Europe’s Nord Stream headache: Poland, Germany, and Ukraine turn on each other over arrest
By Uriel Araujo | October 11, 2025
The Nord Stream saga has taken a new twist. A Ukrainian citizen detained in Poland at Germany’s request over the 2022 pipeline sabotage has now become the center of a diplomatic storm. Ukraine’s reported pressure on Poland is straining ties with Warsaw and Berlin, reopening questions European leaders have tried to bury.
Polish authorities have resisted Germany’s extradition request for the detained Ukrainian, citing national interest and judicial independence. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk stated bluntly that it was “not in Poland’s interest” to hand the suspect over to Berlin — a statement that speaks volumes about the deepening mistrust within the European Union. He added that “the problem of Europe… is not that Nord Stream 2 was blown up, but that it was built.”
This is symptomatic of Europe’s broader crisis: a continent that once aspired to “strategic autonomy” now grapples with American influence, tensions over the “Ukranian Question”, and internal divisions.
The destruction of the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines in September 2022 effectively ended decades of German-Russian energy cooperation, forcing Europe into costly dependence on American LNG. From that moment onward, every official narrative seemed to deflect attention away from one key question: who truly benefited?
One may recall that in August, Italian police arrested Ukrainian national Serhij K. for alleged involvement in the 2022 Nord Stream sabotage. According to Der Spiegel, he coordinated a Ukrainian team that planted explosives from the yacht “Andromeda.” The operation was reportedly approved by Ukraine’s military.
At the time, I wrote that the Nord Stream case has been a tale of confusion and cover-ups. I pointed out that a so-called “Ukrainian diver” suspect (unnamed to this very day) could be a lone scapegoat, a proxy, or just a minor operative in a much larger operation. All signs, I argued, pointed to the US as the main orchestrator, with Ukraine likely playing a supporting role on the ground.
According to Pulitzer Prize–winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh’s sources, the CIA is behind the deed. Ukraine’s latest behind-the-scenes pressure on Poland suggests Kyiv has more to hide than to reveal. The Eastern European country has long been a key hub for CIA operations.
Indeed, one must ask: why would Ukraine intervene at all, unless it feared what an open extradition to Germany might uncover? Berlin’s prosecutors have hinted that their investigation connects the detained suspect to a wider network tied to Ukrainian intelligence. If that thread were ever pulled, it could expose not just Kyiv’s denials, but also shake the credibility of the entire Western narrative since 2022.
The Polish position is equally telling. Tusk’s refusal to comply with Germany’s request exposes the uneasy balancing act that Poland now faces. On the one hand, it remains a staunch supporter of Ukraine in its proxy war with Russia. On the other, it has domestic political reasons to resist appearing subservient to Berlin — and perhaps also to shield itself from unwanted entanglement in the Nord Stream mystery.
Poland, after all, was one of the loudest voices calling for the pipelines to be dismantled long before the explosions happened. The fact that the blasts occurred in waters close to Denmark and Sweden, yet remains unsolved three years later, is remarkable enough.
The European Union’s silence is thus deafening. While media attention focuses on minor procedural disputes, the larger strategic implications are quietly ignored. The Nord Stream sabotage was no mere act of vandalism — it was a geopolitical earthquake that permanently reshaped Europe’s energy map. By destroying the infrastructure that connected Germany to cheaper Russian gas, someone ensured Europe’s long-term dependence on transatlantic energy imports. It is worth remembering that American officials, including then President Biden himself, had publicly threatened to “end” Nord Stream 2 before the current Russo-Ukrainian conflict even began. That is too much of a coincidence.
In that light, the current Polish-German-Ukraine triangle takes on a new meaning. It reveals the uncomfortable truth that Europe’s supposed allies are now quietly at odds. Germany apparently wants to restore a semblance of legal order by investigating the crime, while Poland wants to preserve its political leverage. Ukraine wants to avoid revelations that could alienate its Western backers. Washington in turn seems content to keep the entire affair buried under layers of confusion and selective leaks.
The deeper irony is that the Nord Stream pipelines were not merely Russian assets — they were European lifelines. Their destruction accelerated deindustrialization and skyrocketed energy prices, while American energy exporters reap the profits. The most obvious suspects remain Washington and Kyiv.
Yet European leaders cling to transatlantic loyalty. Berlin’s alignment with American policy verges on economic self-harm, while Brussels pushes “solidarity” as factories close and households struggle with high energy costs. The result is a Europe that’s strategically adrift and economically weakened — a dynamic that suits Washington.
If this Poland-Germany-Ukraine scandal deepens, it could force a reckoning. Europe will have to confront what everyone avoids: was the Nord Stream sabotage an act of war — and by whom? Until then, diplomacy remains a messy game where allies distrust each other, and truth is sidelined for convenience.
The Nord Stream affair may be remembered not just as sabotage, but as the moment Europe lost its last illusion of autonomy. It could confirm how dependent the continent has become on external powers — even in matters of justice. Politically, this could be as explosive as the pipelines blasts themselves.
Uriel Araujo, Anthropology PhD, is a social scientist specializing in ethnic and religious conflicts, with extensive research on geopolitical dynamics and cultural interactions.
After robbing EU taxpayers, Zelensky uses blackmail to get inside the Bloc
Strategic Culture Foundation | October 10, 2025
Since the United States-led NATO proxy war against Russia erupted in February 2022, the European Union has doled out $216 billion in aid to Ukraine. That’s equivalent to €186 billion, according to the EU’s latest official count. The true figure is likely to be even more.
The United States has given a similar amount to Ukraine. All paid for by taxpayers.
