Saturday 5 January 2019

كي يكون لبنان القوي وتكون الجمهورية القوية



يناير 4, 2019

ناصر قنديل

– سيطرت خلال الستينيات والسبعينيات من القرن الماضي نظرية عنوانها قوة لبنان في ضعفه على السياسة الرسمية للدولة اللبنانية ومؤسساتها، وكان جوهرها يقول إن أي مصادر قوة للبنان ستجعله هدفاً للعدوان الإسرائيلي أسوة بحال الدول العربية الأخرى، وكان ذلك مخالفاً بالطبع لتحذيرات أطلقها من يمكن تسميتهم بفلاسفة لبنان الاستقلال من أمثال شارل مالك وميشال شيحا، من كون الخطر الإسرائيلي نابعاً من الأطماع بمياه لبنان ودوره الاقتصادي، وكانت النتيجة التي يعرفها الجميع بوقوع أغلب الأراضي اللبنانية تحت الاحتلال عام 1982، بعد سلسلة اعتداءات بدأت على نهر الوزاني عام 1964 ومطار بيروت عام 1968 قبل أن يكون في لبنان أي سلاح يتحدى السيطرة الإسرائيلية، وبقي الاحتلال لأكثر من عشرين عاماً رغم زوال السلاح الذي تذرعت به إسرائيل لشن عدوانها، وخلال الفترة الممتدة بين العدوان الأول ونهاية الاحتلال سقطت نظرية قوة لبنان في ضعفه سقوطاً مدوياً، حيث كان يقوم شقها الثاني على اعتبار العلاقات الدولية للبنان كفيلة برد الخطر الإسرائيلي عنه، فبقي القرار 425 معلقاً بلا تنفيذ حتى نجحت مقاومة الشعب اللبناني الممتدة منذ عام 1982 والتي نظّمتها وقادتها الأحزاب اللبنانية المنبوذة والملاحقة من دولتها، مثبتة مقولة معاكسة قوامها قوة لبنان بمقاومته ووحدة شعبه ، وصولاً للمعادلة الذهبية التي ظهرت بقوة مع التصدي لعدوان تموز 2008 بصيغة الشعب والجيش والمقاومة .

– اليوم رغم الخطاب السياسي لبعض القوى المناوئة لخيار المقاومة، الداعي لمناقشة وضع سلاحها ومستقبله، لا يوجد منطق لدى أصحاب هذا الخطاب يستطيع إعادة إنتاج نظرية قوة لبنان في ضعفه. فسقف ما يتحدث عنه هؤلاء هو أن الجيش اللبناني قادر على صد أي عدوان أو أن ضمّ سلاح المقاومة لمقدرات الجيش سيجعله قادراً على ذلك، ما يعني أن السقوط النهائي لنظرية قوة لبنان في ضعفه، وبقاء تردّداتها ضمن دائرة اللعب السياسي لإضعاف المقاومة لحساب معادلات خارجية يمثلها أصحاب الخطاب العدائي للمقاومة، إلا أن أحداً في الدولة ومؤسساتها لم يعد يجرؤ على التحدث عن قوة لبنان في ضعفه، بل لم يعد أحد يجرؤ على الحديث عن قوة للبنان بلا المقاومة، ولو من خلال الرد على التحديات التي تمثلها التهديدات الإسرائيلية، أو من خلال رفض اعتبار سلاح المقاومة مصدراً للخطر على لبنان، أو على الأقل اعتباره شأناً يمكن التعايش معه على قاعدة ما يسمونه بربط النزاع.

– لا ينتبه الكثير من اللبنانيين إلى خطورة الانزلاق لمظهر جديد لنظرية قوة لبنان في ضعفه، مبني على وهم فرضية أن يكون لبنان قوياً إذا كان ضعيفاً في تماسك نسيجه الداخلي، أو إمكانية أن يصير لبنان قوياً إذا ضعفت الدولة أمام الطوائف والتشكيلات والحسابات الطائفية، فلبنان القوي والجمهورية القوية، مرادفان لقوة الدولة قياساً بقوة الطوائف واستقواء كياناتها السياسية على الدولة، والثابت من عمر لبنان السياسي أن طريق بناء الدولة القوية لا يمكن أن يمر إلا على حساب إضعاف حضور الطوائف وكياناتها السياسية الذي ينهش من هيبة الدولة ويأكل خيراتها، ويحولها هيكلاً شكلياً لتساكن بارد أحياناً وحار أحياناً أخرى ومشتعل بحرب أهلية أحياناً ثالثة، بين دويلات غير معلنة أو شبه معلنة أو معلنة أحياناً، والدستور في أي دولة هو خريطة طريق لقوتها، وقد قام دستور ما بعد الطائف على معادلة تقوية الدولة تدريجياً على حساب الانقسام الطائفي الموروث من الحرب الأهلية، وصولاً لإلغاء الطائفية كهدف نهائي رسمه الدستور، ولم يف بتحقيقه المؤتمنون على هذا الدستور بعد، بوضع الآلية التنفيذية التي نصت عليها المادة 95 من الدستور قيد التنفيذ، وخارج الدستور لا دولة قوية، وبتنمية العصبيات الطائفية لا دولة قوية، وبتقاسم وظائف الدولة وخيراتها على اساس طائفي لا قيام للبنان قوي. والأهم بقانون انتخابات يعيد إنتاج الحياة السياسية على أساس مفرط في الطائفية، تضعف الدولة ويضعف لبنان وتتجه الجمهورية نحو السقوط، لأن البديل الذي ينمو في رحمها، هو دويلات وجمهوريات، ومرادف إدارة الظهر للدستور، وتجاهل روحه وجوهره ونصوصه الواضحة، بداية تآكل مشروع الدولة وانهيارها، أليس هذا ما نحن فيه اليوم؟

