Dozens of casualties in US attack on market in Yemen’s capital
Palestinian Information Center – April 21, 2025
SANA’A – At least 12 civilians were killed and 30 others were injured in US airstrikes on a market and residential area in the center of Yemen’s capital city, Sana’a, on Sunday night.
According to local media, deadly US strikes targeted the Furwah neighborhood market in Sana’a’s Sha’ub district.
Footage aired by al-Masirah satellite channel showed extensive damage to vehicles and buildings in the bombed area in Sana’a, with citizens, who rushed to the scene, holding what appeared to be a dead child. Other wounded civilians wailed on stretchers heading for hospitals.
The strikes also targeted other populated areas in Sana’a, including Faj Attan neighborhood and the sanitation project in Aser neighborhood. No casualties in those areas have been reported.
Multiple strikes overnight also hit other areas of the country, including in Amran, Hodeida, Marib and Saada governorates.
On Saturday night, at least 29 US airstrikes targeted areas in northern Yemen, resulting in multiple casualties.
These deadly strikes come after the US army bombarded the Ras Issa fuel port in Yemen last week, killing at least 80 people and wounding 171 others, all of them civilians.
Yemen: US fails in its aggression since day one; Trump ‘accountable’ for fatalities
Press TV – April 21, 2025
The chairman of Yemen’s Supreme Political Council says Sana’a has not suffered even one percent damage at the military level despite all US assaults in support of Israel’s war on Gaza.
“I assure you that the aggression failed from its very first day, and we had previously managed to obtain information that thwarted the aggression before it occurred,” Mahdi al-Mashat said during a meeting of the National Defense Council on Sunday.
He added that if the Americans increase their mobilization, it means their weapons have failed.
Referring to US warship USS Harry S. Truman, Mashat said that it lost its command and control and was rendered out of service in the early days of the aggression.
The warship “achieved nothing for the enemy, forcing them to bring in other vessels and use other weapons,” he further said.
Mashat also said that, “The criminal US President Donald Trump will be held accountable for all that he did to civilians and civilian facilities, whether he remains in office or not.”
The US military has been carrying out almost daily attacks on Yemen for the past month, claiming that they are aimed at stopping the Ansarullah movement’s attacks on Israel-related ships.
The Yemeni army, however, said it will not stop its attacks on Israel-bound vessels until the regime halts its genocidal war on Gaza.
“Our stance in supporting our brothers in Gaza is firm and we will never retreat from it,” he said, adding that Yemen cannot allow the Americans and the “Israelis” to prey upon the Palestinian people in Gaza alone.
Since March, over 200 individuals have lost their lives due to US aggression in Yemen.
In retaliation for Israeli atrocities in Gaza and the US-UK-led assault on Yemen, the Yemeni Armed Forces began to carry out a series of strikes against Israeli, American, and British interests in the Red Sea and nearby regions in late 2023.
As the brutal conflict in Gaza worsened, Yemen imposed a strategic blockade on major maritime routes to hinder the movement of military supplies to their enemies and to pressure the international community to respond to the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
If the US launches a ground operation against Yemen, it will backfire
By Robert Inlakesh | Al Mayadeen | April 21, 2025
Frustrated by its costly ongoing offensive campaign against Yemen, the Trump administration is said to be in talks to launch a ground effort aimed at seizing the strategic port city of Hodeidah, before effecting regime change in Sanaa. If this offensive does occur, it will result in a disastrous defeat for Washington.
In 2015, when then-US President Barack Obama backed the Saudi-led coalition’s war on Yemen, Riyadh had estimated that it would only take a few months to uproot the Ansar Allah leadership that had taken over Sanaa. Instead, they faced defeat after defeat at the hands of a highly-motivated armed force that received the backing of the majority of Yemen’s Armed Forces.
A decade later, despite the 2022 ceasefire, the conflict remains unresolved – and Ansar Allah’s power has only continued to grow. The movement that once seized control of Sanaa with the backing of key elements of the existing power structure, including segments of the military, was a shadow of what it has since become. Not only has it forged strong alliances with various tribal factions across Yemen, but it has also made leaps and bounds in developing both offensive and defensive weapons technologies.
