Veteran War Correspondent and Associate Editor of Global Research Felicity Arbuthnot reminds us of the crimes against humanity committed against the Iraqi people at the height of Iraq War I, euphemistically described as The Gulf War. It happened on Valentine’s Day. Forty-three years of killings and destruction.
Iraq War I was followed by Iraq War II (March 2003) and Iraq War III (2014), which was casually presented to public opinion as a bona fide “counter-terrorism campaign” launched by president Obama in 2014 against ISIL-ISIS-Daesh, an Al Qaeda affiliate which happens to be supported by the CIA.
The extensive bombing campaign ordered by Nobel Peace Laureate Obama was portrayed by the media as a humanitarian endeavour on behalf of the people of Iraq and Syria.
“I will not hesitate to take action against ISIL in Syria, as well as Iraq. This is a core principle of my presidency: if you threaten America, you will find no safe haven”
What next? Joe Biden
Michel Chossudovsky, February 13, 2021
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Thirty-three years ago, on the night of 13th/14th February 1991, the Ameriya Shelter, on Baghdad’s outskirts, was deliberately targeted by US missiles, in a war crime which near excelled the litany of criminal acts in the onslaught which then Secretary of State, James Baker, promised would: “reduce Baghdad to a pre-industrial age.”
My memories of Ameriya have been left in their immediacy, rather than again updated. (See below.)
On 13th/14th February this year [2010], the US is still extinguishing Iraqis, detaining without trial (and almost certainly worse) in the name of “nation building” (read: nation erasing) after near seven years of murderous occupation. In the other country the US and UK are systematically destroying, Afghanistan, on precisely the anniversary of the Shelter bombing, they have launched another St Valentine’s Eve and Day massacre. It is also another equally infamous anniversary: that of the fire bombing of Dresden.
“Operation Moshtarak”, in Helmand Province, the biggest “surge” since the numerous other biggest surges since 2001, in this graveyard of Empires and Afghans, is set to create Ameriya’s incendiary tragedy throughout the towns and villages of the region.
The US military is to “clear” (read kill) “suspected Taliban” (their trained and paid allies when the USSR invaded) from the region. Rule of law shredded, “suspects” are no longer tried, simply summarily executed. Over the years, a surprising number of “suspects” have still been in diapers. Quite a few have also been in wedding dresses.
The US military, of course, reverted to their old habit to “avoid civilian casualties.” They dropped leaflets telling the locals to leave to avoid casualties. According to UNICEF, just 28% of the population is literate, far less in rural areas. In the frozen wastes of a February Afghan winter, where are they to go? (In 1991, the US dropped several tonnes of leaflets with the same warning to the Marsh Arabs in Iraq. Illiterate but not stupid, they sold this bounty to the government, unable to import paper under the embargo.)
In 1750, Ahmad Shah’s army, is said to have lost eighteen thousand men in Afghanistan from cold, in a single night in February, the most Siberian month, where the temperature falls to an average low of -8 C., and the eastern reaches of the Hari river can freeze so hard that people travel it as a road.
“This is not going to be a Falluja” said Major General Nick Carter, “that’s not the model.” Oh good. “Moshtarak” means “together”, in the Dari language. At least it’s not the Wild West “Panther’s Claw” mark two, title of the last absolutely “final surge.”
In more quaint army-speak, General Carter refers to “inserting” the fifteen thousand testosterone-driven troops, backed by bombs, bullets, possibly the odd bit of white phosphorous and other aids to “pacification” and “bringing the government in behind us.” One could almost think it was a raunchy Friday night on the town, rather than a killing spree.
The troops refer to this “insertion” as: “lawn mowing.” What is it about blood baths and gardening euphemisms? Remember those military human shredding machines,”daisy cutters”?
So as Ameriyah is commemorated in the hearts of Iraqis, a day which is as yesterday for all Baghdadis, keep the Afghan people also in your hearts, in their terror, this Dresden replicating Valentine’s Day.
In her new book, to be launched on Wednesday 17th February, Iraqi writer and activist Haifa Zangana comments of Iraq:
“We wanted to put an end to this but we failed. The war and occupation in 2003, apart from shattering Iraq as a country and a people, has brought about many more imprisonments, many more deaths.
Abu Ghraib is only one of many symbols. In occupied Iraq, torture became an instrument of humiliation and of a way to force a nation into submission. As we resist occupation now, our message is clear: We did not struggle for decades to replace one torturer with another.”(1)
An eloquent encapsulation for those in both occupied, invaded, terrorised, defiled lands.
A last word on the Ameriya Shelter comes from Dahr Jamail:
“I learned that the Amiriyah Bomb Shelter has been closed by the Americans, due to the fact that an Islamic Fundamentalist group was keeping it open. I am glad I went when I did a couple of weeks ago, for when monuments/schools/buildings are closed and/or occupied by the Americans here, they have a tendency not to reopen.” (2)
This uniquely poignant shrine, marking an unimaginable end, is now designated: an “Islamic Fundamentalist” site, by Iraq’s liberators, the new Crusaders.
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The food transition, the energy transition, net-zero ideology, programmable central bank digital currencies, the censorship of free speech and clampdowns on protest.
What’s it all about? To understand these processes, we need to first locate what is essentially a social and economic reset within the context of a collapsing financial system.
Writer Ted Reece notes that the general rate of profit has trended downwards from an estimated 43% in the 1870s to 17% in the 2000s. By late 2019, many companies could not generate enough profit. Falling turnover, squeezed margins, limited cashflows and highly leveraged balance sheets were prevalent.
Professor Fabio Vighi of Cardiff University has described how closing down the global economy in early 2020 under the guise of fighting a supposedly new and novel pathogen allowed the US Federal Reserve to flood collapsing financial markets (COVID relief) with freshly printed money without causing hyperinflation. Lockdowns curtailed economic activity, thereby removing demand for the newly printed money (credit) in the physical economy and preventing ‘contagion’.
According to investigative journalist Michael Byrant, €1.5 trillion was needed to deal with the crisis in Europe alone. The financial collapse staring European central bankers in the face came to a head in 2019. The appearance of a ‘novel virus’ provided a convenient cover story.
The European Central Bank agreed to a €1.31 trillion bailout of banks followed by the EU agreeing to a €750 billion recovery fund for European states and corporations. This package of long-term, ultra-cheap credit to hundreds of banks was sold to the public as a necessary programme to cushion the impact of the pandemic on businesses and workers.
In response to a collapsing neoliberalism, we are now seeing the rollout of an authoritarian great reset — an agenda that intends to reshape the economy and change how we live.
Shift to Authoritarianism
The new economy is to be dominated by a handful of tech giants, global conglomerates and e-commerce platforms, and new markets will also be created through the financialisation of nature, which is to be colonised, commodified and traded under the notion of protecting the environment.
In recent years, we have witnessed an overaccumulation of capital, and the creation of such markets will provide fresh investment opportunities (including dodgy carbon offsetting Ponzi schemes) for the super-rich to park their wealth and prosper.
This great reset envisages a transformation of Western societies, resulting in permanent restrictions on fundamental liberties and mass surveillance. Being rolled out under the benign term of a ‘Fourth Industrial Revolution’, the World Economic Forum (WEF) says the public will eventually ‘rent’ everything they require (remember the WEF video ‘you will own nothing and be happy’?): stripping the right of ownership under the guise of a ‘green economy’ and underpinned by the rhetoric of ‘sustainable consumption’ and ‘climate emergency’.
Climate alarmism and the mantra of sustainability are about promoting money-making schemes.
But they also serve another purpose: social control.
Neoliberalism has run its course, resulting in the impoverishment of large sections of the population. But to dampen dissent and lower expectations, the levels of personal freedom we have been used to will not be tolerated. This means that the wider population will be subjected to the discipline of an emerging surveillance state.
To push back against any dissent, ordinary people are being told that they must sacrifice personal liberty in order to protect public health, societal security (those terrible Russians, Islamic extremists or that Sunak-designated bogeyman George Galloway) or the climate. Unlike in the old normal of neoliberalism, an ideological shift is occurring whereby personal freedoms are increasingly depicted as being dangerous because they run counter to the collective good.
The real reason for this ideological shift is to ensure that the masses get used to lower living standards and accept them. Consider, for instance, the Bank of England’s chief economist Huw Pill saying that people should ‘accept’ being poorer. And then there is Rob Kapito of the world’s biggest asset management firm BlackRock, who says that a “very entitled” generation must deal with scarcity for the first time in their lives.
At the same time, to muddy the waters, the message is that lower living standards are the result of the conflict in Ukraine and supply shocks that both the war and ‘the virus’ have caused.
The net-zero carbon emissions agenda will help legitimise lower living standards (reducing your carbon footprint) while reinforcing the notion that our rights must be sacrificed for the greater good. You will own nothing, not because the rich and their neoliberal agenda made you poor but because you will be instructed to stop being irresponsible and must act to protect the planet.
Net-zero Agenda
But what of this shift towards net-zero greenhouse gas emissions and the plan to slash our carbon footprints? Is it even feasible or necessary?
Gordon Hughes, a former World Bank economist and current professor of economics at the University of Edinburgh, says in a new report that current UK and European net-zero policies will likely lead to further economic ruin.
Apparently, the only viable way to raise the cash for sufficient new capital expenditure (on wind and solar infrastructure) would be a two decades-long reduction in private consumption of up to 10 per cent. Such a shock has never occurred in the last century outside war; even then, never for more than a decade.
But this agenda will also cause serious environmental degradation. So says Andrew Nikiforuk in the article The Rising Chorus of Renewable Energy Skeptics, which outlines how the green techno-dream is vastly destructive.
He lists the devastating environmental impacts of an even more mineral-intensive system based on renewables and warns:
“The whole process of replacing a declining system with a more complex mining-based enterprise is now supposed to take place with a fragile banking system, dysfunctional democracies, broken supply chains, critical mineral shortages and hostile geopolitics.”
All of this assumes that global warming is real and anthropogenic. Not everyone agrees. In the article Global warming and the confrontation between the West and the rest of the world, journalist Thierry Meyssan argues that net zero is based on political ideology rather than science. But to state such things has become heresy in the Western countries and shouted down with accusations of ‘climate science denial’.
Regardless of such concerns, the march towards net zero continues, and key to this is the United Nations Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development Goals.
Today, almost every business or corporate report, website or brochure includes a multitude of references to ‘carbon footprints’, ‘sustainability’, ‘net zero’ or ‘climate neutrality’ and how a company or organisation intends to achieve its sustainability targets. Green profiling, green bonds and green investments go hand in hand with displaying ‘green’ credentials and ambitions wherever and whenever possible.
It seems anyone and everyone in business is planting their corporate flag on the summit of sustainability. Take Sainsbury’s, for instance. It is one of the ‘big six’ food retail supermarkets in the UK and has a vision for the future of food that it published in 2019.
Here’s a quote from it:
“Personalised Optimisation is a trend that could see people chipped and connected like never before. A significant step on from wearable tech used today, the advent of personal microchips and neural laces has the potential to see all of our genetic, health and situational data recorded, stored and analysed by algorithms which could work out exactly what we need to support us at a particular time in our life. Retailers, such as Sainsbury’s could play a critical role to support this, arranging delivery of the needed food within thirty minutes — perhaps by drone.”
Tracked, traced and chipped — for your own benefit. Corporations accessing all of our personal data, right down to our DNA. The report is littered with references to sustainability and the climate or environment, and it is difficult not to get the impression that it is written so as to leave the reader awestruck by the technological possibilities.
However, the promotion of a brave new world of technological innovation that has nothing to say about power — who determines policies that have led to massive inequalities, poverty, malnutrition, food insecurity and hunger and who is responsible for the degradation of the environment in the first place — is nothing new.
The essence of power is conveniently glossed over, not least because those behind the prevailing food regime are also shaping the techno-utopian fairytale where everyone lives happily ever after eating bugs and synthetic food while living in a digital panopticon.
Fake Green
The type of ‘green’ agenda being pushed is a multi-trillion market opportunity for lining the pockets of rich investors and subsidy-sucking green infrastructure firms and also part of a strategy required to secure compliance required for the ‘new normal’.
It is, furthermore, a type of green that plans to cover much of the countryside with wind farms and solar panels with most farmers no longer farming. A recipe for food insecurity.
Those investing in the ‘green’ agenda care first and foremost about profit. The supremely influential BlackRock invests in the current food system that is responsible for polluted waterways, degraded soils, the displacement of smallholder farmers, a spiralling public health crisis, malnutrition and much more.
It also invests in healthcare — an industry that thrives on the illnesses and conditions created by eating the substandard food that the current system produces. Did Larry Fink, the top man at BlackRock, suddenly develop a conscience and become an environmentalist who cares about the planet and ordinary people? Of course not.
Any serious deliberations on the future of food would surely consider issues like food sovereignty, the role of agroecology and the strengthening of family farms — the backbone of current global food production.
The aforementioned article by Andrew Nikiforuk concludes that, if we are really serious about our impacts on the environment, we must scale back our needs and simplify society.
In terms of food, the solution rests on a low-input approach that strengthens rural communities and local markets and prioritises smallholder farms and small independent enterprises and retailers, localised democratic food systems and a concept of food sovereignty based on self-sufficiency, agroecological principles and regenerative agriculture.
It would involve facilitating the right to culturally appropriate food that is nutritionally dense due to diverse cropping patterns and free from toxic chemicals while ensuring local ownership and stewardship of common resources like land, water, soil and seeds.
That’s where genuine environmentalism and the future of food begins.
For further insight into the issues discussed above, you can access the author’s two free e-books on the food system here and here.
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Renowned author Colin Todhunter specialises in development, food and agriculture. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).
Featured image: Original image by Birch Gold Group staff
Read Colin Todhunter’s e-Book entitled
Food, Dispossession and Dependency. Resisting the New World Order
We are currently seeing an acceleration of the corporate consolidation of the entire global agri-food chain. The high-tech/big data conglomerates, including Amazon, Microsoft, Facebook and Google, have joined traditional agribusiness giants, such as Corteva, Bayer, Cargill and Syngenta, in a quest to impose their model of food and agriculture on the world.
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Medical errors are a significant global issue, with the World Health Organization estimating they cause 2.6 million deaths annually worldwide. In the U.S., this number could be as high as 440,000, making it the third leading cause of death
10% of all deaths in the U.S. are attributable to some kind of medical error, and it continues to be a leading cause of death today, ranking somewhere between third and first place, depending on the scope of medical mistakes you include in the equation
The documentary “Medical Errors: Why Doctors Make Mistakes” underscored a crucial issue in the medical community: the reluctance to openly discuss mistakes, which can hinder learning and improvement, contributing to ongoing errors
A mix of inexperience, fatigue and diagnostic challenges contributes significantly to medical errors, complicating the efforts to reduce these mistakes
To minimize your risk of harm from medical errors, consider creating a “Caregivers and Consent” document that spells out what your doctor may or may not do to you while you’re hospitalized. Also be sure to always bring family member or friend who can act as your advocate and keep track of what’s being done to you
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The documentary above, “Medical Errors: Why Doctors Make Mistakes,” explores the causes behind medical errors, which according to the World Health Organization claim 2.6 million deaths each year, worldwide, with at least 250,000 of those in the U.S.1
In July 2022, the National Institutes of Health updated their library on medical errors, saying that number could be as high as 440,000 — and possibly even higher due to poor reporting — making it the third leading cause of death in the U.S.2
A Historical Look at Statistical Data on Medical Errors
In July 2010, Dr. Barbara Starfield published an article in JAMA titled “Is U.S. Health Really the Best in the World?”3 Buried in the tables of that article were data showing that physicians were the third leading cause of death in the United States. I created that headline 24 years ago and it has been a meme ever since.
For over 15 years, when you typed in “doctors are the third leading cause of death,” my article from 2000 came up first. Of course, those days are now long gone, since Google began censoring me from its search engine eight years ago. Sadly, the claim that “doctors are the third leading cause of death” remains true to this day.
One of the first indications that medical errors were a significant problem emerged in 1989, when professor Lucian Leape from the Harvard Medical School — a pioneer in patient safety who is featured in the documentary — published a study on medical errors. (He also published the book “Making Healthcare Safe: The Story of the Patient Safety Movement”4 in 2021, which you can read and download for free here.)
Leape analyzed 30,000 medical records from 50 New York hospitals, concluding that nearly 4% had suffered an injury caused by treatment, and of those, two-thirds “were caused by an error in care and therefore are potentially preventable,” Leape said.
Extrapolating from that data, Leape estimated that 1.3 million American patients are injured each year due to medical mistakes and 180,000 die — the equivalent of three jumbo-jet crashes every two days. In the UK, according to statistics cited in the documentary, medical mistakes claim the lives of an estimated 40,000 Britons each year.
Properly Prescribed Drugs Are the Fourth Leading Cause of Death
In 1998, another eye-opening study was published. Researchers at the University of Toronto, led by professor Bruce Pomeranz, concluded that properly prescribed and correctly taken pharmaceutical drugs were the fourth leading cause of death in the U.S.5,6
Pomeranz’s analysis was the largest and most complete of its kind at that time. In all, they calculated that somewhere between 76,000 and 137,000 American patients died each year from correctly administered drugs.
Might Doctors Be the No. 1 Cause of Death?
In a 2003 article aptly titled, “Death by Medicine,”7 Dr. Carolyn Dean, Gary Null, Ph.D., Dr. Martin Feldman, Dr. Debora Rasio and Dorothy Smith, Ph.D., described in excruciating detail how the modern conventional American medical system has bumbled its way into becoming the LEADING cause of death and injury in the United States, claiming the lives of nearly 784,000 people annually.
Using those figures, that would put the health care system as the No. 1 cause of death in the U.S., bypassing cardiovascular disease. These iatrogenic deaths (meaning deaths resulting from the activity of physicians) include everything from adverse drug reactions and avoidable medical errors to hospital-acquired infections, surgeries gone bad and deaths from unnecessary medical procedures.
The authors took statistics straight from the most respected medical and scientific journals and investigative reports by the IOM, showing that overall, American medicine is causing more harm than good. For clarity, the reason Dean et. al. came up with a much higher number than anyone else, even in later years, is likely because they included a broader range of mistakes.
Medicine Is Still a Leading Cause of Death
In 2010, a report in The New England Journal of Medicine,8 and another in the Journal of General Internal Medicine,9 revealed just how little things had changed since 2003.
Out of 62 million death certificates dated between 1976 and 2006, nearly 250,000 deaths were coded as having occurred in a hospital setting due to medication errors,10 and an estimated 450,000 preventable medication-related adverse events occurred every year.
Three years later, in 2013, a Journal of Patient Safety study11,12,13,14 concluded preventable medical errors kill anywhere from 210,000 to 440,000 patients a year. In 2016, Johns Hopkins patient safety experts, led by Dr. Martin Makary, calculated that more than 250,000 patients died each year from medical errors — the same death count found by Starfield in 2010.
Then, in 2022, the WHO announced that unsafe care by medical professionals and hospitals result in a “horrifying” 2.6 million deaths annually, worldwide, with at least 250,000 of those deaths occurring in the U.S.15 And, as mentioned, that summer the NIH stated the death toll might be closer to 440,000, or more.16
So, medical errors have been the third leading cause of death for years, with 10% of all deaths being attributable to some kind of medical error,17,18 and it continues to be a leading cause of death today, ranking somewhere between third and first place, depending on the scope of medical mistakes you include in your equation.
Misdiagnosis Rates Are on the Rise
Death isn’t the only outcome of medical mistakes. Permanent disability is another. When permanent disability and death are lumped together, the toll from medical mistakes reaches as high as 795,000 annually in the U.S. alone, according to data published in 2023.19
Researchers at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine have described diagnostic errors as “the most under-resourced public health crisis we face.”20 When you visit a doctor, whether you’re at a doctor’s office or hospital, you depend on getting expert care, including a correct diagnosis. But about 11% of the time, medical conditions are misdiagnosed.21,22
The likelihood of misdiagnosis varies widely, however, depending on the type of medical problem and the symptoms presented. For instance, only about 1.5% of heart attacks are misdiagnosed, compared to 62% of spinal abscesses, a rarer condition.
But even among strokes, a leading cause of disability in the U.S., misdiagnosis occurs more than 17.5% of the time.23 When a stroke occurs, some patients may experience only dizziness or headaches, which can easily be confused with other conditions. In all, 15 diseases account for 50.7% of the serious harms due to misdiagnosis while just five — stroke, sepsis, pneumonia, venous thromboembolism and lung cancer — account for 38.7%.24
A 2023 review25 of nearly 300 studies by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality also found that a startling number of patients who visit U.S. emergency rooms get an incorrect diagnosis.
Overall, their research showed about 1 in 18 people who visit an emergency room will be misdiagnosed, 1 in 50 will suffer an adverse event as a result, and 1 in 350 will suffer from permanent disability or death. Out of the 130 million visits to emergency departments (EDs) that occur every year in the U.S., this amounts to 7.4 million misdiagnoses, 2.6 million related adverse events and 370,000 serious harms from diagnostic error. According to the authors:26
“Put in terms of an average ED [emergency department] with 25,000 visits annually and average diagnostic performance, each year this would be over 1,400 diagnostic errors, 500 diagnostic adverse events, and 75 serious harms, including 50 deaths per ED …
The strongest, most consistent predictors of ED diagnostic error were individual case factors that increased the cognitive challenge of identifying the underlying disorder, with nonspecific, mild, transient, or ‘atypical’ symptoms being the most frequent.”
Effort to Reduce Medical Mistakes in the UK
As noted in the documentary, the UK has implemented something called “League tables” in an effort to cut down on medical mistakes. League tables are rankings that compare the performance of National Health Service (NHS) hospitals based on various quality and performance metrics such as patient satisfaction, clinical outcomes, waiting times and efficiency measures, among others.
The purpose of these tables is to provide transparency, stimulate improvements in healthcare delivery, and reduce medical mistakes by:
While league tables can drive improvements in healthcare quality and patient outcomes, they are not without criticism. Concerns have been raised about the potential for these rankings to oversimplify complex issues, penalize hospitals serving disadvantaged populations, or encourage gaming of the system. Nevertheless, they remain a key tool in the NHS’s strategy to improve healthcare quality and reduce medical mistakes in England.
How Is the US Tackling Medical Mistakes?
In the U.S., several mechanisms and tools parallel the concept of league tables in England, aiming to improve medical care quality and reduce medical mistakes. These tools include hospital rankings, reporting systems and quality improvement programs, which serve to enhance transparency, promote best practices, and ensure accountability in healthcare.
For example, the U.S. News & World Report Hospital Rankings is a publication that ranks hospitals nationally in various specialties, conditions, and procedures. The rankings are based on several factors, including patient outcomes, patient experience, nurse staffing levels, and expert opinions.
The Leapfrog Group also assigns letter grades to hospitals based on their performance in preventing medical errors, injuries, accidents, and infections. Leapfrog’s Hospital Safety Grade is intended to help consumers choose the safest hospital for their care.
There are also a variety of quality improvement organization (QIOs) that work with healthcare providers, including hospitals and physicians, to help them improve the care they provide to Medicare beneficiaries, as well as reporting and surveillance systems that track data on things like hospital-acquired infections.
Patient safety organizations also exist, as do clinical practice guidelines intended to help healthcare providers make consistent, evidence-based decisions to reduce variability in care and prevent medical errors. The electronic health records system is also intended to help prevent medication errors, ensure timely follow-ups, and support adherence to clinical guidelines.
Why Do Doctors Make So Many Mistakes?
Yet despite all these tools, the rates of medical mistakes aren’t dropping. According to the film, there are many potential reasons for this, including the taboo among doctors to discuss their mistakes openly.
Junior doctors also make mistakes due to inexperience. As noted in the film, doctors fresh out of medical school are literally “practicing” medicine on their patients, performing procedures they’ve never done before without oversight. Other factors include fatigue, as hospital doctors typically work very long shifts, and the fact that many conditions share symptoms.
In short, diagnosis isn’t necessarily easy, even with advanced medical tests. The same goes for treatment. Even with a correct diagnosis, choosing the best treatment isn’t black-and-white.
Experience comes into play and, I would say, a certain level of intuition, which requires your doctor to have a strong connection to his or her consciousness or Spirit. Unfortunately, that’s rare these days, as solid intuition requires a certain level of biological optimization that few have, even if they’re doctors.
How to Reduce Your Risk of Misdiagnosis
As a patient, taking an active role in your health care may help you receive the best care possible and reduce your risk of getting an incorrect diagnosis. This starts with choosing healthcare providers who listen to your concerns and have a holistic view of health.
Seek a healthcare practitioner who will help you understand the foundational causes of your health challenges, and create a customized and comprehensive — i.e., holistic — treatment plan for you.
What’s more, you can have an impact on your doctor’s tendency to recommend natural alternatives, as when you inquire about them, some do in fact listen. If they don’t, then keep shopping. Further, if something doesn’t sound right about the diagnosis you’re given, ask questions and get a second, or third, opinion if needed.
Remember, your doctor works for you, not the other way around. Ideally, health care should be a partnership, where you work together with your providers to identify the best solutions. Either way, if you’re not satisfied with their know-how or the tools in their toolbox, find another doctor. If you’re hospitalized or in an emergency situation, this is more challenging since you can’t always choose who’s providing your care.
There are many cases when it’s in your best interest to avoid hospitals, particularly for elective procedures or chronic conditions, but if you’re hospitalized due to a life-threatening emergency, be sure to have an advocate with you who can manage your care and act as a power of attorney if necessary.
If you’re seriously ill, it can be very difficult to explain what’s wrong while keeping tabs on what they’re asking you to sign and the medications and treatments they’re giving you, so having someone there who can double-check everything and advocate for you is essential. And no matter where you’re receiving medical care, be sure to explain all symptoms you’re experiencing thoroughly. The more information you provide, theoretically the better the outcome should be.
Create a Caregivers and Consent Document
Last but not least, I strongly recommend creating a “Caregivers and Consent” document, as detailed in “How to Save Your Life and Those You Love When Hospitalized.” A template for this was created by Laura Bartlett and Greta Crawford in response to the abhorrent medical mistreatment experienced by patients during the COVID pandemic.
Bartlett and Crawford have founded an organization to address the lethal and, in many cases, forced treatments patients receive when they’re hospitalized for COVID-19, but the same strategy can be used to protect yourself against other medical hazards as well.
When you enter a hospital, you must sign a general consent authorization form. This is basically a contract between you and the hospital. Since you have bodily autonomy, they need your consent before they can do anything to you.
Typically, the general consent form authorizes hospital staff to test, treat and care for you in whatever way they see fit — and when a patient signs the general consent authorization, physicians feel justified that they can implement a hospital protocol without further explaining the risks, benefits or alternatives of that protocol to the patient.
Now, if you’re well enough to read the entire document, and see something in there that you don’t agree with, you can strike the sentence or paragraph and initial it, to indicate that you do not consent to that specific detail. However, that still doesn’t offer you much protection.
What you need is a much more specific document where you detail the types of treatments you consent to and the ones you don’t.
You need to carve out a niche from the general consent form that specifies exactly what you do (and do not) consent to. And you need to be clear. Fortunately, the Caregivers and Consent document carves out that niche to communicate clearly to all physicians your exact consent wishes. And, they are legally required to respect your written directives.
A template Caregivers and Consent document can be found on OurPatientRights.com. Also be sure to read through “How to Save Your Life and Those You Love When Hospitalized,” as there are specific procedures that must be followed to make the document binding.
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After six months of blocking ceasefire resolutions at the United Nations, the US delegation submitted its own draft resolution on Friday ostensibly aimed at stopping the hostilities so humanitarian aid can reach the starving people of Gaza. Unfortunately, the American team linked the proposed ceasefire to the release of hostages and to the repudiation of Hamas which merely restates the Israeli position on a final settlement. The draft resolution also failed to explicitly demand an immediate ceasefire, but inserted deliberately-ambiguous language intended to give Israel sufficient legal flexibility to continue its aggression. In short, the US draft resolution was a cynical hoax concocted by the backers of Israel’s bloody campaign in Gaza that blew up in the US delegations face heaping more shame on the administration and the American people.
The media’s coverage of the ceasefire fiasco has been predictably biased and deceptive. The US delegation did not “call” for an “immediate ceasefire” as has been widely reported in the West. In fact, that was the issue that prompted the Russian and Chinese vetoes. Whatthe draft resolution said was that “an immediate and sustained ceasefire” was “imperative.” There is a world of difference between a resolution that invokes the authority of the UN to ‘demand’ a ceasefire, and one that merely says a ceasefire is necessary. And, it is a difference that senior-level diplomats fully grasp, because in diplomacy, words matter. The words that the US delegation chose, were intentionally chosen to subvert the process, link the ceasefire to a release of the hostages, and to give Israel a green light to continue its military operations until a diplomatic agreement could be reached. The Russian ambassador summed it up like this:
If this resolution were adopted, it would definitively close the debate on the need for a ceasefire in Gaza, give Israel a free hand and condemn Gaza and its entire population to extermination or expulsion.
He’s right, this maliciously-worded resolution was designed to legitimize Israel’s rampage and provide legal cover for future aggression. Here is the excerpt from the US draft resolution that has drawn the most attention and criticism:
(The Security Council) Determines the imperative of an immediate and sustained ceasefire to protect civilians on all sides, allow for the delivery of essential humanitarian assistance, and alleviate humanitarian suffering, and towards that end unequivocally supports ongoing international diplomatic efforts to secure such a ceasefire in connection with the release of all remaining hostages.
And here’s a brief explanation from political analyst Trita Parsi:
The clause does not demand a ceasefire but determines that it is imperative. Its support is not directly for the ceasefire but for the negotiation process the U.S. has been co-leading and whose parameters the U.S. has sought to determine in favor of Israel. The text points out that this effort to secure a ceasefire is “in connection with the release of all remaining hostages. Why the Ceasefire Proposal Failed at the UNSC, Responsible Statecraft
In other words, the draft resolution is not aimed at bringing the hostilities to an end at all but, rather, to transforming the Security Council into another battlefield on which Israel’s bloody war can be waged. So, to dismiss this meticulously-engineered hoax as merely another example of US trickery, vastly understates the real objective of the operation which is to provide legal cover for the killing of civilians. Andre Damon at the World Socialist Web Site summed it up like this:
The cynicism of Biden’s call for a “ceasefire” while continuing to fund and arm the government massacring over a hundred Palestinians every day and starving the entire Gazan population is beyond description. The Biden administration hopes that by proclaiming its support for a “ceasefire” loudly enough, it will make the world’s population forget that it fully supports and enables the US-Israeli “final solution” of the Palestinian question. The Fraud of Biden’s call for a “ceasefire” in Gaza, Andre Damon, World Socialist Web Site
The point we’ve been trying to make becomes clearer when we consider the comments of US ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield who said the following just prior to the voting:
Many of us here share the same goals. First, we want to see an immediate and sustained ceasefire as part of a deal that leads to the release of all hostages which are being held by Hamas and other groups and that will allow much more life-saving humanitarian aid to get into Gaza … By adopting the resolution before us, we can put pressure on Hamas to accept the deal on the table... I urge all council members to vote “yes”; to vote for a resolution that at long last condemns Hamas for its horrific terrorist attacks and sexual violence that makes clear that all civilians ….should be able to live without fear of violence. United Nations News (see video)
Thomas-Greenfield is mistaken; the purpose of the ceasefire is not to resolve the hostage crisis or to “condemn Hamas” or “to put pressure on Hamas to accept the deal on the table.” Those are Israel’s objectives not the Security Council’s. The purpose of the ceasefire is to stop the killing of innocent civilians and to make sure they get the food and medicine they need to survive. Full stop. As we said earlier, the US ambassador is merely parroting the demands of the Israeli government and then characterizing those demands as a ceasefire. Naturally, the Russians saw through this ruse and voted accordingly. Nevertheless, the ploy has succeeded in providing the Biden team with a welcome public relations triumph by making them look like peacemakers. (which is entirely undeserved.)
Without a doubt, the most powerful analysis of Washington’s failed draft resolution was by Russian ambassador Vassily Nebenzia who—once again—revealed himself to be principled statesman with a keen grasp of the issues. Here’s a lengthy excerpt of his comments that (predictably) appear no where in the western media and can only be found on the Kremlin website:
Mr. President,
For six months now, the UN Security Council has been unable to adopt a resolution demanding a ceasefire in Gaza. Time and again, the United States thwarted any attempt to do so by using a veto in cold blood as many as four times.
During that time, we have heard many different excuses from our American colleagues. For example, that it is premature to seek a ceasefire because it is necessary to give space “for Israel’s counter-terrorism efforts”; that the Council should not interfere with Washington’s “effective diplomacy on the ground”; that we should wait until Ramadan, when, they say, an agreement on a cessation of violence will definitely be made.
Now, six months later, whenGaza has been practically leveled to the ground, the US representative says without batting an eye that Washington has finally started to realize the need for a ceasefire. This leisurely thinking process by Washington has cost the lives of 32,000 Palestinian civilians, two-thirds of them women and children.
And even now we see a typical hypocritical show, when in the cloak of a “ceasefire” the United States is trying to sell to the members of the Security Council and the entire international community something else – a vague phrase about “defining the imperative of a ceasefire”. Such philosophy about ‘moral imperatives’ might seem normal in the works of Immanuel Kant, but it’s not going to save the lives of Palestinians. And that is not at all what the mandate of the UN Security Council suggests, which has a unique toolkit to demand a ceasefire and, if necessary, enforce it.
In an official interview to Al Hadath in Jeddah on 20 March, Secretary of State Blinken said, “Well, in fact, we actually have a resolution that we put forward right now that’s before the UNSC that does call for an immediate ceasefire tied to the release of hostages and we hope very much that countries will support that”. However, the US-proposed draft resolution does not make such call. It appears that either the US Permanent Representative to the United Nations or the US Secretary of State is deliberately misleading the international community.
Colleagues,
From the very beginning, it was obvious that the “negotiations” on the draft resolution held by our American colleagues were only meant to (buy) time. All our comments and “red lines” were ignored, as well as the proposals of a number of other delegations….
The US draft is a thoroughly politicized document, which only aims at pulling on voters’ heartstrings before the US elections by throwing them a “bone” in the form of at least some mention of a “ceasefire” in Gaza. The draft also seeks to consolidate US policy in the region through “terrorist labels” and to ensure impunity for Israel, whose criminal actions the draft gives no assessment to.
Let me also stress that the American draft contains a de facto green light for Israel to conduct a military operation in Rafah. At least, the sponsors have tried to make sure that nothing in their draft would prevent West Jerusalem from completing the deadly cleanup of southern Gaza.
That is actually what Washington wants. We already said that we will no longer pass meaningless resolutions that do not demand a ceasefire and lead us nowhere.
This draft must not pass with the majority of UNSC votes in order to send a message that Washington’s not even palliative but devious concepts are unacceptable. It will be extremely strange if those members of the Council (and they are the majority), who realize this and have been saying to us that the US draft is a flawed one, will now raise their hand in favor. If you do so, you will smear yourselves in disgrace.
Think what this will make you look in the eyes of the people of the Middle East and your own countries, if you support this hypocritical endeavor designed to disorient the international community and, in fact, undermine the authority of the Council by rendering it unable to influence the situation on the ground and making it “stay out of White House’s way”. Are you ready to play a part in this shameful show?
Russia will not do this. As a permanent member of the Security Council and one of the founders of the United Nations, we recognize the global historical responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security and cannot allow the Council to become a tool of Washington’s destructive policy in the Middle East. If this resolution were adopted, it would definitively close the debate on the need for a ceasefire in Gaza, give Israel a free hand and condemn Gaza and its entire population to extermination or expulsion.
In our work, we are not guided by what pleases Washington or its satellites who are ready to cast a vote at the US behest, but by what is necessary for the Palestinians and what promotes peace.
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This article was originally published on The Unz Review.
Michael Whitney is a renowned geopolitical and social analyst based in Washington State. He initiated his career as an independent citizen-journalist in 2002 with a commitment to honest journalism, social justice and World peace.
He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).
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I was quite intrigued by this advertisement from the American Civil Liberties Union that I saw on the internet yesterday. I wanted to know what issues the American Civil Liberties Union is concerned about, and whether they wanted to know what we the citizens are worried about—whether they want to hear our voices.
You see the American Civil Liberties Union, which occasionally plays an important role, has become a corrupt lapdog of the elite, granted it aims for the charity donations market of the progressive-flavor elite who oppress working people through their stock holdings, but show a walrus-style concern for the poor[1].
In any case, when I clicked, I discovered, much as I expected, that the ACLU is not interested in learning what issues we citizens are concerned with, but has already decided for us what issues are critical for us. Let us take a look at what choices they gave us, and did not give us.
Allow me to make a few general comments about each point, and invite others with different perspectives, to add their opinions.
Defend Voting Rights
Voting rights are a major issue in the United States, and must be defended. It has been consistantly true, however, that the ACLU has jumped at Republican attempts to suppress the votes of African Americans, which is a real issue, but has ignored efforts of Democrats to alter or erase votes for Republicans. The most classic case is the embrace by the ACLU of the victory of Biden in the 2020 election. We do not have any idea who won in 2020, but that massive voter fraud took place on the Democratic, and Republican, sides is an easily proven fact. The fact that Donald Trump, for all his weaknesses, was placed under house arrest on bogus charges of suffering from the mythical disease COVID-19 during the campaign was an illegal action that has never been addressed by a single Democrat, or progressive, that I know of—and I am sure the ACLU is not interested in that case.
Trump lost because the Democrats, backed by global finance, could buy off even more people. It is as simple as that.
Think what you want about Donald Trump, but the ACLU should have been all over the Democrats, not supporting and legitimizing their criminal rule.
Fight for Systematic Change to Achieve Racial Equality
The terms employed here are ambiguous, but it is clear that the ACLU is not considering the cause of the tremendous divisions between working Americans of different ethnities: campaigns funded by the power elite that use the term “race” to stir up hostility that is totally unnecessary. Of course there is real racial discrimination in the United States, but to assume that our goal should be to create racial equality, and only racial equality, without concern for who owns what, leaves us barking up the wrong tree.
The primary struggle in the United States is a class struggle and an enormous number of Americans who are classified as caucasians are the victims. In fact many Americans who are white have considerable African American DNA, and vice versa. To focus exclusively race in an artificial process without addressing class issues has led to serious abuses and poisoned the civil rights movement. The result is justified hostility among working-class people.
The ACLU decision to focus on race issues, without concern for economic and social issues, is is precisely what the multinational corporations want because such rhetoric does not threaten them but divides the public.
Protect Free Speech by Ensuring a Free Press, the Right to Protest, and Protection for Whistleblowers
Protecting free speech is essential. But what has the ACLU done for the whistleblowers who took on the 9.11 incident, Federal Reserve fraud, or the use of bogus vaccines and lockdowns (martial law) under the COVID-19 regime? Nothing. The ACLU has ignored, or even justified, this reign of terror. So free speech is only an issue when the progressive-flavored elites say it should be.
I know for a fact that friends of mine, and myself as well, have reached out to ACLU about the manner in which we suffered explicit political persecution and without exception, we were ignored, often not even having our phone calls returned. You see ACLU collects money from you, but there really is no way to go to them about your case and they have decided, precisely because they want to raise big money, that they will be silent about state crimes.
Protect Reproductive Rights
Abortion is such a divisive issue for Americans, and there are clear ethical ambiguities that may never be fully resolved, that I hesitate to make a catagoricial statement on the abortion until I have had a chance to speak to a broad range of citizens.
Addressing the conflicts, often stirred up by interest groups, surrounding abortion will require us to look at related serious contradictions in American society.
I would say, however, that the Alabama ruling on fertilized cells as humans is profoundly unscientific and also undemocratic. I would also say that although I think that access to abortion must be defended in this current environment. And only when women are protected, and guaranteed certain rights, can we talk about the most difficult aspects of abortion. We must also consider how transhumanism is employing the debate on abortion for its own dangerous goals.
I think that the ACLU needs to be clear about what it means here, but basically I support reproductive rights as defined by the ACLU.
Defend Constitutionally Protected Right to Due Process for Immigrants and Asylum Seekers
I most certainly suppport the constitution and due process for immigrants and asylum seekers. I think the statements by many politicians suggesting that we face an immigration crisis that demands an end to constitutional protections is extremely dangerous.
At the same time, we must recognize that immigrants, and especially illegal immigrants, are being used by the power elite to destroy the economy of the United States, to undermine unions, to reduce pay, and to create chaos. The violence perpetuated by these illegal immmigrants is a real threat and that those who are only concerned with the constitutional rights of immigrants, without considering this state of war between multinational corporations and citizens, alienate citizens and fail to understand the real reasons for hostility towards immigrants.
As long as the ACLU refuses to address the true story about how immigration is weaponized, it will serve primarily the agenda of the elite. Both sides of the story must be told.
Ensuring That LGBTQ People Have Equal Rights and Access to Employment, Housing, Restrooms, Businesses, and Healthcare
The term LGBTQ has no scientific basis and it has suddenly appeared in our vocabulary, forced on us by the Department of Education and other institutions without any scientific or legal justification as a way of asserting power.
I have found responding to questions about my position on LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer) to be extremely difficult.
On the one hand, I think that the government does not have a role in dictating what citizens do in the privacy of their homes.
On the other hand, it is clear that the entire culture of transgender has been radically expanded NOT as a civil rights movement to defend the rights of an oppressed minority, but as a Homeland Security operation designed to sow division and confusion among citizens, and to use sexuality, especially in the case of young people, as a tool to create uncertainity, and also induce narcissistic behavior that is intended to break up families and communities, cause unnecessary conflicts and culture wars.
The point of such Homeland Security operations is to keep citizens from forming organizations that can resist the take over of society by multinational banks and corporations. Those operations are paid for by those banks.
Allowing men who “identify” as women to enter into women’s restrooms, or play on women’s sports teams is a strategy intended to create chaos and sow devision between citizens—not to mention violence and trauma for women. It must be opposed. If the ACLU is actually protecting transgender use of restrooms, it is betraying its basic principles.
At the same time, we must recognize that there are Americans who are influenced by this culture and who accept all sorts of definitions of sexuality. We can we can argue that their identities were created intentionally to confuse and divide, but for them as individuals the identity issues are very real. We should be understanding of the confusion and uncertainty young people suffer through, by empathetic, and never be harsh and cruel to these people. Nonetheless, we must recognize that this is a political strategy, not the product of a real “radical left” but rather of organized corporate operations meant to destroy civil society.
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This article was originally published on Fear No Evil.
Emanuel Pastreich served as the president of the Asia Institute, a think tank with offices in Washington DC, Seoul, Tokyo and Hanoi. Pastreich also serves as director general of the Institute for Future Urban Environments. Pastreich declared his candidacy for president of the United States as an independent in February, 2020.
He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
Note
[1] “I like the Walrus best,’ said Alice: `because you see he was a little sorry for the poor oysters.’
`He ate more than the Carpenter, though,’ said Tweedledee. `You see he held his handkerchief in front, so that the Carpenter couldn’t count how many he took: contrariwise.’
`That was mean!’ Alice said indignantly. `Then I like the Carpenter best–if he didn’t eat so many as the Walrus.’
`But he ate as many as he could get,’ said Tweedledum.
This was a puzzler. After a pause, Alice began, `Well! They were both very unpleasant characters–”
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The Ukrainian conflict would have meant a return to the Cold War between Russia and the US and a return to the Doctrine of Containment, the foundations of which were laid out by George F. Kennan in his essay “The Sources of Soviet Behavior” published in the journal Foreign Affairs in 1947 and whose main ideas are summarized in the quote
“Soviet power is impervious to the logic of reason but very sensitive to the logic of force”.
This would include the entry of Finland and Sweden into NATO military structures and the increase of military forces with four new battalions deployed on the European border with Russia and the Russian response to the installation of missiles in Belarus Iskander-M equipped with multi-purpose warheads as well as S-40 anti-aircraft missiles following the dynamics of the Cold War (action-reaction).
We are also witnessing the fifth phase of the deployment of the anti-missile shield in Europe (Euro DAM) which began in May 2016 when the Aegis Ashore anti-ballistic defence system entered into service at the Deveselu base (Romania), just 600 km from the Crimean peninsula. For its part, Russia would have installed in Kaliningrad the missiles Iskander M equipped with multipurpose warheads as well as anti-aircraft missiles S-400 with what in the words of the political scientist Vladimir Abrámov “the province of Kaliningrad will again play the role of pistol in the temple of Europe as two decades ago” and in the event of closing NATO the exit of the Soviet enclave of Kaliningrad to the Baltic Sea, could be reissued the Kennedy-Khrushchev Missile Crisis (October, 1962) which would have as its epicenter Kaliningrad.
Is the Signing of Peace in the Ukrainian Dispute Close?
With regard to the United States, in the Democratic field, the signs of Biden’s senility, the fentanyl pandemic and high inflation would have sunk the popularity of the Democratic leader, which could facilitate the triumphant return of Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential elections by clearing his way to the White House after the latest decisions of the Supreme Cour. Consequently, a republican victory in 2024 would represent the decline of the Atlantist strategy of Biden and Soros committed to defend Putin from power, the signing of a peace agreement in Ukraine and the return to the Doctrine of Peaceful Coexistence with Russia.
Thus, after Trump’s victory we could see the signing of a Peace Agreement that establishes that Ukraine will not enter NATO and that the Ukrainian dispute is outlined with the division of Ukraine into two halves, leaving the East of the country, including Crimea, the Donbas, Zaporizhia and Kherson under Russian orbit.