– المأزق الحكومي ولو تم تجاوزه بتسوية، كشف ما لم يعد ممكناً ستره حول ما أنجبه قانون الانتخابات النيابية الذي لم يحترم المادتين 22 و95 من الدستور، رغم مرور قرابة ثلاثين عاماً على وضع هذا الدستور، وبالمناسبة ليس هناك بلد في العالم غير لبنان يتحدث دستوره عن موجبات ملزمة لاحقة بقيت لاحقة ومؤقتة تنتظر من ينفذها ولم تنفذ. وجاء قانون الانتخابات ليكشف عبر المأزق الحكومي حجم الاستيقاظ الطائفي الذي ينهش الدولة، ونوع القضايا التي تحكم تشكيل الحكومات، بحيث لن تكون أي حكومة ينتجها هذا القانون الانتخابي إلا حكومة تصريف أعمال بأحسن الأحوال، ومنصة لفض النزاعات الطائفية حول المحاصصة، والاعتماد على المزيد من الديون في تحريك الاقتصاد، فاللا دولة تفليسة غير معلنة، والاقتصاد الوطني مشروط بوجود دولة، تضعف فرص وجودها يوماً فيوم، فيكفي لها أن تكون قوية لتنهض بالاقتصاد، وكيف لوعد مكافحة الفساد أن يتحقق وللفساد محميات طائفية ممنوع الاقتراب منها، والتوظيف في الدولة من أعلى مراتب الوظيفة إلى أدناها يقوم على الولاء للطائفة وزعيم الطائفة وحزب الطائفة ومحازبي الطائفة، وعلى حساب الولاء للدولة ومؤسسات الدولة ومواطني الدولة، وكيف لدولة أن تنتظر من مواطن تعامله كزبون يمر عبر وكالة حصرية طائفية، أن يعاملها كمرجع وهي تتهرّب من طبابته وتعليمه وإسكانه وتوفير الخدمات له كمواطن. والمواطنة مصطلح غائب عن الحياة السياسية، ومساواة المواطنين أمام القانون نص في الدستور لكنه مهمل لحساب نص مضمر، اللبنانيون طوائف متساوية في الحق بعائدات الدولة ووظائفها .

– ألفباء لبنان القوي، والجمهورية القوية، هي الدولة القوية، وإذا كانت قوة الأطراف اللبنانية هي قوة البعض بوجه البعض الآخر، تبدأ بقياس عدد النواب والوزراء وتنتهي بما لا تحمد عقباه على حساب الوطن والدولة، والاستقواء استعداد مضمر لحرب أهلية وإلا لماذا يستقوي بعضنا على بعض، إلا أن قوة الدولة تقاس بدرجة قوتها ككائن مستقل على جميع الأطراف حكماً، وهي لم تكن يوماً ولن تكون بمجموع قوتهم منفردين فقوتهم مأخوذة من قوتها بالأساس. والدولة القوية لها خريطة طريق هي السير نحو دولة المواطنة. فقوة لبنان ليست في ضعفه، لأن النسيج الاجتماعي الهش ينتج حرباً أهلية وفي أحسن الأحوال فدرالية دويلات، لكنه لا ينتج دولة قوية، والنسيج الاجتماعي المتماسك شرطه الواجب المواطنة، والدستور هو وثيقة الوفاق الوطني وهو المرجع الحاكم لبناء الدولة، والعقد الاجتماعي المتاح للانطلاق منه نحو الأفضل، والأمر بات وجودياً، فهل علينا أن ننتظر اختبار قوة لبنان في ضعفه داخلياً بكارثة تشبه كارثة الاحتلال التي جلبتها نظرية قوة لبنان في ضعفه خارجياً، حتى نستدير نحو مصدر القوة الحقيقي بالخروج من كهوف العصبيات إلى رحاب الوطن؟

– يحب اللبنانيون أن يسمعوا خطاباً عن حقوق اللبنانيين بدلاً من أن تصم آذانهم بخطاب يتحدث عن حقوق المسلمين وحقوق المسيحيين.

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Iraq Rejects Iran Sanctions and US Troop Presence

In another blow to US control on Iraq, the country’s foreign minister warned that Baghdad would ignore US sanctions on Iran.