The Yemeni Armed Forces that aligned with the Ansar Allah-led government proved capable of holding off the combined power of the Saudi-backed and UAE-backed Yemeni forces, in addition to various militant groups like Al-Qaeda and ISIS, also battling Saudi Arabia’s armed forces and later mercenary fighters from Sudan and elsewhere. They fought on the ground for years, amidst a US-Saudi blockade in the Red Sea, combined with US-British-Israeli logistical support being provided to their enemies, backing Riyadh’s air attacks against the country.
While managing to inflict countless defeats on what was supposed to be a militarily superior opposition – on paper – the Yemeni government in Sanaa continued to expand its power and territorial control in a country that has historically been divided between north and south.
In late 2021, game changing technological advances introduced a new dynamic to the conflict, ultimately pressuring the Saudi-led coalition to accept a UN mediated ceasefire proposal. By early 2022, after an expansion of the ground war the previous year, the Yemeni Armed Forces had launched a wave of successful drone and missile attacks at targets across the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Saudi Arabia.
While Riyadh had been dealing with Ansar Allah’s drones and missiles for years by that point, it was clear that a significant technological advancement had occurred. And whereas the Saudi State had some capacity to absorb limited attacks on its vital infrastructure, the Emirati regime was far less equipped to withstand repeated blows from Yemen.
Abu Dhabi in particular cannot afford to absorb sustained waves of drone and missile attacks, especially if Dubai becomes a target. Unlike Saudi Arabia, the UAE is a tiny and vulnerable country. If Yemen decides to blanket them with strikes, their endeavors to diversify their economy will likely disintegrate, and no amount of deals with the US nor the Israelis can help them.
The claims that are being spread, particularly across Arabic language media, speculate that a Saudi-UAE backed force of about 80,000 soldiers is being amassed in order to launch an offensive aimed at seizing Hodeidah. Then, so goes the report, the US will offer air support and even launch a smaller ground attack to invade Yemen.
Donald Trump’s Vietnam?
Yemen was once dubbed Egypt’s Vietnam – and if the United States decides to launch a ground campaign there, the outcome is unlikely to align with President Donald Trump’s intentions. Already, the air campaign alone, which has to date killed around 150 civilians, has proven to be an embarrassing failure, costing US taxpayers billions of dollars with little to show in return.
Despite this war of aggression against Yemen being launched without a popular mandate, nor congressional approval, the US corporate media have largely chosen to ignore it. Yet, if Trump sends boots on the ground, Yemen will quickly dominate headlines, for the simple reason that US service members will start returning home in coffins.
So far, the Yemeni Armed Forces have limited their confrontations with the US’s naval fleets to defensive maneuvers, meaning that they have not been attempting to sink ships or aircraft carriers and are focused on defending their nation. If a large-scale ground operation is launched, the defensive posture will shift to one of offense.
The ground campaign will not only be costly and far from a walk in the park, the US will also endure direct hits to its vessels and significant casualties. Additionally, we should expect major attacks on both Saudi and Emirati infrastructure, which will disrupt oil markets. It is also very likely that US bases located in the Arabian Peninsula and beyond will come under attack.
Furthermore, we should probably expect occasional strikes against the Zionist regime that will be more intense than previous waves. If we begin to see the civilian death toll climb dramatically in Yemen, while the war is overtly an American-Zionist aggression, the way in which Ansar Allah will deal with it won’t be restricted any longer. On top of this, it could even end up uniting the people of Yemen to an even greater degree as a result, including factions and tribes that have always been at odds with Ansarallah.
Yemen is not Iran, but it has the capacity to inflict considerable losses on the US-allied regimes surrounding it and can target US forces directly. The question then becomes, can Riyadh and Abu Dhabi endure continuous barrages of munitions being fired towards them? Also, when the war lasts much longer than anticipated and the proxy ground force used to attack Yemen is suffering severe losses, as American soldiers return home in body bags, what will the strategy be then?
Will the 80,000 strong force continue to fight if they are suffering considerable losses, all in order to achieve a victory for Israeli strategic interests? Or will they begin to experience serious morale issues and defections? Will the US public be able to stomach the losses, and can the US military itself justify the loss of assets in a pointless fight to please their Zionist allies?
There will be no benefits to launching such an assault, and the US has not amassed nearly enough ground troops to launch a war alone. On every level, this would be a catastrophic strategic blunder. If they lose, this would be an embarrassment of historic proportions and nation-defining victory for the Sana’a government, despite the immense civilian suffering that will inevitably come from the war. All of this leaves out the potential involvement of other regional actors who may take advantage of the situation too.