That’s about $400 billion total in three years, with the EU promising more over the next few years.
To put this in perspective, the EU aid to Ukraine is multiples more than all of the 27 member nations have received – combined – from the bloc’s collective budget and administration. According to Euronews reporting, some of the biggest recipients of EU subsidies each year are Germany (€14 bn), France (€16.5 bn), and Poland (€14 bn). Some of the smaller recipient countries are Austria, Denmark, and Ireland (around €2 bn).
That means Ukraine has received heaps more than all of the EU members combined.
Get your head around that. Ukraine, which is not a member of the European Union, is receiving manifold what actual member states are receiving. And you wonder why people in France are angrily taking to the streets because their shambolic government wants to cut pensions and other social welfare services to save money. Elsewhere, European governments are collapsing from unsustainable debt. And, at the same time, European citizens are constantly being lectured that their states need to spend more and more money on the NATO alliance, even to the insulting point of having to accept the cutting of social benefits and public services.
Ukraine and its corrupt Kiev regime of NeoNazis has bled Europe dry. The so-called president, Vladimir Zelensky (who canceled elections last year, so he’s not really a legitimate president), is reported to be funneling €50 million a month to overseas funds for his retirement while his wife goes luxury shopping in New York and Paris. Other members of the regime, like former prime minister and now “defense” minister Denys Shmyhal, are also reportedly up to their eyes in corruption, siphoning off billions in the military aid that Western taxpayers have paid for.
This week, Zelensky took his brassneckery to new levels – if that’s possible. He is demanding that Ukraine be made a member of the EU, and he wants to change the rules of the bloc to speed up the process. The EU has granted Ukraine (and Moldova) a fast-track path to membership, but, to its credit, Hungary has objected to this.
In June, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán cast a veto on continuing access talks for Ukraine. According to EU rules, there must be unanimity among member nations for the approval of new members. Orbán said Ukraine is not eligible because of the current war against Russia. “We would be importing a war,” he said.
Also, Budapest objects to Ukrainian language laws that discriminate against a Hungarian minority in the western Zakarpattia region of Ukraine. (The Russian language has been banned, too, in public offices.)
A referendum held in Hungary in June recorded that 95 percent of voters were against Ukraine becoming a member of the EU.
Zelensky is pushing ahead regardless, with his peevish wheedling. In a joint press conference in Kiev on Monday, with the indulgence of the Dutch PM at his side, Zelensky said: “Ukraine will be in the European Union, with or without Orbán, because it is the choice of the Ukrainian people.”
The little dictator flaunted his insufferable presumptuousness by hinting that the European Union would change its rules to bypass Hungary’s veto – all just to accommodate his scrounging regime. “Changing the procedure is called finding a way without Hungary,” he said. And in a further arrogant dismissal of democratic process, Zelensky asserted that the Hungarian people support his EU ambitions, contradicting the referendum back in June.
Orbán responded firmly by telling Zelensky he could not blackmail his way into the European Union.
Hungary’s Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó added a dose of reality by stating: “The decision on which country is ready to join the European Union and which can join the EU will not be made by the president of Ukraine, but by the European Union itself, where such decisions require unanimity.”
In a further comment, Szijjártó nailed it by saying that Zelenskyy is “completely detached from reality.” The Hungarian diplomat also reminded that the Kiev regime is blowing up energy infrastructure and jeopardizing the EU members’ vital interests.
Last month, Ukrainian forces exploded the Druzhba oil pipeline from Russia, cutting off energy supplies to Hungary and Slovakia. The Zelensky regime carried out the sabotage as retribution for Budapest’s opposition to Ukraine’s EU application. This is what Orbán was no doubt referring to when he slammed Zelensky this week for using blackmail.
So, there you have it. A corrupt, unelected, Neo-Nazi regime headed up by a Jewish scam-artist who plays piano with his penis while wearing women’s high heels is using terrorist tactics to attack the vital interests of EU members, and is now telling those members that they won’t have a vote in the EU processes, because the regime has decided it will become a member of the bloc. You could not make it up. This, too, after robbing the taxpayers of the bloc of €186 billion to wage a war against Russia – a war that has killed 1.5 million Ukrainian soldiers – which could spiral out of control into a nuclear Third World War.
If this is the kind of ruination that this regime can inflict while not being a member of the EU, one can only imagine the hellscape it will bring after becoming a member.
An analogy could be a householder being tormented by a criminal gang hanging around the gate, and then for the household to invite the gang inside the premises. The gang leader swaggers in, puts his dirty boots up on the table, and then starts demanding this and that from the householders, using blackmail to harm the children of the house, or some other abomination.
However, the real culprits in this obscene farce are the American and European elites who have fomented the war against Russia. Together, they have weaned and pampered the Kiev regime with largesse and indulgence, paid for by the taxpayers. The U.S.-EU transatlantic ruling class has cultivated the regime of corruption and war since the 2014 CIA-backed coup in Kiev against an elected president. The racket has laundered hundreds of billions of public money to the Western military industrial complex. The racket has destroyed the economies of Europe and is now destroying the semblance of democracy within Europe. (It’s not clear what Trump’s position in all of this is, but he probably doesn’t count anyway.)
The Western imperialist ruling class is so obsessed with its scheme for “strategic defeat” of Russia (and China) and for global domination that it is willing to cultivate any scumbag regime it can make use of for its goals, no matter how much that violates international law and its own professed democratic principles.
Zelensky’s corrupt dictatorship is just a pale reflection of his patrons in Washington, Brussels, Paris, Berlin, and London. They are all detached from reality.