Meanwhile, the Center and West of present-day Ukraine will sail under the tutelage of Poland, with which Putin will achieve total control of the Sea of Azov and Ukraine would ensure its exit to the Black Sea, while the imaginary line linking Kharkov, Zaporiyia, Bajmut and Rubizhne will become the new Berlin Wall of the Cold War 2.0.
This agreement will seek to be torpedoed by Zelensky, who will do his utmost to involve NATO in the Ukrainian conflict, so that Mr Zelensky would already be a liability for the US, which should be removed immediately, not being ruled out that he should be accused of corruption and forced into exile in the US.
Are Poland and Romania Seeking to Annex Part of Ukraine?
Poland seeks to become a local player in the Eastern European hornet’s nest and extend its influence to the Ukrainian area by claiming its right to incorporate the Ukrainian region of Lviv on the Polish map, which was occupied by Poland from 1918 to 1939.Thus, according to the director of the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) of Russia, Sergey Naryshkin in statements to RIA Novosti “the leaders of Poland intend to hold referendums in western Ukraine to achieve the annexation of the territories of Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk and most of the oblasts of Ternopil in Ukraine”.
To achieve this, Poland has suspended the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe implying that Poland “would no longer be obliged to comply with NATO provisions on limiting the size of armed forces and their deployment” and would therefore be free to occupy the Ukrainian region of Lviv and subsequently incorporate it into Poland following the signing of the future Peace Treaty between Ukraine and Russia.
Claudiu Tarziu, president of the National Board of Directors of the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR), in a speech in the Romanian city of Iasi, listed the territories that Romania should annex: the Northern Bukovina region, the Bessarabia region, the territory of Hertsa, included in the Ukrainian region of Chernovtsi, bordering with Romania, and the Ukrainian region of Transcarpathia, with which the Ukrainian cartography under control of Kiev wanted to reduced notably.
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Germán Gorraiz López is a political analyst. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
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The cause of the global increase, which is said to have sparked alarm among scientists, is hotly debated. But while improved diagnostic methods, genetic predispositions, lifestyles, and as yet unknown environmental factors have all been proposed as possible reasons, the roles of some other possible influences are essentially being ignored.
Illustrating the scale of the problem, the annual cancer incidence rate among British individuals aged between 25 and 49 has reportedly reached 162.4 cases per 100,000 people. This represents a 22 per cent increase over the figure in the 1990s.
At the global level, a study published in the BMJ Oncology journal last year revealed that, between 1990 and 2019, there was a 79 percent surge in the incidence of early-onset cancer and a 27 percent higher number of early-onset cancer deaths.
Cancers previously seen as being more common in older age groups are increasingly being diagnosed in younger adults.
Examples include breast, colorectal, esophageal, gastric, and pancreatic cancers, among others. With healthcare systems still struggling to recover from the impact of policies imposed during the COVID-19 pandemic, there is growing concern that in the years ahead, the burden on national economies will escalate still further.
The Fall in the Nutrient Content of the Global Food Supply
While diet is being discussed as a contributory cause to the rise in cancer cases, important scientific evidence that could help explain the phenomenon would appear to be being ignored.
Of particular relevance are studies conducted in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Finland, and other countries, which show that the nutrient content of the global food supply has fallen significantly over the past 70 to 80 years. The suspected causes of this include the increasing worldwide shift towards industrial forms of agriculture.
In some cases, the reduction in nutrient levels has been dramatic. Between 1951 and 1999, for example, the calcium content of broccoli in Canada fell by almost 63 percent. Similarly, the vitamin A content of Canadian broccoli fell by almost 56 percent, with the vitamin B2 content falling by almost 43 percent and the vitamin B1 content by 40 percent. Changes in nutrient levels for potatoes were also concerning, with iron and vitamin C content falling by over 57 percent, vitamin B2 by 50 percent, vitamin B3 by 45 percent and, most disturbingly of all, vitamin A by 100 percent. With similar reductions being seen in other countries, it is unthinkable that this would not result in negative health consequences.
Significantly, therefore, Dr. Matthias Rath’s Cellular Medicine research has revealed that long-term deficiencies of vitamins, minerals, and other essential nutrients are the primary cause of chronic diseases such as cancer. Based on this finding, a patented combination of nutrients has now been successfully tested against more than 55 different types of cancer cells. Cutting-edge scientific studies carried out at the Dr. Rath Research Institute have demonstrated that these nutrients are able to inhibit cancer cell invasion and metastasis, cancer cell multiplication and tumor growth, the formation of new blood vessels to feed tumors (angiogenesis), as well as induce the natural death of cancer cells (apoptosis).
Reversing the worldwide rise in cancer cases will necessitate improving global nutrient intakes. Achieving this for people of all ages could lead to a significant reduction in the overall number of cases, including those now being seen in younger people. Towards this goal, as well as encouraging and facilitating the use of science-based nutrient supplementation, governments should also consider promoting organic agriculture. Research shows that food produced organically contains higher levels of nutrients.
COVID-19 Vaccines and ‘Turbo Cancers’
Action also needs to be taken regarding the use of mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines. Research published in the Viruses journal suggests these experimental injections could significantly inhibit DNA damage repair. The effective repair of DNA – the biological software of each cell – is essential for maintaining a proper immune defense and protecting against a multitude of diseases, including cancer.
In the years ahead, far from successfully reversing the rise in cancer incidence, the continued use of these vaccines could potentially even increase the number of cases. Indeed, some observers are already linking the shots to rapidly developing so-called ‘turbo cancers.’ In this respect, with mRNA vaccine profiteer Pfizer recently making a $43 billion bet that cancer will become more prevalent in future, questions are being asked as to whether it knows something that it hasn’t disclosed. Rather than treating the pharma industry as benevolent saviors of humankind, it is time for governments to realize that reversing the cancer ‘epidemic’ also requires confronting the entities that are benefiting from it.
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The Worldwide Corona Crisis, Global Coup d’Etat Against Humanity
by Michel Chossudovsky
Michel Chossudovsky reviews in detail how this insidious project “destroys people’s lives”. He provides a comprehensive analysis of everything you need to know about the “pandemic” — from the medical dimensions to the economic and social repercussions, political underpinnings, and mental and psychological impacts.
“My objective as an author is to inform people worldwide and refute the official narrative which has been used as a justification to destabilize the economic and social fabric of entire countries, followed by the imposition of the “deadly” COVID-19 “vaccine”. This crisis affects humanity in its entirety: almost 8 billion people. We stand in solidarity with our fellow human beings and our children worldwide. Truth is a powerful instrument.”
Reviews
This is an in-depth resource of great interest if it is the wider perspective you are motivated to understand a little better, the author is very knowledgeable about geopolitics and this comes out in the way Covid is contextualized. —Dr. Mike Yeadon
In this war against humanity in which we find ourselves, in this singular, irregular and massive assault against liberty and the goodness of people, Chossudovsky’s book is a rock upon which to sustain our fight. –Dr. Emanuel Garcia
In fifteen concise science-based chapters, Michel traces the false covid pandemic, explaining how a PCR test, producing up to 97% proven false positives, combined with a relentless 24/7 fear campaign, was able to create a worldwide panic-laden “plandemic”; that this plandemic would never have been possible without the infamous DNA-modifying Polymerase Chain Reaction test – which to this day is being pushed on a majority of innocent people who have no clue. His conclusions are evidenced by renown scientists. —Peter Koenig
Professor Chossudovsky exposes the truth that “there is no causal relationship between the virus and economic variables.” In other words, it was not COVID-19 but, rather, the deliberate implementation of the illogical, scientifically baseless lockdowns that caused the shutdown of the global economy. –David Skripac
A reading of Chossudovsky’s book provides a comprehensive lesson in how there is a global coup d’état under way called “The Great Reset” that if not resisted and defeated by freedom loving people everywhere will result in a dystopian future not yet imagined. Pass on this free gift from Professor Chossudovsky before it’s too late. You will not find so much valuable information and analysis in one place. –Edward Curtin
ISBN: 978-0-9879389-3-0, Year: 2022, PDF Ebook, Pages: 164, 15 Chapters
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Recent developments suggest that Israel’s full-scale ground offensive in Rafah could take place at any time. What we have been told by Israeli officials, is that the operation will require the evacuation of the city, presumably so the IDF can inflict the same level of destruction on Rafah as was inflicted on Khan Yunis and Gaza City. Once the ground forces are deployed, the Palestinians will be forced to flee to the Egyptian border where they will seek refuge from the Israeli onslaught. What happens next is uncertain but –given the numerous meetings between Israeli and Egyptian officials and their respective Intel chiefs– we think there may be an agreement to allow over a million Palestinian refugees to cross the border into Egypt. Here are a few recent articles suggesting that Egypt may be getting paid to participate in Israel’s ethnic cleansing operation.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said on Wednesday it would increase its current loan programme with Egypt by $5 billion…. The new agreement is an expansion of the $3 billion, 46-month Extended Fund Facility that the IMF struck with Egypt in December 2022….
Egypt is also seeking a separate loan from the IMF’s Resilience and Sustainability Facility which promotes climate transition financing. Egyptian Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly said that loan would be $1.2 billion
The European Union on Sunday, March 17 announced a €7.4 billion aid package for cash-strapped Egypt as concerns mount that economic pressure and conflicts in neighboring countries could drive more migrants to European shores….
The aid package includes both grants and loans over the next three years for the Arab world’s most populous country, according to the EU’s mission in Cairo….
The deal comes amid growing concerns that Israel’s looming ground offensive on Gaza’s southernmost town of Rafah could force hundreds of thousands of people to break into Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula. The Israel-Hamas war, now in its sixth month, has pushed more than 1 million people to Rafah.
The World Bank on Monday said it would provide Egypt with over $6 billion, boosting the global bailout for the North African nation’s struggling economy to more than $50 billion in the past few weeks….
The announcement comes a day after the European Union pledged around $8 billion in aid, loans and grants. Those funds followed a newly-expanded $8 billion International Monetary Fund program that was unveiled hours after authorities enacted the nation’s biggest rate hike ever and devalued the currency for the fourth time since early 2022.
Obviously, heaping billions of dollars of loans on a debt-ridden nation whose moribund economy shows no sign of a rebound, is not normal procedure. One can only conclude that the money is being offered for some alternate purpose, that is, to deal with the surge of refugees that will soon be pouring over the border. But, if these articles have not yet convinced readers that the Egyptian government is in cahoots with Israel, then perhaps this March 23 column will:
The European Commission is officially sidelining the European Parliament’s scrutiny role when it comes to €1bn of loans being sent to Egypt. The announcement came ahead of a €7.4bn cash-for-migration-control agreement with Cairo, posing tricky questions for an increasingly frustrated European Parliament.
European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen says, in a letter dated 15 March and seen by EUobserver, that the urgency of wiring the money to Cairo requires her to bypass the assembly. She has since decided to trigger article 213 in the EU treaty, allowing the European Commission to go at it alone.
“For reasons of utmost urgency and highly exceptionally, the recourse to of Article 213 TFEU is considered as appropriate legal basis for the first operation of EUR 1 billion,” she writes, in a letter sent to European Parliament president, Roberta Metsola..
Why would the president of the European Commission feel such an unbearable sense of urgency over the dodgy finances of a failed state in east Africa? And why did Ms. von der Leyen chose to ignore the limits of her legal authority by wiring the funds to Cairo without first acquiring the approval of the assembly?
If all of this seems rather unusual, it’s because it is. Political powerbrokers across the West are doing whatever they can to assist Israel in its plan to ethnically cleanse Palestine. Ms. von der Leyen is just one of the contributors to this malign project but there are others as well. The point we are trying to make is that Israel’s destruction of Gaza and the herding of its population towards the southern border is part of a broader plan that has many moving parts and many powerful players. Israeli leaders know what it takes to carry off an operation like this because they have conducted similar operations in the past as this excerpt from an article at Counterpunch helps to illustrate:
Ethnic cleansing was and remains integral to the Zionist project…
In order to create a Jewish state in Palestine the Zionists had to create an overwhelming Jewish majority…. Nazi Germany helped by driving out Jews from Europe… but there still existed no realistic prospect anytime soon of creating an overwhelming Jewish majority by attracting Jewish settlers….
Israel’s first round of ethnic cleansing began in 1947, intensified in 1948, and continued into 1949. Altogether, 720,000 Palestinians, some eighty percent of the Palestinians in the territories occupied by Jewish/Israeli forces, were expelled during this period; this amounted to half the Arab population of mandatory Palestine.
Israel engaged in a second round of ethnic cleansing during and after the capture in June 1967 of the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem… Palestinians who were present in the Occupied Territories but were not counted in an Israeli census after the June War were denied the right of residence in Israel…. by these and other means, Israel had ethnically cleansed one-fifth of the Palestinians in the occupied territories.
In the decades following the June 1967 War, Israel made life increasingly difficult for the Palestinians in the occupied territories…. Between 1970 and 2000 the population of the West Bank and Gaza tripled, increasing from one million to three million. Inside its de factor borders, Israel now contained 4.1 million Palestinians and 5 million Jews. This was ringing alarm bells. Something had to be done about this…. Postscripts on Israel: October 7 Surprise?, M. Shahid Alam, Counterpunch
What we can infer from this excerpt is that the expulsion of Palestinians from Gaza is not aimed at quashing terrorism but at changing the demographic make-up of the area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. The fact is that one cannot preserve a Jewish-majority state without a clear Jewish majority. By annexing the occupied territories of Gaza and the West Bank, Israel will dramatically increase the number of Arabs within its borders putting that core principle at risk. Here’s more from the same article:
Israel’s Jewish population grew tenfold between 1948 and 2023, increasing from 717,000 to 7,181,000. Nearly half the world’s Jewish population now lives in Israel.
Yet Israel has not been winning the demographic race. In 2023, the Palestinians outnumbered the Jews in historic Palestine—7.4 million Palestinians versus 7.1 million Jews…. Postscripts on Israel: October 7 Surprise?, M. Shahid Alam, Counterpunch
Israel’s military operation in Gaza is merely a response to a demographic problem that has bedeviled Israeli leaders since the inception of the Jewish state. In light of that fact, we can see that Hamas is just the pretext that’s being used to conceal the motive driving the hostilities. In truth, it wouldn’t matter if the Palestinians were Hispanic, Asian or Scots-Irish. If their numbers threatened to exceed those of the Jewish majority, their fate would be the same.
Naturally, the de facto annexation of additional Arab territory poses a numerical challenge for which there is ultimately only one solution; ethnic cleansing. And while the formulation has been repeatedly repackaged to sound less oppressive, (transfer, evacuation, resettlement, voluntary migration) the practice remains the same. (Ethnic Cleansing def– The mass expulsion or killing of members of one ethnic or religious group in an area by those of another. Oxford) Here are a few recent iterations on the same theme:
In a document from October 17, 2023, Israels’ Intelligence Ministry, examined the option of ‘evacuating’ the Gazans to the Sinai, and claimed that this would “yield positive, long-term strategic outcomes for Israel.”….
An Israeli think tank, the Misgav Institute, also made a similar pitch. It argued that the conditions in Gaza offered “a unique and rare opportunity to evacuate the whole Gaza Strip and its coordination with the Egyptian government.”….
Jonathan Adler, a Hurford Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, writing on December 31, 2023, asserts that “today there is a growing momentum [in Israel] to carry out mass transfer—with American support.” Some Israeli politicians and officials—including a former Brigadier General and a former Israeli ambassador to the United States—“suggest that Palestinians should flee Gaza through the Rafah border crossing with Egypt and seek refuge in the Sinai Peninsula…
On October 20, the White House asked Congress for funds to “address potential needs of Gazans fleeing to neighboring countries.” If the White House was preparing to finance the ethnic cleansing of Gazans, it is unlikely that this happened without prior discussions with Israel and Egypt. Did these discussions happen before October 7?… Counterpunch
Clearly, what Israel wants a Palestine without the Palestinians, and in the last six months they have done everything in their power to achieve just that. Now that the goal is within their grasp, they will do anything –even jeopardize relations with their most important ally– to reach their objective. That is why on Wednesday “Netanyahu said that Israel “had no choice” but to move into Rafah as the country’s “very existence is on the line.” In truth, Israel is in no danger at all, Netanyahu is merely trying to conceal the real aim of Israel’s ground offensive which is to exile over a million Palestinians into Egypt. According to a report in CNN:
Netanyahu had earlier told the delegation that displaced Palestinians in Gaza could “just move” out of Rafah and “move with their tents.”
“Move with their tents”?
So, now, Netanyahu is admitting what his critics have been saying from the very beginning, that Israel’s military onslaught is actually an ethnic cleansing operation aimed at pushing the Palestinians out of Gaza and into tent cities in the Sinai Desert?
It appears so, and it also looks like Egypt is going along with the plan. According to the Guardian:
Egypt has begun building an enclosed area ringed with high concrete walls along its border with Gaza that appears intended to house Palestinians fleeing a threatened Israeli assault on the southern city of Rafah.
Photos and videos released by the Sinai Foundation for Human Rights (SFHR), a monitoring group, show workers using heavy machinery erecting concrete barriers and security towers around a strip of land on the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing….
Everything from the clearing of land in the Sinai desert to the issuance of humongous loans to Egypt, to the secret meetings of Intel chiefs in Doha (CIA, Mossad, Egypt’s General Intelligence) to the blustery pronouncements of Israeli officials, to the frenetic leapfrogging of Anthony Blinken from Jedda to Jerusalem to Doha to Cairo and back again, suggests that we are about to begin the final phase of Israel’s malignant ethnic cleansing operation. Here’s how Johnathan Adler at the Carnegie Endowment summed it up:
….. it is becoming increasingly clear that the war is in pursuit of a second goal: the mass expulsion of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip. Israeli politicians and officials from the Israeli defense establishment have called for a second Nakba and urged the military to flatten Gaza. Some suggest that Palestinians should flee Gaza through the Rafah border crossing with Egypt and seek refuge in the Sinai Peninsula, including former Brigadier General Amir Avivi and the former Israeli ambassador to the United States Danny Ayalon.
Avivi and Ayalon insist that evacuating Palestinians out of Gaza is simply a humanitarian measure, protecting civilians while Israel conducts its military operations. But other reports suggest that Palestinians would be permanently resettled outside of Gaza, in an act of ethnic cleansing….
Today’s plans for mass transfer thus bear a closer historical resemblance to the 1948 Nakba and its aftermath. After 200,000 Palestinian refugees had fled from historic Palestine to Gaza by March 1949, the United States pushed for a UN proposal to resettle tens of thousands in the Sinai desert….
Over the past few weeks, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi has resisted Israeli and American pressure to allow Palestinians to evacuate through Rafah into the Sinai… But in exchange for accepting Palestinians from Gaza, the US has reportedly offered Cairo economic incentives at a time when Egypt faces an extreme debt crisis…. South into the Sinai: Will Israel Force Palestinians Out of Gaza?, Carnegie Endowment
In all probability, there’s nothing that can be done to prevent Israel’s flattening of Rafah or the inevitable eviction of the Palestinians from their last refuge. The only hope is that the international community will condemn Israel’s illegal occupation of Gaza by imposing painful economic, political and military sanctions that will last until the land is returned to its rightful owners. That is not sufficient restitution for the death and suffering the Palestinians have endured over the last half century, but it’s a step in the right direction.
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This article was originally published on The Unz Review.
Michael Whitney is a renowned geopolitical and social analyst based in Washington State. He initiated his career as an independent citizen-journalist in 2002 with a commitment to honest journalism, social justice and World peace.
He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).
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As a cardiologist, my two greatest fears concerning COVID-19 vaccine myocarditis are: 1) sudden cardiac death, 2) permanent damage to the heart resulting in scar.
The reason why scar is important is because it puts the patient at risk for two late complications: 1) malignant arrhythmias and cardiac arrest, 2) development of dilated cardiomyopathy and heart failure.
In clinical practice I have observed a few patients with small areas of damage (<15% of the left ventricle with late gadolinium enhancement) return to normal on follow-up cardiac MRI. However I remain concerned about patients with larger areas of damage.
Warren and colleagues studied patients with COVID-19 vaccine myocarditis with serial MRI data and the following abstract results:
“Sixty-seven patients with C-VAM (mean age 30 ± 13 years, 72% male) underwent CMR evaluation. Median time from vaccination to CMR was 548 (range 398-603) days. Twenty patients (30%) had persistent LGE, most frequently found in the basal inferolateral segment (n = 11). At diagnosis, nine patients (13%) were classified as definite and 58 (87%) as probable myocarditis. With integration of CMR LGE data, 16 patients (28%) were reclassified from probable to definite myocarditis. Persistent LGE on CMR occurs in one third of patients with C-VAM. Without CMR at diagnosis, almost one third of patients are misclassified as probable rather than definite myocarditis.”
However, it was Table 3 that caught my eye—particularly those with baseline and follow up MRI scans completed out to 556 days.
Apparently 47% of this small sample had persistently abnormal MRI scans far more than a year after the initial diagnosis of vaccine damage. These patients may have permanently scarred hearts by COVID-19 vaccination and could have a lifetime of worry about severe outcomes years into the future.
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Featured image is from Mercola
The Worldwide Corona Crisis, Global Coup d’Etat Against Humanity
by Michel Chossudovsky
Michel Chossudovsky reviews in detail how this insidious project “destroys people’s lives”. He provides a comprehensive analysis of everything you need to know about the “pandemic” — from the medical dimensions to the economic and social repercussions, political underpinnings, and mental and psychological impacts.
“My objective as an author is to inform people worldwide and refute the official narrative which has been used as a justification to destabilize the economic and social fabric of entire countries, followed by the imposition of the “deadly” COVID-19 “vaccine”. This crisis affects humanity in its entirety: almost 8 billion people. We stand in solidarity with our fellow human beings and our children worldwide. Truth is a powerful instrument.”
Reviews
This is an in-depth resource of great interest if it is the wider perspective you are motivated to understand a little better, the author is very knowledgeable about geopolitics and this comes out in the way Covid is contextualized. —Dr. Mike Yeadon
In this war against humanity in which we find ourselves, in this singular, irregular and massive assault against liberty and the goodness of people, Chossudovsky’s book is a rock upon which to sustain our fight. –Dr. Emanuel Garcia
In fifteen concise science-based chapters, Michel traces the false covid pandemic, explaining how a PCR test, producing up to 97% proven false positives, combined with a relentless 24/7 fear campaign, was able to create a worldwide panic-laden “plandemic”; that this plandemic would never have been possible without the infamous DNA-modifying Polymerase Chain Reaction test – which to this day is being pushed on a majority of innocent people who have no clue. His conclusions are evidenced by renown scientists. —Peter Koenig
Professor Chossudovsky exposes the truth that “there is no causal relationship between the virus and economic variables.” In other words, it was not COVID-19 but, rather, the deliberate implementation of the illogical, scientifically baseless lockdowns that caused the shutdown of the global economy. –David Skripac
A reading of Chossudovsky’s book provides a comprehensive lesson in how there is a global coup d’état under way called “The Great Reset” that if not resisted and defeated by freedom loving people everywhere will result in a dystopian future not yet imagined. Pass on this free gift from Professor Chossudovsky before it’s too late. You will not find so much valuable information and analysis in one place. –Edward Curtin
ISBN: 978-0-9879389-3-0, Year: 2022, PDF Ebook, Pages: 164, 15 Chapters
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16 Lebanese have died from Israeli airstrikes on the south of Lebanon since March 27. The first strike was on Hebbarieh, where seven young paramedic volunteers died, in the second attack five died at Tair Harfa, of which three were Hezbollah paramedics, and then an attack on Naqoura killed four, of which two were paramedics from the Amal Movement.
Seven young medical volunteers were killed in an Israeli airstrike on Hebbarieh. The Islamic Emergency and Relief Corps operate a medical center in the Sunni village of 2,000 inhabitants which has never before been targeted by Israel. There had been ten persons earlier at the center, and after some left, the center was hit in a massive airstrike that residents recalled as being similar to an earthquake. The volunteer medical crew were all young, with the oldest of the dead just 25 yrs.
The center was run by the Jamaa Islamiya (Islamic Group), a Sunni Muslim group affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood which had been established as a Lebanese political party over 50 years ago.
Sheikh Mohammed Takkoush, the Secretary-General of the Islamic Group, said coordination with Hezbollah, the Shiite resistance organization, is vital to fight Israel.
The Muslim Brotherhood is a global organization with a very heavy presence in America and Great Britain. US President Barak Obama was particularly closely affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood and elevated the group to an ally status when he used their armed fighters as foot-soldiers in his project to overthrow the Syrian government.
Senator Ted Cruz of Texas has brought forward several legislative bills aimed at outlawing the Muslim Brotherhood in the US, but he has not had support from the US Congress.
Usually, Israel strikes Hezbollah and Shiite targets in Lebanon, but this marks a first for Hebbarieh. The village elder reported at least ten houses had been destroyed in the attack, along with numerous cars which were burnt.
The south of Lebanon is home to Christians, Sunnis, Druze and Shiites. During the Israeli occupation of Lebanon, 1985-2000, all the various religious communities suffered equally under the brutal Israeli military regime, which saw even women and children imprisoned at al-Haim prison. After the Israelis left in 2000, the prison was opened as a museum and memorial to the torture and suffering the Lebanese endured for decades. In the summer 2006 Israeli war on Lebanon, the prison was completely destroyed by Israeli airstrikes in an effort to erase the evidence of crimes against humanity committed there.
Hezbollah released a statement condemning Israel’s heinous criminal aggression, and pointed out that the center targeted was a medical center serving families in the village.
Other health centers in the south are operated by Hezbollah’s Islamic Health Society, and the Amal Movement’s Risala Scouts, whose medical teams have carried out the majority of rescue missions since the war broke out in southern Lebanon in October.
Progressive Socialist Party (PSP), and Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, condemned the Israeli airstrike on the medical volunteers in Hebbarieh calling it a heinous crime. Jumblatt called the attack a massacre that goes against all international laws, and called for an urgent complaint to the UN Security Council. Jumblatt is well known for his close relationship with America.
Wael Abou Faour, Member of Parliament representing the PSP, described the attack as a “mass crime” against humanitarian workers.
The Amal Movement referred to it as a massacre, and a war crime committed by Israel. The movement also said that the international community could no longer remain silent or turn a blind eye to what the Israeli war machine is committing in Palestine and Lebanon, considering these acts to be tantamount to crimes against humanity.
Nabieh Berri, the leader of the Amal Movement, and has held the office of Speaker of the Parliament for decades. He is an American citizen of Lebanese birth, having lived in the US previously. His movement is allied strategically with Hezbollah, which is also a political party which won through open elections seats in the Lebanese Parliament.
The American media paints Lebanon as a country under the domination of an armed group, Hezbollah. However, Lebanon is home to many resistance groups, who may be from different religions, or political parties, but all hold the same passionate view towards Israel: that the occupation of Palestine must end, and Israel must end the occupation of Lebanese territory in Shebaa Farms. The armed resistance to occupation is guaranteed to all peoples by the Geneva convention.
Tair Harfa Attack
Israel bombed Tair Harfa after sunset on March 27, killing five, three of whom were Islamic Health Society paramedics. The president of the Tair Harfa municipal council, Qassem Haidar, said that the Israeli airstrike targeted a house in the village, completely destroying it.
Naqoura Massacre
Naqoura is a small city in southern Lebanon. Since March 23, 1978, the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) has been headquartered in Naqoura.
Israel bombed Naqoura shortly after the Tair Harfa attack. Two paramedics from the Risala Scouts were killed along with three others at a café as they were about to break their fast in the Holy month of Ramadan.
The Amal Movement announced the death of two of its members: Ali Ahmad Mahdi, and first responder Hussein Ahmad Hojeir. Both men were from Naqoura and were killed in the Israeli attack.
Nearly 240 Hezbollah resistance fighters and about 40 civilians have died in Lebanon, while the cross-border exchanges of fire have killed nine civilians and 11 soldiers in Israel.
Israeli strikes on southern Lebanon had already killed more than half a dozen medical personnel and rescue workers, according to Lebanon’s health ministry.
Other Israeli Strikes on Lebanon
Israeli artillery shelling targeted the outskirts of the town of Mais al-Jabal and shelled the town of Blida in the Marjayoun district.
Heavy Israeli artillery fire targeted the outskirts of Adaisseh, with two Israeli artillery shells falling east of the village of Taybeh, and the Israeli army fired with machine guns at residential neighborhoods in the village of Kfar Kila and the outskirts of Odaisseh, also an Israeli drone fired a missile on a House in Dhaira, Sour district, but the explosive failed to detonate.
Hezbollah Strikes Back
In response to the recent deadly attacks on southern Lebanon, Hezbollah fired dozens of rockets at the northern Israeli city of Kiryat Shmona and the military base of the Israeli 769th Brigade in the Kiryat Shmona barracks, which killed one person.
Hezbollah also said they fired on surveillance equipment at the Israeli site of Miskav Am, opposite the Lebanese village of Adaisseh.
More than 32,000 people have been killed in Gaza and 74,000 wounded, women and children make up two-thirds of the dead. Hezbollah, and many other resistance groups, are standing in solidarity with the suffering Palestinian people.
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Soldiers in uniforms round up civilians at gunpoint. They separate the men from the women and children. The men are stripped naked and blindfolded, then taken into a room by the soldiers, gunshots are heard, and finally only the soldiers emerge from the room. The scene, panic, terror and brutality remind us of the Nazi abuse of Jews in the holocaust. But, this time it is the Jews who are killing and abusing, having learned nothing of humanity from their past suffering.
The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) entered Al Shifa Hospital in northern Gaza city on March 18 and have claimed to have made 500 arrests. Doctors and nurses are made to be guides to the 500 IDF invading soldiers as they search the hospital and torture their victims. Patients, their families and medical staff have been forced to stand outside the hospital as human shields, protecting the IDF from resistance to the occupation of the hospital, while 250 people have been killed by the IDF since entering the hospital.
Although most of those arrested were males, in some cases they did arrest mothers and their children. When the women and children became unnecessary to the IDF goals, they forced them to walk long distances to the south without and water or food for days. When they finally arrived in the south, some were near death from dehydration and the children starving.
Al Shifa is the largest medical complex in Gaza. It began as a British Army barracks, and over the decades of use as a hospital, areas were added on and in the 1980’s Israel constructed underground bunkers which included a tunnel system.
The hospital was first attacked and raided on November 15, 2023, with the UN, WHO and other humanitarian organizations condemning the attack which caused the deaths of patients and premature babies. The IDF claimed the Al Shifa hospital was being used by Hamas as a command center, and pointed to the Israeli built tunnels under the hospital as having supported Hamas and its resistance fighters. Despite the IDF’s incessant accusation, the Washington Post and Amnesty International both said there was no credible evidence to support the IDF’s claim.
Since then, the hospital has been under intermittent attack by the IDF, culminating in the recent invasion and occupation of the hospital which has resulted in mass arrests, executions, sexual abuse, humiliation of innocent civilians, deprivation of both water and food, and the attack on civilian homes near the hospital.
The IDF goal was to justify their claim that Al Shifa served as a Hamas asset. If they couldn’t find the evidence they needed, they could manufacture the proof they sought. The IDF needed to arrest hundreds of men and claim they were Hamas resistance fighters, or their allies. The hospital was sheltering 30,000 people, and many were men accompanied by their families. But, the IDF needed more men, so they began attacking the homes surrounding the hospital, and then invading the homes and removing the males found to add to their list of fighters they were creating
One family in a nearby house hunkered down and tried to survive by hiding in a small room, while the father of the large family would crawl to the kitchen to find anything to feed his children. Then the house began to fall apart after days of shelling, which allowed the IDF to invade the home and remove the man, blindfolded and naked. This was repeated among the neighborhood.
Gaza is a conservative society, and men and women wear clothes to cover themselves up as a sign of respect of themselves, their family and their society. Whereas in the West, going shirtless and in very short shorts might be acceptable, in Gaza it is not. The IDF stripped arrested men to their under pants alone and sent them to the neighboring houses near Al Shifa to warn residents they had 30 minutes to evacuate or die in the bombing.
The eye witness accounts are coming out of Gaza about severe sexual abuse by the IDF. Females have reported being raped by IDF soldiers in a gang rape scene, as well as alone in front of their fathers, brothers or husband. In the religious and conservative society of Gaza, these crimes will be hushed up, swept under the rug, in an effort by male members of the family to preserve the honor and dignity of the victim. However, this leaves the victim to deal with the trauma of sexual abuse alone, and without a support system that gets the facts into the light of day. The abuse and trauma are magnified because she can’t talk about it. But, many women and girls are defying the taboos and telling their story to humanitarian workers.
There are no foreign journalists in Gaza. The one and only foreign journalist who was granted a Visa to go inside Gaza by the Israelis was CNN’s Clarissa Ward, and she was only allowed several hours in December. Despite the bombardment and siege of Gaza, emails, Facebook messages and Whatsapp messages and videos continue to emerge from the battle zone.
Al Shifa hospital’s current nightmare is but one of many healthcare service providers in Gaza who have been under siege. Food and medicine had been going into Gaza in a slow trickle, but now the doors are shut and sealed. Israel refuses to allow any UN trucks into Gaza after they claimed the UNRWA is in a conspiracy with Hamas. Other humanitarian aid groups say their aid is also prevented from entering Gaza.
More than 32,200 Palestinians have since been killed and over 74,500 injured amid mass destruction and shortages of necessities.
The international community agrees that only a ceasefire along with massive aid distribution can save Gaza from genocide and starvation. Yesterday, the UN Security Council passed a non-binding resolution calling for a ceasefire for the remainder of the month of Ramadan. But, will Israel comply? The International Court of Justice gave Israel an instruction to improve the humanitarian aid into Gaza or face an ultimate ruling by the court of genocide. However, Israel until now has completely disregarded the court’s urging.
In the end, only US President joe Biden holds the keys to turning off the IDF war machine in Gaza. Only Biden has the power to cut off the weapons flow to Israel. But, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has stood firm on his promise to invade Rafah, whether it causes mass deaths beyond comprehension, or not. Will Netanyahu enter Rafah in defiance of Biden and the UN? If he does, will Biden turn on the red-light?
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Rarely has the International Court of Justice been so constantly exercised by one topic during a short span of time. On January 26, the World Court, considering a filing made the previous December by South Africa, accepted Pretoria’s argument that the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was applicable to the conflict in so far as Israel was bound to observe it in its military operations against Hamas in Gaza. (The judges will determine, in due course, whether Israel’s actions in Gaza meet the genocidal threshold.) By 15-2, the judges noted that “the catastrophic humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip is at serious risk of deteriorating further before the Court renders its final judgment.”
At that point 26,000 Palestinians had perished, much of Gaza pummelled into oblivion, and 85% of its 2.3 million residents expelled from their homes. Measures were therefore required to prevent “real and imminent risk that irreparable prejudice will be caused to the rights found by the Court to be plausible, before it gives its final decision.”
Israel was duly ordered to take all possible measures to prevent the commission of acts under Article II of the Genocide Convention; prevent and punish “the direct and public incitement to genocide” against the Gaza populace; permit basic services and humanitarian assistance to the Gaza Strip; ensure the preservation of, and prevent destruction of, evidence related to acts committed against Gaza’s Palestinians within Articles II and III of the Convention; and report to the ICJ on how Israel was abiding by such provisional measures within a month. The balance sheet on that score has been uneven at best.
Since then, the slaughter has continued, with the Palestinian death toll now standing at 32,300. The Israelis have refused to open more land crossings into Gaza, and continue to hamper aid going into the strip, even as they accuse aid agencies and providers of being tardy and dishonest. Their surly defiance of the United States has seen air drops of uneven, negligible success (the use of air to deliver aid has always been a perilous exercise). When executed, these have even been lethal to the unsuspecting recipients, with reported cases of parachutes failing to open.
On March 25, the UN Security Council, after three previous failed attempts, passed Resolution 2728, thereby calling for an immediate ceasefire for the month of Ramadan “leading to a lasting sustainable” halt to hostilities, the “immediate and unconditional release of all hostages”, “ensuring humanitarian access to address their medical and other humanitarian needs” and “demands that the parties comply with their obligations under international law in relation to all persons they detain”.
Emphasis was also placed on “the urgent need to expand the flow of humanitarian assistance to and reinforce the protection of civilians in the entire Gaza Strip”. The resolution further demands that all barriers regarding the provision of humanitarian assistance, in accordance with international humanitarian law be lifted.
Since January, South Africa has been relentless in its efforts to curb Israel’s Gaza enterprise in The Hague. It called upon the ICJ on February 14, referring to “the developing circumstances in Rafah”, to urgently exercise powers under Article 75 of the Rules of Court. Israel responded on February 15. The next day, the ICJ’s Registrar transmitted to the parties the view of the Court that the “perilous situation” in the Gaza Strip, but notably in Rafah, “demands immediate and effective implementation of the provisional measures indicated by the Court in its Order of 26 January 2024”.
Throughout the following month, more legal jostling and communication took place, with Pretoria requesting on March 6 that the ICJ “indicate further provisional measures and/or to modify” those ordered on January 26. The application was prompted by the “horrific deaths from starvation of Palestinian children, including babies, brought about by Israel’s deliberate acts and omissions … including Israel’s concerted attempts since 26 January 2024 to ensure the defunding of [the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) and Israel’s attacks on starving Palestinians seeking to access what extremely limited humanitarian assistance Israel permits into Northern Gaza, in particular”.
Israel responded on March 15 to the South African communication, rejecting the claims of starvation arising from deliberate acts and omissions “in the strongest terms”. The logic of the sketchy rebuttal from Israel was that matters had not materially altered since January 26 to warrant a reconsideration: “the difficult and tragic situation in the Gaza Strip in the last weeks could not be said to materially change the considerations upon which the Court based its original decision concerning provisional measures.”
On March 28, the Court issued a unanimous order modifying the January interim order. Combing through the ghoulish evidence, the judges noted an updated report from March 18 on food insecurity from the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification Global Initiative (IPC Global Initiative) stating that “conditions necessary to prevent Famine have not been met and the latest evidence confirms that Famine is imminent in the northern governorates and projected to occur anytime between mid-March and May 2024.” The UN Children’s Fund had also reported that 31 per cent of children under 2 years of age in the northern Gaza Strip were enduring conditions of “acute malnutrition”.
In the face of this Himalaya of devastation, the Court could only observe “that Palestinians in Gaza are no longer facing a risk of famine, as noted in the Order of 26 January 2024, but that famine is setting in, with at least 31 people, including 27 children, having already died of malnutrition and dehydration”. There were “unprecedented levels of food insecurity experienced by Palestinians in the Gaza strip over recent weeks, as well as the increasing risks of epidemics.”
Such “grave” conditions granted the Court jurisdiction to modify the January 26 order which no longer fully addressed “the consequences arising from the changes in the situation”. In view of the “worsening conditions of life faced by Palestinians in Gaza, in particular the spread of famine and starvation”, Israel should take “all necessary and effective measures to ensure, without delay, in full cooperation with the United Nations, the unhindered provision at scale by all concerned of urgently needed basic services and humanitarian assistance”.
The list of what is needed is also enumerated: food, water, electricity, fuel, shelter, clothing, hygiene, sanitation requirements, and “medical supplies and medical care to Palestinians throughout Gaza, including by increasing the capacity and number of land crossing points and maintaining them open for as long as necessary”.
A less reported aspect of the March 28 order, passed by fifteen votes to one, was that Israel’s military refrain from committing “acts which constitute a violation of any rights of the Palestinians in Gaza as a protected group” under the Genocide Convention “including by preventing, through any action, the delivery of urgently needed humanitarian assistance.”
In this, the Court points to the possible, and increasingly plausible nexus, between starvation, famine and deprivation of necessaries as state policies with the intent to injure and kill members of a protected group. It is no doubt something that will weigh heavily on the minds of the judges as they continue mulling over the nature of the war in Gaza, which South Africa continues to insist is genocidal in scope and nature.
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Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He currently lectures at RMIT University. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). Email: [email protected]
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Two legal cases posing globe-spanning threats to our most basic freedoms unfolded separately in Britain and the Netherlands this week. Neither received more than perfunctory coverage in western establishment media like the BBC.
One was the last-ditch appeal of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange in London against efforts by the United States to extradite him so he can be locked away for the rest of his life.
Assange’s crime, according to the Biden administration, is that he published leaks exposing the systematic war crimes signed off on by the US and British establishments in Iraq and Afghanistan. The British government, perhaps not surprisingly, has assented to his extradition.
The other case was heard by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague. Weeks after the World Court judges deemed it plausible that Israel was carrying out genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, the US client state was back in the dock on a separate matter.
The judges have been asked by the United Nations General Assembly to provide an advisory opinion on whether Israel’s now-permanent occupation and colonisation of the Palestinian territories amounts to an illegal annexation of territory where it has established an apartheid regime.
Separately, Israel also has to report back on whether it has adhered to the court’s earlier ruling that it cease activities that might amount to genocide.
While the cases of Assange and Israel might appear to share little in common, they are, in fact, intimately connected – and in ways that have underscored the degree to which the West’s so-called “rules-based order” is being exposed as a hollow sham.
Media Silence
One telling similarity is the limited media coverage each case has attracted despite the gravity of what is at stake. The BBC’s main evening news dedicated mere seconds to the first day of the Assange hearing, and near the end of its running order.
If the US gets its way, the courts would effectively hand the White House the power to seize any publisher who shines a light on US state crimes, and then disappear them into its draconian incarceration system.
The purpose of reclassifying investigative journalism as espionage is to further chill critical reporting and free speech. Any journalist contemplating taking on the US national security state would remember Assange’s cruel fate.
But in truth, much of the establishment media appears to need no such threats, as confirmed by the many years of obedient, near-non-existent reporting on Assange’s mistreatment by British and US authorities.
Meanwhile, if The Hague rules in its favour, Israel would be emboldened to accelerate its theft and colonisation of Palestinian land. The ethnic cleansing and oppression of Palestinians would deepen, with the risk that current regional tensions could further escalate into a wider war.
A win for Israel would rip up the legal framework written after the horrors of the Second World War and the Holocaust, stripping the weak and vulnerable of the protections supposed to be afforded to them by international humanitarian law. Conversely, it would signal to the strongest and most belligerent that they can do as they please.
The legal clock would be set back eight decades or more.
Stinging Hypocrisy
Yet strangely, both of these momentous cases – critical to the preservation of a modern liberal democratic order and the rule of law – have received barely a fraction of the interest and media attention dedicated to the death of Alexei Navalny, a critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
In flaunting their concerns about Navalny, the western media have once again echoed rather than tackled the all-too-obvious hypocrisies of western governments.
US President Joe Biden this week announced sanctions against Moscow for the targeting of the Russian political dissident. That is the very same Biden seeking, at the same time, to lock a dissident Australian journalist, Assange, out of sight for up to 175 years for bringing to light US war crimes.
For years, the western media have paraded their horror over Navalny’s treatment and various attempts on his life, which they always ascribe to the Kremlin. But there has been barely an eyebrow raised over reported discussions by the CIA in 2017 plotting potential ways to abduct and assassinate Assange.
Few have highlighted the fact that Assange has already suffered a stroke amid his persecution and the 15-year confinement imposed on him by US and UK authorities. He was too unwell to attend this week’s court hearings or even to watch the proceedings via a digital link from the court.
The former UN special rapporteur on torture, Nils Melzer, has long warned that Assange is being slowly “crushed” through isolation and psychological torture, with grave consequences for his health.
Assange’s lawyers warned the High Court in London this week that there was a serious danger the US would add more charges once Assange was extradited, including ones warranting the death penalty. This threat to the life of a western journalist fell under the media radar.
According to medical experts, and accepted by the first judge to hear the extradition case, Assange is in danger of committing suicide should he end up in the strict isolation of a US super-max prison.
The media’s tears for Navalny sting with their hypocrisy.
Blank Cheque
Another revealing similarity between the Assange and Israel cases is that both are in front of the courts only because Washington has dug in its heels and refused to resolve the legal issues, despite their deeply ominous implications.
Were the US to withdraw its extradition request, Assange could be set free immediately. The oppressive cloud hanging over the future of a free society, one that has the right and ability to hold its officials to account for wrongdoing, would instantly lift.
Basic freedoms, such as those enshrined in the First Amendment of the US Constitution, are being shredded only because a consensus reigns among the US political class – from Democrats to Republicans – to snuff out such rights.
Similarly, were the US to insist that the mass slaughter of children in Gaza stop – more than 12,000 have died so far – Israel’s guns would fall silent immediately.
Were it to demand that Israel bring to an end its occupation of the Palestinian territories and 17-year siege of Gaza, and were the US to take a genuinely even-handed approach to peace talks, the World Court could set aside its hearings against Israel. Its opinion would be superfluous.
Washington, whatever its protestations, has such power. It is the US and its allies supplying Israel with bombs and ammunition. It is the US and its allies providing the military aid and diplomatic cover that allows Israel to act as an attack dog in the oil-rich Middle East.
Israel’s intransigence, its hunger for others’ land, its dehumanisation of the Palestinian people, and its constant resort to military options would have to be abandoned, however unwillingly, were it not being written a blank cheque by the US.
Instead, the US cast a veto this week at the Security Council, blocking efforts to impose a ceasefire to end the genocide. The UK abstained.
Also this week, US officials told the World Court’s judges they should not call for Israel to end its occupation anytime soon. In Orwellian fashion, decades of violent oppression by Israel and the illegal settlement of Palestinian land were characterised by the US as “Israel’s very real security needs”.
Intimidation Campaign
The cases are connected in yet another way.