If Trump decides to go ahead with such a conflict, in order to please his Zionist ally, it will greatly backfire. There will also be no way to hide the fact that he is working against US interests and sacrificing his own citizens in order to make the Israelis satisfied, without any real end goal or vision for victory.
Why AIPAC Must Register Under FARA: Exposing Israel’s Influence in Washington
Track AIPAC
For decades, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) has served as Israel’s unofficial arm in Washington, shaping U.S. policy to favor Israeli interests while avoiding the transparency required by the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). This evasion hides AIPAC’s role as a foreign proxy and undermines American democracy.
What Is FARA?
Enacted in 1938 to counter Nazi and Soviet influence, FARA mandates that anyone acting as an “agent of a foreign principal”—engaging in political activities in the U.S. at the direction or request of a foreign government—register with the Department of Justice. This means disclosing contacts, activities, and funding. FARA focuses on whose agenda is being pushed, not the source of the money. AIPAC’s mission, to align U.S. policy with Israel’s goals, fits this definition exactly. Yet it cloaks itself as an “American” lobby, a claim that doesn’t withstand scrutiny.
AIPAC: Israel’s Proxy in Washington
AIPAC’s mission is to steer U.S. policy toward Israel, functioning as a coordinated extension of Israeli interests. It invests millions in U.S. elections with its political action committee, AIPAC PAC, and through its super PAC, United Democracy Project, to support Israel First candidates and oppose anyone who speaks out against Israel’s crimes. It pushes anti-BDS laws mirroring Israeli priorities and secures billions in annual aid, often at the expense of U.S. needs. Through its nonprofit arm, the American Israel Education Foundation (AIEF), it funds frequent congressional trips to Israel—the number one destination for privately sponsored foreign travel by members of the House and their aides—where they meet Israeli leaders and adopt their narrative.
The connections are undeniable: AIPAC has operated a Jerusalem office since 1982, a direct link to Israeli leadership. Its leaders frequently visit Israel, host Israeli officials at policy summits, and align U.S. policy with Israel’s agenda. In 2015, AIPAC strongly opposed a UN resolution condemning Israeli settlements, mirroring Israel’s defiance, and launched a significant lobbying effort, spending a reported $30 million, to support Netanyahu’s campaign against the Iran nuclear deal. In 2023, it briefed Congress on Israel’s Gaza operations, echoing military talking points. In 2024, it pushed $14.1 billion in emergency aid for Israel, matching Netanyahu’s demands, and followed through on Foreign Minister Israel Katz’s request to secure congressional sanctions against the International Criminal Court. If a group lobbying for Russia maintained a Moscow office, funded trips there, and parroted Kremlin lines, we’d call it foreign influence. AIPAC’s U.S. funding doesn’t alter its role as Israel’s conduit.
A History of Dodging Accountability
AIPAC’s ties to Israel are deep-rooted. Its predecessor, the American Zionist Council (AZC), was ordered to register under FARA in 1962 after funneling millions from Israel’s Jewish Agency to lobby Congress. Instead, Isaiah Kenen relaunched it as AIPAC in 1963, dodging the law by using U.S. donors. Declassified 1984 FBI files reveal AIPAC’s early collaboration with Israel’s Ministry of Economics, using stolen U.S. trade data to shape the U.S.-Israel Free Trade Agreement; an act of espionage, not advocacy. In 2005, AIPAC staffers Steven Rosen and Keith Weissman passed classified Pentagon data to Israeli officials, though charges were later dropped. Leaked 2018 Israeli Justice Ministry documents show Jerusalem’s worry that AIPAC’s advocacy could trigger FARA scrutiny, prompting plans to conceal ties with a U.S. nonprofit. If AIPAC’s work is truly domestic, why does Israel fear exposure?
Transparency, Not Prohibition
FARA doesn’t prohibit lobbying, it requires openness. Registration would compel AIPAC to reveal its meetings with Israeli officials, spending details, and directives. If it’s merely Americans supporting Israel, why resist this disclosure? Refusing transparency raises questions about whose interests it truly serves.
The Stakes for Democracy
AIPAC’s unchecked influence skews U.S. policy. General David Petraeus warned in 2010 that Israel’s actions, amplified by AIPAC, put U.S. troops in the Middle East at risk. Billions flow to Israel each year, while domestic crises like healthcare languish. Without FARA, we remain blind to how much Israel shapes these decisions or what AIPAC is hiding.