Global Research, January 05, 2019
Geopolitics Alert 2 January 2019
Speaking to journalists on Wednesday, Iraqi Foreign Minister Mohammed Ali al-Hakim laid out the latest step on the path to independence for Baghdad from the US concerning sanctions on Iran by Washington. Although Iraq currently has a 90-day waiver to trade with Iran issued on December 20th, Hakim let reporters know Iraq would be pursuing their own policy on Iran should the waiver not be renewed.
Hakim explained to reporters that
“These sanctions, the siege, or what is called the embargo,” imposed by the US is “unilateral, not international,” and Iraq is “not obliged [to follow] them.”
This is a big step for Baghdad to take in the face of pressure from Washington for Iraq to become “energy independent” with the help of US corporations exploiting their oil and gas resources. Instead, as explained by Hakim, Iraq would rather choose their own options for energy, even if that includes continuing the annual $12 billion in trade between Iraq and Iran flowing over US objections.
There are also discussions ongoing concerning increasing the amount of trade between Baghdad and Tehran despite US pressure. Iraqi President Barham Salih and his Iranian President Hassan Rouhani even doubled down on this during a recent meeting where Rouhani said that Tehran was willing to increase trade with Baghdad from the $12 billion a year mark to $20 billion.
Hakim assured reporters Iraq is already thinking of “solutions” to counteract any US threats to increased trade with Iran. According to Hakim, there are multiple options open to Baghdad “including dealing in Iraqi dinars in bilateral trade” as opposed to US dollars.
Iraqi Sovereignty: From Sanctions to Bases
This defiance to US sanctions is only the latest step in Iraq declaring independence from Washington. Another sign that the US is losing their grip on Baghdad was also made apparent last week when, after Trump made a surprise visit to US troops in Iraq, fueling outrage among Iraqi politicians.
Many Iraqi leaders called Trump’s surprise visit to their country a violation of their nation’s sovereignty. This has ended up leading to a wider backlash and resulted in multiple Iraqi politicians demanding a complete end to the US military presence in the country.
This all comes as the Trump regime is attempting to cement new positions in the Middle East by way of new bases on the Iraq-Syria border. According to some Iraqi MPs such as Badr al-Zaidi who has said that the new bases violate “agreements between Iraq and the US were on the pullout of foreign forces from Iraq after 2013.”
Even US-ally and supporter of the NATO occupation, former Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi rejected the “method of Trump’s visit,” saying “it was not appropriate to diplomatic mores and to relations with sovereign states.”
These insults to Iraq have led to a wave of Iraqi lawmakers demanding more than an apology and saying the Iraqi government would move to make a “parliamentary decision to expel (Trump’s) military forces” in the words of Qais Khazali, an Iraqi politician. Much like with the rejection of the Iran sanctions, Khazali also promised his faction of the government (backed by Shia militias) also had creative “solutions” to dealing with US pressure on Iraq including “experience and ability to get them out in another way that is well known to your forces, which were forced to withdraw in humiliation in 2011.”
All of these events paint a picture of a growing movement in Iraq to reject US control of the government there that has been in place since the fall of the government of Saddam Hussein in 2003. All the parties that opposed both Saddam and the US occupation are moving closer to the levers of power in Iraq and Baghdad is no longer under Washington’s thumb. The question now for Donald Trump is, will he leave Iraq like he is Syria or will this case take more convincing by the forces of resistance in Iraq?
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US and Israel Formally Quit UNESCO

By Stephen Lendman
Source
The Trump and Netanyahu regimes announced their intention to leave the UN’s educational, scientific and cultural organization in 2017. 
Earlier, the State Department said “(t)his decision…reflects US concerns (about its alleged) anti-Israel bias.” The Netanyahu regime used the same pretext to pullout.
The organization fosters “building peace in the minds of men and women” – notions Washington and Israel reject.
It “works to create the conditions for dialogue among civilizations, cultures and peoples, based upon respect for commonly shared values.”
Through dialogue it hopes the “world can achieve global visions of sustainable development encompassing observance of human rights, mutual respect and the alleviation of poverty, all of which are at the heart of UNESCO’S mission and activities.”\
Ahead of her departure as US UN envoy, Nikki Haley embarrassed herself a final time, tweeting: “UNESCO is among the most corrupt and politically biased UN agencies. Today the US withdrawal from this cesspool became official.”
She gone and won’t be missed. Good riddance to bad rubbish, an expression I remember from my boyhood and adolescent days.
In mid-December, Haley turned truth on its head, claiming the US “demonstrated time and again our commitment to peace in the Middle East” – ignoring endless US wars of aggression in multiple theaters, an imperial agenda she wholeheartedly endorses.
She also lied saying “(w)e…offer our hand in friendship to the Palestinian people.” The Trump regime and its predecessors long ago abandoned them, one-sidedly supporting Israel, contemptuous of Palestinian rights.
The agendas of UNESCO v. the US and Israel are polar opposite. The organization should have expelled both countries and their imperial allies long ago. They have no place in an organization supporting world peace.
They partner in endless wars of aggression against nations threatening no one. UNESCO’s message for the new year said the following: 
“Our wishes for 2019? Just one. One word. One hope. One goal. PEACE 🕊☮#HappyNewYear to everyone!!
It’s what the world needs now to prevent US-led warlords from destroying it. Withdrawal is a symbolic blow to world peace, a notion the US, NATO, and Israel abhor.
Anti-Israeli bias is all about truth-telling on its apartheid ruthlessness, its wars against Gazans and regional nations, its contempt for rule of law principles and democratic values.
The US operates the same way on a global scale. Washington and Israel stopped funding UNESCO in 2011.
The same year it granted Palestinians full membership in the organization. Israel called the move a “tragedy.”
Earlier, US and Israeli pressure to block UNESCO’s pro-Palestinian resolutions failed – notably its aim to safeguard “the cultural heritage of Palestine and the distinctive character of East Jerusalem,” calling Israel’s control of the city “illegal,” along with recognizing Hebron’s Old City as a Palestinian World Heritage Site.”
Commenting earlier on the Trump regime’s announced pullout, UNESCO director-general Irina Bokova said “(a)t the time when the fight against violent extremism calls for renewed investment in education, in dialogue among cultures to prevent hatred, it is deeply regrettable that the United States should withdraw from the United Nations agency leading these issues.”
“At the time when conflicts continue to tear apart societies across the world, it is deeply regrettable for the United States to withdraw from the United Nations agency promoting education for peace and protecting culture under attack.”
Bokova failed to explain Washington’s responsibility for creating violent extremism, along with stoking and perpetuating conflicts worldwide.
Ahead of his own withdrawal announcement, Netanyahu praised Trump’s deplorable action, calling it “a brave and moral decision,” adding “UNESCO has become a theater of the absurd. Instead of preserving history, it distorts it” – typical Netanyahu bald-faced lies.
The US is the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism, Israel a junior partner in its endless war on humanity.
Truth-telling about their destructive agendas is called “bias.” Pile it on, lots more of the same needed in the new year and others to come.