In the Assange case, the US demands an absolute global legal jurisdiction to hound critics, those who wish to pull away the veil of secrecy that shields western officials from accountability for their crimes.
It wishes to silence those who would expose its lies, deceptions and hypocrisies. It hopes to be able to disappear into its prison system those seeking to enforce the West’s self-professed commitment to a democratic order and lawful behaviour.
In parallel, and for similar reasons, Washington demands the opposite for itself and client states such as Israel. It insists on absolute global legal immunity, whatever they do.
Its veto at the Security Council is wielded to that effect, and so is its campaign of intimidation against judicial authorities who entertain the fanciful notion that the same international law used to rein in enemies might constrain Washington and its allies.
Israel’s legal team at the ICJ (Source: Al Jazeera)
When the ICJ’s sister court at The Hague, the International Criminal Court, sought to properly investigate the US for war crimes in Afghanistan, and Israel for atrocities in the occupied Palestinian territories, Washington went on a rampage.
It placed financial sanctions on leading figures of the ICC and blocked entry to its investigators so they could not carry out their duties. Israel has similarly barred a series of UN special rapporteurs from entering the occupied Palestinian territories to report on human rights abuses there.
Just as the persecution of Assange is meant to terrorise other journalists from considering holding US officials to account for their crimes, the bullying of the highest legal authorities on the planet is intended to send a clear message to national court systems. Certainly, that message appears to have been loudly received in London.
Information Void
Another connection is perhaps the most significant. Assange once observed: “Nearly every war that has started in the past 50 years has been a result of media lies.”
It is only because of a void of real information – whether omitted by journalists for fear of upsetting powerful actors, or shielded from view by those same powerful actors’ self-serving secrecy policies – that states can persuade their publics to get behind wars and violent resource grabs.
The only people to gain from these wars are a tiny, wealthy elite at the top of society. All too often it is ordinary people who pay the price: either with their lives or through damage to the parts of the economy on which the public depends.
The continuing proxy war in Ukraine – a Nato-funded and armed war with Russia, using Ukraine as the battlefield – is a perfect illustration. It is ordinary Ukrainians and Russians who are dying.
Despite the West spurring on the bloodshed, European economies have been wrecked and further deindustrialised, while as a direct result of the fighting, yet another surge in consumer prices has hit the most vulnerable.
But a few – including major energy corporations and arms manufacturers, as well as their shareholders – have reaped a large windfall from the war. It has been precisely the same game plan in Gaza.
It is the job of the media to connect the dots for western publics by serving as a watchdog on power. But once again, they have failed in this, their most important professional and moral duty. The villains have yet again gotten away with their crimes.
It is the war criminals and genocide enablers in Washington who are free, while Assange is locked up in a dungeon and the people of Gaza are slowly being starved to death.
Assange’s project was designed to reverse all that. It was about bringing the war criminals in western capitals to book through truth-telling and transparency. It was about pulling back the veil.
Were Assange free, and were the whistleblowers and people of conscience in the corridors of power emboldened rather than terrorised by his treatment, we might live in a society where our leaders dared not arm a genocide; and dared not conspire in the starvation of two million people.
This is why the fates of the people of Gaza and Julian Assange are so tightly sealed together.
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Do cell phones, Bluetooth devices, WiFi and other wireless tech cause cancer or is it just another “coincidence” that tin-foil hat conspiracy theorists are sharing on their smartphones?
Let me tell you about such a “coincidence” I witnessed firsthand…
Many years ago, I hired a young lady to help out around the apartment and in the office, as my wife was quite ill and I was already working seven days a week (still am, I guess). The new assistant came in six days a week for a few hours and completed a long list of items in record time. The whole time she’d be singing and was a joy to have around.
Until, after about six months, she began slowing down and making mistakes. I asked her what was up. She said she was having trouble getting to sleep and staying asleep at night.
I asked her a few questions about her sleeping arrangements. It turned out to be an EMF nightmare: she and her husband both slept in a small, loft room, upon a large futon on the floor with a tin roof above them. On either side of their bed, they each had their laptops and their smartphones active, recharging and certainly not in airplane mode. They also kept their WiFi blasting all night.
I suggested that maybe they should experiment and get all the tech out of their sleeping chamber and kill the WiFi at night.
She looked at me like I had suggested they move out to the wilderness and live in a cave.
I then told her about the $30 million, ten-year study the US Department of Health and Human Services conducted, exposing rats to 2G and 3G cellphone radiation. I believe the scientists were trying to prove that wireless tech was harmless.
Their experiment failed.
The study concluded
“there is clear evidence that male rats exposed to high levels of radio frequency radiation (RFR) like that used in 2G and 3G cell phones developed cancerous heart tumors, according to final reports released today. There was also some evidence of tumors in the brain and adrenal gland of exposed male rats.”
She told me that she wasn’t worried about that and Jesus would heal her if she got cancer.
Well, you can’t argue with faith. So I didn’t mention it again.
Fast forward a few months and she’d become quite sick — throwing up and having to lie down after an hour of work. She had to quit.
A week later, she emailed to let us know that she had cancer and was beginning chemotherapy. The doctors found one tumour on her heart (just like the rats in the study) and the other in her neck.
Coincidence? Sure. Just like getting vaccinated and dying suddenly is a coincidence.
There is a pile of studies, such as the above, showing that EMFs from wireless tech affect our physical and mental health. It’s not a tin-foil hat theory (in fact, wearing a tin-foil hat would turn your head into an EMF antenna).
Of course, Apple, Facebook and Samsung don’t want you to know that these addictive, can’t-sleep-without-them-by-my-side, money-making devices may be slowly killing you. And neither does the $176 billion a year cancer drug industry (vaccines only manage half that revenue at about $88 billion per year). By 2026, cancer drug sales are expected to almost double to $320.6 billion.
Chemotherapy ain’t cheap.
But the 2024 EMF Hazard Summit is. In fact, it’s free to attend.
Nick Pinault, the “EMF Guy,” has brought together 20 doctors, scientists and researchers — who aren’t being bribed by Big Tech or Big Pharma — to talk about the big dangers of EMF exposure and how to protect yourself (hint: don’t sleep with your cellphone and laptop recharging beside your bed).
Jesus didn’t save my assistant from cancer — just like he won’t save you from an oncoming train if you stand on the tracks. Instead, he counselled that we should “be as wise as serpents and harmless as doves.”
The online event begins April 11th, but you can wisely register now and get instant access to Nick Pineault’s free EMF guide (“6 Signs You Might be Electro-Sensitive”) here.
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John C. A. Manley is the author of Much Ado About Corona: A Dystopian Love Story , the forthcoming All The Humans Are Sleeping and other works of speculative fiction. You get free chapters from his novels by subscribing to his Blazing Pine Cone email newsletter.
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Here’s a live broadcast of the disaster area in Baltimore, Maryland.
“Can we take the idea that this [Baltimore bridge collapse] was a terrorist attack off the table … and absolutely we cannot do that,” President Trump’s former national security adviser (and retired lieutenant general) Michael Flynn told Alex Jones in an online interview.
REPORT: There were no vehicles traveling on the Francis Scott Key Bridge when it fell into the ocean thanks to heroic police officers who jumped into action.
It has now been confirmed that the only people on the bridge when it collapsed was a pothole repair crew.
Meanwhile, the White House and federal government agencies have been quick to declare this was not a terror attack.
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Update (1423ET):
Maritime job placement company BalticShipping shows the captain of the container ship is a Ukranian.
Update (1356ET):
Bloomberg Intelligence reports:
Reinsurers Could Bear Brunt of Baltimore Bridge Collapse Claims
The bulk of claims from the March 26 Baltimore bridge collapse will likely fall on reinsurers. The ship has about $3 billion of reinsurance coverage over a $100 million retention. Chubb is reported to be the lead insurer on the bridge’s property cover but might recover losses paid. We note it’s still early, and this will be a complex loss.
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Update (1229ET):
President Biden is expected to address the press at 1230 PM EST regarding the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse at the Port of Baltimore. At 0130 AM EST, a container ship lost propulsion and collided with the 1.6-mile-long bridge, leading to an instant collapse.
The current issue revolves around an emerging disruption in mid-Atlantic supply chains. The major East Coast port is now paralyzed due to the mangled bridge blocking the only shipping lane in and out of the harbor.
Bloomberg reports that the US automotive supply chain will be disrupted. Data shows that Mazda Motor and Mercedes Benz, Subaru of America, Mitsubishi Motors of North America, and Volkswagen Group have the most exposure to the port.
Source: Bloomberg
“It’s a large port with a lot of flow through it, so it’s going to have an impact,” John Lawler, Ford Motor Co.’s chief financial officer, said Tuesday on Bloomberg TV.
Lawler continued, “We’ll work on the workarounds. We’ll have to divert parts to other ports along the East Coast or elsewhere in the country.”
Earlier, Consol Energy shares plunged nearly 10%, the most since October, as the bridge collapse will affect its massive coal terminal, which is served by CSX trains.
A major sugar refinery owned by American Sugar Refining Inc. warned its Domino Sugar refinery only has six to eight weeks of raw sugar supplies as the blockage affects ships moving in and out of the port.
Major cruise ship terminal
The supply chain snarls have sent major logistics companies scrambling across the US East Coast on Tuesday afternoon.
“Our first priority is engaging clients to make plans for containers that were originally routed to Baltimore that will be discharged at other ports on the Eastern Seaboard,” Paul Brashier, vice president of drayage and intermodal for ITS Logistics, told CNBC.
“These diverted volumes will impact the ports of New York/New Jersey, Norfolk and the Southeast and we have to prepare trucking and transload capacity to get that freight to its intended network,” Brashier said.
Goetz Alebrand, senior vice president and head of ocean freight for the Americas at DHL Global Forwarding, told CNBC:
“The immediate impact is with the cargo on board and its accessibility. Other planned shipments through Baltimore will likely be rerouted, potentially increasing cargo flow to New York, Norfolk, and nearby ports.
“Bulk and car carriers reliant on Baltimore must assess operations in the event of a prolonged closure.”
According to the shipping journal Lloyd’s List, Baltimore is the eleventh-largest port in the nation, making an average of 207 port calls per month.
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Update (1018ET):
An unclassified report from the DHS National Operations Center says the container ship “lost propulsion” before it rammed the Francis Scott Key Bridge.
Here’s a video of the incident:
Video seems to show repeated power losses on ship just before it destroyed Francis Scott Key Bridge.pic.twitter.com/REoGCL9zcu
Bloomberg’s Brendan Murray explains how the collapsed bridge blocking the only shipping lane in and out of the Port of Baltimore is about to spark a supply chain crisis across the Mid-Atlantic:
An economic disruption along the US East Coast is unfolding with potentially tragic human consequences after a container ship struck the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore, sending nearly the entire roadway structure crumbling into the water.
The immediate priority of the rescuers is finding people who may have been on the bridge either working or driving across. The ship, the Singapore-registered Dali, was operated by charter company Synergy Group and is time chartered by Maersk carrying Maersk customers’ cargo.
Of secondary concern in the days ahead will be tough questions about the effect on business, commuters, holiday travelers and the economy across the region.
The Port of Baltimore — the biggest handler of US imports and exports of cars and light trucks — looks to be out of commission indefinitely. The resulting bottleneck could accelerate a shift of goods through West Coast ports. Another crucial question: Which other ports have spare capacity to handle the Ro-Ro vessels that carry automobiles if Baltimore is closed for an extended period.
And it begins:
One very big logistical complication in the Baltimore bridge collapse is that the Francis Scott Key Bridge was the main route for hazardous materials (which aren't allowed to be transported through the tunnels) pic.twitter.com/dj2vR7OVdL
ABC News reports the Singapore-flagged “Dali” container ship “lost propulsion” as it left the Port of Baltimore just before it rammed the Francis Scott Key Bridge.
“The vessel notified MD Department of Transportation (MDOT) that they had lost control of the vessel and a collision with the bridge was possible,” ABC quoted the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency as saying, adding, “The vessel struck the bridge causing a complete collapse.”
Bloomberg’s Josh Wingrove says, “Authorities are heavily downplaying the risk of foul play here.”
Authorities are heavily downplaying the risk of foul play here.
"We don't see anything that relates to that at this time. It's an open investigation but there's nothing that points to that, " Wiedefeld said.
No indication as of now of "nefarious intent," per the White House.
BREAKING🚨: Mass Casualties. Ship collides with Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore. This comes just days after the Crocus terror attack in Moscow which has been widely blamed on the West. pic.twitter.com/zgC4tO24wH
A massive container ship chartered by Maersk and moving outbound from the Port of Baltimore struck the Francis Scott Key Bridge around 0130 ET. The bridge collapse has paralyzed a large swath of the largest inland port on the East Coast. The port is ranked 9th for total dollar value of cargo and 13th for cargo tonnage among US ports.
Governor Wes Moore released a statement on the collapse, declaring a State of Emergency in Maryland:
“My office is in close communication with US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott, Baltimore County Executive Johnny Olszewski, and the Baltimore Fire Department as emergency personnel are on the scene following the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge. I have declared a State of Emergency here in Maryland and we are working with an interagency team to quickly deploy federal resources from the Biden Administration. We are thankful for the brave men and women who are carrying out efforts to rescue those involved and pray for everyone’s safety. We will remain in close contact with federal, state, and local entities that are carrying out rescue efforts as we continue to assess and respond to this tragedy.”
Chief Kevin Cartwright, the Baltimore City Fire Department’s director of communications, told Fox Baltimore that at least 20 people and several vehicles had fallen into the river.
In markets, Maersk shares in Copenhagen are trading down more than 3% on the news.
Shocking radio transmission: “The entire Key Bridge is in the harbor.”
Radio traffic from the first arriving @BaltimoreFire unit.
“SOC5 to Battalion 6 and Communications, I’m at Fort Armistead, be advised the entire bridge, the entire Key Bridge is in the harbor.” pic.twitter.com/wTlPxLStRf
Shocking footage is coming from Baltimore City, home to one of the nation’s largest marine ports. It shows a container ship striking the 1.6-mile-long Francis Scott Key Bridge and collapsing it.
🚨#BREAKING: Mass Casualty has been Declared after a Large Container Ship Collides with Key Bridge Causing it completely Collapse⁰ 📌#Baltimore | #Maryland
Currently, numerous agencies, including the Coast Guard and fire department have just declared a mass casualty incident as… pic.twitter.com/wvOTOVbvHE
The Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore, Maryland which crosses the Patapsco River has reportedly Collapsed within the last few minutes after being Struck by a Large Container Ship; a Mass Casualty Incident has been Declared with over a Dozen Cars and many Individuals said to… pic.twitter.com/SsPMU8Mjph
“This effectively shuts down the Port of Baltimore completely. I’m truly speechless,” one X user said.
Pictured: Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed. This is the bridge I drive every single day. This effectively shuts down the Port of Baltimore completely. I’m truly speechless pic.twitter.com/BzqPa3axJ2
According to the ship tracking website MarineTraffic, the Singapore-flagged cargo ship “Dali” slammed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge around 0130 ET. Bloomberg notes the ship was chartered by Maersk (remember Maersk’s Ever Given in the Suez Canal a few years ago?).
The bridge spans the Patapsco River and carries an estimated 11.5 million vehicles annually. In this collapse, the only shipping lane in and out of the port was severed.
Baltimore is the most inland port on the East Coast and is connected to the I-95 highway network. With no commercial vessels sailing in and out of port anytime soon, this is catastrophic for port operations and could spark supply chain snarls in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast. We suspect inbound vessels are rerouting sails this morning.
The bridge collapse has severed these major marine terminals. It’s unknown when operations will be restored.
According to the Maryland government’s website, the Port of Baltimore handled over 52 million tons of international cargo valued at more than $80 billion last year, ranking it as the ninth busiest port in the United States. The data shows that the port handled 847,158 autos and light trucks in 2023, the most of any US port. The port also handles farm and construction machinery, sugar, gypsum, and coal.
The port supports 15,330 direct jobs and 139,180 jobs in Maryland, according to the Maryland government’s website.
Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott’s office posted on X:
“I’m aware of and en route to the incident at the Key Bridge. I have been in contact with Baltimore Fire Chief James Wallace, Gov. Wes Moore (and the county executives of Baltimore and Anne Arundel counties). Emergency personnel are on scene, and efforts are underway.”
Developing…
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All images in this article are from ZH unless otherwise stated
Os ataques ucranianos a Belgorod continuam a acontecer. O regime de Kiev intensifica cada vez mais a sua violência contra pessoas comuns nas fronteiras russas, atingindo alvos civis e matando cidadãos pacíficos. Nos meios de comunicação ocidentais, a responsabilidade pelos ataques é normalmente atribuída a supostos “grupos dissidentes russos”, mas, segundo fontes locais, esta informação é incorreta e destina-se a disfarçar o envolvimento direto da inteligência ucraniana nos ataques.
No dia 14 de março, fui a Belgorod durante uma expedição de imprensa da Associação de Jornalistas do BRICS. A intenção da viagem era investigar os ataques ucranianos na região durante o dia anterior ao início do processo eleitoral na Federação Russa. Cobrimos a situação local e relatamos vários bombardeios contra áreas civis. Porém, além de mostrar a realidade sobre os ataques ucranianos, também tivemos a oportunidade de obter algumas informações interessantes sobre os verdadeiros responsáveis pelos crimes cometidos em Belgorod.
Durante o meu trabalho no terreno, falei com vários militares locais e ouvi alguns detalhes interessantes sobre estes ataques. Afirmam que, ao contrário do que afirma a comunicação social ocidental, estes ataques não são levados a cabo por cidadãos russos expatriados, mas por profissionais ucranianos, apesar de os assassinos se descreverem publicamente como “guerrilheiros russos”.
Os militares de Belgorod dizem que o chamado “Corpo de Voluntários Russos” (RDK, na sigla em russo) e a “Legião Russa da Liberdade” são, na verdade, organizações falsas. Os seus supostos “líderes” são, na verdade, cidadãos russos expatriados, que trabalham como propagandistas do regime de Kiev. No entanto, o pessoal destas organizações, segundo fontes, não é na verdade composto por soldados russos, mas por comandos ucranianos. Com isto, seria possível cumprir o objetivo de propagandear a alegada existência de uma “forte oposição” dentro da Federação Russa. Afirmam que tais grupos estão diretamente subordinados à inteligência militar de Kiev, não tendo autonomia nas suas ações.
Os militares afirmam que não há provas de qualquer migração significativa de “dissidentes russos” para território ucraniano desde o início da operação militar especial. Seria necessário um grande número de expatriados para criar milícias armadas suficientemente fortes para realizar ataques contra Belgorod – ainda mais depois de as forças russas terem eliminado vários dos invasores, impondo baixas consideráveis aos grupos. Apesar de terem perdido vários dos seus soldados, estas milícias continuam a atacar frequentemente a fronteira, o que mostra que têm a capacidade de substituir rapidamente o pessoal. É virtualmente impossível que todos estes soldados sejam dissidentes russos, o que indica que os ucranianos estão a lutar na região sob a bandeira dos “guerrilheiros russos”.
Na opinião pública ocidental, há um impacto propagandístico relevante com a história dos “guerrilheiros” russos que lutam na Ucrânia. Cria-se uma narrativa infundada para dizer que existe uma forte oposição interna ao governo de Putin, com muitos cidadãos russos dispostos até a lutar na guerra por Kiev. A mídia induz as pessoas comuns a acreditar que a operação militar especial não tem apoio popular, descrevendo-a como uma medida rejeitada a tal ponto que vários russos decidiram lutar contra o seu próprio país.
Tudo isso, porém, é uma falácia. Os resultados do processo eleitoral russo mostram como o atual governo é amplamente aprovado pelo povo. Além disso, o apoio à operação especial na Ucrânia é quase unânime na Rússia, como mostram várias sondagens de opinião. A única alternativa que resta ao Ocidente face a tal apoio ao governo e à operação é utilizar mecanismos de guerra psicológica e propaganda para distorcer a realidade. Fazer com que as pessoas comuns no Ocidente acreditem que a Rússia é uma “ditadura ilegítima” combatida por milícias “partidárias” é uma forma de promover a guerra, fazendo com que os contribuintes apoiem o envio de mais dinheiro e armas para Kiev.
A informação recolhida no terreno é vital para desmascarar a narrativa ocidental. Os militares locais, que lidam diariamente com o terror ucraniano e conhecem bem os seus inimigos, têm uma opinião que difere de tudo o que é dito pelos jornais ocidentais. No entanto, o bloqueio midiático imposto aos canais russos e pró-Rússia impede que esta informação relevante chegue à opinião pública ocidental, criando uma barreira de comunicação. Esta é a forma como o Ocidente tem espalhado mentiras sobre o conflito nos últimos dois anos.
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The US has supported Islamic terror before, ISIS, Al Qaeda, Al Nusra, and in Chechnya – yes, the US has even supported Islamic terror inside Russia in the Caucasus.
During the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina, the US flew Islamic terrorists into ex-Yugoslavia.
Already within 55 minutes of the Crocus terror attack, all US media in coordinationannounced that “Ukraine didn’t do it”. How could the US know before anyone else – unless Washington KNEW beforehand what was planned and happening.
Already before 8 March 2024, the US embassy in Russia warned Americans in Moscow against terror at “concerts.” The US clearly had knowledge, but yet the US withheld from Russia concrete information which Russia could act on.
The terror suspects are not the usual jihadists – they were doing it for money, and they fled the scene, not wanting to die as “martyrs”.
An image alleging to be the perpetrators before the attack was clearly made-up by westerners.
Faces were blurred, not usual for ISIS. And the “fighters” raised their left hand, not the right hand which in Islam is the clean hand.
Ukraine (with US support) has committed several acts of severe terror inside Russia before.
Ukraine has for years shielded Jihadists and ISIS terrorist leaders – and given them Ukrainian passports with false identities. The CIA knew all the time. See this.
The suspects of the Crocus terror crime were heading towards Ukraine – where the Ukrainians had “opened a window” for their passage.
Ukraine’s security services are created, steered, monitored, and supported by the USA – in all details.
Based on the smoking trail linking the Crocus terror attack to Kiev and Washington, Russia is right now quickly digging into Ukrainian and US relations with Islamic terrorists.
In early March 2022, the BBC quoted Syria-based terrorist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) explicitly expressing solidarity with the Kiev regime. High-profile HTS member al-Shamali al-Hurr took to Telegram to cheer Ukrainian victories by sharing footage and graphic images of damaged Russian military hardware and dead soldiers. See this.
Even without a “smoking gun” proving US guilt, it is becoming more and more clear where this is going.
Russia is right now seeing criminal evidence and intelligence information piling up which all points to US-Ukrainian organization of the Crocus terror crime.
Devastating for the US in the World
One of my friends in international relations pointed out that it is pivotal whether Russia can deliver this perspective to the rest of the world. Russia will of course never be able to sell to the US and the West – Russia knows that, and Russia doesn’t care too much about that either.
China
But as Russia digs up the evidence, Russia will have enough of evidence and intelligence information to deliver this perspective to China. And China will know, that China can be the next target of US-organized “Islamic” terror at any time.
China will draw the consequences – not openly, but very, very effectively at the policy level. It will be extremely bad for the USA. China siding with Russia on this will already be a game-changer for Global Politics.
India
Russia is already getting top-attention among the broad Indian public to the perspective, that US-Ukraine were the real perpetrators, using “ISIS-K” as a front for their own act of terror against Russia. See these two popular videos from two big Indian news media on that issue.
The following is going out directly to 1.4 billion Indians:
This is completely devastating for the USA.
Russia will obviously present its evidence to top circles in Delhi – and top circles in Delhi will be sufficiently convinced to make some unannounced but big underlying changes as well. If it goes as I see it most likely, it will put an enormous road-block on how far India is willing to ever go with the USA.
Africa
Then you have Africa. I am not on doubt, that a lot of African states – if not outright the vast majority of them – will accept Russia’s narrative. After all, what Russia has suffered, Africa suffers all the time…
The US Going Down?
The US media – steered by the CIA and its think tanks – is already spinning its own net of lies and parallel realities.
With US participation in the Israeli genocide starving one million people in Gaza, and now US commitment of incredible terrorism, the majority of the world sees the US as a decrepit, failing, and Nihilistic violent entity.
The US is going down in the non-Western world – which is the majority in both numbers and power.
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Karsten Riise is a Master of Science (Econ) from Copenhagen Business School and has a university degree in Spanish Culture and Languages from Copenhagen University. He is the former Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of Mercedes-Benz in Denmark and Sweden.
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WE, participants of the International Conference held in Belgrade on March 22-24, 2024, on the occasion of marking the 25th anniversary of NATO’s armed aggression against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) dedicated to the theme “From the Aggression to a New Just Order”, gathered from all over the world, hereby declare:
We belong to different countries, nations, ideologies, religions and civilizations, but stand firmly united in our commitment to peace, equality, and prosperity for all peoples, as well as in our condemnation of interventionism, expansion, domination, and hegemonism.
We firmly condemn the unprovoked armed aggression by NATO against the FRY (Serbia and Montenegro) in 1999 as an unlawful, invading and criminal war against a sovereign, peace-loving European country, waged devoid of a UN Security Council mandate, in blatant violation of the United Nations Charter, the OSCE Helsinki Final Act (1975) and the fundamental principles of international law.
We underline:
That the aggression was carried out under false pretexts and that therefore NATO’s responsibility cannot be diminished.
It was not state authorities but, instead NATO’s expansionism that actually threatened a ‘humanitarian disaster’. What happened in Rachak was not a ‘massacre of civilians’, but instead legitimate response of the state to terrorism.
The ‘Horseshoe Plan’ did not exist. ‘Humanitarian’ wars or interventions do not exist. Prevention of human suffering can hardly be prevented by depleted uranium, cluster bombs and by poisoning air, soil and water.
Back in 1999, NATO reintroduced the war on the European soil, ironically, a war that Europe waged on itself.
Image is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0
It was neither a “little Kosovo war”, but rather a war of these geopolitical goals:
a) carving the Autonomous Province of Kosovo and Metohija out of Serbia and a full control over the Balkans;
b) deployment of the US troops in the Balkans for the purposes of the strategy of Eastward expansion;
c) creating a precedent for subsequent interventions conducted in violation of international law and of the inviolability of the UN Security Council;
d) justifying the existence of NATO and its acting beyond the area defined in its Founding Act of 1949.
“Wherever the law presented obstacle to the policy of expansion, it must be removed” – was yet another NATO new rule.
The NATO aggression embodied the undoing of the legal order of peace and security in Europe and the world, established on the outcome of the Second World War.
Today, the Balkans is more unstable, Europe militarized on dangerous tracks, without autonomy, identity and vision.
The aggression took lives of 1,139 soldiers and police officers, about 3,000 civilians also including 89 children, while some 10,000 people were wounded. However, the consequences of prolonged effects of weapons filled with depleted uranium and toxic compounds are by far greater.
NATO, also, bombed the Embassy of the PR of China, in Belgrade, killing three Chinese journalists and destroying the building of the Chinese Embassy.
We pay our highest respect to all the fallen innocent people and express our deepest, sincere condolences to their families.
The aggressor had been systematically destroying or badly damaging civilian infrastructure, such as railways, roads, bridges, airports, energy system, as well as apartment buildings, industrial facilities, schools, hospitals, kindergartens, and many more objects. Over thirty radio and TV stations and transmitters had been bombed including the national public TV RTS killing 16 professional employees on duty. The direct damage totals some USD 100 billion.
We emphasize that NATO and its member states, participants in the illegal act of aggression, are obliged to compensate Serbia for the war damage they have inflicted.
We appeal that special state and expert bodies, tasked with determining the consequences of aggression on the health of people and the environment, resume their work, and that the war crimes against civilians and crimes of non-compliance with the war-related conventions be prosecuted and sanctioned.
We express our strong support and solidarity with Serbia’s efforts to mitigate the consequences of the aggression and her endeavoring to prevent the continuation of NATO’s armed aggression by other means.
We express our full support to the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Serbia in her internationally recognized borders within which she continued her membership in the UN, the OSCE, and other universal international organizations.
We are deeply concerned about the mass-scale violation of the basic human rights of the Serbian community in Kosovo and Metohija embodied in continuation of their systematic expulsion from, and in preventing the free and safe return of over 250,000 expelled Serbs and other non-Albanians to, their homes and property.
We firmly believe that the future status of the Province of Kosovo and Metohija may be resolved only in accordance with international law and, in particular, with UN Security Council Resolution 1244 of June 10, 1999, which is lasting, legally binding document. We demand that all provisions of the UNSC resolution 1244 be fully respected and implemented.
We condemn each and all violations of that Resolution and the policy of blackmail and pressuring, and all one-sided steps aimed at legalizing the seizure of state territory and completing the ethnic cleansing of the remaining Serbian population, in preparation to create the so-called Greater Albania.
We oppose the unipolar world order based on the strategy of hegemonism and global domination with NATO as its military feast. The aggression against the FRY in 1999 was speeding up of the strategy of expansion to the East, and a source of danger to peace in Europe and the world. At the time of the aggression, NATO had 19 members, and today counts 32. After the erection of US military base Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo and Metohija, there followed dozens of new NATO bases. Presently, Europe hosts a far larger number of foreign military bases and stockpiles of nuclear weapons than it did during the bipolar world and the Cold War era.
We express our deepest concern about the accelerated escalation of hostilities and conflicts in global relations that add fuel to the fire of conflict, continued provocations, and the looming danger of a global conflict. The world sits on the brink of the abyss. Humanity will either restrain the rampant aggressiveness of the alienated power centers, or fall into that abyss.
This makes us stand unified in the demand for an immediate beginning of the dialogue at the strategic level, under the auspices of the UN, aimed at putting to a halt the escalation, the accumulation of conventional and nuclear weapons, and the breaching of international agreements.
We demand the closure of foreign military camps, the complete withdrawal from Europe of the US tactical nuclear weapons and installations of the so-called anti-missile defenses that make security more volatile.
We call for an end to war-mongering rhetoric, and invite all responsible statesmen to resort to dialogue and to finding peaceful, just and sustainable solutions to the ongoing conflicts and crises.
We appeal to all peace-loving forces in the world to join forces in the struggle for the observance of international law, sovereignty and territorial integrity of all countries, reinforcing the authority and role of the United Nations and other universal international organizations, the observance of principles of equality, sovereignty and territorial integrity, and for cooperation and coordination in the fight against terrorism and separatism as global threats.
We support the process of multi-polarization of global relations and their democratization on the basis of the sovereign equality of all states and peoples.
We support the peace, security and development initiatives that are based on the principle of mutual indivisibility of peace, security and development, and that take note of the root causes of problems. The key roles in that process play BRICS, EAEU, Global Initiative “Belt and Road”, Shanghai Cooperation Organization, NAM. We support the abolition of all monopolies, privileges based on ‘exceptionalism’. We refuse unilateral sanctions, erection of new ‘walls’ or divisions. Attempt to divide the world into ‘democracies’ and ‘autocracies’ is a trickery of the power-centers designed to extend the life of the unipolar world order.
The policy of confrontation, interventionism, and interference in internal affairs, backed by the military-industrial complex and large financial capital, must give way to dialogue, partnership, respect for fundamental norms of international law and the multi-polar world order.
Peace, stability, democracy and inclusive development require radical changes in present global relations, observance of sovereign equality, non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries, multilateralism, respect of common interests, and exclusion of any egoism, protectionism and privileges of the past.
The biggest obstacle to the world order of sovereign equal nations is the relics of the Cold War. That is why NATO should be dissolved and the doctrine of hegemonism, expansionism and neo-colonialism consigned to history.
We condemn the mass-scale killing of the innocent Palestinian people, in particular of children, and call for an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and other areas inhabited by the Palestinian people, in order to finally stop this human suffering unprecedented in recent history, and for unhindered delivery of food, medicines, water, and other necessities of life to the vulnerable population.
We support a two-state solution, the free and safe return of all expelled persons, the abolition of the occupation and the establishment of a Palestinian state within the pre-June 4, 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as the capital, all in accordance with the United Nations Resolutions.
We express our solidarity with the people of Cuba who have been suffering the devastating consequences of the unilateral US embargo for many years. The Cuban people have an inalienable right to choose the paths of internal development of their own, without external interference. We demand respect for the UN positions on the lifting of the US blockade of Cuba, and the removal of Cuba from the list of ‘states sponsoring terrorism’ because it was inserted without any bases.
We hold that the Ukrainian crisis is a corollary of NATO’s strategy of expansion to the East, under betrayal of all agreements of the otherwise.
We believe this crisis can be resolved peacefully, by acknowledging and removing the causes and by guaranteeing equal security for all countries. The common future of humanity excludes egotism and selfish approaches such as the ‘golden billion’ security thesis.
We express our acknowledgment and gratitude to our hosts – the Belgrade Forum for a World of Equals, the Club of Generals and Admirals of Serbia, SUBNOR of Serbia, the Diaspora Fund for Serbia, and the Association of Veterans of the Military Intelligence Service, as well as to the citizens of Serbia – for their hospitality and good organization of the Conference.
The organizers express their acknowledgment to the participants of the Conference, including the World Peace Council and all its members, for their decades long solidarity and support to Serbia and the Serbian people, as well as for their extraordinary contribution to the results of this Conference.
(Belgrade, March 23, 2024)
Statement of Condemnation of the Terrorist Attack in Moscow
Image: Russian Crocus City Hall amphitheater interiors, day after terrorist attack on 22 March 2024 (Licensed under CC BY 4.0)
Participants of the International Conference held in Belgrade on March 22-24, 2024, on the occasion of marking the 25th anniversary of NATO’s armed aggression against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia,
Condemn in strongest terms the heinous, bestial and provocative terrorist attack in Moscow that killed so many innocent people, and express belief that the perpetrators will be quickly apprehended and brought to justice.
At the same time, express their deepest condolences to the families of the killed and the injured ones, to the citizens of Moscow, and to the entire Russian people, in the moment of their pain and huge grief.
Call for a determined and coordinated combatting terrorism as a global danger that threatens all the peoples of the world.
(In Belgrade, March 23, 2024)
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First published on November 27, 2023. Video Interview added on November 29, 2023, Author’s Note, December 5, 2023
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Author’s Message to Readers
This article focussing on the alleged novel coronavirus is among the most important articles I have written.
There is an element of simplicity and common sense in the text. My objective is that the article will be extensively read and debated at the grassroots of society, not only by scientists and medical doctors. The complexity of this crisis is overwhelming. This is not solely a “Public Health Crisis”.
The implications are far-reaching because the article refutes and invalidates ‘everything” pertaining to the Covid pandemic. These include the policies related to The Lockdown and the Covid-19 “Vaccine”, not to mention the infamous Pandemic Treaty and The World Economic Forum’s “Great Reset”.
The official “corona narrative” is predicated on a “Big Lie” endorsed by corrupt politicians.
That “official consensus” is exceedingly fragile. Our intent is to precipitate its collapse “like a house of cards”.
What is ultimately at stake is the value of human life and the future of humanity.
Our objective is to save lives including those of newly born babies who are the victims of the Covid-19 “Vaccine”.
At this juncture in our history, the priority is to “Disable the Fear Campaign” and “Cancel the Vaccine” (including the repeal of the so-called “Pandemic Treaty”).
Hopefully this will set the stage for the development of a Worldwide movement of solidarity, which questions the legitimacy of the powerful “Big Money” financial elites which are behind this infamous project.
Dear Readers, please forward this article and the video far and wide.
“Get off that crazy train. I know, it is scary, it can hurt. Take back your physical and intellectual autonomy and protect your children”. Dr. Pascal Sacré, Belgian author and Medical Doctor, November 2021.
“Hell is Empty and the Devils are All Here”. William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, 1623
My response to Shakespeare: “Send the Devils Back to Where They Belong”
“When the Lie Becomes the Truth, There Is No Moving Backwards”
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Introduction
Destabilizing the social, political and economic structure of 190 sovereign countries cannot constitute a “solution” to combating a novel coronavirus which mysteriously emerged in Wuhan, Hubei province (PRC) in late December 2019. That was the imposed “solution” —implemented in several stages from the very outset–, leading to The March 2020 Lockdown and the Rollout of a so-called Covid 19 “Vaccine” in December 2020, which since its inception has resulted in an upward trend in excess mortality.
It’s the destruction of people’s lives Worldwide. It is the destabilization of civil society.
Fake science was supportive of this devastating agenda. The lies were sustained by a massive media disinformation campaign. 24/7, Incessant and Repetitive “Covid alerts” in the course of more than three years. In turn, the ongoing fear campaign had devastating impacts on people’s health.
The historic March 11, 2020 lockdown triggered economic and social chaos Worldwide. It was an act of “economic warfare”: a war against humanity.
The New Virus: 2019-nCoV
The official story is that a dangerous NEW VIRUS was detected in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China in December 2019. It was entitled 2019-nCoV which stands for “2019 New (n) Corona (Co) Virus (V)”.
On January 1, 2020, “the Chinese health authorities closed the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan following Western media reports claiming that wild animals sold there may have been the source of the virus.
As of early January 2020, it was the object of extensive media coverage and an unfolding Worldwide fear campaign. Media disinformation 24/7 went into high gear.
“The Chinese authorities (allegedly) “identified a new type of virus” on January 7, 2020, using the RT-PCR test. No specific details were provided regarding the process of isolation of the virus.
It is not just a renaming process: the 20 year old virus 2003 SARS-CoV is the “point of reference” for everything pertaining to the alleged Covid-19 pandemic including the Lockdown and the Vaccination.
(Scroll down for analysis and details pertaining to the identification and renaming of 2019-nCoV)
Video: The Non-existent “New Corona Virus”?
Michel Chossudovsky, Interview with Caroline Mailloux, Lux Media
The alleged new virus was actively debated at the World Economic Forum (WEF), meeting in Davos Switzerland (January 22, 2020).
Proposed by the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) an entity financed by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, a 2019-nCoV vaccine program was put forth. Announced at Davos, Seattle-based Moderna (with the support of CEPI) was to manufacture an mRNA vaccine to build immunity against 2019-nCoV.
The evidence as well as the statements at Davos suggest that the 2019-nCoV vaccine project was already underway in early 2019. And CEPI had foreknowledge regarding the announcement of the 2019-nCoV. (Michel Chossudovsky, Chapter VIII).
Note: The development of a 2019 nCoV vaccine was announced at Davos, 2 weeks after the January 7, 2020 announcement, and barely a week prior to the official launching of the WHO’s Worldwide Public Health emergency on January 30. The WEF-Gates-CEPI Vaccine Announcement precedes the WHO Public Health Emergency (PHEIC)
Lies and Falsehoods
All of this was unfolding at a time when the alleged new coronavirus named 2019-nC0V had not been isolated, it’s identity had not been confirmed and the number of reported cases in China was exceedingly low: “As of 3 January 2020, there were 44 cases reported, 11 are severely ill, while the remaining 33 patients are in stable condition (WHO Report).
There was no evidence of an unfolding epidemic in China, nor was there evidence of a lab leak, CEPI’s statement at Davos regarding “The Rapid Global Spread of the Novel Coronavirus” is a bold face lie. (See image above)
And then on January 30th, 2020, the Director General of the WHO Dr. Tedros declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) with absolutely no evidence of a threatening epidemic.
On that same day there were 83 positive cases Worldwide out of China for a population of 6.4 billion people. See table below: 5 positive cases in the U.S, 3 in Canada, 4 in France and 4 in Germany. Ask yourself does that constitute a Worldwide emergency?
And those (cumulative) cases were based on the RT-Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) Test which does not detect the identity of the virus. (See Appendix).
Screenshot from WHO, January 29, 2020.
Number of confirmed positive cases in US, Canada, France and Germany
“[I am] concerned that the chance to contain the coronavirus outbreak was “closing” …
“I believe the window of opportunity is still there, but that the window is narrowing.”
What was the evidence put forth by Dr. Tedros in support of his bold statement?
On February 20, 2020, there were only 1076 confirmed cases outside China (including those of the Diamond Princess Cruise Ship stranded in Japan’s territorial waters).
March 11, 2020: The historic COVID-19 pandemic lockdown, “Closing Down” of approximately 190 National Economies
The WHO Director-General had already set the stage in his February 21st Press Conference.
“The world should do more to prepare for a possible coronavirus pandemic.”
The WHO officially declared a worldwide pandemic at a time when there were 44,279 (cumulative) positive Covid cases outside China for a population of 6.4 billion. (For details and analysis see Michel Chossudovsky, Chapter II)
Confirmed by the WHO, in the United States, recorded on March 9, 2020, there were3,457 “confirmed cases” (RT-PCR positive) out of a population of 329.5 million people (Screenshot of WHO graph Interactive WHO graph)
In Canada on March 9, 2020, there were125 “confirmed cases” out of a population of 38.5 million people
Screenshot of WHO graph Interactive WHO graph. Data for Canada
In Germany on March 9, 2020, there were 2948 “confirmed cases” out of a population of 83.2 million people
The October 2019 “Event 201” Simulation of a “Dangerous Virus” entitled nCoV-2019
Event 201 was a table top simulation of a coronavirus epidemic, sponsored by John Hopkins and the Gates Foundation.
The WHO initially adopted the same acronym, namely 2019-nCoV (to designate the novel coronavirus), as that of the Johns Hopkins simulated Pandemic Event 201 Exercise.
The name of the new coronavirus was (with the exception of the placement of 2019) identical to that of the Event 201 simulation.
Attended by prominent personalities, The Simulation was held on October 18, 2019, less than three months before the announcement in early January 2020 of a new coronavirus.
Among the participants, were representatives (aka. decision-makers) from the WHO, US Intelligence, the Gates Foundation, the Global Alliance on Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI) (financed by the Gates Foundation), the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), the World Economic Forum (WEF), the United Nations, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), China’s Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC, Director Dr. George Fu Gao), Big Pharma, the World Bank, among others.
These various organizations played a key role when the so-called pandemic went live in early 2020. Many features of the 201 “simulation exercise” did in fact correspond to what actually happened when the WHO Director-General launched a Global Public Health Emergency (PHEIC) on January 30, 2020.
.
Moreover, the sponsors of Event 201 — including the WEF and the Gates Foundation — as well the participants were actively involved from the very outset in coordinating (and financing) COVID-19-related policies including the RT-PCR test, the March 2020 lockdown as well as as the mRNA vaccine, launched in December 2020
China’s CDC Director Dr. George Fu Gao –who participated in the 201 simulation– played a central role in overseeing the COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan in early 2020, acting in close liaison with his mentor Dr. Anthony Fauci, as well as with the Gates Foundation, CEPI, et al.
“the Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) is a viral respiratory disease caused by a SARS-associated coronavirus. It was first identified at the end of February 2003 [more than 20 years ago] during an outbreak that emerged in China and spread to 4 other countries. …
A worldwide outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) has been associated with exposures originating from a single ill health care worker from Guangdong Province, China. We conducted studies to identify the etiologic agent of this outbreak.
… a novel coronavirus was isolated from patients who met the case definition of SARS. … Consensus coronavirus primers designed to amplify a fragment of the polymerase gene by reverse transcription–polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) were used to obtain a sequence that clearly identified the isolate as a unique coronavirus only distantly related to previously sequenced coronaviruses.
What is significant in this report is that the WHO confirmed that the novel 2003 coronavirus entitled 2003 SARS-CoV had been isolated from patients’ samples, identified and designated “severe acute respiratory syndrome” in March 2003.
Absence of An Isolate of the “New 2019 Virus (2019-nCoV)”
While the 2003 SARS-CoV was duly isolated, the WHO acknowledged in January 2020 that it did not have an isolate and purified sample of the new 2019 coronavirus from an infected patient, which meant that they were unable to confirm the identity of the (“dangerous”) 2019 novel coronavirus entitled 2019-nCoV. That was the reason given. Sounds Absurd.
How was this matter resolved. Following advice from the Gates Foundation, the WHO was in liaison with the Berlin Virology Institute at Charité Hospital.
Under the scientific guidance of Dr. Christian Drosten, the Berlin Virology study was entitled:
“The genome sequences suggest presence of a virus closely related to the members of a viral species termed severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS)-related CoV, a species defined by the agent of the 2002/03 outbreak of SARS in humans [3,4].
We report on the the establishment and validation of a diagnostic workflow for 2019-nCoV screening and specific confirmation [using the RT-PCR test], designed in absence of available virus isolates or original patient specimens. Design and validation were enabled by the close genetic relatedness to the 2003 SARS-CoV, and aided by the use of synthetic nucleic acid technology.” (Eurosurveillance, January 23, 2020, emphasis added).
What this ambiguous statement suggests is that the identity of 2019-nCoV was not required and that “COVID-19 confirmed cases” (aka infection resulting from the 2019 novel coronavirus) would be validated by “the close genetic relatedness to the 2003 SARS-CoV.”
How could the new virus be categorized as similar without having been identified, i.e. without an “isolate”? Moreover, bear in mind that while the PCR test does not detect the virus, it detects genetic fragments (of numerous viruses).
Smoking Gun
What this means is that a coronavirus detected 20 years ago (at the time of writing) in Guangdong Province (2003 SARS-CoV) has been used to “validate” the identity of a so-called “novel coronavirus” first detected in China’s Hubei Province in late December 2019.
They were subsequently endorsed by the Director- General of the WHO, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
The WHO did not have in its possession the “virus isolate” required to identify the new virus.
“Never mind”. It was decided that an isolate of the new coronavirus was not required.