TrackAIPAC demands that lawmakers, regulators, and the public compel AIPAC to register under FARA. Transparency is the first step to dismantling foreign influence in U.S. policy.
Atmosphere of talks with Washington is ‘constructive’: Iran
Al Mayadeen | April 20, 2025
The Iranian government’s spokesperson, Fatemeh Mohajerani, stated on Sunday that the atmosphere of the recent round of indirect talks with the United States was “constructive,” signaling a potential easing of tensions between the two countries.
She confirmed that practical steps to reduce tensions will be discussed in the upcoming sessions.
Speaking to the state-run IRNA news agency, Mohajerani emphasized that Iran is acting in its national interests and values, adding that “Iran is moving forward based on its national interests and preserving the dignity of its people.”
“It will welcome any initiative to lift sanctions that serve the interests of the Iranian people,” noting that the expert-level talks are expected to resume in Muscat, Oman, in the coming days.
Araghchi confirms forward momentum
The statement came a day after Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi described the second round of indirect discussions, held in Rome, as “good.”
He said the talks, which lasted approximately four hours, led to an understanding on several key frameworks and objectives.
“We reached an understanding on some of the main frameworks and objectives, and we agreed to continue the talks,” Araghchi told Iranian state television.
Araghchi confirmed that technical-level discussions will begin on Wednesday in the Sultanate of Oman. These expert meetings aim to work out the specifics of a potential agreement. A follow-up political meeting is scheduled for Saturday, also in Oman, to evaluate the results of the technical talks.
This second round of diplomacy comes just one week after the first round, also held in Oman, which both sides had described as constructive.
NATO’s War Narratives Collapse
Aaron Maté & Glenn Diesen
Glenn Diesen | April 18, 2025
Investigative journalist Aaron Maté discusses how NATO’s war narratives are falling apart. Maté is renowned for debunking the Russiagate hoax, yet the lessons about the dangers of embracing false stories have not yet been appreciated.
Wrong, ABC News, Climate Change Didn’t Cause 2025’s Severe Tornado Outbreak
By Linnea Lueken | ClimateREALISM | April 14, 2025
A recent story by ABC News, “Climate and environment updates: Tornado activity doubled March average: NOAA,” classifies recent severe tornado outbreaks under their “climate crisis” category, implying that these storms were caused by global warming. This is false. Climate change is not causing an increase in the number or severity of tornados, nor can it be connected to such a limited event.
ABC warns:
The climate crisis is not a distant threat; it’s happening right now and affecting what matters most to us.
According to a new report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, U.S. tornado activity in March was more than twice the monthly average, with over 200 tornadoes recorded.
Although ABC doesn’t explicitly state that this tornado season has been caused by climate change, the story strongly implies it, and as such it cannot be left unchallenged, because it is wrong.
The United States did experience a destructive and violent tornado season in March 2025, but it was not a record breaker in terms of numbers or strength, nor does it reflect a long-term trend that would be necessary to prove the climate connection.
The National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) disagree strongly with ABC’s claims. They report that tornado records in the past are spotty, because they are very short lived and aren’t always reported, especially as one moves further back into the past. NCEI reports “[m]any significant tornadoes may not make it into the historical record since Tornado Alley was very sparsely populated during the 20th century.”
Doppler weather radar did not become widespread until the 1990s. Because of the low coverage of weather radar before then, and much higher coverage in recent years, NCEI explains that “observation practices have led to an increase in the number of reported weaker tornadoes, and in recent years EF-0 tornadoes have become more prevalent in the total number of reported tornadoes.”
NCEI continues:
With increased National Doppler radar coverage, increasing population, and greater attention to tornado reporting, there has been an increase in the number of tornado reports over the past several decades. This can create a misleading appearance of an increasing trend in tornado frequency. To better understand the variability and trend in tornado frequency in the United States, the total number of EF-1 and stronger, as well as strong to violent tornadoes (EF-3 to EF-5 category on the Enhanced Fujita scale) can be analyzed. These tornadoes would have likely been reported even during the decades before Doppler radar use became widespread and practices resulted in increasing tornado reports. The bar charts below indicate there has been little trend in the frequency of the stronger tornadoes over the past 55 years.