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The WB’s Ghost: Yahya Ayyash

The WB Ghost: Yahya Ayyash
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The Witch Hunt: from Pontius Pilate to the Labour Party

A witch hunt is a dangerous game. It entails a merciless campaign directed against  people who hold unorthodox or unpopular views. But, as Jewish history tells us, a witch hunt can backfire and turn the pursuer into the hunted.
Jewish past is littered with witch hunts that boomeranged. In fact, the birth of Christianity contains a classic example of this. Jesus’ persecution began with a hate campaign against a whistle blower who held some radical views, such as ‘love your neighbor’ or ‘turn the other cheek.’ Historically, it was the Sanhedrin war against Jesus that made him into Christ – the message as well as the messenger.
Jesus wasn’t the only casualty of such a campaign. The history of Jewish herem  (Hebrew for excommunication), tells us that Spinoza was subjected to the apparatus of a similar highly orchestrated witch hunt. In the Jewish world,  Herem is the highest rabbinical censure, such a verdict commands that the person suffer total exclusion from the Jewish community and beyond. As with Christ, it was Spinoza’s humanism and universalism, and not the dictates of the inquisitor rabbis, that planted the seeds of enlightenment and progress. While Spinoza’s Jewish contemporaries didn’t approve of the Dutch Jewish philosopher, the Goyim couldn’t have enough of his Wisdom.
The Hasbara Handbook indicates that Israel is very concerned that it will be subjected to ‘name calling.’  “Through the careful choice of words, the name calling technique links a person or an idea to a negative symbol.  Creating negative connotations by name calling is done to try and get the audience to reject a person or idea on the basis of negative association, without allowing a real examination of that person or idea.”(Hasbara Handbook p 22)  It is interesting that the Hasbara Manual complains that Israel’s enemies employ name calling. The truth is the opposite. Name calling is actually a state policy of Israel. It is certainly Israel firsters’ most popular device. Far more concerning to me is that Jewish so called ‘anti’ Zionists use  exactly the same tactics. Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) and Jewish BDS have been smearing those whom they want to cleanse out of ‘their’ solidarity movement. We have seen JVP and Mondoweiss witch hunting, name calling and issuing their Herem against Alison WeirKen Okeefe,Greta Berlin, yours truly and many others. What do these vile campaigns have in common? I will let you guess.
Name-calling, witch hunts and herem are designed to stop any lone voice from spreading beyond the walls of the ghetto. At his trial, Jesus was presented by the Sanhedrin as an enemy of the Roman Empire. The Rabbinical body intended Spinoza’s excommunication to impact the church. When Alison Weir is attacked, she is often criticized for her alleged ‘connection’ with white nationalists in an attempt to make the attack resonate with the wider community. I have been slandered as a ‘racist’ although I have never presented a single critical reference to race or biology.
What is fascinating about the herem ritual is both its complete lack of mercy and the role it allocates to the Goy. An examination of how the British Labour Party became an inquisitor provides us with a window into the metaphysics of the witch hunt mechanism.
Since the election of Jeremy Corbyn as the party’s leader, British Labour has been openly operating as a thought policing apparatus. The party has been played as an instrument of the Zionist global witch hunt. It has been purging, evicting, suspending and expelling some of its best and most ethical members. Ken Livingstone, probably the last true socialist in the Kingdom was suspended numerous times for telling the truth about Hitler, Zionism and Palestine. Hundreds if not thousands of other members have been suspended and/or expelled for supporting human rights in Palestine.
The British public has witnessed all of this with dismay. Labour Party members watched their party with disbelief. But none of that matured into any significant protest.  This has now changed.  Hell broke loose when the Islington Council (Labour) decided to stop me from playing my Saxophone with the Blockheads in one of its venues. Thousands signed a petition expressing disgust with the Labour Council, Hundreds filled complains with the Council. Many others expressed their total dismay with how the Labour Party has managed to fall into every possible trap in this affair.
As is consistent with the Jewish past, the witch hunt has boomeranged. This last slander campaign against me revealed an astonishing continuum between Likud and British Labour. When the story made it to the national press, the Labour Party panicked. Like Pilate, it made the wrong decision which has backfired colossally. Instead of the people judging me, it is the Labour Party that is under scrutiny. Although many of us are sympathetic to Corbyn, the actual workings of the Labour Party have been devastating and perhaps tragic. The Labour Party is running a Stasi like operation, operating as a hateful opponent of elementary freedoms. If the Labour Party in its current form manages to win an election, it may mark the end to Britain as a free country (assuming that it still is). This might sound like a radical prediction but it isn’t original. Orwell saw it coming in 1936 while in Spain. He was slightly wrong about the date (1984). I predicted this fatal transition in my recent book Being in Time.
By no means do I compare myself to Jesus Christ or Spinoza. Instead,  I am trying to point out that what is at play here is the classic ritual of a witch-hunt. This time it is the Likud UK instead of the Sanhedrins that has instigated a non ethical anti humane campaign through a proxy operator that happens to be the Labour Party. In this saga, a Labour Council was happy to play the role of Pilate. The Labour Party has been exploring this treacherous role for at least three years. Yet no one seemed to care when hundreds of Labour members were unfairly punished by their party. People have watched the absurd impunity with which Jewish pressure groups have been terrorizing the British media and political universes. But the public reacted differently in my case. First because the idea that the director of Likud UK, a body that in the eyes of many is associated with crypto fascist ideology, can interfere with British culture and politics is sickening. But there is another reason.
My offering is a message of hope. It counters the path towards destruction that is advocated by pro war Zionist enthusiasts. It transcends beyond the politicized left/right agenda to exist in the realm of the philosophical and the universal. People seem to take my side because they are expressing their fatigue with the institutional duplicitous narrative imposed on them by the media, politics and academia. People are rallying behind me because this battle is theirs as much as it is mine: they fight for my right to express what they think but are afraid to say.
To sign a petition in support of Gilad click here
To support Gilad’s legal fund:  https://donorbox.org/gilad-needs-additional-support