It stands to reason that if the PCR test uses the 2003 SARS-CoV virus as a proxy or “point of reference”, there can be no “confirmed” cases pertaining to the novel coronavirus 2019-nCoV.
See also our review of the RT- PCR in the Appendix of this article.
The significance and ambiguity of the WHO decision –following the advice of the Berlin Virology Institute– namely the issue of the “isolate” of the novel coronavirus have been casually overlooked. “No Questions Asked”
The British Media reported on February 6, 2020 the change in the name of the virus:
“[The] Deadly coronavirus will FINALLY get a name: Scientists plan to officially label the disease ‘within days’ – but it won’t be called after any places or animals. The International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses has submitted a name. …
Big Money, Big Pharma. Patent Rights
Let’s bear in mind: The Covid Crisis which is still ongoing is a Big Money Operation Worldwide, with numerous Big Pharma products, extending from the global misuse of the RT-PCR test, to the multibillion dollar Big Pharma vaccine project, largely dominated by Pfizer.
Was the change in the name of the virus to SARS-CoV-2 an issue of “royalties” and intellectual property rights? The U.S Patent Rights, pertaining to 2003 SARS-CoV was filed in April 2004 and assigned in May 2007 to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services:
Patent No.: US 7,220,852 B1 Date of Patent: May 22 2007. (This is a matter for further investigation.)
“The Big Lie” and the “Non-Existent New Virus”. What are the Consequences?
As documented above (confirmed by the WHO) the new 2019 corona virus was never identified.
The use of a 20 year old virus entitled 2003 SARS-CoV as a proxy for the alleged new virus confirms that there was NO PANDEMIC resulting from a NEW CORONAVIRUS in January-March 2020.
THERE WAS NO “NEW VIRUS”.
What this signifies is that both the Devastating Lockdown policies imposed on 190 countries (March 11, 2020) as well the Worldwide Rollout of the Covid-19 Vaccine (mid December 2020) are fraudulent. They are based on a “Big Lie”, which has contributed in the course of almost four years to literally destroying people’s lives.
In turn the incessant fear campaign had a devastating impact on people’s health, their mental health, including a Worldwide wave of suicides. In several countries suicides among school children were recorded (See Michel Chossudovsky, Chapter VI)
“The Big Lie” Precipitates the Lockdown
The unspoken truth is that the novel coronavirus has provided a pretext and a justification to powerful financial interests and corrupt politicians to precipitate the entire world into a spiral of mass unemployment, bankruptcy, extreme poverty and despair.
The lockdown was an act of economic and social warfare. The labor force was confined, the work place is frozen, leading to an engineered Worldwide economic collapse.
This crisis is by no means over. The entire World is currently strangled in the Most Serious Debt Crisis is World history. All categories of indebtedness (private and public).
In the words of the WEF billionaires to those who are loosing their homes or cannot pay their monthly rent: their motto is:
“Own Nothing Be Happy”.
The mRNA “Vaccine” Intended to Protect People against a “Non Existent New Virus”
Amply documented the mRNA “vaccine” which was intended to protect people against this non-existent new coronavirus renamed SARS-nCoV-2 has resulted in an upward trend in excess mortality.
There are numerous studies on vaccine related excess mortality. Below is a summary of an incisive study pertaining to Cancer Related Excess Mortality in England and Wales resulting from the mRNA Vaccine conducted by the team of Edward Dowd
Dowd’s method was to analyze the number of deaths attributed to cancer in England and Wales between 2010 and 2022 (based on the data of the U.K. Office for National Statistics).
The table below pertains to excess deaths related to malignant neoplasm (cancerous tumor) in England and Wales, recorded in three consecutive years: 2020, 2021, and 2022 vs. a 10 year trend (2010-2019).
The data for excess mortality in 2020 (the year prior to the vaccine) are negative with the exception of “malignant neoplasm without specification of site”.
The upward movement in excess mortality (%) commences in 2021. The increase in excess mortality related to malignant neoplasm is tabulated for the two first years of the vaccine.
Below is a similar table pertaining to Excess Mortality in Germany, which points to the Deviation of Observed Mortality from Expected Mortality (by age group) in 2020, 2021, and 2022.
Notice the upward shift in excess mortality in 2021 and 2022 following the rollout of the Covid Vaccine in December 2020
Germany: Excess Mortality by Age Group (%)
Excess Mortality in Red by age group, Total Excess Mortality in Gray
Media Disinformation, Boldface Lies
There are numerous studies on excess mortality resulting from the vaccine, which are ignored by the media.
Invariably the Press reports state with authority that it is the virus which is “dangerous”or “deadly”, when in fact it is the “Vaccine” which has triggered an upward trend in mortality.
The Daily Mail (February 6, 2020) refers to a “deadly coronavirus” intimating that it is spreading Worldwide
The dangerous virus designation is a boldface LIE:
Confirmed by the WHO, the CDC and peer reviewed reports, the 2019 nCoV-19 is not dangerous. See the Appendix below.
“When the Lie Become the Truth, There is No Moving Backwards”
CENSORSHIP: The original Global Research video produced by Ariel Rodriguez in February 2021 was taken down by Vimeo on March 5, 2022
Below is the Version on Rumble
***
Our thanks to Vaccine Choice Canada
Our analysis in this short article has provided evidence:
that the alleged NEW CORONAVIRUS entitled 2019 nCoV was never isolated,
the renamed new coronavirus entitled SARS-CoV-2 is NOT A NEW VIRUS. It is similar to an OLD VIRUS entitled 2003-SARS-CoV.
I should mention that there are many other issues which invalidate the “official narrative”, specifically the RT-PCR test which does not identify the virus.
See sections 1, 2, 3 4 of the Appendix below as well as our review of The Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) Test.
Scroll down to consult the Appendix
Michel Chossudovsky’s Message
Dear Readers,
We stand in solidarity Worldwide. My thanks for your support in the course of more than twenty years.
You are welcome to download (free of charge) my Book (15 chapters) which provides a detailed analysis of a crisis which is still ongoing.
The Worldwide Corona Crisis, Global Coup d’Etat Against Humanity
by Michel Chossudovsky
Michel Chossudovsky reviews in detail how this insidious project “destroys people’s lives”. He provides a comprehensive analysis of everything you need to know about the “pandemic” — from the medical dimensions to the economic and social repercussions, political underpinnings, and mental and psychological impacts.
“My objective as an author is to inform people worldwide and refute the official narrative which has been used as a justification to destabilize the economic and social fabric of entire countries, followed by the imposition of the “deadly” COVID-19 “vaccine”. This crisis affects humanity in its entirety: almost 8 billion people. We stand in solidarity with our fellow human beings and our children worldwide. Truth is a powerful instrument.”
Reviews
This is an in-depth resource of great interest if it is the wider perspective you are motivated to understand a little better, the author is very knowledgeable about geopolitics and this comes out in the way Covid is contextualized. —Dr. Mike Yeadon
In this war against humanity in which we find ourselves, in this singular, irregular and massive assault against liberty and the goodness of people, Chossudovsky’s book is a rock upon which to sustain our fight. –Dr. Emanuel Garcia
In fifteen concise science-based chapters, Michel traces the false covid pandemic, explaining how a PCR test, producing up to 97% proven false positives, combined with a relentless 24/7 fear campaign, was able to create a worldwide panic-laden “plandemic”; that this plandemic would never have been possible without the infamous DNA-modifying Polymerase Chain Reaction test – which to this day is being pushed on a majority of innocent people who have no clue. His conclusions are evidenced by renown scientists. —Peter Koenig
Professor Chossudovsky exposes the truth that “there is no causal relationship between the virus and economic variables.” In other words, it was not COVID-19 but, rather, the deliberate implementation of the illogical, scientifically baseless lockdowns that caused the shutdown of the global economy. –David Skripac
A reading of Chossudovsky’s book provides a comprehensive lesson in how there is a global coup d’état under way called “The Great Reset” that if not resisted and defeated by freedom loving people everywhere will result in a dystopian future not yet imagined. Pass on this free gift from Professor Chossudovsky before it’s too late. You will not find so much valuable information and analysis in one place. –Edward Curtin
that the alleged NEW CORONAVIRUS entitled 2019 nCoV was never isolated and that
the renamed new coronavirus entitled SARS-CoV-2 is similar to a 20 year old virus entitled 2003-SARS-CoV
It should be understood that there are many other issues which invalidate the “official narrative” which are not addressed in the article(See sections 1, 2, 3 4 below as well as our review of The Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) Test
Of significance to our understanding of “fear campaigns”, the WHO and CDC confirm that the 2019 nCoV (SARS-CoV-2) is not a dangerous virus.
1. The WHO Statement Regarding 2019-nCoV
The most recently discovered coronavirus causes coronavirus disease COVID-19. The most common symptoms of COVID-19 are fever, dry cough, and tiredness. … These symptoms are usually mild and begin gradually. Some people become infected but only have very mild symptoms. Most people (about 80%) recover from the disease without needing hospital treatment. Around 1 out of every 5 people who gets COVID-19 becomes seriously ill and develops difficulty breathing.” (For further details see Michel Chossudovsky, August 2022, emphasis added)
2. Dr. Anthony Fauci Regarding SARS-CoV-2 in the NEJM
From the outset, Fauci has persistently warned of the imminent dangers of the SARS-CoV-2 (including its variants and sub-variants), while acknowledging in his peer reviewed article in the New England Journal of Medicine (together with H. Clifford Lane, M.D. and Robert R. Redfield, M.D. that:
“The overall clinical consequences of Covid-19 may ultimately be more akin to those of a severe seasonal influenza (which has a case fatality rate of approximately 0.1%) or a pandemic influenza (similar to those in 1957 and 1968)…” (See Covid-19 — Navigating the Uncharted, NEJM)
3. The WHO’s Definition of 2003-SARS
SARS is an airborne virus and can spread through small droplets of saliva in a similar way to the cold and influenza. … SARS can also be spread indirectly via surfaces that have been touched by someone who is infected with the virus.
Most patients identified with SARS were previously healthy adults aged 25–70 years. A few suspected cases of SARS have been reported among children under 15 years. The case fatality among persons with illness meeting the current WHO case definition for probable and suspected cases of SARS is around 3%.
One month prior to the change of name of the novel 2019 nCoV coronavirus to SARS-CoV-2 (On February 11), the WHO released, a detailed document pertaining to the 2003 Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (Operational Support & Logistics Disease Commodity Packages pdf).
4. The CDC’s Comparison of SARS-CoV-2 with Seasonal Influenza
“Influenza (Flu) and COVID-19 are both contagious respiratory illnesses, but they are caused by different viruses. COVID-19 is caused by infection with a new coronavirus (called SARS-CoV-2) and flu is caused by infection with influenza viruses.
Because some of the symptoms of flu and COVID-19 are similar, it may be hard to tell the difference between them based on symptoms alone, and testing may be needed to help confirm a diagnosis. Flu and COVID-19 share many characteristics, but there are some key differences between the two.”
If the public had been informed and reassured that COVID is “similar to Influenza”, the fear campaign would have fallen flat.
The lockdown and closure of the national economy would have been rejected outright, not to mention the subsequent imposition of the Covid-19 Vaccine.
The Reverse Transcription
Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) Test
The slanted methodology applied under WHO guidance for detecting the alleged spread of the virus is the Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction (RT-PCR) test, which has been routinely applied all over the world since February 2020. (This Text is an excerpt from Michel Chossudovsky’s book, August 2022)
The RT-PCR test has been used worldwide to generate millions of erroneous “COVID-19 confirmed cases”, which are then used to sustain the illusion that the alleged pandemic is real.
This assessment based on erroneous numbers has been used in the course of three and and a half years to spearhead and sustain the fear campaign.
“Confirmed” is a misnomer. A “confirmed RT-PCR positive case” does not imply a “COVID-19 confirmed case”.
Positive RT-PCR is not synonymous with the COVID-19 disease! PCR specialists make it clear that a test must always be compared with the clinical record of the patient being tested, with the patient’s state of health to confirm its value [reliability]. (Dr. Pascal Sacré)
The procedure used by the national health authorities is to categorize all RT-PCR positive cases as “COVID-19 confirmed cases” (with or without a medical diagnosis). Ironically, this routine process of identifying “confirmed cases” is in derogation of the CDC’s own guidelines:
“Detection of viral RNA may not indicate the presence of infectious virus or that 2019-nCoV is the causative agent for clinical symptoms. The performance of this test has not been established for monitoring treatment of 2019-nCoV infection. This test cannot rule out diseases caused by other bacterial or viral pathogens.”8 (emphasis added)
The methodology used to detect and estimate the spread of the virus is flawed and invalid.
False Positives
The earlier debate at the outset of the crisis focused on the issue of “false positives.”
Acknowledged by the WHO and the CDC, the RT-PCR test was known to produce a high percentage of false positives. According to Dr. Pascal Sacré:
“Today, as authorities test more people, there are bound to be more positive RT-PCR tests. This does not mean that COVID-19 is coming back, or that the epidemic is moving in waves. There are more people being tested, that’s all.”9
The debate on false positives (acknowledged by health authorities) points to so-called errors without necessarily questioning the overall validity of the RT-PCR test as a means to detecting the alleged spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
The PCR Test Does Not Detect the Identity of the Virus
The RT-PCR test does not identify/detect the virus. What the PCR test identifies are genetic fragments of numerous viruses (including influenza viruses types A and B and coronaviruses which trigger common colds).
The results of the RT-PCR test cannot “confirm” whether an individual who undertakes the test is infected with SARS-CoV-2.
The following diagram summarizes the process of identifying positive and negative cases. All that is required is the presence of “viral genetic material” for it to be categorized as “positive”. The procedure does not identity or isolate COVID-19. What appears in the tests are fragments of the virus.10
Failures of the PCR Test, Ridiculously Low Numbers
Even if the 2019 nCoV had been detected and duly identified, the numbers of PCR-RT confirmed (cumulative) positive cases in the period leading up to to March 11, 2020 used as a justification to enforce the Lockdown of more than 190 countries were ridiculously low.
Image: Total cumulative cases on March 12, 2020 (Source: WHO)
L’attacco terroristico alla sala concerti di Mosca, che ha provocato la morte di 140 inermi civili (numero che può aumentare dato l’alto numero di feriti) è stato compiuto da quattro killer professionisti, membri dell’ISIS-K (Stato Islamico Khorasan), che hanno compiuto la strage con spietata freddezza. La dinamica dell’attacco dimostra che è impossibile che abbiano agito da soli.
Lo sottolinea il presidente Putin nel discorso di cittadini della Russia: “Hanno tentato di fuggire e si stavano dirigendo verso l’Ucraina, dove, secondo le prime informazioni, era stata preparato per loro un varco sul lato ucraino per attraversare il confine di Stato. Stiamo identificando e smascherando la base di complici che sta dietro dietro questi terroristi: coloro che hanno fornito loro il trasporto, pianificato le vie di fuga dalla scena del crimine e preparato i nascondigli con armi e munizioni. Tuttavia, è già chiaro che non ci troviamo di fronte semplicemente a un attacco terroristico pianificato con cura e cinismo, ma a un omicidio di massa premeditato e organizzato. Come i nazisti che un tempo compivano massacri nei territori occupati, hanno pianificato un’esecuzione dimostrativa, un sanguinoso atto di intimidazione. Tutti gli autori, gli organizzatori e le menti di questo crimine saranno puniti in modo giusto e inevitabile, chiunque essi siano e chiunque li abbia diretti. Identificheremo e consegneremo alla Giustizia ogni singolo individuo che sta dietro a questi terroristi”.
L’ISIS-K è una fazione dell’ISIS – il movimento islamico promosso, finanziato e armato dagli Stati Uniti, dai membri europei della NATO e dalle monarchie del Golfo, per scardinare dall’interno lo Stato Siriano, per frammentare ulteriormente l’Iraq, la Libia e altri paesi. Quando, dopo vent’anni di guerra, USA e NATO sono costretti a ritirarsi dall’Afghanistan, dove vanno al governo i Talebani l’ISIS-K inizia una serie di sanguinosi attacchi terroristici in Afghanistan, che poi si estendono all’Iran e al Pakistan man mano che si estendono l’area e l’influenza dei BRICS basate sulla stretta cooperazione tra Russia e Cina.
Siamo quindi di fronte a un rilancio del “terrorismo Islamico” ad opera principalmente dei servizi segreti statunitensi e britannici, affiancati da quelli ucraini e da altri. Lo scopo è colpire all’interno la Russia, nel momento in cui sta prevalendo militarmente sull’Ucraina di Kiev, e giustificare la guerra di Israele contro i palestinesi e le operazioni belliche USA in Medioriente facendole apparire come azioni di difesa contro il “terrorismo islamico”. Nel quadro di tale strategia, c’è la possibilità di attacchi terroristici anche in paesi europei membri della NATO.
Os Centros de Controle e Prevenção de Doenças (CDC) no início deste mês responderam a uma solicitação da Lei de Liberdade de Informação (FOIA) de documentos contendo informações sobre a frequência de miocardite em pessoas que receberam as vacinas COVID-19 – produzindo um documento 148- documento de página.
Dois tweets do repórter do Epoch Times Zachary Stieber em 7 e 8 de março revelaram que o pedido FOIA “pedia informações sobre vários estudos que os CDC publicaram sobre casos de miocardite em receptores da vacina COVID-19.
“Um documento dos CDC que nos foi enviado em resposta a um pedido da Lei de Liberdade de Informação… foi totalmente redigido”, escreveu Stieber, acrescentando que um segundo documento que os CDC forneceram como parte do mesmo pedido “está em grande parte redigido”.
Os documentos redigidos geraram críticas da mídia, de especialistas médicos e de outros, incluindo Robert F. Kennedy Jr., presidente licenciado da Children’s Health Defense (CHD).
Num tweet de 11 de março, Kennedy, que concorre à presidência como candidato independente, escreveu:
De acordo com Vigilant News, o documento totalmente redigido é “um relatório de 148 páginas sobre miocardite após injeção de COVID-19”.
“Parece que há algo muito contundente que eles estão tentando esconder porque cada palavra é editada”, escreveu Vigilant News.
Respondendo a uma pergunta do usuário do X (ex-Twitter), Charles Rozier , que perguntou se é mesmo possível verificar se o documento totalmente redigido “realmente está em conformidade com a solicitação FOIA”, Stieber escreveu: “Não se pode saber”.
Segundo Stieber, um dos estudos produzidos pelo projeto MOVING foi publicado no The Lancet em setembro de 2022.
Esse estudo descobriu que “após pelo menos 90 dias desde o início da miocardite após a vacinação com mRNA contra a COVID-19, a maioria dos indivíduos da nossa coorte foram considerados recuperados pelos prestadores de cuidados de saúde”.
No entanto, de acordo com o estudo, “estes resultados podem não ser generalizáveis, dado o pequeno tamanho da amostra e é necessário um acompanhamento adicional para o subconjunto de pacientes com resultados de testes atípicos ou não considerados recuperados”.
Stieber disse que um porta-voz dos CDC disse ao Epoch Times: “Os CDC planejam enviar outro artigo sobre as descobertas atualizadas do projeto para revisão por pares” em janeiro de 2025.
A ‘relação dos CDC com a verdade é, na melhor das hipóteses, duvidosa’
Especialistas médicos e de saúde disseram ao The Defender que não ficaram surpresos com as ações dos CDC.
Brian Hooker, Ph.D. , diretor científico do CHD, disse que a divulgação de um documento totalmente redigido “é muito típico dos CDC, pois eles têm mentido e se escondido desde o experimento Tuskegee e antes”.
Ele adicionou:
“A sua relação com a verdade é, na melhor das hipóteses, duvidosa e estão empenhados em esconder a ligação muito óbvia entre as vacinas contra a COVID-19 e a miocardite, tal como fizeram desde o início do lançamento da vacina.
“Os CDC sabiam desta ligação já em janeiro de 2021, poucas semanas após o lançamento da vacina, e nunca se pronunciou sobre o assunto. É criminoso que continuem a fraudar o público americano.”
Em 2022, os CDC recusaram-se a divulgar documentos em resposta a três pedidos FOIA apresentados pela Rede de Ação de Consentimento Informado (ICAN). As solicitações diziam respeito aos dados de lesões da vacina COVID-19 que os CDC coletaram por meio de seu aplicativo V-safe. A ICAN processou e, em setembro de 2022, um tribunal federal ordenou que os CDC divulgassem os dados.
O cardiologista Dr. Peter McCullough disse ao The Defender: “Os CDC e as agências de saúde pública não podem se perguntar por que a comunidade médica e o público em geral perderam toda a confiança em sua honestidade, integridade e competência. Produzir este documento em resposta a um pedido é uma vergonha.”
“Cento e quarenta e oito páginas. A coisa toda está redigida. De que adianta um estudo se não há nada nele?” Shamp, uma enfermeira registrada, disse durante a reunião.
Documentos fortemente redigidos obtidos pelo CHD através de um pedido FOIA em março de 2023, e documentos vazados para o Projeto Veritas naquele mês revelaram que os CDC e a Pfizer retiveram evidências de que as vacinações contra a COVID-19 estavam causando miocardite.
Um estudo publicado em fevereiro descobriu que, independentemente da gravidade da miocardite, houve 71,7 vezes mais casos de miocardite entre os vacinados do que entre os hospitalizados por COVID-19.
Ocasionalmente, o Defender publica conteúdo relacionado à missão sem fins lucrativos da Children’s Health Defense, que apresenta as opiniões do Sr. Kennedy sobre as questões que o CHD e o The Defender cobrem regularmente. De acordo com as regras da Comissão Eleitoral Federal, este conteúdo não representa um endosso ao Sr. Kennedy, que está de licença do CHD e concorre como independente à presidência dos EUA.
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Russian attacks are increasing across Ukraine. In recent days, critical infrastructure targets, such as energy facilities, have once again been hit by Moscow’s artillery – something that has not happened since the first half of 2023.
On March 25, in an even more intense attack, the headquarters of Ukrainian intelligence in Kiev were destroyed by Russian missiles, making it clear that a new phase of the conflict is beginning.
The intensification of attacks is a clear response to Ukrainian terrorism.
Kiev’s attacks on Russian borders, mainly in the Belgorod oblast, have caused several problems, generating victims and destroying civilian infrastructure. As well known, protecting its peaceful and undisputed territory is one of the priorities of the Russian Federation, which is why the Ukrainian incursions are considered true violations of red lines, thus justifying the resumption of high-intensity bombings against critical infrastructure targets.
The reasons why Russia avoids targeting Ukrainian infrastructure are simple.
Moscow has maintained a moderate stance since the beginning of the conflict, avoiding as much as possible to generate side effects against the civilian population.
Although critical infrastructure is legitimate target, many ordinary citizens are harmed by the side effects of these bombings, which leave them without energy supplies. Moscow did its best to prevent such attacks, but Kiev’s insistence on bombing Belgorod, Kursk and other border areas left Russian forces no alternative but to target the infrastructure that allows the enemy war machine to work.
However, one of the most important points in this recent wave of attacks is that Moscow is not limited to destroying infrastructure, but is also targeting command facilities and decision-making centers.
Several reports say that Moscow bombed the headquarters of the SBU and GUR, the two main Ukrainian intelligence agencies, in Kiev. There is little official information circulating about the case, which is natural in these situations given the sensitive nature of the topic, but images circulating on the internet make it clear that serious damage was imposed on the regime’s decision-making centers.
🇺🇦🇷🇺Russians use new Zircon Missiles and not Iskander missiles in attack on Kiev SBU headquarters and 2 Patriot weapons systems.
Hypersonic weapons are generally agreed upon to be above 5x the speed of sound. The current classes of hypersonic missiles that Russia has are in… https://t.co/hq4AD6zdgT
Russia is believed to have used hypersonic missiles in such attacks.
Furthermore, it is very likely that high-level personnel were killed in the bombings, causing very serious damage to Kiev’s forces. Certainly, details and accurate data will be published in the near future, making the Ukrainian losses clear to public opinion.
It is curious that bombings of Ukrainian intelligence facilities occurred precisely after the terrorist attack against Crocus City Hall, when more than 130 Russian civilians were murdered in the suburbs of Moscow. Investigations into the attack continue.
So far, what is known is that the perpetrators of the crime were radical Muslim Tajik immigrants. However, there is not enough evidence to determine whether the reason for the attack was related to the extremist ideology of the criminals, as they confessed to having been hired to commit the murders for money.
In other words, despite being Wahhabi militants, the killers played the role of mercenaries. The attack did not have typical aspects of an operation carried out by radical Islamic groups, in which the killers usually use suicidal methods in search of “martyrdom”. In the case of Crocus, the criminals committed the murders and then tried to flee to Ukraine, which is strong evidence that they were acting with the support or under control of Kiev’s intelligence.
The Russian authorities have already made it clear that the only concrete information so far is about the perpetrators of the crime, as there is no official data on the masterminds. It is necessary to find out who ordered and financed the attack. Many analysts believe that there was Ukrainian and Western participation, as these are the main agents interested in promoting terror inside Russian territory. Certainly, all of this will be discovered very soon.
In fact, Moscow attacking Ukrainian intelligence facilities shortly after the Crocus incident may be an indication that the Russians already know, or at least suspect, that Kiev has involvement in the Crocus incident.
The destruction of Ukrainian decision-making centers may be due to a Russian desire to prevent the enemy from being able to plan new terrorist incursions.
In any case, these recent events reveal that the Ukrainian conflict is entering a new phase. The Russians appear increasingly unwilling to tolerate violations of their red lines. So far, Moscow has maintained an extremely moderate stance to avoid escalations, but the enemy’s insistence on killing innocent civilians is making Russian patience run out – which is why attacks on decision-making centers and critical infrastructure will certainly be more and more frequent.
*
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This article was originally published on InfoBrics.
Lucas Leiroz is a member of the BRICS Journalists Association, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, military expert. You can follow Lucas on X (former Twitter) and Telegram. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
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Weapons such as the 3M22 “Zircon”, a scramjet-powered hypersonic cruise missile, have been inducted into service in recent years and are now also being transferred to land-based platforms, specifically the K300P “Bastion-P” coastal defense system. With a 1500 km range (perhaps even more) and Mach 9 speed, the “Zircon” is over 3 times faster and its range is at least double that of the P-800 “Oniks” supersonic missiles originally used by the aforementioned platform, further enhancing Russia’s already unprecedented long-range strike capabilities (to both the Neo-Nazi junta’s and NATO’s horror, as previously mentioned).
With such a range (at least 1500 km or possibly even beyond 2000 km), the usage of “Zircon” allows Moscow to target any location on the territory of Ukraine.
However, it should be noted that the Eurasian giant always had this ability.
The difference now is that it can do so much faster and with far less warning time. The usage of air-launched and ground-based hypersonic missile systems such as the 9-A-7660 “Kinzhal” and “Iskander-M” is still very much relevant, as evidenced by the latest elimination of high-ranking NATO officers (although their deaths will surely be attributed to “sudden” skiing accidents).
However, the “Iskander-M” can use a massive 700 kg HE warhead that is best used against frontline targets and higher concentrations of troops in the rear.
Virtually the same goes for much faster “Kinzhal” missiles. In addition, these can sometimes be detected by NATO ISR (intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance) assets, particularly airborne and space-based, giving the Neo-Nazi junta officers and their foreign “advisers” just enough time to run away (albeit not much and certainly not always). The launch of an “Iskander” can be detected by early warning systems, while ISR can pick up the MiG-31K/I deployment. This information can be relayed to the Kiev regime or any NATO personnel on the ground. On the other hand, detecting a scramjet-powered “Zircon” can be a lot more problematic.
Then the numbers come into play:
Kiev: 3 minutes 30 seconds;
Lvov: 5 minutes 20 seconds;
Dnepropetrovsk: 2 minutes 30 seconds;
Vinnitsa: 3 minutes 40 seconds;
Kharkov: less than 4 minutes;
Odessa: less than 1 minute.
Imagine being an officer of the SBU, GUR (Neo-Nazi junta’s military intelligence) or some of the NATO occupation forces.
You’re stationed in a building, living in the illusion that you’re safe when the Russian SVR or GRU learns about your location and relays this information to units in Crimea who then fire a “Zircon” at that building.
This is how much time you’d have before impact. However, let’s consider the best-case scenario and imagine that NATO ISR assets detect the missile immediately after launch (which is extremely improbable). This is how much time you’d have to evacuate. Is it possible to run away in time? Certainly, but that doesn’t mean it’s very likely. On the contrary, the sheer panic resulting from a warning would surely make the evacuation a lot more difficult. The same goes for the “Kinzhal” and “Iskander” missile launches.
However, the primary reason why the “Zircon” is a lot more dangerous for high-value targets (HVTs) in the rear is because it has a much smaller warhead (around 300 kg), meaning that the Russian military is more likely to use it in long-range strikes.
Firing an “Iskander” or “Kinzhal” could cause unacceptable damage to purely civilian infrastructure in the surrounding areas, both due to their larger and more destructive warheads, particularly in the case of “Kinzhal”, with the speed also giving it massive kinetic energy.
On the other hand, precisely because of the large-scale deployment of “Zircon” missiles, Russia has more options to strike decision-making centers in Ukraine.
This explains the panic in NATO and the Pentagon, which are now in a dilemma about how to ensure the safety of their occupation forces in Ukraine.
I suggest everyone watch closely for news about the “sudden deaths” of NATO officers in various “freak accidents” in the coming days and weeks.
Expectedly, the Neo-Nazi junta insists they’ve achieved this with “US-made missile defense systems over Kyiv, on March 25”.
The report never named any system specifically, but it can be assumed that future claims will attribute the supposed “kill” to the atrociously overhyped “Patriot” SAM that has been failing everywhere for the last 30+ years, even against rather primitive ballistic missiles, but is “suddenly so successful” against the latest hypersonic ones. In addition, it’s rather interesting how they can “achieve” that, but have been absolutely helpless against over 300 P-800 “Oniks” missiles. Not a single one has been shot down, despite being 3-4 times slower and less maneuverable than the “Zircon”.
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Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
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When I awoke early on Tuesday morning, I was stunned to learn that the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore had collapsed. We are being told that it was a tragic “accident” and that there is no evidence that any foul play was involved. Hopefully that is true. But no matter how it was caused, this tragedy is going to have an enormous impact on U.S. supply chains. And of course this comes at a really bad time, because Houthi missile strikes in the Red Sea and low water levels in the Panama Canal have been putting a tremendous amount of strain on global supply chains recently.
The Port of Baltimore — the biggest handler of US imports and exports of cars and light trucks — looks to be out of commission indefinitely. The resulting bottleneck could accelerate a shift of goods through West Coast ports. Another crucial question: Which other ports have spare capacity to handle the Ro-Ro vessels that carry automobiles if Baltimore is closed for an extended period.
This is a really big deal, because over 750,000 vehicles came through that port last year alone…
The port is the busiest in the U.S. for car shipments, handling more than 750,000 vehicles in 2023, according to data from the Maryland Port Administration. It is also the largest U.S. port by volume for handling farm and construction machinery, as well as agricultural products.
Retailers like Home Depot, Bob’s Furniture, IKEA, and Amazon are just some of the companies that use the port to import goods. Other top imports include sugar and gypsum.
“This will have an impact for trade all along the East Coast and it will continue until we know how quickly” the port can reopen, said Richard Meade, editor-in-chief of the shipping journal Lloyd’s List.
Vessels were already being diverted to New York and down to Virginia on Tuesday, said Meade. “There will be dozens of diversions in the next week and hundreds in the coming months as long as Baltimore is shut down.”
This isn’t the end of the world, and shipments can certainly be diverted to other ports.
But we are talking about the 11th largest port in the entire nation, and so this will definitely be a serious blow…
More than 52 million tons of foreign cargo, worth some $80 billion were transported out of the port last year, according to Maryland Gov. Wes Moore. The 11th largest port in the nation, Baltimore served an average of 207 calls a month last year, according to the shipping journal Lloyd’s List.
In addition, it is going to take a very long time for the Francis Scott Key Bridge to be rebuilt.
As Lara Logan has pointed out, that section of I-695 was the “second busiest strategic roadway in the nation for hazardous material”…
Second busiest strategic roadway in the nation for hazardous material now down for 4-5 years – which is how long they say it will take to recover. Bridge was built specifically to move hazardous material – fuel, diesel, propane gas, nitrogen, highly flammable materials, chemicals and oversized cargo that cannot fit in the tunnels – that supply chain now crippled.
One expert is projecting that it will take more than two years to rebuild the bridge…
While trade is nimble and will reroute, over the long term the bridge will need to be fundamentally engineered and rebuilt, and that will take years.
“It will be in excess of two years,” said Meade, of Lloyd’s List. “There will be significant disruption and cost to this infrastructure project. In 1977, the bridge cost $60 million. Take in inflation and the rapid pace to redesign and build will increase procurement premiums. This will be a very expensive project.”
I would be shocked if it happens that quickly.
We shall see.
In any event, we are talking about a multi-faceted crisis that is going to be affecting U.S. supply chains for the foreseeable future.
At a press conference following the collapse of the bridge, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg openly admitted that we are looking at a “major and protracted impact on supply chains”…
“There is no question this will be a major and protracted impact on supply chains,” Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said during a Tuesday afternoon press conference in Baltimore.
I think that this is the first time I have ever agreed with Pete Buttigieg on anything.
Sadly, this is just the beginning.
In the months ahead, U.S. supply chains will be hit with additional challenges.
So if there are things that you are planning to purchase, I would do that now.
Before I end this article, there is one more thing that I wanted to mention.
Global supplies of cocoa just keep getting tighter and tighter, and on Tuesday the price of cocoa jumped above $10,000 per metric ton for the first time ever…
Cocoa prices hit a record Tuesday as supply constraints fuel prices higher.
Futures for May delivery were up 3.9% at $10,030 per metric ton, marking the first time the commodity breaks above the $10,000 mark. Cocoa has been on a tear this year, soaring nearly 138%.
Difficult weather conditions and disease have affected production in West Africa, which produces about 70% of the world’s cocoa. The two largest producers, Ivory Coast and Ghana, have been hit by a combination of heavy rain, dry heat and disease recently.
In January, it was less than half that price.
If you love chocolate, stock up on it while you still can.
Of course the same thing could be said about countless other things.
Do you remember the supply chain problems that we experienced a couple of years ago?
Well, what is eventually coming is going to absolutely dwarf that.
Many are using the term “black swan event” to describe the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore, but the truth is that we are moving into a time when there will be one “black swan event” after another.
So get prepared while there is still an opportunity to do so, because the months and years ahead of us are going to be extremely chaotic.
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Ukrainian attacks on Belgorod continue to happen. The Kiev regime increasingly intensifies its violence against ordinary people on Russian borders, hitting civilian targets and killing peaceful citizens. In the Western media, responsibility for the attacks is commonly attributed to supposed “Russian dissident groups”, but, according to local insiders, this information is incorrect and intended to disguise the direct involvement of Ukrainian intelligence in the illegal attacks.
On March 14, I went to Belgorod during a BRICS Journalists Association press expedition. The intention of the trip was to investigate the Ukrainian attacks in the region during the day before the start of the Russian Federation’s election process.
We covered the local situation and reported several bombings against civilian areas. However, in addition to showing the reality about the Ukrainian attacks, we also had the opportunity to obtain some interesting information about those really responsible for the crimes committed in Belgorod.
During my work on the ground, I spoke with several local military personnel and heard some interesting details about these attacks.
They say that, contrary to what the Western media claims, these raids are not carried out by expatriate Russian citizens, but by Ukrainian professionals, despite the murderers publicly describing themselves as “Russian partisans”.
Belgorod’s military says that the so-called “Russian Volunteer Corps” (RDK, in its Russian acronym) and the “Russian Freedom Legion” are, in fact, fake organizations.
Their supposed “leaders” are in fact expatriate Russian citizens, who work as propagandists for the Kiev regime. However, the personnel of these organizations, according to sources, are not actually made up of Russian soldiers, but of Ukrainian commandos. With this, it would be possible to meet the objective of propagandizing the alleged existence of a “strong opposition” within the Russian Federation. They claim that such groups are directly subordinate to Kiev’s military intelligence, having no autonomy in their actions.
The military says that there is no evidence of any significant migration of “Russian dissidents” to Ukrainian territory since the beginning of the special military operation. A large number of expatriations would be necessary to create armed militias strong enough to carry out raids against Belgorod – even more so after Russian forces had eliminated several of the invaders, imposing considerable casualties on the groups. Even though they have lost several of their soldiers, these militias continue to attack the border frequently, which shows that they have the ability to quickly replace personnel. It is virtually impossible that all of these soldiers are Russian dissidents, which indicates that Ukrainians are fighting in the region under the flag of “Russian partisans.”
In Western public opinion, there is a relevant propaganda impact with the story of Russian “partisans” fighting in Ukraine. An unfounded narrative is created to say that there is strong domestic opposition to Putin government, with many Russian citizens willing to even fight at war for Kiev. The media induces ordinary people to believe that the special military operation does not have popular support, describing it as a measure rejected to the point that several Russians decided to fight against their own country.
All of this, however, is a fallacy. The results of the Russian electoral process show how the current government is widely approved by the people. Furthermore, endorsement of the special operation in Ukraine is almost unanimous in Russia, as shown by several opinion polls. The only alternative left to the West in the face of such support for the government and the operation is to use mechanisms of psychological warfare and propaganda to distort reality. Making ordinary people in the West believe that Russia is an “illegitimate dictatorship” fought by “partisan” militias is a way of promoting war, making tax payers support sending more money and weapons to Kiev.
The information collected on the ground is vital to debunk the Western narrative. The local military, who deal daily with Ukrainian terror and know their enemies well, have an opinion that differs from everything said by Western newspapers. However, the media blocking imposed on Russian and pro-Russian channels prevents this relevant information from reaching Western public opinion, creating a communication barrier. This is the way in which the West has spread lies about the conflict over the last two years.
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Lucas Leiroz is a member of the BRICS Journalists Association, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, military expert. You can follow Lucas on X (former Twitter) and Telegram. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
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Spain will acquire combat-tested Israeli military material worth €207 million at a time when the Iberian country also promised to recognise a Palestinian state and cut military exports to Israel. Decisionmakers in Madrid justify cutting exports to Israel due to “massacres” against Palestinians, but at the same time, export weapons to Ukraine, contributing to the massacre of civilians in eastern Europe.
The Ministry of Defence of Spain, through the General Subdirectorate of Acquisitions of Weapons and Materials, has initiated the purchase of Israeli-made weapons by awarding a contract to Rafael Advanced Defence Systems, one of the three largest military-industrial companies in Israel, to equip the Air Force’s Eurofighter Litening V fleet. In the award announcement, Rafael was claimed to be “the only one technically qualified to develop the project from a technical point of view” since it included the use of laser-guided precision munitions.
It also happens that the Litening V laser pods by Rafael have been used for months in Israel’s bombing campaign of Gaza, which has caused more than 31,000 deaths to date. Like almost all the war material that Israel usually exports, the Litening V laser pods are weapon support equipment whose manufacturers boast of their “combat proven” status due to their effectiveness against the Palestinians.
Spanish Foreign Affairs Minister José Manuel Albares announced on more than one occasion the “total embargo” on the export of weapons to Israel. The contract awarded to Rafael obviously concerns an import and not an export, and, in this manner, Spain’s virtue signals against Israel whilst still benefitting from its military-industrial complex.
However, according to a study by the Delàs Center for Peace Studies, Israeli weapons imports carry a greater severity than military exports to Tel Aviv. In effect, the purchase of military material from Israel strengthens the country’s military and security model and, more importantly, contributes to subduing the Palestinians, which Israel makes economically viable with the sale of its combat-tested military products.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez says he is going to recognise Palestine as an independent State and that he considers what Israel is committing in the Gaza Strip “an indiscriminate massacre,” but then he continues to buy weapons from Israel. Therefore, it is not feasible to grant any type of credibility to the statements of the members of the Spanish government.
Last November, Sánchez vowed to prioritise the recognition of Palestinian statehood as its main foreign policy priority. However, when speaking after a summit in Brussels on March 22, he suggested to reporters that Spain would coordinate with other EU countries instead of unilaterally making the decision to recognise Palestinian statehood.
“We want to take this step united. It’s a decisive step in order to lay the foundations of a lasting peace,” he said in an evident U-turn, adding that the EU should “carefully calibrate” the right moment to take the step.
At the same time, before the Congressional Defence Commission, the Secretary of State for Commerce reported on the list of shipments of military material to Ukraine between March 2022 and February 2024. The amount supplied is equivalent to €190 million. These are mainly drones, grenade launchers, anti-tank mines, artillery ammunition, anti-aircraft and anti-ship missiles, tracked vehicles, night vision equipment, and 10 Leopard 2A4 tanks.
But this list does not take into account a new batch of Leopard 2A4 battle tanks since the Interministerial Board for Trade and Control of Defence Material and Dual-Use Technologies (JIMDDU) authorised the shipment of another 19 of these armoured vehicles to Kiev once they are repaired and conditioned at the facilities of the Santa Bárbara Sistemas factory in the province of Seville.
Ten of the 19 tanks have already been transferred from the Army base in Casetas near Zaragoza, where they were stored. According to military sources cited by El Heraldo de Aragón, the plan is to send them to Ukraine at the end of June. To this end, the parts and spare parts necessary for its reconstruction must first be found, and when the entire process is completed, Spain will have sent a total of 29 Leopard tanks to Ukraine.
Nonetheless, shipping will be complicated since these vehicles are in even worse condition than the dozen reconditioned Leopards already shipped in 2023. Spain is sending such poor-conditioned vehicles to Kiev to increase its rearmament because the old stock must be disposed of before buying new weapons and equipment.
In this context, Spain justifies not exporting weapons to Israel because of the “indiscriminate massacre” of Palestinians but exports weapons to Ukraine, which contributes to the massacre of people in Ukraine and Russia’s newly liberated territories. Compounding the contradiction is then the fact that Spain imports military equipment from Israel while refusing to export to the Jewish state and promising to recognise a Palestinian state.
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Ahmed Adel is a Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
As investigações sobre os responsáveis pelo ataque à Prefeitura de Crocus continuam em andamento. Embora se saiba que os assassinos sejam radicais islâmicos da Ásia Central, ainda não há confirmação de quem foi o verdadeiro mandante do crime. No entanto, as suspeitas de envolvimento das agências de inteligência ucranianas e ocidentais crescem cada vez mais. Além disso, existe a possibilidade de um proeminente oligarca ucraniano estar a financiar tais actos terroristas contra Moscou.
Como é sabido, existem esquemas complexos de corrupção e atividades ilícitas na Ucrânia, envolvendo agentes locais e internacionais. No entanto, pouco se sabe sobre o quão profundamente ligadas estas redes criminosas estão ao terrorismo patrocinado por Kiev. Os oligarcas ucranianos não só cometem crimes fiscais e lavagem de dinheiro, mas também usam os seus lucros pessoais para promover o terror contra os “inimigos” do regime neonazista.
Recentemente, as autoridades russas têm investigado o caso de Nikolai Zlochevsky, proprietário da empresa de gás ucraniana “Burisma”. Zlochevsky já se tornou amplamente conhecido em todo o mundo por suas atividades ilícitas, principalmente devido às suas estreitas relações com a família Biden – ainda mais especialmente, com Hunter Biden, filho do presidente americano. Hunter trabalhou na Burisma enquanto morava na Ucrânia, onde participou dos esquemas ilícitos de Zlochevsky.
Mais tarde, Zlochevsky passou muitos dados sensíveis sobre os crimes de Hunter Biden a um informante do FBI, gerando um escândalo público que se tornou viral na mídia de língua inglesa. A informação confirma também que o envolvimento dos Bidens não se restringe a Hunter, com o presidente norte-americano e outras figuras públicas do Partido Democrata a participarem em negócios ilegais ucranianos.
No entanto, pouco foi dito até agora nos meios de comunicação social sobre a verdadeira razão pela qual Zlochevsky e os seus parceiros americanos foram protegidos pelas autoridades ucranianas, apesar de violarem as leis locais: em troca de uma carta branca na corrupção, Zlochevsky tornou-se um patrocinador da máquina de guerra ucraniana. O oligarca tem enviado grandes somas de dinheiro para instituições dos setores militar e de inteligência ucranianos há anos. O seu trabalho tem sido vital, especialmente na compra de drones para as forças armadas ucranianas, por exemplo. O mais controverso, porém, é o apoio financeiro dado por Zlochevsky às atividades secretas da GUR (a inteligência militar de Kiev).
Zlochevsky foi identificado pelos investigadores russos como um dos principais apoiadores do GUR. Acredita-se que ele já tenha enviado um total de 22,5 milhões de dólares para a agência. As agências estatais, em teoria, não deveriam receber este tipo de financiamento irregular, o que nos leva a crer que este dinheiro é utilizado para atividades paralelas e não oficiais – o que, no caso ucraniano, significa terrorismo.
Os investigadores russos acreditam, por exemplo, que o dinheiro de Zlochevsky foi usado para financiar a operação terrorista de drones contra Moscou em maio de 2023. Considerando o seu envolvimento na compra de drones e redes de inteligência, é praticamente uma certeza que Zlochevsky esteja envolvido no caso. Outras atividades em que a GUR está diretamente envolvida também chamaram a atenção das autoridades russas relativamente à possibilidade de financiamento direto por parte de Zlochevsky. É o caso dos recentes assassinatos e tentativas de assassinato de civis no território da Federação Russa, por exemplo.