Data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) tornado count show no trend in the number of tornadoes since the introduction of widespread Doppler radar. (See figures below)
Figure 1: Trend of all tornadoes counted since 1950. Note that the trend stops increasing once the widespread coverage of Doppler weather radar is achieved in the 1990s. Red are preliminary estimates for this year.
When it comes to the strongest tornadoes, EF-3 and above, there appears to be a downwards trend. (see figure below)
Climate at a Glance: Tornadoes points out that as recently as 2017 through 2018, the United States set records for the longest period in history without a tornado death and the longest period in history without an F3 or stronger tornado. In fact, the two record-low years for number of tornadoes both occurred this past dozen years, in 2014 and 2018.
Moreover, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change finds that “[t]here is low confidence in observed trends in small spatial-scale phenomena such as tornadoes.”
ABC’s alarming coverage of the 2025 tornado season is at odds with the data. There is no dangerous climate signal in the tornado data, there may even be evidence that the modest warming of the past century is related to the decline in severe tornado outbreaks in the United States. A single severe tornado season, or concentrated outbreak, is not evidence of catastrophic climate change, only a long-term sustained trend would suggest climate change might be a factor, and there is no such trend.
How Might The US’ Relations With Ukraine & Russia Change If It Abandons Its Peace Efforts?
By Andrew Korybko | April 18, 2025
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Friday that the US might stop mediating an end to the Ukrainian Conflict if it concludes within “a matter of days” that no peace deal is doable. That coincided with the Wall Street Journal reporting that Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff told them that “Putin had been fixated on Ukrainian land in their discussions. He said that Russia might get some of the regions, but not all.” This analysis here explained why it’s so important for Russia to obtain full control over the disputed lands.
If no breakthrough is achieved, such as the US coercing Ukraine into withdrawing from those regions or Russia agreeing to freeze this dimension of the conflict, then the US might indeed abandon its peace efforts. The question therefore arises of how that could change its relations with Ukraine and Russia. Beginning with the first, Trump and his team’s explicitly expressed exhaustion with this conflict bodes ill for the scenario of the US continuing military support for Ukraine, which would please Russia.
The Europeans would try to replace some of this lost aid in order to keep the conflict going in alignment with Zelensky’s vision, but they’d be unable to replace all of it and he might ultimately be forced into agreeing to worse terms than the US’ if Russia successfully expands its ground offensive. At the same time, however, the US might also suspend its talks with Russia on the strategic resource deals that were supposed to serve as the centerpiece of their planned “New Détente” as long as the conflict continues.
This balanced approach would be predicated on pressuring Ukraine and Russia into committing to compromises aimed at restoring the US-led peace talks since the first doesn’t want to lose territory in other regions while the second is interested in shaping the post-conflict era in partnership with the US. These evidently aren’t their top priorities, however, otherwise the land issue would have already been resolved one way or another and there wouldn’t be any talk of the US abandoning its peace efforts.
Other than the unlikely scenario of the US “escalating to de-escalate” on better terms for Ukraine, another comparatively more probable one exists but which is still less likely than the aforesaid, and that’s the US discontinuing military support for Ukraine but continuing resource talks with Russia. These negotiations are connected to Ukraine since the US is seeking privileged terms from Russia in exchange for coercing Kiev into Moscow’s demanded concessions but can still proceed even if that doesn’t occur.
The reason why this scenario is considered less likely than the balanced one described above is because some of the US’ sanctions that impede the clinching of resource deals with Russia can’t easily be lifted without first bringing about an end to the Ukrainian Conflict. Moreover, sanctions relief and the prospect of jointly shaping the post-conflict era are the only carrots that the US can dangle for incentivizing Russia to compromise on ending the conflict, which Trump wants it to do for solidifying his global legacy.
He’s therefore expected to at least temporarily suspend such talks with Russia for that reason in that scenario but might resume them if the conflict remains protracted with no clear diplomatic or military solution. That would make the most sense since he wouldn’t prematurely give up the only means that the US has for incentivizing Russia to compromise for peace but he also wouldn’t lose the objective economic and strategic benefits that a resource deal would bring.