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Moscow Demands Answers after FBI Arrests Russian


Flags of Russia and US
Russia said Saturday it wanted an explanation from Washington over the arrest of one of its nationals, as Moscow continued to hold a US citizen for alleged espionage.
FBI agents arrested Dmitry Makarenko on December 29 on Saipan, a US island in the western Pacific and he had since been taken to Florida, a Russian foreign ministry statement said.
It did not detail the accusations against him but said the US authorities had failed to inform them of his arrest and they had only found out from his family.
Meanwhile, a top Russian diplomat on Saturday said the case of Paul Whelan, the US national detained in Moscow, was very serious.
Whelan, a security official at a US auto parts company and former US Marine, was arrested on December 28 “while carrying out an act of espionage”, the FSB security service announced.
“The situation around Mr Whelan is very serious,” Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told RIA Novosti news agency.
“He came to Russia, as we understand, to take measures to carry out intelligence activities in violation of Russian law,” he said, indicating that Whelan had not yet been formally charged.
But Whelan’s lawyer Vladimir Zherebenkov told RIA Novosti on Thursday that his client had been charged — with espionage.
Whelan’s family said he was visiting Moscow for a friend’s wedding and US security experts have raised doubts that he was a spy, given a reportedly chequered history in the US military.
Some observers believe his arrest was in retaliation for last year’s arrest in the US of a Russian woman called Maria Butina.
Butina was indicted and pleaded guilty to acting as an unregistered agent of the Russian government — a legal charge sometimes used against foreign intelligence agents.
Analysts have speculated that Moscow might be hoping to swap Whelan for Butina or another Russian held by the United States.
Ryabkov said that given the fact that Whelan has not yet been charged, it was too early to talk about his possible release in a spy swap.
Although Whelan entered Russia on his US passport, he also holds British, Irish and Canadian citizenship.
Ryabkov said the question of which country’s diplomats would have access to Whelan would be decided on a case-by-case basis, based on conventions on consular relations.
Source: AFP

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George Soros Person of the Year?