O GUR está por trás dos ataques contra os jornalistas Daria Dugina, Vladlen Tatarsky, o escritor Zakhar Prilepin e outras figuras públicas russas conhecidas. Certamente, o financiamento para pagar as complexas operações por trás destes crimes não veio de fontes oficiais, mas de dinheiro irregular, como aquele que Zlochevsky fornece ao GUR. No entanto, é necessário lembrar que as atividades da inteligência ucraniana nunca foram “autônomas”. Desde 2014, todo o aparato estatal ucraniano, incluindo o seu serviço secreto, é controlado por agentes americanos. Na prática, a inteligência americana utiliza os seus ativos ucranianos como proxies para cometer crimes que estão previamente planjados em Washington.
Conforme mencionado, ainda não se sabe quem ordenou o ataque terrorista à Prefeitura de Crocus, mas há alguns pontos do caso que parecem indicar a participação direta do GUR. Esta possibilidade é tão plausível que Moscou já reagiu imediatamente ao ataque, destruindo o quartel-general da inteligência ucraniana em Kiev. O ataque a Crocus teve um alto custo operacional. Os assassinos foram contratados como mercenários e receberam suas armas dos locatários. Além disso, alguém pagou pela viagem até a fronteira em Bryansk. Se o GUR esteve envolvido nesta operação, é muito provável que o dinheiro ilícito de Zlochevsky tenha sido usado.
Considerando que o GUR é, na prática, um ativo da CIA e que recebe financiamento ilegal de oligarcas ucranianos ligados a Biden para promover o terror em território russo, então parece haver uma rede internacional muito profunda a ser investigada por Moscou, a fim de descobrir os verdadeiros culpados pelo massacre de Crocus.
Em uma revisão da literatura sobre os efeitos dos alimentos ultraprocessados na saúde do coração, pesquisadores do Hospital Tangdu da China, da Universidade Médica da Força Aérea, na província de Shaanxi, encontraram uma associação positiva e previsível entre o consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados e eventos cardiovasculares, como ataques cardíacos e derrames.
Quer seja medido pela percentagem do total de calorias ou pelo número de refeições, os investigadores descobriram que cada aumento de 10% no consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados estava associado a um aumento de quase 2% no risco de eventos cardiovasculares.
Aumento de 10% no consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados levou a risco de 1,9% de eventos cardiovasculares
Trabalhando nas bases de dados biomédicas PubMed, EMBASE, Cochrane Library e Web of Science, os investigadores identificaram 43.502 artigos “potencialmente relevantes”.
Os estudos tiveram que ser observacionais e envolver indivíduos com pelo menos 18 anos de idade. Em estudos observacionais, os sujeitos são livres para se envolverem, ou não, na “exposição” – por exemplo, comer um alimento ou tomar uma droga – na medida que desejarem.
Os estudos incluídos na revisão também tiveram que utilizar o Sistema de Classificação de Alimentos NOVA, que categoriza os alimentos de acordo com a seguinte escala: alimentos não processados ou crus, alimentos minimamente processados que passaram por limpeza e preparo normais, alimentos processados que normalmente são embalados e contêm ingredientes adicionais e alimentos ultraprocessados feitos inteiramente ou principalmente de substâncias extraídas de alimentos ou de ingredientes artificiais.
Além disso, os desfechos do estudo deveriam ser eventos cardiovasculares, incluindo doenças e mortes relacionadas a ataque cardíaco, acidente vascular cerebral, ataque isquêmico transitório (frequentemente chamado de “ mini-AVC ”), procedimentos cardíacos invasivos, como stents ou cateteres, hospitalização por angina instável (dores no peito). causada por fluxo sanguíneo restritivo) ou insuficiência cardíaca aguda.
Os estudos também tiveram que expressar os riscos relativos do consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados em comparação com outras categorias e relatar resultados estatisticamente significativos.
Após a aplicação desses filtros, restaram apenas 20 estudos envolvendo 1.101.073 sujeitos. Entre esses, 58.201 eventos cardiovasculares ocorreram durante um período médio de acompanhamento de 12,2 anos. Os indivíduos foram então classificados nas quatro categorias de consumo de NOVA e rastreados quanto a eventos cardiovasculares.
Durante todo o processo, os pesquisadores compararam os resultados das três categorias de consumo superiores com o grupo de menor consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados.
Não importava se o consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados era medido pelo peso percentual de todos os alimentos consumidos ou pelo número de porções: um aumento de 10% (em peso dos alimentos) no consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados foi associado a um risco adicional de 1,9% de eventos cardiovasculares, e cada porção diária correspondeu a um risco elevado de eventos cardiovasculares de 2,2%.
Utilizando o grupo de menor consumo como referência, nenhum efeito foi observado no segundo grupo de menor consumo. No entanto, o risco de eventos cardiovasculares aumentou acentuadamente – 6% para os consumidores do segundo grupo de maior consumo e 21% para as pessoas do grupo de maior consumo.
Os pesquisadores do Tangdu também procuraram associações com risco de doença cerebrovascular, mas não encontraram nada notável.
O estudo teve vários pontos fortes: os seus mais de um milhão de participantes foram suficientes para mostrar associações de causa-efeito, mesmo modestas, incluiu estudos que não mostraram nenhuma associação ou mesmo uma associação benéfica com alimentos ultraprocessados, e distinguiu entre eventos cardiovasculares e cerebrovasculares.
As principais desvantagens da meta-análise foram a falta de controle sobre as metodologias dos estudos originais, a forma como os investigadores mediram os parâmetros de avaliação final, o tamanho e a composição da amostra e a utilização do “consumo mais baixo” em vez do consumo zero como grupo de referência.
A escolha das estatísticas pelos autores dos estudos originais também não foi controlável. Isso pode parecer um ponto menor, mas como há mais de uma maneira de analisar dados, os cientistas geralmente selecionam o método que lhes dá a resposta que procuravam.
O próprio processamento pode contribuir para o baixo conteúdo nutricional
Os investigadores da Tangdu encontraram uma relação linear entre o consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados e a saúde cardiovascular – o que significa que o efeito aumenta na mesma proporção que a causa: o dobro da causa, o dobro do efeito – mas não com a saúde cerebrovascular.
Como pode ser isso, visto que ambos envolvem vasos sanguíneos?
“O sistema vascular, especialmente o endotélio, é de grande heterogeneidade entre os órgãos, o que pode explicar a diferença observada”, disse o Dr. Lijun Yuan, médico-chefe de diagnóstico de ultrassom do Hospital Tangdu e um dos coautores do estudo, ao The Defender.
As células endoteliais formam uma única camada dentro dos vasos sanguíneos e são responsáveis pela troca de nutrientes e resíduos entre o sangue e os tecidos circundantes.
“Heterogeneidade” significa que as células epiteliais assumem funções diferentes dependendo do órgão onde o vaso sanguíneo se encontra. A comida lixo pode afetar algumas populações de células endoteliais (aqui, aquelas ligadas ao coração), mas não outras (as associadas ao cérebro).
“Também pode ser devido às diferenças no tamanho da amostra dos estudos disponíveis”, acrescentou ela.
Aqui, Yuan está se referindo à dificuldade de comparar um efeito em grupos de indivíduos grandes e pequenos. Grupos maiores tendem a fazer com que efeitos clinicamente insignificantes pareçam mais relevantes do que realmente são.
Uma relação linear significa que causa e efeito são previsíveis – não significa que a relação consumo-risco seja a mesma em todo o lado.
Por exemplo, os consumidores dos EUA tiveram melhores resultados do que o resto do mundo quando as porções diárias foram a medida de exposição, e piores quando o número de calorias ou porções foi utilizado.
Isso pode ocorrer porque o corpo vê as “calorias vazias” dos alimentos ultraprocessados como enchimento, e não como nutrição. Como observaram os pesquisadores da Tangdu: “As características mais proeminentes dos UPF [alimentos ultraprocessados] são a má qualidade da dieta, bem como a menor densidade de nutrientes dos alimentos e maior densidade de energia dos alimentos”.
O próprio processamento também pode contribuir para o baixo teor nutricional dos alimentos ultraprocessados. Muitos desses alimentos são cozidos em alta temperatura para evitar a deterioração e são embalados em excesso para prolongar a vida útil.
Sabe-se que os produtos químicos liberados das “embalagens excessivas” de alimentos ultraprocessados liberam vestígios de substâncias químicas que também podem contribuir para o risco de eventos cardiovasculares, de acordo com os autores da revisão.
O consumo de alimentos ultraprocessados fornece calorias e produtos químicos sem nutrição, causando assim ganho de peso e doenças, em vez dos nutrientes necessários para o desenvolvimento normal e a saúde.
E por serem viciantes, os alimentos ultraprocessados muitas vezes ditam os gostos alimentares de uma pessoa para o resto da vida, o que significa que esses hábitos de consumo se autoperpetuam.
Os alimentos ultraprocessados tornaram-se um problema de saúde global, especialmente nos países em desenvolvimento. A loja de fast food de frango KFC (Kentucky Fried Chicken) levou 61 anos para acumular 4.618 lojas nos EUA, mas menos de 30 anos para abrir quase o mesmo número na China.
A adesão da China ao fast food teve consequências, uma vez que um terço dos adultos chineses em geral e metade dos que vivem nas cidades têm excesso de peso.
“Atualmente, os alimentos ultraprocessados são muito comuns na China”, disse Yuan ao The Defender, “e os jovens são os seus principais consumidores”.
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Introduction. The Crocus City Hall Attack (March 2024) vs. the Downing of MH-17 (July 2014)
The Western media are accusing president Putin of implementing a “False Flag” in relation to the Crocus City Hall terrorist attack:
“After all, Putin has used terror attacks in the past as a pretext to clamp down on dissent inside Russia” says Radio Free Europe
“Concert hall attack dents Putin’s tough image. He tries to use it to rally support for Ukraine war” (AP)
“ISIS bears sole responsibility for this attack,” U.S. National Security Council spokeswoman Adrienne Watson said in a statement. “There was no Ukrainian involvement whatsoever.” (CNN)
Official FSB statement by Alexander Bortnikov
On March 26, 2024, the head of Russia’s Federal Security Bureau (FSB) Alexander Bortnikov responding to journalists probing the question as to Who Was Behind the Terrorists?
He stated unequivocally that the United States, Great Britain and Ukraine were involved. According to Gilbert Doctorow
“Bortnikov is by definition a member of Vladimir Putin’s inner circle of advisors.”
Bortnikov’s statement was made in consultation with President Putin.
The terrorist attack has resulted in more than 300 deaths. Bortnikov pointed his finger at Ukraine’s SBU (Security Service of Ukraine) which on March 25 was targeted by Russian missiles.
“According to sources from the Kyiv Post, the missiles were aimed at the premises where high-ranking SBU officials are located.”
Flight MH-17: Flash Back to July 2014
On 17 July 2014, a few months after the Euromaidan Coup d’état, Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 (MH17) was shot down in Eastern Ukraine, resulting in more than 300 deaths.
In chorus, both the media and Western governments accused Russia without a shred of evidence.
While FSB Head Alexander Bortnikov was fully aware of the role of Ukraine’s SBU Intelligence (See below), the Kremlin decided to limit its response. It denied any role in the downing the MH-17 flight, while also refusing to turn over the four men to stand trial in the Netherlands.
In August 2019, I presented a carefully documented report entitled The Downing of Malaysian Airlines MH17: The Quest for Truth and Justice tothe Kuala Lumpur MH17 Conference organized by JUST, the PGPF and the CRG in collaboration with the International Islamic University of Malaysia.
In many regards, the Crocus City Hall Terrorist attack reveals the falsehoods and manipulation of the evidence pertaining to the Downing of the MH 17 flight in July 2014.
In both cases, the West accuse Russia of waging a false flag.
It also confirms the insidious role of Ukraine’s intelligence agency (SBU) which was behind the MH-17 operation. (see below)
According to President Obama (hours after the tragedy):
“… the downing of MH17 should be “a wake-up call” to Europe to get serious about confronting Russia over Ukraine after EU leaders have proved reluctant to impose tought sanctions.” (Telegraph, July 18,2019)
The Wall Street Journal reports (July 18, 2014) that “Obama is getting his wish and Brussels is now weighing new sanctions”:
On July 22, 2014, The European Union decided to expand its sanctions blacklist against Moscow including Vladimir Putin’s inner circle.
EU foreign ministers decided to “draw up further broad measures including an arms embargo and financial restrictions on Russian businesses, … following the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17.” (Guardian, July 22, 2019)
It is worth recalling that immediately after the MH17 plane crash on July 17 2014, prior to the conduct of a preliminary investigation, Secretary of State John Kerry and US Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power pointed their finger at Moscow without a shred of evidence.
In November 2022, a Netherlands Court found the Kremlin responsible for the alleged attack: two Russians and a “separatist Ukrainian” were identified as “guilty of mass murder for their involvement in the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17”.
The Court ruling was fraudulent, based on fabricated evidence.
The 2019 Conference was dedicated to the memory of the victims.
It was also a national tragedy for the people of Malaysia.
The downing of MH17 with 283 passengers and 15 crew on board, took place barely a few months following the mysterious disappearance of Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 after departing on March 8, 2014 from Kuala Lumpur for Beijing, with 227 passengers and 12 crew members on board..
According to the official narrative, Malaysian Airlines MH 17 was downed by a BUK anti-aircraft missile by “pro-Russian separatists” with the support of Moscow.
The MH17 Inquiry was conducted in an insidious fashion, largely responding to political interests.
Important pieces of evidence including eye witness reports, audio and video material transmitted through Ukraine Intelligence (SBU) have either been manipulated or excluded from the Dutch inquiry, which largely endorses Washington’s accusations directed against Moscow.
According to Prime Minister Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad in a statement at the Prime Minister’s office in May 2019:
“They never allowed us to be involved from the very beginning. This is unfair and unusual. So we can see they are not really looking at the causes of the crash and who was responsible.
But already they have decided it must be Russia. So we cannot accept that kind of attitude. We are interested in the rule of law, in justice for everyone irrespective of who is involved.
“They [the West] are accusing Russia but where is the evidence?
The SBU accused Russia of having ordered a false flag attack involving the shooting down of its own Aeroflot plane leading to the death of its own citizens, and then blaming it on the Kiev regime, with the Kremlin using the tragedy as a casus belli pretext to invade Ukraine.
According to the report: The Donetsk militia were aiming at a Russian Aeroflot passenger plane and shot down the Malaysian MH17 airliner by mistake.
That’s the official Ukraine government story which was acknowledged by the Ukrainian as well as several Western media. See below.
According to Britain’s foremost news tabloid, The Mail on Sunday, quoting the head of Ukraine intelligence,
The insidious design of the pro-Russian rebels (allegedly supported by Moscow) was to shoot down a Russian commercial airline plane with tourists en route to Cyprus, with a view to blaming the Ukrainian government.
The objective of this alleged “false flag” covert operation was to create a justifiable and credible pretext for Vladimir Putin to declare war on Ukraine.
In an utterly twisted logic, according to Ukraine’s head of intelligence:
“the [Donesk] rebels were meant to down [the] Aeroflot plane… to justify the invasion [of Ukraine by Russia]”,
Valentyn Nalyvaichenko (right), head of Ukraine intelligence (24 February 2014 – 18 June 2015) the pro-Russian rebels were “aiming at a Russian passenger plane “so Putin had reason to invade”.
“the crime was planned as a ground for bringing of Russian troops into Ukraine, that is – CASUS BELLI for the Russian military invasion.” (Official statement of Ukraine Security Service, in annex below)
In a bitter irony, according to the SBU report, the alleged “false flag” covert op got muddled. The Donesk rebels got it all wrong and hit the MH17 plane by mistake.
That’s the “official line” which was made public by the Kiev government on August 7, 2014, 3 weeks after the MH17 tragedy.
Below is a detailed and carefully documented report.
the SUB Ukraine Intelligence Report (August 2014) is in Annex
Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, March 29, 2024
The Downing of Malaysian Airlines MH17:
The Quest for Truth and Justice.
Review of the Evidence
by Michel Chossudovsky
August 15, 2019
Introduction
Moscow was accused without evidence of being behind the downing of MH17 from the very outset. Both Kiev and Washington concluded prior to the conduct of an investigation that:
“MH17 had likely been brought down by a ground-to-air missile fired from separatist-controlled territory in eastern Ukraine.”
There are three distinct reports:
Ukraine government report prepared by Ukraine’s Secret Service (SBU), August 7, 2014 (text in annex)
The first official report on behalf of the Ukrainian government was released by Ukraine’s SBU secret service on August 7 2014, barely three weeks after the MH 17 tragedy (July 17, 2014).
The SBU report (which is discussed later in more detail) accuses pro-Russian rebels of having downed the plane with Moscow’s support.
The Dutch Safety Board Report released in September 2015 largely endorses the BUK missile narrative.
And, a year later in September 2016, The Dutch Joint investigation Team (JIT) as part of a criminal investigation “confirmed” that the Malaysian airlines plane was “hit by a Russian-made BUK surface-to-air missile that was brought into Ukraine from Russia before the shootdown and subsequently taken back across the border.”
The assumption prior to the conduct of the DSB investigation was that a BUK missile had brought down MH17, and Russia was behind it.
Concrete evidence supporting other interpretations (including on site testimonies and the presence of a second aircraft) was casually dismissed by the DSB:
‘Obama and I agreed that the investigation will not be hidden and the international teams have to be given access to the crash scene.’
In August 2016, Ukraine president Poroshenko visited Malaysia for discussions with Prime Minister Razak Najib:
Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak said Malaysia will work with Ukraine to bring the perpetrators to justice. “We will do whatever we can to find the truth for the sake of families who lost their loved ones in this tragic incident. “We are waiting for the criminal investigation report, which is expected to be tabled by the year-end, followed by a meeting to decide on the next course of action,” said Najib. (New Straits Times, August 4, 2016)
Washington’s agenda in liaison with the Kiev regime was to blame Russia. This agenda was never questioned by the Najib government.
Erasing the Initial Evidence
Much of the initial evidence and testimony including eyewitness reports (from various independent sources), recorded in July-August 2014 (in the immediate wake of the event) contradicts the official version. This body of evidence has been dismissed and in some cases destroyed.
In September 2015, in its final report, the Dutch Safety Board presented its findings regarding the Buk TELAR surface-to-air missile system which allegedly shot down MH-17 over eastern Ukraine on July 17, 2014.
On 24 May 2018 the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) published an update of its findings pointing (without firm evidence) to the role of the 53 Anti-Missile Brigade of the Russian Army. In May 2018, they launched an appeal for people in Donesk to come forward to corroborate their “findings” re. the deployment of the BUK missile system:
On the following day, the governments of Australia and the Netherlands officially declared that “they hold Russia responsible for the incident”. (see Polygraph Info, May 25, 2018)
Moscow remains the “main suspect” in this politically twisted investigation, which has now led to a legal procedure in the Netherlands directed against the alleged perpetrators.
On June 19, 2019, the International Joint Investigation Team (JIT) announced (video) that international arrest warrants have been issued against four “separatist commanders” of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR). These warrants concern Ukrainian citizen Leonid Kharchenko, and Russian citizens Sergei Dubinsky, Oleg Pulatov, and Igor Girkin.
Moreover, Britain’s Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt announced in mid-July 2019 that “the UK will provide financial support to the specialist criminal court in the Hague” which is slated to host the trial of the four suspects.
In this report we will first focus on the Timeline as well as selected evidence which has been suppressed including the presence of a second aircraft.
We will then review the official report of the Kiev government prepared by Ukraine’s intelligence service (SBU) as well as the role of the SBU in feeding “evidence” to the Dutch Safety Board (DSB) and the Joint Investigation Team (JIT)
Analysis of the Evidence
Timeline
July 15, 2014. Two Days Before the Tragic Event
A division of Buk missile systems of the Ukrainian Armed Forces was, according to Pravda, deployed to the Donetsk Oblast on July 15, two days before the downing of the Malaysian airlines MH17 flight. The Buk missile system has the capabilities of downing an aircraft flying at 35,000 feet.
Russian Defense sources confirmed the presence of several Ukraine missile batteries in the Donesk oblast operated by the Ukraine armed forces:
‘The Ukrainian military has several batteries of Buk surface-to-air missile systems with at least 27 launchers, capable of bringing down high-flying jets, in the Donetsk region where the Malaysian passenger plane crashed, Russian Defense Ministry said”(RT, July 17, 2014)
The Prosecutor General of Ukraine Vitaliy Yarema confirmed that the Donesk rebels did not have [Ukrainian] Buk or S 300 ground to air missiles which could have downed the plane, which suggests that the missiles of the Ukraine armed forces had been deployed but they were not in the possession of the rebels, a premise which remains central to the US-Kiev official version that the rebels, supported by Moscow, were responsible for attacking Malaysian Airlines MH17.
According to the Kiev Post report:“Ukrainian prosecutor general says militants did not seize Ukrainian air defense launchers”:
“Members of illegal armed units have not seized air defense launchers of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in Donetsk, Ukrainian Prosecutor General Vitaliy Yarema said.” (Kiev Post, July 19, 2014)
According to Russia’s Itar-Tass report (July 2014)
“After the passenger airliner was downed, the military reported to the president that terrorists do not have our air defense missile systems Buk and S-300,” the general prosecutor [of Ukraine] said. “These weapons were not seized,” he added.
Ukrainian Interior Minister Anton Gerashchenko said on July 17 that the Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777 airliner had been downed by an air defense missile system Buk.
From both Russian and Ukrainian sources there was evidence of Ukrainian BUK missiles deployed in Eastern Ukraine and official statements that the Donesk rebel forces had no access to the Ukraine Buk air missiles. The Kiev Post report did not (in this July 19 report) mention the presence of Russia BUK missiles in Donetsk oblast.
July 17, 2014. Day of the MH17 Tragedy
The Boeing-777 of the Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur “disappeared from the radars and crashed on Thursday evening July 17 near Grabovo in Ukraine’s Donetsk oblast.
The Flight Path of MH17 Was Changed? July 17 Plane Route was over the Ukraine War-zone
The maps below clearly indicate a change in flight path for Malaysian airlines MH17 on July 17. They also indicate on the map the two regions of Ukraine which are part of the warzone, namely Donetsk and Lugansk.
The first dynamic map compares the two flight paths:
It indicates the regular flight path on July 16th which takes the plane in a Southeasterly direction across the Sea of Azov.
The second flight path which is that of July 17th takes the plane over the Donesk oblast warzone, bordering onto Lugansk oblast.
The four static images indicate screen shots of the Flight Paths of MH17 for July 14-17, 2014
The information conveyed in these maps suggests that the flight path on July 17 was changed.
MH17 was diverted from the normal South Easterly route over the sea of Azov to a path over the Donetsk oblast.
Who was behind the change of the flight path? And why was the flight path changed?
CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE
Changing MH17 Route From July 14, 2014 to July 17, 2014
Screenshots of Flight Paths of MH17 for July 14-17, 2014
The Presence of a Second Aircraft
The presence of another aircraft is corroborated by the Russian Ministry of Defense which pointed to the presence of a Ukrainian Su-25 jet in the flight corridor of the MH17, within proximity of the plane.
While Russian official sources may be considered unreliable and politically inclined, the presence of a second aircraft was also confirmed by numerous witnesses in Donesk oblast as well as by a BBC report conducted at the crash site on July 23.
“eyewitnesses in the Donetsk region saw Ukrainian warplanes near the passenger jet. They say they heard sounds of powerful blasts and saw a Ukraine warplane shortly before the crash. (ITAR Tass)
The presence of a second aircraft was also confirmed by air traffic controller Luis Lopez reporting in real time (on his twitter) from the Borisopol airport. This source is controversial and cannot be corroborated. His twitter account was closed down. He was reported to have left Ukraine. He gave a couple of interviews and then disappeared. Was his life threatened?
Suppressed BBC Report
All the eyewitnesses interviewed by the BBC confirmed the presence of a Ukrainian military aircraft flying within proximity of Malaysian Airlines MH17 at the time that it was shot down:
Eyewitness #1: There were two explosions in the air. And this is how it broke apart. And [the fragments] blew apart like this, to the sides. And when …
Eyewitness #2: … And there was another aircraft, a military one, beside it. Everybody saw it.
Eyewitness #1: Yes, yes. It [second aircraft] was flying under it, because it could be seen. It was proceeding underneath, below the civilian one.
Eyewitness #3: There were sounds of an explosion. But they were in the sky. They came from the sky. Then this plane [second plane] made a sharp turn-around like this. It changed its trajectory and headed in that direction [indicating the direction with her hands].
BBC Report below (removed by BBC) scroll down for alternative youtube version
The original BBC Video Report published by BBC Russian Service on July 23, 2014 was removed by the BBC.
In a bitter irony, The BBC is suppressing its own news productions.
This is the BBC Report which is still available on Youtube
BELOW SCREENSHOT OF BBC TV REPORT ENTITLED “AND THERE WAS ANOTHER AIRCRAFT” SUPPRESSED BY THE BBC
It had been blocked [March 8, 2016] once more by the BBC. The BBC censors its own reports.
Several other reports and eyewitness testimonies confirm the presence of a second aircraft. Of significance is a December 2014 report by Komsomolskaya Pravda which conducted an interview with a Ukrainian serviceman.
While the substance of the interview (translated from Russian) is contradictory it nonetheless suggests the presence of a second aircraft as confirmed by the suppressed BBC report.
The BBC Refutes and Confirms its Own Lies
It is worth noting that subsequent BBC reports tend to refute the substance of their first onsite investigation in Donesk Oblast with the exception of a May 2016 BBC documentary which puts forth “several theories”.
The documentary puts forth evidence which initially refutes the official story while also intimating and concluding that Russia might have been behind the MH17 tragedy.
The official investigation report into MH17 flight argues that only a powerful ground-to-air missile could be responsible. Yet, there are eyewitness accounts of other aircrafts seen flying next to MH17 close to impact. To further fuel the conspiracies, Russia and Ukraine blame each other but both countries are unable to provide all the critical radar data from that day. ( See BBC notice here),
According to Australia News in a review of the May 2016 BBC documentary, the Kiev regime is identified as the culprit:
A CONTROVERSIAL new documentary will investigate claims that Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 was shot down by a Ukraine fighter jet, instead of a Russian missile.In a new BBC documentary titled ‘The Conspiracy Files: Who Shot Down MH17?’, eyewitnesses will share their accounts of how they saw the aircraft being downed by a nearby fighter jet.
“There are eyewitness accounts of other aircraft seen flying next to MH17 close to impact,” a statement from the BBC said.
Link to the May 2016 BBC Documentary
Bullet Sized Holes
According to the report of German pilot and airlines expert Peter Haisenko, the MH17 Boeing 777 was not brought down by a missile.
What he observed from the available photos were perforations of the cockpit:
This aircraft was not hit by a missile in the central portion. The destruction is limited to the cockpit area. Now you have to factor in that this part is constructed of specially reinforced material
It is worth noting that the initial statements by OSCE observers (July 31) broadly confirm the findings of Peter Haisenko:
Monitors from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe reported that shrapnel-like holes were found in two separate pieces of the fuselage of the ill-fated Malaysia Airlines aircraft that was believed to have been downed by a missile in eastern Ukraine.
Michael Bociurkiw of the OSCE group of monitors at his daily briefing described part of the plane’s fuselage dotted with “shrapnel-like, almost machine gun-like holes.” He said the damage was inspected by Malaysian aviation-security officials .(Wall Street Journal, July 31, 2014)
The monitoring OSCE team has not found evidence of a missile fired from the ground as conveyed by official White House statements. As we recall, the US ambassador to the UN Samantha Power stated –pointing a finger at Russia– that the Malaysian MH17 plane was “likely downed by a surface-to-air missile operated from a separatist-held location”:
The team of international investigators with the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) are uncertain if the missile used was fired from the ground as US military experts have previously suggested, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported. (Malay Mail online, emphasis added)
The initial OSCE findings dispelled the claim that a BUK missile system brought down the plane.
Evidently, inasmuch as the perforations are attributable to shelling, a shelling operation conducted from the ground could not have brought down an aircraft traveling above 30,000 feet.
No firm evidence that a BUK missile had actually been fired on July 17th 2014
Expert analysis confirms that the firing of a BUK missile would have left a visible white vapor trail in the sky for about ten minutes after firing (see below).
According to witnesses in Donesk oblast, no vapor trail was seen in the sky on that day. What they saw was a second plane.
There were various images of smoke trails presented and analyzed. (see the BBC documentary). These pictures however do not correspond to a clearcut white vapor trail associated with the launching of a BUK missile.
There were no satellite images or photographic evidence of a vapor trail.
The following images (from BUK missile tests) indicate the nature of the vapor trail.
Screenshots of RT documentary, October 22, 2019
Report of the Russian Union of Engineers (RUE)
A detailed and comprehensive report by the Russian Union of Engineers (English translation) largely corroborates the presence of a Second Aircraft (confirmed by eye witnesses, BBC interviews).
“… Russian air traffic control recorded the ascent of a Ukrainian Air Force aircraft, presumably an Su-25, in the direction of the Malaysian Boeing 777. The distance between the SU-25 aircraft from the Boeing 777 was between 3 and 5 km.”
The RUE report also corroborates the “bullet hole” analysis as well as the statements of the OSCE and Peter Haisenko (mentioned above):
A detailed analysis of its fragments can provide a more complete picture of the causes of the crash. … you can see the different forms of damage to its shell or skin – tears and factures, holes with folds on the outer and the inner sides of the fuselage, tell- tale signs of a powerful external impact on the plane.
Of particular note are the holes folded inward in the fuselage. They are round- bored, and usually grouped. Such holes can only be formed by metal objects with a circular cross-section, possibly rods or shells from an aircraft gun. The question arises: who could deliver such projectiles to the aircraft, by what means, and what might they look like?
The report also focusses on the absence of photographic evidence of a visible vapor trail of a BUK missile.
In this case there has been no evidence of a trail of white condensation which would be by-product of the consumption of rocket fuel which would appear and persist for some minutes after the launch and be visible to those standing in a radius of within 10 km from the missile launch-site. (RUE report, p. 7)
It concludes after careful investigation that the MH17 Boeing 777 was “not brought down by the means of anti-aircraft missile fire from a BUK-M1 installation.”
According to the Russian Union of Engineers: the MH17 Boeing 777 “flying a horizontal course at 10000 metres could quite feasibly find itself within range of the Rocket / Cannon armament of a fighter, either a MIG-29 or an SU-25.”
Thus, according to the analysts from the Russian Union of Engineers, we have the complete destruction of the Boeing 777 as [a result of] missile systems using “air-to-air” close-combat missiles as well as a 30-mm aircraft cannon or an SPPU-22 container with GSh-23L 23-mm dual-barrel guns. At the same time, when firing on a target, a laser range finder can be used, or a laser sight, that allows for significantly improved accuracy. This is indicated by the pattern of damage and the dispersal of the fragments: there are round holes, which are typically produced as a result of gun shots, and discontinuous holes characteristic of flechette rockets. (RUE report, page 12)
Media Spin: Shrapnel, Bullet Holes, “High Energy Objects”
The media has reported that a BUK surface to air missile was indeed fired and exploded before reaching its target.
According to the official explanation (DSB), it was not the missile that brought down the plane, it was the shrapnel resulting from the missile explosion (prior to reaching the plane) which punctured the plane and then led to a loss of pressure.
This is largely the position of the Dutch Safety Board which explains the holes as a result of the explosion of the missile. This is analysis is tenuous. A shelling operation from a jet fighter was simply not considered by the DSB.
The holes according to the DSB report were the result of so-called “high energy objects coming from the warhead [Buk missile]” (i.e shrapnel from the missile). This assessment was used to dispel the evidence concerning the second aircraft.
According to a BBC report (September 9, 2014) “Cockpit window contained numerous small puncture holes suggesting small objects entered from above level of cockpit floor. Damage to forward section indicates plane penetrated by large number of high energy objects from outside”.
The holes from outside were presented as the result of the explosion of the missile, according to the DSB (13 October 2015)
At 13.20 UTC (Coordinated Universal Time) a 9N314M warhead, launched by a Buk surface-to-air missile system from a 320-square-kilometre area in the eastern part of Ukraine, detonated to the left and above the cockpit. The forward section of the aircraft was penetrated by hundreds of high-energy objects coming from the warhead.
The statement of the OSCE observer Michael Bociurkiw is not acknowledged by the Dutch Safety Board and JIT reports.
“… international investigators believed data from the flight recorders show “the reason for the destruction and crash of the plane was massive explosive decompression arising from multiple shrapnel perforations from a rocket explosion”.
Surface-to-air missiles such as the Buk system widely believed to have shot the passenger jet down can explode near their targets, blasting a cloud of shrapnel into them.”
” The downed Malaysia Airlines jet in eastern Ukraine suffered an explosive loss of pressure after it was punctured by shrapnel from a missile…. They say the information came from the plane’s flight data recorders, which are being analysed by British experts.”
“Machine Gun Like Holes” Caused by a Second Aircraft or a BUK Missile?
The shrapnel marks should be distinguished from the small entry and exit holes “most likely that of a 30 millimeter caliber projectile” fired from a military aircraft. According to the findings of Peter Haisenko:
If we now consider the armament of a typical SU 25 we learn this: It is equipped with a double-barreled 30-mm gun, type GSh-302 / AO-17A, equipped with: a 250 round magazine of anti-tank incendiary shells and splinter-explosive shells (dum-dum), arranged in alternating order. The cockpit of the MH 017 has evidently been fired at from both sides: the entry and exit holes are found on the same fragment of it’s cockpit segment
Our review of the evidence points to
the presence of a second aircraft,
“bullet like holes” pointing to the possibility of an attack by a second aircraft
No firm evidence of a BUK missile attack directed against MH17.
Absence of photographic evidence of a vapor trail from a BUK style missile on July 17, 2014
The Official Kiev Government Report Prepared by Ukraine Intelligence (SBU)
Of significance, Ukraine’s Secret Service (SBU) was given the mandate by the Ukraine authorities of coordinating and gathering the evidence in Eastern Ukraine as well as transmitting it to the Dutch Safety Board and the JIT.
According to the official SBU report entitled Terrorists and Militants planned cynical terrorist attack at Aeroflot civil aircraft published on August 7, 2014, the SBU accused Russia of having ordered a false flag attack involving the shooting down of its own Aeroflot plane leading to the death of its own citizens, and then blaming it on Kiev, with Russia using the tragedy as a casus belli pretext to invade Ukraine. According to the report: The Donetsk militia were aiming at a Russian Aeroflot passenger plane and shot down the Malaysian MH17 airliner by mistake.
That’s the official Ukraine government story which was acknowledged by the Ukrainian as well as several Western media. See below.
According to Britain’s foremost news tabloid, The Mail on Sunday, quoting the head of Ukraine intelligence, the insidious design of the pro-Russian rebels (allegedly supported by Moscow) was to shoot down a Russian commercial airline plane with tourists en route to Cyprus, with a view to blaming the Ukrainian government. The objective of this alleged “false flag” covert op was to create a justifiable and credible pretext for Vladimir Putin to declare war on Ukraine.
In an utterly twisted logic, according to Ukraine’s head of intelligence:
“the [Donesk] rebels were meant to down [the] Aeroflot plane… to justify the invasion [of Ukraine by Russia]”,
Valentyn Nalyvaichenko (right), head of Ukraine intelligence (24 February 2014 – 18 June 2015) that the pro-Russian rebels were “aiming at a Russian passenger plane “so Putin had reason to invade”.
“the crime was planned as a ground for bringing of Russian troops into Ukraine, that is – CASUS BELLI for the Russian military invasion.” (Official statement of Ukraine Security Service, in annex below)
In a bitter irony, according to the report, the alleged “false flag” covert op got muddled. The Donesk rebels got it all wrong and hit the MH17 plane by mistake.
That’s the “official line” which was made public by the Kiev government on August 7, 2014, 3 weeks after the MH17 tragedy.
The former head of Ukraine’s secret service has claimed rebels intended to down a Russian airliner to give Vladimir Putin a pretext for invasion – but blasted Flight MH17 out of the sky by mistake.
Why on earth would pro-Russian rebels who are at war with the Kiev regime shoot down a Russian passenger plane AFL-2074 allegedly with a view to harnessing Russia’s support? It does not make sense.
What’s more, according to SBU Chief Valentyn Nalyvaichenko’s statement, Moscow was helping the pro-Russian rebels in their alleged false flag op to shoot down Russia’s Aeroflot plane by providing them with a Buk missile system, which allegedly had been discretely smuggled across the border to the Donesk region of Eastern Ukraine. The Aeroflot plane was slated to be “shot down over territory controlled by Ukrainian government troops” with the support of Russia:
Valentyn Nalyvaichenko said that Russian-backed fighters were supposed to take their BUK rocket launcher – which had been transported across the Russian border – to a village called Pervomaiskoe in Ukrainian-held territory west of Donetsk.
But they “screwed up”. The Buk rocket launcher was apparently positioned in the wrong rural location and because of that it targeted the MH17 by mistake:
Instead, they mistakenly positioned it in a rebel-controlled village of the same name to the east of the city.
Got it wrong? Valentyn Nalyvaichenko claims pro-Russian rebels targeted the wrong civilian airliner
If they had gone where they had been ordered, he said, they would have hit an Aeroflot flight carrying civilians travelling from Moscow to Larnaca in Cyprus.
Crucially, the crash site would have been in Ukrainian-held territory. (Mail on Sunday, August 9, 2014)
The August 2014 “intelligence” report released by SBU Chief Nalyvaichenko bordered on ridicule and incompetence to say to the least.
(Since its release in August 2014, the link to the original SBU report is no longer available. The text of the SBU report (press release) is published in annex to this article.
Who is Valentyn Nalyvaichenko. His role in the MH17 investigation
Valentyn Nalyvaichenko commissioned the SBU report on behalf of the Kiev government in July 2014 in coordination with The National Security and National Defense Committee (RNBOU) of which the Secretary General was Andriy Parubiy (February 27, 2014 — August 7, 2014), followed by the appointment of Oleksandr Turchynov (December 16, 2014 — 19 May 2019)
The RNBOU oversees National Security and Intelligence (SBU), the Ministry of Defense, the Armed Forces, Law Enforcement.
Parubiy who became president (chair) of the Ukrainian Parliament is the co-founder of the Neo-Nazi Social-National Party of Ukraine (subsequently renamed Svoboda). He has been routinely received with red carpet treatment in Canada, the US and the European Union.
Both Nalyvaichenko and Parubiy are followers of Ukrainian Nazi leader Stepan Bandera, who collaborated in the mass murderer of Jews, Russians and Poles during World War II. (For more details on Parubiy click here)
Can we trust the SBU?
Following the MH17 tragedy, the head of Ukraine’s SBU was entrusted with the gathering and feeding of evidence to the Dutch inquiries. In fact most of the information and analysis (including recordings of telephone conversations, video, audio material) transmitted to the JIT emanated from the SBU.
Is the information and evidence transmitted by the SBU reliable?
An indepth forensic analysis conducted by OG IT Forensic Service led by Akash Rosen points to the manipulation of telephone conversations, video and audio material by the SBU. The OG IT report confirms unequivocally that the “evidence” submitted by Ukraine’s SBU to the JIT has been manipulated.
Akash Rosen was interviewed in the MH17 documentary entitled MH17 Call for Justice, directed by Yana Yerloshova, which sheds light on the deceptive role of Ukraine’s Secret Service.
Fraud and Corruption within the SBU. The Neo-Nazi connection
While the media has remained silent on the matter, the insidious and corrupt role of the SBU has nonetheless been acknowledged. A December 2015 report in the Irish Times suggests that:
The Dutch government has been warned that the criminal case against those who shot down Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 could be undermined because the Ukrainian security service, the SBU, which has provided key evidence, is widely regarded as institutionally corrupt.
Both justice minister Ard van der Steur and the Dutch public prosecutor’s office are coming under increasing pressure to make statements about the integrity of the evidence gathered by the SBU following a string of scandals, including the sacking of its boss, Valentyn Nalyvaichenko.
The SBU has played a crucial role in two elements of the MH17 investigation. It has handed over phone conversations between pro-Russian rebels intercepted shortly before the jet, … It was also responsible for securing the main elements of the Boeing 777’s shattered fuselage in the hours after it crashed in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine, spreading debris over 50 sq km.
“Institutionally corrupt” is an understatement. The former head of the SBU is an avowed Nazi. Ukraine’s intelligence service not to mention the National Guard and elements within the military in 2014-2015 were largely under the control of the two neo-Nazi parties: Svoboda and Right Sector.
The SBU was also in permanent liaison with Western intelligence including the CIA and MI6.
The head of Ukraine intelligence Valentyn Nalyvaichenko appointed by the Kiev regime worked in tandem with the Neo-Nazi Right Sector leader Dmitro Yarosh who in turn played a key role in setting up the Azov Battalion (see image right), a National Guard entity integrated by Neo-Nazis, operating in Eastern Ukraine in so-called “anti-terrorist” operations. Dmitro Yaroch, who became member of parliament was appointed advisor to the Chief of general staff of the Ukrainian army.
Eduard Dolinsky, director of the Ukrainian Jewish Committee, “made the accusation on Facebook against Valentyn Nalyvaichenko, head of the Security Service of Ukraine (see the news website evreiskiy.kiev.ua report) after Nalyvaichenko said his organization [the SBU] needed to base its work on the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, or UPA, which murdered thousands of Jews in the ’40s. The UPA under the leadership of Stepan Bandera collaborated with the Third Reich during World War II”( quoted in The Times of Israel 15 April 2015)
In an [April 2015] interview with the local media … Nalyvaichenko said the Security Service “does not need to invent anything new, it is important to build on the traditions of the [Nazi] Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists and UPA in the 1930-1950 years.”
The popularity of UPA, which for a time collaborated with the Nazi occupation to further UPA’s ambitions of sovereignty from Russia, has soared in Ukraine since a 2013 revolution that led to armed conflict with pro-Russian militias in Ukraine’s east.
Earlier this month [April 2015], the Ukrainian Parliament passed a bill that opened the door to state recognition of UPA, previously a taboo because of the widespread war crimes committed by its troops. The Times of Israel (15 April 2015)
Those war crimes have not ceased. The Atlantic Council, (June 18, 2015) a Washington Think Tank with close links to both the Pentagon and the US State Department acknowledged that the Right Sector had permeated Ukraine’s military intelligence apparatus:
Poroshenko Bloc MP Serhiy Leshchenko released a document confirming old rumors that Right Sector’s Dmitro Yarosh [Neo-Nazi leader] worked for Nalyvaichenko when he was a member of parliament from 2012 to 2014. While the connection between the two raises some questions about the events of Euromaidan and the origins of Right Sector, this attack alone wasn’t enough to discredit Nalyvychenko. Yarosh is now a member of parliament and an advisor to the chief of general staff of the Ukrainian army. In other words, Yarosh has been legitimized by the political establishment. . . .
Details of the SBU Report
While the SBU report focussing on an alleged false flag was casually acknowledged by the Western media, Washington remained silent on the matter. Nobody in the US intelligence community acknowledged or corroborated the statement of their Ukrainian counterparts.
Moreover, while the SBU was feeding “evidence” to the Dutch inquiries, the SBU report (August 7, 2014) was not acknowledged or mentioned in the reports of the Dutch Safety Board and the JIT.
As we recall, immediately after the MH17 plane crash on July 17 2014, Secretary of State John Kerry and US Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power pointed their finger at Moscow without a shred of evidence. In the wake of this official and “authoritative” SBU August 7 2014 announcement by the Kiev regime, Obama, Kerry, Samantha Power et al, chose to remain mum. The Ukraine Secret Service’s official statement concerning the crash of Malaysian airlines MH17 was so outlandish. It simply did not fit the usual mold of media disinformation.
In a new and rather unusual twist, however, according to the Kiev regime, the Donetsk militia did not intend to shoot down Malaysian airlines MH17.
What the “pro-Russian rebels” (according to the SBU report) were aiming at was a Russian Aeroflot passenger plane. The MH17 was shot down “by mistake” according to an official statement by the head of Ukraine’s Secret Service, Valentyn Nalyvaichenko (Ukraine News Service, August 7, 2014).
According to SBU Chief Nalyvaichenko:
“Ukraine’s law enforcement and intelligence agencies have established during the investigation into a terrorist attack on the Boeing… that on that day, July 17, and at that time military mercenaries and terrorists from the Russian Federation planned to carry out a terrorist attack against a passenger aircraft of Aeroflot en route from Moscow to Larnaca… as a pretext for the further invasion by Russia,”
“This cynical terrorist attack was planned for the day when the [Malaysia Airlines] plane happened to fly by, planned by war criminals as a pretext for the further military invasion by the Russian Federation, that is, there would be a casus belli,” he added.
Thus, according Nalyvaichenko, the terrorists downed the Malaysian airliner by mistake.” (Ukraine Interfax News, August 8, 2014)
The head of Ukraine’s secret service has claimed rebels intended to down a Russian airliner to give Vladimir Putin a pretext for invasion – but blasted Flight MH17 out of the sky by mistake.
Nalyvaichenko said that the Kiev government reached this conclusion “in the course of its own investigation into the downing of MH17”.
“Had the terrorists succeeded in downing the Aeroflot jet, it would have created the needed casus belli for Russia to invade Ukraine from its East to its West” according to Nalyvaichenko (see Tweet above, see also Transcript of August 7, 2014 SBU document in Annex)
While Nalyvaichenko was dismissed by Poroshenko from the SBU in June 2015, much of the “evidence” of MH!7 had been gathered and processed during his mandate.