The Empire’s Assassins
Tales of the American Empire | October 9, 2025
The recent assassination of Charlie Kirk was done by professionals. The FBI story is full of holes and experts agree that he was not shot by a high-power rifle, something our corporate media refuses to report. That would have knocked his head off!
This is not a detailed report of his assassination, but how it matches the proven method used by teams of professional killers, which includes setting up a lone nut patsy.
_______________________________________
“Analysis Solves Kirk Case”; a retired pathologist explains why Kirk was not hit by a high-power rifle bullet; Chris Martenson; September 26, 2025; 
• Analysis Solves Kirk Case—Evidence Points …
“Valhalla VFT” channel; a retired Green Beret soldier with several videos about the magic bullet; / @valhallavft
Related Tale; “The American Colony of Thailand”; • The American Colony of Thailand
Related Tale; “Football Star Murdered in Afghanistan”; • Football Star Murdered in Afghanistan
“Charlie Kirk Assassination: Narrative vs Reality”; a great short video summarizing the odd stories about this killing; RangeDayBro; October 4, 2025; • Charlie Kirk Assassination: Narrative vs R…
“PROOF Epstein Jail Video Is A Sham & Doctored By FBI!”; Jimmy Dore Show; August 2, 2025; • PROOF Epstein Jail Video Is A Sham & Docto… • Lee Harvey Oswald was a Patsy
West turning internet into ‘tool of control’ – Telegram founder
RT | October 10, 2025
Western surveillance and censorship is eroding digital freedom and is turning the internet into a “tool of control,” Telegram founder Pavel Durov has warned.
The Russian-born billionaire has long portrayed Telegram as an outpost for free speech and privacy, contrasting it with what he describes as authoritarian censorship efforts by Western governments.
“Our generation is running out of time to save the free Internet built for us by our fathers,” Durov said in a statement on Telegram on Friday, marking his 41st birthday.
“What was once the promise of the free exchange of information is being turned into the ultimate tool of control,” he added, noting that nations once considered free are adopting authoritarian digital practices. He cited measures such as digital IDs in the UK, compulsory online age verification in Australia, and the mass scanning of private messages in the EU.
Durov said people have been misled by the West into believing that their mission is to dismantle traditional values – privacy, sovereignty, free markets, and free speech – and by doing so, society has embarked on a path of “self-destruction.”
“A dark, dystopian world is approaching fast – while we’re asleep. Our generation risks going down in history as the last one that had freedoms – and allowed them to be taken away… We are running out of time,” he said.
Durov has long clashed with Western governments over Telegram’s policies, facing fines in Germany for not removing ‘illegal’ content and criticism in the US for allegedly enabling extremist groups.
Last year, he was arrested in Paris and charged with complicity in crimes linked to Telegram users, but was released on bail. He called the case politically motivated. He later accused French intelligence of pressuring him to censor conservative content during elections in Romania and Moldova, and condemned France for waging “a crusade” against free speech.
Durov has also warned that EU laws such as the Digital Services Act and the AI Act are paving the way for the centralized control of information.
Trump’s Gaza peace plan won’t work, it’s an ultimatum under genocide
By Finian Cunningham | Strategic Culture Foundation | October 9, 2025
The so-called peace plan put forward by U.S. President Trump is a non-starter that won’t work, according to international legal expert Alfred de Zayas.
De Zayas says Trump’s much-ballyhooed initiative is not a peace offer. It is an ultimatum demanded by criminal rogue regimes that are responsible for genocide – the United States and Israel.
Professor De Zayas points out that Donald Trump and Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu have no credibility. Both are complicit in the genocide of Palestinians. The very idea of Trump proposing a peace deal amidst an ongoing U.S.-backed mass slaughter, where there is no legal prosecution of the perpetrators of genocide, nor for the illegal occupation of Palestinian land, and numerous other war crimes, is grotesque and absurd.
The appointment of British former leader Tony Blair to oversee Trump’s “peace plan” in Gaza is another insult.
“He should be behind bars as a war criminal,” says de Zayas, referring to Blair’s role in launching the U.S.-British war on Iraq in 2003, based on lies, killing over one million people.
On the issue of Gaza, the problem is that Israel, with support from the U.S. and European states, has been grossly violating international law and UN treaties for decades with impunity. This shameful lack of accountability and enforcement of international law makes Israel and its Western sponsors criminal regimes. It is nonsense to expect such serial violators to now propose a peace deal when they have not been held to account for a litany of crimes.
De Zayas says we need a ceasefire in Gaza urgently, with massive humanitarian aid for a population being deliberately starved to death by Israel. But any resolution must be applied with international law and justice for the horrific crimes.
Trump’s plan is a whitewash of the genocide. The Western mainstream media are also guilty of covering up the depth of horror. The media are ridiculously spinning Trump’s offer as genuine and credible, perhaps with a few flaws pooh-poohed here and there. The media are not reporting on the true horror and Western complicity in genocide. That’s because their long-time role is to serve as a propaganda service to sanitize the crimes and systematic lawlessness of Western rogue regimes.
Professor Alfred de Zayas teaches international law and history at the Geneva School of Diplomacy. He has worked as a UN staff expert on human rights for nearly 50 years.
His latest book is The Human Rights Industry (Clarity Press, 2023), see here: https://www.claritypress.com/product/human-rights-industry/
Catch his recent articles on wide-ranging international issues at Counterpunch: https://www.counterpunch.org/author/alfred-de-zayas/
When Presidents Kill
By Andrew P. Napolitano | Ron Paul Institute | October 9, 2025
During the past six weeks, President Donald Trump has ordered US troops to attack and destroy four speed boats in the Caribbean Sea, 1,500 miles from the United States. The president revealed that the attacks were conducted without warning, were intended not to stop but to kill all persons on the boats, and succeeded in their missions.
