Aletho News

ΑΛΗΘΩΣ

Zionism on the Upper East Side

By Patrick Lawrence | Consortium News | December 3, 2025

We watch in horror from afar as the Zionist terror state continues its genocide against the people of Gaza and escalates its slower-motion, lower-technology genocide against the 3 million Palestinians who reside in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, otherwise known as the Occupied Territories — illegally occupied, of course.

As a few Israeli commentators have pointed out — those few who guard their integrity— the operative principle here is the limitless impunity the Western powers have long granted “the Jewish state.”

This is the outcome, they say, when a people given to a culture of vengeance are told they will never suffer consequences however barbaric their conduct toward others, however many laws they break, however many their assassinations, however many their torture victims, however many exploding telephones they plant among civilian populations, etc.

Maybe we need no reminders, maybe we do, that this presumption of impunity is not bound by sovereign borders and is not limited to the cowardly, condemnable savagery of apartheid Israel in Gaza and the West Bank. But we had one last week, and it is well we consider it carefully.

Zohran Mamdani, the principled social democrat who is New York’s mayor-elect, is now under attack from Zionist Americans who insist Zionist Americans are above the law — American law and international law. You may look well on Mamdani and you may not, but as he is besieged by these objectionable people, so are we all.

This story begins on Wednesday, Nov. 19, at Park East Synagogue, a grand edifice that sits on East 67th Street between Third and Lexington Avenues in the Lenox Hill section of Manhattan.

Park East has been serving Modern Orthodox Jews since 1890. Its congregation, to be noted, is comprised of the great and good of the Upper East Side. These are observant but assimilated Jews, thoroughly plugged into, let’s say, secular public space.

Except.

Two Wednesdays back Park East hosted an organization dedicated to encouraging Jews to “make Aliyah,” the Hebrew term for emigrating to “the Promised Land.” O.K., you cannot find anything legally wrong in this, although it is unambiguously a moral wrong in that it expresses support for a genocidal state.

But let us set aside the moral question for now. The organization Park East sponsored, Nefesh B’Nefesh, also assists American Jews who wish to emigrate to Israeli settlements in the Occupied Territories. This is a legal matter and as such not inconsequential.

American Settlers

Statistics on the settler population in the West Bank and East Jerusalem are hard to nail down (and I can easily imagine why). The Times of Israel reported eight years ago that some 60,000 Americans were among the Jewish settlers in the West Bank.

That was roughly 15 percent of the settler population then — not counting the considerable number residing in East Jerusalem. We have no precise figures now, but these populations — settlers and Americans among the settlers — are both higher.

As has been well-reported, and well-recorded in several documentaries, the Americans among the West Bank settlers are frequently the most violent in their incessant attacks on Palestinians. They have also been at times the most readily inclined to murder.

There is the infamous case of Baruch Goldstein, a freakshow Zionist from Brooklyn who killed 29 Palestinians when he attacked the Ibrahimi Mosque (tomb of Abraham and other patriarchs) in Hebron in 1994. Goldstein was not singular: He was and remains exemplary — and a hero among some Zionists. National Security Minister Ben Givr had a picture of Goldstein on his living room wall until 2020.

I cannot name the precise statutes applicable here, but they must be several. Open and shut, just the facts, Ma’am, Nefesh B’Nefesh is an accomplice to the settler movement.

Most immediately significant in the Park East case, Nefesh B’Nefesh — this translates as “soul to soul,” and who knows what that is all about — is directly implicated in the settlers’ breach of international law given that all the settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem are illegal according to said law.

There was no claiming surprise that blustery Nov. 19th when a group of roughly 200 vociferous demonstrators gathered in front of Park East to protest the promotional seminar Nefesh B’Nefesh was running that day.

“Death to the IDF” was among the tamer of various chants; others encouraged violence against settlers. “It is our duty,” one leader of the demonstration said measuredly to those assembled, “to make them think twice before holding these events.”

Inside the Park East building, people indirectly but unmistakably promoting violence against Palestinians, land theft and all the rest. And on East 67th Street, righteous indignation, anger in behalf of a persecuted people, some violent rhetoric, but no violence.

It was obvious the mayor-elect would have to intervene. The event itself warranted this, and various Zionist constituencies, as well-reported before and since Mamdani’s election, have been attacking him as a radical jihadist, an anti–Semite and who knows what else, so attempting to poison his relations with New York’s Jewish community.

Here is the ever-poised Mamdani’s day-after statement, his first on the incident:

“The mayor-elect has discouraged the use of language used at last night’s protest and will continue to do so. He believes every New Yorker should be free to enter a house of worship without intimidation and that these sacred spaces should not be used to promote activities in violation of international law.”

A few days later, storms of protest from Zionist quarters having instantly erupted, Mamdani sent this statement to The New York Times:

“We will protect New Yorkers’ First Amendment rights while making clear that nothing can justify language calling for ‘death to’ anyone. It is unacceptable, full stop.”

I find these statements a little in the way of Solomon in their discernment, in Mamdani’s determination not to tilt his hand and to articulate the core truth of the matter:

The more extreme language out on East 67th Street was wrong so far as it intimidated synagogue goers, but the principle of free speech is nonetheless to be honored; those encouraging breaches of international law are wrong, and a synagogue should not be used to promote illegalities.

‘A Hateful Mob’

Maybe what has come back at Mamdani in the course of all this was predictable, more-of-the-same babble. “Mob” was the de rigueur term among those responding to the mayor-elect’s response.

The demonstrators were “a hateful mob of anti–Israel protesters,” the New York Post reported, and it got worse from there. Mamdani sided with “an anti–Semitic mob,” eJP, or eJewishphilanthropy.com, declared. “Last week,” this outfit continued, “Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani failed the first test of his promise to protect all New Yorkers.”

And from William Daroff, the chief exec of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations: “We are still judging him, and I’d say that at the moment he’s got a failing grade.”

They sitteth in judgment, you see.

O.K., we have heard all this before in one or another context, so has Mamdani. He is surely in for more of same once he assumes office Jan. 1. But we ought not miss the very much larger matters raised by the Park East incident.

There is the First Amendment question, as Mamdani correctly noted, and there are the legal questions as pencil-sketched above. These are related at the not-too-distant horizon.

People speaking for Nefesh B’Nefesh now deny they promote emigration to West Bank settlements — which, as the group’s website attests, is simply not true. It advertises Gush Etzion, an expanding sprawl of 22–and-counting settlements south of Jerusalem, Ma`ale Adumim, whose location makes it key to the Israelis final takeover of the West Bank, and various others.

“Teaching about Aliyah and Zionism belongs in that space”: This is the aforementioned William Daroff. And from eJP again: “Mamdani condemned the synagogue’s choice of programming.”

Choice of programming.

You see what is going on here. Park East and Nefesh B’Nefesh are encouraging Americans to breach international law. And absolutely to a one, those defending the synagogue and the event-organizer do so by pretending this is not what is most pithily at issue.

“We are deeply concerned by, and firmly condemn, the violent rhetoric and aggressive behavior that took place outside of the Park East Synagogue,” Nefesh B’Nefesh now declares on its website. Violent rhetoric and aggressive behavior on East 67th Street but not in the West Bank or in East Jerusalem.

To go straight to the point, this is another assertion of Zionist impunity. And we should understand what has lately transpired in New York as a very, very direct extension of the impunity that encourages and also protects the Israeli terror machine in Gaza and the West Bank. Impunity: It is a blight under which Palestinians suffer, and none of us is immune to it.