There was no visible shift in direction of the SBU following his dismissal. Nalyvaichenko’s Deputy Vasyl Hrytsak was appointed head of SBU (July 2015- May 2019)
The so-called “pro-Russian rebels” had allegedly planned an Operation Northwoods type “false flag” with utmost proficiency.
The covert op allegedly consisted in downing a Russian passenger plane with Moscow’s support. The alleged objective was for Moscow to place the blame on the government of Ukraine for having ordered the downing of the Aeroflot plane (resulting in the deaths of Russian tourists), thereby creating a “useful wave of indignation” across the Russian Federation.
The alleged “false flag” slated to be implemented by the Donetsk “terrorists and mercenaries” would then, according to the scenario depicted by Ukraine’s Chief Spy, spearhead public support for a Russian invasion of Ukraine, with patriotic Russian troops coming to the rescue of the “pro-Russian separatists”:
The mass killing of Russian tourists could then have been blamed on the Ukrainian army, giving Moscow a justification for invasion, said Mr Nalyvaichenko, head of the Ukrainian intelligence service, the SBU. (Daily Mail, August 9, 2014)
The official SBU report states that the:
“The Russian side would need a compelling argument for such a step, for example accusation of the Ukrainian government in mass murder of the Russian citizens [on the plane]” (See complete SBU statement in Annex below).
According to the head of Ukraine’s Secret Service: “It is incredibly cynical that the act of terrorism was planned [by the rebels] against peaceful innocent Russian citizens who were on the way to their holidays with children”:
‘This cynical terrorist act was intended to justify an immediate military invasion by the Russian Federation,’ he said.
Aeroflot flight AFL2074 was close to Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 when it was blown out of the sky on July 17, killing all 298 on board, he said.
… He claimed this was a significant conclusion of Kiev’s probe into MH17’s downing. (Daily Mail, August 8, 2019)
A Russian invasion plan had allegedly been scheduled –according to the official SBU report– to commence on July 18, on the day following the planned downing of Aeroflot flight 2074. But when the MH17 flight was downed by mistake, the Russian invasion plan scheduled for July 18, according to the Kiev scenario, was cancelled.
This whole scenario was fabricated. There were no indications or evidence that Russia was preparing to invade Ukraine on July 18th, 2014.
Mainstream Media Response to Kiev Regime’s Accusations
Normally, the Western media would provide ample coverage and commentary to an official Kiev statement pertaining to MH17 accusing Russia. It’s part of the MSM routine of “Russia bashing” and demonizing president Vladimir Putin.
With the exception of Ukraine News Service and London’s Daily Mail, however, the official statement of the head of Ukraine’s Secret Service went largely unnoticed. Normally, a declaration of this nature would be picked up by the wire services with syndicated reports flooding the front page of the Western news chain.
Screenshot Daily Mail on Sunday, August 09, 2014
Was the mainstream media instructed to temporarily “put a hold” on reporting the “revelations” of Ukraine’s Secret Service.
The Kiev regime’s allegations are far-fetched to say the least: the Donesk rebels –largely involved in combat operations– had neither the capabilities nor the desire to undertake a complex intelligence operation of this nature. What purpose would it serve? Cui Bono?
Does Russia require a fake humanitarian pretext to intervene when several thousand civilians in the Donbass region had been killed by the Azov Battalion (image right, flag with Nazi SS symbol) and Ukrainian Armed Forces, not to mention the Odessa massacre perpetrated by the Kiev regime’s Neo-Nazi national guard.
Ironically, barely four days after being accused by Kiev of planning to invade Ukraine, Russia’s President Putin agreed with European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso that Moscow would not only collaborate with the Red Cross on channeling humanitarian aid to Eastern Ukraine through Russian territory, but that the agreement reached with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), had the support of the Kiev government.
It is worth noting that neither the Russian government nor the Russian media have commented extensively on (or responded to) the accusations directed against Moscow contained in Ukraine’s dodgy Secret Service’s MH17 report.
Was Washington consulted before the release of the dodgy SBU False Flag report?
Did Washington give them the “Green Light” to release the SBU report as a means of “Framing Russia”?
Or did the White House or the State Department decide that the SBU’s “fake intelligence” was visibly flawed and could not effectively be used for propaganda purposes against Russia?
Were the CIA and MI6 consulted? Britain’s Secret Service MI6 subsequently had access to the plane’s black box, which was handed over by a Malaysian official to the Dutch task force and which in turn was entrusted to an unnamed partner entity in the UK.
Concluding Remarks
The Day After
According to the SBU in its August 7, 2014 official report on behalf of the Ukraine government, the Kremlin’s planned “false flag” to bring down a commercial Aeroflot flight en route to Cyprus and blame the tragedy on the Kiev regime, was to be used to justify the launching of a major war against Ukraine.
the crime was planned as a ground for bringing of Russian troops into Ukraine, that is – CASUS BELLI for the Russian military invasion. …
“the [Donesk] rebels were meant to down [the] Aeroflot plane… to justify the invasion [of Ukraine by Russia]” (see complete text in Annex)
These statements border on ridicule. They reveal the corrupt and criminal nature of the SBU.
If a Russian military invasion of Ukraine had been planned to commence on July 18th, 2014 there would have been ample evidence of deployment and movement of Russian forces in proximity of the border in the days prior to the July 17th tragedy. Sloppy intelligence? No such evidence was forthcoming indicating the movement of Russian forces.
It is worth noting that the only movement of military hardware documented by both Ukrainian and Russian sources was the deployment of a BUK missile system belonging to the Ukrainian armed forces, reported on July 15, 2014.
According to Ukrainian sources, the Prosecutor General of Ukraine Vitaliy Yarema confirmed that “the Donesk rebels did not have [Ukrainian] Buk or S 300 ground to air missiles which could have downed the plane”, which suggests that the missiles of the Ukraine armed forces had been deployed but they were not in the possession of the rebels, a premise which remains central to the US-Kiev official version that the rebels, supported by Moscow, were responsible for attacking Malaysian Airlines MH17.
A final note:
The alleged Russian Invasion Plan was slated to start on the 18th according to SBU Chief Nalyvaichenko.
Intelligence data proved that on July 18 the militants have already waited for the introduction of Russian Armed forces into the territory of Ukraine. (See official report of Ukraine Security Service (SBU, in annex below)
This account seems to be at odds with both the SBU and JIT statements that the alleged Russian BUK Missile had been brought in secretly on the 16th of July into Donesk, and was planned to be discreetly moved back across the border into Russia on the 17th or 18th.
If Russia had been planning an invasion to commence on July 18th, why on earth would they need to discretely move their military hardware back across the border to Russia.
During the investigation of Malaysia Airlines Boeing-777 downing the law enforcement and intelligence bodies established that terrorists and militants have cynically planned the terrorist attack at Aeroflot civil aircraft, AFL-2074 Moscow-Larnaca, which was flying over the territory of Ukraine at that moment. Hereof informed the Head of the Security Service of Ukraine Mr. Valentyn Nalyvaichenko during the briefing today.
He underlined – the crime was planned as a ground for bringing of Russian troops into Ukraine, that is – CASUS BELLI for the Russian military invasion.
According to the official Ukrainian data, June 17, 2014, at the mentioned time two regular international flights were operating over the territory of Ukraine following the filed requests for aircraft clearance – MAS17 plane of the Malaysia Airlines and AFL-2074 one of Aeroflot.
The routes of the mentioned international flights were approaching the sky over Donetsk. At 16:09 in the area of Novomykolaivka town the routes of the mentioned flights crossed. It is worth noting that the flight specifications of the aircrafts were almost identical – the Malaysian aircraft flew at a height of 10,100 m at a speed 909 km/h, while the Russian one – at a height of 10,600 m at a speed 768 km/h.
At 16:20 from the area of ‘Pervomaiske’ village, north-east from Donetsk, near the town of Torez, terrorists shot down the Malaysian jet, which then crashed near Grabove, Donetsk region.
According to the intercepted and published data about the ‘Buk” missile system, the terrorists had received an order to place the system near ‘Pervomaiskoe’ village, V. Nalyvaichenko mentioned. The namesake village is located about 20 km to the north-east from Donetsk.
The terrorists (most of them are not locals, but the Russian mercenaries) misrecognized the namesake villages and moved the other way, the SSU Head said. The odd route of the ‘Buk’ missile system on the territory of Ukraine proves that fact. The system crossed the Russia-Ukraine border in Luhansk region, then was deployed westward to Donetsk and moved back to the border between Donetsk and Luhansk regions afterwards.
By setting up the ‘Buk’ missile system in ‘Pervomaiske’ village located to the west from Donetsk and taking into consideration the military specifications of the weapon, the terrorists could have shot down the Russian civilian jetliner with its further crashing on the Ukrainian territory controlled by the ATO [Ukraine] forces.
In that case Russia would receive an opportunity to accuse the Ukrainian authorities of downing the Russian plane, assaulting the Russian citizens and would use this irresistible proof for its invasion into Ukraine.
Russian side would need a compelling argument for such a step, for example accusation of the Ukrainian government in mass murder of the Russian citizens.
“A peculiar cynicism appears in the fact that the terrorist act was planned just against the peaceful, innocent Russian citizens, who were flying with their children on vacation”, – V. Nalyvaichenko, stressed.
Intelligence data proved that on July 18 the militants have already waited for the introduction of Russian Armed forces into the territory of Ukraine. The Russian side had been giving grounding for such developments for the several previous days. The Russian Mass Media had massively published information about the alleged shelling of the RF territory from the Ukrainian side.
For further details see [link no longer available]
Aparte de la declaración semioficial, nada indica que ISIS haya llevado a cabo el ataque al Crocus City Hall en Moscú.
Las agencias de noticias occidentales informan que, a través de su vehículo oficial, la agencia de noticias Amaq, ISIS declaró que “el ataque se produce en el contexto de una guerra violenta entre el Estado Islámico y los países que luchan contra el Islam”.
Esta afirmación no tiene sentido cuando miramos el país que fue atacado. Rusia es uno de los mayores aliados de los países islámicos. Y no me parece que ISIS esté precisamente preocupado por luchar contra los enemigos del Islam, ya que también se atribuyó la responsabilidad de un reciente ataque que mató a casi 100 personas en Irán, un país musulmán.
¿Qué naciones estarían “luchando contra el Islam”? En primer lugar, tenemos obviamente a Israel, que promueve el genocidio en Gaza. Todos los musulmanes militantes ven a Israel como el mayor enemigo del Islam. Pero ISIS no comete ataques en Israel, aunque eso sería muy fácil para Hamás o la Jihad Islámica. Hezbollah y Ansarullah también han atacado a Israel.
ISIS no ataca a Israel. Tampoco ha llevado a cabo ningún ataque importante en Estados Unidos, aunque es visto por la mayoría de los creyentes musulmanes como el segundo mayor enemigo del Islam y el mayor patrocinador de Israel.
Francia ha aplicado medidas dictatoriales contra los creyentes musulmanes, pero ha pasado un tiempo desde que ISIS llevó a cabo ataques importantes en el país. Lo mismo ocurre en el Reino Unido, donde la policía arresta a manifestantes que protestaban por la masacre de musulmanes en Gaza. En Alemania, el canciller Olaf Scholz ha sido uno de los más firmes partidarios del genocidio israelí, pero esto no parece molestar a ISIS.
Ninguno de los atacantes capturados declaró ser miembro de ISIS, ni siquiera haber sido reclutados para una misión sagrada, aunque la mayoría aparentemente son de origen musulmán.
De hecho, según ha difundido hasta el momento las autoridades rusas, los delincuentes declararon que actuaron exclusivamente por motivos económicos. No eran militantes de ningún grupo, ni de ISIS. Eran mercenarios pagados para matar gente, sin ideología declarada.
La prensa controlada por el imperialismo occidental difunde la creencia ciega en la atribución del ataque al ISIS. Todo empezó, como siempre, con noticias de Estados Unidos.
Parece un intento de establecer una verdad como cierta para evitar cualquier cuestionamiento, cualquier declaración diferente, que luego sería considerada una teoría de conspiración o persecución por parte del gobierno ruso contra Ucrania.
El gobierno estadounidense se apresuró a decir que Ucrania no tenía nada que ver con el ataque, mucho antes de que se formularan acusaciones contra los ucranianos. Todo el mundo conoce la historia del culpable que, justo después de hacer algo mal, es el primero en decir que no fue él. Esta declaración de Washington huele muy mal.
María Zajárova dio en el clavo: ¿cómo pueden los EE.UU. asegurar con tanta vehemencia que no fue Ucrania, si todavía nadie tiene información sobre lo que pasó? Si saben que supuestamente no era Ucrania, ¡entonces tienen pistas de quién fue!
Estados Unidos también se contradice al declarar, a través de John Kirby, que no tenía conocimiento de un complot en Moscú, y luego afirma que avisó a los rusos a principios de mes. Aunque advirtieron, considerando que no se puede creer a Estados Unidos, la información pudo haber sido una bandera falsa para despistar a los rusos y bajar la guardia ante el ataque que se produciría apenas dos semanas después.
El grupo musical Picnic, que actuaba en el teatro, apoya la operación militar especial en Ucrania. Según las investigaciones de las autoridades rusas, los responsables del ataque planeaban huir a Ucrania, donde ya tenían contactos que les ayudarían a escapar.
Vale, Ucrania es la frontera más cercana y segura para un terrorista que acaba de perpetrar un atentado en Moscú. Pero seamos realistas, en plena guerra entre Ucrania y Rusia, esto también huele muy mal para el lado ucraniano.
Sobre todo porque el secretario del Consejo Nacional de Defensa y Seguridad de Ucrania, Alexei Danilov, dijo a la televisión ucraniana que “les ofreceremos este tipo de entretenimiento más a menudo”. Los ucranianos, como los israelíes, no son muy discretos…
Los medios de propaganda occidentales habían causado revuelo anteriormente por las palabras de Dmitri Peskov, quien afirmó que Rusia se encuentra, en la práctica, en estado de guerra. Sería la prueba faltante de la amenaza, el peligro, la agresión y la megalomanía asesina de Vladimir Putin para apoderarse de Ucrania y del mundo.
El mismo día, respondiendo a una pregunta sobre si la OTAN estaba preparada para un conflicto con Rusia, Robert Bauer, miembro del comité militar de la OTAN, afirmó: “¡la respuesta es sí! Esta es nuestra principal tarea por hacer”. Sobre esto la prensa guardó silencio.
La situación actual muestra una peligrosa tendencia hacia la escalada de la guerra. Emmanuel Macron consideró enviar tropas francesas, mientras oficiales alemanes fueron sorprendidos discutiendo un ataque al puente de Crimea.
También en vísperas del ataque, Ucrania incrementó los bombardeos contra las regiones fronterizas. Todos estos son signos de una escalada del conflicto. Desde que Rusia puso en funcionamiento su picadora de carne, allá por 2022, ya se informó que ucranianos desesperados se embarcarían en acciones terroristas en territorio ruso, ya que no tendrían ninguna posibilidad de victoria en el campo de batalla.
Las embajadas de Ucrania son notorias reclutadoras de terroristas. El 10 de marzo, la embajada de Ucrania en Tayikistán publicó un anuncio para el reclutamiento de mercenarios tayikos. Según información preliminar, algunos de los capturados tras el atentado en Moscú son tayikos.
Los ataques que mataron a Darya Dugina en agosto de 2022 y a Vladlen Tatarsky en abril de 2023 son parte de esta nueva estrategia ucraniana. La muerte de Evgeny Prigozhin, en agosto de 2023, está ahora más cerca de ser obra de los ucranianos que de los propios rusos.
El periodista ruso Andrey Medvedev cita algunos puntos: 1) Amaq News no se había utilizado durante algún tiempo para informar sobre las acciones de ISIS; 2) los integrantes de este grupo huyeron luego del ataque y no tomaron rehenes, lo que difiere de las acciones anteriores.
Rusia acababa de vivir un momento de éxtasis con la abrumadora reelección de Vladimir Putin. Un momento de extrema felicidad y celebración para el Kremlin y la inmensa mayoría de la población rusa. Esta elección fue boicoteada, saboteada y calumniada por todo el imperialismo occidental, que patrocina a Ucrania, y lógicamente fue vista por él como una clara señal del fortalecimiento del gobierno ruso.
Al mismo tiempo, sería un buen momento –precisamente por la guardia baja debido al ambiente festivo– para un ataque sorpresa como este.
Ucrania y sus patrocinadores de la OTAN tienen todas las razones – sabiendo cómo piensan y actúan durante décadas – para llevar a cabo este tipo de cobardía contra Rusia. ISIS no tiene ningún motivo.
Pero incluso si en realidad fue orquestado por ISIS, eso no exime de culpa a Estados Unidos y sus satélites. Después de todo, quienes están detrás de ISIS son las mismas personas detrás de Vladimir Zelensky.
Eduardo Vasco
*
Eduardo Vascoé jornalista especializado em política internacional, correspondente de guerra e autor dos livros-reportagem “O povo esquecido: uma história de genocídio e resistência no Donbass” e “Bloqueio: a guerra silenciosa contra Cuba”.
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How much longer will the Biden administration and the mainstream media continue to deny that we are in the midst of a very painful economic downturn? Debt levels have never been higher, delinquency rates are spiking, the commercial real estate market is crashing, the banking industry is mired in turmoil and large companies are conducting mass layoffs all over the nation. Anyone that attempts to claim that the U.S. economy is in good shape is just being delusional. Unfortunately, it is those that are at the bottom of the economic food chain that are being hurt the most.
If you want to know what is really going on with the economy, pawn shops are a great place to look.
When the economy is doing well, pawn shop inventories tend to go down because people aren’t pawning much stuff and there is lots of buying going on.
But when the economy is not doing well, pawn shop inventories tend to go up because people are pawning lots of stuff for fast cash and there aren’t as many buyers as there were during the good times.
So what are we seeing during the early stages of 2024?
One pawn shop owner that was recently interviewed by USA Today admitted that he has “a glut of inventory” right now…
Clay Baron has everything in his pawn shop from gold rings and pearl necklaces to vintage cowboy boots, silver belt buckles, stereos and ticking clocks.
The only thing he’s short on is space. “Right now we have a glut of inventory,” Baron said, “which tells me that our clientele doesn’t necessarily have money.”
Accumulating pawn shop inventory means fewer buyers than sellers – a sign that for the lowest-income Americans, times remain tough.
That same article pointed out that inventory levels have also grown rapidly at some of the largest pawn shop chains in the entire nation…
Two of the largest, publicly traded pawnshop corporations in the U.S. – which between them own roughly 1,700 pawnshops nationwide – are also reporting growing inventory and increased demand for short-term loans.
FirstCash Holdings Inc. operates nearly 1,200 pawnshops under the FirstCash and Cash America brands in 29 states and the District of Columbia. The company reported “record pawn receivables” in its most recent year-end earnings report and a 10% increase in inventory at its U.S. stores.
EZCORP Inc. also owns 530 pawnshops in the U.S. and reported an 8% increase in inventory at U.S. stores in the company’s latest earnings report. The “challenging macro-economic backdrop” continued to fuel demand for short-term cash loans, the company said.
If anyone comes to you and tries to convince you that the economy is doing well, just show them these numbers.
That will be the end of any debate.
One of the reasons why so many Americans need fast cash is because debt loads have risen to unprecedented levels. Here is just one example…
For Denise and Paul Nierzwicki, credit cards are the only way to make ends meet. The couple, ages 69 and 72, respectively, have about $20,000 in debt spread across multiple cards, all with interest rates above 20%.
The trouble started during the pandemic, when Denise lost her job and a business deal for a bar that they owned in their hometown of Lexington, Kentucky, went bad.
They applied for Social Security, which helped, and Denise now works 50 hours a week at a restaurant. Still, they’re barely scraping together the minimum payments for their credit card debt.
Can you imagine how much stress they must be feeling on a daily basis?
Sadly, there are millions of others that are in similar positions.
The combination of high debt levels and high interest rates has created a “perfect storm” of suffering for U.S. consumers, and so it should be no surprise that delinquency rates have been surging…
The signs are obvious. Last week we noted that banks’ charge-offs are accelerating, and are now above pre-pandemic levels.
…and leading this increase are credit card loans – with delinquencies that haven’t been this high since Q3 2011.
On top of that, while credit cards and nonfarm, nonresidential commercial real estate loans drove the quarterly increase in the noncurrent rate, residential mortgages drove the quarterly increase in the share of loans 30-89 days past due.
When large numbers of people start getting behind on their mortgages, it is only a matter of time before foreclosures start to spike.
Home foreclosures rose again in February as Americans continue to grapple with the ongoing cost-of-living crisis.
That is according to a new report published by real estate data provider ATTOM, which found that there were 32,938 properties in February with foreclosure filings, which includes default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions.
Sadly, things are only going to get worse during the months ahead, because the labor market is starting to get very tight.
Cheyenne Barton, 26, of Kissimmee, Florida, graduated in December with one degree in biomedical sciences and another in computing technology and software development – the kind of practical background employers have coveted.
She initially targeted software development jobs but is now looking for “really any job” where she can use her degrees.
Barton has applied for about 1,000 positions but hasn’t yet notched an interview.
Companies “say they want recent grads who are teachable and can learn quicker,” she says. “But then you apply for the job and it’s like, ‘Oh, we already have over 100 applications with people who are more qualified.’”
Wait a second.
Joe Biden told us that good jobs are easy to find these days.
So why can’t Cheyenne Barton even get an interview?
Something is not adding up.
Of course the truth is that we have seen a major shift in the labor market in recent months. According to Challenger, Gray & Christmas, the number of layoffs in February was the highest that they have ever recorded for that particular month…
The pace of job cuts by U.S. employers accelerated in February, a sign the labor market is starting to deteriorate in the face of ongoing inflation and high interest rates.
That is according to a new report published Thursday by Challenger, Gray & Christmas, which found that companies planned 84,638 job cuts in February, a 3% increase from the previous month and a 9% jump from the same time last year.
It marked the highest layoff total for the month of February in data going back to 2009.
The outlook for the rest of the year is absolutely dismal.
So even more Americans will fall into poverty.
And even more Americans will fall into hunger.
And even more Americans will end up homeless.
Over the weekend, a story about a homeless man in Wasco, California that was apparently eating “a severed human leg” has been going viral…
Video footage shot in Wasco, California appears to show a crazed maniac waving around a severed human leg and taking bites out of it before police apprehended him Friday.
Reports have suggested that the man ‘stole’ the leg from the scene of a train accident, where a person was earlier hit and killed.
The footage shows the man, identified as 27-year-old Resendo Tellez, holding and examining the limb, with witnesses saying he was eating parts of it, before attempting to walk away waving it around as multiple police cars close in on him.
That is pretty shocking.
But it is also a preview of where this country is heading.
The economic suffering of the past couple of years has been very painful, but the truth is that it isn’t even worth comparing to what is in front of us.
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To the uninitiated, I explain first that the FSB is the successor organization to the Soviet Union’s well-known and much feared KGB. However, the FSB today might be better compared with the FBI in the United States. It deals with domestic criminality of all kinds and with threats to Russian civilians such as terrorism. The agency and its head are rarely in the news.
In this respect, the FSB is less visible both at home and abroad than the Foreign Intelligence Service headed by Sergei Naryshkin, a state figure who spent five years of this millennium as chairman of the State Duma, Russia’s lower house of the legislature, and also three years as head of the Presidential Administration. In both positions Naryshkin was very often seen on television performing his duties.
By contrast, Bortnikov spent the past 15 years in his FSB offices out of sight. However, the spectacular attack on the Crocus City Hall concert venue has propelled him to center stage and yesterday he met with the Russian state television journalist Pavel Zarubin for an interview and then allowed himself to be questioned further by a gaggle of other journalists on his way out along a corridor. This spontaneous Q&A was later broadcast on the television news. What Bortnikov had to say was extraordinary and bears directly on whether you and I should now be looking for bomb shelters. Regrettably you will not find any of it in the lead stories of today’s mainstream media. The Financial Times, for example, features an account of Xi’s meeting with CEOs of American businesses to mend ties: interesting, but not very relevant if we are at the cusp of WWIII.
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Bortnikov is by definition a member of Vladimir Putin’s inner circle of advisors. He, Putin and Naryshkin are all roughly the same age. At 72, Bortnikov is just several years older.
I was struck in particular by his poise and prudent, carefully weighed choice of words while setting out where the investigation is heading with transparency and a ‘let the chips fall where they may’ unaffected demeanor.
The journalists were all probing the question of who stood behind the terror attack. Bortnikov told them…and us: standing behind the terror act committed by Islamist extremists are the United States, Great Britain and Ukraine.
Russian Crocus City Hall amphitheater interiors, day after terrorist attack on 22 March 2024 (Licensed under CC BY 4.0)
Bortnikov said that the preliminary findings indicate that the four perpetrators of the slaughter were headed by car to the border with Ukraine where they were awaited on the other side.
He very calmly explained that the involvement of foreign powers is being clarified and that he will say nothing out of pure emotion now but will wait for the facts to be solidly collected before being presented.
Nonetheless, it was entirely newsworthy that he named the United States, Great Britain and Ukraine as the likely puppet masters of the terror act. Let us remember that following the bombing of the Nord Stream pipelines, the most significant attack on critical civilian infrastructure globally in the last 50 years, Russian officials did not point the finger directly at any country. There was innuendo but no direct accusations such as we heard from Bortnikov yesterday.
*
Meanwhile, quite apart from Mr. Bortnikov’s chat with journalists, a lot of new elements to the terror attack at Crocus City Hall were posted yesterday on the Russian state television news and analysis program Sixty Minutes.
In particular, we learned that in the last days of February and first couple of days of March two of the four attackers were in Istanbul. The departure and arrival of one at a Moscow airport was recorded on video. We were told which hotels they stayed in, and the selfies and other photos taken by one in Istanbul were put up on the screen. It is still not clear with whom they met in Turkey. However, the timing itself is very important, because the point was made that they returned to Moscow to carry out a terror attack on 8 March, International Women’s Day, a sacred date on the Russian calendar. Had they done so on that day, the effect would have been catastrophic for the presidential elections in Russia one week later.
However, per Sixty Minutes, it was determined that Russian state security on 8 March was too tight for the terrorist mission to succeed and the United States decided to pull the plug on that operation. Note that this is approximately the time when Victoria Nuland tendered her resignation at the State Department (5 March). The possible causal link here surely deserves attention by my peers in the U.S. ‘dissident’ community.
In any case, the scenario which was explored later in the day on the Evening with Vladimir Solovyov talk show is that the Ukrainians decided to proceed with the terror attack a week after the Russian presidential elections, when it lost most of its rationale. They did so over the objections of Washington.
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From time to time, readers ask why I pay attention to talk shows like Vladimir Solovyov’s. These skeptics tend to ignore that Solovyov invites not just the usual irresponsible academics and journalists who can amuse the public but also some very serious statesmen who are close to the center of power in Russia and exert influence on the conduct of foreign and domestic policy, including in particular committee chairmen and other key personalities from the State Duma.
So it was last night when we heard from a member of the Committee on Relations with the Commonwealth of Independent States (Former Soviet Union). With reference to the never ending terror attacks on civilians in the Russian border region of Belgorod coming from nearby Kharkiv (Ukraine), he said it is time to raze Kharkov to the ground: issue a warning to the population to get in their cars and head West, then blow it all to bits. Kharkiv is, by the way, Ukraine’s second most populous city after Kiev.
In general, the mood of panelists and of the host Solovyov himself is now changing in a cardinal manner: Ukraine is seen as an enemy state and the sooner it is finished off the better. There was talk last night on the need for missile strikes to flatten the presidential palace in Kiev along with all military and other decision making government centers in the capital.
As we have observed repeatedly over the past two years. President Putin has been a voice for moderation and restraint, resisting actions that might precipitate WWIII. That is clearly coming to an end when his own FSB director names the United States and the UK as planners of the biggest terror attack in Russia in 20 years.
*
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Featured image: Alexander Bortnikov (Licensed under CC BY 4.0)
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On Nov. 26, 2023, 24 year old healthcare worker Jayden’s life was turned upside down. She had been experiencing a migraine for days. On Nov. 27, a CT and MRI confirmed she had a brain tumor just a bit smaller than baseball in size.
Jayden Zientara, a health care partner at Vanderbilt University Hospital in Nashville, Tennessee, recently underwent brain surgery.
The 24-year-old said it all started with a bad migraine in late Nov. 2023.
“I never get migraines or headaches, so like any other person, I took Ibuprofen and Tylenol, hoping my headache would go away,” she said.
After another miserable 24 hours, Zientara decided to go to urgent care and see if the doctors there could help address her pain.
“I was prescribed … sleep meds and headache meds … and was told that if my migraine didn’t go away in the next 24 hours, that I needed to go get a CT scan,” she recalled.
Two days later, Zientara said the pain had not subsided — so she went to get a scan.
“After I received the CT, they told me I had a brain mass and needed to get transferred to Vanderbilt for an MRI,” she said.
The MRI showed that Zientara had a brain tumor roughly the size of a baseball — and that she would need surgery to remove it.
Within a few days, Zientara was in surgery.
Doctors removed and biopsied her tumor — and confirmed that it was brain cancer.
“My specific brain tumor is called an astrocytoma, and it’s commonly found in men over 40 and children under two,” she said.
The rare tumor took doctors about 12 hours to remove, she said.
However, Zientara needed to be awake for part of it so that her brain would be stimulated during surgery.
Prior to the procedure, Zientara said doctors asked her what they could engage her on during the procedure to stimulate her brain.
Zientara said the Boston Celtics and her little brother were topics she “could talk about for hours.”
“I also told them I could list all 50 states in alphabetic order,” she said.
And so, when the health staff asked her about the 50 states during surgery, Zientara began to sing a song while doctors were removing her brain tumor.
“It’s a song I’ve known since I was young,” she told Fox News Digital.
She added, “I learned it in elementary school, and I’ve never forgotten it.”
Although Zientara said she does not remember being awake during the surgery, she loved seeing the video of herself singing and naming all 50 states.
The patient’s mom, Jamie Zientara, said she was shocked to see her daughter recite such a thing while undergoing surgery.
“I knew that there would be some type of video recorded,” she said.
“However, I was not expecting that.”
She added, “The exposure and outpouring of support she has received has been nothing short of amazing.”
Since then, Jayden Zientara has been home with her family in Illinois ahead of her upcoming chemotherapy and radiation treatments.
Jayden Zientara said each of her treatments will last for six weeks, but she’s not afraid of the process.
“After my first brain surgery, I guess you could say I’m a pro,” she joked.
The care worker said her mother has been a huge support to her during this time and she’s grateful for that.
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Migraines are a bad sign for the COVID-19 vaccinated.
Mar. 21, 2024 – 37 year old Antiques Roadshow host Theo Burrell has terminal brain cancer (glioblastoma). The first symptom was car sickness on a journey I’d done many times before. I’d never had car sickness as a child so that was strange. Then I had what I thought was a migraine – visual disturbance, lots of vomiting. That progressed to constant headaches and sinus problems, with my vision getting progressively worse.
Feb. 2024 – Melbourne, Australia – 27 year old Tahlia West had a “never-ending stream of migraines” – she was finally diagnosed with a rare brain tumor in the pituitary.
Nov. 6, 2023 – Liverpool, UK – The Night Cafe Indie lead singer 26 year old Sean Martin died suddenly Nov. 6, 2023. His girlfriend revealed that he had been suffering migraines.
Oct. 2023 – 33 year old Safa Srour, Dubai based beauty and fashion influencer was jet-setting between international fashion weeks when she had migraines. She was diagnosed with a brain aneurysm.
Sep. 3, 2023 – Sep.3, 2023 – Biloxi, MS – 21 year old Alesia Lockhard is in US National Guard Reserve. In May 2023 after weeks of suffering from chronic migraines & nausea she was diagnosed with Stage 3 Rhabdomyosarcoma.
Sep. 2023 – UK – 45 year old Pippa Griffiths, photographer, developed migraines, due to an undiagnosed meningioma.
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Dr. William Makis is a Canadian physician with expertise in Radiology, Oncology and Immunology. Governor General’s Medal, University of Toronto Scholar. Author of 100+ peer-reviewed medical publications.
Featured image is from COVID Intel
The Worldwide Corona Crisis, Global Coup d’Etat Against Humanity
by Michel Chossudovsky
Michel Chossudovsky reviews in detail how this insidious project “destroys people’s lives”. He provides a comprehensive analysis of everything you need to know about the “pandemic” — from the medical dimensions to the economic and social repercussions, political underpinnings, and mental and psychological impacts.
“My objective as an author is to inform people worldwide and refute the official narrative which has been used as a justification to destabilize the economic and social fabric of entire countries, followed by the imposition of the “deadly” COVID-19 “vaccine”. This crisis affects humanity in its entirety: almost 8 billion people. We stand in solidarity with our fellow human beings and our children worldwide. Truth is a powerful instrument.”
Reviews
This is an in-depth resource of great interest if it is the wider perspective you are motivated to understand a little better, the author is very knowledgeable about geopolitics and this comes out in the way Covid is contextualized. —Dr. Mike Yeadon
In this war against humanity in which we find ourselves, in this singular, irregular and massive assault against liberty and the goodness of people, Chossudovsky’s book is a rock upon which to sustain our fight. –Dr. Emanuel Garcia
In fifteen concise science-based chapters, Michel traces the false covid pandemic, explaining how a PCR test, producing up to 97% proven false positives, combined with a relentless 24/7 fear campaign, was able to create a worldwide panic-laden “plandemic”; that this plandemic would never have been possible without the infamous DNA-modifying Polymerase Chain Reaction test – which to this day is being pushed on a majority of innocent people who have no clue. His conclusions are evidenced by renown scientists. —Peter Koenig
Professor Chossudovsky exposes the truth that “there is no causal relationship between the virus and economic variables.” In other words, it was not COVID-19 but, rather, the deliberate implementation of the illogical, scientifically baseless lockdowns that caused the shutdown of the global economy. –David Skripac
A reading of Chossudovsky’s book provides a comprehensive lesson in how there is a global coup d’état under way called “The Great Reset” that if not resisted and defeated by freedom loving people everywhere will result in a dystopian future not yet imagined. Pass on this free gift from Professor Chossudovsky before it’s too late. You will not find so much valuable information and analysis in one place. –Edward Curtin
ISBN: 978-0-9879389-3-0, Year: 2022, PDF Ebook, Pages: 164, 15 Chapters
In recent developments– barely a few days following the reelection of Vladimir Putin (October 17, 2024)five Islamic State gunmen (ISIL) waged a brutal terror attack on Moscow’s Crocus City Concert Hall attached to a shopping mall, at the outskirts of Moscow. The attack has resulted in more than 130 deaths.
The Islamic State (IS) or the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) which happens to be a creation of the CIA claimed responsibility for the attack.
On March 7, 2024, 10 the days before Russia’s presidential elections, the US Embassy in Moscow had warned the Kremlin that a terror attack may take place in a shopping mall, within the next few weeks… It also “warned US citizens in Moscow not to visit shopping malls.”
What is the Islamic State (ISIL, ISIS-Daesh)?
Ask former President Barack Obama who in 2014 ordered a major counter-terrorism operation directed against the Islamic State under the doctrine of Responsibility to Protect (R2P)
The counter-terrorism mandate is a fiction. America is the Number One “State Sponsor of Terrorism”.
In 2014 President Obama launched a “counter-terrorism campaign” allegedly directed against The Islamic State (ISIL, ISIS-Daesh).
It was an outright act of war disguised as a fake counter-terrorism operation.
It consisted in providing a justification for the extensive bombing of Iraq and Syria, largely targeting residential areas and civilians.
In turn, ISIS-Daesh was covertly supported and funded by the U.S. and its allies including Israel.
Israel was directly involved in President Obama’s “counter-terrorism” bombing raids directed against Syria, while also supporting Al Qaeda and ISIS mercenaries out of the Golan Heights.
Since 9/11, “America’s The Islamic State has gone Global”.
The Islamic State is not limited to the the Middle East and Central Asia.
West Africa, Central Africa, Southeast Asia, Western Europe, Russia, Turkey, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, The Philippines, and many more.
There are Islamic State related jihadist networks supported covertly by Western intelligence in all major regions of the World with the exception of Latin America.
Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, March 25, 2024
* * *
26 Things About the Islamic State (ISIS-ISIL-Daesh)
that the U.S. Government Does Not Want You to Know About
by Michel Chossudovsky
November 2014
Going after ” Islamic terrorists”, carrying out a worldwide pre-emptive war to “Protect the American Homeland” are used to justify a military agenda.
The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) is a creation of US intelligence. Washington’s “Counter-terrorism Agenda” in Iraq and Syria consists in Supporting the Terrorists.
The incursion of the Islamic State (IS) brigades into Iraq starting in June 2014 was part of a carefully planned military-intelligence operation supported covertly by the US, NATO and Israel.
The counter-terrorism mandate is a fiction. America is the Number One “State Sponsor of Terrorism”
The Islamic State is protected by the US and its allies. If they had wanted to eliminate the Islamic State brigades, they could have “carpet” bombed their convoys of Toyota pickup trucks when they crossed the desert from Syria into Iraq in June.
\
The Syro-Arabian Desert is open territory (see map below). With state of the art jet fighter aircraft (F15, F22 Raptor, CF-18) it would have been -from a military standpoint- a rapid and expedient surgical operation
It could not have been undertaken without the unbending support of the Western media which has upheld Obama’s initiative as a counter-terrorism operation.
“Advertisements, paid for from CIA funds, were placed in newspapers and newsletters around the world offering inducements and motivations to join the Jihad.”
3. Since the Reagan Administration, Washington has supported the Islamic terror network.
Ronald Reagan called the terrorists “freedom fighters”. The US supplied weapons to the Islamic brigades. It was all for “a good cause”: fighting the Soviet Union and regime change, leading to the demise of a secular government in Afghanistan.
President Reagan and Mujahideen leaders from Afghanistan
Ronald Reagan meets Afghan Mujahideen Commanders at the White House in 1985 (Reagan Archives)
5. Osama bin Laden, America’s bogyman and founder of Al Qaedawas recruited by the CIA in 1979 at the very outset of the US sponsored jihadist war against Afghanistan . He was 22 years old and was trained in a CIA sponsored guerilla training camp.
Al Qaeda was not behind the 9/11 Attacks. September 11, 2001 provided a justification for waging a war against Afghanistan on the grounds that Afghanistan was a state sponsor of terrorism, supportive of Al Qaeda. The 9/11 attacks were instrumental in the formulation of the “Global War on Terrorism”.
THE ISLAMIC STATE (ISIL)
6. The Islamic State (ISIL) was originally an Al Qaeda affiliated entity created by US intelligence with the support of Britain’s MI6, Israel’s Mossad, Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and Saudi Arabia’s General Intelligence Presidency (GIP), Ri’āsat Al-Istikhbārāt Al-’Āmah ( رئاسة الاستخبارات العامة).
7. The ISIL brigades were involved in the US-NATO supported insurgency in Syria directed against the government of Bashar al Assad.
8. NATO and the Turkish High Command were responsible for the recruitment of ISIL and Al Nusrah mercenaries from the outset of the Syrian insurgency in March 2011. According to Israeli intelligence sources, this initiative consisted in:
“a campaign to enlist thousands of Muslim volunteers in Middle East countries and the Muslim world to fight alongside the Syrian rebels. The Turkish army would house these volunteers, train them and secure their passage into Syria. (DEBKAfile, NATO to give rebels anti-tank weapons, August 14, 2011.)
9.There are Western Special Forces and Western intelligence operatives within the ranks of the ISIL. British Special Forces and MI6 have been involved in training jihadist rebels in Syria.
10. Western military specialists on contract to the Pentagon have trained the terrorists in the use of chemical weapons.
“The United States and some European allies are using defense contractors to train Syrian rebels on how to secure chemical weapons stockpiles in Syria, a senior U.S. official and several senior diplomats told CNN Sunday. ( CNN Report, December 9, 2012)
11. The ISIL’s practice of beheadings is part of the US sponsored terrorist training programs implemented in Saudi Arabia and Qatar.
Jihadist fighters have met Israeli IDF officers as well as Prime Minister Netanyahu. The IDF top brass tacitly acknowledges that “global jihad elements inside Syria” [ISIL and Al Nusrah] are supported by Israel. See image below:
“Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Moshe Ya’alon next to a wounded mercenary, Israeli military field hospital at the occupied Golan Heights’ border with Syria, 18 February 2014″
SYRIA AND IRAQ
14 The ISIL are the foot soldiers of the Western military alliance. Their unspoken mandate is to wreck havoc and destruction in Syria and Iraq, acting on behalf of their US sponsors.
15. US Senator John McCain has met up with jihadist terrorist leaders in Syria. (see picture right)
16 The Islamic State (IS) militia, which is currently the alleged target of a US-NATO bombing campaign under a “counter-terrorism” mandate, continues to be supported covertly by the US. Washington and its allies continue to provide military aid to the Islamic State.
17. US and allied bombings are not targeting the ISIL, they are bombing the economic infrastructure of Iraq and Syria including factories and oil refineries.
18. The IS caliphate project is part of a longstanding US foreign policy agenda to carve up Iraq and Syria into separate territories: A Sunni Islamist Caliphate, an Arab Shia Republic, a Republic of Kurdistan.
THE GLOBAL WAR ON TERRORISM (GWOT)
19. “The Global War on Terrorism” (GWOT) is presented as a “Clash of Civilizations”, a war between competing values and religions, when in reality it is an outright war of conquest, guided by strategic and economic objectives.
20 U.S. sponsored Al Qaeda terror brigades (covertly supported by Western intelligence) have been deployed in Mali, Niger, Nigeria, the Central African Republic, Somalia and Yemen.
These various affiliated Al Qaeda entities in the Middle East, sub-Saharan Africa and Asia are CIA sponsored “intelligence assets”. They are used by Washington to wreck havoc, create internal conflicts and destabilize sovereign countries.
22. The US is also supporting Al Qaeda affiliated terrorist organizations in the Xinjiang Uighur autonomous region of China. The underlying objective is to trigger political instability in Western China.
23 The Terrorists R Us: While the US is the unspoken architect of the Islamic State, Obama’s holy mandate is to protect America against ISIL attacks.
24 The homegrown terrorist threat is a fabrication. It is promoted by Western governments and the media with a view to repealing civil liberties and installing a police state. The terror attacks by alleged jihadists and terror warnings are invariably staged events. They are used to create an atmosphere of fear and intimidation.
In turn, the arrests, trials and sentences of “Islamic terrorists” sustain the legitimacy of America’s Homeland Security State and law enforcement apparatus, which has become increasingly militarized.
The ultimate objective is to instill in the minds of millions of Americans that the enemy is real and the U.S. Administration will protect the lives of its citizens.
25. The “counter-terrorism” campaign against the Islamic State has contributed to the demonization of Muslims, who in the eyes of Western public opinion are increasingly associated with the jihadists.
26 Anybody who dares to question the validity of the “Global War on Terrorism” is branded a terrorist and subjected to the anti-terrorist laws.
The ultimate objective of the “Global War on Terrorism” is to subdue the citizens, totally depoliticize social life in America, prevent people from thinking and conceptualizing, from analyzing facts and challenging the legitimacy of the inquisitorial social order which rules America.
The Obama Administration has imposed a diabolical consensus with the support of its allies, not to mention the complicit role of the United Nations Security Council. The Western media has embraced the consensus; it has described the Islamic State as an independent entity, an outside enemy which threatens the Western World.
The Big Lie has become the Truth.
Say no to the “Big Lie”. Spread the message.
The truth is ultimately a powerful weapon.
Please help us continue. We rely on the support of our readers.
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The diabolical massacre of over 300 people (nearly half of whom are dead now) at the Crocus City Hall is the worst terrorist attack in Russia in the last 20 years and one of the worst in the world in the last half a decade. And yet, many in the mainstream propaganda machine called it a “shooting”, possibly a “mass shooting” or simply an “attack” and similar terms that show just how little empathy there is for Russian civilians. The terrorist attack in and of itself was horrible enough, but the monstrous glee that was coming from the Neo-Nazi junta and its supporters made things far worse.
Rather interesting how the US could claim this mere hours after the terrorist attack, when not even Russian services who were on the ground had all the details, but it “doesn’t really know” who destroyed the Nord Stream pipelines, except that it was a “mysterious deep-diving Ukrainian group”.
Even worse, Washington DC is yet to conclude the 9/11 investigation 23 years after the attacks that were a defining moment of America’s 21st-century history.
It’s “almost as if” the political elites are hiding something. But, for some reason, they “immediately know” who’s behind a terrorist attack 10,000 km away and insist their favorite puppet regime “most certainly had nothing to do with it”.
What’s more, the US started defending the Neo-Nazi junta before Russia came out with any official statements about its involvement.
And while the troubled Biden administration, including vice president Kamala Harris, is fighting tooth and nail to “prove” the Kiev regime’s “innocence”, the latter’s on the brink of throwing parties to celebrate the brutal massacre of hundreds of unarmed Russian civilians. There are at least two such disturbing cases, one where a Ukrainian restaurant included something called “the Crocus City set” in its menu and another where Ukrainian gamers created a map of the Crocus City Hall concert hall in the globally popular Counter Strike FPS game, where they can shoot and set fire to virtual hostages or even plant explosives to blow them up.
Apart from the (now former) Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council Oleksiy Danilov, who not only praised the terrorist attack, but also mocked the victims and Russia as a whole and threatened with more such massacres, there’s also the SBU head Vasyl Malyuk who openly boasted about organizing terrorist attacks that killed a number of Russian public figures, including Darya Dugina and Maxim Fomin (aka Vladlen Tatarsky), clearly implying that he’s also involved in the Crocus City Hall terrorist attack.