By Stephen Lendman
Source
The London-based Financial Times (FT) calls itself “the world’s leading global business publication.”
Around the time of its 19th century founding, it described itself as the friend of “The Honest Financier, the Bona Fide Investor, the Respectable Broker, the Genuine Director, and the Legitimate Speculator” when its readership was largely comprised of London’s financial community.
Today its reach is global, publishing business, economic, financial and geopolitical news – polar opposite journalism the way it’s supposed to be.
It supports what demands condemnation, operating like other Western media, using journalism as advocacy for powerful interests, hostile to world peace and the public welfare.
James Petras slammed the way the FT operates, backing US-led NATO wars, endorsing illegal sanctions, supporting powerful political and monied interests.
Petras cited a “journalist who was close to the (FT’s) editors suggest(ing) it should be called the ‘Military Times’ – the voice of a declining empire.”
Annually it chooses a Person of the Year. Earlier ones included Trump, Angela Merkel, ECB president Mario Draghi, Goldman Sach CEO Lloyd (just a banker “doing God’s work,” the money god, of course) Blankfein, Obama, Bush II, Alan Greenspan, Tony Blair, Rupert Murdock, Saudi king Faisal, Margaret Thatcher, Henry Kissinger – you get the picture, a virtual rogue’s gallery of warlords, imperialists, crooks, and other scoundrels.
This year it named neoliberal globalist/international con man George “(As a market participant, I don’t need to be concerned with the consequences of my actions”) Soros. 
The award should have been for the international con man person of the year, glorifying market manipulation, grand theft, economic and political chaos, along with endless imperial wars.
Soros made billions of dollars the old-fashioned way, by all sorts of dirty tricks – including notoriously sabotaging European monetary policy by attacking the European Rate Mechanism (ERM) through a highly leveraged speculative assault on the British pound, forcing its devaluation and ERM breakup, making a billion dollars in short order on this scheme alone.
He made billions more from the 1997 East Asian currency crash, profiting from global turmoil. 
Backing Hillary in 2016, he financed anti-Trump protests, including hooligans disrupting some of his campaign events, using violence and other dirty tricks to turn voters against him – unsuccessfully as things turned out.
All the money and mischief he aimed at Trump failed to put Hillary in the White House where he wanted her, easily bought to serve his interests.
Moscow’s Prosecutor General earlier called his Open Society Institute and Open Society Institute Assistance Foundations “threat(s) to Russian national security and constitutional order.”
MoveOn.org is a Soros front group, involved with other dubious NGOs, their activities serving his interests.
In 1998, he called for a “comprehensive political and military strategy for bring down Saddam Hussein.” Five years later, Bush/Cheney’s aggression obliged him.
He supports global wars for huge profits. He takes credit for “Americaniz(ing) eastern Europe” by exploiting its wealth and people.
He believes “America should be replaced by a world government with a global currency under UN rule.”
He wants national sovereignty replaced by centralized control over money, populations, resources and markets – an undemocratic ruler-serf global society unfit to live in except for rulers and profiteers.
He once said “(w)e need a global sheriff.” Maybe he had himself in mind. He’s one of the world’s worst, profiting from the misery of others.
Naming him person of the year was another black mark on the FT and what it notoriously stands for.

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The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Blog!

US/Israeli New Year’s Resolution on Iran

By Stephen Lendman
Source
US/Israeli Iran bashing has been ongoing for nearly 40 years, regime change the objective of both countries.
Long-planned US naked aggression on the Islamic Republic may be coming if its political, economic, financial, and propaganda war fails to achieve its objective.
A year ago ahead of Trump’s inauguration, a joint House/Senate Resolution 10: Authorization of Use of Force Against Iran Resolution was introduced.
Though not adopted, it called for “us(ing) the Armed Forces of the United States as the President determines necessary and appropriate in order to achieve the goal of preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons” – knowing the Islamic Republic’s legitimate nuclear program has no military component.
Time and again, its leadership called for eliminating these weapons. Nothing suggests they intend developing them, nor does any evidence indicate Iran threatens Israel, the US, or any other countries. 
It’s the region’s leading proponent of peace and stability, its agenda polar opposite how the US, NATO, Israel, and their imperial partners operate.
The issue about Iran is its sovereign independence, its refusal to subordinate its sovereignty to US interests, the way all countries everywhere should operate.
US sanctions and other actions against the Islamic Republic are flagrantly illegal. Its claims about its regional policies are Big Lies.
A Trump regime State Department report on Iran vilified the country with malicious disinformation.
It lied claiming the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) “regularly threatens freedom of navigation in the Persian Gulf while its Aerospace Force directs the country’s ballistic missile program in defiance of Security Council resolutions.”
It lied saying Tehran supports regional terrorist groups, adding “(s)ince 1979, Iran has made it a policy of state to actively direct, facilitate, and carry out terrorist activity globally” – a US, NATO, Israeli specialty, polar opposite how the Islamic Republic operates.
It lied claiming “Iran’s development of ballistic missiles…pose a critical threat to regional security.” The Islamic Republic’s military and legitimate weapons are solely for defense.
Iran hasn’t attacked another country in centuries. It threatens none now. The US, NATO, Israel, and their imperial partners threaten everyone everywhere.
A further litany of Big Lies followed, how the US operates ahead of and while pursuing regime change actions against targeted countries, Iran a prime one.
That’s what US imperialism is all about, a diabolical plot for global hegemony by whatever it takes to achieve its aims, endless wars its favored strategy.
Will Iran be targeted in the new year? Will Trump regime hardliners go this far to replace its legitimate government with pro-Western puppet rule?
On Tuesday, Mike Pompeo and Benjamin Netanyahu met face-to-face. They vowed to continue jointly cooperating on countering Syria and nonexistent Iranian “aggression” – whether US forces stay or leave the Syrian Arab Republic.
Commenting for the first time on Trump’s troop withdrawal announcement, Pompeo said it “in no way changes anything that this administration is working on alongside Israel,” adding:
“The counter-ISIS campaign (sic) continues, our efforts to counter Iranian aggression (sic) continue, and our commitment to Middle East stability (sic) and the protection of Israel continues in the same way it did before that decision was made.”
Netanyahu said that “(w)e’re going to (continue) our intense (regional) cooperation” in countering Syria and Iran,” turning truth on its head claiming Israeli actions are for “self-defense” – ignoring that the US and Israel have no enemies in the Middle East or anywhere else, just invented ones to unjustifiably justify waging forever wars.
Deputy State Department spokesman Robert Palladino lied, saying Pompeo and Netanyahu “discussed the unacceptable threat that regional aggression and provocation by Iran and its agents (sic) poses to Israeli and regional security.”
When repeated endlessly, Big Lies take on a life of their own, Iran unjustifiably assaulted by them since its 1979 revolution.
Relentless US-led hostility toward the country failed to achieve its objectives? Is war on the Islamic Republic likely in the new year?
For sure, US/Israeli hostility toward Iran will continue intensively, perhaps escalate beyond what’s now ongoing.
It’s unknown how far Trump and Netanyahu will go. War remains an ominous possibility – risking Russian involvement if launched, heightening the chance for East/West confrontation beyond what’s happened so far.
Previous articles discussed the ominous possibility of US launched global war with nuclear weapons, hardliners in Washington thinking they can win.
US war plans were prepared long ago and updated against all its adversaries, notably Russia, China and Iran. 
The sole purpose of NATO is to pursue Washington’s imperial objectives, including its endless wars, wanting ruling authorities in all sovereign independent countries eliminated.
That’s where things are heading because militarist hardliners run Washington’s geopolitical agenda.
US presidents are frontmen for their policies. Their aim to colonize and control planet earth may destroy it. Their drive for global hegemony should scare everyone.