To put this another way, we witness an especially insidious case of chutzpah, the dangers of which I have considered elsewhere. You have your laws, the world has its, and we will ignore them before your eyes (and ostracize you as an anti–Semite if you object). This, in a sentence, is what Zionists now insist we must accept.

Full article

December 5, 2025 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

US rushes loitering drones built based on Iranian blueprint to West Asia

Press TV – December 3, 2025

The US has deployed “its first squadron” of one-way attack drones, developed following reverse-engineering of a much-sought-after and versatile Iranian unmanned aerial vehicle, to the West Asia region.

On Wednesday, US Central Command announced establishment of Task Force Scorpion Strike (TFSS) that will oversee the first of its kind operational deployment by the US military, various American outlets reported.

The aircraft in question was identified as the Iranian Shahed-136 long-range UAV.

The reports also cited CENTCOM as noting that Washington had additionally set up Task Force Scorpion Strike (TFSS) to oversee the drone’s so far unprecedented deployment.

Observers also pointed to the unique nature of the taskforce, saying its development signaled urgency in Washington’s approach towards the drones’ deployment.

“This new taskforce sets the conditions for using innovation as a deterrent,” said Adm. Brad Cooper, CENTCOM commander.

‘Cutting-edge drone capabilities’

“Equipping our skilled warfighters faster with cutting-edge drone capabilities showcases US military innovation and strength,” the official added.

According to one report, the system’s deployment was spurred in part by War Secretary Pete Hegseth’s “drone dominance” initiative that was deployed to accelerate delivery of low-cost and effective drones to US forces.

The Islamic Republic deployed the aircraft during the Israeli regime’s and the US’s unprovoked and illegal war against its soil in June.

December 4, 2025 Posted by | Militarism, Wars for Israel | | Leave a comment

The missing ‘If’ that could get us killed: How Western media distorted Putin’s words about war with Europe

The message was rather simple: Russia is ready to respond to aggression. But you wouldn’t know it if you read the headlines

By Timur Tarkhanov | RT | December 4, 2025

A depressing pattern has taken hold in the way parts of the Western press cover Russia: take a volatile subject, strip it of the conditional language that contains it, and then act surprised when the public grows more fearful, more hardline, and less able to distinguish deterrent rhetoric from an intent to attack.

The latest example is the frenzy around Vladimir Putin’s remark about Europe and war. In Russian, his meaning is not subtle: “We are not going to fight Europe, I’ve said it a hundred times already. But if Europe suddenly wants to fight and starts, we are ready right now.” A refusal paired with a threat of readiness if attacked. Many headlines flattened that into “Russia is ready for war with Europe.”

In news reporting, headlines aren’t neutral labels. They are the main event. They set the emotional temperature for millions who will never read beyond the first line, especially on mobile feeds where nuance is a luxury and outrage is a business model. So when a headline drops the words “we are not going to” and discards “if Europe starts,” it’s not just a shortening – it reverses the reader’s perception. The public walks away believing Putin signaled readiness to launch a war against Europe, not readiness in response to one. In a moment when misperception can harden policy and policy can harden into escalation, that is reckless.

Worse, this kind of framing does real political work. It amplifies the narrative long championed by certain European officials – that Russia is poised to attack the EU next, regardless of evidence. If you swallow the headline alone, those officials sound validated. If you read the quote, at minimum you have to admit the claim is not what was said. Maybe you’ll even start asking questions. That difference is the hinge between journalism and propaganda.

This pattern didn’t start this week. Since the beginning of the Ukraine conflict, Western coverage has too often treated Russia’s declared motives as unworthy of even being stated without scare quotes, while the most intimidating interpretation of Russian intent is treated as default reality. “Imperial ambition.” “War of conquest.” “Russia wants to reconstitute an empire.” The public is denied the basic reporting function of hearing why Russia is doing what it’s doing. Instead we get a morality play with prewritten roles: one side’s motives are analyzed in paragraphs; the other’s are assumed in headlines.

The same sloppiness shows up in claims that Putin “stalled” peace talks. Negotiations are not a TikTok trend; they are an exhausting grind of sequencing, verification, backchannels, domestic politics, and face-saving. Many major conflicts have required long, ugly diplomatic marathons before anything moved. The Vietnam peace talks, for example, dragged on for years. To declare “stalling” because a meeting ended without a breakthrough is to confuse diplomacy with customer service: “Where is my peace deal? I ordered it an hour ago.”

And if we’re going to talk about “stalling,” we should at least look honestly at which actors have been most allergic to acknowledging battlefield realities. The Russia-US channel – whatever one thinks of it – is the only vector that has shown any capacity to force trade-offs into the open, because it involves the parties with the leverage to make and enforce them. By contrast, the EU and the UK’s public posture has often resembled a maximalist wish list: demands unmoored from the war’s trajectory, presented as prerequisites rather than negotiating positions. It has hardened expectations so thoroughly that any compromise looks like betrayal, and any diplomacy looks like surrender. That is the worst kind of stalling – not merely delaying talks, but by making talks politically impossible.

It didn’t have to be like this, and it isn’t universal. Some outlets have demonstrated that integrity is still possible: they lead with the full quote and include the conditional. They are at least honest with the readers about what was said and what was implied, allowing them to distinguish threat from intent. Far from being “soft on Putin”, this is basic journalistic competence. In a climate where fear sells and escalation eats, and the Doomsday Clock is at 89 seconds to midnight, faithful quotation is a mandatory public safety measure.

Timur Tarkhanov is a journalist and media executive.

December 4, 2025 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia | , , , | Leave a comment

The Ukraine War Hawks Sabotaging America First

By Harrison Berger | The American Conservative | December 2, 2025

As the White House moves to negotiate an end to the yearslong Ukraine proxy war, establishment members of Congress, elements of the deep state, and their corporate media allies work overtime to sabotage the president’s efforts.

The aggressive establishment campaign seeks to derail a draft settlement, negotiated largely in Washington, that would bar Ukraine from NATO in exchange for U.S. security guarantees, grant Russia de facto control of Crimea and the Donbas, and limit the size of the Ukrainian armed forces, among other measures.

By pursuing a negotiated resolution to the Ukraine war, the Trump administration is doing exactly what it was democratically elected to do. Voters who wanted to continue the proxy war against Russia were told to—and overwhelmingly did—vote for the defeated candidate, Kamala Harris.

But even though President Donald Trump and voters may prefer restraint and diplomacy with nuclear powers like Russia, the Washington political establishment that drives U.S. foreign policy has long made clear that it does not—and that it will take aggressive measures to subvert democratically decided policies in favor of its own. With a peace deal possibly within reach, this remarkably bipartisan campaign has become increasingly overt.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers last week floated the rumor that the Trump administration’s 28-point peace plan was secretly a Russian-authored “wish list.” The claim has since fallen apart—and never made sense in the first place—because, as Steve Bannon has pointed out, the terms of the deal are, if anything, overly favorable to Kiev, not Moscow. Under the proposal, the Ukrainian military would be permitted to build a fighting force of up to 600,000 troops. “That’s unacceptable to the Russians,” says political scientist John Mearsheimer. And while the draft would formally rule out NATO membership for Ukraine, it nonetheless commits the United States to extending security guarantees, a provision that leaves the door open for future rounds of confrontation between Ukraine and Russia.

Nonetheless, bipartisan factions continue to argue that Trump’s proposal favors Moscow, branding the pursuit of peace as Neville Chamberlain-style appeasement. Joining them to do it has been former Trump official Mike Pompeo, who argued against the 28-point plan on X, saying that “any so-called peace deal that limits Ukraine’s ability to defend itself would look more like a surrender.”