Trump has claimed that his victims are “narco-terrorists” who were planning to deliver illegal drugs to willing American buyers. He apparently believes that because these folks are presumably foreigners, they have no rights that he must honor and he may freely kill them. As far as we know, none of these nameless faceless persons was charged or convicted of any federal crime. We don’t know if any were Americans. But we do know that all were just extrajudicially executed.
Can the president legally do this? In a word: NO. Here is the backstory.
The Constitution was ratified to establish federal powers and to limit them. Congress is established to write the laws and to declare war. The president is established to enforce the laws that Congress has written and to be commander-in-chief of the armed forces. Restraints are imposed on both. Congress may only enact legislation in the 16 discrete areas of governance articulated in the Constitution — and it may only legislate subject to all persons’ natural rights identified and articulated in the Bill of Rights.
The president may only enforce the laws that Congress has written — he cannot craft his own. And he may employ the military only in defense of a real imminent military-style attack or to fight wars that Congress has declared. The Constitution prohibits the president from fighting undeclared wars, and federal law prohibits him from employing the military for law enforcement purposes.
The Fifth Amendment — in tandem with the 14th, which restrains the states — assures that no person’s life, liberty or property may be taken without due process of law. Because the drafters of the amendment used the word “person” instead of “citizen,” the courts have ruled consistently that this due process requirement is applicable to all human beings. Basically, wherever the government goes, it is subject to constitutional restraints.
Traditionally, due process means a trial. In the case of a civilian, it means a jury trial, with the full panoply of attendant protections required by the Constitution. In the case of enemy combatants, it means a fair neutral tribunal.
The tribunal requirement came about in an odd and terrifying way. In 1942, four Nazi troops arrived via submarine at Amagansett Beach, New York, and exchanged their uniforms for civilian garb. At nearly the same time, four other Nazi troops arrived via submarine at Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, and also donned civilian clothing. All eight set about their assigned task of destroying American munitions factories. After one of them went to the FBI, all eight were arrested.
President Franklin Roosevelt panicked and ordered all eight summarily executed. When two of the eight protested in perfect English that they were born in the US, and their protests proved accurate, FDR decided to appoint counsel for all of them and to hold a trial.
At trial, all eight were convicted of attempted sabotage behind enemy lines — a war crime. The Supreme Court quickly returned to Washington from its summer vacation and unanimously upheld the convictions. By the time the court issued its formal opinion, six of the eight had been executed. The two Americans were sentenced to life in prison. Their sentences were commuted five years later by President Harry Truman.
The linchpin to all this was FDR’s decision to appoint counsel and have a trial. The Supreme Court made it clear that even unlawful enemy combatants — those out of uniform and not on a recognized battlefield — are entitled to due process; and, but for the trial afforded to the Nazi saboteurs, it would not have permitted their executions.
This jurisprudence was essentially followed in three Supreme Court cases involving foreign persons whom the George W. Bush administration had arrested and characterized as enemy combatants detained at the US Naval Base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
In wartime, US troops can lawfully kill enemy troops that are engaged in violence against them. But, pursuant to these Supreme Court cases, the United Nations Charter — a treaty that the US wrote — as well the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights — another treaty that the US wrote — if combatants are not engaged in violence, they may not be harmed, but only arrested. All this presumes that Congress has in fact declared war on the country or group from which the combatants come. That hasn’t happened since Dec. 8, 1941.
Now, back to Trump ordering the military to kill foreigners in the Caribbean. International law provides for stopping ships engaged in violence in international waters. It also provides for stopping and searching ships — with probable cause for the search — in US territorial waters. But no law permits, and the prevailing judicial jurisprudence deriving from the Constitution and federal statutes absolutely prohibits, the summary murders of folks not engaged in violence — on the high seas or anywhere else.
The Attorney General has reluctantly revealed the existence of a legal memorandum purporting to justify Trump’s orders and the military’s killings — but she insisted the memorandum is classified. That is a non sequitur. A legal memorandum can only be based on public laws enacted by Congress and interpreted by the courts. There are no secret laws, and there can be no classified rationale for killing the legally innocent.
If the memorandum purports to permit the president to declare non-violent enemy combatants on a whim and kill them, it is in defiance of 80 years of consistent jurisprudence, and its drafters and executors have engaged in serious criminality. Where will these extrajudicial killings go next — to Chicago?
To learn more about Judge Andrew Napolitano, visit https://JudgeNap.com.
COPYRIGHT 2025 ANDREW P. NAPOLITANO
DISTRIBUTED BY CREATORS.COM
Lack of self-criticism in Kamala Harris’s book exposes continued Democratic ignorance
By Ahmed Adel | October 10, 2025
Former United States Vice President Kamala Harris has just published “107 Days,” a memoir about her failed 2024 presidential bid. The book’s thesis attributes the defeat solely to Joe Biden’s decision to give Harris insufficient time to campaign, which suggests that the Democratic establishment still does not understand why they lost the election.
Harris’s memoir recounts her brief and tumultuous presidential campaign after then-President Joe Biden was knocked out of the race following his disastrous debate against Donald Trump, which highlighted his notorious physical and cognitive decline. The book does not contain any major revelations, beyond confirming Harris’s poor relationship with Biden, his wife Jill, and the president’s team at the White House, whom she accuses of never defending her and giving her tasks deliberately damaging to her image, such as the immigration crisis.