This brings us to another similar episode that happened in the US when the infamous neocon warmonger Victoria Nuland used the opportunity to threaten Russia on the second anniversary of its special military operation (SMO).
Days later, she left the State Department. It seems the Neo-Nazi junta isn’t the only one trying to cover their tracks, although Nuland appears to have been a bit more cunning by leaving before the Crocus City Hall terrorist attack. But Nuland is not the only one. Last year, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, made similar threats.
“There should be no Russian who goes to sleep without wondering if they’re going to get their throat slit in the middle of the night,” Washington Post quoted Milley, who also added: “You gotta get back there, and create a campaign behind the lines.”
What happened with Milley soon after this?
You guessed it – he retired. But terrorist attacks across Russia keep escalating. In the meantime, the political West is further exposing its monstrous hypocrisy by condemning the treatment of the terrorists who committed the Crocus City Hall massacre. American journalist Julia Davis is “worried” about their well-being, while the former chief of the CIA’s Russia ops Steve Hall stated that this demonstrates the supposed “difference in values between what is happening in Russia and what is happening in the West”. Yes, there’s a clear difference, because Russia didn’t run the infamous Abu Ghraib prison where American occupation forces tortured countless Iraqi soldiers and civilians.
Russia also doesn’t run the brutal Guantanamo Bay detention camp where hundreds (if not thousands) have been illegally incarcerated, some of whom have been in solitary confinement for decades without ever being charged with a crime.
However, the question is – why is it all so sloppy and too obvious? If analysts and journalists noticed all this so easily, Russian intelligence and state services certainly know far more. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov recently pointed out this hypocrisy, referring to the offer by so-called “international institutions” to supposedly “help” with the investigation regarding the latest terrorist attack, but ignored similar Russian requests regarding the Nord Stream sabotage. It should be noted that this terrorist attack was also previously announced by the US, which pledged to ensure that the pipeline becomes “a hunk of metal at the bottom of the sea”. In other words, the true terrorists aren’t even bothering to hide anymore (and haven’t been for quite some time now).
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This article was originally published on InfoBrics.
Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the Translate Website button below the author’s name (only available in desktop version).
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On the occasion of the first nationwide lockdown imposed by the Ardern government, in 2020, my plans to return to the United States to visit my few remaining relatives were stymied. During that time my planned leave from work was spent volunteering at a local health practice in a low-decile area of the region, making home visits and writing scripts.
When the second lockdown was decreed — on the basis of a single person testing ‘positive’ for a chimerical pathogen — my cousin passed away in Philadelphia. She was the last tangible and emotional link to my mother, yet I was prevented from traveling anywhere, prevented from joining her children to mourn her and celebrate her courageous and vigorous life spent fighting off a severe heart condition for decades. I had seen her last some 7 years ago.
I remember too that during the lockdowns and the insipid colour-coded reentry phases, I had begun to despair that humanity might ever recover. We were forbidden from gathering, from protesting, from visiting our elderly and infirm, and from mourning our dead.
In retrospect it is an astonishingly heinous crime to have subjected an entire population to restrictions and violations of the most fundamental of rights, but the propaganda was so strong and relentless — daily death counts and case counts worldwide and dire messages of worse to come, over and over and over — that the majority accepted the constraints with nary a peep.
I took refuge in film, from time to time, but what I remember is the sensation of looking at a lost world, a world of community and rubbing shoulders, of easy association and crowded summer beaches — particularly in Italy. I discovered the unheralded masterpiece of director Dino Risi — Il Sorpasso— The Overtaking — and reveled in the glimpses of freely-communing bodies and souls as two unlikely protagonists motored their way together from Rome through the Italian countryside during a summer holiday.
I had wondered, as I watched and rewatched Il Sorpasso, if we would ever return to such facile grace again, bristling at the iron heel of the ‘single source of truth’ that blithely turned gregarious beings into recluses, and knowing that the quarantining of health people was an as yet unheard-of innovation in pandemic protocols.
Everything about covid was false, from the beginning, and the lies came thicker and faster than a plague of locusts: masks, ‘social’ distancing, a necessary gene-altering jab, the ‘impossibility’ of treating the incomparably ‘lethal’ virus …
Now people are congregating again, crowding the streets when not working from home, a relatively novel institution developed and honed during covid, congenially embraced by those who love to lounge in pyjamas with their laptops, and for whom the barrier between work and home has become delightfully permeable.
I marvel at the absence of rush-hour traffic on certain days here in Wellington. I note too that on the city beaches the healthy and resilient impulse to socialize has reared its irrepressible head. Teenagers preen and flirt, swimmers swim, kids scream and yell, and the more mature simply bask in the sun and the scene, desperately hoping that normality will not be upended by another fraud.
I muse with irony at the marketing that convinced so many people to feel unified while their rights were demolished: ‘we’re all in this together’ went the slogan, precisely as we were mandated to be apart.
For many of us, privileged to have been brought up with the perfume of freedom and hope, the lockdowns brought home the terrifying realities of what so many peoples in history have suffered as slaves, as victims of rape and other coercions: that horrible and indescribable feeling of no escape.
If the authorities attempt to impose another set of deceptive and destructive restraints, if they attempt to sound the knell of fear and pound the message home with further falsehoods and repetition, I like to think that even the Lilliputians who complied and participated in enforcing the senseless depredations of our humanity will, at last, resist.
I guess we’ll see. Meanwhile the unsung relics of the lockdowns remain in view: so many shuttered businesses, so many once-thriving establishments now closed. So many of the jabbed who know that something is amiss unwilling to acknowledge that they have been had …
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Dr. Garcia is a Philadelphia-born psychoanalyst and psychiatrist who emigrated to New Zealand in 2006. He has authored articles ranging from explorations of psychoanalytic technique, the psychology of creativity in music (Mahler, Rachmaninoff, Scriabin, Delius), and politics. He is also a poet, novelist and theatrical director. He retired from psychiatric practice in 2021 after working in the public sector in New Zealand. Visit his substack at https://newzealanddoc.substack.com/.
The Worldwide Corona Crisis, Global Coup d’Etat Against Humanity
by Michel Chossudovsky
Michel Chossudovsky reviews in detail how this insidious project “destroys people’s lives”. He provides a comprehensive analysis of everything you need to know about the “pandemic” — from the medical dimensions to the economic and social repercussions, political underpinnings, and mental and psychological impacts.
“My objective as an author is to inform people worldwide and refute the official narrative which has been used as a justification to destabilize the economic and social fabric of entire countries, followed by the imposition of the “deadly” COVID-19 “vaccine”. This crisis affects humanity in its entirety: almost 8 billion people. We stand in solidarity with our fellow human beings and our children worldwide. Truth is a powerful instrument.”
Reviews
This is an in-depth resource of great interest if it is the wider perspective you are motivated to understand a little better, the author is very knowledgeable about geopolitics and this comes out in the way Covid is contextualized. —Dr. Mike Yeadon
In this war against humanity in which we find ourselves, in this singular, irregular and massive assault against liberty and the goodness of people, Chossudovsky’s book is a rock upon which to sustain our fight. –Dr. Emanuel Garcia
In fifteen concise science-based chapters, Michel traces the false covid pandemic, explaining how a PCR test, producing up to 97% proven false positives, combined with a relentless 24/7 fear campaign, was able to create a worldwide panic-laden “plandemic”; that this plandemic would never have been possible without the infamous DNA-modifying Polymerase Chain Reaction test – which to this day is being pushed on a majority of innocent people who have no clue. His conclusions are evidenced by renown scientists. —Peter Koenig
Professor Chossudovsky exposes the truth that “there is no causal relationship between the virus and economic variables.” In other words, it was not COVID-19 but, rather, the deliberate implementation of the illogical, scientifically baseless lockdowns that caused the shutdown of the global economy. –David Skripac
A reading of Chossudovsky’s book provides a comprehensive lesson in how there is a global coup d’état under way called “The Great Reset” that if not resisted and defeated by freedom loving people everywhere will result in a dystopian future not yet imagined. Pass on this free gift from Professor Chossudovsky before it’s too late. You will not find so much valuable information and analysis in one place. –Edward Curtin
ISBN: 978-0-9879389-3-0, Year: 2022, PDF Ebook, Pages: 164, 15 Chapters
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Gilbert Doctorow now confirms with his own analysis my prediction that Putin’s toleration of provocations is spinning the Ukraine conflict out of control.
Doctorow is a careful analyst never overstating a situation. In this interview, he says that the Russia’s Federal Security Bureau (FSB) statement implicating the US and UK governments in the Crocus attack had to have been approved by Putin and that implicating the US and UK in the Crocus attack has brought us to the level of danger of the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Doctorow reports that Russian television has undergone a massive change following the Crocus attack. Commentators are unwilling to accept any longer Putin’s nonresponse to attacks on Russians. Television talk is suddenly very violent with talk of flattening Kharkiv and Kiev and bringing a quick end to the conflict that has been permitted to endure for far too long.
It seems that a fatal red line has been crossed.
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Paul Craig Roberts is a renowned author and academic, chairman of The Institute for Political Economy where this article was originally published. Dr. Roberts was previously associate editor and columnist for The Wall Street Journal. He was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy during the Reagan Administration. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
Who hasn’t heard about the mysterious sudden cardiac deaths occurring around the world? They are just the tip of an iceberg. Heart disease caused by vaccinations is on the agenda of young and old alike.
I predict with sadness and disgust that the remaining Palestinian inhabitants of Gaza will be killed or expelled, mostly the former, despite all our efforts. The main reason is that, Joe Biden, as recently described by Aaron David Miller, sees no compelling alternative for Israel that doesn’t include doing grievous harm to Palestinian civilians.
The most extraordinary thing about Julian Assange is that he is being treated as if he were an American citizen. “Treason” was the original cry, now converted to “espionage.”
25 years ago, NATO under US command demolished with war what remained of the Yugoslav Federation, the State that hindered its expansion eastwards towards Russia. In the following twenty years, NATO expanded from 16 to 30 countries and, with the war in Ukraine that began in 2014, it expanded to 32.
When exposing a crime is treated as committing a crime, you are being ruled by criminals. In the current governmental climate, obeying one’s conscience and speaking truth to the power of the police state can easily render you an “enemy of the state.”
When it comes to the bleeding and crushing of human life in Gaza by the Israeli Defence Forces (32,300 dead Palestinians and rising), resolutions demanding a cease fire of a conflict that began with the attack on Israeli soil by Hamas militants have tended to pass into voting oblivion.
The article “Harvard Shuts Geoengineering Project” by Cauf Skiviers, explains Bill Gates, funder of the project, stopping Harvard from carrying out the study to preserve the climate narrative. How is this relevant? That Bill Gates calls the shots on what should and should not go forward is nothing new. Surprising is that he was willing to finance such a study in the first place. Why?
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Now, you and everybody can have your own hyper-realistic robot-copy – including your facial expressions and everything.
The realistic appearance of robots in the video (see above) is today – imagine how indistinguishable robot copies of humans will be from real humans in a decade or two.
At the same time, Artificial General Intelligence and Artificial Human Emotions are being developed. In not many years, humanoid robots will have intelligence beyond humans. Robots will also register and handle your feelings, and have feelings and desires (objectives) of their own. And robots can be employed by the government or others without you knowing it.
The World of Blade Runner, of “I Robot” and other science fiction is just years around the corner.
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Karsten Riise is a Master of Science (Econ) from Copenhagen Business School and has a university degree in Spanish Culture and Languages from Copenhagen University. He is the former Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of Mercedes-Benz in Denmark and Sweden.
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Collective punishment is a war crime. Those who inflict it on civilians are terrorists.
To endeavour to disguise the crime by calling it ‘collateral damage’ when it is perpetrated deliberately against tens of thousands of mainly women and children, is not only a crime but an act of extreme cowardice.
It doesn’t take bravery to point a missile at a residential family home, from a Lockheed Martin F-16 war plane, screaming 500m over a completely defenceless village, at midnight.
It doesn’t take bravery to drop banned, white phosphorus on a school, hospital or clinic.
It doesn’t take bravery to shoot to kill an unarmed, female journalist doing her professional job by reporting the truth; or a hospital doctor trying to save the life of a mutilated child.
It doesn’t take bravery to deliberately starve two million people of food and water.
It takes a special type of cowardice.
The type where the perpetrator pretends to be a professional soldier, operating under the strict moral code of the international laws of war, in accordance with the UN Charter, the Geneva Conventions on Human Rights, the Rome Statute and the International Criminal Court – when, in fact, he is a war criminal.
So, of the two terrorist organizations, fighting each other today, which is the most extreme example of cowardice and criminality?
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Hans Stehling is a regular contributor to Global Research.
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The future always surprises us to some degree. But we make plans, anyway, based on our projections, and we adjust them when our predictions are at least partially wrong, which they always are, because they make assumptions based upon things that we take for granted, such as our health and that meteors and tsunamis will not disrupt those plans. Bearing that in mind, I will make some predictions for the immediate future of Gaza and Israel, and their relationships with the rest of the world. I’m sorry if it is not a happy picture.
First, I predict with sadness and disgust that the remaining Palestinian inhabitants of Gaza will be killed or expelled, mostly the former, despite all our efforts.
The main reason is that, Joe Biden, as recently described by Aaron David Miller, sees no compelling alternative for Israel that doesn’t include doing grievous harm to Palestinian civilians.
Properly translated, this means the greatest genocide since WWII. If this is an accurate picture of the thinking of the Biden administration, there can be little doubt that the US will continue to supply Israel with the means to make the population of Gaza disappear. The option of denying those means to Israel is simply unthinkable to Joe and his government. It might mean giving up their comfortable and prestigious futuresm presidential libraries and all.
Joe Biden is not Dwight D. Eisenhower, nor John Kennedy, nor even Richard Nixon or Jimmy Carter.
We no longer have a president with the guts or the acumen to defy anyone, least of all the Zionist Lobby, and we have no prospect of ever having such a person in the White House in the foreseeable future.
Donald Trump? He needs the Israel Lobby even more than Biden, and if they weren’t comfortable with him, they would have sabotaged his candidacy a long time ago. Both of them have the same morals as Netanyahu. I rest my case.
A ceasefire? I cannot imagine it.
The week-long November pause worked because neither side gave up too much strategically and both benefited politically. There is no similar bargain on the horizon. If Hamas gives up all its captives, it has nothing left to trade. That’s why the Hamas proposal is in three stages, with the final stage being an independent Palestinian state with the right to defend itself, and with multilateral guarantees for its security and independence.
That is of course totally unacceptable to Israel, and they said so. For them, the “occupied territories” are more accurately called “greater Israel”, which has not yet been sufficiently settled by Zionist Jews to justify extending the official borders to encompass it. Too many non-Jews. They will address that problem in its turn, but for now the priority is to empty Gaza. So much for the two-state solution, which Israel embraced as long as all they had to do was sit at a negotiations table, keep the deal just out of reach and blame the Palestinians for its failure. Now they’re having none of it.
When will Israel’s genocide end, and what will the result look like? First, the Palestinian population in Gaza will have fallen by at least 2 million, the result of both murder and expulsion, as noted earlier. The orphaned children will be far fewer than the dead ones, but those who survive will be shipped to western countries for adoption, so that they will lose their names and their cultural heritage. But I’m sure they will have loving parents and become well-adjusted western citizens.
As for Israel, its world has been changing since October 7th. First, it is losing – and will continue to lose – its liberal population. It began years ago, but Israel’s population has declined by roughly 10 percent since October 7th, 2023, in parallel with the decline in the population of Gaza, but by choice instead of genocide.
The fanatics with genocidal intentions are not the ones leaving, mostly the ones who are more in keeping with traditional Jewish values of being a light unto the nations – or at least not a source of darkness. The emigrants are mainly those who are giving up on the Zionist project. They are not the only ones. American and other western Jews are losing their appetite for the Zionist menu, which allows us to maintain our respect for integrity.
This of course means that Israel will be far more isolated than previously, both from the Jewish diaspora and from the non-Jewish communities that previously supported Israel. It’s amazing how a little thing like genocide can cause your friends to turn on you. I suspect that Israeli products, institutions, and culture will be shunned by much of the world. No more trips to Israel as prizes on television game shows.
I have no doubt that Gaza will be annexed to Israel, and I imagine that developers will create Zionist dream communities along the coast, on top of the graves and rubble of their victims.
But there might be fewer new immigrants than they might have hoped for. Israel’s future, if it has one, will be as a violent fortress for Zionist exclusivism, supported by a slowly shrinking world Zionist network and their allies using the resources of other countries in much the same way that Israel is using the United States today, and enriching those individuals and interests that cooperate with them.
I leave it to you to decide if this sounds like a strategy for success.
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Paul Larudee is a retired academic and current administrator of a nonprofit human rights and humanitarian aid organization. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
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“Putin Should be Concerned about more terror attacks” says John Bolton
Video
How does Bolton know that?
This is like Biden warning that Nord Stream might blow up.
Bolton has been implicated in all dirty missions of the US in other countries.
Perhaps Bolton knows something about terror against Russia (and others) which he doesn’t tell.
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Karsten Riise is a Master of Science (Econ) from Copenhagen Business School and has a university degree in Spanish Culture and Languages from Copenhagen University. He is the former Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of Mercedes-Benz in Denmark and Sweden.
All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the Translate Website button below the author’s name (only available in desktop version).
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The most extraordinary thing about Julian Assange is that he is being treated as if he were an American citizen. “Treason” was the original cry, now converted to “espionage.”
There was no espionage. Wikileaks published, and made available to the New York Times, The Guardian, and other media organizations leaked information. The media organizations published the information, just as did Wikileaks, but they are not charged. Neither is Wikileaks charged. Only Julian Assange is charged.
Nothing is any different from Ellsberg releasing the Pentagon Papers to the New York Times. The US government wanted to prosecute both, but was prevented by the First Amendment and long-accepted duty of media organizations to hold government accountable.
The stark deterioration in the protective power of the First Amendment and journalistic freedom since 1971 demonstrates the rise in tyranny. Tyranny is what Julian Assange is experiencing, not a legitimate prosecution.
Let’s carefully examine the issue of “espionage.” Espionage is a function of every embassy everywhere in the world. The purpose of embassies is not simply to represent a country’s commercial and political interests. It is also to collect information, the more sensitive the better. When embassy personnel are caught engaging in espionage, the personnel are required to leave the country. They are not prosecuted.
It is well known that US embassies contain CIA agents posing as diplomats. Under the protocol governing the Assange case, Russia, China, any number of countries could arrest members of US embassies and put them on trial. Indeed, many countries could do this to one another. What prevents it is not merely good judgment, but the fact that foreign citizens are not subject to the laws of other countries. Only the US, which imagines itself as some kind of international unipower, asserts the worldwide primacy of its laws. This is an absurd claim and has no legal basis.
The orchestrated, in fact legally incorrect, case against Assange is based on nothing but Washington’s demand for revenge.
Here is what Assange is guilty of: He released leaked information that showed conclusively that the United States government is a liar, a deceiver of its allies, and a war criminal. The purpose of the case against Assange is to pay him back and to intimidate all journalists from ever again publishing information unfavorable to the US government.
In other words, the purpose of the Assange case is to end forever the ability of media to hold government accountable. The Assange case is the fundamental foundation for tyranny. Once it is in place, tyranny is unleashed.
That so many dumbshit “patriots” support “getting Assange” indicates complete stupidity. “Getting Assange” means getting themselves, and they are too stupid to see it.
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Paul Craig Roberts is a renowned author and academic, chairman of The Institute for Political Economy where this article was originally published. Dr. Roberts was previously associate editor and columnist for The Wall Street Journal. He was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy during the Reagan Administration. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
Featured image: Assange billboard in front of the Capitol Building. [Source: Photo Courtesy of Randy Credico]
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25 years ago, NATO under US command demolished with war what remained of the Yugoslav Federation, the State that hindered its expansion eastwards towards Russia. In the following twenty years, NATO expanded from 16 to 30 countries and, with the war in Ukraine that began in 2014, it expanded to 32.
In the 1999 war, the role of the Italian government, chaired by Massimo D’Alema, was crucial. As we can hear from the official audio recording, Vice President Sergio Mattarella announced the start of the war to the Italian Senate on the evening of March 24, 1999, and explained the reasons according to the official version.
While the United States and other NATO countries’ planes dropped the first bombs on Serbia and Kosovo, Democratic President Clinton announced:
“At the end of the 20th century, after two world wars and a cold war, we and our allies will be able to leave our children a free, peaceful and stable Europe”.
For 78 days, 1,100 planes took off mainly from Italian bases, and carried out 38 thousand raids, dropping 23,000 bombs and missiles.
“Of the 2000 targets hit in Serbia by NATO planes – the Pentagon later documented – the American secret services chose 1999 and only one by the European ones”.
The bombings dismantled Serbia’s structures and infrastructure causing victims, especially among civilians. The resulting health and environmental damage is not quantifiable. Due to the bombing, thousands of tons of highly toxic chemicals (including dioxin and mercury) leaked from the Pancevo refinery alone, while other damage was caused by NATO’s massive use of depleted uranium shells in Serbia and Kosovo.
The D’Alema government placed Italian territory, particularly the airports, at the complete disposal of the armed forces of the United States and other countries, to implement what the Prime Minister defines as “the right of humanitarian interference“. 54 Italian planes took part in the bombings, making 1,400 raids, and attacking the targets indicated by the US command.
“In terms of the number of planes we were second only to the USA. Italy is a great country and we should not be surprised by the commitment shown in this war” – declared Prime Minister D’Alema during his visit to the Amendola base on 10 June 1999 – underlining that, for the pilots who participated, it was a great human and professional experience.”
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This article was originally published in Italian on Grandangolo, Byoblu TV.
Manlio Dinucci, award winning author, geopolitical analyst and geographer, Pisa, Italy.
He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization.
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“…The vaccination turned out to be the greatest blessing for the money and world’s elites, for the pharmaceutical industry and politics. They could pursue their own interests, under the common slogan “Everything for public health”, “everything for the well-being of the general public”. To achieve this goal, they created the WHO. This non-democratically elected people, basically a private association that is in the process of gaining power over the healthcare system in the 190 Member States”“
Kevin McKernan discovered that this crucial step of removal of plasmid DNA had not been carried out conscientiously. Huge amounts of plasmid DNA have been found in packaged form. This ensured their successful delivery to the cells. Kevin’s discovery has now been confirmed in several other laboratories, Also in Germany. Large amounts of DNA contamination were found in all 27 batches examined so far. Four weeks ago, the Canadian medical authority even confirmed the discovery of plasmid DNA. However, the authority does not see this as a sufficient reason for to withdraw the approval. By the way, question for the interested public, has the responsible German authority, the Paul Ehrlich Institute of the Federal Ministry of Health carried out reliable scientific measurements? Question, answer, no. Not to this day.”
“Who hasn’t heard about the mysterious sudden cardiac deaths occurring around the world? They are just the tip of an iceberg. Heart disease caused by vaccinations is on the agenda of young and old alike. Fortunately, to save the honor of German science, well-known pathologists stood up and carried out the world’s first research work, who discovered the connection between vaccination and severe organ damage. Professor Arne Burkhardt, who recently tragically died in an accident, and his dear friend Professor Walter Lang, who spoke to you today. Dr. Michael Mörz in Dresden and the world-famous Professor Peter Schiermacher, director of the Institute of Pathology at Heidelberg University. Thanks to their work, it is now scientifically proven. And so it says in this work from Peter Schiermacher’s group, Literally, it has been proven beyond a doubt that vaccination can lead to fatal myocarditis.”“
Anyone who praises RNA vaccines as safe and effective, Anyone who claims that vaccination rarely causes serious side effects is either incredibly ignorant or infinitely evil. And they ar committing a crime. Just like everyone who actively or passively pursues and supports this vaccination. Because it is now scientifically proven that vaccination can only have negative effects and this to a life-threatening extent.”
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Featured image is a screenshot from the video
The Worldwide Corona Crisis, Global Coup d’Etat Against Humanity
by Michel Chossudovsky
Michel Chossudovsky reviews in detail how this insidious project “destroys people’s lives”. He provides a comprehensive analysis of everything you need to know about the “pandemic” — from the medical dimensions to the economic and social repercussions, political underpinnings, and mental and psychological impacts.
“My objective as an author is to inform people worldwide and refute the official narrative which has been used as a justification to destabilize the economic and social fabric of entire countries, followed by the imposition of the “deadly” COVID-19 “vaccine”. This crisis affects humanity in its entirety: almost 8 billion people. We stand in solidarity with our fellow human beings and our children worldwide. Truth is a powerful instrument.”
Reviews
This is an in-depth resource of great interest if it is the wider perspective you are motivated to understand a little better, the author is very knowledgeable about geopolitics and this comes out in the way Covid is contextualized. —Dr. Mike Yeadon
In this war against humanity in which we find ourselves, in this singular, irregular and massive assault against liberty and the goodness of people, Chossudovsky’s book is a rock upon which to sustain our fight. –Dr. Emanuel Garcia
In fifteen concise science-based chapters, Michel traces the false covid pandemic, explaining how a PCR test, producing up to 97% proven false positives, combined with a relentless 24/7 fear campaign, was able to create a worldwide panic-laden “plandemic”; that this plandemic would never have been possible without the infamous DNA-modifying Polymerase Chain Reaction test – which to this day is being pushed on a majority of innocent people who have no clue. His conclusions are evidenced by renown scientists. —Peter Koenig
Professor Chossudovsky exposes the truth that “there is no causal relationship between the virus and economic variables.” In other words, it was not COVID-19 but, rather, the deliberate implementation of the illogical, scientifically baseless lockdowns that caused the shutdown of the global economy. –David Skripac
A reading of Chossudovsky’s book provides a comprehensive lesson in how there is a global coup d’état under way called “The Great Reset” that if not resisted and defeated by freedom loving people everywhere will result in a dystopian future not yet imagined. Pass on this free gift from Professor Chossudovsky before it’s too late. You will not find so much valuable information and analysis in one place. –Edward Curtin
ISBN: 978-0-9879389-3-0, Year: 2022, PDF Ebook, Pages: 164, 15 Chapters
All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the Translate Website button below the author’s name (only available in desktop version).
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President Zelensky yesterday 26 March just fired Oleksiy Danilov, the secretary head of Ukraine’s national security council.
Mr. Danilov was Zelensky’s top security guy. See this.
The dismissal of Ukraine’s security chief Danilov comes just as bad news are surfacing about possible Ukrainian-US involvement in the terror attack on Crocus City Hall in Moscow.
For a wrap-up of the facts surrounding Ukraine’s likely involvement in the Crocus terror attack – see also Prof. Jeffrey Sachs, senior advisor to the UN:
So the big question is if the Ukrainian government in one way or another was involved in this.
And there are lots of reason to believe the answer could well be Yes.
For a 1 hour overview of US cooperation with ISIS and other extremist “Islamic” groups, listen to Kevork Almassian, a Syrian analyst living in Germany:
Lots of more sources exist of the US support for “Islamic” terrorism for anyone who want to take a look.
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Karsten Riise is a Master of Science (Econ) from Copenhagen Business School and has a university degree in Spanish Culture and Languages from Copenhagen University. He is the former Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of Mercedes-Benz in Denmark and Sweden.
All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the Translate Website button below the author’s name (only available in desktop version).
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When exposing a crime is treated as committing a crime, you are being ruled by criminals.
In the current governmental climate, obeying one’s conscience and speaking truth to the power of the police state can easily render you an “enemy of the state.”
The government’s list of so-called “enemies of the state” is growing by the day.
Wikileaks founderJulian Assange is merely one of the most visible victims of the police state’s war on dissidents and whistleblowers.
Five years ago, on April 11, 2019, police arrested Assange for daring to access and disclose military documents that portray the U.S. government and its endless wars abroad as reckless, irresponsible, immoral and responsible for thousands of civilian deaths.
Included among the leaked materials was gunsight video footage from two U.S. AH-64 Apache helicopters engaged in a series of air-to-ground attacks while American air crew laughed at some of the casualties. Among the casualties were two Reuters correspondents who were gunned down after their cameras were mistaken for weapons and a driver who stopped to help one of the journalists. The driver’s two children, who happened to be in the van at the time it was fired upon by U.S. forces, suffered serious injuries.
There is nothing defensible about crimes such as these perpetrated by the government.
When any government becomes almost indistinguishable from the evil it claims to be fighting—whether that evil takes the form of war, terrorism, torture, drug trafficking, sex trafficking, murder, violence, theft, pornography, scientific experimentations or some other diabolical means of inflicting pain, suffering and servitude on humanity—that government has lost its claim to legitimacy.
These are hard words, but hard times require straight-talking.
It is easy to remain silent in the face of evil.
What is harder—what we lack today and so desperately need—are those with moral courage who will risk their freedoms and lives in order to speak out against evil in its many forms.
Throughout history, individuals or groups of individuals have risen up to challenge the injustices of their age.
Nazi Germany had its Dietrich Bonhoeffer. The gulags of the Soviet Union were challenged by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. America had its color-coded system of racial segregation and warmongering called out for what it was, blatant discrimination and profiteering, by Martin Luther King Jr.
And then there was Jesus Christ, an itinerant preacher and revolutionary activist, who not only died challenging the police state of his day—namely, the Roman Empire—but provided a blueprint for civil disobedience that would be followed by those, religious and otherwise, who came after him.
Indeed, it is fitting that we remember that Jesus Christ—the religious figure worshipped by Christians for his death on the cross and subsequent resurrection—paid the ultimate price for speaking out against the police state of his day.
A radical nonconformist who challenged authority at every turn, Jesus was a far cry from the watered-down, corporatized, simplified, gentrified, sissified vision of a meek creature holding a lamb that most modern churches peddle. In fact, he spent his adult life speaking truth to power, challenging the status quo of his day, and pushing back against the abuses of the Roman Empire.
Much like the American Empire today, the Roman Empire of Jesus’ day had all of the characteristics of a police state: secrecy, surveillance, a widespread police presence, a citizenry treated like suspects with little recourse against the police state, perpetual wars, a military empire, martial law, and political retribution against those who dared to challenge the power of the state.
For all the accolades poured out upon Jesus, little is said about the harsh realities of the police state in which he lived and its similarities to modern-day America, and yet they are striking.
Secrecy, surveillance and rule by the elite. As the chasm between the wealthy and poor grew wider in the Roman Empire, the ruling class and the wealthy class became synonymous, while the lower classes, increasingly deprived of their political freedoms, grew disinterested in the government and easily distracted by “bread and circuses.” Much like America today, with its lack of government transparency, overt domestic surveillance, and rule by the rich, the inner workings of the Roman Empire were shrouded in secrecy, while its leaders were constantly on the watch for any potential threats to its power. The resulting state-wide surveillance was primarily carried out by the military, which acted as investigators, enforcers, torturers, policemen, executioners and jailers. Today that role is fulfilled by the NSA, the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security and the increasingly militarized police forces across the country.
Widespread police presence. The Roman Empire used its military forces to maintain the “peace,” thereby establishing a police state that reached into all aspects of a citizen’s life. In this way, these military officers, used to address a broad range of routine problems and conflicts, enforced the will of the state. Today SWAT teams, comprised of local police and federal agents, are employed to carry out routine search warrants for minor crimes such as marijuana possession and credit card fraud.
Citizenry with little recourse against the police state. As the Roman Empire expanded, personal freedom and independence nearly vanished, as did any real sense of local governance and national consciousness. Similarly, in America today, citizens largely feel powerless, voiceless and unrepresented in the face of a power-hungry federal government. As states and localities are brought under direct control by federal agencies and regulations, a sense of learned helplessness grips the nation.
Martial law. Eventually, Rome established a permanent military dictatorship that left the citizens at the mercy of an unreachable and oppressive totalitarian regime. In the absence of resources to establish civic police forces, the Romans relied increasingly on the military to intervene in all matters of conflict or upheaval in provinces, from small-scale scuffles to large-scale revolts. Not unlike police forces today, with their martial law training drills on American soil, militarized weapons and “shoot first, ask questions later” mindset, the Roman soldier had “the exercise of lethal force at his fingertips” with the potential of wreaking havoc on normal citizens’ lives.
Acts of civil disobedience by insurrectionists. Much like the Roman Empire, the American Empire has exhibited zero tolerance for dissidents such as Julian Assange, Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manningwho exposed the police state’s seedy underbelly. Jesus was also branded a political revolutionary starting with his attack on the money chargers and traders at the Jewish temple, an act of civil disobedience at the site of the administrative headquarters of the Sanhedrin, the supreme Jewish council.
Military-style arrests in the dead of night. Jesus’ arrest account testifies to the fact that the Romans perceived Him as a revolutionary. Eerily similar to today’s SWAT team raids, Jesus was arrested in the middle of the night, in secret, by a large, heavily armed fleet of soldiers. Rather than merely asking for Jesus when they came to arrest him, his pursuers collaborated beforehand with Judas. Acting as a government informant, Judas concocted a kiss as a secret identification marker, hinting that a level of deception and trickery must be used to obtain this seemingly “dangerous revolutionist’s” cooperation.
Torture and capital punishment. In Jesus’ day, religious preachers, self-proclaimed prophets and nonviolent protesters were not summarily arrested and executed. Indeed, the high priests and Roman governors normally allowed a protest, particularly a small-scale one, to run its course. However, government authorities were quick to dispose of leaders and movements that appeared to threaten the Roman Empire. The charges leveled against Jesus—that he was a threat to the stability of the nation, opposed paying Roman taxes and claimed to be the rightful King—were purely political, not religious. To the Romans, any one of these charges was enough to merit death by crucifixion, which was usually reserved for slaves, non-Romans, radicals, revolutionaries and the worst criminals.
Jesus was presented to Pontius Pilate “as a disturber of the political peace,” a leader of a rebellion, a political threat, and most gravely—a claimant to kingship, a “king of the revolutionary type.” After Jesus is formally condemned by Pilate, he is sentenced to death by crucifixion, “the Roman means of executing criminals convicted of high treason.” The purpose of crucifixion was not so much to kill the criminal, as it was an immensely public statement intended to visually warn all those who would challenge the power of the Roman Empire. Hence, it was reserved solely for the most extreme political crimes: treason, rebellion, sedition, and banditry. After being ruthlessly whipped and mocked, Jesus was nailed to a cross.
The Passion of the Christ
Jesus—the revolutionary, the political dissident, and the nonviolent activist—lived and died in a police state. Any reflection on Jesus’ life and death within a police state must take into account several factors: Jesus spoke out strongly against such things as empires, controlling people, state violence and power politics. Jesus challenged the political and religious belief systems of his day. And worldly powers feared Jesus, not because he challenged them for control of thrones or government but because he undercut their claims of supremacy, and he dared to speak truth to power in a time when doing so could—and often did—cost a person his life.
Unfortunately, the radical Jesus, the political dissident who took aim at injustice and oppression, has been largely forgotten today, replaced by a congenial, smiling Jesus trotted out for religious holidays but otherwise rendered mute when it comes to matters of war, power and politics.
Yet for those who truly study the life and teachings of Jesus, the resounding theme is one of outright resistance to war, materialism and empire.
What a marked contrast to the advice being given to Americans by church leaders to “submit to your leaders and those in authority,” which in the American police state translates to complying, conforming, submitting, obeying orders, deferring to authority and generally doing whatever a government official tells you to do.
Will we follow the path of least resistance—turning a blind eye to the evils of our age and marching in lockstep with the police state—or will we be transformed nonconformists “dedicated to justice, peace, and brotherhood”?
As Martin Luther King Jr. reminds us in a powerful sermon delivered 70 years ago, “This command not to conform comes … [from] Jesus Christ, the world’s most dedicated nonconformist, whose ethical nonconformity still challenges the conscience of mankind.”
Ultimately, as I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, this is the contradiction that must be resolved if the radical Jesus—the one who stood up to the Roman Empire and was crucified as a warning to others not to challenge the powers-that-be—is to be an example for our modern age.
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Point to point navigation describes the long-lost art of celestial navigation, the ability to use the stars to chart a course across the open seas in the age before compasses. The key to successfully executing point to point navigation lay in fixing one’s position vis-à-vis the North Star. Failure to do so meant risking sailing aimlessly about a sea with no fixed reference points, an act that leads to death or, perhaps worse, becoming a castaway on some unchartered point on earth.
After a storm, a ship’s captain and his navigator would scan the skies for the North Star, from which they could establish not only what direction true north was, but also where they were in reference to the position of the North Star in the sky, so that they might navigate to safety.
When special operations forces are compromised behind enemy lines, they conduct what they call “escape and evasion,” the act of avoiding detection and probable death or capture, while making their way to a pre-designated haven from which they can regroup or be extracted. The CIA trains its operations officers in similar skill sets. Both colloquially refer to such actions as “finding their true north.”
The perpetrators of the horrific attack on the Crocus City Hall and Concert Center in Krasnogorsk, a metropolitan community located to the northwest of Moscow, were no different than any other terrorist/militant before them; after their act of mass murder, they sought out their “true north” to make good their escape.
Western governments, analysts, and pundits have loudly proclaimed that the men who carried out the attack on the Crocus City Hall had nothing whatsoever to do with Ukraine, and instead have collectively embraced a narrative that paints the men as members of the Islamic State-Khorasan (ISIS-K). ISIS is an off-shoot of Al-Qaeda-Iraq (AQI) which emerged in 2013 when core AQI members relocated to Syria. In 2014 ISIS declared itself to be a caliphate and began a series of operations which saw it take control on a third of Syria and a quarter of Iraq before being driven back and ultimately defeated by a coalition which included Iraq, the United States and Iran.
In 2014 Central Asian fighters affiliated with Al Qaeda in Afghanistan formed a branch of ISIS in Afghanistan known as ISIS-K, where they stood for Khorasan (ISIS-K). Khorasan is an ancient term for the territory encompassed by modern day Iran, Turkmenistan, and Afghanistan. ISIS-K continues to operate today in Afghanistan and Iran, as well as inside the former Soviet Central Asian republics, including Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.
Terrorists attacking the Crocus City Hall
According to US officials, the United States collected intelligence that ISIS-K was planning an attack on Moscow in early March.
This intelligence was behind a public warning issued by the US embassy in Russia on March 7 that “extremists” were planning an imminent attack on large gatherings in Moscow.
“US citizens should be advised to avoid large gatherings over the next 48 hours,” the warning, published on the embassy website, stated. American citizens were warned to avoid crowds, including concerts. These US officials likewise claimed (and Russia has acknowledged) that Russia had been informed about the intelligence behind the March 7 warning. This information was shared based upon the “duty to warn” principle where US intelligence about potential terrorist attacks must be shared with the suspected targets. However, rather than passing this information through formal channels, it was done unofficially, through informal channels, significantly diluting the impact of the information.
The attackers posted a photograph of them reciting the Shahada, or Islamic oath and creed (“I bear witness that there is no deity but God, and I bear witness that Muhammad is the Messenger of God”) which, if made sincerely, is all that is required to be identified as a Muslim in the eyes of God. While Islamic scholars note that it is only necessary to recite the words, for jihadists reciting Shahada accompanied by a raised right index finger, has become de riguere—Osama Bin Laden delivered it in this fashion, as did Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the founder of the Islamic State.
Shahada is a ritual, and those who make Shahada must understand its importance for it to have any meaning. As such, if one incorporates the raising of the right index finger as part of the Shahada ritual, it must be done piously. The use of the right hand is critical—in the Muslim faith, the right hand symbolizes all that is good, and the left is reserved for unclean acts:
“No one among you should eat with his left hand or drink with it, for the shaytaan (devil) eats with his left hand and drinks with it.”
The four attackers delivered this oath by raising their left hands.
They also published this photograph with their faces blurred—they were shielding their identity.
There can be no subterfuge when reciting Shahada—it is an oath made before God and in the eyes of men.
Moreover, the blurring of their faces indicated that the attackers intended to survive their mission.
The Crocus City Hall attackers making Shahada
For most militants affiliated with ISIS-K, true north is the path to martyrdom, a one-way ticket to paradise.
Their goal is to inflict as much harm as possible before being dispatched from this mortal earth, an act that is usually made certain using a suicide vest detonated at a time when more death and destruction can be wrought.
The perpetrators of the Crocus City Hall attack, however, did not wear suicide vests. Indeed, they had no intention of losing their lives, but rather to live and be able to enjoy the fruits of their labor, a purported $5,500 payment for services rendered.
These weren’t Islamist militants.
These were mercenaries who disguised themselves as Islamic militants.
The Crocus City Hall attackers in their getaway car
And when they finished their murderous rampage, the purported ISIS-K fighters jumped into their car and headed toward their “true north.”
Ukraine.
Ukraine. The source of their money.
Ukraine. The source of their motivation.
The Russian investigation into the terror attack is still in its early stages. There are many facts left to be uncovered.
But there is a plethora of data which allows one to populate the puzzle with enough pieces to begin to see a discernable shape take form.
Russian authorities went out of their way to make sure that all four perpetrators were captured alive.
The perpetrators are in the process of being interrogated. Many of the techniques being used by Russia would not be permitted in the United States as they could readily be classified as torture. And many intelligence professionals—me included—discount the value of any confession made under severe duress.
But the Russian interrogations are aided by the fact that the Russian investigators are not engaged in a fishing expedition, but rather are guided by specific facts derived from the forensic examination of the cell phones of the four terrorists, which are currently in the possession of Russian authorities.
One of these phones was recovered at the crime scene, and the data contained on this phone was used by Russian security officials to track the terrorists as they drove out of Moscow, toward Ukraine. Telephone numbers contained on the recovered phone allowed the Russians to zero in on the remaining phones, and monitor phone calls made by the terrorists in real time—including numerous calls to persons inside Ukraine who were working to create a gap in the Russian-Ukrainian border that the terrorists could escape through.
True North.
The Russians have been able to identify the core structure of a support network in Moscow which provided the four terrorists with transportation and housing.
Eleven arrests have been made in this regard.
The Russians have identified a network operating in Turkey who were affiliated with the recruitment, training and logistical preparation and support of the terrorist operation in Moscow.
Forty arrests have been made as a result.
But more importantly, Russia has gathered enough information to issue a warrant for the head of the Ukrainian security service, Vasyl Malyuk, on charges of public incitement of terrorism. Likewise, the head of the Russian security service, Alexander Boritnikov, has stated that when it comes to delivering justice to Ukrainians who may have been involved in the attack on the Crocus concert venue, “Everything is ahead of us.”
Russia, it seems, is navigating point to point.
Not toward a safe haven, but rather on a path of retribution.
And its “true north” is the same as that of the terrorists.
Ukraine.
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[This article was originally published in August 2023.]
After two-and-a-half months of failed negotiations, the U.S. government on Thursday intensified its effort to quash Mexico’s limits on genetically modified corn imports by calling for the formation of a dispute settlement panel under a North American trade deal.
In a 2020 decree backed by agricultural, consumer, environmental, public health, and worker groups, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO)announced plans to phase out genetically modified (GM) corn and the herbicide glyphosate by January 2024.
Under pressure from the U.S. government and impacted industries, he issued a new decree in February reiterating plans to block GM corn imports for human consumption by then but lifting the deadline for imports intended for livestock feed and industrial use.
“The Mexican government will show what has occurred: Its cherished tortillas are being contaminated with glyphosate and GM corn. And they intend to put a stop to that.”
While AMLO’s move was seen as a concession to the U.S. and lobbyists challenging his policies, the Biden administration in June still requested 75 days of formal negotiations. After talks ended Wednesday, U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Katherine Tai confirmed the decision to form a panel under the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA).
“Through the USMCA dispute panel, we seek to resolve our concerns and help ensure consumers can continue to access safe and affordable food and agricultural products,” Tai said Thursday. “It is critical that Mexico eliminate its USMCA-inconsistent biotechnology measures so that American farmers can continue to access the Mexican market and use innovative tools to respond to climate and food security challenges. Our bilateral relationship with Mexico, one of our oldest and strongest trading partners, is rooted in trust and honesty, and there are many areas where we will continue to cooperate and work together.”
U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack similarly said that “Mexico’s approach to biotechnology is not based on science” and “the United States is continuing to exercise its rights under the USMCA to ensure that U.S. producers and exporters have full and fair access to the Mexican market.”
The Mexican Ministry of Economy responded in a statement that “Mexico does not agree with the position of the United States” and “is prepared to defend the Mexican position before this international panel and demonstrate: 1) that the national regulation is consistent with the commitments signed in the treaty; and 2) that the challenged measures do not have commercial effects.”
Recibe México solicitud de Estados Unidos para establecer un panel arbitral del #TMEC sobre maíz transgénico.
La Secretaría de Economía se encuentra preparada para coordinar la defensa de México y demostrar que la regulación nacional es consistente con… pic.twitter.com/1AycEsj9Yy
The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) has previously supported Mexico’s efforts to phase out GM corn and glyphosate and on Thursday challenged claims by U.S. officials and agribusiness about Mexican obligations under the treaty and the potential economic impact of the policies.
“U.S. agribusiness exporters, the biotech industry, and their allies in Congress are pushing this case, intent on compelling Mexico to accept U.S. exports without debate. It is an assault on Mexico’s food sovereignty,” said Karen Hansen-Kuhn, IATP director of trade and international strategies. “Trade rules should provide a forum to protect and advance rights, rather than block them.”
Hansen-Kuhn on Thursday authored an op-ed about Mexico’s rights under the USMCA while ITAP senior adviser Timothy A. Wise wrote about “exaggerated claims of economic damage” that “sprang from a convenient set of assumptions, all of which are flawed and now outdated in light of the more recent presidential decree.”