Trump Administration Targets $1.4B in Federal “Misinformation” Grants
NIH and State Dept. Order Crackdown on Speech-Policing Programs Funded Under Biden
By Christina Maas | Reclaim The Net | April 19, 2025
It started, as so many federal science fair projects do, with a grant and a vague idea. The University of California, Irvine secured a $683,000 pot of taxpayer gold to study how social media “misinformation” affects vaccine acceptance among black and latino communities. Their plan was to track the followers of so-called “vaccine-hesitant influencers” and feed the data into a visualization tool.
That grant is now dead. Not because it failed, but because the broader disinformation-industrial complex is starting to crack under the weight of its own contradictions.
The UC Irvine project was just one tile in a mosaic of more than 800 federally funded efforts, totaling over $1.4 billion since 2017. All of it was earmarked to combat misinformation, disinformation, and whatever the marketing department decided to call lies [and unapproved views] this week. More than 600 of these contracts were approved during the Biden administration, and it turns out people started noticing that the government was quietly inserting itself into the content moderation business.
Enter Donald J. Trump, stage right, with his first-day executive order accusing the federal government of turning buzzwords like “malinformation” into permission slips for clamping down on speech. The Department of Justice was assigned to dig through the records and figure out just how far the thought policing went.
The public got a good look after The Free Press decided to play matchmaker between obscure federal records and actual journalism. That triggered a glorious round of internal audits, panicked reviews, and in some cases, the rapid self-destruction of programs that suddenly couldn’t remember what they were for.
NIH: From Health Science to Thought Control
The National Institutes of Health got caught mid-sprint. In response to press inquiries, the NIH not only canceled the UC Irvine grant but also torched a $22.4 million payout to UnidosUS, a group whose mission had somehow morphed from Latino advocacy into online speech policing. NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya hit the panic button, sending out an “URGENT” internal email ordering a review of all research touching the sacred trinity of mis-dis-mal information.
An NIH spokesperson said the agency is now “taking action to terminate research funding that is not aligned” with updated policy priorities. In plain English, they finally read the Constitution and realized they might be setting it on fire.
The State Department’s Digital Hall Monitor Gets Benched
Meanwhile, the State Department has been busy putting its own houseplants on leave. Secretary Marco Rubio, now running Foggy Bottom like it’s a Senate hearing, has suspended dozens of staffers from the Global Engagement Center. He says the agency crossed the line into censorship, which is a bold claim until you look at the receipts. The Center has spent years telling Americans what is or isn’t true, always with the urgency of a substitute teacher discovering TikTok.
The department has begun attaching “no-cost amendments” to existing grants. That’s bureaucrat-speak for telling award recipients to sign a bunch of legal paperwork and swear they aren’t doing anything unconstitutional. A little late for that, but sure.
The Pentagon: Same Game, New Label
At the Pentagon, they’ve decided that the problem is just a branding issue. So the term “disinformation” has been retired in favor of the more patriotic-sounding “countering adversary propaganda and information operations.” A senior Defense Department official explained that the shift brings the program into alignment with the new White House directive. Which is the kind of sentence that usually ends with somebody testifying in front of Congress about data collection gone wrong.
None of this seems to affect Peraton, a defense contractor that holds a $979 million contract to identify threats in coordination with US Central Command. Peraton did not respond to The Free Press’ requests for comment, possibly because they were too busy deciding whether your aunt’s Facebook post counts as hostile influence activity.
Microsoft Broadens Always-Watching AI-Powered Recall Tool That Logs and Indexes User Activity
A built-in memory machine disguised as convenience, Recall quietly turns every moment at your keyboard into searchable history.
By Ken Macon | Reclaim The Net | April 19, 2025
Microsoft’s renewed push to roll out Recall, an AI-powered feature in Windows 11 that automatically logs user activity every few seconds, is reigniting deep concerns among those focused on digital privacy and personal security.
Initially paused following a storm of backlash last year, Recall has quietly returned in a preview version of Windows 11 (Build 26100.3902), now available to select testers. The tool takes snapshots of a user’s screen at regular intervals and creates a searchable timeline of everything from app usage to websites visited and documents accessed. While Microsoft pitches this as a convenience tool, privacy advocates see a surveillance mechanism in disguise.
The company claims the tool is safe. It requires users to opt in and enroll in Windows Hello to access stored snapshots. Microsoft describes the feature as a way to “quickly find and get back to any app, website, image, or document just by describing its content.” Users, the company says, can pause recording and choose what is saved.