The former CIA director has in recent weeks emerged as a regular guest on Fox News to sabotage Trump’s peace plan, while simultaneously serving on the advisory board of the Ukrainian defense company FirePoint. The Murdoch-owned news network, which previously partly fired Tucker Carlson over his opposition to the Ukraine war, does not disclose that the former CIA director stands to profit directly from the war he goes on air to promote.

The most brazen and revealing effort to derail the Trump administration’s diplomacy comes from anonymous leakers, likely from the U.S. security state, which, through their servants in corporate media, repeatedly leak classified information in what has so far been a failed attempt to embarrass and undermine the president’s lead negotiator, U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff.

The campaign against Witkoff began when Reuters reported that unnamed “U.S. officials” were “increasingly concerned” by Witkoff’s discussions with Russian diplomats to end the war. Soon after, Bloomberg published a selective leak of a classified call transcript, claiming Witkoff had “advised Russia on how to pitch Ukraine plans to Trump,” framing his diplomacy as improper.

The bipartisan pro-war establishment took their cue and seized on the leak, deploying the same strategy wielded against Trump’s first National Security Adviser Michael Flynn in 2017, when classified surveillance material was leaked to derail détente with Moscow. Now in the case of Witkoff, routine diplomatic back-channeling has again been framed as sinister and improper, in a controversy likely manufactured by unelected elites in northern Virginia to sabotage the foreign policy agenda of the elected president.

Their efforts fell flat, however, when the next morning, Trump reassured the press that nothing improper had occurred with Witkoff’s diplomacy. “That’s a standard thing… he’s got to sell this to Ukraine. He’s got to sell Ukraine to Russia. That’s what a dealmaker does,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One.

While negotiations with Russia nonetheless continue to advance, the episode reveals an unsustainable tension for the Trump presidency: the figures actively sabotaging its foreign policy agenda are largely the same Republican establishment actors the president continues to defend and campaign for.

At the same time, Trump has now spent several months campaigning against the chief opponents of Ukraine war spending in the House of Representatives—retiring Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Congressman Thomas Massie of Kentucky—mainly because they dared to consistently apply America First principles. Yet the actual saboteurs in the GOP work hard to subvert Trump’s foreign policy agenda without any consequences.

With the administration’s disapproval ratings now approaching record highs, there has never been a better moment for Trump to cut loose those saboteurs from his coalition and rediscover the America First instincts that first carried him to the White House.

December 4, 2025 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Militarism | , | Leave a comment

Why Rachel Maddow and Bill Kristol Attended Cheney’s Funeral

The neoconservative right has merged with the anti-Trump left

By Jack Hunter | The American Conservative | November 26, 2025

Twenty years ago, there was no greater villain to the left than Dick Cheney. The vice president was called a fascist. He was called a warmonger. He was called Hitler. He was the center and soul of left-wing derision and Democratic identity.

Their ire? The George W. Bush administration’s 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, for starters, considered today to be one of America’s greatest foreign policy mistakes. Even a majority of veterans believe it was not worth fighting. Then there was the torture, the rampant due process violations, and the fact that Cheney’s advocacy for extreme executive power made him an enemy of the Constitution.

Concerning Cheney and national depravity, there’s a lot to work with.

The progressive pundit Rachel Maddow was once all in on this left-wing hate. She built her early career on it.

Last week, Maddow attended Dick Cheney’s funeral.

Cheney never apologized for or even said he regretted Iraq. He was seemingly down to torture until the day he died.

Maddow was not at Cheney’s funeral to show grace to a once wayward man who had since repented. Independent journalist Glenn Greenwald noted of MSNBC’s biggest star, “Maddow’s career as a commentator began during Bush/Cheney, when she’d frequently compare Cheney to the worst monsters in history (I was on her programs when she said it).”

Greenwald added, “For so many liberals, Cheney is now rehabilitated despite regretting nothing: solely for opposing Trump.”

That’s it. Cheney was against Trump. In 2025, even for dead fascists, warmongers and Hitlers, that’s all it takes for the left to sing your praises.

If this sounds simplistically silly, it’s because it is.

Once Donald Trump finally replaced former villains Dick Cheney or George W. Bush as the Great Satan in leftist minds, there was virtually no self-awareness in Democrats’ drift into turning these neocon Republicans they once despised into heroes. Dubya gets the same love.

In their blind hatred for Trump, mainstream Democrats also ended up becoming something closer to 2003-era Republicans in their foreign policy. One X user commented on the service for Cheney, “Anyone that attended Cheney’s funeral is going to be upset with an end to war.”

Greenwald agreed, “Exactly: I bet if you were to survey the people in attendance at Dick Cheney’s funeral—from Rachel Maddow and Kamala Harris to Lindsey Graham and George W. Bush—opposition to ending the war in Ukraine would be close to 100%, if not unanimous.”

He has a point. After “Resistance” posters and Covid-era virtue signaling got stale for the left, pro-Ukrainian yard signs and social media flag icons became as popular with Democrats as they were with Lindsey Graham.

Democrats and neocon Republicans like Graham ended up with the same foreign policy. The former came to it as an emotional reaction to “America First” Trump. The latter just never changed, welcoming their reformed pro-war Democrats with open arms.

To be fair, mainstream Democrat attitudes toward Israel and Gaza have varied. On the United States’ proxy war with Russia in Ukraine, they have not.

The 2024 Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris not only received an endorsement from Cheney and his congresswoman daughter Liz; Cheney fille hit the campaign trail with Harris, seemingly signaling to the neoconservative foreign policy establishment that she was their gal.

When candidate Harris repeatedly accused Trump of admiring dictators—that is, engaging in diplomacy as an alternative to war—she sounded like every GOP hawk who ever criticized Pat Buchanan, Ron Paul, or any other antiwar Republican. “Putin’s puppet” became an institutionalized Democratic attack on Trump.

Maddow attending Cheney’s funeral wasn’t surprising or a departure for the current American left. It was, however, an indicator.

She and the “War on Terror” Republicans in attendance weren’t simply friendly adversaries paying their final respects. They’re not adversaries anymore.

This has been true for some time. J6 helped seal the deal.

The “insurrection” mythology surrounding the January 6, 2021 Capitol Hill riots has been as important to Never Trump neocon identity as it has been to Democratic identity. Dick Cheney was on the Never Trump and Democratic side of that event. Donald Trump was on the other side. That line has long been crystal clear, at least on the Never Trump–Dem side—that it was an organized attempt by MAGA forces to overthrow democracy—even if that view is not based in reality.

But the reality of J6 as an actual insurrection was always beside the point. Political identity, and reinforcing it—Never Trump/Democrats good, MAGA bad—was the entire point.

Hence, longtime Democrat Rachel Maddow accepted the invitation to “maestro of terror” Republican Dick Cheney’s funeral.

Bill Kristol was there too. Anyone who has followed politics for any amount of time would expect the neocon scion to be at the funeral service of the most impactful neoconservative of the 21st century. Kristol had wanted a U.S. war with Iraq since the 1990s, and 9/11 finally gave his small band of neocons an excuse to lie their way into it. Team Cheney ultimately delivered it.

Cheney is unquestionably their hero.

Kristol is a Democrat now. He appears to be pro-choice these days. He’s flipped on immigration. The former Weekly Standard editor recently endorsed New York City’s socialist mayor-elect. So Kristol has definitely changed some of his beliefs in joining his new party.

On foreign policy, Bill Kristol has never budged any more than Dick Cheney did. Both were always for all U.S. wars, anywhere, for any reason, by any means, no matter how much death or damage was wrought.