“As Mexican Economy Minister Raquel Buenrostro stated in response to the USTR request for technical consultations, Mexico’s decree is based on science, and she will challenge the U.S. government in the consultations to show ‘quantitatively, with numbers, something that has not occurred: that the corn decree has commercially affected U.S. exporters,'” Wise also said.
“The Mexican government will show what has occurred: Its cherished tortillas are being contaminated with glyphosate and GM corn,” he continued. “And they intend to put a stop to that.”
Under USMCA’s dispute settlement rules, a five-person panel, chosen from a roster of pre-approved experts, must be convened within 30 days, with a chair jointly chosen and the U.S. side choosing two Mexican panelists and Mexico choosing two American panelists. The panel will review testimony and written submissions and its initial report is due 150 days after the panel is convened.
Previous USMCA dispute panels last year ruled in the U.S.’s favor in a dispute over Canadian dairy quotas, and against the U.S. on automotive rules of origin, siding with Mexico and Canada.
There have been other disagreements between the U.S. and Mexico, most notably over energy in which the U.S. has argued that Mexico’s nationalist policy prejudices foreign companies.
Arturo Sarukhán, a former Mexican ambassador to the United States, said on social media Thursday that “of the two consultation processes—energy and yellow corn—this is the one that is politically most relevant for the White House in 2024,” given the significance of agricultural states such as Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin to Democratic U.S. President Joe Biden, who is seeking reelection, and the GOP nominee, which could be former President Donald Trump, who signed the USMCA.
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Jessica Corbett is a senior editor and staff writer for Common Dreams.
Featured image: Screen shot of Mexico President Andrés Manuel López Obrador from MILENIO broadcast of press conference on July 4, 2022
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The UN Security Council presents one of the great contradictions of power in the international system. On the one hand vested with enormous latitude in order to preserve international peace and security, it remains checked, limited and, it can be argued, crippled by an all too regular use of the veto by members of the permanent five powers (US, Russia, China, the United Kingdom and France).
When it comes to the bleeding and crushing of human life in Gaza by the Israeli Defence Forces (32,300 dead Palestinians and rising), resolutions demanding a cease fire of a conflict that began with the attack on Israeli soil by Hamas militants have tended to pass into voting oblivion. The United States, Israel’s great power patron and defender, has been consistent in using its veto power to ensure it, exercising it on no less than three occasions since October 7.
On March 25, a change of heart was registered. Washington, reputationally battered for its unconditional support for Israel, haughtily defied by its own ally in being reduced to airdrops of aid for the expiring residents of Gaza, and resoundingly ignored by the Netanyahu government in moderating the savagery of its operations in the strip, abstained. In terms of resolution protocol, it meant that 14 out of 15 Council members favoured the vote.
Resolution 2728 calls for an immediate ceasefire for the month of Ramadan “leading to a lasting sustainable” halt to hostilities, the “immediate and unconditional release of all hostages”, “ensuring humanitarian access to address their medical and other humanitarian needs” and “demands that the parties comply with their obligations under international law in relation to all persons they detain”. The resolution further emphasises “the urgent need to expand the flow of humanitarian assistance to and reinforce the protection of civilians in the entire Gaza Strip”. All barriers regarding the provision of humanitarian assistance, in accordance with international humanitarian law” are also to be lifted.
The wording of the resolution has a degree of lexical ambiguity only tolerable to oily diplomats and paper mad bureaucrats. Neither Hamas nor Israeli hostages are mentioned, ghosts unacknowledged at the chattering feast. Does the latter, for instance, cover Palestinian prisoners?
The justification from the US delegation was uneven and skewed. The abstention, Secretary of State Anthony Blinkenexplained, “reaffirms the US position that a ceasefire of any duration come as part of an agreement to release hostages in Gaza.” While some provisions of the text had caused disagreement in Washington, the sponsors of the resolution had made sufficient changes “consistent with our principled position that any ceasefire text must be paired with the release of the hostages.”
Mild mannered approval for this sloppy, weak position (the apologetics of abstentions are rarely principled, suggesting a lack of moral timbre) followed. Hadar Susskind, President and CEO of Americans for Peace Now, even praised the stance in Newsweek. “By allowing the resolution to pass the US has staked out a position in favor of ending this horrible war, and in opposition to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s prioritization of his political well-being over the current and future good of Israelis and Palestinians alike.”
For his part, Netanyahu cancelled a planned Washington visit of two of his ministers, Ron Dermer and Tzachi Hanegbi, to specifically discuss the impending attack on Rafah, though much of this is bound to be studiously ceremonial, given the language of inevitability associated with the planned operation. Besides, neither are versed in anything related to military matters. But just as one pays attention to a wealthy, doddering relative who keeps funding your bad habits in the hope that you might, one day, see sense, it pays to feign courtesy and interest from time to time to your benefactor.
As if to prove this point, John F. Kirby, spokesman for the National Security Council, reminded journalists that various other meetings would still be taking place between the US and Israel, notably those between President Joe Biden’s national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, and with Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III.
In a gruff statement, the Israeli PM rebuked the abstention as “a retreat from the consistent American position since the beginning of the war”. In taking that stance, Washington had given “Hamas hope that international pressure will enable them to achieve a cease-fire without freeing the hostages.”
Netanyahu’s approach to Hamas, Gaza and the Palestinians has become one with his obsession with political survival and rekindling the fires of the Israeli electorate. As far back as December, a Likud official was already making the observation that the PM had adopted the posture of a vote getting electioneer even as the war was being prosecuted. “Netanyahu is in full campaign mode. While the external political threats are gradually increasing, Netanyahu knows that over time the attacks and the calls to remove him will also increase. He has been acting first to win back his base.”
For the UN Secretary General, António Guterres, the resolution had to be implemented. “Failure would be unforgivable.” But failure to do so, certainly in the context of the planned assault on Rafah so solemnly denounced by the international community, is most likely.
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Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He currently lectures at RMIT University. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). Email: [email protected]
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The CDC’s own research found that the long denied vaccine-SIDS link is real.
If you believe the official pronouncements of top governmental health agencies like the CDC and FDA, all the vaccines in the present day schedule are a priori safe and effective.
Not only are you told that they can’t harm you, but that not taking them can kill you.
Parents are under even more pressure. They are told that refraining from vaccinating their infants or children will greatly increase their risk of dying or being disabled. Worse, they are increasingly labeled as ‘crazy’ and ‘irresponsible’ anti-vaccine zealots who are putting the lives of others in danger.
But what happens when the actual evidence from the scientific and clinical literature produced by these very agencies contradicts their own vaccine policies?
This is exactly what has happened with the publication of a new study in the Journal of Pediatrics titled ,
The CDC has boldly denied that there is any evidence supporting a causal link between vaccines and infant death, despite the fact that their own webpage on the topic acknowledges that “From 2 to 4 months old, babies begin their primary course of vaccinations. This is also the peak age for sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS).” Written off as coincidence, the CDC suggests that stomach sleeping is the primary modifiable risk factor.
Because SIDS is the 3rd leading cause of death in infants, and because the U.S. has one of the highest infant mortality rates in the developed world, one would think that more progress would have been made toward understanding its causes. Perhaps, as explored in this past article, the signal of harm is being ignored. Neglect and suppression of available data has recently been exposed with the confession of a top CDC vaccine scientist who was compelled to covered up data revealing an autism-MMR link in African-American boys.
In the new study, the CDC and FDA researchers themselves acknowledge “the scarcity” of post licensure safety data on Hib vaccines in today’s vaccination schedule. They evaluated reports involving the currently licensed Hib vaccines received from January 1, 1990, through December 1, 2013 available on the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS).
Presently, the CDC recommends 4 doses of the Hib vaccine at the following ages: 2 months, 4 months, 6 months, 12 months through 15 months.
The Hib vaccine is described on the CDC website as “very safe” and “effective” at preventing Hib disease, which it states can be deadly. They list “most common side effects as usually mild and last 2 or 3 days,” including “redness, swelling, and warmth where the child got the shot” and “fever”. Nowhere is there listed death or disability as a possible side effect.
In stark contrast to these statements the study uncovered the following highly concerning results:
VAERS received 29,747 reports after Hib vaccines; 5179 (17%) were serious, including 896 reports of deaths. Median age was 6 months (range 0-10.22 months). Sudden infant death syndrome was the stated cause of death in 384 (51%) of 749 death reports with autopsy/death certificate records. The most common non-death serious AE categories were neurologic (80; 37%), other noninfectious (46; 22%) (comprising mainly constitutional signs and symptoms); and gastrointestinal (39; 18%) conditions. No new safety concerns were identified after clinical review of reports of AEs that exceeded the data mining statistical threshold.
Consider also that VAERS is a passive surveillance system, which suffers from profound underreporting. According to the VAERS site’s own disclaimer:
“Underreporting” is one of the main limitations of passive surveillance systems, including VAERS. The term, underreporting refers to the fact that VAERS receives reports for only a small fraction of actual adverse events. The degree of underreporting varies widely. As an example, a great many of the millions of vaccinations administered each year by injection cause soreness, but relatively few of these episodes lead to a VAERS report.
According to Barbara Loe Fisher, founder of the National Vaccination Information Center, underreporting may result in overlooking 99% or higher of all vaccine associated injuries:
Former FDA Commissioner David Kessler estimated in a 1993 article in the Journal of the American Medical Association that fewer than 1 percent of all doctors report injuries and deaths following the administration of prescription drugs. This estimate may be even lower for vaccines. In one survey that our organization conducted in New York in 1994, only 1 doctor in 40 reported to VAERS.
Considering the influence of underreporting, these deaths represent only the tip of the iceberg of vaccine-induced infant morbidity and mortality caused by Hib vaccines. The study also mentioned an earlier analysis which found that infant death is the most common cause of death reported by all vaccine linked reports on VAERS, “accounting for almost one-half of all deaths reported.”
Obviously, this is an appalling study. The death of even 1 child for a potentially ineffective medical intervention designed to prevent a rarely fatal illness is a tragedy. Nor can any single vaccine be proven to have prevented any single case of disease because the clinical outcome (end point) is a non-event. This is not the case, however, for vaccine side effects which can be linked directly to the vaccination event with plausible scientific mechanisms.
What is perhaps most astounding is the researcher’s conclusion:
Review of VAERS reports did not identify any new or unexpected safety concerns for Hib vaccines.
This callous disregard for the evidence — evidence that clearly shows the CDC misrepresents the safety of the Hib vaccine — speaks to the blind investment in vaccine policy decisions over human wellbeing. Millions of parents have listened to the CDC and FDA and believed that these vaccines not only work but are safe. Informed consent requires those undergoing a quasi-mandatory medical intervention like vaccination to know the true risks associated with it. Failing to do so is clearly a violation of this medical ethical protection against being abused, and in some cases disabled and even killed.
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My Take…
VAERS has 1881 deaths of babies 0 to 2 years old after Hib Vaccine.
1514 deaths are < 6 months.
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Dr. William Makis is a Canadian physician with expertise in Radiology, Oncology and Immunology. Governor General’s Medal, University of Toronto Scholar. Author of 100+ peer-reviewed medical publications.
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“We still don’t know how many shooters there were. We don’t know what the weapons were. We don’t know what the firearms were. We don’t know what the explosives were. We don’t know how many were actually killed, how many wounded, but yet the US State Department knows that it was not Ukraine,” stated former CIA and State Department analyst Larry Johnson, according to Sputnik.
This indicates that the US government has no grounds to declare that there is no Ukrainian connection to the terrorist attack that claimed the lives of innocent Russians in Moscow.
The former analyst then highlighted another significant point stating that the statement “comes on a day that one of the CIA propaganda outlets came out and said that the Biden administration and the intelligence community were very concerned about what they call ‘brazen’, unwarranted attacks by Ukraine.”
Based on these premises, the former CIA and US State Department analyst announced that he suspected that Washington had information regarding the attack, yet withheld this information from Moscow.
“On what basis do officials in Washington draw any conclusions in the midst of the tragedy about anyone’s innocence? If the United States has or had reliable information in this regard, then it must be immediately transferred to the Russian side.”
Zakharova then stressed that
“if there is no such data, then the White House has no right to issue indulgences to anyone,” adding “All those involved, as stated by the Russian leadership, will be identified by the competent authorities.”
As for the Deputy chairman of the Security Council of Russia, Dmitry Medvedev, he underscored that
“Terrorists understand only retaliatory terror.”
Medvedev further emphasized that
“If it is established that these are terrorists of the Kiev regime, it is impossible to do otherwise with them and their ideological inspirers. All of them must be found and ruthlessly destroyed as terrorists. Including officials of the state that committed such an atrocity.”
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On March 25, Russia initiated a UN Security Council (UNSC) session concerning the 25th anniversary of the illegal NATO bombing of Serbia (then officially known as the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia). The attack was essentially the final act of the political West’s direct involvement, following nearly a decade of aggression by NATO whose endgame was to dismantle Yugoslavia, primarily by reducing Serbian ethnic space as much as possible.
Both were fully (Croatia) or partially (Bosnia and Herzegovina) secured by NATO after the belligerent alliance engineered the ethnic cleansing of Serbs from these areas. However, the political West wasn’t done with Yugoslavia (reduced to only Serbia and Montenegro).
On March 24, 1999, under the false pretext of supposedly “protecting” the separatist Albanian population in the Serbian province of Kosovo and Metohia, NATO launched a massive air attack on FR Yugoslavia. For the next 78 days, after failing to defeat the Serbian military, NATO launched strikes against civilian infrastructure, determined to bring the country to its knees by destroying its economy and killing thousands of civilians. By the time it was over, NATO’s attack on Serbia was just one of the countless instances of the political West’s unpunished aggression against the world, disguised as the so-called “humanitarian intervention”, as per usual.
However, the latest UNSC session about this issue seems to have been “too unpleasant” for NATO, so its most prominent powers, particularly the permanent UNSC members, the United States, United Kingdom and France, effectively blocked the discussion. Russia’s proposal was supported by China and Algeria. Serbian Minister of Foreign Affairs Ivica Dacic stated that Belgrade is “disappointed because today the truth about the NATO aggression against FR Yugoslavia in 1999 was prevented from being heard at the UNSC”. The Permanent Representative of Russia at the UNSC Vasily Nebenzya said that he understood that was “uncomfortable for NATO representatives at this table to hear this and to discuss it”, but stressed that it was important to have the discussion, “not only because of what happened but also because of what is happening now in that region”, obviously referring to ongoing tensions.
The political West criticized Russia’s initiative, insisting “it was unnecessary”. At the very beginning of the session, the Permanent Representative of France at the UNSC, Nicolas de Rivière, opposed the discussion, claiming that “this topic will not contribute to progress in any way”, obviously trying to avoid NATO’s responsibility, as it was the belligerent alliance that orchestrated the conflict in Yugoslavia in order to dismantle the country and then systematically destroy any pockets of resistance. The discussion about this at the UNSC would surely result in many questions regarding the functioning and the unreasonable power balance in the UN, which is often being used to justify NATO aggression against the world or, perhaps even worse, it’s simply ignored when Russia and/or China are using legal mechanisms to prevent it. This not only nullifies the very point of the UN, but it also makes international law void.
Any discussion that could result in the UN’s reform toward a more fair international order is immediately blocked by the political West. Worse yet, the belligerent power pole wants to impose the ludicrous “rules-based world order” that boils down to “international law” that the world “must follow”, but which the political West can interpret in any way it wants, giving it a free hand at maintaining (or even expanding) the extremely exploitative neocolonialist system. In addition, the discussion about NATO aggression on Yugoslavia/Serbia would also expose the belligerent alliance’s offensive-oriented nature. Namely, NATO has never been a “defensive alliance”, as it has never actually defended anything. Quite the contrary, its so-called “humanitarian interventions” around the world have resulted in the death and destruction of dozens of millions of lives, worsening the actual humanitarian situation.
It should also be noted that Russia decided to push for the discussion despite experiencing a horrendous terrorist attack at the Crocus City Hall just three days before. This is a clear indicator that Moscow doesn’t forget its friends and allies, even when going through the toughest of times. It should also be noted there’s a wide political consensus in Russia when it comes to the question of NATO aggression on Serbia, as both houses of the Russian State Duma adopted the draft document that Representative Nebenzya submitted at the UN. The document called on the world to condemn NATO aggression against FR Yugoslavia, prevent continued attempts to conceal the truth about its true motive and hold NATO perpetrators legally accountable. Truly independent media have covered the aggression on Yugoslavia extensively, exposing the blatant lies and deceit used as pretexts to destroy it.
Globally renowned expert and Professor Emeritus of Economics at the University of Ottawa Michel Chossudovsky,also the Editor-in-Chief of Global Research, one of the most prominent independent media outlets on the planet, has been particularly active in this regard.
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This article was originally published on InfoBrics.
Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
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Looks like the USA has more terrorist attacks in the pipeline.
US media is now preparing the global public that more terror will emerge under the US cover of “ISIS-K”.
Moscow rampage reveals ambition, deadly reach of ISIS successor groups
“The Islamic State quickly claimed responsibility for Friday’s rampage through the Crocus City Hall concert venue in Krasnogorsk, a few miles west of central Moscow. U.S. counterterrorism officials believe it was ISIS-K, specifically, that recruited the four gunmen who fired automatic weapons at concertgoers before setting fire to the building, killing at least 139 in one of the deadliest terrorist attacks in the history of modern Russia.
More attacks may be coming, counterterrorism officials warn. In a development that has been largely overshadowed by the conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza, ISIS-K and other regional groups have been expanding in size and ambition in recent years.” (Joby Warrick, Robyn Dixon and Souad Mekhennet, The Washington Post, March 25, 2024)
This is typical of US-Western security services. If their cover story and front-organizations are being revealed, they don’t fold but double down on them to keep them running.
As doubt rises in Russia and the world about the “ISIS-K” as the real perpetrator behind the heinous attack on Crocus City Hall in Moscow, the CIA will organize new terror inside and outside of Russia to “prove” that “ISIS-K” is a real thing outside US control. At the same time, the CIA has unleashed the biggest US mainstream media like Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal to ridicule Russia and Putin that they couldn’t prevent the attacks and for pointing to the real western perpetrators behind “ISIS-K”.
Former UK security insider Alastair Crooke has revealed that “ISIS-K” is an American creation. Listen to Alastair Crooke explaining that “ISIS-K” is not real but just a US cover organization:
The US “fighting terror” is a lie.
Like the US created Taliban, Al Qaeda, Al Nusra, and other extremist groups, the US created “ISIS-K” to attack US enemies. For the US, terror is really good, as long as hits US enemies and doesn’t come back to the USA itself.
At first, it seemed overwhelming to understand that the US really engages such violent extremism and terrorism – but the trail of the US on the terror path is overwhelming.
The US supported and used Nazis to gain control over Ukraine in 2014.
That was openly documented in Western media at the time, though it has later been censored. For 4 years, the US let the ISIS “Khalifat” in Syria and Iraq export enormous amounts of oil via clearly visible tanker convoys through Syria to Türkiye to finance ISIS fighting Al Assad.
That ISIS also used its oil money to finance terror in Paris, Madrid, and Berlin didn’t bother the Americans.
The CIA even organized a cover story in one of the big US media was it was so “difficult” for the US to stop ISIS’ enormous oil exports – pure disinformation from the CIA to whitewash the US from its support of ISIS.
Only when Russia entered Syria, was the industrial ISIS oil export bombed away. In a few weeks, Russia stopped the ISIS oil export which the US had let ISIS do for 4 years. The ISIS oil was sold in Türkiye via the highest ranking people, further indicating that the US also had a role in the further distribution of the oil financing ISIS’ deadly expansion and atrocities. At the same time, the US agreed to support Al Qaeda in Syria, also against Al Assad, just using the new name of Al Nusra. New name, same (US) thing.
And for years, the US has used Ukraine to shelter top ISIS leaders and give them genuine Ukrainian passports with false identities, even as they continued directing their international terrorism from Ukrainian soil and under the eyes of Ukraine’s security Service SBU. This was published in 2019 in the UK, when CIA-SBU ties were firmly established. See this.
The SBU, according to US media, has been built from scratch by the CIA. The predecessor of the SBU before the Nazi coup in 2014 had too many contacts with Russia, according to US opinion. So the US appointed its current leader Budanov as chief of a new SBU and led Budanov to build up and staff the new, now current, SBU from scratch.
Rest assured, that all Western security services are involved in this ring of terror involving Nazis and Islamic terrorists alike.
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Karsten Riise is a Master of Science (Econ) from Copenhagen Business School and has a university degree in Spanish Culture and Languages from Copenhagen University. He is the former Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of Mercedes-Benz in Denmark and Sweden.
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The Third Reich’s manpower reserves was reaching its end as 1944 began which is now eight decades ago. The average age of a soldier in the German Wehrmacht through 1943 was 31.5 years, which was four years older than the average age in the German Army in 1917.
At the start of 1944 Nazi Germany on paper had 304 divisions in operation, 179 of which were in eastern and central Europe, 53 were in France, 26 in the Balkans, 24 in Scandinavia and 22 in Italy. Growing numbers of German divisions fighting against the Soviet Army had been “fought out”. They were no longer of division size due to the heavy casualties they had suffered. Through 1944 German forces stationed in western and northern Europe were increasingly sent eastwards in a vain attempt to offset their losses.
The great majority of the damage inflicted against the Wehrmacht in World War II was caused by the Soviet military.
It can be stressed that Russia possessed more than enough capabilities, manpower and military resources to defeat the Nazis, and without the need for a Western Allied amphibious landing in France.
In May 1944 the number of Germans fighting against the Russians had sunk to its lowest total since Adolf Hitler’s invasion of Russia had begun on 22 June 1941, while the number of Soviet troops in May 1944 had reached its highest point, and altogether they outnumbered the Germans by almost three-to-one.
Yet according to author Samuel W. Mitcham, in May 1944 the Germans at their closest point were 290 miles from Moscow, whereas the Soviet soldiers that month were still 550 miles from Berlin at their closest point. This would change dramatically in coming months with large-scale advances made by the Russians, such as during Operation Bagration, which was launched exactly three years after the Nazis had attacked Russia.
German units seriously depleted by Russian troops were often transferred to France, where some of them underwent reorganisation to prepare for a Western Allied landing. While it is normal for top level commanders to be of an experienced age, often over 60-years-old, one of the Germans’ main issues in the war’s latter stages was in shortages of frontline soldiers of an appreciably younger age. Some of the newly recruited men in the German gun-crews in France were 55-years-old or more.
With an American-led landing in western Europe becoming an inevitability, in early November 1943 Hitler had appointed Field Marshal Erwin Rommel as inspector of German coastal fortifications in the west which stretched from Norway southward to France. Rommel was not impressed by Germany’s defences, called the Atlantic Wall, and the many hundreds of miles of coastline meant the Nazis could merely erect a system of strongpoints and not a continuous line of concrete structures and minefields. By January 1944 even the strongpoint system was far from finished.
To strengthen the defensive lines, Rommel requested vast amounts of mines of different types, such as anti-tank mines, anti-landing craft mines, anti-personnel mines and nonferrous mines, the latter of which would be unidentifiable on enemy mine detectors, the Germans hoped. They also wanted mines detonated by trip wires and remote-controlled mines.
If the Anglo-Americans could be delayed on the French beaches, and if high casualties could be inflicted on them before they were allowed to reinforce, the Germans might decisively defeat their landing and force them back into the sea. Admiral Friedrich Ruge, a German naval officer stationed in France for most of the war and who was advising Rommel in 1943 and 1944, wrote how the field marshal “knew that there was no hope of winning, but hoped that the war could be brought to a tolerable end… So he looked for a way to defeat the landing on the beach, and to win a respite which could be exploited politically”.
From early 1941 to early 1944, around 1.7 million mines had been laid by the Germans in western and northern France. On 13 January 1944 Rommel requested a major increase of mine deployment to General Alfred Jodl of the Wehrmacht high command, who was visiting France. Rommel wanted two million mines to be laid each month. Rommel had a number of other ideas relating to Germany’s fortifications in western Europe. To solidify the defence, the mined and fortified areas were to be extended five to six miles inland. The number of strongpoints along or beside the coast would be increased, as would anti-tank guns and heavy machine guns in the forward sectors.
The panzer units were moved much closer to the coastlines where a Western Allied landing was expected, to enable the Germans to launch a counterblow towards the beaches in the opening hours of the amphibious assault. The enemy landing would have to be defeated within the first day, Rommel felt. Allied soldiers, upon arriving on the beaches or water’s edge, would have no tanks, artillery or heavy weapons. Some of them would probably be suffering from varying degrees of seasickness, due to the often unsettled waters of the English Channel which separates southern England from northern France, across which the Allies had to sail.
Rommel demanded the laying of mines in the English Channel itself. The German Navy, which had never been the strongest branch of the country’s military, lacked the vessels needed to drop significant numbers of mines into the English Channel. Rommel was also having problems in his relations with German Army officers, like Colonel-General Hans von Salmuth, who was commanding the German 15th Army in the region of Pas-de-Calais in the far north of France.
Colonel-General von Salmuth had previously commanded different Wehrmacht forces following the Nazi invasion of the USSR in 1941, such as the 30th Corps and the 2nd Army, and he was then sent to France in August 1943. Rommel first inspected von Salmuth’s 15th Army in December 1943, and he informed the colonel-general that he wanted hundreds of thousands of mines to be laid along his section of the coastline. Less than four weeks later Rommel again visited von Salmuth’s command area to see how things were going, and he was not satisfied with the progress made.
Rommel told von Salmuth to increase the amount of hours per day that troops under his command spent laying mines, even if it meant reducing time for training. Von Salmuth responded to Rommel in a haughty manner, telling the field marshal that he wanted his troops to be well-trained and prepared, and not overextended as a result of mine laying. Rommel replied, “Evidently you don’t intend to carry out my orders”.
Von Salmuth informed Rommel there was no realistic hope of the field marshal completing his program within a year, and that anyone who told him he could is either “trying to flatter you or he’s a pig idiot”. Von Salmuth’s superior attitude made it obvious that he felt he knew more than Rommel about military affairs. Rommel, who was quietly furious, waited until the other officers had disappeared into their vehicles, before he pulled von Salmuth to one side and severely criticised him for his disrespectful behaviour.
Mitcham wrote that “Salmuth’s face was red when he escorted the marshal [Rommel] back to the car, and his manner had changed completely. Rommel bade him farewell as if nothing had happened. As they drove away, the Desert Fox winked at Admiral Ruge and said: ‘He is a thoroughly rude fellow and has to be treated the same way!'” From January 1944, minefield and obstacle building in von Salmuth’s 15th Army increased substantially. Rommel’s angry words made the colonel-general see sense.
There was, as noted, a shortage of troops in the Wehrmacht. Major-General Karl-Wilhelm von Schlieben’s German 709th Infantry Division, which was stationed in Normandy, France, and would be engaged in heavy fighting when the Western Allies landed there on 6 June 1944, had to defend a 40-mile wide front. A division could be expected to successfully defend a front of six miles in width against a large enemy force, not 40 miles, which gives an idea of how stretched the Germans were.
Part of Rommel’s solution to von Schlieben’s problems was the sowing of mines and construction of concrete bunkers. These obstacles would help to slow the Western Allies down and inflict significant losses on them, but the overall strategy remained to rapidly defeat the enemy on the beaches. Rommel discovered that the Normandy coast, located in northern France, was particularly neglected up until January 1944.
Between the port of Dieppe in the Normandy region, 600 miles along the coast to Saint Nazaire in western France, just 11 German batteries were in position with a combined force of 37 guns. By early 1944, the only adequately fortified areas were Cap Gris-Nez in the northern tip of France, the port of Brest in the extreme west of France, and the Nazi-occupied Channel Islands (Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney, Sark and Herm) located not far off the French north-western coast.
The Nazi construction and engineering force, Organisation Todt, was almost entirely committed to building fortifications around the ports along with railroad reparations and maintenance. As a result, Rommel chose to put the German soldiers themselves to work in laying the minefields, anti-landing devices and other barriers. By 20 May 1944, the Germans had laid 4,193,167 mines in the stretch of northern France resting on the English Channel which included Normandy.
The Germans erected obstacles underneath the water and on the sand, to act as blockers to disable enemy ships coming ashore and personnel carriers. Some of the underwater obstacles consisted of stakes driven into the ground with an anti-tank mine connected to the tip. When a vessel struck the stake, the mine would detonate; other obstacles comprised of concrete triangular-shaped devices (tetrahedrons) with steel blades or anti-tank mines attached.
Further instruments of war were used like the nutcracker mine, consisting of a stake discreetly sticking out of a concrete housing which contained a heavy shell. Should something accidentally make contact with the protruding stake, the heavy shell would explode and strike the unsuspecting enemy.
The Germans proved effective at building fake or dummy gun emplacements and batteries, which regularly fooled Allied pilots on their bombing raids. By the time of the Anglo-American landing in Normandy, the US and British air forces had destroyed a modest 16 German guns in total, all in northern France, eight in Pas-de-Calais, five in the Seine-Somme area and three in Normandy. The Germans believed that the Western Allies would execute their landing at high tide, to reduce the distance they had to travel from the beach to solid ground inland which would provide some cover.
On the 2nd of January 1944, Rommel resumed his inspection of German coastal defences, this time in Belgium and the Netherlands. As he travelled in his vehicle through the interior of those countries, Rommel was understandably left in a sour mood by the liberalism and debauchery he repeatedly saw when driving along the Belgian and Dutch streets. Rommel rarely intervened to rectify the behaviour which he encountered, but on occasion he would be compelled to when out of strict military necessity. He wrote to his wife in various letters and complained to her about the attitude of the western Europeans, and in general he disliked the atmosphere that he came across.
The Germans thought it unlikely the Anglo-Americans would attempt their landing in Belgium or the Netherlands. Large parts of the Belgian and Dutch terrain consists of marshy or boggy ground, which is not suitable for armoured vehicles, and there are great numbers of obstacles like canals, rivers and streams scattered across Belgium and the Netherlands.
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This article was originally published on Geopolitica.RU.
Shane Quinn obtained an honors journalism degree and he writes primarily on foreign affairs and historical subjects. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).
Sources
Samuel W. Mitcham Jr., The Desert Fox in Normandy (Praeger Publishers; 1st edition, 28 May 1997)
Chris Bellamy, Absolute War: Soviet Russia in the Second World War (Pan; Main Market edition, 21 August 2009)
“World War II anti-landing devices found in Guernsey”, BBC, 7 February 2012
Samuel W. Mitcham Jr., Hitler’s field marshals and their Battles (Leo Cooper Ltd. edition, 1 February 1988)
Donald J. Goodspeed, The German Wars (Random House Value Publishing, 2nd edition, 3 April 1985)
“Von Salmuth, Hans, Colonel-General, 1888-1962”, Generals.dk [World War II]
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What is it about British justice that has a certain rankness to it, notably when it comes to dealing with political charges? The record is not good, and the ongoing sadistic carnival that is the prosecution (and persecution) of Julian Assange continues to provide meat for the table.
Those supporting the WikiLeaks publisher, who faces extradition to the United States even as he remains scandalously confined and refused bail in Belmarsh Prison, had hoped for a clear decision from the UK High Court on March 26. Either they would reject leave to appeal the totality of his case, thereby setting the wheels of extradition into motion, or permit a full review, which would provide some relief. Instead, they got a recipe for purgatorial prolongation, a tormenting midway that grants the US government a possibility to make amends in seeking their quarry.
A sinking sense of repetition was evident. In December 2021, the High Court overturned the decision of the District Court Justice Vanessa Baraitser to bar extradition on the weight of certain assurances provided by the US government. Her judgment had been brutal to Assange in all respects but one: that extradition would imperil his life in the US penal system, largely due to his demonstrated suicidal ideation and inadequate facilities to cope with that risk.
With a school child’s gullibility – or a lawyer’s biting cynicism – the High Court judges accepted assurances from the Department of Justice (DOJ) that Assange would not face the crushing conditions of detention in the notorious ADX Florence facility or suffer the gagging restrictions euphemised as Special Administrative Measures. He would also receive the appropriate medical care that would alleviate his suicide risk and face the prospect of serving the balance of any sentence back in Australia. The refusal to look behind the mutability and fickle nature of such undertakings merely passed the judges by. The March 26 judgment is much in keeping with that tradition.
The grounds for Assange’s team numbered nine in total entailing two parts. Some of these should be familiar to even the most generally acquainted reader. The first part, comprising seven grounds, argues that the decision to send the case to the Home Secretary was wrong for: ignoring the bar to extradition under the UK-US Extradition Treaty for political offences, for which Assange is being sought for; that his prosecution is for political opinions; that the extradition is incompatible with article 7 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) noting that there should be no punishment without law; that the process is incompatible with article 10 of the ECHR protecting freedom of expression; that prejudice at trial would follow by reason of his non-US nationality; that the right to a fair trial, protected by article 6 of the ECHR, was not guaranteed; and that the extradition is incompatible with articles 2 and 3 of the ECHR (right to life, and prohibiting inhuman and degrading treatment).
The second part of the application challenged the UK Home Secretary’s decision to approve the extradition, which should have been barred by the treaty between the UK and US, and on the grounds that there was “inadequate specialty/death penalty protection.”
In this gaggle of imposing, even damning arguments, the High Court was only moved by three arguments, leaving much of Baraitser’s reasons untouched. Assange’s legal team had established an arguable case that sending the case to the Home Secretary was wrong as he might be prejudiced at trial by reason of his nationality. Following from that “but only as a consequence of that”, extradition would be incompatible with free speech protections under article 10 of the ECHR. An arguable case against the Home Secretary’s decision could also be made as it was barred by inadequate specialty/death penalty protection.
What had taken place was a dramatic and savage pruning of a wholesome challenge to a political persecution garishly dressed in legal drag. On the issue of whether Assange was being prosecuted for his political opinions, the Court was happy to accept the woeful finding by Baraitser that he had not. The judge was “entitled to reach that conclusion on the evidence before her, and on the unchallenged sworn evidence of the prosecutor (which refutes the applicant’s case).” While accepting the view that Assange “acted out of political conviction”, the extradition was not being made “on account of his political views.” Again, we see the judiciary avoid the facts staring at it: that the exposure of war crimes, atrocities, torture and various misdeeds of state are supposedly not political at all.
Baraitser’s assessment on the US Espionage Act of 1917, that cruel exemplar of war time that has become peacetime’s greater suppressor of leakers and whistleblowers, was also spared necessary laceration. The point missed in both her judgement and the latest High Court ruling is a seeming inability to accept that the Act is designed to circumvent constitutional protections, a point made from the outset by the brave Wisconsin Senator Robert M. La Follette.
On the issue of whether Assange would be denied due process in that he could not foresee being prosecuted for publishing classified documents in 2010, the view that US courts are “alive to the issues of vagueness and overbreadth in relation” to the Act misses the point. It hardly assures Assange that he would not be subject “to a real risk of a flagrant denial” of rights protected by article 7 of the ECHR, let alone the equivalent Fifth Amendment of the US Constitution.
The matter of Assange being denied a fair trial should have been obvious, evidenced by such prejudicial remarks by senior officials (that’s you Mike Pompeo) on his presumed guilt, tainted evidence, a potentially biased jury pool, and coercive plea bargaining. He could or would also be sentenced for conduct he had not been charged with “based on evidence he will not see and which may have been unlawfully obtained.” Instead, Baraitser’s negative finding was spared its deserved flaying.
“We, like the judge, consider the article 6 objections raised by the applicants have no arguable merit, from which it follows that it is not arguable that his extradition would give rise to a flagrant denial of his fair trial rights.”
Of enormous, distorting significance was the refusal by the High Court to accept “fresh evidence” such as the Yahoo News article from September 2021 outlining the views of intelligence officials on the possible kidnapping and even assassination of Assange. To this could be added a statement from US attorney Joshua Dratel who pertinently argued that designating WikiLeaks a “non-state hostile intelligence service” was intended “to place [the applicant] outside any cognizable legal framework that might protect them from the US actions based on purported ‘national security’ imperatives”.
A signed witness statement also confirmed that UC Global, the Spanish security firm charged by the CIA to conduct surveillance of Assange in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, had means to provide important information for “options on how to assassinate” Assange.
Instead of considering the material placed before them as validating a threat to Assange’s right to life, or the prospect of inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, the High Court justices speculated what Baraitser would have done if she had seen it. Imaginatively, if inexplicably, the judges accepted her finding that the conduct by the CIA and UC Global regarding the Ecuadorian embassy had no link with the extradition proceedings. With jaw dropping incredulity, the judges reasoned that the murderous, brutal rationale for dealing with Assange contemplated by the US intelligence services “is removed if the applicant is extradited.” In a fit of true Orwellian reasoning, Assange’s safety would be guaranteed the moment he was placed in the custody of his would-be abductors and murderers.
The High Court was also generous enough to do the homework for the US government by reiterating the position taken by their brother judges in the 2021 decision. Concerns about Assange’s mistreatment would be alleviated by granting “assurances (that the applicant is permitted to rely on the First Amendment, that the applicant is not prejudiced at trial (including sentence) by reason of his nationality, that he is afforded the same First Amendment protection as a United States citizen, and that the death penalty not be imposed).” Such a request is absurd for presuming, not only that the prosecutors can be held to their word, but that a US court would feel inclined to accept the application of the First Amendment, let alone abide by requested sentencing requirements.
The US government has been given till April 16 to file assurances addressing the three grounds, with further written submissions in response to be filed by April 30 by Assange’s team, and May 14 by the Home Secretary. Another leave of appeal will be entertained on May 20. If the DOJ does not provide any assurances, then leave to appeal will be granted. The accretions of obscenity in the Assange saga are set to continue.
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Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He currently lectures at RMIT University. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). Email: [email protected]
Featured image: Supporters of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange protest outside Westminster Magistrates’ Court in London, during his continuing extradition hearing. Picture date: Wednesday April 20, 2022. Picture: PA Wire
The attack left Russia and the world in shock. Despite the ongoing NATO-orchestrated conflict in Ukraine, the country has been largely safe from such attacks. The FSB and other relevant services have prevented hundreds of similar attempts over the years, meaning that the latest terrorist attack certainly has elements that are not consistent with the usual pattern.
Contemplating U.S. history for the past 55 plus years confirms the continuity of government policy for war and economic policies that enrich the wealthy at the expense of the working class and massacre the innocent around the world. But we can pretend otherwise.
Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski recently told German press agency dpa that “Ukraine and Poland have been one country for 400 years. [Conventionally intervening in Ukraine] would provide fodder for Russian propaganda. Therefore, we should be the last ones to do so.”
ICTR prisoners in Senegal have written this eloquent letter, which should serve as a basic document for any course in international criminal law given by any university in the world.
Britain was the biggest imperial power for well over a century. During its heyday it used to control about a quarter of the global landmass. So vast was this empire that there was always sunlight on one part or the other of this vast territory, leading to the boast that the sun never sets on the British Empire.
This is a fascinating story. How does any company get a deal like this: “government paid an additional $150 million to Medicago in the form of a non-refundable agreement to purchase COVID-19 vaccine doses in advance.” NON-REFUNDABLE.
The road to the Crocus Center in Moscow began in Turkey, as one of the attackers confessed who killed 143 concert goers and injured more than 150 on Friday night. Russia has said the all the attackers have been captured on their way to Ukraine in an effort to escape.
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As of this writing, the death toll was 137 killed and over 180 wounded. The total tally could be worse, as dozens of people are critically injured and may not survive in the following days.
The attack left Russia and the world in shock. Despite the ongoing NATO-orchestrated conflict in Ukraine, the country has been largely safe from such attacks.
The FSB and other relevant services have prevented hundreds of similar attempts over the years, meaning that the latest terrorist attack certainly has elements that are not consistent with the usual pattern.
Some in the political West, as well as the foreign-backed opposition in Russia, are accusing the FSB of supposed “incompetence”, obviously trying to use the tragedy for political purposes.
However, Russian services promptly arrested the attackers and detained at least 11 other suspects, preventing some of them from reaching the border with Ukraine.
It’s rather peculiar that the terrorists chose to leave Russia in such a way, especially considering that it’s effectively impossible to cross the border between the two countries due to the ongoing conflict.
Thus, the involvement of the Neo-Nazi junta is already implied due to this alone.
“Having fun in Moscow today? I think it’s a lot of fun. I would like to believe that we will arrange such fun for them more often. After all, they are ‘brotherly’ people, and you need to please your relatives more often and visit them more often. So, we’ll walk,” Danilov said.
In other words, apart from open support for the terrorists, he effectively threatened to arrange more such attacks.
The video is so disturbing and enraging that its authenticity has been called into question.
And indeed, it’s yet to be 100% confirmed that Danilov actually said this.
However, such statements are certainly not out of the ordinary for the Kiev regime.
Namely, one of its former top-ranking officials, Aleksey Arestovich, openly showed his admiration for the so-called Islamic State (previously known as ISIS and ISIL) and its depraved ways. What’s more, his statements about this predate the special military operation (SMO), meaning that this wasn’t some emotional reaction to it, but a conviction that Arestovich held for years. ISIS/ISIL/IS is a global Islamic terrorist group, infamous for horrific war crimes, destruction and simply havoc they have brought upon the peoples of Syria, Iraq, Libya, Nigeria, the Philippines, etc.
On the other hand, while the terrorists who attacked the Crocus City Hall were obviously inspired by the IS, to conclude that’s all there is to it would be naive, to say the least.
In a statement for Ukrainska Pravda, given minutes after the initial reports about the Crocus City Hall terrorist attack, Andrii Yusov,a GUR (Kiev regime’s military intelligence) spokesperson said that this was a “deliberate provocation by Putin’s special services”. Yusov’s accusations came at a time when the Afghanistan-based ISIS-K (Khorasan Province) took responsibility, while the Russian government still hadn’t issued any official statements. It’s almost as if Yusov was trying to preemptively shift responsibility for the terrorist attack.
Thus, this terrorist attack would accomplish nothing that Russia didn’t already have.
On the other hand, the Neo-Nazi junta and its overlords in the political West stand to gain everything from this. Apart from insisting that Russian services are supposedly “incompetent”, thus undermining their reputation, Moscow’s enemies also get the benefit of fomenting and exploiting religious divisions in Russia, particularly between ethnic Russians and various Muslim minorities. This comes at a time when the latter have shown overwhelming support for their country, as demonstrated by a large number of Muslims in the Russian military, be it Tatars, Bashkirs, Chechens, etc.
There’s also a geopolitical dimension to it, as most Muslim-majority countries around the world have shown full support for Moscow, meaning that any internal conflict on religious grounds in Russia would diminish that support.
On the other hand, we all know full well who controls the actions of the Kiev regime, which leads to perhaps the most important piece of the puzzle – the involvement of the United States and NATO. Namely, just two weeks before the terrorist attack on the Crocus City Hall, the American Embassy in Moscow called on US citizens in Russia to avoid public gatherings.
Why would Washington DC instruct its (arguably) most important embassy to make such an announcement unless they knew something was coming?
It’s monstrously hypocritical of the US to offer condolences when, at the very least, it knew that an attack was coming, but chose not to warn the Russian side.
On the other hand, this begs the question of how did Washington DC know, further implying that it was actually involved. South Front reports that, quoting leaked information, the four terrorists were recruited by a man named Salmon Khurasani, known to have close links to both the CIA and IS in Central Asia.
The reason why the term “total war” is the most fitting is because it includes a plethora of tools that are being used against Russia, including deep psy-ops that are supposed to shape the narrative.
It’s only a matter of time before the political West launches its own propaganda campaign that Moscow conducted a supposed “false flag”.
This accomplishes at least two important goals. First, it shows that the US can supposedly “predict events” (when the truth is that it actually engineers them), and two, it creates the illusion that Russia wanted to initiate a wider conflict with the said “false flag”.
However, what many keep forgetting is that the US-led political West has a propensity for projection, especially through mass media such as movies, TV series and video games, all very effective ways to influence the masses and public opinion.
Namely, video gamers surely remember the hugely popular Call of Duty series, specifically its Modern Warfare 2 iteration, published in 2009.
In short, it boils down to a “Russian ultranationalist” group storming the Domodedovo airport in Moscow, killing hundreds of civilians in the process. In-game, this was later used as an excuse by Russia to attack the entire NATO.
Interestingly, the main protagonist in the aforementioned level is a CIA agent named Joseph Allen. His goal was to infiltrate the “Russian ultranationalist group” that launched the false flag.
So, what does this have to do with current events? Well, it’s quite clear that NATO’s strategic planners have a tendency to project events through mass media years or decades in advance. And it should be noted that the entire Modern Warfare segment of the Call of Duty franchise goes even further.
Back in 2019, the already overtly Russophobic Modern Warfare was rebooted specifically to present the Russians in an even worse light. The Pentagon insisted that Moscow, particularly its soldiers, are shown in a dehumanizing manner.
To that end, it even pinned American war crimes on Russia.
It should be noted that the first part of the reboot was released back in 2019, which was three years before the SMO. Either way, it’s perfectly clear that the political West’s endgame is to not only dehumanize the Russian people and manufacture hatred toward them through mass media, but to also shape the narrative and public opinions with preplanned events, often years or decades in advance.
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This article was originally published on InfoBrics.
Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
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“Institutionally corrupt” is an understatement. The former head of the SBU is an avowed Nazi. Ukraine’s intelligence service not to mention the National Guard and elements within the military in 2014-2015 were largely under the control of the two neo-Nazi parties: Svoboda and Right Sector.
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