But these assurances fall flat for those warning about the broader consequences. The fact that Recall is opt-in does not prevent the exposure of data from people who never enabled it. If someone with Recall turned on receives a private photo, message, or sensitive document, it will be silently captured, analyzed, and indexed by the tool, regardless of the sender’s intent or privacy tools used.
The feature’s ability to store and catalog data so comprehensively opens up a host of legal, security, and ethical issues. Lawyers, governments, and spyware operators would gain an unprecedented level of access to a user’s digital life; not through brute force or phishing, but through a built-in tool that essentially creates a time-lapse of computer activity.
For those wary of the increasing creep of AI into daily computing, Recall has become a textbook case. Critics have framed it as part of a larger trend where companies inject AI features into existing platforms not to serve users, but to drive engagement, data collection, or lock-in.
From Ms. Rachel To Anti-War College Students: The End Of American Free Speech
By Robert Inlakesh | Palestine Chronicle | April 19, 2025
Working together with the most powerful government in the world, Zionist organizations are smearing and persecuting anyone who expresses sympathy with Palestinians, subjected to a genocide subsidized with their own tax dollars. From the media to academia, American free speech rights are being stripped.
Fulfilling an agenda laid out in a 33-page document named “Project Esther”, published in October of last year by the Heritage Foundation, the US government is teaming up with extremist elements of the Zionist Lobby to crush criticism of Israel.
From its recommendations to form a federal task force to combat alleged antisemitism, which is really just criticism of the Israeli government, to its strategy to tear down leading academic institutions, the plan is being followed.
The Heritage Foundation, most well-known for its “Project 2025”, is known to possess considerable influence on the Trump White House. Yet, despite its obvious influence and policy recommendations that are being followed, almost down to the letter, there has been little connection drawn between these think-tank documents and Donald Trump’s anti-free speech crusade.
It is evident, however, that the Democratic Party also presided over the greatest assault on academic freedom in American history, placing itself in line with the Zionist Lobby, which is why it makes sense that there is no incentive from Democrat-aligned media to give light to this topic. Although the situation has only grown more dire for free speech rights, particularly on college campuses, since the departure of former President Joe Biden.
Uncharted Waters
Under the Trump administration, it started to become clear with the detention of Mahmoud Khalil that we were entering uncharted waters. The mere fact that a Green-Card holder, accused of no crime, and who is married to an American citizen, was snatched in the night by plain-clothed ICE officers, who ferried him off from New York to Louisiana, was a tell-tale sign of things to come.
Thereafter, things only grew worse. Zionist student groups and racist extremist organizations have worked to put together lists of completely peaceful, law-abiding individuals who are set to be targeted by federal security agencies.
Claiming persecution themselves, these groups hide behind the cloak of being offended by anti-war protests, in order to work with the state to see their political opposition suppressed by force.
Yet, the crackdown has not been limited to students/former students. Instead, this campaign that aims to trample on the First Amendment rights as they are laid out in the US Constitution is beginning to empower pro-Israel extremists.
Weaponizing the claims of antisemitism and claiming that their targets are “Hamas supporters”, these organizations no longer are required to even present evidence for their allegations.
The Case of Ms. Rachel
This lack of any proof for the claims being made was no more evident than in the case of Ms. Rachel, a popular children’s entertainer.
A pro-Israel organization known as “Stopantisemitism” decided to accuse Ms. Rachel of spreading Hamas propaganda and requested the US government investigate whether she is receiving foreign funding.
Ms. Rachel has not commented on any of the political dynamics concerning the genocide in Gaza, yet has long expressed her sympathies for Palestinian children suffering in the Gaza Strip, as well as the Israeli Bibas family. There is nothing even remotely antisemitic about her posts on the topic, nor do they have anything to do with Hamas.
Yet, the US government appears to have reached the same point Israel has, where an accusation that someone is affiliated with Hamas needs no evidence to corroborate it before action is taken.
In Israel’s case, the action taken is the detention, torture, and/or murder of that individual, whereas in the United States, it can come in the form of detention or legal battles for now.
This assault on free speech is being carried out against media outlets also, using similar tactics of providing baseless claims regarding collaboration with Hamas, and even on behalf of Israeli citizens filing their cases in US courts to take down registered not-for-profit organizations.
Fired employees call for boycott of Microsoft over its role in Gaza genocide
Press TV – April 19, 2025
Two former Microsoft employees slammed the company for complicity in the Israeli genocide in Gaza and systematic apartheid in the West Bank, urging global boycotts against the tech giant.