However, the memoir is striking because it is almost entirely devoid of self-criticism regarding the causes that led Trump to a comfortable victory, with the Republicans winning in all seven so-called swing states, something unprecedented in 21st-century US presidential contests.
The book is structured as a countdown from the moment Biden tells her he is dropping out until Election Day, and from the title itself, 107 days, Harris seeks to make it clear that the reason for her defeat is strictly linked to the short time she had to campaign, which she repeatedly calls “the shortest campaign in modern history.”
Conveniently, Harris avoids mentioning the unexpected scenario that was caused by the administration’s efforts to hide from Americans Biden’s true physical and mental state, until the fateful debate against Trump in June 2024 exposed him in all his decline.
In that sense, the other major justification Harris invokes throughout the text to explain her defeat is the unpopularity of then-President Biden. However, she always made it clear that it was not so much that his administration’s policies were bad, but rather that they could not be communicated effectively. She recounts how the White House relegated her to a secondary role, and Biden avoided speaking to the press or voters. Therefore, “the Democratic message” failed to connect with the public.
It is revealing that at the beginning of the book, which narrates her first hours to secure the nomination after Biden announced he would not seek reelection, Harris admits that her logic for being crowned the Democratic standard-bearer is that she already has a prior relationship with the main donors and that due to her connections in Hollywood and Silicon Valley, she will be able to attract celebrities like Oprah Winfrey and Beyoncé to campaign with her. Effectively, Harris admits in the book what was clear to anyone who closely followed her failed 2024 campaign: ideas to help citizens and the working class were not part of the Democratic equation for attracting votes or governing, and the main input of her candidacy was the celebrities at her rallies and the money raised from the Democratic establishment’s ties to the financial, media, and technology elite.
Harris’s lack of self-criticism about the flaws in her electoral strategy and campaign is indicative of a larger problem. It is clear that the Democrats are blind to the reason why the public has turned its back on them.
Harris could have taken advantage of the publicity she would gain from the book to signal that she understood that a lack of clear or bold policies on how she planned to help people could have cost her many votes. However, by choosing to cling to the bellicose neoliberalism that contributed to her loss in the election, Harris positions herself as Hillary Clinton’s successor, that is, a representative of the old Democratic guard who is no longer attractive to younger voters but will continue to hold a place because she is valuable as a lobbyist.
Her refusal to project a different image than the Democrats after the electoral defeat and her insistence on defending the supposed achievements of the Biden administration represent a warning sign for the Democrats ahead of the upcoming elections. With Biden retired due to his advanced age, health problems, and his great unpopularity, and Barack Obama dedicated to a life of luxury and million-dollar conferences, Harris, despite the defeat, remains the most recognizable face of her party. So the fact that she continues to believe what made her lose and only focuses on criticizing Trump and not on proposing new things means that the Democrats remain in the same swampy ground as in 2024.
The former vice president missed an opportunity to share what she really saw behind the scenes at the White House regarding the concealment of Biden’s health, which could have been an overdue but important public service to transparency and the record of history, but instead chose to settle scores with Biden’s advisers and continue to flatter the Democratic Party’s long-standing millionaire donors.
In a way, the book is more of a series of excuses than an autopsy on why her campaign failed, and it has the unintended effect of reminding voters of the Democratic Party’s lack of ideas, its ideological hypocrisy, and its commitment to serving the interests of elites only.
Ahmed Adel is a Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher.
Pakistan’s Gaza assignment: Policing resistance for Trump’s ‘peace’
By F.M. Shakil | The Cradle | October 9, 2025
Washington is looking to draft Pakistan into a sweeping plan to reshape Gaza under the guise of a 20-point “peace” initiative led by US President Donald Trump. At the heart of the proposal is an International Stabilization Force (ISF) tasked with enforcing “internal stability” in the devastated Palestinian enclave – a euphemism for dismantling resistance and tightening Israeli control.
Trump, standing alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a September press conference, laid out a scheme to forcibly relocate Palestinians and reconstruct Gaza as a neoliberal outpost he previously branded “the Riviera of the Middle East.”
Pakistan’s public backlash builds
Details of the initiative have raised alarm in Pakistan, where any military collaboration with Israel is a red line for the establishment and the population, given that Islamabad does not recognize the state. Public backlash has intensified since revelations surfaced of Pakistan’s potential participation in the ISF, alongside forces from Egypt and Jordan.
The people of Pakistan would not accept Washington’s plan to deploy joint military forces from “like-minded Islamic countries” to eliminate resistance forces in Gaza. The opinion-makers, intellectuals, and political circles have already questioned the authority of the rulers to enter into a process that is aimed at transforming Palestine into a part of a “Greater Israel.”
Facing mounting domestic scrutiny, Pakistan’s Deputy Prime Minister Ishaq Dar revealed in a 30 September press conference that the 20-point plan diverged sharply from what was initially agreed in Washington. His statement came amid growing demands for transparency from political leaders and civil society, many of whom accuse Islamabad of capitulating to Washington’s demands without a national consensus.
Pakistan’s refusal to join the Saudi and UAE-led coalition against the Ansarallah-aligned forces in Yemen still looms large in public memory. In 2015, Islamabad’s parliament voted unanimously to remain neutral, citing the dangers of waging war on a Muslim country and the risks of further sectarian entanglement. That restraint is now being contrasted with the military’s apparent willingness to deploy forces into a conflict zone tightly controlled by Israel.
It is equally important to note that, despite Tel Aviv’s lack of trust in Pakistan’s military establishment and the latter’s threats to target its nuclear assets in solidarity with Iran, it still chose to assign Pakistani forces a leading role in the proposed ISF. This suggests that Pakistan’s military leadership has offered significant, and so far undisclosed, concessions to Washington.