War is the goal. It is who they are. Their beef with Trump—in the most basic, concrete terms—is that he poses a threat to their mission at times.
Democrats hate Trump so much they now dismiss this evil, finding common cause with neocons in more ways than one.

President Donald Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance were not invited to the former vice president’s funeral. They wouldn’t have belonged, even if it is unusual for a sitting president and vice president to be excluded from such a service.

But Rachel Maddow belonged at Dick Cheney’s funeral. The left she represents belonged too.

December 3, 2025 Posted by | Militarism | , | Leave a comment

National Guard shooter a former CIA asset: why Rahmanullah Lakanwal case is typical

Trump points finger to Biden, but the deeper scandal is about America’s “terror fabric”

By Uriel Araujo | December 3, 2025

Last week, Afghan national Rahmanullah Lakanwal allegedly shot two National Guard officers near the White House, killing one and injuring the other. Authorities swiftly detained him, treating it as an isolated security breach, but the incident predictably fueled national debates on immigration and Islamic extremism.

President Donald Trump and CIA Director John Ratcliffe have pointed fingers at former President Joe Biden, claiming his policies enabled the attack. Interestingly, Ratcliffe himself acknowledged that Lakanwal was resettled in the US due to his prior collaboration with the CIA as part of a partner force in Kandahar, which ended amid the chaotic 2021 evacuation.

That detail alone — linking a suspect in an attack near the nation’s capital to its own intelligence apparatus — barely registered in the news cycle. In most countries, it would spark parliamentary inquiries, mass resignations, and nonstop media scrutiny, especially given the fact that clandestine operations and political assassinations are some of the CIA specialties.

The shooting itself followed a now-familiar script: a sudden act of violence, an almost immediate tightening of security, and official assurances that there was “no broader threat” or plot. Yet the most significant fact remains unexplored. Who exactly is this shooter? Under what circumstances did he work with US intelligence? When did he cease to do so? And more importantly, how does an American intelligence asset end up opening fire in the heart of the capital? Not to mention (in the context of Trump’s new War on Drugs): is this intelligence asset connected to the Afghan dope trade?

In any case, we are not looking at an isolated anomaly. Each time a political assassination attempt, mass shooting, or terrorist threat incident captures national attention in the US, investigators often concede that the suspect had some form of prior contact or connection with federal agencies. Sometimes it is the CIA. At other times the FBI. Thus far, the pattern has been acknowledged only in fragments, but rarely examined as a systemic problem, conspiracy theories aside.

American intelligence agencies (like those of other countries) do not recruit from convents. They often operate in war zones, criminal markets, and militant networks. The question is: are American agencies simply gathering intelligence, or are they also shaping (to some degree) the very threats they claim to prevent?

Back in 2021, I wrote that any  American withdrawal from Afghanistan was likely to stay incomplete, with special forces and covert presence expected to remain, partly due to Afghanistan’s strategic importance and the resurgence of massive opium/heroin production under the US-backed government after 2001.

One may recall that Afghanistan has been a hub for CIA activity for over 40 years, and, as I recently noted, warlords, traffickers, militias, and fixers there were not accidental byproducts of intervention but often operational tools. With American “withdrawal”, these networks did not vanish, but rather scattered. This troubling legacy remains underreported, especially its most profitable pillar: narcotics.

Washington did not just fail to stop the Afghan drug trade. It is fair to say it maintained it. Opium financing sustained armed groups, secured loyalty, and lubricated covert operations long after public rhetoric focused on reconstruction. US intelligence has become structurally entangled with drug revenues during the occupation and the very collapse of this system triggered economic and security chaos inside Afghanistan itself. Considering all of this, I’ve recently written that the Taliban’s sudden shutdown of most the world’s largest illicit heroin supply this year was likely to provoke serious blowback

Thus, when Afghan-linked personnel surface in a national security scandal, American indignation is conveniently selective.

The same logic applies domestically. The FBI has an extensive record of infiltrating extremist groups on US soil, and, in multiple documented cases, actively encouraging or facilitating crimes that otherwise might never have occurred. FBI agents and informants have funded operations, provided materials, and pushed vulnerable individuals toward violence just in time for dramatic arrests (and sometimes not in time for that). Evidence can be thin enough in any single case, but overwhelming in accumulation.

The 2009 Newburgh case is emblematic, when a paid FBI informant induced impoverished Black Muslims from New York to plot a terrorist plan, even providing them cash, and orchestrating the entire plot to bomb Bronx synagogues.

The same can be said of the Fort Dix Five (2007) episode; of the Liberty City Seven case (2006); of the Rezwan Ferdaus affair (2011); of the Cleveland Bridge Plot (2012), and many others, with a clear pattern emerging: studies (like those of award-winning journalist Trevor Aaronson) even estimate federal informants drove nearly half of post 911 terror convictions, in what has been described as a “terror fabric”. This means domestic terrorism in America is largely a product of its own security apparatus.

No wonder public confidence in federal institutions has collapsed. Americans are asked to accept an absurd contradiction: that the intelligence community can monitor global communications in real time but cannot detect local radicals already on its payroll.

Thus, the fact that the Utah Valley University (where the Charlie Kirk assassination took place) is a key intelligence hub triggered a lot of conspiratory speculation. One may also recall, in the context of Trump’s so-called war against the “deep state”, that there were links between federal agencies and two Trump assassination attempt suspects (Thomas Crook and Ryan Routh).

So much for the notion that political violence in America is always the work of random loner shooters. Of course sociological, cultural and psychological factors play a role and much has been written from that angle. But sometimes “deep state” intrigues are also a factor that should not be overlooked.

Uriel Araujo, Anthropology PhD, is a social scientist specializing in ethnic and religious conflicts, with extensive research on geopolitical dynamics and cultural interactions.

December 3, 2025 Posted by | Deception, False Flag Terrorism, Timeless or most popular | , , | Leave a comment

US-led regime change in Venezuela angering MAGA

Al Mayadeen | December 3, 2025

United States President Donald Trump’s suggestion of an imminent land strike against Venezuela has jolted the America First movement he built on avoiding foreign entanglements, sparking divisions among his supporters and reviving debates reminiscent of the war on Iraq, part of what supporters describe as “forever wars”.

On Tuesday, Trump hinted not only at an intervention in Venezuela but also at possible attacks against other countries. The remarks rattled anti-interventionists, a core Make America Great Again (MAGA) constituency, who fear that toppling Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro could mire the US in a years-long conflict, destabilize the region, and damage both Trump’s legacy and the movement’s political brand.

Republicans redraw the lines on intervention

Despite his long-standing criticism of US interventions, some Republican allies are now defending the possibility of military action. They argue that operations within the Western Hemisphere are more defensible than the West Asia wars they once denounced, and contend that the US is not seeking “regime change” but an adjustment in Venezuelan leadership without reshaping its political structure.

“He’s not trying to play God with what regime is in which country,” said Alex Gray, former National Security Council chief of staff.

Gray argued the move represents a refocusing of US strategy toward “core American interests,” describing Venezuela as central to hemispheric security.

Pressure mounts as US military presence grows

The administration insists it is not pursuing regime change; instead, it continues to level baseless accusations against the Venezuelan president, describing him as a leader of a “drug cartel”.

Still, the scale of US deployments, including a carrier strike group and roughly 15,000 troops, and Trump’s reported private ultimatum to Maduro last week, have amplified expectations of imminent action. Two people familiar with the call said Trump threatened Maduro, demanding he step down or face the “consequences.”

“No one is more bullish than the president on this,” another individual familiar with internal discussions told Politico, adding that the initiative “comes from the top.”

