to a serial killer. It would be a pretty desperate move by Republicans to try stopping Trump by loading Cruz, a man they simply don’t like, with money and influence. And I tend to feel the effort would fail in any event.
You get nothing free in a big, ugly place like America, so if you would like to see some end to a quarter century of brutal wars and the savage practices which have taken root under Bush/Clinton/Obama, perhaps you need to take a chance.
As few non-Americans realize, in domestic affairs the American President’s office is a rather weak one. It was designed to be that way. We have seen the frustration of Obama trying increasingly to govern by executive order, a pernicious practice not much different than imperial fiats, but even with that practice he has made little headway in this rigidly structured society. And no one, certainly no genuine liberal, ever can, without fundamental changes we have no reason to expect any time soon. America in its governance much resembles a giant wearing a huge, thick suit of concrete.
It is only in the area of military and foreign affairs that the American President has some real power, and that is an area which needs serious change. It won’t happen under bloodthirsty Hillary, loyal servant to neocon interests.
As far as ugly stuff like great walls or drastic changes to migration, Trump could do nothing without both houses of Congress, so they are proposals unlikely to become realities. Even on such domestic subjects, however, we do hear echoes of the neocon influence. After all, Israel has built many walls and builds more now, all on other people’s land and all of which prevent normal life for millions of others. It couldn’t be more unfair and anti-democratic, but the same people viciously attacking Trump for his proposals are the last ones to say a word about Israel’s actual practices. So those most violently attacking Trump cannot claim concerns for human decency or human rights motivate them, although they very much pretend to do so rather than being open about their real motives. Calling Trump a fascist over mere rhetoric and proposals is pretty ridiculous when we see Israel’s actual practices left unquestioned by crowds of prominent people.
Trump Bashing Reaches Epic Proportions
By Stephen Lendman | March 4, 2016
Ideologically he’s over-the-top like all other duopoly power presidential aspirants, supporting the same dirty business as usual agenda.
His unorthodox campaigning against the grain sounding anti-establishment put him at odds with Republican power brokers.
They’re committed to anyone but him – with, as expected, echo chamber scoundrel media backing. Bashing him virtually drowns out other news.
A separate article discussed Republican desperation in hauling out failed presidential aspirant Mitt Romney, a vulture capital predator profiting from asset-stripping companies and mass-firings to cut costs.
The March 4 Washington Post edition published an astonishing nine anti-Trump opinion pieces in one issue, plus other reports with a distinct anti-Trump flavor.
New York Times editors bash him relentlessly, while shamelessly supporting war goddess Hillary Clinton, their latest broadside citing an open letter from 95 so-called Republican national security experts, declaring “united… opposition to a Donald Trump presidency,” followed by a volley of pejoratives.
Claiming Trump’s agenda makes America less safe ignores endless post-9/11 US wars of aggression, raging in multiple theaters, Obama more belligerent than Bush, Hillary Clinton to continue his ruthlessness on steroids if elected president.
Times op-ed columnist Charles Blow blasted Trump with a volley of pejoratives, most applicable to the array of despicable aspirants, calling him “nativist, sexist… fascist,” demagogic, “oddly entertaining, vacuous… vain, disarming and terrifyingly dangerous.”
Wall Street Journal contributor, former Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal was over-the-top claiming Obama created Trump, his support stemming from “deficiencies of the incumbent.”
The political silly season usually runs from early summer to the beginning of autumn in election years – characterized by demagogic and hyperbolic posturing.
It’s been raging now since Trump declared his candidacy for president in mid-June last year – with comments like America “has become a dumping ground for everybody’s problems.”
“(W)e have no protection and we have no competence. We don’t know what’s happening. (I)t’s got to stop, and it’s got to stop fast.”
Things have been downhill since then. Expect ferocious Trump bashing to continue, bipartisan campaigning and media coverage ignoring vital issues.
What matters most to Americans goes unaddressed. No matter who succeeds Obama next January, monied interests exclusively will continue being served at the expense of popular ones.
The state of America is deplorable, a nation unfit to live in except for its privileged few.
Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.
His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.”
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Israeli rabbi says ‘kill everyone in Gaza, including babies’
The Cradle | March 24, 2024
Rabbi Eliyahu Mali, head of the Shirat Moshe yeshiva (religious school) in the occupied city of Jaffa, called on the Israeli army to kill everyone in Gaza, including babies.
During a conference on 8 March, Mali said that “according to the halachic principle (a religious-ethical system of legal reasoning in Judaism), all residents of Gaza must be killed.”
When asked during the conference if babies should be killed as well, he said: “The same thing. You can’t be clever with the Torah. Today he’s a baby, tomorrow he’s a fighter. There are no questions here. Today’s terrorists were previously 8-year-old children.”
“Those who create the terrorists” should also be killed, he said in reference to women in Gaza.
The Rabbi went on to explain that Israel’s war on Gaza is a “Mitzvah war,” which is defined as a war of “commandment” in Jewish tradition. According to Jewish law, this kind of war does not require permission from a “Sanhedrin,” also known as a council or assembly, such as the war against Amalek – previously declared in a biblical reference by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the start of the war on Gaza.
“There is a difference between a civilian population in other places and a civilian population in Gaza. In Gaza, according to estimates, 95 to 98 percent want us destroyed.”
“Since this is a sensitive issue, and I was told that it is being uploaded on the Internet, I want to be ahead of the curve and say that the bottom line is that you have to do exactly what is said in the IDF’s order,” Mali added.
The rabbi’s students in the Shirat Moshe yeshiva serve in the Israeli army. The Yeshiva is sponsored by the Israeli government. … Full article
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