Pakistan’s business community is equally concerned about the reports regarding the US investment in Pasni Port terminals, located 120 kilometers from Iran and the Chinese-built Gwadar seaport. If the investment targets naval or military bases, there are concerns that it could draw regional ire from both Tehran and Beijing.
Imtiaz Gul, Pakistan defense analyst and Executive Director of the Center for Research and Security Studies (CRSS), Islamabad, tells The Cradle:
“By all indications, Pakistan is likely to be part of the multinational Islamic force, albeit in a zone that will be totally at the mercy of and surrounded by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). To what extent this force can neutralize and eventually eliminate Hamas, which has backing from Iran, Turkiye, and Qatar, is difficult to forecast at this time.”
Gul adds that since Pakistan, Egypt, and Jordan are all military-run states, they may coordinate more easily to oversee Gaza under occupation. The hope, he says, is that this cooperation might at least put a stop to Israel’s relentless slaughter of Palestinians.
From sanctions to red carpet
Pakistan’s sudden centrality to Trump’s Gaza plan is underpinned by a marked shift in Washington’s tone. Since the brief Pakistan–India skirmish in May, the US has rolled out the red carpet. Last month, Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and army chief Field Marshal Asim Munir were hosted in the Oval Office for a high-profile meeting with Trump.
The recent developments concerning West Asia have unequivocally revealed the transformation in Washington’s diplomatic approach toward Pakistan. President Trump expressed a strong belief that additional Muslim nations will soon become part of the Abraham Accords and commended Prime Minister Sharif and Field Marshal Munir for their full alignment with his peace initiative.
“Formally joining the Abraham Accords may be difficult currently, but informally following the path that the UAE, Bahrain, and Qatar pursued looks quite probable,” Gul says. He asks if countries around Israel and Palestine can reconcile with ground realities, then why should Pakistan have a problem with a country that is not even a distant neighbor?
“The challenge is whether Pakistan can stay stable and can develop a national consensus on engaging with Israel – even if informally,” he explains.
Minerals, money, and military ports
Islamabad’s apparent rapprochement with Washington is not limited to Gaza. In October, Pakistan delivered its first shipment of enriched rare-earth elements to US Strategic Metals (USSM), part of a $500-million deal signed with the Pakistan army’s commercial arm, Frontier Works Organization (FWO). The minerals will feed a new polymetallic refinery funded by Washington.
The recent delivery to the USSM on 2 October has catalyzed a notable transformation in the dynamics of the Pakistan–US relationship.
Concurrently, reports surfaced of the aforementioned strategic proposal to build a port terminal in Pasni, Balochistan, submitted to US authorities by Pakistan’s military-linked business interests. Any such move carries profound strategic implications for China and Iran, which view Pasni’s proximity to Gwadar and Chabahar as vital to their own maritime interests.
Gwadar serves as a crucial component of the China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), featuring China’s strategically constructed Gwadar seaport.
On 4 October, senior security sources informed a select group of media representatives in Islamabad that Pakistan will not be extending an invitation to the US for a naval base in Balochistan. The reports circulating in foreign media regarding potential future public-private partnerships are simply proposals.
The security sources pointed out the immense potential of Pakistan’s coastline for both large and small commercial ports, noting that nations globally evaluate such partnership proposals.
“We shall uphold the primacy of Pakistan’s national interest in this framework. The nature of what defines the interests of the US holds no significance for us. Our primary concern is the advancement of Pakistan’s interests,” a defense spokesman remarked.
The official clarification only added confusion, claiming the port terminal proposal came from private business collaboration, even though the FWO is not a private entity but an army-run unit, raising questions about how such sensitive decisions are made.
Former Karachi Chamber of Commerce president Majyd Aziz tells The Cradle that it was imperative to limit the foreign military utilization of Pasni Port to uphold regional stability and prevent any discontent from Tehran and Beijing:
“Pakistani entrepreneurs are hesitant to invest in maritime sectors, leading to a dependence on foreign investment. This situation subsequently attracted the US interest in Pasni Port, which may carry serious implications for China’s influence in the region.”
Aziz adds that Gwadar’s underperformance has made smaller ports like Pasni, Ormara, and Jiwani more attractive. These offer lower costs, shorter routes, and better local integration. With over 85 percent of Pakistan’s trade dependent on maritime routes, diversifying port infrastructure is seen as essential to economic resilience.
Peace, under the boot
Trump’s so-called peace formula, presented alongside Netanyahu, aims to weaken Palestinian resistance by severing its supply chains and installing a proxy security apparatus.
The US-led ISF, with a significant Pakistani component, is the linchpin of this plan. But critics argue the operation is little more than a smokescreen for Tel Aviv’s next phase of territorial expansion.
As the details unfold, Islamabad faces a stark choice: yield to US pressure and risk regional isolation, or heed domestic voices warning against entanglement in a colonial project masquerading as peace.
Turkiye to boost US gas imports, cut reliance on Iran and Russia
The Cradle | October 9, 2025
Turkiye is moving to cover more than half of its natural gas demand by 2028 through domestic production and increased US liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports, decreasing reliance on Iran and Russia, according to analysts cited by Reuters on 8 October.
The plan follows a White House meeting on 25 September, during which US President Donald Trump urged Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to curb Russian energy purchases, as part of the US push to press allies to scale back ties with both Moscow and Tehran.
Ankara’s strategy centers on expanding LNG terminals and boosting local output through the state-owned energy firm, Turkish Petroleum Corporation (TPAO).