MAGA skeptics warn of Iraq-style pitfalls

For anti-interventionist MAGA figures, the moment represents a deep ideological test. Many had hoped for an administration focused exclusively on domestic priorities. Now they hope any action resembles the recent limited aggression on Iran, where the US bombed three Iranian nuclear facilities in June.

“Let’s not turn into George W. Bush and before you know it, we’re in charge of Venezuela,” said a former senior Trump advisor.

Boots on the ground and nation-building remain “red lines” for the America First movement.

Vice President JD Vance, once a fierce critic of foreign interventions, has shifted as well, defending limited strikes on Iran while framing any action in Venezuela as essential to combating “narco terrorists in our own hemisphere.”

Concerns over fallout, regional stability

Opponents of interference in Venezuela argue that Maduro’s removal could spark migration surges, empower criminal networks, or disrupt global energy markets, consequences that evoke the results of the US invasion of Iraq.

Ian Bremmer of the Eurasia Group noted Trump never campaigned on regime change, calling unilateral intervention “a NeoCon idea… discredited around the world.”

Still, some conservative realists believe Trump may ultimately avoid escalation. Curt Mills of The American Conservative said Trump may yet decide a full-scale conflict would be “a disaster in the making.”

At a Cabinet meeting, top officials emphasized a simple America First litmus test. As Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a staunch backer of military action in the Latin American country, stated, “Is it going to make us richer? Is it going to make us safer? If it is, he is for it.”

December 3, 2025 Posted by | Militarism | , | Leave a comment

Obama Paved the Way for Trump’s Venezuelan Killings

By Jim Bovard | The Libertarian Institute | December 3, 2025

The Trump administration’s killings of scores of Venezuelans are justifiably provoking outrage. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth recently proclaimed, “We have only just begun to kill narco-terrorists.” Donald Trump and Hegseth are cashing a blank check for carnage that was written years earlier by President Barack Obama.

In his 2017 farewell address, Obama boasted, “We have taken out tens of thousands of terrorists.” Drone strikes increased tenfold under Obama, helping fuel anti–U.S. backlashes in several nations.

As he campaigned for the presidency in 2007, then-Senator Barack Obama declared, “We will again set an example for the world that the law is not subject to the whims of stubborn rulers.” Many Americans who voted for Obama in 2008 expected a seachange in Washington. However, from his first weeks in office, Obama authorized widespread secret attacks against foreign suspects, some of which spurred headlines when drones slaughtered wedding parties or other innocents.

On February 3, 2010, Obama’s Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair stunned Washington by announcing that the administration was also targeting Americans for killing. Blair revealed to a congressional committee the new standard for extrajudicial killings:

“Whether that American is involved in a group that is trying to attack us, whether that American has—is a threat to other Americans. We don’t target people for free speech. We target them for taking action that threatens Americans.”

But “involved” is a vague standard—as is “action that threatens Americans.” Blair stated that “if we think that direct action will involve killing an American, we get specific permission to do that.” Permission from who?

Obama’s first high-profile American target was Anwar Awlaki, a cleric born in New Mexico. After the 9/11 attacks, Awlaki was showcased as a model moderate Muslim. The New York Times noted that Awlaki “gave interviews to the national news media, preached at the Capitol in Washington and attended a breakfast with Pentagon officials.” He became more radical after he concluded that the Geoge W. Bush administration’s Global War on Terror was actually a war on Islam. After the FBI sought to squeeze him into becoming an informant against other Muslims, Awlaki fled the country. He arrived in Yemen and was arrested and reportedly tortured at the behest of the U.S. government. After he was released from prison eighteen months later, his attitude had worsened and his sermons became more bloodthirsty.

After the Obama administration announced plans to kill Awlaki, his father hired a lawyer to file a challenge in federal court. The ACLU joined the lawsuit, seeking to compel the government “to disclose the legal standard it uses to place U.S. citizens on government kill lists.” The Obama administration labeled the entire case a “State Secret.” This meant that the administration did not even have to explain why federal law no longer constrained its killings. The administration could have indicted Awlaki on numerous charges but it did not want to provide him any traction in federal court.

In September 2010, The New York Times reported that “there is widespread agreement among the administration’s legal team that it is lawful for President Obama to authorize the killing of someone like Mr. Awlaki.” It was comforting to know that top political appointees concurred that Obama could justifiably kill Americans. But that was the same “legal standard” the Bush team used to justify torture.   

The Obama administration asserted a right to kill U.S. citizens without trial, without notice, and without any chance for the marked men to legally object. In November 2010, Justice Department attorney Douglas Letter announced in federal court that no judge had legal authority to be “looking over the shoulder” of Obama’s targeted killing. The letter declared that the program involves “the very core powers of the president as commander in chief.”

The following month, federal judge John Bates dismissed the ACLU’s lawsuit because “there are circumstances in which the Executive’s unilateral decision to kill a U.S. citizen overseas” is “judicially unreviewable.” Bates declared that targeted killing was a “political question” outside the court’s jurisdiction. His deference was stunning: no judge had ever presumed that killing Americans was simply another “political question.” The Obama administration’s position “would allow the executive unreviewable authority to target and kill any U.S. citizen it deems a suspect of terrorism anywhere,” according to Center for Constitutional Rights attorney Pardiss Kebriae.

On September 30, 2011, a U.S. drone attack killed Awlaki along with another American citizen, Samir Khan, who was editing an online Al Qaeda magazine. Obama bragged about the lethal operation at a military base later that day. A few days later, administration officials gave a New York Times reporter extracts, a peek at the fifty-page secret Justice Department memo. The Times noted, “The secret document provided the justification for [killing Awlaki] despite an executive order banning assassinations, a federal law against murder, protections in the Bill of Rights and various strictures of the international laws of war, according to people familiar with the analysis.” The legal case for killing Awlaki was so airtight that it did not even need to be disclosed to the American public.

Two weeks after killing Awlaki, Obama authorized a drone attack that killed his son and six other people as they sat at an outdoor café in Yemen. Anonymous administration officials quickly assured the media that Abdulrahman Awlaki was a 21-year-old Al Qaeda fighter and thus fair game. Four days later, The Washington Post published a birth certificate proving that Awlaki’s son was only 16-years old and had been born in Denver. Nor did the boy have any connection with Al Qaeda or any other terrorist group. Robert Gibbs, Obama’s former White House press secretary and a top advisor for Obama’s reelection campaign, later shrugged that the 16-year-old should have had “a far more responsible father.”

Regardless of that boy’s killing, the media often portrayed Obama and his drones as infallible. A Washington Post poll a few months later revealed that 83% of Americans approved of Obama’s drone killing policy. It made almost no difference whether the suspected terrorists were American citizens; 79% of respondents approved of preemptively killing their fellow countrymen, no judicial niceties required. The Post noted that “77 percent of liberal Democrats endorse the use of drones, meaning that Obama is unlikely to suffer any political consequences as a result of his policy in this election year.” The poll results were largely an echo of official propaganda. Most folks “knew” only what the government wanted them to hear regarding drones. Thanks to pervasive secrecy, top government officials could kill who they chose and say what they pleased. The fact that the federal government had failed to substantiate more than 90% of its terrorist accusations since 9/11 was irrelevant since the president was omniscient.