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The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Blog!

White Helmets, Black Hearts

By Jeremy Salt
Source
White_Helmets_Latuff_c0386.jpg
In 2016 the White Helmets were nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. Justin Timberlake thought they should get it. So did Bear Grylls, Ben Affleck, Michael Palin, Daniel Craig, Rowan Williams, Ridley Scott, George Clooney, Sacha Baron Cohen, Vanessa Redgrave and various other artists, writers, and politicians who put their signatures to the petition on the White Helmets web site.
‘Give it to Syria’s White Helmets’ theGuardian, a media mainstay of the terrorist war on Syria from the beginning, implored the Nobel committee. ‘They embody a spirit of civic resistance.’
The actor George Clooney also identified their essential goodness. ‘In a world full of hate these people put on helmets and run towards violence while everyone else is running away from it,’ he said in London when attending a showing of the glowing documentary the White Helmets made about themselves.
‘Where there is no structure in society they are there to protect. First and foremost they are heroes.’
On their website, the White Helmets describe themselves as ‘former tailors, bakers, teachers and other ordinary Syrians’ who had come together to form the ‘Syria Civil Defence’. In fact, Syria has, and has had since the 1950s, a government civil defense organization of the same name, which operates across the country, unlike the White Helmets, which has operated only in ‘rebel’ held areas.
Furthermore, far from being an organization set up by ‘ordinary Syrians’ who saw a need for ‘civil defense’ and decided to fill it, the White Helmets were not even Syrian in origin but the brainchild of a former British intelligence officer. Furthermore, again, they were never financially independent, as they claimed, but were funded from the beginning by the same governments making war on Syria through armed proxies tied to their intelligence services. They were a carefully constructed arm of this war.
The White Helmets were a sustained lie from the start. They were deliberately packaged to give the corporate media the images it wanted, dominated by the White Helmet hero scurrying across a rubble-strewn foreground with a dusty, crying child in his arms. In the background, out of sight but figuratively represented in the wailing of children and the bodies on the street were the architects of these horrors, the ‘regime’ in Damascus and the dictator sitting in his palace.
It was not long before holes began to appear in the narrative. These rescues were not genuine but were being staged for media consumption. Journalists Vanessa Beeley and Eva Bartlett were the first to pick holes in the narrative and the more they picked the more the holes widened, to the point where it was clear that the White Helmets were a scam of the first order.
But they were a scam the governments making war on Syria wanted their people to believe and a scam that the corporate media perpetuated, when the most cursory research would have revealed the lies.
The White Helmets were not just working in ‘rebel-held’ areas, a media euphemism for civilian districts taken over by the most violent terrorist groups on the face of the earth. They were an extension of these groups. They boasted of their affinities on their Facebook pages. They hated the Syrian government with the same fervor as the takfiris. They also reviled the Alawi, the Shia, Christians and Sunni Muslims who fell short of the takfiris’ exacting standards.
Many White Helmets doubled up as ‘first responders’ and takfiri gunmen. They operated completely under the instructions of the takfiris. They took away the bodies of the newly executed for burial and staged chemical weapons attacks as required. As evidence gathered by Russian researchers indicates, they were also involved in the harvesting of body organs from the bodies of wounded civilians.
These activities were all funded by the ‘liberal democracies,’ including the UK, the US, the EU and individual EU governments, including Denmark and Germany, nominally committed to fighting terrorism around the world.
By 2017 the British Foreign Office alone had paid the White Helmets an acknowledged $80 million. Outside money had even come from the Jo Cox Foundation, set up in memory of the British Labor politician, murdered in 2016, to work for a ‘fairer, kinder and more tolerant world.’
The contradictions in western attitudes were exemplified when Raed Saleh, the head of the White Helmets, and the recipient of millions of dollars in US aid, travelled to the US in 2016 to receive a humanitarian award and was turned back at Dulles International Airport in Washington.
Although the Department of Homeland Security never makes its reasons public, Saleh was clearly on a security/terrorist watch list. He had been allowed into the country before but this time he was turned away.
Waiting to greet him, the well-meaning but naïve members of the InterAction NGO alliance donned white helmets in his absence. Unfortunately, they are not likely to see the White Helmets being outed anywhere in the US media.
The Russian Foundation for the Study of Democracy recently compiled evidence based on extensive interviews in Syria with hundreds of witnesses, including former White Helmets and takfiri fighters, physicians and civilians living in areas that had been taken over by takfiri groups.
The interviews indicated that many of the White Helmets were not volunteers as claimed. In East Aleppo men were imprisoned and given time to decide whether to join Jabhat al Nusra or the White Helmets. It had to be one or the other. There was no third option unless saying ‘no’ to both and facing execution can be considered an option.