According to Turkiye’s Energy Exchange (EPIAS), the country’s LNG terminals can now import up to 58 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas each year, enough to meet its entire domestic demand.
Domestic production and contracted LNG imports are projected to exceed 26 bcm annually from 2028, compared with 15 bcm this year.
That would account for more than half of Turkiye’s 53 bcm gas demand, sharply reducing its need for Russian and Iranian pipeline supplies.
“Turkiye has been signalling that it will take advantage of the [global] LNG abundance,” said Sohbet Karbuz of the Paris-based Mediterranean Organisation for Energy and Climate (OMEC).
Although Russia remains Turkiye’s largest supplier, its share of the market has fallen from over 60 percent two decades ago to 37 percent in the first half of 2025.
Moscow’s long-term pipeline contracts – covering 22 bcm annually via Blue Stream and TurkStream – are nearing expiry. Iran’s 10 bcm contract ends next year, while Azerbaijan’s 9.5 bcm deals run until 2030 and 2033.
To replace these, Ankara has signed $43 billion worth of LNG agreements with US suppliers, including a 20-year deal with Mercuria in September.
Turkish Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar said in a recent interview that Turkiye “must source gas from all available suppliers,” which includes Russia, Iran, and Azerbaijan, but noted that US LNG offers cheaper alternatives.
Analysts believe Ankara will likely burn Russian and Iranian gas domestically while re-exporting imported LNG and its own output to Europe, where a full ban on Russian energy is expected by 2028.
Turkiye’s state energy company BOTAS has already begun small-volume exports to Hungary and Romania as part of its efforts to become a regional gas hub.
The Mystery of Trump, Ukraine, and Russia
By Jacob G. Hornberger | FFF | September 18, 2025
Hardly anyone in the mainstream press addresses the mystery of how Trump went from what was supposedly a secret agent of the Russians to an ardent opponent of Russia in the Ukraine-Russia war. My hunch is that the commentators in the mainstream press are so excited that Trump has turned pro-Ukraine that they don’t care that they were, not so long ago, accusing him of being a secret agent of Russia.
After all, who can forget the daily refrain during Trump’s first term in office. “Robert Mueller is going to save us!” We had to be subjected to that refrain from both Democrats and the mainstream press for more than a year. The notion was that Trump was, as president of the United States, secretly serving the interests of Russia. Democrats and most of the mainstream press were convinced that Robert Mueller, a lawyer who had been appointed as special counsel to investigate the matter, was going to save us all by concluding that Trump was, in fact, serving as a secret agent of Russia, which would then result in Trump’s removal from office through impeachment.
As we all know, Robert Mueller did not save us because there was nothing to save us from. The entire matter was one great big ridiculous conspiracy theory on the part of the mainstream press and Democrats. After a year of extensive investigation by a huge and very expensive staff of lawyers, Robert Mueller ended up concluding that the allegation was bogus.
Nonetheless, most everyone thought that Trump would do everything possible to establish friendly and peaceful relations with Russia. Such a policy, of course, wouldn’t make him a secret agent of Russia, any more than President Kennedy’s efforts in that direction made him a secret agent of Russia.
Yet in his first term in office, Trump ended up taking a fairly adversarial stand toward Russia. It was reasonable to conclude, however, that one reason he did that was an effort to bend over backwards to show that the secret-agent accusations were entirely bogus.
This time around as president, however, there was nothing that Trump had to prove. During his 2024 campaign, he made it clear that he intended to bring an end to the Ukraine-Russia war as soon as he took office. Of course, the easiest and fastest way to have done that was to immediately cut off all U.S. foreign aid to Ukraine. For a while, it appeared that that was precisely what Trump was going to do. When Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky visited Trump and Vice President Vance in the White House, both of them berated, insulted, humiliated, and dressed down Zelensky in public. Zelensky ended up leaving that meeting with his tail between his legs. Trump even stated that it was Ukraine that had started the war. The message seemed clear — U.S. aid to Ukraine was going to terminate, which would, of course, have been the logical course of action given Trump’s conviction that it was Ukraine that started the war.
However, sometime afterward, Trump did an about-face and began berating Russia and Russian president Vladimir Putin for not doing enough to end the war. He began threatening Putin with more economic sanctions. He made it clear that the U.S. government would continue supporting Ukraine, especially with weaponry. He has also taken an increasingly aggressive position toward Russia and Putin.
The mainstream press treats all this as perfectly normal. I myself find it extremely mysterious. How does a guy who is accused of being a Russian agent go all the way to becoming a Russian adversary? For me, that’s quite a switch.
The following is my opinion as to what has happened to bring about this very radical turnaround. As longtime readers of my blog know, I have long maintained that it is the national-security branch of the federal government — i.e., the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA — that is in charge of the federal government, especially in foreign affairs, and that the other three branches simply operate in support of the national-security branch.
It was the national-security branch that used NATO to successfully provoke Russia into attacking Ukraine. It did that by having NATO, an old relic from the Cold War racket, move eastward toward Russia’s borders knowing full well that Russia would object and ultimately invade Ukraine, after which they could condemn Russia for its “aggression.” The objective was to use a war with Russia to “degrade” Russia, give Russia its own “Afghanistan,” and bring about regime change within Russia. The U.S. would supply the weaponry and cash to Ukraine to accomplish this. It would only be Ukrainian soldiers, not American soldiers, who would be dying and so the American people wouldn’t care about what the national-security branch had done to bring about the war.