On March 6, 2012, Attorney General Eric Holder, in a speech on targeted killings to a college audience, declared, “Due process and judicial process are not one and the same, particularly when it comes to national security. The Constitution guarantees due process, it does not guarantee judicial process.” TV comedian Stephen Colbert mocked Holder, quipping “Trial by jury, trial by fire, rock, paper scissors, who cares? Due process just means that there is a process that you do.” One purpose of due process is to allow evidence to be critically examined. But there was no opportunity to debunk statements from anonymous White House officials. For the Obama administration, “due process” meant little more than reciting certain phrases in secret memos prior to executions.

Holder declared that the drone attacks “are not [assassinations], and the use of that loaded term is misplaced; assassinations are unlawful killings. Here, for the reasons I have given, the U.S. government’s use of lethal force in self-defense.” Any termination secretly approved by the president or his top advisers was automatically a “lawful killing.” Holder reassured Americans that Congress was overseeing the targeted killing program. But no one on Capitol Hill demanded a hearing or investigation after U.S. drones killed American citizens in Yemen. The prevailing attitude was exemplified by House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Peter King (R-NY): 

“Drones aren’t evil, people are evil. We are a force of good and we are using those drones to carry out the policy of righteousness and goodness.”

Obama told White House aides that it “turns out I’m really good at killing people. Didn’t know that was gonna be a strong suit of mine.” In April 2012, The New York Times was granted access for a laudatory inside look at “Terror Tuesday” meetings in the White House:

“Every week or so, more than 100 members of the government’s sprawling national security apparatus gather, by secure video teleconference, to pore over terrorist suspects’ biographies and recommend to the president who should be the next to die.”

It was a PowerPoint death parade. The Times stressed that Obama personally selected who to kill next:

“The control he exercises also appears to reflect Mr. Obama’s striking self-confidence: he believes, according to several people who have worked closely with him, that his own judgment should be brought to bear on strikes.”

Commenting on the Times’ revelations, author Tom Engelhardt observed, “We are surely at a new stage in the history of the imperial presidency when a president (or his election team) assembles his aides, advisors and associates to foster a story that’s meant to broadcast the group’s collective pride in the new position of assassin-in-chief.”

On May 23, 2013, Obama, in a speech on his targeted killing program at the National Defense University in Washington, told his fellow Americans that “we know a price must be paid for freedom”—such as permitting the president untrammeled authority to kill threats to freedom. The president declared that “before any strike is taken, there must be near-certainty that no civilians will be killed or injured—the highest standard we can set.”

Since almost all the data on victims was confidential, it was tricky to prove otherwise. But NBC News acquired classified documents revealing that the CIA was often clueless about who it was killing. NBC noted, “Even while admitting that the identities of many killed by drones were not known, the CIA documents asserted that all those dead were enemy combatants. The logic is twisted: If we kill you, then you were an enemy combatant.” Killings are also exonerated by counting “all military-age males in a strike zone as combatants… unless there is explicit intelligence posthumously proving them innocent.” And U.S. bureaucrats have no incentive to track down evidence exposing their fatal errors. The New York Times revealed that U.S. “counterterrorism officials insist… people in an area of known terrorist activity… are probably up to no good.” The “probably up to no good” standard absolved almost any drone killing within thousands of square miles in Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia. Daniel Hale, a former Air Force intelligence analyst, leaked information revealing that nearly 90% of people who were killed in drone strikes were not the intended targets. Joe Biden’s Justice Department responded by coercing Hale into pleading guilty to “retention and transmission of national security information,” and he was sent to prison in 2021.

Sovereign immunity entitles presidents to kill with impunity. Or at least that is what presidents have presumed for most of the past century. If the Trump administration can establish a prerogative to preemptively kill anyone suspected of transporting illicit narcotics, millions of Americans could be in the federal cross-hairs. But the Trump administration is already having trouble preserving total secrecy thanks to controversies over who ordered alleged war crimes. Will Trump’s anti-drug carnage end up torpedoing his beloved Secretary of War Hegseth and his own credibility with Congress, the judiciary, and hundreds of millions of Americans who do not view White House statements as divine revelations handed down from Mt. Sinai?

December 3, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Scott Ritter: War Has Been Won & Russia Faces a Dilemma

Glenn Diesen | December 2, 2025

Rumble

Scott Ritter is a former Major, Intelligence Officer, US Marine, and UN Weapons Inspector. Ritter argues Russia has defeated NATO and Ukraine, and now faces a dilemma about what kind of peace it wants.

Follow Prof. Glenn Diesen:
Substack: https://glenndiesen.substack.com/
X/Twitter: https://x.com/Glenn_Diesen
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/glenndiesen

Support the research by Prof. Glenn Diesen:
PayPal: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/glenndiesen
Buy me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/gdieseng
Go Fund Me: https://gofund.me/09ea012f

Books by Prof. Glenn Diesen

December 2, 2025 Posted by | Militarism, Video | , , , , | Leave a comment

Why Is the Establishment Ignoring the Recently Declassified JFK Files?

By Harrison Berger | The American Conservative | November 28, 2025

Overshadowed by the recent revelations in the Epstein files, the 62nd anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination came and went with little notice. Yet new documents relating to that still-unsolved murder—released only recently by the Trump administration—deserve far more scrutiny than they have received from corporate media.

From the moment the latest batch of disclosures emerged this past March, the Democratic Party and their allies in corporate media assumed their familiar role as CIA stenographers, either overlooking—or outright refusing to look at—what more than 60,000 documents revealed. At an April 1 House hearing, Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX)—illustrating the Democratic Party’s loyalty to the U.S. security state—confidently insisted that the JFK files “show no evidence of a CIA conspiracy,” and complained that even hearing testimony from Oliver Stone, Jefferson Morley, and Jim DiEugenio amounted to “platform[ing] conspiracy theories.”

The New York Times’ Julian Barnes echoed the Democratic congresswoman nearly word for word, announcing definitively that “the CIA did not kill JFK…Oswald acted alone,” despite the sheer volume of documents that no reporter could have seriously reviewed in such a short span of time. Speed-readers Lalee Ibssa and Diana Paulsen of ABC News likewise asserted that, by calling for Congress to reopen the investigation into Kennedy’s assassination, filmmaker Oliver Stone was “reviv[ing] unfounded conspiracy theories.”

But despite committed insistence from Democrats and their corporate media allies, the Trump administration’s JFK disclosures, along with troves of previously released files, do in fact suggest a CIA conspiracy. We have ample documentation from unsealed congressional records of who worked hard to cover it up—among them a consortium of CIA officials who systematically lied to the Warren Commission, misleading the public investigation about the prime suspect in the president’s murder, Lee Harvey Oswald.

Perhaps the main architect of that cover-up was the CIA spymaster James Jesus Angleton, who, despite being the counterintelligence chief presiding over what was supposedly the worst intelligence failure since Pearl Harbor, wound up deeply involved in the CIA’s official investigation into the assassination.

Though Angleton insisted that the agency was inattentive to Oswald and unaware of the purpose of his activities leading up to Dallas, it has since been disclosed through unclassified JFK assassination records that Angleton personally maintained a classified 201 intelligence/surveillance file on Oswald for the four years preceding Kennedy’s assassination, strictly controlling which officials inside the CIA were permitted to see it through compartmentalization.

Angleton’s deceptions to investigators are so numerous that 60 years later they are still being uncovered; in one notable instance only revealed this year, Angleton committed perjury before the House Select Committee on Assassinations, claiming he knew almost nothing about Lee Harvey Oswald before the shooting. In another, Angleton concealed the fact that Oswald had visited the Cuban embassy in Mexico City—a visit the CIA publicly claimed it only discovered after the assassination. As Jefferson Morley, author of The Ghost: The Secret Life of CIA Spymaster James Jesus Angleton, explained, the  counter-intelligence chief “preferred to wait out the Warren Commission rather than explain the CIA’s knowledge of and interest in Oswald’s visit to the Cuban consulate” in Mexico.