For some, joining the White Helmets was the only means of survival for themselves and their families but once inside the organization, everyone knew orders had to be obeyed whatever they were.
These orders came from the takfiri groups. A member of Jaysh al Islam’s internal security services told Russian researchers that instructions were delivered to the White Helmets by phone or personal messenger but either way, they were under the full control of Jaysh al Islam.
After eastern Ghouta was taken over by the takfiris it was divided into four sectors. The White Helmets in the district were integrated with the takfiri group assigned responsibility for each sector.
Along with faked chemical weapons attacks, setting up faked ‘regime’ bombings in line with instructions from the takfiri groups was a specialty of the White Helmets media unit. Witnesses gave evidence of bodies being brought from the morgue and the wounded from the hospital in preparation for faked attacks. Wrecked cars would be dragged to the site. The stage having been set with the apparent consequences of a ‘regime’ bombing, tyres and trash would be set on fire and the cameras would begin to roll.
In Douma, the White Helmets constructed barriers, dug trenches and tunnels, and transported fighters, weapons, and ammunition to the front lines. According to witness evidence, they were permanently engaged in preparing battle positions for the takfiris. White Helmet or ‘rebel’ media rooms or centers kept the global corporate media supplied with a steady flow of lies which were eagerly lapped up, no questions asked. The lies included the faked 2018 chemical weapons attack in Douma.
Theft was a common perquisite of being a White Helmet. Money and gold would be stolen from houses and jewelry stripped from the living – usually women – as well as the dead. Senior White Helmet figures enriched themselves, one in Douma buying cars and summer houses.
In the districts, they occupied the takfiris and the White Helmets shared office space. They took over schools and kindergartens. Under the threat of death, teachers in eastern Ghouta were told to send their students to religious schools. Students at the Gaza school in Aleppo were told to seek their education at the mosque.
The most heinous of White Helmet activities was the harvesting of body organs. Statements made to the Russian researchers indicated that organs were being removed in Turkey for transplantation into the bodies of wounded fighters and that the White Helmets and takfiri groups such as Ahrar al-Sham acted as an integrated team throughout the whole process.
The Russian researchers heard extensive prima facie evidence of the wounded being taken away for treatment by the White Helmets and being returned as corpses stripped of their body parts. A doctor in Aleppo gave evidence relating to a driver in Aleppo who weighed about 70 kgs when taken away and about 30-45 kgs when his corpse was returned. He had been cut from his throat to his stomach.
‘The skin almost touched his back,’ the doctor said. ‘I touched him with my hand and understood that there were clearly no organs left.’
In Aleppo the mother of a boy whose organs had been removed was only allowed to see his head and neck. An injured girl was taken to Turkey for ‘treatment’ and her body returned three days later with her internal organs missing. Even a person with a minor injury would be taken away and returned with the stomach cut open and the organs removed. It was understood, according to witnesses, that people taken away for medical treatment by the White Helmets often did not come back alive.
In July, 2018, 429 members of the White Helmets were smuggled out of Syria across the occupied Golan Heights and moved immediately to Jordan. The transfer was facilitated by the government of Israel which had armed the takfiris and given hospital care to their wounded since the beginning of the war. It had also helped and protected them by attacking Syrian military installations and now it was saving their White Helmet enablers from the retribution of the Syrian state and people.
From Jordan, the White Helmets were dispersed among the countries whose governments had supported them. They were quickly whisked away into a life of anonymity, supported by the British, European or American taxpayer. No one would know where they were or who they were so no critical questions could be asked. The truth was being buried with them.
This is a shocking story, of government criminality and media irresponsibility, of which the lies fed to the world about the White Helmets is only part.
The Russian report is a significant addition to the enormous body of prime facie evidence about the real nature of the White Helmets but as anything coming out of Russia is instantly dismissed as ‘fake news’ the corporate media already has a licensed reason to ignore this report.
The caravan of celebrities who moved quickly to capture some of the limelight created by the White Helmets, without asking any questions about what they were actually supporting, without caring as long as some of the spotlight fell on them, will move on in their narcissistic, feckless fashion.
The truth must have dawned on George Clooney by now. Certainly, it would be surprising to see him going ahead with his feature film on the White Helmets unless he intends to show what they were really like behind the lies he and many others swallowed. That’s the story that certainly needs to be told.

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian   
The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Blog!