What the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA failed to confront was the distinct possibility that Russia would end up winning the war, which would necessarily mean a defeat of the United States. After the deadly 20-year U.S. fiasco war in Afghanistan and the installation of a pro-Iranian regime in the U.S. war of aggression against Iraq, the last thing the national-security branch wants is the humiliation of another military defeat, especially at the hands of Russia — its adversary in its old Cold War racket.
So, it’s my opinion that the national-security establishment has put the squeeze on Trump and made him see how important it is to “national security” that Russia not be permitted to win this war. It is my opinion that Trump has caved in to such pressure, just like Congress and the federal courts have long deferred to the national-security branch. That, to me, is a logical explanation for Trump’s about-face on Russia and also why he no longer heavily emphasizes the need to “drain the swamp” and bring an end to the “deep state.”
White House Has Not Provided Proof That Boats Destroyed in Caribbean Were Carrying Drugs
By Kyle Anzalone | The Libertarian Institute | October 8, 2025
Two US officials said the White House has not provided proof to Capitol Hill that the four boats destroyed by the US military in the Caribbean were part of drug trafficking operations.
Starting in September, the US military began targeting vessels in the Caribbean Sea that were allegedly smuggling drugs for cartels designated as Foreign Terrorist Organizations. The US has destroyed at least four ships, killing 21 people.
Two sources speaking with the AP said the Trump administration has not provided evidence to Congress that the boats were in fact linked to narco-terrorist cartels. The officials explained the White House has only pointed to the videos published by President Donald Trump and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth showing the boats being destroyed by US strikes.
The Constitutionality and legality of the strikes are in question. Congress has not declared war on the cartels. President Donald Trump says the US is now engaged in an armed conflict with the narco-terrorist organizations.
The White House has been tight-lipped about its legal authority to use military force in law enforcement matters. Attorney General Pam Bondi refused to tell Congress how the White House believes it has the authority to conduct extrajudicial executions.
While the Trump administration says the goal of the attacks is to stop the flow of lethal drugs to the US, reports say the White House is moving towards attempting to remove Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro from power.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio claims that Maduro is the leader of a narco-terrorist cartel.
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UK Researchers: Tax Food to Reduce Climate Change
I doubt these professors have anything to fear from a food tax
By Eric Worrall | Watts Up With That? | November 19, 2016
A group of researchers in Oxford University, England have suggested that imposing a massive tax on carbon intensive foods – specifically protein rich foods like meat and dairy – could help combat climate change. […]
This proposal, from a group of people who have probably never missed a meal in their lives, is totally obscene. High income countries often have a lot of poor people who would be hard hit by increases in the price of food.
Needlessly exacerbating the risk poor people don’t get enough to eat, especially children and pregnant mothers, who are especially vulnerable to adverse health impacts from lack of protein in their diet – if this ghastly proposal is ever implemented, future generations will look upon it as a crime against humanity. – Read full article
Blog Roll
Aletho News- Seyed M. Marandi: Trump Lost the Iran War – Must Sell It as a Victory
- Iran, Saudi FMs hold phone talks as Persian Gulf states rethink US ties
- The Illusions of Western Virtue: Ursula von der Leyen and Europe’s Moral Bankruptcy
- AIPAC-backed candidates lose New York primaries as voters reject pro-genocide lobby
- The West’s Post-Soviet ‘Democracy’ Playbook
- UK suppressed intel on Sudan genocide to protect UAE ties: Report
- Starmer’s exit exposes dirty secret: UK can’t afford Ukraine War
- Putin Warns the West: Russia Is Ready
- BEN-GVIR: “ALL OF LEBANON MUST BURN” — w/ Mouin Rabbani
- There Are No Budget Constraints In New York City: “Coastal Resiliency” Edition
- If Americans Knew
- Israel’s Attacks on Gaza’s Children (Photos)
- ‘His only crime is that he is a Palestinian doctor’
- ‘Killed pursuing her dream’: Gaza girl on her way to school dies in Israeli drone strike
- Unbelievable pressure on Gaza from Israel, “Board of Peace” – Daily Update
- UN: Israel Continues to Commit Genocide and Other Atrocity Crimes by Deliberately Targeting Palestinian Children
- Bari Weiss, Free-Speech Fraud & Zionism Promoter, Would Rather Deport Than Debate
- ‘Doctor of the Poor’: Israeli Occupation Arrests Prominent Palestinian Physician
- Search for Your Church (and see if it has been targeted by the Israeli gov’t)
- Mark Levin Flying to Israel as Netanyahu Reportedly Seeks to ‘Leverage’ Levin to Trash Trump’s Iran Deal
- Watch: Zionist Brags about Israel’s Power to Get the World to Do What Israel Wants
- No Tricks Zone
- 3 New Studies Find Increasing Trends In Solar Radiation Since The 1980s – Easily Explaining Warming
- THE TRANSCEIVER PARADOX: Why Organoid Intelligence (OI) Could Become Our Ultimate Alien Predator
- German Wind Turbines Face Regulatory Shutdown Due To Excessive Noise
- New Study: Chile’s Relative Sea Level Was 3.2 Meters Higher Than Today During The Mid-Holocene
- Beyond The Pitch: Why FIFA’s World Cup Is One Of Humanity’s Best Investments
- Climate Alarmists Now Using Natural Phenomena To Support Their Claims
- New Study: Significant CO2 Fluxes From Non-Volcanic Sources Are Largely Neglected In Carbon Budgets
- Women Climate Scientists Being Harassed, Insulted By Skeptics, Claims Berkeley Earth Researcher
- Germany’s Longterm Spring Climate Data Show “No Climate Trend”
- New Study: Solar Photovoltaic, Wind Power Fail To Meet Annual Energy Demands 62% Of The Time
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