Though Angleton left the CIA in disgrace, dismissed by many colleagues as a paranoid obsessive, his legacy has been consistently venerated by Israel’s intelligence services. In his memoir, the former director of the Mossad, Meir Amit, famously described James Angleton as “the biggest Zionist of the lot,” adding that “his total identification with Israel was an extraordinary asset for us.” As Morley writes, “Angleton’s loyalty to Israel betrayed US policy on an epic scale,” probably allowing the Israelis to build a nuclear bomb using stolen materials from the U.S.-based Nuclear Materials and Equipment Corporation (NUMEC) facility at a time when it was the expressed policy of the U.S. government to prevent Israel from acquiring one.

Angleton had regular professional and personal contact with at least six men aware of Israel’s secret plan to build a bomb. From Asher Ben Natan to Amos de Shalit to Isser Harel to Meir Amit to Moshe Dayan to Yval Ne’eman, his friends were involved in the building of Israel’s nuclear arsenal. If he learned anything of the secret program at Dimona, he reported very little of it. If he didn’t ask questions about Israel’s actions, he wasn’t doing his job. Instead of supporting U.S. nuclear security policy, he ignored it.

Among the most sensitive questions revived by the Trump administration’s releases is whether Israel may have had a role in or foreknowledge of the plot against Kennedy, who spent his final months battling the Israeli government over its nuclear program, its lobby power in the U.S., and the resettlement of Palestinians from the land the Israelis had expelled them from.

The mere suggestion that Israel may have been involved in Kennedy’s assassination, much more so than allegations against the CIA, produces the swiftest denunciations from across the establishment. When podcaster Theo Von made the allegation against Israel on a recent episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, for example, Israel loyalists like Amit Segal rapidly denounced the claim as a “blood libel” and  “antisemitic.” CyberWell, an Israeli-helmed censorship outfit staffed by former Israeli intelligence officials that partners with every major social-media platform, has likewise labeled the allegation an antisemitic conspiracy theory and worked with those platforms to censor it from the internet.

The intensity with which critics denounce anyone who raises the question mirrors the vigor with which the government spent decades scrubbing any trace of the connection from its own files. For decades, dozens of references to “Israel,” “Tel Aviv,” and even the identities of Angleton’s Israeli operatives were blacked out of congressional testimony, including the Church Committee records.

In his 1975 Church Committee testimony, now available with many of the old redactions removed, Angleton confirms that during the CIA’s “Cuban business”—the covert campaign of sabotage and assassination plots against Castro run through Bill Harvey and Task Force W—he arranged for an Israeli intelligence officer in Havana to act as Harvey’s secret channel. According to Angleton, this “Israeli man” sent reports from Havana to Tel Aviv, from where they were passed directly to Angleton and then to Harvey. This setup kept some of the agency’s most sensitive operations outside the normal CIA chain of command. A now-missing page of that same testimony uncovered by Aaron Good shows Angleton downplaying any need to brief CIA Director John McCone about his Israeli liaison, even while admitting that “what they were doing was enormous.”

Good also highlights how Angleton’s Israeli channel intersected with Lee Harvey Oswald. The Counterintelligence Staff officer assigned to read Oswald’s mail and collect it for the 201 surveillance file that Angleton maintained before the assassination was Reuben Efron—a committed Zionist who had lived in Israel, published on espionage in a World Zionist Organization–affiliated journal, and, as Jefferson Morley notes, sat in on Marina Oswald’s Warren Commission interview with no official role listed.

At the very moment a U.S. president was seeking to restrict Israel’s nuclear ambitions and limit the political power of its lobby in Washington, the CIA official in control of the Oswald file was secretly sharing intelligence channels, assassination communications, and off-the-books operatives with Israel—and lying to both Congress and potentially some of his own CIA colleagues about it. The government spent 60 years redacting those facts and Americans have a right to know why.

December 2, 2025 Posted by | Deception, Timeless or most popular | , , , , | Leave a comment

US tech giants to expand role in post-war Gaza strategy: Report

Press TV – December 2, 2025

A new report has revealed that US-based artificial intelligence firms Palantir and Dataminr are positioning themselves to take on a pivotal role in shaping the post-war security framework proposed for the Gaza Strip.

According to a report by the Israeli-Palestinian publication +972 Magazine on Tuesday, the companies have been integrated into the newly established Civil-Military Coordination Center (CMCC), a US-run operational hub in the southern part of the occupied territories where Washington and Israeli officials are coordinating the implementation of President Donald Trump’s 20-point plan for Gaza.

An official seating chart reviewed by +972 indicates that a “Maven Field Service Representative” from Palantir, referencing their battlefield analytics platform Project Maven, is assigned to the CMCC.

The hub, situated approximately 20 kilometers from the northern Gaza boundary, was opened in mid-October and currently accommodates around 200 US military personnel.

Project Maven, for which Palantir recently secured a $10 billion Pentagon contract to upgrade, gathers intelligence from various sources such as satellites, drones, spy planes, intercepted communications, and online platforms, reorganizing it into an “AI-powered battlefield platform” aimed at expediting military decision-making, including lethal airstrikes.

Palantir executives have described the system as “optimizing the kill chain,” and it has been previously utilized in US operations in Yemen, Syria, and Iraq.

Palantir has also strengthened its partnerships with Israeli forces during the current war, following a strategic agreement signed in January 2024 to support “war-related missions,” and has expanded its recruiting in Tel Aviv, doubling the size of its office over the past two years.

CEO Alex Karp has defended the collaboration amid international concerns over war crimes, saying that the company was the first to be “completely anti-woke.”

Documents reviewed by +972 also reveal the involvement of Dataminr, a US surveillance company, in internal CMCC presentations.

Dataminr, which utilizes AI to scan and analyze global social-media streams in real time, promotes its platform as providing “event, threat, and risk intelligence,” and has established partnerships with X to provide governments and law-enforcement agencies, including the FBI, with extensive access to public social-media data.

Both companies are expected to shape the “Alternative Safe Communities” model proposed under the Trump plan, which suggests relocating Palestinian civilians into fenced, heavily monitored compounds controlled by US and Israeli forces.

Within these zones, systems enabled by Palantir and Dataminr would be used to track mobile phones, monitor online activity, analyze movement, and flag individuals classified by AI as security risks.

Critics and analysts argue that this arrangement mirrors the predictive surveillance already deployed in Gaza over the past two years, including the AI-driven Lavender system used by Israel to create kill lists of suspected Hamas affiliates, which included public-sector employees such as police and medical workers.

Human-rights observers caution that such technologies have contributed to the extensive targeting of Palestinian families during an ongoing genocide.

The integration of US tech companies into the CMCC underscores a privatized model of occupation, one that sidelines Palestinian participation while expanding the role of AI-enabled policing, according to analysts.

For technology firms, the war presents an opportunity to access vast datasets and conduct real-world testing for new military systems.

Additionally, for Israel, it offers a way to outsource parts of the occupation while maintaining extensive control over Gaza’s population.

December 2, 2025 Posted by | Full Spectrum Dominance, War Crimes | , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Hezbollah and Saudi Arabia’s uneasy détente

By Tamjid Kobaissy | The Cradle | December 2, 2025

In West Asia, where sectarian politics and external meddling collide with local power struggles, few rivalries have been as entrenched or as symbolically loaded as that between Hezbollah and Saudi Arabia.