Hossam Nasr, a software engineer, and Abdo Mohamed, a data scientist, who were both fired in 2024 for organizing a vigil for Palestinians killed in Gaza, called for severing Microsoft’s partnerships that support military operations.
According to Nasr, Microsoft provides cloud services, AI capabilities, translation, and data storage to the Israeli military, and “they use Microsoft translation services to translate the data they collect on Palestinians from Arabic to Hebrew.”
“Then they feed that into a pipeline of AI targeting systems that help determine where to bomb in Gaza and help Israel classify innocent Palestinians as terrorists,” he said, citing reports showing a 200-fold increase in Israel’s use of Microsoft’s AI tools between October 2023 and March 2024.
“Their usage of cloud storage increased to 13.6 petabytes,” he added.
“Microsoft Azure also hosts the target bank for the Israeli military,” he said, noting: “It hosts the civil registry of the Palestinian population.”
“These systems allow Israel to accelerate and exacerbate its genocide in Gaza to unforeseen levels,” he said.
Nasr pointed out that Microsoft staff became deeply embedded in Israeli military units, including Unit 8200, the notorious Israeli military intelligence branch.
“Microsoft employees become so embedded… that they become described as soldiers, acting as soldiers within those units,” he said.
“This kind of deep partnership allows Israel to automate and remove any sort of human element to the Palestinians,” he added. “It turns the mass murder of Palestinians into essentially a video game.”
Nasr said Microsoft’s technology is also used in the West Bank through applications such as Al-Munasik, which helps control Palestinian movement.
“Microsoft is enabling the apartheid system and the racial segregation system in the West Bank and the rest of Palestine,” he said.
He also criticized Microsoft’s employee donation program, saying, “They allow donations to illegal Israeli settlements and match them.”
“No Azure for Apartheid” campaign, which they co-founded, was inspired by earlier efforts at other tech companies.
“That campaign started as bombs were dropping on the heads of Palestinian children in Gaza in the wake of the Sheikh Jarrah events in 2021,” Nasr said, adding, “We took inspiration from our colleagues at Google and Amazon… to launch our own campaign at Microsoft in 2024.”
Nasr explained that the goal of their campaign was to sever Microsoft’s partnerships that support the Israeli regime’s forces brutal attacks against Gaza and the West Bank.
He insisted that holding meetings and writing letters did not have the necessary impact, and boycotting the company was the only way to stop its cooperation.
Nasr said that their campaign coordinated the April 4 protests during Microsoft’s 50th anniversary events.
“As soon as we became aware that Microsoft was planning a celebration… we made it clear that we will not allow Microsoft to celebrate while their hands are stained with Palestinian blood.”
“It is no longer sufficient to be in meetings with executives or writing emails,” Nasr highlighted.
“It is imperative for us… to stop materially contributing and materially partnering to the genocide of our brothers and sisters in Palestine,” he emphasized.
“We have made a huge dent in this Microsoft castle,” Nasr concluded. “I do believe that Microsoft’s reputation has never been more tarnished because of its complicity in genocide,” he said.
Nasr said losing his job or being deported from the US was a “cheap price to pay” compared to what Palestinians endure.
“A lot of the time I’m asked… Are you not scared of being fired? Of being deported?” he said. “And my response is always… Are you not scared of being complicit in the Holocaust of our time? Of what you’ll tell your children and grandchildren when they ask… Where were you when the genocide in Palestine and Gaza was happening?”
The Israel regime launched the campaign of genocide in Gaza on October 7, 2023.
Since then, it has killed at least 51,065 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injured more than 116,505 others.
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From the Archives
How 1960’s French Nuclear Tests Are Still Claiming Lives in Algeria
Sputnik – 15.02.2018
On February 13, 1960, France carried out its first nuclear test in Algeria’s southern Reggane region. According to official statistics, 17 nuclear tests were carried out in total over the next 6 years. The area remains affected, and local scientists say that radioactive contamination has caused genetic mutations and irreversibly changed the region.
There are no official statistics on the number of victims. The only figures can be found in the records kept by the French representative of the local church, which lists 42,000 victims of nuclear tests. Three years ago, the French Ministry of Defense issued a statement, putting the number at 27,000 people. The victims include French soldiers as well as local Algerians who lived in the surrounding areas. … continue
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