For decades, it embodied the broader confrontation between Iran and the Persian Gulf kingdoms – a proxy war defined by ideology, oil, and shifting battlefronts. But today, under the weight of new regional calculations, rising Israeli belligerence, and the cracks in American hegemony, that once-intractable hostility is giving way to a more ambiguous and tactical coexistence.

What is developing is neither an alliance nor even reconciliation. But for the first time, Hezbollah and Riyadh are probing the edges of a relationship long defined by zero-sum enmity. A pragmatic detente is emerging, shaped less by goodwill than by the shared urgency to contain spiraling instability across the region.

Tehran, Riyadh, and the long shadow of history

The long arc of the Hezbollah–Saudi confrontation is impossible to separate from Iran’s post-revolutionary clash with Riyadh. When Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini toppled the Shah in 1979 and declared the House of Saud a reactionary tool of western imperialism, the rupture was both ideological and strategic.

The Saudis responded by bankrolling Saddam Hussein’s devastating war against Tehran, and in 1987, relations cratered after Saudi security forces massacred Iranian pilgrims in Mecca. Khomeini’s message was scathing:

“Let the Saudi government be certain that America has branded it with an eternal stain of shame that will not be erased or cleansed until the Day of Judgment, not even with the waters of Zamzam or the River of Paradise.”

Decades later, the so-called Arab Spring of 2011 reopened the wound. While Tehran stood by its state allies in Damascus and Baghdad, Riyadh threw its weight behind opposition movements and fanned the flames of sectarian conflict.

In Yemen, the kingdom launched a military campaign against the Ansarallah movement and allied forces, which Tehran backed politically and diplomatically. After Saudi Arabia executed outspoken Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr in 2016, Iranian protesters stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran, prompting Riyadh to sever diplomatic ties. The two regional powers would only resume relations as part of Chinese-backed mediation in 2023.

From Hariri’s abduction to assassination plots

Within this regional maelstrom, Hezbollah became a prime Saudi target. When the Lebanese resistance captured two Israeli soldiers on 12 July 2006, to secure the release of prisoners, Riyadh dismissed it as “uncalculated adventures” and held Hezbollah responsible for the fallout.

In Syria, Hezbollah’s deployment alongside former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s army placed it in direct opposition to Saudi-backed militants. In Yemen, the movement’s vocal support for the Ansarallah–led government in Sanaa triggered Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) sanctions and terrorist designations.

Matters escalated in 2017 when Saudi Arabia detained then-Lebanese prime minister Saad Hariri and coerced him into announcing his resignation on television from Riyadh. Late Hezbollah secretary-general Hassan Nasrallah slammed the move as an act of war against Lebanon. The situation de-escalated only after French mediation.

In a 2022 TV interview, Nasrallah revealed that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) was ready to authorize an Israeli plot to assassinate him, pending US approval.

Quiet channels, Iranian cover

The Beijing-brokered rapprochement between Tehran and Riyadh changed the regional tone but did not yield immediate dividends for Hezbollah. On the contrary, Saudi Arabia intensified its efforts to roll back Hezbollah’s influence in Beirut, especially following Israel’s October assault on Gaza and southern Lebanon.

Riyadh pressured Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam to implement the so-called “Barrack Paper,” aimed at politically sidelining Hezbollah and stripping its arms. Speaking to The Cradle, a well-informed political source reveals that the kingdom informed the former Lebanese army commander – now the country’s president – Joseph Aoun, that it would proceed with its plans even if they triggered civil war or fractured the military. The source describes this as emblematic of Riyadh’s short-term crisis management, mirroring Washington’s reactive regional strategy.

Despite this, signs of a tactical shift began to emerge. In September, Nasrallah’s successor, Sheikh Naim Qassem, publicly called for opening a “new chapter” in ties with Riyadh – an unprecedented gesture from the movement’s leadership. According to the same source, this was not a spontaneous statement.

During a visit to Beirut, Iranian national security official Ali Larijani reportedly recieved a message from Hezbollah to Riyadh expressing its openness to reconciliation. In a subsequent trip to the kingdom, Larijani presented the message to MbS.

While initially dismissed, it was later revisited, leading to discreet backchannel coordination directly overseen by Larijani himself.

Tehran talks and guarded understandings

The Cradle’s source adds that since then, three indirect rounds of Hezbollah–Saudi talks have reportedly taken place in Tehran, each under Iranian facilitation. The first focused on political de-escalation, while the latter two addressed sensitive security files, signaling a mutual willingness to test limited cooperation.

One provisional understanding emerged: Saudi Arabia would ease pressure on Hezbollah in Lebanon and drop immediate demands to disarm the movement. In exchange, Riyadh asked Hezbollah to keep its weapons out of Syria – echoing a broader Gulf consensus – and assist Lebanese authorities in curbing drug smuggling networks.

In private, Riyadh reportedly acknowledges Hezbollah’s military resilience as a strategic buffer against Israel’s regional belligerence. The Persian Gulf states no longer trust Washington to shield them from Tel Aviv’s increasingly unilateral provocations – as was seen in the Israeli strikes on Doha in September. But Hezbollah’s dominance in Lebanon remains a challenge to Riyadh’s political influence.

Hezbollah, Saudi Arabia, and the Iranian umbrella

The Hezbollah–Saudi contacts are just one strand in a broader strategic dance between Riyadh and Tehran. According to The Cradle’s source, Saudi Arabia has assured Iran it will not join any Israeli or US-led war, nor allow its airspace to be used in such a scenario. In return, Tehran pledged not to target Saudi territory. These commitments are fragile, but significant.

The source also reveals that US President Donald Trump had authorized MbS to explore a direct channel with Iran, tasking him with brokering understandings on Yemen and beyond. Larijani conveyed Iran’s openness to dialogue, though not to nuclear concessions. MbS reportedly stressed to Trump that a working accord with Tehran was essential to regional stability.

In parallel, Lebanese MP Ali Hassan Khalil, a close advisor to Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, is expected to visit Saudi Arabia soon following meetings in Tehran. This suggests continued shuttle diplomacy across resistance, Iranian, and Saudi nodes.

Strategic divergence, tactical convergence

Still, no one should confuse these developments with a realignment. Rather than a reset, this is merely a tactical repositioning. For Riyadh, the old boycott model – applied to Lebanon between 2019 and 2021 – failed to dislodge Hezbollah or bolster pro-Saudi factions. Now, the kingdom is shifting to flexible engagement, partly to enable economic investments in Lebanon that require minimal cooperation with the dominant political force.

The pivot also serves Saudi Arabia’s desire to project itself as a capable mediator rather than a crude enforcer. The 7 October 2023 Operation Al-Aqsa Flood has tilted regional equations, while Israeli expansionism has become a destabilizing liability. A Hezbollah–Israel war would not stay confined to the Blue Line. Gulf cities, energy infrastructure, and fragile normalization deals would all be at risk.

From Hezbollah’s side, the outreach reflects both constraint and calculation. The resistance faces growing pressure: an intensified Israeli campaign, a stagnating Lebanese economy, and the need to preserve internal cohesion. A tactical truce with Riyadh offers breathing space, and possibly, a check against Gulf-backed meddling in Syria.

When Sheikh Naim Qassem declared that Hezbollah’s arms are pointed solely at Israel, it was also a signal to the Gulf: we are not your enemy.

The real enemy, for both sides, is the unpredictable nature of Israeli escalation. Riyadh fears being dragged into an Israeli-led regional war that it cannot control. Hezbollah fears encirclement through economic, political, and military pressure. Their interests may never align, but for now, they are no longer mutually exclusive.

December 2, 2025 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

« Previous Entries     Next Entries »